Now let us apply these definitions to the personality of Jesus.
Granted that the devotion of Christians has been right in recognising
in Him the one perfect human life, that is, the one life which
consistently and from first to last was lived in terms of the whole,
what are we to call it except divine? In a sense, of course,
everything that exists is divine, because the whole universe is an
expression of the being of God. But it can hardly be seriously
contended that a crocodile is as much an expression of God as General
Booth. It is wise and right, therefore, to restrict the word "divine"
to the kind of consciousness which knows itself to be, and rejoices to
be, the expression of a love which is a consistent self-giving to the
universal life. "God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in
God and God in him." General Booth is divine in so far as this is the
governing principle of his life. Jesus was divine simply and solely
because His life was never governed by any other principle. We do not
need to talk of two natures in Him, or to think of a mysterious
dividing line on one side of which He was human and on the other
divine. In Him humanity was divinity and divinity, humanity. Does
anyone think that this brings Jesus down to our level? Assuredly it
does not; we are far too prone to be ruled by names. To the ordinary
Christian this explanation of the divinity of Jesus may seem equivalent
to the denial of His uniqueness, but it is nothing of the kind. I have
already devoted some little space to emphasising the obvious fact that
it is impossible to deny the uniqueness of Jesus; history has settled
that question for us. If all the theologians and materialists put
together were to set to work to-morrow to try to show that Jesus was
just like other people, they would not succeed, for the civilised world
has already made up its mind on that point, and by a right instinct
recognises Jesus as the unique standard of human excellence. But this
is not to say that we shall never reach that standard too; quite the
contrary. We must reach it in order to fulfil our destiny and to crown
and complete His work. To stop short of manifesting the perfect love
of God would be to fail of the object for which we are here and to
render the advent of Jesus useless. Christendom already knows this
perfectly well, although it has not always succeeded in expressing it
with perfect clearness. "Beloved, now are we sons of God, and it doth
not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when He (or rather
it) shall appear, we shall be like Him." In our practical religion we
all, even the most reactionary of us, regard the divinity of Jesus just
in this way. It has no other value. We talk of imitating Him,
conforming to His likeness, showing His spirit, and so on. When we
want a model for courage, fidelity, gentleness, humility,
unselfishness, we promptly turn to Jesus. Even in our relations with
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