The mind of the Lord carries altogether here the impression of a closing scene, and Christianity is come into the world with this, and has never lost it. It received it in the world by the death of Christ. Yet, while the purpose of it was in His mind, only inducing the energy of action on the mass around Him, so for His followers He felt too how few with the energy the emergency called for were the laborers in such a field. What a lesson from the Lord thus going away! All this part of this book is deeply interesting in its practical power as resting on the rejection of Jesus, and His consciousness of this and the character this stamped on His lot, and those with Him. No hanging of hands, no flagging of love-blessed be His Name! The evil around Him but drew forth the energy of His love by its need. He came to work in love. The sorrowful state around Him, shown in His rejection, was occasion of more earnest service. His record was on high, and, indeed, how fruitful was the harvest though it was not to Him here! May we, I scarce dare to say may I, so walk! How blessedly high is the Savior above us, yet how near to us! And everything in this our joy, even when we are so short of it surely! At least it is my food and my solace thus to hold communion with Him, to know His ways, to follow His steps, to know Himself and hold communion with Himself in them all. Most blessed Lord! Still, though a closing message of mercy, it was a closing message. The character too of the service is marked in connection with His now manifest rejection. It is not sending to His loved Israel, but: " Go ye, behold I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves." Nothing could be more marked than this. There was conscious rejection, but asserted and maintained authority with judgment on those who refused it in those sent by Him.
In this chapter both the present service of Christ, conclusive as to Israel as then before God, and the entirely new thing, both morally and in the Person of Christ, and in grace, is very distinctly brought out. The seventy are sent out with definite judgment resting on those who reject them. It was rejecting Christ, and rejecting Him who sent Him; and He pronounces final woe on the cities where He had wrought. But the seventy were to rejoice, not in the power they had even from Christ then, which prevailed over the power of Satan there-a power which marked to Christ's foreseeing eye the total destruction of his power, and which would be conferred on them even then, so that all his power, while it did exist, could not hurt them. It was not in this they were to rejoice, but that their own names were written in heaven. It was their heavenly portion which was their true joy; in verse 21, this is referred to the good pleasure and sovereign grace of the Father, but connected with the given glory of Christ associated with the unfathomable and divine glory of His Person, and the revelation of the Father by Him to others. Yet they were then enjoying what prophets and kings had desired to see and had not seen, and, indeed, though the full heavenly blessing was not come, there was the revelation of the Father by the Son. Finally, the essence of the Law in man, as regards God and man, is brought out in answer to the lawyer, as the way of life if man kept it, but on the shrinking of the conscience from the test by a subterfuge, another principle is brought out-our acting in grace according to the pattern of Christ who has manifested that grace on earth to be, not to have, a neighbor.
In this and the following chapter we are still on the rejection of Israel, but it takes not a dispensational but a moral and individual character-the word of God valued and received, prayer, and the gift of the Holy Ghost. This moral operation is as yet viewed as within Israel in the Remnant, the disciples, but as not to be confined to it. The light thus lighted up was to shine up. First, Mary has the good part, the word-not the world even to receive Christ. Next, prayer as then taught, but the millennial parts left out, and its general moral demands retained, further the value and power of it, and the promise of the Spirit as a result. Then the chapter turns to the kingdom being come and blasphemously rejected, but the question was finally at issue in the Person of Christ, and the state of the Jews depicted, but left in its moral application to man. But there was more blessing in hearing His word than in any natural nearness to Him. Jonas himself is then given as a sign not of death and resurrection, but by his preaching in Nineveh. The light set up in Christ was for all that came in to see, but then the moral state of the individual was tested by it-the eye might be single or evil. On the one hand, as with the Pharisees and many now, the light was darkness, but where the light was received it was absolute light, not only light was there, but, received, it lightened everything, no part was dark. Then the Pharisees, cleaners of the outside not the in, and covetous are denounced as are the lawyers. There is a present application of the great principles spoken of. Chapter 12 continues the same subject, only showing the principles which are to govern the discipular Remnant in the testimony they are to give, and the result on Christ's return, and then from verse 49 to the end, the present state of the case as to Himself, and between Himself and Israel, and their judgment.
-1-16. This gives the character of the ministry itself, and its consequences; but, verses 17-42, there is something higher than the ministry of, i.e., the glory, character, and spirit of reception of the kingdom of which it was the harbinger; this introduced in verses 17 to 21, on the consideration of the object of the work on the return of the seventy. The real truth of its glory, and the as yet hidden mystery of godliness (yet not to faith altogether) and the manner of its revelation, verses 22-24. But in truth being such, its life flowed down from and reflected that which revealed it, or which it was, God manifest in the flesh, and thus we find its moral character drawn out (vv. 25-37) the title which it gave, being a supreme revelation of God restoring all things, to absolute and soul claiming attention, and that God recognized and approved this attention to it. ' Ye are idle,' having no claim upon faith, but that God in Christ claimed all, and that it was a good choice, because the old world, and all its formal duties had lost their power and were, in truth, of unbelief and rejected, not of that world to come whereof it spake, verses 38-42.
-3. I suppose the " I " (ego) has force here. At any rate " I send you " is the great basis. The Lord knew what He was doing when He was sending them; He knew it was "As sheep in the midst of wolves." Their knowing He knew this disarmed it if they felt the force of that " I." It was not merely: Ye will be, but " I send you as," etc. It was a supreme commission.
-7. Experience assures me that there are the deepest laid principles of abstraction from the world in all this, which nothing but the fullness of the former part would carry through, or the gift of grace suited to such office.
-9, et seq. These are displays of judicial and providential dealing, but the whole course of events is not a present display, nor are the circumstances of the display the ultimate result. The moral trial of individuals is quite distinct from display of character in judicial conduct in dispensations. If Tire had such it would have repented, but Tire had not; such were given to those who never repented by them at all. This is a question of judgment and display, not of individual salvation. Still the Lord asserts His supremacy in them. But responsibility for ultimate judgment is connected with the presentation of the means, or their absence, which are the occasion of judgment inflicted for instruction of others (see verse 14), i.e., had Tire repented it would have been as Nineveh, spared in judicial government as a city, not the souls saved necessarily thereby. But this was not the suitable order of the divine government. But when the miracles and testimony of the Lord were presented, it became personal sin, their rejection, and thus the responsibility to be met " in that day " incomparably greater, though Tire and Sidon may be under condemnation as sinners. Thus, while perfection of righteous wisdom will be displayed at the end, the all-important principle of supremacy, divine supremacy, is maintained by the way, and yet signal instances, as He sees fit, given of the just righteousness and indignation against evil, of the character of Him who is supreme, so as to instruct and act morally on men. This is a most important instruction. The mind of man is narrow and knows not how to bring these things together, but supremacy in wisdom does. Man must act finally in justice, if he acts at all, but God has reserved " that day " for the display of His judgment on individual conduct against Himself, and individual righteousness. But He has exercised a providential government, and given multiplied displays here of a patience marvelous to behold, and a righteousness never acted against with impunity, though the time of judgment be His own. The Church can apply within its sphere, partially without it as knowing all things, the ground and ordering of this judgment- without, it assumes to man the form of providence by no means without witness in conscience, when that is not hardened, but having no settled rule to them because of the blindness of their hearts. Of either within or without Satan serves himself to assume the dispensation of it to the one, and to cloud the love of God to the other, alike false in his ways in both. Judgment may come both here and hereafter, and one be significative of the other; so Capernaum is denounced. The whole is a high scene of the supreme judgment of God, and dignity of Christ breaking forth in it, though in the form of a Servant, for, note, though able He never exercised it here, but told those who would: " Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of," for He came in the Spirit of loving gracious service and Himself never went out of it. But He, as we have said, could not be hid. And note, Christ in His glory and rejection bringing in the whole moral display of God's nature, and the grounds of judgment, enables the Church taught and fully apprehensive of this by the Holy Ghost, to apprehend the whole of this. The Lord thus instructing them, for it is interested in all His glory, whether a full moral test of the heart as a sign spoken against, or judging Tire and exercising providential government because of its pride, Christ is the Interpreter as the Center of it all, and we have the mind of Christ; our attainments in this are another question. The nations too are all guilty, so that He can exercise judgment on them all. The specialties of His government, His giving them times of humbling so as to spare, and enable Him righteously to exercise it are all matters of grace. His own nation is the great example and public center of this government. The Lord give such humiliation to foolish nations for their mercy and good, for He is gracious! And it may be He has a people among them, wherefore they should be spared a little.
We are to observe here He extends His government, on Israel's rejection of Him, over the heathen nations, and those of the land even before Israel. It so happens here that they are within the bounds, but it is a matter of principle, and Tire and Sodom just represent the commercial human pride and natural wickedness of man. But all was centered now in: " He that rejects me." This was the point of evil, all hinged on owning or rejecting Jesus in His messengers, for all manifest authority and divine beauty was in Him, in Man.
We may remark as to the whole of this commission that it is one clothed with the authority of the Lawgiver and Prophet of the Jewish people, to whom whosoever should not hearken was to be cut off from among His people. He sends them out with a final claim (in mercy) on the attention and acceptance of His people, secures authoritatively their provision, sanctions their message by the works He enables them to do, and announces that whoever receives them receives Him, they preceding Him as heralds making plain the way for Him, He following, for if He went up to suffer it was to be received up into glory really. He went up with divine will, divine glory and divinely exercised power, power which as divine He could commit authoritatively to others, and evince the riches of the grace in which He gave Himself. By the glory and dignity which was in Him so going up to give Himself up the divine glory proved, as we have often seen, in proportion as He was rejected in His mission as Messiah, the glory and dignity of His Person. His divine glory broke forth, content to be received as Messiah in a certain sense, rejected in that, " He could not be hid." The whole of this savors of authority-a final message-if you will not receive it " We shake off the dust of our feet, but," nothing less " be sure of this, the kingdom of God is come nigh to you." It was the present manifestation and acting in the kingdom of God as a final witness in mercy, in the dignity of mission as a last thing, not merely the patience of service. Hence moreover it was a separating work. It was who receives it-well; woe to him who does not. It would practically separate the sons of peace.
There is something very peculiar in the character of this mission, and altogether most blessedly suited to the dignity, grace and authority of the blessed Lord. How far in vindication of that authority it may be used in principle is clearly a matter of special judgment, and it is only in special cases that it has its application at all where for the securing of Christ's glory and authority we may be found (and vindicating it for the preservation of the feeble against the rejection of the hostile) to act on a principle of, in testimony, judicial separation. The judgment on cities is clearly Israelitish, and of the character of divine government, not ministerial service, and this characterizes the whole. He acts en roi (like a King) with His people, though patient grace may have characterized the action, and what brought Him there. On some, the scene of His labors which He was now leaving, He pronounces sentence Himself, thus showing His title, power and righteous judgment now in declaring the distinctive judgment of these different places. Divine knowledge, competency, and title, the announcement of the judgment of God, of His knowledge before the time arrives, and yet all this done as a Servant! It is wonderful to see the divine Person of the Lord thus brought into the place of humanity, and yet seen in it. It stands alone, the one great Object for eternity when God even is all in all. Note, too, it is not at the beginning of His course the Lord says: " Woe " ever; it is the result of rejecting evil. The Lord also authoritatively closes the door on them in saying (a strong encouragement to them among " the wolves ") " He that despiseth you despiseth me, and he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me."
It is, as I have said, a supreme commission; would this in any sort apply to the Gentiles? " When I sent you forth," etc. " But now I say unto you." " While I was with them in the world," in this Christ was not indeed outwardly showing or using the power which He had as Lord over all, though He left them to go " As lambs in the midst of wolves." It was a partial exercise of it. He had not put Himself into the trial of the crucifying in weakness yet, where He could indeed have prayed, but " How then," etc. Therefore also it was among Jews, not in the world. But the Spirit witnessing in the world is a Witness and not a Governor, i.e., Christ, as in Spirit in the world. He may control providences to the end, and make " All things work together," etc., but it is a different thing from the presence of His Person in the world-this the world has turned out, and the Spirit is a Witness of the Savior in heaven. Therefore all things, save grace in the heart of His, are as though there were no Christ save to him; he must be " All things to all men " in the activity and independence of the Spirit, if by any means he might save some, and " Know how to be full and to be hungry," to, carry a purse and be without one, and do all things through Christ strengthening him. I have noticed that I do not think miracles so properly belong to Gentiles, i.e., to the system; they are the witness of God upon earth. But this was not the cause of rejoicing, but that in which the (Gentile) Church fully participated, their names written in heaven.
The exercise of this power fully verified the position of authority and grace from which it emanated; the devils were subject to the disciples through His Name. The Lord recognized, with the clearest sense of joyful power, the principle of power thus exercised by them. He saw prospectively-not His reception as Messiah simply now, but the secret cause of all His rejection broken, and man's deliverance wrought- Satan fall from heaven like lightning, the consequence of rejected power and mercy breaking forth in its higher sphere of exercise in the power in which He, Jesus the Lord, could delegate it to these simple ones. He sees the whole perspective display of this power; he who in heaven wrought the mischief, and rejection on the earth, fell before the display of power and the exercise of the dignity of that place into which He, Jesus, was cast by that rejection. The Lord breaks forth, as it were, for the comfort of the disciples, in the consciousness of this- comforting them, we may say, with the comfort wherewith He Himself was comforted of God-still here emptied in that the display of the power was through others, strengthening them in their faith on His rejection in the lower or Messiah sphere of His power and glory, in which He was to be rejected and crucified. He tells them strengthened by this experience that He will give them authority over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall wrong them. How completely we see here Jesus the Source of full power over, and setting aside all the power of Satan over the world, as in the heavens! This was true and blessed. It will be just the full blessing of the millennium, the full ample display of this, for he will be bound in the bottomless pit, and the world blessed by his exclusion from the heavens-they not to be regained. And this would be, in title and comfort to them, displayed in the disciples. But He carries their minds higher to where His heart-Blessed be His Name!-was above it all, and where He would carry in His rest of love theirs with Him, a place of rest and of holiness, a place of acceptance and favor, where it was not question of superiority over evil but enjoyment of good-the place of His Father's delight, where holiness and joy unhindered and unsullied had their dwelling place, heir fullness and their home. There His heart was, whatever His service, and there He would carry theirs. And surely the Church's greatest joy and delight is not even dominion over a world restored from Satan's destructive and corrupting dominion, and being the instrument of blessing to it-most blessed as that is, for it is being given to participate in the exercise and administration of Christ's love, still less in the exercise of power over evil which is here the point-but in the delight in the Father's love, infinitely blessed as to Jesus Himself, and in Jesus' love full of the devoted tenderness in which He has brought us to Himself, for we are of God, in the highest heavenly sense partakers of the divine nature, children of the Father, the spouse of Christ, our communion even now with the Father and with Him. And all this higher than, as indeed the blessed source of our participation in the dominion of blessedness which He the holy, just, and mighty One exercises over the world. This is the display to others of the certainty of what we enjoy there; see John 17, " That the world may know." Holiness and love any way, and the Father's delight in us are more than the exercise of power. But note the unalterable perfection of Christ our blessed Lord.
The power was in the title of Christ's Person. The full display of it was before Him in that word: " I beheld Satan like lightning fall "; but there was a joy in eternal favor more than in the exercise of power. The Lord then proceeds to His own joy in the righteous economy of grace, righteous because the vindication and the justification of the divine glory. While He pointed them to that higher and better joy which in divine grace is theirs, He rejoices in Spirit that these things, even the full exercise of beneficent power in His Person, from the Lord of heaven and earth, are hidden from the pride and haughtiness of human reason and understanding, and revealed in grace to babes, the witness of sovereign grace to them, the source and subject of joy and boundless thankfulness. So it seemed good in His sight. We still remark here the blessed Lord maintaining the place of Servant, but the revelation therein, and that He might effectuate sovereign beneficence, He addresses: " Father " as " Lord of heaven and earth." Thus withal extending the sphere of this blessing to be accomplished in the casting down of Satan, He thanking the Father for what seemed good in His sight, while the blessed character of the way of it was felt and enjoyed by Jesus as the blessing and joy of His little ones, as well as the sovereign pleasure of Him who sent Him, the double joy of the Son a Servant in His house. But in very deed the glory of His Person was just maintained by this. Was He rejected by the Jews, guilty as they were in it-yet the truth was,-it was that the glory of His Person as the divine Son was such that none could understand Him but the Father. And by virtue of His union with the Father, still the glory of His Person, none but He could know the Father, and he to whom He, the Son, should reveal Him; and this last was just His gracious, blessed service with the disciples. Messiah they ought to have received, but indeed the Son none knew, and the Son He really was. Then looking at this second sphere, the revelation of the Father, who they said was their God, none knew Him but He, and He alone thereon could, as He did, reveal Him to the little ones. The passing of the heart of Christ, on His rejection, over the whole scene of His portion with the little ones and with the Father, to His glory as to the place Christ took, but really revealing the excellency and glory of His Person and place, is of the deepest and, to us, most blessed interest. How are we let by this infinite grace of the Holy Spirit into the workings of His heart! And what a place to be admitted to towards His little ones before the Father, and Himself the humbled Center of the whole display! It is most blessed. Who is like or can be compared with Him who is our Joy, and Excellency, and Crown?
The Lord having passed from the exercise of power to their place in heaven as the more blessed part, and His Spirit having gone through the whole scene of what formed the basis of the gospel revelation-future blessedness, the breaking forth of His Person and glory on the Jewish rejection-returns in quiet care for His little ones, the poor of the flock. " Turning to his disciples privately he said, Blessed are the eyes that see the things that ye see," i.e., the intelligent perception of Messiah's power thus revealed, for indeed it involved all the rest over which His Spirit had passed in prospect; but He brings them back in joy to the present object of their faith (whatever the result in His mind) for this actual manifestation of Messiah had been the object of longing desire to many a prophet and king who had passed from the scene below without the accomplishment of their ardent wish, blessed, honored, as they were, but not as these. Such is the effect on the soul on well-understood rejection! It is but the breaking down of what hinders the full development of the glory of the counsel of God, and in us would hinder the enjoyment of it, the tearful entrance into the spirit and glory of another world.
-21. " In spirit " (to pneumati) as a Man. In all this Christ is speaking in His prophetic spirit as a Man, rather as the Son subject than Christ governing, and accordingly immediately afterward He says: " All things are delivered to me," etc. Is not therefore as a witness to man of principle Christ more excellent in this subjection, though the glory be due? It is in this the perfection of righteousness, and moral truth of the great principles of eternal life and relationship were shown.
-23, 24. " Those things "; what things? Is it not evident that the hope of Christ upon earth was the first object of prophets and kings? What more could they look for? It is hardly necessary to remark that this is no question of how a man is to be saved.
-25. This is the state and condition suitable to the direct kingdom and administration of Christ; one of principle, too, not of party, as under Him. Meanwhile it is exercised on principle in respect of evil, in mercy. The Lord well knew how to draw the conduct suited to His kingdom and ministry.
So, connected with verse 24, the connection is thus: the great character in which Christ was manifested as Christ, " All things are delivered to me of my Father " (it was not seeing the miracles, but the Person, the power from which the miracles flowed, for the miracles they did, and were bid not to rejoice in that, and the world saw-it was this taken in all together, the conference of power in Christ and the saving of the people-it was indeed to man singular, but rejoicing to Christ that the revelation of it was to the poor and simple, it was well pleasing to the Father) and this as connected with the revelation of the Father-and of this He says: " Blessed are the eyes," etc.; compare John 1:1414And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth. (John 1:14), and Matt. 13:1111He answered and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given. (Matthew 13:11), et seq., and observe the places they come from. Then compare the case of Thomas and 1 Peter 1:88Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: (1 Peter 1:8). Then come the great principles of the state which Christ dispensatorily establishes- the restitution of all things, " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God," etc. The everlasting principles of God's character, as exhibited in relationship to Him now, as we have seen, the joy and what was our portion meanwhile while we wait for it, so as these are their principles on the perfectness of God's character, so is it manifested in the midst of evil by showing mercy on them that hate us, as John 1:1616And of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace. (John 1:16).
The Lord returns on the circumstances, as we have seen, denoting the breaking up of the dispensation and passage into another, into the moral principles and relationship which the law contained, and, sanctioning the great eternal principles contained in it, as the form and unchangeable character of eternal life in its perfection and nature, the love of God and one's neighbor-on the self-justifying inquiry of a bad conscience, breaks down the whole narrowness of fleshly exaltation by the law, and introduces the principle and display of sovereign goodness manifested in Man on the evident failure of all that was right and gracious in those who had the privileges the law externally attached as a form or dispensation, and presents a Samaritan as an example unanswerably to a lawyer. In a word, while sanctioning the eternal principle of truth between God and the creature in righteousness-the kernel hidden in the law-breaks down the form which ministered to human pride by the exhibition of what was, beyond controversy, intrinsically goodness in a stranger in contrast with the heartlessness of formal privilege. Nothing could be more clear, more definite in its purpose, or more conclusive than this of the Lord, and yet it broke up (with the sanction of its contained righteousness) the whole form and principle of the law, but by bringing in God in goodness where man had failed in righteousness, bringing in Substance instead of form. So the power of the Holy Ghost always does. " The kingdom of God is not in word but in power," and the Spirit of love characterizes its ways, for God who is Love is revealed in it, and He does not wait for goodness on the pride of men's forms. How blessed when God is thus brought in! And how perfect in His ordering of all things! The way of righteousness fully preserved, the pride of distinctive circumstance completely laid low before the true goodness of God!
-27. Some are apt to take the second member of the great commandment as though it was a measure of the extent to which love to our neighbor was to go, and that we need not love him better, but if we thus weigh the obligation we shall be apt to lose the very principle wholly, and in essence, which we seek thus to limit to make self-love the judge of how far we are to go in kindness to our neighbor, instead of a holy urgency by which another is identified (not contrasted in obligation) in interest with oneself in unity of love. But it seems to me, though it be a simple practical direction, yet it teaches us the moral measure of love towards man or our neighbor, while it gives a regulating principle when we love God. It is unlimited in its nature. The object is infinite, the debt is infinite. It is an entire devotedness fluent in obligation, which in duty takes its measure from the nature and essential supremacy of God, and His claim over us from His being our God and all in all, which none can express, but the believer alone can apprehend. Whereas thus to love man would be so far from excellent that it would be idolatry. Man is to be loved as man, yet with a perfect love according to its nature, such as every man must bear to himself, and when love exists it identifies our neighbor not in necessity but in unity of interest with ourselves, and we seek his good with a perfect heart. But it is in its nature essentially different from love to God, in that God is so from man, and every affection follows the nature, and, if a holy affection, is perfectly and precisely suitable to the nature and character of the object of it. We may remark the facility of our Lord's transition from the summit, as it were, and fullness of contemplation and, so to speak, divine philosophical enunciation of truth, to the practical dealing with the lawyer's reluctant conscience. It was one thing to Him.
-38. That these are the general moral instructions of Jesus is manifest. The general division begins when the seventy returned.
-38-42. The different reception of Christ by one given to choose Him and the word by Him as their part, and one who receives Him indeed to the saving of their soul, being renewed as to evil and alienation from God, but not as to be lost to the world and brought away into the new kingdom (in a measure everlasting kingdom) from self, is here strongly marked. And how deeply, and how perfectly shown! Yet Martha was a believer, and loved the Lord.
We have here the distinctive privilege of the saint. Jesus, separated from all here into which, in gracious fulfillment of the ancient promises of God, He had thrown Himself, leads the way in sanction to undivided attention to the interests of the heavenly kingdom; no attention to Himself in the flesh could replace this. There was the necessity of death and life, and life cheered with the blessedness of the favor of grace into which it passed, but with the urgency of a rejection to death, and therefore sentence of death passed on all that was of man, and that by His death who should have been the power of it. And the whole of man was now to give attention to His words which flowed from life and source of life which was beyond all that death could touch, and above all, and yet now in His Person guided through all. The hearing of Jesus' words was everything. What unselfish disregard of self in the accomplishment of blessing is manifested in the Lord! The one thing needful is to hear Jesus. All these " many things " ended in death. It was care and trouble, not what led into life eternal, for so Jesus' words did-words issuing from a heart broken that it might let forth the stream of eternal life.
We have the word of Christ as the way of blessing. Mary acted according to the exhortation to the disciples: " Hear him." In chapter 11: 1-13, the Holy Spirit to be given, and the power of prayer. That is, we have the Word, prayer, and the Holy Ghost, our ear open to God and assurance that God's ear is open to us. Earnest importunity on one side, and sure goodness on the other; both as to hearing and prayer earnest purpose of heart. After verse 13, it is His pleading with the Jews as to their state, ending in judgment, to the end of the chapter; only the moral state, and the doctrine which has influence within, settles the question of our reception of the truth. In chapter 12: 1-12, the grounds of service for the disciples in the midst of the wickedness and opposition around them. In what follows, the same subject as regards the temporal part of it, and their waiting for Him; thus the Church's losing her true character by saying: " My Lord delayeth his coming," to verse 48. Then the then present state of things, though division and opposition would not cease with that, only that with Christ's death the straitening of the outflowing of His love would pass away. On the whole, all is a pleading in respect of His rejection, with the path of His disciples in it, and the result for Israel. In chapter 13, Israel and flesh in Israel is rejected forever-is a barren fig tree. The unrepentant in Israel would be violently destroyed. He convicts them of hypocrisy, justifying the workings of His own grace, shows the nature of the coming kingdom through His rejection. Soon the door would be shut, though He should walk to-day and to-morrow, all the due time. Then Jerusalem should do its accustomed work of rejecting prophets, and its house, with the mourning voice of Christ the Jehovah that would have gathered her children, is left desolate. Chapter 14 carries on the same subject, the moral ground of breach with Israel, and the introduction of the new order of things by grace.
A little more detail here as to Luke. After introducing the word and prayer as the standing ground of His own then (and ever) we get the utter rejection by ascribing His power to Beelzebub, whereas God's kingdom was come amongst them. The strong man and Stronger were there. He not with Christ was against Him. Hearing the word of God took the place of connection of Christ with Israel after the flesh. He pronounces His judgment on them. But the light was lighted up not to be hid; the moral state, singleness of eye, however, was the way of receiving-the fruit complete light. Then the Pharisees and lawyers judged, and specially by their treatment of prophets and apostles who would test their willingness to receive the word. This leads to urgent pressing testimony on His disciples; they were to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees. All would come out to light. They must be faithful. The next motive was, if they found hostility they were to fear not those who could kill the body and do no more, but Him who could after death cast into hell. Next, they were precious to God, their hairs counted. Next, him that confessed Christ before men He would confess before the angels. Next, they would have the Holy Ghost, so that he that treated that with outrage would be worse than he who outraged the Son of man. But it was He who would speak in them. In what follows the Lord shows indeed the folly of having a portion in this world, and disclaims its government or ordering, but mainly expatiates on the spirit in which His disciples should walk through it. First, God would have care of them, they could not take care of themselves. The nations who do not know God seek after them; their heavenly Father knew they had need of them. They were to seek the kingdom of God, and these would be added. Far more than that was in the Father's thoughts—they were to have the Kingdom. They were to have their treasure in heaven, and their heart would be there. Next, they were to wait for Christ with loins girded and lights burning; in heaven they would sit down and be at ease. They were to be ready for His return, the faithful servant would be ruler over all God's goods. The mark of faithfulness would be always expecting Him, and not go on with assumption and worldliness while He was away. The Church position is shown, and greater judgment on it than on heathen. Christ was come to send fire on the earth by that testimony, and His very presence, though in peace and grace, had kindled it. But till His death was accomplished, love, perfect in Him, was shut up as it were, could not freely flow forth to a sinful world. Though His presence kindled a fire, He must die to let out love abroad. Still from that out divisions through Him would come. Yet the Jews ought to have discerned the signs of the times, and even morally of themselves seen what was right. The aphorism of the man with his adversary going to the judge is used as to their state. They must all repent or perish by a present destruction. Israel was on its last trial, digged about and dunged, and, if it did not bear fruit, would be cut down. Such is the end of human nature!