What a different scene is now before us as we ascend the Mount of Olives with the Man of sorrows and His disciples. The Prince of this world driven away and worsted from the temptation in the wilderness, will now appear again, to try and draw through fear of death God’s faithful Son from the path that led to victory. Sorrowful, even unto death, amazed and very heavy was He, as He knelt and fell upon His face in prayer, and so great was His agony as He offered up His supplications with strong crying and tears, that His sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground. His disciples might sleep under the weight of their sorrow, but He continued agonizing, whilst still perfectly submissive to His Father’s will. Well might He suffer, and because of suffering pray, when thus bereft of earthly comforters, an angel only strengthening Him, while yet in perfect communion with His Father, Satan thrust upon Him all the fearful consequences of the position He had taken as the Lamb of God to take away the sin of the world. The martyrs, and still worse, the victim’s sufferings in utter separation from God, rose up before Him in all their fearful intensity, and hence the deep—and the more deep because of His absolute perfectness—exercises of soul He passed through. At length the conflict ceases, the cup is taken from the Father’s hand (John 18:1111Then said Jesus unto Peter, Put up thy sword into the sheath: the cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it? (John 18:11)), and held fast in faithfulness until the moment came to drain it to the bottom. What scenes of interest are these, and how worthy of our deepest study!
But Calvary, too, demands our notice as Jesus once more is seen the central figure of the landscape. Rejected of men, deserted by His disciples, yet in patient love He treads with unfaltering footsteps the lonely road that led to death and judgment. The tears of the sympathizing women; the indifference of the populace; the scorn of those in authority; the insulting conduct of the brutal soldiery, and the blasphemy of the unrepentant malefactor alike fail to move that One whose perfectness was only more distinctly visible as the pressure from without became the more intense against Him. In calm dependence on His God and Father, though feeling most intensely, and the more intensely because divinely, all that was against him, yet completely superior to it, He can tell the women of their danger; He can pour out His soul in intercession for His murderers; He can breathe words of comfort to the dying thief; He can think of His mother’s lonely heart, and entrust her to His loved disciple; and, then, God’s righteous judgment over, can commend His spirit to His Father’s care. Truly this, of all the mountain scenes we have glanced at, is one of deepest moment.
But once more the Mount of Olives, so often the blessed Lord’s resort while here, and witness to so many occasions of interest, comes before us, as the place whence He ascended to His present place of glory; and surely here, too, we may pause a little to note what passed at that eventful time. Again and again had He appeared to reassure the hearts of His faltering disciples during the forty days that intervened between His resurrection and His departure to His Father’s throne, and now the moment had come for Him to take His leave of them. Then, as ever, was His people’s cause His care. Assured they were that His absence should only pave the way for a far higher order of blessing than they had hitherto enjoyed. Henceforth the heavens should be opened to them, and the Holy Ghost should dwell within them, to fill their souls with Him whose person now garnished the heavenlies as He had before adorned the earth. Henceforth Messiah’s kingdom should, as to their thoughts, be merged in the far superior glory of the Son of man’s dominions, whilst they themselves should take their place as those, and we with them, who form a portion of the mystic man, the body of Christ, the Church of God, the bride. Surely, then, though His departure must cause a blank that His return alone could fill, there was in the measure of blessing accorded in exchange for what they had renounced, far more than enough to compensate for their apparent present loss. A cloud received Him out of their sight, but soon a present Holy Ghost becomes their Comforter and ours, and fills our souls with the unnumbered glories of the Son of God.
But one more mountain scene I propose to turn to. It is that unfolded. in Rev. 21:9-22:5, where the bride, the lamb’s wife, is seen descending in all her given glory as the Church of God. How beautiful she is, and what a contrast to that which bears her name at present. The title of affection is conferred upon her, and affection towards the One whose blood has cleansed her. Her name is Peace, as with heavenly features, and of God’s creation, she is seen descending. His glory is hers, and now no want of singleness of eye obscures her light, but inaccessible to evil, yet with ready welcome to those who can make good their right to enter, she is Christ’s epistle, known and read of all men; the display to heavenly principalities and powers of God’s manifold wisdom, while the center of God’s government of Israel. Man’s building now no more disfigures her, but God’s workmen’s labors have their place in her foundations, whilst divine proportions answer to divine admeasurement. Eternally glorious, the characteristic features of the new man (Eph. 4:2424And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. (Ephesians 4:24)) are seen in her ways and throughout her internal structure; whilst from her foundations to her gates the precious stones and pearls bear testimony to the fact that she is now God’s own reflection (comp. Ezek. 28, Ex. 28); and dear as ever to the heart of Christ (Matt. 13); and best of all, no temple now obscures the unveiled glory of creations, patriarchs, Israel’s God and our Jesus, but they are seen as our center, and at the same time light and glory. The Holy Spirit, too, is there, issuing forth, in unhindered streams of blessing, while the ever fresh productions of the tree of life take the thoughts away from man’s to God’s own paradise. Service will then be in blessed contrast to all our efforts now, while the Master’s presence, and His open recognition of them, and a share in His dominion will be the eternal portion of all whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life. How refreshing to turn away from the weakness and failure everywhere around to such a scene as this, and answer as the Bridegroom tells us, “Surely I come quickly”— “Amen, even so; come, Lord Jesus.”
D. T. G.