The Incarnate Saviour

“This is the rest whemuith ye may cause the weary to rest, and this is the refreshing” —

“e taofe upon im tfjt form of n sctfaant.”

—Phil. ii. 7.

2rf)e Kncarnate
,^al]tour.

“The Word was made flesh, and dwelt (lit. tented) among us.” Yes, He, the true Heavenly Palm (if it be allowable for a moment to mix the metaphor) Himself came down amid the wilderness grove; He the Pilgrim of Pilgrims, in infinite condescension and love, pitched His tent in the midst of the human encampment 1 How comforting and consoling, our Divine Redeemer thus identifying Himself with our tried, tempted, woe-worn humanity! Moreover, that in stooping to assume our nature, He selected not the exalted condition, but linked Himself rather with poverty and distress and dependence, in order that the poorest and the humblest, the most wretched and forlorn, might catch balm-words of comfort from His lips, — the lips of Him who often had not where to lay His head.

Let us think of that lowly nature of His, thus embracing in its amplitude every class and every phase of being, even those who had hitherto been neglected and disowned. Rome was accustomed to deify the manly virtues alone —

Strength, courage, heroic endurance. Greece wreathed her chaplets around the brows of her intellectual heroes, — her poets and philosophers, her sculptors and painters. But the weak, the ignorant, the oppressed, had none to vindicate their cause till He came, who pronounced “Blessed,” — not the great, or rich, or powerful, or learned, — but the meek, the mourner, the poor in spirit, the persecuted, him that had no helper! Hence, groups composed of every diversity of character tracked His footsteps and hailed in Him a friend. Stern, strong men like Peter; intellectual, thoughtful men like Thomas; loving and meditative men like John. Penitence crept unabashed to His feet, and bathed them confidingly with tears. Sorrow came with sobbing heart and speechless emotion to be comforted. The poor came with their tale of long-endured misery. Infancy came stretching out its tiny arm, and smiled delighted in His embrace. While He rejoiced with them that rejoiced. He wept with them that wept. The fainting multitudes moved Him to compassion; the one suppliant in the crowd who touched His garment-hem, arrested His steps and evoked His mercy. Every weary, wandering bird, with drooping pinion, seemed to come and perch on the thick branches of this gracious Palm of Elim — this mighty Cedar of God. Beautifully has it been said: “In His heart Mercy may be said to have held her court: Holiness could dispense with an Ark and Tables to hold her laws; for in His life its enshrined glory was made so transparent, that even demons confessed Him to be the Holy One of God.”

Believer, you who perchance may be fainting under life’s burden and heat, come and anew take refuge in the contemplation of the perfect Manhood of the adorable Son of God! Delight often to think of Him as a partaker of your nature. Though He has been well described, “as the One only true and perfect flower which has ever unfolded itself out of the root and stalk of humanity,” yet it was a real — a veritable humanity. It is because they come welling from the depths of a Im/nan heart — because their music vibrates on a human lip — that the words are so unspeakably tender, “Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” Those who are thus buffeting the storm, exposed to the sirocco blast of the desert, battling with care, harassed with anxiety, prostrated with bereavement, stricken with conscious guilt, longing for safe rest and deliverance from earth’s sins and sorrows: — can understand the deep meaning of the central words in the importunate prayer of blind Bartimeus at the gate of Jericho — “Jesus, Thou Son of David (Thou Elder Brother), have mercy on me!” It will be from glorified human lips, too, the welcome will at last be given — “Come, ye blessed of My Father, inherit the Kingdom.”

“His the descent from everlasting bliss,

In manger born, to raise us up on high;
A woe-worn Pilgrim in earth’s wilderness,
Wedding our finite dust with Deity.

“Around His path no blazoned banners wave,
No jewelled diadem His brows adorned,
His cradle borrowed, and a borrowed grave,

Servant of servants, poor, despised, and scorned.

“Thus was He more than Brother unto all.

The poor, the. lost, the burdened, the oppressed; Not one excluded from the gracious call, ‘Come unto Me, ye weary, and have rest! ’

“Peace for the guilty, stung with conscious sin,

Peace for bereaved ones, wailing for their dead, Peace amid waves without and storms within, The troubled soothed, the mourner comforted.”

“IN ALL THINGS IT BEHOVED HIM TO BE MADE LIKE UNTO HIS

BRETHREN, THAT HE MIGHT BE A MERCIFUL AND

FAITHFUL HIGH PRIEST.”