How Was Jesus to Realise His Mission?

The aspect of Jesus in the great gallery is one of deep thought. We are apt to figure it as one of pure pathos or of tragic sentiment. It is a mistake so to fancy it. The Portrait of Jesus has for its deepest expression a weight of thoughtful care. It could not be otherwise. He has arrived at a momentous resolve. He has determined to make the Messianic experiment. Does the word ‘experiment’ offend you? Do you remind me that His life was all along decreed by Heaven? Doubtless; but Heaven allowed Him to grow into the nowledge of that decree. He was the chosen One of God; but He was chosen within the veil; no whisper of the choice transpired. The thought broke upon Him from within His own heart —

broke upon Him as a problem, as a possibility, 40

as a thing to be tried. And therefore it broke upon Him as a care. His human consciousness was not behind the scenes to read the counsels of the Eternal. If Job had known the prologue to his own book, it would have spoiled the drama; for it would have removed the sense of personal responsibility to tell him that the result was decreed in heaven. Even so with Jesus. His life was doubtless arranged in a prologue, but the prologue was concealed. He was left to work out the problem for Himself — to think of it, to dream of it. Therefore it came to Him as a care, an anxiety. He was to follow where God led; but that involved the search for an open door. Where was He to begin? What was the nearest way? Was it His duty to select the nearest way? He was not seeking His own glory, but God’s glory; what was the shortest path to the glory of God?

And now, as Jesus stands upon the threshold of His mission, let us stand beside Him. Let us try to look at the scene with His eyes — to see it as it floated before Him in that old world,

Three possible roads are before Him — three possible ways in which He may try to realise His mission. Looking back in an after-time, He called them ways of temptation; but they did not present themselves in that light then. Indeed, the main attraction of each of them is just its seeming Godwardness — its conformity to the Jewish Scriptures. What are these roads? If I were allowed to express myself in a single phrase I should call them respectively, the Democratic Way, the Imperial Way, and the Ecclesiastical Way; and, with the third Evangelist, I see them presented in this order, Let us look at each in turn.

First there comes to Him a cry from the people, ‘If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread.’ He says to His inner self: ‘What better proof of Messiahship could there be than to offer myself as a physical reformer! Are not the multitude crying for bread in the wilderness and finding nothing but stones! Why not try to transform the wilderness — to make the stones bread! Would not this be a service to my Father!

Does not my Father love to be called the helper of the poor! Is not this path of social amelioration a direct, a very near avenue to the Messianic goal!’

But then from within the soul of Jesus there comes another voice, and it speaks in contradiction to the first. It says: ‘Would this be an adequate service to your Father? Is the relation of your Father to the world simply that of breadgiver? Does man live by bread alone? does man live by bread mainly? Is it not the wish of your Father to be loved for Himself, to be reverenced for His holiness? There are deeper needs in the heart of humanity than the want of bread; there are deeper joys in the heart of the Father than the satzsfaction of the want of bread. You cannot give the Father a partial offering. The shortness of the avenue may be tempting, but it falls short in perfection also. It is too meagre, too inadequate a goal. Not by ¢hzs road can you establish the kingdom of God.’

And so, this first vision fades from the sight of Jesus. Presently there rises another. A second road opens before Him; a new possibility appears. The dream of democracy has given place to the dream of imperialism. Before Him floats in fancy the kingdoms of the world ‘and the glory of them; and a voice says, ‘If you are the Messiah, they are yours.’ Would it not be possible to serve the Father by establishing a kingdom of outward force? Would it not be a shorter way to the goal than the purely inward path? Why not begin as a literal king? Why not approach the people as Moses approached them — from the mount — enacting a law of righteousness, and enforcing obedience to the Divine commands?

Was there ground for such a hope on the part of Jesus? He Himself declares that there was. Looking back to this moment from an after-day, and in the light of calm reflection, He says, ‘Think ye that I cannot now pray to my Father, and He shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels?’ I think He had in His mind the Roman legions, Nor am I sure that the throne of the Czsars would have been unfriendly to the establishment in

Judea of a reign of Messianic righteousness. Judea had given such trouble to the Empire that Rome might well have hailed the appointment of a peaceful king. But she would have hailed it only on one condition — that the Messianic king should in temporal things be the vassal of Cesar.

Will Jesus accept that condition? Looking at the suggestion afterwards, it seemed to Him nothing less than a solicitation of Satan to worship him. But for the present the import of that suggestion appears divine. Was it not a quick way to holiness ? — are not men swayed from the mountains rather than from the valleys! Were not the Gentiles to come to the Messiah’s light, and kings to the brightness of His rising? Why not throw Himself into the political arena? Why not utilise Cesar for the glory of God?

And then another voice speaks within Him: ‘Would ¢dzs be using Cesar for the glory of God? Would it not be subordinating God to Cesar? Why speak of being a vassal in temporal things? Is there anything temporal?

Is not the earth the Lord’s, and the fulness thereof? Shall the kingdom of God on earth pay tribute toa power which is zo¢ the kingdom of God? Should not Rome be a vassal of the Messiah rather than the Messiah a vassal of Rome? Is not the man of the spirit entitled to rule all things? You cannot give Cesar the reverence of the body, and God the reverence of the soul; for the mandate to all ages is this, “Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve.”’

And so the second vision fades from the eyes of Jesus. The political road cannot, any more than the social road, be the way to the glory of the Father. By and by there opens a third vision, distinct from either of these. It is a road neither through the people nor through the empire, but through the priesthood. Could the favour of the Father not be won by a great sacrifice? Jesus stands in imagination on the pinnacle of the temple, and feels Himself to be the Priest of the Most High. He sees in fancy the crowds below, eager for a divine manifestation. He says to Himself: ‘If I could really place myself in this position, might I not ata bound achieve the Messianic goal? If 1 were to stand as the High Priest of the Father on the pinnacle of the temple, might I not say to the crowd below, “Iam about to make a sacrifice for you all, Iam about to cast myself down from this pinacle, to throw myself unreservedly into the arms of the Father. If He will, He can save me. Let my fate this day be the sign whether He does or does not accept me as His Messiah. I peril my case upon the issue. Be ye the judges of my election to be the Expiation for the sins of the world”?’ Then to the soul of Jesus there comes another, an inner voice; and it speaks in answer to the first. It says: ‘This act of devotion will not do. It would be an attempt to test your own power of sacrifice. True sacrifice must be unconscious of itself, must deny its own existence. Love never measures the height from which it leaps; it undervalues that height. It does not feel that it has done a great thing, a test thing. This that you would offer is but a priestly offering after all — a sacrifice conscious of its costliness, a gift presented as a proof of being holy.’

So, from the eyes of Jesus the three visions fade one by one. What has been the defect of them all? It has been one and the same — the starting from a design to prove Messiahship. ‘If thou be the Son of God’ is the initial note of these temptations. To project any course of holiness with a view to establish a Messianic mission would be itself to defeat that mission. Holiness, to be holiness, must be spontaneous, The Messiah was to be the Perfect Life offered up to the Father; but He must not offer that life in order to de the Messiah. Imagine Jesus, walking along the shores of Galilee and seeing a paralytic by the wayside, saying to Himself,

The Messiah was to be one who should heal distress; I will heal this man.’ Would not the healing be robbed of half its glory? It would not be an act of spontaneous love — love that could not help it. It would be an act of calculation — calculation doubtless for the glory of God, but still calculation. A young girl once said to me, ‘I intend to make an fort to live for others.’ I thought it was a laudable, but not a very hopeful beginning; the intention and the effort were both against its success. Perfect love must be a passion-flower. It must spring spontaneously. It must operate unconsciously. It must be a compulsion of the sfzrzz.

And so, if Jesus would be the Messiah, He must begin by forgetting His Messiahship. His first act must be an act of self-emptying. He must forget everything but the love of God and man. He must remember only the long years of unrequitedness which the Father has experienced from His creatures, and the long years of pain which the creatures have reaped apart from the Father. He must lay aside for a time the thought of His Messiahship; He must substitute in His heart the name ‘Son of Man’ for the name ‘Son of God.’ There must be nothing official in His sympathy. When He sees distress in any form, He must heal it because it zs distress — not because the Messiah was predicted to heal it. The leper must touch Him by his leprosy, the pauper by his poverty, the invalid by his sickness, The virtue that

D goes out of Him must go out of Him — TI use His own simile — as the water goes out of a well-spring. It must be gushing, spontaneous. It must be dictated by no outside motive. It must be an immediate response to the call of His heart. Therefore, for a time, the Messianic mission must take the background in His consciousness, The human, not the divine, must be the dominating power; a man must be‘a hiding-place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest.’

ND so, O Christ, Thy keynote was self-forgetfulness. I understand now what

Paul meant by the saying, ‘He emptied Himself’; Thou couldst only become ‘ Messiah’ by spontaneous virtue. Thy first work was to lay aside Thy crown — the thought of Thy crown. The thought of Thy crown would have spoiled Thy purity. It would have made Thee say in the presence of the paralytic, ‘I must heal this man to keep up my dignity.’ Not from Thy conscious dignity must Thy hand of healing come. It must come from Thine own pain, from the bleeding of Thy wounded heart. The robe of official duty would have impeded the road to Thy heart. Therefore, early in the morning, that robe was removed. Thy vesture was concealed; Thy crown was covered. ‘To be the Messiah’ was not Thy primal motive; it was ‘to compensate the Father,’ ‘to succour the creature.’ It was love that disrobed Thee. It was pity that uncrowned Thee. It was the pathos of human pain that made Thee forget the wreath upon Thy brow. Thy power of self-forgetting is the opening ray of all Thy

glory.