Wounding to Heal

thereby he may break altogether the already yielding heart; for as soon as the cry, “What must we do?” shall burst from broken hearts, the healing balm is ready. God “hath glorified his Son Jesus; whom ye delivered up, and denied him in the presence of Pilate, when he was determined to let him go.” Pilate, the Roman, from a natural sense of justice, desired to save the innocent; but ye, the Israel to whom he came, denied him, and compelled the governor to put him to death. Never was a sharper sword pointed at naked breasts; and never did a mightier thrust send the weapon home to the marrow: “Ye killed the Prince of life.” But it is the physician and not the enemy who is piercing here. He wounds in order that the distressed may seek the Healer. At verse 17th he changes his voice. He withdraws the weapon as soon as its work is done. As soon as the preacher sees that that the dividing Word has taken effect, he begins to give consolation. I think it was Whitefield who, when his audience of coal-miners was so large that he could not read in the distant faces the emotions of their hearts, perceived by certain white streaks, like African tattoo, made by coursing tears on sable cheeks, that the Word had cut into the conscience. This was for him the turning-point. The, strokes for wounding may now safely cease, and the healing ( work begin.

Changing his voice, Peter the preacher begins to insinuate 0 a tender consolation. He will present the truth on another side. He had said, “Ye killed the Prince of life:” but now he informs them that it is of God that Christ should suffer, L the just for the unjust.

There are two opposite ways in which the blood of Jesus L may be upon men: “His blood be upon us and upon our j| children!” exclaimed the Jewish leaders, when they had L hemmed Pilate in, and extorted from him the sentence of [,

Wounding to Heal. death. Ah! that was not the blood of sprinkling for the pardon of sin. It was the blood of Christ upon them, but it did not cleanse. It was the blood of the curse, not the blood of blessing. At first, and for a specific purpose, Peter speaks of the blood of Christ in that evil sense. He takes it and pours it on the murderers’ heads, a scorching flood. But when the work of conviction is done, he addresses himself to the work of saving; he takes that same blood in his other hand and pours it out for blessing. The blood of Christ, although shed by them, is presented now as the blood shed for them — is presented now not as their sin, but as their redemption from sin.

It was a great transition; and it was suddenly made. But the same transition all the new-born make; and most of them make it quickly. It is like a leap from Christ crucified by you, into Christ crucified for you. From trampling underfoot the blood of the covenant, they pass over to take shelter, like the Hebrews in Egypt, under the besprinkled lintel, safe from the angel of death, and ready to march out free towards the promised land.

“Now, brethren, I wot that through ignorance ye did it:” and so he opens up to the convicted a door of hope. The drift of the discourse changes to tenderness. So, when the frost has congealed the ground into rock, the sun and rain beating on it make it broken and contrite ground — a fitting soil for the seed of the kingdom.

Then in verse 18th the preacher carefully engrafts his gospel upon the Scriptures of the Old Testament: “But those things, which God before had showed by the mouth of all his prophets, that Christ should suffer, he hath so fulfilled.” The New Testament grows upon the Old, like branches in the root and stem. If you undermine Moses, Christ, as far as you are concerned, will fall. Chaos will return. Darkness will again be on the face of the deep, and no Spirit of God will move upon the waters.

Those who eat out, by acid drops of criticism, the authority of the Old Testament, intending to hold fast by Christ and his gospel, are victims of a delusion. These blessed flowers and fruits cannot grow on a dead root.

When I was young, I took pleasure in ornamenting the front of my father’s cottage with flowers. One particular effort was eminently successful, and attracted the notice of every visitor. By budding, I inserted several fine kinds of roses on one common root. For two or three years the flowers of various hues, flourishing simultaneously on one stem, became a spectacle to the rural neighbourhood. But, alas! the original stem, not chosen as suitable for the purpose, but adopted as it happened to be there, was not a hardy species. There came a night of severe frost. The plant that sustained my beautiful branches died, and all my beautiful branches died with it. Alas! for men in whose hearts the Divine authority of Moses and the prophets is withered by the frost of a hard, cold, earthly philosophy. Faith cannot grow upon Kant and Hegel, when God has departed from Moses and the Psalms!

That is not the first of Christ when the Babe is born in Bethlehem. Before the foundation of the world he took his people’s place in the eternal counsel. As soon as men needed a Saviour he appeared for salvation in the promise spoken at the gate of Eden. Christ interpenetrates the Scriptures of the Old Testament through and through. The Plant of Benown that appeared in man’s sight in the fulness of time has a root that goes down to the beginning. If you cut away the word which holy men of old spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, you cut through that root, and your own hope withers in your breast.

The First Persecution.