'Jesus ... said, It is finished.'--JOHN xix. 30.
'He said unto me, It is done.'--REV. xxi. 6.
One of these sayings was spoken from the Cross, the other from the
Throne. The Speaker of both is the same. In the one, His voice 'then
shook the earth,' as the rending rocks testified; in the other, His
voice 'will shake not the earth only but also heaven'; for 'new heavens
and a new earth' accompanied the proclamation. In the one, like some
traveller ready to depart, who casts a final glance over his
preparations, and, satisfied that nothing is omitted, gives his
charioteer the signal and rolls away, Jesus Christ looked back over His
life's work, and, knowing that it was accomplished, summoned His
servant Death, and departed. In the other, He sets His seal to the
closed book of the world's history, and ushers in a renovated universe.
The one masks the completion of the work on which the world's
redemption rests, the other marks the completion of the age-long
process by which the world's redemption is actually realised. The one
proclaims that the foundation is laid, the other that the headstone is
set on the finished building. The one bids us trust in a past perfected
work; the other bids us hope in the perfect accomplishment of the
results of that work. Taken singly, these sayings are grand; united,
they suggest thoughts needed always, never more needful than to-day.