“What think ye of Christ?”
JESUS we know claimed to be the Christ. He was not wont, indeed, to
manifest Himself plainly in that character to the multitude; He did not
often so speak of Himself even to the chosen; but still, indirectly, by
hint of speech and deed, He did—parabolically—propose Himself to mankind
as the promised Messiah, the Son of GOD, the Son of David, the Saviour of
the World. But He was not often so received. A Galilean fisherman was
enabled by the Spirit to confess—“Thou art the Christ, the son of the
Blessed.” A Samaritan asked in wondering faith—“Is not this the Christ?”
But more frequently He was regarded as merely a prophet, as Elijah or
Jeremiah, or as a wonderful man who came from GOD; who spake as no other
had ever spoken; who could not do such works except GOD were with Him.
This was among the well-disposed.
His enemies called Him “Beelzebub, the Prince of the Devils;” “The fellow
that deceiveth the people;” “a Nazarene;” “a sinner;” “a winebibber;” “a
Sabbath-breaker;” “a blasphemer;” “guilty, _i.e._, deserving, of death.”
It mattered not that they were unable to resist the wisdom with which He
spake; that He did all things well, making both the deaf to hear and the
dumb to speak; that He was proved to be versed in Divine letters, without
ever having learned (of men); that His appeals to GOD for vindication as
a teacher of truth and a forgiver of sins were visibly answered. They
saw no beauty or comeliness in Him, nor anything that should make them
desire Him; they would not come unto Him that they might have life. He
was despised and rejected.
It was when He had been exhibiting His credentials very openly and
condescendingly, and when the witnesses, with marvellous obstinacy, had
refused to believe what they saw, that drawing off their thoughts for the
moment from Himself the fulfiller of prophecy, He bade them look back
upon the prophecy itself and answer to themselves and to Him what it was
they expected: “What think ye,” He demanded, “of Christ?” “Since you see
not in me any resemblance to GOD’S portrait of His anointed One, tell me,
tell yourselves what are the features for which you look. I am not the
being whom you expect—what, then, do you expect? what think ye of the
Christ?”
But the question was a wide one, and had they been willing, it might have
perplexed them to know how to begin to answer it. Therefore as though
dealing with them as children, and considerately attempting to lead them
on step by step, He immediately limits the inquiry to _one_
particular—First tell me “whose son is He?” Ye searchers and expounders
of prophecy, what have you ascertained, what do you know of the descent
of the Messiah? whose son is He? They say unto Him—“The son of David.”
Now, if any of us, my brethren, were catechising Sunday School children,
and they so answered such a question, we should commend the answer as
true though imperfect, and we should patiently and encouragingly
continue—“True; but has He not besides another Father? an elder and
superior birth? Who else in Holy Scripture is called His Father?” It
might be that then some would answer—“He is the son of Abraham,” or
perhaps even “the seed of the woman.” We should bear with this, we
should approve it; we should become more hopeful of leading them to the
perfect answer, and we should therefore gently proceed—“It is so; but now
you have traced back His earthly being to its source, tell me whether he
had not another and previous existence, and if so from whom He derived
it.”
In this way should we question children; in this way from what we know of
his forbearance and condescension do we believe that JESUS would have
dealt—that indeed He did deal—with Galilean fishermen or Samaritan women;
but not in this way did He deal with the Pharisees. He made an objection
to their answer—He seemed to reject it as wrong. He asked how can that
be. “How then doth David in spirit (by inspiration) call Him LORD?” If
David call Him LORD, how is He his son? and He put them to silence, and
turned away from them. He was not _pleased_ that they were so far
orthodox as to say the “son of David,” instead—as so many Jews would
erroneously have done—of “the son of Ephraim.” He did not lead on, “What
else? whose son besides? you have but in part traced His parentage.
Consider, what are you taught more?” No! He seems to contradict them—to
say, He is not David’s son; He is David’s LORD—and He leaves them in
apparent perplexity.
Brethren, if you are in the habit of considering what you read, this
passage of Scripture must at some time have occasioned you more or less
difficulty. Why should Christ have apparently repudiated His true
parentage? Why should He have darkened instead of enlightening these
imperfect theologians? It was because they had knowledge, but perversely
abused it; because they were partial in learning and teaching the
Scriptures; because they contented themselves with low thoughts
respecting Him. They were not uninformed heathen: they were not tyros in
the school of divinity. They were _teachers_ of the Word of GOD—they
possessed His whole Word (as far as then written), and they were
familiarly acquainted with all the contents of that Word. Theirs was the
ignorance of men enabled to be wise, and responsible for wisdom: it was
the corrupt misconception of what was palpable and easy to conceive
aright. Human pride, false tradition of their own invention,
self-interest, wilful short-sightedness, or, at the best, culpable
contentedness with low and imperfect doctrine, had caused them to utter,
perhaps to conceive, only half a truth, when it was in their power to
know the whole truth. It was then in accordance with that teaching of
His in parables—dark sayings hard to understand—it was on the principle
that “he that hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he seemeth
to have,” that He who hardened Pharaoh’s hard heart, and chose not Esau
for not choosing Him, now darkened the understanding of the Pharisees,
and made them blind because they would not see.
And His treatment of them utters a loud warning, brethren, to us. The
question, “What think ye of Christ?” is not addressed with its full force
to open heretics—to Gnostics, in whose philosophy Christ is but one of
many æons emanating from the hidden god of the Pleroma; to Arians, who
make Him but an inferior and created god; to Docetæ, who teach that He
never was more than the shadow, the ghost of a man; to Eutychians, who
make Him a compound of GOD and man, partaking of both, yet being neither;
to Unitarians, who regard Him but as a perfect and pre-eminently godlike
man; to Universalists, who say that every one, righteous or unrighteous,
submissive or rebellious, must be saved by Him at the last; to particular
Redemptionists, who suppose that only a chosen few, themselves that is,
shall be saved, and they without regard or care for their holiness or
iniquity—it is not, I say, to them that this question is mainly
addressed—it is to _us_; the orthodox, the enlightened, the receivers of
the whole Word of GOD, the maintainers of the Three Creeds, the
theoretical believers, that JESUS is the Christ, the son of David, the
son of Abraham, the seed of the woman, the Son of GOD, the Saviour, the
Prophet, the Priest, the Vine, the Shepherd, the LORD, the King, the
Judge. It is to us that the question is addressed with all its
force—with how much of its rebuke—“What think ye of Christ?”
Christians! what think ye of Christ? Ask and answer this question with
all earnestness, as in the presence of Him who first put it, Who is true,
and demands the truth, and the whole truth—and ask it, not of your minds,
which it may be supposed are ready to assent to all that Holy Scripture
sets forth respecting Him, but of your hearts, your heart of hearts, the
seat of your affections, out of which are the issues of life—“What think
ye of Christ?” And stay for a moment, pause at the threshold of the
inquiry, and honestly consider whether you think of Him at all. Do you
ever _feel_ that there was and is such a Being? Do you ever meditate on
what He is, and what He has done, and is doing, and is yet to do for you?
Do your affections twine themselves around what they can reach of Him,
and yearn for a more perfect hold? Do your spiritual appetites crave
food of Him? your spiritual understandings beg for light? In your sin,
is He grasped as your Saviour? in your sorrow as your Sympathiser? in
your troubles as your Helper? in your comforts as your Benefactor? in
your hopes as your All? in your life, passive and active, as your LORD?
Do you feel any of this about Christ, or do you only think of Him as of
some historical person long since passed away, or as of some distant
lord, who knows nothing, for the time, of his vineyard—some _future_
judge, whom you need not trouble yourselves about now, and yet whom you
will not have to fear then? Is it only on Sundays, at church, by your
bedside, that you think of Christ? Is it only as some ideal being, some
vague, distant, indifferent, easy person of the past, the present, or the
future, that you think of Him; or is He more real and perceptible to you
than the men and women around you—more in your thoughts than any one
else—more feared than your earthly masters and rulers—more implicitly
obeyed than your most revered earthly superior—more looked to than your
most substantial earthly benefactor—more loved than the dearest earthly
object of your affections? Is Christ in you the worship of your heart,
the motive of your life, the centre and summit of your hopes? If He
stood visibly before you now, and asked, “Do you _think_ of Me;” and if
your hearts, your thoughts, your lives, rather than your lips, had to
answer, would you be able to say honestly, “Yea, LORD, Thou knowest that
I do think of Thee?”
It is well, brethren, to put this preliminary question, and try to reply
to it. It is well to consider whether you do think at all of Christ,
before you are further asked _what_ you think of Him; because, if you are
led to feel that you do _not_ think of Him, you will be ready to
administer reproof to yourselves, and that, by GOD’S grace, calling you
to a better mind may spare you the rebuke of Christ; because, too, if you
do think of Him righteously, though imperfectly and partially, you will
be enabled to look up with humble hope of indulgent consideration from
Him who was the Instructor of the simple and the unwise; and because,
_feeling_ your thought, you will be anxious to enlarge, and deepen, and
direct it, and so will strive to provide yourselves with a right and full
answer to the question, _What_ think ye of Christ? To do this fully, is
not the work of a mere half hour. You must take out of GOD’S Word, each
description, each title of Christ; you must ask for the Holy Spirit’s
special aid in its examination; you must survey it and search it, and
survey and search yourselves, and then with earnest desire to know Him,
and to know yourselves, with long meditation and much pains, you must
find out your _heart’s_, your _life’s_ answer to the question, What think
I of this view, this title of Christ? Then, after profiting by this
answer, enlarging what is right, correcting what is wrong, filling up
what is wanting, you must go on to another and another description and
title, _keeping in mind all the while those that have been already
received_.
Thus, and thus only, will you come to _know_ Christ rightly, and so to
_think_ rightly of Him, advancing step by step, growing day by day, till
you reach His actual presence, and see Him as He is, and are audibly
approved by Him as of the perfect stature and fulness of a man in Christ
Jesus.
To help you in this most profitable, spiritual exercise, let me suggest
to you how to pursue some few of its particulars.
What think you then of Christ as the son of Abraham, the seed of the
woman, _i.e._, as the promised Saviour, in Whom whosoever would was to be
blessed? Do you really appreciate the salvation which He has wrought out
for you? Do you duly consider the misery of the “not saved?” and are you
heartily thankful for the proffered knowledge of the saved? Do you
remember that He is a Saviour _from_ sin, that there is no hope whatever
of deriving any benefit from His sacrifice, so long as you willingly
yield to the temptations of the devil, or indulge the lust of the eye,
the lust of the flesh, or the pride of life? Do you therefore resolutely
come out, and become separate from sin and sinners? Do you further
consider how His salvation is to be laid hold on? Do you avail
yourselves very largely and eagerly of the means of salvation, wrestling
in prayer, searching the Scriptures, using diligently all ordinances of
grace? Is each sin carried to Him to be effaced, and laid before Him,
bedewed with the tears of repentance? In every weakness and doubt do you
apply to Him (in holy communion, for instance), for strength and
guidance? Is it your desire, your labour, to be joined to Him, to derive
grace from Him, to grow in His image, because of your duty, because of
your interest, because, above all, of your grateful love? The amount of
your gratitude and devotion to Him; of your abhorrence and renunciation
of sin; of your attendance on means of grace; of your growth in holiness;
of your joy in salvation, will furnish you with a faithful answer to the
question, “What think ye of Christ as a Saviour?”
Again, what think ye of Christ as the son of David, the promised LORD and
King who should sit on the throne of the true Israel, and own and rule
all GOD’S chosen people? Do you feel that He is indeed your LORD and
Master; that He has purchased you wholly to Himself; that you are pledged
and bound to His entire service; that every precept which He has
delivered, must be implicitly obeyed; that there must be no doing of what
He has forbidden, no omitting of what He has commanded, no self-seeking,
no mammon-worship; that all your faculties and talents must be laid out,
and all your work done for Him; that there must be no empty profession,
“LORD, LORD,” while you do not the things that He bids—no wasting of His
goods, no neglecting of His service? As your LORD, He claims you wholly,
body, soul, and spirit, thoughts, words, and deeds. As your King, He has
prescribed the service you are to render. By and by, sitting on His
throne, He will bring you to account, and deal with you according to your
merits. What think ye of Him as your Owner, your Ruler, your Judge?
Again, what think ye of Christ as the son of Mary, the perfect human
being; partaking of all the properties and qualities, the infirmities and
sufferings and sympathies, the desires, the wants, the hopes and fears of
man, as far as they are separate from sin? Do you contemplate His life
on earth, to ascertain what you can and ought to be, and to follow His
example? Are you encouraged in every aim, every resolute resistance of
evil, every patient submission to suffering, every fulfilment of duty,
every pursuit of righteousness by the thought “_Man_ has done it, the Man
Whom I am required to imitate.” Do you think of Him as still retaining
His manhood with all its experience, and acquired wisdom, and perfected
obedience? Do you rejoice in such a Sympathizer, such a Mediator, such a
Helper, such a Judge? One who can feel for you in your trials, can
describe faithfully to His Father, from His own experience, your
condition and necessities, through His knowledge can supply exactly what
you need, and make due allowance for your shortcomings and offences?
Once more, what think ye of Christ as the Son of GOD? very and eternal
GOD, with all the Divine attributes, power, knowledge, justice, holiness,
and exaction of obedience, abhorrence of evil, wrath against sin, love of
righteousness? Do you feel that He is mighty to save? Do you live as
under His all-searching eye? Are you convinced that He is impartially
just, alike to approve and disapprove, to reward and punish, in His
present and future dealings with all the partakers of His covenant? Do
you realise the utter impossibility of being loved by Him, of being
allowed to draw nigh to Him, of deriving any benefit from Him now or
hereafter, if you are impure, worldly, unloving, indifferent? Are you
impressed with the guilt of disobedience to Him, a twice revealed, a
doubly jealous GOD, binding you to Himself by the mercies and
responsibility of redemption, as well as creation, and by the threats and
forebodings of a particular and most righteous judgment? Is it thus you
think of Christ as GOD?
Dear brethren, make use, I beseech you, of these brief and plain
suggestions, to ascertain your past thoughts of Christ, to rebuke them,
if they have been low and partial, to lead you on to perfection. Beware
of separating what GOD has joined together, of recognising in Him who is
the Son of GOD, only the son of David. Never allow yourselves to joy
over salvation without remembering judgment. Dwell not on the Deliverer
apart from the Purchaser; appropriate not promises, if you do not observe
commands; count not on human sympathy, if you do not deserve Divine
compassion; expect not heavenly blessings, without using appointed means.
You do not think of the Christ of the Bible, unless every phase of His
character there represented, has its due place in your thoughts. And so
your thoughts are unacceptable to Him, and unprofitable to you; they are
neither worship, nor helps to salvation; they do not recognise Him at
all, because they do not recognise Him altogether; they prompt to no
service, because they prompt not to all. An imperfect Christ is no
Christ. A Christian who regards Him as imperfect, is no Christian.
Oh, may He who has given Christ to be our All in all, enable us to
recognise and incline us to serve, and love, and depend on Him, as indeed
our All in all!
SERMON III.
THE CHURCHMAN’S THOUGHTS ABOUT DISSENTERS.