XI. Three Paradoxes
“I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.”
“The world seeth Me no more; but ye see Me.”
“Because I live, ye shall live also.”–JOHN xiv. 18, 19.
The Bible and Christian life are full of paradoxes. Paul loved to enumerate them; they abound also in the discourses of our Lord. Here are three.
The Master had declared His purpose of leaving His apostles and friends and returning to His Father: but in the same breath He says, “I will not leave you desolate; I come to you.”
Again, He had forewarned them that He would be hidden from them; yet now He tells them that they would still behold Him.
Further, with growing emphasis and clearness, He had unfolded His approaching death by the cruel Roman method of the cross; yet He claims the timeless life of an ever-present tense and insists that their life will depend on His.
Absent, yet present; hidden, yet visible; dying, yet living and life-giving–such are the paradoxes of this paragraph in His marvellous farewell discourse; and they reveal three facts of which we may live in perpetual cognizance.
I. WE MAY ENJOY THE PERPETUAL RECOGNITION OF THE ADVENT OF CHRIST.–”I will not leave you orphans, or desolate, I come unto you” (R. V.). Note the majesty of those last words; they are worthy of Deity; He speaks as though He were always drawing nigh those He loves: “I come unto you.”
Christ is always present, yet He comes.–The Creator had been always immanent in His universe, but He came in each creative act; the Lawgiver had been ever-present in the Church in the wilderness, but He came down on Sinai, and His glory lit up the peaks of sandstone rock; the Deliverer was never for a moment absent from the side of the Shepherd-King, but in answer to His cry for help He came down riding upon a cherub, flying on the wings Of wind; the Holy Spirit had been in the world from the earliest days of prayer and inspired speech, but He came down from the throne to sit on each bowed head in lambent flame. So Christ is with us all the days, yet He comes. He will come at last to receive His own to Himself, and to judge the world; but He comes in dark and lonely hours that we may not be desolate.
“For warm, sweet, tender, even yet
A present help is He;
And faith has yet its Olivet
And love its Galilee.
The heeling of His seamless dress
Is by our beds of pain;
We touch Him in life’s throng and press,
And we are whole again.”
He comes when we need Him most.–When the storm is high, and the water is pouring into the boat; when the house is empty because the life that made it home has fled; when Jericho has to be attacked on the morrow, and the Jordan crossed; when lover and friend stand aloof; when light is fading before dimming eyes, and names and faces elude the grasp of the aged mind; when the last coal is turning to grey ash; when the rush of the river is heard in the valley below–Jesus says, I come. It is in the hour of desolation, when Lazarus has been in the grave four days already, that the glad tidings are whispered in the ear of the mourner, “The Master is come.” “I will not leave you orphans,” He said, “I come unto you.” Oh, blessed orphanhood, it were well to be bereaved, to have such comforting!
He pays surprise visits.–He does not always wait to be invited; but sometimes, when we lie sleeping with wakeful hearts, we hear His gentle voice calling to us, “Arise, My love, and come away.” Then as we lift the door-latch, our hand drops with the sweet-smelling myrrh which betrays His presence. How often when we have been losing ground, getting lukewarm and worldly, we have suddenly been made aware of His reviving presence, and He has said, I come. He comes, as the wood-anemones and snowdrops (the most fragile and tender flowerets of spring) penetrate the hard ground to announce that the winter is over and gone, and that the time of the singing of birds is come.
It is well to put ourselves in His way.–There are certain beaten tracks well-worn by His feet, and if we would meet Him we must frequent their neighborhood. Olivet, where He used to pray; Calvary, where He died; Joseph’s garden, where He rose, are dear to Him yet. When we pray or meditate; when we commemorate His dying love at the memorial feast; when we realize our union with Him in death and resurrection; when we open our hearts to the breathing of the Holy Spirit–we put ourselves in His way, and are more likely to encounter Him when He comes. “To them that look for Him shall He appear.” “Behold the Bridegroom cometh, go ye out to meet Him”–but take the path by which He is sure to travel. Be in the upper room, with the rest of the disciples, so that you may not, like Thomas, miss Him when He comes.
His footsteps are noiseless.–It is said of old, “Thy footsteps are not known,” therefore we need not be surprised if He steal in upon us as a thief in the night, or as spring over the wolds. There is no blare of trumpet or voice of herald; we cannot say, Lo here, or Lo there; when the King comes there is no outward show; “He does not strive, nor cry, nor lift up, nor cause His voice to be heard in the street.”
“He entered not by the eyes,” says St. Bernard, “for His presence was not marked by color; nor by the ears, for there was no sound; nor by the touch, for He was impalpable. How then did I know that He was present? Because He was a quickening power. As soon as He entered He awoke my slumbering soul. He moved and pierced my heart, which before was stony, hard, and sick. He began also to pluck up and destroy, to build and plant, to freshen the inner drought, to enlighten the darkness, to open the prison-house, to make the crooked straight and
the rough smooth; so that my heart could bless the Lord with all that was within me.”
Oh, lonely, desolate soul, open thy door to Him; wait not on the alert to detect His entrance, only believe that He is there; and presently, and before ever thou art aware, thou wilt find a new fragrance distilling through the heart-chamber, a new power throbbing in thy pulse.
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