PUBLIC-DOMAIN CHRISTIAN BOOK
Expositions of Holy Scripture : St. Matthew Chaps. IX to XXVIII
Alexander Maclaren, 1826-1910 · 245,559 words · 344 reading sections
JOHN'S DOUBTS OF JESUS, AND JESUS' PRAISE OF JOHN (Matt. xi. 2-15)
Produced by Anne Folland, Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team ALEXANDER MACLAREN, D. D., Litt. D. _Chaps. IX to XXVIII_ ALEXANDER MACLAREN, D. D., Litt. D. _Chaps. IX to XVII_ CHRIST'S ENCOURAGEMENTS (Matt. ix. 2) SOUL-HEALING FIRST: BODY-HEALING SECOND (Matt. ix. 6) THE CALL OF MATTHEW (…
347 wordsSECTION 2Christ'S Encouragements
'Son, be of good cheer.'--MATT. ix. 2. This word of encouragement, which exhorts to both cheerfulness and courage, is often upon Christ's lips. It is only once employed in the Gospels by any other than He. If we throw together the various instances in which He thus speaks, we may get a somewhat striking view of the hi…
682 wordsSECTION 3Christ'S Encouragements
And so, in like manner, 'thus conscience doth make cowards of us all.' There is nothing that so drapes a soul with darkness as either the consciousness of unforgiven sin or the want of consciousness of forgiven sin. There may be plenty of superficial cheerfulness. I know that; and I know what the bitter wise man called…
738 wordsSECTION 4Christ'S Encouragements
'Tell us not to be frightened when we see something stalking across the waves in the darkness!' 'It is I'; surely that is enough. The Companion in the storm is the Calmer of the terror. He who recognises Jesus Christ as drawing near to his heart over wild billows may well 'be of good cheer,' since the storm but brings …
703 wordsSECTION 5Soul-Healing First: Body-Healing Second
And the spirit of that encouragement may go with us all, breeding in us the quiet confidence that no matter who may thwart or hinder, no matter what dangers or evils may seem to ring us round, the Master who bids us 'Be of good cheer' will give us a charmed life, and nothing shall by any means hurt us until He says to …
765 wordsSECTION 6Soul-Healing First: Body-Healing Second
There is the fontal source of all sorrow, for even to the most superficial observation ninety per cent., at any rate, of man's misery comes either from his own or from others' wrongdoing, and for the rest, it is regarded in the eye of faith as being sorrow that is needful because of sin, in order to discipline and to p…
721 wordsSECTION 7Soul-Healing First: Body-Healing Second
But yet these Pharisees are right; perfectly right. Forgiveness _is_ an exclusively divine act. Of course. For sin has to do with God only; vice has to do with the laws of morality; crime has to do with the laws of the land. The same act may be vice, crime, and sin. In the one aspect it has to do with myself, in the ot…
670 wordsSECTION 8Soul-Healing First: Body-Healing Second
III. So I come to say, in the next place, that the incident before us teaches us that Jesus Christ claims and exercises this divine prerogative of forgiveness. Mark His answer to these cavillers. He admits their promises absolutely. They said, 'No man can forgive sins but God only.' If Christ was only a man, like us, …
823 wordsSECTION 9Soul-Healing First: Body-Healing Second
I claim all the difference between Christendom and Heathendom as attestation of the reality of Christ's divine and atoning work. I say, and I believe it to be a valid and a good argument as against much of the doubt of this day, 'If you seek His monument, look around.' His own answer to the question, 'Art thou He that …
352 wordsSECTION 10The Call Of Matthew
'And as Jesus passed forth from thence, He saw a man, named Matthew, sitting at the receipt of custom: and He saith unto him, Follow Me. And he arose, and followed Him. 10. And it came to pass, as Jesus sat at meat in the house, behold, many publicans and sinners came and sat down with Him and His disciples. 11. A…
684 wordsSECTION 11The Call Of Matthew
No doubt this was not the first of Matthew's knowledge of Jesus. Living in Capernaum, he would have had many opportunities of hearing Him or of Him, and his heart and conscience may have been stirred. As he sat in his 'tolbooth,' feeling contempt and hatred poured on him, he, no doubt, had had longings to get nearer to…
671 wordsSECTION 12The Call Of Matthew
But what a scandal in the eyes not only of Pharisees, but of all the proper people in Capernaum, Jesus' going to such a gathering of disreputables would be, we may estimate if we remember that they did not know His reason, but thought that He went because He liked the atmosphere and the company. 'Like draws to like' wa…
821 wordsSECTION 13The Call Of Matthew
The Pharisees objected to Jesus' feasting, and could scarcely in the same breath find fault with Him for not fasting, but they put forward some of John's disciples to bring that fresh objection. Common hatred is a strong cement, and often holds opposites together for a while. It was bad for John's followers that they s…
702 wordsSECTION 14The Call Of Matthew
The two condensed parables or extended metaphors, which follow the vindication of the disciples, carry the matter further, and lay down a principle which is intended to cover not only the question in hand, their non-observance of Jewish regulations as to fasting, but the whole subject of the relations of the new word, …
538 wordsSECTION 15The Touch Of Faith And The Touch Of Christ
'While He spake these things unto them, behold, there came a certain ruler, and worshipped Him, saying, My daughter is even now dead: but come and lay Thy hand upon her, and she shall live. 19. And Jesus arose, and followed him, and so did His disciples. 20. And, behold, a woman, which was diseased with an issue o…
780 wordsSECTION 16The Touch Of Faith And The Touch Of Christ
The other evangelists give us a more extended account, but Matthew throws into prominence, in his condensed narrative, the essential points. Notice her real but imperfect faith. There was unquestionable confidence in Christ's power, and very genuine desire for healing. But it was a very ignorant faith. She believes th…
807 wordsSECTION 17The Touch Of Faith And The Touch Of Christ
His words to her are full of tenderness. She receives the name of 'daughter.' Gently He encourages her timidity by that 'Be of good cheer,' and then He sets right her error: 'Thy faith'--not thy finger--'hath made thee whole.' There was no real connection between the touch of the robe and healing; but the woman thought…
747 wordsSECTION 18The Touch Of Faith And The Touch Of Christ
Then comes the great deed. The crowd is shut out. For such a work silence is befitting. The father and mother, with His foremost three disciples, go with Him into the chamber. There is no effort, repeated and gradually successful, as when Elisha raised the dead boy; no praying, as when Peter raised Dorcas; only the tou…
805 wordsSECTION 19The Touch Of Faith And The Touch Of Christ
There is something very beautiful and pathetic in the simple brevity of the unhesitating answer, 'Yea, Lord.' Sincerity needs few words. Faith can put an infinite deal of meaning into a monosyllable. Their eagerness to reach the goal made their answer brief. But it was enough. Again the hand which had clasped the maide…
792 wordsSECTION 20A Christlike Judgment Of Men
The Pharisees did not wonder, and did look into the phenomenon with sharp eyes; and in so far, they were in advance of the gaping multitudes. They were much too superior persons to be astonished at anything, and they had already settled on a formula which was delightfully easy of application, and had the further advant…
1,006 wordsSECTION 21A Christlike Judgment Of Men
First of all, notice how here, as always to Jesus Christ, the outward was nothing, except as a symbol and manifestation of the inward; how the thing that He saw in a man was not the external accidents of circumstance or position, for His true, clear gaze and His loving, wise heart went straight to the essence of the ma…
724 wordsSECTION 22A Christlike Judgment Of Men
And as for 'teacher,' whom are we to put up beside Him? Is it to be these dim figures of religious reformers that are gliding, ghostlike, to their doom, being wrapped round and round about by ever thicker and thicker folds of the inevitable oblivion that swallows all that is human? Brethren, by common consent it is Chr…
971 wordsSECTION 23A Christlike Judgment Of Men
Then passing by altogether the other idea which I said was only doubtfully suggested by the words--namely, that of laceration and wounding--let me say a word about the last of the aspects of humanity when Christless, which is set forth in this text, and that is, the dejected weariness arising from the fruitless wanderi…
814 wordsSECTION 24A Christlike Judgment Of Men
And, if I might venture to touch upon another matter, compassion and not curiosity is an especial lesson for the day to the more thoughtful and cultivated amongst our congregations. I have just said that the appropriate Christian feeling in contemplating the state of the sheep without the Shepherd is compassion, not cu…
687 wordsSECTION 25The Obscure Apostles
One word more. Take my text as a guide to the form of action into which we are to cast the emotions that should spring from this gaze upon the world. I will only name three points. Christ opened His mouth and spake to them, and taught them many things; Christ said to His disciples, 'Pray ye the Lord of the harvest'; an…
661 wordsSECTION 26The Obscure Apostles
Recall, for example, the way in which the New Testament deals with 'the very chiefest' apostles, the illustrious triad of Peter, James, and John. The first escapes from prison; we see him hammering at Mary's door in the grey of the morning, and after brief, eager talk with his friends he vanishes to hide in 'another pl…
718 wordsSECTION 27The Obscure Apostles
'Thou art the organ, whose full breath is thunder; I am the keys, beneath thy fingers pressed.' If this be true, how it should deliver us from all overestimate of men, to which our human affections and our feeble faith tempt us so sorely! There _is_ One man, and One man only, whose biography is a 'Gospel, who owes no…
673 wordsSECTION 28The Obscure Apostles
What was an apostle's function during the life of Christ? One of the evangelists divides it into three portions: to be with Jesus; to preach the kingdom; to cast out devils and to heal. There is nothing in these offices peculiar to them. The seventy had miraculous powers too, and some at least were our Lord's companion…
698 wordsSECTION 29The Obscure Apostles
III. We may gather, too, the lesson of how often faithful work is unrecorded and forgotten. No doubt those apostles who have no place in the history toiled honestly and did their Lord's commands, and oblivion has swallowed it all. Bartholomew and 'Lebbaeus, whose surname was Thaddaeus,' and the rest of them, have no p…
757 wordsSECTION 30The Obscure Apostles
IV. Finally, we may add that forgotten work is remembered, and unrecorded names are recorded above. The names of these almost anonymous apostles have no place in the records of the advancement of the Church or of the development of Christian doctrine. They drop out of the narrative after the list in the first chapter …
670 wordsSECTION 31Christ'S Charge To His Heralds
Then let us do our work for Christ, not much careful whether it be greater or smaller, obscure or conspicuous; assured that whoever forgets us and it, He will remember, and however our names may be unrecorded on earth, they will be written in heaven, and confessed by Him before His Father and the holy angels. 'These t…
730 wordsSECTION 32Christ'S Charge To His Heralds
'Freely ye have received'; namely, in the first application of the words, the message of the coming kingdom and the power to work miracles. But the force of the injunction, as applied to us, is even more soul-subduing, as our gift is greater, and the freedom of its bestowal should evoke deeper gratitude. The deepest sp…
690 wordsSECTION 33Christ'S Charge To His Heralds
Christian earnestness does not abolish courtesy. The message is not to be blurted out in defiance of even conventional forms. Zeal for the Lord is no excuse for rude abruptness. But the salutation of the true apostle will deepen the meaning of such forms, and make the conventional the real expression of real goodwill. …
640 wordsSECTION 34The Widened Mission, Its Perils And Defences
'Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves; be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves. 17. But beware of men: for they will deliver you up to the councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues; 18. And ye shall be brought before governors and kings for My sake, for a testimony…
721 wordsSECTION 35The Widened Mission, Its Perils And Defences
A further difference between this and the preceding section is, that there the stress was laid on the contents of the disciples' message, but that here it is laid on their sufferings. Not so much by what they say, as by how they endure, are they to testify. 'The noble army of martyrs praise Thee,' and the primitive Chu…
721 wordsSECTION 36The Widened Mission, Its Perils And Defences
The solemn foretelling of persecution, broken for a moment, goes on and becomes even more foreboding, for it speaks of dearest ones turned to foes, and the sweet sanctities of family ties dissolved by the solvent of the new Faith. There is no enemy like a brother estranged, and it is tragically significant that it is i…
703 wordsSECTION 37The Widened Mission, Its Perils And Defences
But the reason for this command to flee is perplexing. 'Ye shall not have gone over the cities of Israel till the Son of Man be come.' Is Jesus here reverting to the narrower immediate mission of the apostles? What 'coming' is referred to? We have seen that the first mission of the twelve was the theme of verses 5-15, …
651 wordsSECTION 38The Widened Mission, Its Perils And Defences
A second reason for fearlessness is the limitation of the enemy's power to hurt, reinforced by the thought that, while the penalties that man can inflict for faithfulness are only corporeal, transitory, and incapable of harming the true self, the consequences of unfaithfulness fling the whole man, body and soul, down t…
387 wordsSECTION 39Like Teacher, Like Scholar
'The disciple is not above his master, nor the servant above his lord. 26. It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master, and the servant as his lord.' --MATT. x. 24, 25. These words were often on Christ's lips. Like other teachers, He too had His favourite sayings, the light of which He was wont to flash …
696 wordsSECTION 40Like Teacher, Like Scholar
The chances are that no scholar shall be on his master's level. The eyes that see truth directly and for themselves in this world are very few. Most men have to take truth at second-hand, and few indeed are they who, like a perfect medium, receive even the fragmentary truth that human lips can impart to them, and trans…
777 wordsSECTION 41Like Teacher, Like Scholar
In following Christ as our absolute Teacher, there is no sacrifice of independence or freedom of mind, but listening to Him is the way to secure these in their highest degree. We are set free from men, we are growingly delivered from errors and misconceptions, in the measure in which we keep close to Christ as our Mast…
671 wordsSECTION 42Like Teacher, Like Scholar
That is to say, dear brethren, in this one incident, which is the condensation, so to speak, of the whole spirit of His life, is the law for our lives as well. We, too, are bound to that same love as the main motive of all our actions; we, too, are bound to that same stripping off of dignity and lowly equalising of our…
1,153 wordsSECTION 43The King'S Charge To His Ambassadors
If you do not know what it is to find yourselves out of harmony with the world, I am afraid it is because you have less of the Master's spirit than you have of the world's. The world loves its own. If you are not 'of the world, the world will hate you.' If it does not, it must be because, in spite of your name, you bel…
800 wordsSECTION 44The King'S Charge To His Ambassadors
The confession which is to be thus rewarded, like the denial opposed to it, is, of course, not merely a single utterance of the lip. So far Judas Iscariot confessed Christ, and Peter denied Him. But it is the habitual acknowledgment by lip and life, unwithdrawn to the end. The context implies that the confession is mai…
718 wordsSECTION 45The King'S Charge To His Ambassadors
That conflict ranges the dearest in opposite ranks. The gospel is the great solvent. As when a substance is brought into contact with some chemical compound, which has greater affinity for one of its elements than the other element has, the old combination is dissolved, and a new and more stable one is formed, so Chris…
752 wordsSECTION 46The King'S Charge To His Ambassadors
But Christ's demand is not only for the surrender of the heart, but for the giving up of self, and, in a very profound sense, for the surrender of life. How enigmatical that saying about taking up the cross must have sounded to the disciples! They knew little about the cross, as a punishment; they had not yet associate…
700 wordsSECTION 47The King'S Charge To His Ambassadors
I. The stringent requirement for the Christian life that is here made. Now we shall very much impoverish the meaning and narrow the sweep of these great and penetrating words, if we understand by 'losing one's life' only the actual surrender of physical existence. It is not only the martyr on whose bleeding brows the …
653 wordsSECTION 48The King'S Charge To His Ambassadors
I need not diverge here to point to that life from which my thoughts have taken their start in this sermon. Surely if there was any one characteristic in it more distinct and lovely than another, it was that self was dead and that Christ lived. There may be sometimes a call for the actual--which is the lesser--surrende…
734 wordsSECTION 49The King'S Charge To His Ambassadors
Ah! brethren, you and I know how hard it is to escape from the tyrannous dominion of self, and how the evil spirits that have taken possession of us mock at all lesser charms than the name which 'devils fear and fly'; 'the Name that is above every name.' We have tried other motives. We have sought to reprove our selfis…
737 wordsSECTION 50The Greatest In The Kingdom, And Their Reward
'Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord; they rest from their labours, and their works do follow them.' 'He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward; and he that receiveth a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man's reward. 42. And who…
841 wordsSECTION 51The Greatest In The Kingdom, And Their Reward
Therefore I am inclined to believe that we have here an ascending series--that we begin at the bottom and not at the top; that the prophet is less than the righteous man, and the righteous man less than the little one who believes in Christ. For, suppose there were a prophet who was not righteous, and a righteous man w…
754 wordsSECTION 52The Greatest In The Kingdom, And Their Reward
Oh! what a reversal of this world's estimates is coming one day, when the names that stand high in the roll of fame shall pale, like photographs that have been shut up in a portfolio, and when you take them out have faded off the paper. 'The world knows nothing of its greatest men,' but there is a time coming when the …
712 wordsSECTION 53The Greatest In The Kingdom, And Their Reward
And so in those two sister parables of our Master's, which are so remarkably discriminated and so remarkably alike, we have both these aspects of the Heavenly reward set forth--both that which declares its identity in all cases, and the other which declares its variety according to the recipient's character. All the se…
737 wordsSECTION 54The Greatest In The Kingdom, And Their Reward
As all work done from the same motive is the same in God's eyes, whatever be the outward shape of it, so the work that involves the same type of spiritual character will involve the same reward. You find the Egyptian medal on the breasts of the soldiers that kept the base of communication as well as on the breasts of t…
540 wordsSECTION 55John'S Doubts Of Jesus, And Jesus' Praise Of John
'Now when John had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples, 3. And said unto Him, Art Thou He that should come, or do we look for another? 4. Jesus answered and said unto them, Go and shew John again those things which ye do hear and see: 5. The blind receive their sight, and the lame…
879 wordsSECTION 56John'S Doubts Of Jesus, And Jesus' Praise Of John
We may well take to heart the lesson of the fluctuations possible to the firmest faith, and pray to be enabled to hold fast that we have. We may learn, too, the danger to right conceptions of Christ, of separating the two elements of mercy and judgment in His character and work. John was right in believing that the Chr…
658 wordsSECTION 57John'S Doubts Of Jesus, And Jesus' Praise Of John
The benediction on him who finds none occasion of stumbling in Christ, is at once a beatitude and a warning. It rebukes in the gentlest fashion John's temper, which found difficulty in even the perfect personality of Jesus, and made that which should have been the 'sure foundation' of his spirit a stone of stumbling. O…
747 wordsSECTION 58John'S Doubts Of Jesus, And Jesus' Praise Of John
Our Lord next speaks of John's great office. He was a prophet. The dim recognition that God spoke in His fiery words had drawn the crowds, weary of teachers in whose endless jangle and jargon of casuistry was no inspiration. The voice of a man who gets his message at first-hand from God has a ring in it which even dull…
700 wordsSECTION 59John'S Doubts Of Jesus, And Jesus' Praise Of John
Then follows the explanation of this new interest in the kingdom. 'All the prophets and the law prophesied until John.' The whole period till his coming was one of preparation, and it all converged on the epoch of the forerunner. The eagerness to flock into the Kingdom which characterised his time would have been impos…
322 wordsSECTION 60The Friend Of Publicans And Sinners
'The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, Behold a man gluttonous, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners. But wisdom is justified of her children,'--MATT. xi. 19. Jesus very seldom took notice of His enemies' slanders. 'When He was reviled He reviled not again.' If ever He did, it was fo…
528 wordsSource & rights
Public domain in the USA; original historical text digitized by Project Gutenberg.
Project Gutenberg source record →
Historical Christian writing; not Scripture.