we need reminding that seeing is not always believing. Thousands saw Christ continually, while He Was on earthy and yet clung to their sins. Even His brethren at one time " did not believe in him." (John 8.) A mere fleshly knowledge of Christ saves no one. The words of St. Paul are very instructive : — " Though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more." (2 Cor. v. 16.)
Let us learn from our Lord's words before us that the highest privileges our souls can desire are close at hand, and within our reach, if we only believe. We need not idly wish that we had lived near Capernaum, or hard by Joseph's house at Nazareth. We need not dream of a deeper love and a more thorough devotion if. we had really pressed Christ's hand, or heard Christ's voice, or been numbered among Christ's relatives. All this could have done nothing more for us than simple faith can do now. Do we hear Christ's voice and follow Him ? Do we take Hitti for our only Saviour and our only Friend, and forsaking all other hopes, cleave only unto Him ? If this be so, all things are ours. We need no higher pri- vilege. We can have no higher, until Christ comes again. No man can be nearer and dearer to Jesus than the man who simply believes.
We should observe, secondly, in these verses, the despe- rate unbelief of the Jews in our Lord's time. We are told that though they " gathered thick together " to hear Christ preach, they still professed to be waiting for a sign. They pretended to want more evidence before they be- lieved. Our Lord declares that the Queen of Sheba and the men of Nineveh would put the Jews to shame at the
LxnoB, CHAP. XI. VEB. 27 — 32. 33
last day. Tbe Queen of Slieba had audi faiili fhat she trayelled a vast distance in order to hear &xe wisdom of Solomon. Yet Solomon, with aU his wisdom, was an erring and imperfect king. The Ninevites had such faith that they believed the message which Jonah brought firom God, and repented. Yet even Jonah was a weak and unstable prophet. The Jews of our Lord's time had far higher light and infinitely clearer teachings than either Solomon or Jonah could supply. They had amongst them the King of kings, the Prophet greater than Moses. Yet the Jews ndtber repented nor believed !
Let it never surprise us to see unbelief abounding, both in the church. and in the world. So far from wondering that there have been men like Hobbes, and Payne, and Bousseau, and Voltaire, we ought rather to wonder that such men have been so few. So far from marvelling that the vast majority of professing Christians remain un- affected and unmoved by the preaching of the Gospel, we ought to marvel that any around us believe at all. Why should we wonder to see that old disease which began with Adam and Eve infecting all their children P Why should we expect to see more faith among men and women now than was seen in our Lord's time? The enormous amount of unbelief and hardness on every side may wdl grieve and pain us. But it ought not to cause surprise.
Let us thank God if we have received the gift of fiutL It is a great thing to believe all the Bible. We do not sufficiently realize the corruption of human nature. We do not see the full virulence of the disease by which all Adam's children are infected, and the small number of those who are saved. — ^Have we faith, however weak