3. And this life is conveyed to man through Christ. He secures it for us by the surrender of His own life, His sacrifice on Calvary, thus making it possible for the Father to bestow it righteously on us who are unworthy of it. And He, Christ crucified and alive again, is the medium of its communication. Again and again He claims, and it is claimed for Him, that He is the Author of life. " I am come," He says, " that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly " ; " He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life " ; " The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord " ; " God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son." The Father is the fountain, but, said Christ, " If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink."
^ Like the great aqueducts that stretch from the hills across the Eoman Campagna, His Incarnation brings the waters of the fountain from the mountains of God into the lower levels of our nature, and the fetid alleys of our sins. The cool, sparkling treasure is carried near to every lip. If we drink, we live. If * £. F. Scott, Tht Fourth Gospel, 235.
142 LIFE AND LIGHT
we will not, we die in our sins, and are dead whilst we live. Stop the fountain, and what becomes of the stream ? It fades between its banks, and is no more. You cannot live the life of the animal except that life be joined to Him. If it could be broken away from God it would disappear as the clouds melt in the sky, and there would be nobody, and you would be nowhere. You cannot break yourself away from God physically so completely as to annihilate yourself. You can do so spiritually ; some do it, and the consequence is that they are dead ! You can be made alive from the dead, if you will lay hold on Jesus Christ, and get His life-giving spirit into your heart.^
(1) The fountain is mysterious in its origin. This is perhaps the thought that first occurs to any one who stands by the rushing fountain pouring forth its stream of life ; and the mystery has led the uninstructed nations to curious conjectures as to the origin of these fountains.
^ Some years ago the engineers engaged in constructing the water-works of the city of Beyrout set themselvea to the task of exploring the caverns from which issues the permanent supply of the Dog Eiver. After great labour and repeated expeditions they succeeded in penetrating to a distance of three-quarters of a mile into the heart of the mountain ; but as they passed onward from lake to torrent, now under lofty dome, and again through narrow and tortuous channels, the water was undiminished in its volume, and finally a roaring cataract barred their progress and forbade them to search farther into the secret of the living stream.
So is it that life, after all our inquiries into its nature and origin, remains hidden from us. We are conscious of its existence, we can see its effects, but in itself it is a mystery, even as the great Giver of it, tlie Fountain of Life, dwells in thick darkness. We can only say, " In his hand is the breath of all living." In Him we " live, and move, and have our being." ^
(2) The fountain is free and full in its flow. The people of the East call water the " gift of God " ; and so throughout Scripture the invitation is repeated in various forms : " Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters." " If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink." For " the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." This stream of spiritual life, though in its origin far above the level of human
' A. Maclarcn.
■■' J. Robt'rt-son, iu Sunday Mayazhu, 1881, p. 703.
PSALM XXXVI. 9 143
nature, bursts forth in our nature, and at a level within reach of the poorest and the vilest. At the lowest point of the humiliation of the Son of God it was manifested. Though springing from the bosom of the eternal hills it runs in the valleys, and he that would have life must first know the power of death. The Eock of Ages cleft for us is the point at which we receive the gift of Lrod, and we receive it without money and without price.
^ The water of the fountain will flow of its own necessity. It is in its very nature that it must flow if only we do not wilfully hinder it. It is always flowing into an open heart.^
(3) The fountain of life brings life wherever it flows.
^ One of the most striking of all the fountains of Syria is the fountain of Fijeh, in Anti- Lebanon, which furnishes at one spring from the solid rock three-fourths of the waters of the river Barada, the ancient Abana of Damascus. The traveller pitches his tent under the walnut-trees that overhang the fountain ; lulled to sleep by it at night, he hears it at every waking hour ; and when the rising sun pierces through the thick foliage its rays fall upon the sparkling river, rushing on with undiminished strength. By night and by day, when swollen by the rains of winter, and after all the snow on the highest heights has disappeared, for six long months of drought, the fountain pours forth its stream of life. And the nodding oleanders dip their flowered heads in its stream, and the poplars and walnut-trees draw their deep life from its waters, and orchards and gardens flourish along its banks, and it scatters life and beauty wherever it goes. But let us leave for a little the narrow valley in which it holds its course, and as we bend oft' to the left and its sound fades away on the ear, let us observe how- vegetation gets scantier and poorer, till, within sight and almost within hearing of the river, we stand in a dry, parched wilderness. Proceeding still across the arid waste we reach the summit of a hill that is burnt up by the summer sun, and we have before us a view that is unparalleled in the East, perhaps unequalled in the world. A plain of vast extent is bounded on all sides by barren deserts, but in its centre, embedded in a belt of living green, is a city of a hundred and fifty thousand souls, for the river is there, and whithersoever the river comes there is life.^