2 R. C. Gillie, The Soul with a View, 13. 8 D. J. Burrell, The Wondrous Cross, 118.
268 OPEN WINDOWS
niunity. There were Jews in the alien city where he ruled in magnificence; there were no doubt informal gatherings which were the rudimentary beginnings of the synagogue, but Jerusalem with its Temple and its sacrifices was representative of the whole race in its religious aspect. The narrator means such thoughts to pass through our mind when we read of the lattices thrust back at the hour of prayer. This man cared not simply for his own soul or for his fellow-exiles but for his whole race, and the tie which bound together his nation was religious even more than racial. Jerusalem, then, was to Daniel what the Church is to us to-day — the focal point of the Divine influence upon earth. That influence is in humanity everywhere but it flows most freely and most fully in the fellowship of believing people we call the Church. We find Christ there in a perfectly definite sense. " Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them," said He who is the Light that lighteth every man. Togetherness accentuates His presentness. The faith and the faithfulness of Christ's people make them in their fellowship the natural and chosen dwelling-place of the Spirit of God, who once deigned to glorify the Temple of Jerusalem with His over-shadow- ing might. The Church of Christ is our Jerusalem.
Tf How blessed, how untiring, the joy of this great companion- ship [of the Christian Church], Those who once had known all the loneliness of aliens, the misery of strangers and exiles, without any holy commonwealth, without any hope, are now no more strangers, and foreigners, but are " fellow-citizens with the saints and of the household of God ; are built into a holy temple, fitly framed together," laid upon the strong foundations of the Apostles and the prophets. They have a city in heaven, which is their dear motherland ; " Jerusalem on high, which is the mother of us all." There their citizenship lies ; and on earth they walk in all the virtues of the holy citizenship, in the habits of delightful intercourse, in the beauty of fellowship ; " with all lowliness and meekness, forbearing one another in love, endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace."
It was no dead metaphor — no vague allegory — to those who heard the Lord and the Apostles tell of a family of God — of a household of Christ — of a country, a kingdom, a holy nation — of a temple fitly framed — of a body compacted and entire. Yet what meaning, what reality can our broken Christianity give to words like these ?
DANIEL vi. 10 269
And are we content that they should have no meaning ? Are we content to shut ourselves up in the narrow question, " Am I saved ? " Shall we fasten our eyes on nothing but our own private interest in Christ — our own personal receipt for getting to Heaven, as if that were something that concerned no one but ourselves ? l
3. Moreover, Jerusalem was to Daniel the ideal city, the city of daring hope. Piercing the shadowy future, he saw that its destiny was high, its career by no means ended ; it was no mere melancholy survival of shattered hopes. From Jerusalem up to God and from God down to Jerusalem — these two paths the eyes of the prophet followed daily. God and Jerusalem he saw together, and each helped him to see the other.
^[ To different eyes the vision will take diverse forms. Blake speaks of "a spiritual, fourfold London" of which he dreamed. He was not much concerned with the material aspect of the city. He knew that this would be admirable if the dwellings of the Spirit were well formed and nobly conceived and conscientiously built together. Here is his description of the real, essential London, of which streets and squares are but the material casing, revealing or obscuring it. " Lo, the stones are pity, and the bricks well wrought affections, enamelled with love and kindness; the tiles engraven gold, labour of merciful hands; the beams and rafters are forgiveness, the mortar and cement of the work tears of honesty; the nails and the screws and iron braces are well wrought blandishments, and well contrived words; firm fixing, never forgotten, always comforting the remembrance ; the floors humility ; the ceilings devotion ; the hearths thanksgiving." Blake's words buried for a century in obscurity have become a watchword to-day —
I will not cease from Mental Fight, Nor shall my Sword sleep in my hand, Till we have built Jerusalem In England's green and pleasant Land.2
1 H. Scott Holland.
9 R. C. Gillie, The Soul with a View, 22.
A Promised Inheritance.
«7»
Literature.
Bonar (H.), Light and Truth : Old Testament, 325.
Church (R. W.), Village Sermons, iii. 332.
Grant (W.), Christ Our Hope, 32.
Laird (J.), Sermons, 78.
Maclaren (A.), The Beatitudes and other Sermons, 253.
„ „ Expositions : Ezekiel to Malachi, 84.
Rainy (R.), Sojourning with God, 37. Raleigh (A.), From Dawn to the Perfect Day, 401. Vaughan (J.), Sermons (Brighton Pulpit), viii. (1871), No. 747. Wilkes (H.), The Bright and Morning Star, 62. Christian World Pulpit, lxxii. 277 (W. E. Beet). Churchman's Pulpit : Twenty -second Sunday after Trinity, xiii. 190