1 J. M. Gibbon.
ST. MATTHEW xxvi. 28 433
life is excluded from its scope ; and as is the measure, grade, and perfection of life, such is the measure, grade, and perfection of talvation.1
5. "Shed for many." The terms of the covenant are com- prehensive. The cup commemorates the supreme moment when the barrier between God and man was swept away, and the access to communion with God was opened by "a new and living way." It bids all men remember that the Divine life and love are free for all who will receive them. Whosoever will may come and enter into the covenant of God in Christ. None are excluded save those who exclude themselves. Here is our comfort. Salvation does not rest on our goodness of character or on our worthiness of conduct, but on the covenant relation- ship in Christ. Such an immense debt will prevent us from taking liberties with our life, and will continually inspire in us a devotion to serve as our talents allow and our opportunities permit.
T| Jesus died to "bring in the Kingdom of God. That is one thing we can be sure of. Now, what was this Kingdom of God as conceived by Him ? Subjectively considered, it was the reign of God in men's hearts, and to establish it thus involved the bring- ing of men to God, so that His Spirit should possess their hearts and they be made the true children and heirs of God. The Cross was meant to be effectual for this. Its aim was ethical, and nothing short of that which would lead to an ethical Salvation would be the bringing in of the Kingdom of God. But the Kingdom had also an objective aspect. As such, it was the Kingdom of God's Grace ; it was something that should come from God as His great gift to men; it was the drawing nigh of God to the sinful, and as yet unrepentant, world, with the proclamation of Forgiveness, nay, with the assurance of it as the foundation of a solemn Covenant made with men ; and it was only through the coming of the Kingdom in this objective way that it could come effectually, or, in its power, subjectively. Christ therefore intended that His Cross should bring to men the assurance of the Divine Forgiveness. . . . The Divine Forgiveness or Eemission of Sins that comes to men through the Cross is not the Forgiveness of individual sinners on their Eepentance (which was always open to men), but the Forgiveness of God going forth to the whole sinful world, in order to lead men to Eepentance and to make them
1 F. J. A. Hort, The Way, The Truth, The Life, 100. ST. MATT. — 28
434 THE BLOOD OF THE COVENANT
members of God's Kingdom. It comes as the proclamation of a Divine amnesty to men, but it is of no avail unless it is accepted by them so as to make them loyal members of the Kingdom, and followers of that Eighteousness which alone can give final entrance into it.1
1 W. L. Walker, Tlu Cross and The Kingdom, 241.
Christ's Parting Charge,
43S
Literature.
Broughton (L. G.), Table Tallcs of Jesus, 96.
Brown (C), The Message of God, 46.
Brown (H. D.), Christ's Divinity School, 68.
Campbell (R. J.), New Theology Sermons, 50.
Cross (J.), Old Wine and New, 185.
Dyke (H. van), The Open Door, 85.
Fremantle (W. H.), The Gospel of the Secular Life, 91.
Greenhough (J. G.), Christian Festivals and Anniversaries, 123.
Ingram (A. F. W.), The Gospel in Action, 45.
John (Griffith), A Voice from China, 38.
Liddon (H. P.), Easter in St. Paul's, 393.
Morgan (G. C), The Missionary Manifesto, 29.
Moule (H. C. G.), Christ's Witness to the Life to Come, 135.
Newman (C. E.), The Bible in the Pulpit, 225.
Simpson (J. G.), Christian Ideals, 309.
Smellie (A.), In the Secret Place, 3.
Stubbs (C. W.), Christus Imperator, 18.
Terry (G. F.), The Old Theology in the New Age, 119.
Vaughan (C. J.), University Sermons, 233.
Virgin (S. H.), Spiritual Sanity, 47.
Welldon (J. E. C), The Fire upon the Altar, 54.
Cambridge Review, xx., Supplement No. 510 (F. H. Chase).
Christian World Pulpit, viii. 100 (H. W.Beecher) ; xliii. 300 (R. Rainy) ;
lv. 248 (C. Gore) ; lxviii. 67 (J. Foster) ; lx.xi. 309 (C. Brown). Churchman's Pulpit : Pt. 82, Mission Work, 183 (W. Leitch). Record of Christian Work, xxxii. (1913) 439 (J. 11. Jowetl).
4*
Christ's Parting Charge.
And Jesus came to them and spake unto them, saying, All authority hath been given unto me in heaven and on earth. Go ye therefore, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost : teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I commanded you : and lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. — Matt, xxviii. 18-20.
1. In Galilee as in Jerusalem the Eisen Saviour manifested Himself to the representatives of His universal Church. The brief summary of the history which St. Matthew gives calls up before our eyes a scene of singular majesty and awe. The time we are not told ; we may conjecture that it was again a Lord's Day, the day which even then was becoming hallowed as the weekly memorial of the resurrection, the birthday of the Lord into the new life, and the birthday of His people in Him. The place is " the mountain " — the mountain of the Beatitudes, or the mountain where once He had fed the crowds. The occasion differs from all those which had gone before. At other times He had appeared at most to a handful of His followers. Now, if we may interpret the hint of the Evangelist by the statement of St. Paul, there were with the Eleven five hundred of the brethren. At other times He had come suddenly and un- expectedly. Now the place is of His appointment, the meeting of the disciples by His command. It is, to use a phrase of the Epistles, the first Christian Ecclesia — the conscious gather- ing of those who belong to Him into His presence as the one centre and secret of their common life. He comes not suddenly, as before, but as a looked for friend approaching from the distance.