They climbed the Eastern slope Which leads from Jordan up to Olivet; And they who earlier dreams could not forget
Were flushed with eager hope.
They gained the crest, and lo ! The marble temple in the sunset gleamed. And golden light upon its turrets streamed,
As on the stainless snow.
They shout for joy of heart. But He, the King, looks on as one in grief; To heart o'erburdened weeping brings relief,
The unbidden tear-drops start:
"Ah, had'st thou known, e'en thou In this thy day the things that make for peace;** Alas ! no strivings now can work release.
The night is closing now.
ST. LUKE XIX. 41, 42 399
"On all thy high estate, Thy temple-courts and palaces of pride, Thy pleasant pictures and thy markets wide,
Is written now 'Too late.'
Time was there might have been The waking up to life of higher mood, The knowledge of the only Wise and Good,
Within thy portals seen;
But now the past is past, The last faint light by blackening clouds is hid; Thy heaped-up sins each hope of grace forbid,
The sky is all o'ercast;
And soon from out the cloud Will burst the storm that lays thee low in dust, Till shrine and palace, homes of hate and lust
Are wrapt in fiery shroud." ^
Let us consider : — I. Jerusalem's Day of Privilege. II. Her Kej action of the Light. III. The Tears of the Kedeemer.
I.
The Day of Privilege.
1. There are seasons of special privilege. Jesus here speaks of " a time of visitation." Properly speaking, that means an overseeing. That is the strict meaning of the original word. It IS thus used to describe the office of an Apostle, in the Acts of the Apostles, and the office of a bishop, in St. Paul's First Epistle to Timothy; and, from this employment of the word in Scripture, it has come to be applied to the court — for such it is — which from time to time, a bishop is bound by the old law of the Church to hold, in order to review the state of his diocese. But this word is more commonly applied in the Bible to God's activity than to man's ; and a visitation of God is sometimes penal or judicial, and sometimes it is a season of grace and mercy. The
^ E. H. Plumptre.
400 THE IMPENITENT CITY
day of visitation of which St. Peter speaks, in which the heathen shall glorify God for the good works of Christians, is, we cannot doubt, the day of judgment. And Job uses the Hebrew equivalent to describe the heavy trials which had been sent to test his patience. On the other hand, in the language of Scripture, God visits man in grace and mercy — as He did the Israelites in Egypt after Joseph's death ; as He visited Sarah in one generation, and Hannah in another ; as He visited His flock, to use Zechariah's expression, in Babylon. It was such a visitation as this that our Lord had in view. He Himself had held it ; and when He spoke it was not yet concluded.
(1) This visitation was unohtricsive. — In the Advent of the Eedeemer there was nothing outwardly remarkable to the men of
V that day. It was almost nothing. Of all the historians of that period few indeed are found to mention it. This is a thing which we at this day can scarcely understand; for to us the blessed Advent of our Lord is the brightest page in the world's history ; but to them it was far otherwise. Eemember for one moment what the Advent of our Lord was to all outward appearance. He seemed, let it be said reverently, to the rulers of those days,
\y a fanatical freethinker. They heard of His miracles, but they appeared nothing remarkable to them ; there was nothing there on which to fasten their attention. They heard that some of the populace had been led away, and now and then, it may be, some of His words reached their ears, but to them they were hard to be understood, full of mystery ; or else they roused every evil passion in their hearts, so stern and uncompromising was the morality they taught. They put aside these words in that brief period, and the day of grace passed.
^ There was nothing of the outward pageant of royalty to greet the son of David. There were no guards, no palace, no throne, no royal livery, no currency bearing the king's image and superscription. All these things had passed into the hands of the foreign conqueror, or, in parts of the country, into the hands of princes who had the semblance of independence without its reality. There was not even the amount of circumstance and state which attends the reception of a visitor to some modern institution — a visitor who only represents the majesty of some old prerogative or of some earthly throne. As He, Israel's true King, visits Jerusalem, He almost reminds us of the descendant of an ancient
ST. LUKE XIX. 41, 42 401
and fallen family returning in secret to the old home of his race. Everything is for him instinct with precious memories. Every stone is dear to him, while he himself is forgotten. He wanders about unnoticed, unobserved, or with only such notice as courtesy may accord to a presumed stranger. He is living amid thoughts which are altogether unshared by men whom he meets, as he moves silently and sadly among the records of the past, and he passes away from sight as he came, with his real station and character generally unrecognized, if indeed he is not dismissed as an upstart with contempt and insult. So it was with Jerusalem and its Divine Visitor. " He came unto his own, and his own received him not." ^