Spurgeon (C. H.), Metropolitan Tahernacle Pulpit, xxxiii. (1887) No. 1,
987 ; Ivi. (1910) No. 3, 222. Taylor (W. M.), The Silence of Jesus, 17. Thomas (J.), The Dijnamic of the Cross, 86. Trench (R. C), Sermons in Westminster Abbey, 163. Van Dyke (H.), The Reality of Religion, 99. Waddell (R.), Behold the Lamb of God, 107, 121. Webb-Peploe (H. W.), Calls to Holiness, 11. Biblical World, xxxvii. 30 (Robinson). Christian World Pulpit, xxxvi. 233 (Symes) ; xxxix. 75 (Peyton) ; xli.
251 (Abbott) ; Ixx. 74 (Silvester) ; Ixxviii. 241 (Selbio).
The Lamb of God.
On the morrow he seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold, the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world !— John i. 29.
1. The importance of the Baptist's ministry becomes fully intelli- gible only when his teaching is placed over against the character- istics of the religious thought of his day. It is no far-fetched analogy to liken his work, in one respect, to that of the Eeformers of the sixteenth century. He made a great attempt to go back from the accretions of a later age to the purer doctrine of the Scriptures.
Pharisaism had, both directly and indirectly, done vast damage to the spiritual life of Palestine. It had "bound" upon men's aching backs " heavy burdens and grievous to be borne." Eighteousness had been made to consist in the punctilious dis- charge of a multitude of ceremonial obligations. The conception of God as a loving and gracious Father had to no small extent been thrust into the background, while in the forefront of Pharisaic teaching was the idea of " a servile relationship " — God as the Master, man as the servant who was required to perform certain duties, and had a right, in return, to the Divine favour. A free, healthy spiritual life was thus made impossible, while encouragement was given, on the one hand to religious self- complacency and self-confidence, and on the other to hypocrisy, and equivocation, and subterfuge.
The effect of such encouragement was only too plain in con- nection with the popular anticipations of the Divine Kingdom. These anticipations always included the triumph of Israel and the overthrow of the heathen ; but they took little or no account of Israel's own unworthiness, of Israel's own moral and spiritual failure, of Israel's own utter need of reconciliation and re-
72 THE LAMB OF GOD
generation. The Judaism of that day failed to realize what sin must mean for God's chosen people. Controlled to a great extent by the Pharisees, it insisted with wearisome urgency upon offering, ablution, fast, or tithe, but it " left undone the weightier matters of the law." It refused to contemplate the possibility of a day of wrath coming for Israel.
At a critical hour in the fortunes of the nation John the Baptist sought to create a stricter, juster, healthier sense of the requirements of real religion. His teaching was the strong and uncompromising corrective of the prevailing fallacies and errors. He attacked with all his might the fabric of belief in privilege which confronted him like some enemy's stronghold. He told his auditors that their Abrahamic descent would afford them no refuge from the judgment which was impending. A new life ! A new mind ! Purity of heart and conscience ! Self -separation from the guilty past ! — herein lay the hope of salvation. It was the teaching of the Old Testament at its highest and best. The prophets had ever laid stress upon the renewal of the inner life through the operation of the Divine grace ; and it was this idea that animated all the ministry of the appointed Forerunner of the Lord.
Thine, Baptist, was the cry, In ages long gone by, Heard in clear accents by the Prophet's ear; As if 'twere thine to wait, And with imperial state Herald some Eastern monarch's proud career; Who thus might march his host in full array, And speed through trackless wilds his unresisted way.
But other task hadst thou Than lofty hills to bow. Make straight the crooked, the rough places plain: Thine was the harder part To smooth the human heart. The wilderness where sin had fixed his reign ; To make deceit his mazy wiles forego. Bring down higli vaulting pride, and lay ambition low.
Such, Baptist, was thy care, That no objection there,
ST. JOHN I. 29 73
Might check the progress of the King of kings; But that a clear highway- Might welcome the array Of Heavenly graces which His Presence brings; And where Eepentance had prepared the road, There Faith might enter in, and Love to man and God.^
2. Two utterances mark the flood-tide of St. John's prophetic inspiration ; for when he says of his greater successor, " He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with fire," the very term " baptize " connects his thought with " the divers washings " under the old dispensation, while the words " with the Holy Ghost and with fire " fore-herald that ministration of the Spirit which was ushered in on the day of Pentecost. So, again, when he exclaimed, "Behold, the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world ! " the phraseology in which he describes the great propiti- ation of Christ is seen at once to be derived from the typical sacrifices with which as the son of a priest he was perfectly familiar ; while the mention of " the world " gives a wider range to the efficacy of the Atonement than the common Jew would have assigned to it, and is the prelude of the great commission, "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature." In the former instance it would almost seem that he had received a vision of the Upper Eoom at the moment when, to the disciples assembled in it, there appeared " cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them." In the latter he appears to have had a revelation of the uplifted Christ on Calvary drawing all men unto Him.