^ " God is not the God of dead beings but of living beings, for all live unto him." All do not live to us; to us the dead are dead, but to God the dead are living ; all live unto Him ; as He sees men there are none dead. In proof of this, witness the resurrection of Lazarus. What was that miracle ? Merely this ;
^ Stephen Sylvester Thomas.
ST. JOHN XI. 25, 26 471
God making the dead, but really living, Lazarus visible to us. To Christ Himself Lazarus was alive; to his sisters he was dead. Christ comforted them by showing them he was alive. He called the soul back to the old frame it had worn and so made Lazarus visible again. He had not been dead. Jesus spoke to him. He had a secret of communication which we have not, and having the secret He called back the soul to the old body, that He might for ever prove to us that our beloved dead are in reality alive. We have but lost the means of communication. Christ asked Lazarus to come forth and show himself that we might be assured of this truth. " I am the resurrection, and the life." ^
^ When the chemist has produced in his laboratory a certain desired and attested scientific result, when he has mastered the secret of some new process in nature and exhibited the product in a single sample, the problem is solved, the result is guaranteed. He may now set up his factory and invest his capital, and invite the co-operation of wealth and labour, and build up a vast collective industry with full assurance of faith upon the evidence gathered from his crucible, upon the security afforded by the laws of nature that what they have once allowed and yielded, they will always yield to the action of the same cause ; and there lies in his hand the power to do a million times what he has actually effected once. The raising of Lazarus was a prompt and a majestic verification on the part of the Lord Jesus Christ of His claim to be the destined Eaiser of the dead, a pledge and earnest of all that was to follow.2
n.
The Eternal Application.
The miraculous resurrection of Lazarus was simply a symbol of a far more important truth than the mere restoration of an earthly life conveys. It was a visual illustration of a fact which is too inward and subtle to come under the eye of observers at all. If, as indeed we are bound to do, we strive to set before ourselves with vivid particularity the various emotions which are crowded into the narrative — the bitter regret for help unbrought, the sudden awakening of vague hope, the mysterious grief of the Lord Himself, the awful suspense before the opened grave — ^it must be that we may the better realize that Truth which calms and satisfies them all. The miracle is nothing more than a translation
1 D. Fairweather. * G. G. Findlay, The Things Above, 149.
472 THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE
of an e terra! lesson into an outward and intelligible form. The command of sovereign power, " Lazarus come forth," is but one partial and transitory fulfilment of the absolute and unchanging gospel, " I am the resurrection, and the life."
L I am the Resurrection, and the Life.
1. " / am the resurrection, and the life." — " I am " in point of time, and also in respect of essential being.
(1) In point of time. — Christ does not think of immortality as we do. The thought of immortality is with Him involved in, and absorbed by, the idea of life. Life is a present thing and its continuance a matter of course. When life is full, and abundant, and glad, the present is enough, and past and future are unthought of. It is life, therefore, rather than immortaUty that Christ speaks of ; a present not a future good ; an expansion of the nature now, which necessarily carries with it the idea of permanence.
^ It is the devastating mistake of ages of imperfect faith that the emphasis and crisis of life is carried forward into the next world, robbing this of its dignity, disrobing this of its loftiest motives, cheapening by withholding from it its proper fruitions. There is no juster word used among men than " probation," and none more perverted. Life is indeed probation, but the judgment that decides is in perpetual session ; not for one moment is it adjourned ; every hour it renders the awards that angels fulfil ; daily and forever does the Christ of humanity judge according to the deeds done in this present life of humanity, and send to right or left hand destinies. There is no day of eternity more august than that which now is. There is nothing in the way of conse- quence to be awaited that is not now acting, no sweetness that may not now be tasted, no bitterness that is not now felt. What comes after will be but the increment of what now is, for even now we are in the eternal world. The Kingdom of heaven has come and is ever coming ; its powers and processes, its rewards and punishments are to-day in full activity, mounting into ever higher expression, but never more real in one moment of time than in another.^