of disciples? The last to leave the place where the body of Jesus was laid, as the first to haRten to the tom? when the sabbath is past, are the holy women (vers. 66, 66). ,ve see them on Friday evening watching the tomb, and observiug how the lifeless fo':11 was at~ended to, and then hastening into the city, that they may make ready the spices an_d 01_ntments for tmbalming before the sabbath began. Their love is stronger than their faith. 'l'he heart's yearning is sometimes more than the heart's believing. A very dreary sabbath that was to all the disciples. "They rested according to the com- mandment" (ver. 5G). A commandment-rest, and nothing more. \Vhnt conflicts of thought and affection! What desolation of spirit I Pcter-wli;1t a strange sabbath it must have been to him! Only one thing for all. 'l'he sense of relation to the crucified Jesus can never be effaced; but it has no glow of hope, it has only the darkneRs of e. memory, the gloom of a despair. "They rested on the sabbath; but" (the first word of the twenty-fourth chapter should be " but" rather than" now"); but the running of the spirit, the movement of the love, is only towar,ls the garden and its sepulchre. Is it not the type of Church, of Christian, wanting the power of the Holy Ghost? Work for Christ, loyal but cheerless, without sight of his ii;lory, or waiting for his advent- this is sug~estcd by the preparation of the spices and ointments, and the sabbath- keeping but without the true spiritual sabbath, tho joy of the Lord; ordinances observed, but with no inner alacrity, only because of the commandment. 'l'his is sug~este,l by the unrestful resting on that seventh day. Not yet is there the anointing of the Roly Ghost, the power of the Resurrection. III. WHAT HAPPE~"ED AS IT CONCERNS 'l'RE WORLD WHICH CRUCIFIED mM. Is it not strange that what was absent from faith as a hope was present to unbelief as e. fear'.-' Those who had crucified the Lord have their memory wonderfully quickened, 'l'hey recall (Matt. x.xvii. 62-64) some words which he uttered nearly three years lx:fore, about a temple which he would raise in three days, ~nd their dread gives a force to these words. Sabbath thoagh it be, the chief priests and Pharisees seek an audience of Pi late, and beg him to "make the sepulchre sure until the third day, lest his dis- ciples come by night, and steal him away, and say to the people, He is risen from the dead: and so the last error be worse than the first." 'l'hey are told to go their way and do as they choose; and hence the sealing of the great stone and the setting of the watch. ls not all now secure? Have they not for ever dispelled the illusions as to the Deceiver? So thought the Jewish authorities; so men think still. 'l'hey are always crying out that the Christian religion is effete, that the Christian's Uhrist has been slain. ".Are there any Christians still?" asked a notable sceptic some years ago. 0 purblind souls! What avail your watch and seal? He whom you call Deceiver is yet alive; and there are compunctions of heart, convictions of guilt and wrong-doing, and needs of spiritual restoration and inward rectitude, which will assert themselves against all your philosophies I Pentecost days are never far distant days ~hen e. mighty remorse rolls over the minds of men, and the cry which never ~an be silenced, because it is the cry of the human soul in its most solemn hours, and with reference to its deepest wants bursts through lips which are quivering with a genuine earnestness, "What shall we do to be sa'l'ed?" On that sabbath the world religious and irreligious holds its rest. It cannot altogether forget; lmt it holds its Paschal fea~ts, and complies with all the etiquette of these feasts, as if there were no Calvary, as if no Jesus h~d lived and died. And is not this the feature of all times? Do not men push then· ambitious projects, scheme and toil, spend their strength, and hold their sabbath8 without the living consciousness of the Christ who died for their sins? :May not we ounselvea say- • I sin; and heaven and earth go round As if no dreadful deed were doue, }J if Christ's blood had never 11.owed To hinder sin or to atone "1
There ls no word more solemn than that (Heh. vi. 4-6) in which the sacred writer reminds us that if those who have tasted the Word of God and the powers of the world to come fall away, they pass from the fold of the Church into the ranks o~ Christ's enemies, seeing "they cr~cify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put lum to au open aha.me." ctt. xlttn. 1-5G.J Tt1E GOSPEL ACCOit!JING TO S1'. LUKE. 240