The Pulpit Commentary — Luke — Volume 1 — Section 60

HOMILIES BY VARIOUS AUTHORS. Ver. 7.-(Jhrist eru'luded. Little did the occupants of that inn at Bethlehem imagine who it was they were turning away when Joseph and Mary sought admission there. They did not realize, for they did not know, whom they were excluding. Practically they were declining to receive, not only the Messiah of their country, but the Saviour of the world. What they did in guiltless ignorance, men too often do in wilful and culpable rejection.; Jesus Christ is sometimes exclnded by men- L FROM TilEIB THEORIES OF THE DIVINE GOVERNMENT. They have constructed such 11 perfect theory of government out of the operation of physical law, that there is no room at all for a.n interposing Saviour. The whole space of their kingdom of truth is occupied. , IL FROll TREIB ESTIil.ATE OF TREIB INTELLECTUAL NEOESBITIES, They believe that, by applying their knowledge, their reasoning faculty, their intuitive powers, to nature and to mankind, they can rl'&Ch all the conclusions there is any necessity to attain. All that is over and above thi.B is redundant; there is no room in their sense of need for a Divine Teacher. Well did the Master say that to enter the kingdom of heaven we must become as a little child. The self-sufficiency of a complacent maturity thinks it has nothing to learn; it bare its doors; it sends the light of the world elsewhere; its little "inn" of knowledge and aspiration is occupied from floor to roof. III. FnoH TREIB Et;Tl.114.A'l'E OF HAN'S SPIRITUAL WANTS. Very many are they who are not unwilling to welcome a. Guide, but who have no room for a Saviour; for they have no seuee of sin. They want to know which of the commandments they have broken. It does not occur to tLem that they have been owing to their great Creator, to thoir heavenly Father, to their Divine Friend, ten thousand talents of reverence, obedience, gratitude; and that they have been only offering to him a few poor pence, or that they Lave had nothing at a.11 to pay. They a.re not conscious of a. deep and wide gulf betwt:en their indebtedness and their discharge, and they go on their way not knowing that "the God in whose hand their breath ie, rind whose are all their ways, they have not glorified;" toot they have sinned against 11he Lord, and need his a.bounding mercy. 'J'Ley, therefore, have 1.10 room for Christ, the Divine Pror,itiation, the great Reconciler of l.l.Jr,u t'l God. oR. TT. 1-62,] TIJF: GOSPEL AO.JORDING TO ST. LUKK 61