‘Correct, rebuke and encourage’

(2 Ti 4:2) 2 preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. ESV

     When you crave acceptance and approval, you end up being controlled by those you’re supposed to lead. Paul recognised this. That’s why he instructed Titus: ‘Teach…and encourage your people…correcting them when necessary as one who has every right to do so. Don’t let anyone think that what you say is not important’ (Titus 2:15 TLB). Afraid of causing upheaval in the ranks, insecure leaders agonise over decisions and assume responsibility for other people’s emotional reactions. They don’t realise that when you’re doing what you should be doing and others don’t agree, that’s their problem, unless you make it yours. A mature leader deals with disappointment and keeps a good attitude; they’re willing to face the music even when they don’t like the tune. Think: when you warn your children about putting their hand on a hot stove, it’s not your responsibility to make them enjoy hearing it, right? Hopefully, as they mature they’ll understand. But the truth is, some people won’t like hearing the word ‘no’ regardless of how old they get! But we all need to hear it from time to time; otherwise, we’ll never be happy with anything other than getting our own way - and that means getting nowhere, or getting into trouble. Paul, who was training Timothy for leadership, told him, ‘Correct, rebuke and encourage - with great patience and careful instruction.’ Correct people when they’re wrong, rebuke them when they’re stubborn, encourage them when they struggle, be patient as they learn and grow, and make sure your instructions are clear and understandable. That’s what good leaders do - and the only way you learn it is by doing it.

Jer 40-42
Titus 1

UCB The Word For Today

     On October 23, 1913, President Woodrow Wilson issued a Proclamation of a National Day of Thanksgiving and Prayer. He wrote: “The season is at hand… to turn in praise and thanksgiving to Almighty God for His manifold… blessings to us as a nation. The year that has just passed has been marked… by… His gracious and beneficent providence…. We have seen the practical completion of a great work at the Isthmus of Panama…. ‘Righteousness exalteth a nation’ and ‘peace on earth, good will towards men’ furnish the only foundation upon which can be built the lasting achievements of the human spirit.”

     God’s object with us is not to give just so many things and withhold so many; it is to place us in the tissue of His kingdom. His best answer to us is to raise us to the power of answering Him. The reason why He does not answer our prayer is because we do not answer Him and His prayer. And His prayer was, as though Christ did beseech us, “Be ye reconciled.” He would lift us to confident business with Him, to commerce of loving wills. The painter wrestles with the sitter till he gives him back himself, and there is a speaking likeness. So man with God, till God surrender His secret. He gives or refuses things, therefore, with a view to that communion alone, and on the whole. It is that spiritual personal end, and not an iron necessity, that rules His course. Is there not a constant spiritual interaction between God and man as free spiritual beings? How that can be is one of the great philosophic problems. But the fact that it is is of the essence of faith. It is the unity of our universe. Many systems try to explain how human freedom and human action are consistent with God’s omnipotence and omniscience. None succeed. How secondary causes like man are compatible with God as the Universal and Ultimate Cause is not rationally plain. But there is no practical doubt that they are compatable. And so it is with the action of man on God in prayer. We may perhaps, for the present, put it thus, that we cannot change the will of God, which is grace, and which even Christ never changed but only revealed or effected; but we can change the intention of God, which is a manner of treatment, in the interest of grace, according to the situation of the hour.

     If we are guided by the Bible we have much ground for this view of prayer. Does not Christ set more value upon importunity than on submission? “Knock, and it shall be opened.” I would refer also not only to the parable of the unjust judge, but to the incident of the Syrophenician woman, where her wit, faith, and importunity together did actually change our Lord’s intention and break His custom. There there is Paul beseeching the Lord thrice for a boon; and urging us to be instant, insistent, continual in prayer. We have Jacob wrestling. We have Abraham pleading, yea, haggling, with God for Sodom. We have Moses interceding for Israel and asking God to blot his name out of the book of life, if that were needful to save Israel. We have Job facing God, withstanding Him, almost bearding Him, and extracting revelation. And we have Christ’s own struggle with the Father in Gethsemane.

     It is a wrestle on the greatest scale—all manhood taxed as in some great war, or some great negotiation of State. And the effect is exhaustion often. No, the result of true, prayer is not always peace.

--- Forsyth, P. T. (1848-1921).

He who wept beside the grave of Lazarus
     could never be the antagonist of tears.
--- George H. Morrison

Human life includes some necessary suffering.
--- Carl Young


I just did what I did and I still am. It makes you unpopular, maybe for a lifetime, but I'd rather do that than be popular and doubt what I am.
--- Robert Barnes

     CHAPTER 8.

     How Caesar Raised Banks Round About The Upper City [Mount Zion] And When They Were Completed, Gave Orders That The Machines Should Be Brought. He Then Possessed Himself Of The Whole City.

     1. Now when Caesar perceived that the upper city was so steep that it could not possibly be taken without raising banks against it, he distributed the several parts of that work among his army, and this on the twentieth day of the month Lous [Ab]. Now the carriage of the materials was a difficult task, since all the trees, as I have already told you, that were about the city, within the distance of a hundred furlongs, had their branches cut off already, in order to make the former banks. The works that belonged to the four legions were erected on the west side of the city, over against the royal palace; but the whole body of the auxiliary troops, with the rest of the multitude that were with them, [erected their banks] at the Xystus, whence they reached to the bridge, and that tower of Simon which he had built as a citadel for himself against John, when they were at war one with another.

     2. It was at this time that the commanders of the Idumeans got together privately, and took counsel about surrendering up themselves to the Romans. Accordingly, they sent five men to Titus, and entreated him to give them his right hand for their security. So Titus thinking that the tyrants would yield, if the Idumeans, upon whom a great part of the war depended, were once withdrawn from them, after some reluctancy and delay, complied with them, and gave them security for their lives, and sent the five men back. But as these Idumeans were preparing to march out, Simon perceived it, and immediately slew the five men that had gone to Titus, and took their commanders, and put them in prison, of whom the most eminent was Jacob, the son of Sosas; but as for the multitude of the Idumeans, who did not at all know what to do, now their commanders were taken from them, he had them watched, and secured the walls by a more numerous garrison, Yet could not that garrison resist those that were deserting; for although a great number of them were slain, yet were the deserters many more in number. They were all received by the Romans, because Titus himself grew negligent as to his former orders for killing them, and because the very soldiers grew weary of killing them, and because they hoped to get some money by sparing them; for they left only the populace, and sold the rest of the multitude, 28with their wives and children, and every one of them at a very low price, and that because such as were sold were very many, and the buyers were few: and although Titus had made proclamation beforehand, that no deserter should come alone by himself, that so they might bring out their families with them, yet did he receive such as these also. However, he set over them such as were to distinguish some from others, in order to see if any of them deserved to be punished. And indeed the number of those that were sold was immense; but of the populace above forty thousand were saved, whom Caesar let go whither every one of them pleased.

     3. But now at this time it was that one of the priests, the son of Thebuthus, whose name was Jesus, upon his having security given him, by the oath of Caesar, that he should be preserved, upon condition that he should deliver to him certain of the precious things that had been reposited in the temple 29 came out of it, and delivered him from the wall of the holy house two candlesticks, like to those that lay in the holy house, with tables, and cisterns, and vials, all made of solid gold, and very heavy. He also delivered to him the veils and the garments, with the precious stones, and a great number of other precious vessels that belonged to their sacred worship. The treasurer of the temple also, whose name was Phineas, was seized on, and showed Titus the coats and girdles of the priests, with a great quantity of purple and scarlet, which were there reposited for the uses of the veil, as also a great deal of cinnamon and cassia, with a large quantity of other sweet spices, 30 which used to be mixed together, and offered as incense to God every day. A great many other treasures were also delivered to him, with sacred ornaments of the temple not a few; which things thus delivered to Titus obtained of him for this man the same pardon that he had allowed to such as deserted of their own accord.

     4. And now were the banks finished on the seventh day of the month Gorpieus, [Elul,] in eighteen days' time, when the Romans brought their machines against the wall. But for the seditious, some of them, as despairing of saving the city, retired from the wall to the citadel; others of them went down into the subterranean vaults, though still a great many of them defended themselves against those that brought the engines for the battery; yet did the Romans overcome them by their number and by their strength; and, what was the principal thing of all, by going cheerfully about their work, while the Jews were quite dejected, and become weak. Now as soon as a part of the wall was battered down, and certain of the towers yielded to the impression of the battering rams, those that opposed themselves fled away, and such a terror fell upon the tyrants, as was much greater than the occasion required; for before the enemy got over the breach they were quite stunned, and were immediately for flying away. And now one might see these men, who had hitherto been so insolent and arrogant in their wicked practices, to be cast down and to tremble, insomuch that it would pity one's heart to observe the change that was made in those vile persons. Accordingly, they ran with great violence upon the Roman wall that encompassed them, in order to force away those that guarded it, and to break through it, and get away. But when they saw that those who had formerly been faithful to them had gone away, [as indeed they were fled whithersoever the great distress they were in persuaded them to flee,] as also when those that came running before the rest told them that the western wall was entirely overthrown, while others said the Romans were gotten in, and others that they were near, and looking out for them, which were only the dictates of their fear, which imposed upon their sight, they fell upon their face, and greatly lamented their own mad conduct; and their nerves were so terribly loosed, that they could not flee away. And here one may chiefly reflect on the power of God exercised upon these wicked wretches, and on the good fortune of the Romans; for these tyrants did now wholly deprive themselves of the security they had in their own power, and came down from those very towers of their own accord, wherein they could have never been taken by force, nor indeed by any other way than by famine. And thus did the Romans, when they had taken such great pains about weaker walls, get by good fortune what they could never have gotten by their engines; for three of these towers were too strong for all mechanical engines whatsoever, concerning which we have treated above.

     5. So they now left these towers of themselves, or rather they were ejected out of them by God himself, and fled immediately to that valley which was under Siloam, where they again recovered themselves out of the dread they were in for a while, and ran violently against that part of the Roman wall which lay on that side; but as their courage was too much depressed to make their attacks with sufficient force, and their power was now broken with fear and affliction, they were repulsed by the guards, and dispersing themselves at distances from each other, went down into the subterranean caverns. So the Romans being now become masters of the walls, they both placed their ensigns upon the towers, and made joyful acclamations for the victory they had gained, as having found the end of this war much lighter than its beginning; for when they had gotten upon the last wall, without any bloodshed, they could hardly believe what they found to be true; but seeing nobody to oppose them, they stood in doubt what such an unusual solitude could mean. But when they went in numbers into the lanes of the city with their swords drawn, they slew those whom they overtook without and set fire to the houses whither the Jews were fled, and burnt every soul in them, and laid waste a great many of the rest; and when they were come to the houses to plunder them, they found in them entire families of dead men, and the upper rooms full of dead corpses, that is, of such as died by the famine; they then stood in a horror at this sight, and went out without touching any thing. But although they had this commiseration for such as were destroyed in that manner, yet had they not the same for those that were still alive, but they ran every one through whom they met with, and obstructed the very lanes with their dead bodies, and made the whole city run down with blood, to such a degree indeed that the fire of many of the houses was quenched with these men's blood. And truly so it happened, that though the slayers left off at the Evening, yet did the fire greatly prevail in the night; and as all was burning, came that eighth day of the month Gorpieus [Elul] upon Jerusalem, a city that had been liable to so many miseries during this siege, that, had it always enjoyed as much happiness from its first foundation, it would certainly have been the envy of the world. Nor did it on any other account so much deserve these sore misfortunes, as by producing such a generation of men as were the occasions of this its overthrow.

                Not a bit of it!

     If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away. --- 2 Cor. 5:17.

      Our Lord never nurses our prejudices, He mortifies them, runs clean athwart them. We imagine that God has a special interest in our particular prejudices; we are quite sure that God will never deal with us as we know He has to deal with other people. ‘God must deal with other people in a very stern way, but of course He knows that my prejudices are all right.’ We have to learn—‘Not a bit of it!’ Instead of God being on the side of our prejudices, He is deliberately wiping them out. It is part of our moral education to have our prejudices run straight across by His providence, and to watch how He does it. God pays no respect to anything we bring to Him; there is only one thing He wants of us, and that is our unconditional surrender. When we are born again, the Holy Spirit begins to work His new creation in us, and there will come a time when there is not a bit of the old order left; the old solemnity goes, the old attitude to things goes, and “all things are of God.” How are we going to get the life that has no lust, no self-interest, no sensitiveness to pokes, the love that is not provoked, that thinketh no evil, that is always kind? The only way is by allowing not a bit of the old life to be left, but only simple perfect trust in God, such trust that we no longer want God’s blessings, but only want Himself. Have we come to the place where God can withdraw His blessings and it does not affect our trust in Him? When once we see God at work, we will never bother our heads about things that happen, because we are actually trusting in our Father in Heaven Whom the world cannot see.

                At It

I think he sits at that strange table
  of Eddington's, that is not a table
  at all, but nodes and molecules
  pushing against molecules
  and nodes; and he writes there
  in invisible handwriting the instructions
  the genes follow. I imagine his
  face that is more the face
  of a clock, and the time told by it
  is now, though Greece is referred
  to and Egypt and empires
  not yet begun.
          And I would have
  things to say to this God
  at the judgement, storming at him,
  as Job stormed, with the eloquence
  of the abused heart. But there will be
  no judgement other than the verdict
  of his calculations, that abstruse
  geometry that proceeds eternally
  in the silence beyond right and wrong.

     In Maimonides’ description of the law of the heathen slave, there is a marked difference between action based on the legislative authority of God (din), and action stemming from the imitation of the God of creation. If an individual were to conduct himself on the basis of the strict requirements of the law, he would only refrain from treating the Hebrew slave harshly. The ethical responsibility toward the non-Jewish slave results from understanding how God is related to all of creation. The legal category of din channels one’s perception of God within the particular juridical relationship of God to Israel. The boundaries of one’s obligations are circumscribed by God’s legal revelation to the community of Israel. When the boundaries of man’s perception of God are expanded, he discovers that the very existence of all men reflects an ethical attribute of God. The boundaries of his ethical obligations, therefore, also change; he then finds himself unable to restrict his ethical responsibilities only to individuals who participate in the juridical relationship with God.

     The shift in man’s understanding of God which we have discussed in connection with the law of the non-Hebrew slave should serve as an explanatory model for the lifnim mi-shurat ha-din practice of the ḥasid. Knowledge of God as the Creator of all life affects halakhic practice both in terms of the scope of obligation (lifnim mi-shurat ha-din) and the motives for observance of the commandments (ahavah).

     He who lacks this knowledge of God is motivated to fulfill the commandments on the basis of the expectation of rewards and to follow only the strict requirements of din.

     The halakhic category of din can be understood as reflecting the behavior of one who cannot transcend the motivating principle of self-interest (yirah). Reciprocal responsibility defines the boundaries of one’s understanding of obligation. Within this structure, the individual understands the meaning of responsibility to God and to other human beings to the extent that he can be shown that his own welfare is enhanced by such behavior. The am ha-areẓ knows that by conforming to the din, he is entitled to claim similar behavior from others. The am ha-areẓ, both in his theology and his halakhic practice, reflects the principle of reciprocity. Disinterested morality and disinterested love of God are beyond his comprehension. His God and his fellowmen must be bound to reciprocate to him for, otherwise, he cannot comprehend why he should be obligated to fulfill the law.

     The halakhic category of lifnim mi-shurat ha-din reflects the behavior of one who has transcended the motivating principles of self-interest and legal obligations based upon reciprocity. Philosophical knowledge of God can—in a number of ways—help one to transcend the principle of reciprocity, which is an important feature of din. By transforming the individual into a person whose highest joy consists in knowing God—and not in material self-interest—the ground for requiring reciprocity as a ground for motivation becomes meaningless. The entire world view of the theocentric world of philosophic reason draws the individual to serve God not only because of His juridical authority, but also because of His perfection.

     An understanding of the God of being would reveal that the principle of ḥesed (“overflow”) is the organizing principle of reality. The entire chain of being, beginning with God and descending to lesser beings, is founded on the notion of overflow. This image—overflow—captures the idea of action yielding benefits to others, not on the basis of legal claims or reciprocal actions, but as a result of the benefits which spill over due to an excess of perfection. Maimonides, in the Guide, writes:

     We have already explained in the commentary on Avot that the meaning of ḥesed is excess in whatever manner excess is practiced. In most cases, however, it is applied to excess in beneficence. Now it is known that beneficence includes two notions, one of them consisting in the exercise of beneficence toward one who has no right at all to claim this from you, and the other consisting in the exercise of beneficence toward one who deserves it, but in a greater measure than he deserves it. In most cases the prophetic books use the word ḥesed in the sense of practicing beneficence toward one who has no right at all to claim this from you. Therefore every benefit that comes from Him, may He be exalted, is called ḥesed. Thus it says: “I will make mention of the lovingkindnesses [ḥasdei] of the Lord.” Hence this reality as a whole—I mean that He, may He be exalted, has brought it into being—is ḥesed. Thus it says: “The world is built up in lovingkindness [ḥesed]”; the meaning of which is “The building up of the world is lovingkindness.” And He, may He be exalted, says in an enumeration of His attributes: And abundant in lovingkindness.

     In the Guide Maimonides adopts the principle of overflow as the most adequate model for understanding God’s relationship to nature.60 The ḥasid’s understanding of nature—as reflecting God’s ḥesed—directs him to bestow benefits on others who have no legal claim on him.

     Observing the commandments for their own sake and acting for the benefit of those from whom one does not expect a similar response derives from a commitment to the law influenced by the ḥasid’s understanding of God’s revelation in nature. One who acts beyond the strict line of the law cannot know if others will act in the same manner toward him. The ḥasid has no way of knowing whether others will treat his lost property with the same degree of concern as he treats theirs. Only law within the rubric of din can give this security, since all norms constituted by din are capable of being enforced by the courts. (The Sages) The ḥasid is not bothered by a lack of certainty because his actions toward others spring from his commitment to imitate the God of ḥesed.

     Maimonides’ characterization of how a ḥasid responds to the way others treat him, is also the paradigm of a person who has completely transcended the idea of reciprocity. To Maimonides, lifnim mi-shurat ha-din is not only a description of types of legal behavior, but is also used to describe the nature of one’s moral disposition and character structure. The ḥasid’s self-understanding is based on his philosophic knowledge of God. The way others within the community respond to him, therefore, is not as crucial for his self-respect as is his growth of knowledge and his ability to enter into the theocentric world of reason. Since he does not define himself in the manner by which others respond to him, his self-respect does not suffer when others treat him with disdain. Maimonides, in Avot, presents a graphic picture of the extent to which an individual can sustain his dignity irrespective of the behavior of others toward him:

     The difference between the unique individual and his community is not only reflected in his ability to develop a comprehensive understanding of Halakhah. Even within the circumscribed world of halakhic norms, one can discern both communal and individual orientation. The two halakhic categories reflecting this are 1) din—law which defines the line of legal requirement, and 2) lifnim mi-shurat ha-din—law which is beyond the line of legal requirement. The following examples from the Mishneh Torah indicate how the Halakhah distinguished between action obligatory for every member of the community (din) and action practiced by individuals who were not content simply to fulfill the requirements of the strict rules of law (lifnim mi-shurat ha-din):

     I have seen in a certain book from among the books on ethics where it was asked of one of the esteemed saintly men—it was said to him, “Of all your days, in which day did you most rejoice?” He said; “On the day that I was traveling on a ship, and my place was in the lowliest of the places on the ship, [that is] among the bundles of clothes. On the ship were merchants and wealthy men. I was lying in my place and one of the men on the ship arose to urinate. I was insignificant and contemptible in his sight because in his sight I was very low, until he uncovered his nakedness and urinated on me. I was astonished at the firmness of the disposition of brazenness in his soul. As the Lord lives, my soul was not pained at his deed at all, nor was my power [to react in anger] aroused within me. Instead, I rejoiced greatly when I attained the limit where the contempt of that deficient man did not pain me and that my soul was not stirred up toward him.” There is no doubt that this is the ultimate of humbleness of spirit—in order that one may remove from pride.

     The ḥasid has no need to seek revenge or to retaliate, for his dignity does not have its source in the response of others: “The practice of the righteous is to suffer contumely and not inflict it; to hear themselves reproached, not retort; to be impelled in what they do by love, and to rejoice in suffering.”64 He is beyond community in the sense that he is unaffected by the fears and threats which accompany the ordinary man’s feelings of self-worth.

     The law entitles a sage to safeguard his honor:

     To safeguard his honor, the ḥakham may himself excommunicate a boor who treated him disrespectfully. For this, neither witnesses nor previous warning are necessary. The ban is not removed until the offender has appeased the ḥakham.

     Maimonides, however, qualifies this legal right when he writes:

     Although a ḥakham has the right to pronounce the ban to safeguard his honor, it is not creditable for a scholar to accustom himself to this procedure. He should rather close his ears to the remarks of the illiterate and take no notice of them, as Solomon in his wisdom, said, “Also pay no heed to all the words that are spoken.” Such too was the way of the ancient saints. They heard themselves reviled and made no reply. Yet more, they forgave the reviler and pardoned him. Great sages, glorying in their commendable practices, said that they never, for the sake of personal honor, imposed on anyone the lighter or severer ban. This is the way of scholars, which it is right to follow.

     The excessive humility of the ḥasid has its source not in self-debasement and weakness, but in the dignity and strength derived from one’s knowledge of God. Moses, to Maimonides, is the model of one who achieved both the highest degree of philosophic knowledge and the highest degree of humility. The ḥasid’s method of response to others and to the law represents the development of a renewed man who has liberated himself from the tyranny of self-interest. He who has never left the orbit of community has no dignity or identity independent of the modes of response of others to him. The eyes of the am ha-areẓ are always focused on that which is external to him in order for him to know who he is and how he ought to act. Only from God’s promises of reward and punishment is he able to discern the difference between right and wrong. He feels obligated to perform norms to the degree that he can observe that all members of the society are required equally to obey the same norms. He symbolizes political man who has not yet discovered the meaning of action based on individual excellence.

     Maimonides was able, therefore, to find traditional support for a philosophical understanding of God both in the Aggadah of Talmud and in the behavior of the ḥasid. Maimonides recognized, that for a religious Jew, changing patterns of action must result from changes in his understanding of God. The conception of God as legislator is not adequate by itself to explain the ḥasid’s approach to Halakhah. The unification of the legislative model of Sinai with the model of God as the creator and the sustainer of life explains, for Maimonides, the movement from an approach to Halakhah by one who follows the strict requirements of the law to an approach to Halakhah by one who goes beyond the strict rule of law.

     From our analyses of the talmudic categories of love and fear, and of the halakhic categories of din and lifnim mi-shurat ha-din, we have shown that Maimonides believed that the talmudic tradition was fully aware of the differences between the capacities of the community and of the unique individual. The distinction made in the Talmud between messianism and olam ha-ba enabled Maimonides to maintain that Jewish spirituality was not indifferent to the non-historical quest for God. The distinction between love and fear enabled him to recognize that the tradition did not address itself to one audience. Spiritual ideals in the tradition were understood in a way that would enable Judaism to contain and to give support to different people with different spiritual capacities. There were those who were encouraged by the sages to perform commandments even if their motivation for action was based upon self-interest. Serving God from fear, and not from pure motives, was but the first rung in the ladder of spiritual growth.

     Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. --- Psalm 139:23–24.

     Saints who ask to be searched must be willing to submit to anything that God sees fit to lay on them.  Charles G. Finney: Sermons From The Penny Pulpit

     Saints should be prepared to receive answers to prayer in their own persons. Perhaps God lets them fall ill just when they had some very great object in view. Well, it is intended for their good, therefore they ought not to brood or murmur but receive with thankfulness the good that is intended for them.

     It is necessary that these trials should be awarded us, for it will not do that God should always feed his children on sweets. We need severe discipline; it makes us good soldiers. A mere silken religion that passes through no trials has little productiveness in it. These providential trials take away the dross and tin and make us strong in the Lord. How lovely is the character of the Christian who has patiently endured the trials through which she or he has had to pass. These individuals quiet themselves under all the dispensations of providence; they receive everything as bestowed on them from their Father. The more holy Christians become, the more necessary they find it to lay their whole hearts before him and ask him that he may search them and purify them, until he is satisfied with his own work. Christians, are you in the habit of asking the Lord to satisfy himself, to do that which will bring you into a condition that will please him? Don’t you long for the pruning knife to be applied, to be purged of all your selfishness and everything that is offensive to God, so that you may stand before him in meekness and love, while he looks on you and says, this is my handiwork, and it is very good. Ask God to search you, then, and do not be afraid to have it done. Look on all the trials of life as coming from your heavenly Father, in order that if you are really self-deceived you may know it, and if you are not, that you may grow up into the likeness of the Son of God.
--- Charles G. Finney

     Among Christianity’s greatest treasures is the Codex Alexandrinus, a manuscript of the Greek Bible written in the early 400s. It contains virtually the entire Bible, along with the Apocrypha, some hymns, and letters written by Clement of Rome.

     It was housed in Alexandria until 1627, when Cyril Lucar, the patriarch of Alexandria, presented it to England’s King Charles I, who placed it in his Royal Library at St. James Place. But when the Puritan Revolution occurred, Charles was beheaded, and troops were quartered at St. James’s. The books in his library lay on the floor in heaps, subject to rain and dust and rats.

     The monarchy was restored in 1660 under Charles II, but conditions at the Royal Library didn’t improve. In 1693 Richard Bentley, a brilliant classical scholar, temporarily took the Alexandrian Manuscript to his own lodgings for safekeeping.

     In the early 1700s the Royal Library was moved to Cotton House, and the priceless Bible was kept in a narrow, damp room with only a small window at each end. Christopher Wren considered the building so ruinous that most of it “should be demolished,” and the library “purged of much useless trash.” In 1730 the Royal Library was moved into Ashburnham House which, on Saturday Morning, October 23, 1731, caught fire. The alarm was given, and Arthur Onslow, Speaker of the House of Commons, came across from his nearby residence to direct the rescue. Many precious volumes were thrown from the windows in an effort to save them, but the invaluable Codex Alexandrinus was treated with better care. An eyewitness told of the learned Dr. Bentley “in nightgown and great wig” fleeing the building with the Codex Alexandrinus under his arm.

     The disastrous fire drew public attention to the plight of the Royal Library, and a generation later it found a home in the newly founded British Museum, where today the Codex Alexandrinus is securely displayed.

     Many people have tried to tell the story of what God has done among us. They wrote what we had been told by the ones who were there in the beginning and saw what happened. So I made a careful study of everything and then decided to write and tell you exactly what took place. …
--- Luke 1:1-3a.

          Morning - October 23

     “Will ye also go away?” --- John 6:67.

     Many have forsaken Christ, and have walked no more with him; but what reason have YOU to make a change? Has there been any reason for it in the past? Has not Jesus proved himself all-sufficient? He appeals to you this Morning—“Have I been a wilderness unto you?” When your soul has simply trusted Jesus, have you ever been confounded? Have you not up till now found your Lord to be a compassionate and generous friend to you, and has not simple faith in him given you all the peace your spirit could desire? Can you so much as dream of a better friend than he has been to you? Then change not the old and tried for new and false. As for the present, can that compel you to leave Christ? When we are hard beset with this world, or with the severer trials within the Church, we find it a most blessed thing to pillow our head upon the bosom of our Saviour. This is the joy we have to-day that we are saved in him; and if this joy be satisfying, wherefore should we think of changing? Who barters gold for dross? We will not forswear the sun till we find a better light, nor leave our Lord until a brighter lover shall appear; and, since this can never be, we will hold him with a grasp immortal, and bind his name as a seal upon our arm. As for the future, can you suggest anything which can arise that shall render it necessary for you to mutiny, or desert the old flag to serve under another captain? We think not. If life be long—he changes not. If we are poor, what better than to have Christ who can make us rich? When we are sick, what more do we want than Jesus to make our bed in our sickness? When we die, is it not written that “neither death, nor life, nor things present, nor things to come, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord!” We say with Peter, “Lord, to whom shall we go?”


          Evening - October 23

     “Why sleep ye? rise and pray, lest ye enter into temptation.” --- Luke 22:46.

     When is the Christian most liable to sleep? Is it not when his temporal circumstances are prosperous? Have you not found it so? When you had daily troubles to take to the throne of grace, were you not more wakeful than you are now? Easy roads make sleepy travellers. Another dangerous time is when all goes pleasantly in spiritual matters. Christian went not to sleep when lions were in the way, or when he was wading through the river, or when fighting with Apollyon, but when he had climbed half way up the Hill Difficulty, and came to a delightful arbour, he sat down, and forthwith fell asleep, to his great sorrow and loss. The enchanted ground is a place of balmy breezes, laden with fragrant odours and soft influences, all tending to lull pilgrims to sleep. Remember Bunyan’s description: “Then they came to an arbour, warm, and promising much refreshing to the weary pilgrims; for it was finely wrought above head, beautified with greens, and furnished with benches and settles. It had also in it a soft couch, where the weary might lean.” “The arbour was called the Slothful’s Friend, and was made on purpose to allure, if it might be, some of the pilgrims to take up their rest there when weary.” Depend upon it, it is in easy places that men shut their eyes and wander into the dreamy land of forgetfulness. Old Erskine wisely remarked, “I like a roaring devil better than a sleeping devil.” There is no temptation half so dangerous as not being tempted. The distressed soul does not sleep; it is after we enter into peaceful confidence and full assurance that we are in danger of slumbering. The disciples fell asleep after they had seen Jesus transfigured on the mountain top. Take heed, joyous Christian, good frames are near neighbours to temptations: be as happy as you will, only be watchful.

          GOD OF OUR FATHERS

     Daniel C. Roberts, 1841–1907

     If my people, who are called by My name, will humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land. (2 Chronicles 7:14)

     After what I owe to God, nothing should be more dear or more sacred to me than the love and respect I owe my country.
----- Jacques Auguste de Thou

     We need to be reminded that a nation can receive God’s blessing only when He is recognized as ruler and Lord. Christian people in every land have an awesome responsibility—to be models of God’s righteousness—“salt” and “light” for a sinful and hurting society. The moral strength of a nation rests upon the knees of God’s people.

     “God of Our Fathers” also reminds us that concerned citizens of the heavenly kingdom should also be involved citizens of their earthly kingdom. The hymn text was written in 1876, the year that America was preparing to celebrate its 100th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Daniel Crane Roberts, a 35-year-old rector of a small Episcopal church in Brandon, Vermont, felt that the country should have a new national hymn for the occasion. His new song was sung for the first time by the parishioners of the Brandon village church for their worship service on July 4th, 1876.

     Later, at the time of the actual National Centennial Observance commemorating the adoption of the Constitution, Roberts’ hymn text was chosen as the official hymn for that event. These words remind us well that the God who has so richly blessed our land in the past is the One still needed to be “our ruler, guardian, guide, and stay.”

     God of our fathers, whose almighty hand leads forth in beauty all the starry band; of shining worlds in splendor thru the skies, our grateful songs before Thy throne arise.
     Thy love divine hath led us in the past, in this free land by Thee our lot is cast; be thou our ruler, guardian, guide and stay, Thy word our law, Thy paths our chosen way.
     From war’s alarms, from deadly pestilence, be Thy strong arm our ever sure defense; Thy true religion in our hearts increase; Thy bounteous goodness nourish us in peace.
     Refresh Thy people on their toilsome way. Lead us from night to never ending day; fill all our lives with love and grace divine, and glory, laud, and praise be ever Thine.

     For Today: Exodus 3:15; Psalm 33:12; Proverbs 14:34

     Breathe a prayer of thanks for the heritage of Christianity and for God’s continued guidance of our land.

     2. The wisdom of God appears in the subject or person wherein these were accorded; the Second Person is the blessed Trinity. There was a congruity in the Son’s undertaking and effecting it rather than any other person, according to the order of the persons, and the several functions of the persons, as represented in Scripture. The Father, after creation, is the lawgiver, and presents man with the image of his own holiness and the way to his creatures’ happiness; but after the fall, man was too impotent to perform the law, and too polluted to enjoy a felicity. Redemption was then necessary; not that it was necessary for God to redeem man, but it was necessary for man’s happiness that he should be recovered. To this the Second Person is appointed, that by communion with him, man might derive a happiness, and be brought again to God. But since man was blind in his understanding, and an enemy in his will to God, there must be the exerting of a virtue to enlighten his mind, and bend his will to understand, and accept of this redemption; and this work is assigned to the Third Person, the Holy Ghost.

     (1.) It was not congruous that the Father should assume human nature, and suffer in it for the redemption of man. He was first in order; he was the lawgiver, and therefore to be the judge. As lawgiver, it was not convenient he should stand in the stead of the lawbreaker; and as judge, it was as little convenient he should be reputed a malefactor. That he who had made a law against sin denounced a penalty upon the commission of sin, and whose part it was actually to punish the sinner, should become sin for the wilful transgressor of his law. He being the rector, how could he be an advocate and intercessor to himself? How could he be the judge and the sacrifice? a judge, and yet a mediator to himself? If he had been the sacrifice, there must be some person to examine the validity of it, and pronounce the sentence of acceptance. Was it agreeable that the Son should sit upon a throne of judgment, and the Father stand at the bar, and be responsible to the Son? That the Son should be in the place of a governor, and the Father in the place of the criminal? That the Father should be bruised (Isa. 53:10) by the Son, as the Son was by the Father (Zech. 13:70)? that the Son should awaken a sword against the Father, as the Father did against the Son? That the Father should be sent by the Son, as the Son was by the Father (Gal. 4:4)? The order of the persons in the blessed Trinity had been inverted and disturbed. Had the Father been sent, he had not been first in order; the sender is before the person sent: as the Father begets, and the son is begotten (John 1:14), so the Father sends, and the son is sent. He whose orders is to send, cannot properly send himself.

     (2.) Nor was it congruous that the Spirit should be sent upon this affair. If the Holy Ghost had been sent to redeem us, and the Son to apply that redemption to us, the order of the Persons had also been inverted; the Spirit, then, who was third in order, had been second in operation. The Son would then have received of the Spirit, as the Spirit doth now of Christ, “and shew it unto us” (John 1:15). As the Spirit proceeded from the Father and the Son, so the proper function and operation of it was in order after the operations of the Father and the Son. Had the Spirit been sent to redeem us, and the Son sent by the Father, and the Spirit to apply that redemption to us, the Son in his acts had proceeded from the Father and the Spirit; the Spirit, as sender, had been in order before the Son; whereas, the Spirit is called “the Spirit of Christ,” as sent by Christ from the “Father” (Gal. 4:6; John 15:27). But as the order of the works, so the order of the Persons is preserved in their several operations. Creation, and a law to govern the creature, precedes redemption. Nothing, or that which hath no being, is not capable of a redeemed being. Redemption supposeth the existence and the misery of a person redeemed. As creation precedes redemption, so redemption precedes the application of it. As redemption supposeth the being of the creature, so application of redemption supposeth the efficacy of redemption. According to the order of these works, is the order of the operations of the Three Persons. Creation belongs to the Father, the first person; redemption, the second work, is the function of the Son, the second person; application, the third work, is the office of the Holy Ghost, the third person. The Father orders it, the Son acts it, the Holy Ghost applies it. He purifies our souls to understand, believe, and love these mysteries. He forms Christ in the womb of the soul, as he did the body of Christ in the womb of the Virgin. As the Spirit of God moved upon the waters, to garnish and adorn the world, after the matter of it was formed (Gen. 1:2), so he moves upon the heart, to supple it to a compliance with Christ, and draws the lineaments of the new creation in the soul, after the foundation is laid. The Son pays the price that was due from us to God, and the Spirit is the earnest of the promises of life and glory purchased by the merit of that death. It is to be observed, that the, Father, under the dispensation of the law, proposed the commands, with the promises and threatenings, to the understandings of men; and Christ, under the dispensation of grace, when he was upon the earth, proposeth the gospel as the means of salvation, exhorts to faith as the condition of salvation; but it was neither the functions of the one or the other to display such an efficacy in the understanding and will to make men believe and obey; and, therefore, there were such few conversions in the time of Christ, by his miracles. But this work was reserved for the fuller and brighter appearance of the Spirit, whose office it was to convince the world of the necessity of a Redeemer, because of their lost condition; of the person of the Redeemer, the Son of God; of the sufficiency and efficacy of redemption, because of his righteousness and acceptation by the Father. The wisdom of God is seen in preparing and presenting the objects, and then in making impression of them upon the subject he intends. And thus is the order of the Three Persons preserved.

     (3.) The Second Person had the greatest congruity, in this work. He by whom God created the world was most conveniently employed in restoring the defaced world (John 1:4): who more fit to recover it from its lapsed state than he that had erected it in its primitive state (Heb. 1:2)? He was the light of men in creation, and therefore it was most reasonable he should be the light of men in redemption. Who fitter to reform the Divine image than he that first formed it? Who fitter to speak for us to God than he who was the Word (John 1:1)? Who could better intercede with the Father than he who was the only begotten and beloved Son? Who so fit to redeem the forfeited inheritance as the Heir of all things? Who fitter and better to prevail for us to have the right of children than he that possessed it by nature? We fell from being the sons of God, and who fitter to introduce us into an adopted state than the Son of God? Herein was an expression of the richer grace, because the first sin was immediately against the wisdom of God, by an ambitious affectation of a wisdom equal to God, that that person, who was the wisdom of God, should be made a sacrifice for the expiation of the sin against wisdom.

     3. The wisdom of God is seen in the two natures of Christ, whereby this redemption was accomplished. The union of the two natures was the foundation of the union of God and the fallen creature.

     1st. The union itself is admirable: “The Word is made flesh” (John 1:14), one “equal with God in the form of a servant” (Phil. 2:7). When the apostle speaks of “God manifested in the flesh,” he speaks “the wisdom of God in a mystery” (1 Tim. 3:16); that which is incomprehensible to the angels, which they never imagined before it was revealed, which perhaps they never knew till they beheld it. I am sure, under the law, the figures of the cherubims were placed in the sanctuary, with their “faces looking towards the propitiatory,” in a perpetual posture of contemplation and admiration (Exod. 37:9), to which the apostle alludes (1 Pet. 1:12). Mysterious is the wisdom of God to unite finite and infinite, almightiness and weakness, immortality and mortality, immutability, with a thing subject to change; to have a nature from eternity, and yet a nature subect to the revolutions of time; a nature to make a law, and a nature to be subjected to the law; to be God blessed forever, in the bosom of his Father, and an infant exposed to calamities from the womb of his mother: terms seeming most distant from union, most uncapable of conjunction, to shake hands together, to be most intimately conjoined; glory and vileness, fulness and emptiness, heaven and earth; the creature with the Creator; he that made all things, in one person with a nature that is made; Immanuel, God, and man in one; that which is most spiritual to partake of that which is carnal flesh and blood (Heb. 2:14); one with the Father in his Godhead, one with us in his manhood; the Godhead to be in him in the fullest perfection, and the manhood in the greatest purity; the creature one with the Creator, and the Creator one with the creature. Thus is the incomprehensible wisdom of God declared in the “Word being made flesh.”

     2d. In the manner of this union. A union of two natures, yet no natural union. It transcends all the unions visible among creatures: it is not like the union of stones in a building, or two pieces of timber fastened together, which touch one another only in their superficies and outside, without any intimacy with one another. By such a kind of union God would not be a man: the Word could not so be made flesh. Nor is it a union of parts to the whole, as the members and the body; the members are parts, the body is the whole; for the whole results from the parts, and depends upon the parts: but Christ, being God, is independent upon anything. The parts are in order of nature before the whole, but nothing can be in order of nature before God. Nor is it as the union of two liquors, as when wine and water are mixed together, for they are so incorporated as not to be distinguished from one another; no man can tell which particle is wine, and which is water. But the properties of the Divine nature are distinguishable from the properties of the human. Nor is it as the union of the soul and body, so as that the Deity is the form of the humanity, as the soul is the form of the body: for as the soul is but a part of the man, so the Divinity would be then but a part of the humanity; and as a form, or the soul, is in a state of imperfection, without that which it is to inform, so the Divinity of Christ would have been imperfect till it had assumed the humanity, and so the perfection of an eternal Deity would have depended on a creature of time. This union of two natures in Christ is incomprehensible: and it is a mystery we cannot arrive to the top of, how the Divine nature, which is the same with that of the Father and the Holy Ghost, should be united to the human nature, without its being said that the Father and the Holy Ghost were united to the flesh; but the Scripture doth not encourage any such notion; it speaks only of the Word, the person of the Word being made flesh, and in his being made flesh, distinguisheth him from the Father, as “the only begotten of the Father” (John 1:14). The person of the Son was the term of this union.

     (1.) This union doth not confound the properties of the Deity and those of the humanity. They remain distinct and entire in each other. The Deity is not changed into flesh, nor the flesh transformed into God: they are distinct, and yet united; they are conjoined, and yet unmixed: the dues of either nature are preserved. It is impossible that the majesty of the Divinity can receive an alteration. It is as impossible that the meanness of the humanity can receive the impressions of the Deity, so as to be changed into it, and a creature be metamorphosed into the Creator, and temporary flesh become eternal, and finite mount up into infinity: as the soul and body are united, and make one person, yet the soul is not changed into the effections of the body, nor the body into the perfections of the soul. There is a change made in the humanity, by being advanced to a more excellent union, but not in the Deity, as a change is made in the air, when it is enlightened by the sun, not in the sun, which communicates that brightness to the air. Athanasius makes the burning bush to be a type of Christ’s incarnation (Exod. 3:2): the fire signifying the Divine nature, and the bush the human. The bush is a branch springing up from the earth, and the fire descends from heaven; as the bush was united to the fire, yet was not hurt by the flame, nor converted into fire, there remained a difference between the bush and the fire, yet the properties of the fire shined in the bush, so that the whole bush seemed to be on fire. So in the incarnation of Christ, the human nature is not swallowed up by the Divine, nor changed into it, nor confounded with it, but so united, that the properties of both remain firm: two are so become one, that they remain two still: one person in two natures, containing the glorious perfections of the Divine, and the weaknesses of the human. The “fulness of the Deity dwells bodily in Christ” (Col. 2:9).

     (2.) The Divine nature is united to every part of the humanity. The whole Divinity to the whole humanity; so that no part but may be said to be the member of God, as well as the blood is said to be the “blood of God” (Acts 20:28). By the same reason, it may be said, the hand of God, the eye of God, the arm of God. As God is infinitely present everywhere, so as to be excluded from no place, so is the Deity hypostatically everywhere in the humanity. not excluded from any part of it; as the light of the sun in every part of the air; as a sparkling splendor in every part of the diamond. Therefore, it is concluded, by all that acknowledge the Deity of Christ, that when his soul was separated from the body, the Deity remained united both to soul and body, as light doth in every part of a broken crystal.

     (3.) Therefore, perpetually united (Col. 2:9). The “fulness of the Godhead dwells in him bodily.” It dwells in him, not lodges in him, as a traveller in an inn: it resides in him as a fixed habitation. As God describes the perpetuity of his presence in the ark by his habitation or dwelling in it (Exod. 29:44), so doth the apostle the inseparable duration of the Deity in the humanity, and the indissoluble union of the humanity with the Deity. It was united on earth; it remains united in heaven. It was not an image or an apparition, as the tongues wherein the Spirit came upon the apostles, were a temporary representation, not a thing united perpetually to the person of the Holy Ghost.

     (4.) It was a personal union. It was not an union of persons, though it was a personal union; so Davenant expounds (Col. 2:9), Christ did not take the person of man, but the nature of man into subsistence with himself. The body and soul of Christ were not united in themselves, had no subsistence in themselves, till they were united to the person of the Son of God. If the person of a man were united to him, the human nature would have been the nature of the person so united to him, and not the nature of the Son of God (Heb.2:14, 16), “Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, be also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil. For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham.” He took flesh and blood to be his own nature, perpetually to subsist in the person of the Αόγος, which must be by a personal union, or no way the Deity united to the humanity, and both natures to be one person. This is the mysterious and manifold wisdom of God.

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