July 5

The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me; because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound. To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all that mourn. - Isaiah 61:1-2.

HERE is a combination of tenderness and severity, and both these opposite characteristics were continually displayed by the Saviour in all their strength in his personal ministry, and in all his dealings with men in the days of his flesh. He was at once, as the Apostle says, “a merciful and a faithful high priest.” David says, referring to this combination, “Kiss the son lest he be angry, and ye perish by the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little; blessed are all they that put their trust in him.” It is impossible to do justice to his tenderness, and Watts says-

“His heart is made of tenderness,

His bowels melt with love.”

His love passeth knowledge. He was to come down “like rain upon the mown grass, as showers that water the earth,” and did he not? It was foretold of him, “a bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench till he shall bring judgment unto victory,” and did he either? When he said in language as soft as the ether of heaven, “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest”-“He shall feed his flock like a shepherd; He shall gather the lambs with his arm and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young”-did he not this when he taught his disciples “as they were able to bear,” and when he said to Peter, “Feed my lambs?” But oh, to see him as his forerunner also describes him, “His fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly purge his floor, and will gather the wheat into the garner, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

Observe him in dealing with the Scribes and Pharisees, and mark also that he uses no such severity with any other characters-it was only with those sanctimonious pretenders to piety, who had so deluded the common people with their pretensions that they were accustomed to say that if two persons enter heaven, one of them must be a Pharisee-“Woe unto you Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,” “ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?” John saw him in his vision as the “lion of the tribe of Judah,” and also as “a lamb that had been slain.”

What a combination of gentleness and dreadfulness does this express. He has patience, but he does not connive at sin, and if we go forward to the last scene we shall see the heavens rolling together as a scroll, and every mountain and island moving out of its place. “The kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondsman, and every freeman hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains, and say to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne; and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of his wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand?”