Are you a good shepherd or a hireling?

“I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down His life for the sheep.  He who is a hireling, and not a shepherd, who is not the owner of the sheep, sees the wolf coming, and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hireling and is not concerned about the sheep.”

John 10:11-12

         As we read this tender allegory, the Good Shepherd passes before our eyes, a gracious, well-loved reassuring figure. All about Him there is an atmosphere that induces confidence. A sense of security pervades the story. The bond between Him and His flock is high and perfect. He knows their names. They know His voice; they recognize its tones; they cannot be deceived. And whether they are biding in the fold or being put forth to pasture, it is enough for them to know that He is near.

         The pastoral figure speaks to us not only of personal satisfaction, but of personal responsibility. We all have partly in our keeping some of the fair and precious things in other souls. We are called to be humble, lowly servants of the Good Shepherd. And surely Jesus Himself meant that we should find in this great allegory that which should teach us not only where to place our faith, but also how to do our work. Surely He meant us to find that ideal of sympathy and personal devotion, of vigilance, courage, and sacrifice, in the power of which alone we can hope to serve our needy brethren.

         The picture of the hireling shepherd is introduced just when the allegory has reached its highest point of thought and uttered its noblest message: ‘The Good Shepherd lays down His life for the sheep.’ That is the last heroism of faithfulness, the final seal of sacrifice; the unutterable, convincing tragedy of love. Suddenly our gaze is turned to another scene. We are still among the sheepfolds. Still a shepherd is keeping watch. And lo! a gaunt and hungry wolf leaps into the flock before their shepherd’s eyes. And in a moment he drops his heavy staff, wraps his long outer garment about his waist, and flees for his life. And the wolf has its cruel will of the deserted sheep. Surely Jesus sets this shameful picture of the coward shepherd fleeing like the wind and the snarl of the wolf in his ears just where He did set it—against a fair background of courage, love, and sacrifice—to warn us against unfaithfulness in life’s high task, and to teach us what manner of men we must be if we are to do that task as it should be done.

         ‘The hireling flees because he is a hireling.’ The hireling might have said that it was hardly fair to judge him by one weak moment. He had looked after the flock fairly well; he had counted them morning and evening, led them to pasturage, and kept them from straying. Was this all to be forgotten in one flight from duty? The wolf came so suddenly. He had no time to think. In justice to this shamed man, in justice to the pure and dreadful truth, how much is there in this plea? Very little when you come to look into things. It is in the surprises of life that we reap the reward of character. Half the value of character building would be swept away if it were not a fact that a man is gloriously or shamefully himself in the moment when he must act without deliberation. We talk about a man rising to an occasion, but in the last deep truth of things that is a shallow and misleading phrase. No man ever rose to an occasion. If he meets the great occasion and deals with it as it should be dealt with, it is because he is living all the while on the level of that occasion.

         But let us turn from the question of the vital place that character holds in all service to the question of what kind of a character is essential to the best service. Love is at once the germ and the spirit of it. The hireling is contrasted with the Good Shepherd in that the bond between the hireling and his work was a bond of selfishness and not a bond of love. The hireling works simply for wages. He is the picture for all time of the utter incompetence of selfishness to perform the great task of life….the hireling—the man with the inadequate motive—fails his trust and his Master, and flees for his life, not knowing that in that flight every step is taking him farther away from the few things worth saving—the price of his conscience, the cleanness of his soul, the power to look in the face of the Great Shepherd.

         We have, each of us, a place in the service of the Good Shepherd—in the folds where there are so many hungry mouths to feed, so many weak souls to protect, and out in the wilderness of sorrow and sin where so many foolish and weary ones are straying. Most of us have in our partial keeping the peace and happiness and spiritual safety of a little circle we meet at hearth and board. Each of us has a place and trust in the great pastorate of life. How shall we fill it: How not fail in it? How shall we glorify its drudgeries and meet its great occasions? Whence the courage and good cheer, the patience, tenderness, and hopefulness for all these things?

         The answer to these questions is not far to seek. It is here. ‘I am the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd lays down His life for His sheep.’ The symbol of our service may be the Shepherd’s crook, but the secret of our service is the Savior’s Cross. It is only by the grace of an ever-deepening communion with the eternal love of God made manifest in Christ that the hireling spirit in its most subtle forms and deep disguises can be tracked down in the inmost recesses of our nature and driven forth from the smallest detail of our service…no man may be sure that he will not some day prove himself a hireling spirit unless for him the cup of life has become the cup of a sacrament, even, to use the great words of Ignatius, ‘the blood of Christ which is immortal love.

JAMES HASTINGS John vol. I

New Year's Day Devotional ~Simeon, "Many a great man has striven after an immortality..."

And behold, there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, and this man was just and devout, waiting for the Consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him.  And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ. So he came by the Spirit into the temple. And when the parents brought in the Child Jesus, to do for Him according to the custom of the law, he took Him up in his arms and blessed God saying,

​“Now Lord, You are letting Your servant depart in peace,

​​According to Your word;

 ​​For my eyes have seen Your salvation…”

Luke 2:25-30

For years, I have waited expectantly,

Longing to see Your salvation with my eyes.

Treasuring the promise You’ve given me,

This great hope of seeing the Christ.

Oh, how the years swiftly pass;

My steps may falter, yet my heart burns bright.

I see my end drawing near,

Searching the midnight sky for Your light.

Then I see Him, the tiny Babe wrapped in warmth;

I stretch forth my hands to this blessed Child,

And draw Him close to my beating heart

All glory to You, Lord—my eyes now behold my desire!

Gazing in His eyes, peaceful like doves,

A divine and holy love settles upon Him,

And now that I’ve embraced Your great salvation,

Take me in peace; the bright Morning Star has dawned.

C.A. TAYLOR

Simeon’s Prayer

         Simeon was a very usual name in Judea, and there is no doubt that our Simeon was just an obscure old man of the common people, entirely unknown out of his own little circle, who for years had been a devout but unofficial student of those prophetic Scriptures which had kindled in his heart, and kept burning for many years, the fire of faith and expectation; who, hoping against hope, had at last been rewarded by a revelation from God ‘that he should not see death, before he had seen the Lord’s Christ.’ Many a great man has striven after an immortality of memory among men, only to die and be forgotten even in the place where he lived and wrought what he fondly hoped would be immortal deeds; yet this obscure old man, who was a lover of God and a believer in His Son Jesus Christ, has attained an immortality which shall endure while the world stands, and in the world of glory shall live and shine among the greatest of the servants of God. True immortality comes only to those who associate themselves with the Lord’s Christ. Not all who believe and receive Jesus shall be known in this word, and have their names preserved in the records of time; but none is too obscure to have his name written in the Lamb’s book of life; none too obscure to live and shine forever among the great unnumbered and numberless host of God’s redeemed ones.

         Simeon was just and devout. His character was summed up in these two words. They were enough, for they tell the whole story of his walk before God and man. A just man and devout is certain to be a good man, in the broad sense of the word; a kind, merciful, generous, and benevolent man.

         Simeon was just.—The just man of the Scriptures is a man who is right with both God and man. The just, or the justified, man is he who been set, or made, right with God; the rightened man. A sinful man can be justified with God only by faith in Him. Every truly justified or just man is also a regenerated man; and thus righteousness is not only a matter of standing with God, but also a matter of state as well. It is a walk of faith, truly, but of character as well. Not with God only was Simeon just; he was also just with men; that is, he was righteous in all his relations and all his dealings with men. Righteousness of character and actions, or practical holiness, is the final test of Christian character.

         He was devout.—Simeon was devout as well as just. Now devoutness is that which describes our attitude towards God, without respect to law. It is the characteristic of personal relation. The devout man is the pious man, who loves and adores God for Himself. Loving His holiness, His goodness, His mercy and His truth, He seeks to imitate them in his own life. He walks with God in holy admiration and adoration all the days of his life. He beholds and admires His glory in all His work and especially in all the manifestations of His grace towards men. He is a man of humility, prayer, and praise. He loves God’s law, lays up His precepts and commandments in his heart, and seeks to illustrate them in his life, simply for the purpose of glorifying God’s holy name among men.

         Lastly, it is said that he had faith in God’s promises. He not only believed in God, but he believed and expected the things which God promised and foretold. ‘Having seen them afar off,’ he was persuaded of them and embraced them.’ He ‘waited for the ??consolation of Israel.’ Being familiar with the Scriptures, he had discovered that God had promised to visit and redeem His people by the coming of the Messiah. In that Messiah he saw concentrated all the good things which God had prepared for His people, and he looked forward to His coming with all his heart and soul.

         Simeon had been long a lover of the light…. He had lived for many a year with his windows open towards the east. But now the morning broke for him; what more had he to ask of God or man?

And we see, too, a soul completed in a vision not only of salvation for himself, but of a glory and a radiance for all the world.

         If we could only trust God like Simeon, our whole powers would immediately become enlarged, and our whole being be fulfilled.

JAMES HASTINGS

Luke

         The charm about Simeon was that, though he lived many years, he had not begun to grown old…. He never doubted his dreams; he was sure that they would all come true. He sang through the whole of the storm. He was certain that his old eyes would yet gaze upon the face of the Messiah. His was an unconquerable soul.

F.W. BOREHAM

The Silver Shadow

Christmas Devotional ~"All the mighty angels called Him Lord."

So it was, that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered.  And she brought forth her firstborn Son, and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the Inn. And they came with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the Babe lying in a manger….And the shepherds went back, glorifying and praising God for all that they had heard and seen, just as had been told them.    


Luke 2:6-7, 16, 20                                                                                                                                

                                                                                                                                                                                                       
 Sleep! Holy Babe! upon Thy mother’s breast;
Great Lord of earth and sea and sky,
How sweet it is to see Thee lie
In such a place of rest.
Sleep! Holy Babe! Thine angels watch around,
All bending low with folded wings,
Before th’incarnate King of kings,
In reverent awe profound.
Sleep! Holy Babe! while I with Mary gaze
In joy upon that face awhile,
Upon the loving infant smile
Which there divinely plays.
Sleep! Holy Babe! ah! take Thy brief repose;
Too quickly will Thy slumbers break,
And Thou to lengthened pains awake
That death alone shall close.
EDWARD CASWALL
~ Sleep! Holy Babe

     How wonderful this was!  We must remember who it was that was thus born.  The birth of another child in this world was nothing strange, for thousands of children are born every day.  But this was the Lord of glory.  This was not the beginning of His life.  He had lived from all eternity in heaven.  His hands made the universe.  All glory was His.  All the crowns of power flashed upon His brow.  All the mighty angels called Him Lord.  We must remember this if we would understand how great was His condescension….   

      Christ’s glory was folded away under robes of human flesh.  He never ceased to be the Son of God; and yet He assumed all the conditions of humanity.  He veiled His power, and became a helpless infant, unable to walk, to speak…lying feeble and dependent in His mother’s bosom…He laid aside His majesty. What condescension!  And it was all for our sake, that He might lift us up to glory.  It was as a Saviour that He came into this world.  He became Son of man that He might make us sons of God.   He came down to earth and lived among men, entering into their experiences of humiliation, that He might lift them up to glory to share His exaltation.               

                                            
J.R. MILLER~Come Ye Apart

        How gentle the coming!  Who would have had sufficient daring of imagination to conceive that God Almighty would have appeared among men as a little child?  We should have conceived something sensational, phenomenal, catastrophic, appalling!  The most awful of the natural elements would have formed His retinue, and men would be chilled and frozen with fear.  But He came as a little child.  The great God “emptied Himself”; He let in the light as our eyes were able to bear it.

                                            
J.H. JOWETT~My Daily Meditation

Christmas morn brings the Prince of all Peace

“Because of the tender mercy of our God,

Whereby the Sunrise from on high shall dawn upon us,

To shine on those who live in darkness

And the shadow of death,

To guide our feet into the way of peace.”

Luke 1:78-9

This One will be our peace.
Micah 5:5a

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying:

​“Glory to God in the highest,

​​And on earth peace, goodwill toward men!”

Luke 2:13-14

He has come! The Christ of God;

  Left for us His glad abode,

Stooping from His throne of bliss,

  To this darksome wilderness.

 He has come! The Prince of Peace;

  Come to bid our sorrows cease;

Come to scatter with His light

  All the shadows of our night.

 Unto us a Child is born!

  Ne'er has earth beheld a morn

Among all the morns of time,

  Half so glorious in its prime!

Unto us a Son is given!

He has come from God's own heaven,

Bringing with Him from above,

  Holy peace and holy love.

HORATIUS BONAR

Hymns of Faith and Hope -1878

“Peace, perfect peace!” What music there is in these words! The very mention of them fills the heart with longings, which cry out for satisfaction, and will not be comforted. Sometimes, indeed, we may succeed in hushing them for a little, as a mother does a fretful child; but soon they will break out again with bitter and insatiable desire. Our natures sigh for rest, as the ocean shell, when placed to the ear, seems to sigh for the untroubled depths of its native home.

         There is peace in those silent depths of space, —blue for very distance, —bend with such gentle tenderness, over the fevered, troubled lives. There is peace in the repose of the unruffled waters of the mountain lake, sheltered from the winds by the giant cliffs around. There is peace at the heart of the whirlwind, which sweeps across the desert waste in whirling fury. The peace of the woodland dell, of a highland glen, of a summer landscape, —all touch us. And is there none for us, whose nature is so vast, so composite, so wonderful?

         There is! Weary generations passed by until at length there stood among men One, whose outward life was full of sorrow and toil; but whose calm face mirrored unbroken peace that reigned within His breast. He was the promised Peace-giver. He had peace in Himself; for He said, “My peace.” He had the power of passing on that peace to others; for He said, “My peace I give unto you.” Why should not each reader of these lines receive the peace which Jesus had Himself, and which He waits to give to every longing and recipient heart?

         His peace is perfect, unbroken by storms, unreached by the highest surges of sorrow. Unstained by the contaminating touch of sin. The very same peace that reigns in Heaven, where all is perfect and complete.

His peace is as a river: The dweller on its banks, in time of drought, is well supplied with water. It is flowing at early dawn, as one goes to their daily toil. It is there in the scorching noon. It is there when the stars shine, hushing one to sleep with the melody of its waves. Think, too, how it broadens and deepens and fills up, in its onward journey, and from its source to the boundless, infinite sea. So may our peace be, abiding and growing with our years.

His peace is great: its music is louder than the tumult of the storm. Learn the lesson of the Lake of Galilee, —that the peace which is in the heart of Jesus, and which He gives to His own can quell the greatest hurricane that ever swept down the mountain ravine and spent itself on the writhing waters beneath. For when the Master arose and rebuked the wind and said unto the sea, “Peace, be still,” the winds ceased and there was a great calm.

There is a remarkable text in Isaiah, which teaches us that the Government should be upon the shoulders of Jesus Christ; and that when it is so, there is no end to the increase of Peace. Surely these glorious words refer, not only to the government of a nation, but of each individual life also, and they are very searching.

“In Me you shall have peace.” ‘Twas our Savior who said those words. Let us abide in Him. Let us live in Him. Let us walk in Him. Let us make of Him the secret place unto which we may continually resort. And as we are joined to Him, in the intimacy of deepest union, the peace that fills His heart, like a Pacific ocean, shall begin to flow into ours, until they are filled with the very fullness of God; and the peace of God, like a dove, with fluttering wings, shall settle down upon our hearts, and make them its home forevermore.

F.B. MEYER

Steps into the Blessed Life

         

"For a more tender and true Shepherd cannot be found."

Jesus therefore said to them again, “Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep…. I am the good shepherd, and I know My own and My own know Me….and I lay down My life for the sheep…. My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand.

John 10: 7, 14, 27-28

There’s a peace here in the green valley;

Along the edge of the brook I lay down.

You’ve led me here to rest my soul, so weary;

For a more tender and true Shepherd cannot be found.

Over mountains and along steep, rocky crags,

I hear Your voice, and love is the sound,

Saying, “Stay near, my child, I’ll lead the way”;

For a more tender and true Shepherd cannot be found.

Though clouds descend and I can’t see;

And valleys of deep darkness are all that surround;

It’s then that You lift and gently carry me;

For a more tender and true Shepherd cannot be found.

The radiant evening sky is dusted with stars;

Nighttime isn’t dark, with jewels all around.

Your love shines forth, comforting my anxious heart;

For a more tender and true Shepherd cannot be found.

C.A. TAYLOR

It is morning. The dew lies heavy on the upland wolds; the fresh morning breeze is airing the fevered world; the sun's pavilion glows with gorgeous colors, as he prepares to emerge on his daily pilgrimage; and the shepherds stand knocking at the barred gates of the fold, calling to the porter to let them have their flocks. When the door opens, each calls to His own sheep, and leads them forth, and they follow him to pastures green and waters still. They would flee from a strange voice; but they know their shepherds.

     In the hubbub the voice of the true Shepherd is undetected or unheeded, except by a few. But these hear its soft gentle tones, and obey, and follow; and to do so is certain evidence that they are His own. The desire to hear and follow Jesus proves that you are His sheep.

     Again, It is noon. The downs are baking in the scorching glare, and every stone burns like fire; but in that oppressive hour the shepherd remembers a little green glen, where a tranquil lake reflects the azure sky, or a brooklet babbles musically over the pebbles. The grass is green and the boulders cast black shadows. Perhaps an old fold is there, with open doorway, so that the sheep may go in for shelter or out for pasture, till the shadows begin to climb stealthily up the hills.  Thus our Beloved makes His flock rest at noon. He is the secret place of the Most High, in whom our life is hidden. We can get pasture, abundant life, and salvation only by the Lord Jesus.

Lastly, It is evening. The sun is setting, the air is becoming chill, the valleys are deep in gloom. The shepherd hastens downward with his flock to the fold. They are descending together the last dark gorge, densely shadowed by foliage. Suddenly the ominous snarl and scream tell that a wolf has sprung from the thicket, and seized on one of the hindmost ewes or tender lambs; and then the shepherd rushes to the rear, prepared to lay down his life, if needs be, to save. And who can view the struggle which ensues between the shepherd and the wolf, without being reminded of the fourfold allusion of our Lord to the fact that He was about to lay down his life for the sheep.

Good does not mean benevolent and kind; but genuine and true. And its significance is pointed by the contrast with the thief and the hireling; by which it appears that the Good Shepherd is One who is imbued with the true spirit of His work, and is an enthusiast in it, not for pay or reward, but by the compulsion of the noble instincts of His soul.

      Robbers may turn shepherds, climbing the walls of the fold, or swooping down on the flock and driving it off…. But their purpose is for the flesh and fleece, to kill and to destroy. They have no more the true shepherd's heart than a bandit has a soldier's or a pirate a sailor's. Such were the thieves and robbers who came before the Good Shepherd, stealing from God His glory, from men their souls and goods.

What a contrast was the Savior, who expected no reward but hatred and a crown of thorns, a cross and a borrowed tomb, and whose supreme object was to give life, and to give it more abundantly--abundant as the flowers of May; exhaustless as the perennial fountains of His own being; infinite as the nature of God!

Why has He loved us thus? We cannot tell. It is a mystery which will forever baffle us; but love knows no reason, no law. Surely the Son of God might have discovered, or made, beings more worthy of His attachment. But it was not to be so. He has loved us with the greatest love of all, the love that recks not the cost of life; and there is nothing now of good which He will withhold from His own, His loved, His chosen and purchased flock.

"I know Mine own, and mine own know Me; even as the Father knoweth Me, and I know the Father."

And it is just in this way, with a Divine, comprehensive, and perfect knowledge, that the Lord Jesus knows each of us. He is of a quick understanding to take in our past, with its sad and bitter failures, and our present with its unrealized longings. He knows our downsitting and uprising; our motives so often misunderstood; our anxieties, which cast their shadows over our lives; our dread; our hopes and fears. He intermeddles with the bitterness of our hearts, known only to us and Him. He scrutinizes each guest as it enters, and needs no census to tell Him the inmates of our hearts. "There is not a word on our tongue, but Thou, O Lord, knowest it altogether." It is very blessed to be known thus; so that we do not need to assume a disguise, or enter into labored explanations. He cannot be surprised, or taken unawares by anything we may tell Him.

“I give unto the eternal life, and they shall never perish.” When once that life has come to indwell the believer’s heart it must remain. Christ's sheep shall never perish. They may wander far from Him, lose all joy and comfort, fall under the rebuke of men, and seem to be living under a cloud; but, if they are really His, His honor is pledged to seek them out in the cloudy and dark day, and bring them back to Himself. His body cannot be dismembered; He cannot forfeit that which it has cost Him so much to purchase.

You may be a very lame and timid and worthless sheep; but you were purchased by the Shepherd’s blood, because He loved you so. There is not a wild beast in all hell that He has not vanquished and put beneath His feet; there is no fear, therefore, of His ability, as there in none of His love. He will deliver you from the lion and the bear, and bring you in triumph to the fold, with all the rest.

And so at last we shall be folded with all the flock beside in those sweet pasture lands, in which the Lamb leads His flock unto living fountains of water, and God wipes away all tears from our eyes.

F.B. MEYER

The Gospel of John

"My soul, move up to the top; let no stone be above thee; higher and higher; God awaits thee..."

“So be ready by morning, and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai, and present yourself there to Me on the top of the mountain.”

Exodus 34:2

For in the day of trouble

He shall hide me in His pavilion;

In the secret place of His tabernacle

He shall hide me;

He shall set me high upon a rock.

Psalm 27:5

Come away by yourself

And rest awhile,

For you are weary

 Of toil and strain.

Withdraw from the city

All the turmoil leave behind

Fly away like a dove,

Be with Me here.

Find life in the secret place

Alone with Me,

Peaceful and quiet,

Come be renewed.

Your Father watches,

From Heaven He sees;

His home, His abode

He makes in you.

Come, abide in My presence,

Rest in comfort and peace.

Receive healing, find forgiveness

Learn of Me, humble and meek. 

 C. TAYLOR

I am called to climb as far away from the world as I can. Surely the very place of meeting has meaning in it. For many a day I have not seen the top of the Mount. I have stood on the plain, or I have gone to the first cleft, or have tried a short way up the steep. I have not risen above the smoke of my own house, or the noise of my daily business. I have said, “In my climbing I must not lose sight of my family; I must be within call of my children; I must not go beyond the line of vegetation…” Thus I have not seen the top, nor have I entered into the secret place of the Most High. Oh that I might urge my way to the very top of the hill chosen of God! “What must it be to be there?” The wind will be music. The clouds will be as the dust of my feet. Earth and time will be seen as they are, in their littleness and their meanness. My soul, move up to the top; let no stone be above thee; higher and higher; God awaits thee, God calls thee, God will give thee rest! God means that the very climbing should do me good. He could come to me, but He bids me go to Him. There is mercy in the going. There is comfort on the road. The very weariness has a promise. The mountain is measured; God does not ask me to climb an unknown distance; He knows my strength, and He fixes the meeting-place within its limits.  This day I will see the sacred top. The enemy will try to turn me back, but I will meet him in the strength of my God, and abash him by the name of Christ. Lord, help me this day to see the very top of the Mount, and let my poor soul taste the sweetness of the liberty which is assured to it in Christ.

JOSEPH PARKER

“Come away by yourselves to a secluded place and rest..."

Jesus took with him Peter, John, and James, and went up the mountain to pray.

Luke 9:28

         And Jesus said to them, “Come away by yourselves to a secluded place and rest a while.” (For there were many people coming and going, and they did not even have time to eat.)

Mark 6:31

I am coming, Lord,

Climbing up the mountain;

You’ve bid me to come away

And be with You there.

High above, where the air is clear

I’m surrounded by natural beauty;

And on that mount

There is peace.

I am coming, Lord,

Seeking Your glorious presence;

You alone

Have words of eternal life.

Promising my soul

Will find its rest;

I unload my heavy burdens,

For Yours is light.

I remember, Lord,

The mount where You died;

Bringing glory to the Father

In Your passion.

Your precious blood

Gave me everlasting life;

The darkness lifted,

As You rose in triumph.

I am here, Lord,

Beholding Your shining splendor;

Reigning from Your throne,

Ablaze with flames of fire.

Your kingdom come,

Your will be done on earth.

Praise You, for bringing me

Into Your kingdom of Light.

Show me Your glory, I pray!

The glory of the only begotten Son;

Let me behold Your glorious face

Shining like the sun in all its brilliance.

C. TAYLOR

The part which mountains play in the life of our Lord is interesting. The great sermon, the manifesto of the King, was delivered on a mount. On a mount He apparently often went to teach and to preach. We learn that on one occasion when He came nigh to the Sea of Galilee He went up into a mountain and sat down there and great multitudes came to Him. It is a no less significant fact that before choosing the Twelve He did the like. When He sought to escape from the unwise enthusiasm of the crowd after the miracle of the loaves the mountain was His refuge. Most of all He sought the solitude of the lonely hills for prayer. The mountains afforded Him His favorite oratory, where He spent whole nights in prayer. The impression which these statements make on us is that He was often up the mountain, lingering in its lonely recesses, and finding amid their grandeur and majesty that sympathy which He could not get in the busy haunts of men.

         Nowhere else do we get more completely away from the world and its influence than on a mountain. The literal fact that we are then above the world is deeply significant of the spiritual. The mountains are the true cloisters of the Church…On the mount, with the world literally at our feet and heaven all around us, we have the solitude which alone is endurable and which alone is inspiring; the solitude which Jesus found so desirable and which He constantly sought: a solitude which is lost in the consciousness of an innumerable company of angels, of the spirits of just men made perfect, and of the very presence of God Himself.

         But, you say, no mountain rises at my door; what must I do therefore? Undoubtedly this is your loss; there is nothing that can take its place. It has no substitute. And yet there is a Holy Mount accessible to all who care to climb it, just as every man finds his Gethsemane somewhere, even though it be not among olive trees. Every disciple may find the hill of God somewhere; it may be in his own house, it may be in the lofty cathedral, or it may be in the humblest of sanctuaries. If anywhere he can be alone with God, there he may find the Holy Mount. And it should be his holy ambition to reach its summit—to present himself to God at the top of the Mount, where he may enjoy the fullness of the blessing.

JAMES HASTINGS

Luke