THE DAY OF REST, WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? AN ADDRESS

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 204, 21 May 1887, Page 8 (Supplement)

THE DAY OF REST, WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST? AN ADDRESS

By D. L. Moody.

Matthew xxii, 42. 1 suppose thero is not a singlo individual in this audience who has not thought something about Christ. There is no ono about whom so much has been written and talked about as Christ. For eighteen hundred years men havo been talking about Him, and thinking about Him, more or less ; and many hare got their minds made up about who He is, whilst there are doubtless others who have not done so, but still are undecided. Now, I want you this morning to spend a few minutes in thinking about Christ, and asking your&elf •who He was, and what He came into this world for. If I were to ask this audience what you think of any of your prominent men, you would have your minds made up on the subject. If 1 were to ask you what you think of jour noble Queen, you would speak right out, and very soon tell me your opinion. If I were to ask what you think of your Premier, you would be ready in an instant to speak out aud tell me what you thought for or against him. And why should not poo pie make up their minds 'about Jesus Christ, and take their stand for or against Him ? If you think well of Him, why not .speak well of Him, and come out and range yourself on His aide. And if you think ill of Him, and believe Him to be an impostor, and that He did not die to save the world, why not lift up your handi and say you are against Him? It would be a happy day, 1 believe, for Christianity, if the line of distinction were clearly drawn, and then we should know positively who was for ChiUt, arid who was against Him. A man cannot sen c Clod and Mammon. Ho cannot setve Christ and the de\ il at the samo time, because one is the great enemy of the other. I have not come to ask you what you think about the Church of England, Dissenters, or this or that denomination, or about the Bible. They are of little importance compared with the question, " What think ye of Christ? 1 ' Was he the Son of God? was lie not God-man ? Did he leave heaven and come dov, n into this world for a purpose — to seek and aa\e that >\ liich was lost ? I would like to commence with Christ's birth in the manger, andjollow Him up through the thirty-three years He was here on earth. 1 would like to speak of Him as a Ttacher, a Preacher, a Physician, and a Comforter. I would liko to press the subject home to you, and ask you what you really think of Him. If we had more time to go fully into the subject, 1 would ask you what you think of His coming into this world and being born in a manger, when he might have been born in a palace,— His passing by palaces, riches, crowns, and •dominions, though He might have had them, and might, if He chose, have come with all the grandeur and glory and pomp of heaven, and \\rx\Q had a letinue of legions of angels. When the Princo of Wales ■went to America, he had with him a grand and noble escort ; but when the Prince of Heaven came down, Ho came alone, and wont clean down into the manger, that He might just get His arms under the poorest sinner ami lift him up to heaven. J Nicodemus said, uWe know Tho ! art a barker come from God : for no man can do these miracles that Thou doest except God be with him." Talk about the twihtra of the present day ; I would rather a thousand fcimts be five minutes at the feet of Christ than listen a lifetime to all the wise men in the world. If you want to get heavenly wisdom, you must pass through God's College. Do you know what that is ? j Why, at the feet of Christ. Mary found her place there. A man may go to Oxford or Cambridge, or anywhere else, but if he ha^ not been to God's seminary he will never fay tit for heaven. He puts tho truth so plain that the little children could get hold of it. There are no stories in the world like the stories of Je-.ua. He used just to hang truth upon anything. Yonder is a sower, a fox, a bird, and He just hangs the truth upon it, so that you cannot see a fox, a .sower, or a bird, but it calls something to your mind that Jesus said. Yonder is a lily of the valley ; you cannot see it without thinking of His words — " they toil not, neither do they spin." He makes the little sparrow chirping in the air preach to ulpu 1p He was a wonderful teacher. Theologians have not fathomed the depth of His teaching yet. I would like to take you to tho mountain side to hear this wonderful Teacher and Prpw.'her. Never man speak like this man. His sermon on the mount is as fresh to-day a3 when he first uttered it. Thank Gou, His teachings and preachings stand firm*to-day ! Eighteen hundred years have rolled away, and yet Christ is thought rnoie of to-day than at any other time in the world's history ; and, a* years roll on, His name shall be exalted above every other name, and He, a-> the predicted Stone cut out without hands, shall come in contact with the Image prefiguring the kingdoms of this world, and break it to pieces like chaff on the threshing-floor, as foretold in Daniel ii. J would like you to go with me from village to village, as He journeyed up and down that little country of Palestine as a Physician. Here comes'a man along.lcovered with leprosy, He says, ' ' Lord, if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean ;" and the Great Physician says, "I will," and the man was clean in an instant, and the leprosy left him. You have got hospitals for incurable diseases ; but there were no incurable diseases with Him. A word from His lips, and away went disease. Pray God that, as a Physician, He may quicken dead souls to-day ! Again, nee Him in the little home at Bethany, binding up the wounded hearts of Martha and Mary, and tell me what think ye of Him as a Comforter ? He is a husband to the widow, and a father to the fatherless. If there is any widow here, take my advice and make Him your comforter. Fatherless children who may bo here, make Him your friend. He is a friend who never dies ;He will sheer you in adversity, and will never leave you. The weary may find a restingplace upon His breast. He never varies, never fails, never dies. His sympathy is ever fresh ; His love ever free. Thank God for Christ as a Teacher, Preacher, Physician and Comforter. But these are not the points I want to take up now. I wish on this occasion to bring up the witnesses for and against Christ, and see what they have to say about Him. If I went to London and wanted to find out all about a man, there would be two classes of people that I would inquire of. First : — The class of people who were not great admirers of him. I would like to get their opinion of the man. People sometimes say oi a person, " Oh, he is so blinded, he love» the man ao much that he can't sea his

faults, and you can't get anything out of him, but what is in the man's favour, and it's a one-sided affair." Therefore, I am not going to take the friends of Christ only, but His bitterest enemies as well, and bring them both up here before you, and put them in the jury-box, as it were, and see what they have to say about Him. In the first place, bring in for witnesses Pharisees. We know how they hated Him. He pui one question to them ; that was enough, and they went about seeking to kill Him. And that's the way now-a-days — when men are foiled in argument, they begin to lie about their opponent and abuse him. Suppose there is a Pharisee near at hand, will we ask him what lie has to say , about Christ. Well, he is brought in, and what does he say ?— " This man receivelh sinners, and eateth with them- " Well, that's a fine argument, but that's what they brought against Him. Why, it's the very thing that makes us love Him. It's the highest recommendation of the Gospel that He is the friend of publicans and sinners. Yea, and he still receives sinners to-day. Again, when He was hanging there on the cross, they brought tins against Him, — "This man trusted in GodV "He saved others, Himself He cannot save." And so He did save others ; but He could not save himself and save you and mo as well. He had lo lay down His own life to redeem yours and mine. The Pharisees told the truth for once in their lives, because He came to lay down His life to save ours. Now, let us bring"in Gaivphas. He was the president, we may say, of the Sanhedrim, the Chairman of the Council. Let that High Priest be brought in — let him come on to this platform and give his evidence. " Caiaphas, you were in the council chamber when the Sanhedrim found Him guilty. You put the question to them, ' What think ye ?' and all of them answered, 'He Is worthy of death.' Tell us, Caiaphas, on what testimony did you condemn Him ? You said, ' I adjure Thee by the living God, tell us, Art Thou the Son of God ?' And he answered, • I am ; and ye shall see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of God, and coming in the clouds of heaven.' Alas! Caiaphas, you unjustly condemned Him to death for blasphemy, because He testified that He was the Son of God, and that He would come again a second time in the clouds to judge the world." And now let u« summon Pilate into the witness-box. We have got his testimony on record. What does he say ? Let us ask him. " Pilate, Christ was brought before you ; you looked at Him, and talked with Him face to face ; what think ye of Christ V "He said he was the King of the Jews,'' replies Pilate, "and I wrote it over the cross ; but I find no fault in Him." There are a good many men now, who are worse than Pilate, because they do find fault with Christ, whilst Pilate did not. But see, there comes a man elbowing his way through the crowd ; he is in great haste, and he comes up to Pilate, and thrusting- out his hand gives him a message, and it reads thus :—": — " Have thou nothing to do with this ju.sfc man, for I have .suffered many things of Him in a dream." This is the testimony of Pilate's wife. You want to know what His enemies thought of Him, what the heathen man thought of him, and what his wife thought, and there it is—" Have thou nothing to do with thatjutt man." And now 100k — in comes Judas. " Come tell us, Judai, What think you of Christ ? You sold Him for thirty pieces of silver, and betrayed Him witli a kiss. You were with Him in Jerusalem, ond saw Him perform His miracles. In Bethany, when he raised Lazarus, you were there. Tell us what you think of Him." You can hear what he says, as he throws the money on the table : "I have betrayed innocent Mood." He confessed his sin to the High Priest, and then went out and hung himself. Never confess your sins to a man, but confess them to God. All he got from the High Priest, and the Council was, " What is that to us ?" and so they turned him away. Every single person that had anything to do with the death of Christ, God has made them put their testimony on record that He was an innocent man. There is the Centurion, who had charge of the soldiers. Now, we have got him as a witness. Let him come in and speak. "Now, Centurion, tell us what you think of Christ. You had charge of His executioners ; it was you that had to see the order earned out that he should be nailed to the cross ; you saw Him die, and 'heard Him speak upon tho cross." Hark ! Look at the man. He is smiting his breast as he cries out, " Truly, thin was the. Son of God." That's the Centurion's testimony. Again, I may summon the thief on the crow to give his testimony. Both of the j thieves at first railed upon Christ and reviled Him, and cast in His teeth the words, "If Thou bo the Son of God, save Thyself and us ;" but at last one begins to rebuke the other, and says, " This man hath done nothing amiss." That's what the thief thought of Him when ho was on the cross. And so I might go on sfcill further, and call up as witnesses the, very devils thcjnsehm We have got their testimony. Why the very devils said, "Thou Son of God." They called Him the Son of God, Many people say, " Oh, I believe Christ to be the Son of God, and, because I believe it intellectually, I shall be saved." I teli you the devils believed that. They s-aid to Christ, " Jesus, Thou Son of the Most High God, art Thou come to torment us before the time? We know Thee who Thou art, the Holy One of God." They knew their time was coming. They believed, but,- alas ! they only trembled. They know that Satan is to be cast down, and all that follow him will be cast down with him. May God make you wise to-day to receive Christ, and to stand up for Him, and may you escape the condemnation of hell ! { And now let us bring in Chr-hC* friends, and hear their evidence. Here is one — none \ better born of women, as Christ declared. I He preached only Christ ; and that is John, ' the Baptist— ■the voice of one crying ih the ; wilderness. He was only a forerunner ; he preached down himself, and preached up Christ. " I must decrease, but He must increase." Hear the wilderness-preacher, clothed in his leathern girdle and hairy coat : these are his words, and, although they were echoed in the wilderness of Palestine, they live to-day. They are written down in this Book for ever—" Behold the Lamb of God, which taheth away the sins of the world" That's what John the Baptist thought of Him. " / hear record that He, is the Son of God ." That's his rocord. No wonder that he drew all Jerusalem and Judaea un£o him, because he preached Christ : and whenever men preach up nothing but Chrisfc.and preach down nothing but the devil, as Rowland Hill used to say, they will always have plenty of followers. (John i.) Now let us bring in Peter. " Come, Peter, you were with Him on tho Mount of Transfiguration and in the Garden of Gethsemane ; tell us what you think of Christ. Stand here in this witness-box now, and testify Him, You denied Him once. Was it true, Peter, that you did not know Him ?" " Know Him !" replies Peter. "It was a lie I told then, I did know Him. I fell because I was so confident. Know Him ! I knew Him very well. He is both Lord and Christ" That was Peter's testimony on the day of Pentecost. There he I stooa out and said, " God hath made that

same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ. " (Acts ii. 36.) And fcradition.tells us that whentheycame to execute Peter, he felt he was not worthy to die in tho way His Master died, and he requested to be crucified with his head downwards. That's what Peter thought of Him. , He thought well of Him. Some one says, if you want to please a father, speak well of his son. And so with God, ifc will please him better than anything else, if you speak well and think well of Christ. Suppose we bring in next the doubting Thomas. "You doubted Him, Thomas, whon you saw Him, after He was risen from the dead ; and put your fingers upon the prints of the nails, and thrust your hands into his side. What do you think of Him?" "My Lord and my God!" says Thomas. "My Lord and my God." Again, supposing we could bring in John, the gentle disciple. He knew more about that loving, kindly, beating heart than anyone else. He was very dear to the Lord. Matthew wrote of Christ as the Royal King come to take the throne. Mark wrote of Him as a Servant ; Luke, as the Son of Man. Matthew begins with David, Mark with Zochariah, Luke with Jeremiah ; but John takes up his pen, and with'one stroke for ever settles the question of Unitarianism, and of Christ being only a man — he went right back before the time of Adam. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with Ood, and the Word was God. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." He said He was "the root and offspring of David, the bright and morning star." So John thought well of Him, and 1 wish I had time to tell you how well. Then if I go over to the peojtlc of DccapoUs, I find Christ had been there casting out devils ; and, because they lost a few swine, they besought Him to depart out of their coasts, and He went. But He came | back again. I don't know how he gob back ; but tho Lord told the man out of whom Ho had cast tho devils to go and tell tho wonderful things that had been done for him, and he dia so, and began to preach about it everywhere ; and we are told that "all men did marvel at it." The man was a lay preacher, and he did his work well. A revival broke out, and the people, no doubt, pressed the man to try and get his Master back again ; and the people then said, "He hath done all things well." You see, they had changed their m nda, and said, "He maketh both the deaf to hear, and the dumb to speak. He doeth all things well." And the best thing you can do to-day is to let Him save you. But we have other witnesses to bring in. There is Saul of Tarsus, formerly one ot his worst enemies. Hear him breathing out threatenings and slaughters against Christ. And Christ says, " Saul, Saul, why persecutest fchou me ?" and he might have added, " What have I done to you ? Have I injured you ? Did I not come to bless you ? Saul, Saul, why do you treat me thus?" And Saul asks, "Who art thou, Lord?" "lam Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutest." Ton see, he was not ashamed of his name, although He had been up in heaven : "1 am He whom thou pensecutest." And now, a few years after that, what does Paul say ?— " 1 count everything as dross, that I may win Christ." He thought a good deal of Him ; he did not even count his life ; he thought nothing of being boaten for preaching the Gospel. When he was beaten at one place, he went boldly on fco the next, still preaching Christ crucified. On he went to Corinth, where they gave him, not gold or silver, not a thousand pounds, or anything of that sort, but thirty-nine stripes. Yet he was willing to endure anything, and. called his sufferings and persecutions "a light affliction." Y r es, he thought a great deal of Christ. But 1 could go beyond this a long way ; for we have got the testimony of angeh* If I could summon the angels down here today, what would they say about Christ? They were permitted once to come and testify about His birth, and what did they say then? — "1 bring you glad tidings ofgreat joy ; for unto you is born this day, in the city of David, a Son* and he shall be your Saviour." Won't you believe the j tidings to-day, and take Him as your Saviour ? And then we have got on record what the redeemed saints think of Him. Here on earth He was not known— no one seemed fully to be acquainted with Him ; but Ho was know in that world in which Ho has been from the very foundation : for He was there before the morning stars sang together, and the sons of God shouted for joy. We are told that John was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and, being caught up, ho hoard a loud shout around him, aud, looking, he saw ten thousand times ten thousand angels, who were shouting, '* Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing." Yes, He is worthy of all this. That is what Heaven thinks of Him ; and it would be a good thing if earth would take up the echo, and join with Heaven in that inscriptive song. 0 come, thou most High God, and help this poor, pincursed earth to receive Christ ao its Saviour, and to think well of Him ! There is just one more witness I would like to bring in here to-day, and that is God the Father. He bore his testimony when Jesus came up out of Jordan, and then— His voice coming from the Throne of Heaven — Hark ! what the voice is saying, " Thii is my beloved Son in whom I am ivell 2>lea<ied.'' That's what God thinks of Him. The moment the sinner is pleased with Christ, the sinner and God come together. The moment you come and say, as the Father did, "I am well pleased with Him and accept Him," you aro wedded to God. Christ took Peter, and John, and James up into a great mountain ; and there came another voice, the same voice again — " This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased ; hear ye Him. " And that voice went echoing and re-echoing through Palestine, and through the earth, and is echoing still — "Hear ye him! Hear ye Him!" My friend, will you hoar Him to-day? Hark ! what does He say—" Come unto me, all ye that labour and ai % e heavy laden. Take my yoke upou you, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls." Before I close, let me ask you, have you not reason to think well of Christ— will you not think well of Him to-day, and remember what He died for ? Not for His own sin ; He never did sin j if He had, He would have had to die for His own sin. No, He was a lamb without spot or blemish. Do you think it is right and just and noble to lift up your voice against such a Saviour? Let me entreat you not to do so, and may God help you all to accept Him now.