Religious Studies, Sketches and Poems

MP3 Audio CD. Religious Studies, Sketches and Poems


RELIGIOUS STUDIES


FOOTSTEPS OF THE MASTER




I

CHRIST IN THE OLD TESTAMENT

"The Lamb slain from the foundation of the world."


Our Lord asserts nothing more frequently than that he came to this
world, not as other men come, but as a voluntary exile from a higher
and purer life. He said in public, speaking to the Jews, "I came
down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him that
sent me." When the Jews tauntingly said to him, "Thou art not yet
fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham?" he answered, "Before
Abraham was, I AM." In fact, while he walked as a brother among men,
there were constant and mysterious flashes from the life of a higher
sphere. Jesus moved about in our life as a sympathetic foreigner
who ever and anon in moments of high excitement breaks out into
his native language. So Christ at times rose into the language of
heaven, and spoke for a moment, unconsciously as it were, in the
style of a higher world.

He did not say, "Before Abraham was, I was," but "I AM," using
the same form which in the Old Testament is used by Jehovah when
he declares his name to Moses, "I AM that I am." So, too, when
conversing with Nicodemus, our Lord asserts that he is the only
person competent to bear testimony to heavenly things, because he
came from heaven.