Personal Friendships of Jesus, J. R. Miller [best english novels for beginners txt] 📗

experiences of his passion. He did it for his own sake; his heart hungered for communion with his friends; with desire he desired to eat the Passover, and enjoy these hours with them before he suffered. We may be sure, too, that he received from the holy fellowship comfort and strength, which helped him in passing through the bitter hours that followed. Then, he did it also for the sake of his disciples. He knew how their hearts would be broken with sorrow when he was taken from them, and he wished to comfort them and make them stronger for the way. The memory of those holy hours hung over them like a star in all the dark night of their sorrow, and was a benediction to them as long as they lived.

Then, who can tell what blessings have gone out from that farewell into the whole Church of Christ through all the centuries? It is the holy of holies of Christian history. The Lord's Supper, instituted that night, and which has never ceased to be observed as a memorial of the Master's wonderful love and great sacrifice, has sweetened the world with its fragrant memories. The words spoken by the Master at the table have been repeated from lip to heart wherever the story of the gospel has gone, and have given unspeakable comfort to millions of hearts. The petitions of the great intercessory prayer have been rising continually, like holy incense, ever since they were first uttered, taking into their clasp each new generation of believers. This farewell has kept the Christian hearts of all the centuries warm and tender with love toward him who is the unchanging Friend the same yesterday and to-day and forever.

CHAPTER XIV JESUS' FRIENDSHIPS AFTER HE AROSE.

  "Our own are our own forever—God taketh not back his gift;
    They may pass beyond our vision, but our soul shall find them out
  When the waiting is all accomplished, and the deathly shadows lift,
    And the glory is given for grieving, and the surety of God for doubt."

We cannot but ask questions about the after life. What is its character? What shall be the relations there of those who in the present life have been united in friendship? What effect has dying on the human affections? Does it dissolve the bonds which here have been so strong? Or do friendships go on through death, interrupted for a little time only, to be taken up again in the life beyond? Surely God will not blame us for our eagerness to know all we can learn about the world to which we are going.

True, we cannot learn much about this blessed life while we stay in this world. Human eyes cannot penetrate into the deep mystery. We are like men standing on the shore of a great sea, wondering what lies on the other side. No one has come back to tell us what he found in that far country. We bring our questions to the word of God, but it avails little; even inspiration does not give us explicit revealings concerning the life of the blessed. We know that the Son of God had dwelt forever in heaven before his incarnation, and we expect that he will shed light upon the subject of life within the gates of heaven. But he is almost silent to our questions. Indeed, he seems to tell us really nothing. He gives us no description of the place from which he came, to which he returned, and to which he said his disciples shall be gathered. He says nothing about the occupations of those who dwell there. He satisfies no human yearnings to know the nature of friendship after death. We are likely to turn away from our quest for definite knowledge, feeling that even Jesus has told us nothing. Yet he has told us a great deal.

There is one wonderful revelation of which perhaps too little has been made. After Jesus had died, and lain in the grave for three days, he rose again, and remained for forty days upon the earth. During that time he did not resume the old relations. He was not with his disciples as he had been during the three years of his public ministry, journeying with them, speaking to them, working miracles; yet he showed himself to them a number of times.

The remarkable thing in these appearances of Jesus during the forty days is that we see in him one beyond death. Lazarus was brought back to earth after having died, but it was only the old life to which he returned. The human relations between him and his sisters and friends were restored, but probably they were not different from what they had been in the past. Lazarus was the same mortal being as before, with human frailties and infirmities.

Jesus, however, after his return from the grave, was a man beyond death. He was the same person who had lived and died, and yet he was changed. He appeared and disappeared at will. He entered rooms through closed and barred doors. At last his body ascended from the earth, and passed up to heaven, subject no longer to the laws of gravitation. We see in Jesus, therefore, during the forty days, one who has passed into what we call the other life. What he was then his people will be when they have emerged from death with their spiritual bodies, for he was the first-fruits of them that are asleep.

As we study Jesus in the story of those days, we are surprised to see how little he was changed. Death had left no strange marks upon him. Nothing beautiful in his life had been lost in the grave. He came back from the shadows as human as he was before he entered the valley. Dying had robbed him of no human tenderness, no gentle grace of disposition, no charm of manner. As we watch him in his intercourse with his disciples, we recognize the familiar traits which belonged to his personality during the three years of his active ministry.

We may rightly infer that in our new life we shall be as little changed as Jesus was. We shall lose our sin, our frailties and infirmities, all our blemishes and faults. The long-hindered and hampered powers of our being shall be liberated. Hidden beauties shall shine out in our character, as developed pictures in the photographer's sensitized plate. There will be great changes in us in these and other regards, but our personality will be the same. Jesus was easily recognized by his friends; so shall we be by those who have known us. Whatever is beautiful and good in us here,—the fruits of spiritual conquest, the lessons learned in earth's experiences, the impressions made upon us by the Word of God, the silver and golden threads woven in our life-web by pure friendships, the effects of sorrow upon us, the work wrought in us by the Holy Spirit,—all this shall appear in our new life. We shall have incorruptible, spiritual, and glorious bodies, no longer mortal and subject to the limitations of matter; death will rob us of nothing that is worthy and true, and fit for the blessed life.

  "We are quite sure
  That he will give them back—
  Bright, pure, and beautiful.
        * * *
  He does not mean—though heaven be fair—
  To change the spirits entering there
  That they forget
  The eyes upraised and wet,
  The lips too still for prayer,
  The mute despair.
  He will not take
  The spirits which he gave, and make
  The glorified so new
  That they are lost to me and you.
        * * *
  I do believe that just the same sweet face,
  But glorified, is waiting in the place
  Where we shall meet.
        * * *
  God never made
  Spirit for spirit, answering shade for shade,
  And placed them side by side—
  So wrought in one, though separate, mystified,
  And meant to break
  The quivering threads between."

It is interesting, too, to study the friendships of Jesus after he came from the grave. He did not take up again the public life of the days before his death. He made no more journeys through the country. He spoke no more to throngs in the temple courts or by the Seaside. He no more went about healing, teaching, casting out demons, and raising the dead. He made no appearances in public. Only his disciples saw him. We have but few details of his intercourse with individuals, but such glimpses as we have are exceedingly interesting. They show us that no tender tie of friendship had been hurt by his experience of dying. The love of his heart lived on through death, and reappeared during the forty days in undiminished gentleness and kindness. He did not meet his old friends as strangers, but as one who had been away for a few days, and had come again.

The first of his friends to whom he showed himself after he arose was Mary Magdalene. Her story is pathetic in its interest. The traditions of the centuries have blotted her name, but there is not the slightest evidence in the New Testament that she was ever a woman of blemished character. There is no reason whatever for identifying her with the woman that was a sinner, who came to Jesus in Simon's house. All that is said of Mary's former condition is that she was possessed of seven demons, and that Jesus freed her from this terrible bondage. In gratitude for this unspeakable deliverance Mary followed Jesus, leaving her home, and going with him until the day of his death. She was one of several women friends who accompanied him and ministered to him of their substance.

Mary's devotion to Jesus was wonderful. When the tomb was closed she was one of the watchers who lingered, loath to leave it. Then, at the dawn of the first day morning she was again one of those who hurried through the darkness to the tomb, with spices for the anointing of the body—last at his cross, and earliest at his tomb. Mary's devotion was rewarded; for to her first of all his friends did Jesus appear, as she stood weeping by the empty grave. She did not recognize him at once. She was not expecting to see him risen. Then, her eyes were blinded with her tears. But the moment he spoke her name, "Mary," she knew him, and answered, "Rabboni." He was not changed to her. He had not forgotten her. The love in his heart had lost none of its tenderness. He was as accessible as ever. Dying had made him no less a friend, and no less sympathetic, than he was before he died.

Soon after Mary had met Jesus, and rejoiced to find him her friend just as of old, he appeared to the other women of the company who had followed him with their grateful ministries. They also knew him, and he knew them; and their hearts suffered no wrench at the meeting, for they found the same sweet friendship they thought they had lost, just as warm and tender as ever.

That same day Jesus appeared to Peter. A veil is drawn by the evangelists over the circumstances of this meeting. The friendship of Jesus and Peter had continued for three years. He had often given his Master pain and trouble through his impulsive ways. But the culmination of it all came on the night of the betrayal, when, in the hall of the high priest's palace, Peter denied being a disciple of Jesus, denied even knowing him. While for the third time the base and cowardly words were on his lips, Jesus turned and looked upon his faithless disciple with a look of grieved love, and then Peter remembered the forewarning the Master had given him. His heart was broken with penitence, and he went out and wept bitterly. But he had no opportunity to seek forgiveness; for the next morning Jesus was on his cross, and in the evening was in his grave. Peter's sorrow was very deep, for his love for his Master was very strong.

We can imagine that when