THE KING’S BUSINESS
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Friday, July 9. Mark 9:1-10.
day, the disciples would not believe the report of it when it had actually occurred (Luke 18:34; 24:25). Peter again rushes to the front, not, however, this time with a God-given confession of faith, but with a flesh-given drawing-back from the cross— “the man of rock,” so made by his appre hension and confession of Jesus as the “Christ the son of the Living God” (cf. Matt. 16:17), becomes “satan” (an adver sary), by minding" not the things of God, but the things that be of men. To shrink from the cross, the suffering that lies in the path of obedience to God and love to men, is the mind of man: to face the cross, is the mind of God, Which mind have you? Thursday, July 8. Mark 8:34-38. There are three essential conditions of discipleship: (1) Denial of self, that is, the saying to self when it comes forward with its claims, its demands, its desires, its opin ions, its interests, its anything, “I don’t know you,” “I won’t pay any attention to you” ; “Christ is my supreme and absolute Lord, and, your claims I have renounced forever.” (2) Taking up our cnoss, that is, going right on in the path in which Jesus leads to meet the suffering, the shame and the crucifixion, that always lie there. To compromise in order to avoid the suffering ^nd the shame, is to refuse to take up our cross. (3) Following Him, that is, to have the mind of Christ:.and that mind is to obey God even unto death, and to choose the lowly path of service. The man who seeks his own personal welfare, the highest life for himself, will not get it, but the man who loses sight of personal interests, even the highest, for Jesus’ sake and the Gospel’s, will gain the very thing of which he has lost sight. A man must have some higher aim than “saving his own soul.” Not self saving nor self-culture, but self-sacrifice, is the vocation of the child of God. To-gain the whole material world at the cost of losing one’s true self is a bad bargain (cf. 1 Jno."2:17),
We have had the study of the transfigu ration before in our study of Matthew 17, but study it as often as we may, we shall never exhaust its meaning. If things had been allowed to take their course, Jesus would have been glorified right then and there on the mount with the glory which He had with the Father before the world was (cf. Jno. 17:5), but things were not allowed to take their course; the work of redemption was not yet accomplished, for our. Lord was not to .redeem men by His perfect life, but by His atoning death (Heb. 9 :221 Eph. 1:7) ; so He who had already turned His back on the divine glory and had been made in-the likeness of man (Phil. 2:6, 7) again turns His back upon it, and descends from the mountain to die. Not until upon the cross He can utter the tri umphant cry, “It is finished” (Jno. 19:30), will He consent to resume the glory that He had laid aside to redeem us (2 Cor. 8:9). And having finished that atoning work, He will not be transfigured alone, but in due time we also shall be transfigured together with Him (Phil. 3:21, R. V., cf. Col. 3:4; R. V.). Building upon Old Testament prophecy (Mai. 4:5, 6) the Scribes expected Elijah to come as the restorer of all things before the establishment of the kingdom. Our Lord Jesus told the three who had gone up with Him into the mount that this expec tation was correct, but He told them fur ther that this prophecy had already been fulfilled in John the Baptist: but there is a suggestion in His words that the prophecy will have a still further and completer ful fillment. Our Lord’s words have been seized upon and applied to themselves by various iniposters, and many insane people, in all ages, but that is no reason for our discrediting them nor discounting them. Saturday, July 10. Mark 9:11-13.
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