756
T h e K i n g ' s B u s i n e s s
December 1928
L uke 15 :3-7. As the shepherd left ninety-nine for one; so Christ left glory for one, even me (Phil. 2:5-11). As the shepherd seeks “until he find it,” so Christ “must needs go to Jerusalem” and rebuked Peter’s suggestion of an easier way when he said “This shall not be unto thee, Lord.” As the shepherd “layeth it on his shoul ders, rejoicing,” so Christ carried us up in His body on the tree, and did it gladly and willingly (John 10:11, 15, 18). As the shepherd “when he cometh home” rejoices with his friends, cannot our thought carry over to “the marriage supper” ? For though this may not be a present interest wth boys and girls, it shall be a future experience if our hearts’ desire for them be granted. There are many wonderful things that boys and girls and men and women may do, but when it comes to the battle with sin we are all “without strength.” We need Christ the Saviour, and the sooner we come to realize it, the better it will be for the boys and girls and others; for years and powers shall not be wasted, but rather may best be given to serve the Master and those we may-, help in His name (Rom. 5:6). The greatest human heroism and sacri fice on behalf of others, be it World War or other of which we may have knowl edge as indicated in Romans 5 :7, cannot begin to compare with Christ’s death for us as set forth in 5 :8; for the first is but sheep dying for sheep and like sheep, the other is the Shepherd dying for the sheep and like God—indeed as God; in the one case it is friend for friend, in the other it is friend for enemy. Not only so, but since our Shepherd Saviour is risen, “we shall be saved by His life” (5 :10). Some may have a one-time or a wartime sav iour ; but we have an all-time Saviour (John 10:27-29). TELL ME, TEACHER : Why did the shepherd call his friends and neighbors together for one sheep,— because he had his property back, or be cause of what the sheep had been spared, or both? Why joy over one sinner that repenteth more than over ninety-nine just persons? What am I to understand by “righteous man” and “good man” ? What do you mean by “the ungodly” and “enemies,” and does that apply to me? How may I know whether I am one of the ninety-nine or one of “that which is lost” ? FRED S. SHEPARD ’S BLACKBOARD OUTLINE Salvation is in Christ. —Acts 4:12. All have sinned. —Rom. 3 :10. JESUS— Verily, I say unto you. M j-Jno. 6:24. Evermore salvation; ■ ■ 7:25 R. V. Self-surrender. —Rev. 22:17. “We have heard a joyful sound, Jesus saves!”
I I X \tr earns intheDesert” $ ( O 1 BE SURE TO READ OUR J | CHRISTMAS PROPOSITION § Inside Back Cover Page “
Jn. 8:43; Mt. 15:16). Repeatedly our Lord told them that He must go to Jeru salem to be crucified and raised three days after (Mt. 16:21), but “they under stood, not these things.fflgw. After the résurrection, they were shown by the Lord Himself, that they had in verted the order of prophecy. “O fools and slow of heart,”' said He, “to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into His glory f And begin ning at Moses and all the prophets He ex pounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself” (Lk. 24: 25-27). “These are the words which I spake unto you while I was yet with you. . . . . Then He opened their understand ing . . . Thus it is written and thus it behooved Christ to suffer and to rise the third day and that REPENTANCE and REMISSION OF S IN S s h o u l d be preached in his name AMONG ALL NA TIONS” (vs. 44-47). While one more inquiry was made as to the time when He should reign on earth, after being told that it was not for them to know the times and the seasons (Acts 1:7), they immediately applied themselves to the carrying out of His commission to preach repentance and salvation, begin ning with thé Jew, as He Himself had done, but reaching out to the whole world (Acts 1:8; cf. Mt. 28:19-20). This commission, it should be carefully noted, required them to teach all nations the very words He had taught His Jew ish hearers while on earth. His sermon on the mount had been closed with thè definite warning that its content was for “whosoever” and “every one” (Mt. 7 :24, 26). Any teaching, we believe should be viewed with alarm, when it has a ten dency to separate hearts from the words Jesus spoke by assigning them to some other age or people (1 Tim. 6:3-4). We believe also that serious error may arise from any teaching that would ascribe a failure to our Lord in His first advent, or any necessity of His having had to postpone His original plan. We should be able to find in the story of the gospels, the most natural unfolding of one supreme purpose. Is the cross to you, the theme and the glory of the entire New Testament? Have you seen at the heart of Christ’s mission, that all-essen tial work of saving His people from their sins? Have you accepted His own Word as to the nature of that heavenly king dom which He declared “at hand” (Mt. 4:17; cf. 5:3; Jn. 18:33-36)? Have you been “translated into the kingdom of God’s dear Son” (Col. 1 :13) through ac ceptance of His atoning death?
G olden T ext I llustration And thou shalt call his name lesus for he shall save his people from their sins (Mt. 1:21).’ We cannot gaze directly at the disc of the sun, for the eye cannot endure the splendor; but when its rays pass through a prism, they are arranged in beautiful order and the eye : examines them in detail with ease and satisfaction. ■Similar is the effect of the cross of Jesus Christ upon the radiations of the divine charac ter, that character which no man is able directly to contemplate. The perfections 'of God are there spread out in more than rainbow glory and in all their surpassing beauty and harmony for our inspection. It is the cross that reaches the world’s heart. The continued life of Jesus would have left us’,in our sins. For this hour came He into the world. He was the only One born into this world with spe cific relation to the sins of mankind. When we behold the incarnate “Word” nailed to the accursed tree to save His people from their sins, then we must cry out: “O Lamb of God, I come.rf Not until we view God through this prism, do we know Him as a loving heavenly Father. “God forbid that I should glory save in the cross.” — o — C hrist T h e S aviour Luke 15:3-7; Romans 5 :6-10 Last week we tried to present the les son in a way that would cause the class to face the fact of sin sincerely and in a very personal way, and we noticed what a prominent p l a c e “we” had in the record; but in this week’s lesson, where C h r i s t our Shep herd Saviour is pre sented, it is very fit tingly “He” that is the prominent word. We are mentioned only as “that which is l ost , " . w h i l e Christ is presented thirteen t i me s as “He, me, my, I” ; and how proper this is, since He is our all in all. May not one of heaven’s greatest joys be experienced when a boy or girl gives the heart to Christ, since that means that a lifetime as well as a soul has been given Him for His use? Let us get down into terms of a child’s understanding such ideas as the follow ing:
Made with FlippingBook - Online magazine maker