Bible Commentaries
Luke 8

Verses 1-3

XXIX

OUR LORD’S GREAT MINISTRY IN GALILEE

Part IV The Centurion’s Servant Healed, the Widow’s Son Raised, The Sin Against the Holy Spirit

Harmony -pages 52-59 and Matthew 8:1; Matthew 8:5-13; Matthew 11:2-30; Matthew 12:22-37; Mark 3:1-30; Luke 7:1-8:3.

When Jesus, who spoke with authority, had finished the Sermon on the Mount, he returned to Capernaum where he acted with authority in performing some noted miracles. Here he was met by a deputation from a centurion, a heathen, beseeching him to heal his servant who was at the point of death. This Jewish deputation entered the plea for the centurion that he had favored the Jews greatly and had built for them a synagogue. Jesus set out at once to go to the house of the centurion, but was met by a second deputation, saying to Jesus that he not trouble himself but just speak the word and the work would be done. The centurion referred in this message to his own authority over his soldiers, reasoning that Christ’s authority was greater and therefore he could speak the word and his servant should be healed. This called forth from our Lord the highest commendation of his faith. No Jew up to this time had manifested such faith as this Roman centurion. Then our Lord draws the picture of the Gentiles coming from the east, west, north, and south to feast with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven while the Jews, the sons of the kingdom, were cast out. Jesus then granted the petition of the centurion according to his faith.

The second great miracle of Jesus in this region was the raising of the widow’s son at Nain, which was a great blessing to the widow and caused very much comment upon the work of our Lord, so that his fame spread over all Judea and the region roundabout. His fame as a miracle worker and "a great prophet, “ reached John the Baptist and brought forth his message of inquiry.

This inquiry of John, which reflects the state of discouragement, and also the testimony of Jesus concerning John, is discussed in John 10 of this volume (which see), but there are some points in this incident not brought out in that discussion which also need to be emphasized. First, what is the meaning of "the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence" (Matthew 11:12)? The image is not precisely that of taking a city by storm, but of an eager, invading host, each trying to be first, pressing and jostling each other, as when gold was discovered in California, or at the settlement of the Oklahoma strip. It means impassioned earnestness and indomitable resolution in the entrance upon and pursuit of a Christian life, making religion the chief concern and salvation the foremost thing as expressed in the precepts: "Seek first the kingdom, etc.," "Agonize to enter in at the strait gate." It rightly expresses the absorbing interest and enthusiasm of a revival. "Thus Christianity was born in a revival and all its mighty advances have come from revivals which are yet the hope of the world." This thought is illustrated in Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, pp. 47-49. Following this is the contrast between the publicans and scribes, the one justifying God and the other rejecting for themselves the counsel of God. Then he likens them unto children in the market, playing funeral. One side piped but the other side did not dance; then they wailed but the others did not weep. So, John was an ascetic and that did not suit them; Jesus ate and drank and that did not suit them. So it has ever been with the faultfinders. But in spite of that, wisdom is justified of her works (or children), i.e., wisdom is evidenced by her children, whether in the conduct of John or Jesus. But this statement does not justify the liquor business as the defendants of it claim.

There is no evidence that Jesus either made or drank intoxicating wine

Then began Jesus to upbraid the cities wherein were done these mighty works, including Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum, because they had not repented. This shows that light brings with it the obligation to repent, and that this will be the governing principle of the judgment. Men shall be judged according to the light they have. Then follows the announcement of a great principle of revelation. God makes it to babes rather than to the worldly-wise man, and that Jesus himself is the medium of the revelation from God to man, but only the humble in spirit and contrite in heart can receive it. Because he is the medium of the blessing, the God-man, his compassion here finds expression in this great, broad invitation: "Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for am I meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light." Note the two kinds of rest here: First, the given rest, which is accepted by grace, and second, the found rest, which is attained in service.

The next incident is the anointing of our Saviour’s feet by a woman who was a sinner. This incident occurred in Galilee – just where I do not know – possibly, but not probably, in Nain. It is recorded by Luke alone, who, following a custom of the historians of mentioning only one incident of a special kind, omits the narrative of a later anointing.

Two preceding things seem to be implied by the story: (a) That the host had been a beneficiary in some way of Christ’s healing power over the body; (b) That the woman had been a beneficiary" of his saving power. It is quite probable that her weary and sin-burdened soul had heard and accepted the gracious invitation: "Come unto me, etc.," just given by the Saviour. At any rate her case is an incarnate illustration of the power of that text and is a living exposition of it. It is far more beautiful and impressive in the Greek than any translation can make it. Several customs prevalent then but obsolete now, constitute the setting of the story, and must be understood in order to appreciate its full meaning.

(1) The Oriental courtesies of hospitality usually extended to an honored guest. The footwear of the times – open sandals – and the dust of travel in so dry a country, necessitated the washing of the feet of an incoming guest the first act of hospitality. See Abraham’s example (Genesis 18:4) and Lot’s (Genesis 19:2) and Laban’s (Genesis 24:32) and the old Benjaminite (Judges 19:20-21) and Abigail (1 Samuel 25:41). See as later instances (John 13) our Lord’s washing the feet of his disciples and the Christian customs (1 Timothy 5:10). This office was usually performed by servants, but was a mark of great respect and honor to a guest if performed by the host himself.

(2) The custom of saluting a guest with a kiss. See case of Moses (Exodus 18:7) and of David (2 Samuel 19:39). To observe this mode of showing affectionate respect is frequently enjoined in the New Testament epistles. As employed by Absalom for purposes of demagogy (2 Samuel 15:5), and as employed toward Amasa by Joab when murder was in his heart (2 Samuel 20:9-10), and by Judas to our Lord when treachery was in his heart, rendered their crimes the more heinous. To this Patrick Henry refers: "Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a kiss."

(3) The custom of anointing the head at meals (Ecclesiastes 9:7-8; Psalms 23:5). Hence for the Pharisee to omit these marks of courteous hospitality was to show his light esteem for his guest. It proves that the invitation was not very hearty.

(4) The custom of reclining at meals (Amos 6:4-6). This explains "sat at meat" and "behind at his feet."

With these items of background we are prepared to understand and appreciate that wonderful story of the compassion of Jesus. His lesson on forgiveness and proportionate love as illustrated in the case of this wicked woman has been the sweet consolation of thousands. The announcement to the woman that her faith had saved her throws light on the question, "What must I do to be saved?" There are here also the usual contrasts where the work of salvation is going on. The woman was overflowing with love and praise while others were questioning in their hearts and abounding in hate and censure. This scene has been re-enacted many a time since, as Christianity has held out the hand of compassion to the outcasts and Satan has questioned and jeered at her beautiful offers of mercy.

In Section 47 (Luke 8:1-3) of the Harmony we have a further account of our Lord’s ministry in Galilee with the twelve, and certain women who had been the beneficiaries of his ministry, who also ministered to him of their substance. This is the first Ladies’ Aid Society of which we have any record and they were of the right sort.

We now take up the discussion of the sin against -the Holy Spirit found in Section 48 (Matthew 12:22-37; Mark 3:19-30). Before opening the discussion of it, allow me to group certain passages of both Testaments bearing on this question: Psalms 19:13: "Innocent of the great transgression." Mark 3:29: "Guilty of an eternal sin." Numbers 15:28-31: "If any soul sin through ignorance, the priest shall make an atonement for the soul that sinneth ignorantly, when he sinneth by ignorance before the Lord, to make an atonement for him and it shall be forgiven him. But the soul that doeth presumptuously, born in the land of a stranger, the same reproacheth the Lord; and that soul shall be cut off from among his people. Because he hath despised the word of the Lord, and hath broken his commandment, that soul shall be utterly cut off; his iniquity shall be upon him." Hebrews 10:26-29: "For if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more a sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful expectation of judgment and a fierceness of fire which shall devour the adversaries. A man that hath set at naught Moses’ law, dieth without compassion on the word of two or three witnesses; of how much sorer punishment, think ye, shall he be judged worthy, who has trodden under foot the Son of God and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace?" Jeremiah 15:1: "Then said the Lord unto me, Though Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet my mind could not be toward this people: cast them out of my sight, and let them go forth." 1 John 5:16: "If any man see his brother sinning a sin not unto death, he shall ask, and God will give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: not concerning this do I say that he should make request." Ezekiel 14:13-14: "Son of man, when a land sinneth against me, by committing a trespass, and I stretch out mine hand upon it, and break the staff of the bread thereof, and send famine upon it, and cut off from it man and beast; though these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in it, they should deliver but their own souls by their righteousness, saith the Lord God."

The scriptures just cited have excited profound interest in every age of the world since they were recorded. In all the intervening centuries they have so stirred the hearts of those affected by them as to strip life of enjoyment. They have driven many to despair. In every community there are guilty and awakened consciences as spellbound by these scriptures as was Belshazzar when with pallid lips and shaking knees he confronted the mysterious handwriting on the wall, Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin. In almost every community we can find some troubled soul, tortured with the apprehension that he has committed the unpardonable sin. Sympathetic and kindly-disposed expositors in every age have tried in vain to break the natural force or soften in some way the prima facie import of these divine utterances. Some have denied that there ever was, or ever could be an unpardonable sin. Others conceded that such sin might have been committed in the days of Christ’s earthly ministry, but the hazard passed away with the cessation of miracles. All the power of great scholarship has been brought to bear with microscopic inspection of words and phrases to establish one or the other of these propositions. And, indeed, if great names could avail in such cases, this slough of despond would have been safely bridged. But no such explanation ever satisfies a guilty conscience or removes from the hearts of the masses of plain people, the solemn conviction that the Bible teaches two things:

First, that in every age of the past, men were liable to commit the unpardonable sin and that as a matter of fact, some did commit it.

Second, that there is now not only the same liability, but that some do now actually commit it. There is something in man which tells him that these scriptures possess for him an awful admonition whose truth is eternal.

Whether all the scriptures just cited admit of one classification matters nothing, so far as the prevalent conviction is concerned. Where one of the group may be successfully detached by exegesis another rises up to take its place. The interest in the doctrine founded on them is a never-dying interest. Because of this interest, it is purposed now to examine somewhat carefully, the principal passages bearing on this momentous theme. Most humbly, self-distrustingly and reverently will the awful subject be approached.

It is deemed best to approach it by considering specially the case recorded by Matthew and Mark. The words are spoken by our Lord himself. The antecedent facts which occasioned their utterance may be briefly stated thus:

(1) Jesus had just delivered a miserable demoniac by casting out the demon who possessed him.

(2) It was a daylight affair, a public transaction, all the circumstances so open and visible, and the fact so incontrovertible and stupendous that many recognized the divine power and presence.

(3) But certain Pharisees who had been pursuing him with hostile intent, who had been obstructing his work in every possible way, finding themselves unable to dispute the fact of the miracle, sought to break its force by attributing its origin to Beelzebub, the prince of demons, charging Jesus with collusion with Satan.

(4) The issue raised was specific. This issue rested on three indisputable facts conceded by all parties. It is important to note these facts carefully and to impress our minds with the thought that as conceded facts, they underlie the issue. The facts are, first, that an evil and unwilling demon had been forcibly ejected from his much desired stronghold and dispossessed of his ill-gotten spoils. It was no good spirit. It was no willing spirit. It was a violent ejectment. It was a despoiling ejectment. Second, the one who so summarily ejected the demon and despoiled him was Jesus of Nazareth. Third fact, the ejectment was by supernatural miraculous power – by some spirit mightier than the outcast demon. Evidently Jesus had, by some spirit, wrought a notable miracle. He claimed that he did it by the Holy Spirit of God resting on him and dwelling in him. The Pharisees alleged that he did it by an unclean spirit, even Satan himself. The contrast is between "unclean-spirit" and "Holy Spirit." An awful sin was committed by one or the other. Somebody was guilty of blasphemy. If Jesus was in collusion with Satan – if he attributed the devil’s work by him to the Holy Spirit, he was guilty of blasphemy. If the Pharisees, on the other hand, attributed the work of the Holy Spirit to an unclean spirit, this was slandering God. They were guilty of blasphemy.

(5) Jesus answers the charge against himself by three arguments: First, as the demon cast out belonged to Satan’s kingdom and was doing Satan’s work, evidently he was not cast out by Satan’s power, for a kingdom divided against itself cannot stand, and none could justly accuse Satan of the folly of undermining his own kingdom. Second, the demon could not have been despoiled and cast out unless first overpowered by some stronger spirit than himself, who, if not Satan, must be the Holy Spirit, Satan’s antagonist and master. Third, as the Pharisees themselves claimed to be exorcists of demons, it became them to consider how their argument against Jesus might be applied to their own exorcisms.

Then he in turn became the accuser. In grief and indignation he said, "Therefore I say unto you, every sin and blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven. And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him, but whosoever shall speak against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world nor in that which is to come."

Or as Mark expresses it, "Verily I say unto you, All their sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and their blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme: but whosoever shall blaspheme against the Holy Spirit hath never forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin; because they said, He hath an unclean spirit." Having the case now before us, let us next define or explain certain terms expressed or implied in the record.

Unpardonable. – Pardonable means not that which is or must be pardoned, but which may be pardoned on compliance with proper conditions – that while any sin unrepented of, leads ultimately to death, yet as long as the sinner lives, a way of escape is offered to him. But an unpardonable sin is one which from the moment of its committal is forever without a possible remedy. Though such a sinner may be permitted to live many years, yet the very door of hope is closed against him. It is an eternal sin. It hath never forgiveness. Sermons, prayers, songs, and exhortations avail nothing in his case. The next expression needing explanation is, "Neither in this world, nor in the world to come." Construed by itself this language might imply one of two things:

First, that God will pardon some sins in the next world, i.e., there may be for many, though not all, a probation after death. So Romanists teach. On such interpretation is purgatory founded.

Second, or it may imply that God puts away some sins so far as the next world is concerned, but yet does not remit chastisement for them in this world.

Where the meaning of a given passage is doubtful, then we apply the analogy of the faith. That is, we compare the doubtful with the certain. The application of this rule necessitates discarding the first possible meaning assigned. It is utterly repugnant to the tenor of the Scriptures. Men are judged and their destiny decided by the deeds done in the body, not out of it. If they die unjust they are raised unjust. There is no probation after death. It remains to inquire if the second possible implication agrees with the tenor of the Scriptures. Here we find no difficulty whatever. The general Bible teaching is in harmony with the second meaning. The Scriptures abundantly show three things:

First, some sins are remitted both for time and eternity. That is, when they are pardoned for eternity, even chastisement on earth is also remitted.

Second, much graver sins are, on repentance, put away as to eternity, but very sore chastisement is inflicted in time. As when God said to David after Nathan visited him: "The Lord hath put away thy sin; thou shalt not die. Howbeit, because by this deed thou hast given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, the child also that is born unto thee shall surely die." The Lord also announced to him that "the sword should never depart from his house" because he had caused the death of Uriah (see 2 Samuel 12:7-14). Here is one unmistakable case out of many that could be cited where sin was forgiven as to the next world, but not as to this world.

The thought is that God, in fatherly discipline, chastises all Christians in this world. To be without chastisement in this world proves we are not God’s children. An awful token of utter alienation from God is to be deprived of correction here, when we sin. To be sinners and yet to prosper. To die sinners and yet have no "bands in our death." So that the expression "hath never forgiveness, neither in this world nor in the world to come," implies nothing about a probation after death, but refers to God’s method of withholding correction in this world, from some sinners, but never withholding punishment of this class in the next, and to his method of correcting Christians in this world, but never punishing them in the next world.

Third, the expression teaches that in the case of those who sin against the Holy Spirit, God’s method of dealing is different from both the foregoing methods. In the case of the unpardonable sin, punishment commences now and continues forever. There is no remission of either temporal or eternal penalties. They have the pleasures of neither world. To illustrate: Lazarus had the next world, but not this; Dives had this world, but not the next. But the man who commits the unpardonable sin has neither world, as Judas Iscariot, Ananias, and others.

To further illustrate, by earthly things, we might say that Benedict Arnold committed the unpardonable sin as to nations. He lost the United States and did not gain England. Hated here; despised yonder. The price of his treason could not be enjoyed. He had never forgiveness, neither on this side the ocean nor on the other side. Another term needing explanation is the word,

Blasphemy. – This is strictly a compound Greek word Anglicized. It is transferred bodily to our language. In Greek literature it is quite familiar and often used. Its meaning is thoroughly established. According to strict etymology, it is an offense of speech, i.e., of spoken words. Literally, as a verb, it means to speak ill or injuriously of any one, to revile or defame. As a noun, it means detraction or slander. I say it means to defame any one whether man or God. Even in the Bible usage of both the Septuagint and the Greek New Testament, the word is generally applied to both man and God.

When Paul says he was "slanderously reported," as saying a certain thing, and when Peter says "speak evil of no man," they both correctly employ the Greek word "blaspheme." Even this passage refers to other blasphemies than those against God, "all manner of blasphemies except the blasphemies against the Holy Spirit." In both English and American law, blasphemy has ever been an indictable offense, whether against man or God. Later usages, however, restrict the term "blasphemy" to an offense against God, while the term "slander" is applied to the same offense against men. According to strict derivation, it is an offense of spoken words. To this our Saviour refers in the context when he says, "For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned." But one is quite mistaken who limits the meaning of the term to strict etymology. In both human and divine law, the offense of "blasphemy" may be committed by writing the words, or publishing them, as well as by speaking them. We may blaspheme by either printing, painting, or pantomime. Any overt, provable action which intentionally conveys a false and injurious impression against any one comes within the scope of the offense. Under the more spiritual, divine law, the offense may be committed in the mind, whether ever spoken aloud. Our context says, "Jesus knowing their thoughts." Indeed, the very essence of the offense is in the heart – the intent – the idea. Words are matters of judgment, solely because they are signs of ideas and expressions of the heart. This our context abundantly shows. Our Saviour says, "Either make the tree good and its fruit good; or make the tree corrupt, and its fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by its fruit. Ye offspring of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. The good man out of his good treasure, bringeth forth good things: and the evil man out of his evil treasure bringeth forth evil things."

From this exhibition of the meaning of the word "blasphemy," we can easily see that either Jesus or the Pharisees were guilty of the offense. Both could not be innocent. If Jesus, while claiming to act by the Holy Spirit, was but the organ of "an unclean spirit," then he blasphemed or slandered the Holy Spirit. If his work was wrought by the Holy Spirit, then the Pharisees, by attributing that work to an "unclean spirit," blasphemed the Holy Spirit.

Having clearly before us the meaning of "blasphemy," let us advance to another explanation. The character of any code or government is revealed by its capital offenses; the grade of any nation’s civilization is registered by its penal code. If capital punishment, or the extreme limit of punishment is inflicted for many and slight offenses, the government is called barbarian. If for only a few extraordinary and very heinous crimes, the government is called civilized. For instance, under the English law of long ago, a man might be legally put to death for snaring a bird or rabbit. The extreme limit of punishment was visited upon many who now would be pronounced guilty of only misdemeanors or petit larceny. It was a bloody code. The enlightened mind intuitively revolts against undue severity. Modern civilization has reduced capital offense to a minimum. Even in these few cases three things at least must always be proved:

(1) That the offender had arrived at the age of discretion, and possessed a sound mind. A mere child, a lunatic or idiot cannot commit a capital offense.

(2) Premeditation. The crime must be deliberately committed.

(3) Malice. The evil intent must be proved.

The higher benevolence of the divine law will appear from the fact that there is but one unpardonable offense, and that even more must be proved against one accused of this offense than the age of discretion, a sound mind, premeditation, and malice. Indeed, the sin against the Holy Spirit must outrank all others in intrinsic heinousness. This will abundantly appear when we reach the Bible definition and analysis of the sin against the Holy Spirit. We are not ready even yet, however, to enter upon the discussion of the sin itself. Two other preliminary explanations are needed.

Why must the one unpardonable sin be necessarily against the Holy Spirit? What is the philosophy or rationale of this necessity? This question and the answer to it cannot be understood unless we give due weight, both separately and collectively, to the following correlated proposition: There is one law giver, God. His law is the one supreme standard which defines right and wrong – prescribing the right, proscribing the wrong. God himself is the sole, authoritative interpreter of his law. The scope of its obligations cannot be limited by finite knowledge, or human conscience. Any failure whatever at conformity thereto, or any deflection therefrom, to the right or left, however slight, and from whatever cause, is unrighteousness. All unrighteousness is sin. The wages of sin is death. All men are sinners by nature and practice.

Therefore, by the deeds of the law can no man be justified in the sight of God. The law condemns every man. It also follows: First, that any possible salvation must flow from God’s free grace. Second, that not even grace can provide a way of escape for the condemned inconsistent with God’s Justice and holiness. That is, any possible scheme of salvation for sinners must both satisfy the law penalty, thereby appeasing justice, and provide for the personal holiness of the forgiven sinner.

To put it in yet other words, the plan of salvation, to be feasible, must secure for every sinner to be saved, three things at least: (a) justification, (b) regeneration, (c) sanctification, which are equivalent to deliverance from the law penalty, a new nature, and personal holiness. I say that these three things are absolutely requisite. I cite just now only three scriptural proofs, one under each head:

Romans 3:23-26 declares that a propitiation must be made for sin in order that God might be just in justifying the sinner. John 3:3-7 sets forth the absolute necessity of the new birth the imparting of a new nature.

Hebrews 12:14 declares that "without holiness no man shall see the Lord."

To admit into heaven even one unjustified man, one man in his carnal nature, one unholy man, would necessarily dethrone God, while inflicting worse than the tortures of hell on the one so admitted.

No fish out of water, no wolf or owl in the daylight, could be so unutterably wretched as such a man. He would be utterly out of harmony with his surroundings. I think he would prefer hell. The gates of the holy city stand open day and night, which means that no saint would go out, and no sinner would go in. After the judgment as well as now, the sinner loves darkness rather than light. It therefore naturally, philosophically and necessarily follows that salvation must have limitations. A careful study of these limitations will disclose to us the rationale of the unpardonable sin. What, then, are these limitations?

(1) Outside of grace, no salvation.

(2) Outside of Christ, no grace.

(3) Outside of the Spirit, no Christ.

In other words, Christ alone reveals the Father, and the Spirit alone reveals Christ; or no man can reach the Father except through Christ – Christ is the door – and no man can find that door except through the Spirit. It necessarily follows that an unpardonable sin is a sin against the Spirit. This would necessarily follow from the order of the manifestations of the Godhead: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. From the order of the dispensations: First, the Father’s dispensation of law; second, the Son’s dispensation of atonement; third, the Spirit’s dispensation of applying the atonement. The Spirit is heaven’s ultimatum – heaven’s last overture. If we sin against the Father directly, the Son remains. We may reach him through the Son. If we sin directly against the Son, the Spirit remains. We may reach him through the Spirit. If we sin against the Spirit, nothing remains. Therefore that sin is without remedy. So argues our Saviour: "Every sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men; but the blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven. And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him; but whosoever shall speak against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, nor in that which is to come. He is guilty of an eternal sin."

Our last preliminary explanation answers this question: Are men now liable to commit this sin? If not liable, the reasons for discussing the matter at all are much reduced. If liable, the reasons for discussion are infinitely enhanced. It is of infinitely greater moment to point out to the unwary of a possible immediate danger, than to relieve the mind from the fear of an unreal danger, however great and torturing may be that fear. It is claimed by many intelligent expositors that this sin cannot be committed apart from an age of miracles, nor apart from the specific miracle of casting out demons, nor apart from attributing the supernatural, miraculous power of the Holy Spirit in said miracle to Beelzebub, the prince of demons.

Very deep love have I for the great and good men who take this position, as, I believe, led away by sentiment, sympathy, and amiability on the one hand, and horrified on the other hand with the recklessness which characterizes many sensational discussions of this grave matter by tyros, unlearned, and immature expositors. Very deep love have I for the men, but far less respect for their argument. I submit, just now, only a few out of many grave reasons for rejecting this interpretation.

(1) Such restriction of meaning is too narrow and mechanical. The Bible could not be to us a book of principles, if the exact circumstances must be duplicated in order to obtain a law. From the study of every historical incident in the Bible we deduce principles of action.

(2) The Scriptures clearly grade miracles wrought by the Spirit below other works of the Spirit. This is evident from many passages and connections. Writing the names of the saved in the book of life was greater than casting out devils (Luke 10:20). Fourth only in the gifts of the Spirit does miracle-working power rank (1 Corinthians 12:28). Far inferior are any of these gifts to the abiding graces of the Spirit (1 Corinthians 13:1-13; 1 Corinthians 14:1-33). How, then, in reason and common sense, can it be a more heinous blasphemy to attribute an inferior work of the Spirit to the devil than a superior work? Will any man seriously maintain that this is so, because a miracle is more demonstrable – its proof more vivid and cognizable by the natural senses? This would be to affirm the contrary of scriptural teaching on many points. We may know more things about spirit than we can know about matter. This knowledge is more vivid and impressive than the other. Spiritual demonstration to the inner man is always a profounder demonstration than any whatever to the outer man.

(3) Such a restriction of meaning to the days of Christ in the flesh is out of harmony with Old Testament teaching on the same subject.

(4) It fails to harmonize with many other passages in later New Testament time, which will not admit of a different classification without contradicting the text itself, since thereby more than one kind of unpardonable sins would be established.

(5) The utter failure of this exposition to convince the judgment of plain people everywhere, and its greater failure to relieve troubled consciences everywhere, is a strong presumptive argument against its soundness.

Because, therefore, I believe that the sin against the Holy Spirit may now be committed – because I believe that some men in nearly every Christian community have committed it – because I believe that the liability is imminent and the penalty, when incurred, utterly without remedy, and because I feel pressed in spirit to warn the imperiled of so great condemnation, therefore I preach on the subject – preach earnestly – preach in tears – preach with melted heart.

QUESTIONS

1. How did Jesus vindicate his authority apart from his claims and teaching?

2. What are the details in the incident of healing the centurions servant, how do you reconcile the accounts of Matthew and Luke, and what the lessons of this incident?

3. Describe the incident of the raising of the widow’s son at Nain and its lesson.

4. What inquiry from John the Baptist brought forth by this fame of Jesus and what was Jesus’ reply?

5. What is the meaning of "the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence?

6. What reproof of the Pharisees by our Lord called forth by this?

7. What cities here upbraided by our Lord and what principle enunciated in this connection?

8. What principle of revelation announced here also?

9. What great invitation here announced by our Lord and what is its great teaching?

10. Relate the story of the anointing of the feet of Jesus by the wicked woman.

11. What two things seem to be implied by the story?

12. What Oriental customs constitute the setting of this story and what is the explanation of each?

13. What are the lessons and contrasts of this incident?

14. Give an account of the first Ladies’ Aid Society.

15. What scriptures of both Testaments bearing on the sin against the Holy Spirit?

16. What can you say of the impression made by these scriptures?

17. What efforts of sympathetic expositors to soften the import of these scriptures?

18. What two solemn convictions yet remain?

19. What were the antecedent facts which occasioned the statements of our Lord in Section 48 of the Harmony?

20. What is the meaning of "unpardonable"?

21. What is the meaning of "neither in this world, nor in the world to come"?

22. What is the meaning of "blasphemy"?

23. Show that either Jesus or the Pharisees were guilty of blasphemy on this occasion.

24. How is the character of a code of laws determined? Illustrate.

25. What three things must be proved in the case of capital offenses against our laws?

26. How does the higher benevolence of the divine law appear?

27. What correlated proposition must be duly considered in order to understand the sin against the Holy Spirit?

28. What two things also follow from this?

29. What three things must the plan of salvation secure for every sinner who shall be saved, and what the proof?

30. What are the limitations which determine the rationale of the sin against the Holy Spirit? Explain.

31. What are the claims of some expositors with respect to this sin and what the reasons for rejecting them?

Verses 4-18

XXXI

OUR LORD’S GREAT MINISTRY IN GALILEE

Part VI THE FIRST GREAT GROUP OF PARABLES

Harmony pages 60-66 and Matthew 13:1-53; Mark 4:1-34; Luke 8:4-18.

We come now to our Lord’s first great group of parables and it will be necessary for us to dwell here somewhat at length in order to get certain definitions and principles fixed in our minds before we try to expound this great section.

First, what is a parable? There are two words used in the Greek for parable –

one by John and the other by the Synoptics. The word used by John is paroimia, which means, literally, "something by the way " Secondarily, it means a figura- tive discourse, or dark saying, suggesting more than meets the ear. The word used by the Synoptics is parebole,which, Anglicized, gives us our word "parable." The verb of this word means to throw, or to place, side by side, for purposes of comparison. The noun means an utterance involving a comparison, as "the kingdom of heaven is like, etc." which is a similitude. In the wider sense it means (a) an adage or proverb.(Luke 4:23), (b) a dark saving Matthew 15:15), (c.) pithy instruction in the form of an aphorism (Luke 14:7). In the more restricted sense it is a story of a scene in human life, or a process in nature, true in its character, though it may be fictitious in fact, suggesting a spiritual lesson. As the child gave it when asked to define a parable, “It is an earthly story with a heavenly meaning." The ideas in the word are these: (1) To place two things side by side for comparison; (2) veil ing the truth in a story, but with the veil so thin that the spiritually minded may easily apprehend it.

Second, there are several other words of similar, or kindred meaning, which should claim our attention here for purposes of distinction, such as proverb, simile, similitude, metaphor, allegory, fable, and myth, the definitions of which will follow in their order. A parable, as we have already defined, is a narrative true to nature or life, used for the purpose of conveying spiritual truth. A proverb is a short pithy saving and may contain a condensed parable. A simile is a simple comparison in which one thing is likened to another in, some of its aspects. A similitude is more comprehensive than a simile and borders on the realm of the parable, as in Drummond’s Natural Law in the Spiritual World. A metaphor ig a simile without the comparative word, as "that man is a fox." instead of "that man is like a fox," which is a simile. An allegory is an expanded metaphor, or the description of one thing under the imagery of another, as Pilgrims Progress. A fable is a story in which inanimate objects or lower animals are represented as acting in the capacity of human beings, the purpose of which is to instruct or to impress some moral lesson. It differs from a parable in that it is not true to nature or to life. A myth is a tale of some extraordinary personage or country, formed purely by the imagination.. It is fictitious and usually has an element of the supernatural in it.

In the Bible we find an example of the proverb, the simile, the similitude, the metaphor, the allegory, the fable, and the parable (let the reader search out examples of each), but there is no myth in the Bible. But why did our Lord use parables in his teachings? (1) To get the attention of the people. There is nothing more interesting than a good story well told. (2) To reveal conduct and character without being too direct. Thus our Lord often revealed the very heart and life of the enemy without becoming too offensive and by so doing precipitating a clash with his foes. (3) To enforce truth by way of illustration. This principle of teaching is too evident to need comment. (4) To stimulate inquiry. This we find to be the effect so often in his ministry: "What is the meaning of the parable of the tares?" (5) To fasten truth in the mind and aid the memory. This, too, is self-evident and needs no comment.

Here I append a list of the parables of Jesus, showing the pages of the Harmony where found, the references to the scriptures containing them and the leading thought of each. This will enable a Bible student, at a glance, to locate each parable in the Harmony, to find its setting in the Scripture and to give its interpretation in a nutshell. They are arranged in chronological order and therefore a careful study of them will reveal to the student of the Bible the occasion and frequency of Christ’s use of parables as well as to furnish a convenience of interpretation.

It will be observed that quite a number of these parables are very short and might be called similes or proverbs. The first great group commences with number 31, the parable of the sower, the second great group with number 68, the parable of the lost sheep, and the third great group with number 83, the parable of the two sons. All the parables of the first group are "kingdom parables," and relate to some phase of the kingdom, and that leads me to say that there are two general classes of parables, viz: "kingdom parables" and "homiletical parables." In interpreting a parable one should first deter mine its class, then its central truth, or point of illustration and then let all the details conform to this central point deducing no doctrine from the parable that cannot be found elsewhere in the Bible in unparabolic language. Also we must be careful not to try to spiritualize all the points. Much o the parable is often mere drapery, designed only to round out an Oriental story.

Here let the reader study closely and compare the points of the two parables which Christ interpreted himself, viz: the parable of the sower and the parable of the tares. These suggestions are brief, but they will serve as timely cautions in interpreting the many parables of our Lord. The three great groups of parables in the Gospels are as follows: First, there is the group here, Matthew 13:3-23; second, the five great parables in Luke 15-16; third, the three parables of his last day in the Temple. (Let the reader search out each of these groups and name the parables in each group.)

We will now look at the first great group of parables and take a general view of them in their relation to each other. Our Lord had made many disciples since his baptism, who followed him from place to place, growing in knowledge and grace as they heard his words, witnessed his deeds and imbibed his Spirit. After long companionship of this kind he purposed to select from the many a few as authorized teachers of his doctrine. Accordingly, after spending a whole night in prayer, he chose from the multitude of the disciples twelve men whom he ordained as apostles, to be with him and that he might send them forth to preach and to have authority over demons; but that they might know and understand what to preach before they went out alone, he, in their hearing on one occasion, expounded the principles and relations of his kingdom in the matchless Sermon on the Mount; and soon after that, on another occasion, he delivered a great group of very striking parables, illustrating the same principles. All of these many parables, as Mark tells us, he expounded privately to the twelve apostles; not just two of them, but all of them. Of the great number of parables delivered on this one occasion, only eight are recorded by the gospel historians, and the exposition of only two is recorded. The scene is Galilee, the Sea of Galilee. The pulpit is a boat. The preacher is sitting in a boat. The congregation are all gathered on the shore, and from that boat he delivers the parables. When the parables are spoken and he enters the house, he privately expounds them to his immediate disciples. The eight parables recorded are, the sower, the seed growing of itself, the tares, the mustard seed, the leaven, the hid treasure, the pearl of great price and the net. The two whose expositions are recorded are the sower and the tares. But in connection with the eight are also given two subsidiary parables, making ten in all. These two parables, the lighted lamp and the householder’s treasure, are called subsidiary, because they were given to show the disciples what to do with the knowledge contained in the eight.

As the reader will readily infer, the object of one discussion covering so much ground, cannot be to expound in detail all of the eight parables. Therefore, let us generalize, if we can find a single thread of thought on which to string, like beads of pearl, the eight parables, making one necklace to be worn around memory’s neck as an ornament of beauty and value. It may not be done quite as fast as stringing beads, but it need not take much time, as only prominent and general meanings from one standpoint will be given. The thread of thought that unites all the eight parables into one is this: The discouragements and encouragements to religious teachers suggested by the eight parables. And just here, instead of quoting these parables, I would like to cause to pass before the reader a panorama of eight pictures.

Look at the first: It is a plowed field. The plowed surface looks all alike. If there be underlying rock or buried seeds thorns they do not appear. It has been sowed down wit seed. There is the sower. We see him. He is the religion teacher. The only thing in sight, birds flying away. That all. We look at that picture until that plowed field turn green, carpeted with the upspringing grain; but we see in certain parts of the field the stalks turn yellow and die – a rock under them. We see in the beaten path no grain coming up. Those birds explain. We see in another part thorns and briers choking the grain that we plant. Discouragements. It seems that three parts of what I sow is lost. Three parts gone. It discourages me. The devil took some of the seed. A superficial nature in the hearers prevented others from bringing forth fruit to maturity. The cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the exactions of society choke to death other seeds that I planted. It is discouraging. But brother, look where some did fall in good ground and yielded thirty-fold and sixty-fold and one hundredfold of fruit. Think of that. Slide that picture out of sight.

I see another, and there is a field again, plowed, and sowed with good seed. There is a sower. He is asleep, but in the night anxiety awakes him. Watch him get up and go out in the field and dig down in the dirt and take the seed up to see if it has sprouted; see him in the day anxiously look for clouds that promise rain. See his fear of cold, blighting seasons and his desire for a warm, sunshiny day. See him trying to mark even a day’s development. See him trying to comprehend the inscrutable. He rises up night and day. What is the difficulty? He is anxious for seed-sprouting and seed growing and seed-maturing and rain falling and sunshine, and with all of it he has nothing under heaven to do. As far as that discouragement is concerned it is all pure gratuity. We borrow every bit of that. Why will not a man let God’s part alone? We cannot make the seed. Here in this Book is the seed ready made. We do not have to make them. Nor can we make them sprout. The Spirit of God does that. That is regeneration. We cannot make them grow and mature. That is sanctification. We cannot bring the gentle dews and the rains and sunshine. Those are the showers or manifestations of grace. We do not have to puzzle our minds over the inscrutable mystery of the Spirit’s work in regeneration and sanctification. Let our anxieties stop with our responsibilities. What is the encouragement? Well, while I cannot make seed, God can, and there is plenty of it. While I cannot give an increase, God can, and he does it. While I cannot regenerate men, he can. I cannot sanctify, he can. I cannot tell how it sprouts nor how it grows. There is a mystery, an inscrutable mystery, in the work of the Spirit of God. I have nothing to do with that.

We see another picture. It is a field – a plowed field, a field that has been sowed down with good grain, and there is the sower. He is asleep. He has done his work and night has come and he has gone to bed; but lo! while he sleeps there creeps up a shadowy figure from the pit and sows other seeds all over that field. The seeds of the day sower and of the night sower come up together and look much alike until the fruit discriminates – the one nutritious food, the other a deadly poison. What is the lesson? Well, we understand that the darnell, the tare, is so nearly like wheat that the wheat planter can hardly tell the difference until it heads for fruit. Here then is a difficulty not in the mind of the hearer as in the first parable. There is here no beaten path, no underlying rock, no difference in the soil; this soil is all good; no thorns in it; it is not poisoned with briers; the field is all good. What is the difficulty? The difficulty here is that an enemy has sowed something so like wheat that one cannot tell it from wheat until it begins to fruit. It is the difficulty of the hypocrite – the counterfeit Christian. We see the devil come in again. He took away the good seed in the first parable lest it might lead a man to conversion. He does not take away any of these seeds; he cannot get at them; they have gone down into the good and honest heart and he cannot take them away. But what can he do? Why, he will bring that religion into disrepute by passing counterfeits on it. That bank’s reputation is high. He will flood the country with counterfeit bills. Surely that is a great discouragement. Men will point to the counterfeit as an example of religion, and will tell us that it is a fruit of our preaching. No, sir, I did not sow those seeds – never. Those seeds did not come from God; the devil sowed them, and the hypocrite is the son of the devil and not a son of God. But where is the encouragement? The encouragement is twofold: Every time we look at a hypocrite we see a compliment to religion. As the counterfeit proves the value of the genuine, so his masking in the garb of piety shows that piety passes current among men. What other encouragement? We see the time coming when God’s angels shall gather the hypocrites out of the world – for the field is the world, not the church; there is no church in this – the field is the world, and the good seed are the children of the kingdom of God and the tares are the children of the evil one. In the world there are hypocrites that bring discredit upon religion and that discourages the religious teacher, but God says, "Wait! You cannot persecute him, you cannot hang him because he is a hypocrite. You cannot put him in jail because he is a hypocrite. You may not tear up and destroy that darnell lest you destroy wheat. You may not persecute him for religion’s sake. Wait. The angels will get him. They will take him and bind him and his fellows in bundles and burn them." Now, that is an encouragement. And now let that picture pass by.

We see that sower again and he has a seed in his hand, and we have to look close or we cannot see it. It is a very tiny, seed. It is not bigger than a mustard seed. How distrustfully he looks at it. What is the matter with it? He is discouraged; discouraged about what? Oh, it is such a little thing. Ah, me, if I could only plant a seed as big as a house! If I could do some great thing!

Brother, let not the smallness of the seed discourage thee, but be encouraged by this thought, that while the seed is small there is no limit to its expansiveness. As that mustard seed grew into a plant and spread out its branches and attracted the birds of heaven, so is the kingdom of God. Do not despise the day of small things. God calls upon us to attempt great things and to expect great things, but he does not tell us to expect them at the beginning – never.

Replace that picture by another. This time we see a woman with a bread tray in her hand! What a great batch of dough in it, and such dough! Now, if she makes this up into biscuit, they will be flat and hard. Ah, me, the inbred corruption of the human heart; that discourages the religious teacher. Why, if I lead this man to Christ, even after conversion, he will find a law in his members warring against the law of his mind and bringing his soul into captivity. He will cry out: “O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" If, when I lead a soul to God, that soul could stand in the maturity of Christian manhood, and never make a mistake and never stumble and never fall, I would like to be a teacher. But brother, stop. Look back at the woman putting a little leaven in the dough. So for us there is a little leaven. It is spiritual leaven. Consider the woman, putting a little leaven in her dough – just a pinch of it. Does she say, "Why cannot I wave my hand over that batch of dough and say, ’Rise at once?’ " And why should we kneel down and pray, "O, Lord God, in answer to my prayer, sanctify me, body, soul and spirit, in a minute." That is not God’s way. He put in the leaven and it will work. It works little by little, but it works. It works out and enlarges, and, blessed be God, ultimately it leavens the whole lump, and then sanctification is complete. But I would be silly if I were to kneel down and pray for it to all come at once.

Behold next, a double picture. See a field with a mine in it, a recently discovered gold mine – a hidden treasure; and then in another part of the picture a pearl, a valuable pearl. What about the difficulty here, the discouragement? Well, here it is: One cannot get that mine unless he sell everything he has. Nor that pearl at the same price. What are you discouraged about, brother? I am discouraged about the cost. Just look at those doleful scriptures: "No man can be my disciple unless he will deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow me." "Except a man hate father and mother and brother and sister, he cannot be my disciple." "Go and sell all that you have and come and follow me." Well, that is discouraging, from one standpoint. But there is a standpoint that reveals encouragement. Frankly admit all the costs. Never deny or abate that. Never dilute it.

Tell the people plainly that it means absolute and total surrender. It means that in the whole realm of the soul there shall not be a reserved spot as big as the point of a cambric needle that denies the sovereignty of God. The surrender must be complete. Don’t disguise that. But while it costs all we have, yet what we get for it is infinitely better and more valuable. The hidden treasure is worth more than what we surrender. The pearl is worth more than what we give for it.

If we would put matters on a business footing, let me ask, "What will it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul? And what will a man give in exchange for his soul?" Religion is no child’s play. It reduces itself to this great alternative: Everything for Christ, or everything for the devil and hell. And mark this: Whoever sees the value of the kingdom of heaven will not whine about the cost. He asks for no pity because of his sacrifices. But one must be born from above to see the kingdom. Then, like Moses (Hebrews 11), and like Paul (Phil.), he will gladly pay the price.

So we come to the last picture. What do we see now? We see an ocean and a great net let down into its waters that sweeps it from end to end. Is the net the church? Why, the church does not enter even the parable of the tares, where there is at least a nominal profession and outward form of religion in the hypocrite – even there the field was the world, not the church. But those bad fish in the net are not even called hypocrites. It is simply good fish and bad fish. That net is the providence of God, that drags over all the ocean of time and lands all its people on the shore of eternity. What is there here then for discouragement? Just this: Here in time, there are so many bad people mixed with the good. We go down the street, thinking about good things, and lo I there is a saloon. We cannot help it; there it is. We hear the ribald jest, we see the bloated face and the blotched eye and the pimpled skin and the haggard visage of the drunkard. We hear the rattle of the dice. We know that behind that screen the gambler, a beast of prey, is lurking for an unsuspecting victim. In this world, too, our world, are liars, thieves, murderers, adulterers, blasphemers. "Oh," says one, "it discourages me. Lord God, I would like to preach if thou wouldst put me in a world where there were only good people." What need to preach in such a world? Be not foolish, thou scribe of God. The contiguity of bad men belongs to the present condition. There is no escape from them yet. They vexed Lot’s righteous soul and mocked at the preaching of Noah. They tried Abraham sorely and worried Paul. Our Lord himself – our great exemplar – patiently endured their contradiction and gainsaying. Tares will appear in the wheat field till Satan is bound, and bad fish in the sea of time with the good till the net of Providence shall strand all alike on eternity’s shore and the angels shall sort them.

Let us now inquire somewhat into the import of the two parables which tell what to do with the eight. They read: "No man when he hath lighted a lamp covereth it with a vessel or putteth it under a bed, but putteth it on a stand that they which enter in may see the light. For nothing is veiled that shall not be unveiled, nor anything secret that shall not be known and come to light. If any man hath ears to hear, let him hear. Give heed, therefore, to what you hear and take heed how you hear it. With what measure ye mete it shall be measured unto you, and more shall be given unto you. For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away that which he thinketh he hath," or, as the margin expresses it, "He seemeth to have." "Have ye understood all these things? They said unto him, yea. And he said unto them: Therefore every scribe who hath been made a disciple to the kingdom of heaven [or every teacher who has been instructed in the principles of the kingdom of heaven], is like a householder who bringeth forth out of his treasure things new and old."

Let us briefly expound the more important words of this passage. First, the word "scribe." Originally a scribe was merely a copyist of the law; that is, one skilled in making careful manuscript copies of the books of the Old Testament. And then, from his familiarity with the text, coming from frequent transcription of it, he naturally became an expounder of that text, and the latter meaning, "an expounder," gradually became the greater meaning, so that in our text today the word "scribe" means "teacher." "Every teacher instructed in the principles of the kingdom of heaven." The next word of the passage that needs explanation is "hid" or "veiled." "For whatsoever is hid shall be made manifest." This reference is to the nature of parabolic teaching. A parable is a dark or veiled saying, and yet the veil is designedly thin and semitransparent, instead of opaque. It was not intended by it to hide the truth from the devout and thoughtful searcher after truth, but only from the idle and careless and hardhearted. So it is declared. "For nothing is hid that shall not be made manifest." "I speak to these people in parables. A parable veils my teaching, but there is nothing veiled in these parables that shall not be made manifest to you. I lift the veil. I let you see what it means." The next word that needs explanation is, "The lighted lamp." The lighted lamp represents the disciple who heard the exposition of the parable. Mark you, when he used the parable of the lighted lamp, he did not use it in connection with the delivery of a parable; he used it in connection with the exposition of a parable. The exposition is the light. The understanding hearer is the lighted lamp. Merely to hear the parables does not make one a lighted lamp, but to know the meaning of the parables makes one a lighted lamp. The sense of it, the spiritual import of it, as expounded by the Spirit of God – that is the light. The next word is this: "Putteth it not under a vessel, but on a stand." This means that one who hears and understands the exposition must not keep it to himself. It was given him for others, that they who enter in may see the light. "Let your light so shine before men." Hence the caution. "Give close attention to this exposition. Take heed to what you hear. Take heed how you hear." This is the light. The parable was veiled. The exposition lifts the veil; therefore notice closely, give attention. The light comes with the exposition. Thus it was in the days of Ezra, for the Scripture says, "So they read in the books, in the law of God, and read distinctly and gave the sense, and caused them to understand the reading." Truly that was a wonderful scene. All the people were gathered together, the men, the women and the children, every child, as the text says, "that had sense enough to understand" – the whole of them. Thousands of them were gathered together, and Ezra stood on a pulpit of wood, and he first read the text of the law distinctly so that they got the words. Then they gave the sense, so as to cause the people to understand the meaning of the words, and the light came with the meaning; and no light comes from memorizing words of a scripture which we do not understand. It is about the same as speaking in an unknown tongue, which profits nobody unless it is interpreted. "Understandest thou what thou readest?" said Philip to the eunuch, and hence our Saviour’s question following his exposition of the parables: "Have ye understood all these things?" The emphasis is not on the "all"; it is on "these things," as indicated by the order in which they come in the Greek, "Have ye understood these things all?" Not, "Have you heard the words?" Have you understood? Do you know what they mean?

The Bible is not a precious book to those who do not understand it, but the entrance of God’s Word into the understanding giveth light. A teacher must himself understand before he can give the sense to others. A preacher who does not know the meaning of Gods Word is an unlighted lamp. How can he shine? He is a blind guide leading the blind. He may know everything else in the world, but if he be ignorant of the meaning of God’s Word he has no ministerial education, and he cannot preach. He is worse than an ignoramus, though he have diplomas from every college in the world. He teaches falsehoods instead of truths, and wrecks the souls of men. We would not allow a man ignorant of medicine to doctor our bodies, nor entrust a case of property or of honor or of life to a pettifogger ignorant of law, but we count it a little thing to trust our immortal spirits and our eternal interests to preachers who cannot call off the names of the books of the Bible, who perhaps never read all of the Bible, or have not diligently and prayerfully studied even one of its books, and could not stand a creditable examination upon the text, much less the spirit of one chapter.

Oh, we are guilty along this line, preachers and people! I repeat, I make no reference whatever to ministerial education in other things, but surely a preacher ought to have profoundly and prayerfully studied the One Book. Our Saviour prescribed no educational test in mathematics, or the sciences, in rhetoric or elocution for his preachers, but he sent out no man to preach until he had carefully instructed him in what to preach. When then I say ministerial education, I mean Bible education – education in the Bible. How long a time he kept these men right with him, hearing his words, witnessing his deeds, imbibing his spirit, expounding the principles of his kingdom to them, precept by precept and line upon line, and now illustrating by striking and vivid images, in parables those same principles, and all before he sends them out to preach God’s Word! An educated preacher is a scribe who hath been made a disciple to the kingdom of God; that is, he is a teacher who hath been instructed in the principles of the kingdom of heaven. That alone is an educated preacher.

That leads to the next thing that needs explanation, "the householder’s treasure." Here the figure changes. Before the exposition was "light"; now it is "treasure." "Have you understood all of these things? Yes. Then I say unto you that every scribe instructed in the principles of the kingdom of heaven, is like a householder who bringeth forth out of his treasures things new and old." Not the treasure of a traveler, but of a householder who has stored away the accretions and accumulations of years. A rolling stone gathers no moss. A boarder, or a man always moving, accumulates no property. "Three moves are equal to a fire." A householder has old things that are precious, which have been proved as to their value in many times of trial. They are sacred with memories. He has new things also, but recently acquired, and he brings out on fitting occasions both new and old. What does this mean? What is the spiritual import of this parable? I see its meaning. It stands embodied before me. The householder is a religious teacher, rich in the knowledge of the meaning of God’s Word. He has devoutly studied it for years. It is the one living oracle whose utterances settle all of bis perplexities. In the time of spiritual drought and scorching heat, that book has been to him what the well with the old oaken bucket was to Woodworth. And now, when we call him out of life’s problems and experiences, he brings forth from his treasure things new and old. Yes, some of them are old. Some of them came to him when his heart was first given to Jesus, when God for Christ’s sake forgave his sins. He opens the book, the sacred volume, and points out the very passage in God’s Word whose sense or meaning brought to him peace and rest, long, long ago. And he never forgets it. He opens it again and brings forth another treasure. It came to him perhaps when his first baby died.

How well I recollect when my first child died, and out in the old cemetery, when the preacher who kindly conducted the funeral services of that child, Brother Richard Burleson, with that reverence so peculiar to him, opened the Book of God, and his voice rings in my ears today, "My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord." I never see him in my memory but I hear him saying that, and that day that scripture, in the spirit of it and in the sense of it, so entered my soul that I can never forget.

He turns to yet another passage. It came to him in connection with his anxieties concerning a revival of religion, and one day when feeling lonely beyond expression, his eye fell upon this passage, "I am with you," and the actual presence and power of the eternal Spirit of God came upon him as never before. Mark you, that the light comes with the exposition and experimental realization of the Scriptures, and a scribe who has been instructed in the principles of the kingdom of God, bringeth forth from his treasures things new and old. He turns to some that came last year. (Last year I got into the heart of this passage.) He turns to one that came last month, one that came yesterday, one that came today, and these are the new, and all of them are treasures – priceless treasures – the spiritual interpretation of the Word of God.

He does not keep his face to the past and dwell on memories of treasures found long ago, for where we do not acquire new treasures we lose the old.

But we retain the old if we can say, "This manna fell last night; it is fresh from God; it has the dew on it. It came straight from a present, not a historic God; it came not to one who was, but who is, his disciple and his child. It is not the cold, stale food left over from last year’s banquet, but fresh and hot from the kitchen of heaven it is served to him hungry now." I say that this Book is an ocean without shores; that to its interpretation there is no ultima thule. We never do get to its outer boundary and say, "I have compassed it all." We might look at it and apostrophize it:

“O thou precious Bible, thou exhaustless mine of gold and silver and diamonds, who has found thy last treasure? Thou shoreless ocean, who has brought up from thy depth the last tinted shell or beautiful coral or pearl of ray serene? Thou range of mountains, whose tops touch the stars and kiss the skies and come in touch with God; the climber who reaches thy summit looks out upon ever-increasing landscapes of beauty, and there burst upon his vision prospects of future glory never yet dreamed of, until at last he gets so high that he looks out and finds no horizon."

That is heaven I New and old I Old as creation and new as God!

Now the last word to explain in this passage: "What measure ye mete it shall be measured unto you, and more shall be given unto you. For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and whosoever hath not from him shall be taken away even that which he thinketh he hath." What does it mean? What does it mean in this connection? Will you please recall a point made just now, that the lamp was lighted for the benefit of others? The Saviour expounded to one that he might tell that exposition to another. Said he, "It is given to you to understand the mysteries of the kingdom of God. I whisper in your ear the meaning of the parables. You publish it on the housetops. If you dispense what I give you, if you measure out what I give you, I give you more. As you measure so I mete." Oh, what a significance! Hear a secret, ye misers, who would hoard the gold of truth:

Knowledge not imparted to others dies to the man who has it.

So long as one teaches mathematics he remembers mathematics. So long as one teaches Latin or Greek these things are easy to him, but let him cease the imparting and his treasure at once begins to shrink in bulk, to get lighter in weight, to diminish in value. "There is that withholdeth and it tendeth to poverty. There is that scattereth abroad and it maketh rich." Oh, young convert, when God has given the sense of just one precious scripture to you – it may be this: "Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy-laden and I will give you rest;" it may be this: "God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son" – but whatever it is, young convert, when God lights that lamp let it shine, and be eager to say in the language of David, "Come all ye that fear God and I will tell you what great things he hath done for my soul;" hide not the righteousness of God in your heart. Oh, preacher, if you have found the exposition of a passage of God’s Word, if Jesus has whispered an interpretation into your ear, give it out, let the world have it, let others use it. Raise no whining cry of plagiarism on God-given interpretations.

Do not jealously guard your little stock of cast iron sermons. Preach them, and get new ones fresh with the dew of heaven and alive with the breath of the Spirit of God.

Give out and God will give to you. Look at Spurgeon. What cared he for his old sermons? Not a thing in the world. For thirty years he published a sermon every week, and the more he published the more he had to publish.

Why, I can well recollect with what shrinking and horrible dread I heard Brother Cranfill’s proposition calling upon me to let him publish a sermon of mine every week. I supposed it would bankrupt all the material I had in six months, and how foolish I was I

I never did in my life, freely, lovingly, and tenderly, give out one exposition that Jesus had given to me but he gave me another. I never did empty my bucket of water upon the thirsty lips of the famished but I could the more readily let it down into the well of salvation and draw it up filled again to the brim, fresh-dripping and glowing from the cool and living fountain, inexhaustible.

Impart! Give out! Scatter abroad! It will come back to you good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over into your bosom and into your soul.

A scribe, then, is a religious teacher. Ministerial education, then, is having the meaning of the Bible. The lamp is the preacher. Exposition from God lights the lamp. The lamp being lighted should shine. As it radiates the light given, more light comes. The householder is a preacher. His treasure is the accumulation of scriptural meanings, passages which he has understood, passages upon which he has experimentally fed and nourished his soul. Unless he acquire new treasure he loses the old. If he faces the past only, that past becomes ever dimmer to him, until it will at last seem to be only a dream of a flickering, vague and uncertain fancy, without reality.

Now, these are two subsidiary parables, the parable of the lighted lamp and the parable of the householder’s treasure, and they tell what to do with the eight.

QUESTIONS

1. Where do we find our Lord’s first great group of parables?

2. What two words are used in the Gospels for "parable" and what the meaning of each in both the narrower and the wider senses?

3. Give a good definition of "parable."

4. Distinguish between parable, proverb, simile, similitude, metaphor, allegory, fable, and myth.

5. Give a biblical example of each of these except myth, and give an example also of a myth.

6. Why did our Lord use parables in his teaching?

7. From the table of "the parables of our Lord" give the interpretation of each parable as there indicated.

8. What can you say in a general way of this list of parables and what the two great classes of parables?

9. What brief rules here given for interpreting parables?

10. Compare the two parables which Christ interpreted himself with their interpretation, and note the points in each not interpreted,

11. What three great groups of our Lord’s parables and what parables in each group?

12. Give a general survey of our Lord’s ministry up to this point.

13. What is the scene, the pulpit, and the congregation of this first group of parables?

14. What two subsidiary parables in connection with this group and why so called?

15. What is the thread of thought that unites all these eight parables into one necklace?

16. What is the first parable here, what is its details and what is its lesson?

17. Give the details of the parable of the good seed growing of it self, and its lesson.

18. Relate the story of the parable of the tares, and show its lesson.

19. Give the parable of the mustard seed and its lesson.

20. Give the parable of the leaven and its lesson.

21. Give the double picture in the parable of the hid treasure and the pearl of great price, and their lessons.

22. Recite the parable of the dragnet and its lesson.

23. What is the import of the parable of the lighted lamp and what is the meaning and application of the terms used therein?

24. What is the import of the parable of the householder’s treasure and what is the meaning and application of the terms used in it?

Verses 19-21

XXX

OUR LORD’S GREAT MINISTRY IN GALILEE

Part V THE SIN AGAINST THE HOLY SPIRIT (Continued)

Harmony pages 59-60, same as for the preceding chapter and Matthew 12:38-50; Mark 3:31-35; Luke 8:19-21.

We are now ready to consider the unpardonable sin itself. Here, at the outset we meet a difficulty that needs to be removed. It is a question concerning the true text of the latter clause of Mark 3:29. Our common version reads: "But is in danger of eternal damnation," while the revised version reads: "But is guilty of an eternal sin." Evidently these two renderings cannot be differences in translating the same Greek words. It is unnecessary to cite all the variations of the text in the several manuscripts on this short clause. For our present purpose we need to note only one. The revised version, on the authority of older and more reliable manuscripts than were before the King James translators, recognized as the true text hamartematos instead of kriseos. The former is rendered "sin," the latter "damnation." But the difficulty is not yet entirely explained. All the texts have the same Greek word enochos, which the common version renders "in danger of." The question arises: How can there be such vast difference in rendering this one word? The difference is great and obvious since "in danger of" expresses a mere liability which may be averted, while "guilty of" expresses a positive, settled transaction. This difficulty is grammatical, and not textual so far as the word enochos is concerned, but is textual when we look at the case of the noun connected with it. If the noun in the true text is in one case, say the dative, then "in danger of," "liable to" or " exposed to" would fairly translate enochos. But if the noun with which it is connected is in a different case, say the genitive, then "guilty of" is the better translation. Well, it so happens that in the true text – that is, the one so regarded by such scholars as Lachmann, Tischendorf, Tregelles, Alford, and others, and the one so accepted by both the English and American companies of the revisers of the new version – in this text the noun hamartematos,rendered "sin," is in the genitive case, hence enochos hamartematos with its modifying words is rightly translated "guilty of an eternal sin," while enochos kriseos with the same modifying words might well be rendered "in danger of eternal judgment." So that in the true text we find not only a different word meaning "sin," instead of "damnation" or "judgment," but we find that word in a case which will necessarily give color to the meaning of another word connected with it, about which there is no textual difficulty.

We accept, then, the text and rendering of the revised version. We hold it as the word of God, that whoever blasphemes the Holy Spirit is at once, not liable to, but guilty of an eternal sin." What, then, is an eternal sin? Does it mean an "eternal sinning"? That is, does the perpetuity refer to the committing? Evidently not. Doubtless one who has blasphemed the Holy Spirit will, as a matter of fact, continue to sin, but the language under consideration refers not to such fact. An eternal sin, as here intended, is an act already completed, whose guilt and judgment have already been incurred. It is called an eternal sin because its penalty can never be blotted out. Any sin would be eternal in this sense, if there were no possible way to escape its punishment. A sin becomes eternal, then, when all gracious means of forgiveness are withdrawn. For example: David committed a great sin. Its penalties, or chastisements, lasted to the border of this world. But it was not an eternal sin, because those penalties had an end. They did not continue forever. Grace stopped them with this life and blotted them out forever. What is blotted out has no existence. But the sin against the Holy Spirit is eternal, because thereby the sinner at once puts himself beyond the only means of pardon. Remember the principles already stated: Outside of grace no salvation; outside of Christ no grace; outside of the Spirit no Christ. Or without regeneration, justification, and sanctification, no salvation; and apart from the Spirit no regeneration, justification, and sanctification.

We have seen that as human governments become more civilized very few offenses are made capital, and these must be very heinous in character. Moreover, the conditions under which such crimes are possible are very stringent, to wit: discretionary age, sanity, premeditation, and malice. Not only so, but the accused is additionally hedged about by a liberal construction of all provocation and of the right of self-defense, and of the amount and character of the evidence necessary to conviction. Now since this benevolent modification of hitherto rigorous human law has been brought about by the influence of the Bible, we would naturally expect to find in that good book that the only unpardonable offense against divine law calls for a rare degree of heinousness, and such extraordinary conditions under which the sin could be possible, as would on their face vindicate the divine procedure from all appearances of harshness, with all right thinking intelligences. This high degree of heinousness and these extraordinary conditions are just what we do find.

It is not a sin to be committed by a thoughtless child – immature youth – nor by one of feeble mind, nor by the ignorant. It must be knowingly done, wilfully done, maliciously done, presumptuously done.

The whole matter may be made more forcible by stating clearly and considering separately the constituent elements or conditions of the unpardonable sin:

It is a sin of character crystallized in opposition to God.

By this is meant such a confirmed state of heart, and such fixedness of evil character, such a blunting or searing of moral perceptions as mark the incorrigibly wicked. Indeed, this reflection embodies the essence of the sin.

It is no impulsive, no hasty act, but proceeds from such a state of heart, such a character, such a servitude to evil habits, such a violent distortion or utter perversion of moral vision, such an insensibility to spiritual impressions as would indicate the hopelessness of benefit in the continuance of remedial appliances, since there is a point beyond which we cannot go without destroying individuality and moral agency.

The case in point is abundantly illustrative. Let us carefully examine each step of our way just here. Let us be sure we are right before we go ahead. Milton not inaptly represents the crystallization of Satan’s character in five words: "Evil, be thou my good." Isaiah, in rapt, prophetic vision, forecasts the very characters fitted to commit the unpardonable sin. He denounces six woes which may well be compared to the eight woes denounced by our Lord (Isaiah 5:8-23; Matthew 23:13-36). They all refer to character incorrigibly evil, such as (a) inordinate covetousness and selfishness that join house to house and field to field until there is no place for other people to have a home; (b) inveterate and confirmed drunkards that rise early and sit up late to inflame themselves with strong wines until they regard not the work of the Lord, neither consider the operation of his hands; (c) incorrigible sinners that draw iniquity with cords of vanity and defy the judgments of God; (d) moral perverts that justify the wicked and take away the righteousness of the righteous; (e) inveterate vanity and self-conceit; (f) but especially this one: "Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil, that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!" Now this answers to Milton’s devil: "Evil, be thou my good." And it was this very distortion and perversion of moral vision of which the Pharisees of this passage were guilty, and which constituted the essence of their blasphemy or slander of God. They called the Holy Spirit an unclean spirit. Upon this point the testimony of Mark is explicit. They are expressly declared to be guilty of an eternal sin, "Because they said, He hath an unclean spirit." But the words were significant only because they were symptoms of expressions of a state of heart – a heart of overflowing, implacable hate and malice.

So, in the context, our Saviour declares: "How can ye, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh." It is therefore evidently out of harmony with the Bible concept of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, that thoughtless boys and girls, who sometimes in revival meetings manifest an irreverent spirit, do thereby commit the unpardonable sin.

I have myself conversed with a now genuinely good and converted mother, who, when young, once conspired with nine or ten other girls to practice on the credulity of a conceited young preacher by joining the church in a body and by being baptized, when the whole procedure was meant for a practical Joke. Some of these parties are now living and one of them is the exemplary wife of a Baptist preacher. The irreverence and impiety of the act were not realized until afterward. This was no blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. They were immature, ill taught girls, without malicious intent against God, and some others of them, as I have since learned, afterward most cordially repented of their great sin and received the gracious forgiveness of the Heavenly Father whose institutions and ordinances had been outraged by their folly. If we compare with this incident the act of Ananias and Sapphira, we may readily perceive the difference in degree of guilt.

It is an old proverb: "Nature has no leaps." Character is a result of long working forces tending to permanency of type. We have thus reached a view of the first and most important element in this awful sin – an element of character resulting from cumulative forces and habits.

It is a sin against spiritual knowledge. Far, far from us, however, be the thought that every sin against light or knowledge is unpardonable. Do allow me to make this very clear and very emphatic, because a host of good people have tortured themselves needlessly just here by misapprehension. They are conscious of having sinned, and of having sinned when they knew beforehand that what they were tempted to do and did was wrong. Misapplying the Scripture they have said to themselves: "The unpardonable sin is a sin against knowledge. I have sinned against knowledge. Have I not committed the unpardonable sin?" Here again let us step carefully. Let us be sure we are right before we go ahead. Look closely at a little catechism – mark the emphatic words: The unpardonable sin is a sin against what knowledge? Against what degree of that knowledge? Is every sin against even that particular kind of knowledge necessarily unpardonable? Note the emphasis on the discriminating word in this second constituent element of the unpardonable sin. It is a sin against spiritual knowledge. How else could it be a sin against the Holy Spirit as specially distinguished from and contrasted with a sin against the Father or the Son?

Let us illustrate by the case of Paul. (a) According to his own testimony he was, before his conversion, "a blasphemer, and a persecutor and injurious" (1 Timothy 1:13). (b) By persecution and torture he "compelled others to blaspheme" (Acts 26:11). (c) Yet he says, "I obtained mercy because I did it ignorantly in unbelief" (1 Timothy 1:13). What are the salient points of this case? We find here first an indisputable case of blasphemy, but it is blasphemy against the Son, which this passage declares to be pardonable. Next we find a case of ignorance which again makes the sin pardonable. This second finding is most pertinent to the matter in hand. It furnishes the clue, which properly followed leads us safely out of the maze of discussion on the unpardonable sin. What was Paul’s ignorance? We cannot deny that he had the Old Testament with all its shadows, symbols and prophecies pointing to the Messiah. We cannot deny that he had knowledge of the historical and argumentative proofs, certifying Jesus to be that Messiah. Wherein then was he ignorant? In this material point: Light from the Holy Spirit had not convinced him that Jesus was the Messiah. He had not spiritual knowledge and hence had not sinned against the Holy Spirit. In his soul he thought Jesus was an imposter. He "verily thought within himself he was doing God’s service" in warring against Jesus. His conscience was void of offense. Compare this with the demons: "We know thee, who thou art, thou Holy One of God." Paul hated Jesus from an utter misconception of him, and loved him when the misconception was removed. The demons hated him the more, that they did not misconceive his mission and character. Because they knew he was the Messiah and because they painfully felt the presence of his holiness as a wolf is shamed or an owl is pained by the light; therefore they hated him.

Just here we approach a borderland whose precise boundary line has never been fixed by theological controversy. And yet in this narrow strip lies the unpardonable sin. Where the great have stumbled let guides of less degree walk humbly, circumspectedly, and prayerfully. I trust, at least, to make myself intelligible here. Some hyper-Calvinists hold that all subjects of influence from the Holy Spirit are necessarily saved, basing their arguments on such scriptures as, "Being confident of this very thing, that he who hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ" (Philippians 1:6). From which they argue that the Holy Spirit never really touches any man except those pre-ordained to salvation. I hold unswervingly to the doctrine that in every case of genuine conversion the good work thus commenced will be graciously completed. But, in my judgment, the Bible is very far from teaching that the lost never had any spiritual light – never were subject to any impressions made by the Holy Spirit. Indeed, it would seem impossible otherwise to commit the unpardonable sin against the Holy Spirit.

With all light comes responsibility to accept it and walk in it. With all light comes liability. As said the Saviour, "If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not the sin: but now they have no cloak for their sin" (John 15:22). Unquestionable the degree of both guilt and penalty is measured by the degree of light against which one sins. This sentiment readily finds universal acceptance. It accords with our instinctive and intuitive ideas of justice. Certainly the Bible, at least, is very clear on this point. On what other principle could our Lord declare the punishment of Sodom and Gomorrah, Tyre and Sidon, more tolerable in the day of judgment than the punishment of the cities which rejected him and his servants (Matthew 10:15; Matthew 11:20-24; Mark 6:11; Luke 10:12-14) ? How else account for the difference in penalty between "a few stripes" and "many stripes" when the act of offense is precisely the same in both cases (Luke 12:47-48) ? How otherwise account for David’s distinction between "secret sins and presumptuous sins"? How otherwise could Paul represent God as "winking at" [i. e. a mercifully overlooking] "times of ignorance" (Acts 17:30) ? How else could the men of Nineveh and the Queen of Sheba condemn at the judgment the generation that rejected Jesus (Matthew 12:41-42)? Now mark the application of this argument to the matter under consideration. Chorazin, Bethsaida, Capernaum, and Jerusalem were guiltier than Sodom and Tyre, because a greater light, in a greater person than Lot, Solomon or Jonah, was in their midst.

But our Saviour himself teaches that the light is brighter still when the Holy Spirit works. And hence a sin against the Son of man may be pardonable while a sin against the Holy Spirit is unpardonable. But as Lot, Jonah, Solomon, and Jesus, the light-bearers, were all personally present in a way to be known and felt, so it must follow that the Holy Spirit, as bearer of a brighter light, must be personally present in a way to be known and impressively felt. Therefore none can commit this unpardonable sin against the Holy Spirit unless he has known and felt his presence as a light-bearer. I say the presence of the Holy Spirit must be known and felt. The mind must be convinced of his presence, and the heart must feel it, and the inmost judgment of conscience must acknowledge it. This is precisely why the unpardonable sin is oftenest committed in great revivals. It is a sin against light – spiritual light – light known and felt, light so painfully, gloriously bright that a man must run from it, blaspheme or be converted. What miracle affecting only the physical man can equal the Spirit’s display of power over mind and soul in a great revival? When he fills a house or a whole city; when he is demonstrably convicting and converting on the right and left; when strong men are broken down; when hard hearts are melted; when long-sealed fountains of tears are opened; when hardened sinners fall as oak trees before a sweeping tempest; when all around the guilty confess their sins; when the saved rise up with love-lighted eyes and glorified faces to joyfully declare that God for Christ’s sake has forgiven their sins – ah I the power – the felt Presence! Then some sinner, seeing and knowing and feeling the truth of it all, pierced through and through with the arrows of conviction, riven to the marrow with the bolt of demonstration, trembling like Belshazzar before the mysterious, awful, but certain Presence, overwhelmed by memory of a thousand sins, yet so knowing, so feeling, clings with death-grip to some besetting sin and to justify rejection of Jesus, so witnessed by the Holy Spirit, lies unto God as to his real motives of rejection, reviles the Holy One, turns away and dies forever. Yes, a soul dies! As I have been impressed with the presence of physical death, so, only far more vividly, have I felt the presence of spiritual death. Once during a great meeting I felt it; I felt a soul had died – that I was in the presence of the hopelessly lost.

It must be a sin of malice. In the special case before us the presence of malice is most evident. One expression of our Lord sufficiently tells the whole story: "Ye offspring of vipers I" See the snake in his coil! Mark his cold, steely eye of hate! Behold the lightning play of his forked tongue! See the needle fang and the venom of secreted poison! That snake means death to his innocent victim. So Satan’s devotee, about to commit the unpardonable sin. Hear him: "I hate this light. It exposes my secret sins. It strips me of my mask of self-respect. It humiliates me. This light shows how sensual, how groveling, how beastly, how devilish I really am. It exposes my chains. It advertises my bondage to pride, lust, and money. It makes me loathesome to myself. I hate this painful light, this awful purity. 0, prince of darkness, restore my self-esteem, re-establish my respectability!"

Hear Satan’s rejoinder: "You must away from that light. You cannot put it out. It is the unquenchable shining of immaculate holiness. Here is your only expedient: Lock all the doors of your soul. Close the blinds of every window. Pull down every curtain. Now call that light ’& superstition.’ Call your rejection of it ’superior intelligence,’ or ’science,’ or ’higher criticism,’ or ’progress,’ or ’broadmindedness,’ or whatever you will. Put evil for good and good for evil. Blaspheme. And that light will never disturb you any more."

Ah, no! Never more. "The die is cast. The Rubicon is crossed – that soul is free no more." In his case is fulfilled the scripture: "My Spirit shall not always strive with man." He has joined that outlawed host to whom this scripture applies: "Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Spirit." Here is genuine striving and genuine resisting. The Spirit strives – the man resists. The gnashing upon Stephen with their teeth expresses desperate malice. It was malice proceeding from deep conviction that Stephen was right and they were wrong. It followed "being cut to the heart."

The sin must be wilful. This involves the double idea of premeditation and decision. The mind has not only deliberated – it has chosen. The love of pleasure, or of money, or of power, is deliberately preferred to the love of God. The "will" settles the matter. However long the time, complex the forces, or inscrutable the processes which determine the resultant character which makes the decision, that decision itself is one definite act of the will. The preparation of mind and heart which fitted the man to make such awful choice may indeed have extended over a period of years, the man meanwhile waxing worse and worse, the heart indurating, the soul petrifying. Yet, in one moment, at last, the border of possible salvation is crossed over forever. The "will" steps across the line. "I will not to do the will of God." "I will not go to Jesus. I will not have this Man to reign over me."

It is a sin of presumption. It is not difficult to get a clear idea of the meaning of this word. An irreverent, overweening, daring confidence for which there are no just grounds. Presumption draws false conclusions from God’s forbearance. Because sentence against an evil deed is not speedily executed the presumptuous heart is fully set to do evil. God suspended judgment that the man might repent. The sinner concludes that God does not mark iniquity. So many times has he trifled with the overtures of mercy) he presumes that he may continue to trifle with impunity. God’s patience, erroneously construed, has made him irreverent and daring. He can recall, and despise as he recalls, the number of times he has been touched somewhat in other meetings. He presumes that what has been will be again, in case it becomes necessary to revise his decision. Time enough for that if one chooses to turn back later on. Nothing tells him that this is the last time. He presumes as if he had a lease on life and as if the sovereign and eternal Spirit of God must come to his call.

Just here I desire to quote a scripture which some high human authorities affirm to be applicable to the subject under consideration. I very greatly respect them and very readily concede my own fallibility of judgment. But where my convictions are strong I speak. Here is the scripture: "For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins. But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries. He that despised Moses’ law died without mercy under two or three witnesses. Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace" (Hebrews 10:26-29). My present brief comment on the passage is:

There appears to be a manifest reference, in some sort, to apostasy. I mean by apostasy the final loss of all that is accomplished by regeneration and justification.

It clearly teaches, and for obvious reasons, that in case of such a loss, renewal would be impossible. The remedial resources of grace in such case being completely exhausted, there would be nothing more to draw upon for recovery.

But the reference is not to such calamity as objectively possible. The context and all the letter to the Hebrews as unequivocally teach the final perseverance of all the saints as does the letter to the Romans, or any other scripture. And to my mind the Bible teaches no doctrine more clearly than the ultimate salvation of all the elect. The reference then is to apostasy as hypothetically and even, perhaps, subjectively possible.

If then the reference is to apostasy, though not hypothetically and not really possible, how can it be applicable to the sin under discussion? This pertinent question I will now answer. While only a hypothesis concerning one thing, it yet contains an argument fairly applicable to another thing. It discusses wilful sin after enlightenment. The greater the enlightenment, the greater the sin. In the hypothetical, but actually impossible case of apostasy, there would be no more sacrifice for sin. The blood of Christ, and the Spirit power, beyond which grace has nothing to offer, would have been found inefficacious after fair trial. Now apply this same principle of argument to an unregenerate man. To him the Father’s love is offered and rejected. To him Christ as the highest expression of that love is offered and rejected. To him, the Spirit’s testimony to Christ is offered in such a way that he knows and feels that Spirit’s presence and power, and in such a way that his conscience recognizes and confesses the truth of the testimony. But from love of sin and hatred of known truth he blasphemes that Holy Spirit. Then in his case it would be true that "there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin," not because he had experimentally tried its efficacy and used up all its power to save, but that from his rejection of such sacrifice in the blaze of spiritual light demonstrating its efficacy, such efficacy is no longer available to him. On this passage Dr. Kendrick says: "If others fall away who have reached a very high grade of spiritual enlightenment, who have experienced all of the divine influence but regeneration, their recovery is morally impossible. God will not bless the efforts for their renewal but, like the field that has answered the rains and sunshine only with thorns and thistles, will give them over to the burning." (See American Commentary – Hebrews.)

Now our theory of the unpardonable sin necessarily supposes spiritual light to make it a sin against the Spirit, and a very high degree of spiritual light to make it so heinous as to constitute it the only unpardonable sin. That there is shed forth such spiritual light, that there is put forth such spiritual influence – light which may be seen and influence which may be felt, and yet light and influence which, through the sinner’s fault, do not eventuate in salvation – is the clear and abundant teaching of the Bible. I know of no great theologian in the Baptist ranks who denies it. I refer to such acknowledged teachers of systematic theology as Gill, Boyce, Strong, Dagg, Hovey, Pendleton, and Robinson, and among the Presbyterians such authors as Calvin, Hodge, and Shedd – all of whose books I have studied on this specific point.

We may here, I think, conclude the analysis of this sin. Its conditions are clearly before us: The age of discretion, a sound mind, a high degree of spiritual light, a character fixed in opposition to God, a life under the dominion of confirmed evil habits. Its constituent elements are: Premeditation, or deliberation, a decisive choice, presumption and malice. We come now to consider the state of one guilty of this eternal sin. This is an important phase of the subject. Such a state surely evidences itself in some way. The marks which distinguish it from other states ought, one would naturally suppose, to be sufficiently visible for recognition. As an introduction to my discussion of these marks it is thought appropriate to give the most remarkable poem on the subject in all literature. It is Alexander’s hymn:

There is a time, we know not when, A point, we know not where, That marks the destiny of men, To glory or despair.

There is a line by un unseen, That crosses every path, The hidden boundary between God’s patience and His wrath.

To pass that limit is to die – To die as if by stealth; It does not quench the beaming eye, Nor pale the glow of health.

The conscience may be still at ease, The spirit light and gay; That which is pleasing still may please, And care be thrust away.

But on that forehead God hath set Indelibly a mark, Unseen by man, for man as yet Is blind and in the dark.

And yet the doomed man’s path below, Like Eden may have bloomed; He did not, does not, will not know Or feel that he is doomed.

He knows, be feels that all is well, And every fear is calmed; He lives, he dies, he wakes in hell, Not only doomed, but damned.

Oh I where is this mysterious bourne, By which our path is crossed? Beyond which God himself hath sworn, That he who goes is lost?

How far may we go on in sin? How long will God forbear? Where does hope end, and where begin The confines of despair?

An answer from the skies is sent; Ye that from God depart, While it is called to-day, repent, And harden not your heart.

Confining my own diagnosis strictly to the Scriptures I would say that the state of one who has committed the unpardonable sin is one of awful deprivation. We say "Darkness is deprivation of light; death deprivation of life." The deprivation in this case is:

Of the Holy Spirit whom he has reviled and despised. To that Spirit God has said, "Let him alone; he is wedded to his idols." This insures his death. This makes his sin eternal. He cannot now ever find Christ, the door. Without the Spirit he can never repent, believe, be regenerated, be justified, or sanctified. "There remaineth no more sacrifice for sin," that is, to him there is no Christ. I think that there are such men today, from whom the Holy Spirit has taken his everlasting flight.

It is a deprivation of the prayers of God’s people. God who said to his Spirit, "Let him alone," now says to his people who would pray for such a man, "Let me alone." Awful words: Let him alone – let me alone!

The friends of Job had sinned, but not beyond the reach of prayer (Job 42:7-10). Paul had sinned by persecution and blasphemy of Jesus, but not beyond the reach of Stephen’s dying prayer: "Lord Jesus, lay not this sin to their charge" (Acts 7:60). The crucifiers of Jesus had sinned, but not all of them beyond the reach of his dying prayer: "Father forgive them; for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). But God’s people cannot pray acceptably without the Spirit’s prompting (Romans 8:26-27). The Spirit never prompts one to pray against the will of God. Hear the word of God (1 John 5:16): "If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it." (Jeremiah 15:1): "Then said the Lord unto me, Though Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet my mind could not be toward this people; cast them out of my sight, and let them go forth."

It is a deprivation of the protection usually afforded to the wicked by the presence of the righteous. The presence of ten righteous men would have protected Sodom and Gomorrah from overthrow (Genesis 18:23-32). The righteous are the salt of the earth. Their presence preserves it from immediate destruction. Paul and Christ taught that when the righteous are garnered off the earth then comes the deluge of fire. But one who has committed the unpardonable sin, at once is deprived of all protection arising from the contiguity of the righteous. To repeat a scripture: "Though Noah, Daniel, and Job were in the city, as I live saith the Lord they shall deliver neither son nor daughter; they shall but deliver their own souls by their righteousness" (Ezekiel 14:20). No Spirit, no prayers) no protection.

It is a deprivation of spiritual sensations. What is meant here? Speaking naturally, our sensations are from our five senses. One who is blind loses the sensations that come from sight; one who is deaf, those from hearing. So with taste, and smell, and touch or feeling. A body that cannot see, hear, feel, taste or smell is dead to the world around it. So with the senses of the inner man. When the spiritual or moral perceptive faculties are so paralyzed that they cannot take hold of God, that soul is dead to God, however much it may be alive to the devil. Having eyes it sees not. Having ears it hears not. Having a heart it feels not. The conscience is seared as with a hot iron. They are past feeling (Ephesians 4:18-19) : "Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart: who being past feeling having given themselves over to lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness." Old soldiers recall that when mortification took place in a wounded limb there was no longer any pain. The wounded man felt unusually well. It was the prelude of death.

In his book, Over the Teacups, Oliver Wendell Holmes says: "Our old doctors used to give an opiate which they called ’the black drop.’ It was stronger than laudanum, and, in fact, a dangerously powerful narcotic. Something like this is that potent drug in Nature’s pharmacopeia which she reserves for the time of need, the later stages of life. She commonly begins administering it at about the time of the ’grand climacteric,’ the ninth septennial period, the sixty-third year. More and more freely she gives it, as the years go on, to her gray-haired children, until, if they last long enough, every faculty is benumbed, and they drop off quietly into sleep under its benign influence. Time, the inexorable, does not threaten them with the scythe so often as with the sandbag. He does not cut, but he stuns and stupefies."

But the "black drop" administered by Satan, when, at any age, the unpardonable sin is committed, has no such kindly intent. It puts one past feeling as to heaven, but full of sensation as to hell. There are no kindlings to repentance, however keen may be the biting and sting of remorse. It is quite possible that one who is past feeling to spiritual impressions may dream as Shakespeare’s Macbeth and Richard III, or Scott’s "Glossin" in Guy Mannering. And so to such a one there may remain nothing "but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries." What time these apprehensions last they are the foretaste of hell.

It is not only a state of deprivation, but of positive infliction. When "the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, an evil spirit from the Lord troubled him" (1 Samuel 16:14). To the man who closes his eyes to the Spirit’s testimony, God sends judicial blindness and hardness of heart. Not only so, when the Lord refused to answer Saul, "neither by dreams, nor by Urim, nor by prophets," he allowed him to return to spiritualism and "inquire of one who had a familiar spirit" (1 Samuel 2:5-7). God chooses the delusions of the hopelessly lost. He sends them a strong delusion that they may believe a lie and be damned (Isaiah 66:4; 2 Thessalonians 2:11). This delusion may be spiritualism, or science, or philosophy, or anything else. Whatever it is, for the time being it fills the vision and the heart. It points out a path "whose steps take hold on death and hell," and though the end thereof is death, it seems right to him.

Such, I think, is the Bible teaching concerning the unpardonable sin. It is a sin of today as well as yesterday. The liability of its commission is greatly increased during revivals of religion.

That hazard is unspeakably awful when men know and feel God’s presence and power, and though convicted and trembling, turn away with a lie on their lips and hatred of holiness in their hearts.

To younger people would I urgently say:

Beware of those insidious beginnings which tend to the formation of an evil character. Cultivate most assiduously such tenderness of heart, such susceptibility to religious impressions as you now have. Follow every prompting toward heaven. Transmute every spiritual emotion to action. Beware of becoming hardened. Beware of dominant passions, such as the love of pleasure, the pride of opinion, the pride of life, the love of money. Distrust as an enemy, anything or anybody, whose influence keeps you apart from the use of the means of salvation. Shun, as you would a tiger’s Jungle, all associations that corrupt good manners. Beware of all people who make a mock at sin and speak irreverently of holy things.

Oh, the beginnings! The beginnings I These are the battlegrounds of hope. Hear today, turn today, escape for thy life today. For when once under the dominion of pleasure, or lust, or wine, or pride, or especially the love of money, that root of all kinds of evil, then – O then – how easily, how unconsciously you may commit the unpardonable sin.

And then, though the world were full of Bibles to the stars, and Christians more numerous than the sands and forest leaves, and every church ablaze with revivals – for you there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin. You are now and forever lost.

In response to this discussion of our Lord upon the sin against the Holy Spirit the Pharisees demanded of him a sign, to which he replied that no sign should be given them except the sign of Jonah, i. e., his burial and resurrection. This test of his messiahship he submitted time and again both to his enemies and to his disciples. Here he again announces a principle of the judgment, viz: that men will be judged according to the light they have here. The Ninevites and the queen of the south will stand up in the judgment and condemn the Jews of his day because with less light than these Jews had they responded to God’s call while that generation rejected their light. Then he closes that discussion with a comparison of the Jewish nation to a man whom the evil spirit volunteered to leave and re-enter at pleasure with the assurance that every time he returned, after a leave of absence, the last state was worse than the first.

It is necessary to add a word of comment on Section 50 (Matthew 12:46-50; Mark 3:31-35; Luke 8:19-21) of the Harmony. Here on the same day and on this same occasion the mother of Jesus and his brothers come to him for an interview, ostensibly to arrest him from so great a zeal. Perhaps they thought he ought to stop and eat, but he, knowing their purpose toward him, announced the principle of spiritual relation above the earthly relation – that whosoever would do the will of God was nearer to him than earthly relations. What a lesson for us!

QUESTIONS

1. What is the difficulty of Mark 3:29 and what is its solution?

2. What is the meaning of "eternal sin"?

3. By whom and how must this sin be committed?

4. What is the first constituent element, or condition, of the unpardonable sin? Give biblical illustrations and proof.

5. What is the second constituent element? Explain and illustrate by the case of Paul.

6. What theological controversy here and what is the author’s position?

7. What principle of judgment here involved and what is the biblical proof?

8. Describe the spiritual conditions under which a soul may commit the unpardonable sin.

9. What is the third element and what is the proof? Recite the struggle of a soul on the verge of this awful sin and Satan’s rejoinder.

10. What is the fourth element and what is involved in it?

11. What is the fifth element and what its meaning? Illustrate.

12. What passage of Scripture here introduced, what is the author’s points of interpretation, and how does this passage apply to the subject under discussion?

13. What is the state of one who is guilty of the unpardonable sin and what poem quoted on this point? Quote it.

14. What are the items of deprivation which constitute the state of such a soul? Explain each.

15. In response to our Lord’s discussion of this sin against the Holy Spirit what demand did the Pharisees make, what was our Lord s reply and what does he mean?

16. How does our Lord here characterize these Jewish people?

17. What was the incident of Section 50 of the Harmony and what is its lesson for us?

Verses 22-40

XXXII

OUR LORD’S GREAT MINISTRY IN GALILEE

Part VII

STILLING THE TEMPEST, THE TWO GADARENE DEMONIACS, SECOND REJECTION AT NAZARETH, SENDING FORTH THE TWELVE, AND HEROD’S SUSPICION

Harmony -pages 66-75 and Matthew 8:18-23; Matthew 11:1; Matthew 13:54-58; Matthew 14:1-12; Mark 4:34-5:20; Mark 6:1-29; Luke 8:22-40; Luke 9:1-9.

When Jesus had finished his discourse on the kingdom, as illustrated in the first great group of parables, he crossed over the Sea of Galilee to avoid the multitudes. While on the bosom of the sea a storm swept down upon them, as indicated by Luke, but our Lord had fallen asleep. So the disciples awoke him with their cry of distress and he, like a God, spoke to the winds and the sea, and they obeyed him. Such is the simple story of this incident, the lesson of which is the strengthening of their faith in his divinity.

Upon their approach to the shore – the country of the Gadarenes – occurred the thrilling incident of the two Gadarene demoniacs. The story is graphically told here by Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and does not need to be repeated in this interpretation, but there are certain points in the story which need to be explained. First, there are some difficulties: (1) The apparent discrepancy of long standing, relating to the place, is cleared up by Dr. Broadus in his note at the bottom of page 67 (see his explanation of this difficulty);

The long famous instance of "discrepancy" as to the place in this narrative has been cleared up in recent years by the decision of textual critics that the correct text in Luke is Gerasenes, as well as in Mark, and by Dr. Thomson’s discovery of a ruin on the lake shore, named Khersa (Gerasa). If this village was included (a very natural supposition) in the district belonging to the city of Gadara, some miles south-eastward, then the locality could be described as either in the country of the Gadarenes, or in the country of the Gerasenes

(2) Matthew mentions two demoniacs, while Mark and Luke mention but one. This is easily explained by saying that the one mentioned by Mark and Luke was probably the prominent and leading one, and that they do not say there was only one. Second) there are some important lessons in this incident for us: (1) We see from this incident that evil spirits, or demons, not only might possess human beings by impact of spirit upon spirit, but they also could and did possess lower animals. (2) We see here also that these evil spirits could not do what they would without permission, and thus we find an illustration of the limitations placed upon the Devil and his agencies. (3) There is here a recognition of the divinity of Jesus by these demoniacs and that he is the dispenser of their torment. (4) There is here also an illustration of the divine power of Jesus Christ over the multitude of demons, and from this incident we may infer that they are never too numerous for him. (5) The man when healed is said to have been in his right mind, indicating the insanity of sin. (6) The new convert was not allowed to go with Jesus, but was made a missionary to his own people) to tell them of the great things the Lord had done for him. (7) The Gadarenes besought him to leave their borders. Matthew Henry says that these people thought more of their hogs than they did of the Lord Jesus Christ. Alas I this tribe is by far too numerous now.

Following the Harmony, we find that after crossing back to the other shore Jesus revisits Nazareth and teaches in their synagogue. Here he was rejected as at first. He did some works there, but was limited by their unbelief. Their questions as to his origin indicate their great stupidity and throw light on the question of "the perpetual virginity" of Mary, showing that the Romanist contention here is utterly groundless. Before leaving them Jesus announced a fact which has been experienced by many a man since that time, viz: that a man is often least appreciated by his own people.

In Section 55 (Matthew 10:1-42; Mark 6:7-13; Luke 9:1-6) we have the first commission of the twelve apostles. The immediate occasion is expressed in Matthew 9:36. (See the author’s sermon on "Christ’s Compassion Excited by a Sight of the Multitude.") These apostles had received the training of the mighty hand of the Master ever since their conversion and call to the ministry, and now he thrusts them out to put into action what they had received from him. The place they were to go, or the limit of their commission, is found in Matthew 10:5-6. This limitation to go to the Jews and not to the Gentiles seems to have been in line with the teaching elsewhere that salvation came first to the Jews and that the time of the Gentiles had not yet come in, but this commission was not absolute, because we find our Lord later commissioning them to go to all the world. What they were to preach is found in Matthew 10:7 and what they were to do in Matthew 10:8. The price they were to ask is found in the last clause of Matthew 10:8. How they were to be supported, negatively and positively, together with the principle of their support, is found in Matthew 10:9-11. The principle of ministerial support is found also, very much elaborated, in 1 Corinthians 9:4-13, and is referred to in 1 Corinthians 9:14 as an ordinance of our Lord. The manner of making this operative on entering a city is found in Matthew 10:11-12. The rewards of receiving and rejecting them are found in Matthew 10:13, while the method of testimony against the rejectors is expressed in Matthew 10:14-15.

The characteristics of these disciples are given in Matthew 10:16: "Wise as serpents, and harmless as doves." If they should have had the characteristic of the dove alone they would have been silly; if the serpent alone, they would have been tricky. But with both they had prudence and simplicity. In this commission we find also that they were to be subject to certain hazards, recorded in Matthew 10:18. Their defense is also promised in Matthew 10:19-20. The extent of their persecutions is expressed in Matthew 10:21-22. Their perseverance is indicated in the last clause of Matthew 10:22. In Matthew 10:23 we have the promise that the Son of man would come to them before they had gone through all the cities of Israel. What does that mean? There are five theories about it, all of which are amply discussed by Broadus (see his Commentary in loco).

The consolations offered these disciples, in view of their prospective persecutions, are as follows (Matthew 10:24-31): (1) So they treated the Lord, (2) all things hidden shall be made known, (3) the work of their persecutors is limited to the body, but God’s wrath is greater than man’s and touches both soul and body, and (4) the Father’s providential care. The condition of such blessings in persecution, and vice versa, are expressed in Matthew 10:32-33. From this we see that they were to go forth without fear or anxiety and in faith. The great issue which the disciples were to force is found in Matthew 10:34-39. This does not mean that Christ’s work has in it the purpose of stirring up strife, but that the disturbance will arise from the side of the enemy in their opposition to the gospel and its principles, whose purpose means peace. So there will arise family troubles, as some yield to the call of the gospel while others of the same family reject it. Some will always be lacking in the spirit of religious tolerance, which is not the spirit of Christ. In this connection our Lord announces the principle of loyalty to him as essential to discipleship, with an added encouragement, viz., that of finding and losing the life. In Matthew 10:40-42 we have the identity of Christ with the Father which shows his divinity and also his identity with his people in his work. Then follows the blessed encouragement of the promise of rewards. When Jesus had thus finished his charge to his disciples, he made a circuit of the villages of Galilee preaching the gospel of the kingdom.

From this incident come three important lessons for us: First, we have here the origin and development of a call to the ministry as follows: (1) Christ’s compassion for the perishing and leaderless, (2) prayer to God that he would send forth laborers, and (3) a positive conviction that we should go. Second, there is also suggested here the dangers of the care for fine preaching: (1) If it has its source in anxiety and selfishness it restrains spirituality; (2) it manifests itself in excitement and excess which adulterates spirituality; (3) it leads to weariness or self-seeking and thus destroys spirituality. Third, we have here several encouragements to the preacher: (1) The cause is honorable; (2) the example is illustrious; (3) the success is certain; (4) care is guaranteed; (5) the reward is glorious; (6) the trials become triumphs; (7) the identification with Christ.

The account of the miracles wrought by the disciples of Jesus on this preaching tour impressed Herod Antipas, as well as those wrought by Jesus himself, the impression of which was so great that he thought that John the Baptist was risen from the dead. The account in the Harmony throws light on the impression that was made by the ministry of John. Some were saying that Jesus was Elijah or one of the other prophets, but Herod’s conscience and superstition caused him to think it was John the Baptist, for he remembered his former relation to John. Then follows here the story of how John had rebuked Herod which angered his wife, Herodias, and eventually led to John’s death at the band of the executioner. Josephus gives testimony relative to this incident. (See chapter X of this "Interpretation.")

There are some lessons to be learned from this incident. First, we are impressed with the courage and daring of the first Christian martyr, a man who was not afraid to speak his convictions in the face of the demons of the pit. Second, the life must leave its impress, but that impress will be variously interpreted according to the antecedents and temperaments of the interpreters. Third, the influence of a wicked woman, often making the weak and drunken husband a mere tool to an awful wicked end. Fourth, the occasion of sin and crime is often the time of feasting and frivolity. Just such a crime as this has often been approached by means of the dance and strong drink. Fifth, we have here an example of a man who was too weak to follow his conviction of the right because he had promised and had taken an oath. He had more respect for his oath than he had for right. Sixth, there is here also an example of the wickedness of vengeance. It is a tradition that when the daughter brought in the head of John and gave it to Herodias, her mother, she took a bodkin and stuck it through the tongue of John, saying, "You will never say again, It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife."

QUESTIONS

1. Give the time, place, circumstances, and lesson of Jesus stilling the tempest.

2. Tell the story of the two Gadarene demoniacs.

3. What two difficulties here, and how is each explained?

4. What seven important lessons for us in this incident?

5. Give the story of the second rejection of Jesus at Nazareth and its several lessons.

6. What was the immediate occasion of sending forth the twelve apostles on their first mission?

7. What preparation had they received?

8. Where were they to go, or what was the limit of this commission?

9. Why was it limited, and was it absolute?

10. What were they to preach, and what were they to do?

11. What price were they to ask?

12. How were they to be supported, negatively and positively, and how do you harmonize the Synoptics here?

13. What was the principle of their support and where do we find this principle very much elaborated?

14. How is this principle referred to in 1 Corinthians 9:14?

15. What was the manner of making it operative on entering a city?

16. What rewards attached to receiving and rejecting them?

17. What was the method of testimony against those who rejected?

18. What was to be the characteristics of these disciples?

19. To what hazards were they subject?

20. What was to be their defense?

21. What was to be the extent of their persecution?

22. What was text on the perseverance of the saints, and what was its immediate application to these apostles?

23. Explain "till the Son of man be come."

24. What were the consolations offered these disciples?

25. What was the condition of such blessings?

26. In what spirit were they to go forth?

27. What great issue must they force? Explain.

28. What principle of discipleship here announced?

29. What proof here of the divinity of Jesus Christ?

30. What promise here of rewards?

31. What did Jesus do immediately after finishing his charge here

32. What lessons here on the origin and development of a call to the ministry?

33. What dangers of the care for fine preaching?

34. What seven encouragements from this incident to the preacher of today?

35. How was Herod and others impressed by the miracles of Jesus and his disciples?

36. What several conjectures of Herod and others?

37. What part was played in this drama by John? by Herod? by Herodias and by Salome, the daughter of Herodias?

38. What testimony of Josephus on this incident?

39. What lessons of this incident?

Verses 41-56

XXVI

OUR LORD’S GREAT MINISTRY IN GALILEE

Part I

Harmony pages 85-39 and Matthew 4:17-25; Matthew 8:2-17; Matthew 9:2-26; Mark 1:14-2:22; Mark 5:22-43; Luke 4:14-5:39; Luke 8:41-56; John 4:46-54.

We now come to our Lord’s great ministry m Galilee. We will take a sort of preview of this whole division and then follow it up with more detailed discussions. The general theme of this division of the Harmony is "The kingdom of heaven." We are prone at times to fall into errors of interpretation concerning the kingdom similar to those which led ancient Israel so far and so harmfully astray concerning the advent of the Messiah. Either we so fill our minds with the sublimity of world redemption, as applied to the race, in the outcome, so satisfy our hearts with rhetorical splendor in the glowing description of universal dominion that we lose sight of its application to individuals in our day, and the responsibilities arising from the salvation of one man, or we so concentrate our fancy upon the consummation that we forget the progressive element in the development of the kingdom and the required use of means in carrying on that progress. The former error breeds unprofitable dreamers – the latter promotes skeptics. The preacher is more liable to be led astray by the one, the average church member by the other.

Perhaps the most unprofitable of all sermons is the one full of human eloquence and glowing description excited by the great generalities of salvation, and perhaps the most stubborn of all skepticism is that resulting from disappointment as not witnessing and receiving at once the very climax of salvation, both as to the individual and the race.

Such a spirit of disappointment finds expression in words like these: "The prophecies here of the kingdom are about 1,900 years old. Nineteen centuries have elapsed since the Child was born. Wars have not ceased. The poor are still oppressed. Justice, equity, and righteousness do not prevail. Sorrow, sin, and death still reign. And I am worried and burdened and perplexed. My soul is cast down and disquieted within me." In such case we need to consider the false principles of interpretation which have misled us, and inquire: Have we been fair to the Book and its promise?

Here I submit certain carefully considered statements: (1) The consummation of the Messiah’s kingdom was never promised as an instantaneous result of the birth of the Child. (2) The era of universal peace must follow the utter and eternal removal of things and persons that offend. This will be the harvest of the world. (3) Again, this consummation was never promised as an immediate result, i.e., without the use of means to be employed by Christ’s people. (4) Yet again, this aggregate consummation approaches only by individual reception of the kingdom and individual progress in sanctification. (5) It is safe to say that the promises have been faithfully fulfilled to just the extent that individuals have received the light, walked in the light and discharged the obligations imposed by the gift of the light. These receptive and obedient ones in every age have experienced life, liberty, peace, and joy, and have contributed their part to the ultimate glorious outcome. (6) And this experience in individuals reliably forecasts the ultimate race and world result, and inspires rational hope of its coming. This is a common sense interpretation. In the light of it our duty is obvious. Our concern should be with our day and our lot and our own case as at present environed. The instances of fulfilment cited by the New Testament illustrate and verify this interpretation, particularly that recorded by Matthew as a fulfilment of the prophecies of Isaiah 4-13 inclusive, of his gospel. What dispassionate mind can read these ten chapters of Matthew, with the parallel passages in Mark and Luke, without conceding fulfilment of Isaiah’s prophecies uttered seven centuries before?

Here is the shining of a great light, brighter than all of the material luminaries in the heavens which declare the glory of God and show his handiwork. This is, indeed, the clean, sure and perfect law of the Lord, converting the soul, making wise the simple, rejoicing the heart, enlightening the eyes, enduring forever, more desirable than gold and sweet "r than honey in the honeycomb. Here are judgments true and righteous altogether.

Here in sermon and similitude the incomparable Teacher discloses the principles and characteristics of a kingdom that, unlike anything earth-born, must be from heaven. Here is a fixed, faultless, supreme, and universal standard of morality. The Teacher not only speaks with authority and wisdom, but evidences divinity by supernatural miracles, signs, and wonders. But there is here more than a teacher and wonder worker. He is a Saviour, a Liberator, a Healer, conferring life, liberty, health, peace, and joy. To John’s question – John in prison and in doubt – the answer was conclusive that this, indeed, was the one foreshown by the prophets and there was no need to look for another: "Go and tell John the things which ye hear and see: the blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them. And whosoever shall find no occasion for stumbling in me, blessed is he" (Matthew 11:1-4).

The special matter here most worthy of our consideration is that the kingdom of heaven was not expanded by instantaneous diffusion over a community, a nation, or the world, regardless of human personality, activity, and responsibility ill receiving and propagating it, but it took hold of each receptive individual’s heart and worked out on that line toward the consummation.

To as many as received him to them he gave the power to become the sons of God. Those only who walked in the light realized the blessings of progressive sanctification. To the sons of peace, peace came as a thrilling reality. From those who preferred darkness to light) who judged themselves unworthy of eternal life, the proffered peace departed, returning to the evangelists who offered it.

The poor woman whom Satan had bound for eighteen years experienced no imaginary or figurative release from her bonds (Luke 11:10-16). That other woman, who had sinned much, and who, in grateful humility, washed his feet with her tears – was not forgiveness real and sweet to her? That blind Bartimeus who kept crying, "Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy on me" – did he not receive real sight? That publican, who stood afar off and beat upon his breast, crying, "God, be merciful to me, the sinner" – was he not justified?

And when the Galilean disciples went forth in poverty and weakness preaching his gospel, did they not experience the Joy of the harvest on beholding the ingathering of souls? And when they saw even demons subject to them through the name of Jesus, was not that the joy of victory as when conquerors divide the spoil?

When the stronger than the strong man armed came upon him and bound him, might not our Lord justly say, "As lightning falls from heaven, I saw Satan fall before you"? And just so in our own time.

Every conversion brings life, liberty, peace, and joy to the redeemed soul. Every advance in a higher and better life attests that rest is found at every upward step in the growth of grace. Every talent or pound rightly employed gains 100 per cent for the capital invested, and so the individual Christian who looks persistently into the perfect law of liberty, being not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the Word, is blessed in every deed. Willing to do the will of God, and following on to know the Lord, he not only knows the doctrine to be of God, but experimentally goes on from strength to strength, from grace to grace, and is changed into the divine image from glory to glory.

In the light of these personal experiences he understands how the kingdom of God is invincible, and doubts not the certain coming of the glorious consummation foreshown in prophecy and graciously extended, in the hand of promise. His faith, staggering not through unbelief, takes hold of the invisible, and his hope leaps forward to the final recompense of the reward.

The opening incident of the Galilean ministry is the healing of the nobleman’s son, the second miracle of our Lord in Galilee, and a most remarkable one. The nobleman was Herod’s steward, maybe Chuza, as many suppose, but that is uncertain. The nobleman manifested great faith and it was amply rewarded. This is an illustration of the tenderness with which Jesus ministered to the temporal needs of the people, thus reaching their souls through their bodies. The effect of this miracle was like that of the first: "He himself believed, and his whole house."

The next section (Luke 4:16-31) gives the incident of his rejection at Nazareth. The account runs thus: "And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up: and he entered, as his custom was, into the synagogue on the sabbath day, and stood up to read." How solemn, how sad in its immediate result – how pathetic that scene in Nazareth when the Redeemer announced his mission and issued his proclamation of deliverance: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, Because he anointed me to publish good tidings to the poor: He hath sent me to proclaim deliverance to the captives, And recovering of sight to the blind, To send crushed ones away free, To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.

Oh! what a day when this scripture was fulfilled in the hearing of the captives I But the Spirit on him was not on them.

As Jewish widows in Elijah’s day, perished of famine, through unbelief, and left to Sarepta’s far-off widow in a foreign land to believe and be blessed with unfailing meal and oil, as Jewish lepers, through unbelief, in Elisha’s day died in uncleanness and loathsomeness while touching elbows with One having power to heal, leaving to a Syrian stranger to wash in Jordan and be clean, so here where Jesus "had been brought up," the people of Nazareth shut their eyes, bugged their chains and died in darkness and under the power of Satan – died unabsolved from sin, died unsanctified and disinherited, and so yet are dying and shall forever die.

The Year of Jubilee came to them in vain. In vain its silver trumpets pealed forth the notes of liberty. They had no ear to hear, and so by consent became slaves of the Terrible One forever.

This brings us to church responsibility and ministerial agency in the perpetuation of this proclamation of mercy. As Paul went forth to far-off shores, announcing in tears, yet with faith and hope and courage, the terms of eternal redemption, so now the churches find in the same mission their warrant for existence, and so now are we sent forth as witnesses to stand before every prison house where souls are immured, commissioned "to open the eyes of the prisoners that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive remission of sins and an inheritance among them that are sanctified by faith in Christ." Ours to blow the silver trumpets and proclaim to captives the year of jubilee. Ours is the evangel of liberty – ours to make known that "if the Son of God make men free, they shall be free indeed."

Leaving Nazareth, Jesus went to Capernaum, where he made his residence from which he radiates in his ministry in Galilee, teaching and healing on a large scale. His work here in Zebulun and Naphtali is a distinct fulfilment of Isaiah 9:1-2, in which he is represented as a great light shining in the darkness. By the sea of Galilee near Capernaum he calls four fishermen to be his partners – Peter, Andrew, James, and John, two sets of brothers. Here he announces his purpose for their lives – to be fishers of men. What a lesson! These men were skilled in their occupation and now Jesus takes that skill and turns it into another direction, toward a greater end, "fishers of men." Here he gives them a sign of his authority and messiahship in the incident of the great draught of fishes. The effect on Peter was marvelous. He was conscious of Christ’s divinity and of his own sinfulness. Thus he makes his confession, Luke 5:8: "Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” But our Lord replied to Peter: "Fear not, from henceforth thou shalt catch men." Later (John 21), when Peter and his comrades went back to their old occupation, the risen Lord appeared to them and renewed their call, performing a miracle of a similar draught of fishes.

In Section 28 (Mark 1:21-28; Luke 4:31-37;) we have his first case of healing a demoniac. What is the meaning of the word "demoniac"? It means demon-possessed, and illustrates the fact of the impact of spirit on spirit, many instances of which we have in the Bible. Here the demons recognized him, which accords with Paul’s statement that he was seen of angels. They believed and trembled as James says, but they knew no conversion. The lesson there is one of faith. The effect of this miracle was amazement at his authority over the demons.

In Section 29 (Matthew 8:14-17; Mark 1:29-34; Luke 4:38-41) we have an account of the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law, which incident gives us light on the social relations of the disciples. Peter was married, the Romanist position to the contrary notwithstanding. Further scriptural evidence of his marriage is found in 2 Corinthians 8:5. It is interesting to compare the parallel accounts of this incident in the Harmony and see how much more graphic is Mark’s account than those of Matthew and Luke. There is a fine lesson here on the relation between the mother-in-law and the son-in-law. Peter is a fine example of such relation. Immediately following the healing of Peter’s wife’s mother those that had sick ones brought them to Jesus and he healed them, thus fulfilling a prophecy of Isaiah, that he should take our infirmities and bear our diseases. Our Lord not only healed their sick ones, but he cast out the demons from many, upon which they recognized him. But he would not let them speak because they knew that he was the Christ.

The effect of our Lord’s great work as described in Section 29 was that Peter tried to work a corner on salvation and dam it up in Capernaum. This is indicated in the account of the interview of Peter with our Lord as described in Section 30 (Matthew 4:23-25; Mark 1:35-39; Luke 4:42-44). Here it is said that Jesus, a great while before day, went out into a desert place to pray, and while out there Peter came to him and complained that they were wanting him everywhere. To this our Lord responded that it was to this end that he had come into the world. So Jesus at once launched out and made three great journeys about Galilee. His first journey included a great mass of teaching and healing, of which we have a few specimens in Sections 31-36, which apparently occurred at Capernaum, his headquarters. A second journey is recorded by Luke in Section 47 (Luke 8:1-3) and a third journey is found in Section 55. (For Broadus’ statement of these tours, see Harmony, p. 31.)

Here we have the occasion of one of the special prayers of Jesus. There are four such occasions in his ministry: (1) At his baptism he prayed for the anointing of the Holy Spirit; (2) here he prayed because of the effort to dam up his work of salvation in Capernaum; (3) the popularity caused by the healing of a leper (Sec. 31 – Matthew 8:2-4; Mark 1:40-45; Luke 5:12-16) drove him to prayer; (4) the fourth occasion was the ordination of the twelve apostles. The immense labors of Jesus are indicated in Matthew 4:23-24. These labors gave him great popularity beyond the borders of Palestine and caused the multitudes from every quarter to flock to him. Attention has already been called to the popularity caused by the healing of the leper (Sec. 31) and Jesus’ prayer as the result.

In the incident of the healing of the paralytic we have a most graphic account by the synoptics and several lessons: (1) That disease may be the result of sin, as “thy sin be forgiven thee”; (2) that of intelligent cooperation; (3) that of persistent effort; (4) that of conquering faith. These are lessons worthy of emulation upon the part of all Christians today. Out of this incident comes the first issue between our Lord and the Pharisees, respecting the authority to forgive sins. This was only a thought of their hearts, but he perceived their thought and rebuked their sin. From this time on they become more bold in their opposition, which finally culminated in his crucifixion. Let the reader note the development of this hatred from section to section of the Harmony.

In Section 33 (Matthew 9:9-13; Mark 2:13-17; Luke 5:27-32) we have the account of the call of Matthew, his instant response and his entertainment of his fellow publicans. Here arose the second issue between Christ and the Pharisees, respecting his receiving publicans and sinners and eating with them. This was contrary to their idea in their self-righteousness, but Jesus replied that his mission was to call sinners rather than the righteous. This issue was greatly enlarged later, in Luke 15, to which he replied with three parables showing his justification and his mission. In this instance (Matthew 9:13) he refutes their contention with a quotation from Hosea which aptly fitted this case: "I desire mercy, and not sacrifice."

Then came to him the disciples of John and made inquiry about fasting, to which he replied with the parable of the sons of the bride chamber, the interpretation of which is that we should let our joy or sorrow fit the occasion, or set fasting ments and old bottles, the interpretation of which is to let the form fit the life; beware of shrinking and expansion.

In Section 35 (Matthew 9:18-25; Mark 5:22-43; Luke 8:41-56) we have the account of his healing of Jairus’ daughter and the healing of the woman with the issue of blood. Usually in the miracles of Christ, and in all preceding miracles, there was the touch of some kind between the healer and the healed. We are informed that great multitudes of people came to Jesus with this confidence, "If I but touch him I shall be healed." Accordingly we find that Christ put his fingers on the eyes of the blind, on the ears of the deaf, or took hold of the hand of the dead. In some way usually there was either presence or contact.

We will now consider the special miracle connected with the fringe of the garment of Jesus which the Romanists cite to justify the usage concerning the relics of the saints. In Numbers 15:38 we have a statute: "Thou shalt put fringes on the wings or ends of the outer garment," and this fringe had in it a cord or ribbon of blue, and the object of it was to remind the wearer of the commandments of God. The outer garment was an oblong piece of cloth, one solid piece of cloth, say, a foot and a half wide and four feet long. The edge was fringed on all the four sides, and in the fringe was run a blue thread, and the object of the fringe and of the blue thread also was to make them remember the commandments of God. The statute is repeated in Deuteronomy 22. Again in Deuteronomy 6 is the additional law of phylacteries, or frontlets – little pieces of leather worn between the eyes – on which were inscribed the commandments of God. The people were taught to instruct their children in the commandments of God: "And they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes, and thou shalt put them upon thy door posts, and when thou goest out and when thou comest in, and when thou sittest down and when thou gettest up, and when thou liest down, thou shalt at all times teach thy children the Word of God.” Now, because of these statutes a superstitious veneration began to attach to the fringe and to the phylacteries. So we learn in Matthew 23, as stated by our Saviour, that the Pharisees made broad the phylacteries between their eyes and enlarged the fringe of the outer garment. They made the fringe or tassel very large. They did it to be seen of men. The law prescribed that when the wearer should see this fringe on his garment he should remember the commandments of the Lord his God. But these Pharisees put it on that others might see it, and that it might be an external token to outsiders of their peculiar sanctity and piety. What was intended to be a sign to the man himself was converted by superstition into a sign for other people. Hence this woman said within herself, "If I but touch that sacred fringe – the border of his garment." She could not go up and touch the phylactery between his eyes, in case he wore one, but he did wear the Jewish costume with the fringe or border on his outer garment, and she could reach that from behind. She would not have to go in front of him. She argued: "Now, if I can in the throng get up so that I can reach out and just touch that fringe, I shall be saved." We see how near her thought connected the healing with the fringe of the garment, because by the double statute of God it was required on the Jewish garment to signify their devotion to his Word – the matchless Word of Jehovah. Mark tells us that she was not the only woman, not the only person healed by touching the border of his garment (Mark 6:56). Her sentiment was not an isolated one. It was shared by the people at large. Multitudes of people came to touch the fringe of his garment that they might be healed.

The question arises, Why should Christ select that through contact with the fringe on his outer garment healing power should be bestowed? He did do it. The question is, why? There shall be no god introduced unless there be a necessity for a god. There shall be no special miracle unless the case demands it. Why? Let us see if we cannot get a reason. I do not announce the reason dogmatically, but as one that seems sufficient to my own mind. Christ was among the people speaking as never man spake, doing works that no man had done. He was awakening public attention. He was the cynosure of every eye. They came to him from every direction. They thronged him. And right here at this juncture Jairus had said, "Master, my little girl, twelve years old, is even now dead. Go and lay thy hand upon her that she may live." He arose and started, the crowd surging around him and following him, and all at once he stopped and said, "Who touched me?" "Master, behold the crowd presseth thee on every side, and thou sayest, who touched me?" Here was a miracle necessary to discriminate between the touches of the people. "Who touched me?" Hundreds sin sick touched him and were not saved. Hundreds that had diseases touched him and were unhealed. Hundreds that were under the dominion of Satan looked in his face and heard his words and were not healed. It was touch and not touch. They touched, but there was no real contact. They rubbed up against salvation and were not saved. Salvation walked through their streets and talked to them face to face. The stream of life flowed right before their doors and they died of thirst. Health came with rosy color and bright eye and glowing cheek and with buoyant step walked through their plague district) and they died of sickness. But some touched him. Some reached forth the hand and laid hold upon the might of his power. This woman did.

Poor woman! What probably was her thought? "I heard that ruler tell him that he had a little girl twelve years old that was just dead, and he asked him to go and heal her, she twelve years old, and for twelve years I have been dead. For twelve years worse than death has had hold on me and I have spent all my money; have consulted many physicians. I have not been benefited by earthly remedies, but rendered worse. Twelve years has death been on me, and if he can heal that, girl that died at twelve years of age, maybe he can heal me twelve years dead. If that ruler says, ’If you will but go and lay your hand upon her even now she will revive,’ what can I do? In my timidity, in the ceremonial uncleanness of my condition, in my shame, I dare not speak. I cannot in this crowd, for if they knew that I were here they would cast me out; for if any of them touch me they are unclean in the eyes of the law. I cannot go and kneel down before him, and say, ’Master, have mercy on me.’ The ceremonial law of uncleanness forbids my showing my face, and if I come in contact with his power it must be with a touch upon the garment. And I beg for that. I say within myself, that if I but touch the fringe with its blue thread in it that reminds him of God’s commands, I shall be healed."

There was the association of her healing with the memento of the Word of God. There was the touch of her faith, that came into contact with that Word of God and with him. So her faith reasoned, and virtue going out from him responded to her faith. And she felt in herself that she was healed. Well, he healed her and there it stands out one of the most beautiful lessons in the Word of God. Oh, what a lesson! Some will say at the judgment, "Lord Jesus, thou hast taught in our streets and we have done many wonders in thy name," and he will say, "I never knew you." "You were close to the Saviour. You did not touch him. You were his neighbor. You did not touch him." There were many lepers in Israel in the days of Elisha, the prophet – lepers that could have been healed of leprosy by an appeal to the power of God in Elisha. They died in leprosy, but Naaman came from afar and touched the healing power of the prophet and was healed. There were many widows in Israel whose staff of life was gone, whose barrel of meal was empty, whose cruse of oil had failed, and here was the prophet of God, who by a word could supply that empty barrel, that failing cruse, but they did not touch him. They did not reach out in faith and come in contact with that power. The widow of Sarepta did, and her barrel of meal never failed, and her cruse of oil never wasted. Now, the special miracle: It was designed to show that if there be a putting forth of faith, even one finger of faith, and that one finger of faith touches but the fringe, the outskirts of salvation – only let there be a touch, though that touch covers no more space than the point of a cambric needle – "let there be the touch of faith and thou art saved."

In the midst of this stir about the woman the news of the death of Jairus’ daughter burst forth upon them with the request to trouble not the Master any further. But that did not stop our Lord. He proceeded immediately to the house to find a tumult and many weeping and wailing, for which he gently rebuked them. This brought forth their scorn, but taking Peter, James, and John, he went in and raised the child to life and his praise went forth into all that land.

QUESTIONS

1. What is the general theme of this division of the Harmony?

2. What common errors of interpretation of the kingdom? Illustrate.

3. What was the offspring of these errors respectively and who the most liable to each?

4. What, perhaps, was the most unprofitable sermon and what was the most stubborn skepticism?

5. How does such disappointment find expression?

6. Give the author’s statements relative to the kingdom,

7. Where do we find the fulfilment of Isaiah’s prophecies relative to the kingdom?

8. What specific prophecy in Isaiah fulfilled in Matthew?

9. Where do we find the principles of the kingdom disclosed?

10. What great office did our Lord fill besides teacher and wonder worker and what proof did he submit to John the Baptist?

11. What thing most worthy of special consideration in connection with the kingdom?

12. What the opening incident of the Galilean ministry, what its importance, what its great lesson and what its effect?

13. Give an account of our Lord’s rejection at Nazareth.

14. Why was he thus rejected?

15. By what incidents in the lives of the prophets does he illustrate the folly of their unbelief?

16. What is the church responsibility and ministerial agency in the proclamation of mercy?

17. Where does Jesus make his home after his rejection at Nazareth and what his first work in this region?

18. Recite the incident of the call of the four fishermen and its lessons.

19. What was Christ’s first case of healing a demoniac and what the meaning of the term "demoniac"? Illustrate.

20. What was the lesson of this miracle and what was its effect?

21. Recite the incident of the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law and give its lessons.

22. What were the great results of this miracle and why would not Christ allow the demons to speak?

23. How did Peter try to work a "corner" on salvation and how did our Lord defeat the plan?

24. How many and what journeys did Jesus make about Galilee?

25. Give the four special prayers of Jesus here cited and the occasion of each.

26. Describe the incident of the healing of the paralytic and its les sons.

27. What issue arises here between our Lord and the Pharisees and what was the final culmination?

28. Give an account of the call of Matthew, his entertainment, the second issue between our Lord and the Pharisees and how Jesus met it.

29. What question here arises, how was it brought up, how did our Lord reply and what the meaning of his parables here?

30. What double miracle follows and what was the usual method of miracles?

31. What was the law of fringes and phylacteries and what were their real purpose?

32. Why should Christ select that through contact with the fringe on his outer garment healing power should be bestowed?

33. What, probably, was the thought of this woman as she contemplated this venture of faith?

34. What was the great lesson of this incident of her healing?

35. Describe the miracle of raising Jairus’ daughter and its effect.