Daily Devotionals

Music For the Soul

Devotional: March 16th

THE UNCHILLED LOVE OF THE CHRIST

Who loved me, and gave Himself for me. - Galatians 2:20

The love of Christ is unchilled by the sovereignty and glory of His exaltation. There is a wonderful difference between the Christ of the Gospels and the Christ of the Revelation. People have exaggerated the difference into contradiction, and then, running to the other extreme, others have been tempted to deny that there was any. But there is one thing that is not different. The nature behind the circumstances is the same. The Christ of the Gospels is the Christ in His lowliness, bearing the weight of man’s sins; the Christ of the Apocalypse is the Christ in His loftiness, ruling over the world and time,- but it is the same Christ. The one is surrounded by weakness and the other is girded with strength, but it is the same Christ. The one is treading the weary road of earth, the other is sitting at the right hand of God the Father Almighty; but it is the same Christ. The one is the " Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief," the other is the Man glorified and a companion of Divinity; but it is the same Christ. The hand that holds the seven stars is as loving as the hand that was laid in blessing upon the little children; the face that is as the sun shining in its strength beams with as much love as when it drew publicans and harlots to His feet. The breast that is girt with the golden girdle is the same breast upon which John leaned his happy head. The Christ is the same, and the love is unaltered. From the midst of the glory and the sevenfold brilliancy of the light which is inaccessible, the same tender heart bends down over us that bent down over all the weary and the distressed when He Himself was weary; and we can lift up our eyes above stars and systems and material splendours, right up to the central point of the universe, where the throned Christ is, and see "Him that loveth us" - even us!

When He was here on earth, the multitude thronged Him and pressed Him, but the wasted forefinger of one poor timid woman could reach the garment’s hem for all the crowd. He recognised the difference between the touch that had sickness and supplication in it and the jostlings of the mob, and His healing power passed at once to her who needed and asked it, though so many were surging round Him. So still He knows and answers the silent prayer of the loving and the needy heart. Howsoever tremulous and palsied the finger, howsoever imperfect and ignorant the faith, His love delights to answer and to over-answer it, as He did with that woman, who not only got the healing which she craved, but bore away besides the consciousness of His love and the cleansing of her sins.