Personal Friendships of Jesus by J. R. Miller (surface ebook reader txt) 📖

for the kingdom of God." Even the privilege of running home to say "Good-by" must be denied to him who follows Jesus.

These incidents show, not that Jesus would make it hard and costly for men to be his disciples, but that discipleship must be unconditional, whatever the cost, and that even the holiest duties of human love must be made secondary to the work of Christ's kingdom. Another marked instance of like teaching was in the case of the young ruler who wanted to know the way of life. We try to make it easy for inquirers to begin to follow Christ, but Jesus set a hard task for this rich young man. He must give up all his wealth, and come empty-handed with the new Master. Why did he so discourage this earnest seeker? He saw into his heart, and perceived that he could not be a true disciple unless he first won a victory over himself. The issue was his money or Jesus—which? The way was made so hard that for that day, at least, the young man turned away, clutching his money, leaving Jesus.

Really, a like test was made in every discipleship. Those who followed him left all, and went empty-handed with him. They were required to give up father and mother, and wife and children, and lands, and to take up their cross and follow him.

Why were the broad invitations of the heart of Jesus so narrowed in their practical application? The answer is very simple. Jesus was the revealing of God—God manifest in the flesh. He had come into this world not merely to heal a few sick people, to bring back joy to a few darkened homes by the restoring of their dead, to formulate a system of moral and ethical teachings, to start a wave of kindliness and a ministry of mercy and love; he had come to save a lost world, to lift men up out of sinfulness into holiness.

There was only one way to do this,—men must be brought back into loyalty to God. Jesus astonishes us by the tremendous claims and demands he makes. He says that men must come unto him if they would find rest; that they must believe on him if they would have everlasting life; that they must love him more than any human friend; that they must obey him with absolute, unquestioning obedience; that they must follow him as the supreme and only guide of their life, committing all their present and eternal interests into his hands. In a word, he puts himself deliberately into the place of God, demanding for himself all that God demands, and then promising to those who accept him all the blessings that God promises to his children.

This was the way Jesus sought to save men. As the human revealing of God, coming down close to humanity, and thus bringing God within their reach, he said, "Believe on me, love me, trust me, and follow me, and I will lift you up to eternal blessedness." While the invitation was universal, the blessings it offered could be given only to those who would truly receive Christ as the Son of God. If Jesus seemed to demand hard things of those who would follow him, it was because in no other way could men be saved. No slight and easy bond would bind them to him, and only by their attachment to him could they be led into the kingdom of God. If he sometimes seemed to discourage discipleship, it was that no one might be deceived as to the meaning of the new life to which Jesus was inviting men. He would have no followers who did not first count the cost, and know whether they were ready to go with him. Men could be lifted up into a heavenly life only by a friendship with Jesus which would prove stronger than all other ties.

Religion, therefore, is a passion for Christ. "I have only one passion," said Zinzendorf, "and that is he." Love for Christ is the power that during these nineteen centuries has been transforming the world. Law could never have done it, though enforced by the most awful majesty. The most perfect moral code, though proclaimed with supreme authority, would never have changed darkness to light, cruelty to humaneness, rudeness to gentleness. What is it that gives the gospel its resistless power? It is the Person at the heart of it. Men are not called to a religion, to a creed, to a code of ethics, to an ecclesiastical system,—they are called to love and follow a Person.

But what is it in Jesus that so draws men, that wins their allegiance away from every other master, that makes them ready to leave all for his sake, and to follow him through peril and sacrifice, even to death? Is it his wonderful teaching? "No man ever spake like this man." Is it his power as revealed in his miracles? Is it his sinlessness? The most malignant scrutiny could find no fault in him. Is it the perfect beauty of his character? Not one nor all of these will account for the wonderful attraction of Jesus. Love is the secret. He came into the world to reveal the love of God—he was the love of God in human flesh. His life was all love. In a most wonderful way during all his life did he reveal love. Men saw it in his face, and felt it in his touch, and heard it in his voice. This was the great fact which his disciples felt in his life. His friendship was unlike any friendship they had ever seen before, or even dreamed of. It was this that drew them to him, and made them love him so deeply, so tenderly. Nothing but love will kindle love. Power will not do it. Holiness will not do it. Gifts will not do it—men will take your gifts, and then repay you with hatred. But love begets love; heart responds to heart. Jesus loved.

But the love he revealed in his life, in his tender friendship, was not the supremest manifesting of his love. He crowned it all by giving his life. "I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep." This was the most wonderful exhibition of love the world had ever seen. Now and then some one had been willing to die for a choice and prized friend; but Jesus died for a world of enemies. It was not for the beloved disciple and for the brave Peter that he gave his life,—then we might have understood it,—but it was for the race of sinful men that he poured out his most precious blood,—the blood of eternal redemption. It is this marvellous love in Jesus which attracts men to him. His life, and especially his cross, declares to every one: "God loves you. The Son of God gave himself for you." Jesus himself explained the wonderful secret in his words: "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." It is on his cross that his marvellous power is most surpassingly revealed. The secret of the attraction of the cross is love. "He loved me, and he gave himself for me."

Thus we find hints of what Jesus is as a friend—what he was to his first disciples, what he is to-day. His is perfect friendship. The best and richest human friendships are only little fragments of the perfect ideal. Even these we prize as the dearest things on earth. They are more precious than rarest gems. We would lose all other things rather than give up our friends. They bring to us deep joys, sweet comforts, holy inspirations. Life without friendship would be empty and lonely. Love is indeed the greatest thing. Nothing else in all the world will fill and satisfy the heart. Even earth's friendships are priceless. Yet the best and truest of them are only fragments of the perfect friendship. They bring us only little cupfuls of blessing. Their gentleness is marred by human infirmity, and sometimes turns to harshness. Their helpfulness at best is impulsive and uncertain, and ofttimes is inopportune and ill-timed.

But the friendship of Jesus is perfect. Its touch is always gentle and full of healing. Its helpfulness is always wise. Its tenderness is like the warmth of a heavenly summer, brooding over the life which accepts it. All the love of God pours forth in the friendship of Jesus. To be his beloved is to be held in the clasp of the everlasting arms. "I and my Father are one," said Jesus; his friendship, therefore, is the friendship of the Father. Those who accept it in truth find their lives flooded with a wealth of blessing.

Creeds have their place in the Christian life; their articles are the great framework of truth about which the fabric rises and from which it receives its strength. Worship is important, if it is vitalized by faith and the Holy Spirit. Rites have their sacred value as the channels through which divine grace is communicated. But that which is vital in all spiritual life is the friendship of Jesus, coming to us in whatever form it may. To know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge is living religion. Creeds and services and rites and sacraments bring blessing to us only as they interpret to us this love, and draw us into closer personal relations with Christ.

  "Behold him now where he comes!
    Not the Christ of our subtile creeds,
  But the light of our hearts, of our homes,
    Of our hopes, our prayers, our needs,
  The brother of want and blame,
  The lover of women and men."

The friendship of Jesus takes our poor earthly lives, and lifts them up out of the dust into beauty and blessedness. It changes everything for us. It makes us children of God in a real and living sense. It brings us into fellowship with all that is holy and true. It kindles in us a friendship for Christ, turning all the tides of our life into new and holy channels. It thus transforms us into the likeness of our Friend, whose we are, and whom we serve.

Thus Jesus is saving the world by renewing men's lives. He is setting up the kingdom of heaven on the earth. His subjects are won, not by force of arms, not by a display of Sinaitic terrors, but by the force of love. Men are taught that God loves them; they see that love first in the life of Jesus, then on his cross, where he died as the Lamb of God, bearing the sin of the world. Under the mighty sway of that love they yield their hearts to heaven's King. Thus love's conquests are going on. The friendship of Jesus is changing earth's sin and evil into heaven's holiness and beauty.

CHAPTER V. JESUS CHOOSING HIS FRIENDS.

    He seeks not thine, but thee, such as thou art,
  For lo, his banner over thee is love.
                           CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI.

  If you loved only what were worth your love,
  Love were clear gain, and wholly well for you.
    Make the low nature better by your throes!
  Give earth yourself, go up for gain above.
                           BROWNING.

Nothing in life is more important than the choosing of friends. Many young people wreck all by wrong choices, taking into their life those who by their influence drag them down. Many a man's moral failure dates from the day he chose a wrong friend. Many a woman's life of sorrow or evil began with the letting into her heart of an unworthy friendship. On the other hand, many a career of happiness, of prosperity, of success, of upward climbing, may be traced to the choice of a pure, noble, rich-hearted, inspiring friend. Mrs. Browning asked Charles Kingsley, "What is the secret of your life? Tell me, that I may make mine beautiful too." He replied, "I had a friend." There are many who have reached eminence of character or splendor of life who could give the same answer. They had a friend who came