THE PATH OF JOY.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 991, 13 May 1911, Page 4

THE PATH OF JOY.

(II.) JESUS CHRIST THE WAY. The path of joy hidden in the world is the life Jesus Christ lived when upon earth, for “He maketh a path to shine after Him.” The Master tells us : “lam the Way ; no man cometh unto the Father but through Me,” and that is exactly what we mean when we sing in the Te Deum Laudamus, “ Thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven to all believers.” When once the seeker after God knows and loves Christ, he is suddenly filled with the joy of an eternal hope. To know Christ is to know the way—the path that leads to God and all joy. Christ in Hii Human Nature went through Himself to the Father—” I go to the Father ’’—and then He shows how, for our sakes, He became the Way by which we might also go to the Father. “ No man cometh unto the Father but through Me.” Thus we go through Him both to Himself and the Father. When we enter into His most holy Life we feel at once it is a Life that really understands us, a Life that passed through every human heartache and every human joy, and so there is nothing that can come to any of us which He does not know of, which He has not felt. He knows our joys and He knows our sorrows, simply because He knows thoroughly our human nature. It was a wonderful thing for the love ot Jesus to do: to leave His pre-existent glory and seek us in our own nature —to become Incarnate. When He knelt in the Garden of Gethsemane and took the Cup from His Father’s hands, He knew that the Cup contained a corrupted and degraded human nature, and He prayed that it might pass from Him, so repulsive was it to His pure and immaculate Soul. He knew also that unless He drank it there would be no way back again to God, no path by which the unborn millions could - travel, so His great prayer was one of resignation ; “ Nevertheless, not My will, but Thine, be done. ’ ’ We shall never fathom in this world the awfulness of that agony as our human nature passed through Him until “His sweat became as it were great drops of blood falling down upon the ground.” Then it was on the Cross with His blessed Hands stretched out in appealing love, and His Blood pouring forth as a great river cleansing all before it, that He won the great victory and made the golden path that no age can obliterate, “ If I be lilted up I will draw all men to Myself.” To Himself, why ? Because He is the way to the Father, and the invitation to all is, “ Come unto Me.” As the Master passed through this world making the path that should shine after Him, He often sighed and was sad, but never depressed; even for Him there was always a distant joy, “ who, for the joy that was set before Him, endured the Cross, despising shame.” That joy was realised when from the sepulchre the Saviour came forth in radiant majesty, lighting up the golden path of joy with the glory of His Risen life ; it was no longer dark, for the true Light had dawned. All was not finished, the path of joy must be extended so as to reveal an ever increasing joy; it must stretch from the green slopes of the Mount of Olives to the Throne of God. It was all so natural, all so beautiful and true. He led His disciples out as far as Bethany, and there on the wild uplands overlooking the city, they watched Him in wondering awe rise higher and higher, until a cloud hid Him trom view. No wonder they knelt and worshipped—no wonder their hearts were tilled with unutterable joy, He was the Way, and the path that shone after Him as they looked steadfastly up to Heaven, was the very path they themselves should tread, as they journeyed nearer and nearer to God. “I go to prepare a place for you” ; that place is distant, but He shows us that His Ascension is the path that will lead to it. The Ascension is

the coronation of humanity: Christ goes back to His Father, not as before His Incarnation with His Godhead alone, but enriched by His perfect Human Nature —opening the kingdom of Heaven to all who would follow in His steps, and walk through Him to the Father. To imitate His life, is the path of joy in this world, and this will lead us to the gate of death through which we must pass to our joyful Resurrection. Of that extended path in all its ethereal loveliness beyond the grave, we know nothing —only the eye of faith can scan its starry heights, and leave the sense of an inward and exquisite joy—it is the path that He took and He will bid us follow. “And if Igo and prepare a place for you, I come again, and will receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.” The light is clear, lor on His way to prepare a place for us, “He maketh a path to shine after Him” and down this path He will come again, to lead us by it, to that place where we shall be always with Him. What a wonderful truth dawns upon us —as we go down the path of joy, the Master is preparing a place for Himself in us, and lor us in Himself, “Abide in Me, and I in you.” This leads us to realise that He is indeed the Way and that “No man cometh unto the Father, but through Him.” Why? Because he tells us, “I and the Father are One.” Jesus born at Bethlehem •is the Way through this world to the Father—and Jesus, Risen and Ascended, is the Way after death to a nearer and nearer approach to that same loving Father. In the path through the world and in the extended path alter death, it is the spirit of the Holy Jesus that leads us step by step, “Howbeit when He, the Spirit of Truth, is come, He shall guide you into all the Truth.” There need be no fear, for Christ is our Guide on the golden path of glory—and when we come as all must, to that narrow stream of physical death, we need not be atraid, for on that extended path He will still be our Guide. He will come again, that is the joyful hope of the pilgrim—the two angels in white apparel, made that clear when they said: “Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye looking into Heaven ? This Jesus which was received up from you into Heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye beheld Him going into Heaven.”

“Chains of my heart, avaunt I say I will arise, and in the strength of love Pursue the bright track ere it fade away, My Saviour’s pathway to His Home above.”