The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1895-06-22
SECOND QUARTER.
June 80, 1895.
The Quarterly Review.
INTRODUCTION.


The design of the combination of the
Four Gospels into single life-story of
Jesus is that the student may obtain some
vision of the Life of Christ as whole 1t
is only when we survey the story of Jesus
In its completeness, from the manger to
the ascension, that we can attain to an
adequate understanding of its unique char
acter and feel the spiritual magnetism of
its divine beauty. Through telescope
we may gain special information concern
ing single stars, and arrive at the knowl-
edge that every dot of light in the night
sky is world or sun. But it is when
we survey the whole dome of the night-sky
that we are most impressed with the unity
and grandeur of the material universe. So
in our separate lessons during the year
past we have seen special points of light
in the life of Christ; but it is only when
we survey the life of Christ as whole,
subordinating individual scenes to the
grand unity that we are most deeply i'm
pressed with his peerless CHARACTER
His life-plan is without parallel. His
spiritual vision was without flaw of OBJ
scuration. His spiritual power and author
ity are unbounded His fraternity was as
broad as the race he was the Son of Man.
His realized childhood to God was the
central fact of his life; in no exclusive
sense, yet in degree of realization beyond
all other men, he knew himself to be the
Son of God. While it is, in our view, con-
Trajectory of the first principles of faith to
ascribe deity to Christ, it is but acceptance
of the plain evidence to ascribe to him
divineness not elsewhere beheld among
the sons of men. He is our Brother and
our Master. From him as from no other
comes spiritual quickening to our souls.
He is worthy of being chosen as our
Teacher, of our obedience as the Captain,
of endless praise and alteration as our
Saviour.-We glance over the various
stages of the wondrous Life we have stud
led. We recall his birth and youth; the
glimpse we had of him when he visited the
temple in Jerusalem at twelve years of age
reveals the quality of his early life at Naz-
areth. We remember the THIRTY YEARS
OF PREPARATION, during which, in pure
home, in study of his peoples literature,
in daily toll as carpenter, he matured his
manhood. We recall THE BEGINNING OF
HIS PUBLIC MINISTRY, at thirty years of
age; his baptism by John; his protracted
retirement in the wilderness of Judea, mis-
called his temptation, it being instead the
period in which he formulated and adopted
his life-plan. This was his life-plan,- first,
abjuring riches, which were the profered
emoluments of the Messianic Office; sec
ond, abjuring all power based on force,
while the military mastery of the world
seemed proffered to him; third, abjuring
all spiritual authority based on deception,
while the highest pinnacle of fame in the
temple was offered to him. These are the
things he instead chose: Absolute sinceri-
ty and candor as Son of God; faithful
ness to universal and endless love of man;
endurance of human wrongs without re-
taliation in kind; self-abnegation, yet valu-
ing himself and every soul as child of
God more than he valued the whole ma
terial earth. By the fulhlment of such a
life-plan, in a heroism which is holiness,
he expected to place the world and the
ages under redeeming moral obligation;
and this devotion to himself he designed
should be no less love of the Father, for
no one could, as he taught, receive him ex-
cept he received the Father who sent him.
We see him again during A YEAR OF OBJ
disciples, and cleanses the temple, and
converses on the New Life with Nicode-
mus, and, afrer a period of eight months
of which we have no record, returns to
Galilee, pausing by Jacobs Well in Sa-
maria to declare his Messiahship and the
nature of his mission to the Samaritan
woman. We recall the second year of his
ministry, THE YEAR OF PUBLIC FAVOR,
passed in Galilee, during which he COM
pleted the choosing of his Twelve, and full
filled his work of healing and teaching
around the Lake, speaking the Galilean
parallels, and gaining general favor among
the people of the northern province. We
revert to the third and last year of his min
istry, characterized at its opening by the
violent death of the Baptist prehguring his
own martyrdom, the period which has
been designated THE YEAR OF OPPOSE
TON. The year was passed in travels in
Galilee, in the Hierarchy of Philip, and in
Perea; it was devoted largely to prepare
ton of the disciples to become apostles,
after he had passed through the martyr
dom he now saw constantly approaching.
We note in this year the symbolic and
prophetic feeding of the five thousand in
the Great Banquet, the TRANSPORTATION
on Mount Hermon, the speaking of the
Perean parallels, the raising of Lazarus,
the Last Supper, the crucifxion, the resur-
rection and the temperance, and the
ascension and final commission to the
Twelve. Combining all these stages of
his life into unity, we have the unfolding
of character which makes manifest to US
within human limitations the nature of the
Eternal Father, and is for us the exempli-
fcation of the Way, the Truth, the Life.
HINTS FOR REVIEW.
1. The Triumphal Entry. MARK
II:I-II. Why was the special prepare
ton made for the entry into JerusalemI
What impelled the multitude to extraor-