Free press. [volume] (Hays, Kan.) 1888-1908, 1904-01-16
:0aeGR EsOa1R!
The Law OF Christ.


Bear We one another's burdens. and so
fulfill the law of Christ.-Galatians 81.
l take it that no mans life can be
consistent or can accomplish anything
worth while unless it follows a law.
unless it obeys some principle, clearly
understood, firmly grasped, faithfully
adhered to. I take it, too, that no
mans life is understandable unless
you go beneath the surface and dis
cover this law. 1t is the law behind
the outward life which gives color
and character to everything man
does.
Now, what was the dominating i'm
pulse, the ruling principle of Christ's
life, manifesting itself through every
thing He said and did? Add incident
to incident, examine into each, and
what is apparent? 1t is that Jesus
felt himself standing underneath the
burdens of the world into which he
had come. AS he went his way, meet
ing people of all sorts and conditions.
his quick sympathy transferred all
their sorrows and cares and infirmi-
ties to himself.
In Peters house, in the house of
Jairus, in the home at Bethany. he
made the burdens of the household
his own. By Jacobs well he finds a
woman who seems to us at first flip
pant and careless. But our Lord rec
ognizes that the light laugh DISCUSSES
a deep concern about her spiritual
condition and he makes that concern
his concern. Every joke that CALLED
humanity chafed his shoulders. 1t
was as a burden bearer that Israel's
great prophet thought of him when
he said, THE Lord hath laid on htm
the iniquity of us ALL" 1t was as a
burden bearer that John the Baptist
spoke of him, Behold the Lamb of
God, who beareth away the sins of the
world" The law of Christ was to bear
others burdens. He came to do the
will of God by bearing the burdens of
men.
When we speak of Christ as the
Son of Man we mean that he is the
representative man. When st. John
speaks of him as the Word of God
he means that he is the expression
of Gods intention for each of us. The
will of God for him, then, must be the
will of God for us. The law of his
life must be the true law for every
life. Your life is fitted, in Gods prov
idence, to grow and flower and bear
fruit only under this law of Christ.
Deny that law, evade it, and you must
suffer the penalty which comes from
broken lava crippled and limited
existence. Bring your life into cor
respondence with it and your life must
take on something of the beauty and
dignity and power which you find in
the life of Christ.
When things are uncongenial, when
you cannot get along with people,
when they irritate you-before you
find fault with your environment look
within yourself. Ask yourself whether
| you are fulfilling Christ's law for your
life. Are you bearing the burdens of
these people? I'm a sense Lam" you
say. They make life burden for
me-" But that is not the question.
There is no more virtue in bearing
burdens you cannot help than in pay
ing taxes or catching measles. Are
you fulfilling this law in the sense in
which Christ fulfilled it, voluntarily
and sympathetically? Penetrate these
lives, get at their unknown burdens,
get underneath them, and the chances
are you will find that God mas evident
ly put you where you are that you
might fulfill the law of your life.
The bearing of others burdens is
| the secret by which we find our own
lives. There are people so engrossed
with their own burdens that they have
no eyes for others more heavily bur-
dened than they. It is a pity: for to
| help them bear those burdens would
be to tighten their own. This is
Christ's law: Take my yoke upon
you'-the burdens of others, their in
| firmities and sorrows and sins-"and
We shall find rest.''-Rev. Henry Ever
| ton Cobb, D. ID.