IT BEHOVED HIM TO RISE.

HIS is the way Jesus Himself speaks of His resurrection. Appearing unto the eleven, showing them His hands and feet, inviting them to handle Him and see that He was not an intangible spirit, but that He had flesh and bones, and eating before them, He said, " These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning me. Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the scriptures, and said unto them, Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day," (Luke xxiv. 36-46).

The word rendered behoved is nearly always elsewhere translated must or ought, and it implies necessity. It is the same word used by the apostle when he went into the Jewish synagogue, as his manner was, " and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures, opening and alledging that Christ must needs have suffered, and risen again from the dead; and that this Jesus, whom I preach unto you, is the Christ," (Acts xvii. 2, 3). It is the same word used by the Saviour when He said to Nicodemus, "Ye must be born again;" " and as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up," (John ill. 5, 14). If, therefore, man must be born again before he can enter the kingdom of God, Jesus must be lifted up to bear our sins in His own body on the tree.

But if it was necessary for Him to die for our sins, it was equally necessary for Him to rise from the dead, because otherwise His work would have been incomplete. Nay, if the existence of a personal God is admitted, the resurrection becomes a necessity, for how else can He vindicate His character, and judge the world in righteousness, and reward His saints who have suffered in the flesh, and mete out to villains who escaped punishment here the just consequences of the deeds done in the body? It may be thought that this has nothing to do with the resurrection of Jesus, but it is vitally connected with it, since, as the apostle argues, if He did not rise, there is no resurrection for any one, and hence no possibility of dealing in the future with man as man made up of spirit, soul and body.

The history of the human race is for the most part a record of avarice, selfishness, bloody deeds, atrocious cruelty, brutal despotism, and untold suffering; and does death end all? Is the grave the last stage in the experience both of heartless tyrants and their helpless victims? Shall a Nero or Caligula never be summoned before a higher tribunal than that of Rome to answer in the body for their merciless barbarities, and shall thousands and hundreds of thousands of slaughtered Christians never come forth from the tomb to receive compensation for the anguish they endured on earth? Even as these lines are written, the body of a young Englishman lies in the Morgue of St. Louis, hideous in its ghastliness. He was gentle, modest, and refined, an earnest follower of Jesus, and spending much time and money in doing good. He was foully murdered in his room at the Hotel by a fellow-countryman, and his body, while yet living, crushed down into a trunk, was discovered after seven days only by the intolerable stench it emitted. Meanwhile the scoundrel who deliberately put him to death fled from the country, and will probably never be brought to justice. Is there to be no reckoning for this hereafter? If not, what kind of Being is the God who sits upon the throne of the universe?

It may be replied that the soul is immortal, and God can deal with that. Yes, but there is no more evidence of the immortality of the soul than there is of the resurrection of the body, and this, as already shown, depends wholly upon the resurrection of Jesus. Nor can science bring any stronger objection to the latter than to the former. Indeed, it speaks far more clearly for resurrection than for immortality. It tells us in the first place that there is no such thing in nature as annihilation, and in the second place that " the materials of our bodies are being constantly renewed, and the great mass of their structure changes in less than a year. At every motion of your arm, and at every breath you draw, a portion of the muscles concerned is actually burnt up in the effort. . . . I know that there are some who entertain a vague fear that these well-established facts of Chemistry conflict with one of the most cherished doctrines of Christian faith; but so far from this, I find that they elucidate and confirm it. Modern scientific discoveries have shown that our only abiding substance is merely the passing shadow of our outward form, that these bones and muscles are dying within us every day, that our whole life is an unceasing metempsychosis, and that the final death is but one phase of the perpetual change. Thus the idea of a spiritual body becomes not only a possible conception, but, more than this, it harmonizes with the whole order of nature," (Religion and Chemistry by Professor J. P. Cooke of Harvard University).

But it may be urged that the resurrection of Jesus was a miracle, and therefore impossible. Well may the question be asked of the skeptic, which was presented by the apostle to King Agrippa, "Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you, that God should raise the dead?" (Acts xxvi. 8). Bring God upon the scene, and every difficulty instantly disappears. If there is a personal God, it will of course be acknowledged by all (1) that it is possible for Him to raise the dead; (2) that it is possible for eye-witnesses to have satisfactory evidence of the fact; (3) that it is possible for eyewitnesses to bear credible testimony of it to others.

Even John Stuart Mill has said, "A miracle (as was justly remarked by Brown) is no contradiction to the law of cause and effect; it is a new effect, supposed to be produced by the introduction of a new cause. Of the adequacy of that cause, if it exist, there can be no doubt; and the only antecedent improbability which can be ascribed to the miracle, is the improbability that any such cause had existence in the case. . . . All, therefore, which Hume has made out, and this he must be considered to have made out, is, that no evidence can be sufficient to prove a miracle to any one who did not previously believe the existence of a being or beings with supernatural power; or who believed himself to have full proof that the character of the Being whom he recognizes, is inconsistent with His having seen fit to interfere on the occasion in question," (Logic, Vol. ii. pp 185, 186). That is to say, Hume has only succeeded in showing that a miracle cannot be j^roved to an atheist, or to one who is determined not to believe that God will at times supernaturally manifest Himself to men.

A vast amount of nonsense has been spoken and written about Hume's celebrated argument, which assumes that a miracle is a violation of the laws of nature. But it is no such thing. It is only the temporary removal of a person or thing for a great purpose from the control of the laws of nature, while the laws move on unchecked in relation to every other person or thing. A boy tossing a ball into the air, thus overcoming by superior force for a time the law of gravitation, or arresting with his hand a miniature boat on a stream, fairly illustrates the violation of the laws of nature involved in a miracle; and in this sense miracles are of daily occurrence. The testimony of one honest and intelligent man, therefore, is worth more than the observation of nature's uniformity of operations for a thousand years; and if twelve good men, with no motive to deceive, with everything to lose, carrying with them innumerable blessings for the whole world, and laying down their lives in attestation of their sincerity, were to declare that they had repeatedly seen a person who had risen from the dead, and that they could not be mistaken in his identity, he might justly be considered as lacking in common intelligence, or as a blinded partisan, who would still refuse to believe them.

If it is still insisted that the resurrection is denied by Science, the question is, what science? Not Chemistry; for it proves it. Not Evolution; for it favors it. Not Geology; for it has nothing to do with the future, but only with the past, and its guesses even here are too wild to deserve serious attention. For example. Sir Charles Lyell informs us that it required 1000,000 years to deposit the delta at the mouth of the Mississippi. St. John, a text book used in some of the Colleges thirty years ago, says that it took 54,000 years; but M. Elie de Beaumont thinks 1300 years are sufficient to account for the mud. He who tries to count the wrecks of scientific speculations and theories, scattered along the pathway of the present century, will be slow to surrender his faith in God's word at the dictate of "profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called." So far, then, as nature speaks at all, or can speak, her voice is eloquent with whisperings of resurrection, and her hands are outstretched in eager longing every cold, dead winter for its speedy attainment. The poor blind grub, struggling under the earth to put on its beautiful wings and to flutter in the sunshine; the hydroid which will supply itself with a foot or even a head, if lost; the dull crab and stupid lobster that will reproduce a leg or claw, if cut off; the sprouting of the seed; the breaking of the bird from the egg; the ugly and unpromising bulb developing into the gorgeous flower; the materials of our own bodies, that are being constantly renewed, the form alone undergoing change, the substance and personality remaining permanent; and ten thousand transmutations not less wonderful, which we daily witness around us, and which science is quick enough to recognize — all rebuke the madness of the skepticism that says resurrection violates any law of nature, or thinks it a thing incredible that God should raise the dead.

But let us take it for granted for a moment that sin is followed by death, as a law of cause and effect, not less certain in its operation than the law of gravity, or any other order of sequence observable in the broad field of nature. If so, then holiness is followed by life, as a law of cause and effect. Once more, let us take it for granted that the testimony borne by the apostles concerning Jesus is true, He "knew no sin," He was "without sin," He "did no sin," " in Him is no sin;" and that the testimony He bore concerning Himself is true, "the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him;" "the prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me," and it will be seen that by law, a law of nature if you choose, at all events a law not less exacting and imperial in its demands than any law which presides in the domain of nature, Jesus must have risen from the dead. If death is the necessary penalty of sin, life is the certain reward of holiness, and if the richly merited and fairly won life has been interrupted in some way, resurrection must ensue as a matter of justice and propriety and law. Hence Peter's remarkable address on the day of Pentecost: "Ye men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of' God among you by miracles and signs, which God did, by him, in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also know; Him being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain: whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death: because it was not possible that he should be HOLDEN OF IT." Death had no right to Him, and in the nature of the case He could not remain its prey.

But this opens up a wonderful vista, through which we behold the outworking of God's eternal purpose of grace in the redemption of lost man. That purpose, whether we can understood its reasonableness or not, proceeds upon the principle that forfeited life can be restored only through inflicted death. From the time that He clothed our fallen parents in Eden with garments torn from the slain bodies of substituted victims, down to the time when the piercing cry of the Son of His love was heard on Calvary, this is the great truth He sought to proclaim and to press upon the attention of His people. It is set forth in the bloody sacrifice of Abel, that was more acceptable than Cain's; it is set forth in the bloody offerings of Noah, that stayed another curse from smiting the earth; it is set forth in the sprinkled blood of the pascal lamb, that procured Israel's redemption from Egyptian bondage; it is set forth in the burnt offering, and peace offering, and sin offering, and trespass offering under the Levitical economy; it is set forth in the impressive ceremonies observed on the great day of atonement; it is set forth in the distinct statement, "It is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul;" it is set forth in the words of Jesus, found in the trustworthy gospel of Matthew, "The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many," and at the institution of the Lord's Supper, "This is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins;" it is set forth in what may be called the central truth of the epistles, " Without shedding of blood is no remission."

Now, admitting that these statements are true, and that they make known an immutable law ruling in the higher sphere of morals, it is obvious that there is no possible escape for the sinner, except through the suffering in his stead of a sinless One, who must meet the demands of God's holiness and justice, honor and magnify and uphold God's righteous government, and exhibit at the same time His hatred of sin and His love for the ruined sinner. The gospel tells us with marvellous consistency and harmony, that exhibits its undesigned but entire unity with every part of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, how this has been accomplished. It introduces One whose body was formed by the Spirit of God in the womb of a virgin; who was in His nature and through His whole life essentially and perfectly holy; who so glorified God that twice the silence of the heavens above His head was broken by the voice of His Father, saying, " This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased;" who proved His divine mission by signs and wonders that were all benevolent and kind; who was infinite love embodied in human form; who as already shown by the testimony of Paul in the genuine epistle to the Corinthians, died for our sins, according to the scriptures; and was buried; and rose again the third day according to the scriptures.

Let men say what they please against His resurrection, it is a necessary part of this magnificent scheme of human redemption; and, conceding that we are sinners, and that God interposed in our behalf, the laws of both physical and moral nature, so far from being violated by that resurrection, positively demand it as inherently right and indeed unavoidable. If it is required by the perfection of the Being who made us, and by the exigencies of our condition, it is not only possible but absolutely certain; and it sets upon the wondrous revelation of divine mercy the bright and indispensable crown of divine glory. Oh, if the skeptic would look upon the resurrection of Jesus, not as an inexplicable miracle, nor the meaningless exhibition of irresponsible power, but as the expression and proof of God's love to a lost world, and the fitting termination of His Son's obedience unto death, surely cavilling would sink into silence, and doubt would hide its diminished head in the presence of the most splendid spectacle this universe has ever seen. Then would there be deep significance in the fine language of the apostle, when he calls attention to the exceeding greatness of God's power to US-ward who believe, " according to that working of the strength of his might which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and made him to sit at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule, and authority, arid power, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come: and he put all things in subjection under his feet, and gave him to be head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all," (Eph. i. 19-23, R. V.). Yes, the head in such sense that He would not be complete without the entire number of believing sinners, who constitute His body; and hence His resurrection is not only the pledge of our own, it is the beginning of it, it is part of it already taken place, it is the sure and infallible forerunner of a mighty host that shall come forth out of the grave, as the apostle writes in the genuine epistle to the Corinthians, " Every man in his own order; Christ the first fruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming." It is for this coming all believers wait, whether their bodies slumber in the ground, or they are still moving amid the activities of life, for as the same apostle says in the same chapter, "Behold, I show you a mystery: we shall not all sleep, but we all shall be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we [that is, we who are then upon the earth] shall be changed. For this corruptible [if we are in the grave] must put on incorruption, and this mortal [if we are on the earth] must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy victory? grave, where is thy victory?" Well might old Trapp the Commentator, say, " This is the sharpest and shrillest note, the boldest and the bravest challenge, that man ever rang in the ears of death. Death is here out-braved, called craven to his face, and bidden do his worst." The apostle, however, is not yet done: "The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." The battle has been fought, and the victory gained by the crucified One of whom Renan wrote, " Complete Conqueror of death, take possession of thy kingdom, whither shall follow thee, by the royal road which thou hast traced, ages of worshippers."