"He that enters not by the door into the sheepfold but climbs up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber." (John 10.1).

The lawful entry into any building is by the door. Anyone seen climbing in some other way is immediately suspected as an intruder; up to no good. Jesus portrayed Himself as the Good Shepherd caring for His sheep. From the pastoral life around He could draw abundant illustrations by which to teach natural men heavenly faith and truth.

Those who heard and followed Him were His sheep with all the sheep's need of care and protection. Only at night were they folded to protect them from thieves and wild beasts which prowl under cover of darkness for purposes of destruction. Such marauders would not be likely to come boldly up to the front door and seek admittance. If a large sheepfold had a porter he would answer to none but the shepherd. The sheep themselves only knew and responded to the man who led them by day, finding pasturage and running water for them and shade from the heat. They relied upon him to protect them from perils known and unknown. In him they found peace and safety. A good shepherd never betrayed his trust or forsook his flock.

Jesus went one further. He said with emphasis "I am the door of the sheep". It was the custom where sheep were valuable for the shepherd to rest with his flock. Lying down in the doorway he became the door, guarding its entrance with his life. None could get in or out without his knowledge. This picture presents two aspects important to the Christian faith, the keeping power of the shepherd with His readiness to lay down His life for those in His care, and the cunning necessary for any intruder to get into the fold any other way.

Of the believers who heard the voice of Jesus and followed Him, recognizing the tones of love and authority, He said, "They shall never perish, neither shall any pluck them out of my hand. My Father who gave them to me is greater than all; no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand." The true and only door into the love of God is Jesus Christ. Peace with Him and eternal life is the Divine sheepfold where "Stands God within the shadow, keeping watch upon His own". The safety of such folded sheep, contentedly hidden with God in Christ, is expressed repeatedly throughout the Word of God as 'great peace' the 'peace of God', the peace Christ left to all His sheep.

Whatever is valuable in this world or closely guarded, presents a challenge to certain perverted natures. To get in, to gain possession or even to destroy, becomes a fixed idea. During the Christian era men have tried unlawful entry into the fold of God. By some other means than salvation through Jesus Christ they have tried to steal away men's hearts or lead Christ's sheep away from safety into false places where there is neither sustaining food, water nor shelter. The true sheep who know His voice have resisted both tyranny and seduction.

It is not in the power of legislation, of science, of great religious systems, of political doctrines or learned philosophers, or eastern mystics, to grant life to any human being. God alone is the giver of life and He gives it through Christ and no other. Jesus claimed repeatedly and under many metaphors to give men life. Of His believing sheep He said

"I give unto them eternal life".

There is no love like the love of Jesus

Never to fade or fall

Till into the fold of the peace of God

He has gathered us all."

"The Master is come and calls for you" (John 11.28). There is a poetic beauty about these words. The relation of this whole incident is like the painting of a masterpiece. Nothing is lacking of human emotion. Drama and pathos play their part on the domestic stage of a country home. Every character is drawn with an observant and unbiased pen. The friend of Jesus is sick. His devoted sisters, believing in the love and power of Jesus to heal, send Him the news, never doubting that He will come. But Jesus did not come. He stayed where he was, purposely delaying His visit until Lazarus was beyond human aid. Four days after the burial He arrived, to be met outside the village by the practical and reproachful Martha, who softened her words with the sincerity of her belief in Him. "I know that even now whatever you will ask of God, God will give you." Jesus warmed to the tenacity of this member of a much loved family, speaking to her the words which have thrilled, comforted and inspired with hope and courage thousands of bereaved hearts. "I am the resurrection and the life. He that believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live." Never before had such words been spoken in the ears of the living. Scarcely comprehending His meaning Martha turned away and went home where she had left Mary sitting still in the house. She was brooding over the sorrow and the pain of death, meditating sadly over the inscrutable ways of the Son of God, whose power had opened the eyes of the blind and healed so many sick, yet had allowed her brother, whom He loved, to die. A few words whispered privately by Martha energized the drooping, gentle Mary into immediate action. She arose at once, going with all speed to Him who had requested her presence. So well is the picture drawn, it is possible to overhear the low, beautiful words which brought joy and relief to the grieving heart. He had not neglected or forgotten them. He was there the kingly teacher at whose feet she had sat drinking in the wonderful words of life spoken to none other, unrecorded words, yet so convincing that they sent her to his feet with the heart-broken cry, "Lord, if you had been here my brother had not died." The same words from Martha had moved him to declare his power over life and death. Mary's anguished cry and the tears of those who had followed her, moved him to tears. Knowing what he was about to do, the sorrows of mankind touched the heart of Christ with overwhelming compassion. Revealing the power and the ultimate purpose of God, He showed also the pity of God for human sorrow and helplessness.

Alone and silent in some desolating experience, schooling the spirit to submission, baffled by the unfathomable ways of a Divine love which appears neglectful and aloof, how intensely joyous it would be to hear the same poetically, lovely words whispered in a despondent ear. "The Master is come and calls for you." How swiftly the feet would take their flight to his all-powerful loving presence. "Be swift my soul to answer him, be jubilant my feet." Although the thin veil of the flesh divides time from eternity, by the word of His promise, "Lo I am with you always", He still calls the sorrowing to His side. He still stimulates the flagging spirit by the miracle of His grace, to rise and pursue the onward path with renewed vigour. Life, the very life of God in Christ, is still infused into the beating heart of the faithful. The day will dawn which crowns all other days, when the call of the Master sounds clear, strong and imperative. As steel rushes to the magnet so will His saints be gathered, drawn, brought together from the four corners of earth and time, to be forever with Him. In a moment of time, in the twinkling of an eye, they shall see Him as He is and be like Him.

What rejoicing in His presence,

When are banished grief and pain;

When the crooked ways are straightened,

And the dark things shall be plain.

Face to face, O blissful moment!

Face to face to see and know;

Face to face with my Redeemer,

Jesus Christ who loves me so.

"If we let him alone, all men will believe on him" (John 18. 48). Here we stumble upon a little-acknowledged human longing for life, love and true leadership, and the base means employed to deprive the race of these benefits. Whatever the reasons given by the council for their determination to put Jesus to death after His greatest display of invested power, self-preservation was their prime motive. Fear for the loss of their own top positions of wealth, prestige and authority, drove them to eliminate the one man who could have liberated their race and freed the world from the foot of tyrants. As He rode into Jerusalem triumphantly a week later to the glad Hosannas of the crowds who hailed Him 'King of Israel, coming in the name of the Lord.' The Pharisees expressed their fear and dismay. "Perceive how you prevail nothing? Behold the world is gone after him." Any student of history cannot fail to note the methods by which the bulk of the human race have been kept in servitude and ignorance by a privileged minority or to observe how every step forward towards decency and dignity has been fought for inch by inch against ruthless aggression and crafty deception. The thoughtful cannot fail to be moved by the sight and sound of restless multitudes, either past or present. They have cried out for security, for sufficient food and suitable homes, for the rights of human creatures to enjoy their fair share of the good earth and its products in peace. Jesus had expounded His formula for all these things, to which the people had eagerly listened. Moreover He had plainly shown His power over Nature, over life and death. He had stilled the storm and fed the hungry, healed the sick and raised the dead. Of no other man could it be said, as He had said to the messengers of John the Baptist, who had asked from his dungeon "Are you he that should come or do we look for another?", "Go your way and tell John what you have seen and heard. The blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, to the poor the gospel is preached."

He was the great emancipator of the people, setting free whoever would believe on Him. All forms of servitude of the mind and flesh were broken. He ruled, not by tyranny but by justice, gentleness and love. The people who cried 'Hosannas' on the road to Jerusalem recognised in Him a wise and benevolent king, a leader to be trusted. Through the centuries the restless, confused masses of the peoples have looked to human leaders to improve their lot, often to meet with disappointment. Even the son of the glorious Solomon had threatened to beat the burdened people of his day when they complained of the heavy yoke put upon them. "I will add to your yoke. I will chastise you with scorpions instead of whips." Pharaoh of Egypt had likewise increased both labour and chastisement to every appeal of Moses to set the people free. When in the end he was driven to letting them go, he and his rulers soon regretted it and pursued after them that they might drag them back to the old drudgery. It is a conspiracy old as the race to bind men, body and soul, to keep in subjection by ignorance, superstition, fear, sorrow, labour, sickness and death, the race of man. The forces of evil have constantly opposed the forces of good. Agencies have always been at work to block the path, to blind the eyes of those who long for life. Darkness has hated the light, finding ready tools and willing minds among the warped, the selfish and the ignorant, to thwart by any means the universal happiness of mankind, to throw any obstacle in the way of their knowledge and worship of the living God. Like many before and since, the men who plotted the death of Jesus were ready to stamp out life and light to maintain their own place in society. That the blind should see, or the sick be healed, or the dead raised, or the poor receive good news of the kingdom of God, was of no account. They cared for none of these things. Yet the days will come when this same Jesus will take up His great power and reign over the earth. The desire of all nations shall come because "He comes to break oppression, to set the captives free, to take away transgression and rule in equity".

"I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." (John 12. 32). Jesus knew He would be crucified. He knew the priests would demand His death. They had no legal power to carry out the sentence, and the Roman form of execution was the cross. The shadow of the cross has lain across the world ever since; the symbol of human cruelty, of martyrdom, of suffering and self-sacrifice. It has become the pinnacle of the world, glittering from its tallest spires, or standing ruggedly in mountain snows. The faultless Son of God who poured out His life without stint in a healing, teaching ministry, was nailed to the wooden beams of the cross by the sin of man. Willingly or unwillingly a good cross-section of mankind were participants in that evil deed. Jesus could have saved himself but he went willingly to a foreknown end. God could have saved him but for three dark hours He forsook him. "He made him to be sin who knew no sin."

God's purpose was to redeem Israel and save the world. The way He chose and the submission of Jesus to its shame and pain are a mysterious dispensation of a far-sighted wisdom and astounding love which leaves the beholder dumb with silence. Before that cross it is presumption either to question the ways of God or doubt the cross is a stake, fixed into the centre of history, driven into the heart of mankind, until every knee shall bow and every tongue confess the exalted name of their Saviour and their King. The lifting up of the cross on Calvary's hill has forced large sections of mankind to look up to that guiltless sufferer, recognizing dimly that in some way his life and death are strangely bound up with theirs. If this turning point in history is only vaguely comprehended, "seen through a glass darkly", it is always there with its mystic attraction, its drawing power, putting question and answer into the minds of the unresisting. When Israel rebelled in their wilderness wanderings they were bitten by snakes. For their cure Moses lifted up a shining serpent of brass upon a pole. When they looked at this fiery symbol they were healed. The incident was prophetic, a living picture illustrating greater events. The sins and revolts of man against God are many. It pleases the conceit of modern society to call these offences by some other name, but it does not make their bite any the less deadly. The sick and the plagued may look in a thousand directions finding palliatives but no cure. "All we like sheep have gone astray. We have erred every one from his ways and there is no health in us" is not an idle chant. It is an easily recognizable fact.

The old evangelists who wrote "There is life in a look at the Crucified One, O yes, there is life there for thee, Simply look unto Christ and by faith be thou saved - Unto Him who was nailed to the tree - Look! Look! look and live!" were not fanatical enthusiasts for a new religious sect. They spoke the language of the Scriptures, a language unknown to many, forgotten by some and needing restatement to all. It is the gospel, the good news, that by the cross of Christ man may become reconciled to God, so gaining peace and hope of everlasting life. There is neither merit nor charm in the wood of the cross, even if it were obtainable. It is the love and self-sacrifice of the living load it bore unto His death, that bought the peace and life of man, "that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life".

"In the cross of Christ I glory,

Towering o'er the wrecks of time,

All the light of sacred story,

Gathers round its head sublime."

"While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may be the children of the light" (John 12. 36). Light is the life-blood of Nature. It is that indefinable element which gives energy and colour to every living thing. Deprived of light the growths of a perpetual dungeon become diseased and deformed. There is little use for the eye in the dark. Those who walk in the dark without a light, walk in danger. They do not know where they are going or what perils await their unwary feet. It is in the dark hours of night that most troubles strike. It is when weary and off guard that disaster finds its easiest victims. The works and the faces which cannot bear the light of day set out on their rounds under cover of darkness.

To any visitor coming from a world of wholesome peace, sanity, soundness and beauty, this planet must seem like a whirling mad-house. Its teeming cities full of raucous sounds, of squalid slums and hideous crimes. Its highways and byways are an endless rush of wheels, killing and maiming the inhabitants by the thousand. Its green countryside slowly despoiled by forests of steel and concrete, by towers and chimneys belching smoke and flame, by the tiers of boxes reared for human habitation, the whole plentifully dotted with the ever present provision for the sick and the dead. However well lighted the modern world may be, or however blue it may look to man on the moon, its aspect in the eyes of its Creator is dark.It was dark when He sent His son into the world to be its light. Because men's deeds were evil they preferred the darkness and hated the light. Light silently rebukes darkness. It shows up a multitude of deficiencies for which the dark provides an ample cloak. The greater fear of faulty natures is not of doing wrong but of being found out, of being shown up or seen through. As Shakespeare shrewdly observed, "Conscience doth make cowards of us all".

The nature of God is light. It is not only an incandescent glory of Being, but a radiant glowing energy of pure beauty, named Holiness, a state which is wholly opposed to evil and to darkness. The Ruler of the Universe dwells in a light which cannot be approached by mortal man. Jesus brought some of this eternal light to earth, its radiant purity suitably clothed in the flesh of man, its energy given off in waves of healing power. Some believed and worshipped; others believed and trembled. Doubt was that rare phenomenon that disturbed those who - had been given the greatest cause for trust.

That light and love and life are a triple alliance, the three strands of one powerful cord that none who read the Bible intelligently can fail to overlook. To have one is to have the other. To have the other is to have all and this is to walk through a dark world with the light of the glory of God before and behind, on the right hand and on the left. Israel in the wilderness had as guardian the pillar of fire. They had the shining face of Moses, veiled after his forty days in the mountain with the Giver of the Law. They had the radiant glory of the Shekinah between the cherubim, the glory that filled the temple and the lambent tongues of Pentecostal fire, all the outward evidences of the invisible Supreme Being. They all walked by sight, living and vivid testimonies to those who walk by faith. By many means and through many men God had spoken to the world, more especially to the nation of Israel, made and separated to prove to other peoples the power of a living God. They were in contrast to the worshippers of gods of wood and brass and clay who were all wind and confusion. In the days, when Jesus walked among them, the light to Jew and Gentile alike, opening the eyes of the blind to new ways and larger avenues of life, his power and preaching and personality only half discerned, He yet shone as the light of God among men. None of the noxious vapours of darkness have ever been able to extinguish it. Those who have believed and followed the Light of the life of Christ have themselves become lights in the world's darkness. They are the exponents of an indestructible ideal which will in due time conquer all darkness, filling the earth with the glory of the light of God as the waters cover the sea.

"Walk in the light! and thou shalt own

Thy darkness passed away,

Because that Light hath on thee shone

In which is perfect day."

(To be concluded)

FAS