NO, no! “not this man!” He is too good, too tender-hearted, too compassionate of the poor and distressed, much too willing to relieve and comfort all who mourn: He must not live. Besides, He possesses some supernatural power by which He heals all manner of diseases. Even leprosy has yielded to His touch, and many poor demoniacs have been delivered from their torments simply by a word from His lips. Then again, it is a well-known fact that He has actually raised dead persons to life, and we cannot deny it. A year ago at Nain He met the funeral of a young man about to be buried. He was the only son of a poor widow woman, and when this man Jesus saw her sorrow, He bid her dry her tears and then brought her son to life again, overwhelming her alike with wonder and with joy. And then, instead of getting the young man to follow Him and spread the news of the miracle He had wrought, He just delivered him to his mother, and went His way.
Now, how can we suffer a man so full of kindness as this to live in our midst? And besides all this, He preaches the gospel to the poor, and to all who desire it He declares the forgiveness of their sins, and many of the publicans and of the common people are quite taken up with Him. Many a heart has He made to leap and sing for joy as it has found in Him all it needed for present and eternal happiness, but we do not want Him and we will not have Him; let us rather have Barabbas. He is a murderer ‘tis true, while this Jesus has never taken away life, but has seemed delighted to impart or to restore it; and he is a robber, while this man is the most upright and benevolent person our city has ever seen, his whole life appears to have been spent in doing good to all who have come in His way, dispensing the choicest blessings to the most needy ones. Barabbas, too, stirs up sedition, and we are only sure of our peace or property so long as he is in prison, but we will have him out and let him go at large rather than this meek and lowly, unassuming and innocent man shall be permitted to live any longer.
Reader, you remember this scene, when they killed the Prince of Life, denying “the Holy One and the Just,” and desiring a murderer to be granted unto them. What says YOUR HEART to it all? Has Jesus or Barabbas the chief room there? In words you would not say, “Away with Jesus, crucify him!” but in the secret of your soul how is it with you? Do you try to dismiss the thought of Him from your mind, like “the fool saith in his heart, No God”? or do you vainly fancy that though you mingle in the crowd of His bitterest enemies, and make yourself their boon companion, He will not yet search you out and deal with you as one of them? Oh, remember, He looketh at the heart, and although He now in His marvelous long-suffering delays His deserved vengeance, He will presently enter into judgment with all who have not received and owned Him as their Saviour, believing on Him to the saving of their souls. And He is now witness whom you choose—Himself with all His lowliness; with all His glory; or the world, with all its vanity, and its impending doom, for by-and-by, concerning all those who rejected and despised Him, He will utter those dread words, “Those mine enemies, who would not that I should reign over them, biting hither, and slay them before me!” Again, dear friend, what is the response of your inmost heart? What the answer of your outward life?
W. T.