IN "the place that is called "Calvary," or onward to that place from the garden of Gethsemane, we see the great crisis, as we may surely call it, where all are engaged in their several characters, and all disposed of, answered or satisfied, exposed, or revealed and glorified, according to their several deserving. What a place; what a moment, presented to us and recorded for us, by each of the evangelists, in their different Way!
Man is seen there, taking his place and acting his part, wretched and worthless as He is. He is there in all variety of conditions; in the Jew and in the Gentile; as rude and as cultivated; in the civil and in the ecclesiastical place; as brought nigh or as left in the distance; as privileged, I mean, or left to himself. But whatever this variety may be, all are exposed to their shame.
The Gentile Pilate is there, occupying the seat of civil authority. But if we look there for righteousness, it is oppression we find. Pilate bore the sword, not merely in vain, but for the punishment of those who did well. He condemned the One whom he owned to be ‘' just," and of whom he had said, " I find no fault in Him; " and the soldiers who served under him shared or exceeded his iniquity.
The Jewish scribes and priests, the ecclesiastical thing of that hour, seek for false witnesses; and the multitude who wait on them are one with them, and cry out against the One who had been ministering to their need and sorrow all His days.
They who passed by, mere travelers along the road, men left in-the distance, or as to themselves, revile, venting impotent hatred as so many Shimeis in the day of David. And disciples, a people brought nigh and privileged, betray the common corruption, and take part in this scene of shame to man, heartlessly forsaking their Lord in the hour of danger, and when He had looked for some to stand by Him ...
Satan, as well as men, shows himself in this great crisis. He deceives and then destroys. He makes his captive his victim, destroying by the very snare by which he bad tempted. The bait becomes the hook, as it always does, in his hand. The sin we perpetrate loses its charm the moment it is accomplished, and then becomes the worm that dies not. The gold and silver is cankered; and its rust eats the flesh as if it were fire. The thirty pieces of silver does this with Judas, the captive and the victim of Satan.
Jesus is here in His virtues and His victories; virtues in all relationships, and victories over all that stood in His way. What patience in bearing with His weak selfish disciples! what dignity and calmness in answering His adversaries! what self-consecration and surrender to the will of His Father! These were His virtues, as we track Him on this path, from His sitting at the table to His expiring on the cross. And then His victories! The Captive is the Conqueror, like the ark in the land of the Philistines. He put away sin and abolished death.
"His be the Victor's name
Who fought our fight alone."
God is here, God Himself and in the highest. He enters the scene, as I may express it, when darkness covers all the land. That was His acceptance of the offer of the Lamb, who said, “Lo, I come." And such offer being accepted, God could show no mercy. If Jesus made Himself sin for us, it is unrelieved, unmitigated judgment He must have to sustain. The darkness was the expression of this. God was accepting the offer, and dealing with the Victim accordingly, abating nothing of the demands of righteousness.
And then, when the offer has been fulfilled, and the sacrifice rendered, and Jesus has given tip His life, when the blood of the Victim has flowed, and all is finished, God, by another figure, owns the accomplishment of everything, the fullness of the atonement, and the perfection of the reconciliation. The veil of the temple is rent, from the top to the bottom. He that 'sits on the throne, that judges right, and Weighs all claims and their answers, Sin and its judgment, peace and its price and its purchase, gives out that wondrous witness of the deep, ineffable satisfaction He took In the deed that was then perfected "in the place that is called Calvary."
What a part for the blessed God Himself to take in this great crisis, this greatest of all solemnities, when everything was taking its place for eternity!
And further still. Angels are here also, and heaven, earth and hell, sin, also, and death, yea, and the world too.
Angels are here, witnessing these things, and learning new wonders. Christ is seen of them.
Heaven, earth, and hell are here, waiting on this moment; rocks and, graves, the earthquake, and the darkness of the sky, bespeaking this.
Sin, and death are disposed of, set aside and overthrown; the rent veil and the empty sepulcher, publishing these mysteries.
The world learns its judgment in the sealed stone being rolled away, and the keepers of it forced to take the sentence of death in themselves.
Surely we may call this " the great crisis"-the most solemn moment in the history of God's dealings with His creatures. Wondrous assemblage of actors and of actings, God and Jesus, man and Satan, angels, heaven, earth and hell, sin, and death, and the world, all occupy their place, whether of shame or of defeat, or of judgment, of virtues and of triumphs, of manifestations and of glory. This is the record of each of the evangelists in his several way, or according to his own method, under the Spirit. Our speculations can find no place. We have but to take up the lessons which they teach us, lessons for an ascertained and well-understood eternity. J. G. B.