THE perfect humanity of the Lord Jesus Christ is a truth of the most precious import to the believer. Encompassed with difficulties, wants, trials; exposed to dangers of all kinds; he needs One who is not only all-powerful to help, but also most tenderly merciful and able to sympathize with him in his weakness and distress; and such an One he finds in the ever blessed Son of God. Made of the seed of David according to the flesh, the Holy One of God trod this dreary wilderness as one who had not where to lay His head, a stranger and a pilgrim in the world that knew Him not, though He had created all things; and this spewed more than all beside how everything was lapsed and gone from Him―the fact that He, the Blessed One, had no home here. It was indeed a visit to this world the Saviour made, a visit for a season. He is gone. He is not here now; for He is risen―returned to heaven, the heaven from which He came. This makes the world a wilderness for those who know and love Him; for His presence only can give rest and satisfaction to their hearts. As long as I am upon earth I have to say,
“Absent from Him I roam;”
and hence the longing desire of every heaven-born soul to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better. Not that the Scripture does not give a hope of His return. It does. But my hope, as a Christian, is to be in heaven, not earth; and though I shall rejoice-hereafter to see this world brought under the dominion of its rightful Lord, I am only hoping now to leave it, to go to Him who made it, and who lives in heaven as man―the man Christ Jesus. He is the hiding-place. He was the hiding-place for me when, a poor sinner, trembling under the load of guilt and misery that oppressed me, I fled to His cross. I remember it very well. I saw Him dying on the tree for me. I found relief in His presence, in the precious blood which He once shed. He redeemed me thus, scattered the terrors of a guilty conscience by His light, and gave me peace. I have to walk the desert now by confidence in that same Jesus. “A man shall be as an hiding-place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest.” Yes, you say, by-and-by, when a King shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment. I grant it you. I am glad to think so. I weaken not in any measure the blessed hope of the future literal fulfillment of prophecy. But I say the Christ I know has been and is a hiding-place, a covert from the tempest. You say He is not on the cross now, nor in humiliation. I know it. I am glad of it. I know He is in heaven, and looks on me. I know there is not a sharp blast of this wild desert that He cannot check or hide me from; but for all that I would not stay where I am so exposed. I want to go to Him. I say, Lord, take me; come and take me soon. I think sometimes there are things worth waiting for-flowers in the desert that give sweetness, and yield honey too. But ah! the thorn springs up; the brier of the wilderness says, “This is not your rest.” You have no home here. Away! And I look up, and I see that it is so. “Earth is a desert drear,” a dry place, a thirsty land! Whence can refreshment come? From Jesus. He is the fountain of living water. He alone. “As rivers of water in a dry place.” The smitten Rock He once was. The Rock was smitten, and the water flowed. “He that believeth on me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” This was His word on earth. He took the place of the Rock in the wilderness. That Rock was Christ, the apostle tells us. And it never ceased to give its streams as oft as they were wanted. Oh, if Jesus were not living, where would His poor people be? But He is the Living One; and because He lives, they live. They are a feeble flock, a lowly flock. They lie hid in the valleys. Meek and lowly is their character, like His who lived and died for them. As the shadow of a great, a heavy Rock to them is He, the Beloved of their souls. Shelter and shadow is He to them. When the fierce heat would beat upon their heads, He tempers it. When the journey is too great for them, He takes them in His arms and carries them, or bids them lie down to rest. Sometimes He strengthens them with meat convenient for them. Then again He lets them know how weak they are, how little able to conduct themselves, or win a step on the heavenward road. “Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit,” then He says. And is it not so? Surely yes. And must we learn our utter weakness, and His strength? our utter nothingness, and His all-sufficiency? Yes, we must. His grace is all in all, from first to last. His love is perfect, infinite. And it is joy to know, that while we worship Him who is our all, God blessed forever, we know Him as a hiding-place from the wind, a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place; as the shadow of a great Rock in a weary land. Thus we know Jesus now, as meeting us in our wilderness needs; but we wait for His coming again to take us out of the wilderness, that we may be forever with Him where He is.