JOHN THE BAPTIST, the messenger prepared by God to go before Messiah’s face and make straight His way, the stern denouncer of sin and hypocrisy, had given him by the Holy Spirit a very remarkable insight into the glories of Jesus. As an example, he thus announced the Lord when he saw Him coming to him, “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.” These are most notable words coming from the herald’s lips. He did not announce Him as the God-sent Ruler of the world, and cry, “Behold the Messiah; behold the King” —far different thoughts concerning Jesus filled his mind—he proclaimed Him as the God-given Offering for the Altar, the Sacrifice, whose holy death and precious blood should bear away the sin of the world!
Jesus was rejected by man from the very first. His pathway led to the cross; man revered Him not as the Lamb of God. The scepter is more congenial to the mind of man than the cross—power and majesty may captivate; from weakness and shame men shrink away. The Eternal Word, the only begotten of the Father, the Maker of all things—essentially Life, and Light, and Love—is the Lamb of God! The only One whom God ever sent to the world to be a sacrifice—the only Sacrifice ever well-pleasing to God— the only sacrifice by which sin can be borne away. The Lamb of God “taketh away” the sin of the world! “Taketh away,” in connection with sin, is a most marvelous word; not merely does He forgive, He removes sin. Sin stood in the way of friendship between man and God, but the Lamb of God removes this obstruction. He takes it away from individuals now; He will take it away from the world eventually. By His suffering, even to death, God effects reconciliation. His weakness and shame precede the display of His power and His majesty.
As we meditate upon this truly wonderful Name of Christ—THE LAMB OF GOD—let US inquire whether we have been called from our former hopes and former selves to new hopes and purposes, to new scenes and new affections, by beholding the Lamb of God. Our thoughts of Jesus are all in fault if we have not seen Him by faith as the Lamb of God, and all our thoughts of God are false until we recognize in Jesus God’s Lamb.
We can conceive men following Jesus for the sake of His healing touch, His gifts and His bounty. Men are willing to receive the benefits Christianity has conferred upon the human race, such as the mercies and the kindness that mark off Christian lands from heathen countries. But, oh, how few receive Him as the Lamb of God! How few delight in His willing offering of Himself a sacrifice to God on account of human sin! How few prize beyond all price His wounds and His sufferings unto death for their sins!
The same pen that chronicles the Baptist’s proclamation of Jesus, tells us how the writer himself saw Jesus as the Lamb upon the throne of God: “And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of the throne... stood a Lamb as it had been slain.” (Rev. 5:66And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of the throne and of the four beasts, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all the earth. (Revelation 5:6)). As John gazed upon the Lamb, the marks of whose wounds were apparent in the midst of the very seat of God’s eternal majesty, he heard the harps and songs of heaven, and saw the multitudes there prostrate themselves before the throne.
Angels and saints, might and majesty supreme, filled the vision of John, but the highest height of the glory was occupied by the Lamb as it had been slain. Such is God’s will. The glory of His throne and the death of the Lamb are united, never to be sundered. The scepter issues from the cross, the glories of the kingdom from the shame of Calvary. The songs of heaven and the echoing praises of earth well up from the virtue of the blood of the Lamb of God, who bears away the sin of the world.
Reader, how do you regard Jesus, the Lamb of God? This is a question to you of eternal importance. The throne of God is not to be robbed of its glory by men or devils. The surges of the sea of rebellion against divine justice may break over earth’s barriers, and for a while cover this world as a flood, but thus far shall they go and no farther—here shall their proud waves be stayed; heaven, peopled with saved sinners, earth in harmony with heaven, will abide at rest in the power of the throne of God, established in righteousness by the blood of the Lamb.
Hearken to the voices of the redeemed, to the unison of every tribe and kindred, tongue and people of earth! Hearken to the songs of heaven; listen to the harpers harping with their harps, and to the ten thousand times ten thousand and thousands of thousands of angels answering to the song with loud acclaim! What is the burden of the majestic song? what is the theme of every tongue? It is the dying of Jesus for sinners on the cross.
“Crown Him with many crowns,
The Lamb upon the throne.
Hark, how the heavenly anthem drowns
All music but its own!”
Is Jesus slain for sinners the Saviour of your soul? Have you gone to Him, and upon your knees thanked Him for His dying love? Have you received Him as the gift of God, the Lamb slain for you? Well then it is for you both for time and for eternity!
“All hail Redeemer, hail
For Thou hast died for me;
My praise shall never, never fail
Throughout eternity.”