The incomparable Christ--He still lives.

More than 1900 years ago there was a man born contrary to the laws of life.  This man lived in poverty, and was reared in obscurity.  He did not travel extensively.  Only once did he cross the boundaries of the country in which he lived and that was during his exile in childhood.  His lifework was confined to a little place much less in size than Tasmania.  He possessed neither wealth, nor influence.  His relatives were inconspicuous, uninfluential and had neither training nor education.  In infancy, he startled a king, in childhood, he puzzled doctors, in manhood, he ruled the course of nature, walked upon billows as pavements, and hushed the sea to sleep.  He healed the multitude without medicine and made no charge for his services.  He never wrote a book, yet all the libraries of the country could not hold the books that have been written about him.  He never wrote a song and yet he has furnished the theme for more songs and all songwriters combined.  He never practiced medicine, yet he has healed more broken hearts, far and near, than all the doctors.  He never marshaled an army, nor drafted a soldier, nor fired a gun, yet no leader ever had more volunteers who have under his orders made more rebels stuck arms and surrender without a shot being fired.    He is the star of astronomy, the rock of geology, the lion and lamb of the zoological kingdom.  He is the revealer of the snares that lurk in the darkness, the rebuker of every evil thing that prowls by night, the quickener of all that is wholesome, the adorner of all that is beautiful, the reconciler of all that is contradictory, the harmoniser of theology and hymnology.  Every prayer that goes up to God, goes up in his name, and is asked to be granted for his sake.    The names of the past proud statesmen of Greece and Rome have come and gone.  The name of past scientists, philosophers and theologians have come and gone.  But the name of this man abounds more and more.  Though time has spread 1900 years between the people of this generation and the scene of his crucifixion, yet he still lives.  Herod couldn't kill him.  He stands forth upon the highest pinnacle of heavenly glory.  Proclaimed of God, acknowledged by angels, adored by saints and feared by devils as the living personal Christ.  This man, as you know, was Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.    It was one great from the throne of God to a manger in a stable, from the top of glory to the bottom of humiliation, from the bosom of God to the breast of a woman, from prominene to obscurity, from infinite riches to abject poverty, from a son to a servant.  For he made himself of no reputation and took upon him the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of man.  He put on humanity, that we might put on divinity.  He became the son of man that we might become the sons of God.  To get a proper appreciation of HIs condescension, we must look at him in his pristine condition, heaven, were the brightness of intelligences cannot define sickness, sorrow and death.  Such words are not in heaven's vocabulary.  How must the angels have felt when told that He who's threw into space racing planets, worling worlds and luminous suns, that he who created a world with its wonders of animalism, beauty of flowers, majesty of rippling reels, glassy seas and lofty mountains, that he who placed the twinkle in the stars and the blaze in the sun, the sparkle in the planets, was going to lay aside his purple robe for a peasant's gown.  That the infinite upon whose shoulders the universe hangs was going to become so helpless as to hang at a woman's breast.  Condensation.  He was rich, but for our sakes became poor.  How poor? Ask Mary his mother; ask the camel drivers, ask the wise men who traveled from the far east to present to him their gifts.  Examine the records of real estate.  See how many farms and city blocks he owned.  He didn't own the boat in which he cruised the lake, not the beast upon which he rode, nor the cradle in which he slept, not the grave in which he was buried.  He cruised the lake in another's man boat, he rode on another man's beast, he slept in another man's cradle, he was buried in another man's mausoleum.  He rode on no fast limited trains, he ever walked over the wrath hills of Judea on his eons of mercy. He was poor, for on one occasion he saw the birds flying and the foxes running and he said: "the foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the son of man has nowhere to lay his head".    If he had a purse, it was often empty.  Once, he only needed a small amount to pay his taxes and he had to perform a miracle to get it.  He was poor in the estimation of the more prosperous classes of his day.  I can only think of two well to do people who espoused his cause while he lived. When he died, few people mourned, but black crape was hung over the sun.  When he died the world rushed in to take an inventory of his stock, and all they found in his possession were the clothes he wore by day and slept in by night.    He came to his own, but his own received him not.  Every door was closed against him, except the stable door.    Behold him the first night out of heaven, lying on a bed of straw.  He had a purpose and it was a stupendous one.  He was purposed in the mind of God before the foundation of the world.  Before the mud hills of the earth were laid, before he stretched out the havens like a scroll, or scooped out the valleys or piled up the mountains, or carpeted the earth with verned green and leisted with running brooks and flowing rivers.  Before he set the funace of the sun on fire and called the queen of night into orbit, and set the sons of God to shouting for joy, redemption was accomplished.  The method Christ used in accomplishing his purpose he didn't rely on organization, civilization, cultivation, education, reformation, or any other --ation.  He relied upon one intangible thing: truth.    In coming to this world he had but one objective: he didn't come to save us from sorrow, but he was a man of sorrows and acquainted with greif.  He didn't come to save us from temptation, yet he was tempted in all points like as we are.  He didn't come to preach, or teach or to heal.  He didn't come to work at the core in the realm of the effect; nor to white wash us, but to wash us white; nor to repair our hearts, but to replace our hearts.  Repaired goods are second hand goods and Christ is not in the second hand business.  He didn't come to put in a new patch on an old garment, for Christianity is a sworn thought of patchwork.  Nor did he come to deal with our wrongdoing, but rather with our wrong being.    Once at the end of the ages had he been tranvested to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself (Heb. 9:28).  He came to deal with that thing that blights homes, breaks hearts and digs graves.  He came to deal with that thing that insulted God, killed the prophets, robbed heaven and made hell the high capital of the universe.    He came to transform us from the sensual to spirtual, by extracting the hereditary prones to evil.  His purpose in coming is set forth in the following scriputres: "I have come that they might have life, that they might have it more abundantly".  For this purpose the Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the devil.