The soul of man cannot work its own new birth; the breath of the Divine Spirit must sweep through it, like the fruitful south wind upon a garden. This breathing of the Spirit fecundates the soul with divine virtues. How it does this, we know not. But we feel it; we are conscious of it in our heart's depths, and suddenly, or gradually and imperceptibly, we are transformed, we are born again. The fact is evident; it reveals its own existence. We are made over again into new men. Nicodemus began to understand this amazing teaching, and he cried: "How can these things be?"-as if to imply, and I not know them? Then said Jesus, with gentle irony: "Art thou a master in Israel and knowest not these things?" Meaning that the petty disputes of the Pharisees about minute observances unfitted one to study a great question; for here was a Pharisee, a teacher in Israel, totally ignorant of a doctrine which outranks all others in the school of divine truth. And now our Saviour, amid His newly gathered disciples, simple men, unlearned and lowly, identifies Himself with these docile spirits, and using the first person plural thereby affirms their unity with Him in His teaching office: "Amen, Amen I say to thee, we speak what we know, and we testify what we have seen, and you receive not our testimony." The haughty teachers of the Hebrew people have found it hard to understand the truths of natural religion, which are verified by the unaided conscience; how, then, shall they manage with the deep secrets of Heaven, which must be accepted on the direct testimony of the Teacher? "If," said Jesus, "I have spoken to you earthly things, and you believe not, how will you believe if I speak to you heavenly things? And no man hath ascended into heaven, but He that hath descended from heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven." Nicodemus was silenced. The words of Jesus overwhelmed him with wonder; they were the words of a masterful teacher revealing His divine authority. Jesus ended by teaching him the Redemption: "And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up: that whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish, but may have life everlasting." Here was affirmed the plainest analogy between the brazen serpent (Num. xxi. 9), set up in the desert by Moses, and Christ upon the Cross. The brazen serpent was an image of the living serpents whose fiery sting had killed the sinful Hebrews: their penitent and imploring glances at the image-serpent saved them. And so the Son of Man on the Cross is the image of guilty humanity, living, suffering, dying, in His all-sufficing atonement; the sinner who looks with entire faith and with loving repentance upon Him shall be cleansed of the poison in His soul and restored to spiritual health. "For God so loved the world," exclaims Jesus, "as to give His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have life everlasting." Thus it is the spontaneous love of the Father's heart for His wayward child, for poor humanity, that gave us our Saviour-not for the redeeming of one nation, but for the entire human race has He given His own Son. And Jesus continued: "For God sent not His Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved by Him." The Jews believed that the Messias would judge, condemn, and subjugate the nations of the earth. Jesus affirms the contrary: He will save all who will allow Him to do so; those who will not allow Him are self-judged and selfcondemned. "He that believeth in Him is not judged; but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." Men are divided into good and evil by their love and hatred of the truth of God. "This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil." These words consoled the upright heart of Nicodemus, who had sought the truth and who, without fully understanding it, bowed down before it. The soul that hungers and thirsts after righteousness and truth is worthy of praise from the lips of the Messias. But, as too often happens with virtuous souls, the courage of Nicodemus was less than his sincerity; he never dared openly proclaim his faith in Jesus. Later on he timidly pleaded for the Saviour's life before the Sanhedrin, but without insisting, and with an air of almost indifference. But we shall see him on Calvary changed into a true disciple, ashamed no longer of Jesus, but rather ashamed of his own former cowardice. During the Redeemer's life he had crept in secret to visit Him; now when He is dead he boldly and publicly claims Him from His enemies, sharing with Joseph of Arimathea the sorrowful honor of burying Him. CHAPTER X. TEACHING IN THE COUNTRY-PLACES.-FINAL WIT NESS OF JOHN. John iii. 22-36. JESUS was fond of country people and loved to be with them and to teach them. To them He went out from Jerusalem, the Evangelist not stating how long a time He had remained in the city. "After these things, Jesus and His disciples came into the land of Judea, and there He abode with them and baptized." This was only the baptism of John, which Jesus personally did not administer but His disciples, as the Evangelist tells us further on: He would have His apostles co-operate with John in his preparation for the Messias. The Baptist, meanwhile, had left the banks of the Jordan. "And John also was baptizing in Enon near Salim, because there was much water there, and they [the people] came and were baptized. For John was not yet cast into prison." This change of place removed the Baptist from the reach of Herod, whose incest with his brother Philip's wife he had boldly reproved. 66 HE MUST INCREASE; BUT I MUST DECREASE. And now Jesus came into the same neighborhood with John, not And there arose a question between some of John's disciples and the Jews concerning purification. And they came to John, and said to him: Rabbi, he that was with thee beyond the Jordan, to whom thou gavest testimony, behold, he baptizeth, and all men come to him. John answered and said: A man cannot receive anything except it be given him from heaven. You yourselves do bear me witness, that I said, I am not the Christ, but that I am sent before him. He that hath the bride, only to strengthen him in his strug-God doth not give the Spirit by measure. gle with the tyrant, but to draw from him a final witness of His own office of Messias. The disciples of John and of Jesus, being thus brought to The Father loveth the Son: and he hath given all things into his hand. He that believeth in the Son, hath life everlasting: but he that believeth not the Son, shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him. gether, began to dispute about the baptisms of their respective masters, and the preference given to the latter chagrined the followers of the Precursor. But the soul of the Baptist was thrilled with joy, and not, as they had hoped, with anger. John had been commissioned by Heaven to prepare the way for Jesus; he could only be glad to know that the Messias was drawing the people about Him and teaching them. "You yourselves do bear me witness that I said I am not the Christ," he insisted, "but that I am sent before Him. He that hath the bride is the bridegroom: but the friend of the bridegroom, who standeth and heareth him, rejoiceth with joy because of the bridegroom's voice. This my joy, therefore, is fulfilled." John thus claims the honor of the Shoshben, the intermediary between bride and groom among the Jews, who bore their affectionate messages, prepared the marriage and superintended its ceremonies. So John was the Shoshben between Jesus Christ and His Church (Eph. v. 32), His Spouse. When he had given to the loving company of Jesus His first disciples, John, Peter, and Andrew, he rejoiced to see the union of bride and groom begun. Yet more he now rejoices to see it extending and perfecting itself in the souls of a multitude of disciples. He is glad to withdraw, his task well done. "He must increase, but I must decrease," he exclaimed. And his disciples must bear their part in this order of Providence. He continued addressing them, and in words so like our Saviour's to Nicodemus that it has been supposed that he had received them from some of his old followers in an account of that interview. "He that cometh from above is above all he that is of the earth is earthly, and speaketh of the earth." The misery of it is that so |