XLI.

The Stone at the Sepulchre.

WHO has not known the pang of bereavement,—

"When sorrowing o'er the stone we bend, Which covers what was once a friend, And from his hand—his voice—his smile, Divides us for a little while?"

Let the mourner draw nigh to this stone which closed the sepulchre of the Lord, and beneath its quiet shadow meditate on the solemn and most blessed doctrine of the resurrection.

With aching hearts, with drooping heads, the disciples of the crucified Saviour turned from the sepulchre in which they had seen His sacred body laid. For Him, indeed, the awful trial was over; He was beyond reach of the cruelty of soldier, or the malice of priest. Those holy eyes were clothed in death, no cry of anguish would ever more burst from those pallid lips, the blood had ceased to flow from the pierced hands and side. For the Master indeed there was rest, but for the disciples desolation, for none in that hour of anguish appears to have believed or understood the re-iterated promise,—

"After three days I will rise again."

What was the world, then, to the followers of Christ, without Him who had been their Friend and their Guide, the Life and Light of their souls! That tombstone seemed to shut them out from all that remained to them of One so deeply reverenced, so tenderly beloved.

And when early in the twilight which preceded the Easter morn, women drew near to the grave to pay the last honour to the body of the Lord, this same stone, heavy, sealed and guarded, appeared to their anxious minds as a barrier between them and Him.

"Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the sepulchre?" was the perplexed enquiry of those whose love was stronger than their faith. But the stone had been rolled away by an angel's hand, and had become the seat of a messenger from Heaven, whose countenance was like lightning, and his raiment white as snow; at the sight of whose glory the guards had trembled, and become even as the dead!

The Lord of Life had risen indeed, the first-fruits of them that sleep; the sepulchre had yielded up its heavenly guest; Christ had led captivity captive, and by dying abolished death! Thenceforth all believers could exclaim, "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!"

This stone stands as a representative of all that shuts out from the eye of love, from the sunshine of Heaven, the mortal forms that once held souls that Christ hath redeemed. The little grassy mound in the churchyard over some babe whose brief span of life—

"Left no trace behind,—save in a parent's breast;"

the heavy monument in the cemetery, the solid walls of the vault, the earth-covering in the deep pit on the battlefield, the unfathomable sea which rolls over the dead,—all, all shall yield up their trust!

Again shall an angel of God descend from heaven; again shall the solid earth tremble and shake; again shall rocks be rent and graves be opened; and as Christ, the Head, arose, so shall the body—the Church—arise! Hear the glorious words of Isaiah's prophecy, omitting the italics which are not in the original text, and which seem to obscure its meaning:

"Thy dead shall live, My dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead."

Oh, joyful Easter morn, for which Faith is watching and waiting! When the first dawn of its coming light is around us, and the shadows of night are beginning to flee, well may our Lord address to mourners for departed saints the question, "Why weepest thou?"

Christ when He rose from the dead was again restored to His loving followers, but, as regarded visible presence, for only a little space; but when the graves of His saints shall be opened, when from countless sepulchres the heavy stones shall be rolled back, it is to no transient glimpses of the Lord, to no brief moments of blissful intercourse that they will then be admitted.

"I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not a stranger—" (marginal reading).

No, NOT A STRANGER! When Mary first beheld her risen Lord, her eyes were holden that she should not know Him, and as a stranger she addressed Him! But the saints as they burst from the sod in the morn of the resurrection shall at once recognize Him, whom not having seen they have loved! They will know the voice of the Good Shepherd who has led them through the wilderness of life, and the valley of the shadow of death!

"And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us: this is the Lord; we have waited for Him, we will be glad and rejoice in His salvation."

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The Queen and the Twelve Names.

WE find in the seventh chapter of the book of Revelation a description of the sealed ones, the spiritual Israel, under the names of the tribes to whom was granted the promised inheritance of Canaan. If it be, as many believe, that we here behold Christ's Church under a different symbol, yet identical with her of whom we read in the forty-fifth Psalm, the twelve names in Revelation beautifully fill up the description of "the King's daughter, the Queen," who is "all glorious within," for all these names have meanings. The virgins, her companions, that shall be brought into the King's palace with gladness and rejoicings, may be regarded as representing "the multitude which no man could number, of all nations and kindreds, and peoples and tongues," who appear to be distinct from, and yet in some degree sharers in the blessedness of the sealed ones, "the hundred and forty-four thousand." Let us examine the meaning of the names mentioned in Revelation vii., and see if they are not as twelve stars in the crown of the "Church of the firstborn," * placed on her head by Him whom she worships, because He is the Lord her God.

* Heb. xii. 23.

And, first, we mark what name is "omitted." DAN had a place amongst the twelve tribes of Israel under the Law, but none amongst the spiritual Israel. The signification of the word may throw light upon what is otherwise dark and mysterious. Dan signifies judgment. There was judgment stern and terrible under the Law, but in the Gospel "mercy rejoiceth against judgment." The curse has been removed, the penalty endured by another; Dan is, as it were, absorbed and disappears. It is remarkable that when Jacob on his death-bed blessed his sons, after speaking of Dan, "judgment," then, and then alone, he burst forth into the exclamation, "I have waited for thy salvation, O Lord!"

Following the order in which the names of the tribes are given by St. John, the first of which we read is:

JUDA, "the praise of the Lord." And so praise unto Him who hath chosen and redeemed her is, as it were, the first gem, the central star in the crown of the Church, the spiritual Bride.

REUBEN, "see the Son, or who sees the Son," a name of deep meaning if we may take it as descriptive of the precious privilege of her whose "eyes shall see the King in His beauty, the pure in heart" who shall look upon God.

GAD, "a band," or "happy," or "armed and prepared." * The interpretation seems to speak for itself. The Church is a chosen "band" of those who are "happy" in the love of their Lord; who have been "armed" to fight the good fight, and "prepared" for the coming of Him whom, not having seen, they have loved. Of such is the spiritual Israel.

* See Cruden's Concordance.

ASER, "blessedness," or "happiness." The Church, when she enters the palace of her Lord, will shine in blessedness for ever. Immortal happiness will beam from her countenance, the reflection of the light of Him in whose presence is the fulness of joy, and at whose right hand there are pleasures for evermore.

NEPTHALIM, "my wrestling, or one that struggles." Here we are reminded that they who bear the palms of victory are they that have endured the conflict. A reference may also be made to earnest wrestling in prayer. Esther, ere the hour of triumph, might be said to have earned the name of Naphtali. The Church who will wear the garment of praise, now appears in the spirit of heaviness, wrestling, struggling, till He with whom she pleads grant her more than she dares to ask for, or to desire.

MANASSEH, "forgetfulness." This name was given by Joseph to his firstborn in Egypt; "for God," said he, "hath made me to forget all my toil, and all my father's house." The patriarch's words sound like a response to the exhortation addressed to the bride in the psalm,—"Hearken, O daughter, and consider . . . forget also thine own people, and thy father's house." The vanities of earth, with its sorrows and sins, put away and forgotten for ever!

SIMEON, "that hears or obeys." In this word is described a special attribute of the Church of Christ, the obedience of faith. "He that hath My commandments and keepeth them, He it is that loveth Me," saith the Heavenly King. It is the Church that listens to His voice, that seeks to follow wherever He leads. Of Reuben, the patriarch, it was said, "unstable as water thou shalt not excel;" but Reuben's name taken in its hidden meaning may remind us that "even water, hearing and obeying" the Lord, became as a well at His bidding, or firm as a pavement under His feet.

LEVI, "joined," or "held and associated." Here is a description of that union of which, alas! amongst those who are called Christians, we now see so little. There is too much of the party spirit which cries, "I am of Paul—I of Apollos," with believers who should be one in Christ. Should mere form and ceremonies, the colour of a garment, a posture, or a name, have power to separate those whom God Himself hath joined together? We need larger Christian charity. The higher we rise towards Heaven, the wider spreads the horizon around. Not but that purity of doctrine must ever be jealously guarded, we must earnestly contend for the faith once given to the saints; but as regards those non-essentials by means of which the enemy would divide us, and bring discord into the Church, well may we say,—

Judge not thy differing brother, nor in aught Condemn; his prayer and thine may rise above, Though blending not in "unison of thought," Yet mingling in the "harmony of love."

ISSACHAR, "price, reward." A touching allusion may here be contained to the truth that we are not our own, but "bought with a price;" that the salvation of the Church is the "reward" of a Saviour's merits, the purchase of a Saviour's blood. To the spiritual Israel comes the message, "Fear not, for I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by thy name, thou art Mine."

ZABULON, "dwelling." Under another figure we find the Church represented as the temple of an indwelling God. "If a man love Me," said the Lord, speaking of each individual believer, "he will keep My words: and My Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him." St. Paul reminded the early Christians of this high privilege granted to them. "Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates? Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?"

JOSEPH, "increase." Here we have in the name of Israel's best beloved son the description of one of the essential attributes both of the Church and of each of her members; "growth" in grace, "increase" in knowledge and brotherly love. The Church is not only a temple but a living body, that must be nourished and exercised, till "it come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." It is the Spirit of God whose effectual working "maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love."

BENJAMIN, "the son of the right hand." The impression conveyed by such a name as this is that of power, honour, and strength. It is the name which Jacob substituted for that bestowed on his youngest son by a dying mother, BENONI, "the son of my sorrow." By birth every child of Eve "is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward;" as Benonis we enter into the world, and as Benonis we must have left it, had not the Father of mercies and God of all comfort changed the nature of His child, as Jacob with his changed the name; so that the worm * should "thresh the mountains," and to the feeble be given "power over the nations." †

* Isaiah xli. 14. † Rev. ii. 26.

This very slight sketch of the features of the Church as drawn in the names of the tribes of Israel must be considered as little more than suggestive; an abler hand than mine may fill up the outlines, and so give us a glimpse of the spiritual beauty of the Queen when she shall be presented to her Lord "without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing," robed in His righteousness, bright with His glory, and blessed in His love!

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