The fourth miracle is Progress-the greatest miracle of all. Take a map of the world and draw a line around all civilized lands. What have you done? You have outlined "Christendom." The name is significant. It means that civilization and evangelization have been practically identical. The progress of the centuries has been in the name of Jesus. The moral forces which he set in motion have been at work like leaven, leavening the lump. Call the roll of the nations: Christian Italy! Christian Germany! Christian France! Christian Russia! Christian Austria! Christian England! Christian America! And pause a moment before you say, "Christian China"; for China, with her six hundred millions even now, as she emerges from barbaric night, is turning her eyes with uncertain but pathetic longing toward the Cross. Can you account for this? Can you explain Christendom? We do not have to explain it. This Jesus is the Christ! He came into the world to establish a kingdom of truth and righteousness; and he is here personally to see that the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

Let us turn to another fact in the circumstances of our time which is still more difficult to account for; namely, the personal presence of Jesus in the world.

This is claimed to be a real presence; no less real, no less living, no less energetic than when he was visibly dwelling among men. His promise to his disciples was, "I will not leave you. Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world." Is that promise fulfilled? The other mighties of the past have lived, served their generations, died and left nothing but dust and a memory behind them. Not so with Jesus. There are some hundreds of millions of people in the world who will tell you that they constantly walk and talk with him. And these witnesses are of such a character that their testimony cannot be ruled out of court. A derisive smile or a lifting of one's eyebrows will not answer it.

Moreover, it is claimed that Jesus, thus personally present with his people, is the only perfect One. Along with a confession of the sinfulness of all others, there is a singular unanimity-notwithstanding the fiercest scrutiny and the most unsparing criticism-as to the sinlessness of Christ. The judg

ment that was passed upon him by the man who sentenced him to death is echoed by the world to-day, "I find no fault in this Man!"

Still further, this Jesus is the colossal figure, not only in the history of the past nineteen centuries, but in current events. He stands in solitary majesty as the mightiest of the mighty. He leads the van of every praiseworthy enterprise in the world. We are reminded of what Charles Lamb once said of Him, during a discussion as to the relative influence of Jesus and other historic leaders, "Gentlemen, if Shakespeare were to come in among us, we would rise and uncover; but if Jesus were to enter, we would with one consent fall upon our knees before him." This is true. The foremost man of our time would not presume to say that he is worthy to unloose the latchet of the shoes of this Jesus which is called the Christ.

The argument which I have thus presented has been without reference to the Scriptures in any way; but the time has now come to take down the old Book, in order to confirm it. If our minds are open to conviction, we shall be able to follow the prophecies from Genesis to Malachi, after the manner of Paul, and see the face of Jesus shining forth on every page and his name written between all the lines. It will now be a different Book, because we shall read it with different eyes.

An Oriental weaver, who had made an elaborate piece of tapestry, stretched it on tenter-hooks in his yard. That night it was stolen. The officers found a fabric which seemed to answer the description, but as the pattern was not unlike that of others there must be definite proof. Accordingly it was brought to the weaver's yard; and there the perforations in the fabric were found to correspond exactly to the tenterhooks. This was demonstration. In like manner the life and character of Jesus are placed over against the prophecies of the Holy Writ and found to correspond point by point. The conclusion would seem to be inevitable. This Jesus is the Christ.

It is painful to be an "honest doubter," for while infidelity rests in unbelief, honest doubt ever agonizes toward the light. The Pilgrims on their way to the Celestial City were given over to despondency when they found themselves in Doubting

Castle. They had been beaten by Giant Despair with a crabtree cudgel and feared lest the Lord had forgotten them. On Saturday about midnight they began to pray, and continued thus until almost the breaking of day. Then Christian, as one amazed, broke out into this passionate speech: "What a fool am I, to thus lie in a dungeon when I may as well walk at liberty! I have a key in my bosom, called Promise, that will, I am persuaded, open any lock in Doubting Castle." Hopeful said, "This is good news, my brother; pluck it out of thy bosom and try." And, as he turned the key in door after door, they flew open with ease and Christian and Hopeful came forth into the light of day.

A willingness to believe-not blind credulity, but a simple rational faith, a faith founded on evidence and backed by the authority of Scripture is the key which will solve the honest doubt of every thinking man. Have you been questioning as to whether or no this Jesus is the Christ? Pluck the key out of your bosom and try!

XII

SEE HIM AT YOUR DOOR

IF YOU knew a stranger was knocking at your door just now what would you do about it? In common courtesy you would inquire as to his errand, and, if well disposed, you would admit him.

The Saviour stands knocking at the door of every heart, saying, "If any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him and will sup with him, and he with me." Look out of your window and you shall see him. What will you do about it?

In Holman Hunt's picture, "The Light of the World," the patient Christ is represented waiting thus before a closed door, his locks wet with the dews of night. A little child who saw this picture looked at it long and earnestly and then, turning to her father, asked with a pathetic tremor in her voice, “Did he get in, father; did he get in?"

All the world knows how Henry the Fourth of Germany, the proudest sovereign of his time, was brought to his knees by the Pope's anathema; so that, having crossed the mountains in the dead of winter and presented himself at Canossa as a suppliant in sackcloth, he was kept waiting three days and nights at the closed door of the so-called Vicar of God. Volumes have been written about that visit, because it determined the policy of empires; but here is a visit, told in a single sentence, which is fraught with greater interest, forasmuch as the issues of eternal life and death are involved in it.

This august visitor comes to let us know that he has not forgotten us. "Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea,

she may forget; yet will I not forget thee." How can he forget us, when our names are written on the palms of his hands? It is not because of any personal merit that we are thus remembered, nor because of anything we have ever done for him; but rather on account of what he has done for us. Is this singular? Love is oftentimes engendered by benefits conferred where there are no benefits received. In a letter written by Captain Marryat to his mother, when he was a midshipman in the English Navy, he speaks of a sailor who had provoked his bitter resentment by inflicting petty wrongs and affronts upon him. The time came, however, when that sailor fell overboard and was rescued by the young midshipman: and then he wrote his mother again, telling of this occurrence and saying, "I do not understand why this should be; but I never in my life loved another as I love this man." So the love of Christ is grounded in itself: he loves us because he gave himself for us. Wherefore he has written our names as a perpetual memorial on his wounded hands, so that he can never forget us.

He comes, also, to reprove us of sin. It is true that of reprovers there is no lack: but there is none like him. We are compassed about by witnesses who look askance at our shortcomings and point their fingers at us. We need no monitors to cry "Aha! aha!" The most lynx-eyed of critics is not more aware of our backslidings than we are. But Christ's reproof is not like theirs. On the night before his crucifixion, when he stood before Pilate as a prisoner at the bar, he was thrice denied by Peter, who was warming his hands at a fire in the open court near by. "And the Lord turned and looked upon Peter: . . . and he went out and wept bitterly." Oh, that loving, heart-breaking look! No fault-finder in the world looks at us that way. It is as if he said, "Is this thy gratitude for all that I have done for thee?" The only answer is to cry, "Sorrie I am, my Lord; sorrie I am!" And the evidence of that true repentance which needeth not to be repented of is not only to weep bitterly, but to forsake our besetting sins.

...

He comes, again, to assure us of his pardoning grace. When he met Peter on the lakeshore, not long after the denial, and asked, "Simon, son of John, lovest thou me?"

Peter