John Logan

“ He saw that the wickedness of men was to coninue and abound, to erect a Golgotha in every age, and by obstinate impenitenice to crucify afresh the Son of God. He saw that in his blessed name, and under the banners of his cross, the most atrocious crimes were to be committed, the sword of persecution, to be drawn, the best blood of the earth to be shed, and the noblest splits that over raced the world to be cut off; he saw that for many of the human race, all the efforts of saving mercy were to be defeated; that is death was to be of no avail ”

“ How is the condition of our Redeemer now changed? From a scenes of terror and distress, he is exalted to the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens. As the sun broke out from the eclipse which is then suffered, so did the light of his Father’s countenance upon his soul. Shame and sorrow, and suffering, were succeeded by glory, and victory, and triumph.
What consolation does this not yield to Christians in all their afflictions! The High Priest under the law was taken from among men, that he might have compassion on the ignorant, and on those that were out of the way ”

“ In the early times of the Christian Church, the first disciples followed their Lord in a bath that was marked with blood; persons of all ranks, of all ages, and of both sexes, braved the rage of the enemy, the sword of the persectutor, the fire of the tormentor, became candidates for the crown of martyrdom, and with triumph embraced that very form of death at which our Lord, to appearance, now trembled and stood aghast. ”

“ There is a misapprehension into which we are apt to fall, in considering the sufferings of Jesus Christ. Whenever he appears before our eyes, the splendour of his Divinity overcomes the mind, and in the Lord of Glory, the man of sorrows is forgotten. But, my friends, you are to remember that as God is by his nature incapable of pain or sorrow, in all scenes of distress, the Divinity withdrew, that the Humanity might suffer. ”

“ Hence, many illustrious and virtuous men in the heathen world, supported by the native fortitude of the human mind, poured contempt upon all the forms of death, and departed with magnanimity and with glory, If a man who had only innocence to support him, might this acquiesce in his doom, one whose sufferings were to be publicly useful, whose death was to be gorious to himself, and beneficial to the world, might rejoice in the midst of his sufferings, and result in the prospect of death. ”

“ These sufferings were not intended to excite the sighs of sensibility, and the tears of distress. Sympathy is not the proper return for his love. His sufferings are the objects of your faith, and ought to awaken your gratitude. Neither vent your wrath against the enemies and the crucifiers of your Saviour. Look inwards, O man! search thine own bosom; there dwell the murderers of thy Lord. Thy sins, thy crimes, thine unhallowed desires and unmortified passions, were the actors in that dreadful scene. ”

“ The torments which our Saviour endured in the garden, therefore, must have been great and amazing, when the sacred writers cloth them with all the circumstances of terror, and paint them in all the colours of distress. What shall we say, then, to account for this dejection which our Lord felt, and for this desire which he expressed to be saved from his sufferings; in the ordinary course of human affairs, an innocent man of common fortitude resigns himself with acquiescence to his fate; his integrity supports him ”

“ Thus, our Lord was not only he sufferer, but in appearance a criminal, he had not only to endure the pain but the ignomy of the cross; not only to be wounded and tormented, but also to be mocked, reviled, and scorned by the vilest of mankind. Then were fulfilled the words of the mystical Prophet, “I am a reproach of men, and despised of the people. ”

“ The sacred writers, on the other hand, lay aside every thing that looks like passion or party zeal; they relate events not like men who are interested in the facts which they describe: not like men who had acted a part in the history they write ”

“ So likewise “we have not a High Priest who cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are, but without sin. It behoved him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful High Priest, in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people for in that he himself hath suffered, being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted.” ”

“ Historians contemporary to the events which they record, and who beheld the actions which they describe, usually give free vent to their passions in relating the occurrences of their history, and enter with the zeal of parties upon the various subjects which engage their attention. ”

“ This leads us to the second thing proposed, which was to account for these appearances,—to assign the causes of our Lord’s peculiar sufferings. In general, then, there were circumstances in the passion of our Lord, of a singular kind, fully adequate to produce the effects here mentioned What these were will appear when we consider that our Lord died in a state where he was abandoned by his friends, and by mankind; and he died in a state of ignomy and that he died in a state, where, after suffering an agony of spirit, he was at last forsaken by his Father in heaven. ”

“ There is not a circumstance in the history of mankind so ignominous, and to an ingenuous nature so tormenting, as the following which is recorded by the Evangelists.— Pilate said, “Shall I release Jesus? ”