Tracts for the Christian Seasons. FOURTH SUNDAY IN ADVENT. One among you whom ye know not. PROPER LESSONS: Morning, Isaiah xxx.; Evening, Isaiah xxxii. It was very wonderful that He who came to redeem the world, should have lived so long in the world unnoticed and unknown. Yet thus it pleased our Blessed Saviour to live the earlier and larger part of His earthly life. The aged Simeon, and Anna the devout widow, and those who with them waited for redemption in Israel, seem to have departed this life while the holy Jesus was still a child. Then His blessed mother laid up the various sayings concerning Him in her heart; and but few seem to have had any great expectations concerning that wondrous child, in whom the destinies of the whole world centred. He, the Wisdom of God, and the Word of God, by whom all things were made, lived as a man in His own world for thirty years unknown and disregarded. Many were coming and going around Him; these held converse with Him; they perceived in Him the child of the lowly wife of the carpenter of Nazareth and knew not that He was their sal : vation, and the salvation of all the ends of the earth. They knew their Saviour; yet they knew Him not. They knew the man Jesus but they knew not God manifest in the flesh. : This seems to have been true not only of the world in general, but of His own brethren, His nearest relations according to the flesh for if they believed Him not when He manifested His power and preferred His claim, much less did they "know" Him while He was pleased to hide His divine power entirely from the eyes of men, so that their intimate communication with Him availed them nothing. Their eyes with which they saw Him, and their hands with which they handled the Word of life, conveyed to them no more than ordinary impressions. Now this ignorance of Him who was among them, so far as concerned the world in general, prevailed for a limited time, according to His own divine will. It pleased our Almighty Saviour to withhold Himself entirely from the observation of the world, until the appointed time for His public ministrations arrived. For neither did He manifest Himself by miraculous deeds until the mar riage of Cana of Galilee: nor did He permit St. John Baptist, His forerunner, to proclaim Him "the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world," until He was prepared by His baptism in the river Jordan for His ministerial work. But with His brethren it would seem the case was different. Enough had been made known to them by the words of the shepherds, and the visit of the wise men, and the anxiety of Herod, to prepare them to mark the holiness, gentleness, wisdom, unspotted purity, and unswerving obedience of His childhood, and discover in them the tokens of the divine presence. Yet so it was, whether through their own fault or not, that of them it was equally true as of the rest of the world, "There standeth One among you whom ye know not." And it would seem that this spiritual blindness was afterwards visited upon them, and indeed upon the inhabitants generally of the city of Nazareth, in hardness of heart; in that they "believed Him not" when multitudes throughout all the regions round about were pressing upon Him to hear the word of God, and to be healed of their diseases, believing Him able, and hoping that He was willing, to make them clean. "There standeth One among you whom ye know not," this represents the condition of the Jews at the time when St. John Baptist spoke ; and does it not also, to some extent, represent ours? We are led to consider the question by the holy Gospel for the day. I dare say you who read this tract have heard these words this morning, or will hear them shortly. "There standeth one among you." Is He then among us now? Certainly He is. "Whom ye know not;" know we Him who is among us? Do we know in very deed that Christ is among us? Do we know and consider who Christ is if we believe that He is among us? Some I fear know Him not at all; others know Him but a little; and the best of us might know Him better than we do. Yes, Christ is among us. Let us not forget it to-day; if we forget it too often-not to-day; when we pray, “O Lord raise up (we pray Thee) Thy power and come among us, and with great might succour us." If we learn nothing else let us learn to remember that Christ is indeed present with us. If we forget all other learning let us not forget this, but store it up to be a principle which may abide with us all our lives and bring forth much fruit, in this world and in the world to come. Let us consider, why do we believe that Christ is with us? and how is Christ with us? By His own promise we are assured it is so, "Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the world." In the Church this promise is fulfilled. To the rulers of the Church it was given, and to their successors it was continued, and in them is fulfilled, and will be till the consummation of all things, "Go ye into all the world, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them . . . and lo, I am with you always." Christ then is with the ministers of His Church, who go teaching and baptizing until the end of the world. He is also with the baptized; for they are admitted into one fellowship with the baptizers. Upon His own word then we believe that He is with us: with you who are baptized, and with me or any other priest of the Church baptizing or preaching in His Name. Let us then never forget the presence of Christ in His ordinances, and by His ordained ministers. He is the true Priest, who by His gracious presence gives validity and power to all the holy acts performed in His name by His ordained ministers. Again, Christ has promised, "where two or three are gathered together in My Name there |