LECT. than He. But still there was the carnal idea XXI. attaching to it; and even this approach to reve

rence they soon abandoned, when a little time had intervened to wear off the edge of their enthusiasm, and the Lord rebuked their carnal appetite, and spoke to them of spiritual food. Then they with rare perverseness draw an invidious comparison between Him and that same Moses, to whom they had the very day before themselves likened Him, as the Prophet of whom Moses had spoken, and who was to be like unto himself.

But now in the ardour of their enthusiasm, conveniently assembled as they were for their journey to Jerusalem, they would fain carry Him with them to the sacred city, and there, together Iwith the multitudes who should be at this time assembled from the other cities of Israel, proclaim Him King, and putting Him at the head of their armies, seize this opportunity of rising up against the Roman power, for which they supposed the hour was now come'.

Our Lord perceiving this, constrains the disciples, (with whose own notions at this time this plan would have exactly fallen in, and who would readily have acquiesced in such carnal scheme,)

f Compare the accounts of St. Matthew and St. Mark. The word is hváуkaσe. They give the fact, but not the reason. St. John without mentioning the fact, which was not needful for his purpose, supplies us with collateral information which incidentally suggests to ns a reason for this also.

"Non erat rex," asks Augustine, (in Jo. Tr. xxv. 2.) " qui timebat fieri rex? Erat omnino: nec talis rex qui ab hominibus fieret, sed talis qui hominibus regnum daret."

He constrains them to re-embark and to re-cross LECT. the lake, while He, no doubt with some difficulty, _XXI. sent the multitudes away. And having at last accomplished this, He retires into the mountainh for that prayer and meditation and communing with His Father for which He had first sought this privacy, which the people had so broken in upon, but whom He was too compassionate to dismiss untaught, unfed.

We may notice one or two of the Old Testament miracles which, as it were, prefigured these of Christ as, for instance, that wrought by Elijah, when the widow found that "the barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil faili:" or those two recorded of his successor, in one of which the oil stayed not till the vessels were full, and there was not a vessel more; and in the other, which presents the closest analogy to this of our Lord's, many were fed with twenty barley loaves and some ears of corn: and though the servitor asked, in the spirit of the incredulous disciples, "What, should I set this before a hundred men?" yet, they did eat, and left thereof, according to the word of the Lord!"

66

The full application of this passage must be reserved till we come to consider our Lord's improvement of it. At present we only observe farther, that this incident in our blessed Lord's life strikingly evinces His gentleness and com

"Frequenter Jesus amavit montium juga seligere, quando exercitiis pietatis secretioribus vacare voluit. Testes sunt mons in quo a Satana fuit tentatus, mons e quo descendens populum docuit, mons in quo est glorificatus, mons in quo passiones suas incepit." Lampe. * 2 Kings iv. 1-7.

i 1 Kings xvii. 8-16. 12 Kings iv. 42. 44.

LECT. passion, who yet entertained the multitude which XXI. had interrupted Him with teaching and healing and it instructs all people, but pastors especially, after their manner, to go and do like

and food

wise.

This will be a fitting place for the following edifying extract from one of Dr. Chalmers' Posthumous Sermons. (No. X.) "I cannot ascend into heaven to bring down Jesus again upon the world, that you may hear the kindness which fell from His lips, and see the countenance most frankly expressive of it; but I can bring the word which He left behind Him nigh unto you. I can assure you, upon the faith of that word which never lies, that what He was on earth He is still in heaven; and if in the history of the New Testament He was never found to send a diseased petitioner disappointed away, be assured that when He took up His body to the right hand of the everlasting throne, He took up all His kind and warm and generous sympathies along with Him.....I would have you to know the gift of God. I would have you to look upon it in the simplicity of an offer, on the one hand, and of a joyful and confiding acceptance on the other. When He was on earth great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them. Come to Him with your disease—the disease of a guilty and despairing mind........ and be assured that the voice which He uttered in the hearing of His countrymen is of standing authority and signification to the very latest ages of the world- Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.' Yes! if rest is to be found at all, it must be given. It is upon the footing of a gift that I offer it to you. Not that you are worthy to receive the present, but that it is a present worthy of His generosity to bestow."

LECTURE XXII.

THE STORM ON THE SEA OF GALILEE.

JOHN vi. 16-21.

WE left our Lord returned to His prayer and LECT. meditation on the mountain; the multitude whom XXII. He had miraculously fed being at length dispersed, and the disciples at His request departed to re-embark by themselves.

By this time the evening was full come: for though St. Matthew in his account of the preceding miracle speaks of its being already evening before that miracle was begun, yet is there in that nothing discrepant from this account and the accounts of the other Evangelists: for the Jews were in the habit of speaking of two evenings, the former of which would correspond to our late in the afternoon, when the miraculous repast was commenced; and the other to our actual evening, the time of twilight, when this repast was concluded, and the people returned to their villages, and the Lord to His oratory in the mountain, and the disciples to the sea. Here these latter re-embark at the spot where they had moored their little vessel in the morning, with the design of eventually re-crossing the

b

See Exodus xii. 6. the marginal rendering.

b

Pxovтo," they were going to the other side:" "denoting," as Alford observes," the unfinished action."

LECT. lake towards the town of Capernaum on the opposite shore.

XXII.

It would appear, however, that though the Lord had urged the disciples "to go before Him unto the other side," and they indeed had gone down to the lake and on board their vessel, yet they lingered awhile in the hope that their Lord, who could see them on the. lake from His station on the mountain, would yet come down to them and rejoin them, and after all re-cross the lake in their company. But having waited till darkness had come on, in vain expecting Him, they conclude that He means, as on a former occasion, to spend the night on the mountain, or to go round by the land; and they determine therefore at once to set out for the opposite shore.

But the wind had risen, and the waves were high, so that, with all their toil in rowing, they had only advanced about five and twenty or thirty furlongs', or (as St. Matthew informs us) about midway across the lake", by the fourth

e St. Mark says, πрds Вnoσaïdáv. There is no need to get rid of the apparent discrepancy by adopting the rendering of the margin "over against Bethsaida," if we bear in mind the fact that there were two places of this name; one on the north-eastern shore, being that in the neighbourhood of which the miracle was wrought, and the other on the northwestern shore, not far from Capernaum. So that whether we say, they went over the sea "toward Capernaum," with St. John, or "unto Bethsaida," with St. Mark, it amounts to the same thing, and there is no discrepancy; seeing that both Capernaum and this Bethsaida lay in the same direction.

d Matt. xiv. 22.

e Luke ix. 12.

f "Norat Spiritus Sanctus et Johanni dicere poterat, quot præcise stadia fuissent: sed in Scriptura imitatur popularem loquendi rationem." Bengel.

8 μéσov Tĥs laλdoons, Matt. xiv. 14. The lake is about forty furlongs in breadth; but they were probably compelled to pull in an oblique direction; so that they may have rowed this distance and more, and yet be only midway.