Studies of the Man Christ Jesus (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1896. Excerpt: ... OTHER EXTRAORDINARY CHARACTERISTICS OF CHRIST, MOST EASILY EXPLICABLE BY THE BELIEF IN HIS DIVINITY I. He presents the perfect ideal of friendship. We are just beginning to appreciate Jesus the friend. We shall appreciate Him more and more as our ideals of friendship rise to His. To describe truly this ideal would be to write a life of Jesus and to produce a Gospel that would blend the four we possess. "Friend of sinners" was His divinest name. He has taught great masses of men what it is to love with the friendship-love. It was thus that He revealed the heart of that Father whose name is friendshiplove. The classic book on this subject is Trumbull's Friendship, the Master Passion. Only some of the traits of the friendships of Jesus can be suggested here. 1. Unselfishness. It was for His friends that He thought. When He was called out to the gate of the Garden of Gethsemane by Judas and the band that had come for His arrest, His first care was to protect His friends who were within at first, but who came out at once and closed round Him. For them He spoke. "If ye seek Me, well, here I am, but let these go their way" (John xviii. 8, 9). In many a so-called human friendship a man has dragged his friend down with him in ruin. Jesus gave His life for His friends, not for those only who were possessed by the friendship-love for Him, but for His enemies even, whom He still loved with the love of a friend (John xv. 13; Rom. v. 8). He willingly incurred the greatest personal danger for His friend Lazarus (John xi. 2, 8). In His great prayer He made but one request for Himself (John xvii. 1, 5); all the rest was for His friends. And on the cross His last thoughts were for others, even His enemies (Luke xxiii. 34), His fellow-sufferers (Luke xxiii. 43), and His mot...