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THE NATURE AND SOURCE OF THE REDEEMER'S SORROW,

REV. C. B WOODMAN,

ARTILLERY STREET CHAPEL, OCTOBER 25, 1835.

"A man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief."-ISAIAH, liii. 3.

It appears impossible to read the narratives of the sufferings of the Redeemer without the most intense interest. They abound with such inimitable pathos and sublimity of description that, independently of their being records of circumstances that have actually transpired, they are invested with such piety and beauty that we do not envy the man who can peruse them either in a thoughtless or disinterested manner. You are aware that even infidels have confessed, that as compositions they teem with the richest imagery and the most affecting details that are to be met with in the whole compass of language. Now if such are the effects produced on minds totally opposed to the truth of Revelation, how much greater interest may we be supposed to take in the details of that awful tragedy with which our destiny is so closely connected.

The Bible, you are aware, abounds witn allusions to this subject: the details of the various sacrifices and ceremonies of the Jewish ritual, all directly refer to the sufferings of Jesus Christ. It appears to me that the Deity adopted this method of communication, for the purpose of identifying in an incontrovertible manner, the person of our Saviour. Hence recourse is had to prophetic enigmas relative to the character, offices, and sufferings, of Jesus Christ. Prophecy, like a mystic lamp, throws a glimmering light on the cloud which enshrouds futurity. The ancient seers appear to have held converse with future generations to have looked through the veil which envelopes the scenes and circumstances of other times; and by foretelling a series of events which were to transpire when they should have mingled with the dust, have given no weak evidence of the genuineness of Revelation-have furnished an unanswerable argument to the absurd dogmas of the sceptic, and have erected a pillar for the support of our religion, which neither the sophistry of men nor the subtlety of fiends will be able to overthrow.

Your time will not permit me, and it would be foreign to my purpose, were I to enter into any thing like a dissertation on this species of composition. It is a subject which must remain wrapped in mystery till time shall have dispersed the mist by which the greater part of it is enveloped. I am aware that many have attempted to unravel the secrets of futurity-they have hurled anathemas at those who have differed from them; and perhaps there is no subject that has occasioned greater controversy in Christendom than that of prophecy. But

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it is not ours to enter on forbidden limits; we will not attempt to lift the vol of uncertainty; we are content to rest in hope that what we know not now we shall know hereafter. But however absurd it may appear to pry into hicuen mysteries by rashly interpreting prophetic lore, this is a portion of it which has so completely met its accomplishment, and the meaning of which has been so satisfactorily revealed, that we are justified in considering it as a proof of the soundness of our cause, and calculated to produce the greatest benefits. Such are the words to which your prayerful attention is now requested: He was man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief."

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In making a few observations on this passage, I shall, in the first place, inquire what was the nature of the sorrow of which the Redeemer is here supposed to be the subject; and in the second place, the source of that sorrow, and the ends which it was destined to accomplish.

Sorrow, you are aware, is of two kinds; personal, and relative. The one is an action of the mind when borne down by the intenseness of its own sufferings, the other is occasioned either by its sympathy with the body, or by commiseration with a fellow-creature. In each of these ways, Christ may be said to have sorrowed: he was the subject not only of bodily suffering, but of the severest mental agony; he was "a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief." The bodily anguish of the Redeemer, though it was great, was evidently far less severe than that of his mind. His sufferings are represented as unparalleled, and his visage as being "marred more than that of any man." Now how are we to account for this and similar expressions if bodily torture is principally intended. That it was great I do not deny ; but it would not be difficult to select many instances from the records of martyrology where severer measures were resorted to than in the present instance. Some were worried by the beasts; others were gradually consumed in the flames; and many tortured in a way which I conceive must not only have increased but protracted their sufferings. If we judge, too, from the circumstance of the speedy dissolution of the Redeemer, which appears to have taken place considerably before that of his fellow-sufferers, we cannot but suppose that the bodily sufferings which they endured were at least equal to those of which he was the subject.

We therefore conclude that it was a mental passion to which Isaiah more directly refers. You may remember that in other parts of the prophecy it is said, "He made his soul an offering for sin." And again: "He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied." If we follow him to Gethsemane, we find him " travailing in spirit," and "sorrowful even unto death:" and when suspended upon the cross his pain appears to have been of a similar kind, arising from a consciousness of his Father's anger, and the hiding of his Father's countenance. Then "it pleased Jehovah to bruise him, to put him to grief." Then it was that despair settled upon his brow, and the angel of death flapped its dreary wing across his path, and compelled him to exclaim, " My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” "And as this," says Dr. Dwight, his only complaint, it must, I think, be believed to refer to his principal suf- '. ferings." But the evil here complained of is, being forsaken of God: in other words, God hid his face from him; that is, if I mistake not, withdrew from him those manifestations of complacency in his character and conduct which he had before made. As this was itself the most distressing testimony cʻ the Divine anger against sin, so it is naturally imagined-and I think, wheu we

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are informed "It pleased Jehovah to bruise him," directly declared in 'he Scriptures that this manifestation was accompanied by other disclosures of the anger of God against sin, and against Him as the substitute for sinners. I need not remind you, my brethren, that it is not necessary to receive bodily pain in order that we may become miserable:

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There is a sorrow of the mind, there is an agony of feeling; there is a speechless, voiceless suffering, the intensity of which presses us down in spite of our will. It fetters the soul, it damps our hope, it impairs our energy, it withers our expectation; it inspires the mind with a feverish tremour, arising from an agitation too keen to be expressed, and leaves it the prey of unutterable woe We have felt it when we were the victims of some little and narrow mind which used its temporary power for the exercise of its petty and contemptible tyranny. We have felt it when the world has frowned upon us, when friendship has been dissolved, and when our confidence has been destroyed. Then has despair shot through the brain, the feverish throb has quivered upon the pulse, and we were left to grapple with the agony of grief. We have felt it when cherishing their hallowed memories who are lost to us for ever. We have felt it when standing by an expiring friend, and catching the last look as it flashed from his closing eye. We have felt it when he bid us the final farewell, and breathed that sigh which wafted the spirit to the other world: and when all was over, and we were left with the cold tenement of one that was dear to us, clasping the hand of our departed associate, O then have we felt the agony of grief.

"Have you lost a friend or brother,
Heard a father's parting breath,
Gazed upon a lifeless mother,

Till she seem'd to wake from death?"

Then, have you felt the agony of grief. And what are the most excruciating pains when compared to this? What the severest torture of the body, when compared with the midnight of the soul—the dark and cheerless torpor of the mind? It is like the whisper of the dying breeze when compared with the thundering of the angry tempest. There are remedies which may alleviate the former, but "a wounded spirit who can bear?" It spurns every lenitive, it refuses every consolation; the prop of the system gives way, and all is lost in unutterable despair.

The same causes, however, do not produce similar effects: it requires various degrees of power to operate on different objects. It is so in the natural world. we are affected by circumstances in exact proportion to our mental capabilities. Hence arises that diversity of feeling which exists in different persons and >pecies. The brute creation are less affected than we are, owing to their incapacity to reflect on the bearing of the disasters to which they are liable. Instinct is insufficient to inspire them with those feelings which we possess. Even man himself varies in this particular. One man can grasp a subject in all its parts whilst another is unable to comprehend even its simplest rudiments. If hen you believe Christ formed an essential portion of the Godhead, you must admit that his mental capabilities must have been immense. It requires the

utmost stretch of human understanamng to form the minutest conception of them. Imagine what must have been the limits of that thought which planned the fabric of the universe, and placed its various dependencies in their exact stations which not only overlooked the whole, but was mindful of the minutest parts-which not only attended to the homage of the cherubim, but listened to the cry of the meanest suppliant. These are parts of its ways-tne whole of its power who can understand? There are other systems over which it presides; there are other beings of which it is mindful; there are other worlds of which it is the ruler: and if you carry your imagination to its utmost stretch, you will be utterly lost in attempting to discover the limits of its guidance and its protection.

Imagine, then, what must have been the travail of that soul which was not only alive to the minutest circumstance, but could grasp infinity itself. Even our limited powers are sometimes distracted by grief, and overwhelmed with wretchedness how unutterable, then, must have been that misery which oppressed the mind of the Omniscient! Our sorrows resemble the solitary stream which occasionally ruffles the path over which it glides-His the moun tain cataract which rolls along with desolating fury, bearing in its course devastation and death.

Some minds are so constituted that they can treat almost every thing with indifference; they appear indifferent to every attack that is made upon them. There are others of so tender a make, that they are ruffled by the slightest breeze-so delicate, that they are withered by the chills of adversity—so susceptible of injury, that the slightest unkindness can wound them. Now the mind of the Redeemer appears to have been imbued with the tenderest susceptibilities. Of this we have a touching proof in his visit to the grave of Lazarus. He there consecrates the ashes of his friend with the tear of sympathy and so great was his sorrow on that occasion that it was emphatically said, "See how he loved him." His career on earth presents us with innumerable instances of benevolence, and of all those virtues which can do honour to our nature. There was nothing like bravado or that intrepid daring, commonly (but erroneously) termed fortitude: there were no symptoms of malice, of hatred, or of anger; the rougher passions found no place in his bosom; to him animosity and revenge were equally unknown: so justly and so emphatically was he termed "the Lamb of God."

Let us reflect for a moment what must have been the feelings of such a mind. When the Redeemer was buffeted by his cruel persecutors-when he was spit upon, reviled, and insulted, by the very refuse of society; surely he was "a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief." It is remarkable that there is only one instance on record when he is said to have rejoiced in spirit. The cloud which hovered over his cradle darkened the whole of his life, till at length it burst on the hill of Calvary. Surely he was " a brother born for adversity." The pleasures arising from the cultivation of friendship, are amongst the most exquisite delights which are left us in this dreary world: they are some of those flowerets of Eden which occasionally bloom in this bleak wilderness; and to a superior mind there can be no trial so severe as their loss. When the Saviour was on earth he selected a few with whom it was his delight to associate. They were a happy family, aptly denominated "sheep among wolves.' You may remember, that on that eventful night when the fearful drama was

acted, and the plot was ripe for execution, having given them his benediction and commended them to his Father and their Father, to his God and their God, he led them to the garden whither he oft resorted with his disciples, and after praying, with strong crying and tears, a man who had been accustomed to associate with the favoured few betrayed him to the assassins, and delivered him over to the infuriated populace. My brethren, what an hour was that! He was forsaken by his friends, and he was forgotten by his God! "He trod the wine-press alone, and of the people there was none with him." He seemed suspended in a fearful vacuum between heaven and earth: clouds and darkness were round about him; his mind was big with unutterable woe, and his soul "sorrowful even unto death." ..If he reflected upon the past, there was the remembrance of former glory, angels and archangels bowing before him, and ten thousand times ten thousand ministering unto him. If he contemplated the future, there were the pains of death, there was the conflict with the powers of darkness. Hell assaulted him at every turn; his sweat was as blood falling to the ground: and when he could bear it no longer, and exhausted nature sunk beneath the pressure of the conflict, "being in an agony he prayed more earnestly, Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not my will, but thine be done." But, my brethren, this was impracticable. It was an event in which the honour of Deity was implicated, and on which the destiny of the Church was suspended. It was necessary that he should enter his kingdom through the arena of conflict, wearing on his brow the scars of honour, and wielding a sceptre glittering with the ensigns of victory. It had been predicted that he was to come "from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah, travailing in the greatness of his strength." It was decreed that he was to wade to the throne of the universe through a sea of blood, and to ascend it accompanied with the hallelujahs of the ransomed church: in fine, my brethren, that the Captain of our salvation was to be "made perfect through suffering."

Such was the cup of which the Saviour had to take; such the sorrow of which he was the subject: and this leads me very briefly to notice, in the second place, THE SOURCES FROM WHENCE IT arose, and tHE ENDS IT WAS DESTINED TO ACCOMPLISH. We have been contemplating grief the most intense and unparalleled. We have beheld a Divine victim sacrificed on the altar of atonement. We have witnessed a scene in which the very elements appear to have sympathized: and surely such an event could not have occurred but from some strange and momentous necessity, connected with the destinies of our race. Is it not natural, then, to ask, Why did the angels become mute, and why did silence reign through the celestial choir? Why was it that the fellow of the God of Hosts was immolated on the altar of retribution?-and why did he travail in the agony of his spirit? The source of this sorrow, my brethren, may be traced to that sin which

"Brought death into the world, and all our woe;"

which diɛarranged the order of the universe, and set up a barrier between the Deity and the creature of his power. Ever since the fall of his progenitor, man had been adding crime to crime, and heaping transgression upon transgression: the thoughts of his heart were evil, and that continually. If you

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