but reached the fulness of their proclamation and proof in Jesus Christ.
He who owned the simple trust of the first four verses, saying, 'Thou art
right, I am the Good Shepherd,' so that since He walked on earth the name
is no more a mere metaphor of God, but the dearest, strongest reality
which has ever visited this world of shadows--He also has been proved by
men as the Host and Defender of all who seek His aid from the memory and
the pursuit of sin. So He received them in the days of His flesh, as they
drifted upon Him across the wilderness of life, pressed by every evil with
which it is possible for sin to harry men. To Him they were all 'guests of
God,' welcomed for His sake, irrespective of what their past might have
been. And so, being lifted up, He still draws us to Himself, and still
proves Himself able to come between us and our past. Whatever we may flee
from He keeps it away, so that, although to the last, for penitence, we
may be reminded of our sins, and our enemies come again and again to the
open door of memory, in Him we are secure. He is our defence, and our
peace is impregnable.




PSALM XXXVI

THE GREATER REALISM


Like the twenty-third Psalm, the thirty-sixth seems to fall into two
unconnected parts, but with this difference, that while both of the
twenty-third are understood by us, and heartily enjoyed, of the
thirty-sixth we appreciate only those verses, 5-10, which contain an
adoration of God's mercy and righteousness. Verses 1-4, a study of sin,