the ugly old name. Our tears flow less bitterly when we think of our
dear ones as 'sleeping in Jesus.' Their bodies, like this little
child's, are dead, but _they_ are not. They rest, conscious of
their own blessedness and of Him 'in whom they live, and have their
being,' whether they 'move' or no.

Then comes the great deed. The crowd is shut out. For such a work
silence is befitting. The father and mother, with His foremost three
disciples, go with Him into the chamber. There is no effort, repeated
and gradually successful, as when Elisha raised the dead boy; no
praying, as when Peter raised Dorcas; only the touch of the hand in
which life throbbed in fulness, and, as the other narratives record,
two words, spoken strangely to, and yet more strangely heard by, the
dull, cold ear of death. Their echo lingered long with Peter, and
Mark gives us them in the original Aramaic. But Matthew passes them
by, as he seems here to have desired to emphasise the power of
Christ's touch. But touch or word, the real cause of the miracle
was simply His will; and whether He used media to help men's faith,
or said only 'I will,' mattered little. He varied His methods as the
circumstances of the recipients required, and in order that they and
we might learn that He was tied to none. These miracles of raising
the dead are three in number. Jairus's daughter is raised from her
bed, just having passed away; the widow's son at Nain from his bier,
having been for a little longer separated from his body; Lazarus
from the grave, having been dead four days. A few minutes, or days,
or four thousand years, are one to His power. These three are in
some sense the first-fruits of the great harvest; the stars that
shone out singly before all the heaven is in a blaze. For, though
they died again, and so left to Him the precedence in resurrection,
as in all besides, they are still prophetic of His power in the hour