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Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark by Alexander Maclaren
page 58 of 636 (09%)
fast'? Do you believe in a Christ whose bare will, thrown among
material things, makes them all plastic, as clay in the potter's
hands, whose mouth rebukes the demons and they flee, rebukes death and
it looses its grasp, rebukes the tempest and there is a calm, rebukes
disease and there comes health?

But this use of Christ's touch as apparent means for conveying His
miraculous power also serves as an illustration of a principle which
is exemplified in all His revelation, namely, the employment in
condescension to men's weakness, of outward means as the apparent
vehicles of His spiritual power. Just as by the material vehicle
sometimes employed for cure, He gave these poor sense-bound natures a
ladder by which their faith in His healing power might climb, so in
the manner of His revelation and communication of His spiritual gifts,
there is provision for the wants of us men, who ever need some body
for spirit to make itself manifest by, some form for the ethereal
reality, some 'tabernacle' for the 'sun.' 'Sacraments,' outward
ceremonies, forms of worship, are vehicles which the Divine Spirit
uses in order to bring His gifts to the hearts and the minds of men.
They are like the touch of the Christ which heals, not by any virtue
in itself, apart from His will which chooses to make it the apparent
medium of healing. All these externals are nothing, as the pipes of an
organ are nothing, until His breath is breathed through them, and then
the flood of sweet sound pours out.

Do not despise the material vehicles and the outward helps which
Christ uses for the communication of His healing and His life, but
remember that the help that is done upon earth, He does it all
Himself. Even Christ's touch is nothing, if it were not for His own
will which flows through it.
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