Divine Teacher
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human agent at the footstool of mercy. “Ask, and it shall be given you,”
he promised; “seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened
unto you.” “If ye shall ask anything in my name, I will do it. If ye love
me, keep my commandments.” “He that hath my commandments, and
keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and I will love him, and will
manifest myself to him.” “As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved
you: continue ye in my love. If ye keep my commandments, ye shall
abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and
abide in his love.”
These lessons Christ gave in his teaching, showing that the ritual
service was passing away, and possessed no virtue. “The hour cometh,”
he said, “and now is, when the true worshipers shall worship the Father
in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God
is a Spirit; and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and
in truth.” True circumcision is the worship of Christ in spirit and truth,
not in forms and ceremonies, with hypocritical pretense.
The deep necessity of man for a divine teacher was known in
heaven. The pity and sympathy of God were exercised in behalf of
man, fallen and bound to Satan’s chariot car; and when the fulness
of time was come, he sent forth his Son. The One appointed in the
counsels of heaven came to the earth as an instructor. He was no less
a being than the Creator of the world, the Son of the Infinite God.
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The rich benevolence of God gave him to our world; and to meet
the necessities of humanity, he took on him human nature. To the
astonishment of the heavenly host, he walked this earth as the Eternal
Word. Fully prepared, he left the royal courts to come to a world
marred and polluted with sin. Mysteriously he allied himself to human
nature. “The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.” God’s excess
of goodness, benevolence, and love was a surprise to the world, of
grace which could be realized, but not told.
That Christ, during his childhood, should grow in wisdom, and in
favor with God and man, was not a matter of astonishment; for it was
according to the laws of his divine appointment that his talents should
develop, and his faculties strengthen by exercise. He sought neither the
schools of the prophets nor the learning received from the rabbinical
teachers; he needed not the education gained in these schools; for God
was his instructor. When in the presence of the teachers and rulers, his
questions were instructive lessons, and he astonished the great men