Matthew 26:38

Matthew 26:38

The Valley of the Shadow of Death.

I. Whether death be easy or painful, it is appointed unto all men once to die. This everyone knows, so that each person thinks that he can gain nothing by hearing it repeated. But I imagine, that although we know that we shall die, yet we who move about in health and strength have a very faint and imperfect notion of what death is. Indeed, it is not more concealed from our spirit than it is shut out from our minds. It would be vain to say that we can by any means escape all its bitterness, most certainly we cannot; but we canmake this bitterness only a brief suffering of a few days or weeks, instead of the beginning of a miserable eternity. This we may gain, with God's blessing, by thinking seriously and frequently upon it.

II. It becomes us to accustom ourselves to consider death as something real, to make it a part of every day's serious thoughts; to bring steadily before our eyes the possibility that before the day closes which has now begun, it may be near, even at the doors. Will it be said that such thoughts would unfit us for our common business, or, at least, would stop all cheerfulness, and mark our countenances with a perpetual expression of gloom? Then we must still be in bondage to the weak and beggarly elements; we must be ignorant of the liberty which Christ has given us; or else our mirth and pleasure, and our business, must be such as Christ would condemn, and, in that case, we must, at whatever cost, get rid of them. For most certainly that is no fit employment and no Christian relaxation, in which we should be afraid to die; but either it is wrong in itself, or it takes us too much time, or it encourages us in a spirit of sloth, or pride, or carelessness. If it does none of these, and if it be pursued with thankfulness, as the gift of God, then the thought of death need not disturb or sadden it; we may go to it without scruple from our most solemn thoughts and prayers; and we may be called from it without fear if such be the will of God in the pangs of the most sudden death.

T. Arnold, Sermons,vol. i., p. 85.

Christ's Agony in the Garden.

I. It was in the soul rather than in the body that our blessed Saviour made atonement for transgression. He had put Himself in the place of the criminal, so far as it was possible for an innocent man to assume the position of the guilty; and standing in the place of the criminal with guilt imputed to Him, He had to bear the punishment that misdeeds had incurred. You must be aware that anguish of the soul more than of the body is the everlasting portion which is to be awarded to sinners, and we might well expect that our Lord's external affliction, however vast and accumulated, would be comparatively less in its rigour 01 accompaniments than His internal anguish, which is not to be measured or imagined. This expectation is quite borne out by the statements of Scripture, if carefully considered. Was it the mere thought of dying as a malefactor which so overcame the Redeemer that He needed strengthening by an angel from heaven? Was it this that wrung from Him the thrilling exclamation, "My soul is exceeding sorrowful?" Though we cannot explain what passed in the soul of the Redeemer, we would impress on you the truth, that it was in the soul rather than in the body that those dire pangs were endured which exhausted the curse denounced against sin.

II. It gives a preciousness to every means of grace, to consider it as brought into being by the agonies of the Redeemer. It would go far, were this borne in mind, to defend it against resistance or neglect if it were impressed on you that there is not a single blessing of which you are partakers that did not spring from this sorrow this sorrow unto death of the Redeemer's soul. Neither is it the worth only of the means of grace that we may learn from the mighty sorrow by which they were purchased; it is also our own worth, the worth of our own soul. If you read the form of the question, "What shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" you will see it implies that it is not within the empire of wealth to purchase the soul. But cannot this assume the form of another question What would God give in exchange for the soul? Here we have an answer, not of supposition, but of fact; we tell you what God has given, He has given Himself. Wonderful as it may be, the human soul is worth the incalculable price which was paid for its ransom.

H. Melvill, Penny Pulpit,No. 1,501.

Reference: Matthew 26:38. W. Gresley, Parochial Sermons,p. 189.