Chapter I: THE DIVINE IMMANENCE.--"We will make our abode." The word "abode"

is here a translation of the Greek word which is rendered "mansions" in a former part of this chapter. "We will make our _mansion_ with Him." God is willing to become the mansion of the soul that believes in Christ, but asks in return that such a one should prepare a guest-chamber, and become a mansion in which He may dwell. As He steals with noiseless tread into the loving, believing heart, I hear Him say, "This is My rest forever; here will I dwell, for I have desired it."

(1) _It is the Immanence of the Father._--Consider who this is of whom the Saviour speaks. The infinite God! Time with all its ages is but the flash of a moment in His eternity! Space, "beyond the soar of angel wings," is but a corner in His dwelling-place; matter, with its ponderous mass, but the light dust that will not affect the level of the scale! The mighty sun, which is the centre of all worlds, but a mote floating in the beam of His being! All the gathered wisdom of man, stored in the libraries of the world, but as a glow-worm's spark compared with the meridian light of His wisdom! O souls of men, consider how marvellous that such a One, whom the heavens cannot contain, who overflows their limits, asking for room that He may dwell, will yet become the resident of our nature!

_Its motive is Love._--"The Father will love him." This is wonderful! The more so as we are told that His love toward us is identical with that which He has toward our Lord. Speaking of those who shall believe through His apostles' words, Jesus said, "That the world may know that Thou lovest them even as Thou lovest Me." That God should condescend to think about our planet, which is as a leaf in the forest of being! That He should deign to regard mankind, who, in size at least, are less than a colony of ants that may have built their home at the foot of the Himalaya! That He should pity our race! This were much. But that He should _love_ the world, that He should _love_ individuals belonging to our race, that He should love them with the love He has toward the Only-begotten--we could not have believed this unless we had been assured by the lips of infallible Truth. But the supreme revelation which towers above the rest, like some great banyan tree amid the slender growth of the Indian forest, is that the Creator should indwell and find a mansion in the heart of His creatures.

_It is dual, yet one._--"We will come." We! Then, is there more than One? Who is this who dares class Himself with the supreme God within the limits of a common pronoun, that challenges the love and trust and obedience of man, that poses as King? The meekest and humblest of men. The One who, above all others of the human family, seemed to have least to disturb or darken the incidence of the rays of truth upon His soul; who has cast a light on all the dark problems of human life, and could not possibly have been deceived in respect to His own nature. His conceptions of the holiness, greatness, and purity of God have stood out in unrivalled magnificence from all others whatsoever; yet it is He who couples in one small word His humanity with Deity, His meekness with the Infinite Majesty, His personality with God's. Is not this proof enough that He was conscious of His Divine nature? Is not the fact of His not counting it robbery to be equal with God evidence that He was God? What can they make of this _We_, who hold that He was only a good man and a great teacher? Good men are humble men, great teachers know best their own limitations!

It is in, and with, and through the Son, and by the Spirit, that the Father comes to indwell.

(2) _It is the Immanence of the Son. To be loved by Him were much!_--"I will love Him." His love is of the rarest quality. Most free of the soil of selfishness, of any human love. True and tender, strong and sweet, inexorable in its demands upon Himself, inexhaustible in its outflow toward the objects of His affectionate regard. Such love as He gave to John, who grew like Him beneath the magic power of that environment; as He gave to Mary, who perhaps most deeply understood Him; as He gave to Peter, winning him back from his waywardness--brings with it a heaven of bliss, for which a man may well be prepared to count all things but loss. But there is a bliss beyond all this. The Lover of men would indwell them.

_It were much that He should seek our love._--"He that loveth Me." We might have supposed that He would have been satisfied with the vastness of His dominion, and the myriad bright spirits that wait on His word! But no, the thirst for love cannot be satisfied with gold, or bright angelic servants. As Isaac could not find a companion among those who tended the cattle that browsed over the wolds of Canaan, or the troops of slaves that gathered round his father's tents, but Eliezer must bring a bride from across the desert; so the Son of God must needs come as a suitor to our world to find His Bride, who can share His inner thoughts and purposes. Here is a marvel indeed. As the village becomes famous which provides the emperor's bride, so earth, though it be least among her sister-spheres, shall have the proud preëminence of having furnished from her population the Spouse of the Lamb. But, great as this marvel is, it is followed by the greater, that the Immortal Lover is willing to tenant the poor hearts, whose love at the best is so faint and cold.

_It were much that He should give us manifestations of His love._--"I will manifest Myself unto him." Have you not sometimes taken up a daisy, and looked into its little upturned eye, and thought and thought again, till through the gate of the flower you have passed into an infinite world of life, beauty, and mystery? There are moments when even a flower is transfigured before us, and manifests itself to us as a thought of God, a ray of His glory, the frail product of His infinite mind, the wick around which trembles the fire of the Shekinah! Have you not sometimes stood alone amid mountains, glaciers, wooded valleys, and rushing streamlets, till nature has dropped her veil, and revealed herself in a phase of beauty and a depth of meaning which struck you as altogether unique and singular? So there are moments in the life of the believer, when Christ, who is ever with us, manifests Himself as He does not to the world. There is borne in upon the spirit a consciousness that He is near; there is a waft of His breath, a savor of His fragrant dress, fresh from the ivory palaces.

All this is much: but how much more to be told that this glorious Christ, the Fellow of Jehovah, who with the Father and the Spirit is God; the Organ of creation; the Mouthpiece of the Godhead; the Mediator of Redemption; the Monarch of all worlds; the Supreme Teacher, Guide, and Saviour of men--is prepared to repeat the experiences of Bethlehem, and make His abode in man! "_We_ will come unto Him, and make our abode with Him."

(3) _Learn to revere the work of God in the souls of others._--"For thy meat," said the apostle, "destroy not the soul for whom Christ died." He might have added, "and in whom Christ lives." Weak and erring, trying and vexatious, that fellow-believer may be, yet there is a chamber in his nature in which God has already taken up His abode. The conflict between the light and darkness, the Christ-spirit and the self-spirit, may be long and arduous, but the issue is certain. Help, but do not hinder the process. Be reverent, careful, mindful of the presence of God.

_Be hopeful for thyself._--When an art-student asked Mr. Ruskin whether he would ever be able to paint like Turner, the great critic replied, "It is more likely that you will become Emperor of all the Russias!" But God never daunts a soul with such discouragement. He first sets before it a great ideal--the faith of Abraham, the meekness of Moses, the prayer of an Elijah, the love of a John--and then, as the source of all perfection, enters the soul, to be in it all that He has taught it to desire.

_Count on the indwelling of His power._--The merchant of to-day has facilities granted to no previous age. The cablegram, telegram, and telephone put him in communication with the markets of the world: steam and electricity are his willing slaves in manufacture: machinery with its unwearying iron fingers toils for him. A single human brain, which knows how to avail itself of these resources, can multiply its conceptions indefinitely. How vast the space between the untutored savage, doing everything with his hands, and the merchant prince, who has but to press the ivory-plated pushes fixed upon the walls of his room! But not less is the difference between the work we can accomplish by our natural resources, and that which we achieve when we recognize that what is impossible to us is possible to Him who has come in to abide. I cannot; but God is within me, and He can.