n heart who see God. There is still a positive rain of
smut and filth in the world around; there is a recognition of the evil
tendencies of the self-life, which will assert themselves unless
graciously restrained; but triumphing above all is the purity of the
indwelling Lord, who Himself becomes in us the quality for which holy
souls eagerly long.

XI

Three Paradoxes

"I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you."

"The world seeth Me no more; but ye see Me."

"Because I live, ye shall live also."--JOHN xiv. 18, 19.

The Bible and Christian life are full of paradoxes. Paul loved to
enumerate them; they abound also in the discourses of our Lord. Here
are three.

The Master had declared His purpose of leaving His apostles and friends
and returning to His Father: but in the same breath He says, "I will
not leave you desolate; I come to you."

Again, He had forewarned them that He would be hidden from them; yet
now He tells them that they would still behold Him.

Further, with growing emphasis and clearness, He had unfolded His
approaching death by the cruel Roman method of the cross; yet He claims
the timeless life of an ever-present tense and insists that their life
will depend on His.

Absent, yet present; hidden, yet visible; dying, yet living and
life-giving--such are the paradoxes of this paragraph in His marvellous
farewell discourse; and they reveal three facts of which we may live in
perpetual cognizance.

I. WE MAY ENJOY THE PERPETUAL RECOGNITION OF THE ADVENT OF CHRIST.--"I
will not leave you orphans, or desolate, I come unto you" (R. V.).
Note the majesty of those last words; they are worthy of Deity; He
speaks as though He were always drawing nigh those He loves: "I come
unto you."

_Christ is always present, yet He comes._--The Creator had been always
immanent in His universe, but He came in each creative act; the
Lawgiver had been ever-present in the Church in the wilderness, but He
came down on Sinai, and His glory lit up the peaks of sandstone rock;
the Deliverer was never for a moment absent from the side of the
Shepherd-King, but in answer to His cry for help He came down riding
upon a cherub, flying on the wings Of wind; the Holy Spirit had been in
the world from the earliest days of prayer and inspired speech, but He
came down from the throne to sit on each bowed head in lambent flame.
So Christ is with us all the days, yet He comes. He will come at last
to recei