was teaching them about the life and character of the
Lord Jesus. One day a new girl came in, fresh from the heathenism in
which she grew up, knowing nothing of the Gospel. She listened, and then
became quite intense and excited in her childish way, as she heard them
talking about some One, how good He was, how gentle, how He was always
teaching and helping the people around Him. At last she could restrain her
eagerness no longer, but blurted out, "I know that man; he lives near us."
It was found that she did not know about Christ, but supposed they were
speaking of a very earnest native Christian man living in her
neighbourhood. She had mistaken her neighbour for Jesus. How glad that man
must have been if he ever knew. This was a part of our Lord's plan.

And at the very end, these successive invitations took the shape of a
command, which was both a permission and an order,--"Go ye."[33] Men who
had taken to heart, one after another, these invitations were ready for
the command. They would be eager for it. The invitations were the Master's
preparation for the command. He could trust such men to go, and to keep
steady and true as they went, in the power He gave them. There is one word
that you find in all these invitations--"Me." They all centre about the
Lord Jesus. He is the centre of gravity drawing every one, in ever growing
nearness and meaning, to Himself. It is only when we have been drawn into
closest touch with Him that we are qualified to "go" to others. It's only
Himself in us, only as much of Himself as is in us, that will be helpful
to any one else, or will make any one else willing to break with his old
way. He is the only magnet to draw men away from the old life up to
Himself.

"Follow Me."

But there's one other invitation which belongs in this list. It proves to
be the greatest of them all, because you come to find it includes all
these others. It's His "Follow Me." It seems at first glance to be the
same as that "Come after Me." But it is the word He repeated again and
again, under different circumstances, with added explanations, to the same
men, until you feel that He meant it to stand out as the great invitation
to His disciples. It seems to mean different things at different times.
That is to say, it grew in its significance. It came to mean more than it
had seemed to.

Peter is a good illustration here. The word really came to him five times,
with a different, an added, meaning each tim