calm of assured victory He comes. And the
"express image of the substance" of the Living God stands face to face
as Man with our awful foe, Death. And lo, He speaks but a
word--"Lazarus, come forth!"--and the glory of God shines forth with
exceeding brightness and beauty! Oh, joyous scene! oh, bright figure
of that morn, so soon approaching, when once again that blessed Voice
shall lift itself up in a "shout," that shall be heard, not in one, but
in every tomb of His people, and once more the glory of God shall so
shine in the ranks upon ranks of those myriads, that all shall again
fully justify His "waiting"!

It was indeed a blessed light that shone into the grave of Lazarus.
Such was its glory, that our spirits may quietly rest forever; for we
see our Lord and Eternal Lover is Conqueror and Lord of Death. Nor
need we ask, with our modern poet, who sings sweetly, but too much in
the spirit of Ecclesiastes,

Where wert thou, brother, those four days?
There lives no record of reply,
Which, telling what it is to die,
Had surely added praise to praise.

The resurrection of Lazarus does tell us what it is

for His redeemed to die. It tells that it is but a sleep for the body,
till He come to awaken it,--that those who thus sleep are not beyond
His power, and that a glorious resurrection shall soon "add praise to
praise" indeed.

But do not these blessed words give us a hint, at least, of the answer
to that most perplexing of all questions, Why was evil ever permitted
to disturb the harmony and mar the beauty of God's primal creation,
defile heaven itself, fill earth with corruption and violence, and
still exist even in eternity? Ah, we tread on ground here where we
need to be completely self-distrustful, and to cleave with absolute
confidence and dependence to the revelation of Himself!

The works of God must be manifested; and He is Light and Love, and
nothing but Light and Love. Every work of His, then, must speak the
source whence it comes, and be an expression of Light or Love; and the
end, when He shall again--finding everything very good--rest from His
work to enjoy that eternal sabbath, never to be broken, shall shew
forth absolutely in heaven, in earth, and in hell, that He is Light and
Love, and nothing but that.

Light and Love!--blending, harmonizing, in perfect equal manifestation,
in the cross of the Lord Jesus, and--Light now approving Love's
activity--in the righteous eternal redempt