nifested Himself as the Light of the World, yet
the darkness does not comprehend Him; as the Shepherd of the Sheep, and
they will not hear His voice; as the Life of men, and they will not come
unto Him that they might have Life; as the impersonated love of God come
to dwell among men, sharing their sorrows and their joys, and men hate
Him the more, the more love He shows; as the Truth which could make men
free, and they choose to serve the father of lies, and to do his work.
And now, when He reveals Himself as the Resurrection and the Life,
possessed of the key to what is inaccessible to all others, of the power
most essential to man, they resolve upon His death. There was an
appropriateness in this. His love for His friends drew Him back at the
risk of His life to the neighbourhood of Jerusalem: it is as if to His
eye Lazarus represented all His friends, and He feels constrained to
come out from His safe retreat, and, at the risk of His own life,
deliver them from the power of death.

That this was in the mind of Jesus Himself is obvious. When He expresses
His resolve to go to His friends in Bethany, He uses an expression which
shows that He anticipated danger, and which at once suggested to the
disciples that He was running a great risk. "Let us go," not "to
Bethany" but "into Judaea again." His disciples say unto Him, "Master,
the Jews of late sought to stone Thee, and goest Thou thither again?"
The answer of Jesus is significant: "Are there not twelve hours in the
day?" That is to say: Has not every man his allotted time to work, his
day of light, in which he can walk and work, and which no danger nor
calamity can shorten? Can men make the sun set one hour earlier? So
neither can they shorten by one hour the day of life, of light, and toil
your God has appointed to you. Wicked men may grudge that God's sun
shine on the fields of their enemies and prosper them, but their envy
cannot darken or shorten the course of the sun: so may wicked men grudge
that I work these miracles, and do these deeds of My loving Father, but
I am as far above their reach as the sun in the heavens; until I have
run My appointed course their envy is impotent. The real danger begins
when a man tries to prolong his day, to turn night into day; the danger
begins when a man through fear turns aside from duty; he then loses the
only true guide and light of his life. A man's knowledge of duty, or
God's will, is the only true light he has to guide hi