The Death of Christ
A Sermon
(No. 173)
Delivered on Sabbath Morning, January 24, 1858, by the
REV. C.H. SPURGEON
at the Music Hall, Royal Surrey Gardens.
"Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when
thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he
shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in
his hand."–Isaiah 53:10.
WHAT myriads of eyes are casting their glances at the sun! What
multitudes of men lift up their eyes, and behold the starry orbs of
heaven! They are continually watched by thousands–but there is one
great transaction in the world's history, which every day commands far
more spectators than that sun which goeth forth like a bridegroom,
strong to run his race. There is one great event, which every day
attracts more admiration than do the sun, and moon, and stars, when
they march in their courses. That event is, the death of our Lord Jesus
Christ. To it, the eyes of all the saints who lived before the
Christian era were always directed; and backwards, through the thousand
years of history, the eyes of all modern saints are looking. Upon
Christ, the angels in heaven perpetually gaze. "Which things the angels
desire to look into," said the apostle. Upon Christ, the myriad eyes of
the redeemed are perpetually fixed; and thousands of pilgrims, through
this world of tears, have no higher object for their faith, and no
better desire for their vision, than to see Christ as he is in heaven,
and in communion to behold his person. Beloved, we shall have many with
us, whilst this morning we turn our face to the Mount of Calvary. We
shall not be solitary spectators of the fearful tragedy of our
Saviour's death: we shall but dart our eyes to that place which is the
focus of heaven's joy and delight, the cross of our Lord and Saviour
Jesus Christ.
Taking our text, then, as a guide, we propose to visit Calvary, hoping
to have the help of the Holy Spirit whilst we look upon him who died
upon the cross. I would have you notice this morning, first of all, the
cause of Christ's death–"It pleased the Lord to bruise him." "It
pleased Jehovah to bruise him," saith the original; "he hath put him to
grief." Secondly, the reason of Christ's death–"When thou shalt make
his soul an offering for sin." Christ died because he was an offering
for sin. And then, thirdly, the effects and consequences of Christ's
death. "He shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the
pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand." Come, Sacred Spirit,
now, whilst we attempt to speak on these matchless themes.
I. First, we have THE ORIGIN OF CHRIST'S DEATH. "It pleased Jehovah to
bruise him; he hath put him to griefs." He who reads Christ's life, as
a mere history, traces the death of Christ to the enmity of the Jews,
and to the fickle character of the Roman governor. In this he acteth
justly, for the crime and sin of the Saviour's death must lay at the
door of manhood. This race of ours became a deicide and slew the Lord,
and nailed its Saviour to a tree. But he who reads the Bible with the
eye of faith, desiring to discover its hidden secrets, sees something
more in the Saviour's death than Roman cruelty, or Jewish malice: he
sees the solemn decree of God fulfilled by men, who were the ignorant,
but guilty instruments of its accomplishment. He looks beyond the Roman
spear and nail, beyond the Jewish taunt and jeer, up to the Sacred
Fount, whence all things flow, and traces the crucifixion of Christ to
the breast of Deity. He believes with Peter–"Him, being delivered by
the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by
wicked hands have crucified and slain." We dare not impute to God the
sin, but at the same time the fact, with all its marvelous effects in
the world's redemption, we must ever trace to the Sacred Fountain of
divine love. So cloth our prophet. He says, "It pleased Jehovah to
bruise him. He overlooks both Pilate and Herod, and traces it to the
heavenly Father, the first Person in the Divine Trinity. "It pleased
the Lord to bruise him, he hath put him to grief."
Now, beloved, there be many who think that God the Father is at best
but an indifferent spectator of salvation. Others do belie him still
more. They look upon Him as an unloving, severe Being, who had no love
to the human race, and could only be made loving by the death and
agonies of our Saviour. Now, this is a foul libel upon the fair and
glorious grace of God the Father, to whom for ever be honor: for Jesus
Christ did not die to make God loving, but he died because God was
loving.
"Twas not to make Jehovah's love
Toward his people flame,
That Jesus from the throne above,
A suffering man became.
"Twas not the death which he endured,
Nor all the pangs he bore,
That God's eternal love procured,
For God was love before."
Christ was sent into the world by his Father, as the consequence of the
Father's affection for his people. Yea, he "so loved the world, that he
gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not
perish, but have everlasting life. The fact is, that the Father as much
decreed salvation, as much effected it, and as much delighted in it, as
did either God the Son, or God the Holy Spirit. And when we speak of
the Saviour of the world, we must always include in that word, if we
speak in a large sense, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy
Ghost, for all these three, as one God, do save us from our sins. The
text puts away every hard thought concerning the Father, by telling us
that it pleased Jehovah to bruise Jesus Christ. The death of Christ is
traceable to God the Father. Let us try if we can see it is so.
1. First it is traceable in decree. God, the one God of heaven and
earth, hath the book of destiny entirely in his power. In that book
there is nothing written by a stranger's hand. The penmanship of the
solemn book of predestination is from beginning to end entirely divine.
"Chained to his throne a volume lies,
With all the fates of men,
With every angel's form and size
Drawn by th' eternal pen."
No inferior hand hath sketched even so much as the least minute parts
of providence. It was all, from its Alpha to its Omega, from its divine
preface to its solemn finis, marked out, designed, sketched, and
planned by the mind of the all-wise, all-knowing God. Hence, not even
Christ's death was exempt from it. He that wings an angel and guides a
sparrow, he that protects the hairs of our head from falling
prematurely to the ground, was not likely, when he took notice of such
little things, to omit in his solemn decrees the greatest wonder of
earth's miracles, the death of Christ. No; the blood-stained page of
that book, the page which makes both past and future glorious with
golden words,–that blood-stained page, I say, was as much written of
Jehovah, as any other. He determined that Christ should be born of the
Virgin Mary, that he should suffer under Pontius Pilate, that he should
descend into Hades, that thence he should rise again, leading captivity
captive, and then should reign for ever at the right hand of the
Majesty on high. Nay, I know not but that I shall have Scripture for my
warrant when I say, that this is the very core of predestination, and
that the death of Christ is the very center and main-spring by which
God did fashion all his other decrees, making this the bottom and
foundation-stone upon which the sacred architecture should be builded.
Christ was put to death by the absolute foreknowledge and solemn decree
of God the Father, and in this sense "it pleased the Lord to bruise
him; he hath put him to grief."
2. But a little further, Christ's coming into the world to die was the
effect of the Father's will and pleasure. Christ came not into this
world unsent. He had laid in Jehovah's bosom from before all worlds,
eternally delighting himself in his Father, and being himself his
Father's eternal joy. "In the fullness of time" God did rend his Son
from his bosom, his only-begotten Son, and freely delivered him up for
us all. Herein was matchless, peerless love, that the offended judge
should permit his co-equal Son to suffer the pains of death for the
redemption of a rebellious people. I want your imaginations for one
minute to picture a scene of olden times. There is a bearded patriarch,
who rises early in the morning and awakes his son, a young man full of
strength, and bids him arise and follow him. They hurry from the house
silently and noiselessly, before the mother is awake. They go three
days, journey with their men; until they come to the Mount, of which
the Lord hath spoken. You know the patriarch. The name of Abraham is
always fresh in our memories. On the way, that patriarch speaks not one
solitary word to his son. His heart is too full for utterance. He is
overwhelmed with grief. God has commanded him to take his son, his only
son, and slay him upon the mountain as a sacrifice. They go together;
and who shall paint the unutterable anguish of the father's soul,
whilst he walks side by side with that beloved son, of whom he is to be
the executioner? The third day has arrived; the servants are bidden to
stay at the foot of the hill, whilst they go to worship God yonder.
Now, can any mind imagine how the father's grief must overflow all the
banks of his soul, when, as he walked up that hill-side, his son said
to him, "Father, behold the fire and the wood; but where is the lamb
for a burnt-offering?" Can you conceive how he stifled his emotions,
and, with sobs, exclaimed, "My son, God will provide himself a lamb."
See! the father has communicated to his son the fact that God has
demanded his life. Isaac, who might have struggled and escaped from his
father, declares that he is willing to die, if God hath decreed it. The
father takes his son, binds his hands behind his back, piles up the
stones, makes an altar, lays the wood, and has his fire ready. And now
where is the artist that can depict the anguish of the fathers
countenance, when the knife is unsheathed, and he holds it up, ready to
slay his son? But here the curtain falls. Now the black scene vanishes
at the sound of a voice from heaven. The ram caught in the thicket
supplies the substitute, and faith's obedience need go no further. Ah!
my brethren, I want to take you from this scene to a far greater one.
What faith and obedience made man do, that love constrained God himself
to do. He had but one son, that son his own heart's delight: he
covenanted to yield him up for our redemption, nor did he violate his
promise; for, when the fullness of time was come, he sent his Son to be
born of the Virgin Mary, that he might suffer for the sins of man. O!
can ye tell the greatness of that love, which made the everlasting God
not only put his Son upon the altar, but actually do the deed, and
thrust the sacrificial knife into his Son's heart? Can you think how
overwhelming must have been the love of God toward the human race, when
he completed in act what Abraham only did in intention? Look ye there,
and see the place where his only Son hung dead upon the cross, the
bleeding victim of awakened justice! Here is love indeed; and here we
see how it was, that it pleased the Father to bruise him.
3. This allows me to push my text just one point further. Beloved, it
is not only true that God did design and did permit with willingness
the death of Christ; it is moreover, true that the unutterable agonies
that clothed the death of the Saviour with superhuman terror, were the
effect of the Father's bruising of Christ in very act and deed. There
is a martyr in prison: the chains are on his wrists, and yet he sings.
It has been announced to him that to-morrow is his burning day. He
claps his hands right merrily, and smiles while he says, "It will be
sharp work to-morrow, I shall breakfast below on fiery tribulations,
but afterward I will sup with Christ. Tomorrow is my wedding-day, the
day for which I have long panted, when I shall sign the testimony of my
life by a glorious deaths." The time is come; the men with the halberts
precede him through the streets. Mark the serenity of the martyrs
countenance. He turns to some who look upon him, and exclaims, "I value
these iron chains far more than if they had been of gold; it is a sweet
thing to die for Christ. There are a few of the boldest of the saints
gathered round the stake, and as he unrobes himself, ere he stands upon
the fagots to receive his doom, he tells them that it is a joyous thing
to be a soldier of Christ, to be allowed to give his body to be burned;
and he shakes hands with them, and bids them "Good by" with merry
cheer. One would think he were going to a bridal, rather than to be
burned. He steps upon the fagots; the chain is put about his middle;
and after a brief word of prayer, as soon as the fire begins to ascend,
he speaks to the people with manful boldness. But hark! he sings whilst
the fagots are crackling and the smoke is blowing upward. He sings, and
when his nether parts are burned, he still goes on chanting sweetly
some psalm of old. "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help
in trouble; therefore will we not fear, though the earth be removed and
the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea."
Picture another scene. There is the Saviour going to his cross, all
weak and wan with suffering; his soul is sick and sad within him. There
is no divine composure there. So sad is his heart, that he faints in
the streets. The Son of God faints beneath a cross that many a criminal
might have carried. They nail him to the tree. There is no song of
praise. He is lifted up in the air, and there he hangs preparatory to
his death. You hear no shout of exultation. There is a stern
compression of his face, as if unutterable agony were tearing his
heart–as if over again Gethsemane were being acted on the cross–as if
his soul were still saying, "If it be possible let this cross pass from
me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt." Hark! he speaks.
Will he not sing sweeter songs than ever came from martyr's lips? Ah!
no; it is an awful wail of woe that can never be imitated. "My God, my
God, why hast thou forsaken me?" The martyrs said not that: God was
with them. Confessors of old cried not so, when they came to die. They
shouted in their fires, and praised God on their racks. Why this? Why
doth the Saviour suffer so? Why, beloved, it was because the Father
bruised him. That sunshine of God's countenance that has cheered many a
dying saint, was withdrawn from Christ; the consciousness of acceptance
with God, which has made many a holy man espouse the cross with joy,
was not afforded to our Redeemer, and therefore he suffered in thick
darkness of mental agony. Read the 22nd Psalm, and learn how Jesus
suffered. Pause over the solemn words in the 1st, 2nd, 6th, and
following verses. Underneath the church are the ever lasting arms; but
underneath Christ there were no arms at all, but his Father's hand
pressed heavily against him; the upper and the nether mill-stones of
divine wrath pressed and bruised him; and not one drop of joy or
consolation was afforded to him. "It pleased Jehovah to bruise him; he
hath put him to grief." This, my brethren, was the climax of the
Saviour's woe, that his Father turned away from him, and put him to
grief.
Thus have I expounded the first part of the subject–the origin of our
Saviour's worst sufferings, the Father's pleasure.
II. Our second head must explain the first, or otherwise it is an
insolvable mystery how God should bruise his Son, who was perfect
innocence, while poor fallible confessors and martyrs have had no such
bruising from him in the time of their trial. WHAT WAS THE REASON OF
THE SAVIOUR'S SUFFERING? We are told here, "Thou shalt make his soul an
offering for sin." Christ was thus troubled, because his soul was an
offering for sin. Now, I am going to be as plain as I can, while I
preach over again the precious doctrine of the atonement of Christ
Jesus our Lord. Christ was an offering for sin, in the sense of a
substitute. God longed to save; but, if such a word may be allowed,
Justice tied his hands. "I must be just," said God; "that is a
necessity of my nature. Stern as fate, and fast as immutability, is the
truth that I must be just. But then my heart desires to forgive–to
pass by man's transgressions and pardon them. How can it be done?
Wisdom stepped in, and said, "It shall be done thus;" and Love agreed
with Wisdom. "Christ Jesus, the Son of God, shall stand in man's place,
and he shall be offered upon Mount Calvary instead of man. Now, mark:
when you see Christ going up the Mount of Doom, you see man going
there: when you see Christ hurled upon his back, upon the wooden cross,
you see the whole company of his elect there; and when you see the
nails driven through his blessed hands and feet, it is the whole body
of his Church who there, in their substitute, are nailed to the tree.
And now the soldiers lift the cross, and dash it into the socket
prepared for it. His bones are every one of them dislocated, and his
body is thus torn with agonies which can not be described. Tis manhood
suffering there; tis the Church suffering there, in the substitute. And
when Christ dies, you are to look upon the death of Christ, not as his
own dying merely, but as the dying of all those for whom he stood as
the scape-goat and the substitute. It is true, Christ died really
himself; it is equally true that he did not die for himself, but died
as the substitute, in the room, place, and stead of all believers. When
you die you will die for yourselves; when Christ died, he died for you,
if you be a believer in him. When you pass through the gates of the
grave, you go there solitary and alone; you are not the representative
of a body of men, but you pass through the gates of death as an
individual; but, remember, when Christ went through the sufferings of
death, he was the representative Head of all his people.
Understand, then, the sense in which Christ was made a sacrifice for
sin. But here lies the glory of this matter. It was as a substitute for
sin that he did actually and literally suffer punishment for the sin of
all his elect. When I say this, I am not to be understood as using any
figure whatever, but as saying actually what I mean. Man for his sin
was condemned to eternal fire; when God took Christ to be the
substitute, it is true, he did not send Christ into eternal fire, but
he poured upon him grief so desperate, that it was a valid payment for
even an eternity of fire. Man was condemned to live forever in hell.
God did not send Christ forever into hell; but he put on Christ,
punishment that was equivalent for that. Although he did not give
Christ to drink the actual hells of believers, yet he gave him a quid
pro quo–something that was equivalent thereunto. He took the cup of
Christ's agony, and he put in there, suffering, misery, and anguish
such as only God can imagine or dream of, that was the exact equivalent
for all the suffering, all the woe, and all the eternal tortures of
every one that shall at last stand in heaven, bought with the blood of
Christ. And you say, "Did Christ drink it all to its dregs?" Did he
suffer it all? Yes, my brethren, he took the cup, and
"At one triumphant draught of love,
He drank damnation dry."
He suffered all the horror of hell: in one pelting shower of iron wrath
it fell upon him, with hail-stones bigger than a talent; and he stood
until the black cloud had emptied itself completely. There was our
debt; huge and immense; he paid the utmost farthing of whatever his
people owed; and now there is not so much as a doit or a farthing due
to the justice of God in the way of punishment from any believer; and
though we owe God gratitude, though we owe much to his love, we owe
nothing to his justice; for Christ in that hour took all our sins,
past, present, and to come, and was punished for them all there and
then, that we might never be punished, because he suffered in our
stead. Do you see, then, how it was that God the Father bruised him?
Unless he had so done the agonies of Christ could not have been an
equivalent for our sufferings; for hell consists in the hiding of God's
face from sinners, and if God had not hidden his face from Christ,
Christ could not–I see not how he could–have endured any suffering
that could have been accepted as an equivalent for the woes and agonies
of his people.
Methinks I heard some one say, "Do you mean us to understand this
atonement that you have now preached as being a literal fact?" I say,
most solemnly, I do. There are in the world many theories of atonement;
but I can not see any atonement in any one, except in this doctrine of
substitution. Many divines say that Christ did something when he died
that enabled God to be just, and yet the Justifier of the ungodly. What
that something is they do not tell us. They believe in an atonement
made for every body; but then, their atonement is just this. They
believe that Judas was atoned for just as much as Peter; they believe
that the damned in hell were as much an object of Jesus Christ's
satisfaction as the saved in heaven; and though they do not say it in
proper words, yet they must mean it, for it is a fair inference, that
in the case of multitudes, Christ died in vain, for he died for them
all, they say; and yet so ineffectual was his dying for them, that
though he died for them they are damned afterward. Now, such an
atonement I despise–I reject it. I may be called Antinomian or
Calvinist for preaching a limited atonement; but I had rather believe a
limited atonement that is efficacious for all men for whom it was
intended, than an universal atonement that is not efficacious for
anybody, except the will of man be joined with it. Why, my brethren, if
we were only so far atoned for by the death of Christ that any one of
us might afterward save himself, Christ's atonement were not worth a
farthing, for there is no man of us can save himself–no, not under the
gospel; for if I am to be saved by faith, if that faith is to be my own
act, unassisted by the Holy Spirit, I am as unable to save myself by
faith as to save myself by good works. And after all, though men call
this a limited atonement, it is as effectual as their own fallacious
and rotten redemptions can pretend to be. But do you know the limit of
it? Christ hath bought a "multitude that no man can number." The limit
of it is just this: He hath died for sinners; whoever in this
congregation inwardly and sorrowfully knows himself to be a sinner,
Christ died for him; whoever seeks Christ, shall know Christ died for
him; for our sense of need of Christ, and our seeking after Christ, are
infallible proofs that Christ died for us. And, mark, here is something
substantial. The Arminian says Christ died for him; and then, poor man,
he has but small consolation therefrom, for he says, "Ah! Christ died
for me; that does not prove much. It only proves I may be saved if I
mind what I am after. I may perhaps forget myself; I may run into sin
and I may perish. Christ has done a good deal for me, but not quite
enough, unless I do something." But the man who receives the Bible as
it is, he says, "Christ died for me, then my eternal life is sure. I
know," says he, "that Christ can not be punished in a man's stead, and
the man be punished afterwards. No," says he, "I believe in a just God,
and if God be just, he will not punish Christ first, and then punish
men afterwards. No; my Saviour died, and now I am free from every
demand of God's vengeance, and I can walk through this world secure; no
thunderbolt can smite me, and I can die absolutely certain that for me
there is no flame of hell, and no pit digged; for Christ, my ransom,
suffered in my stead, and, therefore, am I clean delivered. Oh!
glorious doctrine! I would wish to die preaching it! What better
testimony can we bear to the love and faithfulness of God than the
testimony of a substitution eminently satisfactory for all them that
believe on Christ? I will here quote the testimony of that
pre-eminently profound divine, Dr. John Owen:–"Redemption is the
freeing of a man from misery by the intervention of a ransom. Now, when
a ransom is paid for the liberty of a prisoner, does not justice demand
that he should have and enjoy the liberty so purchased for him by a
valuable consideration? If I should pay a thousand pounds for a man's
deliverance from bondage to him that retains him, who hath power to set
him free, and is contented with the price I give, were it not injurious
to me and the poor prisoner that his deliverance be not accomplished?
Can it possibly be conceived that there should be a redemption of men,
and those men not redeemed? That a price should be paid and the ransom
not consummated? Yet all this must be made true, and innumerable other
absurdities, if universal redemption be asserted. A price is paid for
all, yet few delivered; the redemption of all consummated, yet, few of
them redeemed; the judge satisfied, the jailer conquered, and yet the
prisoners inthralled! Doubtless 'universal,' and 'redemption,' where
the greatest part of men perish, are as irreconcilable as 'Roman, and
'Catholic.' If there be a universal redemption of all, then all men are
redeemed. If they are redeemed, then are they delivered from all
misery, virtually or actually, whereunto they were inthralled, and that
by the intervention of a ransom. Why, then, are not all saved? In a
word, the redemption wrought by Christ being the full deliverance of
the persons redeemed from all misery, wherein they were inwrapped, by
the price of his blood, it can not possibly be conceived to be
universal unless all be saved: so that the opinion of the Universalists
is unsuitable to redemption."
I pause once more; for I hear some timid soul say–"But, sir, I am
afraid I am not elect, and if so, Christ did not die for me." Stop sir!
Are you a sinner? Do you feel it? Has God, the Holy Spirit, made you
feel that you are a lost sinner? Do you want salvation? If you do not
want it it is no hardship that it is not provided for you; but if you
really feel that you want it, you are God's elect. If you have a desire
to be saved, a desire given you by the Holy Spirit, that desire is a
token for good. If you have begun believingly to pray for salvation,
you have therein a sure evidence that you are saved. Christ was
punished for you. And if now you can say,
"Nothing in my hands I bring,
Simply to the cross I cling."
you may be as sure you are God's elect as you are sure of your own
existence; for this is the infallible proof of election–a sense of
need and a thirst after Christ.
III. And now I have just to conclude by noticing the BLESSED EFFECTS of
the Saviour's death. On this I shall be very brief.
The first effect of the Saviour's death is, "He shall see his seed."
Men shall be saved by Christ. Men have offspring by life; Christ had an
offspring by death. Men die and leave their children, and they see not
their seed; Christ lives, and every day sees his seed brought into the
unity of the faith. One effect of Christ's death is the salvation of
multitudes. Mark, not a chance salvation. When Christ died the angel
did not say, as some have represented him, "Now by his death many may
be saved;" the word of prophecy had quenched all "buts" and
"peradventures;" "By his righteousness he shall justify many. There was
not so much as an atom of chance work in the Saviour's death. Christ
knew what he bought when he died; and what he bought he will
have–that, and no more, and no less. There is no effect of Christ's
death that is left to peradventure. "Shalls" and "wills" made the
covenant fast: Christ's bloody death shall effect its solemn purpose.
Every heir of grace shall meet around the throne,
"Shall bless the wonders of his grace,
And make his glories known."
The second effect of Christ's death is, "He shall prolong his days."
Yes, bless his name, when he died he did not end his life. He could not
long be held a prisoner in the tomb. The third morning came, and the
conqueror, rising from his sleep burst the iron bonds of death, and
came forth from his prison house, no more to die. He waited his forty
days, and then, with shouts of sacred song, he "led captivity captive,
and ascended up on high." "In that he died he died unto sin once; but
in that he liveth he liveth unto God," no more to die.
"Now by his Father's side he Sits,
And there triumphant reigns,"
the conqueror over death and hell.
And, last of all, by Christ's death the Father's good pleasure was
effected and prospered. God's good pleasure is, that that this world
shall one day be totally redeemed from sin; God's good pleasure is,
that this poor planet, so long swathed in darkness, shall soon shine
out in brightness, like a new-born sun. Christ's death hath done it.
The stream that flowed from his side on Calvary shall cleanse the world
from all its blackness. That hour of mid-day darkness was the rising of
a new sun of righteousness, which shall never cease to shine upon the
earth. Yes, the hour is coming when swords and spears shall be
forgotten things–when the harness of war and the pageantry of pomp
shall all be laid aside for the food of the worm or the contemplation
of the curious. The hour approacheth when old Rome shall shake upon her
seven hills, when Mohammed's crescent shall wane to wax no more, when
all the gods of the heathens shall lose their thrones and be cast out
to the moles and the bats; and then, when from the equator to the poles
Christ shall be honored, the Lord paramount of earth, when from land to
land, from the river even to the ends of the earth, one King shall
reign, one shout shall be raised, "Hallelujah, hallelujah, the Lord God
Omnipotent reigneth." Then, my brethren, shall it be seen what Christ's
death has accomplished, for "the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in
his hand."
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