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The Epistle to the Hebrews and chapter two beginning in verse five. For not unto angels did he subject the world to come whereof we speak, but one has somewhere testified, saying, what is man that thou art mindful of him, or the son of man that thou visitest him? Thou madest him a little lower than the angels, thou crownest him with glory and honor, and did set him over the works of thy hands. Thou didst put all things in subjection under his feet. For in that he subjected all things to him, he left nothing that is not subject to him. And now we see not yet all things subjected to him, but we behold him who has been made a little lower than the angels, even Jesus, because of the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor, that by the grace of God he should taste death for every man. For it became him for whom are all things and through whom are all things, bringing many sons unto glory, to make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering. For both he that sanctifieth and they that are sanctified are all of one, for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the congregation will I sing thy praise. And again, I will put my trust in him. And again, behold, I and the children which God has given me. Since then the children are sharers in flesh and blood, he also himself in like manner partook of the same, that through death he might bring to naught him that had the power of death, that is the devil, and might deliver all them who through fear of death were all their lifetimes subject to bondage. For verily, not of angels does he take hold, but he taketh hold of the seed of Abraham. Wherefore it behoved him in all things to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For in that he himself has suffered being tempted, he is able to succour them also that are tempted. And may God give us good understanding of his holy work. I suspect all of us have from time to time gone out on a clear night and behold, beheld a star. As a special reward for my coming here to New Zealand, I was on Thursday night taken out across the road to my host next door neighbor, who is the proud possessor of a Dobsonian telescope. It is a marvelous form of telescope that I have often secretly coveted, but this is the first one I had actually seen in, uh, real life. He allowed me with great excitement to stand up on a chair and look through the eyepiece at the wonders of the night sky that you have here in the southern part of our world. What spectacular things they were. As he showed me the globular clusters and some of the distant galaxies that I had not before seen with my naked eye. Crowning glory of all, of course, is your Southern Cross, brilliant in the night sky that we poor Northerners are never allowed to see. I think there ought to be some law that taxes you more heavily than we ourselves are taxed in the Northern Hemisphere. But it's not an uncommon thing, I find, that when people go out and start looking at the stars, and the immensity of the wonder of it all, the overpowering majesty of the skies begins to sink through into their hearts and imaginations, they find it somewhat threatening. It reduces them, they feel, to such tiny little microbes crawling on the face of the earth that they begin to feel that they are insignificant, not only in their size, but in their life duration, compared with the stars whose ages we count in li- uh, whose distances we count in light years. People are brought up to think of the tiny span of life. What is your life, says Jane? It is but a vapor that appeareth and passeth away. Perhaps that is one of the reasons why astronomy is not very, uh, popular among people. It makes people feel so insignificant. And good believers in that situation are heard to exclaim, in the words of our passage, Oh Lord, what is man that thou art mindful of him, when I consider the stars and the heavens that thou had made? It is certainly good that our hearts be filled with awe, and we ourselves be cut down to proportionate size. But if viewing the stars should make us feel insignificant and small, and we cry out, O Lord, what is man, meaning how terribly insignificant we are, then we have drawn the utterly ob- opposite lesson from the experience that we should have drawn. When we consider the heavens and the stars that thou hast made, cried the psalmist, what is man? His answer is not some tiny little insignificant worm of a creature. His answer is in terms of the majesty of man as God originally designed him. Oh Lord, what is man? The answer comes, man is an exceedingly glorious creature, designed by God for supremacy, not only over this planet and its immediate celestial surrounds, destined one day to be lord and sovereign of the whole universe. That is God's concept of what he designed man to be. So let us hear again the words of Psalm eight. What is man that thou art mindful of him, or the son of man that thou visitest him? Thou madest him a little lower than the angels, that is true. For angels are spirit beings, pure spirits. Human beings are not pure. They are part spirit and part animal. Please, I'm not saying that human beings are animals just like that. There is a vast difference of gulf between animals and human beings. But human beings are animal, share physical contraptions with the beasts that roam around them, do they not? Stomachs and lungs and all sorts of other unmentionables, they'll say. Uh, man is part spirit and part animal. In that he is a little lower than the angel. Let him not be ashamed of that. Listen to the glory that God designed him to fill. Thou crownest him with glory and honor, and didst set him over the works of thy hand. Thou didst put all things in subjection under his feet, for in that he subjected all things to him, he left nothing, absolutely nothing, that is not subject to him. These are breathtaking ideas, aren't they? Can you take them in as to yourself? This is God's intention. In creating human beings, in creating mankind, God envisaged one day a whole universe, nothing except it, except God himself. Uh, uh, uh, should be subject to humankind. Or unto angels is he put in subjection, says the writer, the world to come of which we speak. But man to man is to be given that glorious role. Sit back a moment, my dear fellow believer, and allow yourself to enjoy it and revel in it. Put your fingers through the gold that one day shall be yours, and creation is delivered from her bondage to corruption and set free with the liberty of the glory of the children of God. That is God's estimate of humankind. Oh, how proud we Christians ought to be in the right sense of that term. For the atheist has no such hope. He struggles with his science to comprehend the universe, and that is a noble endeavor. But the atheist science is ultimately filled with pessimism. There is no hope for him individually. One day death shall claim him, and his massive intellect will come down to the dust and the bitterness of the grave. He holds that when that happens, there is nothing but meaningless emptiness for all eternity for him, in spite of his massive intellect and understanding. Not so, says God. That is a lie upon the very character of God. Did not make humanity to perish in the bitterness of the dust of death. He made him to be Lord, King, and sovereign of the whole of God's universe. Then the writer adds, but now as yet we see not yet all things subjected to him. And that is so true, isn't it? This same passage now is to be filled with suffering and with death. We have to face the realities of the situation. It is obvious that something has gone most seriously wrong. This, of course, is the ancient story of the fall. Man was made in the image of God and made to have dominion. The same chapter of Genesis that tells us that man was made to have dominion describes for us the conditions that God laid down on which man was to have dominion. So, for instance, in day one of the story of creation, God describes for us the lighting system that he organized for our world, and a very interesting lighting system it is proved to be. God said, let there be light, and there was light. Then he adds, and God divided the light from the darkness, and the light he called day, and the darkness he called night. Let's ponder those words for a few moments. God said, let there be light, and there was light. Evening and morning were one. But then God did a curious thing. Day, in the first instance, means the whole twenty four hours. But then, says God, he divided the light from the darkness, and he called the light day, and the darkness he called night. So why did he do that for? Why didn't he leave it like it was and just call it darkness and light? Why he called the light day and the darkness he called night? Because now the word day is going to be used in two different senses, isn't it? We use it in good New Zealand language, don't we, in that way. Somebody asks you, when is Aunt Matilda coming? You say next Thursday. Oh, I see, that's the day she's coming. Is she flying by day or by night? Oh, she says she's flying by night. Oh. So it says day, but it's night. You see, we're using the term in two different senses, aren't we? Why did God do it that way? Why did he, uh, uh, uh, arrange our lighting system in that fashion? You see why it is, of course, now you understand, every schoolboy understands, that when God organized our lighting system, he put it up in the sky, and he organized our world that once in twenty four hours it twizzles round. So for roughly twelve hours in the day, we are in the light, and then when we finished our work or not, whether we're ready or not, we are twizzled out of the light into the dark for another twelve hours, and that it is for every day of our existence on Earth. We are rationed for light. We get about twelve hours of it every day, and the rest we're in the dark. Why did God do it that way? He didn't have done it that way, need he? He could have equipped us with a lighting system inside us so that we could see our way around like glowworms or something, or like fish in the deep oceans of the sea. Why has God made our lighting system that way? I remember as a student, in my student days, walking along the road with, uh, a mathematician and a psychologist, and we were discussing the difference between the question how and why, and the important difference there is. And the psychologist got the impression that the mathematician hadn't understood. So, as we were walking down the road, there were some new lights put down the road, and they were these amber colored lights. And the psychologist said to the mathematician, tell me, why are those lights amber? And immediately the mathematician came off with a string of enormous great words, unpronounceable and incomprehensible, of physics and chemistry that explained round to the last detail, so he thought, why those lights were amber. And when he'd finished, the psychologist said, no, that's not the reason why they're amber at all. That's how they're amber. Why they are amber is that the city authorities decided that amber light was the best light to light the road with. We can see how we get our lighting system on Earth, sun up in the sky, and the Earth twizzles round. But if you ask, why did God do it that way? Why did God less ration the light every day of the week? Then it's not a how answer you want, it's a why answer. And our blessed Lord himself commented upon it when he was here on Earth. He had occasions, so we're told in John chapter eleven, to point out to his disciples the lighting system of our world, and when he did that, he drew a lesson from it. He said, if a man walks in the daylight, he doesn't stumble because he sees the light of the world, that is the sun up in the sky. But if he walks at night, he stumbles because, and here I shall have to translate his words, uh, literally, because the light is not in him. That's saying the obvious, isn't it? The light upon which we are dependent every day of our lives, it is our first number one necessity. Without light, there is no seeing, but without light there is no life. We are dependent for light and direction, for light and warmth, for our actual physical, uh, existence. The light that we are dependent upon every day of our week, every day of our lives, is not in us, not in our little world. We don't have the switch for it. It is outside our world. It is somewhat nineteen million miles or more outside our world, utterly beyond our power to control. So, as I say, we are, uh, hopelessly dependent upon it. Why has God done it that way? The answer is given by our Lord Jesus now as he applies the lesson, you'll see if we are prepared to walk in the light of God's will and word, we shall not stumble. If we try to walk outside God's will and word, we shall stumble and perish. God so designed our universe. One saying to man, look, I put you over the works of my hand, I want you to be my viceroy in creation, and one day to rule the whole universe, but on this condition, first you will learn to be utterly dependent upon God, his will, and his word. And had we eyes to see it still every twenty four hours of our life, preaches in our ears from nature around us that we are helplessly dependent on a light source outside ourselves and outside our world. We all remember the tragedy that happened when man, beguiled by the devil. Grasp that independence of God. God said, the devil whispered into the heart of Eve, has God said you mustn't eat of this tree that is in the midst of the garden, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil? Yes, said Eve, for he said that in the day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. Oh, nonsense, said Satan. You don't believe that old yarn, do you? Grow up, woman. Look at the tree. So she looked at the tree, and she saw that the tree was good for food. It was to satisfy your physical desires. And then she looked again, and she saw it was good to look at. That is to satisfy your aesthetic desires. And it was desirable to make you wise. That would satisfy your intellectual desires. Go on, said Satan, that's it. That's life, my dear woman. Physical satisfaction, intellectual satisfaction, and, uh, aesthetic satisfaction, that's life. You can enjoy that without God? Grow up, woman. The reason why God has told you not to eat it is because God is jealous of you. He wants to keep you down. He knows that in the day you eat thereof, you shall rise in creation. You shall be as God, able to take your own independent decisions and run the world as you like. Life. You don't need God for it. The woman took the fruit, with all its disastrous consequences. On that day, they began to die at every level of human experience. God turned them out of the garden, till the ground until they returned to the dust from which they were taken, the dust of death. What a vivid expression that is. And our passage will echo it this morning when we shall hear the writer talk about the taste of death. This is not just a brute fact, is it? Death has a taste to it. It has a scent to it. The fine intellects, that this beautiful woman over here, this ingenious scientist, this lovely baby, will come to the nothingness of the dust of death, come to it on times through the indignities of the stench of death. Oh, what a pall hangs over the human race, and what bitter experience, and what offensive pain. Ah, but courage up. Morning, as our chief duty and privilege, we are to assemble to remember the Lord's death. What curious people Christians are, you might think, that they should gather to remember and celebrate death, the Lord's death, till he comes. I'm told in some circles among believers today, the Lord's Supper has become very unpopular. People say it's too gloomy, it's too morbid, let's just cut it down, don't spend too long on it, let's get to the joyful things and the hand clapping and the singing. These are lovely, joyful things. Let's not delve too long on the Lord's death. All shame on us, my dear fellow believer, if thus we think. This chapter will teach us to see that the sufferings and death of our Lord Jesus Christ are not something to be ashamed of. These are our very glory. For it is by the suffering of death Christ is going to bring us to the full fulfillment of the glorious destiny that God himself designed for us. For here is a wonderful story, that when man revolted against God and fell and brought himself to the dust of death, God did not abandon his original purpose, but is determined to go on with it. What is man that thou art mindful of him? Thou hast found him with glory and honor and put him over the works of thy hand. Thou hast put all things under his feet. Granted, says the writer, that at this present moment we don't see all things yet under his feet. Death surrounds us at every turn, and man in the end appears to be a victim. But God hasn't abandoned his purpose. Indeed, as we sit here this morning, God's original purpose has moved on and is three quarters complete. For we see the man Jesus already crowned with glory and honor. Has crowned him with glory and honor. And why crowned with glory and honor? The writer say- tells us it's not in spite of the fact that he, uh, endured death. It's not that his death was an unfortunate accident that, uh, mercifully he overcame, and now in spite of dying, he is crowned with glory and honor. He is crowned with glory and honor because of his suffering of death. It will be with glory and triumph in our hearts that we surround the emblems of our Lord's body and his blood this morning, and praise him and glory in this, that for this very suffering of death, he is crowned with glory and with honor. Why is it a glory? Because his dying was in God's means and purpose, that he should taste death for everyone. Ponder it. Son of God was under no obligation to die. How could he die? God, therefore, when the human race sinned, could have banished the human race and let them perish in their misery, and introduced a new something, started again with the pre-incarnate Son of God. He could have carried on running the place by angels. But no, this is the amazing story. When we destroyed ourselves by disobedience and independence of God. God ordained that his own son should become a man like one of us and bring the human race to glory, be and eventually train to take over the dominion of the universe. If therefore he would bring us many sons to glory, he must first become one of us and deal with the great obstacle in the road. That obstacle was death. The penalty of human sin lay in the road of humanity like some vast mountain barring the way to glory. In himself, the blessed Son of God could have gone round the mountain or over the mountain. He had title deeds to the universe, being the Son of God. Instead, he became one of us. And the scheme was to bring us, to bring you and me. Just you imagine it. To bring us to glory. How could he do it? Oh, he must pay the penalty that our sin had incurred, becoming one of us. He tasted death for us, did not avoid death, went into death, all the marvel of it. He tasted death's waters, dark, bitter, offensive, and for his lost sheep, he went down to the grave. Oh, let it get hold of our hearts this morning. What a lovely redeemer he was. How could I ever regard his death as a boring subject, or a melancholy subject, or a morbid subject? There was a great mountain of my sin. There was a consequence of it in the form of death. God could not overlook my sin and take me to glory in spite of it. The only way for me to get to glory was to go through the penalty of death. Christ came along to do it for me. He tasted death for everyone. Is it not glorious? But what about the suffering? The next verse tells us, it became him for whom are all things and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering. It was the fitting thing, the only fitting way God could devise of bringing us to glory. The only fitting way was to make the captain of our salvation perfect through suffering. You could ask, I suppose, well, isn't God all powerful? Can't he do what he likes in the universe? He is the one, isn't he, for whom all things were made and by whom all things were made. He's the absolute omnipotent God of absolute power. Why can't he take us and take us to glory by an act of his power? Well, he could do if he wanted to. You wouldn't find it very comfortable. I'm telling you now, if by an act of power simply he removes you to glory. You see, if you like to, you can go to the jungles and get a tiger, and by an act of your power transform, transport the dear animal into your drawing room. Power can do that. That won't turn the tiger into a welcome guest in your house, house trained and taught how well to behave and use his knife and fork in the right way, will it, Watson? Take more than power to do that. God at this moment could take us to glory by an act of power. You suppose we should feel comfortable amongst the angels? How should we behave fit for glory? Not just God's power that does it. We have got to be led to glory along a path of experience. Not only our sins forgiven, but all those unattractive, ugly behavior patterns that we have developed. They've got to be trained out of us, haven't they? The pathway to glory, therefore, will have to be a pathway of discipline and training, and from time to time it will be exceedingly painful. How many a child has resented its education and wished it could grow up to manhood without being e- e- educated, haven't they? Think mum and dad are horrible for making them to go to school because the thing is so painful, just learning is painful. Why can't you grow up adult without having to go to school? Very often we feel like that about heaven too. Why have we go through the suffering to be prepared for heaven? Can't we go forthwith? No, you can't, says God. For in bringing many sons to glory all the way from Ingvatagil, Ingvatagil, home to glory of worldwide dominion, there must be a pathway of training, there will be a pathway of suffering. And the God who organized the whole career of discipline and education said to himself, now the only fitting way I can do that, if I'm going to ask these people to tread this pathway of discipline and painful suffering that will eventually bring them to glory, the only fitting thing I do is to provide them with a captain of their salvation, a leader who shall lead them along the pathway and bring them home to glory. And if he's going to lead them, then first of all, he himself must be qualified by having himself suffered. We pause again to ponder it, to bring the likes of you and me through the disciplines and sufferings of life that shall prepare us and grace us to reign with Christ eternally. For that, our blessed Lord came down and not only took humanity, but allowed himself to be subject to pain and suffering, and eventually death. Oh, how shall I not come and remember him? How shall I not ca- count it his chief glory that he was prepared to qualify himself by suffering the kind of suffering that I suffer, that he might be my capable, efficient, tender, sympathetic, and in the end successful guide for me on the path that will bring me home to glory. And then there is another thing, says, uh, uh, says the writer, for both he that sanctifies and they that are sanctified are all of one, for which cause he is not ashamed to call us brothers, saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the congregation will I sing thy praise. He's not ashamed to call us his brothers, says the writer. Let's pause there too. Why should not Christ be ashamed of us, do you think? I better put it the other way. What reason has he, you think, to be ashamed? Any reason Christ has to be ashamed of us? I fancy like you, like me, you can think a thousand and one reasons why Christ should be ashamed of us. I wonder what he says to Gabriel, if Gabriel is allowed on times to comment on the behavior of believers. See that man down there, Lord? See what he's doing now? Yes. One of yours, isn't he? Mm. Yeah, I- I thought he, uh, what have you done to him? You saved him or something, this man. And what gave, uh, our Lord says to Gabriel or Michael, if they're allowed to say that. And what does God say to Satan when Satan comes along to God and says, have you considered that servant Job of yours? Yes, says God, I have. Well, you imagine he loves you and trusts you, don't you, God? Yes, I do, says God. Well, you're mistaken, grievously mistaken, says Satan. You see, that man Job, he he he pretends to believe you. Of course, you've feather bedded him, haven't you? You've blessed him with rich farms and a beautiful wife and gangs of lovely daughters and sons. Well, of course, he says he loves you and sings choruses to praise you and says he believes you. Why shouldn't he? You've abutted his bread very thickly. So what, says Satan, were you to allow him to suffer, we'll find out how deep his faith is, curse you to your very face. All right, says God, you're allowed to touch him, Satan, don't you touch his life, but you're allowed to test him. Yes, you could think of many reasons why God might be ashamed of us. Why then is the Lord Jesus not ashamed of us? Some people understand the verse to mean that now we are saved, we have become children of God, and therefore are much nearer to him. He is the Son of God. We are children of God, and therefore, because now we are sons of God, and he is the Son of God, he's not ashamed of us. Well, that is blessedly true. We are children of God in the family of God, though his sonship remains distinct. That is not the reason why, uh, he's not ashamed of us according to this verse. Why is he not ashamed of us? Because, though he was the Son of God, he has in all things become like unto us. He who sanctifies us and we who are sanctified are all of one. He is absolutely human, like we are human. That's why he's not ashamed to call us brethren. You know, suppose the Queen of England came down to my little cottage in her condescending majesty and deigned to sit upon my rickety chair. Well, okay, I should say, what a condescending monarch she is. But if she dared to say, now my brother David, I should be tempted to say, what a hypocrite the woman is. How dare she call me her brother with all her, how many palaces has she got? How many ranks of servants? What riches uncountable has the woman got, and she dares to come and call me her brother? Wouldn't be right, would it? Wouldn't be sincere. Right to be ashamed of herself if she were to indulge in that kind of political, uh, propaganda and call me her brother. When the Son of God calls you his brother, oh my good friend, there's no insincerity in it. He is truly human, born in conditions more lowly than you were born in, born in a manger. Often a night spent in the open with no bed to sleep in and nowhere to lay his head. Made in all things light to his presence, and when he calls us his brothers, it is absolutely true. And he's not ashamed of us. He wasn't ashamed of us when he was here on earth. And when he rose triumphant after the cross and in the glory of his resurrection, he said in the words of the Psalm in the midst of the church, I will give praise to thee. Behold, I and the children that God has given me. All the wonder of it. Risen from the dead in glory, he came to his disciples, and ha- holding out to them his hands, he said, handle me and see, it's me. I'm the same, it's it's me, Jesus. Handle me and see. A spirit has not flesh and bones, as you see me have. He calls us his children still. In his glory. Listen to him standing praying to his father just before he's di- he dies, and he's praying for his people, and he describes them as those whom thou hast given to me. Oh, how can he be so gracious? With uncountable worlds in his bank balance. How comes he to treasure me as one of the children that God has given him, for whom he was prepared to die, when one day, soon he will bring the glory. Not ashamed to call us his brothers. One day before the mass night of the intelligentsia of heaven, he will present the church to himself, unashamed of them, as his glorious bride, and seat them at his own right hands, far above all principalities, powers, mights, and dominions. Then the verses tell us of another wonderful thing. The verses are heavy, are they not, with reference to death? There is the suffering of death, there is the taste of death, and now there is death used as an instrument, and watch the ingenuity of it. Here was our great foe, Satan, who had the power of death. What a dastardly foe he is. You see, first he told a lie to Eve. Eat the tree, woman, he said, for thou shalt not surely die. And having induced the woman to eat the tree, he now incurred death. Now Satan takes hold of that very death and wields it as a weapon in his hand. While God were to say, well, I'm going to overlook that sin, Satan, because I like those people. Satan would say, no, you don't, God. No, you don't. If you overlook their sin, God, I will blast your name around the universe. How dare you let them off their sin? How could you remain the God of righteousness that you are if you dared forgive them? Yes. Satan had the power of death, didn't he? Demanding that God up keep up his law, and therefore the sinner must die and be consigned to eternal perdition. And thus he frightened men, who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. People fear death. They still fear death. Sometimes people fear that death will not be the end. They fear there is a life to come, and if there's a life to come, there is a judgment. So they try to persuade themselves that science has proved there is nothing after death. Hope is vain. There is an afterlife. Some people are afraid that there's nothing after death. And so, because death is the end of everything, they're going to enjoy themselves here in this life, no matter at what cost, no matter how many moral laws they break, they're going to enjoy themselves while life lasts and get themselves in sort- into all sorts of immoral affairs. What a powerful thing has been the fear of death in the hand of Satan. How shall Christ deliver us? The only way he could do it was to become a human and himself die and use death as a weapon to disarm Satan himself. What a magnificent genius. He died and bore the penalty of sin, and thus unarmed Satan. For now, to a believer, death is no longer a penalty of sin. The believer knows that there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. Death is no longer a penalty of sin. For a believer, death is but the gateway into the palace of the king. Christ died as a human being to show us what the reality is. He rose again the third day. For a believer, there is nothing to fear, even in the process of dying. And finally, we are told that on the long road home to glory, Christ must needs be perfected, qualified to his suffering, so that he could be for us a merciful high priest in things pertaining to God. One day we must meet God. Just as in Israel, the high priest on the Day of Atonement went into the presence of God to make propitiation for the sins of the people. So our blessed Lord Jesus has died that he might make propitiation for us and has gone into heaven to represent us. He is the mediator between God and men. And therefore he had to be made like his brethren and know what temptation means. Because if he's going to represent us to God, he must do so sympathetically, mustn't he? Just suppose the Lord Jesus is standing before God, and our behavior is reviewed, and the Lord Jesus loses patience with us and says, I can't think why they failed there, and why they failed there, what stupid, unreasonable people they are. How should we please our, plead our cause before God? Well, if he's going to understand us, he must understand what temptation means. He must have experienced its power and experienced it more than we, because we give in. He never gave in, but he knows what it is to be tempted, and in spite of all our failings, as he comes to represent us before God, he has a sympathetic heart that will ever remain loyal to us, present our case before the Father. Oh, what a marvelous Savior he is. Now, presently, we come to remember him. We shall remember his glory. He is risen. He is triumphant. But as we remember his glory, morning we shall remember his suffering. We can't find it morbid. We shall find the topic of the sufferings of our blessed Lord is the topic that fills our hearts to overflowing with admiration of our Savior, and it will lead us to an ever increasing devotion to Him. Thus may God bless his study for our name, his name's sake.