21. The Sonship of Christ

I. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of God, not by adoption, in any sense of the word, but by nature. Adoption is the gratuitous assumption of a person who is not a relative, to bring him into the family and entitle him to an inheritance. This cannot be said of Our Blessed Lord. He has the two natures: the divine, which He possessed from all eternity; the human, which He took so many years ago; the one is of the substance of the Father, the other is of the substance of the Blessed Virgin Mary. But it is the one indivisible Person who exists in both these natures, and the same who is Son of God and Himself God, is also Son of Mary. St. Paul draws out for us this divine dignity of Jesus Christ. God, he says, “in these days hath spoken to us by His Son, whom He hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also He made the world: who being in the splendour of His glory, and the figure of His substance … sitteth on the right hand of the Majesty on high” (Heb. i. 2, 3). We adore Our Lord, therefore, with supreme worship as being true God of true God; and we venerate the unparalleled dignity of her who, being Mother of the Son of God, was also Mother of God. Adore Our Lord profoundly, especially when you enter His presence, for the sublime dignity which belongs to Him in His Divinity and His Humanity.




II. Our Lord Jesus Christ, as man, bore Himself with all respect, love and obedience towards His heavenly Father. He manifested God to us in that character, which hitherto had been unknown. God had been, during the old dispensation, the Lord of hosts, mighty and terrible, ready to punish every transgression. Our Lord, as His Son, was able to take a new attitude towards Him and teach it to us. The Infinite Majesty is always Father towards Him; and the same sentiments that He exhibits towards His only-begotten Son He feels also towards us. In return, Jesus shows us how we should comport ourselves towards Our Father in heaven. He showed obedience by carrying out His Father’s will to the death on the cross; He died as an exhibition also of love for the Father, that the world might know and imitate it. Every action of His life had as its object the manifestation and the glory of His Father. These duties are yours. See how you fulfil each one of them. See whether you live always as considering God to be your Father, and yourself to be His son.




III. “God sent His Son, made of a woman, made under the law … that we might receive the adoption of sons” (Gal. iv. 4, 5). The Son of God became Son of man so as to make all of us sons of God. We were outcasts, criminals under sentence of punishment, absolutely devoid of any claim to supernatural grace or heavenly glory, “by nature the children of wrath” (Eph. ii. 3). Now we have become children of God, not indeed by nature, but by adoption, on account of Jesus Christ being our brother in the flesh. So we are made “sons, heirs also; heirs indeed of God, and joint-heirs with Christ” (Rom. viii. 17). By this adoption we acquire the likeness to God which children have to their parents. First, sanctifying grace is poured out in our souls, and God dwells in us, forming in us a preliminary resemblance. Our duty next is to make this more perfect by the exercise of good works, which constitute a practical and active resemblance to God. From these two proceed the final transformation into the image of God by the addition of the life of glory. Then “we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is” (1 John iii. 2). Thus we attain to the final results of the Incarnation. Humanity is inconceivably elevated, first in Jesus Christ, and by Him in us. He accomplishes it; but you must share in His works if you are to have your full share in His dignity.

20. The Royalty of Christ

I. Jesus Christ is not only our Pontiff in spirituals, He is King and supreme ruler of mankind in temporals; because “there is no power but from God” (Rom. xiii. 1); and secondly because He is actually our King; He is “Prince of the Kings of the earth” (Apoc. i. 5). He Himself says, “All power is given Me in heaven and on earth” (Matt. xxviii. 18), and again, “I am appointed King by Him over Sion, His holy mountain” (Ps. ii. 6). Our Lord has all the qualities which go to the making of kings. He is of noble descent, being Son of God, He is the firstborn of all mankind, He surpasses all in power and in qualities of body and soul, He has conquered His rights by delivering the world from its previous slavery and disorganization, and He is the founder of a new social order and a new civilization. He is also Son of David, the King of the chosen people, which had primacy over all nations, to be their blessing and their salvation. The Father gave Him not only the Jews but all mankind, according to His word: “I will give Thee the Gentiles for Thy inheritance, and the utmost parts of the earth for Thy possession” (Ps. ii. 8). His rights, therefore, over us are temporal as well as spiritual, even though many refuse to admit them. The two things cannot be separated; for our internal and external life, although different, constitute one human life; the prosperity of the one is interwoven with that of the other; and the influences of religion and morality penetrate all our actions—domestic, industrial, and political. Honour your King with the service both of body and soul. Let His law rule your whole life in every branch of it.

II. Our Lord’s Kingdom is not indeed of this world, but it is a real kingdom in this world. He has separated the Priestly and the Royal functions and placed them in different hands. In the spiritual order He has Himself appointed His representative, and one universal, unvarying form of administration. But not so in the civil order. Centralization and uniformity would not meet the requirements of human life. Men have to work out their worldly destinies for themselves under God’s direction and assistance, according to their different circumstances, but in accordance with revealed principles of action. They have liberty to obey or disobey these. The human apparatus of compulsion does not belong to Christ’s Kingdom—armies, police, tribunals, prisons. He appeals to the good-will of His subjects, by exhortation, by inward grace, by love, and also by threats of future consequences. His Kingdom is, in the first instance, in the souls of men, and thence it extends to their outward life. Thus He designed to establish on earth a universal kingdom, guided by faith, cemented together with love, abounding, first in spiritual, and then in temporal benediction. In spite of the extensive rejection of the Royalty of Christ, the faithful few still form a world-wide kingdom, and reap many of its benefits.

III. “The nation and the kingdom that will not serve Thee shall perish” (Isa. lx. 12). Our King, in giving His law, knew what was best adapted to human life, and necessary for its success. Under His laws the order of humanity would be as perfect and beautiful as the order of the material creation. If we disobey the instructions of the maker of powerful machinery we must expect some great catastrophe, and we deserve it. By disobeying the divine laws of human organization we lose control of the enormous destructive forces of the perverted human will, and our imperfect makeshifts cannot avert the calamitous consequences. Hence, among the highest creatures of God and the best endowed, we find so much failure, retrogression, hopeless degradation. As their capacities are increased, so do their miseries increase. There is one cause of all these evils; it is that men have thrust aside their King, His law and His grace. Your duty is to resist the rising tide of evil, to help the cause of good and happiness, by fidelity to Christ the King, and by promoting His reign.

19. The Priesthood of Christ

 

I. “The Lord hath sworn and He will not repent: Thou art a priest for ever according to the order of Melchisedec” (Ps. cix. 4). The priesthood used to be attached to the primogeniture; it belongs, therefore, to Our Lord, the firstborn of mankind; and it is His office to offer supreme worship to the Creator on behalf of all. He was, further, appointed to offer the great sacrifice for sins by the shedding of His blood on Calvary. This priesthood is “for ever,” because the oblation continues for ever in heaven and on earth. The Apostle saw “in the midst of the throne … a lamb standing as it were slain” (Apoc. v. 6); and Christ “offering one sacrifice for sins, for ever sitteth on the right hand of God” (Heb. x. 12). The eternal sacrifice as it goes on amongst us, is, according to the order of Melchisedec, under the forms of bread and wine. This is the “clean oblation” (of flour), which the prophet said would be offered among the Gentiles in every place, from the rising of the sun to its setting (Mal. i. 11). Venerate Our Lord as the eternal Priest, always offering the sacrifice of the Mass, invisibly but really, and inviting you to be present at it. There is no event so holy or so efficacious on earth; nothing that corresponds so exactly with the actual facts of heaven.

II. Our Lord is also the great High Priest and Pontiff. In fulfilment of the Old Testament type, He offered His sacrifice in the outer court of this world; and then, leaving the priests still ministering at the altar, He has gone within the veil that shrouds the majesty of God in the true Holy of Holies. There, with the blood of sacrifice upon His hands, He continues the same oblation that was commenced and still goes on in the outer court. Jesus is High Priest also in relation to the multitude of consecrated priests of the New Law. They are His ministers and instruments, not of a new sacrifice, for there can be no other; nor of a repetition of the same, “for this He did once, offering Himself” (Heb. vii. 27); but they are appointed to give visible form, in every place, on every day, to the one sacrifice which the High Priest is ever engaged in offering. They act in His name, they speak His words, but He is really the Priest of the sacrifice exerting His supreme power through them. Admire the wisdom and power which God has exercised in so arranging this mystery that you may be able to assist at it as though on Calvary. Thank Him for this.

III. “It was fitting that we should have such a High Priest, holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners, and made higher than the heavens” (Heb. vii. 26).

We need such a one that He may be able to stand between us and God as Mediator, and atone for our sins.

We need a Victim also of infinite value for the sacrifice, and such also is our great Pontiff.

We need to have a form of sacrifice always amongst us, in order that the perfect religion may find its expression in that form which is the characteristic ceremony of religion.

We crave to be personally present at such an act, and not merely to know as a matter of history that it once took place.

We need such a form of worship as will bind the systems of the Old Testament and the New into one. The ancient law offered a symbolic sacrifice prophetic of the Crucifixion; we recall it daily in a mystic sacrifice.

We need a form of worship of divine institution, invariable through the ages, the same in all lands, which will express the unity of God and of religion, and bind our souls into one. All this God has given you through the sacred priesthood of Our Lord. What treasures of truth, and beauty, and utility are therein contained! Make full use of your privileges.

18. The Prayer of Christ

 

I. The Gospels remind us continually of the long, frequent, and fervent prayers of Our Lord. This is meant for our example, and we should learn to consider prayer as the most pressing and important of our duties. It was necessary even for the Son of God as man. As being bound by the laws of human life, He had to exercise the virtue of Religion with its different forms of service towards God. Prayer is the ordinary means of securing the blessing of God on our work and graces for ourselves; Our Lord made use of it, therefore, for the promotion of His work of preaching and miracles, just as He made use of food for the support of His life in accordance with natural law. Prayer was also a function of Our Lord’s office as Priest, Pontiff, and Mediator; those offices still continue in heaven, wherefore He is represented to us as “at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us” (Rom. viii. 34). The example of Our Divine Master shows us that prayer is one of the most necessary of our duties; first, as a homage to God; secondly, as the accompaniment of every one of our undertakings, to secure its success, especially if it be of a spiritual nature; thirdly, as a most precious privilege which admits us to intimate communication with God; fourthly, as a source of grace, strength, comfort and guidance under all circumstances.

II. Consider the qualities and virtues exhibited by Our Lord in His prayer. 1. Reverence. “Who in the days of His flesh, offering up prayers and supplications with a strong cry and tears . . . was heard for His reverence” (Heb. v. 7). 2. Fervour, arising from His perfect vision of the Father and knowledge of our necessities, from His burning love of God and men, and His ardent desire to obtain what He petitioned for. 3. Confidence, which He manifested when He said while yet praying, “Father, I give Thee thanks that Thou hast heard Me. And I knew that Thou hearest Me always” (John xi. 41, 42). 4. Perseverance. Jesus continued often the whole night in prayer, and once for forty days, and in Gethsemani He returned three times and used the self-same words. Attend carefully to the manner of your prayer. If one of these qualities is deficient, you are asking amiss, and cannot expect to obtain anything from God. Every effect must have an adequate cause; and as the favour you ask is greater, so must your prayer be more prolonged, more fervent, more confident, more capable of standing the severest test which God often imposes on the faith of petitioners.

III. The prayer of Our Lord was supremely efficacious, according to the foregoing words, “I knew that Thou hearest Me always” (John xi. 42). What He willed and prayed for was also the will of His Father, and was infallibly carried out. He prayed for all mankind, and died to obtain for them the sufficient means of salvation. Every soul, therefore, in some way or other receives those sufficient graces; after that, their actual salvation depends upon their own free-will, which cannot be forced. Our Lord prayed especially for certain persons and objects; for the unbroken unity of His Church, its preservation from the taint of error, its endowment with all truth, its stability, perpetuity, and infallibility. Those prayers were necessarily heard, for they are contained in what God promised: “Ask of Me, and I will give Thee the Gentiles for Thy inheritance, and the utmost parts of the earth for Thy possession” (Ps. ii. 8). Your prayer too, when properly conditioned, will possess infallible efficacy, according to Our Lord’s words, “Ask and you shall receive, that your joy may be full” (John xvi. 24).

17. THE SUBJECTION OF CHRIST

I. Consider the successive descents and subjections of Je
sus Christ for our sake. His Humanity was a creature of God, and so, of necessity, dependent on the supreme dominion of its Creator. The Divinity is over all, and loses none of its rights over the work of its hand even though it be united to the Humanity. Christ speaking in His human nature says therefore: “the Father is greater than I” (John xiv. 28). Our Lord then was subject to the natural and supernatural, moral and spiritual law. To the ceremonial law of God given by Moses, Christ was not properly subject, as being the Messias, the legislator, and the founder of a new dispensation. He submitted, however, out of respect to a law that had come from God, out of humility concealing His dignity, in order to give us an example. He submitted Himself further to obedience to the death of the cross under the law of His Father’s will, and the law of charity towards us. The subjection of Christ was a lowering of Himself, but it exalted the Divinity in the person of the Father. An infinite Person became in His human nature the first subject of God; and for the first time God received His full due, infinite service of adoration and love. How great are the results of humility! Put off all your self-sufficiency for the sake of God, forego all elevation in your own esteem and in the esteem of others; it is little indeed to offer to God, but it will cost you much, and it will honour Him still more. It is the only way in which you can exalt Him.

II. Our Lord made Himself not merely the subject but the servant of His Father. “He debased Himself, taking the form of a servant” (Phil. ii. 7). He descended from the throne of the Divinity, put aside the dignity of Son, covered His glory with our degrading garb, gave up His own will, and devoted Himself to a life of lowliness and obedience. In this He made compensation to the Father for our refusal of service, He took the place of humanity, fulfilled its duties, and saved it from the chastisement of its rebellion. For the first time the fulness of service which God demanded, and which His greatness required from man, was rendered to Him. The offending race, in requital for the service of their head and chief member, are received back by the Father, not merely as servants, but as sons. Our Lord, further, is not content with this abasement, but makes Himself our servant, enduring our humours, waiting on our pleasure, allowing us to dictate terms to Him. As for His faithful followers, “He will gird Himself, and make them sit down to meat, and passing, will minister to them” (Luke xii. 37); for obstinate sinners He is ready to do much more in order to gain them. Put off that pride which revolts against all subjection even to God. Offer yourself to be the lowliest in the house of God; be ready to serve all others for His sake.

III. “Thou hast made Me to serve with thy sins; thou hast wearied Me with thy iniquities” (Isa. xliii. 24). Mankind, refusing honourable service in the house of God, have fallen into a most real and degrading slavery to material nature and to the passions; they have lost their spiritual liberty, and the dignity which ought to belong to free beings, and the beauty of noble life. Our Lord could not enter into this degradation; none are the slaves of sin but those who commit it. But He took on Himself the outward stigma of slavery, to save us from the reality. He was poor and in labour from His youth, and that labour was the ignominious one of cleansing this world from its filthiness. He had no possessions of His own, no home. He was sold for the price of a slave, was clothed as a buffoon and exposed to derision. He was scourged like a slave, and suffered the death of a slave. What He endured ought to have been your lot for ever; you deserved it, and except for Our Lord’s substitution of Himself for you, you would have had to endure it.

16. FOR WHOM CHRIST MERITED

 

I. In accordance with the law of the nature He had assumed, the Son of God, acting as man, merited for Himself. It was to His glory, as it is to ours, to earn the recompense, to win the victory at the point of the sword, to be crowned for striving lawfully (2 Tim. ii. 5). Therefore it is written: “Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and so to enter into His glory?” (Luke xxiv. 26). There were certain things which were not merited by Our Lord for Himself. The Hypostatic Union, for instance; His essential beatitude, His habitual grace and knowledge were bestowed on Him at first as prerogatives proper to His condition. Christ’s human actions rendered a service of glory to God and merited glory for Him in return. Therefore He says: “I have glorified Thee on earth . . . and now glorify Thou Me, O Father” (John xvii. 4, 5). He glorified the Father by preaching His name, by manifesting Him in His own life, by obeying His commands, by attributing His own great works to His Father’s power. He merited thereby what He received: the glorification of His Humanity in the Resurrection and Ascension, the power of miracles that proved Him to be the Son of God, the faith and adoration of the elect, the office of Judge which He will exercise at the end. Rejoice in the full justice that has been done to your Lord by His Father, and say: “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and divinity, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and benediction” (Apoc. v. 12).

II. It is generally held that Our Lord as man merited for the angels the grace and glory bestowed on them, and that He is the Author of their salvation through the Father’s prevision of His merits to come. The words said of mankind are considered to include the angels: “of His fulness we all have received, and grace for grace” (John i. 16). The angels, equally with this world, were created by the Eternal Father through His Divine Word, the Second Person. This Word of God is in His human nature “head of all principality and power” (Col. ii. 10); and, therefore, such things as were superadded to the angelic nature may well be conceived as conferred on it through the merits of the Word made flesh. The same meaning seems to be conveyed by another passage: Thou “hast set Him over the works of Thy hands: Thou hast put all things in subjection under His feet. For in that He subjected all things to Him, He left nothing not subject to Him” (Heb. ii. 7, 8). What a beautiful harmony of all things! The spiritual and the material universe are brought together in one unity of plan, under the prevalence of one law, by this subjection to Jesus Christ.

III. Our Lord Jesus Christ also merited for mankind all that they possess of supernatural good, and a great deal of their natural advantages. He does this as being the principal member of the great corporate society of humanity, in which the rest of us constitute the smaller and subordinate portion. We share in the advantages which He brings to that society. “Blessed be God . . . who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ” (Eph. i. 3). So we receive through Our Lord the first grace that calls us to faith and repentance, then sanctification and perfection, the strength to persevere to the end, and lastly our reward in glory. He is the beginning and the end of everything for us; “without Me you can do nothing” (John xv. 5). God demands our service; we have to struggle and fight; we must earn and merit our reward; but it is Our Lord who gives us power to do all these things, and He serves, and struggles, and merits in us. Consider how much you individually have received through the merits of Christ, and give Him thanks. Consider the little you have done, and recognize that it was through Him. Consider how much you ought to do, and be certain that you can do it all in Him that strengtheneth you.

15. THE MERITS OF CHRIST

 

I. Every good action has its proper effect towards God and towards ourselves; it makes compensation for our bad deeds, and it obtains favours from God in reward; it is satisfactory and it is meritorious. The human acts of Jesus Christ had all the conditions which give that character to our actions. 

1. He placed Himself in our present stage of trial and preparation for the next life. 

2. He possessed human liberty. 

3. He was in the state of grace. 

4. He had received that which makes merit possible for us, viz., the divine promise of reward. 

“If He shall lay down His life for sin He shall see a long-lived seed, and the will of the Lord shall be prosperous in His hand” (Isa. liii. 10). The divine actions of Our Lord could not remain sterile, but produced an adequate effect. Those actions proceeded from an infinite and most holy Person; they were wrought in a human nature which had been assumed and sanctified by the Divinity; each action received its character and value, not from its visible importance in the mundane order of things, but from the source that produced it, and the intensity of the motives and sentiments that acted through it. And thus a single drop of the Precious Blood, a single action, prayer, or thought of Christ was of infinite value, both satisfactory and meritorious, and was capable of expiating the sins of mankind, and purchasing grace and glory for the whole world. Admire the infinite treasures of Our Lord’s life, and thank Him for placing them at your disposal.

II. Satisfaction and merit are qualities which belong to human actions; they do not belong to the actions of the Divinity. Our Lord, therefore, did not satisfy and merit for us by those actions which proceeded exclusively from His Divine nature, such as the Beatific Vision and the divine love and enjoyment of the Divine Essence. It was His human actions that were meritorious, and they were so in the highest degree, both as regarded Himself and mankind. This is indicated by the Apostle: “He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore also God hath exalted Him” (Phil. ii. 8, 9). This merit belonged to every one of His virtues, prayers, and sufferings; and also to the commonest actions of His domestic life at Nazareth. But we attribute His satisfaction and merits rather to His Passion and Death, as being the crowning events of His life and the manifestation of Him in His highest office as Priest and Victim of Sacrifice. It is by communication with Our Lord that we receive the power of really satisfying and meriting by our good works. Actually and in themselves they are worthless apart from Him. Make use of this power by offering all your actions to God.

III. Merit and satisfaction belong to the deeds of this present life only, and cease as soon as we enter eternity. Our Lord merited, therefore, by every action, but during the present life only. St. Paul speaks of the beginning of His meritorious works: coming “into the world He saith, Sacrifice and oblation Thou wouldest not, but a body Thou hast fitted to Me . . . then said I, Behold I come” (Heb. x. 5, 7). Our Lord speaks of the ending of His time for meriting: “I must work the works of Him that sent Me while it is day: the night cometh when no man can work” (John ix. 4). In heaven Our Lord satisfies and merits no longer; He continues only the offering of the inexhaustible satisfaction and merit accomplished by Him on earth. His life-time here was sufficient. Short as it was, it was the fullest and richest epoch in the world’s history, for “being made perfect in a short space He fulfilled a long time” (Wisd. iv. 13). You are able to merit by every action of your life. By fervour and love you can make the smallest things great, and in the sight of God fulfil a long time in a few years.