| Strength and Beauty |
Chapter 8 |
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One of the pictures of the crucifixion of Jesus shows the scene on Calvary after the body had been taken down and laid away in the grave. All is quiet and still. The crowd is gone. No one is seen about the place. There are only the ghastly memorials of the terrible things which had happened during the day. Off to one side of the picture is seen an ass, nibbling at some withered palms that lay there. Thus the artist most graphically teaches the fickleness of human applause. Only a few days ago a great throng had followed Jesus over Olivet into the city in triumphant procession, waving their palm branches and strewing them on the road before him as they shouted their hosannas. Now Jesus is dead, crucified, and here, hard by the cross, lie those faded reminders of that glad day’s rejoicing – nothing more.
So fickle was men’s love for Jesus in those days, and so quickly did their hosannas change to shouts of derision! But is it different today? Do not men’s hearts grow warm and tender with love for Christ on Sunday, in a service of devotion, and then by Monday lose all their glad, spiritual enthusiasm? The palm branches of praise and consecration, the green leaves of good resolves and eager intentions, lie withered on the ground, amid the tokens of unfaithfulness and disloyalty.
We hear stirring appeals to duty, and our hearts respond gladly and ardently. We think that we have become altogether Christ’s, that our life henceforth will be devoted to him without stint or reserve. But, alas! The soil is thin. The green shoots find no place to root, and under the first hot sun they wither. What comes of all our good intentions, our fair promises, our sacred pledges, our solemn vows? Too often nothing but faded leaves. We mean to live grandly – in the glow of our devotions we sincerely intend to be apostolic in our zeal and in the beauty of our character and work; but in the end nothing but pitiful failure comes of it all.
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