And it came to pass, that, as the people pressed upon Him to hear the Word of God
The gospel and the masses
What could have been the wonderful secret power by which the great Prophet of Galilee drew all men after Him?
1. One simple and very intelligent element in it was the way in which he recognized the wholeness of human nature, that, at the bottom, peer did not differ from peasant, nor monarch from villager.
2. And not only did He recognize the wholeness of human nature, hut also its many diversified needs.
3. He was sinless, and yet He never had a harsh word for the sinners--provided they were not hypocrites.
4. He had the tenderest feelings for those who enjoyed fewest opportunities.
5. He recognized the natural or social wants which are common to all men. Feeding five thousand; making wine at wedding.
6. He disdained no man.
APPLICATION. Oh that God would give us grace to preach fully, faithfully, wisely, lovingly this gospel in the spirit, and with the simplicity and abounding sympathy with which it was first preached in the cities and on the mountain slopes and by the lake shores of Galilee; and then I believe the people would be found pressing to hear it as they pressed then. (Bishop Fraser.)
The Word of God
I. THE WORD OF GOD THAT IS NOW PREACHED AMONG US.
II. THE EXISTING URGENCY TO HEAR IT. Of diffusive religion we have abundance; a concentrative Christianity is what we require.
III. THE PEOPLE WHO ARE ITS FAVOURED, AND TOO OFTEN ITS FORGETFUL HEARERS. TWO great classes; those who know the revelation of the will of God through Christ as a mass of doctrines and commands demanding from our understandings a simple assent to their truth; and those who know it in such a sense and degree, as that it becomes the pervading principle of all their actions. Beware of the Christianity of the formalist. When rightly received, “the Word of God is quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword.” (W. A. Butler, M. A.)
To hear the Word of God
One of the finest conceivable pictures presented in this verse--people pressing to hear the Word of God! They often pressed to see Christ’s miracles, and to listen to His parables, with more or less of mere curiosity; but in this case the motive was spiritual and pure. Why do people attend the sanctuary? To hear the word of man? Then will there be debate, opposition, doubt, or at best, admiration, fickle and selfish. The remedy is partly in the hands of ministers themselves. When they insist upon delivering the message of God without any admixture of human speculation, their spiritual reverence and earnestness may carry a holy contagion amongst the people. God’s Word should always be supreme in God’s house. “Them that honour Me, I will honour.” (J. Parker, D. D.)
The Lake of Gennesaret
It is the centre of the ministry of our Lord; it is not too much to say of it what Dean Stanley has said, “It is the most sacred sheet of water that the earth contains.” The Rabbins say, “I have created seven seas, saith the Lord, but out of them I have chosen none but the sea of Gennesaret.” In the day of our Lord, it was a scene of teeming life as well as the centre of a peculiarly hushed and hallowed solitude. No doubt, as compared with many quarters of the globe, it was secluded; but still its shores and its waves were the way of traffic. It was situated in the midst of the Jordan valley, or the great thoroughfare from Babylon and Damascus into Palestine; hence it was “the way of the sea beyond Jordan.” Along its banks a wondrous vegetation spread, and full of especially beautiful birds and flowers and fruits. What a scene it must have presented--fishermen by hundreds on the Lake; in hamlets around the numerous shipbuilders; and the sails and boats of pleasure flying before the frequent gusts from the mountains. There was no other spot which would so instantly have been a conductor to the words of our Lord. There is a Divine providence in even the very spot itself. The dwellers of the Sea of Galilee were free from most of the strong prejudices which, in the south of Palestine, raised a bar to Christ’s reception. There were the people of Zabulon and Nephthalim, by the way of the sea beyond Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles. They had sat in darkness; but for that very reason they saw more clearly the great light when it came to them in the region of the shadow of death. There He came, to that spot, to preach the gospel to the poor, the weary, and the heavy laden, to seek and to save that which was lost. Where could He find what He sought so readily as in the ceaseless turmoil of those busy waters and teeming villages? Roman soldiers, centurions quartered with their slaves; here, too, the palaces of the princes. Hardy boatmen, publicans, and tax-collectors sitting at the receipt of custom, women who were sinners from neighbouring Gentile cities and villages. Thus all was prepared to concentrate and give effect to the power of His teaching by the Lake. (E. Paxton Hood.)
Description of the lake
The Sea of Galilee is shaped like a pear, with a width at the broadest part of 6.75 miles, and a length of 121; miles; that is, it is about the same length as our own Windermere, but considerably broader, though in the clear air of Palestine it looks somewhat smaller. Nothing can exceed the bright clearness of the water, which it is delightful to watch as it runs in small waves over the shingle. Its taste, moreover, is sweet, except near the hot springs and at Tiberias, where it is polluted by the sewerage of the town. There is much more level ground on the eastern side than the western, yet the western side was always, in Bible times, much more thickly peopled by the Hebrews than the other; partly from the fact that “beyond Jordan” was almost a foreign country; partly because the land above the lake on the east was exposed to the Arabs; and in some measure also because it always had a large intermixture of heathen population. (Geikie’s “Holy Land and the Bible.”)
Description of the surrounding scenery
The original population of the shores of the lake was Sidonian, and when Tyre and Sidon were founded on the shores of the Mediterranean they moved westward, but the town of Bethsidon still retained the name given it by its first inhabitants. The richest part of the shores was at the north-west, where is a luxuriant plain of half-moon shape, walled out from the north and west winds by mountains, and exposed to the sun. This was where the princes and the nobles had their country residences, and the gardens were filled with all kinds of flowers and fruit. The lake was called by its first colonists, Cenuereth, or the Harp, from its shape. The Jews thought so highly of its beauty that they said, “God created seven seas--but for Himself He elected but one, and that the Lake Gennesareth”; and again, “It is the Gate of Paradise.” Josephus says, “It is a district where Nature seems to have constrained herself to create an eternal spring, and to gather into one spot the products of every one.” To the present day the date-palm, citrons, pomegranate, indigo, rice, sugar-cane, grow there; cotton, balsams, vines, thrive; the purple grapes are as big as plums, and the bunches weigh twelve pounds. Here also the fig-tree yields her fruit throughout the year, ripening every month. The Jews call Gennesareth the Garden Lake, and if there were any place in Palestine that could recall the lost Paradise, it was this fruitful, beautiful tract, watered with its five streams. At Chammath, about two miles south of Tiberias, are hot springs, of old much used for baths, and half an hour’s walk above Tiberias a cold spring of beautiful water bursts out of the mountain side, and pours down to the lake in five or six streams. At Tabigha also are hot springs, that gush streaming down into the blue waters of the lake. Now the neglect of mismanagement of the Turkish Government have led to the devastation of this beautiful corner of the world, and many of the foreign plants once introduced into it have died out, or are disappearing. We can only guess what a garden of delight it must have been in the time of our Lord, when the aqueducts were in working order, and canals carried water to all the gardens and fields. (S. Baring-Gould, M. A.)
Attractiveness of the true preacher
Let a man be a true preacher, really uttering the truth through his own personality, and it is strange how men will gather to listen to him. We hear that the day of the pulpit is past, and then some morning the voice of a true preacher is heard in the land, and all the streets are full of men crowding to hear him, just exactly as were the streets of Constantinople when Chrysostum was going to preach at the Church of the Apostles, or the streets of London when Latimer was bravely telling the truth at St. Paul’s. (Phillips Brooks, D. D.)
The personal power inpreaching
The nameless and potent charm of intense personality cannot all go down into a dead book. Truth in personality is where the hidings of power are. We look in vain along the pages of Whitefield for the secret of his mighty effectiveness. We search the famous sermon of Edwards, and wonder what there was in it that moved men so. It was not the sermon on the printed page; it was the sermon in the living preacher. While men are men, a living man before living men will always be more than white paper and black ink. And therein will for evermore lie the supremest possibilities of pulpit power, which no competing press, however enterprising and ubiquitous, can rival. The Founder of Christianity made no mistake when He staked its triumphal progress down through all ages, and its victorious consummation at “the end of the “world,” on “the foolishness of preaching.” He chose the agency in full view of the marvels of these later centuries, and the pulpit is not therefore likely to be despoiled of its peculiar glory and made impotent to its work by any device born of the inventive genius of man. (Dr. Herrick Johnson, of Chicago.)
A remarkable pulpit
I have seen in different countries some very wonderful pulpits, some of them exquisitely carved in stone or wood, some of them richly inlaid with the choicest mosaics, some of them illustrating scenes from the Bible. Perhaps the loveliest pulpit I have ever seen is in a place where you would least expect to find it. In Italy you often see places that are called Baptisteries--that is, places built specially for the baptism of children. In the old city of Pisa there is a most lovely Baptistery, and in it the most beautiful pulpit, which every one who sees greatly admires; but, strange to say, it cannot be used, because there is such a wonderful echo in the building that the preacher’s voice could not be heard. If you speak quite softly in it you hear a sound as of a great choir right up in the roof, and so the pulpit can only be admired and not used. But the pulpit from which Christ preached on this occasion was a very simple one; it was not richly carved, nor beautifully decorated, nor of massive form. It was only a tiny boat resting upon the bosom of a lake. (W. A. Herder.)
The preaching of Christ
The form of the preaching of Jesus was essentially Jewish. The Oriental mind does not work in the same way as the mind of the West. Our thinking and speaking, when at their best, are fluent, expansive, closely reasoned. The kind of discourse which we admire is one which takes up an important subject, divides it out into different branches, treats it fully under each of the heads, closely articulates part to part, and closes with a moving appeal to the feelings, so as to sway the will to some practical result. The Oriental mind, on the contrary, loves to brood long on a single point, to turn it round and round, to gather up all the truth about it into a focus, and pour it forth in a few pointed and memorable words. It is concise, epigrammatic, oracular. A Western speaker’s discourse is a systematic structure, or like a chain in which link is firmly knit to link; an Oriental’s is like the sky at night, full of innumerable burning points shining forth from a dark background. Such was the form of the teaching of Jesus. It consisted of numerous sayings, every one of which contained the greatest possible amount of truth in the smallest possible compass, and was expressed in language so concise and pointed as to stick in the memory like an arrow. Read them, and you will find that every one of them, as you ponder it, sucks the mind in and in like a whirlpool, till it is lost in the depths. You will find, too, that there are very few of them which you do not know by heart. They have found their way into the memory of Christendom as no other words have done. Even before the meaning has been apprehended, the perfect, proverb-like expression lodges itself fast in the mind. (James Stalker.)
Attention to the Word of God
I. The circumstance mentioned in the first verse of the text was A NATURAL CONSEQUENCE OF OUR LORD’S OFFICE AND CHARACTER. “The people pressed upon Him to hear the Word of God.” Jesus Christ was “that Prophet which should come into the world.” He brought down a message of mercy from heaven to earth; a message of pardon for the guilty, of life to the dead, and of salvation to those who were utterly and eternally lost. They were astonished at His doctrine; for He taught them as one having authority. They “ pressed upon Him to hear the Word of God.” And surely it is not too much for us to expect to witness a continuance of the same spirit. If God has indeed sent His Son and His servants to communicate an authentic revelation of His will to man, these teachers must be listened to by all who understand their own character and circumstances, and the great ends for which they live.
II. Such AN ATTENTION TO THE WORD OF GOD IS MATTER OF ABSOLUTE AND UNIVERSAL DUTY AND OBLIGATION. We are all bound to receive Divine instruction, and to receive it in the mode contemplated in the text. The law of Moses directed that, at stated seasons, there were to be holy convocations of the people; when they were to be collected in masses, to engage in holy duties, to enjoy holy delights, to receive holy light and power, and thereby to be filled for those high and holy ends for which they existed as a separate people. In the gospel, Christians are commanded not to forsake the assembling of themselves together. They are to “exhort one another.” Along with these commands, there are “given unto us exceeding great and precious promises.” “In all places where I record My name I will come unto thee, and I will bless thee” (Exodus 20:24; Matthew 18:20). We are bound to give this attendance on the word and worship of God, because He requires it. We are bound to do this, because we ourselves have need of it. If the highest archangel in heaven were commanded to frequent religious assemblies, as a learner, and as a worshipper, he would not refuse. This was done by Him who has received “a name which is above every name.” As the Mediator, Jesus Christ was subject to the Father; and He testified that subjection by a devout regard for His ordinances. He was a stated attendant on the services of the Temple. But we are not merely creatures: we are also sinners. We are not only subject to our Maker’s authority; we need our Maker’s mercy. If we would obtain His blessing, we must seek it in the way of His own appointment. In any other way He has not promised it; in any other way we have no right to expect it. It does not mean that the vulgar and illiterate must go to Church, but that men of science and literature are at liberty to stay away. A man may be as great a philosopher as Socrates or Plato; but then he is a creature and a sinner. He must therefore attend to his Creator’s word; he must kneel at his Creator’s feet. Neither can political rank at all free us from this great obligation. A man may be a lord, a duke, a king, or an emperor; yet he must imitate the example of Him who is Lord of lords, and King of kings. No man is excused on the ground of poverty and meanness. It may mortify him excessively to exhibit his rags before a large and respectable congregation; but Christ hath left us an example that we should tread in His steps. His piety and poverty were great and manifest. The plea of a high and refined spirituality of mind will be equally unavailing. It is useless to say, “I have no need to observe the mere forms of piety, since I enjoy its spirit and its power.”
III. The men of bustle and business are sometimes disposed to look upon all this attendance on the Word of God AS SO MUCH LOST TIME, AND AN INCONVENIENT INTERFERENCE WITH THE CONCERNS OF LIFE. If such excuses could ever be seasonable, they might have been urged by the fishermen of Galilee, on the occasion referred to in the text. They had toiled all the night before, and caught nothing. They were now in the act of washing their nets, in order at the earliest opportunity to go to sea again and make another attempt. Several of them, it is probable, had families dependent on their industry and success. Under such circumstances they might have said, “Lord, we have no time to hear sermons now. It is impossible for us to comply with your request, and to spare our boat for preaching purposes at present. We must follow our employment, or our debts cannot be paid, nor our children’s wants supplied.” But not a word of objection or excuse was heard. What follows proves that in the end they suffered no loss. Know, therefore, that there is a providence; a blessing of the Lord which maketh rich.
IV. THE WORD OF GOD DESERVES TO BE IMPLICITLY BELIEVED AND OBEYED. We may always venture to carry out its instructions into practical effect in the face of every difficulty and discouragement. But Peter reasoned on a different principle, and came to a different conclusion. He called Jesus “Master,” and was consistent with himself. Many of us talk like servants while we act like masters. We say, “Lord, Lord,” but do not the things which He enjoins. But Peter understood his duty better. When the Master commands, the servant’s business is, not to argue, but to obey.
V. THAT WORD DESERVES OUR ATTENTION ON ACCOUNT OF ITS POWER TO REACH AND CONTROL THE HUMAN HEART. The Author of the Bible knows what is in man. He can speak to the heart of His own creatures. His Word touches the hidden springs of thought and feeling, and thus turns us about whithersoever He will (Hebrews 4:12). Peter found this by experience. The sermon was heard, and such was the silent and secret but powerful effect of Divine truth upon his heart, that he saw his unutterable guilt and depravity as in the light of open day; and became so agitated with grief and terror, that, in the end, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, exclaiming, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord” (Luke 5:8). You will soon be brought to the same temper, if you listen to the same Teacher.
VI. IT IS NOT INTENDED, HOWEVER, TO INTIMATE THAT THIS MATCHLESS WORD WILL INTRODUCE US TO A REST AND PEACE, WHICH IMPLIES AN EXEMPTION FROM WORLDLY CALAMITIES. When the disciples were favoured with the immediate presence of Christ, and were in the very act of receiving a miraculous blessing at His hands, we scarcely expected to hear anything of a broken net and a sinking boat. Yet both these inconveniences were experienced on this memorable occasion. The afflictions of a good man only tend to heighten his gratitude, by more abundant displays of the Divine faithfulness and love. It was wonderful that the net should be suffered to break; but it was more wonderful that, after this accident, the fishes were not lost. It was wonderful that the boat should be suffered to begin to sink; but it was more wonderful that, in such a state, they should all come safe to land. God often reduces His people to the last extremities, and then shows them His salvation. The vessel which bears the saints to glory is often in a leaky and sinking state. All hope of being saved is not unfrequently taken away. Yet, while they have an ear to hear, and a heart to obey, they continue to float.
VII. THE BENEFITS ARISING FROM. AN ATTENTION TO THE WORD OF GOD ARE NOT CONFINED TO OURSELVES; THEY EXTEND TO OTHERS. While attention to the Word of God teaches us the duty of instructing others, it also gives us the disposition to make the attempt. Piety and charity are inseparably connected. (Samuel Jackson.)
The attractive power of the gospel
Jesus as a preacher “drew.” What was the attraction? He used no rhetorical device to produce an effect. His method was startling in its novelty. He did not follow the customs of His age. Though claiming to be a religious teacher, He did net adopt the conventional role of a priest or scribe. But to really appreciate the spirit of the Preacher we must understand His doctrine. The message He brought men made it imperative that His attitude towards them should be that of large-hearted sympathy. Now, there are some things I want you to see as the result of this exposition.
1. The first is that the gospel of Christ, when proclaimed in the proper spirit, never fails to touch the heart. In a sermon of Bishop Fraser’s I read the following story: A well-known Anglican Bishop was announced to preach in a certain church. A tradesman in the parish, the leader of a set of Atheists, made up his mind to go and hear him. He listened attentively, and after the sermon he said to some one, “If that bishop had argued, I would have fought with him; but there was no arguing about him; he preached to us simply about the love of God, and that touched me.” Let the gospel be preached with the simplicity and sympathy with which it was first preached in Galilee, and people will still be found pressing to hear.
2. The next thing I want you to see is, that the gospel and spirit of Christ are the powers that have been refining and elevating society ever since He lived and taught. Slowly, almost insensibly, the gospel has been making its way in society.
3. The last thing I want you to see is, that the gospel and spirit of Jesus alone have the power to make humanity noble and good. What a principle this is on which to base individual, social, and political life--God is the Father of all men and has given His Son to redeem them from death; all men are the sons of God, bound to obey Him with loving and filial spirit; each man owes to every other man the duties of a brother. Were that principle realized the happiness of the world would far surpass the dreams of the most ardent socialist. Getting rich by methods that injure others would be unknown. (S. If. Hamilton, D. D.)