IV. And Now, Lastly, Note Here The Summons To Grateful Contemplation.

Behold the place where they laid Him.' To these women the call was simply one to come and see what would confirm the witness. But we may, perhaps, permissibly turn it to a wider purpose, and say that it summons us all to thankful, lowly, believing, glad contemplation of that empty grave as the basis of all our hopes. Look upon it and upon the Resurrection which it confirms to us as an historical fact. It sets the seal of the divine approval on Christ's work, and declares the divinity of His person and the all-sufficiency of His mighty sacrifice. Therefore let us, laden with our sins and seeking for reconciliation with God, and knowing how impossible it is for us to bring an atonement or a ransom for ourselves, look upon that grave and learn that Christ has offered the sacrifice which God has accepted, and with which He is well pleased.

Behold the place where they laid Him,' and, looking upon it, let us think of that Resurrection as a prophecy, with a bearing upon us and upon all the dear ones that have trod the common road into the great darkness. Christ has died, therefore they live; Christ lives, therefore we shall never die. His grave was in a garden--a garden indeed. The yearly miracle of the returning life re-orient out of dust,' typifies the mightier miracle which He works for all that trust in Him, when out of death He leads them into life. The graveyard has become' God's acre'; the garden in which the seed sown in weakness is to be raised in power, and sown corruptible is to be raised in incorruption.

Behold the place where they laid Him,' and in the empty grave read the mystery of the Resurrection as the pattern and the symbol of our higher life; that, like as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.' Oh to partake more and more of that power of His Resurrection!

In Christ's empty grave is planted the true tree of life, which is in the midst of the "true"Paradise of God.' And we, if we truly trust and humbly love that Lord, shall partake of its fruits, and shall one day share the glories of His risen life in the heavens, even as we share the power of it here and now.