The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1898, Page 9

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The Lutheran Pioneer,

A MISSIONARY

MONTHLY.

PusiisHED By THE EVANGELICAL LutHEeraN SynopicaL CoNFERENCE OF Nort AMERICA.

R. A. BISCHOFF, Editor.

Entered at the Post Office at St. Louis, Mo., as second-class matter.

St. Louis, Mo., March, 1898.

No. 3.

| Did It.

I see the crowd in Pilate’s hall,
I mark their wrathful mien;
Their shouts of ‘‘crucify”’ appal,

With blasphemy between.

And of that shouting multitude,
I feel that I am one;

And in that din of voices rude,
T recognize my own.

I sce the scourges tear His back,
I see the piercing crown,

And of that crowd who smite and mock,
I feel that I am one.

Around yon cross the throng I see
Mocking the Sufferer’s groan;

Yet still my voice it seems to be,
As if I mocked alone.

*Twas I that shed the sacred blood,
I nailed Him to the tree,

I crucified the Christ of God,
I joined the mockery.

Yet not the less that blood avails,
To cleanse away my sin;

And not the less that cross prevails,

To give me peace within.
Selected.

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We Did It.

In the season of Lent we call to mind the
sufferings and death of Christ. We go with
Him on His way of sorrows from Gethsemane
to Calvary. We see Him in His agony in the
arden sweating great drops of blood. We

see Him forsaken by His disciples, mocked by
His enemies, and dragged like a criminal from
one tribunal to another. We see His body
scourged and torn by the whips of cruel sol-
diers. We see the crown of thorns pressed
upon His head, whilst the blood rushes down
His cheeks. We see Him hurried through the
streets to Calvary, nailed to the cross, hoisted
in the air. We see Him enduring the suffer-
ings of the body and the agony of the soul
which pressed from His lips that cry of woe,
‘My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken
me?’’? We see Him bowing His head and
dying the most shameful death upon the ac-
cursed tree.

Who did all this to the Holy One, in whom
there was no sin and no guile! You say, the
Jews and the Gentiles. But all the malice of
the Jews and all the power of Rome could not
make Him suffer the least against His will.
The answer to our question is: We didit. He
suffered and died willingly in our place and
in our stead. He Himself says through the
mouth of the prophet: ‘‘Thou hast made me
to serve with thy sins, thou hast wearied me
with thine iniquities. I, even I, am He that
blotteth out thy transgressions,’’ Is. 43, 24.
‘He hath borne our grief,’’ says the prophet,
‘tand carried our sorrows. He was wounded
for our transgressions, He was bruised for
our iniquities.’’ ‘Behold the Lamb of God
which taketh away the sin of the world!”’ says
St. John. ‘His own self bore our sins in His
body on the tree,’’ says St. Peter. He ‘‘gave
Himself for our sins,’’ says St. Paul.

Yes, we did it. Our sins brought that bit-
ter suffering of body and great agony of soul
on the Holy One of God. Oonr sins lay like a
heavy mountain upen Him and made His soul
‘exceeding sorrowful unto death.’’ Our sins
scourged that holy body, and platted that
crown of thorns, and pressed it on that holy
head. Our sins nailed that Man of sorrows to
the cross, made Him forsaken of God, and
put Him to death. It was the punishment due
to us which He thus bore in His sufferings and
death.

Blessed are those that in true sorrow over
their sins cry out: Yes, we did it! what a
horrible thing is our sin! what a great offence

against God! Such can find comfort and sal-
vation in that which Christ did. He bore the
burden, He endured the shame, the cross, the
wrath of the Father, that we might escape.
By His sufferings and death He paid the
debt of sin and extinguished the fire of God’s
righteous wrath. ‘‘By His wounds we are
healed,’’ says the prophet. ‘‘He is the propi-
tiation for our sins; and not for ours only,
but also for the sins of the whole world,”’ says
St. John. “Ye are not redeemed with cor-
ruptible things, as silyer and gold, but with
the precious blood of Christ,’’ says St. Peter.
In Christ ‘‘we have redemption through His
blood, namely the forgiveness of sins,’’ says
St. Paul. ‘Thou wast slain and hast redeemed
us to God by Thy blood,’’ sing the saints in
heaven before the throne of the Lamb.

Yes, happy are they who, in sorrow over
that which they did by their sins, trust in that
which Christ did for them by His sufferings
and death. They have forgiveness of sin and
are free from all condemnation. For since
Christ was condemned for us, ‘‘there is, there-
fore, now no condemnation to them which are
in Christ Jesus.”

——> ~-o- eo -

Footprints.

A farmer went out in the deep winter, when
the snow was thick on the ground, and he took
his little boy with him. By and by they came
to a yery steep hill, and it was dangerous
climbing, for the snow concealed a great
many ugly gaps into which they might fall,
so the father went ahead, and his little boy
climbed after him. When they had gone this
way some distance, the little fellow called out:

“Father, be sure you take the right road,
for I am stepping in your footprints!”

‘(My son stepping in my footprints!’’
thought the father, and the thought troubled
him, and made him think, and at last made
him pray and become a Christian: for he
thought, ‘If my son is following me, surely
I should be following Christ!””

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Tuere can be no failure in anything that is
undertaken in the name of the Lord.