Notes of a Sermon Preached by the Rev. C. E. Darwent in Union Church, Tientsin, Sunday Evening, January 28
Text: St. Matthew III. 12. "Whose fan is in his hand."
Professor Seeley, in his "Ecce Home," is only writer to give anything like a sensible and convince ing explanation of this mysterious fan in the hand of Jesus Christ, with which He will "thoroughly cleanse His garner." The comment tators on it are poor. They have not even the wit to make use of the insight of Seeley by quoting: him, as far as I know them.
But before we turn to the question of the fan, we may remind ourselves of one thing. We are not to think of Jesus Christ coming into the world with all His plans of action fixed, or as we say, "out and dried." His great purpose, to redeem mankind from slavery to sin, was no doubt fixed, but the means of carrying it out in detail can hardly have been. He would hardly be a human being at all, if He had not to consider ways and means, as we all know a man} has to do as Luther had. He had made up his mind, that the church of his day was wrong in some particulars. He wanted to publish! his views. No doubt, he considered various ways of making his views known, and after mature consideration, he resolved to nail his ninety-five propositions on the door. of Wittenberg Cathedral, which he did. So then, in order to find out what the fan is, we begin, with "Ecce Homo" by asking the question that Jesus had to settle, how His people should be organized, how sep-; atated. he Jews, God's first chosen people, were separated phy-sicelly from other peoples, by being made a separate nation. Was Christ to follow this plan As See-Jey says, Christ had two courses! open to Him in this matter. He! could organize his followers in communities, or He could let them remain units in the general population. Seeley says that He chose the latter alternative, as we know He did. The wheat and the tares are "to grow up together."
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.