sacrifice imperative, so weighed upon the Savior's mind that He
sorrowed deeply. "Now is my soul troubled," He groaned; "and what shall
I say?" He exclaimed in anguish. Should He say, "Father, save me from
this hour" when as He knew "for this cause" had He come "unto this
hour?" To His Father alone could He turn for comforting support, not to
ask relief from, but strength to endure, what was to come; and He
prayed: "Father, glorify thy name." It was the rising of a mighty Soul
to meet a supreme issue, which for the moment had seemed to be
overwhelming. To that prayer of renewed surrender to the Father's will,
"Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it,
and will glorify it again."

The voice was real; it was no subjective whisper of comfort to the inner
consciousness of Jesus, but an external, objective reality. People who
were standing by heard the sound, and interpreted it variously; some
said it was thunder; others, of better spiritual discernment, said: "An
angel spake to him"; and some may have understood the words as had
Jesus. Now fully emerged from the passing cloud of enveloping anguish,
the Lord turned to the people, saying: "This voice came not because of
me, but for your sakes." And then, with the consciousness of assured
triumph over sin and death, He exclaimed in accents of divine
jubilation, as though the cross and the sepulchre were already of the
past: "Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this
world be cast out." Satan, the prince of the world was doomed.[1075]
"And I," the Lord continued, "if I be lifted up from the earth, will
draw all men unto me." John assures us that this last utterance
signified the manner of the Lord's death; the people so understood, and
they asked an explanation of what seemed to them an inconsistency, in
that the scriptures, as they had been taught to interpret the same,
declared that the Christ was to abide forever,[1076] and now He who
claimed to be the Messiah, the Son of Man, averred that He must be
lifted up. "Who is this Son of man?" they asked. Mindful as ever not to
cast pearls where they would not be appreciated, the Lord refrained from
a direct avowal, but admonished them to walk in the light while the
light was with them, for darkness would surely follow; and as He
reminded them, "he that walketh in darkness knoweth not whither he
goeth." In conclusion the Lord admonished them thus: "While ye have
light, believe in