rtaker of our human nature, in order that
we might realise the end of our manhood, by being made partakers of His
Divine Life.

THE DEVOTION OF THE THREE HOURS

I
INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS

The object with which we meet here can be expressed in a Pauline phrase
of three words, it is "to learn Christ."

But, in those three words, there is contained, in the manner of St. Paul,
a wealth of meaning. To learn Christ is clearly an affair of the
intellect, in the first place. It quite certainly, in this sense, does
not mean merely to accumulate information regarding the words and acts of
our Lord. St. Paul himself is singularly sparing of allusions to the
history of Christ, if we exclude from that His Death, Burial, and
Resurrection. The phrase, in fact, describes that kind of knowledge to
which a detailed study of the Saviour's Life is related as means to an
end, the knowledge, namely, of Christ's character, of His Mind and Will.
Such knowledge is not to be acquired in one hour or in three. It is, it
ought to be, the life-long object of a Christian man to gain it in an
ever-increasing measure of fulness and accuracy. But the last words of
the Lord, the seven sayings from His Cross, constitute a special and in
some measure unique disclosure of His Mind and Will. And, therefore, to
meditate upon them, as we are now proposing to do, will be to advance one
stage further, and a distinct stage, in the process of "learning Christ."

1. But we do well to remind ourselves, at the very outset, that our aim
is not merely intellectual, but also practical. There is no real gain
arising from the knowledge of Christ's Mind and Will, save so far as that
knowledge enables us to make that Mind and Will our own mind and our own
will. _That_ is the very meaning of Christian discipleship. "Let this
mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus."

2. The end thus set before us is one capable of attainment by all. The
individual, indeed, cannot hope to realise that end completely by
himself. The embodiment of Christ's Mind and Will is the supreme task
and the final achievement of the whole Body of Christ. The purpose of
the long development of the Church on earth is, that "we should _all_
(not _each_) arrive at a perfect man, at the measure of the stature of
the fulness of the Christ." The whole Church, the Body in its
completeness, is meant to reflect back in the eyes of the Father, the
moral glory of the Son of man.