t (Matt. 16:17). "Unto you
it is given," he says on another occasion, "to know the mystery of
the Kingdom of Heaven" (Mark 4:11), and he adds that there are those
who see and do not see; they are outside it; they have not the
alphabet, we might say, that will open the book (cf. Rev. 5:3). He
makes it clear at every point in the story of the Kingdom of God
that there is more beyond; and he means it. It is to be a new
beginning, an initiation, leading on to what we shall see but do not
yet guess, though he gives us hints. We shall not easily fathom the
depth of his idea of the new life, but along with it we have to
study the width and boldness of his purpose. This new life is not
for a few--for "the elect," in our careless phrase. He looks to a
universal scope for what he is doing. It will reach far outside the
bounds of Judaism. "They shall come from the east and from the west,
and from the north and from the south, and shall sit down in the
Kingdom of God" (Luke 13:29). "Wheresoever this gospel shall be
preached throughout the whole world," he says (Mark 14:9). "My words
shall not pass away" (Luke 21:33). All time and all existence come
under his survey and are included in his plan. The range is
enormous. And this was a Galilean peasant! As we gradually realize
what he has in mind, must we not feel that we have not grasped
anything like the full grandeur of his thought?

He makes it plain, in the second place, that it will be a matter for
followers, for workers, for men who will watch and wait and
dare--men with the same abandonment as himself. He calls for men to
come after him, to come behind him (Mark 1:17, 10:21; Luke 9:59). He
emphasizes that they must think out the terms on which he enlists
them. He does not disguise the drawbacks of his service. He calls
his followers, and a very personal and individual call it is. He
calls a man from the lake shore, from the nets, from the custom
house.

In the third place, he clearly announces an intention to achieve
something in itself of import by his death. There are those who
would have us believe that his mind was obsessed with the fixed idea
of his own speedy return on the clouds, and that he hurried on to
death to precipitate this and the new age it was to bring.
References to such a coming are indeed found in the Gospels as we
have them, but we are bound to ask whence they come, and to inquire
how far they represent exactly what he said; and then, if he is
correctly