f His life. It
was written on His very face and bodily gait. He never had the easy,
indeterminate air of one who does not know what He means to do in the
world. "I have a baptism," He would say, "to be baptized with, and how
am I straitened till it be accomplished." In a rapt moment, at the
well of Sychar, after His interview with the Samaritan woman, when His
disciples proffered Him food, He put it away from Him, saying, "I have
meat to eat that ye know not of," and He added, "My meat is to do the
will of Him that sent Me and to finish His work." On His last journey
to Jerusalem, as He went on in front of His disciples, they were amazed
and, as they followed, they were afraid. His purpose possessed Him; He
was wholly in it, body, soul and spirit. He bestowed on it every scrap
of power He possessed, and every moment of His time. Looking back now
from the close of life, He has not to regret that any talent has been
either abused or left unused. All have been husbanded for the one
purpose and all lavished on the work.

What was this work of Christ? In what terms shall we express it? At
all events it was a greater work than any other son of man has ever
attempted. Men have attempted much, and some of them have given
themselves to their chosen enterprises with extraordinary devotion and
tenacity. The conqueror has devoted himself to his scheme of subduing
the world; the patriot to the liberation of his country; the
philosopher to the enlargement of the realm of knowledge; the inventor
has rummaged with tireless industry among the secrets of nature; and
the discoverer has risked his life in opening up untrodden continents
and died with his face to his task. But none ever undertook a task
worthy to be compared with that which engrossed the mind of Jesus.

It was a work for God with men, and it was a work for men with God.

The thought that it was a work for God, with which God had charged Him,
was often in Christ's mouth, and this consciousness was one of the
chief sources of His inspiration. "I must work the work of Him that
sent Me while it is day," He would say; or, "Therefore doth my Father
love Me, because I do always those things which please Him." And, at
the close of His life-work, He said, in words closely related to those
of our text, "I have glorified Thee on the earth, I have finished the
work which Thou gavest Me to do." This was His task, to glorify God on
the earth--to make known the Father t