thy body He lays in the field which He purchased for thee at the price of His blood, the field of the Church, His Bride.
Christ is all to us. He who loses Him, loses all. Truly, if Micah could say when his idols were removed, Ye have taken away my gods which I made,—and what have I more? (Judg. xviii. 24;) far more truly may he complain who sees himself deprived of Jesus.
And this will be the chief woe of the damned—that Jesus is irrevocably lost to them. For if He were in hell, it would be no hell, as Heaven without Him would be no Heaven, as the Royal Psalmist exclaims: Whom have I in Heaven but Thee? To be with Jesus, is to be in Paradise, as the poor thief learned, when he was assured that he should be with Jesus, and therefore be in Paradise: To-day shall thou be with Me in Paradise.
To be away from Jesus is to be in hell. Wherefore the sentence of the Judge is: Depart from Me, ye cursed. To be separated from Jesus, and that for ever; ah! that is the malediction of all, that a hell deeper than hell itself.
But how is it that we esteem this loss at so small a price? that we lose Jesus knowingly, wilfully, for a momentary pleasure, for a point of honour, for a nothing at all; and having lost Him, seek Him not sorrowing?
Our own gross ignorance is the cause, readily consenting to sin, and so losing us the dear presence of Jesus.
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