February 22

He became poor. - 2 Corinthians 8:9.

FROM the Saviour’s greatness let us pass to His humiliation. We are not to suppose from hence that he ceased to be what he had been, or that he divested himself of the prerogatives of Deity. This was impossible; but he veiled them. The first degree of his humiliation was his assuming our nature. “The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us.” It would have been a low stoop in him if he had taken upon him the nature of angels; but he stooped much lower. “Because the children were partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same.”

The next degree in his humiliation was the manner in which he became incarnate. Jesus appeared in no worldly grandeur; nothing could be more obscure, abased, abject, than the circumstances attending his birth: born in a stable and laid in a manger. His mother acknowledged to God the “low estate of his handmaiden.” Nor was he exempted from the weakness of infancy. He tottered before he could walk, lisped before he could speak; he passed from ignorance to knowledge; he increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man. He was brought up at no university, and was not trained at the feet of any Gamaliel. Therefore the people said, “Whence hath this man knowledge? seeing he was never taught.” He was poor in accommodation. He said himself, “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head.” He was poor in reputation. He was “a worm, and no man.” He was called “a gluttonous man and a wine-bibber, and the friend of publicans and sinners;” a Samaritan, an enemy of Cæsar, and a blasphemer of Moses. He was poor in sympathy. The feelings of persons struggling with hardships, or under sorrow, are often relieved when they excite commiseration and notice; for it is natural for the sufferer to exclaim, “Pity me, pity me, oh ye my friends; for the hand of God hath touched me.” “I looked,” said he, in his agony, “for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none.” Where is the multitude he fed with the loaves and fishes? Where are the blind whose eyes he opened? And his disciples, where are they all? They have forsaken him, and fled. Angels who ministered to him in the wilderness, where are ye? Almighty God, where art thou? “My God, my God,” he cries, “why hast thou forsaken me?”