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Quiet Talks about Jesus
by
S. D. Gordon
Author of "Quiet Talks on Power," and "Quiet Talks on Prayer"
Contents
A Bit Ahead
I. The Purpose of Jesus. 1. The Purpose in Jesus' Coming 2. The Plan for Jesus' Coming 3. The Tragic Break in the Plan 4. Some Surprising Results of the Tragic Break
II. The Person of Jesus. 1. The Human Jesus 2. The Divine Jesus 3. The Winsome Jesus
III. The Great Experiences or Jesus' Life. 1. The Jordan: The Decisive Start 2. The Wilderness: Temptation 3. The Transfiguration: An Emergency Measure 4. Gethsemane: The Strange, Lone Struggle 5. Calvary: Victory 6. The Resurrection: Gravity Upward 7. The Ascension: Back Home Again Until----
IV. Study Notes
"Show me, I pray thee, Thy glory."--_Moses_.
"When I could not see for the glory of that light."--_Paul_.
"But we all with open face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord are transformed into the same image from glory to glory."--_Paul_.
"The light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ."--_Paul_.
"Since mine eyes were fixed on Jesus, I've lost sight of all beside, So enchained my spirit's vision, Looking at the Crucified." --From _Winnowed Hymns_.
A Bit Ahead
So far as I can find out, I have no theory about Jesus to make these talks fit into. I have tried to find out for myself what the old Book of God tells about Him. And here I am trying to tell to others, as simply as I can, what I found. It was by the tedious, twisting path of doubt that I climbed the hill of truth up to some of its summits of certainty. I am free to confess that I am ignorant of the subject treated here save for the statements of that Book, and for the assent within my own spirit to these statements, which has greatly deepened the impression they made, and make. There is no question raised here about that Book itself, but simply a taking and grouping up together of what it says.
Most persons simply _read_ a book. A few _study_ it, also. It is good to read. It is yet better to go back over it and _study_, and meditate. Since learning that the two books on power and prayer have been used in Bible classes I have regretted not including study notes in them. For those who may want to study about Jesus there has been added at the close a simple analysis with references. The reading pages have been kept free of foot-notes to make the reading smooth and easier. The analysis is so arranged that one can quickly turn in reading to the corresponding paragraph or page in the study notes.
Table of contents (by pages)
- 1: Quiet Talks about Jesus by S. D. Gordon
- 2: Of the Old Eden language of love
- 3: And the choice made an ugly kink in his will
- 4: That degree of difference is an infinite degree
- 5: So overlaid you would hardly guess it was there
- 6: He has made man an absolute sovereign in one realm
- 7: Then come the climax and the crisis
- 8: It is cunningly implied with a sticky
- 9: Clothing is man's badge of shame
- 10: If you think there were no crab apples in Eden
- 11: A famous bit in Isaiah puts it very clearly
- 12: Because of the hardening of their hearts
- 13: That word vanity means aimlessness
- 14: All its fruitage grows about that core
- 15: Natural function to gratify unnatural desires
- 16: Jesus is God letting sin do its worst
- 17: The Gospels speak of believing on Jesus
- 18: It was the usual trysting place and trysting hour
- 19: But God comes closer yet in His wooing
- 20: Man is the fairest flower of earth's creation
- 21: That is in the Hebrew half of the Bible
- 22: The circle route is always the shortest
- 23: This is repeated to his son and to his grandson
- 24: That ruleth in the fear of God
- 25: In direct descent from the great David
- 26: Those refusing her leadership will
- 27: While the devout Christian will likely
- 28: Through these lines run forebodings
- 29: And the wondrous messenger and message
- 30: The message a very winsome coming
- 31: And in these Jesus and John are inextricably interwoven
- 32: First came the contemptuous rejection
- 33: Before the alert eyes of his hundreds of hearers Pharisees
- 34: Not in response to their captious demand
- 35: And if the label is satisfactory
- 36: Is based the aggressive campaign begun that day
- 37: And spy upon His movements and words
- 38: With the crowd come the Pharisees
- 39: Jesus probably returns to Galilee
- 40: Th' unbroken foal beneath Him gently stepped
- 41: While His own disciples fled in fear
- 42: The simple hearted Bethany Mary
- 43: Nor the Mosaic scheme of sacrifice
- 44: It is the superlative degree of hate
- 45: Eating My flesh means abiding in Me
- 46: Jesus saw a necessity for His dying
- 47: On their part of the intensest
- 48: The devout heathen with face turned up to the hill top
- 49: How can He be the promised Messiah
- 50: Thoroughly immersed in its literature and atmosphere
- 51: And to people away from Palestine
- 52: Comes the Pentecost outpouring
- 53: This surprising Jew is surprising us anew
- 54: It is possible to the human being to err
- 55: Jesus was a virtuous unfallen man
- 56: Jesus ate the bread of the poor
- 57: He was the village carpenter up in Nazareth
- 58: The Divine JesusJehovah Jesus
- 59: Distance is essential to perspective
- 60: Whether His own kinsfolk or not
- 61: And the only Son who had been begotten
- 62: Moses gave you not the manna from heaven
- 63: Abraham was Israel's link with the idolatrous heathen
- 64: This told most His winsomeness
- 65: The Transfiguration would deepen the spirituality
- 66: The Transfiguration An Emergency Measure
- 67: Even the primary knowledge of space
- 68: Gethsemane is Calvary in anticipation
- 69: John's baptism meant turning from sin
- 70: He had a keen scent for danger
- 71: Now at the plunge into the Jordan waters
- 72: It pushes trust over into unwarranted presumption
- 73: Earth's fairest became earth's ugliest
- 74: Every temptation was brought
- 75: The tempter attacks first the neediest point
- 76: With every rope tugging at its fastenings
- 77: The tempter acts his part like an old hand
- 78: The tempter comes now to the real thing he is after
- 79: Has affected the Galilean crowds
- 80: There are two sorts of leadership
- 81: It took the transfiguration to put into the impulsive
- 82: Jesus was changed from within
- 83: The transfiguration served its purpose fully
- 84: As He comes to a certain Samaritan village on the road south
- 85: It is the beginning already of Gethsemane
- 86: This is the agony of Gethsemane
- 87: A city rabble with Roman soldiers
- 88: Caiaphas was the nominal high priest
- 89: In supposed righteous horror Caiaphas tore his garments
- 90: Poor Peter mingles a lie with the denial
- 91: The charge must appeal to Pilate
- 92: It is the second mocking and the second acquittal
- 93: Pilate brings forward a man named Barabbas
- 94: Pilate quits the prolonged duelling
- 95: And so Jesus was crucified as a King
- 96: He goeth before you into Galilee
- 97: Now she stands at the open tomb weeping
- 98: They are intently absorbed in conversation
- 99: Whosesoever ye retain they are retained
- 100: The return to life followed the same voluntary course
- 101: Sin's gravity is toward a center downward
- 102: Yonder in full view is Gethsemane and Calvary
- 103: The American Revision is used here
- 104: The Plan for the Coming of Jesus
- 105: Hosea 2 18 see Romans 8 20 22
- 106: Matthew 21 12 17 with parallels
- 107: The name Father in Old Testament
- 108: The Jordan The Decisive Start
- 109: The Resurrection Gravity Upward