The miracles of Jesus - Classical Christian Literature by Athleo.net

356 THE RESURRECTION
desolation wherever He met with it, He never forgot
its relation to another and a deeper need. He was
also ever unwilling to perform a wonder for the
wonder's sake, or to satisfy a merely earthly yearning.
He desired, along with the visible and temporary relief,
to bestow a spiritual and heavenly blessing.
Occasionally
this double purpose produces upon us an effect
not altogether welcome. We feel so keenly the
lower need, that the intrusion of the other appears
out of place. When the nobleman of Capernaum
entreats His help for his sick child, Jesus meets him
with the remark, " Except ye see
ye will in no wise believe."
signs and wonders,
So in the narrative before
us, Jesus, when He met Martha on the outskirts of
Bethany, was not unwilling to turn the sorrow before
Him into rejoicing by an act transcending her utmost
expectation ;
but
He was anxious that the present
earthly benefit should be the means of raising her
thoughts to a higher spiritual truth. He must prepare
her for reading in the miracle He was about to
perform, the lessons it was fitted to convey. Simply
to restore her dead brother to her sight and love
would have been an act of kindness indeed, but the
very intensity of the joy occasioned by it might have
diverted attention from its loftier aspect. But this
was the side of it He was most anxious to impress.
The one benefit a few \ ~ars would exhaust, the other
was a treasure bestowed for eternity.
The conversation of Jesus with Martha will be read
a little
differently, according as we suppose Martha to
have had a secret thought regarding the possibility of
a miraculous restoration, or not. Both views may be
maintained. In the one case, Jesus would be pre-