Scripture: "Believe ye that I am able to do this? They said unto Him, Yea, Lord."—MATT. ix. 28.
If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth. And straightway the father of the child said with tears: Lord, I believe, help Thou mine unbelief" (Mark ix. 23, 24). "Jesus said, He that believeth in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. Believeth thou this? She saith unto Him, Yea, Lord, I believe" (John xi. 25, 26, 27).
To what we have seen and heard of Christ Jesus, our heart is ready to say with Martha, in answer to Christ's question: "Yea, Lord, I have believed that Thou art the Christ, the Son of God." But when it comes to the point of believing that what Christ promises to us of the power of the resurrection life, of His abiding presence every day and all the day, we do not find it so easy to say, "I do believe that this omnipotent, omnipresent, unchangeable Christ, our Redeemer God, will in very deed walk with me all the day, and give me the unceasing consciousness of His holy presence"—it almost looks too much to venture. And yet it is just this faith that Christ asks, and is waiting to work within us.
It is well that we understand clearly what the conditions are on which Christ offers to reveal to us in experience the secret of His abiding presence. God cannot force His blessings on us against our will. He seeks in every possible way to stir our desire, and to help us to realize that He is able and most willing to make His promises true. The resurrection of Christ from the dead is His great plea, His all-prevailing argument. If He could raise that dead Christ, Who had died under the burden of all our sin and curse, surely He can, now that Christ has conquered death, and is to us the Resurrection and the Life, fulfil in our hearts His promise that Christ can be so with us, and so in us that He Himself should be our life all the day.
And now the great question comes, whether in view of what we have said and seen about Christ as our Lord, as our redeeming God, whether we are willing to take His word in all simplicity in its divine fullness of meaning, and to rest in the promise: "Lo, I am with you all the day." Christ's question comes to us: "Believest thou this?" Let us not rest until we have bowed before Him and said: "Yea, Lord, I do believe."
