Page:The future of Africa.djvu/205

Rh throes of distressed and dying woman, and all the various notes of misery with which earth is filled.

3. Into this region of distress and death—this world of suffering and of woe, Jesus Christ appeared. He came on a lofty mission to earth, in order to see what were the pains and pangs of wretched humanity; and to exert a divine power, capable of arresting the deadly tide of disease, in human frames and human hearts. He came in his own distinct and peculiar manifestation—"the of life," for the purpose of scattering disease and of destroying death and its powers. He was the reality of that incident in the life of the High Priest, when we read that "He stood between the dead and the living, and the plague was stayed." Aaron was but the type, but Christ is the reality of that wondrous healing power. And when He came, the world experienced an efficacy of actual curative might, which it had never before known in all its histories. Here, now, was the great Physician. Here was "Balm of Gilead." He went about everywhere, doing good. He spent a life of generous and saving restorative power, healing all manner of disease and sickness. He fed the hungry. He comforted the widow. He raised the dead. The deaf had their hearing restored. The blind were reclaimed from darkness, to look forth in joy upon the brightness of clear skies and "the lilies of the field." The paralytic regained lost vital power to disabled limbs. The withered hand was made whole, and became once more pliant and elastic. Lunacy was changed to calm rationality and clear sense. Indeed, all