Luke 17:37 And they answered and said to him, Where, Lord? And he said to them, Wherever the body is… 1. These words have many meanings for us. First we may think of them as referring to the fall of Jerusalem. There indeed was the body, the dead corrupt body of the Jews, who had refused to hear the message of salvation, and had taken and slain the Son of God outside the wall of their fated city. And where the body was, there were the eagles gathered together. That enemy, of which the prophets had spoken long ago, had come, and encompassed Jerusalem in on every side. The Roman eagles glittered upon their helmets, and flashed upon their standards. They set up their banners for tokens, even within the sacred courts of the temple, and so was fulfilled the prophecy of the "abomination of desolation standing in the holy place." 2. Again, we take the words of the text as applying to the hour of death, and first of the death of the body. Whoever has stood at a good man's death-bed must feel that the dying man is not alone, nor allowed in that last hour for any pains of death to fall from God. Where that poor worn-out body lies, there are the eagles of God's host gathered together, strengthening, comforting the dying man, ready to bear his soul as swift as on eagles' wings to Paradise. There is a beautiful fancy of the East which makes Azrael, the angel of death, speak thus to a dying saint: — "'Thou blessed one,' the angel said, 'I bring thy time of peace, When I have touched thee on the eyes, life's latest ache will cease; God bade me come as I am seen amid the heavenly host, — No enemy of awful mould, but he who loveth most.'"So looks the Christian on death, as being a fair and gracious messenger from God, bringing to the captive liberty, and to the weary rest. "Wheresoever the body is, thither will the eagles be gathered together." 3. These words are terribly true of the death of the godless and impenitent. Julian, the apostate emperor, took for his crest an eagle pierced through the heart by an arrow feathered from his own wing, and as a motto the words, "Our death flies to us with our own feather." So every sinner who dies impenitent knows that the arrow of remorse which pierces him is of his own making, that the dark spectres, which are gathered like eagles around him, are of his own inviting. 4. Once more, and in another and brighter sense, we will take the text as applying to the Blessed Sacrament of the altar; so it has always been understood by the old writers of the Church. One of them says — "Where the sacred body lieth, eagle souls together speed; There the saints and there the angels find refreshment in their need. And the sons of earth and heaven on that one Bread ever feed."When we kneel at that altar and receive the Body of our Lord, we are not alone. The very word "Communion" teaches us that we are encompassed by a great cloud of witnesses. Not only are we in that Sacrament made one with Christ, and with all true members of His Church, but we join in the work of saints and angels, and they take part with us. Thus we say, "With angels and archangels, and all the company of heaven, we laud and magnify Thy glorious name." "Wheresover the body is," wheresoever the Body of Jesus Christ is present in the Sacrament, there will the faithful worshippers be gathered together like eagles, and there too will be high and holy ones present, although unseen by us, making the altar a ladder between earth and heaven, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon it. (H. J. Wilmot Buxton, M. A.). Parallel Verses KJV: And they answered and said unto him, Where, Lord? And he said unto them, Wheresoever the body is, thither will the eagles be gathered together. |
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