Mark 15:21 And they compel one Simon a Cyrenian, who passed by, coming out of the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to bear his cross. Little did these people know that they were making this man immortal! Notice in this connection: I. THE GREATNESS OF TRIFLES. Had Simon started from the little village where he lived five minutes earlier or later, had he walked a little faster or slower, had he happened to be lodging on the other side of Jerusalem, had he gone in at another gate, had the centurion not fixed on him to carry the cross, all his life would have been different. And so it is always. Our lives are like the Cornish rocking stones, pivoted on little points. 1. Let us bring the highest and largest principles to bear on the smallest events and circumstances. 2. Let us repose in quiet confidence on Him in whose hands the whole puzzling overwhelming mystery lies. To Him "great" and "small" are terms that have no meaning. He looks upon men's lives, not according to the apparent magnitude of the deeds with which they are filled, but simply according to the motives from which, and the purpose towards which, they were done. II. THE BLESSEDNESS AND HONOUR OF HELPING JESUS CHRIST. Though He bore Simon's sins in His Own Body on the tree, He needed Simon to help Him to bear the cross; and He needs us to help Him to spread throughout the world the blessed consequences of that cross. For us all there is granted the honour, and from us all there is required the sacrifice and the service of helping the suffering Saviour of men. III. THE PERPETUAL RECOMPENSE AND RECORD OF HUMBLEST CHRISTIAN WORK. How little Simon thought, when he went back to his rural lodging that night, that he had written his Name high up on the tablet of the world's memory, to be legible forever. God never forgets, or allows to be forgotten, anything done for Him. We may not leave our works on any record that men can read. What of that, if they are written in letters of light in the Lamb's Book of Life, to be read out by Him, before His Father and the holy angels, in the last great day. We may not leave any separate traces of our service, any more than the little brook that comes down some galley on the hillside flows separate from its sisters, with whom it has coalesced in the bed of the great river, or in the rolling, boundless ocean. What of that, so long as the work, in its consequences, shall last? IV. THE BLESSED RESULTS OF CONTACT WITH THE SUFFERING CHRIST. Only by standing near the cross, and gazing on the Crucified Jesus, will any of us ever learn the true mystery and miracle of Christ's great and loving Being and work. Take your place there behind Him, near His cross; gazing upon Him till your heart melts, and you, too, learn that He is your Lord, and Saviour, and God. Look to Him who bears what none can help Him to carry — the burden of the world's sin; let Him bear yours; yield to Him your grateful obedience; and then take up your cross daily, and bear the light burden of self-denying service to Him who has borne the heavy load of sin for you and all mankind. (A. Maclaren, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: And they compel one Simon a Cyrenian, who passed by, coming out of the country, the father of Alexander and Rufus, to bear his cross. |
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