THE PERFECT MODEL

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · May 27, 1889

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 15, No. 20.

THE PERFECT MODEL.

JESUS CHRIST is the Christian's only complete and perfect model. Other men may be, humanly speaking, perfect; they may be, locally, models of benevolence, piety, and humility; but, compared to Christ, they are as the shadow to the substance, darkness to light. Christ belongs to all people, and to every age. They belong to particular time and places. David never rose above the Jewish type of character. Luther was a German in all of his modes of writing and thinking, and can best be understood as a German, and Washington can never mean to other people and lands what he means to us and to our country. But Christ stands above all limitation of age, nation, or people. He was not affected by the bigotries and superstitions of his time, but towers above all local and national significance, as the pyramids above the plains of Egypt. All his words and all his actions, while they were fully adapted to the occasion which called them forth, retain their force and application undiminished to our own time. His command, "Follow me," means just as complete consecration on the part of all his professed followers to-day, as it did to his disciples when he walked and talked with them over the hills of Palestine, or through the streets of Jerusalem.—Christian Inquirer.