The Lamb of God

William D. McCrackan

Love is a universal language, and the word lamb has an abiding place therein through inspiration and demonstration. The mother in her tenderest mood whispers it to her child, and divine Love, the white light of Truth, illuming everything, designates the real man, the Christ, as the Lamb of God. The symbol of the lamb stands for purity and light; its gambols set forth freedom, agility, and alertness. The writer of the Song of Solomon exclaims, "The voice of my beloved! behold, he cometh leaping upon the mountains, skipping upon the hills." The lamb is innocent and intact; knowing no guile, no aggression, but perennial freshness, the permanence of bliss. Above all, the lamb knows no hate, and therefore is always victorious.

In Christian history Jesus represents the sacrificial lamb, but the corporeal Jesus crucified brought to view the deathless Christ. Hence the reference in the Apocalypse to "the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world," and the statement of the Son of man, "I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore." This is the root of day that knows no darkness, belonging to the eternal sunrise kingdom of righteousness. On page 334 of Science and Health Mrs. Eddy writes concerning the above reference from the Apocalypse, "This is a mystical statement of the eternity of the Christ, and is also a reference to the human sense of Jesus crucified."

The idea of God can only be perceived by spiritual understanding and received and conceived by woman, strong in vision's zeal. Only that quality which powerfully discerns man in the likeness of God can bring forth, nourish, and cherish the divine idea. Individuals of either sex can mother the lamb if they have learned the scientific secret of man's origin; all can exclaim in the words of the prophet Isaiah, "Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given." Then cometh the marriage of the lamb, the union of Principle and idea, the conscious communion of man with God, wherein God is recognized as Father-Mother and man as the Son, a unity illustrated by Jesus when he said, "I and my Father are one."

In the fulfilment of the law of Christian Science the coming to human consciousness of "the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world," must eventually bring to light that humanhood which no longer needs to be sacrificed and which ceases to suffer. The father of the world and the mother of freedom cooperate to bring forth the lamb without blemish. On page 49 of "Unity of Good" Mrs. Eddy writes, "The more I understand true humanhood, the more I see it to be sinless,—as ignorant of sin as is the perfect Maker." The serpent, the dragon, and the wolf cannot find this spotless humanhood to harm it. The prayer of the unrighteous falls to nothing before it. Judas may wish to betray the lamb, but instead he goes and hangs himself. The victory of the lamb is won; its being is intact, its joy complete. It does not suffer, but lives to love, to obey, and to give.

The lamb has no sense of responsibility, no self-righteousness, but trusts all to the Mother God; and She yearns and watches over Her own. There is no black sheep for the Mother Love, who washes white the darkest stains, who trustingly leaves the ninety and nine in the wilderness and goes into the mountains after the one sheep which is lost, who cradles the weak ones in Her arms, soothes their fears, takes off the pressure of Her commands, and "tempers the wind to the shorn lamb." What the world calls a duty Love makes a joy, and so unfolds the divine plan that the obedient may follow. The supreme prayer of today echoes the words of Mrs. Eddy's well beloved hymn (Poems, p. 14):—

Lead Thy lambkins to the fold,
Take them in Thine arms.

A war worn world needs above all else the pure consciousness of the little child, the lambkin, the gift of God, dwelling in perpetual springtide, which does not suffer, because Love has overcome the world.

William D. McCrackan.

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