there is always a danger that a clever characterization, a witty label, may conclude the matter, that a possible friendship may be lost through the very ingenuity with which the man has been labelled, who might have been a friend.  It is not a small matter in Jesus’ eyes, he puts his view very strongly (Matt. 5:22); and, as we must always remember, he bases himself on fact.  We may lose a great deal more than we think by letting our labels stand between us and his words, by our habit of calling them paradoxes and letting them go at that.

It is worth while to look at the type of character that he admires.  Modern painters have often pictured Jesus as something of a dreamer, a longhaired, sleepy, abstract kind of person.  What a contrast we find in the energy of the real Jesus—­in the straight and powerful language which he uses to men, in the sweep and range of his mind, in the profundity of his insight, the drive and compulsiveness of his thinking, in the venturesomeness of his actions.  How many of the parables turn on energy?  The real trouble with men, he seems to say, is again and again sheer slackness; they will not put their minds to the thing before them, whether it be thought or action.  Thus, for instance, the parable of the talents turns on energetic thinking and decisive action; and these are the things that Jesus admires—­in the widow who will have justice (Luke 18:21)—­in the virgins who thought ahead and brought extra oil (Matt. 25:4)—­in the vigorous man who found the treasure and made sure of it (Matt. 13:44)—­in the friend at midnight, who hammered, hammered, hammered, till he got his loaves (Luke 11:8)—­in the “violent,” who “take the Kingdom of Heaven by force” (Matt. 11:12; Luke 16:16)—­in the man who will hack off his hand to enter into life (Mark 9:43).  Even the bad steward he commends, because he definitely put his mind on his situation (Luke 16:8).  As we shall see later on, indecision is one of the things that in his judgement will keep a man outside the Kingdom of God, that make him unfit for it.  The matter deserves more study than we commonly give it.  You must have a righteousness, he says, which exceeds the righteousness of the Pharisees (Matt. 5:20)—­and the Pharisees were professionals in righteousness.  His tests of discipleship illumine his ideal of character—­Theocentric thinking—­negation of self—­the thought-out life.  He will have his disciples count the cost, reckon their forces, calculate quietly the risks before them—­right up to the cross (Luke 14:27-33)—­like John Bunyan in Bedford Gaol, where he thought things out to the pillory and thence to the gallows, so that, if it came to the gallows, he should be ready, as he says, to leap off the ladder blindfold into eternity.  That is the energy of mind that Jesus asks of men, that he admires in men.