‘The greater part remain until this present.’  Now the word remain is no mere synonym for living or surviving.  It not only tells us the fact that the survivors were living, but the kind of life that they did live.  It is very significant that it is the same expression as our Lord used in the profound prophetic words, ’If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee?’ Now we are told in John’s Gospel that ‘that saying went abroad amongst the brethren,’ and inasmuch as it was a matter of common notoriety in the early Church, it is by no means a violent supposition that it may be floating in Paul’s memory here, and may determine his selection of this remarkable expression ‘they remain,’ or ‘they tarry,’ and they were tarrying till the Master came.  So, then, I think if we give due weight to the significance of the phrase, we get two or three thoughts worth pondering.

One of them is that the sight of a risen Christ will make life calm and tranquil.  Fancy one of these 500 brethren, after that vision, going back to his quiet rural home in some little village amongst the hills of Galilee.  How small and remote from Him, and unworthy to ruffle or disturb the heart in which the memory of that vision was burning, would seem the things that otherwise would have been important and distracting!  The faith which we have in the risen Christ ought to do the same thing for us, and will do it in the measure in which there shines clearly before that inward eye, which is our true means of apprehending Him, the vision which shone before the outward gaze of that company of wondering witnesses.  If we build our nests amidst the tossing branches of the world’s trees, they will sway with every wind, and perhaps be blown from their hold altogether by such a storm as we all have sometimes to meet.  But we may build our nests in the clefts of the rock, like the doves, and be quiet, as they are.  Distractions will cease to distract, and troubles will cease to agitate, and across the heaving surface of the great ocean there will come a Form beneath whose feet the waves smooth themselves, and at whose voice the winds are still.  They who see Christ need not be troubled.  The ship that is empty is tossed upon the ocean, that which is well laden is steady.  The heart that has Christ for a passenger need not fear being rocked by any storm.  Calmness will come with the vision of the Lord, and we shall abide or ‘remain,’ for there will be no need for us to flee from this Refuge to that, nor shall we be driven from our secure abode by any contingencies.  ‘He that believeth shall not make haste.’

It is a good thing to cultivate the disposition that says about most of the trifles of this life, ‘It does not much matter’; but the only way to prevent wholesome contempt of the world’s trivialities from degenerating into supercilious indifference is, to base it upon Christ, discerned as near us and bestowing upon us the calmness of His risen life.  Make Him your scale of importance, and nothing will be too small to demand and be worthy of the best efforts of your work, but nothing will be too great to sweep you away from the serenity of your faith.