The Sorrow of the King

‘The king himself also passed over the brook Kidron.’— 2 Sam. XV. 23.
‘JESUS went forth with His disciples over the J brook Cedron. ‘ How precisely the Old Testament shadow corresponds with the New Testament fulfilment! The King, in sorrow and humiliation, is here brought before us, passing from his royal home, from all his glory and gladness,—passing over into exile and unknown distresses.
There is no need for imagination in dwelling on His sorrows. The pathos of the plain words is more than enough; no pen has power to add to it. Let us listen to them just as they stand, —not hurrying over them because they are only texts, and we know them all beforehand; they are the Holy Ghost’s sevenfold testimony to the sorrow of the King.
‘ A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief,’  ‘ I am poor and sorrowful.’  ‘ The sorrows of death compassed me.’  The sorrows of hell compassed me.’  ‘ Behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow.’  ‘He began to be sorrowful and very heavy.’ ‘My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death.’ Oh, stay a little that you may take it in ! hear Jesus saying to you,  ‘Hear, I pray you, and behold my sorrow? ‘

1 Kidron means ‘ obscurity ‘; Cedron is * black’ or ‘ sad.’
2 John xviii. i. 83 Sam. xviii. 20. 4 Isa. liii. 3. 5 Ps. Ixix. 29.

‘ Surely He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows.’ The sorrows of the past, the very sorrow that may be pressing heavily at this moment; all yours, all mine; all the sorrows of all His children all through the groaning generations; all that were
* too heavy ”’ for them,—Jesus bore them all.  ‘Is it nothing to you?’ It is when the Lord says,
‘ Now will I gather them ‘ (the rebels and wanderers), that He adds, ‘And they shall sorrow a little for the burden of the King of princes.’ Have we this proof that He has indeed gathered us? For ‘all the people,’ except the rebels, ‘passed over with the king.’ ” Do we know anything of this passage over Cedron, the brook of sadness, with Him? Possibly it seems presumptuous to think of sharing ‘the fellowship of His sufferings,’  that mysterious privilege ! But mark, it was not only the mighty Ittai and ‘all his men,’ the nobles and the veterans, that passed over, but ‘ all the little ones that were with him’^Hoo. And so ‘the little ones, the weak ones,’ the least member of His body, may thus  ‘continue with’ Jesus; and nothing brings one closer to another than a shared sorrow.
But look forward ! Because He has drunk  ‘of the brook in the way, therefore shall He lift up the head.” Already the  ‘exceeding sorrowful ‘ is exchanged for ‘Thou hast made Him (the King) exceeding glad;’* and when the ransomed and gathered of the Lord shall return with everlasting joy/ ‘their King also shall pass before them.’

1 Ps. xviii. 4, 5. 2 Lam. i. 12. 3 Matt. xxvi. 37.
4 Matt. xxvi. 38. 5 Lam. i. iS. ^ Isa. liii. 4.
7 Ps. xxxviii. 4. 8 Lam. i, 12. 9 Hos. viii. 10. .
^f’ 2 Sam. XV. 23. 11 Phil. iii. lo. ^- 2 Sam. xv. 22,
I Cor. xii. 26, 27,