The gate which looketh toward the east.
Let us clearly understand that this is only a prosaic description of part of Jerusalem as the prophet conceives it in his vision of the city rebuilt. We cannot fairly see in these words any profound mystical allusions. But we may use them as illustrations of other things, as we may take nature in illustration of religion without believing that our parables are founded on fixed, objective, Swedenborgen-like correspondences. Let us, then, follow the fancy which the picture of a gate looking towards the east may call up when we take it as an illustration of what may be similar in other regions of life.
I. AN ORIENTAL OUTLOOK. The new city of God has this outlook—she has a gate which looketh towards the East. We must never forget that our religion comes from the East. In form it is Oriental still.
1. We need to remember this fact when we are in danger of interpreting its glowing metaphors in the cold matter-of-fact style of the West.
2. It might quiet the pride of Europe for men to remember that they owe what is best in European civilization to an Asiatic stock.
3. The wonder is that the unprogressive East produced the most progressive religion. The world-religion of Christ sprang from Asia. This very fact testifies to its Divine origin.
4. It shows, however, that Orientals especially should receive the gospel.
II. AN OUTLOOK TOWARDS THE LIGHT. The light dawns in the East. We all need light, and should love, seek, and cherish it. We are too satisfied with our dim, human, artificial light, instead of looking for that Light of the world, which is indeed the Light of the ages. The true Christian will be ever looking towards Christ, his Sun.
III. AN OUTLOOK TOWARDS THE NEW DAY. Each day begins in the east. We shall miss the sunrise if we set our faces towards the west. Some natures always incline to turn with a melancholy gaze towards the waning light of setting suns. They deplore the good old times; they weep over the days that have been, but can never be again; they weary their souls with incessant regrets. This continuous dreaming on the past is unwholesome; it tends to paralyze our energies and leave us in neglect of the duties as well as the hopes of the future. They are wiser who, like St. Paul, forget the things that are behind, and reach forth unto those which are before (Philippians 3:13). God has a new day of light and service for the saddest, most wearied soul that will turn to his grace. Wise men live in the future; they look to the rising sun.
IV. AN OUTLOOK TOWARDS CHRIST. The first sight which many a visitor to Palestine craves to set eves on is the Mount of Olives; his most earnest desire is to climb the very hill that Jesus Christ often trod. Of all sacred spots about Jerusalem this must be most like its original self. Now the eastern gate looks right on the Mount of Olives. To the Christian its prospect is profoundly interesting. Yet Christ has arisen. He is not there. What we now look for is an eastern gate of the soul turned to that ever-living Christ who ascended from the Mount of Olives—
"Faith has yet her Olivet, And Love her Galilee."