# A quote from Hugh Martin's Abiding Presence



## a mere housewife (May 4, 2008)

[Speaking of the perpetuity of the sacrifice of Christ]


> It was offered on earth. For the scene of sin's offence must be the scene of sin's expiation. And amidst earth's conditions of weakness, and shame, and sorrow, and transiency, the sacrifice was perfected upon the tree. Its heavenliness was veiled most of all in the hour in which, by its exhaustion of the curse and its fulfillment of all righteousness, it riveted a bond of union between earth and heaven. To human eye and reason, it appeared the most earthly and offensive of all earthly things -- foolishness to Greeks, to Jews a stumbling-block. Nevertheless, it belonged neither to Greece nor Judea, nor to earth at all. It was heavenly. It was heaven fastening its cords of love to earth; girdling round the earth with mercy and with righteousness and fastening it to heaven. It was heaven tasting earth's death, to destroy death from off the earth, and open for earth the way to heaven and to heavenly life for ever.


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