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I. THE AIMS AND HOPES OF JESUS DIFFERENT FROM THOSE TO WHOM HE SPOKE. Those who questioned and criticized him cared for no country but their own. Not that they were ignorant of other Countries, for they went to live in them, but they still kept communion and close touch with Jerusalem. The Jew liked to make money out of the Gentile, and so he would go and live in the Gentile city, but it never seemed to strike him that the God of the Jew was God also of the Gentile, and that the Christ for whom the Jew waited was needed by the Gentile just as much. But Jesus, being himself the Christ, longed inexpressibly for the hour when he should begin to draw all men to himself. Even in the days of his flesh he began to draw the Gentiles. For even as Jews went to dwell in Gentile lands, so Gentiles came to dwell in the Jewish land; and when Jesus went about doing good, humanity in all its pressing need overleaped the bounds of nationality, and came to him for help.

II. OUR AIMS AND HOPES ARE ALSO DIFFERENT. Most part of men certainly do not care to be drawn to Jesus. Jesus is interested in everybody, while our deep, underlying desire is to get as many people as possible interested in us. We are mightily grieved if other people do not think almost as much about us as we do about ourselves. But it is not quite so much a matter of course to be interested in other people. And to be interested in Jesus, to set ourselves in real sober earnest to find out all we can about him, may strike us as an eminently unpractical thing.

III. Look AT THIS DRAWING POWER IN THE EXERCISE OF IT.

1. The purpose of Jesus is clear. He made that abundantly plain while he lived under the conditions of ordinary humanity. The times of retirement and avoidance of men were only exceptional. The miracles of Jesus were advertisements in the best sense of the word. His wondrous works were things that people talked about, and were meant to have this effect.

2. The motive also is clear. All were to be drawn, because of the need of all. We all need Jesus, just as every growing plant in the field needs the sunshine and the rain. As none can live the natural life without air and food, so none can live the higher life without Jesus. We can never be what we were meant to be, until Jesus the Christ is using us for himself. We are like unlighted candies, and Jesus alone can light us. The glory of a candle is in its burning, and the glory of a human being is in his shining Christianity. We ourselves feel the paramount claim of need upon us, and shall Jesus not feel it?

3. The means must be noticed. Drawing, not driving. The only effectual compulsion is that of love. We must be drawn because we cannot help it. So long as we prefer self-indulgence, ease, mere drifting, we shall not be drawn. We must come within the circle of which Jesus is the Center. Then shall we ever tend more and more toward that Center. - Y.

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KJV: And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.

WEB: And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself."