EXPOSITIONS OF HOLY SCRIPTURE

ALEXANDER MACLAREN, D. D. , Litt. D. 

ST. JOHN Chaps. XV to XXI

EXPOSITIONS OF HOLY SCRIPTURE

ALEXANDER MACLAREN, D. D. , Litt. D. 

ST. JOHN Chaps. XV to XXI

CONTENTS

THE TRUE VINE (John xv. 1-4)

THE TRUE BRANCHES OF THE TRUE VINE (John xv. 5-8)

ABIDING IN LOVE (John xv. 9-11)

THE ONENESS OF THE BRANCHES (John xv. 12, 13)

CHRIST'S FRIENDS (John xv. 14-17)

SHEEP AMONG WOLVES (John xv. 18-20)

THE WORLD'S HATRED, AS CHRIST SAW IT (John xv. 21-25)

OUR ALLY (John xv. 26, 27)

WHY CHRIST SPEAKS (John xvi. 1-6)

THE DEPARTING CHRIST AND THE COMING SPIRIT (John xvi. 7, 8)

THE CONVICTING FACTS (John xvi 9-11)

THE GUIDE INTO ALL TRUTH (John xvi. 12-15)

CHRIST'S 'LITTLE WHILES' (John xvi. 16-19)

SORROW TURNED INTO JOY (John xvi. 20-22)

'IN THAT DAY' (John xvi. 23, 24)

THE JOYS OP 'THAT DAY' (John xvi. 25-27)

'FROM' AND 'TO' (John xvi. 28)

GLAD CONFESSION AND SAD WARNING (John xvi. 29-32)

PEACE AND VICTORY (John xvi. 33)

THE INTERCESSOR (John xvii. 1-19)

'THE LORD THEE KEEPS' (John xvii. 14-16)

THE HIGH PRIEST'S PRAYER (John xvii. 20-26)

THE FOLDED FLOCK (John xvii. 24)

CHRIST'S SUMMARY OF HIS WORK (John xvii. 26)

CHRIST AND HIS CAPTORS (John xviii. 6-9)

JESUS BEFORE CAIAPHAS (John xviii. 15-27)

'ART THOU A KING?' (John xviii. 28-40)

JESUS SENTENCED (John xix. 1-16)

AN EYE-WITNESS'S ACCOUNT OF THE CRUCIFIXION (John xix. 17-30)

THE TITLE ON THE CROSS (John xix. 19)

THE IRREVOCABLE PAST (John xix. 22)

CHRIST'S FINISHED AND UNFINISHED WORK (John xix. 30; Rev. Xxi. 6)

CHRIST OUR PASSOVER (John xix. 36)

JOSEPH AND NICODEMUS (John xix. 38, 39)

THE GRAVE IN A GARDEN (John xix. 41, R. V. )

THE RESURRECTION MORNING (John xx. 1-18)

THE RISEN LORD'S CHARGE AND GIFT (John xx. 21-23)

THOMAS AND JESUS (John xx. 28)

THE SILENCE OF SCRIPTURE (John xx. 30, 31)

AN ELOQUENT CATALOGUE (John xxi. 2)

THE BEACH AND THE SEA (John xxi. 4)

'IT IS THE LORD' (John xxi. 7)

'LOVEST THOU ME?' (John xxi. 15)

YOUTH AND AGE, AND THE COMMAND FOR BOTH (John xxi. 18, 19)

'THEY ALSO SERVE WHO ONLY STAND AND WAIT' (John xxi. 21, 22)

THE TRUE VINE

'I am the true vine, and My Father is the husbandman. Everybranch in Me that beareth not fruit He taketh away; and everybranch that beareth fruit He purgeth it, that it may bring forthmore fruit. Now ye are clean through the word which I have spokenunto you. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bearfruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in Me. '--JOHN xv. 14. 

WHAT suggested this lovely parable of the vine and the branches isequally unimportant and undiscoverable. Many guesses have been made, and, no doubt, as was the case with almost all our Lord's parables, some external object gave occasion for it. It is a significant tokenof our Lord's calm collectedness, even at that supreme and heart-shaking moment, that He should have been at leisure to observe, andto use for His purposes of teaching, something that was present atthe instant. The deep and solemn lessons which He draws, perhaps fromsome vine by the wayside, are the richest and sweetest clusters thatthe vine has ever grown. The great truth in this chapter, applied inmanifold directions, and viewed in many aspects, is that of theliving union between Christ and those who believe on Him, and theparable of the vine and the branches affords the foundation for allwhich follows. 

We take the first half of that parable now. It is somewhat difficultto trace the course of thought in it, but there seems to be, first ofall, the similitude set forth, without explanation or interpretation, in its most general terms, and then various aspects in which itsapplications to Christian duty are taken up and reiterated, I simplyfollow the words which I have read for my text. 

I. We have then, first, the Vine in the vital unity of all its parts. 

'I am the True Vine, ' of which the material one to which He perhapspoints, is but a shadow and an emblem. The reality lies in Him. Weshall best understand the deep significance and beauty of thisthought if we recur in imagination to some of those great vines whichwe sometimes see in royal conservatories, where for hundred of yardsthe pliant branches stretch along the espaliers, and yet one lifepervades the whole, from the root, through the crooked stem, rightaway to the last leaf at the top of the farthest branch, and reddensand mellows every cluster, 'So, ' says Christ, 'between Me and thetotality of them that hold by Me in faith there is one life, passingever from root through branches, and ever bearing fruit. '

Let me remind you that this great thought of the unity of lifebetween Jesus Christ and all that believe upon Him is the familiarteaching of Scripture, and is set forth by other emblems besides thatof the vine, the queen of the vegetable world; for we have it in themetaphor of the body and its members, where not only are the manymembers declared to be parts of one body, but the name of thecollective body, made up of many members, is Christ. 'So also is'--not as we might expect, 'the Church, ' but--'Christ, ' the wholebearing the name of Him who is the Source of life to every part. Personality remains, individuality remains: I am I, and He is He, andthou art thou; but across the awful gulf of individual consciousnesswhich parts us from one another, Jesus Christ assumes the Divineprerogative of passing and joining Himself to each of us, if we loveHim and trust Him, in a union so close, and with a communication oflife so real, that every other union which we know is but a faint andfar-off adumbration of it. A oneness of life from root to branch, which is the sole cause of fruitfulness and growth, is taught ushere. 

And then let me remind you that that living unity between JesusChrist and all who love Him is a oneness which necessarily results inoneness of relation to God and men, in oneness of character, and inoneness of destiny. In relation to God, He is the Son, and we in Himreceive the standing of sons. He has access ever into the Father'spresence, and we through Him and in Him have access with confidenceand are accepted in the Beloved. In relation to men, since He isLight, we, touched with His light, are also, in our measure anddegree, the lights of the world; and in the proportion in which wereceive into our souls, by patient abiding in Jesus Christ, the verypower of His Spirit, we, too, become God's anointed, subordinatelybut truly His messiahs, for He Himself says: 'As the Father hath sentMe, even so I send you. '

In regard to character, the living union between Christ and Hismembers results in a similarity if not identity of character, andwith His righteousness we are clothed, and by that righteousness weare justified, and by that righteousness we are sanctified. Theoneness between Christ and His children is the ground at once oftheir forgiveness and acceptance, and of all virtue and nobleness oflife and conduct that can ever be theirs. 

And, in like manner, we can look forward and be sure that we are soclosely joined with Him, if we love Him and trust Him, that it isimpossible but that where He is there shall also His servants be; andthat what He is that shall also His servants be. For the oneness oflife, by which we are delivered from the bondage of corruption andthe law of sin and death here, will never halt nor cease until itbrings us into the unity of His glory, 'the measure of the stature ofthe fullness of Christ. ' And as He sits on the Father's throne, Hischildren must needs sit with Him, on His throne. 

Therefore the name of the collective whole, of which the individualChristian is part, is Christ. And as in the great Old Testamentprophecy of the Servant of the Lord, the figure that rises beforeIsaiah's vision fluctuates between that which is clearly thecollective Israel and that which is, as clearly, the personalMessiah; so the 'Christ' is not only the individual Redeemer whobears the body of the flesh literally here upon earth, but the wholeof that redeemed Church, of which it is said, 'It is His body, thefullness of Him that filleth all in all. '

II. Now note, secondly, the Husbandman, and the dressing of the vine. 

The one tool that a vinedresser needs is a knife. The chief secret ofculture is merciless pruning. And so says my text, 'The Father is theHusbandman. ' Our Lord assumes that office in other of His parables. But here the exigencies of the parabolic form require that the officeof Cultivator should be assigned only to the Father; although we arenot to forget that the Father, in that office, works through and inHis Son. 

But we should note that the one kind of husbandry spoken of here ispruning--not manuring, not digging, but simply the hacking away ofall that is rank and all that is dead. 

Were you ever in a greenhouse or in a vineyard at the season ofcutting back the vines? What flagitious waste it would seem to anignorant person to see scattered on the floor the bright green leavesand the incipient clusters, and to look up at the bare stem, bleedingat a hundred points from the sharp steel. Yes! But there was not arandom stroke in it all, and there was nothing cut away which it wasnot loss to keep and gain to lose; and it was all done artistically, scientifically, for a set purpose--that the plant might bring forthmore fruit. 

Thus, says Christ, the main thing that is needed--not, indeed, toimprove the life in the branches, but to improve the branches inwhich the life is--is excision. There are two forms of it given here--absolutely dead wood has to be cut out; wood that has life in it, but which has also rank shoots, that do not come from the all-pervading and hallowed life, has to be pruned back and deprived ofits shoots. 

It seems to me that the very language of the metaphor before usrequires us to interpret the fruitless branches as meaning all thosewho have a mere superficial, external adherence to the True Vine. For, according to the whole teaching of the parable, if there be anyreal union, there will be some life, and if there be any life, therewill be some fruit, and, therefore, the branch that has no fruit hasno life, because it has no real union. And so the application, as Itake it, is necessarily to those professing Christians, nominaladherents to Christianity or to Christ's Church, people that come tochurch and chapel, and if you ask them to put down in the censuspaper what they are, will say that they are Christians--Churchmen orDissenters, as the case may be--but who have no real hold upon JesusChrist, and no real reception of anything from Him; and the 'takingaway' is simply that, somehow or other, God makes visible, what is afact, that they do not belong to Him with whom they have this nominalconnection. 

The longer Christianity continues in any country, the more does theChurch get weighted and lowered in its temperature by the aggregationround about it of people of that sort. And one sometimes longs andprays for a storm to come, of some sort or other, to blow the deadwood out of the tree, and to get rid of all this oppressive andstifling weight of sham Christians that has come round every one ofour churches. 'His fan is in His hand, and He will throughly purgeHis floor, ' and every man that has any reality of Christian life inhim should pray that this pruning and cutting out of the dead woodmay be done, and that He would 'come as a refiner's fire and purify'His priesthood. 

Then there is the other side, the pruning of the fruitful branches. We all, in our Christian life, carry with us the two natures--our ownpoor miserable selves, and the better life of Jesus Christ within us. The one flourishes at the expense of the other; and it is theHusbandman's merciful, though painful work, to cut back unsparinglythe rank shoots that come from self, in order that all the force ofour lives may be flung into the growing of the cluster which isacceptable to Him. 

So, dear friends, let us understand the meaning of all that comes tous. The knife is sharp and the tendrils bleed, and things that seemvery beautiful and very precious are unsparingly shorn away, and weare left bare, and, as it seems to ourselves, impoverished. But Oh!it is all sent that we may fling our force into the production offruit unto God. And no stroke will be a stroke too many or too deepif it helps us to that. Only let us take care that we do not letregrets for the vanished good harm us just as much as joy in thepresent good did, and let us rather, in humble submission of will toHis merciful knife, say to Him, 'Cut to the quick, Lord, if onlythereby my fruit unto Thee may increase. '

III. Lastly, we have here the branches abiding in the Vine, andtherefore fruitful. 

Our Lord deals with the little group of His disciples as incipientlyand imperfectly, but really, cleansed through 'the word which He hasspoken to them, ' and gives them His exhortation towards that conductthrough which the cleansing and the union and the fruitfulness willall be secured. 'Now ye are clean: abide in Me and I in you. As thebranch cannot bear fruit of itself except it abide in the vine, nomore can ye except ye abide in Me. '

Union with Christ is the condition of all fruitfulness. There may beplenty of activity and yet barrenness. Works are not fruit. We canbring forth a great deal 'of ourselves, ' and because it is ofourselves it is nought. Fruit is possible only on condition of unionwith Him. He is the productive source of it all. 

There is the great glory and distinctive blessedness of the Gospel. Other teachers come to us and tell us how we ought to live, and giveus laws, patterns and examples, reasons and motives for pure andnoble lives. The Gospel comes and gives us life, if we will take it, and unfolds itself in us into all the virtues that we have topossess. What is the use of giving a man a copy if he cannot copy it?Morality comes and stands over the cripple, and says to him, 'Lookhere! This is how you ought to walk, ' and he lies there, paralysedand crippled, after as before the exhibition of what gracefulprogression is. But Christianity comes and bends over him, and layshold of his hand, and says, 'In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk, ' and his feet and ankle bones receive strength, and'he leaps, and walks, and praises God. ' Christ gives more thancommandments, patterns, motives; He gives the power to live soberly, righteously, and godly, and in Him alone is that power to be found. 

Then note that our reception of that power depends upon our ownefforts. 'Abide in Me and I in you. ' Is that last clause acommandment as well as the first? How can His abiding in us be a dutyincumbent upon us? But it is. And we might paraphrase the intentionof this imperative in its two halves, by--Do you take care that youabide in Christ, and that Christ abides in you. The two ideas are buttwo sides of the one great sphere; they complement and do notcontradict each other. We dwell in Him as the part does in the whole, as the branch does in the vine, recipient of its life and fruit-bearing energy. He dwells in us as the whole does in the part, as thevine dwells in the branch, communicating its energy to every part; oras the soul does in the body, being alive equally in every part, though it be sight in the eyeball, and hearing in the ear, and colourin the cheek, and strength in the hand, and swiftness in the foot. 

'Abide in Me and I in you. ' So we come down to very plain, practicalexhortations. Dear brethren, suppress yourselves, and empty yourlives of self, that the life of Christ may come in. A lock upon acanal, if it is empty, will have its gates pressed open by the waterin the canal and will be filled. Empty the heart and Christ will comein. 'Abide in Him' by continual direction of thought, love, desire toHim; by continual and reiterated submission of the will to Him, ascommanding and as appointing; by the honest reference to Him of dailylife and all petty duties which otherwise distract us and draw usaway from Him. Then, dwelling in Him we shall share in His life, andshall bring forth fruit to His praise. 

Here is encouragement for us all. To all of us, sometimes, our livesseem barren and poor; and we feel as if we had brought forth no fruitto perfection. Let us get nearer to Him and He will see to the fruit. Some poor stranded sea-creature on the beach, vainly floundering inthe pools, is at the point of death; but the great tide comes, leaping and rushing over the sands, and bears it away out into themiddle deeps for renewed activity and joyous life. Let the flood ofChrist's life bear you on its bosom, and you will rejoice andexpatiate therein. 

Here is a lesson of solemn warning to professing Christians. Thelofty mysticism and inward life in Jesus Christ all terminate at lastin simple, practical obedience; and the fruit is the test of thelife. 'Depart from Me, I never knew you, ye that work iniquity. '

And here is a lesson of solemn appeal to us all. Our only opportunityof bearing any fruit worthy of our natures and of God's purposeconcerning us is by vital union with Jesus Christ. If we have notthat, there may be plenty of activity and mountains of work in ourlives, but there will be no fruit. Only that is fruit which pleasesGod and is conformed to His purpose concerning us, and all the restof our busy doings is no more the fruit a man should bear thancankers are roses, or than oak-galls are acorns. They are but thework of a creeping grub, and diseased excrescences that suck intothemselves the juices that should swell the fruit. Open your heartsto Christ and let His life and His Spirit come into you, and then youwill have 'your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life. '

THE TRUE BRANCHES OF THE TRUE VINE

'I am the vine, ye are the branches: he that abideth in Me, and Iin him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without Me ye cando nothing. If a man abide not in Me, he is cast forth as abranch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them intothe fire, and they are burned. If ye abide in Me, and My wordsabide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be doneunto you. Herein is My Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit;so shall ye be My disciples. '--JOHN xv. 5-8. 

No wise teacher is ever afraid of repeating himself. The average mindrequires the reiteration of truth before it can make that truth itsown. One coat of paint is not enough, it soon rubs off. Especially isthis true in regard to lofty spiritual and religious truth, remotefrom men's ordinary thinkings, and in some senses unwelcome to them. So our Lord, the great Teacher, never shrank from repeating Hislessons when He saw that they were but partially apprehended. It wasnot grievous to Him to 'say the same things, ' because for them it wassafe. He broke the bread of life into small pieces, and fed themlittle and often. 

So here, in the verses that we have to consider now, we have therepetition, and yet not the mere repetition, of the great parable ofthe vine, as teaching the union of Christians with Christ, and theirconsequent fruitfulness. He saw, no doubt, that the truth was butpartially dawning upon His disciples' minds. Therefore He said it allover again, with deepened meaning, following it out into newapplications, presenting further consequences, and, above all, givingit a more sharp and definite personal application. 

Are we any swifter scholars than these first ones were? Have weabsorbed into our own thinking this truth so thoroughly andconstantly, and wrought it out in our lives so completely, that we donot need to be reminded of it any more? Shall we not be wise if wefaithfully listen to His repeated teachings?

The verses which I have read give us four aspects of this great truthof union with Jesus Christ; or of its converse, separation from Him. There is, first, the fruitfulness of union; second, the withering anddestruction of separation; third, the satisfaction of desire whichcomes from abiding in Christ; and, lastly, the great, noble issue offruitfulness, in God's glory, and our own increasing discipleship. Now let me touch upon these briefly. 

I. First, then, our Lord sets forth, with no mere repetition, thesame broad idea which He has already been insisting upon--viz. , thatunion with Him is sure to issue in fruitfulness. He repeats thetheme, 'I am the Vine'; but He points its application by the nextclause, 'Ye are the branches. ' That had been implied before, but itneeded to be said more definitely. For are we not all too apt tothink of religious truth as swinging _in vacuo_ as it were, with nopersonal application to ourselves, and is not the one thing needfulin regard to the truths which are most familiar to us, to bring theminto close connection with our own personal life and experience?

'I am the Vine' is a general truth, with no clear personalapplication. 'Ye are the branches' brings each individual listenerinto connection with it. How many of us there are, as there are inevery so-called Christian communion, that listen pleasedly, and, in afitful sort of languid way, interestedly, to the most glorious andmost solemn words that come from a preacher's lips, and never dreamthat what he has been saying has any bearing upon themselves! And theone thing that is most of all needed with people like some of you, who have been listening to the truth all your days, is that it shouldbe sharpened to a point, and the conviction driven into you, that_you_ have some personal concern in this great message. 'Ye are thebranches' is the one side of that sharpening and making definite ofthe truth in its personal application, and the other side is, 'Thouart the man. ' All preaching and religious teaching is toothlessgenerality, utterly useless, unless we can manage somehow or other toforce it through the wall of indifference and vague assent to ageneral proposition, with which 'Gospel-hardened hearers' surroundthemselves, and make them feel that the thing has got a point, andthat the point is touching their own consciousness. '_Ye_ are thebranches. '

Note next the great promise of fruitfulness. 'He that abideth in Me, and I in Him, the same bringeth forth much fruit. '

I need not repeat what I have said in former sermons as to the plain, practical duties which are included in that abiding in Christ, andChrist's consequent abiding in us. It means, on the part ofprofessedly Christian people, a temper and tone of mind very farremote from the noisy, bustling distractions too common in ourpresent Christianity. We want quiet, patient waiting within the veil. We want stillness of heart, brought about by our own distinct effortto put away from ourselves the strife of tongues and the pride oflife. We want activity, no doubt, but we want a wise passiveness asits foundation. 

 'Think you, midst all this mighty sum Of things for ever speaking, That nothing of itself will come, But we must still be seeking?'

Get away into the 'secret place of the Most High, ' and rise into ahigher altitude and atmosphere than the region of work and effort;and sitting still with Christ, let His love and His power pourthemselves into your hearts. 'Come, My people, enter thou into thychambers and shut thy doors about thee. ' Get away from the janglingof politics, and empty controversies and busy distractions of dailyduty. The harder our toil necessarily is, the more let us see to itthat we keep a little cell within the central life where in silencewe hold communion with the Master. 'Abide in Me and I in you. '

That is the way to be fruitful, rather than by efforts afterindividual acts of conformity and obedience, howsoever needful andprecious these are. There is a deeper thing wanted than these. Thebest way to secure Christian conduct is to cultivate communion withChrist. It is better to work at the increase of the central forcethan at the improvement of the circumferential manifestations of it. Get more of the sap into the branch, and there will be more fruit. Have more of the life of Christ in the soul, and the conduct and thespeech will be more Christlike. We may cultivate individual graces atthe expense of the harmony and beauty of the whole character. We maygrow them artificially and they will be of little worth--by imitationof others, by special efforts after special excellence, rather thanby general effort after the central improvement of our nature andtherefore of our life. But the true way to influence conduct is toinfluence the springs of conduct; and to make a man's life better, the true way is to make the man better. First of all be, and then do;first of all receive, and then give forth; first of all draw near toChrist, and then there will be fruit to His praise. That is theChristian way of mending men, not tinkering at this, that, and theother individual excellence, but grasping the secret of totalexcellence in communion with Him. 

Our Lord is here not merely laying down a law, but giving a promise, and putting his veracity into pawn for the fulfilment of it. 'If aman will keep near Me, ' He says, 'he shall bear fruit. '

Notice that little word which now appears for the first time. 'Heshall bear _much_ fruit. ' We are not to be content with a littlefruit; a poor shrivelled bunch of grapes that are more like marblesthan grapes, here and there, upon the half-nourished stem. Theabiding in Him will produce a character rich in manifold graces. 'Alittle fruit' is not contemplated by Christ at all. God forbid that Ishould say that there is no possibility of union with Christ and alittle fruit. Little union will have little fruit; but I would haveyou notice that the only two alternatives which come into Christ'sview here are, on the one hand, 'no fruit, ' and on the other hand, 'much fruit. ' And I would ask why it is that the average Christianman of this generation bears only a berry or two here and there, likesuch as are left upon the vines after the vintage, when the promiseis that if he will abide in Christ, he will bear much fruit?

This verse, setting forth the fruitfulness of union with Jesus, endswith the brief, solemn statement of the converse--the barrenness ofseparation--'Apart from Me' (not merely 'without, ' as the AuthorisedVersion has it) 'ye can do nothing. ' _There_ is the condemnation ofall the busy life of men which is not lived in union with JesusChrist. It is a long row of figures which, like some other long rowsof algebraic symbols added up, amount just to _zero_. 'Without me, nothing. ' All your busy life, when you come to sum it up, is made upof plus and minus quantities, which precisely balance each other, andthe net result, unless you are in Christ, is just nothing; and onyour gravestones the only right epitaph is a great round cypher. 'Hedid not do anything. There is nothing left of his toil; the wholething has evaporated and disappeared. ' That is life apart from JesusChrist. 

II. And so note, secondly, the withering and destruction followingseparation from Him. 

Commentators tell us, I think a little prosaically, that when ourLord spoke, it was the time of pruning the vine in Palestine, andthat, perhaps, as they went from the upper room to the garden, theymight see in the valley, here and there, the fires that the labourershad kindled in the vineyards to burn the loppings of the vines. Thatdoes not matter. It is of more consequence to notice how the solemnthought of withering and destruction forces itself, so to speak, intothese gracious words; and how, even at that moment, our Lord, in allHis tenderness and pity, could not but let words of warning--grave, solemn, tragical--drop from His lips. 

This generation does not like to hear them, for its conception of theGospel is a thing with no minor notes in it, with no threatenings, aproclamation of a deliverance, and no proclamation of anything fromwhich deliverance is needed--which is a strange kind of Gospel! ButJesus Christ could not speak about the blessedness of fruitfulnessand the joy of life in Himself without speaking about its necessaryconverse, the awfulness of separation from Him, of barrenness, ofwithering, and of destruction. 

Separation is withering. Did you ever see a hawthorn bough thatchildren bring home from the woods, and stick in the grate; how in aday or two the little fresh green leaves all shrivel up and the whiteblossoms become brown and smell foul, and the only thing to be donewith it is to fling it into the fire and get rid of it? 'And so, 'says Jesus Christ, 'as long as a man holds on to Me and the sap comesinto him, he will flourish, and as soon as the connection is broken, all that was so fair will begin to shrivel, and all that was greenwill grow brown and turn to dust, and all that was blossom willdroop, and there will be no more fruit any more for ever. ' Separatefrom Christ, the individual shrivels, and the possibilities of fairbuds wither and set into no fruit, and no man is the man he mighthave been unless he holds by Jesus Christ and lets His life come intohim. 

And as for individuals, so for communities. The Church or the body ofprofessing Christians that is separate from Jesus Christ dies to allnoble life, to all high activity, to all Christlike conduct, and, being dead, rots. 

Withering means destruction. The language of our text is adescription of what befalls the actual branches of the literal vine;but it is made a representation of what befalls the individuals whomthese branches represent, by that added clause, 'like a branch. ' Lookat the mysteriousness of the language. 'They gather them. ' Who? 'Theycast them into the fire. ' Who have the tragic task of flinging thewithered branches into some mysterious fire? All is left vague withunexplained awfulness. The solemn fact that the withering of manhoodby separation from Jesus Christ requires, and ends in, the consumingof the withered, is all that we have here. We have to speak of itpityingly, with reticence, with terror, with tenderness, with awelest it should be our fate. 

But O, dear brethren! be on your guard against the tendency of thethinking of this generation, to paste a bit of blank paper over allthe threatenings of the Bible, and to blot out from its consciousnessthe grave issues that it holds forth. One of two things must befallthe branch, either it is in the Vine or it gets into the fire. If wewould avoid the fire let us see to it that we are in the Vine. 

III. Thirdly, we have here the union with Christ as the condition ofsatisfied desires. 

'If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ye shall ask what yewill, and it shall be done unto you. ' Notice how our Lord varies Hisphraseology here, and instead of saying 'I in you, ' says 'My words inyou. ' He is speaking about prayers, consequently the variation isnatural. In fact, His abiding in us is largely the abiding of Hiswords in us; or, to speak more accurately, the abiding of His wordsin us is largely the means of His abiding in us. 

What is meant by Christ's words abiding in us? Something a great dealmore than the mere intellectual acceptance of them. Something verydifferent from reading a verse of the Gospels of a morning before wego to our work, and forgetting all about it all the day long;something very different from coming in contact with Christian truthon a Sunday, when somebody else preaches to us what he has found inthe Bible, and we take in a little of it. It means the whole of theconscious nature of a man being, so to speak, saturated with Christ'swords; his desires, his understanding, his affections, his will, allbeing steeped in these great truths which the Master spoke. Put alittle bit of colouring matter into the fountain at its source, andyou will have the stream dyed down its course for ever so far. Seethat Christ's words be lodged in your inmost selves, by patientmeditation upon them, by continual recurrence to them, and all yourlife will be glorified and flash into richness of colouring andbeauty by their presence. 

The main effect of such abiding of the Lord's words in us which ourLord touches upon here is, that in such a case, if our whole inwardnature is influenced by the continual operation upon it of the wordsof the Lord, then our desires will be granted. Do not so vulgariseand lower the nobleness and the loftiness of this great promise as tosuppose that it only means--If you remember His words you will getanything you like. It means something a great deal better than that. It means that if Christ's words are the substratum, so to speak, ofyour wishes, then your wishes will harmonise with His will, and so'ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. '

Christ loves us a great deal too well to give to our own foolish andselfish wills the keys of His treasure-house. The condition of ourgetting what we will is our willing what He desires; and unless ourprayers are a great deal more the utterance of the submission of ourwills to His than they are the attempt to impose ours upon Him, theywill not be answered. We get our wishes when our wishes are mouldedby His word. 

IV. The last thought that is here is that this union and fruitfulnesslead to the noble ends of glorifying God and increasing discipleship. 

'Herein is My Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit. ' Christ'slife was all for the glorifying of God. The lives which are ours inname--but being drawn from Him, in their depths are much rather thelife of Christ in us than our lives--will have the same end and thesame issue. 

Ah, dear brethren, we come here to a very sharp test for us all. Iwonder how many of us there are, on whom men looking think moreloftily of God and love Him better, and are drawn to Him by strangelongings. How many of us are there about whom people will say, 'Theremust be something in the religion that makes a man like that'? Howmany of us are there, to look upon whom suggests to men that God, whocan make such a man, must be infinitely sweet and lovely? And yetthat is what we should all be--mirrors of the divine radiance, onwhich some eyes, that are too dim and sore to bear the light as itstreams from the Sun, may look, and, beholding the reflection, maylearn to love. Does God so shine in me that I lead men to magnify Hisname? If I am dwelling with Christ it will be so. 

I shall not know it. 'Moses wist not that the skin of his faceshone'; but, in meek unconsciousness of the glory that rays from us, we may walk the earth, reflecting the light and making God known toour fellows. 

And if thus we abide in Him and bear fruit we shall 'be' or (as theword might more accurately be rendered), we shall '_become_ Hisdisciples. ' The end of our discipleship is never reached on earth: wenever so much _are_ as we are in the process of _becoming_, His truefollowers and servants. 

If we bear fruit because we are knit to Him, the fruit itself willhelp us to get nearer Him, and so to be more His disciples and morefruitful. Character produces conduct, but conduct rests on character, and strengthens the impulses from which it springs. And thus ouraction as Christian men and women will tell upon our inward lives asChristians, and the more our outward conduct is conformed to thepattern of Jesus Christ, the more shall we love Him in our inmosthearts. We ourselves shall eat of the fruit which we ourselves haveborne to Him. 

The alternatives are before us--in Christ, living and fruitful; outof Christ, barren, and destined to be burned. As the prophet says, 'Will men take of the wood of the vine for any work?' Vine-wood isworthless, its only use is to bear fruit; and if it does not do that, there is only one thing to be done with it, and that is, 'They castit into the fire, and it is burned. '

ABIDING IN LOVE

'As the Father hath loved Me, so have I loved you: continue ye InMy love. If ye keep My commandments, ye shall abide in My love;even as I have kept My Father's commandments, and abide in Hislove. These things have I spoken unto you, that My joy mightremain in you, and that your joy might be full. '--JOHN xv. 9-11. 

The last of these verses shows that they are to be taken as a kind ofconclusion of the great parable of the Vine and the branches, for itlooks back and declares Christ's purpose in His preceding utterances. The parable proper is ended, but the thoughts of it still linger inour Lord's mind, and echo through His words, as the vibration of somegreat bell after the stroke has ceased. The main thoughts of theparable were these two, that participation in Christ's life was thesource of all good, and that abiding in Him was the means ofparticipation in His life. And these same thoughts, though modifiedin their form, and free from the parabolical element, appear in thewords that we have to consider on this occasion. The parable spokeabout abiding in Christ; our text defines that abiding, and makes itstill more tender and gracious by substituting for it, 'abiding inHis love. ' The parable spoke of conduct as 'fruit, ' the effortlessresult of communion with Jesus. Our text speaks of it with moreemphasis laid on the human side, as 'keeping the commandments. ' Theparable told us that abiding in Christ was the condition of bearingfruit. Our text tells us the converse, which is also true, thatbearing fruit, or keeping the commandments, is the condition ofabiding in Christ. So our Lord takes His thought, as it were, andturns it round before us, letting us see both sides of it, and thentells us that He does all this for one purpose, which in itself is atoken of His love, namely, that our hearts may be filled with perfectand perennial joy, a drop from the fountain of His own. 

These three verses have three words which may be taken as their key-notes--love, obedience, joy. We shall look at them in that order. 

I. First, then, we have here the love in which it is our sweet dutyto abide. 'As the Father hath loved Me, so have I loved you. Abide yein My love. '

What shall we say about these mysterious and profound first words ofthis verse? They carry us into the very depths of divinity, andsuggest for us that wonderful analogy between the relation of theFather to the Son, and that of the Son to His disciples, whichappears over and over again in the solemnities of these last hoursand words of Jesus. Christ here claims to be, in a unique andsolitary fashion, the Object of the Father's love, and He claims tobe able to love like God. 'As the Father hath loved Me, so have Iloved you'; as deeply, as purely, as fully, as eternally, and withall the unnameable perfectnesses which must belong to the divineaffection, does Christ declare that He loves us. 

I know not whether the majesty and uniqueness of His nature stand outmore clearly in the one or in the other of these two assertions. Asbeloved of God, and as loving like God, He equally claims for Himselfa place which none other can fill, and declares that the love whichfalls on us from His pierced and bleeding heart is really the love ofGod. 

In this mysterious, awful, tender, perfect affection He exhorts us toabide. That comes yet closer to our hearts than the other phrase ofwhich it is the modification, and in some sense the explanation. Thecommand to abide in Him suggests much that is blessed, but to haveall that mysterious abiding in Him resolved into abiding in His loveis infinitely tenderer, and draws us still closer to Himself. Obviously, what is meant is not our continuance in the attitude oflove to Him, but rather our continuance in the sweet and sacredatmosphere of His love to us. For the connection between the twohalves of the verse necessarily requires that the love in which weare to abide should be identical with the love which had beenpreviously spoken of, and _that_ is clearly His love to us, and notours to Him. But then, on the other hand, whosoever thus abides inChrist's love to Him will echo it back again, in an equallycontinuous love to Him. So that the two things flow together, and toabide in the conscious possession of Christ's love to me is thecertain and inseparable cause of its effect, my abiding in thecontinual exercise and outgoing of my love to Him. 

Now note that this continuance in Christ's love is a thing in ourpower, since it is commanded. Although it is His affection to us ofwhich my text primarily speaks, I can so modify and regulate the flowof that divine love to my heart that it becomes my duty to continuein Christ's love to me. 

What a quiet, blessed home that is for us! The image, I suppose, thatunderlies all this sweet speech in these last hours, about dwellingin Christ, in His joy, in His words, in His peace, and the like, isthat of some safe house, into which going, we may be secure. And whatsorrow or care or trouble or temptation would be able to reach us ifwe were folded in the protection of that strong love, and always feltthat it was the fortress into which we might continually resort? Theywho make their abode there, and dwell behind those firm bastions, need fear no foes, but are lifted high above them all. 'Abide in Mylove, ' for they who dwell within the clefts of that Rock need noneother defence; and they to whom the riven heart of Christ is theplace of their abode are safe, whatsoever befalls. 'As the Fatherhath loved Me, so have I loved you. Abide ye in My love. '

II. Now note, secondly, the obedience by which we continue inChrist's love. 

The analogy, on which He has already touched, is still continued. 'Ifye keep My commandments, ye shall abide in My love; even as I havekept My Father's commandments and abide in His love. ' Note thatChrist here claims for Himself absolute and unbroken conformity withthe Father's will, and consequent uninterrupted and completecommunion with the Father's love. It is the utterance of a natureconscious of no sin, of a humanity that never knew one instant's filmof separation, howsoever thin, howsoever brief, between Him and theFather. No more tremendous words were ever spoken than these quietones in which Jesus Christ declares that never, all His life long, had there been the smallest deflection or want of conformity betweenthe Father's will and _His_ desires and doings, and that never hadthere been one grain of dust, as it were, between the two polishedplates which adhered so closely in inseparable union of harmony andlove. 

And then notice, still further, how Christ here, with Hisconsciousness of perfect obedience and communion, intercepts _our_obedience and diverts it to Himself. He does not say, 'Obey God as Ihave done, and He will love you'; but He says, 'Obey _Me_ as I obeyGod, and _I_ will love you. ' Who is this that thus comes between thechild's heart and the Father's? Does He come _between_ when He standsthus? or does He rather lead us up to the Father, and to a share inHis own filial obedience?

He further assures us that, by keeping His commandments, we shallcontinue in that sweet home and safe stronghold of His love. Ofcourse the keeping of the commandments is something more than mereoutward conformity by action. It is the inward harmony of will, andthe bowing of the whole nature. It is, in fact, the same thing(though considered under a different aspect, and from a somewhatdifferent point of view), as He has already been speaking about asthe 'fruit' of the vine, by the bearing of which the Father isglorified. And this obedience, the obedience of the hands because theheart obeys, and does so because it loves, the bowing of the will inglad submission to the loved and holy will of the heavens--thisobedience is the condition of our continuing in Christ's love. 

He will love us better, the more we obey His commandments, foralthough His tender heart is charged towards all, even thedisobedient, with the love of pity and of desire to help, He cannotbut feel a growing thrill of satisfied and gratified affectiontowards us, in the measure in which we become like Himself. The lovethat wept over us, when we were enemies, will 'rejoice over us withsinging, ' when we are friends. The love that sought the sheep when itwas wandering will pour itself yet more tenderly and with selectorgifts upon it when it follows in the footsteps of the flock, andkeeps close at the heels of the Good Shepherd. 'If ye keep Mycommandments, ye shall abide in My love, ' so we will put nothingbetween us and Him which will make it impossible for the tenderesttenderness of that holy love to come to your hearts. 

The obedience which we render for love's sake will make us morecapable of receiving, and more blessedly conscious of possessing, thelove of Jesus Christ. The lightest cloud before the sun will preventit from focussing its rays to a burning point on the convex glass. And the small, thin, fleeting, scarcely visible acts of self-willthat sometimes pass across our skies will prevent our feeling thewarmth of that love upon our shrouded hearts. Every known piece ofrebellion against Christ will shatter all true enjoyment of Hisfavour, unless we are hopeless hypocrites or self-deceived. Thecondition of knowing and feeling the warmth and blessedness ofChrist's love to me is the honest submission of my nature to Hiscommandments. You cannot rejoice in Jesus Christ unless you do Hiswill. You will have no real comfort and blessedness in your religionunless it works itself out in your daily lives. That is why so manyof you know nothing, or next to nothing, about the joy of Christ'sfelt presence, because you do not, for all your professions, hourlyand momentarily regulate and submit your wills to His commandments. Do what He wants, and do it because He wants it, if you wish that Hislove should fill your hearts. 

And, further, we shall continue in His love by obedience, inasmuch asevery emotion which finds expression in our daily life isstrengthened by the fact that it is expressed. The love which worksis love which grows, and the tree that bears fruit is the tree thatis healthy and increases. So note how all these deepest things ofChristian teaching come at last to a plain piece of practical duty. We talk about the mysticism of John's Gospel, about the depth ofthese last sayings of Jesus Christ. Yes! they are mystical, they aredeep--unfathomably deep, thank God!--but connected by the shortestpossible road with the plainest possible duties. 'Let no man deceiveyou. He that doeth righteousness is righteous. ' It is of no use totalk about communion with Jesus Christ, and abiding in Him, inpossession of His love, and all those other properly mystical sidesof Christian experience, unless you verify them for yourselves by theplain way of practice. Doing as Christ bids us, and doing thathabitually, and doing it gladly, then, and only then, are we in nodanger of losing ourselves on the heights, or of forgetting thatChrist's mission has for its last result the influencing of characterand of conduct. 'If ye keep My commandments, ye shall abide in Mylove, even as I have kept My Father's commandments, and abide in Hislove. '

III. Lastly, note the joy which follows on this practical obedience. 'These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain, ' (or'might _be_') 'in you, and that your joy might be full. '

'My joy might be in you'--a strange time to talk of His 'joy. ' Inhalf an hour he would be in Gethsemane, and we know what happenedthere. Was Christ a joyful man? He was a 'Man of sorrows' but one ofthe old Psalms says, 'Thou hast loved righteousness . .. Therefore Godhath anointed Thee with the oil of gladness above Thy fellows. ' Thedeep truth that lies there is the same that He here claims as beingfulfilled in His own experience, that absolute surrender andsubmission in love to the beloved commands of a loving Father madeHim--in spite of sorrows, in spite of the baptism with which He wasbaptized, in spite of all the burden and the weight of our sins--themost joyful of men. 

This joy He offers to us, a joy coming from perfect obedience, a joycoming from a surrender of self at the bidding of love, to a lovethat to us seems absolutely good and sweet. There is no joy thathumanity is capable of to compare for a moment with that bright, warm, continuous sunshine which floods the soul, that is freed fromall the clouds and mists of self and the darkness of sin. Self-sacrifice at the bidding of Jesus Christ is the recipe for thehighest, the most exquisite, the most godlike gladnesses of which thehuman heart is capable. Our joy will remain if His joy is ours. Thenour joy will be, up to the measure of its capacity, ennobled, andfilled, and progressive, advancing ever towards a fuller possessionof His joy, and a deeper calm of that pure and perennial rapture, which makes the settled and celestial bliss of those who have'entered into the joy of their Lord. '

Brother! there is only one gladness that is worth calling so--andthat is, that which comes to us, when we give ourselves utterly awayto Jesus Christ, and let Him do with us as He will. It is better tohave a joy that is central and perennial--though there may be, asthere will be, a surface of sorrow and care--than to have theconverse, a surface of joy, and a black, unsympathetic kernel ofaching unrest and sadness. In one or other of these two states we alllive. Either we have to say, 'as sorrowful yet always rejoicing' orwe have to feel that 'even in laughter the heart is sorrowful, andthe end of that mirth is heaviness. ' Let us choose for ourselves, andlet us choose aright, the gladness which coils round the heart, andendures for ever, and is found in submission to Jesus Christ, ratherthan the superficial, fleeting joys which are rooted on earth andperish with time. 

THE ONENESS OF THE BRANCHES

'This is My commandment, That ye love one another, as I haveloved you. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man laydown his life for his friends. '--JOHN xv. 12, 13. 

The union between Christ and His disciples has been tenderly setforth in the parable of the Vine and the branches. We now turn to theunion between the disciples, which is the consequence of their commonunion to the Lord. The branches are parts of one whole, andnecessarily bear a relation to each other. We may modify for ourpresent purpose the analogous statement of the Apostle in referenceto the Lord's Supper, and as He says, 'We being many, are one body, for we are all partakers of that one bread, ' so we may say--Thebranches, being many, are one Vine, for they are all partakers ofthat one Vine. Of this union amongst the branches, which results fromtheir common inherence in the Vine, the natural expression andmanifestation is the mutual love, which Christ here gives as _the_commandment, and commends to us all by His own solemn example. 

There are four things suggested to me by the words of our text--theObligation, the Sufficiency, the Pattern, and the Motive, ofChristian love. 

I. First, the Obligation of love. 

The two ideas of commandment and love do not go well together. Youcannot pump up love to order, and if you try you generally produce, what we see in abundance in the world and in the Church, sentimentalhypocrisy, hollow and unreal. But whilst that is true, and whilst itseems strange to say that we are commanded to love, still we can do agreat deal, directly and indirectly, for the cultivation andstrengthening of any emotion. We can either cast ourselves into theattitude which is favourable or unfavourable to it. We can eitherlook at the facts which will create it or at those who will check it. We can go about with a sharp eye for the lovable or for the unlovablein man. We can either consciously war against or lazily acquiesce inour own predominant self-absorption and selfishness. And in these andin a number of other ways, our feelings towards other Christianpeople are very largely under our own control, and therefore arefitting subjects for commandment. 

Our Lord lays down the obligation which devolves upon all Christianpeople, of cherishing a kindly and loving regard to all others whofind their place within the charmed circle of His Church. It is anobligation because He commands it. He puts Himself here in theposition of the absolute Lawgiver, who has the right of entire andauthoritative control over men's affections and hearts. And it isfurther obligatory because such an attitude is the only fittingexpression of the mutual relation of Christian men, through theircommon relation to the Vine. If there be the one life-sap circlingthrough all parts of the mighty whole, how anomalous and howcontradictory it is that these parts should not be harmoniouslyconcordant among themselves! However unlike any two Christian peopleare to each other in character, in culture, in circumstances, thebond that knits those who have the same relations to Jesus Christ oneto another is far deeper, far more real, and ought to be far closer, than the bond that knits either of them to the men or women to whomthey are likest in all these other respects, and to whom they areunlike in this central one. Christian men! you are closer to everyother Christian man, down in the depths of your being, however he maybe differenced from you by things that are very hard to get over, than you are to the people that you like best, and love most, if theydo not participate with you in this common love to Jesus Christ. 

I dread talking mere sentiment about this matter, for there isperhaps no part of Christian duty which has been so vulgarised andpawed over by mere unctuous talk, as that of the fellowship thatshould subsist between all Christians. But I have one plain questionto put, --Does anybody believe that the present condition ofChristendom, and the relations to one another even of good Christianpeople in the various churches and communions of our own and of otherlands, is the sort of thing that Jesus Christ meant, or is anythinglike a fair and adequate representation of the deep, essential unitythat knits us all together?

We need far more to realise the fact that our emotions towards ourbrother Christians are not matters in which our own inclinations mayhave their way, but that there is a simple commandment given to us, and that we are bound to cherish love to every man who loves JesusChrist. Never mind though he does not hold your theology; never mindthough he be very ignorant and narrow as compared with you; nevermind though your outlook on the world may be entirely unlike his. Never mind though you be a rich man and he a poor one, or you a poorone and he rich, which is just as hard to get over. Let all thesesecondary grounds of union and of separation be relegated to theirproper subordinate place; and let us recognise this, that thechildren of one Father are brethren. And do not let it be possiblethat it shall be said, as so often has been said, and said truly, that 'brethren' in the Church means a great deal less than _brothers_in the world. Lift your eyes beyond the walls of the little sheepfoldin which you live, and hearken to the bleating of the flocks away outyonder, and feel--'Other sheep He has which are not of this fold';and recognise the solemn obligation of the commandment of love. 

II. Note, secondly, the Sufficiency of love. 

Our Lord has been speaking in a former verse about the keeping of Hiscommandments. Now He gathers them all up into one. 'This is mycommandment, that ye love one another' All duties to our fellows, andall duties to our brethren, are summed up in, or resolved into, thisone germinal, encyclopaediacal, all-comprehensive simplification ofduty, into the one word 'love. '

Where the heart is right the conduct will be right. Love will softenthe tones, will instinctively teach what we ought to be and do; willtake the bitterness out of opposition and diversity, will make evenrebuke, when needful, only a form of expressing itself. If the heartbe right all else will be right; and if there be a deficiency of lovenothing will be right. You cannot help anybody except on condition ofhaving an honest, beneficent, and benevolent regard towards him. Youcannot do any man in the world any good unless there is a shoot oflove in your heart towards him. You may pitch him benefits, and youwill neither get nor deserve thanks for them; you may try to teachhim, and your words will be hopeless and profitless. The one thingthat is required to bind Christian men together is this commonaffection. That being there, everything will come. It is the germ outof which all is developed. As we read in that great chapter to theCorinthians--the lyric praise of Charity, --all kinds of blessing andsweetness and gladness come out of this, It is the central forcewhich, being present, secures that all shall be right, which, beingabsent, ensures that all shall be wrong. 

And is it not beautiful to see how Jesus Christ, leaving the littleflock of His followers in the world, gave them no other instructionfor their mutual relationship? He did not instruct them aboutinstitutions and organisations, about orders of the ministry andsacraments, or Church polity and the like. He knew that all thesewould come. His one commandment was, 'Love one another, ' and thatwill make you wise. Love one another, and you will shape yourselvesinto the right forms. He knew that they needed no exhortations suchas ecclesiastics would have put in the foreground. It was not worthwhile to talk to them about organisations and officers. These wouldcome to them at the right time and in the right way. The 'one thingneedful' was that they should be knit together as true participatorsof His life. Love was sufficient as their law and as their guide. 

III. Note, further, the Pattern of love. 

'As I have loved you. Greater love hath no man than this, that a manlay down his life for his friends. ' Christ sets Himself forward then, here and in this aspect, as He does in all aspects of human conductand character, as being the realised Ideal of them all. And althoughthe thought is a digression from my present purpose, I cannot butpause for a moment to reflect upon the strangeness of a man thuscalmly saying to the whole world, 'I am the embodiment of all thatlove ought to be. You cannot get beyond Me, nor have anything morepure, more deep, more self-sacrificing, more perfect, than the lovewhich I have borne to you. '

But passing that, the pattern that He proposes for us is even moreaugust than appears at first sight. For, if you remember, a verse ortwo before our Lord had said, 'As the Father hath loved Me so I haveloved you. ' Now He says, 'Love one another as I have loved you. 'There stand the three, as it were, the Father, the Son, the disciple. The Son in the midst receives and transmits the Father's love to thedisciple, and the disciple is to love his fellows, in some deep andaugust sense, as the Father loved the Son. The divinest thing in God, and that in which men can be like God, is love. In all our otherattitudes to Him we rather correspond than copy. His fullness is metby our emptiness, His giving by our recipiency, His faithfulness byour faith, His command by our obedience, His light by our eye. Buthere it is not a case of correspondence only, but of similarity. Myfaith _answers_ God's gift to me, but my love is _like_ God's love. 'Be ye, therefore, imitators of God as beloved children'; and havingreceived that love into your hearts, ray it out, 'and walk in love asGod also hath loved us. '

But then our Lord here, in a very wonderful manner, sets forth thevery central point of His work, even His death upon the Cross for us, as being the pattern to which our poor affection ought to aspire, andafter which it must tend to be conformed. I need not remind you, Isuppose, that our Lord here is not speaking of the propitiatorycharacter of His death, nor of the issues which depend upon it, andupon it alone, viz. , the redemption and salvation of the world. He isnot speaking, either, of the peculiar and unique sense in which Helays down His life for us, His friends and brethren, as none othercan do. He is speaking about it simply in its aspect of being avoluntary surrender, at the bidding of love, for the good of thosewhom He loved, and that, He tells us--that, and nothing else--is thetrue pattern and model towards which all our love is bound to tendand to aspire. That is to say, the heart of the love which Hecommands is self-sacrifice, reaching to death if death be needful. And no man loves as Christ would have him love who does not bear inhis heart affection which has so conquered selfishness that, if needbe, he is ready to die. 

The expression of Christian life is not to be found in honeyed words, or the indolent indulgence in benevolent emotion, but in self-sacrifice, modelled after that of Christ's sacrificial death, whichis imitable by us. 

Brethren, it is a solemn obligation, which may well make us tremble, that is laid on us in these words, 'As I have loved you. ' Calvary wasless than twenty-four hours off, and He says to us, '_That_ is yourpattern!' Contrast our love at its height with His--a drop to anocean, a poor little flickering rushlight held up beside the sun. Mylove, at its best, has so far conquered my selfishness that now andthen I am ready to suffer a little inconvenience, to sacrifice alittle leisure, to give away a little money, to spend a littledribble of sympathy upon the people who are its objects. Christ'slove nailed Him to the Cross, and led Him down from the throne, andshut for a time the gates of the glory behind Him. And He says, 'Thatis your pattern!'

Oh, let us bow down and confess how His word, which commands us, putsus to shame, when we think of how miserably we have obeyed. 

Remember, too, that the restriction which here seems to be castaround the flow of His love is not a restriction in reality, butrather a deepening of it. He says, 'Greater love hath no man thanthis, that a man lay down his life for his friends. ' But evidently Hecalls them so from His point of view, and as He sees them, not fromtheir point of view, as they see Him--that is to say, He means by'friends' not those who love Him, but those whom He loves. The'friends' for whom He dies are the same persons as the Apostle, inhis sweet variation upon the words of my text, has called by theopposite name, when He says that He died for His 'enemies. '

There is an old, wild ballad that tells of how a knight found, coiling round a tree in a dismal forest, a loathly dragon breathingout poison; and how, undeterred by its hideousness and foulness, hecast his arms round it and kissed it on the mouth. Three times he didit undisgusted, and at the third the shape changed into a fair lady, and he won his bride. Christ 'kisses with the kisses of His mouth'His enemies, and makes them His friends because He loves them. 'If Hehad never died for His enemies' says one of the old fathers, 'Hewould never have possessed His friends. ' And so He teaches us here inwhat seems to be a restriction of the purpose of His death and thesweep of His love, that the way by which we are to meet evenalienation and hostility is by pouring upon it the treasures of anunselfish, self-sacrificing affection which will conquer at the last. 

Christ's death is the pattern for our lives as well as the hope ofour hearts. 

IV. Lastly, we have here by implication, though not by directstatement, the Motive of the love. 

Surely that, too, is contained in the words, 'As I have loved you. 'Christ's commandment of love is a new commandment, not so muchbecause it is a revelation of a new duty, though it is the casting ofan old duty into new prominence, as because it is not merely arevelation of an obligation, but the communication of power to fulfilit. The novelty of Christian morality lies here, that in its lawthere is a self-fulfilling force. We have not to look to one placefor the knowledge of our duty, and somewhere else for the strength todo it, but both are given to us in the one thing, the gift of thedying Christ and His immortal love. 

That love, received into our hearts, will conquer, and it alone willconquer, our selfishness. That love, received into our hearts, willmould, and it alone will mould, them into its own likeness. Thatlove, received into our hearts, will knit, and it alone will knit, all those who participate in it into a common bond, sweet, deep, sacred, and all-victorious. 

And so, brethren, if we would know the blessedness and the sweetnessof victory over these miserable, selfish hearts of ours, and to walkin the liberty of love, we can only get it by keeping close to JesusChrist. In any circle, the nearer the points of the circumference areto the centre, the closer they will necessarily be to one another. Aswe draw nearer, each for himself, to our Centre, we shall feel thatwe have approximated to all those who stand round the same centre, and draw from it the same life. In the early spring, when the wheatis green and young, and scarcely appears above the ground, it comesup in the lines in which it was sown, parted from one another anddistinctly showing their separation and the furrows. But when thefull corn in the ear waves on the autumn plain, all the lines andseparations have disappeared, and there is one unbroken tract ofsunny fruitfulness. And so when the life in Christ is low and feeble, His servants may be separated and drawn up in rigid lines ofdenominations, and churches, and sects; but as they grow the linesdisappear. If to the churches of England to-day there came a suddenaccession of knowledge of Christ, and of union with Him, the firstthing that would go would be the wretched barriers that separate usfrom one another. For if we have the life of Christ in any adequatemeasure in ourselves, we shall certainly have grown up above thefences behind which we began to grow, and shall be able to reach outto all that love the Lord Jesus Christ, and feel with thankfulnessthat we are one in Him. 

CHRIST'S FRIENDS

'Ye are My friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you. HenceforthI call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what hislord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that Ihave heard of My Father I have made known unto you. Ye have notchosen Me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that yeshould go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit shouldremain; that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in My name, Hemay give it you. These things I command you, that ye love oneanother. '--JOHN xv. 14-17. 

A wonderful word has just dropped from the Master's lips, when Hespoke of laying down His life for His friends. He lingers on it as ifthe idea conveyed was too great and sweet to be taken in at once, andwith soothing reiteration He assures the little group that they, eventhey, are His friends. 

I have ventured to take these four verses for consideration now, although each of them, and each clause of them, might afford amplematerial for a discourse, because they have one common theme. Theyare a description of what Christ's friends are to Him, of what He isto them, and of what they should be to one another. So they are alittle picture, in the sweetest form, of the reality, theblessedness, the obligations, of friendship with Christ. 

I. Notice what Christ's friends do for Him. 

'Ye are My friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you. ' In the formerverse, 'friends' means chiefly those whom He loved. Here it meansmainly those who love Him. They love Him because He loves them, ofcourse; and the two sides of the one thought cannot be parted. Butstill in this verse the idea of friendship to Christ is looked atfrom the human side, and He tells His disciples that they are Hislovers as well as beloved of Him, on condition of their doingwhatsoever He commands them. 

He lingers, as I said, on the idea itself. As if He would meet thedoubts arising from the sense of unworthiness, and from some dimperception of how He towers above them, and their limitations, Hereiterates, 'Wonderful as it is, you poor men, half-intelligentlovers of Mine, _you_ are My friends, beloved of Me, and loving Me, if ye do whatsoever I command you. '

How wonderful that stooping love of His is, which condescends toarray itself in the garments of ours! Every form of human love Christlays His hand upon, and claims that He Himself exercises it in atranscendent degree. 'He that doeth the will of My Father which is inheaven, the same is My brother and sister and mother. ' That which iseven sacreder, the purest and most complete union that humanity iscapable of--that, too, He consecrates; for even it, sacred as it is, is capable of a higher consecration, and, sweet as it is, receives anew sweetness when we think of 'the Bride, the Lamb's wife, ' andremember the parables in which He speaks of the Marriage Supper ofthe Great King, and sets forth Himself as the Husband of humanity. And passing from that Holy of Holies out into this outer court, Helays His hand, too, on that more common and familiar, and yetprecious and sacred, thing--the bond of friendship. The Prince makesa friend of the beggar. 

Even if we do not think more loftily of Jesus Christ than do thosewho regard Him simply as the perfection of humanity, is it notbeautiful and wonderful that He should look with such eyes of beaminglove on that handful of poor, ignorant fishermen, who knew Him sodimly, and say: 'I pass by all the wise and the mighty, all the loftyand noble, and My heart clings to you poor, insignificant people?' Hestoops to make them His friends, and there are none so low but thatthey may be His. 

This friendship lasts to-day. A peculiarity of Christianity is thestrong personal tie of real love and intimacy which will bind men, tothe end of time, to this Man that died nineteen hundred years ago. Welook back into the wastes of antiquity: mighty names rise there thatwe reverence; there are great teachers from whom we have learned, andto whom, after a fashion, we are grateful. But what a gulf there isbetween us and the best and noblest of them! But here is a dead Man, who to-day is the Object of passionate attachment and a love deeperthan life to millions of people, and will be till the end of time. There is nothing in the whole history of the world in the least likethat strange bond which ties you and me to the Saviour, and theparadox of the Apostle remains a unique fact in the experience ofhumanity: 'Jesus Christ, whom, having not seen, ye love. ' We stretchout our hands across the waste, silent centuries, and there, amidstthe mists of oblivion, thickening round all other figures in thepast, we touch the warm, throhbing heart of our Friend, who lives forever, and for ever is near us. We here, nearly two millenniums afterthe words fell on the nightly air on the road to Gethsemane, havethem coming direct to our hearts. A perpetual bond unites men withChrist to-day; and for us, as really as in that long-past Paschalnight, is it true, 'Ye are My friends. '

There are no limitations in that friendship, no misconstructions inthat heart, no alienation possible, no change to be feared. There isabsolute rest for us there. Why should I be solitary if Jesus Christis my Friend? Why should I fear if He walks by my side? Why shouldanything be burdensome if He lays it upon me and helps me to bear it?What is there in life that cannot be faced and borne--aye, andconquered, --if we have Him, as we all may have Him, for the Friendand the Home of our hearts?

But notice the condition, 'If ye do what I command you. ' Note thesingular blending of friendship and command, involving on our partsthe cultivation of the two things which are not incompatible, absolute submission and closest friendship. He commands though He isFriend; though He commands He is Friend. The conditions that He laysdown are the same which have already occupied our attention in formersermons of this series, and so may be touched very lightly. 'Ye areMy friends if ye do the things which I command you, ' may eithercorrespond with His former saying, 'If a Man love Me he will keep Mycommandments, ' or with His later one, which immediately precedes ourtext, 'If ye keep My commandments ye shall abide in My love. ' Forthis is the relationship between love and obedience, in regard toJesus Christ, that the love is the parent of the obedience, and theobedience is the guard and guarantee of the love. They who love willobey, they who obey will strengthen love by acting according to itsdictates, and will be in a condition to feel and realise more thewarmth of the rays that stream down upon them, and to send back morefully answering obedience from their hearts. Not in mere emotion, notin mere verbal expression, not in mere selfish realising of theblessings of His friendship, and not in mere mechanical, externalacts of conformity, but in the flowing down and melting of the hardand obstinate iron will, at the warmth of His great love, is our lovemade perfect. The obedience, which is the child and the preserver oflove, is something far deeper than the mere outward conformity withexternally apprehended commandments. To submit is the expression oflove, and love is deepened by submission. 

II. Secondly, note what Christ does for His friends. 

'Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not whathis lord doeth. ' The slave may see what his lord does, but he doesnot know his purpose in his acts--'Theirs not to reason why. ' In sofar as the relation of master and servant goes, and still more inthat of owner and slave, there is simple command on the one side andunintelligent obedience on the other. The command needs noexplanation, and if the servant is in his master's confidence he ismore than a servant. But, says Christ, 'I have called you friends';and He had called them so before He now named them so. He had calledthem so in act, and He points to all His past relationship, andespecially to the heart-outpourings of the Upper Room, as the proofthat He had called them His friends, in the fact that whatsoever Hehad heard of the Father He had made known to them. 

Jesus Christ, then, recognises the obligation of absolute frankness, and He will tell His friends everything that He can. When He tellsthem what He can, the voice of the Father speaks through the Son. Every one of Christ's friends stands nearer to God than did Moses atthe door of the Tabernacle, when the wondering camp beheld him faceto face with the blaze of the Shekinah glory, and dimly heard thethunderous utterances of God as He spake to him 'as a man speaks tohis friend. ' That was surface-speech compared with the divine depthand fullness of the communications which Jesus Christ deems Himselfbound, and assumes Himself able, to make to them who love Him andwhom He loves. 

Of course to Christ's frankness there are limits. He will not pourout His treasures into vessels that will spill them; and as HeHimself says in the subsequent part of this great discourse, 'I havemany things to say unto you, but you are not able to carry them now. 'His last word was, 'I have declared Thy name unto My brethren, and_will declare_ it. ' And though here He speaks as if His communicationwas perfect, we are to remember that it was necessarily conditionedby the power of reception on the part of the hearers, and that therewas much yet to be revealed of what God had whispered to Him, erethese men, that clustered round Him, could understand the message. 

That frank speech is continued to-day. Jesus Christ recognises theobligation that binds Him to impart to each of us all that each of usis in our inmost spirits capable of receiving. By the light which Hesheds on the Word, by many a suggestion through human lips, by many ablessed thought rising quietly within our hearts, and bearing thetoken that it comes from a sacreder source than our poor, blunderingminds, He still speaks to us, His friends. 

Ought not that thought of the utter frankness of Jesus make us, forone thing, very patient, intellectually and spiritually, of the gapsthat are left in His communications and in our knowledge? There areso many things that we sometimes think we should like to know, thingsabout that dark future where some of our hearts live so constantly, things about the depths of His nature and the divine character, things about the relation between God's love and God's righteousness, things about the meaning of all this dreadful mystery in which wegrope our way. These and a hundred other questionings suggest to usthat it would have been so easy for Him to have lifted a littlecorner of the veil, and let a little more of the light shine out. Heholds all in His hand. Why does He thus open one finger instead ofthe whole palm? Because He loves. A friend exercises the right ofreticence as well as the prerogative of speech. And for all the gapsthat are left, let us bow quietly and believe that if it had beenbetter for us He would have spoken. 'If it were not so I would havetold you. ' 'Trust Me! I tell you all that it is good for you toreceive. '

And that frankness may well teach us another lesson, viz. , theobligation of keeping our ears open and our hearts prepared toreceive the speech that does come from Him. Ah, brother! many amessage from your Lord flits past you, like the idle wind through anarchway, because you are not listening for His voice. If we kept downthe noise of that 'household jar within'; if we silenced passion, ambition, selfishness, worldliness; if we withdrew ourselves, as weought to do, from the Babel of this world, and 'hid ourselves in Hispavilion from the strife of tongues'; if we took less of our religionout of books and from other people, and were more accustomed to'dwell in the secret place of the Most High, ' and to say, 'Speak, Friend! for Thy friend heareth, ' we should more often understand howreal to-day is the voice of Christ to them that love Him. 

 'Such rebounds the inward ear Catches often from afar; Listen, prize them, hold them dear, For of God--of God--they are. '

III. Thirdly, notice how Christ's friends come to be so, and why theyare so. 

'Ye have not chosen, ' etc. (verse 16). 

Our Lord refers here, no doubt, primarily to the little group of theApostles; the choice and ordaining as well as 'the fruit thatabides, ' point, in the first place, to their apostolic office, and tothe results of their apostolic labours. But we must widen out thewords a great deal beyond that reference. 

In all the cases of friendship between Christ and men, theorigination and initiation come from Him. 'We love Him because Hefirst loved us. ' He has told us how, in His divine alchemy, Hechanges by the shedding of His blood our enmity into friendship. Inthe previous verse He has said, 'Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. ' And as I remarked inmy last sermon, the friends here are the same as 'the enemies' forwhom, the Apostle tells us that Christ laid down His life. Since Hehas thus by the blood of the Cross changed men's enmity intofriendship, it is true universally that the amity between us andChrist comes entirely from Him. 

But there is more than that in the words. I do not suppose that anyman, whatever his theological notions and standpoint may be, who hasfelt the love of Christ in his own heart in however feeble a measure, but will say, as the Apostle said, 'I was apprehended of Christ. ' Itis because He lays His seeking and drawing hand upon us that we evercome to love Him, and it is true that His choice of us precedes ourchoice of Him, and that the Shepherd always comes to seek the sheepthat is lost in the wilderness. 

This, then, is how we come to be His friends; because, when we wereenemies, He loved us, and gave Himself for us, and ever since hasbeen sending out the ambassadors and the messengers of His love--or, rather, the rays and beams of it, which are parts of Himself--to drawus to His heart. And the purpose which all this forthgoing ofChrist's initial and originating friendship has had in view, is setforth in words which I can only touch in the lightest possiblemanner. The intention is twofold. First, it respects service orfruit. 'That ye may _go_'; there is deep pathos and meaning in thatword. He had been telling them that He was going; now He says tothem, 'You are to go. We part here. My road lies upward; yours runsonward. Go into all the world. ' He gives them a _quasi_-independentposition; He declares the necessity of separation; He declares alsothe reality of union in the midst of the separation; He sends _them_out on their course with His benediction, as He does _us_. Wheresoever we go in obedience to His will, we carry theconsciousness of His friendship. 

'That ye may bring forth fruit'--He goes back for a moment to thesweet emblem with which this chapter begins, and recurs to theimagery of the vine and the fruit. 'Keeping His commandments' doesnot explain the whole process by which we do the things that arepleasing in His sight. We must also take this other metaphor of thebearing of fruit. Neither an effortless, instinctive bringing forthfrom the renewed nature and the Christlike disposition, nor a painfuland strenuous effort at obedience to His law, describe the wholerealities of Christian service. There must be the effort, for men donot grow Christlike in character as the vine grows its grapes; butthere must also be, regulated and disciplined by the effort, theinward life, for no mere outward obedience and tinkering at dutiesand commandments will produce the fruit that Christ desires andrejoices to have. First comes unity of life with Him; and theneffort. Take care of modern teachings that do not recognise these twoas both essential to the complete ideal of Christian service--thespontaneous fruit-bearing, and the strenuous effort after obedience. 

'That your fruit should remain'; nothing corrupts faster than fruit. There is only one kind of fruit that is permanent, incorruptible. Theonly life's activity that outlasts life and the world is the activityof the men who obey Christ. 

The other half of the issues of this friendship is the satisfying ofour desires, 'That whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in My name Hemay give it you. ' We have already had substantially the same promisein previous parts of this discourse, and therefore I may deal with itvery lightly. How comes it that it is certain that Christ's friends, living close to Him and bearing fruit, will get what they want?Because what they want will be 'in His name'--that is to say, inaccordance with His disposition and will. Make your desires Christ's, and Christ's yours, and you will be satisfied. 

IV. And now, lastly, for one moment, note the mutual friendship ofChrist's friends. 

We have frequently had to consider that point--the relation of thefriends of Christ to each other. 'These things I command you, that yelove one another. ' This whole context is, as it were, enclosed withina golden circlet by that commandment which appeared in a formerverse, at the beginning of it, 'This is My commandment, that ye loveone another, ' and reappears here at the close, thus shutting off thisportion from the rest of the discourse. Friends of a friend shouldthemselves be friends. We care for the lifeless things that a dearfriend has cared for; books, articles of use of various sorts. Ifthese have been of interest to him, they are treasures and preciousevermore to us. And here are living men and women, in all diversitiesof character and circumstances, but with this stamped upon them all--Christ's friends, lovers of and loved by Him. And how can we beindifferent to those to whom Christ is not indifferent? We are knittogether by that bond. We are but poor friends of that Master unlesswe feel that all which is dear to Him is dear to us. Let us feel theelectric thrill which ought to pass through the whole linked circle, and let us beware that we slip not our hands from the grasp of theneighbour on either side, lest, parted from them, we should beisolated from Him, and lose some of the love which we fail totransmit. 

SHEEP AMONG WOLVES

'If the world hate you, ye know that it hated Me before it hatedyou. If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: butbecause ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of theworld, therefore the world hateth you. Remember the word that Isaid unto you, The servant is not greater than his Lord. If theyhave persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they havekept My saying, they will keep yours also. '--JOHN xv. 18-20. 

These words strike a discord in the midst of the sweet music to whichwe have been listening. The key-note of all that has preceded hasbeen love--the love of Christ's friends to one another, and of all toHim, as an answer to His love to all. That love, which is one, whether it rise to Him or is diffused on the level of earth, is theresult of that unity of life between the Vine and the branches, ofwhich our Lord has been speaking such great and wonderful things. Butthat unity of life between Christians and Christ has anotherconsequence than the spread of love. Just because it binds them toHim in a sacred community, it separates them from those who do notshare in His life, and hence the 'hate' of our context is the shadowof 'love'; and there result two communities--to use the much-abusedwords that designate them--the Church and 'the World'; and theantagonism between these is deep, fundamental, and perpetual. 

Unquestionably, our Lord is here speaking with special reference tothe Apostles, who, in a very tragic sense, were 'sent forth as sheepin the midst of wolves. ' If we may trust tradition, every one of thatlittle company, Speaker as well as hearers, died a martyr's death, with the exception of John himself, who was preserved from it by amiracle. But, be that as it may, our Lord is here laying down auniversal statement of the permanent condition of things; and thereis no more reason for restricting the force of these words to theoriginal hearers of them than there is for restricting the force ofany of the rest of this wonderful discourse. 'The world' will be inantagonism to the Church until the world ceases to be a world, because it obeys the King; and then, and not till then, will it ceaseto be hostile to His subjects. 

I. What makes this hostility inevitable?

Our Lord here prepares His hearers for what is coming by putting itin the gentle form of an hypothesis. The frequency with which 'If'occurs in this section is very remarkable. He will not startle themby the bare, naked statement which they, in that hour of depressionand agitation, were so little able to endure, but He puts it in theshape of a 'suppose that, ' not because there is any doubt, but inorder to alleviate the pain of the impression which He desires tomake. He says, 'If the world hates, ' not 'if the world hate'; and thetense of the original shows that, whilst the form of the statement ishypothetical, the substance of it is prophetic. 

Jesus points to two things, as you will observe, which make thishostility inevitable. 'If the world hate you, ye know that it hatedMe before it hated you. ' And again, 'If ye were of the world, theworld would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but Ihave chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. 'The very language carries with it the implication of necessary andcontinual antagonism. For what is 'the world, ' in this context, butthe aggregate of men, who have no share in the love and life thatflow from Jesus Christ? Necessarily they constitute a unity, whateverdiversities there may be amongst them, and necessarily, that unity inits banded phalanx is in antagonism, in some measure, to those whoconstitute the other unity, which holds by Christ, and has been drawnby Him from 'out of the world. '

If we share Christ's life, we must, necessarily, in some measure, share His fate. It is the typical example of what the world thinksof, and does to, goodness. And all who have 'the Spirit of life whichwas in Jesus Christ' for the animating principle of their lives, will, just in the measure in which they possess it, come under thesame influences which carried Him to the Cross. In a world like this, it is impossible for a man to 'love righteousness and hate iniquity, 'and to order his life accordingly, without treading on somebody'scorns; being a rebuke to the opposite course of conduct, eitherinterfering with men's self-complacency or with their interests. Fromthe beginning the blind world has repaid goodness by antagonism andcontempt. 

And then our Lord touches another, and yet closely-connected, causewhen He speaks of His selecting the Apostles, and drawing them out ofthe world, as a reason for the world's hostility. There are twogroups, and the fundamental principles that underlie each are indeadly antagonism. In the measure in which you and I are Christianswe are in direct opposition to all the maxims which rule the worldand make it a world. What we believe to be precious it regards as ofno account. What we believe to be fundamental truth it passes by asof little importance. Much which we feel to be wrong it regards asgood. Our jewels are its tinsel, and its jewels are our tinsel. Weand it stand in diametrical opposition of thought about God, aboutself, about duty, about life, about death, about the future; and thatopposition goes right down to the bottom of things. However it may becovered over, there is a gulf, as in some of those American canons:the towering cliffs may be very near--only a yard or two seems toseparate them; but they go down for thousands and thousands of feet, and never are any nearer each other, and between them at the bottom ablack, sullen river flows. 'If ye were of the world, the world wouldlove its own. ' If it loves you, it is because ye are of it. 

II. And so note, secondly, how this hostility is masked and modified. 

There are a great many other bonds that unite men together besidesthe bonds of religious life or their absence. There are the domesticties, there are the associations of commerce and neighbourhood, thereare surface identities of opinion about many important things. Thegreater portion of our lives moves on this surface, whore all men arealike. 'If you tickle us, do we not laugh; if you wound us, do we notbleed?' We have all the same affections and needs, pursue the sameavocations, do the same sort of things, and a large portion of everyone's life is under the dominion of habit and custom, and determinedby external circumstances. So there is a film of roofing thrown overthe gulf. You can make up a crack in a wall with plaster after afashion, and it will hide the solution of continuity that liesbeneath. But let bad weather come, and soon the bricks gape apart asbefore. And so, as soon as we get down below the surface of thingsand grapple with the real, deep-lying, and formative principles of alife, we come to antagonism, just as they used to come to it longago, though the form of it has become quite different. 

Then there are other causes modifying this hostility. The world hasgot a dash of Christianity into it since Jesus Christ spoke. Wecannot say that it is half Christianised, but some of the issues andremoter consequences of Christianity have permeated the generalconscience, and the ethics of the Gospel are largely diffused in sucha land as this. Thus Christian men and others have, to a largeextent, a common code of morality, as long as they keep on thesurface; and they not only do a good many things exactly alike, butdo a great many things from substantially the same motives, and havethe same way of looking at much. Thus the gulf is partly bridgedover; and the hostility takes another form. We do not wrap Christiansin pitch and stick them up for candles in the Emperor's gardennowadays, but the same thing can be done in different ways. Newspaperarticles, the light laugh of scorn, the whoop of exultation over thefailures or faults of any prominent man that has stood out boldly onChrist's side; all these indicate what lies below the surface, andsometimes not so very far below. Many a young man in a Manchesterwarehouse, trying to live a godly life, many a workman at his bench, many a commercial traveller in the inn or on the road, many a studenton the college benches, has to find out that there is a great gulfbetween him and the man who sits next to him, and that he cannot befaithful to his Lord, and at the same time, down to the depths of hisbeing, a friend of one who has no friendship to his Master. 

Still another fact masks the antagonism, and that is, that after all, the world, meaning thereby the aggregate of godless men, has aconscience that responds to goodness, though grumblingly andreluctantly. After all, men do know that it is better to be good, that it is better and wiser to be like Christ, that it is nobler tolive for Him than for self, and that consciousness cannot but modifyto some extent the manifestations of the hostility, but it is thereall the same, and whosoever will be a Christian after Christ'spattern will find out that it is there. 

Let a man for Christ's sake avow unpopular beliefs, let him tryhonestly to act out the New Testament, let him boldly seek to applyChristian principles to the fashionable and popular sins of his classor of his country, let him in any way be ahead of the conscience ofthe majority, and what a chorus will be yelping at his heels! Dearbrethren, the law still remains, 'If any man will be a friend of theworld he is at enmity with God. '

III. Thirdly, note how you may escape the hostility. 

A half-Christianised world and a more than half-secularised Churchget on well together. 'When they do agree, their agreement iswonderful. ' And it is a miserable thing to reflect that about theaverage Christianity of this generation there is so very little thatdoes deserve the antagonism of the world. Why should the world careto hate or trouble itself about a professing Church, large parts ofwhich are only a bit of the world under another name? There is noneed whatever that there should be any antagonism at all between agodless world and hosts of professing Christians. If you want toescape the hostility drop your flag, button your coat over the badgethat shows that you belong to Christ, and do the things that thepeople round about you do, and you will have a perfectly easy andundisturbed life. 

Of course, in the bad old slavery days, a Christianity that had not aword to say about the sin of slave-holding ran no risk of beingtarred and feathered. Of course a Christianity in Manchester thatwinks hard at commercial immoralities is very welcome on theExchange. Of course a Christianity that lets beer barrels alone mayreckon upon having publicans for its adherents. Of course aChristianity that blesses flags and sings _Te Deums_ over victorieswill get its share of the spoil. Why should the world hate, orpersecute, or do anything but despise a Christianity like that, anymore than a man need to care for a tame tiger that has had its clawspared? If the world can put a hook in the nostrils of leviathan, andmake him play with its maidens, it will substitute good-nature, halfcontemptuous, for the hostility which our Master here predicts. Itwas out-and-out Christians that He said the world would hate; theworld likes Christians that are like itself. Christian men and women!be you sure that you deserve the hostility which my text predicts. 

IV. And now, lastly, note how to meet this antagonism. 

Reckon it as a sign and test of true union with Jesus Christ. And so, if ever, by reason of our passing at the call of duty or benevolenceoutside the circle of those who sympathise with our faith andfundamental ideas, we encounter it more manifestly than when we'dwell among our own people, ' let us count the 'reproach of Christ'as a treasure to be proud of, and to be guarded. 

Be sure that it is your goodness and not your evils or your weakness, that men dislike. The world has a very keen eye for theinconsistencies and the faults of professing Christians, and it is agood thing that it has. The loftier your profession the sharper thejudgment that is applied to you. Many well-meaning Christian people, by an injudicious use of Christian phraseology in the wrong place, and by the glaring contradiction between their prayers and theirtalks and their daily life, bring down a great deal of deservedhostility upon themselves and of discredit upon Christianity; andthen they comfort themselves and say they are bearing the 'reproachof the Cross. ' Not a bit of it! They are bearing the natural resultsof their own failings and faults. And it is for us to see to it thatwhat provokes, if it does provoke, hostile judgments and uncharitablecriticisms, insulting speeches and sarcasms, and the sense of ourbelonging to another regiment and having other objects, is ourcleaving to Jesus Christ, and not the imperfections and the sins withwhich we so often spoil that cleaving. Be you careful for this, thatit is Christ in you that men turn from, and not you yourself and yourweakness and sin. 

Meet this antagonism by not dropping your standard one inch. Keep theflag right at the masthead. If you begin to haul it down, where areyou going to stop? Nowhere, until you have got it draggling in themud at the foot. It is of no use to try to conciliate by compromise. All that we shall gain by that will be, as I have said, indifferenceand contempt; all that we shall gain will be a loss to the cause. Agreat deal is said in this day, and many efforts are being made--Icannot but think mistaken efforts--by Christian people to bridge overthis gulf in the wrong way--that is, by trying to make out thatChristianity in its fundamental principles does approximate a greatdeal more closely to the things that the world goes by than it reallydoes. It is all vain, and the only issue of it will be that we shallhave a decaying Christianity and a dying spiritual life. Keep theflag up; emphasise and accentuate the things that the worlddisbelieves and denies, not pushing them to the 'falsehood ofextremes, ' but not by one jot diminishing the clearness of ourtestimony by reason of the world's unwillingness to receive it. Ourvictory is to be won only through absolute faithfulness to Christ'sideal. 

And, lastly, meet hostility with unmoved, patient, Christlike, andChrist-derived love and sympathy. The patient sunshine pours upon theglaciers and melts the thick-ribbed ice at last into sweet water. Thepatient sunshine beats upon the mist-cloud and breaks up its edgesand scatters it at the last. And our Lord here tells us that ourexperience, if we are faithful to Him, will be like His experience, in that some will hearken to our word though others will persecute, and to some our testimony will come as a message from God that drawsthem to the Lord Himself. These are our only weapons, brethren! Theonly conqueror of the world is the love that was in Christ breathedthrough us; the only victory over suspicion, contempt, alienation, ispleading, persistent, long-suffering, self-denying love. The only wayto overcome the world's hostility is by turning the world into achurch, and that can only be done when Christ's servants oppose pityto wrath, love to hate, and in the strength of His life who has wonus all by the same process, seek to win the world for Him by themanifestation of His victorious love in our patient love. 

Dear brethren, to which army do you belong? Which community is yours?Are you in Christ's ranks, or are you in the world's? Do you love Himback again, or do you meet His open heart with a closed one, and Hishand, laden with blessings, with hands clenched in refusal? To whichclass do I belong?--it is the question of questions for us all; and Ipray that you and I, won from our hatred by His love, and wooed outof our death by His life, and made partakers of His life by Hisdeath, may yield our hearts to Him, and so pass from out of thehostility and mistrust of a godless world into the friendships andpeace of the sheltering Vine. And then we 'shall esteem the reproachof Christ' if it fall upon our heads, in however modified and mild aform, 'greater riches than the treasures of Egypt, ' and 'have respectunto the recompense of the reward. '

May it be so with us all!

THE WORLD'S HATRED, AS CHRIST SAW IT

'But all these things will they do unto you for My name's sake, because they know not Him that sent Me. If I had not come andspoken unto them, they had not had sin: but now they have nocloke for their sin. He that hateth Me, hateth My Father also. IfI had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin: but now have they both seen and hated bothMe and My Father. But this cometh to pass, that the word might befulfilled that is written in their law, They hated Me without acause. '--JOHN XV. 21-25. 

Our Lord has been speaking of the world's hostility to His followers, and tracing that to its hostility to Himself. In these solemn wordsof our text He goes still deeper, and parallels the relation whichHis disciples bear to Him and the consequent hostility that falls onthem, with the relation which He bears to the Father and theconsequent hostility that falls on Him: 'They hate you because theyhate Me. ' And then His words become sadder and pierce deeper, andwith a tone of wounded love and disappointed effort and almostsurprise at the world's requital to Him, He goes on to say, 'Theyhate Me, because they hate the Father. '

So, then, here we have, in very pathetic and solemn words, Christ'sview of the relation of the world to Him and to God. 

I. The first point that He signalises is the world's ignorance. 

'These things they will do unto you, ' and they will do them 'for Myname's sake'; they will do them 'because they know not Him that sentMe. '

'The world, ' in Christ's language, is the aggregate of godless men. Or, to put it a little more sharply, our Lord, in this context, givesin His full adhesion to that narrow view which divides those who havecome under the influence of His truth into two portions. There is nomincing of the matter in the antithesis which Christ here draws; nohesitation, as if there were a great central mass, too bad for ablessing perhaps, but too good for a curse; which was neither blacknor white, but neutral grey. No! however it may be with the massesbeyond the reach of the dividing and revealing power of His truth, the men that come into contact with Him, like a heap of metal filingsbrought into contact with a magnet, mass themselves into two bunches, the one those who yield to the attraction, and the other those who donot. The one is 'My disciples, ' and the other is 'the world. ' Andnow, says Jesus Christ, all that mass that stands apart from Him, and, having looked upon Him with the superficial eye of those menround about Him at that day, or of the men who hear of Him now, haveno real love to Him--have, as the underlying motive of their conductand their feelings, a real ignorance of God, 'They know not Him thatsent Me. '

Our Lord assumes that He is so completely the Copy and Revealer ofthe divine nature as that any man that looks upon Him has had theopportunity of becoming acquainted with God, and that any man whoturns away from Him has lost that opportunity. The God that the menwho do not love Jesus Christ believe in, is not the Father that sentHim. It is a fragment, a distorted image tinted by the lens. Theworld has its conception of God; but outside of Jesus Christ and Hismanifestation of the whole divine nature, the world's God is but asyllable, a fragment, a broken part of the perfect completeness. 'TheFather of an infinite majesty, ' and of as infinite a tenderness, thestooping God, the pitying God, the forgiving God, the loving God isknown only where Christ is accepted. In other hearts He may be dimlyhoped for, in other hearts He may be half believed in, in otherhearts He may be thought possible; but hopes and anticipations andfears and doubts are not knowledge, and they who see not the light inChrist see but the darkness. Out of Him God is not known, and theythat turn away from His beneficent manifestation turn their faces tothe black north, from which no sun can shine. Brother, do you knowGod in Christ? Unless you do, you do not know the God who is. 

But there is a deeper meaning in that word than simply the possessionof true thoughts concerning the divine nature. We know God as we knowone another; because God is a Person, as we are persons, and the onlyway to know persons is through familiar acquaintance and sympathy. Sothe world which turns away from Christ has no acquaintance with God. 

This is a surface fact. Our Lord goes on to show what lies below it. 

II. His second thought here is--the world's ignorance in the face ofChrist's light is worse than ignorance; it is sin. 

Mark how He speaks: 'If I had not come and spoken unto them, they hadnot had sin: but now they have no cloke for their sin. ' And thenagain: 'If I had not done amongst them the works which none other mendid, they had not had sin. ' So then He puts before us two forms ofHis manifestation of the divine nature, by His words and His works. Of these two He puts His words foremost, as being a deeper and moreprecious and brilliant revelation of what God is than are Hismiracles. The latter are subordinate, they come as a second source ofillumination. Men who will not see the beauty and listen to the truththat lie in His word may perchance be led by His deed. But the wordtowers in its nature high above the work, and the miracle to the wordis but like the picture in the child's book to the text, fit forfeeble eyes and infantile judgments, but containing far less of therevelation of God than the sacred words which He speaks. First thewords, next the miracles. 

But notice, too, how decisively, and yet simply and humbly andsorrowfully, our Lord here makes a claim which, on the lips of anybut Himself, would have been mere madness of presumption. Think ofany of us saying that our words made all the difference betweeninnocent ignorance and criminality! Think of any of us saying that tolisten to us, and not be persuaded, was the sin of sins! Think of anyof us pointing to our actions and saying, In these God is so manifestthat not to see Him augurs wickedness, and is condemnation! And yetJesus Christ says all this. And, what is more wonderful, nobodywonders that He says it, and the world believes that He is saying thetruth when He says it. 

How does that come? There is only one answer; only one. His wordswere the illuminating manifestation of God, and His deeds were theplain and unambiguous operation of the divine hand then and there, only because He Himself was divine, and in Him 'God was manifested inthe flesh. '

But passing from that, notice how our Lord here declares that incomparison with the sin of not listening to His words, and beingtaught by His manifestation, all other sins dwindle into nothing. 'IfI had not spoken, they had not had sin. ' That does not mean, ofcourse, that these men would have been clear of all moraldelinquency; it does not mean that there would not have been amongstthem crimes against their own consciences, crimes against the lawwritten on their own hearts, crimes against the law of revelation. There were liars, impure men, selfish men, and men committing all theordinary forms of human transgression amongst them. And yet, saysChrist, black and bespattered as these natures are, they are white incomparison with the blackness of the man who, looking into His face, sees nothing there that he should desire. Beside the mountainbelching out its sulphurous flame the little pimple of a molehill isnought. And so, says Christ, heaven heads the count of sins withthis--unbelief in Me. 

Ah, brother, as light grows responsibility grows, and this is themisery of all illumination that comes through Jesus Christ, thatwhere it does not draw a man into His sweet love, and fill him withthe knowledge of God which is eternal life, it darkens his nature andaggravates his condemnation, and lays a heavier burden upon his soul. The truth that the measure of light is the measure of guilt has manyaspects. It turns a face of alleviation to the dark places of theearth; but just in the measure that it lightens the condemnation ofthe heathen, it adds weight to the condemnation of you men and womenwho are bathed in the light of Christianity, and all your days havehad it streaming in upon you. The measure of the guilt is thebrightness of the light. No shadows are so black as those which theintense sunshine of the tropics casts. And you and I live in the verytropical regions of divine revelation, and 'if we turn away from Himthat spoke on earth and speaketh from heaven, of how much sorerpunishment, think you, shall we be thought worthy' than those wholive away out in the glimmering twilight of an unevangelisedpaganism, or who stood by the side of Jesus Christ when they had onlyHis earthly life to teach them?

III. The ignorance which is sin is the manifestation of hatred. 

Our Lord has sorrowfully contemplated the not knowing God, which inthe blaze of His light can only come from wilful closing of the eyes, and is therefore the very sin of sins. But that, sad as it is, is notall which has to be said about that blindness of unbelief in Him. Itindicates a rooted alienation of heart and mind and will from God, and is, in fact, the manifestation of an unconscious but real hatred. It is an awful saying, and one which the lips 'into which grace waspoured' could not pronounce without a sigh. But it is our wisdom tolisten to what it was His mercy to say. 

Observe our Lord's identification of Himself with the Father, so asthat the feelings with which men regard Him are, _ipso facto_, thefeelings with which they regard the Father God. 'He that hath seen Mehath seen the Father. ' 'He that hath loved Me hath loved the Father. ''He that hath hated Me hath hated the Father. ' An ugly word--a wordthat a great many of us think far too severe and harsh to be appliedto men who simply are indifferent to the divine love. Some say, 'I amconscious of no hatred. I do not pretend to be a Christian, but I donot hate God. Take the ordinary run of people round about us in theworld; if you say God is not in all their thoughts, I agree with you;but if you say that they _hate_ God, I do not believe it. '

Well, what do you think the fact that men go through their days andweeks and months and years, and have not God in all their thoughts, indicates as to the central feeling of their hearts towards God?Granted that there is not actual antagonism, because there is nothought at all, do you think it would be possible for a man who lovedGod to go on for a twelvemonth and never think of, or care to please, or desire to be near, the object that he loved? And inasmuch as, deepdown at the bottom of our moral being, there is no such thingpossible as indifference and a perfect equipoise in reference to God, it is clear enough, I think, that--although the word must not bepressed as if it meant conscious and active antagonism, --where thereis no love there is hate. 

If a man does not love God as He is revealed to him in Jesus Christ, he neither cares to please Him nor to think about Him, nor does heorder his life in obedience to His commands. And if it be true thatobedience is the very life-breath of love, disobedience or non-obedience is the manifestation of antagonism, and antagonism towardsGod is the same thing as hate. 

Dear friends, I want some of my hearers to-day who have neverhonestly asked themselves the question of what their relation to Godis, to go down into the deep places of their hearts and testthemselves by this simple inquiry: 'Do I do anything to please Him?Do I try to serve Him? Is it a joy to me to be near Him? Is thethought of Him a delight, like a fountain in the desert or the coolshadow of a great rock in the blazing wilderness? Do I turn to Him asmy Home, my Friend, my All? If I do not, am I not deceiving myself byfancying that I stand neutral?' There is no neutrality in a man'srelation to God. It is one thing or other. 'Ye cannot serve God andMammon. ' 'The friendship of the world is enmity against God. '

IV. And now, lastly, note how our Lord here touches the deep thoughtthat this ignorance, which is sin, and is more properly named hatred, is utterly irrational and causeless. 

'All this will they do that it might be fulfilled which is written intheir law, They hated Me without a cause. ' One hears sighing throughthese words the Master's meek wonder that His love should be so met, and that the requital which He receives at men's hands, for such anunexampled and lavish outpouring of it, should be such acarelessness, reposing upon a hidden basis of such a rootedalienation. 

'Without a cause'; yes! that suggests the deep thought that the mostmysterious and irrational thing in men's whole history and experienceis the way in which they recompense God in Christ for what He hasdone for them. 'Be astonished, O ye heavens! and wonder, O ye earth!'said one of the old prophets; the mystery of mysteries, which cangive no account of itself to satisfy reason, which has no apology, excuse, or vindication, is just that when God loves me I do not loveHim back again; and that when Christ pours out the whole fullness ofHis heart upon me, nay dull and obstinate heart gives back so littleto Him who has given me so much. 

'Without a cause. ' Think of that Cross; think, as every poor creatureon earth has a right to think, that he and she individually were inthe mind and heart of the Saviour when He suffered and died, and thenthink of what we have brought Him for it. De we not stand ashamed at-if I might use so trivial a word, --the absurdity as well as at thecriminality of our requital? Causeless love on the one side, occasioned by nothing but itself, and causeless indifference on theother, occasioned by nothing but itself, are the two powers that meetin this mystery-men's rejection of the infinite love of God. 

My friend, come away from the unreasonable people, come away from themen who can give no account of their attitude. Come away from thosewho pay benefits by carelessness, and a Love that died by anindifference that will not cast an eye upon that miracle of mercy, and let His love kindle the answering flame in your hearts. Then youwill know God as only they who love Christ know Him, and in thesweetness of a mutual bond will lose the misery of self, and escapethe deepening condemnation of those who see Christ on the Cross anddo not care for the sight, nor learn by it to know the infinitetenderness and holiness of the Father that sent Him. 

OUR ALLY

'But when the Comforter Is come, whom I will send unto you fromthe Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from theFather, He shall testify of Me: And ye also shall bear witness, because ye have been with Me from the beginning. '--JOHN xv. 26, 27. 

Our Lord has been speaking of a world hostile to His followers and toHim. He proceeds, in the words which immediately follow our text, topaint that hostility as aggravated even to the pitch of religiousmurder. But here He lets a beam of light in upon the darkness. Theseforlorn Twelve, listening to Him, might well have said, 'Thou artabout to leave us; how can we alone face this world in arms, withwhich Thou dost terrify us?' And here He lets them see that they willnot be left alone, but have a great Champion, clad in celestialarmour, who, coming straight from God, will be with them and put intotheir hands a weapon, with which they may conquer the world, and turnit into a friend, and with which alone they must meet the world'shate. 

So, then, we have three things in this text; the great promise of anAlly in the conflict with the world; the witness which that Allybears, to fortify against the world; and the consequent witness withwhich Christians may win the world. 

I. Now consider briefly the first of these points, the great promiseof an Ally in the conflict with the world. 

I may touch, very lightly, upon the wonderful designation of thisChampion-Friend whom Christ sends, because on former occasions inthis course of sermons we have had to deal with the same thoughts, and there will be subsequent opportunities of recurring to them. ButI may just emphasise in a few sentences the points which our Lordhere signalises in regard to the Champion whom He sends. There is adouble designation of that Spirit, 'the Comforter' and 'the Spirit oftruth. ' There is a double description of His mission, as being 'sent'by Jesus, and as 'proceeding from the Father, ' and there is a singlestatement as to the position from which He comes to us. A word abouteach of these things. 

I have already explained in former sermons that the notion of'Comforter, ' as it is understood in modern English, is a great dealtoo restricted and narrow to cover the whole ground of this great andblessed promise. The Comforter whom Christ sends is no mere drier ofmen's tears and gentle Consoler of human sorrows, but He is amightier Spirit than that, and the word by which He is described inour text, which means 'one who is summoned to the side of another, 'conveys the idea of a helper who is brought to the man to be helped, in order to render whatever aid and succour that man's weakness andcircumstances may require. The verses before our text suggest whatsort of aid and succour the disciples will need. They are to be assheep in the midst of wolves. Their defenceless purity will need aProtector, a strong Shepherd. They stand alone amongst enemies. Theremust be some one beside them to fight for them, to shield and toencourage them, to be their Safety and their Peace. And thatParaclete, who is called to our side, comes for the special helpwhich these special circumstances require, and is a strong Spirit whowill be our Champion and our Ally, whatever antagonism may stormagainst us, and however strong and well-armed may be the assaultinglegions of the world's hate. 

Then, still further, the other designation here of this strongSuccourer and Friend is 'the Spirit of truth, ' by which isdesignated, not so much His characteristic attribute, as rather theweapon which He wields, or the material with which He works. The'truth' is His instrument; that is to say, the Spirit of God sent byJesus Christ is the Strengthener, the Encourager, the Comforter, theFighter for us and with us, because He wields that great body oftruth, the perfect revelation of God, and man, and duty, andsalvation, which is embodied in the incarnation and work of JesusChrist our Lord. The truth is His weapon, and it is by it that Hemakes us strong. 

Then, still further, there is a twofold description here of themission of this divine Champion, as 'sent' by Christ, and 'proceedingfrom the Father. '

In regard to the former, I need only remind you that, in a previouspart of this wonderful discourse, our Lord speaks of that divineSpirit as being sent by the Father in His name and in answer to Hisprayer. The representation here is by no means antagonistic to, ordiverse from, that other representation, but rather the fact that theFather and the Son, according to the deep teaching of Scripture, arein so far one as that 'whatsoever the Son seeth the Father do thatalso the Son doeth likewise, ' makes it possible to attribute to Himthe work which, in another place, is ascribed to the Father. Inspeaking of the _Persons_ of the Deity, let us never forget that thatword is only partially applicable to that ineffable Being, and thatwhilst with us it implies absolute separation of individuals, it doesnot mean such separation in the case of its imperfect transference tothe mysteries of the divine nature; but rather, the Son doeth whatthe Father doeth, and therefore the Spirit is sent forth by theFather, and also the Son sends the Spirit. 

But, on the other hand, we are not to regard that divine Spirit asmerely a Messenger sent by another. He 'proceeds from the Father. 'That word has been the battlefield of theological controversy, withwhich I do not purpose to trouble you now. For I do not suppose thatin its use here it refers at all to the subject to which it has beensometimes applied, nor contains any kind of revelation of the eternaldepths of the divine Nature and its relations to itself. What ismeant here is the historical coming forth into human life of thatdivine Spirit. And, possibly, the word 'proceeds' is chosen in orderto contrast with the word 'sent, ' and to give the idea of a voluntaryand personal action of the Messenger, who not only is _sent_ by theFather, but of Himself _proceeds_ on the mighty work to which He isdestined. 

Be that as it may, mark only, for the last thought here about thedetails of this great promise, that wonderful phrase, twice repeatedin our Lord's words, and emphasised by its verbal repetition in thetwo clauses, which in all other respects are so different--'from theFather. ' The word translated '_from_' is not the ordinary word sorendered, but rather designates _a position at the side of_ than an_origin from_, and suggests much rather the intimate and ineffableunion between Father, Son, and Spirit, than the source from which theSpirit comes. I touch upon these things very lightly, and gather themup into one sentence. Here, then, are the points. A Person who isspoken of as 'He'--a divine Person whose home from of old has beenclose by the Father's side--a Person whose instrument is the revealedtruth ensphered and in germ in the facts of Christ's incarnation andlife--a divine Person, wielding the truth, who is sent by Christ asHis Representative, and in some sense a continuance of His personalPresence--a divine, personal Spirit coming from the Father, wieldingthe truth, sent by Christ, and at the side of all the persecuted andthe weak, all world-hated and Christian men, as their Champion, theirCombatant, their Ally, their Inspiration, and their Power. Is notthat enough to make the weakest strong? Is not that enough to make us'more than conquerors through Him that loved us'? All nations havelegends of the gods fighting at the head of their armies, and throughthe dust of battle the white horses and the shining armour of thecelestial champions have been seen. The childish dream is ahistorical reality. It is not we that fight, it is the Spirit of Godthat fighteth in us. 

II. And so note, secondly, the witness of the Spirit which fortifiesagainst the world. 

'He shall bear witness of Me. ' Now we must especially observe herethat little phrase, 'unto you. ' For that tells us at once that thewitness which our Lord has in mind here is something which is donewithin the circle of the Christian believers, and not in the widefield of the world's history or in nature. Of course it is a greattruth that long before Jesus Christ, and to-day far beyond the limitsof His name and knowledge, to say nothing of His faith and obedience, the Spirit of God is working. As of old He brooded over the chaoticdarkness, ever labouring to turn chaos into order, and darkness intolight, and deformity into beauty; so today, all over the field ofhumanity, He is operating. Grand as that truth is, it is not thetruth here. What is spoken of here is something that is done in andon Christian men, and not even through them on the world, but in themfor themselves. 'He shall testify of Me' to you. 

Now it is to be noted, also, that the first and special applicationof these words is to the little group listening to Him. Never weremen more desolate and beaten down than these were, in the prospect ofChrist's departure. Never were men more utterly bewildered anddispirited than these were, in the days between His crucifixion andHis resurrection. Think of them during His earthly life, their narrowunderstandings, their manifold faults, moral as well as intellectual. How little perception they had of anything that He said to them, astheir own foolish questions abundantly show! How little they haddrunk in His spirit, as their selfish and ambitious janglings amongstthemselves abundantly show! They were but Jews like their brethren, believing, indeed, that Jesus Christ was the Messiah, but not knowingwhat it was that they believed, or of what kind the Messiah was inwhom they were thus partially trusting. But they loved Him and wereled by Him, and so they were brought into a larger place by theSpirit whom Christ sent. 

What was it that made these dwarfs into giants in six weeks? What wasit that turned their narrowness into breadth; that made them start upall at once as heroes, and that so swiftly matured them, as thefruits and flowers are ripened under tropical sunshine? Theresurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ had a great deal to dowith the change; but they were not its whole cause. There is noexplanation of the extraordinary transformation of these men as wesee them in the pages of the Gospels, and as we find them on thepages of the Acts of the Apostles, except this--the resurrection andthe ascension of Jesus Christ as facts, and the Spirit on Pentecostas an indwelling Interpreter of the facts. He came, and the weakbecame strong, and the foolish wise, and the blind enlightened, andthey began to understand--though it needed all their lives to perfectthe teaching, --what it was that their ignorant hands had grasped andtheir dim perceptions had seen, when they touched the hands andlooked upon the face of Jesus Christ. The witness of the Spirit ofGod working within them, working upon what they knew of thehistorical facts of Christ's life, and interpreting these to them, was the explanation of their change and growth. And the New Testamentis the product of that change. Christ's life was the truth which theSpirit used, and a product of His teaching was these Epistles whichwe have, and which for us step into the place which the historicalfacts held for them, and become the instrument with which the Spiritof God will deepen our understanding of Christ and enlarge ourknowledge of what He is to us. 

So, dear friends, whilst here we have a promise which speciallyapplies, no doubt, to these twelve Apostles, and the result of whichin them was different from its result in us, inasmuch as the Spirit'steaching, recorded in the New Testament, becomes for us theauthoritative rule of faith and practice, the promise still appliesto each of us in a secondary and modified sense. For there is nothingin these great valedictory words of our Lord's which has not auniversal bearing, and is not the revelation of a permanent truth inregard to the Christian Church. And, therefore, here we have thepromise of a universal gift to all Christian men and women, of anactual divine Spirit to dwell with each of us, to speak in ourhearts. 

And what will He speak there? He will teach us a deeper knowledge ofJesus Christ. He will help us to understand better what He is. Hewill show us more and more of the whole sweep of His work, of thewhole infinite truth for morals and religion, for politics andsociety, for time and for eternity, about men and about God, which iswrapped up in that great saying which we first of all, perhaps underthe pressure of our own sense of sin, grasp as our deliverance fromsin: 'God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, thatwhosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlastinglife. ' That is the sum of truth which the Spirit of God interprets toevery faithful heart. And as the days roll on, and new problems rise, and new difficulties present themselves, and new circumstances emergein our personal life, we find the truth, which we at first dimlygrasped as life and salvation, opening out into wisdom and depth andmeaning that we never dreamed of in the early hours. A Spirit thatbears witness of Christ and will make us understand Him better everyday we live, if we choose, is the promise that is given here, for allChristian men and women. 

Then note that this inward witness of Christ's depth and preciousnessis our true weapon and stay against a hostile world. A little candlein a room will make the lightning outside almost invisible; and if Ihave burning in my heart the inward experience and conviction of whatJesus Christ is and what He has done and will do for me--Oh! then, all the storm without may rage, and it will not trouble me. 

If you take an empty vessel and bring pressure to bear upon it, in gothe sides. Fill it, and they will resist the pressure. So withgrowing knowledge of Christ, and growing personal experience of Hissweetness in our souls, we shall be able, untouched and undinted, tothrow off the pressure which would otherwise have crushed us. 

Therefore, dear friends, here is the true secret of tranquillity, inan age of questioning and doubt. Let me have that divine Voicespeaking in my heart, as I may have, and no matter what questions maybe doubtful, this is sure--'We know in whom we have believed'; and wecan say, 'Settle all your controversies any way you like: one thing Iknow, and that divine Voice is ever saying it to me in my deepestconsciousness--the Son of God is come and hath given us anunderstanding that we may know Him that is true; and we are in Himthat is true. ' Labour for more of this inward, personal conviction ofthe preciousness of Jesus Christ to strengthen you against a hostileworld. 

And remember that there are conditions under which this Voice speaksin our souls. One is that we attend to the instrument which theSpirit of God uses, and that is 'the truth. ' If Christians will notread their Bibles, they need not expect to have the words of theseBibles interpreted and made real to them by any inward experience. Ifyou want to have a faith which is vindicated and warranted by yourdaily experience, there is only one way to get it, and that is, touse the truth which the Spirit uses, and to bring yourself intocontact, continual and reverent and intelligent, with the great bodyof divine truth that is conveyed in these authoritative words of theSpirit of God speaking through the first witnesses. 

And there must be moral discipline too. Laziness, worldliness, theabsorption of attention with other things, self-conceit, prejudice, and, I was going to say, almost above all, the taking of our religionand religious opinions at secondhand from men and teachers and books--all these stand in the way of our hearing the Spirit of God when Hespeaks. Come away from the babble and go by yourself, and take yourBibles with you, and read them, and meditate upon them, and get nearthe Master of whom they speak, and the Spirit which uses the truthwill use it to fortify you. 

III. And, lastly, note the consequent witness with which theChristian may win the world. 

'And ye also shall bear witness of Me, because ye have been with Mefrom the beginning. ' That 'also' has, of course, direct reference tothe Apostles' witness to the facts of our Lord's historicalappearance, His life, His death, His resurrection, and His ascension;and therefore their qualification was simply the companionship withHim which enabled them to say, 'We saw what we tell you; we werewitnesses from the beginning. '

But then, again, I say that there is no word here that belongs onlyto the Apostles; it belongs to us all, and so here is the task of theChristian Church in all its members. They receive the witness of theSpirit, and they are Christ's witnesses in the world. 

Note what we have to do--to bear witness; not to argue, not to adorn, but simply to attest. Note what we have to attest--the fact, not ofthe historical life of Jesus Christ, because we are not in a positionto be witnesses of that, but the fact of His preciousness and power, and the fact of our own experience of what He has done for us. Note, that that is by far the most powerful agency for winning the world. You can never make men angry by saying to them, 'We have found thoMessias. ' You cannot irritate people, or provoke them into acontroversial opposition when you say, 'Brother, let me tell you myexperience. I was dark, sad, sinful, weak, solitary, miserable; and Igot light, gladness, pardon, strength, companionship, and a joyfulhope. I was blind--you remember me when my eyes were dark, and I satbegging outside the Temple; I was blind, now I see--look at myeyeballs. ' We can all say that. This is the witness that needs noeloquence, no genius, no anything except honesty and experience; andwhosoever has tasted and felt and handled of the Word of Life maysurely go to a brother and say, 'Brother, I have eaten and amsatisfied. Will you not help yourselves?' We can all do it, and weought to do it. The Christian privilege of being witnessed to by theSpirit of God in our hearts brings with it the Christian duty ofbeing witnesses in our turn to the world. That is our only weaponagainst the hostility which godless humanity bears to ourselves andto our Master. We may win men by that; we can win them by nothingelse. 'Ye are My witnesses, saith the Lord, and My servants whom Ihave chosen. ' Christian friend, listen to the Master, who says, 'Himthat confesseth Me before men, him will I also confess before MyFather in heaven. '

WHY CHRIST SPEAKS

'These things have I spoken unto you, that ye should not beoffended. They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the timecometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth Godservice. And these things will they do unto you, because theyhave not known the Father, nor Me. But these things have I toldyou, that, when the time shall come, ye may remember that I toldyou of them. And these things I said not unto you at thebeginning, because I was with you. But now I go My way to Himthat sent Me; and none of you asketh Me, Whither goest Thou? Butbecause I have said these things unto you, sorrow hath filledyour heart. '--JOHN xvi. 1-6. 

The unbroken flow of thought, and the many subtle links of connectionbetween the parts, of these inexhaustible last words of our Lord makeany attempt at grouping them into sections more or lessunsatisfactory and artificial. But I have ventured to throw these, perhaps too many, verses together for our consideration now, becausea phrase of frequent recurrence in them manifestly affords a key totheir main subject. Notice how our Lord four times repeats theexpression, 'These things have I spoken unto you. ' He is not so muchadding anything new to His words, as rather contemplating the reasonsfor His speech now, the reasons for His silence before, and theimperfect apprehension of the things spoken which His disciples had, and which led to their making His announcement, thus imperfectlyunderstood, an occasion for sorrow rather than for joy. There is akind of landing place or pause here in the ascending staircase. OurLord meditates for Himself, and invites us to meditate with Him, rather upon His past utterances than upon anything additional tothem. So, then, whilst it is true that we have in two of these versesa repetition, in a somewhat more intense and detailed form, of theprevious warnings of the hostility of the world, in the main thesubject of the present section is that which I have indicated. And Itake the fourfold recurrence of that clause to which I have pointedas marking out for us the leading ideas that we are to gather fromthese words. 

I. There is, first, our Lord's loving reason for His speech. 

This is given in a double form. 'These things have I spoken unto you, that ye should not be offended. ' And, again, 'These things have Itold you, that when the time shall come, ye may remember that I toldyou of them. ' These two statements substantially coalesce and pointto the same idea. 

They are separated, as I have said, by a reiteration, in moreemphatic form, of the dark prospect which He has been holding out toHis disciples. He tells them that the world which hates them is to befully identified with the apostate Jewish Church. 'The synagogue' isfor them 'the world. ' There is a solemn lesson in that. The organisedbody that calls itself God's Church and House may become the mostrampant enemy of Christ's people, and be the truest embodiment on theface of the earth of all that He means by 'the world. ' A formalchurch is the true world always; and to-day as then. And such a bodywill do the cruellest things and believe that it is offering upChrist's witnesses as sacrifices to God. That is partly anaggravation and partly an alleviation of the sin. It is possible thatthe inquisitor and the man in the _San Benito_, whom he ties to thestake, may shake hands yet at His side up yonder. But a church whichhas become, the world will do its persecution and think that it isworship, and call the burning of God's people an _auto-da-fe_ (act offaith); and the bottom of it all is that, in the blaze of light, andcalling themselves God's, 'they do not know' either God or Christ. They do not know the one because they will not know the other. 

But that is all parenthetical in the present section, and so I saynothing more about it; and ask you, rather, just to look at theloving reasons which Christ here suggests for His present speech--'that ye should not be offended, ' or stumble. He warns them of thestorm before it bursts, lest, when it bursts, it should sweep themaway from their moorings. Of course, there could be nothing moreproductive of intellectual bewilderment, and more likely to lead todoubt as to one's own convictions, than to find oneself at odds withthe synagogue about the question of the Messiah. A modest man mightnaturally say, 'Perhaps I am wrong and they are right. ' A cowardwould be sure to say, 'I will sink my convictions and fall in withthe majority. ' The stumbling-block for these first Jewish converts, in the attitude of the whole mass of the nation towards Christ andHis pretensions, is one of such a magnitude as we cannot, by anyexercise of our imagination, realise. 'And, ' says Christ, 'the onlyway by which you will ever get over the temptation to intellectualdoubt or to cowardly apostasy that arises from your being thrown outof sympathy with the whole mass of your people, and the traditions ofthe generations, is to reflect that I told you it would be so, beforeit came to pass. '

Of course all that has a special bearing upon those to whom it wasoriginally addressed, and then it has a secondary bearing uponChristians, whose lot it is to live in a time of actual persecution. But that does not in the slightest degree destroy the fact that italso has a bearing upon every one of us. For if you and I areChristian people, and trying to live like our Master, and to do as Hewould have us to do, we too shall often have to stand in such a verysmall minority, and be surrounded by people who take such an entirelyopposite view of duty and of truth, as that we shall be only too muchdisposed to give up and falter in the clearness, fullness, andbraveness of our utterance, and think, 'Well, perhaps after all it isbetter for me to hold my tongue. '

And then, besides this, there are all the cares and griefs whichbefall each of us, with regard to which also, as well as with regardto the difficulties and dangers and oppositions which we may meetwith in a faithful Christian life, the principles of my text have adistinct and direct application. He has told us in order that wemight not stumble, because when the hour comes and the sorrow comeswith it, we remember that He told us all about it before. 

It is one of the characteristics of Christianity that Jesus Christdoes not try to enlist recruits by highly-coloured, rosy pictures ofthe blessing and joy of serving Him, keeping His hand all the whileupon the weary marches and the wounds and pains. He tells us plainlyat the beginning, 'If you take My yoke upon you, you will have tocarry a heavy burden. You will have to abstain from a great manythings that you would like to do. You will have to do a great manythings that your flesh will not like. The road is rough, and a highwall on each side. There are lovely flowers and green pastures on theother side of the hedge, where it is a great deal easier walking uponthe short grass than it is upon the stony path. The roadway isnarrow, and the gateway is very strait, but the track goes steadilyup. Will you accept the terms and come in and walk upon it?'

It is far better and nobler, and more attractive also, to tell usfrankly and fully the difficulties and dangers than to try and coaxus by dwelling on pleasures and ease. Jesus Christ will have noservice on false pretences, but will let us understand at thebeginning that if we serve under His flag we have to make up ourminds to hardships which otherwise we may escape, to antagonismswhich otherwise will not be provoked, and to more than an ordinaryshare of sorrow and suffering and pain. 'Through much tribulation wemust enter the Kingdom. '

And the way by which all these troubles and cares, whether they bethose incident and peculiar to Christian life, or those common tohumanity, can best be met and overcome, is precisely by this thought, 'The Master has told us before. ' Sorrows anticipated are more easilymet. It is when the vessel is caught with all its sails set that itis almost sure to go down, and, at all events, sure to be badlydamaged in the typhoon. But when the barometer has been watched, andits fall has given warning, and everything movable has been madefast, and every spare yard has been sent below, and all tightened upand ship-shape--then she can ride out the storm. Forewarned isforearmed. Savages think, when an eclipse comes, that a wolf hasswallowed the sun, and it will never come out again. We know that ithas all been calculated beforehand, and since we know that it iscoming to-morrow, when it does come, it is only a passing darkness. Sorrow anticipated is sorrow half overcome; and when it falls on us, the bewilderment, as if 'some strange thing had happened, ' will beescaped when we can remember that the Master has told us it allbeforehand. 

And again, sorrow foretold gives us confidence in our Guide. We havethe chart, and as we look upon it we see marked 'waterless country, ''pathless rocks, ' 'desert and sand, ' 'wells and palm-trees. ' Well, when we come to the first of these, and find ourselves, as the mapsays, in the waterless country; and when, as we go on step by step, and mile after mile, we find it is all down there, we say toourselves, 'The remainder will be accurate, too, ' and if we are in'Marah' to-day, where 'the water is bitter, ' and nothing but the woodof the tree that grows there can ever sweeten it, we shall be at'Elim' to-morrow, where there are 'the twelve wells and the seventypalm trees. ' The chart is right, and the chart says that the end ofit all is 'the land that flows with milk and honey. ' He _has_ told us_this_; if there had been anything worse than this, He would havetold us _that_. 'If it were not so I would have told you. ' The sorrowforetold deepens our confidence in our Guide. 

Sorrow that comes punctually in accordance with His word plainlycomes in obedience to His will. Our Lord uses a little word in thiscontext which is very significant. He says, 'When _their hour_ iscome. '

'Their hour'--the time allotted to them. Allotted by whom? Allottedby Him. He could tell that they would come, because it was as Hisinstruments that they came. 'Their time' was His appointment. It wasonly an 'hour, ' a definite, appointed, and brief period in accordancewith His loving purpose. It takes all sorts of weathers to make ayear; and after all the sorts of weathers are run out, the year'sresults are realised and the calm comes. And so the good old hymn, with its rhythm that speaks at once of fear and triumph, has caughtthe true meaning of these words of our Lord's--

 'Why should I complain Of want or distress, Temptation or pain? He told me no less. '

'These things have I spoken unto you that ye might not be offended. '

II. Still further, note our Lord's loving reasons for past silence. 'These things I said not unto you from the beginning, because I waswith you. '

Of course there had been in His early ministry hints, and very plainreferences, to persecutions and trials, but we must not restrict the'these things' of my text to that only, but rather include the wholeof the previous chapter, in which He sets the sorrow and thehostility which His servants have to endure in their true light, asbeing the consequences of their union with Him and of the closenessand the identity of life and fate between the Vine and the branches. In so systematic and detailed fashion, and with such an exhibition ofthe grounds of its necessity, our Lord had not spoken of the world'shostility in His earlier ministry, but had reserved it to these lastmoments, and the reason why He had given but passing hints before wasbecause He was there. What a superb confidence that expresses in Hisability to shield His poor followers from all that might hurt andharm them! He spreads the ample robe of His protection over them, orrather, to go back to His own metaphor, 'as a hen gathereth herchickens under her wings' so He gathers them to His own breast, andstretches over them that which is at once protection and warmth, andkeeps them safe. As long as He is there, no harm can come to them. But He is going away, and so it is time to speak, and to speak moreplainly. 

That, too, yields for us, dear brethren, truths that apply to usquite as much as to that little group of silent listeners. For us, too, difficulties and sorrows, though foretold in general terms, arelargely hidden till they are near. It would have been of little usefor Christ to have spoken more plainly in those early days of Hisministry. The disciples managed to forget and to misunderstand Hisplain utterances, for instance, about His own death and resurrection. There needs to be an adaptation between the hearing ear and thespoken word, in order that the word spoken should be of use, andthere are great tracts of Scripture dealing with the sorrows of life, which lie perfectly dark and dead to us, until experience vitalisesthem. The old Greeks used to send messages from one army to anotherby means of a roll of parchment twisted spirally round a baton, andthen written on. It was perfectly unintelligible when it fell into aman's hands that had not a corresponding baton to twist it upon. Manyof Christ's messages to us are like that. You can only understand theutterances when life gives you the frame round which to wrap them, and then they flash up into meaning, and we say at once, 'He told usit all before, and I scarcely knew that He had told me, until thismoment when I need it. '

Oh, it is merciful that there should be a gradual unveiling of whatis to come to us, that the road should wind, and that we should seeso short a way before us. Did you never say to yourselves, 'If I hadknown all this before, I do not think I could have lived to face it'?And did you not feel how good and kind and loving it was, that in therevelation there had been concealment, and that while Jesus Christhad told us in general terms that we must expect sorrows and trials, this specific form of sorrow and trial had not been foreseen by usuntil we came close to it? Thank God for the loving reticence, andfor the as loving eloquence of His speech and of His silence, withregard to sorrow. 

And take this further lesson, that there ought to be in all our livestimes of close and blessed communion with that Master, when the senseof His presence with us makes all thought of sorrows and trials inthe future out of place and needlessly disturbing. If these discipleshad drunk in the spirit of Jesus Christ when they were with Him, thenthey would not have been so bewildered when He left them. When He wasnear them there was something better for them to do than to be 'overexquisite to cast the fashion of uncertain evils' in the future--namely, to grow into His life, to drink in the sweetness of Hispresence, to be moulded into the likeness of His character, tounderstand Him better, and to realise His nearness more fully. And, dear brethren, for us all there are times--and it is our own fault ifthese are not very frequent and blessed--when thus, in such an hourof sweet communion with the present Christ, the future will be allradiant and calm, if we look into it, or, better, the present will beso blessed that there will be no need to think of the future. Thesemen in the upper chamber, if they had learnt all the lessons that Hewas teaching them then, would not have gone out, to sleep inGethsemane, and to tell lies in the high priest's hall, and to flylike frightened sheep from the Cross, and to despair at the tomb. Andyou and I, if we sit at His table, and keep our hearts near Him, eating and drinking of that heavenly manna, shall 'go in the strengthof that meat forty days into the wilderness, ' and say--

 'E'en let the unknown to-morrow Bring with it what it may. '

III. Lastly, I must touch, for the sake of completeness, upon thefinal thought in these pregnant verses, and that is, the imperfectapprehension of our Lord's words, which leads to sorrow instead ofjoy. 

'Now I go My way to Him that sent Me; and none of you asketh Me, Whither goest Thou? But because I have said these things unto you, sorrow hath filled your heart. ' He had been telling them--and it wasthe one definite idea that they gathered from His words--that He wasgoing. And what did they say? They said, 'Going! What is to become of_us_?' If there had been a little less selfishness and a little morelove, and if they had put their question, 'Going! What is to becomeof _Him_?' then it would not have been sorrow that would have filledtheir hearts, but a joy that would have flooded out all the sorrow, 'and the winter of their discontent' would have been changed into'glorious summer, ' because He was going to Him that sent Him; that isto say, He was going with His work done and His message accomplished. And therefore, if they could only have overlooked their own selves, and the bearing of His departure, as it seemed to them, onthemselves, and have thought of it a little as it affected Him, theywould have found that all the oppressive and the dark in it wouldhave disappeared, and they would have been glad. 

Ah, dear brethren, that gives us a thought on which I can but touchnow, that the steadfast contemplation of the ascended Christ, who hasgone to the Father, having finished His work, is the sovereignantidote against all sense of separation and solitude, the sovereignpower by which we may face a hostile world, the sovereign cure forevery sorrow. If we could live in the light of the great triumphant, ascended Lord, then, Oh, how small would the babble of the world be. If the great White Throne, and He that sits upon it, were moredistinctly before us, then we could face anything, and sorrow would'become a solemn scorn of ills, ' and all the transitory would bereduced to its proper insignificance, and we should be emancipatedfrom fear and every temptation to unfaithfulness and apostasy. Lookup to the Master who has gone, and as the dying martyr outside thecity wall 'saw the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing'--having sprung to His feet to help His poor servant--'at the righthand of God, ' so with that vision in our eyes and the light of thatFace flashing upon our faces, and making them like the angels', weshall be masters of grief and care, and pain and trial, and enmityand disappointment, and sorrow and sin, and feel that the absentChrist is the present Christ, and that the present Christ is theconquering power in us. 

Dear brethren, there is nothing else that will make us victors overthe world and ourselves. If we can grasp Him by our faith and keepourselves near Him, then union with Him as of the Vine and thebranches, which will result inevitably in suffering here, will resultas inevitably in joy hereafter. For He will never relax theadamantine grasp of His strong hand until He raises us to Himself, and 'if so be that we suffer with Him we shall also be glorifiedtogether. '

THE DEPARTING CHRIST AND THE COMING SPIRIT

'Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you thatI go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come untoyou; but if I depart, I will send Him unto you. And when He iscome, He will _convince_ the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment. '--JOHN xvi. 7, 8. 

We read these words in the light of all that has gone after, and tous they are familiar and almost thread-bare. But if we wouldappreciate their sublimity, we must think away nineteen centuries, and all Christendom, and recall these eleven poor men and theirpeasant Leader in the upper room. They were not very wise, nor verystrong, and outside these four walls there was scarcely a creature inthe whole world that had the least belief either in Him or in them. They had everything against them, and most of all their own hearts. They had nothing for them but their Master's promise. Their eyes hadbeen dimmed by their sorrowful hearts, so that they could not see thetruth which He had been trying to reveal to them; and His departurehad presented itself to them only as it affected themselves, andtherefore had brought a sense of loss and desolation. 

And now He bids them think of that departure, as it affectsthemselves, as pure gain. 'It is for your profit that I go away. ' Heexplains that staggering statement by the thought which He hasalready presented to them, in varying aspects, of His departure asthe occasion for the coming of that Great Comforter, who, when He iscome, will through them work upon the world, which knows neither themnor Him. They are to go forth 'as sheep in the midst of wolves, ' butin this promise He tells them that they will become the judges andaccusers of the world, which, by the Spirit dwelling in them, theywill be able to overcome, and convict of error and of fault. 

We must remember that the whole purpose of the words which we areconsidering now is the strengthening of the disciples in theirconflict with the world, and that, therefore, the operations of thatdivine Spirit which are here spoken of are operations carried on bytheir instrumentality and through the word which they spake. Withthat explanation we can consider the great words before us. 

I. The first thing that strikes me about them is that wonderfulthought of the gain to Christ's servants from Christ's departure. 'Itis expedient for you that I go away. '

I need not enlarge here upon what we have had frequent occasion toremark, the manner in which our Lord here represents the complexwhole of His death and ascension as being His own voluntary act. He'goes. ' He is neither taken away by death nor rapt up to heaven in awhirlwind, but of His own exuberant power and by His own will He goesinto the region of the grave and thence to the throne. Contrast thestory of His ascension with that Old Testament story of the ascensionof Elijah. One needed the chariot of fire and the horses of fire tobear him up into the sphere, all foreign to his mortal and earthlymanhood; the Other needed no outward power to lift Him, nor anyvehicle to carry Him from this dim spot which men call earth, butslowly, serenely, upborne by His own indwelling energy, and rising asto His native home, He ascended up on high, and went where the verymanner of His going proclaimed that He had been before. 'If _I go_away, I will send Him. '

But that is a digression. What we are concerned with now is thethought of Christ's departure as being a step in advance, and apositive gain, even to those poor, bewildered men who were clusteringround Him, depending absolutely upon Himself, and feeling themselvesorphaned and helpless without Him. 

Now if we would feel the full force and singularity of this saying ofour Lord's, let us put side by side with it that other one, 'I have adesire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better. Nevertheless, to abide in the flesh is more needful for you. ' Why isit that the Apostle says, 'Though I want to go I am bound to stay?'and why is it that the Master says, 'It is for your good that I amgoing, ' but because of the essential difference in the relation ofthe two to the people who are to be left, and in the continuance ofthe work of the two after they had departed? Paul knew that when hewent, whatever befell those whom he loved and would fain help, hecould not stretch a hand to do anything for them. He knew that deathdropped the portcullis between him and them, and, whatever their soreneed on the one side of the iron gate, he on the other could notsuccour or save. Jesus Christ said, 'It is better for you that Ishould go, ' because He knew that all His influences would flowthrough the grated door unchecked, and that, departed, He would stillbe the life of them that trusted in Him; and, having left them, wouldcome near them, by the very act of leaving them. 

And so there is here indicated for us--as we shall have occasion tosee more fully, presently, --in that one singular and anomalous factof Christ's departure being a positive gain to those that trust inHim, the singularity and uniqueness of His work for them and Hisrelation to them. 

The words mean a great deal more than the analogies of our relationto dear ones or great ones, loves or teachers, who have departed, might suggest. Of course we all know that it is quite true that deathreveals to the heart the sweetness and the preciousness of thedeparted ones, and that its refining touch manifests to our blindeyes what we did not see so clearly when they were beside us. We allknow that it needs distance to measure men, and the dropping away ofthe commonplace and the familiar ere we can see 'the likeness' of ourcontemporaries 'to the great of old. ' We have to travel across theplains before we can measure the relative height of the clusteredmountains, and discern which is manifestly the loftiest. And all_this_ is true in reference to Jesus Christ and His relation to us. But that does not go half-way towards the understanding of such wordsas these of my text, which tell us that so singular and solitary isHis relation to us that the thing which ends the work of all othermen, and begins the decay of their influence, begins for Him a higherform of work and a wider sweep of sway. He is nearer us when Heleaves us, and works with us and in us more mightily from the thronethan He did upon the earth. Who is He of whom this is true? And whatkind of work is it of which it is true that death continues andperfects it?

So let me note, before I pass on, that there is a great truth herefor us. We are accustomed to look back to our Lord's earthlyministry, and to fancy that those who gathered round Him, and heardHim speak, and saw His deeds, were in a better position for lovingHim and trusting Him than you and I are. It is all a mistake. We havelost nothing that they had which was worth the keeping; and we havegained a great deal which they had not. We have not to compare ourrelation to Christ with theirs, as we might do our relation to somegreat thinker or poet, with that of his contemporaries, but we haveChrist in a better form, if I may so speak; and we, on whom the endsof the world are come, may have a deeper and a fuller and a closerintimacy with Him than was possible for men whose perceptions weredisturbed by sense, and who had to pierce through 'the veil, that isto say, His flesh, ' before they reached the Holy of Holies of Hisspirit. 

II. Note, secondly, the coming for which Christ's going was needful, and which makes that going a gain. 

'If I go not away the Comforter will not come unto you, but if Idepart I will send Him unto you. ' Now we have already, in formersermons, touched upon many of the themes which would naturally besuggested by these words, and therefore I do not propose to dwellupon them at any length. There is only one point to which I desire torefer briefly here, and that is the necessity which here seems to belaid down by our Lord for His departure, in order that that divineSpirit may come and dwell with men. That necessity goes down deeperinto the mysteries of the divinity and of the processes and order ofdivine revelation than it is given to us to follow. But though we canonly speak superficially and fragmentarily about such a matter, letme just remind you, in the briefest possible words, of what Scriptureplainly declares to us with regard to this high and, in its fullness, ineffable matter. It tells us that the complete work of Jesus Christ--not merely His coming upon earth, or His life amongst men, but alsoHis sacrificial death upon the Cross--was the necessary preliminary, and in some sense procuring cause, of the gift of that divine Spirit. It tells us--and there we are upon ground on which we can more fullyverify the statement--that His work must be completed ere that Spiritcan be sent, because the word is the Spirit's weapon for the world, and the revelation of God in Jesus must be ended, ere the applicationof that revelation, which is the Spirit's work, can be begun in itsfull energy. 

It tells us, further, (and there our eyesight fails, and we have toaccept what we are told), that Jesus Christ must ascend on high andbe at the right hand of God, ere He can pour down upon men thefullness of the Spirit which dwelt uncommunicated in Him in the timeof His earthly humiliation. 'Thou hast ascended up on high, ' andtherefore 'Thou hast given gifts to men. ' We accept the declaration, not knowing all the deep necessity in the divine Nature on which itrests, but believing it, because He in whom we have confidence hasdeclared it to us. 

And we are further told--and there our experience may, in somedegree, verify the statement, --that only those, in whose hearts thereis union to Jesus Christ by faith in His completed work and ascendedglory, are capable of receiving that divine gift. So every way, bothas regards the depths of Deity and the processes of revelation, andas regards the power of the humanity of Christ to impart His Spirit, and as regards the capacity of us poor recipients to receive it, thewords of my text seem to be confirmed, and we can, though not withfull insight, at any rate with full faith, accept the statement, 'IfI go not away, the Comforter will not come to you. '

That coming is gain. It teaches a deeper knowledge of Him. It teachesand gives a fuller possession of the life of righteousness which islike His own. It draws us into the fellowship of the Son. 

III. Lastly, note here the threefold conflict of the Spirit throughthe Church with the world. 

'When He is come He will convict the world' in respect 'of sin and ofrighteousness and of judgment. ' By the 'reproof, ' or rather'conviction, ' which is spoken about here, is meant the process bywhich certain facts are borne in upon men's understanding andconsciences, and, along with these facts, the conviction of error andfault in reference to them. It is no mere process of demonstration ofan intellectual truth, but it is a process of conviction of error inrespect to great moral and religious truth, and of manifestation ofthe truths in regard to which the error and the sin have beencommitted. So we have here the triple division of the great workwhich the divine Spirit does, through Christian men and women, in theworld. 

'He shall convict the world of sin. ' The outstanding firstcharacteristic of the whole Gospel message is the new gravity whichit attaches to the fact of sin, the deeper meaning which it gives tothe word, and the larger scope which it shows its blightinginfluences to have had in humanity. Apart from the conviction of sinby the Spirit using the word proclaimed by disciples, the world hasscarcely a notion of what sin is, its inwardness, its universality, the awfulness of it as a fact affecting man's whole being and all hisrelations to God. All these conceptions are especially the product ofChristian truth. Without it, what does the world know about thepoison of sin? And what does it care about the poison until theconviction has been driven home to the reluctant consciousness ofmankind by the Spirit wielding the word? This conviction comes firstin the divine order. I do not say that the process of turning a manof the world into a member of Christ's Church always begins, as amatter of fact, with the conviction of sin. I believe it mostgenerally does so; but without insisting upon a pedantic adherence toa sequence, and without saying a word about the depth and intensityof such a conviction, I am here to assert that a Christianity whichis not based upon the conviction of sin is an impotent Christianity, and will be of very little use to the men who profess it, and willhave no power to propagate itself in the world. Everything in ourconception of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and of His work for usdepends upon what we think about this primary fact of man'scondition, that he is a sinful man. The root of all heresy liesthere. Every error that has led away men from Jesus Christ and HisCross may be traced up to defective notions of sin and a defectiverealisation of it. If I do not feel as the Bible would have me feel, that I am a sinful man, I shall think differently of Jesus Christ andof my need of Him, and of what He is to me. Christianity may be to mea system of beautiful ethics, a guide for life, a revelation of muchprecious truth, but it will not be the redemptive power without whichI am lost. And Jesus Christ will be shorn of His brightest beams, unless I see Him as the Redeemer of my soul from sin, which elsewould destroy and is destroying it. Is Christianity merely a bettermorality? Is it merely a higher revelation of the divine Nature? Ordoes it _do_ something as well as _say_ something, and what does itdo? Is Jesus Christ only a Teacher, a Wise Man, an Example, aProphet, or is He the Sacrifice for the sins of the world? Oh, brethren, we must begin where this text begins; and our wholeconception of Him and of His work for us must be based upon thisfact, that we are sinful and lost, and that Jesus Christ, by Hissweet and infinite love and all-powerful sacrifice, is our soul'sRedeemer and our only Hope. The world has to be convicted andconvinced of sin as the first step to its becoming a Church. 

The next step of this divine Spirit's conviction is that whichcorresponds to the consciousness of sin, the dawning upon thedarkened soul of the blessed sunrise of righteousness. The triplesubjects of conviction must necessarily belong to the world of whichour Lord is speaking. It must be the world that is convinced, and itmust be the world's sin and the world's righteousness and the world'sjudgment of which my text speaks. How, then, can there follow on theconviction of sin as mine a conviction of righteousness as mine? Iknow but one way, 'Not having mine own righteousness, which is of thelaw, but that which is of God through faith. ' When a man is convincedof sin, there will dawn upon the heart the wondrous thought that arighteousness may be his, given to him from above, which will sweepaway all his sin and make him righteous as Christ is righteous. Thatconviction will never awake in its blessed and hope-giving powerunless it be preceded by the other. It is of no use to exhibitmedicine to a man who does not know himself diseased. It is of no useto talk about righteousness to a man who has not found himself to bea sinner. And it is of as little use to talk to a man of sin unlessyou are ready to tell him of a righteousness that will cover all hissin. The one conviction without the other is misery, the secondwithout the first is irrelevant and far away. 

The world as a world has but dim and inadequate conceptions of whatrighteousness is. A Pharisee is its type, or a man that keeps a cleanlife in regard to great transgressions; a whited sepulchre of somesort or other. The world apart from Christ has but languid desiresafter even the poor righteousness that it understands, and the worldapart from Christ is afflicted by a despairing scepticism as to thepossibility of ever being righteous at all. And there are menlistening to me now in every one of these three conditions--notcaring to be righteous, not understanding what it is to be righteous, and cynically disbelieving that it is possible to be so. My brother, here comes the message to you--first, Thou art sinful; second, God'srighteousness lies at thy side to take and wear if thou wilt. 

The last of these triple convictions is 'judgment. ' If there be inthe world these two things both operating, sin and righteousness, andif the two come together, what then? If there is to be a collision, as there must be, which will go down? Christ tells us that thisdivine Spirit will teach us that righteousness will triumph over sin, and that there will be a judgment which will destroy that which isthe weaker, though it seems the stronger. Now I take it that thejudgment which is spoken about here is not merely a futureretribution beyond the grave, but that, whilst that is included, andis the principal part of the idea, we are always to regard thejudgment of the hereafter as being prepared for by the continualjudgment here. 

And so there are two thoughts, a blessed one and a terrible one, wrapped up in that word--a blessed thought for us sinful men, inasmuch as we may be sure that the divine righteousness, which isgiven to us, will judge us and separate us day by day from our sins;and a terrible thought, inasmuch as if I, a sinful man, do not makefriends with and ally myself to the divine righteousness which isproffered to me, I shall one day have to front it on the other sideof the flood, when the contact must necessarily be to me destruction. 

Time does not allow me to dwell upon these solemn matters as I fainwould, but let me gather all I have been feebly trying to say to younow into one sentence. This threefold conviction, in conscience, understanding, and heart, of sin which is mine, of righteousnesswhich may be mine, and of judgment which must be mine--this threefoldconviction is that which makes the world into a Church. It is themessage of Christianity to each of us. How do you stand to it? Do youhearken to the Spirit who is striving to convince you of these? Or doyou gather yourselves together into an obstinate, close-knitunbelief, or a loose-knit indifference which is as impenetrable?Beware that you resist not the Spirit of God!

THE CONVICTING FACTS

'Of sin, because they believe not on Me; Of righteousness, because I go to My Father, and ye see Me no more; Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged. '--JOHN xvi. 9-11. 

Our Lord has just been telling His disciples how He will equip them, as His champions, for their conflict with the world. A divine Spiritis coming to them who will work in them and through them; and bytheir simple and unlettered testimony will 'convict, ' or convince, the mass of ungodly men of error and crime in regard to these threethings--sin, righteousness, and judgment. 

He now advances to tell them that this threefold conviction whichthey, as counsel for the prosecution, will establish as against theworld at the bar, will be based upon three facts: first, a truth ofexperience; second, a truth of history; third, a truth of revelation, all three facts having reference to Jesus Christ and His relation tomen. 

Now these three facts are--the world's unbelief; Christ's ascensionand session at the right hand of God; and the 'judgment of the princeof this world. ' If we remember that what our Lord is here speakingabout is the work of a divine Spirit through the ministration ofbelieving men, then Pentecost with its thousands 'pricked to theheart, ' and the Roman ruler who trembled, as the prisoner 'reasonedof righteousness and judgment to come, ' are illustrations of the wayin which the humble disciples towered above the pride and strength ofthe world, and from criminals at its bar became its accusers. 

These three facts are the staple and the strength of the Christianministry. These three facts are misapprehended, and have failed toproduce their right impression, unless they have driven home to ourconsciences and understandings the triple conviction of my text. Andso I come to you with the simple questions which are all-importantfor each of us: Have you looked these three facts in the face--unbelief, the ascended Christ, a judged prince of the world, and haveyou learned their meaning as it bears on your own character andreligious life?

I. The first point here is the rejection of Jesus Christ as theclimax of the world's sin. 

Strange words! They are in some respects the most striking instanceof that gigantic self-assertion of our Lord, of which we have hadoccasion to see so many examples in these valedictory discourses. Theworld is full of all unrighteousness and wickedness, lust andimmorality, intemperance, cruelty, hatred; all manner of buzzingevils that stink and sting around us. But Jesus Christ passes themall by and points to a mere negative thing, to an inward thing, tothe attitude of men towards Himself; and He says, 'If you want toknow what sin is, look at that!' _There_ is the worst of all sins. There is a typical instance of what sin is, in which, as in someanatomical preparation, you may see all its fibres straightened outand made visible. Look at that if you want to know what the world is, and what the world's sin is. 

Some of us do not think that it is sin at all; and tell us that manis no more responsible for his belief than he is for the colour ofhis hair, and suchlike talk. Well, let me put a very plain question:What is it that a man turns away from when he turns away from JesusChrist? The plainest, the loveliest, the loftiest, the perfectestrevelation of God in His beauty and completeness that ever dawned, orever will dawn upon creation. He rejects that. Anything more? Yes! Heturns away from the loveliest human life that ever was, or will be, lived. Anything more? Yes! He turns away from a miracle of self-sacrificing love, which endured the Cross for enemies, and willinglyembraced agony and shame and death for the sake of those whoinflicted them upon Him. Anything more? Yes! He turns away from handsladen with, and offering him, the most precious and needful blessingsthat a poor soul on earth can desire or expect. 

And if this be true, if unbelief in Jesus Christ be indeed all thisthat I have sketched out, another question arises, What does such anattitude and act indicate as to the rejector? He stands in thepresence of the loveliest revelation of the divine nature and heart, and he sees no light in it. Why, but because he has blinded his eyesand cannot behold? He is incapable of seeing 'God manifest in theflesh, ' because he 'loves the darkness rather than the light. ' Heturns away from the revelation of the loveliest and most self-sacrificing love. Why, but because he bears in himself a heart casedwith brass and triple steel of selfishness, against the manifestationof love? He turns away from the offered hands heaped with theblessings that he needs. Why, but because he does not care for thegifts that are offered? Forgiveness, cleansing, purity a heaven whichconsists in the perfecting of all these, have no attractions for him. The fugitive Israelites in the wilderness said, 'We do not want yourlight, tasteless manna. It may do very well for angels, but we havebeen accustomed to garlic and onions down in Egypt. They smellstrong, and there is some taste in _them_. Give us _them_. ' And sosome of you say, 'The offer of pardon is of no use to me, for I amnot troubled with my sin. The offer of purity has no attraction tome, for I rather like the dirt and wallowing in it. The offer of aheaven of your sort is but a dreary prospect to me. And so I turnaway from the hands that offer precious things. ' The man who is blindto the God that beams, lambent and loving, upon him in the face ofJesus Christ--the man who has no stirrings of responsive gratitudefor the great outpouring of love upon the Cross--the man who does notcare for anything that Jesus Christ can give him, surely, in turningaway, commits a real sin. 

I do not deny, of course, that there may be intellectual difficultiescropping up in connection with the acceptance of the message ofsalvation in Jesus Christ, but as, on the one hand, I am free toadmit that many a man may be putting a true trust in Christ which isjoined with a very hesitant grasp of some of the things which, to me, are the very essence and heart of the Gospel; so, on the other side, I would have you remember that there is necessarily a moral qualityin our attitude to all moral and religious truth; and that sin doesnot cease to be sin because its doer is a thinker or has systematisedhis rejection into a creed. Though it is not for us to measuremotives and to peer into hearts, at the bottom there lies what ChristHimself put His finger on: 'Ye _will_ not come to me that ye mighthave life. '

Then, still further, let me remind you that our Lord here presentsthis fact of man's unbelief as being an instance in which we may seewhat the real nature of sin is. To use learned language, it is a'typical' sin. In all other acts of sin you get the poisonmanipulated into various forms, associated with other elements, disguised more or less. But here, because it is purely an inward acthaving relation to Jesus Christ, and to God manifested in Him, andnot done at the bidding of the animal nature, or of any of the otherstrong temptations and impulses which hurry men into gross and coarseforms of manifest transgression, you get sin in its essence. Beliefin Christ is the surrender of myself. Sin is living to myself ratherthan to God. And there you touch the bottom. All those differentkinds of sin, however unlike they may be to one another--the lust ofthe sensualist, the craft of the cheat, the lie of the deceitful, thepassion of the unregulated man, the avarice of the miser--all of themhave this one common root, a diseased and bloated regard to self. Thedefinition of sin is, --living to myself and making myself my owncentre. The definition of faith is, --making Christ my centre andliving for Him. Therefore, if you want to know what is the sinfulnessof sin, there it is. And if I may use such a word in such aconnection, it is all packed away in its _purest_ form in the act ofrejecting that Lord. 

Brother, it is no exaggeration to say that, when you have summoned upbefore you the ugliest forms of man's sins that you can fancy, thisone overtops them all, because it presents in the simplest form themother-tincture of all sins, which, variously coloured and perfumedand combined, makes the evil of them all. A heap of rotting, poisonous matter is offensive to many senses, but the colourless, scentless, tasteless drop has the poison in its most virulent form, and is not a bit less virulent, though it has been learnedlydistilled and christened with a scientific name, and put into adainty jewelled flask. 'This is the condemnation, that light is comeinto the world, and men love darkness rather than light, becausetheir deeds are evil. ' I lay that upon the hearts and consciences ofsome of my present hearers as the key to their rejection or disregardof Christ and His salvation. 

II. Now, secondly, notice the ascension of Jesus Christ as the pledgeand the channel of the world's righteousness--'Because I go to theFather, and ye see Me no more. '

He speaks as if the process of departure were already commenced. Ithad three stages--death, resurrection, ascension; but these three areall parts of the one departure. And so He says: 'Because, in thefuture, when ye go forth to preach in My name, I shall be there withthe Father, having finished the work for which He sent Me; thereforeyou will convince the world of righteousness. '

Now let me put that briefly in two forms. First of all, the fact ofan ascended Christ is the guarantee and proof of His own completefulfilment of the ideal of a righteous man. Or to put it into simplerwords, suppose Jesus Christ is dead; suppose that He never rose fromthe grave; suppose that His bones mouldered in some sepulchre;suppose that there had been no ascension--would it be possible tobelieve that He was other than an ordinary man? And would it bepossible to believe that, however beautiful these familiar records ofHis life, and however lovely the character which they reveal, therewas really in Him no sin at all? A dead Christ means a Christ who, like the rest of us, had His limitations and His faults. But, on theother hand, if it be true that He sprang from the grave because 'itwas not possible that He should be holden of it, ' and because in Hisnature there was no proclivity to death, since there had been noindulgence in sin; and if it be true that He ascended up on highbecause that was His native sphere, and He rose to it as naturally asthe water in the valley will rise to the height of the hill fromwhich it has descended, then we can see that God has set His sealupon that life by that resurrection and ascension; and as we gaze onHim swept up heavenward by His own calm power, a light falls backwardupon all His earthly life, upon His claims to purity, and to unionwith the Father, and we say, 'Surely this was a perfectly righteousMan. '

And further let me remind you that with the supernatural facts of ourLord's resurrection and ascension stands or falls the possibility ofHis communicating any of His righteousness to us sinful men. If therebe no such possibility, what does Jesus Christ's beauty of charactermatter to me? Nothing! I shall have to stumble on as best I can, sometimes ashamed and rebuked, sometimes stimulated and sometimesreduced to despair, by looking at the record of His life. If He belying dead in a forgotten grave, and hath not 'ascended up on high, 'then there can come from His history and past nothing other in kind, though, perhaps, a little more in degree, than comes from the historyand the past of the beautiful and white souls that have sometimeslived in the world. He is a saint like them, He is a teacher likethem, He is a prophet like some of them, and we have but to try ourbest to copy that marble purity and white righteousness. But if Hehath ascended up on high, and sits there, wielding the forces of theuniverse, as we believe He does, then to Him belongs the divineprerogative of imparting His nature and His character to them thatlove Him. Then His righteousness is not a solitary, uncommunicativeperfectness for Himself, but like a sun in the heavens, which streamsout vivifying and enlightening rays to all that seek His face. If itbe true that Christ has risen, then it is also true that you and I, convicted of sin, and learning our weakness and our faults, may cometo Him, and by the exercise of that simple and yet omnipotent act offaith, may ally our incompleteness with His perfectness, our sin withHis righteousness, our emptiness with His fullness, and may have allthe grace and the beauty of Jesus Christ passing over into us to bethe Spirit of life in us, 'making us free from the law of sin anddeath. ' If Christ be risen, His righteousness may be the world's; ifChrist be not risen, His righteousness is useless to any but toHimself. 

My brother, wed yourself to that dear Lord by faith in Him, and Hisrighteousness will become yours, and you will be 'found in Himwithout spot and blameless, ' clothed with white raiment like His own, and sharing in the Throne which belongs to the righteous Christ. 

III. Lastly, notice the judgment of the world's prince as theprophecy of the judgment of the world. 

We are here upon ground which is only made known to us by therevelation of Scripture. We began with a fact of man's experience; wepassed on to a fact of history; now we have a fact certified to usonly on Christ's authority. 

The world _has_ a prince. That ill-omened and chaotic agglomerationof diverse forms of evil has yet a kind of anarchic order in it, and, like the fabled serpent's locks on the Gorgon head, they intertwineand sting one another, and yet they are a unity. We hear very littleabout 'the prince of the world' in Scripture. Mercifully theexistence of such a being is not plainly revealed until the fact ofChrist's victory over him is revealed. But however ludicrousmediaeval and vulgar superstitions may have made the notion, andhowever incredible the tremendous figure painted by the great Puritanpoet has proved to be, there is nothing ridiculous, and nothing thatwe have the right to say is incredible, in the plain declarationsthat came from Christ's lips over and over again, that the world, theaggregate of ungodly men, _has_ a prince. 

And then my text tells us that that prince is 'judged. ' The Cross didthat, as Jesus Christ over and over again indicates, sometimes inplain words, as 'Now is the judgment of this world, ' 'Now is theprince of this world cast out'; sometimes in metaphor, as 'I beheldSatan as lightning fall from heaven, ' 'First bind the strong man andthen spoil his house. ' We do not know how far-reaching the influencesof the Cross may be, and what they may have done in those darkregions, but we know that since that Cross, the power of evil in theworld has been broken in its centre, that God has been disclosed, that new forces have been lodged in the heart of humanity, which onlyneed to be developed in order to overcome the evil. We know thatsince that auspicious day when 'He spoiled principalities and powers, making a show of them openly and leading them in triumph, ' even whenHe was nailed upon the Cross, the history of the world has been thejudgment of the world. Hoary iniquities have toppled into theceaseless washing sea of divine love which has struck against theirbases. Ancient evils have vanished, and more are on the point ofvanishing. A loftier morality, a higher notion of righteousness, adeeper conception of sin, new hopes for the world and for men, havedawned upon mankind; and the prince of the world is led bound, as itwere, at the victorious chariot wheels. The central fortress has beencaptured, and the rest is an affair of outposts. 

My text has for its last word this--the prince's judgment prophesiesthe world's future judgment. The process which began when JesusChrist died has for its consummation the divine condemnation of allthe evil that still afflicts humanity, and its deprivation ofauthority and power to injure. A final judgment will come, and thatit will is manifested by the fact that Christ, when He came in theform of a servant and died upon the Cross, judged the prince. When Hecomes in the form of a King on the great White Throne He will judgethe world which He has delivered from its prince. 

That thought, my brother, ought to be a hope to us all. Are you gladwhen you think that there is a day of judgment coming? Does yourheart leap up when you realise the fact that the righteousness, whichis in the heavens, is sure to conquer and coerce and secure under thehatches the sin that is riding rampant through the world? It was ajoy and a hope to men who did not know half as much of the divinelove and the divine righteousness as we do. They called upon therocks and the hills to rejoice, and the trees of the forest to claptheir hands before the Lord, 'for He cometh to judge the world. ' Doesyour heart throb a glad Amen to that?

It ought to be a hope; it is a fear; and there are some of us who donot like to have the conviction driven home to us, that the end ofthe strife between sin and righteousness is that Jesus Christ shalljudge the world and take unto Himself His eternal kingdom. 

But, my friends, hope or fear, it is a fact, as certain in thefuture, as the Cross is sure in the past, or the Throne in thepresent. Let me ask you this question, the question which Christ hassent all His servants to ask--Have you loathed your sin? have youopened your heart to Christ's righteousness? If you have, when men'shearts are failing them for fear, and they 'call on the rocks and thehills to cover them from the face of Him that sitteth upon theThrone, ' you will 'have a song as in the night when a holy solemnityis kept, ' and lift up your heads, 'for your redemption draweth nigh. ''Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness beforeHim in the day of judgment. '

THE GUIDE INTO ALL TRUTH

'I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear themnow. Howbeit when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guideyou into all truth: for He shall not speak of Himself; butwhatsoever He shall hear, that shall He speak: and He will showyou things to come. He shall glorify Me: for He shall receive ofMine, and shall show it unto you. All things that the Father hathare Mine: therefore said I, that He shall take of Mine, and shallshow it unto you. '--JOHN xvi. 12-15. 

This is our Lord's last expansion, in these discourses, of the greatpromise of the Comforter which has appeared so often in them. First, He was spoken of simply as dwelling in Christ's servants, without anymore special designation of His work than was involved in the name. Then, His aid was promised, to remind the Apostles of the facts ofChrist's life, especially of His words; and so the inspiration andauthority of the four Gospels were certified for us. Then He wasfurther promised as the witness in the disciples to Jesus Christ. And, finally, in the immediately preceding context, we have Hisoffice of 'convincing, ' or convicting, 'the world of sin, and ofrighteousness, and of judgment. ' And now we come to that gracious andgentle work which that divine Spirit is declared by Christ to do, notonly for that little group gathered round Him then, but for all thosewho trust themselves to His guidance. He is to be the 'Spirit oftruth' to all the ages, who in simple verity will help true hearts toknow and love the truth. There are three things in the words beforeus--first, the avowed incompleteness of Christ's own teaching;second, the completeness of the truth into which the Spirit of truthguides; and, last, the unity of these two. 

I. First, then, we have here the avowed incompleteness of Christ'sown teaching. 

'I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear themnow. ' Now in an earlier portion of these great discourses, we haveour Lord asserting that '_all_ things whatsoever He had heard of theFather He had made known' unto His servants. How do these tworepresentations harmonise? Is it possible to make them agree? Surely, yes. There is a difference between the germ and the unfolded flower. There is a difference between principles and the complete developmentof these. I suppose you may say that all Euclid is in the axioms anddefinitions. I suppose you may also say that when you have learnedthe axioms and definitions, there are many things yet to be said, ofwhich you have not grown to the apprehension. And so our Lord, as faras His frankness was concerned, and as far as the fundamental andseminal principles of all religious truth were concerned, had eventhen declared all that He had heard of the Father. But yet, in so faras the unfolding of these was concerned, the tracing of theirconsequences, the exhibition of their harmonies, the weaving of theminto an ordered whole in which a man's understanding could lodge, there were many things yet to be said, which that handful of men werenot able to bear. And so our Lord Himself here declares that Hiswords spoken on earth are not His completed revelation. 

Of course we find in them, as I believe, hints profound and pregnant, which only need to be unfolded and smoothed out, as it were, andtheir depths fathomed, in order to lead to all that is worthy ofbeing called Christian truth. But upon many points we cannot butcontrast the desultory, brief, obscure references which came from theMaster's lips with the more systematised, full, and accurate teachingwhich came from the servants. The great crucial instance of all isthe comparative reticence which our Lord observed in reference to Hissacrificial death, and the atoning character of His sufferings forthe world. I do not admit that the silence of the Gospels upon thatsubject is fairly represented when it is said to be absolute. Ibelieve that that silence has been exaggerated by those who have nodesire to accept that teaching. But the distinction is plain andobvious, not to be ignored, rather to be marked as being fruitful ofblessed teaching, between the way in which Christ speaks about HisCross, and the way in which the Apostles speak about it afterPentecost. 

What then? My text gives us the reason. 'You cannot bear them now. 'Now the word rendered 'bear' here does not mean 'bear' in the senseof endure, or tolerate, or suffer, but 'bear' in the sense of carry. And the metaphor is that of some weight--it may be gold, but still itis a weight--laid upon a man whose muscles are not strong enough tosustain it. It crushes rather than gladdens. So because they had notstrength enough to carry, had not capacity to receive, our Lord waslovingly reticent. 

There is a great principle involved in this saying--that revelationis measured by the moral and spiritual capacities of the men whoreceive it. The light is graduated for the diseased eye. A wiseoculist does not flood that eye with full sunshine, but he puts onveils and bandages, and closes the shutters, and lets a stray beam, ever growing as the curve is perfected, fall upon it. So from thebeginning until the end of the process of revelation there was acorrespondence between men's capacity to receive the light and thelight that was granted; and the faithful use of the less made themcapable of receiving the greater, and as soon as they were capable ofreceiving it, it came. 'To him that hath shall be given. ' In Hislove, then, Christ did not load these men with principles that theycould not carry, nor feed them with 'strong meat' instead of 'milk, 'until they were able to bear it. Revelation is progressive, andChrist is reticent, from regard to the feebleness of His listeners. 

Now that same principle is true in a modified form about us. How manythings there are which we sometimes feel we should like to know, thatGod has not told us, because we have not yet grown up to the point atwhich we could apprehend them! Compassed with these veils of fleshand weakness, groping amidst the shadows of time, bewildered by thecross-lights that fall upon us from so many surrounding objects, wehave not yet eyes able to behold the ineffable glory. He has manythings to say to us about that blessed future, and that strange andawful life into which we are to step when we leave this poor world, but 'ye cannot bear them now. ' Let us wait with patience until we areready for the illumination. For two things go to make revelation, thelight that reveals and the eye that beholds. 

Now one remark before I go further. People tell us, 'Your moderntheology is not in the Gospels. ' And they say to us, as if they hadadministered a knockdown blow, 'We stick by Jesus, not Paul. ' Well, as I said, I do not admit that there is no 'Pauline' teaching in theGospels, but I do confess there is not much. And I say, 'What then?'Why, this, then--it is exactly what we were to expect; and people whoreject the apostolic form of Christian teaching because it is notfound in the Gospels are flying in the face of Christ's own teaching. You say you will take His words as the only source of religioustruth. You are going clean contrary to His own words in saying so. Remember that He proclaimed their incompleteness, and referred us, for the fuller knowledge of the truth of God, to a subsequentTeacher. 

II. So, secondly, mark here the completeness of the truth into whichthe Spirit guides. 

I must trouble you with just a word or two of remark as to thelanguage of our text. Note the personality, designation, and officeof this new Teacher. 'He, ' not '_it_, ' He, is the Spirit of truthwhose characteristic and weapon is truth. 'He will guide you'--suggesting a loving hand put out to lead; suggesting thegraciousness, the gentleness, the gradualness of the teaching. 'Intoall truth '--that is no promise of omniscience, but it is theassurance of gradual and growing acquaintance with the spiritual andmoral truth which is revealed, such as may be fitly paralleled by themetaphor of men passing into some broad land, of which there is muchstill to be possessed and explored. Not to-day, nor to-morrow, willall the truth belong to those whom the Spirit guides; but if they aretrue to His guidance, 'to-morrow shall be as this day, and much moreabundant, ' and the land will all be traversed at the last. 'He shallnot speak of Himself, but whatsoever He shall hear that shall Hespeak. ' Mark the parallel between the relation of the Spirit-Teacherto Jesus, and the relation of Jesus to the Father. Of Him, too, it issaid by Himself, 'All things whatsoever I have heard of the Father Ihave declared unto you. ' The mark of Satan is, 'He speaketh of hisown'; the mark of the divine Teacher is, 'He speaketh not of Himself, but whatsoever things, ' in all their variety, in their continuity, intheir completeness, 'He shall hear, '--where? yonder in the depths ofthe Godhead--'whatsoever things He shall hear there, ' He shall showto you, and especially, 'He will show you the things that are tocome. ' These Apostles were living in a revolutionary time. Men'shearts were 'failing them for fear of the things that were coming onthe earth. ' Step by step they would be taught the evolving glory ofthat kingdom which they were to be the instruments in founding; andstep by step there would be spread out before them the vision of thefuture and all the wonder that should be, the world that was to come, the new constitution which Christ was to establish. 

Now, if that be the interpretation, however inadequate, of thesegreat and wonderful words, there are but two things needful to sayabout them. One is that this promise of a complete guidance intotruth applies in a peculiar and unique fashion to the originalhearers of it. I ventured to say that one of the other promises ofthe Spirit, which I quoted in my introductory remarks, was thecertificate to us of the inspiration and reliableness of these FourGospels. And I now remark that in these words, in their plain andunmistakable meaning, there lie involved the inspiration andauthority of the Apostles as teachers of religious truth. Here wehave the guarantee for the authority over our faith, of the wordswhich came from these men, and from the other who was added to theirnumber on the Damascus road. They were guided 'into _all_ the truth, 'and so our task is to receive the truth into which they were guided. 

The Acts of the Apostles is the best commentary on these words of mytext. There you see how these men rose at once into a new region; howthe truths about their Master which had been bewildering puzzles tothem flashed into light; how the Cross, which had baffled anddispersed them, became at once the centre of union for themselves andfor the world; how the obscure became lucid, and Christ's death andthe resurrection stood forth to them as the great central facts ofthe world's salvation. In the book of the Apocalypse we have part ofthe fulfilment of this closing promise: 'He will show you things tocome'; when the Seer was 'in the Spirit on the Lord's Day, ' and theheavens were opened, and the history of the Church (whether inchronological order, or in the exhibition of symbols of the greatforces which shall be arrayed for and against it, over and overagain, to the end of time, does not at present matter), was spreadbefore Him as a scroll. 

Now, dear friends, this great principle of my text has a modifiedapplication also to us all. For that divine Spirit is given to eachof us if we will use Him, is given to any and every man who desiresHim, does dwell in Christian hearts, though, alas! so many of us areso little conscious of Him, and does teach us the truth which ChristHimself left incomplete. 

Only let me make one remark here. We do not stand on the same levelas these men who clustered round Christ on His road to Gethsemane, and received the first fruits of the promise--the Spirit. They, taught by that divine Guide and by experience, were led into thedeeper apprehension of the words and the deeds, of the life and thedeath, of Jesus Christ our Lord. We, taught by that same Spirit, areled into a deeper apprehension of the words which they spake, both inrecording and interpreting the facts of Christ's life and death. 

And so we come sharp up to this, 'If any man thinketh himself to be aprophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things which Ispeak unto him are the commandments of the Lord. ' That is how anApostle put his relation to the other possessors of the divineSpirit. And you and I have to take this as the criterion of all truepossession of the Spirit of God, that it bows in humble submission tothe authoritative teaching of this book. 

III. Lastly, we have here our Lord pointing out the unity of thesetwo. 

In the verse on which I have just been commenting He says nothingabout Himself, and it might easily appear to the listeners as ifthese two sources of truth, His own incomplete teaching, and the fullteaching of the divine Spirit, were independent of, if not opposedto, one another. So in the last words of our text He shows us theblending of the two streams, the union of the two beams. 

'He shall glorify Me. ' Think of a _man_ saying that! The Spirit whowill come from God and 'guide men into all truth' has for Hisdistinctive office the glorifying of Jesus Christ. So fair is He, sogood, so radiant, that to make Him known _is_ to glorify Him. Theglorifying of Christ is the ultimate and adequate purpose ofeverything that God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit has done, because the glorifying of Christ is the glorifying of God, and theblessing of the eyes that behold His glory. 

'For He shall take of Mine, and show it unto you. ' All which thatdivine Spirit brings is Christ's. So, then, there is no newrevelation, only the interpretation of the revelation. The text isgiven, and its last word was spoken, when 'the cloud received Him outof their sight, ' and henceforward all is commentary. The Spirit takesof Christ's; applies the principles, unfolds the deep meaning ofwords and deeds, and especially the meaning of the mystery of theCradle, and the tragedy of the Cross, and the mystery of theAscension, as declaring that Christ is the Son of God, the Sacrificefor the world. Christ said, 'I am the Truth. ' Therefore, when Hepromises, 'He will guide you into all the truth, ' we may fairlyconclude that 'the truth' into which the Spirit guides is thepersonal Christ. It is the whole Christ, the whole truth, that we areto receive from that divine Teacher; growing up day by day into thecapacity to grasp Christ more firmly, to understand Him better, andby love and trust and obedience to make Him more entirely our own. Weare like the first settlers upon some great island-continent. Thereis a little fringe of population round the coast, but away in theinterior are leagues of virgin forests and fertile plains stretchingto the horizon, and snow-capped summits piercing the clouds, on whichno foot has ever trod. 'He will guide you into all truth'; throughthe length and breadth of the boundless land, the person and the workof Jesus Christ our Lord. 

'All things that the Father hath are Mine, therefore said I that Heshall take of Mine and show it unto you. ' What awful words! A divine, teaching Spirit can only teach concerning God. Christ here explainsthe paradox of His words preceding, in which, if He were but human, He seems to have given that teaching Spirit an unworthy office, byexplaining that whatsoever is His is God's, and whatsoever is God'sis His. 

My brother! do you believe that? Is that what you think about JesusChrist? He puts out here an unpresumptuous hand, and grasps all theconstellated glories of the divine Nature, and says, 'They are Mine';and the Father looks down from heaven and says, 'Son! Thou art everwith Me, and all that I have is Thine. ' Do you answer, 'Amen! Ibelieve it?'

Here are three lessons from these great words which I leave with youwithout attempting to unfold them. One is, Believe a great deal moredefinitely in, and seek a great deal more consciously and earnestly, and use a great deal more diligently and honestly, that divine Spiritwho is given to us all. I fear me that over very large tracts ofprofessing Christendom to-day men stand up with very faltering lipsand confess, 'I believe in the Holy Ghost. ' Hence comes much of theweakness of our modern Christianity, of the worldliness of professingChristians, 'and when for the time they ought to be teachers, theyhave need that one teach them again which be the first principles ofthe oracles of God. ' 'Quench not, grieve not, despise not the HolySpirit. '

Another lesson is, Use the Book that He uses--else you will not grow, and He will have no means of contact with you. 

And the last is, Try the spirits. If anything calling itselfChristian teaching comes to you and does not glorify Christ, it isself-condemned. For none can exalt Him highly enough, and no teachingcan present Him too exclusively and urgently as the sole Salvationand Life of the whole earth, And if it be, as my text tells us, thatthe great teaching Spirit is to come, who is to 'guide us into alltruth, ' and therein is to glorify Christ, and to show us the thingsthat are His, then it is also true, 'Hereby know we the Spirit ofGod. Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in theflesh is of God; and every spirit that confesseth not that JesusChrist is come in the flesh is not of God. And this is the spirit ofAntichrist. '

CHRIST'S 'LITTLE WHILES'

'A little while, and ye shall not see Me: and again, a littlewhile, and ye shall see Me, because I go to the Father. Then saidsome of His disciples among themselves, What is this that Hesaith unto us, A little while, and ye shall not see Me: andagain, a little while, and ye shall see Me: and, Because I go tothe Father? They said therefore, What is this that He saith, Alittle while? we cannot tell what He saith. Now Jesus knew thatthey were desirous to ask Him, and said unto them, Do ye inquireamong yourselves of that I said, A little while, and ye shall notsee Me: and again a little while, and ye shall see Me?'--JOHN xvi. 16-19. 

A superficial glance at the former part of these verses may fail todetect their connection with the great preceding promise of theSpirit who is to guide the disciples 'into all truth. ' They appear tostand quite isolated and apart from that. But a little thought willbring out an obvious connection. The first words of our text arereally the climax and crown of the promise of the Spirit; for thatSpirit is to 'guide into all the truth' by declaring to the disciplesthe things that are Christ's, and in consequence of thatministration, they are to be able to see their unseen Lord. So thisis the loftiest thought of what the divine Spirit does for theChristian heart, that it shows Him a visible though absent Christ. 

Then we have in the subsequent part of our text the blundering of thebewildered disciples and the patient answer of the long-sufferingTeacher. So that there are these three points to take up: the timesof disappearance and of sight; the bewildered disciples; and thepatient Teacher. 

I. First of all, then, note the deep teaching of our Lord here, aboutthe times of disappearance and of Sight. 

The words are plain enough; the difficulty lies in the determinationof the periods to which they refer. He tells us that, after a briefinterval from the time at which He was speaking, there would come ashort parenthesis during which He was not to be seen; and that uponthat would follow a period of which no end is hinted at, during whichHe is to be seen. The two words employed in the two consecutiveclauses, for 'sight, ' are not the same, and so they naturally suggestsome difference in the manner of vision. 

But the question arises, Where are the limits of these times of whichthe Lord speaks? Now it is quite clear, I suppose, that the first ofthe 'little whiles' is the few hours that intervened between Hisspeaking and the Cross. And it is equally clear that His death andburial began, at all events, the period during which they were not tosee Him. But where does the second period begin, during which theyare to see Him? Is it at His resurrection or at His ascension, whenthe process of 'going to the Father' was completed in all its stages;or at Pentecost, when the Spirit, by whose ministration He was to bemade visible, was poured out? The answer is, perhaps, not to berestricted to any one of these periods; but I think if we considerthat all disciples, in all ages, have a portion in all the rest ofthese great discourses, and if we note the absence of any hint thatthe promised seeing of Christ was ever to terminate, and if we markthe diversity of words under which the two manners of vision aredescribed, and, above all, if we note the close connection of thesewords with those which precede, we shall come to the conclusion thatthe full realisation of this great promise of a visible Christ didnot begin until that time when the Spirit, poured out, opened theeyes of His servants, and 'they saw His glory. ' But however we settlethe minor question of the chronology of these periods, the greattruth shines out here that, through all the stretch of the ages, truehearts may truly see the true Christ. 

If we might venture to suppose that in our text the second of theperiods to which He refers, when they did not see Him, was notcoterminous with, but preceded, the second 'little while, ' all wouldbe clear. Then the first 'little while' would be the few hours beforethe Cross. 'Ye shall not see Me' would refer to the days in which Helay in the tomb. 'Again, a little while' would point to that strangetransitional period between His death and His ascension, in which thedisciples had neither the close intercourse of earlier days nor thespiritual communion of later ones. And the final period, 'Ye shallsee Me, ' would cover the whole course of the centuries till He comesagain. 

However that may be, and I only offer it as a possible suggestion, the thing that we want to fasten upon for ourselves is this--we all, if we will, may have a vision of Christ as close, as real, as firmlycertifying us of His reality, and making as vivid an impression uponus, as if He stood there, visible to our senses. And so, 'by thisvision splendid' we may 'be everywhere attended, ' and whithersoeverwe go, have burning before us the light of His countenance, in thesunshine of which we shall walk. 

Brother! that is personal Christianity--to see Jesus Christ, and tolive with the thrilling consciousness, printed deep and abiding uponour spirits, that, in very deed, He is by our sides. O how thatconviction would make life strong and calm and noble and blessed! Howit would lift us up above temptation! 'He endured as seeing Him whois Invisible. ' What should terrify us if Christ stood before us? Whatshould charm us if we saw Him? Competing glories and attractionswould fade before His presence, as a dim candle dies at noon. Itwould make all life full of a blessed companionship. Who could besolitary if he saw Christ? or feel that life was dreary if thatFriend was by his side? It would fill our hearts with joy andstrength, and make us evermore blessed by the light of Hiscountenance. 

And how are we to get that vision? Remember the connection of mytext. It is because there is a divine Spirit to show men the thingsthat are Christ's that therefore, unseen, He is visible to the eye offaith. And therefore the shortest and directest road to the vision ofJesus is the submitting of heart and mind and spirit to the teachingof that divine Spirit, who uses the record of the Scriptures as themeans by which He makes Jesus Christ known to us. 

But besides this waiting upon that divine Teacher, let me remind youthat there are conditions of discipline which must be fulfilled uponour parts, if any clear vision of Jesus Christ is to bless uspilgrims in this lonely world. And the first of these conditions is--If you want to see Jesus Christ, think about Him. Occupy your mindswith Him. If men in the city walk the pavements with their eyes fixedupon the gutters, what does it matter though all the glories of asunset are dyeing the western sky? They will see none of them; and ifChrist stood beside you, closer to you than any other, if your eyeswere fixed upon the trivialities of this poor present, you would notsee Him. If you honestly want to see Christ, meditate upon Him. 

And if you want to see Him, shut out competing objects, and thedazzling cross-lights that come in and hide Him from us. There mustbe a 'looking _off_ unto Jesus. ' There must be a rigid limitation, ifnot excision, of other objects, if we are to grasp Him. If we wouldsee, and have our hearts filled with, the calm sublimity of thesolemn, white wedge that lifts itself into the far-off blue, we mustnot let our gaze stop on the busy life of the valleys or the greenslopes of the lower Alps, but must lift it and keep it fixed aloft. Meditate upon Him, and shut out other things. 

If you want to see Christ, do His will. One act of obedience has morepower to clear a man's eyes than hours of idle contemplation; and oneact of disobedience has more power to dim his eyes than anythingbesides. It is in the dusty common road that He draws near to us, andthe experience of those disciples that journeyed to Emmaus may beours. He meets us in the way, and makes 'our hearts burn within us. 'The experience of the dying martyr outside the city gate may be ours. Sorrows and trials will rend the heavens if they be rightly borne, and so we shall see Christ 'standing at the right hand of God. 'Rebellious tears blind our eyes, as Mary's did, so that she did notknow the Master and took Him for 'the gardener. ' Submissive tearspurge the eyes and wash them clean to see His face. To do His will isthe sovereign method for beholding His countenance. 

Brethren, is this our experience? You professing Christians, do yousee Christ? Are your eyes fixed upon Him? Do you go through life withHim consciously nearer to you than any beside? Is He closer than theintrusive insignificances of this fleeting present? Have you Him asyour continual Companion? Oh! when we contrast the difference betweenthe largeness of this promise--a promise of a thrilling consciousnessof His presence, of a vivid perception of His character, of anunwavering certitude of His reality--and the fly-away glimpses andwandering sight, and faint, far-off views, as of a planet welteringamid clouds, which the most of Christian men have of Christ, whatshame should cover our faces, and how we should feel that if we havenot the fulfilment, it is our own fault! Blessed they of whom it istrue that they see 'no man any more save Jesus only'! and to whom allsorrow, joy, care, anxiety, work, and repose are but the means ofrevealing that sweet and all-sufficient Presence! 'I have set theLord always before me, therefore I shall not be moved. '

II. Now notice, secondly, these bewildered disciples. 

We find, in the early portion of these discourses, that twice theyventured to interrupt our Lord with more or less relevant questions, but as the wonderful words flowed on, they seem to have been awedinto silence; and our Lord Himself almost complains of them that'None of you asketh Me, Whither goest Thou?' The inexhaustible truthsthat He had spoken seem to have gone clear over their heads, but theverbal repetition of the 'little whiles, ' and the recurring ring ofthe sentences, seem to have struck upon their ears. So passing by allthe great words, they fasten upon this minor thing, and whisper amongthemselves, perhaps lagging behind on the road, as to what He meansby these 'little whiles. ' The Revised Version is probably correct, orat least it has strong manuscript authority in its favour, inomitting the clause in our Lord's words, 'Because I go to theFather. ' The disciples seem to have quoted, not from the precedingverse, but from a verse a little before that in the context, where Hesaid that 'the Spirit will convince the world of righteousnessbecause I go to My Father, and ye see Me no more. ' The contradictionseems to strike them. 

These disciples in their bewilderment seem to me to represent somevery common faults which we all commit in our dealing with the Lord'swords, and to one or two of these I turn for a moment. 

Note this to begin with, how they pass by the greater truths in orderto fasten upon a smaller outstanding difficulty. They have noquestions to ask about the gifts of the Spirit, nor about the unityof Christ and His disciples as represented in the vine and thebranches, nor about what He tells them of the love that 'lays downits life for its friends. ' But when He comes into the region ofchronology, they are all agog to know the 'when' about which He is soenigmatically speaking. 

Now is not that exactly like us, and does not the Christianity ofthis day very much want the hint to pay most attention to thegreatest truths, and let the little difficulties fall into theirsubordinate place? The central truths of Christianity are theincarnation and atonement of Jesus Christ. And yet outside questions, altogether subordinate and, in comparison with this, unimportant, arefilling the attention and the thoughts of people at present to suchan extent that there is great danger of the central truth of allbeing either passed by, or the reception of it being suspended on theclearing up of smaller questions. 

The truth that Christ is the Son of God, who has died for oursalvation, is the heart of the Gospel. And why should we make ourfaith in that, and our living by it, contingent on the clearing up ofcertain external and secondary questions; chronological, historical, critical, philological, scientific, and the like? And why should menbe so occupied in jangling about the latter as that the toweringsupremacy, the absolute independence, of the former should be lostsight of? What would you think of a man in a fire who, when theybrought the fire-escape to him, said, 'I decline to trust myself toit, until you first of all explain to me the principles of itsconstruction; and, secondly, tell me all about who made it; and, thirdly, inform me where all the materials of which it is made camefrom?' But that is very much what a number of people are doing to-dayin reference to 'the Gospel of our salvation, ' when they demand thatthe small questions--on which the central verity does not at alldepend--shall be answered and settled before they cast themselvesupon that. 

Another of the blunders of these disciples, in which they showthemselves as our brethren, is that they fling up the attempt toapprehend the obscurity in a very swift despair. 'We cannot tell whatHe saith, and we are not going to try any more. It is all cloud-landand chaos together. '

Intellectual indolence, spiritual carelessness, deal thus withoutstanding difficulties, abandoning precipitately the attempt tograsp them or that which lies behind them. And yet although there areno gratuitous obscurities in Christ's teaching, He said a great manythings which could not possibly be understood at the time, in orderthat the disciples might stretch up towards what was above them, and, by stretching up, might grow. I do not think that it is good to breakdown the children's bread too small. A wise teacher will now and thenblend with the utmost simplicity something that is just a little inadvance of the capacity of the listener, and so encourage a littlehand to stretch itself out, and the arm to grow because it isstretched. If there are no difficulties there is no effort, and ifthere is no effort there is no growth. Difficulties are there inorder that we may grapple with them, and truth is sometimes hidden ina well in order that we may have the blessing of the search, and thatthe truth found after the search may be more precious. The tropics, with their easy, luxuriant growth, where the footfall turns up thewarm soil, grow languid men, and our less smiling latitude growsstrenuous ones. Thank God that everything is not easy, even in thatwhich is meant for the revelation of all truth to all men! Instead ofturning tail at the first fence, let us learn that it will do us goodto climb, and that the fence is there in order to draw forth oureffort. 

There is another point in which these bewildered disciples areuncommonly like the rest of us; and that is that they have nopatience to wait for time and growth to solve the difficulty. Theywant to know all about it now, or not at all. If they would wait forsix weeks they would understand, as they did. Pentecost explained itall. We, too, are often in a hurry. There is nothing that theordinary mind, and often the educated mind, detests so much asuncertainty, and being consciously baffled by some outstandingdifficulty. And in order to escape that uneasiness, men aredogmatical when they should be doubtful, and positively assertingwhen it would be a great deal more for the health of their souls andof their listeners to say, 'Well, really I do not know, and I amcontent to wait. ' So, on both sides of great controversies, you getmen who will not be content to let things wait, for all must be madeclear and plain to-day. 

Ah, brethren! for ourselves, for our own intellectual difficulties, and for the difficulties of the world, there is nothing like time andpatience. The mysteries that used to plague us when we were boysmelted away when we grew up. And many questions which trouble me to-day, and through which I cannot find my way, if I lay them aside, andgo about my ordinary duties, and come back to them to-morrow with afresh eye and an unwearied brain, will have straightened themselvesout and become clear. We grow into our best and deepest convictions, we are not dragged into them by any force of logic. So for our ownsorrows, questions, pains, griefs, and for all the riddle of thispainful world, 'Take it on trust a little while, Thou soon shalt read the mystery right, In the full sunshine of His smile. '

III. Lastly, and very briefly, a word about the patient Teacher. 

'Jesus knew that they were desirous to ask Him. ' He knows all ourdifficulties and perplexities. Perhaps it is His supernaturalknowledge that is indicated in the words before us, or perhaps it ismerely that He saw them whispering amongst themselves and so inferredtheir wish. Be that as it may, we may take the comfort that we haveto do with a Teacher who accurately understands how much weunderstand and where we grope, and will shape His teaching accordingto our necessities. 

He had not a word of rebuke for the slowness of their apprehension. He might well have said to them, 'O fools and slow of heart tobelieve!' But that word was not addressed to them then, though two ofthem deserved it and got it, after events had thrown light on Histeaching. He never rebukes us for either our stupidity or for ourcarelessness, but 'has long patience' with us. 

He does give them a kind of rebuke. 'Do ye inquire _amongyourselves_?' That is a hopeful source to go to for knowledge. Whydid they not ask Him, instead of whispering and muttering therebehind Him, as if two people equally ignorant could help each otherto knowledge? Inquiry 'among yourselves' is folly; to ask Him iswisdom. We can do much for one another, but the deepest riddles andmysteries can only be wisely dealt with in one way. Take them to Him, tell Him about them. Told to Him, they often dwindle. They becomesmaller when they are looked at beside Him, and He will help us tounderstand as much as may be understood, and patiently to wait andleave the residue unsolved, until the time shall come when 'we shallknow even as we are known. '

In the context here, Jesus Christ does not explain to the disciplesthe precise point that troubled them. Olivet and Pentecost were to dothat; but He gives them what will tide them over the time until theexplanation shall come, in triumphant hopes of a joy and peace thatare drawing near. 

And so there is a great deal in all our lives, in His dealings withus, in His revelation of Himself to us, that must remain mysteriousand unintelligible. But if we will keep close to Him, and speakplainly to Him in prayer and communion about our difficulties, Hewill send us triumphant hope and large confidence of a coming joy, that will float us over the bar and make us feel that the burden isno longer painful to carry. Much that must remain dark through lifewill be lightened when we get yonder; for the vision here is notperfect, and the knowledge here is as imperfect as the vision. 

Dear friends! the one question for us all is, Do our eyes fix andfasten on that dear Lord, and is it the description of our own wholelives, that we see Him and walk with Him? Oh! if so, then life willbe blessed, and death itself will be but as 'a little while' when we'shall not see Him, ' and then we shall open our eyes and behold Himclose at hand, whom we saw from afar, and with wandering eyes, amidstthe mists and illusions of earth. To see Him as He became for oursakes is heaven on earth. To see Him as He is will be the heaven ofheaven, and before that Face, 'as the sun shining in His strength, 'all sorrows, difficulties, and mysteries will melt as morning mists. 

SORROW TURNED INTO JOY

'Verily, verily, I say unto you, That ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice: and ye shall be sorrowful, but yoursorrow shall be turned into joy. A woman when she is in travailhath sorrow, because her hour is come: but as soon as she isdelivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, forjoy that a man is born into the world. And ye now, therefore, have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart shallrejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you. '-JOHN xvi. 20-22. 

These words, to which we have come in the ordinary course of ourexposition, make an appropriate text for Easter Sunday. For their onetheme is the joy which began upon that day, and was continued inincreasing measure as the possession of Christ's servants afterPentecost. Our Lord promises that the momentary sadness and painshall be turned into a swift and continual joy. He pledges His wordfor that, and bids us believe it on His bare word. He illustrates itby that tender and beautiful image which, in the pains and bliss ofmotherhood, finds an analogy for the pains and bliss of thedisciples, inasmuch as, in both cases, pain leads directly toblessedness in which it is forgotten. And He crowns His greatpromises by explaining to us what is the deepest foundation of ourtruest gladness, 'I will see you again, ' and by declaring that such ajoy is independent of all foes and all externals, 'and your joy noman taketh from you. '

There are, then, two or three aspects of the Christian life as a gladlife which are set before us in these words, and to which I ask yourattention. 

I. There is, first, the promise of a joy which is a transformedsorrow. 

'Your sorrow shall be turned into joy, ' not merely that the oneemotion is substituted for the other, but that the one emotion, as itwere, becomes the other. This can only mean that _that_, which wasthe cause of the one, reverses its action and becomes the cause ofthe opposite. Of course the historical and immediate fulfilment ofthese words lies in the double result of Christ's Cross upon Hisservants. For part of three dreary days it was the occasion of theirsorrow, their panic, their despair; and then, all at once, when witha bound the mighty fact of the resurrection dawned upon them, thatwhich had been the occasion for their deep grief, for theirapparently hopeless despair, suddenly became the occasion for arapture beyond their dreams, and a joy which would never pass. TheCross of Christ, which for some few hours was pain, and all but ruin, has ever since been the centre of the deepest gladness and confidenceof a thousand generations. 

I do not need to remind you, I suppose, of the value, as a piece ofevidence of the historical veracity of the Gospel story, of thissudden change and complete revolution in the sentiments and emotionsof that handful of disciples. What was it that lifted them out of thepit? What was it that revolutionised in a moment their notions of theCross and of its bearing upon them? What was it that changeddownhearted, despondent, and all but apostate, disciples into heroesand martyrs? It was the one fact which Christendom commemorates to-day: the resurrection of Jesus Christ. That was the element, added tothe dark potion, which changed it all in a moment into goldenflashing light. The resurrection was what made the death of Christ nolonger the occasion for the dispersion of His disciples, but boundthem to Him with a closer bond. And I venture to say that, unless thefirst disciples were lunatics, there is no explanation of the changesthrough which they passed in some eight-and-forty hours, except thesupernatural and miraculous fact of the resurrection of Jesus Christfrom the dead. That set a light to the thick column of smoke, andmade it blaze up a 'pillar of fire. ' That changed sorrow into joy. The same death which, before the resurrection, drew a pall ofdarkness over the heavens, and draped the earth in mourning, byreason of that resurrection which swept away the cloud and broughtout the sunshine, became the source of joy. A dead Christ was theChurch's despair; a dead and risen Christ is the Church's triumph, because He is 'the Christ that died. .. And is alive for evermore. '

But, more generally, let me remind you how this very same principle, which applies directly and historically to the resurrection of ourLord, may be legitimately expanded so as to cover the whole ground ofdevout men's sorrows and calamities. Sorrow is the first stage, ofwhich the second and completed stage is transformation into joy. Every thundercloud has a rainbow lying in its depths when the sunsmites upon it. Our purest and noblest joys are transformed sorrows. The sorrow of contrite hearts becomes the gladness of pardonedchildren; the sorrow of bereaved, empty hearts may become thegladness of hearts filled with God; and every grief that stoops uponour path may be, and will be, if we keep near that dear Lord, changedinto its own opposite, and become the source of blessedness elseunattainable. Every stroke of the bright, sharp ploughshare that goesthrough the fallow ground, and every dark winter's day of pulverisingfrost and lashing tempest and howling wind, are represented in thebroad acres, waving with the golden grain. All your griefs and mine, brother, if we carry them to the Master, will flash up into gladnessand be "turned into joy. "

II. Still further, another aspect here of the glad life of the trueChristian is, that it is a joy founded upon the consciousness thatChrist's eye is upon us. 

'I will see you again and your heart shall rejoice. ' In other partsof these closing discourses the form of the promise is the converseof this, as for instance--'Yet a little while, and ye shall see_Me_. ' Here Christ lays hold of the thought by the other handle, andsays, '_I_ will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice. ' Nowthese two forms of putting the same mutual relationship, of course, agree, in that they both of them suggest, as the true foundation ofthe blessedness which they promise, the fact of communion with apresent Lord. But they differ from one another in colouring, and inthe emphasis which they place upon the two parts of that communion. '_Ye_ shall see _Me_' fixes attention upon us and our perception ofHim. '_I_ will see you' fixes attention rather upon Him and Hisbeholding of us. 'Ye shall see Me' speaks of our going out after Himand being satisfied in Him. 'I will see you' speaks of His perfectknowledge, of His loving care, of His tender, compassionate, complacent, ever-watchful eye resting upon us, in order that He maycommunicate to us all needful good. 

And so it requires a loving heart on our part, in order to find joyin such a promise. 'His eyes are as a flame of fire, ' and He sees allmen; but unless our hearts cleave to Him and we know ourselves to beknit to Him by the tender bond of love from Him, accepted andtreasured in our souls, then 'I will see you again' is a threat andnot a promise. It depends upon the relation which we bear to Him, whether it is blessedness or misery to think that He whose flamingeye reads all men's sins and pierces through all hypocrisies andveils has it fixed upon us. The sevenfold utterance of His words tothe Asiatic churches-the last recorded words of Jesus Christ-beginswith 'I know thy works. ' It was no joy to the lukewarm professors atLaodicea, nor to the church at Ephesus which had lost the freshnessof its early love, that the Master knew them; but to the faithfulsouls in Philadelphia, and to the few in Sardis, who 'had not defiledtheir garments, ' it was blessedness and life to feel that they walkedin the sunshine of His face. 

Is there any joy to us in the thought that the Lord Christ sees us?Oh! if our hearts are really His, if our lives are as truly built onHim as our profession of being Christians alleges that they are, thenall that we need for the satisfaction of our nature, for the supplyof our various necessities, or as an armour against temptation, andan amulet against sorrow, will be given to us, in the belief that Hiseye is fixed upon us. _There_ is the foundation of the truest joy formen. 'There be many that say, Who will show us any good? Lord, liftThou up the light of Thy countenance upon us. Thou hast put gladnessin my heart more than in the time when their corn and their wineabound. ' One look _towards_ Christ will more than repay and abolishearth's sorrow. One look _from_ Christ will fill our hearts withsunshine. All tears are dried on eyes that meet His. Loving heartsfind their heaven in looking into one another's faces, and if Christbe our love, our deepest and purest joys will be found in His glanceand our answering gaze. 

If one could anyhow take a bit of the Arctic world and float it downinto the tropics, the ice would all melt, and the white drearinesswould disappear, and a new splendour of colour and of light wouldclothe the ground, and an unwonted vegetation would spring up wherebarrenness had been. And if you and I will only float our livessouthward beneath the direct vertical rays of that great 'Sun ofRighteousness, ' then all the dreary winter and ice of our sorrowswill melt, and joy will spring. Brother! the Christian life is a gladlife, because Christ, the infinite and incarnate Lover of our souls, looks upon the heart that loves and trusts Him. 

III. Still further, note how our Lord here sets forth His disciples'joy as beyond the reach of violence and independent of externals. 

'No man taketh it from you. ' Of course, that refers primarily to theopposition and actual hostility of the persecuting world, which thathandful of frightened men were very soon to face; and our Lordassures them here that, whatsoever the power of the devil workingthrough the world may be able to filch away from them, it cannotfilch away the joy that He gives. But we may extend the meaningbeyond that reference. 

Much of our joy, of course, depends upon our fellows, and disappearswhen they fade away from our sight and we struggle along in asolitude, made the more dreary because of remembered companionship. And much of our joy depends upon the goodwill and help of ourfellows, and they can snatch away all that so depends. They can hedgeup our road and make it uncomfortable and sad for us in many ways, but no man but myself can put a roof over my head to shut me out fromGod and Christ; and as long as I have a clear sky overhead, itmatters very little how high may be the walls that foes or hostilecircumstances pile around me, and how close they may press upon me. And much of our joy necessarily depends upon and fluctuates withexternal circumstances of a hundred different kinds, as we all onlytoo well know. But we do not need to have all our joy fed from thesesurface springs. We may dig deeper down if we like. If we areChristians, we have, like some beleaguered garrison in a fortress, awell in the courtyard that nobody can get at, and which never can rundry. 'Your joy no man taketh from you. '

As long as we have Christ, we cannot be desolate. If He and I werealone in the universe, or, paradoxical as it may sound, if He and Iwere alone, and the universe were not, I should have all that Ineeded and my joy would be full, if I loved Him as I ought to do. 

So, my brother! let us see to it that we dig deep enough for thefoundation of our blessedness, and that it is on Christ and nothingless infinite, less eternal, less unchangeable, that we repose forthe inward blessedness which nothing outside of us can touch. That isthe blessedness which we may all possess, 'For I am persuaded thatneither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, norany other creature, shall be able to separate us' from the eye andthe heart of the risen Christ who lives for us. But remember, thoughexternals have no power to rob us of our joy, they have a veryformidable power to interfere with the cultivation of that faith, which is the essential condition of our joy. They cannot force usaway from Christ, but they may tempt us away. The sunshine did forthe traveller in the old fable what the storm could not do; and theworld may cause you to think so much about it that you forget yourMaster. Its joys may compel Him to hide His face, and may so fillyour eyes that you do not care to look at His face; and so the sweetbond may be broken, and the consciousness of a living, loving Jesusmay fade, and become filmy and unsubstantial, and occasional andinterrupted. Do you see to it that what the world cannot do byviolence and directly, it does not do by its harlot kisses and itsfalse promises, tempting you away from the paths where alone you canmeet your Master. 

IV. Lastly, note that this life of joy, which our Lord here speaksof, is made certain by the promise of a faithful Christ. 

'Verily, verily, I say unto you, '--He was accustomed to use thatimpressive and solemn formula, when He was about to speak wordsbeyond the reach of human wisdom to discover, or of prime importancefor men to accept and believe. He tells these men, who had nothingbut His bare word to rely upon, that the astonishing thing which Heis going to promise them will certainly come to pass. He wouldencourage them to rest an unfaltering confidence, for the briefparenthesis of sorrow, upon His faithful promise of joy. He puts Hisown character, so to speak, in pawn. His words are preciselyequivalent in meaning to the solemn Old Testament words which arerepresented as being the oath of God, 'As I live saith the Lord, ''You may be as sure of this thing as you are of My divine existence, for all My divine Being is pledged to you to bring it about. ''Verily, verily, I say unto you, ' 'You may be as sure of this thingas you are of Me, for all that I am is pledged to fulfil the words ofMy lips. '

So Christ puts His whole truthfulness at stake, as it were; and ifany man who has ever loved Jesus Christ and trusted Him aright hasnot found this 'joy unspeakable and full of glory, ' then Jesus Christhas said the thing that is not. 

Then why is it that so many professing Christians have such joylesslives as they have? Simply because they do not keep the conditions. If we will love Him so as to set our hearts upon Him, if we willdesire Him as our chief good, if we will keep our eyes fixed uponHim, then, as sure as He is living and is the Truth, He will floodour hearts with blessedness, and His joy will pour into our souls asthe flashing tide rushes into some muddy and melancholy harbour, andsets everything dancing that was lying stranded on the slime. If, mybrother, you, a professing Christian, know but little of this joy, why, then, it is _your_ fault, and not _His_. The joyless lives of somany who say that they are His disciples cast no shadow of suspicionupon His veracity, but they do cast a very deep shadow of doubt upontheir profession of faith in Him. 

Is your religion joyful? Is your joy religious? The two questions gotogether. And if we cannot answer these questions in the light ofGod's eye as we ought to do, let these great promises and my textprick us into holier living, into more consistent Christiancharacter, and a closer walk with our Master and Lord. 

The out-and-out Christian is a joyful Christian. The half-and-halfChristian is the kind of Christian that a great many of you are--little acquainted with 'the joy of the Lord. ' Why should we live halfway up the hill and swathed in mists, when we might have an uncloudedsky and a visible sun over our heads, if we would only climb higherand walk in the light of His face?

'IN THAT DAY'

'And in that day ye shall ask Me nothing. Verily, verily, I sayunto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in My name, He willgive it you. Hitherto have ye asked nothing in My name: ask, andye shall receive, that your joy may be full. '--JOHN xvi. 23, 24. 

Our Lord here sums up the prerogatives and privileges of His servantsin the day that was about to dawn and to last till He came again. There is nothing absolutely new in the words; substantially thepromises contained in them have appeared in former parts of thesediscourses under somewhat different aspects and connections. But ourLord brings them together here, in this condensed repetition, inorder that the scattered rays, being thus focussed, may have morepower to illuminate with certitude, and to warm into hope. 'Ye shallask Me nothing. .. . Ask and ye shall receive. .. . Your joy shall befull. ' These are the jewels which He sets in a cluster, thejuxtaposition making each brighter, and gives to us for a partingkeepsake. 

Now it is to be noticed that the two askings which are spoken of hereare expressed by different words in the Greek. Our English word 'ask'means two things, either to question or to request; to ask in thesense of interrogating, in order to get information and teaching, orin the sense of beseeching, in order to get gifts. In the formersense the word is employed in the first clause of my text, withdistinct reference to the disciples' desire, a moment or two before, to ask Him a very foolish question; and in the second sense it isemployed in the central portion of my text. 

So, then, there are three things here as the marks of the Christianlife all through the ages: the cessation of the ignorant questionsaddressed to a present Christ; the satisfaction of desires; and theperfecting of joy. These are the characteristics of a true Christianlife. My brother, are they in any degree the characteristics ofyours?

I. Note then, first, the end of questionings. 

'In that day ye shall ask Me nothing, ' and do not you think that whenthe disciples heard that, they would be tempted to say, 'Then what inall the world are we to do?' To them the thought that He was not tobe at their sides any longer, for them to go to with theirdifficulties, must have seemed despair rather than advance; but inChrist's eyes it was progress. He tells them and us that we gain bylosing Him, and are better off than they were, precisely because Hedoes not any longer stand at our sides for us to question. It isbetter for a boy to puzzle out the meaning of a Latin book by his ownbrains and the help of a dictionary than it is lazily to use aninterlinear translation. And, though we do not always feel it, andare often tempted to think how blessed it would be if we had aninfallible Teacher visible here at our sides, it is a great dealbetter for us that we have not, and it is a step in advance that Hehas gone away. Many eager and honest Christian souls, hungering aftercertainty and rest, have cast themselves in these latter days intothe arms of an infallible Church. I doubt whether any suchquestioning mind has found what it sought; and I am sure that it hastaken a step downwards, in passing from the spiritual guidancerealised by our own honest industry and earnest use of the materialssupplied to us in Christ's word, to any external authority whichcomes to us to save us the trouble of thinking, and to confirm to ustruth which we have not made our own by search and effort. We gain bylosing the visible Christ; and He was proclaiming progress and notretrogression, when He said: 'In that day ye shall ask Me no morequestions. '

For what have we instead? We have two things: a completed revelation, and an inward Teacher. 

We have a completed revelation. Great and wonderful and unspeakablyprecious as were and are the words of Jesus Christ, His deeds are farmore. The death of Christ has told us things that Christ before Hisdeath could not tell. The resurrection of Christ has cast light uponall the darkest places of man's destiny which Christ, before Hisresurrection, could not by any words so illuminate. The ascension ofChrist has opened doors for thought, for faith, for hope, which werefast closed, notwithstanding all His teachings, until He had burstthem asunder and passed to His throne. And the facts which aresubstituted for the bodily presence of Jesus with His disciples tellus a great deal more than they could ever have drawn from Him byquestionings, however persistent and however wisely directed. We havea completed revelation, and therefore we need 'ask Him nothing. '

And we have a divine Spirit that will come to us if we will, andteach us by means of blessing the exercise of our own faculties, andguiding us, not, indeed, into the uniform perception of theintellectual aspects of Christian truth, but into the apprehensionand the loving possession, as a power in our lives, of all the truththat we need to mould our characters and to raise us to the likenessof Himself. 

Only, brother! let us remember what such a method of teaching demandsfrom us. It needs that we honestly use the revelation that is givenus; it needs that we loyally, lovingly, trustfully, submit ourselvesto the teaching of that Spirit who will dwell in us; it needs that webring our lives up to the height of our present knowledge, and makeeverything that we know a factor in shaping what we do and what weare. If thus we will to do His will, 'we shall know of the doctrine';if thus we yield ourselves to the divine Spirit, we shall be taughtthe practical bearings of all essential truth; and if thus we ponderthe facts and principles that are enshrined in Christ's life, and theApostolic commentary on them, as preserved for us in the Scripture, we shall not need to envy those that could go to Him with theirquestions, for _He_ will come to us with His all-satisfying answers. 

Ah! but you say experience does not verify these promises. Look at adivided Christendom; look at my own difficulties of knowing what I amto believe and to think. Well, as for a divided Christendom, saintlysouls are all of one Church, and however they may formulate theintellectual aspects of their creed, when they come to pray, they saythe same things. Roman Catholic and Protestant, and Quaker andChurchman, and Calvinist and Arminian, and Greek and LatinChristians--all contribute to the hymn-book of every sect; and we allsing their songs. So the divisions are like the surface cracks on adry field, and a few inches down there is continuity. As for thedifficulty of knowing what I am to believe and think aboutcontroverted questions, no doubt there will remain many gaps in thecircle of our knowledge; no doubt there will be much left obscure andunanswered; but if we will keep ourselves near the Master, and usehonestly and diligently the helps that He gives us--the outward helpin the Word, and the inward help in His teaching Spirit--we shall not'walk in darkness, ' but shall have light enough given to be to us'the Light of Life. '

Brother, keep close to Christ, and Christ--present though absent--will teach you. 

II. Secondly, satisfied desires. 

This second great promise of my text, introduced again by the solemnaffirmation, 'Verily, verily, I say unto you, ' substantially appearedin a former part of these discourses with a very significantdifference. 'Whatsoever ye shall ask in My name that will I do. ' 'Ifye shall ask anything in My name I will do it. ' There Christpresented Himself as the Answerer of the petitions, because His moreimmediate purpose was to set forth His going to the Father as Hiselevation to a yet loftier position. Here, on the other hand, He setsforth the Father as the Answerer of the petitions, because Hispurpose is to point away from undue dependence on His own corporealpresence. But the fact that He thus, as occasion requires, substitutes the one form of speech for the other, and indifferentlyrepresents the same actions as being done by Himself and by theFather in heaven, carries with it large teachings which I do notdwell upon now. Only I would ask you to consider how much is involvedin that fact, that, as a matter of course, and without explanation ofthe difference, our Lord alternates the two forms, and sometimessays, 'I will do it, ' and sometimes says, 'The Father will do it. 'Does it not point to that great and blessed truth, 'Whatsoever thingthe Father doeth, that also doeth the Son likewise?'

But passing from that, let me ask you to note very carefully thelimitation, which is here given to the broad universality of thedeclaration that desires shall be satisfied. 'If ye shall askanything in My name'; there is the definition of Christian prayer. And what does it mean? Is a prayer, which from the beginning to theend is reeking with self-will, hallowed because we say, as a kind ofcharm at the end of it, 'For Christ's sake. Amen'? Is _that_ prayingin Christ's name? Surely not! What is the 'name' of Christ? His wholerevealed character. So these disciples could not pray in His name'hitherto, ' because His character was not all revealed. Therefore, topray in His name is to pray, recognising what He is, as revealed inHis life and death and resurrection and ascension, and to base allour dependence of acceptance of our prayers upon that revealedcharacter. Is that all? Are any kind of wishes, which are presentedin dependence upon Christ as our only Hope and Channel of divineblessing, certain to be fulfilled? Certainly not. To pray 'in Myname' means yet more than that. It means not only to pray independence upon Christ as our only Ground of hope and Source ofacceptance and God's only Channel of blessing, but it means exactlywhat the same phrase means when it is applied to us. If I say that Iam doing something in your name, that means on your behalf, as yourrepresentative, as your organ, and to express your mind and will. Andif we pray in Christ's name, that implies, not only our dependenceupon His merit and work, but also the harmony of our wills with Hiswill, and that our requests are not merely the hot products of ourown selfishness, but are the calm issues of communion with Him. _Thus_ to pray requires the suppression of self. Heathen prayer, ifthere be such a thing, is the violent effort to make God will what Iwish. Christian prayer is the submissive effort to make my wish whatGod wills, and that is to pray in Christ's name. 

My brother! do we construct our prayers thus? Do we try to bring ourdesires into harmony with Him, before we venture to express them? Dowe go to His footstool to pour out petulant, blind, passionate, un-sanctified wishes after questionable and contingent good, or do wewait until He fills our spirits with longings after what it must beHis desire to give, and then breathe out those desires caught fromHis own heart, and echoing His own will? Ah! The discipline that iswanted to make men pray in Christ's name is little understood bymultitudes amongst us. 

Notice how certain such prayer is of being answered. Of course, if itis in harmony with the will of God, it is sure not to be offered invain. Our Revised Version makes a slight alteration in the order ofthe words in the first clause of this promise by reading, 'If ye askanything of the Father He will give it you _in My name_. ' God's giftscome down through the same channel through which our prayer goes up. We ask in the name of Christ, and get our answers in the name ofChrist. 

But, whether that be the true collocation of ideas or not, mark theplain principle here, that only desires which are in harmony with thedivine will are sure of being satisfied. What is a bad thing for achild cannot be a good thing for a man. What is a foolish and wickedthing for a father down here to do cannot be a kind and a wise thingfor the Father in the heavens to do. If you wish to spoil your childyou say, 'What do you want, my dear? tell me and you shall have it. 'And if God were saying anything like that to us, through the lips ofJesus Christ His Son, in the text, it would be no blessing, but acurse. He knows a great deal better what is good for us; and so Hesays: 'Bring your wishes into line with My purpose, and then you willget them'; 'Delight thyself in the Lord, and He will give thee thedesires of thine heart. ' If you want God most you will be sure to getHim; if your heart's desires are after Him, your heart's desires willbe satisfied. 'The young lions do roar and suffer hunger. ' That isthe world's way of getting good; fighting and striving and snarling, and forcibly seeking to grasp, and there is hunger after all. Thereis a better way than that. Instead of striving and struggling tosnatch and to keep a perishable and questionable portion, let us waitupon God and quiet our hearts, stilling them into the temper ofcommunion and conformity with Him, and we shall not ask in vain. 

He who prays in Christ's name must pray Christ's prayer, 'Not Mywill, but Thine be done. ' And then, though many wishes may beunanswered, and many weak petitions unfulfilled, and many desiresunsatisfied, the essential spirit of the prayer will be answered, and, His will being done in us and on us, our wishes will acquiescein it and desire nothing besides. To him who can thus pray inChrist's name in the deepest sense, and after Christ's pattern, everydoor in God's treasure-house flies open, and he may take as much ofthe treasure as he desires. The Master bends lovingly over such asoul, and looks him in the eyes, and with outstretched hand says, 'What wilt thou that I should do unto thee? Be it unto thee even asthou wilt. '

III. Lastly, the perfect joy which follows upon these two. 

'That your joy may be fulfilled. ' Again we have a recurrence of apromise that has appeared in another connection in an earlier part ofthis discourse; but the connection here is worthy of notice. Thepromise is of joy that comes from the satisfaction of meek desires inunison with Christ's will. Is it possible then, that, amidst all theups and downs, the changes and the sorrows of this fluctuating, tempest-tossed life of ours we may have a deep and stable joy? 'Thatyour joy may be full, ' says my text, or 'fulfilled, ' like somejewelled, golden cup charged to the very brim with rich andquickening wine, so that there is no room for a drop more. Can it bethat ever, in this world, men shall be happy up to the very limits oftheir capacity? Was anybody ever so blessed that he could not be moreso? Was your cup ever so full that there was no room for another dropin it? Jesus Christ says that it may be so, and He tells us how itmay be so. Bring your desires into harmony with God's, and you willhave none unsatisfied amongst them; and so you will be blessed to thefull; and though sorrow comes, as of course it will come, still youmay be blessed. There is no contradiction between the presence ofthis deep, central joy and a surface and circumference of sorrow. Rather we need the surrounding sorrow, to concentrate, and so tointensify, the central joy in God. There are some flowers which onlyblow in the night; and white blossoms are visible with startlingplainness in the twilight, when all the flaunting purples and redsare hid. We do not know the depth, the preciousness, the power of the'joy of the Lord, ' until we have felt it shining in our hearts in themidst of the thick darkness of earthly sorrow, and bringing life intothe very death of our human delights. It may be ours on theconditions that my text describes. 

My dear friends! there are only two courses before us. Either we musthave a life with superficial, transitory, incomplete gladness, and anaching centre of vacuity and pain, or we may have a life which, inits outward aspects and superficial appearance, has much about itthat is sad and trying, but down in the heart of it is calm andjoyful. Which of the two do you deem best, a superficial gladness anda rooted sorrow, or a superficial sorrow and a central joy? 'Even inlaughter the heart is sorrowful, and the end of that mirth isheaviness. ' But, on the other hand, the 'ransomed of the Lord shallreturn, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon theirheads. They shall obtain joy and gladness; and sorrow and sighingshall flee away. '

THE JOYS OF 'THAT DAY'

'These things have I spoken unto you in proverbs: but the timecometh, when I shall no more speak unto you in proverbs, but Ishall show you plainly of the Father. At that day ye shall ask inMy Name: and I say not unto you, that I will pray the Father foryou: For the Father Himself loveth you, because ye have loved Me, and have believed that I came out from God. '--JOHN xvi. 25-27. 

The stream which we have been tracking for so long in thesediscourses has now nearly reached its close. Our Lord, in these allbut final words, sums up the great salient features which He hasalready more than once specified, of the time when His followersshall live with an absent and yet present Christ. He reiterates heresubstantially just what He has been saying before, but in somewhatdifferent connection, and with some slight expansion. And thisreiteration of the glad features of the day which was about to dawnsuggests how much the disciples needed, and how much we need, to haverepeated over and over again the blessed and profound lessons ofthese words. 

What a sublime self-repression there was in the Master! Not one wordescapes from His lips of the personal pain and agony into which Hehad to plunge and be baptized, before that day could dawn. All thatwas crushed down and kept back, and He only speaks to the disciplesand to us of the joy that comes to them, and not at all of the bittersorrow by which it is bought. There are set forth in these words, asit seems to me, especially three characteristics which belong to thewhole period between the ascension of Jesus Christ and His comingagain for judgment. It is a day of continual and clearer teaching byHim. It is a day of desires in His name. It is a day of filialexperience of a Father's love. These are the characteristics of theChristian period, and they ought to be the characteristics of ourindividual Christian life. My brother! are they the characteristicsof yours?

Let us note them in order. 

I. First, our Lord tells us that the whole period of the Christianlife upon earth is to be a period of continuous and clearer teachingby Himself. 

'Hitherto I have spoken to you in proverbs, ' or parables. The wordmeans, not only a comparison or parable, but also, and perhapsprimarily, a mysterious and enigmatical saying. The reference is, ofcourse, directly to the immediately preceding thoughts, in which Hisdeparture and the sorrow that accompanied it and was to merge intojoy, were described under that touching figure of the woman intravail. But the reference must be extended very much farther thanthat. It includes not only this discourse, but the whole of Histeaching by word whilst He was here upon earth. 

Now the first thing that strikes me here is this strange fact. Hereis a man who knew Himself to be within four-and-twenty hours of Hisdeath, and knew that scarcely another word of instruction was to comefrom His lips upon earth, calmly asserting that, for all thesubsequent ages of the world's history, He is to continue itsTeacher. We know how the wisest and profoundest of earthly teachershave their lips sealed by death, so as that no counsel can come fromthem any more, and their disciples long in vain for responses fromthe silenced oracle, which is dumb whatever new problems may arise. But Jesus Christ calmly poses before the world as not having Histeaching activity in the slightest degree suspended by that factwhich puts a conclusive and complete close to all other teachers'words. Rather He says that after death He will, more clearly than inlife, be the Teacher of the world. 

What does He mean by that? Well, remember first of all the factswhich followed this saying--the Cross, the Grave, Olivet, theHeavens, the Throne. These were still in the future when He spoke. And have not these--the bitter passion, the supernaturalresurrection, the triumphant ascension, and the everlasting sessionof the Son at the right hand of God--taught the whole world themeaning of the Father's name, and the love of the Father's heart, andthe power of the Father's Son, as nothing else, not even the sweetestand tenderest of His utterances, could have taught them? When, then, He declares the continuance of His teaching functions unbrokenthrough death and beyond it, He refers partly to the future facts ofHis earthly manifestation, and still more does He refer to thatcontinuous teaching which, by that divine Spirit whom He sends, isgranted to every believing soul all through the ages. 

This great truth, which recurs over and over again in thesediscourses of our Lord, is far too much dropped out of theconsciousness and creeds of the modern Christian Church. We callourselves Christ's disciples. If there be disciples, there must be aMaster. His teaching is by no means merely the effect of the recordedfacts and utterances of the Lord, preserved here in the Book for us, and to be pondered upon by ourselves, but it is also the hourlycommunication, to waiting hearts and souls that keep themselves nearthe Lord, of deeper insight into His will, of larger views of Hispurposes, of a firmer grasp of the contents of Scripture, and a morecomplete subjection of the whole nature to the truth as it is inJesus. Christian men and women! do you know anything about what it isto learn of Christ in the sense that He Himself, and no poor humanvoice like mine, nor even merely the records of His past words anddeeds as garnered in these Gospels and expounded by His Apostles, isthe source of your growing knowledge of Him? If we would keep ourhearts and minds clearer than we do of the babble of earthly voices, and be more loyal and humble and constant and patient in our sittingon the benches in Christ's school till the Master Himself came togive us His lessons, these great words of my text would not, as theyso often do in the mass of professing Christians, lack theverification of experience and the assurance that it is so with us. Have you sat in Christ's school, and do you know the secret andilluminative whispers of His teaching? If not, there is somethingwrong in your Christian character, and something insincere in yourChristian profession. 

Notice, still further, that our Lord here ranks that subsequentteaching before all that He said upon earth, great and precious as itwas. Now I do not mean for one moment to allege that freshcommunications of truth, uncontained in Scripture, are given to us inthe age-long and continuous teaching of Jesus Christ. That I do notsuppose to be the meaning of the great promises before us, for thefacts of revelation were finished when He ascended, and the inspiredcommentary upon the facts of revelation was completed with thesewritings which follow the Gospels in our New Testament. But Christ'steaching brings us up to the understanding of the facts and of thecommentary upon them which Scripture contains, so that what wasparable or proverb, dimly apprehended, mysterious and enigmaticalwhen it was spoken, and what remains mysterious and enigmatical to usuntil we grow up to it, gradually becomes full of significance andweighty with a plain and certain meaning. This is the teaching whichgoes on through the ages--the lifting of His children to the level ofapprehending more and more of the inexhaustible and manifold wisdomwhich is stored for us in this Book. The mine has been worked on thesurface, but the deeper it goes the richer is the lode; and no ageswill exhaust the treasures that are hid in Christ Jesus our Lord. 

He uses the new problems, the new difficulties, the new circumstancesof each successive age, and of each individual Christian, in order toevolve from His word larger lessons, and to make the earlier lessonsmore fully and deeply understood. And this generation, with all itsnew problems, with all its uneasiness about social questions, withall its new attitude to many ancient truths, will find that JesusChrist is, as He has been to all past generations, --the answer to allits doubts, using even these doubts as a means of evolving the deeperharmonies of His Word, and of unveiling in the ancient truth morethan former generations have seen in it. 'Brethren, I write unto youno new commandment. Again, a new commandment I write unto you. ' Theinexhaustible freshness of the old word taught us anew, with deepersignificance and larger applications, by the everlasting Teacher ofthe Church, is the hope that shines through these words. I commend toyou, dear brethren, the one simple, personal question, Have Isubmitted myself to that Teacher, and said to men and systems andpreachers and books and magazines, and all the rest of the noisy andclamorous tongues that bewilder under pretence of enlightening thisgeneration--have I said to them all, 'Hold your peace! and let me, inthe silence of my waiting soul, hear the Teacher Himself speak to me. Speak, Lord! for Thy servant heareth. Teach me Thy way and lead me, for Thou art my Master, and I the humblest of Thy scholars'?

II. In the next place, another of the glad features of this dawningday is that it is to be a day of desires based upon Christ, andChristlike. 

'In that day ye shall ask in My name. ' Our translators have wiselyput a colon at the end of that clause, in order that we may not hurryover it too quickly in haste to get to the next one. For there is asubstantial blessing and privilege wrapped up in it. Our Lord hasjust been saying the same thing in the previous verses, but Herepeats it here in order to emphasise it, and to set it by thesubsequent words in a somewhat different light. But I dwell upon itfor a very simple, practical purpose. I have already explained informer sermons the full, deep meaning of that phrase, 'asking inChrist's name, ' and have suggested to you that it implies two things--the one, that our desires should all be based upon His great workas the only ground of our acceptance with God; and the other, thatour desires should all be such as represent His heart and His mind. When we 'ask in His name' we ask, first, for His sake, and, second, as in His person. And such desires, resting their hopes of answersolely upon His mighty sacrifice and all-sufficient merit, and shapedaccurately and fully after the pattern of the wishes that are dear toHis heart, are to be the prerogative and the joy of His servants, inthe new 'day' that is about to dawn. 

Note how beautifully this thought, of wishes moulded into conformitywith Jesus Christ, and offered in reliance upon His great sacrifice, follows upon that other thought, 'I will tell you plainly of theFather. ' The Master's voice speaks, revealing the paternal heart, thescholar's voice answers with desires kindled by the revelation. Longings and aspirations humbly offered for His sake, and after thepattern of His own, are our true response to His teaching voice. Asthe astronomer, the more powerful his telescope, though it mayresolve some of the nebulae that resisted feebler instruments, onlyhas his bounds of vision enlarged as he looks through it, and seesyet other and mightier star-clouds lying mysterious beyond its ken--so each new influx and tidal wave of knowledge of the Father, whichChrist gives to His waiting child, leads on to enlarged desires, tolongings to press still further into the unexplored mysteries of thatmagnificent and boundless land, and to nestle still closer into theinfinite heart of God. He declares to us the Father, and the answerof the child to the declaration of the Father is the cry, 'Abba!Father! show me yet more of Thy heart. ' Thus aspiration and fruition, longing and satisfaction in unsatiated and inexhaustible andunwearying alternation, are the two blessed poles between which thelife of a Christian may revolve in smoothness and music. 

My friend! is that anything like the transcript of our experience, that the more we know of God, the more we long to know of, and topossess, Him? and the more we long to know of, and to possess, Him, the more full, gracious, confidential, tender, and continuous are theteachings of our Master? Is not this a far higher level of Christianlife than that we live upon? And why so? Is Christ's word faithless?Hath He forgotten to be gracious? Was this promise of His idle wind?Or is it that you and I have never grasped the fulness of privilegesthat He bestows upon us?

III. Note, lastly, that that day is to be a day of filial experienceof a Father's love. 

'I say not unto you that I will pray the Father for you, for theFather Himself loveth you because ye have loved Me, and have believedthat I came out from God. ' Jesus Christ does not deny Hisintercession. He simply does not bring it into evidence here. To denyit would have been impossible, for soon afterwards we find Himsaying, 'I pray for them which Thou hast given Me, for they areThine. ' But He does not emphasise it here, in order that He mayemphasise another blessed source of solace--viz. , that to those wholisten to the Master's teaching, and have their desires moulded intoharmony with His, and their wishes and hopes all based upon Hissacrifice and work, the divine Father's love directly flows. There isno need of any intercession to turn Him to be merciful. Men sometimescaricature the thought of the intercession of Christ, as if it meantthat He, by His prayer, bent the reluctant will of the Father inheaven. All such horrible misconceptions Christ sweeps out of thefield here, even whilst there remains, in the fact that the prayersof which He is speaking are offered in His name, the substance andreality of all that we mean by the intercession of Jesus Christ. 

And now note that God loves the men who love Jesus Christ. Socompletely does the Father identify Himself with the Son, that loveto Christ is love to Him, and brings the blessed answer of His loveto us. Whosoever loves Christ loves God. 

Whosoever loves Christ must do so, believing that He 'came forth fromGod. ' There are the two characteristics of a Christian disciple, --faith in the divine mission of the Son, and love that flows fromfaith. Now, of course, it does not follow from the words before us, that this divine love which comes down upon the heart which lovesChrist is the original and first flow of that love towards thatheart. 'We love Him because He first loved us. ' Christ is not heretracking the stream to its source, but is pointing to it midway inits flow. If you want to go up to the fountain-head you have to go upto the divine Father's heart, who loved when there was no love in us;and, because He loved, sent the Son. First comes the unmotived, spontaneous, self-originated, undeserved, infinite love of God tosinners and aliens and enemies; then the Cross and the mission ofJesus Christ; then the faith in His divine mission; then the lovewhich is the child of faith, as it grasps the Cross and recognisesthe love that lies behind it; and then, after that, the special, tender, and paternal love of God falling upon the hearts that loveHim in His Son. There is nothing here in the slightest degree toconflict with the grand universal truth that God loves enemies andsinners and aliens. But there is the truth, as precious as the other, that they who have 'known and believed the love that God hath to us'live under the selectest influences of His loving heart, and have aplace in its tenderness which it is impossible that any should havewho do not so love. And that sweet commerce of a divine loveanswering a human, which itself is the answer to a prior divine love, brings with it the firm confidence that prayers in His name shall notbe prayers in vain. 

So, dear friends, growing knowledge, an ever-present Teacher, thepeace of calm desires built upon Christ's Cross and fashioned afterChrist's Spirit, and the assurance in my quiet and filial heart thatmy Father in the heavens loves me, and will neither give me'serpents' when I ask for them, thinking them to be 'fishes, ' norrefuse 'bread' when I ask for it--these things ought to mark thelives of all professing Christians. Are they our experience? If not, why are they not, but because we do not believe that 'Thou art comeforth from God, ' nor love Thee as we ought?

FROM' AND 'TO'

'I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father. '--JOHN xvi. 28. 

These majestic and strange words are the proper close of our Lord'sdiscourse, what follows being rather a reply to the disciples'exclamation. There is nothing absolutely new in them, but what is newis the completeness and the brevity with which they cover the wholeground of His being, work, and glory. They fall into two halves, eachconsisting of two clauses; the former half describing our Lord's_descent_, the latter His _ascent_. In each half the two clauses dealwith the same fact, considered from the two opposite ends as it were--the point of departure and the point of arrival. 'I came forth_from_ the Father, and am come _into the world: again I _leave_ theworld and go _to_ the Father. ' But the first point of departure isthe last point of arrival, and the end comes round to the beginning. Our Lord's earthly life is, as it were, a jewel enclosed within theflashing gold of His eternal dwelling with God. 

So I think we shall best apprehend the scope, and appropriate toourselves the blessing and power of these words, if we deal with thefour points to which they call our attention--the dwelling with theFather; the voluntary coming to the earth; the voluntary departurefrom the earth; and, once more, the dwelling with the Father. We mustgrasp them all if we would know the whole Christ and all that He isable to do and to be to us and to the world. So, then, I deal simplywith these four points. 

I. Note then, first, the dwelling with the Father. 

If we adopt the most probable reading of the first clause of my text, it is even more forcible than in our version: 'I came forth _out of_the Father. ' Such an egress implies a being _in_ the Father in asense ineffable for our words, and transcending our thoughts. Itimplies a far deeper and closer relation than even that ofjuxtaposition, companionship, or outward presence. 

Now, in these great words there is involved obviously, to begin with, that, during His earthly life, our Lord bore about with Him theremembrance and consciousness of an individual existence prior to Hislife on earth. I need not remind you how frequently such hints dropfrom His lips--'Before Abraham was, I am, ' and the like. But beyondthat solemn thought of a remembered previous existence there is thisother one--that the words are the assertion by Christ Himself of aprevious, deep, mysterious, ineffable union with the Father. On sucha subject wisdom and reverence bid us speak only as we hear; but Icannot refrain from emphasising the fact that, if this fourth Gospelbe a genuine record of the teaching of Jesus Christ--and, if it isnot, what genius was he who wrote it?--if it be a genuine record ofthe teaching of Jesus Christ, then nothing is more plain than thatover and over again, in all sorts of ways, by implication and bydirect statement, to all sorts of audiences, friends and foes, Hereiterated this tremendous claim to have 'dwelt in the bosom of theFather, ' long before He lay on the breast of Mary. What did He meanwhen He said, 'No man hath ascended up into heaven save He which camedown from heaven'? What did He mean when He said, 'What and if yeshall see the Son of Man ascend up where He was before'? What did Hemean when He said, 'I came down from heaven, not to do Mine own will, but the will of Him that sent Me'? And what did He mean when, in themidst of the solemnities of that last prayer, He said, 'Glorify ThouMe with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was'?

Dear friends! it seems to me that if we know anything about JesusChrist, we know _that_. If we cannot believe that He thus spoke, weknow nothing about Him on which we can rely. And so, withoutventuring to enlarge at all upon these solemn words, I leave thiswith you as a plain fact, that the meekest, lowliest, and most saneand wise of religious teachers made deliberately over and over againthis claim, which is either absolutely true, and lifts Him into theregion of the Deity, or else is fatal to His pretensions to be eithermeek or modest, or wise or sane, or a religious teacher to whom it isworth our while to listen. 

II. Note, secondly, the voluntary coming into the world. 

'I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world. ' We alltalk in a loose way about men coming into the world when they areborn; but the weight of these words and the solemnity of the occasionon which they were spoken, and the purpose for which they werespoken--viz. , to comfort and to illuminate these disciples--forbid usto see such a mere platitude as that in them. There would have beenno consolation in them unless they meant something a great deal morethan the undeniable fact that Jesus Christ was born, and themelancholy fact that Jesus Christ was about to die. 

'I am _come_ into the world. ' There has been a Man who chose to beborn. There has been a Man who appeared here, not 'of the will of theflesh, nor of the will of man, ' but by His own free choice. He willedto take upon Him the form of humanity. Now the voluntariness of theentrance of Jesus Christ into the conditions of our human life isall-important for us, for it underlies the whole value of that lifeand its whole power to be blessing and good to us. It underlies, forinstance, the personal sinlessness of Jesus Christ, and hence Hispower to bring a new beginning of pure and perfect life into themidst of humanity. All the rest of mankind, knit together by thatmysterious bond of natural descent which only now for the first timeis beginning to receive its due attention on the part of men ofscience, by heredity have the taint upon them. And if Jesus Christ isonly one of the series, then there is no deliverance in Him, forthere is no sinlessness in that life. However fair its record mayseem on the surface, there is beneath, somewhere or other, theleprosy that infects us all. Unless He came in another fashion fromall the rest of us, He came with the same sin as all the rest of us, and He is no deliverer from sin. Rather He is one of the series who, like the melancholy captives on the road to Siberia, each carries alink of the hopeless chain that binds them all together. But, if itbe true that of His own will He took to Himself humanity, and wasborn as the Scripture tells us He was born, His birth being His'coming' and not His being brought, then, being free from taint, Hecan deliver us from taint, and, Himself unbound by the chain, He canbreak it from off our necks. The stream is fouled from its sourcedownwards, and flows on, every successive drop participant of theprimeval pollution. But, down from the white snows of the eternalhills of God, there comes into it an affluent which has no stain onits pure waters, and so can purge that into which it enters. JesusChrist willed to be born, and to plant a new beginning of holy lifein the very heart of humanity which henceforth should work as leaven. 

Let me remind you, too, that this voluntary assumption of our natureis all-important to us, for unless we preserve it clear to our mindsand hearts, the power to sway our affections is struck away fromJesus Christ. Unless He voluntarily took upon Himself the naturewhich He meant to redeem, why should I be thankful to Him for what Hedid, and what right has He to claim my love? But if He willingly camedown amongst us, and 'to this end was born, and for this cause, ' ofHis own loving heart, 'came into the world, ' then I am knit to Him bycords that cannot be broken. One thing only saves for Jesus Christthe unbounded and perpetual love of mankind, and that is, that fromHis own infinite and perpetual love He came into the world. We talkabout kings leaving their palaces and putting on the rags of thebeggar, and learning 'love in huts where poor men lie, ' and makingexperience of the conditions of their lowliest subjects. But here isa fact, infinitely beyond all these legends. It is set forth for usin a touching fashion, in the incident that almost immediatelypreceded these parting words of our Lord, when 'Jesus, knowing thatHe came forth from God, laid aside His garments and took a towel, andgirded Himself, ' and washed the foul feet of these travel-stainedmen. That was a parable of the Incarnation. The consciousness of Hisdivine origin was ever with Him, and that consciousness led Him tolay aside the garments of His majesty, and to gird Himself with thetowel of service. That He had a body round which to wrap it was morehumiliation than that He wrapped it round the body which He took. Andwe may learn there what it is that gives Him His supreme right to ourdevotion and our surrender--viz. , that, 'being in the form of God, Hethought not equality with God a thing to be covetously retained, butmade Himself of no reputation, and was found in fashion as a Man. '

III. Note the voluntary leaving the world. 

The stages of that departure are not distinguished. They arethreefold in fact--the death, the resurrection, the ascension, and inall three we have the majestic, spontaneous energy of Christ as theircause. 

There was a voluntary death, I have so often had occasion to insistupon that, in the course of these sermons, that I do not need todwell upon it now. Let me remind you only how distinctly and in whatvarious forms that thought is presented to us in the Scriptures. Wehave our Lord's own words about His having 'power to lay down Hislife. ' We have in the story of the Passion hints that seem to suggestthat His relation to death, to which He is about to bow His head, wasaltogether different from that of ours. For instance, we read: 'IntoThy hands I _commend_ My Spirit'; and 'He _gave up_ the Spirit. ' Wehave hints of a similar nature in the very swiftness of His death andunexpected brevity of His suffering, to be accounted for by nonatural result of the physical process of crucifixion. The fact isthat Jesus Christ is the Lord of death, and was so even when Heseemed to be its Servant, and that He never showed Himself morecompletely the Prince of Life and the Conqueror of Death than when Hegave up His life and died, not because He must, but because He would. There is a scene in a modern book of fiction of a man sitting on arock and the ocean stretching round him. It reaches high upon hisbreast, but it threatens not his life, till he, sitting there in hiscalm, bows his head beneath the wave and lets it roll over him. SoChrist willed to die, and died because He willed. 

There was also a voluntary resurrection by His own power; foralthough Scripture sometimes represents His rising again from thedead as being the Father's attestation of the Son's finished work, italso represents it as being, in accordance with His own claim of'power to lay down My life, and to take it again, ' the Son'striumphant egress from the prison into which, for the moment, Hewilled to pass. Jesus 'was raised from the dead by the glory of theFather, ' but also Jesus rose from the dead by His own power. 

There was also a voluntary ascension to the heavens. There was noneed for Elijah's chariot of fire. There was no need for a whirlwindto sweep a mortal to the sky. There was no need for any externalvehicle or agency whatsoever. No angels bore Him up upon their wings. But, the cords of duty which bound Him to earth being cut, He rose toHis own native sphere; and, if one might so say, the natural forcesof His supernatural life bore Him, by inverted gravitation, upward tothe place which was His own. He ascended by His own inherent power. 

Thus, by a voluntary death, He became the Sacrifice for our sins; bythe might of His self-effected resurrection He proclaimed Himself theLord of death and the resurrection for all that trust Him; and byascending up on high He draws our hearts' desires after Him, so thatwe, too, as we see Him lost from our sight, behind the brightShekinah cloud that stooped to conceal the last stages of Hisascension from our view, may return to our lowly work 'with greatjoy, ' and 'set our affection on things above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. '

IV. So, lastly, we have here the dwelling again with the Father. 

But that final dwelling with God is not wholly identical with theinitial one. The earthly life was no mere parenthesis, and He whoreturned to the Throne carried with Him the manhood which He hadassumed, and bore it thither into the glory in which the Word haddwelt from the beginning. And this is the true consolation whichChrist offered to these His weeping servants, and which He stilloffers to us His waiting children, that now the manhood of JesusChrist is exalted to participation in the divine glory, and dwellsthere in the calm, invisible sweetness and solemnity of fellowshipwith the Father. 

If that be so, it is no mere abstract dogma of theology, but ittouches our daily life at all points, and is essential to thefullness of our satisfaction and our rest in Christ. 

'We see not all things put under Him, but we see Jesus. ' Our Brotheris elevated to the Throne, and, if I might so say, He makes thefortunes of the family, and none of them will be poor as long as Heis so rich. He sends us from the far-off land where He is goneprecious gifts of its produce, and He will send for us to share Histhrone one day. 

Christ's ascension to the Father is the elevation of our best anddearest Friend to the Throne of the Universe, and the hands that werepierced for us on the Cross hold the helm and sway the sceptre ofCreation, and therefore we may calmly meet all events. 

The elevation of Jesus Christ to the Throne fills Heaven for ourfaith, our imagination, and our hearts. How different it is to lookup into those awful abysses, and to wonder where, amidst theircrushing infinitude, the spirits of dear ones that are gone arewandering, if they are at all; and to look up and to think 'My Christhath passed through the Heavens, ' and is somewhere with a true Body, and with Him all that loved Him. Without an ascended Christ we recoilfrom the cold splendours of an unknown Heaven, as a rustic might fromthe unintelligible magnificence of a palace. But if we believe thatHe is 'at the right hand of God, ' then the far-off becomes near, andthe vague becomes definite, and the unsubstantial becomes solid, andwhat was a fear becomes a joy, and we can trust ourselves and thedear dead in His hands, knowing that where He is they are, and thatin Him they and we have all that we need. 

So, dear friends! it all comes to this--make sure that you have holdof the whole Christ for yourselves. His earthly life is littlewithout the celestial halo that rings it round. His life is nothingwithout His death. His death without His resurrection and ascensionmaybe a little more pathetic than millions of other deaths, but isnothing, really, to us. And the life and death and resurrection arenot apprehended in their fullest power until they are set between theeternal glory before and the eternal glory after. 

These four facts--the dwelling in the Father; the voluntary coming toearth; the voluntary leaving earth; and, again, the dwelling with theFather--are the walls of the strong fortress into which we may fleeand be safe. With them it 'stands four square to every wind thatblows. ' Strike away one of them, and it totters into ruin. Make thewhole Christ your Christ; for nothing less than the whole Christ, 'conceived of the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, . .. Crucified, dead, and buried, . .. Ascended into Heaven, and sitting at the righthand of God, ' is strong enough to help your infirmities, vast enoughto satisfy your desires, loving enough to love you as you need, orable to deliver you from your sins, and to lift you to the glories ofHis own Throne. 

GLAD CONFESSION AND SAD WARNING

'His disciples said unto Jesus, Lo! now speakest Thou plainly, and speakest no proverb. Now are we sure that Thou knowest allthings, and needest not that any man should ask Thee: by this webelieve that Thou earnest forth from God. Jesus answered them, Doye now believe? Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is now come, thatye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave Mealone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with Me. '--JOHN xvi. 29-32. 

The first words of these wonderful discourses were, 'Let not yourheart be troubled. ' They struck the key-note of the whole. The aim ofall was to bring peace and confidence unto the disciples' spirits. And this joyful burst of confession which wells up so spontaneouslyand irrepressibly from their hearts, shows that the aim has beenreached. For a moment sorrow, bewilderment, dullness of apprehension, had all passed away, and the foolish questioners and non-receptivelisteners had been lifted into a higher region, and possessedinsight, courage, confidence. The last sublime utterance of our Lordhad gathered all the scattered rays into a beam so bright that theblindest could not but see, and the coldest could not but be warmed. 

But yet the calm, clear eye of Christ sees something not whollysatisfactory in this outpouring of the disciples' confidence. He doesnot reject their imperfect faith, but He warns them, as if seeing theimpending hour of denial which was so terribly to contradict therapture of that moment. And then, with most pathetic suddenness, Hepasses from them to Himself; and in a singularly blended utterancelets us get a glimpse into His deep solitude and the companions thatshared it. 

My words now make no attempt at anything more than is involved infollowing the course of thought in the words before us. 

I. Note the disciples' joyful confession. 

Their words are permeated throughout with allusions to the previouspromises and sayings of our Lord, and the very allusions show howshallow was their understanding of what they thought so plain. He hadsaid to them that, in that coming day which was so near its dawn, Hewould speak to them 'no more in proverbs, but show them plainly ofthe Father'; and they answer, with a kind of rapture of astonishment, that the promised day has come already, and that even now He isspeaking to them 'plainly, ' and without mysterious sayings. Did theyunderstand His words when they thought them so plain? 'I came forthfrom the Father, and am come into the world? Again I leave the worldand go unto the Father, ' that summary statement of the centralmysteries of Christianity, which the generations have found to beinexhaustible, and which to so many minds has been absolutelyincredible, seemed to the shallow apprehension of these disciples tobe sun-clear. If they had understood what He meant, could they havespoken thus, or have left Him so soon?

They begin with what they believed to be a fact, His clear utterance. Then follows a conviction which has allusion to His previous words. 'Now', say they, 'we know that Thou knowest all things, and needestnot that any man should ask Thee. ' He had said to them, 'In that dayye shall ask Me nothing'; and from the fact that he had interpretedtheir unspoken words, and had anticipated their desire to ask whatthey durst not ask, they draw, and rightly draw, the conclusion ofHis divine Omniscience. They think that therein, in His answer totheir question before it is asked, is the fulfilment of that greatpromise. Was that all that He meant? Certainly not. Did He merelymean to say, 'You will ask Me nothing, because I shall know what youwant to know, without your asking'? No! But He meant, 'Ye shall askMe nothing, because in that day you will have with you anilluminating Spirit who will solve all your difficulties. ' So, again, a shallow interpretation empties the words which they accept of theirdeepest and most precious meaning. 

And then they take yet a further step. First, they begin with a fact;then from that they infer a conviction; and now, upon the basis ofthe inferred conviction, they rear a faith, 'We believe that Thoucamest forth from God. ' But what they meant by 'coming forth fromGod' fell far short of the greatness of what He meant by thedeclaration, and they stand, in this final, articulate confession oftheir faith, but a little in advance of Nicodemus the Rabbi, andbehind Peter the Apostle when he said: 'Thou art the Son of theliving God. '

So their confession is a strangely mingled warp and woof of insightand of ignorance. And they may stand for us both as examples to teachus what we ought to be, and as beacons teaching us what we should notbe. 

Let me note just one or two lessons drawn from the disciples'demeanour and confession. 

The first remark that I would make is that here we learn what it isthat gives life to a creed--experience. These men had, over and overagain, in our Lord's earlier utterances, heard the declaration that'He came forth from God'; and in a sort of fashion they believed it. But, as so many of our convictions do, it lay dormant and half deadin their souls. But now, rightly or wrongly, experience had broughtthem into contact, as they thought, with a manifest proof of Hisdivine Omniscience, and the torpid conviction flashed all up at onceinto vitality. The smouldering fire of a mere piece of abstractbelief was kindled at once into a glow that shed warmth through theirwhole hearts; and although they had professed to believe long agothat He came from God, now, for the first time, they grasp it as aliving reality. Why? Because experience had taught it to them. It isthe only teacher that teaches us the articles of our creed in a wayworth learning them. Every one of us carries professed beliefs, whichlie there inoperative, bedridden, in the hospital and dormitory ofour souls, until some great necessity or sudden circumstance comesthat flings a beam of light upon them, and then they start and waken. We do not know the use of the sword until we are in battle. Until theshipwreck comes, no man puts on the lifebelt in his cabin. Every oneof as has large tracts of Christian truth which we think we mostsurely believe, but which need experience to quicken them, and needus to grow up into the possession of them. Of all our teachers whoturn beliefs assented to into beliefs really believed none is somighty as Sorrow; for that makes a man lay a firm hold on the deepthings of God's Word. 

Then another lesson that I draw from this glad confession is--thebold avowal that always accompanies certitude. These men's stammeringtongues are loosed. They have a fact to base themselves upon. Theyhave a piece of assured knowledge inferred from the fact. They have afaith built upon the certitude of what they know. Having this, out itall comes in a gush. No man that believes with all his heart can helpspeaking. You silent Christians are so, because you do not more thanhalf grasp the truth that you say you hold. 'Thy word, when shut upin my bones, was like a fire'; and it ate its way through all thedead matter that enclosed it, until at last it flamed out heavenhigh. Can you say, 'We know and we believe, ' with unfalteringconfidence? Not 'we argue'; not 'we humbly venture to think that onthe whole'; not 'we are inclined rather to believe'; but 'we _know_--that Thou knowest all things, and that Thou hast come from God. ' Seekfor that blessed certitude of knowledge, based upon the facts ofindividual experience, which 'makes the tongue of the dumb sing, ' andchanges all the deadness of an outward profession of Christianityinto a living, rejoicing power. 

Then, further, I draw this lesson. Take care of indolently supposingthat you understand the depths of God's truth. These Apostles fanciedthat they had grasped the whole meaning of the Master's words, andwere glad in them. They fed on them, and got something out of them;but how far they were from the true perception of their meaning! Thisgeneration abhors mystery, and demands that the deepest truths of thehighest subject, which is religion, shall be so broken down intomincemeat that the 'man in the street' can understand them in theintervals of reading the newspaper. There are only too many of us whoare disposed to grasp at the most superficial interpretation ofChristian truth, and lazily to rest ourselves in that. A creed whichhas no depth in it is like a picture which has no distance. It isflat and unnatural, and self-condemned by the very fact. It is betterthat we should feel that the smallest word that comes from God islike some little leaf of a water plant on the surface of a pond; ifyou lift that you draw a whole trail after it, and nobody knows howfar off and how deep down are the roots. It is better that we shouldfeel how Infinity and Eternity press in upon us on all sides, andshould take as ours the temper that recognises that till the end weare but learners, seeing 'in a glass, in a riddle, ' and thereforepatiently waiting for light and strenuously striving to stretch oursouls to the width of the infinite truth of God. 

II. So, then, look, in the second place, at the sad questions andforebodings of the Master. 

'Do ye _now_ believe?' That does not cast doubt on the reality oftheir faith so much as on its permanence and power. 'Behold the hourcometh that ye shall be scattered'--as He had told them a littlewhile before in the upper room, like a flock when the shepherd isstricken down--'every man to his own. ' He does not reject theirimperfect homage, though He discerns so clearly its imperfection andits transiency, but sadly warns them to beware of the fleeting natureof their present emotion; and would seek to prepare them, by theknowledge, for the terrible storm that is going to break upon them. 

So let us learn two or three simple lessons. One is that the dearLord accepts imperfect surrender, ignorant faith and love, of whichHe knows that it will soon turn to denial. Oh! if He did not, whatwould become of us all? _We_ reject half hearts; we will not have afriendship on which we cannot rely. The sweetness of vows is allsucked out of them to our apprehension, if we have reason to believethat they will be falsified in an hour. But the patient Master waswilling to put up with what you and I will not put up with; and toaccept what we reject; and be pleased that they gave Him even that. His 'charity suffereth long, and is kind. ' Let us not be afraid tobring even imperfect consecration--

 'A little faith all undisproved'--

to His merciful feet. 

Then another lesson is the need for Christian men sedulously tosearch and make sure that their inward life corresponds with theirwords and professions. I wonder how many thousands of people willstand up this day and say, 'I believe in God the Father Almighty, andin Jesus Christ His only Son, ' whose words would stick in theirthroats if that question of the Master's was put to them, '_Do_ yenow believe?' And I wonder how many of us are the fools of our ownverbal acknowledgments of Christ. Self-examination is not altogethera wholesome exercise, and it may easily be carried too far, to thedestruction of the spontaneity and the gladness of the Christianlife. A man may set his pulse going irregularly by simplyconcentrating his attention upon it, and there may be self-examination of the wrong sort, which does harm rather than good. But, on the other hand, we all need to verify our position, lest ouroutward life should fatally slip away from correspondence with ourinward. Our words and acts of Christian profession and service arelike bank notes. What will be the end if there is a whole ream ofsuch going up and down the world, and no balance of bullion in thecellars to meet them? Nothing but bankruptcy. Do you see to it thatyour reserve of gold, deep down in your hearts, always leaves amargin beyond the notes in circulation issued by you. And in themidst of your professions hear the Master saying, '_Do ye_ nowbelieve?'

Another lesson that I draw is, trust no emotions, no religiousexperiences, but only Him to whom they turn. 

These men were perfectly sincere, and there was a glow of gladness intheir hearts, and a real though imperfect faith when they spoke. Inan hours time where were they?

We often deal far too hard measure to these poor disciples, in ourestimate of their conduct at that critical moment. We talk about themas cowards. Well, they were better and they were worse than cowards;for their courage failed second, but their faith had failed first. The Cross made them dastards because it destroyed their confidence inJesus Christ. 

'We _trusted_. ' Ah! what a world of sorrow there is in those twofinal letters of that word! 'We trusted that it had been He whoshould have redeemed Israel. ' But they do not trust it any more, andso why should they put themselves in peril for One on whom theirfaith can no longer build?

Would we have been any better if we had been there? Suppose you hadstood afar off and seen Jesus die on the cross, would your faith havelived? Do we not know what it is to be a great deal more exuberant inour professions of faith--and real faith it is, no doubt--in somequiet hour when we are with Him by ourselves, than when swords areflashing and we are in the presence of His antagonists? Do we notknow what it is to grasp conviction at one moment, and the next tofind it gone like a handful of mist from our clutch? Is our Christianlife always lived upon one high uniform level? Have we no experienceof hours of exhaustion coming after deep religious emotion? 'Let himthat is without sin among you cast the first stone'; there will notbe many stones flung if that law be applied. Let us all, recognisingour own weakness, trust to nothing, either in our convictions or ouremotions, but only to Him, and cry, 'Hold Thou me up, and I shall besafe!'

III. Lastly, note the lonely Christ and His companion. 

'Ye shall leave Me alone'; there is sadness, though it be calm, inthat clause, and then, I suppose, there was a moment's pause beforethe quiet voice began again: 'And yet I am not alone, for the Fatheris with Me. ' There are two currents there, both calm; but the onebright and the other dark. 

Jesus was the loneliest man that ever lived. All other forms of humansolitude were concentrated in His. He knew the pain of unappreciatedaims, unaccepted love, unbelieved teachings, a heart thrown back uponitself. No man understood Him, no man knew Him, no man deeply andthoroughly loved Him or sympathised with Him, and He dwelt apart. Hefelt the pain of solitude more sharply than sinful men do. Perfectpurity is keenly susceptible; a heart fully charged with love iswounded sore when the love is thrown back, and all the more sorelythe more unselfish it is. 

Solitude was no small part of the pain of Christ's passion. Rememberthe pitiful appeal in Gethsemane, 'Tarry ye here and watch with Me!'Remember the threefold vain return to the sleepers in the hope offinding some sympathy from them. Remember the emphasis with which, more than once in His life, He foretold the loneliness of His death. And then let us understand how the bitterness of the cup that Hedrank had for not the least bitter of its ingredients the sense thatHe drank it alone. 

Now, dear friends! some of us, no doubt, have to live outwardlysolitary lives. We all of us live alone after all fellowship andcommunion. Physicists tell us that in the most solid bodies the atomsdo not touch. Hearts come closer than atoms, but yet, after all, wedie alone, and in the depths of our souls we all live alone. So letus be thankful that the Master knows the bitterness of solitude, andhas Himself trod that path. 

Then we have here the calm consciousness of unbroken communion. JesusChrist's sense of union with the Father was deep, close, constant, inmanner and measure altogether transcending any experience of ours. But still He sets before us a pattern of what we should aim at inthese great words. They show the path of comfort for every lonelyheart. 'I am not alone, for the Father is with Me. ' If earth be dark, let us look to Heaven. If the world with its millions seems to haveno friend in it for us, let us turn to Him who never leaves us. Ifdear ones are torn from our grasp, let us grasp God. Solitude isbitter; but, like other bitters, it is a tonic. It is not all loss ifthe trees which with their leafy beauty shut out the sky from us arefelled, and so we see the blue. 

Christ's company is to us what the Father's fellowship was to Christ. He has borne solitude that He might be the companion of all thelonely, and the same voice which said, 'Ye shall leave Me alone, 'said also, 'I am with you always, even to the end of the world. '

But _that_ communion of Christ with the Father was broken, in thatawful hour when He cried: 'My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?' Wetread there on the verge of mysteries, beyond our comprehension; butthis we know--that it was our sin and the world's, made His by Hiswilling identifying of Himself with us, which built up that blackwall of separation. That hour of utter desolation, forsaken by God, deserted by men, was the hour of the world's redemption. And JesusChrist was forsaken by God and deserted by men, that you and I mightnever be either the one or the other, but might find in His sweet andconstant companionship at once the society of man and the presence ofGod. 

PEACE AND VICTORY

'These things I have spoken unto you, that in Me ye might havepeace. In the world ye shall have tribulation; but be of goodcheer; I have overcome the world. '--JOHN xvi. 33. 

So end these wonderful discourses, and so ends our Lord's teachingbefore His passion. He gathers up in one mighty word the totalintention of these sweet and deep sayings which we have so long beenpondering together. He sketches in broad outline the continualcharacteristics of the disciples' life, and closes all with thestrangest shout of victory, even at the moment when He seems mostutterly defeated. 

We shall, I think, best lay on our hearts and minds the spirit andpurpose of these words if we simply follow their course, and look atthe three things which Christ emphasises here: the inward peace whichis His purpose for us; the outward tribulation which is our certainfate; and the courageous confidence which Christ's victory for usgives. 

I. Note, then, first, the inward peace. 

'These things have I spoken unto you that in Me ye might have peace. 'Peace is not lethargy; and it is very remarkable to notice how, inimmediate connection with this great promise, there occur words whichsuggest its opposite--tribulation and battle. 'In the world ye havetribulation. ' 'I have overcome'--that means a fight. These are to goside by side with the peace that He promises. The two conditionsbelong to two different spheres. The Christian life bifurcates, as itwere, into a double root, and moves in two realms--'in Me' and 'inthe world' And the predicates and characteristics of these two livesare, in a large measure, diametrically opposite. So here, without anycontradiction, our Lord brackets together these two oppositeconditions as both pertaining to the life of a devout soul. Hepromises a peace which co-exists with tribulation and disturbance, apeace which is realised in and through conflict and struggle. Thetree will stand, with its deep roots and its firm bole, unmoved, though wildest winds may toss its branches and scatter its leaves. Inthe fortress, beleaguered by the sternest foes, there may be, rightin the very centre of the citadel, a quiet oratory through whosethick walls the noise of battle and the shout of victory or defeatcan never penetrate. So we may live in a centre of rest, however wildmay be the uproar in the circumference. 'In Me. .. Peace, ' that is theinnermost life. 'In the world. .. Tribulation, ' that is only thesurface. 

But, then, note that this peace, which exists with, and is realisedthrough, tribulation and strife, depends upon certain conditions. OurLord does not say, 'Ye have peace, ' but 'These things I have spokenthat you _may_ have it. ' It is a possibility; and He lays downdistinctly and plainly here the twofold set of conditions, infulfilment of which a Christian disciple may dwell secure and still, in the midst of all confusion. Note, then, these two. 

It is peace, if we have it at all, _in Him_. Now you remember howemphatically and loftily, as one of the very key-notes of thesediscourses, our Lord has spoken to us, in them, of 'dwelling in Him'as the prerogative and the duty of every Christian. We are in Him asin an atmosphere. In Him our true lives are rooted as a tree in thesoil. We are in Him as a branch in the vine, in Him as the members ina body, in Him as the residents in a house. We are in Him by simplefaith, by the trust that rests all upon Him, by the love that findsall in Him, by the obedience that does all for Him. And it is onlywhen we are 'in Christ' that we rest, and realise peace. All elsebrings distraction. Even delights trouble. The world may giveexcitement, the world may give vulgar and fleeting joys, the worldmay give stimulus to much that is good and true in us, but there isonly one thing that gives peace, and that is that our hearts shoulddwell in the Fortress, and should ever be surrounded by Jesus Christ. Brother! let nothing tempt us down from the heights, and out from thecitadel where alone we are at rest; but in the midst of all thepressing duties, the absorbing cares, the carking anxieties, theseducing temptations of the world, and in the presence of all thenecessity for noble conflict which the world brings to every man thatis not its slave, let us try to keep the roots of our lives incontact with that soil from which they draw all their nourishment, and to wrap ourselves round with the life of Jesus Christ, whichshall make an impenetrable shield between us and 'the fiery darts ofthe wicked. ' Keep on the lee side of the breakwater and your littlecock-boat will ride out the gale. Keep Christ between you and thehurtling storm, and there will be a quiet place below the wall whereyou may rest, hearing not the loud winds when they call. 'Thesethings have I spoken that in Me ye might have peace. '

But there is another condition. Christ speaks the great words whichhave been occupying us so long, that they may bring to us peace. Ineed not do more than remind you, in a sentence, of the contents ofthese wonderful discourses. Think of how they have spoken to us ofour Brother's ascension to Heaven to prepare a place for us; of Hiscoming again to receive us to Himself; of His presence with us in Hisabsence; of His indwelling in us and ours in Him; of His gift to usof a divine Spirit. If we believed all these things; if we realisedthem and lived in the faith of them; if we meditated upon them in themidst of our daily duties; and if they were real to us, and not merewords written down in a Book, how should anything be able to disturbus, or to shake our settled confidence? Cleave to the words of theMaster, and let them pour into your hearts the quietness andconfidence which nothing else can give. And then, whatsoever stormsmay be around, the heart will be at rest. We find peace nowhere elsebut where Mary found her repose, and could shake off care and'trouble about many things, ' sitting at the feet of Jesus, wrapt inHis love and listening to His word. 

II. Then note, secondly, the outward tribulation which is the certainfate of His followers. 

Of course there is a very sad and true sense in which the warning, 'In the world ye shall have tribulation, ' applies to all men. Painand sickness, loss and death, the monotony of hard, continuous, unwelcome toil, hopes blighted or disappointed even in theirfruition, and all the other 'ills that flesh is heir to, ' afflict usall. But our Lord is not speaking here about the troubles that befallmen as men, nor about the chastisement that befalls them as sinners, nor about the evils which dog them because they are mortal or becausethey are bad, but of the yet more mysterious sorrows which fall uponthem because they are good, 'In the world ye have tribulation, ' isthe proper rendering and reading. It had already begun, and it was tobe the standing condition and certain fate of all that followed Him. 

I have already said that the Christian life moves in two spheres, andhence there must necessarily be antagonism and conflict. Whoeverrealises the inward life in Christ will more or less, and sooner orlater, find himself coming into hostile collision with lives whichonly move on the surface and belong to the world. If you and I areChristians after the pattern of Jesus Christ, then we dwell in themidst of an order of things which is not constituted on or for theprinciples that regulate our lives and the objects at which we aim. And hence, in that fundamental discordance between the Christian lifeand society as it is constituted, there must always be, if there behonesty and consistency on the side of the Christian man, more orless of collision between him and it. All that you regard asaxiomatic the world regards as folly, if you take Christ for yourTeacher. All that you labour to secure the world does not care topossess, if you have Him for your aim. All that you live to seek ithas abandoned; all that you desire to obey it will not even consult, if you are taking Christ and His law for your rule. And thereforethere must come, sooner or later, and more or less intensely in allChristian lives, opposition and tribulation. You cannot get away fromthe necessity, so it is as well to face it. 

No doubt the form of antagonism varies. No doubt the more the worldis penetrated by Christian principles divorced from their root andsource, the less vehement and painful will the collision be. But_there_ is the gulf, and there it will remain, until the world is aChurch. No doubt some portion of the battlements of organisedChristianity has tumbled into the ditch, and made it a little lessdeep. Christians have dropped their standard far too much, and so theantagonism is not so plain as it ought to be, and as it used to be, and as, some day, it will be. But there it is, and if you are goingto live out and out like a Christian man, you will get the old sneersflung at you. You will be 'crotchety, ' 'impracticable, ' 'spoilingsport, ' 'not to be dealt with, ' 'a wet blanket, ' 'pharisaical, ''bigoted, ' and all the rest of the pretty words which have been sofrequently used about the men that try to live like Jesus Christ. Never mind! 'In the world ye have tribulation. ' 'I bear in my bodythe marks of the Lord Jesus, ' the branding-iron which tells to whomthe slave belongs. And if it is His initials that I carry I may beproud of the marks. 

But at any rate there will be antagonism. You young men in yourwarehouses, you men that go on 'Change', we people that live by ourpens or our tongues, and find ourselves in opposition to much of thetendencies of the present day--we have all, in our several ways, tobear the cross. Do not let us be ashamed of it, and, above all, donot let us, for the sake of easing our shoulders, be unfaithful toour Master. 'In the world ye have tribulation'; and the Christianman's peace has to be like the rainbow that lives above the cataract--still and radiant, whilst it shines above the hell of white watersthat are tortured below. 

III. Lastly, notice the courageous confidence which comes from theLord's victory. 

'Be of good cheer!' It is the old commandment that rang out to Joshuawhen, on the departure of Moses, the conduct of the war fell into hisless experienced hands: 'Be strong, and of a good courage; only bethou strong and very courageous. ' So says the Captain of salvation, leaving His soldiers to face the current of the heady fight in thefield. Like some leader who has climbed the ramparts, or hewed hisway through the broken ranks of the enemies, and rings out the voiceof encouragement and call to his followers, our Captain sets beforeus His own example: 'I have overcome the world, ' He said that the daybefore Calvary. If that was victory, what would defeat have been?

Notice, then, how our Lord's life was a true battle. The world triedto draw Him away from God by appealing to things desirable to sense, as in the wilderness; or to things dreadful to sense, as on thecross; and both the one and the other form of temptation He faced andconquered. It was no shadow fight which evoked this paean of victoryfrom His lips. The reality of His conflict is somewhat concealed fromus by reason of its calm and the completeness of His conquest. We donot appreciate the force that drives a planet upon its path becauseit is calm and continuous and silent, but the power that kept JesusChrist continually faithful to His Father, continually sure of thatFather's presence, continually averse to all self-will and selfishliving, was a power mightier then all others that have beenmanifested in the history of humanity. The Captain of our salvationhas really fought the fight before us. 

But mark, again, that our Lord's life is the type of all victoriouslife. The world conquers me when it draws me away from God, when itmakes me its slave, when it coaxes me to trust it, and urges todespair if I lose it. The world conquers me when it comes between meand God, when it fills my desires, when it absorbs my energies, whenit blinds my eyes to the things unseen and eternal. I conquer theworld when I put my foot upon its temptations, when I crush it down, when I shake off its bonds, and when nothing that time and sense, with their delights or their dreadfulnesses, can bring, prevents mefrom cleaving to my Father with all my heart, and from living as Hischild here. Whoso thus coerces Time and Sense to be the servants ofhis filial love has conquered them both, and whoso lets them draw himaway from God is beaten, however successful he may dream himself tobe and men may call him. 

My friends! there is a lesson for Manchester people. Jesus Christ wasnot a very successful man according to the standard of Market Streetand the Exchange. He made but a poor thing of the world, and He wasgoing to be martyred on the cross the day after He said these words. And yet that was victory. Ay! Many a man beaten down in the struggleof daily life, and making very little of it, according to our vulgarestimate, is the true conqueror. Success means making the world astepping-stone to God. 

Still further, note our share in the Master's victory--'_I_ haveovercome the world. Be _ye_ of good cheer. ' That seems an irrelevantway of arguing. What does it matter to me though He has overcome? Somuch the better for Him; but what good is it to me?

It may aid us somewhat to more strenuous fighting, if we know that abrother has fought and conquered, and I do not under-estimate theblessing and the benefit of the life of Jesus Christ, as recorded inthese Scriptures, even from that, as I conceive it, miserablyinadequate and imperfect point of view. But the victory of JesusChrist is of extremely little practical use to me, if all the use ofit is to show me how to fight. Ah! you must go a deal deeper thanthat. 'I have overcome the world, and I will come and put Myovercoming Spirit into your weakness, and fill you with My ownvictorious life, and make your hands strong to war and your fingersto fight; and be in you the conquering and omnipotent Power. '

My friends! Jesus Christ's victory is ours, and we are victors in it, because He is more than the pattern of brave warfare, He is even theSon of God, who gave Himself for us, and gives Himself to us, anddwells in us our Strength and our Righteousness. 

Lastly, remember that the condition of that victory's being ours isthe simple act of reliance upon Him and upon it. The man who goesinto the battle as that little army of the Hebrews did against thewide-stretching hosts of the enemy, saying, 'O Lord! we know not whatto do, but our eyes are up unto Thee, ' will come out 'more thanconqueror through Him that loved him. ' For 'this is the victory thatovercometh the world, even our faith. '

THE INTERCESSOR

'These words spake Jesus, and lifted up His eyes to heaven, andsaid, Father, the hour is come; glorify Thy Son, that Thy Sonalso may glorify Thee: As Thou hast given Him power over allflesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as Thou hastgiven Him. And this is life eternal, that they might know Theethe only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent. I haveglorified Thee on the earth: I have finished the work which Thougavest Me to do. And now, O Father, glorify Thou Me with Thineown Self with the glory which I had with Thee before the worldwas. I have manifested Thy name unto the men which Thou gavest Meout of the world: Thine they were, and Thou gavest them Me; andthey have kept Thy word. Now they have known that all thingswhatsoever Thou hast given Me, are of Thee. For I have given untothem the words which Thou gavest Me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came out from Thee, and they havebelieved that Thou didst send Me. I pray for them: I pray not forthe world, but for them which Thou hast given Me; for they areThine. And all Mine are Thine, and Thine are Mine; and I amglorified in them. And now I am no more in the world, but theseare in the world, and I come to Thee. Holy Father, keep throughThine own name those whom Thou hast given Me, that they may beone, as we are. While I was with them in the world, I kept themin Thy name: those that Thou gavest Me I have kept, and none ofthem is lost, but the son of perdition; that the Scripture mightbe fulfilled. And now come I to Thee; and these things I speak inthe world, that they might have My joy fulfilled in themselves. Ihave given them Thy word; and the world hath hated them, becausethey are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. I praynot that Thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that Thoushouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them through Thy truth:Thy word is truth. As Thou hast sent Me into the world, even sohave I also sent them into the world. And for their sakes Isanctify Myself, that they also might be sanctified through thetruth. '--JOHN xvii. 1-19. 

We may well despair of doing justice to the deep thoughts of thisprayer, which volumes would not exhaust. Who is worthy to speak or towrite about such sacred words? Perhaps we may best gain some glimpsesof their great and holy sublimity by trying to gather their teachinground the centres of the three petitions, 'glorify' (vs. 1, 5), 'keep' (v. 11), and 'sanctify' (v. 17). 

I. In verses 1-5, Jesus prays for Himself, that He may be restored toHis pre-incarnate glory; but yet the prayer desires not so much thatglory as affecting Himself, as His being fitted thereby forcompleting His work of manifesting the Father. There are three mainpoints in these verses-the petition, its purpose, and its grounds. 

As to the first, the repetition of the request in verses 1 and 5 issignificant, especially if we note that in the former the language isimpersonal, 'Thy Son, ' and continues so till verse 4, where 'I' and'Me' appear. In verses 1-3, then, the prayer rests upon the idealrelations of Father and Son, realised in Jesus, while in verses 4 and5 the personal element is emphatically presented. The two petitionsare in their scope identical. The 'glorifying' in the former is morefully explained in the latter as being that which He possessed inthat ineffable fellowship with the Father, not merely beforeincarnation, but before creation. In His manhood He possessed andmanifested the 'glory as of the Only-Begotten of the Father, full ofgrace and truth'; but that glory, lustrous though it was, was pale, and humiliation compared with the light inaccessible, which shonearound the Eternal Word in the bosom of the Father. Yet He who prayedwas the same Person who had walked in that light before time was, andnow in human flesh asked for what no mere manhood could bear. Thefirst form of the petition implies that such a partaking in theuncreated glory of the Father is the natural prerogative of One whois 'the Son, ' while the second implies that it is the appropriaterecompense of the earthly life and character of the man Jesus. 

The petition not only reveals the conscious divinity of the Son, butalso His willing acceptance of the Cross; for the glorifying soughtis that reached through death, resurrection, and ascension, and thatintroductory clause, 'the hour is come, ' points to the impendingsufferings as the first step in the answer to the petition. TheCrucifixion is always thus treated in this Gospel, as being both thelowest humiliation and the 'lifting up' of the Son; and here He isreaching out His hand, as it were, to draw His sufferings nearer. Sowillingly and desiringly did this Isaac climb the mount of sacrifice. Both elements of the great saying in the Epistle to the Hebrews arehere: 'For the joy that was set before Him, [He] endured the Cross. '

The purpose of the petition is to be noted; namely, the Son'sglorifying of the Father. No taint of selfishness corrupted Hisprayer. Not for Himself, but for men, did He desire His glory. Hesought return to that serene and lofty seat, and the elevation of Hislimited manhood to the throne, not because He was wearied of earth orimpatient of weakness, sorrows, or limitations, but that He mightmore fully manifest by that Glory, the Father's name. To make theFather known is to make the Father glorious; for He is all fair andlovely. That revelation of divine perfection, majesty, and sweetnesswas the end of Christ's earthly life, and is the end of His heavenlydivine activity. He needs to reassume the prerogatives of which Heneeded to divest Himself, and both necessities have one end. He hadto lay aside His garments and assume the form of a servant, that Hemight make God known; but, that revelation being complete, He musttake His garments and sit down again, before He can go on to tell allthe meaning of what He has 'done unto us. '

The ground of the petition is twofold. Verses 2 and 3 represent theglory sought for, as the completion of the Son's mission and task. Already He had been endowed with 'authority over all flesh, ' for thepurpose of bestowing eternal life; and that eternal life stands inthe knowledge of God, which is the same as the knowledge of Christ. The present gift to the Son and its purpose are thus preciselyparallel with the further gift desired, and that is the necessarycarrying out of this. The authority and office of the incarnateChrist demand the glory of, and consequent further manifestation by, the glorified Christ. The life which He comes to give is a life whichflows from the revelation that He makes of the Father, received, notas mere intellectual knowledge, but as loving acquaintance. 

The second ground for the petition is in verse 4, the actual perfectfulfilment by the Son of that mission. What untroubled consciousnessof sinless obedience and transparent shining through His life of theFather's likeness and will He must have had, who could thus assertHis complete realisation of that Father's revealing purpose, as theground of His deserving and desiring participation in the divineglory! Surely such words are either the acme of self-righteousness orthe self-revealing speech of the Son of God. 

II. With verse 6 we pass to the more immediate reference to thedisciples, and the context from thence to verse 15 may be regarded asall clustered round the second petition 'keep' (v. 11). That centralrequest is preceded and followed by considerations of the disciples'relation to Christ and to the world, which may be regarded as itsgrounds. The whole context preceding the petition may be summed up intwo grounds for the prayer--the former set forth at length, and thelatter summarily; the one being the genuine, though incompletediscipleship of the men for whom Christ prays (vs. 6-10), and thelatter their desolate condition without Jesus (v. 11). 

It is beautiful to see how our Lord here credits the disciples withgenuine grasp, both in heart and head, of His teaching. He hadshortly before had to say, 'Have I been so long time with you, andyet hast thou not known Me?' and soon 'they all forsook Him andfled. ' But beneath misconception and inadequate apprehension therelived faith and love; and He saw 'the full corn in the ear, ' whenonly the green 'blade' was visible, pushing itself above the surface. We may take comfort from this generous estimate of imperfectdisciples. If He did not tend, instead of quenching, 'dimly burningwicks, ' where would He have 'lights in the world?'

Verse 6 lays down the beginning of discipleship as threefold:Christ's act in revealing; the Father's, in giving men to Jesus; andmen's, in keeping the Father's word. 'Thy word' is the wholerevelation by Christ, which is, as this Gospel so often repeats, notHis own, but the Father's. These three facts underlying discipleshipare pleas for the petition to follow; for unless the feeble disciplesare 'kept' in the name, as in a fortress, Christ's work of revelationis neutralised, the Father's gift to Him made of none effect, and theincipient disciples will not 'keep' His word. The plea is, in effect, 'Forsake not the works of thine own hands'; and, like all Christ'sprayers, it has a promise in its depths, since God does not beginwhat He will not finish; and it has a warning, too, that we cannotkeep ourselves unless a stronger Hand keeps us. 

Verses 7 and 8 carry on the portraiture of discipleship, and thencedraw fresh pleas. The blessed result of accepting Christ's revelationis a knowledge, built on happy experience, and, like the acquaintanceof heart with heart, issuing in the firm conviction that Christ'swords and deeds are from God. Why does He say, 'All things whatsoeverThou hast given, ' instead of simply 'that I have' or 'declare'?Probably it is the natural expression of His consciousness, the lowlyutterance of His obedience, claiming nothing as His own, and yetclaiming all, while the subsequent clause 'are of Thee' expresses thedisciples' conviction. In like fashion our Lord, in verse 8, declaresthat His words, in their manifoldness (contrast v. 6, 'Thy word'), were all received by Him from the Father, and accepted by thedisciples, with the result that they came, as before, to 'know' byinward acquaintance with Him as a person, and so to have the divinityof His Person certified by experience, and further came to 'believe'that God had sent Him, which was a conviction arrived at by faith. Soknowledge, which is personal experience and acquaintance, and faith, which rises to the heights of the Father's purpose, come from thehumble acceptance of the Christ declaring the Father's name. Firstfaith, then knowledge, and then a fuller faith built on it, and thatfaith in its turn passing into knowledge (v. 25)--these are theblessings belonging to the growth of true discipleship, and arediscerned by the loving eye of Jesus in very imperfect followers. 

In verse 9 Jesus assumes the great office of Intercessor. 'I pray forthem' is not so much prayer as His solemn presentation of Himselfbefore the Father as the High-priest of His people. It marks an epochin His work. The task of bringing God to man is substantiallycomplete. That of bringing men by supplication to God is now tobegin. It is the revelation of the permanent office of the departedLord. Moses on the Mount holds up the rod, and Israel prevails (Exod. Xvii. 9). The limitation of this prayer to the disciples applies onlyto the special occasion, and has no bearing on the sweep of Hisredeeming purpose or the desires of His all-pitying heart. Thereasons for His intercession follow in verses 9-11a. The disciplesare the Father's, and continue so even when 'given' to Christ, inaccordance with the community of possession, which oneness of natureand perfectness of love establish between the Father and the Son. Godcannot but care for those who are His. The Son cannot but pray forthose who are His. Their having recognised Him for what He was bindsHim to pray for them. He is glorified in disciples, and if we showforth His character, He will be our Advocate. The last reason for Hisprayer is the loneliness of the disciples and their exposure in theworld without Him. His departure impelled Him to Intercede, both asbeing a leaving them defenceless and as being an entrance into theheavenly state of communion with the Father. 

In the petition itself (v. 11b), observe the invocation 'HolyFather!' with special reference to the prayer for preservation fromthe corruption of the world. God's holiness is the pledge that Hewill make us holy, since He is 'Father' as well. Observe thesubstance of the request, that the disciples should be kept, as in afortress, within the enclosing circle of the name which God has givento Jesus. The name is the manifestation of the divine nature. It wasgiven to Jesus, inasmuch as He, 'the Word, ' had from the beginningthe office of revealing God; and that which was spoken of the Angelof the Covenant is true in highest reality of Jesus: 'My name is inHim. ' 'The name of the Lord is a strong tower: the righteous runnethinto it and is safe. '

Observe the issue of this keeping; namely, the unity of believers. The depths of that saying are beyond us, but we can at least see thusfar--that the true bond of unity is the name in which all who are oneare kept; that the pattern of the true unity of believers is theineffable union of Father and Son, which is oneness of will andnature, along with distinctness of persons; and that therefore thispurpose goes far deeper than outward unity of organisation. 

Then follow other pleas, which are principally drawn from Christ'srelation to the disciples, now ending; whereas the former ones werechiefly deduced from the disciples' relation to Him. He can no moredo what He has done, and commits it to the Father. Happy we if we canleave our unfinished tasks to be taken up by God, and trust thosewhom we leave undefended to be shielded by Him! 'I kept' is, in theGreek, expressive of continuous, repeated action, while 'I guarded'gives the single issue of the many acts of keeping. Jesus keeps Hisdisciples now as He did then, by sedulous, patient, reiterated acts, so that they are safe from evil. But note where He kept them--'in Thyname. ' That is our place of safety, a sure defence and inexpugnablefortress. One, indeed, was lost; but that was not any slur onChrist's keeping, but resulted from his own evil nature, as being 'ason of loss' (if we may so preserve the affinity of the words in theGreek), and from the divine decree from of old. Sharply defined andclosely united are the two apparent contradictories of man's freechoice of destruction and God's foreknowledge. Christ saw them inharmony, and we shall do so one day. 

Then the flow of the prayer recurs to former thoughts. Going away sosoon, He yearned to leave them sharers of His own emotions in theprospect of His departure to the Father, and therefore He hadadmitted them (and us) to hear this sacred outpouring of His desires. If we laid to heart the blessed revelations of this disclosure ofChrist's heart, and followed Him with faithful gaze as He ascends tothe Father, and realised our share in that triumph, our empty vesselswould be filled by some of that same joy which was His. Earthly joycan never be full; Christian joy should never be anything less thanfull. 

Then follows a final glance at the disciples' relation to the world, to which they are alien because they are of kindred to Him. This isthe ground for the repetition of the prayer 'keep', with thedifference that formerly it was 'keep _in_ Thy name, ' and now it is'_from_ the evil. ' It is good to gaze first on our defence, the'munitions of rocks' where we lie safely, and then we can venture toface the thought of 'the evil, ' from which that keeps us, whether itbe personal or abstract. 

III. Verses 16-19 give the final petition for the immediate circle ofdisciples, with its grounds. The position of alienation from theworld, in which the disciples stand by reason of their assimilationto Jesus, is repeated here. It was the reason for the former prayer, 'keep'; it is the reason for the new petition, 'sanctify. ' Keepingcomes first, and then sanctifying, or consecration. Security fromevil is given that we may be wholly devoted to the service of God. The evil in the world is the great hindrance to that. The likeness toJesus is the great ground of hope that we shall be truly consecrated. We are kept 'in the name'; we are consecrated 'in the truth, ' whichis the revelation made by Jesus, and in a very deep sense is Himself. That truth is, as it were, the element in which the believer lives, and by abiding in which his real consecration is possible. 

Christ's prayer for us should be our aim and deepest desire forourselves, and His declaration of the condition of its fulfilmentshould prescribe our firm adhesion to, and constant abiding in, thetruth as revealed and embodied in Him, as the only means by which wecan attain the consecration which is at once, as the closing versesof the passage tell us, the means by which we may fulfil the purposefor which we are sent into the world, and the path on which we reachcomplete assimilation to His perfect self-surrender. All Christiansare sent into the world by Jesus, as Jesus was sent by the Father. Wehave the charge to glorify Him. We have the presence of the Senderwith us, the sent. We are inspired with His Spirit. We cannot do Hiswork without that entire consecration which shall copy His devotionto the Father and eager swiftness to do His will. How can suchennobling and exalted consecration be ours? There is but one way. Hehas 'consecrated Himself, ' and by union with Him through faith, ourselfishness may be subdued, and the Spirit of Christ may dwell in ourhearts, to make us 'living sacrifices, consecrated and acceptable toGod. ' Then shall we be truly 'consecrated, ' and then only, when wecan say, 'I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. ' That is theend of Christ's consecration of Himself--the prayer which He prayedfor His disciples--and should be the aim which every discipleearnestly pursues. 

'THE LORD THEE KEEPS'

'. .. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Ipray not that Thou shouldest take them out of the world, but thatThou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of theworld, even as I am not of the world. '--JOHN xvii. 14-16. 

We have here a petition imbedded in a reiterated statement of thedisciples' isolated position when left in a hostile world withoutChrist's sheltering presence. We cannot fathom the depth of themystery of the _praying_ Christ, but we may be sure of this, that Hisprayers were always in harmony with the Father's will, were, in fact, the expression of that will, and were therefore promises andprophecies. What He prays the Father for His disciples He gives toHis disciples. Once only had He to say, 'If it be possible'; at allother times He prayed as sure that 'Thou hearest Me always, ' and inthis very prayer He speaks in a tone of strange authority, when Heprays for all believers in future ages, and says: 'I will that, whereI am, they also may be with Me. ' In this High-priestly prayer, offered when Gethsemane was almost in sight, and the Judgment Halland Calvary were near, our Lord's tender interest in His disciplesfills His mind, and even in its earlier portion, which is in form aseries of petitions for Himself, it is in essence a prayer for them, whilst this central section which concerns the Apostles, and theclosing section which casts the mantle of His love and care over allwho hereafter shall 'believe on Me through their word, ' witnesses tothe sublime completeness of His self-oblivion. Gethsemane heard Hisprayer for Himself; here He prays for His people, and the calmserenity and confident assurance of this prayer, set against theagitation of that other, receives and gives emphasis by the contrast. 

Our text falls into two parts, the enclosing circle of the repeatedstatement of the disciples' isolation in an alien world, and theenclosed jewel of the all-sufficient prayer which guarantees theirprotection. We shall best make its comfort and cheer our own bydealing with these two successively. 

I. The disciples' isolation. 

Of course we are to interpret the 'world' here in accordance with theethical usage of that term in this Gospel, according to which itmeans the aggregate of mankind considered as apart from and alien toGod. It is roughly equivalent to the modern phrase, 'society. '

With that order of things Christ's real followers are not in accord. 

That want of accord depends upon their accord with Jesus. 

Every Christian has the 'mind of Christ' in him, in the measure ofhis Christianity. 'It is enough for the disciple that he be as hisMaster' But Christian discipleship has a better guarantee for theassimilation of the disciple to his Lord than the ordinary forms ofthe relation of teacher and taught ever present. There is aparticipation in the Master's life, an implantation in the scholar'sspirit of the Teacher's Spirit. 'Christ in us' is not only 'the hopeof glory, ' but the power which makes possible and actual the presentpossession of a life kindred with, because derived from, andessentially one with, His life. 

They whose spirits are touched by the indwelling Christ to the 'fineissues' of sympathy with the law of His earthly life cannot but livein the world as aliens, and wander amid its pitfalls with 'blankmisgivings' and a chill sense that this is not their rest. They areknit to One whose 'meat and drink' was to do the will of the Fatherin heaven, who 'pleased not Himself, ' whose life was all one longservice and sacrifice for men, whose joys were not fed by earthlypossessions or delights. How should they have a sense of community ofaims with grovelling hearts that cling to wealth or ambition, thatare not at peace with God, and have no holdfasts beyond this 'bankand shoal of time'? A man who has drunk into the spirit of Christ'slife is thereby necessarily thrown out of gear with the world. 

Happy is he if his union with Jesus is so deep and close that it isbut deepened by his experience of the lack of sympathy between theworld and himself! Happy if his consciousness of not being 'of theworld' but quickens his desire to help the world and glorify hisLord, by bringing His all-sufficiency into its emptiness, and leadingit, too, to discern His sweetness and beauty!

But how little the life of the average Christian corresponds to thisreiterated utterance of our Lord! Who of us dare venture to take iton our lips and to say that we are 'not of the world even as He isnot of the world'? Is not our relation to that world of which Jesushere speaks a contrast rather than a parallel to His? The 'prince ofthis world' had nothing in Christ, as He himself declared, but He hasmuch in each of us. There are stored up heaps of combustibles inevery one of us which catch fire only too swiftly, and burn but toofiercely, when the 'fiery darts of the wicked' fall among them. Instead of an instinctive recoil from the view of life characteristicof 'the world, ' we must confess, if we are honest, that it draws usstrongly, and many of us are quite at home with it. Why is this butbecause we do not habitually live near enough to our Lord to drink inHis Spirit? The measure of our discord with the world is the measureof our accord with our Saviour. It is in the degree in which wepossess His life that we come to be aliens here, and it is in thedegree in which we keep in touch with Jesus, and keep our hearts wideopen for the entrance of His Spirit, that we possess His life. Aworldly Christian--no uncommon character--is a Christian who has allbut shut himself off from the life which Christ breathes into theexpectant soul. 

II. The disciples' guarded security. 

Jesus encloses His prayer between the two parts of that repeatedstatement of the disciples' isolation. It is like some lovely, peaceful plain circled by grim mountains. The isolation is anecessary consequence of the disciples' previous union with Him. Itinvolves much that is painful to the unrenewed part of their natures, but their Lord's prayer is more than enough for their security andpeace. 

'I pray not that Thou shouldest take them out of the world. ' They arein it by God's appointment for great purposes, affecting their owncharacters and affecting the world, with which Christ will notinterfere. It is their training ground, their school. The sense ofbelonging to another order is to be intensified by their experiencesin it, and these are to make more vivid the hopes that yearn towardsthe true home, and to develop the 'wrestling thews that throw theworld. ' The discipline of life is too precious to be tampered witheven by a Saviour's prayer, and He loves His people too wisely toseek to shelter them from its roughness, and to procure for themexemption which would impoverish their characters. 

So let us learn the lesson and shape our desires after the pattern ofour Lord's prayer for us, nor blindly seek for that ease which Hewould not ask for us. False asceticism that shrinks from contact withan alien world, weak running from trials and temptations, selfishdesires for exemption from sorrows, are all rebuked by this prayer. Christ's relation to the world is our pattern, and we are not to seekfor pillows in an order of things where He 'had not where to lay Hishead. '

But He does ask for His people that they may be kept 'from evil, ' orfrom 'the evil One. ' That prayer is, as we have said, a promise and aprophecy. But the fulfilment of it in each individual disciple hingeson the disciple's keeping himself in touch with Jesus, whereby the'much virtue' of His prayer will encompass him and keep him safe. Wedo not discuss the alternative renderings, according to one of which'the evil' is impersonal, and according to the other of which it isconcentrated in the personal 'prince of this world. ' In either case, it is 'the evil' against which the disciples are to be guarded, whether it has a personal source or not. 

Here, in Christ's intercession, is the firm ground of our confidencethat we may be 'more than conquerors' in the life-long fight which wehave to wage. The sweet strong old psalm is valid in its assurancesto-day for every soul which puts itself under the shadow of Christ'sprotecting intercession: 'The Lord shall keep thee from all evil, Heshall keep thy soul. ' We have not 'to lift up our eyes unto thehills, ' for 'vainly is help hoped for from the multitude of themountains, ' but 'Our help cometh from the Lord which made heaven andearth. ' Therefore we may dwell at peace in the midst of an alienworld, having the Father for our Keeper, and the Son, who overcamethe world, for our Intercessor, our Pattern and our Hope. 

The parallel between Christ and His people applies to their relationsto the present order of things: 'They are not of the world, even as Iam not of the world. ' It applies to their mission here: 'As Thoudidst send Me into the world, even so sent I them into the world. ' Itapplies to the future: 'I am no more in the world, but these are inthe world, and I come to Thee, ' and in that 'coming' lies theguarantee that His servants will, each in his due time, come out fromthis alien world and pass into the state which is home, because He isthere. The prayer that they might be kept from the evil, whileremaining in the scene where evil is rampant, is crowned by theprayer: 'I will that, where I am, they also may be with Me, that theymay behold My glory. '

THE HIGH PRIEST'S PRAYER

'Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shallbelieve on Me through their word; That they all may be one; asThou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be onein us: that the world may believe that Thou hast sent Me. And theglory which Thou givest Me I have given them; that they may beone, even as we are one: I in them, and Thou in Me, that they maybe made perfect in one; and that the world may know that Thouhast sent Me, and hast loved them, as Thou hast loved Me. Father, I will that they also, whom Thou hast given Me, be with Me whereI am; that they may behold My glory, which Thou hast given Me:for Thou lovedst Me before the foundation of the world. Orighteous Father, the world hath not known Thee: but I have knownThee, and these have known that Thou hast sent Me. And I havedeclared unto them Thy name, and will declare it; that the lovewherewith Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them. '--JOHN xvii. 20-26. 

The remainder of this prayer reaches out to all generations ofbelievers to the end. We may incidentally note that it shows thatJesus did not anticipate a speedy end of the history of the world orthe Church; and also that it breathes but one desire, that for theChurch's unity, as though He saw what would be its greatest peril. Characteristic, too, of the idealism of this Gospel is it that thereis no name for that future community. It is not called 'church, ' or'congregation, ' or the like--it is 'them also that believe on Methrough their word, ' a great spiritual community, held together bycommon faith in Him whom the Apostles preached. Is not that still thebest definition of Christians, and does not such a conception of itcorrespond better to its true nature than the formal abstraction, 'the Church'?

We can but touch in the most inadequate fashion the profound words ofthis section of the prayer which would take volumes to expound fitly. We note that it contains four periods, in each of which something isasked or stated, and then a purpose to be attained by the petition orstatement is set forth. 

First comes the prayer for unity and what the answer to it willeffect (v. 21). Now in this verse the unity of believers isprincipally regarded as resulting from the inclusion, if we may sosay, of them all in the ineffable union of the Father and the Son. Jesus prays that 'they may all be one, ' and also 'that they also maybe in us' (Rev. Ver. ). And their unity is no mere matter of formalexternal organisation nor of unanimity of creed, or the like, but itis a deep, vital unity. The pattern of it is the unity of the Fatherand the Son, and the power that brings it about is the abiding of allbelievers 'in us. ' The result of such a manifestation in the world ofa multitude of men, in all of whom one life evidently moves, fusingtheir individualities while retaining their personalities, will bethe world's conviction of the divine mission of Jesus. The world wasbeginning to feel its convictions moving slowly in that direction, when it exclaimed: 'Behold how these Christians love one another!'The alienation of Christians has given barbs and feathers to itsarrows of scorn. But it is 'the unity of the Spirit, ' not that of a, great corporation, that Christ's prayer desires. 

The petitions for what would be given to believers passes for amoment into a statement of what Jesus had already given to them. Hehad begun the unifying gift, and that made a plea for its perfecting. The 'glory' which He had given to these poor bewildered Galilaeanswas but in a rudimentary stage; but still, wherever there is faith inHim, there is some communication of His life and Spirit, and some ofthat veiled and yet radiant glory, 'full of grace and truth, ' whichshone through the covering when the Incarnate Word 'became flesh. ' Itis the Christ-given Christ-likeness in each which knits believersinto one. It is Christ in us and we in Christ that fuses us into one, and thereby makes each perfect. And such flashing back of the lightof Jesus from a million separate crystals, all glowing with one lightand made one in the light, would flash on darkest eyes the lustre ofthe conviction that God sent Christ, and that God's love enfoldedthose Christlike souls even as it enfolded Him. 

Again (v. 24) comes a petition with its result. And here there is nomention of the effect of the answer on the world. For the moment thethoughts of isolation in, and a message to, the world fade away. Thepartially-possessed 'glory' seems to have led on Christ's thoughts tothe calm home of perfection waiting for Him who was 'not of theworld' and was sent into it, and for the humble ones who had takenHim for Lord. 'I will that'--that is a strange tone for a prayer. What consciousness on Christ's part does it involve? The disciplesare not now called 'them that should believe on Me, ' but 'that whichThou hast given Me, ' the individuals melt into the great whole. Theyare Christ's, not merely by their faith or man's preaching, but bythe Father's gift. And the fact of that gift is used as a plea withHim, to 'perfect that which concerneth' them, and to complete theunity of believers with Jesus by bringing them to be 'with Him' inHis triumphant session at the right hand. To 'behold' will be thesame as to share His glory, not only that which we beheld when Hetabernacled among us, but that which He had in the pouring out on Himof God's love 'before the foundation of the world. ' Our dim eyescannot follow the happy souls as they are lost in the blaze, but weknow that they walk in light and are like Him, for they 'see Him asHe is. '

The last statement (vs. 25, 26) is not petition but vow, and, to ourears, promise. The contrast of the world and believers appears forthe last time. What made the world a 'world' was its not knowing God;what made believers isolated in, and having an errand to, the world, was that they 'knew' (not merely 'believed, ' but knew by experience)that Jesus had been sent from God to make known His name. All ourknowledge of God comes through Him; it is for us to recognise Hisdivine mission, and then He will unveil, more and more, with blessedcontinuity of increasing knowledge, the Name, and with growingknowledge of it growing measures of God's love will be in us, andJesus Himself will 'dwell in our hearts by faith' more completely andmore blessedly through an eternity of wider knowledge and morefervent love. 

THE FOLDED FLOCK

'I will that they also, whom Thou hast given Me, be with Me whereI am; that they may behold My glory. '--JOHN xvii. 24. 

This wonderful prayer is (_a_) for Jesus Himself, (_b_) for theApostles, (_c_) for the whole Church on earth and in heaven. 

I. The prayer. 

'I will' has a strange ring of authority. It is the expression of Hislove to men, and of His longing for their presence with Him in Hisglory. Not till they are with Him there, shall He 'see of the travailof His soul and be satisfied. '

We have here a glimpse of the blessed state of the dead in Christ. 

(_a_) Local presence with Christ. His glorified body is somewhere. The value of this thought is that it gives solidity to our ideas of afuture life. There they _are_. We need not dwell on the metaphysicaldifficulties about locality for disembodied spirits. 

If a spirit can be localised in a body, I suppose it can be localisedwithout a body; but passing by all that, we have the hope held outhere of a real local presence with the glorified humanity of ourLord. We speak of the dead as gone _from us_, and we have that ideafar more vividly in our minds than that of their having gone _toHim_. We speak of the 'departed, ' but we do not think of them as'arrived. ' We look down to the narrow grave, but we forget 'He is nothere, He is risen. Why seek ye the living among the dead?' Ah! if wecould only bring home to our hearts the solid prose of the convictionthat where Christ is there His servants are, and that not in thediffused ubiquity of His Divine Omnipresence, it would go far toremove the darkness and vague mist which wrap the future, and to setit as it really is before us, as a solid definite reality. We see thesails glide away out into the west as the sun goes down, and we thinkof them as tossing on a midnight sea, an unfathomable waste. Try tothink of them more truly. As in that old miracle, He comes to themwalking on the water in the night watch, and if at first they areterrified, His voice brings back hope to the heart that is beginningto stand still, and immediately they are at the land whither they go. Now, as they sink from our sight, they are in port, sails furled andanchor dropped, and green fields round them, even while we watch thesinking masts, and cannot yet rightly tell whether the fading sailhas faded wholly. 

(_b_) Communion with Christ. 

Our Lord says not only 'that where I am, they also may be, ' but adds'with Me. ' That is not a superfluous addition, but emphasises thethought of a communion which is more intimate and blessed than localpresence alone would be. 

The communion here is real but imperfect. It is perfected there onour part by the dropping away of flesh and sin, by change ofcircumstances, by emancipation from cares and toils necessary here, by the development of new powers and surroundings, and on His side bynew manifestations. 

(_c_) Vision of His glory. 

The crown of this utterance of Christ's will is 'that they may beholdMy glory. ' In an earlier part of this prayer our Lord had spoken ofthe 'glory which I had with Thee before the world was. ' But probablythe glory 'given' is not that of essential Divinity, but that of Hismediatorial work. To His people 'with Him where He is, ' are impartedfuller views of Christ as Saviour, deeper notions of His work, clearer perception of His rule in providence and nature. This is theloftiest employment of the spirits who are perfected and lapped in'pleasures for evermore' by their union with the glorified Jesus. 

Surely this is grander than all metaphorical pictures of heaven. 

II. The incipient fulfilment now going on. 

The prayer has been in process of fulfilment ever since. The dead inChrist have entered on its answer now. 

We need not discuss difficulties about the 'intermediate state, ' forthis at all events is true, that to be 'absent from the body' is tobe 'present with the Lord. '

A Christian death is an answer to this prayer. True, for Christiansas for all, the physical necessity is an imperative law. True, thepunitive aspect of death is retained for them. But yet the law iswielded by Christ, and while death remains, its whole aspect ischanged. So we may think of those who have departed in His faith andfear as gone in answer to this prayer. 

How beautiful that is! Slowly, one by one, they are gathered in, asthe stars one by one light up. Place after place is filled. 

Thus through the ages the prayer works on, and our dear ones havegone from us, but they have gone to Him. We weep, but they rejoice. To us their departure is the result of an iron law, of a penalnecessity, of some secondary cause; but to them it is seen to be theanswer to His mighty prayer. They hear His voice and follow Him whenHe says, 'Come up hither. '

III. The final fulfilment still future. 

The prayer looks forward to a perfect fulfilment. His prayer cannotbe vain. 

(_a_) Perfect in degree. 

(_b_) Perfect in extent, when all shall be gathered together and the'whole family' shall be 'in heaven, ' and Christ's own word receivesits crowning realisation, that 'of all whom the Father hath given HimHe has lost nothing. '

And these are not some handful picked out by a decree which we canneither fathom nor alter, but Christ is given to us all, and if wechoose to take Him, then for us He has ascended; and as we watch Himgoing up the voice comes to us: 'I go to prepare a place for you. Iwill come again and receive you unto Myself, that where I am, thereye may be also. '

CHRIST'S SUMMARY OF HIS WORK

'I have declared onto them Thy name, and will declare it: thatthe love wherewith Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I inthem. '--JOHN xvii. 26. 

This is the solemn and calm close of Christ's great High-priestlyprayer; the very last words that He spoke before Gethsemane and Hispassion. In it He sums up both the purpose of His life and thepetitions of His prayer, and presents the perfect fulfilment of theformer as the ground on which He asks the fulfilment of the latter. There is a singular correspondence and contrast between these lastwords to God and the last words to the disciples, which immediatelypreceded them. These were, 'In the world ye shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world. ' In both He sums upHis life, in both He is unconscious of flaw, imperfection, orlimitation; in both He shares His own possessions among Hisfollowers. But His words to men carry a trace of His own conflict anda foreboding of theirs. For Him life had been, and for them it was tobe, tribulation and a battle, and the highest thing that He couldpromise them was victory won by conflict. But from the sereneelevation of the prayer all such thoughts disappear. Unbroken calmlies over it. His life has been one continual manifestation of thename of God; and the portion that He promises to His followers is notvictory won by strife, but the participation with Himself in the loveof God. 

Both views are true--true to His experience, true to ours. Thedifference between them lies in the elevation of the beholder's eye. Looked at on the outward side, His life and ours must be always abattle and often a sorrow. Looked at from within, His life was anunbroken abiding in the love of God, and a continual impartation ofthe name of God, and our lives may be an ever growing knowledge ofGod, leading to and being a fuller and fuller possession of His love, and of a present Christ. So let us ponder these deep words: ourLord's own summing up of His work and aims; His statement of what wemay hope to attain; and the path by which we may attain it. I shallbest bring out the whole fullness of their meaning if I simply followthem word by word. 

I. Note, first, the backward look of the revealing Son. 

'I have declared Thy name. '

The first thing that strikes one about these words is their boldness. Remember that they are spoken to God, at the close of a life theheights and depths of which they sum up. They are an appeal to God'srighteous judgment of the whole character of the career. Do theybreathe the tone that we might expect? Surely the prophet or teacherwho has most earnestly tried to make himself a mirror, without spotto darken and without dint to distort the divine ray, will be thefirst to feel, as he looks back, the imperfections of his repetitionof his message. But Jesus Christ, when He looks back over His life, has no flaw, limitation, incompleteness, to record or to confess. Asalways so here, He is absolutely unconscious of anything in thenature of weakness, error, or sin. As when He looked back upon Hislife as a conflict, He had no defeats to remember with shame, sohere, when He looks upon it as the revelation of God He feels thateverything which He has received of the Father He has made known untomen. 

And the strange thing is that we admit the claim, and have become soaccustomed to regard it as being perfectly legitimate that we forgethow enormous it is. He takes an attitude here which in any other manwould be repulsive, but in Him is supremely natural. We criticiseother people, we outgrow their teachings, we see where theirdoctrines have deviated from truth by excess or defect, ordisproportion; but when He says 'I have declared Thy name, ' we feelthat He says nothing more than the simple facts of His life vindicateand confirm. 

Not less remarkable is the implication in these words, not only ofthe completeness of His message, but of the fullness of His knowledgeof God, and its entirely underived nature. So He claims for Himselfan altogether special and unique position here: He has learned Godfrom none; He teaches God to all. 'That was the true Light whichlighteth every man that cometh into the world. '

Looking a little more closely at these words before us, we have hereChrist's own account of His whole life. The meaning of it all is therevelation of the heart of God. Not by words, of course; not by wordsonly, but far more by deeds. And I would have you ask yourselves thisquestion--If the deeds of a man are a declaration of the name of God, what sort of a man is He who thus declares Him? Must we not feel thatif these words, or anything like them, really came from the lips ofJesus Christ, we are here in the presence of something other than aholy life of a simple humanity, which might help men to climb to theapprehension of a God who was perfect love; and that when He says 'Hethat hath seen Me hath seen the Father, ' we stand before 'Godmanifest in the flesh. '

What is that name of God which the revealing Son declares? Not themere syllables by which we call Him, but the manifested character ofthe Father. That one name, in the narrower sense of the word, carriesthe whole revelation that Jesus Christ has to make; for it speaks oftenderness, of kindred, of paternal care, of the transmission of anature, of the embrace of a divine love. And it delivers men from alltheir creeping dreads, from all their dark peradventures, from alltheir stinging fears, from all the paralysing uncertainties which, like clouds, always misty and often thunder-bearing, have shut outthe sight of the divine face. If this Christ, in His weakness andhumanity, with pity welling from His eyes, and making music of Hisvoice, with the swift help streaming from His fingers-tips to everypain and weariness, and the gracious righteousness that drew littlechildren and did not repel publicans and harlots, is our best imageof God, then love is the centre of divinity, and all the rest that wecall God is but circumference and fringe of that central brightness. 

 'So through the thunder comes a human voice Saying, "O heart I made! a heart beats here. "'

He has declared God's name, His last best name of Love. 

Need I dwell for one moment on the fact that that name is onlydeclared by this Son? There is no need to deny the presence ofmanifold other precious sources in men's experience and lives fromwhich something may be inferred of what God truly is. But all these, rich and manifold as they are, fall into nothingness before the lifeof Jesus Christ, considered as the making visible of God. For all therest are partial and incomplete. 'At sundry times and in diversmanners' God flung forth syllables of the name, and 'fragments ofthat mighty voice came rolling down the wind. ' But in Jesus Christthe whole name, in all its syllables, is spoken. Other sources ofknowledge are ambiguous, and need the interpretation of Christ's lifeand Cross ere they can be construed into a harmonious whole. Life, nature, our inmost being, history, all these sources speak with twovoices; and it is only when we hear the deep note that underlies themin the word of Christ that their discord becomes a harmony. Othersources lack authority. They come at the most with a 'may be. ' Hecomes with a 'Verily, verily. ' Other sources speak to theunderstanding, or the conscience, or to fear. Christ speaks to theheart. Other sources leave the man who accepts them unaffected. Christ's message penetrates to the transforming and assimilation ofthe whole being. 

So, dear brethren! for all generations, and for this generation mostof all, the plain alternative lies between the declaration of thename of God in Jesus Christ and a godless and orphan world. Modernthought will make short work of all other sources of certitude aboutthe character of God, and will leave men alone in the dark. Christ, the historical fact of the life and death of Jesus Christ, is thesole surviving source of certitude, which is blessedness, as towhether there is a God, and what sort of a God He is. 

II. Secondly, note here that strange forward look of the dying Man:'I have declared Thy name and _will declare it_. '

And that was said within eight and forty hours of the Cross, which, if He had been a simple human teacher and martyr, would have endedall His activity in the world. But here He is not merely summing upHis life, and laying it aside, writing the last sentence, as it were, which gathers up the whole of the completed book, but He is closingthe first volume, and in the act of doing so He stretches out Hishand to open the second. 'I will declare it. ' When? How? Did notearthly life, then, put a stop to this Teacher's activity? Was therestill prophetic function to be done after death had sealed His lips?Certainly. 

That anticipation, which at once differentiates Him from all thebrood of merely human teachers and prophets, even the highest, doesindeed include as future, at the moment when He speaks, the swiftlycoming and close Cross; but it goes beyond it. How much ofChristendom's knowledge of God depended upon the Passion, on thethreshold of which Christ was standing? He, hanging on the Cross inweakness, and dying there amidst the darkness that overspread theland, is a strange Revealer of the omnipotent, infinite, ever-blessedGod. But Oh! if we strike Gethsemane and Calvary out of Christ'smanifestation of the Father, how infinitely poorer are we and theworld! 'God commendeth, ' (rather 'establisheth, ') 'His love toward usin that whilst we were yet sinners Christ died for us. ' And so as weturn ourselves to the little knoll outside the gate, where theNazarene carpenter hangs faint and dying, we--wonder of Wonders, andyet certainty of certainties!--have to say, 'Lo! this is our God; wehave waited for Him. '

But that future revelation extends beyond the Cross, and includesresurrection, ascension, Pentecost, and the whole history of theChurch right onwards through the ages. The difference between the twovolumes of revelation--that which includes the work of Christ uponearth, and that which includes His revelation from the heavens--isthis, that the first volume contains all the facts, and the secondvolume contains His interpretation and application of the facts inthe understandings and hearts of His people. We have no more factsfrom which to construe God than these which belong to the earthlylife of Jesus Christ, and we never shall have, here at all events. But whilst the first volume to the bottom of the last page isfinished and tolerates and needs no additions, day by day, moment bymoment, epoch by epoch Christ is bringing His people to a fullerunderstanding of the significance of the first volume, and writingthe second more and more upon their hearts. 

So we have an ever-living Christ, still the active Teacher of HisChurch. Times of unsettlement and revolutionary change and the'shaking of the things that are made, ' like the times in which welive, are but times in which the great Teacher is setting some newlesson from the old Book to His slow scholars. There is always alittle confusion in the schoolroom when the classes are beingrearranged and new books are being put into old hands. The tributarystream, as it rushes in, makes broken water for a moment. Do not letus be afraid when 'the things that can be shaken' shake, but let ussee in the shaking the attendant of a new curriculum on which thegreat Teacher is launching His scholars, and let us learn the newlessons of the old Gospel which He is then teaching. 

III. Thirdly, note the participation in the Father's love which isthe issue of the knowledge of the Father's name. 

Christ says that His end, an end which is surely attained in thedeclaration of the divine name, is that 'the love wherewith Thou hastloved Me may be in them. ' We are here touching upon heights too dizzyfor free and safe walking, on glories too bright for close and steadygaze. But where Christ has spoken we may reverently follow. Mark, then, that marvellous thought of the identity between the love whichwas His and the love which is ours. 'From everlasting' that divinelove lay on the Eternal Word which in the hoary beginning, before thebeginning of creatures, 'was with God, and was God. ' The deepestconception that we can form of the divine nature is of a Being who inHimself carries the Subject and the Object of an eternal love, whichwe speak of in the deep emblem of 'the Word, ' and the God with whomHe eternally 'was. ' That love lay upon Christ, without limitation, without reservation, without interruption, finding nothing there fromwhich it recoiled, and nothing there which did not respond to it. Nomist, no thunderstorm, ever broke that sunshine, no tempest everswept across that calm. Continuous, full, perfect was the love thatknit the Father to the Son, and continuous, full, and perfect was theconsciousness of abiding in that love, which lay like light upon thespirit of Him that said 'I delight to do Thy will. ' 'The Father hathnot left Me alone. '

And all that love Christ gives to us as deep, as continuous, asunreserved. Our consciousness of God's love is meant by Christ to belike His own. Alas! alas! is that our experience, Christian people?The sun always shines on the rainless land of Egypt, except for amonth or two in the year. The contrast between the unclouded blue andcontinuous light and heat there, and our murky skies and humidatmosphere, is like the contrast between our broken and feebleconsciousness of the shining of the divine love and the uninterruptedglory of light and joy of communion which poured on Christ's heart. But it is possible for us indefinitely to approximate to such anexperience; and the way by which we reach it is that plain and simpleone of accepting Christ's declaration of the Father's name. 

IV. And so, lastly, notice the indwelling Christ who makes ourparticipation in the divine love possible: 'And I in them. '

One may well say, 'How can it be that love should be transferred? Howcan it be that the love of God to me shall be identical with the loveof God to Christ?' There is only one answer. If Christ dwells in me, then God's love to Him falls upon me by no transference, but by myincorporation into Him. And I would urge that this great truth of theactual indwelling of Christ in the soul is no mere piece ofrhetorical exaggeration, nor a wild and enthusiastic way of puttingthe fact that the influence of His teaching and the beauty of Hisexample can sway us; but it is a plain and absolute truth that thedivine Christ can come into and abide in the narrow room of our poorhearts. And if He does this, then 'he that is joined to the Lord isone Spirit'; and the Christ in me receives the sunshine of the divinelove. That does not destroy, but heightens, my individuality. I ammore and not less myself because 'I live, yet not I, but Christliveth in me. '

So, dear brethren! it all comes to this--we may each of us, if wewill, have Jesus Christ for Guest and Inhabitant in our hearts. If wehave, then, since God loves Him, He must love me who have Him withinme, and as long as God loves Christ He cannot cease to love me, norcan I cease to be conscious of His love to me, and whatsoever giftsHis love bestows upon Jesus, pass over in measure, and partially, tomyself. Thus immortality, heaven, glory, all blessedness in heavenand earth, are the fruit and crystallisation, so to speak, of thatoneness with Christ which is possible for us. And the conditions aresimply that we shall with joyful trust accept His declaration of theFather's name, and see God manifest in Him; and welcome in our inmosthearts that great Gospel. Then His prayer, and the travail of Hissoul, will reach their end even in me, and 'the love wherewith theFather loved the Son shall be in me, ' and the Son Himself shall dwellin my heart. 

CHRIST AND HIS CAPTORS

'As soon then as He had said unto them, I am He, they wentbackward, and fell to the ground. Then asked He them again, Whomseek ye? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus answered, I havetold you that I am He: if therefore ye seek Me, let these gotheir way: That the saying might he fulfilled, which He spake, Ofthem which Thou gayest Me have I lost none. '--JOHN xviii. 6-9. 

This remarkable incident is narrated by John only. It fits in withthe purpose which he himself tells us governed his selection of theincidents which he records. 'These things are written, ' says he, nearthe end of the Gospel, 'that ye might believe that Jesus is the Sonof God, and that, believing, ye might have life in His name. ' Thewhole of the peculiarities of the substance of John's Gospel are tobe explained on the two grounds that he was writing a supplement to, and not a substitute for, or a correction of, the Gospels already inexistence; and that his special business was to narrate such factsand words as set forth the glory of Christ as 'the Only Begotten ofthe Father. '

The incident before us is, as I think, one of these. The Evangelistwould have us see in it, as I gather from his manner of narrating it, mainly three things. He emphasises that strange recoil of the would-be captors before Christ's majestic, calm 'I am He'; that was amanifestation of Christ's glory. He emphasises our Lord's patientstanding there, in the midst of the awe-struck crowd, and eveninciting them, as it would seem, to do the work for which they hadcome out; that was a manifestation of the voluntariness of Christ'ssufferings. And He emphasises the self-forgetting care with which atthat supreme moment He steps between His faithless, weak friends anddanger, with the wonderful words, 'If ye seek Me, let these go theirway'; to the Evangelist that little incident is an illustration, on avery low level, and in regard to a comparatively trivial matter, ofthe very same principle by which salvation from all evil in time andin eternity, is guaranteed to all that believe on Him:--

I. First, then, consider this remarkable, momentary manifestation ofour Lord's glory. 

'I am He!' When the Band were thus doubly assured by the traitor'skiss and by His own confession, why did they not lay hands upon Him?There He stood in the midst of them, alone, defenceless; there wasnothing to hinder their binding Him on the spot. Instead of that theyrecoil, and fall in a huddled heap before Him. Some strange awe andterror, of which they themselves could have given no account, wasupon their spirits. How came it about? Many things may have conspiredto produce it. I am by no means anxious to insist that this was amiracle. Things of the same sort, though much less in degree, havebeen often enough seen; when some innocent and illustrious victim hasfor a moment paralysed the hands of his would-be captors and madethem feel, though it were but transiently, 'how awful goodness is. 'There must have been many in that band who had heard Him, though, inthe uncertain light of quivering moonbeams and smoking torches, theyfailed to recognise Him till He spoke. There must have been many morewho had heard of Him, and many who suspected that they were about tolay hands on a holy man, perhaps on a prophet. There must have beenreluctant tools among the inferiors, and no doubt some among theleaders whoso consciences needed but a touch to be roused to action. To all, His calmness and dignity would appeal, and the manifestfreedom from fear or desire to flee would tend to deepen the strangethoughts which began to stir in their hearts. 

But the impression which the narrative seems intended to leave, appears to me to be of something more than this. It looks as if therewere something more than human in Christ's look and tone. It may havebeen the same in kind as the ascendency which a pure and calm naturehas over rude and inferior ones. It may have been the same in kind ashas sometimes made the headsman on the scaffold pause before hestruck, and has bowed rude gaolers into converts before some grey-haired saint or virgin martyr; yet the difference is so great indegree as practically to become quite another thing. Though I do notwant to insist upon any 'miraculous' explanation of the cause of thisincident, yet I would ask, May it not be that here we see, perhapsapart from Christ's will altogether, rising up for one moment to thesurface, the indwelling majesty which was always there?

We do not know the laws that regulated the dwelling of the Godhead, bodily, within that human frame, but we do know that at one othertime there came upon His features a transfiguration, and over Hisvery garments a lustre which was not thrown upon them from without, but rose up from within. And I am inclined to think that here, asthere, though under such widely different circumstances and to suchvarious issues, there was for a moment a little rending of the veilof His flesh, and an emission of some flash of the brightness thatalways tabernacled within Him; and that, therefore, just as Isaiah, when He saw the King in His glory, said, 'Woe is me, for I amundone!' and just as Moses could not look upon the Face, but couldonly see the back parts, so here the one stray beam of manifestdivinity that shot through the crevice, as it were, for an instant, was enough to prostrate with a strange awe even those rude andinsensitive men. When He had said 'I am He, ' there was something thatmade them feel, 'This is One before whom violence cowers abashed, andin whose presence impurity has to hide its face. ' I do not assertthat this is the explanation of that panic terror. I only ask, May itnot be?

But whatever we may think was the reason, at all events the incidentbrings out very strikingly the elevation and dignity of Christ, andthe powerful impressions made by His personality, even at such a timeof humiliation. This Evangelist is always careful to bring out theglory of Christ, especially when that glory lies side by side withHis lowliness. The blending of these two is one of the remarkablefeatures in the New Testament portraiture of Jesus Christ. Whereverin our Lord's life any incident indicates more emphatically thanusual the lowliness of His humiliation, there, by the side of it, youget something that indicates the majesty of His glory. For instance, He is born a weak infant, but angels herald His birth; He lies in amanger, but a star hangs trembling above it, and leads sages fromafar, with their myrrh, and incense, and gold. He submits Himself tothe baptism of repentance, but the heavens open and a voiceproclaims, 'This is My beloved Son!' He sits wearied, on the stonecoping of the well, and craves for water from a peasant woman; but Hegives her the Water of Life. He lies down and sleeps, from pureexhaustion, in the stern of the little fishing-boat, but He wakes tocommand the storm, and it is still. He weeps beside the grave, but Heflings His voice into its inmost recesses, and the sheeted dead comesforth. He well-nigh faints under the agony in the garden, but anangel from Heaven strengthens Him. He stands a prisoner at a humanbar, but He judges and condemns His judges. He dies, and that hour ofdefeat is His hour of triumph, and the union of shame and glory ismost conspicuous in that hour when on the Cross the 'Son of Man is_glorified_, and God is glorified in Him. '

This strange blending of opposites--the glory in the lowliness, andthe abasement in the glory--is the keynote of this singular event. Hewill be 'delivered into the hands of men. ' Yes; but ere He isdelivered He pauses for an instant, and in that instant comes a flash'above the brightness of the noonday sun' to tell of the hiddenglory. 

Do not forget that we may well look upon that incident as a prophecyof what shall be. As one of the suggestive, old commentators on thisverse says: 'He will say "I am He, " again, a third time. What will Hedo coming to reign, when He did this coming to die? And what will Hismanifestation be as a Judge when this was the effect of themanifestation as He went to be judged?' 'Every eye shall see Him';and they that loved not His appearing shall fall before Him when Hecometh to be our Judge; and shall call on the rocks and the hills tocover them. 

II. There is here, secondly, a manifestation of the voluntariness ofour Lord's suffering. 

When that terrified mob recoiled from Him, why did He stand there sopatiently? The time was propitious for flight, if He had cared toflee. He might have 'passed through the midst of them and gone Hisway. ' as He did once before, if He had chosen. He comes from thegarden; there shall be no difficulty in finding Him. He tells who Heis; there shall be no need for the traitor's kiss. He lays them lowfor a moment, but He will not flee. When Peter draws his sword Herebukes his ill-advised appeal to force, and then He holds out Hishands and lets them bind Him. It was not their fetters, but the'cords of love' which held Him prisoner. It was not their power, butHis own pity which drew Him to the judgment hall and the Cross. 

Let us dwell upon that thought for a moment. The whole story of theGospels is constructed upon the principle, and illustrates the fact, that our Lord's life, as our Lord's death, was a voluntary surrenderof Himself for man's sin, and that nothing led Him to, and fastenedHim on, the Cross but His own will. He willed to be born. He 'cameinto the world' by His own choice. He 'took upon Him the form of aservant. ' He 'took part' of the children's 'flesh and blood. ' Hisbirth was His own act, the first of the long series of the acts, bywhich for the sake of the love which He bore us, He 'humbledHimself. ' Step by step He voluntarily journeyed towards the Cross, which stood clear before Him from the very beginning as the necessaryend, made necessary by His love. 

As we get nearer and nearer to the close of the history, we see moreand more distinctly that He willingly went towards the Cross, Take;for instance, the account of the last portion of our Lord's life, andyou see in the whole of it a deliberate intention to precipitate thefinal conflict. Hence the last journey to Jerusalem when 'His facewas set, ' and His disciples followed Him amazed. Hence the studiedpublicity of His triumphal entry into Jerusalem. Hence the studied, growing severity of His rebukes to the priests and rulers. The sameimpression is given, though in a somewhat different way, by Hismomentary retreat from the city and by the precautions taken againstpremature arrest, that He might not die before the Passover. In boththe hastening toward the city and in the retreating from it, there isapparent the same design: that He Himself shall lay down His life, and shall determine the how, and the when, and the where as seemsgood to Him. 

If we look at the act of death itself, Jesus did not die because Hemust. It was not the nails of the Cross, the physical exhaustion, thenervous shock of crucifixion that killed Him. He died because Hewould. 'I have power to lay down My life, ' He said, 'and I havepower'--of course--'to take it again. ' At that last moment, He wasLord and Master of death when He bowed His head to death, and, if Imight so say, He summoned that grim servant with a 'Come!' and hecame, and He set him his task with a 'Do this!' and he did it. He wasmanifested as the Lord of death, having its 'keys' in His hands, whenHe died upon the Cross. 

Now I pray you to ask yourselves the question, if it be true thatChrist died because He would, why was it that He would die? Ifbecause He chose, what was it that determined His choice? And thereare but two answers, which two are one. The divine motive that ruledHis life is doubly expressed: 'I must do the will of My Father, ' and'I must save the world. '

The taunt that those Jewish rulers threw at Him had a deeper truththan they dreamed, and was an encomium, and not a taunt. 'He savedothers'--yes, and _therefore_, 'Himself He cannot save. ' He cannot, because His choice and will to die are determined by His free love tous and to all the world. His fixed will 'bore His body to the tree, 'and His love was the strong spring which kept His will fixed. 

You and I have our share in these voluntary sufferings, and our placein that loving heart which underwent them for us. Oh! should not thatthought speak to all our hearts, and bind us in grateful service andlifelong surrender to Him who gave Himself for us; and _must_ diebecause He loved us all so much that He _could not_ leave us unsaved?

III. We have, lastly, here, a symbol, or, perhaps, more accurately, an instance, on a small scale, of Christ's self-sacrificing care forus. 

His words: 'If ye seek Me, let these go their way, ' sound more likethe command of a prince than the intercession of a prisoner. The calmdignity of them strikes one just as much as the perfect self-forgetfulness of them. 

It was a very small matter which He was securing thereby. TheApostles would have to die for Him some day, but they were not readyfor it yet, and so He casts the shield of His protection round themfor a moment, and interposes Himself between them and the band ofsoldiers in order that their weakness may have a little more time togrow strong. And though it was wrong and cowardly for them to forsakeHim and flee, yet these words of my text more than half gave thempermission and warrant for their departure: 'Let these go their way. '

Now John did not think that this small deliverance was all thatChrist meant by these great words: 'Of them which Thou gavest Me haveI lost none!' He saw that it was one case, a very trifling one, amerely transitory one, yet ruled by the same principles which are atwork in the immensely higher region to which the words properlyrefer. Of course they have their proper fulfilment in the spiritualrealm, and are not fulfilled, in the highest sense, till all who haveloved and followed Christ are presented faultless before the Fatherin the home above. But the little incident may be a result of thesame cause as the final deliverance is. A dew-drop is shaped by thesame laws which mould the mightiest of the planets. The old divinesused to say that God was greatest in the smallest things, and theself-sacrificing care of Jesus Christ, as He gives Himself a prisonerthat His disciples may go free, comes from the same deep heart ofpitying love, which led Him to die, the 'just for the unjust. ' It maythen well stand for a partial fulfilment of His mighty words, eventhough these wait for their complete accomplishment till the hourwhen all the sheep are gathered into the one fold, and no evilbeasts, nor weary journeys, nor barren pastures can harass them anymore. 

This trivial incident, then, becomes an exposition of highest truth. Let us learn from such an use of such an event to look upon allcommon and transitory circumstances as governed by the same lovinghands, and working to the same ends, as the most purely spiritual. The visible is the veil which drapes the invisible, and clings soclosely to it as to reveal its outline. The common events of life areall parables to the devout heart, which is the wise heart. They speakmystic meanings to ears that can hear. The redeeming love of Jesus isproclaimed by every mercy which perishes in the using; and all thingsshould tell us of His self-forgetting, self-sacrificing care. 

Thus, then, we may see in that picture of our Lord's surrenderingHimself that His trembling disciples might go free, an emblem of whatHe does for us, in regard to all our foes. He stands between us andthem, receives their arrows into His own bosom, and says, 'Let thesego their way. ' God's law comes with its terrors, with its penalties, to us who have broken it a thousand times. The consciousness of guiltand sin threatens us all more or less, and with varying intensity indifferent minds. The weariness of the world, 'the ills that flesh isheir to, ' the last grim enemy, Death, and that which lies beyond themall, ring you round. My friends! what are you going to do in order toescape from them? You are a sinful man, you have broken God's law. That law goes on crashing its way and crushing down all that isopposed to it. You have a weary life before you, however joyful itmay sometimes be. Cares, and troubles, and sorrows, and tears, andlosses, and disappointments, and hard duties that you will not beable to perform, and dark days in which you will be able to see butvery little light, are all certain to come sooner or later; and thelast moment will draw near when the King of Terrors will be at yourside; and beyond death there is a life of retribution in which menreap the things that they have sown here. All that is true, much ofit is true about you at this moment, and it will all be true someday. In view of that, what are you going to do?

I preach to you a Saviour who has endured all for us. As a mothermight fling herself out of the sledge that her child might escape thewolves in full chase, here is One that comes and fronts all yourfoes, and says to them, 'Let these go their way. Take Me. ' 'By Hisstripes we are healed. ' 'On Him was laid the iniquity of us all. '

He died because He chose; He chose because He loved. His love had todie in order that His death might be our life, and that in it weshould find our forgiveness and peace. He stands between our foes andus. No evil can strike us unless it strike Him first. He takes intoHis own heart the sharpest of all the darts which can pierce ours. Hehas borne the guilt and punishment of a world's sin. These solemnpenalties have fallen upon Him that we, trusting in Him, 'may go ourway, ' and that there may be 'no condemnation' to us if we are inChrist Jesus. And if there be no condemnation, we can stand whateverother blows may fall upon us. They are easier to bear, and theirwhole character is different, when we know that Christ has borne themalready. Two of the three whom Christ protected in the garden died amartyr's death; but do you not think that James bowed his neck toHerod's sword, and Peter let them gird him and lead him to his cross, more joyfully and with a different heart, when they thought of Himthat had died before them? The darkest prison cell will not be sovery dark if we remember that Christ has been there before us, anddeath itself will be softened into sleep because our Lord has died. 'If therefore, ' says He, to the whole pack of evils baying round us, with their cruel eyes and their hungry mouths, 'ye seek Me, let thesego their way. ' So, brother, if you will fix your trust, as a poor, sinful soul, on that dear Christ, and get behind Him, and put Himbetween you and your enemies, then, in time and in eternity, thatsaying will be fulfilled in you which He spake, 'Of them which Thougavest Me, have I lost none. '

JESUS BEFORE CAIAPHAS

'And Simon Peter followed Jesus, and so did another disciple:that disciple was known unto the high priest, and went in withJesus into the palace of the high priest. But Peter stood at thedoor without. Then went out that other disciple, which was knownunto the high priest, and spake unto her that kept the door, andbrought in Peter. Then saith the damsel that kept the door untoPeter, Art not thou also one of this Man's disciples? He saith, Iam not. And the servants and officers stood there, who had made afire of coals; for it was cold: and they warmed themselves: andPeter stood with them, and warmed himself. The high priest thenasked Jesus of His disciples, and of His doctrine. Jesus answeredhim, I spake openly to the world; I ever taught in the synagogue, and in the temple, whither the Jews always resort; and in secrethave I said nothing. Why askest thou Me? ask them which heard Me, what I have said unto them: behold, they know what I said. Andwhen He had thus spoken, one of the officers which stood bystruck Jesus with the palm of his hand, saying, Answerest Thouthe high priest so? Jesus answered him, If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil: but if well, why smitest thou Me? NowAnnas had sent Him bound unto Caiaphas the high priest. And SimonPeter stood and warmed himself. They said therefore unto him, Artnot thou also one of His disciples? He denied it, and said, I amnot. One of the servants of the high priest, being his kinsmanwhose ear Peter cut off, saith, Did not I see thee in the gardenwith Him? Peter then denied again: and immediately the cockcrew. '--JOHN xviii. 15-27. 

The last verses of the preceding passage belong properly to this one, for they tell us that Jesus was 'first' brought before Annas, a factwhich we owe to John only. Annas himself and his five sons held thehigh-priesthood in succession. To the sons has to be added Caiaphas, who, as we learn from John only, was Annas' son-in-law, and so one ofthe family party. That Jesus should have been taken to him, though heheld no office at the time, shows who pulled the strings in theSanhedrim. The reference to Caiaphas in verse 14 seems intended tosuggest what sort of a trial might be expected, presided over by sucha man. But verse 15 tells us that Jesus entered in, accompanied by'another disciple, ' 'to the court, ' not, as we should have expected, of Annas, but 'of the high priest, ' who, by the testimony of verse13, can be no one but Caiaphas. How came that about? Apparently, because Annas had apartments in the high-priest's official residence. As he obviously exercised the influence through his sons and son-in-law, who successively held the office, it was very natural that heshould be a fixture in the palace. 

What John's connection was with this veteran intriguer (assuming thatJohn was that 'other disciple') we do not know. Probably it was somefamily bond that united two such antipathetic natures. At all events, the Apostle's acquaintance with the judge so far condoned hisdiscipleship to the criminal, that the doors of the audience chamberwere open to him, though he was known as 'one of them. '

So he and poor Peter were parted, and the latter left shiveringoutside in the grey of the morning. John had not missed him at first, for he would be too much absorbed in watching Jesus to have thoughtsto spare for Peter, and would conclude that he was following him;but, when he did miss him, like a brave man he ran the risk of beingobserved, and went for him. The sharp-witted porteress, whosebusiness it was to judge applicants for entrance by a quick glance, at once inferred that Peter 'also' was one of this man's disciples. Her 'also' shows that she knew John to be one; and her 'this man'shows that either she did not know Jesus' name, or thought Him toofar beneath her to be named by her! The time during which Peter hadbeen left outside alone, repenting now of, and alarmed for what mighthappen to him on account of, his ill-aimed blow at Malchus, andfeeling the nipping cold, had taken all his courage out of him. Theone thing he wished was to slip in unnoticed, and so the first denialcame to his lips as rashly as many another word had come in old days. He does not seem to have remained with John, who probably went up tothe upper end of the hall, where the examination was going on, whilePeter, not having the _entree_ and very much terrified as well asmiserable, stayed at the lower end, where the understrappers weremaking themselves comfortable round a charcoal fire, and paying noattention to the proceedings at the other end. He seemed to be asindifferent as they were, and to be intent only on getting himselfwarmed. But what surges of emotion would be tossing in his heart, which yet he was trying to hide under the mask of being anunconcerned spectator, like the others!

The examination of our Lord was conducted by 'the high priest, ' bywhich title John must mean Caiaphas, as he has just emphaticallynoted that he then filled the office. But how is that to bereconciled with the statement that Jesus was taken to Annas?Apparently by supposing that, though Annas was present, Caiaphas wasspokesman. But did not a formal trial before Caiaphas follow, anddoes not John tell us (verse 24) that, after the first examination, Annas sent Jesus bound to Caiaphas? Yes. And are these thingscompatible with this account of an examination conducted by thelatter? Yes, if we remember that flagrant wresting of justice markedthe whole proceedings. The condemnation of Jesus was a judicialmurder, in which the highest court of the Jews 'decreed iniquity by alaw'; and it was of a piece with all the rest that he, who was topose as an impartial judge presently, should, in the spirit of apartisan, conduct this preliminary inquiry. Observe that no sentencewas pronounced in the case at this stage. This was not a court atall. What was it? An attempt to entrap the prisoner into admissionswhich might be used against Him in the court to be held presently. The rulers had Jesus in their hands, and they did not know what to dowith Him now that they had Him. They were at a loss to know what Hisindictment was to be. To kill Him was the only thing on which theyhad made up their minds; the pretext had yet to be found, and so theytried to get Him to say something which would serve their purpose. 

'The high priest therefore asked Jesus of His disciples, and of Histeaching'! If they did not know about either, why had they arrestedHim? Cunning outwits itself, and falls into the pit it digs for theinnocent. Jesus passed by the question as to His disciples unnoticed, and by His calm answer as to His teaching showed that He saw thesnare. He reduced Caiaphas and Annas to perpetrating plain injustice, or to letting Him go free. Elementary fair play to a prisonerprescribes that he should be accused of some crime by some one, andnot that he should furnish his judges with materials for his ownindictment. 'Why askest thou Me? ask them that have heard Me, ' isunanswerable, except by such an answer as the officious 'servant'gave--a blow and a violent speech. But Christ's words reach farbeyond the momentary purpose; they contain a wide truth. His teachingloves the daylight. There are no muttered oracles, no whisperedsecrets for the initiated, no double voice, one for the multitude, and another for the adepts. All is above-board, and all is spoken'openly to the world. ' Christianity has no cliques or coteries, nothing sectional, nothing reserved. It is for mankind, for allmankind, all for mankind. True, there are depths in it; true, thesecrets which Jesus can only speak to loving ears in secret are Hissweetest words, but they are 'spoken in the ear' that they may be'proclaimed on the housetops. '

The high-priest is silent, for there was nothing that he could say toso undeniable a demand, and he had no witnesses ready. How many sincehis day have treated Jesus as he treated Him--condemned Him orrejected Him without reason, and then looked about for reasons tojustify their attitude, or even sought to make Him condemn Himself!

An unjust judge breeds insolent underlings, and if everything elsefails, blows and foul words cover defeat, and treat calm assertion ofright as impertinence to high-placed officials. Caiaphas degraded hisown dignity more than any words of a prisoner could degrade it. 

Our Lord's answer 'reviled not again. ' It is meek in majesty andmajestic in meekness. Patient endurance is not forbidden toremonstrate with insolent injustice, if only its remonstrance bearsno heat of personal anger in it. But Jesus was not so muchvindicating His words to Caiaphas in saying, 'If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil, ' as reiterating the challenge for'witnesses. ' He brands the injustice of Caiaphas, while meeklyrebuking the brutality of his servant. Master and man were alike insmiting Him for words of which they could not prove the evil. 

There was obviously nothing to be gained by further examination. Nocrime had been alleged, much less established; therefore Jesus oughtto have been let go. But Annas treated Him as a criminal, and handedHim over 'bound, ' to be formally tried before the man who had justbeen foiled in his attempt to play the inquisitor. What a hideousmockery of legal procedure! How well the pair, father-in-law and son-in-law, understood each other! What a confession of a foregoneconclusion, evidence or no evidence, in shackling Jesus as amalefactor! And it was all done in the name of religion! and perhapsthe couple of priests did not know that they were hypocrites, butreally thought that they were 'doing God service. '

John's account of Peter's denials rises to a climax of peril and ofkeenness of suspicion. The unnamed persons who put the secondquestion must have had their suspicions roused by something in hismanner as he stood by the glinting fire, perhaps by agitation toogreat to be concealed. The third question was put by a more dangerousperson still, who not only recognised Peter's features as thefirelight fitfully showed them, but had a personal ground ofhostility in his relationship to Malchus. 

John lovingly spares telling of the oaths and curses accompanying thedenials, but dares not spare the narration of the fact. It has tooprecious lessons of humility, of self-distrust, of the possibility ofgenuine love being overborne by sudden and strong temptation, to beomitted. And the sequel of the denials has yet more preciousteaching, which has brought balm to many a contrite heart, consciousof having been untrue to its deepest love. For the sound of the cock-crow, and the look from the Lord as He was led away bound past theplace where Peter stood, brought him back to himself, and broughttears to his eyes, which were sweet as well as bitter. On theresurrection morning the risen Lord sent the message of forgivenessand special love to the broken-hearted Apostle, when He said, 'Go, tell My disciples and Peter, ' and on that day there was an interviewof which Paul knew (1 Cor. Xv. 5), but the details of which wereapparently communicated by the Apostle to none of his brethren. Thedenier who weeps is taken to Christ's heart, and in sacred secrecyhas His forgiveness freely given, though, before he can be restoredto his public office, he must, by his threefold public avowal oflove, efface his threefold denial. We may say, 'Thou knowest that Ilove thee, ' even if we have said, 'I know Him not, ' and come nearerto Jesus, by reason of the experience of His pardoning love, than wewere before we fell. 

ART THOU A KING?

'Then led they Jesus from Caiaphas unto the hall of judgment: andit was early; and they themselves went not into the judgmenthall, lest they should be defiled; but that they might eat thepassover. Pilate then went out unto them, and said, Whataccusation bring ye against this Man? They answered and said untohim, If He were not a malefactor, we would not have delivered Himup unto thee. Then said Pilate unto them, Take ye Him, and judgeHim according to your law. The Jews therefore said unto him, Itis not lawful for us to put any man to death: That the saying ofJesus might be fulfilled, which He spake, signifying what deathHe should die. Then Pilate entered into the judgment hall again, and called Jesus, and said unto Him, Art Thou the King of theJews? Jesus answered him, Sayest thou this thing of thyself, ordid others tell it thee of Me? Pilate answered, Am I a Jew? Thineown nation and the chief priests have delivered Thee unto me:what hast Thou done? Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of thisworld: if My kingdom were of this world, then would My servantsfight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is Mykingdom not from hence. Pilate therefore said unto Him, Art Thoua king then? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a king. Tothis end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is ofthe truth heareth My voice. Pilate saith unto Him, What is truth?And when he had said this, he went out again unto the Jews, andsaith unto them, I find in Him no fault at all. But ye have acustom, that I should release unto you one at the passover: willye therefore that I release unto you the King of the Jews? Thencried they all again, saying, Not this Man, but Barabbas. NowBarabbas was a robber. '--JOHN xviii. 28-40. 

John evidently intends to supplement the synoptic Gospels' account. He tells of Christ's appearance before Annas, but passes by thatbefore Caiaphas, though he shows his knowledge of it. Similarly hetouches lightly on the public hearing before Pilate, but gives us indetail the private conversation in this section, which he alonerecords. We may suppose that he was present at both the hearingbefore Annas and the interview within the palace between Jesus andHerod, for he would not be deterred from entering, as the Jews were, and there seems to have been no other impediment in the way. Thepassage has three stages--the fencing between the Sanhedrists andPilate, the 'good confession before Pontius Pilate, ' and thepreference of Barabbas to Jesus. 

I. The passage of arms between the priests and the governor. 'It wasearly, ' probably before 6 A. M. A hurried meeting of the Sanhedrim hadcondemned Jesus to death, and the next thing was to get the Romanauthority to carry out the sentence. The necessity of appeal to itwas a bitter pill, but it had to be swallowed, for the right ofcapital punishment had been withdrawn. A 'religious' scruple, too, stood in the way--very characteristic of such formalists. Killing aninnocent man would not in the least defile them, or unfit for eatingthe passover, but to go into a house that had not been purged of'leaven, ' and was further unclean as the residence of a Gentile, though he was the governor, that would stain their consciences--asingular scale of magnitude, which saw no sin in condemning Jesus, and great sin in going into Pilate's palace! Perhaps some of ourconventional sins are of a like sort. 

Pilate was, probably, not over-pleased at being roused so early, norat having to defer to a scruple which would to him look likeinsolence; and through all his bearing to the Sanhedrim a certainirritation shows itself, which sometimes flashes out in sarcasm, butis for the most part kept down. His first question is, perhaps, notso simple as it looks, for he must have had some previous knowledgeof the case, since Roman soldiers had been used for the arrest. But, clearly, those who brought him a prisoner were bound to be theprosecutors. 

Whether or not Pilate knew that his question was embarrassing, therulers felt it so. Why did they not wish to formulate a charge?Partly from pride. They hugged the delusion that their court wascompetent to condemn, and wanted, as we all often do, to shut theireyes to a plain fact, as if ignoring it annihilated it. Partlybecause the charge on which they had condemned Jesus--that ofblasphemy in calling Himself 'the Son of God'--was not a crime knownto Roman law, and to allege it would probably have ended in the wholematter being scornfully dismissed. So they stood on their dignity andtried to bluster. 'We have condemned Him; that is enough. We look toyou to carry out the sentence at our bidding. ' So the 'ecclesiasticalauthority' has often said to the 'secular arm' since then, andunfortunately the civil authority has not always been as wise asPilate was. 

He saw an opening to get rid of the whole matter, and with just afaint flavour of irony suggests that, as they have 'a law'--which he, no doubt, thought of as a very barbarous code--they had better go byit, and punish as well as condemn. That sarcastic proposal compelledthem to acknowledge their subjection. Pilate had given the reins theleast touch, but enough to make them feel the bit; and though it wentsore against the grain, they will own their master rather than losetheir victim. So their reluctant lips say, 'It is not lawful for us. 'Pilate has brought them on their knees at last, and they forget theirdignity, and own the truth. Malicious hatred will eat any amount ofdirt and humiliation to gain its ends, especially if it calls itselfreligious zeal. 

John sees in the issue of this first round in the duel between Pilateand the rulers the sequence of events which brought about thefulfilment of our Lord's prediction of His crucifixion, since thatwas not a Jewish mode of execution. This encounter of keen witsbecomes tragical and awful when we remember Who it was that these menwere wrangling about. 

II. We have Jesus and Pilate; the 'good confession, ' and theindifferent answer. We must suppose that, unwillingly, the rulers hadbrought the accusation that Jesus had attempted rebellion againstRome. John omits that, because he takes it for granted that it isknown. It is implied in the conversation which now ensued. We mustnote as remarkable that Pilate does not conduct his first examinationin the presence of the rulers, but has Jesus brought to him in thepalace. Perhaps he simply wished to annoy the accusers, but moreprobably his Roman sense of justice combined with his wish to asserthis authority, and perhaps with a suspicion that there was somethingstrange about the whole matter--and not least strange that theSanhedrim, who were not enthusiastic supporters of Rome, should allat once display such loyalty--to make him wish to have the prisonerby himself, and try to fathom the business. With Roman directness hewent straight to the point: 'Art Thou the King of the Jews, as theyhave been saying?' There is emphasis on 'Thou'--the emphasis which apractical Roman official would be likely to put as he looked at theweak, wearied, evidently poor and helpless man bound before him. There is almost a touch of pity in the question, and certainly thebeginning of the conviction that this was not a very formidable rivalto Caesar. 

The answer to be given depended on the sense in which Pilate askedthe question, to bring out which is the object of Christ's questionin reply. If Pilate was asking of himself, then what he meant by 'aking' was one of earth's monarchs after the emperor's pattern, andthe answer would be 'No. ' If he was repeating a Jewish charge, then, 'a king' might mean the prophetic King of Israel, who was no rival ofearthly monarchs, and the answer would be 'Yes, ' but that 'Yes' wouldgive Pilate no more reason to crucify Him than the 'No' would havegiven. 

Pilate is getting tired of fencing, and impatiently answers, withtrue Roman contempt for subject-people's thoughts as well as theirweapons. 'I . .. A Jew?' is said with a curl of the firm lips. Hepoints to his informants, 'Thine own nation and the chief priests, 'and does not say that their surrender of a would-be leader in a warof independence struck him as suspicious. But he brushes aside thecobwebs which he felt were being spun round him, and comes to thepoint, 'What hast Thou done?' He is supremely indifferent to ideasand vagaries of enthusiasts. This poor man before him may callHimself anything He chooses, but _his_ only concern is with overtacts. Strange to ask the Prisoner what He had done! It had been wellfor Pilate if he had held fast by that question, and based hisjudgment resolutely on its answer! He kept asking it all through thecase, he never succeeded in getting an answer; he was convinced thatJesus had done nothing worthy of death, and yet fear, and a wish tocurry favour with the rulers, drove him to stain the judge's robewith innocent blood, from which he vainly sought to cleanse hishands. 

Our Lord's double answer claims a kingdom, but first shows what it isnot, and then what it is. It is 'not _of_ this world, ' though it is_in_ this world, being established and developed here, but havingnothing in common with earthly dominions, nor being advanced by theirweapons or methods. Pilate could convince himself that this 'kingdom'bore no menace to Rome, from the fact that no resistance had beenoffered to Christ's capture. But the principle involved in thesegreat words goes far beyond their immediate application. It forbidsChrist's 'servants' to assimilate His kingdom to the world, or to useworldly powers as the means for the kingdom's advancement. Thehistory of the Church has sadly proved how hard it is for Christianmen to learn the lesson, and how fatal to the energy and purity ofthe Church the forgetfulness of it has been. The temptation to suchassimilation besets all organised Christianity, and is as strong to-day as when Constantine gave the Church the paralysing gift of'establishing' it as a kingdom 'of this world. '

Pilate did pick out of this saying an increased certainty that he hadnothing to fear from this strange 'King'; and half-amused contemptfor a dreamer, and half-pitying wonder at such lofty claims from sucha helpless enthusiast, prompted his question, 'Art Thou a king then?'One can fancy the scornful emphasis on that 'Thou. ' and canunderstand how grotesquely absurd the notion of his prisoner's beinga king must have seemed. 

Having made clear part of the sense in which the avowal was to betaken, our Lord answered plainly 'Yes. ' Thus before the high-priest, He declared Himself to be the Son of God, and before Pilate Heclaimed to be King, at each tribunal putting forward the claim whicheach was competent to examine--and, alas! at each meeting similarlevity and refusal to inquire seriously into the validity of theclaim. The solemn revelation to Pilate of the true nature of Hiskingdom and of Himself the King fell on careless ears. A deepermystery than Pilate dreamed of lay beneath the double designation ofHis origin; for He not only had been 'born' like other men, but had'come into the world, ' having 'come forth from the Father, ' andhaving been before He was born. It was scarcely possible that Pilateshould apprehend the meaning of that duplication, but some vagueimpression of a mysterious personality might reach him, and Jesuswould not have fully expressed His own consciousness if He had simplysaid, 'I was born. ' Let us see that we keep firm hold of all whichthat utterance implies and declares. 

The end of the Incarnation is to 'bear witness to the truth. ' Thatwitness is the one weapon by which Christ's kingdom is established. That witness is not given by words only, precious as these are, butby deeds which are more than words. These witnessing deeds are notcomplete till Calvary and the empty grave and Olivet have witnessedat once to the perfect incarnation of divine love, to the perfectSacrifice for the world's sin, to the Victor over death, and to theopening of heaven to all believers. Jesus is 'the faithful and trueWitness, ' as John calls Him, not without reminiscences of thispassage, just because He is 'the First-begotten of the dead. ' As hereHe told Pilate that He was a 'king, ' because a 'witness, ' so John, inthe passage referred to, bases His being 'Prince of the kings of theearth' on the same fact. 

How little Pilate knew that he was standing at the very crisis of hisfate! A yielding to the impression that was slightly touching hisheart and conscience, and he, too, might have 'heard' Christ's voice. But he was not 'of the truth, ' though he might have been if he hadwilled, and so the words were wind to him, and he brushed aside allthe mist, as he thought it, with the light question, which summed upa Roman man of the world's indifference to ideas, and belief in solidfacts like legions and swords. 'What is truth?' may be the cry of aseeking soul, or the sneer of a confirmed sceptic, or the shrug ofindifference of the 'practical man. '

It was the last in Pilate's case, as is shown by his not waiting foran answer, but ending the conversation with it as a last shot. Itmeant, too, that he felt quite certain that this man, with his high-strained, unpractical talk about a kingdom resting on such a filmynothing, was absolutely harmless. Therefore the only just thing forhim to have done was to have gone out to the impatient crowd and saidso, and flatly refused to do the dirty work of the priests for them, by killing an innocent man. But he was too cowardly for that, and, nodoubt, thought that the murder of one poor Jew was a small price topay for popularity with his troublesome subjects. Still, like allweak men, he was not easy in his conscience, and made a futileattempt to get the right thing done, and yet not to suffer for doingit. The rejection of Barabbas is touched very lightly by John, andmust be left unnoticed here. The great contribution to our knowledgewhich John makes is this private interview between the King whoreigns by the truth, and the representative of earthly rule, based onarms and worldly forces. 

JESUS SENTENCED

'Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged Him. And thesoldiers platted a crown of thorns, and put it on His head, andthey put on Him a purple robe. And said, Hail, King of the Jews!and they smote Him with their hands. Pilate therefore went forthagain, and saith unto them, Behold, I bring Him forth to you, that ye may know that I find no fault in Him. Then came Jesusforth, wearing the crown of thorns, and the purple robe. AndPilate saith unto them, Behold the Man! When the chief prieststherefore and officers saw Him, they cried out, saying, CrucifyHim, crucify Him. Pilate saith unto them, Take ye Him, andcrucify Him: for I find no fault in Him. The Jews answered him, We have a law, and by our law He ought to die, because He madeHimself the Son of God. When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he was the more afraid; And went again into the judgment hall, and saith unto Jesus, Whence art Thou? But Jesus gave him noanswer. Then saith Pilate unto Him, Speakest Thou not unto me Iknowest Thou not that I have power to crucify Thee, and havepower to release Thee? Jesus answered, Thou couldest have nopower at all against Me, except it were given thee from above:therefore he that delivered Me unto thee hath the greater sin. And from thenceforth Pilate sought to release Him: but the Jewscried out, saying, If thou let this Man go, thou art not Caesar'sfriend: whosoever maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar. When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he brought Jesus forth, and sat down in the judgment seat in a place that is called thePavement, but in the Hebrew, Gabbatha. And it was the preparationof the passover, and about the sixth hour: and he saith unto theJews, Behold your King! But they cried out, Away with Him, awaywith Him, crucify Him! Pilate saith unto them, Shall I crucifyyour King? The chief priests answered, We have no king butCaesar. Then delivered he Him therefore unto them to becrucified. And they took Jesus, and led Him away. '--JOHN xix. 1-16. 

The struggle between the vacillation of Pilate and the fixedmalignity of the rulers is the principal theme of this fragment ofChrist's judicial trial. He Himself is passive and all but silent, speaking only one sentence of calm rebuke. The frequent changes ofscene from within to without the praetorium indicate the steps in thestruggle, and vividly reflect the irresolution of Pilate. Thesechanges may help to mark the stages in the narrative. 

I. The cruelties and indignities in verses 1-3 were inflicted withinthe 'palace, ' to which Pilate, with his prisoner, had returned afterthe popular vote for Barabbas. John makes that choice of the robberthe reason for the scourging of Jesus. His thought seems to be thatPilate, having failed in his attempt to get rid of the wholedifficulty by releasing Jesus, according to the 'custom, ' ordered thescourging, in hope that the lighter punishment might satisfy theturbulent crowd, whom he wished to humour, while, if possible, savingtheir victim. It was the expedient of a weak and cynical nature, and, like all weak attempts at compromise between right and wrong, onlyemboldened the hatred which it was meant to appease. If by clamourthe rulers had succeeded in getting Pilate to scourge a man whom hethought innocent, they might well hope to get him to crucify, if theyclamoured loudly and long enough. 

One attitude only befitted Pilate, since he did not in the leastbelieve that Jesus threatened the Roman supremacy; namely, to set Himat liberty, and let the disappointed rulers growl like wild beastsrobbed of their prey. But he did not care enough about a single half-crazy Jewish peasant to imperil his standing well with his awkwardsubjects, for the sake of righteousness. The one good which Romecould give to its vassal nations was inflexible justice and asovereign law; but in Pilate's action there was not even the pretenceof legality. Tricks and expedients run through it all, and never oncedoes he say, This is the law, this is justice, and by it I stand orfall. 

The cruel scourging, which, in Roman hands, was a much more severepunishment than the Jewish 'beating with rods' and often ended indeath, was inflicted on the silent, unresisting Christ, not becauseHis judge thought that it was deserved, but to please accusers whosecharge he knew to be absurd. The underlings naturally followed theirbetters' example, and after they had executed Pilate's orders toscourge, covered the bleeding wounds with some robe, perhaps ragged, but of the royal colour, and crushed the twisted wreath of thorn-branch down on the brows, to make fresh wounds there. The jest ofcrowning such a poor, helpless creature as Jesus seemed to them, wasexactly on the level of such rude natures, and would be the moreexquisite to them because it was double-barrelled, and insulted thenation as well as the 'King. ' They came in a string, as the tense ofthe original word suggests, and offered their mock reverence. Butthat sport became tame after a little, and mockery passed intoviolence, as it always does in such natures. These rough legionarieswere cruel and brutal, and they were unconscious witnesses to HisKingship as founded on suffering; but they were innocent as comparedwith the polished gentleman on the judgment-seat who prostitutedjustice, and the learned Pharisees outside who were howling forblood. 

II. In verses 4-8 the scene changes again to without the palace, andshows us Pilate trying another expedient, equally in vain. Thehesitating governor has no chance with the resolute, rooted hate ofthe rulers. Jesus silently and unresistingly follows Pilate from thehall, still wearing the mockery of royal pomp. Pilate had calculatedthat the sight of Him in such guise, and bleeding from the lash, might turn hate into contempt, and perhaps give a touch of pity. 'Behold the man!' as he meant it, was as if he had said, 'Is thispoor, bruised, spiritless sufferer worth hate or fear? Does He looklike a King or a dangerous enemy?' Pilate for once drops the scoff ofcalling Him their King, and seeks to conciliate and move to pity. Theprofound meanings which later ages have delighted to find in hiswords, however warrantable, are no part of their design as spoken, and we gain a better lesson from the scene by keeping close to thethoughts of the actors. What a contrast between the vacillation ofthe governor, on the one hand, afraid to do right and reluctant to dowrong, and the dogged malignity of the rulers and their tools on theother, and the calm, meek endurance of the silent Christ, knowing alltheir thoughts, pitying all, and fixed in loving resolve, even firmerthan the rulers' hate, to bear the utmost, that He might save aworld!

Some pity may have stirred in the crowd, but the priests and theirimmediate dependants silenced it by their yell of fresh hate at thesight of the prisoner. Note how John gives the very impression of thefierce, brief roar, like that of wild beasts for their prey, by his'Crucify, crucify!' without addition of the person. Pilate lostpatience at last, and angrily and half seriously gives permission tothem to take the law into their own hands. He really means, 'I willnot be your tool, and if my conviction of "the Man's" innocence is tobe of no account, _you_ must punish Him; for _I_ will not. ' How farhe meant to abdicate authority, and how far he was launchingsarcasms, it is difficult to say. Throughout he is sarcastic, andthereby indicates his weakness, indemnifying himself for beingthwarted by sneers which sit so ill on authority. 

But the offer, or sarcasm, whichever it was, missed fire, as theappeal to pity had done, and only led to the production of a newweapon. In their frantic determination to compass Jesus' death, therulers hesitate at no degradation; and now they adduced the charge ofblasphemy, and were ready to make a heathen the judge. To ask a Romangovernor to execute their law on a religious offender, was to dragtheir national prerogative in the mud. But formal religionists, inflamed by religious animosity, are often the degraders of religionfor the gratification of their hatred. They are poor preservers ofthe Church who call on the secular arm to execute their 'laws. ' Romewent a long way in letting subject peoples keep their institutions;but it was too much to expect Pilate to be the hangman for thesefurious priests, on a charge scarcely intelligible to him. 

What was Jesus doing while all this hell of wickedness and furyboiled round Him? Standing there, passive and dumb, 'as a sheepbefore her shearers, ' Himself is the least conspicuous figure in thehistory of His own trial. In silent communion with the Father, insilent submission to His murderers, in silent pity for us, in silentcontemplation of 'the joy that was set before Him, ' He waits on theirwill. 

III. Once more the scene changes to the interior of the praetorium(vs. 9-11). The rulers' words stirred a deepened awe in Pilate. He'was the more afraid'; then he had been already afraid. His wife'sdream, the impression already produced by the person of Jesus, hadtouched him more deeply than probably he himself was aware of; andnow this charge that Jesus had 'made Himself the Son of God' shookhim. What if this strange man were in some sense a messenger of thegods? Had he been scourging one sent from them? Sceptical he probablywas, and therefore superstitious; and half-forgotten and disbelievedstories of gods who had 'come down in the likeness of men' would swimup in his memory. If this Man were such, His strange demeanour wouldbe explained. Therefore he carried Jesus in again, and, not now asjudge, sought to hear from His own lips His version of the allegedclaim. 

Why did not Jesus answer such a question? His silence was answer;but, besides that, Pilate had not received as he ought what Jesus hadalready declared to him as to His kingdom and His relation to 'thetruth, ' and careless turning away from Christ's earlier words isrighteously and necessarily punished by subsequent silence, if thesame disposition remains. That it did remain, Christ's silence isproof. Had there been any use in answering, Pilate would not haveasked in vain. If Jesus was silent, we may be sure that He who seesall hearts and responds to all true desires was so, because He knewthat it was best to say nothing. The question of His origin hadnothing to do with Pilate's duty then, which turned, not on whenceJesus had come, but on what Pilate believed Him to have done, or notto have done. He who will not do the plain duty of the moment haslittle chance of an answer to his questions about such high matters. 

The shallow character of the governor's awe and interest is clearlyseen from the immediate change of tone to arrogant reminder of hisabsolute authority. 'To me dost Thou not speak?' The pride ofoffended dignity peeps out there. He has forgotten that a momentsince he half suspected that the prisoner, whom he now seeks toterrify with the cross, and to allure with deliverance, was perhapscome from some misty heaven. Was that a temper which would havereceived Christ's answer to his question?

But one thing he might be made to perceive, and therefore Jesus brokesilence for the only time in this section, and almost the only timebefore Pilate. He reads the arrogant Roman the lesson which he andall his tribe in all lands and ages need--that their power is derivedfrom God, therefore in its foundation legitimate, and in its exerciseto be guided by His will and used for His purposes. It was God whohad brought the Roman eagles, with their ravening beaks and strongclaws, to the Holy City. Pilate was right in exercising jurisdictionover Jesus. Let him see that he exercised justice, and let himremember that the power which he boasted that he 'had' was 'given. 'The truth as to the source of power made the guilt of Caiaphas or ofthe rulers the greater, inasmuch as they had neglected the duties towhich they had been appointed, and by handing over Jesus on a chargewhich they themselves should have searched out, had been guilty of'theocratic felony. ' This sudden flash of bold rebuke, remindingPilate of his dependence, and charging him with the lesser but yetreal 'sin, ' went deeper than any answer to his question would havedone, and spurred him to more earnest effort, as John points out. He'sought to release Him, ' as if formerly he had been rather simplyunwilling to condemn than anxious to deliver. 

IV. So the scene changes again to outside. Pilate went out alone, leaving Jesus within, and was met before he had time, as wouldappear, to speak, by the final irresistible weapon which the rulershad kept in reserve. An accusation of treason was only too certain tobe listened to by the suspicious tyrant who was then Emperor, especially if brought by the authorities of a subject nation. Many aprovincial governor had had but a short shrift in such a case, andPilate knew that he was a ruined man if these implacable zealotshowling before him went to Tiberius with such a charge. So the diewas cast. With rage in his heart, no doubt, and knowing that he wassacrificing 'innocent blood' to save himself, he turned away from thevictorious mob, apparently in silence, and brought Jesus out oncemore. He had no more words to say to his prisoner. Nothing remainedbut the formal act of sentence, for which he seated himself, with apoor assumption of dignity, yet feeling all the while, no doubt, whata contemptible surrender he was making. 

Judgment-seats and mosaic pavements do not go far to secure reverencefor a judge who is no better than an assassin, killing an innocentman to secure his own ends. Pilate's sentence fell most heavily onhimself. If 'the judge is condemned when the guilty is acquitted, ' heis tenfold condemned when the innocent is sentenced. 

Pilate returned to his sarcastic mood when he returned to hisinjustice, and found some satisfaction in his old jeer, 'your King. 'But the passion of hatred was too much in earnest to be turned oreven affected by such poor scoffs, and the only answer was therenewed roar of the mob, which had murder in its tone. The repetitionof the governor's taunt, 'Shall I crucify your King?' brought out theanswer in which the rulers of the nation in their fury blindly flungaway their prerogative. It is no accident that it was 'the chiefpriests' who answered, 'We have no king but Caesar. ' Driven by hate, they deliberately disown their Messianic hope, and repudiate theirnational glory. They who will not have Christ have to bow to atyrant. Rebellion against Him brings slavery. 

AN EYE-WITNESS'S ACCOUNT OF THE CRUCIFIXION

'And He bearing His cross went forth into a place called theplace of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha: Wherethey crucified Him, and two other with Him, on either side one, and Jesus in the midst. And Pilate wrote a title, and put it onthe cross. And the writing was, JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THEJEWS. This title then read many of the Jews: for the place whereJesus was crucified was nigh to the city: and it was written inHebrew, and Greek, and Latin. Then said the chief priests of theJews to Pilate, Write not, The King of the Jews; but that Hesaid, I am King of the Jews. Pilate answered, What I have writtenI have written. Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took His garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part;and also His coat: now the coat was without seam, woven from thetop throughout. They said therefore among themselves, Let us notrend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be: that thescripture might be fulfilled, which saith, They parted My raimentamong them, and for My vesture they did cast lots. These thingstherefore the soldiers did. Now there stood by the cross of JesusHis mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus therefore saw His mother, and thedisciple standing by, whom He loved, He saith unto His mother, Woman, behold Thy Son! Then saith He to the disciple, Behold thymother! And from that hour that disciple took her unto his ownhome. After this, Jesus knowing that all things were nowaccomplished, that the Scripture might be fulfilled, saith, Ithirst. Now there was set a vessel full of vinegar: and theyfilled a spunge with vinegar, and put it upon hyssop, and put itto His mouth. When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, Hesaid, It is finished: and He bowed His head, and gave up theghost. '--JOHN xix. 17-30. 

In great and small matters John's account adds much to the narrativeof the crucifixion. He alone tells of the attempt to have the titleon the Cross altered, of the tender entrusting of the Virgin to hiscare, and of the two 'words' 'I thirst' and 'It is finished. ' Hegives details which had been burned into his memory, such as Christ'sposition 'in the midst' of the two robbers, and the jar of 'vinegar'standing by the crosses. He says little about the act of fixing Jesusto the Cross, but enlarges what the other Evangelists tell as to thesoldiers 'casting lots. ' He had heard what they said to one another. He alone distinctly tells that when He went forth, Jesus was bearingthe Cross which afterwards Simon of Cyrene had to carry, probablybecause our Lord's strength failed. 

Who appointed the two robbers to be crucified at the same time? Notthe rulers, who had no such power but probably Pilate, as one moreshaft of sarcasm which was all the sharper both because it seemed toput Jesus in the same class as they, and because they were of thesame class as the man of the Jews' choice, Barabbas, and possiblywere two of his gang. Jesus was 'in the midst, ' where He always is, completely identified with the transgressors, but central to allthings and all men. As He was in the midst on the Cross, with apenitent on one hand and a rejecter on the other, He is still in themidst of humanity, and His judgment-seat will be as central as HisCross was. 

All the Evangelists give the title written over the Cross, but Johnalone tells that it was Pilate's malicious invention. He thought thathe was having a final fling at the priests, and little knew how trulyhis title, which was meant as a bitter jest, was a fact. He had itput into the three tongues in use--'Hebrew, ' the national tongue;'Greek, ' the common medium of intercourse between varyingnationalities; and 'Latin' the official language. He did not knowthat he was proclaiming the universal dominion of Jesus, andprophesying that wisdom as represented by Greece, law and imperialpower as represented by Rome, and all previous revelation asrepresented by Israel, would yet bow before the Crucified, andrecognise that His Cross was His throne. 

The 'high-priests' winced, and would fain have had the title altered. Their wish once more denied Jesus, and added to their condemnation, but it did not move Pilate. It would have been well for him if he hadbeen as firm in carrying out his convictions of justice as in abidingby his bitter jest. He was obstinate in the wrong place, partlybecause he was angry with the rulers, and partly to recover his self-respect, which had been damaged by his vacillation. But his stiff-necked speech had a more tragic meaning than he knew, for 'what hehad written' on his own life-page on that day could never be erased, and will confront him. We are all writing an imperishable record, andwe shall have to read it out hereafter, and acknowledge ourhandwriting. 

John next sets in strong contrast the two groups round the Cross--thestolid soldiers and the sad friends. The four legionaries wentthrough their work as a very ordinary piece of military duty. Theywere well accustomed to crucify rebel Jews, and saw no differencebetween these three and former prisoners. They watched the pangswithout a touch of pity, and only wished that death might come soon, and let them get back to their barracks. How blind men may be to whatthey are gazing at! If knowledge measures guilt, how slight theculpability of the soldiers! They were scarcely more guilty than themallet and nails which they used. The Sufferer's clothes were theirperquisite, and their division was conducted on cool businessprinciples, and with utter disregard of the solemn nearness of death. Could callous indifference go further than to cast lots for the robeat the very foot of the Cross?

But the thing that most concerns us here is that Jesus submitted tothat extremity of shame and humiliation, and hung there naked for allthese hours, gazed on, while the light lasted, by a mocking crowd. Hehad set the perfect Pattern of lowly self-abnegation when, amid thedisciples in the upper room, He had 'laid aside His garments, ' butnow He humbles Himself yet more, being clothed only 'with shame. 'Therefore should we clothe Him with hearts' love. Therefore God hasclothed Him with the robes of imperial majesty. 

Another point emphasised by John is the fulfilment of prophecy inthis act. The seamless robe, probably woven by loving hands, perhapsby some of the weeping women who stood there, was too valuable todivide, and it would be a moment's pastime to cast lots for it. Johnsaw, in the expedient naturally suggested to four rough men, who allwanted the robe but did not want to quarrel over it, a fulfilment ofthe cry of the ancient sufferer, who had lamented that his enemiesmade so sure of his death that they divided his garments and castlots for his vesture. But he was 'wiser than he knew, ' and, while hiswords were to his own apprehension but a vivid metaphor expressinghis desperate condition, 'the Spirit which was in' him 'did signify'by them 'the sufferings of Christ. ' Theories of prophecy or sacrificewhich deny the correctness of John's interpretation have the NewTestament against them, and assume to know more about the workings ofinspiration than is either modest or scientific. 

What a contrast the other group presents! John's enumeration of thewomen may be read so as to mention four or three, according as 'Hismother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, ' is taken to mean onewoman or two. The latter is the more probable supposition, and it isalso probable that the unnamed sister of our Lord's mother was noother than Salome, John's own mother. If so, entrusting Mary toJohn's care would be the more natural. Tender care, joined withconsciousness that henceforth the relation of son and mother was tobe supplanted, not merely by Death's separating fingers, but byfaith's uniting bond, breathed through the word, so loving yet soremoving, 'Woman, behold thy son!' Dying trust in the humble friend, which would go far to make the friend worthy of it, breathed in thecharge, to which no form of address corresponding to 'Woman' isprefixed. Jesus had nothing else to give as a parting gift, but Hegave these two to each other, and enriched both. He showed His ownloving heart, and implied His faithful discharge of all filial dutieshitherto. And He taught us the lesson, which many of us have provedto be true, that losses are best made up when we hear Him pointing usby them to new offices of help to others, and that, if we will letHim, He will point us too to what will fill empty places in ourhearts and homes. 

The second of the words on the Cross which we owe to John is thatpathetic expression, 'I thirst. ' Most significant is the insight intoour Lord's consciousness which John, here as elsewhere, ventures togive. Not till He knew 'that all things were accomplished' did Hegive heed to the pangs of thirst, which made so terrible a part ofthe torture of crucifixion. The strong will kept back the bodilycravings so long as any unfulfilled duty remained. Now Jesus hadnothing to do but to die, and before He died He let flesh have onelittle alleviation. He had refused the stupefying draught which wouldhave lessened suffering by dulling consciousness, but He asked forthe draught which would momentarily slake the agony of parched lipsand burning throat. 

The words of verse 28 are not to be taken as meaning that Jesus said'I thirst' with the mere intention of fulfilling the Scripture. Hisutterance was the plaint of a real need, not a performance to fill apart. But it is John who sees in that wholly natural cry thefulfilment of the psalm (Ps. Lxix. 21). All Christ's bodilysufferings may be said to be summed up in this one word, the only onein which they found utterance. The same lips that said, 'If any manthirst, let him come unto Me, and drink, ' said this. Infinitelypathetic in itself, that cry becomes almost awful in its appeal to uswhen we remember who uttered it, and why He bore these pangs. Thevery 'Fountain of living water' knew the pang of thirst that everyone that thirsteth might come to the waters, and might drink, notwater only, but 'wine and milk, without money or price. '

John's last contribution to our knowledge of our Lord's words on theCross is that triumphant 'It is finished, ' wherein there spoke, notonly the common dying consciousness of life being ended, but thecertitude, which He alone of all who have died, or will die, had theright to feel and utter, that every task was completed, that allGod's will was accomplished, all Messiah's work done, all prophecyfulfilled, redemption secured, God and man reconciled. He looked backover all His life and saw no failure, no falling below the demands ofthe occasion, nothing that could have been bettered, nothing thatshould not have been there. He looked upwards, and even at thatmoment He heard in His soul the voice of the Father saying, 'This isMy beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased!'

Christ's work is finished. It needs no supplement. It can never berepeated or imitated while the world lasts, and will not lose itspower through the ages. Let us trust to it as complete for all ourneeds, and not seek to strengthen 'the sure foundation' which it haslaid by any shifting, uncertain additions of our own. But we mayremember, too, that while Christ's work is, in one aspect, finished, when He bowed His head, and by His own will 'gave up the ghost, ' inanother aspect His work is not finished, nor will be, until the wholebenefits of His incarnation and death are diffused through, andappropriated by, the world. He is working to-day, and long ages haveyet to pass, in all probability, before the voice of Him that sittethon the throne shall say 'It is done!'

THE TITLE ON THE CROSS

'Pilate wrote a title also, and put it on the cross. '--JOHN xix. 19. 

This title is recorded by all four Evangelists, in words varying inform but alike in substance. It strikes them all as significant that, meaning only to fling a jeer at his unruly subjects, Pilate shouldhave written it, and proclaimed this Nazarene visionary to be He forwhom Israel had longed through weary ages. John's account is thefullest, as indeed his narrative of all Pilate's shufflings is themost complete. He alone records that the title was tri-lingual (forthe similar statement in the Authorised Version of Luke is not partof the original text). He alone gives the Jews' request for analteration of the title, and Pilate's bitter answer. That angry replybetrays his motive in setting up such words over a crucifiedprisoner's head. They were meant as a savage taunt of the Jews, notas an insult to Jesus, which would have been welcome to them. Heseems to have regarded our Lord as a harmless enthusiast, to have hada certain liking for Him, and a languid curiosity as to Him, whichcame by degrees to be just tinged with awe as he felt that he couldnot quite make Him out. Throughout, he was convinced that His claimto be a king contained no menace for Caesar, and he would have letJesus go but for fear of being misrepresented at Rome. He felt thatthe sacrifice of one more Jew was a small price to pay to avert hisaccusation to Caesar; he would have sacrificed a dozen such to keephis place. But he felt that he was being coerced to do injustice, andhis anger and sense of humiliation find vent in that written taunt. It was a spurt of bad temper and a measure of his reluctance. 

Besides the interest attaching to it as Pilate's work, it seems toJohn significant of much that it should have been fastened on theCross, and that it should have been in the three languages, Hebrew(Aramaic), Greek, and Latin. 

Let us deal with three points in succession. 

I. The title as throwing light on the actors in the tragedy. 

We may consider it, first, in its bearing on Jesus' claims. He wascondemned by the priests on the theocratic charge of blasphemy, because He made Himself the Son of God. He was sentenced by Pilate onthe civil charge of rebellion, which the priests brought against Himas an inference necessarily resulting from His claim to be the Son ofGod. They drew the same conclusion as Nathanael did long before:'Rabbi, Thou art the Son of God, ' and therefore 'Thou art the King ofIsrael. ' And they were so far right that if the former designation iscorrect, the latter inevitably follows. 

Both charges, then, turned on His personal claims. To Pilate Heexplained the nature of His kingdom, so as to remove any suspicionthat it would bring Him and His subjects into collision with Rome, but He asserted His kingship, and it was His own claim that gavePilate the material for His gibe. It is worth notice, then, thatthese two claims from His own lips, made to the authorities whorespectively took cognisance of the theocratic and of the civic lifeof the nation, and at the time when His life hung on the decision ofthe two, were the causes of His judicial sentence. The people whoallege that Jesus never made the preposterous claims for Himselfwhich Christians have made for Him, but was a simple Teacher ofmorality and lofty religion, have never fairly faced the simplequestion: 'For what, then, was He crucified?' It is easy for them todilate on the hatred of the Jewish officials and the grossearthliness of the masses, as explaining the attitude of both, but itis not so easy to explain how material was found for judicialprocess. One can understand how Jesus was detested by rulers, and howthey succeeded in stirring up popular feeling against Him, but nothow an indictment that would hold water was framed against Him. Norwould even Pilate's complaisance have gone so far as to havecondemned a prisoner against whom all that could be said was that hewas disliked because he taught wisely and well and was too good forhis critics. The question is, not what made Jesus disliked, but whatset the Law in motion against Him? And no plausible answer has everbeen given except the one that was nailed above His head on theCross. It was not His virtues or the sublimity of His teaching, butHis twofold claim to be Son of God and King of Israel that haled Himto His death. 

We may further ask why Jesus did not clear up the mistakes, if theywere mistakes, that led to His condemnation. Surely He owed it to thetwo tribunals before which He stood, no less than to Himself and Hisfollowers, to disown the erroneous interpretations on which thecharges against Him were based. Even a Caiaphas was entitled to betold, if it were so, that He meant no blasphemy and was not claiminganything too high for a reverent Israelite, when He claimed to be theSon of God. If Jesus let the Sanhedrim sentence Him under a mistakeof what His words meant, He was guilty of His own death. 

We note, further, the light thrown by the Title on Pilate's action. It shows his sense of the unreality of the charge which he baselyallowed himself to be forced into entertaining as a ground ofcondemning Jesus. If this enigmatical prisoner had had a sword, therewould have been some substance in the charge against Him, but He wasplainly an idea-monger, and therefore quite harmless, and Hiskingship only fit to be made a jest of and a means of girding at therulers. 'Practical men' always under-estimate the power of ideas. TheTitle shows the same contempt for 'mere theorisers' as animated hisquestion, 'What is truth?' How little he knew that this 'King, ' atwhom he thought that he could launch clumsy jests, had lodged in theheart of the Empire a power which would shatter and remould it!

In his blindness to the radiant truth that stood before him, in thetragedy of his condemnation of that to which he should have yieldedhimself, Pilate stands out as a beacon for all time, warning theworld against looking for the forces that move the world among thepowers that the world recognises and honours. If we would not commitPilate's fault over again, we must turn to 'the base things of thisworld' and the 'things that are not' and find in them thetransforming powers destined to 'bring to nought things that are. '

Pilate's gibe was an unconscious prophecy. He thought it an exquisitejest, for it hurt. He was an instance of that strange irony that runsthrough history, and makes, at some crisis, men utter fateful wordsthat seem put into their lips by some higher power. Caiaphas and he, the Jewish chief of the Sanhedrim and the Roman procurator, wereforemost in Christ's condemnation, and each of them spoke such words, profoundly true and far beyond the speaker's thoughts. Was theEvangelist wrong in saying: 'This spake he not of himself?'

II. The Title on the Cross as unveiling the ground of Christ'sdominion. 

It seemed a ludicrous travesty of royalty that a criminal dyingthere, with a crowd of his 'subjects' gloating on his agonies andshooting arrowy words of scorn at him, should be a King. But Hiscross _is_ His throne. It is so because His death is His great workfor the world. It is so because in it we see, with melted hearts, thesublimest revelation of His love. Absolute authority belongs to utterself-sacrifice. He, and only He, who gives Himself wholly to and forme, thereby acquires the right of absolute command over me. He is the'Prince of all the kings of the earth, ' because He has died andbecome the 'First-begotten from the dead. ' From the hour when Hesaid, 'I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto Me, ' down to thehour when the seer heard the storm of praise from 'ten thousand timesten thousand, and thousands of thousands' breaking round the throne, every New Testament reference to Christ's dominion is accompaniedwith a reference to His cross, and every reference to His crossmerges in a reference to His throne. The crown of thorns was arevelation of the inmost nature of Christ's rule. The famous IronCrown of Milan is a hard, cold circlet within a golden coveringblazing with jewels. Christ's right to sway men, like His power to doso, rests on His sacrifice for men. A Christianity without a Cross isa Christianity without authority, as has been seen over and overagain in the history of the Church, and as is being seen again today, if men would only look. A Christ without a Cross is a Christ withouta Kingdom. The dominion of the world belongs to Him who can swaymen's inmost motives. Hearts are His who has bought them with Hisown. 

III. The Title as prophesying Christ's universal dominion. 

The three tongues in which it was written were chosen simply to makeit easy to read by the crowd from every part of the Empire assembledat the Passover. There were Palestinian Jews there who probably readAramaic only, and representatives from the widely diffused Jewishemigration in Greek-speaking lands, as well as Roman officials andJews from Italy who would be most familiar with Latin. Pilate wantedhis shaft to reach them all. It was, in its tri-lingual character, asign of Israel's degradation and a flourishing of the whip in theirfaces, as a government order in English placarded in a Bengaleevillage might be, or a Russian ukase in Warsaw. Its very wordingbetrayed a foreign hand, for a Jew would have written 'King ofIsrael, ' not 'of the Jews. '

But John divined a deeper meaning in this Title, just as he found asimilar prophecy of the universality of Christ's death in theanalogous word of Caiaphas. As in that saying he heard a faintprediction that Jesus should die 'not for that people only, but thatHe might also gather into one the scattered children of God, ' so hefeels that Pilate was wiser than he knew, and that his written wordsin their threefold garb symbolised the relation of Christ and Hiswork to the three great types of civilisation which it foundpossessed of the field. It bent them all to its own purposes, absorbed them into itself, used their witness and was propagated bymeans of them, and finally sucked the life out of them anddisintegrated them. The Jew contributed the morality and monotheismof the Old Testament; the Greek, culture and the perfected languagethat should contain the treasure, the fresh wine-skin for the newwine; the Roman made the diffusion of the kingdom possible by the_pax Romana_, and at first sheltered the young plant. All three, nodoubt, marred as well as helped the development of Christianity, andinfused into it deleterious elements, which cling to it to-day, butthe prophecy of the Title was fulfilled and these three tonguesbecame heralds of the Cross and with 'loud, uplifted trumpets blew'glad tidings to the ends of the world. 

That Title thus became an unconscious prophecy of Christ's universaldominion. The Psalmist that sang of Messiah's world-wide rule wassure that 'all nations shall serve Him, ' and the reason why he wascertain of it was '_for_ He shall deliver the needy when he crieth. 'We may be certain of it for the same reason. He who can deal withman's primal needs, and is ready and able to meet every cry of theheart, will never want suppliants and subjects. He who can respond toour consciousness of sin and weakness, and can satisfy hungry hearts, will build His sway over the hearts whom He satisfies on foundationsdeep as life itself. The history of the past becomes a prophecy ofthe future. Jesus has drawn men of all sorts, of every stage ofculture and layer of civilisation, and of every type of character toHim, and the power which has carried a peasant of Nazareth to be theacknowledged King of the civilised world is not exhausted, and willnot be till He is throned as Saviour and Ruler of the whole earth. There is only one religion in the world that is obviously growing. The gods of Greece and Rome are only subjects for studies inComparative Mythology, the labyrinthine pantheon of India makes noconquests, Buddhism is moribund. All other religions thanChristianity are shut up within definite and comparatively narrowgeographical and chronological limits. But in spite of prematurejubilations of enemies and much hasty talk about the need for a re-statement (which generally means a negation) of Christian truth, wehave a clear right to look forward with quiet confidence. Often inthe past has the religion of Jesus seemed to be wearing or worn out, but it has a strange recuperative power, and is wont to startle itsenemies' paeans over its grave by rising again and winning renewedvictories. The Title on the Cross is for ever true, and is writtenagain in nobler fashion 'on the vesture and on the thigh' of Him whorides forth at last to rule the nations, 'KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OFLORDS. '

THE IRREVOCABLE PAST

'What I have written I have written. '--JOHN xix. 22. 

This was a mere piece of obstinacy. Pilate knew that he hadprostituted his office in condemning Jesus, and he revenged himselffor weak compliance by ill-timed mulishness. A cool-headed governorwould have humoured his difficult subjects in such a trifle, as ajust one would have been inflexible in a matter of life and death. But this man's facile yielding and his stiff-necked obstinacy wereboth misplaced. 'So I will, so I command. Let my will suffice for areason, ' was what he meant. He had written his gibe, and not all theJews in Jewry should make him change. 

But his petulant answer to the rulers' request for the removal of theoffensive placard carried in it a deeper meaning, as the Title alsodid, and as the people's fierce yell, 'His blood be on us and on ourchildren, ' did. Possibly the Evangelist had some thought of that sortin recording this saying; but, at all events, I venture to take aliberty with it which I should not do if it were a word of God's, orif it were given for our instruction. So I take it now as expressingin a vivid way, and irrespective of Pilate's intention, the thoughtof the irrevocable past. 

I. Every man is perpetually writing a permanent record of himself. 

It is almost impossible to get the average man to think of his lifeas a whole, or to realise that the fleeting present leaves indelibletraces. They seem to fade away wholly. The record appears to bewritten in water. It is written in ink which is invisible, but asindelible as invisible. Grammarians define the perfect tense as thatwhich expresses an action completed in the past and of which theconsequences remain in the present. That is true of all our actions. Our characters, our circumstances, our remembrances, are allpermanent. Every day we make entries in our diary. 

II. That record, once written, is irrevocable. 

We all know what it is to long that some one action should have beenotherwise, to have taken some one step which perhaps has colouredyears, and which we would give the world not to have taken. But itcannot be. Remorse cannot alter it. Wishes are vain. Repentance isvain. A new line of conduct is vain. 

What an awful contrast in this respect between time future and timepast! Think of the indefinite possibilities in the one, the rigidfixity of the other. Our present actions are like cements that dryquickly and set hard on exposure to the air--the dirt of the trowelabides on the soft brick for ever. Many cuneiform inscriptions wereimpressed with a piece of wood on clay, and are legible millenniumsafter. 

We have to write _currente calamo_, and as soon as written, the MS. Is printed and stereotyped, and no revising proofs nor erasures arepossible. An action, once done, escapes from us wholly. 

How needful, then, to have lofty principles ready at hand! The frescopainter must have a sure touch, and a quick hand, and a full mind. 

What a boundless field the future offers us! How much it may be! Howmuch, perhaps, we resolve it shall be! What a shrunken heap theharvest is! Are you satisfied with what you have written?

III. This record, written here, is read yonder. 

Our actions carry eternal consequences. These will be read byourselves. Character remains. Memory remains. 

We shall read with all illusions stripped away. 

Others will read--God and a universe. 

'We shall all be _manifested_ before the judgment-seat of Christ. '

IV. This record may be blotted out by the blood of Christ. 

It cannot be made not to have been, but God's pardon will be given, and in respect to all personal consequences it is made non-existent. Circumstances may remain, but their pressure is different. Charactermay be renewed and sanctified, and even made loftier by the evilpast. Our dead selves may become 'stepping-stones to higher things. '

Memory may remain, but its sting is gone, and new hopes, and joys, and work may fill the pages of our record. 

'He took away the handwriting that was against us, nailing it to HisCross. '

Our lives and characters may become a palimpsest. 'I will write uponhim My new name. ' 'Ye are an epistle of Christ ministered by us. '

CHRIST'S FINISHED AND UNFINISHED WORK

'Jesus . .. Said, It is finished. '--JOHN xix. 30. 

'He said unto me, It is done. '--REV. Xxi. 6. 

One of these sayings was spoken from the Cross, the other from theThrone. The Speaker of both is the same. In the one, His voice 'thenshook the earth, ' as the rending rocks testified; in the other, Hisvoice 'will shake not the earth only but also heaven'; for 'newheavens and a new earth' accompanied the proclamation. In the one, like some traveller ready to depart, who casts a final glance overhis preparations, and, satisfied that nothing is omitted, gives hischarioteer the signal and rolls away, Jesus Christ looked back overHis life's work, and, knowing that it was accomplished, summoned Hisservant Death, and departed. In the other, He sets His seal to theclosed book of the world's history, and ushers in a renovateduniverse. The one masks the completion of the work on which theworld's redemption rests, the other marks the completion of the age-long process by which the world's redemption is actually realised. The one proclaims that the foundation is laid, the other that theheadstone is set on the finished building. The one bids us trust in apast perfected work; the other bids us hope in the perfectaccomplishment of the results of that work. Taken singly, thesesayings are grand; united, they suggest thoughts needed always, nevermore needful than to-day. 

I. We see here the work which was finished on the Cross. 

The Evangelist gives great significance to the words of my firsttext, as is shown by his statement in a previous verse: 'Jesus, knowing that all things were now accomplished, said, I thirst, ' andthen--'It is finished. ' That is to say, there is something in thatdying voice a great deal deeper and more wonderful than the ordinaryhuman utterance with which a dying man might say, 'It is all overnow. I have done, ' for this utterance came from the consciousnessthat all things had been accomplished by Him, and that He had doneHis life's work. 

Now, there, taking the words even in their most superficial sense, wecome upon the strange peculiarity which marks off the life of JesusChrist from every other life that was ever lived. There are no looseends left, no unfinished tasks drop from His nerveless hands, to betaken up and carried on by others. His life is a rounded whole, witheverything accomplished that had been endeavoured, and everythingdone that had been commanded. 'His hands have laid the foundation;His hands shall also finish. ' He alone of the sons of men, in thedeepest sense, completed His task, and left nothing for successors. The rest of us are taken away when we have reared a course or two ofthe structure, the dream of building which brightened our youth. Thepen drops from paralysed hands in the middle of a sentence, and afragment of a book is left. The painter's brush falls with hispalette at the foot of his easel, and but the outline of what heconceived is on the canvas. All of us leave tasks half done, and haveto go away before the work is completed. The half-polished columnsthat lie at Baalbec are but a symbol of the imperfection of everyhuman life. But this Man said, 'It is finished, ' and 'gave up theghost. ' Now, if we ponder on what lies in that consciousness ofcompletion, I think we find, mainly, three things. 

Christ rendered a complete obedience. All through His life we seeHim, hearing with the inward ear the solemn voice of the Father, andresponding to it with that 'I must' which runs through all His days, from the earliest dawning of consciousness, when He startled Hismother with 'I must be about My Father's business, ' until the verylast moments. In that obedience to the all-present necessity which Hecheerfully embraced and perfectly discharged, there was no flaw. Healone of men looks back upon a life in which His clear consciousnessdetected neither transgression nor imperfection. In the midst of Hiscareer He could front His enemies with 'Which of you convinceth Me ofsin?' and no man then, and no man in all the generations that haveelapsed since--though some have been blind enough to try it, andmalicious enough to utter their attempts, --has been able to answerthe challenge. In the midst of His career He said, 'I do always thethings that please Him'; and nobody then or since has been able tolay his finger upon an act of His in which, either by excess ordefect, or contrariety, the will of God has not been fullyrepresented. At the beginning of His career He said, in answer to theBaptist's remonstrance, 'It becometh us to fulfil all righteousness, 'and at the end of His career He looked back, and knowing that He hadthus done what became Him--namely, fulfilled it all--He said, 'It isfinished!'

The utterance further expresses Christ's consciousness of havingcompleted the revelation of God. Jesus Christ has made known theFather, and the generations since have added nothing to Hisrevelation. The very people, to-day, that turn away fromChristianity, in the name of higher conceptions of the divine nature, owe their conceptions of it to the Christ from whom they turn. Not inbroken syllables; not 'at sundry times and in divers manners, ' butwith the one perfect, full-toned name of God on His lips, and vocalin His life, He has declared the Father unto us. In the course of Hiscareer He said, 'He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father'; and, looking back on His life of manifestation of God, He proclaimed, 'Itis finished!' And the world has since, with all its thinking, addednothing to the name which Christ has declared. 

The utterance farther expresses His consciousness of having made acompleted, atoning Sacrifice. Remember that the words of my firsttext followed that awful cry that came from the darkness, and as byone lightning flash, show us the waves and billows rolling over Hishead. 'My God! My God! why hast Thou forsaken Me?' In that infinitelypathetic and profound utterance, to the interpretation of which ourpowers go but a little way, Jesus Christ blends together, in the mostmarvellous fashion, desolation and trust, the consciousness that Godis His God, and the consciousness that He is bereft of the light ofHis presence. Brethren! I know of no explanation of these words whichdoes justice to both the elements that are intertwined so intimatelyin them, except the old one, which listens to Him as they come fromHis quivering lip, and says, 'The Lord hath made to meet on Him theiniquity of us all. '

Ah, brethren! unless there was something a great deal more than thephysical shrinking from physical death in that piteous cry, JesusChrist did not die nearly as bravely as many a poor, trembling womanwho, at the stake or the block, has owed her fortitude to Him. Many ablood-stained criminal has gone out of life with less tremor thanthat which, unless you take the explanation that Scripture suggestsof the cry, marred the last hours of Jesus Christ. Having drained thecup, He held it up inverted when He said 'It is finished!' and not adrop trickled down the edge. He drank it that we might never need todrink it; and so His dying voice proclaimed that 'by one offering forsin for ever, ' He 'obtained eternal redemption' for us. 

II. Now, secondly, note the work which began from the Cross. Betweenmy two texts lie untold centuries, and the whole development of theconsequences of Christ's death, like some great valley stretchingbetween twin mountain-peaks on either side, which from some points ofview will be foreshortened and invisible, but when gazed down upon, is seen to stretch widely leagues broad, from mountain ridge tomountain ridge. So my two texts, by the fact that millenniums have tointerpose between the time when 'It is finished!' is spoken, and thetime when 'It is done!' can be proclaimed from the Throne, imply thatthe interval is filled by a continuous work of our Lord's, whichbegan at the moment when the work on the Cross ended. 

Now it has very often been the case, as I take leave to think, thatthe interpretation of the former of these two texts has been of sucha kind as to distort the perspective of Christian truth, and toobscure the fact of that continuous work of our Lord's. Therefore itmay not be out of place if, in a sentence or two, I recall to you theplain teaching of the New Testament upon this matter. 'It isfinished!' Yes; and as the lower course of some great building is butthe foundation for the higher, when 'finished' it is but begun. Thework which, in one aspect, is the close, in another aspect is thecommencement of Christ's further activity. What did He say Himself, when He was here with His disciples? 'I will not leave youcomfortless, I will come to you. ' What was the last word that camefluttering down, like an olive leaf, into the bosoms of the men asthey stood with uplifted faces gazing upon Him as He disappeared?'Lo! I am with you alway, even to the end of the ages. ' What is thekeynote of the book which carries on the story of the Gospels in thehistory of the militant Church? 'The former treatise have I made. .. Of all that Jesus _began_ both to do and to teach, until the day inwhich He was taken up'--and, being taken up, continued, in a newform, both the doing and the teaching. Thus that book, misnamed theActs of the Apostles, sets Him forth as the Worker of all theprogress of the Church. Who is it that 'adds to the Church daily suchas were being saved?' The Lord. Who is it that opened the hearts ofthe hearers to the message? The Lord. Who is it that flings wide theprison-gates when His persecuted servants are in chains? The Lord. Who is it that bids one man attach himself to the chariot of theeunuch of Ethiopia, and another man go and bear witness in Rome? TheLord. Through the whole of that book there runs the keynote, as itsdominant thought, that men are but the instruments, and the hand thatwields them is Christ's, and that He who wrought the finished workthat culminated on Calvary is operating a continuous work through theages from His Throne. 

Take that last book of Scripture, which opens with a view of theascended Christ 'walking in the midst of the seven candlesticks, andholding the stars in His right hand;' which further draws aside thecurtains of the heavenly sanctuary, and lets us see 'the Lamb in themidst of the Throne, ' opening the seven seals--that is to say, setting loose for their progress through the world the forces thatmake the history of humanity, and which culminates in the vision ofthe final battle in which the Incarnate Word of God goes forth tovictory, with all the armies of heaven following Him. Are not itswhole spirit and message that Jesus Christ, the Lamb who is theAntagonist of the Beast, is working through all the history of theworld, and will work till its kingdoms are 'become the kingdoms ofour God and of His Christ?'

Now, that continuous operation of Jesus Christ in the midst of men isnot to be weakened down to the mere continued influence of the truthswhich He proclaimed, or the Gospel which He brought. There issomething a great deal more than the diminishing vibrations of aforce long since set in operation, and slowly ceasing to act. Deadteachers do still 'rule our spirits from their urns'; but it is nodead Christ who, by the influence of what He did when He was living, sways the world and comforts His Church; it is a living Christ whoto-day is working in His people, by His Spirit. Further, He works onthe world through His people by the Word; they plant and water, He'gives the increase. ' And He is working in the world, for His Churchand for the world, by His wielding of all power that is given to Him, in heaven and on earth. So that the work that is done upon earth Hedoeth it all Himself; and Christian people unduly limit the sphere ofChrist's operations when they look back only to the Cross, and talkabout a 'finished work' there, and forget that that finished workthere is but the vestibule of the continuous work that is being doneto-day. 

Christian people! The present work of Christ needs working servants. We are here in order to carry on His work. The Apostle ventured tosay that he was appointed 'to fill up that which is behind of thesufferings of Christ'; we may well venture to say that we are heremainly to apply to the world the benefits resulting from the finishedwork upon the Cross. The accomplishment of redemption, and therealisation of the accomplished redemption, are two wholly differentthings. Christ has done the one. He says to us, 'You are honoured tohelp Me to do the other. ' According to the accurate rendering of agreat saying of the Old Testament, 'Take no rest, and give Him norest, till He establish and make Jerusalem a praise in the earth, Christ's work is finished; there is nothing for us to do with it buttrust it. Christ's work is going on; come to His help. Ye are fellow-labourers with and to the Incarnate Truth. 

III. I need not say more than a word about the third thought, suggested by these texts--viz. , the completion of the work whichbegan on the Cross. 

'It is done!' That lies, no man knows how far, ahead of us. As surelyas astronomers tell us that all this universe is hastening towards acentral point, so surely 'that far-off divine event' is that 'towhich the whole creation moves. ' It is the blaze of light which fillsthe distant end of the dim vista of human history. Its elements arein part summed up in the context--the tabernacle of God with men, theperfected fellowship of the human with the divine, the housing of menin the very home and heart of God; 'a new heaven and a new earth, ' arenovated universe; the removal of all evil, suffering, sorrow, sin, and tears. These things are to be, and shall be, when He says 'It isdone!'

Brethren! nothing else than such an issue can be the end of Creation, for nothing else than such is the purpose of God for man, and God isnot going to be beaten by the world and the devil. Nothing else thansuch can be the issue of the Cross; for 'He shall see of the travailof His soul, and shall be satisfied, ' and Christ is not going tolabour in vain, and spend His life, and give His breath and His bloodfor nought. 

Nothing but the work finished on the Cross guarantees the coming ofthat perfected issue. I know not where else there is hope formankind, looking on the history of humanity, except in that greatmessage, that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, has come, has died, livesfor ever, and is the world's King and Lord. 

So for ourselves, in regard to the one part of the work, let uslisten to Him saying 'It is finished!' abandon all attempts to eke itout by additions of our own, and cast ourselves on the finishedRevelation, the finished Obedience, the finished Atonement, made oncefor all on the Cross. But as for the continuous work going on throughthe ages, let us cast ourselves into it with earnestness, self-sacrifice, consecration, and continuity, for we are fellow-workerswith Christ, and Christ will work in, with, and for us if we willwork for Him. 

CHRIST OUR PASSOVER

'These things were done, that the Scripture should be fulfilled, A bone of Him shall not be broken. '--JOHN xix. 36. 

The Evangelist, in the words of this text, points to the great Feastof the Passover and to the Paschal Lamb, as finding their highestfulfilment, as he calls it, in Jesus Christ. For this purpose ofbringing out the correspondence between the shadow and the substancehe avails himself of a singular coincidence concerning a perfectlyunimportant matter--viz. , the abnormally rapid sinking of Christ'sphysical strength in the crucifixion, by which the final indignity ofbreaking the bones of the sufferers was avoided in His case. Johnsees, in that entirely insignificant thing, a kind of fingerpostpointing to far more important, deeper, and real correspondences. Weare not to suppose that he was so purblind, and attached so muchimportance to externals, as that this outward coincidence exhaustedin his conception the correspondence between the two. But It was atrifle that suggested a greater matter. It was a help aiding grossconceptions and common minds to grasp the inward relation betweenJesus and that Passover rite. But just as our Lord would havefulfilled the prophecy about the King coming 'meek, and havingsalvation, ' though He had never ridden on a literal ass into theliteral Jerusalem, so our Lord would have 'fulfilled' the shadow ofthe Passover with the substance of His own sacrifice if there hadnever been this insignificant correspondence, in outward things, between the two. 

But whilst my text is the Evangelist's commentary, the questionarises, How did he come to recognise that our Lord was all which thatPassover signified? And the answer is, he recognised it throughChrist's own teaching. He does not record the institution of theLord's Supper. It did not fall into his scheme to deal with externalevents of that sort, and he knew that it had been sufficiently taughtby the three earlier Gospels, to which his is a supplement. Butthough he did not narrate the institution, he takes it for granted inthe words of my text, and his vindication of his seeing thefulfilment of 'A bone of Him shall not be broken' in the incident towhich I have referred, lies in this, that Jesus Christ Himself sweptaway the Passover and substituted the memorial feast of the Lord'sSupper. 'This do in remembrance of Me, ' said at the table where thePaschal lamb had been eaten, sufficiently warrants John's allusionhere. 

So then, marking the fact that our Evangelist is but carrying out thelesson that he had learned in the upper room, we may fairly take theidentification of the Paschal lamb with the crucified Christ as beingthe last instance in which our Lord Himself laid His hand upon OldTestament incidents and said, 'They all mean Me. ' And it is from thatpoint of view, and not merely for the purpose of dealing with thewords that I have read as our starting-point, that I wish to speaknow. 

I. Now then, the first thing that strikes me is that in thissubstitution of Himself for the Passover we have a strange instanceof Christ's supreme authority. 

Try to fling yourself back in imagination to that upper room, whereJesus and a handful of Galileans were sitting, and remember thesanctity which immemorial usage had cast round that centre and apexof the Jewish ritual, established at the Exodus by a solemn divineappointment, intended to commemorate the birth of the nation, venerable by antiquity and association with the most vehementpulsations of national feeling, the centre point of Jewish religion. Christ said: 'Put it all away; do not think about the Exodus; do notthink about the destroying Angel; do not think about the deliverance. Forget all the past; do this in remembrance of Me. ' Take into accountthat the Passover had a double sacredness, as a religious festival, and also as commemorating the birthday of the nation, and thenestimate what a strange sense of His own importance the Man must havehad who said: 'That past is done with, and it is _Me_ that you haveto think of now. ' If I might venture to take a very modernillustration without vulgarising a great thing, suppose that on theother side of the Atlantic somebody were to stand up and say, 'Iabrogate the Fourth of July and Independence Day. Do not think aboutWashington and the establishment of the United States any more. Thinkabout me!' That is exactly what Jesus Christ did. Only instead of acentury there were millenniums of observance which He thus laidaside. So I say that is a strange exercise of authority. 

What does it imply? It implies two things, and I must say a wordabout each of them. It implies that Christ regarded the whole of theancient system of Judaism, its history, its law, its rites ofworship, as pointing onwards to Himself, that He recognised in it asystem the whole _raison d'etre_ of which was anticipatory andpreparatory of Himself. For Him the Decalogue was given, for Himpriests were consecrated, for Him kings were anointed, for Himprophets spake, for Him sacrifices smoked, for Him festivals wereappointed, and the nation and its history were all one longproclamation: 'The King cometh! go ye forth to meet Him. ' You cannotget less than that out of the way in which He handled, as is told inthis Gospel, Jacob's ladder, the Serpent in the wilderness, the Mannathat fell from Heaven, the Pillar of Cloud that led the people, theRock that gushed forth water, and now, last of all, the Passover, which was the very shining apex of the whole sacrificial and ritualsystem. 

And remember, too, that this way of dealing with all the institutionsof the nation as meaning, in their inmost purpose, Himself, isexactly parallel to His way of dealing with the sacred words ofMosaic commandment and prohibition in the Sermon on the Mount, whereHe set side by side as of equal--I was going to say, and I shouldhave been right in saying, identical--authority what was 'said tothem of old time' and what 'I say unto you. ' Amidst the dust of ourpresent controversies as to the processes by which, and the times atwhich, the Old Testament books assumed their present form, there isgrave danger that the essential thing about the whole matter shouldbe obscured. The way in which what is called Higher Criticism mayfinally locate the origins and dates of the various parts of thatancient record and that ancient system does not in the slightestdegree affect the outstanding characteristic of the whole, that it isthe product of the divine hand, working (if you will) through men whohad more freedom of action whilst they were its organs than ourgrandfathers thought. Be it so; but still that divine Hand shaped thewhole in order that, besides its educational effects upon thegenerations that received it, there should shine through it all theexpectation of the coming King. And I venture to say that, howevergrateful we may be to modern investigation for light upon these otherpoints to which I have referred, the ignorant reader that reads JesusChrist into all the Old Testament may be very uncritical and mistakenin regard to details, but he has got hold of the root of the matter, and is nearer to the apprehension of the essence and spirit andpurpose of the ancient Revelation than the most learned critic whodoes not see that it is the preparation for, and the prophecy of, Jesus Christ Himself. And the vindication of such a position lies inthis, among other facts, that He in the upper room, in harmony with, and in completion of, all that He had previously spoken about Hisrelation to the Old Testament, claimed the Passover as the prophecyof Himself, and said, 'I am the Lamb of God. '

I need not dwell, I suppose, on the other consideration that isinvolved in this strange exercise of authority--viz. , thenaturalness, as without any sense of doing anything presumptuous orextraordinary, with which Christ assumes His right to handle divineappointments with the most perfect freedom, to modify them, toreshape them, to divert them from their first purpose, and to enjointhem with an authority equal to that with which the Lord said untoMoses, 'Keep ye this day through your generations. ' There is only onesupposition on which I, for my part, can understand that conduct--that He was the possessor of authority the same as the Authority thathad originally instituted the rite. 

And so, dear brethren! when our Lord said, 'Do this in remembrance ofMe, ' I pray you to ask yourselves, What did that involve in regard toHis nature and the source of His authority over us? And what did itinvolve in regard to His relation to that ancient Revelation?

II. And now another point that I would suggest is--we have, in thissubstitution of the new rite for the old, our Lord's cleardeclaration of what was the very heart of His work in the world. 

'This do in remembrance of Me. ' What is it, then, to which He points?Is it to the wisdom, the tenderness, the deep beauty, the flashingmoral purity that gleamed and shone lambent in His words? No! Is itto the gracious self--oblivion, the gentle accessibility, the lovingpity, the leisurely heart always ready to help, the eye ready to fillwith tears, the hand ever outstretched and ever laden with blessings?No! It is the death on the Cross which He, if I might so say, isolates, at least which He underscores with red lines, and which Hewould have us remember, as we remember nothing else. Brethren, ritesare insignificant in many aspects, but are often of enormousimportance as witnesses to truths. And I point to the Lord's Supper, the one rite of the Christian Church, which is to be repeated overand over and over again, and see in it the great barrier which hasrendered it impossible, and will render it impossible, as I believe, for evermore, that a Christianity, which obscures the atoningsacrifice of Christ on the Cross, should ever pose as the fullrepresentation of the Master's mind, or as the full expression of theSaviour's word. 

What do men and churches that falter in their allegiance to the truthof Christ's redemptive death do with the Lord's Supper? Nothing! Forthe most part they ignore it, or if they retain it, do not, for thelife of them, know how to explain it, or why it should be there. Theexplanation of why it is there is the great truth, of which it is theclear utterance and the strong defence, the truth that 'Jesus Christdied for our sins according to the Scriptures, ' and that 'the Son ofMan came. .. To give His life a ransom for the many. '

What did that Passover say? Two things it said, the blood that wassprinkled on the lintels and on the door-posts was the token to thedestroying Angel, as with his broad, silent pinions he swept throughthe land, bringing a blacker night into Egyptian darkness, andleaving behind him no house 'in which there was not one dead. ' Allthe houses of which the occupants had put the ruddy mark on thelintels and on the doorposts, and were wise enough not to go forthfrom behind the shelter of that mark on the door, were safe when themorning dawned. And so to us all who, by our sinfulness, have broughtdown upon our heads exposedness to that retribution, which, in arighteously governed universe, must needs follow sin, and to thatdeath which the separation from God--the necessary result of sin--most surely is, there is proffered in that great Sacrifice shelterfrom the destroying sword. 

But that is not all. Whilst the blood on the posts meant security, the Lamb on the table meant emancipation. So they who find in thedying Christ their exemption from the last consequences oftransgression, find, in partaking of the Christ whose sacrifice istheir pardon, the communication of a new power, which sets them freefrom a worse than Egyptian bondage, and enables them to shake fromtheir emancipated limbs the fetters of the grimmest of the Pharaohsthat have wielded a tyrannous dominion over them. Pardon and freedom, the creation of a nation subject only to the law of Jehovah Himself--these were the facts that the Passover festival and the Passover lambsignified, and these are the facts which, in nobler fashion, arebrought to us by Jesus Christ. So, I beseech you, let Him teach youwhat His work in the world is, as He lays His own hand on thathighest of the ancient festivals, and endorses the Baptist'sdeclaration, 'Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin ofthe world!'

III. Now, lastly, let me ask you to notice how, in this regal andauthoritative dealing by our Lord with that ancient festival, therelies a loving provision for our weakness. 

Surely we may venture to say that Jesus Christ desired to beremembered, even by that handful of poor people, and by us, not onlyfor our sakes, but because His heart, too, craved that He should notbe forgotten by those whom He was leaving. As you may remember, thedying king turned to the bishop standing by him, with the enigmaticalword which no one understood but the receiver of it--'Remember!' sodid Jesus Christ. He appeals to our thankfulness, He appeals to ouraffections, He lets us see that He wishes to live in our memories, because He delights in it, as well as because it is for our profit. 

The Passover was purely and simply a rite of remembrance. I ventureto believe that the Lord's Supper is nothing more. I know how peopletalk about the bare, bald, Zwinglian ideas of the Communion. They dolook very bald and bare by the side of modern notions and mediaevalnotions resuscitated. Well, I had rather have the bareness than Iwould have it overlaid by coverings under which there is room forabundance of vermin to lurk. Christ puts the Lord's Supper in theplace of the Passover. The Passover was a purely memorial rite. YouChristian people will understand the spirituality of the whole Gospelsystem, and the nature of the only bond which unites men to Jesus andbrings spiritual blessings to them--viz. Faith--all the better, themore you cling, in spite of all that is going on round us to-day, tothat simple, intelligible, Scriptural notion that we commemorate theSacrifice, not offer the Sacrifice. Jesus Christ said that the Lord'sSupper was to be observed 'in remembrance of Me. ' That was Hisexplanation of its purpose, and I for one am content to take as theexpounder of the laws of the feast, the feast's own Founder. 

Now one more word. In the Passover men fed on the Sacrifice. JesusChrist presents Himself to each of us as at once the Sacrifice forour sins and the Food of our souls. If you will keep your minds intouch with the truth about Him, and with Him whom the truth about Himreveals to you, if you will keep your hearts in touch with that greatand unspeakable sign of God's love, if you will keep your wills insubmission to His authority, if you will let His blood, 'which is thelife, ' or as you may otherwise word it, His Spirit, come into yourlives, and be your spirit, your motive, then you will go out from thetable, not like the disciples to flee, and deny, and forget, nor likethe Israelites to wander in a wilderness, but strengthened for many aday of joyous service and true communion, and will come at last towhat He has promised us: 'Ye shall sit with Me at My table in MyKingdom, ' whence we shall go 'no more out. '

JOSEPH AND NICODEMUS

'And after this Joseph of Arimathea, being a disciple of Jesus, but secretly for fear of the Jews, besought Pilate that he mighttake away the body of Jesus; . .. And there came also Nicodemuswhich at the first came to Jesus by night. '--JOHN xix. 38, 39. 

While Christ lived, these two men had been unfaithful to theirconvictions; but His death, which terrified and paralysed andscattered His avowed disciples, seems to have shamed and stung theminto courage. They came now, when they must have known that it wastoo late, to lavish honour and tears on the corpse of the Master whomthey had been too cowardly to acknowledge, whilst acknowledgmentmight yet have availed. How keen an arrow of self-condemnation musthave pierced their hearts as they moved in their offices of love, which they thought that He could never know, round His dead corpse!

They were both members of the Sanhedrim; the same motives, no doubt, had withheld each of them from confessing Christ; the same impulsesunited them in this too late confession of discipleship. Nicodemushad had the conviction, at the beginning of Christ's ministry, thatHe was at least a miraculously attested and God-sent Teacher. But thefear which made him steal to Jesus by night--the unenviabledistinction which the Evangelist pitilessly reiterates at eachmention of him--arrested his growth and kept him dumb when silencewas treason. Joseph of Arimathea is described by two of theEvangelists as 'a disciple'; by the other two as a devout Israelite, like Simeon and Anna, 'waiting for the Kingdom of God. ' Luke informsus that he had not concurred in the condemnation of Jesus, but leadsus to believe that his dissent had been merely silent. Perhaps he wasmore fully convinced than Nicodemus, and at the same time even moretimid in avowing his convictions. 

We may take these two contrite cowards as they try to atone for theirunfaithfulness to their living Master by their ministrations to Himdead, as examples of secret disciples, and see here the causes, themisery, and the cure of such. 

I. Let us look at them as illustrations of secret discipleship andits causes. 

They were restrained from the avowal of the Messiahship of Jesus byfear. There is nothing in the organisation of society at this day tomake any man afraid of avowing the ordinary kind of Christianitywhich satisfies the most of us; rather it is the proper thing withthe bulk of us middle-class people, to say that in some sense orother we are Christians. But when it comes to a real avowal, a realcarrying out of a true discipleship, there are as many and asformidable, though very different, impediments in the way to-day, from those which blocked the path of these two cowards in our text. In all regions of life it is hard to work out into practice any moralconviction whatever. How many of us are there who have beliefs aboutsocial and moral questions which we are ashamed to avow in certaincompanies for fear of the finger of ridicule being pointed at us? Itis not only in the Church, and in reference to purely religiousbelief, that we find the curse of secret discipleship, but it iseverywhere. Wherever there are moral questions which are yet thesubject of controversy, and have not been enthroned with thehallelujahs of all men, you get people that carry their convictionsshut up in their own breasts, and lock their lips in silence, whenthere is most need of frank avowal. The political, social, and moralconflicts of this day have their 'secret disciples, ' who will onlycome out of their holes when the battle is over, and will then shoutwith the loudest. 

But to turn to the more immediate subject before us, how many men andwomen, I wonder, are there who ought to be and are not, distinctlyand openly united with the Christian community?

I do not mean to say--God forbid that I should--that connection withany existing church is the same as a connection with Jesus Christ, orthat the neglect to be so associated is tantamount to secretdiscipleship; I know there are plenty of other ways of acknowledgingHim than that, but I am quite sure that this is one department inwhich a large number of men, in all our congregations--and there arenot a few in this congregation--need a very plain word of earnestremonstrance. It is one way of manifesting whose you are, that youshould unite yourselves openly with those who belong to Him, and whotry to serve Him. I do not dwell upon this matter, because I do notwish to be misunderstood, as if I supposed that union to a church isequivalent to union with Him; or that a connection with a church isthe only, or even the principal way of making an open avowal ofChristian principle; but I am certain that amongst us in this daythere is a laxity in this matter which is doing harm both to theChurch and to some of you. Therefore I say to you, dear friends, suffer the word of exhortation as to the duty of openly unitingyourselves with the Christian community. 

But far higher and more important than that--do you ever say anyhowthat you belong to Jesus Christ? In a society like ours, in which theinfluence of Christian morality affects a great many people who haveno personal connection with Him, it is not always enough that thelife should preach, because over a very large field of ordinary dailylife the underground influence, so to speak, of Christian ethics hasinfiltrated and penetrated, so that many a tree bears a greener leafbecause of the water that has found its way to it from the river, though it be planted far from its banks. Even those who are notChristians live outward lives largely regulated by Christianprinciple. The whole level of morality has been heaved up, as thecoastline has sometimes been by hidden fires slowly working, by theimperceptible, gradual influence of the gospel. 

So it needs sometimes that you should _say_ 'I am a Christian, ' aswell as that you should live like one. Ask yourselves, dear friends!whether you have buttoned your greatcoat over your uniform thatnobody may know whose soldier you are. Ask yourselves whether youhave sometimes held your tongues because you knew that if you spokepeople would find out where you came from and what country youbelonged to. Ask yourselves, Have you ever accompanied the witness ofyour lives with the commentary of your confession? Did you ever, anywhere but in a church, stand up and say, 'I believe in JesusChrist, His only Son, _my_ Lord'?

And then ask yourselves another question: Have you ever dared to besingular? We are all of us in this world often thrust intocircumstances in which it is needful that we should say, 'So do not Ibecause of the fear of the Lord. ' Boys go to school; they used alwaysto kneel down at their bedsides and say their prayers when they wereat home. They do not like to do it with all those critical and crueleyes--and there are no eyes more critical and more cruel than youngeyes--fixed upon them, and so they give up prayer. A young man comesto Manchester, goes into a warehouse, pure of life, and with a tonguethat has not blossomed into rank fruit of obscenity and blasphemy. And he hears, at the next desk there, words that first of all bring ablush to his cheek, and he is tempted into conduct that he knows tobe a denial of his Master. And he covers up his principles, and goeswith the tempters into the evil. I might sketch a dozen other cases, but I need not. In one form or other, we have all to go through thesame ordeal. We have sometimes to dare to be in a minority of one, ifwe will not be untrue to our Master and to ourselves. 

Now the reasons for this unfaithfulness to conviction and to Christ, are put by the Apostle here in a very blunt fashion--'For fear of theJews. ' That is not what we say to ourselves; some of us say, 'Oh! Ihave got beyond outward organisations. I find it enough to be unitedto Christ. The Christian communities are very imperfect. There is notany of them that I quite see eye to eye with. So I stand apart, contemplating all, and happy in my unsectarianism. ' Yes, I quiteadmit the faults, and suppose that as long as men think at all theywill not find any Church which is entirely to their mind; and Irejoice to think that some day we shall all outgrow visibleorganisations--when we get there where the seer 'saw no templetherein. ' Admitting all that, I also know that isolation is alwaysweakness, and that if a man stand apart from the wholesome frictionof his brethren, he will get to be a great diseased mass of oddities, of very little use either to himself, or to men, or to God. It is nota good thing, on the whole, that people should fight for their ownhands, and the wisest thing any of us can do is, preserving ourfreedom of opinion, to link ourselves with some body of Christianpeople, and to find in them our shelter and our home. 

But these two in our text were moved by 'fear. ' They dreadedridicule, the loss of position, the expulsion from Sanhedrim andsynagogue, social ostracism, and all the armoury of offensive weaponswhich would have been used against them by their colleagues. So, ignobly they kept their thumb on their convictions, and the two ofthem sat dumb in the council when the scornful question was asked, 'Have any of the rulers or of the Pharisees believed on Him?' whenthey ought to have started to their feet and said 'Yes, we have!' Andwhen Nicodemus ventured a feeble remonstrance, which he carefullydivested of all appearance of personal sympathy, and put upon themere abstract ground of fair play--'Doth our law judge any man beforeit hear him?'--one contemptuous question was enough to reduce him tosilence. 'Art thou also of Galilee?' was enough to cow him intodropping his timid plea for Him whom in his heart he believed to bethe Messiah. 

So with us, the fear of loss of position comes into play. I haveheard of people who settled the congregation which they should honourby their presence from the consideration of the social advantageswhich it offered. I have heard of their saying, 'Oh! we cannot attachourselves to such and such a community; there is no society for thechildren. ' Then many of us are very much afraid of being laughed at. Ridicule, I think, to sensitive people in a generation like ours, ispretty nearly as bad as the old rack and the physical torments ofmartyrdom. We have all got so nervous and high-strung nowadays, anddepend so much upon other people's good opinion, that it is adreadful thing to be ridiculed. Timid people do not come to the frontand say what they believe, and take up unpopular causes, because theycannot bear to be pointed at and pelted with the abundant epithets ofdisparagement, which are always flung at earnest people who will notworship at the appointed shrines, and have sturdy convictions oftheir own. 

Ridicule breaks no bones. It has no power if you make up your mindthat it shall not have. Face it, and it will only be unpleasant for amoment at first. When a child goes into the sea to bathe, he isuncomfortable till his head has been fairly under water, and thenafter that he is all right. So it is with the ridicule which out-and-out Christian faithfulness may bring on us. It only hurts at thebeginning, and people very soon get tired. Face your fears and theywill pass away. It is not perhaps a good advice to giveunconditionally, but it is a very good one in regard of all moralquestions--always do what you are afraid to do. In nine cases out often it will be the right thing to do. If people would only discount'the fear of men which bringeth a snare' by making up their minds toneglect it, there would be fewer 'dumb dogs' and 'secret disciples'haunting and weakening the Church of Christ. 

II. I have spent too much time upon this part of my subject, and Imust deal briefly with the following. Let me say a word about theillustrations that we have in this text of the miseries of thissecret discipleship. 

How much these two men lost--all those three years of communion withthe Master; all His teaching, all the stimulus of His example, allthe joy of fellowship with Him! They might have had a treasure intheir memories that would have enriched them for all their days, andthey had flung it all away because they were afraid of the curled lipof a long-bearded Pharisee or two. 

And so it always is; the secret disciple diminishes his communionwith his Master. It is the valleys which lay their bosoms open to thesun that rejoice in the light and warmth; the narrow clefts in therocks that shut themselves grudgingly up against the light, are alldank and dark and dismal. And it is the men that come and avow theirdiscipleship that will have the truest communion with their Lord. Anyneglected duty puts a film between a man and his Saviour; anyconscious neglect of duty piles up a wall between you and Christ. Besure of this, that if from cowardly or from selfish regard toposition and advantages, or any other motive, we stand apart fromHim, and have our lips locked when we ought to speak, there willsteal over our hearts a coldness, His face will be averted from us, and our eyes will not dare to seek, with the same confidence and joy, the light of His countenance. 

What you lose by unfaithful wrapping of your convictions in a napkinand burying them in the ground is the joyful use of the convictions, the deeper hold of the truth by which you live, and before which youbow, and the true fellowship with the Master whom you acknowledge andconfess. And when these men came for Christ's corpse and bore itaway, what a sharp pang went through their hearts! They woke at lastto know what cowardly traitors they had been. If you are a discipleat all, and a secret one, you will awake to know what you have beendoing, and the pang will be a sharp one. If you do not awake in thislife, then the distance between you and your Lord will become greaterand greater; if you do, then it will be a sad reflection that thereare years of treason lying behind you. Nicodemus and Joseph had theveil torn away by the contemplation of their dead Master. You mayhave the veil torn away from your eyes by the sight of the thronedLord; and when you pass into the heavens may even there have somesharp pang of condemnation when you reflect how unfaithful you havebeen. 

Blessed be His name! The assurance is firm that if a man be adisciple he shall be saved; but the warning is sure that if he be anunfaithful and a secret disciple there will be a life-longunfaithfulness to a beloved Master to be purged away 'so as by fire. '

III. And so, lastly, let me point you to the cure. 

These men learned to be ashamed of their cowardice, and their dumblips learned to speak, and their shy, hidden love forced for itself achannel by which it could flow out into the light; because ofChrist's death. And in another fashion that same death and Cross arefor us, too, the cure of all cowardice and selfish silence. The sightof Christ's Cross makes the coward brave. It was no small piece ofcourage for Joseph to go to Pilate and avow his sympathy with acondemned criminal. The love must have been very true which wasforced to speak by disaster and death. And to us the strongest motivefor stiffening our vacillating timidity into an iron fortitude, andfortifying us strongly against the fear of what man can do to us, isto be found in gazing upon His dying love who met and conquered allevils and terrors for our sakes. 

That Cross will kindle a love which will not rest concealed, but willbe 'like the ointment of the right hand which bewrayeth itself. ' Ican fancy men to whom Christ is only what He was to Nicodemus atfirst, 'a Teacher sent from God, ' occupying Nicodemus' position ofhidden belief in His teaching without feeling any need to avowthemselves His followers; but if once into our souls there has comethe constraining and the melting influence of that great and wondrouslove which died for us, then, dear brethren, it is unnatural that weshould be silent. If those 'for whom Christ has died' should holdtheir peace, 'the stones would immediately cry out. ' That death, wondrous, mysterious, terrible, but radiant, and glorious with hope, with pardon, with holiness for us and for all the world--that deathsmites on the chords of our hearts, if I may so speak, and brings outmusic from them all. The love that died for me will force me toexpress my love, 'Then shall the tongue of the dumb sing, ' andsilence will be impossible. 

The sight of the Cross not only leads to courage, and kindles a lovewhich demands expression, but it impels to joyful surrender. Josephgave a place in his own new tomb, where he hoped that one day hisbones should be laid by the side of the Master against whom he hadsinned--for he had no thought of a resurrection. Nicodemus brought alavish, almost an extravagant, amount of costly spices, as if byhonour to the dead he could atone for treason to the living. And boththe one and the other teach us that if once we gain the true visionof that great and wondrous love that died on the Cross for us, thenthe natural language of the loving heart is--

 'Here, Lord! I give _myself_ away; 'Tis all that I can do. '

If following Him openly involves sacrifices, the sacrifices will besweet, so long as our hearts look to His dying love. All lovedelights in expression, and most of all in expression by surrender ofprecious things, which are most precious because they give lovematerials which it may lay at the beloved's feet. What are position, possessions, reputation, capacities, perils, losses, self, but the'sweet spices' which we are blessed enough to be able to lay upon thealtar which glorifies the Giver and the gift? The contemplation ofChrist's sacrifice--and that alone--will so overcome our naturalselfishness as to make sacrifice for His dear sake most blessed. 

I beseech you, then, look ever to Him dying on the Cross for each ofus. It will kindle our courage, it will make our hearts glow withlove, it will turn our silence into melody and music of praise; itwill lead us to heights of consecration and joys of confession; andso it will bring us at last into the possession of that wondroushonour which He promised when He said, 'He that confesseth Me beforemen, him will I also confess; and he that denieth Me before men, himwill I also deny. '

THE GRAVE IN A GARDEN

'In the garden a new tomb. '--JOHN xix. 41 (R. V. ). 

This is possibly no more than a topographical note introduced merelyfor the sake of accuracy. But it is quite in John's manner to attachimportance to these apparent trifles and to give no express statementthat he is doing so. There are several other instances in the Gospelwhere similar details are given which appear to have had in his eyesa symbolical meaning--e. G. 'And it was night. ' There may have beensuch a thought in his mind, for all men in high excitement love andseize symbols, and I can scarcely doubt that the reason which inducedJoseph to make his grave in a garden was the reason which inducedJohn to mention so particularly its situation, and that they bothdiscerned in that garden round the sepulchre, the expression of whatwas to the one a dim desire, to the other 'a lively hope by theresurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead'--that they who are laidto rest in the grave shall come forth again in new and fairer life, as 'the garden causeth the things that are sown in it to bud. '

To us at all events on Easter morning, with nature rising on everyhand from her winter death, and 'life re-orient out of dust, ' thatnew sepulchre in the garden may well serve for the starting-point ofthe familiar but ever-precious lessons of the day. 

I. A symbol of death and decay as interwoven with all nature andevery joy. 

We think of Eden and the first coming of death. 

The grave was fittingly in the garden, because nature too is subjectto the law of decay and death. The flowers fade and men die. Meditative souls have ever gathered lessons of mortality there, andinvested death with an alien softness by likening it to fallingleaves and withered blooms. But the contrast is greater than theresemblance, and painless dropping of petals is not a parallel to therending of soul and body. 

The garden's careless wealth of beauty and joy continues unconcernedwhatever befalls us. 'One generation cometh and another goeth, butthe earth abideth for ever. '

The grave is in the garden because all our joys and works have sooneror later death associated with them. 

Every relationship. 

Every occupation. 

Every joy. 

The grave in the garden bids us bring the wholesome contemplation ofdeath into all life. 

It may be a harm and weakening to think of it, but should be astrength. 

II. The dim hopes with which men have fought against death. 

To lay the dead amid blooming nature and fair flowers has been and isnatural to men. The symbolism is most natural, deep, and beautiful, expressing the possibility of life and even of advance in the lifeafter apparent decay. There is something very pathetic in so eager agrasping after some stay for hope. 

All these natural symbols are insufficient. They are not proofs, theyare only pretty analogies. But they are all that men have on which tobuild their hopes as to a future life apart from Christ. That futurewas vague, a region for hopes and wishes or fears, not for certainty, a region for poetic fancies. The thoughts of it were very faintlyoperative. Men asked, Shall we live again? Conscience seemed toanswer, Yes! The instinct of immortality in men's souls grasped atthese things as proofs of what it believed without them, but therewas no clear light. 

III. The clear light of certain hope which Christ's resurrectionbrings. 

The grave in the garden reversed Adam's bringing of death into Eden. 

Christ's resurrection as a fact bears on the belief in a future stateas nothing else can. 

It changes hope into certainty. It shows by actual example that deathhas nothing to do with the soul; that life is independent of thebody; that a man after death is the same as before it. The risen Lordwas the same in His relations to His disciples, the same in His love, in His memory, and in all else. 

It changes shadowy hopes of continuous life into a solid certainty ofresurrection life. The former is vague and powerless. It isimpossible to conceive of the future with vividness unless as abodily life. And this is the strength of the Christian conception ofthe future life, that corporeity is the end and goal of the redeemedman. 

It changes terror and awe into joy, and opens up a future in which Heis. 

We shall be with Him. 

We shall be like Him. 

Now we can go back to all these incomplete analogies and use themconfidently. Our faith does not rest upon them but upon what hasactually been done on this earth. 

Christ is 'the First fruits of them that slept. ' What will theharvest be!

As the single little seed is poor and small by the side of thegorgeous flower that comes from it; so will be the change. 'Godgiveth it a body as it hath pleased Him. '

How then to think of death for ourselves and for those who are gone?Thankfully and hopefully. 

THE RESURRECTION MORNING

'The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, when itwas yet dark, unto the sepulchre, and seeth the stone taken awayfrom the sepulchre. Then she runneth, and cometh to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple, whom Jesus loved, and saith unto them, They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre, and we knownot where they have laid Him. Peter therefore went forth, andthat other disciple, and came to the sepulchre. So they ran bothtogether: and the other disciple did outrun Peter, and came firstto the sepulchre. And he stooping down, and looking in, saw thelinen clothes lying; yet went he not in. Then cometh Simon Peterfollowing him, and went into the sepulchre, and seeth the linenclothes lie, And the napkin, that was about His head, not lyingwith the linen clothes, but wrapped together in a place byitself. Then went in also that other disciple, which came firstto the sepulchre, and he saw, and believed. For as yet they knewnot the scripture, that He must rise again from the dead. Thenthe disciples went away again unto their own home. But Mary stoodwithout at the sepulchre weeping: and as she wept, she stoopeddown, and looked into the sepulchre, And seeth two angels inwhite sitting, the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain. And they say unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? She saith unto them, Because they have takenaway my Lord, and I know not where they have laid Him. And whenshe had thus said, she turned herself back, and saw Jesusstanding, and knew not that it was Jesus. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing Him tobe the gardener, saith unto Him, Sir, if thou have borne Himhence, tell me where thou hast laid Him, and I will take Himaway. Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and saithunto Him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master. Jesus saith unto her, Touch Me not; for I am not yet ascended to My Father: but go toMy brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto My Father, and yourFather; and to My God, and your God. Mary Magdalene came and toldthe disciples that she had seen the Lord, and that He had spokenthese things unto her. '--JOHN xx. 1-18. 

John's purpose in his narrative of the resurrection is not only toestablish the fact, but also to depict the gradual growth of faith init, among the disciples. The two main incidents in this passage, thevisit of Peter and John to the tomb and the appearance of our Lord toMary, give the dawning of faith before sight and the rapturous faithborn of sight. In the remainder of the chapter are two more instancesof faith following vision, and the teaching of the whole is summed upin Christ's words to the doubter, 'Because thou hast seen Me, thouhast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet havebelieved!'

I. The open sepulchre and the bewildered alarm it excited. The act ofresurrection took place before sunrise. 'At midnight, ' probably, 'theBridegroom came. ' It was fitting that He who was to scatter thedarkness of the grave should rise while darkness covered the earth, and that no eye should behold 'how' that dead was 'raised up. ' Theearthquake and the descent of angels and the rolling away of thestone were after the tomb was empty. 

John's note of time seems somewhat earlier than that of the otherGospels, but is not so much so as to require the supposition thatMary preceded the other women. She appears alone here, because thereason for mentioning her at all is to explain how Peter and Johnknew of the empty tomb, and she alone had been the informant. Inthese Eastern lands, 'as it began to dawn, ' 'very early at the risingof the sun, ' and 'while it was yet dark, ' are times very near eachother, and Mary may have reached the sepulchre a little before theothers. Her own words, 'We know not, ' show that she had spoken withothers who had seen the empty grave. We must therefore suppose thatshe had with the others come to it, seen that the sacred corpse wasgone and their spices useless, exchanged hurried words of alarm andbewilderment, and then had hastened away before the appearance of theangels. 

The impulse to tell the leaders of the forlorn band the news, whichshe thinks to be so bad, was womanly and natural. It was not hope, but wonder and sorrow that quickened her steps as she ran through thestill morning to find them. Whether they were in one house or not isuncertain; but, at all events, Peter's denial had not cut him offfrom his brethren, and the two who were so constantly associatedbefore and afterwards were not far apart that morning. The disciplewho had stood by the Cross to almost the last had an open heart, andprobably an open house for the denier. 'Restore such an one, . .. Considering thyself. '

Mary had seen the tomb empty, and springs to the conclusion that'they'--some unknown persons--have taken away the dead body, which, with clinging love that tries to ignore death, she still calls 'theLord. ' Possibly she may have thought that the resting-place inJoseph's new sepulchre was only meant for temporary shelter (ver. 15). At all events the corpse was gone, and the fact suggested nohope to her. How often do we, in like manner, misinterpret as darkwhat is really pregnant with light, and blindly attribute to 'them'what Jesus does! A tone of mind thus remote from anticipation of thegreat fact is a precious proof of the historical truth of theresurrection; for here was no soil in which hallucinations wouldspring, and such people would not have believed Him risen unless theyhad seen Him living. 

II. Peter and John at the tomb, the dawning of faith, and thecontinuance of bewildered wonder. In the account, we may observe, first, the characteristic conduct of each of the two. Peter is firstto set out, and John follows, both men doing according to their kind. The younger runs faster than his companion. He looked into the tomb, and saw the wrappings lying; but the reverent awe which holds backfiner natures kept him from venturing in. Peter is not said to havelooked before entering. He loved with all his heart, but his love wasimpetuous and practical, and he went straight in, and felt no reasonwhy he should pause. His boldness encouraged his friend, as theexample of strong natures does. Some of my readers will recallBushnell's noble sermon on 'Unconscious Influence' from thisincident, and I need say no more about it. 

Observe, too, the further witness of the folded grave-clothes. Johnfrom outside had not seen the napkin, lying carefully rolled up apartfrom the other cloths. It was probably laid in a part of the tombinvisible from without. But the careful disposal of these came tohim, when he saw them, with a great flash of illumination. There hadbeen no hurried removal. 

Here had been no hostile hands, or there would not have been thisdeliberation; nor friendly hands, or there would not have been suchdishonour to the sacred dead as to carry away the body nude. What didit mean? Could He Himself have done for Himself what He had bade themdo for Lazarus? Could He have laid aside the garments of the grave asneeding them no more? 'They have taken away'--what if it were not'they' but He? No trace of hurry or struggle was there. He did 'notgo out with haste, nor go by flight, ' but calmly, deliberately, inthe majesty of His lordship over death, He rose from His slumber andleft order in the land of confusion. 

Observe, too, the birth of the Apostle's faith. John connects it withthe sight of the folded garments. 'Believed' here must mean more thanrecognition of the fact that the grave was empty. The next clauseseems to imply that it means belief in the resurrection. Thescripture, which they 'knew' as scripture, was for John suddenlyinterpreted, and he was lifted out of the ignorance of its meaning, which till that moment he had shared with his fellow-disciples. Theirfailure to understand Christ's frequent distinct prophecies that Hewould rise again the third day has been thought incredible, but issurely intelligible enough if we remember how unexampled such a thingwas, and how marvellous is our power of hearing and yet not hearingthe plainest truth. We all in the course of our lives are lost inastonishment when things befall us which we have been plainly toldwill befall. The fulfilment of all divine promises (and threatenings)is a surprise, and no warnings beforehand teach one tithe so clearlyas experience. 

John believed, but Peter still was in the dark. Again the former hadoutrun his friend. His more sensitive nature, not to say his deeperlove--for that would be unjust, since their love differed in qualitymore than in degree--had gifted him with a more subtle and swifter-working perception. Perhaps if Peter's heart had not been oppressedby his sin, he would have been readier to feel the sunshine of thewonderful hope. We condemn ourselves to the shade when we deny ourLord by deed or word. 

III. The first appearance of the Lord, and revelation of the new formof intercourse. Nothing had been said of Mary's return to the tomb;but how could she stay away? The disciples might go, but shelingered, woman-like, to indulge in the bitter-sweet of tears. Eyesso filled are more apt to see angels. No wonder that these calmwatchers, in their garb of purity and joy, had not been seen by thetwo men. The laws of such appearance are not those of ordinaryoptics. Spiritual susceptibility and need determine who shall seeangels, and who shall see but the empty place. Wonder and adorationheld these bright forms there. They had hovered over the cradle andstood by the shepherds at Bethlehem, but they bowed in yet moreawestruck reverence at the grave, and death revealed to them a deeperdepth of divine love. 

The presence of angels was a trifle to Mary, who had only onethought--the absence of her Lord. Surely that touch in her unmovedanswer, as if speaking to men, is beyond the reach of art. She says'My Lord' now, and 'I know not, ' but otherwise repeats her formerwords, unmoved by any hope caught from John. Her clinging love neededmore than an empty grave and folded clothes arid waiting angels tostay its tears, and she turned indifferently and wearily away fromthe interruption of the question to plunge again into her sorrow. Chrysostom suggests that she 'turned herself' because she saw in theangels' looks that they saw Christ suddenly appearing behind her; butthe preceding explanation seems better. Her not knowing Jesus mightbe accounted for by her absorbing grief. One who looked at white-robed angels, and saw nothing extraordinary, would give but acareless glance at the approaching figure, and might well fail torecognise Him. But probably, as in the case of the two travellers toEmmaus, her 'eyes were holden, ' and the cause of non-recognition wasnot so much a change in Jesus as an operation on her. 

Be that as it may, it is noteworthy that His voice, which wasimmediately to reveal Him, at first suggested nothing to her; andeven His gentle question, with the significant addition to theangels' words, in 'Whom seekest thou?' which indicated His knowledgethat her tears fell for some person dear and lost, only made herthink of Him as being 'the gardener, ' and therefore probablyconcerned in the removal of the body. If He were so, He would befriendly; and so she ventured her pathetic petition, which does notname Jesus (so full is her mind of the One, that she thinks everybodymust know whom she means), and which so overrated her own strength insaying, 'I will take Him away, ' The first words of the risen Christare on His lips yet to all sad hearts. He seeks our confidences, andwould have us tell Him the occasions of our tears. He would have usrecognise that all our griefs and all our desires point to onePerson--Himself--as the one real Object of our 'seeking, ' whomfinding, we need weep no more. 

Verse 16 tells us that Mary turned herself to see Him when He nextspoke, so that, at the close of her first answer to Him, she musthave once more resumed her gaze into the tomb, as if she despaired ofthe newcomer giving the help she had asked. 

Who can say anything about that transcendent recognition, in whichall the stooping love of the risen Lord is smelted into one word, andthe burst of rapture, awe, astonishment, and devotion pours itselfthrough the narrow channel of one other? If this narrative is thework of some anonymous author late in the second century, he isindeed a 'Great Unknown, ' and has managed to imagine one of the twoor three most pathetic 'situations' in literature. Surely it is morereasonable to suppose him no obscure genius, but a well-knownrecorder of what he had seen, and knew for fact. Christ's calling byname ever reveals His loving presence. We may be sure that He knowsus by name, and we should reply by the same swift cry of absolutesubmission as sprung to Mary's lips. 'Rabboni! Master!' is the fitanswer to His call. 

But Mary's exclamation was imperfect in that it expressed theresumption of no more than the old bond, and her gladness neededenlightenment. Things were not to be as they had been. Christ's'Mary!' had indeed assured her of His faithful remembrance and of herpresent place in His love; but when she clung to His feet she wasseeking to keep what she had to learn to give up. Therefore Jesus, who invited the touch which was to establish faith and banish doubt(Luke xxiv. 39; John xx. 27), bids her unclasp her hands, and gentlyinstils the ending of the blessed past by opening to her the superiorjoys of the begun future. His words contain for us all the very heartof our possible relation to Him, and teach us that we need envy nonewho companied with Him here. His ascension to the Father is thecondition of our truest approach to Him. His prohibition encloses apermission. 'Touch Me not! for I am not yet ascended, ' implies 'WhenI am, you may. '

Further, the ascended Christ is still our Brother. Neither themystery of death nor the impending mystery of dominion broke the tie. Again, the Resurrection is the beginning of Ascension, and is onlythen rightly understood when it is considered as the first upwardstep to the throne. 'I ascend, ' not 'I have risen, and will soonleave you, ' as if the Ascension only began forty days after onOlivet. It is already in process. Once more the ascended Christ, ourBrother still, and capable of the touch of reverent love, is yetseparated from us by the character, even while united to us by thefact, of His filial and dependent relation to God. He cannot say 'OurFather' as if standing on the common human ground. He is 'Son' as weare not, and we are 'sons' through Him, and can only call God ourFather because He is Christ's. 

Such were the immortal hopes and new thoughts which Mary hastenedfrom the presence of her recovered Lord to bring to the disciples. Fragrant though but partially understood, they were like half-openedblossoms from the tree of life planted in the midst of that garden, to bloom unfading, and ever disclosing new beauty in believing heartstill the end of time. 

THE RISEN LORD'S CHARGE AND GIFT

'Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto yon: as My Fatherhath sent Me, even so send I you. And when He had said this, Hebreathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost. Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; andwhose soever sins ye retain, they are retained. '--JOHN xx. 21-23. 

The day of the Resurrection had been full of strange rumours, and ofgrowing excitement. As evening fell, some of the disciples, at anyrate, gathered together, probably in the upper room. They were brave, for in spite of the Jews they dared to assemble; they were timid, forthey barred themselves in 'for fear of the Jews. ' No doubt in littlegroups they were eagerly discussing what had happened that day. Fuelwas added to the fire by the return of the two from Emmaus. And then, at once, the buzz of conversation ceased, for 'He Himself, with Hishuman air, ' stood there in the midst, with the quiet greeting on Hislips, which might have come from any casual stranger, and minimisedthe separation that was now ending: 'Peace be unto you!'

We have two accounts of that evening's interview which remarkablysupplement each other. They deal with two different parts of it. Johnbegins where Luke ends. The latter Evangelist dwells mainly on thedisciples' fears that it was some ghostly appearance that they saw, and on the removal of these by the sight, and perhaps the touch, ofthe hands and the feet. John says nothing of the terror, but Luke'saccount explains John's statement that 'He showed them His hands andHis side, ' and that, 'Then were the disciples glad, ' the joyexpelling the fear. Luke's account also, by dwelling on the firstpart of the interview, explains what else is unexplained in John'snarrative, viz. The repetition of the salutation, 'Peace be untoyou!' Our Lord thereby marked off the previous portion of theconversation as being separate, and a whole in itself. Their doubtswere dissipated, and now something else was to begin. They who weresure of the risen Lord, and had had communion with Him, were capableof receiving a deeper peace, and so 'Jesus said to them again, Peacebe unto you!' and thereby inaugurated the second part of theinterview. 

Luke's account also helps us in another and very important way. Johnsimply says that 'the disciples were gathered together, ' and thatmight mean the Eleven only. Luke is more specific, and tells us whatis of prime importance for understanding the whole incident, that'the Eleven. .. And they that were with them' were assembled. Thisinterview, the crown of the appearances on Easter Day, is marked asbeing an interview with the assembled body of disciples, whom theLord, having scattered their doubts, and laid the deep benediction ofHis peace upon their hearts, then goes on to invest with a sacredmission, 'As My Father hath sent Me, even so send I you'; to equipthem with the needed power, 'Receive ye the Holy Ghost'; and tounfold to them the solemn issues of their work, 'Whose sins ye remitthey are remitted; and whose sins ye retain they are retained. ' Themessage of that Easter evening is for us all; and so I ask you tolook at these three points. 

I. The Christian Mission. 

I have already said that the clear understanding of the persons towhom the words were spoken, goes far to interpret the significance ofthe words. Here we have at the very beginning, the great thought thatevery Christian man and woman is sent by Jesus. The possession ofwhat preceded this charge is the thing, and the only thing, that fitsa man to receive it, and whoever possesses these is therebydespatched into the world as being Christ's envoy and representative. And what are these preceding experiences? The vision of the risenChrist, the touch of His hands, the peace that He breathed overbelieving souls, the gladness that sprang like a sunny fountain inthe hearts that had been so dry and dark. Those things constitutedthe disciples' qualification for being sent, and these things werethemselves--even apart from the Master's words--their sending out ontheir future life's-work. Thus, whoever--and thank God I amaddressing many who come under the category!--whoever has seen theLord, has been in touch with Him, and has felt his heart filled withgladness, is the recipient of this great commission. There is noquestion here of the prerogative of a class, nor of the functions ofan order; it is a question of the universal aspect of the Christianlife in its relation to the Master who sends, and the world intowhich it is sent. 

We Nonconformists pride ourselves upon our freedom from what we call'sacerdotalism. ' Ay! and we Nonconformists are quite willing toassert our priesthood in opposition to the claims of a class, and areas willing to forget it, should the question of the duties of thepriest come into view. You do not believe in priests, but a greatmany of you believe that it is ministers that are 'sent, ' and thatyou have no charge. Officialism is the dry-rot of all the Churches, and is found as rampant amongst democratic Nonconformists as amongstthe more hierarchical communities. Brethren! you are included inChrist's words of sending on this errand, if you are included in thisgreeting of 'Peace be unto you!' 'I send, ' not the clerical order, not the priest, but 'you, ' because you have seen the Lord, and beenglad, and heard the low whisper of His benediction creeping into yourhearts. 

Mark, too, how our Lord reveals much of Himself, as well as of ourposition, when He thus speaks. For He assumes here the royal tone, and claims to possess as absolute authority over the lives and workof all Christian people as the Father exercised when He sent the Son. But we must further ask ourselves the question, what is the parallelthat our Lord here draws, not only between His action in sending us, and the Father's action in sending Him, but also between the attitudeof the Son who was sent, and of the disciples whom He sends? And theanswer is this--the work of Jesus Christ is continued by, prolongedin, and carried on henceforward through, the work that He lays uponHis servants. Mark the exact expression that our Lord here uses. 'AsMy Father _hath_ sent, ' that is a past action, continuing itsconsequences in the present. It is not 'as My Father _did_ sendonce, ' but as 'My Father _hath_ sent, ' which means 'is also atpresent sending, ' and continues to send. Which being translated intoless technical phraseology is just this, that we here have our Lordpresenting to us the thought that, though in a new form, His workcontinues during the ages, and is now being wrought through Hisservants. What He does by another, He does by Himself. We Christianmen and women do not understand our function in the world, unless wehave realised this: 'Now, then, we are ambassadors for Christ' andHis interests and His work are entrusted to our hands. 

How shall the servants continue and carry on the work of the Master?The chief way to do it is by proclaiming everywhere that finishedwork on which the world's hopes depend. But note, --'_as_ My Fatherhath sent Me, so send I you, '--then we are not only to carry on Hiswork in the world, but if one might venture to say so, we are toreproduce His attitude towards God and the world. He was sent to be'the Light of the world'; and so are we. He was sent to 'seek and tosave that which was lost'; so are we. He was sent not to do His ownwill, but the will of the Father that sent Him; so are we. He tookupon Himself with all cheerfulness the office to which He wasappointed, and said, 'My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, --and to finish His work'; and that must be our voice too. He wassent to pity, to look upon the multitudes with compassion, to carryto them the healing of His touch, and the sympathy of His heart; somust we. We are the representatives of Jesus Christ, and if I mightdare to use such a phrase, He is to be incarnated again in thehearts, and manifested again in the lives, of His servants. Many weakeyes, that would be dazzled and hurt if they were to gaze on the sun, may look at the clouds cradled by its side, and dyed with its lustre, and learn something of the radiance and the glory of the illuminatinglight from the illuminated vapour. And thus, 'as My Father hath sentMe, even so send I you. '

Now let us turn to

II. The Christian Equipment. 

'He breathed on them, and said, Receive ye the Holy Ghost!' Thesymbolical action reminds us of the Creation story, when into thenostrils was breathed 'the breath of life, and man became a livingsoul. ' The symbol is but a symbol, but what it teaches us is thatevery Christian man who has passed through the experiences which makehim Christ's envoy, receives the equipment of a new life, and thatthat life is the gift of the risen Lord. This Prometheus came fromthe dead with the spark of life guarded in His pierced hands, and Hebestowed it upon us; for the Spirit of life, which is the Spirit ofChrist, is granted to all Christian men. Dear brethren! we have notlived up to the realities of our Christian confession, unless intoour death has come, and there abides, this life derived from JesusHimself, the communication of which goes along with all faith in Him. 

But the gift which Jesus brought to that group of timid disciples inthe upper room did not make superfluous the further gift on the dayof Pentecost. The communication of the divine Spirit to men runsparallel with, depends on, and follows, the revelation of divinetruth, so the ascended Lord gave more of that life to the disciples, who had been made capable of more of it by the fact of beholding Hisascension, than the risen Lord could give on that Easter Day. Butwhilst thus there are measures and degrees, the life is given toevery believer in correspondence with the clearness and the contentsof his faith. 

It is the power that will fit any of us for the work for which we aresent into the world. If we are here to represent Jesus Christ, and ifit is true of us that 'as He is, so are we, in this world, ' thatlikeness can only come about by our receiving into our spirits akindred life which will effloresce and manifest itself to men inkindred beauty of foliage and of fruit. If we are to be 'the lightsof the world, ' our lamps must be fed with oil. If we are to beChrist's representatives, we must have Christ's life in us. Here, too, is the only source of strength and life to us Christian people, when we look at the difficulties of our task and measure our ownfeebleness against the work that lies before us. I suppose no man hasever tried honestly to be what Christ wished him to be amidst hisfellows, whether as preacher or teacher or guide in any fashion, whohas not hundreds of times clasped his hands in all but despair, andsaid, 'Who is sufficient for these things?' That is the temper intowhich the power will come. The rivers run in the valleys, and it isthe lowly sense of our own unfitness for the task which yet pressesupon us, and imperatively demands to be done, that makes us capableof receiving that divine gift. 

It is for lack of it that so much of so-called 'Christian effort'comes to nothing. The priests may pile the wood upon the altar, andcompass it all day long with vain cries, and nothing happens. It isnot till the fire comes down from heaven that sacrifice and altar andwood and water in the trench, are licked up and converted into fierylight. So, dear brethren! it is because the Christian Church as awhole, and we as individual members of it, so imperfectly realise theA B C of our faith, our absolute dependence on the inbreathed life ofJesus Christ, to fit us for any of our work, that so much of our workis ploughing the sands, and so often we labour for vanity and spendour strength for nought. What is the use of a mill full of spindlesand looms until the fire-born impulse comes rushing through thepipes? Then they begin to move. 

Let me remind you, too, that the words which our Lord here employsabout these great gifts, when accurately examined, do lead us to thethought that we, even we, are not altogether passive in the receptionof that gift. For the expression, 'Receive ye the Holy Ghost' might, with more completeness of signification, be rendered, 'take ye theHoly Ghost. ' True, the outstretched hand is nothing, unless thegiving hand is stretched out too. True, the open palm and theclutching fingers remain empty, unless the open palm above drops thegift. But also true, things in the spiritual realm that are givenhave to be asked for, because asking opens the heart for theirentrance. True, that gift was given once for all, and continuously, but the appropriation and the continual possession of it largelydepend upon ourselves. There must be desire before there can bepossession. If a man does not take his pitcher to the fountain thepitcher remains empty, though the fountain never ceases to spring. There must be taking by patient waiting. The old Friends had a lovelyphrase when they spoke about 'waiting for the springing of the life. 'If we hold out a tremulous hand, and our cup is not kept steady, thefalling water will not enter it, and much will be spilt upon theground. Wait on the Lord, and the life will rise like a tide in theheart. There must be a taking by the faithful use of what we possess. 'To him that hath shall be given. ' There must be a taking by carefulavoidance of what would hinder. In the winter weather the watersupply sometimes fails in a house. Why? Because there is a plug ofice in the service-pipe. Some of us have a plug of ice, and so thewater has not come, '_Take_ the Holy Spirit!'

Now, lastly, we have here

III. The Christian power over sin. 

I am not going to enter upon controversy. The words which close ourLord's great charge here have been much misunderstood by beingrestricted. It is eminently necessary to remember here that they werespoken to the whole community of Christian souls. The harm that hasbeen done by their restriction to the so-called priestly function ofabsolution has been, not only the monstrous claims which have beenthereon founded, but quite as much the obscuration of the largeeffects that follow from the Christian discharge by all believers ofthe office of representing Jesus Christ. 

We must interpret these words in harmony with the two precedingpoints, the Christian mission and the Christian equipment. Sointerpreted, they lead us to a very plain thought which I may putthus. This same Apostle tells us in his letter that 'Jesus Christ wasmanifested to take away sin. ' His work in this world, which we are tocontinue, was 'to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. ' Wecontinue that work when, --as we have all, if Christians, the right todo--we lift up our voices with triumphant confidence, and call uponour brethren to 'behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin ofthe world!' The proclamation has a twofold effect, according as it isreceived or rejected; to him who receives it his sins melt away, andthe preacher of forgiveness through Christ has the right to say tohis brother, 'Thy sins are forgiven because thou believest on Him. 'The rejecter or the neglecter binds his sin upon himself by hisrejection or neglect. The same message is, as the Apostle puts it, 'asavour of life unto life, or of death unto death. ' These words arethe best commentary on this part of my text. The same heat, as theold Fathers used to say, 'softens wax and hardens clay. ' The messageof the word will either couch a blind eye, and let in the light, ordraw another film of obscuration over the visual orb. 

And so, Christian men and women have to feel that to them isentrusted a solemn message, that they walk in the world charged witha mighty power, that by the preaching of the Word, and by their ownutterance of the forgiving mercy of the Lord Jesus, they may 'remit'or 'retain' not only the punishment of sin, but sin itself. Howtender, how diligent, how reverent, how--not bowed down, but--erectunder the weight of our obligations, we should be, if we realisedthat solemn thought!

 THOMAS AND JESUS

'And after eight days, again His disciples were within, andThomas with them. Then came Jesus. '--JOHN xx. 26. 

There is nothing more remarkable about the narrative of theresurrection, taken as a whole, than the completeness with which ourLord's appearances met all varieties of temperament, condition, andspiritual standing. Mary, the lover; Peter, the penitent; the twodisciples on the way to Emmaus, the thinkers; Thomas, the stiffunbeliever--the presence of the Christ is enough for them all; itcures those that need cure, and gladdens those that need gladdening. I am not going to do anything so foolish as to try to tell overagain, less vividly, this well-known story. We all remember itsoutlines, I suppose: the absence of Thomas from Christ's firstmeeting with the assembled disciples on Easter evening; the doggeddisbelief with which he met their testimony; his arrogant assumptionof the right to lay down the conditions on which he should believe, and Christ's gracious acceptance of the conditions; the discoverywhen they were offered that they were not needful; the burst of gladconviction which lifted him to the loftiest height reached whileChrist was on earth, and then the summing up of all in our Lord'swords--'Blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed!'--the last Beatitude, that links us and all the generations yet to comewith the story, and is like a finger pointing to it, as containingvery special lessons for them all. 

I simply seek to try to bring out the force and instructiveness ofthe story. The first point is--

I. The isolation that misses the sight of the Christ. 

'Thomas, one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. ' Noreason is assigned. The absence may have been purely accidental, butthe specification of Thomas as 'one of the Twelve, ' seems to suggestthat his absence was regarded by the Evangelist as a dereliction ofapostolic duty; and the cause of it may be found, I think, withreasonable probability, if we take into account the two other factsthat the same Evangelist records concerning this Apostle. One is hisexclamation, in which a constitutional tendency to accept theblackest possibilities as certainties, blends very strangely andbeautifully with an intense and brave devotion to his Master. 'Let usalso go, ' said Thomas, when Christ announced His intention, but a fewdays before the Passion, of returning to the grave of Lazarus, 'thatwe may die with Him. ' 'He is going to His death, that I am sure of, and I am going to be beside Him even in His death. ' A constitutionalpessimist! The only other notice that we have of him is that he brokein--with apparent irreverence which was not real, --with a brusquecontradiction of Christ's saying that they knew the way, and theyknew His goal. 'Lord! we know not whither Thou goest'--there spokepained love fronting the black prospect of eternal separation, --'andhow can we know the way?'--there spoke almost impatient despair. 

So is not that the kind of man who on the Resurrection day would havebeen saying to himself, even more decidedly and more bitterly thanthe two questioning thinkers on the road to Emmaus had said it, 'Wetrusted that this had been He, but it is all over now'? The keystonewas struck out of the arch, and this brick tumbled away of itself. The hub was taken out of the wheel, and the spokes fell apart. Thedivisive tendency was begun, as I have had occasion to remark inother sermons. Thomas did the very worst thing that a melancholy mancan do, went away to brood in a corner by himself, and so toexaggerate all his idiosyncrasies, to distort the proportion oftruth, to hug his despair, by separating himself from his fellows. Therefore he lost what they got, the sight of the Lord. He 'was notwith them when Jesus came. ' Would he not have been better in theupper room than gloomily turning over in his mind the dissolution ofthe fair company and the shipwreck of all his hopes?

May we not learn a lesson? I venture to apply these words, dearfriends, to our gatherings for worship. The worst thing that a mancan do when disbelief, or doubt, or coldness shrouds his sky, andblots out the stars, is to go away alone and shut himself up with hisown, perhaps morbid, or, at all events, disturbing thoughts. The bestthing that he can do is to go amongst his fellows. If the sermon doesnot do him any good, the prayers and the praises and the sense ofbrotherhood will help him. If a fire is going out, draw the dyingcoals close together, and they will make each other break into aflame. One great reason for some of the less favourable features thatmodern Christianity presents, is that men are beginning to think lessthan they ought to do, and less than they used to do, of theobligation and the blessing, whatever their spiritual condition, ofgathering together for the worship of God. But, further, there is afar wider thought than that here, which I have already referred to, and which I do not need to dwell upon, namely, that, although, ofcourse, there are very plain limits to be put to the principle, yetit is a principle, that solitude is not the best medicine for anydisturbed or saddened soul. It is true that 'solitude is the mother-country of the strong, ' and that unless we are accustomed to livevery much alone, we shall not live very much with God. But on theother hand, if you cut yourself off from the limiting, and thereforedeveloping, society of your fellows, you will rust, you will becomewhat they call eccentric. Your idiosyncrasies will swell intomonstrosities, your peculiarities will not be subjected to thegracious process of pruning which society with your fellows, andespecially with Christian hearts, will bring to them. And in everyway you will be more likely to miss the Christ than if you werekindly with your kind, and went up to the house of God in company. 

Take the next point that is here:

II. The stiff incredulity that prescribed terms. 

When Thomas came back to his brethren, they met him with the witnessthat they had seen the Lord, and he met them as they had met thewitnesses that brought the same message to them. They had thought thewomen's words 'idle tales. ' Thomas gives them back their ownincredulity. I need not remind you of what I have already hadoccasion to say, how much this frank acknowledgment that none ofthese, who were afterwards to be witnesses of the Resurrection to theworld, accepted testimony to the Resurrection as enough to convincethem, enhances the worth of their testimony, and how entirely itshatters the conception that the belief in the Resurrection was amist that rose from the undrained swamps of their own heatedimaginations. 

But notice how Thomas exaggerated their position, and took up a farmore defiant tone than any of them had done. He is called 'doubtingThomas. ' He was no doubter. Flat, frank, dogged disbelief, and nothesitation or doubt, was his attitude. The very form in which he putshis requirement shows how he was hugging his unbelief, and how he hadno idea that what he asked would ever be granted. 'Unless I have so-and-so I will not, ' indicates an altogether spiritual attitude fromwhat 'If I have so-and-so, I will, ' would have indicated. The one isthe language of willingness to be persuaded, the other is a token ofa determination to be obstinate. What right had he--what right hasany man--to say, 'So-and-so must be made plain to me, or I will notaccept a certain truth'? You have a right to ask for satisfactoryevidence; you have no right to make up your minds beforehand whatthat must necessarily be. Thomas showed his hand not only in the formof his expression, not only in his going beyond his province andprescribing the terms of surrender, but also in the terms which heprescribed. True, he is only saying to the other Apostles, 'I willgive in if I have what you had, ' for Jesus Christ had said to them, 'Handle Me and see!' But although thus they could say nothing inopposition, it is clear that he was asking more than was needful, andmore than he had any right to ask. And he shows his hand, too, inanother way. 'I will not believe!'--what business had he, whatbusiness have you, to bring any question of will into the act ofbelief or credence? Thus, in all these four points, the form of thedemand, the fact of the demand, the substance of the demand, and theimplication in it that to give or withhold assent was a matter to bedetermined by inclination, this man stands not as an example of adoubter, but as an example, of which there are too many copiesamongst us always, of a determined disbeliever and rejecter. 

So I come to the third point, and that is:

III. The revelation that turned the denier into a rapturousconfessor. 

What a strange week that must have been between the two Sundays--thatof the Resurrection and the next! Surely it would have been kinder ifthe Christ had not left the disciples, with their new-found, tremulous, raw conviction. It would have been less kind if He hadbeen with them, for there is nothing that is worse for the solidityof a man's spiritual development than that it should be precipitated, and new thoughts must have time to take the shape of the mind intowhich they come, and to mould the shape of the mind into which theycome. So they were left to quiet reflection, to meditation, to adjusttheir thoughts, to get to understand the bearings of the transcendentfact. And as a mother will go a little way off from her little child, in order to encourage it to try to walk, they were left alone to makeexperiments of that self-reliance which was also reliance on Him, andwhich was to be their future and their permanent condition. So theweek passed, and they became steadier and quieter, and began to befamiliar with the thought, and to see some glimpses of what wasinvolved in the mighty fact, of a risen Saviour. Then He comes backagain, and when He comes He singles out the unbeliever, leaving theothers alone for the moment, and He gives him back, granted, hisarrogant conditions. How much ashamed of them Thomas must have beenwhen he heard them quoted by the Lord's own lips! How different theywould sound from what they had sounded when, in the self-sufficiencyof his obstinate determination, he had blurted them out in answer tohis brethren's testimony! There is no surer way of making a good manashamed of his wild words than just to say them over again to himwhen he is calm and cool. Christ's granting the request was Christ'ssharpest rebuke of the request. But there was not only the graciousand yet chastising granting of the foolish desire, but there was apenetrating warning: 'Be not faithless, but believing. ' What did thatmean? Well, it meant this: 'It is not a question of evidence, Thomas;it is a question of disposition. Your incredulity is not due to yournot having enough to warrant your belief, but to your tendency andattitude of mind and heart. ' There is light enough in the sun; it isour eyes that are wrong, and deep below most questions, even ofintellectual credence, lies the disposition of the man. The ultimatetruths of religion cannot be matters of demonstration any more thanthe fundamental truths of any science can be proved; any more thanEuclid's axioms can be demonstrated; any more than the sense ofbeauty or the ear for music depend on the understanding. 'Be notfaithless, but believing. ' The eye that is sound will see the light. 

And there is another lesson here. The words of our Lord, literallyrendered, are, 'become not faithless, but believing. ' There are twotendencies at work with us, and the one or the other willprogressively lay hold upon us, and we shall increasingly yield toit. You can cultivate the habit of incredulity until you descend intothe class of the faithless; or you can cultivate the opposite habitand disposition until you rise to the high level of a settled andsovereign belief. 

It is clear that Thomas did not reach forth his hand and touch. Therush of instantaneous conviction swept him along and bore him faraway from the state of mind which had asked for such evidence. OurLord's words must have pierced his heart, as he thought: 'Then He washere all the while; He heard my wild words; He loves me still. ' AsNathanael, when he knew that Jesus had seen him under the fig-tree, broke out with the exclamation, 'Rabbi! Thou art the Son of God, ' soThomas, smitten as by a lightning flash with the sense of Jesus' all-embracing knowledge and all-forgiving love, forgets his incredulityand breaks into the rapturous confession, the highest ever spokenwhile He was on earth: 'My Lord and my God!' So swiftly did his wholeattitude change. It was as when the eddying volumes of smoke in somegreat conflagration break into sudden flame, the ruddier and hotter, the blacker they were. Sight may have made Thomas believe that Jesuswas risen, but it was something other and more inward than sight thatopened his lips to cry, 'My Lord and my God!' Finally, we note--

IV. A last Beatitude that extends to all generations. 

'Blessed are they who have not seen and yet have believed. ' I neednot do more than just in a sentence remind you that we shall verypoorly understand either this saying or this Gospel or the greaterpart of the New Testament, if we do not make it very clear to ourminds that 'believing' is not credence only but trust. The object ofthe Christian's faith is not a proposition; it is not a dogma nor atruth, but a Person. And the act of faith is not an acceptance of agiven fact, a Resurrection or any other, as true, but it is areaching out of the whole nature to Him and a resting upon Him. Ihave said that Thomas had no right to bring his will to bear on theact of belief, considered as the intellectual act of accepting athing as true. But Christian faith, being more than intellectualbelief, does involve the activity of the will. Credence is thestarting-point, but it is no more. There may be belief in the truthof the gospel and not a spark of faith in the Christ revealed by thegospel. 

Even in regard to that lower kind of belief, the assent which doesnot rest on sense has its own blessing. We sometimes are ready tothink that it would have been easier to believe if 'we had seen withour eyes, and our hands had handled the (incarnate) Word of Life' butthat is a mistake. 

This generation, and all generations that have not seen Him, are notin a less advantageous position in regard either to credence or totrust, than were those that companied with Him on earth, and theblessing Which He breathed out in that upper room comes floating downthe ages like a perfume diffused through the atmosphere, and is withus fragrant as it was in the 'days of His flesh. ' There is nothing inthe world's history comparable to the warmth and closeness ofconscious contact with that Christ, dead for nearly nineteencenturies now, which is the experience today of thousands ofChristian men and women. All other names pass, and as they recedethrough the ages, thickening veils of oblivion, mists offorgetfulness, gather round them. They melt away into the fog and areforgotten. Why is it that one Person, and one Person only, triumphseven in this respect over space and time, and is the same closeFriend with whom millions of hearts are in loving touch, as He was tothose that gathered around Him upon earth?

What is the blessing of this faith that does not rest on sense, andonly in a small measure on testimony or credence? Part of itsblessing is that it delivers us from the tyranny of sense, sets usfree from the crowding oppression of 'things seen and temporal';draws back the veil and lets us behold 'the things that are unseenand eternal. ' Faith is sight, the sight of the inward eye. It is thedirect perception of the unseen. It sees Him who is invisible. Thevision which is given to the eye of faith is more real in the truesense of that word, more substantial in the true sense of that word, more reliable and more near than that sight by which the bodily eyebeholds external things. We see, when we trust, greater things thanwhen we look. The blessing of blessings is that the faith whichtriumphs over the things seen and temporal, brings into every lifethe presence of the unseen Lord. 

Brethren! do not confound credence with trust. Remember that trustdoes involve an element of will. Ask yourselves if the things seenand temporal are great enough, lasting enough, real enough to satisfyyou, and then remember whose lips said, 'Become not faithless butbelieving, ' and breathed His last Beatitude upon those 'who have notseen and yet have believed. ' We may all have that blessing lying likedew upon us, amidst the dust and scorching heat of the things seenand temporal. We shall have it, if our heart's trust is set on Him, whom one of the listeners on that Sunday spoke of long after, inwords which seem to echo that promise, as 'Jesus in whom though nowye see Him not, yet believing ye rejoice with joy unspeakable andfull of glory, receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation ofyour souls. '

THE SILENCE OF SCRIPTURE

'And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of Hisdisciples, which are not written in this book: But these arewritten, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Sonof God; and that believing ye might have life through His name. '--JOHN XX. 30, 31. 

It is evident that these words were originally the close of thisGospel, the following chapter being an appendix, subsequently addedby the writer himself. In them we have the Evangelist's ownacknowledgment of the incompleteness of his Gospel, and his ownstatement of the purpose which he had in view in composing it. Thatpurpose was first of all a doctrinal one, and he tells us that incarrying it out he omitted many things that he could have put in ifhe had chosen. But that doctrinal purpose was subordinate to a stillfurther aim. His object was not only to present the truth that Jesuswas the Christ, the Son of God, but to present it in such a way as toinduce his readers to believe in that Christ. And he desired thatthey might have faith in order that they might have life. 

Now, it is a very good old canon in judging of a book that 'in everywork' we are to 'regard the writer's end, ' and if that simpleprinciple had been applied to this Gospel, a great many of thefeatures in it which have led to some difficulty would have been seento be naturally explained by the purpose which the Evangelist had inview. 

But this text may be applied very much more widely than to John'sGospel. We may use it to point our thoughts to the strange silencesand incompletenesses of the whole of Revelation, and to theexplanation of these incompletenesses by the consideration of thepurpose which it all had in view. In that sense I desire to look atthese words before us. 

I. First, then, we have here set forth the incompleteness ofScripture. 

Take this Gospel first. Anybody who looks at it can see that it is afragment. It is not meant to be a biography; it is avowedly aselection, and a selection under the influence, as I shall have toshow you presently, of a distinct dogmatic purpose. There is nothingin it about Christ's birth, nothing in it about His baptism, norabout His selection of His Apostles. There is scarcely anything aboutthe facts of His outward life at all. There is scarcely a word aboutthe whole of His ministry in Galilee. There is not one of Hisparables, there are only seven of His miracles before theResurrection, and two of these occur also in the other Evangelists. There is scarcely any of His ethical teaching; there is not a wordabout the Lord's Supper. 

And so I might go on enumerating many remarkable gaps in this Gospel. Nearly half of it is taken up with the incidents of one week at theend of His life, and the incidents of and after the Resurrection. Ofthe remainder-by far the larger portion consists of severalconversations which are hung upon miracles that seem to be relatedprincipally for the sake of these. The whole of the phenomena show usat once the fragmentary character of this Gospel as stamped upon thevery surface. 

And when we turn to the other three, the same thing is true, thoughless strikingly so. Why was it that in the Church, after thecompletion of the Scriptural canon, there sprang up a whole host ofApocryphal Gospels, full of childish stories of events which peoplefelt had been passed over with strange silence, in the teachings ofthe four Evangelists: stories of His childhood, for instance, andstories about what happened between His death and His resurrection? Agreat many miracles were added to those that have been told us inScripture. The condensed hints of the canonical Gospels received agreat expansion, which indicated how much their silence about certainpoints had been felt. What a tiny pamphlet they make! Is it notstrange that the greatest event in the world's history should be toldin such brief outline, and that here, too, the mustard seed, 'lessthan the least of all seeds, ' should have become such a great tree?Put the four Gospels down by the side of the two thick octavovolumes, which it is the regulation thing to write nowadays, as thebiography of any man that has a name at all, and you will feel theirincompleteness as biographies. They are but a pen-and-ink drawing ofthe Sun! And yet, although they be so tiny that you might sit downand read them all in an evening over the fire, is it not strange thatthey have stamped on the mind of the world an image so deep and sosharp, of such a character as the world never saw elsewhere? They arefragments, but they have left a symmetrical and an unique impressionon the consciousness of the whole world. 

And then, if you turn to the whole Book, the same thing is true, though in a modified sense there. I have no time to dwell upon thatfruitful field, but the silence of Scripture is quite as eloquent asits speech. Think, for instance, of how many things in the Bible aretaken for granted which one would not expect to be taken for grantedin a book of religious instruction. It takes for granted the being ofa God. It takes for granted our relations to Him. It takes forgranted our moral nature. In its later portions, at all events, ittakes for granted the future life. Look at how the Bible, as a whole, passes by, without one word of explanation or alleviation, a greatmany of the difficulties which gather round some of its teaching. Forinstance, we find no attempt to explain the divine nature of ourLord; or the existence of the three Persons in the Godhead. It hasnot a word to say in explanation of the mystery of prayer; or of thedifficulty of reconciling the Omnipotent will of God on the one hand, with our own free will on the other. It has not a word to explain, though many a word to proclaim and enforce, the fact of Christ'sdeath as the atonement for the sins of the whole world. Observe, too, how scanty the information on points on which the heart craves formore light. How closely, for instance, the veil is kept over thefuture life! How many questions which are not prompted by merecuriosity, our sorrow and our love ask in vain!

Nor is the incompleteness of Scripture as a historical book lessmarked. Nations and men appear on its pages abruptly, rending thecurtain of oblivion, and striding to the front of the stage for amoment, and then they disappear, swallowed up of night. It has nocare to tell the stories of any of its heroes, except for so long asthey were the organs of that divine breath, which, breathed throughthe weakest reed, makes music. The self-revelation of God, not theacts and fortunes of even His noblest servants, is the theme of theBook. It is full of gaps about matters that any sciolist orphilosopher or theologian would have filled up for it. There itstands, a Book unique in the world's history, unique in what it says, and no less unique in what it does not say. 

'Many other things truly did' that divine Spirit in His march throughthe ages, 'which are not written in this book; but these are writtenthat ye might believe. '

II. And so that brings me next to say a word or two about the moreimmediate purpose which explains all these gaps and incompletenesses. 

John's Gospel, and the other three Gospels, and the whole Bible, NewTestament and Old, have this for their purpose, to produce in men'shearts the faith in Jesus as 'the Christ' and as 'the Son of God. '

I need not speak at length about this one Gospel with any specialregard to that thought. I have already said that the Evangelist avowsthat his work is a selection, that he declares that the purpose thatdetermined his selection was doctrinal, and that he picked out factswhich would tend to represent Jesus Christ to us in the twofoldcapacity, --as the Christ, the Fulfiller of all the expectations andpromises of the Old Covenant, and as the Son of God. The one of thesetitles is a name of office, the other a name of nature; the onedeclares that He had come to be, and to do, all to which types andprophecies and promises had dimly pointed, and the other declaresthat He was 'the Eternal Word, ' which 'in the beginning was with Godand was God, ' and was manifest here upon earth to us. 

This was his purpose, and this representation of Jesus Christ is thatwhich shapes all the facts and all the phenomena of this Gospel, fromthe very first words of it to its close. 

And so, although it is wide from my present subject, I may just makeone parenthetical remark, to the effect that it is ridiculous in theface of this statement for 'critics' to say, as some of them do: 'Theauthor of the fourth Gospel has not told us this, that, and the otherincident in Christ's life, therefore, he did not know it. ' Then someof them will draw the conclusion that John's Gospel is not to betrusted in the given case, because he does not give us a certainincident, and others might draw the conclusion that the other threeEvangelists are not to be trusted because they do give it us. And thewhole fabric is built up upon a blunder, and would have been avoidedif people had listened when John said to them: 'I knew a great manythings about Jesus Christ, but I did not put them down here because Iwas not writing a biography, but preaching a gospel; and what Iwanted to proclaim was that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. '

But now we may extend that a great deal further. It is just as trueabout the whole New Testament. The four Gospels are written to tellus these two facts about Christ. They are none of them merelybiographies; as such they are singularly deficient, as we have seen. But they are biographies _plus_ a doctrine; and the biography is toldmainly for the sake of carrying this twofold truth into men'sunderstandings and hearts, that Jesus is, first of all, the Christ, and second, the Son of God. 

And then comes the rest of the New Testament, which is nothing morethan the working out of the theoretical and practical consequence ofthese great truths. All the Epistles, the Book of Revelation, and thehistory of the Church, as embodied in the Acts of the Apostles, --allthese are but the consequences of that fundamental truth; and thewhole of Scripture in its later portions is but the drawing of theinferences and the presenting of the duties that flow from the factsthat 'Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. '

And what about the Old Testament? Why, this about it: that whatevermay be the conclusion as to the date and authorship of any of thebooks in it, --and I am not careful to contend about these atpresent;--and whatever a man may believe about the verbal prophecieswhich most of us recognise there, --there is stamped unmistakably uponthe whole system, of which the Old Testament is the record, anonward-looking attitude. It is all anticipatory of 'good things tocome, ' and of a Person who will bring them. Sacrifice, sacredoffices, such as priesthood and kingship, and the whole history ofIsrael, have their faces turned to the future. 'They that wentbefore, and they that followed after, cried "Hosanna! Blessed be Hethat cometh in the name of the Lord!"' This Christ towers up abovethe history of the world and the process of revelation, like MountEverest among the Himalayas. To that great peak all the country onthe one side runs upwards, and from it all the valleys on the otherdescend; and the springs are born there which carry verdure and lifeover the world. 

Christ, the Son of God, is the centre of Scripture; and the Book--whatever be the historical facts about its origin, its authorship, and the date of the several portions of which it is composed--theBook is a unity, because there is driven right through it, like acore of gold, either in the way of prophecy and onward-lookinganticipation, or in the way of history and grateful retrospect, thereference to the one 'Name that is above every name, ' the name of theChrist, the Son of God. 

And all its incompleteness, its fragmentariness, its carelessnessabout persons, are intended, as are the slight parts in a skilfulartist's handiwork, to emphasise the beauty and the sovereignty ofthat one central Figure on which all lights are concentrated, and onwhich the painter has lavished all the resources of his art. So God--for _God_ is the Author of the Bible--on this great canvas haspainted much in sketchy outline, and left much unfilled in, thatevery eye may be fixed on the central Figure, the Christ of God, onwhose head comes down the Dove, and round whom echoes the divinedeclaration: 'This is My Beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. '

But it is not merely in order to represent Jesus as the Christ of Godthat these things are written, but it is that that representation maybecome the object of our faith. If the intention of Scripture hadbeen simply to establish the fact that Jesus was the Christ and theSon of God, it might have been done in a very different fashion. Atheological treatise would have been enough to do that. But if theobject be that men should not only accept with their understandingsthe truth concerning Christ's office and nature, but that theirhearts should go out to Him, and that they should rest their sinfulsouls upon Him _as_ the Son of God and the Christ, then there is noother way to accomplish that, but by the history of His life and themanifestation of His heart. If the object were simply to make us knowabout Christ, we do not need a Book like this; but if the object isto lead us to put our faith in Him, then we must have what we havehere, the infinitely touching and tender Figure of Jesus ChristHimself, set before us in all its sweetness and beauty as He livedand moved and died for us. 

And so, dear friends, let me put one last word here about this partof my subject. If this be the purpose of Scripture, then let us learnon the one hand the wretched insufficiency of a mere orthodox creed, and let us learn on the other hand the equal insufficiency of a merecreedless emotion. 

If the purpose of Scripture, in these Gospels, and all its parts, isthat we should believe 'that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, 'that purpose is not accomplished when we simply yield ourunderstanding to that truth and accept it as a great many people do. That was much more the fault of the last generation than of this, though many of us may still make the mistake of supposing that we areChristians because we idly assent to--or, at least, do not deny, andso fancy that we accept--Christian truth. But, as Luther says in oneof his rough figures, 'Human nature is like a drunken peasant; if youput him up on the horse on the one side, he is sure to tumble down onthe other. ' And so the reaction from the heartless, unpracticalorthodoxy of half a century ago has come with a vengeance to-day, when everybody is saying, 'Oh! give me a Christianity without dogma!'Well, I say that too, about a great many of the metaphysicalsubtleties which have been called Doctrinal Christianity. But thisdoctrine of the nature and office of Jesus Christ cannot be given up, and the Christianity which Christ and His Apostles taught beretained. Do you believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God? Doyou trust your soul to Him in these characters? If you do, I think wecan shake hands. If you do not, Scripture has failed to do its workon you, and you have not reached the point which all God's lavishrevelation has been expended on the world that you and all men mightattain. 

III. Now, lastly, notice the ultimate purpose of the whole. 

Scripture is not given to us merely to make us know something aboutGod in Christ, nor only in order that we may have faith in the Christthus revealed to us, but for a further end--great, glorious, but, blessed be His Name! not distant--namely, that we may 'have life inHis name. ' 'Life' is deep, mystical, inexplicable by any other wordsthan itself. It includes pardon, holiness, well-being, immortality, Heaven; but it is more than they all. 

This life comes into our dead hearts and quickens them by union withGod. That which is joined to God lives. Each being according to itsnature, is, on condition of the divine power acting upon it. This bitof wood upon which I put my hand, and the hand which I put upon it, would equally crumble into nothingness if they were separated fromGod. 

You can separate your wills and your spiritual nature from Him, andthus separated you are 'dead in trespasses and in sins. ' And, Obrother! the message comes to you: there is life in that greatChrist, 'in His name'; that is to say, in that revealed character ofHis by which He is made known to us as the Christ and the Son of God. 

Union with Him in His Sonship will bring life into dead hearts. He isthe true 'Prometheus' who has come from Heaven with 'fire, ' the fireof the divine Life in the 'reed' of His humanity, and He imparts itto us all if we will. He lays Himself upon us, as the prophet laidhimself on the little child in the upper chamber; and lip to lip, andbeating heart to dead heart, He touches our death, and it isquickened into life. 

The condition on which that great Name will bring to us life issimply our faith. Do you believe in Him, and trust yourself to Him, as He who came to fulfil all that prophet, priest, and king, sacrifice, altar, and Temple of old times prophesied and looked for?Do you trust in Him as the Son of God who comes down to earth that wein Him might find the immortal life which He is ready to give? If youdo, then, dear brethren! the end that God has in view in all Hisrevelation, that Christ had in view in His bitter Passion, has beenaccomplished for you. If you do not it has not. You may admire Him, you may think loftily of Him, you may be ready to call Him by manygreat and appreciative names, but Oh! unless you have learned to seein Him the divine Saviour of your souls, you have not seen what Godmeans you to see. 

But if you have, then all other questions about this Book, importantas they are in their places, may settle themselves as they will; youhave got the kernel, the thing that it was meant to bring you. Manyan erudite scholar, who has studied the Bible all his life, hasmissed the purpose for which it was given; and many a poor old womanin her garret has found it. It is not meant to wrangle over, it isnot meant to be read as an interesting product of the religiousconsciousness, it is not to be admired as all that remains of theliterature of a nation that had a genius for religion; but it is tobe taken as being God's great Word to the world, the record of therevelation that He has given us in His Son. The Eternal Word is thetheme of all the written word. Have you made the jewel which isbrought us in that casket your own? Is Jesus to you the Son of theliving God, believing on whom you share His life, and become 'sons ofGod' by Him? Can you take on to your thankful lips that triumphantand rapturous confession of the doubting Thomas, --the flag flying onthe completed roof-tree of this Gospel--'My Lord and my God'? If youcan, you will receive the blessing which Christ then promised to allof us standing beyond the limits of that little group, 'who have notseen and yet have believed'--even that eternal life which flows intoour dead spirits from the Christ, the Son of God, who is the Light ofthe world, and the Life of men. 

AN ELOQUENT CATALOGUE

'There were together Simon Peter, and Thomas called Didymus, andNathanael of Cana in Galilee, and the sons of Zebedee, and twoother of His disciples. '--JOHN xxi. 2. 

This chapter, containing the infinitely significant and patheticaccount of our Lord's appearance to these disciples by the Sea ofTiberias, is evidently an appendix to the Gospel of John. The designof that Gospel is complete with the previous chapter, and there is aformal close, as of the whole book, at the end thereof. But whilstobviously an appendix, this chapter is as obviously the work of thesame hand as wrote the Gospel. There are many minute points ofidentity between the style of it and of the rest of the work, so thatthere can be no difficulty or doubt as to whence it came. Thisenumeration of these seven disciples, regarded as being the work ofJohn himself, seems to me to be significant, and to contain a goodmany lessons. And I desire to turn to these now. 

I. First of all, the fact that they were together is significant. 

How did they come to hold together? How had they not yielded to thetemptation to seek safety by flight, which would have been thenatural course after the death of their Leader on a charge of treasonagainst the Roman power? The process of disintegration had begun, andwe see it going on in the conduct of the disciples before theResurrection. The 'Shepherd was smitten, ' and, as a matter of course, 'the sheep' began to 'scatter. ' And yet here we find them back inGalilee, in their old haunts, and not trying to escape by separation, which would have been the first step suggested to ordinary men in anordinary state of things. But where everybody knew them, and theyknew everybody, and everybody knew them to be disciples of JesusChrist, thither they go, and hold together as if they had still aliving centre and a uniting bond. How did that come about? The factthat after Christ's death there was a group of men united togethersimply and solely as disciples, and exhibiting their unity asdisciples conspicuously, in the face of the men that knew them best, this forms a strange phenomenon that needs an explanation. And thereis only one explanation of it, that Jesus Christ had risen from thedead. That drew them together once more. You cannot build a Church ona dead Christ; and of all the proofs of the Resurrection, I take itthat there is none that it is harder for an unbeliever to accountfor, in harmony with his hypothesis, than the simple fact thatChrist's disciples held together after He was dead, and presented aunited front to the world. 

So, then, the fact of the group is itself significant, and we mayclaim it as being a morsel of evidence for the historical veracity ofthe resurrection of Jesus Christ. 

II. Then the composition of this group is significant. 

Taken in comparison with the original nucleus of the Church, thecalling of which we find recorded in the first chapter of thisGospel, it is to be noticed that of the five men who made thePrimitive Church, there are three who reappear here by name--viz. Simon Peter, John and Nathanael, and Nathanael never appears anywhereelse except in these two places. Then, note that there are twounnamed men here, 'two other of His disciples'; who, I think, in allprobability are the two of the original five that we do not findnamed here--viz. 'Philip and Andrew, Simon Peter's brother'--both ofthem connected with Bethsaida, the place where probably thisappearance of the risen Lord took place. 

So, then, I think, the fair inference from the list before us is thatwe have here the original nucleus again, the first five, with acouple more, and the couple more are 'Thomas, who is called Didymus'--and we shall see the reason for _his_ presence in a moment--and thebrother of John, one of the first pair. 

Thus, then, to the original little group that had gathered round Himat the first, and to whom He had been so often manifested in thisvery scene where they were standing now, He is revealed again. There, along the beach, is the place where James and John and Simon andAndrew were called from their nets three short years ago. Acrossyonder, on the other side of the lake, is the bit of green grasswhere the thousands were fed. Behind it is the steep slope down whichthe devil-possessed herd rushed. There, over the shoulder of thehill, is the road that leads up to Cana of Galilee, which they hadtrod together on that never-to-be-forgotten first morning, and fromwhich little village one of the group came. They who had companiedwith Him all the time of His too short fellowship, and had seen allHis manifestations, were fittingly chosen to be the recipients ofthis last appearance, which was to be full of instruction as to thework of the Church, its difficulties, its discouragements, itsrewards, its final success, and His benediction of it until the veryend of time. It was not for nothing that they who were gatheredtogether were that first nucleus of the Church, who received againfrom their Master the charge to be 'fishers of men. '

And then, if we look at the list, having regard to the history ofthose that make it up, it seems to me that that also brings us somevaluable considerations. Foremost stand, as receiving this greatmanifestation of Jesus Christ, the two greatest sinners of the wholeband, 'Simon Peter, and Thomas, which is called Didymus, ' the denierand the doubter. Singularly contrasted these two men were in much oftheir disposition; and yet alike in the fact that the Crucifixion hadbeen too much for their faith. The one of them was impetuous, theother of them slow. The one was always ready to say more than hemeant; the other always ready to do more than he said. The one wasnaturally despondent, disposed to look ahead and to see the gloomiestside of everything--'Let us also go that we may die with Him'--theother never looking an inch beyond his nose, and always yieldinghimself up to the impulse of the moment. And yet both of them wereunited in this, that the one, from a sudden wave of cowardice whichswept him away from his deepest convictions and made him for an houruntrue to his warmest love, and the other, from giving way to hisconstitutional tendency to despondency, and to taking the blackestpossible view of everything--they had both of them failed in theirfaith, the one turning out a denier and the other turning out adoubter. And yet here they are, foremost upon the list of those whosaw the Risen Christ. 

Well, there are two lessons there, and the one is this--let usChristian people learn with what open hearts and hands we shouldwelcome a penitent when he comes back. The other is, --let us learnwho they are to whom Jesus Christ deigns to manifest Himself--notimmaculate monsters, but men that, having fallen, have learnedhumility and caution, and by penitence have risen to a securerstanding, and have turned even their transgressions into steps in theladder that lifts them to Christ. It was something that the first towhom the risen Saviour appeared when He came victorious and calm fromthe grave, was the woman 'out of whom He had cast seven devils, ' andthe blessed truth which that teaches is the same as that which is tobe drawn from this list of those whom He regarded, and whom weregard, as then constituting the true nucleus of His Church--a listwhich is headed by the blackest denier and the most obstinate andcaptious sceptic in the whole company. 'There were together SimonPeter and Thomas, which is called Didymus, ' and the little group wasglad to have them, and welcomed them, as it becomes us to welcomebrethren who have fallen, and who come again saying, 'I repent. '

Well, then, take the next: he was 'Nathanael, of Cana in Galilee'; aguileless 'Israelite indeed, ' so swift to believe, so ready with hisconfession, so childlike in his wonder, so ardent in his love andfaith. The only thing that Christ is recorded as having said to himis this: 'Because I said. .. Believest thou? Thou shalt see greaterthings than these. ' A promise of growing clearness of vision andgrowing fullness of manifestation was made to this man, who neverappears anywhere else in Scripture but in these two scenes, and somay stand to us as the type of the opposite kind of Christianexperience from that stormy one of the doubter and the denier--viz. That of persistent, quiet, continuous growth, which is marked byfaithful use of the present amount of illumination, and is rewardedby a continual increase of the same. If the keynote to the two formerlives is, that sin confessed helps a man to climb, the keynote tothis man's is the other truth, that they are still more blessed who, with no interruptions, backslidings, inconsistencies, or denials, bypatient continuousness in well-doing, widen the horizon of theirChristian vision and purge their eyesight for daily larger knowledge. To these, as to the others, there is granted the vision of the risenLord, and to them also is entrusted the care of His sheep and Hislambs. We do not _need_ to go away into the depths and the darknessin order to realise the warmth and the blessedness of the light. There is no _necessity_ that any Christian man's career should bebroken by denials like Peter's or by doubts like Thomas's, but we may'grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour. ' 'So isthe kingdom of heaven, first the blade, then the ear, after that thefull corn in the ear. '

Then, still further, there were here 'the two sons of Zebedee. ' Thesewere the men of whom the Master said that they were 'sons ofthunder, ' who, by natural disposition, in so far as they resembledone another (which they seem to have done), were eager, energetic, somewhat bigoted, ready with passionate rebukes, and not unwilling toinvoke destructive vengeance, all for the love of Him. They were alsotouched with some human ambition which led them to desire a place atHis right hand and His left, but the ambition, too, was touched withlove towards Him, which half redeemed it. But by dwelling with Himone of them, at least, had become of all the group the likest hisMaster. And the old monastic painters taught a very deep truth when, in their pictures of the apostles, they made John's almost a copy ofthe Master's face. To him, too, there was granted in like manner aplace amongst this blessed company, and it is surely a trace of _his_hand that his place should seem so humble. Any other but himselfwould certainly have put James and John in their natural place besidePeter. It must have been himself who slipped himself and his brotherinto so inconspicuous a position in the list, and further veiled hispersonality under the patronymic, 'the sons of Zebedee. '

Last of all come 'two other of His disciples, ' not worth naming. Probably, as I have said, they were the missing two out of the fiveof the first chapter; but possibly they were only 'disciples' in thewider sense, and not of the Apostolic group at all. Nobody can tell. What does it matter? The lesson to be gathered from their presence inthis group is one that most of us may very well take to heart. Thereis a place for commonplace, undistinguished people, whose names arenot worth repeating in any record; there is a place for us one-talented folk, in Christ's Church, and we, too, have a share in themanifestation of His love. We do not need to be brilliant, we do notneed to be clever, we do not need to be influential, we do not needto be energetic, we do not need to be anything but quiet, waitingsouls, in order to have Christ showing Himself to us, as we toilwearily through the darkness of the night. Undistinguished discipleshave a place in His heart, a sphere and a function in His Church, anda share in His revelation of Himself. 

III. The last point that I touch is this, that the purpose of thisgroup is significant. 

What did they thus get together for? 'Simon Peter saith, I go afishing. They say, We also go with thee. ' So they went back again totheir old trade, and they had not left the nets and the boats and thehired servants for ever, as they once thought they had. 

What sent them back? Not doubt or despair; because they had seenJesus Christ up in Jerusalem, and had come down to Galilee at Hiscommand on purpose to meet Him. 'There shall ye see Him, lo! I havetold you, ' was ringing in their ears, and they went back in fullconfidence of His appearance there. It is very like Peter that heshould have been the one to suggest filling an hour of the waitingtime with manual labour. The time would be hanging heavily on hishands. John could have 'sat still in the house, ' like Mary, the heartall the busier, because the hands lay quietly in the lap. But thatwas not Peter's way, and John was ready to keep him company. Peterthought that the best thing they could do, till Jesus chose to come, was to get back to their work, and he was sensible and right. Thebest preparation for Christ's appearance, and the best attitude to befound in by Him, is doing our daily work, however secular and smallit may be. A dirty, wet fishing boat, all slimy with scales, was astrange place in which to wait for the manifestation of a risenSaviour. But it was the right place, righter than if they had beenwandering about amongst the fancied sanctities of the synagogues. 

They went out to do their work; and to them was fulfilled the oldsaying, 'I, being in the way, the Lord met me. ' Jesus Christ willcome to you and me in the street if we carry the waiting heart there, and in the shop, and the factory, and the counting-house, and thekitchen, and the nursery, and the study, or wherever we may be. Forall things are sacred when done with a hallowed heart, and He choosesto make Himself known to us amidst the dusty commonplaces of dailylife. 

He had said to them before the Crucifixion: 'When I sent you forthwithout purse or scrip, lacked ye anything? And they said, Nothing. 'And then He said, as changing the conditions: 'But now he that hath apurse or scrip, let him take it. ' As long as He was with them theywere absolved from these common tasks. Now that He had left them theobligation recurred. And the order of things for His servants in alltime coming was therein declared to be: no shirking of daily tasks onthe plea of wanting divine communications; keep at your work, and ifit last all night, stick to it; and if there are no fish in the net, never mind; out with it again. And be sure that sooner or later youwill see Him standing on the beach, and hear His voice, and beblessed by His smile. 

THE BEACH AND THE SEA

'When the morning was now come, Jesus stood on the shore; but thedisciples knew not that it was Jesus. '--JOHN xxi. 4. 

The incident recorded in this appendix to John's Gospel is separatedfrom the other appearances of our risen Lord in respect of place, time, and purpose. They all occurred in and about Jerusalem; thistook place in Galilee. The bulk of them happened on the day of theResurrection, one of them a week after. This, of course, to allowtime for the journey, must have been at a considerably later date. Their object was, mainly, to establish the reality of theResurrection, the identity of Christ's physical body, and to confirmthe faith of the disciples therein. Here, these purposes retreat intothe background; the object of this incident is to reveal thepermanent relations between the risen Lord and His struggling Church. 

The narrative is rich in details which might profitably occupy us, but the whole may be gathered up in two general points of view inconsidering the revelation which we have here in the participation ofChrist in His servants' work, and also the revelation which we havein the preparation by Christ of a meal for His toiling servants. Wetake this whole narrative thus regarded as our subject on this Eastermorning. 

I. First we have here a revelation of the permanent relation of JesusChrist to His Church and to the individuals who compose it, in this, that the risen Lord on the shore shares in the toil of His servantson the restless sea. 

The little group of whom we read in this narrative reminds us of theother group of the first disciples in the first chapter of thisGospel. Four out of the five persons named in our text appear there:Simon Peter, Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, and the sons of Zebedee, James and John. And a very natural inference is that the 'two others'unnamed here are the two others of that chapter, viz. Andrew andPhilip. If so, we have at the end, the original little group gatheredtogether again; with the addition of the doubting Thomas. 

Be that as it may, there they are on the shore of the sea, and Petercharacteristically takes the lead and suggests a course that they allaccept: 'I go a fishing. ' 'We also go with thee. '

Now we must not read that as if it meant: 'It is all over! Our hopesare vain! We dreamed that we were going to be princes in theMessiah's Kingdom, we have woke up to find that we are onlyfishermen. Let us go back to our nets and our boats!' No! all thesemen had seen the risen Lord, and had received from His breath thegift of the Holy Spirit. They had all gone from Jerusalem to Galilee, in obedience to His command, and were now waiting for His promisedappearance. Very noble and beautiful is the calm patience with whichthey fill the time of expectation with doing common and long-abandoned tasks. They go back to the nets and the boats long sinceforsaken at the Master's bidding. That is not like fanatics. That isnot like people who would be liable to the excesses of excitementthat would lead to the 'hallucination, ' which is the modernexplanation of the resurrection faith, on the part of the disciples. 

And it is a precious lesson for us, dear brethren! that whatever maybe our memories, and whatever may be our hopes, the very wisest thingwe can do is to stick to the common drudgery, and even to go back toabandoned tasks. It stills the pulses. 'Study to be quiet; and to doour own business' is the best remedy for all excitement, whether itbe of sorrow or of hope. And not seldom to us, if we will learn andpractise that lesson, as to these poor men in the tossing fisherman'sboat, the accustomed and daily duties will be the channel throughwhich the presence of the Master will be manifested to us. 

So they go, and there follow the incidents which I need not repeat, because we all know them well enough. Only I wish to mark thedistinct allusion throughout the whole narrative to the earlier storyof the first miraculous draught of fishes which was connected withtheir call to the Apostleship, and was there by Christ declared tohave a symbolical meaning. The correspondences and the contrasts areobvious. The scene is the same; the same green mountains look downupon the same blue waters. It was the same people that wereconcerned. They were, probably enough, in the same fishing-boat. Inboth there had been a night of fruitless toil; in both there was thecommand to let down the net once more; in both obedience was followedby instantaneous and large success. 

So much for the likenesses; the contrasts are these. In the one casethe Master is in the boat with them, in the other He is on the shore;in the one the net is breaking; in the other, 'though there were somany, yet did it not break. ' In the one Peter, smitten by a sense ofhis own sinfulness, says, 'Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, OLord!' In the other, Peter, with a deeper knowledge of his ownsinfulness, but also with the sweet knowledge of forgiveness, castshimself into the sea, and flounders through the shallows to reach theLord. The one is followed by the call to higher duty and to theabandonment of possessions; the other is followed by rest and themysterious meal on the shore. 

That is to say, whilst both of the stories point the lesson ofservice to the Master, the one of them exhibits the principles ofservice to Him whilst He was still with them, and the other exhibitsthe principles of service to Him when He is removed from strugglingand toiling on the billows to the calm of the peaceful shore in themorning light. 

So we may take that night of toil as full of meaning. Think of themas the darkness fell, and the solemn bulk of the girdling hills layblacker upon the waters, and the Syrian sky was mirrored with all itsstars sparkling in the still lake. All the night long cast after castwas made, and time after time the net was drawn in and nothing in itbut tangle and mud. And when the first streak of the morning breakspale over the Eastern hills they are still so absorbed in their tasksthat they do not recognise the voice that hails them from the nearershore: 'Lads, have ye any meat?' And they answer it with a half surlyand wholly disappointed monosyllabic 'No!' It is an emblem for usall; weary and wet, tugging at the oar in the dark, and often seemingto fail. What then? If the last cast has brought nothing, tryanother. Out with the nets once more! Never mind the darkness, andthe cold, and the wetting spray, and the weariness. You cannot expectto be as comfortable in a fishing-boat as in your drawing-room. Youcannot expect that your nets will be always full. Failure anddisappointment mingle in the most successful lives. Christian workhas often to be done with no results at all apparent to the doer, butbe sure of this, that they who learn and practise the homely, wholesome virtue of persistent adherence to the task that God setsthem, will catch some gleams of a Presence most real and mostblessed, and before they die will know that 'their labour has notbeen in vain in the Lord. ' 'They that sow in tears shall reap injoy. '

And so, finally, about this first part of my subject, there standsout before us here the blessed picture of the Lord Himself, the RisenLord, with the halo of death and resurrection round about Him; there, on the firm beach, in the increasing light of the morning, interestedin, caring about, directing and crowning with His own blessing, theobedient work of His servants. 

The simple prose fact of the story, in its plain meaning, is moreprecious than any 'spiritualising' of it. Take the fact. JesusChrist, fresh from the grave, who had been down into those darkregions of mystery where the dead sleep and wait, and had come backinto this world, and was on the eve of ascending to the Father--thisChrist, the possessor of such experience, takes an interest in sevenpoor men's fishing, and cares to know whether their ragged old net isfull or is empty. There never was a more sublime and wonderfulbinding together of the loftiest and the lowliest than in thatquestion in the mouth of the Risen Lord. If men had been going todream about what would be fitting language for a risen Saviour, if wehad to do here with a legend, and not with a piece of plain, prosaicfact, do you think that the imagination would ever have entered themind of the legend-maker to put such a question as that into suchlips at such a time? 'Lads, have ye any meat?'

It teaches us that anything that interests us is not without interestto Christ. Anything that is big enough to occupy our thoughts and ourefforts is large enough to be taken into His. All our ignoble toils, and all our petty anxieties, touch a chord that vibrates in that deepand tender heart. Though other sympathy may be unable to come down tothe minutenesses of our little lives, and to wind itself into thenarrow room in which our histories are prisoned, Christ's sympathycan steal into the narrowest cranny. The risen Lord is interested inour poor fishing and our disappointments. 

And not only that, here is a promise for us, a prophecy for us, ofcertain guidance and direction, if only we will come to Him andacknowledge our dependence upon Him. The question that was put tothem, 'Lads, have ye any meat?' was meant to evoke the answer, 'No!'The consciousness of my failure is the pre-requisite to my appeal toHim to prosper my work. And just as before He would, on the othermargin of that same shore, multiply the loaves and the fishes, He putto them the question, 'How many have ye?' that they might knowclearly the inadequacy of their own resources for the hungry crowd, so here, in order to prepare their hearts for the reception of Hisguidance and His blessing, He provides that they be brought tocatalogue and confess their failures. So He does with us all, beatsthe self-confidence out of us, blessed be His name! and makes us knowourselves to be empty in order that He may pour Himself into us, andflood us with the joy of His presence. 

Then comes the guidance given. We may be sure that it is given to usall to-day, if we wait upon Him and ask Him. 'Cast the net on theright side of the ship, and ye shall find. ' His command is followedby swift, unanswering, unquestioning obedience, which in its turn isimmediately succeeded by the large blessing which the Master thengave on the instant, which He gives still, though often, in equallove and unquestioned wisdom, it comes long after faith has discernedHis presence and obedience has bowed to His command. 

It may be that we shall not see the results of our toil till themorning dawns and the great net is drawn to land by angel hands. Butwe may be sure that while we are toiling on the tossing sea, Hewatches from the shore, is interested in all our weary efforts, willguide us if we own to Him our weakness, and will give us to see atlast issues greater than we had dared to hope from our poor service. The dying martyr looked up and saw Him 'standing at the right hand ofGod, ' in the attitude of interested watchfulness and ready help. ThisEaster morning bids us lift our eyes to a risen Lord who 'has notleft us to serve alone, ' nor gone up on high, like some carelessgeneral to a safe height, while his forsaken soldiers have to standthe shock of onset without him. From this height He bends down and'covers our heads in the day of battle. ' 'He was received up, ' saysthe Evangelist, 'and sat on the right hand of God, and they wentforth and preached everywhere. ' Strange contrast between His thronedrest and their wandering toils for Him! But the contrast gives placeto a deeper identity of work and condition, as the Gospel goes on tosay, 'The Lord also _working with them_ and confirming the word withsigns following. '

Though we be on the tossing sea and He on the quiet shore, between usthere is a true union and communion, His heart is with us, if ourhearts be with Him, and from Him will pass over all strength, grace, and blessing to us, if only we know His presence, and owning ourweakness, obey His command and expect His blessing. 

II. Look at the other half of this incident before us. I pass overthe episode of the recognition of Jesus by John, and of Peterstruggling to His feet, interesting as it is, in order to fix uponthe central thought of the second part of the narrative, viz. Therisen Lord on the shore, in the increasing light of the morning, 'preparing a table' for His toiling servants. That 'fire of coals'and the simple refreshment that was being dressed upon it had beenprepared there by Christ's own hand. We are not told that there wasanything miraculous about it. He had gathered the charcoal; He hadprocured the fish; He had dressed it and prepared it. They are biddento 'bring of the fish they had caught'; He accepts their service, andadds the result of their toil, as it would seem, to the provisionwhich His own hand has prepared. He summons them to a meal, not themidday repast, for it was still early morning. They seat themselves, smitten by a great awe. The meal goes on in silence. No word isspoken on either side. Their hearts know Him. He waits on them, making Himself their Servant as well as their Host. He 'taketh breadand giveth them and fish likewise, ' as He had done in the miracles bythe same shore and on that sad night in the upper room that seemed sofar away now, and in the roadside inn at Emmaus, when something inHis manner or action disclosed Him to the wondering two at the table. 

Now what does all that teach us? Two things; and first--neglectingfor a moment the difference between shore and sea--here we have thefact of Christ's providing, even by doing menial offices, for Hisservants. 

These seven men were wet and weary, cold and hungry. The first thingthey wanted when they came out of the fishing-boat was theirbreakfast. If they had been at home, their wives and children wouldhave got it ready for them. Jesus had a great deal to say to themthat day, a great deal to teach them, much to do for them, and forthe whole world, by the words that followed; but the first thing thatHe thinks about is to feed them. And so, cherishing no overstrainedcontempt for material necessities and temporal mercies, let usremember that it is His hand that feeds us still, and let us be gladto think that this Christ, risen from the dead and with His heartfull of the large blessings that He was going to bestow, yet pausedto consider: 'They are coming on shore after a night's hard toil, they will be faint and weary; let Me feed their bodies before I beginto deal with their hearts and spirits. '

And He will take care of you, brother! and of us all. The 'bread willbe given' us, at any rate, and 'the water made sure. ' It was a modestmeal that He with His infinite resources thought enough for toilingfishermen. 'One fish, ' as the original shows us, 'one loaf of bread. 'No more! He could as easily have spread a sumptuous table for them. There is no covenant for superfluities, necessaries will be given. Let us bring down our wishes to His gifts and promises, and recognisethe fact that 'he who needs least is the nearest the gods, ' and hethat needs least is surest of getting from Christ what he needs. 

But then, besides that, the supply of all other deeper and loftiernecessities is here guaranteed. The symbolism of our text divides, necessarily, the two things which in fact are not divided. It is notall toiling on the restless sea here, any more than it is all restand fruition yonder; but all that your spirit needs, for wisdom, patience, heroism, righteousness, growth, Christ will give you _in_your work; and that is better than giving it to you after your work, and the very work which is blessed by Him, and furthered andprospered by Him, the very work itself will come to be moat andnourishment. 'Out of the eater will come forth meat, ' and the slain'lions' of past struggles and sorrows, the next time we come to them, will be 'full of honey. '

Finally, there is a great symbolical prophecy here if we emphasisethe distinction between the night and the morning, between the shoreand the sea. We can scarcely fail to catch this meaning in theincident which sets forth the old blessed assurance that the risenLord is preparing a feast on the shore while His servants are toilingon the darkling sea. 

All the details, such as the solid shore in contrast with thechangeful sea, the increasing morning in contrast with the toilsomenight, the feast prepared, have been from of old consecrated toshadow forth the differences between earth and heaven. It would beblindness not to see here a prophecy of the glad hour when Christshall welcome to their stable home, amid the brightness of unsettingday, the souls that have served Him amidst the fluctuations andstorms of life, and seen Him in its darkness, and shall satisfy alltheir desires with the 'bread of heaven. '

Our poor work which He deigns to accept forms part of the feast whichis spread at the end of our toil, when 'there shall be no more sea. 'He adds the results of our toil to the feast which He has prepared. The consequences of what we have done here on earth make no smallpart of the blessedness of heaven. 

 'Their works and alms and all their good endeavour Stayed not behind, nor in the grave were trod. '

The souls which a Paul or a John has won for the Master, in theirvocation as 'fishers of men, ' are their 'hope and joy and crown ofrejoicing, in the presence of our Lord Jesus. ' The great benedictionwhich the Spirit bade the Apocalyptic seer write over 'the dead whichdie in the Lord, ' is anticipated in both its parts by this mysteriousmeal on the beach. 'They rest from their labours' inasmuch as theyfind the food prepared for them, and sit down to partake; 'Theirworks do follow them' inasmuch as they 'bring of the fish which theyhave caught. '

Finally, Christ Himself waits on them, therein fulfilling in symbolwhat He has told us in great words that dimly shadow wondersunintelligible until experienced: 'Verily I say unto you, He shallgird Himself, and make them to sit down to meat, and will come forth, and serve them. '

So here is a vision to cheer us all. Life must be full of toil and offailure. We are on the midnight sea, and have to tug, weary and wet, at a heavy oar, and to haul an often empty net. But we do not labouralone. He comes to us across the storm, and is with us in the night, a most real, because unseen Presence. If we accept the guidance ofHis directing word, His indwelling Spirit, and His all-sufficientexample, and seek to ascertain His will in outward Providences, weshall not be left to waste our strength in blunders, nor shall ourlabour be in vain. In the morning light we shall see Him standingserene on the steadfast shore. The 'Pilot of the Galilean lake' willguide our frail boat through the wild surf that marks the breaking ofthe sea of life on the shore of eternity; and when the sun rises overthe Eastern hills we shall land on the solid beach, bringing our 'fewsmall fishes' with us, which He will accept. And there we shall rest, nor need to ask who He is that serves us, for we shall know that 'Itis the Lord!'

'IT IS THE LORD!'

'Therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved saith unto Peter, It isthe Lord. --JOHN xxi. 7. 

It seems a very strange thing that these disciples had not, at anearlier period of this incident, discovered the presence of Christ, inasmuch as the whole was so manifestly a repetition of that formerevent by which the commencement of their ministry had beensignalised, when He called them to become 'fishers of men. ' We areapt to suppose that when once again they embarked on the lake, andwent back to their old trade, it must have been with many a thoughtof Him busy at their hearts. Yonder--perhaps we fancy them thinking--is the very point where we saw Him coming out of the shadows of themountains, that night when He walked on the water; yonder is thelittle patch of grass where He made them all sit down whilst we borethe bread to them: there is the very spot where we were mending ournets when He came up to us and called us to Himself; and now it isall over. We have loved and lost Him; He has been with us, and hasleft us. 'We trusted that it had been He who should have redeemedIsrael, ' and the Cross has ended it all! So, we are apt to think, they must have spoken; but there does not seem to have been aboutthem any such sentimental remembrance. John takes pains in thisnarrative, I think, to show them to us as plain, rough men, busyabout their night's work, and thinking a great deal more of theirwant of success in fishing, than about the old associations which weare apt to put into their minds. Then through the darkness He comes, as they had seen Him come once before, when they know Him not; and Hespeaks to them as He had spoken before, and they do not detect Hisvoice yet; and He repeats the old miracle, and their eyes are allholden, excepting the eyes of him who loved, and _he_ first says, 'Itis the Lord!' Now, besides all the other features of this incident bywhich it becomes the revelation of the Lord's presence with HisChurch, and the exhibition of the work of the Church during all thecourse of the world's history, it contains valuable lessons on otherpoints, such as these which I shall try to bring before you. 

Now and always, as in that morning twilight on the Galilean lake, Christ comes to men. Everywhere He is present, everywhere revealingHimself. Now, as then, our eyes are 'holden' by our own fault, sothat we recognise not the merciful Presence which is all around us. Now, as then, it is they who are nearest to Christ by love who seeHim first. Now, as then, they who are nearest to Him by love, are sobecause He loves them, and because they know and believe the lovewhich He has to them. I find, then, in this part of the story threethoughts, --First, they only see aright who see Christ in everything. Secondly, they only see Christ who love Him. Lastly, they only loveHim who know that He loves them, I. First then, they only see aright who see Christ in everything. 

This word of John's, 'It is the Lord!'--ought to be the convictionwith the light of which we go out to the examination of all events, and to the consideration of all the circumstances of our daily life. We believe that unto Christ is given 'all power in heaven and uponearth. ' We believe that to Him belongs creative power--that 'withoutHim was not anything made which was made. ' We believe that from Himcame all life at first. In Him life was, as in its deep source. He isthe Fountain of life. We believe that as no being comes intoexistence without His creative power, so none continues to existwithout His sustaining energy. We believe that He allots to all mentheir natural characters and their circumstances. We believe that thehistory of the world is but the history of His influence, and thatthe centre of the whole universe is the cross of Calvary. In thelight of such convictions, I take it, every man that calls himself aChristian ought to go out to meet life and to study all events. Letme try, then, to put before you, very briefly, one or two of theprovinces in which we are to take this conviction as the keynote toall our knowledge. 

No man will understand the world aright, to begin with, who cannotsay about all creation, 'It is the Lord!' Nature is but the veil ofthe invisible and ascended Lord: and if we would pierce to thedeepest foundations of all being, we cannot stop until we get down tothe living power of Christ our Saviour and the Creator of the world, by whom all things were made, and whose will pouring out into thisgreat universe, is the sustaining principle and the true force whichkeeps it from nothingness and from quick decay. 

Why, what did Christ work all His miracles upon earth for? Not solelyto give us a testimony that the Father had sent Him; not solely tomake us listen to His words as a Teacher sent from God; not solely asproof of His Messiahship, --but besides all these purposes there wassurely this other, that for once He would unveil to us the trueAuthor of all things, and the true Foundation of all being. Christ'smiracles interrupted the order of the world, because they madevisible to men for once the true and constant Orderer of the order. They interrupted the order in so far as they struck out theintervening links by which the creative and sustaining word of Godacts in nature, and suspended each event directly from the firmstaple of His will. They revealed the eternal Orderer of that orderin that they showed the Incarnate Word wielding the forces of nature, which He has done from of old and still does. We are then to take allthese signs and wonders that He wrought, as a perennial revelation ofthe real state of things with regard to this natural world, and tosee in them all, signs and tokens that into every corner and far-offregion of the universe His loving hand reaches, and His sustainingpower goes forth. Into what province of nature did He not go? Heclaimed to be the Lord of life by the side of the boy's bier at thegate of Nain, in the chamber of the daughter of Jairus, by the graveof Lazarus. He asserted for Himself authority over all the powers andfunctions of our bodily life, when He gave eyes to the blind, hearingto the deaf, feet to the lame. He showed that He was Lord over thefowl of the air, the beasts of the earth, the fish of the sea. And Heasserted His dominion over inanimate nature, when the fig-tree, cursed by Him, withered away to its roots, and the winds and wavessunk into silence at His gentle voice. He let us get a glimpse intothe dark regions of His rule over the unseen, when 'with authority Hecommanded the unclean spirits, and they came out. ' And all thesethings He did, in order that we, walking in this fair world, encompassed by the glories of this wonderful universe, should bedelivered from the temptation of thinking that it is separated fromHim, or independent of His creative and sustaining power; and inorder that we should feel that the continuance of all which surroundsus, the glories of heaven and the loveliness of earth, are as trulyowing to the constant intervention of His present will, and theinterposition beneath them of His sustaining hand, as when first, bythe 'Word of God' who 'was with God and who was God, ' speaking forthHis fiat, there came light and beauty out of darkness and chaos. 

O Christian men! we shall never understand the Christian thoughtabout God's universe, until we are able to say, Preservation is acontinual creation; and beneath all the ordinary workings of Nature, as we faithlessly call it, and the apparently dead play of secondarycauses, there are welling forth, and energising, the living love andthe blessed power of Christ, the Maker, and Monarch, and Sustainer ofall. 'It is the Lord!' is the highest teaching of all science. Themystery of the universe, and the meaning of God's world, are shroudedin hopeless obscurity, until we learn to feel that all laws suppose aLawgiver, and that all working involves a divine energy; and thatbeneath all which appears there lies for ever rising up through itand giving it its life and power, the one true living Being, theFather in heaven, the Son by whom He works, and the Holy Ghost theSpirit. Darkness lies on Nature, except to those who in

 'the light of setting suns, And the round ocean, and the living air, And the blue sky, '

see that Form which these disciples saw in the morning twilight. Let'It is the Lord!' be the word on our lips as we gaze on them all, andnature will then be indeed to us the open secret, the secret of theLord which 'He will show to them that fear Him. '

Then again, the same conviction is the only one that is adequateeither to explain or to make tolerable the circumstances of ourearthly condition. To most men--ah! to all of us in our faithlesstimes--the events that befall ourselves, seem to be one of two thingsequally horrible, the play of a blind Chance, or the work of an ironFate. I know not which of these two ghastly thoughts about thecircumstances of life is the more depressing, ruining all our energy, depriving us of all our joy, and dragging us down with its weight. But brethren, and friends, there are but these three ways for it--either our life is the subject of a mere chaotic chance; or else itis put into the mill of an iron destiny, which goes grinding on andcrushing with its remorseless wheels, regardless of what it grindsup; or else, through it all, in it all, beneath it and above it all, there is the Will which is Love, and the Love which is Christ! Whichof these thoughts is the one that commends itself to your own heartsand consciences, and which is the one under which you would fain liveif you could? I understand not how a man can front the awfulpossibilities of a future on earth, knowing all the points at whichhe is vulnerable, and all the ways by which disaster may come downupon him, and retain his sanity, unless he believes that all isruled, not merely by a God far above him, who may be asunsympathising as He is omnipotent, but by his Elder Brother, the Sonof God, who showed His heart by all His dealings with us here below, and who loves as tenderly, and sympathises as closely with us as everHe did when on earth He gathered the weary and the sick around Him. Is it not a thing, men and women, worth having, to have this for thesettled conviction of your hearts, that Christ is moving all thepulses of your life, and that nothing falls out without theintervention of His presence and the power of His will workingthrough it? Do you not think such a belief would nerve you fordifficulty, would lift you buoyantly over trials and depressions, andwould set you upon a vantage ground high above all the pettyannoyances of life? Tell me, is there any other place where a man canplant his foot and say, 'Now I am on a rock and I care not whatcomes'? The riddle of Providence is solved, and the discipline ofProvidence is being accomplished when we have grasped thisconviction--All events do serve me, for all circumstances come fromHis will and pleasure, which is love; and everywhere I go--be it inthe darkness of disaster or in the sunshine of prosperity--I shallsee standing before me that familiar and beloved Shape, and shall beable to say, 'It is the Lord!' Friends and brethren, that is thefaith to live by, that is the faith to die by; and without it life isa mockery and a misery. 

Once more this same conviction, 'It is the Lord! should guide us inall our thoughts about the history and destinies of mankind and ofChrist's Church. The Cross is the centre of the world's history, theincarnation and the crucifixion of our Lord are the pivot round whichall the events of the ages revolve. 'The testimony of Jesus was thespirit of prophecy, ' and the growing power of Jesus is the spirit ofhistory, and in every book that calls itself the history of a nation, unless there be written, whether literally or in spirit, this for itsmotto, 'It is the Lord!' all will be shallow and incomplete. 

'They that went before and they that came after, ' when He enteredinto the holy city in His brief moment of acceptance and pomp, surrounded Him with hosannas and jubilant gladness. It is a deep andtrue symbol of the whole history of the world. All the generationsthat went before Him, though they knew it not, were preparing the wayof the Lord, and heralding the advent of Him who was 'the desire ofall nations' and 'the light of men'; and all the generations thatcome after, though they know it not, are swelling the pomp of Histriumph and hastening the time of His crowning and dominion. 'It isthe Lord!' is the secret of all national existence. It is the secretof all the events of the world. The tangled web of human history isonly then intelligible when that is taken as its clue, 'From Him areall things, and to Him are all things. ' The ocean from which thestream of history flows, and that into which it empties itself, areone. He began it, He sustains it. 'The help that is done upon earthHe doeth it Himself, ' and when all is finished, it will be found thatall things have indeed come from Christ, been sustained and directedby Christ, and have tended to the glory and exaltation of thatRedeemer, who is King of kings and Lord of lords, Maker of theworlds, and before whose throne are for ever gathered for service, whether they know it or not, the forces of the Gentiles, the richesof the nations, the events of history, the fates and destinies ofevery man. 

I need not dwell upon the way in which such a conviction as this, myfriends, living and working in our hearts, would change for us thewhole aspect of life, and make everything bright and beautiful, blessed and calm, strengthening us for all which we might have to do, nerving us for duty, and sustaining us against every trial, leadingus on, triumphant and glad, through regions all sparkling with tokensof His presence and signs of His love, unto His throne at last, tolay down our praises and our crowns before Him. Only let me leavewith you this one word of earnest entreaty, that you will lay toheart the solemn alternative--either see Christ in everything, and beblessed; or miss Him, and be miserable. Oh! it is a waste, wearyworld, unless it is filled with signs of His presence. It is a drearyseventy years, brother, of pilgrimage and strife, unless, as youtravel along the road, you see the marks that He who went before youhas left by the wayside for your guidance and your sustenance. If youwant your days to be true, noble, holy, happy, manly, and Godlike, believe us, it is only when they all have flowing through them thisconviction, 'It is the Lord!' that they all become so. 

II. Then, secondly, only they who love, see Christ. 

John, the Apostle of Love, knew Him first. In religious matters, loveis the foundation of knowledge. There is no way of knowing a Personexcept love. The knowledge of God and the knowledge of Christ are notto be won by the exercise of the understanding. A man cannot arguehis way into knowing Christ. No skill in drawing inferences willavail him there. The treasures of wisdom--earthly wisdom--are allpowerless in that region. Man's understanding and natural capacity--let it keep itself within its own limits and region, and it is strongand good; but in the region of acquaintance with God and Christ, thewisdom of this world is foolishness, and man's understanding is notthe organ by which he can know Christ. Oh no! there is a better waythan that: 'He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love. ' Asit is, in feebler measure, with regard to our personal acquaintancewith one another, where it is not so much the power of theunderstanding, or the quickness of the perception, or the talent andgenius of a man, that make the foundation of his knowledge of hisfriend, as the force of his sympathy and the depth of his affection;so--with the necessary modification arising from the transferencefrom earthly acquaintances to the great Friend and Lover of our soulsin heaven--so is it with regard to our knowledge of Christ. Love willtrace Him everywhere, as dear friends can detect each other in littlemarks which are meaningless to others. Love's quick eye piercesthrough disguises impenetrable to a colder scrutiny. Love has in it alonging for His presence which makes us eager and quick to mark thelightest sign that He for whom it longs is near, as the footstep ofsome dear one is heard by the sharp ear of affection long before anysound breaks the silence to those around. Love leads to likeness tothe Lord, and that likeness makes the clearer vision of the Lordpossible. Love to Him strips from our eyes the film that self andsin, sense and custom, have drawn over them. It is these which hideHim from us. It is because men are so indifferent to, so forgetfulof, their best Friend that they fail to behold Him, 'It is the Lord!'is written large and plain on all things, but like the great letterson a map, they are so obvious and fill so wide a space, that they arenot seen. They who love Him know Him, and they who know Him love Him. The true eye-salve for our blinded eyes is applied when we haveturned with our hearts to Christ. The simple might of faithful loveopens them to behold a more glorious vision than the mountain 'fullof chariots of fire, ' which once flamed before the prophet's servantof old--even the august and ever-present form of the Lord of life, the Lord of history, the Lord of providence. When they who love Jesusturn to see 'the Voice that speaks with them, ' they ever behold theSon of Man in His glory; and where others see but the dim beach and amysterious stranger, it is to their lips that the glad cry firstcomes, 'It is the Lord!'

And is it not a blessed thing, brethren! that thus this high andglorious prerogative of recognising the marks of Christ's presenceeverywhere, of going through life gladdened by the assurance of Hisnearness, does not depend on what belongs to few men only, but onwhat may belong to all? When we say that 'not many wise men after theflesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called'--when we say thatlove is the means of knowledge--we are but in other words saying thatthe way is open to all, and that no characteristics belonging toclasses, no powers that must obviously always belong to but ahandful, are necessary for the full apprehension of the power andblessedness of Christ's Gospel. The freeness and the fullness of thatdivine message, the glorious truth that it is for all men, and isoffered to all, are couched in that grand principle, Love that thoumayest know; love, and thou art filled with the fullness of God, Notfor the handful, not for the _elite_ of the world; not for the few, but for the many; not for the wise, but for all; not for classes, butfor humanity--for all that are weak, and sinful, and needy, andfoolish, and darkened He comes, who only needs that the heart thatlooks should love, and then it shall behold!

But if that were the whole that I have to say, I should have said butlittle to the purpose. It very little avails to tell men to love. Wecannot love to order, or because we think it duty. There is but oneway of loving, and that is to see the lovely. The disciple who lovedJesus was 'the disciple whom Jesus loved. ' Generalise that, and itteaches us this, that

III. They love who know that Christ loves them. His divine andeternal mercy is the foundation of the whole. Our love, brethren, cannever be any thing else than our echo to His voice of tenderness thanthe reflected light upon our hearts of the full glory of Hisaffection. No man loveth God except the man who has first learnedthat God loves him. 'We love Him, because He first loved us. ' Andwhen we say, 'Love Christ, ' if we could not go on to say, 'Nay, rather let Christ's love come down upon you'--we had said worse thannothing. The fountain that rises in my heart can only spring upheavenward, because the water of it has flowed down into my heartfrom the higher level. All love must descend first, before it canascend. We have, then, no Gospel to preach, if we have only this topreach, 'Love, and thou art saved. ' But we have a Gospel that isworth the preaching, when we can come to men who have no love intheir hearts, and say, 'Brethren! listen to this--you have to bringnothing, you are called upon to originate no affection; you havenothing to do but simply to receive the everlasting love of God inChrist His Son, which was without us, which began before us, whichflows forth independent of us, which is unchecked by all our sins, which triumphs over all our transgressions, and which will make us--loveless, selfish, hardened, sinful men--soft, and tender, and fullof divine affection, by the communication of its own self. 

Oh, then, look to Christ, that you may love Him! Think, brethren, ofthat full, and free, and boundless mercy which, from eternity, hasbeen pouring itself out in floods of grace and loving-kindness overall creatures. Think of that everlasting love which presided at thefoundation of the earth, and has sustained it ever since. Think ofthat Saviour who has died for us, and lives for us. Think of Christ, the heart of God, and the fullness of the Father's mercy; and do notthink of yourselves at all. Do not ask yourselves, to begin with, thequestion, Do I love Him or do I not? You will never love by thatmeans. If a man is cold, let him go to the fire and warm himself. Ifhe is dark, let him stand in the sunshine, and he will be light. Ifhis heart is all clogged and clotted with sin and selfishness, lethim get under the influence of the love of Christ, and look away fromhimself and his own feelings, towards that Saviour whose love shedabroad is the sole means of kindling ours. You have to go down deeperthan _your_ feelings, _your_ affections, _your_ desires, _your_character. There you will find no resting-place, no consolation, nopower. Dig down to the living Rock, Christ and His infinite love toyou, and let _it_ be the strong foundation, built into which you andyour love may become living stones, a holy temple, partaking of thefirmness and nature of that on which it rests. They that love do sobecause they know that Christ loves them; and they that love see Himeverywhere; and they that see Him everywhere are blessed forevermore. And let no man here torture himself, or limit the fullnessof this message that we preach, by questionings whether Christ lovesHim or not. Are you a man? are you sinful? have you broken God's law?do you need a Saviour? Then put away all these questions, and believethat Christ's personal love is streaming out for the whole world, andthat there is a share for you if you like to take it and be blessed!

There is one last thought arising from the whole subject before us, that may be worth mention before I close. Did you ever notice howthis whole incident might be turned, by a symbolical application, tothe hour of death, and the vision which may meet us when we comethither? It admits of the application, and perhaps was intended toreceive the application, of such a symbolic reference. The morning isdawning, the grey of night going away, the lake is still; and yonder, standing on the shore, in the uncertain light, there is one dimFigure, and one disciple catches a sight of Him, and another castshimself into the water, and they find 'a fire of coals, and fish laidthereon, and bread, ' and Christ gathers them around His table, andthey all know that 'It is the Lord!' It is what the death of theChristian man, who has gone through life recognising Christeverywhere, may well become:--the morning breaking, and the finishedwork, and the Figure standing on the quiet beach, so that the lastplunge into the cold flood that yet separates us, will not be takenwith trembling reluctance; but, drawn to Him by the love beaming outof His face, and upheld by the power of His beckoning presence, weshall struggle through the latest wave that parts us, and scarcelyfeel its chill, nor know that we _have_ crossed it; till fallingblessed at His feet, we see, by the nearer and clearer vision of Hisface, that this is indeed heaven. And looking back upon 'the sea thatbrought us thither, ' we shall behold its waters flashing in the lightof that everlasting morning, and hear them breaking in music upon theeternal shore. And then, brethren, when all the weary night-watcherson the stormy ocean of life are gathered together around Him whowatched with them from His throne on the bordering mountains ofeternity, where the day shines for ever--then He will seat them atHis table in His kingdom, and none will need to ask, 'Who art Thou?'or 'Where am I?' for all shall know that 'It is the Lord!' and thefull, perfect, unchangeable vision of His blessed face will beheaven!

'LOVEST THOU ME?'

'Jesus saith to Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou Memore than these? He saith unto Him, Yea, Lord; Thou knowest thatI love Thee. He saith unto him, Feed My lambs. '--JOHN xxi. 15. 

Peter had already seen the risen Lord. There had been that interviewon Easter morning, on which the seal of sacred secrecy was impressed;when, alone, the denier poured out his heart to his Lord, and wastaken to the heart that he had wounded. Then there had been twointerviews on the two successive Sundays in which the Apostle, incommon with his brethren, had received, as one of the group, theLord's benediction, the Lord's gift of the Spirit, and the Lord'scommission. But something more was needed; there had been publicdenial, there must be public confession. If he had slipped again intothe circle of the disciples, with no special treatment or referenceto his fall, it might have seemed a trivial fault to others, and evento himself. And so, after that strange meal on the beach, we havethis exquisitely beautiful and deeply instructive incident of thespecial treatment needed by the denier before he could be publiclyreinstated in his office. 

The meal seems to have passed in silence. That awe which hung overthe disciples in all their intercourse with Jesus during the fortydays, lay heavy on them, and they sat there, huddled round the fire, eating silently the meal which Christ had provided, and no doubtgazing silently at the silent Lord. What a tension of expectationthere must have been as to how the oppressive silence was to bebroken! and how Peter's heart must have throbbed, and the others'ears been pricked up, when it was broken by 'Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou Me?' We may listen with pricked-up ears too. For we havehere, in Christ's treatment of the Apostle, a revelation of how Hebehaves to a soul conscious of its fault; and in Peter's demeanour anillustration of how a soul, conscious of its fault, should behave toHim. 

There are three stages here: the threefold question, the threefoldanswer, and the threefold charge. Let us look at these. 

I. The threefold question. 

The reiteration in the interrogation did not express doubt as to theveracity of the answer, nor dissatisfaction with its terms; but itdid express, and was meant, I suppose, to suggest to Peter and to theothers, that the threefold denial needed to be obliterated by thethreefold confession; and that every black mark that had been scoreddeep on the page by that denial needed to be covered over with thegilding or bright colouring of the triple acknowledgment. And soPeter thrice having said, 'I know Him not!' Jesus with a graciousviolence forced him to say thrice, 'Thou knowest that I love Thee. 'The same intention to compel Peter to go back upon his past comes outin two things besides the triple form of the question. The one is thedesignation by which he is addressed, 'Simon, son of Jonas, ' whichtravels back, as it were, to the time before he was a disciple, andpoints a finger to his weak humanity before it had come under theinfluence of Jesus Christ. 'Simon, son of Jonas, ' was the name thathe bore in the days before his discipleship. It was the name by whichJesus had addressed him, therefore, on that never-to-be-forgottenturning-point of his life, when he was first brought to Him by hisbrother Andrew. It was the name by which Jesus had addressed him atthe very climax of his past life when, high up, he had been able tosee far, and in answer to the Lord's question, had rung out theconfession: 'Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God!' So thename by which Jesus addresses him now says to him in effect:'Remember thy human weakness; remember how thou wert drawn to Me;remember the high-water mark of thy discipleship, when I was plainbefore thee as the Son of God, and remembering all these, answer Me--lovest thou Me?'

The same intention to drive Peter back to the wholesome remembranceof a stained past is obvious in the first form of the question. OurLord mercifully does not persist in giving to it that form in thesecond and third instances: 'Lovest thou Me more than these?' Morethan these, what? I cannot for a moment believe that that questionmeans something so trivial and irrelevant as 'Lovest thou Me morethan these nets, and boats, and the fishing?' No; in accordance withthe purpose that runs through the whole, of compelling Peter toretrospect, it says to him, 'Do you remember what you said a dozenhours before you denied Me, "Though all should forsake Thee, yet willnot I"? Are you going to take that stand again? Lovest thou Me morethan these that never discredited their boasting so shamefully?'

So, dear brethren! here we have Jesus Christ, in His treatment ofthis penitent and half-restored soul, forcing a man, with mercifulcompulsion, to look steadfastly and long at his past sin, and toretrace step by step, shameful stage by shameful stage, the road bywhich he had departed so far. Every foul place he is to stop and lookat, and think about. Each detail he has to bring up before his mind. Was it not cruel of Jesus thus to take Peter by the neck, as it were, and hold him right down, close to the foul things that he had done, and say to him, 'Look! look! look ever! and answer, Lovest thou Me?'No; it was not cruel; it was true kindness. Peter had never been soabundantly and permanently penetrated by the sense of the sinfulnessof his sin, as after he was sure, as he had been made sure in thatgreat interview, that it was all forgiven. So long as a man isdisturbed by the dread of consequences, so long as he is doubtful asto his relation to the forgiving Love, he is not in a positionbeneficially and sanely to consider his evil in its moral qualityonly. But when the conviction comes to a man, 'God is pacifiedtowards thee for all that thou hast done'; and when he can look athis own evil without the smallest disturbance rising from slavishfear of issues, then lie is in a position rightly to estimate itsdarkness and its depth. And there can be no better discipline for usall than to remember our faults, and penitently to travel back overthe road of our sins, just because we are sure that God in Christ hasforgotten them. The beginning of Christ's merciful treatment of theforgiven man is to compel him to remember, that he may learn and beashamed. 

And then there is another point here, in this triple question. Howsignificant and beautiful it is that the only thing that Jesus Christcares to ask about is the sinner's love! We might have expected:'Simon, son of Jonas, are you sorry for what you did? Simon, son ofJonas, will you promise never to do the like any more?' No! Thesethings will come if the other thing is there. 'Lovest thou Me?' JesusChrist sues each of us, not for obedience primarily, not forrepentance, not for vows, not for conduct, but for a heart; and thatbeing given, all the rest will follow. That is the distinguishingcharacteristic of Christian morality, that Jesus seeks first for thesurrender of the affections, and believes, and is warranted in thebelief, that if these are surrendered, all else will follow; and lovebeing given, loyalty and service and repentance and hatred of self-will and of self-seeking will follow in her train. All the graces ofhuman character which Christ seeks, and is ready to impart, are, asit were, but the pages and ministers of the regal Love, who followbehind and swell the _cortege_ of her servants. 

Christ asks for love. Surely that indicates the depth of His own! Inthis commerce He is satisfied with nothing less, and can ask fornothing more; and He seeks for love because He is love, and has givenlove. Oh! to all hearts burdened, as all our hearts ought to be--unless the burden has been cast off in one way--by the consciousnessof our own weakness and imperfection, surely, surely, it is a gospelthat is contained in that one question addressed to a man who hadgone far astray, 'Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou?'

Here, again, we have Jesus Christ, in His dealing with the penitent, willing to trust discredited professions. We think that one of thesigns of our being wise people is that experience shall have taughtus 'once' being 'bit, twice' to be 'shy, ' and if a man has oncedeceived us by flaming professions and ice-cold acts, never to trusthim any more. And we think that is 'worldly wisdom, ' and 'the bitterfruit of earthly experience, ' and 'sharpness, ' and 'shrewdness, ' andso forth. Jesus Christ, even whilst reminding Peter, by that 'morethan these, ' of his utterly hollow and unreliable boasting, showsHimself ready to accept once again the words of one whose unveracityHe had proved. 'Charity hopeth all things, believeth all things, ' andJesus Christ is ready to trust us when we say, 'I love Thee, ' eventhough often in the past our professed love has been all disproved. 

We have here, in this question, our Lord revealing Himself as willingto accept the imperfect love which a disciple can offer Him. Ofcourse, many of you well know that there is a very remarkable play ofexpression here. In the two first questions the word which our Lordemploys for 'love' is not the same as that which appears in Peter'stwo first answers. Christ asks for one kind of love; Peter proffersanother. I do not enter upon discussion as to the distinction betweenthese two apparent synonyms. The kind of love which Christ asks foris higher, nobler, less emotional, and more associated with the wholemind and will. It is the inferior kind, the more warm, more sensuous, more passionate and emotional, which Peter brings. And then, in thethird question, our Lord, as it were, surrenders and takes Peter'sown word, as if He had said, 'Be it so! You shrink from professingthe higher kind; I will take the lower; and I will educate and bringthat up to the height that I desire you to stand at. ' Ah, brother!however stained and imperfect, however disproved by denials, howevertainted by earthly associations, Jesus Christ will accept the poorstream of love, though it be but a trickle when it ought to be atorrent, which we can bring Him. 

These are the lessons which it seems to me lie in this triplequestion. I have dealt with them at the greater length, because thosewhich follow are largely dependent upon them. But let me turn nowbriefly, in the second place, to--

II. The triple answer. 

'Yea, Lord! Thou knowest that I love Thee. ' Is not that beautiful, that the man who by Christ's Resurrection, as the last of the answersshows, had been led to the loftiest conception of Christ'somniscience, and regarded Him as knowing the hearts of all men, should, in the face of all that Jesus Christ knew about his denialand his sin, have dared to appeal to Christ's own knowledge? What asuperb and all-conquering confidence in Christ's depth of knowledgeand forgivingness of knowledge that answer showed! He felt that Jesuscould look beneath the surface of his sin, and see that below itthere was, even in the midst of the denial, a heart that in itsdepths was true. It is a tremendous piece of confident appeal to thedeeper knowledge, and therefore the larger love and more abundantforgiveness, of the righteous Lord--'Thou knowest that I love Thee. '

Brethren! a Christian man ought to be sure of his love to JesusChrist. You do not study your conduct in order to infer from it yourlove to others. You do not study your conduct in order to infer fromit your love to your wife, or your husband, or your parents, or yourchildren, or your friend. Love is not a matter of inference; it is amatter of consciousness and intuition. And whilst self-examination isneedful for us all for many reasons, a Christian man ought to be assure that he loves Jesus Christ as he is sure that he loves hisdearest upon earth. 

It used to be the fashion long ago--this generation has not depthenough to keep up the fashion--for Christian people to talk as if itwere a point they longed to know, whether they loved Jesus Christ ornot. There is no reason why it should be a point we long to know. Youknow all about your love to one another, and you are sure about that. Why are you not sure about your love to Jesus Christ? 'Oh! but, ' yousay, 'look at my sins and failures'; and if Peter had looked only athis sins, do you not think that his words would have stuck in histhroat? He did look, but he looked in a very different way from thatof trying to ascertain from his conduct whether he loved Jesus Christor not. Brethren, any sin is inconsistent with Christian love toChrist. Thank God, we have no right to say of any sin that it isincompatible with that love! More than that; a great, gross, flagrant, sudden fall like Peter's is a great deal less inconsistentwith love to Christ than are the continuously unworthy, worldly, selfish, Christ-forgetting lives of hosts of complacent professingChristians to-day. White ants will eat up the carcase of a deadbuffalo quicker than a lion will. And to have denied Christ once, twice, thrice, in the space of an hour, and under strong temptation, is not half so bad as to call Him 'Master' and 'Lord, ' and day byday, week in, week out, in works to deny Him. The triple answerdeclares to us that in spite of a man's sins he ought to be consciousof his love, and be ready to profess it when need is. 

III. Lastly, we have here the triple commission. 

I do not dwell upon it at any length, because in its original form itapplies especially to the Apostolic office. But the generalprinciples which underlie this threefold charge, to feed and to tendboth 'the sheep' and 'the lambs, ' may be put in a form that appliesto each of us, and it is this--the best token of a Christian's loveto Jesus Christ is his service of man for Christ's sake. 'Lovest thouMe?' 'Yea! Lord. ' Thou hast _said_; go and _do_, 'Feed My lambs; feedMy sheep. ' We need the profession of words; we need, as Peter himselfenjoined at a subsequent time, to be ready to 'give to every man thatasketh us a reason of the hope, ' and an acknowledgment of the love, that are in us. But if you want men to believe in your love, howeverJesus Christ may know it, go and work in the Master's vineyard. Theservice of man is the garb of the love of God. 'He that loveth Godwill love his brother also. ' Do not confine that thought of service, and feeding, and tending, to what we call evangelistic and religiouswork. That is one of its forms, but it is only one of them. Everything in which Christian men can serve their fellows is to betaken by them as their worship of their Lord, and is taken by theworld as the convincing proof of the reality of their love. 

Love to Jesus Christ is the qualification for all such service. If weare knit to Him by true affection, which is based upon ourconsciousness of our own falls and evils, and our reception of Hisforgiving mercy, then we shall have the qualities that fit us, andthe impulse that drives us, to serve and help our fellows. I do notsay--God forbid!--that there is no philanthropy apart from Christianfaith, but I do say that, on the wide scale, and in the long run, they who are knit to Jesus Christ by love will be those who renderthe greatest help to all that are 'afflicted in mind, body, orestate'; and that the true basis and qualification for efficientservice of our fellows is the utter surrender of our hearts to Himwho is the Fountain of love, and from whom comes all our power tolive in the world, as the images and embodiments of the love whichhas saved us that we might help to save others. 

Brethren! let us all ask ourselves Christ's question to the denier. Let us look our past evils full in the face, that we may learn tohate them, and that we may learn more the width and the sweep of thepower of His pardoning mercy. God grant that we may all be able tosay, 'Thou knowest all things; Thou knowest that I love Thee!'

YOUTH AND AGE, AND THE COMMAND FOR BOTH

_Annual Sermon to the Young_

'. .. When thou wast young, thou girdedst thyself, and walkedstwhither thou wouldest: but when thou shalt be old, thou shaltstretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carrythee whither thou wouldest not. .. . And when He had spoken this, He saith unto him, Follow Me. '--JOHN xxi. 18, 19. 

The immediate reference of these words is, of course, to themartyrdom of the Apostle Peter. Our Lord contrasts the vigorous andsomewhat self-willed youth and the mellowed old age of His servant, and shadows forth his death, in bonds, by violence. And then He bidshim, notwithstanding this prospect of the issue of his faithfulness, 'Follow Me. '

Now I venture, though with some hesitation, to give these words aslightly different application. I see in them two pictures of youthand of old age, and a commandment based upon both. You young peopleare often exhorted to a Christian life on the ground of the possibleapproach of death. I would not undervalue that motive, but I seek nowto urge the same thing upon you from a directly oppositeconsideration, the probability that many of you will live to be old. All the chief reasons for our being Christians are of the same force, whether we are to die to-night, or to live for a century. So in mytext I wish you to note what you are now; what, if you live, you aresure to become; and what, in the view of both stages, you will bewise to do. 'When thou wast young thou girdedst thyself, and wentestwhither thou wouldest. When thou shalt be old another shall girdthee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest not. ' Therefore, 'FollowMe. '

I. So, then, note the picture here of what you are. 

Most of you young people are but little accustomed to reflect uponyourselves, or upon the special characteristics and prerogatives ofyour time of life. But it will do you no harm to think for a minuteor two of what these characteristics are, that you may know yourblessings, and that you may shun the dangers which attach to them. 

'When thou wast young thou girdedst thyself. ' _There_ is a pictureeasily translated, and significant of much. The act of girdingimplies preparation for action, and may be widened out to expressthat most blessed prerogative of youth, the cherishing of brightimaginations of its future activity and course. The dreams of youthare often laughed at, but if a young man or woman be faithful to themthey are the prophecies of the future, and are given in order that atthe opening of the flower nature may put forth her power; and so wemay be able to live through many a dreary hour in the future. Only, seeing that you do live so much in rich foreshadowings and fairanticipations of the times that are to come, take care that you donot waste that divine faculty, the freshness of which is granted toyou as a morning gift, the 'dew of your youth. ' See that you do notwaste it in anticipations which cling like mist to the low levels oflife, but that you lift it higher and embrace worthy objects. It isgood that you should anticipate, that you should live by hope. It isgood that you should be drawn onwards by bright visions, whether theybe ever fulfilled or no. But there are dangers in the exercise, anddreaming with some of you takes the place of realising your dreams, and you build for yourselves fair fabrics in imagination which younever take one step to accomplish and make real. Be not the slavesand fools of your imaginations, but cultivate the faculty of hopinglargely; for the possibilities of human life are elastic, and no manor woman, in their most sanguine, early anticipations, if only thesebe directed to the one real good, has ever exhausted or attained thepossibilities open to every soul. 

Again, girding _one's self_ implies independent self-reliance, andthat is a gift and a stewardship given (as all gifts arestewardships) to the young. We all fancy, in our early days, that weare going to build 'towers that will reach to heaven. ' Now _we_ havecome, and we will show people how to do it! The past generations havefailed, but ours is full of brighter promise. There is something verytouching, to us older men almost tragical, in the unbounded self-confidence of the young life that we see rushing to the front allround us. We know so well the disillusion that is sure to come, thedisappointments that will cloud the morning sky. We would not carryone shadow from the darkened experience of middle life into theroseate tints of the morning. The 'vision splendid'

 Will fade away Into the light of common day, '

soon enough. But for the present this self-reliant confidence is oneof the blessings of your early days. 

Only remember, it is dangerous, too. It may become want of reverence, which is ruinous, or presumption and rashness. Remember what acynical head of a college said, 'None of us is infallible, not eventhe youngest, ' and blend modesty with confidence, and yet be buoyantand strong, and trust in the power that may make you strong. And thenyour self-confidence will not be rashness. 

'Thou wentest whither thou wouldest. ' That is another characteristicof youth, after it has got beyond the schoolboy stage. Your own willtends to become your guide. For one thing, at your time of life, mostother inward guides are comparatively weak. You have but littleexperience. Most of you have not cultivated largely the habit ofpatient reflection, and thinking twice before you act once. Thatcomes: it would not be good that it should be over-predominant inyou. 'Old heads on young shoulders' are always monstrosities, and itis all right that, in your early days, you should largely live byimpulse, if only, as well as a will, there be a conscience at workwhich will do instead of the bitter experience which comes to guidesome of the older of us. 

Again, yours is the age when passion is strong. I speak nowespecially to young men. Restraints are removed for many of you. There are dozens of young men listening to me now, away from theirfather's home, separated from the purifying influence of sisters andof family life, living in solitary lodgings, at liberty to spendtheir evenings where they choose, and nobody be a bit the wiser. Ah, my dear young friend! 'thou wentest whither thou wouldest' and thouwouldest whither thou oughtest not to go. 

There is nothing more dangerous than getting into the habit ofsaying, 'I do as I like, ' however you cover it over. Some of you say, 'I indulge natural inclinations; I am young; a man must have hisfling. Let me sow my wild oats in a quiet corner, where nobody willsee the crop coming up; and when I get to be as old as you are, Iwill do as you do; young men will be young men, ' etc. , etc. You knowall that sort of talk. Take this for a certain fact: that whoeverputs the reins into the charge of his own will when he is young, hasput the reins _and the whip_ into hands which will drive over theprecipice. 

My friend! 'I will' is no word for you. There is a far diviner andbetter one than that--'I ought. ' Have you learnt that? Do you yieldto that sovereign imperative, and say, 'I _must_, because I _ought_and, therefore, I _will_'? Bow passion to reason, reason toconscience, conscience to God--and then, be as strong in the will andas stiff in the neck as ever you choose; but only then. So much, then, for my first picture. 

II. Now let me ask you to turn with me for a moment to the secondone--What you will certainly become if you live. 

I have already explained that putting this meaning on the latterportion of our first verse is somewhat forcing it from its originalsignification. And yet it is so little of violence that the whole ofthe language naturally lends itself to make a picture of thedifference between the two stages of life. 

All the bright visions that dance before your youthful mind will fadeaway. We begin by thinking that we are going to build temples, or'towers that shall reach to heaven, ' and when we get into middle lifewe have to say to ourselves: 'Well! I have scarcely material enoughto carry out the large design that I had. I think that I will contentmyself with building a little hovel, that I may live in, and perhapsit will keep the weather off me. ' Hopes diminish; dreams vanish;limited realities take their place, and we are willing to hold outour hands and let some one else take the responsibilities that wewere so eager to lay upon ourselves at the first. Strength will fadeaway. 'Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young menshall utterly fail. ' Physical weariness, weakness, the longing forrest, the consciousness of ever-narrowed and narrowing powers, willcome to you, and if you grow up to be old men, which it is probablethat many of you will do, you will have to sit and watch the tide ofyour life ebb, ebb, ebbing away moment by moment. 

Self-will will be wonderfully broken, for there are far strongerforces that determine a man's life than his own wishes and will. Weare like swimmers in the surf of the Indian Ocean, powerless againstthe battering of the wave which pitches us, for all our science, andfor all our muscle, where it will. Call it environment, call it fate, call it circumstances, call it providence, call it God--there issomething outside of us bigger than we are, and the man who beginslife, thinking 'Thus I will, thus I command, let my determinationstand instead of all other reason'; has to say at last, 'I could notdo what I wanted. I had to be content to do what I could. ' Thus ourself-will gets largely broken down; and patient acceptance of theinevitable comes to be the wisdom and peace of the old man. 

And, last of all, the picture shows us an irresistible approximationto an unwelcome goal: 'Another shall carry thee whither thou wouldestnot. '

Life to the old seems to you to be so empty and ashen grey that youwonder they care to live. But life to them, for all itsdisappointments, its weariness, its foiled efforts, its vanishedhopes, its departed companions, is yet life, and most of them clingto it like a miser to his gold. But yet, like a man sucked intoNiagara above the falls, they are borne on the irresistible, smoothflood, nearer and nearer to the edge of the rock, and they hear themighty sound in their ears long before they reach the place where theplunge is to be taken from sunshine into darkness and foam. 

So 'when thou shalt be old' your fancy will be gone, your physicalstrength will be gone, your freshness will be gone, your faculty ofhoping will work feebly and have little to work on; on earth yoursense of power will be humbled, and yet you will not want to be borneto the place whither you must be borne. 

Fancy two portraits, one of a little chubby boy in child's dress, with a round face and clustering curls and smooth cheeks and redlips, and another of an old man, with wearied eyes, and thin locks, and wrinkled cheeks, and a bowed frame. The difference between thetwo is but the symbol of the profounder differences that separate thetwo selves, which yet are the one self--the impetuous, self-reliant, self-willed, hopeful, buoyant youth, and the weary, feeble, broken, old man. And that is what you will come to, if you live, as sure as Iam speaking to you, and you are listening to me. 

III. And now, lastly, what in the view of both these stages it iswise for you to do. 

'When He had spoken thus, He saith unto him, Follow Me. ' What do wemean by following Christ? We mean submission to His authority. 'Follow Me' as Captain, Commander, absolute Lawgiver, and Lord. Wemean imitation of His example. These two words include all humanduty, and promise to every man perfection if he obeys. 'Follow Me'--it is enough, more than enough, to make a man complete and blessed. We mean choosing and keeping close to Him, as Companion as well asLeader and Lord. No man or woman will ever be solitary, thoughfriends may go, and associates may change, and companions may leavethem, and life may become empty and dreary as far as human sympathyis concerned--no man or woman will ever be solitary if stepping inChrist's footsteps, close at His heels, and realising His presence. 

But you cannot follow Him, and He has no right to tell you to followHim, unless He is something more and other to you than Example, andCommander, and Companion. What business has Jesus Christ to demandthat a man should go after Him to the death? Only this business, thatHe has gone to the death for the man. You must follow Christ first, my friend, by coming to Him as a sinful creature, and finding yourwhole salvation and all your hope in humble reliance on the merit ofHis death. Then you may follow Him in obedience, and imitation, andglad communion. 

That being understood, I would press upon you this thought, that sucha following of Jesus Christ will preserve for you all that is blessedin the characteristics of your youth, and will prevent them frombecoming evil. He will give you a basis for your hopes and fulfilyour most sanguine dreams, if these are based on His promises, andtheir realisation sought in the path of His feet. As Isaiahprophesies, 'the mirage shall become a pool. ' That which else is anillusion, dancing ahead and deceiving thirsty travellers into thebelief that sand is water, shall become to you really 'pools ofwater, ' if your hopes are fixed on Jesus Christ. If you follow Him, your strength will not ebb away with shrunken sinews and enfeebledmuscles. If you trust Christ, your self-will will be elevated bysubmission, and become strong to control your rebellious nature, because it is humble to submit to His supreme command. And if youtrust and follow Jesus Christ, your hope will be buoyant, and bright, and blessed, and prolong its buoyancy, and brightness, andblessedness into 'old age, when others fade. ' If you will followChrist your old age will, if you reach it, be saved from thebitterest pangs that afflict the aged, and will be brightened byfuture possibilities. There will be no need for lingering lamentsover past blessings, no need for shrinking reluctance to take theinevitable step. An old age of peaceful, serene brightness caughtfrom the nearer gleam of the approaching heaven, and quiet as theevenings in the late autumn, not without a touch of frost, perhaps, but yet kindly and fruitful, may be ours. And instead of shrinkingfrom the end, if we follow Jesus, we shall put our hands quietly andtrustfully into His, as a little child does into its mother's soft, warm palm, and shall not ask whither He leads, assured that since itis He who leads we shall be led aright. 

Dear young friends! 'Follow Me!' is Christ's merciful invitation toyou. You will never again be so likely to obey it as you are now. Well begun is half ended. 'I would have you innocent of muchtransgression. ' You need Him to keep you in the slippery ways ofyouth. You could not go into some of those haunts, where some of youhave been, if you thought to yourselves, 'Am I following Jesus as Icross this wicked threshold?' You may never have another message ofmercy brought to your ears. If you do become a religious man in laterlife, you will be laying up for yourselves seeds of remorse andsorrow, and in some cases memories of pollution and filth, that willtrouble you all your days. 'To-day, if ye will hear His voice, hardennot your hearts. '

'THEY ALSO SERVE WHO ONLY STAND AND WAIT'

'Peter, seeing him, saith to Jesus, Lord, and what shall this mando! Jesus saith unto him, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? Follow thou Me. '--John xxi. 21, 22. 

We have seen in a former sermon that the charge of the risen Christto Peter, which immediately precedes these verses, allotted to himservice and suffering. The closing words of that charge 'Follow Me!'had a deep significance, as uniting both parts of his task in the onesupreme command of imitation of his Master. 

But the same words had also a simpler meaning, as inviting theApostle to come apart with Christ at the moment, for some furthertoken of His love or indication of His will. Peter follows; but infollowing, naturally turns to see what the little group, sittingsilent there by the coal fire on the beach, may be doing, and henotices John coming towards them, with intent to join them. 

What emboldened John to thrust himself, uncalled for, into so secretan interview? The words in which he is described in the contextanswer the question. 'He was the disciple whom Jesus loved, whichalso leaned on His breast at Supper, and said, Lord! which is he thatbetrayeth Thee?' He was also bound by close ties to Peter. So withthe familiarity of 'perfect love which casteth out fear, ' he feltthat the Master could have no secrets from him, and no charge to giveto his friend which he might not share. 

Peter's swift question, 'Lord! and what shall this man do?' though ithas been often blamed, does not seem very blameworthy. There wasperhaps a little touch of his old vivacity in it, indicating that hehad not been sufficiently subdued and sobered by the prospect whichChrist had held out to him; but far more than that there was anatural interest in his friend's fate, and something of a wish tohave his company on the path which he was to tread. Christ's answer, 'If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? Followthou Me!' gently rebukes any leaven of evil that there may have beenin the question; warns him against trying to force other people intohis groove; with solemn emphasis reiterates his own duty; and, ineffect, bids him let his brother alone, and see that he himselfdischarges the ministry which he has received of the Lord. 

The enigmatical words of Christ, and the long life of the Apostle, which seemed to explain them, naturally bred an interpretation ofthem in the Early Church which is recorded here, as I believe, by theEvangelist himself, to the effect that John, like another Enoch atthe beginning of a new world, was to escape the common lot. And verybeautiful is the quiet way in which the Evangelist put that error onone side, by the simple repetition of his Master's words, emphasisingtheir hypothetical form and their enigmatical character: 'Jesus saidnot unto him, He shall not die; but _if_ I will that he _tarry_ tillI come, what is that to thee?'

Now all this, I think, is full of lessons. Let me try to draw one ortwo of them briefly now. 

I. First, then, we have in that majestic 'If I will!' the revelationof the risen Christ as the Lord of life and death. 

In His charge to Peter, Christ had asserted His right absolutely tocontrol His servant's conduct and fix his place in the world, and Hispower to foresee and forecast his destiny and his end. But in thesewords He goes a step further. 'I _will_ that he tarry'; tocommunicate life and to sustain life is a divine prerogative; to actby the bare utterance of His will upon physical nature is a divineprerogative. Jesus Christ here claims that His will goes out withsovereign power amongst the perplexities of human history and intothe depths of that mystery of life; and that He, the Son of Man, 'quickens whom He will, ' and has power 'to kill and to make alive. 'The words would be absurd, if not something worse, upon any butdivine lips, that opened with conscious authority, and whose Uttererknew that His hand was laid upon the innermost springs of being. 

So, in this entirely incidental fashion, you have one of thestrongest and plainest instances of the quiet, unostentatious andhabitual manner in which Jesus Christ claimed for Himself properlydivine prerogatives. 

Remember that He who thus spoke was standing before these seven menthere, in the morning light, on the beach, fresh from the grave. Hisresurrection had proved Him to be the Lord of death. He had bound itto His chariot-wheels as a Conqueror. He had risen and He stood therebefore them with no more mark of the corruption of the grave upon Himthan there are traces of the foul water in which a sea bird may havefloated, on its white wing that flashes in the sunshine as it soars. And surely as these men looked to Christ, 'declared to be the Son ofGod with power, by His resurrection from the dead, 'they may havebegun, however 'foolish and slow of heart' they were 'to believe, ' tounderstand that 'to this end Christ both died and rose and revived, that He might be the Lord both of the dead and of the living, ' bothof death and of life. 

These two Apostles' later history was full of proofs that Christ'sclaim was valid. Peter is shut up in prison and delivered once, atthe very last moment, when hope was almost dead, in order that hemight understand that when he was put into another prison and _not_delivered, the blow of martyrdom fell upon him, not because of thestrength of his persecutors, but because of the will of his Lord. AndJohn had to see his brother James, to whom he had been so closelyknit, with whom he had pledged himself to drink the cup that Christdrank of, whom he had desired to have associated with himself in thespecial honours in the Messianic Kingdom--he had to see him slain, first of the Apostles, while he himself lingered here long after allhis early associates were gone. He had, no doubt, many a longing todepart. Solitary, surrounded by a new world, pressed by many cares, he must often have felt that the cross which he had to carry was nolighter than that laid on those who had passed to their rest bymartyrdom. To him it would often be martyrdom to live. His personallonging is heard for a moment in the last words of the Apocalypse, 'Amen! even so, come, Lord Jesus!'--but undoubtedly for the most parthe stayed his heart on his Lord's will, and waited in meek patiencetill he heard the welcome announcement, 'The Master is come andcalleth for thee. '

And, dear friends! that same belief that the risen Christ is the Lordof life and death, is the only one that can stay our hearts, or makeus bow with submission to His divine will. He who has conquered deathby undergoing it is death's Lord as well as ours, and when He willsto bring His friends home to Himself, saith to that black-robedservant, 'Go, and he goeth; do this and he doeth it. ' The visionwhich John saw long after this on another shore, washed by a stormiersea, spoke the same truth as does this majestic 'I will'--'He thatliveth and became dead and is alive for evermore, ' is by virtue ofHis divine eternal life, and has become in His humanity by virtue ofHis death and resurrection the Lord of life and death. The hands thatwere nailed to the Cross turn the keys of death and Hades. 'Heopeneth and no man shutteth; He shutteth and no man openeth. '

II. We have here before us, in this incident, the service of patientwaiting. 

'If I will that he tarry, what is that to thee? Follow thou Me. 'Peter is the man of action, not great at reflection; full of impulse, restless until his hands can do something to express his thoughts andhis emotions. On the very Mount of Transfiguration he wanted to setto work and build 'three tabernacles, ' instead of listening awed tothe divine colloquy. In Galilee he cannot wait quietly for his Masterto come, but must propose to his friends to 'go a fishing. ' In thefishing-boat, as soon as he sees the Lord he must struggle throughthe sea to get at Him; whilst John sits quiet in the boat, blessed inthe consciousness of his Master's presence and in silently gazing atHim verily there. All through the first part of the Acts of theApostles his bold energy goes flashing and flaming. It is always hisvoice that rings out in the front, whether preaching on the PentecostDay, bringing healing to the sick, or fronting the Sanhedrim. Hiselement is in the shock of conflict and the strain of work. 

John, on the other hand, seldom appears in the narrative. When hedoes so he stands a silent figure by the side of Peter, anddisappears from it altogether before very long. We do not hear thathe did anything. He seems to have had no part in the missionary workof the Church. 

He 'tarried, ' that was all. The word is the same--'abide'--which isso often upon his lips in his Gospel and in his Epistles, asexpressive of the innermost experience of the Christian soul, thecondition of all fruitfulness, blessedness, knowledge and Christ-likeness. Christ's charge to John to 'tarry' did not only, as hisbrethren misinterpreted it, mean that his life was to be continued, but it prescribed the manner of his life. It was to be patientcontemplation, a 'dwelling in the house of the Lord, ' a keeping ofhis heart still, like some little tarn up amongst the silent hills, for heaven with all its blue to mirror itself in. 

And that quiet life of contemplation bore its fruit. In hismeditation the deeds and words of his Master slowly grew ever moreand more luminous to him. Deeper meanings came out, revealing newconstellations, as he gazed into that opening heaven of memory. Hereaped 'the harvest of a quiet eye' and garnered the sheaves of it inhis Gospel, the holy of holies of the New Testament; and in hisEpistles, in which he proclaims the first and last word ofrevelation, 'God is love'--the pure diamond that hangs at the end ofthe golden chain let down from Heaven. Often, no doubt, his brethrenthought him 'but an idler in the land, ' but at last his 'tarrying'was vindicated. 

Now, dear brethren! in all times of the world's history that form ofChristian service needs to be pressed upon busy people. And therenever was a time in the world's history, or in the Church's history, when it more needed to be pressed upon the ordinary Christian manthan at this day. The good and the bad of our present Christianity, and of our present social life, conspire to make people think thatthose who are not at work in some external form of Christian servicefor the good of their fellows are necessarily idlers. Many of themare so, but by no means all, and there is always the danger that theexternal work which good, earnest people do shall become greater thancan be wholesomely and safely done by them without their constantrecourse to this solitary meditation, and to tarrying before God. 

The stress and bustle of our everyday life; the feverish desire forimmediate results; the awakened conviction that Christianity isnothing if not practical; the new sense of responsibility for thecondition of our fellows; the large increase of all sorts ofdomestic, evangelistic, and missionary work among all churches inthis day--things to be profoundly thankful for, like all other goodthings have their possible dangers; and it is laid on my heart towarn you of these now. For the sake of our own personal hold on JesusChrist, for the sake of our progress in the knowledge of His truth, and for the sake of the very work which some of us count so precious, there is need that we shall betake ourselves to that still communion. The stream that is to water half a continent must rise high in thelonely hills, and be fed by many a mountain rill in the solitude, andthe men who are to keep the freshness of their Christian zeal, and ofthe consecration which they will ever feel is being worn away by theattrition even of faithful service, can only renew and refresh it byresorting again to the Master, and imitating Him who prepared Himselffor a day of teaching in the Temple by a night of communion on theMount of Olives. 

Further, there is here a lesson of tolerance for us all. Practicalmen are always disposed, as I said, to force everybody else intotheir groove. Martha is always disposed to think that Mary is idlewhen she is 'sitting at Christ's feet, ' and wants to have her comeinto the kitchen and help her there. The eye which sees must not sayto the hand which toils, nor the hand to the eye, 'I have no need ofthee. ' There are men who cannot think much; there are men who cannotwork much. There are men whom God has chosen for diligent externalservice; there are men whom God has chosen for solitary retiredmusing; and we cannot dispense with either the one or the other. Didnot John Bunyan do more for the world when he was shut up in BedfordGaol and dreamed his dream than by all his tramping aboutBedfordshire, preaching to a handful of cottagers? And has not theChristian literature of the prison, which includes three at least ofPaul's Epistles, proved of the greatest service and most preciousvalue to the Church?

We need all to listen to the voice which says, 'Come ye apart byyourselves into a solitary place, and rest awhile. ' Work is good, butthe foundation of work is better. Activity is good, but the lifewhich is the basis of activity is even more. There is plenty of so-called Christian work to-day which I fear me is not life butmechanism; has slipped off its original foundations, and is, therefore, powerless. Let us tolerate the forms of service least likeour own, not seek to force other men into our paths nor seek toimitate them. Let Peter flame in the van, and beard high priests, andstir and fight; and let John sit in his quiet horns, caring for hisLord's mother, and holding fellowship with his Lord's Spirit. 

III. Lastly, we have here the lesson of patient acquiescence inChrist's undisclosed will. 

The error into which the brethren of the Apostle fell as to themeaning of the Lord's words was a very natural one, especially whentaken with the commentary which John's unusually protracted lifeseemed to append to it. We know that that belief lingered long afterthe death of the Apostle; and that legends, like the stories that arefound in many nations of heroes that have disappeared, but aresleeping in some mountain recess, clustered round John's grave; overwhich the earth was for many a century believed to heave and fallwith his gentle breathing. 

John did not know exactly what his Master meant. He would not ventureupon a counter-interpretation. Perhaps his brethren were right, hedoes not know; perhaps they were wrong, he does not know. One thinghe is quite sure of, that what his Master said was: '_If_ I will thathe tarry. ' And he acquiesces quietly in the certainty that it shallbe as his Master wills; and, in the uncertainty what that will is, hesays in effect: 'I do not know, and it does not much matter. If I amto go to find Him, well! If He is to come to find me, well again!Whichever way it be, I know that the patient tarrying here will leadto a closer communion hereafter, and so I leave it all in His hands. '

Dear brethren! that is a blessed state that you and I may come to; astate of quiet submission, not of indifference but of acquiescence inthe undisclosed will of our loving Christ about all matters, andabout this alternative of life or death amongst the rest. The soulthat has had communion with Jesus Christ amidst the imperfectionshere will be able to refer all the mysteries and problems of itsfuture to Him with unshaken confidence. For union with Him carrieswith it the assurance of its own perpetuity, and 'in its sweetnessyieldeth proof that it was born for immortality. ' The Psalmistlearned to say, 'Thou shalt afterward receive me to glory, ' becausehe could say, 'I am continually with Thee. ' And in like manner we mayall rise from the experience of the present to confidence in thatimmortal future. Death with his 'abhorred shears' cuts other closeties, but their edge turns on the knot that binds the soul to itsSaviour. He who has felt the power of communion with the ever-livingChrist cannot but feel that such union must be for ever, and thatbecause Christ lives, and as long as Christ lives, he will live also. 

Therefore, to the soul thus abiding in Christ that alternative oflife or death which looms so large to us when we have not Christ withus, will dwindle down into very small dimensions. If I live therewill be work for me to do here, and His love to possess; if I diethere will be work for me to do there too, and His love to possess instill more abundant measure. So it will not be difficult for such asoul to leave the decision of this as of all other things with theLord of life and death, and to lie acquiescent in His gracious hands. That calm acceptance of His will and patience with Christ's '_If_' isthe reward of tarrying in silent communion with Him. 

My dear friend! has death to you dwindled to a very little thing? Canyou say that you are quite sure that it will not touch your truestself? Are you able to leave the alternative in His hands, contentwith His decision and content with the uncertainty that wraps Hisdecision? Can you say, 'Lord! It belongs not to my care, Whether I die or live'?

The answer to these questions is involved in the answer to theother:--Have you trusted your sinful soul for salvation to JesusChrist, and are you drawing from Him a life which bears fruit in gladservice and in patient communion? Then it will not much matterwhether you are in heaven or on earth, for in both places and statesthe essence of your life will be the same, your Companion one, andyour work identical. If it be 'Christ' for me to live it will be'gain' for me to die. 

END OF VOL. III.