“Don’t let your heart be troubled. Believe in God. Believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many homes. If it weren’t so, I would have told you. I am going to prepare a place for you. If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and will receive you to myself; that where I am, you may be there also. You know where I go, and you know the way.”
Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going. How can we know the way?”
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father, except through me. If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on, you know him, and have seen him.”
Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us.”
Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you such a long time, and do you not know me, Philip? He who has seen me has seen the Father. How do you say, ‘Show us the Father?’ Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? The words that I tell you, I speak not from myself; but the Father who lives in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me; or else believe me for the very works’ sake. Most certainly I tell you, he who believes in me, the works that I do, he will do also; and he will do greater works than these, because I am going to my Father. Whatever you will ask in my name, I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you will ask anything in my name, I will do it. If you love me, keep my commandments. I will pray to the Father, and he will give you another Counselor, that he may be with you forever: the Spirit of truth, whom the world can’t receive; for it doesn’t see him and doesn’t know him. You know him, for he lives with you, and will be in you. I will not leave you orphans. I will come to you. Yet a little while, and the world will see me no more; but you will see me. Because I live, you will live also. In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. One who has my commandments and keeps them, that person is one who loves me. One who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him, and will reveal myself to him.”
Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, “Lord, what has happened that you are about to reveal yourself to us, and not to the world?”
Jesus answered him, “If a man loves me, he will keep my word. My Father will love him, and we will come to him, and make our home with him. He who doesn’t love me doesn’t keep my words. The word which you hear isn’t mine, but the Father’s who sent me. I have said these things to you while still living with you. But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things, and will remind you of all that I said to you. Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you; not as the world gives, I give to you. Don’t let your heart be troubled, neither let it be fearful. You heard how I told you, ‘I go away, and I come to you.’ If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I said ‘I am going to my Father;’ for the Father is greater than I. Now I have told you before it happens so that when it happens, you may believe. I will no more speak much with you, for the prince of the world comes, and he has nothing in me. But that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father commanded me, even so I do. Arise, let’s go from here.
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31 1. Let not your heart be troubled. Not without…
1. Let not your heart be troubled. Not without good reason does Christ confirm his disciples by so many words, since a contest so arduous and so terrible awaited them; for it was no ordinary temptation, that soon afterwards they would see him hanging on the cross; a spectacle in which nothing was to be seen but ground for the lowest despair. The season of so great distress being at hand, he points out the remedy, that they may not be vanquished and overwhelmed; for he does not simply exhort and encourage them to be steadfast, but likewise informs them where they must go to obtain courage; that is, by faith, when he is acknowledged to be the Son of God, who has in himself a sufficiency of strength for maintaining the safety of his followers.
We ought always to attend to the time when these words were spoken, that Christ wished his disciples to remain brave and courageous, when they might think that every thing was in the greatest confusion; and therefore we ought to employ the same shield for warding off such assaults. It is impossible for us, indeed, to avoid feeling various emotions, but though we are shaken, we must not fall down. Thus it is said of believers, that they are not troubled, because, relying on the word of God, though very great difficulties press hard upon them, still they remain steadfast and upright.
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You believe in God. It might also be read in the imperative mood, Believe in God, and believe in me; but the former reading agrees better, and has been more generally received. Here he points out the method of remaining steadfast, as I have already said; that is, if our faith rest on Christ, and view him in no other light than as being present and stretching out his hand to assist us. But it is wonderful that faith in the Father is here placed first in order, for he ought rather to have told his disciples that they ought to believe in God, since they had believed in Christ; because, as Christ is the lively image of the Father, so we ought first to cast our eyes on him; and for this reason, too, he descends to us, that our faith, beginning with him, may rise to God. But Christ had a different object in view, for all acknowledge that we ought to believe in God, and this is an admitted principle to which all assent without contradiction; and yet there is scarce one in a hundred who actually believes it, not only because the naked majesty of God is at too great a distance from us, but also because Satan interposes clouds of every description to hinder us from contemplating God. The consequence is, that our faith, seeking God in his heavenly glory and inaccessible light, vanishes away; and even the flesh, of its own accord, suggests a thousand imaginations, to turn away our eyes from beholding God in a proper manner.
The Son of God, then, who is Jesus Christ, holds out himself as the object to which our faith ought to be directed, and by means of which it will easily find that on which it can rest; for he is the true Immanuel, who answers us within, as soon as we seek him by faith. It is one of the leading articles of our faith, that our faith ought to be directed to Christ alone, that it may not wander through long windings; and that it ought to be fixed on him, that it may not waver in the midst of temptations. And this is the true proof of faith, when we never suffer ourselves to be torn away from Christ, and from the promises which have been made to us in him. When Popish divines dispute, or, I should rather say, chatter, about the object of faith, they mention God only, and pay no attention to Christ. They who derive their instruction from the notions of such men, must be shaken by the slightest gale of wind that blows. Proud men are ashamed of Christ’s humiliation, and, therefore, they fly to God’s incomprehensible Divinity. But faith will never reach heaven unless it submit to Christ, who appears to be a low and contemptible God, and will never be firm if it do not seek a foundation in the weakness of Christ.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 10, 12, 15, 17, 20, 21, 22, 25, 27, 28, 30 He believeth in God that believeth in Christ, and…
He believeth in God that believeth in Christ, and there is no other way to confirm our minds in greatest distresses.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv1–31 1 Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe…
1 Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.
Ver. 1. Let not your heart, &c.] Our Saviour sweetly proceeds in his swan-like song. Aelian tells us that he once heard a dying swan sing most heavenly and harmoniously, ευφωνοτατον και ωδικωτατον. (Hist. Var. lib. i.) The poet shows the manner of it, when he saith
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-"longa canoros
Dat per colla modos"-
Of the Syrens (on the contrary) it is reported, that how sweetly soever they sang before, yet at death they make a horrid noise and unpleasant roaring. Morris articulo instante, et sanguine male affecto valde horride mugiunt Sirenes. Likewise, good men utter their best usually at last, the wine of the spirit being then strongest and liveliest in them. Whereas wicked men are then usually at worst, and go out with a stench, as the devil is said to do. And as Melancthon said of Eccius’s last wicked work, written of priests’ marriage, Non full cygnea cantio, sed ultimus crepitus: et sicut felis fugiens pedit, sic ille moriens hunc crepitura cecinit. (Melch. Adam. in Vit. Calv.) So of Baldwin the apostate, one saith that vivere simul et maledicere desiit, he died cursing, as that wretch did swearing, who desperately also desired the bystanders to help him with oaths and to swear for him.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv1–31 Chapter Introduction
Chapter Introduction
The three ensuing chapters contain either one or more consolatory discourses of our Saviour to his disciples, (as appeareth from Joh 14:1), made, as is probable, to them in the guest chamber (at least that part of them which we have in this chapter); for we read of no motion of our Saviour’s till we come to the last verse of this chapter. That which troubled them was, what he had told them in the close of the former chapter, that he was going from them. By our Saviour’s discourse in this and the two following chapters, it should seem that there were three things that troubled them.
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1. The sense of their loss as to his bodily presence.
2. The fear, that with the loss of that they should also lose those spiritual influences which they had received from him, and upon which their souls had lived.
3. The prospect of those storms of troubles and persecutions, which were likely to follow his departure from them; for if we wisely consider what our Saviour saith in these three following chapters, it all tends to comfort them as to troubles that might arise in their spirits, upon one or other of these accounts: the general proposition is laid down in Joh 14:1.
Let not your heart be troubled, through grief, or fear, which are the two passions which ordinarily most disturb our minds. Our Saviour himself was troubled, but not sinfully; his trouble neither arose from unbelief, nor yet was in an undue measure; it was (as one well expresses it) like the mere agitation of clear water, where was no mud at the bottom: but our trouble is like the stirring of water that hath a great deal of mud at the bottom, which upon the roiling, riseth up, and maketh it the whole body of the water in the vessel impure, roiled and muddy. It is this sinful trouble, caused from these two passions, and rising up to an immoderate degree, and mixed with a great deal of unbelief and distrust in God, against which our Saviour here cautions his disciples; and the remedy he prescribes against those afflicting passions, is a believing in God, and a believing on him. The two latter passages in the verse are so penned in the Greek, that they may be read four ways; for the verb
believe, twice repeated, may be read either indicatively or imperatively, or the one may be read indicatively and the other imperatively; so as they may be translated, You believe in God, you believe also in me. And so they teach us, that there is no such remedy for inward troubles, as a believing in God, and a believing in Jesus Christ; and those that do so, have no just reason for any excessive heart troubles. Or else they may be read, Believe in God, believe in me: or else as we read them,
Ye believe in God, believe also in me: or, Believe in God, ye believe in me. But the disciples’ faith in Christ as Mediator, and God man, being yet weak, and their weakness being what our Saviour hath ordinarily blamed, not magnified, or commended, the best interpreters judge the sense which our translators give to be the best sense; and judge that our Saviour doth inculcate to them his Divine nature, and again offer himself to them as the proper object of their faith. You (saith he) own it for your duty to trust in God, as your Creator, and he that provideth for you: believe also in me, as God equal with my Father; and in me, as the Messiah, your Mediator and Redeemer: so as you have one to take care or all your concerns, both those of your bodies, and those of your souls also, so as you have nothing to be immoderately and excessively, or distrustfully, troubled for; therefore let not your hearts be troubled; only, without care or distrust, commit yourselves to me.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On vv1, 5, 7, 12, 13, 15, 16, 18, 19, 21, 22, 23, 25, 27, 28, 29 Our blessed Saviour in the foregoing chapter, having acquainted…
Our blessed Saviour in the foregoing chapter, having acquainted his disciples with his approaching death, by the treachery of Judas, their hearts were thereupon overwhelmed with grief and trouble. Accordingly in this chapter, by sundry arguments, he comforts his disciples against the perplexity of their fears and sorrows.
Observe, 1. How Christ addresses himself to his disciples in a very endearing and affectionate manner; Let not your hearts be troubled.
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Whence learn, 1. That the best and holiest of God’s children and servants, whilst here in an imperfect state, are subject to desponding, and disquieting and distrustful fears.
2. That no work is more delightful to our Saviour, than to comfort the troubled and perplexed spirits of his servants.
Observe, 2. The remedy which Christ prescribes for the calming their present fears, and for arming them against future troubles, and present fears, and for arming them against future troubles, and that is, Faith in the Father and in himself: Ye believe in God, believe also in me.
Observe next, The arguments of consolation which Christ propounds for the support of his disciples, under the sorrow which they had conceived for his approaching departure.
1. He tells them, That heaven, whither he was now going, was his Father’s house, a place of happiness, not designed for himself also, but for many more to enjoy perpetual rest and abode in, as in everlasting mansions: In my Father’s house are many mansions.
Heaven is God’s house, in which he will freely convese with his domestics, his children and servants, and they shall enjoy full glory there, as in a quiet and capacious habitation.
A second ground of comfort is, that he assures them, he will come again and receive them to himself, that they may live together with him in the heavenly mansions. This promise Christ makes good to his saints, partly at the day of their death, and perfectly at the day of judgment, when he shall make one errand for all, and take up all is children to himself, and make them completely happy, both in soul and body, with himself.
Learn hence, That though Christ has removed his bodily presence from his friends on earth, yet his love to them is not ceased, nor will he rest satisfied till he and they meet again, eternally to solace themselves in each other’s company: I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am, there ye may be also.
A third argument for consolation is, that, notwithstanding Christ was to leave them, yet they knew whither he went: namely, to heaven, and which was the way thither; Whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.
It contributes much to the comfort of believers, as to know God and heaven, so to know the way that leads thither, that so they may be armed against all the difficulties of that way.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On vv1, 4, 12, 15, 18, 25, 28 In these verses we have,
In these verses we have,
I. A general caution which Christ gives to his disciples against trouble of heart (Joh 14:1): Let not your heart be troubled. They now began to be troubled, were entering into this temptation. Now here see,
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1. How Christ took notice of it. Perhaps it was apparent in their looks; it was said (Joh 13:22), They looked one upon another with anxiety and concern, and Christ looked upon them all, and observed it; at least, it was intelligible to the Lord Jesus, who is acquainted with all our secret undiscovered sorrows, with the wound that bleeds inwardly; he knows not only how we are afflicted, but how we stand affected under our afflictions, and how near they lie to our hearts; he takes cognizance of all the trouble which his people are at any time in danger of being overwhelmed with; he knows our souls in adversity. Many things concurred to trouble the disciples now.
(1.) Christ had just told them of the unkindness he should receive from some of them, and this troubled them all. Peter, no doubt, looked very sorrowful upon what Christ said to him, and all the rest were sorry for him and for themselves too, not knowing whose turn it should be to be told next of some ill thing or other they should do. As to this, Christ comforts them; though a godly jealousy over ourselves is of great use to keep us humble and watchful, yet it must not prevail to the disquieting of our spirits and the damping of our holy joy.
(2.) He had just told them of his own departure from them, that he should not only go away, but go away in a cloud of sufferings. They must shortly hear him loaded with reproaches, and these will be as a sword in their bones; they must see him barbarously abused and put to death, and this also will be a sword piercing through their own souls, for they had loved him, and chosen him, and left all to follow him. When we now look upon Christ pierced, we cannot but mourn and be in bitterness, though we see the glorious issue and fruit of it; much more grievous must the sight be to them, who could then look no further. If Christ depart from them [1.] They will think themselves shamefully disappointed; for they looked that this had been he that should have delivered Israel, and should have set upon his kingdom in secular power and glory, and, in expectation of this, had lost all to follow him. Now, if he leave the world in the same circumstances of meanness and poverty in which he had lived, and worse, they are quite defeated. [2.] They will think themselves sadly deserted and exposed. They knew by experience what little presence of mind they had in difficult emergencies, that they could count upon nothing but being ruined and run down if they part with their Master. Now, in reference to all these, Let not your heart be troubled. Here are three words, upon any of which the emphasis may significantly be laid. First, Upon the word troubled, mē tarassesthō. Be not so troubled as to be put into a hurry and confusion, like the troubled sea when it cannot rest. He does not say, "Let not your hearts be sensible of the griefs, or sad because of them" but, "Be not ruffled and discomposed, be not cast down and disquieted," Psa 42:5. Secondly, Upon the word heart: "Though the nation and city be troubled, though your little family and flock be troubled, yet let not your heart be troubled. Keep possession of your own souls when you can keep possession of nothing else." The heart is the main fort; whatever you do, keep trouble from this, keep this with all diligence. The spirit must sustain the infirmity, therefore, see that this be not wounded. Thirdly, Upon the word your: "You that are my disciples and followers, my redeemed, chosen, sanctified ones, however others are overwhelmed with the sorrows of this present time, be not you so, for you know better; let the sinners in Zion tremble, but let the sons of Zion be joyful in their king." Herein Christ's disciples should do more than others, should keep their minds quiet, when every thing else is unquiet.
2. The remedy he prescribes against this trouble of mind, which he saw ready to prevail over them; in general, believe - pisteuete. (1.) Some read it in both parts imperatively, "Believe in God, and his perfections and providence, believe also in me, and my mediation. Build with confidence upon the great acknowledged principles of natural religion: that there is a God, that he is most holy, wise, powerful, and good; that he is the governor of the world, and has the sovereign disposal of all events; and comfort yourselves likewise with the peculiar doctrines of that holy religion which I have taught you." But, (2.) We read the former as an acknowledgment that they did believe in God, for which he commends them: "But, if you would effectually provide against a stormy day, believe also in me." Through Christ we are brought into covenant with God, and become interested in his favour and promise, which otherwise as sinners we must despair of, and the remembrance of God would have been our trouble; but, by believing in Christ as the Mediator between God and man, our belief in God becomes comfortable; and this is the will of God, that all men should honour the Son as they honour the Father, by believing in the Son as they believe in the Father. Those that rightly believe in God will believe in Jesus Christ, whom he has made known to them; and believing in God through Jesus Christ is an excellent means of keeping trouble from the heart. The joy of faith is the best remedy against the griefs of sense; it is a remedy with a promise annexed to it; the just shall live by faith; a remedy with a probatum est annexed to it. I had fainted unless I had believed.
II. Here is a particular direction to act faith upon the promise of eternal life, Joh 14:2, Joh 14:3. He had directed them to trust to God, and to trust in him; but what must they trust God and Christ for? Trust them for a happiness to come when this body and this world shall be no more, and for a happiness to last as long as the immortal soul and the eternal world shall last. Now this is proposed as a sovereign cordial under all the troubles of this present time, to which there is that in the happiness of heaven which is admirably adapted and accommodated. The saints have encouraged themselves with this in their greatest extremities, That heaven would make amends for all. Let us see how this is suggested here.
1. Believe and consider that really there is such a happiness: In my Father's house there are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you, Joh 14:2.
(1.) See under what notion the happiness of heaven is here represented: as mansions, many mansions in Christ's Father's house. [1.] Heaven is a house, not a tent or tabernacle; it is a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. [2.] It is a Father's house: my Father's house; and his Father is our Father, to whom he was now ascending; so that in right of their elder brother all true believers shall be welcome to that happiness as to their home. It is his house who is King of kings and Lord of lords, dwells in light, and inhabits eternity. [3.] There are mansions there; that is, First, Distinct dwellings, an apartment for each. Perhaps there is an allusion to the priests' chambers that were about the temple. In heaven there are accommodations for particular saints; though all shall be swallowed up in God, yet our individuality shall not be lost there; every Israelite had his lot in Canaan, and every elder a seat, Rev 4:4. Secondly, Durable dwellings. Monai, from mneiō, maneo, abiding places. The house itself is lasting; our estate in it is not for a term of years, but a perpetuity. Here we are as in an inn; in heaven we shall gain a settlement. The disciples had quitted their houses to attend Christ, who had not where to lay his head, but the mansions in heaven will make them amends. [4.] There are many mansions, for there are many sons to be brought to glory, and Christ exactly knows their number, nor will be straitened for room by the coming of more company than he expects. He had told Peter that he should follow him (Joh 13:36), but let not the rest be discouraged, in heaven there are mansions for them all. Rehoboth, Gen 26:22.
(2.) See what assurance we have of the reality of the happiness itself, and the sincerity of the proposal of it to us: "If it were not so, I would have told you. If you had deceived yourselves, when you quitted your livelihoods, and ventured your lives for me, in prospect of a happiness future and unseen, I would soon have undeceived you." The assurance is built, [1.] Upon the veracity of his word. It is implied, "If there were not such a happiness, valuable and attainable, I would not have told you that there was." [2.] Upon the sincerity of his affection to them. As he is true, and would not impose upon them himself, so he is kind, and would not suffer them to be imposed upon. If either there were no such mansions, or none designed for them, who had left all to follow him, he would have given them timely notice of the mistake, that they might have made an honourable retreat to the world again, and have made the best they could of it. Note, Christ's good-will to us is a great encouragement to our hope in him. He loves us too well, and means us too well, to disappoint the expectations of his own raising, or to leave those to be of all men most miserable who have been of him most observant.
2. Believe and consider that the design of Christ's going away was to prepare a place in heaven for his disciples. "You are grieved to think of my going away, whereas I go on your errand, as the forerunner; I am to enter for you." He went to prepare a place for us; that is, (1.) To take possession for us, as our advocate or attorney, and so to secure our title as indefeasible. Livery of seisin was given to Christ, for the use and behoof of all that should believe on him. (2.) To make provision for us as our friend and father. The happiness of heaven, though prepared before the foundation of the world, yet must be further fitted up for man in his fallen state. It consisting much in the presence of Christ there, it was therefore necessary that he should go before, to enter into that glory which his disciples were to share in. Heaven would be an unready place for a Christian if Christ were not there. He went to prepare a table for them, to prepare thrones for them, Luk 22:30. Thus Christ declares the fitness of heaven's happiness for the saints, for whom it is prepared.
3. Believe and consider that therefore he would certainly come again in due time, to fetch them to that blessed place which he was now going to possess for himself and prepare for them (Joh 14:3): "If I go and prepare a place for you, if this be the errand of my journey, you may be sure, when every thing is ready, I will come again, and receive you to myself, so that you shall follow me hereafter, that where I am there you may be also." Now these are comfortable words indeed. (1.) That Jesus Christ will come again; erchomai - I do come, intimating the certainty of it, that he will come and that he is daily coming. We say, We are coming, when we are busy in preparing for our coming, and so he is; all he does has a reference and tendency to his second coming. Note, The belief of Christ's second coming, of which he has given us the assurance, is an excellent preservative against trouble of heart, Phi 4:5; Jam 5:8. (2.) That he will come again to receive all his faithful followers to himself. He sends for them privately at death, and gathers them one by one; but they are to make their public entry in solemn state all together at the last day, and then Christ himself will come to receive them, to conduct them in the abundance of his grace, and to welcome them in the abundance of his love. He will hereby testify the utmost respect and endearment imaginable. The coming of Christ is in order to our gathering together unto him, Th2 2:1. (3.) That where he is there they shall be also. This intimates, what many other scriptures declare, that the quintessence of heaven's happiness is being with Christ there, Joh 17:24; Phi 1:23; Th1 4:17. Christ speaks of his being there as now present, that where I am; where I am to be shortly, where I am to be eternally; there you shall be shortly, there you shall be eternally: not only there, in the same place; but here, in the same state: not only spectators of his glory, as the three disciples on the mount, but sharers in it. (4.) That this may be inferred from his going to prepare a place for us, for his preparations shall not be in vain. He will not build and furnish lodgings, and let them stand empty. He will be the finisher of that of which he is the author. If he has prepared the place for us, he will prepare us for it, and in due time put us in possession of it. As the resurrection of Christ is the assurance of our resurrection, so his ascension, victory, and glory, are an assurance of ours.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv2–31 In my Father's house are many mansions,.... This he…
In my Father's house are many mansions,.... This he says to draw off their minds from an earthly kingdom to an heavenly one; to point out the place to them whither he was going, and to support them with the views and hopes of glory under all their troubles. By his "Father's house" is meant heaven; see Co2 5:1; which is of his Father's building, where he has, and will have all his family. This Christ says partly to reconcile the minds of his disciples to his departure from them, and partly to strengthen their hope of following him thither; since it was his Father's, and their Father's house whither he was going, and in which "are many mansions"; abiding or dwelling places; mansions of love, peace, joy, and rest, which always remain: and there are "many" of them, which does not design different degrees of glory; for since the saints are all loved with the same love, bought with the same price, justified with the same righteousness, and are equally the sons of God, their glory will be the same. But, it denotes fulness and sufficiency of room for all his people; for the many ordained to eternal life, for whom Christ gave his life a ransom, and whose blood is shed for the remission of their sins, whose sins he bore, and whom he justifies by his knowledge; who receive him by faith, and are the many sons he will bring to glory. And this is said for the comfort of the disciples who might be assured from hence, that there would be room not only for himself and Peter, whom he had promised should follow him hereafter, but for them all. Very agreeable to this way of speaking are many things in the Jewish writings:
"says R. Isaack (o), how many , "mansions upon mansions", are there for the righteous in that world? and the uppermost mansion of them all is the love of their Lord.''
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Moreover, they say (p), that
"in the world to come every righteous man shall have "a mansion", to himself.''
Sometimes they (q) speak of "seven mansions" (a number of perfection) being prepared for the righteous in the other world, though entirely ignorant of the person by whom these mansions are prepared: who here says,
if it were not so, I, would have told you, I go to prepare a place for you. This expresses the certainty of it, that his Father had a house, and in it were many mansions, room enough for all his people, or he would have informed them otherwise, who must needs know the truth of these things, since he came from thence; and who never deceives with vain hopes of glory; and whatever he says is truth, and to be depended on; everything he here delivers; both what he said before, and also what follows: "I go to prepare a place for you"; heaven is a kingdom prepared by the Father for his saints, from the foundation of the world; and again, by the presence and intercession of Christ, who is gone before, and is as a forerunner entered into it, and has took possession of it in the name of his people; and by his own appearance there for them with his blood, righteousness, and sacrifice, he is, as it were, fitting up these mansions for their reception, whilst they are by his Spirit and grace fitting and preparing for the enjoyment of them.
(o) Zohar in Deut. fol. 113. 1. (p) Praefat ad Sepher Raziel, fol. 2. 1. Nishmat Chayim, fol. 26. 2. & 27. 1. (q) T. Bab. Bava Bathra, fol. 75. 1. Nishmat Chayim, fol. 32. 2. Midrash Tillim in Galatin. l. 12. c. 6.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10, 11, 12, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 23, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31 Let not your heart be troubled - At my…
Let not your heart be troubled - At my departure. Believe - This is the sum of all his discourse, which is urged till they did believe, Chap. xvi, 30. And then our Lord prays and departs.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31 Christ comforts his disciples, on the event of his…
CHAPTER XIV.
Christ comforts his disciples, on the event of his removal from
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them, by the consideration of his going to prepare a place for
them in heaven, 1-4.
Thomas questions him concerning the way to the Father, and is
answered, 5-7.
Philip proposes a difficulty, and Christ shows that he and the
Father are one; that he is Mediator between God and man; and
that whatsoever is asked in his name shall be obtained, 8-14.
He promises them the Holy Spirit as the Comforter and Spirit of
truth, 15-18.
Shows them that he is shortly to leave them, and that those who
love him should be loved of the Father, 19-21.
Jude asks a question, how Christ is to manifest himself to the
disciples, and not to the Jews? 22.
Christ answers, and shows that the manifestation is to be made
to those who love God, and to them the Holy Spirit is to be an
infallible teacher, 23-26.
He bequeaths his peace to them, and fortifies them against
discouragements, 27-29.
Foretells his approaching death, 30, 31.
NOTES ON CHAP. XIV.
Verse 1. Let not your heart be troubled] After having answered St. Peter's question, he addresses himself again to his disciples, and tells them not to be afflicted at his leaving them, nor to lose courage because of what he said concerning Peter's denying him; that if they reposed their confidence in God, he would protect them; and that, howsoever they might see him treated, they should believe in him more firmly, as his sufferings, death, and resurrection should be to them the most positive proof of his being the Messiah, the Saviour of the world.
Ye believe in God, believe also in me.] It is best to read both the verbs in the imperative mood:-Place your confidence in God, and in me as the Mediator between God and man, Joh 14:12-14; and expect the utmost support from God; but expect it all through me. The disciples began to lose all hope of a secular kingdom, and were discouraged in consequence: Christ promises them a spiritual and heavenly inheritance, and thus lifts up their drooping hearts.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 5, 7, 8, 12, 15, 18, 25, 28 Joh 14:1. Let not your hearts be troubled —…
Joh 14:1. Let not your hearts be troubled — At the thoughts of my departure from you, and leaving you in a world where you are likely to meet with many temptations, trials, and troubles, and to become a helpless prey to the rage and power of your enemies. Ye believe in God — The Almighty Preserver and Governor of the universe, who is able to support you under, and deliver you out of, all your distresses; believe also in me — Who am sent by God, not only to teach, but to redeem and save you; and who can both protect you from evil, and reward you abundantly for whatever losses and sufferings you sustain on my account. But the original words, πιστευετε εις τον Θεον και εις εμε πιστευετε, it seems, ought rather to be rendered, Believe in God, believe also in me; that is, Confide in the being, perfections, and superintending providence of God: or, Rely on the great acknowledged principles of natural religion, that the glorious Maker and Governor of the world is most wise, mighty, holy, just, and good, and the sovereign disposer of all events; and comfort yourselves likewise with the peculiar doctrines of that holy religion which I have taught you. Or, as Dr. Doddridge interprets the clause, “Believe in God, the Almighty Guardian of his faithful servants, who has made such glorious promises to prosper and succeed the cause in which you are engaged; and believe also in me, as the promised Messiah, who, whether present or absent in body, shall always be mindful of your concerns, as well as ever able to help you.” It appears most natural, as he justly observes, to render the same word, πιστευετε, alike in both places; and it is certain an exhortation to faith in God and in Christ would be very seasonable, considering how weak and defective their faith was. Thus Dr. Campbell: “The two clauses are so similarly expressed and linked together by the copulative [και, and, or also] that it is, I suspect, unprecedented, to make the verb in one an indicative, and the same verb repeated in the other an imperative. The simple and natural way is, to render similarly what is similarly expressed: nor ought this rule ever to be departed from, unless something absurd or incongruous should follow from the observance of it, which is so far from being the case here, that by rendering both in the imperative, the sense is not only good, but apposite.”
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31 Let not your heart be troubled - The disciples…
Let not your heart be troubled - The disciples had been greatly distressed at what Jesus had said about leaving them. Compare Joh 16:6, Joh 16:22. Perhaps they had indicated their distress to him in some manner by their countenance or their expressions, and he proceeds new to administer to them such consolations as their circumstances made proper. The discourse in this chapter was delivered, doubtless, while they were sitting at the table partaking of the Lord’s Supper (see Joh 14:31); that in John 15–16, and the prayer in John 17, were while they were on their way to the Mount of Olives. There is nowhere to be found a discourse so beautiful, so tender, so full of weighty thoughts, and so adapted to produce comfort, as that which occurs in these three chapters of John. It is the consolatory part of our religion, where Christ brings to bear on the mind full of anxiety, and perplexity, and care, the tender and inimitably beautiful truths of his gospel - truths fitted to allay every fear, silence every complaint, and give every needed consolation to the soul. In the case of the disciples there was much to trouble them. They were about to part with their beloved, tender friend. They were to be left alone to meet persecutions and trials. They were without wealth, without friends, without honors. And it is not improbable that they felt that his death would demolish all their schemes, for they had not yet fully learned the doctrine that the Messiah must suffer and die, Luk 24:21.
Ye believe in God - This may be read either in the indicative mood or the imperative. Probably it should be read in the imperative - “Believe on God, and believe on me.” If there were no other reason for it, this is sufficient, that there was no more evidence that they did believe in God than that they believed in Jesus. All the ancient versions except the Latin read it thus. The Saviour told them that their consolation was to be found at this time in confidence in God and in him; and he intimated what he had so often told them and the Jews, that there was an indissoluble union between him and the Father. This union he takes occasion to explain to them more fully, Joh 14:7-12.
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Believe in - Put confidence in, rely on for support and consolation.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 9, 10, 12, 13, 15, 16, 19, 20, 21, 22, 26, 28, 31 After having answered the questions of St. Peter, Jesus…
After having answered the questions of St. Peter, Jesus again addresses himself to his disciples, and bids them not to be afflicted or troubled, at what he says to them. Many Greek and Latins begin this chapter thus: Jesus said to his disciples, let not your hearts be troubled. (St. John Chrysostom) --- Euthymius; Leont.; Theophylactus; Theodor.; &c. agree, that our Saviour wished to encourage his apostles, who were so much troubled, because he had said, that Peter should deny him. They thought within themselves, if Peter, who is the strongest, and most resolute amongst us, shall so far forget himself, as to deny his master, what will become of us? Jesus seeing their anxiety, tells them not to be troubled; but to believe in him, and in his words, for he had said, that he would not lose any, whom his Father had given him; (John chap. vi, ver. 39.) and that whosoever should believe in him, should have life everlasting. (chap. iii, ver. 15.) --- Let not you heart be troubled. Christ here begins those incomparable discourses to his apostles, which are set down in the four next chapters. His sufferings and death now approaching, he forewarns them not to be troubled. You believe in God, and put your trust in him; believe also, and trust in me, no less than in him. (Witham)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
John Nelson Darby 1862 · Public Domain On v1 John Chapter 14
John Chapter 14
The Lord now begins to discourse with them in view of His departure. He was going where they could not come. To human sight they would be left alone upon the earth. It is to the sense of this apparently desolate condition that the Lord addresses Himself, shewing them that He was an object for faith, even as God was. In doing this, He opens to them the whole truth with respect to their condition. His work is not the subject treated of, but their position by virtue of that work. His Person should have been for them the key to that position, and would be so now: the Holy Ghost, the Comforter, who should come, would be the power by which they should enjoy it, and indeed more yet.
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To Peter’s question, “Whither goest thou?” the Lord replies. Only when the desire of the flesh seeks to enter into the path on which Jesus was then entering, the Lord could but say that the strength of the flesh was unavailing there; for, in fact, he proposed to follow Christ in death. Poor Peter!
But when the Lord has written the sentence of death upon the flesh for us, by revealing its impotency, He can then (chap. 14) reveal that which is beyond it for faith; and that which belongs to us through His death throws its light back, and teaches who He was, even when on earth, and always, before the world was. He did but return to the place from which He came. But He begins with His disciples where they were, and meets the need of their hearts by explaining to them in what manner-better, in a certain sense, than by following Him here below-they should be with Him when absent where He would be. They did not see God corporeally present with them: to enjoy His presence they believed in Him; It was to be the same thing with regard to Jesus. They were to believe in Him. He did not forsake them in going away, as though there were only room for Himself in His Father’s house. (He alludes to the temple as a figure.) There was room for them all. The going thither, observe, was still His thought-He is not here as the Messiah. We see Him in the relationships in which He stood according to the eternal truths of God. He had always His departure in view: had there been no room for them, He would have told them so. Their place was with Him. But He was going to prepare a place for them. Without presenting redemption there, and presenting Himself as the new man according to the power of that redemption, there was no place prepared in heaven. He enters it in the power of that life which should bring them in also. But they should not go alone to rejoin Him, nor would He rejoin them down here. Heaven, not earth, was in question. Nor would He simply send others for them; but as those He dearly valued, He would come for them Himself, and receive them unto Himself, that where He was, there should they be also. He would come from the Father’s throne: there, of course, they cannot sit; but He will receive them there, where He shall be in glory before the Father. They should be with Him-a far more excellent position than His remaining with them here below, even as Messiah in glory on the earth.
Now, also, having said where He was going, that is, to His Father (and speaking according to the effect of His death for them), He tells them that they knew whither He was going, and the way. For He was going to the Father, and they had seen the Father in seeing Him; and thus, having seen the Father in Him, they knew the way; for in coming to Him, they came to the Father, who was in Him as He was in the Father. He was, then, Himself the way. Therefore He reproaches Philip with not having known Him. He had been long with them, as the revelation in His own Person of the Father; and they ought to have known Him, and to have seen that He was in the Father, and the Father in Him, and thus have known where He was going, for it was to the Father. He had declared the name of the Father; and if they were unable to see the Father in Him, or to be convinced of it by His words, they ought to have known it by His works; for the Father who dwelt in Him-He it was who did the works. This depended on His own Person, being still in the world; but a striking proof was connected with His departure. After He was gone, they would do even greater works than He did, because they should act in connection with His greater nearness to the Father. This was requisite to His glory. It was even unlimited. He placed them in immediate connection with the Father by the power of His work and of His name; and whatsoever they should ask the Father in His name, Christ Himself would do it for them. Their request should be heard and granted by the Father-shewing what nearness He had acquired for them; and He (Christ) would do all they should ask. For the power of the Son was not, and could not be, wanting to the Father’s will: there was no limit to His power.
But this led to another subject. If they loved Him, it was to be shewn, not in regrets, but in keeping His commandments. They were to walk in obedience. This characterises discipleship up to the present time. Love desires to be with Him, but shews itself by obeying His commands; for Christ also has a right to command. On the other hand He would seek their good on high, and another blessing should be granted them; namely, the Holy Ghost Himself, who should never leave them, as Christ was about to do. The world could not receive Him. Christ, the Son, had been shewn to the eyes of the world, and ought to have been received by it. The Holy Ghost would act, being invisible; for by the rejection of Christ, it was all over with the world in its natural and creature relationships with God. But the Holy Ghost should be known by the disciples; for He should not only remain with them, as Christ could not, but be in them, not with them as He was. The Holy Ghost would not be seen then or known by the world.
Until now, in His discourse, He had led His disciples to follow Him (in spirit) on high, through the knowledge which acquaintance with His Person (in which the Father was revealed) gave them of whither He was going, and of the way. He was Himself the way, as we have seen. He was the truth itself, in the revelation (and the perfect revelation) of God and of the soul’s relationship to Him; and, indeed, of the real condition and character of all things, by bringing out the perfect light of God in His own Person who revealed Him. He was the life, in which God and the truth could thus be known. Men came by Him; they found the Father revealed in Him; and they possessed in Him that which enabled them to enjoy, and in the reception of which they came in fact to, the Father.
But, now, it is not what is objective which He presents; not the Father in Him (which they ought to have known) and He in the Father, when here below. He does not, therefore, raise their thoughts to the Father through Himself and in Himself, and He in the Father in heaven. He sets before them that which should be given them down here-the stream of blessing that should flow for them in this world, by virtue of that which Jesus was, and was for them, in heaven. The Holy Ghost once introduced as sent, the Lord says, “I will not leave you orphans, I will come to you.” His presence, in spirit, here below, is the consolation of His people. They should see Him; and this is much more true than seeing Him with the eyes of flesh. Yes, more true; it is knowing Him in a much more real way, even though by grace they had believed in Him as the Christ, the Son of God. And, moreover, this spiritual sight of Christ by the heart, through the presence of the Holy Ghost, is connected with life. “Because I live, ye shall live also.” We see Him, because we have life, and this life is in Him, and He in this life. “This life is in the Son.” It is as sure as His duration. It is derived from Him. Because He lives, we shall live. Our life is, in everything, the manifestation of Himself who is our life. Even as the apostle expresses it, “That the life of Jesus may be manifested in our mortal bodies.” Alas! the flesh resists; but this is our life in Christ.
But this is not all. The Holy Ghost dwelling in us, we know that we are in Christ. [52] “At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.” It is not “the Father in me [which, however, was always true], and I in him”-words, the first of which, here omitted, expressed the reality of His manifestation of the Father here on earth. The Lord only expresses that which belongs to His being really and divinely one with the Father-”I am in my Father.” It is this last part of the truth (implied, doubtless, in the other when rightly understood) of which the Lord here speaks. It could not really be so; but men might imagine such a thing as a manifestation of God in a man, without this man being really such-so truly God, that is to say, in Himself-that it must also be said, He is in the Father. People dream of such things; they speak of the manifestation of God in flesh. We speak of God manifest in the flesh. But here all ambiguity is obviated-He was in the Father, and it is this part of the truth which is repeated here; adding to it, in virtue of the presence of the Holy Ghost, that while the disciples should indeed fully know the divine Person of Jesus, they should moreover know that they were themselves in Him. He who is joined to the Lord is one spirit. Jesus did not say that they ought to have known this while He was with them on earth. They ought to have known that the Father was in Him and He in the Father. But in that He was alone. The disciples, however, having received the Holy Ghost, should know their own being in Him-a union of which the Holy Ghost is the strength and the bond. The life of Christ flows from Him in us. He is in the Father, we in Him, and He also in us, according to the power of the presence of the Holy Ghost.
This is the subject of the common faith, true of all. But there is continual guardianship and government, and Jesus manifests Himself to us in connection with, and in a manner dependent on, our walk. He who is mindful of the Lord’s will possesses it, and observes it. A good child not only obeys when he knows his father’s will, but he acquires the knowledge of that will by giving heed to it. This is the spirit of obedience in love. If we act thus with regard to Jesus, the Father, who takes account of all that relates to His Son, will love us. Jesus will also love us, and will manifest Himself to us. Judas (not Iscariot) did not understand this, because he saw no farther than a bodily manifestation of Christ, such as the world also could perceive. Jesus therefore adds, that the truly obedient disciples (and here He speaks more spiritually and generally of His word, not merely of His commandments) should be loved of the Father, and that the Father and Himself would come and make their abode with him. So that, if there be obedience, while waiting for the time when we shall go and dwell with Jesus in the Father’s presence, He and the Father dwell in us. The Father and the Son manifest themselves in us, in whom the Holy Ghost is dwelling, even as the Father and the Holy Ghost were present, when the Son was here below-doubtless in another way, for He was the Son, and we only live by Him-the Holy Ghost only dwelling in us. But with respect to those glorious Persons they are not disunited. The Father did the works in Christ, and Jesus cast out devils by the Holy Ghost; nevertheless, the Son wrought. If the Holy Ghost is in us, the Father and the Son come and make their abode in us. Only it will be observed here that there is government. We are, according to the new life, sanctified unto obedience. It is not here a question of the love of God in sovereign grace to a sinner, but of the Father’s dealings with His children. Therefore it is in the path of obedience that the manifestations of the Father’s love and the love of Christ are found. We love, but do not caress, our naughty children. If we grieve the Spirit, He will not be in us the power of the manifestation to our souls of the Father and the Son in communion, but will rather act on our consciences in conviction, though giving the sense of grace. God may restore us by His love, and by testifying when we have wandered; but communion is in obedience. Finally, Jesus was to be obeyed; but it was the Father’s word to Jesus, observe, as He was here below. His words were the words of the Father.
The Holy Ghost bears testimony to that which Christ was, as well as to His glory. It is the manifestation of the perfect life of man, of God in man, of the Father in the Son-the manifestation of the Father by the Son who is in the bosom of the Father. Such were the words of the Son here below; and when we speak of His commandments, it is not only the manifestation of His glory by the Holy Ghost, when He is on high, and its results; but His commandments when He spoke here below, and spoke the words of God; for He had not the Holy Ghost by measure, so that His words would have been mingled, and partly imperfect, or at least not divine. He was truly man, and ever man; but it was God manifest in the flesh. The old commandment from the beginning is new, inasmuch as this same life, which expressed itself in His commandments, now moves in and animates us-true in Him and in us (compare 1Jn 2:1-29). The commandments are those of the man Christ, yet they are the commandments of God and the words of the Father, according to the life that has been manifested in this world in the Person of Christ. They express in Him, and form and direct in us, that eternal life which was with the Father, and which has been manifested to us in man-in Him whom the apostles could see, hear, and touch; and which life we possess in Him. Nevertheless the Holy Ghost has been given us to lead us into all truth, according to this same chapter of John’s Epistle-”Ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things.”
To direct life is different from knowing all things. The two are connected, because, in walking according to that life, we do not grieve the Holy Spirit, and we are in the light. To direct life, where it exists, is not the same thing as to give a law imposed on man in the flesh (righteously, no doubt), promising him life if he keep these commandments. This is the difference between the commandments of Christ and the law: not as to authority-divine authority is always the same in itself-but that the law offers life, and is addressed to man responsible in flesh, offering him life as the result; while the commandments of Christ express and direct the life of one who lives through the Spirit, in connection with his being in Christ, and Christ in him. The Holy Ghost (who, besides this, teaches all things) brought to remembrance the commandments of Christ-all things that He had said to them. It is the same thing in detail, by His grace, with Christians individually now.
Finally, the Lord, in the midst of this world, left peace to His disciples, giving them His own peace. It is when going away, and in the full revelation of God, that He could say this to them; so that He possessed it in spite of the world. He had gone through death and the drinking of the cup, put away sin for them, destroyed the power of the enemy in death, made propitiation by fully glorifying God. Peace was made, and made for them before God, and all that they were brought into-the light as He was, so that this peace was perfect in the light; and it was perfect in the world, because it brought them so into connection with God that the world could not even touch or reach their source of joy. Moreover Jesus had so accomplished this for them, and He bestowed it on them in such a way, that He gave them the peace which He Himself had with the Father, and in which, consequently, He walked in this world. The world gives a part of its goods while not relinquishing the mass; but what it gives, it gives away and has no longer. Christ introduces into the enjoyment of that which is His own-of His own position before the Father. [53] The world does not and cannot give in this manner. How perfect must that peace have been which He enjoyed with the Father-that peace He gives to us-His own!
There remains yet one precious thought-a proof of unspeakable grace in Jesus. He so reckons upon our affection, and this as personal to Himself, that He says to them, “If ye loved me ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father.” He gives us to be interested in His own glory, in His happiness, and, in it, to find our own.
Good and precious Saviour, we do indeed rejoice that Thou, who hast suffered so much for us, hast now fulfilled all things, and art at rest with Thy Father, whatever may be Thine active love for us. Oh that we knew and loved Thee better! But still we can say in fulness of heart, Come quickly, Lord! Leave once more the throne of Thy rest and of Thy personal glory, to come and take us to Thyself, that all may be fulfilled for us also, and that we may be with Thee and in the light of Thy Father’s countenance and in His house. Thy grace is infinite, but Thy presence and the joy of the Father shall be the rest of our hearts, and our eternal joy.
Here the Lord closes this part of His discourse. [54] He had shewn them as a whole all that flowed from His departure and from His death. The glory of His Person, observe, is always here the subject; for, even with regard to His death, it is said, “Now is the Son of man glorified.” Nevertheless He had forewarned them of it, that it might strengthen and not weaken their faith, for He would not talk much more with them. The world was under the power of the enemy, and he was coming: not because he had anything in Christ-he had nothing-therefore he had not even the power of death over Him. His death was not the effect of the power of Satan over Him, but thereby He shewed the world that He loved the Father; and He was obedient to the Father, cost what it would. And this was absolute perfection in man. If Satan was the prince of this world, Jesus did not seek to maintain His Messiah glory in it. But He shewed to the world, there where Satan’s power was, the fulness of grace and of perfection in His own Person; in order that the world might come from itself (if I may use such an expression)-those at least, who had ears to hear.
The Lord then ceases to speak, and goes forth. He is no longer seated with His own, as of this world. He arises and quits it.
That which we have said of the Lord’s commandments, given during His sojourn here below (a thought to which the succeeding chapters will give interesting development) helps us much in understanding the Lord’s whole discourse here to the end of chapter 16. The subject is divided into two principal parts:-The action of the Holy Ghost when the Lord should be away; and the relationship of the disciples to Him during His stay upon the earth. On the one hand, that which flowed from His exaltation to the right hand of God (which raised Him above the question of Jew and Gentile); and, on the other, that which depended on His presence upon earth, as necessarily centering all the promises in His own Person, and the relations of His own with Himself, viewed as in connection with the earth and themselves in it, even when He should be absent. There were, in consequence, two kinds of testimony: that of the Holy Ghost, strictly speaking (that is, what He revealed in reference to Jesus ascended on high); and that of the disciples themselves, as eye-witnesses to all that they had seen of Jesus on the earth (chap. 15:26,27). Not that for this purpose they were without the help of the Holy Ghost; but the latter was not the new testimony of the heavenly glory by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven. He brought to their remembrance that which Jesus had been, and that which He had spoken, while on earth. Therefore, in the passage we have been reading, His work is thus described (chap. Joh 14:26): “He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance whatsoever I have said unto you” (compare Joh 14:25). The two works of the Holy Ghost are here presented. Jesus had spoken many things unto them. The Holy Ghost would teach them all things; moreover, He would bring to their remembrance all that Jesus had said. In chapter Joh 16:12, Joh 13:1-38, Jesus tells them that He had many things to say, but that they could not bear them then. Afterwards, the Spirit of truth should lead them into all truth. He should not speak from Himself; but whatsoever He should hear, that should He speak. He was not like an individual spirit, who speaks on his own account. One with the Father and the Son, and come down to reveal the glory and the counsels of God, all His communications would be in connection with them, revealing the glory of Christ ascended on high-of Christ, to whom belonged all that the Father had. Here it is no question of recalling all that Jesus had said upon earth: all is heavenly in connection with that which is on high, and with the full glory of Jesus, or else relates to the future purposes of God. We shall return to this subject by-and-by. I have said these few words to mark the distinctions which I have pointed out.
Footnotes for John Chapter 14
52: Note, this is individual, not the union of the members of the body with Christ; nor is union indeed an exact term for it. We are in Him. This is more than union, but not the same thing. It is nature and life, and position in it, our place in that nature and life. When He was on earth, and they had not the Holy Ghost, they should have known that He was in the Father and the Father in Him. When He was in heaven, and they had the Holy Ghost, they would know they were in Him and He in them.
53: This is blessedly true in every respect, except of course essential Godhead and oneness with the Father: in this He remains divinely alone. But all He has as man, and as Son in manhood, He introduces into, “My Father and your Father, my God and your God.” His peace, His joy, the words the Father gave to Him, He has given to us; the glory given to Him He has given to us; with the love wherewith the Father has loved Him we are loved. The counsels of God were not merely to meet our responsibility as children of Adam, but before the world to put us into the same position with the second Adam, His own Son. And Christ’s work has made that to be righteousness.
54: Chapter 14 gives to us the Son’s personal relationship with the Father, and our place in Him who is in it, known by the Holy Ghost given. In chapter 15 we have His place and standing on earth, the true Vine, and then His state of glory as exalted and sending the Comforter to reveal that.
John Nelson Darby — Synopsis of the Books of the Bible: the New Testament (c. 1857–1862) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On v1
II
HEAVEN (THE HEAVENLY HOME) THROWN OPEN AND REVEALED BY THE REVELATION OF THE HEAVENLY CHRIST IN THIS PRESENT WORLD. GLORIFICATION OF THE WORLD BEYOND, RESULTANT UPON HIS GOING AWAY AND HIS UNION WITH THE DISCIPLES IN THE SPIRIT. UNDERNEATH THE STARRY HEAVENS. CHRIST THE WAY TO THE FATHER’S HOUSE. (THE MANIFESTATION OF THE FATHER (AND OF HEAVEN) IN THE VISIBLE WORLD. THE COMMUNION OF THE SPIRIT AS THE ENTRANCE TO THE FATHER’S HOUSE, OR AS THE TABERNACLE AND FORETOKEN OF THE HEAVENLY HOME. THOMAS, PHILIP, JUDAS LEBBÆUS, OR: 1. THE PERSONAL CHRIST, AS OPPOSED TO THE MENACING ACTUALITY OF THINGS, AND TO DOUBT; 2. THE SPIRITUAL MANIFESTATION OF GOD, IN OPPOSITION TO A VISIBLE APPEARANCE AND TO SENSUOUS PREJUDICE; 3. THE CHURCH OF THE LORD IN OPPOSITION TO THE WORLD AND TO WORLDLY MESSIANIC IDEALS)
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Joh_14:1-31
(Joh_14:1-14, Gospel for St. Philip and St. James’ Day; Joh_14:23-31 for Whit-Sunday.)
1Let not your heart be troubled: ye [omit ye] believe in God, believe also in me 2[Have faith in God, and have faith in me].1 In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. [For, ὅτι] I go to prepare a place for you. [Lange: If it were not so, would I then have said to you, I go to prepare 3a place for you?]2 And if [Lange: Even though] I go and prepare3 a place for you, I will [omit will] come [ἔρχομαι] again, and [will] receive [παραλήμψομαι] you unto myself; that where I am, there [omit there] ye may be also. 4And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know [And ye know the way whither I go, χαὶ ὅπου ἐγὼ ὑπάγω οἵδατε τὴν ὁδόν].4
5Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how Song of Solomon 6[should] we know the way?5 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, [and] the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by [through] me. 7If ye had known me, ye should [would] have known6 my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.
8Philip saith unto him, Lord, shew us the Father [visibly], and it sufficeth us [we shall be satisfied] 9Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me [dost thou not know me], Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then [omit then], Shew us the Father? 10Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father [is] in me? the words that I speak7 unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works [the Father, abiding in me, doeth his works].8 11Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or else [but if not] believe me9 for the very works’ sake. 12Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and [even] greater works [omit works] than these shall he do; because [for] I go unto my [the]10 Father. 13And whatsoever ye shall ask11 in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14If ye shall ask anything in my name, I will do it.12 15, If ye love me, keep my commandments. 16And I will [shall] pray the Father, and he shall [will] give you another Comforter [Paraclete13], that he may abide 17[be]14 with you for ever; Even [omit Even] the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because [for] it seeth [beholdeth] him not, neither knoweth him: but15 ye know him; for [because] he dwelleth [abideth] with you, and shall be 18[will be]16 in you. I will [shall] not leave you comfortless [orphans]: I will 19[shall] come to you. Yet a little while, and the world seeth [beholdeth] me no more; but ye see [behold] me: because [for] I live, [and] ye shall live also.—20At that day ye shall [will] know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you. 21He that hath [possesseth] my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me; and [but] he that loveth me shall [will] be loved of my Father, and I will [shall] love him, and will [shall] manifest myself to him.
22Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how17 is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world? 23Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man [any one] love me, he will keep my words [word]: and my Father will love him, and we will [shall] come unto him, and make our abode with him. 24He that loveth me not keepeth not my sayings [words]: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father’s which [who] sent me.
25These things have I spoken unto you, being yet present [while yet abiding, or, tarrying] with you. 26But the Comforter, which is [But the Paraclete, even] the Holy Ghost, whom the [my]18 Father will send in my name, he shall [will] teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever [which] I have said unto you. 27Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. 28Ye have heard how [that] I said unto you, I go away, and come again [omit again] unto you. If ye loved me, ye would rejoice [ye would have rejoiced, ἐχάρητε] because [that] I said [omit I said19], I go unto the Father: for my [the]20 Father is greater than I. 29And now I have told you before it come to pass, that, when it is come to pass, ye might [may] believe. 30Hereafter I will [shall] not talk much [add more] with you; for the prince of this [the]21 world cometh, and hath nothing in me [and of me there belongeth to him nothing at all]. 31But that the world may know that I love the Father; and as the Father gave me commandment [commanded me], even so [thus] I do. Arise, let us go hence.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
[These discourses were spoken after the Lord’s Supper, which took place, according to Lange and Tholuck, at Joh_13:34. A pause intervened between the close of the last and the beginning of this chapter. When Peter was “humbled and silent” (Lücke), and the other disciples sadly moved by what they had just heard of the treason of Judas, the denial of Peter and the departure of their beloved Lord and Master, He addressed to them these opening words of cheer which, coming from His lips with all the thrilling solemnities of the night preceding the crucifixion, have an immeasurable power of comfort and consolation in seasons of deepest distress and on the very borders of despair. The parting discourses have already been characterized at the beginning of John 13 and on Joh_13:31; but the beautiful remarks of Olshausen may here be added: “We come, finally,” he says, “to that portion of the evangelical history, which we may with propriety call its Holy of Holies. Our Evangelist, like a consecrated priest, alone opens to us the view into this sanctuary. This is composed of the last moments spent by the Lord in the midst of His disciples before His passion, when words full of heavenly thought flowed from His sacred lips. All that His heart which glowed with love had yet to say to His friends, was compressed into this short season. At first the interview with the disciples took the form of conversation; sitting at table they talked together familiarly. But when (Joh_14:31) the repast was finished, the language of Christ assumed a loftier strain; the disciples assembled around their Master, listened to the words of life and seldom spoke a word (only Joh_16:17; Joh_16:29). At length in the Redeemer’s sublime intercessory prayer, His full soul was poured forth in express petitions to His heavenly Father on behalf of those who were his own. Meanwhile, His discourse retained the form of free communication, in which no marks of designed arrangement are to be discovered, as would be the case with a formal oration.—It is a peculiarity of these last chapters, that they treat almost exclusively of the most profound relations—as that of the Son to the Father, and of both to the Spirit, that of the Christ to the Church, of the Church to the world, and so forth. Moreover, a considerable portion of these sublime communications surpassed the point of view to which the disciples had at that time attained; hence the Redeemer frequently repeats the same sentiments in order to impress them more deeply upon their minds, and, on account of what they still did not understand, He points them to the Holy Spirit, who would remind them of all His sayings, and lead them into the whole truth (Joh_14:26).”—P. S.]
Joh_14:1. Let not your heart be troubled [affrighted, μὴ ταρασσέσθω ὑμῶν ἡ καρδία].—The spirit, the soul, may be troubled (see chap.Joh_11:33; Joh_13:21); not so the heart, as the organ and symbol of trust. This encouragement has reference not simply to what He has told them about the approaching denial of Him (Chrysost., etc.), but, in the first place, to the announcement of His departure and to the decree uttered by Him (De Wette and others), to the effect that they could not follow Him. Taking this decree in its concrete sense, however, there comes into consideration as well the saying concerning the denial of Peter,—a saying which revealed a perspective full of danger to all the disciples. The prospect of the denial of faith’s goal in the high and invisible world which lay beyond them, was a prospect calculated to startle them, even when apprehended in the most general sense.
Trust in God, and (then) ye (will) trust in me [or rather: Have faith in God, and have faith in Me, πιστεύε̅ε (Imperative) εἰς τὸν θεὸν, καὶ εἰς ἐμὲ πιστεύετε (Imperative). See the Textual Notes.—P. S.]—Πιστεύειν does not here mean belief in the general sense of that term (in which sense they had belief), but in its special sense—trust: trust directed to God, and trust directed to Christ. Hence we translate: trust in; namely, in God who is on high; in Me when I ascend on high. This sets aside:
1. The interpretation: ‘ye believe in God, believe also in Me.’ With the first verb in the Indicative, the second in the Imperative (Vulg., Erasm. and others [E. V.]).
2. ‘If ye believe in God (as if it were εἰ πιστ.), ye believe also in Me’ (Luther).22 With the verb each time in the Indicative.
3. According to Cyril, Lücke, De Wette and others [Meyer, Alford, Godet], both expressions are in the Imperative: ‘Rely on God and rely also on Me.’ We do not think, however, that Christ can thus make two separate trusts. We might, perhaps, more reasonably expect: ‘Rely on Me; in so doing ye rely also on God,’—in analogy with the saying Joh_14:6. But here Christ’s ascension to heaven must be presupposed, as resulting from the fact that the Father in heaven is the goal towards whom that ascension tends. Therefore: Trust in God; in so doing ye do also trust in Me (εἰς, expressive of the direction of this trust to heaven and to the One who is about ascending into heaven).
Tholuok: “Even Erasmus observes that Joh_14:1 may be apprehended in four ways, according as πιστεύετε is assumed to be both times in the Indicative, the sense of an hypothesis being attached to the word at its first occurrence (Aug., Luth.), or taking the latter as Indicative and as a consequence of the former (Grot., Olsh. and others), or the former as Indicative and the second as Imperative (Vulg.), or, after the example of most of the church fathers, both as in the Imperative.” For the reasons cited above, we agree with Grotius in holding the first πιστεύετε to be in the Imperative mood,—attaching to it the sense of trust, however—and the second to be consecutive to the first.
[I prefer to read πιστεύετε both times imperatively, as in Joh_14:11, because this agrees best with the preceding imperative, μὴ ταρασσέθω, and with the fresh, direct, hortatory character of the address. The other interpretations introduce a reflective tone. Our Lord exhorts and encourages the disciples to dismiss all trouble from their hearts and to exercise full trust and confidence (πιστεύετ.e, emphatically first and last) in God, who has in reserve for them many mansions in heaven, and consequently also to trust in Christ, who is one with the Father and is going to prepare a place for them; faith in God and faith in Christ are inseparable (hence εἰς ἐμέ is placed before the second πιστεύετε), and the glorification of the Son is a glorification of the Father in the Son; comp. Joh_13:31-32, with which this passage is closely connected. In claiming the same trust and reliance on Himself as on the Father, Christ makes Himself equal with God, as in Joh_5:17; Joh_5:23. Hence there is here no addition of faith in Christ to faith in God (as Olshausen objects), nor a transfer of our trust from its proper object to another, but simply the concentration of our trust in the unseen God—who out of Christ is a mere abstraction—upon the incarnate Son, in whom this trust becomes real and effective.—P. S.]
Joh_14:2. In my Father’s house [ἐν τῇ οἰκίᾳ τοῦ πατρός μου μοναὶ πολλαί εἰσιν. Mark the simple, childlike, cheering character of this address to dear children (τεκνία, Joh_13:33): the touching ideas of Father, house, home, peaceful and durable rest, room enough for all in heaven.—P. S.] The house of the Father is the real temple of God, as opposed to the typical temple or house of the Father (Joh_2:16), which they are now cast out of, having taken their leave of it as Jews. According to Meyer [p. 505], this house is “not heaven in general, but the particular dwelling-place of the divine δόξα in heaven, the place of His glorious throne (Psa_2:4; Psa_33:13 ff.; Isa_63:15, etc.), considered as the heavenly sanctuary (Isa_57:15), according to the analogy of the temple at Jerusalem as the οῖ̓κος τοῦ πατρός on earth (Joh_2:16).” But not in vain is it written: Our Father in the heavens (Mat_6:9); Christ came down from heaven (Joh_3:13); ascended into heaven (Act_1:11); is set on the throne of the Majesty in the heavens (Heb_8:1); the inheritance of Christians is reserved for them in the heavens (1Pe_1:4). Therefore even if the throne of God be denominated the central point in the heavens or the highest point above the heavens, still the heavens themselves are not excluded from being His house, for there is a distinction between the seat or throne in a house and the house itself; and this irrespective of the fact that heaven is also simply called His throne, Isa_66:1. We assume, moreover, that we are not required to make a spiritualistic separation between God’s heaven and the starry universe, and that the aspect of the starry heavens is a figure to us of the heavenly mansions, even though it be true that all stars are not to be regarded as heavenly places. (See my book: The Land of Glory.23 Kurtz, Bible and Astronomy; also my Leben Jesu, II. p. 1349.) And so it is most probable that Jesus spoke these words to the disciples as they were leaving the Passover room, pointing, as He uttered them, up to the starry sky. [According to Joh_14:31, they seem to have been still in the room, but see Lange’s notes on the passage.—P. S.] Henceforth they, like Him, were strangers on earth, having no abiding place: at this moment He disclosed heaven to their view and gave them a promise of the many dwelling-places in the Father’s house. Hence the significant choice of the expression: μοναί, a place of rest, a lodging.
[The term μοναί, which in the N. T. occurs only here and Joh_14:23, is derived from μένω, to abide, and hence implies the idea of abode, rest, stability, home (comp. μένουσαν πόλιν, Heb_13:14; the σκηναὶ αἰώνιοι, Luk_16:9, and the οἰκοδομὴν ἐκ θεοῦ, the οἰκία ἀχειροποίητος ἀιώνιος έντοῖς οὐρανοῖς, 2Co_5:1). The E. V. mansion, from mansio, manere, μένειν (introduced by Tyndale), here and in old English means dwelling-house, not, as in modern usage, manor-house, palace. Christ probably alludes to the temple, His Father’s house on earth (Joh_2:16; Rev_3:12; comp. Luk_2:49) with its numerous chambers (1Ki_6:5-6; 1Ki_6:10), perhaps also to the vast oriental palaces with apartments for all the princes and courtiers. Heaven is not only a state, which commences already here on earth with the presence of Christ in the soul and the possession of everlasting life by faith in Him, but also a place, from which Christ descended and to which He ascended, and where He, with the Father and the Spirit, dwells among saints and angels, patriarchs and prophets (Luk_13:28), in the fulness of His majesty and glory. Philosophy and astronomy are unable to define the locality of this spiritual heaven, it is a matter of pure faith, yet most real, even more so than this changing earth; for earth is but the footstool of God and derives its value from the life and light of the supernatural world above, around and within us. The Jewish Rabbis distinguished two heavens (comp. Deu_10:14, the “heaven and the heaven of heavens”), or seven heavens (severally called velum, expansum, nubes, habitaculum, habitatio, sedes fixa, araboth; see Wetstein on 2Co_12:2). St. Paul speaks of the third heaven (2Co_12:2), which by some commentators is placed beyond the atmospheric and the starry heavens; but heaven may be much nearer than is generally supposed. According to the Apocalypse, the many heavenly mansions here spoken of are after all not the final but the intermediate resting-places of the saints till the general resurrection when the heavenly Jerusalem will descend upon the new, glorified earth, and God will dwell with His people for ever, Rev_21:1 ff.; 2Pe_3:13. Then heaven and earth will be one; earth being changed to heaven and heaven to earth, “one kingdom, joy and union without end.”—P. S.]
Many mansions. Tholuck: “In the multiplicity of the μοναί the fathers discovered a diversity of grades; thus Clemens Alex., etc., also Stier, Lange, etc. The context, however, does not indicate any difference of degrees, but simply the multiplicity of the dwellings.” But if this multiplicity were merely quantitative and not qualitative as well, the expression: there is room enough, would suffice. Of course the words convey this meaning too, in accordance with Luther’s saying: “If the devil with his tyrants hunt you out of the world, ye shall still have room enough.” [Wordsworth agrees with Lange as to different degrees of felicity in the same blessed eternity. But Meyer, Godet and Alford confine πολλαί to the number: mansions enough for each and all, ἰκαναὶ δέξασθαι καὶ ὑμᾶς (Euthym. Zig.) The idea of degrees of dignity and blessedness in heaven corresponding to the degrees of perfection, though perhaps not implied in the word many here, is certainly scriptural, comp. 1Co_15:41, and has always been admitted in the Church. No envy or jealousy will arise from disparity of glory, for, as Augustine says, the unity of love will reign in all.—P. S.]24
If it were not so, would I have told you: I go to prepare a place for you? [This is Lange’s construction, which differs from the English V. Comp. Textual Notes and see below.—P. S.] Various constructions:
1. The fathers, Erasm., Luther and others [Maldonatus, Bengel, Ebrard], Hofmann: “If it were not so, I would say to you: I go to prepare a place for you.” [These interpreters refer εῖ̓πον ἂν ὑμῖν to the following ὅτι πορεύομαι. Lange does the same, but makes the sentence a question.—P. S.] Meyer thinks that Joh_14:3 is decisive against this supposition; according to that verse Jesus actually goes and prepares a place. But it would not be the only passage in which John presents a relative antithesis in the form of an absolute one. (See Joh_1:11-12.) A more powerful consideration against the view is, that the work of Christ joins on to the work of the Father, re-organizing the creation but not extending it (Leben Jesu, II. p. 1350).
2. Laurent. Valla, Beza, Calvin, Lücke, Tholuck and many others have placed a period after εὶπον ἂν ὑμῖν. “If it were not so, I would have told you.”25 The expression of Christ’s veracity might recommend this reading, if the idea of the heavenly dwellings had been already diffused among the disciples. But this was not the case: hitherto they had had but the idea of Sheol, with its two grand divisions: Paradise and the place of punishment [Gehenna]. Hence it would have been superfluous for Christ to deny the truth of an idea which as yet they had not entertained.
3. We, therefore, adopt the interrogative apprehension of the words: “would I then, etc.?” (Mosheim, Ernesti, Beck); yet not in the sense of the Present: would I tell you? against which Meyer cites the aorist εῖ̓πον, but: would I have told you? (Ewald). He has really told them this, though not literally, any more than He said to the Jews—Joh_10:14—: Ye are not My sheep (comp. Joh_14:26); for instance Joh_8:22; comp. Joh_13:33; Joh_10:4; Joh_10:11; Joh_14:28-29; Joh_12:26. So, then, He has told them before this, that He is going to another world where He has destined abiding-places for them near Himself. It is His intention now to develop this germ of revelation in the most glorious disclosures concerning heaven. The μονή is there already; by Christ, and above all by His making Himself the centre of it, it shall be converted into a fitting τόπος for them and all believers. For ἑτοιμάσαι τόπον does not mean: to create the place as a place, but: to arrange it as a habitable place. [Comp. 2Pe_1:11 : “An entrance shall be richly ministered unto you into the eternal kingdom of our Lord;” 2Co_5:1, “a building from God, a dwelling not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” Alford quotes here from the Te Deum: “When Thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death, Thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven to all believers.” Christ prepared a heavenly home for His disciples by His atoning death, resurrection and ascension; but considering that the heavenly mansions are merely intermistic abodes, the term may perhaps also refer to the building up of the heavenly Jerusalem, which is ultimately to descend upon the new earth. On πορεν́ομαι Augustine and Wordsworth remark: “Christ sets out on a journey, to prepare a place for us. Let Him depart; let Him ascend, and not be visible to the bodily eye; let Him be hidden from it, that thus He may be seen by the eye of faith; and being so seen, may be desired; and being desired, may be possessed for ever; the desire of our love is the preparation of our house in heaven.”—P. S.]
Joh_14:3. And though I go.—Here stress is laid upon the going away. To prepare for them the place in the inheritance of glory, He must, indeed, first leave them. But the going away is to be counterbalanced by His coming again to take them to Himself. [Meyer: καὶ ἐάν, not κ. ὅταν. Jesus does not intend to indicate the time of His return, but the consequence of His departure. The πορεύεσθαι k. ἑτοιμάσαι are the antecedent facts which, once accomplished, result in the πάλινʼ ἐρχομαι. The nearness or distance of this return is left undecided by ἐάν.—P. S.]
I come again [πάλιν ἔρχομαι].—Three different interpretations:
1. As referring to the παρουσία, of Christ on the last day (Origen, Calvin, Lampe, Meyer, Hofmann [also Luthardt, Brückner, Ewald]). On which Meyer: It is the idea of the imminent Parousia, an idea appearing also in John, though with less prominence. [Meyer refers to Joh_5:28 ff; Joh_21:22; 1Jn_2:28.—P. S.] This view is contradicted (a) by the erroneousness of the supposition that the disciples (or Christ Himself) conceived of the Parousia as so imminent, in a chronological sense. (b) By the fact that in the true Parousia there is to take place, not a re-union between Christ and His people in heaven (where Christ is), but a re-union on earth (where the Church is; see Rev. chap. 14 and 20); while here the disclosures made concern the heaven beyond this life, not the earth with its future destiny of glorification, (c) By the circumstance that the Present ἔρχομαι denotes a right speedy return of Christ, thus being adapted to console these disciples at their separation from Christ and in the sufferings inflicted upon them through persecution.
2. Christ’s coming again to His people, through His Spirit, and their reception into the full and holy spiritual fellowship of the glorified Christ, in accordance with Joh_14:18 (Lücke, Neander [Godet], etc.). But that this spiritual re-union is not the precise thing intended by the passage, though con-supposed or pre-supposed, results from the fact that Christ is here speaking of coming to fetch them to a goal whose locality is determined.
3. The words are indicative of a coming of Jesus for the purpose of receiving the disciples into heaven by means of a blissful death (Grotius, Knapp, Baumg.-Crusius, Nitzsch [Reuss, Tholuck, Hengstenberg] and others). Against this view Meyer remarks: “It is in opposition to these words (comp. Joh_14:21-22) and to the manner in which other portions of the New Testament speak of the coming of Christ; death truly transports the apostles and martyrs to Christ (2Co_5:8; Php_1:23; Act_7:59), but nowhere is it said of Christ that He comes and takes them to Himself. Except in the Paraclete of whom John treats, Christ comes only in His glory at the Parousia.” Against this we would remind our readers that the parable of Lazarus mentions a calling for and carrying away of pious souls (Luk_16:22). There, indeed, the coming of angels is still the temporary substitute for Christ’s coming Himself. But when dying Stephen prays: “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit” (Act_7:58), he takes it for granted that the Lord is coming to meet his parting spirit; for this cause he saw Jesus beforehand, already standing, i.e. having arisen from His throne, on the point of receiving or fetching him (Act_7:55). Further, unless we are willing to affirm that the saying of Christ, Joh_21:22, has not been fulfilled, there is no way in which we can understand it except as referring to His coming to John in death, to take him away with Him. Dying believers also (not “Apostles and Martyrs” only) are in Jesus’ hand (Joh_10:28). But, without doubt, this coming of Jesus to believers in death is connected with His spiritual and yet personal coming to them in life, in Word and Sacrament, and in the Holy Ghost (Joh_17:23; Rev_1:8; Joh_3:20) and, similarly, it points to the last coming of Christ (Stier, and my Leben Jesu, ΙΙ. p. 1351). Tholuck: “It only remains to explain ἐρχομαι agreeably to Biblical usage, according to which the word to come, to visit, פקד, is employed to express every revelation of the Lord, every manifestation of His power, whether for good or evil, comp. Joh_14:18; Joh_14:23; Joh_14:30; Mat_10:23; Mat_26:64, and in Revelation whose whole theme is the ἔρχεσθαι of the Lord.”
[Alford in loc., with Stier and Lange, takes a comprehensive ‘perspective’ view of the coming again of our Lord from the resurrection of Christ to the final judgment. “This ἔρχομαι is begun (Joh_14:18) in His resurrection—carried on (Joh_14:23) in the spiritual life (Joh_16:22 ff.), the making them ready for the place prepared;—further advanced when each by death is fetched away to be with Him (Php_1:23); fully completed at His coming in glory, when they shall for ever be with Him (1Th_4:17) in the perfected resurrection state.”—P. S.]
Joh_14:4. And whither I go.—See the Text. note. According to the Recepta Christ says to them: “Ye know the goal whither I go, and so ye also know the way.” This reading seems to be confirmed by Joh_14:5, since Thomas too distinguishes between the goal and the way. But the connection rests upon the contrast of Christ’s spiritual view to the sensual view which Thomas takes of the matter. Christ means to say: because ye know the way to the place to which I am going, ye also know the goal. Thomas, on the other hand, says: because we know not the goal, neither do we know the way. For here the subject of discourse is not simply the Father’s house, or the Father generally, as the goal of Christ (Joh_14:2, to which Tholuck refers), but that place in the hereafter, the place of Christ’s glory. The way should be their guide to an inference concerning the goal. Interpretation of the way: 1. The Passion and death of Christ (Luther, Grotius and others, Luthardt. Tholuck “the way of denial,” Joh_13:36; Joh_12:24; Joh_12:26). 2. Christ Himself, in accordance with Joh_14:6 (De Wette, Meyer). Christ most undoubtedly; Christ, however, in His motion; consequently the view presented in No. 1 is equally to be held here, in accordance with Joh_14:3 (Tittmann, Knapp). The expression is not anacoluthical; it is a specimen of breviloquence. And whither I (ἐγώ, emphatic) go, thither ye know the way. Christ is the living way for Himself and His people to δόξα with the Father.
Joh_14:5. Thomas saith unto Him: Lord, we know not.—This was perfectly correct, supposing the goal to be inwardly and outwardly determined. Here the way or direction is known only by the goal. Grotius: Quodsi ignoretur, quæ sit meta, non potest via sub ratione viæ concipi. But this reflection is an accessory consideration merely; the main point is the oppressive sense of obscurity, of uncertainty with regard to the goal—uncertainty arising from their imperfect apprehension of their Lord and Master.
Joh_14:6. Jesus saith unto him: I am the way.—The answer of Jesus is not intended to divert the over-forward curiosity of Thomas, as Calvin supposes. (“In re magis necessaria insistit.”26) Thomas has declared that he does not know the way to that goal of Christ, because he is ignorant of the goal itself. Jesus answers, very pertinently: I am the way; only for Him the way means something different from the idea which it conveys to the mind of Thomas. The contrast is, however, not that which exists between an exterior way and a spiritual one; it is a contrast between a local, dead, external way and a dynamical, living way, with which latter, incontrovertibly, the attribute of spirituality is bound up. Since the way is the main idea, it follows: 1. that the words: the truth and the life [καὶ ἡ ἀλήθεια καὶ ἡ ζωή], are explicative (the truth as well as the life), primarily of this way, i.e. for this reason: because He is absolutely truth and life; 2. that, on the other hand, the words: No one cometh unto the Father but by Me, are an applicative circumscription. The significative summing up of Augustine: vera via vitæ [the true way of life], is inadmissible, for it fuses into one the three definitions. Neither may they be apprehended as three co-ordinate definitions as (1) in respect of time; Luther: the beginning, the middle and the end on the ladder to heaven; (2) in respect of effects, Grotius: exemplum, doctor, dator vitæ æternæ. On the contrary, the way is the whole idea, metaphorically presented (De Wette, my Leben Jesu, p. 1353, Tholuck). We must further guard against conceiving of the way as the bare, objective means of salvation (Meyer, Tholuck); it is the objective and effectual means of coming to δόξα with the Father through salvation (redemption and glorification comprehended together in the predominant idea of glorification). But He is the way in an absolute sense because, in His own coming from the Father and going to the Father, He is absolute motion (the pioneer) and in His going first and bringing to the Father, He is the absolute motor. (A warranted double reference in Augustine, Lampe and others, misconstrued by Tholuck as an irrelevancy; Heb_9:12.)
But now, to enter into particulars, Christ is the truth of this way, the clear manifestation of it, because He is, in general, the truth or manifestation of God; and He is the life of this way, the animating motive power by which we come to the Father, because He is, in general, life. This life is, indeed, ζωὴ αἰώνιος; it is, however, in part conceived of more generally, in part differently applied. The difficult conception of life presents for observation these items: the powers of development, appearance and action. If we turn truth into the metaphorical expression: light, then light and life appear side by side as exponents of the way,—that being identical with love, and, similarly, our transport past hate and its exponents, darkness and death.
No man cometh unto the Father.—“ ‘And so, when a man is saved, the Lord Christ must have a hand in the work,’ says Luther, rightly citing these words against Zwingli, who makes a Theseus, a Socrates, to be saved even without Christ.” Thus Tholuck; inexactly, however; proof should have been adduced that Zwingli expressly taught the possibility of being saved in the other world without Christ, and that Luther, on the other hand, advanced the doctrine of salvation in the other world through Christ. De Wette observes: “the exclusive principle, to the effect, namely, that no man cometh unto the Father but by Christ, is mitigated in reference to those who are ignorant of Him as the historical Messiah, by the fact that He is also the eternal, ideal Logos.” More definitely stated: that He is also the eternal Christ and High-priest. (See 1Pe_3:19; 1Pe_4:6.)
Joh_14:7. If ye had known Me.—In accordance with the antithesis: known the Father, the emphasis falls thus: known Me, not upon ἐγνώκ. It is not His intention utterly to deny their knowledge of His personality; what grieves Him, is that they have as yet not recognized in Him the absolute way to the absolute goal, i.e. the living, heavenly image of the heavenly Father,—an image coming from heaven and going to heaven. In a knowledge of the eternal, divine-human personality of Christ they would also have obtained a view of the personal Father and His love-kingdom in heaven—a kingdom elevated above all transitory things.—And from henceforth.—The sharp contrast: ye have not known the Father, and from henceforth ye know Him, is somewhat striking; hence it has been the subject of various interpretations: 1. The terminus a quo is imminent in the future; it is the time of the communication of the Spirit (Chrysost., Lücke and others; the explanation of Kuinoel and others, who apprehend the verbs as though they were in the Future tense, is but another phase of the above). 2. The statement is hypothetical: from henceforth, I hope (De Wette). 3. The from henceforth is indicative of the beginning of appropriation, comp. Joh_15:3 (Tholuck). 4. From henceforth, “after My having told you, Joh_14:6, what I am” (Meyer).—The from henceforth denotes that method just now to be disclosed by Him, and which He desired sharply to define, by which they were to arrive at a knowledge of the Father and the Father’s House—the method of faith, namely. Doubtless, however, the ἄρτι at the same time embraces the confirmation of this method by the whole grand period of Christ’s death and resurrection, whereby, according to Rom_1:4, He was demonstrated to be the Son of God and thus at once made the Surety and the Heir of the Father in heaven. The καί is expressive of both contrast and connection.—Ye have seen Him.—Said of the intuitive glance of faith.
Joh_14:8. Philip saith unto Him: Lord, show us, etc.—As the seeming contradictions of reality darken the glimpse which Thomas’ faith might have of things spiritual, so Philip, in like manner, looks for the confirmation of faith by sight; comp. Joh_1:46; Joh_6:5. According to De Wette, Tholuck, Meyer: he demands that Jesus effect a theophany, in accordance with Mal_3:1; as Exo_33:18. The main point is this: accepting Christ’s words: ye have seen Him, in their literal sense, he requires that Jesus should occasion an appearing of the Father outside of Christ; a sign in the heaven, perhaps, rather than a theophany. Luther: “he flutters up into the clouds.” He declares his faith by assuming Jesus to be capable of producing such a vision; his failing to perceive the manifestation of the Father in Christ, however, proves that faith to be but small.—And it sufficeth us.—I. e. in accordance with the context: it suffices to render us certain of the goal above us or beyond us, and to make us journey towards it with a brave heart; or, to cause us to abandon the expectations we have hitherto entertained and to embrace the new hope.
Joh_14:9. And thou hast not known Me.—For so long time I have appeared among you and hast thou not known the nature of My appearing? Not alone from the “words and works,” but from the whole personality of Christ he should have recognized His heavenly origin, which did, indeed, display itself in word and work.
Joh_14:10. I am in the Father, and the Father in Me.—See Joh_10:38. There the order is inverted, and with reason. The Father is in Christ in virtue of His Father-revelation in the works of Christ. Christ is in the Father in virtue of His Son-revelation in His words. The Jews were to ascend from a belief in His works and mission to a belief in His words and individual personality. But the disciples began with a belief in His word and they have not to ascend to a belief in His works, but to advance to a discrimination between the manifestation of the Father in Him through His works and His being in the Father with His word. Though Christ even speaks His word according to the Father’s commission (Joh_12:50), there is still this distinction: that the words are His most individual, personal life-revelation, while in the works the most special concurrence of the Father’s government is, consciously to Christ, manifested in the creation and the human world. We may not wipe out this contrast with De Wette: “The words that I speak to you, I speak not of Myself, and the works that I do, I do not of Myself, but the Father who is in Me teacheth Me the words and doeth the works.” Neither does there occur a climactic progression (as Theoph. and Lücke pretend): not only are the words God’s words, but the works also are God’s works. As little are the works here intended as a proof that Christ does not speak the words of Himself (Grot., Fritzsche, Meyer). Least of all are the works to be apprehended as effects of the word as “the office of teaching” (Aug., Nösselt); nor are we to assume with Tholuck the existence of an “incongruence of contrasts peculiar to the Johannean style.” Even the words Christ speaks not of Himself; as the Son He utters them from the depths of the Father; as it respects them, however, the initiative lies within Himself, while for the works the initiative is in the Father who permanently dwells in Him (μένων). Words and works are the property of both Father and Son; the words, however, are preëminently and primarily the Son’s, the works preëminently and primarily the Father’s.
Joh_14:11. Believe me for the very works’ sake [διὰ τὰ ἔργα αὐτὰ πιστεύετέ μοι].—Jesus here turns to the disciples as a body. For as Thomas’ doubt was, more or less, the doubt of all, so the like was the case with the scruple of Philip. The explanation of the verse results from the foregoing. As disciples of Jesus, they ought first to believe that He was in the Father and then to know that the Father was in Him. If ye are not able to do this,—it is His intention to say to them in a few sharp words,—why then go to work the other way: begin with the works (in the way pointed out to the Jews, Joh_10:38) and, through a belief in the divinity of My works, arrive at a belief in the divinity of My person.
Joh_14:12. Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth in me, the works that I do he shall do also, etc.—Now follows, undoubtedly, a new series of consolations. Not only shall they be united to Him, but also He to them (Tholuck). The further progress of the discourse, however, must correspond with the principal thought, according to which His earthly appearance shall cease to veil from them the heavenly house of the Father. The disclosure of which we speak, consists in the revelation of that personal, heavenly life which issues from His person as its centre. Verily, verily, therefore it is written, he that believeth on Me, i.e. on the divine personality of Christ Himself, the works that I do, shall he do also, and greater works than these. I. e.: Through this faith there shall be developed in that man likewise such a mighty, personal spirit-life that works shall be the necessary outflowings of the life-spring of personality, which, originating in Christ, wells up within his breast;. the heavenly state shall be unfolded to him on earth and become his surety for the heavenly home, which last should be regarded as the perfect revelation and realization of the personal kingdom of love founded by Christ in this world.—He that believeth on Me.—Not simply applicable “to the disciples of Jesus” in the strictest sense (Meyer). Still the “believeth on Me,” is emphatic. Bengel: qui Christo de se loquenti credit, i.e. he that believes on Himself, His personality (see Joh_14:11).—The works that I do he shall also do himself.—Expressive of the essential relationship or homogeneousness existing between the works of believers and the works of Christ; of the eternal progress of Christ’s wonder-works through the world by means of Christianity.
And (even) greater than these shall he do [και μείζονα τούτων ποιήσει].—The καί is climactic: And even. Tholuck: “Ancient writers believe this greaterness [μειζονότης] of the ἔργα to consist: 1. In their numerical superiority; 2. in their local extension beyond Judea; 3. in the more striking signs, such as the healing by the shadow of Peter, Acts 5 (Theod., Herakl.).27 Origen: In the victories which believers obtain, through faith, over the world, the flesh and the devil. Augustine: In the results of the preached word in the heathen world. Joh_4:38 He had, with prophetic glance, declared that others would reap what He had sowed; Joh_15:26-27, and, indirectly, Joh_8:28; Joh_12:32 are likewise indicative of the greater efficacy of the Messiah through the medium of the apostolic testimony.” Be it observed in this connection that even here, Joh_14:14, it is Christ that will do these greater works; the disciples, through their prayers in His name, in fellowship with Him, are to be but the instruments through which He acts, Joh_15:16; Joh_16:28; comp. Act_3:6; Act_16:18. Luther: “For He took but a little corner for Himself, to preach and to work miracles in, and but a little time; whereas the apostles and their followers have spread themselves through the whole world.” Manifestly, Christ has in view the greatness of the development of His wondrous works throughout the Christian ages until the glorification of the world. [Alford: “This word μείζονα τούτων is not to be evaded (so as to=πλείονα, Lampe), but taken in its full strict sense. And the key to its meaning will be found Joh_1:51; Joh_5:20. The works which Jesus did, His Apostles also did,—scil., raising the dead, etc.;—greater works than those they did,—not in degree, but in kind: spiritual works, under the dispensation of the Spirit, which had not yet come in. But they did them, not as separate from Him: but in Him, and by Him; and so (Joh_5:21) He is said so to do them. The work which He did by Peter’s sermon, Acts 2, was one of these μείζονα τούτων,—the first-fruits of the unspeakable gift. This union of them with and in Him is expressed here by τὰ ἔργα ἃ ἐγὼ ποιῶ, κἀκεῖνος ποιήσει.” “He has sown, we reap; and the harvest is greater than the seed-time.” Stier. Godet (ii. 472) refers the μείζονα to the communication of spiritual life which is superior to the healing of the body. “Le terme plus grand ne désigne pas des miracles plus prodigieux, mais des miracles d’une nature plus excellente.”—P. S.]
For I am going to the Father, and whatever ye shall ask, etc. [ὄτιἐγὼπρὸςτὸνπατέρα (μου) πορεύομα ι, καὶ ὅ, τι ἄν αἰτήσητε].—Rationale of the preceding and, in the abstract, astonishing clause. Various interpretations: 1. The πορεύομαι forms the foundation for the idea that they are to do the miracles in His stead, because of His retirement from the scene (Chrysostom, Theophylact and many others [A. V.]); 2. because He goes to the Father, i.e. to glory with the Father and will thence work in them in His might (Luther, Baumg.-Crusius, Luthardt and others). In the first case a period follows πορεύομαι; in the second a comma. 3. The two considerations are not to be sundered. His going to the Father (ἐγώ is emphasized), as well as His being with the Father, is the reason for their doing greater miracles (Grotius, Lücke and others). When this view of the matter is taken, πορεύομαι is connected with the following sentence by a colon (Knapp, Griesbach, Lachmann, Tischendorf). Both items are more directly emphasized in Joh_16:7, in accordance with which our passage is to be explained.
Joh_14:13. Shall ask in My name.—Exposition of the import of His going to the Father, in reference to their destiny to work miracles. Invocation of God in the name of Jesus, in order to any τὶ in the way of works of redemption or glorification; that is, in order to the working of miracles. Their power of prayer is to have no other limit than His name. A name is objectively the revelation of any subject,—subjectively, experience of it; the signature of its consciousness stamped upon the consciousness of others. The name of the heavenward ascending Jesus is the Elijah-mantle left by Him to His people on the earth: the sign of the living revelation and knowledge of His essence, in which His essence, fully concentrated, works. His name, viewed by faith, is the continual working of His essence, or, rather, of His personality: the element of His personal self-revelation in the experience of His people; hence a. His word or cognizance, b. His Spirit or mind, c. His works, His institutions and instigations, d. His aim. In a word: the communion of His Spirit. There are various interpretations which form different parts of the one just given: I. Bearing upon the principle. Chrysostom: Amidst the invocation of the name of Christ (formal); Augustine; In the name of Him who is called Salvator (non contra salutem nostram);28 2. Bearing upon the medium. Melanchthon: Me agnito; Luther: With faith in Me; Calov: Per meritum meum. 3. Bearing upon the end. Erasmus: In gloriam Christi. Or upon the furtherance of the end; De Wette: In accordance with My mind, and in My cause.29 If we desire to sum up all in one, No. 2, setting forth the medium, seems best fitted for our purpose: in faith, knowing and confessing Christ; hence, briefly, ἐν χριστῷ, ἐν κυρίῳ (Lücke), only with a more objective and teleological modification. Manifestly, the prevailing thought is the end purposed; hence the predominance of the idea: as ambassadors of Christ, the Son of God, by virtue of His δόξα. See Joh_15:16; Joh_16:23. Tholuck: “When even finite good things are prayed for in accordance with the mind of Christ, they are desired only as means to the final end, Mat_6:33. As, however, this may be attained by other means, the cardo desiderii is fulfilled even when specific requests are denied” (Augustine). Nevertheless, the ideal side of prayer, its perfect, prophetic nature, is here assumed, and, such being the case, the ὃ, τι is fulfilled in the τοῦτο.
That will I do [τοῦτο ποιήσω].—Stress falls upon τοῦτο; the ἐγώ, expressed in conjunction with πορεύομαι, is absent here. He will do precisely that for which they pray, and in such a manner, besides, that their doing in the matter shall be vindicated,—their believing, individual personality.
That the Father may be glorified.—The end is the δόξα; modified, the δόξα of the Father; still more explicitly defined, the δόξα of the Father in the Son. Hence results, also, the modification of prayer in the name of Jesus as prayer in the δόξα of the name of the Son of God, in the name of the glorified Christ.
Joh_14:14. If ye shall ask anything [τι] in My name, I will do it [ἐγώ—emphatic—ποιήσω].
Joh_14:14 appears, at first sight, to be a recapitulative repetition of the foregoing (Euthymius); Bengel, however, very justly gives prominence to the ἐγώ. Here the definite ὃ, τι , or the thing (this simply τι) is no longer emphasized; but stress is laid upon the asking in the name of Jesus,—the mind, the communion of spirit with Him, and, to correspond with this, upon His doing, as His doing. According to the preceding verse, He does it upon the request of the disciples; here He does it through their request, Himself, again. At the same time Joh_14:14 forms an introduction to Joh_14:15-16. See Joh_16:23. In the latter passage the doing is ascribed to the Father. But the Father operates through the Son. Here we see the instrumentality, there the final causality.
Joh_14:15. If ye love me, keep my commandments [ἐὰνἀγαπᾶτέμ ε, τὰςἐντολὰδτὰςἐμὰςτηρήσατε].—Jesus proceeds to explain more fully how the disciples are to attain to the doing of the greater works in His name. The first condition is, however, an assumption as well; to the effect, namely, that they love Him. Thence it will follow that they will keep His commandments, embraced, as these are, in the one commandment of fellowship. If they thus stand in the fellowship of prayer (see Act_2:1, ὁμοθυμαδὸν ἐπὶ τὸ αὐτό), the Holy Ghost shall, at Christ’s intercession, be given them. Tholuck: “With John, love is no mere blissfulness of feeling; it is oneness of will with the beloved, Joh_14:21; Joh_15:14; 1Jn_3:18. It is love which makes men susceptible of the communication of the Paraclete; the κόσμος cannot receive Him.” A loving contemplation of Christ’s personality is the bond of fellowship of disciples,—that which makes them a collective personality—and in this fellowship they may become the organ of the personal manifestation of the Holy Ghost.
Joh_14:16. And I will entreat the Father [καὶ ἐγω ἐρωτήσω τὸν πατέρα].—Christ here makes choice of the term ἐρωτᾶν, not αἰτεῖν, as before, in reference to the disciples. Expressive of a more intimate, free and homogeneous relation. In Joh_16:26, on the contrary, He says: οὐ λέγω, ὄτι ἐρωτήσω. Tholuck, setting aside Calov’s explanation: non solus, sed vobiscum rogabo, remarks: “He is there speaking of the time when they, in possession of the Spirit whose mediation is here promised, shall be able themselves to pray acceptably in that Spirit.”
And he shall give you another representative, or, helper [καὶ ἄλλον παρά-κλητον δώσει ὑμῖν].—Here the great promise of the παράκλητος, to speak more accurately, the ἄλλος παράκλητος, makes its appearance; the promise of the Holy Ghost, spoken of under this name by John only, Joh_14:26; Joh_15:26; Joh_16:7.30 The word itself is never met with in the New Testament except in the writings of John, yet the designation: ἄλλος παράκλητος, announces that it may be applied to Christ also.
[The designation of the Holy Ghost, as another Paraclete, who would supply Christ’s own place in His absence, implies that the Lord Himself is the first Paraclete; and this is confirmed by 1Jn_2:1, where “Jesus Christ the righteous ”is called παράκλητος πρὸς τὸν πατέρα. This allusion is lost to the readers of our English version. I quote here beforehand the excellent interpretation of Calvin in loc.: “The name Paraclete is here applied to Christ as well as to the Spirit, and properly: for it is the common office of each to console and encourage us and to preserve us by their defence. Christ was their patron as long as He lived in the world; He then committed them to the guidance and protection of the Spirit. If any one asks whether we are not to-day under the guardianship of Christ, the answer is easy: Christ is a perpetual Guardian, but not visibly. As long as He walked on earth, He appeared openly as their Guardian (patronus); now He preserves us by His Spirit. He calls the Spirit another (sc. paracletum) in view of the distinction which we observe in the blessings proceeding from each. It was the appropriate work of Christ, by expiating the sins of the world to appease the anger of God, to redeem men from death, to obtain righteousness and life. It is the office of the Spirit, to make us partakers of Christ Himself, as well as of all His blessings.” The designation Paraclete, advocate (as already Irenæus, Adv. hær. III. 17, and also Grotius observed), implies an antithesis to the accuser, the κατήγορος τῶν ἀδελφῶν, as the Spirit of evil is called, Rev_12:10. Comp. on this whole passage the excellent remarks of the late Archdeacon Hare on The Mission of the Comforter (a series of Sermons on Joh_16:7-11, preached before the University of Cambridge, 1840, with long notes which are by far the most important part of the book), 2d ed. 1850, Boston reprint 1854, pp. 348 ff.—P. S.]
1. As to the Philological meaning, Meyer says: “The παράκλητος is, according to classical. Greek usage, one who is summoned to help; in particular, an advocate (advocatus), one who manages another’s cause, or an intercessor. With this the talmudic פְּרַקְלִיט agrees. See Buxtorf, Lexicon. Talm., p. 1843, and in general Wetstein on our passage and Düsterdieck on 1Jn_2:1.” [It should be added, however, that in our passage, as also in Philo De opific. mundi, p. 4, and in the Ep. of the church of Vienne, c. 5, ap. Euseb. v. 2 (both quoted by Knapp and Meyer, p. 515), παράκλητος must not be taken in the narrow sense of a legal advocate or pleader (for which the Greeks generally use the terms σύνσδκος and συνήγορος), but in the more general sense of counsellor, helper, patron. On the philological meaning Knapp has a valuable dissertation De Spiritu S. et Christo paracletis, in his Scripta varii arg. I. pp. 115 sqq. He shows that the Greek παράκλητος and the Latin advocatus, answer more nearly to our general term counsel whose office is to advise, direct and support rather than to plead. It is the work of the Holy Spirit, not only to plead for the disciples, but also to plead in them, to direct them in all their ways, to give them mouth and wisdom, to fulfil the part of a higher conscience, to sustain, comfort and cheer them in all their trials and to lead them to heaven. Hence the English word Advocate, which relates more exclusively to the pleading of a cause, is no full equivalent to παράκλητος, and does not cover the whole extent of the office of the Spirit. The idea of Comforter must be added to it. A Comforter is a spiritual Helper. Unfortunately we have no single word coëxtensive in signification. See below sub. 2.—P. S.]
II. Interpretations:
1. Conformably to the idea of the advocatus in its wider sense: assistant, helper, etc., Tertullian, Augustine,31 Calvin,32 Lampe, most of the moderns. [I add under this head the names of Melancthon, Beza, Grotius, Wetstein, Bengel, Knapp, Lücke, Tholuck, De Wette (Beistand), Hengstenberg (Fürsprecher), Godet (défenseur), Hammond, Pierson, Webster and Wilkinson.—P. S.]
2. Comforter, consolator [in accordance with the Hellenistic use of παρακαλεῖν and παράκλησις], Origen, Chrysostom, Theophylact [Cyril, Euthymius Zigab.], Jerome33 [Erasmus], Luther34 [Maldonatus, Jansen] and others [A. E. V.]. Against this Meyer says (according to the note in Lücke, p. 608): “It rests upon an unphilological confusion of the word with παρακλήτωρ (Sept., Job_16:2) in Aquila and Theodotus.”35 Nevertheless, we may safely give he Greek exegetes, who are by preference on this side, credit for having said something philologically justifiable. That, however, in point of fact, the word 1Jn_2:1 cannot mean comforter, but only mediator, representative, helper, and that here also there is no immediate question of comforting, is manifest.
[The term Comforter, as used in this and the 16th ch. of John by our E. V., in harmony with the Hellenistic use of παρακαλεῖν and παράκλησις, with all the Greek commentators and Luther (Tröster), carries with it so many sacred associations and expresses such an important part of the office of the Holy Spirit (comp. the παράκλησις τοῦ ἀγίου πνεύματος, Act_9:31), that it seems almost sacrilege to exchange it for another; and hence Archdeacon Hare and Dean Alford, while admitting that Advocate (in the wider sense above explained) is the strict etymological meaning of παράκλητος, which satisfies 1Jn_2:1, yet retain the E. V. and combine the idea of help and strength with that of consolation in the term.36 Olshausen does the same among German commentators.37 We should remember that the English word Comforter originally means not only Consoler, as now, but primarily also Strengthener and Supporter, agreeably to its derivation from the Latin confortari, to strengthen, which, though scarcely found in classical Latin, is common in the Vulgate, and was frequently used in its Latin sense by Wiclif, e.g. Luk_22:43; Act_9:19; 1Co_16:13; Php_4:13. In this sense it falls in with the connection and object of our Lord, which was, not merely to comfort the disciples for the loss of His visible presence, but mainly to strengthen their hearts. Dr. Lange, as will be seen below, likewise takes a broader but somewhat different view and combines in παράκλητος the idea of Helper (Beistand) with that of Mediator (Vermittler), and hence translates it Representative (Vertreter).—P. S.]
3. Teacher, Theod. of Mopsueste [Ernesti, Opusc. p. 215], Hofmann (Schriflbeweis, II. 2, p. 17), Luthardt [also Campbell who inappropriately translates Monitor.—P. S.]. This view has less to support it than either of the others.
In reference to No. 1, explanations are again divided:
a. Ancient exegetes explain advocatus as equivalent to causæ patronus, orator, against which view Lücke observes: “this would suit 1Jn_2:1, but not the passages of the Gospel.”
b. It was Knapp who, supported by the usage of the term, in pure Greek writers as well as in Jewish ones availing themselves of the language, also in the writings of the Rabbins who have adopted the Greek word (פְרַקְלִיט), etc., demonstrated that the word originally possessed the general signification of a helper [Beistand]. “The office of helper as performed by the Holy Ghost consists of directing and leading to the truth, testifying and reminding, teaching and glorifying.” Against this view, it must be observed: (a) Christ arrives at the idea of the ἄλλος παράκλ. through the promise: “What ye shall ask in My name, I will do.” He will mediate with God for His accomplishment of their work. Thus He is the Mediator, 1Jn_2:1. (b) The ἄλλος παράκλ. is described as “the Spirit of truth; ”as such He is the Mediator through whose instrumentality believers are made one with the Father in Christ; He transports them into Christ, thus making them certain and glad of the operations of God. Without doubt, then, He is a helper, but it is because He is a mediator (see Rom_8:26-27); i.e. since He conducts their cause before God, He conducts it before the world; (not vice versâ).
III. Dogmatical question. Tholuck: “The representative of the departing One is called, in these discourses, παράκλ. (rather ἄλλος παράκλ)., again, πνεῦμα τῆς ἀληθείας here and in Joh_15:26; Joh_16:13,—not immediately ὄτι ἀξιόπιστος ἔσται (Chrysostom), but on account of His being the Mediator of the theocratic and practical truth which, according to Joh_14:9, is Christ Himself; again, according to Joh_14:26, He is called πνεῦμα ἄγιον and, according to an expression peculiar to Luke, δύναμις τοῦ ὑψίστου, Luk_24:49; Luk_1:35; Act_1:8. He is called ἄλλος, for it is not Christ according to His historical appearing. Yet again it is also Christ Himself Joh_14:18; that which, according to Joh_16:25; Joh_17:26 (γνωρίσω), is declared to them by Christ, is, according to Joh_16:14, to be declared to them by the Spirit, for He shall take of His (Christ’s). These declarations lead us to the belief that, in John, by this πνεῦμα we must understand Christ, glorified into a spirit. The view setting forth this πνεῦμα as a ‘self, distinct from Christ’ has lately been revived by Olshausen, Meyer, Schmid, Theologie des Neuen Testaments, I. p. 108; Brückner, p. 230; Hofmann, I. p. 165. No arguments but those of Quenstädt have been brought forward in favor of it.” It is strange that Tholuck will admit neither the expression ἄλλος παράκλ., nor the μεθ’ ὑμῶν, nor the masculine ἐκεῖνος, nor the διδάξει, λαλήσει, etc., as a proof that the Spirit is designated as another self, although he fully grants the hypostatizing of the Holy Ghost in the dogmatical conception of the Divinity. But if in this point dogmatics are to find their support in Paul, not in John, the latter is thrust into a false position, unsustained by the fact that he has given the deepest conception of the doctrinal system of the New Testament. That Christ alternately speaks of the coming of the Holy Spirit and of His own return, does not justify the expression by which the πνεῦμα is in this instance declared to be “Christ glorified into a spirit;” it is an expression inadmissible in any case,—Christ being, indeed, glorified in the Spirit and through the Spirit, but not into a spirit.38 We might almost as well say that the Father is, according to Joh_14:9, glorified into Christ. We have seen that the two expressions; I in the Father, the Father in Me (Joh_10:38; Joh_14:10), do not mean the same thing. The former is indicative of the personality of Christ, the other of the personality of the Father as manifested in Christ. Precisely in the same way do the expressions: ye in Me, and I in you, Joh_14:20, differ. By the translation of Christ’s personality into the disciples, they are translated into Him as personalities; but that whereby they, being translated into Christ, are made one personality with Christ, is that very ἄλλος and ἐκεῖνος, the personality of the Holy Ghost. For the Holy Ghost Himself shall not only be in them, but also with them, Joh_14:17. Inasmuch as He is in them, Christ Himself is with them; inasmuch as He is with them, He is the ἄλλος παράκλ. and Christ is in them. That is, the fellowship rests, in individuals, upon the manifestation of the glorified Christ; individuals rest, as Christ’s fellowship, upon the revelation of the Holy Ghost. Hence we may likewise expect the two ideas: in what degree Christ, in the Holy Ghost, is with them, and in what degree the Holy Ghost, in Christ, is with them, to branch out and divide when we ponder over them. First, then, the discourse turns upon this point: Christ comes to them again, the Holy Ghost being in them, Joh_14:18-31. The second point discussed is this: they shall be in Christ, the Holy Ghost being with them, Joh_15:1 to Joh_16:15. The conclusion embraces both items in the promise of the resurrection, Joh_16:16-33.
That he may be with you for ever [ἴνα μεθ’ ὑμῶν ᾐ̈ εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα].—See the Textual Notes. Observe, moreover, the μεθ’ ὑμῶν, in accordance with the preceding elucidation. The εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα is explained by Meyer as having reference to the αἰὼν μέλλων. But doubtless such a fact would be more definitely expressed.
Joh_14:17. The Spirit of truth [τὸ πνεῦμα τῆς ἀληθείας].—The Holy Ghost is the living, personal, divine unity of complete revelation and, as such, the Spirit of truth (see Joh_15:26; Joh_16:13) He is the Spirit of truth, inasmuch as He makes objective truth subjective in believers, in order to the knowledge of truth. Objectively He is the Spirit of God (Rom_8:14), and God Himself (Acts 5); the Spirit of the Father (Mat_10:20); the Spirit of Christ (Rom_8:9); the Spirit of the Lord (2Co_3:17), the Holy Spirit (Acts 2). Subjectively He is the Spirit of truth, the Spirit of wisdom and revelation (Eph_1:17), the Spirit of power, of love and of a sound mind (2Ti_1:7), the Spirit of adoption, of prayer (Rom_8:15), the Spirit of sanctification (Rom_1:4), of life (Rom_8:10), of meekness (1Co_4:21), of comfort (Act_9:31), of glory (1Pe_4:14), of sealing, of the earnest of eternal life (Eph_1:13-14), of all Christian charismata (1Co_12:4). As the Spirit of truth, the Holy Ghost applies to believers the full truth of the perfect revelation of God in Christ.
Whom the world cannot receive [ὁ κόσμος οὐ δύναται λαβεῖν].—The world as world. Why not? 1. It does not see him [ὄτιοὐ θεωρεῖ αὐτό] in His manifestations, because it lacks the eye of faith. It does not even see the One God above the world, much less the oneness of His manifestations in the world. And hence 2. it does not know him [οὐδὲ γινώσκει αὐτό]. It lacks experience of the Holy Ghost, 1Co_2:14.—But ye know him [ὑμεῖς δὲ γινώσκετε αὐτὄ]. The imminent future is already truly present, inasmuch as they have commenced to recognize the Holy Ghost in the manifestations of Christ, Mat_16:17. They are already beginning to have an experimental knowledge of Him. Nevertheless, the full expression is indicative of a future, near at hand. Proof: He remaineth with you, and will be in you [ὄτι παῤ ὑμῖν μένει39 καὶ ἐν ὑμῖν ἒσται]. He will not relinquish (Present) His activity among them (see Luk_22:32), until He comes with all His influences to dwell in them. Meyer correctly: Since “His abode is in the midst of them, in the Christian communion.” It is necessary to add, however: since He will maintain His uninterrupted activity amongst you until He comes to be fully revealed in you. Not until then, indeed, will He in full measure be with them and abide with them as the Holy Ghost. The one Future ἔσται, will be, is contradictory of Meyer’s assumption: namely, that the Present γινώσκετε should be taken as absolute, without respect to any set time.
Joh_14:18. I leave you not as orphans behind Me. I come to you [οὐ ἀφήσω ὑμᾶς ὀρφανούς, ἔρχομαι πρὸς ὑμᾶς. The rendering of Tyndale and the A. V., comfortless, may have been chosen with reference to the Comforter, but is no translation of ὀρφανούς and impairs the force and beauty of the original. Wiclif has fadirless. The marginal reading orphans ought to have been inserted in the text.—P. S.] See Mar_12:19. The τεκνία, Joh_13:33, an expression of πατρικὴ εὐσπλαγχνία (Euthymius Zigabenus): I come unto you, the Present. [Not will come, as in the A. V. which follows the Vulgate: veniam.—P. S.] A connecting γάρ would do away with the pure antithesis.40 I go not away from you in the sense of leaving you orphans; on the contrary, it is now that I do truly come unto you. In what respect is this true?
1. It is not to be understood as signifying Christ’s Parousia in the abstract (Augustine, Beda, etc., Luthardt, Hofmann; against which Joh_14:19-20 ff.), although this glorious coming of Christ continues until the Parousia.
2. Nor the manifestations subsequent to the resurrection (the Greek exegetes: Origen, Chrysostom, etc., Rupert, Grotius [Ewald, who however spiritualizes and idealizes the resurrection]). Against this view too Joh_14:20-21; Joh_14:23; Joh_16:16; Joh_16:22-23 are cited. Hence
3. Christ’s spiritual coming through the Paraclete is intended (Calvin, Lücke and most of the moderns [Olshausen, Tholuck, Meyer, Bäumlein, Godet]).
4. We, however, uphold the explanation, according to which Christ had in view both His corporeal and His spiritual return (Luther, Beza, Lampe and De Wette [also Ebrard and Hengstenberg]); for His spiritual return was conditioned upon His first returning in the body—upon His resurrection as the consummation of His revelation (without Easter no Pentecost). There is no double meaning in this interpretation, forasmuch as the manifestations of the Risen One were assisted by the operation of the Spirit and the pouring out of the Holy Ghost was the means of perfectly revealing the Risen and Glorified One. Tholuck remarks on the opposite side, that the seeing again, spoken of Joh_16:16, is conditioned upon His going to the Father. True, but it was on His way to the Father that He saw them again, John 20. Tholuck’s assertion of the identity of the returning Christ and the before-mentioned ἄλλος παράκλ. is of a piece with the disregard of the contrast: being with you and being in you, or the contrast between the παράκλ. and the ἄλλος παράκλ.
Joh_14:19. Yet a little while, etc. [Ἔτι μικρόν, sc. ἐστι].—Μικρὸν, καὶ, מְעַט וְ. See Joh_13:33 [Joh_16:16; Heb_10:37; Hos_1:4]. From now until the moment when He was removed from the world by death, less than twenty-four hours elapsed.—But ye see Me. Tholuck: Not “ye shall see Me again,” but: “your eyes shall be opened to perceive Me.” Against this be it observed that the same verb (θεωρεῖν) is used to express the not seeing of the world. Beyond a doubt, the imminent seeing of the Risen One with the bodily eye is meant; a sight destined for the disciples but denied to the world. The second little μικρόν, from the death to the resurrection of Christ, is swallowed up in the first μικρόν. The fact that this θεωρεῖν of the disciples passes into the spiritual, eternal contemplation of Christ, does not militate against the bodily seeing of Him to begin with. The subsequent sentence is expressly indicative of this bodily seeing again: “for I live,” etc. This seeing of Christ is to be brought about by the life of Christ.—For I live, and ye also shall live [ὄτι ἐγὼ ζῶ, καὶ ὐμεῖς ζήσεσθε. The reason of the preceding θεωρεῖτε με. Not: “Because I live, ye shall live also,” Beza, A. V., Godet.—P. S.] The antithesis of Present and Future supports the exegesis. The Present: I live, is expressive of His divine vital power, outlasting death (see John 5) John 12; Rev_1:18.41 Luther: “He is the Person whom death could not devour, though, as it regards His bodily life, it did indeed kill Him.” But His thus living, as the God-Man, mighty in life, is at the same time indicative of His living again in the resurrection,—a fact proved by the promise: ye shall live. For Christ’s life has, by His death and resurrection, become the principle of the new life of His people, Rom_6:8; Eph_1:19-20. The one sided interpretations of these words as having reference to the resurrection,—interpretations quoted by Meyer—(Grotius: Ye shall see Me really alive [non spectrum], and ye yourselves shall survive in the midst of the dangers imminent upon you; or Theophylact: Ye shall be as men who have received new life; or Augustine: Ye shall rise at the last day) do no detriment to the general application of the saying to the resurrection.
Joh_14:20. At that day ye shall know [Ἐν ἐκείνη τῆ ἡμέρᾳ γνώσεσθε ὐμεῖς, ὅτι ἐγὼ ἐν τῷ πατρί μου καὶ ὑμεῖς ἐν ἐμοὶ κἀγὼ ἐν ὑμῖν].—Various interpretations: 1. Reference to the resurrection (see the next note); 2. Meyer: “its historical fulfilment was the day of Pentecost;” 3. Luthardt: the day of the Parousia; 4. De Wette: in that time. Be it observed that the day of the resurrection became for them not only the continually returning day of the Lord, or Sunday, but also the day κατ̓ ἐξοχήν, the new Day of their life. Ye will know that I am in the Father.—I.e. ye will recognize My divine personality. It means more than the words: the Father in Me.—And ye in Me. i.e. personalities who have attained unto new life, who are in Christ through the Holy Ghost because Christ is in them (I in you) by means of His glorified personality, the spirit of His glorified life. See note to Joh_14:16.
Joh_14:21. He that hath my commandments. [Ὁ ἔχων τὰς ἐντολάς μου καὶ τηρῶν αὐτάς, ἐκεῖνός ἐστιν ὁ ἀγαπῶν με].—The ὁ ἔχων is emphatic, significant of that inward appropriation whereby the words of Christ are become the νόμος τοῦ πνεύματος. The proof of this living possession will be the keeping of His commandments. And that shall be the mark of love to Jesus. Now love to Jesus is that whereupon an experience of the Father’s love is conditioned [ἀγαπηθήσεται ὑπὸ τοῦ πατρός μον]; and that, again, is proved by the sending of the Holy Ghost. But the sending of the Holy Ghost is, at the same time, an act of Christ’s love towards the believer; an act in which He manifests Himself to the believer as the heavenly Christ [καὶ ἐγὼ ἀγαπήσω αὐτόν καὶ ἐμφανίσω αὐτῷ ἐμαυτόν]. Hence the discourse neither bears solely upon the appearings of the Risen One (Grotius), nor has it a general reference to the Parousia considered in the abstract (Luthardt). It is this manifestation of Christ through the Holy Ghost which, to Philip and the disciples generally, is to supply and overbalance the wonted, actual, visible presence of Christ.
Joh_14:22. Judas, not Iscariot. οὐχ ὁ Ἰσκαριώτης. To be distinguished from that traitor. The reader was indeed aware of the departure of the traitor, according to Joh_13:30, as also that he could not (according to Bengel) again be present. It was not John’s desire on this occasion to give utterance to his “profound abhorrence” of the traitor [Meyer, Alford]; willingly, however, did he bring into view the contrast between that malicious Judas who despaired of Christ’s cause, and this other Judas, replete with enthusiasm and energy, even now conceiving of his Lord as one certain of victory, for whom the conquest of the world—and that too in a material sense—was reserved.—Thaddeus or Lebbeus according to Mat_10:3; Luk_6:16 (see Comm. on Matt. p. 182, Am. Ed.). It is, then, one of the brothers of the Lord (Comm. on Matt. p. 256 ff. Am. Ed.; my Apost. Zeitalter, p. 189) and, as the brother of James the son of Alpheus, the author of the epistle of Jude. His name (the courageous or stout hearted) as well as his participation in the scene, Mar_3:21, in the challenge, Joh_7:3 and the character of his epistle, give him the appearance of a peculiarly energetic and courageous nature. These characteristics perfectly correspond with the question in our chapter; the query is expressive of his expectation that Jesus would manifest Himself to the world. In this saying there echoes once more with sufficient distinctness the demand (Joh_7:3) that Jesus should labor openly in Jerusalem (Leben Jesu ii. p. 14* and 1360). The ecclesiastical tradition respecting Judas Thaddeus or Lebbeus, see in Winer under that art.: Apostol. Zeitalter 2 p. 407.
How is it that Thou wilt manifest Thyself, etc.? Τί γέγονεν, What has happened? what is the reason? i.e. in spite of all the threats and persecutions of Thine enemies, there seemeth to me as yet no sufficient reason for this holding back. This courage may in part rest upon the expectation that the Messiah, if He manifest Himself at all, must manifest Himself to the whole world in His judicial glory; a view which Tholuck upholds by the citation of Dillmann on the Book of Enoch, chap. xxx. Christ’s answer, however, renders it more probable that Judas entertained the hope that the whole world would pay Him homage if He should manifest Himself in full.
Joh_14:23. If a man love Me, he will, etc. [(Ἐάν τις ἀγαπᾷ με, τὸν λόγον μον τηρήσει). Bengel: τὸν λόγον μου, sermonem meum. Sermo unus est, in hoc versu, respectu fidelium; sermones plures (τοὺς λόγους μου), respectu infidelium, qui discerpunt, Joh_14:24.—P. S.] In the following reply Jesus sketches the contrast between His people and the world, assigning such contrast as the reason which renders it impossible for Him to manifest Himself to the world or to make His abode in it. Be it observed that Jesus has inverted the similarly sounding words in Joh_14:21. There it is: “he that hath My commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me;” here: “if any man love Me, he will keep My word.” There must be some good reason for this antithesis. The proof of the inner life, in antithesis to the visible world, must itself be visible; for this cause Joh_14:21 the keeping of the commandments is mentioned first as an evidence of love. The proof of the divine life, however, in antithesis to the ungodly life of the world, must be love for Christ, since the world can counterfeit the inner life and the keeping of the commandments. In the one case, the proof of the subjective truth of the religious life, i.e. the antithesis to sensuality, suffices; in the other, Christ treats of the proof of the objective truth of the religious life, i.e. of the antithesis to demoniacalness. Ascetics may have some inner life, and yet may subjectively belong to the world; but believers in justification, they being truly in Christ, do not belong to the world. Thus, love to Christ is the foundation. It keeps His word as His objective portrait and law. The believer, pursuing this course, is well pleasing to the Father. Therefore, the Father comes to him with the Son (by means of the Holy Ghost the Paraclete). For the manifestation of Christ is this: the glorification of the Father through the Son,—of the Son with the Father through the Holy Ghost. The Father will manifest Himself through the Son, the Son through the Holy Ghost. They make their abode with him [μονὴν ταῤ αὐτῷ ποιήσομεν], not merely in him; i.e. they found a community, a place where the Triune God manifests Himself—which community forms a contrast to the world. The παῤ αὐτῷ does not mean: in his dwelling. The Spirit is not only in the faithful, but with them as well; He forms a fellowship of believers, the Church. Thus He builds the spiritual house for an individual. The dwelling with him presupposes a dwelling in him. (We may quote as a curiosity the explanation of Semler and Less: Christ and the disciples shall come unto the Father and make their abode with Him). New Testament realization of the tabernacling of God amongst His people, Lev_26:11; prophesied Eze_37:26 and in loc. The real Shekina.
Joh_14:24. He that loveth Me not [Ὁ μὴ ἀγαπῶν με τοὺς λόγους μου ού τηρεῖ].—Characteristic of the world. The world, as an ungodly world, loves itself; its tendency is not centripetal but centrifugal; hence it loves not Christ. Hence it keeps not Christ’s word as a living word, for the reason that it lacks the bond that should hold it and Christ together—namely, the Spirit. Now in failing to keep Christ’s word it also fails to keep the Father’s word which He has sent into the world with Christ [καὶ ὁ λόγος ὀ͂ν ἀκούετε, οὐκ ἔστιν ἐμός, ἀλλὰ τοῦ πέμψαντός με πατρός]. And thus the preliminary condition on which depends the manifestation of God to the world, is wanting; that condition is the medium and focus of His word.
Joh_14:25. These things I have spoken unto you. [Ταῦτα λελάληκα ὑμῖν παῤ ὑμῖν μένων].—I.e. thus much of the heavenly life on earth as the sign of the heavenly home that awaits you beyond this world. Thus much ye can understand now through My words. At some future time, however, the Paraclete shall make it all perfectly clear to you (see Joh_16:12). Ταῦτα λελάληκα. Perfect. I have spoken it, it shall be certain.
Joh_14:26. But the Paraclete, etc. [ό δὲ παράκλητος, τὸ πνεῦμα τὸ ἃγιον δπέμψει ὀ͂ πατὴρ ἐν τῷ ὀνόματί μου, ἐκεῖνος ὑμᾶς διδάξει τὰ πάντα καὶ ὑπομνήσει ὑμᾶς πάντα, α̊ εῖ̓πον ὑμῖν ].—The designation of the Paraclete is more definite. The different predicates are summed up together: the Paraclete—the Holy Ghost—whom the Father sends—in the name of Jesus. Different interpretations of the ἐν τῷ ὀνόματί μου: 1. Grotius (Lücke and others): At My intercession (in meam gratiam, with reference to Joh_14:14). 2. Euthymius Zigabenus and others: Instead of Me, i.e. not, as Meyer explains: He will send Him instead of My sending Him, but: He will send Him as the representative of Me in My character of Ambassador. 3. Meyer: So that the name of Jesus is the sphere containing the divine purpose and will which are to be accomplished by the sending. The object of God’s intent and design is the name of Jesus. Since the name is the subjective knowledge of an objective manifestation, the sense is: in the knowledge of Christ, perfected through the perfect manifestation of Christ,—in the glorified Christ;—in His inclination towards the Church, in the Church’s inclination towards Him, a bias effected by love to Him and by the keeping of His word. Luther: Here the emphatic words are: in My name and: what I have said unto you.
He will teach you all things and bring all things to your remembrance.—The proximate reference is to the subject of chap. 14, the heavenly home, the heavenly goal. But, together with His teachings on this head, He is to be the means of imparting all fulness of Christian knowledge regarding the whole plan of salvation (πάντα). The first promise embraces the whole Christian science of salvation, progressing, as it does, in infinitum; the second its inalienable principial basis: that which Christ has said. It is not specifically new truths that the Holy Ghost will teach; not specifically supplementary ones (traditions in the Romish sense), still less such as shall take the place of those taught by Christ (as the fanatics and enthusiasts would have it), or correct and contradict these (according to Rationalism). His teaching shall consist in reminding men of the word of Christ, in giving them a subjective understanding of the same. In performing this His office, He shall unfetter the word—break down the barriers of individualization, parable, misunderstanding—thus causing it to develop into an ever-living organism of doctrine, the specific soul and character of which does, nevertheless, remain the word of Christ. The first πάντα says that every one of Christ’s words shall attain its full development; hence it refers to the infinite import or capability of development belonging to His words. The second πάντα declares that none of the words of Christ shall be lost, that they all, as items of His doctrine, shall become operative. The interpretation of Grotius, according to which ἅ εἶπον ὑμῖν extends even to the first πάντα, has the effect of confusing the parallels and intrenching upon the independence of the Spirit. The meaning is not: everything that I have told you, He shall teach you and remind you of,—but: He shall teach you all things, whilst He brings all things that I have told you, to your remembrance. The καί is explicative.
[The work of the Spirit is the appropriation of Christ to the believer. “Dicente Filio,” says Augustine, “verba capimus, docente Spiritu eadem verba intelligimus.” Objectively all is done by Christ, subjectively the same work is done or applied every day by the Spirit. The fulfilment of this promise of the Holy Spirit to the Apostles, who was to guide them into the whole truth and give them the right understanding of Christ’s teaching, guarantees their inspiration, sufficiency and authority as witnesses of our Lord, and is abundantly testified by their writings, which carry in themselves their own best evidence, as the shining sun proves his existence to all but the blind. The πάντα furnishes a strong argument for the completeness of the New Testament revelation and against the Romish doctrine of ecclesiastical tradition, in the sense of an additional and co-ordinate source and rule of faith. For two of the most important dogmas of modern Romanism—the sinlessness of Mary and the infallibility of the pope—there is not the faintest trace in the apostolic writings.—P. S.]
Joh_14:27. A peace I leave with you [Εἰ ρήνην ἀφίημι ὑμιν, εἰρήνην τὴν ἐμὴν δίδωμι ὑμῖν].—According to Luther (Neander and others) this is the farewell-greeting of Christ to His people (comp. 1Pe_5:14; 3 John Joh_14:14). Luther: “These are last words, as of one who, on the eve of departure, says good night or invokes a blessing.” Tholuck remarks, against this view, that Christ is not going away from them, but that they are going with Him (Joh_14:31), and that in this case the corresponding phrase could not mean εἰρ. ἀφιέναι, but only διδόναι or λέγειν. And so ἀφιέναι (still according to Tholuck) should be taken in the sense of leaving behind, namely, as a parting gift, and it is the peace of reconciliation that Jesus speaks of. But this deeper meaning offers no obstacle to the belief that to the concrete fact of His departure He affixes His peace as a parting greeting. The Hebrew greeting was perfectly adapted to express this union of the highest with the trivial. And as certainly as the saying of the Risen One: Peace be with you (Joh_20:19; Joh_20:21), is the customary salutation and yet, at the same time, the announcement of the resurrection peace, just so certainly is the leaving of peace here at once the higher farewell greeting of Jesus and a real gift of peace. But there is nothing contradictious in the fact that parting friends may bid each other good-bye, perchance more than once, and still walk a little way together. It is here that the subject we have been considering—viz., the going of Jesus to heaven, in order to the preparation of the place for His disciples—is brought to a conclusion. The term ἀφίημι is explained by the too slightly estimated δίδωμι. Thus the Hebrew שָׁלוֹם, prosperity, peace (go in peace, לֵך לִשָלוֹם, 1Sa_1:17, etc.; Mar_5:34, etc.; see the farewell salutations Eph_6:23 [1Pe_5:14; 3 John Joh_14:13]), in this place certainly peace of soul likewise; this interpretation is disputed by Meyer.42—My peace (peace-greeting) I give unto you [εἰρήνην τὴν ἐμὴν δίδωμιὑμῖν].—We question the generally assumed identity of this saying with the foregoing one: “A peace (εἰρήνην) I leave unto you.” On the contrary, the emphasis: “My peace” (τὴν ἐμήνis of itself indicative of an antithesis. It is the intention of Jesus to declare in the strongest manner possible that His greeting on seeing them again shall follow fast upon His parting salutation, and that He will not present to them that full peace-greeting which is His specific property until, meeting them again, He salutes them, bringing His perfect and entire peace. With a peace I left you; with My peace I am with you again. I leave you a peace for a support; it is sufficient to keep you upright; My full peace I will give unto you. The most lively construction of the words: after a little while, Joh_14:19.
Not as the world giveth [οὐ καθὼς ὁ κόσμος δίδωσι, ἐγὼ δίδωμι ὑμῖν].—The proposition is, undoubtedly, a general one; not for this reason, however, should its application to the world’s empty forms of greeting (Grotius, Bengel and others) be denied (De Wette, Meyer, Tholuck).43 In the world also the manner of salutation on going and coming is connected with the manner of giving. The world gives as it greets, i.e. in a vain and empty way, 1Jn_2:17. Having just recognized an antithesis in the words of Christ: “I leave you a peace” at parting, “I give you My peace” at our new union, it readily occurs to us to meditate upon the inverted conduct of the world. At the start the world with its greetings promises golden mountains; coldly and heartlessly it takes leave of its servants and prepares them an end full of terrors. It fared literally thus with Judas. Christ makes a warm and comforting farewell-greeting the forerunner of the beatific salutation which shall accompany the eternal meeting.
Let not your heart be troubled, nor let it be afraid [μὴ ταρασσέσθω ὑμῶν ἡκαδία μηδὲ δειλιάτω].—Repetition of the exhortation Joh_14:1; hence the indication of a concluded meditation. The annexed δειλιάτω (which is found in this place only in the New Testament)44 proves that He views the trembling more as a natural emotion that might seize them at the thought of a hopeless parting, while in uttering the δειλιάτω His mind is contemplating the danger of a cowardly course of conduct proceeding from that emotion.
Joh_14:28. Said unto you, etc. [ἠκούσατε ὄτι ἐγὼ εἷπον ὑμῖν• ὑπάγω καὶ ἔρχομαι πρὸς ὑμᾶς].—See Joh_14:2. At the same time, however, the words: I go away and I come to you, are doubtless explanatory of the farewell just uttered: “peace,” etc., “My peace,” etc. Neither does the proposition mean simply: “I go away and come again,” etc., but, “by going away, I come to you more truly than ever;” as results from what follows.—If ye loved Me [εἰ ἡγαπᾶτἐ με.—Of perfect love that casteth out fear (1Jn_4:18. He makes their love to Him a motive of comfort to them. They loved Him, but not spiritually enough, else they would have rejoiced at the prospect of His abiding spiritual presence. Bengel: Amor parit gaudium; per se, et quia servat verbum Christi Iætissima omnia aperiens, “Love begets joy, both of itself, and because it keeps the word of Christ, which opens all the most joyful prospects.”—P. S.]—Ye would have rejoiced (ἐχάρητε (not the Imperf. ἑχαίρετε) ἄν ὅτι πορεύομαι πρὸς τὸν πατέρα).—He does not mean: in that case ye would not be in the least affected by grief at parting from Me (comp. Joh_16:21), but, the joy of faith would preponderate. The thing in My difficult journey that would appear pre-eminent to your eyes would be My triumphal home-going to the Father. Hence: “because I said unto you, I go unto the Father,” i.e., because I have put such a cheering interpretation upon My going away from you.—For the Father is greater than I (ὅτι ὁ πατὴρ μείζων μου ἐστίν).—A. We have first to consider this proposition in the abstract, and then in its relation (ὅτι) to what precedes it.
1. Theological elucidations [in the essential or metaphysical sense]: a. The Arians regarded the declaration as a proof-text for their system.
[The Arians inferred from this passage that Christ is a creature of the Father, though existing before the world. The same interpretation has been revived by the Socinians, Unitarians and Rationalists, who deny also the preexistence of Christ, which the Arians admitted. But this gives no intelligible sense at all. On the contrary, the words imply (as even Meyer freely admits, p. 526) the homoousia or divine nature of Christ. If a mere man or creature says: “God is greater than I,” he talks blasphemous nonsense almost as much as if he said: “I am equal with God.” Comp. also the remarks of Godet (II., 490): “Cette parole suppose chez celui qui la prononce, le sentiment le plus vif de sa participation à la divinité.”—P. S.]
b. Athanasius, Gregory of Nazianzum [Hilary, Euthym. Zigab.] and others, in modern times Olshausen,45 considered it expressive of the ἀγεννησία of the Father in antithesis to the begottenness or eternal generation of the Son.
[On the Arian controversy concerning this passage see Suicer, Thesaur., II., pp. 1368 sq., and Bull’s Defens. Fid. Nic., sect. 4. To escape the Arian inference it would have been better to refer the μειζονότης of the Father to His official superiority. The Nicene orthodoxy admitted a certain subordination of the Son to the Father, as to dignity or office, but not as to essence or substance, which is the same; there being but one God. But this passage has no reference to the essence or nature at all, but to the state or condition; for the superiority of essence which exists always and everywhere, could be no reason why the disciples should rejoice at the approaching departure of Christ to the Father. Hence no inference unfavorable to the orthodox doctrine of the homoousia can be drawn from it. Calvin clearly, with his usual tact, saw this, and gives substantially the right interpretation, which I may anticipate here (see ii. b.): “Varie detortus fuit hic locus. Ariani ut Christum probarent quendam secundarium esse Deum, objiciebant minorem esse Patre. Patres orthodoxi, ut tali calumniæ ansam præciderent, dicebant hoc debere ad naturam humanam referri. Atqui ut impie hoc testimonio abusi sunt Ariani, ita nec recta, nec consentanea fuit patrurn solutio. Hic enim neque de humana Christi natura, neque de æterna ejus divinitate sermo habetur, sed pro infirmitatis nostræ captu se medium inter nos et Deum constituit.”—P. S.]
2. Christological explanations:
a. The superiority of the Father has reference to the human nature of Christ, because it is in this alone that He goes to the Father (Hunnius, J. Gerhard). [Comp. the Athanasian Creed: “equal to the Father as touching His Godhead; and inferior to the Father as touching His manhood.” So also Webster and Wilkinson. Wordsworth: “Christ is speaking of going which cannot be predicated of God. My Father is greater than I am in that nature which goes to Him.” This interpretation implies a mere platitude. Who need be told that the human nature is inferior to the divine ? It also assumes an abstract separation of the two natures in Christ, which constitute one life. The speaking and acting Ego of Christ is His divine-human person, and the nature is the organ through which He acts.—P. S.]
b. Reference is had to Christ’s state of humiliation (status exinanitionis, Luther, Calvin, Luthardt).
[This interpretation is also defended by Cyril, Melanchthon, Beza, Bengel, De wette, Brückner, Stier, Alford, Barnes, Owen, etc. Christ spoke these, words as the battling and suffering Messiah from His state of humiliation, which was to cease with His departure to the Father; and it is His prospective exaltation to glory and bliss which ought to have been an occasion for rejoicing to His disciples. There is no force in Meyer’s objection that God is greater than Christ even in His exalted state (Joh_17:5; 1Co_15:27 f.; Php_2:9-11), as He was greater than the preëxistent Logos (Joh_1:1-3). He refers the μειζονότης of the Father to His superior power: “As My Father is greater, especially mightier than I, My departure to Him will be an elevation to greater power and activity, to the victory over the world, to higher union with Him, hence a matter of rejoicing for those who love Me.”—P. S.]
c. It refers to both the above-mentioned considerations [“humanity in its state of lowliness”] (Calov, Quenstädt, Tholuck, Augustine: “quia naturæ humanæ gratulandum est eo, quod sic assumta est a verbo unigenito, ut immortalis constitueretur in cœlo”).
3. We must grasp at once the theological import and the Christological one, for there is a good reason why the Son of God became man and humbled Himself,—not the Father. Theologically considered, the Father is greater than the Son, as the first principle, in respect of order or succession, by whom the Son was established, both being perfectly equal in substance. Hence it follows that He is greater in substance also than Christ in His human nature, and above all, greater in regard to the rule or power which He exercises, than is Christ in His humiliation. And it is upon this latter circumstance that the stress here lies. [So also Meyer, see above.—P. S.] Christ, in going to the Father as to the One greater than He, enters into the joint possession of His greatness and majesty, without, however, thereby destroying the subordination of order (see Joh_14:16; Joh_17:3; Joh_17:5; 1Co_15:27; Php_2:9-11; 1Co_3:23; 1Co_11:3). The characterization of the theological import as the “absolute monotheism of the New Testament,” by Meyer, in connection with Lücke, is liable to misapprehension and fails to afford, in any case, a sufficient explanation.
B. We now consider the relation of this proposition to the preceding ἐχάρητε ἄν. For (ὄτι) the Father. Why should the disciples be glad of His going to the Father?
1. On account of His exaltation to δόξα and blessedness (Cyrill, Olshausen, Tholuck).
2. On account of the more powerful protection which He should thenceforth be able to bestow upon the disciples (Theophylact, Lücke and others).
3. On account of Jesus’ exaltation to greater power and activity (Meyer).
4. Because the going away of Jesus was His own exaltation and was likewise of benefit to them (Luther, Bengel, Lampe).
It is as little possible to separate Jesus’ exaltation to glory from His exaltation to power as to separate His own exaltation from the exaltation of His disciples; nevertheless, their love should first view His exaltation, passing on, however, as the context admonishes, from a glance at that in the abstract to the consideration that it is through His exaltation alone that He shall become in very deed their own.
Joh_14:29. And now I have told you.—As is frequently His custom He emphatically states that He tells them such and such things beforehand, in order that, when His predictions are fulfilled, they may believe. Thus prophecy is, like miracles, a proof of the divine power and presence (Isa_41:22-26). It is impossible that the bare prediction of the death of Jesus can here be meant; it is the announcement of His exaltation by means of His death, resurrection and ascension. These facts, in which they saw Christ’s prediction fulfilled, made perfect their faith. In this sense, therefore, it is written here also: “that ye might believe.” (See Joh_20:31).
Joh_14:30. Hereafter I shall not talk much with you (οὐκ ἔτι πολλὰ λαλήσω μεθ ὑμῶν).—A presentiment of departure, an introduction to the start which He was about proposing.—For the prince, etc. (ἐρχεται γὰρ ὁ τοῦ κόσμου ἄρχων).—See Joh_12:31. A reference of the mood of Jesus to the preparations against Him that are going on in Jerusalem. In spirit He is aware that His enemies are now making ready to advance against Him; and in them He sees the tools of Satan; hence: “the prince of this world cometh,” Joh_13:27.—And hath nothing in Me (καὶ ἐν ἐμοὶ οὐκ ἔχει οὐδέν ).—The ἐν ἑμοί antithesis to the prince of this world. He comes as the prince of this world’s power, of this world’s fear, of death and corruption, to claim a power over Me, Heb_2:14. Καὶ ἐν ἐμοί, etc. Various constructions:
1. He can, or is able to, do nothing to Me; he cannot inflict death upon Me; of My own free will I suffer it (Chrysostom, Kuinoel).
2. He finds nothing in Me; no accusation against Me (Origen).
3. He possesses nothing in Me (Cyril, Augustine: peccatum, cui debetur mortis supplicium; Grotius, Meyer more generally: in Me he possesses nothing, as owning his sway). [Meyer thinks that the sinlessness (Augustine: “in Me non habet quidquam, nullum omnino scilicet peccatum”) is not directly expressed in the passage, but necessarily implied as the causal condition, since only when Christ was free from sin, Satan had no hold on Him and no power over Him. Alford similarly: “no point of appliance whereon to fasten his attack.”—P. S.]
4. Tholuck: He has no claim on Me. (nihil juris). Submission on Christ’s part was, therefore, voluntary; comp. Joh_19:11 (so too De Wette, Hofmann and others).
The words certainly declare not only Jesus’ sinlessness but also His freedom from death. They are a repetition of Jesus’ solemn protestation of His freedom,—a protestation aimed against the idea which represents Him as of necessity succumbing to the irresistible fate of sinful men (see Joh_10:18; Joh_12:24; Joh_13:19). At the same time the saying contains an intimation to the effect that Satan, possessing, as he does, not a single fibre or hair of Him in an ethical sense, shall likewise fail to retain a single fibre or hair of Him in a physical sense. But the fact that he now, in accordance with the counsel of God, is coming upon Him, is implied in the emphasis that rests upon the expression: he cometh (comp. Luk_22:53).
Joh_14:31. But that the world may know, etc.—Expressive of His willingness to become a sacrifice. The root is love to the Father; the proof, obedience to the Father; the consequence: the departure, not so much in order to go obstinately to meet the enemy, but rather, in pursuance of God’s guidance, to await him at the place of prayer, in Gethsemane. That the world. Bengel: “Ut mundus desinat mundus esse et patris in me bene placitum agnoscat salutariter.” That, in His personal submission to the personal Father, the kingdom of grace, love, personal life, may dawn upon the world, for a judgment upon its unrightful prince and in order to the freeing of it from that false tyranny which he exercises through the fear of death. That the world may know that love is stronger than death (comp. Sol. Son_8:6 : “strong as death”).
Arise, let us depart.—The mighty saying prompted by a holy emotion finds expression not in two only, but in three asyndetical exhortations: ἐγείρεσθε—ἄγωμεν—ἑντεῦθεν. Various explanations of the item:
1. Jesus, accompanied by the disciples, proceeds to a secure place where He uttered chh. 15, 16, 17. (Chrysostom, Theophylact and others);—unsupported.
2. Still less tenable: hitherto Jesus had been outside of the city; He was but now about departing for Jerusalem to keep the Passover (Bengel, Wichelhaus [Röper]).
3. Jesus, too full of the matters which were still pressing upon His heart, spoke, still standing in the room where they had eaten the supper, chh. 15, 16, 17. (Knapp, Lücke, Tholuck, Meyer, [Calvin, Olshausen, Bleek, Brückner, Ewald, Alford, Owen], etc.). And this after the three powerful exhortations to depart ?
4. The following (chh. 15–17) was spoken by Him on the road (Luther, Grotius, Lampe, Lange, Leben Jesu II., p. 1347 [Ebrard, Barnes, Webster and Wilkinson, Wordsworth] and others). Meyer [Alford and Owen] in opposition to this view: The thing is psychologically improbable. Psychologically improbable indeed would be the supposition that Jesus did not discourse to the disciples of the most momentous matters even when they were upon the road to their destination. Walking and standing still and walking again is the very expression of a mind stirred by great things.
5. On the hypercritical remarks of De Wette (who identifies the ἐγείρεσθε, ἄγωμεν, Mat_26:46, with that of our text), Strauss, Weisse, Baur, Hilgenfeld, see Meyer [p. 529].
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. The farewell discourses of the Lord have not been sufficiently valued for what they are: namely, the new revelation of Christ concerning heaven. Until these discourses were delivered, the theocratic belief of Israel was acquainted only with Sheol, and with the antithesis of a paradise and a place of punishment (gehenna) in Sheol. See Luk_16:22 ff. The doctrine of paradise was of course the germ of the doctrine of the heavenly home, and even the Old Testament contained sundry dark intimations of the latter in the translation of Enoch, the ascension of Elijah, the description of heaven as the throne of God and the habitation of His holy angels, and the hope of the faithful for a closer union with God, in sayings such as Pro_15:24; Ecc_12:7. But it was reserved for Christ to throw heaven open, in the first instance by His word in the farewell-discourses, and, secondly, by His act in the ascension itself. Hence the farewell-discourses substantially contain a theology of Christ’s ascension. The doctrine of heaven was, however, not intelligible to believing human hearts until the disciples were forced to learn experimentally that the earthly world was no longer a resting-place for the Lord and for them; that they were cast out of the world. When the world cast them out and its doors shut to behind them, there opened to them the gates of heaven. Understanding the ethical import of the going down of the sun and the gathering night, they could also comprehend the symbolical sign of the starry heavens, the Father’s great open house. And even now they were enabled to grasp and hold fast this hope only through the imminence of Christ’s ascension into heaven. But the revelation concerning heaven as the place and land of glory could and should not be the exchange of a new sensuous expectation for an old one; together with the local heaven Christ disclosed the dynamical heaven to their view—destined, this latter, to be developed in the new life upon earth as a personal kingdom of love; founded by the revelation of His personality, by the manifestation of the personal Father and the glorification, by means of the personality of the Holy Ghost, of the personal love-life of God as the foundation of the personal kingdom of love in which they are, which they are to maintain against the hate of the world, and which they are to spread through the world. In the second life of the second Man who is from heaven, in the resurrection of Christ, heaven was made manifest on earth (comp. 1Co_15:21-22; 1Co_15:47; Joh_16:21); through the Paraclete as the Spirit of glory, of δόξα, the disciples were translated into the fellowship of this heavenly state (Php_3:20).
2. The startling effect produced upon the disciple of Christ when this present world is darkened for him by the cross, and sets upon him or casts him out. Then he is comforted by the watch-word which bids him put his trust in the Christ who ascendeth to heaven and in the Father who is in heaven. The soul may be troubled at this transition; but not the heart (Joh_14:1; Joh_14:27).
3. Trust in God; in so doing, etc. Become thorough Israelites, for thus ye shall also become Christians. We can go still further and say: become thorough Catholics and then ye will also be Evangelical Christians.
4. Man, having as a sinner lost his power over the earth and being chained by an autochthonic consciousness to particular climes and countries, had, in still greater measure, lost the bent or drawing of his astral or heavenly citizenship; his way led not upwards toward the stars, but downwards to the earth. Christ has restored us our heavenly citizenship (Hebrews 9). The words of Christ: In My Father’s house, etc., do not, indeed, contain any new astronomical system, but they do prove His view of the world and of heaven to have been infinitely elevated above that of His time.
5. The three sayings inculcating faith in the heavenly home: the saying addressed to Thomas, the saying addressed to Philip, the saying addressed to Judas Lebbæus. Or our heavenly home is sure to us in spite of the contradiction of an outward reality full of distress and death, in spite of the want of phenomena evident to the senses, in spite of the denial of the hostile world, which even by its hate, as the germ and sign of hell, must testify of love, as the seed and sign of heaven. See above.
6. Meyer on Joh_14:3 [p. 507, footnote]: “It is incorrect to affirm that the idea of reward is utterly wanting in John. (Thus Weiss in the Deutsch. Zeitschr., 1853, pp. 325, 388 and in his Petrin. Lehrbegr., 1855, p. 55 ff.) As Christ asks for eternal glory for Himself as a reward, Joh_17:4 ff., so in like manner does He promise it to the disciples as their reward. See Joh_17:24; Joh_12:25. Under this head we should also class the promise of ἰδεῖν τὴν βασ. τοῦ θεοῦ, Joh_3:3; Joh_3:5, and of the raising up at the last day, Joh_5:28 ff; Joh_6:40; Joh_6:54. Comp. 1Jn_3:2-3, where the future glorification and union with Christ is expressly designated as the subject of the ἐλπίς; as also 2Jn_1:8, where the term μισθόν πλήρη is used and must be understood as referring to eternal bliss (see Düsterdieck, II. p. 505).”—Upon all which we must observe, that in John especially, the term reward cannot be apprehended in its legal sense; it is to be construed, in conformity to the kingdom of love, as a loving recompense, bestowed, it is true, in accordance with justice.
7. Christ the living Way, the pledge of the goal. Christianity the absolutely dynamical view of the world. The personal, God-filled heart and essence of Christ becomes surety for the existence and unclosure of the personal, i.e. eternal and spiritually glorious world. Christ’s heart the absolute dynamis of the eternal places and times, 1Pe_1:4. Christ the absolute Way, because He is the Truth,—the principle, medium and aim of all connection, all that is lasting in the world—perfect reality; and because He is the Life,—the complete manifestation of the highest appearance and beauty from the deepest ground: all-animating Life and Love.
8. If ye had known Me. The mystery of Christ’s personality, the medium of the manifestation of God and of the manifestation of the personal kingdom.
9. The greater works of Christianity, a continual miracle in the world, to result in the wonderful metamorphosis of the world at the consummation of all things, and in its transfiguration into the world of the Spirit.
10. The evidence of Philip and the evidence of Christ. Philip still sees in things power over persons; the Lord sees in personality power over things. On the Paraclete see note to Joh_14:16, in reference to Tholuck, p. 364 [and Hare’s Mission of the Comforter.—P. S.]
11. Similarly see note on the distinction between the manifestation of Christ in the Father and that of the Father in Christ. Analogously, the being of believers in Christ—justification—is distinguished from Christ’s being in believers—sanctification.
12. The promise that His people shall see Him again, Joh_14:19, is inclusive of the resurrection, together with the entire future manifestation of Christ in His word and Spirit here, in His paternal house beyond this world, until the time of His great Epiphany. Hence it is wrong to contrast, as Meyer does (p. 400), Christ’s paracletic coming again with His resurrection; and, similarly, to suppose it to result from the Johannean version that Christ did not so definitely predict His resurrection (except in such hints as are contained in Joh_2:19; Joh_10:17) as the Synoptists report Him to have done.
13. The manifestation of Christ in its relation to the world, according to the view of Judas Lebbeus and according to Christ’s view. Love to Christ, as the tendency of the Spirit in the Church to the centre of life, is the fundamental condition, the medium of the manifestation of His personality; the world as world, on the other hand, is, in its centrifugal tendency, bent upon vanity, upon impersonal things. In this medium Christ cannot manifest Himself to it.
14. The doctrine of the procession of the Holy Ghost, according to Joh_14:26, stands, in a manner, betwixt the assertion of the Oriental and that of the Occidental Church. See the history of dogmas. The former Church with reason insists upon the priority of the Father as first principle; the latter, with equal reason, gives prominence to the autonomy of spiritual life which the Son too possesses and of which intimation is given here: “in My name.”
15. On Joh_14:26. The Spirit is related, as Spirit, to a specific vital cause by which He is necessitated. The wind, as the symbolical Spirit, cannot be conceived of without the earth; the spirit of man cannot be conceived of without the substratum of a man. Spirit is the concentrated, conscious unity of a definite life. So the Spirit of God is the unity of the manifestations of the essence of God; the Holy Spirit the unity of the complete manifestation of the Father and Son, by which unity God has fully made manifest His antithesis to the world, in order thus fully to communicate Himself to the world. But because the essence of God is actual to its very foundation, the Holy Ghost also, as the Spirit of the complete manifestation of God, appears as a particular third form of the personality of God, and is free in Himself, like the Father and the Son. The life of the Spirit becomes a fountain of life in men’s spirits. This truth has been misinterpreted by the Montanists, Manichees, the spiritualistic Franciscans and other enthusiasts of the Middle Ages, the Anabaptists and the philosophers of the school of Hegel, inasmuch as all these distinguish, more or less definitely, three kingdoms,—the kingdom of the Father, that of the Son, and that of the Holy Ghost. And the Catholic doctrine of ecclesiastical tradition adds to the kingdom of the Son a kingdom of the Spirit, to the administration of which the Hierarchy pretends. This forms the other extreme to the Spirit’s sphere of manifestation according to the doctrine of the Quakers. The Holy Ghost is related just as purely and entirely to the Son as the Son is to the Father.—The infiniteness of the Christian spiritual life, the eternal nature of it, is expressed in the calling of the Spirit who has been given to the believer, now the Spirit of truth, now the Spirit of knowledge, of strength, etc. There is always denoted an infinite plenitude—self-begetting like a fountain—of this divine life of truth, knowledge, etc.
16. Christ’s farewell-greeting a pledge for the greeting of a future meeting. Thus the Lord comforteth His people.
17. The prophecies in their fulfilment are miracles of God’s Spirit, in order to the awakening, quickening and confirming of faith.
18. Christ’s repeated protest against the misinterpretation of His death-way,—against the conception of it as a blind, inevitable fate or a sign of the world’s superiority; in connection with the asseveration of His freedom in submitting to the will of His Father. In this free submission His high-priesthood is perfected; the Priest is the Sacrifice and the Sacrifice is the Priest Himself.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
The word of the Lord to His disciples: “Let not your heart be troubled! ” or how He encourages them on their entrance upon the night of sorrows: 1. By the admonition to submissive and unconditional trust (Joh_14:1). 2. By the opening up of a view of the high and heavenly home (Joh_14:2). 3. By His going before and coming again (Joh_14:2-3). 4. By the explanations and promises whereby He removes all their scruples and doubts (the scruple of Thomas, of Philip, of Judas Lebbeus). 5. By the gift of His peace as a pledge of a speedy and joyful return (Joh_14:27 ff.).—The rise of the heavenly Paradise upon Christ’s earthly night of passion: 1. The Paradise a heavenly one, better than the lost Paradise on earth. 2. Its rise, brought on by Christ’s exode into the night of Passion, in company with His disciples. 3. Christ the Revealer and Perfecter of it, and the Guide to it.—Discovery of the new celestial realm of life above the old subterranean kingdom of the dead.—The glorification of the human life through Christ, at the same time the glorification of the creation. He hath brought life and immortality to light. First an inner life for God’s paternal house, then a paternal house of God for that inner life.—The heavenly heart revealed and unlocked the heavenly home.—Christ has disclosed and unclosed heaven: 1. He was the bearer of disclosures concerning it; 2. the opener of a way into it.—Christ has pledged His word to His people that there is an heavenly inheritance for them.—He makes all things ready for the heavenly life: 1.The place for His people, 2. His people for the place.—The Christian’s way to earthly woe, the way to the Father’s house in heaven. Heaven our Father-house: 1. The Father of the house; 2. the house of the Father.—Our journey to the Father’s house: 1. The goal of our way; 2. the way to our goal.—The many mansions in the Father’s house: 1. Many mansions, one Father-house. In all one Father, one Son and Heir, one inheritance for one throng of children. 2. One Father-house, many mansions. Room enough for many inhabitants. 3. The mansions, habitable, resting-places, abiding places. 4. The mansions manifold, for every one a special home in the one eternal citadel of God.—The heavenly mansions: 1. In what respect prepared from the beginning; 2. in what respect receiving additional preparation through the ascension of Christ; 3. in what respect undergoing an eternal process of glorification.—The unshakable assurance of Christ with regard to the heavenly Fatherland.—The home-country of Christians where the glorified Christ is.—Christ’s disclosures in regard to the way to heaven. (See above).—The doubt of Thomas.
The saying of Christ: I am the way: 1. He is the way, as the truth of the way:—the living, personal motion to the Father because He is truth itself; 2. He is the way, as the life of the way;—the victorious mover to the Father because He is life in general.—Christ the way in His divine-human personality: 1. God’s way to man. Therefore 2. man’s way to God.—Christ’s personality as a pledge of the heavenly home: 1. As the truth of the heavenly life; 2. as the life of heavenly truth.—No way in the Father except through the Son.—He who knows nothing of the life beyond, knows nothing of it for this reason—because he is ignorant of the kernel of this present life.—The Lord’s discourse with Philip.—The personal life of Christ the substantial appearance in the midst of the seemingness of the world.—The manifestation of the Father in the figure of the Son.—Christ the image of God, Heb_1:3.—Different ways of knowing the one way of truth: 1. The knowledge of elect disciples, a cognition of the Father in the Son by means of the cognition of the Son in the Father, or a comprehension of Christ’s works by Christ’s word. 2. The way of the majority: or the cognition of the Son in the Father by the Father in the Son, i.e. comprehension of the word through a comprehension of the works. The greater works, or how the wonders of Christ are developing in the wonders of Christianity until the great wonder of His appearing.—How Christ’s miracles are perennial in His works.—Greater works, i.e. the increasingly glorious unfolding of Christ’s work in His people.—As Christ Himself has been glorified by the Holy Ghost, so the wonders of Christ have been glorified through the wonders of the Holy Spirit.
For I go to the Father. Christ’s power rendered boundless by His going to the Father, the Fountain of power.—Prayer in the name of Jesus the channel for the performance of Christ’s works.—The sighs of the Christian heart as the prophecy and origin of the triumphs of the Christian hand.—The longing of Christians and the blessing of Christ encounter one another.—An ever purer praying in His name results in an ever richer doing in His strength.
The Holy Spirit as the other Comforter, not Christ’s substitute but His presence.—The promise of the other Comforter (Mediator).—The Holy Ghost promised to Christians as, above all, the Spirit of truth.—The world, as world, is not capable of receiving the Holy Ghost: 1. It does not see Him, therefore it does not know Him; 2. it does not know Him, therefore it does not receive Him.—The world with all its spirit yet without the (Holy) Spirit: 1. Its spirits lack the Spirit (the true Spirit); 2. its spirit lacks spirits (its inspiration does not attain to great personal spirit-life).—The Holy Ghost, like Christ, a stranger to the world.—Always an intimate of Christians, always a stranger to the world.—The disciples of Jesus become the intimates of His Spirit.—Christians never orphans.—Christianity a living in the coming of Christ: 1. He lives, therefore His people shall live 2. He comes, therefore His people shall see Him.
The grand saying: Yet a little while: 1. Yet a little while and He will be here with us (as Comforter, as Quickener, Gladdener, Helper-through) with wonders of refreshment. 2. Yet a little while and we shall be yonder with Him.—After Gethsemane and Golgotha, in sooth,—but still after a little.—Through trouble and death, and yet after a little. (Rom_8:18.)—At that day, Joh_14:20. The new day of a three-fold lustre: 1. That of the Resurrection, 2. of the Ascension, 3. of the outpouring of the Spirit.—Isa_30:26; Isa_60:19.—The resurrection time as the triumphal celebration of the personal life: 1. Of Christ, 2. of His own, 3. of the hearts that they, in His strength, shall awaken to personal life.—Upon what conditions do we become recipients of the manifestation of the living Christ? (See Joh_14:23.)
Christ’s discourse with Judas Lebbeus.—The gloomy views of Thomas, the wavering views of Philip, and the cheerful views of Judas.—Judas’ faith in the piety of the world not free from worldly-mindedness.—The difference and contrast between Jesus’ disciples and the world: First mark: Love to Jesus; no love. Second mark: The keeping of Christ’s word; the failing to keep it. Third mark: Experience of how the Father, together with the Son, takes up His dwelling with His own. The Father’s staying away from the despisers of the Son.—Only where Christ’s radiant image is extant in His word, is this radiant image filled with the power of His life.—Christ having covered up the great abyss between earth and heaven, discloses the great abyss between the company of the faithful and the world.
The Holy Ghost as the teacher of Christ’s word: 1. How He brings to mind all things; 2. how He develops all things.—The Holy Ghost as a Reminder: 1. Who unlocks the penetralia of revelation for the Christian, 2. the penetralia of the Christian for revelation.—The inner life as a being reminded, or a calling to mind.—The mark of the true Christian spirit, unison with Christ and His word.
The peace-greeting of Christ His gift of peace.—The farewell-greeting of Christ the pledge for the greeting of a reunion.—How Christ greets us so differently from the world: 1. At coming, 2. at parting.—Christ’s going away itself a mightier coming again to His own.—The gain of the faithful in Christ’s going home to the Father.—How, in the hour of temptation, the heart’s peace should stand firm in the midst of all and any grief of soul.—Christ’s prophecies concerning His death and glorification, a fountain of faith for His people.—The protestation of Christ Joh_14:30.—The prince of this world cometh, or Christ’s enemies a host of Satan.—He hath nothing in Me: He possesses none of Me. 2. He shall seize none of Me. 3. He shall retain none of Me.—Everything of Christ’s belongs to the light, even His body. This fact decides His future: 1. His going home to the land of light. 2. His return in the power of light.—Christ’s joyfulness in sacrifice (Joh_14:31): 1. Its purpose (that the world), 2. its impulse (love to the Father), 3. its act (obedience), 4. its expression (the exhortation to departure).—The eternal authoritativeness, as applying to Christ’s people, of His charge to depart: 1. Arise! 2. Let us go! 3. Away from this place!
Gospel for Whitsunday Joh_14:23-31.—The promise of the Holy Ghost as an answer to the question of Judas: 1. The magnitude of that promise, 2. its certainty to the disciples of Jesus, 3. its seclusion against the world.—For whom is the promise of the Holy Ghost? 1. Not for the world, as world, but only for the disciples. 2. Not for the disciples alone, but for the whole world which, as world, is at once to be destroyed, and, in the susceptible, elevated and preserved.—The coming of the Holy Ghost: 1. The stipulation of it: a contrast between the disciples who love the Lord, and the world. 2. Form of it: a contrast between the condition of those who are anointed with the Spirit and the condition of immature disciples. 3. The effect of it: a contrast between the true peace of the Lord and the false peace of the world. 4. The aim of it: a contrast between victorious departure out of the world and the destruction of the world.—The development of the Christian life by means of the Holy Ghost: 1. Love to Jesus (Joh_14:23-24). 2. Enlightenment (Joh_14:26). 3. Peace (Joh_14:27). 4. Joy. 5. Victory and perfection (Joh_14:31).
Starke: Luther: Whom the devil tries to terrify and dispirit, Christ comforts; but whom the devil lulls into security, and emboldens, Christ terrifies.—Jer_17:9.—Hedinger: Faith, the best weapon of defence against all fear.—“In My Father’s house:” in heaven, in the which house I am no servant but a son.—Canstein: O blessed friendship and fellowship of Christ with His faithful ones! His heart doth so hang upon them that He is not able, as it were, to dwell in heaven if He have not them with Him.—Zeisius: When the world will no longer put up with thee, remember His house.—On Joh_14:5. Luther: It is laudable for a man to perceive his ignorance in divine things.—On Joh_14:6. Rev_1:8.—Ibid.: A Christian is a man who forthwith commences to go out of this life to heaven.—Hedinger: Through Christ we look into the divine nature.—Canstein on Joh_14:11 : If Christ did not will that men should believe Him without works, still more does it behoove Christians to show in deed and in works how it is that they desire to be accounted of.—On Joh_14:13. Learn to pray aright.—On Joh_14:15. 1Co_16:22.—Zeisius: If thou desire to know whether thou truly love Christ, ask thy conscience whether thou be leading a life of genuine and daily repentance, etc.—If thou grieve not the Holy Spirit with sins, He will not depart from thee, but will guide and lead thee into life.—Osiander on Joh_14:17 : The bad Spirit is a lying spirit who seduces men, making them trifling and deceitful; but the Spirit of Christ is a Spirit of truth who brings forth truth and makes men true so that they take pleasure in the truth.
Joh_14:18. Hedinger: Made sorrowful and yet beloved.—Luther: Christendom has this consoling promise in common.—On Joh_14:19. No matter how thyself and thine art, thy splendor and thy cleverness may be seen; yet a little while, and the world shall see thee no more.—On Joh_14:20. Hedinger: The cross and experience open both the eyes and the understanding.—O mysterious bliss of the faithful! They are united to Christ as Christ is to the Father.
Joh_14:21. Zeisius: To love Christ is not merely to know His commandments, but to keep them.—Be solicitous of this manifestation of Jesus, O soul! more than of all in the world beside.
Joh_14:23. Luther: Christ intends to say: This is the reason why I will not reveal Myself to the world; it is so mad-brained and foolish as to presume to lecture and tutor Me as to how I ought to rule. It should hear Me and learn of Me; but it thinks itself too clever for that and undertakes to dictate to Me how I should act.—Despise not the meanest human being that loves Jesus; meet such with reverence; his soul is a dwelling-place of the triune God.—Cramer: Precious guests, God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost; these come to us; not as to a wedding or on a visit, but to dwell in us—and so we are the temple of God.—Hedinger: Listen! Christ’s word thou must keep, not simply know. Should’st thou say: that I will not do, that I cannot do, then thou must suffer us to dispute thy Christianity. Yet even keeping is not (necessarily) fulfilling.
Joh_14:26. Cramer: The office of the Holy Ghost is implied in His name (and in His different names).—Zeisius: How will the Holy Ghost adorn His dwelling and fill it with light, comfort, righteousness, peace, joy.—Faithful teachers must first suffer themselves to be instructed and reminded by the Holy Ghost before they teach their hearers.—Zeisius: True love rejoiceth at the prosperity of the beloved. Why then, O Christian heart, dost thou mourn so bitterly at the departure of those who have shut their eyes upon this atrocious world and fallen asleep in Christ?
Joh_14:30. Dost thou hear, worldling? thy prince is the devil.—As Satan has no power over Christ, neither has he power over those who are justified through the blood of Christ.
Joh_14:31. The faith, the love and the patience of true Christians must shine in the eyes of the world.—Canstein: All our actions must originate in faith in, and love to, God; their aim must be His glory, and the rule of them His will.—Be comforted, dear Christian, in thy misery; thou art suffering in accordance with thy heavenly Father’s will. He will end thy sufferings in His own good time and will order them to the accomplishment of some good purpose.—Nov. Bibl. Tub.: What is the true Christian’s pilgrimage? After the example of Jesus, it is a continual going hence and a continual hasting to the heavenly Father.
Gerlach: 1. Of Christ’s going to the Father and the way to be pursued. 2. Of the Comforter, the Holy Ghost, in whom Christ comes to His people again in greater glory. 3. The setting out to suffer.—Now did the disciples more and more clearly understand that their Master was really about going away from them, and their faces reflected their fear and anxiety—emotions which had been heightened by His last words to Peter. Therefore it is that the succeeding discourse is preëminently comforting in its nature.—Jesus does not merely point out the way,—He is the Way; He does not simply guide to life,—He is the Life. The Way itself carries the man who enters upon it and continues in it, to the goal; the Truth lights him so that he cannot stray; the Life imbues him with strength in which he walks without growing weary.—This demand of Philip shows that the disciples still imagined the Father to be with Him, not in Him.—The greater works. Jesus had sowed, they were to reap (Joh_4:38); before the whole work of redemption was finished, Jesus’ works on the earth, His teaching, His working of miracles, His guiding and speeding of His people, could not but be (appear) small in comparison with the mighty works of the apostles, to whom the Holy Ghost more than supplied the visible presence of Jesus, glorifying Jesus and His cross for them, throwing open to them the doors of the heathen world, and giving them, through the word of reconciliation, multitudes for a spoil and the strong for a prey.—(Luther). Who is this “I?” He assumes to Himself all the power and strength of the divine majesty and seizes everything in a mass:—“Whatsoever ye ask, without exception.”—Judas probably understood the “manifestation” to mean an outward one.—He hath no power over Me. In order that, even at His death, they might not believe that the prince of this world had conquered Him, He told them so clearly that He went of His own free will to the Cross.—Lisco. Joh_14:1-14. The departing Redeemer comforts His disciples in view of their imminent separation.
Joh_14:15-31. The departing Redeemer promises the Holy Ghost to His people and comforts them.
Braune: To believers, death is in very truth a going home; their life a journey home. The Jews were gathered to their Fathers,—Christians go hence to the Father.—The disciples, Thomas, etc. How honestly they speak out their hearts; not one utters a false Yea.—Thomas: This reminds one of the verse of the natural man: “I live, I know not for how long; I die, I know not how soon; I go, I know not whither; how can I be so cheerful ?”—In our earthly speech we say: The wayfarer makes a way, but in the spiritual tongue the Way makes the wayfarer.—The prophecy Isa_25:8 is fulfilled in Christ.—The greater works. When He had completed the reconciliation, a free, familiar and living intercourse was opened between God and man, and streams of power from on high could now discharge themselves unchecked into the hearts of men.—(Herder). He opens (says He) a clear and lightsome way. The assurance with which Christ declares this, makes heaven and earth one, as it were.—(Bengel:) Truth makes all the virtues in us true; otherwise there would be false knowledge, false faith, false love, false hope.—Beginning with this passage (Joh_14:17), Christ makes a distinction between the world and His people, such as does not elsewhere appear in His addresses. Pentecost, however, confirmed this distinction and made it manifest. The Christian cannot be distinguished from the world if he has not yet celebrated His Pentecost.—The Holy Ghost. The longer we have Him, the better we have Him, the better we know Him, until finally He comes to be in us.—Thomas, Philip, and the faithful Judas speak; the more intelligent, profounder and greater disciples John, Peter, James, keep silence.—He says in the face of death: I live and ye shall live also.—Peace be with you. The heart is free from everything that is hostile to God; there is no latent love of the world, no want of trust in the spirit. Perfect concord of heart is where Christ and His peace are.
Heubner: It is the duty of the Christian to be courageous, undaunted and composed so long as Christ is with him.—We hear after what fashion the Son speaks, as one perfectly at home and able to find His way about in the house of the Father—more familiar with it than all the astronomers who scarcely descry the visible covering, the threshold of that heavenly house.—Many mansions. Many as regards number and kind: different in glory and blessedness.—So long as there are stars in the heavens, there shall not be wanting witnesses to a higher world. Comp. Daub, Der Sternenhimmel mit Christlichem Auge zur Erhebung des Herzens betrachtet, Essen, 1836.—There is already assigned us through Christ a place in heaven. What consolation does this afford in poverty, persecution and death. The reply of Basil to the question of the Arian emperor Valens, as to where he would remain in the face of his persecutions: Aut sub cœlo, aut in cœlo.—Urban, the deputy of Cajetan, to Luther: Where wilt thou abide then? Luther: Under heaven.—A saying of Frederick the Magnanimous (p. 427, note). Must not the Christian be homesick for his heavenly Fatherland ? “Knowest thou the land ?”
Joh_14:3. Christ’s going hence by the way of His cross and passion served,—through His appearing in the presence of God (Heb_9:24), through the offering of His blood in the Holy Place or the presentation of the sufficient reconciliation made by Him,—to purchase for us our re-adoption into heaven. It is to Him we owe our heavenly citizenship.
Joh_14:3. Perfect union with Christ.—No heaven without Christ.—On Joh_14:23. We can surrender ourselves only to one who meets us with a trustful heart.
Joh_14:26. Every one longs to be spirituel (a play upon words: Alles will Geist haben, Geist in the sense of ésprit, wit). Why do not men seek the true Spirit which is with Christ?—Whoso does not become a doctor in this School (of the Holy Spirit), is no true doctor.—What is true clearing up? What Christ makes clear, glorifies.
Joh_14:28. Nothing against the divine nature of Christ can be deduced from this passage, even should we be unprepared to regard, as Basil does, the very fact of Jesus’ instituting a comparison between Himself and the Father, as a proof of the Son’s equality in substance with the Father. (Basil says, namely: none but things of a like nature can be compared,—angels with angels, men with men, etc.).—The prince of this world. Of course he thought it conducive to his highest interest to see Jesus, the Holy One, the Founder of the kingdom of God, covered with opprobrium as the greatest criminal,—and all under the pretence of justice.
Gossner: The Saviour had in His humiliation, never exactly declared (out and out) who He was. Therefore it was difficult for people who were to see him hanging for several hours on the cross between two murderers, to believe in His divinity.—The Father’s House. No fear that there will not be room enough there.—No bridge nor path is there, leading from earth to heaven, from time to eternity, from this world to God, and stretching as far as Christ who did come from heaven and go to heaven. All other bridges break; all other roads fail thee just where they ought to begin,—namely, in death.—Philip here asked a question which has puzzled the brains of the wisest men of all ages—namely, as to what God is and how we may know Him.
Joh_14:16. In this verse the Triune is clear as the sun.
Joh_14:18. It is not: ye shall have a shadow, a conception, a thought of Me; no,—I am coming to you. Our soul doth live, our whole heart laugheth, when He revealeth Himself to us,—Christ, our salvation.—At that day. At the Easter day, which comes to every Christian when Christ rises within him and begins to live—at the day of manifestation.—Without Christ it is not possible to know Christ, without God it is impossible to know God. This saying: “I will reveal Myself unto him,” must be fulfilled for each man or he knows nothing truly of Christ and has no living God.—On Joh_14:23. Scripture ascribes to the inner man all the senses of the outer man. Taste and see that the Lord is good, Psa_34:8.—When the body is dead, the soul continues to be a living substance. This is a proof of the substantiality of spiritual experience in the heart.
Joh_14:30. Against this, Christ’s innocence, the devil has dashed his horns to pieces; it has broken his neck for him.
Joh_14:31. Up, up! away! to suffer with Him; ye must not be taking your repose.
Stier: The first chapter (14) manifestly takes for its starting-point faith in God as existent in Christ; the special subject of the second is the love of those who are united in Him and through Him; finally, the third contains (for the exercise of hope, we may say) the most minute announcement of all that is to result from and succeed the departure of Jesus.—Richter (Luther): So long as we are not ready, the habitations are not prepared for us, though in themselves they are prepared.
Schleiermacher: He requires faith in God and faith in Himself, as something which indeed seems to be two things—things, however, so inseparably united as to be actually one and the same.—That which we do in faith on the Lord, is a work of the Son; and when this work is promoted by the government which the Father exercises in the world, the Father is glorified in the Son.—Only he who holds fast that in My life which, as commandment, doctrine, or promise—for they are all one—has become an eternal, divine word of love and grace to men, etc.,—only he it is who loveth Me.—My peace. This peace resteth upon love, and love expelleth all fear.—Besser: On Joh_14:1. Be of good courage, Deu_31:6-7. But a greater than Joshua is here.—On the “other Comforter.” The ancient Church advisedly took the Gospels for four Sundays of the glorious time between Easter and Pentecost from these three chapters of John.—Heaven the true archetype of the Old Testament temple. Heb. chh. 8–12.
On the Pentecostal pericope. Genzken: Concerning the glorious Pentecostal gifts which the Lord hath promised us.—Bachmann: The Christian a temple of God, of the Holy Ghost.—Rambach: The victory of Christianity over the world.—Hagenbach: The peace of God as the most precious legacy of our Lord, the most glorious gift of the Holy Ghost.—Florey: The kingdom of the Holy Ghost. A kingdom of love, truth, peace.—The peace of the world, and the peace of the Lord.
[Craven: From Hilary (De Trin. vii. 9): Joh_14:6. He who is the Way cannot lead us astray; He who is the Truth cannot deceive us; He who is the Life will not desert us in the darkness of death.
Joh_14:9. He does not mean the sight of the bodily eye; the Father is seen in the Son by the incommunicable likeness of birth.
Joh_14:9-10. That the Father dwells in the Son shows that He is not solitary; that the Father works by the Son, shows that He is not different or alien.——From Augustine: Joh_14:1-4. Our Lord consoles His disciples, who would be naturally troubled at the idea of His death, by assuring them of His divinity.—As the disciples were afraid for themselves when Peter had been told that he would deny his Lord, He adds In My Father’s house, etc., to assure them that they might with confidence look forward to dwelling with Him.—Many mansions, i.e. many degrees of dignity corresponding to people’s deserts.
Joh_14:5-7. The disciples knew not what they did know.—I am the Way, whereby thou wouldest go; the Truth, whereto thou wouldest go; the Life, in which thou wouldest abide—Walk by the Man, and thou wilt arrive at God.
Joh_14:8. To the joy of beholding His [the Father’s] face nothing could be added.
Joh_14:9. When two persons are very much alike, we say, If you have seen the one you have seen the other.
Joh_14:10. Spiritual vision is the reward of faith, vouchsafed to minds purified by faith.
Joh_14:12. Greater works; they afterwards converted the Gentiles to the faith.
Joh_14:13. Why, then, do we often see believers asking and not receiving? Whatsoever we ask for that would hinder our salvation, we do not [truly] ask in our Saviour’ name.—Whenever we ask any thing to the disadvantage of our salvation, He shows Himself our Saviour by not granting.—What we ask for is [often] deferred, not denied.
Joh_14:17. The world, i.e. those who love the world, cannot receive the Holy Spirit; unrighteousness cannot become righteous.—The world cannot receive Him, because it seeth Him not; the love of the world hath not invisible [i.e. spiritual] eyes to see that which can be seen only invisibly [spiritually].
Joh_14:19. A little while; that which seems long to men, is short to God.
Joh_14:21. He that hath them in mind and keepeth them in life; he that hath them in words and keepeth them in works; he that hath them by hearing and keepeth them by doing; he that hath them by doing and keepeth them by persevering, he it is that loveth Me.—Love must be shown by works, or it is a mere barren name.—Now He loves us so only that we believe, then He will love us so that we shall see; now, we love by believing that which we shall see; then, we shall love by seeing that which we have believed.
Joh_14:22-24. Love distinguishes the Saints from the world: it maketh men to be of one mind in an house; in which house the Father and the Son take up Their abode; Who give that love to those to whom in the end They will manifest Themselves.—We will come unto him: They come to us in that we go to Them; They come by succouring, we go by obeying; They come by enlightening, we go by contemplating; They come by filling, we go by holding: so Their manifestation is not external but inward; Their abode is not transitory but eternal.—The abode He promised them hereafter (Joh_14:3) is altogether different from that of which He now speaks; the one is spiritual and inward, the other outward and perceptible to the bodily senses.
Joh_14:26. The Son speaks, the Spirit teaches; when the Son speaks we take in the words, when the Spirit teaches we understand those words.—Bring to your remembrance, i.e. suggest; every wholesome hint to remember is of the grace of the Spirit.
Joh_14:27. He left no peace in this world, in which we conquer the enemy; He shall give us peace in the world to come, when we shall reign without an enemy.—This peace is Himself, both when we believe that He is, and when we shall see Him as He is.—His peace is such peace as He has Himself.—There is a peace which is serenity of thought, tranquillity of mind, simplicity of heart, the bond of love, the fellowship of charity; none will be able to come to the inheritance of the Lord, who do not observe this testament of peace.
Joh_14:28. In that He was Man, He went; in that He was God, He stayed.——From Chrysostom: Joh_14:9. He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father: A man cannot see the substance of gold in silver, one nature cannot be made apparent by another.
Joh_14:16. Another Comforter: The word another shows the distinct personality of the Spirit; the word Paraclete (Comforter) His consubstantiality.—They were made to wait some time for this gift (the Comforter) in order that they might feel the want of it, and so be the more grateful when it came.
Joh_14:19. Because I live ye shall live also: The death of the cross shall not separate you from Me forever, but only hide Me from you for a moment.
Joh_14:27. External peace is often even hurtful, rather than profitable to those who enjoy it.—From Gregory: Joh_14:23. If thou wouldest prove thy love, show thy works.—Into some hearts He cometh, but not to make His abode.—In proportion as a man’s love rests upon lower things is he removed from heavenly love.—To the love of our Maker, let the tongue, mind, life bear witness.
Joh_14:26. Unless the Spirit be present to the mind of the hearer, the word of the teacher is vain.—The invisible Spirit suggests, not because He takes a lower place in teaching, but because He teaches secretly.——From Alcuin: Joh_14:21. By love, and the observance of His commandments that will be perfected in us which He has begun, viz. that we should be in Him and He in us.——From Theophylact: Joh_14:6. When thou art engaged in the practical, He is made thy way; when in the contemplative, He is made thy truth; and to the practical and contemplative is joined life, for we should both act and contemplate with reference to the world to come.
Joh_14:21. As if He had said, Ye think that by sorrowing for My death ye prove your affection, but I esteem the keeping of My commandments the evidence of love.
Joh_14:26. The Spirit was to teach what Christ had forborne to tell His disciples because they were not able to bear it; He was to bring to remembrance what Christ had told and they had failed to remember.——From Burkitt: Joh_14:1. The holiest of God’s children subject to disquieting fears.—Christ’s remedy for fear, viz. faith in God and in Himself.
Joh_14:3-4. Christ’s arguments of consolation in view of His departure.
Joh_14:6. As though Christ had said—I am the author of the way that leadeth unto life, the teacher of the truth that directs to it, the giver of the life that is obtained by walking in it.
Joh_14:8. Much ignorance may consist with saving grace.
Joh_14:13-14. Our Lord assures His disciples that whatever comforts they enjoyed by His presence, they should obtain by their prayers.—To pray in the name of Christ is—1. to look unto Christ as having purchased for us this privilege; 2. to pray in the strength of Christ; 3. to pray in respect of the present mediation of Christ.—The promise is doubled for the confirmation of it.
Joh_14:15. Christ requires an obedient love, and loving obedience.—Not waiters, but workers are the best servants. [We often work by waiting.—E. R. C.]—The surest evidence of love to Christ is obedience.
Joh_14:16. The office of the Holy Spirit—a Comforter [Paraclete], i.e. an Advocate, an Encourager, a Consoler.
Joh_14:18. Christ does not say, I will not suffer you to be comfortless, but I will not leave you so.
Joh_14:19. Because I live ye shall live also.—While there is vital sap in the root you that are branches shall not wither and die.
Joh_14:21. Christ teaches—1. the necessity of knowledge in order to practice; 2. the necessity of practice in order to happiness.—I will manifest Myself: Obedient Christians shall not only enjoy the benefit of Christ’s love, but also the sense thereof.—We may as rationally think to nourish our bodies with poison, as to enjoy the manifestation of Christ’s love in a way of sin.
Joh_14:23. Make our abode denotes—1. the sweet and intimate fellowship between God and the obedient; 2. the perpetuity thereof.
Joh_14:26. The great Comforter, the special Teacher—He teaches, 1. condescendingly; 2. efficaciously; 3. plainly; 4. unerringly.—The Spirit the Remembrancer, He teaches nothing but what Christ Himself taught.
Joh_14:27. The world may wish [in words] peace, yet never intend it; or they may wish it and not be able to give it; but Christ’s peace is real and effectual: The world’s peace is freedom from outward trouble; Christ’s peace is deliverance from inward guilt, which though it does not give exemption from troubles, affords—1. a sanctified improvement of them; 2. an assurance of deliverance out of them.
Joh_14:28. True love to Christ will make us rejoice in His advancement, though it be to our own disadvantage.——From M. Henry: Joh_14:1. Christ knows our souls in adversity.—Let not your heart be troubled—He does not say let them not be saddened, but let them not be disquieted: Let not your heart be troubled—keep the heart with all diligence: Let not your heart be troubled—you that are My chosen, redeemed, sanctified ones.
Joh_14:2. A particular declaration as to what we must trust God for—viz. heaven—Heaven will make amends for all.—Heaven is—1. a house, not a tent.; 2. a Father’s house, My Father’s and therefore our Father’s; 3. a place of mansions; (1) distinct dwellings; (2) durable dwellings; 4. a place of many mansions—for there are (1) many sons to be brought to glory, [(2) many classes of sons].—If it were not so I would have told you.—The assurance of heaven, built upon—1. the veracity of His word; 2. the sincerity of His affection.
Joh_14:3. The belief of Christ’s second coming an excellent preservative against trouble of heart, Php_4:5, Jam_5:8.—The coming of Christ is in order to our gathering together unto Him, 2Th_2:1.—The quintessence of heaven’s happiness is being with Christ, Joh_17:24.
Joh_14:4. Christ having set heaven before His disciples as the end, here shows them Himself as the way to it.
Joh_14:6. The nature of Christ’s mediation, He is—1. the way, the highway, Isa_35:9—(1) His own way, Heb_9:12; (2)our way; 2. the truth, as opposed to—(1) figure, (2) error, (3) deception; 3. the life—we are alive unto God only in and through Jesus Christ, Rom_6:11.—The way, the truth and the life, He is—1. the beginning, middle and end, in Him we must set out, go on and finish; 2. as the truth the guide of our way, as the life the end of it; 3. the true and living way, there is truth and life in it as well as at the end of it; 4. the only true way to life.—No man cometh unto the Father but by Me—the necessity of Christ’s mediation.
Joh_14:9. He reproves Philip for—1. not improving his acquaintance with Him as he might have done; 2. his infirmity in the prayer made—we know not what we should pray for as we ought, Rom_8:26, and often ask amiss, Jam_4:3.—All that saw Christ by faith saw the Father in Him; the Father’s—1. wisdom in His doctrine; 2. power in His miracles; 3. holiness in His purity; 4. grace in His acts of grace.
Joh_14:10-11. Christ’s miracles proofs of His divine mission, not only for the conviction of infidels but for the confirmation of disciples.
Joh_14:13-14. In prayer—1. humility prescribed, ye shall ask; 2. liberty allowed, ask anything.—In My name—1. to plead His merit; 2. to aim at His glory.
Joh_14:16. The Comforter the great New Testament promise.
Joh_14:17. Christ is the truth, and He is the Spirit of Christ.—Speak to the children of this world of the operations of the Spirit and you are as a barbarian.—The experiences of the Saints are the explications of the promises: Paradoxes to others are axioms to them.
Joh_14:18-24. The departure of Christ neither total nor final.—Union with Christ the life and felicity of believers.
Joh_14:19. Because I live ye shall live also. The life of Christians is bound up in the life of Christ.
Joh_14:20. At that day you shall know perfectly what now you see through a glass darkly.
Joh_14:21-24. Note—1. The duty of those who claim the dignity of being disciples; 2. the dignity of those who do the duty of disciples.—The returns for love—those who love shall have—1. The Father’s love; 2. Christ’s love; 3. the comfort of that love.—I will manifest Myself.—Christ’s manifestation of Himself to His disciples—1. is done in a distinguishing way to them and not to the world; 2. is justly marvellous in our eyes.
Joh_14:23. God will be with obedient believers as at His home.
Joh_14:25-27. With two things Christ here comforts believers, that they should be—1. Under the tuition of His Spirit; 2. Under the influence of His peace.
Joh_14:26. He shall teach you all things, as a Spirit—1. of Wisdom 2. of revelation.
Joh_14:27. Peace I leave with you, etc.; observe—1. the legacy bequeathed, viz.: peace, which is here put for all good; 2. to whom it is bequeathed—to His disciples; 3. the manner in which it is left—not as the world giveth; 4. the use that should be made of it—to prevent trouble and fear.
Joh_14:28. Many that love Christ let their love run in a wrong channel; they think they must be in continual pain because of Him, whereas they should rejoice in Him.
[From Stier: Joh_14:1. The already existing faith in God must be the ground of faith in Christ; and, on the other hand, the perfect faith in God is to be the result of faith in Christ.
Joh_14:2. House is home, where one abides, to which he belongs, to which he has a right; still more—it is a firm, secure building, provided for all kinds of need.—Many mansions—the household character of the abodes; many mansions—intimating degrees and distinctions in blessedness.
Joh_14:3. His coming again and receiving embraces the whole of His influence, drawing, setting free (Joh_12:32; Joh_8:35-36), beginning with the resurrection and ending in His final manifestation.
Joh_14:5. When any one in due time, after the Word and Spirit of Christ have long spoken to him, opposes his “we know not,” then becomes he the unbelieving Thomas who will not know and believe; but a genuine Thomas asks for the way in deep earnestness, and will not be long without a perfect understanding.
Joh_14:6. Christ is as—1. Man, the way which offers itself to all men; 2. God, absolute, independent truth; 3. God-Man, the life, that is the fountain of life springing from Him and received by us.—“Yea, Thou art the goal and Thou art also the way: so is a stream goal and way at once: I will bend my energies to go thither where the stream pours itself into the sea, thither where the Son sits at the right hand of the Father; and to reach it I will commit myself to the stream which is my way, and not only a way which guides me, but a way also which bears me: thus come I to Thee through Thyself, Thou guidest me and bearest me at once.” (Theremin).
Joh_14:8. Previous to the true “my Lord and my God” there was no greater honor given to Christ, or higher power ascribed to Him than in this Lord show us the Father.—It sufficeth us; to see God is blessedness.
Joh_14:9. Christ is the visibility of the Invisible, as far as, and in such a way as, He may be seen.
Joh_14:10. Believest thou? That is still the humbling question of the Lord which rebukes the presumption of every aspiring Philip in life, as it is the consoling question which alleviates the sorrow of every downcast Martha at the grave.—His words are no other than works, and His works are speaking and testifying words.
Joh_14:11-24. The transition from believing to loving; from believing primarily as the reliance and subjection of knowledge, to loving as not merely the fruit of faith but as already the living germ of the true and living trust of a person on a person—as the affiance of the heart.
Joh_14:12. He sowed, we reap—and the harvest is indeed greater than the seed.—I go—to death, indeed, but thereby to the Father; away from you, indeed, but thereby the more spiritually and effectually to unite Myself with you.
Joh_14:13-14. Let your faith in My Person become prayer in My name. To pray in the name of Jesus is—1. to mention Him in connection with the thing asked for, appealing to (depending upon) Him; 2. to pray actually in the Person of Christ, that is, as standing in His place; 3. to ask for nothing but what is according to His mind, in His interest; 4. to call immediately upon the name of Him, who is with the one praying by the Spirit at the same time that He is above with the Father.
Joh_14:16. Christ is Himself the one Paraclete, and by His side with like personality stands the other.—The acts of the three Persons—asking, giving, abiding.—Paraclete—one who performs all that which a Counsel or Representative, being at the same time an Adviser, can perform for us.
Joh_14:17. The Spirit brings to us the Truth—that is the truth concerning ourselves, the will of God toward us, the way of return to God through Christ; He shows, glorifies, opens to us this way as truth and life, so that we know what follows in Joh_14:20.—The world cannot receive Him, because to receive Him requires susceptibility.—The beginning and ground of all knowing is an internal true beholding.
Joh_14:18. I will not leave you orphans; they are His little children, Joh_13:33.
Joh_14:19. Because I live ye shall live also; there is no other guarantee for our personal continuance in the integrity of our being than the personality of Christ—all other arguments and hopes of immortality are like shadows and vapor before the light and power of this living word.
Joh_14:21. I will manifest Myself to him; beyond this, promise has nothing greater or higher for man. (Is not the promise of Joh_14:3 greater—I will come again and receive you unto Myself?—E. R. C.).
Joh_14:23. This first loving, which is the point of decision on our part, is the essential germ of life in living faith.—Learn better what love is, ye zealots, and make the banner of love to the Lord, the sole banner of His Church!—My Father will love him, etc.—the rewarding love for such as thus love (obediently) in full communion or manifestation.—As sin dwells in our hearts as a home, so does the new love which casts it out.
Joh_14:26. On account of our weakness or our sinfulness, we forget the most familiar words just where they should be remembered, and there is always need that one should stand behind us ready to pronounce our duty in our ears.—Let us not scorn in relation to babes in the school of Christ the receiving and the keeping of even the word not understood.
Joh_14:27. Peace; the whole salvation of man, his re-establishment into final perfect external and internal well-being.—”In the Hebrew this little word peace means nothing else but thriving and prospering” (Luther).—My peace; the peace which—1. I Myself have, 2. I alone can give, 3. I can give only through fellowship with Myself.—Not as the world giveth; public peace is not to be trusted, still less the world’s peace of heart.—The peace of God in Christ is higher than all understanding; higher than all words about it, and deeper than all consciousness of it.
Joh_14:28. They would rejoice at His departure if they loved Him aright; their love is not yet disinterested enough.—“Up! up! let us go forth to suffering and the fulfilment of the Divine will! Thus does the Lord arouse them, and carry them with Him into His contest, that they may be His followers in the way of suffering.” (Berlenb. Bibel).
[From Barnes. Joh_14:2-3. The universe is the dwelling-place of My Father; in that vast abode earth is one mansion, heaven is another; it should not be a matter of grief when we are called to pass from one part of this vast habitation to another.—I am about to leave you; but shall still be in the same habitation with you, performing an important work for you.
Joh_14:7. if ye had known Me: they had not a full and accurate knowledge of His character and designs.
Joh_14:13. In My name, i.e. on My account; if a man who has money in a bank authorizes us to draw it, we do it in his name.
Joh_14:15. The evidence that a child loves his parents is his being willing without hesitation, gainsaying, or murmuring, to do all they require him to do.
Joh_14:16. The other Comforter, a compensation for Christ’s absence; it is the office of the Spirit—To furnish to all Christians the instruction and consolation which would be given by the personal presence of Jesus. Joh_16:14.
Joh_14:19. Ye shall live also; learn that—1. The life of the Christian depends on Christ; 2. The fact that Jesus lives is a pledge that all who believe in Him shall be saved.
Joh_14:21. Religion is love.
Joh_14:23. We will come unto him with the manifestation of pardon, peace of conscience, and joy in the Holy Ghost.—Make our abode, i.e. manifest ourselves in no temporary way.
Joh_14:26. Bring all things to your remembrance; the Spirit will—1. Remind you of My sayings; 2. Teach you the meaning of them.
Joh_14:27. Not as the world giveth—1. Not as the objects which men commonly pursue; 2. Not as the men of the world give; 3. Not as systems of philosophy and false religion give; 4. My peace is such as meets all the wants of the soul, silences the alarms of conscience, is fixed amid all external changes, and will abide forever.
Joh_14:30. Hath nothing in Me; there is in Me no principle or feeling that accords with his, and nothing therefore by which he can prevail; temptation has only power because there are some principles of evil (?) in us which accord with the designs of the tempter. (How then could holy Adam have been tempted to a fall?—E. R. C.)
[Joh_14:13-14. True faith, wrought by the Spirit, cannot unconditionally ask for anything not in accordance with the will of God; many say: If we had faith we could obtain such a (supposed) blessing for the asking—whereas if our minds were enlightened and purified by true faith we might not regard it as a blessing.]
Footnotes:
[1]Joh_14:1.—[Or, “Trust (confide) in God, trust also in Me.” The sentence admits of four interpretations and translations, as πιστενετε may be taken both times in the imperative, or both times in the indicative, or once in the imperative, and once in the indicative sense. Hence: 1. “Believe in God, believe also in Me” (Cyril, Nonnus, Theophyl., Euthym. Zigab., Lampe, Bengel, Whitby, Doddridge, Locke, De Wette, Meyer, Stier, Alford, Hengstenberg, Godet); 2. “Ye believe in God, ye believe also in Me” (Luther in his trans.); 3. “Believe in God, and (then) ye will also believe in Me” (Olshausen, Lange); 4. “Ye believe in God, (therefore) believe also in Me;” Creditis in Deum, et in Me credite (Vulg, Aug., Erasmus, Beza, Engl, Ver., Grotius). I take πιστενετε in both clauses as Imperative. See the Exeg.—P. S.]
[2]Joh_14:2.—[Ὅτι in accordance with א. A.B.C. * D. K., Lachmann, Tischend., Alford, etc. The omission in the text, rec. arose from its being taken as the mere ὅτι recitantis and hence as unnecessary. It may be taken as the ὅτι recitantis with Lange who connects ὅτι πορεύομαι with εῖ̓πον ἂν ὑμῖν, or in the sense because, for. See Exeg.—P. S.]
[3]Joh_14:3.—Καὶ ἑτοιμάσω. Lachmann, in accordance with A. B. E. G., etc., omits καὶ. Tischendorf retains it in accordance with Codd. [א.] C. I. L., the Vulgate and Itala. [Tischendorf, Ed. 8, claims B. as supporting the latter reading.] The former reading seems to have arisen from the idea that ἑτοιμάσω, as a promise, must be attracted to the subsequent πάλιν ἔρχομαι, etc. The corollary, however, is designed to limit Christ’s going away and remaining in the other world. Codd. D. M., etc. read ἑτοιμά σαι in accordance with the foregoing.
[4]Joh_14:4.—Codd. B. C .* Sin., etc., Tischendorf [Alford, Westcott and H.] read οἴδατε τὴν ὁδόν instead of οἴδατε, καὶ τὴν ὁδόν in accordance with A. D., etc. Meyer favors the former reading: “and whither I go, ye know the way.” Joh_14:5 he declares to be in favor of this reading. This passage indeed seems at first declarative for the Recepta, since it makes a decided distinction between the goal and the way. Nevertheless we must give the preference to the former reading, it being the more difficult and also according significantly with the context. [The καὶ and second οἴδατε of the text. rec. is explanatory according to Joh_14:5.—P. S.]
[5]Joh_14:5.—Lachmann and Tischendorf, in accordance with Codd. B. C. * D., Versions, etc. read οἴδαμεν τὴν ὁδόν instead of δυνάμεθα τὴν ὁδὸν εἰδέναι. The Recepta is explanatory [sustained by (א). A. C.2 (K.) L., etc.]
[6]Joh_14:7.—Ἐγνώκειτε ἄν is opposed to ἥδειτε by strong authorities, A. E. G., etc. [Tischendorf, Ed. 8, reads ἐγνώκατε, instead of ἐγνώκειτε, and γνώσεσθε (cognoscetis) for ἤδειτε, with Cod. Sin. and D* The other reading is supported by A. B. C. D.2 L. N. Q. X., etc., Lachm., Tischend., ed. 7th, Alford.—P. S.]
[7]Joh_14:10.—[Tischend., Alf., etc. read λέγω (with B. L. N. X.), the text. rec. λαλῶ (with א. A. Q., etc.); D. aeth λελάληκα, perhaps from Joh_6:63.—P. S.]
[8]Joh_14:10.—[According to the reading ὀ δὲ πατὴρ ὁ ἐν ἐμοὶ μένων ποιεῖ τὰ ἔργα αὐτοῦ, which is supported by א. B. D. and adopted by Tischendorf, ed. 8. The text. rec. inserts αὐτός before ποιεῖ and omits αὐτοῦ, he himself doeth the works; so Lachm. and Tischend., ed. 7, in accordance with A. Q. Γ.∆.Α.ΙΙ., etc.—P. S.]
[9]Joh_14:11.—[Tischendorf, Ed. 8, omits μοι in accordance with א. D. L.; Lachmann and Alford give it with A. B. Q., etc.—P.S.]
[10]Joh_14:12.—Moυ is omitted in accordance with decisive authorities, [viz. א. A. B. D. L. Q. X. II.]
[11]Joh_14:13.—[Tischendorf gives αἰτήσητε in accordance with א. A. D. L. X.; Cod. B. reads αἰτήτε.—P. S.]
[12]Joh_14:14.—This verse is wanting in 10 and a few Minuscles and Versions. Omitted probably on account of its similarity to Joh_14:13. [Tischendorf, Ed. 8 and Lachmann read αἰτήσητέ in accordance with א. B. E. H., etc.; Tischendorf in Ed. 7 omitted με with A. D. G. K., etc. So does Alford, ed. 6—P. S.]
[13]Joh_14:16.—[On the different renderings of παράκλητος, Paraclete, Comforter, Helper, Advocate, Representative, see the Exeg. Not. The English rendering Comforter, which corresponds to Luther’s Tröster, is derived from Wicliff, who often uses it in the sense of the Latin comfortari, so as to combine the idea of help and strength with that of consolation. See Archdeacon Hare, Mission of the Comforter, vol. 2. j.a. and Alford in loc.—P. S.]
[14]Joh_14:16.—Instead of μένῃ according to Cod. [A.] D., in conformity to Joh_14:17 [N.] א. L. Q. X. S. Lachmann, Tischendorf [Alford, etc.] decide in favor of ῆ̓.
[15]Joh_14:17.—[Tischendorf and Alford omit δέafterὑ,εῖς, in accordance with א. B. Q.; Lachmann gives it with A.D.L.X., etc.—P.S.]
[16]Joh_14:17.—The Future ἔσται, in accordance with [א.] A. [D.2 L.] Q. Tischendorf, in opposition to ἐσταί [is] B. D. Lachmann [Alford], is recommended by the very μένει which precedes it as a Present (E. G. K.) instead of a Future (Vulgate).
[17]Joh_14:22.—[Tischendorf reads καὶ τί in accordance with א.G. H. K., etc.; Lachmann omits καὶ with A. B. D. E. L. X—P. S.]
[18]Joh_14:26.—[The μου is supported only by D. II.2 and a few inferior authorities.—P. S.]
[19]Joh_14:28.—Εῖ̓πον is omitted in accordance with Cod. [א].A. B. D. K., etc. A repetition from the foregoing.
[20]Joh_14:28.—[The μου is omitted by Tischendorf, Ed. 8, in accordance with א.ca A. B. D., * etc.; Griesbach and Lachmann give it with א. * D.2 Γ. Δ., etc.]
[21]Joh_14:30.—Τούτου is omitted in accordance with [א.] A. B. D. [g. r.], etc. An explanatory addition.
[22][In his translation, but not in his Commentary on chh. 14, 16, where he follows, the translation of the Vulgate, see no. 1.—P. S.]
[23][This little book of Dr. Lange, Das Land der Herrlichkeit, appeared first in a series of articles in Hengstenberg’s ‘Evangelical Church Gazette,’ and then separately, Mörs 1838. It is an argument for the Scripture idea of heaven against the astronomical objections, and abounds in beautiful poetic passages. I shall quote but two: “It is certain that there must be some place in the upper worlds where the beauties and wonders of God’s works are illuminated to the highest transparency by His power and holy majesty; where the combination of lovely manifestations, as seen from radiant summits, the enraptured gaze into the quiet valleys of universal creation, and the streams of light which flow through them, must move the spirits of the blest in the mightiest manner, to cry out: Holy! Holy! Holy!—And there is the holiest place in the great Temple! It is there, because there divine manifestations fill all spirits with a feeling of His holiness. But still rather, because there He reveals Himself through holy spirits, and through the holiest one of all, even Jesus Himself!”—“Seek not to persuade us that all those vast regions are destitute of inhabitants. Seek not to persuade the pilgrim, wandering through the darkness, that yon cottage, whence a hospitable light streams forth to greet him, is without an inhabitant. So on us there shimmers from above, light out of ‘many mansions.’ It is a city of God that beams upon us, whose golden streets stretch forth into remotest infinitude. We see not its furthest battlements; its nearest ones do meet our gaze. And when we consider that light from there is thousands of years in reaching us, and that, starting from a remoter point, it is millions of years on its way, we may well call the city of the Living God an ‘Eternal City.’ Its radiance beams mightily upon our bodily vision if we do but step forth into the starry night. Its glory and higher nature have been made evident by science. But to the believer alone do the heavens disclose themselves as the Fatherland and Heritage of the Blessed. Unto Christians it is said: ‘Ye are come unto the City of the Living God,’ and ‘in my Father’s House are many mansions.” P. 62.—P. S.]
[24][A very singular and painful abuse of this passage on the many mansions was made by Göthe in his old age (1823) when, in a letter to Countess Auguste Bernstorf-Stolberg who, as a friend and correspondent of his youth, had most delicately and touchingly entreated him to attend to the salvation of his soul, he coldly replied: “Let us dismiss all fears about the future. In our Father’s kingdom are many provinces, and since He has prepared for us such a delightful abode in this world, He will no doubt take good care of both of us in the other world; perhaps we may there succeed also, what we failed to do heretofore, to become acquainted with each other face to face and to love each other all the more deeply. Remember me in undisturbed faithfulness.”—P. S ]
[25][So also the Eng. 5, Grotius, Olshausen, De Wette, Meyer, Alford, Lachmann, Tischendorf (in their punctuation), Hengstenberg, Godet. In this case εἰ δὲ μή, εῖ̓πον ἁ̓ν ὑμῖν is parenthetical, and ὅτι πορεύομαι, for i go, etc., begins a new sentence which confirms (ὅτι) the assurance: “In My Father’s house are many mansions;” the ἑτοιμάζειν τοπον implies μονὰς πολλάς. The parenthetical assurance, “if it were not so, I would have told you,” agrees with the childlike simplicity of the discourse and is calculated to beget implicit confidence, comp. Joh_16:4. Upon the whole I prefer this interpretation and would retain the English Version, except that it omits for (ὅτι) before “I go.” Lange’s inrerrogative interpretation is open to the objection that no such words as πορεύομαι τόπον ὺμῖν, are recorded in the previous chapters of John.—P. S.]
[26][Not consistit, as the original reads in 2d and 3d ed. A typographical error.—P. S.]
[27][Wordsworth refers also to the healing power of Paul’s handkerchiefs (Act_19:12) and the speaking in new tongues. Comp. Mar_16:17 ff. But, as Meyer justly says, such a mechanical measurement of the greatness of miracles is entirely foreign to the New Testament. The true commentary on the μείζονα ἔργα is found in the Acts and especially the labors of Paul.—P. S.]
[28][Similarly Wordsworth: in submission to My will, and conducive to your own salvation and to God’s glory.—P. S.]
[29][So Alford: “in union with Me, as being Mine, manifesting forth Jesus as the Son of God.”—P. S.]
[30][Παράκλητος occurs five times in the N. T., four times in the Gospel of John, as a designation of the Holy Spirit, and once in the first Ep. of John, as applied to Christ. It is always translated by the E. V. comforter (following Wiclif), except 1Jn_2:1, where it is rendered advocate (after the Vulgate). In the Gospel the Vulgate retains the Greek with a slight change of Paracletus into Paraclitus; the long Greek η being turned into the short Latin i, as in Kyrie eleison. The R. C. Rhemish Version which is constructed on the convenient, but very slavish and un-English system “of taking the words of the Vulgate, chipping off the Latin, and tacking on English terminations,” gives paraclete in all the four passages of the Gospel, and advocate in the Epistle, like the Vulgate. Archdeacon Hare observes (Mission of the Comforter, p. 349), that to avoid confusion the Greek word might have been anglicized (as baptism, apostle, bishop, deacon, etc.), but that this would have obscured our perception of the meaning and, by severing it from its etymological associations, deprived it of a portion of its power.—P. S.]
[31][So in his 74th Tractate on John; but in the 94th, Augustine combines the interpretation Advocate with that of Comforter; both terms being equivalent to the Greek paraclete. See the quotation in Hare, p. 352 f.—P. S.]
[32][The same may be said of Calvin; see his interpretation quoted p. 440.—P. S.]
[33][In the Vulgate Jerome, as already observed; retains the Greek Paraclitum (Paracletum). Some MSS. of the Itala give advocatum.—P. S.]
[34][Luther translates Tröster, Comforter, but explains Advocate.—P. S.]
[35][Meyer, in a footnote, p. 515, urges against this meaning the passive form παράκλητος, instead of the active παρακλητικός (Plat. Republ. p. 524 D.), in accordance with ὲπικλητικός ἀνακλητικός, etc. But it should be remembered that in the N. T. παρακαλέω does not mean to call for, but always to exhort or to comfort.—P. S.]
[36][Wordsworth goes beyond these limits and makes παράκλητος to mean Sanctifier, Teacher, Comforter, Exhorter, Inspirer, Counsellor, Guide, etc., all in one.—P. S.]
[37][Olshausen remarks in loc., that the original meaning, advocatus, called to aid, is lost in the more general idea of helper, assistant, comforter; that this idea Suits admirably the connection in all passages where the word is applied to the Holy Spirit, but that advocate is better suited in 1Jn_2:1 where it is used of Christ.—P. S.]
[38][Meyer also (p. 516) calls Tholuck’s idea that the Paraclete is der zu Geist verklärte Christus, obscure, unjohannean and unbiblical. Comp. 1Co_3:17, Against a similar confounding of the Logos with the Spirit by Reuss, see Godet 2 p. 480.—P. S.]
[39][The absolute present, not the future μενεῖ, manebit (Vulg.). Comp. Meyer in loc.—P. S.]
[40][Meyer explains the omission of a connecting particle from the deep emotion.—P. S.]
[41][Bengel: Non modo vivam, sed vivo; Rev_1:18. Vivetis, futurum; nam vita fidelium sequitur vitam Jesu; et non ex se, sed ex illo vivunt; Joh_6:57. Meyer’s note on this passage is excellent. On these assuring words of Christ Schleiermacher, in the touching funeral discourse of his only son Nathanael, despairing of all philosophical arguments for the immortality of the soul, firmly placed his hope and trust for a future life.—P. S.]
[42][In the fifth edition (p. 524) where Meyer takes εἰρήνη indeed in the most general sense of prosperity, like the Hebrew Shalom but so as to include “the peace of redemption or reconciliation with God as the first essential element.”—P. S.]
[43][Bengel: “In salutationibus inanibus vel beneficiis duntaxat externis, cor non attingentibus, et cum præsentia, conspectu ac vita mortali desinentibus.” (Comp. the English proverb, “Out of sight, out of mind.”) “Mundus ita dat, ut mos eripiat, non relinquit.” Alford and Godet likewise refer the καθώς to the manner of giving, rather than the unreality and emptiness of the world’s peace. But Meyer thinks a reference to the empty formulas of worldly greeting entirely out of place in the solemnity of this moment. Lange has the right view here.—P. S.]
[44][But often in the Sept. For δειλιάω the classics use ἀποδειλιάω. δειλός, timid, fearful, occurs Mat_8:26; Mar_4:40; Rev_21:8, δειλιά, timidity, 2Ti_1:7. Bengel refers ταρασσέσθω, ne turbetur, to the intrinsic, δειλιάτω, ne formidet, to the extrinsic fear.—P. S.]
[45][Olshausen explains: “The Son is born of the essence of the Father, but not inversely the Father from the Son: hence the Father is the cause (der Grund) of the Son, but the Son is not the cause of the Father. The Son proceeding thus from the Father (Joh_13:3) there was necessarily in Him a desire to return to the Father, as every being is attracted to its source; accordingly the return to the Father was the satisfaction of the desire felt by the Son after His source, and this relation is indicated by the words μείζων μου ἐστίν”. But the essential relation is eternal and hence unchangeable. P.S.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv2, 3, 4, 7, 8, 13, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 25, 27, 28, 30, 31 In my Father's house are many mansions--and so room…
In my Father's house are many mansions--and so room for all, and a place for each.
if not, I would have told you--that is, I would tell you so at once; I would not deceive you.
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I go to prepare a place for you--to obtain for you a right to be there, and to possess your "place."
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31 § 127.—JESUS COMFORTS HIS DISCIPLES, Joh_14:1-31.
§ 127.—JESUS COMFORTS HIS DISCIPLES, Joh_14:1-31.
If, as some commentators suppose, the institution of the Lord’s Supper took place between Joh_13:35 and Joh_13:36, then the opening of this discourse has a degree of dependence on the warning just given to Peter. But if the institution of the Supper takes place at the close of the last chapter, the present chapter, at any rate, is a post-communion discourse. Though the variations of thought are so great, that we may, perhaps, properly recognize in it what Vinet calls a “divine disorder,” yet there is a clear succession of topics. In the present chapter we have, 1-14, the impending departure of Jesus, and in 15-31, the sending of the Comforter to supply his place. How far the whole is a single discourse, or is uttered in a single place, we may discuss at Joh_14:31.
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Impending departure of Jesus, Joh_14:1-14.
1. Let not your heart be troubled—The Saviour himself, in view of his own impending passion, had been “troubled in spirit,” Joh_13:31; Joh_12:27, but now he employs his own moments of divine calmness to sustain the hearts of his followers above a similar trouble. The whole is most intelligible by keeping his agony, and cross, and departure in view, as the point by which they would most be troubled. The source of their consolation is God himself, the heaven to which Jesus goes, the Father to whom he introduces them.
Ye believe in God—This may be either indicative or imperative in the Greek. It may be translated ye believe in God, or believe ye in God. Commentators greatly differ, but the essential result of either meaning will be the same. Their trust in God is the essential antecedent of their trust in Christ.
In God—God the Father Almighty as the basis and foundation of all things; whom we cannot but conceive as existing as the fundamental reality. He who is firmly based on Him has a sure foundation of trust.
In me—Who am the revealer and the manifestation of God essential, as has been verified by the attributes of God exercised and displayed through me. But as God essential is universal and invisible in himself, so he becomes concentrated in me, and brought to a point in contact upon each individual soul. The same reliance, therefore, which you can repose in God, as a God of universal reality and truth, you can, in spite of all the sufferings you shall see me endure, repose in me, the only begotten Son of God. Jesus thereupon proceeds, assuming their faith in God and himself, to direct their attention from the approaching scenes of earthly woe, to the heaven he indicates beyond them.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31 1. Let not your heart be troubled] There had…
1. Let not your heart be troubled] There had been much to cause anxiety and alarm; the denouncing of the traitor, the declaration of Christ’s approaching departure, the prediction of S. Peter’s denial. The last as being nearest might seem to be specially indicated; but what follows shews that ‘let not your heart be troubled’ refers primarily to ‘whither I go, ye cannot come’ (Joh_13:33).
ye believe in God, believe also] The Greek for ‘ye believe’ and ‘believe’ is the same, and there is nothing to indicate that one is indicative and the other imperative. Both may be indicative; but probably both are imperative: believe in God, and believe in Me; or perhaps, trust in God, and trust in Me. It implies the belief which moves towards and reposes on its object (see last note on Joh_1:12). In any case a genuine belief in God leads to a belief in His Son.
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1. This Judas, who was the son of a certain James (Luk_6:16; Act_1:13): he is commonly identified with Lebbaeus or Thaddaeus (see on Mat_10:3). 2. Judas Iscariot 3. The brother of Jesus Christ, and of James, Joses, and Simon (Mat_13:55; Mar_6:3). 4. Judas, surnamed Barsabas (Act_15:22; Act_15:27; Act_15:32). 5. Judas of Galilee (Act_5:37). 6. Judas of Damascus (Act_9:11). Of these six the third is probably the author of the Epistle; so that this remark is the only thing recorded in the N.T. of Judas the Apostle as distinct from the other Apostles. Nor is anything really known of him from other sources.
how is it] Literally, What hath come to pass; ‘what has happened to determine Thee?’
manifest thyself] The word ‘manifest’ rouses S. Judas just as the word ‘see’ roused S. Philip (Joh_14:7). Both go wrong from the same cause, inability to see the spiritual meaning of Christ’s words, but they go wrong in different ways. Philip wishes for a vision of the Father, a Theophany, a suitable inauguration of the Messiah’s kingdom. Judas supposes with the rest of his countrymen that the manifestation of the Messiah means a bodily appearance in glory before the whole world, to judge the Gentiles and restore the kingdom to the Jews. Once more we have the Jewish point of view given with convincing precision. Comp. Joh_7:4.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv1–31 (1) Let not your heart be troubled.—The division of…
XIV.
(1) Let not your heart be troubled.—The division of chapters is unfortunate, as it breaks the close connection between these words and those which have gone immediately before. The prophecy of St. Peter’s denial had followed upon the indication of Judas as the traitor, and upon the announcement of the Lord’s departure. These thoughts may well have brought troubled hearts. The Lord had Himself been troubled as the darkness drew on (Joh_12:27; Joh_13:21), and He calms the anxious thoughts that He reads in the souls of the disciples.
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Ye believe in God, believe also in me.—It is more natural to take both these clauses as imperative—Believe in God, believe also in Me. Our English version reads the first and last clauses of the verse as imperative, and the second as an indicative, but there is no good reason for doing so; and a sense more in harmony with the context is got by reading them all as imperatives. As a matter of fact, the present trouble of the hearts of the disciples arose from a want of a true belief in God; and the command is to exercise a true belief, and to realise the presence of the Father, as manifested in the person of the Son. There was a sense in which every Jew believed in God. That belief lay at the very foundation of the theocracy; but like all the axioms of creeds, it was accepted as a matter of course, and too often had no real power on the life. What our Lord here teaches the disciples is the reality of the Fatherhood of God as a living power, ever present with them and in them; and He teaches them that the love of God is revealed in the person of the Word made flesh. This faith is the simplest article of the Christian’s creed. We teach children to say, we ourselves constantly say, “I believe in God the Father.” Did we but fully grasp the meaning of what we say, the troubles of our hearts would be hushed to silence; and our religion would be a real power over the whole life, and would be also, in a fulness in which it never has been, a real power over the life of the world.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31 It is not necessary to follow Codex D and…
It is not necessary to follow Codex D and some of the versions, and here introduce into the text kai eipen toiv mayhtaiv autou . It is enough that the awful warning to Peter, which followed the announcement of the treachery of Judas and his departure, the solemnity of the Lord, and the clear announcement of his approaching death, had fallen like a thunderbolt into their company. Judas held the bag, and was their treasurer, their episkopov (see Hatch"s "Bampt. Lect."), and a referee on all practical subjects and details. He had turned against the Lord; and now their spokesman, their rock of strength, their most prominent and their boldest brother, the senior of the group, and with one exception the disciple most beloved and trusted by the Master, was actually warned against the most deadly sin nay, more, a course of conduct is predicted of him enough to scatter them all to the four winds. Is it possible to exaggerate the consternation and distraction, the shrieks of fear, the bitter sobs of reckless grief that convulsed the upper chamber? In the agony of despair, and amid the awful pause that followed the outburst of their confusion and grief, words fell upon their ears which Luther described as "the best and most consoling sermons that the Lord Christ delivered on earth," "a treasure and jewel not to be purchased with the world"s goods." Hengstenberg has argued at length that the opening words of the chapter do not point to this scene of deep dejection, but to the conversation recorded in Luk_22:35-38, where our Lord warned his disciples of the career of anxiety and dependence and struggle through which they would have to pass. They must be ready even to part with their garment to procure a sword, i.e. they must be prepared to defend themselves against many enemies. With his characteristic impetuosity Peter says, "Here are two swords;" and Jesus said, "It is enough." He could not have meant that two swords were a match for the weapons of the high priests, or the power of the Roman empire, but that the disciple had once again misunderstood the figurative teaching of Christ, and, like a child (as he was), had, in the intensity of his present feeling, lost all apperception of the future. True, the language of Luk_22:35-38 suggests an answer to the question, "Why cannot I follow thee now?" But these words in John 14 more certainly contemplate that query, coupled with the other occasions that had arisen for bitter tribulation. To the faithful ones, to Peter"s own nobler nature, and to them all alike in view of their unparalleled grief and dismay at the immediate prospect of his departure, he says, Let not your heart be troubled the one heart of you all; for, after all, it is one heart, and for the moment it was in uttermost exacerbation and distress, lie repeated the words at the close of the first part of the discourse (Ver. 27), after he had uttered his words of consolation. The "trouble" from which that one heart of theirs is breaking is not the mere sentimental sorrow of parting with a friend, but the perplexity arising from distracting cares and conflicting passions. The work of love and sacrifice means trouble that nothing but supernatural aid and Divine strength can touch. The heartache of those who are wakened up to any due sense of the eternal is one that nothing but the hand that moves all things can soothe or remedy. Faith in the absolute goodness of God can alone sustain the mind in these deep places of fear, and under the shadow of death. But he gives a reason for their consolation. This is, Believe in God, i.e. the eternal God in all his revelations of himself in the past in God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, who has most completely been unveiled to you now in the word and light and life that have been given to you in me. Your faith in God will be equal to your emergencies, and, if you live up to such fairly, you will bear all that befalls you. (cf. Mar_11:22) But, he adds, as I have been in the bosom of God and have declared him to you, believe also in me, as his highest and most complete Revelation. He claimed from them thus the same kind of sentiment, as by right of creation and infinite perfection God Almighty had demanded from them. There are three other ways in which this ambiguous sentence may be translated, according as both the pisteuete are taken either as indicatives or imperatives, but the above method is approved by the great majority of interpreters from the early Fathers to Meyer and Godet. The Vulgate and Authorized Version and Revised Version make the second only of the pisteuete imperative, and consequently read, "Ye believe in God, believe also in me," which, in the revelation they had just given of their wretchedness and lack of adequate courage and faithfulness, was almost more than the Lord, in the deep and comprehensive sense in which he was using the word "God," would have attributed to them. The different order of the words in the Greek, bringing the two clauses, "in God" and "in me," together, gives potency to the argument of the verse, which is that of the entire Gospel.
Vers. 1-4. Comfort under separation.
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There is no break between this chapter and the preceding.
I MARK OUR LORD"S SYMPATHY WITH HIS DISCIPLES. "Let not your heart be troubled.
1. The best of God"s people may be at times in a desponding and distrustful mood.
2. Jesus takes delight in comforting his saints and lightening the burden of a heavy heart. "Come unto me, and I will give you rest.
II MARK THE REMEDY FOR THE DESPONDENT MOOD OF HIS DISCIPLES. "Believe in God, believe also in me." It is faith. Jesus invites them to confidence.
1. There must be faith in God, who has provided a home for his children on high. There is great comfort in the thought of the Fatherhood of God.
2. There must be faith in Christ, who, as the Mediator, will realize what the Father has promised.
(1) As the true Object of our faith, Christ appears here as necessarily God in conjunction with his Father.
(2) The belief that brings comfort to the disciples is not a mere assent to propositions, but trust in a Person, distinguished by love, faithfulness, and power.
III THE ARGUMENTS FOR CONSOLATION.
1. The existence of heaven as the home of the saints. "In my Father"s house are many mansions.
(1) Heaven is a definite locality. Jesus is there in his glorified body.
(2) It is the Father"s house, where God is seen as Father.
(3) It is the home of a family. Heaven is a social state. The children of God are all there.
(4) It is a large house, for it has many mansions.
(a) This does not signify that there are different degrees of happiness in heaven,
(b) but that there is room in heaven for the whole family of God.
(5) It is a prepared place for a prepared people, ordered by the Lord himself. "I go to prepare a place for you.
(a) This implies that Jesus will go first to heaven.
(b) He enters within the veil as "Forerunner." What strong consolation is in this blessed truth!
2. Another argument for consolation is the promise of Christ"s return to receive his disciples. "And if I go and prepare a place for you, I come again, and I will receive you to myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.
(1) Christ"s coming is not
(a) at Pentecost,
(b) nor at conversion,
(c) nor at the day of judgment,
(d) but at the death of each disciple.
(2) The believer will be ultimately received into intimate communion with Christ in glory.
(a) Heaven is wherever Christ -is; therefore "to depart and be with Christ is far better.
(b) Christ will be the Center of the believer"s joys.
3. Another argument for consolation is that the disciples knew the way to heaven. "And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.
(1) Heaven was the goal.
(2) The way was communion with himself.
HOMILIES BY J.R. THOMSON Vers. 1-3. The revelation made to faith.
The dark shadow of our Lord"s approaching agony and death was now upon his heart. Yet he thought tenderly of the sorrow of his disciples on their own account. Hence the sympathizing and consolatory tone of his last sustained and leisurely conversation with them. Hence the special revelation with which they were on this occasion favored. And hence, too, the intercessory prayer which was at that juncture of their need offered so fervently on their behalf. The words which comforted them have proved consolatory to Christ"s people in every age, and especially to those in affliction of spirit.
I THE OBJECT OF FAITH, AS ENJOINED BY CHRIST. Faith was the condition of receiving the revelation and enjoying the promise which the Lord Jesus had to communicate. Now, it is a very common thing in our days for men to eulogize faith. But it is not infrequently forgotten that the virtue of faith depends upon its object. To believe is good, if we believe what is worthy of credit. To trust is good, if we trust one deserving of confidence. Our Lord enjoins faith:
1. In God. If there be a God, surely we can need no argument, no persuasion, to induce us to believe in him. We believe in our imperfect earthly friends; how much more reason have we to believe in our perfect God? Especially does this appear when we consider, not only what God is, but what he has done to justify and to elicit our faith.
2. In Christ. How shall we connect faith in the Savior with faith in the Father? Probably thus: we need some faith in God in order to believe in Jesus whom he sent, and then, trusting in Christ, we attain to a fuller, stronger faith in the Father. The apostles and disciples, whom Jesus gathered round him in his earthly ministry, had such experience of his truth, his tenderness, his fidelity, that they might well trust him entirely and always trust him so as to receive his declarations, to rely upon his promises, to do his will. How natural and proper is it for the Christian, who knows alike his own need and the sufficiency of his Savior, to place in him an absolute and unfaltering trust! If such trust was becoming on the part of those who knew Jesus in his ministry, how far stronger are the inducements which our experience of our Savior"s grace and power furnish to our confidence! We took back upon what Jesus suffered for us, upon his victory as our Representative, and upon his long unseen ministry of grace; and we respond to his summons, and renew our faith in his words and in his work.
II THE REVELATION CHRIST MAKES TO FAITH. This unfolding of Divine counsels has reference to man"s life and history as a whole; not only to the seen, but to the unseen, the eternal. Temporary sorrows and difficulties all but disappear when they take their place as incidents in an immortal existence.
1. The universe is our Father"s house and temple. How far otherwise is it regarded by many, even of the inquiring and intelligent! To not a few the world is mindless, loveless, has no origin that can he understood, and no aim; and has, therefore, a very feeble interest. As God"s house, it has been built and furnished by the Divine Architect, who has arranged it to suit the needs of all his children. As God"s temple, it is the scene of his indwelling and manifestation, of his holy service and his spiritual glory. It is the place where he dwells and where he is worshipped, who is Christ"s Father and ours. What sweet and hallowed associations are wont to gather around the house of the human father! Similarly to the Christian the universe is dear, because there the Divine Father displays his presence, exercises his care, utters his love. That rebellious and profane voices are heard in the house which is consecrated to obedience, reverence, and praise, is indeed too true. Yet the Christian can never lose sight of the true purpose, the proper destination, of the world; in his apprehension it has been formed for the Divine glory, and it is consecrated by the Divine love.
2. The universe is further represented by Jesus as containing many and varied abodes for the spiritual children of God. Why is the great house so spacious and commodious? Because it is constructed to contain multitudes of inhabitants, and to afford to all a scene of service and of development. "Many abiding-places" are for the use of many guests, of many children. There are many citizens in the city, many subjects in the kingdom, many children in the household, many worshippers in the temple. Among those of whom we have little knowledge are the angels, thrones, principalities, and powers. Among those known to us by the records of the past are patriarchs and prophets, apostles, saints, and martyrs. There is room for all for the young and the old, the ignorant and the learned, the great and the despised. No reader of Christ"s words can doubt that his purpose and his promise included untold myriads of mankind. His life was given a ransom "for many." He designed to "draw all men unto himself." He foresaw that many should enter his kingdom, from the East and from the West. In the Book of his Revelation by John, it is foretold that "a great multitude, whom no man can number," shall assemble before the throne of glory. The pilgrim shall leave his tent, the captive his prison, the voyager his ship, the warrior his camp, and all alike shall repair to "the house which hath foundations, whose Builder and Maker is God." It is a glorious spectacle, one which reason is too dim-sighted to behold, but which is clear to the eye of faith.
III THE PROMISE CHRIST GIVES TO FAITH. Many of our Lord"s earlier sayings had been vague; now, in anticipation of his departure, his language is plain and clear.
1. Jesus has gone to prepare. Not indeed for himself, but for his people. When earth has no longer a place for them, a home will be found to have been made ready for their reception elsewhere. There is much that is mysterious in the exercise of our Savior"s mediatorial grace in the sphere of his present action; but we have no difficulty in believing that he concerns himself above with the work which he commenced below.
2. He will come again to receive. Shall we take this assurance to refer to his resurrection, or to his second coming yet in the future? Of has it not rather reference to that perpetual coming of Christ unto his own, of which his Church has always and everywhere had experience? When the earthly service of a faithful disciple is finished, then Jesus comes to welcome that beloved and approved one to rest and recompense. Concerning our dear ones who are dead to earth, we have the assurance that they have not been overlooked by the Divine and tender Friend of souls.
3. He assures his people of his blessed fellowship. The language in which Jesus conveyed the assurance must have been peculiarly affecting to those who had been with him during his earthly ministry. They knew by experience the charm of their Lord"s society, and the strength it gave them for work and for endurance. What more attractive and glorious prospect could the future have for them than this the renewal and the perpetuation of that fellowship which had been the joy and the blessing of their life on earth? But the same is in a measure true of every Christian. What representation of future happiness is so congenial and so inspiring as this the being "ever with the Lord"?
IV THE PEACE WHICH IS THE FRUIT OF FAITH. Much was at hand which was likely to occasion alarm and dismay. Events were about to happen which would crush many hopes and cloud many hearts. This was well known to the Master. Hence his admonition to his disciples, "Let not your heart be troubled." An admonition such as this, when it comes alone, is powerless. But Christ, by revealing himself and his purposes to the minds of his brethren, supported the precept he addressed to them. What might well distress and even overwhelm those who were without the support and consolation of a sustaining and inspiring faith, would be powerless to shake such as built their hopes upon the sure foundation of unchanging faithfulness, immortal love. Those who have faith in Christ are the possessors of true peace the peace which "passeth understanding," the peace which the world can neither give nor take away. T.
HOMILIES BY B. THOMAS Ver. 1. Faith banishing fear.
We have here
I FAITH SPECIALLY ENJOINED.
1. As to its Objects God and Christ.
(1) These are its proper and highest Objects. Faith must have an object. God and Christ are the proper Objects of faith. It cannot ascend higher, and must not remain lower, than this. Faith in the Father and Son, in the Creator and Savior. This alone is worthy of an immortal and responsible spirit. This is the basis of true religion, the element of spiritual progress, the foundation of Christian character, and is alone capable of drawing out the soul into perfection.
(2) Faith is enjoined in both personally. It is not, "Believe in something about God or about Christ," but" Believe in both personally." It is most important to realize the personality of the Divine Being as he is in his spiritual, eternal, and infinite existence, or as manifested in the flesh, so that our ideas of him may not evaporate into vague generalities; hence faith is directed to a personal God and a personal Christ.
(3) Faith is enjoined in both equally. "Believe in God, believe also," etc. This is a strong, but by no means uncommon, circumstantial evidence of the Divinity of our Lord. This equal demand of faith inevitably and unquestionably indicates equality of nature, authority, and honor. On the supposition that Christ was a mere man, to couple himself thus with the supreme Being as the Object of human faith, would be nothing less than a willful misdirection and blasphemy.
(4) Faith in one involves faith in the other. This is not an arbitrary, but a moral and philosophical, injunction. Such is the relationship between God and Christ that faith in one involves faith in both. Whether faith begins from the human or Divine side, it will find itself embracing the Father and Son, or neither. Thus, when Christ appeared in our world, those who had genuine faith in God readily believed in him, and those who had not rejected him. Faith in the visible and incarnate Son was a test of faith in the invisible and eternal Father.
2. The objects of faith are pointed out in their natural order of sequence.
(1) God is the supreme Object of faith. Hence he is introduced first. Christ, as a Teacher, ever pointed to Divinity, as contemplated in the Father or in himself, as the supreme and final Object of human faith.
(2) Christ meets the present requirement of faith. First he points to the highest goal of faith, then to himself as the Way which leads to it. Therefore, "Believe also in me" is not retrogressive, but progressive, in relation to faith. Before the appearance of Christ, faith was weak, struggling and crying for help, for a resting-place, for a medium between heaven and earth. Pious souls yearned for it. Jacob dreamed of it, and in his dream saw a ladder reaching from earth to heaven. Christ responded to this cry and fulfilled this dream. In him faith found a present Help, Encouragement, and a Resting-place. He is the real Ladder between heaven and earth, over which souls by faith may reach the glorious heights of the eternal throne, and embrace him who sits upon it.
(3) In Christ faith in God alone can be perfected. "Looking to Jesus," etc. He is the lowest and the highest rung of the ladder the lowest touching the lowest parts of the earth, and the highest touching the eternal throne. "The Son of man, when he comes, shall he find faith," etc.? Little of it he found; but ever since, he creates, feeds, helps, and perfects it. By his perfect life and self-sacrificing death and intercessory work, he is become the Author, Example, the Inspirer and Perfecter of faith.
3. The exercise of faith is the only way of Divine realization in the soul.
(1) Faith is the power which alone can see the Divine.
(2) Faith is the power which alone can realize the Divine.
(3) Faith is the power which alone can appropriate the Divine. There is a God, but not to us but by faith. There is a Savior, but not to us but by faith. Without love we are nothing, and it is equally true that without faith we are nothing nothing to God and Christ; and they are nothing savingly to us, but by faith they are ours. Hence the soul"s chief duty is to believe.
II FAITH IS ENJOINED AS THE ANTIDOTE OF TROUBLE. "Let not your heart," etc. This implies:
1. That Christians, while in this world, are exposed to trouble. These are:
(1) General. "Man is born to trouble." Christians are men, therefore by birth, nature, and circumstances, are heirs of the common troubles of humanity. Enumeration is unnecessary, as we are all educated in the great university of trouble, and are very proficient in its arithmetic.
(2) Special. As Christians, the disciples had their special trouble now arising from the impending departure of their Lord. This event already cast its dark shadow upon them. The little society, to all appearances, was on the verge of disorganization. The departure of their Lord would leave such a vacancy so that trouble, sorrow, doubts and fears, threatened to invade them as a sweeping flood. The road to Canaan is ever through the wilderness, and the way to life through tribulation.
1. That trouble naturally attacks the heart. Hence our Savior says, "Let not your heart," etc. The heart is the seat of emotion, the avenue of good and evil, and is impressible to every passing influence, and troubles which would be rejected by reason will be admitted by the trembling and undefended heart.
2. Faith in God and Christ fortifies the heart against trouble. "Let not your heart," etc. It was the aim of Christ now to strengthen them against the impending trouble and shelter them from the thunderstorm of sorrow and perplexity which had already begun to break out. This he does by fortifying their heart. This fortification is to be made by faith in God and Christ. For heart-disease there is but one remedy, and it is infallible, prescribed by the infallible Physician. "Believe in God," etc. This will fill the soul with elements of comfort and security, and while full of these, it is impregnable to trouble. What are these?
(1) Consciousness of the Divine indwelling. Believe in God and Christ, and they are yours. By faith the Divine Father and Son become the tenants of the heart and soul. "We will come unto him, and will make our abode with him." What powerful inmates! How near, sympathetic, and able! Who can take the heart with these within?
(2) The possession of adequate knowledge. Ignorance is weakness and trouble, knowledge is strength and happiness. Christ reveals himself to faith, and gives every necessary information. He gave this with regard to his departure, and faith followed him through the gloom of death, and especially through the effulgence of his ascension up to the right hand of power, and waited his return to fetch the spirit home. In the light of Jesus faith can see the invisible, and see the Divine movements proceeding in the direction of the soul"s good; and where it cannot trace, it can trust.
(3) Consciousness of Divine care and love. A sense of loneliness and even apathy is a source of great trouble to a sensitive heart; but the possessor of faith need not feel this. His heart is filled with the sweet consciousness of a Savior"s love, and a Father"s tender and constant care.
(4) Infinite supplies. It is an old tactic of the foe to attempt to stop the supplies by besieging the heart with doubts and fears, and these threaten it with physical and spiritual destitution. But this can never be in the presence of a strong faith. If the water without become dry, there is still a perennial fountain within; and should the rivers about Jerusalem cease to flow, there is still "a river, the streams;" etc. The supplies come from above, and often meet faith midway, and often the suppliant can scarcely rise from his knees under the delightful burden of his prayer"s speedy answer.
(5) The possession of glorious prospects. Much of our present trouble or comfort depends upon the future. If it be gloomy, there is trouble; but if bright, there is joy. The future of Christian faith is bright and full of hope. Faith often penetrates the intervening gloom, and opens the portals of immortality and the door of our Father"s house, and returns with her wings laden with blessings, tinged with the light and beauty of the happy place, her garments perfumed with delightful aroma from the gardens of spices, her face beaming with the awaiting glory, and sings many a sweet song of the future amid the present discord of earth. The God and Savior of the past and present will be those of the future, and he who prepared for us homes and friends on our entrance to this world, shall meet us with even more surprising and congenial preparations on our entrance into other scenes. The departures of dear friends by death, to faith, are only apparent and temporary; they are only removed from the cold and damp kitchens of earth to the grand drawing-rooms in our Father"s house. Death does not really separate the possessors of faith, but leads them into a more permanent and closer union. With these elements of comfort the heart is not only fortified against trouble, but filled with joy and ecstasy.
LESSONS.
1. The freedom of the heart from trouble depends upon its own state and action. With the heart we grieve, and with it we also believe. If the heart is idle and stagnant, it will be filled with trouble; but if active in faith in God and the Savior, it will be filled with hope and joy.
2. The means of fortifying the heart against trouble are within our reach. The remedy for heart-trouble is ever at hand. The ingredients of the Divine prescription might be difficult to procure, but they are easy and near. "Believe," etc.
3. To keep troubles out from the heart is far easier than to drive them out once they are in. Hence our Lord"s special injunction is, "Let not your," etc. Prevention is ever better than cure, and the prevention of trouble is the constant activity of the heart in a large and genuine faith in God and Christ. B.T.
HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG Ver. 1. Trouble on the surface, peace in the depths.
I AN APPEAL TO A FAMILIAR EXPERIENCE. Most of the disciples, perhaps all of them, were well acquainted with the sea of Galilee. Some of them had earned their livelihood on its waters. They knew it in calm and in storm; and when their Master spoke of hearts being troubled, there was everything in this word "troubled" to make them think at once of the sea they had so often to do with. Their hearts were not to be as the waters of the lake, instantly responding to every breeze that set them in agitation. The surface is a mass of tossing billows; it cannot for a moment resist the wind; but the wind tries in vain to blow its turmoil down into the depths. So we cannot help the surface-trouble; but, whatever the changes of life, our hearts are kept in peace.
II FUTURE TRIALS FORSEEN. We must recollect a little of the after experience of those whom Jesus here addresses. They were nearing a time of tempest and troubling, well perceived by him, altogether unexpected by them. They were to lose the visible presence of their Master. Persecution awaited them. They would have to go far from familiar and secluded Galilee out into all the world, to preach the gospel to every creature. So far the disciples had been like mariners, dropping down the harbor and making seaward under One whom they reckon as Captain. He is still with them, and they reckon on his continuing with them. And so he will, but in another guise from that which they expect. Thus Jesus would do his best to make them ready. The greatest of all dangers is that which for a while they will think of least, even the danger of trouble penetrating to the heart, and leaving not one single calm and blessed region in the whole of their experience.
III THE SURE WAY TO UNBROKEN CALM. It is well for us when we come to estimate the perils of life according to the standard of Christ. Some people get no enjoyment out of life from their nervous apprehension concerning all sorts of temporal dangers. They are ever mounting sentinel against foes that no sentinel can keep out. But here is a peril only too easily overlooked that of neglecting a real faith in God and in Christ. Remember the story of the man who was running full speed across a field to escape a thunderstorm. All at once he was gored by a bull, whose presence in the field he had altogether forgotten. This is a sample of the prudence of some people. The man had no certainty of escaping the lightning wherever he might go. But he could easily have escaped the bull by keeping out of the field where it was. Thus men thinking to save their lives, lose them. If the roots of our life are deepening and extending and intertwining into the life of God, then the fabric of our best interests cannot fall. We must be careful, too, to act on the double reference. Jesus does not stop with saying, "Believe in God." Nor does he begin with saying, "Believe in me." Jesus opens up all the resources at once. Jesus himself had believed in his Father. The disciples had to pass through tempests; Jesus himself had to pass through hurricanes and tornadoes, and say to himself, "Let not thy heart be troubled; believe in God." Believe in Jesus for the very works" sake. They will take him to prison; they will crown him with thorns; they will fasten him to the cross, and he will die; and still believe. Believe in Jesus, who himself has trod all the path, from earth"s deepest sorrows to heaven"s fullest joys. Who has better right to say, "Let not your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in me"? Y.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv1, 4, 6, 8, 11, 12, 13, 16, 18, 20, 21, 22, 25, 27, 28, 30, 31 Let not your heart be troubled.
Joh_14:1-4
Let not your heart be troubled.
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This clause is the true heading to the whole consolatory discourse, for it flows on in one channel of love and ends at last with the words, Be of good cheer.
Let not your heart be troubled
We may well feel glad that Gods people of old were men of like passions with ourselves. It is not the will of God that His people should be troubled in heart; hence these blessed words.
I. LET US TASTE OF THE BITTER WATERS.
1. Jesus was to die. It had finally dawned on them that they were to be left like sheep without a shepherd, and they were inconsolable.
2. He was to be betrayed by one of their own number. This pierced the hearts of the faithful. Of this bitter water the faithful at this hour are also made to drink. Reputed ministers under the banner of advanced thought make war upon those eternal truths for which confessors contended and martyrs bled, and the saints in past ages have been sustained in their dying hours.
3. Peters denial was to cause another pang to the faithful.
II. LET US DRINK OF THE SWEET WATERS, TO REFRESH US. Our Master indicates the true means of comfort under every sort of disquietude.
1. Believe not only My doctrine but in Me--a personal, living, ever-present, omnipotent Saviour.
2. Though He was going from them, He was only going to His Fathers house.
3. A great many would follow Him to the Fathers house.
4. I go to prepare a place for you, not only many mansions for our spirits, but an ultimate place of our risen bodies. We are apt to entertain cloudy ideas of the ultimate inheritance of the saints. Christ went away in body--not as a disembodied spirit, but as One who had eaten with His disciples, and whose body had been handled by them. His body needed a place.
5. The promise of His sure return--If I go, etc.
6. And then He will receive us. It will be
(1) A courtly reception.
(2) A marriage reception.
7. He will place us eternally where He is that we may be with Him. Can we not now, once for all, dismiss every fear in prospect of the endless bliss reserved for us? (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Let not your hearts be troubled
The disciples had been like lambs carried in the bosom of a loving shepherd. They were now about to be left by Him, and would be among the wolves and the terrors of the snowstorm. Frequently after conversion God, who tempers the wind to the shorn lamb, gives a period of repose; but for all of us there will come a time of trouble. Albeit that bark so lately launched upon a glassy sea has all her streamers flying, and rejoices in a favourable wind, let her captain remember that the sea is treacherous and that the stoutest vessel may find it more than difficult to outride a hurricane. But without due trial where would be our experience, and without the experience where increase of faith and triumph of love? We have each
1. A share of home trials.
2. Trials arising from the Church of God. In the best-ordered Church it must needs be that offences come.
3. Worst of all are soul troubles. Note that the advice of the text is
I. TIMELY AND WISE. There is no need to say, Let not your heart be troubled, when you are not in affliction. When all things go well with you, you will need, Let not your heart be exalted. Now, it is the easiest thing in times of difficulty to let the heart be troubled, to give up and drift with the stream. Our Lord bids us pluck up heart, and here is the wisdom of His advice, namely
1. That a troubled heart will not help us in our difficulties or out of them. In time of drought lamentations have never brought showers. A man whose business was declining never multiplied his customers by unbelief. It is a dark night, but the darkness of your heart will not light a candle for you.
2. A doubting, fretful spirit takes from us the joys we have. You have not all you could wish, but you have still more than you deserve, and far more than some others; health perhaps, God certainly. There are flowers that bloom in winter if we have but grace to see them.
3. A troubled heart makes that which is bad worse. It magnifies, aggravates, caricatures. Unbelief makes out our difficulties to be most gigantic, and then it leads us to suppose that never soul had such difficulties before. But think of Baxter, Calvin, the martyrs, St. Paul, Christ.
4. A troubled heart is most dishonourable to God. It makes the Christian suspect eternal faithfulness and to doubt unchangeable love. Is this a little thing? The mischief of the Christian Church at large is a want of holy confidence in God. When once an army is demoralized by a want of spirit and the soldier assured that he cannot win the day, then the conclusion is that every man had better take care of himself and fly. But as long as we do not lose heart we have not lost the day.
II. PRACTICABLE. Let not your heart be troubled. Oh, says somebody, thats easy to say but hard to do. Heres a man who has fallen into a deep ditch, and you say to him, Dont be troubled about it. Ah, says he, thats very pretty for you that are standing up there, but how am I to be at ease while up to my neck in mire? But if Jesus says it our heart need not be troubled.
1. He indicates that our resort must be to faith. If in thy worst times thou wouldst keep thy head above water, the swimming belt must be faith. In the olden times how were men kept from perishing but by faith (Heb_11:1-40)? There is nothing which it cannot do, but what can you do if you do not trust your God? and surely it ought not to be difficult for a child to believe his father.
2. The Saviour goes on to say, You believe in God; exercise that same faith with regard to the case in hand. The case in hand was this--could they rest upon One who was about to be crucified? You have believed God about other things, exercise that same faith about this. You have believed God concerning pardon, believe God about the child, the wife, the money.
3. It ought to be a great deal easier for us to live above heart trouble than it was to the apostles.
(1) You have experience.
(2) You have received the Holy Spirit.
(3) You have the whole of Scripture, which they had not.
III. PRECIOUS. Remember that the loving advice
1. Came from Jesus. The mother says to the child, Do not cry, child; be patient. That sounds very differently from what it would have done if the schoolmaster or a stranger had spoken. His own face was towards the Cross, He was about to be troubled as never man was troubled. It is as if He wanted to monopolize all tears.
2. It points to Jesus. If you want comfort you must hear Jesus say, Believe also in Me. No place for a childs aching head like its mothers bosom. No shadow of a great rock in this weary land like our Saviours love consciously overshadowing us.
3. It speaks of Jesus. In My Fathers house, etc. Jesus is here seen in action. Think of all He said and did, and what He is doing for us now.
4. It hints that we are to be with Jesus forever. An hour with my God, says the hymn, will make up for it all. So it will; but what will an eternity with our God be? (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Trouble not
The words are
I. NOT SENTIMENTAL. They are not spoken by one who wishes to silence sorrow by superficial kindliness. Christ does not say we are to disarm ourselves of prudence and energy; but He does say where all these work torture and misery you are faithless. There is a Providence that goes before you. Your Heavenly Father knoweth what things you have need of. There is more than sorrow in this world. Sin is here, but even over it we triumph by a salvation which makes a redeemed life the most glorious life of all. From the lips of Christ this is a reasonable comfort, because He is able to make all grace abound towards us, and because sorrow goes forth as His angel to make us meet for the inheritance of the saints in light.
II. NOT EXHAUSTIBLE. This comfort is not exhaustible in time; nor can you exhaust its adaptation to the variety and speciality of personal sorrow. Does not Christ know your sorrow? We could gain no true comfort if Christ were merely a figure in history. If Christ had not risen the words are exhaustible. But Christ Himself has said, I am He that liveth, etc. The value even of an earthly friend is in the inexhaustibility of sympathy. But at the best human friendship is shallow, but it is different with Christs. His passeth knowledge. He who changes not and abideth always says, Let not your heart be troubled.
III. NOT LIMITABLE. These are words of consolation for all the brothers and sisters of Jesus.
1. No little community has any special privilege of excommunicating, nor has any large one.
2. All through the ranges of experience, as well as through all the ages of time, Christ bids us take these words of comfort. First of all they should be applied to the heaviest sorrows. Here at Christs Cross the most burdened may find release.
IV. NOT ALONE TEMPORAL. They do not simply relate to this time world or to our human and spiritual experiences here. Christ was comforting men concerning the rest that remaineth. And the spirit of man had never been so comforted before. He knew that hearts like ours would grasp every promise concerning the blessed dead. So these words should be taken up into the highest sphere to comfort us concerning those who sleep in Jesus that we sorrow not as those without hope, remembering that the risen Christ went back whence He came, to prepare a place for us.
V. NOT ALONE RETROSPECTIVE. Christ does not say, Do not trouble about past sins, they are forgiven you. No. He looks forward and comforts them in relation to their earthly future here and their home hereafter. And yet what did He see in the near perspective for many of them? On the edge of the horizon stand their crosses in the grey light of tomorrow. The time cometh that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service. Still He says, Do not trouble. Let us take Christ at His word as they did. (W. M. Statham.)
Christs cure for trouble
I. THE SORE OF THE WORLD IS TROUBLE AND ITS CURE IN FAITH. The seat of trouble is not in anything outside of us. It is the passions. Work, wakefulness, losses, bereavements, lifes burdens and battles are not troubles. They are discipline. While the passions are in right and healthful play all these things may befall a man, and yet he may be wholly untroubled. On the other hand, a man may be surrounded by all that can minister to his comfort and dignity, and yet be troubled. In the latter case the mans passions are tossed about as the sea is when a tempest is on it; in the other case, they are serene as the lake in the fastnesses of a mountain.
1. The cause of all our trouble is the want of harmony between our wills and Gods will. Let them accord, and then nothing in heaven or earth or hell can trouble us. But when we beat ourselves against the barriers erected by Omnipotence for our safety and good, then there is trouble.
2. Our trouble arises from our want of faith in the rightfulness and paramount authority of Gods law. Men would not fight against Gods law of morals if they could perceive that the law is perfectly good and right. Men have an impression that the law of God is a kind of Procrustes bed, cutting long men short and stretching short men long for arbitrary reasons, and not that every regulation is for mans sake and that of other creatures. And because men do not believe that the law of God is good they do not believe it is paramount. The origin of the trouble of every heart from the beginning is to be found in this failure of faith in God. It was so with Adam and Eve. There was no trouble while they trusted their Heavenly Father. You cannot seduce a man into wrong-doing until you shake his faith in God. It is this fundamental principle of which Jesus seems to have thought. This seems to me to mean two things
(1) That belief in God is necessary to belief in Jesus. Jesus, then, is something more than a mere extraordinary specimen of humanity.
(2) Simple belief in God has never cured trouble. It might have kept all trouble from the human heart if originally persevered in. But after sin had come into the world something else was necessary. And for this we can appeal to every mans experience. Do you not often feel that you would be freer and happier if God would throw His laws away, or still better, cease to exist? The fact is, that until we came to distinguish between creatures and children, our belief in God can produce no agreeable feelings toward Him.
(a) We must hare some distinct evidence of His loving us. Of such love Jesus is the Demonstration. Belief in Jesus is belief in God incarnating Himself; putting Himself thus into most complete sympathy with us, making us feel that if any disasters should happen to us He would be the Person who most should feel it. This breaks down the opposition of our hearts to God.
(b) Jesus declares Himself the Governor of the world. Providence is in the hands of my Brother. He manages the universe for the purposes of the atonement. Why should my heart be troubled? Is not the King of eternity my Friend?
(3) Christ is my Leader through all places, narrow and dark and frightful, or large and wealthy and seductive. If I believe this and yield my heart to it, how my troubles disappear! Without Jesus, my heart is like the Galilean lake, night-bound and storm-lashed; when He says Peace, there is a great calm.
II. THEN FROM HIMSELF AS FROM A CENTRE HE SWEEPS THE UNIVERSE OF SPACE AND DURATION, AND FOLDS IT ALL DOWN UPON EVERY TRUSTING HEART AS A MEASURELESS BENEDICTION.
1. In My Fathers house are many mansions. How this takes the vagueness out of our ideas of God! How our recently constructed scientific instruments enlarge and deepen this saying of Jesus! It is to be noticed that our intellects gravitate toward a common centre. There, in that centre, we seem to feel must be the chief place of God. There is an unhealthy fear of God which is not humble reverence. Men dread to think of Him. In our catechisms we put Him just as far away from our children as we can. Jesus does no such thing. God is a Person. He has a house and a household. He makes homes for His children. Why, then, should I be troubled that I am to die? My removal will be like the progress of a prince from castle to castle of his fathers dominions. In each I shall find new work and new delights.
2. One of the phases of mans unbelief is that he does not seem to have space and time enough to carry forward to completion the grand projects of his intellect. But if you will believe in Jesus, this trouble shall disappear. In the boundless field of the universe, in the perpetual cycles of eternity, you shall find space and time enough to do all that you desire now or may desire hereafter.
3. Another thing Jesus utters to be a heart cure: If it were not so, I would have told you. He will not only correct our thoughts of God, He will not let us have a false hope. Those men loved Him, and in some blind way had believed in Him. He knew that they had aspirations higher than the Temple and wider than the spangled tent that spread all night above the Holy Land. He would not go away and leave them cherishing a fond delusion. He would tell them if the things they hoped were an idle dream. In this there ought to be a happy lesson for every earnest heart. There is a gloomy infidelity in us which says of happiest things that they are too good to be true. If you have any hope for eternity, and Jesus Christ has not contradicted it, you may reasonably indulge it. See what a field that flings open to us. This is comforting, but grandly vague.
4. He goes further and tells us that He departs in order to prepare a place for us. This meets another phase of trouble. Our wills conflict with the will of God because we never feel at home totally suited in our surroundings on earth. Think how much is necessary for perfect comfort. There must be a suitable physique, agreeable in all the particulars of size, beauty, and health. There must be perfectly-fitting clothes; a collar too tight, a boot too small breaks ones comfort. Then our house must be in everything complete; nay, it must be an elastic house, expanding or shrinking to our wants at different times. When the residence is complete, there is the absence of the beloved or the presence of an unpleasant neighbourhood. It is not an unamiable discontentedness in human nature which makes us dissatisfied or unsatisfied: it is the inability of this present world, with all its resources, to fill the soul; and this argues the souls greatness. Jesus says, I go to prepare a place for you. He knows what is in us and what we need about us. He is putting all His resources to the work of fitting up for us mansions in the spiritual world. Our place will be complete. How that abates our troubles! There shall be nothing wanting in the place when Jesus pronounces it ready.
5. Ready? Then when it is ready we must go to it. There is to be a removal. But still there is something to try one in any change of residence, but Christ says, I will come for you and take you, and that unto Myself. (C. F. Deems, LL. D.)
Trouble and its cordial
I. GODS MOST FAITHFUL SERVANTS ARE SUBJECT TO TROUBLES OF HEART.
1. What troubles?
(1) Inward, arising from
(a) Sin (Psa_51:4-8).
(b) Corruption (Rom_7:24).
(2) Outward, which are
(a) Spiritual: Christs absence.
(b) Temporal: outward afflictions (Lam_1:4).
2. The reason.
(1) Weakness of faith.
(2) Imperfection of other graces.
II. FAITH IN GOD AND CHRIST IS THE BEST CORDIAL TO A TROUBLED HEART.
1. It is the surest and most infallible (Mat_11:28).
2. The strongest (Isa_59:1).
3. The pleasantest (1Pe_1:8).
4. The readiest (Psa_46:1).
5. The most suitable (Isa_43:2-3).
6. The most constant (Heb_13:5).
7. The most universal.
III. APPLY THIS to
1. Temporal troubles. Art thou troubled with
(1) Poverty?
(a) Faith is the best riches (Jam_2:5).
(b) It will turn thy very poverty into a blessing (Rom_8:28).
(2) Disgrace?
(a) By faith thou mayest see the emptiness of honour (Psa_42:11).
(b) Faith will procure thee honour (Heb_1:14; 1Sa_2:30).
(3) Sickness and pains.? By faith
(a) Thou mayest see Gods love in them (Heb_12:6).
(b) Thou mayest get good by them (Psa_119:71).
(c) Thou mayest receive more comfort in them than in health.
(4) Losses and crosses?
(a) Faith will show thee from whence they came (Job_1:21).
(b) Why (Heb_12:10).
(c) And so turn them to thy gain (2Co_4:17).
(5) Fears of death? Faith will show thee
(a) That the sting is out (1Co_15:55).
(b) That death is but the entrance of life.
(c) And so turn thy fears into hopes (Php_1:23).
2. In spiritual troubles. Art thou troubled
(1) For thy sins?
(a) God is merciful (Psa_103:8; Isa_43:25).
(b) Christ is all-sufficient (1Jn_2:1).
(2) With thy lusts?
(a) God is almighty.
(b) Christ will send His Spirit (chap. 16:7).
(c) Faith conquers them (1Jn_5:4).
(3) With desertions? If thou believest
(a) God will never forsake thee wholly (Joh_13:1; Heb_13:5).
(b) Christ will pray that thy faith fail not (Luk_22:31-32).
(Bp. Beveridge.)
Christs word to the troubled
This is a discourse showing the disciple his refuge from trouble. The refuge
I. OF FAITH. Believe in God: believe also in Me, etc. Three grand truths are at the basis of Christianity: God, Christ, Immortality. They are the antidotes to atheism, the helplessness of guilt, and the hopelessness of death.
II. OF LOVE. A personal relation to Christ, He is the way of God to man and of man to God; the truth, about all the soul needs to know and which natural theology fails to answer; and the life, eternal and blissful.
III. OF HOPE. Here was a personal bereavement. He was about to withdraw, and the loss was the more inconsolable because He was the object of faith and love. But He compensates this loss by the promise of the Holy Ghost, through whom they should do greater works, by whom God is manifest in the believer, etc., and who should abide with them forever. And He promises that He will personally intercede for believers above, while the Spirit intercedes in them below. And so He who goes away actually does not leave them orphans, but comes to them, dwells in them, manifests Himself to them, and is seen by them. And so this part of the discourse ends as it began, with peace. Peace
1. For the mind harassed with doubt, by establishing the certainties of faith.
2. For the heart harassed with unsatisfied cravings, by establishing it upon God. (A. T. Pierson, D. D.)
Christs remedy for a troubled heart
I. THE TROUBLED HEART. Trouble in estate is bad, but heart trouble is worst. The mariner cares not for the howling tempest, but matters are serious when the sea gains entrance. Causes.
1. Unpardoned sin.
(1) We cannot ignore it.
(2) Dare not excuse it.
(3) Are unable to expiate it.
2. Separation from beloved friends.
(1) By absence;
(2) by death.
3. Persecution.
4. Disappointed hopes. So the disciples have trials. Sometimes from a clear sky the thunder peals; from richest verdure the venomous serpent hisses.
II. THE QUIET HEART.
1. We acknowledge the authority of the decalogue; but our Lords command is equally binding.
2. This is the purpose of God. Every apparent discord leads up to the final harmony.
3. The quiet heart is the best learner, worker, warrior.
4. The quiet heart is a mirror of heaven.
III. HOW CAN THE TROUBLED HEART BE MADE INTO THE QUIET HEART.
1. The old belief in God. The Jews had fallen into polytheism, but the captivity cured them. Christ points to the old well of comfort--a firm belief in one ever-living God.
(1) God will smite all wrong.
(2) He will bring forth the righteous as the sun.
2. The new belief in Christ. Inferentially a proof of Christs Divinity.
(1) As the great atoning Substitute. There is nothing in the new philosophy to calm the troubled heart.
(2) As our sympathizing Brother and High Priest.
(3) As alive forever more.
(4) As our Representative and Forerunner--I go to prepare a place, etc.
We need not shrink from Worlds unknown. He has made them well known; brought life and immortality to light, and will come again and receive us unto Himself. (W. Andersen, LL. D.)
Christ comforting
There was some good in the disciples trouble.
1. There was natural trouble at the departure of such a friend. For we are flesh, not steel; and in that sense, Christ was troubled Himself to show the truth of His manhood. Nay, trouble is the seasoning of all heavenly comforts; there were no comforts if there were no trouble; and therefore this natural trouble was not disallowed by Christ.
2. There was likewise something spiritually good in this trouble. They loved their Master, who they saw was going away. They were right in this principle, that all comfort depends on the presence of Christ. For as all heavenly light, and heat, and influence come from the sun, so all heavenly comforts must come to us from Christs presence. Their error was in tying all comfort to a bodily presence; as if it were necessary for the sun to come down and abide upon the earth, to bestow its heat and influence.
I. THE BEST CHRISTIANS ARE SUBJECT TO BE TROUBLED MORE THAN SHOULD BE. Christ was troubled, but His trouble was like the shaking of clear water in a crystal glass. There was no mud in the bottom. But our trouble is of another kind, and apt to be inordinate (1Sa_1:13; Isa_38:14; Psa_77:3; Jon_2:2).
1. God permits us to be troubled
(1) For conformity to our Head.
(2) That we may be known to ourselves; that we may discern where our weakness lieth, and so be better instructed to seek Him in whom our strength lieth.
(3) For the preventing of spiritual sins.
(4) In regard of others, that we maybe pitiful.
2. But how shall we know that our hearts are more troubled than they should be? We may sin in being overmuch troubled at things for which it is a sin not to be troubled. If they had not been at all affected with the absence of Christ, it had been a sin, and no less than stupidity; yet it was their sin to be overmuch troubled. A trouble is sinful when it hinders us in duties; or from duty, when the soul is like an instrument out of tune, or a limb out of joint. Naturally, affections should be helps to duty, they being the winds that carry the soul on, and the spiritual wings of the soul. But then they must be regulated and ordered at the command of a spiritual understanding. Now, besides the hurt that is in such affections themselves, Satan loves to fish in these troubled waters (Eph_4:26). That was Sauls case (1Sa_16:23).
3. We should not yield to excess of trouble. And the reasons are:
(1) We wrong our ownselves. We make actions difficult unto us. The wheels of the soul are thereby taken off (Neh_8:10).
(2) We do dishonour to God, mistaking His goodness, murmuring at tits providence, wronging His graciousness and nursing a rebellious pride.
(3) We dishonour Christ, and the love of God in Christ; for it is as if we had not in Him a sufficient remedy for that great malady.
(4) Christ hath forbidden it, Let not, etc.
II. THE WAYS WHEREBY WE MUST LABOUR TO COMFORT OUR HEARTS.
1. There must be a due search into the heart of the grounds of our trouble; for often Christians are troubled, they cannot tell wherefore; as children that will complain they know not why. See if there be not some Achan in the camp.
2. And when you have found out your sin give it vent by confession of it to God, and in some cases to others.
3. And when we have done so, consider what promises, and comforts, in that Word of God are fitted to that condition. And therefore we ought to be skilful in the Word of God, that we may store up comforts beforehand.
4. When we have these promises, let us labour to understand them thoroughly, and then to digest them in our affections, and so make them our own, and then to walk in the strength and comfort of them.
5. Labour likewise to have them fresh in memory. It is a great defect of Christians that they forget their consolation (Heb_12:5).
6. Labour to keep unspotted consciences.
7. And because there can be no more comfort than there is care of duty, therefore, together with innocency, let us be careful of all duties in all our several relations.
8. But above all let us labour for a spirit of faith. You believe in God, etc. How cloth faith in Christ ease the soul in trouble?
(1) It banishes troubles, and brings in comfort, because it is an emptying grace. It empties us of ourselves, and so makes us cleave to another, and thereby becomes a grace of union. It makes us one with the fountain of comfort, and by its repeated acts derives fresh comfort.
(2) It establishes the heart.
(3) It stirs up such graces as comfort the soul, as hope in all good things promised. In My Fathers house are many mansions. (R. Sibbes, D. D.)
Christ comforting the disciples
I. THE HEROIC ATTITUDE CHRIST ASSUMES. He had just dismissed Judas, knew what was transpiring outside, and what would follow. And yet He sat amongst His disciples perfectly composed, and was able to counsel deliberate composure in the prospect of affliction. This was not from any insensibility to pain, nor superiority to it (Joh_11:33; Joh_12:27; Joh_13:21). Itwas a wonderful manifestation of spiritual strength, and as an example was more forcible than even His counsel for the production of a like spirit.
II. THE HEROIC SPIRIT CHRIST COMMANDS HIS DISCIPLES TO CULTIVATE. They were in a grievous plight. They had been drawn into fellowship with Christ. He had led them step by step, and they had learned to lean upon Him utterly. And now He was about to be taken from them by a cruel death, and leave them exposed to persecution for His sake. An hour ago there had been a strife among them which of them should be greatest. How vain all these ambitions seemed now! And yet our Lord counsels calmness. Then
1. It is possible to overmaster trouble, however hard the lot in life may be.
2. It is important to overmaster it; a troubled heart is our agitated medium and cannot see things clearly, and our enfeebled agent impotent to do them adequately.
III. THE SECRET OF A HEROIC SPIRIT WHICH CHRIST COMMUNICATED TO THEM.
1. Faith in God. The Old Testament saints found in this a panacea for all their cares. Thou wilt keep Him in perfect peace, etc., There were resources in Omnipotence which they felt to be equal to all human exigency (Isa_26:3-4). Something of this the disciples knew.
2. Our Lord argues from the Father to Himself, and particularly recommends them to have such faith in Him as they have in God.
3. The advantage of this two-fold trust. Although the disciples had a certain faith in God, it left them far from satisfied with it. Hence Philips request. God was more or less remote from and incomprehensible to them; but Christ brought them near. He that hath seen Me, etc. This sufficed. (W. Roberts.)
Grounds of comfort
I. HEAVEN IS SURE (Joh_14:2-3).
II. THERE IS A CERTAIN WAY TO HEAVEN (Joh_14:4-11).
III. CHRISTS WORK DOES NOT CEASE WITH CHRISTS DEPARTURE (Joh_14:12-14).
IV. THE HELP OF THE SPIRIT IS VOUCHSAFED in the absence of Christ (Joh_14:15-17).
V. CHRISTS ABSENCE IS ONLY TEMPORARY (Joh_14:18-24).
VI. THE SPIRIT WILL TEACH THE DISCIPLES, and supply their want of understanding when left alone (Joh_14:25-26).
VII. THE LEGACY OF PEACE to cheer in the Masters absence (Joh_14:27). (Prof. Hengstenberg.)
Sources of Christian comfort
There is a class of words the meaning of which is known to all, and without consulting a dictionary most people know what the word trouble means. The man who should attempt to construct a theory of life and leave trouble out of the account would be no philosopher. How to deal with it, and not how to ignore it, becomes the great problem. From both ancients and moderns proposals of alleviation and help are forthcoming. But He who boldly cries, Let not your heart be troubled must possess infallible antidotes. What are they? Faith and Hope directed to their proper objects. We propose, then, to examine
I. THE GROUNDS ON WHICH CHRIST SOLICITS OUR FAITH. Relief comes by belief. To be able in some overpowering grief to throw the weight of ones care upon another and to trust wholly in that others help is an eminently satisfying process; while the trustless soul is without the least gleam of comfort. In these times of daring denial and of timid doubt it is well to be reminded that in the great crises of life--poverty, bereavement, affliction--denial is mockery and doubt is impotence, and that only an honest andhearty belief will secure sufficient solace. Christ solicits our faith on the ground of
1. A prior acknowledgment of the Divine. Ye believe in God. Christ desires nothing contrary to already existing and inborn Godward conceptions of the soul, but merely that we enlarge those conceptions so as to include Him.
2. The defectiveness of our belief apart from Him. Ye believe in God; yes, but that is inadequate, it needs supplementing. The most anxious moments of humanity have been spent in searchings after such a view of God as would enable man to approach Him without dread. Humanitys great longing has waited until Christ for its complete satisfaction. He has extracted from the thought of God all that is calculated to give pain and introduced everything calculated to give comfort. God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself.
3. His personality. Trust must repose on a person to be trust at all. Christian apologists often begin with the proofs of superhuman skill and power, and so lead up to the central object of Christian faith. But Christ asked for immediate trust in Himself, for with that would come a hearty belief in all He said and did.
II. THE MOTIVES BY WHICH HE ENCOURAGES OUR HOPE. By two immutable things, Christ intends us to have strong consolation. Hope is as important a contribution to comfort as faith; the two together, exercised rightly, never fail. Without a future what is the present worth? An English nobleman once asked himself why there should be a future existence, and answered, Because, on any other hypothesis, the world would be a piece of magnificent nonsense.
1. Christ, implying human immortality, reveals heaven. He bids the troubled be comforted by directing their hope to the positive existence of an absolutely untroubled state. Heaven is rendered attractive to us as much by its exemptions as by its possessions (Rev_21:4). Christ does present also a positive view. Heaven is a home. In My Fathers house! A house is not necessarily a home, but a fathers house always is, or ought to be. A happy earthly home is the nearest approach to an adequate conception of the life of heaven. My Fathers house is a happier home than the happiest of earthly ones.
2. Hope is encouraged by the variety of heavenly enjoyments. Many mansions, many methods of enjoyment, various fields of occupation, unexhausted resources of interest and pleasure. An endless uniformity of type would be fatal to perfect happiness.
3. Hope is further encouraged by Christs guarantee of its realization. If it were not so I would have told you, etc. What security this! He could not countenance a delusion. Conclusion: We read of a Roman army, when eagerly engaged in battle with their countrys enemies, being unconscious of an earthquake which made the ground beneath their feet to tremble; and so will a high faith in God and Christ, and a holy hope of immortality and heaven, cause the true Christian to be insensible to the tossings to and fro of the life that now is. (W. Brooks.)
The Christian not afraid of unseen dangers
General Sherman is reported to have said: One difference between General Grant and myself is this: I am not afraid of dangers that I can see, but he is not afraid of dangers that he cannot see. Any good soldier of Jesus Christ has a right to absolute confidence as he goes forward, even in the dark. For the Saviour says to him, Whatever comes, Let not your heart be troubled.
Men seem unwilling to be without trouble
Men do not avail themselves of the riches of Gods grace. They love to nurse their cares, and seem as uneasy without some fret as an old friar would be without his hair girdle.
They are commanded to cast their cares upon the Lord; but, even when they attempt it, they do not fail to catch them up again, and think it meritorious to walk burdened. They take Gods ticket to heaven, and then put their baggage on their shoulders, and tramp, tramp, the whole way there afoot.
Christ will relieve our troubles
I heard of a man who was walking along the high road, with a pack on his back: he was growing weary, and was, therefore, glad when a gentleman came along in a chaise, and asked him to take a seat with him. The gentleman noticed that he kept his pack strapped to his shoulders, and so he said, Why do you not put your pack down? Why, sir, said the traveller, I did not venture, to intrude. It was very kind of you to take me up, and I could not expect you to carry my pack as well. Why, said his friend, do you not see that whether your pack is on your back, or off your back, I have to carry it? My hearer, it is so with your trouble: whether you care, or do not care, it is the Lord who must care for you. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The consolation of the gospel unique
In this I say the gospel differs sharply from the most cultivated pagan thought of the age in which it appeared in the world. When Seneca is trying to console a lady who is suffering agonies of mind under a severe bereavement, he can only suggest to her that she had better try as soon as possible to forget her trouble. She has, he says, good examples around her in the birds and in the beasts. They too love their relations, but after a momentary spasm when they lose them they take life easily again; and in doing this they show man an example which he would do well to imitate. As if the mental pain which means to man so much more than to the beast, precisely because he is man and not beast, could be conjured out of him by a philosophy which talks incessantly of his dignity and can only make him comfortable, if at all, at the cost of forgetting it! (Canon Liddon.)
Religion has many comforts
Why should you carry troubles and sorrows unhealed? There is no bodily wound for which some herb doth not grow, and heavenly plants are more medicinal. Bind up your hearts in them, and they shall give you not only healing, but leave with you the perfume of the blessed gardens where they grew. Thus it may be that sorrows shall turn to riches; for heart troubles, in Gods husbandry, are not wounds, but the putting in of the spade before the planting of seeds. (H. W.Beecher.)
Glimpses of our heavenly home
I. THE TROUBLE IN THE HEART OF THE DISCIPLES. The trouble
1. Of agonized ignorance and blank bewilderment. Long before, Jesus had dropped hints of a mysterious journey that He had to take. As the time went on, He spoke of it more frequently, and in terms more and more darkly suggestive of horror. This had not seemed to trouble their heart at first; they regarded His language as metaphorical Probably they had the impression that first some great battle had to be fought, or some unknown trial to be gone through; that would last three days. So just before, Peter asks, Whither goest thou?
2. Of bereaved love. Do I love the Lord, or no? was not a question in any heart there. Jesus had poured upon them all the very essence of kindness, and had received them into the very sanctuary of His heart. Naturally, it was this mighty love that made bereavement of its object so intolerable. Christ had not yet left them; but love may feel a bereavement before it is bereaved.
3. From the thought of having no share in the last passion of their Lord. Why cannot I follow Thee now? Love said then, as love says now, Give me some work to do; some cross to carry; some block to lay nay head upon. It is impossible to stand idly by while Christ gives and suffers all.
II. THE ANTIDOTE.
1. A peculiar, most tranquillizing revelation of the heaven to which He is going--a place. Along with other elements of comfort, our nature needs this. We have been told that this is a doctrine of Materialism, and that heaven is in character rather than in condition. This is only a half-truth, and we want the whole. Heaven is principle, said Confucius; but a house to live in must be built of something besides principle. Heaven is for the complete man, body and soul; and a body asks for a place, understanding that heaven is at least a place, we are ready to ask a thousand questions about it as such; and one of the first will be, Where is it in the map of the universe? In times not a few has this been made a question of astronomy, and to suggest the possibility of some central heaven amongst the stars. Well, the inquiry must start from our own solar system. This, with its circle of at least 5,000,000,000 miles in diameter, is but a speck in the creation. Its stars burn and roll round the sun, their centre. The sun, carrying all these his satellites with him, is moving round another centre, with its system; that, about another; that, about another; and where is the fixed ultimate centre round which all the other centres are wheeling and moving? The only One who could have settled this question was silent about it. He says nothing of its whereabouts, of its beauty, of its music, except in signs that are manifestly but hieroglyphic. He knew that the most exact precision of statement and the most dazzling magic of description would leave the greatest as well as the least of mortals as much in the dark as ever. Therefore Christ, aiming at our spiritual profit rather than at our scientific enlightenment, leaves for future solution all problems that have only to do with place.
2. That the heavenly place is His home and theirs. He has just addressed them in the language of family affection as His little children. With this word of love still in the air, He proceeds to speak of heaven as My Fathers house. A little child looks upon his fathers house as his own, and so would Christ have us look upon heaven. Even on earth, a fathers house is his childs home; and the dearest place to the best man, woman, child, is home. Home, sweet home. Earth is one of My Fathers battlefields, farms, foundries, factories, roads that He travels on; but heaven is our Fathers house, and therefore the home of all His family.
3. That in that home are many mansions, i.e., settled abodes; the same word as in Joh_14:23. Emphasis resting on the idea of permanence. Jesus was speaking to the sad thoughts then stirring in the hearts of His mourners on account of the shortness of the time they had spent with Him, and which seemed, in the review, only like a dream. What does this lack to make it perfect? asked an old Roman of his companion, as they were together looking on some imperial show; and the answer was, Permanence. Permanence adds bliss to bliss. In the word many, He spoke to the thoughts of the company. When one of the disciples, on the notice of His near departure, asked if he might go with Him, the virtual answer was No. This refusal to the one was a blow to the many. If the happiness of going with the Lord is not to be given even to Peter, what is to become of the many? We had all expected that we should go with Him into His kingdom. If these happy dreams of ours are all to melt into misery, why were we not informed of this before? Before now, on some festive day, when a man has asked his friends to his house, he has been forced to ask only a few, because, though his heart was large enough for many, his house was not. Before now, in the straits of some war, some iron captain has spared the lives of only a few prisoners, simply on the ground of lacking room to accommodate the many. God has room in His purpose, in His heart, in His house, for all His captives. By the miracle of His grace He first changes all His captives into children, then welcomes them all home. No limitation is suggested by the indefinite plural, many. Many simply stands for all the children, a great multitude which no man can number, and yet there is room!
4. That He is going to prepare a place for them. While man is asleep in the night, the sun goes before him, that he may prepare the day for him to wake in. Thus he prepares light for him to see by, power for him to work with, and the spirit of gladness. So does Christ prepare heaven for the heirs of heaven. There can be no heaven without the revelation of God, and there can be no revelation of God without Christ. He prepares heaven for them, not only by preparing their right to the place, but by preparing their fitness for it. Why cannot I go with Thee now? asked Peter; and the saying, I go to prepare a place for you, is an answer to this Why? Christ was going to prepare a place for them; first, by His Cross; next, by the Spirit, who would change their hearts and train their natures for the rank they would inherit, as well as for the work they had to do.
5. That He would come again, and receive them unto Himself. Dying may be regarded as a mode in which Christ comes for His people, one by one. Death is not coming; death is not a person, only a door, to which Christ, the sovereign Lord who has at His girdle the keys of death and the unseen state, comes. (C. Stanford, D. D.)
Ye believe in God, believe also in Me
Belief in Christ
I. WHAT IS IT TO BELIEVE? Faith includes two things.
1. The submission of the reason to all Christ has revealed.
2. The trust of the heart in all He has promised. Both of these are difficult duties. To receive as true what we cannot understand, on Gods testimony is declared to be irrational. But remember that faith is rational, and that the testimony of God is informing. To trust that we shall be pardoned, saved, preserved, is equally difficult for unbelieving hearts.
II. THE OBJECT OF FAITH IS CHRIST--i.e., the things to which we are to assent are truths concerning Christ, and these things in which we are to trust are His promises. This is the only form in which we can exercise faith in God. If we believe not God, as seen, how can we believe in Him as not seen.
III. WHAT ARE WE TO BELIEVE CONCERNING CHRIST AND WHAT ARE THE PROMISES WHICH WE ARE TO TRUST?
1. We must believe that He is the Way, i.e., that He brings us to God. We are separated from God
(1) By our ignorance. Christ brings us near to God as an object of knowledge. He is the Loges or Revealer. He is God in our nature.
(2) By our guilt. Christ brings us near to God by reconciliation through His blood. He atones for our sins. Through Him we are able to draw near to God with hope of acceptance.
(3) By our enmity. Christ, by revealing the knowledge of God, and reconciling us to Him, removes our enmity.
2. That He is the Truth, i.e
(1) That He is real; the true God; true Prophet, Priest, King.
(2) That in Him is all truth and excellence.
3. That He is the Life--the source of universal, intellectual, spiritual and eternal life. It is not we that live, but Christ that lives in us.
IV. WHAT PROMISES ARE WE TO TRUST TO? The promises of the Spirit.
1. That His presence is permanent and internal.
2. That He will reveal Christ.
3. That He will be our Paraclete. (C. Hodge, D. D.)
Believe also in Me
1. It might have been urged that the disciples are addressed by our Lord as already believing, not in God only, but in Himself. But the Bible, and He who speaks therein, is truer to nature and experience than many who profess to interpret it. Are there not many in Christian Churches needing still the voice which shall say, Believer, believe; Christian, come to Christ; disciple of three or of thirty years, still, as for the first time, behold Him!
2. There are those, even among Christian people who confide to us, in the tone of sincere and humble regret--I cannot see why a Saviour was needed. If I, being evil, know how to forgive, how much more shall a Father in heaven accept the first sigh and bestow the unpurchased grace? Is it not enough if I believe in God my Father? Why must I be encumbered with a revelation of sacrifice which rather repels me than reassures? I believe in God--why must I believe also in Christ? Let us endeavour to answer this question.
I. Now, someone might say, Look at the saints of the Old Testament. What grace, of reverence, of affiance, of holy aspiration, was lacking in the patriarch Abraham, or to the poet-king of the Psalms? Christ was not manifested when those thoughts of eternal fulness glowed and throbbed in the big heart of David. We venture to dispute the very fact taken for granted. Abraham, saw Christs day, and walked in the light of it. David was reared amidst promises which made Christ a household word in Israel, and sacrifices which brought to the very senses the need and hope of propitiation.
II. Or you might speak of men who, in this century, have not only led good lives, but have had pious feelings, and done beneficent works, without realizing what we should call the fulness of the Christian faith--avowed Unitarians, e.g. But it is only truth to remember that men thus dispensing with Christ are yet unspeakably indebted to Him. The very idea of God as our Father comes from His revelation.
III. Still, you might say, having made this great revelation, may not Christ Himself disappear? Having taught that God is our Father, must He remain in sight to confuse or divide our allegiance? Believing in God by Christs help, why go on further to believe in Christ? Now, it is an obvious answer, and surely a just one. We cannot take Christ by halves. If Christ said one thing from God, He said all things: we must look to see what He said, and not, after catching one isolated word, presume to declare that one word all.
IV. Observe, too, how the particular truth received, no less than the accompanying doctrines objected to, runs up into matters which we can neither dispute as facts, nor yet, apart from God, settle. Sin--you see it, you feel it; all religions pre-suppose it. Evidently sin has made a great rent and breach in Gods work. Listen to this new Teacher, crying in the hearing of the dislocated and disorganized creation, When ye pray, say, Our Father. Yes, we say, something within tells me that I had a Father once--but long, long have I lost Him. Tell me the processes by which it has been recovered--the marvellous mystery of restored sonship and reawakened love. Shall we accept the bare fact, and ask nothing as to the proofs and the instrumentalities? Shall we let Christ say, God is your Father, and never question Him once as to anything further? They who believe the mighty intelligence must hearken what the same Lord bus to say concerning it. May it be, perhaps, that there was that in the Divine holiness which made sin a fatal bar to mans acceptance, except on some condition which God only can perform? Shall we dare, we the guilty and helpless ones, to say that, with nothing but poor human tears and cries and paltry efforts, the stain of sin can be wiped out? Shall we dare to repose upon a feeble bureau analogy, and rest the whole weight of eternity upon the impulses and instincts (not always, even here, prevailing) of family love and parental tenderness? What if there lurked in the background of Deity an obstacle which Calvary alone could take away? It was, no doubt, with special reference to His sacrifice and its consequences that Christ spoke of His disciples, in the text, as having (in some sense) still to believe. They knew Him for the Messiah; what they had still to learn, still to believe in, was the death as itself the life. It is, indeed, the crucial test of faith. He who believes in Christs atonement believes Christ; believes that He came from God, and came with a message.
V. But, although we thus stand upon the dignity of the Cross as a mystery, we do find, as a matter of experience, that no man dispenses with it without being a definite loser in some feature of the Christian character.
1. There is often a feeble sense of the sinfulness of sin. A man cannot really see Himself a sinner, and not cry out for a Saviour.
2. There is often a want of true tenderness towards sinners. Benevolence there may be; but the discovery of unworthiness in the object of the philanthropy is often the death blow of charity. Or, again, there may be an easiness of good nature ready enough to see excuses: there will not be that unique combination, which was in the cross itself, and which is in the true family of the Crucified--tenderness towards the sinner, with displeasure against the sin.
VI. God, in arranging that we should receive this greatest of His gifts--reconciliation through His Son--has given a charm and pathos to the gospel which it could not otherwise have possessed. What possession do you not value tenfold if it is yours through love? That book, that trinket, why is it dear to you? It was the keepsake of a loving friend. And do you not think that God was appealing, perhaps, to some such instinct of your nature, when He would not only send word to you that you were pardoned, but bid you to receive the blessing through the willing self-gift of One who, sharing every emotion of Gods love for the self-ruined one, came Himself to plead, and at last to die, because thus He could effectually roll away the great stone sin, move the obdurate, and win back the lost? Conclusion: Try the charge, Believe also in me. Lean your whole weight of guilt, of sin, of weakness, of sorrow, upon Jesus Christ and Him crucified. See whether, in proportion as you trust Christ more, you become not, in yourself, happier, holier, stronger, gentler. Thus, in time, you shall have a witness within. You life shall be one echo to the sweet persuasive expostulation, Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God; believe also in Me. (Dean Vaughan.)
Faith in God one with faith in Christ
We get a more true and appropriate meaning if we keep both clauses in the imperative, Believe in God, believe also in me.
I. CHRIST HERE POINTS TO HIMSELF AS THE OBJECT OF PRECISELY THE SAME RELIGIOUS TRUST WHICH IS TO BE GIVEN TO GOD.
1. It is only our familiarity with these words that blinds us to their wonderfulness. Try to hear them for the first time, and to remember the circumstances. Here is a man amongst a handful of friends, within four-and-twenty hours of a shameful death, that to all appearance was the annihilation of all His claims and hopes. And He says, Trust in God, and trust in Me!
2. What is it that Christ offers us? A very low and inadequate interpretation is, Believe that God is, that I am. But it is scarcely less so to suppose that the mere assent of the understanding to His teaching is all that Christ is asking for. Faith grasps not a doctrine, but a heart. The trust which Christ requires is entire committal to Him in all my relations and for all my needs.
3. Further, note that this believing in Him is precisely the same thing which He bids us render to God. The two clauses in the original bring out that idea even more vividly--Believe in God, in Me also believe. And so He here proposes Himself as the worthy and adequate recipient of all that makes up religion in its deepest sense. That tone is the uniform characteristic of our Lords teaching. What did He think of Himself Who stood up before the world, and with arms outstretched, like that great white Christ in Thorwaldsens lovely statue, said to all the troop of languid and burdened ones crowding at His feet:--Come unto Me all ye that are weary, etc. That surely is a Divine prerogative. What did He think of
Himself Who said, All men should honour the Son even as they honour the Father? You cannot eliminate the fact that Christ claimed as His own the emotions of the heart, to which only God has a right and which only God can satisfy.
4. We have to take that into account if we would estimate the character of Jesus Christ as a teacher and as a man. What separates Him from all other teachers is not the clearness or the tenderness with which He reiterated the truths about the Fathers love, and morality and goodness; but the peculiarity of His call to the world is, Believe in Me. And if He said that, why, then, one of two things. Either He was wrong, and then He was a crazy enthusiast, only acquitted of blasphemy because convicted of insanity; or else He was God, manifest in the flesh.
II. FAITH IN CHRIST AND FAITH IN GOD ARE NOT TWO, BUT ONE. These two clauses on the surface present juxtaposition. Looked at more closely they present interpretation and identity.
1. What is the underlying truth that is here? How comes it that these two objects blend into one, like two figures in a stereoscope?
(1) This, that Jesus Christ Himself Divine, is the Divine Revealer of God. There is no real knowledge of the real God outside of Jesus. He showing us a Father, has brought a God to our hearts that we can love, and of whom we can be sure. Very significant is it that Christianity alone puts the very heart of religion in the act of trust. Other religions put it in dread worship, service, and the like.
(2) On the other hand, the truth that underlies this is that Jesus is Divine. The light shines through a window, but the light and the glass that make it visible have nothing in common with one another. The Godhead shines through Christ, but He is not a mere transparent medium. It is Himself that He is showing us when He is showing us God. He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father. And because He is Himself Divine and the Divine Revealer, therefore the faith that grasps Him is inseparably one with the faith that grasps God. Men could look upon a Moses, an Isaiah, or a Paul, and in them recognize the irradiation of the Divinity that imparted itself through them, but the medium was forgotten in proportion as that which it revealed was behind. You cannot forget Christ in order to see God more clearly, but to behold Him is to behold God.
2. And if that be true, these two things follow.
(1) One is that all imperfect revelation of God is prophetic of and leads up towards the perfect revelation in Jesus Christ (Heb_1:1-3). And in like manner all the imperfect faith that, laying hold of other fragmentary means of knowing God, has tremulously tried to trust Him, finds its climax and consummate flower in the full-blossomed faith that lays hold upon Jesus Christ.
(2) That without faith in Christ such faith in God as is possible is feeble, incomplete, and will not long last. Historically a pure theism is all but impotent. There is only one example of it on a large scale in the world, and that is a kind of bastard Christianity--Mohammedanism; and we all know what good that is as a religion. The God that men know outside of Jesus Christ is a poor, nebulous thing; an idea, not a reality. It has little power to restrain. It has less power to inspire and impel. It has still less to comfort; it has least of all to satisfy the heart.
III. THIS TRUST IN CHRIST IS THE SECRET OF A QUIET HEART.
1. It is no use saying to men, Let not your hearts be troubled, unless you finish the verse. The state of man is like that of some of those sunny islands in southern seas, around which there often rave the wildest cyclones, and which carry in their bosoms, beneath all their riotous luxuriance of verdant beauty, hidden fires, which ever and anon shake the solid earth and spread destruction. And where is the rest to come from? All other defences are weak and poor. We have heard about pills against earthquakes. That is what the comforts which the world supplies may fairly be likened to. Unless we trust we are, and shall be, troubled.
2. If we trust we may be quiet. To cast a burden off myself on others shoulders is always a rest. But trust in Jesus Christ brings infinitude on my side. Submission is repose. When we cease to kick against the pricks they cease to stick and wound us. Trust opens the heart, like the windows of the Ark, tossing upon the black and fatal flood, for the entrance of the peaceful dove with the olive branch in its mouth. But the wicked is like the troubled sea which cannot rest. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
Faith in God
1. Why should it have been needful to give such a command as this to any intelligent person? In one sense all men believe in God. We acknowledge and recognize a power which passes all control, measurement, or thought. We recognize an authority to which we are responsible. As the moral nature is cultivated, we recognize a moral order in the universe, a law of righteousness, and therefore a Lawgiver and a Judge. In the time of calamity or death all men call upon God. Why, then, teach men to believe in God, and command it? and especially the disciples who had been trained under the ancient system.
2. Of course the answer is that belief may be real and yet wholly ineffective. You see the vapour issuing from the kettle and disappearing through the air. It is steam power, but not enough to drive the train. You step upon the beach and find the little puddles of water, but there is not enough to float the boat and keep alive the fish. So belief may be real in the mind and yet be entirely insufficient for any useful and inspiring purpose. The master would have us carry our belief in God to a point where it shall involve every spiritual force within us. Believe to the roots of your nature; with all your strength and life: and your heart shall not be troubled. What is it thus to believe in God? It is to affirm
I. HIS ABSOLUTE ORIGINAL PERSONALITY OF EXISTENCE. And yet this it is not easy for us to do. If we search into our thoughts we shall find very often that He is to us rather a force without affection, intelligence, and life. So multitudes of men conceive of God, and scientific investigation often comes in to encourage this tendency of thought. On the other hand, the Scripture everywhere manifests to us God as a person. Our own personal constitution reflects and demonstrates that personality. As impossible as that the clod of the valley should generate a human soul, as that the blossoming branch of the tree should bring forth living intelligence; so impossible is it that personality in you and me should come from impersonal forces and mechanical laws. We see the indications of it in His works, where intelligent contrivances present themselves to us in the adjustment of force to force, in the relations of one object to another; and in Christ, who said, I and My Father are one. And this is to be affirmed, with all energy of conviction, and intensity of feeling, as the absolute and everlasting truth.
II. HIS PRESENCE WITH US in every hour and every place. Amazing! Yes, God is amazing in every attribute. The soul is amazing because it has something of God within it. Even natural theology affirms this; for it would imply Divine imperfection if God were not everywhere. The recognition of a moral order in the universe implies that; for otherwise the administration of that order would be necessarily imperfect. The constitution of the universe implies that, since otherwise there would be parts of the universe self-supporting and independent of God. His omnipresence shines throughout the whole Scriptures. There are times in spiritual experience when we feel it. But you say, We do not see Him I Do we see the air, magnetism, the productive force in nature, music, fragrance, the voice of a friend? We see the result.
III. HIS CHARACTER OF PERFECT HOLINESS AND PERFECT TENDERNESS. Undoubtedly there is much to perplex us in the prevalence of sin, and the long delay of punishment. These facts disturb our impression of the Divine holiness. And yet we do not doubt the sun when for a time obscured by cloud. The holiness of God must be recognized by anyone who would for a moment feel safe in the universe. If God were otherwise than holy, what could restrain any arbitrary exercise of His power? He could not properly be worshipped except He were holy. Worship mere power, and it demoralizes and demonizes. Worship intellect, and it degrades the moral nature. Worship can only be offered to absolute and sovereign purity of character; and that must be Gods character, or else let every harp on high be silent and every heart on earth be dumb. Gods holiness shines upon us through His law in our own reason and conscience and in the person of Christ. But then, with this holiness is united tenderness; and it is that which it seems harder still to recognize, for we associate with absolute justice absolute sovereignty rather than absolute tenderness: and yet there is in His Word the declaration of His tenderness. There is a reflection of that tenderness in our own hearts. Whence did these tender loves within us spring? It is idle to say they are transmitted. From whence did they come to our parents? We see them illustrated most perfectly in Christ, whose mission it was to so reveal the Father that we might not be afraid of His holiness.
IV. AFFECTIONATE SOLICITUDE FOR EVERY ONE WHO SEEKS HIM. And this is the most difficult. He is so infinite and we are so weak. Yet even here we find instruction from those who are nearest to Him in spirit and character. We get our clearest view of it from Christ, again, always so welcoming to all who sought Him, so tender towards those who trusted and loved Him. Conclusion: If thus we believe in God, then
1. There is peace for us and in us. We shall no more be afraid of any real harm while we are affiliated with God in spirit.
2. There is power, the power which sent forth the disciples on their errands of love.
3. Creation reveals its mystery of majesty and loveliness to us, and redemption its higher glories both of majesty and beauty.
4. We anticipate the promises and the provisions of grace.
5. We are assured of the victory of righteousness in the world. (R. S.Storrs, D. D.)
Belief in God emotional as well as intellectual
Truth that touches a man not merely through a cold perception, but through some warm feeling, is the kind of truth the Scripture teaches to constitute belief. It may be intellectually conceived, but no moral nor social truth is ever presented so as to be believed, unless it be presented in such a way as to carry sympathy and feeling with it; and that is not the case with all kinds of truth. Physical, scientific truths, do not touch the feelings, and do not need to. Arithmetic deals with truths that have no relation directly except with the understanding. They never come with desire, sorrow, pity, or emotion of any sort. But all truths that relate to dispositions in men, to moral duties--they never stop with the understanding, but touch the feeling as well. A man cannot be said to believe a moral truth unless he believes it so that it carries some emotion with it. And, in this respect, it makes a great difference what a man believes. (H. W. Beecher.)
Belief in God based on the knowledge of His character
A banknote is tendered to me--it is a promise to pay, but by whom? The Oriental Bank Corporation. I should not have it; that institution has lost its character. I could not trust it. Another note is handed to me; this bears the name of the Bank of England. Ah! that is a different matter. I know that bank has a name for solvency and stability. So, without any hesitation, I take the note just for what it stands. I do not ask for any discount off its amount, as I might if there was a shade of suspicion attaching to its name. I just take it for what it appears on its face to be worth, so confident am I that it will be paid to the full in the sterling coin of the realm. So a knowledge of the character of God will lead us to be fully persuaded that what He hath promised He will be able also to perform. (John K. Shaw.)
Belief in God inextinguishable
Whatever men may scientifically agree to believe in, there is in men of noble nature something which science can neither illumine nor darken. When Tyndall was walking among the clouds during a sunset upon the Alps his companion said to him, can you behold such a sublime scene as this and not feel that there is a God? Oh, said he, I feel it. I feel it as much as any man can feel it; and I rejoice in it, if you do not tell me I can prove it. The moment you undertake to bring the evidence with which he dealt with matter to the ineffable and the hereafter, then, he says, I am agnostic. I dont know. It isnt true; but the moment you leave the mind under the gracious influence of such a scene it rises above the sphere of doubt or proof, and he says, I accept it. (H. W.Beecher.)
Belief in God encouraging
When menaced by Indian war and domestic rebellion, when distrustful of those around him, and apprehensive of disgrace at court, Columbus sank for a time into complete despondency. In this hour of gloom, when abandoned to despair, he heard in the night a voice addressing him in words of comfort, O man of little faith! why art thou cast down? Fear nothing, I will provide for thee. The seven years of the term of gold are not expired; in that, and in all other things, I will take care of thee. (Washington Irving.)
Belief in God should inspire confidence
In a small town there lived the widow of a preacher, a God-fearing woman, who in days of trouble used to say to her children and friends, Fear not, God lives. Her trials were sometimes great, but she strove to bear all with cheerfulness and patience. One day her difficulty was greater than she could bear, and she sat down with a feeling of hopelessness, and allowed her tears to flow unchecked. Her little son saw her weeping; he put his little hand in hers, and said, while he looked into her face sorrowfully, Mother, is God dead? No, my son, she said, taking him on her lap. I thank thee for thy question. He ever liveth; He is near to help in all trouble; He will help us. She wiped away her tears and continued her work. She sought and found help in Jesus. (Der Glaubensbote.)
Belief in God stimulating
The late Professor Agassiz once said to a friend, I will frankly tell you that my experience in prolonged scientific investigations convinces me that a belief in God--a God who is behind and within the chaos of vanishing points of human knowledge--adds a wonderful stimulus to the man who attempts to penetrate into the regions of the unknown. Of myself, I may say that I never make the preparations for penetrating into some small province of nature hitherto undiscovered without breathing a prayer to the Being who hides His secrets from me only to allure me graciously on to the unfolding of them.
The revealing power of faith
Christian faith is like a grand cathedral with divinely pictured windows. Standing without you see no glory, nor can possibly imagine any; standing within, every ray of light reveals a harmony of unspeakable splendour. (Bp. Porteous.)
Believing in Jesus is laying hold of Him
A vessel is wrecked: one after another of her crew is swept away, and disappears. As she heaves to and fro, it seems as if every moment she would break up, and send her shivering passengers down into the deep. There is the cabin boy, thinking of his mother and his home, and praying, though scarcely hoping to be saved, when a plank floats past. Eagerly he lays hold of it, rests his whole weight upon it; and, while others perish, he is safe. That describes you. As you are just about to go down, the plank floats along, comes near you--within reach, within arms length. That plank is Christ. Lay hold of Him, rest yourself upon Him. He can bear your whole weight--the whole weight of your sins, which would have sank you to perdition--the whole weight of your soul. Try Him; and, like a sailor who tried Him, youll be able joyfully to say even in dying, The plank bears, the plank bears! (J. H. Wilson.)
Believing is looking to Jesus
Believing on Jesus is looking to Him for salvation. You see that poor widow with a young family, weeping as if her heart would break. When I ask her what ails her, she tells me she is behind with her rent, and her landlord threatens to turn her to the door, unless she can pay her debt, and find security for the next six months. So I tell her to dry her tears, and do her best to work for her children, and just look to me for her rent. How full of joy she is all at once! How cheerfully she works! and, though she has not a penny laid past for the term, she has no fear; and when asked, Why? she says, I am looking to him, for he bade me; and I know he will not fail me. What he promised is just as sure as if I had it in my hand. Now, believing on Jesus is something like this. If I might so speak, it is the hearts look to Jesus--a single glance, indeed, at first, and yet a constant looking to Him ever after. (J. H. Wilson.)
Believing is trusting in Jesus
There is a boy whose father was buried yesterday. Today he is wearing his fathers gold watch. Some wicked lads are trying to take it from him. He is struggling to keep it; but they are too strong for him. He is just about to lose it, when I come up, and say, Give it to me, my boy, and Ill keep it safe for you. For a moment he looks at me with doubtful eye; but as I say to him, Trust me! and he sees that I am earnest and sincere, he hands it over to me, and I prevent him from being robbed. That is just what the apostle Paul says of himself. He had, as you have, something far more precious than a gold watch--an immortal soul; and he was afraid of losing it: he could not keep it himself. Jesus said, Give it to Me, and he gave it to Him; and then you hear him saying rejoicingly, I know whom I have believed (which is the same thing as whom I have trusted), and am persuaded that He will keep that which I have committed to Him against that day. (J. H. Wilson.)
The comfort of believing in Christ
What do you do without a mother to tell all your troubles to? asked a child who had a mother, of one who had none. Mother told me whom to go to before she died, answered the little orphan. I go to the Lord Jesus: He was mothers friend, and Hes mine. Jesus Christ is in the sky. He is away off, and He has a great many things to attend to in heaven. It is not likely He can stop to mind you. I do not know anything about that, said the orphan. All I know, He says He will; and thats enough for me.
Untroubled faith
What the Caliph Omar is reported to have written to Amru, his general commanding in Egypt, has a grand moral. If those books contradicted the Koran, they were false, and ought to be destroyed. If they agreed with the Koran, they were of no use, and might well be spared. One book was enough for Mohammedans. So, when Sir Walter Scott lay dying, he said to his son-in-law one day, Lockhart, read to me. What book shall it be? said Lockhart. Why do you ask? there is but one, said Scott. Now, if this Book itself were in danger of being destroyed, and I might have only one chapter out of it, I rather think it would be this which Scott asked to be read to him. Probably no single chapter is read so much to the dying, over the dead. It was the Speaker who was about to die. His hearers were about to be launched into a lifelong service, and their last necessity was absolute, child-like faith.
I. LET NOT YOUR HEART BE TROUBLED. Certainly they were troubled. And they had reason to be. Many times over Judas betrays his Lord, and hangs himself. Many times over Peter denies his Lord and repents. Many times over the Lord Himself is crucified, and buried, rises and goes away and comes again unseen. It is the same old story always; and always with the old refrain: Let not your heart be troubled.
1. Today, as related to heathen peoples and religions, the Judas Iscariot of Christianity is Christendom itself. At first, Christianity had behind it only the incomparable personality and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. If Christendom were only Christian really, how much longer would China probably be Confucian? or India Brahmanic? These are painful questions. But let not your heart be troubled. Inside of Christendom I see another betrayal of Christianity, which also is very painful. We behold a Christian civilization, incontestably and immensely superior to any heathen pattern. By and by this Christian civilization forgets its Christian parentage; or denies it, and claims for itself another pedigree. Scholarly men analyze and compare the great historic religions, allowing little preeminence to Christianity. Then after a while the conclusion is reached that we really need no religion at all, only science. Take your sop, Judas, and be gone. As for the eleven, let not their hearts be troubled.
2. Peters denial of the Lord also repeats itself. Scandals and offences are sure to come. Good men are tempted, stumble and fall. Let not your heart be troubled. Peter denied his Master with an oath. Whole communions apostatize. Verily, powers of darkness are busy; and the night is long. But let not your heart be troubled. The morning cometh. Peter repented.
3. As for what Christ said about going away and coming again, changing the economy from flesh to spirit, from sight to faith, it seems strange to us that His apostles should have been so staggered by it. Those apostles, for three years had been under marvellous tuition; and we wonder they got so little out of it. The day of Pentecost had not yet come. By and by men will be looking back and wondering that we so poorly understood the gospel, overlaying it, some of us with ritual, others with dogma. We have much to be ashamed of. But let not your heart be troubled. More Pentecosts than one have come already. And more are yet to come.
II. BELIEVE IN GOD.
1. Commanded belief implies always the possibility of honest unbelief. Such unbelief has increased greatly of late. Partly, it seems like a reaction against outward authority, and traditional opinions, or against a superstitious theism. Partly it is sheer science, clear-eyed and dispassionate, unable to help multiplying second causes.
2. I have no fear of any very long reign of Atheism. In the poor, apathetic Orient, there may be morality enough to conserve society, with little or no religion, as in China. But not in Europe and America, fall of vitality, greedy, rich and restless. With us, irreligion today is immorality tomorrow, and after that the deluge.
3. Much of what passes for belie! in God is mere scholastic assent to the proposition that God exists. Or the attributes most emphasized are those pertaining rather to the Divine essence. What we need is a vivid sense of the personality of God. He must come very close, and be very real, to us, in our whole experience of life. Mankind must be His offspring; and human history, from first to last, the working out of His own eternal and righteous purposes. We are but two, said Abu Bakr to Mohammed as they were flying, hunted, from Mecca to Medina. Nay, answered Mohammed, we are three; God is with us. And so belief in God is not mere assent, nor mere conviction, but absolute personal trust, submission, and service.
4. You and I know very well what troubles us in thinking of God--sin. But if He had no hatred of sin, how much worse it would be for us. We might be in the power of evil spirits stronger than we are, from whose hideous tyranny we should feel it a mercy to be delivered over to the righteous judgment of a pure and holy God. You say you are afraid of God. But what human imagination can picture the horrors of a universe given over to the rioting of evil unrestrained? Thank God for His holiness. Though He slay us, we had better trust in Him.
III. BELIEVE ALSO IN ME.
1. In me, not as a second rival object of trust, but as God manifest in the flesh, rounded out and historic. This takes us back into bewildering depths. Sin is a tremendous mystery. But for sin, however, we might never have known, in this world, the sublime Triunity of God. Triunity, as we have to study it, is the whole Godhead, dealing with the problem of moral evil.
2. Believe also in Me. The work of atonement is done, was done centuries ago in time, ages ago in eternity. God in Christ now stands pledged to the forgiveness of sin on the condition of repentance.
3. Believe also in Me. Human history is Gods judgment day. Nations are rising and falling. Human history is also Gods day of grace. The kingdom began in an upper chamber. From then till now the kingdom has steadily advanced. The steady progress of Christianity has no parallel in the history of any other religion. The problem demands solution. And only one is possible. But for the magnetism of the felt divinity of Christ, Christianity could not have started at all as it did, or continued as it has. It stands today the old solid bulwark of liberty and order against license and chaos. (R. D.Hitchcock, D. D.)
In My Fathers house are many mansions
The Fathers house
I. CHRIST SITS AND DISCOVERS HEAVEN TO US.
1. Its nature. His home. This is not your rest.
2. Its extent. Many mansions. Yet there is room.
3. Its reality. If it were not so I would have told you. Christ knew it--came from it--went to it. Stephen saw its open door and its glory when his breath was being beaten out of his body.
II. CHRIST ASCENDS AND PREPARES HEAVEN FOR US. I go to prepare a place for you. He prepares heaven for us
1. By making it accessible. The angel with the flaming sword no longer guards the tree of life, and the veil of the Temple no longer hinders mans approach to God.
2. By gathering its people. Heaven becomes richer to us as Christians die. It is daily more home-like.
3. By supplying its blessings. Who knows so well as He the kind of heaven that will meet our needs? Yes, and He prepares it all.
III. CHRIST RETURNS AND ENTERS HEAVEN WITH US. If I go, etc. This applies to
1. All the journey of life. My presence shall go with thee and I will give thee rest.
2. All the labours of life. Go ye into all the world and preach, etc.…and lo I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.
3. All the trials of life. When thou passeth through the waters I will be with thee, etc.
4. The close of life. He is there with the dying saint.
IV. CHRIST ABIDES AND BECOMES HEAVEN TO US. That where I am there ye may be also. This was Pauls idea of heaven--having a desire to depart and to be with Christ. (W. H. Burton.)
My Fathers house
The very term changed the whole character and aspect of Hades. The invisible became visible in the form of the most benign and beautiful of all the institutions that lend charm and joy to life. My Fathers house! then for the first time men dared to think of death as a going home. It seems a vast, awful world, this invisible which stretches out to the infinite all round us; the trembling soul may well shudder as it goes forth to meet its destiny. But the thought My Fathers house, dissipates all dread. Be it what it may, and where it may, this vast unknown, it is filled with that nameless benediction, a Fathers presence and lit with the light of a Fathers smile. It is this sense of a loving Presence, meeting us at lifes outer gate, and bringing us into a bright home full of light and beauty and living joy, which, for the Christian, has so utterly dissipated the terror; and this made death seem to St. Francis a sister to take him by the hand and conduct him home. It is the activity, the animation, the joyful tasks, the abounding interest, of the life of the invisible world unveiled by Christ, which is the characteristic revelation of the gospel. It is not a world of shades, but a world of sons in strong immortal forms, instinct with energy, rich in faculty, busy with the tasks that occupy the angels; a world glad with work and bright with song. (J. B. Brown, B. A.)
My Fathers house magnificent
A New Zealand chief who visited England was remarkable for the deep spirituality of his mind and his constant delight in the word of God. One day he was taken to see a beautiful mansion near London. The gentleman who took him expected to see him greatly astonished and charmed with its magnificence, but it seemed to excite little or no admiration in his mind. Wondering how this could be, he began to point out to him its grandeur. Tamahana heard all silently, then, looking round, said, My Fathers house is finer than this. Your fathers house! thought the gentleman, who knew that his fathers home was but a poor mud cottage. But Tamahana went on to speak in his own touching strain of the many mansions of the redeemed. (W. Baxendale.)
Entering the Fathers house
It was the quaint saying of a dying man, who exclaimed: I have no fear of going home. Gods finger is on the latch, and I am ready for Him to open the door. It is but the entrance to my Fathers house.
The house of many mansions
From these words we learn
I. The MAGNITUDE of heaven. Christs going away would naturally seem to them pure loss. Death, as a natural event, always seems so. But Christ says death is not a closing so much as an opening--not a going away so much as a coming home. It is the passing of a pilgrim from one mansion to another, from the winter to the summer residence, from one of the outlying provinces up nearer the central home. This is not a chance expression, far less a mere figure of speech. There are many others. The third heavens; Christ has passed through all heavens; heaven, even the heaven of heavens, a place evidently of inconceivable grandeur, for even that cannot contain the infinite presence of God. This idea of immense capacity is a real relief from some of the more popular conceptions of the future life, as that of a temple, etc. The population of this world is something tremendous. It has been yielding immense numbers to heaven in every age. Thus a great multitude which no man can number, has been passing, and will pass, in ceaseless procession. And we cannot help wondering how they are all to be provided for!
II. Out of the idea of vastness arises that of an endless VARIETY. The variety existing in Gods works here is one of the principal charms of the natural world. So as there are many mansions, the adorning of them will be very various. One will not be as another. We do not go to heaven to lose our natural tastes, our sinless preferences, but rather to have all these gratified in a far higher degree. Otherwise heaven would be plainer, poorer, and less interesting than earth. And unless our own nature were pressed down into some kind of mechanical exactness and shape, weariness would ensue. There would be a sighing for the lost seasons of the earth, its withered flowers, its light and shade, its many countries, and its encircling seas. But no! There will be places, pursuits, and enjoyments for all.
III. Then, lest this vastness and variety should seem too large to our thought, we have also in these words a sweet assurance as to the HOMELINESS of heaven.
IV. REALITY. If it were not so, I would have told you. This life in itself is shadowy enough. We speak of long days, and of long years. But when the awakened immortal soul looks at those spaces of time in the light of its own eternity, how short and shadowy they seem I In those times we feel that everything depends on the reality and permanence of the future life! No man who has not long been untrue to himself and to his God can be pleased with the thought of annihilation. But who can tell him firmly where lies the realm of life, or whether anywhere? He asks philosophy, and she answers, I see something like it, but I cannot surely tell. It may be land or it may be cloud. He asks his own reason, and the instincts of his heart, and they answer yes today and no tomorrow, according to the mood, and the aspects of outward life. Then, turning to Jesus Christ, he asks by his sorrow, by his hopes, by all the struggling instincts that will not die, by that upward look in which the soul is seeking a city with foundations, whether such a city is builded--whether such a life is secure. And the answer is here. Conclusion: The love of heaven has been derided by some as a selfish passion. No doubt heaven may be represented and desired by the mind as a place of escape from conflict, of mere ignoble rest. But if we take it just as it is projected to our view in the Scriptures--in its relations to earthly labour, and suffering, and desire; and as the place where our higher toils and nobler enjoyments shall begin:--then the desire of heaven is the noblest and purest passion we cherish. (A. Raleigh, D. D.)
Many mansions
Sorrow needs simple words for its consolation; and simple words are the best clothing for the largest truths. Note in these words
I. THE FATHERS HOUSE, AND ITS AMPLE ROOM. There is only one other occasion in which our Lord used this expression: Make not My Fathers house a house of merchandise. Its courts, its many chambers, its ample porches, with room for thronging worshippers, represented in some poor way the wide sweep and space of that higher house.
1. How sweet and familiar this conception of heaven!
(1) There is something awful, even to the best souls, in the thought even of the glories beyond. But how it is all softened when we say, My Fathers house. Most of us have left behind us the sweet security which used to be ours when we lived as children in a fathers house here. But we may all look forward to the renewal, in far nobler form, of these early days, where the shyest and timidest child shall feel at ease and secure.
(2) And consider how this conception suggests answers to so many of our questions about the relationship of the inmates to one another. Are they to dwell isolated in their several mansions? Surely if He be the Father, and Heaven be His house, the relation of the redeemed to one another must have in it more than all the sweet familiarity and unrestrained frankness which subsists in the families of earth.
(3) But, further, this great and tender name has its deepest meaning in a spiritual state of which the essential elements are the loving manifestation of God as Father, the perfect consciousness of sonship, the happy union of all the children in one great family, and the derivation of all their blessedness from their elder Brother.
2. The ample room in this great house.
(1) There was room where Christ went for eleven poor men. But Christs prescient eye looked down the ages, and some glow of satisfaction flitted across His sorrow as He saw from afar the result of the impending travail of His soul in the multitudes by whom Gods heavenly house should yet be filled. Perhaps that upper room, like the most of the roof chambers in Jewish houses, was open to the skies, and whilst He spoke the innumerable lights that blaze in that clear heaven shone down upon them, and He may have pointed to these as He spoke. Ah! brethren, if we could only widen our measurement of the walls of the New Jerusalem to that of the golden rod which the man, that is, the angel applied to it, we should understand how much bigger it is than any of these poor communities on earth. If we would lay to heart, as we ought to do, the deep meaning of that indefinite many in my text it would rebuke our narrowness.
(2) That one word may also be used to heighten our own confidence as to our own poor selves. A chamber in the great temple waits for each of us, and the question is, Shall we occupy it or shall we not? The old rabbis said that, however many the throngs of worshippers who came up to Jerusalem at the Passover, the streets and the courts were never crowded. And so it is with that great city. There are throngs, but no crowds. Each finds a place in the ample sweep of the Fathers house, like some of the great palaces that barbaric Eastern kings used to build, in whose courts armies might encamp, and the chambers of which were counted by the thousand.
(3) There is only another occasion in this Gospel in which the word here translated mansions is employed--We will come and make our abode with Him. Our mansion is in God; Gods dwelling place is in us. When prodigal children go away from the fathers house sometimes a heartbroken parent will keep the boys room just as it used to be when he was young and pure, and will hope and weary through long days for him to come back and occupy it again. God is keeping a room for you in His house; do you see that you fill it.
II. THE SUFFICIENCY OF CHRISTS REVELATION FOR OUR NEEDS. If it were not so, I would have told you.
1. He sets Himself forward in very august fashion as being the Revealer and the Opener of that house for us. There is a singular tone about all our Lords few references to the future--a tone of decisiveness. He stands like one on a mountain top, looking down into the valleys beyond, and telling His comrades in the plain behind Him what He sees. He speaks of that unseen world always as one who had been in it, and who was reporting experiences, and not giving forth opinions. Very remarkable, therefore, is it that with this tone there should be such reticence in Christs references to the future. But my text suggests to us that we have got as much as we need, and, for the rest, if we needed to have heard it, He would have told us. Let the gaps remain. The gaps are part of the revelation, and we know enough for faith and hope.
2. May we not widen the application of that thought to other matters? In times like the present, of doubt and unrest, it is a great piece of Christian wisdom to recognize the limitations of our knowledge and the sufficiency of the fragments that we have. What do we get a revelation for? To solve theological puzzles and dogmatic difficulties; to inflate us with the pride of quasi-omniscience: or to present to us God in Christ for faith, for love, for obedience, for imitation? Surely the latter, and for such purposes we have enough. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
Many mansions
I. HEAVEN IS GODS HOUSE.
1. God is infinite (Psa_147:5).
2. Therefore, not comprehended, or included anywhere (Isa_66:1).
3. But is present everywhere (Psa_139:7).
4. But yet in some places unveils Himself, and discovers His glory more than in others.
5. Where God is pleased to reveal Himself most, is called His house. He has a two-fold house.
(1) A house of grace.
(a) The Church in general (Mar_3:35).
(b) A believers heart in particular (Isa_57:15; Rev_3:20).
(2) A house of glory, where He manifests most clearly the glory (1Co_13:12) of His power, goodness, mercy, wisdom.
6. Hence, observe that they who come to heaven
(1) Dwell with God, and so with the fountain of light (Psa_104:2): Psa_36:9), love, joy (Psa_16:11).
(2) And so are secure from enemies.
(3) And enjoy true happiness (Psa_16:11; Psa_17:15).
II. IT IS CHRISTS FATHERS HOUSE. And this adds great comfort; for
1. We may be sure of entertainment, though not for our own, yet for Christs sake.
2. We shall dwell with Christ (verse 3).
3. In Christ: it is our Fathers house too (chap. 20:17).
III. THESE MANSIONS ARE CONVENIENT AND SUITABLE
1. For our natures and capacities (2Pe_1:4).
2. For our wants and necessities: being
(1) Void of all troubles
(a) Spiritual: as of the sense of Gods displeasure (Eze_16:42); doubts about our estate; Satans temptations (1Pe_5:8); the delusions of this world; our own corruptions Eph_5:27; Heb_4:10).
(b) Temporal (Rev_7:17); for here is no want in our estates (Psa_34:9; Psa_84:11), no crosses in our enjoyments, no disgrace upon our names (Psa_119:39), no sickness in our bodies (Mar_12:25), no cares in our minds (Mt Php_4:6), no death (Rev_21:4).
2. Furnished with all delightsome furniture.
(1) For our souls.
(a) Our understandings.
(b) Our wills and affections (Psa_16:11).
(2) For our bodies (Php_3:21), robes (Rev_6:11), crowns (Jam_1:12; 2Ti_4:8), thrones (Luk_22:30), banquets (Isa_25:6; Rom_14:17; Rev_7:17), the most pleasing objects (1Co_13:12), the most celestial melodies Rev_4:8-11).
3. They are everlasting (Mat_25:46; Rom_6:23; 2Co_5:1).
IV. IN HEAVEN THERE ARE MANY MANSIONS.
1. What is the purport of this expression? Not distinct cells, but
(1) That there is room enough for many.
(2) That many shall be saved (Rev_7:9; Jam_2:5); but not irrespectively (1Co_1:26-28).
2. Whether in these mansions will there be degrees of glory?
(1) Negatively. All shall be alike in respect of
(a) Their freedom from evil (Rev_21:4).
(b) Gods love.
(c) Duration.
(d) Their capacities, i.e., everyone shall enjoy as much as he is capable of (Psa_16:11).
(2) Positively. One will be more capable, and so enjoy more than another. This appears
(a) From Scripture (1Co_15:41-42; Mt
19:28).
(b) There are degrees of torments in hell (Luk_12:47-48; Mat_11:21-22; Rom_2:9).
(c) There are degrees of angelical glory (1Th_4:16; Jud_1:9).
(d) There are degrees of grace and good works here (Ro 2Co_5:10; Luk_19:16-18).
3. There are many mansions. Then
(1) Despair not of room for you there.
(2) Labour to have one of them. There are degrees in glory--then strive to be eminent in grace that you may be eminent in glory (Mat_15:28). (Bp. Beveridge.)
The heavenly home
The text is suggested of
I. PERMANENCE.
1. All things change, and we with them. The earth and sun and stars are moving from their old forms into new, but their slow, stern cycles seem to us changeless when we think of ourselves. Let anyone who has advanced but a short way in life look round. Old times are away, old interests, old aims: the haunts, the friends, the faces of our youth, where are they? Gone, or so changed that we dare not think to recall them. And we are changing within. If we could keep up the life and freshness there it would be less sad. There is compensation for this, if we will seek it. If we have a home in God through Christ, it brings in something better than youthful brightness. But here, too, there is frequently change. The anchor of our hope seems to lose its hold, our sense of pardon and peace may be broken, and the face of God, if seen at all, may look dim and distant.
2. It is from such changes that the promise of Christ carries us to a fixed place of abode. The permanence of the dwelling shall ensure permanence in all that belongs to the dwellers in it. There must be, indeed, the change of progress: it is the permanence not of death but of life; and so the changes of decay, of loss, of bereavement, of the unretiring past, these are gone with the last great change, which ends the perishing and opens the eternal. There shall be no wavering of faith, no waning of hope, no chill of love. Here, change at every step leaves some lost good behind it; there change shall take all its good things forward into fuller possession, and thus become a growing performance. The way to be sure of a permanent home is to keep fast hold of Him who is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
II. EXTENT. Our present life is related to it as that of childhood to manhood. Let us think of the dwelling of the child, where it looks from its little window on the few houses or fields which make up its world, and then let us compare it with what the man knows of his present world residence, when he has surveyed with his eye or his mind the breadth of the earth with its oceans and lands that stretch over continents by Alps and Andes. There enter at the wicket gate Christiana and also the children, many Ready-to-halts and Feeble-minds, and far-off pilgrims, for whom we can find no names, but who are written in the Lambs Book of Life. Infants are carried through the door sleeping; and it is not for us to say by what far-off rays in dark nights, by what doubtful paths amid many imperfections, hearts have been yearning to this home. The notices of Rahab and Ruth, of Ittai and Naaman, of the wise men of the East, and the Greeks who came up to the Passover, of the Ethiopian eunuch and the devout Cornelius, are hints for the enlargement of our hopes about many who had the same yearning in their hearts, though they did not see the walls of any earthly Jerusalem. And, if we believe the Bible, there are long eras to run, when the flow shall be toward God more than it ever has been away from Him. And then there is to be a gathering together of all things in Christ, and the holy angels have relations to Him which will give them their share in His home. When we think of this, how the extent of the heavenly world grows I and the discoveries of science may help us to extend our hopes.
III. VARIETY. In all Gods works the many means the manifold.
IV. UNITY. These abodes of the future, manifold as they are, have walls around, and an over-arching roof, which make them one house, and that house a home. The chambers of a house have their communication with one another, and the heavenly world, wide as it is, shall have a unity of fellowship. In the present world the children of God are far apart, separated by the emergencies of life, by death, by misunderstandings and prejudices, by chills of heart and jealousies; and they rear their many little mansions, forgetful of the one house. The word of the Saviour promises a reversal of this long, sad history. Conclusion:
1. Something is needed to secure all this, and our Lord teaches us to carry to the thought of heaven a filial heart. It is the Fathers house. This is needed to make it a home in any sense; needed to give the heart rest either on earth or in heaven. Men who inquire into the facts and laws of the world, and find no God in it, have made themselves homeless. Men who have found human affection, but no God beneath it, have found only the shadow of a home. It is to teach us this that God has made a fathers love the bond of a true human household. If it were possible to enter heaven and find no Father there, heaven would be the grave of hope.
2. Our Lord has taught us to connect heaven with the thought of Himself--My Fathers house. Heaven is the house of Christs Father.
(1) It is as when a palace has been raised with all its rooms and their furniture complete, but it is dark or dimly seen by lights carried from place to place. The sun arises, and by the central dome the light is poured into all the corridors and chambers, and by the windows there are prospects over hill and valley and river. Christ is the sun of this house.
(2) If we think of its mansions, and wonder where the final resting place shall be, it is where Christ takes up His dwelling, that they may be with Me where I am.
(3) If we think of its extent and variety, our imagination might be bewildered, and our soul chilled by boundless fields of knowledge, which stir the intellect and famish the heart; but where He is, knowledge becomes the wisdom of love--the daylight softened; and a heart beats in the universe which throbs to its remotest and minutest fibre; for in Him is life, and the life is the light of men.
(4) If we think of heaven in its unity of fellowship, it is in Him that it is maintained and felt. That they all may be one, as Thou, Father, art in Me, etc.
(5) And if we think of a Father in heaven, it is Christ who has revealed Him. No man hath seen God at any time, etc.
(6) But beyond all this, it is Christs Fathers house because He alone is the way and the door to it. (J. Ker, D. D.)
Home in heaven
I. A DESCRIPTION OF HEAVEN.
1. A house, not a tent, put up today, and taken down to morrow; but the home we come to at the end of all our travels; fitted up for rest, security and enjoyment.
2. Gods own house. Not merely the place where His people are to dwell, but the place where He Himself dwells, and enjoys His unutterable happiness and rest. It is not simply, the kingdom--it is the palace of the great King. What, therefore, we may ask, may we not expect in heaven? We do not go there as strangers or foreigners; we go to the richest house in the universe as the children of the owner of it. The very best things it can afford will be ours. The astonished prodigal had the best provisions, and the best robe, brought forth for him, when he got home.
3. A house with many mansions in it, large, spacious, having many rooms, fitted up for the reception of many guests.
II. AN ASSURANCE OF ITS TRUTH.
1. Here is greatness. He speaks of heaven as none other: like One who had been familiar with it.
2. Here, too, is His love; If it were not so, He would have told them. They had left all to follow Him, with some earthly expectations, perhaps, but yet chiefly in the expectation of a future recompense.
III. THE END OF OUR LORDS DEPARTURE TO THE HEAVEN HE HAS BEEN DESCRIBING. And here is love again. Had we been asked what He was going to heaven for, we should have said--To get away from this evil world; to enter into His joy, etc. But He says, No; I go there to prepare a place for you. He left His Fathers house for us; He now returns to it for us. By this we must understand, not His creating heaven for us, or enlarging or adorning it, but removing out of the way all things which would prevent our entering into it. He goes there to prove our title to it; to show, in His wounded hands and pierced side, that He has paid for us its stipulated price. He goes to claim it on our behalf; to take possession of it in our name and stead. Hence He is said to have entered it as our Forerunner.
IV. THE WAY IN WHICH CHRIST WILL PUT US IN POSSESSION OF THE HEAVEN HE HAS PREPARED FOR US. He will send death to us, you may say, to summon us to His kingdom. No: I will come again, and receive you unto Myself, that where I am, there ye may be also. It does not satisfy Him to snatch us from destruction, to open heaven for us, to bring us into the way to it, to make us meet for it; He will come Himself, and take us to it. And when we are there, He will not say--There is the door of My Fathers house open for you; you may now enter in; He will not leave angels to welcome us, or our holy ministers and friends, who have gone before, to receive us; He Himself will come like a parent to his door to receive there his long expected and beloved child. He seems to regard this as the very summit of the heavenly happiness. And so every real believer feels that nothing higher can be promised him, than that he should be ever with his Lord. (C. Bradley, M. A.)
Heaven the Christians home
It is impossible wholly to estimate the value of the gospel. It is not only that it brings the knowledge of salvation to us; but it makes revelations that no other book on earth ever made with reference to a future state of existence.
I. You find in the text, then, first, the idea of COMFORT. You will remark that it was Christs intention, by this description of heaven, to administer comfort to the disciples. Then mark the consolations of religion, and the consolatory hope of heaven, belong to a certain class--to those that believe in God and believe also in Christ. But now, what is the comfort that the idea of a fathers house, or home, conveys to the mind? First of all, Christ speaks of His Fathers house, and therefore we call it our Fathers house--just because he says, My Father and your Father, my God and your God. Of all the ideas of comfort that we can form, home conveys the sweetest.
1. Now the first thing that strikes us here is a wonder certainly--but it is the truth--that we shall feel perfectly at home in our Fathers house. When we think of our own weakness and sinfulness here, and then think of the glory of God, the glory of Christ, the glory of angels, and the glory of the spirits of just men made perfect, it requires no slight effort of mind to fancy that we shall be at home there: but we shall.
2. To constitute a home there must be familiarity and confidence. We can talk with the folks at home with a confidence that we cannot use towards strangers. Now imagine yourself in familiar conversation, in love, with patriarchs, and with prophets, and with Christ Himself--for He will be there. It requires an elevation of faith and confidence, and spirituality of mind.
3. But, of course, this supposes another thing with regard to home--that it is all love there. Here we are strangers--it may be, perhaps, surrounded by enemies; there all is love. Evil tempers, crabbed dispositions, restless fretfulness, that even some good men manifest, will not be there. There will be perfect love; and everyone will wear a cheerful countenance; and it will be a glorious home. Well, that is what you are to think about; that is what it will be. Dont let your hearts be troubled. If troubles come, think of your home, as a stranger does who has long journeyed, and not had a very comfortable berth to rest in at night.
II. In the second place, we have the idea of PERMANENCE. There is a permanence about heaven that we can well understand, if we cannot fully comprehend.
1. The first thing is this, that when we get there nobody can turn us out again.
2. Then you will further observe, that as to this permanence, there will be ample sources of joy for us throughout eternity.
III. The third idea in our text is PREPARATION. Observe it is prepared for us, and the preparation is made by Christ Himself. And you will notice that preparation made for us testifies to the kindness and love of Him who prepares it.
1. Now whilst this shows the love of Christ to His people, the simple fact of His going to prepare a place for us you see involves too His knowledge of our love to Him. It is really as though He had said, Heaven wont be a complete home to Me till you are there, and I am sure it will not be to you till I am there; we must be together.
2. But, moreover, this preparation shows the adaptation of our present state to that home that He is gone to prepare for us. He that hath wrought us for the self-same thing is God, who bath also given us the earnest of the Spirit.
IV. But in the next place we have the idea of RECEPTION. I will come again and receive you unto Myself, that where I am there ye may be also. You immediately catch the idea of home here. The reception one will meet with from wife and children is one of the delightful anticipations of returning home. The moment the spirit is out of the body the first object on which it will fix its sight is Christ, with smiles on His face and glory on His brow. For, mark you, Christ would not trust the safety of one of His redeemed spirits in the hands of all the angels of heaven. He will be there Himself to take care of it. We do not know what death is: He does. Observe, there is a two-fold reception which Christ will give us--first, that which we may call our personal reception in heaven; and next that public, glorious reception that He will give us at the last great day, when He shall come a second time without sin unto salvation.
V. Now, in the last place, here is CERTAINTY. If it were not so, I would have told you.
1. Christ is already there in possession.
2. Next, Christ says He would have told us if there had been no heaven. Further, our hopes of heaven should guard us against two evils that we are subject to. The first is that which Christ has set before you. Dont be unduly troubled about earthly things. Then, on the other hand, do not be too delighted with earthly things. (J. Carter.)
Heaven--home
Someone asked a Scotchman if he was on his way to heaven. Why, man, he said, I live there. He was only a pilgrim here. Heaven was his home. (D. L. Moody.)
Heaven--home
Death came unexpectedly to a man of wealth, as it almost always does; and he sent out for his lawyer to draw his will. He went on willing away his property; and when he came to his wife and child, he said he wanted his wife and child to have the home. The little child didnt understand what death was. She was standing near, and she said, Papa, have you got a home in that land you are going to? The arrow reached that heart; but it was too late. He saw his mistake. He had got no home beyond the grave.
Heaven--home
Home--oh, how sweet is that word! What beautiful and tender associations cluster thick around it! Compared with it, house, mansion, palace, are cold, heartless terms. But home! that word quickens the pulse, warms the heart, stirs the soul to its depths, makes age feel young again, rouses apathy into energy, sustains the sailor in his midnight watch, inspires the soldier with courage on the field of battle, and imparts patient endurance to the worn-down sons of toil. The thought of it has proved a sevenfold shield to virtue: the very name of it has been a spell to call back the wanderer from the paths of vice. And far away, where myrtles bloom and palm trees wave, and the ocean sleeps upon coral strands, to the exiles fond fancy it clothes the naked rock, or stormy shore, or barren moor, or wild highland mountain, with charms he weeps to think of, and longs once more to see. Grace sanctifies these lovely affections, and imparts a sacredness to the homes of earth by making them types of heaven. As a home the believer delights to think of it. Thus, when lately bending over a dying saint, and expressing our sorrow to see him lay so low, with the radiant countenance rather of one who had just left heaven than of one about to enter it, he raised and clasped his hands, and exclaimed in ecstasy, I am going home. (T. Guthrie.)
Heaven, our home
In our last dreadful war the Federals and the Confederates were encamped on opposite sides of the Rappahannock, and one morning the brass band of the Northern troops played the national air, and all the Northern troops cheered and cheered. Then, on the opposite side of the Rappahannock, the brass band of the Confederates played My Maryland and Dixie, and then all the Southern troops cheered and cheered. But after a while one of the bands struck up Home, Sweet Home, and the band on the opposite side of the river took up the strain, and when the tune was done the Confederates and the Federals all together united, as the tears rolled down their cheeks, in one great Huzza! huzza! Well, my friends, heaven comes very near today. It is only a stream that divides us--the narrow stream of death; and the voices there and the voices here seem to commingle, and we join trumpets and hosannahs and hallelujahs, and the chorus of the united song of earth and heaven is, Home, Sweet Home. (T. De Witt Talmage, D. D.)
A good home to go to
Mr. Mead, an aged Christian, when asked how he did, answered, I am going home as fast as I can, as every honest man ought to do when his days work is over, and I bless God I have a good home to go to.
Nearing home
It was stormy from shore to shore, without a single fair day. But the place to which we were going was my home; there was my family; there was my church; there were my friends, who were as dear to me as my own life. And I lay perfectly happy in the midst of sickness and nausea. All that the boat could do to me could not keep down the exultation and joy which rose up in me. For every single hour was carrying me nearer and nearer to the spot where was all that I loved in the world. It was deep, dark midnight when we ran into Halifax. I could see nothing. Yet the moment we came into still water I rose from my berth and got up on deck. And as I sat near the smoke stack while they were unloading the cargo, upon the wharf I saw the shadow of a person, apparently, going backward and forward near me. At last the thought occurred to me, Am I watched? Just then the person addressed me, saying, Is this Mr. Beecher? It is, I replied. I have a telegram for you from your wife. I had not realized that I had struck the continent where my family were. There, in the middle of the night, and in darkness, the intelligence that I had a telegram from home--I cannot tell you what a thrill it sent through me! We are all sailing home; and by and by, when we are not thinking of it, some shadowy thing (men call it death), at midnight, will pass by, and will call us by name, and will say, I have a message for you from home; God waits for you. Are they worthy of anything but pity who are not able to bear the hardships of the voyage? It will not be long before you, and I, and every one of us will hear the messenger sent to bring us back to heaven. It is pleasant to me to think that we are wanted there. I am thankful to think that God loves in such a way that He yearns for me--yes, a great deal more than I do for Him. (H. W. Beecher.)
Diverted from thoughts of home
Why do we not go home? Why are we like a silly child, that when his father sends him forth, and bids him hie him home again, every flower that he meets with in the field, every sign he sees in the street, every companion that meets him in the way, stops him, and hinders him from repairing to his father? So it is with us for the most part: every trifle, every profit, every bauble, every matter of pleasure, every delight, is enough to divert and turn aside our thoughts from death, from home, from heaven, from our God; and we are taken up and lose ourselves, I know not where. (R. Sibbes, D. D.)
Heaven
I. THE UNIVERSAL HEAVEN OF THE GOOD--Fathers house. It is a scene of
1. Family life. It is the Fathers house.
(1) It is a large family. An innumerable company of angels, thrones, principalities, etc.
(2) A holy family. All are pure, free from selfishness, from error and sin.
(3) A harmonious family. Though mixed and of vast gradations they are all united in thought, sympathy, and aim.
(4) An undying family.
(5) An ever-increasing family.
2. Undoubted reality. If it were not so, I would have told you. It is no poets dream, no fictitious realm.
(1) He is too intelligent to be mistaken. He knows every part of the universe.
(2) He is too truthful to misrepresent. In Him there is no motive to deceive.
(3) He is too kind to delude.
II. THE SPECIAL HEAVEN OF CHRISTS DISCIPLES. I go to prepare a place for you. (D. Thomas, D. D.)
The holy habitation of heaven
I. HEAVEN IS THE HOUSE OF OUR FATHER AND UNITES ALL THE ASSOCIATIONS OF FILIAL HAPPINESS AND REVERENT DEVOTION. The relationship of family is supposed by the scheme of our redemption. Sin is alienating; but we are made nigh by the blood of Christ, and our consequent fellowship is with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ. A childlike title and a child-like temper are the results: Now are we the sons of God, and home is the abode of children. Touching are the thoughts of home: what is the home of heaven?
1. Quiet and repose. We are wanderers on earth. Without are fightings, within are fears. But soon shall we toil no more. The days of our mourning shall be ended. We shall come to our Fathers house in peace.
2. Confidence. Look at the home-born child. When danger threatens, home is the bulwark: when affliction weeps, this is the asylum. It is this assuredness which is the secret of all earthly satisfaction and peace. Yet is it not always to be cherished, it may not be invariably justified. Suspicion coils like a serpent about each flower of existence; or, like a lurking poison, taints all its springs. But with what strictest security does all the happiness of heaven rise on our view! Nothing maketh a lie. Thieves do not break through and steal. There is no more death.
3. Concord. Nevertheless a house may be divided against itself. But the inhabitants of that house are made perfect in one. They have one heart. They see eye to eye. If we too much forget to ask each other while here below, Have we not all one Father?--the remembrance of that truth will ever be vivid and efficacious in our Fathers house.
4. Sympathy.
5. Improvement. This is the true sphere of education. But during our moral state, however matured our powers and enlarged our attainments, we speak as a child, etc. In heaven we shall put away childish things. In that light we shall see light.
6. Content and happiness.
7. But it is not only our Fathers house in the associations of a home, it is the consecrated receptacle of His worship. And these ideas are not incompatible. For, to the Christians perception and taste, what can make heaven more delightful, in addition to its illustration as a home, than that this home shall be devoted, with the family which fills it, to the high praises of our Father in heaven? The votary is the child! The child is the votary! Pilgrim never touched more reverently the dreadful shrine: son never more joyously bounded upon the paternal threshold. With this double intention, of resting in a home and of ministering in a sanctuary, he exclaims: I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
II. IN THIS HOUSE OF HOME AND TEMPLE THERE ARE MANY MANSIONS. And thus are we taught that the greatest amplitude consists with the strictest unity, that though the mansions are numerous the house is one. And thus, also, we learn that there is no monotony in that blessed state. There is order in the harmony of difference, and the distribution of the mansions completes the identity of the house. Meditating, then, on this multiform glory, what do we ascertain of the blessed immortals?
1. The immensity of their number. Heaven once suffered a vast depopulation. The influence of the catastrophe we cannot determine. There was a strange vacancy amidst those groves: untrodden paths and ungathered fruits. But that heaven might not always remain thus diminished, it was arranged that beings who had themselves lapsed, and whom a most stupendous salvation should rescue from all their guilt and rebelliousness and ruin, should constitute an incomputable augmentation over the deficiency and loss. There was a wonder in heaven. Meek and humble, there bent before the Divine Majesty a solitary human spirit. It sung, but it was a lonely song. It gazed, but its eye rested upon nothing like itself. Up from this world another and another sprung. He the solitary was set in a family. The question of preponderance, in the number of the saved over that of the lost, might now be properly argued.
(1) The proportion of infant death, the certainty of infant salvation, furnish us with most pleasant grounds on which to rest the argument.
(2) The design of punishment comprehends warning, and we may presume without irreverence, this purpose being revealed, that the good of the majority is sought, and that they who perish form a very inferior proportion to those who are saved.
(3) There are certain implications concerning these ratios which we cannot overlook. Sometimes they are equal. Five of them were wise and five were foolish. In other instances there is an encouraging difference. Two of the servants, among three, are good and faithful: the third alone is wicked and unprofitable. Still higher is placed that relative state: the wedding is furnished with guests, all duly apparelled and royally approved, and only one is without the qualifying badge.
(4) Christianity, as the reign of grace, asserts its purpose and pledges its supremacy. Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. Shall sin predominate and proclaim more victims than this grace can enumerate subjects?
(5) Models of prayer are instituted for us. Let all the people praise Thee. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. These anticipations are, then, assured possibilities: we are taught to seek them with believing expectation.
(6) A glorious sequel to our earths dark history is foretold. The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our God and of His Christ.
2. The inequality of their glory. Where there are rewards, there must be differences. They suppose adaptation and adjustment to every form and habit of excellence. He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly, etc. This man has been like a continued sigh and aspiration and panting after holiness. That man, truly sincere, has pursued a far less devoted course. These could not enjoy the same portion. Nor is there a supposeable alternative, save that all were forcibly, mechanically, conformed to one standard. There would be, then, a necessity to lower as well as to raise, to repress as well as to expand. The first process would be unjust, however the second might be gracious. The speed of a zealous life would give no advantage in the immortal race. Yet if these inequalities exist, some think they must engender envy. Is it necessarily thus even in this imperfect state of ours? Charity envieth not, etc. In heaven nothing is loved but holiness, and the highest holiness is loved the most.
3. The diversity of their character. The modifications of the regenerated soul are not fewer and less notable than those of the soul unrenewed. And who does not rejoice in this difference of mental powers and habits, this diversity of gifts and graces, during the earthly exhibition? In heaven our nature has not perished: our being is only fulfilled. All of it is brought out and glorified. What pleasure to search through these many mansions and to find every form of worth and might, every species of intellectual activity and spiritual perfection, all endlessly, as actually, Variegated, multiplied, and combined!
4. The transition of their employment. One investigation, unchequered and unrelieved, strains the mind. One enjoyment, unvaried, and undiverted, cloys. The glorified spirit may, therefore, not only find its mansion, but be free of the many mansions. Thus may it renew its youth and recreate its immortality. Now shall it offer praise. It bends in adoring contemplation. It sees the King in His beauty. It exercises itself in the research of wonder and mystery. It cultivates communion with all other heavenly spirits. What may not angels, who have ministered to the heirs of salvation, tell of their knowledge and their experience? What saints are there, and we shall recognize them. And are we not then to be still more filled with the love of God, more delineated with the image of Christ, more imbued with love for all saints? and then each effort brings its repose. They rest not, and in that ceaselessness of activity is their rest.
6. The regularity of their arrangement. In this great house, every vessel, all sanctified and meet for the Masters use, has its valuation and its function. There is the mansion
(1) Of the patriarchs, their thoughts still full of sacrifice.
(2) Of the prophets, singing still as in their choir!
(3) Of the apostles, pointing still to the atoning Lamb!
(4) Of the martyrs, as new baptised from the flames!
(5) Of faithful ministers, discriminating among the throng those who are their glory and their crown!
(6) Of pious parents, their solicitudes fulfilled and their prayers answered in the conversion of their offspring!
(7) Of self-sacrificing missionaries, as on set thrones, surrounded by their converts. Yet there is room. But there is in these orders nothing repulsive, arrogant, or humiliating; all is one; one happy family!
6. The series of their progression. The tendencies and yearnings of the human mind are towards an indefinite life and advancement. These keep us restless and dissatisfied while we are in our sins: these excite us to follow on to know the Lord, when we receive the grace of God. If there was a point in our existence beyond which we could learn nothing further and enjoy nothing more, that would be the limit of well-being. Our misery, instead of being lessened by what we had acquired, would be unspeakably aggravated. It would be like an ascent to some everlasting hill to gaze for first and for last our full of the glorious land, not then to die amidst the rapture, but to be doomed to life beneath the sudden fall of an endless night. The stretch for these progressions is the duration of eternity! (R. W. Hamilton, D. D.)
Variety in heaven
A mother was standing by the dying bed of her little child. She tried to lead the childs thoughts to heaven, and told her of how the city was of pure gold, of dazzling brightness. But the little one shuddered, and cried that the light would hurt her eyes. Then the mother told her of the choirs of angels, and the songs before the throne, and the child answered that the noise would make her headache. At last the mother took the moaning child to her breast, and as she nestled there, she said, if heaven is like this, I am ready to go there. For some there will be an existence of dazzling brightness, an existence full of grandeur and glory, like the sound of a mighty anthem; others, those who loved much, shall find, like St. John, their greatest joy in resting on the bosom of their Lord. (H. J. W. Buxton, M. A.)
Recognition in heaven
Not long ago I stood by the death bed of a little girl. Every fibre of her body and soul recoiled from the thought of death. Dont let me die, she said; dont let me die. Hold me fast. Oh, I cant go. Jenny, I said, you have two brothers in the other world, and there are thousands of tender-hearted people over there who will love you and take care of you. But she cried out again despairingly, Dont let me go; they are strangers over there. But even as she was pleading her little hands relaxed their clinging hold from my waist and lifted themselves eagerly aloft. Her face was turned upwards; but it was her eyes that told the story. They were filled with the light of Divine recognition. They saw something plainly that we could not see; and they grew brighter and brighter. Mamma, she said, mamma, they are not strangers; Im not afraid. Her form relapsed upon the pillows, and she was gone. (Helen Williams.)
Not dead, but gone home
We lament for the dead, because we ourselves dread death. The physical instinct, wisely given for the preservation of life, is controlled but not destroyed by faith. Afflicted believers, your sorrows are only the discomforts of a journey, each stage of which, however rough the road and wild the weather, brings you nearer home. The darkness is only that of the tunnel through which you are hurrying, and the speck of light at the end is nearing and brightening as you speed onward to the eternal sunshine. Our Lord speaks of heaven as home--My Fathers house. What a contrast to the gorgeous imageryemployed by servants is this sublimely simple familiarity of the Son l Inspired men are overawed by the distant vision of the celestial city, with its pearly gates and streets of gold; as if a poor cottager, after visiting a royal palace, tried to describe the unimagined splendours of a place which members of the royal family simply knew as home. This was in harmony with His high claims of Deity! The disciples were not to be troubled on His account. Although betrayed, condemned, crucified, He was going home. They were not to be troubled for Him; and because of their intimate union with Him, they were not to be troubled for themselves. If heaven is Christs home, it is ours also. We are joint heirs with Jesus Christ. What hallowed associations are suggested by the word! Love makes home.
1. Home promises rest. There the wearied limbs or wearied brain repose after the days toil. Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord; they rest from their labours.
2. Home suggests fidelity. We may suspect deceit and treachery outside, but we can cast off all reserve, all distrust at home.
3. Home suggests sympathy. There may be enmity outside, avowed or concealed, and even friends may sometimes prove forgetful, selfish, and unkind; but true home is the palace of love, where hearts are of each other sure. But the purest of earthly homes are but faint types of that above. There every heart is wholly true to every other, being wholly true to God.
4. It is a permanent home; mansions, not movable tents, but an enduring habitation. We know that when this earthly tabernacle is dissolved we have a building of God. How unlike the uncertainty of earthly things! The lake, reflecting from its unruffled surface the sky and stars, may, in one short hour, be wild with storms. The stream, which oft refreshed us, suddenly becomes dry. The fairest flowers droop even as we gaze on them. The loveliest homes are quickly broken up. No locks and bolts can shut out sickness and death.
5. And there is abundance of supply. There are many mansions. The Fathers house is large enough for all His children--vast as His own heart.
6. Number implies variety. The mansions are not uniform, though all are perfect. They are prepared for dwellers of varied capacity--for children and young men, for babes in Christ and for those of full age.
7. These hopes are not visionary. If it were not so, I would have told you. The disciples had forsaken all to follow Him. They loved their Lord, and knew He loved them. Could such love perish? They expected a kingdom; and as it was not to be earthly, it must be heavenly. Would Christ allow them to serve Him as they did, on false expectations? He did contradict their expectation of a temporal kingdom--would He not have contradicted this heavenly hope had it also been unfounded? O believer, your hope is no idle dream! That city does glow with splendour. If it were not so, I would have told you. St. Paul says, We are of good courage, and are willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be at home with the Lord (R.V.) Death is only the migration of the soul from the fleshly tabernacle to the house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. We will not weep for them as dead. Is it death to reach home after the toilsome journey, to wear the crown after the fierce fight, to serve in the presence of the King, where there is fulness of joy? The funeral was only that of frailty, sorrow, and sin. A Christian in that coffin, in that grave? No! he is at home in the Fathers house. (N. Hall.)
Room for all saved sinners in heaven
There was a poor man who had been a long while burdened in spirit. One night he dreamed that he stood at the gates of heaven, longing to enter; but he are not, and could not, for sin had shut him out. At length he saw approaching the pearly gates a company of men who came on singing, dressed in white robes. So he stepped up to one of them, and said, Who are you? And they replied, We are the goodly fellowship of the prophets. He said, Alas! I cannot enter with you. And he watched them until they had passed the gates, and he heard outside the voice of song as they were received with welcome. Cast down and troubled, he watched until he saw another company approach, and they came with music and rejoicing. He said to them, Who are you? and they replied, We are the noble army of martyrs. He said, I cannot go with you; and when he heard the shouts a second time ascending from within the gates, his heart was heavy within him at the thought that it was not possible for him to enter there. Then came a third company, and he detected in the van the apostles, and after them there came mighty preachers and confessors of the Word. He said in his heart, Alas! I cannot go with you, for I am no preacher, and I have done nothing for my Master. His heart was ready to break, for they entered and were lost to his sight; and he heard the triumphant acclamations as the Master said, Well done, enter into the joy of your Lord. But as he waited, he saw a greater company approaching. He marked in the forefront Saul of Tarsus, Mary Magdalene, the thief that died upon the cross; and they came streaming on. So he said to one of them, Who are ye? And they replied, We are a company of sinners whom no man can number, saved by blood, through the rich, free, sovereign grace of God. Indeed, all the companies might have said the same, and the dream would have been more complete. But as this poor man, with the tears in his eyes, heard this word, he said, Thank God, I can go with you, for I am a sinner like you, and like you I will trust in the merit of Him that died on Calvary. So he joined their ranks, and was about to enter, but he said in his heart, When we come there shall be no songs; they will admit us, but it will be in silence, for we bring no honour to God; we have done nothing for Him. But to his surprise the acclaim was louder, the music was more melodious, and the shouts of acclamation were louder far, while they said, Here are they who come to complete the number of the host whom Jesus bought with blood. (C. H.Spurgeon.)
The parting consolation
Let us consider
I. THE TRUTH DECLARED. Consider the Fathers house
1. In its majesty and greatness. It is the abode of the great King; where He holds His court, surrounded by all the angels and sons of light.
2. In the right which our Lord here supposes we have to it, But how shall guilty and polluted man hope for admission there? His right is, it is Christs Fathers house. We go there by the invitation of the Lord of glory; we go there by the bidding of Him who is the Heir. Ye are Christs. Heirs of God and joint heirs with Him.
3. In the vastness of its dimensions. Christ, who will bring many sons into glory, hath for these sons many prepared and furnished mansions. Christs mansions, like Christs heart, will be found to be full and large, and ready to embrace every humble, penitent and believing soul.
4. In its everlastingness. Hitherto ye have dwelt in tabernacles; then ye shall enter into the everlasting mansions, into a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
5. In its unfailing certainty. If it were not so, I would have told you.
II. THE PURPOSE AVOWED. To prepare a place. Were not those bright walls built before the birth of time? Did not the turrets of those everlasting mansions glitter before the first sun rose upon the hills? Yes, but these mansions were prepared for men who knew no sin. Our Lord says, I am going, so that when these seats are sprinkled with My sacrificial blood, and when your hearts are sprinkled with that blood too, He that sanctifieth and they that are sanctified, being all one, may sit down together, and I go to keep possession, to preserve the place in continual readiness for your arrival.
III. THE ASSURANCE GIVEN. I will come again, etc. See how large and full is the love of Christ. After having shown us the house, and opened the house, and prepared the house, will He then leave us to ourselves to come afterwards? No; He says--I will come and fetch you. Will forsake the companionship of these immortals that now surround Me, and I will come and receive you unto Myself.
IV. THE CONSUMMATION TO BE ATTAINED. That where I am, there ye may be also. (D. Moore, M. A.)
If it were not so, I would have told you
Christs appeal to His disciples confidence
We are eager for certainty, for reality. In the hour of a bitter loss the heart refuses fictitious comfort, for sorrow makes men wonderfully real.
I. CHRIST ANNOUNCES HIS KNOWLEDGE OF THE FACTS. These are remarkable words in many aspects, but particularly so in that they imply a full knowledge of the secrets of another world. It was just the truth we should suppose a good, loving, tender God would be anxious to make known to the myriads of His children who were treading every hour the sad pathway of death.
II. CHRIST APPEALS TO HIS KNOWN CHARACTER. He knew that the disciples to whom He spoke could not point to any incident in His intercourse with them which would justify a doubt of His perfect truthfulness. Further, Christ was not only truthful, but He was too good to deceive them. It is possible for a man to be sternly, rigidly true, and yet not be good in the large sense of that word. We have known men who would scorn to utter a lie or to draw a false picture, but they were not kind, gentle, compassionate, sympathizing men.
III. CHRIST SEEKS THE CONFIDENCE OF HIS DISCIPLES. If I speak to any doubter who has long struggled in the midst of perplexities, these words are for you. Could He deceive any soul, however humble, on a matter of such supreme importance? (W. Braden.)
The silence of Scripture
1. A familiar proverb says Speech is silvern, but silence is golden. Thoughts are often best expressed by silent acts than words. A grasp of the hand, a glance of the eye may stir us more than a trumpet peal. Christ looked at Peter.
2. Written revelation has its necessary limitations. Only essential truths are given. Much is left to inference. But silence is a source of pain and in no subject more than the future life.
I. LET US SEE THIS RETICENCE OF SCRIPTURE AS CARRIED INTO OTHER TRUTHS.
1. Gods sovereignty and mans responsibility. We can deny neither; history proves both. For their reconciliation we must wait.
2. The Resurrection. Reason is staggered and asks, How are the dead raised? We cannot explain the process. But Gods power is adequate. The darkness is not with God but with us.
3. The proofs of the existence of a personal God, The Bible simply assumes His existence. But we know that our watch must have had a maker. This we believe without referring to our ignorance of him. There must have been a Maker of the eye, whether we know Him or not.
II. FROM THIS THEME WE LEARN HOW TO INTERPRET GODS SILENCE.
1. It is Gods glory to conceal a matter.
2. Secret things belong to Him; things revealed to us and to our children.
3. We are to walk by faith not by sight.
4. We are indeed to dig and toil for truth, yet ever remember that there are depths we cannot now fathom.
5. All true science is humble, and the language of our faith should be, Even so, Father, for so seemeth it good in Thy sight. (D. Murdoch, D. D.)
Inferences from the silence of Christ
This is an appeal of Christ to His own truthfulness and love. He could not allow His disciples to remain victims of delusion. He had often wounded them by telling painful truths, and had their expectation of an immortal life been a mistaken one, He would most certainly have contradicted it. Our text, then, enunciates a grand principle. Christ made it a main part of His work to expose Jewish error. Whenever, therefore, He refrained from contradicting any deeply rooted belief, we have an argument for its truth. Apply this to
I. THE DOCTRINE OF OUR LORDS DEITY. Christ was worshipped over and over again during His earthly ministry. We know that Peter (Act_10:26) and the angel (Rev_22:9) shrunk from such homage; but Jesus never did. When His enemies accused Him of making Himself equal with God He did not repel the charge. Meek and lowly as He was, He accepted all the worship men offered, Had He not been Divine would He not have told us?
II. THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. This the destructive criticism of our time denies. Now remember that to the Jews were committed the oracles of God, and they were conspicuously faithful to their trust. But Christ never questioned the purity and integrity of the ancient scriptures. He held them in the deepest reverence, referred to all classes of facts recorded in them, set His seal to minor incidents, encouraged the people to search them, declared that they could not be broken, and that not one jot or tittle should fail. What a gulf between Christs criticism and that of the modem school! Had the latter been correct, how is it that He, the Truth, did not tell the world so? We need not fear, therefore, any of the lower or higher criticism of our day.
III. THE PERPETUITY OF THE SABBATH LAW. That the weekly Day of Rest was not a mere Jewish institution is proved from its position in the Decalogue, and from the design of God in appointing it. And had it been abrogated, or if it was to have no place in the Christian code of ethics, would not Jesus have told us? He often had to deal with the question of Sabbath observance, and to correct the rabbinical interpretations of the Fourth Commandment; but never did He drop a single word to countenance the idea that the Sabbath law was not to remain in force. On the contrary, He claimed to be Lord of the Sabbath. He found the Sabbath a standing Divine ordinance, and left it such only freshened with the dew of His blessing.
IV. MANS HOPE OF IMMORTALITY. Thoughtful men in every age have cherished this. Socrates held the doctrine, but admitted that a good deal could be said against it. In the oldest scriptures we find deep yearnings, and over against them hopes very distinct and definite (Job_14:14-15; Job_19:25-27). We learn from what our Lord said to the Sadducees, that the doctrine was from the beginning part of the faith of Gods ancient people; and one of the purposes for which He came was to tell men that this was a reasonable hope. In the text He assumed that the disciples cherished it, and in words of deepest tenderness tells them that they are right. (C. Jerden, LL. B.)
Mans hope of immortality uncontradicted by God
I. OUR POSITION TO GOD IS SIMILAR TO THAT IN WHICH THE DISCIPLES STOOD TO CHRIST--We are looking to Him for the fulfilment of hopes which reach beyond our present life.
1. It cannot be questioned that there is a deep and wide testimony in mans nature to the existence of a God and of a future life.
(1) There is a dim token of a nature which seeks more than earth, in the manner in which earthly things are often pursued. The world cannot fill mans soul, because it is greater than the world. The magnet in his heart can never rest till it points to its pole star.
(2) In his thirst for truth, in his faith in it, in his search after it as single and sovereign, there is a token of mans origin and destiny.
(3) We all know men who have aims, more or less exalted, for which they are ready to give time and labour and endless anxiety without even any hope that they themselves shall see the result. In this stretch of mans soul beyond self there is a look of his nature beyond earthly limits.
(4) We can perceive the same in the conception men have of an ideal of perfection, in their struggle to realize it, and in their deep lamentation over the imperfect and impure around them. The only sphere in which this yearning can be realized is immortality.
(5) It is discerned in all the religions which man has made for himself. We can see also, that, as religions rise in their perception of moral excellence, they become clear on this question. We have a right to say, further, that this hope is one of its greatest living forces. No one can read these parting words of Christ or the utterances of such men as Paul and John, without seeing that, wherever their religion goes, the conviction of an immortality goes with it as an all-pervading thought. Its martyrdoms and its missionary efforts are everywhere based upon it. It remains yet to be shown that any view of man, as possessed of a mere earthly life, will lead to the suffering and labour which the gospel has called forth in the cause of humanity. I know that it is the fashion of some to speak of the hope of immortality as selfish. But it is surely worthy of consideration, that the religion which of all others is most disinterested in its morality, which founds its motives on love, is that one also which looks most clearly and steadily into an eternal life, and that its central act is a sacrifice unto death, which becomes the spring and birth of numberless immortalities.
2. If in these hopes and aspirations men were deceived, and were appealing to the Author of their being, so widely and so constantly, for the fulfilment of what He never intends to bestow, then--in some distinct way or other--by some voice from heaven, or some prevailing voice of reason in their own hearts--we might justly conclude that He would act on this principle--If it were not so, I would have told you.
II. THE SAME CONSIDERATIONS WHICH WOULD HAVE LED CHRIST TO UNDECEIVE HIS DISCIPLES, HAD THEY BEEN IN ERROR, APPLY TO GOD IN HIS POSITION TO US.
1. Those which lie in Gods own character.
(1) His truthfulness. A genuine nature will shun not merely active falsehood, but silent connivance with it.
(2) His justice. It would have impelled Christ to undeceive His disciples, had He known their hopes to be vain. For these hopes they were exposing themselves to hardship and scorn, and were ready to suffer a cruel and untimely death. It was right that the terms should be before them, and that Christ should not accept their services and sufferings on a false presumption. If Divine equity can have the law of the universe move on amid a perpetual delusion, and be subserved by it, then Gods justice is something else than the image of it which He has formed within us.
(3) His goodness. If this life were indeed all, would not that goodness bring mans wishes within the circle of his brief existence, and not suffer him to tantalize himself with the lights and shadows, the hopes and fears, of an eternity which shall never dawn!
2. Those which lie in the relation which exists between God and His human creatures.
(1) That of Teacher. Christ had led His disciples to look to Him for instruction in all the great interests of life. He would have convinced them that the desire was unreasonable, or He would have carefully guarded against exciting it.
(2) A higher relation is the drawing out of the hearts affections. Christs words and conduct bound the disciples to Him irrevocably. Now, let us suppose for an instant, that, by some strange arrangement, immortality was for Him but not for them. Then the love had failed, not on the part of earth but heaven--not the mortal friend but the immortal Master would have been guilty of cold forgetfulness. And, if He meant never to meet its desire, would He not be allowing a love to spring up in the human heart, stronger and truer than His own, for mans would be perpetually struggling to overpass death, while Gods would coldly yield to it?
(3) This relation of affection rises into the higher one of fellowship. The bond between Christ and His disciples, of mutual converse and appeal, finds its counterpart in the bond between God and many souls of men in this world. It is as strong a necessity--it is a stronger--for some men to speak to God, than it is for others to speak to their fellow creatures. Whence has come this spontaneous recourse to prayer, which withstands all arguments? If it is not Gods heart meeting man, it is mans heart meeting God, and seeking a fellowship with his Maker, which cannot but be of His Makers prompting. And when, in the trust and joy of this fellowship, the soul looks forward to its continuance, can we believe that God would permit it, in this, to be forever deceived? Conclusion: Note
1. That God has contradicted this hope in the lower creatures, that is, He has not suffered it to spring up.
2. He has contradicted prevalent falsities in human nature in various ways. Apart from supernatural utterance, there is the progress of reason, the growth of conscience, the rise of the souls highest life, which make superstitions and immoralities that have covered whole ages and nations to pine and die. In these ways He tells man what is false; but here it is in proportion as the soul grows and sin dies, that this hope increases, and it is strongest when we find our highest intuitions answered in the light and life of God. (J. Ker, D. D.)
I go to prepare a place for you
The Forerunner
1. What Divine simplicity and depth are in these words! The emblem is homely, the thing meant is transcendent.
2. Not less wonderful is the blending of majesty and lowliness. The office which He takes upon Himself is that of an inferior and a servant. And yet the discharge of it, in the present case, implies His authority over every corner of the universe.
3. Nor can we fail to notice the blending of another pair of opposites, His certainty of His impending death, and His certainty, notwithstanding and thereby, of His continual work and His final return.
I. THE DEPARTURE. Our Lords going away from that little group was a journey in two stages. Calvary was the first; Olivet was the second. He means by the phrase the whole continuous process.
1. He prepares a place for us by His death. The High Priest of old once a year was privileged to pass into the holiest, because he bore in his hand the blood of the sacrifice. But in our New Testament system the path into the holiest is made possible for every foot, because Jesus has died. And as the communion upon earth, so the perfecting of the communion in the heavens. Old legends tell us of magic gates that resisted all attempts to force them, but upon which, if one drop of a certain blood fell, they flew open. And so, by His death, Christ has opened the gates and made the heaven of perfect purity a dwelling place for sinful men.
2. He prepares a place for us by His entrance into and His dwelling in the heavenly places.
(1) If Christ had not ascended, would there have been a place at all? He has gone with a human body, which must be somewhere. And we may even say that His ascending up on high has made a place where His servants are.
(2) But apart from that we may see that Christs presence in the heavens is needful to make heaven a heaven for poor human souls. It is from Him and through Him that there come to men, whether on earth or in the heavens, all that they know, all that they hope, all that they enjoy of the wisdom, love, beauty, peace, power, which flow from God. The very glories of all that lies beyond the veil would have an aspect appalling and bewildering to us, unless our Brother were there. Like some poor savages brought into a great city, or rustics into the presence of a king and his court, what should we do unless we saw standing there our Kinsman, to whom we can turn, and who makes it possible for us to feel that that is home?
3. Not only did He go to prepare a place, but He is continuously preparing it for us all through the ages. We have to think of a double form of the work of Christ.
(1) Past in His earthly life, and present in His exaltation.
(2) Present with and in us here, and for us there.
(3) In the heavens--His priestly intercession and His preparing a place for us.
II. THE RETURN. The purpose of our Lords departure, as set forth by Himself here, guarantees for us His coming back again. He who went away as the Forerunner has not done His work until He comes back, and, as Guide, leads those for whom He had prepared the place to the place which He had prepared for them. That return, like the departure, may be considered as in two stages
1. The main meaning is that final and personal coming which stands at the end of history. And He will come as He went, a visible Manhood, only throned amongst the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. This return ought to be the prominent subject of Christian aspiration and desire. We have a double witness to bear. One half stretches backwards to the Cross and proclaims Christ has come; the other reaches onwards to the Throne and proclaims Christ will come.
2. But Scripture knows of many comings of the Lord preliminary to, and in principle one with, His second coming. For nations, all great crises of their history are comings of the Lord, the Judge. And in reference to individuals, we see in each single death a true coming of the Lord. Beyond all secondary causes, deeper than disease or accident, lies the loving will of Him who is the Lord of life and of death. Death stands amidst the ranks of the ministering spirits sent forth to minister to them that shall be heirs of salvation. Whensoever a Christian man lies down to die, Christ says, Come! and he comes. How that thought should hallow the death chamber as with the print of the Masters feet! How it should quiet our hearts and dry our tears! With Him for our companion the lonely road will not be dreary. The dying martyr beneath the city wall lifted up his face to the heavens and said, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit! It was the echo of the Masters promise: I will come again and receive you to Myself.
III. THE PERFECTED UNION. The departure and the return are stages in the process, which is perfected by complete union--that where I am there ye may be also. Christ is Heaven. To be with Him is to behold His glory. And to behold His glory, as John tells us in his epistle, is to be like Him. So Christs presence means the communication to us of all the lustre of His radiance, of all the whiteness of His purity, of all the depth of His blessedness, and of a share in His wondrous dominion. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
The prepared place
There are two remarkable things about Christs statement.
1. That the Master should prepare for the servant. But this is in keeping with Christs whole method.
2. That the Divine Christ should ever have occasion to prepare anything. Can He who fills eternity have anything to arrange for His servants? The answer is, that Christ accommodates Himself to our way of thinking. There are some things which the Master only can do. We can do one hundred and fifty little things, and double that, and get the notion that we can do anything. But go and prepare summer! You have seen half a hundred: try and make the fifty-first! If the servant cannot prepare the summer, how can he prepare heaven? The text gives three comforting and inspiring views of the Christians position and destiny
I. HE IS THE OBJECT OF CHRISTS ZEALOUS AND TENDER CARE For you; and Paul catching his Masters tone said, All things are yours. Yet we hang our heads and cry as though we had nothing unless we could lace our fingers round it, not knowing that a mans life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth. Wherever you find Christ you find Him working for His people. There is a beautiful necessity of love about this arrangement. For if He were to fail here--in training and sanctifying the Church--He would fail altogether. What if He has made countless millions of stars? Can they talk to Him? If He does not get us--poor, broken things--right into His heaven He has failed. This is the one work He set Himself to do.
II. CHRISTIANS ARE TO BE ETERNALLY HIS JOY. As for these heavens, He will one day dismiss them. He makes some things for the time being; but when we read of the place prepared for believers we have the idea of never-ending fellowship. All true life is in the heart. Love alone is immortal. God is love. Love it is which binds Christ and Christians. If we love Him we shall be with Him forever.
III. Seeing that all this is so, THE CHRISTIAN IS ENTITLED TO LOOK AT THE PRESENT THROUGH THE FUTURE. The Christian is not to be troubled, because in His Fathers house are many mansions. When you are weary of the present, look forward into the future. Conclusion: If Christ is gone to prepare a place for us, then
1. The place will be worthy of Himself. Send a poor creature, and the place will be prepared according to the capacity and resources of the messenger? What kind of place will He prepare, who has all things at command?
2. Christ is waiting for His guests. Bad man! God has prepared nothing for you. There is a place--but it was prepared, not for you, but for the devil and his angels. That is the only place He has to put you in. (J. Parker, D. D.)
Christ preparing a place for us
I. WE HAVE NO RIGHT TO HEAVEN BY NATURE (Eph_2:3).
II. NEITHER CAN WE HAVE RIGHT BUT BY CHRIST (Act_4:12).
III. THIS TITLE CHRIST PURCHASED FOR US BY HIS DEATH (Mt Rth_3:9; Rth_3:12; Rth_4:1).
IV. Having purchased it, HE GOES TO TAKE POSSESSION OF IT AND HAVE IT SURRENDERED TO HIM FOR OUR USE. (Heb_6:20).
V. Having taken possession of it in our names, HE PREPARES IT.
1. By getting us actually admitted or entitled to it; pleading (1Jn_2:1)
(1) That our sins are pardoned (Isa_53:5-6).
(2) Our persons justified (2Co_5:21).
(3) Our lusts subdued (Rom_6:14).
2. By preparing us for it, by
(1) Enlightening our minds (Joh_3:8).
(2) Rectifying our wills.
3. Regulating our affections. (Bp. Beveridge.)
Christ gone to prepare a place for us
In the days before the railway showered its sparks upon the darkness of the wilderness, people put out on foot, or in slow cumbrous waggons, from our Eastern homes, and in the wild thickets of the far West sought to clear for their families a home. Ofttimes leaving their tender little ones in the New England village, with blanket, and gun, and axe, they dared the forest, terrible with bears bark, and panthers scream, and the war whoop cry of scalping savages. After awhile the trees were felled, and the underbrush was burned, and the farm was cleared, and the house was built. Then word came back here, saying that everything was ready. The family would get into the waggon and start on at a slow pace for a very long journey. After awhile, some evening tide, the shout of recognition was heard, and by the fire of the great black log the newly-arrived would recount the exciting experiences of the way. Well, my friends, we are all about to become emigrants to a far country. This is no place for us to stay. Our Older Brother, Jesus, Him of the scarred brow and the blistered feet, has gone ahead to build our mansion and to clear the way for us, and He sends a letter back, saying He has it all ready; and I break the seal of that letter and read to you these words: I go to prepare a place for you. I might put it in another shape. A young man resolves to build a home for himself. He has pledged himself in one of the purest of earthly attachments. He toils no more for himself than for the one who will share with him the results of his industrious accumulation. After awhile the fortune is made, the house is built, the right hands are joined, the blessing is invoked, the joy is consummated. So Jesus, the lover of our souls, has been toiling to make a place for us. He is fitting up our mansion. He is gathering around it everything that can possibly enchant the soul, and after awhile he will say: It is all ready now, and He will reach down His hand and take up to His fair residence the Church, which is the Lambs wife. I go to prepare a place for you. (T. De Witt Talmage, D. D.)
Christ gone to prepare a place for us
I was visiting a friend some years ago, who had just built a new house. It was beautiful, useful. He took me upstairs. It had wardrobes, toilet glasses, books, and paintings. It was furnished grandly. And the father turned to me, and said, This room is for our daughter. She is in Europe, she does not know we are arranging it. Her mother and I have fixed up everything we could think of for her. As soon as the house is fully finished, we are going to Europe to bring her back; and we are going to bring her upstairs, and open the door and say, Daughter, this is yours. And I thought of the joy it would give her, and I thought, how kind these parents are! Just then I turned away and thought, That is what Jesus is doing for me. He says He is going away to prepare a place for me: he will come again, and receive me unto Himself. Then I thought, This father and mother are rich: but they have not all treasures, there are a great many things they do not know how to get. But Jesus, who is furnishing my mansion in glory, has everything. He has undertaken to furnish a place for me, and I shall be with Him forever. (C. S.Robinson, D. D.)
Heaven adapted to us by Christ
In the works of God I know nothing more beautiful than the perfect skill with which He suits His creatures to their condition. He gives wings to birds, fins to the fish, sails to the thistle seed, a lamp to light the glowworm, great roots to moor the majestic cedar, and to the aspiring ivy a thousand hands to climb the wall. Nor is the wisdom thus conspicuous in nature less remarkable and adorable as exhibited in the arrangements of the Kingdom of Grace. He forms a holy people for a holy state. He fits heaven for the redeemed, and the redeemed for heaven. (J. Guthrie, D. D.)
Christ preparing heaven for the believer
It was customary for travellers in those old days to send some of their party on in advance to find lodging and make arrangements for them in some great city. Many a time one or other of the disciples had been sent before His face into every place whither He Himself should come. Christ here takes that office on Himself. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
If I go … I will come again and receive you unto Myself
Christs coming and our future fellowship with Him
I. THE DEATH OF A BELIEVER IS CHRISTS COMING. At death their Saviour comes to fetch them away from this strange land; and thus
1. To rescue them from its numerous snares.
2. To deliver them from its multiplied sorrows. These are often owing
(1) To the conduct of its inhabitants. By far the greater part live in open rebellion against God.
(2) To the influence of worldly things on the mind.
(3) To the strength of sin that dwelleth in us.
(4) The temptations of Satan.
3. And He will thus show
(1) The strength of His affection.
(2) The tenderness of His sympathy.
II. HOW TO REGARD THE FUTURE BLESSEDNESS OF THOSE WHO BELIEVE IN JESUS. It is for them to be with Christ. (Joh_17:24). In that blessed land will the Saviour have all His followers dwell, because
1. They are united to Him (Heb_2:14-15).
2. They bear His image. They now seek and pray to resemble Him.
(1) In humility and meekness.
(2) In purity of heart and life.
(3) In uprightness and sincerity.
3. They delight in fellowship with Him. And as they are formed to this heavenly temper, now so in glory they will be received to this unspeakable felicity. They will there enjoy it
(1) Without suspicion. How often, through the strength of unbelief, does this find an entrance into the pious mind!
(2) Without interruption. Here it is indeed enjoyed, but how transient the season of enjoyment.
(3) Without end. There bliss will be no longer measured, as here, by days, or months, or years.
4. They may then be made perfect
(1) As a body. The Church is the body of Christ. It is a whole body, and not one of its members will be lost or overlooked in the great assembly of the whole.
(2) As a family. (J. Dorrington.)
Jesus comes
He drew very near, solemnly uttered a youthful believer within a few hours of death. Who drew near? anxiously inquired a friend who was present, fearful to hear her pronounce the word death. Jesus, she replied, with an unutterable earnestness of expression. I felt just now as if He stood close beside me. Soon after she was asked by her sister if she would like her to pray with her. She gladly assented. But while she prayed the countenance of the dying one changed, the expression of supplication was succeeded by one of adoring contemplation--it would have been rapture but for its perfect calm. A kind of glow suffused her features, then faded gradually away, and before that prayer was ended she was gone. Her amen to it was her first hallelujah in heaven. Jesus had come again and received her unto Himself. (New Testament Anecdotes.)
Christ will corse again
A minister once entered an almshouse of which an aged couple were the inmates. Beside a little round table sat the husband, and as he was very deaf his visitor shouted in his ear, Well, Wisby, what are you doing? Waiting, sir. For what? For the appearing of my Lord. And what makes you wish for His appearing? Because I expect great things then.
The saints best days to come
A young girl of fifteen, a bright, laughter loving girl, was suddenly cast upon a bed of suffering. Completely paralysed on one side and nearly blind, she heard the family doctor say to her friends, who surrounded her, She has seen her best days, poor child! Oh no, doctor, she exclaimed, my best days are yet to come, when I see the King in His beauty.
Death brings Christ and the soul together
very affecting account is given of the death of Williams of Wern. He had lost his wife some time before, and he and his daughter were dying together in different rooms of the same house. As he said to her one day, We appear to be running, with contending footsteps, to be first at the goal. They spent much time in talking together of death and heaven, and being absent from the body, and present with the Lord. Every morning as soon as he was up found him by the bedside of his daughter. Well, Eliza, how are you this morning? Very weak, father. Ah! said he, we are both on the racecourse. Which of us, do you think, will get to the end first? Oh, I shall, father. Perhaps, he said, it is best that it should be so, for I am more able to bear the blow. But do you long to see the end of the journey? Oh, from my heart! she replied. But why? Because I shall see many of my old friends, and my mother: and above all, I shall see Jesus. Ah well, then, he said, tell them I am coming! Tell them I am coming! She died first. He followed shortly after, in the fifty-ninth year of his age. With Christ--heaven:--A little negro boy, when on his death bed, was visited by a missionary, to whom he spoke of the happiness he felt, and the longing desire he had to be with Jesus. I am going to heaven soon; and then I shall see Jesus, and be with Him forever, said the little fellow. But, rejoined the missionary, if Jesus were to leave heaven, what would you do? I would follow him, replied the boy. But suppose, said the missionary, Jesus went to hell: what would you do then? In an instant, with an intelligent look and a smile on his countenance, he replied, Ah, massa! there is no hell where Jesus is. (S. M. Haughton.)
Christ the supreme attraction of heaven
Have you heard of the poor Chinaman in London? Walking along the streets of the metropolis in the fog and the drizzling rain, he was well-nigh breaking his heart with longing for his native land. One day, however, the sun rose brighter than usual, drove the clouds before him, and lifted the fog. Thereupon the little Chinaman cheered up amazingly. Why, what is the matter with you today? what is the cause of your rejoicing? asked an acquaintance. What is the cause indeed, replied the poor foreigner in broken English, pointing with his finger to the sky. Dont you see there? that is Chinas sun? and with the word he was dancing on the pavement like a delighted schoolboy. Everything else was strange to him--the streets, the inhabitants, the sceneries, and even the stars. The only thing he beheld in England that he had seen at home was the sun; and he felt comforted under the face of the same sun. Thus, when we go to eternity, things will appear very strange--the city with its golden streets, the inhabitants with palms in their hands, the sceneries ever decked in living green. But the same Sun shines there as here, and under its shining we shall feel all fear and tremor depart. The Sun of earth is the Sun of heaven, the Sun of Cardiff is the Sun of the New Jerusalem. (J. Cynddylan Jones, D. D.)
Acquaintances in heaven
When I was a boy, said a minister, I thought of heaven as a great shining city, with vast walls and domes and spires, and with nobody in it except white tenuous angels, who were strangers to me. By and by my little brother died, and I thought of a great city with walls, and domes, and spires, and a flock of cold, unknown angels, and one little fellow that I was acquainted with. He was the only one I knew at that time. Then another brother died, and there were two that I knew. Then my acquaintances began to die, and the flock continually grew; but it was not until I had sent one of my little children to his grandparent--God--that I began to think I had a little in myself. A second went, a third went, a fourth went; and by that time I had so many acquaintances in heaven that I did not see any more walls and domes and spires. I began to think of the residents of the Celestial city; and now there are so many of my acquaintances gone there that it sometimes seems to me that I know more in heaven than I do on earth.
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 15, 16, 17, 18, 20, 21, 26, 27, 28, 30, 31 1. Let not your heart be troubled. Just before…
1. Let not your heart be troubled. Just before him was Gethsemane, the betrayal, the denial, the mock trial, the scourging and the cross; but with these in full view, such are the wonders of his love that he does not think of himself. He does not ask comfort, but he gives it. His heart is full of the sorrow of his disciples over his departure. Believe also in me. They had believed in him, but they were so confused over the prospect of his death and departure, they stumbled. He bids them to believe in him as they believed in God; to trust him even if they did not comprehend; to walk by faith rather than by sight through the darkness of that hour. To understand these words, the confusion, sorrow and despair of his disciples over his death must not be forgotten.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On vv1, 8, 15 Joh_14:1. The discourse begun at Joh_13:31 is here continued.…
EXPLANATORY AND CRITICAL NOTES
Joh_14:1. The discourse begun at Joh_13:31 is here continued. Here our Lord not merely answers fully Peter’s question, “Whither goest Thou?” (Joh_13:36), but speaks much needed words of comfort. Μὴ ταρασσέθω., “Let not your heart be troubled,” etc., should be compared with Ἰησοῦς ἐταράχθη τῷ πνεύματι of Joh_13:21. He was troubled that they might have peace. “From this point onwards, the form of instruction properly so called prevails; Jesus transports Himself in thought to the period when the promised reunion will be realised, and glances from this point of view at the future career of His apostles in the midst of a hostile world to be saved” (Joh_15:1 to Joh_16:15) (Godet). πιστεύετε.—Believe, imperative, like the second πιστεύετε. It was want of faith that caused their despondency. Therefore Jesus says, Look up in confidence to God; remember all that He is. “Believe also in Me.” You know Me: can you not therefore trust Me?
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Joh_14:2. In My Father’s house, etc.—This is a reason for their confidence in God. He is a Father, and the Father’s house is no limited dwelling, but a house of “many mansions,” μοναὶ πολλαί The antitype of the οἶκος τοῦ πατρός μου (Joh_2:16). Comp, also Ezekiel 43; Revelation 21; Mat_25:34. μοναὶ = abiding dwelling-places, or resting-places. Many.—πολλαί, does not denote variety, i.e. conditions of differing degrees of glory, but refers to the number of those dwellings. There will be room for all (Joh_10:16), and therefore for those troubled ones. Does not our Lord refer, perhaps, to the multiplicity of worlds in His universe, throughout space? We might well suppose that He pointed them to the starry sky. No doubt, when supper was ended, they passed from the upper chamber on to the flat roof, and there rested in the falling twilight, ready to go forth to Gethsemane. If it were not so, etc.—If they could not have followed Him He would not have buoyed them up with false hopes. One reason indeed why He told them this was because (ὅτι in best MSS.) I am going to prepare a place, etc.—“Here it is that faith in Jesus comes in as the complement of faith in the Father. He is their πρόδρομος, their forerunner in heaven” (Heb_6:20) (Godet). The interrogative “Would I have told you?” is not admissible, for there is no previous reference to which the clause would point.
Joh_14:3. And if I shall go, etc.—This does not express uncertainty. “The fact that He goes away to realise for them the kingdom of God, i.e. that His going away is for them such a realisation, forms the presupposition (ἐάν, if) of His return to receive His own ‘into His kingdom’ ” (Luthardt). Whether καί, and, be omitted or not, the sense is the same. I am coming again.—Even if this clause does not refer primarily to our Lord’s second coming, it includes a reference to that event. It must evidently be connected with Rev_22:7; Rev_22:12; Rev_22:20; Rev_1:8. He is ever coming until the end—in His resurrection glory, by His Spirit at Pentecost, in judgment on the nations. All these lead up to His final appearing. And shall receive you unto Myself, etc.—Whether in death, as He received His martyred servant (Act_7:56); or those who are alive and remain when He comes to judgment (1Th_4:17).
Joh_14:4. And whither (or where) I go ye know the way.—The meaning is virtually the same as that of the T. R. The “whither” includes the end of the way and the Father’s house.
Joh_14:5-7. These verses include the question of Thomas and the answer of our Lord. “The first conversation occasioned by the question of Peter (Joh_13:36-37) had turned upon the final reunion, the end. The second, called forth by the question of Thomas, turned rather on the ability of Jesus to bring them to the end upon the way” (Godet).
Joh_14:6. In His answer, by substituting the Father for the Father’s house, Jesus sought to make the end of the way more clear. Heaven is the divine presence. I am the way, the truth, and the life.—The end of their hopes and aspirations being the Father, it would be at once evident that Jesus must be the way. As the incarnate Word He is the uniting bond between men and God. Through Him and in His mediatorial office we have access to the Father. And this men attain by accepting His truth and Him as the truth—by coming to Him for spiritual life, and participating in that life by union and communion with Him. No man cometh, etc.—“He brings to the goal, and He alone, because He and He alone is and bears in Himself the essential revelation of God, and the blessing of the essential divine fellowship” (Luthardt).
Joh_14:7. If ye had known Me, etc.—By most expositors the emphasis is placed on known; but there seems to be some justification for the reading ἐγνώκατε ἐμέ, with א, D, i.e. “If ye have known Me, ye shall know My Father also.” Comp. with Joh_14:9, where the emphasis is certainly on I and Me. ἀπʼ ἄρτι, from henceforth.—Now and henceforth they would more fully know and understand Him. Their true knowledge of Him would now begin, and never again be entirely obliterated. From that night’s communications and proceedings they would begin to understand the true relation in which He stood to the Father.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Joh_14:1-3
The reality and assurance of the heavenly state.—These words of Jesus before He went forth to Gethsemane and the cross contained those promises which divine Wisdom saw to be suited to the case of the disciples. They were soon to go out into the world to proclaim their message. Tribulation awaited them—trial, persecution, unjust treatment from Jew and Gentile. A believer’s foes would sometimes be those of his own household. And even though this were not so, they had to wander from land to land among alien peoples and unfamiliar scenes. All this militated against the majority of them possessing settled homes on earth, or any permanent dwelling-place. Therefore this sweet and tender promise was given to them. They had here no abiding city; but having this promise, they confidently looked for one to come. This promise holds good for all God’s people. When they cast off the shackles of mortality and pass into new and higher spheres of being, it is not to wander aimlessly through the vastnesses of eternity; it is to pass to the welcome of a Father’s house, where abiding dwelling-places are provided for them.
I. Notice the ground on which Jesus rests the reality and assurance of the heavenly state.—It is on the fact of His own personality as the truth. “If it were not so,” etc. He could present no stronger argument to the mind of His disciples. It is as if He had said: You know Me; the course of My life is before you, etc. Surely you must be persuaded I would never have spoken thus, would not fill your minds with delusive hopes, if these things were not so? This argument would be of the strongest to the disciples. For nigh three years they had followed Jesus, had seen His wonderful life as He went about doing good, and His wonderful works. They had heard His words of wisdom, had seen the stainless beauty of His character, had felt the strength of His love. Therefore His “If it were not so,” etc., would come to them with the force of a demonstration. Should such considerations have less weight with us? We have friends whose characters are so genuine that we say, Their word is as good as their bond. They would not, even to please us, utter what they know to be untrue, etc. And who that has studied the character of Jesus could think otherwise of Him? And especially will this be the case with those who know the power of Christ’s gospel in their hearts and lives, and have the joy of His fellowship in their souls. Such rest on this blessed promise in implicit confidence, etc.
II. Think what this promise implies.—We may draw from a consideration of the ideas the conception calls up to our minds those lessons of comfort, hope, etc., the Redeemer intended to convey. Of course human language and imagery can only at best dimly shadow forth heavenly things; in fact, they can only be understood in the measure in which we are prepared to understand them. So all the conceptions of the heavenly state in Scripture only faintly adumbrate the reality. Scripture itself declares this to be so (1Co_2:9). Thus the heavenly world is set before us in a variety of aspects. It is a country, state, city, garden, paradise, etc. Here it is the Father’s house. But the reality will be far beyond our highest conceptions. But just as an astronomer may reason analogously from what he knows of the starry orbs as to the infinite glory of the universe, so we, from the analogy of the ideas given in Scripture, may reason as to the glory of the heavenly world. Jesus, as we have said, seems to have chosen this conception as suited to the circumstances of the disciples. But, in speaking of heaven as the Father’s house, He did not leave them under the impression that it is a limited, etc., dwelling. It is a house of many mansions. The idea is that the family will be numerous and always resident (μονά, monç =abiding or tarrying; hence μοναί, monai = residences). The idea of a father’s house is one of the most pleasant that can occur to the mind. In after-life the heart turns fondly toward it. With few exceptions it is the happiest spot on earth. It is generally in the home-circle that we find humanity at its best. None are to be pitied so much as those who are alone on earth, who have no centre round which the affections may turn, no spot where, under the influences of love, trust, helpfulness, their whole being may grow healthily and joyfully. How many a life has been soured through isolation and loneliness! But the happy denizens of the Father’s house above are blessed in the sweetest communion, the noblest employ, etc.
III. Think, then, of a few of the characteristic features of the homes of earth, and see how they typify the house of many mansions.—
1. A true father’s house on earth is a place of safety. The children feel and are safe, so far as can be here, under the roof-tree of home. They are there shielded from danger as lambs in the fold. It is when the child goes forth into the far country that health, strength, energy, so carefully nurtured before, are in danger of being lost, squandered, etc., leaving the life bare. So in the Father’s house above, the family are eternally safe (Joh_10:28-29). The father’s house here is a place where everything needful, so far as possible, is provided for the children. It is in the far country that they meet with bitter want, etc. And in the heavenly dwelling-place “they hunger no more,” etc. (Rev_7:16-17).
2. The true home on earth is a place of rest and peace. Thither the weary labourer directs his steps at close of day: a welcome awaits him—he gains fresh strength for future toil. So, too, the toiler wearied with labour in the fields of time finds a place of welcome rest. It is no wayside inn, no temporary abode; but a house of many abiding dwellings. There the voyager rests from struggle with adverse gales; the Christian soldier rests from conflict with sin and every spiritual foe.
3. Again, every true father’s house on earth is a place of love and joy. It is not the place merely that is dear. It is because there dwell those whom we love. Love binds the members of the family in one. Selfishness is excluded. The members of the family are glad in each other’s joy. A spirit of mutual charity and sympathy binds them together in common aims. No other spot on earth where love gains greater triumphs, where it shows more prominently its power. There it beareth all things, etc. (1 Corinthians 13). And where love reigns there is purest joy. Need it be said that this is true, only in infinitely higher degree, of the heavenly house of many mansions? It is the abode of love, etc. There “love never faileth”; and thus there is endless joy. And one chief element of this joy will be the union of the saints with the heavenly Father in our great elder brother Jesus Christ. “I will come again, and receive you unto Myself,” etc. (Joh_14:3). These are some of the characteristic features of the house of many mansions. But, after all has been said and can be said, how feeble and dim are our conceptions of its eternal glory! And how should such hopes and promises quicken us to live as children of the light and of the day!
Joh_14:3. Reunion of saints in heaven. In the Father’s house the Father’s children in Christ shall know as they are known.—It is a question of deep interest that confronts us when it is asked, “How are the dead raised, and with what body do they come?” And the apostle has answered that question for us with great fulness (1 Corinthians 15). But there is another question also of great interest connected with this subject, the answer to which we are left to infer. It is, Shall we know our friends and brethren in Christ on that happy shore on which they and all His shall dwell in eternal peace, when the resurrection dawn shall bring the consummation of their redemption, and body and soul shall be reunited in perfect purity? The spirit longs to know this, and seeks to rise to hope, and trust,
“With faith that comes of self-control,
The truths that never can be proved
Until we close with all we loved,
And all we flow from, soul in soul.”
Tennyson.
There are two considerations which might be mentioned as warranting Christians to entertain an assured hope that it shall be so.
I. Christ is there, and we shall know Him.—
1. This is, indeed, the chief element of the believer’s gladness in prospect of the life beyond. Our Lord Himself held out this prospect to the disciples as calculated to inspire their hearts with peace and joy: “In My Father’s house are many mansions,” etc. (Joh_14:2-3). It is therefore no unknown land, no land of strangers, into which believers shall enter to possess their inheritance, but a Father’s house of many abiding dwelling-places, fitted for His people.
2. And the Elder Brother, in whom all are united in one family, shall be there to receive all His own. Even now He knows His sheep and is known of them. Shall it be less so then? Nay, the close union in love of Christ and His people will then become complete and perfect. This is, indeed, one of the chief elements of eternal blessedness.
II. Our life beyond shall not be less but more perfect.—
1. “Now we see in a glass, obscurely; but then face to face,” etc. (1Co_13:12). And we know that when the manifestation of the Invisible takes place “we shall be like Him,” etc. (1Jn_3:2). Christ’s people shall be made perfect in Him and in the Father.
2. Now perfection cannot mean loss of personality. If our individuality were destroyed, it would not be we who were perfected; for it is the I, the personality, which distinguishes every man as a separate, sentient, intelligent existence. Nay, we should look for the perfection of our personality rather than its extinction.
3. Thus clearer knowledge will mark the perfected man. “We shall know as we are known.” The dim obscurity of our present state will merge in perfect day. No longer will reason be thwarted by passion, or judgment warped by prejudice. Things shall be seen and known as they are, and not simply as what they appear to be. Then all shams shall be revealed, all hypocrisies unmasked.
4. And if with all the powers and faculties of mind the redeemed are to become Christlike, then memory, on which personality so much depends, will also be perfected. Christ remembers His own—His people remember His atoning work; and one chief theme of their praises will be the fact that He hath “redeemed them with His blood.” And so too we may believe they will remember their fellow-pilgrims in time and “know them when they meet.”
5. And if memory be perfected, it will thus be purified. When we stand close to some great structure of antiquity, we are conscious more of the marks that time and stress have left upon it than of its beauty as a whole—its fair proportions, its exquisite symmetry. But when we remove to a distance these appear, and the flaws and marks of time and the destroyer’s hand are lost and forgotten. So as we look back on and summon up in memory the images of our Christian friends departed, the flaws and disfigurements incident to our imperfect stale are for the most part forgotten, and only the fair proportions of their general Christian character remain. All the rest was adventitious; this is permanent. And in some such fashion the memory of the redeemed will be purged in their intercourse in the heavenly state from what is impermanent and perishable.
6. And as they are all united in Christ in love and knowledge, so will they be united one with another; and whilst the sphere of communion will be infinitely extended, still those who loved and laboured here as fellow-citizens of the saints will not, we may believe, love and labour unknown to each other in that higher sphere and more perfect service.
7. And the chief end, therefore, is to seek for that abiding unity in Christ with all our friends and loved ones that shall endure all the shocks of time and death and judgment, that shall exist and persist through all the ages of eternity. It has been truly said that if it were to be thought possible that we should not know and consequently never love our friends in Christ after this life, we should simply “number them with temporal things, and love them as such” (Baxter). A better hope remains. The redeemed whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life, whose names He will “confess before His Father and before His angels,” shall, knowing Him, know each other, and in unity rejoice eternally.
III. In these considerations there may be found comfort and hope. But there is also warning. This is our probation-sphere. It is here we become fitted or unfitted for the future life of glory. The spiritual life to come is but a continuation and consummation of the spiritual life begun here. For the foundation on which the spiritual life rests here and hereafter is One—Jesus Christ. Unity with Him and in Him is its condition; and its chief manifestation here as hereafter is charity, i.e. love: not only love of Christ, but in Him love of His people. “God is love; and he that abideth in love abideth in God, and God in Him.” And the opposite of love is hatred, unrighteousness, sin. Turn and flee then from that which must perish, and cling to that which alone is enduring. Enter into living union through faith with Him who is the “resurrection and the life,” to whom the Father hath given to have life in Himself, and then rejoice in the assured hope and promise of life eternal.[5]
[5] ILLUSTRATIONS
Not many lives, but only one, have we—Frail, fleeting man!
How scared should that one life ever be—That narrow span!
Day after day filled up with blessed toil,
Hour after hour still bringing in new spoil!
Dr. H. Bonar.
Think of “living”! Thy life, wert thou the “pitifullest of all the sons of earth,” is no idle dream, but a solemn reality. It is thy own; is all thou hast to front eternity with.—Carlyle.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH. Joh_14:6
Jesus, the way, the truth, the life.—Think of the meaning of this claim advanced by our Lord. It is a unique, a divine claim. No merely human leader or teacher ever made a similar claim—not even a Buddha or a Mohammed. They said, We shall instruct you, teach what we think truth, etc. Jesus goes beyond them and says, “I am the way,” etc. Such an utterance seems quite natural when viewed against the background of the life of Christ, so full of heavenly teaching and mighty works. Then think of the joy and peace, etc., He has brought to millions. We all indeed may have personal experience of the truth of this word. The reply to Thomas was not in the order of His question, “Lord, we know not,” etc. The answer means: Surely if ye know Me that is enough. He who comes through Me will attain the true end of the way. The end of spiritual life, the true end of its way, is its begining—God Himself. The stream returns to the ocean whence it was drawn. The spirit attains to union with God, from whom its life is derived. “He that hath seen Me,” etc. He is the mediator, the junction between the two points, the commencement and the end, the Alpha and Omega. Therefore He is absolutely the way.
I. Christ is the way through His incarnation.—There is a general tendency in the theology of the present time to lay great stress on the humanity, the human nature, of our Lord. Now that He was truly human is a precious truth never to be lost sight of. It is this fact that enables Him to say to us men, “I am the way,” for the way must necessarily begin with us, with human nature. But there is along with this tendency also a tendency to neglect, or minimise at least, the truth of the Saviour’s divinity. But the Saviour’s divinity is the corollary of His perfect humanity. And it is in His divine nature that He becomes the end of the way, as by the human He is its beginning. He leads from sin to God, from earth to heaven, because He is Emmanuel—God with us.
II. Not through nature and moral law alone can men come to God.—But say many, It is not so. Christ may be one of many ways to God, but He is not the only one. By the way of nature, of moral law, of moral being, we can come to the Father. But can we, e.g., come to the Father by the works of nature—“rise through nature up to nature’s God”? Truly in the works of nature there is the evidence of a wisdom and power which point to an Almighty Framer. We look out on the universe with its mighty forces, its unerring laws, all working together to produce harmony and order. The wonders of life in all its aspects, beauty of form, radiancy of colour, etc., speak of an intelligent mind informing all, and attuned to order and harmony. Then the workings of what we call providence for the preservation and continuance of the races of living things speak of goodness and benevolence in the presiding power. But they tell little of anything more to men unenlightened by revelation. For all they know from nature and nature’s laws man may be no more to the Deity than the ephemeræ that flutter their little day in the sunshine and then pass. When we realise our own littleness and insignificance in view of the grandeur surrounding us on earth, etc., and in the vast and apparently limitless void of space strewn with its stars and star-systems, then say we, “What is man,” etc. (Psalms 8). Besides, there is in nature something that appears, on a superficial view, even to contradict those conceptions of benevolence, etc., which providence seems to establish. There is disorder in nature—the mystery of pain and evil—facts which, if viewed apart, lead to Buddha’s idea of life as a curse and not a blessing. No, not through nature alone is there any true way to God, not in this way can we rise to the knowledge of the divine, loving Father. Nature’s stern laws tell of Almighty power. Even the workings of providence, and the benevolence inspiring them, are hidden sometimes behind what seems to contradict them. Hence those who seek to come in this way to God approach in fear, seeking to propitiate—not in faith, to a loving Father. Nature-religions, as history shows, have led men away from God. For they have come to “worship and serve the creature,” etc. (Rom_1:25).
III. Men cannot come to God even through their higher nature.—Others will say all this is true. But there is within man himself a witness of the Deity. Not by nature alone can we come to God. But the moral nature—conscience—is the record of the divine presence in man. When it speaks God speaks. Walking according to its dictates, we can come to God. The divine law is written on our moral nature; in listening to the voice of conscience, following the way of duty, the way to God lies before us. True in a measure. There is a great and precious truth here; but it is not all the truth. Were there no sin in the world, it would perhaps be the whole truth regarding man’s relation to God. But do men always obey the divine law, always listen to the voice of conscience, even the best of men? Are not traces of the divine law often obliterated, so that evil may become a man’s good, lying supplant truth, wrong usurp the place of right? Does not conscience oft become dulled, benumbed? Is not its voice often stifled or its pronouncement disregarded? Nay, does not the law only reveal our distance from God and our inability to commend ourselves to Him and come to Him by this way? “By the law is the knowledge of sin.” It reveals to us the holy and righteous God; but across its face is written, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” It tells of the righteous Judge, of the divine Lawgiver, who is jealous for His broken law, who will vindicate it and “make it honourable.” Men are not led by this way to the refuge of a heavenly Father’s love and care.
IV. Jesus alone is the way to God.—A way is a road connecting two distant points. Jesus claims to be the bond of union between man and God, the highway uniting earth and heaven. Men were alienated from God, spiritually dead. Christ came to bring love, light, life, to men. Those who receive in Him these blessings have attained the end of their being. They become Christlike, one with Him in the Father. Through the Way they have attained to the end. The way is therefore the means by which men “attain to the truth which is light, and the life which is love.” Thus Jesus can say absolutely, “I am the way.” And He is so because He is the truth and the life. As Augustine says, He is via vera vitœ. When we have laid hold of the truth, when we have Christ’s life in us, then truly we have come to the Father. Jesus is the truth. The test of a true, a right way is this, that it leads to the desired end. Now what men need is that they shall attain to harmony in their own being, and with that divine Being on whom they depend. In Christ Jesus, and in no other way, can and do they attain to this. In Him they realise and are saved from their sinfulness; they become possessed of a new spirit, through which they attain the mastery over their lower nature, so that the higher being becomes dominant. So, too, by His gospel they learn that the broken divine law has been vindicated, so that in Him God is seen to be just and the justifier, etc. (Rom_3:26). Finally, through union and communion with Jesus they become one with the Father in Him
(17). Thus Christ is the true way to the Father, the way of reconciliation, pardon, peace (Eph_2:11-22).
V. But how is Jesus as the truth to be received and appropriated?—Our Lord does not leave us in doubt. “I am the life,” He says. It is through His power, His spiritual life implanted and working within us, that we must attain to the end of the way. We must become actually and spiritually united to Him
(15), and drawing from that source of all life we shall be aided to endure, to overcome the evil within and without, and thus to advance onward and upward. “In Him was life,” etc. (Joh_1:4). In Him alone is light, i.e. truth; and in Him also is life, i.e. power. Christ then alone is the way, because He is the truth and the life. And in Him those means of grace, which could not in themselves aid us to advance one step in the heavenly life, become channels through which that heavenly life is ever renewed and strengthened within us. In Him also the law, the quickened conscience, and even the tokens of God’s power in nature, etc., act as aids and incentives to progress on the way of life. For there must be progress—a way implies this idea. It is one of the conditions of ultimate attainment. True, at once when men believe they come through Christ to the Father. But our present attainment is only an earnest of fuller joy. As spiritual children we know but little of His glory, power, wisdom, etc. But as we advance in the knowledge of Christ the spiritual vision becomes more clear (2Co_4:6), until at last “we shall know as we are known.” The way begins in the darkness of our state by nature. Christ rises on our souls (Mal_4:2); our spiritual morning dawns; and even here in seasons of spiritual communion we catch glimpses of the glory that shall be revealed in us, when, in God’s eternal presence, the way shall have been traversed and the pilgrimage ended.
ILLUSTRATIONS
Joh_14:1. The heavenly home.—“Where does God live?” asks the little child; “Oh that I knew where I might find Him!” cries the earnest man. We are all seeking Thy dwelling-place, Thou King of kings. We have not yet found a palace large enough to contain Thee. Some have sought Thee in the water, some in the air, some in the fire, because the water and the air and the fire are to us boundless things. Yet it is not in the boundless that Thou desirest to be found; it is in the limited, the broken, the contrite. The heaven of heavens cannot contain Thee, but the broken and contrite heart can; it is there Thou delightest most to dwell. Thy brightest glory is not in the stars, but in the struggles of a conquering soul. Thy temple is the heart of Him whom men have called the Man of Sorrows. Thy fulness dwells in His emptiness, Thy wealth in His poverty, Thy strength in His weakness, Thy joy in His sorrow, Thy crown in His cross. Within that temple meet harmoniously the things which to the world are discords—perfection and suffering, peace and warfare, love and storm; the lion and the lamb lie down together. There would I seek Thee, O my God. Within these sacred precincts, where all things are gathered into one, where middle walls of partition are broken down, where jarring chords are blended in one symphony of praise, there would I seek and find Thee. Under the shadow of that cross, where death meets life and earth is touched by heaven, my finite soul would lose its finitude and be one with Thee; my night would vanish in Thy day, my sorrow would melt in Thy joy, my meanness would merge in Thy majesty, my sin would be lost in Thy holiness. The veil which hides me from Thee is the shadow of my own will; when the veil of the temple shall be rent in twain I shall see the place where Thy glory dwelleth—Dr. Geo. Matheson.
Joh_14:2. The Father’s house.—Home—an endearing name for the heavenly state.
This fond attachment to the well-known place
Whence first we started into life’s long race,
Maintains its hold with such unfailing sway,
We feel it e’en in age, and at our latest day.
Cowper.
There is a land of every land the pride,
Beloved by heaven o’er all the world beside;
There is a spot of earth supremely blest,
A dearer, sweeter spot than all the rest,
Where man, creation’s tyrant, casts aside
His sword and sceptre, pageantry and pride,
While in his softened looks benignly blend
The sire, the son, the husband, brother, friend:
Here woman reigns; the mother, daughter, wife,
Strews with fresh flowers the narrow way of life;
In the clear heaven of her delightful eye
An angel-guard of loves and graces lie;
Around her knees domestic duties meet,
And fireside pleasures gambol at her feet.
“Where shall that land, that spot of earth be found?”
Art thou a man? a patriot?—look around;
Oh, thou shalt find, howe’er thy footsteps roam,
That land thy country, and that spot thy home.—Montgomery, “West Indies.”
Joh_14:2. For pilgrims there is promise of a home beyond.—It has often been so ordered that earth’s greatest have “dwelt apart.” A life of toil and danger or isolation has been mapped out for them. But was it not, perhaps, that through their enduring faith and high example others than themselves might be lured to live for the better home? Take, for example, one of our greatest modern heroes—Crusader and Bayard in one—as he stood alone, surrounded by strangers and traitors, in that far-off city on the Nile whence he went home. Think of exiled Dante in mediæval times, a lonely wanderer, learning in his exile, desolation, and bitter experience to sing more sweetly of the soul’s true home. Or think of Paul the apostle. With his warm affections and deep sympathetic nature he must have often deeply felt his loneliness. Does not a glimpse of this feeling meet us in the words, “If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable”? But to those, and to all who have been spiritually “strangers and pilgrims” here, this higher hope has been given. They were not in reality either desolate or forsaken. They claimed affinity and kinship with a great family, and to them, in view of the unseen and eternal realities, the passing vanities and troubles of time shrank into nothing. They knew also that whatever is most precious here, and most worthy of our regard, would not be lost hereafter. Pure love and friendship, wisdom and knowledge, holiness and truth, all that bear the marks of heaven, are like it—eternal.
Joh_14:2. Premonitions of the heavenly home.—Man, even here in the midst of his life obscure and dim, sees the mountain tops of the future world touched with the golden rays of a sun that never rises here. So the dweller in the polar circle, in the long night of the Arctic winter, when no sun rises, yet sees, at what should be midday, a golden aurora glimmering on the highest summits, and dreams of the long summer days when the sun shines and does not set.—Jean Paul Richter.
And oft I wish amidst the scene to find
Some spot to real happiness consigned,
Where my worn soul, each wandering hope at rest,
May gather bliss to see my fellows blest.
Goldsmith, “The Traveller.”
Joh_14:3. Heaven is blessedness, for Christ is there.
How know I that it looms lovely that land I have never seen,
With morning-glories and heartsease and unexampled green,
With neither heat nor cold in the balm-redolent air?
Some of this, not all, I know; but this is so:
Christ is there.
How know I blessedness befalls who dwell in Paradise,
The outwearied hearts refreshing, rekindling the worn-out eyes;
All souls singing, seeing, rejoicing everywhere?
Nay, much more than this I know; for this is so:
Christ is there.
O Lord Christ whom having not seen I love and desire to love,
O Lord Christ who lookest on me uncomely yet still Thy dove,
Take me to Thee in Paradise, Thine own made fair;
For whatever else I know, this thing is so:
Thou art there.
British Weekly, Aug. 31, 1893.
Joh_14:3. Shall we know our friends in heaven?—One after another they fall by our side, till at last a shadow is cast over every good-night and good-bye, and life comes to be a journey into the wilderness, there to die alone. Yet we do not cease to love them and desire them. Long lost, they are longer dear; and the question we put is, “Is the love of the Lamb so jealous and so strong as to absorb and consume all meaner passions, leaving no room for any but the one affection?” The answer is to be discovered by putting another question: “Do we find that our love for Christ weakens our love for those who share with His supreme affection?” Is it true that all who love one another before they were in Christ, love one another less when they pass from darkness into light? Is it not emphatically the contrary? Are not all other loves hallowed, ennobled, and eternised by this other affection? The love of Christ includes our love for all those who are in Christ. It intensifies and perpetuates the earthly affection, and any heavenly love that does otherwise is diseased and perverted.
“He who being bold
For life to come is false to the past sweet
Of mortal life, hath killed the world above.
For why to live again, if not to meet?
And why to meet, if not to meet in love?
And why in love if not in that dear love of old?”
W. Robertson Nicoll.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain On v1 John 14-16. Now that the Passover meal has been…
CHAPTER 23
THE VALEDICTORY SERMON
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John 14-16. Now that the Passover meal has been enjoyed, and that celebrated Mosaic institution totally eclipsed by bloody Calvary, normally verified and abolished forever, and the Eucharist instituted, our Lord proceeds to preach His Valedictory Sermon to the Eleven, poor Judas no longer in his place. As this is our Savior’s Farewell, our appreciation is certainly intensified to the very utmost. “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me.” They are all flooded with trouble over what Jesus has told them about immediately going away from them, thus upsetting their sanguine anticipations of His eternal perpetuity with them, as they believe Christ will abide forever (Dan 7:14), applying the prophecies appertaining to the second coming to the first, really thinking the Messiah would come but once.
“In the house of My Father are many mansions.” The Father’s house includes the vast celestial universe. Astronomy has revealed one hundred and seventeen millions of suns. Our sun is attended by ten great worlds, most of them much larger than this. Hence, you see, the conclusion follows that one billion one hundred and seventy millions of worlds have proximately been reached by telescopic observation. So rest assured there are many mansions. Our earth, originally one of those mansions, but much out of kelter by reason of Satanic invasion, is even now being refitted, and will erelong be restored, shine with a luster eclipsing Eden, and become one of those bright celestial mansions, occupied by saints and angels to shine and shout forever.
“But if not, I would have told you; because I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto Myself, that where I am, there you may be also.” O blessed thought, to abide with Jesus forever! “And whither I go, ye know the way.” He is now introducing a beautiful and glorious truth, which solves the problem, over which they were so much troubled, as to His departure and the possibility of following Him. “Thomas says to Him, Lord, we know not whither Thou goest, and how do we know the way?” Thomas was the chronic doubter, always taking the dark side of every picture; slow, but sure; the very opposite of Peter. Both of them, however, were all right after the fires of Pentecost consumed the doubts of the one and the cowardice of the other.
“Jesus says to him, I am the way, the truth, and the life.” O what a comprehensive affirmation! If you want to know the way to heaven, just take Jesus for your Paragon. He had no sin, and He says that we shall be like Him. Therefore get Him to take all your sin away, so you can live and die like Him, and you are all right. You want the truth, and can not be saved without it. You have nothing to do but to take Jesus Himself, the blessed Bible being your constant companion. Do not trouble yourself with creeds, nor human dogmatism of any kind, looking to mortal guides. You are going to an immortal heaven. None but the Immortal Jesus can lead you. You want life eternal. Jesus Himself is that Life. If you have Him in your heart, you already have the Life which can never die.
“No one cometh to the Father but through Me. If you have known Me, you shall know My Father also; and henceforth you know Him and have seen Him. Philip says to Him, Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us.”
St. Paul’s Church in London, occupying a whole square, is the largest in the Protestant world. When Dr. Fisk was preaching in it, endeavoring to tell his audience about their Heavenly Father, his eye, dropping on a superscription in large letters in the rear of the orchestra, read these words:
“Christopher Wren, architect, of this city and church, who lived more than ninety years, not for himself, but for the public. Reader, would you see his monument? Look around.” Then, proceeding, he said to his audience:
“Would you see the monument of your Heavenly Father? Just look around upon the glittering stars, the blazing sun, the queenly moon, moving amid the dazzling constellations; the verdant earth, with her majestic mountains, mighty oceans, and thundering seas, — and you see His monument.”
“Jesus says to him, Am I with you so long a time, Philip, and you do not know Me? The one having seen Me, has seen the Father; how do you say, Show us the Father? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words which I speak unto you, I speak not of Myself; but the Father abiding in Me doeth His works. Believe Me that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me; and if not, believe Me on account of the works themselves. Truly, truly, I say unto you, He that believeth in Me, the works which I do, he shall do also; and greater works than these; because I go to My Father. And whatsoever you may ask in My name, this I will do, in order that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you may ask anything in My name, I will do it.” This prophecy was signally verified during the great Pentecostal revivals, when three thousand were converted in a day, and eight thousand within three days; when all Jerusalem was moved as never during the ministry of Jesus. Signal verifications of this prophecy mark the roll of ages down to the present day. Francis Xavier reports ten thousand converted in a day under his own ministry. Great multitudes pursued Jesus in His peregrinations, actuated by a diversity of motives — e. g., curiosity, criticism, and the loaves and fishes; while a few actually yielded to His interior spirit, gladly forsaking all for Him. You remember how that wonderful sermon, going down to the deep things of God, expounding bottom-rock sanctification, which He preached in the synagogue in Capernaum about the close of His second year, alienated a great host of His disciples, so that it seemed that He would almost be left alone?
“If you love Me with Divine love, keep My commandments.” This is the grand confirmation of discipleship — interior love, imparted in regeneration and perfected in sanctification, with a life of exemplary obedience to all of His commandments, constitute the sine qua non of New Testament Christianity.
“I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you forever.” Parakletos, “Comforter,” is from para, “by your side,” and kaleo, “to call.” Hence it means one called by your side. O how blessed the reality to have the Omnipotent Comforter called down from heaven to walk by your side whithersoever you go! “The Spirit of truth,” because He is the Revelator of all truth, and as He alone understands it; consequently the Exponent of all truth. “Whom the world is not able to receive.” Consequently you must get out of the world before you can receive the Holy Comforter. Hence you see that the Zinzendorfian heresy, teaching that we get sanctified — i. e., receive the Holy Ghost as an indwelling Comforter — in conversion, flatly contradicts the Savior, who says the world can not receive Him. Ekklesia, “Church,” means “the called out;” i. e., those who have heard the call of the Holy Ghost and come out of the world, identifying themselves with God, constitute the Church. Hence the Comforter is given to the Church, and not to the world; i. e., sanctification is for Christians, and not for sinners. “Because it does not see Him, nor know Him.” Here you see that Jesus certifies that the unregenerate are utterly blind to the very existence of the Holy Ghost. “You know Him, because He abideth with you, and shall be in you.” Here you see plainly specified the difference between the regenerated and the sanctified, the Holy Ghost abiding with the former as an Illuminator, Teacher, Guide, and Protector; while in the case of the sanctified, He is actually dwelling in them, having taken up His abode in the heart, there to abide a blessed, Heavenly Guest, filling the soul with perennial sunshine, your life with constant victory, and your mind with glorious anticipations of the heavenly triumph the moment your work for Jesus is done. You see these facts illustrated in the case of the apostles, the Holy Ghost being with them from their conversion; but moving in and filling them in their Pentecostal experience, forever afterward dwelling in them, qualifying them all to enjoy a perpetual victory over the world, the flesh, and the devil, and go up to heaven wearing a martyr’s crown.
“I will not leave you orphans: I come to you. Yet a little while, the world sees Me no more; but you see Me: because I live, you shall live also.” He returned to them after His resurrection, putting an end to their bereavement; also, in the person of the Holy Ghost, coming on the day of Pentecost to abide with them. “In that day you shall know that I am in the Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” In the day of their Pentecostal experience the blessed witness of the Spirit revealed to them the Father and the Son, inundating them with the full assurance of their personal salvation.
“The one having My commandments, and keeping them, he is the one loving Me with Divine love; he that loveth Me with Divine love shall be loved of My Father, and I will love him, and manifest Myself to him.” You see, the great problem of salvation is solved in the Divine agape, which the Holy Ghost alone can pour into your heart, and which is made perfect in the full sanctification, eliminating all antagonism, and giving it the undisputed dominion of soul, mind, and body.
“Judas, not Iscariot, says to Him, Lord, what was it that You are about to manifest Yourself unto us, and not unto the world?” You will find in the apostolical catalogue by Matthew, Mark, and Luke, an apostle by the name of Judas, who was also called Lebbeus and Thaddeus. This apostle is the author of the Epistle of Jude, his name being changed from Judas to Jude in order to clearly distinguish him from Judas Iscariot. You observe, also, that the brothers of our Lord were James, Judas, Simon, and Joses. It is claimed that James and Judas became apostles about the time of our Lord’s resurrection.
“Jesus responded, and said to him, If any one loves Me with Divine love, he will keep My words; and the Father will love him, and We will come to him, and make Our abode with him.” Our Savior gives a very plain specification here — the person loving Him with Divine love will keep His commandments, and the Father and the Son will make their abode with him, the Holy Spirit revealing to him the blessed, loving Father and the precious, Omnipotent Savior, the permanent, abiding Guests of his home, however humble it may be. With this description before you, you can not fail to identify the disciple of our Lord wherever you may see him.
“And he that loveth Me, keepeth My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine, but that of the Father who sent Me.” The specifications here are plain and unmistakable. Human love has no place in it. It is the holy agape, the very essence of God (1 John 4), which nothing but the Holy Ghost can impart, and which invariably verifies itself by a life of holy obedience.
“I have spoken these things unto you, abiding with you; but the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and remind you of all things which I spoke to you.” O how infinitely precious the illumination of the indwelling Comforter, lighting up the intellect, quickening the apprehension, vivifying the diagnosis, invigorating the memory, pouring light on the blessed words of Jesus, and sending heavenly irradiations to interpenetrate every fiber of mind, soul, and spirit, thus making the precious words of Jesus a perpetual banquet to the appreciative heart!
“My peace I leave with you, My peace I give unto you; not as the world gives, give I to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.” This is an affectionate adieu He bids them, as the mob is already astir and everything in commotion, getting ready to come and lay violent hands on Him, to take His life.
“You heard that I said to you, I go, and I come to you. If you love Me, you would rejoice because I go to the Father; because the Father is greater than I.” Love always rejoices in the Divine administration, being in perfect harmony with it. You have frequently seen the identity of the Father and the Son certified, as even in this chapter. Then, how is the Father greater than the Son if they are identical, and of course equal? He is greater in position, being in heaven at that time, and the Son down on the earth, His enemies gritting their teeth with rage and thirsting for His blood.
“Now I have told you before it takes place, in order that when it may occur, you may believe.” Of course. His prophecy in reference to the treason of Judas, the denial of Peter, His own arrest, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension, would prove to them an overwhelming confirmation of His Divinity after they had seen it all fulfilled, and thus become a mighty inspiration to their faith.
“I will no longer speak many things with you; for the ruler of this world cometh, and He hath nothing in Me.” That is a positive proof of our Lord’s perfectly pure humanity, as Satan really had nothing in Him. This is the standard of New Testament Christianity which all who go to heaven must reach, as Jesus says that we are to be like Him. There is but one way for us to be like Him, and that is for us to consecrate ourselves fully to Jesus, and trust Him to take everything out of us which Satan ever puts in us; and in what case we will be like Him. You also here see that Jesus pronounces Satan the “ruler of this world.” O how we see the Satanic administration in all the affairs of this world, even in the State, and so largely in the Church, multitudes of people in all countries actually worshipping Satan, believing him to be God!
“But in order that the world may know that I love the Father with Divine love, and as the Father sent Me, so do I.” The Father had sent Him into the world to redeem it by His vicarious death. O the depths of the Father’s love! “Arise, let us go hence.” Thus far our Lord has been sitting at the table, the supper having. taken place and the Eucharist having been administered. He is going away into Gethsemane, over the brook Kidron, on the slope of Mount Olivet. Now they rise up; but His heart is so flooded with these tremendous truths, and this is His last opportunity to speak to His disciples before He passes through the dark valley of death, consequently He proceeds, speaking on through Chapters fourteen and fifteen.
“I am the True Vine, and My Father is the Husbandman. Every branch in Me not bearing fruit, He taketh it away; and every one bearing fruit, He cleanseth it, in order that it may bear more fruit.” This is very plain. God takes away all backsliders — i.e., non-fruit-bearing branches — lest they encumber the Vine; meanwhile He sanctifies the regenerated — i.e., the fruit-bearing branches — in order that they may bear more fruit.
“Now, you are clean through the Word which I have spoken unto you.” This is in the present tense, denoting an existing fact, setting forth the Word as the constituted medium of spiritual purity. While the Holy Ghost is the efficient cause of sanctification, the blood is the Divine elixir, the Word the medium, and faith the condition. While this states a general truth, universally applicable, the apostles at that tithe being clean so far as the pollutions of actual transgression were concerned; yet, as the Word abundantly reveals, they needed a deeper purgation, which they received at Pentecost.
“As the branch is not able to bear fruit of itself unless it may abide in the vine, so you are not unless you abide in Me.” John Wesley says: “It is impossible for us to lay up a stock of holiness, as we really have no holiness except as we abide in Christ.” The moment we are separated from Him, our holiness evanesces, and we have nothing left but unholiness.
“I am the Vine, ye are the branches.” The Church of God is the body of Christ; i.e., all the people in the world who are really in Christ by the regeneration of the Holy Ghost. Hence the idea that religious denominations are branches of the Church of Christ is incorrect, that Church being an indivisible unit, including all the children of God; as you see here the Church is the vine, and the individual members the branches. “He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same beareth much fruit; because without Me you are not able to do anything.” Millions of Church members, who are in the world and not in Christ, vainly think they are working for God, when the devil in hell is chuckling over it, knowing that they are working for him, and actually worshipping him, believing him to be God, and delighted with him, because he puts his full approval on their sinning religion.
“If any one may not abide in Me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and they gather it, and east it into the fire, and it is burned.” The demons from the bottomless pit throng the atmosphere, gathering up the dry, withered branches, which the pruning-knife of the Holy Ghost has amputated from the Vine, and casting them into the lake of fire, where they are burned.
“If you may abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatsoever you may wish , and it shall be done unto you.” Unutterably blessed promise! O how wonderfully consolatory! The soul abiding in Christ and Christ in him has nothing to do but ask everything he wants, and it is granted. The carnally-minded can not understand this, as they would ask for a thousand things detrimental to their spiritual good and heavenly hope. The soul blessed with this mutual abiding, desires nothing but God’s will as revealed by His Word, Spirit, and providence. This soul, lost in God’s will and blessed with the mutual abiding, actually does ask and receive constantly in the full realization of this precious promise.
“In this My Father is glorified, that you may bear much fruit, and shall be My disciples.” This blessed, spiritual fruit is the grand end for which God sent us into this world. Therefore He is more anxious to answer our prayers, and load us with the luscious grapes, like the vines of Eshcol, than we are to receive. Rest assured, He is neither poor nor stingy.
“As the Father loved Me, I indeed loved you; abide ye in My love.” This is the Divine agape all the time, here so copiously emphasized, the fruit of the Spirit, the essence and quintessence of the Christian religion, simple and plain. You seek, with radical repentance, confession, and faith, till the Holy Ghost pours into your heart the heavenly agape, and then go on till He makes that same love perfect by the complete purification of your heart from original sin.
“If you may keep My commandments, abide in My love; as I have kept the commandments of My Father, and I abide in His love.” Our Lord, as you see, makes no provision for sin. When you get this holy love, you can only abide in it by faithfully keeping His commandments, as otherwise you sever your connection with Christ, and forfeit this Divine love. You receive first- love in regeneration, which must abide till swallowed up by perfect love in sanctification, otherwise you become a backslider.
“I have spoken these things unto you, in order that My joy may be in you, and your joy may be full.” Here we see that we are to have our Savior’s joy. N. B — He never had the joy of pardon, because He never had any sins to be pardoned; but He always had the joy of purity, from the simple fact that He was always pure. Hence, you see, you must be sanctified wholly in order to receive the Savior’s joy.
“This is My commandment, That you may love one another, as I have loved you. Greater love hath no one than that he may lay down his life for his friends.” You see here that our Lord lays a climacteric emphasis on the Divine agape, which is indigenous in Him and exotic in us, poured out into our hearts by the Holy Ghost. (Rom 5:5.) You see the Lord hangs the issues of time and eternity, heaven and hell, on “love.” Wholesale delusions sweep over the Churches like withering siroccos, Satan especially, through carnal preachers, manipulating the people into the dreamy hallucination that this is carnal human love, such as the natural man exercises toward his wife, children, comrades, and friends. The word our Savior uses constantly is not native in the fallen human heart, but in God, and can only be received when imparted by the Holy Spirit. Churches are filled up with members on a profession that they love the Lord and the brethren, which is true; but it is only carnal love, and no salvation in it. How can I know that I have the genuine Divine agape, on which the Savior here lays such tremendous emphasis? That problem is easily solved. If you have the same love which actuated Jesus to come down and die for a guilty world, who are not only aliens, but implacable enemies who conspired against Him and took His life, then you will love your enemies sufficiently to die for them. The human philia will love your friends, but allow you to hate your enemies; while the Divine agape loves friends and enemies indiscriminately.
However, in the latter case the love assumes the form of pity and sympathy, while in the former it assumes that of admiration and appreciation.
“You are My friends, if you may do whatsoever I command you.” Hence you see from this affirmation that the people who claim to love Jesus and commit sin are all liars. If they really loved Him, they would die rather than commit a known and willing sin, which you know to be the very opposite of obedience.
“I no longer call you servants, because the servant does not know what his lord doeth; I have called you friends, because I made known to you all things which I heard with My Father.” The Bible is a most wonderful book, revealing the deep things of God and the heavenly state. The very fact that it is appreciated, loved, and enjoyed by so few people, is demonstrative proof that the multitudes of this world are not traveling to heaven, as in that case they would be searching diligently day and night to ascertain the character of God in heaven,
“You did not choose Me, but I chose you.” This is a beautiful affirmation of the prevenient grace, administered by the Holy Spirit to God’s elect, calling and wooing them before they have even thought about seeking the Lord. While the election is mutual, yet grace leads the way, making the first overtures, which we have only to reciprocate in order to make our calling and election sure. “And have put you forth, in order that you may go and bear fruit, and your fruit may abide; in order that whatsoever you may ask the Father in My name, He may give unto you.” This is one of the passages on which. Church ordination is founded, as E. V. translates etheka humas, “I have... ordained you,” which is a simple effort off the part of the translators to defend Church authority, etheka having no such a meaning as ordain.
You will find the same fact true in every case where the E. V. uses the word ordain, there being no such an institution as ecclesiastical ordination in the New Testament. The only example we have is the case of the Church at Antioch, gathering around Paul and Barnabas, praying, laying hands on them, and invoking the enduement of the Holy Ghost to qualify them for the arduous and perilous evangelistic tour they were about to enter upon. This is all right, and cannot be too highly appreciated, there being no New Testament authority for the pompous, papistical, prelatical, and clerical ordination, which was foisted upon the Church during the Dark Ages, and around which a world of superstition has accumulated, and out of which have developed terrible tyranny, autocracy, ostracism, and persecution. The Lord’s people should certainly follow the example of the Antiochian saints in the consecration of brothers and sisters who feel called by the Holy Ghost to preach the living Word.
“I command these things to you, in order that you may love one another with Divine love.” This memorable farewell sermon of our Savior emphasizes, echoes, and reverberates this superlative commandment, that we shall all exercise the very love toward one another which brought Him down from heaven to die for a guilty world.
“If the world hate you, know that it first hated Me.” The love of the world has proved Satan’s chief battering-ram, demolishing the walls of Zion in all ages.
“If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out from the world, on this account the world hates you.” The world hated Jesus enough to kill Him, and in a similar manner hates all of His elect. So beware of the friendship of the world, lest it prove Satan’s trap-door, dropping you into hell.
“Remember the word which I spoke to you, The servant is not greater than his master. If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. If they have kept My word, they will also keep yours.” You here see the counterfeit of all popular religion, which goes with the world; as in the case of the true there never can be any harmony, but eternal antagonism, similar to that between Jesus and Satan, who is the god of this world. (2Co 4:4.)
“But they will do all of these things to you for My name’s sake, because they do not know the One sending Me.” Our Lord is here forewarning His disciples of the implacable hostility, persecution, and martyrdom which will most assuredly characterize all of their contact with the world.
“If I did not come and speak to them, they had not sinned; but now they have no apology for their sin.” Responsibility is tremendously augmented by opportunity. Infinitely better for people never to hear the gospel, and take chances for God’s uncovenanted mercies, than to hear it and reject it.
“He that hateth Me, hateth My Father also.” Those preachers and Church officers who killed Him, were so deluded by Satan as to believe that they loved God, when they hated Jesus with the very venom of the bottomless pit, thus demonstrating their implacable hatred to God. And yet they stood at the head of the Church, paragon illustrations of Satanic hallucination. N.B. — The same thing is going on now.
“If I had not done the works among them which no other one did, they had not had sin; but now they have seen and hated both Me and My Father.”
The holiness movement this day is piling mountains of responsibility on the professors of Christianity in all lands.
“But in order that the word having been written in their law may be fulfilled. They hated Me without a cause. When the Comforter, whom I shall send unto you from the Father may come, the Spirit of truth, who proceedeth from the Father, He will testify concerning Me.” The Holy Ghost is the Spirit of Jesus, His great work being to reveal, magnify, and glorify the Son of God in the salvation of the world. “And you also testify, because you are with Me from the beginning.” The Lord’s true disciples, like the Holy Ghost, are always magnifying Jesus and witnessing to His glory.
“I have spoken these things unto you, that you may not be offended.” He knew the world, the flesh, and the devil would combine against His disciples, consequently He predicts the bloody ordeals that await them, thus putting them on their guard, lest they be jostled and their faith shaken.
“They will put you out of the synagogues;” i.e., turn you out of the Church, as we nowadays see so frequently in the case of the holiness people. Therefore you must fully consecrate your Church membership with everything else, and not be surprised, upset, nor in any way disturbed, if they turn you out of the Church simply because you are true to God. Jesus must be first, and everything else secondary and subordinate. When you are thus persecuted, ostracized, and excommunicated, Jesus says, “Leap for joy.” ( Luk 4:23.) “But the hour cometh when every one killing you may think that he is offering a sacrifice to God.” How signally has this prophecy of our Savior been verified! The pagan emperors in the ensuing three centuries killing a hundred millions, and the Romanists a hundred millions more. If this sounds extravagant, count in the Moslem martyrdoms, and they will make up all apprehended deficiency.
“They will do these things because they do not know the Father nor Me.” These martyrdoms, here predicted by our Lord, were all perpetrated by people claiming to be the true saints of God, thus illustrating the wonderful potency of Satanic delusion and intrigue.
“But I have spoken these things unto you, in order that when the hour may come, you may remember that I said them to you.” Prophecies are invaluable guarantees against surprise, unsettlement, and the delusions of the enemy in a general sense, who so adroitly tells the persecuted saints that their troubles are Divine castigations for their sins, showing that they are not right. The priest used to walk out to the burning stake with the martyr, holding up his Bible, begging her to recant and live, and at the same time assuring her that the flames of martyrdom are but the prelude of hell’s devouring fires, into which she will go down from the consuming flame. If we only know the blessed Word of the Lord, we are amply fortified at every point of the diabolical compass.
“I did not speak these things to you from the beginning, because I was with you.” While He was with them, they suffered no persecution, because it was all concentrated on Jesus. But since her Divine Spouse, who protected her so heroically while with her, has ascended up to heaven, the widowed Church is awfully persecuted by the devil.
“Now I go to Him that sent Me, and no one of you asks Me, Whither are you going? But because I have spoken these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart.” They were flooded with grief because He had told them that He was going away to leave them. “But I speak the truth to you, that it is profitable to you that I may depart.” His ascension to heaven marked a grand epoch in the development of the redemptive scheme, illustrating incontestably His Messiahship, and becoming the grand fulcrum on which the lever of justifying and sanctifying faith rests through all subsequent ages.
“For if I go not away, the Comforter will not come to you; but if I go away, I will send Him to you.” The Holy Ghost had been in the world in all ages, convicting, illuminating, regenerating, sanctifying, and edifying the people. Yet the ascension and glorious coronation of Jesus marked an epoch in the history of redemption so decisive and exceedingly prominent as to bring in a new era in the execution of the redemptive economy, and actually to superinduce the new cognomen of Comforter. He comforted Abel in his dying hour; Enoch in a three-hundred-years’ walk with God; Noah, while warning the antediluvians of the coming flood, one hundred and twenty years; Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Job, Moses, and all the prophets and Old Testament saints. Yet in their case He could only comfort them by lighting up the Messianic prophecies, pointing to the coming Savior. Now, since these prophecies have all become matter-of-fact history, O what wonderful leverage has the Holy Ghost acquired, flooding the soul with the blessed assurance that the atonement is made, the world redeemed, hell defeated, Satan cast down, God reconciled, the redemptive scheme fully accepted in heaven, Jesus, our King, enthroned at the right hand of the Heavenly Majesty, pleading for us in glory, and coming back to sweep sin and misery from the globe, imprison the prince of darkness in the bottomless pit, envelop the globe in millennial glory, populating heaven with the countless millions of the Abrahamic covenant, and finally expurgating the earth with the sanctifying fires, speaking into glorious victory the new heaven and new earth, in which dwelleth righteousness, thus restoring this fallen world to its long-vacated place in the Celestial Empire, the soldiers’ bounty of the sainted heroes, to shine and shout with unfallen angels forever! Such are the wonderful facilities of consolation, pertinent to all the children of God, that the Holy Ghost, illuminating and appropriating these tremendous realities and unutterably inspiring the human spirit, is appropriately and significantly denominated the Comforter.
“And having come, He will convict, the world concerning sin, righteousness, and judgment.” Elenchsei, “will convict,” is a very strong word, literally meaning the arrest and prosecution of a criminal before a civil court. “Reprove,” E. V., is entirely too weak a translation of this verb, which really describes the Holy Ghost as going out, like the sheriff, arresting every criminal, and bringing him to trial. The fact revealed is really grand and glorious. When, like the Pentecostians in their ten-days’ prayer- meeting, we hold on to God with the pertinacity of unwavering faith till he pours down His Spirit on the Church in this extraordinary enduement, the result is that He goes out, arrests sinners, and brings them to trial before the tribunal of their own guilty consciences, now quickened and electrified with heavenly dynamite, thus superinducing that awful state of conviction which reveals an open hell, and the devil roaring like a lion ready to devour them without mercy, till the people fall like dead men, as on the day of Pentecost. Satan keeps the Church blinded to her wonderful availability, thus sleeping on, unconscious of her power, while the people all around are dropping into hell. You see from this statement of Jesus that the coming of the Holy Ghost on the Church, in His sanctifying power, is the normal antecedent of mighty convictions on the sinners.
“Concerning sin, indeed, because they believed no on Me.” The exegesis of this is obvious. If the sinners believed on Jesus, their sins would all be taken away. Consequently they bear their own blood and seal their own perdition, as Jesus has settled the whole matter, and they have nothing to do but abandon all sin and put their trust in Him, thus becoming the happy recipients of His free, pardoning mercy.
“And concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you see Me no more.” Dikaiosune, “righteousness,” is the regular word for justification. Now, we must remember that the ascension of Jesus to His Father is the positive and unequivocal confirmation of His Christhood, thus becoming the fulcrum on which the mighty lever of justification and sanctification must rest, while we actually pry up and tilt forever away the great mountains of sin which have accumulated on us during years of black drudgery in the devil’s kingdom. When Archimedes, the illustrious Greek philosopher, discovered the wonderful lever, the greatest mechanical power, such was his assurance of its reliable efficiency that he gave himself notoriety for the bold maxim, Dos pou sto, kai ton kosmon kineso, “Give me a place where I may stand, and I will move the world,” which is literally true of the lever power. But O how significantly real do we find it in the plan of salvation, when we take the lever of sanctifying faith and toss the world out of our own heart!
“And concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world has been judged.” Until Jesus died on the cross, Satan browbeat every sinner, either telling him his sins were too small for God to notice them, or too great to be forgiven. Consequently, in either case, the conclusion is, “Enjoy the world while you can.” While Satan thought if he could kill Jesus his dominion over the world would be settled and fixed forever, as he would then have nothing to do but reign without a rival, yet really that bloody tragedy satisfied the violated law, expiated the guilt of a lost world, consummated the redemption from under the curse of the law, and demolished Satan’s usurped claim forever, thus superinducing that preliminary fall which exposes him to signal defeat through the rolling centuries, and will culminate in his final arrest, ejectment, and incarceration in the dark pandemonium when our Lord returns in the effulgence of His glory.
“I yet have many things to say to you; but you are not able to bear them now .” Before the full salvation baptism of Pentecost they were comparatively weak, being yet in spiritual minority. “But when He may come, the Spirit of truth, He will guide you into all truth for He will not speak of Himself, but so many things as He hears He will speak, and will proclaim to you those things which are coming.” The Holy Ghost, after His descension on the day of Pentecost continued the revelation of truth which Jesus had begun giving us Acts of the Apostles and all of the wonderful epistles, winding up with that glorious book of prophecies revealed to His servant John in the Apocalyptic visions. “He will glorify Me; because He will take from Mine, and proclaim unto you” i.e., the grand office of the Holy Ghost is to reveal to us the things of Christ, which He has done in all the subsequent New Testament Scriptures, and is still doing by illuminating, expounding, and revealing the deep things of God.
“All things, so many as the Father has, are Mine; therefore I said, He takes of Mine, and proclaims to you.” You see that the office of the Holy Ghost is to reveal the wonders of the Christhood, the stupendous latitude, longitude, and altitude of redeeming love, shining down into the deep interior of the human spirit, irradiating the mind, interpenetrating the entire spiritual being, gloriously flooding us with light from heaven, and empowering us, lost in contemplation of the Divine majesty and glory, to sink away into God, the world, with all its vanities, follies, and vices, waning into total eclipse.
“A little while, and you see Me no more; and again, a little while, and you shall see Me; because I go to the Father. Then some of His disciples were saying to one another, What is this which He says to us, A little while, and you shall see Me, and that I go to the Father? Then they said, What is this little while of which He speaks? We know not what He says. Jesus knew that they wished to ask Him, and said to them, You are seeking with one another concerning this, because I said, A little while, and you see Me not; and again, a little while, and you see Me? Truly, truly, I say unto you, That you will weep and mourn, but the world will rejoice; you will mourn, but your mourning shall be turned into joy.” Though He had repeatedly predicted to them His death, resurrection, and ascension, down to this date they had no light on it, and no apprehension of it. It must be predicted, in order to the completion of the prophetical curriculum, which becomes the basis of faith for all future generations. Yet is said that is was held from them. This was really necessary to prevent a popular revolution, as the disciples and hosts of others would have fought in His defense, thus precipitating on the country a bloody revolution. You see here from His talk that He is simply alluding to His interment in the sepulcher, when they will see Him no more for a little while, followed by the resurrection, rendering Him again conspicuous to their vision.
“When a woman may bring forth, she has sorrow, because her hour has come; but when the little child may be born, she remembers her suffering no more, on account of her joy because a man is born into the world.” This is a very comprehensive metaphor, not only applying to Christian experience, when the agonizing penitent sweeps gloriously into life, but its application to the history of the Church is quite extensive. Terrible was the suffering of the drowning antediluvians, out of whose death-pang was born the new, postdiluvian world. Awful was the suffering amid the plagues of Egypt, the destroying angel hewing down the first-born in every home, and Pharaoh’s army drowned in the Red Sea; yet out of these death-pangs the great nation of Israel was born. Awful was the suffering: when Jerusalem was destroyed, a million slain by sword, pestilence, and famine, and a million more sold into slavery; yet out of those death-pangs was born the Gentile Gospel Church. Awful will be the suffering when the bloody billows of Armageddon shall roll over this world, putting an end to the present age; yet out of the death-pangs of the Gentile dispensation will be born the glorious millennium. How awful when this world will be all wrapped in fire, cremating out of it not only all sin, but all the effects of sin; yet out of those purgatorial fires will be born a new heaven and a new earth!
“Therefore you now indeed have sorrow; but I will see you again, and your heart will rejoice, and no one taketh your joy from you.” The joy following the resurrection was permanent and abiding, as death had no more dominion over Him. “And in that day you will not ask Me anything. Truly, truly, I say unto you, that whatsoever you may ask the Father He will give unto you in My name. Hitherto you have asked nothing in My name; ask, and you shall receive in order that your joy may be complete.” Before Jesus ascended up to heaven, the people of God did not ask in His name, because they were not certain that He was the Christ. Of course, in all bygone ages they offered their petitions in the name of the Redeemer God had promised to send into the world. But now, since they knew that this Jesus is the Christ, they all ask in His name specifically and personally.
“I have spoken these things to you in parables. But the hour cometh when I will no longer speak to you in parables, but openly will I proclaim to you concerning the Father.” The Old Testament is symbolic; the gospel of our Savior parabolic, by way of accommodation to our finite capacities, as the plan of salvation was not yet ostensibly perfected and the history of redemption complete. You see no parables in Acts, Epistles, and Revelation, but straight truth, enunciated categorically.
“In that day you will ask in My name, and I do not say that I will ask the Father concerning you; for the Father Himself loves you, because you have loved Me, and have believed that I came forth from God.” While, of course, Jesus intercedes for us, as He here says, the Father will answer and bless us, because of His own love for us, as well as that of Christ.
“I came forth from the Father, and I have come into the world; again, I leave the world, and go to the Father. His disciples say, Behold, now Thou art talking openly, and speaking no parable. Now we know that Thou knowest all things, and that Thou hast no need that any one may ask Thee; in this we believe that Thou hast, come forth from God. Jesus responded to them, Do you now believe? Behold, the hour has come when you may be scattered abroad, each one into his own place, and leave Me alone; and I am not alone, because My Father is with Me.” N.B. — They are yet in that upper chamber on Mount Zion, where they ate the Passover meal and celebrated the Eucharist. In a few minutes they go away to Gethsemane, where they all take fright, escape for their lives, and leave Him alone, literally fulfilling His prophecy here enunciated.
“I have spoken these things to you, in order that you may have peace.” The prophecies including all the perils which awaited them, of course, in due time illustrated the verity of all these wonderful, consecutive events, enabling them intelligently to apprehend and acquiesce joyfully, seeing that everything is in its place. Consequently faith has the victory. “In the world you have, tribulation but take courage; I have conquered the world.” This winds up our Savior’s valedictory sermon, following the Last Supper, the very night of His betrayal.
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain On v1 Consider the connection between believing in God and believing…
Joh 14:1
Consider the connection between believing in God and believing in Jesus Christ.
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I. Note first that the difficulty which men find in their way when asked to believe in Christ arises from the supernatural character of His manifestation and working. Take this away and there would be no difficulty for them in believing in Christ, no more difficulty in believing in Him than they have in believing in Socrates or Plato. Admitting that Jesus Christ was no more than a man, that His birth was that of an ordinary mortal, that He lived and died as any other man might, and that being dead and buried, He rests in the grave and was never seen again upon earth; admitting all this, you remove the whole difficulty which the unbeliever says he finds in the way of His believing in Christ, and he will then perhaps join you, in extolling the virtues, in admiring the character and in praising the conduct of Jesus of Nazareth. But such admissions cannot be made. A Christ divested of the supernatural is not the Christ whom the Gospels invite us to believe in, no such being, in fact, ever existed. If these men profess to believe in God, they by that very profession bring themselves under obligation to examine carefully and impartially the historical evidence on which Christianity rests its claim. If God be what they say they believe Him to be, then with Him all things are possible, and nothing can be more probable than that He should reveal Himself to His intelligent creatures, and by many infallible proofs show them that it is indeed He who speaks unto them. They are thus by their own premisses bound to examine the evidences of Christianity, and if these are found to stand the test, they are bound as they believe in God to believe also in Jesus Christ.
II. Advancing a step further, I would now go on to affirm that apart from the revelation of God in and through Jesus Christ, it may be doubted if man can believe in God in any real sense, or as He is. Jesus Christ presents Himself as the Revealer of God to men. It is to Christ then that we are to look for instruction in the knowledge of God, and it is only as we believe in Him, and receive out of that fulness of wisdom and knowledge which is in Him, that we shall so acquaint ourselves with God as really and intelligently to believe in Him. It is only a little way that the light of nature can guide us in the search after God, and a man dependent solely upon that light can hardly be said to believe in God as He is.
III. It is Christ alone who supplies what is wanted for a religion for man. Man needs (1) an incarnation, (2) an atonement. Man, with his conscious weakness and his deep wants, and that sore hunger of the soul which no viands the earth furnishes can fill, and that terrible sense of guilt which oppresses the spirit and fills him with that fear which hath torment, finds in Christ at length that which meets his need and satisfies his convictions, and calms his fears, and gives peace to his conscience, and lifts him up from despair to rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.
W. L. Alexander, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xvii., p. 161.
Something is wanting then, till the believer in God is a believer also in Christ. This is our subject.
I. Now some one might say, Look at the saints of the Old Testament! What grace of reverence, of affiance, of holy aspiration, was lacking in the patriarch Abraham, or in the poet king of the Psalms? And yet Christ was not manifested to them. We venture to dispute the very fact taken for granted. The psalmist, the prophet, the patriarch, yea, the very first father himself, lived and prayed and worshipped in the shadow cast before of Him that should come.
II. Or you might come nearer home, and speak of men who, in this century or the last, have not only led good lives, but have had many pious feelings, and done many beneficent works, without realising what we should call the fulness of the Christian faith. In examples such as these, it is but truth to remember that men thus dispensing with Christ are yet unspeakably indebted to Him. The very idea of God as our Father comes from revelation. It is one ray of that Divine truth which is reflected now in a thousand unconscious or ungrateful intellects.
III. Still, you may say, having made this great revelation, may not Christ Himself disappear? It is an obvious answer, and surely a just one, to such reasonings as these: We cannot take Christ by halves; if Christ said one thing from God, He said all things.
IV. Observe too how the particular truth received, no less than the accompanying doctrine objected to, runs up into matters which we can neither dispute as facts nor yet, apart from God, settle. No man dispenses with or disparages the Cross without being a definite loser in some feature of the Christian character. Where there is a reluctance to rely on Christ alone for forgiveness, you will generally perceive one of two great deficiencies: (1) There is often a feeble sense of the sinfulness of sin; (2) there is often a want of true tenderness towards sinners.
V. Nor is it only in this negative aspect that we perceive the distinctive value of faith in Christ. God, in arranging that we should receive this greatest, this most profound of His gifts, forgiveness and reconciliation, through another, His Divine, His Incarnate Son, has not only made the Gospel of one piece with His dealing with us in this life, but has also given a charm and pathos to the Gospel which it could not otherwise have possessed. "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me."
C. J. Vaughan, Temple Sermons, p. 11.
I. What do we mean, apart from the Christian revelation, when we say we believe in God? We mean that we believe in infinite thought, infinite intelligence, and that all things of which we are conscious, and especially all thought, are derived from this omnipresent thought; nay, are parts of it. We believe in absolute, eternal, infinite, intelligence, exercising itself in the incessant movement of thought, when we believe in God. But if that is all we believe we are only Pantheists. We believe in God not only as infinite thought and life, but as infinite goodness. He is a moral Being; He is absolute Holiness, Truth, Justice, and Beauty; and wherever these things are, in matters of the spirit or the intellect, they are there by Him and through Him. But where thought and life and moral character are, we have also a will, and where there is a will with these things, we have that which we call personality. We believe in God and conceive Him then as personal. Hence there springs up the idea of God as the moral Governor of the world and our personal King, and in God as such we believe.
II. All humanity is lifted by Christ’s revelation into union with divinity. Fancy the power of that in life. It does not only exalt it, regenerate it, set it on fire, it makes it completely beautiful. And above all, it fills it with unspeakable love. It binds God and man together like husband and wife, like two beings who, loving one another with perfect sympathy, dwell in one another, and are not two, but one being. That is the faith of the Christian concerning God and man. Christ called God our Father, and made Fatherhood on His side and childhood on ours, the terms that expressed our relation of love to God, and His relation of love to us. God is still to us the infinite thought, and will, and life, and righteousness, by which the material and spiritual universe consists; but in His relation to us as Father, He thinks for us and lives in us, and wills in our behalf, and makes Himself our righteousness. Therefore we not only worship and reverence Him; we also love Him. How? With all our soul and mind and strength, with all the love of children. And now, in being loved by God, and in being able and joyous to love Him, our deepest need is satisfied, our deepest longing quenched. The very root of our heart is watered with the dew of this belief. God is love, and we love Him. It has transfigured all humanity. And that expanded and ennobled belief is the work of Christ. What wonder that He said, "Ye believe in God, believe also in Me."
S. A. Brooke, The Spirit of the Christian Life, p. 305.
References: Joh 14:1.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xiii., No. 730; W. Roberts, Christian World Pulpit, vol. ix., p. 40. Joh 14:1-3.—D. Davies, Ibid., vol. xxix., p. 10. Joh 14:1-4.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxix., No. 1741; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. ix., p. 244; H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xii., p. 200; C. Stanford, The Evening of our Lord’s Ministry, p. 72. Joh 14:1-14.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. ii., p. 224; A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve, p. 385.
Joh 14:2
The truthfulness of Jesus Christ
I. These words were an appeal to the disciples’ knowledge of Christ. Had He ever painted His discipleship in false colours? Had He kept back any hard terms? Had He softened down any harsh conditions, that He might parade among His followers as One whom it was policy to conciliate? "One thing thou lackest," He had said to the rich young ruler, and that one thing was the sacrifice of his all. It was so in everything. The same voice which said, "In the world ye shall have tribulation," would have said, if it was the truth: I have no revelation and no promise, of another "life." I can but speak of truth and of duty. I can but share with you the sorrows of time, and leave you at the gate of that mystery which none can solve—what, or whether anything, shall be hereafter.
II. "If it were not so, I would have told you"—and in the telling there would have lain for Me no defeat and no discomfiture. I might still have come into the life; I might still have been the Comforter, the Sympathiser, and the Friend. If, then, He does not tell us that there is no life beyond this life—shall we not believe that He speaks that He doth know? I will insult the intelligence of no man by supposing that he will accuse Jesus Christ—whose character (I speak as a man) he knows perfectly well by biography and by history—of wilfully fabricating revelations of the truth of which He Himself was not persuaded. Either he must say, if he is a man of sense and honesty, "We have not His real words," or he must say, "He was Himself deluded." The third thing he durst not say—durst not, I mean, for his intellectual character’s sake—"Though He knew that it was so, yet He said it." The hearing ear is from above; but prayer will draw down the gift. If we believe in the home above; if we believe that Jesus lives; if we believe that He will come again to receive us unto Himself—let us look now at the things not seen but eternal, let us live the life now which alone can survive death.
C. J. Vaughan, Temple Sermons, p. 361.
Man’s hope of immortality uncontradicted by God
I. Our position with God is similar to that in which the disciples stood to Christ—we are looking to Him for the fulfilment of hopes which reach beyond our present life.
II. The same considerations which would have led Christ to undeceive His disciples, had they been in error, apply to God in His position to us. These reasons fall under a twofold division—those which lie in God’s own character, and those which lie in the relation between Him and us. Whatever could press on Christ as a moral obligation to speak out to His disciples, would lead us to expect that, if we were deceiving ourselves, God would speak out to us.
J. Ker, Sermons, p. 245.
References: Joh 14:2.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. x., p. 72; Homilist, vol. v., p. 87; T. S. Berry, Expositor, 2nd series, vol. iii., p. 397; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. viii., p. 363; A. Blomfield, Sermons in Town and Country, p. 124; R. L. Browne, Sussex Sermons, p. 1; H. J. Wilmot-Buxton, Sunday Sermonettes for a Year, p. 97. Joh 14:2-3.—Christian World Pulpit, vol. vi., p. 127; vol. ix., p. 90.
Joh 14:2
I. Had the Lord Jesus remained with us here below, various great ends of His mission must have rested unfulfilled. (1) Both His crucifixion and His resurrection were but steps in the way of the greatest event of His whole appointed course—the glorification of His manhood and of us in Him. Had He remained below, we may not say that this could not have been; because it is not for us to limit God to any defined place in His workings; but according to His own declaration, it would not have been. (2) Again, it was not the purpose of God in redemption merely to clear us from guilt, nor merely to place us in acceptance, but to renew us after the Divine likeness—to build up again, infinitely more glorious for the conflict with sin and suffering, that image which in our first parents had been ruined. And this, our Lord again and again taught His disciples, could not be accomplished without His being taken from them. It was to be the especial work of the Holy Spirit, and this Holy Spirit, the Comforter, the Builder-up and Strengthener of Mankind, would not come unless our Lord first went to the Father. (3) Moreover, the Ascension was necessary for the manifestation of Christ’s sovereignty. No manifestation of majesty here below could ever have been equivalent to the resumption by Him of the glory which He had with the Father before the world was—still less to the accession of glory with which Redemption has crowned Him. (4) Another great necessity for our Lord’s removal from us, is the work of His High Priesthood in heaven.
II. Consider the results of the Ascension with a view to our own faith and practice. (1) It is the token to us of the entire acceptance of the Saviour’s finished work in our nature. (2) The Ascension of our Lord should draw our present thoughts and affections to the place whither He is gone before. If we really love our Saviour, if His glorified humanity is to us the spring of our joys, and the centre of our interests, the world may catch our fleeting thoughts and employ our less earnest attentions, but He will have all our serious determinations, all our deepest affections; the world may be our tabernacle, but the place where He is will be our home.
H. Alford, Quebec Chapel Sermons, vol. i., p. 366.
Joh 14:2
I. Our Lord teaches us to connect with heaven the thought of permanence. It is a place of mansions.
II. Our Lord teaches us to connect with heaven the thought of extent and variety. It has many mansions.
III. Our Lord further teaches us to connect with the heavenly world the thought of unity. It is a house of many mansions.
IV. Our Lord teaches us to carry to the thought of heaven a filial heart. It is the Father’s house, a paternal home.
V. Our Lord has taught us to connect heaven with the thought of Himself—"My" Father’s house. "No man cometh into the Father but by Me."
J. Ker, Sermons, 2nd series, p. 247.
References: Joh 14:2.—J. S. Davies, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxv., p. 321; J. H. Hitchens, Ibid., vol. xxix., p. 6; J. Keble, Sermons from Ascension Day to Trinity, p. 72; J. Vaughan, Sermons, 6th series, p. 141. Joh 14:2, Joh 14:3.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. xiii., p. 228; H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxvii., p. 87. Joh 14:2-4.—Homilist, vol. ii., p. 583.
Joh 14:3
With Christ for Ever
I. This whole passage is beautifully calculated to place in their right proportions that hope which every one feels of meeting again in heaven those that are gone before us, and the one all-satisfying anticipation of being with Christ. I feel persuaded that many are far too much afraid of dwelling on the idea of our knowing and loving and enjoying one another again in the future state. I believe, if rightly understood, the danger lies more on the side of thinking of it too little, than of magnifying it too much. Are we not to know all things—to know even as we are known, and if all things, then certainly one another?
II. But perhaps the real mistake and confusion of thought is in this, that we do not connect and identify the saints, as we ought to do, with Christ. Now it is a deep mystery, but it is a most certain fact, that Christ is not a complete Christ without His members. We know and admire Christ in every one of His members, and every one of His members in Christ, and so the very fact of the rejoining of the departed, which some think to be contravened by the text, is by the text promoted and established, and is actually in the words when Christ says, "That where I am, there ye may be also."
III. The nearest approach we can make to the idea of glory lies, I think, in the text. Let any child of God take what Christ’s felt presence has been to his soul, in its most favoured season of spiritual communion. Let him conceive that sweet ecstasy rid of its clogs—multiplied a thousand-fold, and perpetuated for ever—and then this, not any picture of colour or shape, place or circumstance, will be the closest approximation he can make to a true imagination of the heavenly state. He will see how independent everlasting happiness becomes of those things of which the natural heart generally makes it to consist; and how there is enough, and more than enough, for eternity in that single assurance, "Where I am, there ye shall be also."
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 5th series, p. 31.
Reference: Joh 14:5, Joh 14:6.—H. P. Liddon, Christmastide Sermons, p. 18.
Joh 14:6
Christ the Way
I. If it be asked where this way begins, and whither it goes, the answer is evident. It begins in the cold, dark, desolate region, into which sin has thrown the moral and material condition of every living man. And it goes along a course of ever-nearing communion with God—through many stages of prayer, and devout thought and humiliation and assimilation to the character of God, up to the many mansions of the Father’s house.
II. There were three difficulties which had to be overcome in the return of a guilty creature to his God. (1) A road must be made clear before the love of God could travel without trespassing on God’s justice. (2) The false and alien mind of man must be willing to occupy the road when it was made. (3) The returning man must be fit for the happiness to which he is restored. To remove the first obstacle, Jesus, in His own person, and by His own vile death, harmonised the attributes of God. To do away with the second, the commanding spirit works in His sovereignty, which makes willing in the day of His power. To destroy the third, the mediatorial throne is planted on the way, to shed beauty and glory on everything which passes by it, and which acknowledges its efficacy. But over each barrier, rased to the ground, Christ’s banner floats, "I am the Way."
III. Immediately you are in the way, you find yourself in a state of progress. Marvellously you will feel your thoughts and affections begin to rise. Evidences you cannot mistake will tell you you are in the way. Old things will be dwindling behind you into insignificance in the distance, and new things will be brought to you in the present. You will understand the essential progressiveness of the grace of God, and you will need no human voice to explain to you what that means, "I am the Way."
J. Vaughan, Sermons, 1868, p. 229.
Christ the Truth
I. The truth of Christ was an attribute above all others essential to the offices which He undertook to fulfil. I shall take five of these offices. (1) That of a witness. What is a witness without truth? (2) The substance of that of which the whole of the Old Testament was the shadow. But the substance of anything is the truth of anything. Therefore, Christ is Truth. (3) The founder of a faith very different from all others which ever appeared upon this earth. Its precepts are the strictest—its doctrines are the loftiest—its consolations are the strongest. Now what intense veracity did that require in Him. (4) Christ is His people’s truth, His people’s righteousness. And what must be the truth of Him who was to be the Truth of the whole world? (5) Christ is Judge. How unspeakably momentous it is that in the last great division of all human destiny, the Judge should be true.
II. There are three empires of truth—the intellectual, the moral, and the spiritual. (1) I doubt whether any mind ever attains the highest order of intellect without an acquaintance with Jesus Christ. For if everything took its rise in the mind of Christ, then the true science of every subject must revert to Christ. (2) Christ is the Sun, the centre of moral Truth. In proportion as nations have departed from Christ, they have wandered out of the orbit of truth. And every man, as he dwells more with Christ, grows in rectitude of conduct and integrity of practice. (3) Christ is that "Amen" in the Revelation which clenches and ratifies to men the whole scroll of love. And every glimpse of joy, and every flood of sorrow in a believer’s heart, coming and working its appointed purpose there, just according to the chart which God laid down from all eternity—gives another and another evidence of the fact that Christ is Truth.
III. Let us draw one or two conclusions. (1) Repose upon Christ. No storms can shake a man when he has a promise, and feels it under him like a rock. (2) Cultivate the truth. Be real; get rid of phraseologies—go deeper than words to facts. Go deeper than facts—get thoughts. Go deeper than thoughts—get principles. Be real—wherever you are, be the same man—a ray of light put into this dark world, to be clear, and make clearness all about it.
J. Vaughan, Sermons, 1868, p. 237.
Christ the Life
I. We are accustomed to think and speak of life as issuing into death. And the thought is unquestionably true. But there is a yet deeper one, that death issues into life. Consider how many things that live had their cradle in death. The whole animal creation is full of the beautiful transformations of an inferior creature that dies into another formation of itself, much lovelier than the first. In the moral world means are continually dying for the ends to which these means were subservient and lived. In the spiritual and hidden life, every Christian knows too well what an inward dying to self there must be in daily mortifications and most painful crucifixions, that the Divine life may come forth in its power. And all this is leading us up to that great crowning doctrine of our faith, of which all this is only the allegory, that all life sprang first out of the death of Jesus Christ.
II. The supremacy of Christ over the whole history of life, or rather, I would say, the identity of Christ with the life of every soul, will be the more apparent, if we look at the subject in one or two of its bearings. (1) Let us take the life of nature. "By Him all things consist,"—i.e., are kept together, are held in their places and being. And thus the heavens and the earth, and all that are left in them of order, and promise, and stability, and sweetness, is kept against that day when by Him again, by His promise in the midst of them, they shall be restored to more than their original dignity and loveliness. (2) Turn now to things spiritual. Christ is life not for Himself but for His Church. For whatever God gives to the Son, He gives Him for the Church’s sake. The first Adam was a being of real, inherent, energetic life; but he could not communicate it, he was not intended to communicate it to another. But the Second Adam was not only to live, but to diffuse life to live in other lives, to be a fountain of life, to be the life of the whole world. That is what it means; "The first man, Adam, was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit."
J. Vaughan, Sermons, 1868, p. 245.
Union with Christ
I. It is not given to us to know the beginnings of anything, much less of the deep process of union between the soul and Christ, but this much I can say, the great power of the Holy Ghost comes forth in its sovereignty and lays hold of a man’s thoughts and the desires and feelings of his mind, and under its influence draws it and makes it come near to Christ. That thought, having come near to Christ, becomes impregnated with a new principle, "life." All other living things shall have their death. The stars will go out, the world will cease, but without the cessation of a single moment from that date, stronger, happier, brighter, intenser, gladder, it will go on through time into eternity, and through eternity rising everlastingly. And why? It has in it all the immensity and all the eternity of Him who says "I am the Life."
II. Look now alone on two points concerning this life of Christ, so begun in a man’s soul. See (1) its completeness; (2) its security; "Your life is hid with Christ in God." What God hides who shall find? (3) its strength. An infant’s hand, held by a giant’s arm, assumes gigantic force. The very seaweed, with the ocean at its back, is borne with something of the ocean’s might. And what duty is too high, what trial too heavy, what attainment inaccessible for a man who has and realises that he has Christ in him. (4) Its peace. Surely where He dwells no wave of troubled thought can roll heavily. (5) Its expectation. Christ in you the hope of glory. (6) Its finality, its end of ends—God’s glory. That makes and will make for ever and ever your soul a paradise to God, when He can behold everything which He has made in you, and behold it is very good, because Christ is the life thereof.
J. Vaughan, Sermons, 1868, p. 253.
In these marvellous words our Lord has grappled with the question of all questions, and has answered the enquiry of all times and of all ages. He has told us how we can be accepted with God.
I. "I am the Way." What does that mean? Our Lord takes Thomas’ last question and answers it first. He tells him first that He is the Way, before He tells him whither He is going; and therefore seeing that that was the method adopted by Him who knew what was in man, we may be quite sure that this answer of our Blessed Lord is the one that first appeals to the questionings of the human heart. The first question which the soul asks when it becomes anxious about its eternal state is, "Lord, what must I do to be saved?" Our Lord says, "I am the Way," and therefore the first thing we must do is to place the living Christ before us. If it is possible for Christ to be with us now, as His own word promises that He would be, then we cannot understand how He is to be the way unless we first have the eyes of our mind opened to behold Him. If I am to come into the presence of God, there must be some person who can come between me and God, who can lay his hand upon us both and make us one. That person is the Lord Jesus Christ. He it is who has joined together in Himself heaven and earth, God and man.
II. But even when we have the first question answered, then comes another question, What is truth? "I am the Truth," says our Lord; and if we would know the truth, then we must ask the Holy Spirit to lead us to Christ, who is Himself the Truth. Thus, you see, the words of our Blessed Lord appeal first to the timid, to those who are anxious about their eternal state; and secondly, to the thoughtful, to those who are perplexed by the conflict of opinion.
III. But there is yet another class to whom these words are addressed; and that is the practical, to those who want to know what is the life. Christ is Himself the Life. He is not only our mediator with God, He is not only our redemption from sin, but He is also our sanctification. He is not only the life which we must all live, if we would serve Him, but he is Himself the centre of life to us. He is the source of our spiritual life. If we feel that we are dead, if we feel that our heart within us is dull and lifeless, then what is the reason? It is because we do not know Christ as our Life. Thomas did not believe in his Master, therefore he did not understand, and therefore he did not know his Master. If, therefore, we would find in the Lord Jesus in ourselves the fulness of His meaning when He said, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life," we must ask of Him to give us that grace which the doubting Thomas needed, and we must ask Him to help us to believe in Him.
S. Leathes, Penny Pulpit, No. 701.
The Patient Master and the Slow Scholars
I. This question of our Lord’s seems to me to carry in it a great lesson as to what ignorance of Christ is. Why does our Lord charge Philip here with not knowing Him? Because Philip had said," Lord, show us the Father and it sufficeth us. And why was that question a betrayal of Philip’s ignorance of Christ? Because it showed that he had not discerned Him as being the Only Begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth; and had not understood that "He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father;" not knowing that all his knowledge of Christ, howsoever tender and sweet it may have been, howsoever full of love and reverence and blind admiration, is the twilight knowledge, which may be called ignorance. Not to know Christ as the manifest God is practically to be ignorant of Him altogether. You do not know a man if you only know the subordinate characteristics of His nature, but not the essential ones. The very inmost secret of Christ is this, that He is the Incarnate God, the sacrifice for the sins of the whole world.
II. These words give us a glimpse into the pained and loving heart of our Lord. We very seldom hear Him speak about His own feelings or experience, and when He does it is always in some such incidental way as this. There is complaint and pain in the question, the pain of vainly endeavouring to teach, vainly endeavouring to help, vainly endeavouring to love. But the question reveals also the depth and patience of a clinging love that was not turned away by the pain. Let us remember that the same pained and patient love is in the heart of the throned Christ today.
III. Let us look at this question as being a piercing question addressed to each of us. It is the great wonder of human history that after eighteen hundred years the world knows so little of Jesus Christ. In Him are infinite depths to be experienced and to become acquainted with, and if we know Him at all, as we ought to do, our knowledge of Him will be growing day by day. Let us seek to know Christ more, and to know Him most chiefly in this aspect, that He is for us the manifest God and the Saviour of the world.
A. Maclaren, A Year’s Ministry, 2nd series, p. 59.
References: Joh 14:6.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. v., No. 245; vol. xvi., No. 942; H. P. Liddon, Advent Sermons, vol. ii., p. 362; Bishop Monkhouse, Church of England Pulpit, vol. i., p. 191; Homilist, vol. vi., p. 326; E. Blencowe, Plain Sermons to a Country Congregation, vol. i., p. 174; R. Lorimer, Bible Studies in Life and Truth, pp. 315, 333; G. Moberly, Plain Sermons at Brightstone, p. 101; Contemporary Pulpit, vol. v., p. 54; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iii., p. 154; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. viii., p. 179; H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. ii., p. 331; R. W. Pearson, Ibid., vol. iv., p. 157; J. T. Stannard, Ibid., vol. x., pp. 340, 373, 383; J. C. Gallaway, Ibid., vol. xiii., p. 42; Outline Sermons to Children, 206; E. Bersier, Sermons, 2nd series, p. 367; J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 8th series, pp. 292, 300, 308, 314. Joh 14:7, Joh 14:8.—Homiletic Quarterly, vol. iv., p. 519. Joh 14:7, Joh 14:9.—W. Roberts, Christian World Pulpit, vol. ix., p. 209. Joh 14:8.—F. Wagstaff, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xiii., p. 390; Homilist, 3rd series, vol. ii., p. 301. Joh 14:8-9.—H. Melvill, Voices of the Year, vol. ii., p. 427; G. Brooks, Five Hundred Outlines, p. 239; Homilist, vol. v. p. 42; Christian World Pulpit, vol. viii., p. 128; J. C. Gallaway, Ibid., vol. xii., p. 346; Homiletic Magazine, vol. viii., p. 8; Ibid., vol. xiv., p. 215. Joh 14:8-11.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. ii., p. 148; Homilist, 3rd series, vol. vii., p. 61. Joh 14:8-14.—A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve, p. 401. Joh 14:8-16.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iv., pp. 224, 225.
Joh 14:9
The Surprise Christ felt
I. To Christ, that He was the revealer and the image of the Father was the one foremost truth of His life. Ever since He had sense, He had felt that, and it had grown with His growth and been the one proclamation of His ministry. The blind and the deaf in heart might, He thought, see and hear it, so intense, so vivid, was it to Him. And now one of His hearers asks a question, which suddenly makes Him feel that what is to Him as the sun in heaven is not perceived at all. What wonder that we hear in the question the note of wondering surprise? "Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known Me?" At such a time our tendency is to be angry, or to turn aside with scornful silence, or to be filled with the sense of wrong; mark in contrast with his, the tenderness of Christ, a tenderness which we hear in every word of the reply. There is a faint touch of reproach in it; but it is the reproach of love, and it would not hurt the most sensitive heart. And this was said at a time when irritation might have been indeed excused, when His whole soul was darkened with pain and presentiment when He felt with exquisite surprise that all He had ever said had been mistaken.
II. The answer itself to Philip’s question comes before us now, and is a striking answer, astonishing, indeed, from its sublime boldness, and separated by that from the utterances of every other prophet, none of whom dared to say anything like this: "He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father." Who knows Me, knows God; who hears Me, hears God. Nor is this an isolated saying; it is the constantly repeated thought of Christ, repeated in fifty different ways. That was Christ’s teaching concerning God and Himself, and therefore concerning God and man. All our life is God’s life. We are in His hand and abide in Him, and no one can pluck us out of His hand. We are eternal because He is eternal; and when all mankind shall have arrived at likeness to Christ, it will have arrived at likeness to God. He who shall see the perfected humanity shall say, "He who hath seen humanity, hath seen the Father."
S. A. Brooke, The Spirit of the Christian Life, p. 123.
References: Joh 14:9.—H. S. Holland, Oxford and Cambridge Journal, Nov. 22nd, 1883? A. Maclaren, A Year’s Ministry, 2nd series, p. 59; G. Brooks, Five Hundred Outlines, p. 307; S. Green, Christian World Pulpit, vol. i., p. 261. Joh 14:10-14.—W. Roberts. Ibid., vol. ix., p. 250. Joh 14:10-28.—Contemporary Pulpit, vol. v., p. 309. Joh 14:11.—W. M. Taylor, The Gospel Miracles, p. 29. Joh 14:12.—C. Wilson, Christian World Pulpit, vol. x., p. 241; J. Aldis, Ibid., vol. xi., p. 376; Homilist, vol. iii., p. 493. Joh 14:12, Joh 14:13.—A. Murray, With Christ in the School of Prayer, p. 140. Joh 14:13.—Ibid., p. 48; E. W. Shalders, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxiv., p. 298. Joh 14:13-14.—Ibid., p. 180. Joh 16:14.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. x. p. 333. Joh 14:15.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxxii., No. 1932; G. Calthrop, Words Spoken to my Friends, p. 177; Parker, Christian Commonwealth, vol. vi., p. 347; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. i., p. 199.
Joh 14:15-17
The Christian the Temple of God
I. This is the misery of sin, that it brings what is so unholy, so close, into the Presence of the All-Holy. Sin begins in thought, yet thought is of the soul, and in the soul dwelleth God the Holy Spirit. Thought goes on to consent of the will. No deadly sin is committed, but the soul has first willed it; it has willed it in the very presence of God; not afar off, not under heaven, not under His holy eye alone, but there where He came to hallow us; where by the voice of our conscience, He pleaded with us; where, if we held on in sin, we must first stifle our conscience, that is, deaden His voice, nay, cast Him forth. Yet however marred, defiled, sin-stained, a soul may be, He hath not left that soul, which can yet loathe its own stains, His love hath not yet forsaken the soul which can yet hate what it has been, and long to love Him whom once she would not have to reign over her. Yea, He will yet fan that remaining spark into a flame which shall kindle the whole soul.
II. Great as God’s gift is, the soul which can contain it cannot contain the world also. The soul can contain God who is infinite, for He hath said, "I will dwell in them and walk in them." The whole world cannot fill the soul, for it can be filled by nothing but God. Had it all the kingdoms of the earth and the glory of them, it would still crave; for they are ashes and not bread, earth, and not its God. For although all the world could not fill it and it can contain God, it cannot contain the world and God, for God is a jealous God. He, the infinite source of love, must be loved with an entire love. He would give us all He is. He asks of us in return the nothingness we are. Seek therefore to win thy soul more and more from all which is not God. Seek as thou mayest to win to Him the souls of thy brethren whom Christ hath made His own. Commit thyself daily to God, to guard thee as His own shrine.
E. B. Pusey, Sermons from Advent to Whitsuntide, p. 342.
References: Joh 14:15-17.—H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. vii., p. 275; W. Roberts, Ibid., vol. ix., p. 332; D. Bagot, Church of England Pulpit, vol. xiv., p. 73. Joh 14:15-21.—A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve, p. 388. Joh 14:15-31.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. ii., p. 270. Joh 14:16.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xviii., No. 1074; E. Cooper, Practical Sermons, p. 230; J. Armstrong, Parochial Sermons, p. 272; C. Stanford, The Evening of our Lord’s Ministry, p. 93; J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 9th series, p. 107; W. Hutchings, The Person and Work of the Holy Ghost, p. 78.
Joh 14:16-17
Consider how in His residence with the Church the Holy Spirit has verified this title, "The Spirit of Truth." What reasons have we for concluding that this Comforter who descended at Pentecost, has acted among men as the Spirit of Truth?
I. We cannot say that the Spirit’s work has yet been complete in the largest possible extent; but what has been done, however partial in amount, is sufficient as an earnest of the unlimited sovereignty which truth shall yet acquire. It is curious and interesting to observe how truth of every kind has advanced hand in hand with religion. Not, indeed, that it was the office of the Holy Ghost to instruct the world in natural philosophy, to teach the motions of stars or to lay open the mysteries of the elements. He came to unfold Redemption, and so to strengthen the human understanding, that it might be able to bear the vast truths of the mediatorial work. But nevertheless it did come to pass, and there is nothing which should surprise us in the result—that the understanding which the Holy Spirit strengthened to receive redemption, found itself strengthened also to investigate creation. The Christian era has been distinguished by a rapid advance made in every branch of science; by the emancipation of mind from a thousand trammels; by the discovery of truths which seemed to lie beyond the scope of human intelligence. Assign what you will as the cause, the fact has been that the progress of Christianity has identified itself with the progress of natural philosophy.
II. The Holy Ghost was "the Spirit of Truth," to the Apostles. Through His unerring influence it is that we possess most accurate annals of the Redeemer’s life—that we can trace His footsteps as He went about doing good, and listen to His voice as He preached the gospel to the poor. If the Spirit were thus the Spirit of Truth in regard of apostles, is He not still such in regard of every real Christian? It is the office of this Divine person—an office whose discharge must be experienced by every man who will enter heaven—to rectify the disorder of the moral and mental constitution, and thus to communicate that sort of inner light in which alone can be discerned the great truths of religion.
III. There remains much, very much, for this Spirit to teach. How great still is our ignorance. But observe what our Lord says in the text, "that He may abide with you for ever." Things which we cannot bear now shall not always be too vast for our comprehension. We may be led on from degree to degree of intelligence, and trained and taught by the Spirit; eternity shall be one continued growth, immortality one accumulating treasure.
H. Melvill, Penny Pulpit, No. 2206.
I. As our Lord had created and stimulated and developed the spiritual life of His disciples, so would the Holy Spirit further develop, and finally perfect it. He would move in them. He would encourage and stimulate them. He would create the hungering and thirsting after righteousness which has the promise of being filled, and so absolutely has the Holy Spirit taken the place of Christ as the fountain and wellspring of the life of the soul that the indwelling and inworking of the one are stated by St. Paul to be the same as the indwelling and inworking of the other.
II. Observe that as our Saviour prayed to the Father for them, so now they would pray for themselves by the grace of the Advocate. Much of our Saviour’s work among men was teaching them to help themselves. Through the grace of the Holy Ghost they would be enabled to plead for themselves as earnestly and successfully as Christ had done for them; which would be a clear spiritual gain. Prayer heralded every fresh enterprise for the diffusion of the Gospel, and was the great support on which they leaned when they had to endure persecution for the Gospel’s sake. Truly they learned under the teaching of the new Advocate who was within them how to make full use of their privilege of access to the Father in the name of His Son.
III. As Christ had led His disciples into truth, so would the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of Truth, continue to lead them. The presence of Jesus must have been most stimulating to the disciples because of the constant flashes of light and truth that emanated from Him. He never spoke platitudes. The commonest truths were adorned with fresh beauty when they fell from His lips. At the prospect of losing such a Guide into the realms of truth the disciples might well feel as if their onward march would be stayed. The loss of Christ would be as the setting of the sun and the coming on of a great darkness over the soul. But they were assured by Christ Himself that even in this respect they should be no losers; in the other Comforter, the other Advocate, would be the Spirit of Truth who should guide them into all truth. They possessed in the words of their Lord the seeds of truth which would burst into bloom when the Holy Ghost began to shed His light upon them, and other and higher truth would be brought to their hearts.
J. P. Gledstone, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxi., p. 355,
Joh 14:16-17
Christ’s Absence—Quiet Times
I. Our state at this moment is exactly that of the rich man’s brethren in the parable. We have Moses and the prophets, and should hear them. We have the ordinary means of grace in our hands, with no peculiarly awakening call, so far as we can foresee, to arouse us to make use of them. What a state of heart does it show, that the absence of all especial calls to God should be a relief to it! If we feel it a relief not to be forced to think upon God, it is a relief which we shall continually enjoy more plentifully—a relief which the heart will make for itself, when it cannot readily find it. Let it be that we find these quiet and ordinary seasons a relief to us, and we shall soon become insensible to seasons of excitement; great festivals, solemn occasions, the most touching accidents of life, the celebration of the Christian communion, will all pass over us without making any impression; nothing will break the deep rest of averseness to God which we so dreaded to have disturbed. Our hearts’ desire will indeed be gratified; we shall see Christ’s face, we shall hear His words, no more, so long as heaven and earth endure.
II. Most dreadful indeed is the faintest show of that feeling which rejoices to escape from Christ’s call. But others do not rejoice to escape from it, but dread to think that it will not force them to listen to it. Do we desire some stronger religious excitement than usual? some solemn occasion to oblige us to think and to pray? some event that may break through the unmoved current of our daily life and not allow it to stagnate? It is a natural desire, but a vain one. Life will have its tranquil hours, its unvaried days, its ordinary and unexcited feeling. How precious are these quiet moments, when we may show our love to God’s call by listening for and catching its softest sound! With the world all around us; with death and sorrow and care seemingly at a distance; on the plain road of human life, so far from the edge of the hill that we can enjoy no prospect of the distant country, none of the far-off horizon where earth and heaven meet—have we not God’s light to guide and cheer us, and God’s air to refresh us, and God’s work to do? If the period now before us is indeed to go on quietly, let us be awake ourselves, and then we may be sure that its quiet will have nothing of dulness; that God will be near enough, and the aid of His Spirit abundantly ready, and our progress in grace marked by no obscure or doubtful signs.
T. Arnold, Sermons, vol. iii., p. 62.
References: Joh 14:16, Joh 14:17.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. i., No. 4.; H. Melvill, Voices of the Year, vol. i., p. 503; E. Blencowe, Plain Sermons to a Country Congregation, vol. ii., p. 315; Plain Sermons by Contributors to "Tracts for the Times," vol. ix., p. 167.
Joh 14:16-21
I. The Holy Spirit is promised as another Comforter. This surely indicates, not a new office to be discharged, but an old one, or one already subsisting, to be discharged by a new person. The term "Comforter" is common to the Holy Ghost, and to the incarnate Son. In its highest and holiest import, it is clearly not the exclusive property of the Spirit. The ministry is the same though another minister is to be employed in it. The work is the same, though a new and different workman is to be engaged about it. "I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter."
II. And for that office of Comforter or Advocate, the Holy Spirit is better fitted, at least for the present, than even the Lord Jesus in person, had He remained on earth, could have been. (1) The other Comforter or Advocate is to be no passing visitor merely, but a permanent resident here on earth, "He may abide with you for ever." His peculiar functions, the department of the work falling to Him, is not of such a sort as to limit the duration of His stay or sojourn here. On the contrary, it requires His unceasing and uninterrupted ministry always, from the beginning of the Gospel down to the end of time. (2) He is the Spirit of Truth. In that character and capacity, He spiritualises the truth; making it spirit and life. In the hands of any other, even of Christ, the truth, the highest truth, the truth Divine and heavenly, the truth consisting of the very Son Himself, His person and His work, is but flesh which profiteth nothing. The Lord’s own personal teaching, had it been prolonged, would have lacked a certain element of living and life-giving energy—a certain vitality and vivifying force, which it can only have when the Spirit makes it His own—impregnates it with His own life, and assimilates it in some sense, to His own nature. (3) The Spirit is an agent or worker, such as the world does not see or know, and therefore cannot receive. Were He other than that, He would not meet your case; He might dwell with you, but He could not be in you. "It is expedient for you that I go away," for this among other reasons, that He whom I am to send can reach the inmost recesses of your inner man and fix My words deeply there. "He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you."
R. S. Candlish, Sonship and Brotherhood of Believers, p. 192.
References: Joh 14:16-26.—Preacher’s Monthly, vol. vii., p, 336. Joh 14:17.—W. Sanday, The Fourth Gospel, p. 221; Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xiii., No. 754; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. ix., p. 280; R. Tuck, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxiii., p. 381. Joh 14:18.—Wilberforce, Church Sermons, vol. ii., p. 17; G. Moberly, Plain Sermons at Brightstone, p. 219; Christian World Pulpit, vol. i., p. 401; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. i., p. 199. Joh 14:18, Joh 14:19.—J. H. Newman, Sermons on Subjects of the Day, p. 137. Joh 14:18-20.—G. Moberly, Parochial Sermons, p. 145; W. Roberts, Christian World Pulpit, vol. x., p. 56; J. Vaughan, Sermons, 13th series, p. 165.
Joh 14:19
I. Christ lives. In Him was life. He was the Prince, the Author of life. He submitted to die for the sin of the world. But it was impossible that He should be holden of death. He has resumed the body of His humanity, but it is now a glorified body, a body freed from the laws to which He before submitted it, of space and motion; no longer the body of our vileness, but the body of His glory.
II. He liveth; and now what does our text announce to us from His own lips as the consequences of that His life? "Because I live, ye shall live also." Immense consequences shall result from this resumption of His Body, and reunion of it in its resurrection form to His Godhead and His glorified humanity. (1) "In Christ shall all be made alive," In this lowest, but evident sense, because He lives, we shall live also. Every body of man shall one day be re-animated; known as his body was known, by its distinguishing marks and features; built up again by Him who built it up at first, and reunited to the human soul, which has been waiting in the abode of the departed the fulness of the Father’s time. (2) All are united to Christ in the flesh. His body was our body; and the unbeliever, as well as the believer, is one flesh with Christ. All have the same animal and intellectual soul which Christ took upon Him; all, unbeliever as well as believer, are sharers in the immortality which He conferred on our nature by His resurrection, as far as this is concerned in it. All have the same immortal spirit; but here comes in the difference. The man who has degraded that Spirit by which he should have reached out after God, who has never sprinkled it with Christ’s atoning blood, nor had God’s Spirit dwelling in it, he shall live for ever in one sense—but how live for ever? In no spiritual life or enjoyment of God, in no apprehension of Him; for he has rejected the Son of God; and thus for him is reserved a final state of banishment from the presence of God and disappointment of all the high ends of his being. But in the opposite case of the spiritually minded, of those who have learned to look above the world and its animal enjoyment, and its intellectual power and pride, and to seek after the Father of their Spirits by believing on the Son of His love,—they are united to Christ not only in the flesh, not only in the animal and intellectual soul, but in the Spirit also. When Christ, who is their life shall appear, then shall they also appear with Him in glory.
H. Alford, Quebec Chapel Sermons, vol. i., p. 251.
Life in Christ
I. What we all want, and most of us feel that we want, is to live lovingly. Most persons have a consciousness that they are not living up to the intention of their being, and this sense of the interval which there is between the life we live and the life we might live, is perhaps the chief cause of that general undefined feeling of dissatisfaction and uncomfortableness by which so many of us are continually oppressed. So long as there is an interval between what a man might live, and what he ought to live, and what he does live, there will never be any real rest, and the greater the distance, the greater the restlessness. Seeing that we are constituted as we are, no man can have the true enjoyment of the sense of life until there is something of eternity in his living. It is an element which God has made to be a part of our spiritualised nature. And there will always be a void until it is in the mind, and we can say of anything we feel, think, or do, "This is for eternity."
II. Now, it is of this life of a man, in his body, soul, and spirit—it is of this life in a man, as forming a part of his immortality, that Christ is speaking, when He makes this comfortable promise concerning His resurrection and ascension, "Because I live, ye shall live also." See how the life of every Christian, i.e., of everyone who really lives, owes itself to the life of Jesus Christ. We live because the death of Christ upon the Cross redeemed us from a state of death; the dying of Jesus being in substitution for our dying, released us from the necessity of dying for ever. And having thus made us capable of living, the death of Christ placed us under those processes by which a certain new inward life is formed and perfected in us.
III. As water is ever seeking the level from which it flows, so the Christian life is always rising towards the standard of that life of Christ in which its own hidden fountain lies. It is a self-evident truth that if we live by Christ and on Christ, we must also live in Christ and to Christ. Our being, true to its great prototype, of which indeed it is only a part, is passing, for a short appointed period, through a risen spiritual life, preparatory to its glorified condition, of which it is always standing upon the eve, when, like Jesus, it will ascend and be taken up to its perfected consummation, and rise to life indeed for ever and ever.
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 5th series, p. 44.
The Natural Immortality of the Human Soul
I. Note some considerations which go to establish the radical unlikeness between spiritual and material beings. (1) The spirit of man knows itself to be capable of continuous improvement and development. (2) The spirit or mind of man is conscious of, and it values, its own existence. (3) Unless a spiritual being is immortal such a being does count for less in the universe than mere inert matter, for matter has a kind of immortality of its own.
II. How does Christ communicate life when He is out of reach of the senses? (1) By His spirit; (2) by the Christian sacraments.
H. P. Liddon, Penny Pulpit, No. 945.
Consider some aspects in which our Lord’s words light up for us our life. I propose to show how the risen Saviour dispels the darkness in which we walk, fills the vacancy which we dread, gives us the victory over death.
I. The resurrection of Christ is emphatically the accomplishment of our redemption. Apart from that there is no hope for us as sinners in the sight of God. If Jesus Christ had only died, the perfect man would have appeared, but the perfect man would have gone down into the abyss of darkness like the rest. There would have been no proof that the Sacrifice was pleasing to God, no evidence that the Father had accepted Him. But now is Christ risen from the dead, and therein is our salvation sure.
II. But, again, the resurrection of Christ is our victory over death. The life which He has purchased He has given to us, and that life scorns death. He is so One with us that His victory is ours. And so He Himself declares that if we believe in Him we shall never die. Not only death cannot terrify Christ’s children, death has no power over them; death is not death, it is a sleep, or rather it is a birth—a birth into a new and glorious life. It is a deliverance, it is a joy. Do not call it death; there is no real death but separation from God; that is death, death of body and death of soul, death temporal and death eternal. The believer who is one with Christ can say, "O death, where is thy sting?"
III. But the text is true in another sense. The resurrection is the pledge of the resurrection of our bodies. Because He lives, we also shall live, not only as disembodied spirits, but with new bodies, clothed upon with our house which is from heaven.
IV. The resurrection of Christ implies that we are now, even in this world, risen with Him. St. Paul’s great object, he tells us, was to know Christ and the power of His resurrection. It was his aim and endeavour, it was his constant prayer, to be conformed to the image of his risen Saviour. It was to this that he exhorted his converts, "Our conversation is in heaven." "If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God."
J. J. S. Perowne, Sermons, p. 274.
References: Joh 14:19.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xvii., No. 968; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. x., p. 18; J. Vaughan, Three Hundred Outlines on the New Testament, p. 91; T. T. Munger, The Freedom Faith, p. 257.
Joh 14:19-20
Waiting for God in Christ
I. Wait for Christ, for we are privileged to do so; wait for Him, wait at the outer gate, though the gate may be fast closed, and we can see nothing of the glory within; yet wait, for so Christ bids you. Within that gate is your home, if you will not turn your backs upon it; wait, and it will one day be opened. But we grow tired of waiting. Seven days we wait, and He who alone can sacrifice for us, comes not to us sensibly; nay, He seems to linger beyond His promised time; we pray, and He has not seemed to hear; we are bound, and He has not yet delivered us. And then we are tired of waiting, and we try to offer our own sacrifice; in some way or other—the ways are infinitely various—we try to help ourselves. This is the one great lesson to press upon you, "Wait for Christ." Wait patiently; if your prayers are cold, if your faith is weak, if your sins are many, still wait and watch; pray still, believe amidst unbelief; watch your lives, and struggle with your sins, amidst your constant defeats. This is the state of him who through much tribulation enters into the kingdom of God.
II. And can any tongue adequately describe the joy, when those who so watch behold the dawn? Not the Sun—He is not yet risen—but the gracious dawn. Most touching is the natural dawn, when the forms of things first, and then their colours, begin to appear to us, and there is a stillness over everything, a freshness, yet a calmness inexpressible, the preparation, as it were, for the brightness of the full day. It is a true image of the spiritual dawn to them who have been long waiting. That is the dawn when prayer becomes welcome, when God begins to be realised to our minds, when we think of Him as our loving Father, and so begin to feel towards Him as His children. This is the dawn; not the day, for that may still be distant; the sun arises, when the beasts of the field get them away together, and lay them down in their dens; when evil haunts us no more, and Christ is seen face to face. But the dawn brightening more and more unto the perfect day—that is the Christian’s course when he is truly Christ’s, when he waits and is not weary.
T. Arnold, Sermons, vol. v., p. 321.
References: Joh 14:19, Joh 14:20.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. ix., p. 208. Joh 14:20.—Ibid., vol. iii., p. 289. Joh 14:21.—J. W. Colenso, Village Sermons, p. 89; Homiletic Magazine, vol. xvii., p. 312; Parker, City Temple, 1871, p. 159; Spurgeon, Morning by Morning, p. 133; G. G. Findlay, Expositor, 2nd series, vol. ii., p. 30. Joh 14:21-23.—H. W. Beecher, Forty-eight Sermons, vol. i., p. 279. Joh 14:21-26.—W. Roberts, Christian World Pulpit, vol. x., p. 91. Joh 14:22.—T. Gasquoine, Ibid., p. 83; Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. i., No. 29; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. v., p. 326; Homiletic Magazine, vol. xiii., p. 175; J. Keble, Sermons for Saints Days, p. 406; Plain Sermons by Contributors to Tracts for the Times," vol. vi., p. 181; Church of England Pulpit, vol. iii., p. 13. Joh 14:22, Joh 14:23.—J. C. Gallaway, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xii., p. 298; H. W. Beecher, Sermons, 4th series, p. 236.
Joh 14:22-26
Observe:—
I. The harmony we may trace between the Spirit’s working and the working of our own hearts and minds, according to the ordinary laws of thought and feeling which regulate their movements. Here, as always, it may be seen that grace and nature are not antagonistic but concurrent, not conflicting but conspiring forces. Grace renovates and quickens nature. In the common course of nature, the keeping of the loved one’s sayings tends to give a realising sense and sight of the loved one himself, as present in them; not only acknowledging them as having been his own once, but speaking them as his own now. And grace, the gracious ministry of the Holy Ghost, fits into this natural operation, adopts it, uses it, turns it to account, intensifies and vivifies it. Nor is there anything mystical or fanatical in the process. It is a simple quickening of the two faculties that are in exercise, the understanding and the memory.
II. Consider what you lose and forfeit if you have no love to Christ. The faith which works by love is no mere notion of Christ, or barren belief of some facts or doctrines concerning Christ. It is the real personal closing of my soul with Christ, and the accepting of Him as my own Saviour; mine in the sense of my appropriating Him to myself—to myself personally and individually. "Unto you that believe He is precious."
III. When Christ’s sayings are lovingly kept, when they are kept altogether; the whole sayings of the book kept as His; how clear and full may His manifestation of Himself to you be expected to be; and to become more and more day by day. Everywhere He comes forth and manifests Himself the same yesterday, today, and for ever; in creation, providence, judgment, the same; in wrath, in mercy, the same. No more will there be any severing of one part of Holy Writ from another; any setting up of detached passages against one another; any divorce of Christ from Moses or from Paul. Christ is everywhere, Christ alone, Christ always the same.
R. S. Candlish, Sonship and Brotherhood of Believers, p. 233.
Reference: Joh 14:22-31.—A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve, p. 408.
Joh 14:23
Consider:—
I. The connection between Christ and His words. (1) Christ and His words are both very fully made known to us. (2) There is a perfect harmony between Christ and His words.
II. The connection between loving Christ and keeping His words. The way in which our Lord states this brings before us (1) the central truth of Christian doctrine—viz., that in some way, there must be a change of heart before there is a change of life. (2) The Christian philosophy of morality. There is no system but Christianity that gathers all the grand motives to morality round a person, and makes the strength and essence of them spring from love to Him.
J. Ker, Sermons, p. i.
References: Joh 14:23.—S. Cox, Expositor, 2nd series, vol. ii., p. 278; H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. viii., p. 148; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. v., p. 451. Joh 14:23-31.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. xii., p. 273. Joh 14:24-26.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxxi., No. 1842; F. W. Farrar, Church of England Pulpit, vol. xvii., p. 169. Joh 14:25, Joh 14:26.—F. D. Maurice, Gospel of St. John, p. 383. Joh 14:25-31.—W. Roberts, Christian World Pulpit, vol. x., p. 138. Joh 14:26.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. i., No. 5; vol. vi., No. 315; Ibid., Evening by Evening, p. 288; G. Brooks, Five Hundred Outlines, p. 103; A. Barry, Cheltenham College Sermons, p. 370; Homiletic Magazine, vol. xviii., p. 26; J. Keble, Sermons from Ascension Day to Trinity, p. 187; R. W. Church, Three Hundred Outlines on the New Testament, p. 92; B. F. Westcott, The Historic Faith, p. 103.
Joh 14:27
These are musical words, but the music is not of earth alone. They touch a strain above the world. In their Divine consciousness of vast spiritual power, in their farness from the strife and trouble of men, they are of that true supernatural which abides in the secret of God.
I. What was it? It was not peace from the outward pains that beset life. The Jewish and the Roman world, the Church and State, were alike against the disciples of Christ. They were driven into deserts, thrown to the beasts, stoned, butchered to make a Roman holiday. It was not then the peace of an easy life Christ left them. On the contrary, He bade them, would they follow Him, expose themselves to the tempest.
II. Was it freedom from the unrest of the heart—freedom from sorrow and care, and bitter pain of thought and love? No, not that either; for it was My peace, said Christ, and He had not peace of heart. On Him the restlessness we know so well abided; He suffered as we suffer; and it is well. For were freedom from these things His peace, we should have no certainty of His sympathy. The consoler needs to have been the sufferer, and the conqueror of suffering.
III. What was the peace, then? It was a spiritual peace—peace in the deep region of the human spirit—peace in that inner life, which, striking its thoughts into eternity, is linked unbrokenly to God. Nay, which is a part of God. In that deep Life in Christ there was entire and perfect peace. It was (1) the peace that comes through fulfilment of duty. (2) It was peace that comes from the Triumph of Love. It is in the depth of God’s love that His peace is rooted, and in the depth of that life of His which love makes for ever. (3) Christ’s peace consisted in conscious union with God. "I and My Father are One." And because Christ had it, and was one of us, we will not despair, however grim and dim the battle in which we fight with phantoms. If one of us (our Brother in humanity) had this peace, if He was at home in the very truth of things, in the very Central Truth, then we also may win it. We, too, may be at one with God. "Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you."
S. A. Brooke, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xvii., p. 337.
The Peace of Christ is—
I. The peace of obedience. The submission which we owe to God is stripped from all servileness and obsequiousness by the fact that this submission is not only to a sovereign, but to a righteous and loving sovereign. It is submission of trust in God, and that knows what it trusts. This trust is also a large word when you think of it. It shuts out fear—that it may shut in a perfect love. It means friendly confidence with the unseen, the boldness of a favoured child. It means, therefore, a joyful peace. When the soul has got this relation with the eternal God—of utter submission to Him as a righteous sovereign, and love to Him as a loving parent—then the heart has obtained the peace of Jesus.
II. This inward peace is what St. Paul calls peace with God. This phrase refers to the pacification of conscience. Faith accepts God’s gift of His Son as a sincere gift; it seeks to be reconciled, to be justified, and forgiven in God’s way, and thus bowing to the obedience of faith, the sinful man finds that He has recovered that peace with God which is the absence of all condemnation.
III. In this spiritual submission to God, Jesus, in His spiritual character, is our great example. To it His great atonement is our great compeller. To this real loving subjection let us strive continually to bring ourselves, that we may have peace and confidence in Him. There are many sorrows and disturbances to contend with; yet it will not do to give up. It will not do to relegate the hope of inward peace to a future life. Christ had it here. More profound submission to our Father’s will, more childlike confidence in the Father and Son; and surely the Spirit, who is the Dove, will descend, and breathe sweet repose wherever His white wings brood? Surely He will make His nest within your spirit; and then, while storms surge and beat around your steps, you shall have the peace of Christ throughout the ages.
J. Oswald Dykes, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxii., p. 11.
Joh 14:27
Let us take the word "Peace" in at least some of the senses which our Saviour would give to it, and which are on our part fulfilled.
I. There is peace within ourselves. Everyone knows what it is to be at peace with ourselves, or not at peace. We may be perfectly prosperous, and yet there is a secret pang which makes us ill at ease. There is a something of which we do not like to speak, of which we do not like to hear, and of which, if possible, we would rather not think. "Keep innocency," says the Psalmist, "and do the thing that is right, for that will bring a man peace at the last."
II. Peace with one another. Christ Himself was the great Peacemaker. In Him Jew and Gentile, Greek and Barbarian, came together and were one. We must differ. We cannot make all men to be of the same character, of the same pursuits, of the same tastes, and of the same opinions. But here, as in the natural world, we can and we ought to prevent any difference, except the difference of sin, from becoming a separation. Always open the door wide for repentance. Always make the return as easy and as pleasant as it is possible to be made. There are, no doubt, occasions when truth and justice must be preferred to peace, whether in nations, churches, or private life. There are, no doubt, differences which are widened instead of smoothed by saying, "Peace, peace, when there is no peace." But these are the exceptions, and we must be very careful not to multiply the exceptions lest we should make them the rule of life. The peace of the Holy Spirit of Christ is something much wider and deeper than outward diversities or likenesses. "Not as the world giveth," not as outward appearance giveth, not as the mere letter giveth, but as the Spirit, speaking to our inmost spirits, so is the peace which Christ gives to His disciples.
III. Peace with God. Dwell for a moment on the thought of God—of God in His threefold essence as it were, completed for us. Think of God, the one Eternal Judge, perfectly just and perfectly merciful, who sees not as man sees, who knows whereof we are made, who knows our ignorance and our blindness, who sees us exactly as we are, and not as the unjust, capricious world sees us. That thought is the peace of God the Father. Truly in the Spirit of God is the everlasting peace which broods over the face of the waters, whether of chaos or of cosmos—the peace which lies not on the ruffled outward outward surface, but in the silent depths below.
A. P. Stanley, Penny Pulpit, No. 154 (new series).
References: Joh 14:27.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. vi., No. 300; vol. v., No. 247; C. Stanford, Evening of our Lord’s Ministry, p. 112; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iii., p. 93; Preacher’s Monthly, vol. v., p. 327; W. T. Bull, Christian World Pulpit, vol. iii., p. 133; R. A. Bertram, Ibid., vol. iv., p. 234; G. W. Conder, Ibid., vol. vii., p. 196; A. P. Peabody, Ibid., vol. xi., p. 358; J. Oswald Dykes, Ibid., vol. xxii., p. 11; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. ii., p. 394; vol. xviii., p. 127; J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 2nd series, p. 181; W. G. Blaikie, Glimpses of the Inner Life of our Lord, p. 178; S. Baring Gould, Literary Churchman Sermons, p. 145; J. H. Thorn, Laws of Life after the Mind of Christ, 2nd series, p. 152; Homilist, 3rd series, vol. viii., p. 259.
I. These words imply (1) the possession of a power of control over our own hearts. (2) Responsibility as to the exercise of such control. (3) They do not require that we should harden our hearts against the due influences of grievous circumstances, or shut our eyes to danger or to threatening sorrow. (4) Fear is here distinctly and separately condemned.
II. The disciple of Christ has sources of joy counteractive of his sorrows, and he has no ground for fear. (1) The Christian disciple is in the keeping of the Saviour personally. The Saviour has charge of us individually. He has charge of the Church; but He takes care of the Church by taking care of us personally, and He takes as much care of us personally as though He had only one of us to look after. (2) Then, the Father in heaven loves the disciple of Christ. Christ tries to comfort His sorrowing ones by reminding them of this very love. He tells them, in the words that follow, "The Father Himself loveth you." (3) Again, a place is prepared in heaven as the eternal home of Christ’s disciples, and they are moving to that place continually. (4) Farther, a Comforter is sent to the followers of Christ, to abide with them for ever. (5) Moreover, Jesus Christ gives peace to His disciples—a sure and immoveable foundation of reliance; a trust and confidence which loving intercourse with the Almighty Father is calculated to give. To seek, then, and to cherish this peace, to yield ourselves to the ministrations of the Comforter—to look up unto the heavenly home which the Saviour has in readiness for us—to think of our Father in heaven as really loving us—to realise the fact that we are in Christ’s holy keeping—is to prevent fear or to quench fear, and to reduce the stream of sorrow which flows through our souls, and prevent its overflowing its appointed channels and overwhelming our spirit.
S. Martin, Westminster Chapel Sermons, 3rd series, p. 91.
Joh 14:28
Present Relations of Christ with His Followers
The great change of administration to be introduced by the going away and coming again of Christ, includes several points that require to be distinctly noted.
I. That Christ now institutes such a relationship between Himself and His followers that they can know Him when the world cannot. Before this, the world had known Him just as His disciples had, seeing Him with their eyes, hearing His doctrine, observing His miracles; but now He is to be withdrawn, so that only they shall see Him—the world seeth Him not; as being rational persons they may recollect Him, they may read other men’s recollections of Him, but His presence they will not discern. He is not manifest unto them, but only to His followers. He that loveth knoweth God, and he only.
II. It is a point included that the new presence or social relationship is to be effected and maintained by the Holy Spirit, the Comforter. And He it is that Christ, in His promise, calls so freely Himself. The New Testament writings are not delicate in maintaining any particular formula or scheme of personality, as regards the distributions of Trinity. And when Christ calls the Comforter whom He promises Himself, He gives precisely the best and truest representation of the Spirit, in His new office, possible to be given. It is to be as if the disincarnated soul or person of Christ were now to go away and return as a universal Spirit invisible, in that form to abide for ever. And the beauty of the conception is, that the Spirit is to be no mere impersonal effluence or influence, but to be with us in the very feeling and charity of Jesus. He will be as forgiving as Christ in His passion, as tenderly burdened as Christ in His agony, as really present to physical suffering, as truly a Comforter to all the shapes of human sorrow. All which Christ outwardly expressed, He will inwardly show.
III. In this coming again of Christ by the Spirit, there is included also the fact that He will be known by the disciple, not only socially, but as the Christ, in such a way as to put us in a personal relationship with Him, even as His own disciples were in their outward society with Him. Christ is so related now to the soul of them that receive Him, that He is present with them in all places, at all times, bearing witness with their spirit, in guidance and holy society a friend, a consoler, a glorious illuminator, all that He would or could be, if we had Him each to himself, in outward company. Our answer then, to the question, What are Christ’s present relations to His followers? is, that He is present to them as He is not and cannot be to the world; present as an all-permeating Spirit—present as the all-quickening life—consciously, socially present—so that no explorations of science or debates of reason are wanted to find Him, no going over the sea to bring Him back, or up into Heaven to bring Him down, because He is already present, always present, in the mouth and in the heart. In this manner He will be revealed in all men, waits to be revealed in all, if only they will suffer it. The word for every trusting, loving heart is, I will come unto it; I will be manifest unto it; lo, I will be with it always.
H. Bushnell, Christ and His Salvation, p. 295.
References: Joh 14:28.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxxi., No. 1871; Ibid., My Sermon Notes: Gospels and Acts, p. 154; Homiletic Magazine, vol. xv., p. 226; T. M. Herbert, Sketches of Sermons, p. 214. Joh 14:30.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. x., p. 330.
Joh 14:30-31
Consider:—
I. Christ as meeting the prince of this world. (1) The prince of this world comes as an accuser. When the willing Surety took our place, and submitted to the treatment which we deserved, the prince of this world could lay nothing to His charge. He could find no fault in Him, either personally or as our substitute, in His character or in His finished work. (2) The prince of this world comes, not only as an accuser, but as a ruler and lord, claiming dominion over all the world. Still, the Lord says, the prince of this world has nothing in Me. He may be this world’s prince, but he is not Mine. I owe him no allegiance; nor can he, by any minister of his, have any power against Me, except it be given him from above. I give no heed to his suggestions or to his threats. It is not his will that I do, but the will of Him who sent Me; and if that will appoint a Cross, better far a Cross from the Father than a hundred crowns from the prince of this world.
II. The Christian as meeting the prince of this world. (1) He comes to accuse. In this matter let the Father alone deal with you, as having something in you. Fall into His hands. Let Christ’s willing endurance of the Father’s righteous sentence of death for sin become yours. Be ye crucified with Christ. Be ye partakers in His passion, in His cross. Let the Father search and judge and condemn you. That sets you free from every other accuser. (2) The prince of this world comes to claim you as subject to himself. But his title is now null and void, for prince of the world though he be, he has no natural, no original, no legitimate right to be your prince. His right can be only a right of conquest on his part, or of consent on your part, or both. But on neither of these grounds has he anything in you now.
R. S. Candlish, The Gospel of Forgiveness, p. 67.
Joh 14:31
Let us go hence. What was He leaving? Whither was He going? He was going to Gethsemane, to the kiss of the traitor; to the tribunals of Caiaphas, Herod, and Pilate; to His shameful and bitter Cross; to the unknown agonies of His last great conflict with the prince of this world. He had a baptism to be baptized with, and He was straitened until it was accomplished.
I. He was impelled by His supreme sense of duty. No self-interest, no sentiment was ever permitted to interfere with this sense of duty. In all truly great lives the sense of duty is dominant. A man who will not, for duty’s sake, do an arduous or unpleasant thing, will neither build up his own moral strength and nobility nor glorify God before men. Had he taken counsel of His own inclinations, He would not have gone from the upper room to Gethsemane, He would not have made men feel the grandeur and sacredness of His Father’s service.
II. Another impulse was to produce the impression of His filial affection. Love is the inspiration of all high duty, for duty is more than the mere sense of right, it is the impulse of sympathy; a thing done with an averted face and a reluctant heart is not duty. Duty, therefore, is more than mere measured service, it is the feeling that prompts us to do all that we can do to accomplish God’s purposes, to satisfy His heart. Our Lord attached great importance to the impression which His love of duty made upon men. He would have the world to see and know His love, because it would inspire love in them. The only talisman of faith is dutiful love. They who worthily love are held and ruled by love; they whose love is weaker than circumstance do not love at all. Be it ours by ever higher duty, by ever growing love, by ever greater work, to make the world know that we love the Master whom we serve. The one supreme question of every servant of Christ is not, What will most conduce to my ease? What will most please my preference? but, What will most glorify Him?
H. Allon, Christian World Pulpit, vol. viii., p. 72.
References: Joh 14:31.—Spurgeon, My Sermon Notes: Gospels and Acts, p. 157; Christian World Pulpit, vol. ix., p. 24; Homiletic Magazine, vol. xvi., p. 225. Joh 15:1—F. D. Maurice, Gospel of St. John, p. 396; C. Stanford, Evening of our Lord’s Ministry, p. 133. Joh 15:1, Joh 15:2.—Philpot, Thursday Penny Pulpit, vol. iv., p. 409. Joh 15:1-4.—A. Mackennal, Christian World Pulpit, vol. viii., p.. 235; Church of England Pulpit, vol. vii., p. 41; vol. xvi., p. 184. Joh 15:1-5.—H. Batchelor, The Incarnation of God, p. 121; D. Fraser, Metaphors of the Gospels, p. 347; Homilist, 2nd series, vol. ii., p. 311; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. i., p. 486. Joh 15:1-6.—R. C. Trench, Studies in the Gospels, p. 283. Joh 15:1-8.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iii., p. 80; W. Roberts, Christian World Pulpit, vol. x., p. 196. Joh 15:1-11.—Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. ii., p. 220. Joh 15:1-17.—A. B. Bruce The Training of the Twelve, p. 415.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
F. W. Grant 1903 · Public Domain On v1 Section 3. (Joh 14:1-31.)
Section 3. (Joh 14:1-31.)
Part with Him: the Father’s House, and the Manifestation of the Father, in the Son and by the Spirit.
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We have now the "part with Him" of which He has already spoken. First its full consummation in the Father’s House, the many abodes in glory, in which we shall dwell with Him. Then we have the present manifestation of the Father to us in Christ Himself, and by the gift of the Holy Spirit: so perfectly are we provided for on our way to that eternal Home. Father, Son, and Spirit are all employed in our behalf, on a path which shines with heavenly light upon it to the perfect day.
1. The Lord exhorts and encourages them in view of His departure from them. He is to be their sufficient resource whatever might be their trouble, as the sure though unseen object for faith, as God was. The Father’s House was before them as before Him, the only full satisfaction for the heart, where rest will be eternal. That was the place to which He was going, and there of necessity His own would be with Him. Would He otherwise have encouraged an intimacy which was to end for ever? would He not have warned them? Ah, He was going up there to love and care for them with the same steadfast care as when on earth, and would prepare a place for them.
Until He finally left it, as rejected by Israel, the temple was for Christ His Father’s House. Now He speaks of another, -that of which Israel’s was but the figure: but therefore naturally using this to illustrate the higher meaning. The "holy places made with hands," says the apostle (Heb 9:23-24) are "figures of the true," "the patterns of things in the heavens." The court of that house with its numerous chambers, in which the priests as they came up for service in their various courses found temporary lodgment, were indeed more a contrast than anything else with the glorious abodes which the Lord speaks of here. These are homes, not mere lodging-places; and in nearer relation to the Divine Father than such outside courts could indicate. The reality transcends all shadows. They who are here provided for are the happy children of One who transcends infinitely all other fathers. And this at once delivers us from the thought which has been attached to the simple language of the blessed Teacher, -as if "many" signified diversity of rank. The whole connection and the terms used are against such an interpretation. In the Father’s House all are children; and all the children are in the nearness of such relationship. It is the fruit of Christ’s work, and not the reward of our own. It ought to be plain at once to every one who knows anything of the place into which divine grace has brought him, that these things cannot be mingled. The apostle’s words clearly state the incompatibility of these two principles: "If by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace, otherwise work is no more work" (Rom 11:6). The principles are incompatible, and in all that the work of Christ has accomplished for us, this needs and owns no help from man. Yet it is quite true that there are rewards, and that divine love will satisfy itself in thus owning all that has been done for love. Mercy will show itself also in this; but how? By cleansing away all that which has been mixed with it, and would make this impossible; and this is what is represented to us in the blood-washed robes of the book of Revelation. The righteousness which we have in Christ, -the best robe in the Father’s House, -can never need such washing; but the robes that are spoken of in this way are the "righteousnesses," or, as the Revised Version has it, "the righteous deeds" of the saints: for the book of Revelation is the book of the Throne, -of government and recompense, and we must not be surprised if we have a very different view of things from that presented in Romans or Galatians.
But the whole context assures us that differences of reward are not in question. The Lord is not telling His disciples that "one star differeth from another star in glory," -it is not indeed glory at all, of which He is speaking; He is comforting their hearts in the thought of His absence, that after all it is only a temporary one, and that the Father’s House to which He is going has room enough for all, and is to receive them all eternally. The issues of responsibility do not come in here, as should be plain, and would only introduce an element of uncertainty where faith needed to have the clearest vision.
He had come amongst men, not merely to do a certain work among them, however great, and to be gone. He was going back; but as a Man, taking back with Him the nature He had assumed to the glory He had left, -the pledge of abiding fellowship with those for whom He now went up to take a place as their Representative before God. The communion to which He had admitted them on earth was there to be continued and perpetuated: if it were not so, He would have told them; He would not have bound their hearts to Himself by that dear, familiar intercourse to which He had encouraged them, if it were to have an end for ever. Not so; if He were going away, it was to prepare a place for them; and He would return again Himself to receive them to Himself, -to welcome them to His own eternal Home. His must be their first, best greeting.
He does not explain how the place in His Father’s House should be prepared for them; nor were they yet, perhaps, able to understand. The epistle to the Hebrews will show us, if we turn to it, that the heavenly places had to be purified by the better sacrifice which He was to offer, in which all the sacrifices of the law would find their fulfilment. Ephesians speaks similarly of the "redemption of the purchased possession;" and Colossians of the reconciliation of things in heaven (Heb. ix-. 23; Eph 1:14; Col 1:20). Such thoughts are, even now, strange to many a Christian; for we are slow to realize the extent of the injury that sin has inflicted, and equally, therefore, the breadth of the application of the work of Christ. This is not the place to enlarge upon it; but it is not difficult to understand that wherever sin has raised question of God, -and it has done so, as we know, in heaven itself, -the work of Christ, as bringing out in full His whole character in love and righteousness regarding that which had raised the question, has enabled Him now to come in and restore, consistently with all that He is, what had been defiled with evil. Thus our High Priest, to use as the apostle does the figures of Israel’s day of atonement, has entered into the sanctuary to reconcile with the virtue of His sacrifice the holy places themselves, and make them accessible to us. Man in Christ has risen to the highest pinnacle of glory with the whole acclaim of heaven; and men redeemed by His blood can be associated with their Lord in glory, "made the (manifested) righteousness of God in Him" (2Co 5:21).
They knew therefore whither He was going; they knew also the way. For they knew in fact more than they realized that they knew. When Thomas, thinking, as it would appear, of a kind of map of the road, which they had not, ventures to object their ignorance of this, the Lord shows him his mistake by assuring him that He Himself was the Way: through Him alone could any come to God. Nor only so; He was also the Truth, -the revelation of God. And since, even so, man was dead and unreceptive of the truth, He was the Life also, which men needed for this reception. The fall treasury for man’s need was here then to be found.
2. Philip’s desire to be shown the Father brings out more fully the witness of the Son to Him. Where Philip was, many are still today. They know Christ as, in a sense, the way to God; but as yet they have not seen the Father in Him: Christ is rather to them a Saviour from God, than the manifestation of God. He is the Doer of the work which the Father, although they call Him this, simply receives. They are shielded from His wrath, but Himself they do not know. They are, in short, where the Israelite was the night of their first passover. Sheltered under the blood of the lamb, yet the wail of judgment was in their ears, and God for them was identified with what in reality is only His strange work,-unknown therefore in what is His true character.
The Lord’s reply to Philip is an expression of pain at his want of apprehension. "Have I been so long time with you, and hast thou not known Me, Philip? He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father, and how sayest thou, Show us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak unto you I speak not from Myself, but the Father who abideth in Me, He doeth the works." His very presence here was to declare the Father, and that after all the Father should not be understood by disciples of His, wounds Him in the deepest way. "Believe Me," He says, "that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me," -that is, that we are thoroughly identified, -"or else believe Me for the very works’ sake." It is a tender but sad rebuke. Had Philip indeed not known that He was on the Father’s mission? that He was Himself the Love-gift of God? But we are even less excusable, if now we know not. What, is the Father righteousness merely, and only the Son love? are there two Gods, or One Only God? If we have indeed come to Christ, we have not to go a further journey to reach the Father, but have got the very depth of the Father’s heart told out. This is, as we have seen from the beginning, the constant theme in John. And oh, what a marvellous joy in simplicity of faith to take it in! Philip was right at least in saying, "It sufficeth us"; and nothing short of this can possibly suffice us.
And the Lord adds to this, that because He was going to the Father, in testimony of the Father’s delight in that glorious work achieved, even these poor disciples of His should do greater works than He Himself had done. The thousands converted at Pentecost, compared with the "labor for nought" of which He complains through Isaiah as characterizing His own life-toil, already illustrate this; while beyond lay that Gentile harvest which, even while Israel was reaping the fruit of her rejection of Him, would anticipate the final world-harvest. These things are, no doubt, the " greater works," while the miracles that He did His disciples also did, even to the raising of the dead, the healing by the shadow of Peter, or the communication of curative power to handkerchiefs or aprons by the body of Paul. This was still the Son’s own work, all things being put into His hand as the Fulfiller of the Father’s purpose, and received by Him to glorify the Father in the accomplishment of His blessed will. Whatever therefore they should for this end in His Name ask of the Father, He, the Son, would do it; that in the Son the Father might be glorified. And He repeats again, to emphasize it, "If ye shall ask anything in My Name, I will do it."
This is indeed a large enough assurance. It is guarded and made right by the controlling purpose. He who is possessed by the desire that God may be glorified has in this assurance a wondrous possibility before him of successful prayer. Such a desire, just as it is whole-hearted, will clear the sight, and enable for such prayer as can be answered, -will lift up the heart with confidence to God.
We are taught by all this what praying in Christ’s Name is: -that it is not a mere putting His Name at the end of one’s prayer. It means that we are identifying ourselves in faith with Him who seeks ever the fulfilment of the divine purposes. How impossible to ask truly in Christ’s Name that we may obtain the satisfaction of mere selfish cravings! And yet what confidence does it give, that in proportion as our desire is to fill aright the place which He has given us as His representatives upon earth, we may have all that we can possibly need to accomplish this. Here there need be no stinted expectation: here is a sphere in which coveting is fully in place. Alas, how we practise humility after the fashion of Ahaz, who, where God had bidden him make request according to His own greatness, assumes the garb of a piety which he does not possess, and says, "I will not ask, neither will I tempt the Lord." And how often do we remain content with a mere scanty pittance of spiritual good, when God has blessed us with "all spiritual blessings in Christ Jesus," -when He is glorified in our practical possession of them, -and when He has said to us, "Covet earnestly the best gifts," and, "Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it."
3. The Lord now proceeds to speak of the provision made for them, that they might not be left as orphans in the world in the time of His absence from them, but have Him manifested to them, and realize His presence with them in a better and higher way than even when He was with them upon earth. We have already been told of, that gift of the Spirit which they that believed on Him were to receive in a new way after Jesus should be glorified (Joh 7:35). But now the Lord teaches them distinctly that the Spirit is personally to come and take the place that He had filled among them. As the Spirit of truth He would lead them into all truth, giving them the full consciousness of their identification with Him and His with them. He would not leave them, but abide with them for ever. This is indeed the great characteristic of the time in which we live, that while Christ is above on high, our Advocate with the Father, we have "another Advocate" down here, -another glorious Person to take up our cause on earth, and be in us such power as Christ is for us at the right hand of God. Thus indeed is our weakness and emptiness ministered to by divine and perfect fulness and strength. How wondrous is this provision made for us! and what a testimony to the value of the work which has been accomplished for us! This divine Person comes to make us, -our very bodies, -His dwelling-place, -His temple. Yet we are fully conscious that evil also dwells in us: and thus there arises the very serious question, How can the Spirit of God dwell in such an abode? And this is the argument in some forms of perfectionism, -Christ and Belial, it is urged, cannot dwell in the same temple. Certainly the temple cannot be Belial’s and yet Christ’s; but how God could dwell in the midst of a sinful people was the lesson of the day of atonement in the old dispensation: "And (the priest) shall make an atonement for the holy place, because of the uncleanness of the children of Israel, and because of their transgressions in all their sins: and so shall he do for the tabernacle of the congregation, that remaineth among them in the midst of their uncleanness" (Lev 16:16).
For us the blessed work is accomplished of which Israel’s sacrifices were but the mere figure, and it is in Christ that the believer is seen and accepted. The Spirit indwelling is the witness of the perfection of that offering which has "perfected for ever" -or, "in perpetuity" -"them that are sanctified" (Heb 10:14). The right word here is "in perpetuity," -which assures us that at no time -not for a moment -is the believer other than perfect before the eye of God, and that upon ground entirely irrespective of his personal behavior. With the Father -as such -it is very different: "the Father, without respect of persons, judgeth according to every man’s work" (1Pe 1:17). But as between God and His creature all is once for all settled, and to take account of sin there would be to dishonor the covering blood. Thus "if any one sin," says the apostle, writing to Christians, "we have an Advocate with the Father, -Jesus Christ the righteous" (1Jn 2:1). The relationship in which we stand to God is not, and cannot be changed by that which yet becomes more evil in view of it. The Father’s character is outraged by the ill-conduct of those who are of His family, and the Father’s heart is wounded in the same proportion. His provision of atonement for it cannot make it less serious in His sight: the Cross has only revealed it in its abyss of horror.
The Lord’s title in this passage is the same as that which in the Gospel He gives to the Spirit. In the common version: it is translated "Comforter," and is quite capable -of such a meaning; but when He says, "another Comforter" he is comparing the Spirit with Himself. The word in these two applications must therefore be rendered uniformly, and "Advocate" is perhaps its best, as it is its most usual rendering. Literally it means "one called to one’s side," -a helper, assistant; thence, an advocate, a legal assistant, in whose hands you leave your case. The Lord is He to whom God has committed His people, -on earth the true and faithful Shepherd of the sheep, who laid down His life for them. Now going on high, He still maintains in glory the same care over His Bock; and thus their stumblings and wanderings engage Him still in their be half. He is their Advocate with the Father -not because the Father Himself can fail in either love or power, but as the One who has had committed to Him the burden of them all. To Him they were left in the conflict of the Cross: His hand is to bring them through to glory.
Yet on earth, He having gone from it, they are to have another Advocate, the Holy Spirit; from the beginning the Worker in God’s creation and then in His new creation work. The communication of life, the whole work of sanctification, the resurrection of the dead, is His to carry into effect; and this through all dispensations. But this very fact, while it suits well the nature of the place which He has come to fill, shows at the same time that the place itself must imply something other than the work that He has always done. He has come to form and indwell the House of God on earth, and to make the saints individually His living temples. He has come to unite the people of Christ to Himself in heaven, and thus to form also the Body of Christ, with destinies of wondrous blessedness. All this will only open up by degrees, John himself never speaking of the Church, but of the family of God, -of the life therefore which makes men His children. But that this also may have its full character, the Spirit of God must come: in this way the Lord now proceeds to speak of Him.
It is noticeable that it is to disciples who out of love to Him, and not in a spirit of legality, are seeking to keep His commandments, that the Lord promises the gift of the Holy Spirit. If the Spirit be come to dwell in us, the first requisite is readiness of obedience. Wondrous are the possibilities held out to us in this marvellous gift; but marvellous also is the possibility we have of belittling even a gift like this. The Galatians had it, who were giving up the gospel for the law. The Corinthians had it, who were carnal, and walked as men. It belongs to the mystery of our nature that we may have as though we had not. It belongs to the royalty of it that we may debase ourselves. Stranger still is it that the children of this world may be wiser in their generation than the children of light, and that the Lord should even have to put this as if a characteristic thing. Were we not unfaithful to ourselves and to God, how would the world be lighted up with the reflection of the glory that is in the unveiled face of Jesus! how we should go through the world as visitants from another sphere! Thus we need not wonder that the Lord should almost seem to put it as if the gift of the Spirit were dependent upon the reality of one’s obedience. What! can we have God in us, and entertain Him so poorly? Nothing could make such a thing credible but the sad experience of so lamentable a fact. Yes, men who KNOW that Christ has died for them, -who KNOW that the Spirit of God dwells in them, -who KNOW that God’s way is the only way of peace and joy and power, -can yet live and act as if nothing of all this were true. We can give up certainties of blessing for certainties of spiritual loss! Who can enough bewail the misery of such unaccountable folly?
Let us learn now from the Lord’s lips what this gift is of which He is speaking to us; the fruit of the Son’s entreaty with the Father, a divine Person with us, -in us, -never to leave us more! One who with perfect wisdom, perfect love, and perfect power, takes our case into His hand, leaving us nothing to do but to walk with Him in restful confidence and certainty of unfailing good. Yet not to be led blindly, or without exercise, but as one being trained in communion with the divine thoughts and affections, for eternal fellowship with the Father and the Son!
This Spirit is the "Spirit of truth:" the false halo of Satan’s lure thrown over things, the mirage of the desert, is to depart; not to leave one with a mere sombre shadow in its place, but to substitute for it the true yet transfiguring light of an opened heaven, beckoning, -inviting us to the abodes of the Father’s House, -the glory Of God! Darkness there is still remaining,but it is passing away, as the apostle says, and the true light already shines (1Jn 2:8).
For the Spirit of truth is now to utter the "many things" of which the heart of Christ has long been full, but as yet unable to relieve itself; for there were none able to bear the things to be spoken. Think of it! all this is uttered now, to the very last we are to have of revelation; and the Revealer Himself is with us, to give spiritual capacity for its reception. The light is now come to illumine all the ages past with the glory of the ages still to come! light that is its own convincing witness to the soul flooded with its brilliance. Yet the world, alas! cannot receive the Spirit. It has rejected the Word manifest in flesh, and will not receive One whom it cannot see: "it beholdeth Him not, nor knoweth Him." But receptive, obedient souls have good cause to know Him: "for He dwelleth with you," -as Christ had dwelt with them; but there was to be au intimacy even beyond this; -"He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you." This was to be the new blessedness, -God no more dwelling in temples made with hands, but man to be His temple.
After this manner then, Christ would still be with them; they were not to be orphans, left to the helplessness that His very presence had discovered to them. The Spirit would be for them the conscious link with the unseen but unforgetting Saviour. While the world would behold Him no more, they would still behold Him, with whose triumphant life in glory their life was bound up. This identification in life with Him is the connecting link with Paul’s doctrine afterward, who developer from it the whole truth of Christian standing as we find it in Romans and Ephesians; as upon the basis of the Spirit’s indwelling he builds the truth of the Church as the Body of Christ. If Luke in some sense approach nearest to Paul’s gospel, as is so often, and not without cause, insisted on, yet John is most nearly related to him with respect to all his higher truths of Christian position. This we shall see better, if the Lord permit us to go on to the Epistles; but it should not be hard to realize already. So directly He assures us here: "At that day ye shall know that I am in My Father, and ye in Me, and I in you." We shall be better able, however, to apprehend the meaning of this when we come to His own development of it in the next section.
The Lord goes on to show that this manifestation of Himself will be necessarily dependent on, and therefore proportionate to the opening of the heart to receive it. The heart for Christ moreover is indicated not so much by emotional sensitiveness as by the spirit of obedience which has itself also higher or lower grades which require careful noting, though in themselves quite easy to be apprehended. In his first epistle John emphasizes the same thing. The apostle of love is careful to insist that the love of which he speaks is liable to very grave mistakes in men’s estimate of it. It is not so simple as it would appear, to make the estimate. You have to distinguish between sentiment and practical reality; -the world in general easily does this; -and then you have to distinguish, as the world can scarcely do, between the mere human quality and the divine. Thus love with John is characterized especially as love, not of men in general, but of the brethren: for he that loveth Him that begat loveth them also that are begotten of Him. And again, as here, it is love that keeps His commandments: for "this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments."
So the Lord says: "He that hath My commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me; and he that loveth Me shall be loved of My Father, and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him." Here evidently, though a man have the Spirit, the fruits of the Spirit will be found only in the way of practical obedience. How else could we expect them? Can we think that God would comfort His people in paths of disobedience? That would be unholiness, and abhorrent. to His very nature. No: love itself must walk contrary to us, if we will walk contrary: "he that spareth his rod hateth his son; but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes" (Pro 13:24).
The question of Judas (the Lebbaeus of Matthew, and brother of James the son of Alphaeus), -although the Lord seems not to have distinctly answered it, -brings out the further assurance, "If any one love Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him, and make our abode with him."
This statement might appear at first sight to be only the equivalent of the former one; although it is plain that the latter is more emphatic. In each case it is the character of true love of which the Lord is speaking; and indeed it seems as if He would not suppose in His disciples a love less than such as He is speaking of. John follows his Master’s style, when he bursts out in his impassioned way when speaking of the Lord, (which yet is truer than the most rigorous induction of facts could suggest) "he that sinneth hath not seen Him, neither known Him." It is the only thing to be said, to speak worthily; and he that falsifies it is in that measure not a true witness to his Saviour-Lord.
True also it is, that something of both characters of love, as Christ affirms them, will be found in all true Christians, -overborne so much by contrary influences that like Peter in the high priest’s palace, only He who knoweth all things can detect the true disciple underneath the false. There is the false within us all, as well as the true; alas, in many, so often uppermost. The results cannot fail to follow: the blessing of which the Lord speaks attaches to that with which He here connects it. We find it in proportion as we answer to the character.
Looked at in this way, there is no difficulty in seeing the deeper nature of a love that keeps Christ’s word, as compared with that which keeps commandments only. Not to keep a positive command is simple, rank rebellion, -nothing less. His "word" is wider, while it addresses itself with less positiveness of authority to the one whose heart and conscience are less prompt to the appeal of love. And the largeness of Christ’s word involves for keeping it an habitual searching into it, with more than readiness to face all that may be thus discovered. Is it not to be feared that there are many who shrink from honest investigation of the Word, because they do not want to be "troubled" with such and such questions? Nay, is not this one of the commonest causes of the sad ignorance which is found so widely prevalent with regard to it? But were ignorance an excuse, and we were so unhappy as to desire one, it is plain that the deeper the ignorance the better off we should be; and the dullest searcher would be the most blameless also!
But how the Lord delights in the one who with a true spirit of obedience welcomes the light of divine truth without any reserve or qualification whatever! Not only will He manifest Himself to him, but "My Father will love him, and We will come and make our abode with him." How much fuller and more permanent is the blessing here! To the two at Emmaus the Lord manifested Himself; but there was no tarrying of that coveted blessing. And how many of us are in like condition! Transient gleams there are of a glory that abides not, and which leaves the soul burning but mourning after it. But there is something more than this in our Lord’s words here. "We will come," He says, "and make our abode with him." The result will be to manifest the competence of Scripture for the "man of God," to whom alone it is pledged as competent, -"able to furnish thoroughly unto all good works." Who is the man of God, but he who is out and out for God? and who else can expect to be furnished in this way, but he who is honestly intentioned to use his knowledge as before Him who gave it? The very passage which we are quoting here reminds us of where the profit is to be found: "all Scripture is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness." If we do not mean to accept the reproof and the correction, where is the use of talking about the rest?
In God’s ordered path alone can we find God. In His marked out way it would be impossible not to find Him.
"He that loveth Me not keepeth not My words:" here only is the decisive test. Feeling is right, but too sensitive to external influences to be a safe gauge of the man proper. The truest love is shy and sensitive to self-inquiry. Under its influence we are more apt to challenge and accuse ourselves than to congratulate. Nor need we this introspection: let us walk only in His ways, and we shall find the Lord’s own acknowledgement. We shall find Him walking and talking with us, as has been always His manner with His own: we shall find Him treating us as those of whom He is not ashamed.
And this is communion with the Father and the Son: "for the word which ye hear is not Mine," -not simply Mine, -"but My Father’s who sent Me."
And now they were to receive the full revelation: the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, -sent too from the Father as He had been, but now in His Name which covered all of blessing for them, -He would teach them all things: leading them on, as well as reviving and giving them the full value of all that they had heard with Him. The effect for them would be peace in the heart, even as the legacy of His death was peace in the conscience. They would have the peace He Himself enjoyed, -the result of that unbroken communion in which He walked with God. For us it is restlessness of will disturbs this, -the strife with His will which this means, and the dissatisfaction of soul which follows every gain we may seem to make in this direction. Desiring but His will, there can be no proper doubt as to the issue.
That is as sure as it will be blessed; and thus the true remedy for fear is found.
4. Now they should be able to face the fact of His departure which they knew to be but for a time. Nay, they should, if they loved Him, be able to rejoice. that He was going to the Father, -back to Him who abode in that exaltation which He, on His errand of love, had given up. Yet it would bring to an end for the time the intercourse that He had had with them. Nor was the world a place in which this could continue. The world! -its prince was coming; how different from Himself, its rightful Prince! Nay, there was nothing in common between them: the prince of the world had nothing in Him! Yet to the world He was giving proof, in that through which He was thus to pass, of His love to the Father. But the world being what it was, He was leaving it; and for those that were His also, it was no tarrying place: "Arise," He says, "let us go hence."
F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 12, 15, 16, 18, 20, 22, 25, 27, 28, 30
John
FAITH IN GOD AND CHRIST
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Joh 14:1.
The twelve were sitting in the upper chamber, stupefied with the dreary, half-understood prospect of Christ’s departure. He, forgetting His own burden, turns to comfort and encourage them. These sweet and great words most singularly blend gentleness and dignity. Who can reproduce the cadence of soothing tenderness, soft as a mother’s hand, in that ‘Let not your heart be troubled’? And who can fail to feel the tone of majesty in that ‘Believe in God, believe also in Me’?
The Greek presents an ambiguity in the latter half of the verse, for the verb may be either indicative or imperative, and so we may read four different ways, according as we render each of the two ‘believes’ in either of these two fashions. Our Authorised and Revised Versions concur in adopting the indicative ‘Ye believe’ in the former clause and the imperative in the latter. But I venture to think that we get a more true and appropriate meaning if we keep both clauses in the same mood, and read them both as imperatives: ‘Believe in God, believe also in Me.’ It would be harsh, I think, to take one as an affirmation and the other as a command. It would be irrelevant, I think, to remind the disciples of their belief in God. It would break the unity of the verse and destroy the relation of the latter half to the former, the former being a negative precept: ‘Let not your heart be troubled’; and the latter being a positive one: ‘Instead of being troubled, believe in God, and believe in Me.’ So, for all these reasons, I venture to adopt the reading I have indicated.
I. Now in these words the first thing that strikes me is that Christ here points to Himself as the object of precisely the same religious trust which is to be given to God.
It is only our familiarity with these words that blinds us to their wonderfulness and their greatness. Try to hear them for the first time, and to bring into remembrance the circumstances in which they were spoken. Here is a man sitting among a handful of His friends, who is within four-and-twenty hours of a shameful death, which to all appearance was the utter annihilation of all His claims and hopes, and He says, ‘Trust in God, and trust in Me’! I think that if we had heard that for the first time, we should have understood a little better than some of us do the depth of its meaning.
What is it that Christ asks for here? Or rather let me say, What is it that Christ offers to us here? For we must not look at the words as a demand or as a command, but rather as a merciful invitation to do what it is life and blessing to do. It is a very low and inadequate interpretation of these words which takes them as meaning little more than ‘Believe in God, believe that He is; believe in Me, believe that I am.’ But it is scarcely less so to suppose that the mere assent of the understanding to His teaching is all that Christ is asking for here. By no means; what He invites us to goes a great deal deeper than that. The essence of it is an act of the will and of the heart, not of the understanding at all. A man may believe in Him as a historical person, may accept all that is said about Him here, and yet not be within sight of the trust in Him of which He here speaks. For the essence of the whole is not the intellectual process of assent to a proposition, but the intensely personal act of yielding up will and heart to a living person. Faith does not grasp a doctrine, but a heart. The trust which Christ requires is the bond that unites souls with Him; and the very life of it is entire committal of myself to Him in all my relations and for all my needs, and absolute utter confidence in Him as all-sufficient for everything that I can require. Let us get away from the cold intellectualism of ‘belief’ into the warm atmosphere of ‘trust,’ and we shall understand better than by many volumes what Christ here means and the sphere and the power and the blessedness of that faith which Christ requires.
Further, note that, whatever may be this believing in Him which He asks from us or invites us to render, it is precisely the same thing which He bids us render to God. The two clauses in the original bring out that idea even more vividly than in our version, because the order of the words in the latter clause is inverted; and they read literally thus: ‘Believe in God, in Me also believe.’ The purpose of the inversion is to put these two, God and Christ, as close together as possible; and to put the two identical emotions at the beginning and at the end, at the two extremes and outsides of the whole sentence. Could language be more deliberately adopted and moulded, even in its consecution and arrangement, to enforce this thought, that whatever it is that we give to Christ, it is the very same thing that we give to God? And so He here proposes Himself as the worthy and adequate recipient of all these emotions of confidence, submission, resignation, which make up religion in its deepest sense.
That tone is by no means singular in this place. It is the uniform tone and characteristic of our Lord’s teaching. Let me remind you just in a sentence of one or two instances. What did He think of Himself who stood up before the world and, with arms outstretched, like that great white Christ in Thorwaldsen’s lovely statue, said to all the troop of languid and burdened and fatigued ones crowding at His feet: ‘Come unto Me all ye that are weary and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest’? That surely is a divine prerogative. What did He think of Himself who said, ‘All men should honour the Son even as they honour the Father’? What did He think of Himself who, in that very Sermon on the Mount {to which the advocates of a maimed and mutilated Christianity tell us they pin their faith, instead of to mystical doctrines} declared that He Himself was the Judge of humanity, and that all men should stand at His bar and receive from Him ‘according to the deeds done in their body’? Upon any honest principle of interpreting these Gospels, and unless you avowedly go picking and choosing amongst His words, accepting this and rejecting that, you cannot eliminate from the scriptural representation of Jesus Christ the fact that He claimed as His own the emotions of the heart to which only God has a right and only God can satisfy.
I do not dwell upon that point, but I say, in one sentence, we have to take that into account if we would estimate the character of Jesus Christ as a Teacher and as a Man. I would not turn away from Him any imperfect conceptions, as they seem to me, of His nature and His work-rather would I foster them, and lead them on to a fuller recognition of the full Christ-but this I am bound to say, that for my part I believe that nothing but the wildest caprice, dealing with the Gospels according to one’s own subjective fancies, irrespective altogether of the evidence, can strike out from the teaching of Christ this its characteristic difference. What signalises Him, and separates Him from all other religious teachers, is not the clearness or the tenderness with which He reiterated the truths about the divine Father’s love, or about morality, and justice, and truth, and goodness; but the peculiarity of His call to the world is, ‘Believe in Me.’ And if He said that, or anything like it, and if the representations of His teaching in these four Gospels, which are the only source from which we get any notion of Him at all, are to be accepted, why, then, one of two things follows. Either He was wrong, and then He was a crazy enthusiast, only acquitted of blasphemy because convicted of insanity; or else-or else-He was ‘God, manifest in the flesh.’ It is vain to bow down before a fancy portrait of a bit of Christ, and to exalt the humble sage of Nazareth, and to leave out the very thing that makes the difference between Him and all others, namely, these either audacious or most true claims to be the Son of God, the worthy Recipient and the adequate Object of man’s religious emotions. ‘Believe in God, in Me also believe.’
II. Now, secondly, notice that faith in Christ and faith in God are not two, but one.
These two clauses on the surface present juxtaposition. Looked at more closely they present interpenetration and identity. Jesus Christ does not merely set Himself up by the side of God, nor are we worshippers of two Gods when we bow before Jesus and bow before the Father; but faith in Christ is faith in God, and faith in God which is not faith in Christ is imperfect, incomplete, and will not long last. To trust in Him is to trust in the Father; to trust in the Father is to trust in Him.
What is the underlying truth that is here? How comes it that these two objects blend into one, like two figures in a stereoscope; and that the faith which flows to Jesus Christ rests upon God? This is the underlying truth, that Jesus Christ, Himself divine, is the divine Revealer of God. I need not dwell upon the latter of these two thoughts: how there is no real knowledge of the real God in the depth of His love, the tenderness of His nature or the lustrousness of His holiness; how there is no certitude; how the God that we see outside of Jesus Christ is sometimes doubt, sometimes hope, sometimes fear, always far-off and vague, an abstraction rather than a person, ‘a stream of tendency’ without us, that which is unnameable, and the like. I need not dwell upon the thought that Jesus Christ has showed us a Father, has brought a God to our hearts whom we can love, whom we can know really though not fully, of whom we can be sure with a certitude which is as deep as the certitude of our own personal being; that He has brought to us a God before whom we do not need to crouch far off, that He has brought to us a God whom we can trust. Very significant is it that Christianity alone puts the very heart of religion in the act of trust. Other religions put it in dread, worship, service, and the like. Jesus Christ alone says, the bond between men and God is that blessed one of trust. And He says so because He alone brings us a God whom it is not ridiculous to tell men to trust.
And, on the other hand, the truth that underlies this is not only that Jesus Christ is the Revealer of God, but that He Himself is divine. Light shines through a window, but the light and the glass that makes it visible have nothing in common with one another. The Godhead shines through Christ, but He is not a mere transparent medium. It is Himself that He is showing us when He is showing us God. ‘He that hath seen Me hath seen’-not the light that streams through Me-but ‘hath seen,’ in Me, ‘the Father.’ And because He is Himself divine and the divine Revealer, therefore the faith that grasps Him is inseparably one with the faith that grasps God. Men could look upon a Moses, an Isaiah, or a Paul, and in them recognise the eradiation of the divinity that imparted itself through them, but the medium was forgotten in proportion as that which it revealed was beheld. You cannot forget Christ in order to see God more clearly, but to behold Him is to behold God.
And if that be true, these two things follow. One is that all imperfect revelation of God is prophetic of, and leads up towards, the perfect revelation in Jesus Christ. The writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews gives that truth in a very striking fashion. He compares all other means of knowing God to fragmentary syllables of a great word, of which one was given to one man and another to another. God ‘spoke at sundry times and in manifold portions to the fathers by the prophets’; but the whole word is articulately uttered by the Son, in whom He has ‘spoken unto us in these last times.’ The imperfect revelation, by means of those who were merely mediums for the revelation leads up to Him who is Himself the Revelation, the Revealer, and the Revealed.
And in like manner, all the imperfect faith that, laying hold of other fragmentary means of knowing God, has tremulously tried to trust Him, finds its climax and consummate flower in the full-blossomed faith that lays hold upon Jesus Christ. The unconscious prophecies of heathendom; the trust that select souls up and down the world have put in One whom they dimly apprehended; the faith of the Old Testament saints; the rudimentary beginnings of a knowledge of God and of a trust in Him which are found in men to-day, and amongst us, outside of the circle of Christianity-all these things are as manifestly incomplete as a building reared half its height, and waiting for the corner-stone to be brought forth, the full revelation of God in Jesus Christ, and the intelligent and full acceptance of Him and faith in Him.
And another thing is true, that without faith in Christ such faith in God as is possible is feeble, incomplete, and will not long last. Historically a pure theism is all but impotent. There is only one example of it on a large scale in the world, and that is a kind of bastard Christianity-Mohammedanism; and we all know what good that is as a religion. There are plenty of people amongst us nowadays who claim to be very advanced thinkers, and who call themselves Theists, and not Christians. Well, I venture to say that that is a phase that will not last. There is little substance in it. The God whom men know outside of Jesus Christ is a poor, nebulous thing; an idea, not a reality. He, or rather It, is a film of cloud shaped into a vague form, through which you can see the stars. It has little power to restrain. It has less to inspire and impel. It has still less to comfort; it has least of all to satisfy the heart. You will have to get something more substantial than the far-off god of an unchristian Theism if you mean to sway the world and to satisfy men’s hearts.
And so, dear brethren, I come to this-perhaps the word may be fitting for some that listen to me-’Believe in God,’ and that you may, ‘believe also in Christ.’ For sure I am that when the stress comes, and you want a god, unless your god is the God revealed in Jesus Christ, he will be a powerless deity. If you have not faith in Christ, you will not long have faith in God that is vital and worth anything.
III. Lastly, this trust in Christ is the secret of a quiet heart.
It is of no use to say to men, ‘Let not your hearts be troubled,’ unless you finish the verse and say, ‘Believe in God, believe also in Christ.’ For unless we trust we shall certainly be troubled. The state of man in this world is like that of some of those sunny islands in southern seas, around which there often rave the wildest cyclones, and which carry in their bosoms, beneath all their riotous luxuriance of verdant beauty, hidden fires, which ever and anon shake the solid earth and spread destruction. Storms without and earthquakes within-that is the condition of humanity. And where is the ‘rest’ to come from? All other defences are weak and poor. We have heard about ‘pills against earthquakes.’ That is what the comforts and tranquillising which the world supplies may fairly be likened to. Unless we trust we are, and we shall be, and should be, ‘troubled.’
If we trust we may be quiet. Trust is always tranquillity. To cast a burden off myself on others’ shoulders is always a rest. But trust in Jesus Christ brings infinitude on my side. Submission is repose. When we cease to kick against the pricks they cease to prick and wound us. Trust opens the heart, like the windows of the Ark tossing upon the black and fatal flood, for the entrance of the peaceful dove with the olive branch in its mouth. Trust brings Christ to my side in all His tenderness and greatness and sweetness. If I trust, ‘all is right that seems most wrong.’ If I trust, conscience is quiet. If I trust, life becomes ‘a solemn scorn of ills.’ If I trust, inward unrest is changed into tranquillity, and mad passions are cast out from him that sits ‘clothed and in his right mind’ at the feet of Jesus.
‘The wicked is like the troubled sea which cannot rest.’ But if I trust, my soul will become like the glassy ocean when all the storms sleep, and ‘birds of peace sit brooding on the charmed wave.’ ‘Peace I leave with you.’ ‘Let not your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in Me.’
Help us, O Lord! to yield our hearts to Thy dear Son, and in Him to find Thyself and eternal rest.
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain On v1 The Comforter
The Comforter
1-31. The mansions in heaven. The mission of the Comforter. This great discourse, which is not easily susceptible of formal subdivision, deals with five main subjects: (1) the heavenly mansions; (2) Christ as the Way to the Father; (3) the mutual indwelling of the Father in the Son, and of the Son in the Father; (4) the efficacy of prayer through Christ; (5) the mission of the Comforter.
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Some scholars think that a displacement has occurred in the farewell discourses, and particularly that this c, which seems to conclude Christ's words to His disciples, originally stood between John 16, 17.
1. 'Be not disquieted at My departure (see Joh_13:36). Have faith that I have the power to fulfil the promises that I now make to you.'
2. My Father's house] i.e. heaven. Many mansions] RM 'abiding-places.' There are various degrees of glory in heaven, and various employments, suitable to the desert and capacity of each (Luk_19:16-26, etc.). The word used, which sometimes denotes a place of refreshment for travellers, is thought by Westcott to suggest that heaven is a state of continual progress, but this is unlikely.
3. I will come again] viz. at the end of the world.
4. 'You know whither I go, viz. to My Father in heaven; and you know how you also may follow Me, viz. by believing in Me.' But the RV has simply, 'And whither I go, ye know the way.'
5. Thomas] For the character of Thomas see Joh_11:16; Joh_20:25. Thomas expected an immediate manifestation of the Messianic kingdom on earth, and this prevented him from understanding Jesus.
6, 7. 'The Kingdom which I have come to reveal is not an earthly one; the mansions of which I have spoken are in heaven, not on earth. To share in My Kingdom, is to share that state of exalted and blissful communion with the Father, which is not possible on earth. I depart to heaven, to enter into that state of bliss; and you may follow and enjoy it too, if you will have faith in Me as the one mediator between God and man (the Way), the one teacher authorised to reveal the things of God (the Truth), and the one author of spiritual as of natural life (the Life).'
6. No man] It is important to remember that pious heathen, who have never heard of Christ, may and do find acceptance with God, through Him, whom, if they had known, they would have accepted as their Redeemer (Rom_2:14-16).
7. Have seen him] not in His absolute nature, which is invisible (Joh_1:18), but in His character, which is revealed in My Person: see Joh_6:46, and Joh_14:9 below.
8. Philip desired to see the eternal invisible Father as a distinct being beside the Son. He wished for a visible Theophany: cp. Exo_24:10.
10. See on Joh_10:38.
11. Cp. Joh_10:38; Joh_15:24.
12. Greater ivories] The Apostles' work was more effectual than that of Christ Himself, because they were inspired by the Spirit of the Risen and Ascended Lord. Not till Christ had departed to the Father could the Spirit be fully given. 13. Not only is Christian prayer to be offered in the name of (i.e. invoking the mediation of) the Son, but even answers to prayer are given through the Son, that the same honour may be accorded to the Son as to the Father. Whatsoever] cp. Joh_15:16; Joh_16:23, Joh_16:24. The limitations to be understood are that the petitioner must ask in faith (Mat_21:22), be in charity with his neighbours (Mat_6:14), and habitually keep God's commandments (1Jn_3:22).
14. Here, according to the reading of the RY, Christ teaches the disciples to pray directly to Himself, as well as to the Father in His Name. Examples of prayer to Christ are Act_7:59; Act_9:14, Act_9:21; 1Co_1:2.
16. Another Comforter] RM 'Advocate,' or, 'Helper.' Attractive, and suitable to the context, as the rendering 'Comforter' is, there can be little doubt that the true meaning of the Gk. Paracletos is 'Advocate.' The Holy Spirit is represented as Christ's Representative on earth, carrying on His work, and inspiring and strengthening His disciples to fulfil their vocation. As Christ's 'Advocate' he pleads Christ's cause in the hearts of the disciples, and appeals also to the better conscience of 'the world,' convicting the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment (Joh_16:8). He inspires believers with the spirit of prayer, and, when they pray, 'Himself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered' (Rom_8:26-27). To His guidance the disciples are to resign themselves with implicit confidence, for He is the Spirit of Truth. He guides, not so much as an external authority, as an inward light shining in the heart—an interior monitor regulating the secret springs of character. In His coming, Christ also returns to earth, to dwell in the hearts of believers by faith; but yet He must not be altogether identified with Christ, for He is 'another' Comforter. The functions of the Comforter sufficiently attest His divinity.
17. Spirit of truth] He inspires what is good and true in conduct, and reveals what is good and true in doctrine. The world, etc.] The experience of the Spirit is inward and spiritual: this the world cannot grasp. Dwelleth with you] viz. externally, by His presence in the Church. And shall be in you] as an inward principle, sanctifying, inspiring, guiding, and filling you with peace and joy.
18. Comfortless] lit. 'orphans.' I will come to you] invisibly and spiritually in the coming of the Spirit.
19. But ye see me] i.e. shall see Me, literally during the forty days, spiritually after Pentecost, when you shall enjoy communion with Me so deep and satisfying, that it will be better than sight. Because I live] 'because I live' for evermore, 'and ye shall live' (RM) spiritually in Me. 20. At that day (i.e. after Pentecost) ye shall know by spiritual experience that I am in my Father, and ye in me] So close is the spiritual union between Christ and believers, that He compares it with the mutual indwelling of the Father and the Son.
22. Judas] called Thaddæus or Lebbæus (Mat_10:3), is not the same as Jude the Lord's brother. He thought that Jesus was about to establish an earthly kingdom, and therefore to manifest Himself to the world. 23. Jesus, by adding that the Father also will come to believers, shows more clearly that it is a spiritual manifestation of which He is speaking, and that only to those who love Jesus, can the manifestation be made. We will come] Where the Son is, there of necessity is the Father also, as well as the Spirit, for the Three are One, being different forms of the subsistence and manifestation of the same Divine Being. This passage illustrates the doctrine that the Persons of the Holy Trinity are inseparable, and contain one another. The technical word is perichorçsis (Gk.), or 'circumincessio' (circuminsessid), Lat. See on Joh_10:38.
26. In my name] i.e. as My full Representative, endowed with all My powers, and with a mission to promote My cause in the world.
He (masculine, to show the Spirit's personality) shall teach you all things] i.e. all saving truth, which it is necessary for you and your successors to know. Those who would confine the Christian religion to the words of Christ recorded in the Gospels, are here reproved.
Bring all things] The Spirit would awaken the words of Christ which lay like slumbering germs in the minds of the disciples, and cause them to germinate and bear fruit after many days. Of this process St. John's Gospel itself is the most striking example.
27. Peace] more exactly defined as 'My Peace,' is the peace of reconciliation with God through the Death of Christ. Not as the world giveth] This peace is not mere earthly joy and prosperity: it is a removal of all elements of discord from the soul.
28. And come again] i.e. in the coming of the Spirit.
For my Father is greater than I] 'Rejoice that I go to My Father, for it is good both for Me and for you. He will exalt Me to supreme authority over the universe, enable Me to dispense the Holy Spirit, and cause My work to prosper in your hands.' When Christ said 'My Father is greater than I,' He was probably thinking of the humiliation of His earthly life, and of His created human nature ('equal to the Father as touching His Godhead, and inferior to the Father as touching His manhood'); yet there is a sense in which even the eternal Son, as being begotten, is inferior to the Father.
30. Hereafter, etc.] rather, 'No longer will I speak much with you,' because time will not allow it. The prince] i.e. Satan, who, through the powers that be, works his will on Jesus: cp. Joh_12:31. Hath nothing in me] i.e. hath no power over the Sinless One.
31. But I go forth to meet My death that the world may know, etc. Arise, let us go hence] On account of these words, some plausibly (but without sufficient authority), wish to place this chapter after John 16. The discourses which follow (John 15, 16, 17) were delivered either (1) standing at the table before departing, or (2) in the Temple, or (3) in some retired place in Jerusalem, or (4) on the way to the Mount of Olives. The last view seems to be the most plausible.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain On v1 J. W. McGarvey's The Fourfold Gospel [CXXI. Farewell Discourse].
J. W. McGarvey's The Fourfold Gospel [CXXI. Farewell Discourse].
CXXI. FAREWELL DISCOURSE TO DISCIPLES. (Jerusalem. Evening before the crucifixion.) dJOHN XIV.-XVI.
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d1 Let not your heart be troubled: believe in God, believe also in me. [That one should betray him and one should deny him, that all should be offended, and that the Lord should depart, raised anxieties which Jesus here seeks to quiet. That they should go out as homeless wanderers without the presence of their Lord and be subjected to persecution, was also in their thoughts. But Jesus sustains their spirits by appealing to them to trust in the unseen Father, and his yet present self. As to the two verbs "believe," both may be either indicatives or imperatives.] 2 In my Father's house are many mansions [Many abiding places or homes. They were not to be homeless always]; if it were not so, I would have told you [That is to say, if heaven had been of such limited capacity that there was little or no hope that you could follow me, I should have dealt plainly with you, and should have disabused your mind of all vain hopes. But there is room ( Luk_14:22), and you may follow-- Joh_13:36]; for I go to prepare a place for you. [We are familiar with the thought that the going, or death, of Jesus prepared a way for [660] us by providing a fountain for the cleansing of our sin, and by rending the veil of the temple, "thus signifying that the way into heaven is now open." But the thought here is different. Jesus departed to prepare places for his own in the Father's house.] 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I come again, and will receive you unto myself; that where I am, i there ye may be also. [The cause for the departure becomes the assurance of the return.] 4 And whither I go, ye know the way. [My manner of life leads to the Father's house, and as ye know that manner of life, ye know the way.] 5 Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; how know we the way? [Thomas looked for a way wherein one might walk with his feet.] 6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, and the truth, and the life: no one cometh unto the Father, but by me. [God is not approached by physical motion. Being spirit, we must draw near to him by spiritual simplicity, and this is revealed to us fully in the person of Christ, and an energizing power is imparted by Christ to enable us to attain unto it.] 7 If ye had known me, ye would have known my Father also [the unity of nature and of character is so perfect that to know the Son is to know the Father also]: from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him. [This saying is the outgrowth of what is said in the Joh_14:6. Since we can only come to the Father's likeness by the imitation of Jesus, then the truth here uttered follows; viz.: that to see Jesus is to see the Father.] 8 Philip saith unto him, Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us. 9 Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and dost thou not know me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; how sayest thou, Show us the Father? [As Thomas asked for a physical instead of a spiritual approach to God, so Philip asked for a physical instead of a spiritual revelation of him. The answer of Jesus tenderly rebukes Philip. The excellency of God is not physical, but spiritual. Righteousness, truth, love, holiness, etc. are all spiritual. A physical revelation of God, if such a [661] thing had been practicable or even possible, would have been of little or no benefit to the apostles. All the physical demonstrations at Mt. Sinai did not prevent the manufacture and worship of the golden calf.] 10 Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I say unto you I speak not from myself: but the Father abiding in me doeth his works. [The question of Jesus is a mild rebuke because Philip had been so slow to learn and to believe what the Lord had taught; viz.: his unity with the Father ( Joh_16:24). God would glorify himself through Christ by answering prayer thus made.] 15 If ye love me, ye will keep my commandments. 16 And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may be with you for ever, 17 i even the Spirit of truth: whom the world cannot receive; for it beholdeth him not, neither knoweth him: ye know him; for he abideth with you, and shall be in you. [The third token of Christ's union with the Father would be the sending of the Holy Spirit ( Act_2:33). Since, however, the worldly-minded could neither receive nor behold the Spirit, the promise to send him to the disciples is prefaced by an appeal to them to keep his commandments, and thus avoid a worldly spirit such as would be compatible with the reception of the Holy Spirit. The word "Comforter" does not fully translate the Greek word Paraklete; no English word does. The word "Advocate" may be used, and "Helper" is as good if not better than "Comforter." He is called the Spirit of truth because of his many relationships to the truth ( Joh_17:19, 1Co_2:4, 1Th_1:5, Act_2:4, Act_5:32, Heb_2:4). That the gift of the Holy Spirit is conditioned upon belief and obedience is also taught elsewhere ( Joh_7:38, Act_2:38, Act_5:32). We should observe that by the use of the word "another" Jesus shows that he himself had been and would be a Paraklete. But earthly fellowship with him was about to be cut short, and therefore the Holy Spirit would come, with whom fellowship would never be interrupted. We should note, too, the distinction between the present "abideth with you," and the future "shall be in you." The Spirit, being present in the person of Christ, had been abiding with the apostles who followed him. Hereafter the intimacy of the relation would be increased, and the Spirit should abide within them.] 18 I will not leave you desolate [Literally, orphans. The expression breathes the spirit of a father, as at Joh_13:33]: [663] I come unto you. 19 Yet a little while, and the world beholdeth me no more [the next day the world crucified him and sealed him in the tomb, and since then has seen him no more]; but ye behold me [the present tense here indicates a continued vision; it can not therefore refer to the appearances of Christ after the resurrection, for the terminated at the end of forty days]: because I live, ye shall live also. 20 In that day [we may take this either as the day of Pentecost, or the period which began on that day] ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you. 21 He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself unto him. [The fourth and all-convincing token of Jesus' union with the Father would be his return in the spirit which is here described. It was not his temporary return after the resurrection, as is shown Joh_14:25 stands in contrast with the word "teach" of the Joh_14:26. Jesus had uttered the truth, but because of the divine plan of salvation through the death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of our Lord was yet incomplete, all the words which he had spoken were but dimly understood, since they were related to and founded upon this incompleted plan. When the plan was completed the Holy Spirit would reveal or teach the meaning of the words by bringing them to remembrance after full comprehension of the plan to which they related.] 27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be fearful. [This legacy of peace is by no means to be confined to the period of doubt and fear which accompanied the crucifixion; in fact, it seems to overstep that period, and to begin after it, and continue throughout all the trouble ministry of the apostles. The breadth of the legacy also to be noted: 1. The quality of it; it was not the absolute unshaken peace of God, but the peace which Jesus himself possessed while upon the earth--peace with all things save the devil and his powers. 2. The nature of it; it was not peace from without, but from within. It was not such as promised to pacify and quell the persecutors, but a promise of [665] inner calm amidst the storm. 3. The manner of it; it was no stinted, measured store such as the world bestows, but a full, free gift from the overflowing bounty of God.] 28 Ye heard how I said to you, I go away, and I come unto you. If ye loved me, ye would have rejoiced, because I go unto the Father: for the Father is greater than I. [The departure of Jesus was not wholly a humiliation, as it might appear to them; but a real exaltation at which they might well rejoice, and that the more readily and freely since it would not mean to them the total separation which they anticipated, because he would return in the spirit. The word "greater" as here used does not refer to any difference in the nature or essence of the Son as related to the Father. It may well be true that there has been a certain subordination of the will of the Son to the will of the Father from all eternity, but even that, if it exists, is not referred to here. Jesus has in mind the utter humiliation to which his mediatorial office had brought him, and to even lower depths to which it was about to bring him. From all this his departure to the Father would in a large measure free him, restoring him in some degree to that state of equilibrium in glory, power and authority from which he had descended-- Phi_2:6.] 29 And now I have told you before it come to pass, that, when it is come to pass, ye may believe. [Jesus had told them fully of his return to the Father, that when they received the subsequent manifestation of it they might firmly believe it.] 30 I will no more speak much with you, for the prince of the world cometh: and he hath nothing in me; 31 but that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father gave me commandment, even so I do. [In a few hours the earthly teaching of Jesus would be interrupted by the coming of Satan and would never be resumed save in occasional fragments. Satan would come in the persons of his servants and emissaries, but he would find nothing in Christ which would give him either right or reason to exercise power over him. The sorrows and sufferings of Christ would be entered upon of his own free will because by [666] enduring them for our sakes he would please the Father and carry out his commandments, and thus manifest to the world the love which he bore the Father.] Arise, let us go hence. [Some think that Jesus then left the room, and that the next three chapters of John's Gospel contain matters spoken on the way to Gethsemane. But it is likely that the words of these chapters were spoken in the upper room after they had risen from the table and prepared to depart, and that Joh_18:1 marks the leaving of the upper room as well as the crossing of the Kidron.]
XV. 1 I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. 2 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh it away: and every i branch that beareth fruit, he cleanseth it [by pruning], that it may bear more fruit. [The use of the word "true" shows that Jesus refers to a typical vine. The Jewish people had been such a vine ( Isa_5:1, Psa_80:8-16, Jer_2:21). Yet it was but "a figure of the true" ( Heb_9:24). God had now in Christ planted the true vine, and would dissever and cast off all that did not derive life from him, and would prune all that did. This vital connection with Christ is set forth by Paul under the figure of a body and its head ( Eph_5:23, Col_2:19). The fact that Jesus had just given them the fruit of the vine to drink as the symbol of his blood made the transition to this figure easy and natural, for the branches derive their juices from the vine.] 3 Already ye are clean because of the word which I have spoken unto you. [It is God in Christ who cleanseth the soul, but this cleansing is effected through hearing, believing and obeying the Word. The Word tells us what to do that we may be cleansed and saved-- Eph_5:26, Jam_1:18.] 4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; so neither can ye, except ye abide in me. 5 I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same beareth much fruit: for apart from me ye can do nothing. 6 If a man abide [667] not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned. [The whole parable is intended to teach us Christ's relationships. 1. Toward the Father--Husbandman and Vine. 2. Toward man--Vine and branches. 3. Toward good works--Vine, branches, and fruit. 4. The negative condition, or lack of relationship--the Vine, the dissevered branches, the fire.] 7 If ye had known me, ye would have known my Father also: from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him. [Though this verse stands somewhat in contrast to the warning in Joh_15:6, it is rather a statement of causation than a promise of reward. If by communion and the study of the word we abide in Christ, our prayers will be of such a nature that it will fully accord with the divine counsel to answer them, for they will be prayers tending toward fruitfulness.] 8 Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; and i so shall ye be my disciples. [The spirit of Christ leads to those deeds which cause men to glorify God ( Mat_9:8, Luk_17:15), and whoso does those deeds causes such glorification ( Mat_5:16). Moreover, the spirit of Christ leads to abundant fruitfulness, and he who has it, not only performs charitable deeds, but converts the sinner and begets a spirit of goodness in those about him ( Mat_13:8-26, Phi_4:17); and this fruitfulness becomes an evidence or demonstration of true discipleship.] 9 Even as the Father hath loved me, I also have loved you: abide ye in my love. 10 If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in his love. [From the outward evidence of union with Christ, shown by the fruit, Jesus now turns to that inward bond of union which is the cause of fruitfulness. That bond is love. Love is, as it were, the sap which passes back and forth between the Vine and branch, and that love is kept active and vital by the most practical of means--obedience to commandments, a means which the Lord himself does not hesitate to describe as efficient between himself and the Father, only claiming for [668] himself the love of the Father because of a like obedience to that which he prescribed. "And our obedience must be impartial," says Jay; "we must do 'whatsoever' he commands us."] 11 These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy may be in you, and i that your joy may be made full. [He had spoken the words of this discourse that the disciples might have a joy corresponding to his own. By perfect obedience he enjoyed a consciousness of the Father's presence and approval. By a like obedience the disciples might have a like sense of his presence and approval, and hence a like joy.] 12 This is my commandment, that ye love one another, even as I have loved you. 13 Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. [Jesus gives, as his supreme commandment, this law of love. The disciples are to love one another as intensely as Jesus loved them, and the measure of the intensity of his love is prophetically set forth by an allusion to his death on their behalf. But he died for his enemies as well as for his friends-- Rom_5:6.] 14 Ye are my friends, if ye do the things which I command you. 15 No longer do I call you servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I heard from my Father, I have made known unto you. [The commandments of Jesus were not to be obeyed in the spirit of bondmen, but in that of friends. Jesus had shown his friendship by receiving his apostles into confidence as to the things which he had heard from his Father.] 16 Ye did not choose me, but I chose you, and appointed you, that ye should go and bear fruit, and i that your fruit should abide: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you. [Jesus shows the stability of the friendship existing between him and the disciples in that origin of it lies in himself and not in them. For he chose them as friends before they chose him, gave them their high places as apostles without their solicitation, prepared them to bring forth lasting fruits, and gave them the privilege of supplementing their [669] personal deficiencies by prayer made effective through his name.] 17 These things I command you [this includes all the precepts from the beginning of the Joh_1-15:16], that ye may love one another. 18 If the world hateth you, ye know that it hath hated me before i it hated you. [While teaching the fullness and richness of love which is to exist within the circle of discipleship, Jesus warns them that in opposition to it the outer circle of unconverted and sensual--that circle known as the world--would manifest a spirit of hatred. Since this world-spirit hated him, the disciples need not be surprised to find that it hated them when manifesting his spirit.] 19 If ye were of the world, the world would love its own: but because ye are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. 20 Remember the word that I said unto you, A servant is not greater than his lord. [ Joh_13:16.] If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they kept my word, they will keep yours also. [The apostles could rest assured that the messengers would receive like treatment with him who sent them. When, therefore, they found the world rejecting their message they could cheer themselves with the expectation that a few at least would receive it, since a few had always received the words of the Master.] 21 But all these things will they do unto you for my name's sake, because they know not him that sent me. [Christians in the early ages were persecuted for bearing the name of Christ by those who were ignorant of God. But this name, hateful to the world, was sweet to the disciples. For opposition to the name, see Act_5:28, 1Pe_4:14, Rev_3:8. For joy in it see Act_5:41, 2Co_12:10, Gal_6:17.] 22 If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin: but now they have no excuse for their sin. 23 He that hateth me hateth my Father also. 24 If I had not done among them the works which none other did, they had not had sin: but now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father. 25 But i this cometh to pass, that the word [670] may be fulfilled that is written in their law [ Psa_35:19, Psa_69:4], They hated me without a cause. [Though the great proof of the hatred of Christ was yet to come, it is spoken of as if it had passed. Jesus does not mean to say that the world would have committed no sin at all if he had kept away from it. The meaning is that it would not have been guilty of the sin of rejecting Jesus. They would have been excusable.] 26 But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, i even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall bear witness of me: 27 and ye also bear witness, because ye have been with me from the beginning. [One of the principal offices of the Spirit is to testify of Christ ( Joh_16:13-15). The Spirit testified through the apostles and other messengers ( Act_2:4), so that in a sense the apostles were double witnesses. They themselves could testify as to what they had seen and heard. The Spirit could aid them to testify accurately, and with a full intelligence as to the real meaning of things. The Spirit also gave attention to apostolic testimony by enabling the apostles to work miracles.]
XVI. 1 These things have I spoken unto you, that ye should not be caused to stumble. [Jesus warned his disciples of coming persecutions in order that those persecutions might not shake their faith.] 2 They shall put you out of the synagogues [see Act_26:9, Gal_1:13, Gal_1:14.] 3 And these things will they do, because they have not known the Father, nor me. 4 But these things have I spoken unto you, that when their hour is come, ye may remember them, how that I told you. And these things I said not unto you from the beginning, because I was with you. [The disciples being but few, and finding the vast majority of the nation against them, and being but unlearned [671] Galilæans, and finding the leaders--the wise, the cultured, the mighty--against them, would be tempted to doubt the correctness of their course, and to ask, "May we not, after all, be mistaken: may not those who know more be better judges in this matter than we who are so ignorant?" To forestall and prevent such questioning, Jesus asserts that the ignorance is with the rulers. Knowledge of himself and of his Father is the great and supreme knowledge, and the apostles having this were wiser than those with all other learning. It would also strengthen their faith to remember that the Lord's divine wisdom had foreseen all this trouble.] And these things I said not unto you from the beginning, because I was with you. [While he was with his disciples they were in no danger, for he himself bore the brunt of persecution. In the beginning, therefore, of his ministry he did not deem it expedient to dishearten his disciples by foretelling trials which were then remote. When he began to announce his approaching death, then he also began to declare that the disciple must be willing to lose his life if he would find it. See Mat_5:10-12 forms a contradiction to our Lord's statement here. While the words in Matthew were spoken early enough to be classified as "from the beginning," their import is to general to permit of their being brought into contrast with this direct and personal prediction of persecution.] 5 But now I go unto him that sent me; and none of you asketh me, Whither goest thou? 6 But because I have spoken these things unto you, sorrow hath filled your heart. 7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth: It is expedient for you that I go away; for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I go, I will send him unto you. [The disciples had asked the Lord whither he was going ( Joh_13:36, Joh_14:5), but their question had a very different meaning from that which Jesus here suggests to them. They asked it to ascertain whether his departure would involve a separation or whether it would be a withdrawal from the world in which they could accompany him. The question which he suggests [672] has reference to the place to which he was about to journey, that place being the home and presence of his Father. The question asked was selfish, as if the apostles had asked, "What will your departure mean to us?" The question suggested was generous, intimating that the apostles should have asked, "What will this departure mean to you?" Viewing his departure from a selfish standpoint filled their hearts with sorrow; but viewing it from a generous standpoint would have filled them with sympathetic joy, because of the supreme happiness which it would bring to their Master ( Joh_14:28). But even from a selfish standpoint the apostles would have had reason to rejoice because of the advantage which would accrue to them through the Lord's departure, for that departure would result in the advent of the Holy Spirit. Space does not permit us to discuss why the Spirit could not come until the Lord had departed, but the verses which follow give us one good and sufficient reason, for they show that his work had to do with the conviction of human hearts through the preaching of a completed gospel, and the ascension or return of Christ to heaven, and his enthronement in glory there, are essential parts of that completed gospel.] 8 And he, when he is come, will convict the world in respect of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment [It would be the work of the Holy Spirit to take the truths respecting Christ, and, using the apostles as mouthpieces ( Act_2:1-37), to convince the world as to these truths. This convincing work was entirely in relation to Christ, the sin of disbelieving him, the righteousness revealed in him, and the power of judgment conferred upon him]: 9 of sin, because they believe not on me; 10 of righteousness, because I go to the Father, and ye behold me no more; 11 of judgment, because the prince of this world hath been judged. [Sin, righteousness, and a day of judgment with its reward upon one and its punishment upon the other, are three cardinal doctrines of the gospel. The Spirit convinces the world that disbelief in Christ is its fatal sin, for belief in Christ leads to forgiveness, and to the unbelieving there is no forgiveness. The least sin is a sin unto death, and [673] is a sin eternal unless forgiven. The greatest sin, if forgiven, becomes harmless and is as if it had never been. Until the world is convinced of this great truth it feels no need of a gospel. Again, Christianity teaches that righteousness is prerequisite to the attainment of the presence of God. Without righteousness we can never behold him, nor can we ever hope to stand before him. But this required righteousness was found in Jesus, for he returned to the Father, and abides with the Father, being seen by us no more. The Holy Spirit convinces the world that those who are found in Christ, having his righteousness, shall attain unto the presence of the Father ( Phi_3:3-14). Lastly, the Spirit convinces the world that Jesus is commissioned as its judge. Our Lord's resurrection is the assurance of this fact ( Act_17:31). The resurrection is such an assurance because it is an evidence of the judgment and condemnation of Satan, the head and leader in sinful rebellion against God, and he that hath power to judge the head thereby shows he has power to judge the body. Satan held the power of death over humanity, but Jesus judged him and brought him to naught by taking away this power ( Heb_2:14, Heb_2:15). The cross of Christ as the source of life asserted his superiority over all other powers ( Col_2:14, Col_2:15), which implies an ability to judge them.] 12 I have yet many things unto say to you, but ye cannot bear them now. [The doctrines of the gospel were necessarily obscure and largely incomprehensible to the apostles until time had developed the gospel facts. Jesus, therefore, forbore to speak of many things at this time, lest by doing so he should confuse the minds of his followers.] 13 Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he shall guide you into all the truth: for he shall not speak from himself; but what things soever he shall hear, i these shall he speak: and he shall declare unto you the things that are to come. 14 He shall glorify me: for he shall take of mine, and shall declare it unto you. [The Holy Spirit was to bring no absolutely new teaching. The Son of God here claims for himself all that the Spirit taught even to the declaration of things to come. [674] The Spirit would bring to mind and republish in the minds of the apostles all the words which Jesus had spoken, and would add those things which, being now in the mind of Jesus, were really part of his teaching, but which he at this present forbore to utter, the apostles not being able to bear them.] 15 All things whatsoever the Father hath are mine: therefore said I, that he taketh of mine, and shall declare i it unto you. [The Son's unity of interest with the Father made him possessor of all the Father's truth, as well as all the Father's counsel as to the future. As Jesus, therefore, might at this time have uttered all which the Holy Spirit subsequently taught, he rightfully claimed all the teaching of the Spirit as his.] 16 A little while, and ye behold me no more; and again a little while, and ye shall see me. [Having finished his digression about the Holy Spirit, Jesus here returns to his point of departure, the theme of Joh_14:19-23.] 17 i Some of his disciples therefore said one to another, What is this that he saith unto us, A little while, and ye behold me not; and again a little while, and ye shall see me: and, Because I go to the Father? [ Joh_14:28.] 18 They said therefore, What is this that he saith, A little while? We know not what he saith. [Having been unable to entertain the idea of our Lord's burial and resurrection, no wonder the apostles were mystified by these allusions to it.] 19 Jesus perceived [by his divine insight-- Joh_2:24, Joh_2:25, Joh_6:61, Mat_9:4] that they were desirous to ask him, and he said unto them, Do ye inquire among yourselves concerning this, that I said, A little while, and ye behold me not, and again a little while, and ye shall see me? 20 Verily, verily, I say unto you, that ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice: ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. [The death of Jesus truly brought gladness to his enemies ( Luk_22:5), and sorrow to [675] his friends ( Joh_20:11), but the sorrow was indeed turned to joy-- Mat_28:8.] 21 A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but when she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for the joy that a man is born into the world. [The simile here is very apropos, according with Scriptural ideals-- Col_1:18, Rev_1:5.] 22 And ye therefore now have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no one taketh away from you. [ Luk_24:52, Luk_24:53. The joyful hopes which come to us through the resurrection of Jesus are beyond the reach of the despoiling hand of man.] 23 And in that day ye shall ask me no question. [The coming of the Spirit would make all things clear, and the mysteries about which the apostles now questioned would then be fully explained.] Verily, verily [these two words give emphasis and introduce a new thought], I say unto you, if ye shall ask anything of the Father, he will give it you in my name. 24 Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my name: ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be made full. [Having spoken of his departure, and of what the Spirit would do during his absence, he now speaks of the work which he would himself do while absent. He entered heaven as our high priest ( Heb_9:24), and part of his priestly office is to make intercession for his people ( Heb_7:24, Heb_7:25). The use of Christ's name for intercessory purposes was new to the apostles, since it was only thus employed after his ascension.] 25 These things have I spoken unto you in dark sayings: the hour cometh, when I shall no more speak unto you in dark sayings, but shall tell you plainly of the Father. [This closing discourse was full of dark sayings which the disciples did not understand, but when the gospel facts were completed and when the Spirit came on the day of Pentecost, then Christ through the Spirit made all things plain to them.] 26 In that day ye shall ask in my name [fullness of knowledge would lead them to look readily to Christ as intercessor]: and I say not unto you, that I will pray the Father [676] for you; 27 for the Father himself loveth you, because ye have loved me, and have believed that I came forth from the Father. 28 I came out from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go unto the Father. [Birth and death are alike beyond our control. That Jesus had a divine as well as a human nature is shown by the fact that his entrance into and exit from the world were both governed by his own violation, as was also his resurrection ( Joh_10:17, Joh_10:18). While the apostles did not believe in the voluntary exit of Jesus, it having not yet taken place, they did believe that he had come into the world as a divine being, and for this belief the Father loved them, and this love of the Father was not to be lost sight of in considering the mediatory work of Christ. In short, the Father must be looked upon as one who does not need to be interceded with because of a lack of love. Though, according to the divine plan and order, Jesus is intercessor ( 1Ti_2:5, 1Jo_2:1, 1Jo_2:2), yet the office is not self-assumed for the purpose of counteracting any spirit of severity in the Father, but is, on the contrary, undertaken by direct appointment of the Father, made because of the Father's love ( Joh_3:16). Failing to recognize the Father as the fountain and source of grace, love and mercy has led the Roman Church into gross errors. The Father being suspected of undue rigor, a like suspicion arose also as to the Son because of his nearness to the Father. Therefore the Virgin Mary was called in to intercede with and soften the obduracy of the Son. Since the deification of the Virgin Mary in 1853, she also has been looked upon with growing distrust, and the tendency has been to call upon Joseph to intercede with Mary to intercede with the Son to intercede with the Father. Thus that wonderful love of God which passes all understanding is made less than that of mere mortals who never manifested a measure of philanthropy above what is common. Against such errors Jesus guards us by causing us to understand that, if the love of the Father alone were to be considered, there would be no need for him to intercede at all.] 29 His disciples say, Lo, now speakest thou [677] plainly, and speakest no dark saying. [They now clearly understood that as Jesus came from heaven so would he return to heaven, but they did not understand the process by which this return would be effected.] 30 Now know we that thou knowest all things, and needest not that any man should ask thee: by this we believe that thou camest forth from God. [The miraculous manner in which he had just read their thoughts caused them to boldly declare their faith in his divinity.] 31 Jesus answered them, Do ye now believe? 32 Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is come, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and i yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me. [He contrasts the faith which his disciples then professed with that utter lack of it which they would manifest in a few hours. All their confidence in his divinity would vanish when they saw him arrested, etc., and they would seek their own safety, leaving him to his fate. Much as he would feel their desertion, he would not be left utterly comfortless, because the Father would be with him. Paul speaks in a similar strain-- 2Ti_4:16-18.] 33 These things have I spoken unto you, that in me ye may have peace. In the world ye have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world. [Christ's return to the Father and his throne is the Christian's source of peace. As none of the accumulations of evil which came upon Christ prevented him from attaining his goal, so the Christian feels that in the conquering power of Christ, he too shall rise superior to all his troubles, and this feeling brings him peace.] [678]
[FFG 660-678]
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On vv3, 16, 17, 19, 22, 27, 31 receive you unto myself
receive you unto myself
This promise of a second advent of Christ is to be distinguished from His return in glory to the earth; it is the first intimation in Scripture of "the day of Christ". (See Scofield "1Co 1:8"). Here He comes for His saints 1Th 4:14-17 there Mat 24:29; Mat 24:30. He come to judge the nations, etc.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain On v1 1. Let not Your Heart be Troubled! (Joh 14:1-7.)
CHAPTER 14
1. Let not Your Heart be Troubled! (Joh 14:1-7.)
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2. I Am in the Father and the Father in Me. (Joh 14:8-14.)
3. The Other Comforter Promised. (Joh 14:15-27.)
4. I Go unto the Father. (Joh 14:28-31.)
There is no break between these two chapters. The Lord continues His discourse to the eleven disciples. “Let not your heart be troubled!” What precious words of comfort! How many hearts have been soothed by them and how many tears they have dried! And after His loving words He said again: “Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.” (Joh 14:27.) He speaks first of all of the Father’s house with its many abodes. The Father’s house is no longer the temple, but the blessed home where the loving Father dwells and to which the Son of God was about to return in the form of man, after His death and resurrection. And the Father’s house with its many abodes belongs to all who belong to Him; and all who are His, whom He is not ashamed to call brethren (Joh 20:17; Heb 2:11 and Psa 22:22) belong to the Father’s house. He has gone there to prepare a place. The ark of the covenant of the Lord went before Israel to search out a resting place for them (Num 11:33) and so He has gone before as our forerunner. What it all means “to prepare a place for you” we cannot fully know, but we know that His great work has removed every barrier for all who believe on Him, and in God’s own time the full redemption of the purchased possession by the power of God will be accomplished. (Eph 1:14.) Then His unfulfilled promise, “I will come again and receive you unto myself, that where I am ye may be also,” will be fulfilled. He did not mean the death of His disciples. The death of the believer is not the coming of Himself to the child of God, but when the believer dies he goes to be with Christ. “I will come again” means His coming for those who belong to Him, His Saints. How He will redeem this gracious promise and lead His own into the blessed home, is not revealed here. But He gave it in the form of a special revelation to the Apostle of the Gentiles. (1Th 4:13-18.) Thomas speaks first. He misunderstood the words of the Lord and was troubled with unbelief. Yet Thomas loved the Lord and was greatly attached to Him, as we learn from Joh 11:16. Blessed answer he received. “I am the way”;--He is the only way to God and to the Father’s house; “the Truth”;-- the revelation of the Father; and “the Life” as well.
His answer to Philip’s question shows that He was grieved. Yet how gentle the rebuke, “Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.” It is another great witness of His oneness with the Father. “I am in the Father and the Father in me.” And His own belonging to Him, know the Father in Christ and are His. (Solemn truth it is: “Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father.” (1Jn 2:23.) “And ye are Christ’s and Christ is God’s.” (1Co 3:23.) Joh 14:12 has been a difficulty to many. What did our Lord mean when He said: “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also, and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father”? Christian Scientists and extreme faith-healers claim that He meant His actual works of healing and Christians should do now the same works and even greater works. But how could a believer do a greater work than the raising of Lazarus from the dead? The promise “the works that I do shall he do also” was fulfilled immediately after the day of Pentecost. The sick were healed by Peter’s shadow, the lame man was healed, demons were driven out, and the dead were raised. Were these miracles to continue to the end of the dispensation? There is nowhere a statement in Scripture that this should be the case. “If miracles were continually in the church, they would cease to be miracles. We never see them in the Bible except at some great crisis in the church’s history”--(Thoughts on the Gospel of John.) The “greater works” are spiritual works. The thousands saved in the beginning of the dispensation, the preaching of the Gospel far hence among the Gentiles and the gracious results, are these greater works.
The promise of Prayer in His name follows. This is something new. It is to be addressed to the Father and the Son, and He promises, “If ye shall ask anything in my name I will do it.” So far He had spoken of Himself and the Father. God the Father had been revealed in the Son, and now He speaks of the other Person of the Godhead, the Holy Spirit. He is promised to come, not to the world, but to His own as the other Comforter. (In Greek “Parakletos,” one who is alongside to help. The same word as in 1Jn 2:1 “Advocate.”) e would come to abide in them, dwell with them and be in them. Joh 14:18, “I will come to you,” does not mean His second coming as in Joh 14:3. It is Christ Himself in Spirit. The result of the coming and abiding of the Comforter is a blessed knowledge for the believer. “Ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.” Love to Him in the power of the Spirit must be expressed in obedience. Then there is the blessed legacy: “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you.” It is not peace with God, but the peace of Himself which He has left us. And that peace will ever be enjoyed if we believe and obey His words.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On vv1, 5, 8, 12, 15, 18, 21, 24, 27 Of Christ’s Going to the Father.
Of Christ’s Going to the Father.
The comfort of Christ’s going:
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v. 1. Let not your heart be troubled; ye believe in God, believe also in Me.
v. 2. In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.
v. 3. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto Myself, that where I am, there ye may be also.
v. 4. And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.
The last speeches of Christ to His disciples, held partly in the upper room of the Passover feast, partly on the way to Gethsemane, are full of the most glorious cheer and comfort, whose value has in no wise suffered with the passing of time. There are few passages of Scriptures that are so replete with the merciful love of the Savior as these Chapters. The very first words give the keynote of the entire discourse. Let not your hearts be troubled, excite themselves and you, fill you with anxiety and worry. The disciples, in that very night, would become witnesses of such agony and distress of soul as would make the stoutest heart quake and quail. And not only would their Master’s suffering agitate their hearts, but they would eventually have to follow in His steps, though not in the same degree. So they were in need of comfort and assurance from the mouth of their Lord. "But this is written not for their sakes, but for us, that we may learn to make use of this comfort for present and future trouble, and that every Christian, when he has been baptized and has placed himself in Christ’s care, may and should yield to it and certainly expect that he will also meet with terror and fear which will make his heart weak and despondent, whether it be through one or various enmities and oppositions. " But in this emergency the apostles and all disciples should trust God, yea, they should trust Christ as well, and in the same degree. They should put their trust in the almighty Father above, whose providence has ever watched over them. And if He should seem to them too distant and inaccessible, they should rely absolutely upon Him, their Master, who has ever, and in all emergencies, been their true Friend and Helper. Their trust in God would not be misplaced, nor should it lack firmness, for the Mediator between God and man was sitting before them, through whom God is reconciled to all men. "Let others trust in, and boast of, their temporal power and fortune, you, however, comfort yourselves that you have a God, and know Him, and depend upon it that He is with you and can help you, as He has promised through the Word, and surely will not fail you, although everything be against you, but will assist, protect, and help you out, since you suffer all things for His sake. " To emphasize the comfort of these assurances, the Lord reminds His disciples that in His Father’s house there is room not only for Himself, but for them all, that they should have no harm on account of His leaving, but know that it was done for their benefit, that He wants to prepare and order their habitations with the Father, and that He wants to come back Himself to fetch them to the mansions, in order that they may occupy these habitations and remain where He is, thus having the certainty of both, of the mansions in heaven and of Christ Himself for all eternity. The mansions are there even now, by the love of the Father; but the trust in the Savior will bring them into the possession of all believers. As children of God, through faith in Jesus, they have a right and a part in the home of the Son. And Jesus, having made all preparations for their reception and eternal entertainment, will not leave His disciples to find their way above as best they can, but will complete His labor of love by coming again and receiving them to Himself and taking them along with Him to the places of their everlasting stay. There is the true home and fatherland of the Christians, in heaven with the Lord, where He wants them to be, in glorious, wonderful communion and union with Him. After the tedious and laborious pilgrimage of earth they there become partakers of the rest of the Lord. Heaven is the home of every Christian, just as soon as he has finished his earthly life. Jesus comes personally and guides the weary wanderer’s footsteps to everlasting joy and blessedness. Jesus reminds His disciples that they knew both His goal and the way to that goal, the eternal home. He had given them the necessary information so often and in so complete a manner that they all should have had full knowledge, blessed assurance. Heaven is Christ’s eternal home, as it is ours; and the way to heaven leads through Him, since faith in His redemption opens the portals of heaven.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 4, 8, 10, 12, 15, 18, 21, 23, 25, 28, 30 Connecting Statement:
Connecting Statement:
The part of the story from the previous chapter continues. Jesus reclines at the table with his disciples and continues to speak to them.
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Do not let your heart be troubled
Here "heart" is a metonym for a person's inner being. AT: "Stop being so anxious and worried" (See: Metonymy)
In the house of my Father are many rooms
"there are many places to live in my Father's house"
In the house of my Father
This refers to heaven, where God lives.
Father
This is an important title for God. (See: Translating Son and Father)
many rooms
The word "room" can refer to a single room, or to a larger dwelling.
I am going to prepare a place for you
Jesus will prepare a place in heaven for every person who trusts in him. The "you" is plural and refers to all his disciples. (See: Forms of You)
translationWords
heart
believe
God the Father
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, 15, 16, 17, 18, 20, 22, 23, 26, 27, 28, 30 14:1-31 Jesus provided answers to his disciples’ many spoken…
14:1-31 Jesus provided answers to his disciples’ many spoken and unspoken concerns.
14:1 Jesus had himself been troubled (Greek tarassō) on three occasions (11:33; 12:27; 13:21). His confidence in God’s power made it possible for him to face these crises. Faced with the upsetting words of 13:33, the disciples confronted similar feelings. • Trust (or believe, or have faith) in God: Only trusting God would help them through his hour of death.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.