>>'\ .^OFPRIN^ A l^fOZ-OGICALSO^^ .2' A ADDRESSES GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN Delivered in Providence, R. I., at Eight Conferences held BETWEEN October 21, 1903, and May u, 1904 WITH APPENDIX SECOISTD THOXJSANID PRINTED AND CIRCULATED BY THE ST. JOHN CONFERENCE COMMITTEE PROVIDENCE, R. I. 1906 BINGHAM PAPER BOX CO. PRINTERS NEW LONDON, CONN. PREFACE. During the year 1902-3 a series of Saturday afternoon conferences for pastors, addressed by Seminary Professors, was held at the Y. M. C. A. Hall in Providence. The subjects and speakers were as follows : — November 29, 1902. " The Unique Character of the Gospel of John ". Profess- or M. W. Jacobus, D.D., and Professor C. S. Beardslee, D.D., of Hartford Theo- logical Seminary. January 31, 1903. "The Grace and Truth that came by Jesus Christ". (John I : 17 and i : 14). Professor George B. Stevens, D.D., and Professor Frank K. Sanders, D.D., of the Yale Divinity School. March 7. "Johannine Antitheses". Professor Henry C. Sheldon, S.T.D., of the Boston University School of Theology. April 18. "The Father, the Saviour, the Comforter". (John 14). Professor William H. Ryder, D.D., of Andover Theological Seminary. May 16. "That they all may be one". (John 17). President W. H. P. Faunce, D.D., and Professor Henry T. Fowler, Ph.D., of Brown University. Several of the above named Professors spoke in churches of the city on themes in John's Gospel on the Sundays following the Conferences. * Previous to this series of conferences many pastors in Rhode Island had taken up this Gospel in the mid-week meeting of the church. Dr. Henry M. King, Pastor of the First Baptist Church, of Providence, in introducing Professors Jacobus and Beardslee at the first of the above mentioned conferences spoke as follows concerning the experience of his own church the preceding year : — ' ' I have never had a year of such prayer meetings in all my ministry. The attendance has been increased and an unusually large number of people have taken *A series of monthly conferences had also been held in South-Western Washington County, R. 1., under the auspices of a Washington County Interdenominational Committee of which Rev. Alexander McLearn, Pastor of the Seventh Day Baptist Church of Rockville, R. I., was chairman. The study of the Gospel was begun on December 4, 1900 (Rockville), and completed July 24, 1901. Between these dates over fifty conferences were held in fifteen different villages, three of these being held in Connecticut. Three chapters were taken each month. The conferences were conducted and addressed by the local pastors, assisted by the ministers of Westerly. Several speakers came from a distance, viz. : Professor Frederick L. Anderson, D.D., of Newton Theological Institution, Professor Wm. H. Ryder, D.D.,of Andover Theological Seminary, Professor Charles F. Kent, Ph.D., of Brown University (now of Yale), Rev. L. L. Henson, D.D., and Rev. L. S. Woodworth, of Providence, Through the courtesy of the editors of the local papers, viz.: Hon. George H. Utter of the Westerly Daily Sun, Mr. Edward T. Spencer of the Hope Valley Advertiser, and Mr. John Larkin of the Hope Valley Free Press, a series of " Talks on John's Gospel " had been published at frequent intervals, contributed to by well known ministers of Rhode Island and other states. It had been hoped that this valuable series might be included in the present volume, but the limits of space did not permit. A few of these articles, however, of a nature supplementary to the Providence Addresses are printed in the Appendix (see pp. 444-480). Those contributing to this series were the following: Rev. Edward Abbott, D.D., Rev. James Church Alvord, Rev. Wm. C. Bitting, D.D., Rev. George A. Conibear, Rev. Samuel M. Dick, Ph.D., Rev. John G. Dutton, Rev. Edward O. Grisbrook, Professor Doremus A.Hayes, Ph.D., S.T.D., LL.D., Rev. Dorr A. vi PREFACE. Goodwin, Rev. John R. Brown, Rev. Archibald McCord, Rev. J. Francis Cooper, Rev. Henrv M. King. D. D. Rev. T. H. Root (Alton, R. I.) was elected to act as Secretary. Other committees were constituted as follows: — Finance Committee — Hon. Rathbone Gardner, Chairman, Mr. A. B. McCrillis, Mr. C. E. Hancock, Mr. Albert C. Day, Rev. John M. Lowden, Mr. J. \Vm. Rice, Mr. Geo. P. Peterson, Mr. H. E. Thurston, Mr. David Wilmot, Rev. A. E. Krom, Dr. F. B. Sprague, Mr. C. R. Thurston, Rev. Robert Cameron, D.D., Hon. D. Russell Brown. Rev. A. J Coultas, Mr. E. P. Metcalf, Mr. Wm. A. Walton, Hon. C. C. Mumford. Mr. John F. Greene, Mr. F. O. Bishop, Rev. Robert B. Parker, Mr. F. H. Fuller, Mr. Gideon G. Congdon. Mr. F. W. Marden, Dr. Albert L. Mor- rison, Mr. T. W. Waterman, Hon. X. W. Littlefield. Publication Committee — Rev. Edward C. Bass, D.D., Chairman, Rev. T. E. Bartlett, Rev. Levi B Edwards, Rev. M. S. McCord, D.D., Rev. George A. Conibear, Rev. John J. Hall. Rev. H. C. Lowden, Rev. Wm. H. Durfee, Rev. T. F. Xorris, Rev. Warren Dawley. Rev. Clayton A. Burdick, Mr. A. B. McCrillis, Hon. N. W. Littlefield, Mr. Herbert E. Drake, Hon. D. L. D. Granger, Mr. X. A. Westcott, Mr. Edward P. Metcalf, Mr. Albert C. Day. The programs of the eight Conferences held during the year 1903-4, giving dates, speakers, subjects,* etc.. will be found in the Appendix (pp. 4S7-492). Of the fifty-four addresses delivered fifty-two are printed either in full or in part in this volume. Two of the addresses are absent as the speakers were unable to furnish manuscript. In arranging the Conferences it has been the purpose of the committee that they should represent the consensus of the thought of the Church. It has not been the purpose to introduce the controversial element. The committee do not. of course, assume responsibility for any of the opinions expressed. The value of the volume is much increased by the verv complete analvsis by Professor Anderson and by the Suggestive Studies and References by Professor Beardslee, both of which were prepared expressly for the Rhode Island pastors : also by several articles contributed to the series in the press (see note. p. iii. Preface). It is believed that the Indices to Authors and to Texts will also add interest and useful- ness to the volume. The Rhode Island churches appreciate very deeplv the great service rendered without remuneration by the Conference speakers. It was entirely on their part a labor of love for the Gospel, and of desire to assist the Rhode Island pastors in this work. The deep interest which followed the successive Conferences on the part of the large audiences that gathered from month to month was a sufficient attestation of the spiritual strength and scholarly power brought to the Conferences by men of many types of mind and of various ecclesiastical fellowships. The following words by the Providence correspondent of the " Watchman" were written immed- iately after the first Conference : — " The speakers were men competent to instruct as well as to kindle ardor for truth. Xo series of meetings in this generation in Providence has so taken hold of the best minds in all churches. Teachers repre- senting the leading denominations come with their best thought to expound the profound teaching of John ". At the close of the series the following statement was made by President Faunce of Brown University : — " One of the most valuable helps to the intellectual and religious life of the city of Providence during the past *It will be observed that many of the great themes of the Gospel and very many of the secondary themes have not been treated. Several of these were assigned either to professors or to ministers, but those to whom requests were sent, were anable to respond because of engagements already entered into. The TOlnme by what it omits to do as well as by what it does will suggest the inexhaustible riches of this Gospel. PREFACE. vii year has been the series of really remarkable Conferences on the Gospel of John. Seldom have we had in our city so many speakers of eminence on religious themes, and never have we had more deeply interested audiences". The Conferences were, to quote the words of Bishop Jaggar, a " manifestation of the unity of the spirit in the bonds of peace". Through many voices it was the one church that spoke, and the consciousness of the one church was deepened in the minds of all who attended. The Conferences bore signal witness to the growing unity of Christians, and to the strength of united effort. One familiar with St. John's Gospel will readily understand why it has been chosen for special presentation in this way. The Gospel of St. John is remarkable in its unity of structure, in its singleness of purpose in portraying Jesus as the Christ, in the richness and profoundness of its teachings, and in its unique revela- tion of the personality and work of Christ. It is pervaded throughout by the deepest spirit of poetry and is characterized by the deepest philosophic insight. It speaks to the hearts and minds of all Christians, regardless of denomination or theological outlook. Both liberal and conservative are one in their love of this book. Testimony to its power, to the depth and clearness, the grandeur and simplicityof its revelation of the Master is found in every age and in every body of Christians. It is the most vital and vitalizing of the Gospels, preeminent in its urgent en- joining both of the "new commandment" as the organic law of the Christian Church and also of the militant purpose of winning men to Christ. In it are found not only the principles but also the methods for which the church in the present day is so earnestly seeking as the means of a more vital and fruitful work. It throbs intensely with the very heart of Christ. Meditation on and practice of its truths are the only means by which the heart of Christ may become the heart of the Church. It has been called the Theological Gospel because interpreting so deeply the Person and Teachings of Christ ; the Evangelical Gospel because so intensely permeated with the purpose that men may believe;* it might also be called the Ethical Gospel so lofty is its standard of Christian obligation in its insistence on obedience to the commands of Christ and on the doing of the will of God. (It was well said by one of the Conference speakers that a book would yet be written on the Ethics of St. John's Gospel). It has its peculiar grip on the heart and life because in it the disciple is brought into the very presence of the heart and mind of the Master. It presents the psychology of the Christian life becavise it reveals so much of the inmost consciousness of Christ, and because in it Christ makes clear so many of the inner relationships of truth and life in the soul of the disciple. Its keynotes are universal words. It appeals to those who seek the eternal truth and life and love. To the mind of today it presents Christianity in a peculiarly sympathetic way. * In response to the question, " Do you think the purpose of the author was to win those not believing to belief in Christ, or to deepen the belief of believers ? " the following informal replies were received : — Professor Anthony: — " I regard the Gospel as an apologetic, written both to coii/irm, and to pro- duce, belief'. Professor Beardslee: — " I should prefer not to try to distinguish, as your question suggests. I should rather say in general that its aim was to engender and establish faith ". Professor Hayes: — " Why may we not say that John wrote primarily for the church, to establish it in the faith: but with the whole world of readers in the background of his thought ?" Professor Jacobus: — " If, as seems most likely, the F'irst Epistle of John was written in connection with the Gospel of John, it would seem almost beyond question that the Gospel itself was written for those who were already Christians but who, under the influence of false teaching regarding Christ and the viii PREFACE. It was said by a German philosopher of the first half of the century just closed, that the Gospel of John was the Gospel of the church of the future ; that the church of that time was not yet up to it. Whether or not this were true for that time and country, we do not believe it is true of the church in America today. No Gospel is so dear, and none appeals so strongly to Christian people as this Gospel. t The church finds itself — its purposes, its ideals, its aspirations, its duty, its work, its life, in this Gospel written by the beloved apostle. And in coming to this Gospel it also becomes deeply conscious of its own failures and shortcomings. In emphasizing the peculiar worth and function of the Fourth Gospel the value of the Synoptic Gospels must not be underestimated. It is only after a study of St. John that the range, the depth and the crystalline clearness of the Synoptic records can be fully appreciated. The Christ portrayed by St. John is the Christ who is revealed to us as by a lightning flash in Matthew 1 1 : 25-30 and Luke 10 : 2 1 , 22 We can not refrain from quoting here the closing words of Professor Riggs in the Outlines mentioned above (see no*^e, p. iv of Preface) : — "Our study of this noble Gospel has come to an end. To that study which makes experience, life the chief interpreter, there can never be an end. It calls us fThc uniqueness of John's Gospel consists, among other things, in its unique presentation of these three cardinal ideas of Christianity: — belief in Jesus as the Christ; obedience to the "new comniandment " ; the relationship to God of being " sent ". I. To show the emphasis placed on this ruling idea of the Fourth Gospel the passages bearing on this subject of belief in Jesus as the Christ are given herewith: 1:7 — 1:12 — 1:50 — 2:11 — 2:23 — 3:15 — 3 : 16 — 3:18 — 3:36 — 4:39 — 4:41 — 4:42 — 4:53 — 5:38 — 5:44 — 5:46 — 5:47 — 6:29 — 6:30 — 6: 35 — 6: 36 — 6: 40 — 6: 47 — 6: 64 — 6: 69 — 7:5 — 7: 31 — 7: 38 — 7: 39 — 7: 48 — 8: 24— 8: 30— 8:31 — 8: 45 — 8: 46 — 9 : 35 — 9 : 36 — 9 : 38 — 10: 25 — 10: 26 — 10: 37 — 10 : 38 — 10 : 42 — 11 : 15 — 11 : 25 — 11 : 26 — II : 27 — II : 40 — 11 : 42 — " : 45 — 11 : 48 — 12 : 11 — 12: 36 — 12 : 37 — 12: 39 — 12 : 42 — 12 : 44 — 12 : i,(> — 13 :i9 — 14 :i — 14 :io — 14 : 11 — 14 :i2 — 14: 29 — 16 :9 — 16 : 27 — 16 :3o — 16 : 31 — 17:8 — 17: 20 — 17:21 — 19:35 — 20 :8 — 20: 25 — 20:27 — 20: 29 — 20:31. The purpose of John's Gospel to demonstrate that Jesus is the true and eternal life for every man represents the militant character of Christianity. Acceptance of the principles and standards of Christianity means acceptance of and devotion to the purpose and work of Christ " that the world may believe". The spirit of the church is one of con- quest. It is indeed a militant church. II. The new life brought into the world by Christ (as revealed in the cross) must be embodied m a new law, and that law, stated with special reference to the relation of the disciples one to another, is the " new commandment ". The law of self-sacrificing love even unto death which was the principle of His life, is to be Christian life, needed to have the teachings of Christ regarding Himself and His religion placed before them in new and impressive ways. "This would seem to be confirmed by the definite statement of the author of the Gospel at the close of the twentieth chapter, which speaks of the Gospel as presenting Jesus as the Christ through faith in whom, that is through a real and vital faith in whom alone, a full and vital Christian life is possible". Professor Nash: — " I do not believe that the author of the Fourth Gospel consciously separated the two things. But the end and aim is the demonstration to the world that Jesus is the Christ of God. The other motive, however, was a part of the whole ". Professor Sitterly: — " Like John's Epistles and Apocalypses I am of opinion that his Gospel was written to strengthen ' the belief of believers ' ". Professor Stevens: — " I should say the Fourth Gospel was written for Christian Churches and believers, as were the other three, and in order to produce and develop faith in Jesus Christ. It assumes, as already existing, some knowledge of the Gospel facts, and an already existing germ of Christian faith on the part of its readers". Professor White: — " I do not know what is the basis for the opinion held by some that the Gospel was written for believers chiefly. It certainly does greatly strengthen believers, but I do think it was written primarily for outsiders. Surely the statement of 20: 30, 31 looks strongly towards this". Professor Whitford : — "I think that John's purpose was to produce faith in Jesus. Of course such a book as his can not fail to strengthen the faith of those who already believe". See also pages 99-106 and other passages throughout the book. PREFACE. ix to go on to know the Lord through all the profound realities of communion and obedience which involve the ultimate depths of life. The deeper we go by this wav of interpretation the surer shall we be that this is no fabricated portrait of the Master. It is rather the picture of one who saw not merely the scenery of Galilee and Judea, nor simply the external forms of that memorable group now known as Master and Disciples, but whose profoundly religious spirit, touched, illumined, guided by the Spirit of Truth, grasped the eternal significance of Him to whom His life had been given. Is there a subjective element in John ? Of course there is, but it is the subjectivism of one whose insight was directed to the inner, eternal meanings of Jesus. Rightly has it been said that John saw Jesus and His truth sub specie Eternitatis. Does that make the Gospel less true? Evidence enough the principle of their life. Thus the actual life of Christ is to become the actual life of the church. He calls the disciples unto Him that they may possess this life and in turn be workers with Him in bringing this life to others. Through the "new commandment" the power of the cross becomes the power of the church organizing Csee p. 276) its heterogeneons and oftentimes apparently irreconcilable elements into a deep and living unity. This is the great miracle which when accomplished proves to the world the genuineness of Christian discipleship (13:35) and also the divineness of Christ's mission (17:21). Failure to observe the " new commandment " has been the cause of the downfall of many a church. The militant purpose toward those without and the new commandment working within give to the church an tsprit de corps which makes it invincible. In Chapters i- 12 the great word is belief; in Chapters 13-21 the great word is lovi, occasionally interwoven with the word beliff. Belief in Christ leads to love for, obedience to, nnion with Christ. Belief is the gateway to the eternal life of self-sacrificing Icve. For passages bearing on the " new command- ment" and on the unity that results from obedience to it, see 13 : 34 — 13 : 35 — 15 : 12 — 15 : 13 — 15 : 17 — 13 : 14-16 — 17:11 — 17:21 — 17: 22 — 17: 23 (see also 13 :r — 15 :9 — 17 : 26). III. The many different connections in which Jesus speaks of " him that sent me " show how centra and fundamental was Jesus' consciousness of being "sent". The iteration and reiteration of this is most striking. It is an ever recurring refrain (as in "the will of him that sent me", 4 : 34 : 5 : 30 : 6 : 38: cf. Matt. 6 : 10; 7: 21: 12: 50: ro: 39. 42. etc). Christ would have this consciousness become the consciousness of the church. When we notice that the phrase " sent " in connection with Christ is used 40 times before it is used in the final passage, we realize the tremendous impressiveness of the words of Jesns, " As my Father hath sent me, even so send I you" (20 : 21; see also 17:18). Relationship with Christ in learning becomes relation- ship with Christ in being " sent ". Note Professor Nash's definition of the li\-ing church as composed of those who have learned how to pray and therefore have learned how to work (p. 157). For passages see 3:17 — 3:3'4 — 4 : 34 — 5 : 23 — 5 : 24 — 5 :3o— 5 =36 — 5 :37 — 5 : 38 — 6 : 29 — 6:38 — 6 : 39 — 6 :44— 6 : 57 — 7 : 16 — 7 : 18 — 7 : 28 — 7 : 29 — 7 : 33 — 8 : 16 — S : 18 — 8 : 26 — 8 : 29 — 8 : 42 — 9:4 — 10 : 36 — 11: 42 — 13:44 — '"•45 — 12:49 — 13:20 — 14:24 — 15:21 — 16 :5 — 17:3 — 17:8 — 17: 18 — 17: ai — 17: 23 — 17:25 — 20:21. Cf. Matt. 10:40; Mk.9:37: Lk.9:48: 10:16. Christ's relation to the world is comple. mentary to His relation to (jod. The force with which He is sent to the world is the same as that with which He is sent from the Father. In the Synoptic Gospels the emphasis is on the former; in the Fourth Gospel on the latter. See Lk. 3: 32 : 19 : 10 ; Matt. 20 : 28 ; 15 : 24 ; Lk. 4 : 43. As is seen by reading the references under the above headings John's Gospel holds up to us in a peculiarly vivid and definite way Jesus" consciousness of being " sent " to do the will of God; Jesus' purpose that the world may believe; Jesus' teaching of the new commandment of self-sacrificing love. These three ideas are the elemental principles of Christianity. They represent a purpose, life, consciousness of Christ, which in turn are to become the purpose, life, consciousness of the church, that the life of God which was in Christ, the eternal life of self-sacrificing love as manifested in the cross, may be in them: " I in them, and thou in me. that they may be f)erfected into one: that the world may know that thou didst send me, and lovedst them, even as thou lovedst me". The militant purpose of the church is that men may beheve, its life is the life of self-sacrificing love, its consciousness is that of being " sent '' by Christ. A church with such a life and with such a purpose and with such a propulsive force from Christ its Lord has within itself unlimited reserves of power. These three principles represent the movement of the Christian life: — drawn to Christ in belief, united »nth one another in love, sent out into the world in service. The most conspicuous New Testament example of marvellous realization of this three-fold relationship is the Apostle Paul. It will be noticed that these three cardinal ideas are very closely involved in the purpose of the Gospel as stated in 20: 31. Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God, is sent into the world that men may believe, and that believing they may enter into the eternal Ufe of self-sacrificing love. This is He whom the church knows as King of Truth, and Life of the human race. X PREFACE. there is of its historicity. No other Gospel is more faithful to historical situations ; no other Gospel is more keenly alive to psychological presentations. Its portrai- ture of Jesus, different as is its setting from that of the Synoptics, is thoroughly consistent with theirs. What they exhibit constantly in action and now and then by word is here completely interpreted in that blaze of glory which casts a noon-day clearness upon the person and character of the Messiah ". During the progress of the Conferences subscriptions for a proposed volume were taken and at the close of the series enough had been received to ensure the printing of the addresses given. The committee are especially grateful to these earliest subscribers without whose prompt support the volume would have been impossible. One of the inspirations in the work of the Conferences has been the fact that through the volume a medium will be furnished by which the best which a large city like Providence can command will be made available for the pastor and teacher in the remotest hamlet of the state. In serving the Providence churches the speakers have been serving the churches of the entire state. The interest which has been manifested by many outside Rhode Island has also been most gratifying. Subscriptions for from one to one hundred copies have been received from churches, seminaries and individuals beyond the borders of the state. The committee are most grateful to the speakers for their constant encouragement and cooperation. They can best show their appreciation of this cordial support from the first and of the great merit of the addresses, by endeavoring to give to the volume as wide a circulation as possible. Should the sale of the book be sufficient to give a surplus, this will be devoted to interdenominational purposes. The special thanks of the committee are due to Hon. Nathan W. Littlefield for his generous services as Treasurer of the Conferences and for much labor spent in connection with the Business Men's Lunch of January 13 ; to Rev. Albert F. Bassford, a student in Brown University, for careful stenographic reports of many of the addresses ; also to Mr. A. B. McCrillis and to Mr. Albert C. Day for important aid rendered in receiving subscriptions from outside Rhode Island. Mr. Day has also kindly consented to act as Treasurer of the Publication Committee. The committee take pleasure also in acknowledging the uniform courtesy of the daily press — the Journal and Bulletin, the News, and the Telegram — in reporting the Conferences. Particularly is the committee under obligation to Rev. Thomas E. Bartlett, pastor of the Pawtuxet Baptist Church, who has corrected the proof and super- vised the book through the press, and for whose indefatigable labor and constant vigilance every reader will be grateful. The Committee wish to thank most heartily all those who whether in the Con- ferences or by private subscription contributed to the necessary expenses of the Conferences ; also all those who in many other ways have aided in connection with the Conferences or in connection with the resulting volume. For all the Committees as well as for very many individuals, whose names are not mentioned in the volume but who have done much to assist, the entire work connected with both Conferences and volume has been a labor of love. CONTENTS. Preface ........... iii Men and Events in the Time of Jesus — Professor Charles F. Sitterly, Ph.D., S.T.D. . . ' . i The Study of the Gospel by John — President Wilbert W. White, Ph.D lo The First Chapter — President Wilbert W. White, Ph.D 22 The Prologue— (i : 1-18) — Professor Clark S. Beardslee, D.D. ...... 26 John the Baptist and His Gospel — (i : 19-37) — Professor Wm. Arnold Stevens, D.D. , LL.D. . .... 3° The Call of the First Disciples — (i : 29-51) — Rev. A. C. Dixon, D.D 42 " Sons of God " — (i : 12) — Rev. Floyd W. Tomkins, S.T.D 5° "Full of Grace and Truth " — (i : 14) — Professor Henry S. Nash, D.D 59 The Miracle at CanaCwith an Attempt at a Philosophy of Miracles) — (2:1-11)- President Augustus H. Strong, D.D., LL.D. ..... 63 Jesus and Nicodemus— The New Birth — (3:I-I5) — Rev. Edward Abbott, D.D. ........ 71 Eternal Life Through Belief— (3: 14-21) — Rev. Albert H. Plumb, D.D. 76 The Optimism of Jesus — (4: 1-42) — Rev. Frank J. Goodwin ........ 87 The Source of Jesus' Strength — (4:34) — Rev. Willis P. Odell, D.D. 9i The Gospel of John in the Spiritual Life of the Churches — Rev. Henry M. King, D.D. ........ 99 Some Characteristics of the Gospel According to St. John — Rev. Alexander McKenzie, D.D. ....... 107 The Works OF Jesus. L Resurrection — (5 : i 7-30) — Rev. George P. Eckman, Ph.D., D.D 118 The Works of Jesus. IL Judgment — (5: 17-30) — Rev. Charles M. Melden, Ph.D., D.D 124 xii COl^TENTS. I'AGE The Secret of Jesus' Life — (5:30) — Rev. John Balcom Shaw, D.D. ....... 130 Faith in Christ the Spring of Religious Action — (6:29) — President Nathan E. Wood, D.D. . . .136 Jesus the Bread of Life — (6:30-59) — Rev. Cornelius Woelfkin, D.D. ....... 145 The Confession of Peter — Christ the World's Only Hope and Life — (6:68,69) — Professor Henry S. Nash, D.D. . . . . . • i53 Jesus' Controversies with the Jev^^s — Professor Melancthon W. Jacobus, D.D. ..... 161 Unbelief the Fundamental Sin — Rev. B. L. Whitman, D.D., LL.D. 167 Knowledge of the Teaching of Jesus Through the Doing of the Will of God — (7:17) — Rev. Francis J. McConnell, Ph.D. ...... 177 Spirit and Life — (7:37-39) — Rev. Amory H. Bradford, D.D . 187 The Sinlessness of Jesus — (8:29, 46) — Rev. William R. Huntington, D.D., D.C.L., L.H.D 189 The Evidential Value of Miracles — Professor Charles W. Rishell, Ph. D ' . .197 Freedom Through the Truth — (8:31-36) — Rev. Everett D. Burr, D.D. ....... 205 The Home at Bethany and the Friendships of Jesus — (n : 1-46; 12 :i-ii) — Rev. Donald Sage Mackay, D.D. ...... 218 The Cross the World's Evangel, or the Christian Law of Sacrifice in Relation to Missions — (12:20-32) — Rev. Henry C. Mabie, D.D. ....... 224^ The Attracting Power of the Cross — (12:32) — Rev. Avery A. Shaw, M.A. ....... 236 The Commandment of God and Life Everlasting — (12:49,50) — Rev. Stewart Means, D.D. ........ 249 The Washing ofthe Disciples' Feet and the Law of Service — (13: 1-17) — Rev. Edwin Alonzo Blake, Ph.D., D.D 257 The Glorification of the Son of Man — (13:31,32) — Professor Samuel Hart, D.D., D.C.L. ...... 268 Obedience to the New Commandment the Proof of Discipleship — ('3:34. 35) — Rev. Rockwell H. Potter ........ 275 Mysticism in the 14th, 15th and i6th Chapters of the Fourth Gospel — Professor Alfred Williams Anthony, D.D. ..... 280 Jesus the Revelation of the Father — (14:6-11) — Professor Henry C. Sheldon, S.T.D 287 CONTENTS. xiii FAGS The Presence of the Father, Son and Spirit Through Obedience to THE Commands of Christ — (14: 21-26) — Rev. Robert A. Ashworth, A.M. ....... 29s Friendship with Jesus Through Obedience to His Commands— (15:14,15) — Rev. John D. Pickles, Ph.D. 301 "That they all May Be One" — (Chapter 17) — Professor Henry T. Fowler, Ph.D. 306 The Unity of Christianity as Revealed in the Prayer of Christ — (Chapter 17) — Professor Henry S. Nash, D.D. ....... 311 Sanctification in the Truth — (17: 17-19) — Rev. D. W. Faunce, D.D. 317 The Self-Surrender of Jesus Christ — (18: n) — Rev. George M. Stone, D.D. ....... 326 The Crucifixion— "It is Finished" — (19:30) — Rt. Rev. Thomas A. Jaggar, D.D. . . . . . 332 The Resurrection the Crowning Fact of Christianity — (Chapter 20) — President Herbert Welch, D.D. ....... 344 The Twenty-First Chapter — President Henry G. Weston, D.D., LL.D. . . . . • 356 The Import of St. John 21 : 15-17 — Rev. Galusha Anderson, S.T.D., LL.D. ..... 366 The Teaching Function of the Church — Professor Frank K. Sanders, Ph.D., D.D. ..... 380 The Method of Jesus with Individuals — (3: 1-16; 4: 5-26) — President William Douglas Mackenzie, D.D. ..... 382 The Personal Equation of the Fourth Gospel — Rev. Frederic Palmer, A.M. ....... 390 The Author of the Fourth Gospel — Professor Clark S. Beardslee, D.D. ..... 397 APPENDIX. Remarks of Governor Garvin, Mayor Miller and Others at the Business Men's Lunch of January 13, 1904 . . . .405 Analysis of the Gospel, Embodying also Conference Address on " How the Gospel was Made" — Professor Frederick L. Anderson, D.D. ..... 414 Suggestive Studies and References — Professor Clark S. Beardslee, D.D. ...... 437 XIV CONTENTS. The Gospel According to St. John — President Henry G. Weston, D.D., LL.D. The Most Remarkable Gospel — Professor Doremus A. Hayes, Ph.D., S.T.D., LL.D. . ''In the Beginning"— (i : i) — Rev. James Lee Mitchell, Ph.D. .... A Lesson in Methods — President Edwin M. Poteat, D.D. The Condition of Entrance Into the Kingdom of God — (3:1-16) Professor William C. Whitford, A.M. The Gospel of the Conversations — Rev. James G. Vose, D.D. .... The Principle of Missions in the Gospel of St. John — Rev. W. C. Bitting, D.D Sanctification Through the Truth — (17: 17) — Rev. Horace W. Tilden, D.D The Dramatic Movement in St. John's Gospel — Rev. Willard Brown Thorp .... St. John's Teaching of Fatherhood and Sonship — Rt. Rev. Frederic Dan Huntington, S.T.D., D.C.L., LL.D. A Hidden Revelation — (21 : 15-17) — Rev. James Church Alvord The Unity of the Church — Rev. C. A. L. Richards, D.D St. John in all Ages ...... 444 447 450 453 455 458 463 468 471 474 476 478 481 PROGRAMS AND INDICES. Programs of the Conferences Index to Authors Index to Texts 487 493 502 « But as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of god, even to them that believe on His name. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth. For as the Father hath life in Himself ; so hath He GIVEN TO THE SON TO HAVE LIFE IN HiMSELF. And I, IF I BE LIFTED UP FROM THE EARTH, WILL DRAW ALL MEN UNTO Me. I AM THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD: HE THAT FOLLOWETH Me SHALL NOT WALK IN DARKNESS, BUT SHALL HAVE THE LIGHT OF LIFE. A NEW COMMANDMENT I GIVE UNTO YOU, THAT YE LOVE ONE ANOTHER ; AS I HAVE LOVED YOU, THAT YE ALSO LOVE ONE ANOTHER. By THIS SHALL ALL MEN KNOW THAT YE ARE My DISCIPLES, IF YE HAVE LOVE ONE TO ANOTHER, If a MAN LOVE Me, he will keep My words: and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him, and MAKE our abode WITH HIM. I IN THEM, AND ThOU IN Me, THAT THEY MAY BE MADE perfect IN one; and that the world MAY KNOW THAT ThOU HAST SENT Me, AND HAST LOVED THEM, AS ThOU HAST LOVED Me. As My Father hath sent Me, even so send I you. ^ But patient stated much of the Lord's life Forgotten or misdelivered, and let it work : Since much that at the first, in deed and word, Lay simply and sufficiently exposed. Had grown (or else my soul was grown to match. Fed through such years, familiar with such light. Guarded and guided still to see and speak) Of new significance and fresh result ; What first were guessed as points, I now knew stars, And named them in the Gospel I have writ." — Bro'M?iing: "^ Death in the Desert. ' MEN AND EVENTS IN THE TIME OF JESUS. BY i-iK\'. c'h.vrIjKS k. t^i'X"rici*i^v, fii. I)., «. 'V. r>.. Professor ok Biki.ical Literature and Exegesis or the English Bible, Drew Theological Seminary, Madison, N. J. Whether history ever repeats itself is open to debate, but there can be no question that the historical situation into which Jesus was born was wholly unique. Like conditions had certainly never before been realized since the world began, and it is just as clear that their duplicate can never be approximated in the ages to come. The signs of Jesus' times were peculiarly obscure to the men of His generation, but they have ever since been growing more significant and luminous until today even the rapid runner and the traveling man may rightly read them. To be sure, His horoscope had been cast at the begin- ning with a definiteness of detail both as to time, place, and singular cir- cumstances, but even those who searched the Sacred Writings most dili- gently missed utterly the meaning of their testimony unto Him, and it fell in His day, and so far forth until the present, that strangers took Him in and proclaimed and finally crowned Him, while they who were His own not only wilfully misread His credentials in all their Scriptures from Moses until John, but entering into partnership with the proud princes of this world, they finally condemned and crucified their own rightful King. There are three standpoints from which one may view any great his- torical character with profit, and these contemplate Him in His relation to the social, the political, and the religious tendencies of His times. Of course, these relations commingle, and they may not be arbitrarily meas- ured as separate one from the other, but they are capable of practical dis- tinction and are certainly helpful to orderly discussion. When Jesus, after thirty years of preparation, entered upon His Messi- anic mission. He was challenged by Satan from these three standpoints. (i) "If Thou art indeed Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread — abolish hunger — make poverty impossible — command men to divide their inheritance — make labor lighter or do away with it alto- gether. Command the earth to bring forth loaves of bread already baked ; give us manna for the mere gathering, as Moses did ". (2) " If Thou art Son of God, seize the reins of royalty — become the universal king. Thou seest the separate parts of that empire and the glory of them — they are all mine, and by adopting my methods they can all become yours ". (3) " If Thou art Son of God, appeal boldly to the superstitious ele- ment in mankind — cast Thyself down from the temple-top and let angels bear Thee visibly up — ^make display of Thy powers — conjure up and play upon the innate love of man for the spectacular and unreal — the world is * Delivered at the First Conference, held at the First Baptist Church, October 21, 1903. 2 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. always ready for such leadership — worship me and I will bring you the homage of millions of men ". Thus was Jesus of Nazareth tested in His three-fold nature, and by a careful contemplation of the three fields from which His temptation sprang may we obtain some added appreciation of His unique personality and mission. I. First, then, we will consider the social conditions of the world into which Jesus was born, and I use the word " social " in the work-a-day or domestic sense, inclusive of physical and temporal environment. In the province of Galilee, where most happily Jesus was brought up, there existed in miniature all the diverse conditions and combinations of human society. Galilee was the garden of the Holy Land, and its native or Jewish popula- tion was very largely engaged in agricultural pursuits. To engage in man- ual labor was no disgrace to the Hebrew, the disgrace rested rather upon him who would not work. Oil, wine, wheat, fruits, and fish were produced in great quantities. Abundance of flax was raised, and the linen fabrics made by the women of Galilee were of unusual fineness and beauty. A peculiar kind of pottery, made from the black clay found in the region of Cana, was highly esteemed throughout Syria. Magdala boasted of over 300 shops where pigeons for the sacrifices were sold, Safed was celebrated for its honey, Shikmonah for its pomegranates, Akabar for the raising of pheasants, and Sepphoris, the hitherto capital of the province, was noted for the production of grain and fruit, Arbela was celebrated for its manufac- ture of cloth, Tarichaea, on Lake Galilee, was known throughout the east for its extensive fish factories, and from this same port on the lake, Josephus in his day collected a fleet of 230 ships to lead in the attack upon Tiberias. It is evident from the mounds of ruins which today line the shores of that little lake that hundreds of thousands of souls teemed about it at the open- ing of the Christian era, and it is entirely probable that between two and three million people found residence in the 200 cities of this prosperous province of Galilee. The majority of these towns were distinctively Jewish, made up of families whose heads were by right as proud of their pure lineage as any household of Judea, but there was far less of narrowness and racial exclusiveness than in the more southern shire. Business interests were broader and more truly cosmopolitan, and then, as now, the measure of prosperity was more evenly shared and the commoner blessings of life were more generally distributed than in the vicinity of the Jewish capital. The very fact of their comparative isolation, on account of their distance from the sacred center, together with that of their proximity to distinctly Gentile communities, tended to deepen and intensify racial pride and patriotism while, at the same time, it broadened the provincials in a most wholesome way. The malicious fling at Jesus as one " from Nazareth," and as " a Galilean," did not reflect either as wide-spread or as deep-seated a contempt as is too often supposed, and it will be recalled that many of the best disciplined and the most efficient forces which supported the national cause, both with blood and with treasure, from the time of the Maccabees to those of Bar Chochba, were drawn from Galilee. But it was appropri- MEN AND EVENTS IN THE TIME OF JESUS. 3- ately called "Galilee of the Gentiles," and the non- Jewish element must be clearly recognized. The most marked foreign factor is properly called Greek, although the government was actually Roman. But from the days of Alexander the Great and his Seleucid successors, Greek fashions, Greek ideas, and the Greek language had taken deep hold upon the northern province of Palestine. From Ptolemais, on the seacoast, to the group of ten Greek cities called Decapolis, in the upper Jordan valley, there was a chain of Greek communities right across Galilee, which inevitably and indelibly influenced her people, and when we remember that all of the New Testament writings, as they have come down to us, have been in Greek, and more than half of its writers were natives of this province, we realize how mighty that influence must have been. We are able, also, to see why the people of Galilee lacked the narrow prejudices so common to those of Judea, and to understand how the foreign elements among them tended to develop and enlarge their minds and characters. This is doubtless one of the chief reasons why Christ and His cosmopolitan system of ethics and morals received so favorable a hearing in Galilee, and why so large a pro- portion of His disciples came from that province. It will be remembered that II of the apostolic 12 were Galileans, one only being chosen from Judea, " and he was a devil.'' We find, then, that what we have called the social atmosphere in which Jesus Himself was developed, and in turn devel- oped His heaven-born Gospel, was peculiarly healthy as an environment for the reception of that Gospel both from the purity of its native elements and from the world affinities and outgoings of its foreign ingredients. H. Let us now ascend an exceeding high mountain, and behold all the kingdoms of the world in the first century, and the glory of them, and see what attitude our Saviour takes toward \\\q political situation about Him, Born during the Augustan age at the very climax of Rome's imperial pros- perity, with the ears of all men still ringing with the renown of the Caesars, and their mouths full of the tales of conspiracies and plots, the passions and the exploits of a Pompey, a Brutus, a Cassius, an Antony and a Cleo- patra, all of whom had marched and countermarched across the Galilean plains, with the national tales of Maccabean bravery and valor and of Herodian duplicity and diabolism, smarting under the repeated levies of talents and of troops to keep up the pagan pageant, what real patriot could fail to feel the rising within him of a spirit of unquenchable hatred for everything foreign, and a desire for revenge, and that only equal to the depths of shame and of outrage which his land and his people had endured for generations.' And Jesus was a most intense patriot, who yearned after the betterment of His own people and nation with a fervent passion which at times seemed almost to consume Him. To Him, Palestine was already the Holy Land, and He loved its hills and vales and water courses and mountains, its solitudes and forests, and its teeming cities and overflowing capital with an affection which no one else except, perhaps, David had ever approximated. He admired the splendid new temple even then in process of building, and coveted it as " for all nations the house of prayer ", and He enjoyed the architectural renaissance, which was filling with great structures 4 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. every corner of the land, but He could not fail to read in these things the extension of Beelzebub's kingdom, and He was not deceived. Although Jesus was born in the reign and dominion of Herod the Great, He passed His life as a civil subject of Herod Antipas, whose tetrarchate of Galilee covered the entire period of Christ's career. Antipas inherited the political cunning of the greater Herod and ruled his province with marked success, trimming adroitly between the prejudices and customs of his Jewish and Greek subjects, never failing in his loyalty to Tiberius Caesar, in whose honor he built and named the new capital on the lake, and yet never pro- voking to the brink of rebellion the liberty-loving spirit of the Galileans. Christ correctly measured and labeled him "that fox". The province of Judea was so much harder to control that, after the death of the first Herod, who for over 40 years ruled it as with a rod of iron and not improp- erly thereby won the title of "Great", it was taken under the immediate oversight of Roman procurators, of whom Pontius Pilate was the" sixth successive appointee within 20 years. But Herod the Great had utterly demoralized and incapacitated the capital province for loyalty either to the traditions of the fathers or to the political policies of its later masters. No more consummate master in the art of corrupt diplomacy probably ever lived, or more supple acrobat in the arena of spectacular public service than the first Herod, but he was not altogether bad nor was his reign altogether without effect in preparing the hearts of the Hebrews more willingly to receive a spiritual kingdom and king. His glory as a builder of great pub- lic works was scarcely second to that of Solomon, and in Palestine even today one may trace his handiwork from end to end of the land. In Jeru- salem he began by rebuilding the citadel of the temple, which he renamed Antonia in honor of Antony. He then built a group of impregnable towers on the north front of Zion. Next came a stadium, a theatre, and an amphitheatre, which last occasioned a conspiracy well-nigh costing him his life. Turning now from the capital, he began to fortify and garrison various parts of the country, in readiness for revolt. He built two strong castles, known respectively as the Herodium in Judea and the Herodium in Arabia, and rebuilt four well-situated Asmonean strongholds, which had fallen into ruin. Samaria, Caesarea, Gaba and Heshbon he fortified and lavishly equipped as militar>' posts. In the case of Csesarea, he spent 12 years in developing a splendid seaport, erecting quays, moles, towers, sewers, col- onnades, palaces, and temples, as well as an amphitheatre, a theatre, and a hippodrome. This soon became the Roman center of the realm. Here, as well as at Jerusalem, games were instituted in honor of the emperor every four years. These comprised gymnastic and musical games, chariot races, and contests with wild beasts, and it is not at all probable that the mass of the population, which was, of course, Jewish, kept themselves from attending them. Thus the generation to which Jesus belonged was deeply tainted with tastes and tendencies from which only a reformer " whose fan was m his hand ", and whose scourge of stinging thongs could exorcise or purge them. MEN AND EVENTS IN THE TIME OE JESUS. 5 But the process of political servitude, so cleverly concealed and so ably carried out by Herod and his successors, had taken such vital hold upon the nation that when at last the Messiah was heralded by his forerunner and proclaimed from Heaven, and accredited by many mighty works and words of his own, neither leaders nor multitudes were able to break the hypnotic spell that rested upon them while they cried " Away with Him, away with Him, crucify Him, crucify Him, we have no King but Caisar ". HI. This brings us face to face with the religious situation which involves a problem whose complexity well nigh defies satisfactory solution. It is well known that the spiritual life of the pagan world had dwindled to the vanishing point. Among the Hebrews a few families, scattered more often in rural villages and communities of the Diaspora, kept the pure light of intelligent faith and pious living glowing in the hearts of a saving remnant, but the nation as a whole was hopelessly divided into contentious factions incapable of responding to common appeals or leadership except along the lines of the basest passions and prejudices. The two poles we may say, around which these extremes of religious energy centured vi&xe pietism and scribism. As has been well said " the fact that a village became a town when once it possessed ten men who agreed to be regular attendants upon the synagogue and the additional fact that later it became customary to pay these men for attending service, certainly does not heighten one's confidence in popular piety ". Nevertheless the clear glimpses which the gospels give of unfeigned faith and genuine spirituality in a few sporadic cases is evidence that the synagogue was not the only school or source of religious activity. The prophetess Anna was not alone in her sympathy with Mary's glad con- fidence in the Messianic future of her first-born son for " she spake of Him unto all them that looked for redemption in Jerusalem ". Nor was Simeon the only saint awaiting in expectant joy the consolation of Israel, nor was Zacharias the only priest, nor Nicodemus the only rabbi, nor Nathaniel the only Israelite who were righteous and sincere and guileless inquirers into the deepest meaning of Christ's visitation. Moreover, the fact is too often entirely overlooked that Jesus, as well as The Baptist, did in truth arouse and sustain a ready and genuine response to His uncompromising demands, and that His death was accomplished before He had been teaching his doctrine of other-worldliness three short years, and, ///.nd the Father (v. 37) as witnesses, and finally the Scriptures, which the Jews were very familiar with. Now, if you will think a moment, you will see how unlikely it w'ould be for our Lord to command these Jews, who had been all along rejecting Him, and whose unbelief in verse fort}^ he declares to be wilful, — how unlikely, I say, that our Lord should command them to go home and study their Bibles even more about the Messiah. It was not more information they needed. The evidence presented to them was ample. The trouble with them was that they would not do that which the testimony challenged them to do, and the reason for this was, as given in verse forty- two, " Ye have not the love of God in yourselves ". The trouble was not with their intellects, but with their feelings and their wills. An additional reason for accepting the Revised Version I found in the use of the w'ord " life " in verses thirty-nine and forty. The Jews made the mistake of thinking that in the Scriptures they had life and they would not come to the Saviour in order that they might have life. They made the Bible an end in itself instead of a means to an end, a mistake which many people are making in the present day. This passage lying, as I have above explained, in my mind became vividly present on that red letter day of which I am speaking and served as the basis of the outline which I submit below, practically all of which was THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. wrought out that day in the woods and has been followed with various classes and by myself many times since, every new study of which brings additional light on this marvelous Fourth Gospel. LIFE. Ye may have life. Believing ye may have life in His name. These things are written, that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God ; and that believing ye may have life in His name. I.— TESTIMONY. Testimony of John the Baptist. Testimony of Jesus' Works. Testimony of the Father. Testimony of the Scripture. Testimony of Jesus Himself. Testimony of Individuals. Testimony of the Holy Spirit. n— BELIEF. Instances of Belief. Instances of Unbelief. Development of Belief. Development of Unbelief. Secret of Belief. Explanations of Unbelief. Results of Belief. Results of Unbelief. Duty of Belief. Sin of Unbelief. Time of Belief. Object of Belief. Let us now follow briefly the outline above. L — Testimony. I. — The testimony of John the Baptist is very prominent in the Gospel by John. It is twice referred to even in the Prologue (John i : 1-18). Why it is there referred to is a question, to answer which some students reading this article may profitably spend several hours. We shall not dwell upon it here. Nothing is said about John the Baptist in the Gospel of John out of the first and third chapters, except at the end of the tenth chapter, where we THE STUDY OF THE GOSPEL. 13 read of the people remarking that while John did no miracles, everything that he said about Jesus was true. The prominence of the testimony of John the Baptist at the beginning of the Fourth Gospel is accounted for, I think, from the fact that he was the one who pointed the writer of the Gospel to Jesus Christ. John the Evangelist was a disciple of John the Baptist. More time than is usually supposed had been spent by John the Baptist in instructing his disciples about the Messiah before Jesus came to the Jordan to be baptized. John the Evangelist was with John the Baptist when he uttered those memorable words : " Behold the Lamb of God ", and at the suggestion of John the Baptist, John the Evangelist went after Jesus and never came back to his old teacher. The Fourth Gospel is in a real sense a record of the experience of the man who wrote it. I most firmly believe that this material has been given by the inspiration of the Most High, and yet I believe that the inspiration of the Most High did not in any way interfere with the free action of the mind of John the Evangelist, and that we have here a true picture of how our Lord nnpressed him from the beginning to the end. You very well know how natural it is when one is speaking of his religious experience to mention the one who led him to the Saviour. This is what John the Evan- gelist here does. It is worth while noticing as we pass that in this Fourth Gospel John the Baptist is always called simply John, and never John the Baptist, as is the case for the most part in the other three Gospels. This, to me, is one of a number of internal evidences of the genuineness and authenticity of the Gospel by John. In the minds of the other writers there were two Johns, John the Evangelist and John the Baptist, and to distin- guish them they wrote John the Baptist when they had the forerunner of our Lord in mind. The writer of the Fourth Gospel, being John, did not thus need to distinguish, for those to whom he wrote knew that he meant John the Baptist when he merely wrote " John ". The value of the testimony of John the Baptist is very great when we consider that he was the most prominent man of his time in religious mat- ters. Thousands had been waiting on his ministry and had been baptized by him. He was fearless, courageous and truthful. Many thought that he was one of the prophets ; some even wondered if he was not the Mes- siah ; the leaders of the people sent a deputation to inquire who he was, and among the questions they asked was this, "Art thou the Christ.-' " In con- sideration of these things the testimony of John the Baptist is to be given great weight. The first chapter of John records the testimony of John the Baptist on three different occasions. The first was when the Jews sent to him priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, " Who art thou? " He assured them that he was not the Christ. With equal emphasis he denied that he was Elijah or the prophet. When they urged him to tell them who he was, reminding him that they had been ofhcially sent to find out, he answered, " I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, make straight the way of the Lord ". When they inquired his reason for baptizing, since he was not the Christ, or Elijah, or the prophet, he declared the presence of One in their midst coming after him in time, but before him in character ,4 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. and mission, tlie latchet of whose shoes he was not worthy to unloose. The second occasion of John's testifying was on the moirow after the deputation had visited him. When he saw Jesus coming he exclaimed, " Behold the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world ! " and at once pro- ceeded to explain to his hearers how he knew Jesus to be the Messiah. In doing this he related how the One who had sent him had indicated to him definitely (by what manner we know not) that upon whomsoever he should see the spirit descending and abiding. He it was who would baptize with the Holy Spirit. Solemnly, in the presence of the multitudes, he pointed to Jesus and said, " I have seen and borne witness that this is the Son of God ". The third occasion was on the day after this, when John and two of his disciples saw Jesus walking. He once more said to his disciples, " Behold the Lamb of God ! " The testimony of John the Baptist on these three occasions may be summed up as follows : The worthiest is not worthy to unloose His shoes. He is the Lamb of God ; the Son of God. On Him abides the Holy Spirit. His mission is to take away the sin of the world and to baptize in the Holy Ghost. What of the result of this testimony of John the Baptist ? Shall we ever be able to estimate it ? What effect did his words have upon the leaders of the people when the deputation reported them ? How many people who heard John the next day recalled his words later and entered into the rest which Jesus freely gives .'' We are unable to answer these questions, but we can point to the definite results of John the Evangelist following Jesus, and of that quiet Andrew, his companion, also following Jesus. The signifi- cance of the latter fact is hardly less great than that of the former when one recalls that Andrew found his brother Simon Peter and brought him to Jesus. Shall we pause a moment and think of the vast outcome of the testimony of John the Baptist through the lives of these two of the four men of the twelve who came to Jesus that day. I refer to John the Evangelist and Peter the Apostle. A word only about the testimony of John the Baptist, as found in the third chapter of the Gospel. It is found in the second part of the chapter, which contains two notable statements revealing to us much of the char- acter of John the Baptist. One of these expressions is, " He must increase, but I must decrease " (v. 30). The other is, "A man can receive nothing, except it have been given him from Heaven " (v. 27). A few years ago I had no particular admiration for John the Baptist. I thought, in the first place, that he did not dress well, and then I did not like the kind of food he ate, and regarded him as unnecessarily severe. But the more I study John the Baptist and the more comprehensive my view of the Scripture becomes, the more I admire him. I suggest that you make a study of the forerunner of our Lord. Gather all the material in the Gospels about him and make an analysis of what he said about Jesus and what Jesus said about him, and if I am not greatly mistaken you will learn to love him. THE STUDY OF THE GOSPEL. 15 Before passing from the testimony of John the Baptist, recall those words of our Lord in the fifth chapter of the Gospel by John, in which He refers to the Baptist's testimony. " Ye have sent unto John, and he hath borne witness unto the truth * * * . He was the lamp that burneth and shineth ; and ye were willing to rejoice for a season in his light. But the witness which 1 have is greater than that of John : for the works which the Father hath given Me to accomplish, the very works that I do, bear witness of Me, that the Father hath sent Me ". 2. — Let us now briefly note the testimony of Jesus' mighty works as presented in the Gospel by John. This Fourth Gospel records seven notable miracles. They are : The changing of water into wine, ch. 2. The healing of the nobleman's son at a distance, ch. 4. The healing of the man lame 38 years, ch. 5. The feeding of the 5,000 with the five loaves and two fishes, ch. 6. Walking on the sea, ch. 6. Healing a man born blind, ch. 9. Raising Lazarus from the dead, ch. 11. Several observations may be made about these miracles. They are all found in the first part of the Gospel. A noted commentator calls the twelfth chapter of the Gospel by John " the watershed of the book ". The verse which indicates the great division of the book into two parts is 12 : 33, at the middle, together with what follows in the thirty-seventh verse, " These things spake Jesus, and He departed and hid Himself from them. But though He had done so many signs before them, yet they believed not on Him ". The word " sign ", used in verse thirty-seven of the twelfth chapter, is found seventeen times in the Gospel by John. It is used only once after this verse in the twelfth chapter, and that is in 20 : 30-31, the key passage of the book. It will be well here to recall what that passage says, as it emphasizes the fact that the signs were given in testimony. " Many other signs therefore did Jesiis in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book : but these are written, that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God ; and that believing ye may have life in His name". Notice that the antecedent of "these" in verse thirty-one is " signs ", and that " these signs are written that ye may believe ". The word " sign " is one of at least four words, translated " miracle ". It has a peculiar meaning, and stands for that kind of a miracle which has significance or meaning beyond itself. The selection of miracles which John made was for the purpose of setting forth spiritual truth. Hence he calls them semeia (signs). It will be very profitable to trace here the fifteen uses of the word in the Gospel up to the twelfth chapter and thirty-seventh verse. In 2 : 1 1 we read, " This beginning of His signs did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested His glory; and His disciples believed on Him". Here you will observe the effect upon the disciples of the sign. In 2:18, "The Jews therefore answered and said unto Him, what sign showest Thou unto us, seeing that Thou doest these things?" His answer was. 1 6 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. " Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up ". The Jews mis- understood His reply, but the writer in the following verses explains that after He rose from the dead His disciples believed, for they understood that He referred to the resurrection of His body from the dead. The word is used a third time in this chapter (2 : 23), " Many believed on His name, beholding the signs which He did ". The fourth time the word is used is in 3:2, when Nicodemus is reported as saying "Thou art a teacher come from God ; for no one can do these signs that Thou doest, except God be with him". The fifth time is in 4:48, "Jesus therefore said unto him, ' Except ye see signs and wonders, ye will in no wise believe ' ". The sixth time is in 4 : 54, " This is again the second sign that Jesus did, having come out of Judea into Galilee ". The sixth chapter is the banner chapter for the use of the word. It is used four times. In 6 : 2 we read, "A great mul- titude followed Him, because they beheld the signs which He did on them that were sick ". In 6:14 are the words, " When therefore the people saw the sign which He did, they said, this is of a truth the prophet that cometh mto the world ". In 6 : 26, Jesus said to the multitude the day after they had been fed, "Ye seek me, not because ye saw the signs, but because ye ate of the loaves, and were filled ", and in verse thirty, " They said therefore unto Him, what then doest Thou for a tign, that we may see, and believe Thee ? what workest thou ? " In 7 : 31, the multitude who believed on Him said, " When the Christ shall come, will He do more signs than those which this Man hath done ? " Some, in commenting upon the miracle wrought upon the man blind from his birth (9 : 16), said, " How can a man which is a sinner do such signs?" Many came to Jesus and testified (10:41) that while John did no sign, everything he said about Jesus was true, and, as a consequence, believed on Him. After Jesus had raised Lazarus from the dead, the chief priests and Pharisees gathered a council and said, "What do we ? for this man doeth many signs "(11 •.\^). A multitude went out to see Jesus and Lazarus, after he had been raised, because of the report of those who had been with Jesus when He called Lazarus out of the tomb (12: 18). 3. — A close study of the passages cited above, in the light of the whole plan of the Gospel by John, will indicate how important the testimony of Jesus' mighty works was regarded. The reader is advised to follow up the study. Time after time Jesus appeals to His mighty works as evidence that He is from God. The fact is, that he joins inseparably the next line of testimony, namely, the testimony of the Father, with that of His mighty works by declaring that the Father, who is in Him, does the works. He declares that His works would not be accomplished were He alone, and that His ability to do them should be evidence to all that God was in Him and was doing His work through Hirr. In like manner He, before going away from His disciples, intimated to them that should the> believe on Him the works that He did they would do also. In explaining this, He continued, " Whatsoever ye shall ask in My name, that will I do ". So in a very real sense we may say that as Jesus doing the works of God, both received evidence and was evidence that the Father was in Him doing His THE SrrDV OF THE GOSPEL. 17 own works, so the Son of Ciod will dwell in us who believe and give to us and through us indisputable evidence of His presence by doing mighty works by us. Thus may we know that He is the Son of God. 4.- What shall we say of the testimony of the scriptures, to which Jesus appeals? He evidently has in mind the Old Testament. This was the Jewish Bible ; it was His own Bible. In thus appealing the case beyond the limit of contemporaneous testimony, He appeals to voices from the past. And in this connection we should note that He appeals also in the seventh line of testimony, namely, that of the Holy Spirit, to an authorita- tive voice that is to come in the future. He thus looks backward and for- ward and makes present, past and future contribute its evidence to His august claims. W'e shall not here attempt to elaborate the testimony of the Old Testament in behalf of Jesus. It is very strong and clear. The Old Testament would not have been written if Jesus had not been coming. We may truthfully say that the New Testament would not have been writ- ten if He had not already come. He is the central figure of the entire Bible. To Him everj^ part of it directly or indirectly points. 5. — The testimony of Jesus Himself, as recorded in this Fourth Gos- pel is most remarkable. The emphatic form of " I ", in the Greek, is used at least twenty-six times in connection with our Tord's claim. Here are some of the expressions in which this is found : " I am He " (that is, the Messiah,), 4 : 26 ; " Before Abraham was I am " ; " I am the Bread of Life " ; " I am the Living Bread " ; "I am the Good Shepherd " ; "I am the resur- rection and the life " ; "I am the way, and the truth and the life " ; "I am the Light of the World " ; "I am the Son of God " ; " I am the door ". Truly this Fourth Gospel is a strong setting forth of the claims of Jesus Christ as the Son of God. One does not wonder at the strenuous attempts which have been made by the rejectors of the divinity of Jesus Christ to prove this Gospel unauthentic and non-genuine. Thank God it has stood firm against all attacks and is better accredited to-day than it has ever been. 6. — Concerning the testimony of individuals as found in the Fourth Gos- pel, suffer this single remark. This testimony is introduced in remarkable subordination to the general plan and purpose of the book and contributes marvelously to its beauty, unity and force. The student may prove this by examining in the light of the whole book the testimony of individuals from that of Nathaniel, in i : 49, to that of Thomas, in 20 : 28. Notice how strikingly these fit in with the declared object as recorded in 20:30,31. The book there is said to have been written that " Ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God". Nathaniel's testimony, in i 149, is, "Thou art the Son of God; Thou art the King of Israel", which latter expression is equivalent to saying, "Thou art the Christ". Thomas' words are, " My Lord and my God ". Will the reader pause at this point and attempt to recall individual testimony as follows : Who in the third chapter testifies, and what did he say? Who in the fourth, and what was his testimony? Who in the ninth, and what the testimony? Who in the eleventh, and what the testimony? 1 8 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. (A thorough examination of the Gospel for the testimony of individuals is earnestly recommended.) 7. — The testimony of the Holy Spirit has already been alluded to. Refer- ences in the Fourth Gospel to this testimony are found chiefly in our Lord's last discourses. There more than once He refers to the coming of the Holy Spirit. "Whom," said He, "the Father wih send in My name; He shall bear witness of Me ". The words of our Lord concerning the testi- mony of the Holy Spirit were fulfilled on the Day of Pentecost and after- wards. Not for a single moment since that notable day has the Holy Spirit ceased to testify in the hearts of believers and through them that Jesus is the Son of God. At the head of the second part of the outline which we are following is the word " Belief ", which, where it exists, is induced by testimony. II— Belief. That the testimony recorded by John did produce belief is evident from the record. The Gospel records instances of individual belief as well as of the belief of companies. Individuals, such as Philip, Nathaniel, Nicodemus, the woman at the well, and others, we readily recall. Then there are such expressions as " Of the multitudes many believed ". It is not a little remarkable to notice that there are also instances of unbelief recorded. It is what we should expect. In fact, if there were no instances of unbelief recorded in the Gospels, we would be disposed to suspect them to be forged. They would be untrue to nature. Nowhere to-day, not even in the smallest village in any country, does everybody believe. The candor of the writer is clearly shown in his recording these instances of unbelief. The strength of his position is greater also when one thinks about it, for he gives satisfactory explanations of the instances of unbelief. One of the most interesting lines of study in this entire outline is that of the develop- ment of belief and unbelief. This is seen both in individuals and in the body of disciples and of the opposition. The marvelous unity of this Gos- pel grows on one as the development of belief and unbelief is traced, of belief on the one hand in the disciples as they came better to know their Lord ; of unbelief on the other in the Jews as they more and more clearly took their stand against Jesus. Take one or two instances of development of belief in individuals. That of the woman at the well is one. At first her estimate of Jesus was expressed in the words, "Thou being a Jew". After brief conversation with Him she remarked, "I perceive that Thou art a prophet". A little later she suggested to her fellow-townsmen that He was the Christ. The nobleman, as reported near the end of the fourth chapter, believed the word that Jesus said when He told him on the way some distance from the house that his son lived. After his return and discovery that his son was convalescent, we read that the nobleman believed and all his house. The word "believed" in this last instance contained much more than it did when he referred to the road-side experience. So it should be with every believer. Every new day should fill the word "believe" more full of THE STUD Y OF THE GOSPEL. 19 meaning. The man born blind is another illustration of rapid development of belief. Reference to the ninth chapter will show that the first estimate by the blind man of Jesus was that He was a man. His words were, "A man that is called Jesus made clay and told me to go to the pool and wash". After he had heard the Pharisees discussing the claims of Jesus and His work and then was asked his opinion, he said, " He is a prophet". He continued to think as he listened to the discussion, and when occasion presented itself said, " If this man were not from CJod He could do noth- ing ". After they had cast him out for faithfulness to mental and spiritual processes, Jesus Himself found him and said, " Dost thou believe on the Son of God?" He answered, " Who is He that I may believe?" Jesus said, " Thou hast both seen Him and He speaketh with thee ". And he said, " I believe ", and worshipped Him. Thus the blind man in a single day covered all the distance in the development of belief, from "A man that is called Jesus " to acceptance of this same man and worship of Him as the Son of God. To any reader whose eyes are not open to this glorious fact the same experience may come if, like the blind man, he has the willingness and humility to do what Jesus tells him to do and the courage to testify up to the measure of his conviction as Jesus more and more reveals Himself to his inner consciousness. Of the secret of belief I shall not here speak particularly. It has been already in one way or another pointed out. Explanations of unbelief are fully given in the Gospel by John. I believe there is not a single case of unbelief in the world today of which the Gospel by John does not furnish an explanation. Let us note two of these. The first is found in the third chapter, also in the fifth. It is a bad life. " Men love darkness ", says our Lord, " rather than light, because their deeds are evil ; neither will they come to the light lest their deeds be reproved ". The same is involved in John 5 : 42 and 44. " I know you, that ye have not the love of God in your- selves. How can ye believe, who receive glory one of another and the glory that cometh from the only God ye seek not?" It thus appears that in the case of some people it is absolutely true that they cannot believe. They cannot believe because they will not turn from their evil ways, just as a man cannot see the north when his face is set toward the south ; just as one cannot go towards the east while he is progressing westward. The second explanation of unbelief is given in 5:40. "Ye will not come to me that ye may have life ". Here our Saviour indicates that the diffi- culty with these Jews was not that they did not know enough ; that they had not evidence sufficient, but that they would not act ; that they refused to do what it was clear they ought to do. This great Physician of souls here made a true diagnosis. He located the difficulty not in the intellect, but in the feelings and in the will. He said to them, "Your loves are wrong; the love of God is not in you. Your wills are wrong ; ye will not come that ye may have life ". The results of belief and unbelief as indicated in the Gospel by John are the same as those manifesting themselves both before and since the time of our Lord. Take any cases of belief in the Old Testament times, 20 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. such as that of Moses, or David, or Daniel, and compare what resulted in those lives with what the Gospel by John declares to be the results of belief in God and you will be struck by the fact that the results are the same. Take the case of any believer to-day and you will find the joy and the peace and the power and other manifestations of belief to a greater or less degree present. In like manner we might speak of the results of unbelief. It thus appears that this Gospel sets forth truth for all time ; that, in other words, it is eternal. The duty of belief is set forth on every page of this Gospel. "Whatso- ever He saith unto you, do it ", quietly said the mother of Jesus to the servants at the marriage feast. " He that obeyeth not the Son shall not see life ", is the solemn declaration of Jesus Himself. The evidences of His lordship are so many and so strong that the duty of obeying Him, which is what belief means, becomes very apparent. One of the most striking passages setting forth the time of belief is in the Watershed Chapter (twelfth), thirty-fifth and thirty-sixth verses, " Walk in the light while ye have the light * * * believe on the light that ye may become sons of the light ". We cannot emphasize too much the fact that the object of our belief is a person, even Jesus Christ the Son of God Himself and not a proposition or a series of propositions. Christianity is not mere acceptance of a set of doctrines as true. It is personal allegiance and warm, loving friendship. " Ye are My friends ", our Saviour says, " if ye do the things which I command you. No longer (that is, not a moment after you do the things which I command you), 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 have heard from My Father I have made known unto you ". Let me emphasize, in closing this outline study, the distinction between explanation and evidence. Christianity bases its claims upon the latter and not upon the former, and this is scientific. Explanations come after evi- dence is acted upon. There are many students to-day who think that they are compromising their intellect if they accept as true that which they are unable to understand or explain. In no other department except that of religion, however, would they make this demand or have this suspicion. The man is mistaken when he says, I cannot believe. He has a miscon- ception of what belief is. The fact is that belief has been appointed as the means by which salvation is procured, among other reasons because it is possible for everybody to believe ; that is, to act on evidence. Jesus' com- mand is, " Follow Me". This anybody can do. His next command is " Learn of Me". This anyone will do if he will obey the first command, " Follow Me". He does not say, " Be able to explain the doctrine of the divine Sonship". He does say, " Do what I command". An exceptionally intelligent student who had come to accept the general views of Darwin, Huxley, and Spencer, and who regarded himself as an Agnostic, one day made up his mind that he would fairly examine the strongest presentation of Christian truth. He was advised to study the Gospel of John. He read it through from beginning to end, taking it THE STUDY OF THE GOSPEL. 21 simply as a book, without examination of outside evidence of its genuine- ness. When he read it through he said : " The one of whom this book tells us is either the Saviour of the world, or he ought to be". Because of what the Book told him of Jesus Christ he was ready to heed the call of our Lord, " If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink". — " He that followeth Me shall not walk in darkness". He followed the Light of the world and found Him to be his light and is now pointing others to his Saviour, The above, related by Dr. Trumbull, is a challenge to every man who says, I do not know. For my part, I believe that the same prescription would unfailingly cure every Agnostic. Let him with the following prayer, thoughtfully and earnestly read the Gospel by John. " Oh, God, if there be a God, and if Jesus Christ be Thy Son and my Saviour, give me evidence of it and I will follow Him at any cost". I do not believe that any man determined to know and do the truth at all hazards can study the Gospel by John through without becoming a Christian. * THE FIRST CHAPTER OF THE GOSPEL BY JOHN. BY REA^. "W^II.BERT W. \\"MIXE, PM. X)., PRESIDENT BIBLE TEACHERS' TRAINING SCHOOL, NEW YORK. The Gospel by John has a prologue and an epilogue. The epilogue constitutes the twenty-first chapter. The prologue includes the first eighteen verses of the first chapter. In our study of the first chapter we shall con- sider it in three parts. We shall first take the prologue, next the testimony of John the Baptist as found in verses nineteen to forty-two, and lastly we shall make a brief study of Philip and Nathanael. I. THE PROLOGUE. --^ What is the purpose of the prologue ? One great scholar much quoted in these days says, that it was for the purpose of introducing Greek readers of Asia Minor to Jewish thought, the body of the Gospel being Jewish. There is a measure of truth in this, and yet the prologue itself must be recog- nized as Jewish in thought. The outstanding Greek idea which John takes up in the prologue and into which he pours more than any Greek ever dreamed of, is Logos. In brief, we may say that the purpose of the prologue is to introduce. It summarizes in a sense the entire Gospel, setting forth in miniature all that follows. There appears to be some ground for the opinion that this prelude is tripartate and in widening circles presents the motifs of the drama which follows and which describes the development of belief and unbelief. The purpose of the Gospel is to prove that Jesus is the incarnate Logos. This not by a doctrinal course of argument, but by a biography^ " and in accordance with a plan which involves two ideas, testimony and answering belief." It requires no careful study of these verses to reveal not only the claims set forth that Jesus is the Son of God, but also the presence of testimony and its result. Of the plan of the prologue one need not speak at length. As has been intimated, there appears to be a series of ever widening movements, precur- sors of the development which we find in the body of the Gospel. In con- nection with the plan of the prologue it might be well to dwell a moment on the manifest progression as therein found. This is most clearly observed in the three propositions found in verses one, fourteen, and eighteen. The Word was God ; the Word became flesh ; the Word reveals the Father. It is interesting to compare the movement in this prologue with the statement of the object of the writing of John found in 20: 30, 31. The order found there is, first, Jesus; second, the Christ; third, the Son of God. The exact *This is the substance of President White's evening address, delivered at the First Conference on the Gospel of St. John, held October 21, 1903, at the First Baptist Church. THE FIRST CHAPTER. 23 reverse of this order appears in the prologue. Why? Because in the prologue the claims are logical; whereas, in the twentieth chapter a summary of the historical movement as found in the Gospel is j^iven. In the first part of the Gospel the disciples are represented as coming in contact with one Jesus, who, after a while is by them acknowledged to be the Christ, and at last is confessed even by the doubting Thomas to be the Son of God. In connection with those three propositions found in verses one, fourteen and eighteen, may I give the following, quoted from Gomorus, who represents Jesus as saying — " I am what I was : that is God. I was not what I am : that is man. I am now both God and man". n. TESTIMONY OF JOHN THE BAPTIST. [See preceding address.] m. PHILIP AND NATHANAEL. In these two men we have completed one half of the apostolic college. Six of the twelve apostles are found coming to Jesus in this first chapter of John. Jesus, it is said, found Philip (v. 43) and Philip found Nathanael (v. 54). The words of verse forty-five suggest enthusiasm on the part of Philip in announcing to Nathanael the Messiah. Think of him as seeing Nathanael at a distance, perhaps on the other side of a wide street, or on the opposite side of a field, and running towards him crying, " Oh, Nathanael, we have found Him of whom Moses and the Prophets wrote, Jesus of Naza- reth, the Son of Joseph". I think Philip and Nathanael had been talking over matters relating to the coming of the Messiah and were looking for Him. People who are looking are those who usually find. The answer of Nathanael put in the form of a question, " Can any good thing come out of Nazareth? " did not dampen the ardor of Philip. He was unable to answer the objection which Nathanael raised, but he was sure that in spite of the objection he had found the Messiah. He did the wise thing. He did not argue, but said, " Come and see for yourself". Nathanael's response to this invitation of Philip is a revelation of his true character. He was an honest, earnest inquirer. He was one who was not to be turned aside from investi- gation by even a serious objection. He would give more weight to the testi- mony of his friend than to a theoretic difficulty. Would that there were more of the spirit of Nathanael in our day. There are three things which in closing I wish to say about these words " Come and see". The first is that Christianity invites investigation. Not only is it willing to have the most thorough examination of its claims made, but it greatly desires just this thing. Its policy is not to ignore or dodge any difficulty. On its forefront are written the words " Come and see." The Bible invites investigation. Throw all the light possible on its pages. The founder of Christianity invites investigation. His claims. His 24 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. character, His career, all about Him He would have you investigate most carefully. The work of C'hristianity in the world invites investigation. It says, let on all the light possible. A second fact about Christianity is that it stimulates investigation. It presents claims which make us think. We should never forget that the modern university with all that it involves is the daughter of Christianity. May the daughter never deny her mother. The Bible is acknowledged by the most eminent thinkers to be the greatest stimulus to human thought. No book in all the world's history has done for the human intellect in the way of stimulus what the Bible has done. The paradoxes which are pre- sented in the Bible are calculated to stimulate thought. The superficial thinker rejects the Bible as untrue because it has what he calls so many con- tradictions. These are only apparent and dissolve on closer investigation. An illustration of this we find in this question of Nathanaelto Philip," Can any good thing come out of Nazareth ? " The prophets, as Nathanael and Philip knew, had declared that the Messiah should come from Bethlehem of Judea. It seemed impossible to believe that what Philip said was true, and yet a wider synthesis of facts was all that was needed in order to make it manifest that both were true. By the mere claim which Philip made Nathanael was stimulated to investigate. This leads us to the third and last remark that Christianity stands the test of investigation. When Nathanael went to see he found things as Philip had represented them. Everyone since that has gone to see in the same earnest manner has had the same experience. Is it not a remarkable fact that no one who has thoroughly investigated Christianit)' and acted upon the command of our Lord " Follow Me" has returned to tell the world that there is nothing in His claims ? Is there anyone here who does not know that Christ is the Son of God ? My word to such an one is " Come and see." You are challenged to do so by the very claims which are made by those about you whom you ought to trust. Philip had never deceived Nathanael. There are friends of yours who have always told you the truth. Not a single time have they led you astray. They with all the enthusiasm possessed by Philip on this memorable day when he called to Nathanael, declare that they have found the Messiah. Will you not prove yourself to be equally as earnest and honest as Nathanael and come and see even though great difficulties present themselves to you ? If you will do so, you will know that He is what He claims to be. He will give you evidence as He gave Nathanael that He knows you through and through. Will you please notice that this was what convinced Nathanael. When Jesus saw him coming He said to him, "Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile ! " And when Nathanael asked Him, " How did you come to know me?" He said, "I saw thee under the fig tree before Philip called thee". He was doubtless in meditation and prayer. Probably asking God to indicate to him the Messiah about whom John had been preaching and to give him indisputable evidence when he should see Him. His prayer was answered in an unexpected way. At once he confessed, " Thou art the Son of God ; thou art King of Israel". From that day forth Nathanael followed Jesus and the words of our Lord to him THE FIRST CHAPTER. 25 proved true, "Thou shalt see greater things than these". Every day in the true Christian's life new evidences come to him that Jesus is what lie claims to be. Limitless vistas open before him and he goes on a way of ever increas- ing wonder. Will not every hearer accept the statement at the beginning of this book, that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and act upon it.^ By this means, great doubter though you may be, you will inevitably come to the place as Thomas did where in the presence of indisputable evidence, you will cry, "My Lord, and my Cod". * THE PROLOGUE OF JOHN. by rev. ci^arii s. bkardsi^ee, d. d., Professor of Biblical Dogmatics and Ethics, Hartford Theological Seminary, Hartford, Conn. There are many points of entrance into a study of this opening section of John's Gospel. One broad avenue of approach to its meaning is a careful survey of its personnrl. Here stands a notable company, all so disposed within its far- spreading area of thought that each one finds ample room. No one but will well repay a close attention. Take the task of arranging and naming and estimating the impressive array : God, the Father ; the Word, the Son, the Incarnate ; Believers and an Unreceptive World ; Moses and John the Baptist. From among these, bring forward to the foreground the figure undoubt- edly designed by the author to stand preeminent within the group — Jesus Christ. Notice His designation : He is the Only- Begotten, the Word, the Eternal, the Medium of Creation, the Light, the Life of all the World. He has a world-embracing mission, is dowered with a glory as of God, bears within His life and being a full and blessed freightage of grace and truth, can secure to all believers the proper title of children in the household of God, and from His everlasting home in the Father's bosom can bring forth abounding revelations of the being of the Infinite and Unseen. All this opens before one's eye as he heeds the persons filing into view in this brief paragraph. Another open highway into a study of the prologue is its action. Here is a wonderful drama, with mighty actors, engaged in a stupendous enter- prise. There are impressive hints of an eternal companionship of Father and Son ; of the outgoings of an infinite energy and skill in the creation of all existing things ; of an awful and far-spread alienation between persons who should have remained genially at one ; of a gracious, world-encircling personal illumination ; of the strangely variant response of unbelievers and believers ; of an amazing birth from God through Christ of all receptive hearts into filial kinship with God ; and of clusters of events fit to mark world-eras in the ministries of Moses and John. Surely here are move- ments of the most vital and majestic type. But, among all these living scenes one is central : the Word becoming Flesh. Here is mystery beyond all doubt. But here is verity beyond denial. And here pure glory is radiant. He who abides eternally with God, He who brings a universe into ordered life. He who brings life to all who see, He, the Only-Begotten, becomes Flesh that there may come to * Summary of address delivered at the First Conference, held at the First Baptist Church, October 21, 1903. 26 THE rROLOGUE. 27 man from the eternal source of Truth all the fullness of intinite Grace. Here is a transaction fit to summon every seeing eye in all the universe to give thoughtful, reverent heed. And other ways of easy entrance to this gateway of the Gospel of John lie in easy view. Let heedful souls find and map out every one. Once a man has broken into the rich interior of this short paragraph, he is impressed with its arrangement of material in pairs . Word and God, Son and Father, Word and Flesh, Light and Darkness, Being and Becom- ing, Faith and Birth, Repentance and Belief, Grace and Truth. Here are set together infinite contradictions, contrasts, balancings, complements, harmonies, fellowships. Tremendous questions surge into a student's mind. How are the Word and God related inherently and eternally? What deeps lie in Son- ship and Fatherhood in Deity ? How do Word and God cooperate in crea- tion ? What, quite precisely, are the author's views of Darkness? How do Faith in the believer and Birth from God consort, when people " become " sons of God? Exactly how does "witness bearing" corroborate "light"? How do Grace and Truth differ ? and how do they combine in " Glory " ? Here are near and obvious queries, and any one of them may sober anyone. And yet all these astounding coefficients lie together in this prologue in easy fellowship, without any sign of discord or uneasiness. Indeed, they truly unify. Though the colors vary strikingly, they evi- dently and beautifully blend. After all, the theme is one, the aim is one, the effect is one. Here is a characteristic marvel, and herein the prologue is like the Gospel as a whole. It is a living unity. Gospel and prologue are fluid, not solid. All its elements interplay. The whole of it is every- where. The pressure of the entire paragraph pulses and surges in every phrase. To state the same truth in another way, its structure is germinal. Each sentence is like a living cell ; it alone is able to produce the whole. The life of all is in each part. Or once again, it is like a diamond with many facets, through each of which streams all the splendor in all the gem. So wonderful is its unity. Prologue and Gospel are pan-centric. The center of gravity is everywhere. It is all central. Every sentence is a radius. Every affirmation is an orb. Its aspects vary as might vary the different surfaces of a cube, when overlaid with varying hues. Every surface pre- sents the total cube. Such is the composition of this section. All its factors fuse. And they merge in the Incarnate Word. Here is all the manifoldness, all the abundance, all the unity, all the simplicity that flash upon the open eye at this magnetic gatew-ay to the (jospel of John. In Him is Eternal Deity, creative energy, effulgent light, primal lordship, all radiance of glory, full tides of Grace and Truth. All verity and harmony reside in Him. In Him, as set forth here, all the deep, disturbing queryings, which the various factors of the prologue instigate, become tranquilized. The " World " is His. He dominates its " Darkness ". He radiates its "Light". In His full blendings of full Grace and Truth full "Glory" stands revealed. 2,s THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. Here is the central reality and the consummate wonder of this prologue. Here play all the lasting energies of this world's life. And here those forces find their rest. How is this so swiftly and deftly and simply achieved ? This is the task of any earnest and penetrating student of this introduc- tory masterpiece in the matchless Gospel of John. But this is no task for a novice, or a man in any impatient haste. It is a task for a master and for a life-time. One broad assertion may be made at the start. He who fathoms this prologue will be a man of one sole aim. He will be seeking with all his eyes to find out its conception of personality. Within this simple thought range all the areas and slumber all the deeps which this paragraph contains. The key to unlock all the mystery of Word and God, of Father and Son, of Grace and Truth, of Word and Flesh, of Faith and Birth, of Darkness and Light, and of the infinite act of creation lies fully fitted in just one deep, true glance into the mighty energies and awful antagonisms and blissful fellowships that lie inherent in the qualities and capacities of beings who are persons, /. ^., beings who are responsible and free. The forces that play across the face of this prologue are persons. They are beings who know and choose and judge- They can discern and approve and desire. They can also detect and decline. They are inher- ently and freely independent. And they are inherently and freely inter- locked. They stand in individual integrity. And they stand in social fraternity. They may be alienated. They may be reconciled. They may be deadened. They may be quickened. They may freely stray in dark- ness. And they may freely range in light. They may clarify, or they may eclipse their intelligence. They may sully or they may purify their joy. They are persons. Among them all stands, at the focus of this paragraph, and at the focus of the history of the world, the Incarnate Word, the Christ, the Son of God. Now mark what is said of Him. He is the Word. Heed that. He became Flesh. Ponder here. He dwelt among us. Peer into that. He was radiant with Glory. If you really have at your command a true intelligence, use it here. This Glory was as of the Only- Begotten. Think what this does verily mean. The Only-Begotten of the Father. How far do you really see into the essential meaning of this word in this place ? Full of Grace and Truth. Now you have struck the center. Do you know it ? This (the blended Grace and Truth) is the Glory. This beseems the "Father". This is what radiates from the " Only- Begotten". This streams from the "Flesh". This hails from the " Word ". And this is the Word who was " with God ", who " was God ", through whom everything " came into being ". This Word was the "Life" which was the "Light", which irradiated all mankind. It was He in whom certain men "believed". It was through Him that they became " Sons of God ". It was He whom divers other men did not "receive". It is He who "is in the Father's bosom". It is He who '' declares " the " invisible " God. And He is Jesus Christ. THE PROLOGUE. 29 Now here are overwhelming affirmations. But they are splendidly simple. They all center in that blending of Grace and Truth. And the blending of the unmixed energies of eternal Grace and Truth form the deep and priceless verity, the final and full quintescence of deathless, divine personality. This is the " Glory " of Christ. This is the " Word ". In this free range are all the vitality and verity and joy of the copartnership of Word and God, of Father and Son. It is an infinite interplay of Truth and Grace. Herein each is conscious of the solid and unvarying reality of His own being in the exhaustless upspringing of His self respect, while also equally conscious of a full and joyful outflow toward the other in the exhaustless tide of His self-devotion. Truth, the blessed consciousness of the absolute reality of Himself ; Grace, the blessed, free outpouring toward another— here is all the " Glory " of God, all the eternal companionship of Father and Son. This in the unmixed purity of the spirit life, and in the unlimited fullness of the Transcendent One is personality in blessed archetype. It is the unencumbered, unhindered, untiring and unmeasured interplay of Grace and Truth. The revelation of this is "Light". The glad welcome of this is "Belief". The potent engendering of this by God through Christ is the first inbreathing of sonship. And herein rests all basis for pure, abid- ing fellowship, whether with brother man, or Christ, or the Infinite God- Here is personality in all its immortal nature, and ground, and range, and blessedness. Here are the deeps of the fellowship in Deity. Here are the deeps of the comradeship of Word and Flesh. Here is the definition of Light. This is Life. Here is the ambient tide in which rests so peacefully the divinely fashioned keel of human faith. And here, as with the Only- Begotten in the Father's bosom, is the ultimate, and complete, and quiet, and joyful haven of human rest. So deep, and strong, and clear is the infin- ite love that offers to our wondering eye its deeps in the prologue to the Gospel of John. * JOHN THE BAPTIST AND HIS GOSPEL. (St. John i : 19-37.) j3y rk^'. avj^i. arnoli:) stevens, d. d., ll. d. Professor of New Testament Interpretation in Rochester Theological Seminary, Rochester, N. Y. "There came a man, sent from God, whose name was John". Thus the history of Christianity, as distinguished from that of Israel, begins — at least in the Fourth Gospel. The synoptic narrative takes the same point of departure. "The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ ", says Mark — " John the Baptizer came in the wilderness, preaching the baptism of repent- ance unto remission of sins ". It was in the person of John the Baptist that Christianity emerged into history, and by him the foundations of the Chris- tian church were begun. The author of Ecce Homo struck a true note in his opening sentence : " The Christian Church sprang from a movement that was not begun by Christ ". The student of the Gospel narrative, his eye fixed upon one central figure, may easily overlook the large significance of the person and work of John. One indication of this significance is the relative space given to this subject. Take the 150 sections into which the four-fold Gospel has been divided for the purpose of historical interpretation, 23 of them treat of, or have reference to John. Again, in the book of Acts, in at least six passages his ministry or his teaching comes distinctly into view. He is especially prominent in the Fourth Gospel. In that profoundest of the New Testa- ment books there is a distinct recognition of the fact that this man and his message must be studied if the redemptive work of Christ and the begin- nings of Christianity are to be understood. " Sent from God ", says the record. Every man who fills a place in history and renders distinguished service to his generation is in a certain true sense "sent of God ", but the word here means more. The reference is not to the fact that John belonged to the priesthood, and had the conse- crated blood of Aaron in his veins. Rather that he was sent as a prophet is sent, bearing a message supernaturally given, and thus invested with an authority which no personal endowment, no sacred lineage, no human insti- tution, ecclesiastical or civil, could confer. Such was the claim that John put forward for himself, and such the claim that Christ afterwards was dis- tinctly understood to put forward for him. The Jewish hierarchy recog- nized what that claim to prophetic inspiration and authority meant, and on that issue they deliberately and finally rejected him. Once for all let us discard that theory which has contributed in so many ways to a misunderstanding of the origin of Christianity, namely, that John belonged to the old dispensation rather than the new. Dr. Schaff * Delivered at the First Conference, held at the First Baptist Church, October 21, 1903. 30 JOHN THE BAPTIST AND HIS GOSPEL. 31 styles him " the representative of the ancient preparatory economy ", and in this sense the author of a recent hand-book on John the Baptist chooses as its title, " The Last of the Prophets ". This is to forget that the ministry of John, lasting, we may believe, nearly three years, was in large part con- temporaneous witli that of Jesus, — that for nearly a year, perhaps more, they were actively engaged in teaching at no great distance from each other ; that both John and Jesus baptized, and both preached essentially the same gospel — that John, as truly as Peter, or Andrew, or John the Apostle, was a disciple and a servant of Christ. We are told, by way of objection, that John was not one of the members of the kingdom, that Christ Himself expressly excludes him from that number. But it was because the kingdom had not come. John did not live to see the ascension, and the advent of the Spirit ; he could not be included among those who should not taste of death till they should see the kingdom of God (Lk. 9 : 27) ; but no one can accept the historicity of the Fourth (lospel and consistently deny to John a place among the ministers of the new covenant. Luke also expressly says, "he preached the gospel unto the people" (3:1.^). His proper place is in that new order of the world that we call Christian. Who may fitly describe this great man— great in every true, high sense ? His picture — the picture of the external man — is familiar, but the Gospels give us no biography, no account of his education, of his life till manhood, alternating between the temple and the wilderness. Only a few of his say- ings are recorded ; he transmitted no system of doctrine ; the society which he formed was not finally to bear his name or acknowledge his leadership. Still there is no mistaking the mental and moral stature of this sublime man, who has not yet come to his own in history, to whom even Keim's splendid tribute has done only partial justice. His greatness grows with time. As Edersheim says : " It is not easy to speak of him in moderate language. Above all, it is his generosity and his unselfishness and absolute self-abnegation which impresses us. In a gen- eration pre-eminently self-righteous, vain-glorious and self-seeking, when even on the last journey to Jerusalem the two disciples nearest to Christ could only think of pre-eminence of place in the kingdom, and when in the near prospect of suffering a Peter could ask the Master, ' What shall we have, ? ' when even at the last meal the disciples marred the solemn music of this farewell by the discord of their wrangle about the order of rank, * * * the Baptist stands alone in his life and in his death — absolutely self-forgetful". He had, what is so rarely found, self-knowledge, a thorough understand- ing of himself and his vocation. And this suggests one of the lessons to be learned from his life. He was conscious of a prophetic task, and had pon- dered Old Testament prophecy until its thought and spirit had passed into his very life. He perceived that the coming of the Messiah for the deliv- erance of Israel was conditioned, that it depended in part upon the pre- paration to receive Him which the Israelite community itself should make. The theocracy must make ready for the coming of its King ; there must be a spiritual preparation, a revival of faith and obedience. " Come out from 32 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. among them and be ye separate". Now John, as Ewald has said, "recog- nized the Divine call as directed in the first instance to himself ". He was the nearest person he could speak to. Not waiting for the nation, not even waiting for the appearance of the Elijah who was to precede the Messiah, he bowed his own soul before God, and there made ready for the King. Not dreaming that he himself was that Elijah, he passed into the wilder- ness and became Elijah — the Elijah that was to come. Thus is it, or may it be with us all. It is our ideals that shape our destiny, " The thing we long for, that we are." The power with which he brought his message to bear upon his gener- ation may be measured by its effect. The trumpet blast of his voice shook the land. It awoke a reformation, a revival of spiritual life. Herod Anti- pas, as well as the rulers at Jerusalem, feared him. For, as Josephus relates, "the people were wrought up to the highest pitch of excitement by his words ", and " seemed ready to do anything that he might advise ". Even during his imprisonment he had intercourse with his followers. For not less than three years, we suppose, perhaps longer, he preached, taught, gathered a body of disciples, until his mission was accomplished, and he had, in the phrase of scripture, made ready for the Lord "a prepared people ". That John preached a gospel we have already shown. We are now to inquire, what was that gospel ? The answer will be three-fold : I. He preached a Christ — a personal Lord and Savior. II. He preached the Kingdom of God. III. He preached a Gospel of Righteousness. I. John preached a Christ, a personal Lord and Savior. The modern reader of the Gospels takes this as a matter of course, having in mind that the whole Jewish people were in an attitude of expectation. The literature of that age enables us measurably to appreciate the tremendous import of the Messianic hope — the courage, the recuperative energy, the idealized imperialism that were born of it. But that which we are accustomed to designate the Messianic hope was the expectation of a kingdom rather than of a king. The kingdom was to be restored to Israel. The Jew was to be ruler of the world. A monarchy, a throne, a king of the Davidic line, these were matters of course, but it was the kingdom that loomed large in popu- lar thought. In the compilation known as the " Sibylline Oracles " there are certain portions manifestly of Jewish origin, w^hich are on good grounds considered at least a century older than John the Baptist. In their delinea- tion of the future power and glory of Israel, they scarcely more than allude to the Messiah, the King who is to inaugurate the new era. The poet's eye is not fixed upon a person. In the Book of Enoch, it is true, and in the Psalms of Solomon, that personal figure is more prominent. But for the most part the watchword of the Pharisees was not the Messiah, it was Mal- kuth. the kingdom, and this was equally the case with the people at large. John preached the Kingdom of God, but the distinctive feature of his message was the teaching concerning a personal King and Savior. He not JOHN THE BAPTIST AND HIS GOSPEL. 33 only kindled anew the national hope, he interpreted it and spiritualized it. He turned all eyes upon the Coming One. This supreme thought of a unique person as the realization in Himself of the nation's long deferred hope, was not new; it was at least as old as Isaiah, but it was for that age vague and obscure, and practically of slight import. John revived it. "What you have to do with ", he warned rulers and people alike, "is not the matter of a new polity, a reconstructed civic and social order ; the King is coming, a King of absolute righteousness, with power to destroy as well as to save. Your reckoning is not with the kingdom, but with Him." Of the genesis of this phase of his gospel we are not told, nor when it was that he first accepted Jesus of Nazareth as his Lord and Savior. No record remains of the day when for the first time he believed on the Nazar- ene as the Lord's Anointed, whose way he was commissioned to prepare. But surely that was one of the decisive days of history when the Judean prophet beheld in Jesus the Divine One, and had vision, however dim, of the glory of the coming of the Lord. How John first discovered Him in His true character— whether it was discovery, or by what is in scripture termed revelation, we are not called upon to decide. " Who shall draw the mystic line, Which is human, which divine ? " He was at all events distinctly enabled to discern in the lowly man of Nazareth the world's hope, or in the language of his favorite prophet, to " see the King in his beauty ". To the multitude the hero of the hour, the great man, was John, not Jesus. But John saw and believed. It is common to disparage this great act of faith. Because that faith came in the course of the following year to be clouded by doubt, it is con- sidered no wise decisive. The inquiry sent from the prison, "Art thou He that shall come ", in the opinion of Professor Gilbert and others, shows that John had not fully accepted Jesus as the Messiah. But it is surely a false principle to interpret his whole past career by that temporary and partial eclipse of faith. John's problem, let us remember, was the same as that of the apostles themselves. If Jesus be truly the Messiah, why does He con- tent himself with the role of a teacher and a healer of diseases ; where are the signs from heaven, glorious displays of overawing power ? Where is " the days of vengeance of our God ", distinctly predicted by the prophets as the Messiah's day .'' It was a signal proof of John's faith that he brought his great doubt to the Master himself, looked for the answer to Him who alone could give it. " Did never thorns thy path beset ? Beware, — be not deceived ; He who has never doubted yet, Has never yet believed". These words of a Christian poet are often perverted or misapplied ; but they have in them a truth. To quote an anonymous writer: " So little inconsistent with a habit of intelligent faith are such transient invasions of 34 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. doubt, or such diminished perceptions of the evidence of truth, that it may even be said that it is only those who have in some measure experienced them who can be said in the highest sense to believe at all ". Even Keim, whose insight into the facts of Christian experience is not always the profoundest, says of John's procedure at this crisis : " From his dungeon, where all vision was shut out, John acknowledges his own subject- ion to the person of Jesus ". John's message in the wilderness was not so much to tell what the King- dom should be, as who He should be — "he that cometh after me". After the baptism he was able authoritatively to identify Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah. Still later, having had, as we may believe, opportunity for personal intercourse with Jesus, he could teach that fuller, richer gospel of which we have reminiscences from, the pen of the fourth evangelist. It is hardly to be questioned, I take it, that on the banks of the Jordan, after, if not before the baptism and temptation, there were interviews which afforded John a nearer personal acquaintance with his Master and a better understanding of the scriptures concerning Him. Taking a general view of both the earlier and the later ministry, John's teaching concerning the person and office of Christ concentrated itself upon the following particulars : 1. He was the Anointed King of Israel — the Son of God. 2. He had had a pre-existence ; he was from heaven. 3. He was to rule with justice. 4. He was to be a Savior. 5. He was to bestow the Holy Spirit. Our space will not allow us to discuss these separately at length. As to the term Son of God, quoted from the Baptist's teaching in the single passage (John 1 : 34), " I have seen and borne witness that this is the Son ■of God", it is difficult to determine the precise content. For us now to recover the Baptist's Christology, whether that of the earlier, or of the latter stage of his ministry, is manifestly impossible. As it came from John's lips did it stand for the proper deity of Christ, as was the case not many years later in the early church ? Even now, after the Christian thought of nine- teen centuries, there is scarcely a term in theology more difficult to define. The faithful interpreter of Scripture will not attempt to read into John's language the dogmatic distinctions of a later orthodoxy. John did not preach in the wilderness, or teach to his disciples, the clauses of the Athan- asian creed. They would have been incomprehensible to him, even had it been possible to translate them into the Hebrew of his day. The Qui- cicnque V2ilt, — that whoever will be saved must " worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity ", " neither confounding the persons nor dividing the substance ", we do not suppose John believed or preached. But he does appear, in designating Jesus the Son of God, to have expressed a belief in his unique divinity, and to have exalted Him above all other humanity. According to Stanton (" The Jewish and Christian Messiah ", p. 147) it is very doubtful whether the Jews in pre-Christian times ever used the term Son of JOHN THE BAPTIST AND HIS GOSPEL. 35 God of the Messiah. John's testimony then marks a distinct advance in the Messianic idea. The remarkable saying in which John attributes pre-existence to the Messiah is (in substance) given twice in the chapter before us: John i: 15, 29, " He that cometh after me hath been before me, for He was before me ". That John attributed pre-existence to the Messiah need not surprise us, considering that the doctrine had already found distinct expression in the Judaistic literature of the first pre-Christian century. In the Similitudes of Enoch it is said of the Son of Man: " Before the sun and the signs were created, before the stars of the heaven were made. His name was named before the Lord of Spirits " ; " He has been chosen and hidden before Him before the creation of the world and for evermore". "The Elect One standeth before the Lord of Spirits; and His glory is for ever and ever, and His might unto all generations ". As Mr. Charles, in his edition of the Book of Enoch, has shown, " Son of Man " and " Elect One" are distinct designations of the personal Messiah; he says further: the "actual pre- existence of the Son of Man is only in keeping with His other attributes of universal dominion and unlimited judicial authority ". But the visions of Daniel belong to a still earlier date. In Dan. 7 : 13, 14 we read: "I saw in the night visions, and behold there came with the clouds of heaven one like unto a son of man, and they came even to the ancient of days, and they brought Him near before Him. And there was given Him dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations and languages should serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and His kingdom that which shall not be destroyed ". Here, as Schiirer says : " The doctrine of the Messiah's pre- existence is already stated, for it is self-evident that He who comes down from heaven was before in heaven". The Messiah was to come with judgmefit, and this was to be not punitive merely, but separative as well. The ax brought to the tree, and the shovel to winnow grain, are His figures, — and fire. " He shall baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire"; "the chaff He will burn up with un- quenchable fire ", so reads the synoptic passage. Here two converging lines of prophetic symbolism meet and blend. There is a fire of holiness and a fire of wrath. In John's first use of the symbol, fire denotes the same divine principle as the Holy Spirit ; in the latter part of the passage it is the fire of wrath. "John connects the baptism of fire and the judgment of fire without discrimination in time just as the Old Testament prophets were accustomed to do ". Thus Isaiah, for instance, views the Messiah's advent as " the year of Jehovah's favor, and the day of vengeance of our God ". The Messiah was to be a Savior, — a Savior from sin. " Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world ". That John took his figure of the lamb from the 53rd chapter of Isaiah is now admitted by the great majority of interpreters. Whether this be the case or not, it never- theless remains true that the lamb in the religious vocabulary of the Jews was a symbol of expiatory sacrifice. Still, this utterance attributed to John is, if we consider when it was uttered, startling enough. Can he so early 36 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. have seized upon the Christian conception of an atonement made in the person of the Savior, which even the apostles failed to apprehend until after that atonement had actually taken place? It is not surprising that many scholars are inclined to question the literal correctness of the passage as it stands. Kohler is one who maintains the genuineness of the Fourth Gospel and its historicity in general; he holds, however, that the words "who taketh away the sin of the world" are not the Baptist's own, but an explanatory addition of the evangelist writing long afterwards, when the idea of the atonement had become inseparably connected in Christian thought with the Savior's death on the cross. But I cannot see that histor- ical probability is altogether against the saying just as we have it. John the Baptist was deeply read in Isaiah, and Isaiah had shown that the Servant of Jehovah, (whether an ideal or an actual person) must suffer. Why may not John, on his mount of spiritual vision far above all his contemporaries, have had some glimpses, however obscure, of a mysterious tragedy of suf- fering that should expiate the guilt of human sin and reconcile the world to God? John's doctrine of the Messiah reaches its cUmax in the saying, Jo. i : 33 : Christ is '■'■He that baptizeth in the Holy Spirit ''\ All four of the gospels report this saying. It seems indeed to be the keystone of his soteriology. Our Lord himself repeated it in the last interview with his disciples on the mount of ascension, and Peter quotes it (in the form given it. by Jesus) to the church at Jerusalem (Acts 1 1 : i6).. It is remarkable that these are the only passages in the New Testament where the baptism in, or with the Holy Spirit is spoken of, with the possible exception of i Cor. 12 : 13. The con- ception of the bestowment of the Holy Spirit as a baptism has had special prominence in recent theological and devotional literature. It would appear to have originated with John. In that phrase he seems to have embodied his highest conception of Christ's saving work. By this gift, this sovereign act, Christ was to be the founder of the new covenant, and the progenitor of a new race. Harnack is strangely superficial in his view that John's message did not go beyond the lines of repentance. Keim is here the truer interpreter, and penetrates to the inner secret of the Baptist's gospel. "John ", he says, " is no stranger to the notion of grace ". " The spiritual stars of the kingdom of God now approaching were, for John, forgiveness of sins, and the Spirit of God ". Keim practically discards the Fourth Gospel, and therefore comes to this conclusion on the sole authority of the synoptic narrative. But the Fourth Gospel sets the Baptist's teaching concerning Christ as the bearer and the gjiver of the Spirit in bold relief. May it not have been due in part to his earlier teacher that this evangelist distinguishes the gospel period as one during which, as he says, " the Spirit was not yet given ", and that he, more fully than the others, records Christ's own teaching concerning the future advent of the Spirit ? It has been mentioned above that our Lord Himself in His promise of the Spirit's coming borrowed John the Baptist's figurative phrase, " baptized with the Holy Spirit", In some early copies of Luke the Lord's Prayer JOHN THE BAPTIST AND HIS GOSPEL. 37 given in the eleventh chapter had as the second petition, " May thy Holy Spirit come upon us and purify us", instead of "Thy kingdom come", or, " Thy will be done ". Christ's teaching on that occasion was given, as Luke mentions, in response to His disciples' request, " Teach us to pray, even as John taught his disciples ". It is quite credible that here Jesus quoted, and gave His sanction to a petition which had already been taught by John. In any case the coincidence is an interesting one, and may again raise the question whether John's preaching was so non-Christian as it is commonly represented. II. /o/in preached the Kingdom of God. " And in those days came John the Baptist saying. Repent j'e ; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand " (Mt. 3:1,2). Prophets had foretold the founding of a kingdom, and this, as we have seen, had become the goal of the Messianic hope. John's doctrine of the kingdom is not even outlined in the gospels. Probably it remained undeveloped, as was the case with the apostles until after the advent of the Spirit. It is sufficiently clear, however, to what general type it belonged. There are at least three prominent types of the kingdom idea which have been widely influential in history and in Christian theology. 1 . That of an ecclesiastical state. This was the thoroughly political idea that dominated Judaism. 2. The idea of a universal church, an ecclesiastical organization includ- ing all redeemed souls — the Roman Catholic idea at its best. 3. The kingdom as an ethical principle — the law of love made operative in human society — an idea strongly emphasized in the theology of Ritschl. No one of these quite answers to the New Testament idea, or, as I understand it, to the teaching of Jesus. In the New Testament it is the eschatological aspect that predominates. It exists on the earth, but it reaches into the world beyond, and belongs chiefly to an order of things not seen or temporal. It is the new spiritual fellowship, the new moral order, introduced into the world by Christ — not an ecclesiastical state, not a world- church, not an ethical system or society permeated by ethical ideas, — but a new spiritually organized life. As it now exists on earth it is the totality of the Christian life as opposed to the world's sin. John's idea of the kingdom appears rather to have conformed to the latter type. It was not the distinctive note of his teaching, and he did not make it his working idea. It is not unlikely that the Isaiah doctrine of "the remnant ", which afterwards impressed itself upon the thought of the apostle Paul, had its influence in determining John's conception of the kingdom. The prophetic manifesto of the Baptist's mission, attributed by Luke to the angel Gabriel, declares that he is to make ready for Jehovah "a prepared people ". The word for people is laos, properly denoting not a mere mul- titude or aggregate of individuals, but a race or nation, John seems not to have expected the existing Israel to be that elect race; there must be gathered a spiritual Israel, who should hear the prophetic call, " Come ye out from among them and be ye separate ", and who should thus constitute "the remnant ". 38 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. Accordingly he came not only to preach and to teach, but to baptize. The Gospels and Josephus are not far apart in their interpretation of this characteristic function of his ministry. In both these sources John's rite of baptism is viewed as an associative act. Furthermore, the New Testa- ment writers plainly view it as initiatory, marking one's entrance not merely upon a new life, but into a new community. On this point Calvin took issue with the Roman Catholic theology which had denied to the Johannine ordinance the essential significance of Christian baptism. The Council of Trent subsequently reaffirmed emphatically the Catholic position, declaring in their decree : "If any one affirms that the baptism of John had the same force as the baptism of Christ, let him be anathema ". We will risk the anathema and side with Calvin. The rite as John administered it had a double significance. Regarded as the act of the person submitting to it, it was symbolically declarative of repentance toward God and of faith in the Messiah. On the part of the administrator, on the other hand, it was intended to declare that the person baptized had fulfilled the requisite conditions and was now inducted into the new fellowship or society. Thus John's doctrine of the kingdom concentrated itself upon the for- mation of the new covenant-community which was to supersede the old theocracy. His gospel, his ministry as a teacher, lay in part along this line. He was to gather and instruct a body of disciples which should become a nucleus of the Christian kingdom and church. That body or sect of disciples was not itself the church, it was not the kingdom, but it was a religious fellowship or society in which the new kingdom first took a partially organ- ized form. Its members constituted a quasi-sect, known as the disciples of John. They followed certain teachings and observances. Those of them who did not fully carry out the instructions of their master and identify them- selves with the Christian church remained long afterwards a separate Jewish sect, traces of whose existence still remain in the East. But, as already said, John's thought was less of the kingdom than of the King — a personal Deliverer. This was the case also with Peter and Paul, and with John the apostle. In this respect do they not remain a les- son and a law to us 1 With the kingdom as a regulative idea and as a work- ing principle we have less to do, much more with our personal relations to Christ and His church. III. A Gospel of Righteousness. "John came unto you in the way of righteousness ", said our Lord to the Jewish leaders in the temple, — " John came unto you in the way of righteousness, and ye did not believe him and repent" (Matt. 21 :32). Christ here sets the Forerunner's teaching not in opposition to, but in line with His own. For righteousness with John was not legalism. This we must insist upon, despite eminent authorities to the contrary. In the Expositor's Greek Testament, Dr. A. B. Bruce, contrasting John and Jesus, says, " The message of the one was legal, the other evangelic ". " The Baptist had a passion for righteousness, yet his conception of right- eousness was narrow, severe, legal ". And in his comment on the words of JOHN THE BAPTIST AND HIS GOSPEL. 39 Christ cited above, "John came unto you in the way of righteousness", he explains them as meaning, " he cultivated legal piety like yourselves ". We shall not go to the other extreme and say with Dr. Fairbairn, in his " Studies in the Life of Christ ", that John " was a sort of personified revolt against the law, written and oral", reviving "the ancient conflict of his order against the ritualism of the temple and the legalism of the schools ". But it is surely a sheer perversion of the record to put John's teaching in opposition, or even in antithesis to that of Christ. It was Jesus, not John, who said, " Except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven ". It was not John, but Jesus, who said, " One jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass away from the law until all things shall be accomplished ". The essence of legalism consists in substituting the outward form for the inward reality. It is satisfied with the external. It is only a nominal, not a real obedience. Thus it is not righteousness at all, it is literalism, the letter that killeth, not the spirit, that inward reality without which there can be no true normal life. John's message of (righteousnes^ was not legalism ; on the other hand it was not righteousness wdth the idea of law left out. It impUed, as in script- ure it always implies when applied to human life and conduct, conformity to a standard of duty, obedience to moral law. It describes personal life as related to a government, not necessarily to an expressed rule, but always to a moral order. The phrase " conformity to truth " is not sufficient to define it ; it is conformity to imperative truth. It implies submission to authority, to some ruling will. There have been times when it would have been quite superfluous to maintain that righteousness in the Christian vocabulary car- ries with it the idea of obedience, so obvious and distinct is the thought of the New Testament writers on that point. But now the author of " Pro Christo et Ecclesia " is quoted as declaring: " Obedience is not a Christian idea, it is an anti-Christian idea, against which our Lord most strenuously set His face ", and a noted German theologian assures us that " Paul is the great discoverer of the fact that God and law are mutually exclusive ". We have already emphasized the testimony of the four evangelists that John preached a gospel of grace — of One who was to take away guilt and to bestow the Spirit of life and power. It was at the same time a gospel of ethical righteousness — of obedience. According to the angelic prediction, he was to turn " the disobedient to walk in the wisdom of the righteous " (Luke I : 1 7). The Messiah was to be Savior, none the less was He to be Lord and King. The majesty and the justice of the divine government were to be disclosed in His person. The voice of prophecy had already declared, "A king shall rule in righteousness " ; " He shall judge Thy people with righteousness ". Hence the doctrine of a divine retribution upon the unre- pentant was not omitted from John's message to Israel, and, like Paul, he " reasoned of righteousness, of temperance, and of the judgment to come ". His conception of the kingdom, as we have already observed, appears to have remained undeveloped. But it was certainly not that pitiful anomaly made prominent in much of the popular theology today, a kingdom without government, a conception of the kingdom of Christ in which sovereignty 40 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. is unnecessary, which has no subjects who are to obey, and no established imperative moral order. That righteousness in John's conception, while not legalism, was yet on the other hand no mere emotional goodness, but charged with its full ethical and positive Biblical meaning, is indicated by the stress which is laid on repentance as requisite to membership in the kingdom : " Repent ye ; for the kmgdom of heaven is at hand ". Repentance as he preached it was repentance of sin, and denoted not merely sin felt sorry for, but sin renounced, and renounced permanently, perpetually. This is clearly indi- cated in Matt. 3:11, "I baptize you in water unto repentance ". His bap- tism was intended to symbolize the final and absolute separation from the former sinful life of the person who received it ; it was " unto ", it had in view a perpetually realized repentance. Thus John's gospel included the demand for an ethical revival. His teaching to his disciples was not only Messianic doctrine, but practical religion. Only the merest fragments of his ethical teaching remain, pre- served for the most part in Luke. It is beyond the scope of the present paper to consider them in detail. We also learn incidentally from Luke that there was practical instruction on the subject of prayer. If John the Baptist's gospel was one of practical righteousness and of obedience to law, is it not a gospel for us now and here — here in America, in church as well as in state } I know of no fact more ominous of evil than the eifort making m so many quarters to throw overboard the idea of authority in Christian theology, and of obedience in the ethics of the Christian life. It is the testimony of many thoughtful and competent observers that the idea of obligatory law is becoming in a measure obsolete among us. What wonder, when a distinguished theologian tells us that " we must now replace the conception of a divine governor by that of the Heavenly Father, and the conception of a divine government by that of the divine family ". Neither the prophets of the old nor the prophets of the new covenant came with such an exhortation, least of all did John the Baptist. Let us rather with him revive the idea of a divine government, and educate the modern conscience into an apprehension of its true import. Dr. R. W. Dale struck a true note in his volume of discourses, entitled, " The Laws of Christ for Common Life". A single quotation from that book may fitly close the present address, and add the weight of its eloquent appeal to the moral message of John the Baptist to our own time. " The Jewish revival under Hezekiah was wrecked because it was not accompanied by a great reformation in morals. How is it with ourselves ? Have the religious movements of late years produced any considerable ethical reforms.'' Has the ethical revival kept pace with the religious? Has our zeal for the building of churches, for the ingathering of members and for religious education been accompanied with any marked improve- ment in Christian character } " We are entreating God to give greater energy and larger success to all the various forms of our Christian work. It is very necessary for us to remember that we have no right to expect that God will keep His promises JOHN THE BAPTIST AND HIS GOSPEL. 41 unless we keep His commandments. The words of the prophet, ' Wash you, make you cleaft ; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes ; cease to do evil ; learn to do well ', were addressed, not to the irre- ligious, but to those who were zealous in attending the services of the temple and in offering their sacrifices on the altar of God. And the words which follow, ' Come now, let us reason together, saith the Lord, though your sins be as scarlet they shall be as white as snow ; though they be red like crim- son, they shall be as wool ', are not an assurance that God will forgive the sins of men who have lived an irreligious life if they become devout, but an assurance that He will forgive the sins of those who are earnest in religious services, if they set themselves honestly to the moral reformation of their own conduct. If they put away the evil of their doings, if they cease to do evil, learn to do well, God will have mercy upon them. " No matter how noble may be the churches that we build, no matter how solemn may be the religious services which we celebrate, no matter how earnestly we may preach the Gospel, no matter with what fervor we may pray to God to grant us a great religious revival, we shall fail utterly if in our ordinary life we show no practical proof that in the kingdom of heaven to which we profess to belong there is a loftier type of character than in the world outside." * THE CALL OF THE HRST DISCIPLES. ( St. John i : 29-5 1 .) by rkv. a.. c. dixon, d. t>., Pastor of the Ruggles Street Baptist Church, Boston, Mass. We have in the first chapter of John's Gospel the method by which God calls His disciples and the purpose of the call. The method is four- fold and the purpose is five-fold. I. THE METHOD OF THE CALL. 1. By public procla7nation. John stood in the open and said, " Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world ". If we would make the multitude hear the Gospel, we must, as John did, take the Gospel to them. If they have forsaken the church, the church must not forsake them. They can be found in the streets, and they will come to the theatre or secular hall more readily than to the church. Let no expense of strength, time or money be spared, that the crowds may be reached with the glad tidings of salvation. But in John's preaching there was more than proclamation. There was testimony. Thirteen words are given to the proclamation, and one hundred and sixteen to the testimony. And though John was no egotist, he uses the personal pronouns "I " and "me" eleven times. He asserts the superiority of Christ to himself, and declares that his purpose in bap- tizing was to manifest Him to Israel. He tells what he knows about Christ, and closes with the superb confession: " I saw and bare record that this is the Son of God ". With every proclamation of Jesus there should go our testimony as to what He is to us, and the testimony should be as public as the proclamation. We preach to the multitude, and have our testimony meetings among ourselves. The man without a testimony has no place in the pulpit. He is to be a witness as well as a minister, and in the witness box there must be a personal knowledge. 2. By more private proclamation. "Again the next day after John stood and two of his disciples, and looking upon Jesus as He walked, he saith, ' Behold the Lamb of God ' ". There was no need of his adding, "which taketh away the sin of the world", for these well-instructed disci- ples of John knew what the mission of the Lamb of God was. They under- stood the symbolism of the paschal lamb, and were looking for Him to Whom it pointed. These two disciples believed in John, and that made it easy for John to win them to Christ. "The two disciples heard him speak and they followed Jesus ". All of us have our little coteries of admirers and friends. * Delivered at the First Conference, held at the Fir.st Baptist Church, October 21, 1903. 42 THE CALL OF THE FIRST DISCIPLES. 43 Have we, like John, won them to Christ? Have we so lived before them that when we speak to them of Jesus they immediately accept and follow Him ? How about our children ? Has their confidence in us made it easy for us to win them for Christ ? Or have we exhibited to them such incon- sistencies of life and have indulged with them in such doubtful amusements that they have reason to call in question our sincerity when we assure them that the Christian life is the noblest and happiest in the world ? How about our Sunday School class ? If we have won their respect and love, it will be easy for us to win them to Christ. A young lady in a Bible school requested the superintendent to give all her class except two to another teacher. He was surprised, and asked the reason. Her reply was that all her class except two had been converted, and she desired to retain them and seek a new class, that she might win them to Christ. Within a few months her heart's desire was gratified. How about those with whom you work every day in the shop or store ? If you are a consistent Christian, you have influence with them. Have you used that influence in winning them to Christ? Two young men at work in the same office had great respect for each other, and one of them was converted by means of a letter from a friend. Anxious to win his office friend to Christ, he one day expressed the wish that he were a Christian, when the friend had to confess with shame that he was a Christian, but such a negative one that the young man working at his side for a year or more did not find it out. The young man won by the letter was H. C. Trumbull, who became famous as a preacher, editor and author. The office-mate lost the opportunity of doing a great work for Christ and filling his life with the joy of feeling that he was a co-worker with God in the wide field of usefulness which Dr. Trumbull occupied. How about the social circle in which you move ? Have you won any of them to Christ, or have you so drifted into their worldly thoughts and ways that they find that they have won you and that you really have noth- ing better to offer them than they have to offer you ? A successful business man in New York went one evening with his wife to an evangelistic meeting; and as they were going home she ventured to say, "My dear, I was hoping that you would tonight manifest some in- terest in your spiritual welfare, for I wish you to know that I pray for you every day, and nothing could give me more pleasure than to have you be- come a Christian ". He replied, " I am glad that you have mentioned the subject, and when we get home we will talk the matter over ". After they had taken off their wraps and were comfortably seated in the parlor, he turned to her and said with gentle earnestness, " Now, my dear, you say you want me to become a Christian, and I promise that I will try to be- come one if you will show me in what respect you as a Christian differ from me who have made no profession of religion. You go to the theatre ; so do I ; and you seem to enjoy it as much as I do. I play cards, and you can beat me. I drink wine moderately, and so do you. I dance sometimes, and so do you. I do not lie nor steal nor kill nor commit adultery. Both positively and negatively we are alike so far as I can see. You say you 44 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. want me to be converted. Can you tell me from what or to what I am to be converted?" The wife was speechless, but that night, when face to face with God in prayer, she said something like this : " Lord, forgive me the great mistake I now see that I have made in dealing with my husband. Thou knowest that I have had the motive of seeking to win him to Thee and the church by going with him and doing as he does even when it was distasteful to me. And now I can see that, though he loves me, he has no confidence in my religion. Oh Lord, Thou knowest that I have in Thee and Thy work a joy which he has not, and I pray Thee to help me from this time to be so faithful to Thee and my deeper spiritual nature that he will be convinced that I have something better than he has ". If I were to mention the name of this man, some of you would recog- nize him as a man eminent in the world of business, and you would also recognize him as an eminent Christian worker, giving time and money for the advancement of the cause of Christ. And if you gain his confidence, he will tell you as he has told others that he was led to seek salvation when he noticed that the wife he loved above his life had an experience which separated her from the world and gave her a joy superior to the doubtful amusements, which even before his conversion, he believed were not in harmony with the pure spirit of Christianity. When our friends in the family or social circle see that we have yielded to their ways, they conclude, with good reason, that they have captured us, and, though they may esteem us for many excellent qualities, they regard our religious profession as a sort of fad or idiosyncracy, if not a weakness, that they must tolerate. With such an abiding impression upon their minds any spasmodic efforts we may make for their conversion during a religious revival will not count for much. However convincing the argument that you have the right to assert your Christian privilege and indulge things that are not morally wrong, be- cause you are not under the law but under grace, it remains true that the worldly people who enjoy these things with you are not attracted to the brand of religion which you exhibit ; and if they join your church it is because they regard the church as a worldly institution and they are fit for membership because you are as worldly as they are. The men who really win others to Christ are the Pauls who assert the high Christian privilege of giving up their privileges, that they may not be stumbling-blocks in the way of others ; who convince others that they have better meat to eat than that offered to idols, that it is no real sacrifice to give up the garlic and onions of Egypt for the manna from heaven. Such Christians are the insulated wires through which flows the current of divine power. 3. By itidividual contact. It is evident that Andrew and John started for their brothers just as soon as they were convinced that they had found the Messiah. John says that Andrew "first findeth his brother Simon", and the meaning is plain that Andrew found Simon before John found James. It was a sort of race between them as to which would be the first to find his brother and tell him the good news. Andrew was not a great preacher, so far as we know, but on the day of Pentecost, while Peter preached with a tongue of fire and three thousand were converted, he had THE CALL OF THE TTRST DISCIPLES. 45 a right to feel that Peter's great sermon was the echo of the personal word which brought him to Jesus. As soon as Jesus found Philip, he went to the home of his friend Nathanael, and said, " We have found him of whom Moses in the law and the prophets did write, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph". Nathanael was a learned Jew, while Philip was an unlettered peasant, and Archibald Brown may be right when he says that Philip misquoted his scripture, for neither Moses nor the prophets wrote of Jesus as the Son of Joseph, or as Jesus of Nazareth. Nathanael therefore quietly rebukes Philip for his blunder in misquoting scripture when he asks, " Can any good thing come out of Nazareth ? " Philip acknowledges the mild impeachment as he says, " Come and see ". As if to say, " Nathanael, I am not up in Scripture like you, but come and see Him for yourself. Though I may blunder in my Scripture quotation, I have not blundered in my estimate of Jesus ". And thus a man with an experience is ready for soul-winning even though he may be ignorant of many things that it is important to know. If you have a vision of Christ as the Messiah and your Savior, tell someone else about Him. An illiterate cook in a country village won to Christ some of the best people in it, because she had a story of personal salvation to tell, and the people for whom she worked testified that her character confirmed the truth of her story. When Robert McCall began his work in Paris, he knew just two sentences in French, — "God loves you "and "I love you". He spoke these short sentences to the people as he met them on the street, and began in this way his most successful life-work. We should be accurate in our Scripture quotations, but let not the fear of making mistakes prevent us from telling others of the Savior we trust and love. 4. By the direct contact of Christ. In the case of Philip there was no intermediate human agency. Jesus found him and said, " Follow Me ". And shall we deny that Jesus at this day presents Himself directly to the minds and hearts of men and wins them to Himself? It is doubtless excep- tional, but, in view of this case, I dare not say impossible. It implies previ- ous knowledge, for Philip was evidently looking for the Messiah. He had read the Scriptures, even if his memory were faulty. And when there is a knowledge of the truth, God may move through it directly on the human soul. Every flower may suggest the lily of the valley, every stone the rock of ages, every star the star of Bethlehem, every breeze the work of the Spirit, every spring of water the fountain open for all uncleanness, every path the way of life, every flock of sheep the Good Shepherd, every sparrow the care of our Father, every sunrise the Sun of Righteousness, every meal the bread of life, and every garment the robe of His righteousness. Christ has given to almost everything in nature a tongue of suggestiveness with which it speaks in silent eloquence directly to the hearts of men. During a revival in a New England town, people were convicted and converted before they came to church. A wealthy gentleman told me that his ungodly coachman, who had shunned the meetings as he would small-pox, was seized with sudden conviction of sin while he was feeding his horses, and, kneeling in the hay of the stable loft, accepted Christ as his Savior and 46 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. Lord. The atmosphere of the town seemed to be charged with the power of God. Such is the case when the word has been faithfully preached and the people of God are in the spirit of intercessory prayer. n. THE PURPOSE OF THE CALL. 1. To salvatioji. John was no mere reformer. He did give advice to publicans and soldiers, but it was incidental. The purpose of his life-work is seen in the words, " Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world ". The fact and problem of sin confronted him. He knew that men were guilty and lost. The first thing, therefore, which everyone needs is a Savior from sin. We are not ready to follow Him as Leader or walk with Him as Friend until sin has been dealt with and put away. John would have us begin our Christian life at the cross. To the vision of man's need the highest mountain in all the world is Calvary, the only mountain that rises above Sinai. 2. To fellowship. When Jesus asked the two disciples of John, " What seekest thou ? " they replied, " Where dwellest thou ? " He saith unto them, " Come and see ". They came and saw where He dwelt, and abode with Him that day. The first impulse of a regenerate soul is to be with Jesus. It loves the book, the church, the home, the company where Jesus is wel- comed and honored. It shuns the place where Jesus would not be at home and happy in His surroundings. It yearns to be with Him all the time. And Jesus responds to this impulse of the renewed heart. He invites us to dwell with Him. What an evening of fellowship and instruction these two disciples must have had. What heart-burnings of love they must have felt ; what raptures of joy; what inspirations of hope as He revealed to them His inner self and unfolded to them the far-reaching victories they were to gain through Him. Now, what they had for one day we may have every day, for He said, " Lo, I am with you all the days ". He invites us to an inti- mate and perpetual fellowship. The condition is that we go with Him and not assert the self-life by asking Him to go with us. Enoch and Noah had a good time walking with God, and much of our unrest comes from the fact that we are trying to induce God to walk with us. He is always going in the right direction, and He always dwells in the right place. Let us seek His way and walk in it ; the secret place where He dwells and abide there. Such constant fellowship is worth all the sacrifice it may cost. 3. To service. After the day with Jesus, Andrew and John are eager to tell others about Him. Such is always the effect of fellowship with Jesus. It gives courage and enthusiam in soul-winning. It sends us to our friends with warm sympathetic hearts. It gives us vigorous faith. There is no tremor of doubt in the words of Andrew to Simon : " We have found the Messiah, which is being interpreted the Christ". "And he brought him to Jesus ". Such direct personal testimony for Christ cannot fail to bring our friends to Jesus when, as in this case, it has in it the fresh glow of a present experience. If Andrew had gone to Simon and told him an experience ten years old, it would have had little effect. I can imagine that Andrew had in his face a glow of hope, love and joy like the shining face of THE CALL OF THE FLRST DLSCLPLES. 47 Moses when he came down from a face-to-face talk with God on the mount. When people take knowledge of us that we have been with Jesus, they are ready to hear our message concerning Him. Secret fellowship is the source of power in service. 4. To transformation. " When Jesus beheld him, He said, ' Thou art Simon the son of Jonah ; thou shalt be called Cephas, which is by interpre- tation a stone ' ". As soon as the unstable and impulsive Simon is brought to Jesus, our Lord begins the work of transforming his character. The son of Jonah has the nature of the dove, easily frightened, but before Jesus gets through with him he shall be Cephas, with a character of granitic stuff, resisting evil and strong enough to be a pillar in the temple of God. There seems to have been a bit of the dove still left in him when at the trial of Jesus he took fright and denied his Lord, but it was evidently in its dying flutter, for on the Day of Pentecost we find him as bold as a lion and as unyielding as the stones of Gibraltar. His first view of Christ begins in him this transformation. Simon was usually talkative, but here for once he has nothing to say. There was something in the presence of Jesus which awed him into silence. The narrative gives us words from John, Andrew, Philip and Nathanael, but not a word from Simon. He is too full of thought and emotion to speak. He simply listens to the sweetest of voices and looks lovingly into the most majestic of faces. The "altogether lovely" One has thrown a charm of fascination over the rough fisherman. There is a spiritual mesmerism to which Simon yields without an effort at resistance. He has found not only the Messiah of Israel but the Master of men. Now that the sun is in the heavens, all the stars, however brilliant, are forgotten. There has begun in him the process by which heavenly character is made. John says, " It doth not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when He shall appear we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is ". God does not arbitrarily bestow perfect character in heaven ; it is made by the process of seeing Jesus as He is. This process is clearly given in 2 Cor. 3:18: " We all with open face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord are changed into the same image from glory to glory, as by the Spirit of God ". Beholding Jesus as the Lamb of God gives us sight with which we may ever afterward see Him in all the perfection of His char- acter, and "seeing Him as He is" is the means by which the Holy Spirit trans- forms us into His likeness. The process with Peter was slow, because, like the rest of us, he was often more inclined to look at himself and others than at Jesus, and the transformation was thus hindered. But Jesus is patient, and, having begun the good work, He will continue it until He shall see in us His own image and be satisfied. When Andrew brought his rough swearing brother to Jesus, he was doing good ethical work. x\ lecture on profanity would have done little good. Doubtless that had been tried more than once. What Simon needed was the Lamb of God, who could settle the problem of sin for him by mak- ing it possible for him to get rid of its guilt and pollution and give him an ideal that would inspire him to nobler living. In Jesus he found both. If we would reform our friends, whose bad habits are a grief to us, let us bring 48 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN, them to Jesus. He will begin with them at once, as He did with Peter, the process of transformation, and will sooner or later make them not only nega- tively good, enabling them to give up bad habits, but positively good in the possession of Christian graces. The merely ethical method may cast out evil spirits and leave the house " empty, swept and garnished ", ready for " seven other spirits more wicked than himself ", so that the last state is worse than the first. But this Christian process casts out the evil spirit and fills the house with angels of light, more powerful than all the demons of darkness that prowl around, seeking entrance. 5. To vision. "Jesus saw Nathanael coming unto Him, and saith of him, behold an Israelite indeed in whom is no guile ". Our Lord said these words of Nathanael in such a way that Nathanael heard them. If we have anything good to say of young converts, it will not hurt them to hear it. And if you have anything bad to say, it ought to be said before them and not behind their backs. For this reason I do not send applicants for bap- tism from the room after they have related their experience in order that all may be free to discuss their cases. Let them remain and hear what is said about them. If it is good, they will be encouraged, and if it is bad they ought to hear it before it comes to them second-hand and exaggerated, as is almost certain to be the case. Nothing ought to be said about anybody that we are not willing for them to hear. Truly happy is the young convert who, like Nathanael, hears words of commendation from the lips of Jesus. He has a foretaste of the joy with which he will hear the words, " Well done, good and faithful servant ". The answer of Nathanael shows that Jesus had won not only his respect, but his love and loyalty : " Rabbi, Thou art the Son of God ; Thou art the King of Israel". As if to say, "Lord, if I am an Israelite, Thou art my King. Here is the scepter and crown. Sit on the throne of my being and reign supreme ". The reference to Israel suggests Jacob and his ladder, and our Lord uses the vision of Jacob as an illustration by which He gives to Nathanael a new vision of Himself as " Son of God " and " Son of man ". " Hereafter ye shall see heaven open and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man ". In other words, " Nathanael, in calling Me Son of God you have given the top of Jacob's ladder, which reached to the skies ; let me give you the bottom of the ladder, which rests upon earth — Son of man. I am both human and divine. In My deity God is made accessible to you, and in My humanity you are accessible to God. As God- man I am the medium of communication between heaven and earth — the Word made flesh. Through Me, as Son of God and Son of man, the mes- sengers of your need, your praises and your prayers ascend to God, and through Me, as Son of man and Son of God, the messengers of God's love and mercy descend upon you. I am the real Jacob's ladder, which makes not an occasional but a constant vision of the open heaven and an unbroken communication between God and man ". Such a vision is the privilege of every Christian, and the secret of per- petual joy and victory is in translating the vision into daily experience. God is accessible to us at all times. He hears our praises and answers our THE CALL OF THE EIEST DLSCLPLES. 49 prayers. He delights to give us of " His fullness and grace for grace." Through Jesus Christ heaven opens toward us for giving and receiving. God offers to us His best, and it is fitting that we should give to Him our best. While Queen Victoria was on her bed of sickness, she said to the chap- lain at her side, " I wish that the Lord Jesus Christ would come in glory before I die ". He replied, " Why, Your Majesty, do you wish that Christ would come before you die ? " " Because ", she answered, " I can think of nothing that would give me more pleasure than the privilege of giving to Him with my own hand the crown of Great Britain and India ". The spirit of Nathanael and of Victoria that would crown Jesus King in every realm of our being is the spirit of every loyal son of God, and Jesus is worthy that every day should be a coronation day. * '* SONS OF GOD ". (St. John 1:9.) by rev. itloyd av. to]vikins, s. t. d., Rector of Holy Trinity Church, Philadelphia, Pa. I wish to congratulate you, dear friends, upon these conferences and upon selecting for your study the Gospel of St. John, for St. John's Gospel has been attacked more than any other of the Four Gospels, and I suppose it has been attacked because it is preeminently the Gospel of believers. I think the older we grow the more we occasionally, almost insistently, go to it for devotional reading. It is the Gospel which, under God's guidance, was written for the church — for the members of the church It is most theolog- ical in some aspects of it, but it certainly bears very especially and clearly upon the believer's relationship to Jesus Christ. It is in St. John's Gospel that you have the verse which is the verse of the whole Gospel — John 3:16: " For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life ". It is in St. John's Gospel that you have that marvelous chapter, the fifteenth, declaring our relationship to Jesus Christ, our union with Him, and that we have that wonderful prayer of our Lord, sometimes called the sacramental prayer, in which He prays that there may exist between Himself and His disciples the same relationship that exists between God and Himself. In fact, there are passages which make us almost hold our breath in reverence, and I think that is particularly true in connection with the sub- ject about which I am to speak to you. " To them gave He power to become the sons of God ". When we remember that in this very Gospel (as Dr. White has shown), Jesus Himself was called by Nathanael the Son of God, and when we remember how St. John, in his epistles, so wonderfully refers to that fact when he says, " Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be : but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him ; for we shall see Him as He is ", then we realize the greatness of the message. " That we should be called the sons of God ". It makes us fairly tremble and hesitate to think any such honor and glory should be given to us. Yet, as we read the first twelve verses of chapter one, it seems to follow so naturally as the result of God's coming into this world that it is almost logical. Do you remember how it reads? "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. " The same was in the beginning with God. "All things were made by Him ; and without Him was not anything made that was made. * Delivered at the First Conference, held at the First Baptist Church, October 21, 1903. 50 SOA^S OF GOD. SI " In Him was life ; and the life was the light of men. "And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not. " There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. •' The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through Him might believe. " That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. " He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not". Saddest verses in the Bible. " He came unto His own, and His own received Him not. " But as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on His name : " Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God ". You see at once how the very purpose of Christ's coming into this world was that we might be the sons of God. St. John shows in the verses I have just quoted that the love of God was so great that He made it possi- ble for us to become His sons. There is something to say about this son- ship. We are all of us children of God by creation, and as God's sons by creation we can claim something from Him. We may reverently say that we can claim from God a way of redemption, because of His creation alone. Notwithstanding the fact that we have willingly fallen away from Him, since we are His sons by creation we may become His sons by adoption — by re-creation. Hence you see what a growth there is in our relationship to God. I am God's child because He has made me. I am God's child because He has remade me, through Jesus Christ. And yet, you notice how the truth enters — we are all God's children by creation, but only those who believe in Him have received the power to become His sons by re-creation. Dwell a little longer upon that word — son. Just think what it means ; the Son of God ! It means a great deal when we use it — as it is not used here in St. John's Gospel — simply as referring to our creation. That God made me, gives me, or ought to give me, self respect; that God made me, gives me, or ought to give me, the desire to struggle against all that is evil ; gives me, or ought to give me, a vision of all that may be mine ; gives me, or ought to give me, a sense of responsibility concerning my fellow men, concerning the world itself, which is God's world, and which, because it has fallen from Him, I, His son by creation, am bound to do all I can to bring back to Him. If you can get no further than this, that you are His son by crea- tion, you have gotten a great distance. And I sometimes think we may make a mistake in taking men on too rapidly. A great many, because they have not been sufficiently or properly instructed, think that because God has made them, and because they are His sons by creation, all of these rich results necessarily follow. When you turn to the " sons of God " inter- preted by " re-creation ", how much more wonderful it is to be God's son ; 52 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. to be admitted to His fellowship because I trust Him and love Him ; and being His beloved son, to be admitted more and more, as I am able to bear it, into the mysteries of His truth ; to be made more and more the object of His confidence; to be made more and more acquainted with the power- ful purposes through which He works ; to be made more and more in my own being after His image — converted into His likeness — and, at last, to be permitted to enter into His presence, where shall be revealed the very acme of glory. Remember that wonderful verse in St. John's epistle. " Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be : but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him ; for we shall see Him as He is ". If any man had written these words without inspiration it would be blasphemy to speak them ; and, as it is, we tremble and cover our faces, and yet that is what being sons of God must mean. Now, I want you to think of the way in which this sonship of God by re-creation is granted us. I shall speak of the power afterwards. I wish to speak of the sonship first. We are the sons, or we have the power to become the sons, of God. Evidently, this must be something which comes not in a moment but grad- ually. We are made the sons of God by creation in a moment, as it were, when we are born ; by the very fact of our existence we are God's children. We are made the sons of God by re-creation by a precise power to become such — not accidentally. St. John afterwards wrote to the Christians — for I think we may take it that his epistles were addressed to the Christians — " beloved, now are we the sons of God ", because we have entered into the fullness of the Christian life. It is only after years of experience and edu- cation that we enter into it. St. John was an old man, and he felt as though those to whom he wrote had an experience like his own. So that to become sons of God, we are not suddenly changed either physically or morally, but we enter into a new condition. I think that sometimes those who hold to the Anglican catechism forget the true meaning of its words. It says that we are made members of Christ, children and heirs of the kingdom of heaven. The prayer-book undoubtedly means here — for we are told that it teaches nothing that cannot be proved by Holy Scripture— that when the individual is brought to the blessed gift spoken of by Christ to Nicodemus, he begins to grow, he begins to become the son of God by adoption and re-creation. I think it is very necessary to remember that, for two or three reasons. In the first place, we feel ourselves utterly unworthy in our unregenerated state to assume such a title as sons of God. Secondly, we must recognize that the grace of God in the individual heart is just Hke His power which worketh in the world : it works gradually. There is at least that much truth in evolution : the power of God works gradually. Certain persons, we are told in the book of Acts, were in the process of being saved. So it is with the man who enters into this state whereby he may become the son of Ciod ; gradually going on in that state he reaches higher perfection. There is something very beautiful to me in this revelation of God in connection with SO.VS OF GOD. 53 our growth. I go on more and more clinging to Him, trying to serve Him and becoming more and more His son. And it is more and more a con- scious relationship. It is not a state merely. It certainly is not only a condition, but it is a relationship ; the very word itself implies that. Take the illustration of my boy. My boy is my son by birth. I stand by his cradle and look at him with loving eyes, and I say, " My boy, my > boy ". By-and-by that boy grows up, and he begins to come to me to learn he gains confidence in me, and he says, " Papa, I love you " ; he comes to me with his sins and says, " I am sorry I did wrong " ; he comes to have a trust in me, and my heart goes out with a deeper and ever deeper fiow of love for him, and what is the result? By-and-by, when that boy has grown up to wisdom, and the strength of intelligence is reached — when that boy has grown to a position where he can enter into my plans, can see the plan of my life and my plans for his life — then I hold his hand and look into his face and say, " My boy, my son ". Can't you see the difference in that expression from the day when I stood by his cradle of possibilities — not yet realized — and the day when I stood by him in his youth and recog- nized the growing strength and felt those bonds which through the years had bound us closer and closer ? It is the same in our connection with God in sonship. He puts forth the decree that I shall enter into relation- ship with Him, and He gives me the means whereby that relationship may be made ever stronger and richer and purer, so that I may become more and more conscious of the possibilities of that relationship. He opens the flood-gates of His divine love and care for and interest in me, as I am able to receive it. And by-and-by the time will come when I shall be like Him- That is, when I ^^shall have proved, through my loyalty, through my love- but, above all else, through the power of Jesus Christ, my willingness to give all that I have and all that I am to Him, and shall have reached that state of consciousness when I realize that it is not I, "but Christ in me". Then I shall be, as the Lord prays in the seventeenth chapter of St. John — I shall be one with Christ even as Christ is one with God. Then, again, I want you to understand that this sonship is a relation- ship in which we become more and more mtimate with God. The old idea was that you could not know God. The old idea was that no man could see God. Indeed, we have it in the Gospels, "No man hath seen God at any time ". Yet we have it in the beatitudes, " Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God ", and I think this beatitude refers to this life, not some future life. I have it in my consciousness that I have been re-cre- ated by Jesus Christ ; I have it in my consciousness that He is pouring more and more of His grace into me, because I am willing and ready that He should, and so I enter more and more into a knowledge of God. And there we come to what is sometimes called Christian experience, which is a very important thing, and which sometimes, oftentimes, we con- fuse, with other things because of its frequent use. By-and-by the Christian comes to a position where he can say " I know ", as St. Paul said ; where he knows that God is his father ; where he knows that, notwithstanding the contradictions of life, God is working out a glorious ending. 54 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. By-and-by he becomes so intimate with God that even though he can- not understand God's working, because God is infinite and he is finite, nevertheless he is conscious of God's truthfulness, and he works in connec- tion with it. I go on my work tomorrow, I know not what God has for me, but I love Him so, I trust Him so fully and I know so well how He loves me and cares for me, that I know whatever comes will be right : I know that nothing can happen because God is ordering all things for my best good, and consequently for His great and eternal glory. So He comes into a practical relationship with life. You cannot live a great life as you ought to live it unless you are His. In your life tomorrow — I care not what your struggles may be or what your occupation may be — you cannot meet the experiences of life, you cannot meet the trials of life, any more than you can intelligently study the Word of God unless you are conscious of this son- ship. Why ? Because it is only to the son that God can reveal Himself. It is only to the man who has willingly entered into the state in which God reveals Himself to him, and in which he grows more and more into the nature of God, that there can come an understanding of how God works, so that he can trust himself entirely to God, and do everything that he does in God's name. That is what the apostle undoubtedly meant when he said, " Do all things to the glory of God ". He mentions the small details of life which, in the early days, were counted evil in themselves. He says, " Whether ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God ". That is the beauty of the Gospel, that it leads us not only up to the infinite mind of God, but into the kingdom of God in its glory and beauty. He not only gives me that glorious vision, but He sends me out into the struggle of the world, with all its agonies, with all of its friendships, with all of its losses, and makes me live the life of a son of God ; makes me live as one who knows that God is working with him ; makes me live as one who is conscious of a great divine power working behind him. It is not a theological declaration. No truth is true until it is applied, and no truth of God can stand as a creed until it has entered into the heart of the individual who repeats the creed. So you cannot know what the sonship of God is until you have entered into this power in your own lives. And there is just one more thought I want to bring out in regard to this sonship. It is the way in which, more and more, the man gains power himself because he is God's son. My father, let us suppose, owns some land. He is away. I am his son. Someone comes and begins to trespass upon that land. I go to him and say, "You cannot do that, sir". "Why not ? '•' he cries out, " Who are you.-* " " I am the son of the man who owns this land". And he at once recognizes my authority; he knows that I, being the son of my father, have a right to claim that he shall not injure that which belongs to my father, a right to protect that which is my father's, because my father and I, supposedly, are wholly in sympathy and our rights are common. Now, there you have the secret of human power. There you have the difference between the effort of a man to be good in himself, with- out any thought of God, and the effort of a man to be good because he SOJVS OF GOD. 55 knows he is God's son. What a difference there is. I start out tomorrow, and I try to be a moral man ; I try to make the world better, and I go on in my own strength and — fail absolutely. I go out tomorrow, having first knelt down and acknowledged my sonship and asked my Father to give me grace, and when the troubles come, when I desire to help this one or defend that one, when I stand up for the truth or speak against evil, then I am con- scious that it is not I alone but God and I. I have the right to speak, the right to do, because I am God's son. There cannot be any failure in such a case. Why.^ Because God is back of the man, because God is in the man. He may be working, probably is working, after a diviner plan than the man can comprehend ; He probably is working after a very much more mysterious plan than the man could understand if God tried to reveal it to him. But God and he are working together. Now, turn from that to the first part of our verse. ^'■Power to become sons of God ". Oh, never forget that. You cannot rate it too highly. It makes the difference between a human and a divine being. It makes the difference between a regenerated and unregenerated being. It makes the difference between one who looks up into God's face, conscious of his own unworthiness, but who says, " My Father ", and a man who goes around and believes in God just as the devil believes in Him and trembles. Power. "To them gave He power ", and that implies, incidentally, does it not, that the human will comes in, and that is where we have often- times made a great mistake in connection with both our efforts for and our preaching of Christianity. We have not thought enough of the will which God has given us. I like, I confess, that grand old controversy which used to be very rabid sometimes, which is almost forgotten in these days : the controversy about a man's free will and God's predetermination. I like it, not because we can ever solve the problem therein suggested, but because it brings out the fact that God, in making man, made man responsible. I will not say God cannot, because I will not say that God cannot do anything, but He will not say to man who will not love Him, " You shall love Me ". Why ? Because He respects the individual. God wants a vol- untary love. I don't want my boy to love me because he is afraid not to love me, nor because I am his father. I don't want him to obey me because he is afraid of the results if he does not obey me. I want him to love me because he can't help it. I want him to do what I ask him to do because he wants to, because he loves to please me. God has made us free agents in that. He gave them " power to become ". Ah, my dear friends, it is easy enough to stand before obstacles ; it is easy enough to stand, as the children of Israel did long ago on the shore, and cry out. The question is whether you have any will in yourself to be better and to do better, to overcome. The question is whether your will is turned for or against righteousness, whether your will is turned towards or away from God. That solves the very primal condition of the religious nature. Look into your heart tonight, Christian though you may be, and test the growth of your sonship. Do you will to will those things which God wills ? Or, are you absolutely indifferent, with no idea that you have 56 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. anything to do about it, saying, "God does everything"? I like the pas- sage in the parable of the prodigal son, in St. Luke's Gospel, where the prodigal says, " I will arise ". There was his personal determination. The father standing there could not save him unless he was willing to come back ; but as soon as he was willing to come, then the father went out to save him and to redeem him. And I thank God for this very declaration in the words which He has spoken through John, because it respects my indi- viduality ; because it makes me feel that anything I do, I do of my free will. How was it with the poor woman who touched Christ's garment? She had to do something. She said, " I will touch the hem of His garment ", and she did and was healed. And so in all the great history of the dealings of our Lord with men. So with you and me today. There is a great mistake made, I think, in regard to the relationship of the human will to God's will. I have heard ministers say they are two different things and they come into opposition, and there is the cross. I don't think anything of the kind. My will is simply to get into parallelism with God's will. " Grant that I may will, but will nothing but what Thou wiliest ". That is a voluntary prayer. And then He gives " power to become ". Now, doubtless it makes some of you a little startled because I say this. Centered first of all in the indi- vidual. Here is the glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ. The minister stands in the pulpit and proclaims it with all his power, that God is willing to give : but the declaration cannot do anything alone. It is only as the individual comes forth and says, " I will " that there follows a result. You must place yourself in the right condition if you wish to become the sons of God. You can't do anything for yourself ; you can't manufacture yourself, or remake yourself, but you can put yourself where God can remake you. Oh, these human wills. God doesn't break them. He didn't crush Peter's will. He didn't make him a different man from what he was, but He put a new power into him. He wants you to make your will His. Secondly, this power implies, evidently, the work of Jesus Christ. You can't become God's sons save through Jesus Christ. "God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life ". Then, again, that glorious verse quoted before, " Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God ". Now I am not going into any long theological declaration, although I think it would be intensely interesting, of the way in which, through Jesus Christ, we are reconciled to God ; but I think we may not recognize this, that when I have gone wrong and am miserable and wretched, even though I may will God's power to help me, I need some manifestation of that power to lift me up. Some have said : ** You don't have any recognition of that in the parable of the prodigal son, do you?" I answer that we must not make all of God's parables teach everything of God's truth, because they are put forward, most of them, to declare some portion of the truth. But I do say, that even in that parable, although the father ran out and welcomed him and said : " Thou art my son ", yet the son had to be cleansed and clothed, and shoes put upon his feet before he was taken into the house. I may will to be God's son, but my will SOjVS of god. 57 is nothing without Christ, Who makes it all possible, Who takes away the error which covers me, Who opens up the road by which I must go, Who places over me the robe of His divine righteousness, Who presents me to God as His child. There can be no sonship without Jesus Christ. " In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God ". "To them gave He power to become the Sons of God ". Oh, that glorious power of Christ ! Do you wonder that the religion which expresses this truth has been called Christianity? Do you wonder that it is in that Name that every knee shall bow, while every tongue confesses that Jesus is God ? Do you wonder that the little child kneeling at his mother's knee, and the man in the depths of the struggle of life, and the aged just about to cross the river of death cry alike, " Jesus, lover of my soul " ? Do you know that He makes you a son of God just as soon as you are willing to let Him ? Do you know that He gives you ihe power by which and through which you grow day by day, having entered into this new relationship.'' Do you know that He gives you the power by which you begin to understand God more and more, and to enter into the mysteries of His truth and of His service? Do you know that He gives you the power whereby, conscious of the right of the Eternal behind you, you go further and further, from victory to victory? Jesus, the Word made flesh ! Jesus upon the cross ! Jesus exalted at the right hand of God ! Again I want you to notice in the preceding verse and in the first part of this verse, the words " that was the true Light, which lighteth every man that Cometh into the world. He was in the world and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own ", that is, His own people and His own nation, " and His own received Him not. But as mafiy as received Him ^ to them gave He power". Received! Sometimes people read that "believed". Belief is a glorious thing. As Dr. White so helpfully said tonight, it is the trusting of yourself to God. But that receiving, it seems to me, is something which precedes the believing. I love that old prayer : " Take my heart, oh Jesus, for I cannot give it to Thee, and when Thou hast it, keep it, for I cannot keep it for Thee". " As many as received Him"! How beautiful! He went to certain villages; they received Him, and He there could work miracles. He went to other villages ; they there received Him not, and He could there do no mighty work. I receive Him first, as the historic personage, the Being Who once lived at such a time and whose truth has conquered the world. I receive Him as a divine Being, as Canon Row says : The Man Who never sinned, thereby proving His divine origin, because never but once and only once has a sin- less man lived. I receive Him as One who has blessed men so that they could die without fearing. I receive Him as the One who comes into my own life and becomes my Christ, my Savior. " As many as received Him, to them gave He power ". First you will ; then the power of Christ result- ing from your will ; and then your receiving that Christ, in order that He may give that which you are willing to let Him give. Isn't it a wonderful truth? You see how this growth of which I spoke goes on. I cry, " I am nothing of myself, but I do hunger for Thee ; I do more and more thirst for 58 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. Thee ! " There is my will. Then God responds to that will. He says : " Behold, I am here, my child ". He stands there and knocks, and when I open the door and say, " Come in ", He enters. That goes on all through life. We are so imperfect that we have to renew, as it were, this association ; not renew the state, but keep on renewing the conditions. I love that passage in St. John where, in speaking to Peter, Christ says: "He that is bathed needeth not save to wash his feet". The conditions have to be again and again renewed, just as I wash my hands again and again all through the day, but the one fact remains, being done once for all. We have to cry out, "O God, I need Thee", a thousand times a day. And God says: "I am here, my child". And I cry out, "Enter in, O Lord, enter into my speech, enter into my service ; what I do is nothing without Thee". But His gift to me never has to be renewed. Again ; God works through means. I am His child by creation, and it has pleased Him that my body and my mind should grow by the use of those things which He has prepared. I eat, I sleep, I take exercise, I go in and out amongst men, and thereby my physical being grows. And God has ordained exactly the same method whereby my spiritual being may grow ; and without the use of these means, my dear friends, I cannot grow. There you have the practical Christian life going on day after day. I must pray. I must live in constant companionship with God. I must read His Book; it is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. I must go to my church and worship, for He has promised a blessing where two or three are gathered together. I must use what are ordinarily called "the means of grace ". John brings out again and again those ordinances of grace. He speaks of baptism. He speaks of the Holy Communion : " Do this in remembrance of Me". And as we go on using these means, we find that the sonship becomes richer and fuller, and God becomes more willing and able to pour more and more of His divine power into us. I want you to realize, my friends, that this power to become the sons of God is something which is of us, in us, and through us by the influence of God's Holy Spirit. There we have the Three Persons in the Godhead working together. " God so loved " ; Christ coming that we might be saved ; and the Holy Spirit entering in that the growth may progress. May God grant us grace to realize more and more fully in our lives the magnificent glory that is ours ! And God grant us grace at the same time humbly, lovingly to recognize that this is not a birth which comes after any human fashion, " Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God'\ ' " FULL OF GRACE AND TRUTH " . (St. John 1:14.) by rkv. henry s. nash, d. d., Professor ok Nkw Testament Interpretation, Episcopal Theological School, Cambridge, Mass. The text I am to study is a single verse. But at the risk of repeating what may have been already said, I must sum up the thought of the verses that precede it. The Prologue of the Gospel, the first eighteen verses, is so compact, so solidly thought together that an ox team could not draw a sentence from its place. So the context is vital to the text. The Prologue, at this point, illustrates the working of the author's mind at large. He has been accused of mental monotony. And there is a certain justification for the charge. To a singular degree he is one-thoughted. His system is all center. He is like the man in our Lord's parable, who, finding the pearl of great price, sold all that he had and bought it. So, both by reason of the wider context as well as by reason of the nearer context we must gather up the thought of the Prologue in order to enter this verse along the line of the author's own mental motion. The theme is the divine tragedy. The reality of God has entered history and men lack perception of it. The full light of God's mind and plan of redemption has shone forth, and 'tis as if the sun had risen in all its beauty to beat vainly against the obtuseness of men born blind. The life of the Son of God has been lived out in the midst of the chosen people ; and His life is as a landscape to a blind man's eye. The Gospel has two sides. Under one aspect, it is a study in the life of Christ. Under the other aspect, it is the autobiography of apostolic faith. The author is writing a great tragedy, the story of Israel's unbelief. At the same time he tells us how a few were led into belief, how the Christ educated a little body of disciples and friends, leavening them with His life, infusing into them His mind, till at last, the eyes of the heart being opened, they came to know their Master, in some measure, as He knew Himself, and to think after Him His thoughts about God and man. Verse 5. " The light shineth in the darkness and the darkness did not perceive and apprehend it ". Had John known Plato's illustration of the men who lived in a cave and saw the light only as it filtered down through their obstinate pride and tenacious prejudices, he might well have used it here. Verse 11. " He came to His own estate " in history, to the land which God had chosen for the stage of the redemptive life. "And His own people ", His kith and kin. His countrymen, the stewards of His estate, "gave Him no welcome ". • Delivered at the First Conference, held at the First Baptist Church, October 21, 1903. 59 6o THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. Verses 12 and 13. " But to all those who gave Him welcome" who surrendered their prejudices into His keeping, who put their views of God and man into His hands, " He gave the right and the power to become the children of God ". I mean says John, " Those who believed in His name ", that is, those who accepted His view of life, His understanding of the national hope of Israel, His revelation of God, as the ultimate truth about God and man. We have here a very simple and intelligible description of the mystery of the New Birth. To John it meant admission into the intimacy of the Saviour. Friends live in one another's life and mind. The new born man takes Christ's point of view for his very own, and so enters into His purpose and His power. Verse 14. "The Word became flesh". The term Logos, translated " Word ", as John uses it, has two strains in its pedigree, — the Greek and the Hebrew. To the Greek the Logos is the outgoing Reason of God. To the Hebrew it is the will and plan of God, entering history to guide and shape and control it. Both elements are in the Johannic term. But the Hebraic element is the controlling one. The Logos is the full expression of God's mind and heart and purpose touching man's redemption. "The Word became flesh ". Our word " flesh" cannot translate John's word. No one can study the Bible long and earnestly without being forced to the conclusion that the literal translation is sometimes the worst possible translation. In a good translation we must convey not only the logic of the original, but its emotion and colour. Now our word " flesh " is too crassly physical to convey the feeling of the original. Let us then make use of para- phrase and say "God's Word, His Self-expression, took unto itself a perfect and real humanity ". Thus and thus alone could God's thought about men come within reach of the everyday man. The Incarnation, to us who deeply and devoutly believe in it, is the only possible method whereby God's whole mind can be made intelligible to the commonest man. And we think that the alternative is a speculative mysticism, by means of which the man highly favoured by talents and leisure may reason and train himself into intimacy with God's innermost thought. But we Christians will have nothing to do with a reve- lation of God that belongs to the scholar and the speculator. We are common folk ourselves. We have cast in our lot with the common folk. And to us the Incarnation is the necessary means and method whereby God puts His secrets within the reach of the man in the field and the man on the street. " And dwelt amongst us " } that is, in the midst of the chosen witnesses, the men who through intimacy with Jesus had their eyes opened to the meanings of His being and work. It was through their faith in Him, their spiritual perception of His nature and His mind that the Son of God effected a lodgment in human consciousness for His revelation of the Father. " And we gazed upon His glory ". It is the eager and attentive look of faith that John has in mind. Not the casual look of the passer-by, or the indolent glance of the idly curious, but the penetrating look of a man whose mind is bound to a supreme object. The man in the street looks at the FCLI. OF GRACE AND TRUTH. 6i starry heavens. The astronomer gazing at them, puts his soul into his look. So the chosen men, drawn by the Christ, put heart and soul into their study of Him. For this is the deeper meaning of faith ; it is the steady attention of man to the supreme object of spiritual niterest, an eager and tireless and piercing perception which will not rest until it has gone to the heart of its subject. " His glory ". Our word "glory " does not fully or happily translate the Greek. The original involves the thought of power and majesty. Read the Second Isaiah. He throws a clear light on the larger meaning of the word. God's glory is His mastery over history, manifested through the crisis of Israel's experience, the clear outshining of His will and purpose asserting complete control over the nations. So, the glory of the Christ is His master- fulness. To the unbeliever He was a bankrupt Galilean. To the believer He was the embodied might of God. Again the original contains something of the meaning of our word beauty. Plato described beauty as the visibleness of truth. John describes the Christ as the visibleness of the mind and heart of God. Christ is the synonym of (iod in terms of human experience. He is the beauty of God. Through the Incarnation the being of God penetrates history, embodying itself in humanity. Thus it becomes compelling, irresistible, even as noble beauty is irresistible. So, to the eye of faith, of spiritual perception, the Christ is the embodiment of the mastery and beauty of God. " The mastery and beauty as of an only-begotten Son ". In the Christ (iod speaks His deep and clear and final word regarding the mystery of our life and His life. "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father". God's Son fully represents God to our heart and conscience. Touching Him we touch the ultimate moral and spiritual meaning of things. " Full of Grace '". Great words, incessantly used, grow stale. They are no longer instinct with expression. And it is a waste of energy on our part to refuse to recognize this law regarding words. So we would better disuse the word "grace" for a time and substitute a word or phrase which shall convey the thrill of the original. Both Paul and John meant by grace the insetting energy and love of God. Human consciousness, standing before its tasks, is empty of power to meet them, unless God comes to our aid. Life, beset by problems it cannot solve and debts it cannot pay, is like a cove which the tide has long forsaken. The mud flats lie bare. The rock-weed turns brown. But the tide returns. The cove learns afresh the great lesson that the universe cares for it. Irresistible cosmic forces lift the sea and drive its waters, in all their strength and recreating power, into the forsaken cove. And now all is changed. The cove tingles and glows with the sense of its kinship to the universe and the confident consciousness of its dignity. So with the heart seeking salvation. If it relies upon itself, the tide goes out. The flats lie bare. Human helplessness is clearly revealed. But the Christ presents Himself to our attention. Through faith we enter into His mind and nature and meaning. And lo ! a flood of divine energy sets into the soul. Life is filled, bankfull, with the consciousness of power and peace. 62 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. " Full of grace and truth ". Once more we must depart from the estab- lished translation if we would catch the full force of the original. Our word truth, noble as it is, leans too much to the subjective side of experience. We have another word, reality, inseparable from truth, that may serve us better. John found in Jesus of Nazareth the reality of all the promises that God had given to Israel. And thus was he saved from sin and doubt and despair. Only reaUty can save us. The reality of human goodness saves us from despair about humanity. We touch the goodness of the saints and our confidence in our race is restored. Even so we touch the Christ and, in touching Him, touch the very mind and being of God. He is the divine reality, the pledge and assurance of God's power to keep all the promises which He hath given us. Finally, would we enter deep into this great text, we must think together two things which we have been in the habit of holding more or less apart. The men of the Bible, both of the Old and the New Testaments, instinctively connected the thought of individual salvation with the thought of the King- dom of God. The prophet never spoke about his perfection without speak- ing at the same time about the consummation of history. The apostles never preached or wrote about their own immortality without at the same time publishing the news of the returning Christ. Therefore, to enter fully into the text before us, let us imagine that we have bent our whole strength to founding the Kingdom of God amongst men, and that the terribleness of the task has robbed us of our confidence and courage. It cannot be done, we begin to say. As individuals we may be saved. God's mercy will take us through death into eternal life. But that God's power and mercy can lift our race and nation to the level of His mind and plan, this is too hard to be believed. Yet this, nothing less, is the faith that the Saviour imparts to us. He brings God's being and mind close to our consciousness and conscience. His revelation of God is not made to the mystic, the scholar and the monk. On the contrary, it is made in the very midst of us. The Word of God takes upon itself our humanity and dwells among us. Through the incarnate Word the divine being and purpose come upon us with irresistible force to save from disheartenment and despair. The beauty of Christ is as compelling, as little to be escaped from or disbelieved in, as the beauty of the dawn of a day in early June. The eye makes a love-match with the sun, and lo ! the wonder and splendor of the visible world. So the eye of the heart, through our dis- covery of the Christ, makes a love-match with the being and beauty of God. One cannot doubt. One cannot falter. He joyously surrenders himself to an unconquerable faith in humanity. "The Word took upon Himself our humanity and dwelt in the midst of us. And we gazed upon His beauty and splendor, the splendor as of one who is the only Son of His Father, full of saving power and convincing reality ". *THE MIRACLE AT CANA With an attempt at a Philosophy of Miracles. St. John 2 : i-ii.) by rkv. augustus h. strong, id. d., i^l. r>.. President of Rochester Theological Semin/^ry, Rochester, N. Y. This Fourth Gospel was written long after Matthew, Mark and Luke. It was intended as a supplement to them. The Synoptics give us the main facts of Jesus' life and teaching, his works, his death, his resurrection. This Gospel gives us the explanation of the facts, in the eternity, the person- ality, the deity of Christ himself. It presupposes the previous Gospels and builds upon them, yet it adds but few facts to those which they relate. The miracle of Cana is the first miracle that Jesus wrought, and it gives the rule and type of all his miracles. The purpose of it is intimated when the evan- gelist tells us that "this beginning of his signs did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested his glory ". That word "glory " takes us back to the first chapter of the Gospel, and we shall better understand the miracle if we consider the place which it occupies in the Gospel as a whole. True to his purpose of explanation, John begins with a thesis or proposition which he proceeds to demonstrate. He solves all the problems of the Synoptics by boldly asserting at the very start that the eternal Word of God has been manifested in Jesus of Nazareth. It is an argument from the divine to the human, as John's first Epistle is an argument from the human to the divine. The argument, however, is de- ductive rather than inductive. It propounds a principle and then proceeds to point out the operation of it. It declares Christ to be nothing less than Deity revealed, and then shows that this necessarily makes him not only the Christ for whom the Old Testament had prepared the way, but also the Son of God who has wider relations as Lord of the Universe and Savior of mankind. The Synoptics had been content to trace Jesus' origin back to Abraham and to Adam. The Fourth Gospel asserts that before Abraham was born, Christ already was; nay, it maintains that Christ was the Creator not only of Abraham but of all humanity. It goes even further and holds that Christ is God's only medium of communication and activity; he is the preserver as well as the creator of all, and whatever has come into being is life only in him. Since he is the life of the universe, he can be its light, and all knowledge of God and of truth proceeds from him. Christ is the only Revealer of God. He has been revealing God throughout all human his- tory. The darkness of sin has not been able to overcome or suppress his light, even among the heathen. But the incarnation has concentrated his * Delivered at the Second Conference, held at the Mathewson Street Methtxlist Episcopal Church, November ii, iqo3. 63 64 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. rays. Better even than Moses and the Law are the grace and truth revealed in Jesus of Nazareth. There is opposition to Christ, but this very opposition is a proof of Christ's deity. Sin must resist holiness ; selfishness must resist love. Holi- ness and love, however, will attract to themselves their like. There will be increasing faith on the part of some, though there is increasing unbelief on the part of others. Hence this Gospel is the record of two opposing ten- dencies. God's self-mapifestation in Christ stirs up hatred that brings the Savior to the Cross, but it also awakens love that ensures the triumph of his kingdom. Side by side with the growing opposition on the part of the Jews is the growing devotion of Christ's disciples. They have every worldly example and inducement to forsake him. When they do yield to his claims and recognize his authority, the victory is won, the demon- stration is complete, the thesis is proved. And this point is reached when Thomas, the most skeptical of the apostles, is moved after Jesus' resurrec- tion to bow at his feet and cry: "My Lord and my God!" This is the proper end of the Gospel, and all that follows in the last chapter is only a supplement, designed to show why it was that John's service upon earth lasted so much longer than Peter's. The progressive revelation of Christ's glory — this is the central theme of the Fourth Gospel. The first chapter, in which the thesis is stated and the witness of John the Baptist is given, is naturally folloAved by the second chapter, in which Christ manifests his glory, first by turning water into wine, and secondly by driving the traders out of the temple. There is an organic connection between the first chapter and the second which forbids us to regard the sublime declarations of the first chapter as of later author- ship. The glory is declared in chapter one ; the glory is manifested in chapter two. John, the protector and adopted son of Mary the Virgin, is the natural custodian and narrator of the miracle of Cana — a miracle wrought within a family circle, and therefore either unknown to the other evangelists, or seeming to them outside the range of Jesus' official ministry — an evidence that this Fourth Gospel had John for its author. That this beginning of miracles was wrought in so humble a sphere is quite of a piece with the general plan of Christ — his kingdom did not come with observation. He was not born at Rome, but at Bethlehem ; his crown was not of gold, but of thorns. He shows us what true glory is ; self-abne- gation reveals God best ; to him the cross was a lifting up. Not among "the people", or "the world", wa:^ this wonder performed, but in the narrow circle of the family. Though he had just come from his baptism into death and from his struggle with infernal powers in the wilderness, he begins his ministry with no sounding of trumpets or clangor of arms. Instead of this, he enters sympathetically and joyously into the humble and common life of men, helping the poor, increasing their joy, consecrat- ing their marriage. The simplicity of the story carries conviction of its truth. The late arrival of Jesus and of his newly chosen disciples increased unexpectedly THE MIRACLE AT CAN A. 65 the number of the guests. The mother, who had been already on the ground, perceived that the resources of the household were exhausted and that the married pair were exposed to embarrassment. With expecta- tions, long suppressed, but newly awakened by reports of the Baptist's recog- nition of her Son at the Jordan, expectations of some revelation of his power, she whispered to him that "they have no wine". It is an intrusion of her motherly influence into a sphere that is above her. Jesus gently puts aside all authority but that of his mission and of the God who sent him. But at the same time he shows that Mary's expectations were not irrational, for he furnishes wine, and in such abundance that it serves as a symbol of the royal generosity of the gifts of God. Why should we think of the story as merely a parable ? All interpreta- tions that ignore the miraculous element are even more far fetched and incredible than the miracle itself would be. " Jesus' conversation was so entertaining that the guests said : What good wine we have had ! " All this is to contradict the plain teaching of the narrative. The evangelist evi- dently intended to describe a miracle. The testimony of the servants shows what was in the jars; the testimony of the ruler of the feast shows what it has become. The " filling to the brim " has no meaning, unless it is meant that the contents of all the six water-pots was changed to wine. The very superfluity of the provision was necessary to justify the solemn conclusion of the account : " This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested his glory: and his disciples believed on him ". What was this glory, which the miracle made manifest ? It was three- fold, and, in each of its three aspects, it had to do with nature, and with Christ's relation to nature. It was, first of all, the glory of Christ as the Life of Nature. We constantly tend to an atheistic and unchristian view of nature. We think of it as self-originated, as sufficient to itself, as indepen- dent of God. This miracle shows us on the contrary that nature is only the expression of the divine mind and will, and that this divine mind and will is the mind and will of Jesus Christ. He who created the universe has not abandoned the universe. Our gospel designates Christ's creative activity not by the preposition ttpo^ "by", but by the preposition dia, "through". Creation is not the work of an absent, but of a present, Christ. And so with preservation. Only through his constant activity do the forces and laws of the universe maintain their existence. Matter is not dead but living, and it is Christ who upholds all things by the word of his power. And so we, who believe in Christ, " Behind creation's throbbing screen Catch movements of the great Unseen ". If all that has come into being is, as our gospel says, " life in him ", then nature is plastic in the hand of Christ. His will is a free will. He is not an Ixion, bound to nature's wheel. He is nature's Lord. Hence it follows, secondly, that the glory which this miracle manifests is the glory of Christ as the Ennobler of Nature. He is not the victim of a past process. He adds to the process, and the successive additions from his living energy are 66 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. the secret of evolution ; indeed, no growth or progress is conceivable, until we take into account some intelligent and beneficent agent behind or within the process, who is reinforcing and guiding it to a preordained and rational end. If all growth and progress everywhere is the result of his activity, why should we hesitate to recognize his working here? In this miracle he simply shows the inner possibilities of nature, since it is under his control. He can subject it to the needs of man. The turning of water into wine is a prophecy of the transformation of this mortal body into the spiritual body, and of the coming of the new heaven and earth wherein dwelleth righteous- ness. For this glory is the glory of Christ, not simply as the Life of Nature, and as the Ennobler of Nature, but as the Interpreter of Nature. All Christ's miracles were signs of something higher than themselves. This Fourth Gospel is especially concerned to point out the symbolism of Jesus' works. He opens the eyes of the blind, to show that he is the Light of the World ; he multiplies the loaves, to show that he is the Bread of Life ; He raises the dead, to show that he lifts men up from the death of trespasses and sins. The universe is moral and religious at its core. The progress is a progress toward the good, the better, the best. Present commonness, and even imperfection, is no measure of the final result. He who made the world is in the world, to counteract the evil and to cherish the good. Want, the effect of sin, is to be done away. Separation and isolation, such as an accusing conscience brings about, are to give place to a holy society. Love and joy are to prevail, such love and joy as springs from virtue and the fear of God. All this is to begin in humble spheres and from them to spread through all the world. Water is but the basis and foundation for wine, and the world that now is is but the preparation for the world that is to come. But we cannot leave this first miracle without a further consideration of the philosophy of miracles in general. We must grant that the old con- ception of the miracle as a violation or suspension of natural law, has been superseded by a new conception of the miracle, as belonging to a higher order of nature — an order previously existing indeed, but unknown to men before. Miracle, then, is like the eclipse of the sun, whose rareness attracts attention, but is not unnatural; like the cathedral clock, whose bell rings only at the advent of a new century ; like the action of the calculating machine, which presents to the observer in regular succession the series of units from one to ten million, but which then makes a leap and shows, not ten million and one, but a hundred million. The extraordinary and unique may nevertheless be the operation of a law of nature. The blossoming of the century plant is something very unlike its former flowerless condition ; no human being may ever have seen it blossom before ; yet the provision therefor is in the plant from the beginning. The burning of the Windsor Hotel in New York City is thought to have been due to the gradual charring of the woodwork and to superheated steam pipes. The temperature rose imperceptibly, until the sudden addition THE MIRACLE AT CAN A. 67 of a fraction of a degree changed heat into flame. The ellipticity of the earth's orbit might go On increasing by regular gradations until centrifugal force overbalanced the centripetal, and the earth from being a planet might suddenly become a comet, yet this change might be perfectly natural. There are more things in heaven and earth rhan are dreamt of in the philosophy of the ordinary scientist. Now miracle in a similar manner may be, and probably is, the operation of a law hitherto unknown to men, yet entirely within the range of natural forces, when once these natural forces are understood. I say, when once these natural forces are fully understood. But these natural forces are never fully understood until they are recognized as divine. For matter is really spirit, and nature is only another name for God. The laws of nature are the habits of God. It is not true that God is the author of the miracle only in the sense that he instituted the laws of nature at the beginning, and provided that, at the appropriate time, miracle should be their outcome. This view fails to recognize in the miracle any immediate exercise of will. It also regards nature as a mere machine, which can operate apart from God — a purely deistic method of conception. If, how- ever, we interpret nature dynamically, rather than mechanically, and regard it as the regular working of the divine will, instead of the automatic action of a machine, we may regard miracle as a perfectly natural phenomenon, while yet we see in it the action of a present and personal God. There is no such hard and fast line between the natural and the supernatural as some apologists have imagined. With the qualifications already suggested, we may adopt the dictum of Biedermann: 'Everything is miracle, — there- fore faith sees God everywhere ; nothing is miracle, — therefore science sees God nowhere ". "The Hebrew historian or prophet regarded miracles as only the emergence into sensible experience of that divine force which was all along, though invisibly, controlling the course of nature ". So says the Bishop of Southampton, and he speaks wisely. This principle throws new light upon many difficult narratives of Scripture. Miracle is an immediate operation of God ; but, since all natural processes are also immediate operations of God, we do not need to deny the use of the natural processes, so far as they will go, in miracle. Such wonders of the Old Testament as the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, the partings of the Red Sea and of the Jordan, the calling down of fire from heaven by Elijah, and the destruction of the army of Sennacherib, are none the less works of God, when regarded as wrought by the use of natural means. At Cana Jesus took water to make wine, and on the hill-side of Galilee he took the five loaves to make bread, just as in ten thousand vineyards to-day he is turning the moisture of the earth into the juice of the grape, and in ten thousand fields is turning carbon into corn. I do not hesitate to express my belief that all miracle has its natural side, though we may not be able to discern it. Recent mvestigations show the possibility of influence of mind upon body which go far toward explain- ing many of the cures of blindness, deafness, and paralysis, which meet us 68 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. in the gospel narrative. The virgin-birth of Christ may be an extreme instance of parthenogenesis, which Professor Loeb has demonstrated to take place in other than the lowest forms of life, and which he believes to be possible in all. Christ's resurrection may be an illustration of the power of the normal and perfect spirit to take to itself a proper body, and so may be the type and prophecy of that great change when we too shall lay down our own life and shall take it again. The scientist will yet find that his disbelief is not only disbelief in Christ, but also disbelief in science. Even though all miracle were proved to be a working of nature, the Christian argument would not one whit be weakened, for still miracle would evidence the extraordinary working of the immanent God, who is none other than Jesus Christ, and the impartation of his knowledge to the prophet or apostle who was his instrument. Our unreadiness to accept this naturalistic interpretation of the miracle results wholly from our inveterate habit of dissociating nature from God, and of practically banishing God from his universe. This is the method of modern science, and since science deals with phenomena and not with their causes, science has its rights, and we cannot require it to enter a foreign field. But there is another field which belongs to religion, and the scientist is narrow and prejudiced who denies the existence of realities that are behind the phenomena. In his Commentary on Isaiah 33 : 14, George Adam Smith explains the passage : "Who among us can dwell with the de- vouring fire? Who among us can dwell with everlasting burnings?" He tells us that the prophet had no thought of future punishment here. It was the present retributions of divine justice that he had in mind — those retribu- tions that the wicked ignore or deny. If you look at a great conflagration, he says, through a smoked glass, you can see the bricks falling and the walls collapsing, but you cannot see the fire. We may use the illustration for the subject before us. Physical science looks at the universe through a smoked glass. It sees phenomena, but not the cause of them ; it sees the sequences of nature, but not God. There is no antagonism between its view and that of religion — the two are simply complements of each other. Faith looks at the universe without the needless intervention of a smoked glass. Faith sees all that science sees, but it sees also the divine agency. It sees not only the falling bricks, but it sees also the fire. And so it can recognize the natural element in the miracle, while yet it recognizes in it the extraordinary agency and wonder-working power of God. Those who see in Christ none other than the immanent God, manifested to creatures, find in this fact the explanation and the guarantee of his mirac- ulous working. The Logos or divine Reason, who is the principle of all growth and evolution, can make God known to finite creatures only by suc- cessive new impartations of his energy. Since all progress implies incre- ment, and Christ is the only source of life, the whole history of creation is a witness to the possibility of miracle. Every rational step already taken proves that other steps may follow. Miracle is not only possible but proba- ble, for the reason that Christ is the Moral Reason of the world, as well as THE MIRACLE AT CAN A. 69 its Intellectual Reason. The disturbances of the world-order which are due to sin are the matters which most deeply affect him. Christ, the life of the whole system and of humanity as well, must suffer; and, since we have evidence that he is merciful as well as just, we have the strongest of reasons for believing that he will rectify the evil by extraordinary means when merely ordinary means do not avail. Tne miracle of Cana would not have been wrought if there had not been need of it. It was needed as a proof that Christ is the Life of Nature, the Knnobler of Nature, the Interpreter of Nature. It taught that he recognized the needs of the world and that he had come to supply them, not in man's time but in his own time, with such gradualness and in such proportion as best evince the wisdom and the munificence of God. He has come to make all things new, to make sacred every common relation of life, to turn earth into heaven. But he will do this through his own nat- ural forces and laws. Every new manifestation of his power shall lay hold of and build upon and develop that which already exists, even as he uses the w-ater to make wine. And these transformations of the lower into the higher have only just begun. Cana reveals the plan of Christ as a plan of evolution. After Law comes Gospel. After labor and sorrow and pain and tears come rest and reward and rejoicing and life forevermore. Sin gives its brief enjoyments at the first, and afterwards brings remorse and ruin. But Christ's gifts are ever increasing in richness and profusion. He keeps his best wine to the last. May I sum up what I have said by a definition of the miracle ? A miracle is an event in nature so extraordinary in itself and so coinciding with the prophecy or command of a religious teacher or leader as fully to warrant the conviction, on the part of those who witness it, that God has wrought it with the design of certifying that this teacher or leader has been commissioned by him. This definition has certain marked advantages over those that have been commonly accepted. It recognizes the imma- nence of God and his immediate agency in nature, instead of assuming an antithesis between the laws of nature and the will of God. It regards the miracle as simply an extraordinary act of that same God who is already present in all natural operations, and who in them is revealing his general plan. It holds that natural law, as the method of God's regular activity, in no way precludes unique exertions of his power when these will best secure his purpose in creation. It leaves it possible that all miracles may have their natural explanations and may hereafter be traced to natural causes, while both miracles and natural causes may be only other names for the one and self-same will of God. It reconciles the claims of both science and religion : of science, by permitting any possible or probable physical antecedents of the miracle ; of religion, by maintaining that these very ante- cedents, together with the miracle itself, are to be interpreted as signs of God's special commission to him under whose teaching or leadership the miracle is wrought. We are afflicted with a mental and moral astigmatism which sees a 70 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. single point or truth as if it were two. We see God and man, divine sov- ereignty and human freedom, Christ's divine nature and Christ's human nature, the natural and the supernatural, respectively, as two disconnected facts, when deeper insight would see but one. Astronomy has its centrip- etal and centrifugal forces, yet they are doubtless one force. The child cannot hold two oranges at once in its little hand. Our tendency to double vision should be corrected by Old Testament revelation, for that intimates that, in perfect consistency with the operation of natural law, the God of glory thundereth and in the heavens God himself is speaking with the living voice. The miracle of Cana is a New Testament corrective of our mental and moral astigmatism, for here Christ shows himself to be the Life of Nature, the Ennobler of Nature, the Interpreter of Nature, as only he can be who, as the Fourth Gospel declares, was in the beginning with God, and was himself God. To a transcendent and divine Personality miracle and nature are one. •JESUS AND NICODEMUS — THE NEW BIRTH. (St. John 3:1-15.) by rkv. ki>"warr> a-bhoxt, !>. d., Rector of St. James's Episcopal Church, Cambridge, Mass. In order to a correct understanding of the story of Jesus and Nicodemus it is necessary to bear in mind that the Jewish commonwealth was a com- bination of church and state, presenting an ideal, an object lesson, of that coming Kingdom of God, when church and state, long separated, shall be united in a homogeneous whole. One and the same code of laws answered the purpose of both the civil and the ecclesiastical sides of the Jewish national life. Of almost equal authority with its written law were its unwritten traditions. It was one of the distinctions of the party known as the Pharisees that they attached the greatest importance to tradition, and enforced it with the utmost scrupulosity as regarded doctrine, ritual and life. Accompanying this academic rigor was often a practical selfishness, insincerity and superficiality. And Nicodemus was a Pharisee. Nicodemus appears only in the Gospel of St. John, and he appears in that Gospel only three times ; once in the interview with Jesus ; once when he protested against condemning Jesus without a trial ; and once again when he came with Joseph of Arimathea, bearing an hundred weight of spices to anoint the body of the Saviour when taken from the Cross, and so to aid in preparing it for burial. The interview with Nicodemus alone concerns us this morning. Nicodemus was also a member of the Jewish Sanhedrin. As a rule the members of the Sanhedrin were scholars of authority, theologians, teachers of the law ; constituting a supreme court at Jerusalem before whom all cases arising under the law were brought for judgment. With this preliminary picture we are prepared to understand the scene about to be described, which took place at Jerusalem soon after that miracle in Cana of Galilee which has been the basis of discussion this morning. In the language of the Revised Version the brief story of the interview of Nicodemus with our Lord is as follows [St. John 3 : 1-15]. In all probability the actual words of our Saviour end with the fifteenth verse. There follows immediately that noble epitome of the whole gospel of the Incarnation, " God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son ; that whosoever belieyeth on Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." But in the opinion of scholars this is a direct declaration of the author of the gospel, pieced on to the narrative of the conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus, and not a part of the interview itself. * Delivered at the Second Conference, held at the Mathewson Street Methodist Episcopal Church. November ii, 1903. 71 72 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. Now let us for a moment pause in order to form in imagination, if pos- sible, a legitimate picture of the scene itself. It is in Jerusalem, at the crowded time of the Passover, when the streets are full of the Hebrew people. It is night. It is not improbably a windy night, and the gusts that sweep over Judea and Jerusalem are tearing to and fro in the streets of the city. Under the cover of darkness, this Nicodemus, an old man, I think, wends his silent and unperceived way to the house where Jesus of Nazareth is staying. It seems hardly probable, as has been suggested by some students, that it was the house of John, the author of this gospel. At the time of the crucifixion our Lord did commit His mother to the care of John, and John took her, as the King James Version says, " to his own home." But the word " home " is not in the original, and it is not necessary to sup- pose that at this time the author of the gospel had a " home " of his own in Jerusalem at which Jesus stayed. Whatever was the house, we can safely and accurately imagine that there was a stairway leading up on the outside of it, as was not uncommon in the houses of the East, to the upper room, which, as the guest chamber, would be the place where the Lord would be found. Nicodemus, ascending this outside stair, could reach the apart- ment where Jesus was without attracting the attention of the people in the house, so that both architecture and darkness favored the privacy of his visit. But why by night.' There is danger that the intimations given in some other parts of John's Gospel of " doors shut " for fear of the Jews should apply to this adventure, and that it should be inferred that Nicodemus came by night through fear. There is no authority for that interpretation, though it may be true. Let us not label Nicodemus with the word coward when there is nothing in the narrative except the simple fact that he came by night, to indicate that fear had anything to do with his steps. I fancy that if you wanted to see your pastor upon a confidential errand, you might very likely go to him at night when the duties and interruptions of the day were at their lowest ebb, and when perhaps you might be more likely to find him unengaged. At any rate, it was at night that Nicodemus went, and found the Saviour in the room where He was lodging. You can imagine that it did take something of moral courage on the part of this venerable Hebrew, this Pharisee, this judge upon the supreme bench, to seek a private inter- view with the man from Galilee, whose unique personality, whose unpar- alleled teachings, the beginning of whose wonder-working manifestations of His glory had already excited such a sensation, and aroused such a hubbub of excitement and discussion among the Hebrew people. It costs some- thing to interview a man who is under suspicion. St. Paul in his prison abode remembers with a grateful heart the man who is called Onesiphorus, because when he was a prisoner at Rome and this man was visiting there he had sought Paul out, and was not afraid of his bonds. Nicodemus was not afraid of the bonds of the Master. Notice also that he comes with a confession. The miracle at Cana of Galilee had acquired notoriety at Jerusalem ; and probably other miracles THE NE W BIRTH. 73 had been wrought not here recorded. Evidently Nicodemus does not stand alone in his confession, for he says : " We know that thou art a teacher come from God, for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him ". It was a joint confession in which he spoke for others as well as for himself. It was also a compromised confession, a limited confession, a confession with reservations. All that it said was, "we know that Thou art a teacher"; yet that was a good deal for a member of the Sanhedrin to say. " We know that Thou art a teacher come from God ", was a great deal more for a man in his position to say. Now the Saviour, instead of meeting this confession as most persons would have met it, met it as He often met such ; gives no attention appar- ently to the question or remark that had been addressed to Him by His interlocutor, but deftly and effectively turns the mind of His interlocutor to an entirely different point. Here comes a venerable Hebrew, a Pharisee, a judge on the supreme bench, but by the Saviour all he says is brushed aside with the words, " Except a man be born again he cannot see the Kingdom of God". With one stroke He puts Nicodemus outside the pale. Then comes the question, " How can a man be born again ? " It is like Pilate's question, "What is truth?" It may have been ironical, sarcastic, contemptuous or sincere, or a little of each and all. " How can a man be born when he is old .'' " How can a man be born again when he is an old man like me, stooped, grey-headed, and trembling of foot, as I have found my way up these stairs ? The Saviour seems to pay no attention to this question, for in His second declaration He passes right by it and fixes His mind and words upon a spot beyond the place, even, where He had planted His foot in His first answer. " Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God ". Put these two answers side by side and note the progress in the Saviour's thought from the one to the other. In one case it is, "Except a man be born [from above] he cannot see the Kingdom of God " ; in the other it is, " Except a man be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God ". Spiritual perception is one thing, spiritual experience is another. Unless a man be born from above [of the Spirit], and of water as well, he can neither see, through his perceptions, what the King- dom of God is, nor in his experience can he know or enter into the Kingdom of God as a real condition of his life. Now, what does our Saviour mean by the distinction that He draws here between baptism of the Spirit and baptism with water .^ What does He mean by " being born of water and the Spirit " ? I know that this is an interdenominational meeting. I am probably speaking to those who call themselves Baptists or Methodists or Congregationalisls or Episcopalians. I hope nothing I say will exceed the courtesy that a speaker should show in such an assembly as this, or that it will offend or wound or distress the sen- sibilities of any brother or sister who does me the honor to listen to what I have to say. But I want to say here unequivocally, unhesitatingly, and with- 74 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. out the slightest room for doubt in regard to my meaning, that I believe in baptismal regeneration. Baptism is a covenant between God and the human soul. There is a human side to it, and there is a divine side to it, and the divine and the human must coincide to make the perfect baptism, which is the outward and visible sign of the inward and invisible birth. That is baptism ; and what is baptism ? It is an outward and visible application of a medium appointed by our Lord Himself, accompanying an inward and invisible operation of the divine spirit promised by God Himself, That is baptism, and such baptism is not only an indication, it is a means, when it is used in faith, of the new birth. Those who have conformed to the out- ward and visible sign have a right to expect the inward and invisible grace, and that is the literal and spiritual philosophy of that being born of the Spirit and of water which our Saviour lays down to Nicodemus as the pre- liminary condition not only of seeing but entering into the Kingdom of God. There are three foundation doctrines in so much of the Gospel of John as this Conference has proceeded with in its consideration this morning. The first is the Incarnation, God manifest in the flesh, and the world will never outgrow the doctrine of the incarnation. Men deride it, and dispute it, and condemn it, and forsake it, but it is of the nature of the universe. The second is the Atonement. On the foundation of the Incarnation rises the second great doctrine of the Gospel of John. " Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world ". The doctrine may be repudiated, minimized and rejected, but there will ever remain the sacri- ficial atonement of the Son of God for the sin of the world. And the next great doctrine in this spiritual ascent is that of the new birth. It has a logical connection with the others, it grows out of the others, it is essential for the realization of the others. God manifest in Jesus Christ, the sacri- ficial Lamb of Calvary, and the new birth from above by the Spirit, with an outward sign of the washing of regeneration by which the soul is restored to the kingdom to which by sin it had been lost. Those are the three fundamental doctrines of St. John's Gospel. There are four courses to take with certain difficult passages in the gospels of which we have examples before us in our study to-day : " Except a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God " ; " Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God ", We can say, " I do not believe Jesus Christ ever said such a thing "; " that saying is a fiction ; it sprang up in the mind of a deluded enthusiast fifty years after the Saviour had come and gone ", A great many people do dis- pose of such sayings in that way ; it is a very easy way to dispose of them ; yet for one, I do not feel at liberty to take refuge in that method. The second course is to say: " Yes, the narrative is authentic, our Saviour said what He was reported to have said, but He was mistaken. He was honest, sincere, but acting under an hallucination, as other men often do". Well, there are those who comfort themselves with such a refuge as that ; but I reject it, for I do not believe our Lord was a mistaken man. The third THE NEW BIRTH. 75 course is to admit that our Saviour said what He was reported to have said, and that He was perfectly sane, but that He was an imposter, a quack, a mountebank, a pretender who traded on tlie fears and superstitions of an ignorant and half-barbaric people, knowing all the time that He was making pretentions which had no foundation. There are those who accept that explanation, but I reject it. There remains only one other course open. Our Saviour said precisely what He is reported to have said ; He was a sane man ; He was an honest man, and He is to be believed. My character and my life are to be conformed to His teaching, and if I fail to do it, I must take the consequences. That method of disposing of these difficult passages I heartily accept. •ETERNAL LIFE THROUGH BELIEF. (St. John 3 : 14-21.) by rev. albert h. pluivib, d. d., Pastor of the Walnut Avenue Congregational Church, Boston, Mass. In studying the Gospel of John we find the teaching that eternal life comes through belief. We are led therefore, to examine the statements of this Gospel in regard to three inquiries : First. What is eternal life ? Second. What is the belief, or the believing, through which eternal life comes ? Third. Why eternal life comes through belief .-' It seems requisite, moreover, that some considerations should be pre- sented with a view to clear these teachings of this Gospel from misappre- hension and objection, and to show their reasonableness and importance. I. What is eternal life ? 1. Eternal life is that blessed condition of existence of the soul of man in its relation to God, which is set forth in contrast with another condition in which the soul is described as abiding under the wrath of God, abiding in darkness, and which involves such loss of good that the soul, though immortal, is said to perish. "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilder- ness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life" (John 3:14, 15). "He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life : and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life ; but the wrath of God abideth on him " (3 : 36). " I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on Me should not abide in darkness" (12 -.46). 2. Eternal life is a certain kind of practical and affectionate acquaint- ance with God the P'ather, and His Son Jesus Christ, which men may have through the aid of the Holy Spirit. " This is life eternal, that they might know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou has sent" (17:3). " Except a man be born of water and the spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God" (3:5). 3. Eternal life is that happy relationship with God which men may have as a gift from Christ which He came into the world to impart. " My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me : and I give unto them eternal life" (10:27, 28). "Father, glorify Thy Son that Thy Son also may glorify Thee, as Thou has given Him power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as Thou hast given Him " (17:1, 2). " I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly " (10 : 10). * Delivered at the Second Conference, held at the Mathewson Street Methodist Episcopal Church, November ii, 1903. 76 ETERNAL LIFE THROUGH BELIEF. 77 4. Eternal life is that precious relationship with (lod which men may have as a present possession. " He that believeth on the Son hath ever- lasting life" (3:36). " Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth My word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life" (5:24). 5. Eternal life is that glorious relationship with God which men may have as an inalienable possession. " I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall anyone pluck them out of My hand " (10:28). II. What is the belief, — the believing, — through which eternal life comes ? It is that act of the individual soul by which it recognizes and honors the claims of Christ, accepts and confides in His offices as the One sent by God to give eternal life to all who thus entrust themselves to His care. Thus the phrase, " believmg in Christ " is used as synonymous with receiv- ing Christ as the One by whom we, who have rebelled against God, may be reinstated in filial relations to Him. " To as many as received Him, to them gave He power, (or the right) to become the sons of (iod, even to them that believe on His name " (i : 12). Again the phrase is used as meaning the same as obeying Christ. " He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life, but he that obeyeth not the Son (revised version) shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him" (3:36). So Martha recognized the claim of Jesus as the Christ, the anointed deliverer, and said to Him : " Yea, Lord, I believe that Thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come into the world" (11:27). To the Samaritan woman her townsmen said : " Now we believe, not because of thy saying, for we have heard Him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world" (John 4 :42). These teachings are well paraphrased in that admirable definition of believing in Christ, by the late Dr. Joseph Cook : " Saving faith is the affectionate choice of Jesus Christ as both Saviour and Lord ". This implies a penitential confession that as sinners we need Him as a Saviour, and that as subjects we bow to His righteous rule, and engage to obey His commands. HI. The third inquiry, why eternal life comes through believing, has its answer in the statements made in this Gospel concerning the merciful mission of Christ. Since " God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish, but have everlasting life " (3: 16), it follows that the first, most manifest and urgent duty for all who know this is to receive and welcome, accept and trust the Saviour whom God sent into the world " that the world through Him might be saved" (3:17). So when men inquired of Jesus, What shall we do that we might work the works of God, He answered : "This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent" (6:28,29). The Saviour taught that men had such evidence of His divine mission in His life-giving words, and in His miraculous deeds, that not to believe on Him 78 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. showed them to be ungrateful and perverse. " The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life " (6 : 63). " If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin, but now they have no cloak for their sin. If I had not done among them the works that none other man did, they had not had sin, but now they have both seen and hated both Me and My Father" (15:22-24). "Simon Peter answered Him, Lord, to whom shall we go ? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we have be- lieved and know that Thou art the Holy One of God" (6:68, 69). On another occasion as recorded by Matthew, Simon Peter answered and said, "Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him, blessed art thou, Simon, Bar-Jonah : for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but My Father which is in heaven" (Matt. 16: 16, 17). IV. Having thus set forth the plam teachings of this Gospel on eternal life through belief, or believing, it seems proper, in view of the frequent misapprehensions concerning these teachings, and the numerous objections to them, to add some remarks to show their reasonableness and importance. 1. God's great love and mercy are specially apparent in His giving us eternal life on such an easy and simple condition. We are simply to turn away from everything wrong, and in loving trust look to the Saviour God has provided, and try to follow Him. We are not now " under the law, but under grace " (Rom. 6:14); /. e, there- fore, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I commanded you ; and lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world " (Matt. 28 : 18-20). The words of Professor Robert Flint of Edinboro are pertinent here. " In religion, as in every other department of thought and life, man is bound to regulate his belief by the simple but comprehensive principle that evi dence is the measure of assent. Disbelief ought to be regulated by the same principle, for disbelief is belief ; not the opposite of belief, but belief of the opposite. Unbelief is the opposite both of belief and disbelief. Ignorance is to unbelief what knowledge is to belief or disbelief. The whole 82 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. duty of man as to belief is to believe and disbelieve according to evidence, and neither to believe nor disbelieve when the evidence fails him ". (Theism, p. 358). With this agrees the statement of Archbishop Whately : " Disbeliev- ing is believing, since to disbelieve any assertion is to believe its contradic- tory ". 4. To insist on religious belief as a condition of eternal life is really to insist on religious life, since religious life is the response of the soul to the appeal of religious truth. The familiar voice of a weak sciolism cries out, " No matter about a man's belief, religious life is the real need "; as if the latter could be had without the former ; as if the latter were not always produced and deter- mined by the former. All truth is related to life. Strictly, there is no abstract truth. Every conception of realities has an inherent impelling power. The voice of the multiplication table tells us of the harmonies of God's universe, with which it behooves us to be in accord. We look on the good Samaritan, and the scene says, " Go, and do thou likewise ". " Religion ", Professor Flint says, " is man's belief in a being or beings mightier than himself, and inaccessible to his senses, but not indifferent to his sentiments and actions, together with the feelings and practices which flow from such be- lief ". (Anti-Theistic Theories, p. 259.) Hence the belief is the governing constituent in all religion, indeed in all character. A man is always what he is made by his belief, not always by what he says he holds, but by what his life says holds him, the principles and doctrines which he accepts as his rule of action and which govern his life. In practical affairs men acknowledge this. A man can't get a situation as a clerk in a store without an examination of his theological belief, if it is thought to be peculiar. A merchant says to a friend : " Do you know of a competent salesman I can get?" "Yes", the friend replies, ''the brightest, most successful one I ever knew ". " Send him round will you ? " " Yes, only I ought to tell you his religious views are rather peculiar ". "What has that to do with the matter.? " "Well, he believes in the community of goods, that God's plan is for all property ultimately to be held in common ; meanwhile, if one does not get his fair share he has a right to help himself ''. " Then I don't want him around my till ", the merchant rejoins. The genesis of religion is always the same: First, religious knowl- edge ; secondly, religious feeling, awakened by the appeal of the truth that is seen; thirdly, religious action, or the choice to yield to the appeal of the truth, or to resist it. The virtue lies in the action of the will ; that is always accompanied by emotion, but the sensibility and the will are both abso- lutely dependent on the conception of the truth by the intellect. 5. To regard belief or believing as a requisite for eternal life is a safer rule than to consider religious feeling as the clear sign of true religion, for unless religious feeling accords with correct views of truth, it is liable to be misleading, and indeed to be wholly wrong itself. There is no religion without emotion, but emotion is not religion. It must be regulated by a clear vision of the facts of the situation. Thus Professor Flint remarks : ETERNAL LIEE THROUGH BELIEF. 83 " The heart must be appealed to and satisfied as well as the head, but not apart from or otherwise than through the head, or the appeal is sophistical and the satisfaction illegitimate. Our feelings largely determine whether we recognize and assent to reasons or not, but they ought not to be substi- tuted for reasons, or even used to supplement reasons". He condemns " the sentimentalism which pleads feelings in deprecation of the rigid criti- cism of reasons, or in order to retain a conviction which it cannot logically justify". (Theism, p. 334). Men often go wofuUy astray because they yield to the impulse of wrong feelings — feelings awakened by the lower instincts, or by a selfish and par- tial view of facts, while they shut their eyes to unwelcome truth, lest its stronger appeal should prove effectual. A man is passionately enamored of a lady whom he desires to marry, but before he can make her acquaintance they are widely separated. Years pass, when they chance to meet. Suddenly the former impulse is upon him like a whirlwind. Learning immediately, however, that she is now married, instantly, as an honorable man, he stifles the feeling, obeying rather the impulses awakened by this wider knowledge of the facts of the case. A man says : " Some of the sayings of Jesus awaken repugnant feelings in my mind I feel that they cannot be true ". He is reminded that by many infallible proofs Jesus is accredited at the bar of our reason as a trustworthy witness, the light of the world, the truth. This fact, and the remembrance of our imperfect knowledge, our liability to prejudice under the blinding influence of our sin, and our natural aversion to admonitory truth, are considerations which appeal to him to yield a reverent acceptance to all the teachings of our Lord. Those who regard their own feelings as a safe guide, notwithstanding the appeal to the contrary of attested truth, in rejecting certain parts of Christ's teaching as untrue, do not agree with each other what parts their feelings will allow to stand. Every man is to install his own feelings as the supreme authority in deciding what portions of the Word of God he will accept, what portions " find him ", as he says, or approve themselves to his moral sensibilities. Thus the author of The Christ of lot/ay says (p. 161) : " The man who is full of the mind of Christ is dependent on no authority to declare to him the portions of his Bible that are truly the revelation of God : he has an unction from the Holy One, and understands for himself". Some years ago an effort was made at a misnamed Church Congress at Hartford, to ascertain what parts of the Bible the feelings of certain liberal thinkers would agree in commending as worthy of belief. Paul's teaching they felt could be disregarded, but their feelings seemed hopelessly at variance on the question how much of Christ's teachings could safely be trusted. At length an eminent clergyman ended the discussion by stating that we must all become like the little child that Jesus set in the midst of His disciples and commended, for a child does not pretend to know any- thing about these mysteries. On their plan he was right ; they were agnos- tics all, with as many Bibles as there were men, and none of them worth anything as a pillow for a dying bed. 84 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. 6. To insist on religious belief as a pre-requisite to eternal life is pre- cisely what is implied in the injunction to disciple all nations. All the extensive operations of the various missionary societies for the prevalence of God's Kingdom over all the earth are simply an endeavor to carry to every man, everywhere, the message which Ihe great missionary apostle gave to the Philippian jailer: "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved" (Acts 16:31). And all the efforts to produce more harmonious and efficient religious activities at home and abroad in bringing the world to Christ, can successfully proceed only on the principle that there must first be secured greater harmony of conviction in regard to the underlying truths involved. What precisely is the task to be done ? At a farewell meeting on the departure of a missionary sent by one of the liberal denominations to Japan, the distinct declaration was made : "We are not going out to convert the Japanese, but to confer with them, to promote an interchange of religious ideas". And upon this apostle of spiritual trading an educated native of that country, one of the speakers of the occasion, invoked the blessing of the eighty thousand gods of Japan. At the meeting of the Second International Congregational Council in Boston in 1899, a distinguished guest, the head of Cambridge University, in discussing Christian unity and fellowship, attempted to show that the only union possible is " a moral unity, a unity of spirit, which is completely independent of creed ". I am compelled to take issue squarely with that assertion, and to affirm, on the contrary, that there is no moral unity or unity of spirit possible except that which is founded on, and bounded by, an underlying unity of creed. The measure of harmony of spiritual life between persons and parties is absolutely and always determined by the measure of harmony in their creed. The gentleman further said that the ground of unity is a recognition of " the Christlike conduct of life ". Indeed ? And what is that? Mr. Gladstone, in his paper on Authority in Religion says, " The human mind is accustomed to play tricks with itself in every form, and one of the forms in which it most frequently resorts to this opera- tion is when it attenuates the labor of thought, and evades the responsibility of definite decision, by the adoption of a general word that we purposely keep undefined to our own consciousness ". " So ", he says, " men admire the British constitution, without knowing or inquiring what it is, and profess Christianity but decline to say or think what it means". Now to define "the Christlike conduct of life ", so that it can serve as an intelligible basis for Christian unity, one must have some knowledge of Christ, and of the application of His teaching to our life. Such knowledge to be effective must be apprehended with some clearness, and if thus appre- hended, it can be stated, and if stated it is a creed, and that creed governs the feelings and acts of the man who makes it his rule of life. The propa-^ gation of the Gospel does not imply that perfect agreement in all minor matters of belief is the end sought, but a substantial agreement in its essen- tial truths. The great London preacher, the late Joseph Parker, once unfortunately said : " In the case of two men, two hundred, two thousand, two million, unity in mere opinion is not a miracle but an impossibility". ETERNAL LIFE THROUGH BELIEF. 85 Yet millions upon millions passionately sing : " All ha*il the power of Jesus' name", and that shows they are cordially united in the opinions that He is Lord, and that sinners should "crown Him Lord of all". When Mr, Parker adds: "Opinion is necessarily and happily changeable", his confusion arises from spelling opinion with a capital O ; for we must ask, What opinion ? The opinion that there is a holy God, that man is a sinner, and that they must be reconciled to abide in peace together, are necessarily and happily unchangeable among Christians. On the occasion referred to, President Eliot said : " Opinions and beliefs vary more and more, as knowledge advances and freedom grows ". Nay, nay; for who was it who bade us "disciple all nations"? When He ascended on high and gave gifts unto men, why did He give " some to be apostles, and prophets, and evangelists, and pastors, and teachers"? Was it not " for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, until we all come into the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ ? " 7. To insist on belief as the condition of eternal life is the only way to produce strong characters, men of power in promoting the Kingdom of God. It has been a favorite plea of some that one cannot justly be required to believe any definite system of truth, because nothing of that kind is attainable. Christianity is casting aside its old forms, which, though false, were useful once, and putting on what is true to us now, but must in time be cast aside hereafter, for Christianity has no system of doctrine and never can have. Thus Stopford Brooke, in his volume on Christ in Modern Life, says: "Christ's religion never can be made into a system", and he remarks of his faith, " it holds all opinions and theories slightly, being ready to sur- render them for higher truth". But a religious teacher who comes to his hearers saying : "As at present advised the case is thus and so, but I am pursuing my investigations, and I will keep you informed of my researches and of my doubts as well," is like a man standing on the quivering crust of a bog, shifting his footing all the time. He is in no condition to lift any- thing, or to strike an earnest blow, or to do anything but sink in the mire and drag others down with him. Forty-eight years ago, here in Brown University, Professor Lincoln gave me as my theme for a college oration, "Faith an Element of Eloquence", and he held up before me as a type of the men of power in all history the great apostle who said: "We believe and therefore speak". The Saviour prayed: "Sanctify them through Thy truth. Thy word is truth" (John 17:17), and the men who have made the world better have been men who have held the truth, and taught the truth as that on which the eternal life of the soul depends. 8. To insist on religious belief as a condition of eternal life greatly enhances our view of the importance of a full and clear presentation of the truth, and thus points out the chief difference between Christianity and the ethnic religions, a distinction wherein lies its superior power. Max Miiller, in his study of comparative religions, reaches the conclu- sion that there is some good in all religions, enough to save a man, if he 86 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN: will follow the best light he has. These religions may lead men to repent, but none of them show how God can safely forgive them if they repent. That, the Christian religion alone reveals, and in that " piece of informa- tion " is the hiding of its power. " Christ, Christ crucified, is the wisdom and power of God" (i Cor. 1:23, 24). Mr. Gladstone described the Christian religion as consisting not only of certain sacraments enshrining its leading and distinctive facts, and of a peculiar and superior system of morals, but also of a body of doctrine, whose center is the person and work of Christ. It is the lack of these characteristic truths of redemption which explains the comparative powerlessness of all other religions. Wendell Phillips said, " The answer to Confucianism is China, to Buddhism is India, to Mohammedanism is Turkey ". Christianity is supplanting all other relig- ions precisely because it alone is continually crying to all : " Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world " (John i : 29). Allow me a personal allusion as I close. At family worship yesterday morning Mrs. Plumb reminded me that on the tenth of November, just forty-five years ago yesterday, I was ordained to the Christian ministry, and she accepted the position she has since held to my great satisfaction as my helper in my work. It was a precious recollection, and it recalled the fact that it was the voice of a Providence pastor, the saintly and sainted Dr. Leonard Swain, of the Central Church here, which then gave me the solemn charge to be faithful to my high calling. As we reviewed the past, it seemed to us that the one thing which has grown most upon our thoughts is the greatness of the love of Him who said : " He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life " (John 3 : 36). I was at a ministerial gathering lately where a prominent clergyman, in reading a paper, quoted a passage from the Gospel of John, and paused to say he was aware that this Gospel is not considered authentic, but in this case John agrees with the other Gospels, and so he ventured to quote him. Think of it ! Apologizing for quoting from this Gospel, which has been called the heart of Christ ! Such is not the spirit of this Conference. I sometimes ask the children in the Sunday School who is the happiest man in the Bible ? They know who is the strongest, the meekest, the oldest man. Can there be any question that the beloved disciple, who knew more of the heart of Christ than anyone else, who reclined at the last supper on the bosom of his Lord, was the most favored, the happiest man that ever breathed ? And yet he said : " Greater joy have I none than this, to hear of my children walking in the truth " (3 John v. 4). In that joy, you, beloved brethren of this Conference, who have been here engaged in exalting the teaching of this holy apostle, will be permitted, through the happy results of j^our labors, to share. For these Conferences will assuredly result in securing in not a few cases, the object for which the apostle de- clares the Gospel was written. "And many other signs truly did Jesus which are not written in this book, but these are written that ye might be- lieve that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing ye might have life through His name " (John 20 : 30, 31). • THE OPTIMISM OF JESUS. (St. John 4 : 1-42.) by rev. krank j. goodwin, Pastor of the Pawtucket Congregational Church, Pawtucket, R. I. The fourth chapter of St. John reveals, as do few chapters of the New Testament, the optimism of Jesus. This optimism manifests itself in Christ as a soul winner, as a practical worker, and as a teacher. I. The Optimism of Christ as a soul ivinner. Christ chose on two occasions a Samaritan to teach His greatest lessons; it was a Samaritan in the parable of true humanity which He selected to illustrate the spirit of brotherhood which the Jewish priest and Levite failed to express ; it was to a Samaritan woman, a heretic in religion, a profligate in life, the most un- promising person possible to receive His message, that Christ promised the water of eternal life which should spring up forever in the soul. He came to be the Saviour of the world and He guaranteed to save to the uttermost. He came to call not the strong, the spiritually acute, the morally blameless, but the weak, the spiritually blind, the publican, the sinner and the outcast. He did not flinch at the hardest problem ; serene and hopeful, He brought the blessings of His truth to the most lowly and the most sinful. His optimism was apparent in His belief that every man, however spiritually impoverished, <7v/A/ have and x//i:, D. D., Pastor of the First Church, Congregational, Cambridge, Mass. Ladies and Gentlemen: — I do not propose to discuss anything thoroughly, but to gather up some of the peculiarities and characteristics of this Gospel as compared with the others. The question of authorship I do not consider. I am myself persuaded that it was written by the man whose name it bears. There is the historical evidence which is so old that you can get very near to the time when it was written. Then, too, there is one thing I should think every one would feel, that it was written by an honest man. It was not invented ; it was something that had been. A man could not think it out any more than he could think out a sunrise and describe it, if he had never seen one ; or a friendship, if he had never known one. Again, it needed a man of very rare qualities. For instance, we are all familiar with the fact that St. John never mentions himself by name, and he never mentions the name of the mother of Jesus. He loved to call himself the "disciple whom Jesus loved". That is the man we think of when we speak of the authorship of this Gospel. He dealt with the tenderest things of life, the most sacred things ; he dealt with the prin- ciples and facts of life, but if he had been nothing but a loved and loving man, his Gospels and Epistles would hardly have been like these we have. He was a man to be loved, it is true, but he was more than that, he was also a son of thunder. It needed just that combination to make a man go safely among the truths which he traversed and present the most tender things, and yet in such a way as to commend themselves to thoughtful, exacting men. While we speak of this Gospel as the Gospel of the heart, it is also the Gospel of the head and hand ; it stands on the ground, while at the same time it ascends into heaven. St. John is commonly spoken of as an eagle which is able to soar to the greatest heights. But he had his nest in a tree that was very firmly rooted in this world, and if you think of him only in the attitude of a lover you mistake the man. Then, too, he had special advantages in being very near to our Lord. The nearer he came to Christ the more reason he had to love and admire Him. Most great char- acters are great because of their distance. When we come up to them they lose some of their superb proportions. There is that old saying, which I do not like to use, that "A man is never a hero to his valet ". I am inclined to believe that no man is great who is not great to his valet. You have to be great to the man who stands close to you and knows the secrets of your ♦Delivered at the Second Conference, held at the Mathewson Street Methodist Episcopal Church, November ii, 1403. 107 io8 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. life before you can be considered truly great. And John, in standing thus close to Christ, marks the greatness which increased as he came to know Him more intimately. Again, as my old friend, Dr. Peabody, was in the habit of saying, one thing that bears witness that John wrote the Gospel is that it was written by an old man. A peculiarity of the old man is that he notices small things. In this Gospel you will find more of what we are in the habit of calling the trivial things of life. I suppose if he was writing the account of the feast at Cana, a young man would have said, "And there were set some water jars there which were large ". John says there were six water pots of stone, and that they held two or three firkins apiece. In the same way, a young man would have treated the last miracle of our Lord at the Sea of Galilee ; he would have said that they (the fishermen) were quite a little distance off the land ; an old man would say "they were about 200 furlongs, I noticed ". " There were a multitude of fish " ; " there were 153 fishes, and they were big ones ", the old man would say. " Great " is a relative term ; he did not mean that they were large absolutely, but compared with the fish usually taken in the Sea of Galilee. And when this writer says there were 153, and that they were unusually large ones, you see the fisherman is betrayed, and John was a fisherman. Such little traits as these go with the historical evidence. The Gospel was evidently written by a man with the characteristics of this disciple. I do not remember having seen it anywhere, although some of you may have seen it elsewhere, yet it is borne in upon me that there is one per- son who had a great deal to do with the writing of this Gospel whose name is not mentioned in it, and that is the Virgin Mary, the mother of our Lord. Now when Christ was upon the cross, apparently, as far as we can read the story, Mary was not near, and this disciple went and brought her, and from the cross Jesus commended His mother to this disciple, and this disciple to the mother, and then comes that very interesting line : " and from that hour that disciple took her to his own home." What do you suppose they did then ? What did they talk about ? They talked about the one person in all the world who was dearest to their hearts. They talked about what had just taken place, and the mother heart which had enabled her to under- stand and enter into the spirit of her Son was opened before the young man with whom she was living. In the morning and at night they talked about Him. Now if you wished to write the biography of any great man you would go where he lived ; you would go into the house, look at the gfrounds, talk with the neighbors, try to get into what we call by the indefin- ite term the atmosphere of the man and the place. For you can not write a man's biography unless you know the man himself, and the conditions of his life and thought. That is the reason most biographies are of so little use ; they can tell when a man was born and when he died, but they do not give you that indefinable trait which you get when you come close to the man. And this belongs to our Lord more than any one else. It is not alone what He did or said, but in what way He said it and for what reason. SOME CHARACTERISTICS OF THE GOSPEL. 109 We sometimes represent Him with a halo over His head, but that is a poor thing, though it illustrates what I mean. And no one knew Him like His mother. When you get a heart that was as responsive as John's was, and when they could talk together for weeks, or perhaps years, her thoughts would become his. It seems to me that all through, from the beginning to the end, there can be traced the word, spirit, and influence of that mother through whose soul there passes a sword when 1 le was crucified. 1 was not to speak about the authorship of the Gospel, and yet these things carry us into the very spirit of it. St. John's Gospel is not a book of mathematics or philosophy. It is the story of a great human life expressed in insufficient terms, and you never can read it unless you have something a thousand times better than a dictionary ; you must have a heart. It is itself a heart, and it must be read by the heart and translated by the heart. I believe that those who have read it with the heart and translated it into heart have never doubted it or its authorship. A man who has had the spirit to go through it and enter into it finds a witness in himself and believes because he must believe- I call it the Gospel of the heart, and so it is, but it is even then of a very sub- stantial character. The apostles had to put together two things that had never been put together before. They had no precedent. They had to show a person who carried himself in this world as a common man, in whom was the living and eternal Ciod. z\s far as literature is concerned, there has never been a problem that approached this which was set before these men, one of whom was a fisherman, another a tax collector, another a doctor, and the business of the other we do not know. They had to make books so substantial that they could found churches upon them, and men could fashion their lives by them. And how finely they have done it. Some years ago, when I was younger and knew more than I do now, I became a lecturer in a theological seminar}'. I knew that if I was going to accomplish anything I had to be original. So I tried to be original in this lectureship. I pro- posed to tell the young men that I wanted each one to take a blank sheet of paper and rule it into three columns, and in the first column they should put down every passage in the New Testament where Christ was repre- sented simply as a man ; in the second column they should put down every passage representing Christ as God, and in the third the passages repre- senting the union of the two. Well, so far as presenting Him as the (iod- man, I easily filled that column, and so far as presenting Him as God alone, I filled that column with ease, but I never have been able to find the first entry to put in the first colunin. I could not find a passage in the four Gospels which represents Jesus Christ as simply a man. If any of you know such a passage, I wish you would tell me that I may get something in that column. Perhaps you say, " Why, He was tired one day and while on His way through Samaria sat down on a well ". Is that the whole of the narrative ? You must read it all, you know. You might as well take one of the pipes out of this organ, and get a boy to blow it, and say that is the organ, as to take a single sentence out of a narrative and say that that is 110 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. the whole. When you write a letter, you insist that the man shall read it all the way through. Now you will find that every heresy that is in the church, or that is coming into the church, rests upon the principle of taking a single instrument out of a band and then insisting that that is the band. Why stop at the place where it says that Christ was tired ? Go on. Presently He speaks to the woman who had come there to draw water, and He speaks such words as from the creation of the world had never been spoken, and have never been spoken since by any one : " The water that I shall give you shall be in you a well of water springing up into everlasting life ". That is God. It is not a tired man sitting by Jacob's well. Well, He was in the fisherman's boat, and " being weary He put His head on the cushion and went to sleep ". Why do you stop there ? When the waves began to roll and the storm to increase and the boat to begin to sink they called Him ; He stood up, He spoke to the tempest and the tempest became a calm. He breathed upon the waters and the waters were as quiet as the floor. No mere man there. If the man was asleep on the cushion. He was more when He stilled the storm. Let me give you another instance where the man very easily appears. He is on the cross ; three are hanging side by side. They are dying ; surely there is the man. Read the letter through, please. This man draws to Himself the attention of a fellow dying at His side. This man looks to Him. His gaze is the gaze of a dying man. With some poor blind faith he prays, " Lord, remember me when Thou comest into Thy kingdom ". There never has been a man since the beginning of the world who would have said what Jesus said under these circumstances. The best man you know would have said, " My friend, let us both pray to the Father ". What did this man say ? " My poor, dying friend, I shall be in paradise before night, and I will take you there with me." That is not a man, is it.'' I have nothing for my first column. Do you think of anything? And how does it happen ? In vain do you try to separate what God has joined together. In the words that were read to us, " The word became flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth ". That is Divine life. Now we must expect some peculiarities in this Gospel. If you write a book, you do not copy what some one else has written and try to publish it as your own ; but you try to state something that is your own, something that you have found out yourself. Now there were three Gospels written before John began, and to copy them would be a waste of parchment. Luke's Gospel was written by a scientific man, a physician. The other two Gospels were written by different men with a different purpose. John's ■was written a long time afterwards. He certainly might mention some things in a different way, but he would have to go over the same ground, just as they do in school. If you go into your lowest classes here today you find that they are teaching the alphabet and the multiplication table. So, if you turn to your grammar school, your high school, and university, you will find the same things being taught, the alphabet and the multiplica- SOME CHARACTERISTICS OF THE GOSPEL. in tion table, but you will also find the higher grade of scholars and, perhaps, older men teaching. So, here, while John uses the same alphabet and mul- tiplication table, he teaches it in higher branches, for he is speaking in advance of that which has been written. You will find that John takes the initial and essential points of the Gospel and carries them further. John says nothing about the nativity. Why should he .■* That has been described. But he presents the incarnation. The nativity is the primary school ; the incarnation is for the university. The Gloria in Excelsis is the beginning of the incarnation. Why should he write the nativity .-' You have it from the hand of a scientific man that has done it as well as John could do it. You have the changing of a man's life in the earlier Gospels ; you come to John and you have Nicodemus told to be born again. You have redemp- tion and forgiveness in the other Gospels, but John gives you " the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world." That is Brown University ; that is the highest reach of the thought and the method of it. You find the method of redemption described in the three Gospels, but you find John illustrating this. "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up ". " God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish but have everlasting life." That is the extension of the truth, which in its simple principles appears in the other Gospels. But it is no more different than Brown University is different from the kindergarten. I think that is as far as I should go upon this part of my theme. I ask you to notice some peculiarities in this Gospel, some special things that are not mentioned in the others. I venture the statement that these peculiarities are simply a development and not inconsistencies. I have stated that you have in the first three Gospels the primary school, and in the fourth Gospel Brown University. And they are the same, only one is a little higher, a little older, and may express the idea more accurately. The readers are more advanced and have more advanced truths. Now it is a very singular thing that John opens his Gospel with the same words which were used at the beginning of the Bible. It seems to me remarkable that the first three things that are asserted in the beginning of the Bible are the same three things that are asserted in the very beginning of John's Gospel. Now how do you account for that? No other writer ever did that. "In the beginning ", was John's opening. "In the begin- ning God ". John says, " In the beginning was the Word ", and " the Word was with God, and the Word WAS God." Genesis further says, " In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth ". John says, " In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made." Thus the first three declarations of Genesis are the first three declarations of St. John. And further, they are written for the same reason. John is giving the university account of what is given in Genesis. He is showing what the world was made for and Who made it. He is entering into the mystery 112 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. of the Divine being, Father, Son and Holy Ghost ; it is God, but it is also the Son. Tlie New Testament teaches that it is the Son who is the creator, and St. John grasped that truth, which the apostles repeated after him. So that when you come later on into the Book of Revelation, you find a new heaven and a new earth, and a new Jerusalem, and a new life, and a new light. John is writing the story of creation. I think that is a remarkable fact. The narrative in Genesis is the most remarkable thing in literature. The writer was describing things which took place long before he was born. He did it with wonderful accuracy. Some years ago I had occasion to speak of this, and chancing to meet a distinguished geologist spoke of it to him. He finally said, half impatiently, " I believe that the first living thing that was created was a fish." Well, I did not feel that I knew much on the subject, so I kept silent. I had been quoting the Bible, and here was the answer of science. When I reached my home I went to my Bible and looked the matter up. I found that my friend w^as right, for, back in the Book of Genesis, this particular honor was given to the fish, and this was also the last word of science. Now, if you can tell me how the unknown writer of Genesis knew that the first living thing created was a fish, you will solve the greatest problem in the literature of the world. Now if you will take your Gospel of John and compare it with the Synoptics you will find some surprising things. You will find some notable omissions. John has nothing of the Sermon on the Mount, or the Lord's Prayer. He has nothing of the Baptism or Temptation of Jesus. He has scarcely anything of John the Baptist's ministry. He omits some of the best parables that Jesus spoke. He omits the parable of the virgins and the account of that great day of judgment recorded in Matthew. All very substantial things, as you can see. John also omits to say that Jesus took little children in His arms and blessed them. The parable of the Good Samaritan, which we love so much, he leaves out. Perhaps the fact that they had been told was a good reason, but he did repeat some things that the others said. He made a choice of those things which best suited his purpose, as he registered the account of the new creation by Jesus Christ Himself ; the creation of a new man for a new world. I want for a little while to notice some things in John's Gospel that we do not find anywhere else. The first thing, which has already been men- tioned in your discussion today, is the account of the miracle at Cana of Galilee. We might say that is a thing John should leave out. It was not of any consequence, the whole thing was ethically a mistake. Why did he put it in } It means that Christ came down into the home life. And, after all, the comfort that we have in our own homes goes far to make up the real value of life and the pleasure of living. Think for a moment of the circumstances. Here is this wedding, and the bride was probably a kins- woman of our Lord. He had been invited, and had taken several men with Him, and as usually happens under these circumstances, the wine gave out. We might at first think that was not a great matter, but it was. It was the one day of that young girl's life. It would never have done to have the SOME CHARACTERISTICS OF THE GOSPEL. 113 wine fail ; it would have been a life-long disgrace. She would never have gotten over it. Perhaps Jesus felt in a measure responsible for it. He certainly pitied her, and came to her rescue as only He could do, and to save her cheeks from reddening with shame, he reddened the water into wine. What is the next incident? That is much more important — an inter- view with a wise coward, but still a coward, who came by night, when no one could see him, to converse with the Lord. He thought well of himself, but the first thing that Christ taught him was that he was wrong. Nicodemus said : " I would like to talk with you about the Kingdom of Heaven ". Jesus said substantially, " It is not any use, you are not going there. The Kingdom of Heaven is that way, and you are going this way. If you really want to go there, you will have to take this road and turn your back upon that ". Well, that was a pretty serious thing to say to any man. I think I have paraphrased it a little. What, did Jesus say ? " My dear sir, if you are going to be a child of God, you will have to go back and be born over again ". There are only two ways of becoming a man's child or God's child ; you must either be born into the family or adopted into it. And all Christ's processes are processes of nature, so the adoption method would not do. There is not a single eccen- tric thing in all the things that Christ ever did or taught. There was never a queer thing in any of his words or actions. If you are to be really a per- son's son, you must be born so. I believe this is thought to be one of the severest passages in the Gospels. There are men of more than average intelligence who reject it, and many also fear it. It is one of the most joy-, ful and hopeful things that has ever been taught. There is not one of you here who has not said at one time or another, " Oh, if I could only live my life over again ". This passage says that you can. In your school days you worked over your problem and found the answer was not right. But when you found that it was wrong you changed a figure here, another one there, and when finally you could not make it come right you took your sponge and wiped it all out and said, " I am going to begin over again ". Now that is what Christ said to Nicodemus : " Begin over again as a child. Don't do it as an old man, begin to grow up into the childhood toward God, and then when it comes time to go to heaven you will simply go home ". I asked my little girl one day when she came home at noon, "Why did you come in here?" She opened her great eyes and looked at me; she did not know what I meant. I said, "Why didn't you gainto the Doctor's, next door ? " Finally she said, " Why, this is my home ". Yes, it is home, that is the reason you are going to heaven, you are going to your Father's home. It must be a home. You have to be a child of God if you wish to enter the Father's home. There is not a man living who does not need this new birth. There are a great many men living today who need to have their lives turned back to the very source and to be born again into a real childhood, and fitted for the home that is in heaven. So I say it is one of the gladdest and most joyous things in the whole Gospel. To think 114 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. of it, my friends, that a man can be born again. Think of it, that your life with all its blunders can be wiped out ; that your sins can all be cast into the sea ; that you can start all over again and prattle as God's child, and work as God's child, and finally go home, because heaven is your Father's house. Surely the story of the new birth is good news to the men and women of this day. The next incident that comes to my mind is the Lord's interview at the well of Jacob at Samaria, which was of a similar character. The Saviour said to this woman, " You keep coming here day after day, and you are just as thirsty ; I want to tell you something ". Then He said the strangest word she ever heard ; the most marvelous thing that ever fell upon the poor, dull ear of that woman, a name she never had heard ; that the eternal God whom her fathers worshipped was her Father. She crouched at His feet. Other men were ready to stone her, they frowned at her, there was but one friendly face, and only one who knew her, and down into her wrecked heart He let fall that benediction, " God is your Father, and He loves you ". " I can give unto you that water that shall become in you a well of water which shall be pure water, which shall be sweet, refreshing water, and you shall live a life indeed ". She went out and told it, and you know how much bet- ter she was than the disciples. The disciples went into the town to get things, she went into the town to give something; and "it is more blessed to give than to receive ". She even left her water-pot. I wonder what became of it. She went everywhere, telling it to everybody, and the people asked Him to stay. The people were not courteous; they said, " We have heard Him ourselves, we know this is the Christ ", and then followed their confession. It was a strange thing to say. There was hardly a Jew who believed He was the Christ ; there are many people who do not now believe it ; " This is the Christ, the Saviour of the world ". How many wise men say today that Christ is the Saviour for the people in Providence and the rest of Rhode Island ; that Buddha will do for the people of India ; that Mohammed will do for the Turks and Arabians ; that Confucius will do for the Chinese, and Christ will take care of the Anglo-Saxon. But they said this Gospel should be for the world. Nine years after that, when Philip went there, he found people waiting for him, all ready, and it is recorded that there " was great joy in that city ". Those men had held on, they had stood faithful to Christ for nine years. Is not that worth telling ? Was not that worth doing? No wonder that John puts this story in. These inci- dents have been with individuals. He had not very much to do with multi- tudes, though He talked with them when they came to Him. But Christ had wonderful power with individuals. There was Nicodemus. Christ did not seem to get a strong hold upon him, but the man came and anointed Him when He was dead. There was the rich young man who went away, but went sorrowful, because he had to choose between Christ and his real estate. And there was poor Judas. When the treason was all over he brought the money back and threw it down and went out and hanged himself. Christ had some hold upon him, but it was not enough to save him. It is that SOME CHARACTERISTICS OF THE GOSPEL. 115 personal contact, the grip of spirit with spirit, that is so conspicuous in Christ's life, and that is what John preeminently teaches. Then, at the pool of Bethesda at Jerusalem, we have the healing of the poor man who had been a cripple longer than Christ had been in the world. He had not energy enough to roll into the pool, and nobody had goodness enough to put him in. When Christ asked him, "Wilt thou be made whole .'' " he began to whine. " I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool, but while I am coming another steppeth down before me ". "Why, there are forty priests in the temple; here are a score of men going by now ; here is a man just going up out of the water ". " Yes, I know it ", he seemed to reply, " but they go away and forget us who are afflicted here ". And if this man was worth healing, as I think he was, after that there was always some one there to help any other who was helpless. From that day he always went round that way when he returned home or went to work in the morning, if he was a workman. Some one might stop him and ask, " Why do you always go by that road to and from your work, you know the other way is much nearer ? " " Oh, I tell you, I know what it is, I know how it feels to be down there. See that poor fellow there ; I was there a long time, until the day when the good Master healed me, and it shall never be said, as long as I live, that there is no one there to put a poor cripple into the pool when the water is disturbed ". Suppose there was a man here in Providence and nobody had invited him to come to the Lord Jesus for two weeks, what do you suppose that man would think of the Christian people of the town ? Suppose you are a professing Chris- tian and as Christ's disciple you come to the Lord's table, if you had not for some three or four days tried to help your fellow men into a knowledge of your Master, what would He think of your religion "i Say to yourself, " I never, never will have it true that there was any man anxious to go into the pool to be healed who failed because I was concerned only to get into heaven myself. I will not let my afflicted neighbors lie unaided in their affliction ". Every day I will go down upon these marble steps, and these arms shall move any man who is there and needs it. Perhaps that is what John meant by telling this story, which the other apostles omitted. Good Doctor Sears used to say that no man ever tried to go to heaven alone who did not freeze by the way. You come to the God of heaven with a poor sinner in your arms and you will be able to read your title clear. When you come to the great day of the Lord, if you say " I did not do anything, or say anything to help any one, but here I am ", you may hear that sad refrain, as it comes from our Lord's gracious lips, " Not he that repeateth the name but he that doeth the will ". I am detaining you longer than I ought ; you are very patient. I should like to say something about the bread of life, which our Lord called Himself. All the four Gospels give an account of the feeding of the 5,000, but John alone mentions the teaching which was given with it. Here again we have the old man revealed. The other writers say "that there were only five loaves and two small fishes ". John says, " there is a boy here ". ii6 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. That is the old man, he remembers the boy ; and the critical point of the narrative is that boy. Men are always hungry, and Christ is ready to heal ; the great trouble is to find the boy. If religion does not flourish in Provi- dence, it is because you do not do as the boy did, give up all you have. The boy has the balance of power. When the boy is willing to part with his barley cakes, then the multitude will be fed. Then we have the story of the opening of the eyes of the blind man. Here Jesus taught that He was the light of the world, and then He opened the eyes of the man. A good teacher said that when you want to know what Christianity is you should ask what took place between Jesus Christ and the man who was born blind ; then you have it in the lowest terms. What hap- pened then ? Jesus looked upon him and said, " Go down this hill ; there is a pool of water there ; go and bathe your eyes in it and you will receive your sight". The man's cure depended upon his trust in Christ. But why should he obey ? No man advised it. There was not one chance in a thousand that he would be cured. There was not a man in Jerusalem who would not say he was a fool. Many had washed their eyes in the pool of Siloam, and it had not helped them. But he went. The first step he took made him a Christian. A Christian is a man who does what Christ tells him to do, because Christ tells him to do it. Then there is that next chapter, in which our Lord calls Himself the good shepherd. Do you see how John extends everything, and yet every- thing is rooted in the past ? The best name God has in the Old Testament is found in the Twenty-third Psalm. That is a very good beginning, that is the kindergarten. What is the shepherd when you get up to the university ? The kindergarten says, " He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, He leadeth me beside the still waters". John says, "The Good Shepherd giveth His life for the sheep ". Then there came a day when some Greeks wanted to see Jesus, and as soon as the word came to Him He sent them no message, so far as we know. He looked up into heaven and said, " Father, the hour is come ". They had begun to see the same truth which the Samaritans saw, that He was the Saviour of the Jews, but He was the Saviour of the world. "And I ", He said, "If I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me, Jews and Gentiles ". It was a new revelation, of which the church today is not worthy, for while we are living in luxury here in New England the missionary boards are halting for lack of bread. Then there was the raising of Lazarus. Then the new sacrament of washing of feet, which John alone mentions. The symbol we take to represent Christianity is the cross of Christ. Another symbol that Jesus Christ gave to represent Christianity is a basin and a towel. They belong together. If you are not wearing that symbol, do not wear a cross. He came not to be ministered unto but to minister, and to give His life a ran- som for many. That symbol, if carried out in His spirit, would move this town, if only every follower of Christ carried both the symbol and the spirit of the towel and the basin. SOME CHARACTERISTICS OF THE GOSPEI. 117 Then comes the wonderful fourteenth chapter of John, that goes back to the very beginning of things and shows how the Hfe of Christ becomes our life, and how Christ literally lives in us. Then there follows the prom- ise of the Holy Spirit, Who should come to abide with us forever. Then follows that marvelous prayer by the great High Priest, who bears all lov- ing hearts up into the embrace of the loving Father and teaches us that eternal life is to know God and Him. No human presumption, since the beginning of the world to this time, has ever dared to couple its name with the name of the eternal God as essential to eternal life, as Christ does here. And yet He said, and John records it, as a definition of eternal life, "this is life eternal, to know Thee, the only true God, and JESUS CHRIST Whom Thou hast sent". Thee and Me. What a wonderful assertion. Try to write your name, or the name of any one else between the name of Jehovah and this assertion of life. The crucifixion is given more in detail than in the other Gospels, Then comes the last interviews and the confession of Thomas when he bears witness to Christ as the Messiah. And then the wonderful twenty- first chapter closes his record. It is the ordination chapter, with Christ's way of ordination. " Lovest thou Me?" "I do". "Feed My sheep". "Lovest thou Me?" "I do". "Feed My lambs". They have not chosen Him but He has chosen them and ordained them that they should go and bear fruit and that their fruit should remain. I wish that I had another hour to dwell upon this book, but I must relieve you. This is the inspiring Gospel, these words are spirit and they are life. My beloved friend. Professor Thayer, left this as the central, all-conquering truth of Christianity : " Personal loyalty to a personal Master, the crucified, risen, reigning Christ ". We like to read that story of centuries ago, how the venerable Bede had for his last labors the transla- tion of this story of St. John into our words. We are told that he wrote while age crept upon him, and as he drew near the end of his work his strength failed him. His disciples urged him on. They cried, " Master, master, there is but one chapter more ". The master wrote on until his strength was gone. His disciples said, " There is but one verse more " He summoned his failing strength and translated the one remaining verse The master said, " It is finished ". And they answered, " It is finished " He lay where he could fix his eyes upon the place where he used to pray and there breathed out his spirit to that Saviour whom he had glorified That is the way the Gospel of St. John came into our English speech. *THE WORKS OF JESUS. L— RESURRECTION. (St.. John 5 : 17-30.) BY REV. G-EORGE P". ECICjMAN, Ph. T)., T). ID., Pastor of St. Paul's Methodist Episcopal Church, New York. The passage which has been assigned to me is so wondrously fruitful of great thought that one could spend months in the discussion of it without even approximately exhausting the themes which it contains. The student who attempts adequately to treat this chapter finds himself embarrassed much in the same way as the old hero in the Norse mythology, who, being asked to drain a great beaker, found at length that he was vainly seeking to empty the fathomless ocean. The temptation to turn aside to the many important topics suggested by this passage must be resisted. Let us con- fine ourselves to the specific subject in hand. The power to raise the dead implies, of course, the power to impart life. And life can only be imparted by Him who is life. This is the cen- tral fact with regard to Jesus, upon which everything in this discussion must naturally hinge. Jesus came in the form of a man, but He differed from all other men in the fact that He Himself was life. Other men have received life, but He is essentially life. His most intimate friend said that " in Him was life, and the life was the light of men ". He said of Himself, " I am the way, the truth, and the life ". When He met Death, as He did fre- quently, He did not shrink back from him as we do, but He said, " I am the resurrection and the life ", and Death withdrew to his dark domain. He called God His own Father, and said, "As the Father hath life in Him- self, so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself ". This was a very daring claim, and was bound to provoke hostility and criticism. But the lucidity of His mind and the perfection of His character require us to believe that He was very sane and very sincere when He said, " I am life ". Moreover, He substantiated this claim in a most marvelous fashion by cur- ing the sick and raising the dead. What a hollow sham His profession to be "life" would have been, if He meant merely, "I am able to give spir- itual life ", but showed no evidence of it in the fact that He could raise men from physical death ; or if, having fallen asleep in Joseph's tomb. He had not awakened to receive the salutations of the angels. Life is a unity. We speak of life as physical as well as spiritual, and He who calls himself " life " must be the embodiment of all the forms that we call life. He must not only be immanent in nature, but must transcend nature. He must not only pervade the mind, but He must be far above the hum.an mind. He must be the fountain of Spiritual life, and He must be the essence of life in all its various * Delivered at the Third Conference, held at the Beneficent Congregational Church, December 9, 1903. 118 THE WORKS OF JESUS.— RESURRECTION. 119. expressions. Now Jesus demonstrated this power in all the ranges of what we call life. The shrunken limb became normal and the diseased soul became healthy. We have never seen Him cure the sick or raise the dead, but we have discovered Him raising men from the deadness of sin to the life of conscious fellowship with God, And because we have witnessed this, we believe that He could go through all the hospitals of the world and turn out all the sick and impotent folk in abounding health, and that He could go through all the asylums of the world and make lunacy a forgotten malady, for He is " life ". I. We have in this wonderful passage, first of all, an illustration of Christ's power to impart life quite apart from any human agency, except the response of the human will. The chapter begins with the story of the impo- tent man at the pool of Bethesda. Jesus beholds and addresses the unfor tunate man, and arouses in his soul the latent desire to be made whole, and leads him out of helplessness into abundant life. Now this passage is no sooner read than some hard-brained man who thinks more of mathematics than dogmatics, who would rather be logical than theological, declares that it is a story more worthy of the Middle Ages than of our times, and wants to know how the Bible can expect to hold the allegiance of intelligent people while it adheres to such preposterous tales, which remind one of the Church of St. Anne de Beaupre', or the statues of the bleeding saints, or the grotto of Lourdes. He does not know that textual criticism removes certain portions of the narrative which are offen- sive to reason. Our Revised Version recognizes the fact that a popular misconception of the day about angelic interference in the waters of a ther- mal spring has been transferred from the margin of an old manuscript into the body of the text, and has wisely omitted it. Yet this may be done without impairing the value of the story. On the other hand, it receives added strength. Those who throw over an entire narrative because some of its details do not appeal to their reason are as unwise as an old Dutch farmer, whose buildings were overrun with rats, and who resorted to the expedient of burning down the structures in order that he might deliver himself from the pests. There are persons today calling themselves logical who, because occasionally they discover a minor defect in the Scriptures, repudiate the whole system of Christianity. But after criticism has done its most, there remains the fact that Jesus did heal the impotent man. We can- not strike out the supernatural from the New Testament. It is here and everywhere. And while the skeptical may question the miraculous element in this healing, on the supposition that the man was possessed of such a dis- ease as only needed for its removal an authoritative voice to make the vic- tim's will assert itself, no such explanation will account for many other recorded miracles. And we have no occasion to make apology for Jesus. He is life, and life essentially. And what we call the miraculous is simply the extraordinary emergence of life, the unusual working of an activity that is constantly in procedure. Huxley admitted that there was no inherent reason for denying the credibility of a miracle ; and we who have seen Jesus I20 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. working spiritual miracles in this twentieth century have no reason to dis- credit the story of His physical miracles in the first century. But Jesus was always chary of performing miracles. He had no disposition to per- form miracles merely that men might be amazed. The wonder is that He performed so few ; that He should have been so self- controlled as not to be always performing miracles. His miracles were for signs ; they were to sig- nify something. They are as different from the miracles of the Middle Ages as can be conceived. There is no moral significance in a story of healing by the bones of saints. But in the miracles which Jesus works there is an essential moral significance, a spiritual lesson, a type of eternal life which the student cannot possibly overlook. John seems to have fallen into the habit of his Master's mind, and thought always of His miracles in rela- tion to divine truth. Did Jesus heal a withered band ? Then it was an indication that He could cure a diseased soul. Did He by wondrous multi- plication of fishes and loaves feed five thousand men and women ? Then it was a mark of the fact that He was Himself the Bread of Life. Was He able to open the eyes of the blind man ? Then it was a sublime illustration of the fact that Jesus is the Light of the World. Could He cure an impo- tent man at the pool of Bethesda ? Then it was a type of the fact that He could restore those who were spiritually impotent. Did He raise Lazarus from the dead .-' Then it was to prove that He was the Resurrection and the Life. So this story has a very close relation to the whole power of Jesus as " Resurrection " and as " Life ". IL In the next place, we have here the self-vindication of Jesus on the basis of His filial relation to God the Father, and His essential oneness with Him, He is charged with a violation of the Sabbath law ; it is an unproved accusation. Indeed, by the strictest interpretation of the Mosaic code He could not have been convicted. It would have been an easy thing to dispose of this accusation by recourse to the code and to history. On other occasions, when similar accusations were lodged against Him, He took this course, but in the present instance He does not defend Himself in this fashion. He ignores all such considerations, and with a simple thrust strikes at the core of the whole matter when He says, " My Father worketh hitherto, and I work ". The activity which characterizes God is not limited by any narrow Sabbath laws which have been passed for the benefit of mankind. From the hour when His creative work was concluded, and He pronounced His work good, until this hour He has not ceased to pour Him- self out in the sustaining of His universe, in the impartation of life to His creatures, in the work of redemption for those who are lost. " My Father and I are one. He worketh until now, and I work. His will is mine ; His work is My work. At any moment I am ready at His command to do what- soever He desireth ". Instantly the charge of an infraction of the Sabbath law is dropped. His accusers pass over the whole matter, and charge Him with identifying Himself with God, and, therefore, with being guilty of blas- phemy. Their instinct was correct, their motive contemptible. It is in the assumption that He is God, and that life proceeds from Him inevitably, that THE WORKS OF JESUS.— RESURRECTION. 121 the heart of the trouble rests. But we need not discuss that subject now. If that is not true there is no truth in the New Testament Scriptures that one need hold for a single instant. And if that is not truth, it is the greatest of all folly that we should corrie together to study this Gospel. Passing now from this general statement of the basis on which He has assumed authority to impart life to men, Jesus bursts forth, first, into a general statement of His divine right to raise the dead and judge them, and then to a more particular statement, in a concrete and explicit form, of His rights in the moral and external domains now and forever with re- lation to the destiny of mankind. He virtually says to these accusers, " You profess to be scandalized because I am supposed to have violated the Sabbath laws, and because I have claimed to be divine in My own per- son ; what will )'ou say when I tell you that all power is mine ? that I am the judge of the quick and the dead, and that by My own voice I shall call men from the tomb, and in the end shall be the final and absolute arbiter of the destinies of human beings t For, as the Father raiseth up the dead and quickeneth them, even so the Son quickeneth whom He will. For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son ; that all men should honor the Son, even as they honor the Father. He that honoreth not the Son honoreth not the Father which hath sent Him. Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth My word and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemna- tion, but is passed from death unto life. Verily, verily, I say unto yo\x the hour is coming, and now is, v/hen the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God ; and they that hear shall live ". in. Again, the healing of the impotent man forms a concrete illustra- tion in symbolism of the spiritual resurrection. " Wilt thou be made whole .'' " is the challenge of Jesus. The man hears the question, responds to it, and by the expenditure of his own will, in the exercise of what we call faith, takes up his bed and walks ; and goes out to sin no more that he may have no worse thing come upon him than he has been suffering these thirty-eight years. " Wilt thou be made whole ? " is the demand of Jesus now and always. Those who hear His voice and respond to His call are those who live ; and those who will not heed His voice are those who can- not live because they refuse to accept His life as a free gift. " Wilt thou be made whole ? " Do you want to be made sound ? Are you eager to have life and health t That is a very crucial question. It is the question which Jesus is always asking. And it is not everyone who is sick, and murmurs about it, that really wants to be well. There are many people who do not want to get health ; and many people like to tell you of their diseases, and the sufferings they have experienced at the hands of many physicians, and the number of hospitals they have been in or visited for treatment, in order that they may awake in you the impulse of sympathy. And the same thing is true in the moral realm. Not every one who professes himself sick and talks about his being so needy desires to be well spiritually. Lord Byron developed a sort of foolish self-pity by such a method. He desired to 122 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. describe himself as a sort of unfortunate victim of fleshly lusts, and he gloried in his shame. A man recently said that he would rather give ten thousand dollars to retain his delicious thirst for alcoholic beverages than to have that thirst removed. He had sunken into that insensibility which prevents a man from hearing the voice and responding to the call which summons to life. Do you want to be healed ? is the challenge of Jesus. Are you willing to launch your personal will into the divine will, and to arise from the dead ? They who hear the voice of the Son of God and respond, live ; and they who do not heed and respond are dead. IV. It follows naturally that judgment ensues. It is in the very fact of men's attitude toward this call of Jesus. What He says in this connec- tion about judgment being committed to Him is simply the inevitable consequence of His offer of life to men, and of the position they take with reference to it. Perhaps you have read Fenelon's dialogue between Ulysses and Grillus, the man whom Circe had turned into a hog. Ulysses wished to bring him back to manhood. But Grillus would not consent. He said, " No, the life of a hog is so much pleasanter ". " But", said Ulysses, " Do you make no account of eloquence, poetry and music ? " " No, I would rather grunt than be eloquent like you ". " But ", asked Ulysses further, " How can you endure this nastiness and stench?" Grillus replied, "It all de- pends on the taste ; the odor is sweeter to me than that of amber, and the filth than the nectar of the gods ". When men sink into the insensibility of degrading sin they put themselves in the place of judgment ; and the judgment of the hereafter will base itself upon the position we have occu- pied in this probationary sphere. John LeFarge says, " When a man passes a criticism upon a picture, it is the picture that judges the man, and not the man who judges the picture ". The men who receive the offer of Christ, and pass upon it, are judged by the attitude in which they present themselves to His appeal. They that hear the Son of God shall live. Others cannot see life. Even as the impotent man at the Pool of Bethesda would have been helpless to the day of his death, had he not responded to the call of Christ to take up his bed and walk forth into the world. V. And now we see that, advancing from this general statement with regard to resurrection from spiritual deadness, Jesus addresses Himself to the great question of the physical resurrection. He does not say that He is now calling the dead from the tomb, but "the hour is coming, in which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth ; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life ; and they that have done evil unto the resurrection of damnation ". This is the supreme, the only satisfactory and complete argument in favor of a future life. Natura immortality is an unprovable hypothesis ; it may belong to us as our birth- right, but the Bible does not insist that this is true. And the argument from analogy falls to pieces in the presence of the severest scientific invest- igation of our day. No man who stands by the bedside of a dying friend and observes the process of dissolution can see anything in the phenomena of man's death that differentiates it from the death of an animal. With- THE WORKS OF JESUS.— RESURRECTION. 123 out the resurrection of the New Testament in the person of Jesus Christ, there is no absolute foundation upon which one can rest a hope of the future hfe. Plato may " reason well"; so well that some of his disciples are per- suaded to commit suicide in order to reach a life of bliss ; but there is no argument from the day of Plato to our own that can support the soul that questions the fact of a future life. The only sure foundation of such a hope is the personal guarantee of Him who is " Life ", who shall some day send His voice thrilling through the world and call the just and unjust out of the tomb to receive judgment. But this promise cuts in opposite directions. It says that the unjust, as well as the just, shall come at Christ's command. There is no escaping His summons. "Whither shall I go from Thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from Thy presence ? If I ascend up into heaven, Thou art there ; if I make my bed in hell, behold Thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea ; even there shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, ' Surely the darkness shall cover me, even the night shall be light about me. Yea the darkness hideth not from Thee, but the night shineth as the day ' ". There is no escape from Him except escape in Him. There is no way to avoid the wTath of the Just One, except to hide under the shadow of His wings. Martin Luther said, " If I saw Jesus Christ standing before me with a drawn sword, I would still fling myself into His arms ". " Ye will not come unto Me that you might have life ", is the sad plaint of the Master of Life and Conqueror of Death. Jesus is the life, the resurrection, the only hope of eternal life, the judge of the quick and the dead, the appor- tioner of the rewards of the men who have been hearers of His voice and have known His love, the distributer of recompense to those who in deep, moral insensibility have refused to hear His voice and have chosen death instead of life. This is the solemn lesson of the hour. *THE WORKS OF JESUS. II —JUDGMENT. (St. John 5 : 17-30.) BY REV. CHARLES Mi. M:ELr>EISr, JPH. T>., D. D., Pastor of the Mathewson Street Methodist Episcopal Church, Providence. I have been asked for an exegesis of these few verses, John 5 : 1 7-30, which, in the mind of the committee, teach the important doctrine of a gen- eral judgment with the Lord Jesus Christ as judge. Our task would be simplified very greatly if we could assume either of two extreme positions, each of which has its advocates. Mr. Campbell Morgan declares, " There is no warrant for preaching the final judgment at all. The messengers of Christ were never commissioned to do so. They were sent to preach the gospel, and the only reference to the fact of judgment which has any place in preaching is such as is necessary for urging the claims of Christ upon men ". But one might as well say that the apostles were not commissioned to preach the new birth, the punishment of sin, the rewards of righteous- ness, or any other of the great doctrines. It would be interesting to hear this man define the " gospel " of which he speaks. Whether the apostles understood as clearly as Mr. Morgan the meaning of their mission may perhaps be questioned, but it is certain that the fact of a general judgment had a conspicuous place in their teaching. Moreover, if we are to preach Christ, it is our duty to preach Him in all His offices, not only as priest but as prophet and king ; not only as the atoning Saviour, but as the authoritative teacher and reigning sovereign. His functions, according to the Gospel, are not only to redeem but to instruct and govern. As ruler He is also judge, and the gospel-preaching is defective which does not thus present Him. We might do, also, as one learned essayist in these meetings has already done, viz. : deny that the words in vs. 28, 29 were ever uttered by the Master, but are an interpolation by a later hand. In that case they would not require an exegesis. The assurance with which some men erect a personal and purely subjective standard of what ought to be said, and reject everything which does not conform to it, is refreshing. It is an easy way to dispose of an unpleasant truth to say Jesus never uttered it or, if He did, He did not know what He was talking about. Whatever doubts these men may have concerning the inerrancy of the Scriptures, they seem well assured of their own. Now I am disposed to accept this passage as genuine, and for at least two reasons. * Delivered at the Fifth Conference, held at the Central Baptist Church, February lo, 1904. 124 THE WORKS OF JESUS.— JUDGMENT. 125 First, its statements are in perfect accord with the teaching of the Synoptic Gospels and with the writings of all the apostles, as far as they have expressed themselves on the subject. In Matt. 25:31-33, Jesus says, "When the Son of Man shall come in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the throne of His glory, and before Him shall be gathered all nations : and He shall separate them one from the other as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats". In his memorable sermon on Mars Hill, Paul declared, " He hath appointed a day in the which He will judge the world in right- eousness by that man whom He hath ordained, whereof He hath given assurance unto all men in that He hath raised Him from the dead " (Acts 17:31). In His epistles He more than once in substance affirms that "We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ". The revelator in Apocalyptic vision — " Saw a great white throne, and Him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away ; and there was found no place for them. And * * * the dead, small and great, stand before God ; and the books were opened ; and another book was opened, which is the book of life : and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them : and they were judged every man according to their works ". You will say, perhaps, that this is imaginative and poetical. But, taken in connection with the general trend of the New Testament, who that gives any doctrinal value to this book can doubt that the writer is describing the stupendous event toward w^hich time is hurrying us all ? The doctrine of a general judgment cannot be wrested from the New Testament teaching without violence. The passage before us is in harmony with this teaching, and is therefore presumptively genuine. Secondly, this passage is in harmony with the discourse of which it forms a part. It marks, it is true, a great advance in thought, but it is a natural development and not an obtrusion, an irruption, into the discussion in hand. This, I think, will be clear if we glance comprehensively, though briefly, at the entire incident. Our Lord had cured the impotent man at the pool known as Bethesda. It was on the Sabbath. Contrary to Jewish custom, at the Master's bid- ding the man took up his bed and was going his way when he was accosted by the Jews, " It is the Sabbath day ; it is not lawful for thee to carry thy bed ". He quoted the authority of Jesus, saying, " He that made me whole, the same said unto me, take up thy bed and walk ". Thus the con- troversy was shifted, and the Jews in the fierceness of their rage sought to slay Jesus. In justification of His act, and to substantiate His claims else- where made that the " Son of Man was Lord of the Sabbath ", He said, " My Father worketh hitherto and I work ", This still further inflamed their anger, and " They sought the more to kill Him because He had not only broken the Sabbath but said also that God was His Father, mak- ing Himself equal with God ", To the charge of lawlessness was added that 126 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. of blasphemy. Notice the progress, also, in the defence. Jesus does not deny that He claims equality with the Father ; on the contrary, He admits it and proceeds to justify Himself in so doing. He emphasizes the perfect accord between Himself and His Father, and then makes the still graver assertion, doubtless with remembrance of the recent healing in mind, "As the Father raiseth up the dead and quickeneth them, even so the Son quickeneth whom He will ". Nothing could be more natural than to pass from this suggestion of quickening the dead — meaning probably the spiritually dead — awakening them into new life and power, as He Himself had restored the paraljrtic, to the associated thought of the judgment. The fact that the Father had given this great power into His hands was put forth as an additional refutation of the charges made against Him. He was to act as God, "That all men might honor the Son as they honor the Father. He that honoreth not the Son honoreth not the Father which hath sent Him ". He moves forward in the argument with a regal majesty. He, the life- giver and judge of men, declares that for those who hear His voice and respond, the great crises are passed already. They already have within them the beginning of eternal life and witness of their justification. " Ver- ily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth My word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and cometh not into judgment ; but is passed from death unto life. * * * The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God : and they that hear shall live. For as the Father hath life in Himself, so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself. And hath given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man ". Our Lord regards His countrymen, and, indeed, all unregenerate men, as dead in trespasses and sins. Though physically alive, they are spiritually dead. They are as helpless as the impotent man in the porches of Bethesda. He, as the life- giver, stands and calls. He says to them as He said to the other, " Wilt thou be made whole ? " Happy, thrice happy, those who hear ; for those who hear shall live. It is interesting to note here the word rendered " wilt ". It is theleis, a word conveying the idea of volition, of purpose. It is not boiilei, simple desire. It is as though He sought in this man a purpose born of faith to respond to His life-giving power. He found what He sought, the word was spoken, and that weak and pain-racked body thrilled and glowed with the new life. He stands and calls, " If any man thirsts, come unto Me, drink and live ". If His words find response, if any hear, they shall live. If they fail to hear, they continue in the embrace of death. Thus Jesus judges the world today. By their attitude toward Him men are justified and live, or are condemned and die. " For this is the condem- nation that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. Every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light lest his deeds should be reproved. But he THE WORKS OF JESUS.— JUDGMENT. 127 that doeth truth cometh to the light that his deeds may be made manifest that the)^ are wrought in God ". Life is a continuous judgment day. By their acceptance or by their rejection of the light men are determining their destiny. This is the stupendous claim put forth by the Saviour. By their relation to Him as life-giver and judge, the fate of men is settled. It is not strange that He detected incredulity and wonder in the faces of His hearers at such a tremendous assertion ; but He does not hesitate ; He does not soften or mitigate in the slightest the significance of His words. On the contrary He advances yet farther ; there is a constant crescendo in His claims. "Are you startled at what 1 have said ? Does it shock you that I claim to judge those now on earth ? " Marvel not at this, for the hour is coming in which all that are in tneir graves shall hear My voice and shall come forth ; they that have done good unto the resurrection of life, and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation. The voice which now speaks to you, and which many of you refuse to hear, shall sound through the regions where dwell the departed, and hearing, they shall obey its imperative com- mand and come forth to receive at My hand their eternal award ". This marks the culmination of the Saviour's work as life-giver and judge. From the act of supreme authority — judgment, He passes to the supreme act of power — the resurrection of the dead. Then will the universe receive final demonstration of His sublime statement, "lam the resurrection and the life; he that believeth in Me though he were dead, yet shall he live; and whosoever liveth and believeth in Me shall never die ". Now I submit that there is nothing violent or irrelevant in this reference by our Lord to the general judgment in this discourse. It comes in the natural development of His discussion with His enemies. His claims being challenged, He defended them. His authority to supersede their petty traditions rests upon His oneness with the Father. His Father workelh hitherto, why should not He work ? He was one with the Father. He was entrusted with divine authority and power until the honor of the Father was indissolubly inwrought with His. As Godet says : " This work of moral and physical restoration, carried on hitherto by God, passes henceforth into the hands of Jesus but gradually and according to the measure of His growing capacity. Till His baptism He had wrought only human works. From that time He begins to work isolated miracles of bodily and spiritual resurrection, specimens of His great future work. From the time of His elevation to glory, He realizes by Pentecost the moral resurrection of humanity; and finally by His return on the day of His advent, and by His victory over the last enemy, death, which shall be its consequence. He will work in the physical domain, the universal resurrection. Then only will the work of the Father have passed wholly into His hands ". Jesus, as life-giver and judge must be no less than God, manifest in the flesh. As one has said : " The more we ponder the stupendous claim which Christ makes, the more must we feel that it is superhuman authority which 128 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. speaks to us here, or superhuman arrogance ". He, Himself, seemed to reaUze the force of this dilemma, for He said: "If I bear witness of Myself, My witness is not true ". Not that He falsified in His claims, but that He did not meet the demands of Jewish law by which a thing must be established by two or more witnesses. " I am willing ", He says, " to submit to this requirement. I have My witnesses and will produce them. "Ye sent unto John, to him in whose light ye were willing to rejoice. He bore witness to Me, it is true, but I have a greater witness than he. " First of all, there are My works. They clearly demonstrate My divine office and power. Nicodemus was right ; no man can do the works which I do except God be with Him. Ye are absolutely inexcusable for not receiving Me. If I had not done among you the works which none other man had done ye had not had sin, but now ye have no cloak for your sin. Now ye have both seen and hated both Me and My Father". Jesus as the divine ambassador brought with Him His credentials. Whatever weight may now be given the evidential value of miracles, it is doubtless true that He regarded them as a mark of His authority as the Son of God. Secondly. The Father bears witness. " The Father which sent Me hath borne witness to Me ". Our Lord here refers to His baptism, when as the Spirit descended upon Him, the Father's voice declared : " This is My beloved Son, hear ye Him ". He must have referred also to that marvelous scene upon the mountain, when Moses, the law-giver and Elijah, greatest of the prophets, representing the old dispensation, came out of heaven long enough to do homage to Him who was to supersede the law, and in whom the prophecies were to find their fulfilment. These representatives of a passing era faded away, leaving before the amazed apostles the solitary figure of their Lord, while in their ears rang the words: " This is My beloved Son in Whom I am well pleased ; hear ye Him ". Thirdly. Our Saviour brings forward as a final witness the Jewish Scriptures. In Moses, in the prophets, and indeed in all the Scriptures is found testimony as to the character and work of the Messiah. The portrait there drawn finds its original in Jesus of Nazareth. So clear and striking and accurate the likeness that Moses himself, in whom the Jews trusted, would condemn them for rejecting their Saviour. "There is one that accuseth you, even Moses, in whom ye trust. For had ye believed Moses ye would have believed Me, for he wrote of Me ". I have thus simply indicated what I conceive to be the teaching of this passage. If I am correct, every day is in a sense a judgment day. Jesus is speaking to men now engrossed in business, consumed by ambition, drunken with pleasures, sodden in sin. He cries to them : "Wilt thou be made whole ? " If they hear, they shall live. Oh that His voice might be heard above the din of trade, the rush of commerce, the shouts and laughter of revelry ! Alas ! how many refuse to listen. Like the Jews they would away with Him. Like the Jews, too, all such call down unutterable woes upon themselves. His blood be on us and our children forever ! His word is true. "When the Son of Man shall come in glory, and THE WORKS OF JESUS.— JUDGMENT, 129 all His holy angels with Him, then shall He sit on the throne of His glory, and before Him shall be gathered all nations; and He shall sep- arate them one from another as the shepherd separateth the sheep from the goats; and He shall set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on the left ". Ah ! that right hand and left hand ! " You seem, sir ", said Mrs. Adams to Dr. Johnson, when the fear of death and the judgment lay heavy upon him, " You seem to forget the merits of our Redeemer ". " Madam", said the honest old man, " I do not forget the merits of my Redeemer; but my Redeemer has said that He will set some on His right hand and some on His left". It were well if men were to remember that there is a right hand and a left. There is inextricable confusion here, but there will be a separation there. It is sometimes impossible here to discern between those who serve God and those who do not; but then every mask will be torn off and every dissembler revealed in his true character. I have stood in the dimly lighted room of a photographer watching with great interest the development of plates. As they lie side by side there is no apparent differ- ence betw^een them. But when they are dipped into the developing fluid, a change gradually takes place. On this appears the sweet face of a pure and innocent child ; on that the harsh and angular features of one who has seen much of toil and hardship ; on another the coarse and bloated countenance of a sensualist; and on still another the fierce and brutish expression of the hardened criminal. Under the magic of the photographer's art, every characteristic is transcribed with literal exactness upon the sensitive plate and faithfully and permanently preserved. Thus in the blazing light of the judgment, men will stand revealed as they are and not as they seem. Ah ! that right hand and left hand ! Only two classes ; only two destinies. Every man must stand in one of these classes. Every man must enter upon one or the other of the two destinies, which will be decided by his attitude toward the life-giver and judge. By a fixed and unalterable gravitation every man will go to his own place, whither his affinities bear him. One has beautifully and powerfully said : " There are two twilights — the twilight of evening and the twilight of morning; and therefore God's question to us is not how much light have we, but which way do we face, to the night or to the day? Not what art thou, but what wilt thou, is the supreme question. It is the answer to this which sets some on the right hand and some on the left". * THE SECRET OF JESUS' LIFE. (St. John 5 : 30.) tBY REV. JOHN BALCOlVt SKAAV, D. T>., Pastor of the West End Presbyterian Church, New York. There are four Scriptures, all the sayings of Jesus and all found in the Fourth Gospel, which define for me the basic secret of Jesus' life. John 6 : 38 — " For I came down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me" — doing the will of God the purpose oi Christ's life. John 4 : 34 — " My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me " — doing the -will of God the pleasure of Christ's life, its very sustenance and inspiration, its enjoyment and satisfaction. John 5 : 30 — " Because I seek not Mine own will, but the will of the Father which sent Me " — doing the will of God, the pursuit ox principle of Christ's life. John 8 : 29 — " I do always those things that please Him " — doing the will of God \he practice of Christ's life. This was our Lord's unique and unqualified claim. Was it substantiated ? Did He give full proof to the world that doing God's will was the purpose, the pleasure, the pursuit and the practice of His life ? That He always dili- gently sought to know, and earnestly set Himself to do God's will is beyond dispute. A study of His prayer-life fully attests this. " Strong Son of God " though He was, aware of His appointed mission in the world as He must have been, yet was He constantly asking His Father what direction His way should take or what turns in the way already taken He should make. " What wilt Thou have Me to do ? " was His perpetual inquiry. If ever any- one had less need than another to pray, was it not Jesus Christ ? And yet we find that no one living upon our earth ever prayed so much as did He. He alone has perfectly obeyed the apostolic injunction, " Pray without ceasing ". Prayer stood closely related to all the great events of His life — His baptism. His temptation, His transfiguration. His agony in the garden. His crucifixion. The night before He chose the twelve. He was until morn- ing in the mountain alone with His Father. When the Roman guard came to arrest Him He was by Himself in prayer, and did He not die with a prayer upon His lips ? What a testimony to His prayer-life it was that the disciples who took the walk to Emmaus with Him the day of His resurrection did not identify Him till ihey heard His voice in prayer. We sometimes feel that at best we are but children and dare not stir a step alone. This was Jesus' characteristic and continuous attitude. He was supremely the son of solitude, yet He was preeminently a man among men, ever going about doing good. * Delivered at the Fifth Conference, held at the Central Baptist Church, February lo, 1904. t Now Pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church, Chicago, Illinois. 130 THE SECRET OF JESUS' LIFE, 131 This constant converse with His Father was the source of His wisdom, His patience and poise, His steadfastness and strength, His cheerfulness and courage. It was this which made " His face a mirror of His holy mind, His mind a temple for all lovely things to flock to And inhabit ". Living such an uninterrupted prayer-life as this, He came to know the will of God fully and explicitly, and His life was lived with one sole com- manding passion, — to make that will known to men. The words He spoke, the deeds He wrought, the influence breathing itself forth from His person. His character and life, were but the utterance, the exaltation of that will. In whatsoever capacity He appears, as the Messiah of Matthew, or the servant of Mark, or the universal Saviour of Luke, or the divine Son of God of John, He is everywhere and always the synonym, the embodiment, the interpretation of the will of God — the declaration of what God thinks, what God desires, what He purposes and what He delights in — in a word what God is and what He desires man to be. "On one great mission bent, He sped for God, forever unencumbered Of earthly clogs, whereby our souls are numbered In glory excellent". There can be no question, then, but what He always sought to know and follow the will of the Father. That stands forever true. But did He perfectly do that will } In other words, it is beyond dispute that doing the will of God was the purpose, the pleasure and the pursuit of His life. Was this the actual practice of Jesus ? 1. The consciousness of Christ is no slight or uncertain factor in this problem. All the laws of psychology must, do give it emphasis. A sane, true, high soul, such as Jesus confessedly was, could have had none other than a trustworthy consciousness. When, therefore, looking into the face of His Father, He said: " I do always the things that please Him; " and again, " My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me", He established the strongest possible presumption in favor of His claim. 2. Another test is His Father's unqualified approval of Him. This approval would, of course, not have been given if He had failed to do the will of God. That approval is everywhere implied, and the fact that only once did Jesus feel Himself without it, and that when circumstances for which He was not responsible had clouded His consciousness, strongly confirms the implication. Twice, however, this approval was explicitly spoken by the Father from heaven. First at the baptism : " This is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased ", a word which doubtless covered the whole of His life up to that point and is a suggestive key which unlocks for us the so-called " hidden years" ; and again at the transfiguration, when, as St. Peter tells us, " He received from God the Father, honor and glory, when there came such a voice to Him from the excellent glory, This is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased ". 132 THE GOSPEL OF SI. JOHN. 3. But better than His self-consciousness even, still better than His Father's implied or spoken approval, was the sinless life He set before the world. His sinlessness was more than a self-preferred claim — it was an accepted fact. No man did convict Him of sin. The prince of this world did come but found nothing in Him. His contemporaries testified to His purity, and succeeding ages have confirmed the testimony, until an apos- trophe like that of our Sidney Lanier to-day awakens universal applause : " But Thee, but Thee, O sovereign seer of time. But Thee, U poets' poet, wisdom's tongue, But Thee, O man's best man, O love's best love, O perfect life in perfect labor writ, O all men's Comrade, Servant, King or Priest, — What ?/"or jjrA what mole, what flaw, what lapse. What least defect, or shadow of defect, What rumor, tattled by an enemy, Or inference loose, what lack of grace, Even in torture's grasp, or sleep's, or death's — Oh ! what amiss may I forgive in Thee, Jesus, good Paragon, Thou Crystal Christ ?" In view of these facts are we not justified in accepting it as an absolute fact that Jesus did perfectly obey His Father, and that His claim is thus firmly established, that doing the will of God was not only the purpose, the pleasure and the pursuit of His life, but also its actual and constant practice. No other soul was as equal to Wasson's quaint confession as was the Man of Galilee : " If I would pray, I've naught to say. But this : That God would be God still. For grace to give, So still to give, And sweeter than my wish His will". Is not our next logical question this : What was the personal, practical product of such perfect practicing of the will divine ? What sort of a char- acter-structure did it rear ? What type or pattern did it leave to the world ? In a word, what kind of a life did it produce ? Theoretically, the effect of such a practicing of the will of God should have been the ideal, the perfect. If the will of God is the best possible will, if it justifies the Bible's repre- sentations of it as " That good and acceptable and perfect will " of God, if John's dictum be true, "He that doeth the will of God abideth forever", then three things may be demanded of such a person : 1. That the perfect doing of that perfect will of God should produce the highest possible character. Why? Because God is the Creator, and only He can make such laws, which, when obeyed, will insure one's being its highest end. 2. That the perfect doing of the perfect will of God should bring the greatest possible happiness. God is the great Father and He would make only those laws for His children, which, on being obeyed, would contribute to their fullest happiness. THE SECRET OF JESUS' LIFE. 133 3. That the perfect doing of the perfect will of God should result in the longest possible continuance of being. God is eternal and legislates, therefore, only for eternity. God is man's great benefactor, and, where His will is not intercepted, must preserve my soul " From this time forth and even forevermore ". To put it succinctly, complete perfection, complete pleasure and complete permanence must follow from the full surrender of the human will to the will divine. What do we find to have been the case in our Lord's life ? Did He not fulfil each of these three great conditions? He was not only the noblest, the purest, the holiest character of time, but He is the only perfect man our race has produced. Human imagination can picture to itself no higher order of being than He. Do not the Norsemen's title of "The White Christ ", and Lanier's representation of Him as " The Crystal Christ " command universal consent ? What of the second test? Did not perfect obedience to the Father's will yield Him complete happiness ? He was " The man of sorrows ", but He was "Anointed with the oil of gladness " above His fellows. He was able to rise above more trial, temptation, opposition and hatred than has come to any other being on our earth, and yet He was calm, serene, brave, and glad through it all. "Who, for the joy that was set before Him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down on the right hand of the throne of God ". Apply the third test — the longest possible existence. Is He not by all odds the first of the immortals ? Was not death powerless to hold Him ? Is He not now alive forevermore ? Has He not the keys of hades and death ? He who rests his faith in Him may sing with the utmost confidence : " To Thy beyond no fear 1 give, Because Thou livest, I live. Unsleeping Friend, why should I wake Troublesome thought to take For any strange tomorrow ? In Thy hand Days and eternities like flowers expand " Odors from blossoming worlds unknown Across my path are blown ; Thy robes trail myrrh and spice From farthest paradise; I walk through Thy fair universe with Thee, And san me in Thine immortality". And now, having reached this high point, where are we ? We have looked upon His claim that God's will was the guiding star, nay, the rising sun, of His life; we have examined the facts upon which that master claim rests, and assured ourselves that it was warrantable and conclusive. We have scrutinized the effect of Christ's obedience and found it yielded a normal product, answering the soul's threefold aspiration for perfection, pleasure and permanence. Are we not, therefore, face to face with the question as to what is the essential, practical import of all this for us ? Surely it can have but one explicit and ethical meaning for us. It is this : t34 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. that if we would come out at a like goal, we must take the same path Jesus chose. Do we want to attain to the highest character? Do we want abid- ing happiness ? Do we crave a true immortality ? All this has but one secret — doing the will of the Father in heaven. Until Christ's secret is ours we shall not fulfil the genius of our being ; we shall chafe and fret, be ill at ease and generally unhappy ; and the life within us, instead of expanding, will grow shallow and negative and gradually die out. " Have you ever thought, my friend, As you daily toil and plod In the busy paths of men, How still are the ways of God ? " Have you ever paused in the din Of traffic's insistent cry, To think of the calm in the cloud. Of the peace in your glimpse of the sky ? " Go out in the silent fields, That quietly yield you meat. And let them rebuke your noise, Whose patience is still and sweet". Ah ! this is our difficulty. Our wills are in command, and not God's will. Victor Hugo once said, " Men do not lack strength, but will ". It is God's will they lack. By so much as that will is not ours, by so much our characters are defective, our hearts discordant, our lives de-vitalized. No one has got closer to this truth, it would seem to me, than our Quaker poet, who has in a single verse forever signalized the truth : " And so I sometimes think our prayers Might well be merged in one. And nest and perch and hearth and church Repeat, ' Thy will be done ' ". This step but leads to another. Having come face to face with this secret of secrets, we ask most eagerly how we may make it ours. How may we be sure that we have taken God's will ? We do well to ask that question, for there is a great deal of talk these days about absolute surrender, which is ignorant, unscriptural, unphilosophical, and generally wide of the mark. In many quarters the word surrender has become scarcely more than a shibboleth. People talk glibly of surrender who do not know what surrender means. {(i) To begin with, it is not a thing of the emotions, but solely of the will. It is, therefore, a step to be taken deliberately, dispassionately, and, above all, positively. I have known people to declare their surrender when they were under excited feeling, who were at the time as little capable of taking so serious a step as a child. {b) It is a thing of fact and not fancy. A prominent religious teacher, speaking to a great conference of Christian people, a few years ago, sug- gested that only when one could sign his name to a blank sheet of paper and hand it back to God for Him to fill in as He chose, was he really justi- fied in professing surrender. I submit that this is a specious test, and its THE SECRET OF JESUS' LIFE. 135 eflfect most unwholesome. Imagine Christ working Himself up into such an unreal state. He dealt with the will of God as it came to Him at the time, and not as it might address itself to Him at some future juncture. The call which (iod's will makes to us in the present is the only true test of surrender. God has put me in a hard place; do I accept it from Him and in no way fight against the appointment ? My position is not what I like, but God keeps me in it. Am I content therewith ? My life is an aimless, circumscribed one — a tread mill, a tedious round, the dead level of the commonplace. Am I willing to keep on and be cheerful, if (}od does not turn me upon another path 1 {(■) And this, mark you well, is only the first step — the beginning. Surrender, as I understand it, is a compound act. I had almost said a complex act. It is a ladder of three rungs, set far apart and mounted only by long, hard strides. The first rung is submission to God's will — resigna- tion, as we more commonly express it. The second is obedience to God's will. Not merely accepting it negatively, as if there were no other alterna- tive, but giving ourselves gladly, fully, loyally, to its fulfilment. The third is exalting God's will — accounting it and rejoicing in it as the best possible will. Faber was standing on this top rung when he breathed that immortal prayer : " I worship thee, sweet will of God, And all thy ways adore; And every day I live, I seem To love thee more and more. " He always wins who sides with God ; To him no chance is lost. God's will seems sweetest to him when It triumphs at his cost. " 111 that He blesses is our good, And unblest good is ill, And all is right that seems most wrong, If it be His sweet will ". How many of us have brought our feet to that rung ? Until we have, we cannot make claim to full surrender to the will of God, but if we have reached that high and holy station, we are fast becoming our truest and best selves ; it will be easy to be brave and sweet and reposeful, and natural for us to be happy ; and we shall rise above all ordinary, temporal limitations, passing out of the bondage of the material into the glorious life and liberty of the Son of God. " To be made with Thee one spirit, Is the boon I longingly ask. To have no bars 'twixt my soul and Thme, Myself, Thy servant, for any task. Life, life, I may enter through Thee, the door. Saved and sheltered forevermore". * FAITH IN CHRIST DEMANDED BY GOD AND THE SPRING OF RELIGIOUS ACTION. (St. John 6 : 29.) BY REV. T^TA-THAISr K. "\VOOr>, D. T)., President of Newton Theological Institution, Newton Centre, Mass. It is needless for me to enter into introductions. You have already, in this course of study and addresses, had the Gospel of John, the " Pearl of the Gospels ", analyzed by competent, scholarly and devout men. I said devout men, because it remains forever true that, " If any man willeth to do His will, he shall know of the teaching whether it is of God " (John 7 : r^). Devoutness is a key which unlocks the choicest treasures of such a Gospel as that of John. One must sit fixedly with him in his quiet chambers of meditation, and in the atmosphere of peace, if one would think his way into the heart of his Gospel. The simple historic facts could be somewhat easily narrated, but such an interpretation of them, and such a philosophy of them, and such a living of them over again as John gives could come only out of a heart and mind which had long been occupied by Jesus Christ. The facts are given, but they are the facts explained after long pondering in the luminous presence of the Holy Spirit. His Gospel is peculiarly, there- fore, food and drink to the soul which hungers and thirsts after Christ. I will proceed at once to my assigned service and theme which was phrased for me, " Faith in Christ Demanded by God and the Spring of Religious Action ", John 6 : 29 — " This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent ". There is a kind of faith which Jesus both commends and commands as an indispensable prerequisite or condition in order to His healing of men's infirmities, but which, in so far as we have any evidence, is not the saving faith through which the soul is knit to Christ. Significantly, it occurs always in connection with miracles of healing. The Roman Centurion (Matt. 8:10) is emphatically commended for his faith in expecting the healing of his servant, and yet there is no evidence that he was then or became afterward a disciple of Christ. His faith was not of the kind which knits the soul to Christ as Saviour and Lord. The men who brought the palsied man (Matt. 9 : 2) and let him down before Christ to be healed, were also strongly commended for their faith, although there is no evidence that they were in any sense disciples of Christ. Indeed, the circumstances point inferentially and strongly to the fact that they were not disciples, but only a part of the great multitude who had seen the miracles Delivered at the Third Conference, held at the Beneficent Congregational Church, December g, 1903. 136 FAITH IN CHRIS T. 137 of Christ in other places. The two blind men whose history is given in Matt. 9 : 27-31, were given sight with the words, "According to your faith be it done unto you ". Jesus had previously asked them, " Believe ye that I am able to do this ? " His ability to give them sight was the only point on which their faith fast- ened itself. There is no evidence that they received any other benefit from Christ than that of eyesight. Apparently they were not joined to Him in discipleship, although they did afterwards spread abroad His fame as a miracle worker who had special ability to give blind men their sight. Blind Bartimeus (Mark 10:46-52) also had a faith which centered in his belief in Christ's ability to give him sight, but there is no convincing evidence that his faith embraced Christ in any inwardly saving sense. It is a mere possi- bility that V. 52 may indicate some form of discipleship when it says, "And straightway he received his sight and followed Him in the way". Allot these are illustrations of a faith which our Lord commended and without which He would not perform His miracles. It was a condition requfred of man but was of a sort {sui generis) which must be described or defined by the results affected through it. What, then, is this faith and wherein does it differ from that faith which is always allied with inward union with Christ in salvation ? This faith rests on evidences of miracle working which they had seen or had heard reported in definite details. They believed, on the ground of what they had seen and heard, that Jesus had ability to heal, and this confident assent to His power was their faith. It did not bind them to discipleship. It did not reach a state of soul-surrender to Christ, nor a vital union of the soul with its rightful Lord. It did not involve an inward moral obedience of heart and life to the rule of Christ. They were not, in any evangelical sense, believers in Christ. But yet this faith, as far as it went, rested on the same grounds as the higher faith, which is both the condition and the expression of the regener- ated life. Both kinds of faith alike rest on evidence, the first kind on evidence of the ability or power of Christ, the second kind not only on the power of Christ, but on the perfectness of His moral character, on His claim to be divine, and on His ability to give eternal life. If several instances had been definitely reported to the blind men, and especially if they had been witnesses to a few alleged cures, where the King had healed men, they would have believed in the ability of the King to heal, somewhat regardless of what sort of a moral character the King might possess. I do not see that the faith of these men implied any assent to the moral character of Christ, or any acceptance of His divine claims. It reached only to the point that He had ability to heal, as was abundantly attested by evidences of such healing already accomplished among the people. Now saving faith rests on this evidence also, but goes so far beyond it as to give it a wholly different and unique quality. It assents to His ability to heal, His character as Holy and perfect. His claim to be the Son of (iod, and such a voluntary embracing of Christ, as issues in a submission 138 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. of all the will and the life to the authority and the rule of Christ. The first sort of faith is that ordinary confidence which arises upon presentation of certain evidences, which seem reasonable, that a man has power or ability. Such faith may lead one to cast one's self on that ability for help, at least to the necessary extent. It may be for physical healing only as in these illustrations from the Gospels. It does not imply any radical change in the inner life or in the outward conduct. The second sort of faith is in the sphere of the moral life where there is voluntary assent to the truth that there can be but one ruler, lawgiver and Lord, and that one, Jesus Christ, to whom the soul yields unhesitating obedience and love. This faith means a radical change of both inner life and outward conduct. It is the invariable accompanyer of the regener- ating work of the Holy Spirit, and expresses the new attitude of the soul toward its new found Saviour and Lord. I have been thus careful to analyze these two sorts of faith and to differentiate them because they are both still present in human life as much as when our Lord was here in the flesh and dwelt among us. Men may believe that Jesus Christ is able to do what He says that He can do, and even assent to His claim to be divine, and assent to His miracle- working ability, and this faith may be a very genuine one of its sort, but still fall far short of that faith which joins the soul to Christ in a vital union, so that a man may say, " I am in Christ ", and " It is no longer I that live but Christ that liveth in me ; and that life which I now live in the flesh, I live in faith, the faith which is in the Son of God " (Galatians 2: 20). This kind of faith is more than simple intellectual credence. It is indeed a voluntary assent to Christ, but is not that highest assent whose expression is loyal and loving obedience. It is so different in degree as to be practically different in kind from the faith which is the evidence of a Christian believer's " union with Christ ". It is not evangelical faith. A second though inadequate conception of faith is that given in Hebrews 11 : i. " Now faith is assurance of things hoped for, a conviction of things not seen ". This is often supposed to be in the nature of an exact definition. In reality it describes but one aspect of faith. The remainder of the chapter, in which is the muster-roll of heroes of the Kingdom of God, shows just what characteristic of faith was in the writer's mind when he wrote this so-called definition. These heroes were in the midst of great difficulties. They met almost insurmountable obstacles. They suffered continual contumely and obloquy. They were robbed of their earthly possessions. They were hunted, persecuted, and despoiled of the things which minister to the outward comfort of life. In their constant distresses and deprivations, they saw by faith " things " which should be their own possessions where "there was none to molest or make afraid ", and other things which had no material form, and hence could not be seen as could the things here and now. Their faith grasped and embraced these things which God held in reserve for them after life's weary struggle was over. So vivid was this faith, that these things seemed to them already in their FAITH IN CHRIST. 139 possession, although they were only " hoped for" and "not seen " as yet. " For they that say such things make it manifest that they are seeking after a country of their own " (Heb. 11:14). Now it is true that faith may grasp things, seen or unseen, but that is only one characteristic of it, and by no means describes its true nature. It is a superficial description and was never meant to define the essential nature of faith. In so far as the writer intended to cover one phase of faith, it covers it adequately, but it is not an adequate definition for the whole of It, Hence, when people often express the hope or expectation of a heavenly home, the enjoyment of heavenly things, the possession of heavenly estates, and other supernal equipments, and fancy that their faith grasps these so certainly as to furnish reasonable ground for obtaining them, they labor under an utter misconception of what true faith is, both in its nature and in its objects. Many modern Christians have their whole foreground of faith filled with " things hoped for " which are better than what they now possess ; things which will give them greater comforts than they now enjoy ; things which will change poverty into wealth, and want into affluence ; things which will stay by them without being looked after ; — in a word, faith has for its object " things hoped for ". Now this is a wholly inadequate description of faith. The same writer gives a far clearer and more essential description of faith when he says, " By faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king; for he endured as seeing Him who is invisible" (Heb. 11 ra;). This is a clear recognition of the personal element in faith, which unites heart to heart, soul to soul, person to person. Moses laid hold on God, and rested in Him, with whole confidence that God would take care of things, and would provide for him both in the matter of his safety from the wrath of the king, and also in the providential guiding of his steps. God was the source of his strength to endure, and the object of his faith. This state- ment, therefore, uncovers and discloses what I conceive to be the primal and essential principle in faith. The word faith {pistis) does not occur in the Gospel of John, and occurs but once in his Epistles. "And this is the victory that hath overcome the world, even our faith " (i John 5 :4). The word occurs frequently in every other book of the New Testament, except in the writings of John. It has its most numerous use in the Epistles of Paul, who writes it almost one hundred and fifty times, exclusive of the Epistle to the Hebrews. The word faith must certainly have been a very familiar everyday word on the lips of the early Christian disciples, if we may judge by this frequent use of it in the New Testament writings. Hence its entire absence from the writings of John, with the single exception, must require a careful explanation based on an analysis of the psychology of the religious experience. The one time when he uses it would seem to be a case where his pen slipped into the use of the word which was so familiar to all about him, but which was not his own habitual and deliberate mode of conceiving that relation of the soul to God in Christ which is called faith. I am the more I40 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. persuaded of this explanation because he proceeds instantly, in the very next sentence (v. 5), to emphasize his own usual idea of the nature and action of faith. "And who is he that overcometh the world but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God ? " In other words, John does not view faith as an abstract thing, or as a definable entity. But while he does not use the word faith {pisiis) excepting the one time, he does use the verb to believe {pisteud) more than a hundred times. Hence it would appear that his conception of faith holds in it that subtle shade of difference which exists between a noun and its cognate verb. He thinks of it always in the spirit and mould which are characteristic of a verb. The noun faith is abstract and definitional of an entity. The verb " to believe " has in it action, movement, life, and especially in view of its supreme object. It is impossible to imagine John, with his modes of thought, writing such a state- ment of faith as that in Heb. 1 1 : i . It is wholly foreign both to his exper- ience and to his point of view. His thought lies in the other hemisphere. He does not look into the soul of man to find and analyze faith. He looks first at Jesus Christ, whom he sees luminous, gracious, redeeming, almighty, and then secondly at the soul leaping forth to embrace Him and appropriate Him. Hence it seems to me that John's conception of faith is more closely allied to life, action, vital union, than it is even to the intel- lectual perception of the truth, however clear. It is easy to place the ictus on either of these two sides of faith. The perceptional side, with all its clear vision of Christ and the glorious power and passion of His person, may seem the most important side ; or the side of impulse and life, which spring forth in fruitful currents from the knowing of Christ, may seem the most emphatic to the man who is in closest relations with his fellow man. I am unable to accept the statement of Professor William Sanday, of Oxford, although I have the profoundest respect for his scholarly opinions, when he says, " Compared with St. Paul's conception, we may say that faith with St. John is rather contemplative and philosophic, where with St. Paul it is active and enthusiastic " (Sanday, on Romans, p. 32). This seems to me an interesting and curious illustration of the method of criti- cism on subjective grounds. We form a preconception of a man's mode of life or of his personal characteristics, and then compel the interpretation or description of all his thinking or acting to lie in that mould. We forget that man is almost infinitely diversified in his ways of mental approach to a subject as well as in his mental moods. He will, indeed, have his usual method of thought, but it will be broken in upon again and again, and the unusual will usurp its place. John was a meditative and philosophically inclined man, but that does not preclude his thought from being cast in forms of intense action. He conceives activity, however, from the side of the inward sources and states rather than from the side of outward deeds, and especially does he conceive faith from the view point of its object, Jesus Christ, rather than from the view point of faith as a pos- session of the soul. Leaving, then, for the time Paul's conception of faith, I should say FAITH IN CHRIST. 141 that John's conception was not at all what Professor Sanday suggests, but rather the exact opposite. It is active, moving, living, and puts its emphasis on the life side of faith, or in other words, faith is the activity of a soul which is steadfastly putting itself in harmony with God. The one impres- sion which the writings of John make upon me is that faith is the expression of a life at work in all holy ways, and that faith in Jesus Christ is a holy living with Christ as both the supreme source and the supreme goal, Paul in his keener analysis more frequently describes faith as " the living bond, the secret point of union between Christ and the individual soul, the unio mystica ". But we must scrutinize more carefully the varied uses of the word faith in the New Testament. (ii) It is used to describe the body of Christian doctrine. " If so be that ye continue in the faith " (Col. i : 23). " One Lord, one faith, one baptism " (Eph. 4 : 5). " The faith which was once for all delivered to the saints " (Jude 3). (b) It signifies an act of the soul toward these doctrines. It may be favorable or adverse. " So belief cometh of hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ" (Rom. 10: 17). " Thou believest that God is one ; thou doest well : the demons also believe, and shudder " (James 2 : 19). (r) It signifies a favorable act of the soul toward the promises of God. This is the familiar use in the Epistle to the Hebrews, and especially in connection with the glorious roster of the heroes of the faith in the eleventh chapter. {(i) It signifies an attitude of the soul toward the works of God, as e. g., Miracles. "Though ye believe not Me, believe the works" (John 10:38). " By faith we understand that the worlds have been framed by the word of God" (Heb. 11 :3). (., HosMER Professor of New Testament Exegesis and Criticism, TIartkord Theological Seminary, Hartford, Conn. To understand Jesus' controversies with the Jews we must understand the Jews with whom the controversies were held, and to understand the Jews we must read their history from the time they returned from their exile to re-occupy the Holy Land. That history divides itself into three periods : The Persian period, extending from 538 to 332. B. C. ; the Greek period, from 332 to 167, B. C, and the Maccabean period, from 167 to 63, B. C, when Syria became a Roman province. Of the Persian period, little is known in detail. In general, the condi- tion of the people was sad. The rule was oppressive, especially towards the close of the period, so that Alexander and his armies were hailed as divine deliverers. In the Greek period the condition at first was favorable, but towards the close it degenerated, reaching its climax of oppression and corruption in the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes, against whose reckless desecration of the temple and brutal imposition of infamous laws there arose the famous revolt of the Maccabees. Now, this revolt was in its essence a religious rebellion, crystalizing itself in a party of national opposition to foreign rule ; but as the revolt pro- ceeded, the national party developed in the direction of political self-seek- ing, making its aim and passion official power rather than religious rights. As a consequence, the old religious element in the party separated itself into a party of its own, a party whose opposition was more against the national party, which had become political, than against the foreign rule itself. , As this religious party, however, began to develop more zeal for reli- gion than for the nation, there separated from it still another party, a party of revolutionary fanaticism, whose opposition was thrown against both the other parties, while, as this national party in its political self-seeking came to throw itself in favor of the foreign rule it had first opposed, there arose another party of like political cast, but of no religious element, gathering around the reigning family in Palestine, and having for its object the re-establishment of the Herodian kingdom in the spirit of its traditional policy, namely, the union of Judaism and Hellenism. This was a party * Delivered at the Fourth Conference, held at (irace Episcopal Church, January 13, 1004. 161 i62 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. whose opposition was against all the three parties as far as they were reli- gious, but whose favor was extended toward them all as far as they were political. There is no need of my naming these parties I have described. They are named in their description. The party seeking political gain was the party of the Sadducees, the party which represented in itself one of the two great tendencies present in the nation after its return from the exile — the tendency to mingle with the heathen world, a tendency characteristic of the priestly aristocracy among the Jews. The religiously separating party was the party of the Pharisees, the party which represented in itself the other great tendency present after the exile — the tendency to keep aloof from heathendom and preserve the traditional religion pure, a tendency charac- teristic of the people of the Jews. The fanatical party was the party of the Zealots, the parly which believed in the sword to save the cause, a party reckless in its zeal but strangely sincere in its recklessness, a party to which Ben Hur might have belonged, a party which had a representative in the apostolic circle. The dynastic party was the party of the Herodians, a party which gathered around the political leadership that professed to be religious, but whose union of religion and culture reduced religion to a hol- low farce and culture to a mimicry, and left nothing real but politics. Now, if these parties could have been kept apart, there might have con- fronted Jesus a clear cut line between politics and religion. But how was it possible for them to be kept apart? With the Jew, religion was a part of his national life, and national life was a part of his religion. No more really so was it in Scotland in the time of the Covenanters, or in Holland in the time of the Spanish rule, than it was in Judea in the time of Herod and Pontius Pilate. As a matter of fact, much as the Pharisees disavowed poli- tics, and the Sadducees disavowed devotion to the Mosaic law^, the national fortunes of the Jews drew these two parties into alliances and then again into oppositions that brought religion and politics into an inextricable tangle in the nation's life, while the Herodians professed such religion as they had for purely political ends, and the Zealots practiced such politics as they dared with a purely religious spirit. To be sure, in all this tangle of the secular and the religious, there was, as there always is, an element among the people who kept religion pure. You see it in such persons as Simeon and Anna, in the Baptist and his dis- ciples, and the family and kins-folk from Avhich the Baptist and Jesus Him- self came. You see it also in a distinctive group of religionists, who were not a party, or even a sect, but rather a brotherhood w^ho came from the same pious stock as the Pharisees, but, unlike them in their yielding to politics, separated themselves even from the ordinary life of men — the Essenes, who represented in themselves a deep underlying tendency always present in the popular Jewish mind, a tendency to thoughtfulness on religious things. These were the Jews with whom Jesus had to deal. This was the atmosphere in which His ministry was cast. Was it possible, then, for con- JESUS' CONTROVERSIES WITH THE JEWS. 163 troversy not to rise ? Bring before this politico-religious party life the spir- itual mission of Jesus, confront the conceptions of character which it created with the spiritual personality, the divinely spiritual self of Jesus, and what must have happened ? The Sadducees would oppose it all, because Jesus' teachings were based on piety and not on culture, while Jesus Himself involved a divine revelation and not an agnostic skepticism. The Pharisees would resent it all, because Jesus and His teachings laid the hand on legal- istic ceremony and swept it away. The Zealots would not understand it, because Jesus did not reveal Himself along the line of fire and sword. The Herodians would have nothing to do with it, because Jesus had nothing to do with the artificiality of their ideas and the politics of their j\ims. Even the Essenes, who might be supposed to be religiously and spiritually nearest to it, would turn against it, because Jesus would not turn against the every- day life and experience of men. And so it came that, though these parties hated each other, time and again combinations among them threw their forces against Jesus and His work. There was Jesus' healing of the with- ered hand on the Sabbath day. What cared the Herodians for the Sabbath law and custom ? Yet they plotted with the Pharisees against His life. There was the demand for a sign from heaven. What belief had the Sad- ducees in heaven or a sign from there ? Yet they united with the Pharisees in demanding it. There was the open claim of His Messiahship which Jesus placed before the people's leaders in the holy week, and instinctively Pharisee, Sadducee, and Herodians tried to break it down. It was the one great fact of a spiritual movement in the midst of them, the one great fact of a supremely spiritual personality among them, the one great fact of an abso- lutely spiritual claim before them that broke in upon the dream of their political ideals, that smote the indifference of their materialism, that crushed the self-conceit of their ceremonialism, and brought them all to realize that if the Galilean won His way their day of power and life was gone. Now take all this and see the light it throws upon the Fourth Gospel. There is a great difference between the Synoptic Gospels and the Gospel of John, and the greatness of that difference lies at the point of Jesus' dis- courses. In the Synoptists they are parables of fields and flowers, of home and business life, plain and simple talks on the common themes of every day. In the Gospel of John they are deep and profound discourses on themes transcending human experience, but the striking thing about these transcendental themes is that they gather around the one subject of Jesus Himself and His relation to God and the unseen universe. Why this marked difference between this Fourth Gospel and the rest ? Is it that the Synoptists alone give us the story of Jesus' ministry, the Fourth Gospel coming from some later writer who knew more of Greek philosophy than he did of Jesus' teaching? Could the same Jesus not give both kinds of teaching ? Turn over the Gospel pages, and you will see that significantly the Synoptic talks were given, almost all of them, in the early part of Jesus' ministry to the peasant folk of Galilee, the simple-minded people to whom these simple talks brought apprehension of God's spiritual 1 64 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. truth, while the Fourth Gospel discourses were given, almost all of them, in the later part of Jesus' ministry to the ecclesiastical Jews of Jerusalem, the speculative, controversial, the politically scheming Jews, whose one objec- tion to Jesus was that He claimed to have a spiritual truth from God to declare. You see then what this gathering of the Fourth Gospel themes around the person and self of Jesus means. It is not the poetizing of a philo- sophic writer who knew naught of Jesus or His truth. These discourses are Jesus' teaching. They are the teaching of the same Jesus who speaks to us in the Sermon on the Mount and the parables by the sea, only now He is confronting the Jews' materialism, their political, self-seeking, nationalizing materialism, with the great claims of the spiritualism of a God who must be worshipped in spirit and truth, and who could be seen and known only in the spiritual Lordship of Jesus Himself over personal character and life. It was the controversy which came naturally at the close of Jesus' ministry, as the opposition to Him by the religious leaders came to its inevitable issue, and Jesus' claims against it came to their inevitable declaration in the full. Now, go through the scenes the Fourth Gospel gives us, and see how all this works itself out. 1. There is Jesus in Jerusalem at the Pool of Bethesda. The impotent man is lying on the threshold of supposed healing, with no one to help him across. Jesus comes and says to him, "Arise, take up thy bed and walk", and immediately the man was made whole, took up his bed and walked ; and the same day was the Sabbath. Ah, there was the trouble ! The scribes and Pharisees are quick to the scent. They stop the man : " It is the Sabbath Day, knowest thou not?" Everyone in Jerusalem knew that, if he knew nothing else. " It is not lawful for thee to carry thy bed ". Everyone knew that, too. " But He that made me whole, the same said unto me, ' Take up thy bed and walk ' ". " Who made thee whole ? " "I know not". But He must be brought to know, for the issue between the Pharisees and Jesus must be straightway drawn. So Jesus came and disclosed Himself to him, in order that he might tell the Pharisees. And he told them, and imme- diately they began to persecute Jesus and to seek to slay Him, because He laid His hand upon the burdened ritualism of the Sabbath Day to break it down. But why draw the issue ? Why not leave the Pharisees to the idea of their Sabbath Day ? Simply because the Pharisees must come to know that the Sabbath finds itself in no lordship over man, but only in such a service to him as is possible by the lordship over it of Jesus Christ. The Sabbath must be saved from the materialism of the scribes. The spiritual Christ must be put in authority and power over it. 2. There is Jesus in Jerusalem again. It is the Feast of Dedication. The people are in a great quandary about Him. Some say that He is a good man ; others say He deceives the people. Some say that He is the Christ ; others, that He has a devil. Murmuring and division among the people because they could not understand how He could heal diseases, cure infirm- ities, cast out demons, raise the dead, show all the wonder marks of the /ES US ' CONTR O VERS FES WITH THE JE WS. 165 Messiah and yet not reveal Himself to the world, the world of the nation's politics, the world of the nation's policy against Rome. Into all this con- fusion Jesus steps, and on that last great day of the Feast, when the sending of the great procession with its symbolic water of Messianic refreshing testified to the people's confession that the Messiah had not yet come, the Messiah they looked for, on that great day He stands, and over against all this bald materialism of religion lifts up Himself in full announcement of His spiritual self and person. " If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink '". O, the clearness of the issue ! The people of God confessing no Messiah had come, and the Messiah in their midst ! O, the pathos of the situation I The raging thirst for national power and life, and no thought of quenching it anywhere save at the dried up wells of politics and culture, and the living water there at their hand ! The helpless groping after a light, that groping in the darkness of the world around them, and no thought of finding it apart from the ignis fatuus of ritualism and revolution, and the light of life shining before their eyes ! The constant problem of their relationship to God, and no idea of solving it save only through a hold upon the history of the past ; the promises, the covenant, the fathers, Abraham, everything back to that, and there among them He Who is before Abraham was ! The ever present irritation of their dispersion in the world, the ever sounding cry for a reali- zing of the covenant fold and the covenant care, for God's presence with its mastering power, and no conception of how to secure this all, save through the materialism of life, and there pleadirg with them the One Who was the door of the sheep ; the Good Shepherd, Who was ready to give unto them eternal life, and from Whose hand nothing would ever pluck them away ! And the days pass on while the shadows of Calvary gather. The Jews do not see them ; the disciples do not perceive them ; no one is conscious of them save Him Who had known of them all along and Whose soul was troubled through them and exalted by them as no human soul could be. " Except a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone ; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit ". The hour was come that the Son of Man should be glorified. The judgment of the Jews against the Christ was fast approaching, but it should be a judgment of the Christ against the Jews. " Now is the judgment of this world. Now shall the prince of this world be cast out, and I " — oh, how the whole thing gathers up in the Christ Himself ! — " and /, if /be lifted up, shall draw all men unto Me ". And the people could comprehend naught of it, save to say, " How sayest Thou, the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man ?" Is it any wonder that as the shadows came they fell with greater dark- ness on the Jews than they did on the Christ? A few months before, Jesus had said to them : " I am the bread of life ; he that cometh to Me shall never hunger; he that believeth on Me shall never thirst". And now they were dragging Him up before Pilate, and crying, " A malefactor ! Crucify Him ". Truly "The light shineth in the darkness, and the darkness appre- hended it not". To Pilate Jesus might say: "I came into the world that 1 66 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. I might bear witness to the truth ", and Pilate reply, " What is truth ? " and put the truth upon the cross and let it die, and it signified but little to him, a pagan mind of pagan training. What else might we expect? But that throughout His ministry Jesus should have held Himself up before the people of God and declared Himself to them as the truth, and they cry out against Him as the lie ! O Christ, how deep the gulf between Thy spiritual self and the materialism of the world ! And they led Him away, and the soldiers crucified Him, and Pilate wrote over His head " The King of the Jews ", and the Jews mocked and railed at Him : " If Thou be the King of the Jews, come down from the cross and we will believe Thee ", And as the darkness fell upon them and the quaking earth rocked beneath their feet, they smote upon their breasts and returned to their homes and said : " The light of this imposter has gone out ". Yes, so it had, but only that it might burst forth again in resurrection splendor. Yet they saw it not, for the darkness of their souls remained within them ; and when the risen Christ was proclaimed the Saviour of the world they killed the men who preached Him as they had killed the Christ Himself, because ever stands the darkness of the world against the light of God, ever blind to it and so ever ignorant of it, ever unreceptive toward it and so ever hateful of it, till we come to realize that truth of truths — " This alone is life eternal, that they should know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ Whom Thou hast sent ". * UNBELIEF THE FUNDAMENTAL SIN. by rkv. b. l. whitivian', d. d., ll. d., Pastor ok the Fifth Baptist Church, Philadelphia, Pa. The profoundest text book in the world on Psychology is one that is seldom used,, either by teacher or by pupil. The greatest master of the human mind is the last quoted in class room or laboratory. That text book is the New Testament, and that master is Christ. We toss upon seas of distraction, blown hither and thither by winds of uncertainty and reach no haven, because we can not get or keep our course. We talk learnedly and ineffectively of doubt and illusion and hallucination and bootless quest of truth, because the very conditions of truth are wanting in us. We travel according to the rules of logic, and reach, not a conclusion, but a new and still more unmanageable term in a syllogism. We search the cold heights of intellect by the colder light of reason, and find, not a soul but a phantom. We call upon God and are answered by the echo of our own cry. We build a fool's paradise and trip its ways lightly in the dance of death, and wonder why life is not greater and more beautiful. And when we seek escape from our prison-house of folly, we follow ways that lead everywhere except to freedom. We shut our eyes to evil and take the road of blind optimism that runs swiftly to the land of disillusionment. We shut our eyes to good and take the road of blinder pessimism that runs more swiftly still to the abyss of despair. We shut our eyes to fact altogether, and take the road of skep- ticism that begins in one darkness and ends in another. The way of self- knowledge and self-surrender we do not take, and Christ says that that is the only way that leads to freedom. Thus our problem remains unsettled and life has no rest, because in our search for truth we pass truth by unrecog- nized. None the less the search for truth goes on. And this is well. For man's first duty in a world of reality is to face the facts. Whatever the theoretical difficulties of a philosophy of knowledge, the every-day man assumes that the facts that concern his life are worth knowing and that they can be known. Knowledge is relative, no doubt. We know things only as they affect us. But as long as the only condition on which a rational universe can be known at all is the condition that it shall keep faith with itself in all its parts, the values that we find written in the equations of life must have some kind of consistency throughout the system. That which the world is to me it must be in its measure to every being like me, under like conditions, wherever found. And for beings conceivably unlike me and for conditions different from mine, the world must have its meaning, the values still pro- Delivered at the Fourth Conference, held at Grace Episcopal Church, Januaiy 13, 1904. 167 ,68 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. portional, and, so far as the other life and mine have common bonds, con- vertible. The truth which to me is matter of slow reasoning may be to another matter of intuition. But for me and for that other the truth is not two truths but one. This is only saying that the universe will keep faith with us as it keeps faith with itself. Limitations will still hedge us about, and futility attend much of our effort, but up to the very edge of our power the whole universe is ours, and what we can compass we may keep. Faith is the first great note of human sanity, faith in the honesty of the universe and faith in one's own honesty in dealing with the universe. Now faith is only one of an exceedingly rich group of words expressing a disposition toward fair dealing. Belief, confidence, conviction, assurance, trust, — we could multiply the list many times without exhausting the terms properly belonging in it. And in them all we find the same dominant note. It is the note of harmony, and constantly assures us that the universe and we belong together. That which I see and hear and touch I cannot doubt and live. And when the facts are certified to me, not by the warrant of my own senses but by the senses of another, just as far as I have confidence in that other I accept his experience as valid within the limits where it may properly apply. And when it is no sense at all, my own or another's, but an experience that has no traceable connection with the senses, that brings me the fact which concerns me next, if the fact is duly certified I shall not doubt it. Now the data of our mental and spiritual life though mediated by sense are not sensible, for when I have them they are facts of consciousness, and only more or less elaborate processes of reasoning tell us that it is through the senses that certain of those facts of consciousness arise. Those processes sufficiently repeated and suitably extended give us our world. The thing we can never doubt and never be rid of is the fact of consciousness. What is there is there. And being there it must be explained and accounted for. To explain and account for part of these facts, we assume a material world. To explain and account for another part we assume a spiritual world. To get the whole implication of these worlds we are summoned to still further explanation and accounting, and so our universe or complete world comes to view. Conscious life, therefore, is a life of faith. I find certain facts within me which I cannot doubt if I would. Interrogate them I may, nay must. Doubt them I neither do nor can. And by a prodigious act of faith I pass from that world of consciousness to a world of which I know nothing except as the key to its understanding is within me, and the only warrant for whose existence at all, so far as I can see, is my need of it. This applies equally to the world of matter and to the world of spirit. In other words, the universe itself is built by faith. Of course this does not mean that the universe is only a creation of the mind. It means that I proceed to the knowledge of the universe by faith. My universe is created by faith. But this creation is creation only as a process of personal experience. So far as the universe itself is concerned UNBELIEF THE FUNDAMENTAL SIN. 169 my creation is a finding. It is there and I get to know it. But I am sure of it and I can have dealings with it on the basis of faith and faith alone. How shall we define this process or act of faith? By what words can we make clear to ourselves what we mean when we say we believe ? I believe a thing when I accept it as real. Faith, then, maybe defined as the feeling of reality. It is the assent, not of the mind only but also of the heart and will, whatever there is in the soul that grips. There are many specific outgoings of faith, as there are many forms of reality. There is physical reality. So sense perception has its corresponding feeling of reality. There is intellectual reality. So the reasoned conclusion will have its corresponding feeling of reality. There is esthetic reality. So the esthetic deliverance will have its corresponding feeling of reality. There is moral reality. So determinations of good and evil will have their corresponding feeling of reality. There is a distinctively spiritual world. So the deeper judgments of the soul will have their corresponding feeling of reality. But the feeling is in essence one. It is just the soul saying, " This I find to be true ". The thing is there and I have dealings with it. One caution should be noted. As a purely subjective experience what I find so is so. But my finding a thing so does not make the thing really so in the world that transcends purely personal experience. Sometimes things get into the mind that get nowhere else. We are obliged, therefore, more or less constantly to test the contents of our mind, to make sure that the reality we think we hold is real. Illusion, delusion, hallucination, dream, to say nothing of the thousand shapes the unsound brain will conjure into being,^ — these words stand for subjective reality that has no corresponding reality in the external world. Part of the business of every waking hour is to make sure that our faiths represent actual relations between ourselves and the universe. The faith with which we are concerned to-day is always and everywhere the living consent of the soul to have commerce with reality. It is hardly necessary, but let us say it, faith needs no justification. We can neither add to its essential character nor take away from it. It is. And it is what it is. Like any other fact of experience it has to be taken as it is found. Just as the mind brings with it the power to know and to feel and to will, so it brings with it the power to believe. We cannot analyze it, because it is a simple, ultimate mental fact. We cannot go behind it, be- cause it is at the beginning. Faith is part of the natural equipment of the normal soul. And we must not forget that unbelief may be as legitimate as belief. The justification of belief is the justification of unbelief no less. This is true whether by unbelief we mean the negation of belief or positive dis- belief. Let me be bidden to believe something that takes no hold upon my life. The thing may be true, but it means nothing to me. There may be mountains of gold in the moon. I know nothing about it. To me it is not a living hypothesis. If you ask me to believe it notwithstanding this, I can only tell you that I do not believe. There is no fact in my life upon which such a proposition takes hold. So with disbelief. Let me be assured I70 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. that in Providence there are men who habitually ignore the laws of gravity. When they wish to go from one place to another they do not walk or ride, they simply think of going and they are there. You tell me that such men may be found in all parts of the city, on Westminster Street, on Weybosset, on College Hill. What is my problem.? I cast about within me for some fact of experience on which this new fact can take hold. I find none. More than that, this proposed fact contradicts every fact of my experience, so that my entire life is a protest against its acceptance. What shall I do ? Nothing. Yet that is not quite what I shall do. I shall do nothing, but I shall decide that the man who requires such faith of me is deluded, unless I exercise the right of sound reason to set him down as a liar. Believe I cannot. Dis- believe I must. What the mind does is to assent to what it finds. If its outreach in any direction ends in the discovery of nothing, there is no call upon the soul for faith. Belief is the soul's assent to what it finds to be there. The grounds on which the soul is satisfied are many and of many kinds. I can find an object by my own eyes and ears and hands. I can find it by the eyes and ears and hands of another. I can find it without eyes and ears and hands, my own or another's, by signs which eyes and ears and hands can neither take nor interpret. But whenever and however found, reality duly certified by relation to the unquestionable facts of consciousness calls for assent in living terms. The character of the response will bear some ratio in form and value to the reality with which one enters into relation. If I believe that two and two make four, I will make my reckonings accordingly. If I believe that man is mortal, I will make my plans accordingly. If I believe that woolen is fitter material for clothing in winter than silk or cotton, I will dress for the cold in woolen. If I believe that a certain course of business procedure is profitable, I will follow that course. If I believe that it is better to be well than sick, I will seek health. If I believe that it is my duty to think of others rather than of myself, I will think of others before I think of myself. If I believe in God, I will serve and worship Him. What a man assents to and accepts as real, shapes his life. For good or for evil, belief determines conduct. Not what a man calls his belief, but his real belief shapes his life. The thing that is natural and right for the normal man is what the normal man will do. But in the face of all that is natural and right we find men failing to do what normal life requires. Here is a man to whom reason opens the way of honor and profit, and instead of taking that way the man walks straight to uncleanness and poverty. Here is a man who knows where duty lies, and he turns to the end of the world that lies farthest from duty. Here are arguments that cannot be gainsaid or denied, and yet they fall unheeded. Here is a world that is absolutely essential to the explanation of the world in which men live, and behold men treat it as less than a name. What is the result "i Disorder in the whole life in proportion to the violation of the fundamental demand of reason, that belief shall respond to fact duly certified and properly presented. The failures of which we now speak are UNBELIEF THE FUNDAMENTAL SIN. 171 so many cases of refusal to keep faith with the universe. This should be impossible. Were it not for the awful power of the human will to shape its own ways it would be impossible. But the naked fact stands, that of several possible courses I myself determine which I shall follow : throwing the weight of desire upon the side of this course as against that, recalling the decision on the point of execution, appealing to conscience or some obliga- tion that just now suddenly is seen to be precious, swaying, shaping, mould- ing, finally deciding beyond recall the path I shall take. I cannot explain how this is done. I simply find myself doing it, falling or rising by the decision. So, close by the glory of life we find life's shame. In response to the fundamental demand of reason we find a thorough-going violation of the order of the universe. At the very point where faith should be final and complete, we find faith broken or reversed altogether. It is a monstrous thing. For if it is a wrong to the soul to believe without evidence, to believe against evidence is a crime against the universe. How is this monstrous thing possible ? That which should be impossible is not impossible, as a thousand bitter experiences show. I see the better. I see it to be the better. I approve it as the better. I follow the worse. So the unnatural thing is done. But how can we refuse to decide by the evidence t The answer must lie in some kind of mental and moral disorder. One has to bear in mind the fact that there are many forms of reality. There is a world of flesh as well as a world of spirit. The experiences of the flesh are real as truly, if not as permanently, as those of the spirit. And in experience we find many elements which, though not real in valid sense, have the appearance of reality. Error consists in the acceptance of the invalid for the valid. It is possible for such acceptance to be so often repeated that practical reversal of normal conditions of life takes place. Thus what at first looks like mere intellectual and moral revolt turns out to be mental and moral dislocation. Lives helplessly halt and blind and withered go stumbling along the world's highway, some of them crying out for help, some, perhaps most, neither crying nor caring for help. We are standing face to face with the inscrutable mystery of life set to evil. The fact of such life is only too apparent. The world is full of it, our world and the great world of men. Intemperate men, impure men, dishon- est men, deceitful men, cruel men, bad men of every kind live their evil life and find all the happiness they find at all in fleshly courses. And the world lends itself to evil uses apparently with as little reluctance as it does to good. The fact is, that what we call evil and good take on their character as evil and good only when touched and determined by will. The world is the great field in which the dove finds grain and the vulture finds carrion. What one takes to the world determines what one takes from the world. The great question concerns, not grain and carrion, but dove and vulture. At bottom the question of life is a question, not of things but of people. And the set of life toward the worse is what we mean by the evil will. It is the identification of self with the lower, the coarser, the worse elements of the world. 172 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. But every mental act does more than bring itself to pass. It sets into effect certain influences in the outer world. It bears certain fruit in the world of the soul. It is with the inner world that we are concerned just now. A choice often repeated becomes the permanent choice. The act often repeated becomes the habit, the settled course of life. So we are con- stantly making and unmaking ourselves. Suppose that the tendency toward evil that manifests itself in the evil will gets reinforcement from the daily choice. The effect is seen in daily hardening of habit toward a fixed state of evil. So every choice in a given direction makes more inevitable later choice in that direction, till presently no other direction is thought of or desired. How far may this hardening go ? Milton puts into the mouth of Satan the awful words, " Evil, be thou my good." In such a case the pro- cess goes so far as to reach complete reversal of values. Is the choice of Satan psychologically possible ? A thousand cases of like choice, though perhaps less fixed and less confessed, make answer, yes. Ambition, lust, avarice, jealousy, envy, hate fill the breast with seeth- ing passion, till the very life is hell. " Which way I fly is hell, myself am hell ". Not simply Satan on his throne says that, but multitudes of men who have no throne, but who do Satan's work and live his life in acknowl- edged or unacknowledged fellowship with him. The fact is central to life, that evil choice repeated makes further evil choice probable, till no other choice is possible. And yet, responsibility cannot be disclaimed. If the choice has become inevitable, how can one be held accountable for it ? Well may a man say, when caught in the grip of the evil will, " I could not choose otherwise than as I chose in this ". Truer confession than that, lips never made. The man could not have chosen otherwise than as he did. But the inevitableness of that choice lay in earlier choices. Back and back and back we press until we reach a point in the man's life where other choice was possible. Then, under the influence of passion or ignorance or unworthy motive, the man turned from the better way. There in the choice of the worse was the beginning of the way whose end is this bond- age to evil. And the man cannot disclaim responsibility for the result. For choice is nothing but the soul taking the portion that seems to it good. Will is only the soul set to accomplish the purpose the soul has set for itself. When we do ill we are not thrust into the ill by a fate that com- pels us so to cast ourselves away. The only fate that can touch a man to make or mar him is himself. What the machinery of the universe does is to weave the choice of the hour into the fabric of life. The doctrine of fate is no myth, but God's truth plainly spoken. Only, man's fate is the fixing of man's choice, the projection of himself upon eternity. For what he is, therefore, at a given hour, the man must hold himself accountable, and himself alone. In that hour he can no longer help being what he is, but what made him what he is in that hour was his own choice, deliberate or indifferent. The web of life is of our own weaving. The natural history of the evil will helps us to understand why the UNBELIEF THE FUNDAMENTAL SIN 173 requirements of righteousness are so unwelcome to the man who has cast in his lot with unrighteousness. The set of life toward the worse reveals two worlds within the great world. In one world is all that we call good. In the other is all that we call evil. There is a distinct type of life for each of these worlds. By his conformity to one or the other of the two types a man declares his fellowship. Jesus throws this conformity into the striking terms of family fellowship. " I am of My Father God. You are of your father the devil. What I see My Father do I do. What you see your father do you do ". And as the family life of God is good, the life of those who share the family fellowship with God will be good. As the family life of the devil is bad, those who share the family fellowship of the devil will be bad. And as there is nothing in common between the two families, the life of each cannot but seem unbeautiful to the other. Jesus says plainly that the opposition He had to meet was due to something other than dislike of Him. It was want of understanding of the things with which His life was filled. And those who did not understand did more than fail to understand : they misunderstood. They could nor. see what Jesus saw or hear what Jesus heard because their w-hole life belonged in a different sphere from His. When the sense of the divine has gone out of the life no work will seem divine. For those who do not know God the word of Jesus can have no meaning as the word of God. To those who have shut heaven out of the life the very condition by which a revelation can be understood is wanting. By that test Jesus at once tried and condemned the men of His day. "If any man w-illeth to do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God or whether I speak of Myself ". "I speak the things which I have seen with My Father, and ye also do the things which ye have heard with your father. Ye do the works of your father. If God were your father, ye would love Me, for I came forth and am come from God ; for neither have I come of Myself, but He sent Me. Why do ye not understand My speech ? Even because ye cannot hear My word. Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father it is your will to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and stood not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie he speaketh of his own ; for he is a liar and the father thereof. But because I say the truth ye believe Me not, because ye are not of God ". The attitude of a given moment is predetermined. The slow setting of Ufe toward good or toward evil goes into it. One's total belief is engaged in the decision of a given question. My entire relation to party and country and race makes practically certain beforehand what I shall think of the new special political problem. My entire religious experience is involved in the answer to the new religious question, making it possible for any one who knows me thoroughly to feel sure in advance what that answer will be. As soon as one knows the family history of the men to whom Jesus speaks, one may be confident of the response they will make to the divine demand. For they are men whom selfishness has blinded till their understanding is darkened, and their judgment gone utterly astray. The best outline of the 174 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. history of human error ever written is in the first chapter of Romans. Men committed the sin of unclear judgment, with the result that succeeding judgment became less and less clear, till complete reversals of value were inevitable, and life took on a new and strange character. "Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools and changed the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man and of four-footed beasts and .creeping things ". The mystery of the power of choice remains, and the greater mystery of the use of that power unworthily. What the apostle shows is simply the movement of man's mind in the pro- cess of his undoing. Bad grows to worse. " Wherefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts unto uncleanness : for that they exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator". Worse grows to worst, "Even as they refused to have God in their knowledge, God gave them up to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient ; being filled with all unrighteousness, wick- edness, covetousness, maliciousness ; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malignity ; whisperers, back-biters, hateful to God, insolent, haughty, boast- ful, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, unmerciful : who, knowing the ordinance of God that they which practice such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but also consent with those who practice them ". There is little need of seeking further for an explanation of the judgment that lacks judgment and the life that is death. Mind and heart and will are grouped together. And the awful fact is that this outworking is only an outworking. What men do they do themselves. In this blackest picture ever painted the central fact is man's own choice of evil. God let them go their way. The evil they thought and wrought to their undoing was their own. To men who have thus chosen, the divine demand is an impossible demand. Self-centered, self-sufficient, self-seeking — what answer can a man make to the demand of self-surrender ? For the call of God in Christ Jesus is precisely that. As Professor Flint so well says of Christian faith, " It is a self-surrender, an acceptance of Christ as of God made wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption unto us ; a supreme trust in Christ based on a distinctive conviction as to His character and His rela- tionship both to God and man ". The attitude of the wilful life toward such a demand is not hard to name. Failure to accept is not so much failure as refusal. The mood of such a life is not defect but defiance. Alienation of mind ends always in hostility of will. When once the principle of the life is fixed every experience is a confir- mation of it. So the world becomes a mighty instrument of good or evil, according to the life it touches. The sun shining upon a healthy tree means life and ever more life. Upon a dead tree the shining means com- pleter death. Rain floods the foliage with fresh greenness. The fallen leaves it turns into a sodden mass. Life and death are not in the sun and rain, but in that on which they fall. It is within ourselves that we shall find UNBELIEF THE FUNDAMENTAL SIN. 175 the sentence of life and death. When the spirit fell at Pentecost, to some of the lookers-on the marvel seemed a serious thing and they questioned, saying, " What meaneth this ? " To others it was matter of mockery, and they said, " They are full of new wine ". So the history of the truth runs in all times and places in them that are being saved and in them that are per- ishing : to the one the savor from death unto death ; to the other the savor of life unto life. The life of God Himself is deeper death to the soul that closes itself against that life. What is the central principle of the unbelieving life ? Its root and bloom and fruit are one. And that one is self. It begins in self. It matures in self — thinking self, feeling self, willing self. It ends in self. The heart of unbelief is selfishness. All else follows as a matter of course, want of sympathy, separation, opposition, revolt, open warfare. What is the use of specifying the multitudinous acts of sin when we have the princi- ple of sin ? Why count the branches one by one when the pledge of them all is in the root, and we have the root ? Out of the heart proceed the things that defile, and when we have the heart we have all that the heart makes sure. Men reject Christ because they have nothing in common with Him. Their unbelief is simply their unlikeness finding expression in speech and deed. But why keep citing rejection of Christ, as if that were a special proof of unbelief ? Because it is a special proof of unbelief. The spirit and the words and the works of Jesus were divine. They were the spirit and words and works of God. To know Jesus was to know God. Not to see God in the life of Jesus was to show oneself incapable of seeing Him anywhere. Over and over Jesus said, " Believe Me. But if you cannot yet believe Me, look at My works and believe what they say ". The works of God can come only from the life of God. The character of the works of Jesus was not doubted, even by those who hated the spirit by which they were wrought. That was the blasphemy which the judgment of God smote back upon the very lips of denial : insistence by men who knew better, that the divine work before their eyes was the work of the devil. But that was only the crowning denial, the full-voiced unbelief that did not shrink even from charging a lie upon the holiness of God. If that is not itself always the unpardonable sin, it is a sin that joins hands with the unpardonable sin. The rejection of Christ is only less vital. As long as there is possibil- ity of recognizing sin at all, the rejection of Christ will be recognized as sin. The men to whom the Spirit of God brings home conviction of sin find their quickened consciences responding most readily at that very point, as at last they see that all the while God has been looking upon them in the face of Jesus Christ. And though they may have been slow to acknowledge that there is such a thing as sin in the world, when once they realize what Jesus Christ means to the world they must say, " Here at last is something that is unmistakably evil, my denial of the right of Jesus Christ to my life ". And in that evil lies the secret of all other evils that reveal in human life alienation from the mind of God and hostility to His will. Unbelief is the fundamental sin, the root from which every specific sin draws its life. 176 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. And this is a teaching to take hold of the life of our own day. It belongs not simply to a far-off time and people but to the present and to us. The claims of Jesus Christ are as direct today as ever. The life of God is as real as ever. "And this is life eternal, that they should know Thee, the only true God, and Him Whom Thou didst send, even Jesus Christ ". * KNOWLEDGE OF THE TEACHING OF JESUS THROUGH THE DOING OF THE WILL OF GOD. Pastor of the New York Avenue Methodist Episcopal Church, Brooklyn, N. V. " If any man willeth to do His will, he shall know of the teaching whether it be of God or whether I speak of Myself ". (St. John 7: 17 — R. V.) Perhaps the best way of approach to an understanding of this passage is to take the words in their apparently simple and obvious intent. The easy and natural interpretation of the verse would be something as follows : If any man deliberately sets his will toward right doing he will have little difficulty in realizing the essential divineness of the teaching of Jesus. Knowledge arises out of deed. Let a man come to the words of Jesus with a deliberate intention to realize in his activity the highest kind of life, and he will find in the teaching of the Master a satisfaction which will convince him of the truth of the teaching. With continued doing of the Divine Will set forth in the revelation of Jesus there will come an increasingly solid deposit of conviction as to the truth of that revelation. We all know what it is to set the will firmly in devotion to right doing; we all know too what it is to know truth, — to rest in the conviction that the deep satisfaction which a thought brings is a warrant for holding the thought as true. We all know, further, how this satisfaction comes out of experience in the practice of the truth. As the practice of the truth brings increased and deepened satisfaction, we attain to a certainty and immediacy of conviction which nothing can shake. This is what one coming to an interpretation of the text with experience in the search for certainty as to truth in real life would make out of the statement of Jesus. Such a one might put his thought into finer expression, but his conclusion would be substantially that here given. Jesus enforced as no other has ever done the thought that God is a person of moral quality— of highest and holiest righteousness. This con- ception is in one form or another probably at the bottom of most doing of the will of God. Let now a man determined to do the will of God hear the teaching of Jesus concerning the character of God. Will he not at once recognize the teaching as the goal for which his soul has been seeking? Suppose that he goes forward in his righteous doing with the teaching of Jesus definitely in mind. Is it not inconceivable that there should be any other result than a deepening conviction as to the truth of what Jesus has taught ? Or take the teaching of Jesus as to the essential dignity and worthi- • Delivered at the Fourth Conference, held at Grace Episcopal Church, January 13, 1904. 177 178 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. ness of humanity. Can there be better preparation for the full reception of this truth than the doing of the will of God, and if the life be constantly ordered with the teaching of Jesus as to the eternal worth of the moral will constantly before the mind, is it not inevitable that the soul should come to a settled conviction as to its own eternal value in the moral universe ? Will not the doing of the will of God make the attitude of Jesus toward sin seem the one true attitude ? Will not the reliance upon Jesus for spiritual life by one who is earnestly seeking to do right bring an assurance deep and stead- fast as to the truth of the Master's claim to be a veritable center of life-giving forces ? If Christ is taken as king in the realm of right doing, He will prove by the actual results in the increased spiritual power of His followers that He is what He claims to be. The appeal is to life, — the same appeal that we make in the case of any claim, — the appeal to success. Can the claim make itself good? The final test of truth is just the satisfaction we attain as we think the truth. If the mind is at rest as it contemplates a revelation, the revelation is held to be true. Jesus did not come to set forth mere statements of facts; He came to reveal and enforce certain truths. The test of these truths is in the feeling of spiritual satisfaction which they bring. The doing of the will of God, — the taking of Jesus at His word and the practice of His revelation as a matter of moral doing will beget in the heart of the doer the satisfaction which is the real and vital witness. This would seem to be the meaning of the passage to one who should read it for its clear and plain intent. This natural interpretation must be allowed to stand if there is no good reason for going behind it. Jesus did not make hidden enigmas of statements like this. He spoke the language of real life, and while He loaded His words with a significance which eternity cannot exhaust, He no doubt intended us to start with the simple significance which lies upon the surface. There are some, however, who might grant a measure of consent to this general statement who would nevertheless insist that it gives not quite the right ground for religious certainty. First among the objectors might be put those who hold that no inner assurance is necessarily a part of the knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus. For example, an intelligent friend of mine recently attended an inquirer's service held by a reputable and responsible clergyman in a neighboring city. The issue up for illumination was just this matter of Christian certainty. " How can I know the truth to be the truth " was the question of seeker after seeker. The response was stereotyped : " We know that this is true because the Bible says so". Some of these questions had to do with inner and vital experience. " What ground have we for believing that we are sons of God ? " The answer was: " Have you complied with the Biblical conditions so far as you know ? If you have, you are His sons simply because the Bible says so. This is not a matter primarily of inner satisfaction. It is a matter of taking the word of God as true, no matter whether there be any mental rest or not ". The point is clear. This clergyman did what many others have been doing from the beginning. He found the ground for rehgious certainty KNOWLEDGE OF THE TEACHING OF JESUS. 179 in the appeal to an external authority. The appeal to the authority settles all. There is no further need of argument. The truth of this putting all are willing to concede. If a seeker has become almost morbid through introspective search after some mysterious sign, no better advice could be given him tlian this encouragement to take the word of an external authority. Moreover, for very many, or for all of us during certain stages of experience, there must be this re- liance upon authority apart from any response of inner satisfaction. In one form or another the authoritative deliverance by the church, or the parent, or the teacher, or the Book, must play the decisive part in the religious experience of immaturity. All these forms of authoritative utterance get their force, however, from the fact that out of centuries of Christian doing has come a race-wide and heart-deep satisfaction which lends inevitable momentum to the utterance. The Bible is believed not because of its being an external authority settling questions by lawyer-like dogmatism. It is received because centuries of Christian doing have resulted in satisfaction deep and abiding. It rests not upon bodies of evidence of a merely historical and critical kind. If the revelation were merely the utterance of an external authority no one would trouble himself with it long enough to ask about evidences. Another objector declares that Christian certainty is not to be likened to our feeling of satisfaction as we become convinced of any other truth. He tells us that Christian certainty is a matter altogether apart from any other kind of certainty. If not altogether a miraculous revelation it stands aloof from the ordinary experiences of the mental life. It is a peculiar assurance which we recognize at once as coming from the divine spirit. It is a veritable witness of the Spirit and is not to be confounded with any lower order of knowing whatsoever. If we would know God we must have moments of rapt exaltation when we see things hidden from the foundation of the world. Here too there is a measure of truth. If it is possible for the soul to be completely transported by its enthusiasm for earthly objects, it is altogether unreasonable not to allow the same transports of enthusiasm for divine objects. If love for a friend or for a country produces mountain-top experiences, from which we learn more than from months of living at the lower levels, it is perfectly possible to have like moments of illumination as to the things of God. But there is nothing essentially miraculous about these experiences. So far as they have value in any case they come out of the solid devotion which manifests itself in doing. If the ecstasy over friend, or country, or God, comes not out of doing the will of country, or friend, or God, it has but little value. Let a man give himself to the real doing of the will of the Father and the firm conviction that he is on the path of life, may, in particular circumstances, rise to bursts of enthusiastic delight. But underneath all this is the rock basis of ethical, spiritual devotion. Out of this the knowledge comes. And whether the knowledge ever rises to the exalted plane or not, there will be for the doer of the will of God steady satisfaction of settled conviction. j8o the gospel of ST. JOHN. Still another objector comes forward. He is evidently much impressed ty the strictly scientific character of the day in which we live and tells us that this word of the Master is clearly an appeal to a strictly scientific test. If we wish to know Christian truth let us put it to a test of experiment just as the worker in the laboratory puts his discoveries to the test of experi- ment. The objector has evidently overlooked the distinction between matters of truth on the one hand and matters of objective fact on the other. The body of Christ's teaching is not a body of scientific facts. It is a setting forth of truths. Truths are not so much for detailed verification by laboratory experiment as for the proof which comes as they show their wearing qualities in the doubts and stresses which are so frequent in actual life. Yet the truth as it is in Jesus has just as scientific foundation as do those general conceptions which underlie scientific discovery. For these, too, are matters of belief and faith. They are the product of atmosphere and the general conditions which have been thrown around the mind. The work of the experimenter is in large part done before the test is made in the laboratory. It has been done in the shaping of the general conceptions which underlie all scientific procedure. It has been done in the scientific tendency given to the experimenter's mind. On last analysis it would be found that this means that the experimenter has for years been holding certain general conceptions which have been capable of no further proof than the satisfaction which they give to the mind as it conducts its activities. Even the belief in " evolution " which is made so much of in these days rests not so completely upon this or that body of demonstrated fact as upon the general satisfaction which the thought gives the mind. The scientific investigator does not today lay much stress upon apriori methods, but he is an apriorist nevertheless. He may not be an apriorist in the sense that he holds to hard and fast statements of principle which are to guide his discoveries, but the principles are in his thought neverthe- less in the shape of certain expectations and tendencies and inner tests of satisfaction which really determine — if not what he shall find — at least the emphasis he shall put upon what he finds. So then we feel all the more inclined to hold fast the natural reading of the passage of this book of John concerning the knowledge of the truth through doing the will of God. The passage means that as we do the will of God there comes into our minds an increasing and solid deposit of conviction that we are upon the side of the truth in holding what Christ has brought us. The conviction may be that indefinable something which we ordinarily have in mind when we use the word about any matter of belief, or it may rise at times into something more definite, even the transport of an overwhelming enthusiasm. But in any case we have the heart of the truth when we say that Jesus meant just this, that out of Christian doing there comes increasing assurance as to the truth which Jesus taught. While we would not care to bring the teaching to the test of this or that particular experiment we are willing to say that if by experiment is meant the general KNOWLEDGE OF THE TEACHING OF JESUS. i8i conduct of the life, we claim for Christian truth that it can be submitted to experiment as truly as can any other truth. In the satisfaction which follows the making of the truth taught by Jesus the rule of the life we have the inner conviction which assures of the truth of the teaching. But we meet still some further objection. The contender for the real and vital communion between the soul and God feels that somehow we have handed this entire matter of assurance over to the natural as distinguished from the supernatural. Instead of the direct witness of God's spirit with ours we have now only the same kind of assurance which follows grasp upon any kind of truth. The trouble with our explanation is that it seems altogether too easy. To discuss this point with thoroughness would carry us over into metaphysics. We may say, however, that what has been set forth above is said with the conviction that in God we live and move and have our being; that the powers which we call natural are just as truly His as those we call supernatural or miraculous ; that He is in all the things of this universe except sin ; that the worst kind of atheism is that which looks to find God only in the startling and unusual rather than in the orderly, ever^^ day processes which are so common ; that the assurance which we have as to the truth, even if it seems like assurance as to any other kind of truth, is produced by the immediate contact of God, even though he be acting in a way which we call altogether natural. It is high time for the church to get rid of the deism which has haunted her for so long. The modern preaching of the doctrine of " Divine Immanence ", crude as much of it is, is helping us to realize the presence of God in the world of external nature. It is time for the church to take the further step and insist more earnestly that God is not only in orderly physical movements, but in orderly psychological movement as well. Mental realm as well as material realm should be looked upon as the abode of His law. There is only one way that I can be convinced of the Truth, and this is by taking it as the guide of my life and seeing if the satisfaction of assurance follows. But another makes the objection that if God is the immediate inspiring agent back of all truth how are we to decide between truths of differing degrees of importance. We have been taught that the Truth as it is in Jesus is the supreme truth, but if all truth comes to us as the inspiration of God, is not all truth on a level ? There is really very little need of disturbance at this point. The doing of the will of God is supposed to make the will of God the supreme consider- ation. If we wish to know whether the knowledge of the truth of Jesus is the supreme truth there is only one test. Put it in the supreme place and see if the soul finds supreme satisfaction. God indeed tells us all things that are really true. All good gifts come from Him. There is nothing in this thought, however, that should put all the gifts on a dead level of impor- tance. The belief is to be judged by the satisfaction which follows taking it as a rule of life. If we wish to get the true perspective on the importance 1 82 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. of God's gifts let the perspective be the perspective of Jesus. The appeal is always to life. But does this conception provide against error ? Is it not possible for a man to be woefully mistaken ? Can he not go on year after year thinking that he is doing God's will and becoming all the more convinced that his error is the truth ? This is of course possible, but it is possible on any system. The believer in a miraculous witness of the spirit is just as likely to be mistaken as the holder of the view here set forth. All that we can say is that we ought to have something of the confidence in a right outcome that possessed the Master. He was not unaware of the mistakes that men might make, and yet he seemed perfectly sure of his final triumph. There is a great deal of the merely abstract about this scruple. The difficulty is not great in real life. If a central African chorus should attempt to prove to us that their atrocious discords are superior to the music of Handel's Messiah, we should concede the saving sincerity of the African's belief, but should hold fast to our own thought nevertheless. We should even think ourselves warranted in holding fast, no matter how great the body of proof the heathen singers might bring forth. The satisfaction that comes from doing the will of God includes the belief that in the end the truth will prevail. But now our scientific friend of a few moments ago returns with the protest that all this is desperately unscientific. The foundations of the faith must be deeper laid than in the consciousness of satisfied assurance in the minds of the disciples. We have to respond to him as we did before, that there is just as much basis for the belief in Christian truth as there is for belief in scientific truth. Science must have assumptions which rest only on the satisfaction which they give the inner life. That splendid system of law, according to which all things are controlled to the very center is an assumption. If the physicist declares that he takes nothing into the laboratory with him, we make speedy response that he takes this far-reaching assumption with him. And he takes it simply because it satis- fies his inner needs. He will not be satisfied with thought of an arbitrary and irrational chaos of truant and fugitive facts. He will set aside experi- ment after experiment in the hope to vindicate this settled assumption. Or take the thought of the uniformity of nature. This assumption also stands largely because of the satisfaction it gives our mental needs. Underneath all laboratory research is the invisible, unproved basis which is really the guiding factor in the scientist's work. If the scientist points to the body of actual result which follows his assumption, so can we point to the body of actual result which follows our taking the doing of the will of God to be our guide toward the truth. We conclude this part of the discussion as we began, by saying that Jesus rested His system upon the consciousness which would come to men's minds as they acted upon the truth He proclaimed. The Gospels do not stand simply because they have been uttered by divine man. They stand because men longing to be divine have become convinced of their truth in KNOWLEDGE OF THE TEACHING OF JESUS. 183 actual doing. If they ceased to satisfy when taken as the actual guide for men determined to do the will of God, nothing could keep them in the thought of the world. They would have value only to the antiquarian or to the historian. " If any man willeth to do the will of God he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God or whether I speak of Myself ". The revelation which comes in Jesus is the very top and crown of all of God's manifestations of Himself. The final witness to the truth of that revelation is the feeling of satisfaction which it begets in submissive hearts. After having dwelt thus on the meaning of the text, perhaps a word as to some phases of the usableness of the principle here set forth may be in order. The principle provides first of all for a basis of suitable modesty of Christian claim as to knowledge. We are to be unflinchingly certain of the truths which come to us as convictions begotten by religious doing. Some things will be and should be gripped with increasing tenacity as life goes on, but some other things ought to be held lightly and contemplated from the standpoint of a genuine Christian agnosticism. Truths which come to us as the result of doing the will of God belong to the first class, while con- jectures which do not harden into convictio 1 as the product and accom- paniment of the will's faithful activity may well be put in a second and inferior class. For example, Jesus taught us of immortality. The man who goes forth to live as if immortality were actually reachable finds himself coming to ineradicable assurance as to his own essential deathlessness. There are, however, some items of the future life which we all guess at but which are not forced into conviction out of Christian doing. The details of the heavenly existence, the manner of " body " the soul shall have, the precise character of the tasks that are to be ours, the final disposition of the wicked, — matters like these do not come within the reach of the illumina- tion of Christian doing. If there are, on the other hand, implications which follow by a sort of spiritual necessity from the underlying trust in immor- tality there is no reason why we should not hold them fast. If, for instance, earthly friendships are lifted to the exalted spiritual realm where they are eternally worth while, there is every ground for the trust that nothing in the final shock can touch them. But let us always remember that declarations as to hidden things which do not base themselves on convictions rising out of the doing of God's will should be put forward merely as conjectures. Again, consider the bearing of the Master's principle on some of the profoundest speculations in Christian philosophy. The underlying basis in this philosophy is a body of conviction produced in us by obedience to God. We believe in the God Whom Jesus revealed because the assumption of that God's existence as a working belief in our lives convinces us that He is and that He is the rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. Active acceptance of Jesus Christ as the Son of God leads to the completest acquiescence in His claims. Moreover, we can go further. On the basis of our certainty as to the ethical life of God we can reach out into some legiti- mate speculations as to the inmost life of God. We put these speculations 1 84 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. to the same test as the more primary beliefs and if we find satisfaction in them we hold them as true until we get something better. This is, of course, mere philosophical commonplace, but it would be well if we stated more often and more clearly just the ground on which many of our beliefs rest. We need no better basis than this, — that the belief is forced upon us by the doing of the will of God. For illustration, look at the doctrine of the Trinity. What is the secret of its persistence through the centuries in spite of all the intellectual scruples urged against it? Just this, — that we are forced to the belief in one form or another through the strength of our conviction as to the ethical character of God. We wish to make adequate provision for that ethical life, and as ethical life calls for worthy objects on which to expend itself, we say that the Father finds such objects in Son and Spirit. We even go further and give the Son and Spirit personal life that there may be the social requisites of highest ethical experience. The point upon which I now insist is that the effective demand comes from the necessity, which we feel as we do God's will, for some real basis for ethical fulness in the source of all moral and spiritual doing. Of course we may profess to rest our belief on some other foundation stones, but their masonry will not bear close scrutiny. We may say that God must have an object equal to Himself in the very nature of the mind's activity, — that an infinite subject is an absurdity without an infinite object. But if God were not a moral being, the mere psychological demand for an object could be satisfied without having the object worthy and without making it personal. God might be a supreme Egotist glorying in unsocial and loveless loneliness ; or He might grovel in an endless succession of infinitely trivial, or infinitely silly, or infinitely wicked objects. No; the only basis for belief in the Trinity is the pressure for the doctrine as we do the commandments of God. If the pressure of these needs should lessen, our hold on the doctrine of the Trinity would slacken. If the pressure should still further decrease we would surrender the thought of the moral nature of God, and complete removal of the pressure might do away with belief in God altogether. Instead of trying to find some other foundation we ought frankly to face our problem and insist upon the superior stability of a basis which rises out of the mighty upward push of ethical needs. All we ask of reason is that it shall help us express the implications which ethical con- victions carry with them; and that it shall free us from thought which is self- contradictory. Instead of haggling with merely "intellectual" reasoners over the technically logical standing of some belief in Christian philosophy, we should make all reasonable allowance for the frailty of human reasoning and then insist that these beliefs have something of the warrant of the Master's utterance about doing the will and knowing the truth. There ought to be some value too in the thought of the text for our true attitude as reverent critics of the Biblical literature. We are living in an age when science takes all things seriously; and scientific methods are employed as never before in the test of the Scripture narrative. It would be hard to say too much in praise of the results which have come from these methods in the hands of many experts. But there is a danger lest the KNOWLEDGE OF THE TEACHING OF JESUS. 185 methods become too entirely the methods of the merely professional investi- gator. The exclusive reliance on the strictly technical tends to the deadening of that spiritual sympathy which ought to be supreme in Biblical criticism. " I never read anything about the Bible which is not critical" said a distin- guished theological professor recently. Some of this scholar's unreliability is explained by the statement. Critical investigation ought to be accom- panied with that keenness of spiritual insight which is the deposit and outcome of doing the will of God. This ethical insight will mean more than months of technical scrutiny. If the merely textual critic of Shakespeare is to be distrusted, why should not the merely textual critic of the Scripture be distrusted.^ If a critic must steep his mind with the very spirit of Shakespeare before he really becomes able to speak with authority about the author and his work, why should not the same rule hold in the study of the Bible.'' If the one way to come into close understanding of the spirit of Jesus is by doing the will of God, why should not religious devotion be exalted as an indispensable equipment for the study of the word of God? Let us see if this principle can be made of any practical benefit. Take the narratives of the Virgin Birth, for example. The critics busy themselves with minute technical and professional scrutiny of the Gospel account. Many of them seem to think that their critical and scientific processes are the final reliance in the attainment of whatever truth is to be reached. But the man who, out of complete devotion to the will of God, has brought his thought to sympathy with the fineness of the Spirit which is back of and beneath the Book makes almost instantly this significant discovery, — that whereas it would have been deemed apriori improbable that the narrative could be told without shocking reverence, yet that very wonder has been accomplished. The story is there, and is there with an exquisite delicacy which is quite a considerable argument for its veracity. Or take another incident even more detailed. We have in John the story of the Master's treatment of the woman taken in adultery. The critics tell us that the narrative did not originally have a place in John's Gospel, — that it was put in at a date later than the date of the Gospel and by a hand other than that of the apostle. This we are entirely willing to concede. But when the critic goes further and insists that the narrative cannot be true, we demur. We are perfectly willing to take any critical conclusions forced upon us by the facts, but we insist, first, that this question be con- sidered. How does it happen that the narrative appeals to those who have by righteous life come to closest understanding of the spirit of Jesus as per- fectly in harmony with what we should expect of His character.' We cannot believe that any one could have beforehand predicted what Jesus would do in a situation like that of the story, but we feel that the narrative is true to Him. We would not exalt this principle unreasonably, but we nevertheless feel that in this case and in others like it the merely technical methods of the profession alist are not the final instruments. The insight that comes out of doing the will of God is no unimportant part of the furnishing of the competent Biblical student. Instead of telling men to prepare themselves with the latest technical knowledge so as to be able to meet destructive 1 86 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. criticism on its own ground, it would seem just at present to be in order to call also for the development of a spiritual insight to which the destructive critic does not attain. Better make the attack upon him from that higher ground to which he does not come. Not only has this principle philosophical and critical value, but it has also homiletical value. It is our aim as teachers and preachers to instruct men in the teaching of Jesus. How shall we do this? The important method is that of this passage, — the stirring of the depths of the ethical life to the doing of the will of God. I suppose that Jesus depended very little, after all, on His direct oral teaching for the development of the twelve for apostleship. He did not insist upon note book methods of instruction. He aimed to get the disciples to doing the will of God. In the midst of all our attempts to get the Gospel into some simple form so that men may see it at a glance, we should not let go of this fundamental principle of the Master's pedagogics, — that the truth worth seeing can only be seen as we do the will of God, — that unless we rouse the wills of men to righteousness we cannot get them to understand the Gospel. How this is to be done is a problem that taxes us to the utmost, but if we can do it we have the essential thing, not only for the salvation of the souls of the men with whom we work, but for the enlightenment of the church and the world as to the truth of the system which came with Jesus. If it will not unduly extend a paper already too long, let me say in closing that it seems to me that we have in this utterance of Jesus a glimpse at the truth in that most fascinating of all realms of study, — the inquiry as to the secret of the wisdom of Jesus and the unfolding of His mind. For those who think that Jesus brought all His knowledge with Him from the beginning, — that He surrendered nothing m becoming man, this question has of course no meaning. But those of us who believe that it really cost the Son of God something substantial to become man are not willing to admit that all wisdom was His from childhood. We can see that the personal thread of inalienable self-feeling must have been with the Master in all phases of His existence, but we cannot think that His self-knowledge and His penetration of the depths of the wisdom of God came without effort of will. We feel that we have the key to the secret in this passage. From the beginning the will of Jesus swung intuitively toward God. As He did the will of the Father that infinite wisdom which is of God descended as a matter of course. So far as concerns the essential body of His teaching He found the truth not by miraculous revelation, but by profound conviction resulting from perfect obedience to the will above. Out of the perfect deed came the perfect knowledge. Jesus spoke out of His own experience when He said that doing the will of God would bring certainty as to the truth. The lesson brings not only enlightenment but encouragement. As we approximate to His devotion to the will of God we shall approximate to His understanding of the wisdom of God. The one thing that keeps back the descent of the perfect wisdom is imperfect, half-hearted doing. If we could go about doing good as He did we could more speedily come near the wisdom which was His. * SPIRIT AND LIFE. (St. John 7 : 37-39.) by rkv. aaiory h. bradkord, d. t>., Pastor ok the First Congregational Church, Montclair, N. J. The doctrine of the Spirit as stated in the seventh chapter of John's Gospel, impresses one even at the first glance with its vastness and its mystery. What do these texts mean? " If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink. He that believeth on Me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. But this spake He of the Spirit, which they that believed on Him were to receive ; for the Spirit was not yet given; because Jesus was not yet glorified ". Here are two distinct utterances ; the former was spoken by Jesus, and the latter is an intrepretation of His words by the writer of the Fourth Gospel. The Master was speaking to seekers after the truth rather than to the disciples. He says in substance : If you are really athirst for God and for reality, come to Me, trust Me, believe on Me, and you shall be so full of the true life that it will flow out of you as waters from an overflowing fountain. In other words if you really desire truth and right, come into personal con- tact with Me and you will receive what you desire in abundance. If those who are athirst for truth and right will accept Jesus and follow Him, they will be enabled to live the life of the Spirit, to realize the power of the Spirit, and to help others to do so. Let us consider spirit as life in the history of mankind. Spirit is /I'g/if because it is life. Spirit is uni- versal ; consequently light is universal. Spirit according to the Christian usage of the word is everywhere that the Christian revelation has gone. The spiritual life is the spirit in man which is spelled with a small s, touched by the Spirit of God which is spelled with a capital S. Within all true Christians, therefore, is all the light they need for illumination and guidance. " Ye have an unction from the Holy One and need not that any man should teach you ". This, as I understand it, is the doctrine of the Quakers. " When He, the spirit of truth will come. He will lead you into all truth and show you things to come ". What does this mean ? That some external divine light in some strangely mystical way falls upon us and illuminates our path ? Does it not mean rather that within the souls of all men there is light, obscured, perhaps, but surely there, which is sufficient for all man's duties; that the candle in every soul is lighted by the sun which is God, and that it is our supreme duty and privilege to use the light which shines * Abstract of an address delivered at the Fourth Conference, held at Grace Episcopal Church, January 13, 1904. 187 1 88 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. within, and which will never fail those who are pure in mind and loyal in heart. The chief spiritual difficulty of our time is that we are not willing to know ourselves. The oracle was right, " Know thyself ", for thus, and thus only may you hope to know God. I am well aware that it may be said in reply : " Then all authoritative standards go, — then the guess of one man is worth as much as the guess of another ". But there is the mistake. I am not speaking of the guesses of any man, but I am insisting that the final truth is written within as surely, if not as clearly, as without ; that it was within before it was without ; that it was expedient for Jesus to go away in order that the eyes of His disciples might be turned inward rather than outward ; and that we have no more sacred obligation than to study the truth in the inner light, and that no man who is loyal to himself can, at the same time, be false to God. Our next point is that Spirit which is life is the cause of progress and, may it not be said, the efficient force in evolution ? What is evolution ? It is the gradual development according to inherent laws, of a resident force. What is that force ? I choose to call it Spirit. Indeed evolution seems to me to be the process by which the Spirit immanent in the universe rei^ponds to the Spirit who transcends the universe. Finally the spiritualization of all men and of all institutions is the goal of history. All men are spirits ; but all do not live in the realization of their spiritual origin and destiny. A spiritual being has been evolved, but often turns back to fleshly conditions from which he has risen and does not know himself to be a spirit. That is sin. Individuals are spiritualized when they realize that they are spirits come from God, and live according to their higher rather than their lower natures. And this is the lesson of lessons — actually to appreciate that we are spirits, and that, as naturally as flowers turn toward the sun, when we are our true selves we turn toward God the Father of spirits, and are dis- satisfied with everything at enmity with Him. When men shall dwell in the consciousness that they are partakers of God's very nature, and therefore spirits, for He is Spirit, and are in harmonious relations with one another, as God-like spirits must be, then the race will be spiritualized, and the triumph of the Kingdom of God will be near. The Spirit of God identifying Himself with the spirit in man is " The •inner light ", — the candle of the Lord, — the revealer of truth and duty. He is the inspiration toward holy conduct, the power which makes truth to become life. He is the cause of progress in individuals and among the institutions of men ; and the spiritualization of the whole race of man, until the vilest and meanest shall think the thoughts and do the deeds and share the glory of Christ, is the goal of history, " The one far-off event Toward which the whole creation moves ". * THE SINLESSNESS OF JESUS. (St. John 8 : 29, 46.) BY RKV. ■WIUL.IA.M: R. HUNTINGTON, D. D., Rector of Grace Episcopal Church, New York. Invited to address this Conference upon the subject of the sinlessness of Jesus as evidenced by the contents of certain specified chapters of the Fourth Gospel, I felt, for the moment, that I had been shut up between too narrow limits. Why not listen to St. Peter and St. Paul, I asked myself, as well as to St. John ? Or if, for sufficient reason, one must needs be confined to a solitary New Testament author, why not be given access to all of that author's writings, rather than be tied down to a fractional portion of a single one of them ? Had not St. John dealt with this topic in his letters as well as in his Gospel ? Enquiry and meditation, however, soon convinced me that the range given was amply wide, and that a single chapter out of the designated four furnished enough, and more than enough material to supply all my need. I even found it possible to narrow down the sources of information still further, and confess myself, to-day, quite content to stake the whole issue upon two detached sayings, one of them a question and the other an affirma- tion,— both of them together not covering more than twenty words. The secret of this abatement in my demand upon Holy Scripture lies here. I am convinced that certitude as to the sinlessness of Jesus is really conditioned upon an act of faith. We declare Him sinless not because we have critically reviewed His life and found no flaw, but because we have yielded assent to what He says about Himself. In other words, "Christ alone without sin " is a dogma, not a generalization, Absolutely to prove the point from facts observed is impossible. We get at it by beUeving in words spoken, by crediting, for sufficient cause, a solemn asseveration. I learned this from James Mozley, one of the keenest as well as weightiest of the nineteenth-century theologians. In the course of a controversy waged with Professor Tyndall, late in the sixties, over the subject of miracles, Mozley found occasion to show, and did show most convincingly, the utter impossibility of proving in any case inward sanctity from outward actions. He instances our Lord's denuncia- tions of the Scribes and Pharisees, and then remarks: "To those who admit, upon the evidence which is laid before them, our Lord's sinlessness, there is not the slightest discord between such language and such sinless- ness, but common reason tells us that had we to judge of such language without the assumption of our Lord's sinless character, we could not tell but that some element of imperfection, some shade of prejudice, some pas- •Delivered at the Fourth Conference, held at Grace Episcopal Church, January 13, 1904. 189 I90 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. sionate excess, might enter into such censures. The majesty, the integrity, the holiness of our Lord's character is indeed conspicuous and obvious upon the facts of the case, but when we attribute absolute sinlessness to Him, it is plain that by the laws of reason we must be going upon some further evidence than that which is contained in His outward life and deportment". The method to which Mozley in these words points us is so unlike that commonly adopted by Christian apologists, that we shall do well to make sure of understanding it. The more usual course with defenders of the faith is, as we know, to marshal the facts and incidents which in the four Gospels connect themselves, more or less closely, with the person of Christ, and then to urge the conclusion that a life so luminous in its entirety must necessarily have been in its details wholly without spot. But to one who realizes the universality of sin, to one who discerns in sin a characteristic of the human lot which none escapes or can escape, such reasoning is scarcely satisfactory. It may and does suffice to prove the Son of Mary holier than any other born of woman, but to be sinless, in the fullest and deepest sense the word can bear, means to be what no man ever has been, unless we rec- ognize this one solitary exception. In a word, if Jesus was really sinless, His sinlessness must count as the miracle of history, more marvelous than any other recorded marVel, a wonder beyond all other wonders, signal and unique. Surely if there be any phenomenon that transcends experience and defies parallel it is sinlessness, and since under the most favorable of circumstances it is confessedly difficult to authenticate a miracle, doubly difficult ought it to be reckoned to establish in any given instance absolute immunity from blame. A character may be so white and pure as literally to dazzle us by the brilliancy of its perfection, (there have been such,) and yet be far from sinless. Though the unaided eye discerns them not, there are spots on the sun. "The very source and fount of day Is flecked with wandering isles of night". Who, then, is this Light of the World, this Sun of Righteousness, that of Him any should dare to say, He alone among the hundreds of thousands of millions who have come into this world out of the unseen was sinless ? The facts of His life do, indeed, prove Him to have been the holiest of men, but there is a difference between being the hoUest of men and being holy as God is holy. We are in a temper now to look at the two sayings out of St. John's Gospel, one of them an affirmation, one a question, upon which I declared myself willing to rest the whole case. They are these : " I do always those things which please Him ". " Which of you convicteth me of sin ? " These words unquestionably place Jesus of Nazareth in a class by Him- self. It is not known that any other human being ever used the like. The two utterances differ in form ; the one is a positive assertion, the other is a challenge, but in purport they are identical. Always to do those things which please God is, ex vi termini, to be sinless, for on this same Evangelist's authority "he that doeth righteousness is righteous". THE SINLESSNESS OF JESUS. 191 The question is, can we, and do we, trust Jesus Christ, when He thus speaks? If we can and do, the entire question in controversy is for us set- tled ; the miracle of history is acknowledged, the unique exception recognized. No longer do we find it necessary laboriously to examine and critically to weigh the arguments for and against this point of sinlessness. We say, as the Samaritans said to the woman who had brought them out from their city to the place where Jesus was : " Now we believe, not because of thy saying, for we have heard Him ourselves and know that this is indeed the Christ". Depend upon it, friends, this whole matter of religion, as Christians have to do with it, is an affair of personal confidence, to be settled like any other affair of personal confidence— can I trust him or can I not? "The man believed the word which Jesus had spoken unto him, and went his way ". That tells the whole story. Clear-cut against the back-ground of the past stands Jesus Christ. We talk about forgetting Him, ignoring Him, relegating Him to obscurity, vot- ing Him obsolete. It cannot be done. There He stands. His eyes, like the eyes of a portrait on the wall, follow us whithersoever, in this narrow room called human life, we turn. Thrust aside even ever so violently He cannot be, waved aside even ever so courteously He will not be. He is here to stay. Reckon with Him we must. Well then, on the whole, shall we trust Him ? I say " on the whole ", wishing by that phrase to intimate that I have no disposition to minimize the difficulties of faith. But after making all the allowance that you please or that the facts in the case demand for draw-backs and set-backs, after dis- counting the clatter of the critics, the cold neutrality of the literary guild, the strivings of the many that oppose themselves by whatsoever name known or called, — on the whole, all things considered, Christendom being what it is, these nineteen hundred years having been what they have been, can we do better, you and I, than take Jesus at His word? If we do, the sinless- ness is part of it all. Which of us convicteth Him of sin ? Not one, and why ? For the simple reason that He is innocent. "I do always" He says, "those things that please Him". "Assertion, pure assertion ! "—yes, I grant it,— but then we have just agreed that, on the whole, we see our way to giving the asserter our confidence. That settles the matter. Even as those who first trusted in Christ, in Christ we trust. I propose now to set opposite this statement, " I do always such things as please Him ", three other New Testament affirmations, which, upon their face, appear to contravene it. If we find after analysis and investigation that these sayings, so far from being contradictory to, are really confirmatory of the sinlessness of Jesus, we shall be in a position to declare that the men upon whose teaching Christendom is founded, are, with respect to this all- important point, of one mind. " Why callest thou me good ? There is none good but one, that is God ". Jesus Christ said this. Had He known Himself to be sinless would He have so spoken ? Not unless He was conscious of being out of the category which held the one whom He addressed, not unless He was intending to 192 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. bring out into clear light His own essential divinity. There is none good but God, if I am good, I must be God, and conversely, Aut Deus, aut non bonus. Recall the dialogue and note a point in it too commonly missed. The questioner is the young man who has great possessions, but who would fain add to them, if he may, the further treasure of eternal life. Christ says to him, "If thou wilt enter into life keep the commandments". The young man asks " Which?" Now we should naturally expect, should we not, that in answer to this question Jesus would begin with the first commandment and go on consecutively to the tenth. He does nothing of the sort. He skips the entire first table. He omits the whole of the duty towards God, begins, — " Thou shalt do no murder ", and confines Himself wholly to those of the ten words which cover our duty towards our fellow man, — a strange hiatus. But note what follows. "All these", the young man declares, " Have I kept from my youth up, what lack I yet? " The obvious, nay, the absolutely necessary answer would seem to be, "What thou lackest is com- pliance with that portion of the law which thus far I have not named, the duty towards God". Such, I say, would seem to be the one reply which the situation demands. But that is not what we find. What we find is this, — "If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven ; and come, follow Me". Come, follow Me. Who is this, we ask, amazed, who dares to make the following of him, the one thing lacking for a man who has only so far professed compliance with the second table of the law ? Who can it be save the One Whom to trust and Whom to serve, is the same thing as to do our duty towards God? The hiatus is filled, the gap covered, the whole law kept. The second affirmation to which I made reference, as seemingly incon- sistent with the sinlessness of Jesus, is this. " Though He were a Son, yet learned He obedience by the things which He suffered, and being made perfect He became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey Him". You recognize the passage as quoted from the Epistle to the Hebrews. Let us look at it. Disobedience to lawful authority is surely not compatible with sinlessness. And yet, this writer seems to speak as if there was once a time when it could be truly said of the Lord Jesus that He did not know how to obey, in fact had to begin learning how ? But pray whither should we go in search of evidence that such a time there was ? We have, it is true, no authentic Gospel of the infancy, but we have a Gospel of the childhood, and what do we there read? Why, simply this — and it tells the whole story, — "He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them ". And what of His later years ? In all that the Evan- gelists have to tell of that marvelous life, is there to be found the slightest hint of a refusal to obey any rightful authority human or divine? Is not their whole narrative from first to last confirmatory of the, — "I do always those things that please Him " ? Clearly, unless we are to reckon Christ " among the transgressors " in THE SINLESSNESS OF JESUS. 193 a sense quite contrary to that in which His followers have all along been interpreting the prophet's phrase, there must be some way of understanding what it means to " learn obedience " other than that which makes it identical with learning how to obey. A disobedient Christ could have no standing room in the church's creed. It is the One Who says " I come to do Thy will" Whom we confess, the keeper alike of God's least commandments and of His greatest, the sinless One. But how shall we interpret learning obedi- ence in such a way as to make Christ's having done so not inconsistent with such a faith? In this way, I submit, by taking it to mean one's becoming acquainted with the whole territory covered and included by obedience. The man who has learned painting is other and more than the man who has merely learned to paint. The man who has learned music is other and more than the man who has simply learned how to play upon an instrument. The man who has learned painting has explored the entire subject from first to last ; he knows it historically, he knows it critically, he knows it practically, he can tell you who the great painters have been, what were the character- istics of their various styles, and all about it ; he has covered the whole ground. So with learning obedience, we may understand the phrase in the narrow and limited sense of simply learning to do as one is bid, or we may understand it in this larger and broader sense of learning how much a really genuine obedience involves, learning, so to say, the whole cubic contents of obedience, as obedience stands related to human life. This last is the way in which Christ learned obedience. He grew to be master of the whole subject and the method whereby this mastership was acquired was the method of suffering. It is written of the child Christ that He " increased " in wisdom as well as in stature, and part of this increase we may well believe was in that particular kind of wisdom by which men come to know how much a really complete obedience covers and involves. The only difference between the Christ-child and other Nazareth children in this respect was that He never disobeyed. Whatever least thing was taught by suffering was straightway put in practice. With the ordinary child it is not so. In the school of suffering the lesson has to be taught many times, it has to be line upon line and precept upon precept before the pupil can be depended upon to act up to it. Disobedience is an act of the will. There is no such thing as disobeying without a conscious determination to do so. Christ had only to know what obedience required of Him, and at once He did it. But in this sort of wisdom, the learning what obedience did require, He, from day to day, from year to year, "increased" until, at last made perfect in it. He could say that it was learned, even though in the whole process of learning there had been no single instance of transgression; and only when there is transgression is there sin. The third saying which I quote as being seemingly in conflict with the dogma, Christ alone without sin, is also from the Epistle to the Hebrews. In that Scripture we find Christ spoken of as " One that hath been in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin ". How can He, we ask, have been without sin if tempted in all points like as we are. In us there is an 194 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. element of consent, which goes out to meet the temptation half-way so to speak. We cannot say of ourselves as Christ said of Himself that Satan Cometh and finds nothing in us. He finds too much. But let us see whether we cannot establish a parallelism between Christ's temptation and ours, which while it shows us sinful at the same time leaves Him sinless. It is common to explain the three temptations in the wilderness by saying that the first of them, "Command that these stones be made bread ", was addressed to the animal element that is in every man ; that the second, " Cast Thyself down ", was an appeal to spiritual pride, and that the third, "All these things will I give Thee, if — ", was an attempt to work upon ambi- tion in the common, worldly sense. But I think it will be more to our present purpose if we insist on looking at all three of the temptations as intended to undermine the Son's confidence in the Father. You recall the wording of the tempter's appeal, 7/" Thou be the Son of God, — do this; ^Thou be the Son of God, — do that. We must keep it in mind that this crisis in our Lord's life followed close upon the baptism. Jesus had just been inducted, as we may say, into His office as the Christ. The voice had said from heaven, " This is My beloved Son", and John the baptizer had solemnly borne witness to the coming of the greater than himself. Full of this consciousness of a heavenly mission, awakened perhaps for the first time to a clear understanding of all that He really was, the Son of Mary had come into the wilderness to ponder these things, to feed upon them, as it were, while denying Himself all other food. This, then, was the grand point of attack, the confidence in the heavenly Fatherhood. If the tempter could only shake this trust of Sonship, only break up this filial sense, his bad end would be accomplished. " If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread ". " If Thou be the Son of God, cast Thyself down from this pinnacle". These are challenges, — challenges coupled with a sneer. The suggestion is that the powers of God's world, the forces of His universe, are hostile, not friendly, and that because of their being so the divine Fatherhood can- not be trusted or depended upon. Is there nothing in the experience of modern man that tallies with all this ? Have not you and I, in our measure and degree, to grapple with these same temptations? Who, we cry, can be counted upon to turn the stones that strew so thickly the wilderness of this life of ours into bread that shall satisfy our hunger } Who, in the midst of the many and great perils that compass all our ways, will keep us from being dashed to pieces if we fall ? Not God, surely, for God works through nature, and nature is under the hard rule of law, and there is nothing for us save simple acquiescence in what seems to be our doom. There is nothing very unfamiliar about this, — is there.'' This is no strange temptation that thus befalls us, but such a one as is com- mon to modern man,— the temptation to distrust God's love, the temptation to disbelieve in His care, to repudiate the Sonship. But, after all, the only thing we need to help us out of our distress is patience. In wonderful ways. THE SINLESSNESS OF JESUS. 195 and with a rapidity never before observed, the Author of Nature is making nature plastic to our hands. She is no longer the cruel mistress she used to be. When she presses us hard with her pains and bruises, her accidents and sicknesses, and we feel moved almost to despair at the thought of all her waves and billows going over us, let us say to ourselves : " This is my temptation ; God is my Father all the same. For reasons of His own He is letting these forces buffet me, letting me be tossed about, battered and tortured, but He is all the while just as truly my Father, just as really my friend, as if He were turning stones into bread at my appeal, or giving angels charge to bear me miraculously in their hands lest I strike my foot against gargoyle or capital. Be sure whatever voice bids us think otherwise is a tempting voice, a scoffing voice, a voice against which we shall do well to shut our ears. The last of the temptations stands alone and by itself. The devil taketh Him up into an exceeding high mountain, and showeth Him all the king- doms of the world in a moment of tirce. These, he says, are mine and to whomsoever I will I give them, and Thou shalt have them, if Thou wilt only fall down and worship me. But even in this case, different as the subject- matter of the temptation is from that of the other two, even here we discern the same bad motive lurking in the back-ground, the same malicious resolve to break down, if it can possibly be done, the soul's confidence in the Father- hood of God. It is Satan masquerading as the King. " Consider all this grandeur," the tempter says, "see all this magnificent paraphernalia of war and peace, of enterprise and achievement. Look yonder at those parlia- ments and congresses, those armies and navies. Contemplate those huge industries symbolized by factory and workshop and warehouse. Watch the emigrations that are going on, the commingling of races, the peopling of continents, and think of what it means to have the ordering of all this. Think of the honor and the advantage of being my prime minister in the government of so various and interesting a realm '". But this temptation like the others rests on the rotten substructure of a lie. This that the tempter says, is false, utterly, absolutely, everlastingly false. It is the power of goodness, not the power of evil, that really rules these manifold afifairs of men. God, not Satan, is the sovereign commander of all the world. The vain pomp and glory of the world may be in Satan's gift, but the true and solid glory of the world is God's affair, not his. The great activities of human life are under the guidance of Him Whose never- failing providence ordereth all things both in heaven and earth. This vast administration which covers and comprehends both State and Church, is carried on in the interests of righteousness, and any voice which whispers in our ear that to succeed we must sell ourself to Satan, is cajoling us to our ruin. The earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof. Let us not imagine that any save this supreme proprietor can ever give us a clear title ;^to the permanent possession of any single square foot of it. It is the meek-spirited and they only who can expect to hold in perpetuity, these shall inherit the earth. 196 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. Thus was Christ tempted in all points like as we are. He stood it. We, with varying degrees of failure, we succumb. I have tried to show that His confident assertion, "I do always those things which please Him", finds nothing in the New Testament to contradict it, and that the right answer to His question " Which of you convicteth Me of sin ? " is this, " No man. Lord ". * THE EVIDENTIAL VALUE OF MIRACLES. BY REV. CHARLKS AV. RISHKI^I^ PH. D., Professor of Ecclesiastical History in Boston University School of Theology, Boston, Mass. The topic assigned me assumes that miracles, presumably the miracles of Jesus especially as reported in the Fourth Gospel, have an evidential value. To one who stops to consider the assaults that have been made upon the miraculous element in early Christian history, in the name of phi- losophy, science, history, and even of ethics, and the consequent elaborate defence of miracles rendered necessary by those assaults, the question can but suggest itself whether the recorded miracles are not rather a burden than a support to faith. Not a few have so thought, and have demanded that in the interests of Christian propagandism, at least in these days, we shall confess that the miracle stories of the Gospels are entirely incredible. I cannot agree with those who so think, and I do not believe that any one who has thoroughly mastered the principles of a sound philosophy, or who recognizes the limitations of science, or who comprehends the fundamentals of historical criticism, can doubt the reality of the miraculous element in the life of Jesus. The denial of the miraculous is based on a philosophy now falling rapidly into discredit, and upon a conception of science and history which must fall when that philosophy falls, as fall it must, and that soon, for it is now tottering. The flood of materialism in philosophy, science and history has been outridden by the modern ark with its considerable family of those who through all the storm held serenely fast to the truth. Still to those who are influenced by that wholly absurd philosophy, whether they be found in high places or in lowly, miracles must of necessity appear impossible. Some of these people are to be pitied — perhaps all of them. But some of them are to be condemned as pretenders, particularly those who profess to be philosophers ; for they have never once looked at the real problems of philosophy with open eyes. But while some are to be pitied, and some are to be condemned, aU need laboring with ; and it is a great temptation to enter here rather upon an argument in support of miracles than upon an argument which makes miracles a support to faith. I desist simply and solely because I wish to adhere to my topic, and because I presume that Dr. Strong did, a few- weeks ago, all that needs doing in this line, in a single course of lectures. Nevertheless, even after philosophy, science and history have been permitted to give their testimony, and have been cross-examined, and after Delivered at the tourth Conference, held at (Irace Episcopal Church, January 13, 1904. 197 198 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. it has been found that they have nothing to say against belief in miracles, but that at least two of these three witnesses, philosophy and history, ofier practically compulsory evidence in favor of miracles, the question still arises, what is their evidential value ? Not only what was it to' those who saw the miracles performed, but what is it to us? This question divides into two parts : First, as to the manner in which the miracles buttress faith. The answer to this is found in the relation of the miracles of Christ to the claims of Christ. Those claims would have been mere idle boasts had He not wrought miracles. Any one can make claims; not every man's deeds match his claims. When profession and deed do not correspond we rightly doubt the validity of the claim. There were at least two claims made by Christ that demanded miracle for their support. The first is His claim of authority — authority to forgive sin; to control the kingdom of God on earth; to determine the destinies of men. A claim to authority in these realms can be supported only by the exhibition of the divine power requisite to the execution of such a divine mission. There is not a little danger of confusion at this point. Not infrequently we hear it said that the regular course of nature is a better evidence of the divine operation in the world than any irregularity or miraculous opera- tions could be. And this is true. Some, how'ever, fail to see that this does not touch the question as to the attestation of Christ's mission. We do not need miracles to show us that there is a God or that He is at work in the world. What we need miracles for is to show us that Christ's relation to the Father is what He said it was. And particularly did the people of His time need miracles for that purpose. His ministry was brief. Time was not allowed for the development of all those beneficent results which the reign of Christ in the hearts of men has produced and which are our best evidence of His right to reign. What was to be done for His generation had to be done quickly. Hence miracles were a necessity at the first, though for purposes of attesting Christ and His apostles they became less necessary as time went on. In view of all these considerations it is plain that the Jews were not altogether in the wrong in asking for a sign. Jesus refused to give this sign for several reasons ; but the legitimacy of the demand He did not apparently deny. It was unfortunately a wicked and adulterous generation that required the sign. The demand sprang from hostility, not from a spirit of honest inquiry. Now suppose that with such extraordinary claims and such need of attestation there had been no extraordinary deeds illustrative of His divine power, what would have become of His claims .'' The people of His day simply could not have acknowledged them. The discrepancy between word and deed would have been too great. Especially true is this of the second claim referred to, — His claim of being the highest conceivable manifestation of divine love. He who claims practically infinite power and love must not fail to exhibit them in combi- THE EVIDENTIAL VALUE OF MIRACLES. 199 nation if his claims are to be believed. His claims to be incarnate omnipotence must be substantiated by omnipotent works wrought during the incarnate state. The claim to be the incarnation of omnipotent love must be substantiated by omnipotent works of a benevolent type. The being who claims the power to do good and who does not do good is rightly held to be either an impostor or unfeeling. In view of His claims Christ without His miracles would be wholly anomalous. The profession of love and power matched by the exercise of power in the interest of love is a consistent picture. The second phase of the question concerning the evidential value of miracles pertains to the degree or amount of that value. This again divides into two parts : First, do the miracles compel assent? and second, are they sufficient as evidence ? The first of these questions does not admit either of a categorical affirmative or negative. Very certain is it that those miracle stories do not directly compel our assent to Christ's claims. Without them we could not believe ; but for many they are merely the condition of belief, not its ground. They are necessary to a consistent picture, and a consistent picture tells for credibility. But the question still remains unanswered whether the picture is imaginary or real, and the answer to that question is to be sought in the whole realm of Christian evidences. It may be said, however, that one who unhesitatingly accepts the fact of Christ's miracles must accept Christ's claims; and there are unnumbered multitudes who do accept both His miracles and His claims. Those with whom the miracles are themselves a problem cannot, of course, use them as a strong support of faith. With them the correctness of the consistent picture is still in doubt. This leads to the second point, namely, whether the miracles are sufficient evidence. It is plain that they are not. Nor are they the best evidence. One might accept the miracles and so the claims of Christ without becoming a practical Christian. Only that evidence which results in practical Christian living is adequate. Miracles have their place, but they cannot do everything. We must have them, but they are by no means our sole reliance. So much then for the general question of the evidential value of miracles. It is time to come to the special question as to the evidential value of miracles as seen in the Fourth Gospel. It is a generally recognized fact that this Gospel was written with the object of pjoducing belief in Christ on the part of those who had never seen Him and it is worth noting that it was the whole Gospel, not the miracles alone, that was to produce faith. "These things were written", says John, that is, all these things, "that ye might believe ". Furthermore we find that Jesus appealed to His whole ministry in proof of His mission, and not to His miracles alone or chiefly. I think that at this point there is considerable misunderstanding. Jesus says (10:37, 3.S) : — "If I do not the works of My Father, believe Me not 200 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. But if I do them, though ye believe not Me, believe the works : that ye may know and understand that the Father is in Me, and I in the Father ". And again (14:11): — "Believe Me that lam in the Father, and the Father in Me : or else believe Me for the very works' sake ". These passages, with others, have, I think, been generally understood as Christ's appeal to the convincing power of His miracles. Most readers, when they read these passages, mentally substitute miracles for works, as though He had said believe Me for the sake, or on account of the miracles. I cannot help feeling that this is an erroneous interpretation. Doubtless His works include His miracles, but His miracles are by no means the whole of His works. The word translated "work" is ^r^(9«, plural erga. The word translated " miracle " is semeion, plural semeia. Jesus is never represented as appealing to His semeia, but always to His erga. Had He meant to appeal to His miracles only as attesting His nature and mission, He would have used the other word. Besides, His references to His works in other connections show that they were not miracles alone. In chapter 5:36, He says: "The works which the Father hath given Me to accom- plish, the very works that I do, bear witness of Me". And in 10:32, " Many good works have I showed you from the Father ; for which of those works do ye stone Me?" The Jews answered Him: " For a good work we stone Thee not, but for blasphemy ". And in 10 :37, " If I do not the works of My Father, believe Me not ". Also 9:4, "I must work the works of Him that sent Me, while it is day ". The works of the Father — the works that the Father gave Him to accomplish ! Were these works miracles only ? Did the Father send His Son into the world for the sole purpose of working miracles ? Great as they were, and great as was their significance, it is impossible that the miracles of Jesus exhausted His mission, and that everything He did and said over and above this was no part of the Father's purpose in Him. It is unbelieve- able that all those good works in the ordinary human sense of faithfulness to duty, loyalty to principle, courage in the execution of one's tasks in the midst of threatening danger, renunciation of the material in the interest of the spiritual, manifestation of sympathy, love, and human interest in human interests — I say it is unbelievable that these were no part of the works of the Father given to Jesus to accomplish. If the miraculous works are necessary as a credential, equally so are these ordinary, every-day good works neces- sary. And if we may judge from the record, it was just these plain and homely good works that engaged the greater part of His time. The miracles were the exceptional aspect of His activity. It is doubtless true that when He spoke of His works He included His miracles; but He certainly did not confine His thought to them. It is in strict accordance with this view of the case that men are repre- sented as believing in Jesus because of His words. Such a case we have in the Samaritan mentioned in 4:41 ; also in the officers who were sent to arrest Christ, but who returned and said : " Never man spake like this THE KlIDKNTJAL \ALUE OF MIRACLES. 2or man '" (7 :46) ; and of many Jews of whom it is said that while " He spake these words many believed on Him" (7 :3o). In line with this also is the fact that His miracles did not always either produce or sustain faith in Him. In 12 : 37 we read " That though He had done so many semeia before them, yet they believed not on Him " ; and again in chapter 6, it is said that after certain words of Christ, many of His disciples went back and walked no more with Him. This, of course, was in spite of His miracles. On the other hand many did, apparently believe because of His miracles. We have accounts of such in 2 : 23 ; and in 3 : 2, when Nicodemus is repre- sented as recognizing the divine mission of Jesus through His miracles. The woman of Samaria also believed Him to be the Messiah because of His miraculous knowledge of her life. Furthermore, Jesus apparently felt that His miracles ought to be taken into account in the determination of men's relation to Him. "Though ye believe not Me, believe the works" (10:38). *' If I had not done among them the works which none other did, they had not had sin " (15 :24). These passages do not refer to His miracles alone, but they do, nevertheless, refer to the miracles. He had lived His life among them on high levels. Deed miraculous and deed non-miraculous had matched word in Him. His claims had been high, but His works had been high also. There was no excuse for unbelief. So He thought and so we think. That though they had seen Him perform so many miracles and so many other good works, all correspondent to His demands upon men, and yet that they should not yield to His demands, was reprehensible indeed. And yet Christ did not work His miracles for the purpose of producing belief in Him. I am aware that the assertion I have just made is contrary to the received opinion, according to which He felt that in order to sustain His high claims He must attest Himself by miracles which He wrought as a credential of His authority. I can, perhaps, express my own understanding of this matter in this way: Jesus knew full well that His miracles would tend to produce faith in Him, and He felt that it was right that they should contribute to this result; and yet those facts had no influence whatever in prompting Him to work His miracles, all of which would have been wrought if they had been of no evidential value in the sense of producing or sustaining faith in Him. I am thoroughly convinced that this is so for all the miracles mentioned in the Fourth Gospel, though I admit that one or two passages seem on the surface to suggest a few exceptions. In order that the facts may be all brought before you I take up first those which militate against my contention, and then those which seem to me to support it. The first argument which might be used in favor of the ordinary view is that the word so frequently translated miracle should be translated sign. When Jesus turned the water into wine it is said, " This beginning of signs did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth His glory " (2:11). Nico- demus said : " No man can do these signs that Thou doest except God be with him " (3 : 2). Jesus said to certain persons : " Ye seek Me, not because 202 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. ye saw the signs, but because ye did eat of the loaves, and were filled " (6 : 26). Many of the people said : "When Christ cometh, will He do more signs than these which this man hath done?" (7:31.) And so whenever in our King James translation of John, we read " miracles ", we should literally translate " signs ". In other words these miraculous works are unquestion- ably looked upon as signs — signs of the divine power and mission of Jesus. Does not that seem to show that Jesus wrought these works in order to prove His claims ? The answer to this must be an emphatic " No ". It is one thing to say that they are signs and it is quite another to say that they were wrought for the purpose of being signs. I think, therefore, that this consideration has no weight. There are two miracles recorded in the Fourth Gospel which are referred to by Christ in language which seems to indicate that they were wrought for the purpose of producing faith. The first one is the case of the man who was born blind. When His disciples asked " Who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind ", Jesus answered, " Neither did this man sin, nor his parents, but that the works of God should be made manifest in him " (9 : 2, 3). If we applied the ordinary view to this it would have to be understood as saying that the blindness was not caused by the sin either of the man or his parents, but was brought upon him in order that an opportu- nity should be presented for making manifest the works of God. But the implications of such an interpretation are obnoxious in the highest degree. We cannot, in this day, bring ourselves to believe that God would visit blindness for a long term of years upon any one in order to show that He had the power and love requisite to restore him to sight. I pass this case for the present to take up the other similar one. When Jesus was informed that Lazarus was sick, He said : " This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby" (11 14). Here again we seem to be told that a loved friend of Jesus was made sick and a whole family of Jesus' dearest friends plunged into heartbreaking sorrow in order to give the Father an opportunity to glorify both Himself and His Son. So it appears to say, but really it does not seem to describe the action of God as you and I think of God in the light of the teachings of Christ. Was God so hard put to it that He had to create cases of blindness and sickness and death in order to show what His Son could do ? Without any disposition to employ ridicule, I must say that one would have to think of Palestine as a remarkably healthy country if it did not furnish blind and sick in plenty upon whom Christ could exercise His miraculous power, without the necessity of blinding and sickening men in order to furnish opportunity for Him to prove His love and power. There must be some other way of interpreting these passages more consonant with the love and wisdom of God. And hints of that other way we have in other passages. In 5 : 20, we read that " The Father loveth the Son, and showeth Him all things that Himself doeth ; and He will show Him greater works than these, that ye may marvel". Here God is repre- sented as doing great works for the purpose of producing surprise, — a motive THE El'IDENTIAI. VALUE OF MIRACLES. 203 so unworthy of God that we feel practically sure there must be some mis- understanding. In 12 : 37-40 we read : " But though He had done so many miracles before them, yet they believed not on llim ; that the word of Isaiah, the prophet might be fulfilled * * * For this cause they could not believe, for that Isaiah said again, He hath blinded their eyes, and He hardened their hearts ". If we take this language at what it literally says, we shall be obliged to believe that God actually prevented some from believing in order to secure the fulfilment of a prophecy. In 17:12, Jesus says : " Those that Thou gavest Me I have kept, and none of them is lost but the son of perdition; that the Scripture might be fulfilled ". This is a case in which one is even said to be lost in order that the Scripture might be fulfilled. Works of God done in order to produce wonder; men rendered incapable of belief in order that the prophecy of Isaiah might be fulfilled ; a soul lost in order that a passage in a psalm might be fulfilled ! If we take the words " In order that " literally — if we understand them as expressing the prompting motive — we must believe such teaching to be part of the teaching of Christ Himself. I, for one, revolt, and refuse to take the language literally. What is really meant is that great works of God shall be done, and that men shall marvel ; that men did not believe and thereby prophecy was fulfilled ; that a soul was lost, and thus a psalm was paralleled in the history of Christ, or perhaps that thus we knew the psalm to be in part Messianic. But there is about as much reason for revolting from the literalness that would have us believe that a man was born blind, or caused to sicken and die in order that Christ might glorify Himself and secure the belief of the onlookers by His works of restoration to sight and life. The words " in order that " must not always be taken as expressing motive ; sometimes they express result. Such is the case here. A man was born blind and as a result some will believe in Christ when they see Him give the blind man His sight. A man sickened and died and as a result Christ will be glorified when men see Him restore the dead man to life. This interpretation is rational and Christian, even if not warranted by the construction. The other, though demanded by the construction is irrational and unchristian. But if the rational and Christian interpretation is to be accepted, then those passages do not teach that Jesus healed in order to produce faith. So that there is nothing left to show that He ever wrought miracles for that purpose or with that motive. Taking up, now, the facts which seem to substantiate the view I here maintain, it must be noticed that when asked to show a sign He either avoided or declined the request. True, those who demanded a sign did so in a spirit of hostility. But it is incredible that One Who could do the won- derful things recorded in John could not have turned hostility into faith if He had chosen to do so. That He did not do so is the strongest evidence conceivable that His miracles were never wrought with such a motive. An examination of the real motives of Jesus in the performance of His miracles, taking them one by one, shows that He was prompted by the 204 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. desire to bless and benefit men individually and collectively. His miracles were credentials, but they would have been wrought if they had been entirely barren of such a result. They sprang, not from His desire to make men believe on Him, but from His desire to do men good. But, it may be said, why should He not have wrought miracles for the purpose of producing faith in Him ? Would it not have been a worthy use of His miraculous power ? Surely it would so appear. And yet, while we cannot give our Lord's reasons for holding Himself with inflexible firmness to the thought of doing some good instead of winning their faith, we cannot be too thankful that He did just as He did. In the first place, on the facts as here set forth, must all attempts to discredit His miracles by placing Him in the ranks of the wonder-workers go to pieces. It is just the motive of the wonder-worker that his deeds shall in some degree or manner increase the observers' esteem for the performer. Jesus sought nothing in return for His miracles — not even the faith in Himself which would have resulted in fresh benefit to the believer. We have before us in Christ the portrait of one who did His good deeds, whether miraculous or not, out of a loving heart, with absolutely no mixture of any other motive. Closely connected with this is a second thought. The example of Christ as He is thus set be- fore us rebukes more effectually much of the unchristian effort of ministers and churches in all ages. Is it not true that we seek additions to our churches, in part at least, because of the strength those additions can bring to the church ? And does not this lead to the feeling that as some can aid the church more than others the stronger ones should be most coveted ? Yes, the church does all its faithful adherents more good than they do it ; but would not our methods and results be different if we were prompted as Jesus was, wholly and solely by the spirit of love ? And this naturally leads to a third thought, Jesus stands higher in the estimation of the world today because He did His works out of a spirit of love than He would had He mixed with it a desire to secure their faith in Him. And here is the evidential value of miracles in its highest form. They prove His power, but they also prove His love. Men might wonder at His power ; they adore Him for His love. The world will be won to Christ not because He had the omnipotent power of God in Him, but because He had in Him God's infinite love. And this is the true evidential value of miracles. * FREEDOM THROUGH THE TRUTH. (St. John 8:31-36.) by rkv. kverktt d. burr, i). 13., I'ASTOR OF THE FiRST BAPTIST CHURCH IN NeWTON, NeWTON CENTRE, MaSS. In discussing this theme, which has its place in a series of expositions of this Gospel, we must adhere rigidly to the terms of the Gospel in the definition of truth, of freedom, and the relation between the two. Truth in this Gospel is not an impersonal proposition, not a series of definitions, no metaphysical statement, nor subjective conception, but objectively real, personally embodied, livingly interpreted. Freedom is not a deliverance from external shackles by mechanical means, not the abrogation of control, but the emancipation of life to mani- fest itself in various forms, a process working not from without inward, but from within outward. As the truth is vital the freedom must be by process, evolutionary and dynamic. Such a freedom will be the efflorescence of life and will follow the truth as naturally and inevitably as the fruit results from the forces resident in the root. From the point of view of John's Gospel, religion is divine life in the human soul. Dejjuition of Urjus. Jesus always explained His Gospel in terms of life. " I give unto them eternal life ". " I am come that they might have life ". In endeavoring to explain the principles of His Gospel and the rela- tions which are to subsist between Himself and His followers, He chose some vital thing, some living organism as, for example, the vine, as alone an adequate explanation of the relation which is to exist between Himself and the believer. The indictment of Jesus against the religious leaders and the people of His day was that they would not come unto Him that they might have life. They went to the philosophers for theories, to the rabbis for pre- cepts ; they went to the prophets for principles, and to the Mosaic code for ceremonies ; but they would not come unto Him that they might have life. This indictment is in force today. There is manifest reluctance to accept the gift which Christ alone can give. Through the Christian centuries men have been forming and reform- ing creeds while Jesus gave the truth which would transform character. Even so learned a theologian and so prominent a Christian leader as President Patton, of Princeton, was asked whether in his judgment Chris- tianity was a dogma or a life, and he replied, " It is a dogma ". We see the fallacy of this definition when we take it back to Jesus and try to imag- * Delivered at the Fourth Conference, held at (Iracc Episcopal Church, January i -i, 1904. 205 2o6 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. ine Him saying, " I am come that they might have dogma, and that they might have it more abundantly". But the learned president is not the only offender in this regard. According to our own point of view we are apt to say that religion consists in a method of organization, a mode of worship, or a statement of doctrine, and so make it a thing of formulae, creeds, ceremonies, or priesthoods, according to the degree of our religious susceptibility, or according to our religious education, or according to our loyalty to tradition, as though these things were in themselves the ends to be sought and not only means to one single end. It was with reference to that sacred thing, the law, that Paul said it is a " schoolmaster to lead to Christ -i What was true of the most perfect expression of religious life in the olden time is true of everything else religious, ecclesiastic, doctrinal, that their only worth is in • their usefulness in leading to a personal Christ. Jesus found religion sinking into a creed and a ceremony. He presented His Gospel not as a dogma to be believed, a statement to be discussed, or a task to be performed, but a life to be lived. The beginning of religious life is not the reception of a ceremony, subscription to a creed, or submission to an ordinance, but contact with a person. His invitations were always personal. "Come unto J/^" was fre quently upon His lips. The only truth which the believer was asked to accept was the truth embodied in Himself. " I am the truth ". The code of morals, the mode of conduct, the standard of life, were to be found in Him- self. " I am the way". Indeed, the whole content of religion was defined in personal relations to Himself — " I am the life ". He offered Himself as Master and Lord, and relied upon the personal loyalty of His disciples to sustain them in their obedience to Him. He offered the pleasure of associ- ation with Him as a sufficient compensation for the hardships of service, even though it involved denial of self and the bearing of the cross. Devo- tion to the personal Christ was to be at once the impulse and reward for every service. It is a person, not a dogma, that invites belief; a person, not a law, which invites obedience. " In Him is life and the life is the light of men ". He inspires the thought, awakens the conscience, holds the heart, energizes the will. He is Himself the life-blood of Christianity, and as such the giver of life to those who receive Him. Nothing can create life but life itself. " He that hath the Son hath life ". Jesus condemned the people of His time because in the light of overwhelming testimony concerning Him- self they still rejected Him. He presents four witnesses as establishing His claims upon the supreme attention of the thinkers of His day. First, the testimony of John. This is the more important and should have been the more impressive because John was led to the acceptance of Jesus by the resistless argument of His own personality. John was slow to accept Jesus because of his religious preconceptions. He had planned a program for Jesus in which he thought Jesus would perfectly acquiesce. He was, therefore, greatly amazed to have Jesus adopt a different mode of jirocedure, and could scarcely believe Him to be the promised Messiah. So FREEDOM THROUGH THE TRUTH. 207 he sent messengers to ascertain whether He were indeed the Christ. He had predicted the axe laid at the root of the tree, the winnowing fan and the refining fire. But hearing of the beneficent services which Jesus was rendering to humanity in heaUng the sick, cleansing the lepers, preaching to the poor, he was perplexed beyond measure. Nevertheless, the testimony of John when once convinced, was direct and unequivocal. He stripped the veil which hid Christ's glory. He quickened the vision of his contem- poraries, stimulated their conscience, stirred the apathy of the people of His time. The testimony of the works of Christ were even more convincing. The activities of His hand had a divine but self-evidencing force which con- firmed and established His claims. The works of Christ were His normal activities and deeds, which expressed the nature and compass of His will and indicated the quality of His personality. These works were not limited to the miracles of healing, the multiplication of the loaves, the increase of the wine, the raising of the dead, but the whole of His service ; His total activity He presented in testimony as a self-revelation, the disclosure of His consecration, and they are all of such a character as to proclaim His divine commission. This entire service of Christ, reaching special expression in certain typical acts and deeds could not but confirm beyond a challenge the testimony of John. But as though this were not enough, the testimony of the Father was added. Jesus was not content to present John's testimony or the evidence of His works as the complete vindication of His claims. He said, " There is another that beareth witness concerning Me ", " The Father which hath sent Me". At His baptism the voice of the Father proclaimed Him to be His accepted Son, but, more than that, there accompanied Jesus in all His life and service an incontrovertible evidence of a deific presence as, e. g., the angel song at His birth, the unusual providence which protected His childhood, the opening of the heavens at His baptism, the pervasive pres- ence which was manifest in all His acts and made His ministry so influ- ential and impressive. He was the manifestation of the Father's glory, the express image of His person. As though to leave no witness unsummoned into court, there is added to all the evidence the testiniony of the Scriptures. " They testify of Me ". Jesus" criticism is that in searching the written word they were missing the living word. He admits their prolonged and eager study of the Scriptures, approves their motives in the research, but He criticises the superstitious idea that in the possession of the letter they had eternal life. " In them ye think ye have eternal life, but they are they which testify of Me, and ye will not come to Me that ye might have life ". This, then, is the indictment of Jesus against the people of His time. It is as true today. For, according to our point of view or our sense of need, we look to the schools for theory, to the church for ceremony, to philosophy for instruction, to priests for authority, to reason for light, to ordinances for inspiration, to confession for peace of soul, but will not go 2o8 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. to Christ that we may have life. And in consequence the religious world of today is serving in many a house of bondage, the bondage of the letter, the bondage of form, the bondage of tradition, the bondage of definition, from which only the truth as it is in the personal Christ can ever give a real emancipation, — that is, the emancipation of life. The Romanist presents an infallible church as the end of all revelation, the seat of all authority. The Protestant presents an infallible book, but neither book nor church has life or can give life. They are but the staff of the prophet laid upon the child of the Shunamite. They are but dead sticks, — creeds, ordinances, doctrines, priests, preachers,^ — without the vital and vitalizing contact with the living Christ. As the living person of the prophet must needs be stretched upon the dead, lip to lip, nerve to nerve, forehead to forehead, nostril to nostril, heart to heart, limb to limb, so must the personal character, thought, purpose and life of the living Christ be brought into touch with receptive souls. Jesus takes the high ground with reference to the inspired Scriptures which He has also taken with reference to other sacred objects, viz. : the temple and the Sabbath, You call the temple sacred and the altar a heavenly shrine ? In what does their sanctity consist .'' There is One greater than the temple and only so far forth as the sacred structure fulfills its mission in expressing the presence of the greater One has it any sanctity. There is one Lord of the Sabbath. The Sabbath is not an end in itself but is of worth only as it gives evidence of the paramount claims of Him Who is its Lord. So of the Script- ures. They are not sacred in themselves except as they testify of Christ. The bare possession of the written word, the prolonged examination of its mere letter, neither nor both is the condition of eternal life. The study of the Scriptures which is stimulated by the vague idea that it is religion, or that it has life, or can give life, is illusive. We may think that in them we have eternal life, but our Lord would undeceive us. The Scriptures are not religion, nor do they contain religion any more than a captain's chart is navigation, or contains the knowledge of navigation, or a book of tactics contains warfare, or a knowledge of warfare, or a government treatise on the rotation of crops contains agriculture or a knowledge of farming. The Scriptures are a description of religion. They are a testimony to the personal Christ. The Scriptures are not the truth. Jesus Christ is the truth. No book, no church, no priesthood, nor ritual, nor creed, nor mode of worship may diminish by one hair's breadth the immediacy of personal contact of the human heart with the living personal Christ. When Jesus Christ lays hold of a man so that the spirit of Christ becomes the determinative energy of his life, that man is Christian and nothing else nor many things combined can make him Christian. " He that hath the Son hath life ". " If the Son make you free ye shall be free indeed ". This is all there is to it — the personal relation with the personal Christ. Christ is the one thing in the Christian life. The genius of this experience called Christian is being wrought into Him. There is only one thing which so connects a branch of the vine with the vine as to make FREEDOM THROUGH THE TRUTH. 209 it a branch, and that is the life of the vine which makes itself felt in the branch. There is only one thing which involves a limb in the body so as to make it a member of that organic thing called the body and that is the life of the body which courses through it. In the same way there is only one thing which makes a man Christian and that is his vital contact with Christ so that the thought of Christ shall inspire his mind, the love of Christ move his heart, the purpose of Christ gird his will, the law of Christ confirm his conscience. The weakness of Christianity is that we make it complex and composite, and of our own conceits forge the chains which hold us in tether. Life is the thing. This simple fact is the whole of it. We make it con- sist of many things added together instead of one simple, omnipotent, supreme fact. We have heard so much about conviction and sentiment, about doctrines and ceremonies that we have come to consider Christianity as a matter of opinion, or of feeling, but Christianity is simply and solely a matter of divine life in the human soul, and there is no matter of dogma, or sentiment, or ceremony about it. Life is the thing. When divinely alive we may find our emancipation and leave the burden of philosophy, the thraldom of tradition, the shackles of superstition, the galvanism of emotion, for 7ve live. We may refuse to be satisfied with anything religious unless we realize the life-giving touch of the Son of God. No picture of the sun can illumine a landscape ; no richly colored wax or folded paper can make a riower bed. We may have our sunbeams hot from the sky and the fragrance and beauty of life be the flowering of the in dwelling spirit of Him Who is the life. When once this central truth is grasped it will go with us all the way and lead us out of the tangles. First of all, in the problems of cojiduct. Jesus Christ the teacher, taught conduct, character, life, duty, — " By their fruits ye shall know them " was His criterion of judgment as to behavior. " He that heareth My sayings and doeth them " is the man whom He approved. The final tests in the adjudication of destiny are ethical tests as seen in Matt. 25. — " Inasmuch as ye did it — fed the hungry, clothed the naked, visited the sick and the like, you may stand at the right hand of God in the judgment ". The problem of the ethics of the New Testament is the kind of character illustrated in the life of Jesus, and the first problem evident at the outset is the application of this ideal of life to conduct and character. He who accepts Jesus as the truth will follow His lead in the Scripture, not studying the doctrines of the New Testament, not studying the theology of the New Testament, not studying Christology. Nor will he be a New Testament critic studying the books. These problems are behind and beyond. No ! he will take the New Testament as it lies before him and the one question before him will be what is the character exemplified and taught ? What is the Christian character ? What sort of person is built on the New Testament teaching ? These studies are preliminary, introductory. The subjects are near and obvious ; they open the way to the remote. The first thing in the New Testament is the appeal to life, conduct and character. 2IO THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. The path to what is beyond lies through the investigation of the near. Here is a method of approach which reverses the common method which always begins with the remote, the obscure. Study the familiar hand-books of Christian ethics, e. g., Dorner or Martensen. They begin with the specu- lative. The opening chapters are purely theological, metaphysical, and have nothing to do with conduct and character. The whole discussion is of the nature of God, then descends into the realm of conduct and lays down such rules of conduct as are deducible from theological tenets ; but with Jesus as teacher we take the other method of procedure. First the simple, the near, the practical, the personal, then the greater visions of what lies beyond. First ethics, then theology ; first life, then truth ; first the example of Christ, then the person of Christ; first the interpretation of Christ, then the know- ledge of Christ. "He who will do the will of God shall know". The approach to the New Testament through the path of ethics is distinguished from the usual treatment and more consistent with the New Testament itself. The theology of the future is not prerequisite to the understanding of the character of Jesus, but the very reverse. The character and life of Jesus are fundamental to the theology of the future. Look at the ethics of Jesus for a moment. In announcing His morality Jesus took three departures from other systems : Mosaic, Pharisaic, Graeco- Roman. These were the three moral systems of His time, the systems respectively of His ancestral religion, the then principal sect, and that of the outside world. Every utter- ance of Jesus bearing on morals was spoken in contemplation of one or the other of these classes. In departing from the Mosaic system He sought to develop morality from its primitive rudeness and simplicity. In departing from the Pharisaic system He sought to recall it from the ritualistic diver- gence to the proper subjects of morality, and in departing from the Graeco- Roman He sought to substitute the tender for the heroic virtue. His object, therefore, as viewed from these three points of departure was respectfully to fulfil, to correct and to supplant, or to affect an exten- sion, a reformation and a revolution. The ethical classifications in the teach- ings of Jesus become clear when we understand His point of view. Jesus was infinitely patient toward some sins, but was terrifically severe with the Pharisees. His estimate of the Pharisee and the Publican was a subversion of all accepted standards of conduct. Jesus Christ wanted to find one initial quality which the sinner might hold, and the typical Pharisee lacked, namely, — docility, receptivity ; not the quality of wrong-doing in a life, but the quality of self-sufficiency was the great hindrance to goodness, the state of mind which knows no lack and is not open to modifications. His commendation of another type — the child — is evidence of His estimate of the worth of teachableness. Childlikeness is this initial trait. It is not afflicted with self-sufficiency. The chief obstacle to the Christian religion is satiety. This is hopeless. How can we offer a feast when a man has fed ? Hunger, thirst, craving, openness ; these are the qualities of mind on which Jesus lays emphasis. It is not the sins of the flesh against which He inveighs, or the sins of the spirit. It is FREED OM THK O UGH THE TR UTH. 2 1 1 the condition of being surfeited and therefore unteachable. Given teach- ableness, then His faith is in moral growth. He does not say that this is a good man and that man is bad, but this man is moving toward an end, there is hope of him. His movements are dynamic, evolutionary. Jesus always looked for this openness toward growth. Consider, for example. His treat- ment of Peter. Jesus saw in him something teachable. This explains His continued faith in Judas. He hoped for him ; there was something in him to make Him believe in growth. He had not lost faith in him. Add to openness of mind the principle of growth and you have the ground-work and the standards of Jesus' ethics. Now compare the text-books on Christian morals and make the contrast with the Gospel teaching in their mode of approach. Dorner's system of Christian ethics so highly systematized is all an inference from theology instead of as in the New Testament where ethics is propedeutic to theology. As one of my teachers has said, " This process is like drawing the fire down instead of lighting it on the ground. The draught is the wrong way, and we cannot see because of the smoke ". In the Gospel we trace the path of Jesus in His steps ; we listen to Jesus and hear Him talk about conduct and character. To follow His simple, elemental, inductive method of study takes us away from classification. We go through life, not as the professional botanist, to pluck, dry, classify, put away in a drawer, label, and perhaps exhibit the selected specimens of conduct. We go rather as a nature lover who walks through the fields and watches the lilies as they grow. Jesus is not a system maker, but an observer with the highest qualities of insight. He watches the people as they act. His ethics are based on the principles of growth ; He deals not with character as it is, but with character as it may be. He considers the issue, like a bulb planted in winter. He discerns the possibility of beauty in the spring. This is why the nethermost sins are not hopeless from the point of view of Jesus. States of mind interest Him. If the roots are dead there is no hope. So the Pharisee and the Publican in ordinary estimates were clearly distinguishable. So are the rose and the daisy. From all appearances and by ordinary standards of value the rose is to be preferred, but the great question is what will happen next spring .'' Jesus looking on the Publican saw in him promise and possibility and knew that he would come to something, but the Pharisee was dead at the root. What hope is there in the character 1 This is the question. Is there to come something from the unpromising stem which will justify keeping it .-' If not, cut it off. " To be carnally minded is death, to be spiritually minded is life ". Here is the promise of growth. So with the lead of Jesus we are able to get at the real in character and find emanci- pation from the bondage of ordinary classifications of conduct in the discovery of that which is vital. Secondly. In the problems of doctrine. The history of religion plainly reveals a tendency toward elaboration. In the process there is an inevitable loss of some of the elements of original character. A change of basepis not a change for the better. Religions deteriorate ; they lose their finer ingre- dients. The average Mahometan today is not nearly so good a man as 212 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. Mahomet was. Judaism in the time of Christ was very different from the Judaism of Moses. It is equally true of Christianity. The truth which Christ declared is obscured in tradition ; the life which He emphasized is lost in dogmatic systems. The most hopeful religious movement today is the determined effort to get back to Christ, to unload the superfluous baggage of theological dogma, to set back the roots of all Christian growth into the original soil of the real life of God. It is a reaction from the exter- nal to the internal, from the accidental to the essential. Back and up the stream of religious life the earnest souls of this latest of the centuries are pressing their way in order that they may trace the current to the fountain head and discover a clear stream. The longest dogmatic systems are the atest. The Romish Church has continued the elaboration of its articles of faith through fourteen centuries, adding the last in 1870. We have to go back for brevity. The thirty-nine articles in the Westminster Confession are more brief than the Catholic creed. The creed of Athanasius is shorter still, the Nicene creed less elaborate. The nearer the source the simpler the statements. The Apostolic creed is the simplest of all, but the pure river of the water of life is today being traced back to the very altars of God where the stream issues forth clear as crystal uncontaminated by the findings of Augsberg, Trent, Chalcedon or Nicea, back to the New Testament itself in which are the pure springs — there to find the personal Christ. " Hushed be the noise and the strife of the schools, Volume and pamphlet, sermon and speech, The lips of the wise and the prattle of fools, Let the Son of Man teach ! " Who has the key of the future but He t Who can unravel the knots of the skein ? We have groaned and have travailed and sought to be free, We have travailed in vain. " Bewildered, dejected, and prone to despair, To Him as at first do we turn and beseech, Our ears are all open 1 Give heed to our prayer ! O Son of Man teach 1" The essentials of religion as defined by Paul who received his illumma- tion from the personal Christ are but two, — a person and a fact, Jesus and the resurrection. Peter's succinct statement, the summary of which he had learned after seven months with Jesus in northern Galilee was : " Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God ". And the final word of John reveals the heart of the matter—" He that hath the Son hath life ". In the atmos- phere of the New Testament there is the emphasis of life. The councils of the centuries have been elaborating definitions, determining theories, settling opinions, and have wrapped themselves round in the shackles of paralyzing discussion. Take up any system where you will. They have nothing to do with character or conduct. They are metaphysical, not ethical. They discuss the relation of the three persons in the trinity ; the relation of the divine and human natures in the person of Jesus ; the relation of the sacrifice of Jesus FREEDOM THROUGH 2HE TRUTH. 213 to the divine law ; the relation of the will of man to the will of God ; the mysterious nature of the sacraments and many such like things they discuss. Doubtless these ought they to have done but not to have left the other undone. One breathes another atmosphere in the teachings of Jesus, lie speaks of a Father's love and care; His beneficent providence; the freedom from care which comes from trust in that love ; the obligation of children to be like their Father ; the importance of unselfish service ; the excellence of the tender virtues; the estimate of the inner quality of life as compared with the merely external and formal. This is not theory nor theology. It is life. As Henry Van Dyke has said: "Theology is not religion for the same reason that biology is not life ". Wherever there is this conception of what is vital in religion in the actual contact with the living Christ there is life real, throbbing, essential. This emphasis of the essentials has found expression lately in the chapel at Brighton where the eloquent Robertson preached. There has been placed a memorial in the form of HofTman's " Christ Among the Doctors of the Law", and as express- ing the attitude of mind of their beloved preacher, the givers of the tablet have inscribed the legend — " They were thinking about theolog}', he was thinking about God ". Thirdly. In the problems of^vorship. The tendency toward elaboration is as apparent in forms of worship and methods of organization until some- times it is diflficult to discover the earnest, simple activities of the church of the apostles amid the elaborate ritual and complex ceremony of today. The unselfish ministrations of the apostolic church has been displaced by the selfish administration of the church of the later centuries. We have to go back for simplicity. The methods that have gradually come into use through the centuries have obscured the simple ways of the apostles. The emphasis of the church as an organization has given rise to an elaboration of ritual, an enrichment of ceremony which makes the church appear as an end in itself. Ecclesiastical form is thought to express the whole content of religion and in the thought of the church as an organization is lost the more Christly thought of the church as an organism. Simplicity is fundamental to all religious life. In recent explorations in Egypt it is recorded that Cailliaud found some excavations in a mountain which on entering proved to be emerald mines apparently unvisited since the times of the Ptolemies. There at the entrance lay the lamps and the tools with which the ancient miners had worked appeal- ing with silent eloquence for other hands to take them up and dig for new treasures which lay in costly profusion all around, and with the old instru- ments these new workmen in the latest of the centuries dug out the emerald gems. The apostolic church, fresh from the hands of the Holy Ghost had four great characteristics,— love of truth, love of one another, frequent remem- brance of Christ, and immediate connection with Him in prayer. They continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, in the break- ing of bread and in prayers. There are some things in the church more 214 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. important than exactness of ordinances, or ornateness of worship, and one of them is the divine breath, A work among the mariners is carried on in New York harbor by the Episcopal City Mission. The missionary was asked by an ecclesiastical purist whether his church were high or low. He replied, "It depends upon the tide ". There were some simple, great matters which inspired the consecrated disciples in the first century and they engaged in a manifold ministry, a ministry of life as penetrating as human need, as comprehensive as divine love. You will remember John Stuart Blackie's confession of faith. It has the true ring. " Creeds and confessions ? High church or low ? I cannot say; but you would vastly please us If with some pointed Scripture you could show To which of these belonged the Saviour Jesus. I think to all or none. Not curious creeds, Or ordered forms of churchly rule He taught, But soul of love that blossomed into deeds With human good and human blessing fraught. On me nor priest, nor presbyter, nor pope. Bishop nor dean, may stamp a party name. But Jesus with His largely human scope The service of my human life may claim. Let prideful priests do batile about creeds The church is mine that does most Christ-like deeds". That church has the most divinity in it which does the most for human- ity. Humanity wants life, not theories about life. The church that will save a world must be divinely alive. It will not be a rich church nor a poor church, liturgical or non-liturgical. Life consists not in ornateness nor plainness, "Neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature ". Such a church will subordinate tradition to truth, will insist that even Augustine and Calvin shall yield the throne to Jesus, will insist that councils, creeds, priests and fathers combined shall not in the least diminish the immediacy of the pressure of the very words of Christ or divert the permanent and paramount authoritativeness of His word. Such a church will keep the conscience of Christendom face to face and eye to eye with our Lord, will provide an exhilarating atmosphere for Christian activity and impart nerve to Christian enterprise. Such a church will emancipate the thought of God's people from entanglements and complica- tions by its constant fealty to the personal and vital elements of Christian truth. To the member of such a church Christ will be the one thing in the Christian life. He will know Christ as a personal force. Christ will ener- gize him, inspire him, be the motive of all he does. He will yield to Christ exact, absolute and prompt obedience. He will be in vital touch with Christ by virtue of his own personal faith. To him Christ is the vine of which he is a branch and all his Christian experiences are a matter of being wrought into Christ, for Christ and Christ's spirit are the determinative energies of his life. This is the church for which the world is waiting. This is the FREED OM THR O UGH THE TR UTH 2 1 5 simple vital truth which humanity craves. The ordinary mind with difficulty understands the elaborate systems of doctrine which the centuries have perfected, nor can it appreciate the elaborate cults of worship which are maintained in the name of religion ; but the people know the life of Jesus when they see it, and in Him Christianity consists not of many things com- bined, but one thing. Once in immediate contact with Jesus Christ, the seeker for truth is not confused with complicated questions of convictions or conduct. These are incident, not essence. Life is the essential thing. Where there is life there will be fruit. Life will surely manifest itself. The Christianity of Christ is not a system of doctrine, nor a form of worship, nor a code of morals, but divine life in the human soul. To be sure, the Christ -filled man will think deeply and accurately ; he will also behave well, but neither opinion nor behavior, neither creed nor covenant constitute the essence of Christian experience. Life is the thing. Let the truth as it is in Jesus be accepted in its simplicity and its entirety and the world's emancipation is achieved. He did not formulate a definite series of the necessary articles of faith, nor did He summarize the things which it is essential to believe. Such a statement is not essential to the religion of Jesus. He did not insist upon certain forms of worship. " God is a spirit: and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth " ; not in Gerizim, nor in Jerusalem is the place to worship, but wherever and whenever the reverent soul lifts itself to God. He did not fix a heirarchy of virtues and classify actions by any set and fixed ethical standards. He seemed quite willing that the opinions of His disciples should be flexible so long as their faith was firm and their life eternal. He seemed to have anticipated the subtle temptation which has overtaken the Christian disciple in all ages to emphasize the intellectual ele- ment in the religious life on the one hand, or the external on the other, and so He taught, explained, and reiterated that life was paramount and prece- dent. He led His disciples to larger views of intellectual freedom and responsibility. He bade them see that in the nature of the case opinion is to life what letter is to spirit, what scaffold is to structure. The words which He spake unto them, they were spirit, they were life. In the classical passage (John 4) he teaches clearly that worship depends upon a true con- ception of God, that it must be spiritual as opposed to sensuous, that it must be in truth, dealing with reality, giving adequate and veracious expression to genuine desire and veritable emotions. In the public worship which will accord with these simple principles the Praise will not be rendered perfunctorily by certain lay figures arrayed in the latest achievements of the dressmaker's art, conspicuously exposed to the gaze of the curious, nor will it be the pyrotechnical vocalizations of certain musical prodigies whose delight is in the law of the echo. It will rather be the spontaneous expression of real emotion, gratitude, joy, rever- ence— praise in which every worshipper will participate and pour out his soul in exultant song. 2i6 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. The Prayer will not be an elocutionary discourse which brings the wor- shipper into communion with him who prays ; it will rather be the voice of the heart, as natural an outbreathing as when the flowers swing their censers in the temple of the morning. The Preaching will present God, not the preacher ; will awaken the conscience, not tickle the itching ear ; will ennoble and enrich the life of the hearer till he will feel that his minister is the minister of Christ by whose hand he has the gift of life and has that life more abundantly. Fourthly. In the problems of social service. Who shall give humanity the life and liberty it craves ? This opportunity belongs to the church of the living God. What is the New Testament idea of the church ? It is the body of Christ, the reincarnation of the Son of God, the incarnation of the Holy Ghost. As such she must express in her conduct, her doctrine, her worship, her service the spirit which animates her. Christ must be the source of her life, Christ the body of truth which she teaches, Christ the source of her power. There is only one simple fact which constitutes the organism called church, namely, her living relation to Christ. There is no church except as the members of the organism are livingly knit into Him. The church is organism, not mechanism. In the deepest sense, therefore, the church may embody the truth which will give humanity the liberty and life it craves. She may demonstrate that God localizes Himself in her. She may be the organ of the life of God. For this church the world waits. Humanity wants life, the touch of omnip- otence, contact with God. The church of the living Christ today may be the embodiment of divine love, wisdom and powder. She may work in the world as distinct amid the organizations of the time as the life of Abraham was amid the materialistic civilization of the Mesopotamian Valley, as dis- tinct as the life of Enoch, who walked with God, who worked and wor- shipped in a spiritual temple invisible yet real and eternal. While other men build theologies, settle definitions, elaborate theories and try by multi- plied and complex agencies to affect the life of men, the church may triumph as Elijah on Carmel, or Peter at Pentecost, who linked their activities to the dynamics of the skies and were personally moved by the omnipotent energies of God. Such a church may conquer mountainous difficulties, expel insistant and rebellious evil, solve vexed and intricate problems, and bring in a new heaven and a new earth. Herself delivered from the bondage of the letter, and tradition, and form, having found the emancipation of spirit and life, she can deliver humanity from the bondage of sin and death. The social evangel of Jesus was spirit and life. He began with life at its sources. His salvation of society, like salvation of the soul, was to save the body through the soul. His methods in redemption were, therefore, vital, not mechanical. He would transform the soul of mankind and so change the civilization in which they live. Only the life of Christ can raise civilization from the dead. The efficiency of Christ's method has been vindicated through 2000 years of history. Yet it is astonishing how difficult it is to get it practically FREEDOM THROUGH THE TRUTH. 217 accepted by the social workers of to-day. The external method is so plausi- ble, so bewitching, so easy. There never was a time when some reformer was not ready to suggest some Medea's bath, some Merlin's charm, or, with Carlisle, some Morison's pill which can cure all the ills of the race. The shores of the social sea are strewn with the wrecks of these futile and mechanical attempts at changing the condition of men. It is less expensive just to put a face on things. Some people are yet misled by the error that the shell can form the organism, or the feathers grow the bird. There are yet advocates of the theory that environment makes the man ; there are yet reveries of sentiment and romance about the New Jerusalem builded with jewels and paved with gold, and Jesus yet weeps over the city and society because the people will not let Him build their Jerusalem for them. These methods and agencies leave the essential difficulty of the problem untouched. Only the truth as it is in Jesus can make men free. " The law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made us free from the law of sin and death ". We must bring to bear upon dilapidated and disabled souls the quickening breath of the divine life and so awaken them to the appreci- ation of that better life which they may have abundantly. To be sure, men will say they are not dead as the Pharisees declared they had " never been in bondage to any man ", yet there was Egypt and Babylon in their history, and the Roman eagles were visible in the temple, flaunting their wings in the castle. Men are as ingenious as they in ignor- ing the disagreeable facts which blind so many to their fetters. Sin's fet- ters are riveted when the bondsman lifts his manacled hand and protests his freedom, but slavery is not an affair of political or social arrangement. It is a condition of the spirit. Death is not physical collapse, but separation from God. Real bondage is that which enslaves the will and prevents doing right. " Whoso committeth sin is the servant of sin ". The most real servitude and the only terrible death is that perverted condition of soul in which the better nature is incapable of casting off the chains woven by its own acts, and in trying to do so throws aside the restraints of virtue only to be bound the more tightly by the heavier fetters of vice. This deeper human need is revealed as by a lightning flash in the words of John (i John 5:12) and the words of Jesus illumine the path into the larger liberty of the sons of God. " He that hath the Son hath life " — " If the Son make you free you shall be free indeed ". * THE HOME AT BETHANY AND THE FRIENDSHIPS OF JESUS. BY REV, DONALD SAGE IVIACKAY, D. D., Minister of the Fifth Avenue Collegiate Church, New York. Friendship, as an influence in Christ's Hfe, was neither trivial nor inci- dental. If it be true that a man is known by his friends, it may be said with perfect reverence that the character of Jesus, in its human relations, can be interpreted in the light of His friendships. Apart, therefore, from their historical interest, the friendships of Christ have a definite psychologi- cal value. In ways most suggestive and illuminating they interpret cer- tain fundamental qualities in His nature, without which, indeed. His humanity would be incomplete. On the one hand, for example, they reflect Christ's capacity for creating friendships a certain sympathetic power of drawing men and women to Himself on the basis of loving intimacy. On the other hand, they reveal the need of frieridship itself as a feature of His nature, a craving of His heart which demanded the sympathy and love of kindred souls for its expression. But more than that, in addition to this historical and psychological interest, the friendships of Jesus must be studied in the light of their spir- itual and experimental value. Nothing would be more inadequate than to think of these friendships as merely reminiscences of His human life on earth. They are, in fact, the pledge of His continuous presence in the experience of His people. They are the historical type of that mystical communion which the believer enjoys as the supreme achievement of faith. The friendship of Jesus, mediated through the Holy Spirit, is the dynamic in the Christian consciousness. There is no simpler, yet more profound definition of Christianity as a spiritual influence in the soul than in these three words, " Friendship with Jesus ". In these words lies the secret of the divine life in man, transfiguring character and inspiring conduct. " Hence- forth I call you not servants but friends." The Christian life, it may be said, passes through three distinct stages — that of the bond-servant, where the radical motive is compulsion through fear ; that of the hireling, where the controlling elements are duty and reward, and finally that of the friend, where spiritual experience has resolved itself into personal fusion with Christ, in which the dominant influence is love expressing itself in passionate devotion. That is the flower of Christ's friendship. To that high destiny He sought to lift every man who felt the touch of His spirit. Very beautifully is that spiritual aspect of His friendship brought out in that verse in St. Mark's Gospel which records the calling of the twelve. In Mark 3 : 14 we * Delivered at the Seventh Conference, held at the Central Congregational Church, April 13, 1904. 218 THE FRIENDSHIPS OF JESUS. 219 read, "And He appointed twelve that they might be with Him ". A world of spiritual suggestion lies in that preposition " with ". Primarily he chose these twelve men, not to cast out devils or preach the gospel or baptize. Back of all these things was this fundamental condition : He chose them "that they might be with Him", Fellowship with Christ must antedate service for Christ. Our friendship with the Master is the secret of our activity for the Master. To know this atmosphere of personal communion with Him is the highest culture of which the soul is capable. Friendship, the reservoir of service ; lacking that, service becomes drudgery and duty sordid. It is a frequent criticism of Christian ethics that the New Testament is singularly reticent on the subject of friendship. While it is specific enough as to duties of husbands and wives, parents and children, masters and ser- vants, on the claims and duties of friendship, the New Testament, it is often asserted, has no word to say. While Pagan thought found its noblest utterances in its glowing apostrophes to friendship, Christian literature on the other hand, in and out of the canon, has nothing that can compare with the great classics on this theme. Jeremy Taylor, indeed, amongst the Puri- tans, has a charming essay on the " Pleasures and Offices of Friendship ", — next to his book on " Holy Living and Dying ", his best piece of writing, — but even Jeremy Taylor, writing from the Christian point of view, draws his most effective illustrations from the classic authors of Greece and Rome. But the assertion that the New Testament has nothing to say on the pleasures and offices of friendship is only partially true. What it omits to say by precept or aphorism, the New Testament does convincingly by sug- gestion and example. If the word friendship occurs only once in the New Testament, and then only as a term of condemnation, the atmosphere of friendship in its highest and purest sense pervades the book like the aroma of Mary's ointment. The new commandment is the charter of Christian friendship. That we love one another as He loved us is to be the measure of our spiritual kinsh'ip with all men, and from the passion of that divine love. Christian friendship draws its inspiration. The home at Bethany was the geographical center of the friendships of Jesus. To the Fourth Gospel we owe an imperishable debt of gratitude for that exquisite chapter in the Saviour's life. Bethany, lying peacefully amidst the uplands of Judea amongst the vine-clad hills, and shadowed by its spreading date palms, was the Elim in Christ's life, the quiet resting place towards which in His weariest days He turned His feet, not doubting the welcome of love which awaited Him there. Bethany brought the touch of home to a homeless man. Over that village home there rests for the Christian an almost idyllic light, peaceful, restful, like that of the early morning before the birds are awake. With its tender memories it enshrined the holy human sympathy of Jesus. His place in every home is made secure by His presence in that simple household, a presence that con- secrates the family and makes the humblest home a sanctuary. His love for man is made intense and personal by His love for Martha and Mary 220 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. and Lazarus — Mary, " whose eyes were homes of silent prayer " ; Martha, whose heart was burdened down with care, and Lazarus, whose vision pierced the night of death. As one studies Christ's relations in that Bethany home, one becomes conscious of a fourfold manfestation of His friendship with those whose intimacy with Him had ripened into mutual confidence and love. First, we see Christ there as the genial friend, when, with a touch of half playful humor He rebuked, if one may use a word so strong, the anxious worriment of Martha, busy with her household cares. To Luke we owe that charming glimpse of the contrasted temperament of the two sisters, amplified by John under different circumstances. Second, we see Him as the sympathetic friend, when in the hour of their great affliction He comes to them and mingled His tears with theirs at the grave of Lazarus. Third, we behold Him as the divine friend, when with voice of divine authority He declared Himself the Resurection and the Life and com- manded Lazarus to come forth. Fourthly, we witness in Jesus the grateful friend, when with imperish- able words of gratitude He acknowledged Mary's act of devotion in breaking over Him the precious spikenard and vindicated her love for all time in the face of the vulgar criticisms of Judas and his associates. These then were at least four distinctive notes in the friendship of Jesus as it unfolded in the home at Bethany ; geniality, sympathy, gratitude and divine helpfulness from the shadow of death. Combine these qualities and they reveal the intense and beautiful humanness of Christ's relations with those He loved. His was a friendship that invited confidence and disarmed fear. Take, for example, Martha's approach to Him (recorded by St. Luke), when in a moment of petulance she appealed to Him to send Mary back to her household duties instead of monopolizing the Master's attention. The strong aorist verb, meaning literally " coming up suddenly " to Him, betrays not merely a touch of temper on Martha's part, but a cer- tain familiarity of approach which is suggestive of the intimacy which existed between Christ and these two sisters. And it is in the light of that unconstrained confidence that we are able to appreciate the geniality of Christ's reply. It is hardly fair to call it a rebuke. It is rather the half bantering response of one who, recognizing the anxious hospitality of a gen- erous hostess, seeks to relieve her anxiety, while at the same time defending the more spiritually-minded Mary who sat at His feet. But most beautifully this mark of utter confidence in His sympathy was shown by these sisters in the message they sent to Jesus when Lazarus fell ill. " Him whom Thou lovest is sick ". That is all. The message con- tained no request. It was enough, these grief-stricken sisters felt, to tell the Master that His friend was sick. Friendship has no higher mark than that. The silence, the reserves of a true friendship are more eloquent than its speech. The language of the heart in the hour of its necessity fills up the gaps of the broken speech, and what the lips cannot articulate, love interprets and love fulfils. THE FRJENDSHIFS OF JESUS. 221 It is not without significance that the friendship of Jesus towards the household at Bethany found its highest expression in the hour of a great sorrow and through a great self-sacrifice. The eleventh chapter of John is a life-commentary on the exceeding preciousness of Christ's presence in the last and saddest moments of experience. To that grief-shadowed home He came, even though He knew His coming meant the hastening of His own death, as it proved, and forgetful of self, forgetful for the moment even of His own power over death, He bowed His head in tears so deep, so intense that those standing near could not but exclaim, " Behold how He loved him ". Never, save on the cross, were the human and the divine in Christ so sharply contrasted, and yet too, never so matchlessly blended as when, one moment weeping in sympathy by the grave, the next moment He said: "Lazarus, come forth ". Than that act of bringing back life from the tomb, friendship could only go one step further, the laying down of His own life for His friends. And that coronation of friendship Jesus reached on the cross. Turning now for a few moments to Christ's friendships with His disci- ples, one is impressed at once by their variety. The friendships of Jesus were not temperamental. They were not limited by the presence or absence of certain qualities in those He invited to His intimacy. How various and contrasted for example, were the types of character represented in these twelve men, — the choleric Peter, the melancholic John, the phleg- matic Andrew, the cautious Thomas, the secretive Judas; in each and all of these men there was some distinct quality that called out the Master's love. It is indeed a significant fact, that while John was the beloved disciple who most deeply had caught the secret of Christ's love, Judas was the only one of the twelve whom Christ ever addressed as " Friend ". In that moment of betrayal in the garden, as though in that last moment He sought to stay the traitor's kiss, the last pleading of the Master's love and the final appeal to the holy memories of the past could find no deeper expression than this, " Friend, wherefore art thou come ? " It was, as has been said, the last pleading of love, the appeal of a friendship that to the ^very end sought to restrain the treacherous hands that destroyed it. What then was the basis of this friendship of Christ ? What was the supreme condition of entrance into this holy fellowship ? The answer to that question is found in the fifteenth chapter of John. If the eleventh chapter, with its exquisite picture of the Bethany home is the historical record of His friendship, the fifteenth chapter with its beautiful parable of the vine and the branches is the spiritual record of His friendship. Picture for a moment the scene. The fourteenth chapter ends with the words spoken in the upper room, "Arise, let us go hence ". Immediately after the fifteenth chapter begins with the memorable words, " I am the true vine". What is the point of connection ? As Christ arose with the eleven disciples and stepped out on the stairway leading down to the silent road, bathed that Passover night in the radiance of the paschal moon, His eye would naturally rest on the richly clustered vine that climbed against the wall of the house. Instantly it gave the key to the thoughts of His heart. He was 222 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. about to leave those men. Never again could the conditions of intercourse be precisely the same as in these years in which they had sojourned together. But the love, the intimacy, the confidence was to be the same. How then could He make clear to them that though separated in the flesh their kin- ship was not to lessen, but to deepen in the years to come ? And the vine, growing there before them as they stepped out into the silent Passover night, supplied the thought. As the vine drew its life from the root buried out of sight, and as the branches brought forth their fruit through the unseen currents of life which flowed from that hidden root, so henceforth their life in Him and His friendship with them would be realized by their spiritual communion with an unseen friend. So the great words were spoken, " Abide in Me ; henceforth I call you not servants but friends ". That word "henceforth" marked a cleavage line in their spiritual history. On one side "servants"; on the other side "friends". Strange, surely, that not till the night of His leaving them, when, according to human standards friendship was to end. He admitted these eleven men to the high intimacy of friendship. Now what was the condition of entrance into this richer experience r How were they to cross over the " henceforth " from servitude to friendship .'' The condition was obedie^ice. Mystical in its character, this higher friendship was to be supremely practical in its realization. The ethical condition of obedience was emphatic. Here, indeed, we touch one of the most suggestive features in the Fourth Gospel. I sometimes think that a great work has yet to be written on the ethics of St. John. The most spiritual of all the evangelists, the ethical note of his Gospel is as clear as the ethic of the Sermon on the Mount. This is especially true of St. John's doctrine of obedience. In John's Gospel, obedience has a threefold influence, first as the condiion of intellectual illumination ; second, as the con- dition of spiritual communion, and third, as the condition of peace of soul. "If any man will do the will, he shall know the doctrine, whether it be of God", — obedience as the organ of intellectual illumination. "Ye are My friends if you do whatsoever I command you ", — obedience as the organ of spiritual communion. " If ye know these things, happy (blessed) are ye if ye do them, — obedience the organ of blessedness and peace of soul. Through that obedience, the friendship of Christ as a spiritual experi- ence was intended to produce a threefold blessing. First, transformation of motive in service ; second, revelation of purpose in discipline ; and third, assimilation of character through fellowship. These are the three distinctive marks of that deeper life of fellowship to which on the eve of His departure He admitted His disciples. First, transformatiofi of motive in service. The motive of service in the slave or bond-servant is either fear or reward ; the motive in the friend is co-operative love. The friend anticipates his master's word and rejoices in doing his master's will. Friendship is the transfigura- tion of service ; the creation of a new motive ; redeeming life from its drudgery, and sending the pulse-beat of joy into the most trivial task. Secondly, friendship in this spiritual interpretation, is the revelation of purpose in discipline. " I call you friends " said Jesus, " for all things that I THE FRIENDSHIPS OF JESUS. 223 have heard of My Father I make known to you". The slave works in ignorance of his master's purpose. " His not to reason why, his but to do or die ". But it is the privilege of friendship to share its plans, and to the friends of Jesus there is given a constant unfolding of His purposes for them and through them. Through all the web and woof of experience, the friend of Jesus can trace the golden threads which reveal the pattern of the Father's love. So suffering and sorrow became transfigured through the revelation of a divine purpose in life, and submission to the divine will becomes the soul's deepest joy. Lastly, the friendship of Jesus as a spiritual communion, brings with it assimilation of character through daily fellowship. The servant may grow in faithfulness and sympathy with his master, but friendship, as an intimacy of soul, brings with it, as its supreme blessing, the ever deepening assimilation of life and character into the likeness of the Master himself. And that is the coronation of the Friendship of Jesus. *THE CROSS THE WORLD'S EVANGEL, OR THE CHRISTIAN LAW OF SACRIFICE IN RELATION TO MISSIONS. (St. John 12 : 20-32.) BY REA^. HENRY C. :m:ABIE, T). D., Secretary of the American Baptist Missionary Union, Boston, Mass. The Occasion. — It is the third day of Passion Week ; it is the last day of our Lord's public ministry to His own people Israel, — the day on which " He departed and hid Himself from them ". He had come " unto His own, and His own received Him not". Because the house of Israel knew not the day of her visitation, she was left to herself desolate. Just at this juncture an event of great significance occurs. Among the multitude of those who had come up to the Feast of the Passover were many Gentile proselytes to the Jewish faith, who at least half believed that Jesus was " the desire of all nations ". Among these were certain Greeks who wished to see Jesus. He had just made His royal entry into Jerusa- lem, and His name was on all tongues ; they must not miss the opportunity of personal audience with One to Whom the hosannas had been sung. The announcement of this visit fell on the spirit of Jesus in a psychic hour, and it was the harbinger of a new epoch of universal evangelization. Such a visit must have presented to Jesus a strong temptation. The whole Roman empire was about to open to apostolic approach ; the coming Europe would be a theatre for its operation. Britain would be His to exploit, the new world His to pre-empt. His vision, sweeping across all the oceans, embraced Japan, China, India, Africa, and all the Islands of the sea, waiting for His coming. The prospect was such as never gpreeted statesman or world-conqueror before. But fascinating as was this prospect, it was not His to realize in a per- sonal, earthly career. A g^eat summer with teeming harvest awaiting other reapers than Himself, was ahead, but for Him — winter, death, the death of the cross intervened. Even as these new Magi knocked at the door, that cross loomed high on the horizon. Without pausing even to give answer to the uncommon request, His reply was instant: "The hour is come that the Son of Man should be glorified. Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a grain of wheat fall into the earth and die, it abideth by itself alone ; but if it die, it beareth much fruit". Not that Jesus did not appreciate the appearance of this new day-star upon His dark horizon, nor that He did not value the wealth of waiting harvests which the day would ripen : He simply put them away for the present. Just now He is putting first things first ; the atonement must be wrought ; that conditions everything. That ♦Delivered at the Sixth Conference, held at the Trinity Union Methodist Episcopal Church, March g, 1904. 224 THE CROSS THE WORLD'S EVANGEL. 225 which lay in the Father's will as something eternally conceived, but now historically to be accomplished, was of supreme moment. So Jesus drops all other prizes that tempt His imagination, and in one cry of complete abandon He breaks forth, " Father, glorify Thy name ". It is the most consummate self-surrender in all history. It is significant that the particular moment when Jesus so gave Him- self up to His cross, should have been precisely that at which these Greeks came. Up to this time, Christ had magnified His errand as " unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel", but now, since its odor is to fill the world, the alabaster box which contained the precious nard must be broken. The enmity of the Jews was pressing Him up to the Roman cross, but the Father's will working within Him was also constraining Him to His volun- tary self-sacrifice. All middle walls of partition, as between Jew and Gen- tile, must now be broken down ; Christianity must become catholicised. Christ's foot was upon the border of a yielding world ; but before He can advance an inch He must turn away to die. It was bitter, but it was sav- ing, as it was loyal to every moral reality. Such was the occasion. Aspects of Sacrifice. We are now brought to the consideration of the offering itself, in behalf of the world, which the unique death of Jesus con- stituted. It is the law which underlies this death, commonly called " the law of sacrifice ", which we now study. We shall consider this law in two aspects : — First, as the atoning offering of Christ in behalf of the world, and second, as the archetype of Christian self-sacrifice in behalf of others. I. And first, let us consider that objective offering which Christ made of Himself for the redemption of the world. In the expression in v. 24, " Except a grain of wheat fall into the earth and die", all this is implied; but in V. 31 Jesus reiterates the principle in language most unequivocal, as setting forth the character and bearing of the death He died. He exclaims, " Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto myself ". The plain meaning of the two passages just quoted will compel us to conclude that the sacrifice of Christ in behalf of the world was a judg- ment-death. But before defining m what respects this is so, some prelimi- nary considerations are needful, in order to a clear understanding of terms. The Scripture-Term Judgment. The meaning of this term " judgment " has been grossly misconceived, and, in consequence, the most unhappy revolt against its use exists in the modern mind. By many the term has been regarded as synonymous with a sentence of reprobation or damna- tion. But this is due to an oversight of certain additional and very differ- ent and gracious senses in which the Bible uses the term. The word often is employed in the sense of intervention, vindication, albeit it is a vindica- tion which has regard, also, to the divine holiness. For example, in the fifty-fourth Psalm we find the prayer, " Save me, O God ; judge me by Thy 2 26 2 HE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. strength ". The Prophet Jeremiah declares of the coming Redeemer, "He shall judge the cause of the poor and needy". That is, He will deliver them from the oppressor, reversing the false position imposed on them by their cruel persecutors. Matthew, quoting from Isaiah, says, " He shall show judgment to the Gentiles * * * the bruised reed shall He not break, and smoking flax shall He not quench, till He send forth judgment unto victory, and in His name shall the Gentiles trust". What could be more tender ? It is like the opening of a dove-cote for the ingath- ering of heathen souls who are expected to come flying as clouds that they may home themselves in God. After Christ's healing of the man born blind, described in the ninth chapter of John, Christ promulgates His great law of grace in the expression, " For judgment came I into this world" — a new kind of judgment, a judgment according to grace — "that they which see not may see ". The Moral Acknowledgjuent in Christ's Work. But a second thing which needs to be premised, in connection with the law of sacrifice is this : that in the work of Christ, the emphasis properly belongs to the moral acknowledgment therein made, rather than to the mere pain He bore. In some conceptions of the atonement, supposedly most orthodox, too large an emphasis has been put upon the sufferings of Christ as such ; as if the sufferings won the pardon. The old view of a " limited atonement " sprang out of the conviction that in the divine mind there was an exact estimate of the amount of suffering required for the sins of a given number of the race. That which is sometimes called " the commercial view " of the atonement, is objectionable for a similar reason, that a certain amount of pain is conceived as an offset to a definite amount of sin. Thus the atone- ment would be purely a matter of the exact payment of debt. But this con- ception would be incongruous with the necessity of any real pardon. When Jesus was upon earth, while indeed He referred at times to the depth of His sorrow, yet He did not magnify the mere suffering He was called to bear, nor appeal for pity on its account. Even on the way to Calvary, when " there followed Him the great multitude of the people, and of women who bewailed and lamented Him ", He turned unto them and said, " Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for Me, but weep for yourselves and for your children ". Jesus would not have any mere compassion. Some of the mediaeval conceptions expressed in portraits of the Christ, rep- resenting Him as an object of pity, convey most misleading impressions ; they strike one as effeminate, and often as sycophantic. Christ, while the greatest of sufferers, was only incidentally such ; up to the last moment of His heart-break. He was ever actuated by the principles of the highest self- respect ; and He always conveyed the impression that with perfect self-com- mand He was moving towards the sublimest moral goal. There was some- thing unmistakably deeper to be affected by the cross, than the mere sym- pathy of mankind. The acknowledgment made in the moral realm, of the righteous and yet gracious relations with which Jesus was dealing, was the central thing. Says Dr. Godet : " When Christ gave out His last submis- THE CROSS THE WORLD'S EVANGEL. 227 sive cry upon the cross, it was in one conscience alone that this judgment of the world's sin, the echo of that which God pronounces in heaven, took place. But as there is only one rationality in all intelligent minds, so in reality there is only one and the same conscience in all moral beings ; and thus it is that the cry which came from that one perfectly normal conscience, is yet to re-echo in all other human consciences ". The most valuable thing about the humiliation of Christ, was that He assumed it with unques- tioning submission. In the Epistle to the Hebrews it is called " the obedi- ence ". This was its terminal point ; it was the acknowledged propriety of it all, that so vindicated God. Christ's offering was thus an answer to something final in God's uni- verse. Dr. P. T. Forsyth, principal of Hackney College, London, who in various recent papers* has thrown great light upon the atonement, has pointed out that later theological thought, while amply recognizing the prin- ciple of sacrifice, — sacrifice as mere altruism, — has done scant justice to the idea of judgment in its far-reaching Biblical sense ; a sense which has rela- tion to grace as well as law. This conviction is deeply shared b> the writer of this paper. Judgment more Final than Sacrijice. Now, the idea of sacrifice as an end is without warrant either in Scripture or reason. At best it can be only a means ; sacrifice is never an end, except to the ascetics, A man has no more right to sacrifice himself in the sense of destroying or injuring himself than he has to commit suicide. Whenever, as in monasticism, or in the rites of self-oblation which characterize Hinduism, or in self-applied legalistic rigors, the pains inflicted are thought to have a value or merit in themselves, they are idolatrous rather than Christian ; they are morbid and always end disastrously. Judgment, however, is a proper end m itself; it means the vindication of holiness, of righteousness, even of such righteous- ness as embraces in it all that we include in the terms love and grace ; and beyond such vindication one cannot go ; the last standard of appeal has been reached. It was to such a standard that the atonement had refer- ence. At the very basis, therefore, of the law of Christian sacrifice lies this principle of judgment so needing to be restored to the thought of our day. This term "judgment" is only another word for the redeeming realism of God's universe with both a severe and a gracious bearing. When, there- fore, we shall shortly say, as we must, that Christ in the work of His cross had a supreme reference to principles of judgment, we shall simply mean that He was doing iustice to all the moral and spiritual situation required in His Father's endeavor to save the world. He was dealing with the actual realities in the case — the realities of grace as well as of holiness — such realities as the final judgment will disclose. Christ's Death a Judgment- Death. We are now prepared, I trust, to come to the consideration of Christ's sacrificial-death as a judgment-death in behalf of the world. By the sacrificial-death, we mean something very * See Christian World Pulpit, Oct. i, 1902, and May 20, 1903. 228 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. different from the tragedy of the crucifixion.* The crucifixion was an expression of human sin at its worst, whereas the cross of the atonement was the expression of God at His best. The crucifixion was the most criminal act in the history of man, whereas the atoning act was the sub- limest act in the moral history of God ; it was the historical expression of that which was voluntary and eternal in God's character, government and practical attitude toward men. This atonement at its base was an invisible thing. It dealt with factors like these : with the divine government, the divine holiness, the divine love ; and all these as related to human sin in its inmost essence. In all, then, that Christ was exacting on the divine side. He was in some profound way experiencing not merely mortal death, but that death which is immeasurably deeper, namely, that spiritual death, that separation from God which is the consequence of sin. In this profound sense He " tasted death for every man ". He was deserted for the hour, that all who believe in Him may be forever received into fellowship with the divine. It is well known that William Cowper, the poet, passed much of his life under clouds of melancholia, and that in his death he morbidly felt that he was deserted. On a visit to his grave, Mrs. Browning took up this morbid thought of Cowper's and thus wrote correcting it : — " Deserted 1 God could separate from his own essence rather: And Adam's sins have swept between the righteous Son and Father; Yea, once, Immanuel's orphaned cry His universe hath shaken — It went up single, echoless, ' My God, I am forsaken ! ' •' It went up from the Holy's lips amid His lost creation, That, of the lost, no son should use those words of desolation ; That earth's worst phrensies, marring hope, should mar not hope's fruition. And I, on Cowper's grave, should see his rapture in a vision 1" The death of Jesus was intrinsically a judgment-death. Perhaps the term "judgment-death" which we employ, or, to use a broader term, "judgment-infliction " would be better understood in the light of a concrete example. Of course, the judgment-death which Jesus bore was a matter so original and unique that no human illustration of it can be adequate. An illustration, however, may help. An acquaintance of the writer had a noble young son, who, however, on one occasion disobeyed his father and then sought to cover disobedience by falsehood. The father, on ascertaining the facts, summoned his son and asked him what he thought should be done about it. The son replied, " you should whip me ". The father assented, and took the boy aside to inflict the chastisement; when, however, the father came to use the whip his great heart broke and, instead of striking the boy, he said, " I cannot think of whipping you ; you are a small, delicate boy. *Itis indsed true that the New Testam;nt references to the crucifixion seem, at first sight, to place value on the crucifying act. It appears to us, however, that Christ simply adopted that which was intended to be the mark of His shame — His execution upon a cross — as the symbol of His moral enthronement secured through a deeper dying and its consequent resurrection; and thus "by the most exalted irony of history," the Neiv Testament represents Christianity as glorying in the cross: glorying not in what criminal men intended, but in what God purposed and accomplished on the ground of what He Himself had wrought on the divine side of the Calvary enactment. THE CROSS THE WORLD'S EVANGEL. 229 and I am a large, strong man. I can better bear the whipping than you ". So, removing his own coat, the father bade the boy to lay the whip on his own back. The boy struck a blow or two, but becoming overwhelmed with grief ran away to his chamber, where he was shortly found begging the divine forgiveness. It will be readily believed that such a form of cor- rection needed no repetition. Bronson Alcott, the transcendental philoso- pher, at one time introduced a similar form of discipline in his boys' school in Boston. For certain transgressions, the master, instead of the pupil, was to receive the punishment. The first time it was applied the culprit broke down, and the school broke down. So marked was its influence that it seemed likely to eventuate in an evangelical revival. Both these forms of judgment-infliction referred to, the one in the family and the other in the school, in principle are akin to that which under grace is employed in the divine government, and for moral power the principle is unequalled. On the basis of the judgment-death, or infliction, which God in Christ endured, human salvation was made possible. By this we mean that in effect certain great judicial results affecting God's government over men — His sf.ving mastery of men — were achieved, results which could have been secured in no other way. Four Objective Achievements of the Atonement. We name four of these results, results which enter into the objective side of the atonement. The first result was the acknowledgment, made in Christ's experience, of the due judgment or condemnation which belongs to the collective evil of the race- — that judgment which the sin-principle merited: "Now is the judgment of this world ". The second result was the casting out of the self-principle, or the false philosophy which characterizes Satan himself, and on which he also depends for the subversion of God's ideals in human life ; the fallacious world-principle of which Satan is the author, by Christ's moral attitude up to the moment he expired, was set at nought, was judged to its potential destruction, as having no rational or moral justification. " The prince of this world hath been judged ". " The prince of this world cometh and hath nothing in me ". " Now shall the prince of this world be cast out ". This meant the ultimate destruction of Satan himself objectively, as well as in us. The power of Christ's cross achieved it. The third result was this : Christ's death was a judgment-death in the sense that it potentially destroyed the nexus whereby sin and spiritual death had been bound together. So now, through what Christ effected on His cross, notwithstanding man's sin, we need not spiritually and eternally die. This, of course, works subjectively in us, but it was first in principle a historical achievement, and so objective also. Christ came " to destroy the works of the devil ". Thus redemption is deeper than natural causation. And the fourth result was this : Through this judgment-death on the cross, mankind was bought in as a reversionary treasure, and so became adjudged to Christ forever as His peculiar posses- sion. At all these points the atonement in principle was substitutionary, and so really vicarious : it was more than vicarious ; it was vicario-vital, inasmuch as in the atoning work of Christ it is always implied that its 230 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. benefits inure to those who are presupposed to become through faith vitally one with Christ. In all this work of the judgment- death the divine love was peculiarly shown. Divine love in the Scriptures, in fact, "has no meaning apart from the consideration that it took hold of the central situation of man's sin and guilt ". Love dealt with these in grace, instead of according to their strict merits. Perhaps we need to pause here, for this needs to be emphasized. Nothing in current thought is so misunderstood as the divine love. Divine love has a peculiarity : it is utterly unlike any other form of love in the world, because it enters into responsibility for human sin and guilt, as the moral situation, as the divine grace and the saving work require. Accord- ingly, divine love can deal with man in complete holiness, and at the same time safeguard his endless future. So it is that Christ shall "bring forth judgment unto victory", that judgment becomes the foundation of a system of grace. Thus, the salvation of the Gospel is a salvation by judgment rather than from it; nothing can go behind it; it is a basis of adjudication, a method of settlement in grace and righteousness, of all the claims of the holy God upon the fallen sinner. Through this fourfold achievement, we understand that the judgment enacted by Christ on His cross extended to the deepest realities of the moral universe, in this world and the next. In effect, it anticipated every essential moral issue that can cause dread to the human soul in anticipation of the last day. The penal difficulty with respect to past transgressions has been potentially met. Satan, man's great accuser, his arch enemy, has been potentially destroyed. The death doom entailed by sin has been potentially cancelled. .And we all in the intent of God have been adjudged to Christ as His potential possession. We are regarded as Christ's own, ransomed unto Himself, His bride, as dear to Him as the apple of His eye. With such results as these in principle accomplished, and personally appropriated by the vital faith of the believer, all fear of the last day is cast out, so that with confidence we may sing : " Bold shall I stand in that great day, For who aught to my charge shall lay ? Fully absolved from these I am, From sin and fear, from guilt and shame". That day is to become our coronation day, a day in which Christ Him- self has vastly more at stake than have we. Thus in the profoundest sense Christ's judgment-death was an anticipation of all possible expressions of judgment in the future ; and it becomes for all men the touchstone of character and destiny. II. The Secondary Form of the Law of Sacrifice. We now pass to that secondary form of the law of sacrifice, which springs out of the primary one we have just considered, and is conformable to it; that self-sacrifice in behalf of others which the followers of Christ are to exhibit. As for their Lord, so for them, " except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, THE CROSS THE WORLD'S EVANGEL. 231 it abideth alone ". Not that any portion of the disciples' suffering was needed to complete the atonement. That, as a finished work, stands ever by itself, albeit it has implications which involve the disciple. We are to " fill up on our part that which is lacking of the aftlictions of Christ in our rtesh for His body's sake ". This occasion of the visit of the Greeks, and the utterances it evoked from Christ, is one of three momentous hours in His career, in which He was authenticated by an audible voice spoken by the Father right out of the blue. The first occasion was at the baptism ; the second was at the trans- figuration ; and the third was this occasion when the Greeks came. There is something common to the teaching of each of these outstanding hours ; and that common teaching is fundamental. It concerns Christ's coming death and resurrection. These two things are really twin parts of one indi- visible fact, the consummated atonement. For in the Scriptures the cross always eventuates in the resurrection, and the resurrection always presup- poses the atonement. The resurrection is not conceived as a mere survival of a Jesus who was slain, but rather as the affixing of heaven's seal to the validity and value of the judgment-death endured. It was "not possible that He should be holden of death ", because through His supernatural judgment-death. He had destroyed him that had the power of natural death, that is, the devil. At the Jordan, on the mount, and at the coming of the Greeks, Christ was striking the keynote of His complete gospel, namely, this law of sacrifice, — the one only law which the Father emphasized with a voice, nay with a thrice repeated voice, from the eternities ; — He could not withhold this emphatic approval when Jesus His Son was accepting His own unique dying and living again as central to all His mission. At the baptism, the approval concerned Christ's official perfectmg as the last Adam ; on the mount the voice concerned the message essential to be preached, if demons were to be cast out and mankind transformed into divine Sonship; the message of " His decease ", or "exodus" — that trium- phant passage of the Red Sea of His judgment-death — " which He was to accomplish at Jerusalem ; " while the voice on this third occasion accentua- ted the only principle on which Christ's successors could gain power for their world-wide task, namely, the principle of sacrificial love. As Christ had gained His authority to redeem through His cross, so the disciple would gain His power to impress the salvation in that cross through a similarly surrendered life, and the spiritual quickening which would follow it. Hence those words in vs. 25 and 26: "He that loveth his life loseth it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal. If any man .serve Me, let him follow Me ; and where I am there shall also My servant be : if any man serve Me, him will the Father honor ". But here again we need to be on our guard in interpreting the law of sacrifice, that we do not fall into ascetic error. As with Christ, the emphasis was primarily upon the acknowledgment made by His conscience rather than the pain He bore, so in the life of the disciple, the acknowledgment of the moral claim in love, whatever its cost to self-gratification, is the main 232 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. thing. The moment one imagines, in a line of missionary service, for example, that he is performing some excess of devotion, some work of super- erogation, or acquiring merit with God, he is false to Christ's law. The highest form of self-abnegation, even of martyrdom, ever expressed by the most heroic devotee, whether in a Francis of Assisi, or in a Paton of the New Hebrides, is at its best only the manifestation of an elementary relation to Christ. In this realm, heroics are wholly out of the question. Why the Necessity of Sacrifice at all. But some one will ask, where is the moral necessity for this law of sacrifice ? This law is really the deepest paradox in Christianity. The necessity for it lies in the fact of sin. Upon the foreseen certainty that sin would come into the world, God saw it could be overcome in no other way than through a great judgment-death on the part of His Son, and through a new habit of life engendered in His people, conformable to that death. If there were no sin, it would be unnecessary in the moral realm for the "grain of wheat to fall into the earth and die ". Angels follow no such law; unfallen beings would not need to. But "as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin", so through death, in another form, the havoc sin had wrought was undone, "that through death He might bring to nought him that had the power of death ". Through obedience to this law by the Spirit, the sin-principle, the self-centered principle of being which Satan brought in receives its death blow, and evil is progressively overcome and eliminated in so far as place is given to the working of the higher law of vicarious love. Sin, how Expiated? It is in these deep two-fold senses, — through the work of Christ objectively on the cross, and subjectively in the believer, ^ — that sin is expiated ; it is potentially destroyed. The moral difficulty with which God in Christ was dealing in His law of sacrifice, was that of estab- lishing a consistent method of bestowing pardon on the sinner, and at the same time of creating within him a loathing of his sin. Be it observed that this is not expiation in any pagan sense of that term ; it should never be confounded with it. It had no reference to God's disposition as if that needed to be placated or appeased ; it had reference to the moral necessities of the case. Had there been no proper regard for these, the moral sense of mankind, quite apart from what was demanded by God, could not have been satisfied. To have forgiven sin without such a work as was wrought by Christ upon His cross would have legitimized it. But now, since in connection with this objective achievement of Christ's atonement, a new energy by the Spirit of God also works within the soul, a positive righteous- ness establishes itself upon the neck of sin and in the end will overcome and destroy it. Of course the death principle for the believer in this law of sacrifice or expiation above referred to is itself also a deep paradox, because it is a unique form of death, a death which in Christ's case was a judgment-death, but which in the disciple's case is a regenerating death. This issues not in self-destruction but in self-recovery through the spiritual resurrection which accompanies it. Death thus becomes a process not of burial in order to THE CROSS THE WORLD'S EVANGEL. 233 decay, but of planting in order to harvest. We bury dead refuse; we plant living germs; that which perishes is the mere husk, the outside wrappings; this sets free the springing principle of higher, even divine life. Through the transformation in this law of sacrifice, we realize a productiveness alto- gether transcending any processes of mere self-preservation. It is at this point that a new spontaneity of righteousness is begotten by the Spirit of God, so that in the loyalty of its Redeemer, the ransomed and renewed soul avows new fealty to God as expressed in the psalm, "Lo, I come to do Thy will, O God". A dying which thus results is not a waste, but is the highest economic recuperative force in the moral universe. A soul thus recovered, has a safeguard also against a second fall which the first Adam never knew. Moreover, through the operation of this law issues the potency of the new heavens and new earth having for their capital the new Jerusalem. Relation of the Atonement to World-Evangelization. But we cannot leave this law of sacrifice without accentuating its intended application, as Christ Himself did to the matter of world-evangelization. Our Lord having uttered His homily concerning the secondary expression of His principle of sacrifice thus soliloquizes : " Now is My soul troubled and what shall I say ? Father, save me from this hour.? " This would have been the natural thing to ask but for the problem of sin. The sin problem, however, cannot be ignored. Accordingly, Jesus instantly adds, " But for this cause came I unto this hour". This was the distinctive goal for which " the Word became flesh and dwelt among us ". Then in a passion of absolute loyalty to the divine purpose, Jesus throws Himself into the prayer, " Father, glorify Thy name". It was at that moment that " there came a voice out of heaven, saying, ' I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again ' ". This meant not merely that the Father would glorify Himself in the resurrection of Christ to follow^ but it implied also, as we think, that in the new epoch of Gentile evangelization into which Christ's successors would be brought, the divine name would be further glorified through them. And as if to put beyond all doubt what was intended by this miraculous utterance, Jesus made the decisive comment, " This voice hath not come for My sake, but for your sakes"; and if for their sakes, the Saviour implied that God the Father was putting upon them the work of continuing Christ's expression of vicarious love for a lost world. Once then, of the three times in which the audible voice came forth from the Father right out of heaven, it came for the benefit of those who were to build upon the foundation of Christ in the work of evangelizing the nations. Precisely the same emphasis which was afforded to Jesus Himself at the Jordan, and to the gospel message on the transfiguration mount was now given to the principle of their missionary task. This voice was the Father's accent upon that task. Moreover, it was to be conceived by those who apprehend it as perpetually reiterating itself till the end of the dispensation. The Father's Accent. We justly magnify the great commission of the Son, uttered just prior to His ascension. We habitually dwell upon the commission of the Holy Spirit given at Pentecost— upon the import of that 234 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. day with the descending breath, the heavenly fire and the supernatural tongues, empowering the church for high execution, and we do well. But there is a commission of the Father — the first person of the Holy Trinity, also — uttered direct from heaven on the significant day we are now contem- plating, which comes to us with the emphasis of the first person of the Godhead. This commission was intended, not for Christ, but for the disciples who stood about Him, and for their successors, and for theirs, and for theirs, repeating itself right on through each generation up to our own ; and through us to be passed on to all our successors until the work shall be finished and the kingdom shall have fully come. And yet multitudes among us in the modern church seem never to have heard this all-commanding voice at all. Some who heard those august tones said that " it thundered ". Sometimes in the summer time when the conditions have favored, we have been in the midst of an electric storm, the concussions of which became continuous. A peal breaking from one part of the heavens rolled into another arising from a different quarter, and that melted into one imme- diately above our heads, which again reverberated to all the surrounding points of the compass ; this woke yet other sounds, until really for hours there was one long roll like the reveille of the eternities. So it seems to us in the thought of this climacteric teaching of the third day of our Lord's passion, God would be understood as sounding through the heavens above our heads a long continuous thunder call summoning His followers of all times and places to universal cooperation with His glorified Son in the work of the world's salvation. That voice has never ceased to sound since our ♦,. Lord passed it on to His church. Bearing of this on Missions. The work involved in the sublime com- f mission growing out of the law of sacrifice in a few brief sentences is this. To give to the heathen world the benefit of the anticipatory judgment set up in the cross of Christ to prepare them for the final judgment of the last day. It was for this that the great judgment-death on Calvary was enacted and promulgated, — that every last moral issue that can arise in the last assize, might be met and settled in advance. Without the knowledge of that judgment enacted on the cross the heathen are shut up to that poor blurred judgment which exists in their own fallen natural consciences. That indeed God will not despise, " in the day when He shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ ". But this is utterly inadequate ; it lacks dynamic. It affords no certainty of salvation to the heathen who universally live under the torture of their guilty and superstitious fears ; it has little educative and transforming power. At the best it can only afford a low form of embryonic salvation, infantile in character. It certainly can furnish no such full and glorious salvation as God has prepared for everybody in Christ's cross. It is the denial of the benefit of this anticipatory judgment in Christ's cross through long ages to the heathen world that is their spiritual poverty and the church's crime. Evangelical Christians — a few of them — have entered upon work for the heathen to the degree they have, because to some extent they perceive the force and value of Christ's judgment-death as related to THE CROSS THE WOKLirs El'ANGEL. 235 human destiny. Like I'aul, they know that that death has potentially changed the moral status, the divine possibilities in grace for all mankind. Hence they are zealous to render actual the potential in the real experience of the heathen. It is this that creates the evangelical motive for missions. This it is also which raises the obligation to evangelize the heathen to an entirely distinctive plane. It is the obligation to give bein}:^ to the church among peoples to whom as yet it is impossible. To us, therefore, who through Christ have received mercy, God looks to extend that mercy to every groping pagan mind. To the degree that we also in the performance of that task die with Him and rise again to newness of life and service on the whole world-wide field, will the church become possessed with power to transform the earth. * THE ATTRACTING POWER OF THE CROSS. (St. John 12 : 32.) by rea^. a. very a. sha-w, Pastor of the Baptist Church in Brookline, Mass. We are all familiar with the three possible ways of reading the Bible : to read into it what we wish it to mean, to read out of it what we do not wish it to mean, or to let it say what it evidently does mean. No doubt we have found it much easier to read the Bible in either or both the former ways than in the third. It is especially hard for us to rid our minds of prepossessions in the subject now before us. To the great multitude of devout believers, this chapter is the watershed of John's Gospel, as the thought of the 32nd verse is the watershed of human history. In the minds of many, however, possibly of some here today, an exception will be taken to using the words of the subject assigned to me as an interpretation of the text before us. It will be objected by some that Jesus did not refer to His death at all but to His exaltation, John's interpretation being more or less of an impertinence. Others, while admitting that Jesus here refers to His death, would hold that He in no sense thinks of it as being the power of attraction. His death was a necessary incident to His heavenly exaltation, but it is the exaltation that attracts. So, for the present, let us lay aside the subject as stated, and, so far as possible dispossessing our minds of bias of all kinds except a bias toward the truth, let us try to discover our Lord's meaning in these words: "And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Myself". On the face of these words is our Lord's evident desire to draw all men to Himself. This will take place He declares if He " be lifted up from the earth ". John interprets these words as follows : " Now this He said signifying by what manner of death He should die ", an interpretation that in many quarters is treated with scant courtesy. It is difficult for the ordinary reader to understand why John may not be as well qualified to interpret the words of Christ correctly as any one in a later age. But without entering into this controversy, let us see if there is any light we may discover for ourselves. Twice before, as recorded by John, Jesus used this same expression concerning Himself, with the omission in each case of the words " from " or "out of the earth". To Nicodemus (3: 14) He said: "And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in Him may have eternal life ". In John 8 : 28 He said to the unbelieving and hostile Jews : " When ye have lifted up the Son of Man, then shall ye know that I am He ". ' Delivered at the Fifth Conference, held at the Central Baptist Church, February lo, 1904. 236 THE ATTRACTING POWER OE THE CROSS. 237 The word hupsoo'xs used literally of place and means "to lift up", "to lift up on high ", and so comes to mean " to exalt ", " to raise to eminence". From the reference in the first quotation to the pole on which the brazen serpent was hung, from the fact that the unbelieving Jews did lift up Jesus upon the Cross, and thus fulfil literally the prophecy of the second reference, and remembering that the literal meaning of the word refers to place, it ought not to be considered a sign of unwarranted bias to accept at its face value John's interpretation of the third use of the expression. That the words "from" or "out of the earth " would totally change the significance of the word, making it refer only to the heavenly exaltation, would seem unwar- ranted, unless the whole tenor of the passage positively demanded it. That it may give to the passage a double significance so that it includes the death on the Cross and the exaltation to the Father's right hand is quite open to belief. To understand this verse clearly, however, we must take our stand with Jesus and, if possible, face the situation from His point of view. The great confession had been made ; and immediately after this Jesus had told the disciples that He must go up to Jerusalem to suffer many things of the Chief Priests, the Elders and the Scribes, and be put to death, and the third day rise again. Three times over with solemn emphasis is this repeated. When the natural supposition would be that He would stay away from Jerusalem where His claims were derided or ignored and remain in Galilee among friends. He steadfastly set His face to go to Jerusalem. At this time there was no hostility that He could not, if He wished, have easily escaped. But He insists that He has a mission to fulfil. He evidently sees in the shame and death the purpose for which He came. He entered Jerusalem by His own deliberate choice in such a manner as to draw the attention of the multitudes to His Messianic claims. He receives with apparent satisfaction the plaudits of the multitudes and the hosannas of the children. And now some Greeks, evidently proselytes, though of pagan birth, had requested to be introduced to Him. At their request we hear Him say, "The hour is come that the Son of Man should be glorified". Fre- quently during His ministry He had said (or it had been said of Him) " Mine hour is not yet come ". Now He sees that hour at hand. It is an hour when He is to be glorified ; yet it is an hour so filled with darkness and horror that we hear Him saying, " Now is my soul troubled and what shall I say ". " Father save me from this hour ". Light is given us here from the parable of the wheat. " Except a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth by itself alone, but if it die, it beareth much fruit ". The very reason of the existence of the wheat is that it may die and in dying reproduce itself. Its life is of value only as it dies, and is to be interpreted only through its death. The hour then is the hour of Glory, but of a Glory that is inseparable from shame and death and the horror of great darkness more bitter than death. In the request of the Greeks, He sees the waving grain ripe for the harvest, but He sees that before the 238 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. harvest, if He would live and give enduring life to others He must first apply to Himself the law of the wheat and die. His first vision is that of Glory. Then the picture dissolves into a picture of the blackness of death incomparably terrible, and His soul shrinks for a moment, but presently the vision changes to that of a redeemed world, and in the center of it is the Cross reflecting the halo of eternal glory which it creates. One other point gives further light. If the Cross is to be His triumph, then it must be the final defeat of him, who through it, aimed his last and deadliest blow at the sacred head. "The prince of this world" shall be overcome and cast out from the place of power he has usurped over the lives of men. The blow aimed at the head of the Son of Man will rebound upon his own head to his final and complete undoing. Like the serpent that so firmly fastens its fangs in its victim that it cannot withdraw them till all their venom is exhausted, and its victim is not only too strong to be overcome, but rather crushes the serpent's head ; so Satan will exhaust his power to hurt, and, unable to overthrow the Son of Man, will be himself defeated and dethroned. "And /, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto Me ". And I, victor just where I will be thought to be vanquished ; I lifted up upon the Cross as upon a throne of tiiumph, will draw all men unto Myself. It is not at all necessary to exclude the Resurrection and Ascen- sion. They are integral parts of the one transaction without which the death would be an ignominious defeat. The essential point here, however, is that Christ speaks of His death not as a painful incident in the course of His high calling, but as the very fulfiUing of His mission ; not as a shameful trial to be undergone before He can attain His Glory and win men to Him- self, but as the means of His glorification, reflecting the Glory it accom- plishes, and itself drawing men to Himself. If now it has become plain that John has interpreted Christ correctly in this verse, we may go on to discover what are the essential elements in this lifting up that constitute it so great a power over men. Without going at length into the apostolic interpretation of Christ's death, which would be beside our purpose, let us simply note in passing, that in Paul and Peter and in the Epistle to the Hebrews, with such variations as differences in writer and purpose and destination would justify, we have a unanimous interpretation of Christ's death as a vicarious sacri- fice, related to God's love, but also made necessary on account of sin and itself the condition of man's forgiveness. They declare that Christ delib- erately laid down His life. That this course was necessary. That its need lay in man's sin. Paul differs from the others in carrying the question one step further back in its logical course and relating it to God's righteousness, which is that attiibute in God which takes cognizance of sin. "That He might be just and the justifier". It has been claimed that in John there is an entirely different concep- tion. That here we have Redemption through Revelation, not Revelation through Redemption. It is true, as Dr. Geo. B. Stevens expresses it, " That John dwells less than most of the New Testament writers upon the legal THE ATTRACTING POWER OF THE CROSS. 239 aspects of the divine nature, but there are not wanting evidences that the con- ception of the divine love which underlies all his religious ideas includes the idea of righteousness, that self-respecting attribute of God which occasions His holy displeasure at sin, and requires it to be expressed and vindicated while sin is forgiven ". When John speaks of the Lamb of God, he is speak- ing of a sacrificial lamb. He speaks of Christ as the " propitiation for our sins ". True, he does not enter into controversy over this point. He speaks as though this were commonly understood and accepted as fundamental. In the Gospel he is less concerned with the method by which salvation comes than by its actual realization. But we are assured that this apostolic inter- pretation was largely dogmatic, reflecting the mental characteristics and training of the Apostles and the exigencies of the times. It was, we are told, an apologetic designed to meet the reproach of the Jew, to whom the Cross was a stumbling block, and of the Greek, to whom it was foolishness, rather than a fair interpretation of the teaching of their Lord. The question resolves itself into this : Did Paul entirely misunder- stand, and so misrepresent, the meaning of the death of Jesus, and did the other Apostles " paulinize ", or have they all alike sat at the feet of Jesus ? We know what they said, " That which we have seen and heard and our hands have handled declare we unto you ". " I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received". "And we are witnesses of these things". It seems to the plain man quite impossible to walk with Jesus as His steps are traced by the Synoptists, from His baptism where He accepts His mission, into the wilderness where He is tempted to exchange it for an easier and less worthy one, or at least to use unspiritual means to fulfil it ; to hear His prophecy of the bridegroom being suddenly snatched away in the midst of the festivities (Mt. 9:14) to catch His hint in reference to Jonah; and then to follow Him, as we have already done, from Caisarea Philippi to Jerusalem to hear Him say that He gave His life a ransom for many ; to go with Him to the upper room, where in memo rable words He relates His death to the founding of the new covenant sealed by His sacrificial blood ; to watch with Him in Gethsemane and to stand beneath His Cross until we hear Him cry, " It is finished ", — I say it is quite impossible for the plain man thus to follow Him through His life and be content with any interpretation of that death short of the Apostolic. In John's Gospel we find Christ represented, as in the synoptics, as early in His ministry revealing His consciousness that His mission on earth was to die for men. To the Jews in the temple He said (2:19):" Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it again ". And I have no dispo- sition to sneer at John when he interprets these words as referring to Christ's death. To Nicodemus He said (3 : 14) : " As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up ". After the feeding of the five thousand, we have in chapter 6 His long discussion concerning His flesh and blood, where His sacrificial death is the very heart of the passage. In 8 : 28 we read : " When ye have lifted up the Son of Man, then ye shall know that I am He ". In 10: 1 1, 17. 18, He is "the good 240 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. shepherd who giveth his life for the sheep ". John strongly emphasizes the malignity of the Jews which caused Christ's death.* Yet at the same time he records Christ's repeated words : " No man taketh it from Me ; I lay it down of Myself ; I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it again ". A common method of discrediting the strength of Jesus' testimony to Himself is to take each separate passage often apart from its connection, and reducing it to its smallest conceivable meaning, to declare " This is all that Jesus meant ". " But," as Stalker puts it, "it is not often the natural meaning, and one gets tired of this perpetual shallowing of everything Jesus said".t What reason is there for thinking that the most superficial sense of profound words is most nearly true ? Why should we assign to the words only that possible meaning that divests them of all their original associa- tions ? There may be single passages where the meaning is so nicely bal- anced, that a slight bias of mind will turn the scales. But when we see the scales tipped in a single direction in every case, however weighty the words may be on the other side, and this always in the direction of divesting those words of all their deepest meaning, we may be pardoned for a suspicion that the scales are loaded. But now leaving the general significance of our Lord's death, let us ask what it is in particular that constitutes the Cross of Christ so mighty a power over men ? In the first place I would say, the Cross is the supreme revela- tion of God's love to men. " God so loved the world that He gave His Only Begotten Son " is our Lord's explanation of the motive prompting the sacri- fice. Men spare those they love; they seek to shield them from harm. Fathers and mothers seek to shield their children from the chilly winds and biting frosts of life. God "spared not" His Son, but freely gave Him, because He loved the world. It is an exhibition of Christ's love. Volun- tarily and gladly He laid down His life for the sheep. Because He had a mind of love toward men, " He did not insist on retaining His equality with God ", but freely humbled Himself even to the death of the Cross. Though He was rich, yet for the sake of men whom He loved better than His riches, He beggared Himself, pouring out His soul unto death. Here in the Cross we see the aching heart of God laid bare. Here we see the very throbbing of His love. The parable of the Prodigal Son is a graphic and beautiful picture of God's love painted in colors drawn from human life. The Cross is the final proof of God's love set forth in overwhelming reality. No mere picture of love, even when painted by the Master Artist Himself can ever satisfy the heart of man. But for the man who has the love proven to him by the Cross, the picture is of inestimable value "Lest we forget". We do not know love in its length and breadth and height and depth until we see it making cost to itself. For this reason the parable of the Prodigal cannot be taken as an epitome of the Gospel, for although it beautifully portrays the *(5: i8; 7: 19-30; 8: 37-40; 10: 31, 32; 11: 50.) t The Christology of Jesus, p. 121. THE ATTRACTING POWER OF THE CROSS. 241 freeness and fulness of God's love, it is absolutely silent as to its depth and cost. No words however fair and strong could ever tell the cost to God of expressing His redeeming love. And let us remember that as Dr. Denny has so well said : " If there is no atonement in it, neither is there any Christ in it". If that parable is an epitome of the Gospel, then as Harnack has aftirmed, " Christ has no place in the Gospel He proclaims ". But we know that this parable is a beautiful picture whose interpretation is the Cross. The only light in which it can be properly seen is the light that radiates from the Cross. The Cross alone gives it proper perspective. It was this amazing love that mastered the apostles and inspired them. They never felt that they could take salvation for granted. To them salva- tion was a miracle of miracles, the wonder of which never ceased. A gospel which could be taken for granted would be for them no gospel. But here was the infinite and holy God sending His only-begotten Son into the world to save them. Here was their loved Master, Whom now they see to have been from eternity, the Creator of all things, sharing their earthly lot, and freely laying dow-n His life for them. This amazing love of their living Lord they cannot ever hope fully to comprehend. It overpowers them and binds them to Him by ties stronger than death. Perhaps some of you will remember the story of the two street arabs Rag and Dan, whom Mrs. Mason received into her class in the Mission Sunday school. They were well versed in the life and language of the slums, but knew as little as a Hottentot about the Bible and the love of God. One Sunday afternoon the lesson was on the sufferings of Jesus for the sins of men. Very tenderly Mrs. Mason told them of His patience under persecution, and His quiet yielding of Himself to the power of His enemies, who were plotting to kill Him. " Don't believe it," came sud- denly from Rag. A painful and yet delicious thrill shot through the class. But the teacher went over the story again, patiently and tenderly, only to meet another even more uncompromising denial. " Now look-a- here! Me 'n' Dan don't believe no such thing as that. It's a fake, that's wot it is. 'Tain't accordin' to reason for anybody to act that way. You go down on Fourth street, and you hit a feller over the head, and he'll give you one back, he will for sure, if he's big enough. But you say this Man you're talkin' about could do anything He wanted to ; and yet He let them galoots around Him get Him into a corner, and do Him up ! Well, I guess not ! " and the worldly wise young cynic smiled a know- ing smile — the smile of one who isn't taken in by children's stories; while his pal nodded his head in acquiescence, and echoed, " Not much 1 " Mrs. Mason was driven back as never before to the foundations of her faith ; and for the next few months her heart went into her work and out to her boys, her two pagans especially, as never before, until one blessed day, as the story goes. Rag said, looking her steadily in the eye : " Is this all straight, teacher.? Are you sure that you ain't givin' us no bluff.?" And looking him as steadily in the face she answered, in his own dialect : 242 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. " Yes, Rag, I'm sure. It's no bluff, it's straight ". For a moment the boy sat in thoughtlul silence. Then he said : " Wot d'you think of it, Dan ? " And for once little Dan spoke out for himself, without waiting for his cue from his leader: " I tell you. Rag, it's straight goods, just as she says. She's never went back on us yet, an' you bet she ain't going back on us now. I believe it". And Rag said slowly, with the look of one who sees the dawning of light: " Yes, I guess it must be straight. Eut, say, if He done all that for a fellow, how a fellow ought to love Him ! " And the woman who had helped him, and whom he had no less helped, placed her hand on his, and said through her falling tears: " Yes, Rag ; and O, I do so want you to love Him ! " And, still thoughtfully, the lad replied : " I don't see how I'm goin' to help it ". The loyal Dan echoed, " Neither do I ". For many, this may be all that is needed in explanation of the Cross to constitute it the mighty attracting and regulalirg power in their lives. For most people, however, there must be further explanation. Love, to be convincing and commanding, must be no mere display irrelevant to our need ; it must relate itself to our peculiar circumstances. If I am standing by the rapids of Niagara, above the falls, and my friend stands by me protesting his love, and to prove it plunges into the rapids and is swept over the falls to his death, I am impressed only with the pity and the folly of it. But, if I am in the rapids struggling for my life, my strength almost gone, and just at the awful brink, and my friend plunges in, and, at the cost of his own life, rescues me from death, then I know the meaning and reality of his love. It was a love that proved itself by meeting my need, by taking my place at the utmost cost to itself. The very essence of the attracting power of Christ's Cross is that it meets my deepest need. By it He takes my place. "I am the good shepherd". He said; "The good shepherd layeth down his life for the sheep ", and the plain man reading that, has seen it to mean that the shepherd dies to save the sheep from dying. And applying it to Christ has seen that He took the sinner's place and rescued Him from eternal death. The sinner was not only under the power and the stain of sin, but under its penalty and doom. Christ, though without the stain of sin, yielded Himself to its power and bore its doom, that the sinner might escape. " He died for me " was Paul's constant wonder and joy. " The love of Christ con- straineth me, because we thus judge that one died for all". This reveals the inspiration of His life of marvelous devotion and sacrifice. You recall Bunyon's pilgrim as he climbed the hill bounded on either side by the walls of salvation, weighed down with the heavy burden on his back. " Upon that place stood a Cross, and a little below in a hollow a sepulchre. So I saw in my dream, that just as Christian came up with the THE ATTRACTING POWER OF THE CROSS, 243 Cross his burden loosed from off his shoulders and fell from off his back, and began to tumble, and so continued to do till it came to the mouth of the sepulchre, where it fell in and I saw it no more. Then was Christian glad and lightsome, and said with a merry heart, 'He hath given me rest by His sorro7i's, and life by His death /' " The reason why this exhibition of God's love, God taking upon Himself our ill desert, and at infinite cost to Himself making it possible to forgive us freely, is so marvelous an attracting power is that it starts at the right place by begetting repentance in the human heart. When we are brought to see, in the crucifixion of the Holy One, what awful work sin can do, that He died not for His sin but for ours ; if that does not break the heart and stir the conscience to commanding action and bring the will into subjection, nothing can. This moral revolution there must be in order to make the attraction permanent. It is not enough that the prince of this world be formally judged and cast out. Not enough that his reign over the hearts of men should be externally and artificially broken. There must be generated in the hearts of those who rendered him allegiance a deep-seated hatred of his reign, and a bitter repentance for allowing him any place in the heart, then there can be attraction and allegiance to the new Saviour King. " He hangs a dead corpse on the tree, Who made the whole world's life to spring: And, as some outcast, shameful thing The Lord of all we see. " Darkness falls thick to shroud the time: Nature herself breaks up, and cries: Even from the grave shocked ghosts arise, At this tremendous crime. " Speak not : no human voice may tell The secrets which these hours enfold: By treacherous hands to traitors sold, God yields Himself to Hell. " Speak not, draw close : through stricken heart Drink in the sense of all that's here : The shame, the cross, the nails, the spear. Rending His soul apart. " Ahl and far crueller, far, than they, (Tools and mere symbols these) our sin 1 Breathe to thyself, soul, deep within ' 'Twas I that caused this day '. " Speak not : He speaks not : no reproach Falls from those dying lips on thee : No vengeance, muttering ills to be. Bars thy devout approach. " Stricken, unmurmuring, dead, divine, This day He hangs, as He hung of old; Only the dire'sight cries ' Behold I Was ever love like mine ? ' " 244 • THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. And this is the interpretation the history of Christian experience puts upon the Cross. " Is He a Redeemer or a mere dreamer, preaching a kingdom that can- not come? " Ask history. It is not as a hero that the world has thought of Christ. On a little hill outside a city wall, between two other crosses, a young man hung upon a Cross, all three dying a shameful death. A few weeping friends were gathered about the Cross of the young man. A little later they bear the body away and put it in the tomb, and the stone is rolled against the door, and life and hope and joy are shut in, and .darkness and despair reign without. It is a mournful dirge we hear rising from the broken hearts of the few friends and followers. But listen ! Presently you catch another note. The same voices, still few in number, but how differ- ent the song I You hear it spreading like a grand hymn in a mighty out- door congregation. In Samaria and in Galilee the strain is taken up. It spreads to Antioch, to Asia Minor. It leaps the Hellespont. It is taken up in Macedonia, in Greece, in Rome. It becomes the national anthem of the Roman Empire, its echoes reverberating around the Mediterranean. But such narrow limits cannot confine this song. It is borne on the wings of the wind across the channel, across the Atlantic, until America takes up the strain. Back it floats to Africa, to India, to China, to the uttermost parts of the earth, until today a mighty chorus from every tribe and tongue joins in the one harmonious song of triumph. And what is this marvellous song ? None other than that which John heard on Patmos when he had a vision of a redeemed world joining with the heavenly hosts. " Worthy is the Lamb that hath been slain to receive the power and riches and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing ". As nothing else in the world's history has done it, the Cross has domi- nated the minds of men of all nationalities, of all classes and conditions, by drawing them into the fellowship of Jesus Christ. It has transformed relig- ion from that dead and barren thing it was into the living and fruitful thing we see it today. It has transformed society. It has produced civili- zation. It has inspired literature and art to their highest uses. Never are men so nearly at their best in any of the works or walks of life as when the Cross is their theme and inspiration. We must not ask those who have looked upon the Cross only from without , as one might look from without on the storied windows of a cathedral, and complain at the dulness and flatness of the picture because he had not seen them glorified by the light of heaven streaming through them ; but let us ask those who have been redeemed, from whose minds the image of the Redeemer departed not, who are sharers in His joys and in His sufferings ; ask these, and their verdict will be that He was no dreamer, preaching a kingdom that could not come. He is the world's Redeemer, and because He is its Redeemer, He is build- ing up a kingdom that shall have no end. But this attracting power is purely moral and therefore is not irresist- able. " I will draw all men unto Myself ", Christ said, using a word that speaks of inner constraint, not of outward compulsion. An Alexander, a THE ATTRACTING POWER OF THE CROSS. 245 Caesar, a Napoleon, or a Nicholas may dream of a world-empire, but the mailed fist is their highest conception of the unifying principal of their kingdom. But into the Kingdom of Heaven men are to be drawn by sweet persuasion, not " dragged in " against their wills. No outward con- straint could be effective. That the attracting power of the Cross is not irresistable was never more manifest than today. The quite common view that the theories of the apostles concerning Christ's death were simply their adroit efforts to get over the difficulty of Christ's death as a stumbling block proves one thing at least, that the Cross is a stumbling block today, and any expedient that will explain it away will be gladly hailed. The strongest magnet cannot exert its attractive power through perfect insulation. And no one who attempts to preach the Gospel of the Cross in these days as Christ and His apostles taught it can fail to see that there is much that insulates the minds and hearts of men against it. Are we to give up the preaching of the Cross and seek some magic solvent to apply to men that once more they may become susceptible to its power .-' By no means. We must continue to preach it, but we should seek such a method of preach- ing it that it will act as its own solvent and find its way to the hearts of men. It is of no use for us to say " we must preach the old Gospel ", and thus excuse ourselves for our failure to meet the problems of our own day. We must preach the old Gospel in the language of our times so as to meet the problems of our times. In order to that we must understand what these things are which especially alienate men from the (lospel of the Cross. The old problem of man's pride, his unwillingness to humble himself in the dust, acknowledge his helplessness and put himself under so great obligation to Christ is intensified in our day by the deification of humanity. The Incarnation, we are told, is no new thing, but simply the historic expression of the eternal humanity of God. This is no doubt a theory very attractive to the pride of man and one that leaves no room for an atone- ment. It is a theory that is immensely popular in these days when an attractive theory is preferable to stubborn facts. Again, many men of our time are enamored of a method of historical research which finds in the patent circumstances of an event its full explan- ation and forbids applying to the event universal significance. If Jesus of Nazareth aroused the antagonism of Jewish authorities so that they sought and compassed His death, that is enough to explain the fact and we must not seek ulterior causes. Nor must we translate that event, so easily accounted for, into an event of universal significance. This is like assert- ing that we understand all about the life and growth of a tree because we can explain the constituent elements of the soil in which it grows. A his- torical method that fails to account for all the facts is unhistorical and unscientific. The true historical method must take account of the facts of sin and redemption and the triumphs of the Cross in the last 1900 years. It must account for the Christianity of today. Its foundation can be neither the fog of mythicizing tendencies in the early church, nor the rottenness of con- 246 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. scious deception on the part of the apostles. No building of such magni- tude could stand on so slender a foundation. It is far more reasonable to Recognize all the facts in the case and seek to conform our historical theories to the facts, than to eliminate the facts in the interest of any theory whatsoever. Then, there are popular theories of human life which make man so absolutely a part of the " Cosmic Process " as to lead to a denial of the reality of sin, as that word is understood in the New Testament. It makes the atonement appear, as Dr. Denny puts it, "like a rock in the sky". To a far greater degree than we are apt to suppose, the Rubaiyat is revered above the Bible ; and even among many who have never heard of Omar Khayyam and who profess to know the Bible, the Rubaiyat expresses their belief concerning sin. " Oh Thou Who didst with pitfall and with gin Beset the Road I was to wander in, Thou wilt not with Predestined Evil round Enmesh, and then impute my Fall to Sin 1 " Oh Thou, Who Man of baser Earth didst make, And ev'n with Paradise devise the Snake: For all the Sin wherewith the Face of Man Is blackened — Man's forgiveness — give— and take I " But more than by anything else perhaps, men are insulated against the preaching of the "True Cross" by what might be called "an irreligious solicitude for God ". God is revealed by Jesus as the loving Father. Why cannot He forgive as the earthly father does ? What justice can there be in His asking an innocent being to suffer in our stead? "An innocent one cannot take the place of the sinful one anyway " we hear. As a matter of fact, however, the innocent do in human life suffer for the guilty, and often much more than the guilty. Illustrations are before our eyes daily of such suffer- ing of the innocent not only with but in the place of the guilty. The father shields the guilty son and suffers in his stead. He rejoices to do it. Taking the great problem by this small end we may work our way back through the human approach to a partial comprehension of it, though its majesty and mystery are unsearchable. And God does not take an unwilling victim unrelated to Himself and force him to take the sinners' place. It is God Who is in Christ, at infinite CO it, reconciling the world unto Himself. And why can He not forgive without this cost as the earthly father does? We need to remember that however freely the earthly father forgives the wrong against himself, he cannot forgive the sin, for the act was not only a wrong to the father but a sin against God, and only One can forgive sin. God cannot forgive without this atonement, just because the word Father as we commonly use it does not fully represent God to men. For the sweet and beautiful teaching of our Lord concerning the Fatherhood of God, men have in these days substituted a doctrine that some one has irreverently called "the Papahood of God". Let us quote here from Denny, words that this generation sadly need THE ATTRACTING POWER OF THE CROSS. 247 to hear. " The relations of father and child are undoubtedly more adequate to the truth than those of judge and criminal. They are more adequate, but so far as our exparience of them goes, they are not equal to it. If the sinner is not a criminal before his judge, neither is he a naughty child before a parent whose own weakness or affinity to evil introduces an incalculable element into his dealings with his child's fault. * * * Jt ought to be apparent to every one that even the relation of parent and child if it is to be a moral relation, must be determined in a way which has universal and final validity. It must be a relation in which ethically speaking, some things are forever obligatory and some things forever impossible ; in other words it must be a relation determined by law, and law which cannot deny itself. But law in this sense is not legal ; it is not ' judicial ' or ' statu- tory ' or ' forensic ' ; none the less it is real and vital and the whole moral value of the relation depends upon it. What would be the value of a forgiveness which did not recognize in its eternal truth and worth that universal law in which the relations of God and man are constituted ? With- out the recognition of that law — that moral order or constitution in which we have our life in relation to God and each other — righteousness and sin and atonement and forgiveness would all alike be words without meaning".* These things enable us to see how grave a problem we have to meet. It is not preaching a glad message to men who have never heard it, and who are stretching out eager hands to receive the blessing. We preach and see little if any response. It is as the poet expresses it : " As if a well that lay Unvisited, till water-weeds had grown Up from the depths, and woven a thick mass Over its surface, could give back the sun ! Or, dug from ancient battle plain, a shield Could be a mirror to the stars of heaven !" If we are to meet these conditions and overcome them ; if our preaching and teaching are to form any part of those moral agencies which will result in drawing all men to Christ, we must at the outset avoid such presentation as will needlessly add to the thickness of the weeds or rust upon the minds of men that prevent their response to the appeal of the Cross. In our use of terms we must discriminate between their Biblical use and other uses that may be very different. For instance, to use a single illustration, the idea of propitiation often needlessly alienates men from the Cross because they do not understand what the Bible means by the word. " In the heathen view, expiation renders the gods wi ling to forgive ". By sacrifice the personal anger of the god is appeased and his favor bought. Nowhere in Old or New Testament however is there any hint that God has any feeling or disposition averse to forgiveness. " He does not have to be made willing by expiation to forgive sins. He is and always has been willing ". " In the Biblical view, expiition enables God consistently with His holiness to do what He was never unwilling to do ".t The problem is simply this. How can the Holy ♦The Atonement and ihe Modern Mind, p. 71. t Stevens' Johannine Theology, p. 183. 248 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. One take the impure one to His arms and yet remain the Holy One ? That problem has been solved. The Holy meets the unholy over the Blood of the Atonement. There is death for evil doing. The evil desert of sin is recogaized, yet there is mercy for the repentant. Sin is not encouraged, innocence is not confounded with guilt, and yet the fallen'are lifted up. It is interesting and to many cheering, to notice that in England where we are led in theological thought by fifteen or twenty years, the evangelicals are preaching the atonement in its fullest saving sense. The English dele- gates to the Congregational Council held in Boston a few years ago almost without exception emphasized and re-emphasized the full atoning significance of Christ's death. As they declared, they have had their Bushnellianism, and safely passed through it twenty years ago. A writer in the Independent at that time said that he asked one and another of the visiting delegates : " Do these men represent the dominant thought of your pulpit?", and the answer was an emphatic affirmative : " That is what our young men are preaching" said Dr. John Brown of Bedford. "We hold to Christ's Redemptive significance. We have now a firmer grasp on the supernatural. We have passed through the stage which laid weight on the moral view. It is something deeper than that. The foundation rests here. ' He was made sin for us Who knew no sin '. Compared with this the mere ethical conception is secondary. As MacLaren said : ' Christianity without a Christ is a dying Christianity ' ". To have moving and persuasive preaching we must have a moving and persuasive Gospel. Let us take heart, and hope that our period of sentimental inefficiency may soon be superseded by a time of great power and refreshing from the Lord, growing out of a re-habilitation of the old yet ever new Gospel of the Cross. But before all and through all, if we would effectively preach and teach the Gospel, we must ourselves be living examples of what the attracting power of the Cross can do. We must be manifestly under the sweet con- straint of His love Who died for us. We must apply the law of the wheat to ourselves as fully as He applied it to Himself before we can expect our message to bear fruit in the lives of others. We must not only be willing to cast our lives into the earth of human need, but we must do it. But when we do show our understanding of Christ's love and sacrifice by ourselyes entering into the living sacrifice of His service, holding not our lives dear unto ourselves, that we may fulfil our ministry, then we will have the joy unspeakable of having so commended Christ and His cross to men that the winsomeness of His love seen through His Cross will master their hearts and wills, and will bind them to Him by invisible and unbreakable bonds, and we will have hastened the day when by the Attracting Power of the Cross He shall have drawn all men unto Himself. • THE COMMANDMENT OF GOD AND LIFE EVERLASTING. by rkv. stkavart mkans^, d. p)., Rector of St. John's Episcopal Church, New Haven, Conn. St. John 12 -.4^, 50. For I have not spoken of Myself : but the Father which sent Me, He gave Me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak. And now I know that His commandment is life everlasting : whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said unto Me, so I speak. Revised Version. For I spake not from Myself : but the Father which sent Me, He hath g^ven Me a commandment, what I should say and what I should speak. And I know that His commandment is life eternal: the things therefore, which I speak, even as the Father hath said unto Me, so I speak. One of the most striking things to the thoughtful student of human speech is the constant growth and expansion of any language which is the possession of a vigorous and progressive people. The wide range and extension of its thought is met, in most cases at least, by an increase in the terms of its expression. The creative intelligence gets for itself new words to set forth the new ideas. Yet the continuity of the language is preserved by giving to the old forms a new meaning or if not a new, at least a larger and in many respects a different meaning. The obsolete significance of words is one of the characteristics of every old literature. When we enter upon the circle of ideas and the field of the new Christian consciousness, we find here all the characteristic features that are manifest in all literary expression. Old words are loaded down with new meaning and it is often more necessary to understand the mind of the writer than it is to get a definition of his words or phrases. This passage in the Gospel of St. John s a striking illustration of this fact. The first word which meets us as significant is " entola ", " commandment ". It is not a new but an old word and the common association is also very old. In its religious significance it is notably characteristic. All religions without exception, with which the world was then familiar, were at bottom legal in their idea. No man had any other conception of religion, and in Judaism it was stamped upon every phase of the religious life. It might be said to be one of the fundamental elements of human consciousness everywhere. It was the presence of this preconception, along with many other inherited mental and spiritual atti- tudes, that quickly made itself an influence in determining how Christianity * Delivered at the Eighth CoDierence, held at All Saints Memorial Church, May ii, 1904. 249 250 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. would be understood by the mass of men. For men do not and cannot divest tnemselves of all which they have inherited in the way of thought and feeling, of temper and atmosphere of soul. Knowing therefore the accus- tomed associations of the word " commandment ", the attentive reader is met with the thought, immediately upon his reading this passage, that St. John is introducing a conception which he had inherited as a Jew and which was native to his mind and thought before he had ever heard of the Gospel or known his Lord. But while there are no philological or gram- matical reasons for rejecting this interpretation, there are the strongest indications present through an analysis of his thought which render such a meaning utterly improbable. In the first place, he is giving the words of Christ. Knowing the atti- tude of Christ on this way of interpreting religion we know that such a conception could not be His and there is no reason for thinking that St. John has given any turn to this thought in order to establish a view of his own. Christ presents Himself to His disciples as a Son who has a commis- sion from His Father and this commission includes not only what He should say but also how He should say it. Here is where our words begin to cumber the thought and make it hard to penetrate with speech into the real meaning which He was endeavoring to make clear to them. We have the hard objective way of looking at His life and give the common turn of meaning to His words. He does not think of Himself as a messenger sent out alone to deliver the law of the Judge and Ruler of all the earth. He is preeminently and fundamentally a Son. The commandment of God is not an external law under which He is forced to act, but the power of it and the imperative character which belongs to it come from His own inward sym- pathy and harmony with God's will. It constrains Him not as an alien force but by the very roots which it has in His own will and nature. It is a law to Him because it is also the very principle of His own life. He mani- fests and obeys the commandment or the will not because He is compelled to, but because it is of the very essence of His own inner nature. It is the absolute impossibility of wishing or doing otherwise that makes in the forms of human speech a commandment, but it is lifted by the very nature of Jesus into the transcendental atmosphere of filial relations. And so it is likewise with the setting forth of this commandment or the obedience to it. However much emphasis we may lay upon the articulate and verbal expressioa of this commandment, we know that the words fall back for their meaning and power upon the life which they express and out of which they issue. The teaching of Jesus has its chief if not only value in its relation to His character and consciousness. His nature is the perfectly revealed will of God. He is the commandment of God. The contents of His very words are Himself. If we use the word commandment here in anything like the way Ha wishes us to understand it, doubtless it means that it was a com- mandment to Him not to speak what He spoke only, but to be what He was. Now speech may be but the executive presentation of a foreign will, but "/tf be" means the inward and joyful assent of the nature and the consent THE COMMANDMENT OF GOD. 251 of the entire will to the life that wishes itself to be expressed. The man- datory character of this will lies in its perfection and its inward command over the sources and energies of the soul's noblest thought. It is not easy to measure the words of Christ, and when we pass beyond the speech into the consciousness out of which it issued and try to analyze the interior volitions and spiritual affinities and affections, we are oppressed with our own ignorance and dulness of vision. Yet out of our own Christian exper- ience come some gleams of light which help confirm us in the conviction that His own life and His own words have roused within us. We can and do say that Christ commands us to be pure and gentle and loving. Any noble soul could do this. All great souls have been one in this high demand. Yet what makes His command not a command for us, but a command to us .■' Here is where we pass into the region of what is real and vital. It is the irresistible pressure of His perfection, the revelation of the supreme beauty of that which He commands, that wrings from the soul in its first reluctance a deep consent. Not to be at once perhaps, but to wish to be. We do not discuss or dispute His right. The beauty of goodness is imperative to the soul and its right is acknowledged instantly by the recog- nition which the soul confesses of its power and glory. There is no com- mandment like this that the soul has ever known. Christ presents Himself to us and we cannot help it. He is completely and perfectly all that we feel is noblest and most holy, and the soul instinctively rushes out to consent to His appeal. For appeal is the one word we use here to describe the tenderness and gentleness with which He gains us, but at bottom this appeal has a moral and spiritual imperativeness transcending Kant's " Categorical Imperative ". That is the testimony of the soul's submission to the high moralities of life. This is the passionate assertion of the spirit of man to the lofty sanctities of the character of Jesus Christ. God simply is in His love for men what He is, and Christ feels His being as a command to express the same character. Jesus simply is to us what He is, and we feel His being as a command. A command not because it is a legal requirement, but because we feel its insistence exerted immediately over the will and spring of all our finest desires. It is here in this spiritual and psychological form, and not in its legal and objective character, that we are to understand and interpret this use of the word "commandment" by Jesus. For we know that the supreme object of His life was to renew the filial mind in men and to re-establish the filial relation as a conscious element of the soul's life. Now a spiritual relation cannot be enforced by an outward requirement or a legal statute, and even the common moralities of life rest upon the in- ward capacity of men to feel their beauty and echo their assertion of the moral law. The utter sterility and emptiness of all legal conceptions with reference to the production of spiritual life are made manifest the moment we attempt to go to the roots of character or the springs of action. It is in- spiration that counts here and not the barriers of the law. It is the opening of new fountains in the soul, and not the flat dictation of supreme power. 252 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. Nothing is more characteristic in the life of Christ than the inwardness of His real life. " I have meat to eat, that ye know not of ", He says, and we feel the presence there in the secret of His will of the divine love lifting it and feeding it with the energy of the infinite goodness. The mystery of the Gospel is the mystery of the mind of Christ becoming interior to the mind of man and forming a new consciousness which has as its foundation and fullest expression the realization of the sonship of man to God. This new relation and this new consciousness determine the life and character with an accuracy which no external dictation could enforce. It is the spiritual energy within the life which is more potent than any thunders from Sinai. It is when this word " entola " or "commandment " is used by Christ as issuing from a relation and an outflow of spiritual activities that it has this interior meaning and this spiritual basis. In the Gospel of St, John it is used several times. May I ask you to spend a few moments examining these passages ? In John lo : [8 occurs that remarkable passage which lifts us into the very face of the spiritual strength of Christ. Beginning with v. 17, He says : " Therefore doth My Father love Me, because I lay down My life, that I may take it again. No one taketh it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power (or right) to lay it down and I have power (or right) to take it again. This commandment received I of My Father ". It was the love of the Father, the will of salvation which were imperative for Him. Love always commands us with its own power which is of perfect appropriation. It re-creates our will and the new will becomes the law of our being. No other meaning is possible for this passage. On the other hand in John 11 : 57 we meet with the common use of the word : " Now the chief priests and the Pharisees had given commandment, that if any man knew where He was, he should shew it, that they might take Him". This is external in all its aspects. It is social or statutory authority laying its demands without the least reference to character or the interior disposition ; it is the legal demand which asks only for an automatic response. In John 13:34 we are swept back again into the stream and sphere of spiritual relations and activities. " A new commandment I give unto you that ye love one another; even as I have loved you, that ye also love one another ". No one can possibly understand the word commandment here as equivalent in quality or range, corresponding in meaning or character with the legal authority of the Pharisees. Its meaning and efficacy lay in the inward persuasion which the perfection of His love exerted upon their dispositions, and the creative energy of His affection, It is not an injunction, but a new spirit, the spirit of His love, filling them too with a similar love. Even the most rigid and narrow legalist among His hearers could not but feel that the word commandment had a new meaning and a loftier and more awful authority than even the law of Moses. For the spirit of God was testifying to the spirit of man and the heart of man felt the new life urging its own necessities. In the 14th chapter we have three passages in which this phrase is used: " If ye love Me, ye will keep My commandments". "He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me ; and THE COMMANDMENT OF GOD. 253 he that loveth Me shall be loved of My Father, and I will love him, and will manifest Myself unto him ". " But that the world may know that 1 love the Father, and as the Father gave Me commandment, even so I do ". In all these passages there lies back behind the sense of command the authority which creates it. This authority is not external to the man or to the Son Himself. It is love that in its re-enforcement of the spiritual energies proves its own authority. For the highest feelings are a law to the soul which no ordinance of man or tradition can coerce or destroy. The floods are risen up and sweep the soul on into new channels. It is not authority based upon outward claims, but the principle of the real life of man responding to the presence of the divine life that floods it with its regenerating power. It is the determining power of a new love, the passion of a new affection. Loyalty to duty carries men to death, but the Son of God goes to the cross with a joy no man can measure, in obedience to the very law of His being, and reveals the strength of the inward demand which is the ultimate fact in man's true relation to God. In the 15th chapter the same phrase occurs three times again. " 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 ". "This is My com- mandment, that ye love one another as I have loved you ". The secret of His love is the foundation of their new lives. It is a secret because it is that which is felt and in the inward stores of the soul's affections makes its claims. This is its only and supreme authority. No man can prove the necessity of obedience to Christ, for it rests upon no outward claims. This obedience which ranges free above all the prescriptions of man and all the ordinances of religion is the fountain of all pieties of life and heroisms of character. It is always aspiring to new elevations and reaches forward to larger and nobler living. Its aim is the full realization of its filial relation, and it drives the soul with the pressure of an ever expanding affection. It is the most baffling and puzzling thing in the history of the human soul and is the despair of the world, for it stands upon nothing but its inward expe- rience and deep conviction which can never be set forth in decrees or laws. The more the soul feels the love of God. the more the spirit of the Son g^ows into fulness and power, the more imperative and complete becomes the insistence with which the spirit plunges on into the fullest possession and expression of its filial character. This is the unique and mysterious fact of the new Christian personality. In the immediate contact of God with the human soul conscious of its sonship, there is an enormous expan- sion of vision and power. The spiritual capacities are vitalized by the energy of the divine life and each life unfolds itself under the creative force of the divine love and gives full and joyful obedience to the inward pressure of the new life that is seeking realization and expression. This interpreta- tion of the commandment will be confirmed if we regard the obedience not from the point of view of the external act, but of the inward disposition and assent. The human will in relation to a legal demand stands clearly dis- criminated and separate from that requirement. There is a certain mechan- 254 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN, ical adjustment on the part of the individual, and his personality is by no means merged in the law. In the case of the obedience of Christ there is the steady and easy flow of the nature forward along the divine will, with the purpose of God working dynamically as an interior energy and not a mechanical or even a moral compulsion. The Divine will is His will, and the manifestation of His nature is the revelation of the nature of God. They are not two separate things, two factors combined in a given result, but the organic unity in which it cannot be said that the elements can be separated and distinguished as the particular contributions of two distinct personali- ties. We do not say of His life or act, this is the special issue of the character and disposition of Christ, and this other is the clearly defined manifestation of the will of God. The obedience of Christ we feel to be the essential will of God, for that obedience is set forth in a moral nature and a spiritual character that is congruous with the character of God. This being the psychological and internal order of the spiritual facts, it throws the legal estimate of the words "commandment" and "obedience" under a new law or principle of interpretation, and that law or principle is found in the essential unity of the will of God and the mind of Christ. But the full significance of this order of interpretation comes more fully into the light, vihen we consider the entire passage as setting forth the law of the life of man in its organic and fundamental relations with Christ. "I know His commandment is life everlasting", or as the revised ver- sion has it: " I know that His commandment is life eternal". The two terms of " life eternal", or " zoe-aionios ", mutually qualify and define each other. Let us take the adjective first. Like all great words, " aionios " has its popular and its scientific meaning. It is a phrase not only of common speech, but of philosophical significance. In its primary meaning as used for a term of accurate thought and definition, it means that which is apart and above time. That is, the category of time has no relation whatever with it. It is neither a limitation nor an extension of the conception which is planted in the idea of time. Kant tells us that the categories of time and space are the necessary laws or conditions under which all knowledge of sensuous things, taking the term in its widest extension, must be attained. Now, I am not trying to introduce the Critical Philosophy into the Gospel of St. John, or smuggle Transcendental Ideas into the speech of Jesus, but I am using these distinctions in order to reach back to the fact that super- sensuous facts, spiritual realities, ought not to be treated as lying under the same conditions of apprehension as those which belong to the physical phenomena or the ordinary mental processes of everyday life. Only in its most popular and derivative uses does the term have a quantitative meaning. It specifically, and particularly in the Gospel of St. John, has a qualitative significance. " Eternal life " is a special kind of life that only in a loose and rhetorical way can we say admits of quantitative increase or decrease. Goodness is goodness always, and any increase in it means, not by dimensions or measurement, but by vividness, intensity and reality. Its character and its quality are always the same. It is with- THE COMMANDMENT OF GOD. 255 out succession. There was no time when goodness became goodness. It neither increases or decreases by age or term of years. So wiih all moral and spiritual facts. They are truths, and the reality of truths of this order lies in their quality and the energy with which they act in the world of man's spiritual nature. But the most important word in this phrase is " zoe ". It occurs in the Gospel of St. John 34 times. It is generally recog- nized as one of the significant words in this Gospel. It is moreover almost never used to signify mere physical life or even mental activity. 1 here are many ways in which we can approach it and find at least some phases of its meaning. As contrasted, for instance, with death, it means union and fellowship with God. For death is separation from Him ; not separation in the sense of being outside of Him physically or metaphysically, but as having different moral ideals and spiritual purposes; an atmosphere in which the mind and will of God are not the prevailing and dominating characteristics. Outside of God, hence, means outside of the world of His spiritual life. His affection, love, purity, holiness. And not to have these as the contents of the soul is to be dead. There is only one life in the thought of Christ, and that is, God. The word is lifted to its highest significance. The pallid existence of men whose spiritual natures are stunted and dwarfed, in whose veins the sluggish flow of weak spiritual purposes hardly keeps alive the moral will of the man, is not life. It lacks that essential fulness and blessedness which are of the very essence of God's being. His perfect glory and our perfect joy. Now the fulness of life does not consist in our recognition of the fact. It is not the mere indi- vidual apprehension, the feeling of the presence of an existence in which the person has no part or share, but the divine life flows into the human life until the divine consciousness of its own character and sweetness and power become the consciousness of the individual soul that has become partaker of this life. The qualifying adjective " aionios " is not therefore a quantitative term, but rather a distinctly spiritual one. " Eternal life " is the qualitative essence of the character, not continuity or quantity of life. The adjective is used with the noun in this Gospel nine times and, without examining each passage in detail, we may assert without much danger of contradiction that it has this specifically spiritual meaning. Life is eternal, because in the first place it is life real and actual as no other life is. It inten- sifies the conception of life by showing its real and spiritual origin. We can the more readily see this inasmuch as the word or adjective, "eternal ", in St. John's Gospel is only used with life. It is the distinctively qualifying adjective of that word. Eternal life is therefore the inseparable condition or accompaniment of the entrance into the real life of the spirit. It has no date, or rather, if it has, it is reckoned from the moment of entrance into Christ, or spiritual acceptance or inward appropriation of the Gospel as the matter is presented to us as a personal appropriation of Jesus Christ, or the inward consent of the nature to the law of His being. All adjectives repre- sent qualities, and it is not a correct use of words to convert an attribute into a cause and say that eternity is what makes the life eternal. Nor, on 2s6 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. the other hand, is it possible to place the terms in the order of antecedent and consequent and affirm that life being in eternity it becomes partaker of its character. Further, we may affirm, that the acceptance of the Gospel does not confer eternal life. The matter is more closely and organically related. Eternal life is the subjective state represented by the objective statement of the knowledge of God or the reception of the Gospel. Christ is life. The reception of Christ or God is the actual acceptance of life. It is the dynamic activity of the Divine life that constitutes the life of the believer. " This is life eternal, that they might know God and Jesus Christ whom He hath sent ". The knowledge here is not used in any intellectual way whatever. It means that inward and spiritual recognition which is equivalent to the term "faith" in St. Paul. The contents of life, which are God and Christ, have nothing to do with the physical experiences of men. Death is not the beginning of eternal life, nor, on the other hand, is the resurrection the date of its origin. Christ had life in Himself from the very beginning. He also gives life in giving Himself. It is this personal and immediate participation in eternal life which distinguishes the words of Christ in this Gospel from the conventional use of the phrase. " I know that His commandment is eternal life", Jesus says. Eternal life is, not shall be. It is the presence and the revelation of the Divine will in the life of man. But it is the life of man as consciously determined by the will of God, and the consciousness of its supreme beauty and truth. The moral and spiritual evidence of this beauty and truth are found by men in Jesus Christ, who is the incarnation of this holiness and love, grace and truth. These are His revelations, revelations not of Himself but of God. His Self is the expression of the Divine Self. The submission of the soul to Him, the obedience of the heart to His inward disposition, creates a new moral and spiritual consciousness. The union wrought out between the soul Christ loves and the soul that loves Christ is not a merely external union, but is like that which exists between the Father and the Son. In this blending or transforming of the inward consciousness issues the sense and certainty of Christ. So at the end, each through his own spiritual experi- ence is able to affirm as a member of Christ that which Christ declares is the heart and meaning of His own life. " For I speak not from Myself : but the Father which sent Me, He hath given Me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak, and I know that this commandment is life eternal : the things therefore, which I speak, even as the Father hath said unto Me, so I speak ". •THE WASHING OF THE DISCIPLES' FEET AND THE LAW OF SERVICE. (St. John 13: 1-17-) by rkv. kdavin" ai^onzo blaick, ph. d., d. r>.. Pastor of the Tremont Street Methodist Episcopal Church, Boston, Mass. The event which we are to consider at this time, is one of very great importance. Largely so, if I mistake not, because it is the embodiment of a law that underlies all Christian civilization. We are to consider it of course as generic in kind and not specific. There are those I believe who actually do upon occasion wash one another's feet. I certainly would not be willing to question their Christianity as thus manifested, for I have the most profound respect for all who " profess and call themselves Christians" ; but it seems to me we are to seek here the spirit rather than the lelter, to discover the law embodied in the act rather than perceive the act alone. The scene also marks the closing events in the history of our Lord's personal work on earth. The opening sentence of chapter 13, " Before the feast of the Passover ", would preclude the thought that it is the Pascal supper that is being described. Neither could the action have taken place according to the King James' translation, "after supper was ended ", neither as the Revision has it, "during supper ", for it will readily be observed that at either time it would have been inopportune. Rather is the thought that supper time had arrived. In coming from the bath, probably with unsandled feet, they had become somewhat dusty again. According to the usual custom they found the basin of water prepared for them. It might have been the duty of the youngest disciple to perform this service, or possibly the one whose turn it was from the last meal, as was not unfrequently the case. A conversation had taken place, however, which turned the whole trend of things and presented to our Lord a most remarkable opportunity to impress a great lesson. So great was the lesson of service to mankind impressed upon him or from some other cause, that John omitted that most interesting story which to me seems the pivotal point of the Master's act. For this we'^must turn to Luke, and there we have it in chapter 22, v. 24. Although they had traveled so much with the Lord and had so long listened to His teaching, they had as yet failed to grasp the meaning of greatness in His kingdom, and they had been contending who should be accounted the greater. By referring to Luke you will observe that Jesus had told them that one of them had it in mind to betray Him. This causes Delivered at the Kifth Conference, held at the Central Baptist Church, February lo, 1904. 257 258 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. Professor Dods to remark, in regard to this strife among the disciples, that " the juxtaposition of this strife among ;he eleven with ihe anncunctment of the traitor gives to it by comj arisen the aspect of a pardonable infiimity in otherv\ i? e loyal men, and it is so treated by Jesus ", If it were the custom of the younger to do the feet washing upon such occasions, we can see a very forceful meaning to the words of our Lord in Luke, when He said, " He that is the greater among you, let him become the younger, and he that is chief, as he that doth serve ". But it is not necessary for us to pause long over the interpretation of causes which led to the Saviour's action at this time. I think we Mill all agree that the great Teacher seized upon the circumstances to impress a lesson in serving for His disciples then and for all time to come. I think I can also observe that it was to be the key note to the highest type of all coming civilization. There is one predominant feature in Christianity, which, if I mistake not, differentiates it from all other religions, \iz.: it has an ideal to which it is ever tending. You will recall that the Lord at one time remarked that His mission was not to destroy but to fulfi'. The thought is that we have as it were the seeds of the future ideal in the old dispensation, and that He came to add new life and vigor that it might attain the ideal. 1 o this end He bent the energies of His short life, and sought so to instruct His followers that they might carry on the same work. It is in this unfolding that we behold the beauty of this little story under consideration. If this new church was to look for a new kingdom, where were they to search lor the foundations? In ether words, what was to be the governing principle or law that was to control it? When the time arrived when the most menial service was to be per- formed, with the conversation of dispute still ringing within His ears, He disrobes Himself accoidirg lo custcm, takes the basin of water and the towel and stoops to the humble woik. When He had completed the wash- ing and reinvested Himself with His gaimenis and reclined with them at the table, He explained the meaning, and then added as recorded in v. 15, "For I have given you an example, that ye also should do as I have done to you ". Here, then, we behold the law of service, which is to be the law of all Christian civilization. In this act the Leader, the acknowledged King, has shown by actual example what He rightfully expects of every subject. It needs but a cursory glance at His life frcm His entrance upon His mission to its com- pletion, that service for others had been the rule of His own life, and why should He not expect it of those vho were to be called by His name ? Before entering upon the application of this law in various modes of life, 1 wish to direct ycur attention to a few circumstances which to me seem very significant. I. Our Lord was fully conscious that His end was near and that the shadow of the cross was dark athwart His pathway. This is indicated in the first verse of chapter 13, "Jesus knowing that His hour was come that He should depart out of this world unto the Father ". THE WASHING OF THE DISCIPLES' FEET. 259 Such times are usually occasions of ceasing from labor. He had done all He could to impress the grandeur of His mibsicn i pen ihe woild, lut had been repulsed at every point, and now Hisveiy life was to te itquirfd at the hand of His enemies; and v\ hat would seim to mtkt the n'.atter moie serious, was the fact that at the very table >Aith Him was the man who was to betray Him. But it was the last opportunity that was to prett nt itielf for impiessing this great law upon their minds, and with that calmness and self poise always characteristic of the great Teacher, He faltered not. 2. I notice again thai Jesus was conscious of His greatness. The third verse of this chrpter reads, " Jesus kncwirg ih;.t the Fatl er had given all things into His hands, and that He came forth from God, and goeth unto God ", etc. Consciousness of power, of divine power withal did not hinder Him in the performaiiCe of this service. Such being the case, He must have been aware that at His command He could have escaped the cross and have destroyed His enemies. Greatness and condescension are here biought face to face. None but the great could successfully face such difficulties. The act was the natural outcome of that greatness and not the greatness of the act. 1 presume many of us could recall deeds performed by men which of themselves were noble. These men may have done many such deeds, still no one considered them great men. Sinister motives setmtd to luik beneath the action depriving it of its apparent greatness. It is only when we keep in mind that the great purpose of Christ was to reveal the way of God to mankind, to show us the great Father-heait cf Gcd as extmplified in His own lile that we can understand why when conscious of His divine origin and power He did not resent the manifold indignities so often manifested toward Him, and at once seek retribution. 1 his has too often been the spirit shown by His followers. He might frequently have said to many of them, " Have 1 been so long with you and yei hast thou not known Me ?" Eut as life or death were before Him it certainly must have been within His power to take either one or the other. Frcm subsequent expressicns we are to judge that life had its charms for the Holy One as it dees for jou or me. We must not be oblivious of His humanity when we exalt His divinity. But He also discovered the import of the law which He was atcut to emphasize, and for the moment turning His back vpon His conscicus greatness He performs the act under circumstances of the greatest trial. 3. The intensity of Jesus' love is worthy of attention. John of all the disciples seems to have most appreciated the lovirg heart of Jesus. It impresses him more. The only commandment of Christ which seems to impress John is that of love. In his first epistle (4:21), he thus writes: "And this commandment have we from Him, that he who loveth God love his brother also". Then when writing to the "elect lady", he refers to a commandment which they had had from the beginning, and that command- ment was love to one another. God's love thus manifested through the Son was a constant wonder to John. " What manner of love " he exclaims. By this the Apostle sees that we are called the " sons of God ". In his Gospel, 26o THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. in the very beginning, he declares that it was love that brought Christ to the world, and that belief in Him would bring the life eternal. Not content with such assertions he rises to the more wonderful declaration that "God is love ", and that he that would abide in God must abide in love (i John 4:8, 1 6). I suppose that the assertion that God is love is a description rather of the character than of the being of God. One has well said, I think, that "this truth was for John a simple conclusion from the mission and work of Jesus. It was the inference regarding the unseen from the seen ".* We are unable to fathom the immense influence that the act of feet- washing by our Lord had upon the " beloved disciple ". The statement in the first verse of the chapter under consideration is significant : " Having loved His own that were in the world, He loved them unto the end ". The words " His own " must be considered in a little more restricted sense than the same words in the first chapter and eleventh verse. Here it would seem that He is referring to that little band of twelve whom He had selected for their instruction in taking up the work which He was soon to leave in person. If this be accepted, it will make it a little more interesting. We commend the love of God in Jesus Christ for the race, but when we realize that the love is for the individual, that very concentration makes it more valuable. I think our admiration of Jesus' love and for the menial act is height- ened and deepened when we remember that he who was to betray Him was in their company and received this service from the hand of his Master. It had already been put into Judas' heart to betray. I cannot quite agree with Meyer that Satan put it into his own heart, for it was his intention to destroy the work of the Son of God from the beginning. The Saviour knew full well at that time who was to betray Him, that he was already pondering it within his heart, and yet despite this. He loved him and yearned for his soul. Our Lord saw the events about to transpire, and yet. His " Love alters not with His brief hours and weeks, But He bears it even to the edge of doom". II. The Washing of the Feet. We now come to the distinguishing act of that eventful hour. The act of that occasion was but another illustration of the law of service which the great Teacher had at all times sought to enforce. You will remember that John and James, the sons of Zebidee, came to Him upon a certain occasion seeking important positions in His coming kingdom, but that without attempting to disabuse them of their error in regard to the character of that kingdom, He at once showed them that for the attainment of that or any position in His kingdom, there was service to be done. It matters little which Greek word is used which we translate "service" or any of its derivatives; He at all times seeks to impress the thought that we roust serve humanity and thereby we are serving God. Recall for a moment the scene of the 12th chapter of this Gospel. ♦Gilbert: " Interpretations", p. 313. THE WASHING OF THE DISCIPLES' FEET. 261 Certain Greek philosophers had been seeking an interview with the Lord. This little band of Greeks were well versed in their own mythology, and taking advantage of this, Jesus made use of an illustration probably based on the Eleusinian mystery, and by it they were enabled to comprehend the teaching of the coming of a new life from an old or former life. They were perfectly familiar with the legend of Dionysus, his second birth with Semele as his mother, and acquainted with the myth of Persephone. From these came the symbol of vegetation shooting up with such verdure at spring time, and apparently withdrawing into the earth as autumn approaches. Whtn, therefore, the Teacher used the illustration of v. 24 they understood its meaning. " Except a grain of wheat fall into the earth and die it abideth alone ". Then followed what would have been a paradox without the pre- ceding assertion, "he that loveth his life loseth it". Here is the law of service taught which our Lord is about to illustrate to His disciples and finally to the world. If you have no service to render, no death to die, you will remain alone, would seem to be the thought there expressed. You well know, as the margin indicates, that for the word here trans- lated " life ", two different words appear in the Greek. If you are anxious to keep your individual life, your manhood, you must be willing to sacrifice it in doing good for others. This done, you will gain the life eternal. This He failed not to apply to Himself as He beheld the darkening athwart His pathway. Although He did say " Father, save Me from this hour". He immediately exclaimed: "For this cause came I unto this hour ". He felt then, as ever, that His life was one of service for humanity, even unto the death of the cross. Let us take, if you will, that wonderful parable known as that of the Good Samaritan. It has been an inspiration for hundreds of years to all Christendom. Orders have been formed upon it as a ruling principle, and charitable institutions have received their life from it as a foundation. It is within the very warp and woof of all working Christianity. But what does it record ? A little act of service whose immediate teaching is to reveal the meaning of neighbor, but whose ultimate end is to teach us that that neighbor needs our service. The principal record of the eleventh chapter is the raising of Lazarus, but the ground thought for us to learn is that Christ served in that hour of trouble. But to me one of the greatest representations of this law of service by way of teaching is given by the great Leader in His description of the judgment. They are represented as coming to Him after He has told them that they are to inherit the kingdom prepared for them. So greatly are they astonished that they are represented as crying out to Him : " When did we do this ? We have no remembrance of seeing Thee in such condition and ministering unto Thee". The answer is significant. "Inas- much as ye did it unto one of these, My brethren, even the least, ye did it unto Me ". To me it has seemed that Jesus illustrated all these teachings by the feet-washing. It would almost appear that He might have said to His fol- 2^2 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. lowers, " You have been with Me for a long while now. You have heard what I have said about service in the world. I have been seeking to show you that it lay at the very foundation of all greatness. It is at the very entrance of My kingdom and you must understand what it means. You are all seeking greatness in that kingdom. You are thinking as did the lawyer, ' What good thing may I do .'" I can say no more. I want you to scan My life, it has been one of service from the beginning. You must allow Me to wash your feet as the symbol of what I mean ". After saying this they saw the light, and Peter cried out, " Lord, not my feet only, but my hands and my head ". In this act shines the light of which Professor Beardslee spoke, "The study of Christ's mission, if it follows the lead of John, will center around one word, — light. Christ is the light of the world ". So here He becomes our light, and there is no need of walking in darkness. I might emphasize here the value of doing over feeling, I have known people to wander in the dark for weeks and all because so much stress was placed on " how do you feel ", and when the candidate could claim no bet- ter feeling he was told he must feel a little worse, plead a httle more, and then he might feel a little better. Just what this meant, or just what was the process through which he was to pass was never made quite plain, but it was fully taught that his acceptance depend* d largely on feeling. The teaching of Christ, so far as I am able to see, calls upon us first to do something for God, and the feeling will naturally follow. It will be observed that the Master was constantly telling men to give, even if it were but a cup of cold water to the thirsty, as well as many other things, and when they had done these righteous things in the name of Christ or becaule they had accepted Him as their guide they would receive the righteous man's reward. Feeling will undoubtedly follow in a majority of cases, but we are to do something first and consider the feeling as a result. Application of the Law. — If the act of feet-washing embodied a law, as I have already stated to be my belief, it must be universally applied. When we studied arithmetic or the higher mathematics, it was the custom to state the rule and then illustrate it by some appropriate example. But in reality, although I do not remember that the teachers told us so, the rule of course followed from the example. It could not be otherwise. So here from the great Teacher we have first the example, and from that follows the rule. You have observed that the disciples wanted to know why He should do this act, and He told them to allow the act, and He would after- ward explain. This was also the case at the time of the baptism of Jesus, when John was about to forbid His coming to him, " Suffer it to be so now ", was the answer, waiting for subsequent developments to substanti- ate the assertion, " It becometh us to fulfil all righteousness ". I. Nations. The law must be applied to nations in their dealings with each other. This was the one great lapse in the grasp of thought among the Hebrews. Accept to the full extent that they were a "chosen people", THE WASHING OF THE DISCIPLES' FEET 263 that God had given them a revehition superior to what had been received by the nations about them, they never seemed to comprehend the fact that such privileges demanded a service on their part to t leir neighbors. They grew to be more and more exclusive, and finally thought no one was fit for existence but their own nation. It would seem that they were sufficiently warned of this fault of exclusiveness. There are those who believe that the story of Jonah was written to show them the larger opportunities which they might embrace, but the " hermit " thought possessed them so thor- oughly that it controlled them to the days of the promised Messiah. If we are to follow out this law there can be no hermit nations. In our time this law is manifesting itself nationally in reciprocity treaties. It may be doubtful if the greedy politician recognizes the source or feels its full import when he is arguing such national measures, but it is most certainly an exhibition of serving one another. In the same category must be classed the boards of arbitration, of which we hear so much in this century. You may recall that President Woolsey, in his "Introduction to the Study of International law", says that the Roman Imperial Power origi- nally fulfilled this function, and that it was feebly perpetuated by the popes in the mediaeval times. Henry IV of France sought by some such means to avert religious wars, and so on through the succeeding years it has been the strenuous efforts of many national leaders to confederate the nations in such a manner that war might be averted and the weaker nations pre- served. It was reserved for those living at the close of the nineteenth century to witness a mighty nation espousing the cause of a despised people, fighting their battles for them, and then raising them to the honor and dignity of statehood among the nations of the earth. I opine, however, that the world has not yet seen the full outcome of the application of the law of service among nations. I contend, without approving or disapprov- ing of recent methods, or without entering the arena of politics at all, that it is a service which this country has owed to all the nations of the earth for more than a half century to construct and maintain a waterway across the Isthmus of Panama. I also maintain that all intercourse of one nation with another should be based on this Christ Law of Service. It would not be politic to study this law at this time in all its ramifications in these direc- tions, neither is there time ; but if ever any nation attains to the highest possible Christian civilization, it will only be by accepting and working upon Christ's Law of Service. One has well said, " That the principle of service sees the world no longer as divided, fragmentary, a disconnected series of spheres * * * but as one world, an organism, a cosmos, a single sphere in which is no higher or lower, no academic aristocracy or detached group of the learned, but an interdependent, associated, common life, involving the researches of the recluse and the bent back of the man with the hoe ".* * Professor Peabody : " The Religion of an Educated Man ", p. 8i. 264 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. 2. Literature. This brings us naturally to the application of the law of service to literature. Possibly there is no better illustration than the service of literature rendered to England in the middle of the last century. It was one of the great factors which assisted in bringing about the great revolution without recourse to arms. Carlyle seemed to catch the spirit of the law and was willing to apply it to himself. Those were immortal words which he wrote, and worthy of inscription in gold and to be placed in the sanctum sanc- torum of every aspirant in literature : " We are here to do God's will. The only key to a right life is self- renunciation. The man who lives for self, who works for selfish ends is a charletan at bottom, no matter how great his powers. The man who lives for self alone has never caught a vision of the true meaning and order of the universe. * * * Life shall be a barren, worthless thing for me unless I seek to fall in with God's plan, and do the work that He has sent me here to do ". Scarcely less important are the words of that noble Italian patriot who providentially sojourned an exile in England at that time, and who espoused the cause of liberty of that strange land: Joseph Mazini. He wrote: "Life is a mission. Every other definition of life is false and leads all who accept it astray. * * * Life is a mission, a duty, therefore its highest law. In the comprehension of that mission, and fulfilment of that duty, lies our means of future progress, the secret of the stage of existence into which we shall be initialed at the conclusion of this earthly stage ". What could be truer to the law of service than the expression of these two leaders in the literature of their times. But they were not the only ones who used their pens for what to them seemed for the good and exalta- tion of their country and their fellow men. If you are at all familiar with Mazini's life {Joseph Mazini^ His Lije, Writings, Etc. pp. 129-200), you will recall that it was not enough for him to be engaged in these public benefac- tions in the cause of liberty. Finding that there were hundreds of Italian children in London who were extremely ignorant, his great loving heart was so moved that he induced men of means to assist in founding a school for their instruction. At this period Charles Dickens was just entering upon his career, which was to make him one of the foremost instrumentalities in bringing light to darkest England. Elizabeth Barrett, Thomas Hood and a host of others were heard in verse and prose sounding the note of freedom ; legislators heard the cry of humanity and consecrated their pens to its services. It is impossible for one to trace the far-reaching influence that the true literate has had in moulding and fashioning society. There are no more hopeful signs of the times than the fact that such men as Ely, and Vincent, and Zeublen and many other men of letters have been willing to use their pens and time in what is termed the Citizen's Library Economics, Politics and Sociology, whose aim is to make scientific work in the field of the humanities clear and interesting to ordinary intelligent citizens. And I THE WASHING OF THE DISCIPLES' FEET. 265 doubt if the world ever saw the day when so many of our men of education, college presidents and professors, noted clergymen and leaders of society offered themselves in free service for all mankind. Never were so many books published, and good ones, too, to help the rising generation. I well remember when "Todd's Students' Manuel" was not only the best but about the only book of its kind, but now it is not so. Almost every man of any standing in literature gives us the benefit of his education. You can well imagine my chagrin the other day when your secretary asked me what books I had written. All I could do was to remark, in the language of the celebrated Dr. Daniel Curry, that I know too much to write a poor one but not enough to write a good one. I rejoice that so many educated men are consecrating their knowledge and pens for the public good. 4. The Church. We now ask ourselves the question, what service shall the church render to humanity ? The day of controversy has very nearly passed. Heresy is little thought of except now and then when the superior light of some noted professor shines so brightly that it blinds our eyes and we think he is in the dark when, forsooth, it is ourselves, and we wish to try him for heresy. But, generally, all is at peace and the church stands confronted with tremendous problems. You may recall that Canon Fremantle * claims that the fourth and fifth chapters of John's Revelation reveals the ideal or destination of the church of God. In the center is the slain lamb, that is God made known through the self-renouncing love expressed in the cross of Christ. Sur- rounding these are the elders representing the redeemed humanity, then the four living beings which represent the animate creation. He claims that we must take this vision as representing a world right about us, and not far away, that is being slowly but steadily transformed by the expansion of the Christian church. Whatever definition we may give to the church, its mis- sion is a service for humanity. As Christ came to the multitudes to help them, so are we to go to the multitudes in His stead today and render them the service we are able to give. I wish especially to call your attention to the latter part of v. 15, and the whole of v. 16. They seem to me to b^ significant: — "That ye should do as I have done to you. Verily, I say unto you, a servant is not greater than his lord: neither one that is sent greater than he that sent him" This of course will be seen to refer directly to the scene of washing that has just transpired. Turn now if you will to v. 34, and there you will read: — "A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another ". It would almost seem that the great Exemplar paused for a moment to get their attention, for what He was about to say was what there was new in this commandment. Their attention riveted upon Him, He continues: — " Even as I have loved you, that ye love one another ". The word "even" denotes conformity rather than a simple compari- son. Their love, to be forever manifested, is to be of the same nature. • Fremantle: " The World a Subject of Redemption ", p. 8. 266 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. The two ways of rendering this passage are : i. "I give you a new com- mandment, that ye love one another with the same devotion with which I have loved you". 2. "I give you a new commandment, that ye love one another, even as up to this moment I loved you, in order that you may imitate My love one toward another ".* While the first rendering gives the character, the second rendering gives iho. g'oitfid oi that mutual Christian love. The revised version gives this in the margin. That love which was to be the characteristic of the new commandment was on that occasion manifested in the act which at first Peter so strenuously deplored. Indeed He had manifested His superiority, not only to them, but His superiority to the age in which He was living. His words so fitly spoken at all times; His self control under the most trying circumstances; His fear- lessness, yet gentleaess of bearing had all disclosed to them that superiority, while now the closing act of His short life had clearly demonstrated to them that He was willing to use that transcendent greatness in lifting the race to its rightful position. His very coming to the earth, His denial of the glory which He had with the Father, would and did demonstrate this ; but they could not then understand that any more clearly than we do now, and so to give the example that all might understand, He stoops to the menial service of washing the disciples' feet. We sometimes hear the cry, "give us the old time religion", and it is doubtful, if many who are sounding this through the land understand what it means. Mr. Ely in one of his lectures t says that while the metaphysicians are crying : — " Back to Kant 1 " or " Back to Plato 1 " let the church raise the cry : — " Back to Christ ! " This is what I understand by the *' old time religion ", and not one of noise and emotionalism. It may, and will to a certain degree possess both of these, but it will be because the church, Christian people are willing to bring aid as Christ did to the degraded humanity by being its servant. In the light of this interpretation, there is a place for every follower of Jesus Christ, and when he is out of that place, he is of no use to the world. If one has gained education beyond one's fellows, it is the imperative duty for that one to use it among the ignorant or those who are not as enlightened. The thanks of this whole land, yea, of the whole Christendom, are due to President Eliot and a score of other men of like character, who, in the plenitude of their research are willing to meet their opponants on social questions in open fair debate. It certainly has a tendency of removing the " caste " feeling which our Lord so greatly deplored, and which the act before us so greatly wounded. We are living in an age of service, a service of love for mankind, and it is the opini m of many eminent men that it has never been equaled in its com- prehensive love of man. The rich are beginning to realize as never before that wealth means more than self-aggrandizement. It means that they, as * Vincent: " Word Studies in the New Ttstament ",'p. 236. t Ely: " Social Aspects of Christianity ", p. 149. THE WASHING OF THE DISCIPLES' FEET 267 its possessors, are but stewards to do service for humanity, and so the last year surpassed all others in its gifts of beneficence. In this renaissance appears the Young Men's Christian Associa ion, the University Settlements, the Students' Volunteer movement and other methods of helping humanity, all of which show that we are catching the spirit of Christ when He laid aside His garments, and He took a towel and girded Himself, and poured water into the basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet. I believe with Dr. Rice that " the Man of Nazareth has still a message even for those who rejoice in the discovery and possession of the new worlds of truth revealed by modern science ".* * Professor Rice: " Christian Faith in an Age of Science ", p. 6. * THE GLORinCATlON OF THE SON OF MAN. BY RE"V. SAIVLUEI^ HART, T). D., r>. C. L., Professor of Doctrinal Theology and of the Prayer Book in Berkeley Divinity School, Middletown, Conn. St. John 13:31, 32. " Now is glorified the Son of Man, And God is glorified in Him ; And God shall glorify Him in Himself, And straightway shall He glorify Him ". St. John 17:5. "And now glorify Thou Me, Father, with Thyself, By the glory which before the world was I had with Thee". I. As we pass on in the study of St. John's Gospel, we see more and more distinctly how the beloved disciple was led to know the Master and to interpret and record His works. Especially as we come under the shadow of the cross and catch a glimpse of the light which lies beyond it, we see how one of whom we think as most closely following and understanding the Lord, learned the meaning of the great revelation of the life, the death, and the life resumed. He saw in it all, as he traced it out from the beginning, a great progress from God to God, of one who came forth from the Father and came into the world, and again left the world and went unto the Father. A later Apostle noted the steps of humihation from the assumption of human nature to the acceptance of the death of the cross, and then as following upon this the exaltation to the right hand of the Father ; and as he wrote, St. Paul thought of the glory as a compensa- tion for the humiliation and a reward of the obedience. Such, indeed, from the standpoint of man it was, and in this way the facts are doubtless rightly represented to our minds and rightly understood. But St. John looked at these same events as he knew that Christ Himself looked at them, and he saw them in the light of the divine plan and counsel; and in their Godward aspect he learned that the cross was not an interruption of the great work, nor was the Resurrection an undoing of the power of the death, or even a recompense for it; from Bethlehem to Olivet, nay, as I was saying, from God to God, it was a great progress, the triumphal march of a com- batant and conqueror, the revelation of the inherent glory of the Son of God, the assumption of the merited glory of the Son of Man. " I, if 1 be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Myself " ; the Lord spoke these *Deliveied at the Sixth Conference, held at the Trinity Union Methodist Episcopal Church, March 9, 1904. 268 THE GLORIFICATION OF THE SON OF MAN. 2O9 words as He entered into the last tremendous conflict, and He spoke them, St. John himself tells us, " signifying by what death He was about to die " ; but the "lifting up" was not upon the cross alone; it was that, indeed, but it was that as a step in the ascent to the Father. And, in point of fact, it is not the Christ dead upon the cross who has drawn and still draws humanity to His worship and obedience ; it is the Christ in heaven, " the Lamb as it had been slain ", the accepted sacrifice, the living priest, the head over all things to the church. And this expression of one of the greatest of all truths, although we find it most clearly stated in the argument and the words of St. John's Gospel, is not peculiar to him. St. Luke, when entering upon his long record of the events of our Lord's last journey to Jerusalem, says that He steadfastly set His face thitherward "when the time was come that He should be received up" ; so that he, too, looked upon the way of the cross as the way of glory. And there are many phrases which show that even St. Paul wrote sometimes more like a mystic than like a scholastic theologian, and centering his thoughts upon God saw the one great plan which was purposed from eternal ages, not interrupted but furthered by the cross. Thus, indeed, it must have been for all who entered into the full mean- ing of the Lord's teaching about Himself. They saw the childhood, the youth, the opening manhood of the holy Man follow in the wonderful naturalness of perfection ; there was no change of purpose, no break of con- tinuity, when upon them there followed the public ministry with its gracious teaching and its deeds of love, its conflicts with sin and error, its mighty testimony to this truth ; and they saw that it was a step to the greatest vic- tory when the life submitted to death that it might gain new power, that it might enter upon a loftier state of existence, and that it should then be communicated to those who could receive it. Christ Jesus lived and taught, suffered and died, that He might attain and impart the new life. Thus it was that when, His earthly ministry having ended, He had dedi- cated Himself to death, He knew and declared that He had reached the time of His glorification. He had shown Himself to be the Lamb without blemish and without spot; He had, before the hands of wicked men had been violently laid upon Him, devoted Himself to death when He presented to the Father the bread and the wine of the last Paschal feast and the first Eucharist, or at least — for we cannot be certain of the exact sequence of events — He was about to offer this great sacrifice of Himself and to bid His disciples to continue a memorial of it until He should come again ; Judas had left that little company, in which he no longer had his place, and had gone out into the night to fulfil the awful part which he had chosen for him- self; and Jesus said to the eleven who were left, waiting in hope and fear for what might prove the issues of that night, " Now is the Son of Man glorified". A day or two before, when the conflict with His own people was at its height, and Gentiles had come to ask for Him, He had said that the hour of His glorification was at hand ; but now the sacrifice was in true 270 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. symbol and in full intent offered, or to be offered, and the Lord spoke of the act as just completed : " Now was glorified the Son of Man ". II. " The Son of Man ". Thus He spoke of Himself, as showing the place which He held in the great economy of the Father, declaring His identity with humanity and His place as the head of humanity, affirming that He was really man and at the same time representatively man, not one among men but one who was the life of all, who was the one real man because He was the one ideal man. And He, the Son of Man, was now ready to receive a glory such as had never reached humanity before. He saw before Him the agony in the garden and the bloody sweat ; He knew how near to Him were the cross and the passion, with all that they meant of shame and pain, of contempt and dereliction ; but He saw beyond them, and — most important — because of them, the mighty resurrection and the glorious ascension, the enthronement in heaven and the kingly return ; He knew, too, that this was the true way — we need not hesitate to say the natural way — in which He, the Son of Man, was to complete His work and to attain His destined place; and He uttered in the hearing of His apostles words which they could not rightly understand then, but words which it was impossible that they should forget : " Now was glorified the Son of Man, And God was glorified in Him ; And God shall glorify Him in Himself, And straightway shall He glorify Him ". These were not, then, the words of a perfect man who, coming to the end of his appointed work, felt that he might expect a reward. Even the perfect man must, indeed, — paradoxical as it may seem— advance in his perfection. Even the perfect man must meet the conditions of advance in physical and mental and spiritual development, and must prove his place and stand forth as being that which he really is. Even the perfect man must be perfect because he has become perfect, and none can be made per- fect without trials and sufferings. And Jesus Christ was certainly perfect as man, and His humanity was made perfect. None before Him had ever attained to unspotted holiness, as none before Him had ever offered com- plete obedience. He stood pre-eminent among all who have ever trod this earth in the many generations of its history, and as such there must have been a glory especially and peculiarly His. That glory, if I understand the record aright, was shown to Him on one memorable occasion ; and had He been no more than man, had He been but one among the millions of human kind. He might have accepted it as His due and have entered upon it then. On the holy mount, when not only His life of preparation was past, but also He had received the discipline and made the progress which belonged to His public ministry. His glory was revealed to chosen men of both the ancient and the new dispensation, and also (I think we may rightly say it) to Himself. Thit glory our Lord did not then accept, and its vision faded away ; but it left in the memory and the convictions of two apostles who THE GLORIFICATION OF THE SON OF MAN 271 saw it — the other early laid down his life and left no record of his teach- ing— a powerful teslimonj as to the reality and the might of their Master's majesty, whom they had for a brief moment seen cs indeed He was and is. But the Lord came down from the mount, and entered again and at once upon His work as the healer of men's woes, and presently upon His other work as teacher and His conflict with sin. He accepted not the transfigu- ration glory which belonged to Him as man, because He would await and in due time gain the resurrection glory, which should be His as the Son of Man. The hour was not yet come that the Son of Man should be glorified. III. Now the reason for this, as I understand it, is two- fold ; or, to speak more accurately, it is a reason which can be stated and considered in two ways. Our Lord at the time of the transfiguration had accomplished the work of man, as man might have been had there been no need of redemption. He had, indeed, encountered sin, and had known its opposi- tion, and had removed some of its results; but He had not delivered men from its power, nor had He as yet known in His own experience the utter- most of the power of that which He had come to bear. If the words are rightly understood, it may be said that He had fulfilled the destiny of man unfallen, but not as yet that of man fallen. For, though He knew no sin, and the stain and corruption incurred by human nature did not reach to Him, yet He was sent " in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin " ; and it was necessary that His holiness should reach down and take hold of the weakness and sin of those whom He vouchsafed to call His brethren. To help man fallen. He must humble Himself to the destiny of man fallen ; and that He would not have done if He had accepted the glory of perfect man- hood and entered the presence of the Father from the mount of the trans- figuration. And this really implies the other reason which I had in mind, that even in the supreme hour of His ministry, regarded as only His minis- try, Christ had not identified Himself with us; He had not become the head of the church, and through the church the head of mankind. The life of no mere man, be he even the man who alone should be perfect among the children of men, could be communicated to all others as the one source of their true life. None but a mere man could have accepted a glory which was not to be shared with others; none but the Son of Man could have left the vision of the spiritual world and of the eternal life, and calmly faced the evils and sorrows that remained on earth, and turned His steps to Gethsemane and Calvary, even though it was with sure faith that through them a path would be found to the opened grave and the parted heavens. Christ our Lord, because He was the Son of Man, must needs seek to tread as deliverer the way along which man, weak and fallen, was stumbling, and He must needs gain for man a life not only perfect but victorious; ar.d life completely victorious — we may be not able to give the reason, but we are convinced of the truth — is the only high life which is by its nature communi- cable to others and able to extend to all. And no life is completely victo- rious except that which bows itself down to death and rises again in the might of the resurrection. 272 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. IV. Transfiguration glory was therefore not all that was meet for the Son of Man. Because He was the Son of Man, He would not accept that which could not be shared with His brethren ; because He was the Son of Man, He would not enter into glory without us. He came back into this world's life that He might take us with Himself into the life of the world to come. How, then, was He to be glorified as the Son of Man ? The answer has been already in part suggested ; but that it may be truly stated and apprehended, we must keep in our minds the full meaning of glory as the word is used constantly in the Scriptures. Glory is the manifestation of that which has a moral worth ; it belongs only to that which is in itself real and true ; it is the necessary effulgence of light, the revelation of true excellence, that by which a rational being recog- nizes in a rational being the qualities of holiness and reality, of justice and love, and of all that goes to make up moral and spiritual perfection. It is thus essential to the nature of that to which it belongs and which it reveals ; it may be hindered in its manifestation, but it cannot be created and it can- not be destroyed. It follows that it is not, and cannot be, something extraneous, as a golden crown which may be put upon an unworthy head, or a stately garment which may be used to cover up rags and unseemliness ; glory, in any right sense of the word, is as necessary to him in whom it is seen as is brightness to the sun, or beauty to the flower, or order to the system of the universe. And in a true sense we may say that God Himself does not bestow glory. We do not, of course, mean that He does not first create that which is noble and pure and true ; we do not for a moment deny that it is His hand which shapes and His spirit which gives life to all that has perfection of any kind, or that even makes any approach to perfection ; but as He did not first create the sun or the flower or the world, and then give to each its attribute of brightness or beauty or order, but made each to show in itself that which belonged to its very constitution, so it is in regard to that moral excellence of which we are speaking ; it does of very necessity reveal itself, it cannot but be glorious. The glory of God is His holiness and His love, those two elements which specially enter into our thought of what we venture to call His character ; and the holy and loving God must needs have the glory which enters into any true conception of holiness and love, a glory which none can fail to see and recognize who knows these divine attributes. In like manner, the glory of a man is in his character as he is true to that which he was created to be and to the ideal toward which he was meant to advance ; and even with our bodily eyes we catch traces of It on the faces of the saints, and our souls are conscious of it when we are in their presence. So the glory of the Son of Man is to be seen in the completion of His work, in the perfection which He was to attain through life and death and life again, through obedience and its reward, by completing as Son of Man His double service, that of the Father and that of His brethren. The words, then, on the Lord's lips, " Now is the Son of Man glorified", declared that He had as Son of Man finished His work here and had fulfilled THE GLORIFICATION OF THE SON OF MAN. 273 the destiny of man on earth. They witnessed to the completion of that for which He had cast in His lot with those whom, though fallen and sinful, He had from very love called to become His brethren. Dedicating Him- self to death, and accepting the path of life along which alone He could lead man with Himself, He had made that great act of self-surrender which was the only way of true victory for Him and for us, and had acknowledged that in this He would find His sufficient reward. The inward victory had been gained in the surrender of the holy will to do and to suffer all that man needed to accomplish and to endure; and upon the inward victory, so the Lord knew, the outward triumph must follow. Thus, as in one great act, the Son of Man was glorified by life and by death, by resurrection and ascension, and is yet to be glorified by that return for which His church is waiting. Thus in the self-surrender and the deserved exaltation, a death accepted because only through it could life be attained, life possible only as springing out of death, did He who had for our sakes identified Himself with us fulfil His destinj- and ours. Thus did He gain His true reward, the reward of greater service and of greater consequent honor, the ability to serve us by giving us His resurrection life as He had given for us the life in which He lived on earth. Thus, to use His own words, was He glorified, and God was glorified in Him; for in His work was a new revelation of the Father, made known in His wonderful perfections of holiness and love ; and thus was fulfilled that which He added by way of emphasis and assurance, "God shall glorify Him in Himself, and straightway shall He glorify Him ". They are words rather for devout meditation than for critical examination and exposition ; and marvellously do they tell us of the eternal Son of God, as Son of Man, bringing glory to the Father, and the Father glorifying His only begotten Son, when His work as Son of Man was completed, in Himself, And somewhat thus may we venture to apprehend the meaning of the petition which I read at the beginning from the Lord's high-priestly prayer; "Now glorify Thou Me, Father, by the glory which before the world was I had with Thee ". The words in which the eternal Son, who had come forth from the Father, addressed the eternal Father to whom He was about to return, must needs be words above the full understanding of men ; but they do at least contain the prayer, which on the Lord's lips was a prayer in full assurance that it was the Father's will that it should be ful- filled— the prayer that He who had been made and had become the Son of Man, might in His perfection as the God-Man, uniting in His one Person two natures never to be divided, have the glory which belonged to the God-head ; that the glory which before the Incarnation had been His, might be given Him as the Incarnate Son, who by the depth of His humiliation and the completeness of His obedience had gained for Himself the name that is above every name, and for man the privilege of becoming the son of God and even partaker of the divine nature. What one says in trying to grasp the meaning of these great words must needs be said after the manner of men and most imperfectly; but the thought 274 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. inspired may lead to worship and to that lofty faith which is the spring of all true action. V. Thus, as He had declared and as He had prayed, the Son of God, made Son of Man, was glorified by the Father as in the path of the Cross He entered upon the life which had hitherto been the uncommunicated life of the Godhead, to make it communicable to men. Thus did He gain a victory, not for Himself alone, but for all who should be in Him, for His body the church, and for all humanity. Thus did He not only point out the way of man's perfection, but prove it a real thing; thus did He make it possible for us to enter into His perfection and into His glory. • OBEDIENCE TO THE NEW COMMANDMENT THE PROOF OF DISaPLESHIP. (St. John 13:34, 35.) by rev. rockavell h. potter, Pastor of the First Congregational Church, Harikokd, Conn. . Brethren in the Conference : You have asked me to speak upon the words found in the thirteenth chapter of the Gospel of John in the thirty-fourth and thirty-fifth verses, "A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another ; even as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another ". Those who have read thoughtfully these chap- ters of the Gospel will have noted that the chapter division which con- cludes the thirteenth and opens the fourteenth chapter of the Gospel gives to us at the opening of the fourteenth chapter those great words of comfort which are dear to the heait of every Christian. Yet it is unhappy in that it separates those words of Jesus from the other words in His answer to the question of Peter, and that it separates the related ques- tions of Thomas and Philip and Judas from the question of Peter. They will have noted that the real division of the thought occurs at the thirty- sixth verse of the thirteenth chapter with the first of the interrupting' questions. So we see these verses to which our thought is called this evening standing as Jesus' own word at the conclusion of the institution of the Lord's Supper and as His only introduction to the great words of the fifteenth to the seventeenth chapters — the discourse of the vine and His prayer for the church. So that I bring to you one of His great words spoken at a great moment in His ministry. The supper had been instituted. That simple yet profound ceremony summed up in itself great Christian truths that laid hold of the thought and heart of the group of disciples. At its close in that tragic moment Jesus had made the delicate disclosure of him who should betray Him, and the steps of Judas had just died away as he had descended the stair from the upper room. It is as though we had crossed the passion threshold and were now in the great and holy place wherein was to be enacted the sub- lime mystery^ of the Christian faith — as though the traitor being unable to pass that threshold having just departed, had left behind him the group of the disciples whose hearts were loyal to Jesus and to whom could be dis- closed the great and eternal truths which were then to be wrought out. So * Delivered at the Sixth Conference, held at the Trinity Union Methodist Episcopal Church, March 9. 1904- 276 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. Jesus speaks now the word which is to be the constituting principle of the Christian church. The supper being concluded He speaks of the glo- rification of the Son of Man which is to be wrought in Him, speaking of His relation to God. Then He speaks of the Church through which He is to be glorified, and announces the principle which is to constitute that Church in human society — the principle which is to organize human society so that the great work to which He has laid His hand shall find its full fruition in the brotherhood of man. This then is His word. "A new commandment I give unto you that you love one another, as I have loved you ; that you also love one another. By this shall all men know that you are My disciples, because ye have love one for another ". What then is the content of this great commandment which is to become the organizing principle of the Christian Church? What then is the content of this commandment by which men are to be known as His disciples? We read the word, "that ye love one another", and we recognize that this is no new word falling from the lips of Jesus. The disciples had already heard that message. Time and time again had He repeated the ancient command of Israel in their ears. Moreover, in the parable of the Good Samaritan He had given such large interpretation to the word neighbor that they understood something of the breadth of the love that was demanded of them by Jesus. What then constitutes this command, " A new commandment ? " Wherein is it that Jesus speaks these words on the threshold of His pnssion? Wherein is it that, reserving this word for this moment, He speaks of it and says, " This is the new com- mand " ? "I have stated many things. If you forget other things which I have said, forget not this. I have given many precepts. If these all fall from your lives, let not this fall. This is the commandment ". What does He mean ? Let us divest our thought of those unworthy conceptions that cluster around these words. A large part of the meaning of the passage we are apt to lose. We love so many things. We speak of that which is beautiful to the artistic sense and say that we love it because it is a delight to the eye, or pleasant to the ear, or because in deeper meaning it satisfies the aesthetic impulses of the soul. Again, with more of real meaning we say of our friend, " I love him; he is my companion, my trusted friend, I love him ". Yet we know that love such as this cannot be commanded. Or leaving behind the lower meanings of the word, we apply it to that range of affec- tion upon which the home is constituted, the love of husband for wife, of father for son, the love of the mother for her child, and by this word we cover all the range of those sacred relationships which constitute the home and give unto life the sweetness and richness which there is in the home we know. And yet, when we strive to interpret these words by these usages of it, we find that it is impossible for us to derive from it the significance of the text. We cannot be commanded so to love all men, we cannot be commanded so to love our brethren in the Christian Church. These affec- tions which are the center and bond of union in the home, are not the range of affections that are brought into play in the Christian brotherhood. OBEDIENCE TO THE NE W COMMANDMENT. 277 They cannot be commanded, and our Lord never laid that commandment upon us. How then shall we interpret these words but by reading more closely, and by comparing this word here with those in the parable of Jesus by which He has borne it in upon the heart of humanity? We love our neighbor when we, like the good Samaritan, are willing not to pass by on the other side but to go where he is, and put the arm of sympathy under his wounded head, and to lift him in his weakness to the bosom of our strength, and to pour the balm of comfort into his wounds, and to bear him to safety and shelter. We find that we love our neighbor when thus we seek his good, — that Jesus does not command for us a passionate affection, that He does not command us to find the man robbed and at once feel towards him as we feel towards our brother in the flesh ; but that we enter into his life with sympathy and seek his welfare and minister unto him in love. So Jesus means in this great word, " that ye love one another ", as He means always in the interpretation of that great word to Israel. Jesus means, when He says you should love one another, " seek always the welfare of your brother ". Consistently in life and word, in deed and thought, seek the welfare of that brother. "Ah ", you say, " you have taken the meaning out of that great word, what is there left in it.'"' Have I? Then you have never striven to live up to that commandment ; take it home and live up to it in Providence for one week, and see if the meaning is gone from it when I say that Jesus says we shall always seek the welfare of our brother man. This is the commandment that Jesus lays upon the heart of the Christian Church, and He utters the great and fundamental law of redeemed human society. But He has given us here the phrase that makes His word the 7ieni commandment, "Love one another as I have loved you". And so saying. He has given us the type and measure of the Christian obligation. "As I have loved you ". How loved He men? Spiritually first, spiritually, always spiritually. But you say, " He fed the hungry. He clothed the naked, He unstopped the deaf ears, and He caused light to shine in the eyes of the darkened, He made the lame to walk and the dead to live; His ministry was a physical ministry". Yes, He fed the hungry, but He said to them, " Ye seek Me because you ate of the loaves and fishes and were full " ; " Labor not for the meat which perisbeth but for the meat which endureth unto life eternal". "But you are taking all the kindness and sympathy out of the gospel ", some one exclaims. No, I am not. God forbid that 1 should utter a word which should be interpreted to mean that I say unto my brother, " Go, be ye clothed and fed " while I turn about to put on my broadcloth coat and eat my dinner of roast beef, while he walks naked and hungry ! But this is true that in all our ministry for the welfare of our brethren, it is the welfare of their lives that we seek and not the welfare of their bodies. You think of him, not as a beast ; you think of him as a child of God. You seek constantly his welfare, you love to put clothes upon his back, you love to heal his wounds, you love to make the lame to leap and the blind to see, but you will do this because by so ministering, you serve his whole 278 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. life and you redeem his soul. The Christian Church must always assert that her love for men is spiritual as was the love of Jesus. To what point are we to love our neighbor ? Up to the point of sacri- fice. That is what Jesus did. "Love one another as I have loved you". Seek always, consistently, the welfare of your brother's life, and seek it until it hurts. That is what Jesus means, up to the point of sacrifice. "As I have loved you ", said Jesus when the shadow of Gethsemane was falling upon His brow, and when there was graven before Him in feature of flame, the dread figure of the cross. And by this He teaches His Church that they are to love their fellowmen. The Church is to show her love for humanity by loving their lives, and loving their lives to the point of sacri- fice— that is the meaning given by the new commandment. Because we have divested it of those associations of sentiment and of affection which cluster around the word in our ordinary usage of it, will you not bear wit- ness with me that we have deepened and strengthened its claim upon the human heart, when we have interpreted it to mean, "Thou shalt consist- ently seek the welfare of thy brothers's life up to the point of sacrifice " ? It was a solemn moment when Jesus spoke that word. He reserved it until the traitor, Judas, had gone out, because only faithful souls could bear the blaze of the white heat of that new commandment. It is the solemn command which Jesus gives to the Christian Church in every age. " Thou shalt always seek the welfare of thy brother's life, his spiritual life, up to the point of sacrifice ". It is a claim that stands in the world today, a claim that has in it a divine compulsion. " Thou shalt love one another ". " That ye love one another as I have loved you ". Oh, but you say : " It is limited. It was just Andrew, Peter and James and John and Philip and Thomas and the rest of them, that were to love one another. It did not mean the Roman soldiers in the street. It did not mean the centurions ; it did not mean the scribes and Pharisees ". Jesus was speaking to His disciples. But with the full light of these twenty cen- turies blazing in upon those words, with Jesus' own teaching by precept and proverb as He has interpreted the ancient command of Israel, we know that wrapped up in that "you "was potentially the human race. It takes in all mankind. And who dares to draw a circle of limitation around the command of Jesus and say we shall love this one as He loved us but that one is outside of the Church and we need not practice the law towards him. The scope of His command was potentially universal. And in this age the Church must give her allegiance to the universal command or the world will laugh her to scorn. Save as we learn to love humanity as Jesus loved us, spiritually, sacrificially, we deny the word of our Lord. Jesus knew human nature. He knew that He could not command His disciples to have affection for the stranger, for the foreigner, the man of different tem- perament, but He knew He could command them always to seek consistently his welfare. I cannot command you to love the man who lives across the street from you. His education and training are different from yours. All his interests and sympathies are different from yours. I may not ask you to OBEDIENCE TO THE NE W COMMANDMENT. 27«> love him as you love your brother, but I can ask you to seek always, con- sistently, the welfare of that man's life, even if it hurts you to do it. And you can do it, and you know that you can do it. He does not dress as you would like him to dress ; he is more or less ostentatious in his manner of living, but if you always consistently seek his welfare you will find value in that man's life. You will redeem him. You may not put a limit around the command of Jesus when you interpret Him fairly; for He includes within the scope of it all men. And those people who to you are unpleasant and disagreeable are bound up in it. And if your allegiance to Him is from the heart, you will recognize His claim, you will see their welfare, and you will scorn to do the thing which would injure them. What is the design? Why did He give it to His disciples? It was a strategic, apologetic and military command. " By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye have love one to another ". This is the great apologetic of the Christian Church. This is the great weapon of the Church's warfare. Are we asking wherewith shall the Church go forth ? Are we reading in the papers of great congregations of men who cheer the name of Jesus and hiss at the mention of the Christian Church ? Are we talking about the unchurched masses who live in our cities and are scattered upon our plains, and who know the name of Jesus to bow in reverence, but who know the Church only to hiss at it? And are we asking wherewith shall we meet these men and win them to the Church ? Jesus tells us in John 1 3 : 35 — " By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye have love one to another ". If you love, if you seek consistently their welfare in life to the point of sacrifice, they will know that you are His disciples indeed. It will be evidence sufficient when they find you at the point of sacrifice seeking their welfare and they will be found within the Church of Christ. Why are you in the Christian Church ? Not because some eloquent man set forth the claims of the Scriptures. These are not those who won you to the Christian Church, but because you knew a life that loved some one, that sought always another's welfare. Some man who stood in the community a commanding figure, the law of whose life was integrity and in whose lips was the law of kindness, who sought always the welfare of his brother, who scorned to take a dividend on watered stock, if he knew that it was coined out of the tears and blood of his brethren ; who scorned to speak a word harshly to the man who served him because he knew it would injure his spirit; such a man you knew always and consistently sought the welfare of his brother. It was enough for you. You said of him, " He follows Jesus of Nazareth and is obedient to His commands". Or it was some sainted woman whose life and ministry bore witness to the sacrifices with which her life was poured out for others. She won you into the Christian Church. This is Jesus' plan of campaign. Do you know how to take Providence for Christ? Love. Do I know how to take Hartford for Christ? This is His pledge. This is His way of evangelism. When the Christian Church fully lives out the new commandment, then all men shall know that the Church is the Church of Jesus, and all men shall be found within her walls in worship, and go forth from her portals in service, for He Himself hath promised it. * MYSTiaSM IN THE FOURTEENTH, RFTEENTH AND SIXTEENTH CHAPTERS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL. by rev. alfred willialvts anthony, d. d., Professor of New Testament Exegesis and Criticism in Cobb Divinity School, Lewiston, Maine. Mysticism is a term which has been used to cover, but not to hide, a multitude of views and vagaries. Quietism, Pietism and Gichtelianism, — strange expressions of religious feeling now well nigh forgotten — are arrayed under the term ; the Beghards, the Beguins, the Euchites, the Hesychasts, the Illuminati and the Omphalopsychites, who gazed in abstraction at their navels, have borne the designation. Good men, too, have been classified as mystics, men like Erigena, Eckhart, John Tauler, Thomas a Kempis and George Fox, the father of the Quakers, disciples of the " Inner Light." Emerson in writing upon representative men, took Swedenborg as the type of the mystic. The transcendentalists, even Carlyle and Emerson, have been called mystics. Many of our poets are mystics. What is mysticism? A dictionary definition gives it as "Any mode of thought, or phase of intellectual life, in which reliance is placed upon a spiritual illumination believed to transcend the ordinary powers of the understanding". The Encyclopedia Britannica declares, "Mysticism is a phase of thought, or rather peihaps of feeling, which from its very nature is hardly susceptible of exact definition. It appears in connection with the endeavor of the human mind to grasp the divine essence or the ultimate reality of things, and to enjoy the blessedness of actual communication with the Highest ". This writer in the Encyclopedia Britannica, Professor Andrew Seth of University College, Cardiff, Wales, is not wholly consistent with himself, although he consistently describes mysticism. In "one column he says, " The type of character to which mysticism is allied is passive, sensuous and feminine, rather than independent, masculine and ethically vigorous ". In another column he states, " When a religion begins to ossify into a sys- tem of formulas and observances, those who protest in the name of heart- religion are not unfrequently known by the name of mystics ", and again, " Mysticism instinctively recedes from formulas that have become stereo- typed and mechanical into the perennially fresh experience of the individual ". So mysticism may be stigmatized with epithets which are uncomplimentary, and at the same time be extolled as the reforming spirit which is independent, pervasive and virile. * * Delivered at the Fifth Conference, held at the Central P.aptist Church, February lo, 1904. 280 MYSTICISM IN THE FOURTH GOSPEL. 281 William Ralph Inge, of Oxford, England, who delivered the Bampton Lectures for 1899 on Christian Mysticism, uses expressions like the follow- ing in descriptive definitions of mysticism : it is " the dim consciousness of the beyond, which is part of our nature as human beings " ; "a higher instinct, perhaps an anticipation of the evolutionary process"; "an exten- sion of the frontier of consciousness " ; " the voice of (iod speaking to us ". I would define mysticism as the direct cognition of spiritual verities without the intervention of the senses on the one hand, or of logical pro- cesses of reasoning on the other. Can God reveal Himself directly to the human soul ? Can man enter into immediate communication with the Divine, unaided by external forms and symbols ? It is not my task to attempt now to answer this inquiry either on the side of psychology or of philosophy, but by simple exegetical methods to show the teaching of the Fourth Gospel in three of the five chapters which Canon Bernard considers contain the central teaching of Jesus Christ, ("The Central Teaching of Jesus Christ", by Canon T. D. Bernard, Mac- millan, 1892.) These chapters, the fourteenth, fifteenth and sixteenth, contain the Johannine account of the final discourse of our Lord to His apostles. The words are spoken in the upper room on the last Thursday evening, after the institution of the Lord's Supper, and the hour probably is tending well toward midnight. Those apostles still entertained the sensuous conception of the Mes- siah's kingdom. They thought of the Messiah as destined to rule a temporal kingdom, as Kings David and Solomon had ruled, though now with greater splendor and wider sway. Two of them,— the two who should have under- stood Him best, — had come with their mother making request for political honors, that one might sit on His right hand and the other on His left in His kingdom ; they had disputed and quarreled, even in this last meal, respecting place and preferment, and the Master, to teach them a lesson in humility and service, had girded His loins with a towel and had washed their feet. But yet they did not learn, for, two score days later, they ask, " Lord, dost Thou at this time restore the kingdom to Isreal ? " thinking still of a political reign, — this on the eve of the ascension. But now, in that upper room. He gives them sad forebodings; He speaks of treachery and betrayal: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, that one of you shall betray Me" (13:21); He declares His departure as at hand, " Little children, yet a little while am I with you ; ye shall seek Me, and as I said to the Jews, where I go ye cannot come, I say also to you now " (13:33); and He predicts the denial of Peter, His staunchest friend and their brave leader, " Verily, verily, I say to thee, the cock shall not crow until thou hast denied Me three times " (13 : 38). These three declarations, of betrayal, of departure, and of denial, dash their expectations of Messianic triumph in a physical kingdom,— dash them for the time being. If He is treacherously betrayed, if He leaves them 282 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. alone and they cannot follow, if Peter, foremost of them all, is soon to repudiate Him, what can they hope ? what can they expect ? Their hearts are heavy, — their hearts are troubled, filled with sorrow and consternation. It is against such a background that the mystic utterances of these chapters are spoken. " Do not let your heart be troubled ", said the Master, "ye are believ- ing upon God, upon Me also believe" (14:1). The Greek verbs for " believe " here are alike ; both may be in the indicative mode, both may be in the imperative mode, or one may be indicative and the other imperative ; so far as form is concerned there is nothing decisive ; but, since Jews believed devoutly in Jehovah, — and they were Jews, pre-eminent m relig- ious opportunities, — we doubtless are correct in taking the former as a statement of fact, and the latter as a corrective of their trouble and dismay : " Ye are believing upon God ; believe also upon Me ", for ye have as good reason to rest your confidence upon Me as upon God, My Father. Link the invisible with the visible ; link the visible with the invisible. In seeing Me you see God ; and when I go, you then may have as calm confidence in Me as you have in the invisible God ; God, the Father, and I are one. This is obviously His thought a little further on, when He says, "If ye had known Me, ye would have known My Father also, and from henceforth ye have known Him and have seen Him " (v. 7). And Philip's protest of dull understanding brought out the plainer answer, " Show us the Father and it sufficeth us " ; " So long a time have I been with you and hast thou not known Me, Philip "i He who hath seen Me hath seen the Father ; how sayest thou, show us the Father ? Dost thou not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in Me ? " (vs. 8-10). To recognize in the visible the invisible is essentially a mystic act. To see God in nature, in man, in Christ, is essentially mysticism ; it is the pushing of consciousness through the sensuous to the supersensuous ; it is more than experience, it is discernment ; it is more than philosophy, it is vision. The incarnation really requires mysticism. Though I am betrayed, yet am I unharmed ; though I go away, yet do I remain ; though you deny Me, yet am I unchanged ; — these are the assur- ances of the Christ. "I go to prepare a place for you * * * i will come again * * * " (vs. 2, 3). Great errors have been associated with this promise to return. Men have looked for a physical advent, and have set days and hours for the' fleshly Jesus to appear. But it is a mystic act ; the promise is for fulfilment in a spiritual sense. We have Pauline warrant for asserting that the things of the spirit must be spiritually discerned. He went in the flesh ; He returned in the spirit. It was expedient for the flesh (16:7) to disappear, that they might forget the mere flesh and receive the spirit. " I will ask the Father and He will give you another Comforter, that He may be with you forever * * * i will not leave you as orphans, I am coming to you " (vs. 16-18). That the Paraclete is spoken of as another Comforter plainly implies that Jesus, while in the flesh, was the first Com- MYSTICISM IN THE FOURTH GOSPEL. 283 forter and that the Paraclete who came was to continue the functions of Jesus, though invisible now, as spirit. "A little while ", — this caused perplexity because they did not under- stand it in the mystic sense, — " Yet a little while, and the world beholdeth Me no more ; but ye behold Me : because I live, ye shall live also. In that day ye shall know that I am in the Father, and ye in Me, and I in you" (vs. 19, 20) ; — a mystic union. " 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 " (v. 21); — a mystic union and mystic acts. Against this Judas (not Iscariot) expostulated as unintelligible, " Lord, what is come to pass, that Thou wilt manifest Thyself unto us and not unto the world ? " (v. 22.) In the reply of Jesus are three mystic acts, love, obedience, union : — " If any man 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 " (v. 23). Love is the projection of self toward another being; obedience is the surrender of self to another being; and through the outgoing to, and the incoming of, another being a mystic union results. To the apostles, specific mystic assurances were given. The Master went in order to prepare abodes for them. We have read the text, " In My Father's house are many mansions" (14: 2). The margin of the American R. V. gives "abiding places" for mansions. I think the clause well rendered by the paraphrase, "where My Father lives, there are many abodes for you." Usually we have supposed this referred to heaven and glorious habitations therein. But this word for mansions {monai) is the same word rendered " abode" in v. 23 of the same chapter: "We will come and make our abode with Him ". It is used only these two times in the New Testa- ment. Its root is the same as the root of the verb used so many times in the 15th chapter, "abide" {meno), "except the branch abide in the vine; abide in Me ", etc. Where My Father is, there are abiding places for you. This is not the promise of a far distant future glory but of present fellow- ship and safety for the immediate future and for all the hereafter. While I go in the flesh, yet I but the better prepare for your spiritual safety in union with the divine. To the apostles greater works are promised (14: 12) because of this mystic union; to them the inseparable divine presence is assured; God comes and abides; the Comforter will abide; they may abide in Christ, drawing sustenance and strength from Him as a branch depends upon its vine. The ^verb to abide occurs ten times in the first ten verses of the fifteenth chapter. Though He goes away, yet union with Him is still possi- ble. That is the emphasis of these chapters. This teaching has a bearing on the doctrine of the trinity set forth and implied in these chapters. The Holy Spirit seems to be the name of God in this mystic relation. God is in Jesus; note such passages as these: "Believe in God, believe also in Me" (14: i); "he that hath seen Me hath seen the Father" (14: 9); "the Father, who abideth in Me, He doeth the 284 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. works" (14: 10); "believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me " (14 : 1 1). The Father and the Son are with the disciples. See passages like these: "In that day (this little while) ye shall know that I am in My Father and ye are in Me and I in you" (14: 20); "if any one love Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him (14: 23). The Holy Spirit is with the disciples; Jesus said, "I will send Him" (15: 26), and the Father would send Him (14 : 26) ; He will lead into all truth (16 : 13) ; He will convict the world of sin, of righteousness and of judgment (16: 8-1 1). The Father, the Son and the Spirit abide in union with the disciples. Let us recapitulate the thought of the Master which undergird these chapters : 1. The betrayal is at hand. The divine can be delayed, but not thwarted, because the divine does not depend upon the flesh. 2. Peter may deny, yet this is but an episode, not the conclusion. 3. The Master will leave them, — yes, in the flesh; but even more fully does He remain with them in the spirit. It was expedient for Him to go, in order that they might the more clearly see Him, not as king, nor priest, nor prophet, not as the Messiah long expected, but as God, immortal, eternal, more than earth can contain, more than flesh can reveal or the senses per- ceive. There was no separation ; after the garden, and after the trial, after Calvary there was the opportunity for the closer, the real union with Him. Such appears to be the main import of these three chapters. Union in a spiritual sense is the key word. We may well inquire now, whether this is the mysticism of Jesus or of John. Has the subjective element of this Fourth Gospel so thrust itself forward in these chapters as to color completely the phrasing and the con- ception and consequently distort the teaching of Jesus? Is this the mind of Jesus which we here find? or is it the thought of the author? Has the writer stepped into the Teacher's place ? Does he lay words on the Master's lips? Three simple answers may be given : 1. The description of Thomas and Philip in these chapters accords with all other descriptions given of them ; and it is but fair to assume that if fidelity and consistency exist in the lesser details they exist also in the main features of the narrative. The Thomas who here says, " how can we know the way ? " is as slow of discernment as the Thomas, who, in the synoptic narrative, must needs put his finger in the nail-prints and thrust his hand into the wounded side. The Philip who here exclaims, " show us the Father and it sufificeth us ", is the man of practical affairs, who sees material things, the man unto whom certain Greeks, seeking Jesus, found readiest access, and the man who, off- hand, could quickly compute the amount of bread and the cost for feeding five thousand people. 2. Such mysticism as we find here is present also in substance in the Synoptic Gospels. The Sermon on the Mount, though largely practical, yet MYSTICISM IN THE FOURTH GOSPEL. 285 is permeated with mystical elements. The beatitudes have such elements as this: "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God". The great judgment, recorded by Matthew, recognizes a mystical service, which, while not at the time apprehended, is nevertheless real: "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these. My brethren, ye have done it unto Me ". " Lo, I am with you all the days, even unto the end of the world", is the promise of the Great Commission, — the assurance of a mystic union, repeated in the words, "where two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in their midst". In the synoptic narrative Jesus repeatedly exhorts him that hath an ear to hear, to hear, — that is, to hear more than is said in mere phrase, to under- stand the principle and to enter into the spiritual sense. 3. In all the Gospels, the immediate presence of God is the special message of Jesus. He is our Father; He cares for us; He knows even the hairs of our heads; not a sparrow falls to the ground without His notice, and His solicitude for us is even greater and more constant. Really, the religion of Jesus Christ, like every religion which is more than mere casuistry or ethics, has mystical aspects and elements. It points to the unseen as real; insists upon a spiritual presence, unknown through the senses, unperceived by reason alone. A mysticism, such as we find in these three chapters, is the Christian mysticism especially suited to the needs of our day. A few considerations will make this apparent : This is pre-eminently a commercial age, when materialism, not as a phil- osophy— that is past — but as a method of life, is dominant. To offset it, stress must be laid upon the unseen as the most real and the most valuable. Transitions in progress today in church and theolog>' tend toward and demand a rational mysticism. The doctrine of inspiration in its dynamic form now becoming prevalent, thinks not of impart ation from external sources so much of an internal illumination which opens inward vision. According to the modern view, now widely prevailing, the Bible is regarded as a record of what man has discovered respecting God, — a record of how God has touched man and of man's comprehension of that contact, — mystic relations more or less perfect of which man has been in varying degrees conscious. The distinction between things sacred and things secular tends to vanish because of a mysticism extending amongst men. To the Jew, who saw little more than things of sense, one place (the temple), one day (the Sabbath) and one portion of possessions (a tithe) were holy. Now we are recognizing all places, all times and all possessions as essentially holy, because of the invisible, mystically recognized. Men are beginning to learn that God is everlasting and that fellowship with Him and service unto Him should be continuous. Indeed we are beginning fairly to accept the doctrine of the immanence of God: " He is not far from every one of us ; in Him we live, move and have our being"; He occupies all space, is ever- present, and is excluded not even from His finite creatures. 286 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. Perhaps some of these tendencies might lead one legitimately, to philo- sophical monism ; but this is certain : a recognition of the validity of mysti- cism, if we keep ourselves back from reliance upon mere feeling and the weird imaginings of disordered brains, may prompt us to push the frontier of consciousness further out into the infinite, to keep the heart holy in order that we may discover therein the image of its divine maker, to see in the visible the invisible, and in the vision find grounds for confidence and hope, even when misfortune and disaster impend or overwhelm us. If we are in fellowship with the divine, we may breathe the pure atmosphere of heaven, even while still on the earth. "As, in life's best hours, we hear By the spirit's finer ear His low voice within us, thus The All-Father heareth us; And His holy ear we pain With our noisy words and vain. Not for Him our violence Storming at the gates of sense, His the primal language, His The eternal silences". — Whittier, " The Prayer of Agassiz". • JESUS THE REVELATION OF THE FATHER. (St. John 14 :6-i i.) hv «1-:v. hknry c. s;hki,i>on, s^. t. i)., Professor ok Systematic Theulouv in Boston University vSciio ities, affections and experiences which belong to the proper human subject. He declares explicitly that He came in the flesh, and denounces the oppo- site opinion as the warped and wicked contention of antichrist. " The Word became flesh and dwelt among us " (i : 14). " Every spirit that con- fesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God, and every spirit which confesseth not Jesus is not of God " (i John 4 : 2, 3). " Many deceiv- ers are gone forth into the world, even they that confess not that Jesus Christ Cometh in the flesh. This is the deceiver and the antichrist " (2 John 7). Affirmations of this order, it is to be granted, are not distinct assertions of the complete manhood of Jesus, but they point in that direc- tion. For, in the dialect of the writer, " flesh " is capable of a larger refer- ence than to the mere body. In at least one instance it is used where the term ttiefi might have been employed (17 : 2). There is a suggestion, there- fore, that in John's thought the incarnation, or the coming in the flesh, may have been understood to imply the assumption of manhood in its entirety. And this suggestion is confirmed by the application to Jesus of the designa- tion " Son of Man" (5 : 27 ; 6:27, 62). Whatever may be the primary or-- foremost association of this term, it would not naturally have been applied to a personality that was not conceived to be genuinely implicated in the race or truly participant of human nature. That the humanity in Jesus was perfectly pure and guiltless was evi- dently the staunch conviction of John. He represents Him as claiming to be entirely void of unrighteousness and as doing always the things pleasing /ESUS THE REVELATION OE THE EATHEK. 289 to the Father (7 : 18 ; 8 : 29). Moreover, he pens the unqualified declaration : "Ye know that He was manifested to take away sins; and in Him is no sin " (i John, 3: 5). With John, as with the other New Testament writers, the complete sinlessness of Jesus was the axiom prefixed to the whole doctrine of salvation. Now an exceptional humanity like this is fitted to be in an exceptional sense a mirror of the divine. It reflects the higher realities as the calm, clear water takes the image of the sky. In the unsullied soul of Jesus, there was opportunity for divine thought, will, purpose and disposition to be pictured in authentic colors. And the demand for this pure medium is not to be regarded as nullified by any transcendent factor in the incarnate Lord. As the divine thought came to expression from the lips of a prophet only through the medium of his psychical nature and activity, so in Christ, any content from the timeless sphere of divine thought and life may be supposed to have gained the forms of human conception and speech only by being mediated through His human soul. The purity of this finite medium must therefore be .counted, as well on the catholic as on the humanitarian con- ception of His person, a prime condition of an authentic revelation of the divine. The holiness of the man Jesus must be reckoned a condition of the perfect manifestation of the Father in and through Him. John may not have directly enforced this point of view ; but he provides for it in so far as he postulates the humanity of Jesus, since he profoundly emphasizes the intrinsic connection between spiritual enlightenment and holy character. No writer has ever surpassed him in the intense expression of the conviction that the seeing faculty is with love and righteousness, while darkness is the inevitable legacy of hatred and sin. Whatever consideration may have been given to the holy humanity of Jesus as a medium of divine revelation by the author of the Fourth Gospel and the related Epistles, that consideration by no means exhausted his con- templation of the qualifications of Jesus to make known the Father. He regarded his Lord as vastly transcending in nature and essential relations the common human scale, and estimated his competency to reveal the Father in the light of this transcendence. In a variety of ways he affords unmistakeable intimation that this was his point of view. In the first place this Johannine standpoint is strongly asserted in the description of Christ as the Logos, or Word. As in Greek usage this term connotes both thought and its manifestation, so in the description which goes with it in the prologue to the Fourth Gospel we have this double refer- ence. On the one hand the Word, much after the pattern of Philo's con- ception, is the archetypal idea, in which the world is potentially existent, the rational antecedent of all things, divine in relation and in nature. He was in the beginning, that is, as far back as thought can go in its effort to interpret the world. He was with God, that is, in living union with Him. He was God, that is, the adequate image and counterpart of the eternal Father. On the other hand, the Word is the medium of manifestation. He bridges over the interval between the invisible Father and the visible system' 290 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. of things. "Without Him was not anything made that hath been made". Within the world thus dependent on His agency, He has been, and is con- tinually a source of illumination. He is " the true light, even the light which lighteth every man coming into the world ". That in this lofty characterization of the Word, John was giving expression more or less directly to his conviction of the competency of the historical Jesus to reveal the Father cannot fairly be questioned. In his view, the Word became flesh. The Word was in the historical Jesus. And He was there as a transcendent factor in the historical personality, not as something eclipsed, quiescent, robbed of characteristic powers, and lost to self. Who can read the discourses which John attributes to the Master, even in the early part of his Gospel, and not discover there, in the order of self-consciousness ascribed to Jesus, a reflex of the transcendent rank and position of the Word who was with God in the beginning.^ His designation of Himself in the third chapter as the only begotten Son ; His description of Himself in the fourth chapter as able to give the living water springing up into everlasting life ; His expression of a sense of unlimited copartner- ship with the Father in the fifth chapter — all this, with much besides, is clearly indicative that Jesus, at least in the era of His public ministry, was ■credited in Johannine thought with a knowledge and sense of prerogative, •correspondent with the exalted rank and relation of the Word. In the •character of the Word He was accounted to have been with the Father in the beginning, to have come forth from Him, and, therefore, to have been pre-eminently qualified to reveal Him. The terms used in the prologue of the Gospel are most reasonably taken as amounting to an ascription of personality to the Word. The conclusion therefore follows that, in so far as the indwelling Word was viewed as con- stitutive of Christ, personal pre-existence was predicated of Him. It is to be noticed, too, that evidence of faith in Christ's personal pre-existence is not confined to the prologue. John the Baptist is represented as saying of the Christ, "He was before me". Of Himself, Christ is said to have declared: "No man hath ascended into heaven but He that descended out of heaven, even the Son of Man which is in heaven ". " He that cometh from above is above all * * * what He hath seen and heard, of that He beareth witness ". "The bread of God is He that cometh down out of heaven, and giveth life unto the world ". " Not that any man hath seen the Father save He which is from God. He hath seen the Father ". " What then if ye shall see the Son of Man ascending where He was before ". " Before Abraham was, I am ". "Glorify Me with Thine own self, with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was" (i : 30; 3: 13, 31, 32; 6:33,46,62; 8:58; 17:5). Now the collective force of these texts is decisive, and one and another of them taken separately may well work despair in the critic who is minded to impute a merely ideal pre-existence to the Johannine Christ. For instance, how on the supposition of nothing but ideal pre-existence can Christ be said to have dealt fairly with the Jews in making such an affirmation as is recorded in 8:58? His Jewish questioners JESUS THE REVELATION OF THE FATHER. 291 understood a preceding statement to imply logically that He was contempo- rary with Abraham. Instead of correcting their inference, He approved it, or rather transcended it by explicitly affirming an antiquity superior to that of Abraham. Who can imagine that the evangelist designed to represent Him in this saying as merely throwing dust in the eyes of His opponents by using terms in a sense foreign to the occasion.-' Again, it is quite over- taxing to expel the thought of real pre-existence from the language of 17:5. It has been alleged, indeed, that, inasmuch as Christ asks for glorification as a reward for the faithful fulfilment of His mission, it could not have been His by right of original position. But this reasoning rests upon an arbitrary premise. Nothing in the context enforces the conclusion that Christ asks for glorification simply and solely as a reward for fidelity. In His perfect filial submission, He recognized that the times and the seasons were in the Father's hand. It seemed to Him that His work was approaching a con- summation, so that soon the state of humiliation might properly give place to the state of exaltation. Very naturally, therefore. He gave expression to the aspiration by which His spirit was upborne. So far from standing in the way of His confident request, the perfection of His title to heavenly glory gave all the freer scope to His communion with the Father respecting His investment with that glory. Once more it has been urged, that the glory to which Christ looked may be compared to the treasure reserved in heaven for believers, or to the kingdom prepared for the faithful from the foundation of the world ; and that consequently it is only a conceptual pre- existence with which we are here confronted. But this way of arguing overlooks the broad difference between the things brought into comparison. It is one thing to conceive of a treasure, a sphere of glory, a heavenly king- dom, as standing ready for foreordained subjects. It is another thing to say of a given subject that 'Repossessed or enjoyed that glory or that kingdom before the world was. A statement of the latter order is never made in the New Testament respecting God's redeemed children. Christ's reference to a glory, which He had with the Father before the world was, stands apart from and in antithesis to any scriptural language ever applied to the simple human heir to a prepared estate. (Compare the author's System of Christian Doctrine, pp. 613-615). The conviction was evidently sun-clear in the mind of the evangelist that the personal existence of Christ preceded His earthly life. No less certain is it that He thought of this exalted and prior existence as a source of authentic knowledge about things heavenly and divine. This point has already been brought out in the interpretation of the Johannine thought of the incarnation of the Word. A further enforcement might be drawn from the third chapter of the Gospel. For, here Christ is placed in contrast with every other messenger among men. He is the one who alone has descended out of heaven, so that when He speaks of heavenly things He speaks of that which He has seen and heard. Because He had ever had His home in the bosom of the Father He was qualified to declare Him. A second transcendent qualification of Christ to reveal the Father, and 292 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. one closely related to the foregoing, appears in the Johannine thought of His unique sonship and co-partnership with the Father. The conviction that in Christ an extraordinary sonship came to manifestation may be observed in John's choice of terms. He reserves the designation *' Son of God" i^Uios toil 7%\ Back of advent, doing, suffering, propitiation, everything. 294 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. was the free, unbought love of the Father. " God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish but have everlasting life "(3:16). " Herein was the love of God manifested in us, that God hath sent His only-begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins " (i John 4: 9, 10). Thus the sacrifice of the Son was inaugurated in the sacrifice of the Father. Indeed, Bushnell kept fully within the warrant of Johannine teaching when He spoke of the cross as being in God's heart from eternity. According to most emphatic declarations of the evangelist, the love of the Father was but given visible expression in all that the Son did and suffered for men. Not merely in its general tenor and import does the life-story of Jesus serve to reveal the Father, but also various single features of that story may be regarded as mirroring the feeling and attitude of the heavenly Father toward men. When we note the tenderness with which Jesus ministered to the suffering and distressed, we have an object lesson on the compassion of the heavenly Father, and are encouraged to believe, in spite of the hard appearance of nature and history, that His tender mercies are over all the works of His hands. When we observe the patience which Jesus exercised toward disciples who were short-sighted and slow of heart, we have disclosed to us the forbearance of the heavenly Father toward His blundering and imperfect children. When we read the parable of the good shepherd, and consider the wealth of affectionate solicitude and care for the sheep which it portrays, we know that all the Psalmist said about the Lord as a shepherd is gloriously true for every soul that has a purpose to follow His leading. When we come upon the record that Jesus having loved His own which were in the world loved them unto the end, or hear His own declaration that no one shall ever snatch His sheep out of His hand, we have pictured to us the tenacity of that love with which the heavenly Father cleaves to those who have ever entered into filial relations with Himself. In short, in all the typical scenes and events of the ministry of Jesus, we may note the application of His own comprehensive words: "He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father." The aspiring mystic is inclined to think of the direct flight of the soul to God as his high privilege, and to rate any intermediate agency as a superfluity. At times he is even tempted to give slight recognition to his dependence upon the Christ. But in the continual use of this method he is likely to discover that his impression of the divine is becoming vague, and his sense of fellowship with the divine is waning in vitality. It answers to a deep need of the human heart to have the divine set forth through a con- crete historic medium. So the author of the Fourth Gospel felt, and he considered that the need had been perfectly met in his Lord and Master. The revelation of God in Jesus Christ flooded his soul as with the radiance of a sweet and holy morning. May the responsive heart be in us, that the same revelation may bring to us also a full measure of illumination and rejoicing. i •THE PRESENCE OF THE FATHER, SON AND SPIRIT THROUGH OBEDIENCE TO THE COMMANDS OF CHRIST. (St. John 14 : 21-26.) by rkv. robert a. a«h"worth. Pastor of The First Baptist Church, Meriden, Conn. Luther used to call the Gospel of John " the child's Go.spel ", because of its simplicity. It is as simple as are all the great things of earth and heaven, and it is also as profound. It is as lucid and translucent as the ocean, and as fathomless. It is as bottomless as the Utgard horn, which Thor once tried to drain, for its sources are hidden in the depths of divine love. We shall never exhaust the meaning of this (iospel of heaven. It is a text-book for time and for eternity. In the three verses which we are to consider together, though they are not cast in the form of the syllogism, there is a logical progression of thought. The third verse is an epitome of the whole : "If a man love Me, he will keep My words; and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him, and make Our abode with him". Three key words serve to unlock its meaning: obedience, love, manifestation. First, obedience to Christ's commands proves man's love for Him ; second, such obedience and love is rewarded by the love of the Father and the Son ; third, this mutual love of God and man furnishes the conditions of the revelation of the Father ai)d the Son in the loyal soul through the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit. I. First, then, obedience to Christ's commands proves man's love for Him. Obedience is at once the outgrowth and the test of love to Christ. " If a man love Me he will keep My words ". Love to Christ must always, if it be worthy of the name, issue in obedience. It divines the wishes of the Master and springs to fulfil them. It needs no compulsion nor any code of rules : it serves the spirit, not the letter. Love for Christ, you see, is a very practical thing indeed. It is not a mere emotion in which " to sit and sing ourselves away to realms of ever- lasting bliss". It is not the luxurious and enervating atmosphere of which the sentimentalist and the poet prate, though it might well form the theme of the poet's song. It " bids, not sit nor stand, but go ! " It is obedience to the demands of a strenuous life of sacrifice. It places Christ above every worldly good, above father or mother, brother or sister. The life it ♦Delivered at the Sixth Conference, held at the Trinity Union Methodist Episcopal Church, March 9, 1904. 295 296 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. demands is no easy, rose-strown path, warmed by a mawkish sentimen- tality. It may lead a man to darkest Africa or China. It may mean the dengue fever, or a hostile Boxer mob and a cruel death in a lonely land. Love is not a notion of the brain, but a set of the will. It lives in deeds, not words; life service, not lip service. It says, "I'll go where you want me to go, I'll do what you want me to do, I'll be what you want me to be ", It is the foundation of all morality, the inspiration of all self- sacrifice. And obedience is not only the logical consequence and fruit of love, it is also love's supreme test. " He that hath My commandments and keep- eth them, he it is (and no other) that loveth Me ". We cannot conceive a fairer test than this. There are many false and sentimental forms of affec- tion in the world, masquerading under that name, from which these words of Jesus strip the disguise. There is a moral and intellectual admiration of Jesus which is not love because it will not obey ; it resides in the head, and never lays hold of the springs of action ; it doffs the cap and bows the head, but does not do the will. Love is obedience. All other so-called love is spurious. To love is to obey ; to obey is to love. " Obedience ! 'Tis the great tap root, which still Knit round the rock of duty, is not stirred Though storm and tempest work their utmost will I " . 2. Such obedient love is rewarded by the love of the Father and the Son. This form of devotion, a love which serves, attracts as the earth the lightning, the love of God. Obedience is love's law of gravitation. In a sense, God loves all men : " God so loved the world ", we read — the world alienated by wicked works, disloyal. In this one-half God's heart, its giv- ing impulse, is satisfied. This is the love of benevolence, which loves while it cannot approve. But God's is a moral affection, and He loves in a special sense those whose regard for Him is proved by obedience to the commands of His Son. " How can two walk together except they be agreed ? " Love which is not mutual is incomplete. " He that loveth Me shall be loved of My Father". God's love for the Son includes all who are loyal to Him. This is the love of complacence, which also approves its object. It differs from that of benevolence, which God cherishes toward all men, as one's pity for a guilty and unresponsive neighbor differs from the love of a father for a worthy son who returns his affection. In it the whole heart of God finds satisfaction, the craving as well as the giving impulse. He who obeys Christ, then, loves Him ; he who loves Christ shall be loved of God. The third step in this progression is a very blessed one — "And I ", says Jesus, " will love him ". A new and more tender affection springs up m the heart of Jesus as He sees the eye of the Father resting upon His disciple. The loyal soul is now enfolded in love as in an atmos- phere ; he is bathed in it as in a sea. Three arcs make up the perfect circle : man's arc of love is the shorter, yet it reaches a part of the way ; PRESENCE OF THE FATHER, SON AND SPIRIT. 297 Christ's love and God's love are the larger arcs which overlap each other and the love of man, and wrap him round and round in a perfect sphere. 3. The two thoughts which we have traversed thus far are : i. Obe- dience— of man to Christ. 2. Love — of the Father and the Son for the obedient soul. By these two steps on the ladder of love we have reached the third stage in the thought of the text — "Manifestation". "He that obeys Me loves Me, and he that lovingly obeys Me shall be loved by My Father and Myself, and I will manifest Myself to him ". Let us consider, first, the condition on which this manifestation of the Son is promised, and, second, the form which it takes. The condition of the revelation is love in the recipient soul, Jesus will not reveal Himself to all men. "Judas (not Iscariot) saith unto Him, Lord, what is come to pass that Thou wilt manifest Thyself unto us, and not unto the world ? " Judas was not of that group of the disciples who understood most keenly the mind of their Master. Only lately Jesus had shown Himself openly to the people in His triumphal entrance into the holy city. Judas thought that something must have happened that Jesus should now confine His manifestation to a chosen few. Jesus does not answer Judas directly, but proceeds as though He had not heard the question. Yet He does in effect answer him by reaffirming the promise and emphasiz- ing again the condition on which the revelation of Himself may be received. "Jesus answered and said unto him. If a man love Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him ". Jesus will reveal Himself only to those who love and obey Him. He can reveal Himself only to such, for without love in the heart no man can receive the revelation of God. The intellect alone can never know God. The brain is agnostic. The question of Job, " Canst thou by searching find out God ? " has never been answered with satisfaction to the intellect. The astronomer sweeps the heaven with his telescope and declares that he cannot find God there. The geologist with his hammer breaks up the rocks and delves into the earth, but does not discover the Creator. The anatomist with his scalpel divides the tissues of the body, and traces nerve, and vein and artery to its source, but the God in man eludes him. The psychologist ponders the processes of mind and formulates the rules of its action, but fails to find the guiding hand. But the intellect was never meant to be the only organ of discovery. Man was made to soar toward truth on the two pinions of intellect and heart. When he beats the air with either wing alone he flutters, but he cannot fly. A certain fondness for a matter will do much to aid us to pierce to the central secret of it. Without the lubricant of love the edge of mind grows dull. A little warm sunshine will sometimes bore farther than an augur, no matter how much brute force there may be behind it. All of which are but different-ways of saying that the heart will often guide us to truth which the head would never discover. The artist detects beauiies in nature, delicacies of color and form to w hich we are blind, because he is 298 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. endowed with the insight of love. The musician hears harmonies to which we are deaf, because the whole man vibrates in unison with them. " Earth's crammed with heaven, And every common bush afire with God, But only he who sees takes off his shoes ". " Ever the words of the gods resound; But the porches of man's ear Seldom in this low life's round, Are unsealed that he may hear". It is love that enlightens the eyes and unseals the ears. Love is the eye of the soul. They tell us, love is blind ! No ! there is nothing else in the universe so clear sighted ! We cannot know man until we have learned to love him. We do not know our acquaintances ; only our friends, and these in proportion to our affection for them. In the better world, if men should be stripped of the bodies by which we have hitherto recognized them, we shall know only those with whose souls we have become intimate here. And we cannot know souls except as we love them. Without love is no sympathy, there- fore no knowledge. It is the loving heart alone, then, that can receive the manifestations of God in Christ. There must have been, I think, in the mind of John, some reminiscence of the thought of our text when he declared in his Epis- tle, " Everyone that loveth, knoweth God ". We must come toward Him from this angle before we can understand Him. If the brain is agnostic, the heart is theistic. Christ cannot reveal Himself to a loveless world simply because it lacks the organ of apprehension. Affection is the only soil in which knowledge of God grows to its rarest heights. Paul, the philosopher, introduces us to God, tells us many things about Him ; John, the beloved disciple, puts into our hand the key which unlocks the chamber in which He dwells and ushers us into His presence, and the name of that key is love. If we would, then, have this manifestation of Jesus in our lives, we must love Him and obey Him. Every act of loving obedience will make the vision clearer. This is the indispensible condition of knowledge of God, a love which reverently keeps His word. We pass to the form which this promised manifestation will take : " We will come unto Him and make Our abode with Him ". Two points attract our attention. First, the manifestation of Christ is made from within the soul, not from without. This inwardness of the revelation is what troubled Judas. "What has come to pass", he asks, " that Thou, as Messiah, will not show Thyself openly as we have expected, so that the Gentiles may come to Thy light, and kings to the brightness of Thy rising? " It is, however, a spiritual presence of which Jesus is speak- ing. It is no sudden or magical revelation, but one that comes by the slow process of living and loving. It is not accompanied by the signs of earthly PRESENCE OE THE EA THER, SON AND SJ '/R/7\ 299 power or by the trappings of earthly state. Men cannot say of it, "Lo, here ! " or " Lo, there ! " It is a revelation within the soul. Second, the manifestation is permanent, not transient : " We will come unto Him and make Our abode with Him". Jesus has been telling His disciples that He must soon leave them, but He now answers them that His absence is not to be for long. In exchange for the physical presence of the Master, with its limitations of place and time, they are to have the spiritual presence, which is free from these limitations. The loving heart is to become the dwelling-place of the Father and Son. We associate, and rightly, this passage with the promise, which came earlier in the chapter, of the gift of the Holy Spirit. In the verse immedi- ately preceding the text, Jesus has said, " In that day ye shall know that I am in My Father and ye in Me and I in you". The expression "in that day " is held by most to indicate a precise moment rather than a period, and is referred to Pentecost. We are to recognize, then, in the coming of the Holy Spirit, the advent of the Father and Son to make their abode in the human heart. The thought most grateful to us is, that in the presence of the Spirit we may recognize the presence of Jesus. "The Lord is the Spirit " (2 Cor. 3:17). This Jesus whom we have learned to love comes in the Spirit to dwell with us. This blessed promise of the Saviour irradiates life with a new hope. Jesus is not merely a good man who has passed away, leaving only an influ- ence behind Him. Our God is not the unknowable God of the agnostic, of whom we can learn no more than of the further side of the moon. God and Christ dwell in the obedient soul. " Nearer is He than breathing, Closer than hands or feet ". Having seen the vision, man is not to be left to fight the battle with sin alone. There is to be an abiding presence within the soul to inspire, and guard, and guide. In ancient Greece, so runs the legend, a prize was oftered for the best statue of a certain god. Faith in the gods was almost gone, but in a coun- try village, near a marble quarry, lived a youth who still believed in them and loved them. He aspired to win the prize for himself. Choosing a rough block of marble, he set to work with all his skill. But, though he had in his soul the highest ideal of the majesty and beauty of the god whom he would portray, his clumsy fingers made little progress. At last the statues were gathered to be judged, and among them the rude, uncouth attempt of the boy. The critics ridiculed the inartistic figure, and the boy hung his head in shame. But the god in whom the youth believed had pity on him, and entered into the pathetic failure. Then the head was proudly raised, the harsh lines fell away into perfect symmetry and grace, and the statue took on the vigor and harmony of life. So Christ enters the soul that loves Him and redeems its failures, working out within it, in wondrous 300 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. beauty, the ideal of which it despairs. So the obedient soul triumphs through the indwelling Christ. The promise of Jesus fills life also with a new purpose. How well worth striving for is the fulfilment of the promise of the Saviour's presence. How vain and empty in comparison the prospect which the world holds out to its votaries, of wealth, or fame, or ease. To gain Christ and be found in Him, to have His abiding presence in our hearts, is the noblest aspiration of the soul that loves Him. It makes forever impossible also any lower aim. If Christ will dwell in us, the house must be swept and garnished, and other guests, whom He cannot know, must be expelled. How can selfishness, or greed, or any baseness find a home with us ? We can never be satisfied now with anything less than the highest. A Roman sculptor once began a statue of the Christ. After weary months of toil he brought a friend into his studio and unveiled the statue with the question, " Who is this ? " The friend replied, " That is surely the figure of some very great and good man ". Profoundly disappointed, the artist set to work again, and after other months of labor, bringing into the room a little child, he again asked the question. The child clasped her hands and said, " Suffer the little children to come unto me ". Then the sculptor knew that he had succeeded. A little later came an order from the emperor that he should make a statue of Venus for the palace. But the sculptor proudly refused, sending back the message, " I have conceived a statue of the Christ ! I can no longer carve statues to Venus ! " So the vision once seen, the presence once felt, we can no longer live upon the lower plane of the past. We are driven forward to ever new heights of achievement and experience. It raises man, finally, to a new dignity. To be capable of such fellow- ship with God as Jesus here suggests, predicates something of man that is very wonderful indeed. What less does it mean than the essential unity of the nature of God and Christ and man.^ It draws man out of time and sets him in eternity. It finds him on the earth and leaves him in heaven. It is the last and greatest word that can be said of man, and sets him off from the rest of created things in exalted isolation. It arouses every ambition of the soul, sanctifies it and satisfies' it. This is our heritage from God, heirs, not only of what God has to give, but heirs of God Himself. "What is man that thou art mindful of him, or the son of man that thou visitest him ? " The grateful soul exclaims, "Thou hast made him but little lower than God, and hast crowned him with glory and honor! " "Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift ! " "The very God! think Abib; dost thou think? So, the All-Great were the All- Loving too — So, through the thunder comes a human voice Saying, ' O heart I made, a heart beats here! Face, My hands fashioned, see it in Myself! Thou hast no power, nor mayst conceive of Mine, But love I gave thee, with Myself to love, And thou must love Me who have died for thee ! " • FRIENDSHIP WITH JESUS THROUGH OBEDIENCE TO HIS COMMANDS. ( St. John 15:14, 15.) HY RKV. JOHN T>. PICIvLKS, l^H. n.. Pastor of St. John's Methooist Episcopal Church, Boston, Mass. I have been assigned the exposition of John 15:14, "Ye are My friends if ye do the things which I command you ". The topic as formulated is " Friendship with Jesus through Obedience to His Commands ". I regret that I have not had the privilege and the benefit of all the Conferences dealing with the Gospel of John, which Dr. Sears so aptly termed the " Heart of Christ ". And especially would I have enjoyed Drs. Sheldon and Mackay, as in your last Conference they treated specifically of matters closely and even vitally related to the topic assigned me. All the utterances of Jesus are of importance, but especially are those accentuated which fell from His lips as He moved tenderly yet resolutely forward into the deepening shadows of Gethsemane and Calvary. They were the farewell words, the dying legacy, of One who in a few short hours would breathe out His life amid the awful agonies and bitter humiUations of the Cross. We would come then into this chamber of the dying with bated breath and utmost reverence, and listen with deepest attentiveness to the words which hold in themselves an immortality of significance. Among them are the words immediately before us, " Ye are My friends if ye do whatsoever I command you ". Four things emerge out of my study of this statement. I St. The Absolutism of Jesus, involving His possession of Deity. No mere man would dare assert himself in this form. For any com- pelled obedience, as between man and man, leads not to friendship, but to serfdom and to slavery. It is but the prelude to shackles and to stripes and to hatred. But as we throw our thought over the larger area of Christ's teaching throughout His whole ministry, we find this indirect yet vital assumption fully and positively maintained in the discourses of our Lord. In His masterly " Sermon on the Mount", which title Prof. Gibson dis- claims as being altogether too inadequate and for which he would substitute Matthew's own term, " The Gospel of the Kingdom ", as " the grand char- ter of the commonwealth of heaven ", Jesus directly makes the issue as pertaining to authority between Himself and others, when He says again and again, " Ye have heard that it hath been said by them of old time, * * * but / say unto you" (Matt. 5:21, 22, 27, 28, 33, 34, etc.). In the tenth chapter of this Gospel, He declares, "All that ever came before Me are thieves Delivered at the Eighth Conference, held at .All .Saints Memorial Church, .May ii, 1904. 301 302 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. and robbers ; /am the door " (John lo : 8,9). One day, when great multitudes were following Him, He startled them and has challenged every generation since, by the sweeping words, " If any man come to Me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife and children, and brethren and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple " (Luke 14:26). These are but samples of many direct and of more indirect, but none the less forceful claims which Jesus makes upon men for their recognition of the supreme place which He must hold in their affections and service growing out of the divine nature which inheres in Him, and to which His life, His teachings and His achievements give witness. To an ordinary human being possessing only the attributes and powers of our common humanity, yet making such a tremendous claim as this upon his fellow mortals, the answer would be disdain and contempt, and if per- sisted in, would mean either an asylum for the insane or the walls of a prison. But when made by this one unique world-shadowing character, whose influence augments with the centuries, who is being recognized by increasing millions as " very God of very God ", as the " eternal Son of the Father ", as " God over all, blessed forevermore ", then this claim, abso- lute as it is, and all inclusive as it is, in its nature and in its duration, is recognized as being indeed most reasonable, and appeals in the strongest manner to the thoughts and affections of men. Only as Christ possesses all that is involved in Thomas' confession, " My Lord and My God", has he any right to say or any power to enforce, " Ye are My friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you ". Another look at my topic, " Friendship with Christ through Obedience to His Commands" seems to suggest — 2nd. A reversion of the natural order. Obedience is a product, not a cause. If we have read our New Testa- ment aright we have held that Love is the mother of obedience and at once 'a kindred passion to that we are interpreting springs to the surface, " If ye love Me, ye will keep my commandments" (John 14:15, R. V.), and another of similar import, " If a man love Me, he will keep my words " (14 : 23) ; and Paul in his famous and unequalled panegyric of Love in the thirteenth chapter of i Corinthians, makes it the inner and potential seed out of which everything springs and apart from which everything is valueless and fruit- less. And yet obedience as productive of love finds weighty indorsement not only from the passage before us, but from others. Do we not find in the discussions and differences between Paul and James as regards faith and works, a kindred distinction to this between love and obedience .'' James insists that works are productive of and necessary to the salvation of men, while Paul insists that faith, and faith alone, is the basis of man's ac- ceptance with God. Jesus says in the fourteenth chapter and twenty-first verse of this Gospel, " He that hath My commands and keepeth them ; he it is that loveth Me "; he and no one else, for that is the real significance of it. The man who has taken the commandments of Jesus into his heart, made them a part of his very nature, woven them into the very texture of his FRIENDSHIP WITH JESUS THROUGH OBEDIENCE. 303 moral and spiritual being ; t/iis matt to whom the commandments of Jesus are a delight, a joy, yea, have become the very passion of his soul, "he it is", and he only, says Jesus "-loves me'\ May we not say then that love dictates obedience, but obedience issues in a higher love? There was a time in the relations of Jesus and His Apostles when He considered them as "servants". IJut in the progress of their intercourse as they grew to know Him more clearly and to discern His nature and His mission, and He to know them more closely and mark the steady growth of their recep- tivity and the taking on of likeness to Himself, He recognizes their fitness for still closer relations, and says, " Henceforth, I call you not servants, but friends ". Their obedience had led up to a higher friendship. The truest view, rather should I say, the true view, looks upon these relationships, not as separate or as antagonistic, but as merging into a higher unity and characterized by — 3rd. Co-ordinate and alternating interaction. Love incites obedience ; obedience intensifies love, and so on througii the varying experiences of life, deepening confidences, developing friend- ship, producing and enhancing likenesses, changing from glory to glory by the Spirit of God. And thus the onward, upward, outward processes of the spiritual life move, bearing the soul steadily and blessedly into the deeper intimacies and mysteries of a friendship which has eternity for its field of action and God for its eternal object. One has likened this growth to a benefactor who has rescued a maiden from poverty and misfortune, has placed her in favorable conditions, has given her educational advantages, has watched her remarkable development in intellectual acquirements, in graces of manner, in qualities of character, in all womanliness of nature, until philanthropy has changed into sympathy, and sympathy into friend- ship, and friendship into affection, and affection has laid himself and all that he possesses at the feet of his erstwhile ward and in wedded love the highest happiness of life has found expression. And so the soul, redeemed by the philanthropic love of Christ, won to service by its own great needs and the knowledge of the divine compassion, responds in obedience and enlarges in affection and becomes increasingly worthy of confidence until all the wealth of Deity — is poured out upon it, the human becomes divine and God is all in all. A strong if not conclusive suggestion of this interaction and mutual dependence is seen when you place in close contact the cognate passages, " If ye love Me, ye will keep My commands," and, " If ye keep My com- mandments, ye shall abide in My love ". Love leads to obedience and obedience makes love permanent, and incidentally here is a sovereign rem- edy for, or preventive of, the lamentable experiences of backsliding. In the equilibrium of both hemispheres, the one of love and the other of obe- dience, is found the rounded, the completed, the symmetrical, the balanced, the resplendent globe of finished Christian character. In these inter- actions may be traced the shining stairways ascending to God; the grades of growth in the spiritual processes; the rungs in the ladder from the stony pastures of Bethel to the ladder's summit, on which stands God. 304 . THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. One other element, and that the most important remains to be con- sidered, and that is — 4th. The /(fri'^^fa;/ element. This is not a service of things, nor of institutions however venerable, nor of truths however definite and definitive. It is not obedience to creeds, however logical, nor to churches, nor to Bibles, nor to dogmas, which is first demanded of man. His first service, his primary summons, is to a per- son : " Come unto Me'' ; "As many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the Sons of God ". The apprehension and appreciation of Christ, philosophically and theologically, both as to His nature and His work, may, and do differentiate themselves in a thousand and one forms, but the essential, vital thing is to get to the persofi personally, to come into contact with the living, breathing, triumphant, eternal Christ. This was the power of apostolic preaching. Would you have the secret of Paul's impassioned and imperial ministry? He takes no pains to conceal it, but blazens it abroad in utterances that have stirred the centuries, in words that carry in themselves a deathless significance. " I know Him whom I have believed, and I am persuaded that He is able to guard that which I have committed unto Him against that day " (2 Tim. i : 12, R. V.). The dying Alexander, Professor at Princeton, recognized the majestic meaning of that saying, when, having asked a friend to read to him the living word, the friend read this passage: "I know /« whom I have believed". Professor Alexander put his trembling hand upon the arm of the reader and whispered, "Stop, I will not have even a preposition between me and my Lord ". But still closer even than this, and even more significant of the source of Paul's magnificent ministry, is that other utterance, "I live; and yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God" (Gal. 2 : 20). This personal love of Jesus Christ gave the initial impulse, the tidal force to the message of the Gospel as it has come rolling down through the centuries. It is the vin- dication of its presence and its power today. Dr. Van Dyke sets this forth strongly when, speaking of the power of this Gospel of a Person, he says, "St. Chrysostom, St. Francis of Assisi and Savonarola had it ; John Wesley and George Whitefield had it. In different ages and under different conditions, these men had the primal message which moves men to believe. And in our own age, under our own conditions, a like message has been proclaimed with power. Pere Lacor- daire preached such a message in Notre Dame, and Canon Liddon in St. Paul's to listening thousands. Bishop Brooks made it thrill like a celestial music through the young manhood of America, and Dwight L. Moody has spoken it with vigorous directness in every great city that knows the English tongue. One thing only is the same in all of them and that is, the source of their power. Their central message, the core of their preaching, is the piercing, moving, personal Gospel of Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God and Saviour of mankind. This, in its simplest form ; this in its clearest expres- sion ; this presentation of a persoti to persons in order that they may first FRIENDSHIP WITH JESUS THROUGH OBEDIENCE. 305 know, and thus love and trust and follow Him — this is pre-eminently the Gospel for an age of doubt ". In this summing up of the contents of his great book, Dr. Van Dyke only expresses the simple truth. In this fact of personal contact with the personal Christ lies the hope of the race. Every individual, rich or poor, learned or unlearned, master or slave, Saxon or Slav, male or female, Jew or Gentile, can come directly, personally to Jesus Christ and He meets him on his own level. Is he the hardened, cruel, pitiless jailer at Philippi ? Jesus meets him in the midnight hour and before morning gives him the new name and the white stone. Is he the cultured, religious, phylactery- wearing Pharisee, who under cover of darkness seeks the Master ? Jesus meets him with the statement that " as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in Hiyn should not perish but have eternal life ", and in the Sanhedrin, this man, in the very face of the Lord's enemies befriended Him, and when His sacred body was laid in the solemn tomb, it was Nicodemus who brought a hundred pound weight of myrrh and aloes that he might attest his loving friendship for his Lord. Is it the blind man at the gate of Jericho that cries out in his wretchedness, "Thou Son of David, have mercy upon me!"? The Master speaks, and lo, the blind man sees, and there bursts upon his astonished gaze the beauties of the earth, the sea and the glorious heaven, and better than these, the faces of friends, of children and of wife, and best of all, the radiant face of Jesus, the Christ, the Healer and Saviour of men. Is it contemplative Nathaniel sitting under the fig tree ? He responds at once to the evidences inhering in the Master, and cries out, " Rabbi, Thou art the Son of God, Thou art the King of Israel ! " And so it has been through the centuries. Whatever divergencies of thought and divisions ecclesiastical, the irenic ground on which all could stand in sympathies and in mutual appreciation, has been that of personal knowledge of Jesus Christ, the personal contact in profoundest experiences and spiritual illuminations with the Lord Christ. Out of the depths of these personal experiences and these divine friendships, men have spoken with power to their fellow- men, for they have spoken of that which they have seen and heard, of Him with whom they have had sweetest communion, and through whose power manifested in them, they have stormed intrenchments and pulled down strongholds, driven back the armies of the aliens, marched triumphantly across life's battlefield, and at length have furled their victorious banners by the great white throne. It is because of " having not seen, they love, and in whom, though seeing Him not, they believe ", that He takes them into this divinest friendship, this holiest intimacy, and makes known to them the resources of His Kingdom, the infinite wealth of His own nature, and still says to them, " Eye hath not seen nor ear heard, neither have entered the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him ". Such friendship transforms obedience into passionate service and makes life all luminous with the presence and power of God. * "THAT THEY ALL MAY BE ONE." (St. John 17.) by hknry t. ko^vler, fh. r>.. Professor of Biblical Literature and History in Brown University, Providence, R. I. In that unique composition, the interpretation of which occupies these Conferences, there are dominant notes and chords — the grace and truth that came, light and darkness, life and death, the Father, Saviour, Com- forter— and these have been struck by skilled hands during the past months. Today I would touch on a minor theme in the Gospel. As I understand the purpose of those who have instituted these gather- ings, it is, in part, to secure interdenominational sympathy by common study and meditation upon a portion of Scripture which gives the deepest insight into the heart-life of Christ and the Father. In part, the purpose is to bring together professional students of the Bible, with preachers and peo- ple, for that communion which must develop when men speak often together of the Lord whom they love, even as he is revealed in this wonderful Fourth Gospel. If I am right in my apprehension of the purpose in this Con- ference, is not the thought which is so prominent in the seventeenth chapter of John, the thought of unity, a peculiarly appropriate one for our consideration ? The conception of unity between Christ and the Father is a prominent element throughout the Gospel of John from the opening section, where the Word is declared to have been with God from the beginning, on through such assertions as "I and the Father are one" (10:30), "I have • kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love" (15:10), and through such appeals as, " If you do not believe me believe the works, that you may know that I am in the Father and the Father in me, or else through the very works believe" (14:10, 11). Through these, on to the last discourse and prayer before the betrayal, we may trace this theme, coming out again and again. The unity between Christ and the disciple, too, appears somewhat, even outside of the seventeenth chapter, — " He that abideth in me and I in him, this one beareth much fruit, because apart from me ye are not able to do anything". Another phase of unity, that of man with man, is also pre- sented here and there in John's Gospel. It appears in the picture of one fold, one shepherd (10 : 16), or " the gathering together into one the children * Delivered at the Sixth Conference, held at the Trinity Union Methodist Episcopal Church, March 9, 1904. 306 THA T THE Y ALL MA V BE ONE. 307 of God that are scattered abroad " (11:52). The bond of triple unity is likewise emphasized, " 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" (15:10). We find, then, in the Gospel of John, the unity of Christ and the Father, the unity of Christ and the disciples, the unity of the dis- ciples with each other, and the bond of this threefold unity. Paul, as well, emphasizes the necessity of unity among the followers of Christ. He beseeches them to walk worthily of their vocation, endeavor- ing to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, urges upon them their one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father above all, through all, and in them all (Eph. 4 :3 ff). For the Romans he prays that they may be of the same mind one with another, according to Christ Jesus. The writer of Acts emphasizes the fact that the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and one soul. The thought of the unity of Christians and its bond in the common hope and common Lord, is, indeed, confined to no one chapter and to no one writer in the New Testament, but this comes nowhere else to such beautiful and complete expression, I think, as in the chapter which we are to consider this afternoon. The constantly widening circles of inclusiveness in the divine prayer, recorded in John 17, give opportunity to develop the complex relations of the theme with all possible clearness. In the opening verses, when Jesus prays for himself, his essential and eternal oneness with the Father is assumed^ — " I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do. And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self, with the glory which I had with thee before the world was ". The circumference of the peti- tion soon widens to include those to whom Christ had manifested his Father's name, to whom he has given the words which were given him, who have known that he came out from the Father and have believed that God sent him. As he contemplates his departure from the world, view- ing it as though it were already accomplished, he prays, "And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father keep them in thy name, which thou has given me, that they may be one as we are one ". The next verse makes even more definite the ground of his anxiety for them, " While I was with them in the world I kept them in thy name ". With the widening of the prayer to include his followers, as well as himself, the unity of Jesus with God, which has been his strength and power through all the years, becomes the norm of the union which must exist among the disciples now that their leader is to depart and leave them in the world, — " Keep them in thy name that they may be one as we are ". Marcus Dods explains this phrase, " Keep them in thy name, that they may be one ", as meaning that the retention of the knowledge of the Father which Christ had imparted to them would make them one. The narne seems to be the knowledge of the Father which had been given to Christ for revelation to the disciples, and this knowledge it is that will make them one, as Christ and God are one. 3o8 THE GOSPEL OE ST. JOHN. In commenting upon the inaugural vision of Isaiah, George Adam Smith exclaims: "The vision of God — this is the one thing needful for worship and for conduct". That seems to be nearly the thought of the eleventh and twelfth verses here, if we adopt the older text, on which the Revisers' translation is based, not "Keep through thine own name those whom thou 'hast given me ", but " Keep them in thy name, which (name) thou hast given me ". " While I was with them I kept them in thy name, which (name) thou hast given me, and I guarded them ". The name, we know, signified quite generally in Biblical writings the attribute, the function, or character. If the Christian church could but have kept with singleness of vision in the 7iame of God, that is in the knowledge of his character and work as the one thing needful, its history would have been far other than one of so much discord ; then we might have been one, even as God and Christ. I hope we are learning in these latter days that we may differ about the nature and manner of inspiration ; that we may differ about forms of government and forms of worship, even about forms of ordinances or the exact method of salvation, and yet may be one in his name; one in the effort to know God ; one in our faith that whatever else may be revealed to us or not revealed, we have a revelation of God in his name, in his essential character. Again the circle of Christ's loving prayer widens, " Neither for these only do I pray, but for them also that believe on me through their word, that they may all be one, even as thou. Father, art in me and I in thee, that they also may be in us ". As Meyer says, " This ethical unity, to be specifically Christian, must correj^pond to its original type, 'Eveyi as thou Father, art in me and I in thee'". We have noted already how, in the Fourth Gospel, abiding in the Father's love is the state of that unity (15 : 10, 1 1), doing the Father's works is the expression, nay, it would seem, the proof of that unity (10 : 38). The prayer is that all who believe through the word of the disciples may live and move in the Father and Christ as they in each other. Thus the thought advances, enlarging in the inclusiveness of its hope for Christian fellowship, and then it rises to a higher plane, in the thought of the possible grace that can effect such inconceivable union, — "And the glory which thou hast given me, I have given unto them, that they may be one even as we are one ". What is this glory given by Christ to make believers one, even as God and he are one ? Perhaps we cannot answer with certainty. Many have been the suggestions from the days of the fathers onward. Their very number indicates the wide variety of aspects that the Christian's glory dis- plays— the glory of the apostolic office (Chrysostom), the glory of the Christian life, of the life of Christ in believers, of sonship, of love, of grace and truth, or the glory on which the believers are to enter at the coming of Christ. It has even been ventured to interpret glory here as the same as that in v. 5, "O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was", or in v. 24, "I would THAT THEY ALL MA Y BE ONE. 309 that where I am they also may be with me ; that they may behold my glory which thou hast given me ". If this be the true interpretation, then the words in v. 22 carry us far indeed, to the glory which cannot be com- pletely and actually bestowed until we are where he is, — "And the glory which thou hast given unto me I have given unto them, that they may be one even as we are one ; I in them and thou in me, that they may be per- fected into one". We may well join in the exclamation, "What a strong bond of unity must lie in the sure warrant of fellowship in eternal glory! " We have traced imperfectly this increasing thought through the widen- ing circles of the chapter. To recapitulate briefly : Christ's unity with God is assumed as he prays, thinking first of his immediate departure to the glory which he had with God before the world was. Next he passes to those who are left in the world unguarded, and his unity with the Father becomes the standard of their unity with one another, in which they are to be preserved in the name of God revealed by Christ. The thought next includes all who are to come after, and the same standard of union with one another is anticipated for this vast company. Then the hope expands to include not only union of man with man, like the union of Christ with God, but the growing, deepening vision adds to the prayer that they all may be one, the fuller hope that in this unity they may be in God and Christ as the Father is in Christ and Christ in the Father. At last the divine prayer takes wings. With the thought of the glory that had been given to him, and which he had already, in his loving purpose, poured out upon man, comes the final stage of the vision we are following, — " I in them and thou in me, that they may be perfected into one ". We may observe that in this latter part, another thought of John's Gos- pel appears inwoven with that which we have considered : "That they all may be oae, in order that the world may believe that thou didst send me". In earlier chapters we have seen Christ appealing for belief in him- self because of what he is; but if his personality fails to win conviction, deminding belief because of the works he does, the works of the Father (10:38; 14:10, 11). Now his audible voice and visible hand are no more to work the works of God among men. He is no more to move among men in physical presence, winning them as his divine character expresses itself in his hainin personality. After coming out from the upper room, he had given his disciples a badge by which they might be known as his followers. (Read John 13:33-35.) Now in the prayer we advance to the thought that this unity, which he anticipated for all believers, shall be the leajible record to the world, not oaly that they are disciples, but that he, their Master, was sent from God, Even after the final expression, that they may be perfected into one, the result, that the world may know " that thou didst send me, and lovedst them, even as thou lovedst me ", is again enforced. I have drawn out to view only one or two threads of "the wonderful weaving of this seventeenth chapter of John, which has been styled " The simplest in language, the profoundest in meaning in the whole Bible ". That which might be called the central thought of this chapter has hardly 3IO THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. been alluded to, but the few verses considered may open to the attentive eye prophetic visions of possibilities for humanity which stagger the imagina- tion. We can see how such truths overwhelmed the great soul of Paul when he wrote in the Epistle to the Ephesians of the unsearchable riches of Christ; in that third chapter the mystery of it all finds such wonder- ful expression : the riches of his glory, the possibility of Christ's dwelling in their hearts, the length and breadth and depth and height, the love of Christ passing knowledge, the fulness of God who is able to do above all that we can ask or think. Paul's great soul was flooded when the possi- bility of Christ's dwelling in men's hearts swept over him. Such, Christian friends, is the possibility for humanity pictured in this seventeenth chapter of John. We have all contemplated it before, our eyes have grown accustomed to the light, perhaps, so that it no longer daz- zles, and yet, if we stop and look once and again, we may see here the very face of God shining out between dark clouds of human sin and weakness. On the one side stands the record of the betrayer gone out into the night; on the other, the trial and death. And so down through the history, even to our own day, this light from God shines out, showing to man the possi- bility of a life at one with God and man, the possibility of a witness for Christ that cavil can not gainsay ; and all through the history follow the black clouds on either side, the clouds of betrayal, denial and crucifixion, for we have not been one as God and Christ are one, we are not yet per- fected into one, that the world may know that God sent Christ to make men at one with their fellow men and at one with their God. If we view the ideal held before us in this vision of Christ and then view conditions as they are or have been, it may seem that the prayer of Christ can never be answered ; but the signs are surely about us that we are at last beginning to turn toward a developing into unity. May we not read in the history of the church that is now making about us the promise that all who believe through the spread of the apostolic word will at last be perfected into one ? I am not discussing the detailed question of the advantages of unity or of multiplicity in church organization and creed. I have faith that when at last we cease to fight against God's keeping us simply in his name, those questions will be decided in accordance with the need of that future age, and just what that need may be human wisdom today can hardly venture to affirm. Rather I would desire that the words of this prayer, in their depth and simplicity, might ring on and ring ever in our hearts, that no one of us may have any part in delaying the answer to the prayer. God help each one of us so to live in our place that we may speed the day when all shall be one, even as God and Christ are one. • THE UNITY OF CHRISTIANITY AS REVEALED IN THE PRAYER OF CHRIST. (St. John 17,) by rk'v. henry s. nash, d. d., Professor of New Testament Interpretation in the Episcopal Theological School, Camhridc.e, Mass. I shrink from trying to lead your study of this great chapter. There comes into my mind a saying of the great German pietist, Spener, that he never presumed to preach from a text taken from this chapter. But I guard myself against the strength of this quotation by venturing to think that he did not have the right idea about the house of God. His con- ception of the mysteries of God reminds me of certain houses wherein children are not expected to play for fear they will break the furniture. I do not believe that the house of the Lord God has been built upon that plan. I do believe that the Lord is willing to take the risk of a certain amount of broken furniture in his house, to the end that his children may learn to play, if they fully remember that they are playing, and do not pre- sume to put on the airs of popes in his house. Before one enters the chapter there are certain features of the Fourth Gospel of which I trust you will permit me to remind you. The first one is that, according to John, the Gospel is the mind of Christ. This book among all the books that have ever been penned by man is the most singular in its monotony, if one chooses to use that word. Nothing happens, — one may venture to say, — in the Fourth Gospel; nothing happens, but everything is. The whole Gospel is the mind of Jesus. From that point of view it is exceedingly becoming and beautiful that the culmination of the self-revelation of Jesus should be a prayer. For prayer, when we come rightly to understand it is the deepest of all our thinking. That, of course, is not true regarding the bulk of our prayers. I fancy that regarding the large part of our prayers the child's opinion about praying is largely true. You know what the child is apt to think about prayers. He believes that praying is an easy way to get things. The average child thinks that prayer is a substitute for hard work. And I am not sure but that one carries that conception of prayer a good way on his pilgrimage through time and space. But prayer rightly understood is the deepest of our thinking, it is the severest of all our labors. The very last petition of our life is " Lord, teach me to pray ". " Teach me to pray, I care not what else Thou givest or takest away, teach me to pray ", we say to the Master. * Delivered at the Seventh Conference, held at the Ceiitral Congregational Church, April 13,1904. 3" 312 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. So it follows, if we understand prayer aright, that it is natural that in this wonderful book, the final self-revelation of the Master should be a prayer. What happens to us when we truly pray ? Why this is what happens, the divine and the human come together. It is in prayer, if it be vital, and in prayer alone, that we know what revelation is. We do a little talking, but very little do we feel about vital praying, about vital revela- tion. But so far as we feel revelation with our hearts as well as theorize about it with our heads, it is in those rarer moments of real praying that we feel it, because it is in prayer that the mind of God presses irre- sistibly upon our minds ; and it is in prayer that the word of God makes of our thought its medium, and through our lives publishes itself in terms of our experience. And therefore it is with noble propriety that in this book the last word of the self-revelation of the Master should be a prayer. As we enter the chapter, this one thing should be carefully remem- bered regarding it, namely: that the Master's mood is not one of sorrow, but rather one of triumphant peace and joy. A good many of the standard commentaries on this book have gone astray at this point, in that they have found here and there a suggestion of melancholy in the Master's mood. But the key to this chapter is the last verse of the sixteenth chapter, and the key-word there is the word "peace". It is therefore in the mood of triumphant self-possession and exulting certitude that we enter chapter 17. In the first verse Jelus says to His Father, "The hour is come, glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son may glorify Thee ". Now we must be careful to get that word glory by the right handle. What does it mean ? To glorify God means,— does it not? — to make Him intelligible. To glorify a great picture is to make it intelligible, to interpret it. To glorify a great man by some splendid biography is to make the man's mind and purpose plain to his fellows. So, there is but one way to glorify God, and that is to make His mind plain to His servants and children. To glorify God is to make His being and will intelligible to His children. Naturally, then, this is the way that Jesus sums up His work. He has made the mind of God luminous and intelligible to man. So His prayer is that God may glorify Him, that is to say, that God may crown Jesus as the interpreter of God to man. Now is not this what we mean when we call Him the Saviour ? How are we saved? Why, we are saved by understanding God. We are saved by understanding what is deepest in life and God is the deepest thing in life. Salvation consists in apprehending God's mind about us, and Christ's prayer is that God may crown Him with the single glory of being accepted by man as the interpreter of God to man. In vs. 2, 3, we are given Christ's definition of eternal life. "This is life eternal that men may know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent ". Now let us try to give to ourselves a simple defini- tion of what we mean by eternal life. What I mean by it is a kind of life wherein life completely controls the machinery of life. That, to me, is the life eternal, a kind of life so rich and deep that life controls its machinery. One does not realize eternal life very often in this world, but once in THE UNITY OF CHRISTIANITY. 313 a while one does realize it, live it out. There are certain rare moments when the machinery of life is totally lost sight of in living: and life eternal, simply defined and apprehended, is just the art of so living that all the machinery of life is controlled by life itself. As a rule, we Christians so live that the machinery controls life. Any pastor who does not know this knows very little about his trade. It is the disease of the ministry — we ministers know it to our shame — it is the disease of the ministry that the machinery of the ministry oftentimes controls and dominates the life of the minister. Committees and societies of all kinds sometimes take the heart out of a minister. But there are rare moments when life controls all the machinery of life, and that is what we mean by the life eternal. So, life eternal is to know deeply the mind of God as Jesus publishes it, and only so can one have eternal life. The central thought in the next section into which I have divided the chapter for the purpose tonight, namely, vs. 4-8, is the thought of the church. The language here does not use the term church. Sometimes the best way of thinking about a thing is not to name it. Jesus had not read Hobbes. But He was too great a teacher not to know the law which Hobbes lays down, that words are wise men's counters and the money of fools. The best way, sometimes, to think about a great thing is not to give it a definite name, for, when once you have named it, you are apt to think that you know it. How amusing it is sometimes to watch children. They come up to you with a problem and ask you to name it, and the moment you name it you settle it for them, and they put it aside. Names are some- times the soporific of thought, so it is well that the church should appear here in thought and not in name. I venture to think that the thought of the section is this : the ultimate heresy is our unwillingness or inability or incompetency to believe the best things about ourselves. Now, at first blush, that may seem a very foolish assertion to make. Slow to believe the best things about ourselves ? Why, are we not filled with egotism } Are we not consumed with pride and vain glory ? Do we not spend our lives in mutual admiration societies on the basis that we are to say pleasant things about other people with the understanding that they will reciprocate by saying pleasant things about us ? And does not the church resemble such a society ? Is it not an absurd thing to say that we are slow and unwilling to believe the best things about ourselves ? Not a bit of it. It depends upon what we mean by the " best things ". The best things are righteousness and truth, and they mean unlimited capacity for God and the good. This we are very slow to believe in and trust ourselves to. But this is the very essence of the Christian church, to teach men to believe the very best things about humanity. For the church rests upon the Incarnation, and unless the Incarnation is a big word covering up a very small meaning, this is the sum and substance of it. It is God's way of teaching us that God believes that we, sons of God, are capable of understanding God, of imitating Him, and of obeying Him to the uttermost. That is what the church of God is, a 3 14 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. society which Christ has ordained to make men believe the very best things about themselves. In the next section of the chapter, vs. 9-1 1, the central thought is that it is through the church that Christ is to be glorified. " I have been glori- fied in them ", He says. That is to say, without the church, Christ is as a man whose right arm is gone. Without the church, the Incarnation is like a blow under the water. The church is Christ's means of making His mind intelligible to the human race. And the church is to look to it that she does not, by her false definition of God, by her false conception of authority, by her false conception of unity, rob her Lord of His crown. And she robs God of His crown when she puts her interpretations of Christ between Him and the race He is seeking to save. In the next section of the chapter, vs. 12-18, there are two main thoughts, that is, two main thoughts for my purpose at this moment. The first of these is the thought of Christ's joy as being fulfilled in those who believe in Him. Now, what is Christ's joy ? I believe there are two ele- ments in it, and that ultimately there are two elements in the joy of every imitator of Christ. First of all, it is the joy of a man who believes with all his heart in God. I repeat, it is the joy of a man who believes in God with all his heart. There is no joy like that of surrender to a great object. What is the true joy of a seeker after truth ? That he may find the truth and surrender himself to ir. What is the joy of the artist, seeker after beauty, but to find beauty and give himself to it? And what is the joy of the soldier when he has found the chance to offer his life for Fatherland, but to surrender to it? The joy of Christ is the joy of complete surrender to God. And this is the joy of the imitator of Christ. The other aspect of Christ's joy is that of complete faith in man. I repeat, complete faith in man. How apt we have been to disconnect these two things. Faith in God we have been constantly talking about, but faith in man, how little we have spoken about that. But we cannot separate the two. What the Christ wanted to do was to make the two inseparable in our thought and life. Complete faith in God leads to absolute faith in man. What joy is there like unto the joy of him who, believing perfectly in God and in the capacity of man for what is best, can devote himself to making what is best intelligible to man ? In V. 19, we come to the deepest waters of the chapter, or, if one may change the figure, we come to the summit point of the context somewhat abruptly. We see the great High Priest offering up to God our humanity, which He has taken upon Himself. The Son of God takes our humanity upon Him, and by His offering to God rids it of its vanity and imperfec- tion. We see the Son of God in His prayer to God saying for us, " I for My friends' sake consecrate Myself". Now, what does consecration mean ? The scientist consecrates himself when he absolutely surrenders himself to the energy and power and law and mind of this mighty universe. Christ consecrates Himself when for love of His fellow-men He absolutely surrenders Himself to the power and mind and law of God. And it is all THE UNITY OF CHRISTIANITY. 315 done for the church's sake, that the church, they who call themselves Christians, may through Him be consecrated in the truth. Our English language here is defective and at fault in translating the Greek, for the Greek word a/et/ieia, is a very large word. We need two words to render it, " truth " and " reality ". This, then, is the prayer Christ makes, that we may be hallowed and consecrated by complete self-surrender to the truth and reality of God. In the next section, vs. 22, 23, we come upon the objective point of the chapter, namely, Christian unity. " That they may be one as we are one ". llow are we to reach unity? God forbid that in these days, which have no theology, and which are so conceited that they think they do not need it, — God forbid that I should say a word to decry theology. For a man who goes about the church today with his eyes open, sooner or later must make up his mind that what the church needs above all things is a sane theology. Just at present our theology is in a mental state that might fairly be called mush, and we sometimes call our lack of clearness and definiteness toler- ance and charity. We need theology. -You will not misunderstand me, then, when I say that we cannot reach unity through theology, if theology be the primary thing; and we cannot reach it through definition, if that be the primary thing. We need theology, but woe be unto us if our theol- ogy masters us instead of our mastering it. Woe be unto us if our defini- tion dominates us, for the object of a definition is to be the tool and servant of the mind. We need our definition, but it must be kept in its proper place and controlled by life. And I take it that the only way in which we, divergent members of the body of Christ, can be brought together is through a living revelation. It is well for us that, temporarily, we have lost our grip upon theology. It is well for us that, at present, we have lost our grip upon definitions, because the end of it all, if we know and believe that God's hand is guiding us, the end of it all will be that we shall gain, some- how, through the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, a mighty feeling of the invading and penetrating and healing power of God. Experience is always greater than definitions, and definitions must go back into experience to be made over again. Our theology, our definitions and creeds, must descend into the truth and reality of God, if we are to come together and stay together. I must hasten on. The chapter closes with the great word^, "That the love wherewith Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them ". It is only through the sense of the indwelling power of the personal Christ that we Christians of diverging creeds, of widely diverging ancestors, of hostile definitions, can come together. That means, I take it, that we must all strip our minds of our infallibility. There is nothing better than a good definition, and there is nothing more helpful than a clear and sane theology to keep the heads of Christians free from vanity and sentimental nonsense. But the bane of theology and definition is infallibility. We have to strip ourselves of that. I wonder if we can do it. We sons of men are born to infallibility as the sparks are to fiy upward. Thus there is a tremendous 3i6 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. lot of infallibility around. We all believe we are infallible, though our sister church, the Roman Catholic church, alone makes a profession of it. Steele's witty saying about the difference between the Church of Rome and the Church of England is worth quoting at this point. " Yes ", he said, " the Church of Rome is infallible and the Anglican Church is never wrong ". That is the difference. We are all infallible in that sense, or pretty nearly so. Now I wonder if we can strip our minds of this infallibility which is just man's cheap substitute for God's truth, man's cheap and easy substi- tute for God's reality. If we are to reach anything like real church unity we must substitute the hard thing for the easy thing, and the costly thing for the cheap thing. But the hard thing and the costly thing is the real, vital sense of the invading and prevading and redeeming revelation of the living Christ. The easy thing is an infallible church, an infallible priest, an infallible theology. When once we have made up our minds that we have got it, we can put an insurance policy in our pocket, lay our heads on our pillow and go to sleep ; and when we wake up, we shall waste some of our time in damning and excommunicating those who have not put their heads upon the same pillow. But this is ecclesiastical unity ; the unity that Christ speaks of is the unity of Christians who have taken the hard and costly thing for their task and heritage. It is the unity of men who believe with all their hearts in God, and in man, and who, by means of that vital faith, keep their tra- ditions and their preferences under control. We are not called on to belittle our traditions. Mine are exceedingly precious to me, and so are yours, I doubt not, to you, or you would not be here. But the beauty of it is that we can, by the help of the living Christ, make our traditions our servants, keep them from dominating us. From this point of view, one object of a good definition is that we may outgrow it. Put a definition between you and revelation and you block up the entrance to revelation, you shut yourself off from its growth and stunt yourself. But keep your definition under control, and then it is a road over which you go to a wider definition, if it please God to let you live long enough to find it. Your difference from your fellow Christian will inspire you to seek for your unity with him. Then you will thank God that all Christians do not think as you think. You will convert what you honestly believe to be your superiority over him into a means of approach to him. You will learn that in the kingdom of God as Christ has built it, the objective point is differ- ence in unity. We are to abound in our differences from one another. We are not to be ashamed of that aspect of truth which the living God hath disclosed to us. Rather we are to be proud of it, to publish it by every means in our power. But we shall control it. We will not let it control us. The love of God is in us all. His living revelation fills our hearts. Because we differ, we agree to glorify Him who causes us to differ. So, shall He, like the master of a great chorus, bring out of our diverse tradi- tions and interpretations, a grand hymn of praise to the only true God and to Tesus Christ whom He hath sent. * SANCTIFICATION IN THE TRUTH. (St. John 17: 17-19.) by rka'. 1). av. kaunok, d. d., rRoVIDENCE, R. I. The committee has assigned to me the central petition in Christ's great High Pfiestly prayer, as recorded in the seventeenth chapter of John's Gospel at the seventeenth verse. It reads as follows: " Sanctify them in Thy truth, Thy word is truth ". Let me read, that you may have the connection, the verses that imme- diately precede and follow. I read from the Revised Version, v. 14, " I have given them Thy word " ; v. 16, " They are not of the world even as I am not of the world"; v. 17, the verse we are to consider, reads: " Sanctify them in Thy truth ; Thy word is truth ". And this is followed, in V. 19, by the words : " For their sakes I sanctify Myself that they also may be sanctified in truth ". In reading these tenderly expressive words, I have not heeded the request of one of the most intelligent and devout Christians I have ever known. " Pastor", she said, "please never read that prayer in the seven- teenth of John in public again ". The pastor supposed there had been some mistake in emphasis. "Oh no, not that", was the quick reply, "but this: that prayer of love and agony should only be read when one is alone, on his knees and in tears ". We sympathize with the devout feeling so earnestly expressed. But we are permitted, also, to remember that .devotional study may be as devout as prayer itself. Our Lord, in the gift of the promised Holy Spirit to John, caused this prayer to be put into the record. We may, then, be permitted to read it, to study it, and to attempt its devotional interpreta- tion. Devout students in all ages have felt that through these central words in this central part of this great prayer, we get further back into the depths of Christ's own soul than through any other words that ever fell from those holy lips, — " Sanctify them in Thy truth ; Thy word is truth. For their sakes I sanctify Myself". In this devotional interpretation notice, first of all, that this prayer is the one true " Lord's Prayer ". In it He prays. By a mistake which it is too late in the centuries to correct, we are accustomed to call the prayer that begins " Our Father, which art in heaven ", " The Lord's Prayer ". But that prayer should have been called "the disciples' prayer". Our Lord does not even once use it Himself. He the rather puts it into the mouth of ♦Delivered at the Eighth Conference, held at All Saints Memorial Church, May ii, 1904. 3i8 THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN. His followers who had said, " Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples ". That prayer is now known to be a compilation in part from Jewish prayers of that time. The Jews of that age, following their Old Testa- ment, called God "Father" in their prayers. Jesus could never Himself have employed one of the petitions in that prayer, — " Forgive us our tres- passes ". No perfect soul can truthfully make use of those words. On the other hand this prayer — this sinless prayer of the seventeenth of John, which should have been called " The Lord's Prayer ", was prayed only by Him. It is so holy that on any other lips than His it would be profane. Even He could pray it but once. In it His heart found its holy vent. Though in one part of it He prays for His disciples. He does not notice that they are present. He is in His closet alone with God. They two, the Holy Father and the Holy Son are speaking with each other. They are in the very act of communing. Let us be still. The time, the place, the per- sons are sacred. " Let all the earth keep silence before Him ". Only that He left on record this prayer should we dare speak of it. But here it is ; and therefore in no sense acting as spies on our Lord's communings with His Father, we may, with hushed heart, venture to look and listen. And the time when He offers this prayer is especially significant. He has so nearly completed His work that He conceives of it as already done. " I have finished ", " I come to Thee ", He says. He is through with Calvary and the resurrection and ascension, in His thought: "I come to Thee ". Contrast with this prayer the petition popularly called the Lord's Prayer, as to the time of their respective utterances. In the prayer He puts into the lips of disciples — the one commencing " Our Father", He is teaching beginners in discipleship. Had that prayer been given further on in their development, would He have omitted from it the very things for which He afterwards told them to pray, viz.: the gift of the Holy Spirit, and the asking of all in His name ? The prayer at that earlier time could not have had the fulness of the New Dispensation. Let me not be misunder- stood. That prayer, that "disciples' prayer", was absolutely perfect for them at that time ; and it is in its general form and its whole spirit, not so much a stiff mould as a generous and blessed model of prayer for all time. But what a contrast between that " disciples' prayer " and this "Lord's Prayer" in the seventeenth of John. It is not in John "Our Father", the united petition of disciples, but it is "Holy Father", the single separate term of sole use in the intimate intercourse between God and His " Only Begotten Son " as that Son is about to resume the native heaven and the dateless years of His eternity in the bosom of His Father. Notice, also, the order of the petitions in this prayer. He prays first, (vs. 1-5) about Himself that God will glorify Him. He prays second, (vs. 6-19) for the Twelve exclusively. He prays third, (vs. 20-26) for all future believers. Now it is of the utmost importance that we notice that the seventeenth verse, the verse which we are studying, comes in the second division, viz.: SANCTIFICA TION IN THE TR UTH. 3 1 9 that of the petition for the Twelve, lie asks two things for His Twelve (a) negatively, that they may be " kept from the evil " — or as the Revision has it, and very many other versions — that they may be "kept from the Evil One". Then (b) comes the positive petition, " Sanctify them in Thy truth ; Thy word is truth ". "Sanctify them"; the word "sanctify" itself means to separate — simply that. The root idea of the word, taken alone, is not holiness but separation — separation not from what is impure but from what is common. It is constantly used in the Old Testament, not only about persons, but about things no longer common, because set apart for God's peculiar service. Twice only does Jesus use the word about Himself. He says (John 10:36) that He "was sanctified" i.e., " set apart ", and "sent into the world ". In this prayer (v. 20) He says " I sanctify Myself ". God has " sanctified " Him, /.