Matthew 16:13-18, Eph. 5:25-33. Men may talk much about the church, but there is no understanding of it till the person of the Lord is known. Simon was only a poor ignorant fisherman, but he made a glorious unwavering confession, “Thou art the Christ the Son of the living God.” There was no pause, no hesitation; he knew it. But the knowledge came by revelation of the Father, “Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.” There was no happier man than Simon at that moment on the face of the earth. Then indeed there ensues a further revelation, “And I also say to thee that.... upon this Rock I will build my church” — “builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.”
But in Eph. 5 we have another thing: this blessed Person has “loved the church and given Himself for it.” The Spirit here employs the nearest and dearest of all earthly ties—the love of equals. It is not here an angel I am called to love, but a fellow-creature brought into the happiest and closest relationship with myself— “so ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself.” But if that is so sweet, what is it to be the object of the love of the Son of God, to be loved by Him as we know Him revealed by the Father? When we learn His person and then His love to us we may learn about the church. What can those who are discussing His person understand about it, though they talk so loudly about the church?
We are not only living stones on the Rock, but we are “builded” there. We are not loose stones to go anywhere, nor are we thrown down into the road in a heap, but we are “builded together” each having its own place to fill in the “spiritual house” (1 Peter 2:5), and nothing can, in His grace, move us from this allocation, nor from Himself the Builder and the Rock, and by-and-by will He present to Himself His church in all its glorious completeness, ourselves then perfected in glory (John 17:23).
John 13:33 “Little children.” This is the only occasion in which the Lord Himself uses the word “little children” —a diminutive form expressing affection. It does not mean a young believer only, but is the address of love to all His own, and is so used by the disciple whom Jesus loved, in his Epistle when addressing the whole family of God (1 John 2:1, 12, 28; 3:7, 18; 4:4; 5:21).
Here in the Gospel it is divine affection addressing the disciples in their sorrow at their Lord and Master's approaching departure, “Little children, yet a little while I am with you. Ye shall seek me; and as I said unto the Jews, whither I go, ye cannot come; so now I say to you.” How different the time when He used these same words to the Jews, “Whither I go ye cannot come”!
It is His love in verse 33 that leads to verse 34, “A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.” It was a new commandment because never so expressed before. “As I have loved you.” Such should be the character as well as the measure of our love to each other. His love had been shown in washing their feet. We too should wash one another's feet (ver. 14). But was this then realized in the disciples? It needed the power of the indwelling Spirit, that other Comforter, or Advocate, whom He would send from the Father (15:26; Acts 2:33) before it could be said “which thing is true (not only in Him as always, but now for the first time) in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light now shines” (1 John 2:7, 8).
“Let not your heart be troubled.” There was much to trouble—the discovery of a false professor (Judas), as well as the failure of a true disciple (Peter); and above all His own absence, for He had not yet spoken a word about the Comforter. How similar to our present condition, except that we now have the Comforter! “Let not your heart be troubled.” Trouble may be all around; let it stay there. Keep it out of your heart. “Ye believe in God” though you have not seen Him—you have His presence (witness the Psalms), “believe also in Me.” Amid the trouble, He is on your side. I will be also. And the blessed Lord is more occupied with them in His absence from this scene than whilst here— “It is expedient for you that I go away.”