When the Word came-Christ-He brought the truth about everything with Him-it was in Himself-He was the Truth, what He said thoroughly made known what He was. In Him I get the truth about God, about man, about myself, and about Satan. The error with which Professor Maurice set out was confounding the truth with God.
There is another thing-rectitude of heart and the truth always go together.
This is seen in Christ, who was Himself the Truth-it was in Him-and He was it; but we must always know in part. In Christ alone was there perfect reality, sincerity; and we have sincerity in so far as we have Him. Where Christ is not there is no sincerity-that is reality. There may be what men call sincerity, where the heart is dark, and has been badly taught; but in this case there cannot be reality, for the truth only is real. There may be ignorance, but ignorance may be culpable, for it. might have been prevented. It was the case with the Jews: they remained ignorant of Christ, because of the state they were in; hence He said, " They bad both seen and hated him and his Father." Yet in grace he prayed, " Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." So Peter says, " Brethren, I wet that through ignorance ye did it, as also did your rulers;" but surely this ignorance was highly culpable, however sincere they may have been in it. Paul also said that what he did against Christ was done in ignorance and unbelief; but he does not palliate, but himself confesses that he was the chief of sinners. Yet in his natural state he was sincere as men speak-following his conscience.
It is impossible that the truth can be separated from the grace in this verse, because it was God revealing Himself in Christ. God is love; therefore, if God revealed Himself there must be grace. Truth given without Christ coming personally would be judgment. God may give a law without revealing Himself, but directly He says " Came," then grace and truth must come out. The evangelist puts grace first, because doubtless he felt it was what really suited his own case. After the death of Christ grace reigns.
Ver. 18. Here we get Christ as the only-begotten Son. it is not, He was in the bosom of the Father, as though He had left it, but, " is in the bosom of the Father." There He is even when upon earth, and even upon the cross it was true. He was always in the nearness of intimacy indicated by the expression, " in the bosom a the Father."
On the cross He was, of course, not enjoying this relationship, but bearing wrath. The expression, " from the bosom of the Father," is rather inexact, for Christ never left the bosom of the Father. The passage, " Son of man which is in heaven" connects the manhood with the divinity; the Son was in heaven, and that Son was a man upon the earth, therefore might it be said, " Son of man in heaven."
On the cross, Christ was under wrath, and therefore-although He was then doing something on account of which the Father would in a very especial sense love Him-yet then. He could not be enjoying the relationship between Him and His Father. In one sense, the Father never loved the Son so much as when He was upon the cross. This was ' what was in the Father's mind, not what was in Christ's, who could not be enjoying His relationship and drinking the cup of wrath at the same time. He gave Himself up to drink this cup. On the cross He was entirely occupied in bearing the wrath: it. required a divine person really to apprehend infinitely what the wrath of God was. I apprehend that at that time Christ was fully occupied with what He was bearing-infinite pain-which He infinitely realized. God was to be glorified on account of sin, and only such a One as He could do it. Still it is a very deep mystery, and it becomes us to be very careful in speaking about it. We find, however, that the time Christ was upon the cross was most distinctly clouded. There is a period before the three hours of darkness and a period afterward, when Christ on the cross uses the term " Father." He does not use it during the three hours of darkness: during this time He appears to be entirely occupied with God-bearing wrath; everything is shut out but what was passing between Him and God. It is exceedingly terrible this three hours of darkness. It is this terrible character of bearing wrath which makes it so dreadful to think, that in His life Christ was bearing wrath. Christ sympathizes with the judgment He was bearing, feeling
that it was right. See Psa. 22 Christ really bore this wrath before His death, and when it was all done He gave up His life. After the bitter cry-My God, why hast thou forsaken me!—-we see Him calmly giving up His spirit to His Father. The depth of death, looked at as the wages of sin, had been gone through during the hours of darkness. We see first, all man's wickedness in His crucifixion fully brought out; then darkness-darkness and wrath-God forsaking Him. Afterward, having borne this wrath, He comes out and occupies Himself in fulfilling the rest of the scripture which had to be fulfilled in His death. The expression, " It is finished," shows us that just then He was departing because everything was done. It was a most blessed time for Him, for the bitterness of death was past-He was going to Paradise. He must actually die in order that the blood and water might come out for us. We never could enter into what Christ entered into upon the cross, therefore it was that He went through it for us.
We have no revelation of what He passed through during the three hours of darkness: we could not understand it, it was between Him and God alone.
In John's Gospel we never get Jesus dying, as it were, but simply His going out of the world to His Father. In John we get a divine person acting for us; in the other gospels, a man suffering for us.
His dying bodily was the giving effect to all that He did, in order to make it accessible to us.
He hath declared Him-not revealed. The word here used ἐξηγέομαι implies rather more detail. It is the same word which occurs in Luke for relations, and means to tell, narrate, recount, make known. It is a different word to that used in chapter 27:26, " I have declared unto them thy name and will declare it." In verse 18 of our chapter the word is used in the sense of relating what He knew of the Father. It would, perhaps, be better here to say, " Of the bosom of the Father," than " In the bosom of the Father." This verse closes the revelation of what Christ was. Now in verse 19 we get into history. Verse 15 is a parenthesis concerning the Baptist's testimony to Christ, who comes after John as to His appearance in the flesh, but is preferred before him, has the precedence of him, because He was before him. John distinctly apprehends this. Verse 16 should be read in connection with verse 14.
Ver. 19-28. We have here the Baptist's testimony as to his own position) and as to what Christ was. This carries us up to end of verse 28.
Ver. 29-34. The Baptist here says, " Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world." He does not say has taken away. The expression is abstract, and represents the entire bearing of Christ's work before God. Everything that God does now, it is in respect of sin; whether it be grace or judgment, it is in respect of sin. Well, the result of Christ's work will be that all will be totally changed, sin will be gone, and there will be a new heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness; that is, Christ will be found to have taken away the sin of the world; for as the result of His work all God's dealings will be founded upon righteousness. The full effect of this will not be seen in the millennium, for then there will he sin to be dealt with, but not in the new heavens and earth. " Taketh away" has not in this verse the sense given in the margin of our Bibles-" Beareth away." It is not a sacrificial term. It has been said, by some that on account of what Christ has done no man will be condemned for sin as such, but because he did not believe in Christ. This is totally false, for God will judge men for sins. Christ said, " If ye believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins." The other doctrine is the result of trying to make God agreeable to sinners instead of sinners agreeable to God.
(Continued front page 352.)
(To be continued.)