There is nothing a man so reluctantly allows as evil in himself; there is nothing he so much resents as another's saying evil of him, and leaving him no loophole of escape. So was it now with the Jews whom the Lord denied to be of God, as they heard not His words. Never had their self complacency been thus disturbed before. The scorn of the heathen was as nothing compared with such a libel, which was severe in proportion to its self-evident truth. For the ground taken was indisputable. Who could doubt that he who is of God heareth the words of God? How solemn, then, to face the fact that One who spoke as none ever did declared with holy calmness that therefore they did not hear, because they were not of God! Conscience might wince, but refused to bow. Will, ill-will, alone declared itself, save indeed that it was animated from beneath.
"The Jews answered and said to him, Say we not well that thou art a Samaritan, and hast a demon? Jesus answered, I have not a demon, but honor my Father, and ye dishonor me. But seek not my glory: there is one that seeketh and judgeth. Verily, verily, I say to you, If any one keep my word, death he shall never see.” (Vers. 48-51.) Thenceforth the Jews, unable to refute, and unwilling to confess, the truth, betake themselves to insolent retort and railing. They justify and openly repeat their application of “Samaritan” to Him; for what could more prove enmity in their eyes than to refuse their claim to be preeminently God's people? If He declared them to be of their father, the devil, they did not scruple to rejoin that He had a demon. He was outside the Israel of God and the God of Israel.
No Christian then has ever suffered worse in this way of dishonor than Christ. The disciple is not above his Lord, and can expect no exemption. And none are so prone to reproach others falsely as those who are themselves really slaves of the enemy. But let us learn of Him who was meek and lowly of heart, and now calmly repudiates their taxing Him with a demon. Not so, but He was honoring His Father, they dishonoring Him. Yet was there no personal resentment as on his part, who courts his own honor now, or punishes afterward^ such as insult him. “But I seek not my glory: there is one that seeketh and judgeth.” He leaves all with His Father, Himself content to serve, able and ready to save. “Verily, verily, I say to you, if any one” —let him be the vilest of His foes— “keep my word, death he shall never see.” Such an utterance was worthy of all solemnity on His part, of all acceptation on theirs.
“The Jews therefore said to him, Now we know that thou hast a demon. Abraham died, and the prophets; and thou sayest, If any one keep thy word, he shall never taste of death. Art thou greater than our father Abraham which died, and the prophets died? whom makest thou thyself? Jesus answered, If I glorify myself, my glory is nothing; it is my Father that glorifieth me, of whom ye say, He is our God, and ye have not known him, but I know him; and if I should say I know him not, I shall be like you, a liar; but I know him, and keep his word. Abraham your father exulted to see my day, and he saw it, and rejoiced. The Jews therefore said to him, Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham? Jesus said to them, Verily, verily, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am. They took up therefore stones to cast at him; but Jesus hid himself, and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by.” (Vers. 52-59.)
Unbelief reasons from its own thoughts, and is never so confident as when completely wrong. So the Jews, misinterpreting the faithful savings of the Lord Jesus, avail themselves of it triumphantly as the proof that Abraham and the prophets could not be of His school, for they, beyond controversy, were already dead. He must be possessed, therefore, to speak thus. Did He set up to be greater than they? Whom did He make Himself? Alas! it is here that man, Jew or Gentile, is blind. Jesus made Himself nothing, emptied Himself, taking a bondman's form, becoming a man, though being God over all blessed forever, and as the humbled man exalted by God the Father. If the eye be single, the whole body is fall of light. So it was with Him who came here, and became man, to do the will of God, in whom He could, and did, confide to glorify Him. His path was one of unbroken fellowship as of obedience. He never sought His own glory, He always kept His Father's word; He could say, from first to last, I know Him; in all leaving us an example that we should follow His steps. We may learn of Him that, if it be the grossest presumption for men of the world to affect the knowledge of God the Father, it is the greatest wrong in a child of His to deny it. “If I should say I know him not, I shall be like you, a liar.” But He that claims to know Him keeps His word, and herein gives the testimony of reality along with that claim. The Spirit of truth is the Holy Spirit, and where He communicates the truth He also effectually works in holiness according to God's will.
But the Lord did not hesitate to meet the challenge of Abraham, and lets the Jew know that the father of the faithful exulted to see His day (as ever, I presume, His appearing in glory), and saw, and rejoiced. It was, of course, by faith, like the not seeing or tasting death in the context; but the Jews took all in a mere physical way, and on their arguing from His comparative youth to the denial of Abraham's seeing Him, the still deeper utterance comes forth, “Verily, verily, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.” It was said, the good confession before the Jews, the truth of truths, the infinite mystery of His Person, which to know is to know the true God and eternal life, as He is both. Such He was, such He is, from everlasting to everlasting. Incarnation in no way impeached it, but rather gave occasion for its revelation in man to men. He who was God is become man, and as He cannot cease to be God, so will not cease to be man. He is the Eternal, though also a man, and has taken manhood into union with Himself, the Son, the Word, not with God only, but God. “Before Abraham was (γενέσθαι), I am” (εἰμί). Abraham came into being. Jesus is God, and God is. “I am” is the expression of eternal subsistence, of Godhead. He could as truly have said, Before Adam was, I am; but the question was about Abraham, and with that calm dignity which never goes beyond the needed truth, He asserts it, and no more; but what He asserts could not be true were He not the ever-present and unchanging One, the I am before Adam, angels, and all things; as, indeed, He it was who created them. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that has been made.
Not to know Him is the fatal ignorance of the world; to deny Him, the unbelieving lie of the Jew, as of all who assume to know God independently, and to the exclusion of His divine glory. And it is death while they live, eternal death, soon to be the second death, not extinction, but punishment in: the lake of fire. Meanwhile unbelief can with impunity show its spite. “Then took they up stones to cast at him; but Jesus hid himself, and went out of the temple.” The remaining clauses are probably taken from Luke 4:3030But he passing through the midst of them went his way, (Luke 4:30), with the first verse of our next chapter.