It is evident that Jesus here addresses the disciples who were then around Him; but what we see there of Jesus attracts the soul to Him. What draws out the sinner and gives him confidence is that which the Holy Ghost reveals of Jesus.
I desire that we should occupy ourselves with that which is found in the first verse-that is to say, with the constancy of Christ's love-a love which nothing slackened or enfeebled. If we think what were the disciples, the world and the adversaries, we shall find that Jesus had a thousand reasons for giving up His love. We see around Him three sorts of persons-the disciples, the indifferent, and the adversaries. These last are more peculiarly the children of the devil. These are they who, seeing that the Lord is about to take the kingdom and reign over all things, say, “We will not have this man to reign over us.” There are some at the bottom of their heart have the certainty that Jesus is the Christ, and who will not have Him. The adversaries may ensnare the indifferent. All that there was in this world was calculated to destroy the love of Jesus, if He had not been perfect and unchanging; for nothing wounds love more than indifference.
Naturally we love sin, and we wish to avail ourselves of everything God has given us for satisfying our lusts. Jesus has seen all that. He has seen the disgusting state of this world, and has said, “How long shall I suffer you?” When we are in the light of God, it is thus that we judge of sin.
What parents would not desire their children to avoid the corruption which they themselves have known? It is because Jesus has known the sad state of man that grace constrained Him to come and extricate men from it. God sees everything. In His compassions He takes knowledge of all, that He may come to the relief of our wants. But what does He meet with? Indifference of heart. The heart of the natural man sees in Jesus something despicable. He cannot own his state, and he will not be indebted to God to get out of it. He prefers remaining in indifference with respect to the God who loves him. Let us remember that nothing repels love more than indifference.
Jesus met with hatred also. All those who loved not the light because their deeds were evil, hated Jesus. Pride, carnal confidence, self-will, everything in man drove God back! There was nothing in defilement, in indifference, and in hatred, which could attract the love of Jesus. This love might be punished to despair, when Jesus saw, for example, that Judas betrayed Him.
If a person were to betray us, we should be too occupied with ourselves to think of those who would not betray us. This was not the case with Jesus.
Though iniquity abounded, Jesus shows all His love; but at last His disciples also abandon Him. Those who loved Him were so selfish and so enslaved by the fear of man, that it was impossible for Jesus to reckon on them. The heart of man is such that, though he loves Jesus, yet his heart is worth nothing. Jesus had to love in the presence of a hatred which never relaxed. He loved us when we were covered with defilements, indifferent, filled with hatred for the light, and having denied Him a thousand times. He that knows himself best, knows the best how true this is. If we treated a friend as we treat Jesus, the friendship would not last long.
What a contrast we shall have if we consider how different that which Jesus found on earth is from what He enjoyed in heaven! There He found the Father's love, and in presence of this perfect love the purity of His own could not so be manifested, because it found no obstacles. But here below, remembering what He had left, He loves His own people in their very defilements. Nothing turns Him back; but these defilements draw His compassion upon them. The object of grace is where iniquity and evil are found. The indifference of His own people proved to Jesus all the extent of their wretchedness, and the need they had of Him! The very hatred of man showed that he was lost. God is come to seek man, because he is far away from the state of seeking God. What things God has borne with! What indifference, what betrayals, denials! People would be ashamed to do with Satan as they did with the Lord. Nevertheless, nothing stops Jesus- He loves His own even to the end. He acted according to what was in His heart, and all the wickedness of man was only for Him an occasion of manifesting His love.
The Lord has done all that is necessary for putting a soul into relation with God. Sinful as we are, the grace of God is come to seek us. Righteousness and law demand that evil and the evil man be taken away. John the Baptist demanded repentance. There was the beginning of grace, but pure grace, far from saying to man, Leave thy state to come to me-comes itself to man in his sin-enters into relationship with him, that God may be much more manifested than if there had been no sin whatever.
Grace applies what is in God to the need which is produced by the ruin in which we are. Jesus loves unto the end.
What a consolation to know that Jesus is all that is needed for all that we are. That sets us in what is real and true; that disposes us to confess the evil which is in us, and not to conceal it. Grace alone produces sincerity. (Psa. 32:11<<A Psalm of David, Maschil.>> Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. (Psalm 32:1).) A man who has a career to follow wishes to appear strong even when he is feeble. Grace produces the truth—makes us own our feebleness and infirmity. In Peter's place we should do what he has done, if we were not kept. Jesus loves His own, “in the world,” in their pilgrimage, in their circumstances, in spite of their wretchedness, their selfishness, and their feebleness. All that Satan could do, and all that was in man, was well calculated to hinder the love of Jesus. Nevertheless, “He loved them unto the end.”
Can you say, I have part in this love, notwithstanding my weakness: I have understood in Jesus the grace, and the manifestation of the love of the invisible God? Have you owned that it was needful Jesus should come to the world, in order that you should not go where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth Have we taken our side to acknowledge ourselves just what we are? This is disagreeable to the flesh: it is painful; it is the thorn of Paul, something which incessantly tells him, “Thou art feeble;” and this is precisely the reason why God permits that it should remain. Is the flesh sufficiently mortified in us for us to be happy, though Jesus should be all and we nothing, for us to rejoice in seeing our infirmities, since that is to display the strength of God in us?
Jesus has forgotten none of our wants. The heart set free from selfishness only thinks of the things that love desires to do. Thus it is that Jesus, on the cross, does not forget His mother, but commends her to the disciple that He loves.