3. The fact that in this hope the believer is actually clinging to a living Saviour ensures it. The charm of this hope is Christ himself. But the expectation of seeing him hereafter keeps us by his side now. And, abiding in him, we grow like him, and are preparing to stand before him at his coming.
APPLICATION.
1. Let us admire the grace of God in drawing men out of sin by the force of "this blessed hope." God does not terrify and drive, but loves and wins and saves.
2. Let us use the text as a touchstone. No pretence of hope avails apart from growth in purity. A man may, indeed, apart therefrom, have some hope, but it is not "this hope."
3. To refuse to indulge such a hope is a grievous sin, since it throws doubt upon the love of God, by insinuating that he does not care enough for his creatures to prepare such good for them as the Word reveals. Let us not thus wrong our God.
4. In the presence of such solid grounds of hope as are disclosed in the gospel, how great a wrong is done to a man's own nature when his indifference or unbelief has reduced him to such a state of hopelessness that his highest achievement is that of submitting to the inevitable. We do not know, and have no intention of trying to discover, to what degree of acquiescence in this a man may attain. But it is absolutely certain that in such a case anything approximating, anything worthy to be compared with, the "joy unspeakable and full of glory" is absolutely impossible. The peace of God can never make the face radiant with heavenly brightness when once the light of hope is gone. When there is nothing to lighten the heart there can be nothing to brighten the face.
5. And when this catastrophe occurs in human nature, the spur to purity is gone. Abstractly, a ground and reason for purity may exist quite apart from any hope of immortality. This is possible. But in actual fact, take away the hope, and life's inspiration is gone! It becomes forthwith a mere question of time as to how soon the hopeless one will succumb to the maxim, "Let us eat and drink; for tomorrow we die!"
Sinning in every way incompatible with the Christian life.
Connecting link: The apostle had just said that every one with the Christian hope would purify himself" as Christ the Lord is pure." As if to guard this absolutely universal statement, "every one," against the possibility of question, he goes on to illustrate the varied aspects of sin—in its bearing on law; as regards the Person and work of Christ; as related to the new life of the children of God; and with reference to the everlasting statute of the gospel. Thus giving an overwhelming force to the doctrine indicated by the topic before us. Topic—Sinning impossible to the children of God.£ The apostle deals here, not with detailed sins, but with sinning; not with isolated acts (if, indeed, there can be any such), but with the continuous life of sinning. As ὁ ποιῶν τὴν δικαιοσύνην is "one who lives a life of righteousness," so ὁ ποιῶν τὴν ἁμαρτίαν is "one who lives a life of sin." Terrible thought (and yet how true to fact!) that of living a life which is all sin, without any righteousness in it at all! The man who lives for self-pleasing rather than for the sake of pleasing God—who consults his fancies, and not his duty; who cares only for himself, and not at all for his brother—is living in sin every day and all the day long, however glossy his external self may seem. It is to the manifold contrarieties of such a life that the apostle here calls our attention. Let us look at such a life—
I. AS IT CONCERNS THE LAW OF GOD. "Sin is the transgression of law;" literally, "lawlessness." "It is," says Westcott, "the assertion of the selfish will against a paramount authority. He who sins breaks, not only by accident or in an isolated detail, but essentially, the 'Law' which he was created to fulfill"—of right government of self, of concern for our brother, of loyalty to God. Hence the spirit of the Law is broken in its entirety, whatever form the details of his life may assume.
II. AS IT CONCERNS THE CHRIST HIMSELF. (1 John 3:5.)
1. As to his person. "In him there is no sin." How black does a sinful, selfish life appear by the side of the life of the Lord Jesus Christ!
2. As to his work. "He was manifested to take away sins;" not only (as Paul shows in Romans 3:1-31) to demonstrate God's righteousness in forgiving sin, but also "to take away sins£ "(Revised Version)—to remove them altogether. To this end his whole earthly manifestation was directed, from the manger to the cross. And in thus doing, he would destroy "the works of the devil," who "sinneth from the beginning" (cf. John 12:31; Colossians 2:15; Hebrews 2:14, Hebrews 2:15). Hence it is clear that one who is leading a sinful life is in constant opposition to the Person, will, and work of the Son of God!
III. AS IT CONCERNS THE NEW BIRTH AS A DIVINE PRODUCT.
2. It is altogether opposed to the true knowledge of Christ (1 John 3:6).
3. It is contrary to the features which always mark God's children (1 John 3:10). God's children are re-born—born to a life of righteousness and love. Hence (1 John 3:9) whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for the seed of another life is in him.
4. It is impossible to a child of God. "He cannot sin, because he is born of God." Impossibility of sinning is one mark of the new birth. "He cannot sin." Blessed inability! Cannot be sinning, or living a life out of harmony with God's will and Word. Cannot! Why? Because in the new product of God's Spirit the principle of righteousness is so active that a sinning life is entirely out of the question. Virtue is so strong that it expels its opposite. A true child of God cannot be in alienation of spirit from his Father in heaven, even for one moment. So an honest servant cannot steal, a faithful husband cannot be unfaithful. One passionately fond of accuracy cannot be systematically inaccurate. So, also a child of God cannot be opposed to his Father's will, simply because, ex hypothesi, the product of the new birth is a child who will will as his Father wills. Into errors of judgment he may fall, by sudden gusts of temptation he may be overtaken and so surprised into a fault; but from sin, from the sin of living alien to God, he was delivered once and for ever, when, by the change in his nature, he was born again! He was "renewed… after the image of him that created him."
IV. THE SINNING LIFE IS OPPOSED TO THE EVERLASTING STATUTE OF THE GOSPEL. So the apostle argues here. The sinning life is one of lawlessness, one of selfishness. Unlovingness and unrighteousness are not of God. He who drifts away from loyalty to God will soon drift away also from consideration to man. Disloyal self-will Godward, breeds selfish isolation manward. And this is contrary to the commandment that we heard" from the beginning," i.e., from the beginning of Divine revelation (Genesis 9:9), or from the beginning of our Saviour's teaching (Matthew 5:44), or from the beginning of our Christian profession (Galatians 6:10). Consequently, one who receives and obeys the gospel began to unlearn selfishness the moment he was won for God. He is bound by his Lord's precepts to do good unto all men.£
INFERENCES AND APPLICATION.
1. How very serious a matter sin is! It is not a mere question of a few wrong deeds, but of a false bias of the will, which turns the entire life into a wrong channel. E.g. think of the prodigal son. During his guilty wanderings he may have been entirely faithful to the citizen who hired him, but he was sinning against his father all the while he was away from him. So the disloyal man. He may do acts that are right as towards A and B and C but so long as he is disloyal to God, he is sinning against him all the while.
2. How manifold are the forces employed against sin! A Law to condemn it, a Saviour to redeem from it, a Spirit to destroy it, a gospel to testify against it, a whole family of new-born sons to be living witnesses of his deliverance from its power.
3. How blessed and honourable to be a child of God, and so to be numbered among the forces which God would bring to bear against sin! God's children are enlisted on his side, that they may be workers together with their Father in declaring eternal war against sin. Even under the Mosaic economy this principle was recognized. Jehovah called for the united voice of the people to join with him in branding sin with a curse (see homily on Deuteronomy 27:1-26). But then the more prominent force was a law without; now it is a life within.
4. How distinctively Divine is the life of the true child of God! and how clear and manifest a proof of the reality of redemption and of regeneration! Of the former, because he is redeemed out of the region of sin altogether; of the latter, because a new life, higher than nature knows, has been actually begotten in him, and is being sustained by the power of God.
5. How sure the triumph of God's children! They have to fight against the world's selfishness and sin, and in doing this they fight along with One who was manifested that he might destroy the works of the devil. The purport of that manifestation shall be realized; and when their Lord triumphs, his victory will be theirs.
6. What a sorry outlook for those who are not the children of God! What can they be thinking of to fight against so much? But all I they do not think. They pause not to ask—What am I doing? How forlorn their prospect! Alien from God, rushing against his Law, neglecting his gospel, despising the Son of God: to what humiliation and destruction are they rushing on? Siding with the evil one, like him they must be cast down (Luke 10:18) and cast out (John 12:31).
The world's hatred of Christians.
Connecting link: In setting forth the broad contrast between sin and righteousness, the apostle had taken occasion to refer to Cain as the earliest illustration of the wide gulf between the two. The violent contrast between him and his brother generated as violent an antipathy on his part towards him. And even now the contrast between sin and righteousness is just as wide as ever. From the very nature of the case they are an immeasurable distance asunder; so that it is not to be wondered at if a sinful world chafes under the silent and effective rebuke administered to it by the lives of holy men, and if in consequence thereof hatred is felt by men of the world towards the living Church of God. For our part, says the apostle, we know it is so, because we used to cherish it ourselves; and if now we love the brethren, it is because we have undergone so great a change that it is no less than passing from death unto life. And even though that hatred which we once felt may never have broken out into a murderous act, yet that hatred itself is the very germ out of which such an act would develop itself; and hence, in the eye of God, he that hateth his brother is a murderer; and you know, certainly and absolutely, that no man, desiring to kill his brother, has an eternal life abiding in him. The whole passage reminds us of John 15:13-21, with which it should be compared. Topic—The world's hatred of Christians no surprising fact.
I. LET US LOOK AT THE CASE HERE SUPPOSED. "If the world hate you." Close analysis will yield us several distinct facts here.
1. There is a society of brethren in Christ. "You." There is evidently a fellowship of believers in Jesus, who, having passed from death unto life, naturally magnetized each other, and came together by the mutual attraction of the spiritual life they shared in common.
2. There is an outside world, composed of those who are of the earth, earthy, out of which these believers have been drawn, and from which they have become separated. While "the brethren" are among the living, the outer "world" is still among the dead.£
3. Those who had been gathered out of the world devoted themselves to testifying against its sin, and to the manifestation of another and a purer life.
4. This double condemnation of the world's sin—that of witness-bearing on behalf of One who came to take it away, and that of the silent condemnation of a holy life—roused the hostility of the world (cf. John 16:1, John 16:2; John 15:18-25).
II. LET US INQUIRE IF THE CASE HERE SUPPOSED HAS ANY PRESENT-DAY PARALLEL. Does "the world" really hate Christians now? Is not the time past and gone for anything of the kind? Certainly there is a very great difference, on the surface at any rate, between "the world" as we know it and as the Apostle John knew it. And as certainly there is a vast difference between the Church life of our days and that of his. It is well, therefore, that we should set distinctly and clearly before us the thing as it exists under our own eye. How are we to apportion the two apparently contradictory propositions—
1. There are some professors, and possibly some Churches, that there is no likelihood of the world's ever hating, since, though baptized into the Christian name, they are entirely worldly in spirit—they have but a name to live. They will never convert, nor startle, nor disturb the world. They will be deemed "highly respectable" and "inoffensive." They will never be hated.
2. A true Christian even, and a true Church, may be so lacking in outspoken testimony for God's truth, and in aggressive attacks on the world's sin, that they arouse no hostility whatever. And in such a case they will be allowed to pursue their course in peace.
3. Further, it is certainly the case that, with the advance of civilization, the old element of a personal hatred is very largely modified; to persecute any man for his religious faith, or for a holy Christian life, would not be tolerated now m any social circle where there is clue regard for the laws of mutual courtesy.
4. Consequently, whatever dislike there may be in the world to the doctrines of the gospel, it will now show itself less towards men than towards systems. And when we come to this point, it is abundantly clear that hatred, and a virulent hatred, too, exists on the part of the world towards the doctrines maintained in the Church. The dislike will vary in detail according to the standpoint of the individual. The worldling will hate the demands for a life consecrated to Christ. The formalist will hate what he calls "Puritanism." The easy-going man will hate the call to strive to enter in at the strait gate. The rationalist will hate the doctrine of the atonement. The man of "broad thought" will hate the exclusive claims of the Saviour. The scientist will hate the suggestion that an Infinite Will rules all. The philosopher will scorn the doctrine of the Incarnation. The positivist will refuse to rise to the hyper-phenomenal. The agnostic will prefer his ignorance, because he hates to receive the kingdom of God as a little child. The free-thinker will hate to subject his thinking to the supreme laws of righteousness. In all these ways men "hate the doctrine of the cross."
5. Nevertheless, though the hatred ordinarily is more towards systems than men, yet, let any man move out of the common, methods, of easy-going Christianity and set forth on a crusade for some Christian doctrine or against some antichristian heresy;—let him expose and condemn men's favourite sins,—and no one among men will be hated more intensely than he! Illustrations are ready to hand in abundance. Revivalists: dead Churches and dead ministers intensely hate living ones. Temperance reformers, etc. Those who expose the crying sins of covetousness, landlordism, land monopoly, etc. In a word, let but a man aim at bringing gospel doctrine to bear on needed social reform in every direction, the old-world greed will assert itself, and Faithful will have all the showmen in Vanity Fair wishing he were dead!
6. So that, practically, the whole matter may be summed up thus: The world, even if more refined in manner (as it most certainly is) than it was in John's time, yet is as self-willed, as selfish, as indisposed to the yoke of Christ as ever. If we are faithful in bearing testimony for God, we shall meet with our share of hatred. If we were more faithful, we should have the more hatred to endure. True, we have a large number of Christ's followers to speed us on, and so may present a larger front to the enemy; consequently, the hatred will be less felt by the individual—so many will share it with him. And it follows that, unless we make the world wince and writhe under our rebuke of its faithlessness towards God and its wrongs towards man, we are not truly representing him whose we are and whom we are pledged to serve.
Love others, for God hath loved thee!
Connecting link: The great contrast has been presented between the love abiding in those who have passed from death unto life and the enmity abiding in the world. That hatred has been illustrated by a reference to Cain, and believers are told they must not be surprised if the murderous spirit still survives. The apostle then reverts to his favourite theme—love. He seems to say, "As for us, we have learnt a different lesson. We have come to know ἐγνώκα 'the love' [the words 'of God' are not in the Greek nor the Revised Version] the supreme love in the universe. The lesson it has taught us is that we ought to love as God loves. He [emphatic] laid down his life for us: we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren." Divine love has not merely been taught us merely in a book, or by teachers, but in the most stupendous act of self-sacrifice that was possible either in heaven or on earth. If, after this, any one can close up his heart against a needy brother, it is too clear that no love, either of God, or like to God's, dwells in him. Be it ours to show, as God has shown, that with us, love is not merely in word, but also in power. Topic—The supreme love: its act and its lessons.
I. LET US STUDY LOVE'S GREATEST ACT. "He ἐκεῖνος laid down his life for us." We have already had one study in God's love (homily on 1 John 3:2). But the theme is exhaustless. The precise point here is that by what God has done for us we have come to learn the supreme love; such a love as outshines all else—a love which is not only unique as a model, but also as a creative power! Nine features thereof may here be suggested.
1. Love in its highest origin. God (cf. 1 John 4:10).
2. Love's manifestation. Through the Son.
3. Love's channel. The incarnate Son.
4. Love's method. "Laid down his life."
5. Love's meaning in its method. "A propitiation" (1 John 2:1, 1 John 2:2; 1 John 4:10); "A demonstration of righteousness" (Romans 3:20, Romans 3:21); "An offering for sin" (Hebrews 9:26-28).
6. Love under strangest circumstances. "When we were yet sinners" (Romans 5:8); "Ye who sometime were alienated," etc. (Colossians 1:21; cf. Romans 5:6).
7. Love's extent. "A propitiation for… the sins of the whole world" (1 John 2:2); "He died for all" (2 Corinthians 5:15).
8. Love's intent. To save from sin. To purify. To remove for ever the one stumbling-block and bar to human progress. To see men perfect (cf. Ephesians 5:25-28; Colossians 1:26-28; Titus 2:14). This—this is love; this is the love; herein is love. This is the supreme lesson taught us in Christ—that the supreme energy is infinite, eternal, boundless, out-gushing love! Mr. Herbert Spencer tells us that "amid the mysteries which become the more mysterious the more they are thought about, there will remain the one absolute certainty that we are ever in presence of an Infinite and Eternal Energy, from which all things proceed". Where the agnostic ends, acknowledging that there is an Infinite Energy, though he knows not what it is, the gospel messenger begins, and says, "That Energy I declare unto you." The Infinite Energy is a self-existing, self-outpouring love!—a love that makes the greatest possible sacrifice in order to redeem the lost!
II. LET US LEARN LOVE'S GREATEST LESSON. How much the lesson of love needed to be taught can only be learnt from the study of the period at which the Apostle John wrote.£ The space at our disposal forbids our doing more than to refer the student to works touching thereon. This love of God for man is seen to have a fivefold effect.
1. It teaches new truth about man.
(a) of removing obstructions to human advancement, whether
( α) from within or
( β) from without; and
(b) of creating and sustaining such new forces as will raise him in the scale of being.
2. It creates a new duty, viz. that of laying ourselves out for others. "And we ought," etc. The vastly higher plane to which the revelation of Divine love lifted human nature, ipso facto made the claims of manhood on redeemed and sanctified man enormously greater than before. It warranted and even demanded the "enthusiasm of humanity." The measure of self-devotion to others' weal, indicated in the words, "we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren," is very far greater than the phrase just quoted implies. The Church of God has "left its first love;" a return to it would revolutionize and regenerate society.
3. It becomes a new inspiration in man. Of this the text, looked at historically, is a proof. Such precepts as it contains were never considered a part of human duty till God so loved the world. The apostles and the early Christians had learnt of God to love one another and to do good unto all men.£
4. It at once led to the adoption of a new test of character. E.g., take the case of a rich man and a poor one—of Dives and Lazarus. "Whoso hath this world's good βίος, and seeth his brother have need," etc. In such a hard-hearted one it is perfectly clear the love of God does not dwell, i.e., either the love which is like God's, or which he imparts, or which he commands, or of which he is the Object. For love to God is nothing if it be not loyal. He commands us to love our brethren. Therefore, if we do not, we cannot truly love God.
5. It supplies a new and tender persuasive plea. "Let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth." In every case our love is to become a practical power. If a man, out of passionate love for his Lord, spends his strength in defending the doctrines of the gospel, it is so far well. But in doing this, his work is but half-done. He is equally bound to devote himself to insisting on the practice of the gospel, and to inspire men to practical philanthropy as well as to penitence and faith. And while the former ages have been those in which Christian doctrines had
We confess we are jealous for the honour of our glorious faith. We see men by thousands deserting the Christian camp because they think Christianity has nothing to say to the temporal concerns of working men. We see secularists and others taking up such questions, and coming to the front as the working men's benefactors! and all because we Christians have so much more ground yet to occupy in working out and solving the social problems of the age.£ Oh! let us to the fore at once in God's Name, and, inspired by everlasting love, let us show to men of every class and calling that while there is not a sin of man against man which the gospel does not condemn, neither is there a right of man which the gospel does not press on his behalf, when it summons us to be "imitators of him" who laid down his life to save our race.
The privileges of Christian loyalty.
Connecting link: The ἔν τούτῳ with which our present paragraph begins is the connecting link between the material of this homily and that of the last. It connects the privileges here specified with the duties there enjoined. No verses of the Epistles of John lead us more into the very heart-work of religion than do these; nor are there any the construction of which is so complex, and the exact meaning thereof less easy to ascertain. We have no space to reproduce here the exegesis of the various clauses. [The reader will turn for that to the Exposition. Westcott's remarks thereon are finely discriminating and clear.] We do but give the results of our own anxious study. This we will do by a paraphrase of the four verses, the meaning of which, as we understand them, can be thus expressed: "By means of such a life of self-devotion to man for God's sake, we shall come to know that we are of the truth, and shall be able to cherish a calm persuasion of heart towards him in whose presence we habitually and consciously move. We may, indeed, often be condemned by our own hearts for constantly falling short of our ideal; still, God is greater than our heart, and knows all things, and can estimate the desire even when the execution is defective. Or if, as may be the case, we cannot reproach ourselves with any conscious divergence from his will, we can then open our lips freely in our addresses to God; and not only so, but he will open his hands freely to us, in answer to our prayers, knowing that it is our reverent care and study to obey his commands and to do habitually what will please him." Topic—A life of studied loyalty to God is one of highest privilege. The case supposed here is that a believer carries out his love to God by a self-abandoning devotion to his brother-man. He makes it his reverent concern to obey every precept, and, living as in the sight of God, habitually aims at being well-pleasing to him. Surely it is not surprising if such have some privileges and enjoyments that others know nothing of. Not that they are regarded as payments for any meritorious act; that is quite out of the question. They are privileges conferred on one who is stirred by the Spirit of God to a life of devoted and exact obedience to the Father's will. What are they? The apostle specifies six.
I. A SURE STEP. "We shall know that we are of the truth." It is not possible for the heart in loving loyalty to God to doubt if it be the right thing to follow God's commands. Many other points may be doubtful, but not this!
II. A RESTFUL HEART. "We shall assure our hearts before him." There will be a holy confidence of uprightness; and the believer knows well that God is not a hard Master. It is much easier to please God than to please the dearest friend on earth! "The Lord taketh pleasure in them that fear him."
III. A CONFIDING EYE. ἔμπροσθεν αὐτοῦ, "before him;" as in his sight. As a loving, trustful child aiming to please his father looks up with placid confidence to catch the glance of his father's eye, delighted to think of its loving vigilance, so the child of God lives as before the eye of his Father in heaven, happy beyond expression to think that that eye is ever upon him. He looks up to catch the Father's smile; the Father looks down to watch the child's upturned glance.
IV. A LOVING REFERENCE TO HIS FATHER WHEN A SENSE OF FAILURE BURDENS HIS SOUL. There will be times when the child's heart chides him that he has fallen so far below his own ideal and desire£ (verse 20). Well, his Father knows how far, better than the child does. But if the habitual set of the life is towards pleasing God, he can rely upon his father's love in any case of faultiness of detail, assured that he who said," The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak," will be the kindest possible Judge of the acts of an obedient child.£
"There is no place where earth's sorrows
Are so felt as up in heaven;
There is no place where earth's failings
Have such kindly judgment given."
He would rather have his very faultiness estimated by God than by the kindest friend on earth. Very likely he will be reproaching himself that he has not wrought deeds more worthy of God; but even then he can say with infinite content, "Lord, thou knowest all things;" and in the perfect judgment of the All-seeing he is content lovingly to leave the estimate and the award.
V. A FREE TONGUE. It may be that his heart does not condemn him with a sense of conscious failure. He may be able to use Paul's words (1 Corinthians 4:4). In such a case he will have παῤῥησία freedom of speech towards God. He will be able to unburden his whole soul, without restraint, to his Father in heaven, and pour forth words that he would on no account whatever utter in a human ear. But what an infinite relief to be able to pour out the whole burden of one's soul to a Friend who will never misunderstand us! No such freedom of speech as this can we have elsewhere than before God; and only there when loyally living to please God.
VI. A FULL HAND. Free words to God; free gifts from God. Such is the order (verse 22). "Whatsoever we ask, we receive of him." Happy the man who can get everything he asks for! No, not necessarily. If he were to ask for a bane, thinking it would be a boon, it would be anything but a blessing to him to receive it. But the remarkable statement at the beginning of verse 22 is qualified, or rather fenced round and guarded from abuse. Of whom is this true? The children of God, not of men indiscriminately. Under what circumstances is it true? When they keep his commandments, and do those things which are pleasing in his sight. How, then, does it become true? Obviously
1. There are vast privileges to be enjoyed by man. But God will not fling them away indiscriminately.
2. There is an infinite reasonableness in the connection between duty and privilege laid down in this text.
3. Although the salvation of each and all is freely bestowed on the ground of Divine grace alone, yet the fullness of that salvation, the measure of enjoyment therein, and the degree of freedom with which he can hold fellowship with God, will depend on the exactitude and the measure of his loyalty (Matthew 5:19; 1 Corinthians 3:8).
Outward precept and inward life.
Connecting link: The word ἐντολὴ which marked the preceding verse, is caught up in this, and the life of obedience thereto, which had been shown to be the condition of freedom in fellowship with God and of success in prayer, is here declared to be the seal and fruit of the living Spirit, creating and sustaining an inward life corresponding to the outward rule. Topic—The life enjoined by the command of Christ a seal of the indwelling of the Spirit of Christ. The following order of thought is suggested.
I. THE PRECEPTS OF OUR LORD MAY RE SUMMED UP IN TWO.
1. That we should believe in the Name of his Son Jesus Christ. The title here given to Christ is "a compressed creed" (Westcott); comp. John 1:12. The man who believes in Christ is one to which the privilege of becoming a child of God belongs, as the apostle had taught in his Gospel (see also John 6:28, John 6:29). This faith in Christ is here regarded as the basis on which the second duty rests.
2. That we should love one another. The first includes the sum of religion Godward; the latter, the whole of practical Christianity manward. The second is in every way so obviously admirable that many contend for it who yet ignore the first. But it will be found, practically, that the two cannot be disjoined. Such love to men as Christ commands never has been, will be, or can be sustained apart from faith in Christ. No building can be put up without a foundation, however admirably its outline may be drawn on paper. The cross is love's inspiration as well as its model.
II. WHERE THERE IS HABITUAL OBEDIENCE TO BOTH COMMANDS, THERE IS A LIVING UNION BETWEEN THE SOUL AND GOD. (John 1:24.)
1. Man abides in God by faith and fellowship.
2. God abides in man by the indwelling of the Holy Ghost (1 Corinthians 3:16; Ephesians 2:22).
III. THIS FRUITFUL INDWELLING OF THE SPIRIT IS THE SEAL OF GOD'S LIFE IN THE SOUL. When by an inspiration net of man nor by man we are led to a life which is above and beyond nature, "we know that be abides in us." The Spirit which he gave us when we believed (Ephesians 1:13) is the seal to us of God's own life. His command used to be an outside letter, bidding us to live a life that was high above us. Now we have an inward force, inspiring a life that conforms to the letter! In a word, God's Spirit in the soul brings about, in actual life, what the precept enjoins. By the Word we were taught that such a life was the right one to lead. By the Spirit we are so inspired that we cannot lead any other! Note:
1. The Law without is a great gift. The Spirit within is a greater. It is a blessing to be shown the right way. It is a greater blessing to be disposed to walk therein.
2. As we all have the blessing of the Word, since we know there is a greater one obtainable, ought we not to seek for it? For observe:
3. The gift of the Holy Ghost, albeit it is the greatest possible blessing, is precisely that of which we may make most sure, when sought by fervent prayer.
4. Let those who have the Spirit of God seek for a richer fullness of his indwelling power.£ The more of the Holy Ghost we have, the easier will it be to obey; and just as it is the penitent's duty to receive pardon from Christ by faith, even so it is the believer's duty to receive the Spirit from him by faith.
HOMILIES BY W. JONES
1 John 3:1
"Behold what manner of love!"
Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us," etc.! The "behold" summons our attention to the kind of love which God has given to us. It is not the greatness of the love, but the "manner of love," that we are called to contemplate. And the nature of this love is to be inferred from its expression; hence St. John says "that we should be called children of God." God has bestowed his love upon us; not simply the gifts of it, or the proof of it, but itself. Yet of what kind it is can only be discovered from its manifestations. He has given to us not only streams of blessing, but the very fountain of blessing; yet we can know the nature of the fountain only from the streams which flow from it. Thus let us meditate upon the love of the Divine Father to us as it is exhibited in the text.