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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Quiet Talks on John's Gospel, by S. D. Gordon
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Quiet Talks on John's Gospel
+
+Author: S. D. Gordon
+
+Release Date: February 26, 2005 [EBook #15185]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK QUIET TALKS ON JOHN'S GOSPEL ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Distributed Proofreaders
+
+
+
+
+
+Quiet Talks on _John's Gospel_
+
+By
+
+S. D. Gordon
+
+
+
+
+1915
+
+
+
+
+Preface
+
+
+
+_Everything depends on getting Jesus placed._ That lies at the root of
+all--living, serving, preaching, teaching. John had Jesus placed. He had
+Him up in His own place. This settles everything else. Then one gets
+himself placed, too, up on a level where the air is clear and bracing,
+the sun warm, and the outlook both steadying and stimulating. Get the
+centre fixed and things quickly adjust themselves about it to your eyes.
+
+It will be seen very quickly that this little book makes no pretension
+to being a commentary on, or an exposition of, John's Gospel. That is
+left to the scholarly folk who eat their meals in the sacred classical
+languages of the past. It is simply a homely attempt to let out a little
+of what has been sifting in these years past of this wondrous miniature
+Bible from John's pen.
+
+The proportions of this homely little messenger of paper and type may
+seem a little odd at first. The longest chapter is devoted to only the
+opening eighteen verses of John, the prologue. While the whole of the
+first twelve chapters of John, excepting that prologue, is brought into
+one smaller chapter. It wasn't planned so, though I felt it coming as
+the wondrous mood of this book came down over me. I think it mast be
+the effect of the atmosphere of John's book.
+
+Sometimes John packs so much in so little space, and again he goes so
+particularly into the details of some one incident. The prologue is a
+miniature Bible. The whole Bible story is there in its cream. And on the
+other hand John spends five chapters (xiii.-xvii.), almost a fifth of
+the whole, on a single evening. He devotes seven chapters (xiii.-xix.),
+almost a third of all, on the events of twenty-four hours. John is
+controlled not by mere proportion of space or quantity, but by the finer
+proportions of thought and quality.
+
+It has been difficult to hold these homely talks down to the limit of
+space they take here. So many veins of gold in this mine, showing
+clearly large nuggets of pure ore, lie just at hand untouched in this
+little mining venture. But it seemed clearly best to get the one clear
+grasp of the whole. That helps so much. But there'll be strong
+temptation to get one's pick and spade and go at this gold mine again.
+
+But now these things are written that we common folk may understand a
+bit better, and in a warm way, that Jesus was God on a wooing errand to
+the earth; and that we may join the blest company of the won ones, and
+become co-wooers with God of the others.
+
+S. D. G.
+
+
+
+
+Contents
+
+
+
+I. John's Story
+
+II. The Wooing Lover
+
+     Who it was that came.
+
+III. The Lover Wooing
+
+     A group of pictures illustrating how the wooing was done and how
+     the Lover was received.
+
+IV. Closer Wooing
+
+     An evening with opening hearts: the story of a supper and a walk in
+     the moonlight and the shadows.
+
+V. The Greatest Wooing
+
+     A night and a day with hardening hearts: the story of tender
+     passion and of a terrible tragedy.
+
+VI. An Appointed Tryst Unexpectedly Kept
+
+     A day of startling joyous surprises.
+
+VII. Another Tryst
+
+     A story of fishing, of guests at breakfast, and of a walk and talk
+     by the edge of blue Galilee.
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+John's Story
+
+
+
+
+    "I fled Him, down the nights and down the days;
+      I fled Him, down the arches of the years;
+    I fled Him down the labyrinthine ways
+      Of my own mind; and in the midst of tears
+    I hid from Him, and under running laughter.
+          Up vistaed hopes, I sped;
+          And shot, precipitated,
+    Adown Titanic glooms of chasméd fears,
+      From those strong Feet that followed, followed after."
+
+    --_Francis Thompson, in "The Hound of Heaven_."
+
+"These are written that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son
+of God; and that believing ye may have life in his name."--_John xx.
+31_.
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+John's Story
+
+
+
+The Heart-strings of God.
+
+
+There's a tense tugging at the heart of God. The heart-strings of God
+are tight, as tight as tight can be. For there's a tender heart that's
+easily tugged at one end, and an insistent tugging at the other. The
+tugging never ceases. The strings never slack. They give no signs of
+easing or getting loose.
+
+It's the tug of man's sore need at the down-end, the man-end, of the
+strings. And it's the sore tug of grief over the way things are going on
+down here with men, at the other end, the up-end, the heart-end, of the
+strings. It's the tense pull-up of a love that grows stronger with the
+growth of man's misunderstanding.
+
+But the heart-strings never snap. The heart itself breaks under the
+tension of love and grief, grieved and grieving love. But the strings
+only strengthen and tighten under the strain of use.
+
+Those heart-strings are a bit of the heart they're tied to, an inner
+bit, aye the innermost bit, the inner heart of the heart. They are the
+bit pulled, and pulled more, and pulled harder, till the strings grew.
+Man was born in the warm heart of God. Was there ever such a womb! Was
+there ever such another borning, homing place!
+
+It was man's going away that stretched the heart out till the strings
+grew. The tragedy of sin revealed the toughness and tenderness of love.
+For that heart never let go of the man whom it borned. Man tried to pull
+away, poor thing. In his foolish misunderstanding and heady wilfulness
+he tried to cut loose. If he had known God better he would never have
+tried that. He'd never have _started_ away; and he'd never have tried to
+_get_ away.
+
+For love never faileth. A heart--the real thing of a heart, that is,
+God's heart--never lets go. It breaks; but let go? not once: never yet.
+The breaking only loosens the red that glues fast with a tighter hold
+than ever. The fibre of the heart--God's heart--is made of too strong
+stuff to loosen or wear out or snap. Love never faileth. It can't;
+because it's love.
+
+Now all this explains Jesus. It was man's pull on these heart-strings
+that brought Him down. The pull was so strong and steady. It grew tenser
+and more insistent. And straight down He came by the shortest way, the
+way of those same heart-strings. For the heart-strings of God are the
+shortest distance between two given points, the point of God's giving,
+going love, and the point of man's sore need, given a sharper-pointed
+end by its very soreness.
+
+It is a sort of blind pull, this pull of man on the heart of God; a
+confused, unconscious, half-conscious, dust-blinded, slippery-road sort
+of pulling, but one whose tight grip never slacks. Man needs God, but
+does not know it. He knows he needs _some_thing. He feels that keenly.
+But he does not know that it's God whom he needs, with a very few rare
+exceptions. It doesn't seem to have entered his head that he'll never
+get out of his tight corner till God gets him out.
+
+Down the street of life he goes, eyes blinded by the thick dust, ears
+deafened by the cries of the crowd, by the noise of the street without,
+and the noise of passions and fevered ambitions within, heart a-wearied
+by the confusion of it all, groping, stumbling, jostled and jostling,
+hitting this way and that, with the fever high in his blood, and his
+feet aching and bleeding; sometimes the polish of culture on the
+surface; _some_times rags and dirt; but underneath the same thing.
+
+Yet under all there's a vague but very real feeling of that unceasing
+pull upward upon His heart-strings. But though blind and vague and
+confused that tugging is never the less tense, but ever more, and then
+yet more.
+
+Jesus was God answering the tug of man's need on His heart-strings. And
+so naturally there was an answering feel in man's heart. Man felt the
+answer a-coming. There was a great stir in the spirit-currents of earth
+when Jesus came. A thrill of expectancy ran through the world, Roman,
+Greek, Barbarian, far and wide, as Jesus drew near. The book-makers of
+that time all speak of it. It was the vibration of those same
+heart-strings connecting man and God.
+
+The move at God's end was felt at man's. The coming down along the
+highway of the strings thrilled and stirred and awed the hearts into
+which those strings led, and where they were so tightly knotted. The
+earth-currents spread the news. Man heard; he felt; he knew: vaguely,
+blindly, wearily, yet very really he heard and felt and recognized that
+help, a Friend, some One, was nearing.
+
+And then when Jesus walked among men how He did pull upon their hearts!
+So quietly He went about. So sympathetically He looked and listened. So
+warm was the human touch of His hand. So strong was the lift of His arm
+to ease their load. So potent was the spell of His unfailing power to
+give relief. How He did pull! And how men did answer to that pull!
+Unresistingly, eagerly, as weary child in mother's arms at close of day,
+they came crowding to Him.
+
+
+
+The Fourfold Message.
+
+
+It is fascinating to find one book in this old Book of God given up
+wholly to telling of this, John's Gospel. Of course the whole of the
+Book is really given up to it, when one gets the whole simple view of it
+at one glance. But so many of us don't get that whole simple glance.
+
+So to make it easier for us simple common folk, and to make sure of our
+getting it, there is one little book, hardly big enough to call a book,
+just a few pages devoted wholly to letting us see this one thing. You
+can see the whole of the sun in a single drop of water. You can see the
+whole of the Book of God in this one little book that John wrote.
+
+John's Gospel is like the small tracing of the artist's pen on the
+lower corner of an etching, the remarque, put there as a signature, the
+artist's personal mark that the picture is genuine, the real thing. The
+whole consummate skill of the artist is revealed at a glance in the
+simple outline-tracing on the margin. The whole of the God-story in the
+larger picture of the whole Book is given in few simple clear lines in
+this exquisite little thing commonly called John's Gospel.
+
+It is striking to make the discovery that John's little book has _a
+distinctive message as a book_. It is full of messages, of course. But I
+mean that there is a distinct story told by the book as a whole, by the
+very way it is put together. It is told by the very sort of language
+used, the words chosen as the leading words of the book. It is told by
+the picture that clearly fills John's eye as he writes, and by the very
+spirit that floods the pages as a soft light, and that breaks out of
+them as the subtle fragrance of locust blossoms in the spring.
+
+The fragrance of flowers cannot be analyzed: it must be smelled and
+felt. That's the only way you'll ever know it. The fine scholarly
+analyses of John are helpful. But there's the subtler something that
+cannot be diagramed or analyzed or synthesized. It eludes the
+razor-edged knife, and the keenly critical survey. It is recognized only
+by one's spirit, and then only when the spirit is warm, and in tune with
+John's.
+
+Of course each of the Gospel stories has a message of its own, quite
+apart from the group of facts common to them all. And these four
+messages together give us the fuller distinctive message of these four
+little books. And a very winsome message it is, too, that takes hold of
+one's heart, and takes a warm strong hold at that.
+
+_Matthew_ tells us that Jesus is a _King_. For a great purpose He chose
+to live as a peasant, as one of the common folks. But He was of the
+blood royal. He has the long unbroken kingly lineage. He showed kingly
+power in His actions, kingly wisdom in His teachings, and the fine
+kingly spirit in His gracious kindliness of touch. He was gladly
+accepted and served as King by those who understood Him best. He was
+acknowledged as King by the Roman Governor; and He died as a King, and
+as a King was laid in a newly hewn tomb.
+
+_Mark_ adds a fine touch to this picture, a warm touch with colour in
+it,--this King of ours is _a serving King_. This comes not only with a
+warm feel, but it comes as a distinct surprise. Men's kings are _served_
+kings. There have been kings, and are, who rendered their people a fine
+high service, and do. But the overpowering impression given the common
+crowd watching on the street is that kings are superior beings, to be
+waited upon, humbly bowed to, and implicitly obeyed. They are to be
+served.
+
+Bat Mark's picture shows us a King whose passion is to serve. The
+service which He draws out of His followers is drawn out by His warm
+serving spirit towards us. The words on the royal coat-of-arms are, "Not
+to be ministered unto, but to minister." And in the first meaning of the
+words He Himself used that means "not to be _served_ but to _serve_." In
+Mark the air is tense with rapid action. The quick executive movement of
+a capable servant is felt in the terse words short sentences and swift
+action of the story.
+
+There's yet warmer colouring in _Luke's_ picture. This serving King is
+_nearest of kin to us!_ He is not only of the blood royal, but of the
+blood human. He is bone of our bone, blood of our blood, and life of our
+common life. He came to us through a rare union of God's power with
+human consent and human function, never known before nor repeated since.
+This is the bit that Luke adds to the composite message of these four
+little God-story books.
+
+Here Jesus has a tenderness of human sympathy with us men, for He and we
+are brothers. There's an outlook as broad as the race. No national
+boundaries limit its reach. No sectional prejudices warp or shut Him off
+from sympathetic touch with any. He shares our common life. He knows our
+human temptations, and knows them with a reality that is painful, and
+with an intensity that wets His brow and shuts His jaw hard.
+
+This king who serves is _a man_. He _can_ be a king of men for He is a
+_man_. He has the first qualification. I might use an old-fashioned word
+in the first old-time meaning,--He is _a fellow_, one who shares the
+bed and bread of our common experience. And so He is _kin to us_, both
+in lineage and in experience, in blood and in spirit.
+
+And John's share in this partnership message adds a simple bold touch of
+colouring that makes the picture a masterpiece, _the_ masterpiece. This
+King who serves, and is nearest of kin to us, is also _nearest of kin to
+God_. He is not only of the blood royal, and the blood human, but of the
+blood divine. He was with God before calendars came into use. He was the
+God of that creative Genesis week. He came on an errand down to the
+earth, and when the errand was done, and well done, He went back home,
+bearing on His person the marks of His fidelity to the Father's errand.
+This is John's bit of rich high colouring.
+
+And so _we are nearest of kin to God_ through Jesus. Kinship is always a
+matter of blood. There is a double kinship, through the blood of
+inheritance, and the blood of sacrifice. Our _inherited_ kinship of
+blood has been lost. But His blood of sacrifice has made a new kinship.
+We had broken the entail of our inheritance clean beyond mending. We
+were _outcasts_ by our own act. But He _cast in_. His lot with us, and
+so drew us back and up and in. He made a new entail through His blood.
+And that new entail is as unbreakable as the old broken one is
+unmendable. And so we come into the family of a King. And we are
+kingliest in character when we are Christliest in spirit and action. We
+are most like the King when we are helping others.
+
+Our true motto, in our relation to our fellows, is: "I am among you as
+he that serveth." Towel and basin, bended knee and comforted
+pilgrim-feet and refreshed spirit,--this is our family crest. We're kin
+to all the race through Jesus. Black skin and white, yellow and brown;
+round heads and long, slanting eyes and oval, in slum alley and palatial
+home, below the equator and above it,--all are our kinsmen.
+
+We are reaching highest when we are stooping lowest to help some one up.
+We're nearest like God in character when we're getting nearest in touch
+to those needing help. We are kingliest and Godliest and Christliest
+when we're controlled by men's needs, but always under the higher
+control of the Holy Spirit.
+
+This is the composite message of the four Gospels; and this is its
+practical human outworking.
+
+
+
+God on a Wooing Errand.
+
+
+But it's the other John message we are especially after just now.
+There's another message of John's book quite distinct from this, though
+naturally allied with it. And this other is the crowding message of his
+book. Its thought crowds in upon you till every other is crowded into
+second place. And as it gets hold of you it crowds your mind and heart
+and life till every other is either crowded out, or crowded to a lower
+place; _out_, if it jars; _lower place_, if it agrees, for every
+agreeing bit yields to the lead of this tremendous message.
+
+But one must get hold of John before John's message gets hold of him.
+John was swayed by a passion. It was a fiery passion flaming through all
+his life. It burned through him as the fierce forest fire burns through
+the underbrush. Every base thing was eaten up by its flame. Every less
+worthy thing came under its heat. It melted and mellowed and moulded his
+whole being.
+
+It was _the Jesus-passion_. It was kindled that memorable afternoon
+early in his life down in the Jordan bottoms.[1] John's namesake, the
+Herald, applied the kindling match. From then on the flames never
+flickered nor burned low. They increased steadily, and they increased in
+purity, until his whole life was under their holy heat.
+
+John didn't always understand his Master. Sometimes he misunderstood.
+But he never failed in his trust of Him, nor in his fidelity to Him. Of
+the chosen inner circle John was the one who remained true through the
+sorest test, that betrayal-night test. Judas betrayed; Peter denied; the
+nine fled in terror down the road to save their cowardly lives; John
+went in "_with_ Jesus." That fiery nature of his, that early won for him
+the stormy name "son of thunder," came completely under the sway of this
+holier tenderer stronger flame, and burned itself out in a passion of
+love for Jesus.
+
+The Jesus-passion swayed John completely. This explains the man, and his
+career. It explains this little book of his ripe old age. And only this
+can. One must read the book through John's own heart, then he begins to
+understand it. This Jesus-passioned man is the key to the book, the
+human key.
+
+And the distinctive message of the book is simply this: _Jesus was God
+on a wooing errand to the earth_. That simple sentence covers fully all
+that is found in John's twenty-one chapters. Every line in these
+fourteen or fifteen pages can be traced back into that brief statement.
+
+Indeed this becomes an outline of the book. See: in the opening
+paragraphs the wooing Lover is coming down to earth.[2] In the first
+twelve chapters the Lover is pleading winsomely and earnestly for
+acceptance.[3] Then He is seen in closest touch with the inner group of
+those who have accepted, opening His heart yet more, wooing still
+closer.[4] Then comes the last tragic pleading, pleading in intensest
+action, with those who persist in rejecting.[5] And then the last close
+heart-touches with the inner circle.[6]
+
+
+
+The Water-Mark of John's Gospel.
+
+
+The very words John so thoughtfully chooses as his leading words bear
+the distinct impress of this, like the sharply indented stamp of the
+mint on the new coin. Two such words stand out above all others,
+"believe" and "witness." The first actually occurs oftenest, sounding
+out like the dominant chord of music running throughout a symphony. The
+second is like the chief warp-thread into which the fabric is being
+woven.
+
+The two words are really twins, born at the same time, of the same
+mother. They grow up together and work in perfect accord. The witnessing
+is that men may understand and believe. It's the servant leading up to
+the belief that shall become the mastering thing. The belief is servant,
+too, in turn, leading up to the witnessing that becomes the mastering
+passion in those who believe.
+
+These words are worth digging into for the fine gold that lies hidden
+within waiting the miner's pick. The word "believe" is a nugget of pure
+gold, whether you take our English word or John's word lying underneath.
+The underneath word, that John uses in his own mother tongue, runs a
+sliding scale of meaning.
+
+It's a ladder rising from bottom round to topmost. It means to be
+persuaded that a thing is true; then to place confidence in it, to
+trust. And _trust_ always contains the idea of _risk_. The heart-meaning
+always is that you _risk_ something very precious to you, risk it to the
+point of heart-breaking disaster if your trust proves wrong.
+
+Our English word is of very close kin. It runs the same sort of sliding
+scale, from something valuable and precious in itself, on to something
+that _satisfies you_ regarding the matter in hand. You are not only
+satisfied but pleased, content. And so there is the same trusting and
+risking, the same leaning your whole weight upon the thing. Deep down
+at its root, _believe_ is a close kinsman to _love_. They both spring
+out of the same warm creative womb.
+
+When we dig a bit into that word _believe_ in the usage of common life
+it means three distinct things, each leading straight into the
+other,--knowledge, belief, trust. That is, _facts_, facts _accepted_,
+facts _trusted_ in regard to something that takes hold of your life. You
+hear something. You believe it's true. But there must be the third
+thing, risking something valuable. There's no belief in the
+heart-meaning without this thing of _risking_. The trust that risks is
+the life blood of faith. The rest is only the bony skeleton with tendons
+and sinews and flesh. There's no life without the blood. There's no
+belief without trust.
+
+And the word _witness_ is the same pure-gold sort of nugget, assaying
+full weight. John's native word and our own are just the same in
+meaning. Their meaning is _to tell what you know_. We shall be running
+across this word again, and digging a bit deeper into it. But this is
+the thing that stands out in it. You tell something that you yourself
+know. There's personal knowledge. There's a telling some one else this
+thing you know. And yet more, there's the purpose in the telling, that
+others may know what you know, and get all the good that comes with
+knowing it.
+
+The _witnessing_ is that others may _believe_. It is a striking thing in
+John that the _thought_ of witness is more common than the _word_. The
+word occurs several times, and always in a leading way. But the thought
+of witnessing is the colouring of every page, and the chief colouring.
+
+I said that these two words were twins, born at the same time, of the
+same mother. That warm-hearted brooding mother is the word _wooing_.
+Originally _wooing_ means bending towards, inclining forward or reaching
+out towards another. And the purpose of the reaching out is to get the
+other to reach forward towards you. And that purpose puts the warm feel
+into the reaching out.
+
+All words were pictures first. Here in this word _wooing_ is a picture,
+by one of the old masters, waiting to be restored, with all the dusty
+accumulations of the years carefully removed. And here's the picture: a
+man standing, with the light of the morning shining in His eyes, body
+bending forward, hands reaching out, with an eagerness, an expectancy in
+every line of His body, and tender love glowing out of His face, and
+sounding in the very tones with which the voice is calling.
+
+This picture is really the water-mark on the paper of John's Gospel.
+Hold up the paper of John's Gospel to the light. The best light for the
+purpose is found on Mount Calvary. High altitudes have clearer light.
+You see more distinctly. Now look. Hold still that you may see all the
+outlines more distinctly. There's the form of a Man standing in pleading
+attitude, with outstretched hands. His face combines all the fineness of
+the finest woman's face, with all the strength of the strongest man's,
+and more, immensely more, all the purity and tenderness and power of
+_God's_ face. It _is_ God Himself in human form coming a-wooing to
+earth, and we call His name Jesus. This conception is the very
+atmosphere of John's Gospel.
+
+Jesus is the witness of the Father to men. He knew the Father. He knew
+Him by closest intimacy. He lived with Him. He came down to _tell_ what
+He knew. He wanted others to know too. He wanted them to know _even as_
+He knew. _Telling_ is the whole of Jesus; telling men of the Father.
+
+His mere presence, His character, His warm sympathy, His practical
+helpfulness, His words, His actions, most of all His dying and His
+rising, all these were a _telling_, a witnessing, a wooing; telling the
+Father's love, telling the damnableness of our sin by giving His very
+life blood to get it out of us; so telling us how we might really know
+the mother-heart of the Father.
+
+
+
+Jesus the Dividing Line.
+
+
+There are several contrasts between the first three Gospels and John's.
+It is very striking to notice one in particular in this connection. One
+reading the first three Gospels for the first time is impressed with the
+fact of Jesus' _rejection_. This stands out peculiarly and dominantly.
+It was the great fact, told most terribly in the death of Jesus. It was
+the thing that stood out sharpest in the generation to which Jesus
+belonged, the generation for whom these three Gospels were written at
+the first.
+
+But John wrote his story for an after-generation, a generation that had
+not known the man Jesus by personal touch and observation. And so it was
+for all after-generations. And John makes it very clear that Jesus was
+rejected, _and_ accepted.
+
+He was indeed _rejected_; that fact stands out as painfully here as in
+the others. He was rejected by the little inner clique that held the
+national reins, and held them with fevered tenacity, and drove hard. And
+the reason for it is made to stand out as plainly as the fact. The envy
+and jealousy, the intense bitterness and viciousness and devilish
+obstinacy back of the rejection stand as boldly out to all eyes as to
+Pilate's.
+
+But the other side stands out sharply too. Jesus was _accepted_. He was
+accepted by all classes, by the cultured, and the scholarly, by
+thoughtful studious leaders and officials of the nation. He was accepted
+by the great middle classes and by those in lowest scale socially, and
+by the moral outcasts. Intense Hebrews, Roman officials of high rank,
+half-breed Samaritans, and men of outside nations group themselves
+together by their full acceptance of Jesus.
+
+He was listened to, doubted, questioned, discussed, thought over, _and
+then accepted._ And He was accepted with a faith and with a love that
+counted not suffering nor sacrifice for the sake of Him whom they
+believed and trusted and loved. John makes this clear, rejected _and_
+accepted.
+
+Jesus divided the crowds. Down the road He comes, with quiet strength,
+witnessing to the great simple truth of the Father's pure strong wooing
+love. And the crowd looks and listens and--_divides_. Some reject;
+clearly they are a minority, but entrenched in a position of power that
+proves quite sufficient for their purpose. Though it took all the power
+at their command to carry out their purpose.
+
+Others accept. These are the crowds, the majority. Some don't
+understand. Their motives are selfish or mixed, like some other folks'
+motives. Some are played upon by the cunning of the leaders and swung
+away. But there remain the thoughtful ones whose faith goes from
+weakness to strength; it grows from more to yet more. It mellows from a
+true simple faith to a deepened, seasoned, sorely-tested,
+surely-toughened faith that loves, loves clear down to the roots, and
+endures gladly. This is the simple warp-thread into which John's very
+simple story of Jesus is woven.
+
+
+
+Spelling God.
+
+
+_I_ want to give you _a bunch of keys_, as we start into these homely
+talks in John's Gospel. They are simple keys. Any one can use them. They
+fit easily and smoothly into every lock, the lock of your life, the lock
+of any circumstance, any sore problem that may come up to baffle all
+your efforts. They bring treasures within easy reach. They open up the
+way into all you need. There is a key to God, a key to the Book of God,
+and then there are three keys to this little John book.
+
+_The key to God_ is in one little word. It has two spellings, sometimes
+with four letters, sometimes with five, and both correct spellings. The
+four-lettered spelling is for all the world. The five-lettered spelling
+is chiefly used in the western half of the earth, and along certain
+lines and in certain spots here and there in the eastern half where the
+word is known.
+
+That first spelling is l-o-v-e. God is love. Love is of God. _God is
+always controlled by a purpose_ in all His dealings with the race, and
+with you and me. There is no chance-happening with Him, no caprice, no
+shadow in His path that tells of His being swerved aside, by anything we
+do, from a steady purpose.
+
+And that controlling purpose is _always a purpose of love._ It's a
+purpose of strong steady pure clinging brooding love. The bother is we
+don't know what that word _love_ means; none of us. We know words but
+not the real things they stand for. We don't know the real thing of love
+because we don't know the real thing of God. If we knew, oh! if we but
+knew it--Him--how that simple statement would melt us down, and mellow
+us through, and mould us all over anew!
+
+That's the shorter spelling. It is the universal spelling. That love is
+being spelled out to all the race by every twinkling star in the upper
+blue, every shade of green in the lower brown, by every cooling shading
+night, and every fragrantly dewy morning. Every breath of air and bite
+of food and draught of water is repeating God's spelling lesson. These
+are the pages in God's primer. So we all may learn to spell out God. And
+so we get the right spelling of our own lives.
+
+Then there's the other spelling, the five-lettered, J-e-s-u-s. It's the
+same thing, only spelled differently; spelled in a yet better way. The
+spelling grows bigger to us when Jesus comes. When we know Him it takes
+more to spell out and to tell out God's love. God grows larger to our
+eyes as He comes walking among us as Jesus. No, He doesn't grow larger.
+We simply begin to find out how large He is.
+
+This is the closer, more human spelling. The letters are nearer and seem
+bigger as they come walking down the street where we live, and knock at
+our own door. They're easier spelled out. We can get hold of them
+better. Love is a thing, we _think_. Jesus is _a person_. It's so
+different to touch a person. But when we know, we know that both
+spellings tell the same thing. So far, only about a third of us have
+heard anything about this second, this closer spelling. Two out of three
+haven't heard about it yet. But those who really know this spelling are
+eager for the others to get it, too.
+
+God is always controlled by a great simple purpose in thinking of you
+and me. And it is an unfailing purpose of strong tender love. This is
+the first key. Any one may take it and use it. It is unfailing. It will
+fit every lock. It unlock every problem. It will open up the riches to
+any life. They're brought within easy reach of any hand by the steady
+use of this key.
+
+This is the key to God. It unlocks the doors and lets Him freely into
+our lives. Then we find out how much truer it is than we can understand.
+
+Then there's _the key to the Book of God._ There are many keys here, of
+course. Daily time alone with the Book, thoughtful reading, prayer, some
+simple plan, putting into your life what has been put in its
+pages,--these are all good keys. But there's a master-key, _the_
+master-key. It is simply this: glad surrender of will to the God of the
+Book. I mean a strong intelligent yielding to His mastery in all of
+one's plans and life. The highest act of the strongest will is yielding
+to a higher will when you find it. And you find the higher, the highest,
+will here.
+
+This is the master-key. Bending the will affects eyes and ears and mind.
+The hinges of eye and ear are in the will. As the will bends those
+hinges move of themselves. Eye and ear and mind open. The lower the will
+bends, the more fully and habitually, the more will eyes and ears open,
+the keener and more alert will be the mental processes, the more
+intelligent the understanding. And there comes to be a continual mutual
+shifting. With better understanding can come stronger more intelligent
+yielding of will, and so again clearer light.
+
+And it is striking to discover that there's a practical connection
+between the joints of the knees and the joint of the will. The bending
+of knees to a sharp right angle affects the will. It is easier to bend
+it. It bends better and more. And this grows. The habitual bending of
+the knees helps make habitual and stronger and more intelligent the
+bending of the will.
+
+This is the master-key to the Book of God. It opens every lock and page.
+It opens us to the Book, and opens the Book to us. It frees out to us
+the wondrous Spirit who is in these pages. And so through the opened
+Book there come to be the direct touch with the God of the Book. We
+don't come to the Book merely; we come _through_ it to Him who comes
+through it to us. This is the second key in this bunch.
+
+
+
+Three Keys.
+
+
+Now, I want to give you _the three keys to John's Gospel._ There's a
+back-door key, a side-door key, and a front-door key. These keys hang
+outside the doors, low down, that so any one who wants to can easily
+reach up, and get them. And if used faithfully and simply they will be
+found to unlock every page and line and difficult question.
+
+_The back-door key_ hangs right at the back door. It is the very last
+verse of chapter twenty. That really was the last chapter at first. The
+thought of the book comes to a close there. The story is complete. Then
+the Holy Spirit led John to add a little, a second last-chapter, an
+added touch for good measure. Love is never content. It is always adding
+more.
+
+Here is the key: "_these are written that ye may believe that Jesus is
+the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye may have life through
+His name_." This was John's whole thought in telling the Jesus-story.
+The practical gripped him wholly and hard. This is the thing that guides
+his selection of incidents. This purpose shapes the shape of the book.
+It explains everything told, and just why it is told in just the way it
+is told.
+
+John lets Jesus walk before our eyes fresh from His Father's presence.
+The mere fact of His presence, the winsomeness of His personality, the
+clearness of His teaching, the power of His actions, the uncompromising
+purity of His character amidst sin-stained crowds and sin-dirtied
+surroundings, the unflinching rigidity of His ideals, the persuasiveness
+of His very manner and tone of speech, the patience and gentleness, the
+rugged granite strength, the mother tenderness, above all the
+willingness to suffer so terribly,--all this is a plea, a tremendous
+overpowering plea, all the stronger because presented so simply and
+briefly. Jesus is a Lover and this is His wooing.
+
+And John's one thought in writing is the same as the one thought in the
+Lover's heart. John has become simply an echo of Jesus. It is this, that
+_you_, whoever you are, wherever, whatever, that you may _believe_. You
+look and listen, question, puzzle a bit maybe, but keep on listening and
+looking, thinking, weighing, till you are clear these things are just so
+as John tells them. Yon accept them as trustworthy. Then you accept
+_Him_, Jesus, as He comes to you, your wooing Lover, your Lover-God,
+your Saviour and Lord.
+
+You _believe_: that is you _love_. The grammar of the word works itself
+out inside you thus,--believe, trust, love. The truth comes in through
+eyes and ears and feeling, into brain and will; through emotion clear
+down into your heart. You love. You cannot help yourself. You love
+_Him_, Jesus, the One so lovable.
+
+John says that you _may_ believe. It is possible. It is the reasonable
+intelligent thing to do after such a presentation. John makes it easy
+for us to believe. His telling of the story is so strong and convincing,
+though so simple and short, that believing is the natural thing. Jesus
+Himself, as He conies to us through John's eyes and speech, is so
+believable, so trustworthy, so lovable.
+
+Now we _may_ believe. It's the thing to do after a thoughtful kneeful
+study of the case as put by John. We _may believe_ clear into and
+through intellect and emotions and will, right down into the depths of
+heart and love, clear out into every action of the life.
+
+And John sweeps in the whole crowd of the world in the way he puts it
+here. Listen: "that you may believe that Jesus is _the Christ_." That
+was for the Jew peculiarly in the first instance. The Jew had been
+taught through generations that there was One coming who was God's
+chosen One for the Hebrew nation. He was the _Anointed One_. The Hebrew
+said _Messiah_. The Greek said _Christ_. Both mean the same, the One
+chosen of God, anointed by Him as the King and Leader of His chosen
+people, and through them of all the race.
+
+Listen further: "that Jesus is _the Son of God." That_ is for all of us,
+Jew and foreigner, insider and outsider. This Jesus is in a distinctive
+sense _the_ Son of God, the only begotten Son. This pure loving pleading
+wooing suffering dying rising-again Jesus, this is the only begotten Son
+of the Father. All there is in a Father comes to, and is in, an only
+begotten son. This is God Himself coming to us in His Son.
+
+Once let this sift into thought and heart, then who would _not_ believe,
+_and_ trust, _and_ love, _and_ fall on his face in the utter devotion of
+a voluntary slave before such a God!
+
+And so believing, trusting, loving, touching, His life flows in and
+fills up and floods out. We have it _now_. That word _eternal_, used so
+often by John with the word _life_, is not a mere _length_ word. It is
+not a calendar word. It tells the sort of life, the quality of life,
+that comes in through the opening door of our believing. This is John's
+back-door key, but it lets you clear in through the whole house.
+
+Then there is _the side-door key_. It hangs at the side, a bit towards
+the back. It is in the Thursday night talk, as we commonly call it, that
+last heart-talk with the inner group on the betrayal night. It is in
+chapter sixteen, verse twenty-eight: "_I came out from the Father, and
+am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go unto the
+Father_."
+
+Run through this Gospel with that fresh in your mind, and it is
+perfectly fascinating to find how much like a magnet it is, picking out
+to itself so many bits from the Master's lips that fit exactly into it.
+Jesus' constant thought was that He used to be with the Father; He came
+down on an errand to the earth. By and by when the errand was done He
+would go back home again.
+
+This sentence becomes a simple, exact, comprehensive outline of the
+entire Gospel. Notice: "_I came out from the Father_": that is chapter
+one, verses one to eighteen. There Jesus is seen coming down from His
+Father's own presence. Then chapter one, verse nineteen through to the
+close of the twelfth chapter is fully described and covered by the next
+clause, "_and am come into the world_." Here He is seen in the world, in
+the midst of its crowds and contentions and oppositions.
+
+"_Again, I leave the world_,"--chapters thirteen to nineteen. In chapters
+thirteen to seventeen He is tenderly leaving the inner circle. In
+chapters eighteen and nineteen He is going out of the world by the
+terrible doorway of the cross it had carpentered for Him. How quietly He
+says the words, though the terrible going is yet to come, and is now so
+near that He can already feel the shame and the thorns and the nails.
+
+And as quietly He looks beyond and adds, "_and go unto the Father_." In
+chapters twenty and twenty-one He lingers a little for the sake of these
+being left behind, but His face is already turned homeward. They would
+hold Him in their midst. He quietly tells them that He is going back
+home to the Father to get things ready for them, as He had said.
+
+
+
+He Comes to His Own.
+
+
+_The front-door key_ hangs right at the very front, outside, low down,
+where even a child's hand can reach it. It is in chapter one, verses
+eleven and twelve: "_He came unto His own, and they that were His own
+received Him not. But as many as received Him to them gave He the right
+to become children of God, even to them who believe on His name_." This
+is the great key, the chief key to this whole house. It flings the front
+door wide open and you are inside at once, and take in the whole of the
+house at a glance, one glance, one wonderful glance.
+
+The first twelve chapters tell of Jesus coming to His own, His own
+nation, humanly, racially, His own chosen people. He is coming steadily
+and persistently, in spite of rebuffs; coming patiently, tenderly,
+earnestly; coming ever closer in the ever increasing measure of divine
+power seen in His actions.
+
+And continually, persistently, He is being rejected and accepted. He is
+rejected silently and contemptuously, then aggressively and bitterly,
+viciously and murderously. "His own received Him not." But many received
+Him, eagerly and warmly and thoughtfully. They received Him with a
+growing depth of conviction and deepening tenderness of love. And as
+they come, He is ever receiving them, giving them that touch of new
+life that marks only the children of God.
+
+In chapters thirteen to seventeen He is receiving into closer fellowship
+those who have received Him, and at the same time wooing them into yet
+closer touch. The story of the trial and crucifixion in chapters
+eighteen and nineteen, puts the most terrific emphasis on the words,
+"_received Him not_." They not only keep Him out of His own possessions,
+but do their worst in putting Him out of life. And the little book
+closes in its last two chapters with His receivers being received into
+the sweetest intimacies of tested triumphant love and into the inner
+secrets of rarest resurrection power.
+
+This is the most heart-breaking of all of John's heart-breaking
+sentences. John had a hard time writing this Gospel of his. He was not
+simply writing a book; that might have been fairly easy. But he was
+telling about a friend of his, _the_ friend of his life, his one dearest
+Friend. And when he remembers how they treated Him his eyes fill up, and
+his heart beats till it thumps, and his quill sticks into the paper in
+sheer reluctance to tell the story.
+
+I think likely in the original manuscript, John's own first copy, the
+writing was a bit shaky and uneven here. The dew of his wet eyes drops
+and blurs the words a bit as he puts down, "He came to His own, and . .
+they who were His own . . _received . . Him . . not_."
+
+One day a young student was crossing the quadrangles of one of the old
+Scottish Universities towards his quarters in the dormitory. He was not
+feeling well. His eyes had troubled him and made his work very
+difficult. On the advice of a friend he sought the judgment of an expert
+in the treatment of the eyes. The specialist made a very thorough
+examination and then informed the young student tactfully but plainly
+that he would lose his eyesight, surely and not slowly.
+
+Lose his eyesight? A sudden terrific actual blow between his eyes could
+not have stunned his body more than this stunned brain and heart. Lose
+his eyesight! All his plans and coveted ambitions seemed slipping clean
+out from his grasp. With the loss of eyes would go the loss of
+university training, and so of all his dreams. Dazed, blinded, he groped
+his way rather than walked out of the physician's office.
+
+His life was to be joined with another's. And now he turned his
+distracted steps towards her home, hungry doubtless for some word or
+touch of comfort for his sore heart. And he was thinking, too, that with
+this utter break-up of the future she must be told. And as he talked he
+said in quiet manly words that under these unexpected circumstances, and
+the radical change in his prospects, she must be free to do as she
+thought best.
+
+And she took her freedom! Yet she was a woman. And a woman's mission is
+to teach man love by the real thing of love, by being it herself, and
+drawing it out into full flower in him. That was the second staggering
+blow. A second time he groped his dazed way out of the house, down the
+street, into his lone student quarters.
+
+But another One was near, brooding over him, and tenderly holding his
+breaking heart, and speaking words of warm comfort, and breathing in the
+freshing breath of true love. And as he yielded to this it overcame all
+else. A new mood came and dominated. And it became the fixed thing
+mastering all his life. Now he sits down, and out of his torn bleeding
+but newly-touched heart writes the words we have all learned to sing:
+
+    "O Love that will _not_ let me go,
+      I rest my weary soul in Thee,
+    I give Thee back the life I owe,
+      That in thine ocean depths its flow
+        May richer, fuller be.
+
+    "O Light that followest all my way,
+      I yield my flickering torch to Thee;
+    My heart restores its borrowed ray
+      That in Thy sunshine's glow its day
+        May brighter, fairer be.
+
+    "O Joy that seekest me through pain,
+      I cannot close my heart to Thee;
+    I trace the rainbow through the rain,
+      And feel the promise is not vain
+        That morn shall tearless be.
+
+    "O Cross that liftest up my head,
+      I dare not ask to hide from Thee;
+    I lay in dust life's glory dead,
+      And from the ground there blossoms red
+        Life that shall endless be."
+
+And with but a single change, the change of a word or two in one line,
+they stand as at first written. I suppose his biographer omitted the
+incident for the same reason that the first three Gospels may have
+omitted the incident of Lazarus while he was still living. So there was
+a sheltering from personal embarrassment.
+
+He came to his own and his own received him not. _He_--Jesus came to
+_His_ own and they that were His own received Him not. Aye, there's more
+to add: He _comes_ to His own--you and me--to-day. And His own--
+
+You and I must finish that sentence, each in his own way. And we will;
+and we do. We may copy out in our lives just what these men of old did
+as told by John. Some of us do. We _may_ do some fine revision work on
+the text of John's version as we translate it now into the experience of
+our own hearts, and into the life of our own lives. That's the only way
+to understand the next sentence about being taken into the family of God
+and sharing the fullness of life that is common there.
+
+And this bit that is put down here is only a bit of copy work. _These
+things_ are talked and written only that we may be given a lift into
+closer touch of heart and life with the Christ, the Son of God, and the
+Brother and Saviour of men.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+The Wooing Lover
+
+     _Who it Was that Came_
+
+
+
+
+       "But with unhurrying chase,
+        And unperturbed pace,
+    Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
+        They beat--and a Voice beat
+        More instant than the Feet--
+    _'All things betray thee, who betrayest Me'_"
+
+                    --"_The Hound of Heaven._"
+
+
+    "Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any
+    man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in
+    to him, and will sup with him, and he with me."
+
+    --_Rev. iii. 20._
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+The Wooing Lover
+
+(John i. 1-18.)
+
+
+
+In His Own Image.
+
+
+Love gives. It gives freely and without stint, yet always thoughtfully.
+It gives itself out, its very life. This is its life, to give its life.
+It lives most by giving most. So it comes into fullness of life.
+
+So it _gets_. A thing of life, in its own image, comes walking eagerly
+with outstretched arms to its embrace. It gives that it may get. Yet the
+giving is the greater. It brings most joy.
+
+This is the very essence of life, this giving creating spirit. It is
+everywhere, in lower life and higher and highest, wherever the touch of
+God has come. The sun gives itself out in life and light and warmth. And
+out to greet it comes a bit of itself--the fine form and sweet fragrance
+of the rose, the tender blade of grass, the unfolding green of the leaf,
+the wealth of the soil, the song of the bird and the grateful answer of
+all nature.
+
+The hen sits long patient days on her nest. And forth comes cheeping
+life in her own image, answering the call of her mothering spirit. The
+mother-bird in the nest in the crotch of the tree gives her life day by
+day in brooding love. And her wee nestling offspring, in her own image,
+answers with glad increase of strength and growth.
+
+Father and mother of our human kind give of their very life that new
+life may come. And under the overshadowing touch of an unseen Presence
+comes a new life made in their image, and in His who broods unseen over
+all three. And over the life wrecked by sin broods the Spirit of God.
+And out through the doorway of an opening will, comes a new creature of
+winsome life in the very image of that brooding Spirit of God.
+
+This is the holy commonplace of all life. It is the touch of God. It is
+everywhere about us, and beneath and above. The father-mother Spirit of
+God broods over all our common life. And when things go wrong, He broods
+a bit closer and tenderer. He meets every need of the life He has
+created. And He meets it in the same way, by giving Himself.
+
+And there's always the response. The fragrance of the rose answers the
+sun. The pipped shell brings the longed-for answer to the gladdened
+mother-bird. The ever wondrous babe-eyes give unspeakable answer to the
+yearning of father and mother heart. The heart of man leaps at the call
+of his God.
+
+This makes quite clear the wondrous response men gave Jesus when He
+walked among us. Jesus was God coming a bit closer in His brooding love
+to mend a break and restore a blurred image. And men answered Him. They
+couldn't help it. How they came! They didn't understand Him, but they
+felt Him. They couldn't resist the tender, tremendous pull upon their
+hearts of His mere presence.
+
+And Jesus drew man into the closest touch of intimate friendship. The
+long-range way of doing things never suited Him. And it doesn't. He
+didn't keep man at arm's length. And He doesn't. And then because they
+were friends, He and they, they were eager to serve, and willing even to
+suffer, to walk a red-marked roadway for Him they loved.
+
+
+
+The Gospel According to--You.
+
+
+Among all those who felt and answered the call of Jesus was one called
+John, John the disciple. Jesus drew John close. John came close. John
+lived close. John came early and he stayed late. He stayed to the very
+end, into the evening glow of life. And all his long life he was under
+the tender holy spell of Jesus' presence. He was swayed by the
+Jesus-passion. Always burning, he was yet never consumed; only the alloy
+burned up and burned out, himself refined to the quality of life called
+eternal.
+
+Then John came to the end of his long life. And he knew he would be
+slipping the tether of life and going out and up and in to the real
+thing of life. And I think John was a bit troubled. Not because he was
+going to die. This never troubles the man who knows Jesus. The
+Jesus-touch overcomes the natural twinges of death. But he was troubled
+a bit in spirit for a little by the thought that he would not be on
+earth any longer to talk to people about Jesus. And to John this was the
+one thing worth while. This was the life-passion.
+
+And so I think John prayed about it a bit. For this is what he did. He
+said to himself, "I will write a book. I'll make it a little book, so
+busy people can quickly read it. I'll pick out the simplest words I know
+so common folks everywhere that don't have dictionaries can easily
+understand. And I'll make them into the shortest simplest sentences I
+can so they can quickly get my story of Jesus." And so John wrote his
+little book. And we call it the story of Jesus according to John, or, as
+we commonly say the Gospel--the God-story--according to John.
+
+And all this is a simple bit of a parable. It is a parable in action.
+Jesus is brooding over us, giving Himself, warmly wooing us. He woos us
+into personal friendship with Himself. And then He asks that each of us
+shall write a gospel. This is the Gospel according to John; and these
+others according to Luke and Mark and Matthew. He means that there shall
+be the gospel according to--_you_. What is your name? put it in there.
+Then you get the Master's plan. There is to be the gospel according to
+Charles and Robert and George, and Mary and Elizabeth and Margaret.
+
+And you say, "Write a gospel? I couldn't do that. You don't mean that.
+That's just a bit of preaching." No, it isn't preaching. It's so. I do
+not mean to write with a common pen of steel or gold; nor on just common
+paper of rags or wood-pulp. But I do mean--_He_ means--that you shall
+write with the pen of your daily life. And that you shall write on the
+paper of the lives of those you're touching and living with every day.
+
+Clearly, He meant, and He means, that you and I shall live such simple
+unselfish lovable Jesus-touched lives, in just the daily commonplace
+round of life, that those we live with shall know the whole story of
+Jesus' love and life; His love burned out for us till there were no
+ashes, and His life poured out for us till not a red drop was left
+unspilled.
+
+Are _you_ writing _your_ gospel? Is your life spelling out this simple
+wondrous God-story? I can find out, though, of course, I shall not. What
+I mean is this,--_the crowd knows._ The folks that touch you every day,
+they know. This old Bible was never printed so much as to-day, nor
+issued more numerously. And--thoughtfully--it was never read _less_ by
+the common crowd on the common street of life than to-day.
+
+That doesn't mean that the crowd doesn't read what it supposes to be
+religious literature. It does. I wish we church folk read our religious
+literature as faithfully as this crowd I speak of reads its. It is
+reading _the gospel according to you,_ and reading it daily, and
+closely, and faithfully, and remembering what it reads, and being shaped
+by it.
+
+This Bible I have here is bound in--I think it is called sealskin. I
+tried to get the best wearing binding I could. But I've discovered that
+there's a better binding than this. The best binding for the Gospel is
+shoe-leather. The old Gospel of the Son of God is at its best as it is
+being tramped out on the common street of life. Its truths stand out
+clearest as they're walked out. Its love comes warmest, its power is
+most resistless as it comes to you in the common give-and-take of daily
+touch in home and shop and street. Are you writing your copy of the
+Gospel?
+
+You know that sometimes scholars have found some precious manuscripts in
+old monasteries. They have gone into some old, grey, stone monkery in
+the Near East, and they have run across old manuscripts hidden away in
+some dark cell, covered with dust and with rubbish, perhaps. With much
+tact and diplomacy they have at length managed to get possession of the
+coveted manuscript. And they have been fairly delighted to find that
+they have gotten hold of a remnant, a very precious remnant, of one of
+these Gospels. In just this way much invaluable light has been gotten
+that made possible these precious revised versions.
+
+I wonder if _your_ gospel--the one you're writing with your life--is
+_just a remnant,_ a ragged remnant. And perhaps there's a good bit of
+dusting necessary, and removing of rubbish, to get even at what there is
+there. And some of the shy hungry hearts that touch you and me need to
+use quite a bit of unconscious diplomacy perhaps to get even as much as
+they do. I wonder. The crowd knows. It could throw a good bit of light
+here. How much of this old Jesus-story _are_ you really _living!_
+
+Of course, there's a special touch of inspiration in these four Gospels.
+The Holy Spirit brooded over these men in a special way as they wrote.
+That is true. These are the standard Gospels. We would never know the
+blessed story but for these four Spirit-breathed little books. But it is
+also true that that same Holy Spirit will guide you in the writing of
+your version of the Gospel.
+
+These four Gospels are different from each other. The colouring of
+Luke's warm personality, and of his physician habit of thought is in his
+Gospel very plainly. And so it is with each one of these Gospels. And,
+even so, there will be the colouring of your personality, your habit of
+thought, the distinct tinge of the experience you have been through, in
+the gospel you write with the pen of your life, and bind up in the
+shoe-leather of your daily round.
+
+But through all of this there will be the simple, subtle, but very real,
+atmosphere of the Holy Spirit, helping you make the story plain and
+full, and helping people to understand that story as it is _lived_, as
+they never can simply by hearing it told with tongues or read through
+eyes.
+
+Are you writing your gospel? Is your daily life spelling out the life
+and love of Jesus, that life that was poured out till none was left,
+that love that was burned out till even the ashes were burned up, too?
+This is the Master's plan. And practically it is the crowd's only
+chance.
+
+
+
+God in Human Garb.
+
+
+Now I want to have you turn with me to the opening lines of John's
+Gospel. There are not many of these opening lines. The whole story is a
+short one. These lines at the beginning are like an etching, there are
+the fewest touches of pen on paper, of black ink on white surface. But
+the few lines are put in so simply and skilfully that they make an
+exquisite picture. It's the picture of _God coming in human garb as a
+wooing Lover._
+
+I think it might be best perhaps if I might simply give you _a sort of
+free reading_ of these opening lines, with a word of comment or
+illustration to try to make the meaning simpler. It will be a putting of
+John's words into the simple every-day colloquial speech that we
+English-speaking people use. John used very simple language in his own
+telling of the story in his mother-tongue. And it may help if we try to
+do the same.
+
+You will quickly see how very simple this free translation will be. Yet,
+let me say, that though homely and simple it will be strictly accurate
+to what John is thinking and saying in his own native speech. I mean of
+course, so far as I can find out just what he is thinking and saying.
+
+Let us turn then to John's Gospel, at its beginning. And it will help
+very much if we keep our Bibles open as we talk and read together.
+
+Listen: _in the beginning there was a wondrous One_. He was the mind of
+God thinking out to man. He was the heart of God throbbing love out to
+man's heart. He was the face of God looking into man's face. He was the
+voice of God, soft and low, clear and distinct, speaking into man's
+ears. He was the hand of God, strong and tender, reaching down to take
+man by the hand and lead him back to the old trysting-place under the
+tree of life, down by the river of water of life.
+
+He was the person of God wearing a human coat and human shoes,
+hand-pegged, walking in freely amongst us that we might get our tangled
+up ideas about God and ourselves and about life untangled, straightened
+out. He was God Himself wrapped up in human form coming close that we
+might get acquainted with Him all over again.
+
+This is part of the meaning of the little five-lettered word in his own
+tongue that John chooses and uses, at the first here, as a new name for
+Him who was commonly called Jesus. It was because of our ears that he
+used the new word. If he had said "Jesus" at once, they would have said
+"Oh! yes, we know about Him." And at once their ears would have gone
+shut to the thing that John is saying.
+
+For they didn't know. And we don't. We know _words_. The thing, the real
+thing, we know so little. So John uses a new word at the first, and so
+floods in new light. And then we come to see whom he is talking about.
+It's a bit of the diplomacy of God so as to get in through dulled ears
+and truth-hardened minds down in to the heart.
+
+Nature always seems eager to meet a defect. It seems to hurry eagerly
+forward to overcome defects and difficulties. The blind man has more
+acute hearing and a more delicate sense of feel. The deaf man's eyes
+grow quicker to watch faces and movements and so learn what his ears
+fail to tell him. The lame man leans more on other muscles, and they
+answer with greater strength to meet the defect of the weaker muscles.
+
+The bat has shunned the light so long through so many bat-generations
+that it has become blind, but it has remarkable ears, and nature has
+grown for it an abnormal sense of touch, and a peculiar sensitiveness
+even where there is no contact, so that it avoids obstacles in flying
+with a skill that seems uncanny, incredulous.
+
+I remember in Cincinnati one night, sitting on the platform of a public
+meeting by the side of a widely known Christian worker and speaker who
+was blind. As various men spoke he quietly made brief comments to me,--"
+_He_ doesn't strike fire." And then, "_He_ doesn't touch them." And
+then, "Ah! _he's_ got them; that's it; now they're burning." And it was
+exactly so as he said. I sat fascinated as I watched the crowd and heard
+his comments. The sense of discerning what was going on in another way
+than by sight had been grown in him by the very necessity of his
+blindness. Defect in one sense was overcome by nature, by increase in
+another sense.
+
+When Queen Victoria was in residence in Scotland at Balmoral it was her
+kindly custom to present the various clergymen who preached in the
+Castle chapel with a photograph marked with her autograph. When George
+Matheson, the famous blind preacher, came she showed the fine thoughtful
+tact for which she was famous. Clearly an autographed photograph would
+not mean much in itself to a blind man. So the Queen had a miniature
+bust-statue made and presented to him as her acknowledgment of his
+service. And so where his eyes failed to let him see, his sense of touch
+would carry to his mind and heart the fine features of the gracious
+sovereign he was so glad to serve.
+
+Jesus was God coming in such a way that we could know Him _by the feel_.
+We had gone blind to His face. We couldn't read His signature plainly
+autographed by His own hand on the blue above and the brown below. But
+when Jesus came _men knew God by the feel_. They didn't understand
+Jesus. But the sore hungry crowds reached out groping trembling fingers,
+and they knew Him. They began to get acquainted with their gracious
+Sovereign.
+
+All this gives the simple clue to this word "_Word_" which John uses as
+a new name for Jesus. Man had grown deaf to the music of God's voice,
+blind to the beauty of His face, slow-hearted to the pleading of His
+presence. His hand was touching us but we didn't feel it. So He came in
+a new way, in a very homely close-up way and walked down our street into
+our own doors that we might be caught by the beauty of His face, and
+thrilled by the music of His voice, and thralled by the spell of His
+presence.
+
+
+
+God at His Best.
+
+
+John goes on: _and this wondrous One was with God_. There were two of
+them. And the two were together. They were companions, they were
+friends, fellows together. _And this One was God_. Each was the same as
+the other. _This is the same One who was in the later creative beginning
+with God. It was through this One that all things were made. And, of all
+things that have been made, not any thing was made without Him_.
+
+You remember that John's Gospel and Genesis begin in the same way,--"in
+the beginning." But John's "in the beginning," the first one, is not the
+same as the Genesis "in the beginning." John's is the beginning before
+there was any beginning. It is the beginning before they had begun
+making calendars on the earth, because there wasn't any earth yet to
+make calendars on. Then this second time the phrase is used John comes
+to the later creative beginning with which Genesis opens. This is what
+John is saying here.
+
+"_In Him was life_." Out of Him came life. Out of Him comes life. There
+was no life, there is none, except what was in this One, and what came,
+and comes out from Him all the time. How patient God is! There walks a
+man down the street. He leaves God out of his life. He may remember Him
+so far as to use His name blasphemously to punctuate and emphasize what
+he is saying. Yonder walks a woman in the shadow of the street at night.
+And her whole life is spent walking in the dark shadow of the street of
+life. And her whole life is a blasphemy against her personality, and
+against the God who gave her that precious sacred personality.
+
+Take these two as extreme illustrations. There is life there; life of
+the body, of the mind, life of the human spirit. Listen softly, all the
+life there is there, is coming out all the time from this One of whom
+John is talking. It is not given once as a thing to be taken and stored.
+It is _being_ given. It is coming constantly with each breath, from this
+wondrous One. This is what John is saying here.
+
+How _patient_ God is! Only we don't know what patience is. We know the
+word, the label put on the outside. We don't know the thing, except
+sometimes in very smallest part. For patience is love at its best.
+Patience is God at His strongest and tenderest and best.
+
+I think likely when we get up yonder, we'll stop one another on the
+golden streets. There'll be a hand put out, gripping the other hard. And
+we'll look into each other's eyes with our eyes big. And we'll say with
+breaking voices, "How _patient_ God was with us down there on the earth,
+down there in London and New York."
+
+In Him was life. Out of His hand and heart is coming to us all the time
+all we are and all we have. We may leave God practically out. So many of
+us do. But He never leaves us out. The creating, sustaining touch of His
+Hand is ever upon each of us, upon all the world.
+
+Though He cannot do all for us He would except as we gladly come and let
+Him. What He is giving us is so _much_. It's our _all_. Yet it is the
+smaller part. There's the fuller part. This is the whole drive of John's
+story, this fuller part. Out of Him Jesus, into us will come the newer,
+the better, the abundant quality of life, if He may have His way.
+
+And John adds,--"_and the life was the light of men."_ He was what we
+_have_. He gives Himself; not things, but a person. With God everything
+is _personal_. We men go to the impersonal so much, or we try to. We do
+our best at it. We have a great genius for organization, especially in
+this western half of the earth.
+
+As I came back from a four years' absence from my own country, I was
+instantly conscious of a change. Either my ears were changed or things
+about me were. I think likely both. But the wheels were going faster
+than ever. There were more wheels, and their whir seemed never out of
+ear-shot. Commercial wheels, and educational, philanthropic and
+religious, political and humanitarian, thicker and faster than ever,
+driving all day, and with almost no night there.
+
+And the whole attempt is to make the machine do the thing with as little
+dependence as possible on the human element, even though the human
+element was never emphasized more. Contradictory? Yet there it is. We
+men go to the _im_personal. Yet deep down in our hearts we hunger for
+the human touch, the warm personal touch. This after all is _the_ thing.
+We all feel that. Yet the whole crowding of life's action is to crowd it
+out.
+
+But with God everything is personal. The life is the light of men. What
+He is in Himself--that is what He gives. And this is all the light and
+life we ever have. Men make botany. God makes flowers breathing their
+freshening fragrance noiselessly up into your face. Man makes astronomy.
+God makes the stars, shaking their firelight out of the blue down into
+your wondering eyes on a clear moonless night. Man makes theology. And
+theology has its place, when it's kept in its place. _God gives us
+Jesus_.
+
+I don't know much about botany. My knowledge of astronomy is very
+limited. And the more I read of theology, whether Western or Eastern,
+Latin Church or Greek, the first Seven Councils or the later ones, the
+more I stand perplexed. It's a thing fearsomely and wonderfully
+manufactured, this theology. But I frankly confess to a great fondness
+for flowers, and for stars, and a love for Jesus that deepens ever more
+in reverential awe and in tenderness and grateful devotion. The life was
+the light of men. He Himself is all that we have. We go to _things_. We
+reckon worth and wealth by things. He gives _Himself_. And He asks, not
+_things_, but one's self.
+
+
+
+Packing Most in Least.
+
+
+And John goes quietly on with his great simple story: "_and the light
+shineth in the darkness_," John has a way of packing much in little.
+Here he packs four thousand years into three English letters. For he has
+been back in that creative Genesis week. And now with one long stride he
+puts his foot down in the days when Jesus walks among us as a man. Forty
+centuries, by the common reckoning, packed into three letters e-t-h.
+Rather a skilful bit of packing that. Yet it is not unusual. It is
+characteristic both of John and of the One that guides John's pen. When
+He is allowed to have free sway the Holy Spirit packs much in little.
+
+That rugged old Hebrew prophet of fire and storm, Elijah, standing in
+the grey dawn, in the mouth of an Arabian cave, had the whole of a new
+God--a God of tender gentle love--packed into an exquisite sound of
+gentle stillness, that smote so subtly on his ear, and completely melted
+and changed this man of rock and thunder. It's a new man that turns his
+face north again. The new God that had compacted Himself anew inside the
+ruggedly faithful old man is revealed in the prophet's successor. This
+is the new spirit, so unlike the old Elijah, that comes as a birth-right
+heritage upon young Elisha. Great packing work that.
+
+That fine-grained young university fellow on the Damascus road, driving
+hard in pursuit of his earnest purpose, had the whole of a God, a new
+God to him, packed into a single flash of blinding light out of the
+upper blue. He had the whole of a new plan, an utterly changed plan for
+his life, packed into a single sentence spoken into his amazed ears as
+he lies in the dust.
+
+And if this Holy Spirit may have His way--a big if? Yes: yet not too big
+to be gotten rid of at once: God puts in the if's, that we may get the
+strength of choosing. We put them out, _if_ we do. _If_ He may have His
+way He'll pack--listen quietly, with your heart--He'll pack _the whole
+of a Jesus_ inside you and me. Much in little! Most in least! And the
+more we let Him in, the bigger that "most" prints itself to our eyes,
+and the more that "least" dwindles down to the disappearing point.
+
+God gives us His own self in Jesus. Jesus comes to live inside of us. He
+doesn't give us things, but Himself. We talk about salvation. There's
+something better--_a Saviour_. We talk about help in trouble. There's
+something immensely more--_a Friend_, alongside, close up. We talk about
+healing--sometimes, not so much these days; the subject is so much
+confused. There's something much better--a _Healer_, living within,
+whose presence means healing and health for body and spirit.
+
+Then John says, "the light shineth _in the darkness_." This is God's way
+of treating darkness. There are two ways of treating darkness, man's and
+God's. Man's way is to attack the darkness. Suppose this hall where we
+are were quite dark, all shuttered up, and suppose we were new on the
+earth, and not familiar with darkness. We want to hold a meeting. But
+how shall we get rid of this strange darkness that has come down over
+everything? Let's each of us get a bucket or pail or basin, and take
+some of the darkness out. So we'll get rid of it, and its inconvenience.
+
+And if the suggestion were made seriously there might be talk of putting
+the suggestor in a certain sort of institution for the safety of the
+community. Yet this is the way we go at the other darkness, the worse
+moral darkness.
+
+_God's way_ is quite different; indeed just the exact reverse _let the
+light shine._ The darkness can't stand the light. If the hall _were_
+quite dark, and I scratched only a parlour-match, instantly as the
+little flame broke out of the end of the stick some of the darkness
+would go. It's surprising how much would go, and how quickly. The
+darkness can't stand the light. It flees like a hunted hare before a
+pack of hounds.
+
+There may be times when action must betaken by a community against
+certain forms of evil, so damnable, and so strongly entrenched, and so
+threatening to the purity of home and young and of all. But note keenly
+that this is _incidental_. It is immensely important at times, but it is
+distinctly _secondary._ The great simple plan of God is this: _let the
+light shine_. The darkness flees like a whipped cur, tail tightly curled
+down and in, before the real thing of light.
+
+Let me ask you a question. Come up a bit closer and listen quietly, for
+this is tremendously serious. And it's the quietest spoken word that
+reaches the inner cockles of the heart. Listen: is it a bit dark down
+where you live? Morally dark? Spiritually? How about that? in commercial
+circles and social and fraternal, in church and home and city and
+neighbourhood. Is it a bit dark? Or, have I found the Garden of Eden at
+last before the serpent entered?
+
+Because if it be a bit dark, softly, please, let me say it very quietly,
+for it may sound critical, and I would not have that for anything. We
+are talking only to help. Though sometimes the truth itself does have a
+merciless edge. If it be a bit dark does it not suggest that _the light
+has not been shining as it was meant to_? For where the light shines the
+darkness goes.
+
+For, you see, this is still God's plan for treating darkness. It is
+meant to be true to-day of each of us,--"_the light shineth in the
+darkness_." Of course, _we_ are not the light. He is the Light. But we
+are the light-holders. I carry the Light of the world around inside of
+me. And so do you, _if you do_. It is not because of the "me," of
+course, but because of the great patience and faithfulness of Him who is
+the Light. A very rickety cheap lantern may carry a clear light, and the
+man in the ditch find good footing in the road again.
+
+You and I are meant to be the human lanterns carrying the Light, and
+letting it shine clearly fully out. And you know when some one else is
+providing the light the chief thing about the lantern is that the glass
+of the lantern be kept dean and clear so the light within can get freely
+out. The great thing is that _we shall live clean transparent lives_ so
+the Light within may shine clearly out. We may live unselfish clean
+Christly lives, by His great grace. And through that kind of lives, the
+Light itself shines out, and shines out most, and most clearly.
+
+Over at the mouth of the Hudson, where I call it home, there are some
+strange things seen. Sometimes the glass of this human lantern gets
+smoky, badly smoked. And sometimes it even gets cobwebby, rather thickly
+covered up. And even this has been known to happen up there,--it'll seem
+very strange to you people doubtless--_this_; they write finely phrased
+essays on the delicate shading of grey in the smoke on the glass of the
+human lantern.
+
+They meet together and listen to essays, in rarely polished English, on
+the exquisite lace-like tracery of the cobwebs on the glass of the human
+lantern. But look! Hold your heart still and look! There's the crowd in
+the road in the dark, struggling, jostling, stumbling, and falling into
+the ditch at the side of the road, ditched and badly mired, because the
+light hasn't gotten to them. The Light's there. It's burning itself out
+in passionate eagerness to help. But the human lanterns are in bad
+shape.
+
+"Rhetoric!" do you say? I wish it were. I wish with my heart it were.
+Look at the crowds for yourself. There they go down the street,
+pell-mell, bewildered, blinded, some of them by will-o'-the-wisp lights,
+ditched and mired many of them. The thing is only too terribly true.
+
+Our Lord's great plan, bearing the stamp of its divinity in its sheer
+human simplicity, is this: we who know Jesus are to _live Him_. We're to
+let _the whole of a Jesus_, crucified, risen, living, shine out of _the
+whole of our lives_.
+
+Is it a bit dark down where you are? _Let the Light shine_. Let the
+clear sweet steady Jesus-light shine out through your true clean quiet
+Jesus-swayed and Jesus-controlled life. Then the darkness must go. It
+can't stand the Light. It can't withstand the purity and insistence of
+its clear steady shining. And the darkness _will_ go: slowly,
+reluctantly, angrily, doggedly, making hideous growling noises
+sometimes, raising the dust sometimes, but it will go. It must go before
+the Light. The Light's resistless. This is our Lord's wondrous plan
+_through_ His own, and His irresistible plan _for_ the crowd, and His
+plan against the prince of darkness.
+
+
+
+The Heart-road to the Head.
+
+
+Then John goes on to say, "_the darkness apprehended it not_." The old
+common version says "comprehended"; the revisions, both English and
+American, say "apprehended." Both are rather large words, larger in
+English than John would use. John loved to use simple talk. Yet there's
+help even in these English words. Comprehend is a mental word. It means
+to take hold of with your mind; to understand. Apprehend is a physical
+word. It means to take hold of with your hand.
+
+You can't _comprehend_ Jesus. That is just the simple plain fact. You
+may have a fine mind. It may be well schooled and trained. You may have
+dug into all the books on the subject, English and German and the few
+French. You may have spent a lifetime at it. But at the end there is
+immensely more of Jesus that you don't understand than the part that you
+do understand. You've touched the smaller part only, just the edges. You
+cannot take Jesus in with your mind simply. The one is too big and the
+other too limited for that particular process.
+
+But, listen with your heart, you can _apprehend_ Him. You can _take
+hold_ of Him. There isn't one of us here, however poorly equipped
+mentally and in training, and too busy with life's common duties to get
+much time for reading, not one of us, who may not reach out your hand,
+the hand of your heart, the hand of your life, the hand of your simple
+childlike trust--if you're great enough in simplicity to be childlike,
+to be natural, not one of us, but may reach out the hand and _take in
+all there is of Jesus_.
+
+And the striking thing to mark is this, that we don't really begin to
+comprehend until we apprehend. Only as we take Him into heart and life
+_can_ we really understand. It's as if the heat in the heart made by His
+presence there loosens up the grey juices of your brain, and it begins
+to work freely and clearly.
+
+Of course, this is a commonplace in the educational world. It is well
+understood there that no student does his best work, no matter what
+that work may be, in science or philosophy or in mathematics or in
+laboratorial research, his mind cannot do its best, or be at its best,
+until his heart has been kindled by some noble passion. The key to the
+life is in the heart, that is the emotions and purposes tied together.
+The approach to the mind is through the heart. The fire of pure emotion
+and of noble purpose burning together, works out _through_ the mind
+_into_ the life. This is nature's order.
+
+But what John is saying here, put into as simple language as he would
+use, is this: "_the darkness wouldn't let the light in, and couldn't
+shut it out, and couldn't dull the brightness of its shining_." It
+tried. It tried first at Bethlehem. The first spilling of blood came
+there. There was the shedding of blood at both ends of Jesus' career,
+and innocent blood each time. It tried at the Nazareth precipice, and in
+the spirit-racking wilderness. It tried by stones, then in Gethsemane,
+then at Calvary.
+
+And there it seemed to have succeeded. At last the light was shut in and
+down; the door was shut and barred and bolted. And I suppose there was
+great glee in the headquarters of darkness. But the Third Morning came.
+And the bars of darkness were broken, as a woman breaks the
+sewing-cotton at the end of the seam. The Light could not be held down
+by darkness. It broke out more brightly than ever. The darkness couldn't
+shut the light out. And it can't.
+
+_Let the light shine._ Let it shine out through the clear clean glass
+of an unselfish, Jesus-cleansed Jesus-fired life lived for Him in the
+commonplace round, and the shut-away corner. _And the darkness will go_.
+The darkness cannot shut out the light, nor keep it down, nor resist the
+gentle resistless power of its soft clear flooding. Let the Light shine
+down in that corner where you are. And the darkness, darkness that can
+be felt, and _is_ felt so sorely deep down in your spirit, in its
+uncanny Egyptian blackness, that darkness will break, and more, clear,
+and go, go, go, till it's clear gone.
+
+And so ends John's first great paragraph. It is so tremendous in its
+simplicity that, Greek-like, men stumble over its simple tremendousness.
+Away back in the beginning God revealed Himself in making a home for
+man, and in bringing the man, made in His own image, to his home. And
+then when the damp unwholesome darkness came stealing in swamping the
+home and man He came Himself, flooding in the soft clear pure light of
+His presence, to free man from the darkness and woo him out into the
+light.
+
+
+
+Tarshish or Nineveh?
+
+
+Then John goes on into his second paragraph. "_There came a man, sent
+from God, whose name was John_." Why? Because man was in the dark. He
+sent a man to help a man. He used a man to reach a man. He always does.
+Run clear through this old Book of God, and then clear through that
+other Book of God--the book of life, and note that this is God's habit.
+He, Himself, uses the path He had made for human feet. With greatest
+reverence let it be said that God _must_ use a human pathway for His
+feet.
+
+Even when He would redeem a world He came, He must needs come, as a Man,
+one of ourselves. He touches men through men. The pathway of His helping
+feet is always a common human pathway. And, will you mark keenly that
+_the highest level any life ever reaches_, or _can_ reach, is this: _to
+be a pathway for the feet of a wooing winning God_.
+
+And this is still true. It is meant to be true to-day that there came a
+man, sent from God, whose name is--_your name_. You put in your own name
+in that sentence, then you get God's plan for you. For as surely as this
+particular John of the desert and of the plain living, and the burning
+speech, was sent by God, so surely is every man of us a man sent by God
+on some particular errand. And the greatest achievement of life is to
+find and fit into the plan of God for one's life. This is the only great
+thing one can do. Anything else is merely _labelled_ "great." And that
+label washes off. This is the one thing worth while.
+
+The bother is we don't always get the verbs, the action words, of that
+sentence straight. John was a man _sent_ from God. And he _came_. All
+men are sent But they don't all come, some _go_; go their own way. There
+was a man sent from God whose name was Jonah. But he didn't come. He
+went. He was sent to Nineveh on the extreme east. He went towards
+Tarshish on the extreme west; just the opposite direction. Every man is
+headed either for Nineveh or Tarshish, God's way or his own. Which way
+are you headed?
+
+Some of us go to Tarshish _religiously_. We go our own way, and sing
+hymns and pray, to make it seem right and keep from hearing the inner
+voice. We hold meetings at the boat-wharf, while waiting for the
+Tarshish ship to lift anchor. We have services in the steerage and
+second-class and distribute tracts and New Testaments; but all the time
+we're headed for Tarshish; our way, not God's. It won't do simply to do
+good. We must do God's will. Find that and fit into it.
+
+The meetings and tracts are only good but they ought to be on the train
+to Nineveh, and in Nineveh where God's sent you. Are you berthed on the
+boat for Tarshish? or have you a seat engaged on the train for Nineveh?
+going your own way? or God's? John was _sent_ and he _came_. You and I
+are sent. Are we coming or going? coming God's way? or, going our own?
+
+
+
+Living Martyrs.
+
+
+This true-hearted burning man of the deserts _came for a witness_. Here
+we strike one of John's great words. You remember the three things that
+_witness_ means? that you know something; that you tell what you know;
+and that you tell it most with your life. And telling it _with your
+life_ means, not only by the way you live, but, too, even though the
+telling of it _may cost you your life_. It came to mean all of that with
+this witness.
+
+It came to mean that with a new fullness of meaning, a peculiar
+significance, to _the great Witness_, of whom John told. This was the
+very throbbing heart of the wooing errand. This explains the tenderness
+and tenacity of the Lover in His wooing in the midst of intensest
+opposition, and in spite of it.
+
+The opposition brought about the terrific grouping of circumstances
+which the great Lover-witness used as the tremendous climax of both
+wooing and witnessing. No one doubts the reality of Jesus' witness to
+the Father's love before men. And no one, who has had any touch at all
+with Him, doubts the tremendous pull upon one's heart of such a wooing
+appeal as that Calvary climax of witnessing made, and makes.
+
+And this, mark it keenly, is still the plan. "The-same-came-for-witness"
+is meant to be true of each follower of the Christ. This is to be the
+dominant underchording of all our lives. This is to be the never-absent
+motive gripping us, and our possessions and our plans. The rest is
+incidental in a true life.
+
+It may be a "rest" that takes most of the waking hours with most of us,
+most of our strength and thought. But there's an undercurrent in every
+life. And the undercurrent is the controlling current. It makes us what
+we really are. It may be quite different from the upper current
+controlled by the outer necessities of circumstances. And with the true
+Jesus-man _this_ is the undercurrent, this thing of witnessing.
+
+Do you know something of Jesus? Do you know the cleansing of His blood?
+Do you know the music of His peace in your heart? Do you know a bit of
+the subtle fragrance of His presence? Do you know the power of His Name
+when temptations come, when the road gets slippery, and your feet go out
+from under you--almost. Then His Name, its power, and you hold steady.
+Do you know something about such things?
+
+Then _tell_ it. This is the plan--_telling_. It's a Gospel of _telling_.
+Tell it with your lips tactfully, gently, boldly, earnestly. But tell it
+far more, and most with your life. Let what you are, when you're not
+thinking about this sort of thing, let that tell it. That's the greatest
+telling, the best.
+
+And, softly, now, when you get to the end of telling what you know,
+listen quietly, don't go to digging into books for something to tell
+your class or the meeting or the crowd. Don't do that. Books have their
+place, good books, but it's always a sharply secondary place, or third,
+or lower down yet. Poor crowd that must be fed on retailed books worked
+over! Don't do that. _Know more._ Know Jesus better. Trust Him more
+fully. Risk more on following where He clearly leads. Then you can tell
+more and better.
+
+Sometimes I'm asked, "How can I have more faith?" Well, not by thinking
+about your faith. Not by books or definitions chiefly, however they may
+help some. I can tell you how: _Follow where the Master's quiet voice is
+clearly calling._ Go where it is plain to you that that pierced hand is
+leading.
+
+"Ah! but the way is a bit narrow," you think. "And it's steep. There are
+sharp-edged stones under foot. And those bushes are growing rank on both
+sides narrowing the path. And thorns scratch and hurt and sting. This
+other road where I am now--this is a good Christian road. My Christian
+brothers are here. I'd rather stay here."
+
+And so you _stay_. You don't _say_ "no" to the calling voice. You simply
+_act_ "no." No wonder you get confused and tangled. It's only in the
+path of following clear leading that there comes sweetest peace, with no
+nagging doubts and mental confusion. There only will you have more
+faith, know more of Him, touch with whom is the realest faith. And so
+only will the witness be told out to the crowd on the street of your
+life, of the power and satisfying peace of this Jesus.
+
+This is the witnessing we're sent to do. And the crowds crowd to listen,
+when it's given. This is the way _the_ Witness did. He followed the
+clear Father-voice, though the road led straight across the regular
+roads through thorn hedges and thick underbrush. Should not the servant
+tread it still?
+
+The word that John uses here underneath our English word _witness_ is
+the word from which our English word _martyr_ comes. And martyr has
+come to mean one who gives his life clear out in a violent way for the
+truth he believes. But, do you know, that is easy. "Easy?" You say,
+"Surely not, you're certainly wrong there." No, you are right. It is not
+easy. To face a storm of lead, or feel the sharp-edged blade, or yield
+to the eating flame,--that is never easy.
+
+But this is what I mean. There's the heroic in it, and that helps. You
+brace yourself for it. The terrible crisis comes. You pull together and
+pray and resolutely, desperately, face it. A little while, and it's
+over. You've been true in the sharp crisis. You have taken a place with
+the noble army of martyrs. And we who hear of it have a martyr's halo
+about your head.
+
+But there's something immensely harder to do. Without making a whit less
+than it is the splendid courage of martyrdom, there's something that
+takes immensely more courage, and a deeper longer-seasoned heroism, and
+that is to be a _living_ martyr, to bear the simple true witness
+tactfully but clearly, when it takes the very life of your life to do
+it, though it doesn't take your bodily life in a violent way.
+
+You know they don't martyr people these days for their Christian faith.
+At least not in the western half of the earth, the Christian hemisphere.
+No, that's quite behind the calendar. That's rather crude, quite behind
+the cultured advanced Christian progress of _our_ day. Our Christian
+civilization has gone long strides beyond that. We have grown much more
+refined. Now we kill them _socially_. Many a one who would live true to
+the Jesus-ideals in daily life in a simple sane way finds certain social
+doors shut and carefully barred.
+
+We kill them _commercially_ now. The man who will quietly hew to the
+Jesus-line in business is quite apt to find his income reduced. The bulk
+of business shrinks. The thermometer is run down below the living point.
+We kill men by _frost_ now. The blockade system is skilfully used;
+isolation and insulation from certain circles. We are much more refined.
+
+The great need to-day is of _living_ witnesses to the Christ in home,
+and social circle, in the street, and in the market-place.
+
+    "So he died for his faith; that is fine,
+      More than the most of us do.
+    But stay, can yon add to that line
+      That he _lived_ for it, too?
+
+    "It's easy to die. Men have died
+      For a wish or a whim--
+    From bravado or passion or pride.
+      Was it hard for him?
+
+    "But to live: every day to live out
+      All the truth that he dreamt,
+    While his friends met his conduct with doubt,
+      And the world with contempt.
+
+    "Was it thus that he plodded ahead,
+      Never turning aside?
+    Then we'll talk of the life that he led"
+      Even more than the death that he died.
+
+
+
+The Forgotten Preacher.
+
+
+With a simplicity in sticking to his main point, John goes quietly on:
+"_that he might be a witness of the light_." That's rather interesting.
+It was of the _light_ he was to bear witness; not of himself. It was not
+the technical accuracy of his work, not its scholarliness and skill that
+absorbed him, but that the _crowd got the light_. Rather striking that,
+when you break away from the atmosphere round about, and think into it a
+bit.
+
+Here's a man walking down a country road. It's a hot day. The road's
+dusty. He gets a bit weary and thirsty. He comes across a bit of a
+spring by the side of the road. Clear cool water it is. And some one has
+thoughtfully left a tin-cup on a ledge of rock near by. And the man
+gratefully drinks and goes on his way refreshed. He quite forgets the
+tin-cup.
+
+Sometimes the tin-cup seems to require much attention, up in the corner
+of the world where my tent is pitched. It has to be handled very
+carefully and considerately if one is to get what possible drops of
+water it may contain. The human tin-cup seems to bulk very big in the
+drinking process, sometimes, in my corner of the planet. It is
+silver-plated sometimes; just common tin under the plating. There's some
+fine engraving on the silver-plating, noble sentiment, deftly expressed,
+and done in the engraver's best style. But the water is apt to be
+scanty, the drops rather few, in this sort of tin-cup. It's a bit
+droughty.
+
+And sometimes even this has been known to occur: they have associations
+of these human tin-cups for self-admiration and other cultural purposes.
+And they have highly satisfactory meetings. But meanwhile, ah! look!
+hold still your heart, and look here. There's the crowd on the street,
+hot dusty street, exhausted, actually fainting for want of water, just
+good plain water of life. But there's none to be had; only tin-cups!
+John was eager to have men get a good drink. He was content as he
+watched them drink, and their eyes lighten. He was discontent and
+restless with anything else or less.
+
+Do you remember the greatest compliment ever paid John, John the Herald?
+John was a great preacher. He had great drawing power. To-day we
+commonly go where people are hoping they'll stay while we talk to them.
+But John did otherwise. He went down to the Jordan bottoms, where the
+spirit ventilation was better, and called the people to him. And they
+came. They came from all over the nation, of every class. Literally
+thousands gathered to hear John. He had great drawing power.
+
+And then something happened. Here is John to-day talking earnestly to
+great crowds down by the river-road. And here he is again to-morrow; but
+where are the crowds? John has lost his crowd. Same pulpit out in the
+open air, same preacher, same simple intense message burning in his
+heart, but--no congregation! The crowd's gone. Poor John! You must feel
+pretty bad. It's hard enough to fail, but how much harder after
+succeeding. Poor John, I'm so sorry for you.
+
+But if you get close enough to John to see into his eye you quit talking
+like that. And if you get near enough to hear you find your sympathy is
+not needed. For John's eye is ablaze with a tender light, and the sound
+of an inner heart music reaches your ear as you get near him. And if you
+follow, as you instinctively do, the line of the light in his eye you
+quickly look down the road.
+
+Oh! There's John's crowd. _They're listening to Jesus._John's crowd has
+left him for his Master. And the forgotten preacher is the finest
+evidence of the faithfulness of the preacher. The crowd's getting the
+water, sweet cool refreshing water of life, direct from the fountain.
+They've clean forgotten the faithful common tin-cup. And John's so glad.
+John came that he might bear witness of _the light_. And he did. And the
+crowd heard. And they flocked to the light.
+
+Here's a man preaching. And the people are listening. The benediction is
+pronounced. And they go out. And as they move slowly out they're
+talking, always talking. We don't seem yet to have demitted our
+privilege of talking after service. Here are two. Listen to them. "Isn't
+he a great preacher? so scholarly, so eloquent, so polished; and all
+those classical allusions. I didn't understand half he said; he
+certainly is a great preacher. We're very fortunate in such a man."
+
+And the preacher, whoever he be, may know this for a bit of the
+certainty that occasionally _will_ sift in. He may be a scholar. I
+wouldn't question it. And a polished orator. I wouldn't question that.
+But in the main thing, the one thing he's for, as a _Jesus-witness_, he
+is a splendid scholarly polished failure. Men are talking about _him_.
+
+They've forgotten his Master, if indeed--ah, yes, if indeed he _have_ a
+Master! He has a _Saviour_, let us earnestly hope, and willingly
+believe. But a _Master_! One that sweeps and sways his mind and culture
+and life like the strong wind sweeps the thin young saplings in the
+storm--clearly he knows nothing of that. Men are talking of _him_.
+
+And here's another talking a bit It may be just a simple homely talk. Or
+he may likewise be scholarly and eloquent. A man should bring his best.
+The old classic is beaten oil for the lamps of the sanctuary. But
+there's the soft burning fire of the real thing in his message. And the
+people feel it. The air seems a-thrill with its quiet tensity. And the
+last amen is said. And again they go out.
+
+And here are two walking down the road together, and as they come to the
+cross-street, one says to his companion, "Excuse me, please, I have to
+go down _this_ way." And the "have-to" is the have-to of an intense
+desire to get off alone. And as he goes down the side street he's
+talking, but--to himself. Listen to him: "I'm not the man I ought to be,
+I wonder if Jesus is really like he said. I wonder if the thing's really
+so. I believe--yes, I really think I'll risk it. My life isn't like it
+should be. I'll risk trying this Jesus-way. I'll do it."
+
+The man's clean forgotten the speaker. Oh, yes, he remembers the tone of
+the voice, and the look of the face, but indistinctly, far away. He's
+face-to-face with Jesus! And the forgotten speaker is the finest
+evidence of the faithfulness of his speaking. He is holding up the
+light. And men run into the light. They've clean forgot the little tin
+candlestick, they are so taken up with the light it holds.
+
+
+
+The One Thing to Aim At.
+
+
+And John keeps driving in on the point in his mind: "_that all might
+believe through Him_"; that they might listen, stop to think, agree as
+to the thing being believable, then trust it; then trust _Him_, the
+Light, risk something, risk, _themselves_ to _Him_, then love, love with
+a passionate devotion. This was John's objective. It was the bull's-eye
+of his target never out of his keen Spirit-opened eye. Nothing else
+figured in.
+
+This is _the_ thing in all our living and serving and doing and giving,
+_that men may know Jesus_ to the trusting, risking, loving point, the
+glad point. Everything that we can bring of gold and learning and labour
+and skill is precious, it is as purest gold, _if_ it lead men into
+heart-touch with Jesus. And it clean misses the mark if it does less.
+
+Who would be content to give a Belgian or Polish starveling a bare bit
+of bread, and a lonely stick of wood, and a rag of cloth. Bite and stick
+and cloth are good, but it's a _meal_ and a _fire_, and some _clothing_,
+the man wants. And you have both ready at hand. _Things_ are good,
+provided by money and skill and research and painstaking efforts. They
+_do_ good. But it's Jesus men need. It's the warm touch that lets _Him_
+fully in with all of His human sympathy and all of His God-power, that's
+what they need.
+
+Given the sun and quickly come warmth and food and shelter, health and
+vigour and increase of life. Given Jesus, and the warm touch with Him,
+in His simple fullness, just as He is, and surely and not slowly, there
+come flooding in all the rest of an abundant life, physical and mental
+and of the spirit.
+
+John "_was not the light_." He was only the candlestick. And he was
+content to be that. He was a good candlestick. The light was held up. It
+could shine out. How grateful the crowd was. The road had been so dark.
+It is a bad thing when light and candlestick change places. The crowd
+seems to get the two confused sometimes. We get to thinking that the
+candlestick is the light, and the light is--lost sight of. We gather
+about the candlestick. It'll surely lead the way out through the dark
+night into day. It's such a good candlestick, so highly polished. And
+sometimes the human candlestick itself gets things a bit mixed. It
+thinks, then it feels, then it knows, with a peculiar quality of
+self-assertive certainty, that after all _it_ is the light that
+lighteth every one that is so blessed as to come within the radius of
+its shining. And brass does take a high polish, and makes an attractive
+appearance. It does send out a sparkle and radiance _if_ only it is
+somewhere within range of some real light, patient enough to keep on
+shining in the dark, regardless of non-appreciation or misrepresentation
+or misunderstanding.
+
+Is it any wonder the road is so full of people wandering in the night
+gathered about candlesticks? Is it surprising that the ditches are so
+full of men and candlesticks mixed up and mired up together? Yet it is
+always heart-breaking. There may be talent and training of the highest
+and best, and scholarship and culture, eloquence and skill, institutions
+and philanthropies. And there is so much of these. And these are good in
+themselves, and of priceless practical worth when seen and held in their
+right relation to _the_ thing.
+
+But it needs to be said often and earnestly: _these are not the light_.
+They are given to point men better to the Light. They're road-signs,
+index-fingers. And they are seen at their best when they point to the
+Light so clearly that the crowd quite forgets them in hastening to the
+Light they point out. They serve their true purpose in being so
+forgotten. They are still serving and serving best even while forgotten.
+
+
+
+The Real Thing of Light.
+
+
+And John goes on to intensify yet more what he is thinking and saying:
+_there was the true light_, _the real thing of light_. They were
+bothered, in John's old age when he is writing, with false lights,
+make-pretend lights, that led people astray. Every generation seems to
+have been so bothered and confused. And even our own doesn't seem to
+have entirely escaped the subtle contagion. The ground is a bit swampy
+in places, boggy.
+
+Low-lying land runs to bog and swamp. And the air gets thick with heavy
+vapours. And strange will-of-the-wisp lights form out of the foul damp
+gasses, and they flit about in the gloom this way and that. And people
+are led astray by them deeper into swamp and bog. It's surprising to
+find how many, that grow up in well-lit neighbourhoods, wander off after
+the swamp lights, and even follow them so contentedly. That's partly
+due, without doubt, to the false lights borrowing so much of the mere
+outer incidentals from the true. And they succeed in producing a make-up
+that easily deceives the unwary and untaught.
+
+There's a teaching to-day, for instance, that magnifies bodily healing.
+The name of Christ is freely used. And the old Book of God freely
+quoted. And men are really healed. There can be no question of that.
+There are sufficient facts at hand to make that incontestably clear.
+
+But bodily healing does not necessarily argue divine power. There are
+results secured through the operation of unfamiliar mental powers that
+seem miraculous. And clearly there are devilish miracles as well as
+divine. Miracles simply reveal a supernatural power, that is, a power
+above the ordinary workings of nature. Then one must apply a touchstone,
+a test, to learn what that power is.
+
+It is striking that in this teaching I speak of now there is never
+mention of the atoning blood of Christ. And this is the sure touchstone
+by which to detect the real thing of light and the make-believe. The
+outstanding thing in the life of Christ is His death, and the tremendous
+meaning which His own teaching put into that fact of His death.
+
+There is none of the red tinge to this make-believe light. It has the
+unwholesome unnatural tingeing of swamp lights. And those who are healed
+through this teaching will find themselves in a bondage the more
+terrible because so subtle. And only the power of the blood of Christ
+can ever break that bondage.
+
+There was the real thing of light. Here _is_ the real thing of light.
+There's a distinct tingeing of red in it. It's the only light. It only
+is the light. Every other is a make-pretend light, however subtle its
+imitations and reflections: it will lead only into swamp and bog and
+ditch and worse.
+
+And then John goes on to add a very simple bit that has not always been
+quite understood in its simplicity. There was the real thing of light
+_that lighteth every man that cometh into the world_. There is a little
+group of varied readings into the English here, found in the margin of
+the various revisions. But the central statement remains the same.
+Whether John is saying that the light, that lighteth every man, was now
+coming down into the world in a closer way. Or, that every man is
+lighted as _he_ comes into the world, the chief thing being told is the
+same. Every man in the world is lighted by this Light.
+
+Through nature, the nightly twinklers in the wondrous blue overhead, the
+unfailing freshness of the green out of the brown under foot; through
+the never-ceasing wonders of these bodies of ours, so awesomely and
+skilfully made, and kept going; through that clear quiet inner voice
+that does speak in every human heart amidst all the noises of earth and
+of passion; through these the light _is_ shining, noiselessly, softly,
+endlessly, by day and night.
+
+It is the same identical light that John is telling us of here that so
+shines in upon every man, and always has. There is no light but His. His
+later name is Jesus. From the first, and everywhere still, it is the
+light that shines from Him that lights men. He was with the Father in
+the beginning. He acted for the Father in that creation week. He gave
+and sustained all life of every sort everywhere, and does, though only a
+third of us know His later, nearer, newer Name--Jesus.
+
+But the light was obscured, terribly beclouded and bedimmed, hindered by
+earth-fogs, and swampy clouds rising up, until we are apt to think there
+was no light, and is none; only darkness. Then He came closer, and yet
+closer. He came in nearer form so as to get the light closer, and let
+it shine _through_ fog and cloud, for the sake of the befogged,
+beswamped crowd.
+
+And then--ah! hold your heart still--_then_ He let _the_ Light-holder,
+the great human Lantern, be _broken_, utterly broken, that so the light
+might flash out through broken lantern in its sweet soft wondrous
+clearness into our blinded blinking eyes, and show us the real way back
+home. It was in that breaking that it got that wondrous exquisite red
+tingeing that becomes the unfailing hall-mark, the unmistakable evidence
+of the real thing of light.
+
+And it's only as men know of this latest coming of the light, this
+tremendous tragic Jesus-coming of the light, that they can come into the
+full light. That's the reason He came in the way He did. That's the
+reason when He gets possession of us there's the passion to take the
+full Jesus-light out to every one. And this passion burns in us and
+through us, and ours, and sweeps all in the sweep of its tender holy
+flame. In this way every man may be fully lit, and so in following the
+Jesus-light he shall not walk in the darkness where he has been, but in
+the sweet clear light of life.
+
+
+
+Looking for Recognition.
+
+
+Then we come to the first of John's heart-breaking sentences. John had a
+hard time writing his Gospel. He was not simply writing a book. That
+might have been fairly easy for him with his personal knowledge and all
+the facts so familiar. But he is telling about his dearest Friend. And
+the telling makes his heart throb harder, and his eyes fill up, and the
+writing look dim to him, as he tries to put the words down.
+
+Listen: _He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and
+the world recognized, or rather acknowledged, Him not._ It was His
+world, His child, His creation. He had made it. But it failed to
+acknowledge Him. He came walking down the street of life. He met the
+world going the other way. And He gave it a warm good-morning greeting.
+And it knew Him full well. It knew who He was. But it turned its face
+aside and walked by with no return greeting. This is what John is
+saying. It recognized, it acknowledged Him not.
+
+You mothers know the glad hour that comes in a mother's life when her
+little babe of the wee weeks knows her _for the first time._ She's busy
+bathing or nursing, or, she's just hovering over the precious morsel of
+humanity when there's really nothing needing to be done. And the babe's
+eyes catch her own and _a smile comes,_ the first smile of recognition.
+And the mother-heart gives a glad leap. She murmurs to herself, "Oh,
+baby knows me!"
+
+And when the father comes home that night she greets him with, "Baby
+knew me to-day." And there's a soft bell-like tender ring in her voice
+that vibrates on the strings of his heart. And all the folks within
+range are advised of the day's event. And the mother clear forgets all
+the sharp-cutting pain back there just a little before, in this joy,
+this look of recognition.
+
+I knew of a woman. She was of an old family, of unusual native gift, and
+rare accomplishment. And her babe came. And the time came when
+ordinarily there would be that first sweet look of recognition, but--_it
+didn't come._ There was a defect; something not as it should be. And you
+mothers all know how she felt, yes, and you true fathers, too. She was
+heart-broken. And she turned aside from all the busy round of activity
+in which she had been the natural leader. And for years she devoted all
+her splendid talents, her strength and time, to just one thing, a very
+simple thing; only this,--_getting a look of glad recognition out of two
+babe-eyes._
+
+_He_ looked into the face of His child, His world, for the look of
+recognition. But there was none. And He was heart-broken. And He devoted
+all His strength and time, Himself, for those human years to--what? One
+thing, just one thing, a very simple thing, only this: to getting a look
+of recognition out of the eyes of His child.
+
+Aye, there's more yet here. He _looks_ into our faces, eager for that
+simple direct answering look into His face and out of our eyes, yours
+and mine. And we give Him--things, church-membership, orthodox belief,
+intense activity, aggressive missionary propaganda, money in good
+measure, tireless, and then tired-out service--_things!_ And all good
+things. But _the_ thing, the direct look into His own face answering His
+own hungry searching look, that look in the face that reveals the inner
+heart that He _waits_ for so often, and waits, a bit sore at heart.
+
+For you know the eye is the face of the face. It's the doorway into the
+soul, out through which the soul, the man within, looks. I look at you,
+the man inside here looks out at you through my eye. And I look at the
+real you down through your eye. The real man is hidden away within, but
+looks out through the eye and is looked at only through the eye. We
+really give ourselves to Jesus in the look direct into His face which
+tells Him all, and through which He transforms us.
+
+
+
+A Heart-breaking Verse.
+
+
+Then comes John's second heart-breaking verse; but it is just a bit more
+heart-breaking in what it says. Listen: _He came to His own home, and
+they that were His own kinsfolk received Him not into the house but kept
+Him standing out in the cold and storm of the wintry night._
+
+One of you men goes home to-night. It's your own home, shaped on your
+own personality through the years. It's a bit late. You've had a long
+hard day. You're tired. It's stormy. The wind and the rain chill you as
+you turn the corner. And you pull your coat a bit snugger as you quicken
+your steps and think of home, warmth and comfort, loved ones, and rest
+for body and spirit, too.
+
+As you come to the door you reach for your latch-key, and find, in the
+busy rush, you seem to have forgotten it, somehow. So you ring the bell
+or knock. And suppose--be patient with me a bit, please. Suppose your
+loved ones know you're there. You even see a hand drawing aside the edge
+of the window shade, and two eyes that you know so well peer out through
+the crack at you; then the shade goes to again. Yes, they know you're
+there. But the door, your own door, doesn't open. How would you feel?
+
+And some one says to himself, "That's not a good illustration. That
+thing couldn't happen. It isn't natural." No: you're right. It _isn't_
+natural. It could not happen to _you_. I am sure it could not happen to
+_me_. If it could I'd be heart-broken. _But this is what happened to
+Him!_ This is what John is saying here. He came to His own front door,
+and they whose very image revealed their close kinship to Him, received
+Him not into the home, but kept the door fast in His face.
+
+Then there's a later translation. This old King James version bears the
+date of 1611, I think. And the English Revision is dated 1881, I
+believe. And this American Standard Revision I am using has 1901 on its
+title page. But there's a later revision. It bears a yet later date,
+1915, April 27. But it is a shifting date. Each translator fixed his own
+date.
+
+This latest translation runs something like this: He _comes_ to His own.
+That's you and myself. We belong to Him. He gave His breath to us in
+Eden. He gave His breath to you and me at our birth. He gave His blood
+for us on Calvary. We belong to Him. The image of His kinship is stamped
+upon us. We may not acknowledge it, but that can't change the fact.
+
+_He comes to His own, and His own_--and here, as the scholars would say,
+there are variant readings. Let me give you one or two I have found.
+Here is one: He comes to His own, and His own--puts a chair outside the
+door on the top-step. It's a large armchair with a cushion in, perhaps.
+And then His own talks about Him through the crack of the door, or
+likelier, the window. It's reckoned safer to keep the door fast.
+
+Listen to what he says: "He's a wonderful man this Jesus; great teacher,
+the greatest; the greatest man of the race; His philosophy, His moral
+standards are the ideals; wonderful life; great example." They fairly
+exhaust the language in talking about this Man. But notice. It seems a
+bit queer. The man they're talking _about_ is _outside the door_. His
+own claim is left severely outside.
+
+Some make it read like this: He comes to His own, and they who are His
+own open the door a _crack_, maybe a fairly respectably wide crack. We
+all like the word _Saviour_. Yes, we cling tenaciously to that.
+Selfishly, would you say? We want to be saved from a certain place we
+think of as _down_, that we've been taught about, and don't want to go
+to--_if it's there;_ the way men talk about it to-day.
+
+And we want to be saved into another certain place we think of as _up_,
+and where we surely want to go _after_ we get through down on the
+earth, and _must_ go away somewhere else; with that "after" and "must"
+carefully underscored. And we want to be saved from all the
+inconveniences possible along the way, and to secure all the advantages
+and help available: yes, yes, open the door a crack.
+
+But be careful about the width of the opened crack. Let it be just the
+proper conventionalized width. Let there be no extremeism about the
+wideness of that opening. Things must be proper. For what would the
+other crack-open-door-owners think?
+
+And then, too, yet more serious, this Jesus has a way, a most
+inconsiderate way of coming in as far as you let Him, and of taking
+things into His own hands. Certain people use that word
+"inconsiderate"--to themselves, in secret. Jesus changes some things
+when He is allowed all the way in. He might change your personal habits,
+your home arrangements, some of your social customs and your business
+plans.
+
+Of course He changes only what needs changing, as He sees it.
+But--then--you--well, some things can be carried _too far_--to suit
+_you_. This Jesus has the _all_ habit. He contracted it when He was down
+on the earth. Our needs grew the habit. He _gave_ all. And He has a way
+of coming in all the way, and of reaching in His pierced hand and
+_taking_ all.
+
+He might even put His hand in on that most sacred thing, that holiest of
+all, that you guard most jealously--that box. It has heavy hinges, and
+double padlocks, and the keys are held hard under the thumb of your
+will. Of course there may really not be much in it; and again there may
+be very much. But much or little, it is securely kept under that thick
+broad thumb of yours.
+
+Oh! you _give_; of _course_; yes, yes, we're all good proper Christian
+folk here. We give a tenth, and even much more. We support an aggressive
+missionary propaganda. That's the thing, you know, in our day, for good
+church people. We give to all the good things. Ye-es, no doubt. And we
+are very careful, too, that that _inconsiderate_ Hand shall not disturb
+the greater bulk that remains between hinge and lock. That's _yours_. Of
+course you are _His_, redeemed, saved by His blood.
+
+Well, well, how these pronouns, "His," "ours," do get mixed up! How
+lovely some things are to _sing_ about, in church, and special services,
+at Keswick and Northfield. But through it all we hold hard to that key,
+we don't let go--_even to Him_, though it is He who entrusts all to our
+temporary keeping. We do guard the width of that opening crack, do we
+not?
+
+One day I looked through that crack and caught a glimpse of _His face_
+looking through full in my own, with those eyes of His. And at first I
+wanted to take the door clear off of its hinges and stand it outside
+against the bricks, and leave the whole door-space wide for Him.
+
+But I've learned better. No man wants to leave the doorway of his life
+unguarded. He must keep the strong hand of his controlling purpose on
+the knob of the front door of his life. There are others than He, evil
+ones, cunningly subtle ones, standing just at the corner watching for
+such an opportunity. And they step quickly slyly in under your untaught
+unsuspicious eyes, and get things badly tangled in your life. There's a
+better, a stronger way.
+
+Here's the personal translation that I try now, by His help, to work out
+into living words, the language of life. He comes to His own, and His
+own opens the door wide, and _holds_ it wide open, that He may come in
+all the way, and cleanse, and change, readjust, and then shape over on
+the shape of His own presence.
+
+But every one must work out his own translation of that; and every one
+does. And the crowd reads--not this printed version. It reads this other
+translation, the one nearest, in such big print, the one our lives work
+out daily. That's the translation they prefer. And that's the
+translation they're being influenced by, and influenced by tremendously.
+
+
+
+He Came to His Own.
+
+
+In certain circles in England, they tell of a certain physician years
+ago. He came of a very humble family. His father was a gardener on a
+gentleman's estate. And the father died. And the mother wasn't able to
+pay her son's schooling. But a storekeeper in the village liked this
+little bright boy and sent him to school. And he went on through the
+higher schooling, became a physician, and began his practice in London.
+He became skilled, and then famous, and then wealthy.
+
+He remembered his dear old mother, of course. He sent her money, and
+fabrics for dresses, and wrote her. But for a long time, in the busy
+absorption of his life, he had not been to see her. And the dear old
+mother in the little cottage in the country lived in the sweet
+consciousness that her son was a great physician up in the great London.
+He was her chief topic of conversation. When the neighbours were in she
+would always talk of her son, her Laddie, she called him.
+
+"He's so good to me, my Laddie is. He sends me money. I put it in the
+bank. He sends me cloth for dresses; it's quite too good for a plain
+body like me. And he writes me letters, such good letters, wonderful
+letters. But he's so busy up there, that he hasn't been to see me for a
+long time now. You know he's a great doctor now, and he has great skill,
+and there are so many needing him. And he's no time at all, even for
+himself, I expect. But"--she would always finish her talk as they sat
+over the tea by saying, half to herself, really more to herself than to
+the little group, with a half-repressed longing sigh, "but, I wish, I
+just _wish_ I could _see_ my _Laddie_."
+
+Then some changes took place on the estate. And the cottage where she
+had lived so long must be given up. And the dear old woman had to make
+new plans. And she cudgeled her old head, and thought, and at last she
+said to herself, "I know what I'll do. I'll go-up to London, and I'll
+live with Laddie. He'll be so glad to have me." And bright-coloured
+visions flitted through her mind, as she sat over her tea by the open
+grate. But she wouldn't send him word; no, no, she would surprise him,
+and add to his pleasure.
+
+And the dear old soul, in her fine simplicity, did not think into what
+this would mean, nor of the difference that had grown up with the years,
+in manner of life, between her son and herself. He was a cultured
+gentleman, with his well-appointed city home, and the circle of friends
+that had grown up about him. And she was a simple uncultured country
+woman with a broad provincial twist on her tongue. But she was
+blissfully unconscious of this. She would go and live with her Laddie.
+It would be so delightful for them both.
+
+And so she went. It was her first train journey, and quite a time of it
+she had finding the house. But at last she stands looking up at the
+house. "Ugh! does my Laddie live here! in this great mansion?" But there
+was the name on the door-plate. There was no mistaking that. And so she
+rang the bell. "Is the doctor in?" She could hardly get the word
+"doctor" out. She had never called him that before, just Laddie. But now
+she must say it. "Is the doctor in?" And the word almost stuck in her
+throat as she thought to herself, "This poor man opening the door
+doesn't know that the 'doctor' really belongs to _me_."
+
+But in a hard voice the servant said that it was past the hours. She
+couldn't see the doctor.
+
+"Ah! bat," she said, quite taken by surprise at being held there, "I
+_must_ see him."
+
+"But, I tell you, it's quite too late to see him to-day."
+
+But she resolutely put her stout country-boot in the crack of the door,
+and her English jaw set in true English fashion, and she said with that
+quietness that has the subtle touch of danger in it, "I'll see the
+doctor."
+
+And the servant looked puzzled and went to report about this strangely
+insistent woman. And the doctor was annoyed by the interruption in the
+midst of something that was absorbing him. He said sharply, "It's past
+the hours; I can see no one."
+
+"I told her so, sir," replied the man deferentially, "but she insists in
+a strange way, sir."
+
+"What's she like?"
+
+"Oh, just a plain country body, sir."
+
+"Well, show her up."
+
+And I am glad to remember that she had a warm embrace of his strong
+arms, as he instantly recognized her in the doorway, while the servant
+stared. Then he said rather nervously as the servant discreetly
+withdrew, "How did yon happen to come? Why didn't you send word? Has
+anything happened?" And then as she sat by the fire sipping a cup of
+tea, she told the story, in her own simple slow way, and ended up with,
+"And now I'm coming to live with you, Laddie." And the old eyes behind
+the spectacles beamed, and the dear old wrinkled face glowed.
+
+And he poked the fire, and tried to think You know, our English friends
+depend almost wholly on the open grate fire, as we do so largely in the
+South. And it's a great thing, is the open grate fire. It's a fire. It
+warms your body, at least in front in extreme weather. But it's more
+than a fire. It's a stimulus to thought. It refreshes your spirit, and
+rests your tired nerves, and it is a wonderful thing to help you unravel
+knotty problems. So he poked the fire and thought, while she, quite
+unconscious of his embarrassment, went on sipping her tea and talking.
+
+It would never do to have her come there, he thought. And his thoughts
+went to the circle of friends at the dinner table in the evening, and to
+the critical city servants that ran his bachelor establishment. And just
+then his ear caught anew the broad provincial twist on her tongue. He
+had never noticed it so broad, so decided, before. And she was talking
+the small countryside talk, chickens and an epidemic among them. And
+that grated strangely. It certainly wouldn't do to have her come there.
+
+Then the tide began to rise gently on the beach of his heart. He
+thought, "She's my _mother_. And if mother wants to come here, here she
+comes." And he straightened up in his chair, as he gave a gentler touch
+to a blazing lump of coal. Then the tide ebbed. It began running out
+again. "No, it would hardly do." And he poked and thought. Finally he
+broke into her run of talk.
+
+"Mother, you know it is not very healthful here. We have bad fogs in
+London. And you're used to the wholesome country air. It wouldn't agree
+with you here, I'm afraid. I'll get a little cottage on the edge of
+town, and I'll come and see you very often."
+
+And the dear old woman _sensed_ at once just what he was thinking. She
+was not stupid, if she was just a plain homely body. He got his brains
+from his simple country mother, as many a man of note has done. But she
+spoke not of what she felt. She simply said, with that quietness which
+grows out of strong self-control:
+
+"It's a bit late the night, Laddie, I'm thinking, to be talking about
+new plans."
+
+And he said softly, "Forgive me, mother: it is late, I forgot." And he
+showed her to her sleeping apartment.
+
+"And where do you sleep, Laddie?"
+
+"Right here, mother, this first door on the left. Be sure to call me if
+you need anything."
+
+And he bade her a tender "good-night," and went back to his study to do
+some more thinking and planning. And very late he came up to his
+sleeping-chamber. And he was just cuddling his head into the soft pillow
+for the night, when the door opened, so softly, and in there came a
+little body in simple white night garb, with a quaint old-fashioned
+nightcap on, candle in hand. She came in very softly. And he started up.
+
+"Mother, are you ill? What's the matter?"
+
+And she came over very quietly, and put down the candle on the table
+before she answered. And then softly:
+
+"No, no, Laddie, I'm not ill. I just came to tuck you in for the night
+as I used to do at home. ... Lie still, my Laddie."
+
+And she tucked the clothes about his neck, and smoothed his hair, and
+patted his cheek, and kissed his face. And she crooned over him as
+mother with little child. The years were quite forgot. She had her
+little son again. And she talked mother's love-talk to a child.
+"Good-night, Laddie ... good-night ... good-night ... mother's own boy."
+And a little more tucking and smoothing and patting and kissing, and
+then she turned so quietly, picked up the candle, and went out, closing
+the door so softly, her great strength revealed in her gentleness.
+
+And he was just on the point of starting up and saying, "Mother, you
+must stay with me, right here"--no, the morning will do, he thought. But
+when the morning came she wasn't down for breakfast. And when he went to
+her room she wasn't there. It turned out afterwards that she had said to
+herself, "It doesn't suit my Laddie's plans to have me here. I don't
+understand why. It isn't his fault at all. It just doesn't suit. And
+I'll never be a trouble to my Laddie."
+
+And so with that rare characteristic English trait of independence, she
+had quietly gone off early that morning before the house was astir. And
+he broken-hearted--I'm always glad to remember that--he searched through
+the wilderness of London for more than a year, searched diligently, but
+could find no trace of her. And then he was graciously permitted to
+minister to her last hours in a hospital where a street accident had
+sent her unconscious, and where he was chief of the medical staff.
+
+_She came to her own and her own received her not._ He loved her, but it
+didn't suit his plans. _He, Jesus_, came to _His_ own, and His own
+received Him not; it didn't suit their plans. Ah! listen yet further: He
+_comes_ to His own, you and me, and His own--_you_ finish it. Have we
+some plans, too, set plans, that we don't propose to change, even
+for--(softly) even for _Him_? Each of us is finishing that sentence, not
+in words so much if at all, in the words of our action. And the crowd
+reads our translation.
+
+
+
+The Oldest Family.
+
+
+"But," John goes on. That was a steadying "but." It was hard on John to
+recall how they treated his Friend and Master. But there is a "but."
+There's another aide, an offset to what he's been saying, a bright bit
+to offset the black bit. But as many as did receive Him. Some received.
+Jesus was rejected, yes, abominably, contemptibly rejected. But He was
+also accepted, gladly, joyously, wholeheartedly accepted, even though
+it came to mean pain and shame.
+
+_As many as received Him_, John says, _He received into His family_. The
+conception of a family and of a home where the family lives, runs all
+through underneath here. They would not receive this Jesus because He
+didn't belong to the inner circle of the old families which they
+represented. They regarded themselves as the custodians of the
+exclusive aristocratic circles of Jerusalem. And Jerusalem was the upper
+circle of Israel.
+
+And every one knew that Israel was the chiefest, the one uppermost
+nation, of the earth, with none near enough to be classed second. They
+were the favourites of God, all the rest were "dogs of Gentiles,"
+outsiders, not to be mentioned in the same breath. To these national
+leaders of Jesus' day, this was the very breath of their life.
+
+"And _this Jesus_!" They spat on the ground to relieve the intensity of
+their contempt. "Who was He? A peasant! a Galilean! Nazareth!" Nazareth
+was put in as a sort of superlative degree of contempt. Of course, they
+could easily have found out about the lineage of Jesus. In the best
+meaning of the word, Jesus was an aristocrat. Apart from its
+philological derivation that word means one who traces his lineage back
+through a worthy line for a long way, and so one who has the noble
+traits of such lineage. In the best meaning of the word Jesus was an
+_aristocrat_. His line traced back without slip or break to the great
+house of David, and that meant clear back to Adam. The records were all
+there, carefully preserved, indisputable. They could easily have found
+this out.
+
+I recall talking one day in London with a gentle lady of an old, titled
+Scottish family, an earnest Christian, trained in the Latin Church. In
+the course of the conversation she remarked, "Of course, Jesus was a
+_peasant_." And I replied as gently as I could so as not to seem to be
+arguing, "Of course, He was _not_ a peasant. He chose to _live_ as a
+peasant, for a great strong purpose. But He was an aristocrat in blood.
+His family line traced directly back through the noblest families clear
+to the beginning. No one living had a longer unbroken lineage. And that
+is the very essence of aristocracy."
+
+In some circles, they count much, or most, on old families. In certain
+cities of our own country, east and south, this is reckoned as the
+hall-mark of highest distinction. When one goes across the water to
+England and the Continent, he finds the old families of America are
+rather young affairs. And as he pushes on into the East, some of the old
+families of Europe sometimes seem fairly recent. I remember in the
+Orient running across a family where the father had been a Shinto
+priest, father and son successively, through forty-five generations; and
+another where the father of the family has been successively a
+court-musician for thirty-eight generations. I thought maybe I had run
+into some really old families at last.
+
+I come of a rather old family myself. It runs clear back without break
+or slip to Adam in Eden. I've not bothered much with tracing it, for
+there are some pretty plain evidences of ugly stains on the family
+escutcheon, running all through, and repeatedly. And then even more than
+that I've become intensely interested in another family, an older
+family, the oldest family of all. Arrangements have been made whereby I
+have been taken into this oldest family of all with full rights and
+privileges. My claims to aristocracy are now of the very highest, with
+all the noble obligations that go with it. That's what John is talking
+of here. _As many as received Him, He received into His family, the
+oldest family of all._
+
+These people refused Jesus because He didn't belong to their set. In
+their utterly selfish prejudice and wilful ignorance, these leaders shut
+Him out from the circles they controlled. But with great graciousness He
+received into His circle any, of any circle, high or low, who would
+receive Him into their hearts. To as many as received Him into their
+hearts He opened the door into His own family. He gave them the
+technical right of becoming children of His Father.
+
+Their part of the thing is put very simply in two ways. They _believed_.
+They were told, they listened and thought, they accepted as true, they
+risked what they counted most precious, they loved. So they believed.
+And so they _received._ The door opened, the inner door, the heart door.
+He went in. That settled things for them. When He graciously entered
+their hearts, the inner citadel of their lives, that settled their place
+in this oldest family of all.
+
+
+
+How We Don't Get In, and How We Do.
+
+
+It is of intensest interest in our day to have John go on to tell, in
+his own simple taking way, just how we get into this God-family. First
+of all, he tells us how we _don't_ get in. Listen: "_not of blood_,"
+that is, not by our natural generation; "_nor of the will of the
+flesh_," that is, not by anything we can do of ourselves, though this
+has a place, a distinctly secondary place; "_nor of the will of man_,"
+that is, not by what somebody else can do for us, though this too has
+its place.
+
+These are the three "_nots_"; the three ways we are _not_ saved. And it
+becomes of intensest interest to notice that these are the very three
+ways that the crowd is emphasizing to-day, some this, others that, as
+the way of being saved. The three modern words we commonly use for these
+three "nots" of John are, _family, culture_, and _influence_.
+
+Some of us seem to be fully expecting to walk into the presence of God,
+and to get all there is to be gotten there, because of the family we
+belong to. This is probably stronger in some of us than we are conscious
+of. It's a matter of blood with us, our blood, our natural generation.
+We take greatest pride in showing what blood it is that runs in our
+veins. We trace the line far back to those whose names are well known.
+And this sort of thing has overpowering influence in our human affairs
+down here.
+
+His gracious majesty King George is King of England, because he is the
+child of Edward and Alexandra. His one and only claim to the English
+throne is that at the time of accession he was their oldest living son.
+But that won't figure a farthing's worth when he comes up to the
+hearthfire of God's family. And I think he understands this full well.
+I'm expecting to see him there; not as King of England, but as a
+brother.
+
+It is not a matter of blood. It's a blessed thing to be well-born. It
+makes a tremendous difference to have the blood of an old noble family
+in one's veins, if it is good clean blood. But it'll never save us.
+Salvation is not by lineal descent, not by family line. It is "not of
+blood." John clears that ground.
+
+Some of us put great stress on what we are in ourselves. This looms big
+with a great crowd scattered throughout the earth. We know so much. We
+have gotten it by dint of hard work. We can do some things so skilfully.
+We have worked into positions of great power among men. Our names are
+known. Sometimes they are spelled in large letters.
+
+The broad word for this is _culture_, what we have gained and gotten by
+our effort, of that which is reckoned good, and which _is_ good. Culture
+is one of the chief words in our language to-day. Whether spelled the
+English way or the German, it looms big. It is one of our modern
+tidbits. It is chewed on much, and pleases our palate greatly. And
+culture is good, if it is good culture.
+
+But, have you noticed, that you have to have a thing before you can
+culture it? No amount of the choicest culture will get an apple out of a
+turnip, nor a Bartlett pear out of a potato, nor make a Chinese into an
+Englishman, nor an American into a Japanese. Culture can improve the
+stock, but _it can't change it_. It takes some other power than culture
+to change the kind. Here we have to be made of the same kind as they are
+up in the old family of God. There must be a change at the core. Then
+culture of that new stock is only good and blessed.
+
+This is John's second "not." It seems rather radical. It completely
+undercuts so much of our present day notions. If John is right, some of
+us are wrong, radically, dangerously wrong. Yet John had a wonderful
+Teacher whom he lived with for a while. And after He had gone, John had
+another Teacher, unseen but very real, who guided, especially in the
+writing of the old Jesus-story. The whole presumption is in favour of
+John's way of it being wholly right. And if that makes us wrong, we
+would better be grateful to find it out _now_, while there's time to
+change. Being saved is not a matter of what we can do, of our culture,
+though this has its proper place.
+
+And some of us put tremendous stress to-day on _influence_, what we can
+command from others, in furtherance of our desires. Influence is spelled
+in biggest type and printed in blackest ink. Whether in political
+matters at Washington or at London; in financial, whether Lombard Street
+or Wall Street; or in the all-important social matters, or even in the
+educational, the university world, the chief question is, "Whose
+influence can you get?" "What name can you quote?" "Whose backing have
+you?" Influence and culture are the twin gods to-day. The smoke of
+their incense goeth up continuously. Their places of worship are
+crowded, with bent knees and prostrate forms and reverential hush.
+
+Have you noticed that _Jesus_ hadn't enough influence with the officials
+of His day to keep from the cross? No: but He had enough _power_ to
+break the official emblem of earth's greatest authority, the Roman seal
+on the Joseph tomb. Rather striking that; intensely significant for us
+moderns. _Peter_ hadn't enough _influence_ with the authorities to keep
+out of jail. Sounds rather disgraceful that, does it not? Aye, but he
+had enough _power_ with God to open jail-doors and walk quietly out
+against the wish of those highest in authority.
+
+Influence has its proper place. It's good, _if_ it is. But we are not
+saved by it. We are not saved by what some one else can do for us; "not
+of the will of man." Your mother's prayers and your wife's, and the
+influence of their godly lives will have great weight. It's a great
+blessing to have them. They help enormously. But the thing itself that
+takes a man into the presence of God, saved and redeemed, is something
+immensely more than this, some action of his own that goes to the roots
+as none of these other things do.
+
+One time a deputation waited on Lincoln to press a matter of public
+concern. But his keenly logical mind discerned flaws in their
+impassioned and carefully worked out arguments. He waited patiently till
+their case was complete. And then in that quiet way for which he was
+famous, he said, "How many legs would a sheep have if you called its
+tail a leg?" As he expected, they promptly answered "Five." "No," he
+said, "it wouldn't; it would have only four. _Calling_ a tail a leg does
+not make it one." So a simple bit of his homely sense and accurate logic
+scattered their finely spun argument.
+
+Calling either family or culture or influence the chief thing doesn't
+make it so. These are John's three tremendous "nots." They rather cut
+straight across the common current of thought and belief and conduct
+to-day. We may indeed be grateful if a single homely drop of black ink
+from John's pen put into the beautifully cloudy-grey solution of modern
+thought clears the liquid and makes a precipitate of sharply defined
+truth that any eye can plainly see.
+
+This is how we _won't_ be saved. This is how we _don't_ get into the
+family of God. It is "not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of
+the will of man"; not through family connection, nor by what we can do
+of ourselves simply, nor by what we can get some of our fellows to do
+for us, simply.
+
+"_But of God_," John says. It is by Someone else, outside of us, above
+us, reaching down from a higher level, and putting the germ of a new
+life within us, and lifting us up to His own level. He puts His hand
+_through_ the open door of our will, what we do in opening up to Him,
+_through_ "the will of the flesh." He walks along the pathway of the
+earnest desire of those who would help us up, "the will of man." But it
+is what _He_ does that does the one thing that all depends upon. His is
+the decisive action, _through_ our choosing and our friends' helping.
+
+I said it isn't a matter of blood, of lineage. Yet it is. That statement
+must be modified. Family relationship is of necessity a matter of blood.
+That's the very blood of it. This _is_ a matter of blood; but not _our_
+blood; _His._ There has to be a new strain of blood. Our blood is
+stained. It is at fault. It is impure. There's been a bad break far back
+there in the family record, a complete break. We were powerless either
+to purify the stock, or to get over that gap, even if we admitted the
+need.
+
+There had to be a bridging of that gap. It had to be from the upper
+side. The other fell short. The gap was still there. There had to be a
+new strain of blood. This was, this _is_, the only way. We get into that
+old first family only by the Father of the family reaching over the
+break and putting in the new strain of blood, the germ of the family
+life, and so lifting us up to the new level. And Jesus was God doing
+just that.
+
+
+
+Our Tented Neighbour.
+
+
+Then John begins a new paragraph. He goes back to tell just how the
+thing was done. Listen: _the Word, this wondrous One, became a man, one
+of ourselves, and pitched His tent in close amongst our tents._There's
+only a stretch of canvas between Him and any of us. He wanted to get
+close, close enough to help, yet never infringing upon the privacy of
+our tents, only coming in as He was invited. But He has remarkable
+ears. A whisper reaches Him at once. And He is out of His tent into ours
+to help at the faintest call. That was why He pitched His tent in
+amongst ours, to be one of ourselves, and to be at hand in our need.
+
+And then a touch of awe creeps into John's spirit as he writes, and the
+light flashes out of his eye with the intensity of an old picture
+surging to the front of his imagination again. There was more than a
+_tent_ here, more than a _man_. Out of the man, out through the tent
+doorway, and tent canvas, flashes a wondrous, soft, clear light, that
+transfigures canvas and tent and man. John's face glows as he writes,
+"and we beheld His _glory_."
+
+I suppose he is thinking chiefly of that still night on white Hermon.
+This despised Man had called the inner three away from the crowd, in the
+dark of night, and had gently drawn aside the exquisite drapery of His
+humanity, and let some of the inner glory shine out before their eyes.
+So the way was lightened for them as their feet were turned with His
+down towards the dark valley of the cross. I suppose John is thinking
+chiefly of this.
+
+But this is not all, I am very sure. There's more, even though this may
+have been most. Glory is the character of goodness. It is not something
+tacked on the outside. It is some native thing looking out from within.
+So much of what we think of as glory and splendour in scenes of
+magnificence is a something in the externals, the outer arrangements.
+Splendid garbing, brilliant colours, dazzling shining of lights, seats
+removed a distance apart and up, magnificent outer appointments,--these
+seem connected in our thought with an occasion and a scene being
+glorious.
+
+But John is using the word in its simple true first meaning. Glory is
+something within shining out. It is the inner native light that goodness
+gives out. "We beheld _His glory_." I think John must have been thinking
+of Nazareth. Thirty out of thirty-three years were spent in homely
+Nazareth. Ten-elevenths of Jesus' life was spent in--_living_, simply
+living the true pure strong gentle life amid ordinary circumstances,
+homely surroundings. This was the greatest thing Jesus did short of
+dying. He _lived_. Next to Calvary where the glory shined out
+incomparably, it shined out most in Nazareth. He hallowed the common
+round of life by living an uncommon life there. This was a revealing of
+His glory. So He revealed the inner spirit of simple full obedience to
+His Father's plan for His earth-life.
+
+If we would only rise to His level! The way up is down. We are likest
+Him when we live the true Jesus-life _regardless of where it is lived_,
+on the street, in the house, amidst the ideals--or lack of ideals--of
+those we touch closest. It was a wondrous glory John beheld. And the
+crowd--no wonder that crowd couldn't resist Jesus. They can't even yet,
+when He is _lived_.
+
+Then John goes on quietly to explain about that glory, how it came. He
+says it was "_glory as of an only begotten of a father_." The common
+versions with which we are familiar, the old King James, the English and
+American revisions, all say "the," "_the_ only begotten of _the_
+Father." I suppose the translators wanted to make it quite clear that
+Jesus was in an exceptional way the very Son of God. And so they don't
+translate quite as John put it. They try to help him out a little in
+making his meaning clear.
+
+But you will notice that this old Book of God never needs any helping
+out in making the truth quite clear. When you can sift through versions
+and languages down to what is really being said, you find it said in the
+simplest strongest way possible.
+
+Here John is saying, "glory as of _an_ only begotten from _a_ father."
+It is a family picture, so common in the East. Here in the West, the
+unit of society is the individual. The farther west you come the more
+pronounced this becomes, until here in our own land individualism seems
+at times to run to extremes. Custom in the East is the very reverse of
+this. There the unit of action is not the individual, but the _family_.
+The family controls the individual in everything. We Westerners think we
+can see where it runs to such extremes as to constitute one of the great
+hindrances to progress there.
+
+In the East, if a young man is to be married, he has actually nothing to
+do with it, except to be present in proper garb when the time comes. The
+fact that he should now be married, the choice of his bride, the
+betrothal, the time, all arrangements and adjustments,--all this is done
+by the families. The two that we Westerners think of as the principals
+have nothing to do, except to acquiesce in the arrangements of their
+elders. It is strictly a family affair.
+
+Even so all that belongs to the family, of wealth, fame, inheritance,
+distinction, vests distinctly in the head of the family, the father. He
+stands for the whole family. And so, too, all of this descends directly
+from the father at his death to his eldest son. In some parts the father
+retires at a certain age, either really or nominally, and all becomes
+vested technically in his eldest son. And if the son be an only begotten
+son, then literally all that is in the father comes into the son. All
+the fame, the inheritance, the traditions, the obligations, the wealth,
+in short all the glory of the father comes of itself, by common action
+of events, to the son.
+
+Now this is what John is thinking of as he writes, "we beheld His glory,
+glory as of _an_ only begotten of _a_ father." That is to say, all there
+is in the Father is in Jesus. When you see Jesus, you are seeing the
+Father. The whole of God is in this Jesus. This is what John is saying
+here.
+
+
+
+Grace and Truth Coupled.
+
+
+And then John does a bit of exquisite packing of much in little. He
+tells the whole story of the character, the revealed glory, of Jesus in
+such a few simple words,--"_full of grace and truth_." Not grace
+without truth. That would be a sort of weakly, sickly sentimentalism.
+And not truth without grace. That would be a cold stern repellent
+insistence on certain high standards. But grace and truth coupled,
+intermingling.
+
+Of course real grace and truth always are coupled. They tell the
+exquisite poise that is in everything God does. Truth is the back-bone
+of grace. Grace is the soft cushioning of flesh upon the bony framework
+of truth. It is the soft warm breath of life in truth. Truth is grace
+holding up the one only standard of purity and right and insisting upon
+it. And as we look we know within ourselves we never can reach it. Grace
+is truth reaching a strong warm hand down to where we are and _helping_
+us reach it.
+
+With God these things are always coupled. _We_ get them separated badly,
+or would I better say, imitations of them. There is a sort of thing we
+have called truth. It is not so common now as a generation or more ago.
+It is a sort of stern elevated preaching of righteousness, but with no
+warm feel of life to it. I can remember hearing preaching in my immature
+boy days that made me feel that the man and the thing must be right, but
+neither had any attraction for me. It was as though a man went fishing
+with a carefully-made properly-labelled metallic-bait at the end of a
+long stout cord, and said, as he dangled it in the sinful waters to the
+elusive fish, "Now, bite; or be damned."
+
+It was never put so baldly, of course, in words. And I was only a child
+with immature childish imaginations. Yet that was the feeling about the
+thing the child got. But it's scarcely worth while talking of that now
+except to point the contrast; things have swung so far to the other
+extreme.
+
+The current thing to-day is grace without truth, or what is supposed to
+be grace. It is a sort of man-made substitute. It's something like this.
+Here's a man in the gutter, the moral gutter. It may be the actual
+gutter. Or, there may be the outer trappings of refinement that easy
+wealth provides; or, the real refinement that culture and inheritance
+bring. But morally and in spirit, it's a gutter. The slime of sin and
+low passion, of selfishness and indulgence and self-ambition, oozes over
+everything in full sight. The man's in the gutter.
+
+And along comes the modern philosopher of grace, so-called. He looks
+down compassionately, and says, "Poor fellow, I'm so sorry for you. Too
+bad you should have gotten down there. Let me help you a bit, my
+brother." So he puts some flowering plants down in the slime of the
+gutter, and he brushes the man's clothes a bit, and his hair, and
+sprinkles the latest-labelled cologne-water over him, and pats him on
+the shoulder, and says, "Now, you feel better, my man, don't you?" And
+the man sniffs the perfume, and is quite sure he does. _But he is still
+in the gutter._
+
+There seems to be an increasing amount of this sort of thing over in my
+neighbourhood. How is it in your corner of the planet? There's an
+intense stress on environment; that means the _outside_ of things.
+Better sanitation, improved housing, purer milk supply, and segregation
+of vice which seems to mean putting some of the viler smelling slime of
+the gutter, the slimer slime, all over in one guttered section by
+itself. But there can be no health there. It's a _change of location_
+that is needed!
+
+The wondrous Jesus-plan is different. It holds things in poise. Grace
+_and_ truth. Truth is Jesus stretching His hand up high, up to the limit
+of arm's length, and saying, "Here is the standard, purity,
+righteousness, utter honesty of heart and rigid purity of motive and
+life. You _must_ reach this standard. It can't be lowered by the half
+thickness of a paper-thin shaving. You must come to this standard. The
+standard never comes down to you."
+
+And the man in the gutter says, "I'll never reach it." And he is right.
+_He_ never will--of himself, alone. Yet that's truth, true truth. "A
+hopeless case" you say; "utter impractical idealizing! Case ruled out of
+court." Just wait, that's only half the case, and not the warm half
+either.
+
+Grace is Jesus going down into the gutter, the gutterest gutter, and
+taking the man by his outstretching hand, and _lifting_ him _clean up_
+out of the gutter, up, and up, _till the man reaches the standard_, and
+is never content till he does. That was a tremendous going down, and a
+yet more tremendous lifting up. Jesus broke His heart and lost His life
+in the going down.
+
+But out from the broken heart came running the blood that proved both
+cleansing and a salve. And out of the grave of that lost life came a new
+life that proved an incentive, and a tremendous dynamic. The blood
+cleanseth the _inside_ of the man in the gutter, and heals his sores,
+restores his sight and hearing and sensitiveness of touch. The new life
+put inside the man makes him rise up and _walk determinedly_ out of the
+gutter to a _new location_. He is a new man, with a new inside, in a new
+location. That threefold cord is ahead of Solomon's--it _can't_ be
+broken.
+
+And, if you'll mark it keenly, a new _in_side includes a new _out_side.
+The thing that in religious talk is called conversion is a sociological
+factor that cannot be ignored by the thoughtful student. The drunkard
+goes down to the old-fashioned sort of mission where they insist on
+teaching that the blood of Jesus cleanseth from all sin, and that the
+Holy Spirit will make a new man of you, and burn the sin out.
+
+And _something_ happens to the drunkard. He kneels a drunkard, drunk; he
+rises a man, sober. He goes to the hole he calls home. And at once a
+change begins to work gradually out. He treats his wife and children
+differently. He works. They are fed better and clothed warmer. He gets a
+better house in a better neighbourhood. The new sociological factor is
+at work. It began inside; it revolutionizes the outside.
+
+Settlement houses, better environment, improved outer conditions of
+every sort, are blessed, and only blessed, after the inside is fixed or
+in helping to get it fixed. If that isn't done, they are simply as a
+lovely bit of pink-coloured court-plaster skilfully adjusted over an
+ugly incurable ulcer. The man is befooled while the ulcer eats into his
+vitals.
+
+It's only the blood-power of a Jesus, _the Jesus,_ that can fix the
+inside. He cuts out the ulcer and puts in a new strain of blood. Then
+the inner includes the outer. And the most grateful of all is the man.
+This is the Jesus-plan, John says, "_full of grace and truth._"
+
+Grace is named first. It _comes_ first. That is a bit of the
+graciousness of it. That's love's exquisite diplomacy. We feel the
+grateful warmth of the sun in the winter's air, and are drawn by it. We
+smell the fragrance of the roses and come eagerly nearer. We hear the
+winsomeness of a gentle wooing voice a-calling, and instinctively answer
+to it. And then we find the sun's power to heal and cleanse and its
+insistence on burning up what can't stand its heat.
+
+We find the inspiring, purifying uplift of the flowers, drawing us up
+the hillside to the top. We find the voice--the Man--gently but with
+unflinching unbending determination that never yields a hairbreadth,
+insisting on our coming clear up to the topmost level. That's a wondrous
+order of words, and coupling of helps, grace and truth.
+
+And this is Jesus. This is John's simple tremendous picture. This Man
+comes down into our neighbourhood, on our earth. He sticks up His
+stretch of tent-canvas right next ours. He insists on being His own true
+self in the midst of the unlikeliest surroundings. The glow of His
+presence shines out over all the neighbourhood of human tents. There's a
+purity of air that stimulates. Men take deep breaths. There's a
+fragrance breathing subtly out from His tent that draws and delights.
+Men come a-running with childlike eagerness.
+
+
+
+Grace Flooding.
+
+
+And now as Jesus comes quietly down the river road where John's crowd is
+gathered, John the witness points his finger tensely out, and eagerly
+cries out: _There He is! This is the man I've been telling you about! He
+that cometh after me in point of time is become first in relation to me
+in point of preeminence: for He was before me both in time and in
+preeminence._
+
+And then John adds a tremendous bit. He had just been talking about
+Jesus being _full_ of that great combination of grace and truth. Now his
+thought runs back to that. Listen: "Of _His fullness_ have we all
+received."
+
+There's another translation of this sentence that I have run across
+several times. It reads in this way: "Of His _skimpiness_ have we all
+received." I never found that in common print; only in the larger print
+of men's lives. But in that printing it seems to have run into a large
+edition, with very wide circulation. Men don't read this old Book of God
+much; less than ever. They get their impression of God wholly from those
+who call themselves His followers.
+
+They watch the procession go by. Here they come crippled diseased
+maimed weakened in body, piteously pathetically crutching along, singed
+and burned with the flames of the same low passion that the onlooking
+crowds know so well, struggling, limping, crutching along bodily and in
+every other way.
+
+And that's a crowd with very keen logic, those onlookers. It judges God
+by those bearing His name, very properly. And it says more or less
+_unconsciously_,--"What a poor sort of God He must be those people have.
+No doubt He has a great job of management on His hands. There are so
+many of them to provide for. And apparently there can't be any
+abundance, certainly no overflow, no surplus. He has to piece it out the
+best He can to make it go as far as possible."
+
+"I think maybe I needn't be in any hurry to join that crowd, at least
+till I have to, along towards the end of things here. There would only
+be one more to carry. He has such a crowd now. And the resources are
+pretty badly strained, judging by appearances." So the crowd talks. Poor
+God! How He is misrepresented by some walking translations. "Of His
+_skimpiness_---!" Be careful. Don't take too much. Be grateful for the
+crumbs.
+
+Please clean your spectacles, and readjust them carefully, and if you
+are afflicted with the small-print Bible that seems in such common use,
+get a reading-glass and look here at the proper translation. That
+crutching, leather-bound translation is grossly inaccurate, if it _is_
+in such big print, and in such wide circulation. Look here. Can you see
+the words? This is the only correct reading: "Of His _fullness_ have all
+we received." Put that into the print of your life, for your own sake
+and for the crowd's sake, yes, and for God's sake, too, that the crowd
+may know the kind of a God God is.
+
+And as if John had a suspicion about possible bad translations, he did a
+bit of underscoring. That word _fullness_ is underscored in John's
+original copy. It's a heavy underscoring, in red. The underscoring is in
+three words he adds: "Grace for grace." That is, grace _in place of_
+grace. It's a sort of picture. Some grace has been received. And it is
+so wondrous that nothing seems so good. And the man is singing as he
+goes about his work.
+
+Then comes a sudden soft inrushing of a flood of grace so great that it
+seems to displace all that was there. Oh! the man didn't know there was
+such grace as this. It seems as if he had never known grace before. And
+the work-song is hushed into a great stillness, though the wondrous
+rhythm of peace is greater than before.
+
+And then before he quite knows how it happens in comes another soft
+subtle inrushing flood-tide of grace that seems to displace all again.
+Some temptation comes, some sore need, some tight corner. You look to
+Him; lean on Him; risk all on His response. He _responds_; and in comes
+the fresh inrush.
+
+And then this sort of thing becomes a habit, God's habit of responding
+to your need, need of every sort. It becomes the commonplace, the
+blessed commonplace that can never be common. That's John's underscoring
+of the word "fullness." May the crowds whose elbows we jostle get this
+underscored translation, bound in shoe-leather, _your_ shoe-leather.
+
+Then in his eagerness to make us understand the thing really, John makes
+a contrast. "The law was _given_ through Moses; grace and truth _came_
+through Jesus Christ." The law was a thing, _given_, through a man.
+Grace and truth was _a man coming_, the very embodiment in Himself of
+what the two words stand for.
+
+The law, the old Mosaic law, was not a statement of the _full_ message
+of God. That was given much earlier. It was given to all. It came
+directly. It was given first in Eden, in its flood; and then
+continuously to every man wherever he was. It was given within each
+man's own heart, and through the unfailing flooding light in nature
+above and below and all around. The tide of its coming has never ceased
+in volume nor in steadiness of flow; and does not cease. That tide came
+to flood in Jesus. And that flood has never known an ebb.
+
+But men's eyes got badly affected. They didn't let the light in, either
+clearly or fully. The light was there, but it was not getting in.
+Something had to be done to help out those eyes. So the law was given.
+It was merely a mirror to let a man see his face, what it was like.
+
+Here's a mother calling to her little son, "Come here and let me wash
+your face." And he calls out, "It isn't dirty." "Yes, dear, it is very
+dirty, come at once." "Why, no, mother, it isn't dirty; you washed it
+this morning." And the child's tone blends a hurt surprise and a settled
+conviction that his mother is certainly wrong _this_ time about the
+condition of his face.
+
+And if the mother be of the thoughtful brooding kind, she says nothing,
+but gets a hand mirror, and holds it before the child's face. That will
+always get a child's attention. And the boy looks; he sees his dirty
+face reflected. The blank astonishment on his face can't be put into
+words. It tells the radical upsetting revolution in his thought on that
+subject. How could it have happened that his face got into that
+condition! And the washing process is yielded to at least; possibly even
+asked for.
+
+That's what the law did and does. It showed man his face, his heart, his
+need. It brings upsetting revolutionary ideas regarding one's self.
+There it stops. That's its limit. Then the Man who in Himself is grace
+and truth does the rest.
+
+
+
+The Spokesman of God.
+
+
+Then John quietly, deftly draws the line around to the starting point in
+that first tremendous statement. He completes a circle perfect in its
+strength and beauty and simplicity, as every circle is. If we follow the
+order of the words somewhat as John wrote them down, we find the bit of
+truth coming in a very striking, as well as in a fresh way. "_God no
+one has ever, at any time, seen_."
+
+That seems rather startling, does it not? What do these older pages
+say? Adam talked and walked and worked with God, and then was led to
+the gate of the garden. God appeared to Abraham, and gave him a
+never-to-be-forgotten lesson in star study. Moses spent nearly six weeks
+with Him, twice over, in the flaming mount, and carried the impress of
+His presence upon his face clear to Nebo's cloudy top.
+
+The seventy elders "saw the God of Israel, and did eat and drink," the
+simple record runs. And young Isaiah that morning in the temple, and
+Ezekiel in the colony of exiles on the Chebar, and Daniel by the Tigris
+at the close of his three weeks' fast,--these all come quickly to mind.
+John's startling statement seems to contradict these flatly.
+
+But push on. John has a way of clearing things up as you follow him
+through. Listen to him further: The only-begotten God who is in the
+bosom of the Father--_He_ has always been the _spokesman_ of God. Look
+into that sentence of John's a little. It seems quite clear, clear to
+the point of satisfying the most critical research, that John wrote down
+the words, "the only-begotten _God_." The contrast in his mind is not
+between "God," and the "only begotten Son." It is a contrast whose
+verbal terms fit with much nicer exactness than that. It is a contrast
+between "God" and the "only-begotten God."
+
+There is only one such person whichever way unity. They tell the whole
+story hanging at the end of John's pen. This little bit commonly called
+the prologue is a gem of simplicity and compactness.
+
+It is John's Gospel in miniature, even as John's Gospel is the whole
+Bible story in miniature. You can see the whole of the sun reflected in
+a single drop of water. You can see the whole of both Father and Son in
+the action of love in these simple opening lines of John's Gospel.
+
+Have you ever been walking down a country road till, weary and thirsty,
+you stopped at an old farmhouse and refreshed yourself at the
+old-fashioned well, with its bucket and long sweep? And as you rested a
+bit by the well you wondered how deep it was. It didn't look deep at
+all. The water was near, and it was so clear and sweet and refreshing,
+and so easy to get at for a drink.
+
+_Is_ it deep? So you fish a rather long bit of string out of your
+pocket, and tie it to a bit of stone you find lying close by. And you
+let the stone down, and down, and down, till you are surprised to find
+that the well is deeper than your string is long.
+
+Well, John's opening bit is just like that. It seems very simple, easily
+understood at first flush in the mere statements made. The water is near
+the top. You easily drink. And you are refreshed. But when you try to
+find out how deep it is, you are startled to find that it is clear over
+your head.
+
+But it is _never over your heart_. It is too deep for you to grasp and
+understand. You never touch bottom. _But_ it's never beyond
+heart-understanding. You can sense and feel and love. You can open the
+sluice-gates into your heart, and have the blessed flood-tide lift and
+lift and bear you aloft and along. You can _love._ And that is the whole
+story.
+
+Was John an artist? Is he making a rare painting for us here? Is he
+studying perspective, shading and spacing, to an exquisite nicety that
+is revealed in the very way he puts words and sentences and paragraphs
+together? I do not know. And if any of you think the thing I am about to
+speak of is due to a mere mechanical chance of the pen, I'll not quarrel
+with you. Though I shall still have my own personal thought in the
+matter.
+
+But will you notice this? John begins his prologue with a description of
+a wonderful personality. He ends it with another description of this
+same personality. Both descriptions are rare in beauty and boldness, in
+simplicity and brevity. And right midway between the two, at almost the
+exact middle line of the reading, at what is the artistic center, stands
+the word "_came_."
+
+That word "came" gathers up into itself and tells out to you the whole
+story about this twice-described personality. "He came" John says.
+That's the whole thing. First the _He_ fills your eye, and then what He
+did--_came_. And as you step off a bit for better perspective, and
+change your personal position this way and that to get the best light,
+you find the picture standing out before your awed eyes.
+
+It is a Man coming down the road with face looking into yours. He is
+truly a man, every line of the picture makes that clear to you. But such
+a man as never was seen before, with the rarest blending of the kingly
+and the kindly in His bearing. The purest purity, the utmost
+graciousness, the highest ideals, the gentlest manner, nobility beyond
+what we have known, and kindliness past describing,--all these blend in
+the pose of His body and most of all in the look of His face. And He is
+in motion. He is walking, walking towards us, with hands outstretched.
+
+This is John's picture of Jesus. He came to His own. He came because His
+own drew Him. Out from the bosom of His Father, into the womb of a
+virgin maid, and into the heart of a race He came. Out of the
+glory-blaze above into the gloom of the shadow, and the glare of false
+lights below, He came.
+
+Out of the love of a Father's heart, the Only-begotten came, into
+contact with the hate that was the only-begotten of sin, that He might
+woo us men up, and up, and up, into the only-begotten life with the
+Father.
+
+Jesus was God on a wooing errand to the earth.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+The Lover Wooing
+
+     _A Group of Pictures Illustrating How the Wooing Was Done, and How
+     the Lover Was Received_
+
+
+
+
+              "Still with unhurrying chase,
+               And unperturbed pace,
+    Deliberate speed, majestic instancy
+               Came the following Feet,
+               And a Voice above their beat--
+    _Naught shelters thee, who will not shelter Me_.'"
+
+    --"_The Hound of Heaven_."
+
+     "O thou hope of Israel, the Saviour thereof in the time of trouble,
+     why shouldst thou be as a sojourner in the land, and as a wayfaring
+     man that spreadeth his tent for a night?"--_Jeremiah xiv. 8_.
+
+     He came unto his own home, and they who were his own kinsfolk
+     received him not into the house, but left him standing outside in
+     the cold and dark of the winter's night. But as many as did receive
+     him he received into his home, and gave each a seat in the inner
+     circle at the hearthfire of God.--_John i. II, 12. Free
+     translation_.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+The Lover Wooing
+
+(John i. 19-xii. 50)
+
+
+
+The Mother of all Love-Words.
+
+
+Brooding is love at its tenderest and best It is love giving its best,
+and so bringing out the best possible in the one brooded over.
+
+Look into the nest where the word itself was brooded. It is a warm
+something, warm in itself, not a borrowed warmth. The warmth is its
+chief trait. It is a soft tender unfailing cuddling warmth. It cuddles
+and coos, it glows and floods a gentle comforting stimulating warmth.
+And the best there is lying asleep within the thing so brooded over
+awakes.
+
+It answers to that creative mothering warmth. It pushes out, against all
+obstacles, and comes shyly and winsomely, but steadily and strongly, out
+to the brooding warmth, growing as it comes and growing most as it comes
+into closest touch with the warm brooder.
+
+Brooding is the mother of all love-words,--friendship, wooing, pitying,
+helping, mothering, fathering, witnessing, believing. It is the
+mother-word, from out whose warm womb all these others come, warm, too,
+and full of gentle strong life. Its mother quality is so strong that we
+are apt to think of it only in connection with actual mothers, mothers
+among animals and birds and of our human kind.
+
+But this is only one meaning, really a surface meaning, though such a
+fine deep meaning in itself. Its real heart meaning lies much deeper.
+_Brooding is the mother of all love._ It is its warmth that draws out
+that fine feeling that makes and marks friendship. It is its tender
+warmth that draws out that finest degree of friendship which knits with
+unbreakable bonds two lives into one.
+
+It reaches out most subtly to knit up again the ends that have ravelled
+out under the sore stress of life. It bends compassionately over those
+hurt in body, and hurt yet more in their spirit by the greedy rivalry of
+life, and nurses into newness of life the shivering shredded hurt parts.
+In the more familiar use of the word it fathers and mothers the newly
+minted morsels of precious humanity, coming into life with big wondering
+eyes.
+
+And it warms into highest life that highest love that, through the
+process of hearing, assenting, trusting, risking, giving the heart's
+devotion, comes to know God as a tender Father, and Christ as a precious
+personal Saviour. Whether in close friend, or ardent lover, gracious
+philanthropist, devoted parent, or earnest witness, it is the same warm
+thing underneath, at its fine task--brooding.
+
+We think of it most in the mother. For it comes to its highest human
+perfection there. The true thoughtful mother is first and chiefest a
+brooder. She broods in spirit till her child looks into her eyes,
+bearing the image, in face and mental impress and spirit, which the
+brooding months have given. She broods over the inarticulate days when
+the babe cannot tell the felt needs except to a brooding mother's keen
+insight.
+
+She broods over the baby-talk days; over the struggling days when the
+child would tell its awakening thoughts out in words, but doesn't know
+how yet; over the wilful days which come so early when the first battles
+come that decide the whole future.
+
+With a warmth of tenderness and patience, and a strength of gentle wise
+insistence, more than human, she broods. It takes the very strength of
+her life, far far more than in prenatal days. So there comes, slowly,
+but as she keeps true to the brooding spirit, surely, the strong gentle
+self-controlled life out of the warm womb of her brooding life. So comes
+the child's higher birth, so preparing the way for the yet higher.
+
+Now all this is at its native best in God. There only does it reach
+finest fruitage. Some day we shall recognize the meaning of that modest
+but tremendous little sentence,--_God is love_. This warm brooding
+something that comes, gentle as the dawning light in the grey east,
+fragrant as the dew of the new morning, irresistible in its pervasive
+persuasive presence as the rays of the growing sun, giving to us warmth,
+and life, and drawing out from within us warmth and life and beauty and
+strength, all in its own image, this is the thing called love. This is
+the thing that God is. As we know _it_ we are getting acquainted with
+_Him_.
+
+And if a break comes, instantly love in its grief sets itself with
+warmth and renewed strength to the new harder brooding task. It gives
+itself out yet more, regardless of cost, until in place of the broken
+fragments there comes a finer sort of life out of the warm womb of love,
+brooding, redeeming, bringing-back-again love. This is God. This is
+Jesus. John shows us Jesus as a picture of the brooding God.
+
+
+
+Five Pictures of Jesus.
+
+
+There are five wondrous pictures of Jesus in these newer leaves of the
+old Book. Three of them hang on the walls of Paul's tent-weaving
+study-room. There's the Colossian picture, the _Creator-Jesus,_ infinite
+in power, making all things above and below and around, and holding all
+things together.[7]
+
+Close by it in wondrous contrast is seen the Philippian picture. It is
+the _Man-Jesus,_ emptied of all the upper-glory native to Him, bowing
+down low and lower and lowest, till in the form of a slave He hangs on a
+cross.[8]
+
+And in contrast yet more striking and startling, close by its side hangs
+the Ephesian picture. It is the _Enthroned-Jesus,_ back again in the
+soft, blazing, blinding glory of the Father's presence, seated at His
+right hand, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and
+every name that is named. And as you stand awed before this picture
+your eye is caught by the artist's remarque sketch at the bottom. It is
+a broken Roman seal, and an open tomb, and a bird with swelling throat
+singing joyously.[9]
+
+Then there's John's later Patmos picture of the _Present-Jesus_,
+standing now down on the earth in the midst of His candle-holding
+Church, but seen only by opened eyes. There He is seen as a Man of Fire,
+ablaze with light, intently watching, with tender but omnipotent touch
+waiting, ever waiting; with a patience unknown except in Him, still
+waiting.[10]
+
+But John's earlier Gospel picture is of the _Brooding-Jesus_. The word
+"brooding" here takes in its fine deep significance. Jesus is seen here
+as a brooding Lover, by the warmth of His wooing love drawing out the
+warmth of an answering love. This is peculiarly and distinctively the
+picture of John's Gospel. There is _a Man walking towards you_ in these
+pages. Turn where you will there He is, and always facing you, with a
+gentle eagerness in His face and in the bend-forward of His body.
+
+There is always a warmth, a gentle radiating comforting drawing warmth
+in His presence. This is the thing you feel most, the warmth. But it
+isn't the only thing. There's the purity. There are ideals that seem out
+of reach in their great height. There's the insistence on these ideals,
+rigid stern absolutely unbending insistence. You _see_ these. You can't
+help it. You feel them tremendously. They seem to leave you clear out
+of reckoning, they are so high up. But there's the warmth, drawing
+arousing wooing, irresistible.
+
+You come to find that the warmth of that presence is as irresistible as
+the ideals and the insistence are unbending. And the warmth woos you. It
+warms you, till there come the intense admiration of the ideals, and
+then the eager reaching of the whole being up towards them.
+
+This is John's picture of the brooding wooing Jesus. This is God, in
+human garb as He comes to us in John's pages. Jesus is God brooding over
+us to woo out of us the love and purity, the purity and love, that He
+woos into us by the touch of His own warm presence.
+
+John's little book is put together as simply as his sentences. And as
+you take it up, it falls apart almost of itself, so simple and natural
+are its divisions. We had a look at the opening paragraphs of the
+Gospel, those eighteen brief verses that open the doorway into all the
+Gospel holds for us. _There_ is given chiefly John's simple vivid
+tremendous picture of _a Person_, coming with swift long stride and
+outreached hands.
+
+Now we turn to the second part of the book. It runs from the nineteenth
+verse of the opening chapter on through to the end of chapter twelve. It
+is devoted to _the great winsome wooing_ of this great human Person.
+Here we see Him on His wooing errand. He woos individual men. He gives
+the personal touch. He devotes Himself to one person, now here, now
+there. His skill and tact in personal dealing are matchless. But this
+is not the chief wooing of these pages. It is _the nation_ He is wooing.
+With rarest strategy and boldness and persistence He lays loving siege
+to the nation through its leaders. This is central and dominant in all
+His movements here. This is the second picture in the gallery of John's
+Gospel.
+
+It is a good thing to run through these fourteen pages of John's Gospel
+_several times;_ to run through _rapidly_, though not hurriedly; to run
+through them as a story until it stands out in your mind as _one simple
+connected, story_. And then it will help greatly, if you are so blest as
+to have some boy or girl near at hand to whom you can tell it as a story
+in simple child (not childish) talk.
+
+Pack the whole into one story of ten minutes, or fifteen: the man of the
+story;[11] how He tried to win the people's hearts;[12] how towards the
+end He spent a long evening with those who loved Him;[13] how awfully He
+was treated by those who hated Him;[14] then how wondrously He surprised
+His friends;[15] and then the little bit at the end where He prepares
+breakfast and has a walk and talk on the seashore with a little group of
+those who loved Him most.[16]
+
+Tell that to a boy or girl as a short story. Use sensible words, but
+_not one_ that your little listener wouldn't at once understand. Pretty
+sharp discipline for the story-teller, especially if you stop to put in
+a simpler word when you've blundered into a big one. The child will be
+held by it But you will get the most yourself out of the telling.
+
+
+
+Warp-Threads.
+
+
+Now as you read the second part over, it gradually sifts itself into
+several incidents about which the story is woven. These incidents form
+the warp-threads of the narrative. Into this warp are woven, sometimes
+little connecting links, sometimes quarrelsome discussion, sometimes
+exquisite bits of Jesus' teaching, and sometimes John's comments. And as
+the story grows it reaches one climax after another, each increasing in
+intensity, until the intensest is reached.[17] And these incidents fall
+naturally into groups. There are three _chief groups_ that seem to stand
+out as giving the bolder points of the outline, and then _smaller
+groups_ or _single incidents_ that lie in between.
+
+It is very natural that the story begins with the accounts of the
+deputation that was sent from Jerusalem by the official leaders of the
+nation, down to the Jordan bottoms where John the witness was drawing
+such great crowds. John modestly answers their questions about himself,
+and then the next day with dramatic intensity points out the Man for
+whom the whole nation has been looking for so long.
+
+The only response from deputation and officials is a most significant
+disappointing silence, a silence fully understood both by John[18] and
+by Jesus.[19] But five Galileans in the crowd listening to John's reply
+seek out, or are brought into personal questioning touch with, Jesus,
+and then yield Him unquestioning belief and personal devotion. And these
+five come, in after years, to be leaders known wherever Christ's name is
+known.[20] So there begins the sharp contrast running throughout these
+pages, between the two sides into which Jesus' presence divides the
+crowds.
+
+Then John traces the simple way in which the faith of these five men ran
+its tiny but tough tenacious tendril-roots down into their very vitals.
+A simple neighbourhood wedding occasion up near the old Nazareth home
+drew Jesus thither with His kinsfolk and His new-made friends. And then
+He meets the need of the homely occasion by helping out the shortened
+supply of wine in such an unusual way as reveals His character. And the
+conviction takes great fresh hold upon these five men that they have
+made no mistake. This Man is all they had taken Him for, and He is
+immensely more than they had thought into at first.[21]
+
+Then comes a little connecting link. After the Cana visit, Jesus runs
+into the near-by town of Capernaum with His kinsfolk and friends for a
+few days, a sort of continuation of the neighbourhood courtesies.[22]
+
+And then at once John goes to the intensest, and the most significant
+incident of this whole section of the book. It is the drastic turning
+out, by Jesus, of the traders in the temple-area at Jerusalem. This
+touched at once the national leaders' most sensitive nerve, and touched
+it roughly. It never ceased aching. This turning of the temple-area into
+a common market-place, which so jarred on the holy atmosphere of the
+place, and on Jesus' fine spirit, this was by arrangement with these
+leaders, and yielded them large profit. Here was the sore spot.
+
+With one deft stroke John lays bare the secret of the intense hatred of
+Jesus by these national leaders, with which these pages teem, and which
+came to its bursting head at the cross. Long after, when Jesus had died
+and been raised, these five leading disciples find a new strengthening
+of their faith in recalling words spoken at this time by Jesus.[23]
+
+Growing naturally out of this Passover visit comes the Nicodemus
+incident. Many of the Passover crowds were caught by the power of Jesus
+shown in the miracles He did, but had not the seasoned thoughtful faith
+of these first disciples. But one man sifts himself out by his spirit of
+earnest inquiry. The sharp contrast that runs throughout these incidents
+stands out here. This man is of the inner upper cultured circle, that
+controlled national affairs, that sent that Jordan committee, and that
+had been so upset by the temple cleansing.
+
+Yet not only Nicodemus' earnest search for truth, and the questions
+asked by him, but the fullness and fineness of spirit truth in Jesus'
+words to him reveal the true faith of this rare inquirer; and this is
+verified by his later actions.[24] Clearly Jesus found here an opened
+door. Here is the first of those exquisite bits of Jesus' teaching that
+mark John's Gospel.[25]
+
+These four incidents make up the first group of, what I think of as, the
+three chief groups of incidents in this section of John. The group
+begins at the Jordan, and runs up into Galilee, but in its interest and
+its chief incident, centres in Jerusalem. The action begins with John
+the witness, and swings naturally to Jesus. The contrast in this group
+of incidents is intense. With the same evidence at hand, first
+contemptuous silence and loving allegiance, then the beginnings of
+bitterest hate and of tenderest personal love, grow up side by side.
+
+Then there is a sort of swing-away-from-Jerusalem group that includes
+three incidents. After the rejection of John's witness to Jesus[26] by
+the nation's leaders, Jesus withdraws from Jerusalem to the country
+districts of Judea. There He takes up the sort of work John has been
+doing, so bearing His witness to John. John had drawn great crowds down
+to the Jordan and in the neighbourhood of its tributary streams.
+
+Now Jesus helps in arousing and instructing these crowds. There are two
+men preaching instead of one, and Jesus has the greater crowds. This is
+used to make trouble. It stirs up gossipy disputings. It is made to look
+like a jealous rivalry between the two men. And this supposed rivalry
+and disputing about the various claims of the two men become the
+uppermost thing. It reflects the characteristic spirit of the leaders.
+John greatly renews his witness to Jesus with fresh emphasis and
+earnestness.[27]
+
+But as Jesus sees that His presence is only being made a bone of
+contention He quietly slips away from Judea, turning north through
+Samaria towards Galilee. Then comes the great story of the visit to
+Sychar, with the exquisitely tactful winning of the sinful woman to a
+life of purity, and then using her as a messenger to her people.
+Imbedded in the story is another bit of Jesus' simple great teaching
+talk.[28]
+
+Then comes a brief connecting link. Finding no acceptance in Judea, His
+own country, Jesus goes to Galilee, where visitors at the Jerusalem
+Feast of Passover had been spreading the news of His words and deeds,
+and so a gracious welcome now awaits Him.[29]
+
+And here in Galilee He wins the believing love of a roman officer of
+noble birth, whose son is desperately ill. The father's faith passes
+through three stages, the belief that comes to ask for help, the deeper
+belief that rests upon Jesus' word to him and starts back home, and the
+yet deeper that gets confirmation of Jesus' word and power in the
+recovery of his son from the very time Jesus spoke the assuring
+word.[30]
+
+These are the three incidents in this group away from the Jerusalem
+district. It is striking that this group away from Jerusalem stands in
+sharp contrast with that first group centering in Jerusalem. _There_ is
+rejection by the nation's leaders running from contemptuous silence to
+the beginning of open opposition. _Here_ with less evidence there is
+acceptance by a Samaritan and a Roman; the one of no social standing;
+the other of the highest.
+
+The rejection of Jesus by the leaders stands in contrast thus far with
+acceptance of Him by five Galileans, by a cultured scholarly aristocrat,
+a half-breed Samaritan, and a Roman of gentle birth. Acceptance seems to
+grow with the distance from Jerusalem. Yet everything hinged in
+Jerusalem. _There_ had been the flood-light. Jerusalem was meant to be
+the gateway to the world. The irony of sin! The blinding of greed! The
+self-cheating of being self-centered!
+
+
+
+Climbing towards the Climax.
+
+
+And now, true to his controlling thought, John goes straight back to
+Jerusalem with his story, ignoring intervening events. There's another
+feast, not called a Passover, but commonly and probably correctly so
+reckoned, another crowd-gathering Passover. An extreme chronic case of
+bodily infirmity draws out the pity and power of Jesus, and the healed
+man takes his first walk after thirty-eight years.
+
+But the thing is done on a Sabbath day, and gives rise to bitterest and
+murderous persecution, first on the score of Sabbath observance, and
+then because Jesus claimed God as "His own Father" in a distinctive
+sense. Friction fire may send out beautiful sparks. And the opposition
+brings out one of the choicest bits of Jesus' teaching to be found in
+John. This incident stands by itself.[31]
+
+And now John reaches over a whole year with only a sentence or two for
+connection, and comes again to a Passover. The Passover was _the pivot_
+of the Jewish year and of Jewish national life. This Passover is made
+notable by _Jesus' absence from Jerusalem_, the only Passover absence of
+His ministry. And the reason is the violence of the persecution by the
+national leaders.
+
+There is the feeding of the hungry thousands with a handful of loaves
+and fish. Was this the real Passover celebration? The multitudes fed by
+Him who was the Lamb of God and the true Bread of life? while the
+technical observance was empty of life! It wouldn't be the only thing of
+the sort, in ancient times or modern.[32]
+
+Jesus withdraws from the crowds who would like a bread-maker for a king,
+gets a bit of quiet alone with His Father on the mountainside, and then
+walks on the water in the storm to keep His appointment with the
+disciples. Then follows a long disputation and another fine bit of
+Jesus' teaching.[33] These two incidents make another distinct group,
+separated from the previous one by a year on the far side and six months
+on the hither side. And the contrast continues, between the acceptance
+by the Galilean crowds and the intensifying opposition by the chief
+group of Jerusalem leaders.
+
+Then comes _the second chief group of incidents_. About six months later
+Jesus returns to Jerusalem for the autumn Feast of Tabernacles. He
+boldly teaches in the temple in the midst of much opposition, bitter
+discussion, and concerted official effort against Him.[34] The dramatic
+incident of the accused woman and the conscience-stricken leaders[35] is
+followed by a yet more bitter discussion and by the first passionate
+attempt at stoning.[36]
+
+Then the incident of the man born blind but now blessedly given his
+sight leads to the bitterest opposition thus far, and the casting of the
+man out from all religious privileges; and is followed by the rare bit
+of sheepfold and shepherd teaching.[37] These four incidents make up the
+second great outstanding group of incidents, and mark the sharpest clash
+and crisis thus far.
+
+A few months later at another Jerusalem feast called the Feast of the
+Dedication, comes a second hotly impulsive riotous attempt at stoning,
+and then an attempt to arrest, both foiled by the restraint of Jesus'
+mere presence and personal power.[38] And another connecting link traces
+His going away beyond the Jordan River, where the crowds gather to Him,
+and are won to warm personal belief.[39]
+
+Another little gap of a few months passed over in silence, brings the
+narrative to the _third_ and last _chief group of incidents_ in this
+part of the book, and so leads immediately up to the great final events
+of the whole book.
+
+The illness and death of Lazarus draws Jesus back to a suburb of
+Jerusalem, Bethany. Then the stupendous incident of the raising of
+Lazarus leads to the official decision to put Jesus to death.[40] And a
+connecting link of verses tells of Jesus' cautious withdrawal, of the
+inquiring crowds coming to the approaching Passover, and of the public
+notice given that Jesus was under official condemnation.[41]
+
+It is at the home feast given in Bethany as a tribute of love to Jesus
+that Judas, coldly criticizing a warm act of tender love, and gently
+rebuked by Jesus, gets into that bad heat of temper out of which came
+the foul bargaining and betrayal.[42] Another brief connecting link lets
+us see the crowds more eagerly inquiring for Jesus because of the
+raising of Lazarus, and the determined priests coolly plotting Lazarus'
+death, too.[43]
+
+Then comes Jesus' faithful open offer of Himself in kingly fashion to
+the nation, with the tremendous enthusiasm of the multitudes, and the
+hardening of the official purpose to do the one thing that will offset
+this wild-fire enthusiasm.[44]
+
+And then comes the apparently simple, but in meaning tremendous,
+incident of the inquiring Greeks. The Jew door is slamming shut, but the
+outside door is opening. Here the whole world opens its door, its front
+door, in these Greek representatives of the best culture the earth knew.
+But Jesus' vision never blurs. He understands; He alone. The only route
+to Greece and the whole outer world is the underground route, the way
+through Joseph's tomb.
+
+And as the intense spirit-struggle passes, Jesus quietly goes on with
+His searching appealing talk to the crowd, and then slips away into
+hiding till His hour had full come.[45] And with breaking heart John
+sadly recalls Isaiah's wondrous foresight of just these days and
+events.[46] These are the four incidents in this third chief group.
+
+And so the door shuts. The wooing ceases. This bit of John's story is
+done. The evidence is all in. The case is made up. The nation's door to
+its King shuts. The Lover's wooing of the nation ceases. John turns to a
+new chapter. No further evidence is brought forward. The case rests with
+the jury. The door had been shutting for a good while. The inside
+door-keepers had been pulling it hard. But the great Man outside had His
+hand on the knob delaying the shutting process, in the earnest hope that
+it yet might be quite stopped. Now His hand reluctantly loosens its
+hold. The knob is free. The inside pull does its work. The door goes to
+with a vigorous slam.
+
+The wooing is not _wholly_ done. There is still the indirect, the tacit
+wooing. There's still opportunity. All through that fateful night from
+Gethsemane's gate, to the last word at Pilate's seat the Lover is
+wooing. But it is wooing by action, by presence, by yielding. No
+pleading word is spoken. The direct wooing is done. Tender, earnest,
+insistent, patient, tremendous, irresistible in itself save to those who
+willed to resist anything and everything no matter what or
+whom,--wondrous wooing it has been. Now it's over. That chapter is done.
+
+
+
+Way-marks in John's Narrative.
+
+
+Out of this simple running account several things sift themselves, and
+stand out to our eyes. The action of the story swings chiefly _about
+Jerusalem_. The other parts seem but background to make Jerusalem stand
+out big. In this John's Gospel differs radically from the other three.
+They are absorbed chiefly with the tireless gracious Galilean ministry
+of Jesus, till the last great events force them to Jerusalem.
+
+And the reason is plain. Jerusalem is Israel. It is the nation. Jesus is
+wooing the _nation_ through its leaders. Why? For the nation's sake? for
+Israel's sake? Yes and no. Because these Jews were favourites of God?
+Distinctly _no_, though so highly favoured they had been in the wondrous
+mission entrusted to them. But because Israel was the gateway to a world
+Yes, for Israel's sake. _Through_ this gateway, so carefully prepared
+when every other gate was closing, _through_ this out to a world--this
+was the plan of action. And this will yet be found to be the plan.
+Through a Jewish gateway the King will one day go out to touch His
+world. This is the geography of John's story.
+
+The action of the story swirls largely, too, about the great national
+feasts, the Passovers, the Tabernacles or harvest-home feast of the
+autumn, and one called "the Dedication," not elsewhere spoken of. To
+these came great crowds of pilgrim Jews from all quarters of the world,
+speaking many languages beside their national Hebrew, giving large
+business, especially to money-brokers and traders in the animals and
+birds used in the sacrifices. That classical Pentecost Chapter of Acts
+gives the wide range of countries and of languages represented by these
+pilgrim thousands. These feasts are the central occasions of John's
+story.
+
+_The time_ begins with John's preaching in the Jordan bottoms and
+reaches up practically to the evening of the betrayal. It is commonly
+reckoned three and a half years. That is, there are some months before
+that first Passover, and then the events run through and up to the
+fourth Passover, reckoning the unnamed feast of chapter five as a
+Passover. This is the chronology of John's Gospel. John's Gospel gives
+the only clue to the length of Jesus' ministry.
+
+There are three groups _of persons_. There are _the Jews_. That is one
+of John's distinctive phrases. By it he means as a rule the official
+leaders of the nation, whom in common with the other writers he also
+designates by their party names, Pharisees, Scribes, Chief Priests, and
+so on. Among these the name of Caiaphas stands out, and later Annas.
+
+Then there are _the crowds_, the masses of people that flock together in
+any new stirring movement. There are Galilean crowds, feast-time crowds
+including the great numbers of foreign pilgrim Jews, city crowds, and
+country crowds. They gather to John's preaching. They gather in great
+numbers in Jerusalem, and on the Galilean visits. They are easily
+impressionable, swayed by subtle crowd-contagion, stirred up and played
+upon cunningly by the opposition leaders.
+
+They appeal greatly to Jesus, like unshepherded sheep. And the sick and
+needy ones, so numerous, draw out His pity and warm touch and healing
+power. They believe quickly, and almost as quickly are turned away and
+desert the cause they had so quickly and warmly rallied to. Fickle,
+unthoughtful, easily-swayed, needy crowds, but with the thoughtful ones
+and groups here and there who are really helped and who stick. These
+crowds are always in evidence.
+
+And there are _the disciples_. There is the inner group of chosen ones
+who companion with Jesus, sharing His bread and bed, and close witnesses
+of His gracious spirit and unfailing power, with impulsive heady Peter
+and faithful steady John always nearest by. What a schooling all this
+was for them! And there are other disciples, not of this picked circle,
+but on most intimate personal terms with the Master, some of them, like
+thoughtful cautious Nicodemus, like the Bethany group of three, and Mary
+the Magdalene. And there is the larger, looser, changing body of
+disciples, mingling with the crowds, sometimes deserting, but no doubt
+with many thoughtful devoted ones among them. These are the leading
+persons figuring in John's story, grouped about the person of Jesus.
+
+But these are simply interesting incidentals giving local colouring to
+John's story. We pass by them quickly now to a few things that take
+great hold of one's heart, that stand out biggest, and give the real
+action of life to the story.
+
+
+
+Tapestry Threads.
+
+
+As we unravel the fabric of John's Gospel there are three threads that
+stand out by reason of the distinctness of their colours. There's a
+thread of clear decided blue. There's a dark ugly black thread that
+gets blacker as it weaves itself farther in. And then there's a bright
+yellow glory-colour thread that shines with brighter lustre as the black
+gets blacker.
+
+Trace the blue first, the thread of a simple glad acceptance of Jesus,
+and trust in Him. It deepens in its fine shading of blue as you follow
+it, true blue, the colour true hearts wear. From the very first Jesus is
+accepted by some, by many. And this continues steadily through to the
+very last. Some doors open at once to Him. Then under the influence of
+His presence and gentle resistless power they open wide, and then wider.
+
+It is fascinating to trace the simply told story of growing faith, until
+one's own faith gets clearer and steadier and has more warm glow to it.
+To adapt Tennyson's fine lines, as knowledge grows from more to more
+there dwells in us more of the deep tender reverence of love, until all
+the powers of mind and spirit chord into one symphony of unending music.
+And the wheels of our common life move always to its rhythmic swing.
+
+See how _the crowds_ crowd to Jesus, and open up to the appeal of His
+words and acts and presence. Many of the pilgrim crowds of that first
+Passover believe, impressed by Jesus' spirit of helpfulness and His
+unusual power.[47] And the Galileans among them give Him warm welcome as
+He comes up into their country.[48] It is a great multitude that follows
+eagerly up on the east coast of the Galilean sea, hail Him as the
+long-expected prophet of their nation, talk of plans for making Him
+their King, and earnestly cry out, "Lord, evermore give us this (true)
+bread."[49]
+
+Even in the midst of the bickering discussions at the Tabernacles Feast
+many of the multitude believed on Him, some as the long-talked-of
+prophet, some as the very Christ Himself.[50] And as He talks to His
+critics of His purpose always to please the Father, still others are
+drawn in heart to Him and believe.[51] And at this same time, as the
+criticism gets uglier, many make bold to speak out on His behalf[52]
+though it was getting to be a dangerous thing to do. As He feels
+compelled to withdraw from the tense atmosphere of Jerusalem, and goes
+away into the country districts beyond the Jordan the people come
+flocking to Him with open hearts.[53]
+
+The Lazarus incident made inroads into the upper circles of Jerusalem,
+many of the influential social class with whom these dear Bethany
+friends seem on close terms, and who had been out there during those
+stirring days, believe on Jesus, and many of the common people, too, are
+won by that occurrence.[54] That tremendous raising of Lazarus had much
+to do with the great acclaim of the multitudes as Jesus rode into
+Jerusalem on the kingly colt.[55]
+
+It is without doubt a sincere homage that these multitudes from far and
+near, and the home crowds, render, with their palm branches and
+garment-strewn roads, and spontaneous outburst of joyous song.[56] And
+now as John put his bit of a knotted summary on the end of this part of
+his story, he points out that even among the members of the Jewish
+Senate there were many real believers.[57]
+
+But a crowd is a strange complex thing. It doesn't know itself. It's
+easily swept along to do as a crowd what would never be done by each one
+off by himself. And this works in good ways as well as in bad. Jesus
+drew the crowds and was drawn by them. He couldn't withstand the pull of
+the crowd. The lure of its intense need was irresistible to Him. Yet He
+knew crowds rarely.
+
+He was never blinded by their enthusiasm. His keen insight saw under the
+surface, though it never held Him critically back from helping. He
+quickly notes that the belief of those first Passover crowds has not
+reached the dependable stage.[58] He is never held back from showing the
+red marks in the road to be trodden even though many of His disciples
+balk at going farther on such a road, and some turn away to an easier
+road,[59] so revealing an utter lack of the real thing. And even where
+there's real faith of the sincere sort it is yet sometimes not of the
+seasoned sort that can stand the storms.[60]
+
+These crowds seem of close kin to more modern crowds. One touch of a
+crowd rubs out centuries of difference and shows one family blood in us
+all. Yet keep things poised. It was out of these crowds that there came
+the disciples and close friends to whom we now turn. There's gold in the
+crowds, finest twenty-four carat gold. It's all a matter of mining.
+Skilful mining gets out the gold. This wondrous Lover used the
+magnetic-current method of mining, the love-current. The strong warm
+current, the fine personal spirit current, drew out to Him the fine
+grains of gold in these human crowds.
+
+
+
+Growing Faith.
+
+
+Now we climb the hill where _the disciples_ are. The crowds are in the
+bottom-lands. Many have started up the hill. Jesus always woos men
+uphill. You can always tell a man by where he is standing, bottom-land,
+hillside, higher-hill-slope, hilltop. We turn now from the crowds that
+believed to those whose personal acceptance of Jesus drew them into the
+inner circle.
+
+The first three incidents trace the beginnings of faith in those first
+close disciples who came to be numbered among the picked inner
+twelve.[61] The first story is one of the rarest of John's many rare
+stories. It is characteristic of the real thing of faith that beginning
+with two they quickly number five. The attachment of the two to John,
+the Witness, reveals them as of the earnest inquiring sort, after the
+very best. John never forgot that talk with Jesus in the gathering
+twilight by the Jordan. It sends Andrew out for Peter, and John likely
+for James, while the Master gets Philip, and he in turn Nathaniel. That
+reveals the real stuff of faith. It has a mind whose questionings have
+been satisfied, a heart that catches fire, and feet that hasten
+out-of-doors for others. That's the real thing.
+
+Their faith takes deeper root at Cana. A new personal experience of
+Jesus' power is a great deepener of faith, the great deepener. This is
+the only pathway from faith to a deeper realer sturdier faith. A man can
+get a deeper faith only by walking on his own feet where Jesus leads.
+
+Their faith grows imperceptibly but by leaps and bounds. It grows down
+deeper and so up stronger and out farther by their _companionship with
+Jesus_ through those brief packed years. What a school that was! the
+school of companionship with Jesus, with lessons daily, but the chiefest
+lesson the Teacher Himself. What a school it _is_! The only one for
+learning the real thing of faith: still open: pupils received at any
+time.
+
+If we would shut our eyes and go with them as they company with Jesus
+through those wondrous days and events and experiences we may get some
+hold on how their faith grew. They actually saw the handful of loaves
+and fishes grow in their hands until thousands were fed. Their own eyes
+saw Jesus walking on the water.
+
+It was out of their very hearts that they cry out through Peter's lips
+in answer to Jesus' pathetic pleading question and say, "To whom shall
+we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life."[62] And without doubt
+Thomas acts as spokesman for all when Jesus announced His intention of
+returning to the danger zone, and Thomas sturdily says, "Let us _also_
+go, that we may die with Him."[63]
+
+But you are thinking of that terrible break of theirs on the betrayal
+night, are you? Well, perhaps if we call to mind with what an utter
+shock the events of that terrific twenty four hours came, intensified
+the more by the unexpectedness and the suddenness of it; and then
+if--perhaps--we may call to mind the more recent behaviour of some
+modern disciples who have had enormous advantages over them in regard to
+that terrific experience it may chasten our feelings a bit and soften
+the edge of our thought about them.
+
+But dear faithful John never faltered. We must always love him for that.
+How humiliating for us if not even one had stood that test. And how
+their after-contact with John must have affected the others. John pulled
+the others back and up. And how their faith so sorely chastened and
+tested came to its fine seasoned strength afterwards.
+
+These very events of the early days now come back with new meaning to
+them. Jesus' words at the temple cleansing, and the kingly entry into
+Jerusalem, shine now in a new light and give new strength to their
+faith.[64] But John himself brings us back to this again in that long
+talk of the betrayal night. So we leave it now. But blue is a good
+colour for the eyes. It reveals great beauty in the bit of
+tapestry-pattern John is weaving for us to trace these true blue
+threadings.
+
+But there's more here, much more, that adds greatly to the pattern.
+There are faithful disciples _and precious intimate friendships_ outside
+the circle of these future leaders. Take only a moment for these as we
+push on.
+
+There's that night visitor of the early Jerusalem days. Aristocrat,
+ruler, scholar, with all the supercautiousness that these qualities
+always grain in, Nicodemus actually left the inner circle of
+temple-rulers who were as sore to the touch as a boil over John's
+drastic cleansing, and comes for a personal interview. His utter
+sincerity is shown in the temper of his remarks and questions, and shown
+yet more in the openness of Jesus' spirit in talking with him. For this
+is a trait in Jesus' dealings,--openness when He finds an opening door.
+It _must_ be so, then and now. He can open up only where there is an
+opening up to Him. Openness warms and loosens. The reverse chills and
+locks up.[65]
+
+It is in another just such situation but far more acute, that this man
+speaks out for Jesus in an official meeting of these same rulers.
+Timidly? have you thought, cautiously? Yet he spoke out when no one else
+did, though others there believed in Jesus. A really rare courage it was
+that told of a growing faith.[66] And the personal devotion side of his
+faith, evidence again of the real thing, stands out to our eyes as we
+see him bring the unusual gift of very costly ointments for the
+precious body of his personal friend.[67] It's a winsome story, this of
+Nicodemus. May there be many a modern duplicate of it.
+
+In utter social contrast stands the next bit of this sort following so
+hard that the contrast strikes you at once. It's a half-breed Samaritan
+this time, and a woman, and an openly bad life. The Samaritans were
+hated by Jew and Gentile alike as belonging to neither, ground between
+the two opposing social national millstones. Womanhood was debased and
+held down in the way all too familiar always and everywhere. And a moral
+outcast ranks lowest in influence.
+
+But true love discerns the possible lily in the black slime bulb at the
+pond's bottom and woos it into blossoming flower, till its purity and
+beauty greet our delighted eyes. Under the simple tact of love's true
+touch, out of such surroundings grows a faith, through the successive
+stages of gossipy curiosity, cynical remark, interest, eagerness, guilty
+self-consciousness that would avoid any such personal conversation, out
+and out comes a faith that means a changed life, and then earnest
+bringing of others till the whole village acclaims Jesus a Saviour,
+_the_ Saviour.
+
+And the very title they apply to Jesus reveals as by a flash-light the
+chief personal meaning the interview had for this outcast woman. In one
+way her faith meant more than Nicodemus', for it meant a radical change
+of outer life with her. And many a one stops short of that, though the
+real thing never does, and can't.[68]
+
+Then the circle widens yet more, geographically. Jew, Samaritan, it is a
+_Roman_ this time, one of the conquering nation under whose iron heel
+the nation writhes restlessly. He is of gentle birth and high official
+position. It is his sense of acute personal need that draws him to
+Jesus. The child of his love is slipping from his clinging but helpless
+grasp.
+
+There's the loose sort of hearsay groping faith that turns to Jesus in
+desperation. Things can't be worse, and possibly there might be help.
+There's the very different faith that looks Jesus in the face and hears
+the simple word of assurance so quietly spoken. He actually heard the
+word spoken about _his_ dying darling, "_thy son liveth_."
+
+Then there is that wondrous new sort of faith whose sharper hooks of
+steel enter and take hold of your very being as you actually
+_experience_ the power of Jesus in a way wholly new to you. As it came
+to his keenly awakened mind that the favourable turn had come at the
+very moment Jesus uttered those quiet words, and then as he looked into
+the changed face of his recovering child, he became a changed man. The
+faith in Jesus was a part of his being. The two could never be put
+asunder. So the Roman world brought its grateful tribute of acceptance
+to this great wooing brooding Lover. The wooing had won again.
+
+And now there's another extreme social turnabout in the circle that
+feels the power of Jesus' wooing. We turned from Jerusalem aristocrat to
+Samaritan outcast; now it's from gentle Roman official to a beggaring
+pauper. It is at the Tabernacles' visit. Jesus, quietly masterfully
+passing out from the thick of the crowd that would stone Him, noticed a
+blind ragged beggar by the roadway. One of those speculative questions
+that are always pushing in, and that never help any one is asked: "Who's
+to blame here?"
+
+With His characteristic intense practicality Jesus quietly pushes the
+speculative question aside with a broken sentence, a sentence broken by
+His action as He begins helping the man. In effect He says, "Neither
+this man nor his parents are immediately to blame; the thing goes
+farther back. But"--and He reaches down and begins to make the soft clay
+with His spittle--"_the_ thing is to see the power of God at work to
+help." And the touch is given and the testing command to wash, and then
+eyes that see for the first time.
+
+But the one thing that concerns us now in this great ninth chapter is
+the faith that was so warmly wooed up out of nothing to a thing of
+courageous action and personal devotion to Jesus. It is fairly
+fascinating to watch the man move from birth-blind hopelessness through
+clay-anointed surprise and wonder and Siloam-walking expectancy on to
+water-washing eyesight.
+
+It is yet more fascinating to see his spirit move up in the language he
+uses, from "the _man_ called Jesus," and the cautious but blunt "I don't
+know about His being a sinner, but I know I can _see_," on to the
+bolder "clearly not a sinner but a man in reverent touch with God
+Himself."
+
+Then the yet bolder, "a man _from God_," brings the break with the
+dreaded authorities which branded him before all as an outcast and as a
+damned soul. And then the earnest reverent cry "Who is He, Lord, that I
+may believe?" reveals the yearning purpose of his own heart. And then
+the great climax comes in the heart cry, "Lord, I believe, I believe
+Thee to be the very Son of God."
+
+And the outcast of the rulers casts in his lot with Jesus and begins at
+once living the eternal quality of life which goes on endlessly. What a
+day for him from hopeless blindness of body and heart to eyesight that
+can see Jesus' face and know Him as his Saviour and Lord! Growth of
+faith clearly is not limited to the counting of hours. It waits only on
+one's walking out fully into all the light that comes, no matter where
+it may lead your steps.
+
+
+
+The Bethany Height of Faith.
+
+
+The Bethany story is one of the tenderest of all. It touches the
+heights. It's a hilltop story, both in its setting amidst the Bethany
+blue hills where it grew up, and in the height of faith it records. It
+has personal friendship and love of Jesus and implicit trust in Him as
+its starting point. And from this it reaches up to levels unknown
+before. Faith touches high water here. It rises to flood, a flood that
+sweeps mightily through the valleys of doubt and questionings all around
+about.
+
+At the beginning there is faith in Jesus of the tender, personal sort.
+At the close there's faith that He will actually meet the need of your
+life and circumstance _without limit_. The highest faith is this:
+connecting Jesus' power and love with the actual need of your life.
+Abraham believed God with full sincerity that covenant-making night
+under the dark sky. But he didn't connect his faith in God with his need
+and danger among the Philistines.[69] Peter believed in Jesus fully but
+his faith and his action failed to connect when the sore test came that
+Gethsemane night.
+
+The Bethany pitch of faith makes connections. It ties our God and our
+need and our action into one knot. This is the pith of this whole story.
+Jesus' one effort in His tactful patient wooing is to get Martha up to
+the point of ordering that stone aside. He got her faith into touch with
+the gravestone of her sore need. Her faith and her action connected.
+That told her expectancy. Creeds are best understood when they're acted.
+Moving the stone was her confession of faith. _Not_ that Jesus was the
+Son of God. That was settled long before.
+
+No: it meant this--that the Son of God was now actually going to _act as
+Son of God_ to meet her need. Under His touch her dead brother was going
+to live. The deadness that broke her heart would give way under Jesus'
+touch. The Bethany faith doesn't believe that God _can_ do what you
+need, merely. It believes that He _will_ do it And so the stone's taken
+away that He _may_ do it. God has our active consent. Are we up on the
+Bethany level? Has God our active consent to do all He would? Is our
+faith being lived, acted out?
+
+And the feast of grateful tribute that followed has an exquisite added
+touch. The faith that lets God into one's life to meet its needs gets
+clearer eyesight. Acted faith affects the spirit vision. There is a
+spirit sensitiveness that recognizes God and discerns how things will
+turn out.
+
+Notice Jesus' words about Mary's act of anointing. There is a singularly
+significant phrase in it. "Let her _keep it_ against (or in view of) the
+day of My burying." "Keep it" is the striking phrase. What does that
+mean? We speak of _keeping_ a day, as Christmas, meaning to hallow the
+memories for which it stands. "Keep it" here seems to mean that. Let her
+keep a memorial. Yet it would be a memorial _in advance_ of the event
+remembered and hallowed.
+
+It seems to suggest that Mary thus discerned the outcome for Jesus of
+the coming crisis, and more, its great significance. The disciples
+expected Jesus' power to overcome all opposition. She alone sensed what
+was coming, His death and its tremendous spirit-meaning. And it is
+possible that the raising of her brother helped her to sense ahead
+another raising. For there is no mention of her at the tomb, as would
+otherwise have been most natural.
+
+Her simple love-lit faith could _see_, and could see _beyond_ to the
+final outcome. This is the story of the Bethany faith, faith at flood.
+This highest simplest truest faith, that had come in answer to Jesus'
+patient persistent wooing for it, opens the way for the greatest use of
+His power on record.
+
+There's one story more in this true-blue faith list. It is the story of
+the Greeks. At first it seems not to belong in here. There is no mention
+made of the faith of these men nor of their acceptance of Jesus. But the
+more you think into it the more it seems that here is its true place,
+and that this is why John brings it in, not simply to show how the
+outside world was reaching for Jesus, but to show the inner spirit of
+these men towards Jesus.
+
+Whether the term _Greeks_ is used in the looser sense for the
+Greek-speaking Jews,[70] or for non-Jewish foreigners, or, as I think
+most likely, in the meaning of men of Grecian blood, residents of
+Greece, the significance is practically the same, it was the outer world
+coming to Jesus. These had come a long journey to do homage to the true
+God at Jerusalem. Their presence reveals their spirit.
+
+They were eye and ear-witnesses of the stirring events of those last
+days in Jerusalem. The stupendous story of the raising of the man out in
+the Bethany suburb was the talk of the city. And then there was that
+intense scene of the kingly entry into the city amid the acclaiming
+multitudes. They knew of the official opposition, and the public
+proclamation against Jesus. They breathed the Jerusalem air. That put
+them in touch with the whole situation.
+
+Now notice keenly they seek a personal interview with Jesus. This is the
+practical outcome of the situation _to them_. It reminds one of that
+other man, under similar conditions though less intense, at an earlier
+stage, cautiously seeking a night interview. Their desire tells not
+curiosity but earnestness, and the very earnestness reveals both purpose
+and attitude towards Jesus.
+
+And this is made the plainer by the very words they use as they seek out
+the likeliest man of the Master's inner circle to secure the coveted
+interview. They say, "Sir, _we would see Jesus_." The whole story of
+conviction, of earnestness, of decision, is in that tremendous little
+word "would." It was their will, their deliberate choice, to come into
+personal relations with this Man of whom they were hearing so much.
+
+And it seems like a direct allusion to that tremendous word, and an
+answer to it, when Jesus, in effect, in meaning, says, "if any man
+_would_ follow Me." Both the coming under such circumstances, and the
+form of the request, seem to tell the attitude of these men towards
+Jesus and their personal purpose regarding Him. It would be altogether
+likely that they accompany Philip as he seeks out Andrew. It would be
+the natural thing. And so they are with Philip and Andrew as they come
+to tell Jesus.
+
+Then this would be the setting of these memorable intense words that
+Jesus now utters.[71] He senses at once the request and the earnest
+purpose of these men seeking Him out. It is for them especially that
+these words are spoken. And if, as some thoughtful scholars think, Jesus
+spake here, not in His native Aramaic, but in the Greek tongue, it gives
+colouring to the supposition. The intense earnestness of His words, and
+the revealing of the intense struggle within His spirit as He breathes
+out the simple prayer,--all this is a tacit recognition of the spirit of
+these Greeks.
+
+The parallel is striking with the Nicodemus interview where no direct
+mention is made of the faith that later events showed was unquestionably
+there. It seems like another of those silences of John that are so full
+of meaning.[72] And the silence seems, as with Nicodemus, to mean the
+acquiescence of the inquirers in the message they hear.
+
+This then would seem to be the reply to the request. They have indeed
+seen Jesus. And they accept it and Him, as most likely they linger
+through the Passover-days at hand and then turn their faces homeward.
+And so the warm wooing has drawn out this warm response from the
+cultured Greek world.
+
+So we trace the blue thread in John's tapestry picture, the true faith
+that is drawn out from nothing to little and more and much and most,
+under the warmth of the brooded wooing of this great Lover.
+
+
+
+The Ugly Thread in the Weaving.
+
+
+Now for that ugly dark thread, the opposition to, the rejection of, the
+Lover's wooing. But we'll not linger here. We've been seeing so much of
+this thread as we traced the other and studied the whole. Ugly things
+stand out by reason of their very ugliness. This stands out in gloomy
+disturbing contrast with all the rest. A brief quick tracing will fully
+answer our present purpose. And then we can hasten on to the dominating
+figure in the pattern.
+
+The opposition begins with silent rejection, moves by steady stages,
+growing ever intenser clear up to the murderous end. The sending of the
+committee to the Jordan to examine John and report on him was an
+official recognition of his power. The questions asked raise the
+possibility clearly being discussed of John being the promised prophet,
+or Elijah, or even the Christ Himself, and this is an expression of the
+national expectancy. The utter silence with which John's witness to
+Jesus is met is most striking.[73] Its significance is spoken of by both
+Jesus and John.[74]
+
+The intensity of the resentment over the cleansing of the temple-area
+can be almost felt rising up out of the very page, in the critical
+questions and cynical comment of the Jews. One can easily see all the
+bitterness of their hate tracking its slimy footprints out of that
+cleansed courtyard.[75]
+
+The cunning discussion among the great Jordan crowds about the purifying
+rite of baptism, stirred up so successfully by "_a Jew_," that is,
+probably by one of the Jerusalem leaders, would seem to be a studied
+attempt to discredit the two preachers, Jesus and John, and swing the
+crowds away. It was shrewdly done and might have dissipated the fine
+spiritual atmosphere by bitter strife and discussion had not Jesus
+quietly slipped away.[76]
+
+This attitude of theirs is clearly recognized and felt by Jesus. He
+plainly points out that vulgarizing hurt of sin whereby God's own
+messenger is not recognized when He comes in the garb of a
+neighbour.[77]
+
+Then things get more acute. The blessed healing of a
+thirty-eight-year-old infirmity leads to outspoken persecution, to a
+desire and purpose actually to kill Jesus. It grew intenser as Jesus'
+claim grew clearer. The issue was sharply drawn. He "called God _His own
+Father_, making Himself _equal with God_." They begin plotting His
+death.[78]
+
+His prudent absence from Jerusalem at the time of the next Passover
+reveals graphically how tense the opposition had gotten. But even up by
+Galilee's shores they have messengers at work amongst the crowds
+exciting discussion and discontent and worse. In the discussion it is
+easy to pick out the two elements, the nagging critics and the earnest
+seekers. And the saddening result is seen in many disciples leaving
+Jesus and going back again to their old way.[79]
+
+Then things got so intense that Jesus' habit of life was broken or
+changed. He could no longer frequent Judea as He had done, but kept
+pretty much to the northern province of Galilee. The settled plan to
+kill made His absence a matter of common prudence. This makes most
+striking His great courage in going up to Jerusalem at the autumn Feast
+of Tabernacles. He quietly arrived in the midst of much rumour and hot
+discussion about Himself, and begins teaching the crowds openly, to the
+great amazement of many.
+
+At once begin the wordy critical attacks, egged on probably by the
+warmth with which many receive Jesus' teachings. There are three
+attempts to take Him by force, including an official attempt at arrest.
+But, strangely enough, the very officers sent to arrest are so impressed
+by Jesus' teaching that they return with their mission not done, to the
+intensest disgust and rage of their superiors.[80]
+
+Early on the morning following there's a cunning coarse attempt to
+entrap Him into saying something that can be used against Him. A woman
+is brought accused of wrong-doing of the gravest sort, and His opinion
+is asked as to the proper punishment for so serious an offense. There's
+nothing more dramatic in Scripture than the withdrawal of these
+accusers, one by one, actually conscience-stricken in the presence of
+the few simple words of this wondrous Man.[81]
+
+This is followed by the intensest give-and-take of discussion thus far,
+in which they give vent to their bitterest degree of vile language in
+calling Him "a Samaritan," and accusing Him of being possessed with "a
+demon." And then the terrible climax is reached in the enraged
+passionate attempt of stoning. It is the worst yet to which their
+fanatical rage has gone.[82]
+
+Now they reach out to intimidate the multitude, by threatening to cut
+off from religious and civic privileges all who would confess belief in
+Jesus as Christ. And their spleen vents its rage on the man born blind
+but now so wondrously given sight of two sorts.[83]
+
+The winter Feast of the Dedication a few months later finds Jesus back
+again in Jerusalem teaching. And again their enraged attempt at stoning,
+the second one, is restrained by a something in Him they can neither
+understand nor withstand.[84]
+
+The Lazarus incident arouses their opposition to the highest pitch.[85]
+This is recognized as a crisis. Such power had never been seen or known.
+The inroads of belief are everywhere, in the upper social circles, among
+the old families, even in the Jewish Senate itself, notwithstanding the
+threatened excommunication. On every hand men are believing. Things are
+getting desperate for these leaders. They determine to use all the
+authority at hand arbitrarily and with a high hand. What strange
+blindness of stubborn self-will to such open evidence of power!
+
+A special meeting of the Jewish Senate is held, not unlikely hastily
+summoned of those not infected with belief. And there it is officially
+determined to put Jesus to death, and serve public notice that any one
+knowing of His whereabouts must report their information to the
+authorities.
+
+And as the incoming crowds thicken for the Passover, and the talk about
+Lazarus is on every tongue, it is determined to put Lazarus to death,
+too. This is the pitch things have risen to as John brings this part of
+his story to a close.
+
+
+
+The Glory-Coloured Thread.
+
+
+It is a relief to turn now to the chief figure in this tapestried
+picture of John's weaving. Here are glory-coloured threads of bright
+yellow. They easily stand out, thrown in relief both by the pleasing
+blues and the disturbing blacks. It is the figure of the Man on the
+errand, intent on His wooing, absorbed in His great task. Thia Man, His
+tremendous wooing, wins glad grateful ever-growing acceptance. And with
+rarest boldness and courage He persists in His wooing in spite of the
+terrific intensifying opposition.
+
+The gentle softening dew persists in distilling even on the hardest
+stoniest soil. The _gentle winsomeness of the wooing_ stands out
+appealingly as one goes through those fragments of teaching talks
+running throughout. The rare faithfulness of it to the nation and its
+leaders is thrown into bold relief by the very opposition that reveals
+their dire spiritual plight and their sore need.
+
+The _power of it_ is simply stupendous. As gentle in action as the
+falling dew it grows in intensity until neither the gates of death nor
+even the stubborn resistance of a human will can prevail against it. It
+is power sufficient to satisfy the most critical search, and to make
+acceptance not only possible with one's reasoning power in fullest
+exercise but the rational thing.
+
+Look a bit at the power at work here. For in looking at the power we are
+getting a better look at the Man, and at the purpose that grips Him. Of
+the nineteen incidents in these twelve chapters fifteen give exhibitions
+of power. It is of two sorts, power over the human will, and miraculous
+power.
+
+Eight incidents reveal _power working upon the human will_. In three of
+these--Nicodemus, the Samaritan woman, the accused sinful woman--the
+will becomes pliant and is radically changed, so morally affecting the
+whole life. In five--the temple cleansing, at the Tabernacles Feast, the
+first and second attempt at stoning, and the kingly entry into the
+city--the human will is stubbornly aggressively antagonistic to Jesus,
+but is absolutely restrained from what it is fully set upon doing.
+
+In the other seven incidents the power is _miraculous_ or supernatural.
+In three--turning the water into wine, multiplying food supplies,
+walking on the water--it is power in _the realm of nature_. In
+four--healing the Roman nobleman's son, the thirty-eight-year
+infirmity, giving sight to the man born blind, and the raising of
+Lazarus--it is power in _the realm of the body_, radically changing its
+conditions.
+
+It will help to remember what those words _miraculous_ and
+_supernatural_ mean. Miraculous means something wonderful, that is,
+something filling us with wonder because it is so unusual. Supernatural
+means something above the usual natural order. The two words are
+commonly taken as having one meaning. Neither word means something
+contrary to nature, of course, but simply on a higher level than the
+ordinary workings of nature with which we are familiar. The action is in
+accord with some higher law in God's world which is brought into play
+and is seen to be superior to the familiar laws.
+
+But the power, or the man that can call this higher law into action, is
+of a higher order. There is revealed an intimacy of acquaintance with
+these higher laws, and even more a power that can command and call them
+into action down in the sphere of our common ordinary life, until we
+stare in wonder. This is really the remarkable thing. Not supernatural
+action itself simply, tremendous as that is, but the man in such touch
+with higher power as to be able to call out the action, and to command
+it at will.
+
+This is one of the things that marks Jesus off so strikingly from other
+holy men. There are miracles in the Old Testament and in the Book of
+Acts. But there's an abundance and a degree of power in Jesus' miracles
+outclassing all others. It is fascinating and awesome to watch the
+growth of power in these movements of Jesus. It is as though He woos
+more persistently in the very degree and variety of power that He uses
+so freely, and with such apparent ease.
+
+Which calls out greater power, creating or healing? making water into
+wine or healing bodily ailment? Which is the greater, power in the realm
+of nature or the body? _or_ in the realm of the human will? multiplying
+food _or_ changing a human will? Which is greater, to induce a man
+voluntarily to change his course of action, _or_ to restrain him (by
+moral power only, not by force) from doing something he is dead-set on
+doing?
+
+This is the range through which Jesus' action runs in these fifteen
+incidents. Is there a growth in the power revealed? Is there an intenser
+plea to these men as the story goes on? Is there a steady piling up of
+evidence in the wooing of their hearts?
+
+Well, creating is bringing into material being what didn't so exist
+before. Healing does something more. It creates new tissue, makes new or
+different adjustments and conditions, _and_ it overcomes the opposite,
+the broken tissue, the diseased conditions, the weakness, the tendency
+towards decay and death. Clearly there's a greater task in healing, and
+a greater power at work, or more power, or power revealed more.
+
+Then, too, of course, the human is above the physical. Man is higher
+than nature. He is the lord of creation. It is immensely more to affect
+a human will than to affect conditions in nature. The whole thing moves
+up to a measureless higher level. And clearly enough it is a less
+difficult task to enlighten and persuade one who seeks the light, and to
+woo up one who is simply carelessly indifferent, than it is to overcome
+and restrain a will that is dead-set against you and is bitterly set on
+an opposite course.
+
+Of course, all of this is not commonly so recognized. It seems immensely
+more to heal the body than to change a man's course of action, or, at
+least, it appeals immensely more to the imagination. The man who can
+heal is magnified in our eyes above the other. The miraculous always
+seems the greater. It is more unusual. Stronger wills are influencing
+others daily. That's a commonplace. Bodily healing is rare. And all the
+world is ill. Things are ripe to have such power seize upon the
+imagination then and always.
+
+And then, too, there are interlacings here of things we see and things
+we don't see. There is the element of the use of the human will in all
+miraculous action, whether in nature or among men. Behind both nature's
+forces and human forces are unseen spirit personalities, both evil and
+good. The real battle of our human life lies there in the spirit realm.
+Victory there means full victory in the realm of nature and of human
+lives. There is a devil with hosts of spirit attendants. The wilderness
+was a spirit-conflict of terrific intensity, ending in Jesus'
+unqualified victory.
+
+Jesus' power was more than simply creative, or healing, or over human
+wills. It was the power of a pure, strong, surrendered will having the
+mastery over a giant, unsurrendered, God-defiant will. This underlies
+all else. But we've run off a bit. Come back to the simple story, and
+see how the power of Jesus is revealed more and more before their eyes.
+And in seeing the faithfulness and winsomeness of His power, see His
+wooing.
+
+
+
+Intenser Wooing.
+
+
+A look at the _miraculous_ power first. The turning of the water into
+wine was simple creative power at work, creating in the liquid the added
+constituents that made it wine. The healing of the nobleman's son rises
+to a higher level. The power overcomes diseased weakened conditions and
+creates new life in the parts affected.
+
+The healing of a thirty-eight year old infirmity rises yet higher in the
+scale of power seen at work. The Roman's child was an acute case; this
+an extreme chronic case of long standing. The acute case of illness may
+be most difficult and ticklish, demanding a quick masterful use of all
+the physician's knowledge and skill. The chronic case is yet more
+difficult eluding his best studied and prolonged and repeated effort.
+Clearly the power at work is accomplishing more; and so it is pleading
+more eloquently.
+
+The feeding of the five thousand is creative power simply, like the
+water-wine case, but it moves up higher in the greater abundance of
+power shown, the increase of quantity created, and the far greater and
+intenser human need met and relieved.
+
+The walking on the water was an overcoming one of nature's laws, a
+rising up superior to it. The universal law of gravitation would
+naturally have drawn His feet through the surface of the water and His
+whole body down. He overcomes this law, retaining His footing on the
+water as on land.
+
+It was done in the night, but an Oriental community, like any country
+community, anywhere, is a bulletin-board for all that happens. No detail
+is omitted, and no one misses the news. And this like all these other
+incidents become the common property of the nation.
+
+It is interesting to note in the language John uses[86] that the motive
+underneath the action was not to reveal power but simply to keep an
+appointment. But then Jesus never used His power to show that He had
+power, but only to meet the need of the hour. Yet each exhibition of
+power revealed indirectly, incidentally _who He was_.
+
+There is an instance similar to this in the borrowed axe-head that swam
+in obedience to Elisha's touch of power to meet the need of the
+distressed theological student.[87] In each instance it is the same
+habit of nature that yields homage to a higher power at work.
+
+But though there is here no increase of power shown yet the action
+itself was of the sort to appeal much more to the crowd. It has in it
+the dramatic. It would appear to the crowd a yet more wonderful thing
+than they had yet witnessed.
+
+The giving of sight to the man born blind is distinctly a long step
+ahead of any healing power thus far related in John's story. There is
+here not only the chronic element, but the thing is distinctly in a
+class by itself, quite outclassing in the difficulty presented any case
+of mere chronic infirmity.
+
+It was not a matter of restoring what disease had destroyed but of
+supplying what nature had failed to give in its usual course. It was a
+meeting of nature's lack through some slip in the adjustment of her
+action in connection with human action. There is not only the appealing
+dramatic element, as in the walking on the water, but the appealing
+sympathetic element in that this poor man's lifelong burden is removed.
+
+And then the seventh and last of these, the actual raising of Lazarus up
+from the dead, is a climax of power in action nothing short of
+stupendous. Of the six recorded cases of the dead being raised this is
+easily the greatest in the power seen at work. In the other five, in the
+Elijah record,[88] the Elisha,[89] the Moabite's body at Elisha's
+grave,[90] Jairus' daughter,[91] and the widow's son at Nain,[92] there
+was no lapse of time involved.
+
+Here four days of death had intervened, until it was quite certain
+beyond question that in that climate decomposition would be well
+advanced. Utter human impotence and impossibility was in its last
+degree. Man stands utterly powerless, utterly helpless in the presence
+of death. It is not the last degree of improbability. There _is_ no
+improbability. It's an _impossibility_. The thing is in a class by
+itself, the hopeless class. And the four days give death its fullest
+opportunity. And death never fails in grim faithfulness to opportunity.
+
+It is no wonder that all Jerusalem was so stirred. The common crowds of
+home people and pilgrims, the aristocratic families, the inner official
+circles, among _all_ classes, this tremendous event won recognition of
+Jesus' power and claim, and with recognition personal faith. Nothing
+like this had ever happened. This is the superlative degree of
+miraculous power revealed in this matchless wooing of a faithless
+nation.
+
+
+
+Love Wooing Yet More.
+
+
+Now a look at the power at work _in the realm of the human will_, really
+a higher power, or power at work in a higher realm, though not commonly
+so recognized by the crowd. There are eight incidents here. And again we
+shall find the steady rise of the power seen at work. Three of these
+tell of the human will changed, and four of its being restrained
+against its will from doing that which it was dead-set on doing.
+
+The ruler who withdrew from the midst of the disturbed temple managers
+for a night-call upon Jesus was radically changed in his convictions and
+his life-purpose. He had an open mind. The work was begun at that first
+Jerusalem Passover. Under the holy spell of John's presence he is drawn
+away from his enraged brother-rulers to seek the night talk. The
+frankness and fullness of Jesus' talk shows plainly how open he was and
+how much more he opened and yielded that evening. And the after protest
+in the official meeting of the rulers, and the loving care for the body
+of Jesus reveal how radical was the transformation wrought upon his will
+and heart by Jesus.[93]
+
+The Samaritan woman is changed from utter indifference to a change of
+will and purpose that makes her an eager messenger to her people until
+they hail Jesus as the Saviour of the world. The change involved a
+radical face-about in habit and life amongst the very people who knew
+her past sinful life best. It meant more than change of conviction, that
+change actually put into practice across the grain of the habits of
+years, and of the lower passions, so hard to change. It is a distinct
+step up from the change in Nicodemus simply because there was so much
+more to change. The same power had more to do. And it did it.[94]
+
+The story of the woman accused of the gravest offense is a double one in
+the power seen at work. She would naturally be hardened, and stony
+hard, shameless to the point of hopeless indifference in moral sense,
+and all this increased by their coarse publicity of her. And so little
+is said, but so much suggested of a change in her.
+
+The purity of Jesus' face and presence would be a tremendous power of
+conviction. The gentleness of His quiet question would couple softening
+of heart with conviction of her sin. The word of counsel as she is
+dismissed would seem a mirror reflecting the inner longing of her heart
+and the new purpose stirring within, as memory recalls early days of
+virgin purity, and a wild hope within struggles towards life that there
+may yet be a change even for her.
+
+The change in her accusers is, at least, as remarkable though wholly
+different. Morally hardened, as shameless and coarse as the woman as
+regards a fine moral sensibility; by their own tacit confession no
+better in practice than she in the point of morals raised; in their
+malignant cunning only concerned with the woman's sin as a means of
+venting their spleen upon the man they hated and feared,--what a hideous
+spirit-photograph!
+
+Under the strange compelling power of Jesus' word and will, utterly
+conscience-stricken at being as guilty as she in the particular item
+under discussion, they turn, one by one, and slink softly out, until the
+last one is gone. As an instance of one will controlling and changing
+another will wholly against its will to the point of forcing out
+confession of personal guilt, it is most remarkable. One wonders if,
+under that tremendous conviction of personal sin, some of these were
+later included in those of the Sanhedrin who openly accepted Jesus. It
+is quite possible. It is not improbable.[95]
+
+The fact is noted that the very language used here under the English
+indicates a different authorship of the incident than John's. Possibly a
+thoughtful delicacy of regard for the woman restrains John's pen if she
+were still living as he writes. And then later the Holy Spirit, who so
+tactfully restrains John's pen, guides another to fit the remarkable
+story in its place in the record.
+
+The drastic turning of bargaining cattle-dealers and bickering
+money-brokers, out of the temple-area, and restoring it from a barn-yard
+to a place of holy worship, is a most remarkable illustration of
+_restraint upon antagonistic wills_ at the point of their greatest
+concern. These leaders would gladly have turned _Him_ out.
+
+And who was He, this man with flashing eye and quiet stern word? A
+stranger, unknown, from the despised country district of Galilee. And
+they have authority, law-officers, everything of the sort on their side.
+Yet the restraint of His presence and will over them is as absolute as
+though they were in chains. They weakly ask for a sign and evidence of
+power. They themselves experienced the most tremendous exhibition of
+power the old temple-area had known for generations.[96]
+
+The power of restraint at the Feast of Tabernacles is yet greater. Or
+it might be more accurate to say that it is a greater antagonism that is
+restrained by the same power. They are fully prepared now. The cleansing
+incident took them unawares. It made them gasp to think that any one
+would dare oppose them like that.
+
+Now they are on guard. Then, too, their antagonism has intensified and
+embittered to the point of plotting His death. And they have grown more
+openly aggressive. There are three attempts at His arrest. Yet that
+strange noiseless power of restraint is upon them. They do not do as
+they would. Clearly they cannot. They are restrained. The man whose
+presence so aroused, also held them in check, apparently without
+thinking about it. His _presence_ is a restraint.[97]
+
+Then a second clash of wills comes a day or so later. Their opposition
+is yet intenser. There has been no cooling-off interval. His continued
+open teaching in face of their attempts at arrest puts fresh kindling on
+the fire. "No man took Him," but clearly they wanted to. Their open
+relations become more strained. He uses yet plainer speech in exposing
+their hypocrisies. This stirs them still more. Their hooked fingers
+reach passionately for the stones that would make a finish at once, and
+the green light flashes out of their enraged eyes. It's the sharpest
+clash yet. They are at a high fever point.
+
+It seems to take a greater use of power to restrain. "He hid Himself" is
+the simple sentence used. This is one of four times that we are told of
+His overcoming the hostile attack of a crowd by simply passing through
+their midst and going on His way.[98] Perhaps something in the glance of
+that eye of His, or in the set of His face,[99] _something_ in Him
+restrained them as He quietly passes through the uproarious crowd and
+goes on His way undisturbed. They are held back against their wills from
+doing the thing they are so intent on doing.[100]
+
+A few months later He is back in Jerusalem. But the interval seems not
+to have cooled their passion, only to have heated and hardened their
+enmity. They at once begin an aggressive wordy attack. Then losing
+self-control in their rage they again reach down for the stones to kill
+Him at once. And again they are restrained from their passionate
+purpose, as Jesus quietly goes on talking with them. Again they attempt
+to seize His person. And the simple striking sentence used, "He went
+forth out of their hand," points to the extent of their purpose and to a
+yet greater use of His power of restraint over their unwilling
+wills.[101]
+
+The last incident of this sort is the kingly entry into the city amid
+the enthusiasm of the pilgrim and city crowds. It says not a word about
+any attempt on their part nor of His restraint over them. But the very
+boldness of this wholly unexpected move on His part constituted a
+tremendous restraint. Their hate had gone through several stages of
+refined hardening during the few months preceding. The formal decision
+to kill, the edict of excommunication, the public notice that any
+information of His whereabouts must be made known, and the decision to
+kill Lazarus also,--all indicate the hotter burning of the flames of
+their rage.
+
+Yet into just such a situation He quietly turns the head of His untamed
+unridden young colt of an ass and rides through the city surrounded by
+the crowds under the very eyes of these leaders and their hireling legal
+minions. The tenseness of the whole scene, the power of restraint so put
+forth, the volcano smouldering underfoot waiting the slightest extra jar
+to loose out its explosion, all are revealed in the little sentence so
+pregnant in its concealed dynamic meaning, Jesus "_hid Himself from,
+them_." There's an exquisite blending of restraint over them and
+boldness with cautious prudence. He was walking very close to the edge
+that time.[102]
+
+So His power, shown so quietly but irresistibly before the eyes of all
+during those brief years, rises to a double climax nothing short of
+stupendous. Miraculous power in the realm of nature and of the human
+body had reached its climax in the raising of Lazarus, attested beyond
+question. Power over the human will both in affecting a voluntary
+change, and in actually restraining its action against its own set
+purpose, had risen to its climax in the bold open entry in broadest
+daylight into the capital where His death was officially and publicly
+decreed. The two climaxes touch. And it is tremendously significant that
+whereas they sometimes question His miraculous power, they could not
+deny His restraining power over themselves. How gladly they would if
+only they could.
+
+And all this, mark you keenly, is a bit of His wooing. The wooing is
+ever the dominant thought in His heart. So He was revealing to them who
+He was. He claims to be the Son of God, their kingly Messiah. And _He
+lived His claim_. Power is the one universally recognized touchstone by
+which we judge God and man. His power told _who He was_ even more than
+His tremendous words did. He was acting naturally. His presence among
+them thus natural, true to the power native in Him,--this was the
+wooing.
+
+But there was more than power. There was _love_. There was a perfect
+blend of the two. With the power went the love. Nay, rather, with the
+love went the power. Love was the dominating thing. Jesus was love in
+shoes, God in action. Always there was the tenderness, the gentleness,
+the patience, the purity, the unflinching ideals, yes, the courage, the
+utter fearlessness tempered with a wise prudence. All _these are the
+fuller spelling of love_.
+
+Always these went in closest touch with the resisted but resistless
+power. These are the two traits of God, two traits that are one. Men
+always think most of the power. God Himself always emphasizes most the
+love. But true power is simply love in action. The power is the outcome
+of love, and under the control of love.
+
+This is the second of John's great impelling pictures. The first shows
+us _the Person,_ the Man Jesus, God with us, God making a world, and
+then, in homely human garb walking amongst its people, one of
+themselves.
+
+This second shows us _the wooing_. This Man, so tender in touch, so
+gentle in speech, so thoughtful in action, so pure in life, so unbending
+in ideals, so fearless in the thick of opposition, so faithful to the
+chosen faithless nation,--this Man Himself is the wooing. His words, His
+actions, His power, His persistence, His patience, this also is the
+wooing of this great God-Man-Lover. This is God spelling Himself out
+into human speech, wooing men out and up and in to Himself.
+
+
+
+Jesus Recognised by all the Race.
+
+
+And it is most striking to sit still and think into how this Lover was
+_recognized_ by men of all nations, and how His wooing was _understood_
+and yielded to by men of all sorts. The intense Jew, the half-breed
+Samaritan, the aggressive Roman, the cultured refined Greek,--that was
+_all the world_. And all these recognized Him as some one kin to
+themselves, bound by closest spirit-ties, to whom they were drawn by the
+strong cords of His common kinship with themselves. The waves of His
+personal influence were, geographically, like His last commandment to
+His disciples. The movement was from Jerusalem to Judea, through
+Samaria, and out into the uttermost part of the earth and the innermost
+heart of the race.
+
+And all sorts of men understood. Jesus wiped out social differences and
+distinctions in the crowds that gently jostled each other in His
+presence. The aristocrat and the cultured, the student and the gentle
+folk, mingled freely with simple country folk, the unlettered, the
+humblest and lowliest, all drawn alike to Him, and all unconscious of
+differences when under the holy spell of His presence. The wealthy like
+Joseph of Arimathea, and the beggar like the man born blind, the pure in
+heart like Mary of Bethany and the openly bad in life like the accused
+woman of Jerusalem,--all felt alike that this Jesus belonged to them,
+and they to Him.
+
+The underneath tie of real kinship of heart rubbed out all outer
+distinctions. The old families of Jerusalem were glad to unlock their
+jealously guarded doors to Him. And the simple Capernaum fisherfolk were
+grateful when He shared bread and roof with them. All men recognized
+Jesus as belonging to themselves.
+
+And the calendar has not changed this, neither Gregorian nor Old Style.
+Time finds the race the same always. Centuries climb slowly by, but the
+human heart is the same, and--so is Jesus. I was greatly struck with
+this in my errand among the nations. The East balks at the ways of the
+West sometimes. Many books say there is no point of contact between the
+two. The East balks at our Western organization, our rule of the clock,
+and our rush and hurry. Our Westernized church systems and our closely
+mortised logical theologies are sometimes a bit bewildering, not exactly
+comprehensible to their Orientalized mode of thought.
+
+But they never balk at Jesus. When they are told of Him, and get some
+glimpse of Him, their eyes light, their faces glow, their hearts leap in
+response. You book people say there is no point of contact between
+Orient and Occident? But there is. Jesus is the point of contact. One
+real touch of Jesus makes all the world akin. No; that can be put
+better. One touch of Jesus reveals the kinship that is there between Him
+and men, _and_ between all men.
+
+In Japan it was the Portuguese that first took the Gospel a few hundred
+years ago. And you still find Japanese churches founded by the
+Portuguese. Fifty odd years ago it was the English tongue that again
+brought that message of life to them. But as I mingled among Japanese
+Christians of different communions and heard them pray, they were not
+praying in Portuguese nor in English. They had no thought that He was a
+Portuguese Saviour they prayed to, nor yet an English. _They prayed in
+Japanese_. They felt that Jesus spoke their tongue. He belonged to them.
+He and they understood each other.
+
+As I listened to Manchu and Chinese, to Korean and Hawaiian pour out
+their hearts in prayer, I could feel the close personal burning touch of
+their spirits with Jesus. They and He were kin to each other. Their
+very voices told the certainty in their hearts on this point.
+
+I recall a little old bent-over woman of seventy-odd years up in
+northern Sweden, a Laplander. She had come a long three days' journey on
+her snow-shoes to the meetings. Night after night as I talked through
+interpretation her deep-set black eyes glowed and glowed. But when one
+night an hour or more was spent in voluntary prayer she needed no
+interpreter. And as I listened I needed none. I _felt_ that she _knew_
+that _Jesus spoke Lappish_. The two were face to-face in closest touch
+of spirit.
+
+And so it is everywhere. The flaxen-haired Holland maid kneeling by her
+single cot _knows_ that Jesus talks Dutch, and her homely hearthfire
+Dutch, too, at that. And the earnest Polish peasant in his Carpathian
+cabin bowed before the symbol his eyes have known from infancy is
+talking into an ear that knows both Polish accent and Polish heart. So
+with the German of the Saxon highlands, and of the simpler speech of the
+Teutonic lowlands. So with the olive-skinned Latin and the darker-hued
+African kneeling on opposite sides, north and south, of the great
+Central-earth Sea. Wherever knowledge of Jesus has been carried, He is
+_recognized_ and claimed _as their own_ regardless of national or social
+lines.
+
+I knew a minister of our Southland, but whose public service took him to
+all parts of our country. He had been reared in the South and knew the
+coloured people by heart, and loved them. And when he returned to his
+Southern home town he would frequently preach for the coloured people.
+He was preaching to them one Sabbath with the simplicity and fervour for
+which he was noted.
+
+At the close among others, one big black man grasped his hand hard as he
+thanked him for the preaching. And then with his great child-eyes big
+and aglow, he said, "Youse got a white skin, but youse got a black
+heart." And you know what he meant,--you have a black man's heart, you
+have a heart like mine. Your heart makes my heart burn.
+
+Now _Jesus had a Hack heart_. He had a white heart. He had a yellow, a
+brown heart. He had a Jew heart, a Roman, a Greek, a Samaritan heart.
+Aye, He had a _world_ heart, He had _a human heart_. And He _has_.
+There's a _Man_ on the throne yonder, bone of our bone, heart of our
+heart, pain of our pain.
+
+There's more of God since Jesus went back. Human experience has been
+taken up into the heart of God. Jesus belonged to us. And now belongs to
+us more than ever, and we to Him. The human heart has felt His
+tremendous wooing. It has recognized its Kinsman wherever He has been
+able to get to them, and it has gladly yielded to the plea of His love.
+
+Jerusalem might carpenter a cross for Him, but the world would weave its
+heartfelt devotion into a crown of love for Him, bestudded with the dewy
+tears of its gratitude, sparkling like diamonds in the light of His
+face.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+Closer Wooing
+
+     _An Evening with Opening Hearts: the Story of a Supper and a Walk
+     in the Moonlight and the Shadows_
+
+
+
+
+    Nigh and nigh draws the chase,
+    With unperturbed pace,
+    Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
+    And past those noised Feet
+    A Voice comes yet more fleet--
+    "_Lo, naught contents thee, who content'st not Me._"
+
+    --"_The Hound of Heaven._"
+
+     "I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I
+     leave the world, and go unto the Father."--_John xvi. 28_.
+
+    "I thought His love would weaken
+    As more and more He knew me;
+    But it burneth like a beacon,
+    And its light and heat go through me;
+    And I ever hear Him say,
+    As He goes along His way,
+    Wand'ring souls, O _do_ come near Me;
+    My sheep should never fear Me.
+    I am the Shepherd true."
+
+    --_Frederick William Faber._
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+Closer Wooing
+
+(Chapters xiii.-xvii.)
+
+
+
+Knots.
+
+
+The knot tied on the end of the thread holds the seam. The clinching of
+the nail on the underside holds all that has been done. Love ties knots
+to hold what has been gotten. The bit of prayer knots up the kindly act.
+The warm hand-grasp knots the timely word. The added word and act tie up
+all that's gone before. Hate imitates love the best it can. But its
+intense fires are never so hot.
+
+The rest of John's book is simple. It is tying knots on the ends of
+threads. Five knots are tied on the ends of these same three threads we
+have been tracing.
+
+There's a triple knot on the end of the blue thread of acceptance; an
+ugly tangled knotty knot on the end of that black thread of opposition
+and rejection; and a knot of wondrous beauty on the end of that yellow
+thread of winsome wooing. Chapters eighteen and nineteen tie two of
+these, the black and the glory-coloured.
+
+Chapters thirteen through seventeen, is the first knot on the faith
+thread, the betrayal-night knot. Chapter twenty is the second, the
+Resurrection knot; chapter twenty-one the extra knot, the love-service
+knot. We take a look now at the patient skilful tying of the first knot
+on the end of that true-blue faith thread.
+
+It's taken a good bit of careful work to _get_ that thread, tearing
+loose, cleansing, spinning, twisting, careful handling, till at last a
+good thread is gotten, and is being woven into the warp. Now a knot is
+tied on its end to hold what has been gotten, and keep it from ravelling
+out, for there's a desperately hard place coming in the weaving.
+
+There's a clean finish at the end of the twelfth chapter of John.
+There's a sharp break, an abrupt turn off to something quite different.
+The direct-wooing case is made up. There is no more added to it, except
+the indirect, the incidental. The evidence is all in. Wondrous wooing it
+has been, in its winsomeness, its faithfulness, its rare power. Now it
+is over. It's done, and well done. That door is shut, the national door.
+
+Now another door opens. The inner door into Jesus' heart is being opened
+by Him. And the inner door into the disciples' heart is being knocked at
+that it, too, may open. It is the betrayal night. Jesus is alone with
+the inner circle. They have received Him. Now He will receive them into
+closer intimacy than yet before. They have opened their hearts to His
+love. Now He opens His heart to let out more the love that is there.
+Love accepted is free to reveal itself. And love revealing its warmth
+and tenderness and depth yet more calls out quickly a deeper, a tenderer
+love.
+
+It's the Passover evening. They have met, the twelve and their Master,
+by appointment, in the home of one of Jesus' faithful unnamed friends.
+In a large upper room they are shut in, gathered about the supper board.
+As they eat Jesus is quietly but intently thinking. Four trains of
+thought pass through His mind side by side.[103] The Father had trusted
+all into His hands. He had come down from the Father on an errand and
+would return when the errand was done.
+
+And now the hour was come. The turn in the road was reached, the sharp
+turn down leading to the sharp turn up and then back. It had seemed slow
+in coming, that hour.[104] Dreaded things seem to linger even while they
+hasten, dreaded longed-for things, dreaded in the experience of pain to
+be borne, eagerly longed for in the blessed result; as with an expectant
+mother. Now the hour's here.[105]
+
+And yonder across the board sits the man so faithfully wooed, yet
+dead-set in his inner heart on a dark purpose, more evil in its outcome
+than he realizes. There must be more and tenderer wooing. He shall have
+yet another full opportunity. And under all is the heart-throb of love
+for these who are His own, being birthed into a new life by the giving
+of His very own life these months past. He loves His own, and will to
+the uttermost, the utterest, the mostest, limit of love and of time left
+Him before _the_ great event. These are the thoughts passing quietly,
+clearly, intensely, through Jesus' mind as they sit at supper.
+
+
+
+Teaching Three Things in One Action.
+
+
+Now He acts.[106] Quietly He rises from the table, picks up a towel and
+fastens its end in His waistband for convenience in use, after the
+servant's usual fashion. Then He pours water into a basin and turning
+stoops over the feet of the disciple nearest Him. And before they can
+recover from their wide-eyed astonishment He begins bathing his feet and
+then carefully wiping them with the convenient towel. And so around the
+circle. Peter, of course, protests, and so calls out a little of the
+explanation. And then with tender passionateness he asks for the washing
+to take in all his extremities, head and hands as well as feet. How
+their hearts must have felt the touch upon their feet!
+
+Then follows a bit of explanation.[107] But the chief thing had already
+been done. The acting was more than the speech. Three things the Master
+was doing. The teaching about humility lies on the surface, within easy
+reach. It was acted, then spoken; done, then said. It was sorely needed,
+and is. In it was the key to Jesus' great victory within the twenty-four
+hours following,[108] and would have been for them had they used it.
+Humility is the foundation of all strength and victory. Only the strong
+can stoop. It takes the strongest to stoop lowest. He who so stoops is
+revealing strength.
+
+Humility is not thinking meanly of yourself; it is merely getting into
+correct personal relation with God, and so with men. It is our true
+normal attitude, as dependent creatures, as those who have sinned, as
+those who have been bought with blood. Everything we have is from
+Another, originally and continuously; we are utterly dependent. All
+rights have been forfeited by our wilful conduct; we retain nothing in
+our own right. And all we have now has been secured for us at the cost
+of blood; we are being carried at enormous expense. Not much room there
+for self-satisfaction, is there?
+
+Humility is simply _recognizing_ our _utter dependence upon Another_,
+and _living_ it. And this controls our touch with our fellows. In this
+lies the secret of all strength,--mental keenness and vigour,
+sympathetic touch with others, and power of action in life and in
+service. All this touches the _weakest_ spot in these men, and in--us.
+
+But there's more here. The humility teaching is out on the surface.
+There's a bit _under_ the surface, that they would soon be needing and
+needing badly. It's this: the thing in you that's wrong _must_ be made
+right; and it _can_ be. Every sin done by the man who is trusting Christ
+as his Saviour, every such sin _must_ be cleansed away. And it _can_ be.
+The feet-washing told this bit of tremendous truth.
+
+These men trusted Christ. But their moral feet would get badly messed
+that night, mired and slimed by passionate betrayal and blasphemous
+denial and cowardly flight. The man going to the bath-house was clean on
+returning home except where his sandalled feet had gathered some soil
+from the road. These men were cleansed in heart through Christ. But the
+foot-soilings must be cleansed. These two things ring out. Sin _must_ be
+reckoned with and cleansed out. _And_, blessed truth! it _can_ be. This
+is the second bit. It would be brought to their remembrance that same
+night when the road they took dirtied them up so badly, and afterwards.
+
+But there's a deeper, a tenderer bit yet here. There is _the love
+touch_. Jesus was giving them the tenderest touch yet of His love, to
+_hold_ them. The personal touch is the tenderest. Man yearns for the
+personal touch, of presence, of lips, of hands. Something seems to go
+_through_ the personal touch from heart to heart. The spirit-currents
+find their connection so. Jesus gave the tender personal touch that
+evening, the closest yet. His hands touched their feet, but He was not
+thinking most about their feet. He was reaching higher up. His hands
+reached past their feet for their hearts.
+
+And they felt it so. Their hearts understood, if their heads didn't yet.
+Judas felt those hands reaching to touch his heart. And he had to set
+himself afresh to resist that touch. John felt it, and _remained
+steady_. Peter felt it and came back with flooded eyes. The fleeing nine
+felt that touch and yielded to it as they penitently returned. Love
+won. That personal touch did it.
+
+But Jesus feels Judas' heart hardening as He touches his feet, and the
+gentle word already spoken availed not.[109] Now His great heart is
+sorely troubled for Judas.[110] He tries once again to reach his heart
+and stay his wayward feet. He reaches for his feet through his heart
+this time. They're all together about the table again. Quietly, but with
+tactful indirectness, Jesus lets Judas know that _He_ knows. He says,
+"One of you is planning to betray Me."
+
+The men stare one at another in questioning astonishment. Peter touches
+John's arm and with eye and word quietly asks him to find out. John
+reclining next to Jesus asks the question in undertone. And as quietly
+Jesus makes reply. Then the last appeal is made to Judas in the last
+delicate touch of special personal attention. Judas' unchanged spirit
+makes wordless answer. The hardening of the purpose is a further opening
+of a downward door and that door is quickly used by the evil one.
+
+And Judas rises abruptly with jaw set and eye tense, and goes out into
+the blackest night the clouds ever shut in. So the first tremendous part
+of the evening's drama is now done. The wooing of Judas has been intense
+and tender clean up to the last moment, _and_ resisted. Now that chapter
+is done. Another corner is passed. The extremes have--parted. One man
+has gone out. Eleven stay in, and in staying come closer.
+
+
+
+Believe--Love--Obey.
+
+
+The atmosphere clears now. That black cloud shifts. The pressure is
+relieved. The air changes. Breathing is easier. Jesus did His best to
+keep Judas in by trying to have him turn something--some one--out. But
+the something that held the some one is kept within, so the man goes
+out. That inside air was getting a bit thick for Judas. Love's tender
+pleading unyielded to makes breathing difficult.
+
+Again Jesus begins talking in the cleared air. The hour had full come.
+The character of the Son of Man would now be revealed,[111] and in being
+revealed God's character would also be understood, and God Himself would
+show what _He_ thought of Jesus by His personal recognition and
+acknowledgment of Him, and He would do it at once. The clock is striking
+the hour. Now He was going away. They would not understand.[112]
+
+Then Jesus strikes the great key-note of their future conduct as He
+goes on. _The_ thing is this: _love one another_. This is the badge He
+gives them to wear. It will always identify them as His very own. Peter
+picks up the one bit he understands, and is told that he cannot yet
+follow in the tremendous experience lying just ahead for Jesus, but some
+day he can, and will. And then to Peter's blundering self-confidence
+comes a plain tender reminder of his weakness.[113] So that wondrous
+fourteenth chapter that Christendom loves begins back in the thirteenth.
+
+And Jesus goes quietly on as they still linger about the table.[114] He
+had been sorely troubled,[115] but He would have them not troubled by
+their doubtings regarding Himself. It is true that they were outcasts
+with Him, from their national home, but He would provide them a home,
+and a better one. They did believe in God. They should believe Him just
+as implicitly. This is the warp into which is woven the whole fabric of
+that evening's talk. The whole talk is a plea for their trusting loving
+acceptance of Himself as fully as of God. This word "_believe_" changes
+its outer shape three times during that evening, making four words in
+all, but it's always the same thing underneath.
+
+So now the teaching goes on in freest exchange of question and answer.
+What a picture of how we may talk everything out with our Lord and get
+fully answered. Thomas' question helps Jesus to turn them away from
+thinking of a roadway of clay and sand to a Man. Philip's helps Him to
+insist on the presence of the Father in a distinctive sense within this
+Man so familiarly talking with them. And then four times over He rings
+out that word _believe_.
+
+Then by a subtle turn He changes the word, though not the thing, to help
+them understand better: "If ye _love_ Me."[116] That puts the thing at
+once up on the _heart_ level. Believing is a thing of the heart. Their
+heads were bothered. He said in effect,--all your head questions will be
+answered in good time, but this thing is higher up than that. It's a
+matter of your heart. And so that word _believe_ becomes _love_, its
+second shape. And with that is quickly coupled _obey_, the third outer
+shape He gives the word believe that night.
+
+It is all the same thing underneath. _Love_ is the heart side of
+_believe_, the inner side. _Obey_ is the life-side of believe, the
+outer, the action side. The love looks out the window of the life and
+then _comes_ out and _walks_ down the street on an errand. Love doesn't
+simply love: it loves _some one_. Love that simply loves isn't love.
+Love comes to life only in the personal touch.
+
+And love keeps in perfect rhythm of action with the one loved. That is
+the other way of saying _obey_. Obedience is the music of two wills
+acting together. _Believe_ me, _love_ me, _obey_ me,--this is the
+three-noted music of the upper room; three notes but one music; a fourth
+note to be added later. This is the wondrous closer wooing.
+
+"I go to the Father. We, the Father and I, will send the Holy Spirit to
+you. He will come in through this opened door of obedience. He will
+abide in you, come in to stay. He will be everything and do everything
+that you need in every sort of circumstance. Keep in closest touch with
+Him: this is to be your one rule. Your part is simple. _Believe_; that
+means _love_; that means _obey_."
+
+So they talk around the table. Then there's thoughtful silence, which
+the Master breaks by saying, "Arise, let us go."
+
+
+
+The Great Vine Picture.
+
+
+Now they're walking down the street, silently, the Master in the lead,
+with John and Peter close by.[117] The moon is at the full. Now they see
+the temple, the moonlight falling full upon it. And the great brass
+grape-vine with which it had been beautified by Herod at his building of
+it shines with wondrous beauty in the enchantment of moonlight.
+
+And now the Master is speaking again. Very quietly the words come as
+they still gaze at the beauty of the brass vine. Listen to Him, "I am
+the _true_ vine, and My Father the vine-gardener." Here is the
+illustration that exactly pictures what He had been saying in the upper
+room. It supplies the fourth word, the fourth outer shape that word
+_believe_ takes on, _believe_, that is--_love_, that is--_obey_, that
+is--_abide_.
+
+Look at the vine, then you have the whole story pictured, simple,
+clear, full. Each of these four words grows out of the other as fruit
+out of blossom, and blossom out of the new branch and that out of the
+old stock of the vine: believe, love, obey, abide; vine, new branches,
+tiny blossom, fruit. The fruit grows out of the vine; yet it is the very
+life of the vine. _Abide_ grows out of _believe_, yet it is the very
+heart and inner life of believe.
+
+So He goes on ringing the changes back and forth, now here, now there.
+_Pruning_--that insures fruit, and more and better. _Praying_--that _is_
+the fruit, some of it; that naturally grows out of the abiding. "_My
+words_"--that is part of the abiding, the life-juice of the vine coming
+into branch and blossom and fruit. "Joy"--that is the rich red juice of
+the grape in your mouth. "_Friends_"--that is the other word for abide.
+That's what abiding makes and reveals. _Abiding_--that is what friends
+do: that's what friendship is, the real thing. _Obey_--that is the swing
+of step with our great Friend as we go along the road together. So these
+clusters of rich ripe fruit hang thick on the vine of this simple
+teaching-talk as they walk along in the moonlight.
+
+And now they're passing through some of the narrower streets as they
+make their way east towards the city gate.[118] And these narrow streets
+are shadowed. And you feel the shadows creeping into His talk. The world
+will _hate_ them. Of course. This is a natural result of the abiding.
+The outer crowd can no more put up with the Jesus-swayed man than with
+Jesus Himself. And the hate would be aggressive.
+
+But if they would clearly understand ahead what to expect it would help
+them keep their feet when the worst storm came. And by staying steady
+and true through the worst that came, they would be of the greatest
+service. The Holy Spirit in them would reach out and talk to that outer
+crowd. He would make clear to them their awful sin in killing Jesus, the
+spotless purity and rightness of the absent Jesus, and the terrific fact
+that the prince of the world whom they rally to so faithfully is
+actually judged, doomed and damned. Then He adds, "now in a little bit
+I'll be gone from you. Then a little later, I'll be with you again."
+
+So He goes on ringing the changes back and forth on this in simple
+conversational style. And now they are silent. The narrow street is
+quite shadowed. He lets them think a bit over His words. And the
+personal part takes hold most. And they talk softly together of what
+this means,--a little while and He is gone; again a little while, and He
+is back. They're plainly puzzled, yet restrained from breaking in upon
+His deep mood.
+
+But with characteristic gentleness He speaks of what they would
+ask.[119] Clearly there is some terrible experience for Him and for them
+just at hand. But He reaches past to the joy beyond, as the mother
+forgets sharp pains in the joy of her new-born babe. And as He talks
+they think they understand now, but again He gently reminds of the storm
+about to break. And then He leaves them three wondrous words,--_peace,
+good-cheer, overcome_. In the midst of the worst storm there may be
+peace. In the thickest of tribulation the song of cheer may ring out. He
+_has_ overcome. The outcome is settled. No doubts need nag. Sing! Sing
+louder! _Christ is Victor_!
+
+This is the second bit of the evening's closer wooing, this long quiet
+talk about the supper table and along the road. It is wooing them up to
+more intelligence in their believing and loving. It's wooing them to
+trust _Him_, hold hard to _Him_, during the coming storm, when they
+wouldn't understand. Even when they can't understand, but stand in
+hopeless helpless bewilderment, they still can trust _Him_.
+
+
+
+Taken into the Innermost Life.
+
+
+They're outside the city-gate now, going down the path towards the
+Kidron Brook. Now comes the third bit of that evening's closer
+wooing.[120] And this is the tenderest, the most personal, the least
+resistible bit, the closest wooing of all. He takes them into His
+innermost heart-life for a brief moment. It must have reminded John
+afterwards of that mountain-top experience when Jesus drew aside the
+drapery of His humanity and let a little of the inner glory shine out.
+Here He takes them with Him into the holy of holies of His own inner
+life with His Father.
+
+Let not any one think that Jesus was simply letting them hear Him pray,
+so they might learn. Not that; not that. He was taking them into the
+sacred privacy of His own innermost life. That was a bit of the wooing,
+under the desperate happenings just ahead. But now as He takes them in
+He quite forgets them, though He knows they are there. _He is absorbed
+with the Father_. He isn't thinking now of the effect of all this on
+them. That's past. He is alone in spirit with the Father, talking out
+freely even as though actually quite alone.
+
+We are in the innermost holy of holies here. The heart of the world's
+life is its literature. The heart of all literature is this sacred Book
+of God. The heart of this Book is the Gospels. The heart of these four
+Gospels is John's. The heart of John's is this exquisite bit, chapters
+thirteen to seventeen. And there's yet an inner heart here. It is this
+bit, the seventeenth chapter, where the inner side of Jesus' prayer-life
+lies open to us. And we shall find an innermost heart yet again here.
+
+The simplicity of speech here catches the ear. The holy intimacy of
+contact with God hushes the spirit. The certainty of the Father's
+presence awes the heart greatly. The unquestioning confidence in the
+outcome is to one's faith like a glass of kingdom wine fresh from the
+King's own hand. The tenseness and yet exquisite quietness holds one's
+being still with a great stillness. Both shoes and hat go off
+instinctively and we stand with head bowed low and heart hushed for this
+is holiest ground.
+
+Of course, no paraphrase of this prayer can possibly approach its own
+beauty and simplicity. But it may perhaps send one back to the prayer
+itself to see better what is there.
+
+They're out in the open, down near the Kidron. Jesus stops and looks up
+towards the blue, the Father's open door, and quietly talks out of His
+heart into His Father's heart, "Father: the hour is come"; talked of
+long before this errand was started upon, brooded over these human
+years, felt in His inner being as it ticked itself nearer in the
+tremendous passing events. Now it is come. The clock is striking the
+hour, striking on earth and echoed distinctly in the Father's ear.
+
+"Father: reveal now the true character of the Son; yet only that the Son
+may reveal Thy true character.[121] Thou hast already done so in the
+control Thou hast given Him over all men, that so He may give to them
+the eternal life. And this is the real life to come into intimate touch
+of heart and life with Thee and with Thine anointed One, Jesus."
+
+"I have already revealed Thy character in doing fully the errand Thou
+didst send Me on. (And it _was_ fully done in all the active part,
+though the greatest thing yet remained to be done in the tremendous
+yielding, the strong passive yielding to Hate's worst that so Love's
+truest and best might be clearly seen by men.) And now I am coming back
+to be recognized and acknowledged and received by Thine own self even as
+it was before I came away on this errand."
+
+Thus far He has been alone with the Father face-to-face; just the two
+together in closest communion. Now the prayer moves on from communion
+and petition to intercession. He is thinking of others, of these men who
+are grouped near by. He has prayed for them before. He is simply picking
+up the thread of the accustomed prayer He had prayed, and would still
+pray when He had gone from them up through the doorway of the blue.
+
+He has revealed the Father to them, and they have understood and
+believed and have followed. Now He _prays for them_, that they may be
+_kept_; not taken out of the world; kept in it, giving their witness to
+it, yet never of its spirit, always controlled by another Spirit. They
+were being sent into the world for witness even as He had been.
+
+And a great word breaks out like the bursting of a flood of sunlight out
+of dark clouds,--_joy_. He had used it that evening before in the upper
+room, and again along the road. Now it flashes out again. This reveals
+the meaning of that _good-cheer_ and _overcome_ with which the roadway
+talk closed. With the clouds of hate at their blackest, and the storm
+just about to break in uncontrolled wild fury, He speaks of "My _joy_."
+He is _singing_. In the thick of hatred and plotting here's the bit of
+music, in the major key, rippling out. Such a spirit cannot be defeated.
+Joy is faith singing in the storm because it sees already the clearing
+light beyond.
+
+And so He prays on, touching the same keys of the musical instrument of
+His heart, back and forth, yet ever advancing in the theme. Now He
+broadens out, in clear vision, beyond the gathering storm, to those,
+through all the earth, and down the centuries, who would believe through
+these men who are listening. What a sweep of faith. That singing cleared
+His vision.
+
+And then He sees them all, of many races and languages and radical
+differences, all blended into one body of earnest loving believers drawn
+by the one vision of Himself back in the glory of the Father's presence,
+where they will all gather. And then love ties the knot on the end. A
+personal love ties together Father and Son and--us, who humbly give the
+glad homage of our hearts.
+
+Right in the very midst of the prayer lies that innermost heart of which
+I spoke a moment ago. It is in verse ten. Jesus says, "_All things that
+are Mine are Thine, and Thine are Mine_." There lies the very inner
+heart of all carried to the last degree. _There_ is glad giving and full
+taking; surrender and appropriation. He who gives all may reach in and
+take all. Here is, humanly, the secret of Jesus' stupendous character
+and career.
+
+And it is the same for the humblest of us. The road is no different. We
+_may_ say, by His great grace, in the insistence of our sovereign wills,
+"All that is mine is Thine: I give it Thee. I give it back to Thee: I
+use all the strength of my will in yielding all to Thee, and in doing
+it habitually."
+
+Then we _can_ say, with greatest reverence and humility and yet bold
+confidence, "All that is Thine _is mine._" Yet being mine it is Thine.
+Still being Thine it is mine. So comes the perfection of the rhythmic
+action of love. Our love gives our all to _Him_. And then _takes_ the
+greater all of His--no, not _from_ Him, _for_ Him, held in trust, used
+_for_ Him, while we keep knees and face close to the ground, lest we
+stumble and slip and worse.
+
+So the prayer closes. And if we might go back over it, alone in secret,
+prayerfully, quietly thinking thoughtfully into it, until this great
+simple prayer gets its hold upon our hearts. And then gradually it would
+come to us that _so_ He is now praying for us, _you and me_.
+
+What must it have meant to these men to stand there quietly, awed as
+they listen to Him praying that prayer. How it reveals the deep
+consciousness of the intimacy of relation between Father and Son. How it
+must have touched and stirred them to the very depths to hear Jesus
+telling the Father so simply about _their_ faith in Himself, and _their_
+obedience, their break with their national allegiance to follow Himself.
+And that word _joy_--did they wonder about it? And wonder more later
+that night, and the days after? But the key-note of the music _caught_,
+and soon they were singing the same tune, and in the same pitch.
+
+What wooing! This was the closest wooing. The fine wooing of this
+matchless Lover came to its superlative degree that night. Positive
+degree, that touch upon their feet; comparative, that talk about the
+board and along the road; superlative, this taking them in for a brief
+moment into the secrecy of His inner communion with the Father.
+
+
+
+Simplified Spelling.
+
+
+And this closer wooing is not over. It hasn't quit yet. That vine is
+still hanging out in fine view, all softly ablaze with the clear
+beautifying light, not of a fine Passover moon; no, the light of His
+_face_, His _life_, His _words_. That vine becomes for all time to every
+heart the pictured meaning of _abide_. And that word _abide_ gives the
+whole of the true life.
+
+We say _Christian_ life, and rightly. I like to say also, the true, the
+natural, life. Any other is abnormal, unnatural, untrue. I might say,
+"of the higher Christian life," following the common usage of these
+latter days. I still prefer to say _true_ life. Higher means that there
+is a lower life. And that this lower is reckoned Christian, too. That is
+the bother, the cheapening of things; we _call_ a thing Christian which
+is less than the thing it is called.
+
+Some of us need to go to school, and to sit down in the lower classes
+where spelling is taught. We can spell _believe_ in the common way with
+seven letters. We must learn to spell it with four letters--l-o-v-e. We
+need to learn to spell _love_ with a _b_ and a _y_--o-b-e-y. We need to
+learn to spell obey with five letters a-b-i-d-e. We need to find that
+_abide_ is spelled best with four letters o-b-e-y.
+
+We need to learn this simplified spelling a bit, then _all_ will become
+simplified, living, loving, witnessing, praying, winning, singing with
+joy over the results of our new spelling in the syllables of daily life.
+Blessed Master, we would come to school to Thee to-day. Please let us
+start down in the spelling class. And teach us, Thou Thyself teach us.
+
+But the vine--let us make that the central picture on the wall, with the
+Master in the picture pointing to the vine. And under the picture the
+one word _abide_. Then the whole story is in easy shape to help,
+pictured before our eyes. Abide--that is _Jesus walking around in your
+shoes_, looking out through your eyes, touching in your hand, speaking
+through your lips and your presence. He is _free_ to; that's _your_ side
+of it. He's unhindered. He _does_ it; that's _His_ side of it.
+
+Look up at the picture on the wall. The whole vine is in the fruit, is
+it not? The whole of the fruit is in the vine, is it not? That's
+abiding. The whole of Jesus will be in you as you go about your daily
+common task, singing. The whole of you is in Jesus as everything simple
+and great, is done _to please Him_, singing as you do it.
+
+And just as between vine and fruit there are branch and blossom, pruning
+and careful handling, sun and shade, dew and rain, so there are
+_betweens_ here before full ripening of fruit comes. There's purifying,
+cleansing by blood, cleansing by a soft fire burning within, and
+pruning by the Gardener and by His human assistant, you, sharp,
+incisive, hurting pruning.
+
+There's _feeding_,--the juice of the vine _flows_ in, and is _taken_ in;
+the divine word of the divine Master is meditated, the cud of it is
+chewed daily. There's _obedience_,--perfect rhythm of action between
+vine and branches. There's _prayer_, the intercourse of our spirits, His
+and ours, together, the drawing from Him all we need, and the letting
+Him use us in His interceding for His world. These are some of the
+_betweens_. Through these comes the ripening fruit.
+
+And the outer crowd comes eagerly for the fruit hanging over the fence
+within easy reach. There's a warm sympathy with one's fellows; only the
+thing's more than the words sound. The Jesus-spirit within will be felt
+by those outside, something warm and gentle and helpful. There will be
+things done, many things, earnestly thoughtfully done. The proper word
+is service. But the thing's so much more than the word ever seems to
+mean.
+
+And there'll be yet more, a more of a surprising sort. The classical fox
+called the grapes sour because he _couldn't_ reach them. There'll be
+some outside sour talk because some of the crowd _won't_ reach the
+fruit. It wouldn't agree with them the way they insist on living. The
+Jesus-life abiding within and flowing freely out is a protest against
+the opposite. The mere presence of a _Christ-abiding_ man convicts
+people of the sin of their lives and their treatment of Jesus. It
+convinces them that the absent Jesus is right, and so they are wrong.
+So there's trouble out in the crowd just because of the ripe good fruit
+hanging in plain sight and easy reach over the vineyard fence. And that
+double result goes on getting more so, some coming to the vine drawn by
+the fruit, some talking against fruit and vine. But the man abiding is
+of good cheer. He sings. For the outcome is assured.
+
+So every grape-vine, in garden, by roadway, or on hillside, with its
+vine-stock, branches, blossom, and fruit, tells of the Father's ideal
+for men, a unity of life with Himself, and with each other. And every
+bunch of grapes hanging on one stem, with its many in one, tells of that
+same ideal, the concord of love with the Father and with each other.
+
+And that unity of love dominating all is irresistible to the outer
+crowd, in the winsomeness of its wooing.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+The Greatest Wooing
+
+     _A Night and a Day With Hardening Hearts: the Story of Tender
+     Passion and of a Terrible Tragedy_
+
+
+
+
+    "Now of that long pursuit
+    Comes on at hand the bruit;
+    That Voice is round me like a bursting sea:
+    'And is thy earth so marred,
+    Shattered in shard on shard?
+    _Lo, all things fly thee, for thou fliest Me_!
+    Strange, piteous, futile, thing!
+
+    Wherefore should any set thee love apart?
+    Seeing none but I makes much of naught' (He said)
+    'And human love needs human meriting:
+    How hast thou merited--
+    Of all man's clotted clay the dingiest clot?
+    Alack, thou knowest not
+    How little worthy of any love thou art!
+    Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee,
+    Save Me, save only Me?
+    All which I took from thee I did but take,
+    Not for thy harms,
+    But just that thou might'st seek it in My arms.
+    All which thy child's mistake
+    Fancied as lost, I have stored for thee at home:
+    Rise, clasp My hand, and Come.'"
+
+    --"_The Hound of Heaven_
+
+     "I will betroth thee unto me forever; yea, I will betroth thee unto
+     me in righteousness, and in justice, and in loving kindness, and in
+     mercies. I will even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness."--_Hosea
+     ii. 19, 20._
+
+    "Jesus, Lover of my soul,
+    Let me to Thy bosom fly,
+    While the nearer waters roll.
+    While the tempest still is high.
+    Hide me, O my Saviour, hide,
+    'Til the storm of life is past;
+    Safe into the haven guide,
+    O receive my soul at last."
+
+    --_Charles Wesley_.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+The Greatest Wooing
+
+(John xviii.-xix.)
+
+
+
+Wider Wooing.
+
+
+At the top of the mountain is the peak. The peak is the range at its
+highest reach. The peak grows out of the range and rests upon it and
+upon the earth under all. The whole of the long mountain range and of
+the earth lies under the peak. The peak tells the story of the whole
+range. At the last the highest and utmost. All the rest is for this
+capstone.
+
+The great thing in Jesus' life is His death. The death crowns the life.
+The whole of the life lies under and comes to its full in the death. The
+highest point is touched when death is allowed to lay Him lowest. It was
+the life that died that gives the distinctive meaning to the death. Let
+us take off hat and shoes as we come to this peak event.
+
+There's a change in John's story here. The evening has gone, the quiet
+evening of communion. The night has set in, the dark night of hate. The
+intimacies of love give place to the intrigues of hate. The joy of
+communion is quickly followed by the jostling of the crowd. Out of the
+secret place of prayer into the hurly-burly of passion. And the
+Master's rarely sensitive spirit feels the change. Yet with quiet
+resolution He steps out to face it. This is part of _the hour_, part of
+His great task, the greatest part.
+
+For the holy task of wooing is not changed. It still is wooing, but
+there's a difference now. There's a shifting. The wooing goes from
+closer to wider, from the disciples to the outer crowd, from the direct
+wooing of the national leaders by personal plea to the indirect by
+action, tremendously personal action.
+
+It moves out into a yet wider sweep. It goes from the wooing of a nation
+to the wooing of a race, from Jew distinctively to Roman
+representatively, from Annas standing in God's flood light rejected to
+Pilate in nature's lesser light obscured, from God's truant messenger
+nation to the world's mighty ruling nation.
+
+In the epochal event just at hand Jesus begins His great wooing of a
+race. And that wooing has gone on ever since, wherever He has been able
+to get through the human channels to the crowd. He was lifted up and at
+once men began coming a-running broken in heart by the sight. He is
+being lifted up, and men of all the race are coming as fast as the slow
+news gets to them.
+
+But back now to John's story. They pick their way over the stones of the
+little Kidron into the garden of the olives. There, quite alone in the
+deep shadows of the inner trees, Jesus has His great spirit-conflict,
+and great victory. The touch with sin so close, so real, now upon Him
+within a few hours, the sin of others upon His sinless soul,--this
+shakes Him terrifically beyond our understanding, who don't know purity
+as He did. But the tremendous strength of yielding brings victory, as
+ever. And the battle of the morrow is fought in spirit, and won.
+
+Now the trailers of hate come seeking with torch and lantern, soldiers
+and officers, chief priests and rulers, the ever present rabble, and in
+the lead the shameless traitor. They are pushing their quest now,
+seeking Jesus in the hiding whence He had gone days before[122] led by
+the man who knew His accustomed haunts.
+
+But there's no need for seeking now. Jesus is full ready. He decides the
+action that follows. He is masterful even in His purposeful yielding.
+Quietly He walks out from the cover of the trees to meet them. And as
+their torches turn full upon His advancing figure again that marvellous
+power not only of restraint but decidedly more is felt by them. And the
+whole company, traitor, soldiers, rulers, rabble, overpowered in spirit,
+fall back and then drop to the ground utterly overawed and cowed by the
+lone man they are seeking.
+
+Does Judas expect this? Will this power they are unable to resist not
+open the eyes of these rulers! But there's no stupidity equal to that
+which goes with stubbornness. In a moment Jesus reveals His purpose in
+this, to shield His disciples. Now the power of restraint is withdrawn
+and He yields to their desires. They shall have fullest sway in using
+their freedom of action as they will. And Peter's foolish attempts are
+quietly overruled.
+
+They keep up the forms by taking Jesus to Annas the real Jewish ruler of
+the nation. But it is simply an opportunity for the coarseness of their
+hate to vent itself upon His person. They pretend an examination here in
+the night's darkness suited to their deeds. He quietly reminds them of
+the frank openness of all His teachings.
+
+Meanwhile John's friendly act has gotten Peter entrance. The attitude of
+the two men is in sharpest contrast. John is avowedly Jesus' friend,
+regardless of personal danger. Peter just the reverse. And the hate of
+the leaders has soaked into all their surroundings even down to the
+housemaids. And John notes how exactly Jesus foreknew all, even to a
+thrice-spoken denial before the second crowing of a cock.
+
+Now comes the great Pilate phase. It was the intense malignity of their
+hate that made them bother with Pilate. They could easily have killed
+Jesus and Pilate would never have concerned himself about it. But they
+couldn't have put Him to such exquisite suffering and such shameful
+indignity before the crowds as by the Roman form of death by
+crucifixion.
+
+Clearly there is a hate at work _behind_ theirs. Their hate is
+distinctly _inhuman_. Is _all_ hate? There's an unseen personal power in
+action here set on spilling out the utmost that malignant hate can upon
+the person of Jesus. But these men are cheerful tools. Hate is tying its
+hardest knot with ugliest black thread on the end of its opportunity.
+
+This is Pilate's opportunity and he seems to sense it. And a struggle
+begins between conscience and cowardice, between right action with an
+ugly fight for it, and yielding to wrong with an easy time of it.
+Clearly he feels the purity and the personal power of this unusual
+prisoner. The motive of envy and hate under their action is as plain to
+his trained eyes.
+
+Twice the two men, Pilate and Jesus, are alone together. Did ever man
+have such an opportunity, personally, and historically? With rare touch
+and winsomeness Jesus woos. And Pilate feels it to the marrow under all
+his rough speech. His repeated attempts with the leaders make that
+clear. But cowardice gripped him hard. It's a way cowardice has.
+
+The name of Caesar conjures up fears,--loss of position, of wealth, of
+reputation, maybe of life itself. He surrenders. Conscience is slain on
+the judgment seat. Cowardice laughs and wins. A sharp fling brings a cry
+of allegiance to Caesar from their reluctant throats, as their hatred
+wins the day. He strikes them back an ugly blow as He surrenders. That
+reluctant Caesar cry told out the intensity of their hate. They hated
+Caesar much, but they hated Jesus immeasurably more. They gulp down
+Caesar to be able to vent their spleen upon Jesus.
+
+And so they crucified Him. At last they succeed. They have gotten what
+they were bent on. The hate burning within, these months and years,
+finds its full vent. Its hateful worst is done, and horribly well done.
+And they stand about the cross with unconcealed gloating in pose and
+face and speech and eyes. Their part of the story is done.
+
+
+
+Masterful Dying.
+
+
+But Jesus' part--ah! that was just begun. John lays emphasis on the
+mastery of Jesus here. It is marked, and reveals to John's faithful
+love-opened eyes the dominating purpose of Jesus in yielding to death.
+Strong, thoughtful, self-controlled, anticipating every move, He was
+using all the strength of His great strong will in yielding. He was
+doing it masterfully, intelligently.
+
+This is marked throughout. At the arrest He walks frankly out to meet
+those seeking Him, and restrains them in that strangely powerful way
+till He was quite ready. He makes the personal plea to Pilate for
+_Pilate's_ sake, impressing him so greatly, but interposing nothing to
+change the purpose of His accusers. When Pilate's final decision is
+given John notes that Jesus "went out _bearing the cross for Himself,_"
+though provision had been made for this.[123] His influence upon Pilate
+is seen in the accuracy of the kingly inscription that hangs over the
+cross. In the midst of the excruciating bodily pain He thinks of His
+mother, and with marvellous self-control speaks the quiet word to her
+and to John that insures her future under his filial care.
+
+And then John significantly adds, "_Jesus, knowing that all things are
+now finished._"[124] With masterly forethought, and self-control and
+deliberation He had done the thing He had set Himself to do. Never was
+yielding so masterful. Never was a great plan carried out so fully
+through the set purpose of one's enemies. His every action bears out the
+word He had spoken, "No man taketh My life away from Me, I lay it down
+of Myself."[125]
+
+So now His great work is done, and thoroughly done. His lips speak the
+tremendous word, "It is finished." And He bowed His head and _gave up_
+His spirit. It was His own act. The self-restraint was strong upon Him
+till all was done that was needed for the great purpose in hand. Then
+His head is bowed, His great heart broke under the terrific strain on
+His spirit as He allowed His life to go out.
+
+From that moment no indignity touches His body. The Jews with their
+wearisome insistence on empty technicalities would have added further
+indignity to crucifixion. But that body is sacredly guarded from their
+profane hand by unseen restraint. John with solemn simplicity points to
+the unmistakable physical evidence, in the separation of blood and
+water, that Jesus had actually died; no swooning, but death. And
+reverently he finds the confirmation of Scripture.
+
+Only tender love touches that body now. Two gentlemen of highest
+official and social standing and of large wealth, brothers in their
+faith in Jesus, and also in their timidity, now take steps at once to
+have the precious body of their dear friend tenderly cared for without
+regard to expense. So He is laid away in a new tomb in a garden among
+the flowers of the spring time. The last touch is one of tender love. So
+His greatest wooing was done, and begun; the great act done, its
+tremendous wooing influence only just begun.
+
+Jesus died deliberately. This is quite clear. It was done of love
+aforethought. It was His own act fitted into the circumstances
+surrounding Him. This makes His death mean just what He meant it to
+mean. Run back through His teachings rather carefully and that meaning
+stands clearly out.
+
+He was the Father's messenger; simply this; but all of this. The ideals
+of right so insistently and incessantly held up and pressed were the
+Father's ideals. His mere presence told the Father's great love for men.
+They two were so knit that when the one suffered the other suffered,
+too.
+
+It was the love for men in His own heart that drew Him down here and
+drove Him along even to the Calvary Hill. He died _for_ men, in their
+place, on their behalf. This was His one thought. Through this their
+bondage to sin and to Satan would be broken and they would be set
+free.[126] And they would be drawn, their hearts would be utterly melted
+and broken by His love for them.[127] The influence would reach out
+until all the race would feel its power and respond; and it would reach
+into each one's life who came till the life he lived was of the
+abundant, eternal sort.
+
+The devil was a real personality to Jesus. This whole terrific struggle
+ending at the cross was a direct spirit-battle with that great spirit
+prince. So Jesus understood it. All the bitter enmity to Himself traces
+straight back to that source. That enmity found its worst expression in
+Jesus' death. The pitched spirit-battle was there. But that prince was
+judged, condemned, utterly defeated and cast out in that battle, and his
+hold upon men broken.[128]
+
+And so this was the greatest wooing of all. It was greatest in its
+intensity of meaning _to the Father_ looking eagerly down. It revealed
+His unbending, unflinching ideals of right, and the great strength and
+tenderness of His love for men. He would even give His Son. It was
+greatest in its intensity of meaning _to the Son_. It meant the utmost
+of suffering ever endured, the utmost of love underneath ever revealed;
+and it would mean the race-wide sweep of His gracious power.
+
+It was greatest in its intensity of meaning _to Satan_, the hater of God
+and man. It told his utter defeat, and loss of power over man. So it
+broke our bonds and made us free to yield to the wooing. And it was
+greatest in its intensity of meaning _to us men_. For it showed to our
+confused eyes the one ideal of right standing out clear and full. It
+set us free from the fetters of our bondage, gave us the tremendous
+incentive of love to reach up to the ideal of right, and more, immensely
+more, gave us _power to reach it_.
+
+It was the greatest wooing _in the out-reach_ of its influence, for all
+men of all the earth would be touched.[129] And it was greatest _in the
+in-reach_ to all the life of each one who came under its blessed
+influence. The whole ministry taught this. It would mean newness of life
+in body, in mind, in social nature, in spirit, and in the eternal
+quality of life lived here, and to be lived without any ending.
+
+And all the world has responded to this greatest wooing as they have
+come to know of it. That three-languaged inscription on the cross was a
+world appeal and a world prophecy. In Hebrew the religious language of
+the world whose literature told of the one true God, in Latin the
+language of the masters of the world, in Greek the language of the
+culture of the world, that message went out to all the world. This Jesus
+is our Kinsman-King, our Brother-Ruler, our Love-Autocrat. He revealed
+His love for us in His death for us.
+
+And men answer to Jesus' great plea. With flooded eyes and broken
+hearts, and bending wills, and changed lives, men of all the race bow
+gratefully at the feet of Jesus, our Saviour and Lord and coming King.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+An Appointed Tryst Unexpectedly Kept
+
+     _A Day of Startling Joyous Surprises_
+
+
+
+
+    "Halts by me that footfall:
+    Is my gloom, after all,
+    Shade of His hand outstretched caressingly?
+    'Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,
+    I am He whom thou seekest!
+    _Thou drawest love from thee, who drawest Me._'"
+
+    --"_The Hound of Heaven._
+
+     "After I am raised up I will go before you into Galilee."--_Mark
+     xiv. 28._
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+An Appointed Tryst Unexpectedly Kept
+
+(John xx.)
+
+
+
+The Appointment.
+
+
+Jesus had made an appointment. It was with these dear friends who had
+responded so lovingly to His wooing. It was a significant appointment,
+most significant. He had appointed to meet them three days after His
+death. He had made a further appointment to meet them in Galilee. What a
+stupendous appointment to make!
+
+It was a sacred appointment, sacred as the love that made it, sacred to
+Jesus as the friendship of these men with whom it was made, sacred as
+His word that never was broken. Our Scottish friends use a most
+significant word for appointment, the word _tryst_. They used to use it
+some for ordinary appointments, but chiefly it is used for friendship
+and for love-appointments. The appointment is a tryst.
+
+Tryst is the same word as _trust_. In the old Gothic language it was one
+of the words used for a covenant or treaty. In medieval Latin it was a
+pledge given that an agreement would be kept. It is a fine turn of a
+word that uses the very spirit of confidence in one's heart in another
+as the name for the appointment made with him. The trust in the heart
+gives the name to the appointment. It's an appointment with one who
+_can_ be trusted to keep his word, and who _is_ trusted.
+
+So an appointed tryst becomes more than a mere appointment. It is a
+pledge of faith. Now this is the real force of the word here. Jesus had
+appointed a tryst with these men, and in making it He was plighting His
+troth, pledging His word to them. He had asked them to risk all for Him.
+In this tryst He is pledging all to them.
+
+He never forgot that sacred appointment. He had thought much before He
+made it. He knew it would involve much to keep it. The power of God was
+at stake in the making and the keeping of it. He knew that. He thought
+of it. He made the appointment and He kept it. Jesus keeps His
+appointments. His word never fails. Not even the gates of death, nor the
+power of the evil one, can prevail against it.
+
+This was a staggering appointment. It took so much for granted. It
+reckons God's power is as big as it is. But then that's a way Jesus had,
+and has. And it is a way he will come to have who companions much with
+Jesus.
+
+Jesus had spoken of this indirectly but distinctly when first He told
+His disciples of His suffering and death, six months before. And each
+time afterwards when He told them of His death the words were always
+added, "and the third day rise again."[130] I The two things are nearly
+always linked. But they hadn't seemed to sense what He meant. The thing
+seems quite beyond them.
+
+He spoke of it again on that never-to-be-forgotten night of the
+betrayal, the night of the feet-washing, and that last long talk, and
+that wondrous Kidron-prayer. He spoke of it more than once that night.
+
+It was a very emphatic word He spoke as they were walking along the
+darkly shadowed Jerusalem streets out towards the east gate. He said, "a
+little while and ye shall behold Me no more; and again a little while
+and ye shall see Me."[131] And the disciples pick this up and puzzle
+over it.
+
+And the Master explains rather carefully and at some length. There was a
+time of sore trouble coming for Him and for them. And while they were
+sorrowing the outer crowd would be making merry. But it would be just as
+with the expectant mother, He said. All the while even when the pains
+cut she is thinking of the great delight that is to be hers. Her
+after-joy clean wipes out of her thought the sharp cutting of the pain.
+
+So it would be. "_I will see you again_," He said in plainest speech.
+And again that same night He said, "after I am raised up, _I will go
+before you into Galilee_." Could any appointment be more explicit as to
+time and place?
+
+But they forget. Aye, there's the bother, this thing of forgetting. The
+memory is ever the index of the heart and the will and the
+understanding. You can tell the one by the other. Some things are never
+forgot. A bit embarrassing and odd this thing of forgetting what Jesus
+says.
+
+His _enemies_ remembered, and took special pains to head off any
+breaking of their careful plans.[132] And even when the angels remind
+the women of the promised appointment, and they with great joy repeat
+the reminder to the disciples, it seems like "_idle talk_" and is not
+accepted. The thing couldn't be, they think.[133] Finally the evidence
+becomes so convincing that they start off for the trysting place, "into
+Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them."[134]
+
+
+
+How the Appointment Was Kept.
+
+
+Let us look a bit at the wonderful keeping, so unexpected, of this
+sacred tryst. It's the third day now since Jesus' death. It is in the
+dark dusk of the early morning. A little knot of women make their way
+slowly along the road leading out of the city gate. Mary Magdalene is in
+the lead, so far ahead of the others as to be alone. They are carrying
+packages of perfumed ointments. They are thinking only of a dear dead
+body and of clinging fragrant memories.
+
+They are troubling themselves about how to get the big stone at the tomb
+pushed aside. It was too much for their strength. As she drew near the
+tomb Mary Magdalene's love-quickened eyes notice something quite
+unexpected. The stone is moved aside! She naturally thinks some one has
+taken the body secretly away in the night.
+
+Quickly she turns and runs back towards the city to tell Peter and John.
+And as quickly as they hear the startling news they are off on a smart
+run towards the tomb. Meanwhile the other women go on into the tomb.
+They are further startled to see a glorious looking person who assures
+them that Jesus is living, having risen up out of death. All a-quiver
+with fear intermingled with the first glimmering light of a great hope
+that they hardly dare hope, they flee hastily back to town to tell the
+others.
+
+Now Peter and John, who have been eagerly running, arrive breathless,
+with John in the lead. Gazing reverently, intently, in through the
+opening John sees, not a body, but on the spot where the body had been
+laid, the linen wrappings lying, held up in the shape of a body by
+Nicodemus' abundant and heavy ointments just as when they held the body
+of Jesus. But clearly there is nothing in them now.
+
+Now Peter comes up, and, just like him, goes straight in, and is at once
+struck by the arrangement of these cloths, just as John had been. Then
+they comment on the fact that the head cloths are lying where they
+naturally would be, a little apart from the others, the distance of the
+head from the body.
+
+The evidence convinces them that Jesus' spirit had indeed returned to
+His body, and that He had risen up _through the cloths_, and gone. And
+they start back to town in a great maze of wonder and delight.
+
+And now Mary Magdalene, knowing nothing of all this, comes slowly back
+absorbed with her thoughts that the body has been secretly removed. She
+stands at the open tomb weeping. Then for the first time she stoops down
+and looks in. She is startled to see two angels left there to explain
+matters.
+
+They gently say "Why weepest thou?" Still sobbing, she says, "They have
+taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid Him." And
+turning aside as she speaks she sees some One standing near her. Her
+tear-misted eyes think Him the attendant in charge of the garden. Again
+the question by this man, "Why weepest thou?" How strangely they talk,
+these angels and this gardener! She makes a plea for the body.
+
+Then the one word, her name, spoken in that voice she knew so
+well--"_Mary_." Ah! there's no question about _that voice_. She needs no
+explanation nor evidence more than this, as she cries out, "Oh, my
+beloved Master." Then He acts so like Himself; He gives her an errand to
+do for Him. And off she goes. She has had the wondrous privilege of the
+first sight of Him, and the first errand for Him. The tryst has been
+kept with Mary Magdalene.
+
+And now the other women who had gone running down the road after
+hearing the angels' startling message are amazed to meet Jesus standing
+in the roadway in front of them. And the same quiet rich voice so gently
+and simply gives them the usual "good-morning" salutation. At once they
+are on their knees at His feet. And He softly says, "Don't be afraid. Go
+tell My brethren to meet Me at the old place appointed, up by the blue
+waters of Galilee." And again the tryst is kept.
+
+But before all this, the soldiers on guard, terror-stricken by the
+earthquake that had taken place, and dazed at the sight of the "angel of
+the Lord" had fled at top speed to the chief priests with their
+startling story. Here was a wholly unexpected bothersome finish to the
+thing. But quick consultation follows. And then free use of money makes
+the soldiers willing to tell what they know to be a lie. And so the two
+utterly different stories, the truth and the lie, get into circulation
+at once. The soldiers and the chief priests' circle have learned that
+the appointment was kept.
+
+Meanwhile Peter has gone down the road back to town in a maze of
+conflicting emotions. John, lighter of foot, had hurried ahead, very
+likely to tell the great news to Jesus' mother, now his own. Peter plods
+slowly along, thinking hard. It was still early morning, the air so
+still and fragrant with the dew. Maybe down by some big trees he is
+walking, absorbed, when all at once, _some One is by his side_. It's the
+Master. The appointment has been kept with Peter. But we must leave
+them alone together. Peter has some things to straighten out. That's a
+sacred interview meant only for him.
+
+That afternoon two disciples walking out to a little village a few miles
+away are joined by a Stranger whose talk makes their hearts burn like
+the Master's used to. And as they gather about the evening meal with
+Him, and He gives thanks and breaks the loaf, all at once their eyes
+_see_. It is _Jesus Himself_ who has been with them all the time. Again
+the appointment is kept.
+
+At once they hasten back to town, and are just telling the news in
+joyously broken speech to the disciples gathered in an upper room with
+locked doors when again, all at once, Jesus appears in their midst, and
+eats some bread and fish, and tells them to know by the feel that it is
+really Himself with them. He has kept His sacred appointment with the
+Twelve. Then a week later He comes in like manner among them again for
+the sake of one man, Thomas. So He keeps the appointment with Thomas,
+also.
+
+
+
+Our Guarantee of His Promises.
+
+
+Two things stand out sharply. The resurrection was not expected. It was
+the most tremendous surprise. The news was received at first by those
+most interested with utter stubborn unbelief. Then the evidence was so
+clear and repeated, and incontestable that these same men staked their
+lives on it. They suffered to the extreme for their witness that Jesus
+had indeed risen.
+
+Jesus rose from the dead. His body was re-inhabited by His spirit. The
+spirit didn't die. Spirits neither sleep nor die. The body died. Then
+life came into it again. It was a real body that could eat and be
+touched. It was recognized as the same one they had known. But it was
+changed. The old limitations were gone. New powers had come.
+
+Jesus keeps His appointments. His pledged word never fails. Not a word
+He has spoken can ever be broken. Some day He is coming back. It is an
+appointment.[135] Then we, too, who have slipped the tether of life and
+left our bodies temporarily in the dust, shall rise up again to meet
+Him. It is a sacred appointment He has made with us.
+
+And some of us who live in that day shall be changed instead of dying,
+and shall be caught up to meet Him and our own loved ones in the air.
+That's His true tryst with us up in the blue, some day. And He will keep
+it.
+
+And meanwhile everything He has promised us in the Book is sure, as
+being His plighted word. His resurrection is our bond, our guarantee. As
+surely as He rose on that third morning He will keep His word regarding
+every matter to you and me.
+
+His appointments never fail, whether of guidance, of bodily health and
+strength, of supplies for every sort of need, of peace, of power, of
+victory. The power that raised Jesus up from out the dead is pledged to
+us for every promise of this Book for to-day's life. He will do an act
+of creation before He will let His Word fail. He will leave no power
+unused to keep the appointment of His Word with us.
+
+Let us trust His Word to us fully. And let us _live_ our trust.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+Another Tryst
+
+     _A Story of Fishing, of Guests at Breakfast, and of a Walk and Talk
+     by the Edge of Blue Galilee_
+
+
+
+
+     "I come unto you."--_John xiv. 18._
+
+     "Lo, I am with you all the days."--_Matthew xxviii. 20_.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+Another Tryst
+
+(John xxi.)
+
+
+
+Jesus Unrecognised.
+
+
+John's story is done. And it is well done. With the skill of a tried
+jurist he has drawn up a clear full line of evidence and presented it in
+a vigorous straightforward way. And he plainly states his case. His
+whole purpose is that those who read his little book shall come into
+warm personal touch of life with the Lord Jesus. That ties the knot on
+tight at the end of chapter twenty. John's case has gone to the jury of
+his readers.
+
+But now John reaches for his pen again. The guiding Spirit has put
+another bit into his heart to write down. This time it is a special bit,
+not for all to whom the book is sent, but for a selected class of his
+readers, namely, for those of them who have given John a favourable
+verdict on the evidence presented. It grows out of chapter xx. 31 as
+rose out of bud, and fruit out of blossom. It is for those who "believe
+that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God," and so "have life in His
+Name."
+
+And a very tender precious bit it is, more wondrous in its sheer
+simplicity than any of us seem to suspect. It is simply this: _this
+Jesus is with us all the time_. This same Jesus who was so swayed by the
+need of the crowd, who burned His life out day by day warmly responding
+to their sore need--_He is here._
+
+This Jesus who fed the hungry, healed the sick of every sort, and freed
+men from devilish power, who convicted men so tremendously of their
+wrong, restrained their evil power to hurt, wooed the hearts of all so
+irresistibly, and led them into changed lives; this Jesus who died and
+then did the stupendously mighty thing of rising up out of death,--_this
+Jesus is with us now_ by your side and mine.
+
+And He is just the same Jesus in His warm love and resistless power. The
+_words_ are rather familiar. The _fact_--no one of us seems to have
+gotten hold of it yet. This is the thing that makes John eagerly reach
+for his pen again before his little book-messenger goes out on its
+errand.
+
+The thing isn't new in _information_, but in actual living _experience_
+it seems to be so new as to be an unknown thing to some of us. The
+Master had spoken of this that betrayal-night around the supper board.
+It was really a continuation of that trysting appointment He had made
+with them that evening, a wonderful continuation.
+
+Clearly they didn't understand Him that night. But during those
+after-Pentecost days they were given a continuous graphic unforgetable
+illustration of its meaning. We to-day seem able to explain the part
+they didn't understand, the teaching that betrayal-night. We don't seem
+to get hold of the part they did understand and experience, the real
+presence of the risen Jesus in the midst actively at work.
+
+That night Jesus said: "I will make request of the Father, and He will
+send you another unfailing powerful Friend to be always at your side."
+Then He added: "He abides _with_ you now (in My presence) and shall be
+_in_ you (after I send Him)." Then He said, "_I_ come unto you. Yet a
+little while and the world _seeth_ Me no more but ye _see_ Me."
+
+And again, "He that hath My commandments and keepeth them he it is that
+(in that sheweth that he) loveth Me and ... I will _manifest_ or _shew_
+Myself unto him." Here is the simple teaching: He would send the Holy
+Spirit; in the Holy Spirit's coming Jesus Himself, the new risen exalted
+empowered enthroned Jesus, He came; _and_ He would let them see Himself
+with them.
+
+Now this added chapter of John's is _the illustration in advance_ to
+these men of what these words mean. _The great standing illustration_ is
+that Book of Acts which, will you notice, doesn't end. It only breaks
+off, abruptly, without even a punctuation point. It wasn't meant to end.
+We are supposed to be living in it yet. But these men haven't come to
+the experience of the Pentecostal Acts yet. This is an illustration in
+advance to them. And it remains an illustration to us of what we seem a
+bit slow in taking in.
+
+But let us get at the simple bit of story itself. There's a little
+group of the inner circle, seven including the leaders. These men
+haven't found their feet yet. The stupendous events of those days,
+coming in such startling succession, have left them dazed. The
+crucifixion left them stupidly dazed; the resurrection left them joyous,
+but still dazed. They don't know just where they are, nor what to do.
+
+So Peter proposes fishing; an ideal proposition, when you want to get
+off and think things through and out. Any fisherman knows that. And the
+others readily join in. They see the good sense of it. But the fish
+don't catch. And the morning finds them tired in body and more tired in
+the spiritless uncertainty that hangs over them like a clinging damp
+fog.
+
+Yonder is some One standing on the beach. But that's nothing unusual.
+They barely notice Him. And now this Stranger calls out to them a cheery
+common question, "Caught anything?" And now He gives a--no, it can
+hardly be called a _command_, so quietly is it said. Yet they are subtly
+conscious of a something in the word that makes them obey, though it's
+the last sort of thing to do.
+
+And now at once the net-ropes pull _so hard;_ astonishing this! Then
+John's keen spirit detects _Who_ it is. Is he thinking of the other big
+unexpected haul in those same waters![136] And Peter's over the side of
+the boat shoreward. Fishing has lost all attraction for him.
+
+And when they all got ashore with their haul, tired, wet, chilled to
+the marrow, hungry, what's this? A blazing fire of coals burning
+cheerfully on the sands. And some fish dexterously poised, doing to a
+brown turn, and some bread. And the Stranger, no, _Jesus_, He's no
+longer a stranger, Jesus says quietly, "Boys, better bring the haul up
+on the beach."
+
+And the old fishing habit still strong on them counts the fish. It's
+such an unusual haul, they must know how many. John must be thinking
+again about that earlier haul. The net couldn't stand the strain then.
+But now it's different. Ah! _every_thing's blessedly different now. "The
+net was not rent."
+
+Then the gracious call to breakfast by their Host. Was ever fish done to
+such a fine turn? Did ever any fish have such an exquisite flavour? or
+taste so good? Did ever men eat so gladly and yet quietly with a
+distinct touch of awe in their spirits? For they _know_ it is the
+Master, though no word of that has been spoken. Words were needless.
+
+Now they're walking along the beach, Jesus and Peter in the lead but the
+others quite near. And there's the bit of talk between the two. Very
+gently Jesus says, "Do you love Me, Peter?" And Peter feels he hardly
+dare use the sacred word for "love" that the Master has used. He had
+made such an awful break at just that point. And with breaking voice he
+says, "Yea, Lord, Thou knowest I have the highest regard for Thee."
+
+And again the question, and the answer, with Peter still humbly
+clinging to his more modest word. And now Jesus says, "Do you really
+love Me even as you yourself say?" And Peter with his heart in his face
+says passionately, "Lord, Thou knowest better than I can tell Thee."
+
+And because he loves, Peter is given the full privilege of shepherding
+the whole flock, from feeding little lambkins on to feeding all, and
+guiding, through the hard places, even the wayward ones. And more yet
+and higher, because Peter loves, he will be privileged to suffer, even
+as his Master had suffered. The fellowship would extend even to that.
+
+And Peter's eye falls on John. And apparently he is thinking of the
+contrast between John's faithfulness and his own break that
+betrayal-night. If poor faulty Peter may be so privileged how John would
+be rewarded. But Jesus quietly turns Peter, and all Peter's numerous
+kinsfolk of this sort, away from human comparisons. And instead He seeks
+to turn their hearts to this: He is coming back in person some day for
+an advance step in the kingdom program. And there they are, walking and
+talking, along the beach by the blue Galilean waters.
+
+
+
+The Same Jesus Here Now.
+
+
+An unrecognized Stranger who turns out to be Jesus; an unusual haul of
+fish gotten in a very unusual way; a warm fire and tasty breakfast for
+cold hungry men; a tender talk about love and service and sacrifice,
+and about Jesus' return;--all this is a moving-picture illustration of
+the meaning of a word, one word.
+
+It is a word Jesus used in that last long quiet talk. It's the key-word
+to this added chapter, occurring three times. In the old version it is
+the word "_shew_"; in the revision "manifest." "After these things Jesus
+_manifested_ Himself again ... and He _manifested_ Himself on this
+wise." "This is now the third time that Jesus was _manifested_ to the
+disciples after that He was risen from the dead."[137]
+
+The word used underneath literally means "to make manifest or _visible_
+or know, what has been hidden or unknown."[138] Then each time it is
+used it gets its local colouring from its connection. The simple
+tremendous meaning here clearly is this: Jesus let Himself _be seen_ and
+known. _He did not come_. He was there.
+
+But their eyes couldn't see Him. In effect He was hidden, not seeable.
+Now the change that comes is this: _He is seen_. And He is seen in His
+true native character; so certain results follow. He had said, "I will
+_manifest_ Myself."[139] And this was now the third time that He did it,
+to the disciples, after that He was risen.
+
+This is _the advance illustration of the Book of Acts_. This is the
+tremendous thing He is burning into their hearts through eyes and
+ears:--_He is always present_. He, whose power they had felt so
+stupendously, and whose warm sympathy so tenderly, _He is always with
+them_. The coming of the Holy Spirit meant just this. The Spirit would
+be as Jesus' other self, as Jesus Himself. The one thing the Spirit
+would do would be to manifest, to _shew openly_, the power of Jesus.
+
+Then four pictures pass before their eyes to illustrate the meaning, a
+fishing picture and a breakfast picture _in action_; then _in words_, a
+love-service-suffering picture, and a picture of Jesus returning in
+person seen by all to take an advance-step.
+
+The fishing picture clearly meant this: great numbers of people,
+surprisingly great numbers, coming, drawn not by any human skill, but by
+the supernatural power of Jesus manifesting Himself in that way. The
+breakfast picture meant this: that this wondrous Jesus would take tender
+personal care of those in this blessed gathering ministry, even to their
+bodily needs and strength.
+
+And the love-service-suffering word-picture said so plainly this: true
+service grows out of love. The chief thing is the loyal tender
+attachment to the person of Jesus. Then out of this will naturally come
+service, and willingness to suffer. The touchstone won't be service but
+personal love. The service will simply be an expression of the love.
+
+And the Jesus-return word-picture fills their vision with this same
+Jesus coming in open glory before all eyes to carry out the kingdom
+plan. As these men learned to live always in the presence of a Jesus
+whom their outer eyes saw not, these pictures would become living
+pictures seen in open daily life.
+
+So this is a further bit of the tryst appointment. This is the fuller
+tryst, the greater, the yet more wondrous tryst. Not only would He rise
+up out of death, and appear to them in person seen by the outer eyes,
+but He would be with them continually manifesting Himself in rarest
+power of action, in tenderest personal care, in talking and walking with
+them.
+
+They would see the power plainly at work; then they would say with a
+soft hush, "_He_ is here." They would find new bodily strength, new
+guidance in perplexity, new peace in the midst of confusion, and they
+would say to each other in awed tones, "_He is here: it's the Master's
+touch_."
+
+And so it would come to be a habit to _anticipate_ His presence. They
+would figure Him in, and figure Him in big, as big as He is, in all
+sorts of circumstances and planning and meeting of difficulties.
+
+It is most striking that John closes his Gospel so differently from the
+others. They close with the Master rising up and disappearing on a cloud
+into the upper blue. John closes with Jesus walking along the beach,
+talking with the little group of trusted ones. Jesus did ascend up into
+the blue whence He shall some day descend. But the Holy Spirit sends
+John back to his pen to give us this as the last picture, impressed on
+the sensitive plate of the eyes of our heart. _This_: Jesus present with
+us all the while walking along the shore of our common round of life,
+clothed with matchless power, and devoting Himself to us as we to Him.
+
+Along about the middle of the eighteenth century there came to England a
+young French-Swiss, named De la Fléchčre, hungry hearted for the truth.
+He was so helped by John Wesley that he cast in his lot with the new
+Methodist movement and John Williams Fletcher became one of Wesley's
+most faithful co-labourers. Late in life he married a woman of unusual
+mental and spiritual attainment.
+
+I ran across a simple story over there of this Mrs. John Fletcher which
+interested and helped me much. This saintly gifted woman told of a dream
+which came to her with such vividness as to seem to her mature mind more
+than a common passing vagary of sleep. In her dream she was engaged in
+an intense struggle with an evil spirit. She was having a most difficult
+fight.
+
+She noticed some one standing a little bit to one side watching the
+fight but taking no active part in it. The fighting became so intense
+and her strength so sorely strained that she was on the point of giving
+up. Then this one came over near and touched her gently and said, "Be
+strong." Instantly a wondrous strength came to her and she held on.
+
+Again the evil one attacked her viciously. She wondered why this helping
+friend did not come to her assistance in the fight. Then she was moved
+to say to her enemy, "Depart, _in Jesus' Name_." And instantly he fled.
+And she was free and victorious. That was her dream. As she awoke there
+came to her the most real sense of the presence of her Lord.
+
+This is only one simple illustration from life. I have run across many
+of the same, wholly different each from the other, but each emphasizing
+the one simple tremendous fact of _the constant presence with us of this
+same mighty Jesus_.
+
+It is of keenest help to mark that humanly the _initiative of action_ is
+in _our_ hands. The fight is _ours_. We decide our stand. We choose, and
+we bear the brunt or result of our choice. We step out as the need
+comes. Prayer and a spirit of humblest dependence on Another guides our
+decision and action. But _we_ take the action. The initiative is ours.
+
+And _always alongside is One standing close up_, putting all His
+limitless power _at our disposal_, in our action. All He did in living
+and dying and rising up out of death was done _on our behalf_. And now
+all the tremendous result of His victory is at our command. All the
+power native in Him is for our use.
+
+This is the other tryst our Lover-Lord makes with us. "_Lo! I_ am _with
+you_ all the days, sunny days and shadowy, bright days and dark, all the
+days clear to the end." This is the sacred tryst He has made with us.
+
+And He _keeps_ the tryst. We may count on Him, And as we do we shall
+cast nets into hopeless waters and get a great haul. We shall find His
+presence anticipating all our personal needs. We shall rejoice to serve
+and--if so it prove to be--to suffer for the One we love with tenderest
+devotion.
+
+And we shall look eagerly forward to seeing Him who is always in touch
+with us, here and now, to seeing Him with these outer eyes of ours,
+_coming in glory_ with His resistless power, _to make some blessed
+changes_.
+
+
+
+
+Footnotes
+
+
+
+[1] John i. 35-42.
+
+[2] i. 1-18.
+
+[3] i. 19-xii. 50.
+
+[4] Chapters xiii.-xvii.
+
+[5] Chapters xviii.-xix.
+
+[6] Chapters xx.-xxi.
+
+[7] Colossians i. 15-17.
+
+[8] Philippians ii. 6-8.
+
+[9] Ephesians i.19-23.
+
+[10] Revelation i. 13-18.
+
+[11] i. 1-18.
+
+[12] i. 19-xii. 50.
+
+[13] Chapters xiii.-xvii.
+
+[14] Chapters xviii.-xix.
+
+[15] Chapter xx.
+
+[16] Chapter xxi.
+
+[17] There are nineteen of these incidents:
+
+ 1. The official deputation, i. 19-51.
+ 2. Marriage in Cana, ii. 1-11.
+ 3. Cleansing the Temple, ii. 13-22.
+ 4. Nicodemus, iii. 1-21.
+ 5. Dispute about purifying, iii. 22-36.
+ 6. Samaritan woman, iv. 1-42.
+ 7. Nobleman's son, iv. 46-54.
+ 8. Thirty-eight years infirmity, v.
+ 9. Feeding five thousand, vi. 1-15.
+10. Walking on water and discussion, vi. 16-71.
+11. At Feast of Tabernacles, vii.
+12. Accused woman, viii. 1--11.
+13. First attempt to stone, viii. 12-59.
+14. Man born blind, ix. 1-x. 21.
+15. Second stoning, x. 22-42.
+16. Lazarus, xi.
+17. Bethany Feast, xii. 1-11.
+18. Triumphal Entry, xii. 12-19.
+19. The Greeks, xii. 20-50.
+
+
+[18] iii. 32.
+
+[19] iii. 11.
+
+[20] i. 19-51.
+
+[21] ii.1-11.
+
+[22] ii. 12.
+
+[23] ii. 13-22.
+
+[24] vii. 50, 51; xix. 39.
+
+[25] ii. 23-iii. 21.
+
+[26] iii. 11, 19, 32.
+
+[27] iii. 22-36.
+
+[28] iv 1-42.
+
+[29] iv. 43-45.
+
+[30] iv. 46-54.
+
+[31] v. 1-47.
+
+[32] vi. 1-14.
+
+[33] vi. 15-71.
+
+[34] vii. 1-52.
+
+[35] viii. 1-11.
+
+[36] viii 12-59.
+
+[37] ix. l-x. 21.
+
+[38] x. 22-39.
+
+[39] x. 40-42.
+
+[40] xi. 1-53.
+
+[41] xi. 54-57.
+
+[42] xii. 1-8.
+
+[43] xii. 9-11.
+
+[44] xii. 12-19.
+
+[45] xii. 20-36.
+
+[46] xii. 37-50.
+
+[47] ii. 23.
+
+[48] iv. 45.
+
+[49] vi. 1-2, 14, 15, 34.
+
+[50] vii. 31, 40, 41.
+
+[51] viii. 30.
+
+[52] x. 20, 21.
+
+[53] x. 40-42.
+
+[54] xi. 45; xii. 9-12.
+
+[55] xii 17-18.
+
+[56] xii. 12-14.
+
+[57] xii. 42.
+
+[58] ii. 23-25
+
+[59] vi. 60-66.
+
+[60] xii. 42-43.
+
+[61] i. 35-51; ii. 1-11; iii. 13-28.
+
+[62] vi. 66-69.
+
+[63] xi. 16.
+
+[64] ii. 22; xii. 16.
+
+[65] iii. 1-21.
+
+[66] vii. 50-51 with xii. 42, 43.
+
+[67] xix. 39.
+
+[68] iv. 5-42.
+
+[69] Genesis XV. 6 with xx. 11.
+
+[70] vii. 35.
+
+[71] xii. 24-36.
+
+[72] Note the official deputation incident (chapter i.), and the
+Nicodemus incident (chapter iii.).
+
+[73] i. 19-34.
+
+[74] iii. 11, 32.
+
+[75] ii. 13-20.
+
+[76] iii. 22-iv. 3.
+
+[77] iv. 44.
+
+[78] v. 16-18.
+
+[79] vi. 30-36, 41-42, 52, 60-66.
+
+[80] vii. throughout.
+
+[81] viii. 1-11.
+
+[82] viii. 12-59.
+
+[83] ix. 1-x. 21.
+
+[84] x. 22-39.
+
+[85] xi. 47-57.
+
+[86] "Jesus had _not yet_ come," intimating that they were expecting Him
+in accordance with an understanding between Him and them. vi. 17.
+
+[87] Kings vi. 1-7.
+
+[88] Kings xvii. 17-24.
+
+[89] Kings xiii. 20-21.
+
+[90] Kings iv. 32-37.
+
+[91] Luke viii. 40-42, 49-56.
+
+[92] Luke vii. 11-17.
+
+[93] iii. 1-21.
+
+[94] iv. 7-42.
+
+[95] viii. 1-11.
+
+[96] ii. 13-21.
+
+[97] vii. throughout.
+
+[98] Luke iv. 30; John viii. 59; x. 39; xii. 36.
+
+[99] Mark x. 32; Luke ix. 53.
+
+[100] viii. 12-59.
+
+[101] x. 22-39.
+
+[102] xii. 12-19, 36.
+
+[103] xiii. 1-3.
+
+[104] ii. 4; vii. 6, 8, 30; viii. 20.
+
+[105] xii 23, 27; xiii. 1, 31-32; xvii. 1.
+
+[106] xiii. 4-11.
+
+[107] xiii. 12-20.
+
+[108] Philippians ii. 6-11.
+
+[109] xiii. 18.
+
+[110] xiii. 21-30.
+
+[111] The word "glory" with its companion "glorify," is frequent in
+John. We shall understand better if we remember that originally the word
+he uses means the opinion that one has of another, especially a good
+opinion. But as the word is used commonly here the underlying thought
+is, not what one thinks of another, nor yet something that one may give
+to another, but _the actual character in the one so thought of._ Glory
+is the character of goodness. So _to see one's glory_ is to see his real
+inner character, and to see that character openly recognized and
+acknowledged. So to _glorify_ means to recognize and acknowledge openly
+the true character of one. Twice in John the word is used in the cheaper
+meaning of outer honour among men. vii. 18; viii. 50.
+
+[112] xiii. 31-33.
+
+[113] xiii. 34-38.
+
+[114] xiv. 1-14.
+
+[115] xi. 33; xii. 27; xiii. 21.
+
+[116] xiv. 15-31.
+
+[117] xv. 1-17.
+
+[118] 18-xvi. 18.
+
+[119] xvi. 19-33.
+
+[120] xvii. throughout.
+
+[121] See footnote on "glory."
+
+[122] xii. 36.
+
+[123] Matthew xxvii. 32 and parallels.
+
+[124] xix. 28.
+
+[125] x. 17-18.
+
+[126] viii. 31-32, 34-36.
+
+[127] xii. 32.
+
+[128] Some references for this whole paragraph,--viii. 44; xii. 31;
+xiii. 2, 27; xiv. 30; xvi. 11.
+
+[129] x. 16; xii. 32; xvii. 20.
+
+[130] Matthew xvi. 21; xvii. 9, 23; xx. 19; Mark viii. 31; ix. 31; x.
+34; Luke ix. 22; xviii. 33.
+
+[131] xvi. 16.
+
+[132] Matthew xxvii. 63.
+
+[133] Mark xvi. 6-7; Luke xxiv. 6-11.
+
+[134] Matthew xxviii. 16.
+
+[135] John xiv. 3, and others.
+
+[136] Luke v. 1-11.
+
+[137] xxi. 1, 14.
+
+[138] So Thayer.
+
+[139] xiv. 21, 1. c.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Quiet Talks on John's Gospel, by S. D. Gordon
+
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Quiet Talks on John's Gospel, by S. D. Gordon
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Quiet Talks on John's Gospel
+
+Author: S. D. Gordon
+
+Release Date: February 26, 2005 [EBook #15185]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK QUIET TALKS ON JOHN'S GOSPEL ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Distributed Proofreaders
+
+
+
+
+
+Quiet Talks on _John's Gospel_
+
+By
+
+S. D. Gordon
+
+
+
+
+1915
+
+
+
+
+Preface
+
+
+
+_Everything depends on getting Jesus placed._ That lies at the root of
+all--living, serving, preaching, teaching. John had Jesus placed. He had
+Him up in His own place. This settles everything else. Then one gets
+himself placed, too, up on a level where the air is clear and bracing,
+the sun warm, and the outlook both steadying and stimulating. Get the
+centre fixed and things quickly adjust themselves about it to your eyes.
+
+It will be seen very quickly that this little book makes no pretension
+to being a commentary on, or an exposition of, John's Gospel. That is
+left to the scholarly folk who eat their meals in the sacred classical
+languages of the past. It is simply a homely attempt to let out a little
+of what has been sifting in these years past of this wondrous miniature
+Bible from John's pen.
+
+The proportions of this homely little messenger of paper and type may
+seem a little odd at first. The longest chapter is devoted to only the
+opening eighteen verses of John, the prologue. While the whole of the
+first twelve chapters of John, excepting that prologue, is brought into
+one smaller chapter. It wasn't planned so, though I felt it coming as
+the wondrous mood of this book came down over me. I think it mast be
+the effect of the atmosphere of John's book.
+
+Sometimes John packs so much in so little space, and again he goes so
+particularly into the details of some one incident. The prologue is a
+miniature Bible. The whole Bible story is there in its cream. And on the
+other hand John spends five chapters (xiii.-xvii.), almost a fifth of
+the whole, on a single evening. He devotes seven chapters (xiii.-xix.),
+almost a third of all, on the events of twenty-four hours. John is
+controlled not by mere proportion of space or quantity, but by the finer
+proportions of thought and quality.
+
+It has been difficult to hold these homely talks down to the limit of
+space they take here. So many veins of gold in this mine, showing
+clearly large nuggets of pure ore, lie just at hand untouched in this
+little mining venture. But it seemed clearly best to get the one clear
+grasp of the whole. That helps so much. But there'll be strong
+temptation to get one's pick and spade and go at this gold mine again.
+
+But now these things are written that we common folk may understand a
+bit better, and in a warm way, that Jesus was God on a wooing errand to
+the earth; and that we may join the blest company of the won ones, and
+become co-wooers with God of the others.
+
+S. D. G.
+
+
+
+
+Contents
+
+
+
+I. John's Story
+
+II. The Wooing Lover
+
+     Who it was that came.
+
+III. The Lover Wooing
+
+     A group of pictures illustrating how the wooing was done and how
+     the Lover was received.
+
+IV. Closer Wooing
+
+     An evening with opening hearts: the story of a supper and a walk in
+     the moonlight and the shadows.
+
+V. The Greatest Wooing
+
+     A night and a day with hardening hearts: the story of tender
+     passion and of a terrible tragedy.
+
+VI. An Appointed Tryst Unexpectedly Kept
+
+     A day of startling joyous surprises.
+
+VII. Another Tryst
+
+     A story of fishing, of guests at breakfast, and of a walk and talk
+     by the edge of blue Galilee.
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+John's Story
+
+
+
+
+    "I fled Him, down the nights and down the days;
+      I fled Him, down the arches of the years;
+    I fled Him down the labyrinthine ways
+      Of my own mind; and in the midst of tears
+    I hid from Him, and under running laughter.
+          Up vistaed hopes, I sped;
+          And shot, precipitated,
+    Adown Titanic glooms of chasmed fears,
+      From those strong Feet that followed, followed after."
+
+    --_Francis Thompson, in "The Hound of Heaven_."
+
+"These are written that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son
+of God; and that believing ye may have life in his name."--_John xx.
+31_.
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+John's Story
+
+
+
+The Heart-strings of God.
+
+
+There's a tense tugging at the heart of God. The heart-strings of God
+are tight, as tight as tight can be. For there's a tender heart that's
+easily tugged at one end, and an insistent tugging at the other. The
+tugging never ceases. The strings never slack. They give no signs of
+easing or getting loose.
+
+It's the tug of man's sore need at the down-end, the man-end, of the
+strings. And it's the sore tug of grief over the way things are going on
+down here with men, at the other end, the up-end, the heart-end, of the
+strings. It's the tense pull-up of a love that grows stronger with the
+growth of man's misunderstanding.
+
+But the heart-strings never snap. The heart itself breaks under the
+tension of love and grief, grieved and grieving love. But the strings
+only strengthen and tighten under the strain of use.
+
+Those heart-strings are a bit of the heart they're tied to, an inner
+bit, aye the innermost bit, the inner heart of the heart. They are the
+bit pulled, and pulled more, and pulled harder, till the strings grew.
+Man was born in the warm heart of God. Was there ever such a womb! Was
+there ever such another borning, homing place!
+
+It was man's going away that stretched the heart out till the strings
+grew. The tragedy of sin revealed the toughness and tenderness of love.
+For that heart never let go of the man whom it borned. Man tried to pull
+away, poor thing. In his foolish misunderstanding and heady wilfulness
+he tried to cut loose. If he had known God better he would never have
+tried that. He'd never have _started_ away; and he'd never have tried to
+_get_ away.
+
+For love never faileth. A heart--the real thing of a heart, that is,
+God's heart--never lets go. It breaks; but let go? not once: never yet.
+The breaking only loosens the red that glues fast with a tighter hold
+than ever. The fibre of the heart--God's heart--is made of too strong
+stuff to loosen or wear out or snap. Love never faileth. It can't;
+because it's love.
+
+Now all this explains Jesus. It was man's pull on these heart-strings
+that brought Him down. The pull was so strong and steady. It grew tenser
+and more insistent. And straight down He came by the shortest way, the
+way of those same heart-strings. For the heart-strings of God are the
+shortest distance between two given points, the point of God's giving,
+going love, and the point of man's sore need, given a sharper-pointed
+end by its very soreness.
+
+It is a sort of blind pull, this pull of man on the heart of God; a
+confused, unconscious, half-conscious, dust-blinded, slippery-road sort
+of pulling, but one whose tight grip never slacks. Man needs God, but
+does not know it. He knows he needs _some_thing. He feels that keenly.
+But he does not know that it's God whom he needs, with a very few rare
+exceptions. It doesn't seem to have entered his head that he'll never
+get out of his tight corner till God gets him out.
+
+Down the street of life he goes, eyes blinded by the thick dust, ears
+deafened by the cries of the crowd, by the noise of the street without,
+and the noise of passions and fevered ambitions within, heart a-wearied
+by the confusion of it all, groping, stumbling, jostled and jostling,
+hitting this way and that, with the fever high in his blood, and his
+feet aching and bleeding; sometimes the polish of culture on the
+surface; _some_times rags and dirt; but underneath the same thing.
+
+Yet under all there's a vague but very real feeling of that unceasing
+pull upward upon His heart-strings. But though blind and vague and
+confused that tugging is never the less tense, but ever more, and then
+yet more.
+
+Jesus was God answering the tug of man's need on His heart-strings. And
+so naturally there was an answering feel in man's heart. Man felt the
+answer a-coming. There was a great stir in the spirit-currents of earth
+when Jesus came. A thrill of expectancy ran through the world, Roman,
+Greek, Barbarian, far and wide, as Jesus drew near. The book-makers of
+that time all speak of it. It was the vibration of those same
+heart-strings connecting man and God.
+
+The move at God's end was felt at man's. The coming down along the
+highway of the strings thrilled and stirred and awed the hearts into
+which those strings led, and where they were so tightly knotted. The
+earth-currents spread the news. Man heard; he felt; he knew: vaguely,
+blindly, wearily, yet very really he heard and felt and recognized that
+help, a Friend, some One, was nearing.
+
+And then when Jesus walked among men how He did pull upon their hearts!
+So quietly He went about. So sympathetically He looked and listened. So
+warm was the human touch of His hand. So strong was the lift of His arm
+to ease their load. So potent was the spell of His unfailing power to
+give relief. How He did pull! And how men did answer to that pull!
+Unresistingly, eagerly, as weary child in mother's arms at close of day,
+they came crowding to Him.
+
+
+
+The Fourfold Message.
+
+
+It is fascinating to find one book in this old Book of God given up
+wholly to telling of this, John's Gospel. Of course the whole of the
+Book is really given up to it, when one gets the whole simple view of it
+at one glance. But so many of us don't get that whole simple glance.
+
+So to make it easier for us simple common folk, and to make sure of our
+getting it, there is one little book, hardly big enough to call a book,
+just a few pages devoted wholly to letting us see this one thing. You
+can see the whole of the sun in a single drop of water. You can see the
+whole of the Book of God in this one little book that John wrote.
+
+John's Gospel is like the small tracing of the artist's pen on the
+lower corner of an etching, the remarque, put there as a signature, the
+artist's personal mark that the picture is genuine, the real thing. The
+whole consummate skill of the artist is revealed at a glance in the
+simple outline-tracing on the margin. The whole of the God-story in the
+larger picture of the whole Book is given in few simple clear lines in
+this exquisite little thing commonly called John's Gospel.
+
+It is striking to make the discovery that John's little book has _a
+distinctive message as a book_. It is full of messages, of course. But I
+mean that there is a distinct story told by the book as a whole, by the
+very way it is put together. It is told by the very sort of language
+used, the words chosen as the leading words of the book. It is told by
+the picture that clearly fills John's eye as he writes, and by the very
+spirit that floods the pages as a soft light, and that breaks out of
+them as the subtle fragrance of locust blossoms in the spring.
+
+The fragrance of flowers cannot be analyzed: it must be smelled and
+felt. That's the only way you'll ever know it. The fine scholarly
+analyses of John are helpful. But there's the subtler something that
+cannot be diagramed or analyzed or synthesized. It eludes the
+razor-edged knife, and the keenly critical survey. It is recognized only
+by one's spirit, and then only when the spirit is warm, and in tune with
+John's.
+
+Of course each of the Gospel stories has a message of its own, quite
+apart from the group of facts common to them all. And these four
+messages together give us the fuller distinctive message of these four
+little books. And a very winsome message it is, too, that takes hold of
+one's heart, and takes a warm strong hold at that.
+
+_Matthew_ tells us that Jesus is a _King_. For a great purpose He chose
+to live as a peasant, as one of the common folks. But He was of the
+blood royal. He has the long unbroken kingly lineage. He showed kingly
+power in His actions, kingly wisdom in His teachings, and the fine
+kingly spirit in His gracious kindliness of touch. He was gladly
+accepted and served as King by those who understood Him best. He was
+acknowledged as King by the Roman Governor; and He died as a King, and
+as a King was laid in a newly hewn tomb.
+
+_Mark_ adds a fine touch to this picture, a warm touch with colour in
+it,--this King of ours is _a serving King_. This comes not only with a
+warm feel, but it comes as a distinct surprise. Men's kings are _served_
+kings. There have been kings, and are, who rendered their people a fine
+high service, and do. But the overpowering impression given the common
+crowd watching on the street is that kings are superior beings, to be
+waited upon, humbly bowed to, and implicitly obeyed. They are to be
+served.
+
+Bat Mark's picture shows us a King whose passion is to serve. The
+service which He draws out of His followers is drawn out by His warm
+serving spirit towards us. The words on the royal coat-of-arms are, "Not
+to be ministered unto, but to minister." And in the first meaning of the
+words He Himself used that means "not to be _served_ but to _serve_." In
+Mark the air is tense with rapid action. The quick executive movement of
+a capable servant is felt in the terse words short sentences and swift
+action of the story.
+
+There's yet warmer colouring in _Luke's_ picture. This serving King is
+_nearest of kin to us!_ He is not only of the blood royal, but of the
+blood human. He is bone of our bone, blood of our blood, and life of our
+common life. He came to us through a rare union of God's power with
+human consent and human function, never known before nor repeated since.
+This is the bit that Luke adds to the composite message of these four
+little God-story books.
+
+Here Jesus has a tenderness of human sympathy with us men, for He and we
+are brothers. There's an outlook as broad as the race. No national
+boundaries limit its reach. No sectional prejudices warp or shut Him off
+from sympathetic touch with any. He shares our common life. He knows our
+human temptations, and knows them with a reality that is painful, and
+with an intensity that wets His brow and shuts His jaw hard.
+
+This king who serves is _a man_. He _can_ be a king of men for He is a
+_man_. He has the first qualification. I might use an old-fashioned word
+in the first old-time meaning,--He is _a fellow_, one who shares the
+bed and bread of our common experience. And so He is _kin to us_, both
+in lineage and in experience, in blood and in spirit.
+
+And John's share in this partnership message adds a simple bold touch of
+colouring that makes the picture a masterpiece, _the_ masterpiece. This
+King who serves, and is nearest of kin to us, is also _nearest of kin to
+God_. He is not only of the blood royal, and the blood human, but of the
+blood divine. He was with God before calendars came into use. He was the
+God of that creative Genesis week. He came on an errand down to the
+earth, and when the errand was done, and well done, He went back home,
+bearing on His person the marks of His fidelity to the Father's errand.
+This is John's bit of rich high colouring.
+
+And so _we are nearest of kin to God_ through Jesus. Kinship is always a
+matter of blood. There is a double kinship, through the blood of
+inheritance, and the blood of sacrifice. Our _inherited_ kinship of
+blood has been lost. But His blood of sacrifice has made a new kinship.
+We had broken the entail of our inheritance clean beyond mending. We
+were _outcasts_ by our own act. But He _cast in_. His lot with us, and
+so drew us back and up and in. He made a new entail through His blood.
+And that new entail is as unbreakable as the old broken one is
+unmendable. And so we come into the family of a King. And we are
+kingliest in character when we are Christliest in spirit and action. We
+are most like the King when we are helping others.
+
+Our true motto, in our relation to our fellows, is: "I am among you as
+he that serveth." Towel and basin, bended knee and comforted
+pilgrim-feet and refreshed spirit,--this is our family crest. We're kin
+to all the race through Jesus. Black skin and white, yellow and brown;
+round heads and long, slanting eyes and oval, in slum alley and palatial
+home, below the equator and above it,--all are our kinsmen.
+
+We are reaching highest when we are stooping lowest to help some one up.
+We're nearest like God in character when we're getting nearest in touch
+to those needing help. We are kingliest and Godliest and Christliest
+when we're controlled by men's needs, but always under the higher
+control of the Holy Spirit.
+
+This is the composite message of the four Gospels; and this is its
+practical human outworking.
+
+
+
+God on a Wooing Errand.
+
+
+But it's the other John message we are especially after just now.
+There's another message of John's book quite distinct from this, though
+naturally allied with it. And this other is the crowding message of his
+book. Its thought crowds in upon you till every other is crowded into
+second place. And as it gets hold of you it crowds your mind and heart
+and life till every other is either crowded out, or crowded to a lower
+place; _out_, if it jars; _lower place_, if it agrees, for every
+agreeing bit yields to the lead of this tremendous message.
+
+But one must get hold of John before John's message gets hold of him.
+John was swayed by a passion. It was a fiery passion flaming through all
+his life. It burned through him as the fierce forest fire burns through
+the underbrush. Every base thing was eaten up by its flame. Every less
+worthy thing came under its heat. It melted and mellowed and moulded his
+whole being.
+
+It was _the Jesus-passion_. It was kindled that memorable afternoon
+early in his life down in the Jordan bottoms.[1] John's namesake, the
+Herald, applied the kindling match. From then on the flames never
+flickered nor burned low. They increased steadily, and they increased in
+purity, until his whole life was under their holy heat.
+
+John didn't always understand his Master. Sometimes he misunderstood.
+But he never failed in his trust of Him, nor in his fidelity to Him. Of
+the chosen inner circle John was the one who remained true through the
+sorest test, that betrayal-night test. Judas betrayed; Peter denied; the
+nine fled in terror down the road to save their cowardly lives; John
+went in "_with_ Jesus." That fiery nature of his, that early won for him
+the stormy name "son of thunder," came completely under the sway of this
+holier tenderer stronger flame, and burned itself out in a passion of
+love for Jesus.
+
+The Jesus-passion swayed John completely. This explains the man, and his
+career. It explains this little book of his ripe old age. And only this
+can. One must read the book through John's own heart, then he begins to
+understand it. This Jesus-passioned man is the key to the book, the
+human key.
+
+And the distinctive message of the book is simply this: _Jesus was God
+on a wooing errand to the earth_. That simple sentence covers fully all
+that is found in John's twenty-one chapters. Every line in these
+fourteen or fifteen pages can be traced back into that brief statement.
+
+Indeed this becomes an outline of the book. See: in the opening
+paragraphs the wooing Lover is coming down to earth.[2] In the first
+twelve chapters the Lover is pleading winsomely and earnestly for
+acceptance.[3] Then He is seen in closest touch with the inner group of
+those who have accepted, opening His heart yet more, wooing still
+closer.[4] Then comes the last tragic pleading, pleading in intensest
+action, with those who persist in rejecting.[5] And then the last close
+heart-touches with the inner circle.[6]
+
+
+
+The Water-Mark of John's Gospel.
+
+
+The very words John so thoughtfully chooses as his leading words bear
+the distinct impress of this, like the sharply indented stamp of the
+mint on the new coin. Two such words stand out above all others,
+"believe" and "witness." The first actually occurs oftenest, sounding
+out like the dominant chord of music running throughout a symphony. The
+second is like the chief warp-thread into which the fabric is being
+woven.
+
+The two words are really twins, born at the same time, of the same
+mother. They grow up together and work in perfect accord. The witnessing
+is that men may understand and believe. It's the servant leading up to
+the belief that shall become the mastering thing. The belief is servant,
+too, in turn, leading up to the witnessing that becomes the mastering
+passion in those who believe.
+
+These words are worth digging into for the fine gold that lies hidden
+within waiting the miner's pick. The word "believe" is a nugget of pure
+gold, whether you take our English word or John's word lying underneath.
+The underneath word, that John uses in his own mother tongue, runs a
+sliding scale of meaning.
+
+It's a ladder rising from bottom round to topmost. It means to be
+persuaded that a thing is true; then to place confidence in it, to
+trust. And _trust_ always contains the idea of _risk_. The heart-meaning
+always is that you _risk_ something very precious to you, risk it to the
+point of heart-breaking disaster if your trust proves wrong.
+
+Our English word is of very close kin. It runs the same sort of sliding
+scale, from something valuable and precious in itself, on to something
+that _satisfies you_ regarding the matter in hand. You are not only
+satisfied but pleased, content. And so there is the same trusting and
+risking, the same leaning your whole weight upon the thing. Deep down
+at its root, _believe_ is a close kinsman to _love_. They both spring
+out of the same warm creative womb.
+
+When we dig a bit into that word _believe_ in the usage of common life
+it means three distinct things, each leading straight into the
+other,--knowledge, belief, trust. That is, _facts_, facts _accepted_,
+facts _trusted_ in regard to something that takes hold of your life. You
+hear something. You believe it's true. But there must be the third
+thing, risking something valuable. There's no belief in the
+heart-meaning without this thing of _risking_. The trust that risks is
+the life blood of faith. The rest is only the bony skeleton with tendons
+and sinews and flesh. There's no life without the blood. There's no
+belief without trust.
+
+And the word _witness_ is the same pure-gold sort of nugget, assaying
+full weight. John's native word and our own are just the same in
+meaning. Their meaning is _to tell what you know_. We shall be running
+across this word again, and digging a bit deeper into it. But this is
+the thing that stands out in it. You tell something that you yourself
+know. There's personal knowledge. There's a telling some one else this
+thing you know. And yet more, there's the purpose in the telling, that
+others may know what you know, and get all the good that comes with
+knowing it.
+
+The _witnessing_ is that others may _believe_. It is a striking thing in
+John that the _thought_ of witness is more common than the _word_. The
+word occurs several times, and always in a leading way. But the thought
+of witnessing is the colouring of every page, and the chief colouring.
+
+I said that these two words were twins, born at the same time, of the
+same mother. That warm-hearted brooding mother is the word _wooing_.
+Originally _wooing_ means bending towards, inclining forward or reaching
+out towards another. And the purpose of the reaching out is to get the
+other to reach forward towards you. And that purpose puts the warm feel
+into the reaching out.
+
+All words were pictures first. Here in this word _wooing_ is a picture,
+by one of the old masters, waiting to be restored, with all the dusty
+accumulations of the years carefully removed. And here's the picture: a
+man standing, with the light of the morning shining in His eyes, body
+bending forward, hands reaching out, with an eagerness, an expectancy in
+every line of His body, and tender love glowing out of His face, and
+sounding in the very tones with which the voice is calling.
+
+This picture is really the water-mark on the paper of John's Gospel.
+Hold up the paper of John's Gospel to the light. The best light for the
+purpose is found on Mount Calvary. High altitudes have clearer light.
+You see more distinctly. Now look. Hold still that you may see all the
+outlines more distinctly. There's the form of a Man standing in pleading
+attitude, with outstretched hands. His face combines all the fineness of
+the finest woman's face, with all the strength of the strongest man's,
+and more, immensely more, all the purity and tenderness and power of
+_God's_ face. It _is_ God Himself in human form coming a-wooing to
+earth, and we call His name Jesus. This conception is the very
+atmosphere of John's Gospel.
+
+Jesus is the witness of the Father to men. He knew the Father. He knew
+Him by closest intimacy. He lived with Him. He came down to _tell_ what
+He knew. He wanted others to know too. He wanted them to know _even as_
+He knew. _Telling_ is the whole of Jesus; telling men of the Father.
+
+His mere presence, His character, His warm sympathy, His practical
+helpfulness, His words, His actions, most of all His dying and His
+rising, all these were a _telling_, a witnessing, a wooing; telling the
+Father's love, telling the damnableness of our sin by giving His very
+life blood to get it out of us; so telling us how we might really know
+the mother-heart of the Father.
+
+
+
+Jesus the Dividing Line.
+
+
+There are several contrasts between the first three Gospels and John's.
+It is very striking to notice one in particular in this connection. One
+reading the first three Gospels for the first time is impressed with the
+fact of Jesus' _rejection_. This stands out peculiarly and dominantly.
+It was the great fact, told most terribly in the death of Jesus. It was
+the thing that stood out sharpest in the generation to which Jesus
+belonged, the generation for whom these three Gospels were written at
+the first.
+
+But John wrote his story for an after-generation, a generation that had
+not known the man Jesus by personal touch and observation. And so it was
+for all after-generations. And John makes it very clear that Jesus was
+rejected, _and_ accepted.
+
+He was indeed _rejected_; that fact stands out as painfully here as in
+the others. He was rejected by the little inner clique that held the
+national reins, and held them with fevered tenacity, and drove hard. And
+the reason for it is made to stand out as plainly as the fact. The envy
+and jealousy, the intense bitterness and viciousness and devilish
+obstinacy back of the rejection stand as boldly out to all eyes as to
+Pilate's.
+
+But the other side stands out sharply too. Jesus was _accepted_. He was
+accepted by all classes, by the cultured, and the scholarly, by
+thoughtful studious leaders and officials of the nation. He was accepted
+by the great middle classes and by those in lowest scale socially, and
+by the moral outcasts. Intense Hebrews, Roman officials of high rank,
+half-breed Samaritans, and men of outside nations group themselves
+together by their full acceptance of Jesus.
+
+He was listened to, doubted, questioned, discussed, thought over, _and
+then accepted._ And He was accepted with a faith and with a love that
+counted not suffering nor sacrifice for the sake of Him whom they
+believed and trusted and loved. John makes this clear, rejected _and_
+accepted.
+
+Jesus divided the crowds. Down the road He comes, with quiet strength,
+witnessing to the great simple truth of the Father's pure strong wooing
+love. And the crowd looks and listens and--_divides_. Some reject;
+clearly they are a minority, but entrenched in a position of power that
+proves quite sufficient for their purpose. Though it took all the power
+at their command to carry out their purpose.
+
+Others accept. These are the crowds, the majority. Some don't
+understand. Their motives are selfish or mixed, like some other folks'
+motives. Some are played upon by the cunning of the leaders and swung
+away. But there remain the thoughtful ones whose faith goes from
+weakness to strength; it grows from more to yet more. It mellows from a
+true simple faith to a deepened, seasoned, sorely-tested,
+surely-toughened faith that loves, loves clear down to the roots, and
+endures gladly. This is the simple warp-thread into which John's very
+simple story of Jesus is woven.
+
+
+
+Spelling God.
+
+
+_I_ want to give you _a bunch of keys_, as we start into these homely
+talks in John's Gospel. They are simple keys. Any one can use them. They
+fit easily and smoothly into every lock, the lock of your life, the lock
+of any circumstance, any sore problem that may come up to baffle all
+your efforts. They bring treasures within easy reach. They open up the
+way into all you need. There is a key to God, a key to the Book of God,
+and then there are three keys to this little John book.
+
+_The key to God_ is in one little word. It has two spellings, sometimes
+with four letters, sometimes with five, and both correct spellings. The
+four-lettered spelling is for all the world. The five-lettered spelling
+is chiefly used in the western half of the earth, and along certain
+lines and in certain spots here and there in the eastern half where the
+word is known.
+
+That first spelling is l-o-v-e. God is love. Love is of God. _God is
+always controlled by a purpose_ in all His dealings with the race, and
+with you and me. There is no chance-happening with Him, no caprice, no
+shadow in His path that tells of His being swerved aside, by anything we
+do, from a steady purpose.
+
+And that controlling purpose is _always a purpose of love._ It's a
+purpose of strong steady pure clinging brooding love. The bother is we
+don't know what that word _love_ means; none of us. We know words but
+not the real things they stand for. We don't know the real thing of love
+because we don't know the real thing of God. If we knew, oh! if we but
+knew it--Him--how that simple statement would melt us down, and mellow
+us through, and mould us all over anew!
+
+That's the shorter spelling. It is the universal spelling. That love is
+being spelled out to all the race by every twinkling star in the upper
+blue, every shade of green in the lower brown, by every cooling shading
+night, and every fragrantly dewy morning. Every breath of air and bite
+of food and draught of water is repeating God's spelling lesson. These
+are the pages in God's primer. So we all may learn to spell out God. And
+so we get the right spelling of our own lives.
+
+Then there's the other spelling, the five-lettered, J-e-s-u-s. It's the
+same thing, only spelled differently; spelled in a yet better way. The
+spelling grows bigger to us when Jesus comes. When we know Him it takes
+more to spell out and to tell out God's love. God grows larger to our
+eyes as He comes walking among us as Jesus. No, He doesn't grow larger.
+We simply begin to find out how large He is.
+
+This is the closer, more human spelling. The letters are nearer and seem
+bigger as they come walking down the street where we live, and knock at
+our own door. They're easier spelled out. We can get hold of them
+better. Love is a thing, we _think_. Jesus is _a person_. It's so
+different to touch a person. But when we know, we know that both
+spellings tell the same thing. So far, only about a third of us have
+heard anything about this second, this closer spelling. Two out of three
+haven't heard about it yet. But those who really know this spelling are
+eager for the others to get it, too.
+
+God is always controlled by a great simple purpose in thinking of you
+and me. And it is an unfailing purpose of strong tender love. This is
+the first key. Any one may take it and use it. It is unfailing. It will
+fit every lock. It unlock every problem. It will open up the riches to
+any life. They're brought within easy reach of any hand by the steady
+use of this key.
+
+This is the key to God. It unlocks the doors and lets Him freely into
+our lives. Then we find out how much truer it is than we can understand.
+
+Then there's _the key to the Book of God._ There are many keys here, of
+course. Daily time alone with the Book, thoughtful reading, prayer, some
+simple plan, putting into your life what has been put in its
+pages,--these are all good keys. But there's a master-key, _the_
+master-key. It is simply this: glad surrender of will to the God of the
+Book. I mean a strong intelligent yielding to His mastery in all of
+one's plans and life. The highest act of the strongest will is yielding
+to a higher will when you find it. And you find the higher, the highest,
+will here.
+
+This is the master-key. Bending the will affects eyes and ears and mind.
+The hinges of eye and ear are in the will. As the will bends those
+hinges move of themselves. Eye and ear and mind open. The lower the will
+bends, the more fully and habitually, the more will eyes and ears open,
+the keener and more alert will be the mental processes, the more
+intelligent the understanding. And there comes to be a continual mutual
+shifting. With better understanding can come stronger more intelligent
+yielding of will, and so again clearer light.
+
+And it is striking to discover that there's a practical connection
+between the joints of the knees and the joint of the will. The bending
+of knees to a sharp right angle affects the will. It is easier to bend
+it. It bends better and more. And this grows. The habitual bending of
+the knees helps make habitual and stronger and more intelligent the
+bending of the will.
+
+This is the master-key to the Book of God. It opens every lock and page.
+It opens us to the Book, and opens the Book to us. It frees out to us
+the wondrous Spirit who is in these pages. And so through the opened
+Book there come to be the direct touch with the God of the Book. We
+don't come to the Book merely; we come _through_ it to Him who comes
+through it to us. This is the second key in this bunch.
+
+
+
+Three Keys.
+
+
+Now, I want to give you _the three keys to John's Gospel._ There's a
+back-door key, a side-door key, and a front-door key. These keys hang
+outside the doors, low down, that so any one who wants to can easily
+reach up, and get them. And if used faithfully and simply they will be
+found to unlock every page and line and difficult question.
+
+_The back-door key_ hangs right at the back door. It is the very last
+verse of chapter twenty. That really was the last chapter at first. The
+thought of the book comes to a close there. The story is complete. Then
+the Holy Spirit led John to add a little, a second last-chapter, an
+added touch for good measure. Love is never content. It is always adding
+more.
+
+Here is the key: "_these are written that ye may believe that Jesus is
+the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye may have life through
+His name_." This was John's whole thought in telling the Jesus-story.
+The practical gripped him wholly and hard. This is the thing that guides
+his selection of incidents. This purpose shapes the shape of the book.
+It explains everything told, and just why it is told in just the way it
+is told.
+
+John lets Jesus walk before our eyes fresh from His Father's presence.
+The mere fact of His presence, the winsomeness of His personality, the
+clearness of His teaching, the power of His actions, the uncompromising
+purity of His character amidst sin-stained crowds and sin-dirtied
+surroundings, the unflinching rigidity of His ideals, the persuasiveness
+of His very manner and tone of speech, the patience and gentleness, the
+rugged granite strength, the mother tenderness, above all the
+willingness to suffer so terribly,--all this is a plea, a tremendous
+overpowering plea, all the stronger because presented so simply and
+briefly. Jesus is a Lover and this is His wooing.
+
+And John's one thought in writing is the same as the one thought in the
+Lover's heart. John has become simply an echo of Jesus. It is this, that
+_you_, whoever you are, wherever, whatever, that you may _believe_. You
+look and listen, question, puzzle a bit maybe, but keep on listening and
+looking, thinking, weighing, till you are clear these things are just so
+as John tells them. Yon accept them as trustworthy. Then you accept
+_Him_, Jesus, as He comes to you, your wooing Lover, your Lover-God,
+your Saviour and Lord.
+
+You _believe_: that is you _love_. The grammar of the word works itself
+out inside you thus,--believe, trust, love. The truth comes in through
+eyes and ears and feeling, into brain and will; through emotion clear
+down into your heart. You love. You cannot help yourself. You love
+_Him_, Jesus, the One so lovable.
+
+John says that you _may_ believe. It is possible. It is the reasonable
+intelligent thing to do after such a presentation. John makes it easy
+for us to believe. His telling of the story is so strong and convincing,
+though so simple and short, that believing is the natural thing. Jesus
+Himself, as He conies to us through John's eyes and speech, is so
+believable, so trustworthy, so lovable.
+
+Now we _may_ believe. It's the thing to do after a thoughtful kneeful
+study of the case as put by John. We _may believe_ clear into and
+through intellect and emotions and will, right down into the depths of
+heart and love, clear out into every action of the life.
+
+And John sweeps in the whole crowd of the world in the way he puts it
+here. Listen: "that you may believe that Jesus is _the Christ_." That
+was for the Jew peculiarly in the first instance. The Jew had been
+taught through generations that there was One coming who was God's
+chosen One for the Hebrew nation. He was the _Anointed One_. The Hebrew
+said _Messiah_. The Greek said _Christ_. Both mean the same, the One
+chosen of God, anointed by Him as the King and Leader of His chosen
+people, and through them of all the race.
+
+Listen further: "that Jesus is _the Son of God." That_ is for all of us,
+Jew and foreigner, insider and outsider. This Jesus is in a distinctive
+sense _the_ Son of God, the only begotten Son. This pure loving pleading
+wooing suffering dying rising-again Jesus, this is the only begotten Son
+of the Father. All there is in a Father comes to, and is in, an only
+begotten son. This is God Himself coming to us in His Son.
+
+Once let this sift into thought and heart, then who would _not_ believe,
+_and_ trust, _and_ love, _and_ fall on his face in the utter devotion of
+a voluntary slave before such a God!
+
+And so believing, trusting, loving, touching, His life flows in and
+fills up and floods out. We have it _now_. That word _eternal_, used so
+often by John with the word _life_, is not a mere _length_ word. It is
+not a calendar word. It tells the sort of life, the quality of life,
+that comes in through the opening door of our believing. This is John's
+back-door key, but it lets you clear in through the whole house.
+
+Then there is _the side-door key_. It hangs at the side, a bit towards
+the back. It is in the Thursday night talk, as we commonly call it, that
+last heart-talk with the inner group on the betrayal night. It is in
+chapter sixteen, verse twenty-eight: "_I came out from the Father, and
+am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go unto the
+Father_."
+
+Run through this Gospel with that fresh in your mind, and it is
+perfectly fascinating to find how much like a magnet it is, picking out
+to itself so many bits from the Master's lips that fit exactly into it.
+Jesus' constant thought was that He used to be with the Father; He came
+down on an errand to the earth. By and by when the errand was done He
+would go back home again.
+
+This sentence becomes a simple, exact, comprehensive outline of the
+entire Gospel. Notice: "_I came out from the Father_": that is chapter
+one, verses one to eighteen. There Jesus is seen coming down from His
+Father's own presence. Then chapter one, verse nineteen through to the
+close of the twelfth chapter is fully described and covered by the next
+clause, "_and am come into the world_." Here He is seen in the world, in
+the midst of its crowds and contentions and oppositions.
+
+"_Again, I leave the world_,"--chapters thirteen to nineteen. In chapters
+thirteen to seventeen He is tenderly leaving the inner circle. In
+chapters eighteen and nineteen He is going out of the world by the
+terrible doorway of the cross it had carpentered for Him. How quietly He
+says the words, though the terrible going is yet to come, and is now so
+near that He can already feel the shame and the thorns and the nails.
+
+And as quietly He looks beyond and adds, "_and go unto the Father_." In
+chapters twenty and twenty-one He lingers a little for the sake of these
+being left behind, but His face is already turned homeward. They would
+hold Him in their midst. He quietly tells them that He is going back
+home to the Father to get things ready for them, as He had said.
+
+
+
+He Comes to His Own.
+
+
+_The front-door key_ hangs right at the very front, outside, low down,
+where even a child's hand can reach it. It is in chapter one, verses
+eleven and twelve: "_He came unto His own, and they that were His own
+received Him not. But as many as received Him to them gave He the right
+to become children of God, even to them who believe on His name_." This
+is the great key, the chief key to this whole house. It flings the front
+door wide open and you are inside at once, and take in the whole of the
+house at a glance, one glance, one wonderful glance.
+
+The first twelve chapters tell of Jesus coming to His own, His own
+nation, humanly, racially, His own chosen people. He is coming steadily
+and persistently, in spite of rebuffs; coming patiently, tenderly,
+earnestly; coming ever closer in the ever increasing measure of divine
+power seen in His actions.
+
+And continually, persistently, He is being rejected and accepted. He is
+rejected silently and contemptuously, then aggressively and bitterly,
+viciously and murderously. "His own received Him not." But many received
+Him, eagerly and warmly and thoughtfully. They received Him with a
+growing depth of conviction and deepening tenderness of love. And as
+they come, He is ever receiving them, giving them that touch of new
+life that marks only the children of God.
+
+In chapters thirteen to seventeen He is receiving into closer fellowship
+those who have received Him, and at the same time wooing them into yet
+closer touch. The story of the trial and crucifixion in chapters
+eighteen and nineteen, puts the most terrific emphasis on the words,
+"_received Him not_." They not only keep Him out of His own possessions,
+but do their worst in putting Him out of life. And the little book
+closes in its last two chapters with His receivers being received into
+the sweetest intimacies of tested triumphant love and into the inner
+secrets of rarest resurrection power.
+
+This is the most heart-breaking of all of John's heart-breaking
+sentences. John had a hard time writing this Gospel of his. He was not
+simply writing a book; that might have been fairly easy. But he was
+telling about a friend of his, _the_ friend of his life, his one dearest
+Friend. And when he remembers how they treated Him his eyes fill up, and
+his heart beats till it thumps, and his quill sticks into the paper in
+sheer reluctance to tell the story.
+
+I think likely in the original manuscript, John's own first copy, the
+writing was a bit shaky and uneven here. The dew of his wet eyes drops
+and blurs the words a bit as he puts down, "He came to His own, and . .
+they who were His own . . _received . . Him . . not_."
+
+One day a young student was crossing the quadrangles of one of the old
+Scottish Universities towards his quarters in the dormitory. He was not
+feeling well. His eyes had troubled him and made his work very
+difficult. On the advice of a friend he sought the judgment of an expert
+in the treatment of the eyes. The specialist made a very thorough
+examination and then informed the young student tactfully but plainly
+that he would lose his eyesight, surely and not slowly.
+
+Lose his eyesight? A sudden terrific actual blow between his eyes could
+not have stunned his body more than this stunned brain and heart. Lose
+his eyesight! All his plans and coveted ambitions seemed slipping clean
+out from his grasp. With the loss of eyes would go the loss of
+university training, and so of all his dreams. Dazed, blinded, he groped
+his way rather than walked out of the physician's office.
+
+His life was to be joined with another's. And now he turned his
+distracted steps towards her home, hungry doubtless for some word or
+touch of comfort for his sore heart. And he was thinking, too, that with
+this utter break-up of the future she must be told. And as he talked he
+said in quiet manly words that under these unexpected circumstances, and
+the radical change in his prospects, she must be free to do as she
+thought best.
+
+And she took her freedom! Yet she was a woman. And a woman's mission is
+to teach man love by the real thing of love, by being it herself, and
+drawing it out into full flower in him. That was the second staggering
+blow. A second time he groped his dazed way out of the house, down the
+street, into his lone student quarters.
+
+But another One was near, brooding over him, and tenderly holding his
+breaking heart, and speaking words of warm comfort, and breathing in the
+freshing breath of true love. And as he yielded to this it overcame all
+else. A new mood came and dominated. And it became the fixed thing
+mastering all his life. Now he sits down, and out of his torn bleeding
+but newly-touched heart writes the words we have all learned to sing:
+
+    "O Love that will _not_ let me go,
+      I rest my weary soul in Thee,
+    I give Thee back the life I owe,
+      That in thine ocean depths its flow
+        May richer, fuller be.
+
+    "O Light that followest all my way,
+      I yield my flickering torch to Thee;
+    My heart restores its borrowed ray
+      That in Thy sunshine's glow its day
+        May brighter, fairer be.
+
+    "O Joy that seekest me through pain,
+      I cannot close my heart to Thee;
+    I trace the rainbow through the rain,
+      And feel the promise is not vain
+        That morn shall tearless be.
+
+    "O Cross that liftest up my head,
+      I dare not ask to hide from Thee;
+    I lay in dust life's glory dead,
+      And from the ground there blossoms red
+        Life that shall endless be."
+
+And with but a single change, the change of a word or two in one line,
+they stand as at first written. I suppose his biographer omitted the
+incident for the same reason that the first three Gospels may have
+omitted the incident of Lazarus while he was still living. So there was
+a sheltering from personal embarrassment.
+
+He came to his own and his own received him not. _He_--Jesus came to
+_His_ own and they that were His own received Him not. Aye, there's more
+to add: He _comes_ to His own--you and me--to-day. And His own--
+
+You and I must finish that sentence, each in his own way. And we will;
+and we do. We may copy out in our lives just what these men of old did
+as told by John. Some of us do. We _may_ do some fine revision work on
+the text of John's version as we translate it now into the experience of
+our own hearts, and into the life of our own lives. That's the only way
+to understand the next sentence about being taken into the family of God
+and sharing the fullness of life that is common there.
+
+And this bit that is put down here is only a bit of copy work. _These
+things_ are talked and written only that we may be given a lift into
+closer touch of heart and life with the Christ, the Son of God, and the
+Brother and Saviour of men.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+The Wooing Lover
+
+     _Who it Was that Came_
+
+
+
+
+       "But with unhurrying chase,
+        And unperturbed pace,
+    Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
+        They beat--and a Voice beat
+        More instant than the Feet--
+    _'All things betray thee, who betrayest Me'_"
+
+                    --"_The Hound of Heaven._"
+
+
+    "Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any
+    man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in
+    to him, and will sup with him, and he with me."
+
+    --_Rev. iii. 20._
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+The Wooing Lover
+
+(John i. 1-18.)
+
+
+
+In His Own Image.
+
+
+Love gives. It gives freely and without stint, yet always thoughtfully.
+It gives itself out, its very life. This is its life, to give its life.
+It lives most by giving most. So it comes into fullness of life.
+
+So it _gets_. A thing of life, in its own image, comes walking eagerly
+with outstretched arms to its embrace. It gives that it may get. Yet the
+giving is the greater. It brings most joy.
+
+This is the very essence of life, this giving creating spirit. It is
+everywhere, in lower life and higher and highest, wherever the touch of
+God has come. The sun gives itself out in life and light and warmth. And
+out to greet it comes a bit of itself--the fine form and sweet fragrance
+of the rose, the tender blade of grass, the unfolding green of the leaf,
+the wealth of the soil, the song of the bird and the grateful answer of
+all nature.
+
+The hen sits long patient days on her nest. And forth comes cheeping
+life in her own image, answering the call of her mothering spirit. The
+mother-bird in the nest in the crotch of the tree gives her life day by
+day in brooding love. And her wee nestling offspring, in her own image,
+answers with glad increase of strength and growth.
+
+Father and mother of our human kind give of their very life that new
+life may come. And under the overshadowing touch of an unseen Presence
+comes a new life made in their image, and in His who broods unseen over
+all three. And over the life wrecked by sin broods the Spirit of God.
+And out through the doorway of an opening will, comes a new creature of
+winsome life in the very image of that brooding Spirit of God.
+
+This is the holy commonplace of all life. It is the touch of God. It is
+everywhere about us, and beneath and above. The father-mother Spirit of
+God broods over all our common life. And when things go wrong, He broods
+a bit closer and tenderer. He meets every need of the life He has
+created. And He meets it in the same way, by giving Himself.
+
+And there's always the response. The fragrance of the rose answers the
+sun. The pipped shell brings the longed-for answer to the gladdened
+mother-bird. The ever wondrous babe-eyes give unspeakable answer to the
+yearning of father and mother heart. The heart of man leaps at the call
+of his God.
+
+This makes quite clear the wondrous response men gave Jesus when He
+walked among us. Jesus was God coming a bit closer in His brooding love
+to mend a break and restore a blurred image. And men answered Him. They
+couldn't help it. How they came! They didn't understand Him, but they
+felt Him. They couldn't resist the tender, tremendous pull upon their
+hearts of His mere presence.
+
+And Jesus drew man into the closest touch of intimate friendship. The
+long-range way of doing things never suited Him. And it doesn't. He
+didn't keep man at arm's length. And He doesn't. And then because they
+were friends, He and they, they were eager to serve, and willing even to
+suffer, to walk a red-marked roadway for Him they loved.
+
+
+
+The Gospel According to--You.
+
+
+Among all those who felt and answered the call of Jesus was one called
+John, John the disciple. Jesus drew John close. John came close. John
+lived close. John came early and he stayed late. He stayed to the very
+end, into the evening glow of life. And all his long life he was under
+the tender holy spell of Jesus' presence. He was swayed by the
+Jesus-passion. Always burning, he was yet never consumed; only the alloy
+burned up and burned out, himself refined to the quality of life called
+eternal.
+
+Then John came to the end of his long life. And he knew he would be
+slipping the tether of life and going out and up and in to the real
+thing of life. And I think John was a bit troubled. Not because he was
+going to die. This never troubles the man who knows Jesus. The
+Jesus-touch overcomes the natural twinges of death. But he was troubled
+a bit in spirit for a little by the thought that he would not be on
+earth any longer to talk to people about Jesus. And to John this was the
+one thing worth while. This was the life-passion.
+
+And so I think John prayed about it a bit. For this is what he did. He
+said to himself, "I will write a book. I'll make it a little book, so
+busy people can quickly read it. I'll pick out the simplest words I know
+so common folks everywhere that don't have dictionaries can easily
+understand. And I'll make them into the shortest simplest sentences I
+can so they can quickly get my story of Jesus." And so John wrote his
+little book. And we call it the story of Jesus according to John, or, as
+we commonly say the Gospel--the God-story--according to John.
+
+And all this is a simple bit of a parable. It is a parable in action.
+Jesus is brooding over us, giving Himself, warmly wooing us. He woos us
+into personal friendship with Himself. And then He asks that each of us
+shall write a gospel. This is the Gospel according to John; and these
+others according to Luke and Mark and Matthew. He means that there shall
+be the gospel according to--_you_. What is your name? put it in there.
+Then you get the Master's plan. There is to be the gospel according to
+Charles and Robert and George, and Mary and Elizabeth and Margaret.
+
+And you say, "Write a gospel? I couldn't do that. You don't mean that.
+That's just a bit of preaching." No, it isn't preaching. It's so. I do
+not mean to write with a common pen of steel or gold; nor on just common
+paper of rags or wood-pulp. But I do mean--_He_ means--that you shall
+write with the pen of your daily life. And that you shall write on the
+paper of the lives of those you're touching and living with every day.
+
+Clearly, He meant, and He means, that you and I shall live such simple
+unselfish lovable Jesus-touched lives, in just the daily commonplace
+round of life, that those we live with shall know the whole story of
+Jesus' love and life; His love burned out for us till there were no
+ashes, and His life poured out for us till not a red drop was left
+unspilled.
+
+Are _you_ writing _your_ gospel? Is your life spelling out this simple
+wondrous God-story? I can find out, though, of course, I shall not. What
+I mean is this,--_the crowd knows._ The folks that touch you every day,
+they know. This old Bible was never printed so much as to-day, nor
+issued more numerously. And--thoughtfully--it was never read _less_ by
+the common crowd on the common street of life than to-day.
+
+That doesn't mean that the crowd doesn't read what it supposes to be
+religious literature. It does. I wish we church folk read our religious
+literature as faithfully as this crowd I speak of reads its. It is
+reading _the gospel according to you,_ and reading it daily, and
+closely, and faithfully, and remembering what it reads, and being shaped
+by it.
+
+This Bible I have here is bound in--I think it is called sealskin. I
+tried to get the best wearing binding I could. But I've discovered that
+there's a better binding than this. The best binding for the Gospel is
+shoe-leather. The old Gospel of the Son of God is at its best as it is
+being tramped out on the common street of life. Its truths stand out
+clearest as they're walked out. Its love comes warmest, its power is
+most resistless as it comes to you in the common give-and-take of daily
+touch in home and shop and street. Are you writing your copy of the
+Gospel?
+
+You know that sometimes scholars have found some precious manuscripts in
+old monasteries. They have gone into some old, grey, stone monkery in
+the Near East, and they have run across old manuscripts hidden away in
+some dark cell, covered with dust and with rubbish, perhaps. With much
+tact and diplomacy they have at length managed to get possession of the
+coveted manuscript. And they have been fairly delighted to find that
+they have gotten hold of a remnant, a very precious remnant, of one of
+these Gospels. In just this way much invaluable light has been gotten
+that made possible these precious revised versions.
+
+I wonder if _your_ gospel--the one you're writing with your life--is
+_just a remnant,_ a ragged remnant. And perhaps there's a good bit of
+dusting necessary, and removing of rubbish, to get even at what there is
+there. And some of the shy hungry hearts that touch you and me need to
+use quite a bit of unconscious diplomacy perhaps to get even as much as
+they do. I wonder. The crowd knows. It could throw a good bit of light
+here. How much of this old Jesus-story _are_ you really _living!_
+
+Of course, there's a special touch of inspiration in these four Gospels.
+The Holy Spirit brooded over these men in a special way as they wrote.
+That is true. These are the standard Gospels. We would never know the
+blessed story but for these four Spirit-breathed little books. But it is
+also true that that same Holy Spirit will guide you in the writing of
+your version of the Gospel.
+
+These four Gospels are different from each other. The colouring of
+Luke's warm personality, and of his physician habit of thought is in his
+Gospel very plainly. And so it is with each one of these Gospels. And,
+even so, there will be the colouring of your personality, your habit of
+thought, the distinct tinge of the experience you have been through, in
+the gospel you write with the pen of your life, and bind up in the
+shoe-leather of your daily round.
+
+But through all of this there will be the simple, subtle, but very real,
+atmosphere of the Holy Spirit, helping you make the story plain and
+full, and helping people to understand that story as it is _lived_, as
+they never can simply by hearing it told with tongues or read through
+eyes.
+
+Are you writing your gospel? Is your daily life spelling out the life
+and love of Jesus, that life that was poured out till none was left,
+that love that was burned out till even the ashes were burned up, too?
+This is the Master's plan. And practically it is the crowd's only
+chance.
+
+
+
+God in Human Garb.
+
+
+Now I want to have you turn with me to the opening lines of John's
+Gospel. There are not many of these opening lines. The whole story is a
+short one. These lines at the beginning are like an etching, there are
+the fewest touches of pen on paper, of black ink on white surface. But
+the few lines are put in so simply and skilfully that they make an
+exquisite picture. It's the picture of _God coming in human garb as a
+wooing Lover._
+
+I think it might be best perhaps if I might simply give you _a sort of
+free reading_ of these opening lines, with a word of comment or
+illustration to try to make the meaning simpler. It will be a putting of
+John's words into the simple every-day colloquial speech that we
+English-speaking people use. John used very simple language in his own
+telling of the story in his mother-tongue. And it may help if we try to
+do the same.
+
+You will quickly see how very simple this free translation will be. Yet,
+let me say, that though homely and simple it will be strictly accurate
+to what John is thinking and saying in his own native speech. I mean of
+course, so far as I can find out just what he is thinking and saying.
+
+Let us turn then to John's Gospel, at its beginning. And it will help
+very much if we keep our Bibles open as we talk and read together.
+
+Listen: _in the beginning there was a wondrous One_. He was the mind of
+God thinking out to man. He was the heart of God throbbing love out to
+man's heart. He was the face of God looking into man's face. He was the
+voice of God, soft and low, clear and distinct, speaking into man's
+ears. He was the hand of God, strong and tender, reaching down to take
+man by the hand and lead him back to the old trysting-place under the
+tree of life, down by the river of water of life.
+
+He was the person of God wearing a human coat and human shoes,
+hand-pegged, walking in freely amongst us that we might get our tangled
+up ideas about God and ourselves and about life untangled, straightened
+out. He was God Himself wrapped up in human form coming close that we
+might get acquainted with Him all over again.
+
+This is part of the meaning of the little five-lettered word in his own
+tongue that John chooses and uses, at the first here, as a new name for
+Him who was commonly called Jesus. It was because of our ears that he
+used the new word. If he had said "Jesus" at once, they would have said
+"Oh! yes, we know about Him." And at once their ears would have gone
+shut to the thing that John is saying.
+
+For they didn't know. And we don't. We know _words_. The thing, the real
+thing, we know so little. So John uses a new word at the first, and so
+floods in new light. And then we come to see whom he is talking about.
+It's a bit of the diplomacy of God so as to get in through dulled ears
+and truth-hardened minds down in to the heart.
+
+Nature always seems eager to meet a defect. It seems to hurry eagerly
+forward to overcome defects and difficulties. The blind man has more
+acute hearing and a more delicate sense of feel. The deaf man's eyes
+grow quicker to watch faces and movements and so learn what his ears
+fail to tell him. The lame man leans more on other muscles, and they
+answer with greater strength to meet the defect of the weaker muscles.
+
+The bat has shunned the light so long through so many bat-generations
+that it has become blind, but it has remarkable ears, and nature has
+grown for it an abnormal sense of touch, and a peculiar sensitiveness
+even where there is no contact, so that it avoids obstacles in flying
+with a skill that seems uncanny, incredulous.
+
+I remember in Cincinnati one night, sitting on the platform of a public
+meeting by the side of a widely known Christian worker and speaker who
+was blind. As various men spoke he quietly made brief comments to me,--"
+_He_ doesn't strike fire." And then, "_He_ doesn't touch them." And
+then, "Ah! _he's_ got them; that's it; now they're burning." And it was
+exactly so as he said. I sat fascinated as I watched the crowd and heard
+his comments. The sense of discerning what was going on in another way
+than by sight had been grown in him by the very necessity of his
+blindness. Defect in one sense was overcome by nature, by increase in
+another sense.
+
+When Queen Victoria was in residence in Scotland at Balmoral it was her
+kindly custom to present the various clergymen who preached in the
+Castle chapel with a photograph marked with her autograph. When George
+Matheson, the famous blind preacher, came she showed the fine thoughtful
+tact for which she was famous. Clearly an autographed photograph would
+not mean much in itself to a blind man. So the Queen had a miniature
+bust-statue made and presented to him as her acknowledgment of his
+service. And so where his eyes failed to let him see, his sense of touch
+would carry to his mind and heart the fine features of the gracious
+sovereign he was so glad to serve.
+
+Jesus was God coming in such a way that we could know Him _by the feel_.
+We had gone blind to His face. We couldn't read His signature plainly
+autographed by His own hand on the blue above and the brown below. But
+when Jesus came _men knew God by the feel_. They didn't understand
+Jesus. But the sore hungry crowds reached out groping trembling fingers,
+and they knew Him. They began to get acquainted with their gracious
+Sovereign.
+
+All this gives the simple clue to this word "_Word_" which John uses as
+a new name for Jesus. Man had grown deaf to the music of God's voice,
+blind to the beauty of His face, slow-hearted to the pleading of His
+presence. His hand was touching us but we didn't feel it. So He came in
+a new way, in a very homely close-up way and walked down our street into
+our own doors that we might be caught by the beauty of His face, and
+thrilled by the music of His voice, and thralled by the spell of His
+presence.
+
+
+
+God at His Best.
+
+
+John goes on: _and this wondrous One was with God_. There were two of
+them. And the two were together. They were companions, they were
+friends, fellows together. _And this One was God_. Each was the same as
+the other. _This is the same One who was in the later creative beginning
+with God. It was through this One that all things were made. And, of all
+things that have been made, not any thing was made without Him_.
+
+You remember that John's Gospel and Genesis begin in the same way,--"in
+the beginning." But John's "in the beginning," the first one, is not the
+same as the Genesis "in the beginning." John's is the beginning before
+there was any beginning. It is the beginning before they had begun
+making calendars on the earth, because there wasn't any earth yet to
+make calendars on. Then this second time the phrase is used John comes
+to the later creative beginning with which Genesis opens. This is what
+John is saying here.
+
+"_In Him was life_." Out of Him came life. Out of Him comes life. There
+was no life, there is none, except what was in this One, and what came,
+and comes out from Him all the time. How patient God is! There walks a
+man down the street. He leaves God out of his life. He may remember Him
+so far as to use His name blasphemously to punctuate and emphasize what
+he is saying. Yonder walks a woman in the shadow of the street at night.
+And her whole life is spent walking in the dark shadow of the street of
+life. And her whole life is a blasphemy against her personality, and
+against the God who gave her that precious sacred personality.
+
+Take these two as extreme illustrations. There is life there; life of
+the body, of the mind, life of the human spirit. Listen softly, all the
+life there is there, is coming out all the time from this One of whom
+John is talking. It is not given once as a thing to be taken and stored.
+It is _being_ given. It is coming constantly with each breath, from this
+wondrous One. This is what John is saying here.
+
+How _patient_ God is! Only we don't know what patience is. We know the
+word, the label put on the outside. We don't know the thing, except
+sometimes in very smallest part. For patience is love at its best.
+Patience is God at His strongest and tenderest and best.
+
+I think likely when we get up yonder, we'll stop one another on the
+golden streets. There'll be a hand put out, gripping the other hard. And
+we'll look into each other's eyes with our eyes big. And we'll say with
+breaking voices, "How _patient_ God was with us down there on the earth,
+down there in London and New York."
+
+In Him was life. Out of His hand and heart is coming to us all the time
+all we are and all we have. We may leave God practically out. So many of
+us do. But He never leaves us out. The creating, sustaining touch of His
+Hand is ever upon each of us, upon all the world.
+
+Though He cannot do all for us He would except as we gladly come and let
+Him. What He is giving us is so _much_. It's our _all_. Yet it is the
+smaller part. There's the fuller part. This is the whole drive of John's
+story, this fuller part. Out of Him Jesus, into us will come the newer,
+the better, the abundant quality of life, if He may have His way.
+
+And John adds,--"_and the life was the light of men."_ He was what we
+_have_. He gives Himself; not things, but a person. With God everything
+is _personal_. We men go to the impersonal so much, or we try to. We do
+our best at it. We have a great genius for organization, especially in
+this western half of the earth.
+
+As I came back from a four years' absence from my own country, I was
+instantly conscious of a change. Either my ears were changed or things
+about me were. I think likely both. But the wheels were going faster
+than ever. There were more wheels, and their whir seemed never out of
+ear-shot. Commercial wheels, and educational, philanthropic and
+religious, political and humanitarian, thicker and faster than ever,
+driving all day, and with almost no night there.
+
+And the whole attempt is to make the machine do the thing with as little
+dependence as possible on the human element, even though the human
+element was never emphasized more. Contradictory? Yet there it is. We
+men go to the _im_personal. Yet deep down in our hearts we hunger for
+the human touch, the warm personal touch. This after all is _the_ thing.
+We all feel that. Yet the whole crowding of life's action is to crowd it
+out.
+
+But with God everything is personal. The life is the light of men. What
+He is in Himself--that is what He gives. And this is all the light and
+life we ever have. Men make botany. God makes flowers breathing their
+freshening fragrance noiselessly up into your face. Man makes astronomy.
+God makes the stars, shaking their firelight out of the blue down into
+your wondering eyes on a clear moonless night. Man makes theology. And
+theology has its place, when it's kept in its place. _God gives us
+Jesus_.
+
+I don't know much about botany. My knowledge of astronomy is very
+limited. And the more I read of theology, whether Western or Eastern,
+Latin Church or Greek, the first Seven Councils or the later ones, the
+more I stand perplexed. It's a thing fearsomely and wonderfully
+manufactured, this theology. But I frankly confess to a great fondness
+for flowers, and for stars, and a love for Jesus that deepens ever more
+in reverential awe and in tenderness and grateful devotion. The life was
+the light of men. He Himself is all that we have. We go to _things_. We
+reckon worth and wealth by things. He gives _Himself_. And He asks, not
+_things_, but one's self.
+
+
+
+Packing Most in Least.
+
+
+And John goes quietly on with his great simple story: "_and the light
+shineth in the darkness_," John has a way of packing much in little.
+Here he packs four thousand years into three English letters. For he has
+been back in that creative Genesis week. And now with one long stride he
+puts his foot down in the days when Jesus walks among us as a man. Forty
+centuries, by the common reckoning, packed into three letters e-t-h.
+Rather a skilful bit of packing that. Yet it is not unusual. It is
+characteristic both of John and of the One that guides John's pen. When
+He is allowed to have free sway the Holy Spirit packs much in little.
+
+That rugged old Hebrew prophet of fire and storm, Elijah, standing in
+the grey dawn, in the mouth of an Arabian cave, had the whole of a new
+God--a God of tender gentle love--packed into an exquisite sound of
+gentle stillness, that smote so subtly on his ear, and completely melted
+and changed this man of rock and thunder. It's a new man that turns his
+face north again. The new God that had compacted Himself anew inside the
+ruggedly faithful old man is revealed in the prophet's successor. This
+is the new spirit, so unlike the old Elijah, that comes as a birth-right
+heritage upon young Elisha. Great packing work that.
+
+That fine-grained young university fellow on the Damascus road, driving
+hard in pursuit of his earnest purpose, had the whole of a God, a new
+God to him, packed into a single flash of blinding light out of the
+upper blue. He had the whole of a new plan, an utterly changed plan for
+his life, packed into a single sentence spoken into his amazed ears as
+he lies in the dust.
+
+And if this Holy Spirit may have His way--a big if? Yes: yet not too big
+to be gotten rid of at once: God puts in the if's, that we may get the
+strength of choosing. We put them out, _if_ we do. _If_ He may have His
+way He'll pack--listen quietly, with your heart--He'll pack _the whole
+of a Jesus_ inside you and me. Much in little! Most in least! And the
+more we let Him in, the bigger that "most" prints itself to our eyes,
+and the more that "least" dwindles down to the disappearing point.
+
+God gives us His own self in Jesus. Jesus comes to live inside of us. He
+doesn't give us things, but Himself. We talk about salvation. There's
+something better--_a Saviour_. We talk about help in trouble. There's
+something immensely more--_a Friend_, alongside, close up. We talk about
+healing--sometimes, not so much these days; the subject is so much
+confused. There's something much better--a _Healer_, living within,
+whose presence means healing and health for body and spirit.
+
+Then John says, "the light shineth _in the darkness_." This is God's way
+of treating darkness. There are two ways of treating darkness, man's and
+God's. Man's way is to attack the darkness. Suppose this hall where we
+are were quite dark, all shuttered up, and suppose we were new on the
+earth, and not familiar with darkness. We want to hold a meeting. But
+how shall we get rid of this strange darkness that has come down over
+everything? Let's each of us get a bucket or pail or basin, and take
+some of the darkness out. So we'll get rid of it, and its inconvenience.
+
+And if the suggestion were made seriously there might be talk of putting
+the suggestor in a certain sort of institution for the safety of the
+community. Yet this is the way we go at the other darkness, the worse
+moral darkness.
+
+_God's way_ is quite different; indeed just the exact reverse _let the
+light shine._ The darkness can't stand the light. If the hall _were_
+quite dark, and I scratched only a parlour-match, instantly as the
+little flame broke out of the end of the stick some of the darkness
+would go. It's surprising how much would go, and how quickly. The
+darkness can't stand the light. It flees like a hunted hare before a
+pack of hounds.
+
+There may be times when action must betaken by a community against
+certain forms of evil, so damnable, and so strongly entrenched, and so
+threatening to the purity of home and young and of all. But note keenly
+that this is _incidental_. It is immensely important at times, but it is
+distinctly _secondary._ The great simple plan of God is this: _let the
+light shine_. The darkness flees like a whipped cur, tail tightly curled
+down and in, before the real thing of light.
+
+Let me ask you a question. Come up a bit closer and listen quietly, for
+this is tremendously serious. And it's the quietest spoken word that
+reaches the inner cockles of the heart. Listen: is it a bit dark down
+where you live? Morally dark? Spiritually? How about that? in commercial
+circles and social and fraternal, in church and home and city and
+neighbourhood. Is it a bit dark? Or, have I found the Garden of Eden at
+last before the serpent entered?
+
+Because if it be a bit dark, softly, please, let me say it very quietly,
+for it may sound critical, and I would not have that for anything. We
+are talking only to help. Though sometimes the truth itself does have a
+merciless edge. If it be a bit dark does it not suggest that _the light
+has not been shining as it was meant to_? For where the light shines the
+darkness goes.
+
+For, you see, this is still God's plan for treating darkness. It is
+meant to be true to-day of each of us,--"_the light shineth in the
+darkness_." Of course, _we_ are not the light. He is the Light. But we
+are the light-holders. I carry the Light of the world around inside of
+me. And so do you, _if you do_. It is not because of the "me," of
+course, but because of the great patience and faithfulness of Him who is
+the Light. A very rickety cheap lantern may carry a clear light, and the
+man in the ditch find good footing in the road again.
+
+You and I are meant to be the human lanterns carrying the Light, and
+letting it shine clearly fully out. And you know when some one else is
+providing the light the chief thing about the lantern is that the glass
+of the lantern be kept dean and clear so the light within can get freely
+out. The great thing is that _we shall live clean transparent lives_ so
+the Light within may shine clearly out. We may live unselfish clean
+Christly lives, by His great grace. And through that kind of lives, the
+Light itself shines out, and shines out most, and most clearly.
+
+Over at the mouth of the Hudson, where I call it home, there are some
+strange things seen. Sometimes the glass of this human lantern gets
+smoky, badly smoked. And sometimes it even gets cobwebby, rather thickly
+covered up. And even this has been known to happen up there,--it'll seem
+very strange to you people doubtless--_this_; they write finely phrased
+essays on the delicate shading of grey in the smoke on the glass of the
+human lantern.
+
+They meet together and listen to essays, in rarely polished English, on
+the exquisite lace-like tracery of the cobwebs on the glass of the human
+lantern. But look! Hold your heart still and look! There's the crowd in
+the road in the dark, struggling, jostling, stumbling, and falling into
+the ditch at the side of the road, ditched and badly mired, because the
+light hasn't gotten to them. The Light's there. It's burning itself out
+in passionate eagerness to help. But the human lanterns are in bad
+shape.
+
+"Rhetoric!" do you say? I wish it were. I wish with my heart it were.
+Look at the crowds for yourself. There they go down the street,
+pell-mell, bewildered, blinded, some of them by will-o'-the-wisp lights,
+ditched and mired many of them. The thing is only too terribly true.
+
+Our Lord's great plan, bearing the stamp of its divinity in its sheer
+human simplicity, is this: we who know Jesus are to _live Him_. We're to
+let _the whole of a Jesus_, crucified, risen, living, shine out of _the
+whole of our lives_.
+
+Is it a bit dark down where you are? _Let the Light shine_. Let the
+clear sweet steady Jesus-light shine out through your true clean quiet
+Jesus-swayed and Jesus-controlled life. Then the darkness must go. It
+can't stand the Light. It can't withstand the purity and insistence of
+its clear steady shining. And the darkness _will_ go: slowly,
+reluctantly, angrily, doggedly, making hideous growling noises
+sometimes, raising the dust sometimes, but it will go. It must go before
+the Light. The Light's resistless. This is our Lord's wondrous plan
+_through_ His own, and His irresistible plan _for_ the crowd, and His
+plan against the prince of darkness.
+
+
+
+The Heart-road to the Head.
+
+
+Then John goes on to say, "_the darkness apprehended it not_." The old
+common version says "comprehended"; the revisions, both English and
+American, say "apprehended." Both are rather large words, larger in
+English than John would use. John loved to use simple talk. Yet there's
+help even in these English words. Comprehend is a mental word. It means
+to take hold of with your mind; to understand. Apprehend is a physical
+word. It means to take hold of with your hand.
+
+You can't _comprehend_ Jesus. That is just the simple plain fact. You
+may have a fine mind. It may be well schooled and trained. You may have
+dug into all the books on the subject, English and German and the few
+French. You may have spent a lifetime at it. But at the end there is
+immensely more of Jesus that you don't understand than the part that you
+do understand. You've touched the smaller part only, just the edges. You
+cannot take Jesus in with your mind simply. The one is too big and the
+other too limited for that particular process.
+
+But, listen with your heart, you can _apprehend_ Him. You can _take
+hold_ of Him. There isn't one of us here, however poorly equipped
+mentally and in training, and too busy with life's common duties to get
+much time for reading, not one of us, who may not reach out your hand,
+the hand of your heart, the hand of your life, the hand of your simple
+childlike trust--if you're great enough in simplicity to be childlike,
+to be natural, not one of us, but may reach out the hand and _take in
+all there is of Jesus_.
+
+And the striking thing to mark is this, that we don't really begin to
+comprehend until we apprehend. Only as we take Him into heart and life
+_can_ we really understand. It's as if the heat in the heart made by His
+presence there loosens up the grey juices of your brain, and it begins
+to work freely and clearly.
+
+Of course, this is a commonplace in the educational world. It is well
+understood there that no student does his best work, no matter what
+that work may be, in science or philosophy or in mathematics or in
+laboratorial research, his mind cannot do its best, or be at its best,
+until his heart has been kindled by some noble passion. The key to the
+life is in the heart, that is the emotions and purposes tied together.
+The approach to the mind is through the heart. The fire of pure emotion
+and of noble purpose burning together, works out _through_ the mind
+_into_ the life. This is nature's order.
+
+But what John is saying here, put into as simple language as he would
+use, is this: "_the darkness wouldn't let the light in, and couldn't
+shut it out, and couldn't dull the brightness of its shining_." It
+tried. It tried first at Bethlehem. The first spilling of blood came
+there. There was the shedding of blood at both ends of Jesus' career,
+and innocent blood each time. It tried at the Nazareth precipice, and in
+the spirit-racking wilderness. It tried by stones, then in Gethsemane,
+then at Calvary.
+
+And there it seemed to have succeeded. At last the light was shut in and
+down; the door was shut and barred and bolted. And I suppose there was
+great glee in the headquarters of darkness. But the Third Morning came.
+And the bars of darkness were broken, as a woman breaks the
+sewing-cotton at the end of the seam. The Light could not be held down
+by darkness. It broke out more brightly than ever. The darkness couldn't
+shut the light out. And it can't.
+
+_Let the light shine._ Let it shine out through the clear clean glass
+of an unselfish, Jesus-cleansed Jesus-fired life lived for Him in the
+commonplace round, and the shut-away corner. _And the darkness will go_.
+The darkness cannot shut out the light, nor keep it down, nor resist the
+gentle resistless power of its soft clear flooding. Let the Light shine
+down in that corner where you are. And the darkness, darkness that can
+be felt, and _is_ felt so sorely deep down in your spirit, in its
+uncanny Egyptian blackness, that darkness will break, and more, clear,
+and go, go, go, till it's clear gone.
+
+And so ends John's first great paragraph. It is so tremendous in its
+simplicity that, Greek-like, men stumble over its simple tremendousness.
+Away back in the beginning God revealed Himself in making a home for
+man, and in bringing the man, made in His own image, to his home. And
+then when the damp unwholesome darkness came stealing in swamping the
+home and man He came Himself, flooding in the soft clear pure light of
+His presence, to free man from the darkness and woo him out into the
+light.
+
+
+
+Tarshish or Nineveh?
+
+
+Then John goes on into his second paragraph. "_There came a man, sent
+from God, whose name was John_." Why? Because man was in the dark. He
+sent a man to help a man. He used a man to reach a man. He always does.
+Run clear through this old Book of God, and then clear through that
+other Book of God--the book of life, and note that this is God's habit.
+He, Himself, uses the path He had made for human feet. With greatest
+reverence let it be said that God _must_ use a human pathway for His
+feet.
+
+Even when He would redeem a world He came, He must needs come, as a Man,
+one of ourselves. He touches men through men. The pathway of His helping
+feet is always a common human pathway. And, will you mark keenly that
+_the highest level any life ever reaches_, or _can_ reach, is this: _to
+be a pathway for the feet of a wooing winning God_.
+
+And this is still true. It is meant to be true to-day that there came a
+man, sent from God, whose name is--_your name_. You put in your own name
+in that sentence, then you get God's plan for you. For as surely as this
+particular John of the desert and of the plain living, and the burning
+speech, was sent by God, so surely is every man of us a man sent by God
+on some particular errand. And the greatest achievement of life is to
+find and fit into the plan of God for one's life. This is the only great
+thing one can do. Anything else is merely _labelled_ "great." And that
+label washes off. This is the one thing worth while.
+
+The bother is we don't always get the verbs, the action words, of that
+sentence straight. John was a man _sent_ from God. And he _came_. All
+men are sent But they don't all come, some _go_; go their own way. There
+was a man sent from God whose name was Jonah. But he didn't come. He
+went. He was sent to Nineveh on the extreme east. He went towards
+Tarshish on the extreme west; just the opposite direction. Every man is
+headed either for Nineveh or Tarshish, God's way or his own. Which way
+are you headed?
+
+Some of us go to Tarshish _religiously_. We go our own way, and sing
+hymns and pray, to make it seem right and keep from hearing the inner
+voice. We hold meetings at the boat-wharf, while waiting for the
+Tarshish ship to lift anchor. We have services in the steerage and
+second-class and distribute tracts and New Testaments; but all the time
+we're headed for Tarshish; our way, not God's. It won't do simply to do
+good. We must do God's will. Find that and fit into it.
+
+The meetings and tracts are only good but they ought to be on the train
+to Nineveh, and in Nineveh where God's sent you. Are you berthed on the
+boat for Tarshish? or have you a seat engaged on the train for Nineveh?
+going your own way? or God's? John was _sent_ and he _came_. You and I
+are sent. Are we coming or going? coming God's way? or, going our own?
+
+
+
+Living Martyrs.
+
+
+This true-hearted burning man of the deserts _came for a witness_. Here
+we strike one of John's great words. You remember the three things that
+_witness_ means? that you know something; that you tell what you know;
+and that you tell it most with your life. And telling it _with your
+life_ means, not only by the way you live, but, too, even though the
+telling of it _may cost you your life_. It came to mean all of that with
+this witness.
+
+It came to mean that with a new fullness of meaning, a peculiar
+significance, to _the great Witness_, of whom John told. This was the
+very throbbing heart of the wooing errand. This explains the tenderness
+and tenacity of the Lover in His wooing in the midst of intensest
+opposition, and in spite of it.
+
+The opposition brought about the terrific grouping of circumstances
+which the great Lover-witness used as the tremendous climax of both
+wooing and witnessing. No one doubts the reality of Jesus' witness to
+the Father's love before men. And no one, who has had any touch at all
+with Him, doubts the tremendous pull upon one's heart of such a wooing
+appeal as that Calvary climax of witnessing made, and makes.
+
+And this, mark it keenly, is still the plan. "The-same-came-for-witness"
+is meant to be true of each follower of the Christ. This is to be the
+dominant underchording of all our lives. This is to be the never-absent
+motive gripping us, and our possessions and our plans. The rest is
+incidental in a true life.
+
+It may be a "rest" that takes most of the waking hours with most of us,
+most of our strength and thought. But there's an undercurrent in every
+life. And the undercurrent is the controlling current. It makes us what
+we really are. It may be quite different from the upper current
+controlled by the outer necessities of circumstances. And with the true
+Jesus-man _this_ is the undercurrent, this thing of witnessing.
+
+Do you know something of Jesus? Do you know the cleansing of His blood?
+Do you know the music of His peace in your heart? Do you know a bit of
+the subtle fragrance of His presence? Do you know the power of His Name
+when temptations come, when the road gets slippery, and your feet go out
+from under you--almost. Then His Name, its power, and you hold steady.
+Do you know something about such things?
+
+Then _tell_ it. This is the plan--_telling_. It's a Gospel of _telling_.
+Tell it with your lips tactfully, gently, boldly, earnestly. But tell it
+far more, and most with your life. Let what you are, when you're not
+thinking about this sort of thing, let that tell it. That's the greatest
+telling, the best.
+
+And, softly, now, when you get to the end of telling what you know,
+listen quietly, don't go to digging into books for something to tell
+your class or the meeting or the crowd. Don't do that. Books have their
+place, good books, but it's always a sharply secondary place, or third,
+or lower down yet. Poor crowd that must be fed on retailed books worked
+over! Don't do that. _Know more._ Know Jesus better. Trust Him more
+fully. Risk more on following where He clearly leads. Then you can tell
+more and better.
+
+Sometimes I'm asked, "How can I have more faith?" Well, not by thinking
+about your faith. Not by books or definitions chiefly, however they may
+help some. I can tell you how: _Follow where the Master's quiet voice is
+clearly calling._ Go where it is plain to you that that pierced hand is
+leading.
+
+"Ah! but the way is a bit narrow," you think. "And it's steep. There are
+sharp-edged stones under foot. And those bushes are growing rank on both
+sides narrowing the path. And thorns scratch and hurt and sting. This
+other road where I am now--this is a good Christian road. My Christian
+brothers are here. I'd rather stay here."
+
+And so you _stay_. You don't _say_ "no" to the calling voice. You simply
+_act_ "no." No wonder you get confused and tangled. It's only in the
+path of following clear leading that there comes sweetest peace, with no
+nagging doubts and mental confusion. There only will you have more
+faith, know more of Him, touch with whom is the realest faith. And so
+only will the witness be told out to the crowd on the street of your
+life, of the power and satisfying peace of this Jesus.
+
+This is the witnessing we're sent to do. And the crowds crowd to listen,
+when it's given. This is the way _the_ Witness did. He followed the
+clear Father-voice, though the road led straight across the regular
+roads through thorn hedges and thick underbrush. Should not the servant
+tread it still?
+
+The word that John uses here underneath our English word _witness_ is
+the word from which our English word _martyr_ comes. And martyr has
+come to mean one who gives his life clear out in a violent way for the
+truth he believes. But, do you know, that is easy. "Easy?" You say,
+"Surely not, you're certainly wrong there." No, you are right. It is not
+easy. To face a storm of lead, or feel the sharp-edged blade, or yield
+to the eating flame,--that is never easy.
+
+But this is what I mean. There's the heroic in it, and that helps. You
+brace yourself for it. The terrible crisis comes. You pull together and
+pray and resolutely, desperately, face it. A little while, and it's
+over. You've been true in the sharp crisis. You have taken a place with
+the noble army of martyrs. And we who hear of it have a martyr's halo
+about your head.
+
+But there's something immensely harder to do. Without making a whit less
+than it is the splendid courage of martyrdom, there's something that
+takes immensely more courage, and a deeper longer-seasoned heroism, and
+that is to be a _living_ martyr, to bear the simple true witness
+tactfully but clearly, when it takes the very life of your life to do
+it, though it doesn't take your bodily life in a violent way.
+
+You know they don't martyr people these days for their Christian faith.
+At least not in the western half of the earth, the Christian hemisphere.
+No, that's quite behind the calendar. That's rather crude, quite behind
+the cultured advanced Christian progress of _our_ day. Our Christian
+civilization has gone long strides beyond that. We have grown much more
+refined. Now we kill them _socially_. Many a one who would live true to
+the Jesus-ideals in daily life in a simple sane way finds certain social
+doors shut and carefully barred.
+
+We kill them _commercially_ now. The man who will quietly hew to the
+Jesus-line in business is quite apt to find his income reduced. The bulk
+of business shrinks. The thermometer is run down below the living point.
+We kill men by _frost_ now. The blockade system is skilfully used;
+isolation and insulation from certain circles. We are much more refined.
+
+The great need to-day is of _living_ witnesses to the Christ in home,
+and social circle, in the street, and in the market-place.
+
+    "So he died for his faith; that is fine,
+      More than the most of us do.
+    But stay, can yon add to that line
+      That he _lived_ for it, too?
+
+    "It's easy to die. Men have died
+      For a wish or a whim--
+    From bravado or passion or pride.
+      Was it hard for him?
+
+    "But to live: every day to live out
+      All the truth that he dreamt,
+    While his friends met his conduct with doubt,
+      And the world with contempt.
+
+    "Was it thus that he plodded ahead,
+      Never turning aside?
+    Then we'll talk of the life that he led"
+      Even more than the death that he died.
+
+
+
+The Forgotten Preacher.
+
+
+With a simplicity in sticking to his main point, John goes quietly on:
+"_that he might be a witness of the light_." That's rather interesting.
+It was of the _light_ he was to bear witness; not of himself. It was not
+the technical accuracy of his work, not its scholarliness and skill that
+absorbed him, but that the _crowd got the light_. Rather striking that,
+when you break away from the atmosphere round about, and think into it a
+bit.
+
+Here's a man walking down a country road. It's a hot day. The road's
+dusty. He gets a bit weary and thirsty. He comes across a bit of a
+spring by the side of the road. Clear cool water it is. And some one has
+thoughtfully left a tin-cup on a ledge of rock near by. And the man
+gratefully drinks and goes on his way refreshed. He quite forgets the
+tin-cup.
+
+Sometimes the tin-cup seems to require much attention, up in the corner
+of the world where my tent is pitched. It has to be handled very
+carefully and considerately if one is to get what possible drops of
+water it may contain. The human tin-cup seems to bulk very big in the
+drinking process, sometimes, in my corner of the planet. It is
+silver-plated sometimes; just common tin under the plating. There's some
+fine engraving on the silver-plating, noble sentiment, deftly expressed,
+and done in the engraver's best style. But the water is apt to be
+scanty, the drops rather few, in this sort of tin-cup. It's a bit
+droughty.
+
+And sometimes even this has been known to occur: they have associations
+of these human tin-cups for self-admiration and other cultural purposes.
+And they have highly satisfactory meetings. But meanwhile, ah! look!
+hold still your heart, and look here. There's the crowd on the street,
+hot dusty street, exhausted, actually fainting for want of water, just
+good plain water of life. But there's none to be had; only tin-cups!
+John was eager to have men get a good drink. He was content as he
+watched them drink, and their eyes lighten. He was discontent and
+restless with anything else or less.
+
+Do you remember the greatest compliment ever paid John, John the Herald?
+John was a great preacher. He had great drawing power. To-day we
+commonly go where people are hoping they'll stay while we talk to them.
+But John did otherwise. He went down to the Jordan bottoms, where the
+spirit ventilation was better, and called the people to him. And they
+came. They came from all over the nation, of every class. Literally
+thousands gathered to hear John. He had great drawing power.
+
+And then something happened. Here is John to-day talking earnestly to
+great crowds down by the river-road. And here he is again to-morrow; but
+where are the crowds? John has lost his crowd. Same pulpit out in the
+open air, same preacher, same simple intense message burning in his
+heart, but--no congregation! The crowd's gone. Poor John! You must feel
+pretty bad. It's hard enough to fail, but how much harder after
+succeeding. Poor John, I'm so sorry for you.
+
+But if you get close enough to John to see into his eye you quit talking
+like that. And if you get near enough to hear you find your sympathy is
+not needed. For John's eye is ablaze with a tender light, and the sound
+of an inner heart music reaches your ear as you get near him. And if you
+follow, as you instinctively do, the line of the light in his eye you
+quickly look down the road.
+
+Oh! There's John's crowd. _They're listening to Jesus._John's crowd has
+left him for his Master. And the forgotten preacher is the finest
+evidence of the faithfulness of the preacher. The crowd's getting the
+water, sweet cool refreshing water of life, direct from the fountain.
+They've clean forgotten the faithful common tin-cup. And John's so glad.
+John came that he might bear witness of _the light_. And he did. And the
+crowd heard. And they flocked to the light.
+
+Here's a man preaching. And the people are listening. The benediction is
+pronounced. And they go out. And as they move slowly out they're
+talking, always talking. We don't seem yet to have demitted our
+privilege of talking after service. Here are two. Listen to them. "Isn't
+he a great preacher? so scholarly, so eloquent, so polished; and all
+those classical allusions. I didn't understand half he said; he
+certainly is a great preacher. We're very fortunate in such a man."
+
+And the preacher, whoever he be, may know this for a bit of the
+certainty that occasionally _will_ sift in. He may be a scholar. I
+wouldn't question it. And a polished orator. I wouldn't question that.
+But in the main thing, the one thing he's for, as a _Jesus-witness_, he
+is a splendid scholarly polished failure. Men are talking about _him_.
+
+They've forgotten his Master, if indeed--ah, yes, if indeed he _have_ a
+Master! He has a _Saviour_, let us earnestly hope, and willingly
+believe. But a _Master_! One that sweeps and sways his mind and culture
+and life like the strong wind sweeps the thin young saplings in the
+storm--clearly he knows nothing of that. Men are talking of _him_.
+
+And here's another talking a bit It may be just a simple homely talk. Or
+he may likewise be scholarly and eloquent. A man should bring his best.
+The old classic is beaten oil for the lamps of the sanctuary. But
+there's the soft burning fire of the real thing in his message. And the
+people feel it. The air seems a-thrill with its quiet tensity. And the
+last amen is said. And again they go out.
+
+And here are two walking down the road together, and as they come to the
+cross-street, one says to his companion, "Excuse me, please, I have to
+go down _this_ way." And the "have-to" is the have-to of an intense
+desire to get off alone. And as he goes down the side street he's
+talking, but--to himself. Listen to him: "I'm not the man I ought to be,
+I wonder if Jesus is really like he said. I wonder if the thing's really
+so. I believe--yes, I really think I'll risk it. My life isn't like it
+should be. I'll risk trying this Jesus-way. I'll do it."
+
+The man's clean forgotten the speaker. Oh, yes, he remembers the tone of
+the voice, and the look of the face, but indistinctly, far away. He's
+face-to-face with Jesus! And the forgotten speaker is the finest
+evidence of the faithfulness of his speaking. He is holding up the
+light. And men run into the light. They've clean forgot the little tin
+candlestick, they are so taken up with the light it holds.
+
+
+
+The One Thing to Aim At.
+
+
+And John keeps driving in on the point in his mind: "_that all might
+believe through Him_"; that they might listen, stop to think, agree as
+to the thing being believable, then trust it; then trust _Him_, the
+Light, risk something, risk, _themselves_ to _Him_, then love, love with
+a passionate devotion. This was John's objective. It was the bull's-eye
+of his target never out of his keen Spirit-opened eye. Nothing else
+figured in.
+
+This is _the_ thing in all our living and serving and doing and giving,
+_that men may know Jesus_ to the trusting, risking, loving point, the
+glad point. Everything that we can bring of gold and learning and labour
+and skill is precious, it is as purest gold, _if_ it lead men into
+heart-touch with Jesus. And it clean misses the mark if it does less.
+
+Who would be content to give a Belgian or Polish starveling a bare bit
+of bread, and a lonely stick of wood, and a rag of cloth. Bite and stick
+and cloth are good, but it's a _meal_ and a _fire_, and some _clothing_,
+the man wants. And you have both ready at hand. _Things_ are good,
+provided by money and skill and research and painstaking efforts. They
+_do_ good. But it's Jesus men need. It's the warm touch that lets _Him_
+fully in with all of His human sympathy and all of His God-power, that's
+what they need.
+
+Given the sun and quickly come warmth and food and shelter, health and
+vigour and increase of life. Given Jesus, and the warm touch with Him,
+in His simple fullness, just as He is, and surely and not slowly, there
+come flooding in all the rest of an abundant life, physical and mental
+and of the spirit.
+
+John "_was not the light_." He was only the candlestick. And he was
+content to be that. He was a good candlestick. The light was held up. It
+could shine out. How grateful the crowd was. The road had been so dark.
+It is a bad thing when light and candlestick change places. The crowd
+seems to get the two confused sometimes. We get to thinking that the
+candlestick is the light, and the light is--lost sight of. We gather
+about the candlestick. It'll surely lead the way out through the dark
+night into day. It's such a good candlestick, so highly polished. And
+sometimes the human candlestick itself gets things a bit mixed. It
+thinks, then it feels, then it knows, with a peculiar quality of
+self-assertive certainty, that after all _it_ is the light that
+lighteth every one that is so blessed as to come within the radius of
+its shining. And brass does take a high polish, and makes an attractive
+appearance. It does send out a sparkle and radiance _if_ only it is
+somewhere within range of some real light, patient enough to keep on
+shining in the dark, regardless of non-appreciation or misrepresentation
+or misunderstanding.
+
+Is it any wonder the road is so full of people wandering in the night
+gathered about candlesticks? Is it surprising that the ditches are so
+full of men and candlesticks mixed up and mired up together? Yet it is
+always heart-breaking. There may be talent and training of the highest
+and best, and scholarship and culture, eloquence and skill, institutions
+and philanthropies. And there is so much of these. And these are good in
+themselves, and of priceless practical worth when seen and held in their
+right relation to _the_ thing.
+
+But it needs to be said often and earnestly: _these are not the light_.
+They are given to point men better to the Light. They're road-signs,
+index-fingers. And they are seen at their best when they point to the
+Light so clearly that the crowd quite forgets them in hastening to the
+Light they point out. They serve their true purpose in being so
+forgotten. They are still serving and serving best even while forgotten.
+
+
+
+The Real Thing of Light.
+
+
+And John goes on to intensify yet more what he is thinking and saying:
+_there was the true light_, _the real thing of light_. They were
+bothered, in John's old age when he is writing, with false lights,
+make-pretend lights, that led people astray. Every generation seems to
+have been so bothered and confused. And even our own doesn't seem to
+have entirely escaped the subtle contagion. The ground is a bit swampy
+in places, boggy.
+
+Low-lying land runs to bog and swamp. And the air gets thick with heavy
+vapours. And strange will-of-the-wisp lights form out of the foul damp
+gasses, and they flit about in the gloom this way and that. And people
+are led astray by them deeper into swamp and bog. It's surprising to
+find how many, that grow up in well-lit neighbourhoods, wander off after
+the swamp lights, and even follow them so contentedly. That's partly
+due, without doubt, to the false lights borrowing so much of the mere
+outer incidentals from the true. And they succeed in producing a make-up
+that easily deceives the unwary and untaught.
+
+There's a teaching to-day, for instance, that magnifies bodily healing.
+The name of Christ is freely used. And the old Book of God freely
+quoted. And men are really healed. There can be no question of that.
+There are sufficient facts at hand to make that incontestably clear.
+
+But bodily healing does not necessarily argue divine power. There are
+results secured through the operation of unfamiliar mental powers that
+seem miraculous. And clearly there are devilish miracles as well as
+divine. Miracles simply reveal a supernatural power, that is, a power
+above the ordinary workings of nature. Then one must apply a touchstone,
+a test, to learn what that power is.
+
+It is striking that in this teaching I speak of now there is never
+mention of the atoning blood of Christ. And this is the sure touchstone
+by which to detect the real thing of light and the make-believe. The
+outstanding thing in the life of Christ is His death, and the tremendous
+meaning which His own teaching put into that fact of His death.
+
+There is none of the red tinge to this make-believe light. It has the
+unwholesome unnatural tingeing of swamp lights. And those who are healed
+through this teaching will find themselves in a bondage the more
+terrible because so subtle. And only the power of the blood of Christ
+can ever break that bondage.
+
+There was the real thing of light. Here _is_ the real thing of light.
+There's a distinct tingeing of red in it. It's the only light. It only
+is the light. Every other is a make-pretend light, however subtle its
+imitations and reflections: it will lead only into swamp and bog and
+ditch and worse.
+
+And then John goes on to add a very simple bit that has not always been
+quite understood in its simplicity. There was the real thing of light
+_that lighteth every man that cometh into the world_. There is a little
+group of varied readings into the English here, found in the margin of
+the various revisions. But the central statement remains the same.
+Whether John is saying that the light, that lighteth every man, was now
+coming down into the world in a closer way. Or, that every man is
+lighted as _he_ comes into the world, the chief thing being told is the
+same. Every man in the world is lighted by this Light.
+
+Through nature, the nightly twinklers in the wondrous blue overhead, the
+unfailing freshness of the green out of the brown under foot; through
+the never-ceasing wonders of these bodies of ours, so awesomely and
+skilfully made, and kept going; through that clear quiet inner voice
+that does speak in every human heart amidst all the noises of earth and
+of passion; through these the light _is_ shining, noiselessly, softly,
+endlessly, by day and night.
+
+It is the same identical light that John is telling us of here that so
+shines in upon every man, and always has. There is no light but His. His
+later name is Jesus. From the first, and everywhere still, it is the
+light that shines from Him that lights men. He was with the Father in
+the beginning. He acted for the Father in that creation week. He gave
+and sustained all life of every sort everywhere, and does, though only a
+third of us know His later, nearer, newer Name--Jesus.
+
+But the light was obscured, terribly beclouded and bedimmed, hindered by
+earth-fogs, and swampy clouds rising up, until we are apt to think there
+was no light, and is none; only darkness. Then He came closer, and yet
+closer. He came in nearer form so as to get the light closer, and let
+it shine _through_ fog and cloud, for the sake of the befogged,
+beswamped crowd.
+
+And then--ah! hold your heart still--_then_ He let _the_ Light-holder,
+the great human Lantern, be _broken_, utterly broken, that so the light
+might flash out through broken lantern in its sweet soft wondrous
+clearness into our blinded blinking eyes, and show us the real way back
+home. It was in that breaking that it got that wondrous exquisite red
+tingeing that becomes the unfailing hall-mark, the unmistakable evidence
+of the real thing of light.
+
+And it's only as men know of this latest coming of the light, this
+tremendous tragic Jesus-coming of the light, that they can come into the
+full light. That's the reason He came in the way He did. That's the
+reason when He gets possession of us there's the passion to take the
+full Jesus-light out to every one. And this passion burns in us and
+through us, and ours, and sweeps all in the sweep of its tender holy
+flame. In this way every man may be fully lit, and so in following the
+Jesus-light he shall not walk in the darkness where he has been, but in
+the sweet clear light of life.
+
+
+
+Looking for Recognition.
+
+
+Then we come to the first of John's heart-breaking sentences. John had a
+hard time writing his Gospel. He was not simply writing a book. That
+might have been fairly easy for him with his personal knowledge and all
+the facts so familiar. But he is telling about his dearest Friend. And
+the telling makes his heart throb harder, and his eyes fill up, and the
+writing look dim to him, as he tries to put the words down.
+
+Listen: _He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and
+the world recognized, or rather acknowledged, Him not._ It was His
+world, His child, His creation. He had made it. But it failed to
+acknowledge Him. He came walking down the street of life. He met the
+world going the other way. And He gave it a warm good-morning greeting.
+And it knew Him full well. It knew who He was. But it turned its face
+aside and walked by with no return greeting. This is what John is
+saying. It recognized, it acknowledged Him not.
+
+You mothers know the glad hour that comes in a mother's life when her
+little babe of the wee weeks knows her _for the first time._ She's busy
+bathing or nursing, or, she's just hovering over the precious morsel of
+humanity when there's really nothing needing to be done. And the babe's
+eyes catch her own and _a smile comes,_ the first smile of recognition.
+And the mother-heart gives a glad leap. She murmurs to herself, "Oh,
+baby knows me!"
+
+And when the father comes home that night she greets him with, "Baby
+knew me to-day." And there's a soft bell-like tender ring in her voice
+that vibrates on the strings of his heart. And all the folks within
+range are advised of the day's event. And the mother clear forgets all
+the sharp-cutting pain back there just a little before, in this joy,
+this look of recognition.
+
+I knew of a woman. She was of an old family, of unusual native gift, and
+rare accomplishment. And her babe came. And the time came when
+ordinarily there would be that first sweet look of recognition, but--_it
+didn't come._ There was a defect; something not as it should be. And you
+mothers all know how she felt, yes, and you true fathers, too. She was
+heart-broken. And she turned aside from all the busy round of activity
+in which she had been the natural leader. And for years she devoted all
+her splendid talents, her strength and time, to just one thing, a very
+simple thing; only this,--_getting a look of glad recognition out of two
+babe-eyes._
+
+_He_ looked into the face of His child, His world, for the look of
+recognition. But there was none. And He was heart-broken. And He devoted
+all His strength and time, Himself, for those human years to--what? One
+thing, just one thing, a very simple thing, only this: to getting a look
+of recognition out of the eyes of His child.
+
+Aye, there's more yet here. He _looks_ into our faces, eager for that
+simple direct answering look into His face and out of our eyes, yours
+and mine. And we give Him--things, church-membership, orthodox belief,
+intense activity, aggressive missionary propaganda, money in good
+measure, tireless, and then tired-out service--_things!_ And all good
+things. But _the_ thing, the direct look into His own face answering His
+own hungry searching look, that look in the face that reveals the inner
+heart that He _waits_ for so often, and waits, a bit sore at heart.
+
+For you know the eye is the face of the face. It's the doorway into the
+soul, out through which the soul, the man within, looks. I look at you,
+the man inside here looks out at you through my eye. And I look at the
+real you down through your eye. The real man is hidden away within, but
+looks out through the eye and is looked at only through the eye. We
+really give ourselves to Jesus in the look direct into His face which
+tells Him all, and through which He transforms us.
+
+
+
+A Heart-breaking Verse.
+
+
+Then comes John's second heart-breaking verse; but it is just a bit more
+heart-breaking in what it says. Listen: _He came to His own home, and
+they that were His own kinsfolk received Him not into the house but kept
+Him standing out in the cold and storm of the wintry night._
+
+One of you men goes home to-night. It's your own home, shaped on your
+own personality through the years. It's a bit late. You've had a long
+hard day. You're tired. It's stormy. The wind and the rain chill you as
+you turn the corner. And you pull your coat a bit snugger as you quicken
+your steps and think of home, warmth and comfort, loved ones, and rest
+for body and spirit, too.
+
+As you come to the door you reach for your latch-key, and find, in the
+busy rush, you seem to have forgotten it, somehow. So you ring the bell
+or knock. And suppose--be patient with me a bit, please. Suppose your
+loved ones know you're there. You even see a hand drawing aside the edge
+of the window shade, and two eyes that you know so well peer out through
+the crack at you; then the shade goes to again. Yes, they know you're
+there. But the door, your own door, doesn't open. How would you feel?
+
+And some one says to himself, "That's not a good illustration. That
+thing couldn't happen. It isn't natural." No: you're right. It _isn't_
+natural. It could not happen to _you_. I am sure it could not happen to
+_me_. If it could I'd be heart-broken. _But this is what happened to
+Him!_ This is what John is saying here. He came to His own front door,
+and they whose very image revealed their close kinship to Him, received
+Him not into the home, but kept the door fast in His face.
+
+Then there's a later translation. This old King James version bears the
+date of 1611, I think. And the English Revision is dated 1881, I
+believe. And this American Standard Revision I am using has 1901 on its
+title page. But there's a later revision. It bears a yet later date,
+1915, April 27. But it is a shifting date. Each translator fixed his own
+date.
+
+This latest translation runs something like this: He _comes_ to His own.
+That's you and myself. We belong to Him. He gave His breath to us in
+Eden. He gave His breath to you and me at our birth. He gave His blood
+for us on Calvary. We belong to Him. The image of His kinship is stamped
+upon us. We may not acknowledge it, but that can't change the fact.
+
+_He comes to His own, and His own_--and here, as the scholars would say,
+there are variant readings. Let me give you one or two I have found.
+Here is one: He comes to His own, and His own--puts a chair outside the
+door on the top-step. It's a large armchair with a cushion in, perhaps.
+And then His own talks about Him through the crack of the door, or
+likelier, the window. It's reckoned safer to keep the door fast.
+
+Listen to what he says: "He's a wonderful man this Jesus; great teacher,
+the greatest; the greatest man of the race; His philosophy, His moral
+standards are the ideals; wonderful life; great example." They fairly
+exhaust the language in talking about this Man. But notice. It seems a
+bit queer. The man they're talking _about_ is _outside the door_. His
+own claim is left severely outside.
+
+Some make it read like this: He comes to His own, and they who are His
+own open the door a _crack_, maybe a fairly respectably wide crack. We
+all like the word _Saviour_. Yes, we cling tenaciously to that.
+Selfishly, would you say? We want to be saved from a certain place we
+think of as _down_, that we've been taught about, and don't want to go
+to--_if it's there;_ the way men talk about it to-day.
+
+And we want to be saved into another certain place we think of as _up_,
+and where we surely want to go _after_ we get through down on the
+earth, and _must_ go away somewhere else; with that "after" and "must"
+carefully underscored. And we want to be saved from all the
+inconveniences possible along the way, and to secure all the advantages
+and help available: yes, yes, open the door a crack.
+
+But be careful about the width of the opened crack. Let it be just the
+proper conventionalized width. Let there be no extremeism about the
+wideness of that opening. Things must be proper. For what would the
+other crack-open-door-owners think?
+
+And then, too, yet more serious, this Jesus has a way, a most
+inconsiderate way of coming in as far as you let Him, and of taking
+things into His own hands. Certain people use that word
+"inconsiderate"--to themselves, in secret. Jesus changes some things
+when He is allowed all the way in. He might change your personal habits,
+your home arrangements, some of your social customs and your business
+plans.
+
+Of course He changes only what needs changing, as He sees it.
+But--then--you--well, some things can be carried _too far_--to suit
+_you_. This Jesus has the _all_ habit. He contracted it when He was down
+on the earth. Our needs grew the habit. He _gave_ all. And He has a way
+of coming in all the way, and of reaching in His pierced hand and
+_taking_ all.
+
+He might even put His hand in on that most sacred thing, that holiest of
+all, that you guard most jealously--that box. It has heavy hinges, and
+double padlocks, and the keys are held hard under the thumb of your
+will. Of course there may really not be much in it; and again there may
+be very much. But much or little, it is securely kept under that thick
+broad thumb of yours.
+
+Oh! you _give_; of _course_; yes, yes, we're all good proper Christian
+folk here. We give a tenth, and even much more. We support an aggressive
+missionary propaganda. That's the thing, you know, in our day, for good
+church people. We give to all the good things. Ye-es, no doubt. And we
+are very careful, too, that that _inconsiderate_ Hand shall not disturb
+the greater bulk that remains between hinge and lock. That's _yours_. Of
+course you are _His_, redeemed, saved by His blood.
+
+Well, well, how these pronouns, "His," "ours," do get mixed up! How
+lovely some things are to _sing_ about, in church, and special services,
+at Keswick and Northfield. But through it all we hold hard to that key,
+we don't let go--_even to Him_, though it is He who entrusts all to our
+temporary keeping. We do guard the width of that opening crack, do we
+not?
+
+One day I looked through that crack and caught a glimpse of _His face_
+looking through full in my own, with those eyes of His. And at first I
+wanted to take the door clear off of its hinges and stand it outside
+against the bricks, and leave the whole door-space wide for Him.
+
+But I've learned better. No man wants to leave the doorway of his life
+unguarded. He must keep the strong hand of his controlling purpose on
+the knob of the front door of his life. There are others than He, evil
+ones, cunningly subtle ones, standing just at the corner watching for
+such an opportunity. And they step quickly slyly in under your untaught
+unsuspicious eyes, and get things badly tangled in your life. There's a
+better, a stronger way.
+
+Here's the personal translation that I try now, by His help, to work out
+into living words, the language of life. He comes to His own, and His
+own opens the door wide, and _holds_ it wide open, that He may come in
+all the way, and cleanse, and change, readjust, and then shape over on
+the shape of His own presence.
+
+But every one must work out his own translation of that; and every one
+does. And the crowd reads--not this printed version. It reads this other
+translation, the one nearest, in such big print, the one our lives work
+out daily. That's the translation they prefer. And that's the
+translation they're being influenced by, and influenced by tremendously.
+
+
+
+He Came to His Own.
+
+
+In certain circles in England, they tell of a certain physician years
+ago. He came of a very humble family. His father was a gardener on a
+gentleman's estate. And the father died. And the mother wasn't able to
+pay her son's schooling. But a storekeeper in the village liked this
+little bright boy and sent him to school. And he went on through the
+higher schooling, became a physician, and began his practice in London.
+He became skilled, and then famous, and then wealthy.
+
+He remembered his dear old mother, of course. He sent her money, and
+fabrics for dresses, and wrote her. But for a long time, in the busy
+absorption of his life, he had not been to see her. And the dear old
+mother in the little cottage in the country lived in the sweet
+consciousness that her son was a great physician up in the great London.
+He was her chief topic of conversation. When the neighbours were in she
+would always talk of her son, her Laddie, she called him.
+
+"He's so good to me, my Laddie is. He sends me money. I put it in the
+bank. He sends me cloth for dresses; it's quite too good for a plain
+body like me. And he writes me letters, such good letters, wonderful
+letters. But he's so busy up there, that he hasn't been to see me for a
+long time now. You know he's a great doctor now, and he has great skill,
+and there are so many needing him. And he's no time at all, even for
+himself, I expect. But"--she would always finish her talk as they sat
+over the tea by saying, half to herself, really more to herself than to
+the little group, with a half-repressed longing sigh, "but, I wish, I
+just _wish_ I could _see_ my _Laddie_."
+
+Then some changes took place on the estate. And the cottage where she
+had lived so long must be given up. And the dear old woman had to make
+new plans. And she cudgeled her old head, and thought, and at last she
+said to herself, "I know what I'll do. I'll go-up to London, and I'll
+live with Laddie. He'll be so glad to have me." And bright-coloured
+visions flitted through her mind, as she sat over her tea by the open
+grate. But she wouldn't send him word; no, no, she would surprise him,
+and add to his pleasure.
+
+And the dear old soul, in her fine simplicity, did not think into what
+this would mean, nor of the difference that had grown up with the years,
+in manner of life, between her son and herself. He was a cultured
+gentleman, with his well-appointed city home, and the circle of friends
+that had grown up about him. And she was a simple uncultured country
+woman with a broad provincial twist on her tongue. But she was
+blissfully unconscious of this. She would go and live with her Laddie.
+It would be so delightful for them both.
+
+And so she went. It was her first train journey, and quite a time of it
+she had finding the house. But at last she stands looking up at the
+house. "Ugh! does my Laddie live here! in this great mansion?" But there
+was the name on the door-plate. There was no mistaking that. And so she
+rang the bell. "Is the doctor in?" She could hardly get the word
+"doctor" out. She had never called him that before, just Laddie. But now
+she must say it. "Is the doctor in?" And the word almost stuck in her
+throat as she thought to herself, "This poor man opening the door
+doesn't know that the 'doctor' really belongs to _me_."
+
+But in a hard voice the servant said that it was past the hours. She
+couldn't see the doctor.
+
+"Ah! bat," she said, quite taken by surprise at being held there, "I
+_must_ see him."
+
+"But, I tell you, it's quite too late to see him to-day."
+
+But she resolutely put her stout country-boot in the crack of the door,
+and her English jaw set in true English fashion, and she said with that
+quietness that has the subtle touch of danger in it, "I'll see the
+doctor."
+
+And the servant looked puzzled and went to report about this strangely
+insistent woman. And the doctor was annoyed by the interruption in the
+midst of something that was absorbing him. He said sharply, "It's past
+the hours; I can see no one."
+
+"I told her so, sir," replied the man deferentially, "but she insists in
+a strange way, sir."
+
+"What's she like?"
+
+"Oh, just a plain country body, sir."
+
+"Well, show her up."
+
+And I am glad to remember that she had a warm embrace of his strong
+arms, as he instantly recognized her in the doorway, while the servant
+stared. Then he said rather nervously as the servant discreetly
+withdrew, "How did yon happen to come? Why didn't you send word? Has
+anything happened?" And then as she sat by the fire sipping a cup of
+tea, she told the story, in her own simple slow way, and ended up with,
+"And now I'm coming to live with you, Laddie." And the old eyes behind
+the spectacles beamed, and the dear old wrinkled face glowed.
+
+And he poked the fire, and tried to think You know, our English friends
+depend almost wholly on the open grate fire, as we do so largely in the
+South. And it's a great thing, is the open grate fire. It's a fire. It
+warms your body, at least in front in extreme weather. But it's more
+than a fire. It's a stimulus to thought. It refreshes your spirit, and
+rests your tired nerves, and it is a wonderful thing to help you unravel
+knotty problems. So he poked the fire and thought, while she, quite
+unconscious of his embarrassment, went on sipping her tea and talking.
+
+It would never do to have her come there, he thought. And his thoughts
+went to the circle of friends at the dinner table in the evening, and to
+the critical city servants that ran his bachelor establishment. And just
+then his ear caught anew the broad provincial twist on her tongue. He
+had never noticed it so broad, so decided, before. And she was talking
+the small countryside talk, chickens and an epidemic among them. And
+that grated strangely. It certainly wouldn't do to have her come there.
+
+Then the tide began to rise gently on the beach of his heart. He
+thought, "She's my _mother_. And if mother wants to come here, here she
+comes." And he straightened up in his chair, as he gave a gentler touch
+to a blazing lump of coal. Then the tide ebbed. It began running out
+again. "No, it would hardly do." And he poked and thought. Finally he
+broke into her run of talk.
+
+"Mother, you know it is not very healthful here. We have bad fogs in
+London. And you're used to the wholesome country air. It wouldn't agree
+with you here, I'm afraid. I'll get a little cottage on the edge of
+town, and I'll come and see you very often."
+
+And the dear old woman _sensed_ at once just what he was thinking. She
+was not stupid, if she was just a plain homely body. He got his brains
+from his simple country mother, as many a man of note has done. But she
+spoke not of what she felt. She simply said, with that quietness which
+grows out of strong self-control:
+
+"It's a bit late the night, Laddie, I'm thinking, to be talking about
+new plans."
+
+And he said softly, "Forgive me, mother: it is late, I forgot." And he
+showed her to her sleeping apartment.
+
+"And where do you sleep, Laddie?"
+
+"Right here, mother, this first door on the left. Be sure to call me if
+you need anything."
+
+And he bade her a tender "good-night," and went back to his study to do
+some more thinking and planning. And very late he came up to his
+sleeping-chamber. And he was just cuddling his head into the soft pillow
+for the night, when the door opened, so softly, and in there came a
+little body in simple white night garb, with a quaint old-fashioned
+nightcap on, candle in hand. She came in very softly. And he started up.
+
+"Mother, are you ill? What's the matter?"
+
+And she came over very quietly, and put down the candle on the table
+before she answered. And then softly:
+
+"No, no, Laddie, I'm not ill. I just came to tuck you in for the night
+as I used to do at home. ... Lie still, my Laddie."
+
+And she tucked the clothes about his neck, and smoothed his hair, and
+patted his cheek, and kissed his face. And she crooned over him as
+mother with little child. The years were quite forgot. She had her
+little son again. And she talked mother's love-talk to a child.
+"Good-night, Laddie ... good-night ... good-night ... mother's own boy."
+And a little more tucking and smoothing and patting and kissing, and
+then she turned so quietly, picked up the candle, and went out, closing
+the door so softly, her great strength revealed in her gentleness.
+
+And he was just on the point of starting up and saying, "Mother, you
+must stay with me, right here"--no, the morning will do, he thought. But
+when the morning came she wasn't down for breakfast. And when he went to
+her room she wasn't there. It turned out afterwards that she had said to
+herself, "It doesn't suit my Laddie's plans to have me here. I don't
+understand why. It isn't his fault at all. It just doesn't suit. And
+I'll never be a trouble to my Laddie."
+
+And so with that rare characteristic English trait of independence, she
+had quietly gone off early that morning before the house was astir. And
+he broken-hearted--I'm always glad to remember that--he searched through
+the wilderness of London for more than a year, searched diligently, but
+could find no trace of her. And then he was graciously permitted to
+minister to her last hours in a hospital where a street accident had
+sent her unconscious, and where he was chief of the medical staff.
+
+_She came to her own and her own received her not._ He loved her, but it
+didn't suit his plans. _He, Jesus_, came to _His_ own, and His own
+received Him not; it didn't suit their plans. Ah! listen yet further: He
+_comes_ to His own, you and me, and His own--_you_ finish it. Have we
+some plans, too, set plans, that we don't propose to change, even
+for--(softly) even for _Him_? Each of us is finishing that sentence, not
+in words so much if at all, in the words of our action. And the crowd
+reads our translation.
+
+
+
+The Oldest Family.
+
+
+"But," John goes on. That was a steadying "but." It was hard on John to
+recall how they treated his Friend and Master. But there is a "but."
+There's another aide, an offset to what he's been saying, a bright bit
+to offset the black bit. But as many as did receive Him. Some received.
+Jesus was rejected, yes, abominably, contemptibly rejected. But He was
+also accepted, gladly, joyously, wholeheartedly accepted, even though
+it came to mean pain and shame.
+
+_As many as received Him_, John says, _He received into His family_. The
+conception of a family and of a home where the family lives, runs all
+through underneath here. They would not receive this Jesus because He
+didn't belong to the inner circle of the old families which they
+represented. They regarded themselves as the custodians of the
+exclusive aristocratic circles of Jerusalem. And Jerusalem was the upper
+circle of Israel.
+
+And every one knew that Israel was the chiefest, the one uppermost
+nation, of the earth, with none near enough to be classed second. They
+were the favourites of God, all the rest were "dogs of Gentiles,"
+outsiders, not to be mentioned in the same breath. To these national
+leaders of Jesus' day, this was the very breath of their life.
+
+"And _this Jesus_!" They spat on the ground to relieve the intensity of
+their contempt. "Who was He? A peasant! a Galilean! Nazareth!" Nazareth
+was put in as a sort of superlative degree of contempt. Of course, they
+could easily have found out about the lineage of Jesus. In the best
+meaning of the word, Jesus was an aristocrat. Apart from its
+philological derivation that word means one who traces his lineage back
+through a worthy line for a long way, and so one who has the noble
+traits of such lineage. In the best meaning of the word Jesus was an
+_aristocrat_. His line traced back without slip or break to the great
+house of David, and that meant clear back to Adam. The records were all
+there, carefully preserved, indisputable. They could easily have found
+this out.
+
+I recall talking one day in London with a gentle lady of an old, titled
+Scottish family, an earnest Christian, trained in the Latin Church. In
+the course of the conversation she remarked, "Of course, Jesus was a
+_peasant_." And I replied as gently as I could so as not to seem to be
+arguing, "Of course, He was _not_ a peasant. He chose to _live_ as a
+peasant, for a great strong purpose. But He was an aristocrat in blood.
+His family line traced directly back through the noblest families clear
+to the beginning. No one living had a longer unbroken lineage. And that
+is the very essence of aristocracy."
+
+In some circles, they count much, or most, on old families. In certain
+cities of our own country, east and south, this is reckoned as the
+hall-mark of highest distinction. When one goes across the water to
+England and the Continent, he finds the old families of America are
+rather young affairs. And as he pushes on into the East, some of the old
+families of Europe sometimes seem fairly recent. I remember in the
+Orient running across a family where the father had been a Shinto
+priest, father and son successively, through forty-five generations; and
+another where the father of the family has been successively a
+court-musician for thirty-eight generations. I thought maybe I had run
+into some really old families at last.
+
+I come of a rather old family myself. It runs clear back without break
+or slip to Adam in Eden. I've not bothered much with tracing it, for
+there are some pretty plain evidences of ugly stains on the family
+escutcheon, running all through, and repeatedly. And then even more than
+that I've become intensely interested in another family, an older
+family, the oldest family of all. Arrangements have been made whereby I
+have been taken into this oldest family of all with full rights and
+privileges. My claims to aristocracy are now of the very highest, with
+all the noble obligations that go with it. That's what John is talking
+of here. _As many as received Him, He received into His family, the
+oldest family of all._
+
+These people refused Jesus because He didn't belong to their set. In
+their utterly selfish prejudice and wilful ignorance, these leaders shut
+Him out from the circles they controlled. But with great graciousness He
+received into His circle any, of any circle, high or low, who would
+receive Him into their hearts. To as many as received Him into their
+hearts He opened the door into His own family. He gave them the
+technical right of becoming children of His Father.
+
+Their part of the thing is put very simply in two ways. They _believed_.
+They were told, they listened and thought, they accepted as true, they
+risked what they counted most precious, they loved. So they believed.
+And so they _received._ The door opened, the inner door, the heart door.
+He went in. That settled things for them. When He graciously entered
+their hearts, the inner citadel of their lives, that settled their place
+in this oldest family of all.
+
+
+
+How We Don't Get In, and How We Do.
+
+
+It is of intensest interest in our day to have John go on to tell, in
+his own simple taking way, just how we get into this God-family. First
+of all, he tells us how we _don't_ get in. Listen: "_not of blood_,"
+that is, not by our natural generation; "_nor of the will of the
+flesh_," that is, not by anything we can do of ourselves, though this
+has a place, a distinctly secondary place; "_nor of the will of man_,"
+that is, not by what somebody else can do for us, though this too has
+its place.
+
+These are the three "_nots_"; the three ways we are _not_ saved. And it
+becomes of intensest interest to notice that these are the very three
+ways that the crowd is emphasizing to-day, some this, others that, as
+the way of being saved. The three modern words we commonly use for these
+three "nots" of John are, _family, culture_, and _influence_.
+
+Some of us seem to be fully expecting to walk into the presence of God,
+and to get all there is to be gotten there, because of the family we
+belong to. This is probably stronger in some of us than we are conscious
+of. It's a matter of blood with us, our blood, our natural generation.
+We take greatest pride in showing what blood it is that runs in our
+veins. We trace the line far back to those whose names are well known.
+And this sort of thing has overpowering influence in our human affairs
+down here.
+
+His gracious majesty King George is King of England, because he is the
+child of Edward and Alexandra. His one and only claim to the English
+throne is that at the time of accession he was their oldest living son.
+But that won't figure a farthing's worth when he comes up to the
+hearthfire of God's family. And I think he understands this full well.
+I'm expecting to see him there; not as King of England, but as a
+brother.
+
+It is not a matter of blood. It's a blessed thing to be well-born. It
+makes a tremendous difference to have the blood of an old noble family
+in one's veins, if it is good clean blood. But it'll never save us.
+Salvation is not by lineal descent, not by family line. It is "not of
+blood." John clears that ground.
+
+Some of us put great stress on what we are in ourselves. This looms big
+with a great crowd scattered throughout the earth. We know so much. We
+have gotten it by dint of hard work. We can do some things so skilfully.
+We have worked into positions of great power among men. Our names are
+known. Sometimes they are spelled in large letters.
+
+The broad word for this is _culture_, what we have gained and gotten by
+our effort, of that which is reckoned good, and which _is_ good. Culture
+is one of the chief words in our language to-day. Whether spelled the
+English way or the German, it looms big. It is one of our modern
+tidbits. It is chewed on much, and pleases our palate greatly. And
+culture is good, if it is good culture.
+
+But, have you noticed, that you have to have a thing before you can
+culture it? No amount of the choicest culture will get an apple out of a
+turnip, nor a Bartlett pear out of a potato, nor make a Chinese into an
+Englishman, nor an American into a Japanese. Culture can improve the
+stock, but _it can't change it_. It takes some other power than culture
+to change the kind. Here we have to be made of the same kind as they are
+up in the old family of God. There must be a change at the core. Then
+culture of that new stock is only good and blessed.
+
+This is John's second "not." It seems rather radical. It completely
+undercuts so much of our present day notions. If John is right, some of
+us are wrong, radically, dangerously wrong. Yet John had a wonderful
+Teacher whom he lived with for a while. And after He had gone, John had
+another Teacher, unseen but very real, who guided, especially in the
+writing of the old Jesus-story. The whole presumption is in favour of
+John's way of it being wholly right. And if that makes us wrong, we
+would better be grateful to find it out _now_, while there's time to
+change. Being saved is not a matter of what we can do, of our culture,
+though this has its proper place.
+
+And some of us put tremendous stress to-day on _influence_, what we can
+command from others, in furtherance of our desires. Influence is spelled
+in biggest type and printed in blackest ink. Whether in political
+matters at Washington or at London; in financial, whether Lombard Street
+or Wall Street; or in the all-important social matters, or even in the
+educational, the university world, the chief question is, "Whose
+influence can you get?" "What name can you quote?" "Whose backing have
+you?" Influence and culture are the twin gods to-day. The smoke of
+their incense goeth up continuously. Their places of worship are
+crowded, with bent knees and prostrate forms and reverential hush.
+
+Have you noticed that _Jesus_ hadn't enough influence with the officials
+of His day to keep from the cross? No: but He had enough _power_ to
+break the official emblem of earth's greatest authority, the Roman seal
+on the Joseph tomb. Rather striking that; intensely significant for us
+moderns. _Peter_ hadn't enough _influence_ with the authorities to keep
+out of jail. Sounds rather disgraceful that, does it not? Aye, but he
+had enough _power_ with God to open jail-doors and walk quietly out
+against the wish of those highest in authority.
+
+Influence has its proper place. It's good, _if_ it is. But we are not
+saved by it. We are not saved by what some one else can do for us; "not
+of the will of man." Your mother's prayers and your wife's, and the
+influence of their godly lives will have great weight. It's a great
+blessing to have them. They help enormously. But the thing itself that
+takes a man into the presence of God, saved and redeemed, is something
+immensely more than this, some action of his own that goes to the roots
+as none of these other things do.
+
+One time a deputation waited on Lincoln to press a matter of public
+concern. But his keenly logical mind discerned flaws in their
+impassioned and carefully worked out arguments. He waited patiently till
+their case was complete. And then in that quiet way for which he was
+famous, he said, "How many legs would a sheep have if you called its
+tail a leg?" As he expected, they promptly answered "Five." "No," he
+said, "it wouldn't; it would have only four. _Calling_ a tail a leg does
+not make it one." So a simple bit of his homely sense and accurate logic
+scattered their finely spun argument.
+
+Calling either family or culture or influence the chief thing doesn't
+make it so. These are John's three tremendous "nots." They rather cut
+straight across the common current of thought and belief and conduct
+to-day. We may indeed be grateful if a single homely drop of black ink
+from John's pen put into the beautifully cloudy-grey solution of modern
+thought clears the liquid and makes a precipitate of sharply defined
+truth that any eye can plainly see.
+
+This is how we _won't_ be saved. This is how we _don't_ get into the
+family of God. It is "not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of
+the will of man"; not through family connection, nor by what we can do
+of ourselves simply, nor by what we can get some of our fellows to do
+for us, simply.
+
+"_But of God_," John says. It is by Someone else, outside of us, above
+us, reaching down from a higher level, and putting the germ of a new
+life within us, and lifting us up to His own level. He puts His hand
+_through_ the open door of our will, what we do in opening up to Him,
+_through_ "the will of the flesh." He walks along the pathway of the
+earnest desire of those who would help us up, "the will of man." But it
+is what _He_ does that does the one thing that all depends upon. His is
+the decisive action, _through_ our choosing and our friends' helping.
+
+I said it isn't a matter of blood, of lineage. Yet it is. That statement
+must be modified. Family relationship is of necessity a matter of blood.
+That's the very blood of it. This _is_ a matter of blood; but not _our_
+blood; _His._ There has to be a new strain of blood. Our blood is
+stained. It is at fault. It is impure. There's been a bad break far back
+there in the family record, a complete break. We were powerless either
+to purify the stock, or to get over that gap, even if we admitted the
+need.
+
+There had to be a bridging of that gap. It had to be from the upper
+side. The other fell short. The gap was still there. There had to be a
+new strain of blood. This was, this _is_, the only way. We get into that
+old first family only by the Father of the family reaching over the
+break and putting in the new strain of blood, the germ of the family
+life, and so lifting us up to the new level. And Jesus was God doing
+just that.
+
+
+
+Our Tented Neighbour.
+
+
+Then John begins a new paragraph. He goes back to tell just how the
+thing was done. Listen: _the Word, this wondrous One, became a man, one
+of ourselves, and pitched His tent in close amongst our tents._There's
+only a stretch of canvas between Him and any of us. He wanted to get
+close, close enough to help, yet never infringing upon the privacy of
+our tents, only coming in as He was invited. But He has remarkable
+ears. A whisper reaches Him at once. And He is out of His tent into ours
+to help at the faintest call. That was why He pitched His tent in
+amongst ours, to be one of ourselves, and to be at hand in our need.
+
+And then a touch of awe creeps into John's spirit as he writes, and the
+light flashes out of his eye with the intensity of an old picture
+surging to the front of his imagination again. There was more than a
+_tent_ here, more than a _man_. Out of the man, out through the tent
+doorway, and tent canvas, flashes a wondrous, soft, clear light, that
+transfigures canvas and tent and man. John's face glows as he writes,
+"and we beheld His _glory_."
+
+I suppose he is thinking chiefly of that still night on white Hermon.
+This despised Man had called the inner three away from the crowd, in the
+dark of night, and had gently drawn aside the exquisite drapery of His
+humanity, and let some of the inner glory shine out before their eyes.
+So the way was lightened for them as their feet were turned with His
+down towards the dark valley of the cross. I suppose John is thinking
+chiefly of this.
+
+But this is not all, I am very sure. There's more, even though this may
+have been most. Glory is the character of goodness. It is not something
+tacked on the outside. It is some native thing looking out from within.
+So much of what we think of as glory and splendour in scenes of
+magnificence is a something in the externals, the outer arrangements.
+Splendid garbing, brilliant colours, dazzling shining of lights, seats
+removed a distance apart and up, magnificent outer appointments,--these
+seem connected in our thought with an occasion and a scene being
+glorious.
+
+But John is using the word in its simple true first meaning. Glory is
+something within shining out. It is the inner native light that goodness
+gives out. "We beheld _His glory_." I think John must have been thinking
+of Nazareth. Thirty out of thirty-three years were spent in homely
+Nazareth. Ten-elevenths of Jesus' life was spent in--_living_, simply
+living the true pure strong gentle life amid ordinary circumstances,
+homely surroundings. This was the greatest thing Jesus did short of
+dying. He _lived_. Next to Calvary where the glory shined out
+incomparably, it shined out most in Nazareth. He hallowed the common
+round of life by living an uncommon life there. This was a revealing of
+His glory. So He revealed the inner spirit of simple full obedience to
+His Father's plan for His earth-life.
+
+If we would only rise to His level! The way up is down. We are likest
+Him when we live the true Jesus-life _regardless of where it is lived_,
+on the street, in the house, amidst the ideals--or lack of ideals--of
+those we touch closest. It was a wondrous glory John beheld. And the
+crowd--no wonder that crowd couldn't resist Jesus. They can't even yet,
+when He is _lived_.
+
+Then John goes on quietly to explain about that glory, how it came. He
+says it was "_glory as of an only begotten of a father_." The common
+versions with which we are familiar, the old King James, the English and
+American revisions, all say "the," "_the_ only begotten of _the_
+Father." I suppose the translators wanted to make it quite clear that
+Jesus was in an exceptional way the very Son of God. And so they don't
+translate quite as John put it. They try to help him out a little in
+making his meaning clear.
+
+But you will notice that this old Book of God never needs any helping
+out in making the truth quite clear. When you can sift through versions
+and languages down to what is really being said, you find it said in the
+simplest strongest way possible.
+
+Here John is saying, "glory as of _an_ only begotten from _a_ father."
+It is a family picture, so common in the East. Here in the West, the
+unit of society is the individual. The farther west you come the more
+pronounced this becomes, until here in our own land individualism seems
+at times to run to extremes. Custom in the East is the very reverse of
+this. There the unit of action is not the individual, but the _family_.
+The family controls the individual in everything. We Westerners think we
+can see where it runs to such extremes as to constitute one of the great
+hindrances to progress there.
+
+In the East, if a young man is to be married, he has actually nothing to
+do with it, except to be present in proper garb when the time comes. The
+fact that he should now be married, the choice of his bride, the
+betrothal, the time, all arrangements and adjustments,--all this is done
+by the families. The two that we Westerners think of as the principals
+have nothing to do, except to acquiesce in the arrangements of their
+elders. It is strictly a family affair.
+
+Even so all that belongs to the family, of wealth, fame, inheritance,
+distinction, vests distinctly in the head of the family, the father. He
+stands for the whole family. And so, too, all of this descends directly
+from the father at his death to his eldest son. In some parts the father
+retires at a certain age, either really or nominally, and all becomes
+vested technically in his eldest son. And if the son be an only begotten
+son, then literally all that is in the father comes into the son. All
+the fame, the inheritance, the traditions, the obligations, the wealth,
+in short all the glory of the father comes of itself, by common action
+of events, to the son.
+
+Now this is what John is thinking of as he writes, "we beheld His glory,
+glory as of _an_ only begotten of _a_ father." That is to say, all there
+is in the Father is in Jesus. When you see Jesus, you are seeing the
+Father. The whole of God is in this Jesus. This is what John is saying
+here.
+
+
+
+Grace and Truth Coupled.
+
+
+And then John does a bit of exquisite packing of much in little. He
+tells the whole story of the character, the revealed glory, of Jesus in
+such a few simple words,--"_full of grace and truth_." Not grace
+without truth. That would be a sort of weakly, sickly sentimentalism.
+And not truth without grace. That would be a cold stern repellent
+insistence on certain high standards. But grace and truth coupled,
+intermingling.
+
+Of course real grace and truth always are coupled. They tell the
+exquisite poise that is in everything God does. Truth is the back-bone
+of grace. Grace is the soft cushioning of flesh upon the bony framework
+of truth. It is the soft warm breath of life in truth. Truth is grace
+holding up the one only standard of purity and right and insisting upon
+it. And as we look we know within ourselves we never can reach it. Grace
+is truth reaching a strong warm hand down to where we are and _helping_
+us reach it.
+
+With God these things are always coupled. _We_ get them separated badly,
+or would I better say, imitations of them. There is a sort of thing we
+have called truth. It is not so common now as a generation or more ago.
+It is a sort of stern elevated preaching of righteousness, but with no
+warm feel of life to it. I can remember hearing preaching in my immature
+boy days that made me feel that the man and the thing must be right, but
+neither had any attraction for me. It was as though a man went fishing
+with a carefully-made properly-labelled metallic-bait at the end of a
+long stout cord, and said, as he dangled it in the sinful waters to the
+elusive fish, "Now, bite; or be damned."
+
+It was never put so baldly, of course, in words. And I was only a child
+with immature childish imaginations. Yet that was the feeling about the
+thing the child got. But it's scarcely worth while talking of that now
+except to point the contrast; things have swung so far to the other
+extreme.
+
+The current thing to-day is grace without truth, or what is supposed to
+be grace. It is a sort of man-made substitute. It's something like this.
+Here's a man in the gutter, the moral gutter. It may be the actual
+gutter. Or, there may be the outer trappings of refinement that easy
+wealth provides; or, the real refinement that culture and inheritance
+bring. But morally and in spirit, it's a gutter. The slime of sin and
+low passion, of selfishness and indulgence and self-ambition, oozes over
+everything in full sight. The man's in the gutter.
+
+And along comes the modern philosopher of grace, so-called. He looks
+down compassionately, and says, "Poor fellow, I'm so sorry for you. Too
+bad you should have gotten down there. Let me help you a bit, my
+brother." So he puts some flowering plants down in the slime of the
+gutter, and he brushes the man's clothes a bit, and his hair, and
+sprinkles the latest-labelled cologne-water over him, and pats him on
+the shoulder, and says, "Now, you feel better, my man, don't you?" And
+the man sniffs the perfume, and is quite sure he does. _But he is still
+in the gutter._
+
+There seems to be an increasing amount of this sort of thing over in my
+neighbourhood. How is it in your corner of the planet? There's an
+intense stress on environment; that means the _outside_ of things.
+Better sanitation, improved housing, purer milk supply, and segregation
+of vice which seems to mean putting some of the viler smelling slime of
+the gutter, the slimer slime, all over in one guttered section by
+itself. But there can be no health there. It's a _change of location_
+that is needed!
+
+The wondrous Jesus-plan is different. It holds things in poise. Grace
+_and_ truth. Truth is Jesus stretching His hand up high, up to the limit
+of arm's length, and saying, "Here is the standard, purity,
+righteousness, utter honesty of heart and rigid purity of motive and
+life. You _must_ reach this standard. It can't be lowered by the half
+thickness of a paper-thin shaving. You must come to this standard. The
+standard never comes down to you."
+
+And the man in the gutter says, "I'll never reach it." And he is right.
+_He_ never will--of himself, alone. Yet that's truth, true truth. "A
+hopeless case" you say; "utter impractical idealizing! Case ruled out of
+court." Just wait, that's only half the case, and not the warm half
+either.
+
+Grace is Jesus going down into the gutter, the gutterest gutter, and
+taking the man by his outstretching hand, and _lifting_ him _clean up_
+out of the gutter, up, and up, _till the man reaches the standard_, and
+is never content till he does. That was a tremendous going down, and a
+yet more tremendous lifting up. Jesus broke His heart and lost His life
+in the going down.
+
+But out from the broken heart came running the blood that proved both
+cleansing and a salve. And out of the grave of that lost life came a new
+life that proved an incentive, and a tremendous dynamic. The blood
+cleanseth the _inside_ of the man in the gutter, and heals his sores,
+restores his sight and hearing and sensitiveness of touch. The new life
+put inside the man makes him rise up and _walk determinedly_ out of the
+gutter to a _new location_. He is a new man, with a new inside, in a new
+location. That threefold cord is ahead of Solomon's--it _can't_ be
+broken.
+
+And, if you'll mark it keenly, a new _in_side includes a new _out_side.
+The thing that in religious talk is called conversion is a sociological
+factor that cannot be ignored by the thoughtful student. The drunkard
+goes down to the old-fashioned sort of mission where they insist on
+teaching that the blood of Jesus cleanseth from all sin, and that the
+Holy Spirit will make a new man of you, and burn the sin out.
+
+And _something_ happens to the drunkard. He kneels a drunkard, drunk; he
+rises a man, sober. He goes to the hole he calls home. And at once a
+change begins to work gradually out. He treats his wife and children
+differently. He works. They are fed better and clothed warmer. He gets a
+better house in a better neighbourhood. The new sociological factor is
+at work. It began inside; it revolutionizes the outside.
+
+Settlement houses, better environment, improved outer conditions of
+every sort, are blessed, and only blessed, after the inside is fixed or
+in helping to get it fixed. If that isn't done, they are simply as a
+lovely bit of pink-coloured court-plaster skilfully adjusted over an
+ugly incurable ulcer. The man is befooled while the ulcer eats into his
+vitals.
+
+It's only the blood-power of a Jesus, _the Jesus,_ that can fix the
+inside. He cuts out the ulcer and puts in a new strain of blood. Then
+the inner includes the outer. And the most grateful of all is the man.
+This is the Jesus-plan, John says, "_full of grace and truth._"
+
+Grace is named first. It _comes_ first. That is a bit of the
+graciousness of it. That's love's exquisite diplomacy. We feel the
+grateful warmth of the sun in the winter's air, and are drawn by it. We
+smell the fragrance of the roses and come eagerly nearer. We hear the
+winsomeness of a gentle wooing voice a-calling, and instinctively answer
+to it. And then we find the sun's power to heal and cleanse and its
+insistence on burning up what can't stand its heat.
+
+We find the inspiring, purifying uplift of the flowers, drawing us up
+the hillside to the top. We find the voice--the Man--gently but with
+unflinching unbending determination that never yields a hairbreadth,
+insisting on our coming clear up to the topmost level. That's a wondrous
+order of words, and coupling of helps, grace and truth.
+
+And this is Jesus. This is John's simple tremendous picture. This Man
+comes down into our neighbourhood, on our earth. He sticks up His
+stretch of tent-canvas right next ours. He insists on being His own true
+self in the midst of the unlikeliest surroundings. The glow of His
+presence shines out over all the neighbourhood of human tents. There's a
+purity of air that stimulates. Men take deep breaths. There's a
+fragrance breathing subtly out from His tent that draws and delights.
+Men come a-running with childlike eagerness.
+
+
+
+Grace Flooding.
+
+
+And now as Jesus comes quietly down the river road where John's crowd is
+gathered, John the witness points his finger tensely out, and eagerly
+cries out: _There He is! This is the man I've been telling you about! He
+that cometh after me in point of time is become first in relation to me
+in point of preeminence: for He was before me both in time and in
+preeminence._
+
+And then John adds a tremendous bit. He had just been talking about
+Jesus being _full_ of that great combination of grace and truth. Now his
+thought runs back to that. Listen: "Of _His fullness_ have we all
+received."
+
+There's another translation of this sentence that I have run across
+several times. It reads in this way: "Of His _skimpiness_ have we all
+received." I never found that in common print; only in the larger print
+of men's lives. But in that printing it seems to have run into a large
+edition, with very wide circulation. Men don't read this old Book of God
+much; less than ever. They get their impression of God wholly from those
+who call themselves His followers.
+
+They watch the procession go by. Here they come crippled diseased
+maimed weakened in body, piteously pathetically crutching along, singed
+and burned with the flames of the same low passion that the onlooking
+crowds know so well, struggling, limping, crutching along bodily and in
+every other way.
+
+And that's a crowd with very keen logic, those onlookers. It judges God
+by those bearing His name, very properly. And it says more or less
+_unconsciously_,--"What a poor sort of God He must be those people have.
+No doubt He has a great job of management on His hands. There are so
+many of them to provide for. And apparently there can't be any
+abundance, certainly no overflow, no surplus. He has to piece it out the
+best He can to make it go as far as possible."
+
+"I think maybe I needn't be in any hurry to join that crowd, at least
+till I have to, along towards the end of things here. There would only
+be one more to carry. He has such a crowd now. And the resources are
+pretty badly strained, judging by appearances." So the crowd talks. Poor
+God! How He is misrepresented by some walking translations. "Of His
+_skimpiness_---!" Be careful. Don't take too much. Be grateful for the
+crumbs.
+
+Please clean your spectacles, and readjust them carefully, and if you
+are afflicted with the small-print Bible that seems in such common use,
+get a reading-glass and look here at the proper translation. That
+crutching, leather-bound translation is grossly inaccurate, if it _is_
+in such big print, and in such wide circulation. Look here. Can you see
+the words? This is the only correct reading: "Of His _fullness_ have all
+we received." Put that into the print of your life, for your own sake
+and for the crowd's sake, yes, and for God's sake, too, that the crowd
+may know the kind of a God God is.
+
+And as if John had a suspicion about possible bad translations, he did a
+bit of underscoring. That word _fullness_ is underscored in John's
+original copy. It's a heavy underscoring, in red. The underscoring is in
+three words he adds: "Grace for grace." That is, grace _in place of_
+grace. It's a sort of picture. Some grace has been received. And it is
+so wondrous that nothing seems so good. And the man is singing as he
+goes about his work.
+
+Then comes a sudden soft inrushing of a flood of grace so great that it
+seems to displace all that was there. Oh! the man didn't know there was
+such grace as this. It seems as if he had never known grace before. And
+the work-song is hushed into a great stillness, though the wondrous
+rhythm of peace is greater than before.
+
+And then before he quite knows how it happens in comes another soft
+subtle inrushing flood-tide of grace that seems to displace all again.
+Some temptation comes, some sore need, some tight corner. You look to
+Him; lean on Him; risk all on His response. He _responds_; and in comes
+the fresh inrush.
+
+And then this sort of thing becomes a habit, God's habit of responding
+to your need, need of every sort. It becomes the commonplace, the
+blessed commonplace that can never be common. That's John's underscoring
+of the word "fullness." May the crowds whose elbows we jostle get this
+underscored translation, bound in shoe-leather, _your_ shoe-leather.
+
+Then in his eagerness to make us understand the thing really, John makes
+a contrast. "The law was _given_ through Moses; grace and truth _came_
+through Jesus Christ." The law was a thing, _given_, through a man.
+Grace and truth was _a man coming_, the very embodiment in Himself of
+what the two words stand for.
+
+The law, the old Mosaic law, was not a statement of the _full_ message
+of God. That was given much earlier. It was given to all. It came
+directly. It was given first in Eden, in its flood; and then
+continuously to every man wherever he was. It was given within each
+man's own heart, and through the unfailing flooding light in nature
+above and below and all around. The tide of its coming has never ceased
+in volume nor in steadiness of flow; and does not cease. That tide came
+to flood in Jesus. And that flood has never known an ebb.
+
+But men's eyes got badly affected. They didn't let the light in, either
+clearly or fully. The light was there, but it was not getting in.
+Something had to be done to help out those eyes. So the law was given.
+It was merely a mirror to let a man see his face, what it was like.
+
+Here's a mother calling to her little son, "Come here and let me wash
+your face." And he calls out, "It isn't dirty." "Yes, dear, it is very
+dirty, come at once." "Why, no, mother, it isn't dirty; you washed it
+this morning." And the child's tone blends a hurt surprise and a settled
+conviction that his mother is certainly wrong _this_ time about the
+condition of his face.
+
+And if the mother be of the thoughtful brooding kind, she says nothing,
+but gets a hand mirror, and holds it before the child's face. That will
+always get a child's attention. And the boy looks; he sees his dirty
+face reflected. The blank astonishment on his face can't be put into
+words. It tells the radical upsetting revolution in his thought on that
+subject. How could it have happened that his face got into that
+condition! And the washing process is yielded to at least; possibly even
+asked for.
+
+That's what the law did and does. It showed man his face, his heart, his
+need. It brings upsetting revolutionary ideas regarding one's self.
+There it stops. That's its limit. Then the Man who in Himself is grace
+and truth does the rest.
+
+
+
+The Spokesman of God.
+
+
+Then John quietly, deftly draws the line around to the starting point in
+that first tremendous statement. He completes a circle perfect in its
+strength and beauty and simplicity, as every circle is. If we follow the
+order of the words somewhat as John wrote them down, we find the bit of
+truth coming in a very striking, as well as in a fresh way. "_God no
+one has ever, at any time, seen_."
+
+That seems rather startling, does it not? What do these older pages
+say? Adam talked and walked and worked with God, and then was led to
+the gate of the garden. God appeared to Abraham, and gave him a
+never-to-be-forgotten lesson in star study. Moses spent nearly six weeks
+with Him, twice over, in the flaming mount, and carried the impress of
+His presence upon his face clear to Nebo's cloudy top.
+
+The seventy elders "saw the God of Israel, and did eat and drink," the
+simple record runs. And young Isaiah that morning in the temple, and
+Ezekiel in the colony of exiles on the Chebar, and Daniel by the Tigris
+at the close of his three weeks' fast,--these all come quickly to mind.
+John's startling statement seems to contradict these flatly.
+
+But push on. John has a way of clearing things up as you follow him
+through. Listen to him further: The only-begotten God who is in the
+bosom of the Father--_He_ has always been the _spokesman_ of God. Look
+into that sentence of John's a little. It seems quite clear, clear to
+the point of satisfying the most critical research, that John wrote down
+the words, "the only-begotten _God_." The contrast in his mind is not
+between "God," and the "only begotten Son." It is a contrast whose
+verbal terms fit with much nicer exactness than that. It is a contrast
+between "God" and the "only-begotten God."
+
+There is only one such person whichever way unity. They tell the whole
+story hanging at the end of John's pen. This little bit commonly called
+the prologue is a gem of simplicity and compactness.
+
+It is John's Gospel in miniature, even as John's Gospel is the whole
+Bible story in miniature. You can see the whole of the sun reflected in
+a single drop of water. You can see the whole of both Father and Son in
+the action of love in these simple opening lines of John's Gospel.
+
+Have you ever been walking down a country road till, weary and thirsty,
+you stopped at an old farmhouse and refreshed yourself at the
+old-fashioned well, with its bucket and long sweep? And as you rested a
+bit by the well you wondered how deep it was. It didn't look deep at
+all. The water was near, and it was so clear and sweet and refreshing,
+and so easy to get at for a drink.
+
+_Is_ it deep? So you fish a rather long bit of string out of your
+pocket, and tie it to a bit of stone you find lying close by. And you
+let the stone down, and down, and down, till you are surprised to find
+that the well is deeper than your string is long.
+
+Well, John's opening bit is just like that. It seems very simple, easily
+understood at first flush in the mere statements made. The water is near
+the top. You easily drink. And you are refreshed. But when you try to
+find out how deep it is, you are startled to find that it is clear over
+your head.
+
+But it is _never over your heart_. It is too deep for you to grasp and
+understand. You never touch bottom. _But_ it's never beyond
+heart-understanding. You can sense and feel and love. You can open the
+sluice-gates into your heart, and have the blessed flood-tide lift and
+lift and bear you aloft and along. You can _love._ And that is the whole
+story.
+
+Was John an artist? Is he making a rare painting for us here? Is he
+studying perspective, shading and spacing, to an exquisite nicety that
+is revealed in the very way he puts words and sentences and paragraphs
+together? I do not know. And if any of you think the thing I am about to
+speak of is due to a mere mechanical chance of the pen, I'll not quarrel
+with you. Though I shall still have my own personal thought in the
+matter.
+
+But will you notice this? John begins his prologue with a description of
+a wonderful personality. He ends it with another description of this
+same personality. Both descriptions are rare in beauty and boldness, in
+simplicity and brevity. And right midway between the two, at almost the
+exact middle line of the reading, at what is the artistic center, stands
+the word "_came_."
+
+That word "came" gathers up into itself and tells out to you the whole
+story about this twice-described personality. "He came" John says.
+That's the whole thing. First the _He_ fills your eye, and then what He
+did--_came_. And as you step off a bit for better perspective, and
+change your personal position this way and that to get the best light,
+you find the picture standing out before your awed eyes.
+
+It is a Man coming down the road with face looking into yours. He is
+truly a man, every line of the picture makes that clear to you. But such
+a man as never was seen before, with the rarest blending of the kingly
+and the kindly in His bearing. The purest purity, the utmost
+graciousness, the highest ideals, the gentlest manner, nobility beyond
+what we have known, and kindliness past describing,--all these blend in
+the pose of His body and most of all in the look of His face. And He is
+in motion. He is walking, walking towards us, with hands outstretched.
+
+This is John's picture of Jesus. He came to His own. He came because His
+own drew Him. Out from the bosom of His Father, into the womb of a
+virgin maid, and into the heart of a race He came. Out of the
+glory-blaze above into the gloom of the shadow, and the glare of false
+lights below, He came.
+
+Out of the love of a Father's heart, the Only-begotten came, into
+contact with the hate that was the only-begotten of sin, that He might
+woo us men up, and up, and up, into the only-begotten life with the
+Father.
+
+Jesus was God on a wooing errand to the earth.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+The Lover Wooing
+
+     _A Group of Pictures Illustrating How the Wooing Was Done, and How
+     the Lover Was Received_
+
+
+
+
+              "Still with unhurrying chase,
+               And unperturbed pace,
+    Deliberate speed, majestic instancy
+               Came the following Feet,
+               And a Voice above their beat--
+    _Naught shelters thee, who will not shelter Me_.'"
+
+    --"_The Hound of Heaven_."
+
+     "O thou hope of Israel, the Saviour thereof in the time of trouble,
+     why shouldst thou be as a sojourner in the land, and as a wayfaring
+     man that spreadeth his tent for a night?"--_Jeremiah xiv. 8_.
+
+     He came unto his own home, and they who were his own kinsfolk
+     received him not into the house, but left him standing outside in
+     the cold and dark of the winter's night. But as many as did receive
+     him he received into his home, and gave each a seat in the inner
+     circle at the hearthfire of God.--_John i. II, 12. Free
+     translation_.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+The Lover Wooing
+
+(John i. 19-xii. 50)
+
+
+
+The Mother of all Love-Words.
+
+
+Brooding is love at its tenderest and best It is love giving its best,
+and so bringing out the best possible in the one brooded over.
+
+Look into the nest where the word itself was brooded. It is a warm
+something, warm in itself, not a borrowed warmth. The warmth is its
+chief trait. It is a soft tender unfailing cuddling warmth. It cuddles
+and coos, it glows and floods a gentle comforting stimulating warmth.
+And the best there is lying asleep within the thing so brooded over
+awakes.
+
+It answers to that creative mothering warmth. It pushes out, against all
+obstacles, and comes shyly and winsomely, but steadily and strongly, out
+to the brooding warmth, growing as it comes and growing most as it comes
+into closest touch with the warm brooder.
+
+Brooding is the mother of all love-words,--friendship, wooing, pitying,
+helping, mothering, fathering, witnessing, believing. It is the
+mother-word, from out whose warm womb all these others come, warm, too,
+and full of gentle strong life. Its mother quality is so strong that we
+are apt to think of it only in connection with actual mothers, mothers
+among animals and birds and of our human kind.
+
+But this is only one meaning, really a surface meaning, though such a
+fine deep meaning in itself. Its real heart meaning lies much deeper.
+_Brooding is the mother of all love._ It is its warmth that draws out
+that fine feeling that makes and marks friendship. It is its tender
+warmth that draws out that finest degree of friendship which knits with
+unbreakable bonds two lives into one.
+
+It reaches out most subtly to knit up again the ends that have ravelled
+out under the sore stress of life. It bends compassionately over those
+hurt in body, and hurt yet more in their spirit by the greedy rivalry of
+life, and nurses into newness of life the shivering shredded hurt parts.
+In the more familiar use of the word it fathers and mothers the newly
+minted morsels of precious humanity, coming into life with big wondering
+eyes.
+
+And it warms into highest life that highest love that, through the
+process of hearing, assenting, trusting, risking, giving the heart's
+devotion, comes to know God as a tender Father, and Christ as a precious
+personal Saviour. Whether in close friend, or ardent lover, gracious
+philanthropist, devoted parent, or earnest witness, it is the same warm
+thing underneath, at its fine task--brooding.
+
+We think of it most in the mother. For it comes to its highest human
+perfection there. The true thoughtful mother is first and chiefest a
+brooder. She broods in spirit till her child looks into her eyes,
+bearing the image, in face and mental impress and spirit, which the
+brooding months have given. She broods over the inarticulate days when
+the babe cannot tell the felt needs except to a brooding mother's keen
+insight.
+
+She broods over the baby-talk days; over the struggling days when the
+child would tell its awakening thoughts out in words, but doesn't know
+how yet; over the wilful days which come so early when the first battles
+come that decide the whole future.
+
+With a warmth of tenderness and patience, and a strength of gentle wise
+insistence, more than human, she broods. It takes the very strength of
+her life, far far more than in prenatal days. So there comes, slowly,
+but as she keeps true to the brooding spirit, surely, the strong gentle
+self-controlled life out of the warm womb of her brooding life. So comes
+the child's higher birth, so preparing the way for the yet higher.
+
+Now all this is at its native best in God. There only does it reach
+finest fruitage. Some day we shall recognize the meaning of that modest
+but tremendous little sentence,--_God is love_. This warm brooding
+something that comes, gentle as the dawning light in the grey east,
+fragrant as the dew of the new morning, irresistible in its pervasive
+persuasive presence as the rays of the growing sun, giving to us warmth,
+and life, and drawing out from within us warmth and life and beauty and
+strength, all in its own image, this is the thing called love. This is
+the thing that God is. As we know _it_ we are getting acquainted with
+_Him_.
+
+And if a break comes, instantly love in its grief sets itself with
+warmth and renewed strength to the new harder brooding task. It gives
+itself out yet more, regardless of cost, until in place of the broken
+fragments there comes a finer sort of life out of the warm womb of love,
+brooding, redeeming, bringing-back-again love. This is God. This is
+Jesus. John shows us Jesus as a picture of the brooding God.
+
+
+
+Five Pictures of Jesus.
+
+
+There are five wondrous pictures of Jesus in these newer leaves of the
+old Book. Three of them hang on the walls of Paul's tent-weaving
+study-room. There's the Colossian picture, the _Creator-Jesus,_ infinite
+in power, making all things above and below and around, and holding all
+things together.[7]
+
+Close by it in wondrous contrast is seen the Philippian picture. It is
+the _Man-Jesus,_ emptied of all the upper-glory native to Him, bowing
+down low and lower and lowest, till in the form of a slave He hangs on a
+cross.[8]
+
+And in contrast yet more striking and startling, close by its side hangs
+the Ephesian picture. It is the _Enthroned-Jesus,_ back again in the
+soft, blazing, blinding glory of the Father's presence, seated at His
+right hand, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and
+every name that is named. And as you stand awed before this picture
+your eye is caught by the artist's remarque sketch at the bottom. It is
+a broken Roman seal, and an open tomb, and a bird with swelling throat
+singing joyously.[9]
+
+Then there's John's later Patmos picture of the _Present-Jesus_,
+standing now down on the earth in the midst of His candle-holding
+Church, but seen only by opened eyes. There He is seen as a Man of Fire,
+ablaze with light, intently watching, with tender but omnipotent touch
+waiting, ever waiting; with a patience unknown except in Him, still
+waiting.[10]
+
+But John's earlier Gospel picture is of the _Brooding-Jesus_. The word
+"brooding" here takes in its fine deep significance. Jesus is seen here
+as a brooding Lover, by the warmth of His wooing love drawing out the
+warmth of an answering love. This is peculiarly and distinctively the
+picture of John's Gospel. There is _a Man walking towards you_ in these
+pages. Turn where you will there He is, and always facing you, with a
+gentle eagerness in His face and in the bend-forward of His body.
+
+There is always a warmth, a gentle radiating comforting drawing warmth
+in His presence. This is the thing you feel most, the warmth. But it
+isn't the only thing. There's the purity. There are ideals that seem out
+of reach in their great height. There's the insistence on these ideals,
+rigid stern absolutely unbending insistence. You _see_ these. You can't
+help it. You feel them tremendously. They seem to leave you clear out
+of reckoning, they are so high up. But there's the warmth, drawing
+arousing wooing, irresistible.
+
+You come to find that the warmth of that presence is as irresistible as
+the ideals and the insistence are unbending. And the warmth woos you. It
+warms you, till there come the intense admiration of the ideals, and
+then the eager reaching of the whole being up towards them.
+
+This is John's picture of the brooding wooing Jesus. This is God, in
+human garb as He comes to us in John's pages. Jesus is God brooding over
+us to woo out of us the love and purity, the purity and love, that He
+woos into us by the touch of His own warm presence.
+
+John's little book is put together as simply as his sentences. And as
+you take it up, it falls apart almost of itself, so simple and natural
+are its divisions. We had a look at the opening paragraphs of the
+Gospel, those eighteen brief verses that open the doorway into all the
+Gospel holds for us. _There_ is given chiefly John's simple vivid
+tremendous picture of _a Person_, coming with swift long stride and
+outreached hands.
+
+Now we turn to the second part of the book. It runs from the nineteenth
+verse of the opening chapter on through to the end of chapter twelve. It
+is devoted to _the great winsome wooing_ of this great human Person.
+Here we see Him on His wooing errand. He woos individual men. He gives
+the personal touch. He devotes Himself to one person, now here, now
+there. His skill and tact in personal dealing are matchless. But this
+is not the chief wooing of these pages. It is _the nation_ He is wooing.
+With rarest strategy and boldness and persistence He lays loving siege
+to the nation through its leaders. This is central and dominant in all
+His movements here. This is the second picture in the gallery of John's
+Gospel.
+
+It is a good thing to run through these fourteen pages of John's Gospel
+_several times;_ to run through _rapidly_, though not hurriedly; to run
+through them as a story until it stands out in your mind as _one simple
+connected, story_. And then it will help greatly, if you are so blest as
+to have some boy or girl near at hand to whom you can tell it as a story
+in simple child (not childish) talk.
+
+Pack the whole into one story of ten minutes, or fifteen: the man of the
+story;[11] how He tried to win the people's hearts;[12] how towards the
+end He spent a long evening with those who loved Him;[13] how awfully He
+was treated by those who hated Him;[14] then how wondrously He surprised
+His friends;[15] and then the little bit at the end where He prepares
+breakfast and has a walk and talk on the seashore with a little group of
+those who loved Him most.[16]
+
+Tell that to a boy or girl as a short story. Use sensible words, but
+_not one_ that your little listener wouldn't at once understand. Pretty
+sharp discipline for the story-teller, especially if you stop to put in
+a simpler word when you've blundered into a big one. The child will be
+held by it But you will get the most yourself out of the telling.
+
+
+
+Warp-Threads.
+
+
+Now as you read the second part over, it gradually sifts itself into
+several incidents about which the story is woven. These incidents form
+the warp-threads of the narrative. Into this warp are woven, sometimes
+little connecting links, sometimes quarrelsome discussion, sometimes
+exquisite bits of Jesus' teaching, and sometimes John's comments. And as
+the story grows it reaches one climax after another, each increasing in
+intensity, until the intensest is reached.[17] And these incidents fall
+naturally into groups. There are three _chief groups_ that seem to stand
+out as giving the bolder points of the outline, and then _smaller
+groups_ or _single incidents_ that lie in between.
+
+It is very natural that the story begins with the accounts of the
+deputation that was sent from Jerusalem by the official leaders of the
+nation, down to the Jordan bottoms where John the witness was drawing
+such great crowds. John modestly answers their questions about himself,
+and then the next day with dramatic intensity points out the Man for
+whom the whole nation has been looking for so long.
+
+The only response from deputation and officials is a most significant
+disappointing silence, a silence fully understood both by John[18] and
+by Jesus.[19] But five Galileans in the crowd listening to John's reply
+seek out, or are brought into personal questioning touch with, Jesus,
+and then yield Him unquestioning belief and personal devotion. And these
+five come, in after years, to be leaders known wherever Christ's name is
+known.[20] So there begins the sharp contrast running throughout these
+pages, between the two sides into which Jesus' presence divides the
+crowds.
+
+Then John traces the simple way in which the faith of these five men ran
+its tiny but tough tenacious tendril-roots down into their very vitals.
+A simple neighbourhood wedding occasion up near the old Nazareth home
+drew Jesus thither with His kinsfolk and His new-made friends. And then
+He meets the need of the homely occasion by helping out the shortened
+supply of wine in such an unusual way as reveals His character. And the
+conviction takes great fresh hold upon these five men that they have
+made no mistake. This Man is all they had taken Him for, and He is
+immensely more than they had thought into at first.[21]
+
+Then comes a little connecting link. After the Cana visit, Jesus runs
+into the near-by town of Capernaum with His kinsfolk and friends for a
+few days, a sort of continuation of the neighbourhood courtesies.[22]
+
+And then at once John goes to the intensest, and the most significant
+incident of this whole section of the book. It is the drastic turning
+out, by Jesus, of the traders in the temple-area at Jerusalem. This
+touched at once the national leaders' most sensitive nerve, and touched
+it roughly. It never ceased aching. This turning of the temple-area into
+a common market-place, which so jarred on the holy atmosphere of the
+place, and on Jesus' fine spirit, this was by arrangement with these
+leaders, and yielded them large profit. Here was the sore spot.
+
+With one deft stroke John lays bare the secret of the intense hatred of
+Jesus by these national leaders, with which these pages teem, and which
+came to its bursting head at the cross. Long after, when Jesus had died
+and been raised, these five leading disciples find a new strengthening
+of their faith in recalling words spoken at this time by Jesus.[23]
+
+Growing naturally out of this Passover visit comes the Nicodemus
+incident. Many of the Passover crowds were caught by the power of Jesus
+shown in the miracles He did, but had not the seasoned thoughtful faith
+of these first disciples. But one man sifts himself out by his spirit of
+earnest inquiry. The sharp contrast that runs throughout these incidents
+stands out here. This man is of the inner upper cultured circle, that
+controlled national affairs, that sent that Jordan committee, and that
+had been so upset by the temple cleansing.
+
+Yet not only Nicodemus' earnest search for truth, and the questions
+asked by him, but the fullness and fineness of spirit truth in Jesus'
+words to him reveal the true faith of this rare inquirer; and this is
+verified by his later actions.[24] Clearly Jesus found here an opened
+door. Here is the first of those exquisite bits of Jesus' teaching that
+mark John's Gospel.[25]
+
+These four incidents make up the first group of, what I think of as, the
+three chief groups of incidents in this section of John. The group
+begins at the Jordan, and runs up into Galilee, but in its interest and
+its chief incident, centres in Jerusalem. The action begins with John
+the witness, and swings naturally to Jesus. The contrast in this group
+of incidents is intense. With the same evidence at hand, first
+contemptuous silence and loving allegiance, then the beginnings of
+bitterest hate and of tenderest personal love, grow up side by side.
+
+Then there is a sort of swing-away-from-Jerusalem group that includes
+three incidents. After the rejection of John's witness to Jesus[26] by
+the nation's leaders, Jesus withdraws from Jerusalem to the country
+districts of Judea. There He takes up the sort of work John has been
+doing, so bearing His witness to John. John had drawn great crowds down
+to the Jordan and in the neighbourhood of its tributary streams.
+
+Now Jesus helps in arousing and instructing these crowds. There are two
+men preaching instead of one, and Jesus has the greater crowds. This is
+used to make trouble. It stirs up gossipy disputings. It is made to look
+like a jealous rivalry between the two men. And this supposed rivalry
+and disputing about the various claims of the two men become the
+uppermost thing. It reflects the characteristic spirit of the leaders.
+John greatly renews his witness to Jesus with fresh emphasis and
+earnestness.[27]
+
+But as Jesus sees that His presence is only being made a bone of
+contention He quietly slips away from Judea, turning north through
+Samaria towards Galilee. Then comes the great story of the visit to
+Sychar, with the exquisitely tactful winning of the sinful woman to a
+life of purity, and then using her as a messenger to her people.
+Imbedded in the story is another bit of Jesus' simple great teaching
+talk.[28]
+
+Then comes a brief connecting link. Finding no acceptance in Judea, His
+own country, Jesus goes to Galilee, where visitors at the Jerusalem
+Feast of Passover had been spreading the news of His words and deeds,
+and so a gracious welcome now awaits Him.[29]
+
+And here in Galilee He wins the believing love of a roman officer of
+noble birth, whose son is desperately ill. The father's faith passes
+through three stages, the belief that comes to ask for help, the deeper
+belief that rests upon Jesus' word to him and starts back home, and the
+yet deeper that gets confirmation of Jesus' word and power in the
+recovery of his son from the very time Jesus spoke the assuring
+word.[30]
+
+These are the three incidents in this group away from the Jerusalem
+district. It is striking that this group away from Jerusalem stands in
+sharp contrast with that first group centering in Jerusalem. _There_ is
+rejection by the nation's leaders running from contemptuous silence to
+the beginning of open opposition. _Here_ with less evidence there is
+acceptance by a Samaritan and a Roman; the one of no social standing;
+the other of the highest.
+
+The rejection of Jesus by the leaders stands in contrast thus far with
+acceptance of Him by five Galileans, by a cultured scholarly aristocrat,
+a half-breed Samaritan, and a Roman of gentle birth. Acceptance seems to
+grow with the distance from Jerusalem. Yet everything hinged in
+Jerusalem. _There_ had been the flood-light. Jerusalem was meant to be
+the gateway to the world. The irony of sin! The blinding of greed! The
+self-cheating of being self-centered!
+
+
+
+Climbing towards the Climax.
+
+
+And now, true to his controlling thought, John goes straight back to
+Jerusalem with his story, ignoring intervening events. There's another
+feast, not called a Passover, but commonly and probably correctly so
+reckoned, another crowd-gathering Passover. An extreme chronic case of
+bodily infirmity draws out the pity and power of Jesus, and the healed
+man takes his first walk after thirty-eight years.
+
+But the thing is done on a Sabbath day, and gives rise to bitterest and
+murderous persecution, first on the score of Sabbath observance, and
+then because Jesus claimed God as "His own Father" in a distinctive
+sense. Friction fire may send out beautiful sparks. And the opposition
+brings out one of the choicest bits of Jesus' teaching to be found in
+John. This incident stands by itself.[31]
+
+And now John reaches over a whole year with only a sentence or two for
+connection, and comes again to a Passover. The Passover was _the pivot_
+of the Jewish year and of Jewish national life. This Passover is made
+notable by _Jesus' absence from Jerusalem_, the only Passover absence of
+His ministry. And the reason is the violence of the persecution by the
+national leaders.
+
+There is the feeding of the hungry thousands with a handful of loaves
+and fish. Was this the real Passover celebration? The multitudes fed by
+Him who was the Lamb of God and the true Bread of life? while the
+technical observance was empty of life! It wouldn't be the only thing of
+the sort, in ancient times or modern.[32]
+
+Jesus withdraws from the crowds who would like a bread-maker for a king,
+gets a bit of quiet alone with His Father on the mountainside, and then
+walks on the water in the storm to keep His appointment with the
+disciples. Then follows a long disputation and another fine bit of
+Jesus' teaching.[33] These two incidents make another distinct group,
+separated from the previous one by a year on the far side and six months
+on the hither side. And the contrast continues, between the acceptance
+by the Galilean crowds and the intensifying opposition by the chief
+group of Jerusalem leaders.
+
+Then comes _the second chief group of incidents_. About six months later
+Jesus returns to Jerusalem for the autumn Feast of Tabernacles. He
+boldly teaches in the temple in the midst of much opposition, bitter
+discussion, and concerted official effort against Him.[34] The dramatic
+incident of the accused woman and the conscience-stricken leaders[35] is
+followed by a yet more bitter discussion and by the first passionate
+attempt at stoning.[36]
+
+Then the incident of the man born blind but now blessedly given his
+sight leads to the bitterest opposition thus far, and the casting of the
+man out from all religious privileges; and is followed by the rare bit
+of sheepfold and shepherd teaching.[37] These four incidents make up the
+second great outstanding group of incidents, and mark the sharpest clash
+and crisis thus far.
+
+A few months later at another Jerusalem feast called the Feast of the
+Dedication, comes a second hotly impulsive riotous attempt at stoning,
+and then an attempt to arrest, both foiled by the restraint of Jesus'
+mere presence and personal power.[38] And another connecting link traces
+His going away beyond the Jordan River, where the crowds gather to Him,
+and are won to warm personal belief.[39]
+
+Another little gap of a few months passed over in silence, brings the
+narrative to the _third_ and last _chief group of incidents_ in this
+part of the book, and so leads immediately up to the great final events
+of the whole book.
+
+The illness and death of Lazarus draws Jesus back to a suburb of
+Jerusalem, Bethany. Then the stupendous incident of the raising of
+Lazarus leads to the official decision to put Jesus to death.[40] And a
+connecting link of verses tells of Jesus' cautious withdrawal, of the
+inquiring crowds coming to the approaching Passover, and of the public
+notice given that Jesus was under official condemnation.[41]
+
+It is at the home feast given in Bethany as a tribute of love to Jesus
+that Judas, coldly criticizing a warm act of tender love, and gently
+rebuked by Jesus, gets into that bad heat of temper out of which came
+the foul bargaining and betrayal.[42] Another brief connecting link lets
+us see the crowds more eagerly inquiring for Jesus because of the
+raising of Lazarus, and the determined priests coolly plotting Lazarus'
+death, too.[43]
+
+Then comes Jesus' faithful open offer of Himself in kingly fashion to
+the nation, with the tremendous enthusiasm of the multitudes, and the
+hardening of the official purpose to do the one thing that will offset
+this wild-fire enthusiasm.[44]
+
+And then comes the apparently simple, but in meaning tremendous,
+incident of the inquiring Greeks. The Jew door is slamming shut, but the
+outside door is opening. Here the whole world opens its door, its front
+door, in these Greek representatives of the best culture the earth knew.
+But Jesus' vision never blurs. He understands; He alone. The only route
+to Greece and the whole outer world is the underground route, the way
+through Joseph's tomb.
+
+And as the intense spirit-struggle passes, Jesus quietly goes on with
+His searching appealing talk to the crowd, and then slips away into
+hiding till His hour had full come.[45] And with breaking heart John
+sadly recalls Isaiah's wondrous foresight of just these days and
+events.[46] These are the four incidents in this third chief group.
+
+And so the door shuts. The wooing ceases. This bit of John's story is
+done. The evidence is all in. The case is made up. The nation's door to
+its King shuts. The Lover's wooing of the nation ceases. John turns to a
+new chapter. No further evidence is brought forward. The case rests with
+the jury. The door had been shutting for a good while. The inside
+door-keepers had been pulling it hard. But the great Man outside had His
+hand on the knob delaying the shutting process, in the earnest hope that
+it yet might be quite stopped. Now His hand reluctantly loosens its
+hold. The knob is free. The inside pull does its work. The door goes to
+with a vigorous slam.
+
+The wooing is not _wholly_ done. There is still the indirect, the tacit
+wooing. There's still opportunity. All through that fateful night from
+Gethsemane's gate, to the last word at Pilate's seat the Lover is
+wooing. But it is wooing by action, by presence, by yielding. No
+pleading word is spoken. The direct wooing is done. Tender, earnest,
+insistent, patient, tremendous, irresistible in itself save to those who
+willed to resist anything and everything no matter what or
+whom,--wondrous wooing it has been. Now it's over. That chapter is done.
+
+
+
+Way-marks in John's Narrative.
+
+
+Out of this simple running account several things sift themselves, and
+stand out to our eyes. The action of the story swings chiefly _about
+Jerusalem_. The other parts seem but background to make Jerusalem stand
+out big. In this John's Gospel differs radically from the other three.
+They are absorbed chiefly with the tireless gracious Galilean ministry
+of Jesus, till the last great events force them to Jerusalem.
+
+And the reason is plain. Jerusalem is Israel. It is the nation. Jesus is
+wooing the _nation_ through its leaders. Why? For the nation's sake? for
+Israel's sake? Yes and no. Because these Jews were favourites of God?
+Distinctly _no_, though so highly favoured they had been in the wondrous
+mission entrusted to them. But because Israel was the gateway to a world
+Yes, for Israel's sake. _Through_ this gateway, so carefully prepared
+when every other gate was closing, _through_ this out to a world--this
+was the plan of action. And this will yet be found to be the plan.
+Through a Jewish gateway the King will one day go out to touch His
+world. This is the geography of John's story.
+
+The action of the story swirls largely, too, about the great national
+feasts, the Passovers, the Tabernacles or harvest-home feast of the
+autumn, and one called "the Dedication," not elsewhere spoken of. To
+these came great crowds of pilgrim Jews from all quarters of the world,
+speaking many languages beside their national Hebrew, giving large
+business, especially to money-brokers and traders in the animals and
+birds used in the sacrifices. That classical Pentecost Chapter of Acts
+gives the wide range of countries and of languages represented by these
+pilgrim thousands. These feasts are the central occasions of John's
+story.
+
+_The time_ begins with John's preaching in the Jordan bottoms and
+reaches up practically to the evening of the betrayal. It is commonly
+reckoned three and a half years. That is, there are some months before
+that first Passover, and then the events run through and up to the
+fourth Passover, reckoning the unnamed feast of chapter five as a
+Passover. This is the chronology of John's Gospel. John's Gospel gives
+the only clue to the length of Jesus' ministry.
+
+There are three groups _of persons_. There are _the Jews_. That is one
+of John's distinctive phrases. By it he means as a rule the official
+leaders of the nation, whom in common with the other writers he also
+designates by their party names, Pharisees, Scribes, Chief Priests, and
+so on. Among these the name of Caiaphas stands out, and later Annas.
+
+Then there are _the crowds_, the masses of people that flock together in
+any new stirring movement. There are Galilean crowds, feast-time crowds
+including the great numbers of foreign pilgrim Jews, city crowds, and
+country crowds. They gather to John's preaching. They gather in great
+numbers in Jerusalem, and on the Galilean visits. They are easily
+impressionable, swayed by subtle crowd-contagion, stirred up and played
+upon cunningly by the opposition leaders.
+
+They appeal greatly to Jesus, like unshepherded sheep. And the sick and
+needy ones, so numerous, draw out His pity and warm touch and healing
+power. They believe quickly, and almost as quickly are turned away and
+desert the cause they had so quickly and warmly rallied to. Fickle,
+unthoughtful, easily-swayed, needy crowds, but with the thoughtful ones
+and groups here and there who are really helped and who stick. These
+crowds are always in evidence.
+
+And there are _the disciples_. There is the inner group of chosen ones
+who companion with Jesus, sharing His bread and bed, and close witnesses
+of His gracious spirit and unfailing power, with impulsive heady Peter
+and faithful steady John always nearest by. What a schooling all this
+was for them! And there are other disciples, not of this picked circle,
+but on most intimate personal terms with the Master, some of them, like
+thoughtful cautious Nicodemus, like the Bethany group of three, and Mary
+the Magdalene. And there is the larger, looser, changing body of
+disciples, mingling with the crowds, sometimes deserting, but no doubt
+with many thoughtful devoted ones among them. These are the leading
+persons figuring in John's story, grouped about the person of Jesus.
+
+But these are simply interesting incidentals giving local colouring to
+John's story. We pass by them quickly now to a few things that take
+great hold of one's heart, that stand out biggest, and give the real
+action of life to the story.
+
+
+
+Tapestry Threads.
+
+
+As we unravel the fabric of John's Gospel there are three threads that
+stand out by reason of the distinctness of their colours. There's a
+thread of clear decided blue. There's a dark ugly black thread that
+gets blacker as it weaves itself farther in. And then there's a bright
+yellow glory-colour thread that shines with brighter lustre as the black
+gets blacker.
+
+Trace the blue first, the thread of a simple glad acceptance of Jesus,
+and trust in Him. It deepens in its fine shading of blue as you follow
+it, true blue, the colour true hearts wear. From the very first Jesus is
+accepted by some, by many. And this continues steadily through to the
+very last. Some doors open at once to Him. Then under the influence of
+His presence and gentle resistless power they open wide, and then wider.
+
+It is fascinating to trace the simply told story of growing faith, until
+one's own faith gets clearer and steadier and has more warm glow to it.
+To adapt Tennyson's fine lines, as knowledge grows from more to more
+there dwells in us more of the deep tender reverence of love, until all
+the powers of mind and spirit chord into one symphony of unending music.
+And the wheels of our common life move always to its rhythmic swing.
+
+See how _the crowds_ crowd to Jesus, and open up to the appeal of His
+words and acts and presence. Many of the pilgrim crowds of that first
+Passover believe, impressed by Jesus' spirit of helpfulness and His
+unusual power.[47] And the Galileans among them give Him warm welcome as
+He comes up into their country.[48] It is a great multitude that follows
+eagerly up on the east coast of the Galilean sea, hail Him as the
+long-expected prophet of their nation, talk of plans for making Him
+their King, and earnestly cry out, "Lord, evermore give us this (true)
+bread."[49]
+
+Even in the midst of the bickering discussions at the Tabernacles Feast
+many of the multitude believed on Him, some as the long-talked-of
+prophet, some as the very Christ Himself.[50] And as He talks to His
+critics of His purpose always to please the Father, still others are
+drawn in heart to Him and believe.[51] And at this same time, as the
+criticism gets uglier, many make bold to speak out on His behalf[52]
+though it was getting to be a dangerous thing to do. As He feels
+compelled to withdraw from the tense atmosphere of Jerusalem, and goes
+away into the country districts beyond the Jordan the people come
+flocking to Him with open hearts.[53]
+
+The Lazarus incident made inroads into the upper circles of Jerusalem,
+many of the influential social class with whom these dear Bethany
+friends seem on close terms, and who had been out there during those
+stirring days, believe on Jesus, and many of the common people, too, are
+won by that occurrence.[54] That tremendous raising of Lazarus had much
+to do with the great acclaim of the multitudes as Jesus rode into
+Jerusalem on the kingly colt.[55]
+
+It is without doubt a sincere homage that these multitudes from far and
+near, and the home crowds, render, with their palm branches and
+garment-strewn roads, and spontaneous outburst of joyous song.[56] And
+now as John put his bit of a knotted summary on the end of this part of
+his story, he points out that even among the members of the Jewish
+Senate there were many real believers.[57]
+
+But a crowd is a strange complex thing. It doesn't know itself. It's
+easily swept along to do as a crowd what would never be done by each one
+off by himself. And this works in good ways as well as in bad. Jesus
+drew the crowds and was drawn by them. He couldn't withstand the pull of
+the crowd. The lure of its intense need was irresistible to Him. Yet He
+knew crowds rarely.
+
+He was never blinded by their enthusiasm. His keen insight saw under the
+surface, though it never held Him critically back from helping. He
+quickly notes that the belief of those first Passover crowds has not
+reached the dependable stage.[58] He is never held back from showing the
+red marks in the road to be trodden even though many of His disciples
+balk at going farther on such a road, and some turn away to an easier
+road,[59] so revealing an utter lack of the real thing. And even where
+there's real faith of the sincere sort it is yet sometimes not of the
+seasoned sort that can stand the storms.[60]
+
+These crowds seem of close kin to more modern crowds. One touch of a
+crowd rubs out centuries of difference and shows one family blood in us
+all. Yet keep things poised. It was out of these crowds that there came
+the disciples and close friends to whom we now turn. There's gold in the
+crowds, finest twenty-four carat gold. It's all a matter of mining.
+Skilful mining gets out the gold. This wondrous Lover used the
+magnetic-current method of mining, the love-current. The strong warm
+current, the fine personal spirit current, drew out to Him the fine
+grains of gold in these human crowds.
+
+
+
+Growing Faith.
+
+
+Now we climb the hill where _the disciples_ are. The crowds are in the
+bottom-lands. Many have started up the hill. Jesus always woos men
+uphill. You can always tell a man by where he is standing, bottom-land,
+hillside, higher-hill-slope, hilltop. We turn now from the crowds that
+believed to those whose personal acceptance of Jesus drew them into the
+inner circle.
+
+The first three incidents trace the beginnings of faith in those first
+close disciples who came to be numbered among the picked inner
+twelve.[61] The first story is one of the rarest of John's many rare
+stories. It is characteristic of the real thing of faith that beginning
+with two they quickly number five. The attachment of the two to John,
+the Witness, reveals them as of the earnest inquiring sort, after the
+very best. John never forgot that talk with Jesus in the gathering
+twilight by the Jordan. It sends Andrew out for Peter, and John likely
+for James, while the Master gets Philip, and he in turn Nathaniel. That
+reveals the real stuff of faith. It has a mind whose questionings have
+been satisfied, a heart that catches fire, and feet that hasten
+out-of-doors for others. That's the real thing.
+
+Their faith takes deeper root at Cana. A new personal experience of
+Jesus' power is a great deepener of faith, the great deepener. This is
+the only pathway from faith to a deeper realer sturdier faith. A man can
+get a deeper faith only by walking on his own feet where Jesus leads.
+
+Their faith grows imperceptibly but by leaps and bounds. It grows down
+deeper and so up stronger and out farther by their _companionship with
+Jesus_ through those brief packed years. What a school that was! the
+school of companionship with Jesus, with lessons daily, but the chiefest
+lesson the Teacher Himself. What a school it _is_! The only one for
+learning the real thing of faith: still open: pupils received at any
+time.
+
+If we would shut our eyes and go with them as they company with Jesus
+through those wondrous days and events and experiences we may get some
+hold on how their faith grew. They actually saw the handful of loaves
+and fishes grow in their hands until thousands were fed. Their own eyes
+saw Jesus walking on the water.
+
+It was out of their very hearts that they cry out through Peter's lips
+in answer to Jesus' pathetic pleading question and say, "To whom shall
+we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life."[62] And without doubt
+Thomas acts as spokesman for all when Jesus announced His intention of
+returning to the danger zone, and Thomas sturdily says, "Let us _also_
+go, that we may die with Him."[63]
+
+But you are thinking of that terrible break of theirs on the betrayal
+night, are you? Well, perhaps if we call to mind with what an utter
+shock the events of that terrific twenty four hours came, intensified
+the more by the unexpectedness and the suddenness of it; and then
+if--perhaps--we may call to mind the more recent behaviour of some
+modern disciples who have had enormous advantages over them in regard to
+that terrific experience it may chasten our feelings a bit and soften
+the edge of our thought about them.
+
+But dear faithful John never faltered. We must always love him for that.
+How humiliating for us if not even one had stood that test. And how
+their after-contact with John must have affected the others. John pulled
+the others back and up. And how their faith so sorely chastened and
+tested came to its fine seasoned strength afterwards.
+
+These very events of the early days now come back with new meaning to
+them. Jesus' words at the temple cleansing, and the kingly entry into
+Jerusalem, shine now in a new light and give new strength to their
+faith.[64] But John himself brings us back to this again in that long
+talk of the betrayal night. So we leave it now. But blue is a good
+colour for the eyes. It reveals great beauty in the bit of
+tapestry-pattern John is weaving for us to trace these true blue
+threadings.
+
+But there's more here, much more, that adds greatly to the pattern.
+There are faithful disciples _and precious intimate friendships_ outside
+the circle of these future leaders. Take only a moment for these as we
+push on.
+
+There's that night visitor of the early Jerusalem days. Aristocrat,
+ruler, scholar, with all the supercautiousness that these qualities
+always grain in, Nicodemus actually left the inner circle of
+temple-rulers who were as sore to the touch as a boil over John's
+drastic cleansing, and comes for a personal interview. His utter
+sincerity is shown in the temper of his remarks and questions, and shown
+yet more in the openness of Jesus' spirit in talking with him. For this
+is a trait in Jesus' dealings,--openness when He finds an opening door.
+It _must_ be so, then and now. He can open up only where there is an
+opening up to Him. Openness warms and loosens. The reverse chills and
+locks up.[65]
+
+It is in another just such situation but far more acute, that this man
+speaks out for Jesus in an official meeting of these same rulers.
+Timidly? have you thought, cautiously? Yet he spoke out when no one else
+did, though others there believed in Jesus. A really rare courage it was
+that told of a growing faith.[66] And the personal devotion side of his
+faith, evidence again of the real thing, stands out to our eyes as we
+see him bring the unusual gift of very costly ointments for the
+precious body of his personal friend.[67] It's a winsome story, this of
+Nicodemus. May there be many a modern duplicate of it.
+
+In utter social contrast stands the next bit of this sort following so
+hard that the contrast strikes you at once. It's a half-breed Samaritan
+this time, and a woman, and an openly bad life. The Samaritans were
+hated by Jew and Gentile alike as belonging to neither, ground between
+the two opposing social national millstones. Womanhood was debased and
+held down in the way all too familiar always and everywhere. And a moral
+outcast ranks lowest in influence.
+
+But true love discerns the possible lily in the black slime bulb at the
+pond's bottom and woos it into blossoming flower, till its purity and
+beauty greet our delighted eyes. Under the simple tact of love's true
+touch, out of such surroundings grows a faith, through the successive
+stages of gossipy curiosity, cynical remark, interest, eagerness, guilty
+self-consciousness that would avoid any such personal conversation, out
+and out comes a faith that means a changed life, and then earnest
+bringing of others till the whole village acclaims Jesus a Saviour,
+_the_ Saviour.
+
+And the very title they apply to Jesus reveals as by a flash-light the
+chief personal meaning the interview had for this outcast woman. In one
+way her faith meant more than Nicodemus', for it meant a radical change
+of outer life with her. And many a one stops short of that, though the
+real thing never does, and can't.[68]
+
+Then the circle widens yet more, geographically. Jew, Samaritan, it is a
+_Roman_ this time, one of the conquering nation under whose iron heel
+the nation writhes restlessly. He is of gentle birth and high official
+position. It is his sense of acute personal need that draws him to
+Jesus. The child of his love is slipping from his clinging but helpless
+grasp.
+
+There's the loose sort of hearsay groping faith that turns to Jesus in
+desperation. Things can't be worse, and possibly there might be help.
+There's the very different faith that looks Jesus in the face and hears
+the simple word of assurance so quietly spoken. He actually heard the
+word spoken about _his_ dying darling, "_thy son liveth_."
+
+Then there is that wondrous new sort of faith whose sharper hooks of
+steel enter and take hold of your very being as you actually
+_experience_ the power of Jesus in a way wholly new to you. As it came
+to his keenly awakened mind that the favourable turn had come at the
+very moment Jesus uttered those quiet words, and then as he looked into
+the changed face of his recovering child, he became a changed man. The
+faith in Jesus was a part of his being. The two could never be put
+asunder. So the Roman world brought its grateful tribute of acceptance
+to this great wooing brooding Lover. The wooing had won again.
+
+And now there's another extreme social turnabout in the circle that
+feels the power of Jesus' wooing. We turned from Jerusalem aristocrat to
+Samaritan outcast; now it's from gentle Roman official to a beggaring
+pauper. It is at the Tabernacles' visit. Jesus, quietly masterfully
+passing out from the thick of the crowd that would stone Him, noticed a
+blind ragged beggar by the roadway. One of those speculative questions
+that are always pushing in, and that never help any one is asked: "Who's
+to blame here?"
+
+With His characteristic intense practicality Jesus quietly pushes the
+speculative question aside with a broken sentence, a sentence broken by
+His action as He begins helping the man. In effect He says, "Neither
+this man nor his parents are immediately to blame; the thing goes
+farther back. But"--and He reaches down and begins to make the soft clay
+with His spittle--"_the_ thing is to see the power of God at work to
+help." And the touch is given and the testing command to wash, and then
+eyes that see for the first time.
+
+But the one thing that concerns us now in this great ninth chapter is
+the faith that was so warmly wooed up out of nothing to a thing of
+courageous action and personal devotion to Jesus. It is fairly
+fascinating to watch the man move from birth-blind hopelessness through
+clay-anointed surprise and wonder and Siloam-walking expectancy on to
+water-washing eyesight.
+
+It is yet more fascinating to see his spirit move up in the language he
+uses, from "the _man_ called Jesus," and the cautious but blunt "I don't
+know about His being a sinner, but I know I can _see_," on to the
+bolder "clearly not a sinner but a man in reverent touch with God
+Himself."
+
+Then the yet bolder, "a man _from God_," brings the break with the
+dreaded authorities which branded him before all as an outcast and as a
+damned soul. And then the earnest reverent cry "Who is He, Lord, that I
+may believe?" reveals the yearning purpose of his own heart. And then
+the great climax comes in the heart cry, "Lord, I believe, I believe
+Thee to be the very Son of God."
+
+And the outcast of the rulers casts in his lot with Jesus and begins at
+once living the eternal quality of life which goes on endlessly. What a
+day for him from hopeless blindness of body and heart to eyesight that
+can see Jesus' face and know Him as his Saviour and Lord! Growth of
+faith clearly is not limited to the counting of hours. It waits only on
+one's walking out fully into all the light that comes, no matter where
+it may lead your steps.
+
+
+
+The Bethany Height of Faith.
+
+
+The Bethany story is one of the tenderest of all. It touches the
+heights. It's a hilltop story, both in its setting amidst the Bethany
+blue hills where it grew up, and in the height of faith it records. It
+has personal friendship and love of Jesus and implicit trust in Him as
+its starting point. And from this it reaches up to levels unknown
+before. Faith touches high water here. It rises to flood, a flood that
+sweeps mightily through the valleys of doubt and questionings all around
+about.
+
+At the beginning there is faith in Jesus of the tender, personal sort.
+At the close there's faith that He will actually meet the need of your
+life and circumstance _without limit_. The highest faith is this:
+connecting Jesus' power and love with the actual need of your life.
+Abraham believed God with full sincerity that covenant-making night
+under the dark sky. But he didn't connect his faith in God with his need
+and danger among the Philistines.[69] Peter believed in Jesus fully but
+his faith and his action failed to connect when the sore test came that
+Gethsemane night.
+
+The Bethany pitch of faith makes connections. It ties our God and our
+need and our action into one knot. This is the pith of this whole story.
+Jesus' one effort in His tactful patient wooing is to get Martha up to
+the point of ordering that stone aside. He got her faith into touch with
+the gravestone of her sore need. Her faith and her action connected.
+That told her expectancy. Creeds are best understood when they're acted.
+Moving the stone was her confession of faith. _Not_ that Jesus was the
+Son of God. That was settled long before.
+
+No: it meant this--that the Son of God was now actually going to _act as
+Son of God_ to meet her need. Under His touch her dead brother was going
+to live. The deadness that broke her heart would give way under Jesus'
+touch. The Bethany faith doesn't believe that God _can_ do what you
+need, merely. It believes that He _will_ do it And so the stone's taken
+away that He _may_ do it. God has our active consent. Are we up on the
+Bethany level? Has God our active consent to do all He would? Is our
+faith being lived, acted out?
+
+And the feast of grateful tribute that followed has an exquisite added
+touch. The faith that lets God into one's life to meet its needs gets
+clearer eyesight. Acted faith affects the spirit vision. There is a
+spirit sensitiveness that recognizes God and discerns how things will
+turn out.
+
+Notice Jesus' words about Mary's act of anointing. There is a singularly
+significant phrase in it. "Let her _keep it_ against (or in view of) the
+day of My burying." "Keep it" is the striking phrase. What does that
+mean? We speak of _keeping_ a day, as Christmas, meaning to hallow the
+memories for which it stands. "Keep it" here seems to mean that. Let her
+keep a memorial. Yet it would be a memorial _in advance_ of the event
+remembered and hallowed.
+
+It seems to suggest that Mary thus discerned the outcome for Jesus of
+the coming crisis, and more, its great significance. The disciples
+expected Jesus' power to overcome all opposition. She alone sensed what
+was coming, His death and its tremendous spirit-meaning. And it is
+possible that the raising of her brother helped her to sense ahead
+another raising. For there is no mention of her at the tomb, as would
+otherwise have been most natural.
+
+Her simple love-lit faith could _see_, and could see _beyond_ to the
+final outcome. This is the story of the Bethany faith, faith at flood.
+This highest simplest truest faith, that had come in answer to Jesus'
+patient persistent wooing for it, opens the way for the greatest use of
+His power on record.
+
+There's one story more in this true-blue faith list. It is the story of
+the Greeks. At first it seems not to belong in here. There is no mention
+made of the faith of these men nor of their acceptance of Jesus. But the
+more you think into it the more it seems that here is its true place,
+and that this is why John brings it in, not simply to show how the
+outside world was reaching for Jesus, but to show the inner spirit of
+these men towards Jesus.
+
+Whether the term _Greeks_ is used in the looser sense for the
+Greek-speaking Jews,[70] or for non-Jewish foreigners, or, as I think
+most likely, in the meaning of men of Grecian blood, residents of
+Greece, the significance is practically the same, it was the outer world
+coming to Jesus. These had come a long journey to do homage to the true
+God at Jerusalem. Their presence reveals their spirit.
+
+They were eye and ear-witnesses of the stirring events of those last
+days in Jerusalem. The stupendous story of the raising of the man out in
+the Bethany suburb was the talk of the city. And then there was that
+intense scene of the kingly entry into the city amid the acclaiming
+multitudes. They knew of the official opposition, and the public
+proclamation against Jesus. They breathed the Jerusalem air. That put
+them in touch with the whole situation.
+
+Now notice keenly they seek a personal interview with Jesus. This is the
+practical outcome of the situation _to them_. It reminds one of that
+other man, under similar conditions though less intense, at an earlier
+stage, cautiously seeking a night interview. Their desire tells not
+curiosity but earnestness, and the very earnestness reveals both purpose
+and attitude towards Jesus.
+
+And this is made the plainer by the very words they use as they seek out
+the likeliest man of the Master's inner circle to secure the coveted
+interview. They say, "Sir, _we would see Jesus_." The whole story of
+conviction, of earnestness, of decision, is in that tremendous little
+word "would." It was their will, their deliberate choice, to come into
+personal relations with this Man of whom they were hearing so much.
+
+And it seems like a direct allusion to that tremendous word, and an
+answer to it, when Jesus, in effect, in meaning, says, "if any man
+_would_ follow Me." Both the coming under such circumstances, and the
+form of the request, seem to tell the attitude of these men towards
+Jesus and their personal purpose regarding Him. It would be altogether
+likely that they accompany Philip as he seeks out Andrew. It would be
+the natural thing. And so they are with Philip and Andrew as they come
+to tell Jesus.
+
+Then this would be the setting of these memorable intense words that
+Jesus now utters.[71] He senses at once the request and the earnest
+purpose of these men seeking Him out. It is for them especially that
+these words are spoken. And if, as some thoughtful scholars think, Jesus
+spake here, not in His native Aramaic, but in the Greek tongue, it gives
+colouring to the supposition. The intense earnestness of His words, and
+the revealing of the intense struggle within His spirit as He breathes
+out the simple prayer,--all this is a tacit recognition of the spirit of
+these Greeks.
+
+The parallel is striking with the Nicodemus interview where no direct
+mention is made of the faith that later events showed was unquestionably
+there. It seems like another of those silences of John that are so full
+of meaning.[72] And the silence seems, as with Nicodemus, to mean the
+acquiescence of the inquirers in the message they hear.
+
+This then would seem to be the reply to the request. They have indeed
+seen Jesus. And they accept it and Him, as most likely they linger
+through the Passover-days at hand and then turn their faces homeward.
+And so the warm wooing has drawn out this warm response from the
+cultured Greek world.
+
+So we trace the blue thread in John's tapestry picture, the true faith
+that is drawn out from nothing to little and more and much and most,
+under the warmth of the brooded wooing of this great Lover.
+
+
+
+The Ugly Thread in the Weaving.
+
+
+Now for that ugly dark thread, the opposition to, the rejection of, the
+Lover's wooing. But we'll not linger here. We've been seeing so much of
+this thread as we traced the other and studied the whole. Ugly things
+stand out by reason of their very ugliness. This stands out in gloomy
+disturbing contrast with all the rest. A brief quick tracing will fully
+answer our present purpose. And then we can hasten on to the dominating
+figure in the pattern.
+
+The opposition begins with silent rejection, moves by steady stages,
+growing ever intenser clear up to the murderous end. The sending of the
+committee to the Jordan to examine John and report on him was an
+official recognition of his power. The questions asked raise the
+possibility clearly being discussed of John being the promised prophet,
+or Elijah, or even the Christ Himself, and this is an expression of the
+national expectancy. The utter silence with which John's witness to
+Jesus is met is most striking.[73] Its significance is spoken of by both
+Jesus and John.[74]
+
+The intensity of the resentment over the cleansing of the temple-area
+can be almost felt rising up out of the very page, in the critical
+questions and cynical comment of the Jews. One can easily see all the
+bitterness of their hate tracking its slimy footprints out of that
+cleansed courtyard.[75]
+
+The cunning discussion among the great Jordan crowds about the purifying
+rite of baptism, stirred up so successfully by "_a Jew_," that is,
+probably by one of the Jerusalem leaders, would seem to be a studied
+attempt to discredit the two preachers, Jesus and John, and swing the
+crowds away. It was shrewdly done and might have dissipated the fine
+spiritual atmosphere by bitter strife and discussion had not Jesus
+quietly slipped away.[76]
+
+This attitude of theirs is clearly recognized and felt by Jesus. He
+plainly points out that vulgarizing hurt of sin whereby God's own
+messenger is not recognized when He comes in the garb of a
+neighbour.[77]
+
+Then things get more acute. The blessed healing of a
+thirty-eight-year-old infirmity leads to outspoken persecution, to a
+desire and purpose actually to kill Jesus. It grew intenser as Jesus'
+claim grew clearer. The issue was sharply drawn. He "called God _His own
+Father_, making Himself _equal with God_." They begin plotting His
+death.[78]
+
+His prudent absence from Jerusalem at the time of the next Passover
+reveals graphically how tense the opposition had gotten. But even up by
+Galilee's shores they have messengers at work amongst the crowds
+exciting discussion and discontent and worse. In the discussion it is
+easy to pick out the two elements, the nagging critics and the earnest
+seekers. And the saddening result is seen in many disciples leaving
+Jesus and going back again to their old way.[79]
+
+Then things got so intense that Jesus' habit of life was broken or
+changed. He could no longer frequent Judea as He had done, but kept
+pretty much to the northern province of Galilee. The settled plan to
+kill made His absence a matter of common prudence. This makes most
+striking His great courage in going up to Jerusalem at the autumn Feast
+of Tabernacles. He quietly arrived in the midst of much rumour and hot
+discussion about Himself, and begins teaching the crowds openly, to the
+great amazement of many.
+
+At once begin the wordy critical attacks, egged on probably by the
+warmth with which many receive Jesus' teachings. There are three
+attempts to take Him by force, including an official attempt at arrest.
+But, strangely enough, the very officers sent to arrest are so impressed
+by Jesus' teaching that they return with their mission not done, to the
+intensest disgust and rage of their superiors.[80]
+
+Early on the morning following there's a cunning coarse attempt to
+entrap Him into saying something that can be used against Him. A woman
+is brought accused of wrong-doing of the gravest sort, and His opinion
+is asked as to the proper punishment for so serious an offense. There's
+nothing more dramatic in Scripture than the withdrawal of these
+accusers, one by one, actually conscience-stricken in the presence of
+the few simple words of this wondrous Man.[81]
+
+This is followed by the intensest give-and-take of discussion thus far,
+in which they give vent to their bitterest degree of vile language in
+calling Him "a Samaritan," and accusing Him of being possessed with "a
+demon." And then the terrible climax is reached in the enraged
+passionate attempt of stoning. It is the worst yet to which their
+fanatical rage has gone.[82]
+
+Now they reach out to intimidate the multitude, by threatening to cut
+off from religious and civic privileges all who would confess belief in
+Jesus as Christ. And their spleen vents its rage on the man born blind
+but now so wondrously given sight of two sorts.[83]
+
+The winter Feast of the Dedication a few months later finds Jesus back
+again in Jerusalem teaching. And again their enraged attempt at stoning,
+the second one, is restrained by a something in Him they can neither
+understand nor withstand.[84]
+
+The Lazarus incident arouses their opposition to the highest pitch.[85]
+This is recognized as a crisis. Such power had never been seen or known.
+The inroads of belief are everywhere, in the upper social circles, among
+the old families, even in the Jewish Senate itself, notwithstanding the
+threatened excommunication. On every hand men are believing. Things are
+getting desperate for these leaders. They determine to use all the
+authority at hand arbitrarily and with a high hand. What strange
+blindness of stubborn self-will to such open evidence of power!
+
+A special meeting of the Jewish Senate is held, not unlikely hastily
+summoned of those not infected with belief. And there it is officially
+determined to put Jesus to death, and serve public notice that any one
+knowing of His whereabouts must report their information to the
+authorities.
+
+And as the incoming crowds thicken for the Passover, and the talk about
+Lazarus is on every tongue, it is determined to put Lazarus to death,
+too. This is the pitch things have risen to as John brings this part of
+his story to a close.
+
+
+
+The Glory-Coloured Thread.
+
+
+It is a relief to turn now to the chief figure in this tapestried
+picture of John's weaving. Here are glory-coloured threads of bright
+yellow. They easily stand out, thrown in relief both by the pleasing
+blues and the disturbing blacks. It is the figure of the Man on the
+errand, intent on His wooing, absorbed in His great task. Thia Man, His
+tremendous wooing, wins glad grateful ever-growing acceptance. And with
+rarest boldness and courage He persists in His wooing in spite of the
+terrific intensifying opposition.
+
+The gentle softening dew persists in distilling even on the hardest
+stoniest soil. The _gentle winsomeness of the wooing_ stands out
+appealingly as one goes through those fragments of teaching talks
+running throughout. The rare faithfulness of it to the nation and its
+leaders is thrown into bold relief by the very opposition that reveals
+their dire spiritual plight and their sore need.
+
+The _power of it_ is simply stupendous. As gentle in action as the
+falling dew it grows in intensity until neither the gates of death nor
+even the stubborn resistance of a human will can prevail against it. It
+is power sufficient to satisfy the most critical search, and to make
+acceptance not only possible with one's reasoning power in fullest
+exercise but the rational thing.
+
+Look a bit at the power at work here. For in looking at the power we are
+getting a better look at the Man, and at the purpose that grips Him. Of
+the nineteen incidents in these twelve chapters fifteen give exhibitions
+of power. It is of two sorts, power over the human will, and miraculous
+power.
+
+Eight incidents reveal _power working upon the human will_. In three of
+these--Nicodemus, the Samaritan woman, the accused sinful woman--the
+will becomes pliant and is radically changed, so morally affecting the
+whole life. In five--the temple cleansing, at the Tabernacles Feast, the
+first and second attempt at stoning, and the kingly entry into the
+city--the human will is stubbornly aggressively antagonistic to Jesus,
+but is absolutely restrained from what it is fully set upon doing.
+
+In the other seven incidents the power is _miraculous_ or supernatural.
+In three--turning the water into wine, multiplying food supplies,
+walking on the water--it is power in _the realm of nature_. In
+four--healing the Roman nobleman's son, the thirty-eight-year
+infirmity, giving sight to the man born blind, and the raising of
+Lazarus--it is power in _the realm of the body_, radically changing its
+conditions.
+
+It will help to remember what those words _miraculous_ and
+_supernatural_ mean. Miraculous means something wonderful, that is,
+something filling us with wonder because it is so unusual. Supernatural
+means something above the usual natural order. The two words are
+commonly taken as having one meaning. Neither word means something
+contrary to nature, of course, but simply on a higher level than the
+ordinary workings of nature with which we are familiar. The action is in
+accord with some higher law in God's world which is brought into play
+and is seen to be superior to the familiar laws.
+
+But the power, or the man that can call this higher law into action, is
+of a higher order. There is revealed an intimacy of acquaintance with
+these higher laws, and even more a power that can command and call them
+into action down in the sphere of our common ordinary life, until we
+stare in wonder. This is really the remarkable thing. Not supernatural
+action itself simply, tremendous as that is, but the man in such touch
+with higher power as to be able to call out the action, and to command
+it at will.
+
+This is one of the things that marks Jesus off so strikingly from other
+holy men. There are miracles in the Old Testament and in the Book of
+Acts. But there's an abundance and a degree of power in Jesus' miracles
+outclassing all others. It is fascinating and awesome to watch the
+growth of power in these movements of Jesus. It is as though He woos
+more persistently in the very degree and variety of power that He uses
+so freely, and with such apparent ease.
+
+Which calls out greater power, creating or healing? making water into
+wine or healing bodily ailment? Which is the greater, power in the realm
+of nature or the body? _or_ in the realm of the human will? multiplying
+food _or_ changing a human will? Which is greater, to induce a man
+voluntarily to change his course of action, _or_ to restrain him (by
+moral power only, not by force) from doing something he is dead-set on
+doing?
+
+This is the range through which Jesus' action runs in these fifteen
+incidents. Is there a growth in the power revealed? Is there an intenser
+plea to these men as the story goes on? Is there a steady piling up of
+evidence in the wooing of their hearts?
+
+Well, creating is bringing into material being what didn't so exist
+before. Healing does something more. It creates new tissue, makes new or
+different adjustments and conditions, _and_ it overcomes the opposite,
+the broken tissue, the diseased conditions, the weakness, the tendency
+towards decay and death. Clearly there's a greater task in healing, and
+a greater power at work, or more power, or power revealed more.
+
+Then, too, of course, the human is above the physical. Man is higher
+than nature. He is the lord of creation. It is immensely more to affect
+a human will than to affect conditions in nature. The whole thing moves
+up to a measureless higher level. And clearly enough it is a less
+difficult task to enlighten and persuade one who seeks the light, and to
+woo up one who is simply carelessly indifferent, than it is to overcome
+and restrain a will that is dead-set against you and is bitterly set on
+an opposite course.
+
+Of course, all of this is not commonly so recognized. It seems immensely
+more to heal the body than to change a man's course of action, or, at
+least, it appeals immensely more to the imagination. The man who can
+heal is magnified in our eyes above the other. The miraculous always
+seems the greater. It is more unusual. Stronger wills are influencing
+others daily. That's a commonplace. Bodily healing is rare. And all the
+world is ill. Things are ripe to have such power seize upon the
+imagination then and always.
+
+And then, too, there are interlacings here of things we see and things
+we don't see. There is the element of the use of the human will in all
+miraculous action, whether in nature or among men. Behind both nature's
+forces and human forces are unseen spirit personalities, both evil and
+good. The real battle of our human life lies there in the spirit realm.
+Victory there means full victory in the realm of nature and of human
+lives. There is a devil with hosts of spirit attendants. The wilderness
+was a spirit-conflict of terrific intensity, ending in Jesus'
+unqualified victory.
+
+Jesus' power was more than simply creative, or healing, or over human
+wills. It was the power of a pure, strong, surrendered will having the
+mastery over a giant, unsurrendered, God-defiant will. This underlies
+all else. But we've run off a bit. Come back to the simple story, and
+see how the power of Jesus is revealed more and more before their eyes.
+And in seeing the faithfulness and winsomeness of His power, see His
+wooing.
+
+
+
+Intenser Wooing.
+
+
+A look at the _miraculous_ power first. The turning of the water into
+wine was simple creative power at work, creating in the liquid the added
+constituents that made it wine. The healing of the nobleman's son rises
+to a higher level. The power overcomes diseased weakened conditions and
+creates new life in the parts affected.
+
+The healing of a thirty-eight year old infirmity rises yet higher in the
+scale of power seen at work. The Roman's child was an acute case; this
+an extreme chronic case of long standing. The acute case of illness may
+be most difficult and ticklish, demanding a quick masterful use of all
+the physician's knowledge and skill. The chronic case is yet more
+difficult eluding his best studied and prolonged and repeated effort.
+Clearly the power at work is accomplishing more; and so it is pleading
+more eloquently.
+
+The feeding of the five thousand is creative power simply, like the
+water-wine case, but it moves up higher in the greater abundance of
+power shown, the increase of quantity created, and the far greater and
+intenser human need met and relieved.
+
+The walking on the water was an overcoming one of nature's laws, a
+rising up superior to it. The universal law of gravitation would
+naturally have drawn His feet through the surface of the water and His
+whole body down. He overcomes this law, retaining His footing on the
+water as on land.
+
+It was done in the night, but an Oriental community, like any country
+community, anywhere, is a bulletin-board for all that happens. No detail
+is omitted, and no one misses the news. And this like all these other
+incidents become the common property of the nation.
+
+It is interesting to note in the language John uses[86] that the motive
+underneath the action was not to reveal power but simply to keep an
+appointment. But then Jesus never used His power to show that He had
+power, but only to meet the need of the hour. Yet each exhibition of
+power revealed indirectly, incidentally _who He was_.
+
+There is an instance similar to this in the borrowed axe-head that swam
+in obedience to Elisha's touch of power to meet the need of the
+distressed theological student.[87] In each instance it is the same
+habit of nature that yields homage to a higher power at work.
+
+But though there is here no increase of power shown yet the action
+itself was of the sort to appeal much more to the crowd. It has in it
+the dramatic. It would appear to the crowd a yet more wonderful thing
+than they had yet witnessed.
+
+The giving of sight to the man born blind is distinctly a long step
+ahead of any healing power thus far related in John's story. There is
+here not only the chronic element, but the thing is distinctly in a
+class by itself, quite outclassing in the difficulty presented any case
+of mere chronic infirmity.
+
+It was not a matter of restoring what disease had destroyed but of
+supplying what nature had failed to give in its usual course. It was a
+meeting of nature's lack through some slip in the adjustment of her
+action in connection with human action. There is not only the appealing
+dramatic element, as in the walking on the water, but the appealing
+sympathetic element in that this poor man's lifelong burden is removed.
+
+And then the seventh and last of these, the actual raising of Lazarus up
+from the dead, is a climax of power in action nothing short of
+stupendous. Of the six recorded cases of the dead being raised this is
+easily the greatest in the power seen at work. In the other five, in the
+Elijah record,[88] the Elisha,[89] the Moabite's body at Elisha's
+grave,[90] Jairus' daughter,[91] and the widow's son at Nain,[92] there
+was no lapse of time involved.
+
+Here four days of death had intervened, until it was quite certain
+beyond question that in that climate decomposition would be well
+advanced. Utter human impotence and impossibility was in its last
+degree. Man stands utterly powerless, utterly helpless in the presence
+of death. It is not the last degree of improbability. There _is_ no
+improbability. It's an _impossibility_. The thing is in a class by
+itself, the hopeless class. And the four days give death its fullest
+opportunity. And death never fails in grim faithfulness to opportunity.
+
+It is no wonder that all Jerusalem was so stirred. The common crowds of
+home people and pilgrims, the aristocratic families, the inner official
+circles, among _all_ classes, this tremendous event won recognition of
+Jesus' power and claim, and with recognition personal faith. Nothing
+like this had ever happened. This is the superlative degree of
+miraculous power revealed in this matchless wooing of a faithless
+nation.
+
+
+
+Love Wooing Yet More.
+
+
+Now a look at the power at work _in the realm of the human will_, really
+a higher power, or power at work in a higher realm, though not commonly
+so recognized by the crowd. There are eight incidents here. And again we
+shall find the steady rise of the power seen at work. Three of these
+tell of the human will changed, and four of its being restrained
+against its will from doing that which it was dead-set on doing.
+
+The ruler who withdrew from the midst of the disturbed temple managers
+for a night-call upon Jesus was radically changed in his convictions and
+his life-purpose. He had an open mind. The work was begun at that first
+Jerusalem Passover. Under the holy spell of John's presence he is drawn
+away from his enraged brother-rulers to seek the night talk. The
+frankness and fullness of Jesus' talk shows plainly how open he was and
+how much more he opened and yielded that evening. And the after protest
+in the official meeting of the rulers, and the loving care for the body
+of Jesus reveal how radical was the transformation wrought upon his will
+and heart by Jesus.[93]
+
+The Samaritan woman is changed from utter indifference to a change of
+will and purpose that makes her an eager messenger to her people until
+they hail Jesus as the Saviour of the world. The change involved a
+radical face-about in habit and life amongst the very people who knew
+her past sinful life best. It meant more than change of conviction, that
+change actually put into practice across the grain of the habits of
+years, and of the lower passions, so hard to change. It is a distinct
+step up from the change in Nicodemus simply because there was so much
+more to change. The same power had more to do. And it did it.[94]
+
+The story of the woman accused of the gravest offense is a double one in
+the power seen at work. She would naturally be hardened, and stony
+hard, shameless to the point of hopeless indifference in moral sense,
+and all this increased by their coarse publicity of her. And so little
+is said, but so much suggested of a change in her.
+
+The purity of Jesus' face and presence would be a tremendous power of
+conviction. The gentleness of His quiet question would couple softening
+of heart with conviction of her sin. The word of counsel as she is
+dismissed would seem a mirror reflecting the inner longing of her heart
+and the new purpose stirring within, as memory recalls early days of
+virgin purity, and a wild hope within struggles towards life that there
+may yet be a change even for her.
+
+The change in her accusers is, at least, as remarkable though wholly
+different. Morally hardened, as shameless and coarse as the woman as
+regards a fine moral sensibility; by their own tacit confession no
+better in practice than she in the point of morals raised; in their
+malignant cunning only concerned with the woman's sin as a means of
+venting their spleen upon the man they hated and feared,--what a hideous
+spirit-photograph!
+
+Under the strange compelling power of Jesus' word and will, utterly
+conscience-stricken at being as guilty as she in the particular item
+under discussion, they turn, one by one, and slink softly out, until the
+last one is gone. As an instance of one will controlling and changing
+another will wholly against its will to the point of forcing out
+confession of personal guilt, it is most remarkable. One wonders if,
+under that tremendous conviction of personal sin, some of these were
+later included in those of the Sanhedrin who openly accepted Jesus. It
+is quite possible. It is not improbable.[95]
+
+The fact is noted that the very language used here under the English
+indicates a different authorship of the incident than John's. Possibly a
+thoughtful delicacy of regard for the woman restrains John's pen if she
+were still living as he writes. And then later the Holy Spirit, who so
+tactfully restrains John's pen, guides another to fit the remarkable
+story in its place in the record.
+
+The drastic turning of bargaining cattle-dealers and bickering
+money-brokers, out of the temple-area, and restoring it from a barn-yard
+to a place of holy worship, is a most remarkable illustration of
+_restraint upon antagonistic wills_ at the point of their greatest
+concern. These leaders would gladly have turned _Him_ out.
+
+And who was He, this man with flashing eye and quiet stern word? A
+stranger, unknown, from the despised country district of Galilee. And
+they have authority, law-officers, everything of the sort on their side.
+Yet the restraint of His presence and will over them is as absolute as
+though they were in chains. They weakly ask for a sign and evidence of
+power. They themselves experienced the most tremendous exhibition of
+power the old temple-area had known for generations.[96]
+
+The power of restraint at the Feast of Tabernacles is yet greater. Or
+it might be more accurate to say that it is a greater antagonism that is
+restrained by the same power. They are fully prepared now. The cleansing
+incident took them unawares. It made them gasp to think that any one
+would dare oppose them like that.
+
+Now they are on guard. Then, too, their antagonism has intensified and
+embittered to the point of plotting His death. And they have grown more
+openly aggressive. There are three attempts at His arrest. Yet that
+strange noiseless power of restraint is upon them. They do not do as
+they would. Clearly they cannot. They are restrained. The man whose
+presence so aroused, also held them in check, apparently without
+thinking about it. His _presence_ is a restraint.[97]
+
+Then a second clash of wills comes a day or so later. Their opposition
+is yet intenser. There has been no cooling-off interval. His continued
+open teaching in face of their attempts at arrest puts fresh kindling on
+the fire. "No man took Him," but clearly they wanted to. Their open
+relations become more strained. He uses yet plainer speech in exposing
+their hypocrisies. This stirs them still more. Their hooked fingers
+reach passionately for the stones that would make a finish at once, and
+the green light flashes out of their enraged eyes. It's the sharpest
+clash yet. They are at a high fever point.
+
+It seems to take a greater use of power to restrain. "He hid Himself" is
+the simple sentence used. This is one of four times that we are told of
+His overcoming the hostile attack of a crowd by simply passing through
+their midst and going on His way.[98] Perhaps something in the glance of
+that eye of His, or in the set of His face,[99] _something_ in Him
+restrained them as He quietly passes through the uproarious crowd and
+goes on His way undisturbed. They are held back against their wills from
+doing the thing they are so intent on doing.[100]
+
+A few months later He is back in Jerusalem. But the interval seems not
+to have cooled their passion, only to have heated and hardened their
+enmity. They at once begin an aggressive wordy attack. Then losing
+self-control in their rage they again reach down for the stones to kill
+Him at once. And again they are restrained from their passionate
+purpose, as Jesus quietly goes on talking with them. Again they attempt
+to seize His person. And the simple striking sentence used, "He went
+forth out of their hand," points to the extent of their purpose and to a
+yet greater use of His power of restraint over their unwilling
+wills.[101]
+
+The last incident of this sort is the kingly entry into the city amid
+the enthusiasm of the pilgrim and city crowds. It says not a word about
+any attempt on their part nor of His restraint over them. But the very
+boldness of this wholly unexpected move on His part constituted a
+tremendous restraint. Their hate had gone through several stages of
+refined hardening during the few months preceding. The formal decision
+to kill, the edict of excommunication, the public notice that any
+information of His whereabouts must be made known, and the decision to
+kill Lazarus also,--all indicate the hotter burning of the flames of
+their rage.
+
+Yet into just such a situation He quietly turns the head of His untamed
+unridden young colt of an ass and rides through the city surrounded by
+the crowds under the very eyes of these leaders and their hireling legal
+minions. The tenseness of the whole scene, the power of restraint so put
+forth, the volcano smouldering underfoot waiting the slightest extra jar
+to loose out its explosion, all are revealed in the little sentence so
+pregnant in its concealed dynamic meaning, Jesus "_hid Himself from,
+them_." There's an exquisite blending of restraint over them and
+boldness with cautious prudence. He was walking very close to the edge
+that time.[102]
+
+So His power, shown so quietly but irresistibly before the eyes of all
+during those brief years, rises to a double climax nothing short of
+stupendous. Miraculous power in the realm of nature and of the human
+body had reached its climax in the raising of Lazarus, attested beyond
+question. Power over the human will both in affecting a voluntary
+change, and in actually restraining its action against its own set
+purpose, had risen to its climax in the bold open entry in broadest
+daylight into the capital where His death was officially and publicly
+decreed. The two climaxes touch. And it is tremendously significant that
+whereas they sometimes question His miraculous power, they could not
+deny His restraining power over themselves. How gladly they would if
+only they could.
+
+And all this, mark you keenly, is a bit of His wooing. The wooing is
+ever the dominant thought in His heart. So He was revealing to them who
+He was. He claims to be the Son of God, their kingly Messiah. And _He
+lived His claim_. Power is the one universally recognized touchstone by
+which we judge God and man. His power told _who He was_ even more than
+His tremendous words did. He was acting naturally. His presence among
+them thus natural, true to the power native in Him,--this was the
+wooing.
+
+But there was more than power. There was _love_. There was a perfect
+blend of the two. With the power went the love. Nay, rather, with the
+love went the power. Love was the dominating thing. Jesus was love in
+shoes, God in action. Always there was the tenderness, the gentleness,
+the patience, the purity, the unflinching ideals, yes, the courage, the
+utter fearlessness tempered with a wise prudence. All _these are the
+fuller spelling of love_.
+
+Always these went in closest touch with the resisted but resistless
+power. These are the two traits of God, two traits that are one. Men
+always think most of the power. God Himself always emphasizes most the
+love. But true power is simply love in action. The power is the outcome
+of love, and under the control of love.
+
+This is the second of John's great impelling pictures. The first shows
+us _the Person,_ the Man Jesus, God with us, God making a world, and
+then, in homely human garb walking amongst its people, one of
+themselves.
+
+This second shows us _the wooing_. This Man, so tender in touch, so
+gentle in speech, so thoughtful in action, so pure in life, so unbending
+in ideals, so fearless in the thick of opposition, so faithful to the
+chosen faithless nation,--this Man Himself is the wooing. His words, His
+actions, His power, His persistence, His patience, this also is the
+wooing of this great God-Man-Lover. This is God spelling Himself out
+into human speech, wooing men out and up and in to Himself.
+
+
+
+Jesus Recognised by all the Race.
+
+
+And it is most striking to sit still and think into how this Lover was
+_recognized_ by men of all nations, and how His wooing was _understood_
+and yielded to by men of all sorts. The intense Jew, the half-breed
+Samaritan, the aggressive Roman, the cultured refined Greek,--that was
+_all the world_. And all these recognized Him as some one kin to
+themselves, bound by closest spirit-ties, to whom they were drawn by the
+strong cords of His common kinship with themselves. The waves of His
+personal influence were, geographically, like His last commandment to
+His disciples. The movement was from Jerusalem to Judea, through
+Samaria, and out into the uttermost part of the earth and the innermost
+heart of the race.
+
+And all sorts of men understood. Jesus wiped out social differences and
+distinctions in the crowds that gently jostled each other in His
+presence. The aristocrat and the cultured, the student and the gentle
+folk, mingled freely with simple country folk, the unlettered, the
+humblest and lowliest, all drawn alike to Him, and all unconscious of
+differences when under the holy spell of His presence. The wealthy like
+Joseph of Arimathea, and the beggar like the man born blind, the pure in
+heart like Mary of Bethany and the openly bad in life like the accused
+woman of Jerusalem,--all felt alike that this Jesus belonged to them,
+and they to Him.
+
+The underneath tie of real kinship of heart rubbed out all outer
+distinctions. The old families of Jerusalem were glad to unlock their
+jealously guarded doors to Him. And the simple Capernaum fisherfolk were
+grateful when He shared bread and roof with them. All men recognized
+Jesus as belonging to themselves.
+
+And the calendar has not changed this, neither Gregorian nor Old Style.
+Time finds the race the same always. Centuries climb slowly by, but the
+human heart is the same, and--so is Jesus. I was greatly struck with
+this in my errand among the nations. The East balks at the ways of the
+West sometimes. Many books say there is no point of contact between the
+two. The East balks at our Western organization, our rule of the clock,
+and our rush and hurry. Our Westernized church systems and our closely
+mortised logical theologies are sometimes a bit bewildering, not exactly
+comprehensible to their Orientalized mode of thought.
+
+But they never balk at Jesus. When they are told of Him, and get some
+glimpse of Him, their eyes light, their faces glow, their hearts leap in
+response. You book people say there is no point of contact between
+Orient and Occident? But there is. Jesus is the point of contact. One
+real touch of Jesus makes all the world akin. No; that can be put
+better. One touch of Jesus reveals the kinship that is there between Him
+and men, _and_ between all men.
+
+In Japan it was the Portuguese that first took the Gospel a few hundred
+years ago. And you still find Japanese churches founded by the
+Portuguese. Fifty odd years ago it was the English tongue that again
+brought that message of life to them. But as I mingled among Japanese
+Christians of different communions and heard them pray, they were not
+praying in Portuguese nor in English. They had no thought that He was a
+Portuguese Saviour they prayed to, nor yet an English. _They prayed in
+Japanese_. They felt that Jesus spoke their tongue. He belonged to them.
+He and they understood each other.
+
+As I listened to Manchu and Chinese, to Korean and Hawaiian pour out
+their hearts in prayer, I could feel the close personal burning touch of
+their spirits with Jesus. They and He were kin to each other. Their
+very voices told the certainty in their hearts on this point.
+
+I recall a little old bent-over woman of seventy-odd years up in
+northern Sweden, a Laplander. She had come a long three days' journey on
+her snow-shoes to the meetings. Night after night as I talked through
+interpretation her deep-set black eyes glowed and glowed. But when one
+night an hour or more was spent in voluntary prayer she needed no
+interpreter. And as I listened I needed none. I _felt_ that she _knew_
+that _Jesus spoke Lappish_. The two were face to-face in closest touch
+of spirit.
+
+And so it is everywhere. The flaxen-haired Holland maid kneeling by her
+single cot _knows_ that Jesus talks Dutch, and her homely hearthfire
+Dutch, too, at that. And the earnest Polish peasant in his Carpathian
+cabin bowed before the symbol his eyes have known from infancy is
+talking into an ear that knows both Polish accent and Polish heart. So
+with the German of the Saxon highlands, and of the simpler speech of the
+Teutonic lowlands. So with the olive-skinned Latin and the darker-hued
+African kneeling on opposite sides, north and south, of the great
+Central-earth Sea. Wherever knowledge of Jesus has been carried, He is
+_recognized_ and claimed _as their own_ regardless of national or social
+lines.
+
+I knew a minister of our Southland, but whose public service took him to
+all parts of our country. He had been reared in the South and knew the
+coloured people by heart, and loved them. And when he returned to his
+Southern home town he would frequently preach for the coloured people.
+He was preaching to them one Sabbath with the simplicity and fervour for
+which he was noted.
+
+At the close among others, one big black man grasped his hand hard as he
+thanked him for the preaching. And then with his great child-eyes big
+and aglow, he said, "Youse got a white skin, but youse got a black
+heart." And you know what he meant,--you have a black man's heart, you
+have a heart like mine. Your heart makes my heart burn.
+
+Now _Jesus had a Hack heart_. He had a white heart. He had a yellow, a
+brown heart. He had a Jew heart, a Roman, a Greek, a Samaritan heart.
+Aye, He had a _world_ heart, He had _a human heart_. And He _has_.
+There's a _Man_ on the throne yonder, bone of our bone, heart of our
+heart, pain of our pain.
+
+There's more of God since Jesus went back. Human experience has been
+taken up into the heart of God. Jesus belonged to us. And now belongs to
+us more than ever, and we to Him. The human heart has felt His
+tremendous wooing. It has recognized its Kinsman wherever He has been
+able to get to them, and it has gladly yielded to the plea of His love.
+
+Jerusalem might carpenter a cross for Him, but the world would weave its
+heartfelt devotion into a crown of love for Him, bestudded with the dewy
+tears of its gratitude, sparkling like diamonds in the light of His
+face.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+Closer Wooing
+
+     _An Evening with Opening Hearts: the Story of a Supper and a Walk
+     in the Moonlight and the Shadows_
+
+
+
+
+    Nigh and nigh draws the chase,
+    With unperturbed pace,
+    Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
+    And past those noised Feet
+    A Voice comes yet more fleet--
+    "_Lo, naught contents thee, who content'st not Me._"
+
+    --"_The Hound of Heaven._"
+
+     "I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I
+     leave the world, and go unto the Father."--_John xvi. 28_.
+
+    "I thought His love would weaken
+    As more and more He knew me;
+    But it burneth like a beacon,
+    And its light and heat go through me;
+    And I ever hear Him say,
+    As He goes along His way,
+    Wand'ring souls, O _do_ come near Me;
+    My sheep should never fear Me.
+    I am the Shepherd true."
+
+    --_Frederick William Faber._
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+Closer Wooing
+
+(Chapters xiii.-xvii.)
+
+
+
+Knots.
+
+
+The knot tied on the end of the thread holds the seam. The clinching of
+the nail on the underside holds all that has been done. Love ties knots
+to hold what has been gotten. The bit of prayer knots up the kindly act.
+The warm hand-grasp knots the timely word. The added word and act tie up
+all that's gone before. Hate imitates love the best it can. But its
+intense fires are never so hot.
+
+The rest of John's book is simple. It is tying knots on the ends of
+threads. Five knots are tied on the ends of these same three threads we
+have been tracing.
+
+There's a triple knot on the end of the blue thread of acceptance; an
+ugly tangled knotty knot on the end of that black thread of opposition
+and rejection; and a knot of wondrous beauty on the end of that yellow
+thread of winsome wooing. Chapters eighteen and nineteen tie two of
+these, the black and the glory-coloured.
+
+Chapters thirteen through seventeen, is the first knot on the faith
+thread, the betrayal-night knot. Chapter twenty is the second, the
+Resurrection knot; chapter twenty-one the extra knot, the love-service
+knot. We take a look now at the patient skilful tying of the first knot
+on the end of that true-blue faith thread.
+
+It's taken a good bit of careful work to _get_ that thread, tearing
+loose, cleansing, spinning, twisting, careful handling, till at last a
+good thread is gotten, and is being woven into the warp. Now a knot is
+tied on its end to hold what has been gotten, and keep it from ravelling
+out, for there's a desperately hard place coming in the weaving.
+
+There's a clean finish at the end of the twelfth chapter of John.
+There's a sharp break, an abrupt turn off to something quite different.
+The direct-wooing case is made up. There is no more added to it, except
+the indirect, the incidental. The evidence is all in. Wondrous wooing it
+has been, in its winsomeness, its faithfulness, its rare power. Now it
+is over. It's done, and well done. That door is shut, the national door.
+
+Now another door opens. The inner door into Jesus' heart is being opened
+by Him. And the inner door into the disciples' heart is being knocked at
+that it, too, may open. It is the betrayal night. Jesus is alone with
+the inner circle. They have received Him. Now He will receive them into
+closer intimacy than yet before. They have opened their hearts to His
+love. Now He opens His heart to let out more the love that is there.
+Love accepted is free to reveal itself. And love revealing its warmth
+and tenderness and depth yet more calls out quickly a deeper, a tenderer
+love.
+
+It's the Passover evening. They have met, the twelve and their Master,
+by appointment, in the home of one of Jesus' faithful unnamed friends.
+In a large upper room they are shut in, gathered about the supper board.
+As they eat Jesus is quietly but intently thinking. Four trains of
+thought pass through His mind side by side.[103] The Father had trusted
+all into His hands. He had come down from the Father on an errand and
+would return when the errand was done.
+
+And now the hour was come. The turn in the road was reached, the sharp
+turn down leading to the sharp turn up and then back. It had seemed slow
+in coming, that hour.[104] Dreaded things seem to linger even while they
+hasten, dreaded longed-for things, dreaded in the experience of pain to
+be borne, eagerly longed for in the blessed result; as with an expectant
+mother. Now the hour's here.[105]
+
+And yonder across the board sits the man so faithfully wooed, yet
+dead-set in his inner heart on a dark purpose, more evil in its outcome
+than he realizes. There must be more and tenderer wooing. He shall have
+yet another full opportunity. And under all is the heart-throb of love
+for these who are His own, being birthed into a new life by the giving
+of His very own life these months past. He loves His own, and will to
+the uttermost, the utterest, the mostest, limit of love and of time left
+Him before _the_ great event. These are the thoughts passing quietly,
+clearly, intensely, through Jesus' mind as they sit at supper.
+
+
+
+Teaching Three Things in One Action.
+
+
+Now He acts.[106] Quietly He rises from the table, picks up a towel and
+fastens its end in His waistband for convenience in use, after the
+servant's usual fashion. Then He pours water into a basin and turning
+stoops over the feet of the disciple nearest Him. And before they can
+recover from their wide-eyed astonishment He begins bathing his feet and
+then carefully wiping them with the convenient towel. And so around the
+circle. Peter, of course, protests, and so calls out a little of the
+explanation. And then with tender passionateness he asks for the washing
+to take in all his extremities, head and hands as well as feet. How
+their hearts must have felt the touch upon their feet!
+
+Then follows a bit of explanation.[107] But the chief thing had already
+been done. The acting was more than the speech. Three things the Master
+was doing. The teaching about humility lies on the surface, within easy
+reach. It was acted, then spoken; done, then said. It was sorely needed,
+and is. In it was the key to Jesus' great victory within the twenty-four
+hours following,[108] and would have been for them had they used it.
+Humility is the foundation of all strength and victory. Only the strong
+can stoop. It takes the strongest to stoop lowest. He who so stoops is
+revealing strength.
+
+Humility is not thinking meanly of yourself; it is merely getting into
+correct personal relation with God, and so with men. It is our true
+normal attitude, as dependent creatures, as those who have sinned, as
+those who have been bought with blood. Everything we have is from
+Another, originally and continuously; we are utterly dependent. All
+rights have been forfeited by our wilful conduct; we retain nothing in
+our own right. And all we have now has been secured for us at the cost
+of blood; we are being carried at enormous expense. Not much room there
+for self-satisfaction, is there?
+
+Humility is simply _recognizing_ our _utter dependence upon Another_,
+and _living_ it. And this controls our touch with our fellows. In this
+lies the secret of all strength,--mental keenness and vigour,
+sympathetic touch with others, and power of action in life and in
+service. All this touches the _weakest_ spot in these men, and in--us.
+
+But there's more here. The humility teaching is out on the surface.
+There's a bit _under_ the surface, that they would soon be needing and
+needing badly. It's this: the thing in you that's wrong _must_ be made
+right; and it _can_ be. Every sin done by the man who is trusting Christ
+as his Saviour, every such sin _must_ be cleansed away. And it _can_ be.
+The feet-washing told this bit of tremendous truth.
+
+These men trusted Christ. But their moral feet would get badly messed
+that night, mired and slimed by passionate betrayal and blasphemous
+denial and cowardly flight. The man going to the bath-house was clean on
+returning home except where his sandalled feet had gathered some soil
+from the road. These men were cleansed in heart through Christ. But the
+foot-soilings must be cleansed. These two things ring out. Sin _must_ be
+reckoned with and cleansed out. _And_, blessed truth! it _can_ be. This
+is the second bit. It would be brought to their remembrance that same
+night when the road they took dirtied them up so badly, and afterwards.
+
+But there's a deeper, a tenderer bit yet here. There is _the love
+touch_. Jesus was giving them the tenderest touch yet of His love, to
+_hold_ them. The personal touch is the tenderest. Man yearns for the
+personal touch, of presence, of lips, of hands. Something seems to go
+_through_ the personal touch from heart to heart. The spirit-currents
+find their connection so. Jesus gave the tender personal touch that
+evening, the closest yet. His hands touched their feet, but He was not
+thinking most about their feet. He was reaching higher up. His hands
+reached past their feet for their hearts.
+
+And they felt it so. Their hearts understood, if their heads didn't yet.
+Judas felt those hands reaching to touch his heart. And he had to set
+himself afresh to resist that touch. John felt it, and _remained
+steady_. Peter felt it and came back with flooded eyes. The fleeing nine
+felt that touch and yielded to it as they penitently returned. Love
+won. That personal touch did it.
+
+But Jesus feels Judas' heart hardening as He touches his feet, and the
+gentle word already spoken availed not.[109] Now His great heart is
+sorely troubled for Judas.[110] He tries once again to reach his heart
+and stay his wayward feet. He reaches for his feet through his heart
+this time. They're all together about the table again. Quietly, but with
+tactful indirectness, Jesus lets Judas know that _He_ knows. He says,
+"One of you is planning to betray Me."
+
+The men stare one at another in questioning astonishment. Peter touches
+John's arm and with eye and word quietly asks him to find out. John
+reclining next to Jesus asks the question in undertone. And as quietly
+Jesus makes reply. Then the last appeal is made to Judas in the last
+delicate touch of special personal attention. Judas' unchanged spirit
+makes wordless answer. The hardening of the purpose is a further opening
+of a downward door and that door is quickly used by the evil one.
+
+And Judas rises abruptly with jaw set and eye tense, and goes out into
+the blackest night the clouds ever shut in. So the first tremendous part
+of the evening's drama is now done. The wooing of Judas has been intense
+and tender clean up to the last moment, _and_ resisted. Now that chapter
+is done. Another corner is passed. The extremes have--parted. One man
+has gone out. Eleven stay in, and in staying come closer.
+
+
+
+Believe--Love--Obey.
+
+
+The atmosphere clears now. That black cloud shifts. The pressure is
+relieved. The air changes. Breathing is easier. Jesus did His best to
+keep Judas in by trying to have him turn something--some one--out. But
+the something that held the some one is kept within, so the man goes
+out. That inside air was getting a bit thick for Judas. Love's tender
+pleading unyielded to makes breathing difficult.
+
+Again Jesus begins talking in the cleared air. The hour had full come.
+The character of the Son of Man would now be revealed,[111] and in being
+revealed God's character would also be understood, and God Himself would
+show what _He_ thought of Jesus by His personal recognition and
+acknowledgment of Him, and He would do it at once. The clock is striking
+the hour. Now He was going away. They would not understand.[112]
+
+Then Jesus strikes the great key-note of their future conduct as He
+goes on. _The_ thing is this: _love one another_. This is the badge He
+gives them to wear. It will always identify them as His very own. Peter
+picks up the one bit he understands, and is told that he cannot yet
+follow in the tremendous experience lying just ahead for Jesus, but some
+day he can, and will. And then to Peter's blundering self-confidence
+comes a plain tender reminder of his weakness.[113] So that wondrous
+fourteenth chapter that Christendom loves begins back in the thirteenth.
+
+And Jesus goes quietly on as they still linger about the table.[114] He
+had been sorely troubled,[115] but He would have them not troubled by
+their doubtings regarding Himself. It is true that they were outcasts
+with Him, from their national home, but He would provide them a home,
+and a better one. They did believe in God. They should believe Him just
+as implicitly. This is the warp into which is woven the whole fabric of
+that evening's talk. The whole talk is a plea for their trusting loving
+acceptance of Himself as fully as of God. This word "_believe_" changes
+its outer shape three times during that evening, making four words in
+all, but it's always the same thing underneath.
+
+So now the teaching goes on in freest exchange of question and answer.
+What a picture of how we may talk everything out with our Lord and get
+fully answered. Thomas' question helps Jesus to turn them away from
+thinking of a roadway of clay and sand to a Man. Philip's helps Him to
+insist on the presence of the Father in a distinctive sense within this
+Man so familiarly talking with them. And then four times over He rings
+out that word _believe_.
+
+Then by a subtle turn He changes the word, though not the thing, to help
+them understand better: "If ye _love_ Me."[116] That puts the thing at
+once up on the _heart_ level. Believing is a thing of the heart. Their
+heads were bothered. He said in effect,--all your head questions will be
+answered in good time, but this thing is higher up than that. It's a
+matter of your heart. And so that word _believe_ becomes _love_, its
+second shape. And with that is quickly coupled _obey_, the third outer
+shape He gives the word believe that night.
+
+It is all the same thing underneath. _Love_ is the heart side of
+_believe_, the inner side. _Obey_ is the life-side of believe, the
+outer, the action side. The love looks out the window of the life and
+then _comes_ out and _walks_ down the street on an errand. Love doesn't
+simply love: it loves _some one_. Love that simply loves isn't love.
+Love comes to life only in the personal touch.
+
+And love keeps in perfect rhythm of action with the one loved. That is
+the other way of saying _obey_. Obedience is the music of two wills
+acting together. _Believe_ me, _love_ me, _obey_ me,--this is the
+three-noted music of the upper room; three notes but one music; a fourth
+note to be added later. This is the wondrous closer wooing.
+
+"I go to the Father. We, the Father and I, will send the Holy Spirit to
+you. He will come in through this opened door of obedience. He will
+abide in you, come in to stay. He will be everything and do everything
+that you need in every sort of circumstance. Keep in closest touch with
+Him: this is to be your one rule. Your part is simple. _Believe_; that
+means _love_; that means _obey_."
+
+So they talk around the table. Then there's thoughtful silence, which
+the Master breaks by saying, "Arise, let us go."
+
+
+
+The Great Vine Picture.
+
+
+Now they're walking down the street, silently, the Master in the lead,
+with John and Peter close by.[117] The moon is at the full. Now they see
+the temple, the moonlight falling full upon it. And the great brass
+grape-vine with which it had been beautified by Herod at his building of
+it shines with wondrous beauty in the enchantment of moonlight.
+
+And now the Master is speaking again. Very quietly the words come as
+they still gaze at the beauty of the brass vine. Listen to Him, "I am
+the _true_ vine, and My Father the vine-gardener." Here is the
+illustration that exactly pictures what He had been saying in the upper
+room. It supplies the fourth word, the fourth outer shape that word
+_believe_ takes on, _believe_, that is--_love_, that is--_obey_, that
+is--_abide_.
+
+Look at the vine, then you have the whole story pictured, simple,
+clear, full. Each of these four words grows out of the other as fruit
+out of blossom, and blossom out of the new branch and that out of the
+old stock of the vine: believe, love, obey, abide; vine, new branches,
+tiny blossom, fruit. The fruit grows out of the vine; yet it is the very
+life of the vine. _Abide_ grows out of _believe_, yet it is the very
+heart and inner life of believe.
+
+So He goes on ringing the changes back and forth, now here, now there.
+_Pruning_--that insures fruit, and more and better. _Praying_--that _is_
+the fruit, some of it; that naturally grows out of the abiding. "_My
+words_"--that is part of the abiding, the life-juice of the vine coming
+into branch and blossom and fruit. "Joy"--that is the rich red juice of
+the grape in your mouth. "_Friends_"--that is the other word for abide.
+That's what abiding makes and reveals. _Abiding_--that is what friends
+do: that's what friendship is, the real thing. _Obey_--that is the swing
+of step with our great Friend as we go along the road together. So these
+clusters of rich ripe fruit hang thick on the vine of this simple
+teaching-talk as they walk along in the moonlight.
+
+And now they're passing through some of the narrower streets as they
+make their way east towards the city gate.[118] And these narrow streets
+are shadowed. And you feel the shadows creeping into His talk. The world
+will _hate_ them. Of course. This is a natural result of the abiding.
+The outer crowd can no more put up with the Jesus-swayed man than with
+Jesus Himself. And the hate would be aggressive.
+
+But if they would clearly understand ahead what to expect it would help
+them keep their feet when the worst storm came. And by staying steady
+and true through the worst that came, they would be of the greatest
+service. The Holy Spirit in them would reach out and talk to that outer
+crowd. He would make clear to them their awful sin in killing Jesus, the
+spotless purity and rightness of the absent Jesus, and the terrific fact
+that the prince of the world whom they rally to so faithfully is
+actually judged, doomed and damned. Then He adds, "now in a little bit
+I'll be gone from you. Then a little later, I'll be with you again."
+
+So He goes on ringing the changes back and forth on this in simple
+conversational style. And now they are silent. The narrow street is
+quite shadowed. He lets them think a bit over His words. And the
+personal part takes hold most. And they talk softly together of what
+this means,--a little while and He is gone; again a little while, and He
+is back. They're plainly puzzled, yet restrained from breaking in upon
+His deep mood.
+
+But with characteristic gentleness He speaks of what they would
+ask.[119] Clearly there is some terrible experience for Him and for them
+just at hand. But He reaches past to the joy beyond, as the mother
+forgets sharp pains in the joy of her new-born babe. And as He talks
+they think they understand now, but again He gently reminds of the storm
+about to break. And then He leaves them three wondrous words,--_peace,
+good-cheer, overcome_. In the midst of the worst storm there may be
+peace. In the thickest of tribulation the song of cheer may ring out. He
+_has_ overcome. The outcome is settled. No doubts need nag. Sing! Sing
+louder! _Christ is Victor_!
+
+This is the second bit of the evening's closer wooing, this long quiet
+talk about the supper table and along the road. It is wooing them up to
+more intelligence in their believing and loving. It's wooing them to
+trust _Him_, hold hard to _Him_, during the coming storm, when they
+wouldn't understand. Even when they can't understand, but stand in
+hopeless helpless bewilderment, they still can trust _Him_.
+
+
+
+Taken into the Innermost Life.
+
+
+They're outside the city-gate now, going down the path towards the
+Kidron Brook. Now comes the third bit of that evening's closer
+wooing.[120] And this is the tenderest, the most personal, the least
+resistible bit, the closest wooing of all. He takes them into His
+innermost heart-life for a brief moment. It must have reminded John
+afterwards of that mountain-top experience when Jesus drew aside the
+drapery of His humanity and let a little of the inner glory shine out.
+Here He takes them with Him into the holy of holies of His own inner
+life with His Father.
+
+Let not any one think that Jesus was simply letting them hear Him pray,
+so they might learn. Not that; not that. He was taking them into the
+sacred privacy of His own innermost life. That was a bit of the wooing,
+under the desperate happenings just ahead. But now as He takes them in
+He quite forgets them, though He knows they are there. _He is absorbed
+with the Father_. He isn't thinking now of the effect of all this on
+them. That's past. He is alone in spirit with the Father, talking out
+freely even as though actually quite alone.
+
+We are in the innermost holy of holies here. The heart of the world's
+life is its literature. The heart of all literature is this sacred Book
+of God. The heart of this Book is the Gospels. The heart of these four
+Gospels is John's. The heart of John's is this exquisite bit, chapters
+thirteen to seventeen. And there's yet an inner heart here. It is this
+bit, the seventeenth chapter, where the inner side of Jesus' prayer-life
+lies open to us. And we shall find an innermost heart yet again here.
+
+The simplicity of speech here catches the ear. The holy intimacy of
+contact with God hushes the spirit. The certainty of the Father's
+presence awes the heart greatly. The unquestioning confidence in the
+outcome is to one's faith like a glass of kingdom wine fresh from the
+King's own hand. The tenseness and yet exquisite quietness holds one's
+being still with a great stillness. Both shoes and hat go off
+instinctively and we stand with head bowed low and heart hushed for this
+is holiest ground.
+
+Of course, no paraphrase of this prayer can possibly approach its own
+beauty and simplicity. But it may perhaps send one back to the prayer
+itself to see better what is there.
+
+They're out in the open, down near the Kidron. Jesus stops and looks up
+towards the blue, the Father's open door, and quietly talks out of His
+heart into His Father's heart, "Father: the hour is come"; talked of
+long before this errand was started upon, brooded over these human
+years, felt in His inner being as it ticked itself nearer in the
+tremendous passing events. Now it is come. The clock is striking the
+hour, striking on earth and echoed distinctly in the Father's ear.
+
+"Father: reveal now the true character of the Son; yet only that the Son
+may reveal Thy true character.[121] Thou hast already done so in the
+control Thou hast given Him over all men, that so He may give to them
+the eternal life. And this is the real life to come into intimate touch
+of heart and life with Thee and with Thine anointed One, Jesus."
+
+"I have already revealed Thy character in doing fully the errand Thou
+didst send Me on. (And it _was_ fully done in all the active part,
+though the greatest thing yet remained to be done in the tremendous
+yielding, the strong passive yielding to Hate's worst that so Love's
+truest and best might be clearly seen by men.) And now I am coming back
+to be recognized and acknowledged and received by Thine own self even as
+it was before I came away on this errand."
+
+Thus far He has been alone with the Father face-to-face; just the two
+together in closest communion. Now the prayer moves on from communion
+and petition to intercession. He is thinking of others, of these men who
+are grouped near by. He has prayed for them before. He is simply picking
+up the thread of the accustomed prayer He had prayed, and would still
+pray when He had gone from them up through the doorway of the blue.
+
+He has revealed the Father to them, and they have understood and
+believed and have followed. Now He _prays for them_, that they may be
+_kept_; not taken out of the world; kept in it, giving their witness to
+it, yet never of its spirit, always controlled by another Spirit. They
+were being sent into the world for witness even as He had been.
+
+And a great word breaks out like the bursting of a flood of sunlight out
+of dark clouds,--_joy_. He had used it that evening before in the upper
+room, and again along the road. Now it flashes out again. This reveals
+the meaning of that _good-cheer_ and _overcome_ with which the roadway
+talk closed. With the clouds of hate at their blackest, and the storm
+just about to break in uncontrolled wild fury, He speaks of "My _joy_."
+He is _singing_. In the thick of hatred and plotting here's the bit of
+music, in the major key, rippling out. Such a spirit cannot be defeated.
+Joy is faith singing in the storm because it sees already the clearing
+light beyond.
+
+And so He prays on, touching the same keys of the musical instrument of
+His heart, back and forth, yet ever advancing in the theme. Now He
+broadens out, in clear vision, beyond the gathering storm, to those,
+through all the earth, and down the centuries, who would believe through
+these men who are listening. What a sweep of faith. That singing cleared
+His vision.
+
+And then He sees them all, of many races and languages and radical
+differences, all blended into one body of earnest loving believers drawn
+by the one vision of Himself back in the glory of the Father's presence,
+where they will all gather. And then love ties the knot on the end. A
+personal love ties together Father and Son and--us, who humbly give the
+glad homage of our hearts.
+
+Right in the very midst of the prayer lies that innermost heart of which
+I spoke a moment ago. It is in verse ten. Jesus says, "_All things that
+are Mine are Thine, and Thine are Mine_." There lies the very inner
+heart of all carried to the last degree. _There_ is glad giving and full
+taking; surrender and appropriation. He who gives all may reach in and
+take all. Here is, humanly, the secret of Jesus' stupendous character
+and career.
+
+And it is the same for the humblest of us. The road is no different. We
+_may_ say, by His great grace, in the insistence of our sovereign wills,
+"All that is mine is Thine: I give it Thee. I give it back to Thee: I
+use all the strength of my will in yielding all to Thee, and in doing
+it habitually."
+
+Then we _can_ say, with greatest reverence and humility and yet bold
+confidence, "All that is Thine _is mine._" Yet being mine it is Thine.
+Still being Thine it is mine. So comes the perfection of the rhythmic
+action of love. Our love gives our all to _Him_. And then _takes_ the
+greater all of His--no, not _from_ Him, _for_ Him, held in trust, used
+_for_ Him, while we keep knees and face close to the ground, lest we
+stumble and slip and worse.
+
+So the prayer closes. And if we might go back over it, alone in secret,
+prayerfully, quietly thinking thoughtfully into it, until this great
+simple prayer gets its hold upon our hearts. And then gradually it would
+come to us that _so_ He is now praying for us, _you and me_.
+
+What must it have meant to these men to stand there quietly, awed as
+they listen to Him praying that prayer. How it reveals the deep
+consciousness of the intimacy of relation between Father and Son. How it
+must have touched and stirred them to the very depths to hear Jesus
+telling the Father so simply about _their_ faith in Himself, and _their_
+obedience, their break with their national allegiance to follow Himself.
+And that word _joy_--did they wonder about it? And wonder more later
+that night, and the days after? But the key-note of the music _caught_,
+and soon they were singing the same tune, and in the same pitch.
+
+What wooing! This was the closest wooing. The fine wooing of this
+matchless Lover came to its superlative degree that night. Positive
+degree, that touch upon their feet; comparative, that talk about the
+board and along the road; superlative, this taking them in for a brief
+moment into the secrecy of His inner communion with the Father.
+
+
+
+Simplified Spelling.
+
+
+And this closer wooing is not over. It hasn't quit yet. That vine is
+still hanging out in fine view, all softly ablaze with the clear
+beautifying light, not of a fine Passover moon; no, the light of His
+_face_, His _life_, His _words_. That vine becomes for all time to every
+heart the pictured meaning of _abide_. And that word _abide_ gives the
+whole of the true life.
+
+We say _Christian_ life, and rightly. I like to say also, the true, the
+natural, life. Any other is abnormal, unnatural, untrue. I might say,
+"of the higher Christian life," following the common usage of these
+latter days. I still prefer to say _true_ life. Higher means that there
+is a lower life. And that this lower is reckoned Christian, too. That is
+the bother, the cheapening of things; we _call_ a thing Christian which
+is less than the thing it is called.
+
+Some of us need to go to school, and to sit down in the lower classes
+where spelling is taught. We can spell _believe_ in the common way with
+seven letters. We must learn to spell it with four letters--l-o-v-e. We
+need to learn to spell _love_ with a _b_ and a _y_--o-b-e-y. We need to
+learn to spell obey with five letters a-b-i-d-e. We need to find that
+_abide_ is spelled best with four letters o-b-e-y.
+
+We need to learn this simplified spelling a bit, then _all_ will become
+simplified, living, loving, witnessing, praying, winning, singing with
+joy over the results of our new spelling in the syllables of daily life.
+Blessed Master, we would come to school to Thee to-day. Please let us
+start down in the spelling class. And teach us, Thou Thyself teach us.
+
+But the vine--let us make that the central picture on the wall, with the
+Master in the picture pointing to the vine. And under the picture the
+one word _abide_. Then the whole story is in easy shape to help,
+pictured before our eyes. Abide--that is _Jesus walking around in your
+shoes_, looking out through your eyes, touching in your hand, speaking
+through your lips and your presence. He is _free_ to; that's _your_ side
+of it. He's unhindered. He _does_ it; that's _His_ side of it.
+
+Look up at the picture on the wall. The whole vine is in the fruit, is
+it not? The whole of the fruit is in the vine, is it not? That's
+abiding. The whole of Jesus will be in you as you go about your daily
+common task, singing. The whole of you is in Jesus as everything simple
+and great, is done _to please Him_, singing as you do it.
+
+And just as between vine and fruit there are branch and blossom, pruning
+and careful handling, sun and shade, dew and rain, so there are
+_betweens_ here before full ripening of fruit comes. There's purifying,
+cleansing by blood, cleansing by a soft fire burning within, and
+pruning by the Gardener and by His human assistant, you, sharp,
+incisive, hurting pruning.
+
+There's _feeding_,--the juice of the vine _flows_ in, and is _taken_ in;
+the divine word of the divine Master is meditated, the cud of it is
+chewed daily. There's _obedience_,--perfect rhythm of action between
+vine and branches. There's _prayer_, the intercourse of our spirits, His
+and ours, together, the drawing from Him all we need, and the letting
+Him use us in His interceding for His world. These are some of the
+_betweens_. Through these comes the ripening fruit.
+
+And the outer crowd comes eagerly for the fruit hanging over the fence
+within easy reach. There's a warm sympathy with one's fellows; only the
+thing's more than the words sound. The Jesus-spirit within will be felt
+by those outside, something warm and gentle and helpful. There will be
+things done, many things, earnestly thoughtfully done. The proper word
+is service. But the thing's so much more than the word ever seems to
+mean.
+
+And there'll be yet more, a more of a surprising sort. The classical fox
+called the grapes sour because he _couldn't_ reach them. There'll be
+some outside sour talk because some of the crowd _won't_ reach the
+fruit. It wouldn't agree with them the way they insist on living. The
+Jesus-life abiding within and flowing freely out is a protest against
+the opposite. The mere presence of a _Christ-abiding_ man convicts
+people of the sin of their lives and their treatment of Jesus. It
+convinces them that the absent Jesus is right, and so they are wrong.
+So there's trouble out in the crowd just because of the ripe good fruit
+hanging in plain sight and easy reach over the vineyard fence. And that
+double result goes on getting more so, some coming to the vine drawn by
+the fruit, some talking against fruit and vine. But the man abiding is
+of good cheer. He sings. For the outcome is assured.
+
+So every grape-vine, in garden, by roadway, or on hillside, with its
+vine-stock, branches, blossom, and fruit, tells of the Father's ideal
+for men, a unity of life with Himself, and with each other. And every
+bunch of grapes hanging on one stem, with its many in one, tells of that
+same ideal, the concord of love with the Father and with each other.
+
+And that unity of love dominating all is irresistible to the outer
+crowd, in the winsomeness of its wooing.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+The Greatest Wooing
+
+     _A Night and a Day With Hardening Hearts: the Story of Tender
+     Passion and of a Terrible Tragedy_
+
+
+
+
+    "Now of that long pursuit
+    Comes on at hand the bruit;
+    That Voice is round me like a bursting sea:
+    'And is thy earth so marred,
+    Shattered in shard on shard?
+    _Lo, all things fly thee, for thou fliest Me_!
+    Strange, piteous, futile, thing!
+
+    Wherefore should any set thee love apart?
+    Seeing none but I makes much of naught' (He said)
+    'And human love needs human meriting:
+    How hast thou merited--
+    Of all man's clotted clay the dingiest clot?
+    Alack, thou knowest not
+    How little worthy of any love thou art!
+    Whom wilt thou find to love ignoble thee,
+    Save Me, save only Me?
+    All which I took from thee I did but take,
+    Not for thy harms,
+    But just that thou might'st seek it in My arms.
+    All which thy child's mistake
+    Fancied as lost, I have stored for thee at home:
+    Rise, clasp My hand, and Come.'"
+
+    --"_The Hound of Heaven_
+
+     "I will betroth thee unto me forever; yea, I will betroth thee unto
+     me in righteousness, and in justice, and in loving kindness, and in
+     mercies. I will even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness."--_Hosea
+     ii. 19, 20._
+
+    "Jesus, Lover of my soul,
+    Let me to Thy bosom fly,
+    While the nearer waters roll.
+    While the tempest still is high.
+    Hide me, O my Saviour, hide,
+    'Til the storm of life is past;
+    Safe into the haven guide,
+    O receive my soul at last."
+
+    --_Charles Wesley_.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+The Greatest Wooing
+
+(John xviii.-xix.)
+
+
+
+Wider Wooing.
+
+
+At the top of the mountain is the peak. The peak is the range at its
+highest reach. The peak grows out of the range and rests upon it and
+upon the earth under all. The whole of the long mountain range and of
+the earth lies under the peak. The peak tells the story of the whole
+range. At the last the highest and utmost. All the rest is for this
+capstone.
+
+The great thing in Jesus' life is His death. The death crowns the life.
+The whole of the life lies under and comes to its full in the death. The
+highest point is touched when death is allowed to lay Him lowest. It was
+the life that died that gives the distinctive meaning to the death. Let
+us take off hat and shoes as we come to this peak event.
+
+There's a change in John's story here. The evening has gone, the quiet
+evening of communion. The night has set in, the dark night of hate. The
+intimacies of love give place to the intrigues of hate. The joy of
+communion is quickly followed by the jostling of the crowd. Out of the
+secret place of prayer into the hurly-burly of passion. And the
+Master's rarely sensitive spirit feels the change. Yet with quiet
+resolution He steps out to face it. This is part of _the hour_, part of
+His great task, the greatest part.
+
+For the holy task of wooing is not changed. It still is wooing, but
+there's a difference now. There's a shifting. The wooing goes from
+closer to wider, from the disciples to the outer crowd, from the direct
+wooing of the national leaders by personal plea to the indirect by
+action, tremendously personal action.
+
+It moves out into a yet wider sweep. It goes from the wooing of a nation
+to the wooing of a race, from Jew distinctively to Roman
+representatively, from Annas standing in God's flood light rejected to
+Pilate in nature's lesser light obscured, from God's truant messenger
+nation to the world's mighty ruling nation.
+
+In the epochal event just at hand Jesus begins His great wooing of a
+race. And that wooing has gone on ever since, wherever He has been able
+to get through the human channels to the crowd. He was lifted up and at
+once men began coming a-running broken in heart by the sight. He is
+being lifted up, and men of all the race are coming as fast as the slow
+news gets to them.
+
+But back now to John's story. They pick their way over the stones of the
+little Kidron into the garden of the olives. There, quite alone in the
+deep shadows of the inner trees, Jesus has His great spirit-conflict,
+and great victory. The touch with sin so close, so real, now upon Him
+within a few hours, the sin of others upon His sinless soul,--this
+shakes Him terrifically beyond our understanding, who don't know purity
+as He did. But the tremendous strength of yielding brings victory, as
+ever. And the battle of the morrow is fought in spirit, and won.
+
+Now the trailers of hate come seeking with torch and lantern, soldiers
+and officers, chief priests and rulers, the ever present rabble, and in
+the lead the shameless traitor. They are pushing their quest now,
+seeking Jesus in the hiding whence He had gone days before[122] led by
+the man who knew His accustomed haunts.
+
+But there's no need for seeking now. Jesus is full ready. He decides the
+action that follows. He is masterful even in His purposeful yielding.
+Quietly He walks out from the cover of the trees to meet them. And as
+their torches turn full upon His advancing figure again that marvellous
+power not only of restraint but decidedly more is felt by them. And the
+whole company, traitor, soldiers, rulers, rabble, overpowered in spirit,
+fall back and then drop to the ground utterly overawed and cowed by the
+lone man they are seeking.
+
+Does Judas expect this? Will this power they are unable to resist not
+open the eyes of these rulers! But there's no stupidity equal to that
+which goes with stubbornness. In a moment Jesus reveals His purpose in
+this, to shield His disciples. Now the power of restraint is withdrawn
+and He yields to their desires. They shall have fullest sway in using
+their freedom of action as they will. And Peter's foolish attempts are
+quietly overruled.
+
+They keep up the forms by taking Jesus to Annas the real Jewish ruler of
+the nation. But it is simply an opportunity for the coarseness of their
+hate to vent itself upon His person. They pretend an examination here in
+the night's darkness suited to their deeds. He quietly reminds them of
+the frank openness of all His teachings.
+
+Meanwhile John's friendly act has gotten Peter entrance. The attitude of
+the two men is in sharpest contrast. John is avowedly Jesus' friend,
+regardless of personal danger. Peter just the reverse. And the hate of
+the leaders has soaked into all their surroundings even down to the
+housemaids. And John notes how exactly Jesus foreknew all, even to a
+thrice-spoken denial before the second crowing of a cock.
+
+Now comes the great Pilate phase. It was the intense malignity of their
+hate that made them bother with Pilate. They could easily have killed
+Jesus and Pilate would never have concerned himself about it. But they
+couldn't have put Him to such exquisite suffering and such shameful
+indignity before the crowds as by the Roman form of death by
+crucifixion.
+
+Clearly there is a hate at work _behind_ theirs. Their hate is
+distinctly _inhuman_. Is _all_ hate? There's an unseen personal power in
+action here set on spilling out the utmost that malignant hate can upon
+the person of Jesus. But these men are cheerful tools. Hate is tying its
+hardest knot with ugliest black thread on the end of its opportunity.
+
+This is Pilate's opportunity and he seems to sense it. And a struggle
+begins between conscience and cowardice, between right action with an
+ugly fight for it, and yielding to wrong with an easy time of it.
+Clearly he feels the purity and the personal power of this unusual
+prisoner. The motive of envy and hate under their action is as plain to
+his trained eyes.
+
+Twice the two men, Pilate and Jesus, are alone together. Did ever man
+have such an opportunity, personally, and historically? With rare touch
+and winsomeness Jesus woos. And Pilate feels it to the marrow under all
+his rough speech. His repeated attempts with the leaders make that
+clear. But cowardice gripped him hard. It's a way cowardice has.
+
+The name of Caesar conjures up fears,--loss of position, of wealth, of
+reputation, maybe of life itself. He surrenders. Conscience is slain on
+the judgment seat. Cowardice laughs and wins. A sharp fling brings a cry
+of allegiance to Caesar from their reluctant throats, as their hatred
+wins the day. He strikes them back an ugly blow as He surrenders. That
+reluctant Caesar cry told out the intensity of their hate. They hated
+Caesar much, but they hated Jesus immeasurably more. They gulp down
+Caesar to be able to vent their spleen upon Jesus.
+
+And so they crucified Him. At last they succeed. They have gotten what
+they were bent on. The hate burning within, these months and years,
+finds its full vent. Its hateful worst is done, and horribly well done.
+And they stand about the cross with unconcealed gloating in pose and
+face and speech and eyes. Their part of the story is done.
+
+
+
+Masterful Dying.
+
+
+But Jesus' part--ah! that was just begun. John lays emphasis on the
+mastery of Jesus here. It is marked, and reveals to John's faithful
+love-opened eyes the dominating purpose of Jesus in yielding to death.
+Strong, thoughtful, self-controlled, anticipating every move, He was
+using all the strength of His great strong will in yielding. He was
+doing it masterfully, intelligently.
+
+This is marked throughout. At the arrest He walks frankly out to meet
+those seeking Him, and restrains them in that strangely powerful way
+till He was quite ready. He makes the personal plea to Pilate for
+_Pilate's_ sake, impressing him so greatly, but interposing nothing to
+change the purpose of His accusers. When Pilate's final decision is
+given John notes that Jesus "went out _bearing the cross for Himself,_"
+though provision had been made for this.[123] His influence upon Pilate
+is seen in the accuracy of the kingly inscription that hangs over the
+cross. In the midst of the excruciating bodily pain He thinks of His
+mother, and with marvellous self-control speaks the quiet word to her
+and to John that insures her future under his filial care.
+
+And then John significantly adds, "_Jesus, knowing that all things are
+now finished._"[124] With masterly forethought, and self-control and
+deliberation He had done the thing He had set Himself to do. Never was
+yielding so masterful. Never was a great plan carried out so fully
+through the set purpose of one's enemies. His every action bears out the
+word He had spoken, "No man taketh My life away from Me, I lay it down
+of Myself."[125]
+
+So now His great work is done, and thoroughly done. His lips speak the
+tremendous word, "It is finished." And He bowed His head and _gave up_
+His spirit. It was His own act. The self-restraint was strong upon Him
+till all was done that was needed for the great purpose in hand. Then
+His head is bowed, His great heart broke under the terrific strain on
+His spirit as He allowed His life to go out.
+
+From that moment no indignity touches His body. The Jews with their
+wearisome insistence on empty technicalities would have added further
+indignity to crucifixion. But that body is sacredly guarded from their
+profane hand by unseen restraint. John with solemn simplicity points to
+the unmistakable physical evidence, in the separation of blood and
+water, that Jesus had actually died; no swooning, but death. And
+reverently he finds the confirmation of Scripture.
+
+Only tender love touches that body now. Two gentlemen of highest
+official and social standing and of large wealth, brothers in their
+faith in Jesus, and also in their timidity, now take steps at once to
+have the precious body of their dear friend tenderly cared for without
+regard to expense. So He is laid away in a new tomb in a garden among
+the flowers of the spring time. The last touch is one of tender love. So
+His greatest wooing was done, and begun; the great act done, its
+tremendous wooing influence only just begun.
+
+Jesus died deliberately. This is quite clear. It was done of love
+aforethought. It was His own act fitted into the circumstances
+surrounding Him. This makes His death mean just what He meant it to
+mean. Run back through His teachings rather carefully and that meaning
+stands clearly out.
+
+He was the Father's messenger; simply this; but all of this. The ideals
+of right so insistently and incessantly held up and pressed were the
+Father's ideals. His mere presence told the Father's great love for men.
+They two were so knit that when the one suffered the other suffered,
+too.
+
+It was the love for men in His own heart that drew Him down here and
+drove Him along even to the Calvary Hill. He died _for_ men, in their
+place, on their behalf. This was His one thought. Through this their
+bondage to sin and to Satan would be broken and they would be set
+free.[126] And they would be drawn, their hearts would be utterly melted
+and broken by His love for them.[127] The influence would reach out
+until all the race would feel its power and respond; and it would reach
+into each one's life who came till the life he lived was of the
+abundant, eternal sort.
+
+The devil was a real personality to Jesus. This whole terrific struggle
+ending at the cross was a direct spirit-battle with that great spirit
+prince. So Jesus understood it. All the bitter enmity to Himself traces
+straight back to that source. That enmity found its worst expression in
+Jesus' death. The pitched spirit-battle was there. But that prince was
+judged, condemned, utterly defeated and cast out in that battle, and his
+hold upon men broken.[128]
+
+And so this was the greatest wooing of all. It was greatest in its
+intensity of meaning _to the Father_ looking eagerly down. It revealed
+His unbending, unflinching ideals of right, and the great strength and
+tenderness of His love for men. He would even give His Son. It was
+greatest in its intensity of meaning _to the Son_. It meant the utmost
+of suffering ever endured, the utmost of love underneath ever revealed;
+and it would mean the race-wide sweep of His gracious power.
+
+It was greatest in its intensity of meaning _to Satan_, the hater of God
+and man. It told his utter defeat, and loss of power over man. So it
+broke our bonds and made us free to yield to the wooing. And it was
+greatest in its intensity of meaning _to us men_. For it showed to our
+confused eyes the one ideal of right standing out clear and full. It
+set us free from the fetters of our bondage, gave us the tremendous
+incentive of love to reach up to the ideal of right, and more, immensely
+more, gave us _power to reach it_.
+
+It was the greatest wooing _in the out-reach_ of its influence, for all
+men of all the earth would be touched.[129] And it was greatest _in the
+in-reach_ to all the life of each one who came under its blessed
+influence. The whole ministry taught this. It would mean newness of life
+in body, in mind, in social nature, in spirit, and in the eternal
+quality of life lived here, and to be lived without any ending.
+
+And all the world has responded to this greatest wooing as they have
+come to know of it. That three-languaged inscription on the cross was a
+world appeal and a world prophecy. In Hebrew the religious language of
+the world whose literature told of the one true God, in Latin the
+language of the masters of the world, in Greek the language of the
+culture of the world, that message went out to all the world. This Jesus
+is our Kinsman-King, our Brother-Ruler, our Love-Autocrat. He revealed
+His love for us in His death for us.
+
+And men answer to Jesus' great plea. With flooded eyes and broken
+hearts, and bending wills, and changed lives, men of all the race bow
+gratefully at the feet of Jesus, our Saviour and Lord and coming King.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+An Appointed Tryst Unexpectedly Kept
+
+     _A Day of Startling Joyous Surprises_
+
+
+
+
+    "Halts by me that footfall:
+    Is my gloom, after all,
+    Shade of His hand outstretched caressingly?
+    'Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest,
+    I am He whom thou seekest!
+    _Thou drawest love from thee, who drawest Me._'"
+
+    --"_The Hound of Heaven._
+
+     "After I am raised up I will go before you into Galilee."--_Mark
+     xiv. 28._
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+An Appointed Tryst Unexpectedly Kept
+
+(John xx.)
+
+
+
+The Appointment.
+
+
+Jesus had made an appointment. It was with these dear friends who had
+responded so lovingly to His wooing. It was a significant appointment,
+most significant. He had appointed to meet them three days after His
+death. He had made a further appointment to meet them in Galilee. What a
+stupendous appointment to make!
+
+It was a sacred appointment, sacred as the love that made it, sacred to
+Jesus as the friendship of these men with whom it was made, sacred as
+His word that never was broken. Our Scottish friends use a most
+significant word for appointment, the word _tryst_. They used to use it
+some for ordinary appointments, but chiefly it is used for friendship
+and for love-appointments. The appointment is a tryst.
+
+Tryst is the same word as _trust_. In the old Gothic language it was one
+of the words used for a covenant or treaty. In medieval Latin it was a
+pledge given that an agreement would be kept. It is a fine turn of a
+word that uses the very spirit of confidence in one's heart in another
+as the name for the appointment made with him. The trust in the heart
+gives the name to the appointment. It's an appointment with one who
+_can_ be trusted to keep his word, and who _is_ trusted.
+
+So an appointed tryst becomes more than a mere appointment. It is a
+pledge of faith. Now this is the real force of the word here. Jesus had
+appointed a tryst with these men, and in making it He was plighting His
+troth, pledging His word to them. He had asked them to risk all for Him.
+In this tryst He is pledging all to them.
+
+He never forgot that sacred appointment. He had thought much before He
+made it. He knew it would involve much to keep it. The power of God was
+at stake in the making and the keeping of it. He knew that. He thought
+of it. He made the appointment and He kept it. Jesus keeps His
+appointments. His word never fails. Not even the gates of death, nor the
+power of the evil one, can prevail against it.
+
+This was a staggering appointment. It took so much for granted. It
+reckons God's power is as big as it is. But then that's a way Jesus had,
+and has. And it is a way he will come to have who companions much with
+Jesus.
+
+Jesus had spoken of this indirectly but distinctly when first He told
+His disciples of His suffering and death, six months before. And each
+time afterwards when He told them of His death the words were always
+added, "and the third day rise again."[130] I The two things are nearly
+always linked. But they hadn't seemed to sense what He meant. The thing
+seems quite beyond them.
+
+He spoke of it again on that never-to-be-forgotten night of the
+betrayal, the night of the feet-washing, and that last long talk, and
+that wondrous Kidron-prayer. He spoke of it more than once that night.
+
+It was a very emphatic word He spoke as they were walking along the
+darkly shadowed Jerusalem streets out towards the east gate. He said, "a
+little while and ye shall behold Me no more; and again a little while
+and ye shall see Me."[131] And the disciples pick this up and puzzle
+over it.
+
+And the Master explains rather carefully and at some length. There was a
+time of sore trouble coming for Him and for them. And while they were
+sorrowing the outer crowd would be making merry. But it would be just as
+with the expectant mother, He said. All the while even when the pains
+cut she is thinking of the great delight that is to be hers. Her
+after-joy clean wipes out of her thought the sharp cutting of the pain.
+
+So it would be. "_I will see you again_," He said in plainest speech.
+And again that same night He said, "after I am raised up, _I will go
+before you into Galilee_." Could any appointment be more explicit as to
+time and place?
+
+But they forget. Aye, there's the bother, this thing of forgetting. The
+memory is ever the index of the heart and the will and the
+understanding. You can tell the one by the other. Some things are never
+forgot. A bit embarrassing and odd this thing of forgetting what Jesus
+says.
+
+His _enemies_ remembered, and took special pains to head off any
+breaking of their careful plans.[132] And even when the angels remind
+the women of the promised appointment, and they with great joy repeat
+the reminder to the disciples, it seems like "_idle talk_" and is not
+accepted. The thing couldn't be, they think.[133] Finally the evidence
+becomes so convincing that they start off for the trysting place, "into
+Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them."[134]
+
+
+
+How the Appointment Was Kept.
+
+
+Let us look a bit at the wonderful keeping, so unexpected, of this
+sacred tryst. It's the third day now since Jesus' death. It is in the
+dark dusk of the early morning. A little knot of women make their way
+slowly along the road leading out of the city gate. Mary Magdalene is in
+the lead, so far ahead of the others as to be alone. They are carrying
+packages of perfumed ointments. They are thinking only of a dear dead
+body and of clinging fragrant memories.
+
+They are troubling themselves about how to get the big stone at the tomb
+pushed aside. It was too much for their strength. As she drew near the
+tomb Mary Magdalene's love-quickened eyes notice something quite
+unexpected. The stone is moved aside! She naturally thinks some one has
+taken the body secretly away in the night.
+
+Quickly she turns and runs back towards the city to tell Peter and John.
+And as quickly as they hear the startling news they are off on a smart
+run towards the tomb. Meanwhile the other women go on into the tomb.
+They are further startled to see a glorious looking person who assures
+them that Jesus is living, having risen up out of death. All a-quiver
+with fear intermingled with the first glimmering light of a great hope
+that they hardly dare hope, they flee hastily back to town to tell the
+others.
+
+Now Peter and John, who have been eagerly running, arrive breathless,
+with John in the lead. Gazing reverently, intently, in through the
+opening John sees, not a body, but on the spot where the body had been
+laid, the linen wrappings lying, held up in the shape of a body by
+Nicodemus' abundant and heavy ointments just as when they held the body
+of Jesus. But clearly there is nothing in them now.
+
+Now Peter comes up, and, just like him, goes straight in, and is at once
+struck by the arrangement of these cloths, just as John had been. Then
+they comment on the fact that the head cloths are lying where they
+naturally would be, a little apart from the others, the distance of the
+head from the body.
+
+The evidence convinces them that Jesus' spirit had indeed returned to
+His body, and that He had risen up _through the cloths_, and gone. And
+they start back to town in a great maze of wonder and delight.
+
+And now Mary Magdalene, knowing nothing of all this, comes slowly back
+absorbed with her thoughts that the body has been secretly removed. She
+stands at the open tomb weeping. Then for the first time she stoops down
+and looks in. She is startled to see two angels left there to explain
+matters.
+
+They gently say "Why weepest thou?" Still sobbing, she says, "They have
+taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid Him." And
+turning aside as she speaks she sees some One standing near her. Her
+tear-misted eyes think Him the attendant in charge of the garden. Again
+the question by this man, "Why weepest thou?" How strangely they talk,
+these angels and this gardener! She makes a plea for the body.
+
+Then the one word, her name, spoken in that voice she knew so
+well--"_Mary_." Ah! there's no question about _that voice_. She needs no
+explanation nor evidence more than this, as she cries out, "Oh, my
+beloved Master." Then He acts so like Himself; He gives her an errand to
+do for Him. And off she goes. She has had the wondrous privilege of the
+first sight of Him, and the first errand for Him. The tryst has been
+kept with Mary Magdalene.
+
+And now the other women who had gone running down the road after
+hearing the angels' startling message are amazed to meet Jesus standing
+in the roadway in front of them. And the same quiet rich voice so gently
+and simply gives them the usual "good-morning" salutation. At once they
+are on their knees at His feet. And He softly says, "Don't be afraid. Go
+tell My brethren to meet Me at the old place appointed, up by the blue
+waters of Galilee." And again the tryst is kept.
+
+But before all this, the soldiers on guard, terror-stricken by the
+earthquake that had taken place, and dazed at the sight of the "angel of
+the Lord" had fled at top speed to the chief priests with their
+startling story. Here was a wholly unexpected bothersome finish to the
+thing. But quick consultation follows. And then free use of money makes
+the soldiers willing to tell what they know to be a lie. And so the two
+utterly different stories, the truth and the lie, get into circulation
+at once. The soldiers and the chief priests' circle have learned that
+the appointment was kept.
+
+Meanwhile Peter has gone down the road back to town in a maze of
+conflicting emotions. John, lighter of foot, had hurried ahead, very
+likely to tell the great news to Jesus' mother, now his own. Peter plods
+slowly along, thinking hard. It was still early morning, the air so
+still and fragrant with the dew. Maybe down by some big trees he is
+walking, absorbed, when all at once, _some One is by his side_. It's the
+Master. The appointment has been kept with Peter. But we must leave
+them alone together. Peter has some things to straighten out. That's a
+sacred interview meant only for him.
+
+That afternoon two disciples walking out to a little village a few miles
+away are joined by a Stranger whose talk makes their hearts burn like
+the Master's used to. And as they gather about the evening meal with
+Him, and He gives thanks and breaks the loaf, all at once their eyes
+_see_. It is _Jesus Himself_ who has been with them all the time. Again
+the appointment is kept.
+
+At once they hasten back to town, and are just telling the news in
+joyously broken speech to the disciples gathered in an upper room with
+locked doors when again, all at once, Jesus appears in their midst, and
+eats some bread and fish, and tells them to know by the feel that it is
+really Himself with them. He has kept His sacred appointment with the
+Twelve. Then a week later He comes in like manner among them again for
+the sake of one man, Thomas. So He keeps the appointment with Thomas,
+also.
+
+
+
+Our Guarantee of His Promises.
+
+
+Two things stand out sharply. The resurrection was not expected. It was
+the most tremendous surprise. The news was received at first by those
+most interested with utter stubborn unbelief. Then the evidence was so
+clear and repeated, and incontestable that these same men staked their
+lives on it. They suffered to the extreme for their witness that Jesus
+had indeed risen.
+
+Jesus rose from the dead. His body was re-inhabited by His spirit. The
+spirit didn't die. Spirits neither sleep nor die. The body died. Then
+life came into it again. It was a real body that could eat and be
+touched. It was recognized as the same one they had known. But it was
+changed. The old limitations were gone. New powers had come.
+
+Jesus keeps His appointments. His pledged word never fails. Not a word
+He has spoken can ever be broken. Some day He is coming back. It is an
+appointment.[135] Then we, too, who have slipped the tether of life and
+left our bodies temporarily in the dust, shall rise up again to meet
+Him. It is a sacred appointment He has made with us.
+
+And some of us who live in that day shall be changed instead of dying,
+and shall be caught up to meet Him and our own loved ones in the air.
+That's His true tryst with us up in the blue, some day. And He will keep
+it.
+
+And meanwhile everything He has promised us in the Book is sure, as
+being His plighted word. His resurrection is our bond, our guarantee. As
+surely as He rose on that third morning He will keep His word regarding
+every matter to you and me.
+
+His appointments never fail, whether of guidance, of bodily health and
+strength, of supplies for every sort of need, of peace, of power, of
+victory. The power that raised Jesus up from out the dead is pledged to
+us for every promise of this Book for to-day's life. He will do an act
+of creation before He will let His Word fail. He will leave no power
+unused to keep the appointment of His Word with us.
+
+Let us trust His Word to us fully. And let us _live_ our trust.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+Another Tryst
+
+     _A Story of Fishing, of Guests at Breakfast, and of a Walk and Talk
+     by the Edge of Blue Galilee_
+
+
+
+
+     "I come unto you."--_John xiv. 18._
+
+     "Lo, I am with you all the days."--_Matthew xxviii. 20_.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+Another Tryst
+
+(John xxi.)
+
+
+
+Jesus Unrecognised.
+
+
+John's story is done. And it is well done. With the skill of a tried
+jurist he has drawn up a clear full line of evidence and presented it in
+a vigorous straightforward way. And he plainly states his case. His
+whole purpose is that those who read his little book shall come into
+warm personal touch of life with the Lord Jesus. That ties the knot on
+tight at the end of chapter twenty. John's case has gone to the jury of
+his readers.
+
+But now John reaches for his pen again. The guiding Spirit has put
+another bit into his heart to write down. This time it is a special bit,
+not for all to whom the book is sent, but for a selected class of his
+readers, namely, for those of them who have given John a favourable
+verdict on the evidence presented. It grows out of chapter xx. 31 as
+rose out of bud, and fruit out of blossom. It is for those who "believe
+that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God," and so "have life in His
+Name."
+
+And a very tender precious bit it is, more wondrous in its sheer
+simplicity than any of us seem to suspect. It is simply this: _this
+Jesus is with us all the time_. This same Jesus who was so swayed by the
+need of the crowd, who burned His life out day by day warmly responding
+to their sore need--_He is here._
+
+This Jesus who fed the hungry, healed the sick of every sort, and freed
+men from devilish power, who convicted men so tremendously of their
+wrong, restrained their evil power to hurt, wooed the hearts of all so
+irresistibly, and led them into changed lives; this Jesus who died and
+then did the stupendously mighty thing of rising up out of death,--_this
+Jesus is with us now_ by your side and mine.
+
+And He is just the same Jesus in His warm love and resistless power. The
+_words_ are rather familiar. The _fact_--no one of us seems to have
+gotten hold of it yet. This is the thing that makes John eagerly reach
+for his pen again before his little book-messenger goes out on its
+errand.
+
+The thing isn't new in _information_, but in actual living _experience_
+it seems to be so new as to be an unknown thing to some of us. The
+Master had spoken of this that betrayal-night around the supper board.
+It was really a continuation of that trysting appointment He had made
+with them that evening, a wonderful continuation.
+
+Clearly they didn't understand Him that night. But during those
+after-Pentecost days they were given a continuous graphic unforgetable
+illustration of its meaning. We to-day seem able to explain the part
+they didn't understand, the teaching that betrayal-night. We don't seem
+to get hold of the part they did understand and experience, the real
+presence of the risen Jesus in the midst actively at work.
+
+That night Jesus said: "I will make request of the Father, and He will
+send you another unfailing powerful Friend to be always at your side."
+Then He added: "He abides _with_ you now (in My presence) and shall be
+_in_ you (after I send Him)." Then He said, "_I_ come unto you. Yet a
+little while and the world _seeth_ Me no more but ye _see_ Me."
+
+And again, "He that hath My commandments and keepeth them he it is that
+(in that sheweth that he) loveth Me and ... I will _manifest_ or _shew_
+Myself unto him." Here is the simple teaching: He would send the Holy
+Spirit; in the Holy Spirit's coming Jesus Himself, the new risen exalted
+empowered enthroned Jesus, He came; _and_ He would let them see Himself
+with them.
+
+Now this added chapter of John's is _the illustration in advance_ to
+these men of what these words mean. _The great standing illustration_ is
+that Book of Acts which, will you notice, doesn't end. It only breaks
+off, abruptly, without even a punctuation point. It wasn't meant to end.
+We are supposed to be living in it yet. But these men haven't come to
+the experience of the Pentecostal Acts yet. This is an illustration in
+advance to them. And it remains an illustration to us of what we seem a
+bit slow in taking in.
+
+But let us get at the simple bit of story itself. There's a little
+group of the inner circle, seven including the leaders. These men
+haven't found their feet yet. The stupendous events of those days,
+coming in such startling succession, have left them dazed. The
+crucifixion left them stupidly dazed; the resurrection left them joyous,
+but still dazed. They don't know just where they are, nor what to do.
+
+So Peter proposes fishing; an ideal proposition, when you want to get
+off and think things through and out. Any fisherman knows that. And the
+others readily join in. They see the good sense of it. But the fish
+don't catch. And the morning finds them tired in body and more tired in
+the spiritless uncertainty that hangs over them like a clinging damp
+fog.
+
+Yonder is some One standing on the beach. But that's nothing unusual.
+They barely notice Him. And now this Stranger calls out to them a cheery
+common question, "Caught anything?" And now He gives a--no, it can
+hardly be called a _command_, so quietly is it said. Yet they are subtly
+conscious of a something in the word that makes them obey, though it's
+the last sort of thing to do.
+
+And now at once the net-ropes pull _so hard;_ astonishing this! Then
+John's keen spirit detects _Who_ it is. Is he thinking of the other big
+unexpected haul in those same waters![136] And Peter's over the side of
+the boat shoreward. Fishing has lost all attraction for him.
+
+And when they all got ashore with their haul, tired, wet, chilled to
+the marrow, hungry, what's this? A blazing fire of coals burning
+cheerfully on the sands. And some fish dexterously poised, doing to a
+brown turn, and some bread. And the Stranger, no, _Jesus_, He's no
+longer a stranger, Jesus says quietly, "Boys, better bring the haul up
+on the beach."
+
+And the old fishing habit still strong on them counts the fish. It's
+such an unusual haul, they must know how many. John must be thinking
+again about that earlier haul. The net couldn't stand the strain then.
+But now it's different. Ah! _every_thing's blessedly different now. "The
+net was not rent."
+
+Then the gracious call to breakfast by their Host. Was ever fish done to
+such a fine turn? Did ever any fish have such an exquisite flavour? or
+taste so good? Did ever men eat so gladly and yet quietly with a
+distinct touch of awe in their spirits? For they _know_ it is the
+Master, though no word of that has been spoken. Words were needless.
+
+Now they're walking along the beach, Jesus and Peter in the lead but the
+others quite near. And there's the bit of talk between the two. Very
+gently Jesus says, "Do you love Me, Peter?" And Peter feels he hardly
+dare use the sacred word for "love" that the Master has used. He had
+made such an awful break at just that point. And with breaking voice he
+says, "Yea, Lord, Thou knowest I have the highest regard for Thee."
+
+And again the question, and the answer, with Peter still humbly
+clinging to his more modest word. And now Jesus says, "Do you really
+love Me even as you yourself say?" And Peter with his heart in his face
+says passionately, "Lord, Thou knowest better than I can tell Thee."
+
+And because he loves, Peter is given the full privilege of shepherding
+the whole flock, from feeding little lambkins on to feeding all, and
+guiding, through the hard places, even the wayward ones. And more yet
+and higher, because Peter loves, he will be privileged to suffer, even
+as his Master had suffered. The fellowship would extend even to that.
+
+And Peter's eye falls on John. And apparently he is thinking of the
+contrast between John's faithfulness and his own break that
+betrayal-night. If poor faulty Peter may be so privileged how John would
+be rewarded. But Jesus quietly turns Peter, and all Peter's numerous
+kinsfolk of this sort, away from human comparisons. And instead He seeks
+to turn their hearts to this: He is coming back in person some day for
+an advance step in the kingdom program. And there they are, walking and
+talking, along the beach by the blue Galilean waters.
+
+
+
+The Same Jesus Here Now.
+
+
+An unrecognized Stranger who turns out to be Jesus; an unusual haul of
+fish gotten in a very unusual way; a warm fire and tasty breakfast for
+cold hungry men; a tender talk about love and service and sacrifice,
+and about Jesus' return;--all this is a moving-picture illustration of
+the meaning of a word, one word.
+
+It is a word Jesus used in that last long quiet talk. It's the key-word
+to this added chapter, occurring three times. In the old version it is
+the word "_shew_"; in the revision "manifest." "After these things Jesus
+_manifested_ Himself again ... and He _manifested_ Himself on this
+wise." "This is now the third time that Jesus was _manifested_ to the
+disciples after that He was risen from the dead."[137]
+
+The word used underneath literally means "to make manifest or _visible_
+or know, what has been hidden or unknown."[138] Then each time it is
+used it gets its local colouring from its connection. The simple
+tremendous meaning here clearly is this: Jesus let Himself _be seen_ and
+known. _He did not come_. He was there.
+
+But their eyes couldn't see Him. In effect He was hidden, not seeable.
+Now the change that comes is this: _He is seen_. And He is seen in His
+true native character; so certain results follow. He had said, "I will
+_manifest_ Myself."[139] And this was now the third time that He did it,
+to the disciples, after that He was risen.
+
+This is _the advance illustration of the Book of Acts_. This is the
+tremendous thing He is burning into their hearts through eyes and
+ears:--_He is always present_. He, whose power they had felt so
+stupendously, and whose warm sympathy so tenderly, _He is always with
+them_. The coming of the Holy Spirit meant just this. The Spirit would
+be as Jesus' other self, as Jesus Himself. The one thing the Spirit
+would do would be to manifest, to _shew openly_, the power of Jesus.
+
+Then four pictures pass before their eyes to illustrate the meaning, a
+fishing picture and a breakfast picture _in action_; then _in words_, a
+love-service-suffering picture, and a picture of Jesus returning in
+person seen by all to take an advance-step.
+
+The fishing picture clearly meant this: great numbers of people,
+surprisingly great numbers, coming, drawn not by any human skill, but by
+the supernatural power of Jesus manifesting Himself in that way. The
+breakfast picture meant this: that this wondrous Jesus would take tender
+personal care of those in this blessed gathering ministry, even to their
+bodily needs and strength.
+
+And the love-service-suffering word-picture said so plainly this: true
+service grows out of love. The chief thing is the loyal tender
+attachment to the person of Jesus. Then out of this will naturally come
+service, and willingness to suffer. The touchstone won't be service but
+personal love. The service will simply be an expression of the love.
+
+And the Jesus-return word-picture fills their vision with this same
+Jesus coming in open glory before all eyes to carry out the kingdom
+plan. As these men learned to live always in the presence of a Jesus
+whom their outer eyes saw not, these pictures would become living
+pictures seen in open daily life.
+
+So this is a further bit of the tryst appointment. This is the fuller
+tryst, the greater, the yet more wondrous tryst. Not only would He rise
+up out of death, and appear to them in person seen by the outer eyes,
+but He would be with them continually manifesting Himself in rarest
+power of action, in tenderest personal care, in talking and walking with
+them.
+
+They would see the power plainly at work; then they would say with a
+soft hush, "_He_ is here." They would find new bodily strength, new
+guidance in perplexity, new peace in the midst of confusion, and they
+would say to each other in awed tones, "_He is here: it's the Master's
+touch_."
+
+And so it would come to be a habit to _anticipate_ His presence. They
+would figure Him in, and figure Him in big, as big as He is, in all
+sorts of circumstances and planning and meeting of difficulties.
+
+It is most striking that John closes his Gospel so differently from the
+others. They close with the Master rising up and disappearing on a cloud
+into the upper blue. John closes with Jesus walking along the beach,
+talking with the little group of trusted ones. Jesus did ascend up into
+the blue whence He shall some day descend. But the Holy Spirit sends
+John back to his pen to give us this as the last picture, impressed on
+the sensitive plate of the eyes of our heart. _This_: Jesus present with
+us all the while walking along the shore of our common round of life,
+clothed with matchless power, and devoting Himself to us as we to Him.
+
+Along about the middle of the eighteenth century there came to England a
+young French-Swiss, named De la Flechere, hungry hearted for the truth.
+He was so helped by John Wesley that he cast in his lot with the new
+Methodist movement and John Williams Fletcher became one of Wesley's
+most faithful co-labourers. Late in life he married a woman of unusual
+mental and spiritual attainment.
+
+I ran across a simple story over there of this Mrs. John Fletcher which
+interested and helped me much. This saintly gifted woman told of a dream
+which came to her with such vividness as to seem to her mature mind more
+than a common passing vagary of sleep. In her dream she was engaged in
+an intense struggle with an evil spirit. She was having a most difficult
+fight.
+
+She noticed some one standing a little bit to one side watching the
+fight but taking no active part in it. The fighting became so intense
+and her strength so sorely strained that she was on the point of giving
+up. Then this one came over near and touched her gently and said, "Be
+strong." Instantly a wondrous strength came to her and she held on.
+
+Again the evil one attacked her viciously. She wondered why this helping
+friend did not come to her assistance in the fight. Then she was moved
+to say to her enemy, "Depart, _in Jesus' Name_." And instantly he fled.
+And she was free and victorious. That was her dream. As she awoke there
+came to her the most real sense of the presence of her Lord.
+
+This is only one simple illustration from life. I have run across many
+of the same, wholly different each from the other, but each emphasizing
+the one simple tremendous fact of _the constant presence with us of this
+same mighty Jesus_.
+
+It is of keenest help to mark that humanly the _initiative of action_ is
+in _our_ hands. The fight is _ours_. We decide our stand. We choose, and
+we bear the brunt or result of our choice. We step out as the need
+comes. Prayer and a spirit of humblest dependence on Another guides our
+decision and action. But _we_ take the action. The initiative is ours.
+
+And _always alongside is One standing close up_, putting all His
+limitless power _at our disposal_, in our action. All He did in living
+and dying and rising up out of death was done _on our behalf_. And now
+all the tremendous result of His victory is at our command. All the
+power native in Him is for our use.
+
+This is the other tryst our Lover-Lord makes with us. "_Lo! I_ am _with
+you_ all the days, sunny days and shadowy, bright days and dark, all the
+days clear to the end." This is the sacred tryst He has made with us.
+
+And He _keeps_ the tryst. We may count on Him, And as we do we shall
+cast nets into hopeless waters and get a great haul. We shall find His
+presence anticipating all our personal needs. We shall rejoice to serve
+and--if so it prove to be--to suffer for the One we love with tenderest
+devotion.
+
+And we shall look eagerly forward to seeing Him who is always in touch
+with us, here and now, to seeing Him with these outer eyes of ours,
+_coming in glory_ with His resistless power, _to make some blessed
+changes_.
+
+
+
+
+Footnotes
+
+
+
+[1] John i. 35-42.
+
+[2] i. 1-18.
+
+[3] i. 19-xii. 50.
+
+[4] Chapters xiii.-xvii.
+
+[5] Chapters xviii.-xix.
+
+[6] Chapters xx.-xxi.
+
+[7] Colossians i. 15-17.
+
+[8] Philippians ii. 6-8.
+
+[9] Ephesians i.19-23.
+
+[10] Revelation i. 13-18.
+
+[11] i. 1-18.
+
+[12] i. 19-xii. 50.
+
+[13] Chapters xiii.-xvii.
+
+[14] Chapters xviii.-xix.
+
+[15] Chapter xx.
+
+[16] Chapter xxi.
+
+[17] There are nineteen of these incidents:
+
+ 1. The official deputation, i. 19-51.
+ 2. Marriage in Cana, ii. 1-11.
+ 3. Cleansing the Temple, ii. 13-22.
+ 4. Nicodemus, iii. 1-21.
+ 5. Dispute about purifying, iii. 22-36.
+ 6. Samaritan woman, iv. 1-42.
+ 7. Nobleman's son, iv. 46-54.
+ 8. Thirty-eight years infirmity, v.
+ 9. Feeding five thousand, vi. 1-15.
+10. Walking on water and discussion, vi. 16-71.
+11. At Feast of Tabernacles, vii.
+12. Accused woman, viii. 1--11.
+13. First attempt to stone, viii. 12-59.
+14. Man born blind, ix. 1-x. 21.
+15. Second stoning, x. 22-42.
+16. Lazarus, xi.
+17. Bethany Feast, xii. 1-11.
+18. Triumphal Entry, xii. 12-19.
+19. The Greeks, xii. 20-50.
+
+
+[18] iii. 32.
+
+[19] iii. 11.
+
+[20] i. 19-51.
+
+[21] ii.1-11.
+
+[22] ii. 12.
+
+[23] ii. 13-22.
+
+[24] vii. 50, 51; xix. 39.
+
+[25] ii. 23-iii. 21.
+
+[26] iii. 11, 19, 32.
+
+[27] iii. 22-36.
+
+[28] iv 1-42.
+
+[29] iv. 43-45.
+
+[30] iv. 46-54.
+
+[31] v. 1-47.
+
+[32] vi. 1-14.
+
+[33] vi. 15-71.
+
+[34] vii. 1-52.
+
+[35] viii. 1-11.
+
+[36] viii 12-59.
+
+[37] ix. l-x. 21.
+
+[38] x. 22-39.
+
+[39] x. 40-42.
+
+[40] xi. 1-53.
+
+[41] xi. 54-57.
+
+[42] xii. 1-8.
+
+[43] xii. 9-11.
+
+[44] xii. 12-19.
+
+[45] xii. 20-36.
+
+[46] xii. 37-50.
+
+[47] ii. 23.
+
+[48] iv. 45.
+
+[49] vi. 1-2, 14, 15, 34.
+
+[50] vii. 31, 40, 41.
+
+[51] viii. 30.
+
+[52] x. 20, 21.
+
+[53] x. 40-42.
+
+[54] xi. 45; xii. 9-12.
+
+[55] xii 17-18.
+
+[56] xii. 12-14.
+
+[57] xii. 42.
+
+[58] ii. 23-25
+
+[59] vi. 60-66.
+
+[60] xii. 42-43.
+
+[61] i. 35-51; ii. 1-11; iii. 13-28.
+
+[62] vi. 66-69.
+
+[63] xi. 16.
+
+[64] ii. 22; xii. 16.
+
+[65] iii. 1-21.
+
+[66] vii. 50-51 with xii. 42, 43.
+
+[67] xix. 39.
+
+[68] iv. 5-42.
+
+[69] Genesis XV. 6 with xx. 11.
+
+[70] vii. 35.
+
+[71] xii. 24-36.
+
+[72] Note the official deputation incident (chapter i.), and the
+Nicodemus incident (chapter iii.).
+
+[73] i. 19-34.
+
+[74] iii. 11, 32.
+
+[75] ii. 13-20.
+
+[76] iii. 22-iv. 3.
+
+[77] iv. 44.
+
+[78] v. 16-18.
+
+[79] vi. 30-36, 41-42, 52, 60-66.
+
+[80] vii. throughout.
+
+[81] viii. 1-11.
+
+[82] viii. 12-59.
+
+[83] ix. 1-x. 21.
+
+[84] x. 22-39.
+
+[85] xi. 47-57.
+
+[86] "Jesus had _not yet_ come," intimating that they were expecting Him
+in accordance with an understanding between Him and them. vi. 17.
+
+[87] Kings vi. 1-7.
+
+[88] Kings xvii. 17-24.
+
+[89] Kings xiii. 20-21.
+
+[90] Kings iv. 32-37.
+
+[91] Luke viii. 40-42, 49-56.
+
+[92] Luke vii. 11-17.
+
+[93] iii. 1-21.
+
+[94] iv. 7-42.
+
+[95] viii. 1-11.
+
+[96] ii. 13-21.
+
+[97] vii. throughout.
+
+[98] Luke iv. 30; John viii. 59; x. 39; xii. 36.
+
+[99] Mark x. 32; Luke ix. 53.
+
+[100] viii. 12-59.
+
+[101] x. 22-39.
+
+[102] xii. 12-19, 36.
+
+[103] xiii. 1-3.
+
+[104] ii. 4; vii. 6, 8, 30; viii. 20.
+
+[105] xii 23, 27; xiii. 1, 31-32; xvii. 1.
+
+[106] xiii. 4-11.
+
+[107] xiii. 12-20.
+
+[108] Philippians ii. 6-11.
+
+[109] xiii. 18.
+
+[110] xiii. 21-30.
+
+[111] The word "glory" with its companion "glorify," is frequent in
+John. We shall understand better if we remember that originally the word
+he uses means the opinion that one has of another, especially a good
+opinion. But as the word is used commonly here the underlying thought
+is, not what one thinks of another, nor yet something that one may give
+to another, but _the actual character in the one so thought of._ Glory
+is the character of goodness. So _to see one's glory_ is to see his real
+inner character, and to see that character openly recognized and
+acknowledged. So to _glorify_ means to recognize and acknowledge openly
+the true character of one. Twice in John the word is used in the cheaper
+meaning of outer honour among men. vii. 18; viii. 50.
+
+[112] xiii. 31-33.
+
+[113] xiii. 34-38.
+
+[114] xiv. 1-14.
+
+[115] xi. 33; xii. 27; xiii. 21.
+
+[116] xiv. 15-31.
+
+[117] xv. 1-17.
+
+[118] 18-xvi. 18.
+
+[119] xvi. 19-33.
+
+[120] xvii. throughout.
+
+[121] See footnote on "glory."
+
+[122] xii. 36.
+
+[123] Matthew xxvii. 32 and parallels.
+
+[124] xix. 28.
+
+[125] x. 17-18.
+
+[126] viii. 31-32, 34-36.
+
+[127] xii. 32.
+
+[128] Some references for this whole paragraph,--viii. 44; xii. 31;
+xiii. 2, 27; xiv. 30; xvi. 11.
+
+[129] x. 16; xii. 32; xvii. 20.
+
+[130] Matthew xvi. 21; xvii. 9, 23; xx. 19; Mark viii. 31; ix. 31; x.
+34; Luke ix. 22; xviii. 33.
+
+[131] xvi. 16.
+
+[132] Matthew xxvii. 63.
+
+[133] Mark xvi. 6-7; Luke xxiv. 6-11.
+
+[134] Matthew xxviii. 16.
+
+[135] John xiv. 3, and others.
+
+[136] Luke v. 1-11.
+
+[137] xxi. 1, 14.
+
+[138] So Thayer.
+
+[139] xiv. 21, 1. c.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Quiet Talks on John's Gospel, by S. D. Gordon
+
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #15185 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/15185)