Christ to the forerunner which he chiefly dwells upon. That difference
had been sufficiently brought out by the earlier evangelists. He
insists that the superiority of the Christ rested on His _priority_;
that the later in order of manifestation was the first in order of
being; that of His fulness John and all previous prophets had
received; that of Him, as the Word of God, as the Light of men, they
had all borne witness. Whether Jesus was or was not the Word made
flesh,--whether He did or did not prove that in Him was the Life of
all things, and that He was the Light of men,--are questions which the
Evangelist undertakes to resolve for us in the course of his
narrative. Upon that point the Baptist may at times have had a strong
conviction; at times he might be doubtful. But that there was such a
Word of God, such a Light of men, and that He would make Himself
manifest, this was the groundwork of his prophecy; by this
proclamation he proved himself to be of the same class with Isaiah and
Ezekiel; by this he showed that a kingdom of heaven must be at hand,
in which the least might be greater than he.
How our Lord spoke to a ruler of the Jews concerning that kingdom, and
the qualifications for entering into it and seeing it--how he
connected it with a birth by water and by the Spirit--we have heard in
the first part of this chapter. The narrative which occupies the
remainder of it carries us back to John. Not long after the passover
at which the conversation with Nicodemus took place, Jesus, we are
told, went with His disciples into the country part of Judæa--the land
of Judæa being here set in contrast, not with Galilee, but with the
city of Jerusalem, at which He had been during the feast. '_There He
tarried with them and baptized._' This expression is used loosely; it
is qualified in the next chapter. '_Jesus_,' it is said, '_Himself
baptized not, but His disciples_.' Still it was regarded, to all
intents and purposes, as His baptism. It was naturally compared with
that of John; for he was still at large, and was '_baptizing in Ænon,
near to Salim, where there was much water_.' Perhaps the numbers that
went out to him had diminished; but it is obvious from the context
that he was still an object of attraction to many; '_they came to
him, and were baptized_.'
'_Then there arose a question between some of John's disciples and a
Jew_' (the plural is evidently quite out of place) '_about
purification_.' We need not inquire into the nature of this dispute,
seeing that the Apostle tells us no more of it. Before that time, and
ever since, the subject of purification has given rise to thousands of
questions, all bearing more or less directly upon the relation between
outward acts and the inner man,--what the former can or cannot do to
make the other better. Such questions were certain to be awakened by a
baptism with water, and a preaching of repentance such as John's; any
of them may have suggested to his disciples the thought whether there
was some greater virtue in that of Jesus, or whether He were merely a
rival and imitator of the elder teacher. With surprise and perplexity,
and something of the indignation which was natural in men jealous for
the honour of a beloved teacher, '_they came unto John, and said unto
him, Rabbi, He that was with thee beyond Jordan, and to whom thou
barest witness, behold the same baptizeth, and all men come unto
Him_.'
There was probably a pause before John gave his answer. The news which
he heard may have stirred up strange thoughts and doubts within him,
not in a moment to be quelled. Was his work over? Was he to have no
more power over men? Was he no longer a witness for God? The magician
says, when the fabric of his vision is dissolved--
'Now my spells are all o'erthrown,
And what strength I have's my own;
Which is most faint.'
A mournful conclusion, and yet one to which many a man of high genius
has been brought, and out of which, perhaps, in the end he has derived
very precious lessons. Was this to be the result of the _prophet's_
meditation also? No! it comes forth in quite other words, which were a
reply both to the questionings in his own soul, and the shallower
perplexities and speculations of his disciples. '_A man can receive
nothing, except it be given him from above._' As if he had said: 'You
need not be careful of my fame. If I have ever spoken a word which has
entered into you, and shown you your ownselves, and has made you
truer, better men, that word was given me by the Lord of your spirit
and mine; He enabled you to take it in. Out of the bosom of God, where
that Word is whose life is the light of men, did these quickening,
illuminating words proceed. Just so far as my words have led you to
turn to _that_ Word who is always with you, and who has promised that
He will come and manifest Himself to you,--just so far have they been
wholesome and effectual. "_You yourselves bear me witness, that I said
I am not the Christ, but that I am sent before Him._" As I never
pretended to be that unseen Light, which I told you was struggling
with your darkness, so--you know it well--I never pretended to be the
Christ, the Anointed One, the King of Israel. For my message was that
this Christ must be that Light of the world, that Word made flesh. I
told you that He alone would baptize with the Spirit, because He alone
would be fully baptized with the Spirit. I am sent before Him,--sent,
as I said, to baptize with water, that so He might be made known to
Israel who has the higher baptism.' And then, as if he were caught
away by a new and diviner inspiration, as if the very meaning of that
word, Christ the anointed, were revealed to him,--as if, in the light
of that meaning, a thousand old songs and symbols were interpreting
themselves to him,--he goes on, '_He that hath the bride is the
bridegroom_.' The vision of a king was before him; of a king, the
direct contrast to the tyrants of the earth. In place of a Deioces,
hidden in the recesses of some Median palace--in place of a Tiberius,
governing the world by spies--he sees One '_who is fairer than the
sons of men, upon whose lips grace is poured, whose sword is on His
thigh, and who rides on in truth and righteousness_.' He sees Him
coming to woo and claim His bride, '_whose beauty He greatly desires,
who is all-glorious within, whose clothing is of wrought gold_.' Such
a Bridegroom all the prophets had, in one form of speech or another,
been discoursing of. They had proved that they were dealing in no
metaphors--pouring out no Oriental rhapsodies; for their revelation of
Him had been connected with the homeliest exhortations to domestic
union and purity; they had affirmed the relation of the particular
husband and wife to have its foundation in this higher relation; they
had treated all breaches of the marriage-vow as indications and
results of the adultery of the race to its unseen Husband. And though
the race meant in their minds Israel; though the people whom God had
chosen, and with whom He had made a covenant, were those whom they
taught to regard themselves as united in this eternal bond, of which
covenants were but the outward expression, which existed long before
Abraham or Noah; yet their language was always too large for even
these limitations--was continually breaking through them. The King who
was to reign over the Gentiles must be represented as their Husband;
whensoever He should be revealed as the glory of His people Israel, He
would certainly be revealed as the Light to lighten all the nations;
that is to say, whensoever he appeared as the Christ of God, He would
certainly appear as the Bridegroom of Humanity.
To speak of Him, then, by this name, was not, as some would make out,
to anticipate the discoveries of New Testament Apostles. It was
expressly to endorse and unfold the discoveries that had been made to
Old Testament Prophets. It is only when he speaks of his own office in
relation to this Bridegroom, that John looks at all beyond the
previous teachers of his land; and then, that he may make their office
also more intelligible.
'_The friend of the bridegroom, which standeth and heareth him,
rejoiceth greatly because of the bridegroom's voice: this my joy
therefore is fulfilled._' I know scarcely any words in all the
Scriptures which have a deeper and diviner music in them than these,
or which more express all that a Christian minister and a Christian
man should wish to understand and feel; and should hope that some day
he may understand and feel as he who first spoke them did. That may
seem to us a high ambition; we ought to consider it a poor ambition.
After eighteen hundred years we should be able to understand _better_,
to feel _more_ intensely than John did, that all the joy which is
intended for a human being--nay, in the strict sense, which is
possible for a human being--comes from hearing this Bridegroom's
voice. I do believe, brethren, that by sore experience, shameful
experience, those of us who have had fewest saintly aspirations may
learn that lesson. We have listened for the echoes of our own voices;
we have longed to know what impression they made; we have tried to
feast on the outward praise or the inward consciousness of their power
or sweetness. Has it not been very miserable, unsatisfying food? has
not the day's gluttony brought nausea and disgust on the morrow? Has
not the gratification of that vanity gradually formed in us a craving,
which no indulgence could appease, which every disappointment made
intolerable? How much better has it been, if we have striven to take
delight in the words and deeds of other men, to feel the praises of
them as our own! 'As our own! Then we still are intended to connect
what is outside of us with ourselves; we must, in some sort, refer
them to a standard within us?' Here is the puzzle; one always
recurring; one infinitely more tormenting in the practice of life than
it ever can be in speculation; one that affects all our judgments of
our fellow-men; one that never deserts us when we are alone. It never
can be set at rest till we confess a Lord, from whom all that is good
and dear and worthy to be admired in any human being is derived--a
root of all mutual understanding and genial sympathy--a centre of life
and joy. If we think that there is a Bridegroom who is ever bestowing
His own treasures and loveliness upon the creatures who were formed
after His likeness, whose nature He has taken, who is ever drawing
those creatures out of their own narrow and dark prison-houses, to
come and claim their rights as spirits, and to share with Him the free
air and light in which He dwells, then we may begin to claim the place
of His friends, and in our own hearts, as well as in those who have
been most estranged from us, to hear Him speaking. That speech will
not be monotonous; we shall know why it is said in the Apocalypse to
be as the sound of many waters. In the accents of humiliation and
penitence, in the accents of thanksgiving and praise, in the
confessions upon sick-beds, in the laugh of children, in the stillness
of the churchyard, in the noise of cities, in the cries upon the
cross, in the message, He is risen,--we shall hear the Bridegroom's
voice. It testifies that He has come and is coming to us and to all.
Our joy is fulfilled only if we learn to welcome Him, and to bid our
brethren welcome Him also.
And therefore John proceeds, most consistently and harmoniously: '_He
must increase; I must decrease_.' If the words had been spoken only of
a new teacher who was baptizing more disciples than he, there would be
a sadness and a kind of murmur in them, however they might denote a
necessary submission. But when it is the Bridegroom of his own spirit,
the divine Lord, from whom alone he had received light, in whom alone
he could see light, who was to increase, the '_I must decrease_' is
not a qualification of the joy he had claimed as the Bridegroom's
friend, but a principal part of it. How many a one has felt the misery
of a self; has longed to become absorbed in the universe--to be
nothing! It was a wish which a holy man such as John was did not dare
to cherish, and yet which must have haunted him more than most. To
have a glimpse of _this_ annihilation; to see that it was possible to
become less and less, while He in whom he was bound up, in whom was
the spring of his life and joy, grew greater and greater; to feel that
he might find his own personality in another;--was not this the
consummation to which God had always been leading him? Was not this,
too, the very meaning and explanation of the work in which he had been
engaged? The Word, the Light of men, of whom he had told his
countrymen, needed no longer his witness; for He was coming forth
Himself to witness of that Father with whom He had dwelt eternally, to
tell mankind of Him.
This higher testimony, this newer and grander revelation, is the
subject of the verses which follow: '_He that cometh from above is
above all: he that is of the earth is earthly, and speaketh of the
earth: He that cometh from heaven is above all. And what He hath seen
and heard, that He testifieth; and no man receiveth His testimony._'
John had said before, that a man receives nothing but what is given
him from heaven. He does not recal that language, but affirms it anew,
when he says that every man in himself, every child of Adam, though a
living soul, is '_yet of the earth, and speaketh of the earth_.' He is
tied to earthly measures and standards. If he applies even the
faculties which he has derived from heaven to judge of heaven, he
reduces it to the level of earth. But there is One who cometh from
above, One who is above all, One who draws His light from the Fountain
of light, One whose light in us is not a part of our darkness, but a
divine power to scatter it. He testifies of that which He has seen and
heard, of the heavenly things, of the will and nature and purpose of
God. '_And no man receiveth His testimony._' Strange that John should
say that! What he had heard from his disciples was that Jesus was
baptizing, and '_that all men came to Him_.' We are not told that he
doubted their information; we are not told that he had any different
information from more trustworthy sources. And yet he confidently
affirms that His testimony is not received. Why? Because he was not
speaking of what had happened in the few days or weeks since Jesus
came to Jordan to fulfil all righteousness, but of the four thousand
years during which He had come to His own, and His own had received
Him not. That testimony which He had borne as the invisible Word of
God He was bearing still, now that He was made flesh and dwelling
among men. It was mightier in degree; it was not different in kind. It
was still a testimony to the heart, to the inner man, and must be
entertained or rejected there. What, therefore, the Baptist could say
of the past, on the warrant of so long an experience, he could say
surely of the present. The darkness would fight against the light. No
man of himself, without an operation from above, without a higher
baptism than that of water, whether administered by John or by Christ,
would believe that which the Son of God came to tell him.
That this limitation to the expression '_no man_' is involved in the
very nature of the Baptist's discourse, is evident from the next
verse: '_He that hath received His testimony hath set to his seal that
God is true_.' But what need of a limitation? Why should he have made
a large assertion in one sentence, which is to be modified or
contradicted in the next? The answer is contained in the words
themselves: '_He who receives this testimony sets to his seal that God
is true_.' The Christ comes to baptize men with the Spirit, that they
may receive that which of themselves they are both reluctant and
unable to receive. The man who accepts that testimony, confesses his
own reluctance and inability. He believes God to be strong and true,
though he is weak and lying. And his mind becomes stamped with the
impression of God's truth. The Spirit of God raises him above himself
to know Him. It was necessary, then, to make the one assertion in
_its_ breadth and fulness, that the other might not lose any of its
breadth and fulness. It was necessary that no man should suppose
himself capable of entering into the mind and kingdom of God--that all
men might know that God was not deceiving them, when He promised to
bestow that capacity upon them.
'_For_,' John continues, '_He whom God hath sent speaketh the words of
God: for God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto Him_.' He speaks
the words of God. If He proclaimed a doctrine, a theory, a scheme of
the universe--that might be taken in,--if some thought ill of it,
others would embrace it. But He comes speaking the words of
God--revealing the mind of the Eternal Being--showing forth Him who is
truth and who is love. How can we grasp such a manifestation as this?
What have our poor beggarly conceits to do with the idea of a Goodness
without bounds? Let us understand it well, brethren. The Jews rejected
the testimony of Christ, because it was the testimony concerning such
a God as this. The difficulty of all difficulties, whatever we may
fancy, is to believe in _God_, in a _living_ and _true_ God, in a God
who loves His creatures. It is a difficulty which no arguments can
remove; a difficulty which the progress of ages does not diminish in
the least, but makes stronger; a difficulty which is often most
overpowering to the most religious men. The logician says, 'The
understanding is finite; you cannot bring the Infinite within its
range.' The philosopher of advanced civilization says, 'The belief in
God was for little children; science is for us. Physical science does
not reveal God; our worship of humanity dispenses with Him.' Religious
men see evil all about them and within them. They can conceive of a
punisher and avenger of evil; they can conceive that this punisher and
avenger, if he has motive and compensation sufficient, may exempt some
from the destruction which he has decreed for the majority. They
cannot believe in Love.
The logician is right. St. John said, eighteen hundred years ago, that
the Light had shined in the darkness, and the darkness had not
comprehended it. If we think only of our understanding, if we refuse
to believe that there is a Word always illuminating it, we think only
of the darkness, and we may say boldly, 'It can know nothing of God;
we have nothing to do with Him.' The modern philosopher of advanced
civilization is right. We cannot discover God in the world; we cannot
discover in the world anything higher than ourselves. If there is no
Bridegroom of humanity, who witnesses to it of a Father, and binds it
to a Father, we can only worship the world, or worship humanity--that
is to say, worship ourselves. The religious man who exalts evil into
the throne of the universe is right. All the witnesses of the
conscience that there is a God infinitely good,--all the witnesses of
the heart that man is made to be in conformity with that infinite
Good, and can be satisfied with nothing else--are simply mockeries and
delusions, which it is the business of the disciple and minister of
Christ to trample upon, to confute with words taken out of the Bible,
till he has succeeded in making young men profligates and atheists,
old men worldlings and hypocrites,--if there has not been in the world
an only-begotten Son full of grace and truth, who has come forth from
the Father to testify of the Father, and to whom the Father has given
His Spirit without measure, that He might baptize with it all who
receive His testimony, all who believe that God is true, not
false--good, not evil.
To this subject the last and most memorable words of this whole
chapter refer, those in which John the Baptist looks into the promised
land which he was not to enter, in which he winds up the old
dispensation, in which he introduces the new. '_The Father loveth the
Son, and hath given all things into His hand. He that believeth on the
Son of God hath everlasting life: he that believeth not the Son of
God hath not life; but the wrath of God abideth on him._' Henceforth
we shall hear no longer of a prophet discoursing of a Word who has
come to him, and from whom his light and the light of all men has been
derived. We shall find _that_ Word discoursing as a Son concerning a
Father, conversing with a Father, showing forth a Father. We are to
hear how this testimony is received, especially how it is received by
the most religious portion of the Jewish people. We are to learn that,
though their opposition to Jesus took many forms, there was one dark
root of all their hostility and hatred. They could not bear to hear
Christ speak of a Father--of a Father who loved the world. Whenever
they thought of God, a dark image of wrath was present to them; that
wrath abode upon them, settled in them. How was it possible for them,
then, to see in Jesus the perfect image of the Father,--in His wrath
against all baseness and vileness and hypocrisy, the true Divine wrath
which is the expression of the deepest love,--in His sympathy with
publicans and sinners, the self-same love? How was it possible for
them to see in the Son lifted on the cross, the King whom prophets and
holy men had desired, the Son of God in whom dwelt the fulness of the
Father, because the fulness of love, bodily? And, therefore, the wrath
which they had invoked upon all others, and cherished in their own
hearts, came upon them to the uttermost. They rejected their King and
Bridegroom, and all the national and spiritual life which had
proceeded from Him perished inevitably.
I have come back to the subject of which I was speaking last Sunday.
All Christian preaching should return continually to the Cross. It can
never find any other object so central or so glorious. But the death
of Christ and His resurrection are inseparable. I have been preaching
you an Easter sermon to-day. For, if you think of Easter as apostles
and martyrs thought of it, you will think of it as the witness that
the Bridegroom of humanity has presented and justified humanity before
His Father. You will pray for the Spirit of the Father and the Son,
that you, believing in that justification, may rise with Him to
newness of life. And you will join to these prayers another, that each
of us, when the hour comes in which strength and heart fail, may be
able to say with joy, '_I must decrease, that He may increase_.' All
that belongs to my own poor and selfish nature must decay and perish,
that He, my Lord and Saviour, may be exalted,--that I and all His
redeemed may see our own blessedness and glory only and for ever in
Him.
DISCOURSE IX.
THE WATER OF LIFE.
[Lincoln's Inn, Sunday after Easter, March 30, 1856.]
ST. JOHN IV. 10.
_Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift
of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink,
thou wouldst have asked of Him, and He would have given thee
living water._
The dispute between John's disciples and the Jew, of which I spoke
last Sunday, was about purification. Apparently, John's answer to
them, when they came to tell him that Jesus was baptizing, and that
all men were coming to Him, had little reference to this subject.
_Really_ his words threw the greatest light upon it. He did not say
whether the baptism of Jesus had a more purifying effect upon those
who received it than his baptism. But he spoke of another gift which
Jesus, if He was indeed the Son of God, would confer upon those who
believed in Him. '_He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life;
and he that believeth not the Son of God shall not see life._' It was
a mighty thing for men to be purified, to have corruptions removed
from them. But corruption is the consequence of death. Where
corruption is, death must have entered. He who is the source and
spring of life, He who can restore life, must have in Himself the very
principle and power of purification. All instruments of purification
must derive their virtue from Him. He must be _the_ Purifier.