The Revised Version is here to be preferred, and its 'attain unto'
brings out the idea which the Authorised Version fails to express, that
the text is intended to point to the period at which Christ's provision
of helpful gifts to the growing Church is to cease, when the individuals
composing it have come to their destined unity and maturity in Him. The
three clauses of our text are each introduced by the same preposition,
and there is no reason why in the second and third it should be rendered
'unto' and in the first should be watered down to 'in.'
There are then two regions in which this unity is to be realised. These
are expressed by the great words, 'the unity of the faith and knowledge
of the Son of God.' These words are open to a misunderstanding, as if
they referred to a unity as between faith and knowledge; but it is
obvious to the slightest reflection that what is meant is the unity of
all believers in regard to their faith, and in regard to their
knowledge. It is to be noted that the Apostle has just said that there
is one faith, now he points to the realisation of that oneness as the
very end and goal of all discipline and growth. I suppose that we have
to think here of the manifold and sad differences existing in Christian
men, in regard to the depth and constancy and formative power of their
faith. There are some who have it so strong and vigorous that it is a
vision rather than a faith, a trust, deep and firm and settled, to which
the present is but the fleeting shadow, and the unseen the eternal and
only reality; but, alas! there are others in whom the light of faith
burns feebly and flickers. Nor are these differences the attributes of
different men, but the same man varies in the power of his faith, and we
all of us know what it is to have it sometimes dominant over our whole
selves, and sometimes weak and crushed under the weight of earthly
passions. To-day we may be all flame, to-morrow all ice. Our faith may
seem to us to be strong enough to move mountains, and before an hour is
past we may find it, by experience, to be less than a grain of mustard
seed. 'Action and reaction are always equal and contrary,' and that law
is as true in reference to our present spiritual life as it is true in
regard to physical objects. We have, then, the encouragement of such a
word as that of our text for looking forward to and straining towards
the reversal of these sad alterations in a fixed and continuous faith
which should grasp the whole Christ and should always hold Him. There
may still be diversities and degrees, but each should have his measure
always full. 'Thy Sun shall no more go down'; there will no longer be
the contrast between the flashing waters of a flood-tide and the dreary
mud-banks disclosed at low water. We shall stand at different points,
but the faces of all will be turned to Him who is the Light of all, and
every face will shine with the likeness of His, when we see Him as He
is.
But our text points us to another form of unity--the oneness of the
knowledge of the Son of God.
The Apostle uses an emphatic term which is very familiar on his lips to
designate this knowledge. It means not a mere intellectual apprehension,
but a profound and vital acquaintance, dependent indeed upon faith, and
realised in experience. It is the knowledge for which Paul was ready to
'count all things but loss' that he might know Jesus, and winning which
he would count himself to 'have apprehended.' The unity in this deep and
blessed knowledge has nothing to do with identity of opinion on the
points which have separated Christians. It is not to be sought by
outward unanimity, nor by aggregation in external communities. The
Apostle's great thought is made small and the truth of it is falsified
when it is over-hastily embodied in institutions. It has been sought in
a uniformity which resembles unity as much as a bundle of faggots, all
cut to the same length, and tied together with a rope, resemble the tree
from which they were chopped, waving in the wind and living one life to
the tips of its furthest branches. Men have made out of the Apostle's
divine vision of a unity in the faith and knowledge of the Son of God 'a
staunch and solid piece of framework as any January could freeze
together,' and few things have stood more in the way of the realisation
of his glowing anticipations than the formation of the great
Corporation, imposing from its bulk and antiquity, to part from which
was branded as breaking the unity of the spirit.
Paul gives no clear definition here of the time when the one body of
Christian believers should have attained to the unity of the faith and
knowledge of the Son of God, and the question may not have presented
itself to him. It may appear that in view of the immediate context he
regards the goal as one to be reached in our present life, or it may be
that he is thinking rather of the Future, when the Master 'should bring
together every joint and member and mould them into an immortal feature
of loveliness and perfection.' But the time at which this great ideal
should be attained is altogether apart from the obligation pressing upon
us all, at all times, to work towards it. Whensoever it is reached it
will only be by our drawing 'nearer, day by day, each to his brethren,
all to God,' or rather, each to God and so all to his brethren. Take
twenty points in a great circle and let each be advanced by one half of
its distance to the centre, how much nearer will each be to each? Christ
is our unity, not dogmas, not polities, not rituals: our oneness is a
oneness of life. We need for our centre no tower with a top reaching to
heaven, we have a living Lord who is with us, and in Him, we being many,
are one.