Quiet Talks on John's Gospel Part 18

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 circ.u.mstance. 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 bra.s.s 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 bra.s.s vine. Listen to Him, "I am the _true_ vine, and My Father the vine-gardener." Here is the ill.u.s.tration 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 cl.u.s.ters 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 pa.s.sing 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 d.a.m.ned. 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 G.o.d. 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 G.o.d 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 gla.s.s 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 pa.s.sing 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 pa.s.sive 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 pet.i.tion 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 Pa.s.sover 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 cla.s.ses 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.