Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXIMaclaren, Alexander
Religion
Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI
Maclaren, Alexander
Bible. John -- Commentaries
I must trouble you with just a word or two of remark as to the language
of our text. Note the personality, designation, and office of this new
Teacher. 'He,' not '_it_,' He, is the Spirit of truth whose
characteristic and weapon is truth. 'He will guide you'--suggesting a
loving hand put out to lead; suggesting the graciousness, the
gentleness, the gradualness of the teaching. 'Into all truth '--that is
no promise of omniscience, but it is the assurance of gradual and
growing acquaintance with the spiritual and moral truth which is
revealed, such as may be fitly paralleled by the metaphor of men
passing into some broad land, of which there is much still to be
possessed and explored. Not to-day, nor to-morrow, will all the truth
belong to those whom the Spirit guides; but if they are true to His
guidance, 'to-morrow shall be as this day, and much more abundant,' and
the land will all be traversed at the last. 'He shall not speak of
Himself, but whatsoever He shall hear that shall He speak.' Mark the
parallel between the relation of the Spirit-Teacher to Jesus, and the
relation of Jesus to the Father. Of Him, too, it is said by Himself,
'All things whatsoever I have heard of the Father I have declared unto
you.' The mark of Satan is, 'He speaketh of his own'; the mark of the
divine Teacher is, 'He speaketh not of Himself, but whatsoever things,'
in all their variety, in their continuity, in their completeness, 'He
shall hear,'--where? yonder in the depths of the Godhead--'whatsoever
things He shall hear there,' He shall show to you, and especially, 'He
will show you the things that are to come.' These Apostles were living
in a revolutionary time. Men's hearts were 'failing them for fear of
the things that were coming on the earth.' Step by step they would be
taught the evolving glory of that kingdom which they were to be the
instruments in founding; and step by step there would be spread out
before them the vision of the future and all the wonder that should be,
the world that was to come, the new constitution which Christ was to
establish.
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