1
JOHN
CHAPTER VII
THE GUILELESS
SPIRIT REALISING THROUGH OBEDIENCE THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD AS THE MEANS OF BEING
AND ABIDING IN GOD.
"And hereby we do know that we know him, if
we keep his commandments. He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his
commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoso keepeth his
word, in him verily is the love of God perfected : hereby know we that we are
in him."*
-1 JOHN ii. 3-5.
THIS is a more literal explanation of the divine
fellowship, considered as a fellowship of light, than has been given before.
The light which is the atmosphere of the fellowship, or the medium of vision
and sympathy through which it is realised, is the light of knowledge- the light
of the knowledge of God. For the fellowship is intelligent as well as holy -
intelligent that it may be holy. But of what sort is that knowledge? And how is
it to be got hold of and made sure of? These are the questions with which John
now proceeds to deal. And in the verses that form our text he introduces them
very emphatically, as questions personally and practically affecting us, with
reference to our claim and calling to be "walkers in the light."
* A doubt may be suggested as to what Divine Person is
meant here when the third personal pronoun is used. Is it the Son or the
Father? One might at first be inclined to say it is the Son ; for it is he who
is spoken of in the immediately preceding verses (1, 2). But throughout this
whole passage John is speaking of God the Father as the object of knowledge and
fellowship. It is with God in Christ that he summons us to have communion. The
Son is brought in separately (i- 7, ii. 2), only to show how his ministry of
sacrifice, intercession, and propitiation, by providing for our not sinning, or
not sinning beyond the hope of repentance and revival, makes such communion
possible. That end being served, the discourse returns to its original channel.
On this account, as well as on grammatical grounds, I lean to the opinion of
those who think that God the Father is the Divine Person referred to. And I do
so the rather because in the verse that follows (6), - "He that saith he
abideth in him, ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked" - there is a
remarkable distinction of pronouns. It does not appear in cur translation; and
indeed the English tongue scarcely admits of its appearing. But it is clear in
the finer idiom of the original Greek. The "he" in the last clause is different
from the "him" in the first; which again agrees with the "him" and the "his" in
the verses now before us (3-5). Surely this marks a change. The person
indicated in the end of the sixth verse is not the same as the person indicated
in the beginning of that verse, and in those that precede it. But the person
indicated in the end of the sixth verse is clearly the Lord Jesus. It must
therefore be God the Father who is indicated in the verses of our
text.
For, first, he would have us to "know that we know God" (ver. 3).
He raises the question of the trustworthiness of our knowledge of God. It is as
if you asked me about one of my familiars, whose name I am fond of using, whose
opinions I am apt to quote, whose patronage I rather boast of - "But do you
know that you know him? Are you sure that you understand him?" The abrupt
question takes me somewhat aback. I think I know him. But your doubt startles
me. I must inquire and see. Again, secondly, John would have us to "know that
we are in God" (ver. 5). This suggests still more hesitancy. I have had the
idea that I am in him, in the sense of being united to him in the bonds of
faith, fellowship, and friendship. But you raise misgivings. Do I indeed know
that I am in him? The two inquiries may be treated as one; requiring the same
examination and admitting of the same proof. There comes in, however, thirdly,
an intermediate thought: "whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of
God perfected" (ver. 5). This expression denotes a fact accomplished. The word
"is perfected" points to something done; and the word "verily" or "truly" marks
the reality and thoroughness of what has been done and of the doing of it. Now
it is love that is here said to be thus "perfected;" "the love of God." This
can scarcely mean here the grace or affection of love; as the love of God to
us, or our love to God ; but rather the fellowship of love between him and us.
"In the keeping of Ms word" that fellowship of love, so far as we are
concerned, finds its completion, or "is perfected." Most fitly does this
thought come in between the other two.
I - To know God;
II. To have his
love verily and indeed perfected in us ;
III. To be ourselves in him; that
is our thrice holy standing, our thrice blessed privilege, in his Son Jesus
Christ. If we would make sure of it, in our experience, it must be by "keeping
his commandments," - "keeping His word."
I. There were those in John's day who affected to
"know God" very deeply and intimately, in a very subtle and transcendental way.
They laid great stress on thus knowing God; so much so that they took or got
the name of knowing ones, or Gnostics. All about the essence of God, or his
mysterious manner of being, they knew. All his attributes, and inward actings,
and outward emanations, they knew. The forthgoings from everlasting of all his
thoughts and volitions they knew so familiarly, and by so sublime an insight,
that they could give to every one of them a local habitation and a name. They
knew how heaven swarmed with these divine effluences or outcomings, as it were,
of God's inner nature ; to which they ascribed a sort of dreamy personality;
associating them into a spiritual or ghostly hierarchy, in whose ranks they
dared to place the very Son of the Highest himself. So they, after their own
fashion, knew God. And through this knowledge of him, they professed to aspire
to a participation of his godhead; their souls or spiritual essences being
themselves effluences and emanations of his essence ; and being therefore,
along with all other such effluences or emanations, ultimately embraced in the
Deity of which they formed part. So they "knew God."
But how did they
"know that they knew him"? Was it because they "kept his commandments"? Nay,
their very boast was that they knew God so well as to be raised far above that
commonplace keeping of the commandments which might do for the uninitiated, but
for which they had neither time nor taste. Their knowledge of God was too
mystical and ethereal - too much of a rhapsody or a rapture - to admit of its
being tested in so plain and practical a way. It was a small affair for them to
"keep the commandments," and a small affair also to break them. They were
occupied with higher matters. Their real life was in a higher sphere. They
cared for nothing but "knowing God."
John denounces strongly their
impious pretence, "He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments,
is a liar, and the truth is not in him." The language is more forcible than
ever. He not merely "lies"(i. 6); but "is a liar." Not merely does he "not do
the truth," but in that man "the truth is not." To affect any knowledge of God
that is not to be itself known and ascertained by the keeping of his
commandments, - to dream of knowing God otherwise than in the way of keeping
his commandments, - is to be false to the heart's core.
For, in fact,
the question comes to be, Do I know God as a mere abstraction, about whose
nature I may speculate? Or do I know him personally as a man knows his friend?
This last is the only kind of knowledge of God which John can recognise and
own. It is what he starts with; his fundamental position; his postulate or
axiom. God is known through or in the incarnate Word of life, as he was heard,
looked upon, handled, by those who lived familiarly with Jesus. "Whosoever hath
seen him hath seen the Father." "No man knoweth the Father but the Son, and he
to whom the Son shall reveal him." God is known in Christ. And he is known in
Christ as personally interested in me, and personally dealing with me; kind to
me; compassionate to me; waiting to be gracious to me; opening his arms to
embrace me; seeing me afar off; meeting me; falling upon iny neck and kissing
me. When the Spirit opens my eyes, it is thus that I know God. And how may I
know that I do really know him thus? How otherwise than by my keeping his
commandments? For this knowledge is intensely practical; not theoretic and
speculative at all; but only practical. I know God in the giving of his Son to
me and for me; in his giving him to be my friend and brother; my surety and
redeemer; giving him to die for me on the accursed tree. With the new mind and
the new heart created in me by his own Spirit, I know God now in Christ, as
washing me from all my guilt; taking me home; making me his child and heir. I
know him by the fatherly benignity of the look he bends on me, and the fatherly
warmth of the grasp in which he holds me. And I may assure myself that in any
tolerable measure I thus know him, only if I keep his commandments.
Let
me bless his name for that simple practical test. I am not sent to any Gnostic
school to seek a certificate of scholarship from any of these knowing ones. I
have not to graduate in any of their colleges. I need not aspire to any mystic
insight, or visionary rapture, or sublime beatific ecstasy. A lowlier path by
far is mine.
I am ignorant of many things ; ignorant of much even that
it concerns me to learn of God and of his wondrous love to me ; far, very far,
from knowing him as I ought. But do I so know him as to make conscience of
keeping his commandments - keeping them as I did not care to keep them once? Is
my proud will subdued and my independent spirit broken? Moved and melted by
what I know of God do I as if instinctively cry "Lord, what wouldst thou have
me to do?" Then, to me, this word is indeed a precious word in season; "hereby
we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments" (vs.
3).
II. For while "he that saith, I
know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in
him" (ver. 4); "whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God
perfected " (ver. 5).
The change of expression here is surely meant to
be significant. "His commandments," which may be many and various, are reduced
to what is one and simple - "his word." The meaning is doubtless in substance
the same; but there is a shade of difference. This "keeping of his word" is, as
it were, the concentrated and condensed spirit and essence of the "keeping of
his commandments." The thought suggested is not so much that of the things
commanded, as of the command itself. It is not commandments, but God
commanding; not speech, but God speaking; his word. The knowing ones
stigmatised as liars pretended to know God, not as speaking but simply as
being; not by communication from him, but by insight into him; not by his word,
but by their own wisdom. But you know him by his word. And that word of his,
when you keep it, perfects the good understanding, the covenant of love,
between him and you.
For, indeed, it must always be by word that love is
truly perfected between intelligent parties; by the plighting of troth; by the
interchange of pledge or promise expressed or understood ; by word given and
kept. How is it, when I know a friend, that his love is truly perfected in me?
He gives me his word, and I keep it. I have nothing else for it but his word;
his bare and naked word. I need nothing else; I desire nothing else. I keep
that word of his; I keep it firm and fast. And as he is true to me, and I am
true to him, I find that mere word of his, so kept by me, a sufficient warrant
and assurance of all being right, and there being nothing now between us but
true and perfect love, a true and perfect state of amity and peace.
When
God is the party concerned, the keeping of his word on my part may well suffice
for his love being thus truly perfected in me. For that word of his, the sum
now to me of all his commandments, is his one simple assurance of good will in
his Son. It is his word of reconciliation in Christ. It is, one might say, "for
in the word is life" - Christ himself, the reconciler. It is "God in Christ
reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing unto them their trespasses."
It is a word of very complete and comprehensive sweep : embracing all on God's
part that is sovereign, efficacious, and authoritative, in the gift of his
grace and in the obligation of his law ; and all on our part that is humble,
submissive, and obedient, in our trusting acceptance of the gift and cordial
compliance with the obligation. It is a word making over to us freely from God
all that is his; for "he that spared not his own Son, but gave him up for us
all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?" It is a word
winning over to God freely from us, ourselves, and all that is ours; for "we
are not our own but bought with a price," and so bound to "glorify God in our
bodies and in our spirits, which are his." So full, complete, perfect, is this
word on both sides. Only let it be kept. Kept on God's side it cannot fail to
be. Let it be kept on ours. God is faithful to keep it to us. Let us be
faithful to keep it to God. Kept by us, as it is sure to be kept by him, it
does indeed ratify a perfect treaty of love.
III. And thus "we know that we are in him " (ver.
5). This, as it would seem, is the crown and consummation of all; first, to be
in him ; and, secondly, to know that we are in him.
First, to be in him
; in a God whom we know, and between whom and us there is a real and perfect
covenant of peace and love - that must be an attainment worth while for us to
realise ; worth while for us to know or be sure that we realise.
To be
in him! This cannot mean to be in God in any mystical sense of absorption ; as
if we were to lose our distinct personality, and be swallowed up in the ocean
of the divine essence. All such ideas are precluded by the clear and
unequivocal recognition of personal dealings, as between one intelligent being
and another, implied in our knowing God, and in his love being truly perfected
in us. But short of that wild and impious dream, it is not easy to urge too far
the almost literal significancy of the expression - "we are in him." Certainly
it is something very different from merely being in what is his ; as in his
church, his house, his family, his kingdom. It is being in himself. What, on
his part, that implies is among "the things which eye hath not seen, nor ear
heard, nor heart conceived, but which God hath prepared for them that love
him." Even to them it cannot be described beforehand. It transcends all that in
imagination they could previously grasp. It is so "prepared for them that love
him" that only in loving him can they apprehend and prove it. To be in him!
What a covering of them with his wings - what a wrapping of them round with his
own divine perfections - what an identifying of them with himself, of their
interests with his, their triumph with his, their joy with his ; what an
identifying of himself with them, his grace with their guilt, his strength with
their weakness, his glory with their salvation! To be in him! What a
surrounding of them on all sides as with eyes innumerable and arms invincible ;
clothing them, as it were, with his own omniscience, his own omnipotence! Truly
"as the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about his
people." They are in him. "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most
High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty."
But it is rather
what on our part this phrase implies, that we are here led to consider. What
insight! What sympathy! What entering into his rest! What entering into his
working too! What a fellowship of light!
We are in him! We are in his
mind. He lets us into his mind. If I have a friend whom I know, and between
whom and me there is a truly perfected love, I long to enter into his mind; to
be partaker with him in all his mental movements and exercises, as he reads,
and meditates, and studies; as he lays his plans and carries them into effect.
I would be so in him that there should be, as it were, but one mind between us.
0 to be thus in God, of one mind with God!
We are in his heart. He lets
us into his heart, - that great heart of the everlasting Father so warmly and
widely opened in his Son Jesus Christ. To be in him, so that that heart of his
shall draw to itself my heart, and the beating of the two shall, as it were, be
in unison, and the throbbing of the two shall be blended in one - and the
Father's deep earnestness shall be mine; and the Father's holy wrath shall be
mine; - and the Father's pity shall be mine; and the Father's persuasive voice
shall be mine; as I plead with my fellows - "Turn ye, turn ye; why will ye
die?" What a thought! To be thus in God through our knowing him, and through
his love being perfected in us! Surely that is about the highest reach of our
fellowship with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.
And therefore,
secondly, to know that we are thus in God cannot but be a matter of much
concern. Who, on such a point, would run the risk of self-deception - nay, of
being found "a liar, not having the truth in him"? To have some tolerable
confidence, tolerably well grounded, that my being in God is a reality ; that
surely is desirable if it can be attained. And how am I to seek it ? How am I
at once to aim at being in him, more and more thoroughly and unequivocally, and
also to aim at verifying more and more satisfactorily and surely my being in
him? For these two aims must go together; they are one.
Keep his word,
is the reply. Is that then all? I may be tempted to ask. Am I to look for no
clearer token, no more decisive mark and proof of my being in him? Is there to
be no evidence in my experience, no sign from heaven, no voice, no vision, no
lapse or sliding into my soul, I know not how, of some sensible assurance I
know not what, to attest my being in him? Nay, to have such confirmation might
only mislead me. I might content myself with the sign, instead of striving to
realise more and more what it signifies. Better, safer, is it, that I should be
directed to a humbler method, the "keeping of his word." But is that enough?
Yes, for in the "keeping of bis word" "his love is truly perfected" in us who
thereby "know him."
Let us keep his word in that view of its power and
virtue ; as the seal and bond of a perfect understanding and a perfect state of
peace between him and us. Let us cultivate what is the vital element of all
intelligent and loving fellowship between him and us - the spirit which prompts
the cry, "Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth." In that spirit let us "keep
His commandments;" the commandments in which his word is broken up in detail;
the commandments which assure us of his love to us; the commandments which
exercise our love to him. Let us keep the commandments of his word - which, in
our keeping of them, assure us of his love to us, "Ho, every one that
thirsteth, come ye to the waters," "come now and let us reason together," "this
is my beloved Son, hear him." Let us keep also the commandments of his word,
which, in our keeping of them, exercise our love to him - "Humble yourselves
under the mighty hand of God," "risen with Christ, seek the things which are
above," "come out and be separate, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will
be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters." So keeping his
word and his commandments, we more and more completely apprehend his love as
truly perfected in us. "We more and more clearly, brightly, hopefully,
ascertain that we do know God and are in God, in some measure as he knows God
and is in God, who
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while on earth could truly say, "The Father knoweth me, and I
know the Father ;" " Thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee."
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