Volume II Part 4 (1/2)

But there is a deeper meaning in that word than simply the possession of true thoughts concerning the divine nature. We know G.o.d as we know one another; because G.o.d is a Person, as we are persons, and the only way to know persons is through familiar acquaintance and sympathy. So the world which turns away from Christ has no acquaintance with G.o.d.

This is a surface fact. Our Lord goes on to show what lies below it.

II. His second thought here is--the world's ignorance in the face of Christ's light is worse than ignorance; it is sin.

Mark how He speaks: 'If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin: but now they have no cloke for their sin.' And then again: 'If I had not done amongst them the works which none other men did, they had not had sin.' So then He puts before us two forms of His manifestation of the divine nature, by His words and His works. Of these two He puts His words foremost, as being a deeper and more precious and brilliant revelation of what G.o.d is than are His miracles.

The latter are subordinate, they come as a second source of illumination. Men who will not see the beauty and listen to the truth that lie in His word may perchance be led by His deed. But the word towers in its nature high above the work, and the miracle to the word is but like the picture in the child's book to the text, fit for feeble eyes and infantile judgments, but containing far less of the revelation of G.o.d than the sacred words which He speaks. First the words, next the miracles.

But notice, too, how decisively, and yet simply and humbly and sorrowfully, our Lord here makes a claim which, on the lips of any but Himself, would have been mere madness of presumption. Think of any of us saying that our words made all the difference between innocent ignorance and criminality! Think of any of us saying that to listen to us, and not be persuaded, was the sin of sins! Think of any of us pointing to our actions and saying, In these G.o.d is so manifest that not to see Him augurs wickedness, and is condemnation! And yet Jesus Christ says all this. And, what is more wonderful, n.o.body wonders that He says it, and the world believes that He is saying the truth when He says it.

How does that come? There is only one answer; only one. His words were the illuminating manifestation of G.o.d, and His deeds were the plain and unambiguous operation of the divine hand then and there, only because He Himself was divine, and in Him 'G.o.d was manifested in the flesh.'

But pa.s.sing from that, notice how our Lord here declares that in comparison with the sin of not listening to His words, and being taught by His manifestation, all other sins dwindle into nothing. 'If I had not spoken, they had not had sin.' That does not mean, of course, that these men would have been clear of all moral delinquency; it does not mean that there would not have been amongst them crimes against their own consciences, crimes against the law written on their own hearts, crimes against the law of revelation. There were liars, impure men, selfish men, and men committing all the ordinary forms of human transgression amongst them. And yet, says Christ, black and bespattered as these natures are, they are white in comparison with the blackness of the man who, looking into His face, sees nothing there that he should desire. Beside the mountain belching out its sulphurous flame the little pimple of a molehill is nought. And so, says Christ, heaven heads the count of sins with this--unbelief in Me.

Ah, brother, as light grows responsibility grows, and this is the misery of all illumination that comes through Jesus Christ, that where it does not draw a man into His sweet love, and fill him with the knowledge of G.o.d which is eternal life, it darkens his nature and aggravates his condemnation, and lays a heavier burden upon his soul.

The truth that the measure of light is the measure of guilt has many aspects. It turns a face of alleviation to the dark places of the earth; but just in the measure that it lightens the condemnation of the heathen, it adds weight to the condemnation of you men and women who are bathed in the light of Christianity, and all your days have had it streaming in upon you. The measure of the guilt is the brightness of the light. No shadows are so black as those which the intense suns.h.i.+ne of the tropics casts. And you and I live in the very tropical regions of divine revelation, and 'if we turn away from Him that spoke on earth and speaketh from heaven, of how much sorer punishment, think you, shall we be thought worthy' than those who live away out in the glimmering twilight of an unevangelised paganism, or who stood by the side of Jesus Christ when they had only His earthly life to teach them?

III. The ignorance which is sin is the manifestation of hatred.

Our Lord has sorrowfully contemplated the not knowing G.o.d, which in the blaze of His light can only come from wilful closing of the eyes, and is therefore the very sin of sins. But that, sad as it is, is not all which has to be said about that blindness of unbelief in Him. It indicates a rooted alienation of heart and mind and will from G.o.d, and is, in fact, the manifestation of an unconscious but real hatred. It is an awful saying, and one which the lips 'into which grace was poured'

could not p.r.o.nounce without a sigh. But it is our wisdom to listen to what it was His mercy to say.

Observe our Lord's identification of Himself with the Father, so as that the feelings with which men regard Him are, _ipso facto_, the feelings with which they regard the Father G.o.d. 'He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father.' 'He that hath loved Me hath loved the Father.'

'He that hath hated Me hath hated the Father.' An ugly word--a word that a great many of us think far too severe and harsh to be applied to men who simply are indifferent to the divine love. Some say, 'I am conscious of no hatred. I do not pretend to be a Christian, but I do not hate G.o.d. Take the ordinary run of people round about us in the world; if you say G.o.d is not in all their thoughts, I agree with you; but if you say that they _hate_ G.o.d, I do not believe it.'

Well, what do you think the fact that men go through their days and weeks and months and years, and have not G.o.d in all their thoughts, indicates as to the central feeling of their hearts towards G.o.d?

Granted that there is not actual antagonism, because there is no thought at all, do you think it would be possible for a man who loved G.o.d to go on for a twelvemonth and never think of, or care to please, or desire to be near, the object that he loved? And inasmuch as, deep down at the bottom of our moral being, there is no such thing possible as indifference and a perfect equipoise in reference to G.o.d, it is clear enough, I think, that--although the word must not be pressed as if it meant conscious and active antagonism,--where there is no love there is hate.

If a man does not love G.o.d as He is revealed to him in Jesus Christ, he neither cares to please Him nor to think about Him, nor does he order his life in obedience to His commands. And if it be true that obedience is the very life-breath of love, disobedience or non-obedience is the manifestation of antagonism, and antagonism towards G.o.d is the same thing as hate.

Dear friends, I want some of my hearers to-day who have never honestly asked themselves the question of what their relation to G.o.d is, to go down into the deep places of their hearts and test themselves by this simple inquiry: 'Do I do anything to please Him? Do I try to serve Him?

Is it a joy to me to be near Him? Is the thought of Him a delight, like a fountain in the desert or the cool shadow of a great rock in the blazing wilderness? Do I turn to Him as my Home, my Friend, my All? If I do not, am I not deceiving myself by fancying that I stand neutral?'

There is no neutrality in a man's relation to G.o.d. It is one thing or other. 'Ye cannot serve G.o.d and Mammon.' 'The friends.h.i.+p of the world is enmity against G.o.d.'

IV. And now, lastly, note how our Lord here touches the deep thought that this ignorance, which is sin, and is more properly named hatred, is utterly irrational and causeless.

'All this will they do that it might be fulfilled which is written in their law, They hated Me without a cause.' One hears sighing through these words the Master's meek wonder that His love should be so met, and that the requital which He receives at men's hands, for such an unexampled and lavish outpouring of it, should be such a carelessness, reposing upon a hidden basis of such a rooted alienation.

'Without a cause'; yes! that suggests the deep thought that the most mysterious and irrational thing in men's whole history and experience is the way in which they recompense G.o.d in Christ for what He has done for them. 'Be astonished, O ye heavens! and wonder, O ye earth!' said one of the old prophets; the mystery of mysteries, which can give no account of itself to satisfy reason, which has no apology, excuse, or vindication, is just that when G.o.d loves me I do not love Him back again; and that when Christ pours out the whole fullness of His heart upon me, nay dull and obstinate heart gives back so little to Him who has given me so much.

'Without a cause.' Think of that Cross; think, as every poor creature on earth has a right to think, that he and she individually were in the mind and heart of the Saviour when He suffered and died, and then think of what we have brought Him for it. De we not stand ashamed at-if I might use so trivial a word,--the absurdity as well as at the criminality of our requital? Causeless love on the one side, occasioned by nothing but itself, and causeless indifference on the other, occasioned by nothing but itself, are the two powers that meet in this mystery-men's rejection of the infinite love of G.o.d.

My friend, come away from the unreasonable people, come away from the men who can give no account of their att.i.tude. Come away from those who pay benefits by carelessness, and a Love that died by an indifference that will not cast an eye upon that miracle of mercy, and let His love kindle the answering flame in your hearts. Then you will know G.o.d as only they who love Christ know Him, and in the sweetness of a mutual bond will lose the misery of self, and escape the deepening condemnation of those who see Christ on the Cross and do not care for the sight, nor learn by it to know the infinite tenderness and holiness of the Father that sent Him.

OUR ALLY

'But when the Comforter Is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, He shall testify of Me: And ye also shall bear witness, because ye have been with Me from the beginning.'--JOHN xv. 26, 27.