SERMON XXXVI.

DIVINE TEACHING GRADUAL.

ST. JOHN XVI. 12, 13.

I have many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit when He, the Spirit of Truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth.

A

LL the Gospels appointed for the five Sundays after Easter are taken from that according to St. John. One only, that for the first Sunday, belongs to the period which we are at present commemorating; the forty days which passed between the Resurrection and the Ascension of Jesus Christ. The other four are from discourses of Jesus Christ, pronounced before His Crucifixion; and of these the last three from the one discourse pronounced in the Supper-Room. Historically speaking, these Gospels seem to be, at first sight, out of place; in reading them we go back from Eastertide to a time from which we are separated by the Crucifixion and the Resurrection. But looking to the contents of these Gospels, they are, we must see, strictly appropriate. They are, one and all, preparations for a great departure, and for that which will follow it. They might have been spoken, so far as the contents go-I am, of course, saying nothing of their immediate purpose they might have been spoken, at least in the

main, during the great forty days, just as well as on the eve of the Passion.

"If I

Our Lord has referred to His approaching departure, and, as a consequence, "sorrow had filled the hearts of His disciples.' ."a In order to relieve this, He proceeds to explain to them that His departure was to be, not merely glorious for Himself, but expedient for them. If He remained upon the earth, the Holy Spirit, or Comforter, would not come to them. He Himself, if He remained among them continuously, could not be an object of a purely spiritual apprehension. Where sight is satisfied, there is no sufficient room for faith, and, so far, no need of that Divine and Invisible Friend, Who is the Author of faith in the soul of man. But if Christ departed, then faith would become necessary as well as possible; and our Lord promised to send the Author and Giver of this grace. depart, I will send Him unto you." When He is come, what will He do? First of all, He will achieve a moral victory over the world: "He will reprove the world of sin:" He will convince it gradually of the sin of rejecting Jesus. Next, He will reprove the world "of righteousness:" He will teach it the existence of a new standard of goodThe righteousness of Christ will be seen to be higher than the righteousness of the Pharisees, when the Ascension shall have demonstrated the righteousness of the ascending Christ. Lastly, He will reprove the world "of judgment:" He will teach it that the Crucifixion, which seemed to be the victory of the evil one, was really the day of his judgment and humiliation. "The prince of this world is judged." But what will He teach to the Church, to those Apostles who had believed in and followed our Lord, and who in losing Him appeared to be losing their all? This is the question before us.

ness.

a St. John xvi. 6.

b Ibid. 7.

c Ibid. 8.

d Ibid. II.

This question is partly answered by our Lord's words in the text: "I have many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit when He, the Spirit of Truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth."

Now these words have a doctrinal and a moral significance. They teach us a great truth about Christian doctrine, and a serious duty in the Christian life.

I.

earth, did not This is a point

Here we see, first of all, that our Lord's Own oral teaching, during His sojourn upon the embrace all necessary Christian doctrine. of great importance. It is not unusual to hear people say in the present day: 'I am a Christian in this sense, that I accept, I believe, I obey, only the very words of Christ. They are enough for me: I want no more. The Apostles, St. Paul especially, taught some doctrines which Christ Himself did not teach: I do not wish to be bound by these superadded doctrines. The Church has, in her creeds and elsewhere, used language which I do not find in the words of Christ: I may reject that language. It is enough for me to read, to admire, to feel the beauty of the Sermon on the Mount, and of Christ's other discourses. This is genuine, essential, imperishable Christianity. The rest is superfluous. It may be very well in its way, but it stands on a totally different footing, and there can be no great harm in rejecting it.'

This language has been in substance used at least by one recent writer of some reputation; and it recommends itself because it sounds at first hearing so loyal to our Lord. It seems to give implicit credit to His words all the better from refusing such credit to all others: just as politeness towards a single individual is more remarked and remark

able, when the person who shows it is habitually uncivil to the rest of the world. By a confession of faith such as this, men flatter themselves that they can do two things at once; that they can cut down the Christian creed to very narrow dimensions, and at the same time be all the better Christians, for keeping themselves exclusively to the teaching of Christ. It is a raid upon the claims of faith, conducted in the name of an extraordinary reverence professed for its Object. And yet here to-day, as we listen to our Lord, in His last discourse, we find Him saying as plainly as He can, that He Himself did not undertake to teach in person all that it was necessary for His disciples as Christians to know and believe to their soul's health. For He had many things to tell His disciples which they could not bear at the time; and which He meant to tell them, not in person, but by the agency of Another, the Unseen Comforter, or Holy Spirit, hereafter. After He had left the world, so far as His visible Presence was concerned, He would still speak to men from His invisible home. By His Spirit, He would speak in and through His Apostles. What the Apostles taught would be still His teaching, even although it should go beyond the measure of truth which He had taught Himself. For He had not said all that He meant to say: His work of teaching was to be finished by others. To the Apostles He said, "He that heareth you heareth Me;" and "He that receiveth you receiveth Me: and he that receiveth Me receiveth Him that sent Me."b A man, then, who should think himself a good Christian for keeping only to the words of Christ, would deceive himself. He could not keep only to the words of Christ, if he really keeps to all of them. For among these words is the saying in the text, which states, as clearly as possible, that over and above Christ's actual teaching there were b St. Matt. x. 40.

a St. Luke x. 16.

truths to be taught, in His Name and by His authority; truths which, as coming from Christ, although through others, Christians ought to receive and believe.

There are, indeed, other words of our Lord in this discourse which at first sight appear to be at variance with His saying that He had many things to tell His disciples which they could not now bear. "Henceforth," He said, I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of My Father I have made known unto you.' "a Here there seems to be a contradiction to our Lord's statement that He still had many things to say to His disciples. But there is no contradiction in reality. So far as confidence on His side went, our Lord trusted His disciples unreservedly: they were admitted to His intimate counsels. But there was a want of spiritual comprehension on their side; they were not yet able to receive all that He had to tell them; and He therefore reserved it for a later time. We understand this difference in everyday life. Many a man has a wife, or a sister, with whom he has literally no secrets whatever, although she is not on that account able to share all his intellectual interests. He may be willing to confide everything; but he may know that to enter into an account of all his thoughts at once would be a sheer waste of time; so he defers this fuller disclosure in the hope that it will some day be appreciated. He has already made it in spirit, and intention. He does not trust the less because he does not communicate unintelligible secrets; the time will come, perhaps, when whatever is now unintelligible will be understood.

Our Lord's teaching, then, was completed by that of the Holy Spirit. To see how this was done we need not

a St. John xv. 15.