EXPLANATORY AND CRITICAL NOTES
John 12:20-36. Certain Greeks coming with a desire to see Him gave our Lord an opportunity of pointing to His atoning work as the hope of salvation for all men, i.e. the world.
John 12:20. Greeks.—Ἑλληνες, not simply Grecian Jews (Acts 6:1). They were most likely “proselytes of the Gate,” as they had come to Jerusalem to keep the feast.
John 12:21. The same came therefore to Philip, etc.—Why therefore? There were many Greeks in the region of Decapolis; and as Philip’s name is Greek, his family may have been connected, at least by trade, with the foreign residents.
John 12:22. Andrew.—His is also a Greek name; and he is mentioned before in conjunction with Philip (John 1:44; John 6:7-8).
John 12:23. Jesus answered, etc.—This answer is apparently the substance of what our Lord said to the Greeks and disciples alike. The hour is come, etc.—When the old prophecy should begin to be fulfilled (Isaiah 60:3) which told of the ingathering of the Gentiles (John 10:16).
John 12:24-26. These verses show how the glorification of the Son of man is accomplished. It is through death in the case of Christ that the fuller life is reached. And as the disciple must follow his Master, the same great result in their case is attained through self-sacrifice and self-surrender. The similarity of the teaching in St. John and the Synoptists on this point will be seen by a comparison of Matthew 10:37-39, etc., with this passage.
John 12:27. Now is my soul troubled, etc.—Soul, ψυχή, i.e. life (John 12:25), the seat of the natural feelings and emotions (Matthew 11:20-25; Matthew 26:38, etc.). Can it be wondered at that the Prince of Life should feel it a terrible ordeal to submit to death, even for a time? Even His human nature, “holy, harmless, undefiled,” must have shrunk more from this ordeal than we do who feel “we were not made to die.” What shall I say? etc.—Are the words “Father, save Me,” etc., a prayer like that uttered in Gethsemane? or are they to be read interrogatively, like the opening clause of the sentence? The following sentence seems decidedly to favour the latter view. As Godet says, “It is a hypothetical prayer.” It was the cry of nature, if nature had suffered Jesus to speak. In the words which follow He expresses what really hindered Him from addressing such a request to God: it would be a negation of all that He had yet done and suffered.
John 12:28. Father, glorify, etc.—This is the prayer Christ really uttered, and to it a speedy answer was given—a voice from heaven, etc.
John 12:29. The people therefore, etc.—This is the record of a veracious witness. One who sought to deceive would not have recorded these doubts. But why was the voice not distinct to all? Perhaps just because, as in the spiritual sphere, those who are prepared simply to receive the truth, joyfully accept it when it is presented to them; whilst others who have no desire for it will find reasons for rejecting it. An angel.—See Acts 23:8-9. Those who thus interpreted the sound took a higher view, and one in accordance with Hebrew tradition as well as with Old Testament fact (Galatians 3:19; Hebrews 2:2).
John 12:30. Jesus answered, etc.—Our Lord attests the fact of the divine utterance, and shows that it came for the purpose of strengthening the faith of those who heard it.
John 12:31. Now is a judgment, etc.—Not ἡ κρίσις. Now is the time coming, is at hand, when “the thoughts of many hearts shall be revealed” (Luke 2:34). The prince of this world.—See John 14:30; John 16:11; Ephesians 2:2; Ephesians 6:12. This “was the regular rabbinic title for Satan, whom they regarded as the ruler of the Gentiles, the Jews not being included in his kingdom” (Watkins). And as the Greeks were listening to Jesus all would understand that He here meant the beginning of the Messianic reign (Genesis 3:15, etc.).
John 12:32. See John 1:29.
John 12:34. The people answered, etc.—Christ had claimed to be Messiah (John 12:31); how then did He speak of being lifted up out of the earth (ἐκ τῆς γῆς)? Did not the law, at least as interpreted by the Jewish teachers, declare that Christ would abide for ever (see Daniel 7:14; Isaiah 2:2-5; Isaiah 9:7, etc.; Psalms 110.)? Who is this Son of man who is to be lifted up out of the earth? Surely He cannot be the Son of man of whom the prophets speak?
John 12:35. Walk while, etc.—Better “Walk as (ὡς with the majority of great MSS.) ye have the light.” Lest darkness overtake you, come on you, seize on you suddenly (1 Thessalonians 5:4).
John 12:36. That ye may become sons of light.— Ephesians 5:8; 1 Thessalonians 5:5. These things spake … and was hidden from them.—These solemn words are the Saviour’s closing words in His public ministry. He departed, because He was rejected. He was hidden from them. They had chosen the darkness rather than the light. It was most likely to Bethany that He went.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— John 12:20-36
John 12:20-23. The desire to see Jesus.—But a few days before the incident here recorded Jesus had come from His retirement in Ephraim to Bethany, and had been just welcomed with shouts of hosanna as the spiritual King of Israel. The last period of probation had been given to the Jewish rulers and the unbelieving section of the people. The end of it still found them hardened against the Saviour, and prepared to take more violent measures against Him when they saw that, in spite of all their threatenings (John 9:22; John 11:57), the people were being more and more attracted to Jesus (John 12:17-19). But in the midst of so much to grieve there was something also to gladden the heart of Jesus.
I. Certain Greeks desire to see Jesus.—
1. There were many pious Gentiles who had become “proselytes of the gate,” men like Cornelius and the chamberlain of Queen Candace (Acts 8:26; Acts 10:1). No doubt there were not a few such men at this time scattered up and down Palestine, and they might come in even greater numbers from the region of Decapolis.
2. These men, doubtless, came from that region, and recognised Philip and Andrew as fellow-countrymen, i.e. as coming from the neighbourhood of their home. They came first to Philip. He then consulted with his brother Andrew; for had not Jesus said He was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel (Matthew 15:24)? and had He not commanded the disciples not to go into the way of the Gentiles (Matthew 10:5)?
3. But our Lord was already looking forward to the moment when the restriction laid on His ministry would be removed, and the Gentiles should be welcomed as members of His flock (John 10:16). Therefore this coming of these Greeks to Jesus was to Him a matter of joy, as in the case of the Samaritans (John 4:35-46). He was beginning to see the wider fruits of His mission—to see of the travail of His soul, etc. The prophetic word which He fulfilled at the beginning of His ministry (Matthew 4:12-17) was receiving its wider fulfilment. The Gentiles were “coming to His light.” The first braird of the coming harvest (John 4:35) was visible. And no doubt His soul rejoiced, as seeing these Greeks standing with His disciples, He said, “The hour is come,” etc.
4. The sequel of the incident, so far as the Greeks are concerned, is not stated; for John is bent on the great lessons our Lord founded on the incident. But Jesus does not “send empty away” those who come desiring to see and know Him. From His words in John 12:23; John 12:31-32, we may gather that they did not thus earnestly seek Him in vain.
II. What awakened this desire?—
1. Those men as proselytes of the gate were no doubt pious, “devout” men (Acts 10:2), men more truly religious than many of the chosen race. They had heard of Jesus, had seen perhaps the striking scene in the temple (Matthew 21:12-17), and were convinced that here was One who could fill their deepest longings.
2. The beauty of the Saviour’s character, the earnestness and lofty nature of His teaching, and the greatness of His claim—to be the Sent of God—all this, no doubt, impelled them to seek to see Jesus, and to know more of Him.
III. The desire is still expressed by many.—
1. The Greeks came first to the disciples. “It is through the mediation … of the Church of Christ that the heathen attain the personal, saving society of Christ.”
2. And there are many to-day, devout men, not only from among the heathen, but from among those in our modern world, who are “seeking the Lord, if haply they might feel after Him, and find Him” (Acts 17:27), but around whom the mists and darkness of error have been creeping.
3. What responsibility, therefore, rests on the Church—on the disciples of Christ—to show Him in all the beauty of His character and the saving power of His risen life to all men! And how unapostolic, therefore, is the wrangling over trifles that prevails, while all over the world millions are perishing for lack of knowledge!
IV. The Church must herself seek to see Jesus ever more clearly if she is to lead others to see Him.—
1. Christ should ever be the beginning, middle, and end of the Church’s message—Christ as the prophet of His people, who has “the words of eternal life” (John 6:68), as the great high priest of His people, by whose high-priestly, sacrificial action (John 12:24; John 12:32) salvation is made possible for men, and as the King and Head of His Church, who will establish in triumph His universal and eternal dominion (John 18:36-37).
2. And in order that the Church may more fully and clearly deliver this message, she must have close communion with her living Head. To the office-bearers and members of the Church Christ must become a living reality. They must not be content with the mere knowledge of doctrines about Christ, though this is needful also. Faith in Him as a living, personal Redeemer, and fellowship with Him through the Spirit, are the essential needs of the Church. Without these all else is vain. Numbers, sanctities of worship, learning, and even outward activity will not serve the end for which they exist.
3. But the presence of the Spirit of Christ in the heart of His people, leading to burning zeal, tender pity, ardent love for those for whom Christ died—for a perishing world—would more and more attract the heathen—make straight the way for the erring, dispel doubts, arouse the indifferent, till men everywhere should come to the Church, saying, We too would see Jesus.
John 12:24-25. Through death to life.—Our Lord had been moved deeply by the coming of “certain Greeks” to see Him. He recognised in their advent the earliest tokens of that abundant harvest yet to be reaped. But ere this could be He must depart. His rejection by Israel must be completed. He must die, and in His death become the world’s life. “Verily, verily, I say unto you,” etc. In this familiar image our Lord shows forth the deep meaning of His death and resurrection as the hope of His people, also as their encouragement and example in enduring.
I. The death of Christ is the hope of His people.—
1. The corn of wheat is cast into the ground by the sower, and dies. It dies as a grain of wheat, but is not destroyed. There is a germ of life in the grain which dissolution cannot harm. But the seed must die if that germ is to be liberated and to become fruitful.
2. If it be not cast into the ground it abideth, alone; it cannot accomplish its destined purpose. It must fall into the ground; its wrappings must fall off, its substance be transformed; in short, it must perish as a grain of wheat in order that it may spring up and bring forth fruit.
3. So was it with the Saviour. Whilst He remained on earth, despised and rejected despite His heavenly teaching and wondrous works, He abode practically alone. Only a few faithful ones gathered around Him. The world did not understand Him. Neither, indeed, did those who faithfully clung to Him understand the full significance of His mission. It was necessary that He should die, ere the full meaning of His redemptive work should be known through the teaching of the Spirit, and men should learn that a way of eternal safety through time to eternity had been opened up through the cross.
4. Had Jesus not gone on to Calvary to die for men’s sins, where had been their hope of pardon and reconciliation with God? They would still have pursued the weary quest of the waiting ages, and still the cry had gone up, “Wherewith shall I come before the Lord?” etc., and the plaint, “Oh that I knew where I might find Him!” (Job 23:3). But on the cross the cry of humanity was answered when Jesus said, “It is finished,” and died for men—“the Lamb of God, that beareth away the sin of the world.”
II. The result of Christ’s death is a great spiritual harvest.—
1. The seed-corn cast into the earth dies as a seed-corn. The external wrappings and envelopes are thrown aside. But the unseen germ, hidden safely away, remains not only unharmed, but is helped by the decay of those coverings. Then the living portion of the plant begins to swell and push its way upward through the earth, till the warmer sunshine and refreshing rains of spring draw it from its earthly hiding-place, and it peeps above ground, an earnest of harvests yet to be reaped.
2. So was it with our Lord. He died, and was laid in the tomb; and there, in some fashion we understand not, the body of His humiliation became the body of His glory, and He arose conqueror of death and the grave for His people, the firstfruits of them that sleep in Him—a glorious harvest of humanity rescued from death and the grave unto life eternal.
3. This shall be the final result in that harvest which is the end of the world (Matthew 13:39). But now through the power of His risen life—the germ of life eternal in the hearts of those united to Him by faith—the fields of earth are ripening to the harvest.
4. When He died there were but few who followed Him. But how fruitful was that death in the coming days! See how the green blades sprang above the ground all around—how the timid who had hidden themselves came into the light of day, as if some spiritual spring had called them forth! See how in response to Pentecostal showers the hope and promise of the universal harvest germinated in every quarter! And see how in spite of blight and storm and heat of persecution it is spreading worldwide! The idols bow the head and fall never to rise in every quarter of the world, and millions upon millions rise to show forth Christ’s glory.
5. At some far-distant age the first seed-corn was sown in the world, when as yet its fields lay wild and waste. But now every land has its harvest. And thus it has been in the history of Christ’s Church. “There shall be an handful of corn in the earth upon the tops of the mountains: the fruit thereof shall be like Lebanon” (Psalms 72:16). It was this Jesus foresaw when the Greeks were led to Him by Andrew and Philip. “The hour had come that the Son of man should be glorified.”
III. Christ’s spiritual seed grows in His likeness.—
1. His people die with Him unto sin, and live with Him unto righteousness. “He that loveth his life,” etc., who keeps and hoards the external wrappings of the soul’s true life, shall remain unfruitful. “And he that hateth,” etc.—he that subordinates the lower and earthly to the higher, inner, spiritual life—“shall keep it unto life eternal.” All that was best even in the lower shall through this abnegation of it be incorporated and intensified in the growth of the higher. “The cross must be our pattern as well as our trust.”
2. And when believers are thus united with Christ in the likeness of His death (Romans 6:5), they grow up in the likeness of His spiritual life. In every faithful heart Christ lives anew. “I have been crucified with Christ: and it is no longer I that live, but Christ that liveth in me” (Galatians 2:20).
3. The Christian grows up in spiritual freedom. “Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath dominion over Him no more.… Even so reckon ye yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin,” etc. (Romans 6:9; Romans 6:11). The believer is no more the slave of sin unto death, but is now the happy servant of Christ, the spiritual son of the heavenly Father, whom He will honour (John 12:26).
4. The believer grows up in Christ’s spiritual beauty; each advance in growth sees some added grace of character. “He shall grow as the lily,” “he shall be changed into the same image” (2 Corinthians 3:18), until finally “he shall be like Him, seeing Him as He is.”
5. And like the Saviour’s self-sacrifice, the Christian’s life of self-denial will be fruitful for good in the world. “The blood of the martyrs has been the seed of the Church.” And the self-sacrificing lives of His true followers best lead men to living faith in Him.
Learn.—Trust in His cross; imitation of His example.
John 12:26. Christ our example in spiritual service.—Christ is our example in the service of God; and as He was faithful as the servant of Jehovah, and in all things did His Father’s will, so are we to follow Him. “If any man serve Me, let him follow Me.… If any man serve Me, him will the Father honour.” The type of service which He demands from us is of the same sort as that which He Himself rendered—a willing, trustful, complete obedience in the whole life, and in all its activity. It is to be feared that many of His professed followers fail to rise to this conception of the Christian life; and sometimes popular presentations of the gospel tend to perpetuate this fatal error. “Get your soul saved” is the burden of much of modern evangelical preaching. No doubt this is the chief thing, so far as men personally are concerned; for “except a man be born anew,” etc. (John 3:3). But men are not to be left ever in the condition of spiritual children, and fed on milk (Hebrews 5:12-13): they are to be nourished and built up for the higher life of service. Much of the “spiritual awakening” of recent years has simply been an “awakening” of infantile Christians into a higher life of service. And every agency with such a tendency is to be hailed with joy. What indeed is one great end of revelation—especially New Testament revelation—but to build up believers and fit them for this life of service? For what end was the Spirit sent forth, the means of grace established, the stated ministry of the Church set apart? And our Christianity is weak and ineffective in so far as it does not rise toward this goal. And as Christ said to His Father, “I have glorified Thee on the earth by finishing the work,” etc. (John 17:4), so His disciples are to press toward this chief end of their being, in His service. Those who would serve Christ faithfully must, following His example as the servant of Jehovah—
I. Hear His voice.—
1. Beyond question, ere they can begin to obey Him as His servants, they must hear His voice spiritually quickening them. That is what Christ meant when He said, “The hour is coming, and now is,” etc. (John 5:25).
2. But having heard that voice speaking to them with quickening power, they must prove that they have done so by obeying His commands, following His instruction. They must have their “ear open morning by morning” (Isaiah 50:4) to catch the accents of His voice in that divine word which His Spirit has inspired, and in those spiritual impulses to forsake the evil and follow the good; and by entreating Him in earnest prayer to quicken their spiritual ear, so that they may more readily hear and understand.
3. And may it not be that we oftentimes are troubled and perplexed, our way enwrapped in mist, because we are not in this following the example and command of Him who is the light of the world, and who says of His true followers that they hear and know His voice? Further—
II. In the activity of their lives, their speech and action, they serve Him.—
1. To hear, with the true disciple and servant of Christ, is to obey. It was evident this was so in the case of Christ; and so it must be in greater or less degree with His servants. They must not act like the son in the parable, who in answer to his father’s command, “Son, go work,” etc., replied, “I go, sir: and went not” (Matthew 21:28; Matthew 21:30). And yet are there not too many of this class in the Christian Church? By their professed unity in the Church, openly declared at the table of communion, not a few say, “I go,” in answer to God’s command, “Go work to-day,” etc. “You will search the vineyard in vain for too many of them; some get no nearer than a peep across the hedge,” whilst others deliberately turn their backs on it, and spend their energies in the fields of the world.
2. But Christ’s true followers “do not so learn” Him (Ephesians 4:20). When they give heed to His word and the teaching of His Spirit, then the “Spirit of the Father” speaketh in them (Matthew 10:20), and they use the gift of speech as the Son did for the divine glory. They earnestly endeavour to let “no corrupt communication proceed out of their mouths,” but “that which is good” (Ephesians 4:29), and to let their speech be “always with grace, seasoned with salt” (Colossians 4:6).
3. In the work of life, and its every action, Christ’s true servants seek to imitate Him in the divine service. How eagerly did Jesus declare and show it to be His meat to do the will of the Father, and to finish His work! And was not His word to His followers a clear call to imitate Him in this, “We must work the works,” etc. (John 9:4)? And is not this one of His most precious promises to the disciples that they should continue His work (John 14:12)? “If ye keep My commandments, ye shall abide in My love, even as I have kept My Father’s commandments, and abide in His love” (John 15:10). “Ye are My friends,” etc.; “Henceforth I call you not servants,” etc. (John 15:14-15). Just as there was unity of purpose between the Father and Christ in all Christ’s activity on earth, so Jesus said there would be the same unity between Him and His disciples, and therefore will they be His friends and brethren in the Father; for “He shall make known unto them all things which He heard from His Father.” Therefore will the true disciple of Christ seek in all things ever to do His will and finish His work.
III. Christ’s disciples follow Him and serve Him in the path of suffering.—
1. “Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto My sorrow,” said the prophet in Christ’s name, as He foretold His life of suffering here below. And how did His apostles rejoice “because they were counted worthy to suffer for that name” (Acts 5:41)! In Christian lands to-day men have not thus to suffer, although they still have to do so among the heathen. To-day even in many quarters of the world men have to endure tribulations, suffering wrongfully, for the name of Christ and in His service.
2. But we also have our afflictions. The night sometimes darkens around us; the stroke sometimes falls heavily; so that in the darkness, weariness, pain, the spirit is nigh overwhelmed, and from the lips bursts out involuntarily the cry, “Hath God forgotten to be gracious? hath He in anger shut up His tender mercies?” (Psalms 77).
3. It is in such hours that the example of our Lord and Master is fitted to cheer and encourage. As He in the hour of deepest darkness, in which He cried “Eli, Eli,” etc. (Matthew 27:46), lost not His trust in His Father; so we surely in our hours of sorrow, pain, and perplexity may well trust and fear not, if we are consciously following the Saviour. Did He not in love endure for our sakes? and will He then put on us more than we can bear? Does not “the light affliction which is but for a moment”? etc. (2 Corinthians 4:17).
4. For just as the cross of Jesus, the acme of suffering and sorrow, has become the emblem of His glory; so to those who endure, “the proof of their faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, [shall] be found unto praise,” etc. (1 Peter 1:7).
John 12:25-26. The spirit of true service.—It is a spirit of joyful willingness and self-surrender. Not alone at the beginning, when the soul has just been quickened to the higher life, is the true servant to say, “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?” But all along the course of life, even to the end. And during its course there will be manifested:—
I. A growing sense of trust in God and our Redeemer.—
1. The remembrance of the divine love and favour, and that God has in Christ granted the new spiritual life, will lead to the assurance that with Him also He will give all things (Romans 8.).
2. This confidence will increase as life goes on; each day will disclose new mercies, and the divine promises will grow brighter and more assured.
II. A continued confidence that our material needs will be met.—
1. “Whoever serveth as a soldier at his own charges?” (1 Corinthians 9:7), asked the apostle when writing to the Corinthians of the duty of upholding the ministry. But at the same time he showed that he did not depend on men for such help, but on God.
2. So every true disciple learns confidently to trust God for all needed help to fit him for and sustain him in his work. God will not send us on a warfare at our own charges. True servants of Christ, who are setting their affections on things above, are ever sustained and strengthened in their arduous endeavour.
III. A constant consecration of all life’s duties and work.—
1. Each day of our life has its special work and duty, its own perplexities and sorrows. But these are not unknown or indifferent to Christ.
2. Nay, it is just in these, as in all things, that we are to serve Him. We are not to wait for some special position here, some outstanding work, or for the future life, in order to render to our God and Saviour our willing service. The future belongs to God. We are to serve joyfully and trustfully as the Saviour did here, by dedicating to Him the duties and labours of the present days.
John 12:27-33. Jesus’ prayer and the answering voice from heaven.—The thrill of joyful exultation in the mind and heart of Jesus, as He sees in prospect the travail of His soul, is quickly succeeded by the thought of the awful pathway He must tread ere the mighty work is accomplished. This prayer is the prelude of Gethsemane. It is a definite step toward that mysterious conflict, with its “strong crying and tears,” its “sweat as of great drops of blood,” and its utter self-renunciation.
I. Jesus troubled.—
1. The man Christ Jesus, the Prince of life, recoiled from the awful strife before Him. We can in some measure understand how He, the perfect One, would shrink from death even more than we do.
2. Then there was doubtless the thought of His people, the lost sheep of the house of Israel, who in rejecting Him should be rejected (John 12:48), whose rulers were even then engaged in dark plots against Him.
3. And there was also pressing on Him that load of the world’s guilt which He was to bear away, that cup which He was to drain to the bitter dregs, and which was soon to be given Him to drink—the cup of sorrow, pain, and horror, which culminated in that hour of darkness and terrible sense of aloneness on Calvary. Our great High Priest was not untouched with the feeling of our infirmities; and it was He, who was “in all points tempted like we are,” who was thus troubled in prospect of the cross and “all its shame and woe.”
II. The direction in which Jesus turned for relief when troubled.—
1. As the faithful and obedient incarnate Son He turned toward His Father. Jesus prayed; for in trouble and sorrow He was as we are (Hebrews 2:17). He did not conceal from Himself the terrible nature of the coming conflict, and looked to the Father for strength and comfort.
2. The first cry is a perplexed question, showing the conflict in Jesus’ breast—a question as to the possibility of the cross being lifted from Him, of the hour being averted. “Shall I say, Save Me,” etc.
3. But in a moment this thought is put aside. It is seen to be incompatible with the purpose for which He had come unhesitatingly to face this hour. The passion to be entered upon is indeed the only way in which the divine, eternal purpose He had undertaken to carry out could be fulfilled. Only thus can the world be redeemed and the “prince of this world be cast out.” Therefore Christ casts away all thought of the possibility of being saved from the hour before Him, and in willing submission resolves to carry out the eternal, divine purpose: “For this cause came I to this hour.”
4. And now the loftiest flight of prayer is reached by the Saviour: “Father, glorify Thy name.” To this height of filial submission only the divine Son, and unfallen spirits, and those who in Christ become children of God can truly attain. There could be no diviner prayer, as there can be no higher purpose than the divine glory. “What Thou willest, what Thou desirest, O Father, this is My purpose, though the way to the performance of that will leads by the cross and through the grave.”
5. The conflict is now over, the dark cloud withdraws itself, and the Redeemer is further strengthened to go forward to victory.
III. The audible answer to Christ’s prayer.—
1. “Then came a voice from heaven,” etc. This voice is the third audible utterance from heaven during the sojourn of Jesus on earth—the first at His baptism, the second on Tabor, the third here. All proclaim the glory of the Son, but this utterance is to a wider circle. The time has come when the glory of the divine Name will be manifested through the Son in strange and unexpected manner. Hitherto it had been seen in mighty works and divine teaching; now it would be seen—strange contrast—on the cross.
2. And the answer has been verified. Men glory in the cross as the highest exhibition of divine mercy and love. The essential character of the Eternal shines in it most conspicuously. In it the way of salvation and eternal blessedness for humanity is opened up; for with the cross are bound up the resurrection of the Saviour and His ascension to the heavenly places, whence He rules His Church, and where He reigns till all foes of His kingdom shall be finally vanquished.
3. And in every step of progress made by His kingdom here, in every soul quickened from death to life, in every citadel of the kingdom of darkness overthrown—in short, in every new region of earth made glad with the fruit of righteousness—all is “through Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God” (Philippians 1:11).
IV. The double purpose of this audible answer to Christ’s prayer.—
1. It was doubtless intended to strengthen the Saviour and comfort Him in view of what lay before Him, as afterward for the same purpose an angel appeared to Him in Gethsemane (Luke 22:43).
2. And that it did cheer and comfort the Saviour we may gather from the firm declaration of His assured expectation of final victory. That assurance was attained in His own willing submission to the Father’s will and desire for the Father’s glory. It was not necessary for Him that the Father should audibly give the answer to this prayer (John 11:42). Yet can we doubt that this voice from heaven would cheer and rejoice the ?Song of Song of Solomon 3. We seem to detect an echo of this rejoicing in the triumphant word, “Now is a judgment of this world,” etc. The cross would discriminate. Around it would be gathered the children of light; against it would be marshalled the powers of darkness in vain. “For the prince of this world” would be vanquished (Colossians 2:14-15). And Christ is drawing all men unto Him (2 Corinthians 5:20) by the power of His love—not compelling, not driving—men of every tribe and nation. He brings a salvation free and full for all who will not resist the drawings of His mighty love.
4. But the voice came not only, not chiefly, because of Jesus, but for the sake of those who heard it, especially those who believed, so that the remembrance of this heavenly testimony might strengthen their faith. Indeed, was it not they alone who heard the voice speaking, who heard the words, whilst to others the voice was simply a sound like that of thunder? The unbelieving were not expecting that there would be any divine answer; and when it came audibly, it passed before they caught its import. Others whose spiritual nature was in unison with God both heard and understood, and were confirmed in their faith, as the voice on Tabor confirmed the faith of the disciples (2 Peter 1:17-18).
Lessons.—
1. Jesus is our example in prayer: in time of trouble the same blessed source of strength and comfort is open to ns.
2. He is our example in submission to the divine will: acquiescence in the Father’s will is the true source of inward peace and strength to endure.
3. He is our example, as the divine Son, in desiring the highest good—the divine glory.
John 12:34-36. Believe in the Light, walk in the Light.—In John 12:23 Jesus had spoken of Himself as the Son of man who should be glorified. The Jews understood clearly enough this reference to the Messiah. But when He spoke of dying and being lifted up out of the earth, the people were perplexed; for was it not a commonplace of their teachers that Christ should “abide for ever”? Did not the prophet foresee the Son of man coming to take His kingdom, which was to be an everlasting kingdom (Daniel 7:14)? Who is this Son of man? An important question truly, but one which Jesus had often answered. All His life, His teaching, His activity, had been a fulfilment of prophecy concerning Him. The Light had been shining, but their eyes were blinded. Now was their opportunity—the last. In brief space it would pass away, and then the darkness would fall, dense and terrible, on the race of Israel.
I. The traveller to eternity needs light for his journey, and must advance toward his goal while it is day.—
1. The need of spiritual light is admitted by men as a whole; and all the religious and moral systems which men have built up have been designed to light the darksome way through time.
2. And God has given light to men (John 8:12). It remains, therefore, that they should advance by that light whilst they have it. The Jews were blinding themselves to the light by seeking to reconcile Christ’s teaching with their preconceived interpretations of law and prophecy, in place of simply looking to the Saviour, and opening their minds to receive the truth as plainly revealed in Him.
3. So also many now concern themselves with matters of secondary importance in religion, its mere externals, its forms and modes, whilst they miss the true meaning, and thus the comfort and guidance which the gospel is designed and fitted to bring them.
4. Others still, whilst professing to know the “Son of man,” altogether fail to walk in His light, and on their way linger entranced by the occupations and pleasures of time, until the solemn night of dissolution descends in awful swiftness, and snatches from them their opportunities for ever.
II. The way of escape from the power and fear of darkness is to become children of light.—
1. This men attain to by believing in the Light. They thus become transformed into the likeness of Christ. They imitate Him, reflect His character, and escape evermore from the darkness of sin, ignorance, error, and above all from that spiritual blindness which is unconscious of the presence of light.
2. This is a call to receive Christ into our hearts by faith, to follow Him in the activities of life, and in the display of acts of Christian love; and thus we shall abide in the light, and there will be none occasion of stumbling in us (1 John 2:10).
3. With this blessed assurance the public ministry of Jesus closed. Truly He was the Light of men. How great was His patience with the unbelieving! how infinite His compassion! and how terrible was the doom of those who through unbelief had blinded their eyes! And how loud is the warning voice which speaks from these words; and how glorious the prospect of being “light in the Lord” through believing!
HOMILETIC NOTES
John 12:21. “We would see Jesus.”—These words were uttered, probably, in the Court of the Gentiles, as He passed from the Court of the Women, which, as the most public place for Jewish assemblies, was the frequent scene of His teaching. On the previous day, the Court of the Gentiles had been cleansed from the traffic and merchandise which had been customary in it, and the temple had been declared to be “a house of prayer for all nations.” The Court of the Gentiles was divided from the inner square of the temple by a stone fence, bearing upon pillars, placed at regular distances, the following words in Greek and Latin: “No alien must pass within the fence round the temple and the court. If any one be caught doing so, he must blame himself for the death that will follow.” This prohibition was known before, from Josephus (Ant., xv. 11, 5); but in our own day one of the very slabs, bearing the exact words, has been discovered by M. Ganneau during the excavations of the Palestine Exploration Fund (comp. Acts 22:28-29, and especially Mark 11:17). The events and the words of these days must have brought strange thoughts to the minds of proselytes, men who were worshippers of the one God by personal conviction, and not because of the faith of their ancestors; and with heart filled with wonder as to what these things meant, half grasping, it may be, the truth that this middle wall of partition should be broken down, they ask for a special interview with Jesus (comp. Ephesians 2:12 et seq.).—H. W. Watkins.
John 12:27. “Now is My soul troubled.”—Note the punctuation of this verse, for everything depends upon that: “Now is My soul troubled; shall I say, Father, save Me from this hour?” Put the mark of interrogation after the word “hour”; then you have the whole meaning,—“Now is My soul troubled; shall I say, Father, save Me from this hour?” Then He answers Himself: “For this cause came I into the world; for this cause came I unto this hour”: I will not say, Save Me from this hour; I will say, Father, glorify Thy name. Then there came a voice from heaven, saying, “I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again. The people therefore, that stood by and heard it, said that it thundered: others said, An angel spake to Him.” Thus it always is: there are always two explanations of events; the vulgar will call the explanation thunder, and the spiritually refined will call it an angel.—Dr. Joseph Parker.
John 12:28-29. The voice from, heaven.—Every man hears in God’s voice what he is fit to hear. Obviously there was an objective something, an audible sound. To the deafest there was a vague impression of some majestic noise from heaven, which said nothing, but was grand and meaningless as a thunder-clap. Others, a little more susceptible, caught something like articulate words, but discerned no significance, though they felt their sweetness and dignity, and so thought them an angel’s voice. “Ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God.” We can dull our ears till they will not even recognise God’s voice as thunder, and, if it sounds meaningless to us, it is our own fault.—Dr. A. Maclaren.
John 12:31-33. Christ victorious through death.—If He thought of Himself only as a martyr, one among many, it was gross exaggeration to say that His death headed the black roll of the world’s sins. On that hypothesis of His person, there have been many other deaths quite as criminal. Only the full-toned view of who and what the victim was warrants such a construction of the guilt of His slaying as is here. Still more extravagant, on the supposition that Jesus is simply the best of men and teachers, is that other triumphant cry of victory over the defeated and cast-out “prince of this world.” Only the full-toned view of the death of Christ as the sacrifice for the world’s sins can warrant such a construction of its power to redeem the world from the tyranny of that usurper, and to dislodge him from his fortress. He and all his hosts hold their own, undisturbed by teachers and martyrs, but they flee before the power of the cross of the Son of God, “who taketh away the sin of the world.” He “made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it.” The judgment and defeat are immediate results of the cross, but the last issue, which Jesus stays Himself by beholding, is one that begins, indeed, contemporaneously with these, but stretches on through all time, and blesses each coming generation. Of course, the “lifting up” here is primarily a designation of the crucifixion (John 3:14); but that is contemplated in connection with the other lifting up from the earth, in His ascension and session at the right hand of God. To draw men to Himself is the work of Christ till the end of the world. His magnet is the cross. That drawing does not imply universal yielding to itself, for there may be resistance to it; but for evermore there stream out from the cross powers which lay hold on hearts, and sweetly and mightily grapple them to Jesus. He Himself, and nothing less, is the centre; and what conquers men to be His, is His death.—Idem.
ILLUSTRATIONS
John 12:20. The promise of harvest.—What about the first blade that pierces the dull earth and stands up in green beauty: is it a favourite? No, it is better; it is a harbinger; it says, “I have only come first; they are all coming.” It is not elected in the sense of other green blades having been blighted underground: it is elected in some sense of precedence; it outran the others; they all started together, but this little one came up first, elected to preach the harvest, called, not to singularity, but to expressiveness, to algebraic suggestiveness, saying, This is the indication that you must presently get your sickles ready, for we are all alive and all unfolding and all coming; to-morrow the land will be green, and the day following it will be yellow with corn. The blade is only first, because there are more to follow. It would be neither first nor last if there were no succession; it would stand alone, it would be without an arithmetical indication at all, except there be some word that signifies loneliness, some figure that typifies isolation; it is either first or last, because there are more.—Dr. Joseph Parker.
John 12:25. All for Christ.—The glory of a Christian is Christ in heaven, and Christ’s glory is His Church on earth. The believer is a true child of God, who, clothed with Christ’s righteousness, walks in holy fear and willing obedience before his Father. Do not wonder, then, that there meet you in the Church of Christ such a one as Polycarp, who, when threatened with the stake if he would not curse Christ and offer to the gods, replied, “Eighty and six years have I served my Saviour, and He hath done me nothing but good; how could I curse my Lord and King, who hath saved me?”—as an Ignatius, who thus wrote from his Roman prison to his Church: “Let fire and conflict, breaking of the bones and tearing asunder of the members, nay, let the burning of the whole body and all the malice of the devil come upon me, if I may have but Christ with me. I seek Him who died for us; I desire Him who rose again for us. My earthly desires are crucified; the fire of God’s love burns within me with unquenchable glow—it calls, Come to the Father”;—as a Chrysostom, who, after a laborious life for the sake of the confession of the truth, and when dying in exile breathed out his soul with the words, “God be praised for all”;—as a John Huss, who, from the midst of the flames of martyrdom in Constance, thus prayed: “Lord Christ, I will bear this terrible death with joy for the Gospel’s sake, but I pray Thee forgive my foes”;—as a Theodore Beza, who, standing face to face with the ruler of France, thus spoke: “The Church of Christ is indeed like a lamb dumb before her shearers, but she is also like an anvil on which the strongest hammer may he shattered”;—finally, as a Dr. Martin Luther, who, at the imperial diet at Worms before Emperor and Court, in the most decisive moment of his life, finished his heroic confession in these words: “Here I stand—I cannot do otherwise; God help me. Amen.” It is indeed Christ who, in all these standard-bearers of His holy kingdom, radiates forth His power and His life, so that they have overcome through the blood of the Lamb and through the word of their testimony, “and they loved not their lives unto the death” (Revelation 12:11).—Translated from F. Arndt.
John 12:27. Prayer, a way of deliverance from trouble.—The more we give place to our own thoughts and plans, the more we seek through our own power some opening on this land or on that, so much the more dark will our way appear, our dispeace become greater, our mind more perplexed, and the way of escape more doubtful. Many in this way have fallen into such tortures of anxiety, and even despair, that they have been stupefied, deprived of thought, and thus led to take some foolish step, through their own folly sinking deeper and deeper into misfortune. Often indeed such people have thus lost their reason. It is impossible in our own strength to overcome soul trouble. Take up the task as you will—flee loneliness, amuse yourselves, seek to dull feeling, fly into the face of danger, turn your attention to other things, resolve firmly, I shall no longer give way to these thoughts, I shall resist them, put them aside, root them out, let it cost what it will—it will be of no avail. The heavy thoughts will return again, will follow you into society, will rob you of your nightly slumber. They will become only the more powerful the more you seek with hatred to put them down. One thing only can help you—prayer to the Lord. Prayer enables us to recover ourselves, brings peace, gives assurance, confidence, hope. Prayer opens up the true way of escape and deliverance from all trouble and danger.—Idem.
John 12:35. The use of opportunity.—Have we been decided and active in using our opportunities for spiritual improvement and doing good? You remember perhaps the legend of mediæval times, of the young maiden, who, one evening as twilight was falling, rowed out in a skiff on a lake which lay before her father’s castle. As the dreamy twilight descended she fell asleep; and while she slept, the string of her beautiful pearl necklace broke, and one by one the precious gems dropped into the still waters of the lake, till when she woke she found that her gems were lost for ever. This legend is symbolic of many a human life. How many of us have allowed ourselves to slip easily along while we slumbered, not aware or unheeding that golden opportunities were slipping away for ever as the moments sped! or, while we have dreamily hesitated, they have escaped from our grasp! Let us then seek for greater grace and strength, that we may be decided in our Christian calling, that there may be no shirking of duty, no shamefacedness, no wavering; but that we may be able always to stand “strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.”