The Godhead of Christ
There seems to be much in our Lord's manner of teaching to justify this question. Men who have sought to win the world to their side, have ever made the most of their pretentions, and those commissioned by God to do a work for Him in the world have never lost an opportunity of publishing the commission under which they acted. But it was not so with our Divine Master. Search diligently through His teaching and preaching, and how rarely do you find Him asserting that He is the Christ. All that He says is pervaded by this truth, but it does not lie prominently on the surface.
I. Why was, it that He did not comply with the request of the Jews? It was because those who made the request, those to whom He spake, could not bear the revelation, because without prepared hearts they were incapable of receiving or believing the truth, because they could not really know the doctrine without seeking to do the will. What is the claim that He would have made upon their faith had He directly answered their enquiry and announced that He was the Christ? He would have demanded that they should have believed Him to be what He was, the very and eternal God; that as the Father is God, so He is God, and this in no secondary or technical sense, but in the fullest and broadest meaning of the words.
II. Whence is it that we so often doubt and hesitate, whether it really is necessary for us to obey all the precepts Christ has left us in the Gospel? Is it not because we have not yet really learnt to know that the Christ whom we worship is God, that He is ever present, marking what we do, and recording all for the day of judgment? Whence is it that the busy occupations of life, buying and selling, and seeking to get gain, are made so absorbing, whilst we feel that calls to devotion and to works of charity can be so easily set aside? It is because in our hearts we regard the world as more solid and substantial than the Gospel, because we have not comprehended what is meant by our communion with Christ as God. Whence is it that men are so overwhelmed by sorrow, loss of friends, shipwreck of fortune, and feeble health? It is because they have not really learnt that it is God's providence which rules the world, that Christ our God orders all things according to the counsels of His will, and that by loving submission all may be made to minister to their everlasting happiness.
R. Gregory, Penny Pulpit,No. 339 (new series).
References: John 10:27. Spurgeon, Sermons,vol. xvii., No. 995; Ibid., Evening by Evening,p. 264; Preacher's Monthly,vol. x., p. 101. Joh 10:27-29. F. D. Maurice, The Gospel of St. John,p. 274.John 10:28. G. Hadley, Thursday Penny Pulpit,vol. xvi., p. 317; Spurgeon, Sermons,vol. xviii., No. 1056; Ibid., Morning by Morning,p. 168; Clergyman's Magazine,vol. ix., p. 279. John 10:29. J. H. Evans, Thursday Penny Pulpit,vol. iv., p. 61; A. Barry, Cheltenham College Sermons,p. 408. John 10:30. Homiletic Quarterly,vol. iv., p. 525; vol. xv., p. 226. John 10:32. W. M. Taylor, Three Hundred Outlines on the New Testament,p. 86. John 10:34-38. Contemporary Pulpit,vol. ix., p. 318. John 10:39-42. A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve,p. 251; Spurgeon, Sermons,vol. xxxii., No. 1924.John 10:41. Homiletic Magazine,vol. ix., p. 33; Parker, The Ark of God,p. 278. John 11:1. Parker, City Temple,vol. iii., p. 169. John 11:3. Spurgeon, Sermons,vol. xxvi., No. 1518; Christian World Pulpit,vol. vi., p. 95; Bishop Thorold, The Yoke of Christ,p. 3.