I. In these words our Lord foretells the gathering out and knitting "together of His mystical body, which is the Church. From the time of His ascension into heaven, and the shedding abroad of the Holy Ghost, He has been working unseen upon the spirits of mankind; He has been drawing together the living stones of His spiritual house. He has been working out this great all-comprehending aim the perfection of His Church. There has been not a change, but a growth; as the springing or unfolding of a stately tree; a growth, not only of bulk, but of beauty, ever opening itself to the drawings and invitations of a gentle sky; so His mystical body has grown from childhood to youth and manhood, throwing out new powers of illuminated reason and of regenerate will, ever advancing unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.
II. Note the way by which He, in His Church, draws men one by one unto Himself. He is in the midst of His Church, and we are ranged round Him in many measures of approach, as if we were in the many courts or precincts which surround His eternal throne. All of you has He been drawing; and if you look back you can see the links in the chain which has drawn you until now. A word, a thought, a chance, a sickness, a sorrow, a desolation of heart in the daytime, or a dream of the past in the night season, alone, or in the throng of men, in your chamber, or at the altar, something pierced deep into your soul and there abode. And then he has led you, little by little, with gentle steps, hiding the full length of the way that you must tread, lest you should start aside in fear and faint from weariness. Your place, your crown, your ministry, in His unseen kingdom, are all marked out for you. He is drawing you towards your everlasting portion. At that day when he shall have brought unto Mount Zion the last of His redeemed flock, then shall we know what He is now doing with us under a veil and in silence. We shall no more follow Him unseen, but behold Him face to face.
H. E. Manning, Sermons,vol. i., p. 274.
The Cross of Christ the Measure of the World
I. It is the death of the Eternal Word, of God made flesh, which is our great lesson how to think and how to speak of this world. His Cross has put its due value upon everything which we see, upon all fortunes, all advantages, all ranks, all dignities, all pleasures, upon the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life. It has set a price upon the excitements, the rivalries, the hopes, the fears, the desires, the efforts, the triumphs of mortal man. It has given a meaning to the various shifting courses, the trials, the temptations, the sufferings of his earthly state. It has brought together and made consistent all that seemed discordant and aimless. It has taught us how to live, how to use this world, what to expect, what to desire, what to hope. It is the tone into which all the strains of this world's music are ultimately to be resolved.
II. It may be objected: But the world seems made for the enjoyment of just such a being as man, and man is put into it. He has the capacity of enjoyment, and the world supplies the means. How natural this, what a simple as well as pleasant philosophy, yet how different from that of the Cross. (1) Whatever force this objection may have, surely it is merely a repetition of that which Eve felt and Satan urged in Eden; for did not the woman see that the forbidden tree was "good for food," and a tree to be desired? (2) It is but a superficial view of things to say that this life is made for pleasure and happiness. To those who look under the surface it tells a very different tale. The doctrine of the Cross does but teach the very same lesson which this world teaches to those who live long in it, who have much experience in it, who know it. It may be granted, then, that the doctrine of the Cross is not on the surface of the world. The surface of things is bright only, and the Cross is sorrowful; it is a hidden doctrine, it lies under a veil; it at first sight startles us, and we are tempted to revolt from it. And yet it is a true doctrine, for truth is not on the surface of things, but in the depths. Let us not trust the world, let us not give our hearts to it; let us not begin with it. Let us begin with faith, let us begin with Christ. They alone are able truly to enjoy this world who begin with the world unseen. They alone can truly feast who have first fasted; they alone are able to use the world who have learned not to abuse it; they alone inherit it who take it as a shadow of the world to come, and who for that world to come relinquish it.
J. H. Newman, Parochial and Plain Sermons,vol. vi., p. 83.
How is it that Christ, lifted upon the Cross, draws all men unto Him?
Many answers might be given, and all true, to the question now proposed. Two must suffice.
I. The attraction of the Cross is first an attraction of admiration. Who has not felt his heart burn within him as he read of a life given for another? Now when Christ, lifted up from the earth, draws all men to Him, it is in part by the help of admiration. When a man has to learn for the first time what Christ is; when, either from defective instruction or a sceptical temper, he has to lay for himself the foundations of belief, to answer afresh the great question "What shall I think of Christ?" the first instrument of conviction will be commonly that feeling of admiration which must be roused by the study of the character, and most of all the character as manifested on the Cross.
II. Christ did not rest, nor would have us rest, in that superficial sort of relation to Him, which contents many writers and thinkers of our age; a relation which has in it only the satisfaction to be derived from a lovely scene or a beautiful countenance, which a man may just look upon and go his way and forget. If you examine the context, you will see that all points another way. It is not as the magnet of a moral beauty that Christ chiefly regards the attractiveness of His Cross. Not admiration, but faith is that which He asks of us. The object of that "lifting up," which was to be thus all-powerful to attract, was no mere exhibition of an admirable longsuffering; no representation, acted on some magnificent stage, of a superhuman excellence of doing, feeling, suffering; not this, but the very work itself which the Cross effected, the bearing of the sins of the world, the making reconciliation for iniquity, the bringing in of an everlasting righteousness. The reason why we feel differently in kind as well as in degree, towards Christ lifted up from the earth, is to be sought not in the admiration, but in the faith. Though admiration may draw us towards Him, it is faith alone which draws us to Him.
C. J. Vaughan, Temple Sermons,p. 23.
Universality and Individuality of Christ's Gospel
I. Universality is one attribute of Christ's wholesome words, "I will draw all men unto Me." A universality (1) of intention, (2) of invitation, (3) of potency, (4) of kind. Christ draws to Himself men of all characters and men of all histories.
II. Individuality is another attribute of Christ's wholesome words. The race can only be evangelised through the members. To excuse repentance, to excuse faith, to excuse holiness is, in other words, to excuse happiness, to excuse salvation, to excuse heaven. The Gospel kingdom when it comes, must come not in name but in power; they who are drawn to Christ crucified must be drawn spiritually, and therefore drawn personally and one by one. (1) It is the business of each one of us to apprehend the Gospel of a free, a personal absolution. There must be a solemn giving of the individual soul exactly as it is seen to be and felt to be in history and in circumstance, into the hands of God Himself, on the ground of a revelation made by Him in the Gospel as to a free and total forgiveness of all sin through the alone merits of our Lord Jesus Christ. (2) Again, it is the business of each one of us to apprehend for himself the Gospel promise of a Holy and Divine Spirit to dwell personally in him as the life of his life and the soul of his soul. God will give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him; then if that be true we have only to ask and we shall receive. (3) It is the business of each one of us, having thus stamped upon himself by an individual act the seal of his consecration, the double seal of a Divine absolution and a Divine indwelling, then to go forth as a forgiven man and as a spiritual man, not indeed to presume upon what he has done, but as much as possible to forget himself; to forget himself in the Saviour's service and to forget himself in giving his very life for his brethren. Let the individual life, thus far and in this holy sense, be merged and lost in the relative. Thus through Him shall the Almighty Lord make good His Divine saying, "I, lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me."
C. J. Vaughan, University Sermons,p. 89.
Wherein consists the attractive power of the crucifixion of our Lord?
I. That which, first of all, draws men in reverence and love to Jesus Christ hanging on the Cross, is the moral beauty, the moral strength, of self-sacrifice. By sacrifice I mean here the surrender of that which is most precious to self for the benefit of others. A sacrifice exerts a vast power, nothing less than a fascination, over those who witness it. It does this for three distinct reasons. Sacrifice, first of all, requires a moral effort of the highest kind. It is an exhibition of strength. This force of will, like all strength, whether moral, or mental, or physical, is of itself beautiful. Secondly, self-sacrifice attracts because of its rarity. As we admire gems and flowers for their rarity, not less than for their intrinsic beauty, so we are drawn to great examples of self-sacrifice, not merely because of their proper lustre, but because they are in contradiction to the ordinary tenor of human life. But, thirdly, sacrifice attracts by its fertilising power. All good that is done among men is proportioned only and exactly to the amount of sacrifice which is required to produce it. To witness sacrifice is of itself to breathe a bracing atmosphere. To be capable of sacrifice is already to be strong. Is not the voluntary self-sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross the secret of His attraction at this moment for His creatures, who know that sacrifice is as beautiful as it is rare, who know that it is as rare as it is productive.
II. A second explanation of the attraction which Jesus Christ upon the Cross exerts over the hearts of men is to be found in the prevalence of suffering in human life. Not when teaching upon the mountain, not when sitting at the festive board, not when rising from the grave, not when mounting from the earth to beyond the stars, but when hanging upon the tree of shame, Jesus is most welcome to a race whose days are few and evil, whose life at the very best is chequered by sorrow and pain.
III. Jesus Christ crucified attracts us on the Cross, because He is the love as well as the wisdom of God; because He is the well-beloved Son, no less than the eternal intelligence of the Father; because He is not merely the first of all teachers of moral truth, but the all sufficient victim for the sins of men. "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me."
H. P. Liddon, Penny Pulpit,No. 294.
The Attractive Influence of the Cross
I. We read these words in the first instance as they are spoken by One who is nothing more than what He at first sight appears a peasant prophet of Galilee; and if you view them in this aspect, you will be struck by the very strange ambition which they unfold. He dreams of universal sovereignty. A revolt in Judea in favour of the Christ would have been regarded with no more concern among the magnates at Rome than the Ashantee War amongst ourselves. And yet, suspected by His associates, plotted against by His fellow countrymen, hated by the religious part of the community, He dreams still that He will subdue the world, and draw all men to Himself.
II. But if the dream is strange and vast, when viewed in that light, even more strange does it become when we consider the lofty spiritual tune which it assumes. This is not the language of the worldly conqueror "I will drawall men to Myself." His words are cast in a sterner mould. His ambition concerns more material interest. He seeks to subdue realms, to bring territories under his sway. Jesus of Nazareth covets only the hearts of men. It was not the language of enthusiasm; it was not the language of imposture; but it was language which is unearthly in the strength and loftiness of its self-sacrificing love. "And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me."
III. In these words our Saviour affirms the attractive influence of His Cross. Has this all come true? Yes, it has come true. The dream of the peasant prophet now looks like an approximately realised fact. I realise its fulfilment in the wide extended influence of Christian principle; I realise it in this fact, that the civilised world is expressed by another word, which implies the reign, the dominion of Christ when we speak of the civilised world as Christendom. So has the Galilean triumphed. But I realise its fulfilment even more in the total reversal of the reputations of men. Many who exercised sway in the day of Christ owe the immortality of their names to the strange providence that linked their lives with the despised Galilean, so wondrously has that dream come true "I will draw all men unto Me."
Bishop Boyd Carpenter, Penny Pulpit,new series, No. 668.
I. The important event the text anticipates. Our Lord here refers to the crucifixion. The exaltation of Christ in the ministry of the Gospel comprehends: (1) The recital of the manner of the Redeemer's death. (2) The declaration of the great design of His death. (3) The proclamation of His power to save, with the terms on which He saves.
II. The grand purpose the text reveals: (1) The point to which He attracts "unto Me." (2) The manner in which He attracts the view of the Divine character presented by the lifting up of Christ on the Cross is eminently attractive. (3) The scale on which He attracts "all men."
J. Rawlinson, Preacher's Monthly,vol. ii., p. 369.
References: John 12:32. Spurgeon, Sermons,vol. iii., No. 139; vol. xiii., No. 775; S. Baring Gould, One Hundred Sermon Sketches,p. 82; S. Cox, Expositions,2nd series, p. 285; Preacher's Monthly,vol. i., p. 461; W. Dorling, Christian World Pulpit,vol. vii., p. 72; F. Ferguson, Ibid.,vol. xiv., p. 97; J. Greenhough, Ibid.,vol. xxiv., p. 241; Homiletic Magazine,vol. viii., p. 130; J. Keble, Sermons for Holy Week,p. 173; H. P. Liddon, Three Hundred Outlines on the New Testament,p. 88; D. Rhys Jenkins, The Eternal Life,p. 27; F. Morse, Penny Pulpit,new series, No. 636.