If any man hear My words
I.
THE GREATEST SPIRITUAL PRIVILEGE THAT MAN CAN ENJOY. It is a priceless privilege to hear the words of any great sage, poet, moralist. But what are the best human words compared with those of Christ? They are spirit and life; more pure than crystal, more refreshing than the morning breeze, more quickening than the sunbeam, they are recreative forces. What have they accomplished ere now?
II. THE GREATEST CRIMINAL NEGLECT OF WHICH A MAN CAN BE GUILTY--“and believe not,” i.e. keep them not. Such is guilty of
1. The most egregious folly.
2. The most heinous ingratitude.
3. The most hardened impiety.
II. THE MOST TERRIBLE DOOM WHICH A MAN CAN APPREHEND. “I judge him not.” I as a Saviour have nothing more to do with him; I leave him to the retributive treatment of My Father. Mercy leaves him, and justice apprehends him. (D. Thomas, D. D.)
The words of Christ
I. AS LAWS TO BE OBEYED. Christ’s words are not like poetry for entertainment, or abstract science for speculative thought; they are laws to be kept; not so much a creed as a code. It is only as they are embodied in actual life that their mission is answered, that they are of any real or lasting service to man.
II. AS A MEANS OF SALVATION. Had Christ come to judge the world, His words would have breathed the indignation of insulted justice. But He came to save, and hence His words are full of all that can restore man to holiness and God. The salvation which Christ came to effect is restoration from spiritual ignorance to intelligence, from selfishness to benevolence, from bondage to freedom, from inward conflict to inner harmony, from social perniciousness to social utility. To this His signs and words are adapted. “Save the world,” not a class.
III. AS CRITERIA OF JUDGMENT (John 12:48). The man to whom Christ has spoken, and who rejects or nullifies His words, needs no other judge but His words. These words will judge him in his conscience and will condemn him for ingratitude, folly and rebellion. (D. Thomas, D. D.)
Christ is both able and willing to save the world
When the Duke of Argyle was taken in rebellion in Scotland, and brought before James II, the king said to him, “You know that it is in my power to pardon you.” It is reported that the prisoner answered, “It may be in your power, but it is not in your nature”--a speech which, whether true or not, cost him his life, He died like a stoic, executed at Temple Gate. But Christ has both the power and the disposition to pardon sinners. He that rejecteth me … hath one that judgeth Him.
The redemptive becoming retributive
I. CHRISTIANITY MAY BE REJECTED NOW. It is possible to accept Christ’s creed and to reject His authority.
II. THOSE WHO REJECT CHRISTIANITY NOW, MUST BOW TO ITS JUDICIAL FORCE HEREAFTER. “The last day” is the retributive period that awaits us all. Then the “Word” which has been trodden under foot will rise from the dust and take the throne.
1. There is nothing arbitrary in the decision or procedure of the last judgment. The glorious words of mercy which are rejected will spring from their graves, and conscience will invest them with judicial authority.
2. Man should be profoundly cautious as to how to treat the words of Christ now. His words are not sounds but things--terrible things. They must live forever in every soul into which they have fallen. Old sermons will be preached again by memory many ages on. “How shall we escape.” (D. Thomas, D. D.)
The word that I have spoken, the same shall Judge Him.
I. THERE IS A LAST DAY. The world shall not always roll on. God shall interpose at length. In one sense there is no last day either to righteous or wicked. But in reference to the existing order there is a winding up, a reckoning. “Tomorrow” shall then cease, and that word of mystery and procrastination and suspense be known no more.
II. THAT DAY SHALL BE ONE OF JUDGMENT. The long unsettled cases of earth shall be settled then. Time’s riddles shall be solved and its wrongs righted. The oppressed shall be vindicated and the evil-doer be put to shame. The judgment shall be just, undoing the evil and establishing the good.
III. CHRIST’S WORD SHALL JUDGE US. Not that the word is to supersede the Judge, but it will form the ground of judgment. We can imagine in connection with that word such questions as these:
1. Did it reach you?
2. Did you listen to it, or spend your lives in listening to someone or thing else?
3. Did you treat it as a true word? Professing to receive it as true, did you treat it as untrue?
4. Did you treat it as Divine? by reverence and submission.
5. Did you accept it as suitable, as meeting your case? or did you reject it? By this word, then, let us judge ourselves now, that so we may not be condemned by it at the great day. (H. Bonar.)