Lecture XX

THE DIVINE HOPE PERFECTING THE SINLESS FAMILY LIKENESS

THE crowning glory and joy of sonship is to be like him whose sons we are; and that glory, that joy, is set before us. What we are to be, as sons of God, does not now appear. But it is to appear. And when it does appear, we know that we shall be like him. That one element or feature of our future state as children of God, hidden as that state is, we know. What more, or what besides, there may be in it to make it blessed, we cannot know; for “what we are to be does not yet appear.” Only we do know that when it does appear, it will be found to have this blessedness in it; that “we shall be like God.”

It must be so; for “we shall see God as he is.” Other things about our future state as children of God we cannot know until what we are to be, which does not now appear, shall appear. But one thing we do know, that we are to “see God as he is,” and therefore to “be like him.” That is our hope; a divine hope; “hope in God;” tending towards the perfecting, even here, of the family likeness that attests our divine filiation, or our being “born of God.” For “every man that hath this hope in him, (that is, in God,) purifieth himself, even as he, (that is, Christ,) is pure” (ver. 3).

There is, as usual, some difficulty here as to the pronouns “him” and “he.” The first “him” evidently points to God the Father, whose children we are. The hope which we have of being like God, because we shall see him as he is, is a hope “in him,” or upon him, having him as its object and its ground. It is the last “he” that may seem uncertain. It is a different word in the original from the previous word “him;” which again is the same as that used in the previous verse about God. The “he” in the close of the verse,—“even as he is pure,”—is emphatically demonstrative. It means “that one,” “that child of God,” “that Son.” So clear is the identification of the person. Both pronouns, it is to be noticed,—the “him” and the “he,”—are expressed in the original, and not left to be supplied. The first naturally refers to the person previously spoken of, God the Father, whose children we are. The second as naturally refers to some other person, already distinctly enough indicated, in whom the ideal of our ultimate perfection in respect of likeness to God is realised, and in whom, therefore, the model and standard of our duty, as aiming at that likeness, is to be found. That person is evidently Christ the Son. The verse, accordingly, interpreted in strict consistency with the exact grammatical construction, may and must run thus:—Every man, every one, every one of God’s children, every child of God,—having this hope in God, the hope of seeing him as he is and being like him,—purifieth himself, even as that child of God, that Son of God, that Christ, is pure.

Thus the apostle, having set before us the high ideal, brings in the model of its actual realisation. The ideal is our being therefore like God whose children we are; our being like him, because we shall see him as he is. This ideal as to what we shall be implies a striving after it as we now are. For “every one who hath this hope in God purifieth himself.” And we strive all the better because we have a model of its realisation; “even as the Son is pure.”

I. We must look then here, as always, to Christ. He had a hope in God, or upon God; a hope having God for its object, and God for its ground and warrant. “Thou didst make me hope when I was upon my mother’s breast” (Ps. 22:9). “My flesh shall rest in hope” (Ps. 16:9). It was hope for himself as the Son; and it was hope in and upon God his Father. And it was substantially the same hope that we have as children that he had as the Son. True; he could not say, with reference to himself, and his own knowledge or consciousness,—It doth not yet appear what I shall be; at least not exactly as we say it. He knew better what he was to be, than we can know what we are to be. But even he, in his human nature and human experience, did not adequately know this; for even he walked by faith and not by sight. It really did not yet appear what he was to be. There was much, very much, of the joy set before him, that his human soul, in its earthly condition, could not comprehend. The Father had in store for him as his beloved Son such a recompense, such a fulness of consummated joy and glory; that, Son as he was, he could not beforehand comprehend or imagine it. One thing, however, he did know, that whatever the future discovery or development, to himself or others, of his sonship was to be, it would be all in the line of his being like the Father; and being like the Father through seeing him as he is.

I would speak with reverence and diffidence here. I try to put myself in the position of him who, as regards this very matter, is held up before me as my pattern; I mean, as regards my purifying myself now, in virtue of my having this hope in or upon God my Father, that I am to be like him hereafter, when I shall see him as he is. Christ was as I am; else the reference to him here is vain. He had the same hope in or upon God that I have; the hope of seeing him as he is, and being therefore like him. Is it wrong to say that he did not always see God as he is, while he was on earth? I speak of him as man; and it is as man that he is here set before me. Was he not in circumstances in which what he actually saw of God was to a large extent identical with what we see of God? Did he always see him as he is, any more than we do? He saw him in his actings; and in whatever explanation of his actings he was pleased by revelation to give. He saw him, in that way, more clearly than we see him. But did he see him otherwise, any more than we see him otherwise? Did he see him as he is? Were there not to him the same clouds and darkness around the throne of God his Father that there are to us? Was not God’s way to him, as to us, in the deep, and his path in the mighty waters? The medium of vision, at all events, was the same to him that it is to us. It was through the dim and hazy atmosphere of things as they are, with what light revelation sheds on them, that he, like us, had to see God; not as he is in himself, but as he is in his dealings with a world whose fall has made his providence of forbearance, grace, and judgment, a strange and awful mystery to all intelligences; a mystery which the last day alone is to unfold. Jesus lived under that providence, as we do; and saw God, through it, as we do. That is not quite seeing him as he is.

To see God as he is, when the present strange problem—a dispensation of long-suffering patience, subservient to a dispensation of present mercy and salvation, and preparatory to a dispensation of retribution and reward,—is at last solved;—to see God as he is, when the shifting shadows of time flee away, and the repose of the final settlement of all things comes;—that was to Christ a matter of hope; exactly as it is to us. It must have been so. And if it was so, is it too much to say that this included, even in his case, the idea of his hoping to be like God, when he was thus to see him as he is, in a sense and to an extent not within the reach and range of his human experience, when it was among the ordinary conditions of humanity here on earth that he had to see him? Is there no trace of a conflict between his natural human will and the divine will of the Father, in the deep movements of his soul in its agony? Was it never an effort with him to bring his own mind into harmony, or to keep his own mind in harmony, with the mind of the Father? Is he not now more like the Father,—I speak of his human consciousness, his human sense and feeling,—now that he fully “sees of the travail of his soul and is satisfied,” and sees therefore God the Father as he is, in the consummated issue of his mighty plan,—than he could be when he had to bow his meek and uncomplaining neck to the untried yoke; to meet the experimentally-unknown doom; when, “though he was a Son, he had to learn obedience by the things which he suffered;” when, “in the days of his flesh he offered up prayers and supplications unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared?”

That was his trial, as it is ours; to be in a position in which, seeing God as he is, and being consequently thoroughly like him, in respect of full and ultimate contentment, complacency, satisfaction, and joy, is “a thing hoped for.” It is in such a position that our purifying of ourselves is to be wrought out, even as it was in such a position that his being pure was manifested and approved. We, having this hope in God our Father, are to purify ourselves even as he, having this hope also in God his Father—how shall the sentence run to a close?—purified himself?—nay, that will not do,—was pure?—that might do, but it is not enough,—“is pure?” Yes; that is the way of putting it that pleases the disciple who records the Son’s own saying; “Before Abraham was, I am.”

“He is pure.” It is not enough to say that he was pure; that in the condition and experience in respect of which he is here held out as an encouragement and example to us, he kept himself pure, as we have to make ourselves pure. The use of the present tense is most significant, “he is pure.” It is the essential purity of his human nature, as then and now eternally welded into his divine, that is set before us. And the precise lesson is this. The task of purifying ourselves is assigned to us in such circumstances, however unpropitious and unfavourable, as were yet not found to be incompatible or inconsistent with his essential purity. His being pure, in such circumstances, is a motive for our purifying ourselves; his purity, moreover, in these circumstances is the model and measure of what we should wish ours to be. We, having the same hope in God that he had; the hope of being like God because we shall see him as he is; are to purify ourselves as he is pure.

“He is pure.” It is with reference to his being a model to us that he is said to be so; we are “to purify ourselves as he is pure.” And we are to purify ourselves as he is pure, in the very same world which he, in his perfect purity, defied,—“Which of you convinceth me of sin?” He has really, in this matter, no advantage over us. He, as to his being pure; and we, as to our purifying ourselves; are on the same footing. We have to realise our sonship, as he had to realise his sonship, in a world that knows not God; and we have to realise it, like him, in hope. So realising it, and having this joint hope with him in God, we purify ourselves as he is pure.

II. With all this, the commission of sin is incompatible. “He that doeth righteousness,” and he alone, “is born of God” (2:29). For God is righteous; and every one that is born of God must partake of his righteous nature; and be a doer of righteousness, as God his Father is righteous. The doing of sin is inconsistent with so righteous a parentage; for it is the doing of that which is against law; “Whosoever committed sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law” (ver. 4).

Sin is lawlessness; insubordination to law. It is to be so regarded; especially by us who, on the one hand, being born of God, make conscience of doing righteousness as God is righteous (2:29); and who, on the other hand, having this hope in God,—that we are to be like him when we shall see him as he is,—make conscience of purifying ourselves, as our model, his own beloved Son, is pure (3:2, 3). We are to look upon sin as a breach of law. That is our security against committing sin, and so compromising the righteousness which we do, and the purity to which we aspire.

There are other views that may be taken of sin; and some that may even seem more spiritual than this, and more in keeping with our character and position as sons of God. For there is a temptation to over-refining here; a temptation to which many in John’s day yielded, with most disastrous results to the interests of righteousness and purity; a temptation which may even yet beset us. Am I a child of God, born of him, standing to him in the same relation with his beloved Son? I seem to be raised above the commonplace consideration of sin being wrong because it is against the law. Sin should be offensive to me on higher grounds. Does it not shock the heavenly instincts of my new-born nature? Do I not feel it now to be beneath me to commit sin? It is a degradation unworthy of my rank and prospects. There can be no need of law to restrain me. Sin is not to be shunned by me merely because some legal enactment prohibits and condemns it. I loathe its foulness; I despise its baseness; I spurn its ingratitude.

So far, such feelings are gracious, generous, honourable; and they are to be cherished accordingly. But it is dangerous to trust to them, as if they might supersede what may seem the homelier and humbler reason for not committing sin; that it is against the law.

Do I feel or fancy that that is not altogether a filial motive, that it somewhat grates upon my ear and wounds my sensibility, that it scarcely comes up to my notion of what a filial frame of mind should be, and almost subjects me again to the bondage of legal constraint and a legal covenant? Trust me, I may be inclined to say; leave me to myself; and you may be very sure that I shall not commit sin. I have no wish for it; no heart for it. I am upon honour not to commit sin. But why bring in again the element of law? Why be ever reminding me not to break the law? Let me beware of the insidious entrance of such a thought into my heart. Am I not, in suffering it even for a moment, already committing sin? Am I not committing the very sin by which Adam fell, the sin by which the angels fell, the sin of counting it an irksome thing to be governed by law as being under authority, and aspiring to a sort of liberty of independence which no created being can ever assume or usurp without just offence to God and inevitable ruin to himself.

And let me look to that Pure One, who is to be my pattern in my life-task of purifying myself. How did he keep his purity intact when he was in the midst of that world which has not known God? Was he above law? Was he not “made under the law?” Was it not “obedience” that “he learned by the things which he suffered?” Shall I aspire to a more transcendental style of purity than he exemplified? Shall I adopt a method of self-purification more refined than that Pure One himself has by his practice sanctioned? Is the disciple to be above his master, the servant above his lord? Ah! let me remember that if I have to sustain the character of a child of God here; to prove myself to be born of God and partaker of his righteous nature; to purify myself as hoping hereafter to be like God when I shall see him as he is; it is in the midst of a world that has not known him that I have all this to do. And what is more, it is in the midst of a world that has known me, and that I have known, too well. Let me think of the sympathy that there still is between that world and me; how far too congenial its ungodly and unholy spirit still is to my spirit. How am I to keep myself unspotted from the world, and purify myself in it as Christ is pure? How but by entering into his mind as he takes upon him. the form of a servant, and becomes obedient? He who is himself pure; immaculately, incorruptibly, inviolably pure; essentially pure in his human nature as well as his divine; manifested and maintained this purity in the attitude of one saying: “Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart” (Ps. 40:7, 8). Much more must it be in that attitude that I purify myself; I, who am not by nature “separate from sinners;” I, in whom there is still always too much of a leaning to their side. How shall I guard against worldly conformity, against compromises and compliances, against ingenious casuistry or special pleading, that would try to reconcile with a high toned spirituality more or less of indifference or indulgence towards the world and its lusts? “To the law and to the testimony” let me be ever subject. Let me be true and loyal to the law. Let me love and fear the law. Let me take my stand on the law of my God; doing righteousness according to the law of the righteous Father; unsparingly and unflinchingly, without equivocation or evasion, condemning, shunning, hating sin as “the transgression of the law.”