Quiet Talks on John's Gospel

ooing

i. 1

s Own

eely and without stint,

s very life. This is it

ng most. So it comes

eagerly with outstretched arms to its embrace. It gives that

s come. The sun gives itself out in life and light and warmth. And out to greet it comes a bit of itself-the fine form and sweet fragrance of the r

of her mothering spirit. The mother-bird in the nest in the crotch of the tree gives her life day by day in bro

e comes a new life made in their image, and in His who broods unseen over all three. And over the life wrecked by sin broods the Spirit of

. The father-mother Spirit of God broods over all our common life. And when things go wrong, He broods a bit close

s the longed-for answer to the gladdened mother-bird. The ever wondrous babe-eyes give unspeakable

brooding love to mend a break and restore a blurred image. And men answered Him. They couldn't help it. How they came! They di

d Him. And it doesn't. He didn't keep man at arm's length. And He doesn't. And then because they were friends, H

l Accordi

rly and he stayed late. He stayed to the very end, into the evening glow of life. And all his long life he was under the tender holy spell of Jesus' presence. He was

troubled. Not because he was going to die. This never troubles the man who knows Jesus. The Jesus-touch overcomes the natural twinges of death. But he was troubled a bit in spi

out the simplest words I know so common folks everywhere that don't have dictionaries can easily understand. And I'll make them into the shortest simplest sentences I can so they can q

en He asks that each of us shall write a gospel. This is the Gospel according to John; and these others according to Luke and Mark and Matthew. He means that there shall be the gospel acc

o not mean to write with a common pen of steel or gold; nor on just common paper of rags or wood-pulp. But I do mean-He means-that you shall

the daily commonplace round of life, that those we live with shall know the whole story of Jesus' love and life; His l

. What I mean is this,-the crowd knows. The folks that touch you every day, they know. This old Bible was never printed so much as to

folk read our religious literature as faithfully as this crowd I speak of reads its. It is reading the gospel accor

ing for the Gospel is shoe-leather. The old Gospel of the Son of God is at its best as it is being tramped out on the common street of life. Its truths stand out clearest as they're walked

away in some dark cell, covered with dust and with rubbish, perhaps. With much tact and diplomacy they have at length managed to get possession of the coveted manuscript. And they have been fairly delighted

ving of rubbish, to get even at what there is there. And some of the shy hungry hearts that touch you and me need to use quite a bit of unconscious diplomacy pe

as they wrote. That is true. These are the standard Gospels. We would never know the blessed story but for these four Spirit-br

plainly. And so it is with each one of these Gospels. And, even so, there will be the colouring of your personality, your habit of thought, the distin

Spirit, helping you make the story plain and full, and helping people to understand that story

life that was poured out till none was left, that love that was burned out till even the ashes

Human

t one. These lines at the beginning are like an etching, there are the fewest touches of pen on paper, of black ink on white surface. But the f

ion to try to make the meaning simpler. It will be a putting of John's words into the simple every-day colloquial speech that we English-speak

h homely and simple it will be strictly accurate to what John is thinking and saying in his own

inning. And it will help very much if we keep

was the face of God looking into man's face. He was the voice of God, soft and low, clear and distinct, speaking into man's ears. He was the hand of God, str

at we might get our tangled up ideas about God and ourselves and about life untangled, straightened out. He

new name for Him who was commonly called Jesus. It was because of our ears that he used the new word. If he had said "Jesus" at onc

a new word at the first, and so floods in new light. And then we come to see whom he is talking about. It's a

acute hearing and a more delicate sense of feel. The deaf man's eyes grow quicker to watch faces and movements and so learn what his ears

emarkable ears, and nature has grown for it an abnormal sense of touch, and a peculiar sensitiveness even wh

He doesn't strike fire." And then, "He doesn't touch them." And then, "Ah! he's got them; that's it; now they're burning." And it was exactly so as he said. I sat fascinated as I watched the crowd and heard his co

he famous blind preacher, came she showed the fine thoughtful tact for which she was famous. Clearly an autographed photograph would not mean much in itself to a blind man. So the Queen had a miniature bust-statue made an

utographed by His own hand on the blue above and the brown below. But when Jesus came men knew God by the feel. They didn't understand Jesus.

face, slow-hearted to the pleading of His presence. His hand was touching us but we didn't feel it. So He came in a new way, in a very homely close-up way and walked d

t His

nds, fellows together. And this One was God. Each was the same as the other. This is the same One who was in the later creative beginning

beginning." John's is the beginning before there was any beginning. It is the beginning before they had begun making calendars on the earth, because there wasn't any eart

a man down the street. He leaves God out of his life. He may remember Him so far as to use His name blasphemously to punctuate and emphasize what he is saying. Yonder walks a woman in the shadow of the street at

all the life there is there, is coming out all the time from this One of whom John is talking. It is not given once as a thing to be t

ut on the outside. We don't know the thing, except sometimes in very smallest part. Fo

out, gripping the other hard. And we'll look into each other's eyes with our eyes big. And we'll say with

l we have. We may leave God practically out. So many of us do. But He never leaves us out

our all. Yet it is the smaller part. There's the fuller part. This is the whole drive of John's story, this fuller p

but a person. With God everything is personal. We men go to the impersonal so much, or we try to. We do

. I think likely both. But the wheels were going faster than ever. There were more wheels, and their whir seemed never out of ear-shot. Commercial wheels

ement was never emphasized more. Contradictory? Yet there it is. We men go to the _im_personal. Yet deep down in our hearts we hunger for the

ake botany. God makes flowers breathing their freshening fragrance noiselessly up into your face. Man makes astronomy. God makes the stars, shaking their firelight ou

and perplexed. It's a thing fearsomely and wonderfully manufactured, this theology. But I frankly confess to a great fondness for flowers, and for stars, and a love for Jesus that deepens ever more in reverential awe

Most i

een back in that creative Genesis week. And now with one long stride he puts his foot down in the days when Jesus walks among us as a man. Forty centuries, by the common reckoning, packed into three letters e-t-

gentle stillness, that smote so subtly on his ear, and completely melted and changed this man of rock and thunder. It's a new man that turns his face north again. The new God that had compacted Himself anew

e of a God, a new God to him, packed into a single flash of blinding light out of the upper blue. He had the whole of a new

ng. We put them out, if we do. If He may have His way He'll pack-listen quietly, with your heart-He'll pack the whole of a Jesus inside you and me. Much in littl

er-a Saviour. We talk about help in trouble. There's something immensely more-a Friend, alongside, close up. We talk about healing-sometimes, not so much the

Suppose this hall where we are were quite dark, all shuttered up, and suppose we were new on the earth, and not familiar with darkness. We want to hold a meeting. But how shall we get rid

e suggestor in a certain sort of institution for the safety of the communit

dark, and I scratched only a parlour-match, instantly as the little flame broke out of the end of the stick some of the darkness would go.

e purity of home and young and of all. But note keenly that this is incidental. It is immensely important at times, but it is distinctly secondary. The gre

e inner cockles of the heart. Listen: is it a bit dark down where you live? Morally dark? Spiritually? How about that? in commercial circles and social

t for anything. We are talking only to help. Though sometimes the truth itself does have a merciless edge. If it be a bit da

e is the Light. But we are the light-holders. I carry the Light of the world around inside of me. And so do you, if you do. It is not because of the "me," of course, but because

lantern is that the glass of the lantern be kept dean and clear so the light within can get freely out. The great thing is that we shall live clean transparent lives so the Light within

adly smoked. And sometimes it even gets cobwebby, rather thickly covered up. And even this has been known to happen up there,-it'll seem very stra

your heart still and look! There's the crowd in the road in the dark, struggling, jostling, stumbling, and falling into the ditch at the side of the road, ditched and

r yourself. There they go down the street, pell-mell, bewildered, blinded, some of them by

simplicity, is this: we who know Jesus are to live Him. We're to let the who

tand the Light. It can't withstand the purity and insistence of its clear steady shining. And the darkness will go: slowly, reluctantly, angrily, doggedly, making hideous growling noises sometimes, raising the dust

-road to

rehended." Both are rather large words, larger in English than John would use. John loved to use simple talk. Yet there's help even in these English words.

nglish and German and the few French. You may have spent a lifetime at it. But at the end there is immensely more of Jesus that you don't understand than the part that you do under

with life's common duties to get much time for reading, not one of us, who may not reach out your hand, the hand of your heart, the hand of your life, the hand of your

ly as we take Him into heart and life can we really understand. It's as if the heat in the heart made b

or in laboratorial research, his mind cannot do its best, or be at its best, until his heart has been kindled by some noble passion. The key to the life is in the heart, that is the emotions and pu

l the brightness of its shining." It tried. It tried first at Bethlehem. The first spilling of blood came there. There was the shedding of blood at both ends of Jesus'

lee in the headquarters of darkness. But the Third Morning came. And the bars of darkness were broken, as a woman breaks the sewing-cotton at the end o

will go. The darkness cannot shut out the light, nor keep it down, nor resist the gentle resistless power of its soft clear flooding. Let the Light shine down in that corner where you are. And the d

ing God revealed Himself in making a home for man, and in bringing the man, made in His own image, to his home. And then when the damp unwholesome darkness came stea

sh or

He used a man to reach a man. He always does. Run clear through this old Book of God, and then clear through that other Book of God-the book of life, and note tha

gh men. The pathway of His helping feet is always a common human pathway. And, will you mark keenly that the hi

as this particular John of the desert and of the plain living, and the burning speech, was sent by God, so surely is every man of us a man sent by God on some particular errand. And the greatest achievement

l come, some go; go their own way. There was a man sent from God whose name was Jonah. But he didn't come. He went. He was sent to Nineveh on the extreme east. He went

ings at the boat-wharf, while waiting for the Tarshish ship to lift anchor. We have services in the steerage and second-class and distribute tracts and New

ou. Are you berthed on the boat for Tarshish? or have you a seat engaged on the train for Nineveh? going your own way

g Mar

itness means? that you know something; that you tell what you know; and that you tell it most with your life. And telling it with your life mea

of whom John told. This was the very throbbing heart of the wooing errand. This explains the tendern

wooing and witnessing. No one doubts the reality of Jesus' witness to the Father's love before men. And no one, who has had any touch at

ollower of the Christ. This is to be the dominant underchording of all our lives. This is to be the ne

every life. And the undercurrent is the controlling current. It makes us what we really are. It may be quite different from the upper cur

w a bit of the subtle fragrance of His presence? Do you know the power of His Name when temptations come, when the road gets slipper

gently, boldly, earnestly. But tell it far more, and most with your life. Let what you are, when y

crowd. Don't do that. Books have their place, good books, but it's always a sharply secondary place, or third, or lower down yet. Poor crowd that must be fed on retaile

ooks or definitions chiefly, however they may help some. I can tell you how: Follow where the Mast

hose bushes are growing rank on both sides narrowing the path. And thorns scratch and hurt and sting. This ot

ear leading that there comes sweetest peace, with no nagging doubts and mental confusion. There only will you have more faith, know more of Him, touch with

the way the Witness did. He followed the clear Father-voice, though the road led straight across t

ho gives his life clear out in a violent way for the truth he believes. But, do you know, that is easy. "Easy?" You say, "Surely not, you're certainly w

u pull together and pray and resolutely, desperately, face it. A little while, and it's over. You've been true in the sharp

that takes immensely more courage, and a deeper longer-seasoned heroism, and that is to be a living martyr, to bear the simple true wit

ndar. That's rather crude, quite behind the cultured advanced Christian progress of our day. Our Christian civilization has gone long strides beyond that. We have grown much mor

ncome reduced. The bulk of business shrinks. The thermometer is run down below the living point. We kill men by fros

es to the Christ in home, and social circl

or his faith;

the most

an yon add

lived fo

to die. M

ish or

o or passio

hard

e: every da

ruth that

ds met his cond

orld with

s that he p

turnin

lk of the lif

an the death

gotten

was of the light he was to bear witness; not of himself. It was not the technical accuracy of his work, not its scholarliness and skill that abs

across a bit of a spring by the side of the road. Clear cool water it is. And some one has thoughtfully left a tin-cup

er it may contain. The human tin-cup seems to bulk very big in the drinking process, sometimes, in my corner of the planet. It is silver-plated sometimes; just common tin under the plating. There's some fine

while, ah! look! hold still your heart, and look here. There's the crowd on the street, hot dusty street, exhausted, actually fainting for want of water, just good plain water of life. But there's

ple are hoping they'll stay while we talk to them. But John did otherwise. He went down to the Jordan bottoms, where the spirit ventilation was better, and cal

the crowds? John has lost his crowd. Same pulpit out in the open air, same preacher, same simple intense message burning in his heart, but-no congregatio

our sympathy is not needed. For John's eye is ablaze with a tender light, and the sound of an inner heart music reaches your ear

aithfulness of the preacher. The crowd's getting the water, sweet cool refreshing water of life, direct from the fountain. They've clean forgotten the fait

ing. We don't seem yet to have demitted our privilege of talking after service. Here are two. Listen to them. "Isn't he a great preacher? so scholarly, so elo

be a scholar. I wouldn't question it. And a polished orator. I wouldn't question that. But in the main thing, t

hope, and willingly believe. But a Master! One that sweeps and sways his mind and culture and life like the st

ing his best. The old classic is beaten oil for the lamps of the sanctuary. But there's the soft burning fire of the real thing in

s the have-to of an intense desire to get off alone. And as he goes down the side street he's talking, but-to himself. Listen to him: "I'm not the man I ought to be, I wonder if Jesu

ay. He's face-to-face with Jesus! And the forgotten speaker is the finest evidence of the faithfulness of his speaking. He is holding

Thing to

the thing being believable, then trust it; then trust Him, the Light, risk something, risk, themselves to Him, then love, love with a passion

ing, loving point, the glad point. Everything that we can bring of gold and learning and labour and skill is precio

it's a meal and a fire, and some clothing, the man wants. And you have both ready at hand. Things are good, provided by money and skill and research and painstaking e

iven Jesus, and the warm touch with Him, in His simple fullness, just as He is, and surely and not sl

, and the light is-lost sight of. We gather about the candlestick. It'll surely lead the way out through the dark night into day. It's such a good candlestick, so highly polished. And sometimes the human candlestick itself gets things a bit mixed. It thinks, then it feels, then it knows, with a peculiar quality of self-assertive certainty, that after all it is the light t

p and mired up together? Yet it is always heart-breaking. There may be talent and training of the highest and best, and scholarship and culture, eloquence and skill, institutio

index-fingers. And they are seen at their best when they point to the Light so clearly that the crowd quite forgets them in hastening to

Thing o

in John's old age when he is writing, with false lights, make-pretend lights, that led people astray. Every generation seems to have been so b

nd people are led astray by them deeper into swamp and bog. It's surprising to find how many, that grow up in well-lit neighbourhoods, wander off after the swamp lights, and even follow them so contentedl

ay, for instance, that

freely used. And the

ally healed. There can

acts at hand to make t

powers that seem miraculous. And clearly there are devilish miracles as well as divine. Miracles simply reveal a supernatural pow

s is the sure touchstone by which to detect the real thing of light and the make-believe. The outstanding thing in

f swamp lights. And those who are healed through this teaching will find themselves in a bondage the m

red in it. It's the only light. It only is the light. Every other is a make-pretend light, howeve

little group of varied readings into the English here, found in the margin of the various revisions. But the central statement remains the same. Whether John is saying that the light, that lighteth every

ver-ceasing wonders of these bodies of ours, so awesomely and skilfully made, and kept going; through that clear quiet inner voice that does speak in

esus. From the first, and everywhere still, it is the light that shines from Him that lights men. He was with the Father in the beginning. He acted for the Fat

e are apt to think there was no light, and is none; only darkness. Then He came closer, and yet closer. He came in nearer

out through broken lantern in its sweet soft wondrous clearness into our blinded blinking eyes, and show us the real way back home. It was in that

. That's the reason when He gets possession of us there's the passion to take the full Jesus-light out to every one. And this passion burns in us and through us, and ours, and sweeps all in the s

for Reco

hat might have been fairly easy for him with his personal knowledge and all the facts so familiar. But he is telling about his dearest Fri

made it. But it failed to acknowledge Him. He came walking down the street of life. He met the world going the other way. And He gave it a warm good-morning greeting. And it

g or nursing, or, she's just hovering over the precious morsel of humanity when there's really nothing needing to be done. And the babe's eyes cat

ng in her voice that vibrates on the strings of his heart. And all the folks within range are advised of the day's event. An

ome. There was a defect; something not as it should be. And you mothers all know how she felt, yes, and you true fathers, too. She was heart-broken. And she turned aside from all the busy round of activity in which

heart-broken. And He devoted all His strength and time, Himself, for those human years to-what? One thing,

ership, orthodox belief, intense activity, aggressive missionary propaganda, money in good measure, tireless, and then tired-out service-things! And all good things. But the thing, th

here looks out at you through my eye. And I look at the real you down through your eye. The real man is hidden away within, but looks out through the eye and

-breaki

what it says. Listen: He came to His own home, and they that were His own kinsfolk received

e had a long hard day. You're tired. It's stormy. The wind and the rain chill you as you turn the corner. And you pull your coa

be patient with me a bit, please. Suppose your loved ones know you're there. You even see a hand drawing aside the edge of the window shade, and two eyes that you kn

t happen to you. I am sure it could not happen to me. If it could I'd be heart-broken. But this is what happened to Him! This is what John is saying here. He

n is dated 1881, I believe. And this American Standard Revision I am using has 1901 on its title page. But there's a l

ve His breath to us in Eden. He gave His breath to you and me at our birth. He gave His blood for us on Calvary. We b

. Here is one: He comes to His own, and His own-puts a chair outside the door on the top-step. It's a large armchair with a cushion in, p

phy, His moral standards are the ideals; wonderful life; great example." They fairly exhaust the language in talking about this

crack. We all like the word Saviour. Yes, we cling tenaciously to that. Selfishly, would you say? We want to be saved from a certa

the earth, and must go away somewhere else; with that "after" and "must" carefully underscored. And we want to be saved from all

nventionalized width. Let there be no extremeism about the wideness of that open

gs into His own hands. Certain people use that word "inconsiderate"-to themselves, in secret. Jesus changes some things when He is all

ar-to suit you. This Jesus has the all habit. He contracted it when He was down on the earth. Our needs grew the

heavy hinges, and double padlocks, and the keys are held hard under the thumb of your will. Of course there may really not be

anda. That's the thing, you know, in our day, for good church people. We give to all the good things. Ye-es, no doubt. And we are very careful, too, that tha

nd special services, at Keswick and Northfield. But through it all we hold hard to that key, we don't let go-even to H

n my own, with those eyes of His. And at first I wanted to take the door clear off of its h

of the front door of his life. There are others than He, evil ones, cunningly subtle ones, standing just at the corner watching for such an opportun

of life. He comes to His own, and His own opens the door wide, and holds it wide open, that He may come

rsion. It reads this other translation, the one nearest, in such big print, the one our lives work out daily. That's

e to H

. And the father died. And the mother wasn't able to pay her son's schooling. But a storekeeper in the village liked this little bright boy and sent him to s

ife, he had not been to see her. And the dear old mother in the little cottage in the country lived in the sweet consciousness that her son was a great physi

e's so busy up there, that he hasn't been to see me for a long time now. You know he's a great doctor now, and he has great skill, and there are so many needing him. And he's no time at all, even for himself, I expect. But

r old head, and thought, and at last she said to herself, "I know what I'll do. I'll go-up to London, and I'll live with Laddie. He'll be so glad to have me." And bright-c

son and herself. He was a cultured gentleman, with his well-appointed city home, and the circle of friends that had grown up about him. And she was a simple uncultured country

ut there was the name on the door-plate. There was no mistaking that. And so she rang the bell. "Is the doctor in?" She could hardly get the word "doctor" out. She had never called him that before, just L

said that it was past the hour

taken by surprise at being

t's quite too late

nd her English jaw set in true English fashion, and she said with that qu

woman. And the doctor was annoyed by the interruption in the midst of something

he man deferentially, "but she

s she

plain countr

show

he servant discreetly withdrew, "How did yon happen to come? Why didn't you send word? Has anything happened?" And then as she sat by the fire sipping a cup of tea, she told the sto

rate fire. It's a fire. It warms your body, at least in front in extreme weather. But it's more than a fire. It's a stimulus to thought. It refreshes your spirit, and rests your tired nerv

ants that ran his bachelor establishment. And just then his ear caught anew the broad provincial twist on her tongue. He had never noticed it so broad, so decided, be

, here she comes." And he straightened up in his chair, as he gave a gentler touch to a blazing lump of coal. Then the tide

're used to the wholesome country air. It wouldn't agree with you here, I'm afraid.

ain homely body. He got his brains from his simple country mother, as many a man of note has done. But sh

Laddie, I'm thinking, to b

her: it is late, I forgot." And he s

do you slee

t door on the left. Be sure to

eeping-chamber. And he was just cuddling his head into the soft pillow for the night, when the door opened, so softly, and in there came a

you ill? What

put down the candle on the table b

e to tuck you in for the night as I used

e forgot. She had her little son again. And she talked mother's love-talk to a child. "Good-night, Laddie ... good-night ... good-night ... mother's own boy." And a little more tucki

ing came she wasn't down for breakfast. And when he went to her room she wasn't there. It turned out afterwards that she had said to herself, "It doesn't

'm always glad to remember that-he searched through the wilderness of London for more than a year, searched diligently, but could find no trace of her. And then he

their plans. Ah! listen yet further: He comes to His own, you and me, and His own-you finish it. Have we some plans, too, set plans, that we don't propose to change,

dest F

ther aide, an offset to what he's been saying, a bright bit to offset the black bit. But as many as did receive Him. Some received. Jesus was rejected,

ough underneath here. They would not receive this Jesus because He didn't belong to the inner circle of the old families which they represente

to be classed second. They were the favourites of God, all the rest were "dogs of Gentiles," outsiders, not to

ge of Jesus. In the best meaning of the word, Jesus was an aristocrat. Apart from its philological derivation that word means one who traces his lineage back through a worthy line for a long way, and so one who has the noble traits of such lineage. In the b

Jesus was a peasant." And I replied as gently as I could so as not to seem to be arguing, "Of course, He was not a peasant. He chose to live as a peasant, for a great strong purpose. But He was an a

the old families of America are rather young affairs. And as he pushes on into the East, some of the old families of Europe sometimes seem fairly recent. I remember in the Orient running across a family where the father had been a Shinto pr

, and repeatedly. And then even more than that I've become intensely interested in another family, an older family, the oldest family of all. Arrangements have been made whereby I have been taken into this oldest family of all with full r

the circles they controlled. But with great graciousness He received into His circle any, of any circle, high or low, who would receive Him into their hear

at they counted most precious, they loved. So they believed. And so they received. The door opened, the inner door, the heart door. He went in. That se

t Get In, a

ow we don't get in. Listen: "not of blood," that is, not by our natural generation; "nor of the will of the flesh," that is, not by anything we can do of ourselve

these are the very three ways that the crowd is emphasizing to-day, some this, others that, as the way of being

stronger in some of us than we are conscious of. It's a matter of blood with us, our blood, our natural generation. We take greatest pride in showing what blood it is

throne is that at the time of accession he was their oldest living son. But that won't figure a farthing's worth when he comes up to the hea

have the blood of an old noble family in one's veins, if it is good clean blood. But it'll never save u

the earth. We know so much. We have gotten it by dint of hard work. We can do some things so skilfully. We have

good. Culture is one of the chief words in our language to-day. Whether spelled the English way or the German, it looms big. It

to, nor make a Chinese into an Englishman, nor an American into a Japanese. Culture can improve the stock, but it can't change it. It takes some other power than culture to change th

om he lived with for a while. And after He had gone, John had another Teacher, unseen but very real, who guided, especially in the writing of the old Jesus-story. The whole presumption is in favour of John's way of it b

n or at London; in financial, whether Lombard Street or Wall Street; or in the all-important social matters, or even in the educational, the university world, the chief question is, "Whose influence can you get?" "What name can y

atest authority, the Roman seal on the Joseph tomb. Rather striking that; intensely significant for us moderns. Peter hadn't enough influence with the authorities to keep out of

prayers and your wife's, and the influence of their godly lives will have great weight. It's a great blessing to have them. They help enormously. But the thing itself that t

till their case was complete. And then in that quiet way for which he was famous, he said, "How many legs would a sheep have if you called its tail a leg?" As he expected, they promptly answered "

oss the common current of thought and belief and conduct to-day. We may indeed be grateful if a single homely drop of black ink from John's pen put into

d, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man"; not through family connection, nor by wh

level. He puts His hand through the open door of our will, what we do in opening up to Him, through "the will of the flesh." He walks along the pathway of the earnest desire of those

od of it. This is a matter of blood; but not our blood; His. There has to be a new strain of blood. Our blood is stained. It is at fault. It is impure. There's been

strain of blood. This was, this is, the only way. We get into that old first family only by the Father of the family reaching over the break

ted Nei

's only a stretch of canvas between Him and any of us. He wanted to get close, close enough to help, yet never infringing upon the privacy of our tents, only coming in as He was invited. But He has remarkable

to the front of his imagination again. There was more than a tent here, more than a man. Out of the man, out through the tent doorway, and tent ca

k of night, and had gently drawn aside the exquisite drapery of His humanity, and let some of the inner glory shine out before their eyes. So the

ng looking out from within. So much of what we think of as glory and splendour in scenes of magnificence is a something in the externals, the outer arrangements. Splendid garbing, brillian

spent in homely Nazareth. Ten-elevenths of Jesus' life was spent in-living, simply living the true pure strong gentle life amid ordinary circumstances, homely surroundings. This was the greatest thing Jesus did short of dying. He lived. Next to Calvary where the

where it is lived, on the street, in the house, amidst the ideals-or lack of ideals-of those we touch closest. It was a w

liar, the old King James, the English and American revisions, all say "the," "the only begotten of the Father." I suppose the translators wanted to make it quite clear t

g the truth quite clear. When you can sift through versions and languages down to

he more pronounced this becomes, until here in our own land individualism seems at times to run to extremes. Custom in the East is the very reverse of this. There the unit of action is not the indiv

t he should now be married, the choice of his bride, the betrothal, the time, all arrangements and adjustments,-all this is done by the families. The two

e father at his death to his eldest son. In some parts the father retires at a certain age, either really or nominally, and all becomes vested technically in his eldest son. And if the son be an only begotten son, then li

gotten of a father." That is to say, all there is in the Father is in Jesus. When you see Jesus

d Truth

such a few simple words,-"full of grace and truth." Not grace without truth. That would be a sort of weakly, sickly sentimentalism. And no

ioning of flesh upon the bony framework of truth. It is the soft warm breath of life in truth. Truth is grace holding up the one only standard of purity and right and i

f stern elevated preaching of righteousness, but with no warm feel of life to it. I can remember hearing preaching in my immature boy days that made me feel that the man and the thing must be right, but neither had any attractio

aginations. Yet that was the feeling about the thing the child got. But it's scarcely worth while

l gutter. It may be the actual gutter. Or, there may be the outer trappings of refinement that easy wealth provides; or, the real refinement that culture and inheritance bring. But

elp you a bit, my brother." So he puts some flowering plants down in the slime of the gutter, and he brushes the man's clothes a bit, and his hair, and sprinkles the latest-labelled cologn

nt; that means the outside of things. Better sanitation, improved housing, purer milk supply, and segregation of vice which seems to mean putting some of the viler s

's length, and saying, "Here is the standard, purity, righteousness, utter honesty of heart and rigid purity of motive and life. You must reach thi

f, alone. Yet that's truth, true truth. "A hopeless case" you say; "utter impractical idealizin

him clean up out of the gutter, up, and up, till the man reaches the standard, and is never content till he does. That wa

ous dynamic. The blood cleanseth the inside of the man in the gutter, and heals his sores, restores his sight and hearing and sensitiveness of touch. The new life put inside the man makes

ogical factor that cannot be ignored by the thoughtful student. The drunkard goes down to the old-fashioned sort of mission where they in

e a change begins to work gradually out. He treats his wife and children differently. He works. They are fed better and clothed warmer.

e inside is fixed or in helping to get it fixed. If that isn't done, they are simply as a lovely bit of pink-coloured c

ulcer and puts in a new strain of blood. Then the inner includes the outer. And the most

in the winter's air, and are drawn by it. We smell the fragrance of the roses and come eagerly nearer. We hear the winsomeness of a gentle wooing voice a

e-the Man-gently but with unflinching unbending determination that never yields a hairbreadth, insisting on our

He insists on being His own true self in the midst of the unlikeliest surroundings. The glow of His presence shines out over all the neighbourhood of human tents. There's a p

Floo

sely out, and eagerly cries out: There He is! This is the man I've been telling you about! He that cometh after me in poi

us being full of that great combination of grace and truth. Now his tho

r found that in common print; only in the larger print of men's lives. But in that printing it seems to have run into a large edition, with very wide cir

ly pathetically crutching along, singed and burned with the flames of the same low passion that th

-"What a poor sort of God He must be those people have. No doubt He has a great job of management on His hands. There are so many of them to provide for.

e one more to carry. He has such a crowd now. And the resources are pretty badly strained, judging by appearances." So the crowd talks. Poor G

ion. That crutching, leather-bound translation is grossly inaccurate, if it is in such big print, and in such wide circulation. Look here. Can you see the words? This is the only correct reading: "O

copy. It's a heavy underscoring, in red. The underscoring is in three words he adds: "Grace for grace." That is, grace in place of grace. It's a

e. Oh! the man didn't know there was such grace as this. It seems as if he had never known grace before. An

grace that seems to displace all again. Some temptation comes, some sore need, some tight corner.

the commonplace, the blessed commonplace that can never be common. That's John's underscoring of the word "fullnes

en through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ." The law was a thing, given, through a m

ts flood; and then continuously to every man wherever he was. It was given within each man's own heart, and through the unfailing flooding light in nature above and below and al

y affected. They didn't

light was there, but

e to help out those eye

to let a man see his

dear, it is very dirty, come at once." "Why, no, mother, it isn't dirty; you washed it this morning." And the child's tone b

tention. And the boy looks; he sees his dirty face reflected. The blank astonishment on his face can't be put into words. It tells the radical upsetting revolution in

It brings upsetting revolutionary ideas regarding one's self. There it stops.

kesman

erfect in its strength and beauty and simplicity, as every circle is. If we follow the order of the words somewhat as John wrote

to the gate of the garden. God appeared to Abraham, and gave him a never-to-be-forgotten lesson in star study. Moses spent nearly si

orning in the temple, and Ezekiel in the colony of exiles on the Chebar, and Daniel by the Tigris at the close of

Look into that sentence of John's a little. It seems quite clear, clear to the point of satisfying the most critical research, that John wrote down the words, "the only-begotten God." The contrast

whole story hanging at the end of John's pen. This little bit com

. You can see the whole of the sun reflected in a single drop of water. You can see the whole

at the old-fashioned well, with its bucket and long sweep? And as you rested a bit by the well you wondered how deep it was.

o a bit of stone you find lying close by. And you let the stone down, and down, and

in the mere statements made. The water is near the top. You easily drink. And you are refreshed. Bu

ever beyond heart-understanding. You can sense and feel and love. You can open the sluice-gates into your heart, an

evealed in the very way he puts words and sentences and paragraphs together? I do not know. And if any of you think the thing I am about to spe

cription of this same personality. Both descriptions are rare in beauty and boldness, in simplicity and brevity. And right mi

ays. That's the whole thing. First the He fills your eye, and then what He did-came. And as you step off a bit for better perspective

est blending of the kingly and the kindly in His bearing. The purest purity, the utmost graciousness, the highest ideals, the gentlest manner, nobility beyond what we have known, and kin

e bosom of His Father, into the womb of a virgin maid, and into the heart of a race He came. Out o

act with the hate that was the only-begotten of sin, that He might woo

n a wooing erra