PART BY REV. W. B. GODBEY, A.M. Author of “Commentary on the New Testament, Volumes I, II, III, IV, V, and VI;” “Spiritual Gifts and Graces,” “Holy Land,” “Victory,” Holiness or Hell,” “Christian Perfection,” “Sanctification,” “Baptism,” “Woman Preacher,” and “Footprints of Jesus.” PURSUANT to the clamor of the holiness people from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from the Gulf to the Lakes, after long procrastination, feeling my incompetency, finally, five years ago, yielding to their importunity, I entered upon the arduous work of expounding the New Testament Scriptures exegetically for the common people, who desire to know the precious Word of the Lord and communicate it to others, hoping and praying the inspiration of the blessed Holy Spirit, Author of the everlasting Gospel, on our feeble efforts to expound His precious truth; not writing critically for the preachers, but lucidly, experimentally, and practically, sanguinely hoping that the rank and file of God’s sincere, humble, holy people, who, like the inspired Twelve, have no opportunities for collegiate learning, may study these books by the help of the Lord, go out and preach the gospel to the dying millions, not only in the home lands, but especially to those who sit in heathen darkness beyond the sea.

Deprecating the responsibility of writing up our Savior’s ministry, and assured that full salvation has steam-power enough to run up stream, I began at the end of the Book, to go back to the beginning, expounding the Apocalypse, that wonderful book of New Testament prophecy, first of all, constituting Volume 1 in the series. Volume 2, comprising Hebrews, Peter, James, John, and Jude, those wonderful books, so pregnant with perfection, fire, life, love and lightning, then followed. Now, reaching those beautiful, profound, and magnificent writings of the Apostle Paul, Volume 3, expounding Ephesians, Colossians, Philippians, First and Second Thessalonians, First and Second Timothy, Titus, and Philemon, including the Pastoral Epistles and the thrilling prophecies of Paul, setting forth the return of Jesus to this world, to translate His saints, set up His kingdom, and reign in glory, — themes whose absorbing and inspiring interest will ever prove an Archimedean lever, to lift the saints into higher communion, sweeter fellowship, and broader experiences. Then those wonderful Corinthian Epistles, expounding the gifts and graces of the Holy Ghost, till the sanctified intellect grows dizzy in contemplating the transcendent possibilities attainable by the citizens of the kingdom, even in this transitory life, and Galatians, elucidating the plan of salvation, as evolved out of the Abrahamic covenant, with a beauty, symmetry, force, and perspicuity unutterably charming and superlatively edifying, constitute Volume 4; while the Acts of the Apostles, that wonderful history of the advent and mighty works of the Holy Comforter, and that wonderful book of Romans, Paul’s Imperial Epistle, so wonderful for its symmetry, profundity, altitude, latitude, and longitude, containing an epitome of the whole Bible, constitute Volume 5. These five books I wrote between my tours in the Holy Land in 1895 and 1899. Though during the last tour I actually dictated the Commentary on the Gospels stenographically to an amanuensis, after my return, January 3d, in the quietude of the rural home, I have dictated Volume 6 to the amanuenses, beginning with the New Testament Gospels, by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, following the Greek Harmony, and expounding every word in the order in which they occur, — some things being written by the four, others by three and two, and a considerable quantity Of the precious Word by only one. Matthew, Mark, and Luke, writing historically, run much together; John, who wrote spiritually and experimentally, for the edification of the Church, generally going alone. As Volume 6 traverses thirty months of our Savior’s ministry, we only have six left for Volume 7, which concludes the series.

I am sure the first two and a half years of our Lord’s ministry are infinitely and even climacterically interesting and edifying to all the lovers of Jesus and His Word. Yet the valedictory period of His mission on earth, including the conspiracy of His enemies, His arrest, arraignment, condemnation, crucifixion, resurrection, and glorious ascension, constitute a series of themes, tragical and thrilling events, in point of historic interest eclipsing all the transcendent achievements of Alexander, Hannibal, Caesar, and Bonaparte; and the depths and heights, lengths and breadths of immortal truth, flashing out from His heroic deportment in the presence of His enemies, His imperturbable calmness and superhuman serenity when all others were tossed by the tempest and borne away on the wing of the tornado, and the unfathomable depth of that love which moved Him to die for His enemies, are destined to furnish inexhaustible soul pabulum, and hold all sincere lovers of truth, true righteousness, holiness, and heaven spell-bound, lost in unutterable bewilderment, while contemplating the tragical scenes of Calvary, the heavenly sunburst on the sepulcher, the profound mysteries of the ensuing forty days, and the ineffable glory which rolled in billows of light and beauty over Mt. Olivet, while multitudes, with mortal eyes, gazed upon the ineffable glory of His transfigured person, as He moved up the azure firmament, entering pavilions of snowy-white clouds, disappearing in the zenith of the bright Oriental firmament, while angels, robed in the splendor of snowy white, dropped down in His track, and with uplifted hands and eloquent lips, assured the electrified multitude that “this same Jesus, whom they have seen ascend, is coming back in like manner;” i .e ., going up amid clouds and accompanied by angels, so He will ride down amid thronging myriads of unfallen angels, and clouds whose effulgence will illumine the world, and call His saints to meet Him in the air. While the themes of the preceding; six volumes have been interesting and edifying beyond the possibility of mortal language to portray, certainly the valedictory ministry of our Lord will climax them all. So if this volume does not interest and edify the reader, it will be the fault of the writer and not of the theme.

CHAPTER - THE TEN LEPERS Luke 17:11-19. “And it came to pass, while He was journeying to Jerusalem, and He was going through the midst of Samaria and Galilee.” These two countries lie side by side. I traveled that same route from the, Sea of Galilee, through Samaria and Judea, to Jerusalem. “And He, coming into a certain village, ten leprous men met Him, who stood far away; and they lifted up their voice saying, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.” The lepers are still in that country. I saw them, and contributed a little to their temporal support. The city of Sychem — or Shechem, O.T.; and Sychar, N.T. — and now called Nablus, contains a leprous quarter. These lepers stood a long way off and called to Him; for two reasons doubtless: (a) Their loathsome and embarrassing condition; and (b) Their faith in Jesus to heal them even at that distance. “And seeing them, He said, Going, show yourselves to the priests. And while they were going, they were cleansed.” a. No leper was allowed to show himself to the priest till he had already been cleansed ( Leviticus 14), as neither the priest nor any human being had the power to cleanse a leper. The matter was understood by everybody that the cleansing of a leper could only come about by the miraculous intervention of the Almighty. b. A great popular mistake is entertained with reference to the contagion of leprosy. It is neither contagious nor epidemic, as you see in that case the priest, whose office brings him in constant contact with it, would have no chance whatever to escape the contagion. c. The separation of the lepers from the people, instituted in the days of Moses and perpetuated to the present, is simply because of its awful loathsomeness. d. How strikingly is the Scripture corroborated in that country in every respect, customs remaining unchanged from the patriarchal ages, so the traveler sees his Bible verified when he looks out on all sides, even the leprosy, in separate quarters, to be seen now as in the days of Christ! e. We never read about the healing of the leper, but always his “cleansing,” that word being used indicative of the dismal and awful impurity characteristic of leprosy, which is the very synonym of loathsome, living death, its poor victim living on like well people, and dying all the time — a finger dropping off, then another and another, till the hand drops off at the wrist, and finally the arm at the elbow, and then at the shoulder, all this time the decaying flesh emitting a most intolerable carrion odor. Hence the O.T. requirement of seclusion, which is perpetuated to the present day, the lepers themselves, conscious of their obnoxious repellency, preferring seclusion all the time. f . The solution of the whole problem is, that leprosy is the most vivid symbol of sin in all the world; and consequently always incurable by all human remedies. Therefore in all ages it was always understood that none but God could cleanse the leper. g . While leprosy is not contagious, it is intensely hereditary, being a blood trouble, and always transmitted from sire to son through the generations indefinitely, and in that respect most vividly emblematizing inbred sin. h. Of course, the leprous eruptions and running sores typify actual sins, which are the unhappy fruits of original sin, just as the awful cancerous sores of the leper all originate from contaminated blood. i . Leprous infants are bright, beautiful, and sprightly, exhibiting not a solitary symptom of the disease which, erelong, is sure to develop somewhere on the body, and cling to them through life, unless miraculously healed. In a similar manner, the infantile rattlesnake has no poison in his bite, the narcotic glands having not yet sufficiently developed to concentrate the poisonous virus from his blood and transmit it to another.

Yet the poison is there, and as the snake grows, it becomes transmissible by his bite. j. In a similar manner, the virus of inbred sin in the blood of humanity is transmissible indefinitely, like the infant leper, originally bright and fair, but in due time the occult virus making its appearance and intensifying to the end. k. The outward manifestations of the devouring leprosy symbolize evil habits, whose natural tendency is to accumulate impetuosity and dimension, culminating in hopeless ruin. l . Study the Oriental leprosy in all its phases, from its latency in the blood of the beautiful infant, its gradual and progressive development in the organism till it traverses the whole body, transforming it into a fetid, loathsome, living death, and how vividly does it symbolize sin, transmitted in the blood, but unseen in the beautiful, innocent babe, but sure ill due time to develop, making its manifestation on some part of the organism, and if not taken away by Omnipotent grace, spreading on indefinitely, culminating in irremediable ruin! “And one of them, seeing that he was healed, turned back, with a great voice glorifying God, and fell on his face at His feet, giving thanks to Him; and he was a Samaritan.” Here we see a case where sheer misery had triumphed over all the inveterate race prejudices which for ages had alienated the Jews and Samaritans, so that there was no intercommunication; and thus these poor lepers, both Jews and Samaritans, amid their awful sufferings and forlorn alienation from society, forgetting race antipathies, are all living together. “And Jesus responding, said, Were not the ten cleansed? Where are the nine? They were not found returning to give glory to God, except this foreigner.” When the Israelites were carried into captivity by Shalmaneser, B.C. 721, a few poor people were left in the country, who in after years proved insufficient to so occupy it as to prevent the wild beasts, especially the lions, from multiplying among them to their serious detriment. Consequently, Esarhaddon, the Chaldean monarch, sent to that country inhabitants from some of the heathen nations of the great North, who, with the few surviving Hebrews, eventually became the Samaritan nation, having predominantly the foreign, heathen blood, so that here, Jesus calls them “a foreign nation;” i .e ., not Jews, but heathens. “And He said to him, Arising, go; thy faith hath saved thee.” Here our Savior, as constantly and uniformly in His preaching, recognizes faith as the human condition of salvation, a truth so prominent in the Scripture that the most superficial Bible reader can not fail incessantly to recognize it. We see here salvation affirmed of this Samaritan, who returned to give glory to Jesus, our Lord remaining reticent in reference to the other nine, involving the conclusion that they did not get saved, but only healed. Hence you see it is quite an ill omen of salvation for people not to confess it to the honor and glory of God.

CHAPTER - JESUS AT THE FESTIVAL OF TABERNACLES John 7:11-16. “Therefore the Jews continued to seek Him at the feast, and say, Where is He? And there was much murmuring concerning Him among the multitude; some said that He is good; others said, No, but He deceiveth the multitude.” V. 13. “No one, indeed, spoke openly concerning Him, on account of the fear of the Jews. And the festival already being midway, Jesus came up into the temple, and was teaching. Then the Jews were astonished, saying, How does this One know letters, having never been taught? And Jesus responded to them, and said, My teaching is not Mine, but of Him that sent Me.” Jesus began His ministry, according to the prophecies, by coming into the temple and purifying it, casting out the buyers and sellers. Remaining but a few days after the Passover in Judea, He returned to Galilee, His native land, where He remained, preaching, healing the sick, and casting out demons, till the next Passover, which He also attended, returning to Galilee very soon after its adjournment. Remaining in Galilee the ensuing year, He did not go up to Jerusalem to the next Passover, which was the third in His ministry, evidently because the multitude, going from the cities around the Galilean Sea, were determined to crown Him King; consequently remaining in Galilee six months longer, with two little exceptions — the one when he went into Syria to Caesarea-Philippi, and the other when He went into Phenicia, the land of Tyre and Sidon. Now the Feast of Tabernacles, coming off in September, has rolled round. Having declined to go in the crowd, with His brothers and friends, in time for the opening, He goes on later, accompanied by His apostles, preaching and working miracles in Samaria as He passed along, arriving in Jerusalem about Wednesday, the festival, commemorative of Israel’s wilderness peregrinations, having opened on Sunday, and, as it says here, went immediately into the temple and began to teach. The critics even deny that He was ever in the temple proper, that being reserved for the priests alone; but this word “temple” was really applied to the Holy Campus, which is said to contain thirty-five acres, having very many elegant buildings on it at that time, and quite a number now, in several of which — e .g ., Solomon’s Porch and the Treasury — He taught the people; but as the vast multitudes during the festivals occupied the open air, it is more than likely that the most of His preaching in the temple was out on the pavement of that vast area, and overcanopied by naught save the blue, arching skies. During this eighteen months’ absence from Jerusalem and Judea, constant reports were coming from His fields of labor in Galilee, thrilling the people with wonder, curiosity, and amazement, all revolving in their minds what kind of a man can He be. Meanwhile, the high priests and Pharisees are most cunningly maneuvering to break the force of these thrilling reports and prejudice the people against Him, frequently sending their sharpest critics all the way to Galilee to hound Him wherever He went, hanging with diabolical chicanery on His lips, watching and criticizing every word, twisting and perverting all His utterances, laboring night and day to catch up something which they can pervert and magnify into an accusation against Him, so, if possible, to have Him arrested and turned over to the Sanhedrin or the proconsul. They charge Him with deceiving the multitude. How? Why, impressing them that He is the Messiah, when they claim that He is not. By the statement that He had never been taught, is simply meant that He had never gone to school to a rabbi that they knew of, there being no common schools in that day.

During this long interval of His absence from the South, the scribes and Pharisees have done their utmost to obliterate His influence in Jerusalem and Judea. Now, thirty months of His ministry having passed away, and not perhaps more than one month, all told, spent in the metropolis, but nearly all of His time having been appropriated in Galilee, an obscure country compared with Jerusalem and Judea, after the vociferous clamors of the clergy all this time, telling the people that He would never come back there, and if He did they would arrest Him, His sudden and bold appearing and preaching amid the vast multitudes on the Temple Campus produces a tremendous sensation, raising popular inquiry, and exciting curiosity to the very acme, and at the same time arousing all the clergy and official laity to unite against Him, determined if possible to so implicate Him as to secure His arrest, feeling chagrined before the multitude, who had so often heard them boasting that He would never come back, and certifying that if He did they would arrest Him and put Him to death, as they claimed that He richly deserved, as a false prophet.

VOLITION THE SALIENT FACT John 7:17,18. “If any one may wish to do His will, he shall know concerning the doctrine, whether I speak from God or from Myself. He that speaketh from himself, seeketh his own glory; he that seeketh the glory of Him that sent Him, the same is true, and there is no unrighteousness in Him.” In this passage, where the E.V. says, “If any one will do His will, he shall know concerning the doctrine,” the great salient point is actually omitted, using “will” as an auxiliary to “do;” whereas it is the leading verb on which the infinite “to do” depends, the original being thele , and should read, “If any one may will to do His will;” not simply to be willing or to wish to do His will, or to resolve to do His will, but actually to put forth the volition to do His will, which, in the Divine estimation, is actually doing it; because, “while man looks on the outside, God looks on the heart.” Hence, with God, the volition to do a thing is actually doing it. When you resolve to commit a crime, you are guilty of committing it, though mechanically kept from it by uncontrollable circumstances. Now, you see from this statement of our Lord, that the secret of human ignorance in reference to God’s Word and will is in the heart, rather than the understanding. Our Churches abound in people who say they can not understand sanctification.

They are under the delusion of the devil, who is side-tracking them on intellectual lines, simply to keep them from getting it. Sanctification, like regeneration, is an experience which no one can understand till he gets it.

The way out off this difficulty is simply to resolve, “I will have it or die,” and become an indefatigable seeker at the altar and everywhere else. In that case, you are sure to get it, and equally sure to understand it. Here, Jesus condemns the man who speaks of himself and seeks his own glory, thus putting all selfishness under eternal interdict. Sam Jones well says, “Hell is nothing but selfishness on fire.” Man is a dependency, independency invariably alienating him from God and superinducing eternal ruin.

APOSTASY OF THE JEWISH CHURCH John 7:19-23. “Did not Moses give you the law? and no one of you keeps the law.” Do you not see the utter collapse and failure of their religion, as neither priest nor people kept the law? Can we keep it?

Certainly, by the grace of God in Christ. “Love is the fulfilling of the law.” ( Romans 13:10) Hence, you see, all who have perfect love do, by the grace of God, keep and fulfill the law; not literally, but spiritually. “Why do you seek to kill Me? The multitude responded, Thou hast a demon; who seeks to kill thee?” Though the high priests and Pharisees had threatened to kill Him if He ever came back to Jerusalem, the respondent from the crowd did not know it. “Jesus responded, and said to them, One work I did, and you are all amazed.” That was the work of healing the invalid at the pool, which He did eighteen months previously, when last at Jerusalem. “Moses gave you circumcision: not that it is of Moses, but of the fathers; and you circumcise a man on the Sabbath.” God instituted circumcision in the days of Abraham, long before Moses was born. Jesus had healed the invalid of thirty-eight years on the Sabbath-day, while attending the second Passover of His ministry. The penalty under the law for violating the Sabbath being death by stoning, consequently they are constantly maneuvering to arrest and bring Him before the Sanhedrin, and try Him for Sabbath-breaking.

Here He utterly nullifies the allegation by the fact that they circumcise a man on the Sabbath. “If a man receives circumcision on the Sabbath, in order that the law of Moses may not be broken, are you mad at Me because I made a man entirely well on the Sabbath?” Thus He turns the argument against them, breaking their heads with their own club.

RIGHTEOUS JUDGMENT John 7:24-31. “Judge not according to sight.” The verb here is in the perpetual present, setting forth human proneness to judge people from the outward appearance. “But judge righteous judgment.” The verb in this clause is in the aorist tense, which means an instantaneous action and a permanent state following, involving the conclusion that instead of these helter-skelter judgments from the outside, we are to deliberately investigate, ascertain the truth, adopt it, and stick to it permanently. “Then certain ones of the Jerusalemites were saying, Is not this the One whom they are seeking to kill? And, behold, He speaks boldly, and they say nothing to Him.” These people in Jerusalem knew well that the high priests, scribes, and Pharisees had determined and boasted, during His long absence in Galilee, that if He ever came back there, they would kill Him. “Whether have the rulers truly found out that He is the Christ.” There was a prevalent, popular dogma that when Christ came, the wise rabbis and the Sanhedrin would be the first to find it out and tell the people. Now, as these Jerusalemites had heard them say that if He ever came back there they would have Him arrested and put to death, at the same time predicting that He would never come, alleging that He could do wonders off in Galilee among the ignorant people, but they dared Him to come to Jerusalem; and now that He is here, boldly and powerfully preaching to the multitudes, attending the Festival of Tabernacles, on the Temple Campus, and they do not molest Him; therefore they conclude that their great men must in some way have found out that He is the Christ, and consequently are just letting Him alone. “But we know this One, whence He is; but when Christ may come, no one knows whence He is.” There was a popular dogma that when Christ comes on tile earth, He will suddenly appear to the people, and no one will know anything about His origin, the prophecies of His conception and birth being mystified, so they did not understand them. “Then Jesus cried out, teaching in the temple, and saying, You know Me, and you know whence I am. But I did not come of Myself, but the One having sent Me is true, whom you know not.” He had been born at Bethlehem, only seven miles south of Jerusalem, and lived thirty years at Nazareth, only one hundred and fifty miles north of Jerusalem. Of course, He was well known to the Jewish nation, being a native of their country. But while they knew Him personally, though they claimed to be the most godly people in the world, He here frankly informs them that they do not know Him. “I know Him, because I am with Him, and He has sent Me.” Jesus here uses the present tense, only applicable to His Divinity, which was omnipresent, His humanity at that time being confined to this world. We frequently hear silly twaddle nowadays in reference to the impracticability of His presence on earth and in heaven during the millennium. All this is answered by His own proclamation, stating that while in Jerusalem, He was present with the Father. “Then they were seeking to arrest Him, and no One laid his hand on Him, because His hour had not yet come.” Jesus was immortal till His work was done, and so are His true followers. Therefore let us fear neither sickness nor death. We shall live till we finish our work. Then heaven will be infinitely preferable. “And many of the multitude believed on Him, and continued to say, When Christ may come, will He do more miracles than those which this Man doeth?” N.B. — Myriads of people were then at Jerusalem who had witnessed His mighty works in Galilee.

THE CHIEF PRIESTS AND PHARISEES SEND OFFICERS TO ARREST HIM John 7:32-34. “The Pharisees heard the multitude murmuring these things concerning Him, the chief priests and Pharisees sent officers that they may arrest Him.” His powerful preaching during the tabernacle festival is winning many converts, so they are believing on Him on all sides, and there is a great stir among the people; the thousands from Galilee and elsewhere, who had heard Him preach and witnessed His miracles, clamoring among all the people, so there is a great commotion, and everybody talking about the wonderful Prophet of Galilee. So here, at their great camp-meeting, He is more magnetic than all the high priests, theologians, rabbis, and Pharisaical magnates combined. Consequently, they get awfully mad, and resolve to carry on their threat, as the people are already twitting them with cowardice. So they cut the matter short, and send officers to arrest and bring Him at once to the Sanhedrin, assembled in the Judgment Hall of Caiaphas on Mount Zion.

THE DISPERSION OF THE GREEKS John 7:33-36. “Then Jesus said, Yet a little while I am with you, and I go to Him that sent Me. You shall seek Me, and shall not find Me, and where I am you are not able to come. Then the Jews said to one another, Whither is He about to go, that we shall not find Him? Whether is He about to go into the dispersion of the Greeks, and to teach the Greeks? What is this word which He said, Ye shall seek and not find Me, and where I am you are not able to come?” During the Alexandrian conquests, the Greeks conquered the whole world, and became the rulers of all nations, thus establishing their beautiful, concise, definite, vivid, perspicuous, and in every way wonderful language in every nation under heaven, preparatory for the preaching of Jesus and His apostles and the evangelization of the globe. The Jews, the most enterprising people in the world, had gone away on mercantile expeditions, and settled in all the important cities of the world, — a glorious preparation for the evangelization of all nations, the Jews constituting the nucleus of the gospel Church, and becoming the heralds of the living Word to the ends of the earth. Now the meaning of this passage is, they propound the question whether Jesus, forsaking the homelands, will go away into the Jewish settlements of the Gentile cities, and preach to the Jews in their world-wide dispersion among all nations.

RIVERS OF LIVING WATER FLOWING OUT OF THE HEART John 7:37-39. “And on the last great day of the festival, Jesus stood, and continued to cry out, saying, If any one may thirst, let him come and drink. He that believeth on Me, as the Scripture said, Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water. And He spoke this concerning the Spirit which those believing on Him were about to receive; for He was not yet; because Jesus was not yet glorified.” This is really the grand, salient proclamation of all the preaching of our Savior recorded by John on the present occasion.

The Scripture here referred to is Ezekiel 47:1-12, where we have that glorious description of the holy waters, flowing out from the right hand of the altar eastward, and down into the Dead Sea, transforming the wilderness of Judea into blooming gardens and fruitful fields, sanctifying and redeeming the poisonous waters of the Dead Sea, filling them with multitudes of the most valuable fishes, revivifying the whole surrounding country, dotting the shores of that desolate sea with thriving villages and populous cities, clothing the whole surrounding country with fruits and flowers, perennial verdure, and transforming all that vast, desolate region into an earthly paradise, thus symbolizing the wonderful potency of Spiritfilled people to transform the darkest jungles of our city slums and the gloomy wastes of heathen lands into holiness camp-meetings and millennial harbingers. The E.V., unfortunately, mars this wonderful passage by the translation, “Out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water,” using a word entirely too physical in its signification to harmonize with this superlatively spiritual passage. The word is koilia , which means “belly, stomach, heart, chest,” etc. Now you see the word we want here is “heart.”

How beautiful the passage, “Out of his heart [i.e., his interior, spiritual being] shall flow rivers of living water!” This is one of the finest passages in all the Bible, transcendently profound, sublime, thrillingly edifying, lucidly expository of the glorious, positive side of experimental sanctification, progressing indefinitely, through time and eternity — first, ankle-deep, putting us where we walk with God incessantly, going only where Jesus goes; then wading in to the knees, reaching an experience of great proficiency in kneeology, though ever so ignorant of theology, where we learn the grand secret of conquering on our knees; passing another interim of recognition and appreciation, we wade in up to the loins — i .e ., get where we vote our whole precinct for the Lord Jesus Christ, in everything keeping our eye on God, all temporal interests and emoluments left in oblivion; passing another interval of progress, we wade in over our heads; as now the waters have risen to a swimming depth, the specific gravity of the human body being less than that of water, we have nothing to do but lie supine, with limbs relaxed, facing the blue dome of the beautiful celestial temple, and float ad libitum with the current of God’s providence and grace, perfectly secure in the triple leadership of His Word, Spirit, and providence, respectively guiding the intellect, heart, and body.

GLORIFICATION OF JESUS John 7:39. “And He spoke this concerning the Spirit which those who believe on Him were about to receive; for he was not yet [given]; because Jesus was not yet glorified.” The Holy Ghost has been in the world in all ages, illuminating, convicting, regenerating, and sanctifying the people. Of course, He could not comfort the people in the administration of the complete, historic work of Christ till it had been consummated, by His vicarious atonement, resurrection, ascension, and intercession. While He was, in a sense, a Comforter of the O.T. saints, they only enjoyed the consolation of the prophecies setting forth the stupendous work of Christ in the world’s redemption. After the verification of all these wonderful prophecies relative to the stupendous work of the Son, Executive of human redemption from the fall, there was an immeasurable augmentation of the consolatory facilities, in the illumination of the spiritual understanding, in order to the reception and appropriation of the vicarious atonement in all of its grand, inexhaustible, and universal realities, comprehensive of every human being, from Adam down to the latest posterity. Thus the human side necessary to the reception of heavenly consolation was actually centuplicated by the glorious work of Christ, the confirmation of which was the glorification of Jesus. Many have risen claiming to be Christ — e .g ., Theudas, Simon Magnus, Marchochab, etc.; and Mohammed even claimed to be greater than Christ, — the trouble with them and all others consisting in the failure of the resurrection. Hence the glorification of Jesus and His ascension to the Father were the indispensable confirmations of His Christhood. Therefore the Holy Ghost must have all of these indisputable historic facts with which to satisfy and comfort the illuminated and sanctified intellect. Consequently this momentous history must actually transpire before the Holy Spirit could use these thrilling realities in the consolation of the saints. Of course, you all see clearly from this Scripture that this climacteric experience of heavenly rivers flowing out of the heart was actually received when the Holy Ghost fell on them at Pentecost.

Hence the glorification of Jesus certainly preceded the descension of the Comforter on that notable occasion. We certainly could not conclude that our Lord was glorified long before Pentecost, as evidently these events are closely identified in the order of consecution, the one being the antecedent and the other the consequent. I find the word edoxasthe , for the glorification of Jesus, is in the passive voice and aorist tense, peculiarly signifying an instantaneous and complete action, which evidently took place when He flew up from Mt. Olivet. This work of glorification, wrought by the Holy Ghost, eliminates all ponderous matter out of the organism, simultaneously spiritualizing the body and rendering it imponderable.

IGNORANCE OF THE JEWS John 7:40-44. “Then some of the multitude, hearing these words, continued to say, Truly this One is the Prophet.” This is a phrase in O.T. often applied to the Messiah. “Others continued to say, He is the Christ.” I trow, the latter were Galileans, who had so frequently heard Him preach and witnessed His mighty works. “Others continued to say, Whether does Christ come out of Galilee?” Doubtless these were Jerusalemites, who looked with a degree of contempt on the Galileans, whose opportunities of light and culture had been quite inferior to those of Southern Palestine. “Does not the Scripture say that Christ cometh of the seed of David, and from Bethlehem, the village where David was?” Do you not see the gross and inexcusable ignorance here manifested? Bethlehem being only seven miles distant, and Jesus actually having been born there, according to the prophecies they now quote against Him, being shamefully ignorant of the fact that He was not born up in Galilee, as they claim, but in Bethlehem, and though constantly stigmatized as a Galilean, He was really a Bethlehemite. “Therefore there was a division in the crowd with reference to Him.” It seems that none there present knew the facts of His having been born in Bethlehem, all thinking that He was really a Galilean, some claiming His Christhood, notwithstanding the ostracism brought to bear against Galilee, and others rejecting him altogether on that account. Why did not He or some of His apostles speak out, and tell them that He was born in Bethlehem of Judea? It would have done no good, because they had a caviling spirit, and would have lighted on something else. “And some of them wished to arrest Him, but no one laid hands on Him.” They could not touch Him till His work was done.

REPORT OF THE OFFICERS SENT TO ARREST HIM John 7:45-49. “Then the officers came to the chief priests and Pharisees, and they said to them, Why did you not lead Him along? The officers responded, Never did a man speak as this Man is speaking.” The Sanhedrin were in session in the Hall of Caiaphas on Mount Zion, in the west end of the city, while Jesus was preaching on the Temple Campus in the east end. These officers came for the express purpose of arresting and leading Him away to the Sanhedrin for trial. You see their excuse is utterly silly, no plausibility in it whatever. The simple solution of the matter was, they could not put their hands on Him; an unseen Power simply disqualifying them to touch Him. When they did their utmost, they signally failed to lay a solitary hand on His person. Hence, after much delay and endeavor to arrest Him, they are forced to give up in despair, and go back without Him. He was intangible and immortal till His work was done — a grand consolation, substantially true in case of His faithful followers.

HUMAN LEADERSHIP “The Pharisees responded to them, Whether are you also deceived?” They now turn the tantalizing reproach on the officers, doing their utmost to intimidate everybody from following Him. “Whether has any one of the rulers of the Pharisees believed on Him? But this rabble, not knowing the law, are accursed.” Here you see they pertinaciously condemn everybody who does not follow their leaders. This has always been the case with fallen Churches. Nothing but the full sanctification of the Holy Ghost ever does save people from human leadership, which is all wrong, as no really godly person wants to lead; but all such do their utmost, by instruction, exhortation, and prayer, to prevail on the people to follow Jesus only.

Human leadership is a trick of the devil, by which he has populated hell with millions; as the leader, getting out of kilter by Satanic maneuver or human intrigue, he and all his followers will plunge headlong into hell.

God’s leaders don’t want any following; but all do their utmost to get the people to follow the Lord. You are in awful danger of perdition when following a human leader, as none are infallible, and the best are liable to make mistakes which would prove fatal. I have been presiding elder and pastor frequently, yet I never wanted any human following.

NICODEMUS VINDICATES HIM John 7:50-52. “Nicodemus says to them, being one of them, Whether does our law condemn a man until it may first have a hearing with him, and know what he doeth? They responded, and said to him, Whether are you also from Galilee? Search and see that no prophet riseth from Galilee.” You see here they are ringing charges of reproach on Galilee, because most remote from Jerusalem, the center of light and knowledge, the home of the hierarchy, the seat of the rabbinical colleges, and the glory of Israel.

Consequently they look down with contempt on the poor, ignorant Galileans, and think they have made a point, because the prophecies do not specify a great prophet in that age rising out of Galilee, whereas it was not at all applicable to Jesus, who had simply used it as an evangelistic field.

Nicodemus never survived that memorable nocturnal sermon which Jesus preached to him, more than two years ago, on the new birth. As he was an influential member of the Sanhedrin, which was solid against Jesus, how beautiful to see him, true to his convictions, standing alone, and thus daring to vindicate Him! It is a significant fact that Jesus was actually mobbed, being denied a fair trial according to Jewish law, as you here see from the testimony of Nicodemus, which, like the English and American Magna Charta, guaranteed to every accused person a fair trial, bringing the witnesses face to face, and giving them a chance to “implead one another.”

It is equally true in reference to Roman law, as testified by Festus in case of Paul, that every man under accusation had a right to bring the witnesses face to face, prove the guilt or innocence of the accused, and thus bring about a true verdict of acquittal or condemnation in harmony with right and equity. Jonah, one of the first Hebrew prophets, called of God to preach to the Ninevites, was a Galilean, despite all this howl against Jesus on the allegation of no prophet rising from Galilee.

CHAPTER - THE ADULTEROUS WOMAN John 8:1-11. I merely insert this caption through courtesy to the English reader; but will be excused from the exposition, as this item is entirely absent from the original, having been interpolated in post-apostolic times, as John, in whose gospel it appears in the E.V., is the last writer, and he never wrote it. There is no doubt but it was added by some of the clergy after the Constantinean apostasy as an apology for sin.

THE LIGHT OF LIFE John 8:12-16. “Then, Jesus again spoke to them, saying, I am the Light of the world; the one following Me can not walk in darkness, but shall have the Light of life.” The subjunctive mode is here very consolatory, assuring us that no one following Jesus can walk in darkness, but that all such will have the Light of life. The world is full of deluded people, walking in the false light of spiritual death. Dead bodies frequently, in dense darkness, emit a phosphorescent light, which only serves to bewilder and delude. If you do not have the life of the Holy Ghost in your heart, you are walking in Satan’s counterfeit light of spiritual death, whose phosphorescent glare can only illumine the way to hell. Cold Churches have no light but this illusory ignis-fatuus of the devil, only serving to delude its carnal votaries, till their feet finally slip and they take the awful plunge. As true light of every species emanates from fire, so without the fire of the Holy Ghost in your heart, you will not have the “Light of life.” “Then the Pharisees said to Him, Thou art witnessing concerning Thyself; Thy testimony is not true.” This is a stratagem on the part of the Pharisees to turn His own utterances against Him. “Jesus responded, and said to them, If I testify concerning Myself My testimony is true, because I know whence I came and whither I go. You do not know whence I come and whither I go. You judge according to the flesh; I judge no one. And if I judge, My judgment is true, because I am not alone, but I and He who sent Me.” In vain do they seek to turn Him down on His own affirmation, that if one testifies of himself, standing alone, his testimony is not true, as He and His Father testify in perfect harmony, thus confirming the truth and establishing the validity of His testimony.

WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT John 8:17-20. “And it has been written in your law, That the testimony of two people is true. [ Deuteronomy 19:15] I am the one testifying concerning Myself, and the One who sent Me testifies concerning Me.” Here is the experimental consolation of every true Christian, the Holy Spirit witnessing along with his own spirit that he is born of God, and that his heart is clean, thus bringing all Christian testimony into harmony with the Divine law, by which every affirmation is made valid. “Then they said to Him, Where is Thy Father? Jesus responded, You do not know Me nor the Father; if you had known Me, you would also have known the Father.

He spoke these words, teaching in the treasury in the temple, and no one arrested Him, because His hour had not yet come.” There were many magnificent buildings on the Temple Campus, all indiscriminately denominated “the temple.” We have here quite a significant statement of our Savior, while looking those preachers and official laymen in the face, and notifying them that they did not know God, involving the conclusion that they were sinners on their way to perdition. Doubtless they were as honest as the clergy, and ecclesiastical rulers of the present day. What an awful inference is deducible! Lord, help us all to examine ourselves, and see whether we truly know God!

ALARMING PREDICTION AGAINST THEM John 8:21-27. “Then He again said to them, I go, and you shall seek Me, and you shall perish in your sin; whither I go, you are not able to come.” The prophetic eye of Jesus saw the awful calamities coming on those people, when they would perish miserably by sword, pestilence, and famine, doubtless many of them seeing their awful error when too late. “Then the Jews said, Whether will He kill Himself? because He says, Whither I go, you are not able to come; and He said to them, You are from beneath, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world.” Those people, both preachers and members, solidly believed themselves to be the true people of God. Here the Infallible Teacher informs them that they are from beneath; i .e ., not only unacquainted with God, but actually in the hands of Satan, and led captive at his will. “Therefore I said unto you, that you shall perish in your sins; for if you may not believe that I am He, you shall perish in your sins.” This is a most solemn and sweeping abnegation of all human hope without Christ. John the Baptist had preached to those people three years previously, telling them, in words of heavenborn eloquence, winged with celestial lightning, that this Jesus is the veritable Christ of prophecy, Redeemer of Israel and Savior of the world; actually pointing Him out, introducing Him to them, and inaugurating Him into His official Messiahship by the rite of baptism. These three years they have been taking counsel of the devil, imbibing unbelief, hardening their hearts, and stiffening their necks against the truth; not only sealing their own doom, but, by precept and example, leading the multitudes in the way of death. “Then they said to Him, Who art Thou? Jesus said to them, That which I tell you from the beginning, I tell you now. I have many things to speak and judge concerning you.” He knew that the judgment of the quick and dead would devolve on Him in the last day. “But the One having sent Me is true; and whatsoever things I heard with Him, these I am speaking to the world.” What a wonderful blessing is the gospel of Christ, as, having lived in heaven from the dawn of creation, in the very bosom of God, He then spoke on earth precisely what He heard from His Omniscient Father! “They did not know that He was speaking to them of the Father.” THE CRUCIFIXION John 8:28,29. “Then Jesus said, When you may lift up the Son of man, then you shall know that I am He; and I do nothing of Myself; but as the Father taught Me, these things I speak.” In that memorable sermon to Nicodemus, in the beginning of His ministry, in His reference to Moses lifting up the serpent, our Lord assures us by what death He is going to die.

Here He repeats the affirmation. This was quite a new departure, as the Jews had no such a punishment, it being peculiarly Roman. Hence, His death by the hands of the Gentiles, by the most cruel of all methods, He predicts ever and anon. When His ministry thus wound up, it was too late for those hard-hearted, unbelieving Jews, as doubtless the Holy Spirit withdrew, leaving them to their dreadful doom; meanwhile, the darkening sun, rending rocks, heaving earthquakes, bursting tombs, risen saints, rending veil, descending angels, empty sepulcher, etc., would inundate them with conviction that they had actually killed the Prince of light, not a few of them repenting and getting saved during the Pentecostal revival, but vast multitudes only the more hardened, evidently having crossed the deadline, and sealed their doom in endless woe. “The One having sent Me is with Me; He has not left Me alone, because I always do those things pleasing unto Him.” Jesus is our only Paragon. Such is the bountiful redeeming grace which He gives His humble followers, that we are enabled always to do those things pleasing to the Father, thus walking in His footprints and emulating His example.

DEGREES OF FAITH John 8:30-32. “He speaking these words, many believed on Him.

Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed on Him, If you may abide in My Word you are truly My disciples; you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” We see from the context that these Jews, addressed in these verses, had but a vague, shadowy faith in Him, believing that He was an extraordinary messenger sent of God, a prophet, and might perhaps, in the end, prove to be the Christ who is to redeem Israel. O how the Churches of the present day abound in this superficial, carnal belief in Christ, which staggers at the promises, failing in their appropriation!

EGREGIOUS BLINDNESS OF THE JEWS John 8:32,33. “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. They responded to Him, We are the seed of Abraham, and have never been in bondage to any one; how do You say, That you shall be free?” This illustrates the alarming fact that even religious people may become so hallucinated by the devil as to tell falsehoods with unblushing effrontery and amazing volubility, and at the same time not know it, but think they are preaching the truth. Not only had these Jews been in bondage to the Egyptians two hundred and fifteen years, but at that very moment they were in bondage to the Romans, and, worst of all, to the devil.

THE SLAVE OF SIN John 8:34. “Jesus responded to them, Truly, truly, I say unto you, That every one doing sin is the slave of sin.” The devil’s people all night long wheeling in the mazy gyrations of the giddy, lustful dance, quaffing the inebriating bowl till they kindle hell-fire in their blood and transform their cranium into rattlesnake dens, wasting their vitality in brutal debaucheries and diabolical sensualities, vainly dream in their drunken revelries that they are the freest people in all the world because they can do such things, while at the same time they are the most miserable slaves, demons from the bottomless pit lashing them with the firebrands of inflamed appetites and abnormal passions, actually precipitating them into suicide, and forcing them, in the black foundries of an earthly pandemonium, to forge the adamantine chains that shall bind them in penal fires through the flight of eternal cycles.

THE SON THE AUTHOR OF TRUE FREEDOM John 8:35,36. “The slave does not abide in the house forever.” This great and beautiful world is one of God’s houses, in which not a few of His children have been living these six thousand years. All sinners are the slaves of sin and Satan. The slaves never inherit anything, having neither possessions nor rights in the home, their sojourn being transitory, and winding up when they are worn out and can toil no more. Not so with the son. He inherits the estate, transmits it to his children, and in his posterity abides forever. The wicked think they are getting this world, while they are simply traveling through it to their bed in hell. Now, suppose the son of the estate liberates and adopts a slave, do you not see that he will abide forever?

So the time is very near when the redeemed of the Lord shall possess this world, with other paradisian orbs, to shine and shout forever, every track of the wicked having been obliterated in the sanctifying fires, followed by the glorious renovation ( Revelation 1), making the earth new, and enveloping it in a new firmament, which never reverberated the blasphemy of the wicked.

SATANIC PATERNITY OF THE UNREGENERATE John 8:37-47. “I know that ye are the seed of Abraham; but you seek to kill Me, because My Word has no place in you.” How sad the condition of those preachers and people when Jesus, looking through them, actually saw them full of repellency and diabolical antagonism to the truth! N.B.

You will find it so in many Churches nowadays, I awfully fear and doubt not. “Whatsoever things I saw with the Father, I speak; therefore you indeed are doing the things which you heard with your father.” This arouses in those shrewd, cultured priests an awful suspicion that He is impeaching their claim to the Abrahamic paternity. “They responded, and said to Him, Abraham is our father. Jesus says to them, If you are the children of Abraham, you did the works of Abraham; but now you are seeking to kill Me, a man who has spoken to you the truth which I heard with God. Abraham did not this. You are doing the works of your father.

They said to Him, We have not been born of fornication; we have one father, God. Then Jesus said to them, If God were your Father, you would love Me with Divine love; for I came out from God, and I go back; for I have not come from Myself, but He sent Me. Wherefore do you not know My speech? Because you are not able to hear My word.” What a profound significance! His words were then ringing in their ears! Yet He said, “You are not able to hear My word.” The mystery is readily solved. The soul has the five senses — i .e ., sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch — just like the body. When the soul is dead, as in the case of all the unregenerate, the senses are all dead with it. A dead man has eyes, but they are dead; ears, but they are dead; smelling organs, but they are dead; a tongue, but it is dead; nerves, but they are dead. Now these preachers, Church officers, and members, in whose physical ears His sweet, eloquent, melodious words were ringing, heard them plainly with their bodily ears, yet He certifies to them, “You are not able to hear My word.” This is the reason why they rejected it: His utterances were deep, rich, spiritual truth, and they were spiritually dead, so they never heard them; they rang in at one ear and out at the other, the dead soul within knowing nothing about the message of life which had resounded in their mortal ears. How signally does this penetrating truth apply to the fallen Churches of the present day, both ministers and members, as well as to this wicked world! What is the remedy in that case? An avalanche of importunate prayer, that the Holy Ghost may quicken them into life, in which case their spirit will hear and understand the glorious spiritual truth of the gospel. Deficiency of prayer explains multitudes of failures on the part of holiness preachers and workers. As a rule, it is painfully deficient. Shall we not wake up to the fact that we waste our ammunition on dead game, if we do not pray down the Holy Ghost to quicken them into life? “You are of your father the devil, and you wish to do the lusts of your father.” This tells an awful secret, which everybody ought to know, smashing the silly Universalist dogma now ringing from the Protestant pulpits; i .e ., the Divine paternity of the wicked.

You see from the very words of the Savior that it is not so. Preachers, standing in their pulpits, address their audiences as the “children of God,” when in all probability nine-tenths of them are the children of the devil, having never been born from above. Divine life was lost in the fall, and is only regained in regeneration. Consequently all the unregenerate, — whether never converted or backslidden, as you see from the plain words of our Savior, here addressed, not simply to the uncouth rabble, but to the preachers and Church members, — all the unregenerate are the spiritual children of the devil till quickened into life by the Holy Ghost. “He was a murderer from the beginning, and stood not in the truth, because the truth is not in him.” How is the devil a murderer? He murders all the souls that follow him, beginning with the destroying angels, and sweeping down the terrestrial ages, deluging hell with the fallen millions. “When he may speak the lie, he speaks of his own, because he is the liar, and the father of the same. But because I speak the truth, you do not believe Me.” Those people, like the fallen Churches of every age, were deluded by Satan’s lies, making them believe that they were saved when they were lost, in order to blind them and lead them down to hell. Humanity is uniform in all ages. So is Satan, sin, religion, salvation, and God the same now as in our Savior’s time. You must not shove aside these awful truths uttered by our Savior and leave them with the scribes and Pharisees, when they apply to the present generation as pertinently as to them. The world is girdled with Churches today — Pagan, Mohammedan, Papal, and Protestant — standing spiritually precisely where our Savior’s audience, backslidden members of the Jewish Church, stood, so deceived and led away by Satan’s lies, making them believe that they are Christians and on their way to heaven, while they are sinners and on their way to hell, that a preacher coming among them and telling them the truth, as Jesus did, shares the same fate — i .e ., is rejected and persecuted; while a false prophet coming along, and helping Satan to keep them blindfolded till he can dump them into hell, is received like an angel, remunerated, honored, and applauded as a man of God, such as all Churches need. Lord give us all the light, help us to be true, like Jesus, and abide our destiny! “Which one of you convicts Me concerning sin? If I speak the truth, why do you not believe Me?” “Convict” here is the very word descriptive of the condemnatory sentence of a criminal judge, as Jesus defied men and devils to convict Him concerning sin. Good Lord, help us all so to speak the truth and walk in His footprints that we can challenge the powers of earth and hell! His own Church fell out with Him and killed Him because He told them the truth. If He had preached falsehood, they would have received Him with enthusiasm. Satan’s people love lies and fatten on them, preparatory for a barbecue in hell, when devils will