Unbelief inexcusable.
It is significant and affecting to find that in the last deliberate discourse which our Lord Jesus addressed to his disciples, he not only administered comfort to his friends, but uttered words of sad rebuke to his enemies. He knew full well that the attitude which was taken towards him by the Jewish leaders was typical of the regard and treatment of multitudes besides; and his reproaches have a scope far beyond their immediate application.
I. THE MANIFESTATION OF UNBELIEF. This is to be seen in the open rejection and persecution of the Lord Jesus.
II. THE CAUSE OF UNBELIEF. This is not intellectual difficulty, but moral repugnance. The Jewish enemies of Jesus hated his holy character, his denunciations of their worldliness and hypocrisy, his lofty and spiritual standard of teaching, his claims to supreme authority.
III. THE GUILT OF UNBELIEF. This is especially to be recognized in what unbelief of Christ involves. Hatred of the Father, God, and consequent hatred of his holy Law and his benevolent purposes,—such is the charge which Jesus brings against his foes. In rejecting Christ, they were showing themselves to be out of sympathy with the mind and will of him who is eternal righteousness and goodness. This was their sin and condemnation.
IV. THE INEXCUSABLENESS OF UNBELIEF. As powerfully set forth by Jesus Christ in this passage, this is to be observed in three respects.
1. Christ s words, his incomparable teaching, were a witness to his authority, and should have been received with reverence, gratitude, and faith. It should have been an all-sufficient witness to him who spake as never man spake. The truths he revealed, the laws he imposed, the promises he gave, were all such as would have commanded the respect of those morally prepared to appreciate the utterances of One who came from heaven.
2. Christ's marvelous works were well fitted to second the impression produced by his words. They, indeed, appealed to an inferior faculty of human nature, but they were necessary in order to the completeness and justice of the impression to be made upon the minds of our Lord's contemporaries. His enemies did not deny the reality of our Lord's miracles, but they misinterpreted them, attributing them, by an absurd ingenuity, to an infernal source.
3. The hatred, enmity, and unbelief of the Jews were inexcusable because they were "without a cause." By this we must understand, not that there was no motive in the minds of his foes, but that there was no justification for their conclusions or for their conduct.—T.
Witness, Divine and human.
The work of God in the world, so far as it is spiritual, is effected by human agency. Upon man's heart the Author of life and salvation works by means of truth and love, embodied in human language and human actions. The Word, in acting as "the faithful and true Witness," "became flesh." And in this dispensation, whilst Christ is the Savior and the Lord of men, Christ is revealed by the Spirit to human hearts, and it is through human agency, thus called into action, that the kingdom of God is advanced, and the gracious purposes of God fulfilled.
I. THE WITNESS OF THE SPIRIT OF GOD TO CHRIST.
1. This is a Witness Divine in origin and nature. He proceedeth from the Father, and all his acts and operations are Divine.
2. This is a Witness possessing the very highest qualifications. This appears even from the appellations by which he is here mentioned: "The Spirit of truth," whose special office it is to make the Word of God, the gospel of salvation, real, living, and powerful over the nature of man; "the Comforter," or Advocate, who comes to the feeble and helpless disciple of Christ, and pours into him celestial strength and wisdom.
3. This is a Witness commissioned by Christ to testify of himself. What authority does the Lord Jesus claim, when he says, "Whom I will send unto you;" and how distinct is the declaration of the purpose of his mission in the promise, "He shall testify of me"!
II. THE WITNESS TO CHRIST BORNE BY HIS OWN DISCIPLES.
1. Their qualifications.
2. The method of their testimony. The apostles and other disciples of Jesus bore witness to him:
3. The matter of their testimony. Chiefly, if not exclusively, their witness was to relate to Christ himself.. This was an appointment of Divine wisdom; for the Lord Jesus was incarnate Wisdom, Truth, Pity, and Benevolence. It has ever been found in human experience that those who have received the inspired witness to Immanuel, have received with him all the spiritual and immortal blessings which God made him the Medium of carrying to human souls.
APPLICATION. The Holy Spirit is still witnessing in the Church to him who is its Savior and Lord; and it is the part of all who receive this witness in the power of the same Spirit to repeat and extend the testimony.—T.
HOMILIES BY B. THOMAS