JOHN 12 (2)
JOHN 12 (2)
FER The language we get here, I think, must, to a great many people, seem almost an enigma. I am sure it must be an enigma to any but a spiritual mind, because really we are in exactly the same world, and the world itself is exactly the same, and yet we get such expressions as, “If any one serve me, let him follow me”. The world is not a bit changed, that is certain, and I am still in it, and yet there are the Lord’s words still addressed to us as forcibly as ever. I think people can understand the idea of earth; we all know something about the earth, and most people have an idea of heaven, but it is a very great deal more difficult to take in the idea of heavenly ground whilst still down here. It is certainly a thing which none but a spiritual mind could possibly understand.
Ques Is that what is meant by following Him?
FER The Lord must have meant that when He said, “there shall also my servant be”. Of course we are not yet in heaven, that is certain.
Rem What is on the other side is the only thing [p. 232] that lasts.
FER Yes; the other side of death. I do not think, as you say, that there is anything safe but the resurrection platform; and yet it is a very mythical platform to any but a spiritual mind. Man regards the earth as stable, but even that quakes sometimes; still, man knows something of the earth, and he knows something about heaven, but there is in Scripture something which is far more difficult to take in.
Ques In what sense is it to “serve” here?
FER Oh, to minister; it is the same word as ‘deacon’. You remember “they had John to their minister” — that is, he helped them in their work.
Rem And the servant to be efficient must take his place with the Lord.
FER I think so. I think he needs to be on the platform where divine power is active.
Ques Did you say “is acting”?
FER Has acted. Resurrection is, I think, the ground which God has established, and where divine power has been displayed.
Ques. Over Jordan?
FER Yes; that is where Christ is, that is perfectly certain. Christ is not this side of Jordan, it is on the other side that you find Him — “there shall also my servant be”.
Rem In the type, in the case of the children of Israel, they were, in a certain sense, in resurrection, I suppose, in the wilderness. They had come through the Red Sea.
FER No, I do not think so. Christ was in resurrection, and faith in Christ risen was typified, but I think to have resurrection experimentally you must bring together the Red Sea and Jordan — make them coalesce, in that way.
Rem Is it not true that many a person has been through the Red Sea who has not gone over Jordan?
FER Yes; I think there is a great deal of difference between the two.
[p. 233] Ques How far does service go here; is it in its wide sense?
FER I do not know at all; it is just the common word for serve, “If any man serve me”, it is the idea of ministering to Christ. You see the obligation which the Lord puts upon such an one. “If any man serve me, let him follow me; and where I am” — not where I shall be, but where I am — “there shall also my servant be”.
Ques What do you think the Lord means by that, “where I am”?
FER The Lord was always morally outside this scene, though He passed out of it entirely by death; but still, in one sense, I think it made very little difference to Him, because He was morally always outside of it.
Rem There is a great deal of service where you cannot think that the servants are on the resurrection platform, is there not?
FER Yes, I think so. The true character of service is to lead people on to that ground, and a man must be on it himself before he can lead others on to it. What they seek is to bring the grace of God to people here, but it is too limited — it stops short. It is perfectly right and true to tell people that Christ died for our sins, but then you must not ignore the other part of it, to “deliver us from this present evil world”. You must not cloak that part of it, merely taking the first part and leaving out the second. Light has come into the world, not for people to have light in the world, but to show them the way out of it.
Ques Why do you think people are so afraid of telling the whole truth?
FER Well, I think they are — that is, many of the evangelists — afraid to confess the sovereignty of God’s purpose. I think that, in principle, they are Arminian.
Ques. And what [p. 234] is that?
FER I think they look at the gospel as that which man can receive or reject, that is how they present the gospel; they are afraid almost to look in the face the sovereignty of the will of God. If they did but take it in, and worked more on that line, the effect of their work would be to lead people out of the world, and to bring them where Christ is. I quite admit, of course, that it is in the power of man to reject the gospel, and a great many do reject it, and they will come under the responsibility of rejecting. “Light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light”.
Rem The fact is that all would have rejected the gospel but for the sovereignty of God.
FER Yes; that is really the case, and even in the gospel of Luke you get, “Compel them to come in”, and then, too, “None of them that were bidden shall taste of my supper”. They were bidden and they did not come.
Rem “Through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins”, but then, “Beware therefore, lest that come upon you, which is spoken of in the prophets”.
FER Yes; and it goes on: “Behold, ye despisers, and wonder, and perish” — and in that connection it is added, “As many as were ordained to eternal life believed”.
Ques What does “ordained” mean?
FER It is just the common word; it is to put in order with a view to a certain result.
Here (verse 27) the Lord goes on to say, “Now is my soul troubled, and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour. Father, glorify thy name”. I think the Lord was recognising the ground on which everything was going to be placed; I think the Father’s name was to be glorified in resurrection; because resurrection [p. 235] really brings out the glory of the Father. Resurrection really is that in which the Father is revealed.
Rem “Raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father”.
FER Yes; that is the new ground, that in which the Father is displayed. “The Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them” — you get that in chapter 5, it originates in the Father. I think the Son does it because the Father does it: “As the Father raises the dead and quickens them, thus the Son also quickens whom he will” — it is that in which the Father is displayed. It is in consequence of what God is that man will have to be raised for judgment; but that would not be the glory of the Father. Man being such as he is, and God being such as He is, man has to come into judgment, but there is no declaration of the Father’s name in that. The Father raises up the dead and quickens. “The Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son: that all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father”. What the Father does is, He raises up the dead and quickens, and the Son does what He sees the Father doing.
Rem That is the force of “I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again” (verse 28).
FER Yes; it is the Father’s glory; but the character of everything that is raised, subjectively, is derived from the Son — it takes its character from the Son, and the Father is glorified thereby, because the Son of God will be expressed. In the church, for instance, it is all taken out of death, that He may be expressed by it, but He is glorified subjectively. The Father’s glory is more connected with His counsel, it is that which reveals the Father. The revelation of the Father is bound up with resurrection. I do not see how the Father could act in a scene of death. He could not act within that sphere, but He acts outside it.
Ques He brings one up out [p. 236] of it?
FER Yes, that is it.
Ques And He works that way in quickening?
FER Yes; He puts you outside of it too.
Ques In chapter 17, “Glorify thou me” — is that in resurrection?
FER Yes, I think so. And the subjective thing is, “All ... thine are mine; and I am glorified in them”. The Father is glorified in the accomplishment of His counsel.
Rem And the Lord is glorified, would you say, in the number of those who are quickened into the same likeness?
FER Yes; “I am glorified in them”. I do not think it was that the Lord Himself was glorified at that particular moment in the disciples, but He is glorified in the fact that all that comes out of death takes its character from Him. It is the Father that raises up the dead and quickens them, it originates in the Father, that is the way the Lord puts it in chapter 5 — He “quickens whom he will”.
Rem All this latter part of John anticipates the fact that resurrection has taken place?
FER Yes; it is so all through in a way. The fact is this, that the whole of the gospel of John is entirely outside of every dispensation here. That is nothing new, but it comes home to one more and more as the gospel comes before us afresh. It is the unfolding of the Father’s name, the glory of the Father.
Rem That starts in chapter 1?
FER Yes, I think so. He could not work in this sphere, His work is all outside. It is not, however, to take people to heaven, but to put people on heavenly ground down here.
Rem “I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world”.
FER No; but “that thou shouldest keep them from the evil”.
[p. 237] Ques What is the bearing of the expression, “ascend up” (chapter 6: 62)?
FER He was going up because the Father had the first claim upon Him. If He is raised up from the dead, the Father had the first claim upon Him. The Lord shows the direction He takes and it is our proper direction too, we are ascending up in that sense.
Rem You do not get the ascension really in John. He was always with the Father, and therefore there is no need of ascension, as such.
FER No; He was “the only-begotten Son ... in the bosom of the Father” — and the great point in the gospel is to put us in the same place morally.
Rem As a man He came into the world to accomplish the Father’s will.
FER Yes; it is that which enables you to understand the latter part of the chapter. “I am come a light into the world”. He was a light in the world because He revealed the Father. Then, of course, there was this also, that the ground had to be cleared for God. The man that stood in the way had to be removed, the man that existed — “Now is my soul troubled”. I think the first man had to be removed in order that Christ might fill everything, to make room for Christ. There was no room for Christ until the first man was removed.
Ques Was the first man removed in figure at the Red Sea?
FER I do not think so. You see, all those different types of the death of Christ coalesce, all the types refer to the one death of Christ. We may have different aspects of it presented to us, but there is, of course, only one death, and all the types combine to set it forth. The death of Christ, as it was before God, was in its completeness; we only apprehend it in detail.
Rem This chapter brings out, more than any, the necessity of His death.
[p. 238] FER Yes; and the Lord was in the consciousness of what was involved in order that the offending man might be removed from before God. God was to have to say to man apart from sin, and the flesh, and death, but then all these things had to be met to the glory of God. Christ had to enter into everything, He was made sin, “who knew no sin”, and He was made “in the likeness of sinful flesh”, and He had to “taste death”. He had to taste it all; in death He had to taste what it meant, so that it might be in the power of God to have to say to man entirely apart from sin, and the flesh, and death. What the gospel virtually says is, Death has ended all for Him, it is all closed up for Him, and therefore God can present Himself to man — can approach man — entirely apart from the question of sin, or death, or the flesh.
Ques He approaches in Christ in resurrection?
FER Yes; He Himself is on the ground of resurrection in His approach to man. God takes that ground in approaching man. It is as though He said, “I am free to approach you now, entirely apart from any question of sin, or flesh, or death — the blood of Christ is the witness that all is gone”. But then this could not be the case unless all these things had been entered into. God “made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin” — Christ had to enter into all. “When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin” — a sacrifice for sin; and then “God sending his own Son ... condemned sin in the flesh” — that is a very serious matter.
Rem It comes out here that He felt the seriousness of the matter.
FER Quite so; but then I think the great thing was this, that man might be displaced — the sinful man in whom God had been dishonoured — he was to be eternally displaced and removed to make room for Christ, if you can understand, subjectively. Not to make room for Christ to reign, but to make room for [p. 239] Christ in you and in me; that Christ might be formed in us. He could not be formed in us if the first man had not been removed, I should have to bear the brunt of what I am; but in order to do His pleasure you must have yourself removed. There is no room for the two, you could not have Ishmael and Isaac together. All went in the death of Christ — that man went, and there it is, too, that you get reconciliation — the distance is gone, because the man has gone, but all really to make room for Christ.
Ques This would not quite answer to Gethsemane?
FER Well, it is very near akin to it. “Now is my soul troubled” — it is in anticipation of what was before Him there, and so here too. His soul was “exceeding sorrowful, even unto death”. What could the Lord pray for but to be saved from that hour? “When he had offered up ... strong crying and tears” — but then He renders up all unto the Father’s will, “for this cause came I unto this hour”.
Rem Then He says, “Father, glorify thy name”.
FER Yes; that is His prayer here. He does say, “Father, save me from this hour”, but adds, “but for this cause came I unto this hour”. The Lord was willing to say, “Father, glorify thy name”, but He would not naturally say it. How could the Lord have any satisfaction in the thought that He would be made sin, and that He would be forsaken of God? He was perfect Man in that sense.
Ques And He would not have been perfect if He had not shrunk from it all?
FER No. The presenting God to man — that side was a joy to Him; it was His real joy to present God to man; but here it is His bearing man’s portion before God, it is another thing altogether. This is the character pretty much of the latter part of the Lord’s pathway, bearing what lay upon man — entering into man’s portion. It was no longer active service in presenting God to man. He had said, “I am come a light into the world” — I can tell you what is in the heart of God — that is what He virtually said. Really I think it is a wonderful thing to be able to tell people what is in the heart of God for man.
Rem But now that is over, and He has come to another thing altogether.
FER Yes; it is another service, bearing man’s portion now to make room for the Father’s glory, and for His own glory too. You know, I think people expect to see the power of God set forth in connection with this scene, and I think, too, it is that same power of God operating outside this scene that will eventually set this scene aside. He will “bring to nought things that are”. You see, you must have the Man-child complete, and then He will be caught up to God and to His throne; then the second great thing is the revival of Israel. Israel is to be brought up again from the dead, and then, whenever Israel is revived, everything becomes simple. God will simply use certain means to weaken all that now exists, and the world is not so mighty as some people seem to think. Why, even now you get unexpected catastrophes coming; in these last two or three days we have had things happening which were totally unexpected, and it is quite within the power of God to bring things to pass to weaken the world. It will be quite easy for God to bring about the setting aside of what now exists — that is all I mean. The wonderful thing will be the revival or restoration of Israel.
Ques Where does “the stone cut out of the mountain” come in, before or after Israel is revived; Daniel 2?
FER Oh, Israel is revived before that; the time of Jacob’s trouble is before that, then the stone cut out without hands comes in, and the whole image is broken down. I have said sometimes, and I am prepared to stand by it, that the resurrection of Christ was the one act of God’[p. 241] s power.
Rem All else is only subsidiary.
FER Yes; and they follow as a natural consequence. People are so taken up with detail, and it is so very difficult — to most people — to grasp great principles. The resurrection of Christ is not simply a fact, or an event, but the great principle of the thing. God showed the “exceeding greatness of his power” when He raised Christ. The glory of the Father comes in there, and the Son is glorified, because everything takes its character from the Son. “I am glorified in them”, I think, too, that Christ will be glorified in Israel — that is my impression, because they say, “The Lord our Righteousness”, and if He is their righteousness, He must be their life, the two things must go together.
Rem It seems to be essential that they should have the King in righteousness, and He is the King.
FER Yes. “Jehovah our Righteousness”. It is first the name by which He shall be called, and then, later on, it is the name by which she shall be called. But if she takes His name she takes His character. It is so, too, in regard of the church, if she takes His name she also takes His character.
Ques Would you say that the death of Christ established everything for Israel?
FER It established everything for God, and therefore everything for man. The one thing to me is that God can have to say to man apart from sin, and the flesh, and death. Of course it is a long time before one can take it in, but if you look at the thing on the divine side, you must see it. “Christ Jesus whom God hath set forth a mercy-seat”. Then, too, you get, “The God of peace, that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant” — but you notice that it is the God of peace, and it was He that brought again our Lord Jesus from the dead. Peter preached repentance and remission of sins [p. 242] through His name, though all was over as to the flesh; Christ had been presented to them, and they had rejected Him; there was no help for them after the flesh, but Christ is raised up from the dead, and God has exalted Him to be a “Prince and a Saviour”, to give repentance and remission of sins. You know, some people seem to think it a total impossibility for Israel to be raised again as a nation, but all it wants is the moral question settled — a work of God in them.
Rem You see that in Ezekiel, “Can these bones live?”
FER Yes; and they can live when God works in them, and Israel will come again into national existence, and then Babylon will be overthrown. You never find them in Scripture together; if Jerusalem is in the ascendant, then Babylon is not heard of, the two things cannot go on together. Babylon is man’s glory, but Jerusalem is God’s glory. Babylon began at Babel; man set to work to build a tower and a city; Jerusalem is God’s glory, the city of the great King, but God will not have Jerusalem and Babylon together. Babylon might, of course, be Rome or the reconstructed Roman Empire, but it is morally Babylon. I do not care what name it has, it is morally Babylon.
Rem It is evident that it is a principle in Scripture, because you get mention of a Babylonish garment before ever there was a Babylon in the full sense.
FER Yes; a Babylonish garment and a wedge of gold — man’s glory and covetousness, it is not only that he wants a covering, but he would like the gold too. I believe it is these things that man is after. Where is the man in the world now who does not seek a wedge of gold and a Babylonish garment? You get a man of any capacity in the world, and that is pretty much what he seeks, a Babylonish garment and a wedge of gold. Of course man, as man, does not like the thought of dependence on God, he is very fond of [p. 243] human glory. I was thinking only yesterday that even the poorest people in the world would not care for everyone to be on the same dead level, for though they may have no part in the glory of the world, they love the glory of the world. And among the middle classes, although they have no part in the upper circle, yet it exercises a great power over them, they would not care to have everything reduced to “two acres and a cow”. Of course, there are professional socialists who agitate so as to produce a general scramble, by which they themselves would secure a benefit, but at the bottom they would not care for a state of things in which everyone would be on one dead level.
Ques I suppose that these people who heard the voice from heaven really knew nothing of what it meant?
FER No; it was to them an enigma, and yet it says it came for their sake. Then afterwards it comes out that everything is closed up as to the world, and the testimony of God from henceforth must change its character. It is no longer a Man presenting God here, but it is deliverance out of the world. “I, if I be lifted up ... will draw all unto me”.
Ques You mean there is no more saying to the world?
FER Oh, no. “Now is the judgment of this world” — it is something much more definite than had ever been before. I think the whole system of the world is exposed and judged for God; but then, at the same time, the system of the world is completely closed up for the believer. I think it is we who judge it, the believer judges the whole system. It is judged for God, and it is judged, too, for us — for faith.
Ques In what sense does He draw all to Him? Is it that the Lord is an Object outside all here?
FER Yes, I think so. I think you have to accept the reproach of His being lifted up, you have to go forth to Him without the camp, bearing His [p. 244] reproach, you have to accept the reproach. He is lifted up in divine counsel, but there is also the reproach, as they said of Paul, “It is not fit that he should live”. Here you find the people puzzling over things; they could not understand anything at all, because they did not accept the Lord’s word. They could not understand the voice from heaven, and then they say, “Who is this Son of man?” The secret of it was that they did not accept the Lord’s own testimony, which would have made it all simple, but they say, “How sayest thou, The Son of man must be lifted up?” I think they understood it to mean death, “lifting up” evidently meant that to their minds in contrast to abiding for ever. They did not know that even Christ after the flesh could not abide for ever, but they had the clue to it in the Lord’s own words. Of course, it was to them an enigma how on the one hand Christ must abide for ever, and on the other, the Son of man must be lifted up. The clue to it all is that He is Son of God. Death involved no change to Him on that line although it might change His condition as the Son of man, or as the Christ. The fact is this, all that links to the wilderness, in that sense, goes in the wilderness; all that pertained to the wilderness ended there. But then, I think, there is that which abides, the Son of God abides. He is the Son of man which is in heaven, and whatever is in heaven abides, there is no change there.
Rem How it all hangs on who the Person is!
FER Yes; that is the secret of the whole question.
Rem. “Whose Son is he?”
FER Yes.
Ques Is not reconciliation connected with the Son of God?
FER Reconciliation is that love has come in, and therefore the distance is gone. We are “reconciled [p. 245] to God by the death of his Son”. But who could bring in the love of God but the Son? It is love brought in in the place of distance. The Son of God comes into death and now distance is gone and love is there.
Ques Then it comes in on the love side, not the expiatory side?
FER Yes. But the Lord goes on, “Yet a little while is the light with you. Walk while ye have the light”. It is most remarkable how, time after time, the Lord just goes on, He does not answer their questions as to who is this Son of man, but you get, “Jesus said unto them, Yet a little while is the light with you”, etc. — that was the point, “Walk while ye have the light” — “While ye have light, believe in the light”.
Ques He judges their moral condition?
FER Yes; and it was not a question of satisfying their curiosity. He speaks as regards their immediate responsibility. The light was there — “No man hath seen God at any time; the only-begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him” — there was a declaration of God there.
Ques I suppose a person truly exercised does not ask curious questions?
FER Oh, no. The important point to them really was what God was, what the attitude of God was towards man, but they took no account of the testimony of the Lord in regard to that. “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses” — that was the light that the Lord brought, but they took no account of that, they disregarded that, and they asked questions about this thing and that thing, just the things that puzzled them.
Then, towards the close of the chapter, there is a remarkable passage, “Yet they believed not on him”, and then the fulfilment of Scripture is brought in,
[p. 246] setting forth the existing state of things in their rejection of the testimony which the Lord brought to them. He gives the greatest possible weight to the Scriptures.
Ques It is the comment of the Holy Spirit on them?
FER Yes. “I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on me should not abide in darkness”. He was the light in revealing the Father. I think, in another sense, the Lord hid Himself in revealing the Father, if one might venture to use the expression, when He spoke the Father’s words. He hid Himself in the Father, in that way.
Rem “I have not spoken of myself”.
FER No; He did not proclaim what belonged to Him — He was the humblest of men down here. He hid Himself in making known the Father. He was really making known what was in the heart of God towards man.
Rem He makes a very solemn summary at the end of the chapter.
FER Yes; very solemn — it is the word which He had spoken which should judge them. The Father’s commandment was life eternal — that is the most remarkable expression — His commandment is life eternal, and it must stand because it is the Father’s commandment. It is what He has ordained, it is His counsel; “There he commanded the blessing, even life for evermore” — He ordained it.