ETERNAL LIFE
[p. 52] ETERNAL LIFE
Reading, Revised by F.E.R.
1 John 5: 1 - 21 When you said last night that the platform of the New Testament was eternity, did you have in view the thought of eternal life?
FER No, not exactly. If you take John’s gospel you get Christ as the Word; you are carried back to the beginning, beyond creation; you are taken in the New Testament into the eternal thoughts of God, and carried forward to the new heavens and the new earth. The New Testament closes with that.
JT The thought of eternal life does take you to eternity, does it not?
FER I think the expression ‘eternal life’ does not in itself; though that with which it is connected in the thought and revelation of the New Testament does. The idea of eternal life in the New Testament is undoubtedly taken up from the Old. See John 5: 39.
JSA There is one remark you made in conversation at Quebec that might help, and that is that these words, “This is the true God and eternal life”, are spoken in reference to the place the Lord has now taken rather than in reference to what He was here. That throws light on the whole chapter.
FER It says in the previous clause, “we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ”. He “is the true God and eternal life”. It refers to what is now.
JA He is that to me.
FER Not exactly. He is the setting forth, the revelation of it; not only have you certain things told you about it, but you have the thing itself set forth in the Person; He is the true God and eternal life. The [p. 53] true God and eternal life both find their perfect expression in Christ, thus He is said to be both.
WM Is that a kind of climax to the subject?
FER Quite so.
CW Where is that set forth?
FER It is set forth in Christ as He is.
RSS How do the new covenant and reconciliation connect themselves with eternal life?
FER I think the new covenant and reconciliation are the teaching which are needful to enter upon eternal life. You can only enter upon eternal life in the measure in which you are formed in the divine nature, and that is the effect of the new covenant; and on the other hand, as you are formed in the divine nature so it is that you accept the fact that the old man has been removed. The truth works in that way. If you do not overcome the world you know nothing about eternal life, and it is as you are formed in the divine nature that you overcome the world.
JT Would you say that eternal life is objective; that is, it is set forth in Christ where He is, but that the new covenant has more reference to us?
FER Quite so. The new covenant sets forth that by which God proposes to affect you, viz., by divine teaching. We have not the law written in the heart, but the Spirit is given to us, and the object is that we may be affected by the love of God. You get the same thing here in the witnesses, the Spirit, the water, and the blood. The object is to lead you to where the witnesses come from; they witness for a purpose, and the purpose is to lead us into the love of which they witness. Eternal life is of no practical use to us apart from divine teaching. All depends on how far you are prepared to enter on it.
RSS Do water and blood witness of death?
FER Death is the occasion of them, but I do not think that is their witness here.
JSA Is not the point, “came by water and blood”? The thought is that the witnesses come from heaven.
FER Yes, they all bear witness, and they agree in one. The water and the blood did not come from heaven exactly, but they came from God, and in connection with Christ’s coming in to reveal God.
B Do not the Spirit and the water and the blood connect themselves with the counsels of God?
FER They have become the expression of God’s mind. They bring you back to where the truth starts from in John 3, “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son”. When you are carried back to the heart of God, there you find eternal life; “God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son”.
WM So they are witnesses of divine love?
FER Yes, to carry you back to where the love came from. It came out in John 3 by the Lord’s testimony.
WM But it carries you back to death as the expression of love?
FER Death is seen as witness in that sense.
Ques Is the law written in the heart for God’s earthly people, but not for the present time?
FER Yes.
RSS I do not yet see that the blood and water is not specially connected with death.
FER That refers to their efficacy. But the love of God is expressed in them. When Christ died, a soldier pierced His side, and therefrom came blood and water. You can speak of them as to their efficacy, but they witness to the love of God in His Son, that was superior to all the wickedness of man. They are spoken of here as witnesses in conjunction with the Spirit. All testify to the same thing.
JSA I think you get the truth also in John 3, God gave His only begotten Son. In this chapter He [p. 55] came by water and blood, and then you have the Spirit added as testimony.
FER Yes, and He that believeth in the Son of God hath the witness in himself. You are carried back to the source, and in being carried back to the source you know you have eternal life.
RH It is the witness of what was expressed in death, the love of God.
JP The order of the words here is very significant, the Spirit first.
FER You get the same truth coming out in Romans 5. The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Spirit, then the statement that God commendeth His love toward us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. The order shuts out the idea of efficacy in the passage because we must first have the efficacy to have the Spirit. It is only by the Spirit that you know the witness of the water and the blood. Historically, the water and the blood came first, then the Spirit. In their application to us as witnesses the Spirit comes first, then the water and the blood. You get both orders in the chapter. First historically, and then in application.
RSS Is there a thought of the end of the first man in connection with it?
FER I think so, incidentally, because the water and the blood involves the end of the first man. Where man was removed God was expressed. Only half a dozen words, but if we knew the meaning of those half dozen words we should be extremely well instructed christians.
WM One might say it was God coming in testimony into death to express Himself.
FER God comes down to us where we were. Whatever comes out in us is the simple answer to the revelation of God. There is not a bit in us that is any good at all except what is in answer to the expression [p. 56] of God. The man must be removed, and in the removal of the man God was expressed.
JSA The teaching of John is not blood meeting sins at all. It is not on that line.
FER You get in the first chapter, “The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin”, but in that chapter the apostle is taking up the question of fellowship.
CW Coming by water and blood is in contrast with coming in flesh, I suppose. The way He comes to us is by water and blood.
JSA That expression, ‘coming by’, is analogous to the one in Hebrews, “by a greater and more perfect tabernacle”. It is in that connection.
FER Although Christ in a sense came after the flesh to confirm the promises made to Israel, yet the purpose in His coming was death.
RSS Is it not true that the end of the life of the flesh must come, before God could open up eternal life as it is for us?
FER The two things are concurrent, the removal of man, and the revelation of God. God expresses Himself in the removal of man. Reconciliation and the new covenant were really concurrent.
JP The testimony is not so much as to what is removed as to what is expressed. We have come to what is absolutely positive here, to what God has given, eternal life.
FER When you come to the application of things to us you can only get them by what is divine, that is, by the Spirit. You get the testimony and witness of love in the death of Christ, but another thing comes in, how is it effected in you, and that is only by the Spirit of God. The Spirit leads you by divine teaching into the understanding of the water and blood as witnesses. After the love of God is shed abroad in your heart by the Spirit you are able to read the meaning of the death of [p. 57] Christ.
JC Would you not say that man had to be removed before God could be revealed?
FER No, because I believe God was revealed in the removal of the man. When Christ died the veil of the temple was rent; that did not mean that man was removed, but that God had come out.
RSS What hinders in connection with our apprehension of eternal life? Is it not because the life of the first man is not practically gone for us?
FER Yes, you must appropriate divine food; you must eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink His blood; you have to overcome the world.
B What is overcoming the world?
FER I can tell you the way of it, “Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God”. The thing itself must be known to understand the word. If you have overcome the world you are not disposed to talk much about it.
JT It is not ‘he that believeth Jesus as Saviour’.
FER I think it is as you grow in acquaintance with the love of God that you overcome the world, for you realise that everything in the world is incompatible with the love of God. All is lust and vanity down here. Eternal life is to live in the love of God.
WM That is why you lay so much stress upon the death of Christ, because it is really love?
FER Yes.
WM Referring to a previous remark, the trouble is that we are not experimentally gone, and that is why we do not enjoy the love of God.
FER Yes, you must give place to the Spirit so that you may get the witness of the Spirit, that is of the love of God.
JP That brings in the passage in Galatians, “he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting”.
FER I think you will find in the ways and course of a good many christians that there is a very fair bit of sowing to the flesh for self-gratification, and they reap corruption.
CW That is what you meant when you spoke of seeking happiness?
FER People do not seek happiness, but self-gratification. They sow to the flesh, and of the flesh they reap corruption.
WM But it is only in the power of love that you grow in holiness?
JT In the apprehension of our souls we have to pass from the thought of the Saviour to the thought of the Son of God in order to apprehend eternal life. As Son of God, Christ is connected with the purpose of God.
JA What is the thought of reaping life everlasting? Is it that one gets the good of it?
FER I think it is that he gets it now. Mr. Darby has said that Christ was alone here in the world in the out-of-the-world heavenly condition of relationship and being in which eternal life consists, and hence He was eternal life. I may have heard of a man’s house and possibly of all who are in it, and may know that it is an orderly house; but not having been in it, I have not consciousness of the house; but if I were to go and stay with that man and see all that goes on, I should get the consciousness of it. Many people make the mistake of putting off that for eternity. It used to be commonly said, I know that I have got eternal life. Why? Because the scripture says, “He that believeth hath everlasting life”. I say you have thus the faith of eternal life, but that does not prove that you have the thing itself. Many a person has had a promise, but not the thing promised, that was the case largely with the Old Testament saints. They embraced the promises, but they had not the things promised. Christianity is not only that you have the [p. 59] faith of the things proposed, but that you have the consciousness of the things that you believe.
JT I think you are coming to the point of real difficulty now, and in that connection the thought of teaching has been largely ignored.
B I think Mr. Darby speaks of that on Psalm 16, calling it the inner life.
FER Many christians have the light of eternal life, but they have not gone the road to touch it, and I do not much think they intend to go that road. They have the light of the gospel, and a sense of God’s grace, but they do not intend to go where that light came from.
JP Not till they die.
FER Yes, and then they hope to go there.
JP There is nothing like the language of the Spirit of God in Scripture. I was thinking of that in connection with the words, “he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting”, and “that ye may know ye have eternal life”. It is the thing itself.
Ques What is the meaning of that “eternal life which was with the Father”? Is it not connected with the Person?
FER There is no such thing as life apart from a person. In the epistle the apostle is speaking from their standpoint; that is, of what they had seen, and not from God’s standpoint. In Christ, life was with the Father. The same thing is true in the gospel — in the beginning was the Word, but the Word was One with whom they were familiar, and He is identified as God.
JT The Word has to do with revelation.
FER I have thought the meaning is that God becomes His own testimony, no longer speaking by law and prophets.
GR Although He who bears that title is eternal?
FER Quite [p. 60] so.
GR It would be helpful to us all to pursue a little the thought of teaching.
Ques Would you not say that the apostle unfolds in the first chapter what eternal life is?
FER He unfolds christian fellowship. I think the apostle begins from the lowest platform and leads up to the highest. The last chapter leads us to the highest. The lowest platform is christian fellowship on earth. The first four verses are introductory, showing the apostolic place. Then after that the saints are taken up on the ground of christian fellowship, and hence the blood is introduced. We have fellowship with one another; and then in the third chapter they are seen in the place of children. In the fourth chapter we get the knowledge of God in relation to christians here, and in the fifth chapter you are brought to the heart of God, to the highest platform.
WM There is a marvellous order.
FER In the first chapter, verses 1 - 4 are evidently, as I said, introductory, giving the ground on which the apostle could write. The subject of the epistle properly begins at verse 5. As regards the expression, “that eternal life which was with the Father”, it was the actual ever-existing condition of life. It does not refer to time at all. It is the place and sphere of life. It is that eternal life which had that character, was with the Father, and was manifested to those around Christ.
GR So that if you raise the question of time you are introducing into the passage what is not in it.
FER It simplifies the passage very much to see that the apostle is speaking of what came within their cognizance. They had been with Christ from the beginning, and therefore they could bear witness; and then the Spirit bears witness of what they could not bear witness, and that is what you come to in the last chapter. The apostle has done his utmost in the first four chapters, and in the fifth chapter he assigns [p. 61] them to the witness of the Spirit. The Spirit alone can take you to the heart of God. You must have One who has come from the place to take you to that place.
GR So really the Spirit, the water, and the blood are distinct from apostolic testimony?
FER Yes, and it is only in the fifth chapter that you reach eternal life; the apostle could not conduct you to eternal life. He could tell you what had been down here. You will never touch divine love except by divine teaching.
GR It is not merely teaching what is divine, but it is the teaching of a divine Person.
JC The enjoyment of divine Persons where divine Persons are at home.
FER And another thing is needful, which is of all importance, and that is you overcome the world. Eternal life is there, and it is God’s mind for you to be in it, but there is a gulf between you and it, and you have to pass over that gulf. God has passed over that gulf to come to you, and you have to pass over the gulf which is now bridged in order to get what God has for you. What He has effected in the death of Christ has to be made good in you.
WM So that if any man love the world the love of-the Father is not in him.
JP It has been stated that eternal life was communicated to us this side of the bridge.
FER There is no truth in it; what is communicated to you on this side of the bridge is the gift of the Holy Spirit, and He is the well of water in us springing up to eternal life. Unless you have the Holy Spirit you will never get divine teaching, but it is by divine teaching that you get over the bridge.
GR Did not Peter get over the bridge when he left the ship?
FER There are many things we have to fulfil on this side of the bridge, but morally, in the power of [p. 62] the Holy Spirit, you have to go to the other side of the bridge. That gives great emphasis to the second chapter. In the second chapter the apostle takes up practical difficulties to which certain classes are exposed. The fathers have known Him that is from the beginning, the young men have overcome the wicked one, but they are in danger of the world, while the danger of the babes is bad doctrine. You have to judge not only bad doctrine, but all the world system; to be disentangled from that; and that is by eating the flesh of the Son of man. In that way John 6 and Matthew 14 are synchronous.
JT What is the relation of quickening to eternal life?
FER If you are quickened you are brought into it, because you are quickened together with Christ.
RSS It is all connected with the knowledge of the Son of God.
FER It is said, “Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God”. There is genuine faith, but it is not eternal life. John 9 helps on that line.
WM Son of God brings in the thought of relationship and being.
FER Yes; in the third chapter of the epistle you come to children of God, but not yet to eternal life. Children brings in the thought of Father — God is Father to us as children in the world. As to everything in the world I would appeal to the Father because I am a child here upon earth, but that is not the idea of eternal life.
JT When you say you would appeal to the Father in regard to things here, you mean you would appeal to that Person in the Godhead?
FER Yes, according to Luke 12, your Father knoweth that you have need of these things. You are an object of the Father’s affection, and that is as a child here.
WM Do you not need to abstract yourself from [p. 63] the flesh and blood condition to get the thought of a child of God?
JT Is not the relationship outside of the flesh?
FER Now are we the children of God. You must not make the thought ‘child of God’ equivalent to the thought of ‘son of God’; children of God morally in righteousness and love. The new man is created after God in righteousness and holiness of truth. There is a generation here born of God, children of God “blameless and harmless”.
JP As sons of God there is no crooked and perverse nation?
FER No, sons of God brings in the thought of eternal counsel and of heavenly places. The close of the epistle lands you in what Paul speaks of, and that is, “God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son”.
JP And we are in Him.
FER Yes, in His Son Jesus Christ. Paul distinguished most clearly between children and sons. With John you are children down here loved of the Father. Sons is what you are in the calling of God.
Ques Would the term ‘Father’ be right to use in connection with mercies down here?
JT You would not connect the Father with the world as it is?
FER I would indeed. It is the Father who governs the world. I think Christ does not yet take that place; it is the Father who is above all.
RSS Is it not the thought of God?
FER The thought of God is presented to us in the Father, “To us there is one God, the Father”.
GR Take the passage in 2 Corinthians 6, “I ... will be a Father unto you” — that does not convey the thought of divine relationship, does it? I will be a Father, that is, conditionally, down here.
FER I think the simple truth is this, that God is Father in christianity; He is not Father to the [p. 64] heathen. He is the governor of the world, and we appeal to the governor of the world as Father.
RSS Our thought has been that that was not full christianity.
FER Full christianity is entering into the Father’s counsels. The disciples on earth were taught to look to the Father, but that was not christianity.
JSA Every family is named of the Father.
WM It is the same Person.
FER Yes, but He has His counsels, and christianity consists in entering into the Father’s counsels.
RSS But as I understand it, God is Father in two ways, that is, in connection with our place as children here upon earth, and then in full christianity, which is the light of His counsel, and that brings in what the Father is to the Son.
FER Yes. In that sense you stand in association with the Son, but in the other thought you are as children down here. I think the mistake has been made of confounding the idea of children with eternal life. I have fallen into that too much myself; the thoughts are, I judge, quite distinct. Sonship is connected with eternal life; that puts you outside the death scene.
JP What do you come to in the fourth chapter?
FER The fourth chapter brings in the Spirit and the whole range of knowledge — it shows the way in which God has come out in love towards us from the beginning to the end of the christian course. It begins with us as dead and in our sins, and carries us on to the end of our responsibility, the day of judgment. Then the fifth chapter brings in the witnesses and leads you, as I said, on to the highest platform. It leads you to where all came from.