THE KNOWLEDGE OF DIVINE PERSONS AND THINGS READING (1)
THE KNOWLEDGE OF DIVINE PERSONS AND THINGS READING (1)
SMcC The knowledge of divine Persons and divine things is to be considered. It is essential that the importance of John’s gospel should be apprehended by us. Mr. Raven said that it was the backbone of all the gospels, and Mr. Taylor remarked that it was the backbone of all the Scriptures, showing what an important place it had in their minds, and it is especially important as bearing on what we are about to consider together in connection with the revelation of God - the knowledge of divine Persons and divine things. In the consideration of our subject together, divine personality will be before us in each of the Persons of the Deity, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, and particularly before us now we have the divine Personality of the Word, the Son. We need to see the place that the Person of Christ has in these holy writings. It is important that in seeking after light we should not miss the glory of the Persons about whom we seek light. They are presented in John’s ministry in a manner which is calculated to touch every feature of spiritual affection begotten through the operations of God. The knowledge that we are referring to - spiritual knowledge - seems to run right through all John’s ministry, both in the gospel and the epistles, and the Revelation. If we were to consult a concordance, it would be surprising the number of times that the word ‘know’ and ‘knowing’ comes into John’s ministry; and especially is it important in view of all that is abroad in the public profession, that we should come into the knowledge that John has in mind, and, as quickened in our affections, be affected by that knowledge, and especially in view of the enriching of the service of God.
Now in the first portion we have read, the matter of knowledge is presented negatively, which is very interesting. John opens his gospel with negative references to knowledge, whereas when we come to the seventeenth chapter it is replete with references to positive features of knowledge as to the men that God has given Christ out of the world. He says in verse 10, “He” (that is Christ) “was in the world, and the world had its being through him and the world knew him not.” Then in verse 26, “John answered them, saying, I baptise with water. In the midst of you stands, whom ye do not know, he who comes after me, the thong of whose sandal I am not worthy to unloose”. Then John says in verse 30 as to the Lamb of God, “He it is of whom I said, A man comes after me who takes a place before me, because he was before me; and I knew him not; but that he might be manifested to Israel, therefore have I come baptising with water. And John bore witness, saying, I beheld the Spirit descending as a dove from heaven, and it abode upon him. And I knew him not; but he who sent me to baptise with water, he said to me, Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and abiding upon him, he it is who baptises with the Holy Spirit. And I have seen and borne witness that this is the Son of God”. This is what we should keep before us in this first reading, the negative side, throwing into relief what is in mind on the positive side in our enquiry.
JAP When he says “I knew him not”, is he referring to His eternal personality?
SMcC There is no doubt he is not alluding to Him on natural lines, for John stood related to the Lord on the natural side; it seems to refer to something very definite on John’s part, when he says “a man comes after me who takes a place before me, because he was before me; and I knew him not”.
The moral side is in mind in the first negative suggestion, the condition of the world morally, the created sphere into which the Lord came, “the world had its being through him, and the world knew him not”, it is the moral side in regard to knowledge; and then it is the religious side in the second reference, those that came out of Jerusalem - the priests and Levites who should have known, but John says “whom ye do not know”, which suggests the religious darkness marking that setting; but when we come to the Baptist, it is more an allusion to the exclusion of the natural side in the matter of this knowledge.
MGW Is the acquirement of positive knowledge reached by way of our seeing, which is the result of the work of the Spirit in us in the way of enlightenment? I was thinking of verse 34. John says there “I have seen”.
SMcC Yes, new birth in its radical character in us brings about the ability to see things which we did not see before; and seeing is brought much before us in John’s ministry, and it is important that our eyes should be open spiritually to see what comes within our range in the movements of divine Persons in this gospel.
APB Is one of the first steps in acquiring knowledge the realisation that we are without it?
SMcC Yes, the negative side would throw that into relief - the great need there is for the true knowledge of God which John’s gospel would bring on to our view, beginning with this Person. It is important that we should get an impression as to the divine Personality that is before us here in the Son - the Word as He is referred to. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Our affections need to be quickened in relation to the Person of Christ; John’s gospel makes a lot of the Person of Christ.
JSE Had you something further in your mind in alluding to these three categories: the world, and the religious circle, and what is natural?
SMcC I think John is stressing the negative side as he opens his ministry to bring into relief what was in the assembly; the realm to which we belong. The Lord has great pleasure in referring in the 17th chapter to what is known in that realm. He says, “They have known that all things that thou hast given me are of thee” verse 7, “[they] have known truly that I came out from thee” verse 8, and “These have known that thou hast sent me” verse 25 and “I have made known to them thy name” verse 26.
JSE Is it of any interest that Peter’s wife is not referred to in this gospel?
SMcC Say what is in your mind in that regard.
JSE I was thinking of your allusion to John ruling out the natural element, and I was wondering if the Spirit keeps us, in the narrative, entirely in relation to what is spiritual. I suppose most of us have in our minds ruled out the element of the world, and of the religious circle, but I wonder whether we sufficiently face this natural element. I wondered if John is a model to us in that way?
SMcC I think he is, and he would help us to see the importance of coming under the hand of divine Persons in view of the knowledge that we are speaking about, that we have in mind, because it is quite evident that we need divine help when it comes to the matter of the knowledge of divine Persons and divine things.
AJG In his first epistle he says “we know that we are of God and the whole world lies in the wicked one”. Does that fit in with what we have before us here?
SMcC Very good. That is an interesting passage; one was thinking of it in relation to this subject, because he immediately continues, as you will recall, in the following verse, “And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us an understanding that we should know him that is true and we are in him that is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life”. It bears on what we have here. John would help us to see what we stand related to, in the environment that we are in - we know that we are of God.
EJH Would you say that those negatives of John the Baptist are all the more remarkable on account of what we might speak of as the excellency of John the Baptist on the natural line?
SMcC Yes, because John was a remarkable personality himself - a distinguished personality, marked out by an intervention from heaven; one who was filled with the Holy Spirit - he was a remarkable man in that way, and yet he says in such a precise, definite way “I knew him not”, showing that there is no pretension on John’s part to advance any premium that he might have put on his link with Christ along natural lines.
AWGT I wondered if the fact that the Spirit of God uses two words for ‘knowledge’ or ‘know’ would help in the enquiry. One is conscious knowledge and the other is objective knowledge?
SMcC Yes, it does help. There is what we know objectively, and there is what we know consciously. It is remarkable that in this verse, verse 9, he says “the true light was that which, coming into the world, lightens every man”. It is not that every man has the knowledge. It is not the idea of enlightenment, as Mr. Darby points out; it is light to every man, sheds its light upon every man; that is, the bearing of it is towards all. But then we know that we need the Spirit in regard of knowledge that we are speaking of - Christian knowledge - the knowledge of divine Persons and divine things.
JRUB Is the basis of all this “born of God”?
SMcC Well, we should never know divine things unless we are the subject of divine operations, and “born of God” brings on to our view a class of persons here that are distinctly marked out as having a right - a right to take a certain place, and in the light of John’s epistle it would be a class of persons who know God, because they are begotten of God.
AHG Is it in your mind that in approaching the knowledge of divine Persons the first essential is the appreciation of Christ, and who He is?
SMcC That is what is particularly in one’s mind, and that we should not miss the wonderful Personality that is before us in “the Word”; in this opening section of John’s gospel the very use of the appellation ‘Word’ reminds us that the thought of the revelation of God is a prime matter in John’s mind; it is important that we should allow the Spirit of God to have His way in fastening our attention on the glory of this divine Person, of whom John the evangelist, in the Spirit’s power, writes.
FWK So would the negative in verse 18, “No one has seen God at any time”, be important in that connection?
SMcC Well, it would, because there is what we cannot know - what we cannot apprehend, even in regard to what we are saying as to our subject of the knowledge of divine Persons; we are not seeking in any way to intimate that we can know all that there is to be known of divine Persons, because we cannot, and we do not. There is what we do not know, and what we do not see, and John would remind us of that to begin with - that we have limitations.
AMP When the Scripture in 1 Corinthians 2: 14 says “the natural man ... cannot know them because they are spiritually discerned”, does it refer to what can be known?
SMcC Yes, the Spirit of God is alluded to as the great instrumentality by whom God is revealing these things to us. He reveals them to us by His Spirit. “The Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God” (verse 10).
JH Have you in mind that the features you have named, what is moral and religious and natural, are calculated to militate against our apprehension of the presentation of the Person?
SMcC Yes, we have to have a judgment in our souls as to this negative side if we are to come in for the knowledge par excellence which John has in mind - the knowledge of divine Persons and divine things.
JSE Would it be in keeping to ask if there is in the three outstanding titles in these verses an offset to the three spheres that you refer to?
SMcC You mean ‘the Word’, and ‘the Christ’; and what other one are you referring to?
JSE I was thinking of the Word, and the glory of an only-begotten with a father, and then finally the Son of God.
SMcC Yes, it is; it is important that we should see the way in which Christ is presented in this section, first as ‘the Word’, and then as ‘the Son’, the Only-begotten Son, and the glory of an only-begotten with a father - the truth of Christ’s sonship, which the religious world does not understand at all, and then what we have coming in later in regard to ‘the Christ’ and ‘the Lamb of God’ and the ‘Son of God’ and ‘He who baptises with the Holy Spirit’. All that is important in our apprehension of Christ over against these environments that are suggested in the negative statements that we have referred to.
JLF Does it help to see that there are three more negatives that are referred to in verse 13 as to the way that the believer is born?
SMcC Yes, it does. “Not of blood nor of flesh’s will, nor of man’s will, but of God.” We are reminded thus of the impotence connected with that range of things, so that in coming into the knowledge of God as revealed in this gospel it is important that we should see how much depends on divine help.
AWGT I wondered whether that was not really the force of your calling attention to the negatives, that as we accept the negative side, it throws our thoughts and activities in the direction where what is positive can be secured. Is that what is in your mind?
SMcC That is right, and the negative side can only rightly be understood and fully apprehended as the glory of the Person of Christ is apprehended. That is what helps us to see the negativeness of what is in these different realms or environments.
WSS Does verse 14 bring before us what we may enter into?
SMcC Well, it is an allusion to Christ’s sonship. John’s gospel does not treat of sonship in the saints, he would fasten our gaze spiritually on the uniqueness of Christ’s sonship; but then in relation to what you say, we can see that that is the mind of God for us, because the mind of God for us as to sonship is set out in Christ in sonship in man.
WSS Yes. I was thinking of the contemplation of the glory and the fulness that was there.
SMcC Yes, how important that word ‘contemplation’ is in that regard. We need to allow our minds and our affections to be given over to this contemplative attitude.
JAP Would you say something about verse 18 in regard to the relation between sonship and the declaration, “No one has seen God at any time; the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him”. His sonship would of course there be of a special character?
SMcC Yes, only a divine Person could be referred to in this way, “the only-begotten Son.” It is important to see that sonship not only hinges, as we have been taught, on Christ’s humanity, but also on His eternal personality. It is an important thing to see that, because it is His eternal personality that gives a unique touch to His sonship. Only a Person who is divine could be referred to as He is in this section.
JSE Do we come to the term “the only-begotten Son” by way of “the Word was God”. And “the Word became flesh”? Is that right?
SMcC Well, you mean the allusion to verse 1 to what He was in the pre-incarnate condition of Deity?
JSE Yes, as you said, His essential personality.
SMcC Yes, so that the mediatorial system is involved in what we have in verse 18 - the position the Lord has come into; taking a place, as He has, in incarnation, “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us”, and then being “in the bosom of the Father”. The mediatorial economy is thus suggested to us in all its attractiveness to begin with; it comes before us officially in its operations later on.
JSE I wondered if that is why we have no allusion to the Lord’s nativity in this gospel, because there is a certain way in which we can be affected naturally by that, is there not?
SMcC That is so. So it is interesting to see the whole bearing of John’s gospel as standing outside of dispensation. It is not what can be limited to dispensation, although what enters into it particularly characterises and affects our dispensation, but it cannot be limited to it, because of the Persons that are referred to in the revelation of God in it.
CH Would not what verse 1 gives us indicate what has to be borne in mind in this enquiry, that the One who was the Word - known here as the Word - the full expression of the mind of God - was nevertheless God Himself?
SMcC It is important that we should see this, and this verse 1 is very much on one’s heart in regard to what we are considering - the way the appellation “the Word” begins this gospel, “In the beginning was the Word”. It is not that He was the Word then, but John the evangelist, in referring to His position in Deity, uses the appellation, “the Word”, not that He was the Word then, but that He was known in testimony here among the saints in that way; it seems to suggest at the outset of John’s gospel the way the intelligence and affections of the saints were affected by what came within their range in this Person.
CH And thinking of the three Persons, we can only identify Them by names They have taken?
SMcC Yes, so that John’s gospel presents to us God in the majesty of His Being, revealed in Christ; a glorious Being as He is, the supreme Object of worship, but He has come within our range in Christ, and is known in Christ, known in this Person that is referred to as “the Word”, particularly alluding to His ability - His inherent ability to make God known.
AJG So that Luke’s gospel speaks of “those who from the beginning were eye-witnesses of and attendants on the Word”. That throws light, does it not, on the use of that expression?
SMcC It does, showing how much they had been affected by what came out in the Person of Christ as to the knowledge of God, because “the Word” is particularly expressive in regard to the subject that is before us.
PJB So would you say he is emphasising rather the truth of His personality?
SMcC Yes, it is a Person that is before us. His eternal existence is in mind, “In the beginning was the Word”, that is before anything began to be He was - He existed. It is the greatness of the Person that is in our mind, and it says “the Word was with God”. Sometimes one wonders whether the significance of that lays hold of our minds and affections as it should. We must never forget the distinct personality who was always there; His personality is not lost sight of, we might say, reverently speaking, in conditions of abstract Deity. “The Word was with God” is a reference to His distinct eternal personality.
WOS Is that what is in mind in chapter 17, verse 5, “Now glorify me, thou Father, along with thyself, with the glory which I had along with thee before the world was”?
SMcC Just so. We cannot say what the relationships were then, or describe what was there, but we do know in the light of John 1: 1 and John 17: 5 His distinct personality; there is One God but three divine Persons, now known to us in the economy, distinguished for us in Their operations, in all the glory of the economy in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, the way in which God is revealed and known.
WSS In that connection would you say a word about “the fulness” in verse 16? Does that fit into what you have just been speaking of?
SMcC Well, that is alluding to manhood.
WSS Quite so. I was thinking of what has come into revelation.
SMcC Yes, but that would not be the fulness of Deity. We are speaking of how God has come into revelation, how the Deity has come near to us in Christ, in One who has the ability to make God known, to reveal God, as conveyed in the expression “the Word”. When we come to verse 16, the allusion in that section is to the glory of His manhood and to what is coming out in His position in sonship in manhood.
WSS I was seeking really to bring out the difference. Would the fulness be connected with what we speak of as the economy, as distinct from what you have been saying in regard to His deity?
SMcC Yes, I think that would be right.
WSS I was thinking while we have been speaking of the beauty of the two settings: there is what has come into revelation which we contemplate, and which we take on, and there is something that is beyond that, unreachable by us, but to be known in a certain sense as the distinct glory of the Person of whom we have been speaking.
SMcC Yes, exactly. So that we are to keep in mind in that way the glory of the two settings - what John refers to in a past eternity, and what he refers to as before the disciples and before our eyes in testimony in the Lord’s position in sonship in manhood.
WSS I wondered if it would help just to have the two thoughts set before us in that way.
SMcC It does, because in the first part in verse 1 John is alluding to a realm into which we cannot enter, into which the creature mind cannot penetrate; it is beyond our comprehension, yet the Person who was there, eternally there, and His personality standing out distinctly, and His deity too - it says “the Word was God” - is the Person that is before us in the incarnation. So that in this wondrous position of manhood God is so near us, because this Person is God.
EJH And would the array of titles given to the Lord in this chapter move us in the spirit of worship in regard to that which has come within our range?
SMcC It would. The presentation of a divine Person is calculated to elicit some feature of homage from our hearts, and how wonderful it is that God should have come within our range in this way, in a Person who is referred to as “the Word”, and a Person who is referred to as the “only-begotten Son”. These two features of His glory are intended to help us in regard to our knowledge of God.
AB Would these two titles, “the Word” and “the only-begotten Son”, have in mind the thought of declaration? Only one who was “the Word” could really declare God, and would the declaration involve the shining out of His love?
SMcC Yes, the declaration does, and God is made known, declared as the word is, “No one has seen God at any time; the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has declared him.” The allusion would be back to “No one has seen God at any time”, but the declaration proceeds from this setting, “the only-begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father”, and we are reminded of the way that God, and the knowledge of God, comes within our range. It is not a question of acts of power, it is not a question merely of attributes, great as they are, but it is God, known in this way, according to what He is in His nature - for God is love, the relationships intensifying the thought of love - what God is in His nature.
AJG Is it significant that although we do not get it in this gospel, we do learn from other gospels that immediately before the Lord entered on His public testimony He was saluted from heaven as God’s beloved Son?
SMcC Very significant, and something that in the synoptic gospels is intended to arrest us right at the outset in regard to the service of Christ as He entered upon His public ministry.
FWP How is it that John says to Him “Art thou the coming One or are we to wait for another”? (Matthew 11: 3). The Lord in replying to that seems to tell him that he ought to have known?
SMcC Well, John the Baptist in the synoptic gospels reminds us of ourselves, our infirmity and weakness in regard to knowledge. We all know how we begin to wonder just what the truth is, and where the truth is. There might be a good deal of that among the saints, you know, at times, when difficulties arise, as to where the truth really is, and what is the truth. That is just where John was in the synoptic gospels, and the Lord graciously answers him. He says, in effect, ‘Look at what is being done’. He does not tell him exactly what He was or who He was; He sends a message back as to what was happening - the works of power and glory that were taking place, and John was confirmed.
JSE Do the two allusions to backbone meet that matter?
SMcC Well, John’s ministry being the backbone of all the gospels would help us as to the person of Christ.
JSE I notice that John is never referred to in this gospel as John the Baptist.
SMcC Well, that is interesting; nor is there any record of any distinct failure on John’s part. We say John the Baptist to distinguish him in John’s gospel from the evangelist.
JSE So it is right from the standpoint of this narrative to view him apart from the place he had in an earlier dispensation, and to take account of him in relation to these high and glorious matters that are coming before us because he is singled out in this chapter as the only man who ever saw the Spirit, and that cannot be dispensational, can it?
SMcC No, it is not. He is unique in that way. John the Baptist is unique in many ways, and I think it all bears on the excellence of the spiritual knowledge that John the evangelist has in mind that belongs to those that are under the divine hand.
EJH A man sent from God - under the divine hand.
SMcC He was, showing the environment he came from, under the divine hand.
FVW Is there any difference between this thought of declaration and what is said in Hebrews 1: “the expression of his substance”? Is that the same idea?
SMcC No. I think “He has declared” is a formal service here, with a public bearing upon the whole position. It is not a reference to His public service so much in Hebrews 1, but a reference to what He is, what He was as man. He was the expression of His substance, it was there in Him as man. But here it is a formal service that is in mind. “He hath declared.” Now if we could just dwell on the titles ‘the Word’ and ‘Son’ for a moment as bearing on this matter of knowledge that we are considering; the Word particularly refers to His ability to make the whole mind of God known, not only in One who can be the instrument of that service, speaking in a reverential way, but One who in Himself is God, and therefore can adequately express God and the whole mind of God. Then the title “the only-begotten Son” is a peculiarly endearing reference to the place that He has in divine affections, stressing the love side. The “Word” hardly stresses the love side, it stresses the side of intelligence; but “the only-begotten Son” stresses the love side.
It is God coming near in His nature - “God is love”, and the economy is devised so that we should know and understand love, and see that in making Himself known God is drawing near in relationships intelligible to us and that are calculated to affect our souls.
AJG In John’s epistle it says “He that abides in love abides in God”. Is that the great end that God has in mind?
SMcC That is it. That is the great end in mind - that we are to abide in God, and John would help us to see the importance of the love side, the important place that love has. We were seeing in the reading in the house this morning the place that faith and love have. John stresses both: the great necessity of faith, and the great necessity of understanding love.
HFR It says in verse 14 that “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us”. Is that so that we might take account of love? I was wondering whether the word “became” would indicate His sovereign action, that He became flesh and dwelt among us, that is in nearness to us, tabernacled among us?
SMcC Exactly, so that John gives us the real truth of the incarnation. “The Word became flesh.” That is, it was His own divine act. Luke stresses the Holy Spirit’s part in the matter, but John stresses that it was His own act. “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” And so God has come near to us - it is God - the Deity is drawing near to us - in this way, to be known in these intelligible relationships which are not only to affect our minds but to affect our hearts.
EJH Does that gloriously supersede the law mentioned in the previous verse?
SMcC Yes, of course it does, because in the law, as Mr. Darby says, God did not come out, and man did not go in, but in Christ God has come out and man goes in, so it is a direct contrast.
EJH And grace is mentioned first.
SMcC Well, it is.
JAP When you speak of relationships, do you refer to our relationships with the Father and the Son and the Spirit?
SMcC I am speaking of their relationships with one another. How would we have known love had not the Father sent the Son, and had not the Son died? And then the Spirit comes into that too, in regard to what we are saying.
JRUB Is that why Mr. Darby hyphenates “only-begotten” in the New Translation?
SMcC Well, it is a term intensifying the thought of endearment or affection. In what we are speaking of, and enquiring in relation to, in the matter of spiritual knowledge of divine Persons - as to God, we have to be helped as to what comes out in Christ’s sonship and manhood - the excellence of what is there, it is there to help us in the knowledge of God, because God is love. How can we understand it? We cannot understand the pre-incarnate conditions of Deity, because God dwells in unapproachable light. Christ is before us here in manhood, and we can apprehend it here in these relationships intelligible to us; God is within our range in these relationships.
GAL You have said nothing about verse 4. Is that not very important to our enquiry, “in him was life”? Is that one of the distinctive glories that is seen in Christ as incarnate?
SMcC Well, it is. It is referring to what has come within our range in this Person in manhood, “the light was the life of men”. I suppose the life would be the light of love. That is what it would be, a testimony to the love that was there.
CH Referring to this matter of love again, it is clear from Scripture that love existed between Them in those pre-incarnate days, but the form or expression of it we shall never know, but that love has been manifested, as you said, in an intelligible form in the love of a father for a son.
SMcC Quite so. We need to see that the love in the relative is no different from the love in the absolute. It is the same love, only that we do not understand the relations of divine Persons to one another in absolute Deity; but the relationships as seen in the economy we do apprehend, the mediatorial economy, seen in the Father, the Son and the Spirit.
WSS What you were saying about knowledge would refer to the relative side, would it not?
SMcC Yes, of course; we are speaking of what is within our range. Knowledge would allude to what has come within our range, not what is without our range, so it is important to see that after the Word is mentioned in verse 1 we get all these conditions as to the world and men, the moral darkness in the world, and what is said in verse 5, “the light appeared in darkness and the darkness apprehended it not”. That is to be noticed, and then we get the reference to the only-begotten with a father, a figure of speech; and then in verse 18, “the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father”. After, we get the affection side - the love side stressed; we get this position alluded to in verse 19 onwards, where there is such darkness as to the Person of Christ.
APB Might I ask for help in relation to the question of relationship between divine Persons in the economy? Is it right to say that the relationship between the Father and the Son is outstanding?
SMcC Well, what is to be noted is that the relations between the Father and the Son are clearly defined, that is “the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father”. The Spirit’s relations with the Father are not so defined. It is to help us to see the glory and attractiveness of the economy that one divine Person enters a position where He is an object of peculiar attractiveness not only to men but to divine Persons, to the Father and the Spirit, so that, as in verse 18, He is the peculiar Object of the Father’s affections, but in verse 32 “I beheld the Spirit descending as a dove from heaven, and it abode upon him”. He is the peculiar Object of the Spirit’s movements in that verse.
TJG And does this emphasise these peculiar relationships now? Are we entitled to carry that back into the pre-incarnate state?
SMcC These relationships that we have been just alluding to?
TJG Yes, the peculiar emphasis on the intimacy between the Father and the Son as it appears in some sections of Scripture, and the Son Himself as the peculiar object of the Father’s affections and the Spirit’s affections. Are we right in taking these back to the past eternity?
SMcC Not in what we are referring to here in verse 18. We could not carry the relationships there back into these conditions that you refer to. The Lord does say in John 17, “Thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world”, but that would allude to what was between divine Persons in that realm.
TJG I just wanted to guard that; the fact that these relationships are emphasised in their peculiar setting does not give us the right to think of them as being in the past eternity?
SMcC No, we cannot carry back what is before us in the economy in the way of relationship between divine Persons into the abstract conditions of Deity and make them descriptive of that, because they are not. They are descriptive of relationships that are linked with the revelation of God in the mediatorial economy into which He has come, where He is known in Christ.
MPS Might I ask how far the last verse of chapter 17 goes - “that the love with which thou hast loved me may be in them and I in them”? I have in mind your earlier reference as to the love not being different in the relative to what it is in the abstract.
SMcC The love referred to there is the love of sonship, the love linked with sonship, the Father’s love to the Son. We are to keep that clear, lest anyone should carry that back to the abstract conditions of Deity. What the Lord is alluding to there is the love between the Father and Himself; “the love with which thou hast loved me” is the love that is linked with the position of sonship in manhood into which He came and in which He was the particular object of the Father’s affections.
ARA Does not Colossians 1 confirm what you are saying where it speaks of Christ as “the beginning”? He is the beginning.
SMcC Yes, it does. That is what it says, does it not?
ARA And as to all our thoughts of God, we have to begin with Christ in manhood.
SMcC Yes, and John would help us to see, as he opens his gospel, the unique place that Christ has both as “the Word” and as “the only-begotten Son”. We shall never know God apart from Christ. God being who He is, we are wholly dependent upon Christ in relation to the way He has been made known.
GAL All this stresses the great thought of the incarnation, does it not, and this is what we are really considering, “the Word become flesh”. God coming into His own creation in the Person of the Son?
SMcC It brings out and should affect us as we think of it, that God is so near to us in this way that, as it says, “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us”, and then there is the reference to the relationships.
AJG Would you say that there was in that way a certain intimation of what eternal conditions were going to be, for the tabernacle of God is going to be with men, is it not?
SMcC Exactly. God will tabernacle with men. God will be with them, their God, so that we can see that the thought carries through, right into eternity.
LTR Would you say a word as to the Lord’s reference to Himself as “the Son of man who is in heaven” (John 3: 13)?
SMcC Well, it helps in this way, that it is always good for us to be reminded of the element of inscrutability in regard to the Person of Christ; that there is that about the Person of Christ which is entirely beyond us, that we do not know and we do not understand, and we just have to be humble and simply accept it, and say that we do not understand it, because our minds are finite. How He could be here and how He could be there, how can I understand it? And how could any of us explain it? We do well to be reminded in that way of the greatness of the Person, and what is inscrutable, and also of what has come within our range so that we can understand it and apprehend it, as we are privileged to do.
WSS So the two things must be kept distinct. I am thinking of the economy, first of all - the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit made known to us, but there is that which is outside the economy referred to in the beginning of the first chapter, to which you have been drawing our attention, which is beyond us, and yet which throws a certain lustre on all that is known. Would that be right?
SMcC Yes, because what gives character to the economy is the greatness of the Persons that are before us in it. God has come into the economy. We are to be reminded that in what we have here - the Deity - God has drawn near, and is presented in Christ, and all the fulness of the Godhead dwells in Him.
WSS I was wondering about that word fulness as to whether it would link up with Colossians, that all the fulness dwells in Him bodily.
SMcC Colossians 1 relates to the fulness being pleased to dwell, a particular allusion to what we have here, and then Colossians 2 would bear on what He is now. He is still a man, and in Him towards us the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily.
WSS So that in contemplating the Lord in the 14th verse of the 1st chapter they were contemplating the fulness, I judge?
S.McC. What chapter?
WSS The 14th verse of the 1st chapter of John’s gospel, where it says “we have contemplated his glory”, and it goes on to say “and of his fulness we have all received” (verse 16). Is not all the fulness presented there, in the Lord?
SMcC In verse 16? You are not linking that with the fulness of Colossians 1, are you?
WSS I am asking whether that would link with the 1st chapter of Colossians, “the fulness was pleased to dwell in him”
SMcC Well, in Colossians 1 it is the fulness of the Godhead, it is the Deity, but in John 1: 16 it is not Deity.
WC Is not the fulness here that which links on with “full of grace and truth”? That is what we have here, is it?
SMcC Yes, it is what came out in Him as man, in relation to His manhood.
WC And would that be to set us free for contemplation, because we need both grace and truth, being what we are, do we not? In view of our being set free to contemplate?
JAP Do you think in the thought of the fulness of the Godhead you have what is inscrutable, as the Lord could say “no man knoweth the Son but the Father”, whereas in this fulness there is that which we can apprehend - the fulness as presented in John 1?
SMcC The thought of the fulness alludes to what is coming out, and alludes to what is before us in Christ. We should keep that in mind so that Colossians 2 - the fulness of the Godhead dwelling in Him bodily - represents what has come within our range. The “bodily” alluding to that, it can be apprehended.
CH Mr. Raven said, did he not, that the fulness of a thing is not so great as the thing itself?
SMcC No, exactly. We might allude now to the last section we read where John says “I knew him not”, first in verse 31 and again in verse 33; it should help us in relation to what is within our range in the mediatorial economy that is contemplated here, to consider whether we are arriving at things on natural lines, or arriving at what is here under the divine hand, and helped by divine Persons Themselves, as John says, “and I knew him not. But he who sent me to baptise with water, he said to me, Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and abiding on him, he it is who baptises with the Holy Spirit. And I have seen and borne witness that this is the Son of God.” The emphatic He, “He said to me”, and then the emphatic I, “And I have seen and borne witness that this is the Son of God”. We see how John comes into the truth of the sonship of Christ here, because he comes under the hand of a divine Person and is instructed in regard to the Person of Christ.