THE KNOWLEDGE OF DIVINE PERSONS AND THINGS READING (2)

THE KNOWLEDGE OF DIVINE PERSONS AND THINGS READING (2)

John 3:7-13; John 4:10; John 4:19-24; John 4:46-54

SMcC The subject we are considering together is that of the knowledge of divine Persons and divine things as set out in this gospel. We considered the first part of the first chapter in the earlier reading, specially alluding to the way in which Christ is brought on to our view in that section as “the Word”, and as “the only-begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father”, all suggestive of what enters into the revelation of God as we have it according to John. Someone has said that we need to know John’s God, in a certain sense, and these passages that we considered earlier bear on that - how God has come within our range in Christ, involving such wondrous knowledge as it does, and also entering into our subject there is the thought of divine personality. We considered the Lord Jesus in the first chapter, and now He comes again before us in these scriptures that we have read with added thoughts in the interim; we have now three individuals specifically before us; what we had considered earlier bore on the general position, the light being shed on every man, and the declaration standing related to the whole public position, but now we come to the operational side in regard to individuals; we have Nicodemus and the woman of Samaria, and the nobleman - the courtier of Galilee. The brethren will notice that the Lord says to Nicodemus, “Thou art the teacher of Israel and knowest not these things?” (John 3: 10). The Lord brings up the matter of knowledge specially with a man that professedly knew the Scriptures, for the teacher of Israel would be one who supposedly and professedly had the Scriptures in his hands, and, if he did not know them, should have known them, and the Lord says “We speak that which we know” (John 3: 11). The Lord is referring to a class of persons who know what they are speaking about, and He sets out the ideal Himself; and then to the woman of Samaria, the Lord says “If thou knewest the gift of God and who it is that says to thee” (John 4: 10), again stressing the greatness of the Person; and then when the matter of the worship of God comes up, He says “We worship what we know” (John 4: 22). The courtier, you remember, was an observing man; he was following up the truth, and watching what was transpiring even to the reckoning of time, and it says that he knew, “The father therefore knew that it was in that hour in which Jesus said to him”. We can see in these passages how knowledge is accumulating in regard to divine Persons and divine things. We have the Spirit and new birth in the first, and the Lord Jesus Himself presented to us again, then the Spirit and the worship of God in the second, and then the matter of healing. Perhaps these things may yield to us as we enquire together.

It is to be noticed in the first passage that we have read that the element of inscrutability both as to the Spirit and as to the Son of man again comes out, and there is nothing we need to keep more before us than the element of inscrutability in regard to divine Persons. There is much that we do not know, but there is much that enters into our subject that we can know - we are privileged to know, and therefore the importance of coming under the divine hand.

AHG What is it you are referring to, as to inscrutability?

SMcC I was thinking of verse 8, “The wind blows where it will, and thou hearest its voice, but knowest not whence it comes and where it goes: thus is every one that is born of the Spirit”; then the reference to the Son of man (verse 13), “And no one has gone up into heaven, save he who came down out of heaven, the Son of man who is in heaven”. The element of inscrutability is there. What one is thinking of is that it is good to be reminded, and to have constantly kept before us, our finiteness, because of the creature mind and understanding which marks us.

AJG Have you in mind that that would keep us in lowliness of mind, and thus in a condition suitable for divine operations?

SMcC That is just exactly what one is thinking of, the need for lowliness; when we come to the exalted subject of the knowledge of divine Persons, and divine things, we cannot presume to know everything - we are reminded of our limitations.

AHn Does the second verse illustrate the pretentious religious mind? He says “we know” and so on.

SMcC It is important to see this side of Nicodemus, because he represents what is all around us, especially in a religious and pretentious way, and we have to judge it in our minds and hearts. What the Lord says takes the ground from under the feet of Nicodemus, so that he has no ground to stand on.

EJH Would you say in that sense that he had to learn that he could carry nothing over whatever into the spiritual sphere?

SMcC Yes, the Lord is teaching him as to this matter of new birth. There is nothing like new birth to take us down; if that was kept before our minds in the working out of soul history, it would have a very salutary effect; it removes all the bombast, pride and greatness of man, just that radical touch of new birth.

EJH And yet introduces us into something that is infinitely great.

SMcC Exactly, introduces something into our beings that changes us throughout. It is the introduction of something that is going to affect every part of us, affect the way we think, and what we do.

GAL And gives us the capacity to begin to understand, and drink in the glory of the Son?

SMcC Just so. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit. We get a suggestion there of the affinities that are produced in this action; it is not ‘that which is born of the Spirit is the Spirit’, but “is spirit”, partakes of that character. We are dealing now with the knowledge of divine Persons in relation to a spiritual order of things; “God is a spirit”, it is said, referring to the spiritual character of things we have to do with in God as He has come within our range in this way.

PHH How do you understand the three things? Those who are born anew (verse 3), and then born of water and of spirit - are they cumulative?

SMcC I would say they are. The one stresses the sovereign action of the Spirit in introducing into our beings that which changes us entirely; the other introduces the moral element, does it not, “born of water”, the negative side, and “of spirit”, the positive side. The one has to do with seeing, the other with entering. So it is cumulative in that way.

JAP What does the Lord include in the thought of the earthly things which Nicodemus ought to have known about?

SMcC Well, new birth is an earthly thing. New birth is not exactly what we might call an eternal thing. What it produces, of course, has to do with things eternal. But new birth is something that is introduced in connection with the ways of God, and it is linked with the earthly side of the truth.

JAP You are referring to the 36th of Ezekiel?

SMcC Yes. Ezekiel brings in the matter of new birth.

PHH Would that be the principle that God has operated on from the beginning - the principle of new birth?

SMcC That is it.

PHH It did not commence with Christianity.

SMcC No. From Adam onwards the principle of new birth applies, does it not?

CWO'LM Does the thought of the kingdom of God into which new birth introduces us become a basic matter now?

SMcC It does. Especially would it help us to this matter of lowliness and subjection; the necessity of being humble, lowly and subject, to get the gain of the knowledge that we are considering in this gospel; the kingdom of God would have a great place in the displacement in us of what would be contrary to that.

JPH Is there a particular point in the reference to the flesh? “That which is born of flesh is flesh.” Is there something beside contrast in the verse? I was just wondering whether we need to discern the workings of the flesh, which might come in in some subtle way to hinder us from arriving at the full thought of God?

SMcC The Lord is dealing with things which lie at the basis of Christianity - what we have to learn in the very elements of things, the rudiments of things in Christian teaching, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit”. It may take some of us perhaps some time to arrive at it, but it is introduced into the very rudiments of Christian teaching.

JSE Are we not being helped, as we go over the truth now, to arrive at what has already been established in detail and set out plainly in the Lord’s own ministry?

SMcC Yes, I am sure we are. One of the great services of the Spirit is to bring into our minds the Lord’s own ministry here.

JSE He covered, did He not, the whole range when He said to Nicodemus, “Do not wonder that I said to thee, It is needful that ye should be born anew”. As though He is introducing something to Nicodemus which in its effect pertains to the whole earth.

SMcC Yes, exactly. So that what we had earlier bore on what is set out in relation to Christ and His deity; first His place in form of God, and then His place in manhood - Object of divine delight, bringing out the spirit of excellence in His manhood in that delightful environment referred to in verses 14 - 17 of the first chapter. But now, we are coming to what bears upon ourselves, moral conditions with and in ourselves, and how individual persons are coming under the divine hand. Nicodemus was a subject of new birth, but was in darkness as to it. He was in darkness as to what had really transpired in his own soul.

AHn In connection with the moral side. Would you say a word as to the distinction between seeing the kingdom of God and entering it?

SMcC Well, it is one thing to see it, it is another to enter it. None of us could see anything apart from the operation of new birth. New birth brings about a total collapse. F.E.R. likened it to the effect of a pin prick to a balloon - the whole thing collapses, and that is what happens in new birth; and then there is the thought of being born of water and of spirit which affects our ways - our manners and deportment; it comes out initially.

EJH Would you say that one of the greatest comforts of new birth is that it results in spiritual tastes, and a sphere in which they may find full scope?

SMcC Well, it opens up the way to that. New birth does not give us much; we cannot bring much into new birth; it is the introduction of something, in a mysterious inscrutable way, into our beings which changes us throughout. We cannot build too much on it, but there is something mysteriously and inscrutably introduced which affects us radically throughout.

AWGT You would not say it goes so far as to bring in very much consciousness?

SMcC The only consciousness it brings in is helplessness - the consciousness of helplessness, and weakness; as F.E.R. says, all it produces is a cry, a cry of weakness, then the glad tidings comes in with light, as to the Saviour, and as to the kingdom.

AB Do we need the Spirit to get practical deliverance? That is the Spirit working in us, practically setting us free from the flesh, as we have in Romans 7 and 8. So that the man says, “I delight in the law of God after the inward man”. Would that be somewhat akin to “that which is born of the Spirit is spirit”?

SMcC Well, that is further on than what we have here - I mean in progressive teaching. New birth brings about a complete collapse of the man; and later, what often happens, I suppose, is the revival of the features that have been collapsed, so that there is disturbance within; we need to know deliverance as it is set out in those chapters that you refer to, Romans 6, 7 and 8.

ECL Does new birth bring in the ability to believe what is presented? What is developing in John is the believing on this Person.

SMcC Yes, it makes us sensitive to divine impressions - that is what new birth brings about. For instance it says in verse 5 of chapter 1, “The light appears in darkness, and the darkness apprehended it not.” Well, what brings about a change in our souls? It is the action of new birth that brings about something that renders us sensitive as to what may be presented in the glad tidings in the way of light.

GAL So that the cry from Saul of Tarsus was “Who art thou, Lord?”

SMcC That is it - “Who art thou?” There was still the element of darkness in his soul, but light was coming in.

AHG Would this prepare us for divine teaching?

SMcC Well, yes. I think we need to understand this principle as seen in Nicodemus, and the action of new birth in regard to a person like him, because it is laying the foundation for an act of faith in relation to the teaching; running through these three passages is active faith. The Lord has in mind active faith, in which we progress in relation to the knowledge of divine Persons and divine things.

AWGT In a certain sense it involves a kind of demolition before anything positive can be built in the man?

SMcC Well, it is the collapse of the man, but there is something positive introduced. You see, it is not entirely negative; there is a positive thread introduced into the man’s moral being which changes the whole texture.

WJB Is it introducing something of very great potentiality?

SMcC That is what it is: something is introduced in principle into the man’s make-up, his being.

WOS Is that seen in verse 8, “Thus is everyone that is born of the Spirit”?

SMcC Yes; it says “The wind blows where it will, and thou hearest its voice, but knowest not whence it comes and where it goes: thus is every one that is born of the Spirit”. That is to be noticed, “thus is”.

AJG And is all this to emphasise the sovereignty of God? As it says, “The wind blows where it will”. Is it not a question of our being brought back to the sovereignty of God?

SMcC It is, and it should help us as to the divine Personality of the Spirit, in His part in this great operation; that is, making a way for us in regard to the knowledge that is within our range. We owe it to Him.

PHH Does not being born of water and of the Spirit ensure that there is something pure there, as to the source?

SMcC That is it, so that the Spirit is not only the active agent in new birth, but He is the source of the new birth.

AR Would it be right to say then that new birth is entirely the sovereign work of the Spirit and is apart from human agency?

SMcC Well, it is, and we see its bearing here, its full bearing here, on the religious side, not in John 4, but on a man like Nicodemus, an instructed man, a man who is a teacher in Israel, but the Lord says to him, “Thou art the teacher of Israel and knowest not these things! Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that which we know,

and we bear witness of that which we have seen”. It is striking how the Lord brings in the knowledge that was with Him, and those that are embodied in the “we” over against what marked Nicodemus, “and knowest not these things”.

FWK Is new birth antecedent to what we had this afternoon as to those who were born not of man’s will but of God’s? Would you distinguish, please?

SMcC Well, new birth has to do with things in principle. When we come to ‘born of God’ we come to what partakes of the traits of the children of God; they come out in moral traits that mark them as of that generation, children of God.

AWGT That is shown in the reception of Christ, is it?

SMcC Yes, exactly, so that you have something positive in that relation.

JSE Have we to see in this discourse with Nicodemus how the Lord meets him point by point so that He can come to this matter that you referred to as inscrutability, and leaves him in the sense of his own complete ignorance of anything? Nicodemus first speaks as a patron, does he not, “We know that thou art come a teacher”, and the Lord says that unless a man is born anew he cannot see the kingdom; then Nicodemus speaks from a natural and logical standpoint, referring to the womb of his mother. The Lord then brings in the matter of entry, does He not, and then finally introduces the positive thing, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit”. Does not Nicodemus represent a person who has some status on a certain line, and that is all laid bare, whereas in chapter 1 those who receive Christ have never had a status, have they?

SMcC That is right; the Lord is taking this person up on the ground on which he stands as a teacher of Israel, and the Lord is stressing this matter in a peculiar way with him, as if it is to affect Nicodemus in regard to the matter of his knowledge of divine things and divine Persons.

EJH Do you get three features running through these passages which you have called attention to this afternoon,

that is, what is religious in Nicodemus, and what is moral in the woman, and then the side of what is natural with the Courtier?

SMcC Yes, all that runs through the passages that we have read together, especially stressing the Lord’s hand-to-hand service, if I might reverently say so, in regard to individuals; that is, the Lord is viewed here as taking persons on in relation to the different states of soul that are expressed in these passages.

AHG In that way, do we need to apprehend the Lord as Teacher? Nicodemus says “a teacher”, “thou art come a teacher”. Has that to be corrected to see the greatness of the Lord in this way as Teacher?

SMcC Yes, that is interesting, in contrast to what the Lord said to him, “Thou art the teacher of Israel”. The Lord does not say ‘Thou art a teacher of Israel’, but “Thou art the teacher of Israel”. Nicodemus was no ordinary man; he must have been a man of good capacity as men would speak of him, and all around we see that. But the Lord takes him up and speaks very faithfully to him about this matter of new birth, which really leaves Nicodemus wondering as to where he is.

HFR Three times the Lord says to him “I say unto thee”. I was thinking of what you were saying as to the feature of “authority” in the economy, how the Lord comes in in such a distinct way to teach Nicodemus.

SMcC How important that is; it is the Word that is speaking - “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”. The One who is anointed to unfold the whole mind of God, He is here speaking, “Verily, verily, I say unto thee”, and who can speak after Him?

AHn Would you say a word as to why, with such sterile material as Nicodemus seems to be, He speaks to him of love in a way that He speaks to no one else, “For God so loved” and so on?

SMcC Well, surely it is an example set before us, as to whether we are learning; there are those that are always learning, but never seem to come to the knowledge of the truth, and Nicodemus represents that side; he is not extricated from the associations and links in which he was held. This knowledge that the Lord introduces in His ministry and service to Nicodemus should have had an extricating effect with him.

EJH Do you think that the Lord chose Nicodemus as having everything religiously, as best setting forth the necessity of new birth?

SMcC Just so. So that we might not be inclined to say, ‘Well, they are the worst’, the Lord introduces it in relation to the best. Because that is where the trouble lies, it is in persons like Nicodemus, who do not feel they need help. All around we see that, and we have to judge it in our own hearts as a principle.

AJG I was just wondering, as you were remarking about the Lord taking on each of these cases individually, whether we get the secret of that later on, where the Lord says, “All that the Father gives me shall come to me and him that comes to me I will not at all cast out” (John 6: 37). So that is not each soul the subject of the Father’s giving, and of the Lord’s taking on and instructing, and of the Spirit’s operations? Is not each soul the subject of the operations of the whole Godhead?

SMcC Well, exactly, so that it sets in wondrous relief the blessedness of the economy from that side - not only the love that has come into expression in what divine Persons are towards us as shown in the Father’s love to the Son, and the Son laying down His life, but this matter of taking us in hand in view of our instruction in the knowledge that has come within our range in the economy. I think it is most affecting in that way.

GAL So that the Spirit quickens in new birth those whom the Father has chosen in Christ from before the world’s foundation. Does it not emphasise, as you were saying, the divine personality of the Spirit as well as that of the Son?

SMcC Well, it does, and I am sure that we must not eliminate the element of responsibility from new birth in the preaching, because the Lord is speaking to Nicodemus, saying, “It is needful that ye should be born anew”; “ye” - that is, the emphatic “ye”. It is needful that ye should be born anew.”

Ques What is the difference between being born anew and born of water and of Spirit?

SMcC Well, that was asked at the beginning of the reading, and reference was made to the sovereign action of the Spirit in new birth, being born anew; the other is a little bit further in the teaching as to the moral side.

Ques A further operation of the Spirit?

SMcC Except any be born of water and of Spirit brings in the character of the thing now.

CH Does that involve the teaching of death - born of water?

SMcC Yes, the water is the negative side; we would have that in mind - the separative side.

EJB Would you say a little more about the side of responsibility in new birth?

SMcC Well, here it is. The Lord is saying to Nicodemus, so that Nicodemus should be arrested, “It is needful that ye should be born anew”. He is laying it on him.

WJB So that it would be right to draw attention to it in the preaching, would it not?

SMcC Well, certainly, especially bearing on persons with religious airs and religious thinking and feelings.

TJG Is the responsibility, then, to recognise the necessity for new birth, not that the person can do anything about it, but must recognise that it is an absolutely essential thing?

SMcC Well, that is it. The Lord lays it upon him in that way; the way that it comes in, in relation to a religious man, is important. The worst thing to bring down in any of our minds is the religious element if it gets enthroned in any shape or form, as the religious and legal element did at Galatia; it is a most difficult thing to bring down. The Lord is stressing the radical side of the truth in connection with that feature.

PHH I suppose the full answer to being born of water would work out in baptism, would it not?

SMcC Well, it would; there is the link there with baptism, the moral element entering into baptism.

PHH So that when the light of being born of water and of the Spirit is recognised you can understand that the moral and responsible element must enter into the person.

SMcC That is right.

RC Is the Lord laying the responsible side before him in verse 12?

SMcC Well, that is the point too. He goes on teaching, and says, “We speak that which we know, and we bear witness of that which we have seen, and ye receive not our witness. If I have said the earthly things to you and ye believe not, how, if I say the heavenly things to you, will ye believe?” (verse 12). Now notice the Lord uses a plural pronoun ‘we’ in verse 11, but the personal pronoun ‘I’ in verse 12. He is speaking in a general way in verse 11 of a class of persons that have knowledge according to God, “We speak that which we know”. But then when He comes in verse 12 to “If I have said the earthly things to you” He is alluding specifically to what He said to Nicodemus.

WSS Does that put responsibility upon us, in relation to the teaching today?

SMcC Well, it does, so the Lord says “and ye believe not”. This matter of active faith in relation to the teaching is important.

WSS I was thinking how we need to take home to ourselves what is said to Nicodemus, and that we may be marked by believing, as the truth is unfolded.

SMcC Well, that is the point, I think; that is the lesson for us. Mr. Raven said, as you will recall perhaps better than I do, that if a man goes off in his later years he always wondered what stone was loose in his foundation. Well, when we have difficulty as to the truth we might well go back as to whether we have what the Lord is saying here in the teaching.

BH In the matter of learning and receiving the truth, do you distinguish the part played by the spirit and the mind?

SMcC I am not sure that I follow you.

BH I was wondering if it was a faculty that is deeper than the thinking faculty that is there, “the things of man knows no one save the spirit of a man that is in him”, and new birth coming in, in connection with the spirit. I wondered if there was something to be learned besides acquiring knowledge.

SMcC Yes. The element of new birth entering into a man affects his thinking faculties as well as affecting him throughout, so that he does not think in the way he formerly thought.

AWGT Is that not involved in being born anew - that means, from top to bottom?

SMcC Well, that is what the point is. It is, as the word has been used, radical; that is, it is throughout, from top to bottom.

WJB The fact that we make room for the Spirit does not in any way eliminate the mind, does it? It means that we think with subject minds.

SMcC That is it, and renewed minds, minds that have been affected by new birth.

JAP Was it said that new birth is not a matter of divine sovereignty?

S.McC. Who said that?

JAP I am asking whether you are saying that, suggesting that there is responsibility connected with it?

SMcC We did not put it that way. What was said was that in stressing divine sovereignty in the act of new birth we must not eliminate entirely the side of responsibility, and that it is presented to a responsible man, and his responsibility is stressed in relation to it. “It is needful that ye should be born anew.” That was what was said.

HW Does the word “ye” refer to the Jewish nation?

SMcC It refers to the religious man, but he is taken up by John the evangelist to show us the best in a religious way.

HW And would you be free in the preaching of the gospel to say emphatically “Ye must be born again”?

SMcC Most certainly I do, having religious persons in mind.

WJB Mr. Taylor has, I have seen it in notes of his preaching.

SMcC Especially if you are having to do with a religious person, built up in his religious thoughts, or a religious audience, it certainly would be quite in keeping to stress “it is needful that ye should be born anew”.

AWGT That is, you are not putting the onus of being born on the person, but making room in his mind for the fact that he needs to be born anew?

SMcC Well, that is the point.

JPH Does Peter touch on it in 1 Peter 1: 24, 25? He says, “because all flesh is as grass and all its glory as the flower of grass”; then he says, “this is the word which in the glad tidings is preached to you”. Does it come into the preaching?

SMcC Yes, it is very interesting the way Peter puts it; it would involve an action which affects the intelligence. He says, “being born again not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible by the living and abiding word of God”. That should affect the intelligence of the person.

FWK Would it be right to say that all men are responsible, but new birth will give men to realise their responsibility? Is it the element of new birth that would give souls some measure of light and responsibility?

SMcC Well, new birth gives us our first initial touch, you might say, which brings into our souls our feeling of responsibility towards God.

AJG Is not all this instruction to Nicodemus to prepare the way in his soul to receive the light of the cross - the Son of man lifted up, and the gift of God in eternal life to those who believe?

SMcC That is it, so that the Lord says as He continues, in verse 12, “if I say the heavenly things to you, will ye believe? And no one has gone up into heaven, save he who came down out of heaven, the Son of man who is in heaven. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, thus must the Son of man be lifted up.” How searching the teaching is now; the Lord is building up in the teaching.

GAL I was wondering whether it was desirable to see that this chapter is teaching rather than preaching.

SMcC Well, it is. It is the Lord teaching Nicodemus, but that does not eliminate the insistence on the new birth in the preaching.

GAL I can understand that. I was thinking that it comes out in the setting of teaching, that is all.

SMcC That is how it comes out in John 3 here, but Peter says, “this is the word which in the glad tidings is preached unto you”, involving what we have here, although it is really more advanced.

WJB It was really the word through Isaiah, was it not?

SMcC You mean all flesh is as grass?

WJB I mean in principle that is what is implied in Isaiah 40.

SMcC Peter was referring to that, no doubt, in what he is alluding to.

Ques Did you say that Nicodemus was born again although ignorant of it?

SMcC Yes. Nicodemus is one in whom new birth has taken place.

JH So that verse 21 would apply to Nicodemus in that regard?

SMcC Yes, “he that practises the truth comes to the light”. Although we cannot say much about Nicodemus, we must not build too much on him either, as to practising the truth, but nevertheless we give full credit for what is there, and the Lord is treating him now as one in whom new birth is.

JSE Does the Lord in this conversation bring Nicodemus low in himself in relation to the matter of new birth and then finds pleasure in expanding the teaching to the points to which Mr. G. has referred, in the Son of man being lifted up and God so loved the world; in each of those cases He brings in the great matter of believing. Is not the earlier part of the chapter what you have rightly called the laying-low principle in order that there might be more room for these expanded things which are connected with the Lord as the Son of man and God’s only-begotten Son?

SMcC I am sure that is right, so that in regard to what we have been saying, while the Lord is teaching Nicodemus patiently in regard to the truth He is seeking to expand him in regard to the whole gospel vista; what is before us here in this section is the great vista in the gospel, and especially is it needful over against popular evangelism, which does not deal with the state of man. The Lord is bringing in what is essential to help us in regard to the great vista of things in the gospel, “thus must the Son of man be lifted up, that every one who believes on him may not perish but have life eternal. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believes on him may not perish, but have life eternal.” As Mr. Darby says, the sense should be that He has loved men in view of eternal life; this is to expand our vista in the gospel, so that we preach the gospel with this kind of vista.

AHn Mr. Stoney used to remark, you remember, that we change our man, but does the teaching of this chapter really help us in that and so liberate us in view of the service of God?

SMcC Well, it does, so that we should get on to the matter of what comes in in the 4th chapter.

PHH Do you mind first saying another word about inscrutability attached now to the Lord? Is it right to say that in what the Lord has said as to “the wind blows where it will” is really bringing forward the inscrutability of the Spirit? But then He says, “no one has gone up into heaven save he who came down out of heaven, the Son of man who is in heaven”. Does that prepare our minds for greatness in the person of Christ which we can never compass, making us worshipful?

SMcC It does, and it is important to keep that in mind in regard to divine Persons; especially would it save us from limiting divine Persons, or fixing upon divine Persons any position that They may take, or limiting Them to a position that They take. We need special help as to that, that even as we think of certain things and positions that They have taken up we must always bear in mind that there is something beyond that that we cannot compass.

PHH Does the very title Son of man tend to make us think perhaps that the Lord Jesus has come so near to man, to take everything up for him, that we might possibly lose sight of the greatness of the Person who has done it?

SMcC Well, exactly, so that it is important to see how the Lord brings it in here, “No one has gone up into heaven save he who came down out of heaven, the Son of man who is in heaven”. Now some one might say, ‘Well, explain that’. How can we explain it? We cannot explain it, we are just to believe it, there it is, in the Scripture. How the Lord could be there, and how He could be here, how could we explain it?

PHH And yet it serves to magnify all the heavenly things which He is about to speak of.

SMcC Yes, so that we are reminded in speaking of the Lord as man, and speaking of Him as a bondman, that we must be careful not to limit Him to that - there is that which is beyond either of these positions.

CM Would you say more in regard to the inscrutability of the Holy Spirit?

SMcC Oh, just that it says, “The wind blows where it will, and thou hearest its voice, but knowest not whence it comes and where it goes: thus is every one that is born of the Spirit”. We are reminded of the element of inscrutability in regard to divine operations; the Spirit operating in relation to new birth. We cannot explain it or give account of it - there it is.

We must move on to chapter 4 as to this passage which brings in the Spirit in the figure of the living water, and then knowledge in that relation; and then the matter of the worship of God, as the woman brings it up and the Lord speaks to her about it; and the matter of healing; and the thought of faith - active faith is important in all this. The Lord says to her (verse 10), “If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that says to thee” - that is, she is reminded now of the Person who is speaking to her. Again, we might say it is the Word that is speaking to her, the One in whom the full mind of God is made known, is revealed.

EJH The woman says, “when he comes he will tell us all things”.

SMcC That is it, and the Lord says to her, “I who speak to thee am he” - showing the greatness of the Person who is there.

ECL Do you get the thought of responsibility being raised with the woman directly she asks, “Give me this water”, which the Lord had proposed? The Lord raises these moral questions with her: “Go call thy husband,

and come here”. Have these to be settled first before we can receive anything?

SMcC Yes, they have. Showing the importance of the adjustment of moral matters, the Lord brings up the thought of the living water first; that is, He does not say, “He would have given thee the Holy Spirit”; He says, “He would have given thee living water”. As we have pointed out, He is treating the woman according to her capacity, as a learner. We have to learn how in certain persons to treat them according to their capacity, and that is what we have here; but the figure in the living water suggests the Holy Spirit.

JSE In a certain way, would it be safe to say the Lord exhibits more grace in His dealing with this moral wreck than He did with the religious assumption of Nicodemus? There are radical statements, are there not, in chapter 3, but are not the statements somewhat more attractive in this chapter?

SMcC Well, they are. The patience with which He takes her on and serves her is most affecting, especially the fact that He says to such a disreputable woman, “If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that says to thee, Give me to drink, thou” - the emphatic thou - “thou wouldest have asked of him”. A woman of social disrepute, and yet the Lord is stressing the thought of His Person - who He is, to her.

AHG Have you a word as to what is involved in drinking? In the previous incident it is a matter of believing; here it is a question of drinking?

SMcC Well, it brings up this matter of the Spirit; in regard to the feature of knowledge of divine Persons and divine things that we are considering, this matter of the Spirit is important, because it is going to involve inward deliverance from what is morally degrading and corrupting.

AJG And not only deliverance, would you say, but also satisfaction?

SMcC That is it, so that we have the positive suggestion in living water of what would be satisfying.

EJH Has it not been described as satisfaction over against gratification Yes, she no doubt was seeking to gratify certain desires and lusts in her way of living, but the Lord would bring her to a satisfied state of things, a region of satisfied desires, as has been said.

EJB Are there two stages: one the Lord giving, and the other our drinking? The Lord gives the living water, but then it is “whosoever drinks” - on our side.

SMcC Yes, showing the importance of our side, so that the Spirit is in mind in this chapter, and it is an essential part of what we are considering: the necessity for the Spirit; not the necessity for new birth here, but the necessity for the Spirit, in setting us up in purified relations with God. That is the teaching here - purified relations with divine Persons.

AHG So that drinking would involve appropriation, would it?

SMcC Well, it does.

AHG And is that not sometimes where we are lacking in relation to the divine service, because there has been so little with us on the line of appropriation?

SMcC That is it. We need to drink, we need to be on the line of desire in this way. She says, “Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst nor come here to draw” - come here to draw. She already has a judgment of what she has been going on with, feeble as it may be, but there it is, and “Jesus says to her, Go, call thy husband, and come here.” Come here. That is, He is going to bring her back after the moral issue is searched - bring her back to this position.

AB Would the drinking bring in the service of the Spirit in engaging our hearts with Christ so that we learn to find satisfaction in Him? And then the further thought of the Spirit becoming a fountain in us, giving spring to our affections - is that needed if God is to be served rightly?

SMcC Oh, it is, because a living state of things is in mind, specially in view of the service of God, and the Spirit is introduced in that way, setting out what is living, as living water. Why should the Lord stress living water if it is not that a living state of things is in mind. And the service of God necessitates a living state of things.

CH And the retention of the person “such” - “the Father seeketh such”; that is the persons, is it?

SMcC Well, it is an important thing to see that - the kind of persons - for she says in verse 20, “Our fathers worshipped in this mountain, and ye say that in Jerusalem is the place where one must worship”. Jesus says to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when ye shall neither in this mountain nor yet in Jerusalem worship the Father”. Notice how He brings in the Father now; this is an added touch in the instruction, “worship the Father”. “Ye worship ye know not what; we worship what we know, for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour is coming and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth”. Now the Lord is bringing in the refined side of knowledge in Christianity here. He brought it in in speaking to Nicodemus, enlarging our outlook in connection with the glad tidings - the great gospel vista; here He is bringing it in in relation to the woman - knowledge in connection with the refined inward side of the worship of God.

MPS Is there something for our help in the woman’s occupation with place - as to the word “Come here and draw”; “our fathers worshipped in this mountain, and ye say that in Jerusalem is the place where one must worship”?

SMcC Well, I think it is important to see that the Lord is seeking to remove from our minds geographical thoughts and material ideas; there is nothing more important than that material and physical thoughts should be removed in this matter of the worship of God, because God is a spirit, not ‘the Father is a spirit’ - that is not the point here. “God is a spirit, and they who worship him must worship him in spirit and truth.” That is, the worship of God is spiritual, not material.

HFR Do the three Persons come in in this scripture leading up to God - I mean, there is the Lord Himself as the giver of the living water, and then there is what the water becomes in him, and then the Father “seeketh”?

SMcC Exactly. So we are reminded again of the full scope of the activities of the Persons of the Godhead in relation to this matter, all serving with a great end and objective in mind. The way the Lord brings in the Father here is instructive: God before us in that relation, in the thought of the Father; God coming into a certain relationship in view of a full end that is in mind.

AJG Does the fact that the Lord says “God is a spirit, and they who worship him must worship him in spirit and truth” show how God has in mind that we should be in wonderful affinity with Himself?

SMcC That is it. It would bring up the need for the Holy Spirit, do you not think. How could we worship God in this spiritual way without the help of the Holy Spirit?

AJG Quite so.

PHH Were you going to say some more about the Father?

SMcC Oh, I think it is important that we should see the Person that is presented to us in the Father. It is not exactly the relationship here - it is the Person, the wonderful glory of that Person in the Godhead, that God is presented to us in that Person.

PHH So graciously.

SMcC Yes, so graciously.

EJH Do we see the skill of the Lord as teacher in that He transferred her thoughts from “our fathers” to “the Father”?

SMcC Well, He is bringing in something that she had never heard of before; she had never heard of the Father. It is remarkable how the Lord brings the name in without explaining anything about it. He says, “when ye shall neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem worship the Father”. Is it not a credit to the work of God in the woman? He is treating her as a subject of the work of God so that she would take in this knowledge that He is imparting as to “the Father”, involving the place that Person has in the economy. God is presented to us in the Father.

WSS And I suppose it would bring in all that is under the Father - the many families; what is under the Father’s hand, so to speak.

SMcC The Father puts His impress on every family.

JSE Is it interesting that the Lord removes from her mind first of all the two places - this mountain and Jerusalem; and then He removes from her mind two classes, “ye” and “we”, coming to they, who worship the Father, “the Father seeks such as his worshippers”?

SMcC Very good.

JSE So that the Lord arrives at a point with her when He accepts the position of a Jew, but then He goes further and says, “the hour is coming and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth; for also the Father seeks such as his worshippers”. It does seem, does it not, that He is attracting her now away from place and away from classes to bring her into the one and only setting where this matter of worshipping the Father can operate. Is that right?

SMcC Yes, exactly, so that all the knowledge that is being imparted in the teaching is leading to this final result that the Lord has in mind in the thought of worship; first of all, worship in the special way to which He refers in verse 23, “the hour is coming and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth; for also the Father seeks such as his worshippers”. That is, God as having come in in this way, in that special name by which He is known in this dispensation; but then the Lord does not leave her there, He brings in the great general thought as to God. He does not leave her without an impression as to the general thought of God - God in His majesty and greatness involving all three Persons. “God is a spirit, and they who worship him must worship him in spirit and truth.” We approach God in a known relationship - in the relationship in which we stand to Him in sonship, revealed as He is in the wondrous name of Father in the economy. But then, that is not the final thing - there is the great thought as to God, Christ’s God, the God who has come within our range in Christ, and who is now the great exalted object of worship. “God is a spirit, and they who worship him must worship him in spirit and truth.”

HFR Are we limited to the economy, or is there any sense in which we worship God as inscrutable?

SMcC We are always regulated by the economy, because we have only creature minds and understandings. The only way in which we have to do with absoluteness is as alongside of Christ, hearing Him say, “My God”. We get a sense of what is beyond us in that, and yet He goes on to say, “and your God”. We worship God as having made Himself known - not in conditions or environment where He is unknown to us.

CH But it is the same God.

SMcC It is the same God, that is what we should see; no less than God, so that, as the teaching has very persistently drawn our attention to it, we cannot limit God to a relationship into which He comes. We have to do with Him and approach Him in a known relationship, and stand before Him in that known relationship, but the God who has come into that relationship is the God who is the Supreme Object of worship, the Supreme Object of all things.

AJG The very fact that He has initiated the economy itself compels worship, does it not?

SMcC It does. It is all directed towards that end.

WBH Would you say the more we appreciate the great thought of the Father, the more ready we shall be to move on into the appreciation of this great thought of God?

SMcC We shall never know God as God rightly if we do not appreciate the thought of the way in which He is presented in the Father.

WMB Does the thought of the Father seeking bring out the peculiar grace of this dispensation?

SMcC It does. That is the whole point in the presentation of the Father in this way; it is God known in grace, and the seeking is very affecting in that way. We think of seeking in Luke 15, in regard to man’s need, eventuating in God’s pleasure of course; but the grace of it here, “seeking such” to worship, is affecting as you think of it.

JAP In the New Testament you get the thought of God the Father, or God our Father, or God and Father, more than forty times; is that to stress what you have been saying, that we worship Him in a known relationship? That occurs constantly in the epistles.

SMcC Yes. We never have to do with God outside of a known relationship. We are always in sonship. If we think of manhood in the final stage of the service of God, it is manhood in sonship, always is so; but the God who has come into the relationships we have been speaking about is the God that Scripture says “for of him and through him and for him are all things. To whom be glory for ever”. That is, God as God is the supreme end in the service of God - the worship of God.

CH That is, we do not limit God to any name or position He has taken?

SMcC Well, that is the point. God must be greater than any relation He enters into or upon.

AMP But we may worship God as inscrutable, may we not?

SMcC Well, in the sense of the doxologies, yes.

AMP And in our hymn book we say, ‘Oh, how inscrutable, yea how unsearchable’ (48:1).

SMcC Yes, exactly. Paul in 1 Timothy 6 utters such a doxology, and there are other doxologies that bear upon that.

AMP Although our relationship remains a known one, and we are sons in relation to the Father, yet we may reach out in our worship to the God who is inscrutable?

SMcC Well, it is the God who is inscrutable that has come within our range in Christ, you see. What we have to be careful of is that we do not make the terms of the economy applicable to abstract deity and make them descriptive of the inscrutable form of God, because they are not.

NKM Why is the Lord stressing not only “in spirit” but “in truth” also - “must worship him in spirit and truth”?

SMcC Well, it is to bring in the side of what is spiritual as opposed to what is material. And then the necessity for truth - that involves adjustment. The truth has come in in Christ. Christ is the truth, and the Spirit is the truth. The truth has to do with the asserting of what is in another, and Christ asserts what is true in regard to God and in regard to man, so that He is said to be the truth. He is the truth objectively, as the Spirit is the truth subjectively in the saints here according to 1 John 5: 6.

JSE Is it right to say that that touch from the Lord to the woman has such force to her that she can afford to leave her water-pot? All that comes in between those points is to do with the disciples, is it not?

SMcC Well, exactly.

JSE But is it not helpful to see that the woman is affected by that very word, and she abandons all that she had held in relation to what was material and goes forward with the power of that impression in her soul?

SMcC That is it, so that if we had been there it would have been a very active reading after verse 24; but the woman goes on and says, “I know that Messias is coming, who is called Christ; when he comes he will tell us all things. Jesus says to her, I who speak to thee am he”. And that is all that we get. The Lord leaves her with that impression, and that impression remains with her - “God is a spirit”. Without opening up all that is involved, He just left it upon her mind and her spirit, “God is a spirit, and they who worship him must worship him in spirit and truth”.