8:48-53 Observe Christ's disregard of the applause of men. those who are dead to the praises of men can bear their contempt. God will seek the honour of all who do not seek their own. In these verses we have the doctrine of the everlasting happiness of believers. We have the character of a believer; he is one that keeps the sayings of the Lord Jesus. And the privilege of a believer; he shall by no means see death for ever. Though now they cannot avoid seeing death, and tasting it also, yet they shall shortly be where it will be no more forever, Ex 14:13.

Verse 51. - Verily, verily. This impressive recommencement of discourse implies that a new turn is given to the conversation, and that the gravest solemnity and importance is attached to the utterance. It is impossible that the Jews should have listened unmoved to Christ's rejoinder on their rude taunt, or been unimpressed by the self-composed and lofty way in which the honour of our Lord was calmly entrusted by him to the Father. The Jews may say what they please, call him by any opprobrious name they choose; "there is One that seeketh" his glory, and he is content. He has, in earlier portions of this discourse, promised freedom and sonship to those who abide in his word; and now to those who believed on him he says, with extraordinary emphasis, If a man (any one) have kept my word, he shall never behold death. This "keeping" is more than "abiding" in the word. There is the additional notion of intently watching the "keeping," which issues in "fulfilling" and "obeying" (Meyer and Tholuck); see ver. 55; John 14:15, 21, 23; John 15:20; John 17:6. The opposite of τηρεῖν would be "to disregard;" the opposite of φυλάσσειν would be "to let slip" (Westcott). The promise is dazzling: "He shall never behold," i.e. steadily or exhaustively know by experience, what death means and is. He may pass through physical death, he may (γεύσηται) taste of dissolution, he may come before the judgment seat, he may see corruption (ἰδεῖν διαφθοράν); but he will not behold (θεωρεῖν) death. He will never know what death is (cf. here; John 4:14; John 5:24; John 6:51, where the Saviour speaks of the "living water," and "life eternal," and "living bread," which whoso partaketh shall never die.. See also John 11:26). He does not tell his disciples that they shall not see the grave, but that in the deepest sense they shall never die. "Death" and "life" are words that are lifted into a higher connotation. Death is a moral state, not an event in their physical existence.

Verily, verily, I say unto you,.... This is truth, and may be depended upon, as coming from the "Amen", and faithful witness:

if a man keep my saying; or doctrine, receives the Gospel in the love of it, obeys it from his heart, and cordially embraces and firmly believes it; and retains and holds it fast, having a spiritual and comfortable experience of the doctrines of Christ, and yielding a cheerful and ready obedience to his commands and ordinances, in faith and love:

he shall never see death; the second death, eternal death, which is an everlasting separation of a man, body and soul, from God: this death shall have no power on such a person, he shall never be hurt by it; and though he dies a corporeal death, that shall not be a curse, a penal evil to him; nor shall he always lie under the power of it, but shall rise again, and live in soul and body, for ever with the Lord: seeing and tasting death, as in John 8:52, are Hebraisms expressive of dying.

51. If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death—Partly thus vindicating His lofty claims as Lord of the kingdom of life everlasting, and, at the same time, holding out even to His revilers the scepter of grace. The word "keep" is in harmony with Joh 8:31, "If ye continue in My word," expressing the permanency, as a living and paramount principle, of that faith to which He referred: "never see death," though virtually uttered before (Joh 5:24; 6:40, 47, 51), is the strongest and most naked statement of a very glorious truth yet given. (In Joh 11:26 it is repeated in nearly identical terms).

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