John 3:13 And no man has ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven. Christ having reproved Nicodemus for his ignorance, now shows the remedy thereof in Himself. 1. Christ's sharp word is not His last. Having inflicted a wound He offers Himself, the only remedy, to cure it. 2. It is alike impossible for men, by their own parts and natural endowments, to comprehend spiritual mysteries and enter into God's counsels, here called an ascending up to heaven. 3. In so far as sinners come to a true and saving knowledge of heavenly mysteries, they are in a sort transported up to heaven. If Capernaum were exalted to heaven by the offer of these things, what are they who embrace them? 4. It is proper in Christ only, in some sense, to ascend to heaven, both for the measure and degree of knowledge which, as God, is infinite, and, as man, is large as human nature is capable of, and for the kind of knowledge which, as God, is of Himself, and can only be man's by communication from Him who came down from heaven. 5. The Son of God in the boson of the Father manifested Himself in our nature, that He might in our nature understand and communicate the heavenly mysteries; therefore it is marked as the ground of His ascending or comprehending these things that He came down, hereby showing that His abasing of Himself did exalt Him as Mediator to that dignity, to be the storehouse of wisdom to His people. 6. Christ, by His Incarnation, did not cease to be God, for He is still in heaven. 7. The Son of God has assumed the human nature into so strict a personal union that what is proper to either nature is ascribed unto the Person under whatsoever name. And hereby Christ shows His love to our nature that under that name, "Son of Man," He ascribes what is proper to His Godhead to Himself. (G. Hutcheson.) Parallel Verses KJV: And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven. |
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