John 8:38-47 I speak that which I have seen with my Father: and you do that which you have seen with your father.… I. REPUGNANCE TO THE TRUTH (ver. 45). Had He given them popular dogmas or speculative disquisitions, they might have believed Him; but He gave them truth that addressed itself with imperial force to their central being. They were living in falsehood, appearances, and shams, far away from the awful region of spiritual realities. The truth came in direct collision with their prepossessions, pride, interests, habits; and they would not have it. This repugnance — 1. Reveals man's abnormal condition. His soul is as truly organized for truth as his eyes for light. Truth is its natural atmosphere, scenery, food. 2. Suggests his awful future. The soul and truth will not always be kept apart. The time must come when the intervening falsehoods shall melt away and the interspacing gulfs bridged over, and when the soul shall feel itself in conscious contact with moral realities. II. THE PURITY OF CHRIST (ver. 46). Christ is the Truth, and His invincible intolerance of all sin repels the depraved heart. "Men love darkness," etc. The first beams of the morning are not half so repulsive to a burglar as the rays of Christ's truth are to a depraved heart. Purity makes the hell of depravity. III. ESTRANGEMENT FROM GOD (ver. 47). Divine filial sympathies are essential to true faith. The more a child loves his parent, the more he believes in his word. Unregenerate men have not this sympathy, hence their unbelief. They do not like to retain God in their thoughts. "He that loveth not knoweth not God." IV. PRIDE OF INTELLECT (ver. 48). They had said this before, and here they pride themselves on their sagacity. "Say we not well?" Are we not clever? What an insight we have into character! Infidels have ever been too scientific to believe in miracles, too philosophic to require a revelation, too independent to require Christ, too moral to need inward reformation. "Say we not well?" is their spirit. It comes out in their books, lectures, converse, daily life. "We are the wise men, and wisdom will die with us." This pride is essentially inimical to true faith. "Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child," etc. V. UNCHARITABLENESS OF DISPOSITION (ver. 48). Suppose He was a Samaritan, are they all bad? Yes, said they, and because thou art a Samaritan thou hast a devil. This uncharitable reasoning has ever characterized infidelity. All Christians are hypocrites, all preachers crafty mercenaries, all churches nurseries of superstition; hence we will have nothing to do with it. (D. Thomas, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: I speak that which I have seen with my Father: and ye do that which ye have seen with your father. |
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