1 John 3:3-12

Practical Proofs

1Jn 3:3-12

Sometimes we think it is unspeakably comfortable to live in the society of John the Apostle, because he is so full of tenderness and love and fatherly clemency. He seems to have one subject, and to amplify it with the poetry of the heart; the subject of the Apostle is love: Love God, love one another, love the brethren. In no other part of Holy Writ is the word "love" so frequently and tenderly employed. Yet, if we listen to John wholly, that is to say to his entire speech, we shall find that he is as disciplinary as James, and as doctrinal and practical as Paul. He has a way of his own in introducing practical admonition. It is the way of sacred cunning. The Apostle John never strikes a man down and says, You shall be good, I insist upon it; if you are anything but good I will chastise you, I will hold you up to scorn, and you shall reap the consequences of your own wickedness even here and now, to say nothing of another place and another time. No such language does the Apostle John ever employ; yet, whenever he speaks of love, he makes it a kind of flowery road along which he passes, that at the end of it he may be practical in admonition; that at the close of his wondrous poetic exhibition of love he may state the moral, and enforce it with the omnipotence of tenderness. Sometimes we might think John almost weak in his way of speaking. It is not unusual to represent him as an old man, which he was indeed in years, borne into the Church when he could no longer walk into it, and to further represent him stretching out his hands as if in papal benediction, and saying, "Little children, love one another." That is only one aspect of his great character; none could sing more sweetly, none could drop his voice into a more touching and pathetic minor: yet who could be more like Sinai? who could hurl the Ten Commandments as if in one sentence with such tremendous force and unerring precision? We have just been revelling in the prospect of development. John has called us "sons of God," and said, "It doth not yet appear what we shall be," because life is a revelation, a continual unfolding and infolding, a marvellous and subtle and imperceptible advance, but a sure and inevitable progress: yet, looking over all the detail, he says, this will certainly occur: when our God appears, we shall see him with the vision of our love, we shall hail him with all the animation of our thankfulness, and the very sight of God shall transform us into the image of his divinity.

So the Apostle knew, and did not know. That is the very highest philosophy. To know precisely what we have and what we have not; to put the finger upon the possession, and then to lift it, and point to some other treasure not yet attained but sure to be possessed that is knowledge, that is wisdom, and that is peace. There is no finality in Christian progress. What we know as heaven is only the beginning of our better being. We think of heaven as final, but heaven only opens; the brightest seer that ever peered through the clouds, and read the apocalypse of the sky, only said: "Behold, I see heaven opened." That is enough: to see openings indicative of further progress, higher education, nobler life; that is heaven, and no other heaven is worth having. The formal conventional notion of heaven must be driven out of men's minds. We are either in heaven, or we are not in it, or never will be in it. Men are in heaven or in hell now; not in the full heaven, not in the intensest hell, but in our consciousness, our convictions, our spirits witnessing with other spirits, we know where we are. Some men are always talking to God. Others never speak to him; they chatter to the devil; they know his language, they like his style of speech, it suits the vulgarity of their soul, it sets fire to their worst passions and their unholiest ambition. They never pray; what wonder if they dispute about prayer and ask if prayer is ever answered? What wonder that they tire of the altar? they were never there. He who has once prayed prays without ceasing. There is an attitude of prayer which is a posture of weariness: there is an act of fellowship in which the soul says, Disturb me no more, for I have come to the point of rest: here I would build my soul's tabernacle and here abide for ever.

The Apostle John now says to Christian men, You will know whether you have this hope in you by the degree in which you set to the work of self-purification. We will ask the Apostle to tell us by what signs we may know that we are sons of God. O thou sire of the Church, thou seer of the ages, thou to whose wondering eyes all heaven was revealed in pomp of glory, tell us by what tokens we shall know that we are sons of God. We expect him to give some sentimental reply, as who should say, Are you quiet in soul? do you enjoy a sense of luxuriating in the green pastures? do you know that you are walking by the still waters, the waters of rest, the streams of comfort? Nothing of the kind: he says, If you are good men, you will go with both hands and with all-growing energy at the work of self-cleansing. "Every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself." Here is John the disciplinarian, here is the poetry of love brought down to the prose of service. Yet in service, properly accepted and discharged, there is no prose: all work having a good object and a holy inspiration is poetry. When we lose the true idea of work in any sphere of life we become hirelings, and serve with the narrow measure of eye-service and not with the affection and fire of the willing and assenting heart. Then the standard is accessible to every one. It is a practical standard. A man has only to ask himself such questions as, Am I really trying to get purer, tenderer, nobler? do I look as through a microscope at every spot that befouls the robe of my life, that I may get rid of it at once and for ever? have I relaxed my self-discipline? have I said, as a fatalist, I will simply take life as it comes, and let it work out its own consequence? or am I continually giving myself to self-vigilance and self-purification? If we answer these questions, we shall know at once and with certainty where we are in spiritual education and in spiritual prospect. This is reason; behold here, as in a thousand cases which have passed before us, we have our own method of life uplifted, glorified, and applied to its highest uses. In proportion to the measure of our expectation is the measure of our preparation. A man is going to a feast, he is going to sit with great men, he is for an hour or two to be associated with the best life of the metropolis: what does he do? We all know; he prepares himself for the event, he will not be out of harmony with the colour of the occasion, he will not appear without a wedding garment; he will even ask questions as to the etiquette of the occasion, that in no point he may fall short of the dignity of the invitation which he has accepted. O thou wicked and foolish servant, out of thine own mouth will I condemn thee: dost thou prepare for some social pleasure, and forget to put on thy best heart-robes and life-garments in which to meet the King of Glory? I gather up all thy disused robes and rags, and say, Here by these signs I convict thee: thou didst prepare for little feasts, and empty banquets, and noisy revels; on no account wouldst thou walk to the feast; thou must needs ride in some hired, painted chariot: what preparation, what anticipation, what a desire to fall into the harmony and fitness of things! and yet see, O thou worse than beast of the forest, thou hast neglected to provide for the only interview which is worth securing and realising, the interview with thy God. The back-stroke of Christian appeal is tremendous. Christianity substantiates and authorises itself by reason. Christianity gathers up all our fashions customs, methods, and policies, and says at last when we begin to stammer out some vain excuse, Thou wicked and foolish servant, out of thine own mouth do I condemn thee: thy tongue is the sword which shall be thrust through thy life.

By what standard are we to purify ourselves? The words are comparative. Purity admits of degrees; comparing ourselves with ourselves, we may be honourable men. The standard is "as he is pure." Why, John must have heard the Master say these very words "Be ye perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect; be ye holy as your Father in heaven is holy." He brings this flower, this lily, fairer than snow, from the garden of Christ, the paradise of the heart of God. Who can set up the ideal standard? We now say, It is impossible to do what Jesus Christ commands; he must have had some other meaning; when he tells us to resist not evil, we say he must have meant that we are, as far as in us lies, not to strike back when we are struck. He did not say so; if he meant that, it is a pity he did not say it. When Jesus Christ says, "When thou art smitten on the one cheek, turn the other also to the smiter," we say, That is evidently and obviously impossible; this is idealism, very limpid and extremely beautiful, a thought of translucent idealism, a very fine celestial light shining on the other side of it, making it almost transparent: but it is evidently the higher poetry. It is not given in blank verse, it is not reduced to hexameters. Count Tolstoi comes forth and says, All this means what it says, and if we do not carry out these propositions and commandments to the letter, we have no right to the title of Christians. It would be easier to reply to the Count than to answer him. "Even as he is pure." Is there no hope? Our hope is in believing that final purity cannot be suddenly snatched; it must be grown up to, attained little by little: "Brethren," said one, "I count not myself to have apprehended, but this one thing I do, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus." In that "I press" is everything. He who wants to be pure is pure; he who says he will endeavour by the mighty power of the Eternal Spirit to be as pure as God, has already begun the lustration that will take out of him every taint and stain of evil, a detergence infinite, complete.

After this the Apostle protests against lawlessness. He talks of "transgression." "Transgression" is only a kind of theological term for lawlessness. John will not have any lawlessness, any eccentricity that starts on its own account and its own motion to work out some other spheres and heavens in God's universe. John lays down the law after having spoken thus elaborately and poetically of love. Read the fourth verse and onward, and you will find that John talks as if he had never heard of anything but law. John's mountains faced north and south; on the south all the midday rested, on the north what darkness, and yet what sense of massiveness and majesty!

The Apostle points his appeal by a historical case: "Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother," literally, "who cut his brother's throat." Cut-throats are an ancient race. And wherefore cut he the throat of Abel? "Because his own works were evil, and his brother's righteous" ( 1Jn 3:12 ) a theological conflict. Theology has shed more blood than ever wicked kings have shed. Theology is often a man-hater and a man-destroyer. The odium theologicum is the most fatal stigma that can be attached to any man. We cannot overcome it or forget it. The sects are fighting to-day, and cutting each other's throats to-day. The spirit of madness is in the so-called Christian denominations. They do not love one another beyond the point of occasional conference, and the point of an occasional enthusiastic resolution which means nothing. This is another test of Christian progress. Let men drop all theological conflict, and say, Brother, you have as much right to think as I have to think, but, before either of us begins to think farther, let us pray. What unity there is in prayer! what diversity in opinion! Hear these theologues as they resolutionise one another. What statements, what anger, what holy or unholy feeling! so that we say, with the ancient poet, "Can anger dwell in such celestial hearts?" What striving for the victory, what protestations about orthodoxy and heterodoxy! When they come to pray, they say, as they bow, hand-in-hand, "Our Father, which art in heaven." Let us have no more conflict let us pray without ceasing.