THE WORD MADE FLESH.

NOTES ON ST. JOHN'S PROLOGUE TO HIS GOSPEL.

BY THE REV. JAMES CULROSS, M.A., D.D.

No. IV.-John i. 6-13.

THIS paragraph conducts us to a fresh point of view from which to regard the Word.

There arose a God-sent man, the Evangelist tells us, whose name was John. This was John the Baptist, the son of Zacharias and Elizabeth. We have glimpses of his story in the Gospels, in so far as it bears on the life of Jesus, glimpses which exhibit him as a truesouled and noble man, than whom there had not risen a greater among them that are born of women. There are those who arrive at just conclusions through research, intuition, or reasoning, and become leaders of their generation into farther light; there are others, like Cyrus, whom God raises up and girds for great service, though they know Him not: this man, the Evangelist announces, was "gent from God". -a messenger after the example of Moses or Elijah, fulfilling the prophecy: "Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me."

Though sent from God, he did no miracle; gave no fresh or farther revelation of Divine truth. His special function-the scope of his ministry, grasped in its total significance-was witness-bearing.

In particular, he came to bear witness concerning the light-the light that had been shining uncomprehended in the darkness, and that was now entering on a new and more wonderful manifestation. Does the light then need that witness should be borne to it? Is not light its own evidence? Yes, if men have eyes to see; but because they lay in the darkness and slumber of sin, it was necessary to arouse them, and to give testimony to the true light, distinguishing it from all false lights that could only lure to death. In an obvious sense, "the law and the prophets "formed a great system of" witness" to the coming One (Acts x. 43; Rom. iii. 21); but it required completing, and John's ministry was the completion of it-the grand close of the prophetic symphony. The morning star, day's harbinger, bears witness of the sun, by shining in his light; and so also does the mountain-top, kindled with the first rays of morning, to the dwellers in the deep valley beneath, or the far-stretching plain. But John's testimony went beyond even this: he not merely preceded the Messiah, closing the prophetic line, but, having first aroused the nation by that cry, "Repent," he actually introduced and named Him to Israel. A single example will suffice to show the character

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and manner of his testimony. "John bare record, saying, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him; and I knew him not; but he that sent me to baptize, the same said unto me, Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and remaining on him, the same is he that baptizeth with the Holy Ghost: and I saw and bare record that this is the Son of God" (John i. 32–34).

We sometimes speak as if we thought Divine dealing with men intended simply to render them "without excuse." It is true that God's revelations have left even the heathen without excuse in their ungodliness, as Paul tells us in the Epistle to the Romans (i. 20), and this not merely by way of result, but of Divine purpose. The leaving of men without excuse is not however the complete account of God's action; He wishes more than merely to keep Himself in the right in the condemnation of sinners. In the case of the Baptist's ministry this holds good; his testimony was not given in order that men might be without excuse, but (answering to the Divine benevolence) "that all men through him might believe." The very aim of his mission, the reason why God sent him, was that men might be led into faiththe faith spoken of in such words as these: "He that believeth on the Son, hath everlasting life;" "These (things) are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing, ye might have life in his name."

Zacharias spoke in his prophetic song of "the tender mercy of our God, whereby the day-spring from on high hath visited us, to give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death;" and when afterwards the Baptist began his ministry, "all men mused in their hearts whether he were the Messiah or not." Doubtless many of his disciples could say, "He kindled my soul; my intercourse with him was like the dawn of day." But he was not himself the light only at most "a burning and shining lamp;" that was all; and his shining was a testimony to the light that is unkindled and eternal.

The true light (true in distinction, not only from the false, but also from the partial and borrowed and dependent) was that "which lighteth every man that cometh into the world." The light given by the eternal Word was not a mere private illumination vouchsafed to a few; but wheresoever there was a living man, born into the world, light was given to him. This harmonises with what Paul says (Rom. i. 19): "That which may be known of God is manifest in them [in their very consciousness, in their very hearts (ii. 15)]; for God hath showed it unto them "hath made it lie in their view as in the daylight. The very life given to man, as a being endowed with

* It makes no substantial difference in the sense whether we translate, as the English version does; "the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world," or, "the true light was coming into the world which lighteth every man." The latter translation would bring the clause into this group of passages-John iii. 19; iv. 14; ix. 39; xi. 27; xii. 46. A good deal can be said on both sides.

understanding, conscience, and other equally great faculties, and placed in such a world, carries in it the possession, though of course not necessarily the appropriation, of light; for there was such a thing as "holding the truth in unrighteousness." It is not needful to single out men like Socrates, and claim that light was given to them; but take any common man out of the crowd, even to him was light given, and that light was due to the Word. This holds not merely since the incarnation, but from the beginning; and we must read history with the fact in our minds. The measure of light is very different in different cases; but in all cases light has been given; and men have been responsible to God in that proportion.

Advancing another stage, the Evangelist tells us, "He was in the world," that world which we are in at present, which we enter by the gate of birth, and leave by death. The manner of His presence is in no way explained-whether by virtue of His omnipresence, or by theophany, or by incarnation-only the fact is asserted. "And

the world was made by Him"-it was His creation; it owed existence, order, happiness, and well-being to Him; and yet it "knew him not." He remained a stranger in His own world, unknown among the works of His own hand.

This was sad; but there was sadder than this. "He came unto his own," unto His own posessions, His own heritage, " and his own (covenant people) received Him not." The manner in which He came, the abasement and self-sacrifice involved in His coming, the purposes He had in view, the claims He raised, the grace He proferred these matters are not yet touched upon; only the fact is declared of a real and close approach to Israel. But His coming was not met by a welcome; Israel did not stretch out the hand to Him. It was as if a monarch should enter one of his own palaces, and none of his servants should recognise him. Nor was there mere nonrecognition; there was rejection; He was repelled as an intruder; the phrase," they received Him not," marks a refusal to have Him. "Though He had done so many miracles before them, yet they believed not on Him." "To Israel he saith, All day long I have stretched forth my hands to a disobedient and gainsaying people." The supreme token of rejection was the cross, when they "denied the Holy One and the Just, and desired that a murderer should be granted unto them, and killed the Prince of life."

The rejection was not indeed absolutely universal; some did receive Him. The "receiving" carries in it that they admitted His claims, accepted the grace He held out, trusted in Him as Saviour, with the assent of the understanding, and the consent of the heart. In itself the term is somewhat general. When the Galileans "received" Him after His departure from Judea (John iv. 45), it marks a certain welcome given to Him. When He says to His disciples, "He that receiveth you, receiveth me," He does not speak of mere kindly feeling, expressed in hospitable entertainment, though even this is not

to be undervalued, but He speaks of a believing welcome given to the messengers on account of the message they bring, and of Him whom they represent. So here, the receiving implies that His claims were allowed, and welcome given to Him accordingly.

The receivers are farther described in the clause, "Even to them who believe in his name." These words are to be read in the light of the great gospel message, as afterwards set forth in the preaching and writings of the apostles. His Name is the summing up of all that He is as Saviour and Lord, and faith or believing is the trust of all that is within us reposed in Himself.

Though comparatively few in number, there were such receivers of Him when He came to His own; and to all of them He gave power to become sons of God"-not "disclosed a relationship already existing," but gave power to become what they were not before. The paternal and filial relationship helps us to understand the nature of this sonship. What a son is to an earthly father, that a receiver of Christ is to the eternal God. It is a great thing to be God's creature, as Adam was in his innocence, the creature of a God supremely wise, and good, and holy, and mighty; and it is conceivable that believers might only have obtained forgiveness, and been received back into a state of favour as creatures; but the grace actually shown goes unspeakably beyond this-they become "sons." And it is not sonship in the loose sense in which all men are sons-" for we are also his offspring"-but, transcending this, after the example of the Son, and in virtue of union with Him. It is of this sonship that the Apostle Paul says, "The Spirit witnesseth with our spirit "not that we are believers-but "that we (being believers) are children of God; and if children, then heirs ; heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ;' and again, "Ye are all the children of God, by faith in Christ Jesus;" and again, "Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba Father."

Man could never have claimed such a position as this, taking his stand on any prerogative of caste or character; no man had native right to it or native ability to attain it; but to them who received Him, even to them that believe in His name, He "gave power" to become sons-power whether we regard the legal aspects of the case or the moral and spiritual, the status or the disposition, and including the whole capability of obtaining and holding possession.

The sonship is not effected in virtue of a mere act of adoption on the part of God. A child may be taken out of the family to which he originally belonged and be planted in another; he may get a new name; he may be trained to forget that he had another birth; he may be made heir to great estates; he may be as dearly loved and as tenderly cared for as if he were own child to those who have adopted him but the fact remains that he is really the child of another, and nature may prove too strong for the new bonds, and he may pine for his native home, and at length go back to it. The "sons of God,"

however, are sons by birth, for such is the significance of the word here used, having not only a new name and position, but also a new life. It is not simply that they are called sons; they are sons, partakers of the Divine nature, with a filial relationship, and a filial resemblance to the eternal God. The sonship is already established in fact and in principle, though it awaits its full consummation hereafter (1 John iii. 1, 2.)

Unfolding the idea conveyed in the very term "son," it is added, "Who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." Born into God's family: full illustration of this is found in the conversation with Nicodemus, recorded in the third chapter of this Gospel. To what is the new birth to be traced? What does it spring out of? It is not "of blood," blood-relationship, natural descent, transmission from father to son, even though the pedigree could be traced back clear to Abraham. "Nor of the will of the flesh," excluding all that pertains to the sensuous nature. "Nor of the will of man," excluding all that pertains even to the higher nature, the manhood. Tho origin of the new birth is outside human will, outside humanity altogether, and lies in God. It is due to the good pleasure of His goodness, to His abundant mercy, to His great love wherewith He loved us. When we recognise the truth that regeneration is no mere hard and arbitrary condition, on which entrance into heaven is made dependent, but is the provision of Divine love, making us meet as sons for the eternal fellowship and eternal enjoyment of God, the whole aspect of the doctrine is changed, and it becomes to us a new revelation of grace, and an inspiration of the loftiest hope.

IOLANTHIA; OR, THE ITALIAN GIRL.

It was a dingy little room where World" reached the ears of the Iolanthia sat, with her head bowed father of Iolanthia, and he resolved down on her hands; and as the faint to flee to that far-famed country rays of the sun stole through the where wealth and worth were alike small windows and shone on the honoured and a man was weighed long jet tresses of the beautifulchild, in the social balance for his true the large tear-drops sparkled as worth. After bidding his wife and diamonds of the purest water. child farewell, he embarked on the dark blue waters for America.

Poor little Iolanthia had not lived always thus, in poverty and degradation. Years ago, her father had been wealthy, and fair Italia's sun looked not down on a grander or a happier home; but, as Time passed away, he caught in his iron grasp the wealth of that proud family, leaving them only an untarnished

name.

Stories from the wondrous "New

The first news that came was highly gratifying to the waiting wife and daughter in Italy, but after a length of time all reports from him ceased to come. Weeks, and even months, lengthened out, and still he was unheard from.

His gentle wife was bowed down with grief, and could not bear the disgrace and shame that would be