John 14:6 Jesus said to him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man comes to the Father, but by me. Science tells us that there are three elements in light — the illuminating, the chemical, and the heat power. So in Him who is "the Light of the World" there is a threefold perfection. I. THE TRUTHS SEPARATELY. 1. Christ the Way. One of the deepest feelings in man's nature is that of a want of something which this world is found not to supply. The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear with hearing, nor the ambition with success, nor the lust" with gratification. It arises from the terrible disruptions with the intervening chasms which sin has produced. Despite our downward tendencies, man is led by what he feels within, and sees around, to look up to a Divine Power. That Being we would fondly claim as a Father. But where is that Father? There is a way, but somehow we have lost it, and the difficulty is to find it. Conceive a planet wandering from its sphere. Now it is hindered by bodies attracting it or attracted by it, and forthwith it dashes through space, threatening to strike and break in fragments, or to kindle into a conflagration, all the other planets and suns it meets with. It is a picture of a wandering man loosened from the Central Power that stays him, and from the Central Light that should illuminate him. Neither wanderer will right itself till made to move in its old path. But how can we know the way? The flaming sword, turned every way to keep the sinner from the tree of life, has entered into him who is God's fellow, and hath now power against us, and there is a way opened by which the sinner can come into the very presence of God. "I am the Way." 2. Christ the Truth. By truth, in this passage, we are not to understand abstract or general doctrine. Systematized truth may serve most important purposes; but it is not to such that our Lord refers. Truth is defined by philosophers as the agreement of our ideas with things. If we know God as He really is, then have we truth in religion. But how can we know God as He really is? Do we not feel as if He were at an infinite distance, as if we could no more rise to Him with our spirits than our frail bodies could mount from earth to heaven? Who will give us wings that we may ascend to Him? Alas! the attraction of earth is too powerful to admit of our rising to Him. The approach must be on His part. Plato was obliged to say: "The Father of the world is hard to discover, and when discovered cannot be communicated." But when we go on by Christ as the Way, He introduces us to the Father, and we have the truth. God is no longer at a distance; "Emmanuel, God with us." Aristotle has said that the mind as it came from its Maker is organized for truth, as the eye is to perceive light and the ear to hear sounds. He who has found Christ knows that he has found the truth. With the truth there is assurance; the eye has found the light, the ear is listening to the sound. This, this is the reality of things. 3. Christ the Life. It is of vast moment that we know the way, all good that we reach the truth; but we must have more. The well-formed statue is an interesting object, but none of us would exchange our living condition for that of the chiselled marble. Along with the truth we must have life. There are few or no sinners so dead that they do not wish at times to have life. And yet when they would excite and stimulate it, they find that they have only the cold and the clamminess of death. Feeling never will be excited by a mere determination to raise it. There must be a something to call it forth. Nor will it be evoked by an abstract statement or general doctrine. It is called forth by a living person. Christ so lovely and so loving. Apprehended as the truth He becomes the life. II. THE TRUTHS IN THEIR CONNECTION. The full truth is to be found in the union of these various truths. If we would have a true religion, and a proper theology founded upon it, we must give Christ the supreme place. Displace Christ the head from this His proper position and the whole form becomes disproportioned. 1. There are some who would have men first to find the way, and then in the way to find Christ. Who would have, e.g., inquirers first to find the true Church, and then through it to find Christ. But this is to reverse the Scriptural order. 2. Some would have us first seek the truth, and then seek Christ. Seekers of truth deserve all the honour that has been paid to them, but they will never find truth in religion till they find Christ. So acknowledged, and , and Luther. Let us not go out with the tapers of earth to seek the sun. Any other light can at best be merely like the star to guide the wise men, serving a good end only so far as it guides us to where Christ as the truth is to be found. 3. Again, some would find life without Christ. Their appeal is to inward feelings, sentiments, and intuitions. But what, I ask, is to evoke such sentiments from our dead and sinful hearts? They tell us by such grand and generous ideas as the infinite and the eternal. But these ideas call forth love only when they are associated with a living being whose love is infinite and eternal. And such is Christ. 4. There are some who would seek for Christ under one of these aspects or in one of these characters, but who do not care for the others. (1) Thus, there are some who are anxious to have Christ as the way, but who stop at the entrance, instead of going on in the path. They are most anxious to have Christ for salvation; but they do not go on to establish themselves in the truth. (2) Some are contented with the truth without the life, with their orthodox creed, their reverence for the Bible, their attendance at religious meetings. Such a formal religion is offensive to man, even as it is displeasing to God. (3) Another class seek the life without the truth, led into this by a reaction against a stiff formalism or a frigid orthodoxy, or by an unwillingness to submit to any restraints. Persons are calling for a life which is to be independent of all the old forms of orthodoxy and of the letter of the Word of God. Of this I am sure, that the life which is not supported by Scriptural truth will be of a very uncertain and wavering and transient character. (J. Mc Cosh, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. |
    |