1 John 3:22-24 And whatever we ask, we receive of him, because we keep his commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in his sight.… I. THE WORD "BELIEVE," which enters this Epistle for the first time at this point, is one of the royal words of the New Testament. It contains three ideas. 1. First there is knowledge. That which you believe must first announce itself as a fact to your intellect. It must enter the crystal chamber of consciousness. 2. Then follows assent. That is the answer of your mind to the claims made upon it by the fact. 3. Then comes the last and most important of all, viz., trust. You say to yourself, "This is truth — this will bear," and you put your whole weight upon it. II. BUT WHAT IS TO BE DONS WITH IT? To what shall a man attach himself by means of this threefold cord? The object around which we are bid throw our faith is no series of propositions — not any Church — not even the Bible as a whole, but the full name of Jesus Christ. The full title of Christ, as given here, gathers up into itself every ray of spiritual truth diffused through the whole Bible. "His Son Jesus Christ." Say that seriously, simply, honestly, without qualification or reserve, and you have repeated the full Christian creed. That name is the gospel. III. THIS IS GOD'S COMMANDMENT. Note that well. Faith is set before us as a duty, as a work. Now, if God commands us to believe, then surely belief is something that is possible to us all. We cannot imagine God commanding the impossible. Then, too, unbelief is a sin. It is positive disobedience. And further, St. John says that belief in Christ is not simply a commandment, but that it is the commandment. Faith working by love is the spiritual unity of all commandments, and unbelief is therefore the root of all sins. IV. NOW, HOW FAR HAVE WE THE POWER TO BELIEVE IN CHRIST? To what extent is faith subject to our will? It is worth while finding this out, for the measure of our power to believe will be the measure of our sin and of our punishment if we disbelieve. 1. If we look into the Bible we shall find two sets of texts. One set ascribes the whole work of redemption to God — faith, repentance, love, holiness, are all declared to be gifts of God. Another whole class of texts describes repentance, faith, purification, and love as acts which each man ought to, and therefore can perform himself. 2. Again, in the teaching of the Church we have two opposite camps of opinion on this matter. held very strong views on this point. He taught that when Adam fell he lost his freedom of will; the will sank into a state of infirmity, in which it had no power of choice at all between good and evil — only the power of always choosing the wrong; and through his sin all his successors fell into the same state of bondage. In fact, as one said, he taught that in the fall of man one whole piece of human nature had fallen out! But out of this mass of mutilated humanity God has elected a number to be saved. These must be saved. God's grace overpowers them, and they are saved by a fiat of the Almighty Will. As to the others, they must be lost — they are reprobate. held very strong views on the subject of our text. "All men," he said, "are as free to choose as Adam was. The will is not impaired, and can of itself, at any moment, free itself from sin." Man stands at the parting of the ways, and he has full power to choose either. Man — man's own power, is the note that is heard sounding all through his teaching. Grace scarcely appears at all. Thus, while the one almost did away with the free will of man, the other almost did away with the grace of God. And these two men divided the Christian world into opposing factions. The majority followed Augustine, though many too followed Pelagius. And so from age to age the pendulum of opinion swung from extreme to extreme. 3. Neither of these views is right. The first libels both God and man. It represents God as partial and arbitrary. It reduces man to a poor puppet of destiny. It robs religion of morality and deprives heaven of holiness. It takes away the guilt of sin, and lifts the blame of hell from the souls of men and lays it at the feet of God. Equally distant from the New Testament truth is the other view. It renders the best half of Scripture meaningless, and the whole mediatorial work of Christ needless. It peoples the earth with an imaginary race of moral giants, each of whom is sufficient in himself, and fills heaven with a multitude of self-saved souls. 4. But while the many thus swung from one extreme to another, there have always been in the Church of Christ a party of common sense men, able, like Melancthon, to combine the two sets of texts, and to see that they are not contradictions — only the two opposite poles of one great truth. Salvation, they teach, is a work of God's grace, in which each man is required and enabled to take an active part. Mankind is a fallen race, but not an abandoned race. Man cannot save himself, yet God's preparing grace has kept alive in each man enough of moral life to respond to the offer of Christ, a something living in each man to which the Christ can make His appeal. So men are utterly unable to save themselves. But they are not literally lifeless like a stone or stick. Faith is preeminently a matter of will. The text does not say, "Believe this doctrine or that," but "Trust yourselves in Christ's hands — trust Christ as your Saviour." (J. M. Gibbon.) Parallel Verses KJV: And whatsoever we ask, we receive of him, because we keep his commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in his sight. |
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