Our Savior was "a Light to lighten the Gentiles," as well as "the Glory of God's people Israel." It is remarkable that on the several occasions upon which Jesus was brought into contact with Gentiles, such contact was suggestive of the wide and far-reaching consequences of his mission to mankind. The faith of the centurion prompted the prediction, "Many shall come from the East and from the West, and shall sit down in the kingdom of God." When the Samaritans believed, the Lord saw that the fields were already ripe unto the harvest. The inquiry of certain Greeks gave rise to Christ's prediction, "I will draw all men unto myself." As at Christ's birth the wise men came from the East to his cradle, so before his death the Greeks came from the West unto his cross.

I. THERE WAS IN THE HISTORY OF IMMANUEL A CRISIS OF SUFFERING.

1. This was a fixed, a certain, an expected hour. If our Lord's birth was in "the fullness of time," it is reasonable to believe the same to have been the case with his death. Hitherto Jesus had said, "My hour is not yet come;" henceforth his language was, "My hour is at hand, is near, is come." He was prepared for it, and for all it might bring.

2. This was a solemn and momentous hour. There are great and memorable hours in the history of nations - as when a great act passes the legislature; when a mighty revolution is accomplished; when slavery ceases; when, after a long war, peace is concluded; when some momentous decision upon national policy is formed. So this approaching hour in the Savior's life was that for which all others had prepared, which had been foretold, expected, and waited for.

3. This was the hour of the apparent success of Christ's foes. The conspiracy was successful; the innocent was condemned; seemingly the work of Christ was brought to a close and proved a failure.

4. This was the hour of humiliation and of woe. Jesus alone could fully appreciate the magnitude of the crisis, the mysterious import of the great transaction. It was the hour of sacrifice and of redemption.

II. THIS CRISIS OF SUFFERING WAS TO CHRIST'S PROPHETIC MIND A CRISIS OF GLORY. He saw not as man sees. Satan appeared victorious; Christ's enemies seemed to have succeeded in their malignant schemes; his disciples and friends seemed overwhelmed with consternation and despair. But Jesus looked beyond the cruel cross to the immortal crown! The hour was at hand when Jesus should receive his personal glorification the Son of man. As the Word, the Son of God, this exalted Being had enjoyed glory with the Father before the world was. But now his humanity was to be glorified. He loved to call himself the Son of man; in this capacity he was about to be raised to immortal majesty.

2. His glory was to be shown as the accepted of the Father in his resurrection from the dead. God raised him from the dead, and gave him glory. In his ascension Jesus Christ was "received up into glory." There was evident humiliation in the cross, and. as evident glory in his exaltation to the throne.

3. His official glory was to be displayed in his kingship and dominion. In heaven he was to receive the homage both of angels and of glorified men; upon earth he was to extend, by his Spirit and by his Word, the empire be had founded by his death.

4. Christ's truest glory was to consist in the salvation of multitudes of the human race by means of his sacrifice and intercession. The highest glory of an earthly monarch consists in the number and loyalty of his subjects. No earthly king has ever exercised a sway so wide, so beneficent, so enduring, as that of Christ. The kingdoms of this world are to become the kingdoms of our God and of his Christ. All foes shall be put beneath his feet. The inclusion of Jews and Gentiles in the "one new humanity" is a triumph of Christ's spiritual kingship. On his head are many crowns. To an enlightened and spiritual mind there is no proof of royal majesty secured by sacrificial love so convincing as this - the subjugation of human hearts and lives to his moral authority, whose "kingdom is righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost." - T.

Why should this be such an hour of trouble and glory? How should the appearance of a few strangers have led to a discussion respecting the falling of wheat into the ground, and its death — the saving of life and the losing it? You will remember that when our Lord spoke of those "other sheep" He connected the formation of the one flock with the death of the one shepherd. The assertion is in strict harmony with the prophecy of Caiaphas. If you turn from St. John to St. Paul you will find that the breaking down of the wall of partition between Jews and Gentiles is effected "in the body of Christ's flesh through death." If you reflect on these passages, that which we treat as though it were only an accident — the calling in of the Gentiles — the unfolding of a universal society, will be seen to be that wonderful event to which all God's purposes, from the beginning of the world, had been tending — the unveiling of the deepest mystery of all, in the relations of God to man, in the Being of God Himself. Without sacrifice Jews and heathen had been taught there could be no unity among the members of a race. Sacrifice must bind them to God and to each other. Only he who can give up himself — so the heart of mankind testified — is a patriot; only he obeys the laws; only he can save his country when it is falling. There had been, then, a sure conviction that any larger union must involve a mightier sacrifice. As the conscience was awakened by God's teaching more and more clearly to perceive that all resistance to God lies in the setting up of self, it began to be understood that the atonement of man with man must have its basis in an atonement of God with man, and that the same sacrifice was needed for both. One thing yet remained to be learned — the most wonderful lesson of all, and yet one of which God had been giving the elements, line upon line, from the beginning: Could sacrifice originate in God and be made, first, not to Him but by Him? All our Lord's discourses concerning Himself and His Father — concerning His own acts as the fulfilment of the Father's will — concerning the love which the Father had to Him because He laid down His life for the sheep — had been bringing these mysteries to light; had been preparing the meek to confess with wonder and contrition that in every selfish act they had been fighting against an unselfish God — that in every self-sacrificing act they had been merely yielding to Him. And so far as they had any glimpses of the accomplishment of God's promises — that He would bring all into one — that the Gentiles should wait for His law — that He would be a Father of all the families of the earth — so far they had the vision of a transcendent and Divine sacrifice.

(F. D. Maurice, M. A.)

tion: — It was given to St. John long after the other evangelists had described the Passion to add some details of the deepest interest. The Transfiguration and Gethsemane St. John omits, but here records the significance of both. The Lord passed through a season of profound agitation — the earnest of the Garden; but out of the darkness light unspeakable arose — the reflection of the Mount.

I. THE LORD ENTERS INTO THE DARKNESS OF HIS HOUR AND PROCLAIMS ITS GLORY.

1. "The hour" is the sacred term that marks the Passion as the consummation of the Redeemer's work. He entered the world in the "fulness of time"; He wrought His preparatory work in the "days of the Son of Man"; and now, after ages of waiting had passed into days of fulfilment, the days are compressed into an "hour." From this moment the shadow of the cross throws its sacred gloom upon every incident and word. The Passion has begun, and from that moment went on in its ever-deepening variety of grief, through the indignities of His enemies, the abandonment of His friends, the sense of the world's guilt, to that infinite woe which took from man his curse. It was the first more direct onset since the temptation. It was the beginning of the awful strain on the resources of His lower nature under which He would fain cry "Save me," but that He knows "for this purpose," etc.; the same pressure which caused Him to ask that the cup might pass, a prayer the next moment recalled in the submission of perfect victory.

2. The darkness is not past, but the true light already shines. His first word on entering the dark valley is — "The hour...glorified." His lowest humiliation was His highest dignity. The cross in which His servants gloried He here glories in. In it He beholds the glorification of the Father's attributes (ver. 28), an exhibition of the glory of Divine justice visiting upon sin its penalty, and the glory of the Divine mercy providing salvation for the sinner. To this the Redeemer's final "Lo! I come," there is a sublime response from heaven. For the third time the Father proclaims aloud the secret of His constant complacency in the sacrifice of His Son.

3. The record teaches us two errors we must avoid.(1) We must not by our feeble theories mitigate the sorrow that wrought out our redemption and exchange it into a mere demonstration of such charity and self-sacrifice as man might rival and which could never redeem man's soul.(2) It tells us, too, that the Redeemer was filled with a sense of His own glory and His Father's complacency even while He suffered for our sins. He presented Himself as an oblation for man's sin to manifest the love that provided the propitiation, and to declare the glory of the Divine name in the harmony of its perfections.

II. FROM THE HOUR OF THE PASSION TO THE LIFTING UP ON THE CROSS THE TRANSITION IS OBVIOUS. Here also we perceive the blending, of opposite emotions.

1. St. John has already made us familiar with this expression, which serves the double purpose of signifying the crucifixion and the exaltation. But in the gospels it is used to express the act of man that lifted Jesus to His cross. In the beginning of His ministry, our Lord spoke to Nicodemus of this lifting up; in the middle He told the Jews that they would do it; and now He refers to it at the close. But the cross is the symbol here of His own reproach, "Cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree."

2. But while His soul is troubled — and only in His deepest anguish does He mention His soul — Jesus still rejoiced in spirit. On either side is a word of triumph.(1) "The prince of this world is cast out." He had at an earlier time, and in a higher sphere, "beheld Satan as lightning," etc. Now He beholds, as the result of His redeeming death, Satan fall from his power on earth — not, indeed, with the swiftness of lightning, but absolutely and surely.(2) "I will draw all men unto Me" expresses the tranquil assurance that the virtue of His death would draw in due time — when preached in His word and testified by His spirit — all the children of men to Himself.

3. Here also are two lessons that guard our thoughts.(1) The reality of Satan's relation to our sin and the world's redemption. A doctrine of atonement finds acceptance, which rejects the personality of the being to whom our Lord alludes. But in so doing they must reconstruct the entire doctrine of the New Testament, wrest the Saviour's words to their own peril, and undermine the whole economy of redemption, which assumes that Satan is the representative and ruler of the world's wickedness, whose power and law is broken.(2) That through our redemption we are delivered from the reign of sin; that the drawing of Christ is as universal in its influence as the virtue of His atonement; that we may enter into our Master's joy and exult over a vanquished enemy.

III. WE PASS FROM THE HOUR, THROUGH THE LIFTING UP, TO THE SELF-SACRIFICING DEATH WHICH GIVES LIFE TO MULTITUDES. Here again we have two contending emotions.

1. All His allusions to the coming end connect His own loss with our gain, His death with our life. So it is here, only the emblem is the most affecting He ever employed, expressive of the entireness of His surrender, and the absolute connection between His death and the abundant life of His people. What in the similitude of the corn of wheat expresses the deep anguish of this prelude to Gethsemane the Lord does not say. There was a mystery in the anguish of His soul that nothing in the secret of human dying will account for.

2. But the rejoicing of His spirit keeps not silence. He passes immediately to the much fruit that would grow from His death, the example He would set to His saints, and the supreme honour which He and His imitators in the self-renouncing charity of holiness would partake together throughout eternity. Nor is His rejoicing marred by the prospect that His death will not give life to all mankind. And should we be discontented when our Master sees of the travail of His soul and is satisfied?Conclusion:

1. The only word of exhortation that we hear in this solemn hour is, "If any man serve Me, let him follow Me." This is the voice of Him who passes through the garden to the cross. There is no loyalty to the Redeemer which does not share His passion. For Him we must sacrifice our sins, and, in imitation of His last example, must live, and, if need be, die for others.

2. "Where I am," etc.; for a short season in the gloom of sorrow and conflict, but forever in His glory.

3. "If any man serve Me," etc.; heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ.

(W. B. Pope, D. D.)

(text and vers. 27-28): —

I. THE HOUR. It stands out from all other hours amid the reminiscences of the past and anticipation of ages to come. Time's stream set in to bear upon it. All prophecy met here. One dispensation after another was introduced and completed in relation to it, and derived all their importance from that relation. It was an hour —

1. Of intense suffering. Who can tell the physical agony? His soul was troubled within a body of sensibility as keen as ours; and what anguish racked His spirit when He was executed as a malefactor and forsaken of His Father!

2. Of triumph. An hour in which He glorified God and God Him; in which all the Divine attributes harmonized as they never had before, and never could again. They received glory which covered all obscurations that had appeared, and which can never be tarnished to eternity.

II. THE SEEMING RELUCTANCE OF CHRIST TO MEET THIS HOUR (ver. 27). His spirit is perplexed, for He was as truly man as God. But wherefore these cries and tears? Because of —

1. The death of ignominy which He, innocence itself, was about to die.

2. The unbelief and ingratitude of the Jews. "He came to His own," etc.

3. The desertion of His disciples, the denial of Peter, the betrayal of Judas.

4. The buffetings of Satan during "the hour and power of darkness."

5. The hiding of the Father's face (Zechariah 13:7; Matthew 27:45, 46). Well might His soul be troubled and say, Father, save Me from this hour — if there is any other way of saving sinners. But God spared not His own Son, and the Son acquiesced.

III. THE GROUNDS ON WHICH HE OVERCAME HIS APPARENT RELUCTANCE. They respect —

1. Himself. He knew that on this hour depended all that He came to do, and this consideration dispelled the cloud human nature raised. He had done too much to allow of His retracting. Why the Babe of Bethlehem if He refused to be the Man of Sorrows? He came to finish the work God gave Him to do.

2. His people. If I would save others I dare not save Myself. If they are to have life I must endure death.

3. His Father. To glorify Him was the design of His coming into the world. "Lo! I come," etc.

IV. BY WHAT MEANS GOD WAS GLORIFIED IN THE WORK OF CHRIST.

1. In the fulfilment of Messianic prophecy. God had in all the introductory announcements of the Redeemer for four thousand years, connected His glory with the completion of redemption by Christ's death as a sacrifice for sin (Hebrews 1:1-3; Luke 2:7-14).

2. The incarnation. "We beheld His glory," etc.

3. The discourses, miracles, and character of Christ.

4. His death, resurrection, and ascension.

5. The spread of the gospel.

6. The resurrection and judgment.

(T. Raffles, LL. D.)

1. Christ here displays His broad humanity. Not "Son of David." The Jewish side of His mission is no longer prominent. As "the Son of Man" Jesus is near akin to every man that lives.

2. He speaks of His glory as approaching suggested by the sight of these first fruits among the Gentiles. Christ is glorified in the souls He saves, as a physician wins honour by those he heals.

3. The same visitors led the Saviour to use the metaphor of the buried corn. Wheat was mixed up with Greek mysteries. Christ was undergoing the process which would burst the Jewish husk in which His human life had been enveloped. Aforetime He said He was not sent save to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Note —

I. PROFOUND DOCTRINAL TEACHING conveyed in several paradoxes.

1. Glorious as He was, He was yet to be glorified.(1) Jesus was always glorious — as one with God, in the perfection of His moral character, in His great love, in His complete consecration, and also in the wonders of His birth, baptism, and transfiguration.(2) But something was to be added to His honour — death, resurrection, ascension, etc.

2. His glory was to come to Him through shame. It is His highest reputation to be of no reputation. His crown derives new lustre from His cross. If we merge the crucified Saviour in the coming King we rob our Lord of His highest honour.

3. He must be alone, or abide alone. Unless He had trodden the wine. press alone, and had cried, "My God! My God!" etc., He could not have saved us. If He had not died He would, as man, have been alone forever: not without the Father, the Spirit, and the angels; but there had not been another man to keep Him company. Our Lord cannot bear to be alone. Without His people He would have been a shepherd without His sheep, a husband without His spouse. His delights were with the sons of men. In order that He might draw all men unto Him, He was lifted up upon the cross alone.

4. He must die to give life, not teach, etc. If the ethical part of Christianity is the most important, why did Jesus die? But since He did fall into the ground and die, we may expect much as the result of it. The travail of the Son of God shall not bring forth a scanty good.

II. PRACTICAL INSTRUCTION. What is true of Christ is in a measure true of Christians.

1. We must die if we would live.

2. We must surrender everything to keep it. We can never have spiritual life except by giving everything up to God.

3. We must lose self in order to find self. The man who lives for himself does not live — he loses the essence and crown of existence: but if you live for others and God, you will find the life of life. "Seek ye first," etc.

4. If you wish to be the means of life to others, you must, in your measure, die yourself. The self-sacrificing life and death of saints has always been the life and increase of the Church.

(C. H. Spurgeon.)

As regards —

I. THE GREAT ENEMY. In the wilderness Christ did not achieve a complete victory. The devil departed from Him for a season only, and was actually and finally vanquished on the cross. He who hoped to crush Adam was himself crushed in Christ. Satan had brought ruin and misery into a happy world. Christ brought out the world into happiness tenfold as bright and holy as that which Satan ruined.

II. MAN. On the cross was transacted the central event of man's world. All before had reference to this; all after flow from it. The whole system of types found its end on the cross; the whole state of acceptance in which believers stand before God, the whole dispensation of the Spirit, had its origin here. Wherever there breathes a man, there the cross has a deep and never-failing interest. Here also was the triumph of human nature. You hear of the power and dignity of human nature, its wonderful capacities for knowledge, its high endowments for enterprise; but in none of these did it reach its noblest height, nor bear its fairest fruit. Not in Athens or Rome, in poesy or art, has man been most glorified; but on the cross of Jesus. There manhood bore its fruit of love untouched by a blight, and was honoured with the union of the Godhead, stooping to share its sentence of death and to bring it to glory.

III. HIMSELF (Romans 14:9). Christ was born that He might be a King; and here we have His Lordship established and His kingdom inaugurated. Remember what He said to the dying thief. The cross is Christ's throne; His atonement His basis of empire (Revelation 5:6); from it proceeds the work of the Spirit, whose office it is to glorify Christ.

IV. THE FATHER. By the counsel of the Father's will was the plan of redemption directed, and His perfections find their highest example on the cross.

1. Love. "Herein is love," etc.

2. Truth. "For this end He came into the world, to bear witness unto the truth"; and He bore it here.

3. Righteousness. "He made Him to be sin for us," etc.

(Dean Alford.)

In eternity there are no hours; yet there have been two hours in time which are drawn out over the length of eternal ages. One, pregnant of evil, when Eve plucked the forbidden fruit. When time shall be no more that unhappy hour will live in the memory and be felt in the misery of the lost. The other hour, pregnant with greatest good, was when the Son of Man said, "It is finished," and the head He bowed in death was crowned with its brightest glory.

I. THE VISIBLE GLORY OF THE CROSS. There never was a death like this.

1. Rays of Godhead streamed through the darkest stages of Christ's humiliation. Angels attended His humble birth, and a new star rested above the stable. His hands were rough with labour, but at their touch eyes received their sight. His voice cried in infancy and death, but it quelled the storm and burst the fetters of the tomb. His eye was quenched in darkness, but it had read man's heart and penetrated futurity. He wore no costly robes, but the hem of His garment cured inveterate disease. He trod on no luxurious carpets, but His step was on the sea. His simple drink was water, but water changed into wine at His bidding. No sumptuous banquets entertained His guests, but the few fishes and barley loaves in His hands satisfied multitudes.

2. But this glory was still more apparent in His dying hours. Men had left undone nothing to heap shame upon Him. To pour contempt on His kingly claims they crowned Him with thorns; in mockery of His omniscience they asked Him to tell who struck Him; in ridicule of His omnipotence they challenged Him to leave the cross. Yet even ix this dark hour He was glorified. "If these should hold their peace the stones would cry out," was now verified. Men were silent, dumb nature spoke. The rocks, whose bosoms, less hard than man's, were rent, cried out on earth; the sun, veiling his face from a scene on which man looked without emotion, cried out in heaven; the dead, disturbed in their graves by so great a crime, cried out from their open tombs; and' the temple's veil added its solemn testimony to theirs.

II. THE MORAL GLORY OF THE CROSS.

1. Christ's death afforded the fullest display of His love. Not that it had not been displayed before. It was when Moses smote the rock that its hidden treasures were unsealed. It was when the alabaster box was broken that its value became known. It is when the clusters of the grape are crushed that they yield the wine. And so Christ's gracious attributes were not fully disclosed till His dying hour. But for that it had never been known how He loved. He had been despised and rejected of men, but He died to prove His willingness and power to save the chief of sinners.

2. By His death He conquered hell, death, and the grave.

(T. Guthrie, D. D.)

We shrink too much from investigating the mental struggles of Jesus as though it were a profanation. But in this we commit two errors.

1. We lose sight of Christ's proper humanity, of the fact that He had a mind governed like our own, a heart and sympathies which throbbed as ours.

2. A false conception of true reverence. It is reverential to be cautious of approaching too closely an earthly sovereign, because near approach would only produce familiarity, and make us feel that he too is but a frail and sinful man. But the Majesty of Jesus requires no such precautions, because the nearer we get to Him the more we realize His Divine Majesty. Note —

I. THE LAW OF THE ATONEMENT.

1. The gloriousness of suffering. There are two ways of looking at every act — at the appearance, and at the reality. Hence what seems mean is often inwardly glorious, and vice versa. Thus there is nothing in the outward circumstances of a soldier's death to distinguish them from an ignoble brawl; but over the soldier's death is shed the glory of that cause for which his life was offered. So in external circumstances Christ's death was mean, but in inward principles it was glorified by God. We say that a throne is glorious and a coronet noble; but nothing can ennoble cowardice or selfishness. We say that a dungeon, scaffold, and the lower arts of life are base; but Christ's death has sanctified the cross, and His life shed a glory over carpentry.

2. The death of one for the life of many. This is the great law upon which God has constructed the universe. If there is to be a crop, there must first be the destruction of the seed. The lives of vegetables and animals are given for us. So the doctrine of the atonement is no strange, arbitrary principle. The Father who made the law by which the flesh of living things sustains the life of others is the same Being who made and obeyed the law by which the flesh of Christ is to the world "meat indeed."

3. Self-devotion (ver. 25). The previous parallel fails in one thing. We do not thank the grain of wheat for dying, because its death is involuntary; and therefore to constitute a true sacrifice a living will is needed. Christ's sacrifice was a voluntary act, else it had been no sacrifice at all.

II. THE MENTAL STRUGGLE BY WHICH THAT LAW WAS EMBRACED AS THE LAW OF THE REDEEMER'S LIFE. It is one thing to understand a law and another to obey it. To admire that which is right is one thing, but to do what is right is another. The Divine life of Christ subordinated innocent human ideas to itself by degrees. Here He was literally distracted between the natural craving for life and the higher desire to embrace the will of God. But the victory was won by prayer, that communion of the mind with God through which our will becomes at last merged into His. And so there was one perfect will, the will of the Father being that of the Son. "Father, glorify Thy name."

(F. W. Robertson, M. A.)

Andrew, Esaias, Isaiah, Jesus, Judas, Lazarus, Martha, Mary, Philip, SimonBethany, Bethsaida, Galilee, Jerusalem, ZionAnswereth, Glorified, Glory, Hour, Responded, Saying1. Jesus excuses Mary anointing his feet.
9. The people flock to see Lazarus.
10. The chief priests consult to kill him.
12. Jesus rides into Jerusalem.
20. Greeks desire to see Jesus.
23. He foretells his death.
37. The people are generally blinded;
42. yet many chief rulers believe, but do not confess him;
44. therefore Jesus calls earnestly for confession of faith.

John 12:23

     1115   God, purpose of
     1193   glory, revelation of
     2024   Christ, glory of
     2060   Christ, patience of
     2221   Christ, Son of Man
     4903   time
     4971   seasons, of life

John 12:23-24

     4948   hour

John 12:23-25

     2414   cross, centrality
     4506   seed

John 12:23-26

     8120   following Christ

John 12:23-32

     2422   gospel, confirmation

Easter Day
Chester Cathedral. 1870. St John xii. 24, 25. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal." This is our Lord's own parable. In it He tells us that His death, His resurrection, His ascension, is a mystery which we may believe, not only because the Bible tells us of it, but because …
Charles Kingsley—All Saints' Day and Other Sermons

December 28 Evening
We would see Jesus.--JOHN 12:21. O Lord, we have waited for thee; the desire of our soul is to thy name, and to the remembrance of thee. The Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon him, to all that call upon him in truth. Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.--I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.--Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus the …
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

September 8 Evening
Christ the firstfruits.--I COR. 15:23. Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.--If the firstfruit be holy the lump is also holy: and if the root be holy, so are the branches.--Now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.--If we have been planted together in the likeness of his death we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection.--The Lord Jesus Christ . . . shall change our vile …
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

September 22 Evening
O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt.--MATT. 26:39. Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour. I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me.--He . . . became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.--In the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto …
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

May 8 Morning
It pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief.--ISA. 53:10. Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour. Father, glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again.--Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done. And there appeared an angel unto him from heaven, strengthening him. Being found in …
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

February 29 Morning
Boast not thyself of tomorrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth.--PROV. 27:1. Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.--Yet a little while is the light with you. Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you: for he that walketh in darkness knoweth not whither he goeth. While ye have light, believe in the light, that ye may be the children of light. Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor …
Anonymous—Daily Light on the Daily Path

June 12. "We Would See Jesus" (John xii. 21).
"We would see Jesus" (John xii. 21). Glory to Him for all the things laid up for us in the days to come. Glory to Him for all the visions of service in the future; the opportunities of doing good that are far away as well as close at hand. Our Saviour was able to despise the cross for the joy that was before Him. Let us look up to Him, and rise up to Him till we get on high and are able to look out from the mount of vision over all the land of far distances. There shall not a single thing come to …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth

November 19. "We Would See Jesus" (John xii. 21).
"We would see Jesus" (John xii. 21). When any great blessing is awaiting us, the devil is sure to try and make it so disagreeable to us that we shall miss it. It is a good thing to know him as a liar, and remember, when he is trying to prejudice us strongly against any cause, that very likely the greatest blessing of our life lies there. Spurgeon once said that the best evidence that God was on our side is the devil's growl, and we are generally pretty safe in following a thing according to Satan's …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth

May 8. "Except a Corn of Wheat Fall into the Ground and Die" (John xii. 24).
"Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die" (John xii. 24). Death and resurrection are the central ideas of nature and Christianity. We see them in the transformation of the chrysalis, in the buried seed bursting into the bud and blossom of the spring, in the transformation of the winding sheet of winter to the many tinted robes of spring. We see it all through the Bible in the symbol of circumcision, with its significance of death and life, in the passage of the Red Sea and the Jordan …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth

April 14. "I if I be Lifted up from the Earth Will Draw all Men unto Me" (John xii. 32).
"I if I be lifted up from the earth will draw all men unto Me" (John xii. 32). A true and pure Christian life attracts the world. There are hundreds of men and women who find no inducements whatever in the lives of ordinary Christians to interest them in practical religion, but who are won at once by a true and victorious example. We believe that more men of the world step at a bound right into a life of entire consecration than into the intermediate state which is usually presented to them at the …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth

After Christ: with Christ
'If any man serve Me, let him follow Me; and where I am, there shall also My servant be.'--John xii. 26. Our Lord was strangely moved by the apparently trivial incident of certain Greeks desiring to see Him. He recognised and hailed in them the first-fruits of the Gentiles. The Eastern sages at His cradle, and these representatives of Western culture within a few hours of the Cross, were alike prophets. So, in His answer to their request, our Lord passes beyond the immediate bearing of the request, …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

The Universal Magnet
'I, if I be lifted up ... will draw all men unto Me.'--JOHN xii. 32. 'Never man spake like this Man,' said the wondering Temple officials who were sent to apprehend Jesus. There are many aspects of our Lord's teaching in which it strikes one as unique; but perhaps none is more singular than the boundless boldness of His assertions of His importance to the world. Just think of such sayings as these: 'I am the Light of the world'; 'I am the Bread of Life'; 'I am the Door'; 'A greater than Solomon is …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

The Son of Man
'... Who is this Son of Man?'--JOHN xii. 34. I have thought that a useful sermon may be devoted to the consideration of the remarkable name which our Lord gives to Himself--'the Son of Man.' And I have selected this instance of its occurrence, rather than any other, because it brings out a point which is too frequently overlooked, viz. that the name was an entirely strange and enigmatical one to the people who heard it. This question of utter bewilderment distinctly shows us that, and negatives, …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Love's Prodigality Censured and vindicated
'Then Jesus, six days before the passover, came to Bethany, where Lazarus was which had been dead, whom He raised from the dead. There they made Him a supper; and Martha served: but Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with Him. Then took Mary a pound of ointment of spikenard, very costly, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped His feet with her hair: and the house was filled with the odour of the ointment. Then saith one of His disciples, Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, which should betray …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

A New Kind of King
'On the next day much people that were come to the feast, when they heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, took branches of palm-trees, and went forth to meet Him, and cried, Hosanna: Blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord. And Jesus, when He had found a young ass, sat thereon; as it is written, Fear not, daughter of Sion: behold, thy King cometh, sitting on an ass's colt. These things understood not His disciples at the first: but when Jesus was glorified, then remembered …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

A Parting Warning
'Jesus therefore said unto them, Yet a little while is the light among you. Walk while ye have the light, that darkness overtake you not: and he that walketh in the darkness knoweth not whither he goeth. While ye have the light, believe on the light, that ye may become sons of light.'--JOHN xii. 35,36 (R.V.). These are the last words of our Lord's public ministry. He afterwards spoke only to His followers in the sweet seclusion of the sympathetic home at Bethany, and amid the sanctities of the upper …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

The Praise of Men.
"They loved the praise of men more than the praise of God."--John xii. 43. This is spoken of the chief rulers of the Jews, who, though they believed in Christ's Divine mission, were afraid to confess Him, lest they should incur temporal loss and shame from the Pharisees. The censure passed by St. John on these persons is too often applicable to Christians at the present day; perhaps, indeed, there is no one among us who has not at some time or other fallen under it. We love the good opinion …
John Henry Newman—Parochial and Plain Sermons, Vol. VII

The Saviour Lifted Up, and the Look of Faith.
"As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up: that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life."-John iii. 14, 15. "And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. (This he said, signifying what death he should die.)"-John xii. 32, 33. IN order to make this subject plain, I will read the passage referred to-Num. xxi. 6-9. "And the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and much …
Charles G. Finney—Sermons on Gospel Themes

On the Words of the Gospel, John xii. 44, "He that Believeth on Me, Believeth not on Me, but on Him that Sent Me. " against A
1. What is it, Brethren, which we have heard the Lord saying, "He that believeth on Me, believeth not on Me, but on Him that sent Me"? [4174] It is good for us to believe on Christ, especially seeing that He hath also Himself expressly said this which ye have now heard, that is, that "He had come a Light into the world, and whosoever believeth on Him shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." [4175] Good then it is to believe on Christ; and a great evil it is not to believe on …
Saint Augustine—sermons on selected lessons of the new testament

Christ Lifted Up
We have three things to notice. Christ crucified, Christ's glory. He calls it a lifting him up. Christ crucified, the minister's theme. It is the minister's business to lift Christ up in the gospel. Christ crucified, the heart's attraction. "I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto me." His own glory--the minister's theme--the heart's attraction. I. I begin then: CHRIST'S CRUCIFIXION IS CHRIST'S GLORY. He uses the word "lifted up" to express the manner of his death. "I, if I be lifted up, will …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 3: 1857

Israel and Britain. A Note of Warning
Her rejection of the Lord Jesus is the more amazing because Isaiah gave so clear an account of the Messiah, and so clearly pictured Jesus of Nazareth. Descriptions of him could not have been more explicit than were the prophecies of Isaiah. It would be very easy to construct an entire life of Christ out of the book of Isaiah, beginning with "a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel," and ending with "he made his grave with the wicked and with the rich in his death." …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 31: 1885

Sermon for St. Stephen's Day
Of three grades of those who learn to die unto themselves, like corn of wheat, that they may bring forth fruit; or of those who are beginners, those who are advancing, and those who are perfect in a Divine life. John xii. 24.--"Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." BY the corn of wheat we understand our Lord Jesus Christ, who by His death has brought forth much fruit for all men, if they are but willing not only to reign …
Susannah Winkworth—The History and Life of the Reverend Doctor John Tauler

Answer to the Jewish Rabby's Letter.
WE Are now come to the letter of Mr. W's Jewish Rabby, whom Mr. W. calls his friend, and says his letter consists of calm and sedate reasoning, p. 55. I on the other hand can see no reason in it. But the reader than not need to rely upon my judgment. Therefore I will transcribe some parts of it, and then make some remarks. The argument of the letter is, that the story of Lazarus's being raised is an imposture; or else the Jews could not have been so wicked, as to be on that account provoked against …
Nathaniel Lardner—A Vindication of Three of Our Blessed Saviour's Miracles

Our First Proposition Was, that There is Satisfactory Evidence that Many Pretending to be Original...
Our first proposition was, That there is satisfactory evidence that many pretending to be original witnesses of the Christian miracles, passed their lives in labours, dangers, and sufferings, voluntarily undertaken and undergone in attestation of the accounts which they delivered, and solely in consequence of their belief of the truth of those accounts; and that they also submitted, from the same motives, to new rules of conduct. Our second proposition, and which now remains to be treated of, is, …
William Paley—Evidences of Christianity

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