These graces were dwarfed in the apostles. "Commentary on John 16:7". Many examples might be given, but none more illustrious than that of Christ, who eighteen centuries ago was executed as a malefactor, but now is worshipped throughout the world as God. Realize the blessedness here conveyed. The regenerating gift must in like manner consist, not in the annihilation of any of our natural faculties, but in the indwelling of a principle once inherent in Christ, and from Him transmitted to all who in Him are born of the Spirit—a principle which as it advances displaces its rival, as it retreats admits it; when it shall make us wholly its own, shall wholly dispossess it; when it deserts us, yields the heart once more and altogether to ruin. And the same change is wrought in every Christian who receives the fullness of the Holy Spirit. If the holy Head of our blessed faith had himself remained on earth, there would have been no Holy Spirit to guide and comfort. But we should not even then have come to unity. (C. H. Now they are to graduate and begin the task for which He has trained them, assisted by the greatest power of all time. The comparative value of the temporal and the spiritual we learn in the progress of life. 1871-8. Let us with all the strength which God has given resist the dangerous temptations of that “lust of the eye,” which, from our carnal nature, we carry even into the purest of religions. This is an incidental contribution towards the completeness and harmony of the mystery that is embodied in Christ Jesus. Had Christ continued to live visibly upon earth, the spiritual force of the Church might have been expended in an indefinitely prolonged observation. Or, look at the Milky Way, a collection of worlds more numerous than the sands on the sea-shore, separated often from each other by distances which our figures cannot express, and among these are stars whose light must have taken even thousands of centuries in order to reach us on this earth. Yet, in order to secure the great design of saving men, it was needful that there should be some agent who could be in all places, who could attend all ministers, and who could, at the same time, apply the work of Christ to people in all parts of the earth. Already God is working towards that point. ENABLES US TO UNDERSTAND HIM BETTER THAN WE COULD HAVE DONE HAD HE REMAINED. Men might worship a God in the spirit of idolatry, if they worshipped only the human element of His complex nature. We shall enjoy both together by and by: Why not now? Thomas Coke Commentary on the Holy Bible. He was the principle of cohesion among them, and His departure would be the signal for the dissolution of the brotherhood. But now that He was going the outstanding work of the Spirit prophesied by the prophets could begin. (H. B. “HE SHALL NOT SPEAK OF HIMSELF.” Why not? Bezaleel was an inspired theologian. And the strangeness is brought more home to us by that word of Paul’s in which we recognize the familiar tone of love that cannot face the thought of leaving a life’s work half done and dear ones unhelped. HAS SECURED TO THE CHURCH HIS CONSTANT PRESENCE. Has not the fatal apostasy of Rome originated in this infirmity of our nature? Whence we learn, that Christ's ascension was indispensibly necessary, in order to the Spirit's mission; the Spirit could not have descended, if Christ had not first ascended; the Spirit could not come, but by the gift and mission of the Mediator. Perpetually familiar with the humanity, it is scarcely conceivable that men could fix a steady gaze upon the Deity it enshrined. [7] G. Campbell Morgan, The Gospel according to John (Old Tappan, New Jersey: Fleming H. Revell Co.), p. 260. Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament. If we are to give our hearts and wills to the Author and End of our existence; if our Christian worship is not to be a coldly calculated compliment, but the outcome of a pure and of a soul-consuming passion—then it is well that on the heights of heaven should throb to all eternity a human heart, the sacred heart of Jesus, and that, in the adoration which we pay Him, we should know that we are extending the inmost resources of our nature at the feet of the one Being who has upon them the claim of relationship as well as the claim of duty. His text is Christ. THE NECESSITY OF ENFORCING THE PREFERENCE DUE TO THE DIVINE SPIRIT. 3. 2. (J. Jesus calms the fears and dissipates the sorrow of the disciples by showing why it is necessary for Him to depart and send the Helper. In life it is so. John 16:7. Do you desire to pray? (A. Vinet, D. D.). Obviously, then, Christ’s departure into heaven has given the world the surest proof that a heaven exists, and invested it with the strongest and sweetest charm for His people. Therefore the Saviour says, “It is expedient,” &c. 3.