Culross). Treasury (New York), xx. 655 (0. Hiickel), Twentieth Century Pastor, xxx. (1912), 132 (F. B. Meyer).
■8
The Yea and the Amen.
For how many soever be the promises of God, in him is the yea : where- fore also through him is the Amen, unto the.'glory of God through us. — 2 Cor. i. 20.
1. These words occur in a homely and curious connexion. St. Paul had not kept his appointment with the Corinthian Church, and he fears that the influence of a hostile party may cause his failure to be misunderstood. Did he use lightness ? Was his pledge Yea, Yea, and Nay, Nay ; Yes to-day, and No to-morrow ? Now, what would seem most natural for us to say, if exposed to such a charge ? Perhaps we should exclaim, " I am not such a man"; or, "They have mistaken the person they have to deal with " ; or again, " I can afford to despise the insinuation." But St. Paul did not think first about himself. He had passed out of the sphere where any subject, even the slightest, appealed first and most naturally to his personal instincts and his self-respect. When he is reproached with changing lightly the plan of a tour (which plan he had actually changed), his thoughts revert to Christ and His Gospel, which such conduct would dishonour. What notion of the Master have these people, who charge him, the herald, with such unworthy levity ? There was not Yea and Nay with Paul, because in Christ was one steadfast Yea.
Now, this argument is illogical unless we supply a suppressed premiss which St. Paul did not pause to state, since he had much to say in few words. For just as God's fidelity is no guarantee of Paul's veracity, unless Paul was a partaker of the Divine nature, so the steadfast sincerity of Christ is no guarantee of his sincerity, unless he and Christ are one — one in being, one in thought, will, aim. But this oneness with Christ was a fundamental conception of the Christian life with St. Paul. It lay at the basis of his theology. He could neither preach a sermon nor write a letter without affirming or assuming it. So completely was he one with
30 THE YEA AND THE AMEN
Christ that he affirms that he was crucified with Christ ; that he died when Christ died, and rose again from the dead. All he did he did hy Christ, as well as for Him. All he suffered was but a filling up of the remnant of Christ's affliction. His motto, his characteristic word, might well be : " Henceforth I Hve : yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." That being so, it was natural that he should assume this doctrine of the indwelling Christ here; and assume also that his readers would supply this premiss of his argument, which he did not think it necessary, or which it did not occur to him, to state. And, of course, the moment it was assumed, the Apostle's argument became sound, and even irresist- ible. For then it ran: The Son of God, Jesus Christ, is true; Christ is in me ; the spring of all virtue, as well as the hope of glory : and therefore I am, I must be, true. As He was not Yea and Nay, my word to you is not, and cannot be, Yea and Nay.
2. Now look at the text. This is one of the many passages the force and beauty of which are, for the first time, brought within the reach of an English reader by the alterations in the Eevised Version. These are dependent partly upon the reading of the Greek and partly upon the translation. As the words stand in the Authorized Version, " yea " and " amen " seem to be very nearly synonymous expressions, and to point substantially to the same thing, namely, that Jesus Christ is as it were the confirma- tion and seal of God's promises. But in the Eevised Version the alterations, especially in the pronouns, indicate more distinctly that the Apostle means two different things by the " yea " and the " amen." The one is God's voice, the other is man's. The one has to do with the certainty of the Divine revelation, the other has to do with the certitude of our faith in the revelation. When God speaks in Christ, He confirms everything that He has said before, and when we listen to God speaking in Christ, our lips are, through Christ, opened to shout our assenting " Amen " to His great promises.
This is a truth so far-reaching that all the promises of God have the seal of their stability in Christ. As often as any pledge is realized (and that is whenever one is trusted), the conscience of the Church confesses that her enjoyment of it has been attained in Him. Through Him, therefore, she returns her glad attesta-
2 COR. I. 20 31
tion. How many soever are the promises of God, in Him is the Yea of Divine fulfilment; wherefore through Him is also the Amen of human acknowledgment and praise, " to the glory of God through us."
3. Taken thus, the text not only gives us a new conception of the mission of Christ, it gives us also a new conception of the^ vocation of the Church, of our vocation as Christian men, t Chri is the Yea of God : we, through the power of the indwellings Dhrist, are the Amen. It is His mission to translate all the thoughts of God into' actual and vital forms ; it is our vocation, as we study that translation, as we see those thoughts taking shape, as they become visible and recognizable to us, to add our Amen to them, i.e. to accept, welcome, and conform to them. The power to add this Amen, to consent to and obey the will of God, we derive from Christ, who lives, and dwells in us. And this power is given to us with a view " to the glory of God through us." In fine, the vision which lies behind St. Paul's words, and which he labours to express, seems to be nothing less than this: He conceives of the infinite God as dwelling in the inaccessible light, and thinking out the thoughts of His eternal righteousness and love ; He conceives of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, as translating these thoughts into creative, providential, and redeeming acts ; and he conceiyes^ of the vast congregation of thqsg who love God and believe on His Son as standing round and contemplating the Divine thoughts which take visible form at the' bghest^f _the Son, and chanting their loud Amen to all that He does, to all that He reveals of the Father's will.