Jesus should h11vo kingly honour 11nd kingly power they hRd not diRccrned. But tho disciples seem to h11ve thou.\(ht that Olle d11y ho woulrl 118Rumo outward royal pomps, and then everybody would ho forced to recognize him for what be truly waR. A glory that could be manif,·sted to some and not to all w11s beyond the comprehension of the disciples. The question of Judas waR only the world's own h11bitual and self-conceited question, amounting to this-that if there was anything in Christianity, the world would have lleOn it long 11go. The world's delusive notion is that it c:i.n know everything that is to ho known, if only the manifestation is mRde intense enough. II. Tim EXPLANATION OF JEsus. An explanation, indeed, and yet not an explanation to be understood in the m:>ment of utterance. For these very disciples had yet to have stirred up in their hearts n. true spiritual affection. 'fhey did love Jesu8 as human friend loveR human friend; but doing ibis, what did they more than others? The mutual bond. of friendship requires no high stretch of human virtue. But the disciples had yet to attain the a.-yci,rij, that i-yci,rij which is specially affirmed as the ::rowning gift of the Holy Spirit. God so loved the world as to give his Son for the world's redemption, and there is 11, continua.I effort through many and ever multi- plying agencies to mani!est himself in saving power to the world. Ent this is done by all arts of persua,ion and warning-by persistent shaking of those who are asleep till they open their eyes, which many of them never do. There is, of course, an increase of manifestation in the glory of God in Christ Jesus, so that those able to see the mani- festation at all see more and more, and have an increase of joy the longer they look. But just as the same eye beholds the sun in its noonday glory and in its earliest dawn, so the same eye beholds all the manifestations of God in Jesus. If we cannot see the beginning, we cannot see the continuing. To those spiritually blind, all comforting manifestations of the Trinity are alike impossible. There must be a breaking down of selfishness, an opening up of the streams of love, and a gradual increase of them into copious flow. How many indulge selfishness, well knowing the claims that press on them from every side I Shut your eyes and keep them closed; it is true then that you cannot see; but you are not therefore reckoned blind. Only when you are penitent, and profoundly troubled because of deep-rooted selfishness, can the manifestation of Jesus begin to you. Selfishness is what makes the world the world; and as soon as a counter-current is.set up in any human heart, that is a sign of salvation begun, and if only there be no Demas-lapse into the love of the temporal an,\ the visible, then manifestations from above will more and more increase. The more we fit ourselves to see, the more we shall see.-Y. Vers. 25, 26.-How the teaching of Jesus becomes abiding and ejfectool. I. THE POWERLESSNESS OF TRUTH. Jesus continually remembered this. No one, indeed, had more complete experience as to the in=1bility of the natural man to receive spiritual things; and even here, when perhaps the disciples were unusually attentive, Jesus knew that they would be more than ever perplexed. And the~e was nothing in the mere lapse of time to make the meaning clearer, the promises more receivable, the duties more feasible. Persevering, indomitable students have, ere now, puzzlet.l out some abstruse treatise usually ms.de plain by a teacher who knows it thoroughly. They have not been able to ge.t the teacher, and so thoy have managed to do without him. But the utterances of Jesus in thti Gospels are sealet.l up, every one of them, to mere intellectual inquiry. 'l'he words are there, with a strange attractive power-unique words; and yet the very power that is to make them useful is somehow la.eking, or at all events unavailable. No fresh words are needet.l; it may truly be said there is nothing in the Epistles which is not already in the Gospels, so far as principles ar,; concerned; but something is needed to bring the human heart and the words of Jesus into living contact. II. WHAT MAKES TRUTH VITAL. Tho energy of the Holy Spirit. He will indeed be a Paraclete, ever coming in with ample and effectue.l guidance jnst at the needful moment. What riches have been got out of the Gospels by Spirit-guidetl men! What a serious accusation if we reject or neglect what has evidently been given to meet the emergency I G,1d never gives anything unnecessary. Let it not be supposet.l that lhe Iloly Spirit is for the difficulties of some, or for occasiPns when we cannot see our way to truth unc1ided, The Holy Spirit is for all and always. The truth as it i& in Jesus 266 THE GOSPEL AOCORDING TO ST. JOHN. [en. xiv. 1-31,
can n<'l'N become a real system to us, iudividnally, unless as we RCcept thie guidance provided br Jesus and his Father. How this guidance operates is another matter, 'J'hRt we me.y not be able to understand. But neither do we understand how the seed bursts into life and develops int.o plant and fruit. What we need is firm faith and an abiding recollection tha.t the Holy Spirit which the Father sends in the Name of the Son is e. real a.ad a. present power. The difference between the seed unsown and the eeed springing np and moving onwards to fruit, is an a.nalogue of the difference between an utterance of Jesus verbally lodged in the memory, and that so.me utternnco opened up and filled with perennie.l power by the Holy Spirit. Ill. THE TWOFOLD ASPECT OF THE SPIRIT'S WORK HEBE l'BESENTED. 1. Teaching. The dea.th of Jesus had yet to c.ome, and then the resurrection and ascension. Every- thing Jesus h11S ever spoken must be brought into proper relation with these marvellous experiences of his personal life. The Holy Spirit has to expfain the sum total of the incarnation. 2. Reminding. To recollect what we know just when we want it, is one or the hardest of things. What is the value of knowledge unless it can be turned to practice just at the right time P The Holy Spirit mo.y be a help to mere memory, far more t.han we think.-Y.