LESSON XVII.

THE MANY MANSIONS.

THURSDAY, A.D. 30.—JOHN xiv. 1—14.

Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions : if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.

And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.

And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.

Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?

Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.

Philip saith unto him, Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us.

Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father?

Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.

Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or else believe me for the very works' sake.

Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.

And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.

If ye shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it.

COMMENT." Whither I go, thou canst not follow Me now, but thou shalt follow Me afterwards,” had been the words of our Lord to St. Peter just before. Now, since the thought of His leaving them troubled them, He, adds the assurance that they should indeed follow. He was going to His Father's Home, where are many mansions; by which is meant many homes or abiding places, and He was going to make ready these homes. We know how an emigrant sometimes goes alone, and prepares a home for his family, then comes back and fetches them into it. But it is not a strange

land, but His own Father's House whither He was going to prepare their place—yea, and ours; the resting-place of each, and when He comes again it will be to take us home to it, to be with Him. He was again "for the joy that was set before Him, despising the pain," and looking on beyond it to the gladness it would purchase when He should welcome each one of those who were before Him into

the mansion He would prepare. Some, such no doubt as John, already knew the Home He meant, and the way thither; but Thomas, always loving and daring, but little able to see beyond the outer world, was thinking of some earthly journey, and answered in his dull, confused way. It drew forth the great answer, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." The Way, because through Him alone we can enter into the Holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh (Heb. x.); so as to have access to the Father. He is the Truth, the Faithful Witness, called Faithful and True (Rev. xix. 11): the Life, "for in Him was Life, and the Life was the Light of men" (John i. 4), our whole life depending on our being parts of Him. Again, as He shows, He is the Way because He, whom as Man we can know, is the "express image of the Father" (Heb. i. 3), so that in knowing Him, we know the Father; and to Philip's confused reply "Show us the Father," He answers, "Have I been so long with you, and yet hast thou not known Me, Philip?" thus again showing us His Oneness with the Father. His words and His works are alike those of the Father, meaning by these works not only the miracles, but that perfect, unstained, unvarying goodness and kindness, that those who came so near Him must have felt to be like nothing but the goodness of God, or rather to be the goodness of God.

Then He adds that His true believers shall do His works, and still greater works than He had done. For in truth their conversions were more numerous, their miracles were more, "because He went to His Father," and thence shed down abundant grace on them through whom He worked. It was even as when Moses left Joshua a double portion of His spirit, and Elisha received with the mantle of Elijah in like manner a double portion and did more numerous works. The further meaning of their having increased powers because of their Lord's leaving them

is to be explained presently. In the meantime He gives the promise of the greater power of prayer in His Name-prayer that is offered, that is, in right of our union with Christ, who had earned all that His Whole Body can ask or think. These are the rewards He is dwelling on; the hope in which he was ready to endure the cross and shame.

LESSON XVIII.

THE PROMISE OF THE COMFORTER.

THURSDAY, A.D. 30.—JOHN xiv. 15-31; MARK xiv. 26.

If ye love me, keep my commandments.

And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;

Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.

I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.

Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me : because I live, ye shall live also.

At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I

in you.

He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will manifest myself to him.

Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us, and not unto the world?

Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.

He that loveth me not, keepeth not my sayings: and the word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father's which sent me.

These things have I spoken unto you, being yet present with you.

But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.

Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.

Ye have heard how I said unto you, I go away, and come again unto you. If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father for my Father is greater than I.

And now I have told you before it come to pass, that, when it is come to pass, ye might believe.

Hereafter I will not talk much with you: for the prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me.

But that the world may know that I love the Father; and as the Father gave me commandment, even so I do. Arise, let us go hence. And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the mount of Olives.

COMMENT.-Still our Lord is teaching His Apostles what He should have gained for them by His Cross and Passion, and preparing them for His departure. These discourses in St. John answer to the discourses at Pisgah, which Moses made ere leaving his people, and we read them together in the Fifty Days between the commemoration of His suffering and of the coming of God the Holy Ghost. As the "Second Law" was Moses' farewell, the Law of Love is our Lord's charge.

He then promised the presence of the Holy Spirit, as He had never done before, using the name PARACLETOS, which means an Advocate or Comforter. Comfort did not, when the translation was made, only mean soothing, it had more the sense of cheering, exhorting, or stirring up, though soothing was involved in the promise, above all when our Lord says, "I will not leave you comfortless," the promise which the Church repeats on the Sunday after His Ascension, and dwells on in the collect "We beseech Thee, leave us not comfortless," or orphans.

This is the beginning of the first clear revelation of the Third Person of the Holy Trinity, "the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in My Name." He would bring a knowledge of, and feeling of their Lord's Presence, which the world could not enter into, and which, on St. Jude's question, was further explained as a manifestation to the soul of him who strove to keep the commandments in love-yea, more than a manifestation, for it would be the very Presence of the Father and the Son as One with the Holy Ghost. The revelation St. Paul drew out more fully when he said, "The Spirit of God dwelleth in you" (1 Cor. iii. 16); and our Lord, again, when He said (Rev. iii. 20) :—

Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.

Love is the way of keeping this Presence, and that Holy Spirit Who would thus dwell in their hearts would open their understand

ings and recall to their minds all that they now heard as in a dream without comprehending it. Thus we see how it is that the record of our Lord's sayings could be so perfect. The Holy Spirit brought all things to their remembrance, so that St. Matthew, St. Peter, through St. Mark, and St. John much later, could write this history.

Three verses of farewell follow. The Prince of Peace, Whose coming was hailed with songs of "Peace on earth," gives now His blessing. "The Lord shall give His people the blessing of peace." 'It is the peace the world cannot give," the peace that can exist in the heart through all turmoil and uproar from outside, "the peace that passeth all understanding," the peace that comes of being in favour with God.

And if their love for Him had been perfectly understanding and perfectly unselfish, they would have rejoiced for Him at His return to the Home above, the Glory He had with His Father from the beginning. The words, "My Father is greater than I," are spoken of His Manhood, since we know that “being in the form of God, He thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation " (Phil. ii. 6), and thus, though "equal to the Father as touching His Godhead," was "inferior to the Father as touching His Manhood."

After this one glimpse of His glory, He adds that He shall have little more talk with them, as His conflict with Satan is close at hand. Satan had no right or power over Him, but in love to the Father, to do His command and to save man, He was going forth to fight the fight of mankind with the prince of this world.

"Arise, let us go hence," seems to join with St. Mark's words that, when they had sung a hymn they went out to the Mount of Olives. The hymn consisted of almost, beyond all doubt, those Psalms called the Greater Hallel, or Praise, beginning with the IIIth and ending with the 118th, which were always sung at the Paschal suppers, Psalms of Praise, befitting the voluntary offering up of the Great Passover, the Lamb Who should set the whole of creation free.

VOL. V.

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