1 John 2:23

1 John 2:23

The Place of the Doctrine of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit in Christian Ethics.

I. St. John is especially occupied throughout his Gospel in setting forth the ground and principle of the obedience of the Son. It is filial obedience. It is the obedience of a Son to a Father, in whom He delights, and who delights in Him. And so He reveals the Father. And the Apostles, receiving Him as the Christ, learnt from Him not to think of the Godhead as self-willed power or sovereignty. They thought of a Father and a Son. They could not see the will of the Father except in the submission of the Son. They were Jews; they had a greater horror of dividing the Godhead, of setting up two gods, than any of their countrymen had. But it was precisely this belief in the unity of the Father and the Son which kept them from dividing the Godhead.

II. St. John believed that Jesus, being the Son of God and the Son of man, was the real High-priest of the universe; that He had received the true anointing, the Divine Spirit of His Father; that this Spirit had not been poured on Him alone, but had run down to the skirts of His garments; that He was raised on high that men on earth might be filled with it. Because this Spirit of Christ, the Anointed One, was present with them, because God had promised that it should be renewed in them day by day, as the dew fell every day upon the hills, therefore they could as brethren dwell in unity; therefore the Church could live on amidst all the powers, seen and unseen, which were threatening to destroy it. When was there less of that dwelling together in unity which the Psalmist pronounced to be so good and comely than in our time? And surely all the arguments and arrangements in the universe will not bring it one whit nearer to us. We shall become more and more separate, each man will shut himself up more closely in his own notions, conceits, and selfish pursuits, until we all own that we require the Spirit of God, of unity, to keep us one. Then we shall find that He who has breathed into our nostrils the breath of life does not deny us this more needful breath, this deeper life.

F. D. Maurice, The Epistles of St. John,p. 152.