John 17:17

John 17:17

I. Revelation, or, as our Lord terms it solemnly, the truth, sanctifies us first of all by putting before us an ideal of sanctity. The man of action, like the artist, needs an ideal. It is, in fact, his first necessity, and outside the sphere of revelation there have been such ideals; but they have been vague, indistinct, varying, above all, they have been conspicuous by their failure, again and again, to satisfy the higher demands even of the natural conscience. By giving the world, before the eyes of men, the record of one life spotless and consecrated, the truth does sanctify those who will submit themselves to its power. It affects thousands for good in degrees which fall far short of sanctification. It sanctifies those who desire to be made holy, and who, with their eyes fixed on this, the one typical form of excellence, ask earnestly for the Holy Spirit of God, whose work it is in the sacraments, and in other ways, to take of the things of Jesus and to show or to give them to His own.

II. The truth sanctifies, secondly, by stimulating hope. It gives every man who wills it not only an ideal, but a future. Be he what he may, or may not be, he may look forward. There is, he knows, another world, another life; and between this and that there are opportunities. Where there is no such hope, nothing visible to the eye of the soul beyond the horizon of time; where there is no future intimately related to this present life, or growing out of it there sanctity, in its proper sense, is impossible. "Every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as He is pure." To live hereafter, to any purpose at all, is to live at the feet of One whose very name is an incentive to sanctification.

III. But Christian truth sanctifies also as being a revelation of the love of God. Love has a power of making men holy. There are moral conditions which defy fear, but which cannot defy love. "Sanctify" is the response which the heart makes to unmerited mercy. It is the generous response not to be at least untouched by love. If you would find the fructifying power which, in the successive generations of Christendom, has raised up men and women to lead supernatural lives to live, as it were, in view of the other world, with marks of the character and teaching of St. Paul and of the Lord Jesus clearly stamped upon them you will find it in the eternal truth, that the Son of God took flesh, and died out of love for fallen man, being so deeply graven on their hearts.

H. P. Liddon, Penny Pulpit,No. 528.

We see here

I. One cause of the hopeless degradation of the heathen world, even in its most refined and advanced state of mental culture. Truth was discussed in their schools of philosophy, but it was to them only a philosophy; it was not a life. It was to them a startling revelation to say, as the Gospel said, that truth was only truth to those who loved it, that the law of restored humanity was that each advance in illumination should be an advance in spiritual purity.

II. Again, this same principle shows the fallacy of referring to Jewish customs and the standard of Jewish morality to justify lax lives in Christians. Jewish spirituality is no standard for Christian life, unless we can reduce the compass of Christian truth within the limits of Jewish truth.

III. Again, we here see the true nature and course of Christian revivals. As a general law, a revival of doctrine precedes a revival of life. Revivals which arise from truths which fasten themselves in the soul expand and grow with the truths themselves, and become, like them, abiding principles.

IV. It is needful that those who hold the truth should be warned of the dangers and deceits which, adhering to the fullest and most correct apprehension of doctrine, may yet make shipwreck of their faith. (1) It is clear that, as we receive any fresh truth, our first thought should be, "What does this involve? To what change, what progress in my life, does this naturally lead?" (2) Again, we here learn a rule for our devotions. If our devotions tend to earnest practical aspirations as their aim, they will act upon our lives; and the reverse is equally true. (3) A warning needs to be given to those who, by the grace of God, are drawn to an earnest self-devotion, after a sinful and careless life. The graces of a saintly character grow less quickly than the convictions of truth. It is not that sanctity is uncertain, or the results of the grace of God and His truth less real than our natural corruption, but that the noblest plants are of slowest growth, and the consequences of our fall remain to trouble us in the course of our repentance, as a penance ordained to be borne for a while. (4) Be diligent and watchful concerning the lesser facts of daily life, and not merely its greater trials. As "he that despiseth small things shall fall by little and little," so he alone that labours to conform himself to the will of God in the constant claims of everyday life shall rise by little and little to his consummation of bliss, in his predestined union with God.

T. T. Carter, Sermons,p. 136.

References: John 17:17. Spurgeon, Sermons,vol. xxxii., No. 1890; Ibid., Morning by Morning,p. 186; Clergyman's Magazine,vol. iii., p. 80; E. Cooper, Practical Sermons,vol. i., p. 194; H. P. Liddon, Three Hundred Outlines on the New Testament,p. 97; E. Bersier, Sermons,2nd series, p. 228. John 17:17. H. Mackennal, Christian World Pulpit,vol. viii., p. 216. John 17:18; John 17:19. S. Hebditch, Ibid.,vol. xxvii., p. 317.