John 14:23,24

“ Jesus answered and said to him, If any one loves me, he will keep my word; and my Father will love him and we will come to him, and make our abode with him. 24. He who does not love me, does not keep my words; and the word which you hear is not mine, but the Father's who sent me. ”

Jesus continues His discourse, as if He had not heard the question of Judas; for the first part of John 14:23 is only the reproduction of John 14:21 developed and stated with greater precision. And yet He answers the question proposed, by more energetically reaffirming the promise, as well as the moral condition which had called forth the objection; comp. the same mode of replying in Luke 12:41 ff. To love Jesus, to keep His word, to be loved by the Father, these are the conditions on which the promised revelation will be made (John 14:23); now the world does not fulfil them; it is animated by dispositions of an opposite character (John 14:24).

As to the conditions and nature of this revelation, Jesus develops them grandly. The revelation of Himself which He will give to the believer will be nothing less than His own dwelling in his soul, and this will be one with the dwelling of God Himself within him. How can we think here only of the appearances of the Risen One, or even of temporary aid granted to the disciples by the glorified Lord in the work of their ministry? It is incomprehensible how Weiss can persist in such an interpretation to the very end.

Here, as in John 10:30, Jesus says we in speaking of God and Himself; this expression, if it is not blasphemous or absurd, implies the consciousness of His essential union with God. The conception of the kingdom of God which we find here is not foreign to the Synoptics; comp. Luke 17:20: “ The kingdom of God comes not with observation; it is within you ” (ἐντὸς ὑμῶν); and Matthew 28:18-20. A very similar figure is found in Revelation 3:20: “ If any one opens the door, I will enter in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. ”

Joh 14:2 proves that the term μονή, dwelling, can designate not only an inn, but the permanent domicile (see Passow). This expression perhaps places the idea of this verse in connection with that of John 14:2. Here on earth, it is God who makes His abode with the believer; in heaven, it will be the believer who will make his abode with God. The first of these facts (John 14:23) prepares for the second (John 14:3).

Weiss rests upon the παῤ αὐτῷ, properly near him, to support the view that the question is not of an inward dwelling. The unio mystica between Christ and the believer, must have been designated, according to him, by ἐν αὐτῷ, in him. But the preposition παρά, with, is necessarily introduced by reason of the figure of a dwelling (μονὴν ποιεῖν) and cannot in any way serve to determine the mode of this union. And it follows from the terms ἐμφανίζειν and πρὸς αὐτόν, as from the parallel Revelation 3:20, that this mode is internal and spiritual.