πρῶτον

The research to which I previously alluded is still ongoing and will likely work its way into future posts, but I felt compelled to offer the following short meditation for late November/early December. I hope and pray that God's Word will bring encouragement to those who read it and that the full implication of what Christ undertook will resonate in their hearts as His disciples prepare to remember and celebrate His Incarnation.

εἰ ὁ κόσμος ὑμᾶς μισεῖ, γινώσκετε ὅτι ἐμε πρῶτον ὑμῶν μεμίσηκεν. — κατὰ Ἰωάννην 15:18

ei ho kosmos hymas misei, ginoskete hoti eme proton hymon memiseken. — kata Ioannen 15:18

If the world hates you, know that it has hated me first before you. — John 15:18, translation mine

Never one to mince words, Jesus informs His disciples what they can expect from the world for following Him. Although He has taught them at length about how to love, the world will respond largely with hatred to the gospel message. At the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said,

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For He makes His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust.”
(Matthew 5:43-45, ESV)

Jesus knows that people will mistreat each other, that this is the modus operandi of the world. He admonishes His disciples to distinguish themselves from the world with the love that comes from and has its model in Himself and in the Father.

Jesus' words in the gospel of John, however, should not give His disciples cause for despair but rather hope and thanksgiving. The precision in His wording assures His disciples that, wherever they go, He has gone before them and that whatever they endure He has endured for their sake first. It is with this understanding of Jesus as the forerunner and the example by which His followers must pattern their lives that the author of the Book of Hebrews writes:

Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
(Hebrews 4:4-16, ESV)

The word sympathize cognately translates the Greek συμπαθῆσαι (sympathesai), which literally means to suffer with. In their lack of strength, then, Christ not only suffered before His disciples with all the weakness of human flesh but also suffers alongside them, lending them the immeasurable strength which He receives from the Father through the Holy Spirit to endure. The phrase “help in time of need” is in Greek εὔκαιρον βοήθειαν (eukairon boëtheian), which when broken out literally reads “well-timed running to the battle cry.” Christ runs to support His disciples in their physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual battles when they cry aloud for help, even when in such straits that they do not know what to pray, for “the Spirit Himself intercedes for [them] with groanings too deep for words” (Romans 8:26b, ESV).

Christians should therefore rejoice in the great gift and support with which Christ has blessed them, employing Paul's attitude when he writes to the church at Philippi, “All things I have strength for in Him who empowers me” (Philippians 4:13, translation mine). Christ, the true vine, is His disciples' strength and foundation: the root which conquered sin and death through love and resurrection. Because Christ went first, beset with all the weaknesses common to man but unblemished by sin, the Christian may follow despite the world's hatred, confident in Christ's leading and His steadfast promise of eternal life.

εὑρίσκω

I am currently engaged in some etymological research toward the next few posts, so November's post will be slightly delayed. Thanks for your patience!

ἵνα ἀγαπᾱτε

ταῦτα ἐντέλλομαι ὑμῖν, ἵνα ἀγαπᾱτε ἀλλήλους. — κατὰ Ἰωάννην 15:17

tauta entellomai hymin, hina agapate allelous. — kata Ioannen 15:17

These things I am commanding you so that you may love one another. — John 15:17, translation mine

For a third time in this discourse, Christ enjoins the apostles to love one another (John 15:10, John 15:12, John 15:17) in order to underscore the importance of this missive. Only the prefatory addition of the phrase “Amen, Amen” could have added more weight to Christ’s words. The command to love one another is the literally crucial point at which Christ is driving and toward which Christ is headed that very evening.

It is tempting to quickly dismiss this and say that one heard Christ the first time or even the second time. Yet Christ repeats himself so that the message will not be lost but will stick in the mind of the listener. Love one another. This is not the natural human response in man’s fallen state. As it is written, “Many a man proclaims his own steadfast love, but a faithful man who can find?” (Proverbs 20:6, ESV) Christ is sending out His apostles so that they might faithfully proclaim this message which He has entrusted to them.

Christ has begun the discourse by assuring the apostles that if they remain in Him, then they will bear much fruit (John 15:4). Here, Christ encourages them that if they observe His commands then they will be able to love another. By this, He teaches them that love comes from the Father in the Son through the Holy Spirit, but one must continually practice love as He has commanded in order to remain in Him and His love.

This raises the question naturally as to what love is. From Scripture, one sees that love is not indulgence but sacrifice, i.e., that which makes holy. The apostle Peter writes, “Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.” (1 Peter 4:8, ESV). Love after the pattern presented by Christ, that is, sacrificial, forgiving love, redeems that which was unclean and heals that which was wounded, “for if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses” (Matthew 6:14-15, ESV).

Love is not passivity but passion, and this passion is not the lust of hedonism but the devotion whose root is πάσχειν, “to suffer or be affected for good or for bad by anything as opposed to acting for oneself” (Liddell and Scott, 536)¹. Love in the vein of Christ’s sacrifice and the apostles’ martyrdom obeys the command: “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.” (Deuteronomy 6:5 ESV). This command is part of the Shema, one of the cores of Jewish worship of God the Father whose importance is such that Christ stated that “this is the great and first commandment.” (Matthew 22:38, ESV). The ardent fervor of this love holds God in the highest esteem and others before oneself, driving each to share one another’s burdens that all loads may be lightened — a suffering that brings relief.

Some may question the rationality of such an attitude, but such love is not irrationality. Rather, presenting yourselves to God as living sacrifices offers Him τὴν λογικὴν λατρείαν ὑμῶν (ten logiken latreian hymon), “your logical service” (Romans 12:1c, translation mine). This service springs from the root of all love who is love, namely God. It is a service of love freely and consciously given as God’s grace is given.

To reckon love as an irrational tempest of emotion or physicality is to cheat love of its identity. Where God’s love grants life and hope, irrational counterfeits of love deal death and despair. The life of David sharply illustrates this in his encounter with Bathsheba. Spurred only by the sight of her bathing on her roof, David perpetrates adultery, fraud, and murder in a fit of lust. He literally abandons Uriah, a most trusted general who would have gladly given his life honorably in sacrifice for his king, to a dishonorable death in order to cover the shame of the adultery when Bathsheba’s pregnancy by David dissolves all chance of dissembling (2 Samuel 11:1-17).

The Bible speaks of David as a man after God’s own heart (1 Samuel 13:14), but even such a man like David is riddled with flaws and imperfections. That David approximates the heart of God does not preclude the fact that he is a man, prone to err and wander on account of his own lusts. The memory of his own corrupt heart in the Bathsheba incident and other incidents likely induces David to cry out in conciliation when confronted later in life with the sin of his pride, “Let me fall into the hand of the LORD, for His mercy is very great, but do not let me fall into the hand of man” (1 Chronicles 21:13, ESV). David knew that God, the author of justice, would deal more justly with him than man, whose notion of justice ultimately issues from his belly or his loins.

Rational love after that which comes from the heart of God stands firm regardless of circumstance. With such love, Christ admonishes the apostles and all men to love one another, knowing that He is poised to make the consummate act of love upon the cross, choosing to offer service in obedience to God and for the benefit of men so that no barrier may exist between God and man except man’s unwillingness to choose to love God as God has loved him. Christ’s love extends so far as to subjugate Himself in such service while fully cognizant of His own right to authority. It is by this logical act of humility that the Son fully shares with men the love He has shared with the Father from before the dawn of time. The interposition of Christ’s blood pays the debt which man owes to God and frees man to fully love with all of his heart, strength, mind, and soul.

¹Liddell, Henry George, Robert Scott, Henry Stuart Jones, and Roderick McKenzie. A Lexicon Abridged from Liddell and Scott's Greek-English Lexicon. London: Oxford University Press, 1966.

ἵνα ὁ καρπὸς ὑμῶν μένῃ

οὐχ ὑμεῖς με ἐξελέξασθε, ἀλλ' ἐγὼ ἐξελεξάμην ὐμᾶς καὶ ἔθηκα ὑμᾶς ἵνα ὑμεῖς ὑπάγητε καὶ καρπὸν φέρητε καὶ ὁ καρπὸς ὑμῶν μένῃ, ἵνα ὅ τι ἂν αἰτήσητε τὸν πατέρα ἐν τῷ ὀνόματί μου δῷ ὑμῖν. — κατὰ Ἰωάννην 15:16

ouch hymeis me exelexasthe, all' ego exelexamen hymas kai etheka hymas hina hymeis hypagete kai karpon ferete kai ho karpos hymon mene, hina ho ti an aitesete ton patera en to onomati mou do hymin. — kata Ioannen 15:16

You did not elect me for yourselves, but rather I elected you for myself, and I have set you so that you may be underway and bear fruit and that your fruit may last, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name He may give to you. — John 15:16, translation mine

One may ask what purpose Christ has in making this distinction between Him electing His apostles and His apostles electing Him. John's recording of Christ's words in the middle voice holds the key.¹ Had Christ been popularly elected by men as from men, His purpose and servitude would necessarily have been toward men. Yet by this turn of phrase, Christ makes it inescapably clear that He comes from God the Father in the service of the One who made men.

Christ's distinction is validated by the many men of Christ's time who spurned Him, as Isaiah prophesied several hundred years before Christ's birth:

For he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
(Isaiah 53:2-3, ESV)

Isaiah's prophecy is borne out in the reception Jesus received from those in his own hometown, who said,

“Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him.
(Mark 6:3, ESV)

Not even the apostles physically came to Christ on their own. Nathanael in his cynicism retorted when told of Jesus, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” (John 1:46b, ESV)

Ultimately, rejection by men captive to sin crucified Christ. By His trial, torture, and death, which Jesus' discourse with His apostles precedes by mere hours, one observes neither popularity nor power as the driving force in Christ's life, but utter subservience to the Father's mission for the Son for the sake of mankind, namely eternal salvation. The message is bound in the latter part of the verse: “so that you may be underway and bear fruit and that your fruit may last.” Christ fully intends for His apostles to branch out and bear fruit that others might be grafted into the everlasting vine, the true one. The empires of men fall and fade, just as Daniel interpreted from the dream of King Nebuchadnezzar and prophesied of the Roman Empire and the empires that preceded it:

“And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever, just as you saw that a stone was cut from a mountain by no human hand, and that it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold. A great God has made known to the king what shall be after this. The dream is certain, and its interpretation sure.”
(Daniel 2:44-45, ESV)

Man in his finiteness cannot hope to bridge the chasm of sin between himself and God. For “those of low estate are but a breath; those of high estate are a delusion; in the balances they go up; they are together lighter than a breath” (Psalm 62:9, ESV). Man's pattern of shortsighted choices runs throughout history. Even Samuel, one of the most obedient prophets in all Biblical history, does not see as God sees, favoring David's older and more seasoned brothers for anointing as king over all Israel,

but the LORD said to Samuel, “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the LORD sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart.”
(1 Samuel 16:7, ESV)

Christ makes it clear to His apostles that theirs is not a mission doomed to obscurity and comforts them in light of the coming trial in which all the apostles will desert Him. If there is any doubt in Christ and the validity of His choices, Luke's account describes Christ spending the entire night in prayer with His Father before electing the twelve from among His disciples (Luke 6:12-16). Christ has spent the entire discourse at the last supper with His apostles assuring them that all He has done has been at the behest of the Father and not of His own volition.

To man's irreparable benefit, Christ elected the apostles not as man elects but as His Father elected, personally hand-picking them to be leaders from among those who were not leaders according to man: from tax collectors and fishermen rather than scribes and priests. As it is written,

But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.
(1Corinthians 1:27-29, ESV)

God does not desire lofty spirits, but the humble and contrite in heart. David writes, “a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise” (Psalm 51:17, ESV), and the prophet Micah echoes him, writing,

He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?
(Micah 6:8, ESV)

Christ and the Father knew the men that they elected to be apostles, having created them. They knew the men's self-inflicted faults and the God-instilled strengths of each man for the purpose of establishing a church that would transcend the ages and bring God's message of salvation to all the earth. The Father and the Son did not seek the mighty as accounted among men, for they wanted servants and messengers that they could appoint and set so that those whom they sent out could bear the fruit that would last: everlasting fruit from the Tree of Life, namely Christ, the vine.

¹ Translator's Note: The interplay in this passage of John's gospel between the two forms of the Greek verb ἐκλέγω, “I choose, or I elect”, commends the reader to a dissection of the verb. Built from the preposition ἐκ, meaning “out of,” and λέγω, “I lay, I place, I call, I speak, I say,” ἐκλέγω literally means “I call out” or “I place outside.” I have rendered the verb as “elect” on cognate and semantic grounds. Since English lacks a conjugational middle voice, I have added the prepositional phrases to emphasize the reflexive nature of the Greek which John exercises to relay Jesus' reflection of purpose or benefit in the action of election upon Himself as the agent.

ἑτοιμάσομαι

Originally, my goal for κλῆμα 15:5 was to have a post every week delving into Scripture. Due to time constraints in my day to day, I have been unable to devote as much time as I need to faithfully reflect God's Word. Each post has become progressively more rushed, and the study is starting to suffer.

In order to give a better witness to the gospel, I have decided to scale back the frequency of posts to either bi-weekly or monthly. This will hopefully give me more time to research, pray, write, and edit so that God's Word may come through undiluted. I hope you will continue with me on this journey, and I will return with the next post for this study in September.

πάντα ἐγνώρισα

οὐκέτι λέγω ὐμας δούλους, ὅτι ὁ δοῦλος οὐκ οἶδεν τί ποιεῖ αὐτοῦ ὁ κύριος· ὑμᾶς δὲ εἴρηκα φίλους, ὅτι πάντα ἃ ἤκουσα παρὰ τοῦ πατρός μου ἐγνώρισα ὑμῖν. — κατὰ Ἰωάννην 15:15

ouketi lego hymas doulous, hoti ho doulos ouk oiden ti poiei autou ho kyrios; hymas de eireka filous, hoti panta ha ekousa para tou patros mou egnorisa hymin — kata Ioannen 15:15

No longer do I call you slaves, because the slave does not know what his master is doing; but you I have called friends, because everything that I heard from my Father I made known to you. — John 15:15, translation mine

In legal matters, culpability in crime often rests on the degree of knowledge or intent held by the perpetrator. Premeditated murder earns a weightier sentence than involuntary manslaughter. Patent violators who knowingly infringe receive stiffer fines than the ignorant. God's justice, which our own earthly justice dimly reflects, shares this gradation of culpability.

Christ tells a parable to illustrate the degree of culpability of man before God's law in accordance with the man's knowledge thereof, asking, “Who then is the faithful and wise manager, whom his master will set over his household, to give them their portion of food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions” (Luke 12:42-44, ESV).

Contrasted with this picture of fidelity, Christ illustrates the fate of the willfully disobedient servant, saying, “And that servant who knew his master's will but did not get ready or act according to his will, will receive a severe beating” (Luke 12:47, ESV). Christ distinguishes this servant from an unknowingly disobedient servant, adding, “But the one who did not know, and did what deserved a beating, will receive a light beating,” concluding, “Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required, and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more” (Luke 12:48, ESV).

It is the hearing of the master's orders that makes the servant cognizant of expectation and accordingly culpable in failure. To this end, Christ has told His disciples everything He heard from His Father. Every one who has heard Christ's words therefore has heard everything the Father has chosen to reveal regarding His salvation. First, man had the law as given through Moses, concerning sin and death and the recognition that man is not fit to save himself. Now, through Christ, man has the law of grace concerning salvation and eternal life and the recognition that Christ is both necessary and sufficient to partake in eternal community with God.

Some may ask why this reversion into slavery, trading one master for another. To them I say, freedom is not license, and licentiousness is no ascension. Let us not be confused either, thinking that these parables exculpate us on account of God's mercy from the responsibility to share the Gospel of Christ. God demands our obedience, and He has clearly commanded us through Christ to “go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation” (Mark 16:15, ESV) and made it known that “whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned” (Mark 16:16, ESV).

Let us take the apostle Paul's admonishment to heart: “Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?” (Romans 6:16, ESV). The apostle clarifies this by adding, “I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations. For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification” (Romans 6:19, ESV).

The Greek words used for obedient and obedience are based on the verb ὑπακούω (hypakouo), comprised of ὑπὸ (hypo), “under,” and ἀκούω (akouo), “I hear,” i.e., “I listen under the authority of.” When Paul says τὴν άσθένειαν τῆς σαρκὸς ὑμῶν (ten astheneian tes sarkos hymon), translated as “natural limitations,” literally “the weakness of your flesh,” he is speaking of man's inability to rule over himself. We are slaves by our fallen nature and cannot fully appreciate or understand true freedom until we have been perfected in Him who is perfect.

We need the Holy Spirit to control what we cannot, but first Christ must interpose His blood to pay the debt of sin, the price of our freedom. We need the Father to lift us out of the world and graft us into the true vine and prune us so that we may grow into the inheritance of His kingdom. We whom Christ calls friends were not always so. All were once, at heart, enemies of God. After millennia of prophets speaking at the direction of the Holy Spirit, it took God coming down to earth in bodily form to live and preach, to die and rise from the dead in order for many to hear His voice. Now that He has our ear, will we let Him lead the way?

οὐκέτι δοῦλοι

οὐκέτι λέγω ὐμας δούλους, ὅτι ὁ δοῦλος οὐκ οἶδεν τί ποιεῖ αὐτοῦ ὁ κύριος — κατὰ Ἰωάννην 15:15α

ouketi lego hymas doulous, hoti ho doulos ouk oiden ti poiei autou ho kyrios — kata Ioannen 15:15a

No longer do I call you slaves, because the slave does not know what his master is doing. - John 15:15a

Slavery is anathema to modern, enlightened cultures that pride themselves on individual independence. The abomination of man abusing power over his fellow man should be. Yet though we condemn slavery in its most obvious form, we embrace it in other less obvious but equally insidious forms: addiction, immorality, avarice, and wrath. Everyone who indulges in these commits sin, and as Jesus says, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin” (John 8:34a, ESV).

Paul reiterates Jesus' stark statement, writing, “Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods” (Galatians 4:8, ESV). The Greek word translated as “slave”, δοῦλος, indicates one born into slavery. Apart from the knowledge of God and His Word, we readily sell ourselves to anything but Him. We may not explicitly call what we devote all our time, thought, talent, and treasure as gods, but actions in this vein betray any feeble declarations of independence or irreligiosity.

In and of ourselves, we have no hope. “But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba! Father!' So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God” (Galatians 4:4-7, ESV).

Thankfully, Christ prevailed over the world and its enslavements, even death, in His sacrifice and resurrection. If we accept this truth and the price paid for our freedom, then we will truly be free to become heirs of God's kingdom. Just as heirs are privileged to enjoy the inheritance which is set aside for them, we also are privileged to share in the glory which Christ shares with the Father. The apostle Paul writes, “The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs--heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us” (Romans 8:16-18, ESV).

Inheritance is not only a privilege. As Paul writes, followers of Christ should expect to share in Christ's suffering as well as His glory. Our motive for following Christ should not be the search of pleasure but the pursuit of God's kingdom and His righteousness. All those in Christ once sought after themselves and the decaying enticements of the world unto enmity with God, leading to death.

Despite its empty results, sin still entices. The apostle Paul had to admonish some of his slipping brothers and sisters in Christ , “But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more?” (Galatians 4:9, ESV) We who follow Christ today must be equally mindful of the temptation to sin. Though no longer slaves to sin, we should use our freedom judiciously to avoid falling back into that slavery, according to the knowledge of the Father's will which Christ has given us through His Word in which He has enjoined us to remain.