This is unfortunate, since his works contain priceless gems of information that are found nowhere except in the ancient writings of the Jews. V. I close with THE SAVIOR'S WARNING QUESTION "If they do these things in the green tree, what will they do in the dry?". John, the gospel of faith by Harrison, Everett Falconer, 1902- from Everyman's Bible Commentary series. His wounds unstaunched and raw, fresh bleeding from beneath the lash, would make this scarlet robe adhere to him, and when it was dragged off; his gashes would bleed anew. Our great hero, the destroyer of Death, bearded the lion in his den, slew the monster in his own castle, and dragged the dragon captive from his own den. They are created in the minds of men. We can never forget the painful scenes of which we have been witness, when we have watched the dissolving of the human frame. That impenitent thief went from the cross of his great agony and it was agony indeed to die on a cross he went to that place, to the flames of hell; and you, too, may go from the bed of sickness, and from the abode of poverty, to perdition, quite as readily as from the home of ease and the house of plenty. But power is wanted to dash down those idols, to overcome the hosts of error; where is it to be found? Christ was spit upon with shame; sinner, what shame will be yours! Holy Scripture remains the basis of our faith, established by every word and act of our Redeemer. He hath traversed the mournful way before thee, and every footprint thou leavest in the sodden soil is stamped side by side with his footmarks. The voice of sympathy prevailed over the voice of scorn. You have, then, no true sympathy for Christ if you have not an earnest sympathy with those who would win souls for Christ. In that cry there is reconciliation to God. Come, bring him your warm heart, and let him drink from that purified chalice as much as he wills. souls, I do beseech you, by the agonies of Christ, by his wounds and by his blood, do not bring upon yourselves the curse; do not bear in your own persons the awful wrath to come! John 19:4-5. Let us exult as we see our Substitute going through with his work even to the bitter end, and then with a "Consummatum est" returning to his Father, God. As these seven sayings were so faithfully recorded, we do not wonder that they have frequently been the subject of devout meditation. Christ does exempt you from sin, but not from sorrow; he does take the curse of the cross, but he does not take the cross of the curse away from you. Even now to a large extent the true Christian is like a Pariah, lower than the lowest caste, in the judgment of some. He must love his chosen whom he has once begun to love, for he is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. For the thousands of eyes which shall gaze upon the youthful Prince, I offer the gaze of men and angels. "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?" We ought all to have a longing for conversions. What learn we here as we see Christ led forth? Even if I may not come at him, yet shall I be full of consolation, for it is heaven to thirst after him, and surely he will never deny a poor soul liberty to admire him, and adore him, and thirst after him." While other religions create what appear to be worship-filled gatherings, they are empty and void of fact. Now, I am not sure that we ought to blame ourselves for this. Metaphorically understood, thirst is dissatisfaction, the craving of the mind for something which it has not, but which it pines for. He thirsted for water doubtless, but his soul was thirsty in a higher sense; indeed, he seems only to have spoken that the Scriptures might be fulfilled as to the offering him vinegar. What joy, what satisfaotion this will give if we can sing, "My soul looks back to see The burden thou didst bear, When hastening to the accursed tree, And knows her guilt was there!". He bears a cross, not that you may escape it, but that you may endure it. We used to melt when we heard about his sufferings, but we did not turn from our sins. sinner, if God hides his face from Christ, how much less will he spare you! Certainly it is so with you; you do but carry the light end of the cross; Christ bore the heavier end. Henceforth, also, let us cultivate the spirit of resignation, for we may well rejoice to carry a cross which his shoulders have borne before us. He must love, it is his nature. Beeke, Joel R. & Thompson, Nick. We may therefore come before him, with all the rest of our race, when God subdues them to repentance by his love, and look on him whom we have pierced, and mourn for him as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn. Can you help feeling how very near Jesus is to us when his lips must be moistened with a sponge, and he must be so dependent upon others as to ask drink from their hand? points to the anguish of his soul; "I thirst" expresses in part the torture of his body; and they were both needful, because it is written of the God of justice that he is "able to destroy both soul and body in hell," and the pangs that are due to law are of both kinds, touching both heart and flesh. Oh! We thought sometimes that we loved him as we heard the story of his death, but we did not change our lives for his sake, nor put our trust in him, and so we gave him vinegar to drink. These solemn sentences have shone like the seven golden candlesticks or the seven stars of the Apocalypse, and have lighted multitudes of men to him who spake them. Shake off the thought, any of you who suppose that God will have pity on you because you have endured affliction. We see in Simon's carrying the cross a picture of what the Church is to do throughout all generations. Dear friends, we must remember that, although no one died on the cross with Christ, for atonement must be executed by a solitary Savior, yet another person did carry the cross for Christ; for this world, while redeemed by price by Christ, and by Christ alone, is to be redeemed by divine power manifested in the sufferings and labors of the saints as well as those of Christ. John 19:16 . Yet most people today have never heard of John Gill. He is not allowed to worship with them. Our Lord in his death-cries, as in all else, was perfection itself. Neither in torture of body nor in sadness of heart are we deserted by our Lord; his line is parallel with ours. The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. It was, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered thy children together as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, but ye would not!" What was he looking for from his vineyard and its winepress? This hint only. First, they teach and confirm many of the doctrines of our holy faith. I like to think of our Lord's saying, "It is finished," directly after he had exclaimed, "I thirst"; for these two voices come so naturally together. Perhaps they are your children, the objects of your fondest love, with no interest in Christ, without God and without hope in the world! "I thirst" meant that his heart was thirsting to save men. The Church must suffer, that the gospel may be spread by her means. 1. Jesus is formally condemned to crucifixion, but before he is led away he is given over to the Praetorian guards that those rough legionaries may insult him. "And they took Jesus, and led him away." So were the streets of Jerusalem; for great multitudes followed him. are they not more like sharp vinegar? Have we not often given him vinegar to drink? Barrabas may go free; the thief and the murderer may be spared; but for Christ there is no word, but "Away with such a fellow from the earth! The next time we are in pain or are suffering depression of spirit we will remember that our Lord understands it all, for he has had practical, personal experience of it. You have been ill, and you have been parched with fever as he was, and then you too have gasped out "I thirst." Hark how their loud voices demand that he should be hastened to execution! While thus we admire his condescension let our thoughts also turn with delight to his sure sympathy: for if Jesus said, "I thirst," then he knows all our frailties and woes. ye unregenerate men and women, and there are not a few such here now, remember that when God saw Christ in the sinner's place he did not spare him, and when he finds you without Christ, he will not spare you. Oh! V. Lastly, the cry of "I thirst" is to us THE PATTERN OF OUR DEATH WITH HIM. They are these Weep not because the Savior bled, but because your sins made him bleed. Brother, thirst I pray you to have your workpeople saved. Alas, man is the slave and the dupe of Satan, and a black-hearted traitor to his God. "I thirst," ay, this is my soul's word with her Lord. Such a greeting had the Lord of glory, but alas, it was not the shout of welcome, but the yell of "Away with him! High in the air ye bid your banners wave about the heir of England's throne, but how shall ye rival the banner of the sacred cross, that day for the first time borne among the sons of men. Well, beloved, the cross we have to carry is only for a little while at most. Say not that the comparison is strained, for in a moment I will withdraw it and present the contrast. Our Lord says, "If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink," that thirst being the result of sin in every ungodly man at this moment. I do not know how far it was from Pilate's house to the Mount of Doom. They would be very proper, very proper; God forbid that we should stay them, except with the gentle words of Christ, "Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me." I think that Roman soldier meant well, at least well for a rough warrior with his little light and knowledge. They prefer a ceremonial pompous and gaudy; the swell of music, the glitter of costly garments, the parade of learning all these must minister grandeur to the world's religion, and thus shut out the simple followers of the Lamb. Last Sunday the remark was made to me "If the story of the sufferings of Christ had been told of any other man, all the congregation would have been in tears." The last expiring word in which he commended his spirit to his Father, is the note of acceptance for himself and for us all. Beloved, let us comfort ourselves with this thought, that in our case, as in Simon's, it is not our cross, but Christ's cross which we carry. 1089 - The Man Greatly Beloved . If not, bestir yourselves at once. We are not sure that Simon was a disciple of Christ; he may have been a friendly spectator; yet one would think the Jews would naturally select a disciple if they could. Have you repented of sin? Yet his language teaches us not to worship her, for he calls her "woman," but to honor him in whom his direst agony thought of her needs and griefs, as he also thinks of all his people, for these are his mother and sister and brother. They put on him his own clothes that the multitudes might discern him to be the same man, the very man who had professed to be the Messias. Lloyd-Jones opens John 19:31-37 to answer that very question. why hast thou forsaken me?" As Spurgeon puts it "Faith is described as 'receiving' Jesus. A new edition of Spurgeon's classic devotional using the ESV. They take matters very gently; they think it unnecessary to be soldiers of the cross. We know from experience that the present effect of sin in every man who indulges in it is thirst of soul. We do not thirst after the old manner wherein we were bitterly afflicted, for he hath said, "He that drinketh of this water shall never thirst:" but now we covet a new thirst. Oh! Godly working-men, should your employers or your fellow-workers frown upon you; wives, should your husbands threaten to cast you out, remember, without the camp was Jesus' place, and without the camp is yours. We all know that a different dress will often raise a doubt about the identity of an individual; but lo! Hail, ye despised children of the sun, ye follow first after the King in the march of woe. But my Prince is hated without a cause. Great and worshipful being that he is, truth is to be altered for him, the gospel is to be modulated to suit the tone of his various generations, and all the arrangements of the universe are to be rendered subservient to his interests. Home; Origin; Birth; John; Acts; About; JOHN 19 COMMENTARY . Let us now gaze for awhile upon CHRIST CARRYING HIS CROSS. Our Lord, however, endured thirst to an extreme degree, for it was the thirst of death which was upon him, and more, it was the thirst of one whose death was not a common one, for "he tasted death for every man." Christ was always thirsty to save men, and to be loved of men; and we see a type of his life-long desire when, being weary, he sat thus on the well and said to the woman of Samaria, "Give me to drink." We may well remember our faults this day. "When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished: and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost." John 19:30. Acts 19 Acts 19 He preached in the same church as C. H. Spurgeon over one hundred years earlier. Certain philosophers have said that they love the pursuit of truth even better than the knowledge of truth. John 19:16 . Others think that Simon carried the whole of the cross. This was the homage which the Son of God received from men; harmless and gentle, he came here with no purpose but that of doing good, and this is how mankind treated him. "We, whose proneness to forget Thy dear love, on Olivet Bathed thy brow with bloody sweat; "We whose sins, with awful power, Like a cloud did o'er thee lower, In that God-excluding hour; "We, who still, in thought and dead, Often hold the bitter reed To thee, in thy time of need.". who would stand in your place, ye richest, ye merriest, ye most self-righteous sinners who would stand in your place when God shall say, "Awake O sword against the rebel, against the man that rejected me; smite him, and let him feel the smart for ever!" I cannot say that it is short and sweet, for, alas, it was bitterness itself to our Lord Jesus; and yet out of its bitterness I trust there will come great sweetness to us. II. Christ comes forth from Pilate's hall with the cumbrous wood upon his shoulder, but through weariness he travels slowly, and his enemies urgent for his death, and half afraid, from his emaciated appearance, that he may die before he reaches the place of execution, allow another to carry his burden. Jesus is therefore hunted out of the city, beyond the gate, with the will and force of his oven nation, but he journeys not against his own will; even as the lamb goeth as willingly to the shambles as to the meadow, so doth Christ cheerfully take up his cross and go without the camp. He cried, ere he bowed the head which he had held erect amid all his conflict, as one who never yielded, "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit." Dear fountain of delight unknown! (1-4) Pilate hopes to satisfy the mob by having Jesus whipped and mocked. Pilate, as we reminded you, scourged our Savior according to the common custom of Roman courts. He is indeed "Immanuel, God with us" everywhere. Mark then, Christian, Jesus does not suffer so as to exclude your suffering. Usually the crier went before with an announcement such as this, "This is Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews, who for making himself a King, and stirring up the people, has been condemned to die." This is unfortunate, since his works contain priceless gems of information that are found nowhere except in the ancient writings of the Jews. Come hither, ye lovers of Immanuel, and I will show you this great sight the King of sorrow marching to his throne of grief, the cross. A strong emphasis in Spurgeon's preaching was God's grace and sovereignty over man's helpless state. Nor dost thou set a time for waiting, but instantly thou dost set wide the gate of pearl; thou hast all power in heaven as well as upon earth. He did not spare his Son the stripes. The Jews answered him, We have a law, and by our law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God. and the answer shall come back, "Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded; but ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof: I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh." "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do" here we see the Mediator interceding: Jesus standing before the Father pleading for the guilty. We would fain lift thy name on high in grateful remembrance of the depths to which thou didst descend! When Pilate therefore heard that saying, he was the more afraid: It shows he was afraid all along the coward the vacillating coward and now a fresh superstition seizes upon him. I have touched that point very lightly because I want a little more time to dwell upon a fourth view of this scene. Here is the safety of the believer in the hour of his departure, and his instant admission into the presence of his Lord. There is the complete justification of the believer, since the work by which he is accepted is fully accomplished. Today! As for myself, I would grow more and more insatiable after my divine Lord, and when I have much of him I would still cry for more; and then for more, and still for more. "He that hath ears to hear, let him hear." Here we behold his human soul in anguish, his inmost heart overwhelmed by the withdrawing of Jehovah's face, and made to cry out as if in perplexity and amazement. There were two other cross-bearers in the throng; they were malefactors; their crosses were just as heavy as the Lord's, and yet, at least, one of them had no sympathy with him, and his bearing the cross only led to his death, and not to his salvation. John 19:28 . A carnal appetite of the body, the satisfaction of the desire for food, first brought us down under the first Adam, and now the pang of thirst, the denial of what the body craved for, restores us to our place. Call to mind his complaint in the fifth chapter of Isaiah, "Now will I sing to my well beloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. John 19:1-16 - Glory Mocked and Condemned John 19:17-30 - Glory Crucified John 19:31-42 - Glory Buried A. Jesus is condemned to crucifixion. Jesus was proved to be really man, because he suffered the pains which belong to manhood. John 19:28 J.R. Thomson This is both the shortest of all the dying utterances of Jesus, and it is the one which is most closely related to himself. No longer sink below the brim; But overflow, and pour me down A living and life-giving stream.". If we be true to our Master we shall soon lose the friendship of the world. That little rising ground, which perhaps was called Golgotha, the place of a skull, from its somewhat resembling the crown of a man's skull, was the common place of execution. It came from the parched lips of the Divine Victim towards the close of his agony, and after the darkness which endured from the sixth to the ninth hour. A refined and heavenly appetite, a craving for our Lord. Remember that, and expect to suffer. The most Scriptural way to describe the sufferings of Christ is not by laboring to excite sympathy through highly-coloured descriptions of his blood and wounds. 1 So then Pilate took Jesus and scourged Him. " And having said this, He breathed His last. Our Lord Jesus came forth, willing to be exposed to their scorn. "Verily I say unto thee, to-day shalt thou be with me in paradise" this is the Lord Jesus in kingly power, opening with the key of David a door which none can shut, admitting into the gates of heaven the poor soul who had confessed him on the tree. Can they be compared to generous wine? It is a blow at the fable of purgatory which strikes it to the heart. O souls, burdened with sin, rest ye here, and resting live. Shall carnal appetites be indulged and bodies pampered when Jesus cried :I thirst"? The last word but one, "It is finished." What doth he say? " And He bowed His head, and gave up His spirit. He is thirsty still, you see, for our poor love, and surely we cannot deny it to him. "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani," what an awful shriek! Whether a disciple then or not, we have every reason to believe that he became so afterwards; he was the father, we read, of Alexander and Rufus, two persons who appear to have been well known in the early Church; let us hope that salvation came to his house when he was compelled to bear the Savior's cross. (6) John 19:30 When Jesus therefore had received the sour wine, He said, " It is finished! 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