John 5:39-40

John 5:39

Searching Scripture and finding Christ

I. It is evident that the failure of many men to find Christ is not from any deficiency in the means of discovering Him. It is this which our Lord so emphatically marks in the case of the Jews. They had the Scriptures, and they searched them. They had the mine, and they dug in that mine in quest of the eternal riches. They not only venerated, but almost worshipped, the sacred volume. With privileges far less than the mass of professing Christians have now, they improved them far more. Yet, after all, they failed; multitudes of those who thus searched the Scriptures failed in finding Christ; or, if they found Him, found Him only to reject Him.

II. The failure in question does not arise wholly from a want of intelligence right understanding in the use of the means. Observe the case of the Jews, We have seen how they searched the oracles of Divine truth, and let us now observe the views with which they searched them. "Ye search the Scriptures," said Christ, "because in them ye think ye have eternal life." They thus sought the right thing, as well as sought it in the right place. How many Bible readers now-a-days are there of whom even this much can be said? Surely we may ask if the Pharisees and Scribes of those degenerate and unhappy days were not nearer the kingdom of heaven than many of ourselves?

III. Now, then, the true reason for the failure of these men. The evil lay in the will. "Ye are not willing," says Christ, "to come to Me, that ye might have life." It is thus a moral perversity, not an intellectual defect; not a want of light, but a want of love. The reason of this unwillingness is twofold: (1) The natural carnality of the heart. By nature and by habit we live immersed in the things of sense. At home, among things outward, material, tangible, we with difficulty rise to any conception and contemplation of things spiritual and unseen. (2) The love of sin. They instinctively feel that they cannot come to Jesus and live in His Divine and holy fellowship and yet live in sin. They feel that there is a natural and eternal incompatibility between the two things. They may come to Jesus just as they are, but they cannot abide with Jesus just as they are. Therefore He and they remain strangers for ever. Learn, in conclusion (a) The preciousness of the Bible as a means of leading us to Jesus. (b) The worthlessness of the Bible if it leads us not to Christ.

J. Burns, Select Remains,p. 18.