John 14:19

LIFE THROUGH CHRIST

‘Because I live, ye shall live also.’

John 14:19

There is only one law of life, and that law uniform, whatever the manifestation. Let us note three of the essentials of life.

I. Life has never been seen.—Living matter we have; but the minutest examination failed to give a glimpse of life itself. We detect life by its operations. ‘Because I live, ye shall live also’ meant a new localisation for new ends, an extension of powers through the existing power of a life triumphant over death.

II. Life is the cause, never the effect of organisation.—By baptism the living soul is lifted into higher life, made part of an organism. Matter is lifeless until taken up into union with quickened forms. We who conform to the law of the higher life are in Christ by a unifying process. In the organic life of His Body we find fullness of expression.

III. Life must be reproductive.—Non-productive life is practically non-existent. The question of the risen Christ is not ‘Are you saved?’ but ‘Are you saving?’ The man who is not saving others has not yet entered into the fullness of Christ’s life.

Illustration

‘O soul of man, called to this wonderful existence, so gifted, yet so rigidly bounded; made for such great things, yet turned aside by such poor ones; so promising, yet so transient; the breath of a day between the two eternities, yet rich with power, and thought, and beauty, rich in capacities of grace and goodness, ever unfolding, ever growing; conscious of such needs and such evils, longing for such firm reality and truth, responding to such calls, and then going hence as if never having been—where is to be thy part? What wilt thou do with what is given thee, with that great and fearful thing which we call life? Wilt thou rest in the portion of the first Adam, great, lovely as it often is, merely to live, to see, to be glad in the sky above and God’s blessing on the earth, in our home, in our work? It is enough if we had no more. It is enough to be thankful for if our view closed here. But the first man is of the earth earthy, and there is the Second Man, the Lord from Heaven.… He only

“Holds for us the keys of either home,

Earth and the world to come.”

O soul of man, inheritor of the first Adam, new born to the Second, which wilt thou choose?’