Category Archives: John

Edward Taylor, 28th Meditation.5

13 Tuesday Oct 2020

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Where Have We Been and Where Are We Going?: The Samaritan Woman encounters Christ at the Well of ...
Paolo Veronese: Christ and the Samaritan woman at the well.

In this last stanza, Taylor shifts the metaphor slightly. Now rather than wine from a cask it is water in a spring. Just as he never directly uses the word “wine,” but rather makes the allusion, here he never uses the word “water.”

The concept of water is apparent from the words “font,” “sea,” “spring,” and to a lesser extent “flow.” The dispersion of the grace from God to Taylor is still one of great to small: a “sea” of grace which “drops” into a “vessel.” The vessel is still “earthen.” 

But here there is something new. The intake of the grace results in dispersion of the grace from Taylor, “Spring up O well. My cup with grace make flow.” The grace which comes to him is not stagnant, but flows out. 

Finally, there is one additional new movement: The reception of grace itself becomes praise: “They drops will on my vessel sing thy praise.” And finally, this will become the basis for Taylor’s praise, “I’ll sing this song, when these drops embrace.” This actually makes for an interesting move in Taylor’s poetry: As he works through a matter, we realize that the poem is not the recollection of some earlier event but is itself the working through the difficulty with God. The poem in the end is the praise which he is seeking to bring at the beginning. 

My earthen vessel make thy font also:

And let thy sea my spring of grace in’t raise

Spring up O well. My cup with grace make flow.

They drops will on my vessel sing thy praise.

I’ll sing this song, when these drops embrace.

My vessel now’s a vessel of thy grace.

In making this movement to the reception and then dispersal of grace under the image of water, Taylor is again mining the Gospel of John. There are two places in John which distinctly makes this move. The first is in John 4, where Jesus sits with the Samaritan woman at the well. He asks her for drink of water. She says the well is deep, and I have nothing to draw water. He then turns the question on her and says, she should ask him for living water:

11 The woman saith unto him, Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep: from whence then hast thou that living water? 12 Art thou greater than our father Jacob, which gave us the well, and drank thereof himself, and his children, and his cattle? 13 Jesus answered and said unto her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: 14 But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life. 15 The woman saith unto him, Sir, give me this water, that I thirst not, neither come hither to draw. 

John 4:11–15. This is precisely the position of Taylor: He wants that living water. He knows that if he has this water, the water will well up within him so that he becomes a spring of the water:

My earthen vessel make thy font also:

And let thy sea my spring of grace in’t raise

Spring up O well. My cup with grace make flow.

He wants to become a font of the grace: it flows into and then through him.

The next source for Taylor’s imagery is found in John 7:

37 In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. 38 He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. 39 (But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.) 

John 7:37–39. Again, water flows in and then through. However, on this instance, the imagery is further complicated by introduction of the new element of the Spirit. 

Thus, in this accumulation and complication of imagery, Taylor is not operating in the “normal” vein of a poet who carefully develops a single image. But he is mining his source text for imagery concepts and is not operating in a manner contrary to John’s Gospel.

The final element in the poem comes from the final scene in John’s Gospel. When the Risen Christ appears to the Disciples, Thomas is not present and famously doubts. But when Thomas himself meets Jesus, Thomas praises, “My Lord and my God!” John 20:28.

Edward Taylor, 28th Meditation.4

10 Saturday Oct 2020

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Let thy choice cask, shed, Lord into my cue

A drop of juice pressed from thy noble vine.

My bowl is but an acorn cup, I sue

But for a drop: this will not empty thine.

Although I’m in an earthen vessel’s place

My vessel make a vessel, Lord, of grace.

Below, I will work through the theological and conceptual structure of this stanza. But first some work play: cask, cue, aCorn, cup – drop. DroP-Pressed-cuP.

There is the repetition of vessel, vessel, vessel. The repetition sounds and words helps to underscore emotional intensity of the situation.

There is an interesting concealment and reveal in these lines. The unsaid subject of the whole is the wine. Look at the images, “juice pressed” it comes from a “vine”, it comes from a “cask.” The wine is to be poured into an “acorn” cup, very small, wooden cup. There is also another contrast between Lord and the poet: one is of grace, one of earth.

The imagery of wine and the Christ goes back to Jacob’s blessing of Judah:

Genesis 49:10–12 (KJV 1900) 

10         The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, 

Nor a lawgiver from between his feet, 

Until Shiloh come; 

And unto him shall the gathering of the people be.

11         Binding his foal unto the vine, 

And his ass’s colt unto the choice vine; 

He washed his garments in wine, 

And his clothes in the blood of grapes: 

12         His eyes shall be red with wine, 

And his teeth white with milk. 

The image of wine is developed further. There are two ways in particular the image of wine and vine work into this stanza. First, the image of vine. This passage comes from the Gospel of John in a conversation of Jesus as he is walking with his disciples onto Mount of Olives where he will be betrayed. The Last Supper and the institution of communion (which will follow) has been made. 

This passage from John is particularly relevant to the theme of the poem. In the beginning of the Gospel, John states that Jesus is the source of all grace. In this passage at the end of Jesus’ life, as his life will be poured out in death, he will become the source of life:

John 15:1–5 (KJV 1900)

I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. 2 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit. 3 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. 4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me. 5 I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.

And as Jesus said earlier in John 14:19, “Because I live, you also will live.” Earlier in the John 1, Jesus is light and life and grace. When the poet calls himself “earthen,” this also means that she is subject to death: “That which is born of flesh is flesh.” John 3:6. In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul develops at  length the concept that the body is “perishable,” sown in weakness. In particular, 1 Corinthians 15:47, “The first man was from earth, a man of dust.” But there is a resurrection, “But thanks be to God who gives us victory through Jesus Christ.” 

So to be a vessel of grace is not merely a matter of some sort of psychological benefit. It is the question of “salvation;” which is a matter of life:

John 3:16 (KJV 1900)

16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

What is not exactly clear to me in this stanza is whether the “choice cask” has a particular reference.

One further wine reference is necessary. When Jesus institutes the Lord’s Supper, he gives them the cup (again a reference in the poem: the poet’s cup), “Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” (Matt. 26:27-28.)

Thus, by asking for the cup, the poet is asking to partake of the “new covenant in my blood” (Luke 22:20). He is calling for grace: which is life, which is salvation from all the effects of the Fall.

How to Create a Memory

20 Thursday Sep 2018

Posted by in Apologetics, John, Psychology, Uncategorized

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Many researchers have created false memories in normal individuals; what is more, many of these subjects are certain that the memories are real. In one well-known study, Loftus and her colleague Jacqueline Pickrell gave subjects written accounts of four events, three of which they had actually experienced. The fourth story was fiction; it centered on the subject being lost in a mall or another public place when he or she was between four and six years old. A relative provided realistic details for the false story, such as a description of the mall at which the subject’s parents shopped. After reading each story, subjects were asked to write down what else they remembered about the incident or to indicate that they did not remember it at all. Remarkably about one third of the subjects reported partially or fully remembering the false event. In two follow-up interviews, 25 percent still claimed that they remembered the untrue story, a figure consistent with the findings of similar studies.

Read the rest

The trouble with eye witness testimony

What then can help guarantee a good memory? Notice that events which are traumatic are questionable. Notice that distant, vague events are questionable. Compare that to events which take place over a period of time, events which are witnessed by multiple persons, events subject to objective independent corroboration. And with the case of the Scripture, Jesus speaks of receiving supernatural assistance of the Spirit. John 14:26

Is Eternal Life Temporary?

26 Sunday Jun 2016

Posted by in John, Stephen Charnock, Thomas Manton, Uncategorized

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(Got a question from one who heard that “eternal” means a very long time. Therefore, the “eternal life” offered by Jesus may only be a very long life which could end at some point in the future. This is the brief response I wrote)

God does not offer “eternal life” as a shadow or a trick or some temporary thing. God holds eternal life up as one thing so valuable that it is worth losing our life to gain this eternal life. It is better to be hated, abused and murdered and gain this eternal life, than it is to have every good thing which could be had in this world.

The fact that God offers it to us, should give us comfort. If God offered a life which might run out, then it would disturb our peace:

It is an endless and everlasting life. Such as are once possessed of it shall never be dispossessed again. If man be designed to enjoy a chief good, and this chief good must content all our desires, it must also be so firm and absolutely immutable as to secure us against all our fears; for a fear of losing would disquiet our minds, and so hinder our blessedness.

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 11 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1873), 366. God has not offered a very long life as our supreme good. God has offered us a life which is both never-ending, but also which belongs to a differ age, the age to come. Both of those things should give us comfort.

First, when we speak of “eternity” and God, we must out of our heads the idea that “eternity” is a very, very long time. This is hard for us to do, because we only have only experienced time in this way.  In Romans 8:20, Paul explains that the creation – the entire universe that we could know – “was subjected to futility”, it is vain, it is running down (Eccl. 1:2, Gen. 3:19).

This matches what we know about the universe from observing it. Physicists talk about “Time’s Arrow”: the universe is running in one direction, and it is running down (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrow_of_time).  So when we talk about “time”, we think of a succession of moments and an increase in entropy.

Stephen Charnock in The Existence and Attributes of God writes

We must conceive of eternity contrary to the notion of time; as the nature of time consists in succession of parts, so the nature of eternity in an infinite immutable duration. Eternity and time differ as the sea and the rivers; the sea never changes place, and is always one water; but the rivers glide along, and are swallowed up in the sea; so it is time by eternity.

There is a great deal of discussion and speculation when it comes to what eternity actually means. Eternity – and infinity —  are very strange and very hard concepts. God is called the “everlasting” or “eternal” God (Rom. 16:26), he is the eternal king (1 Tim. 1:17). That is why in Revelation we read that God was, is and is to come (Rev. 1:8, 11:17).

When we start to think of concepts like “eternal life” (John 3:16), we have to realize that when it comes to divine things, we are not speaking about very long things.

It is true that sometimes the words translated “eternal” or “everlasting” sometimes have the idea of very long, or indefinite, or “age”, or “aeon”. That, however, should not trouble us. When we speak to one-another we often talk about something “taking forever”, when we mean 20 minutes.  We will say that it was “an eternity”.

But we can also use the word “forever” and understand it to mean something which cannot end. When we use the word “forever” or the word “eternity” we can tell what we mean – and we expect other people to be able to understand us easily. We do this, because can understand the context and the use. We understand that sometimes a word is being used ironically, or emphatically. So if I tell my wife, I will love you forever, I mean to underscore the intensity of my commitment: even though we both know that neither of us will literally live forever.

The same thing applies to uses in the Scripture – the Bible is written in ordinary language. So in Genesis 9:16, God makes “an everlasting covenant” to never flood the earth again. But we also know that God will one day re-create the entire universe (2 Pet. 3:7).  Therefore, we know that this covenant to never flood the earth will hold true throughout the duration of the earth’s existence, but the covenant does not mean that God will keep the earth in existence forever.

Or in Genesis 17:8, God promises Canaan as an “everlasting possession” – we quickly see the problem of simply using the word without consideration (even if we decided we would think about it forever).

So, in some places the word aion/aionios means a long time ago: Luke 1:70, As He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from of old (aion).

In context we can tell it cannot mean “forever” – that would result in nonsense.

By contrast, in 2 Corinthian 9:9, we read that God’s righteousness endures forever. We can’t say that God’s righteous will last a long time and then wear out.  Or God’s throne is “forever”. (Heb. 1:8). If God’s throne is not going to last, God is not much of a God.

What I want you to see here is that you cannot fear that our promised eternal life will wear out in the distant future merely because the word “aion” could mean a very long time.  Our word “forever” can mean “a long time”. The way in which a word could be used does not tell me how it is being used.

Second, when it comes to eternity and God, our normal concepts of time simply do not apply.

 How then is the word “eternity” used when it comes to our “eternal life”?

It would make very little sense to say that you will live “forever” and it to be only a very long time. Life is something which one either has or does not. If life is everlasting, the word “everlasting” or “eternal” would not be ironic/hyperbole (“it took forever to get home”).

It could be emphatic: and there is a sense in which it is. It does not merely mean continual and without end: it means life which belongs to another age: thus the language life of the Age, or Aeon would point toward not merely a long life, but a life which belongs to the age to come, to “eternity”.

But perhaps the most important aspect is that the idea of “eternal” life is contrasted with death.  Consider John 6:51 & 58. In this passage, Jesus is contrasting the bread eaten in the wilderness (manna) which himself as the bread of life. Jesus notes that the fathers ate manna and died (“Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness and died” John 6:49).  Yet the one who eats Christ “will live forever” (John 6:50). He repeats the same idea in John 6:58: they ate and died, but “he who east his bread [Christ] will live forever”. If Jesus is merely offering an extremely long life, this argument fails.  Jesus’ offer is something that cannot end, or his argument is a lie.

This argument is stronger when you consider the other concepts and images which are used to complement the idea of “eternal life” in John 3:

That is the immediate result of the love of God for the world: the mission of the Son. His ultimate purpose is the salvation of those in the world who believe in him (eis auton, not en autō as in v. 15). Whoever believes in him experiences new birth (3:3, 5), has eternal life (3:15, 16), is saved (3:17); the alternative is to perish (cf. also 10:28), to lose one’s life (12:25), to be doomed to destruction (17:12, cognate with ‘to perish’). There is no third option.

A. Carson, The Gospel according to John, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Leicester, England; Grand Rapids, MI: Inter-Varsity Press; W.B. Eerdmans, 1991), 206. Eternal life runs parallel to born again. We cannot be “unborn”, therefore, by analogy we do not un-live.

Second, the contrast is made to death and destruction. If we will die, then the offer of “eternal life” makes no sense if “eternal” only means very long time.

 

 

Sermon Outline, John 1:11

24 Tuesday May 2016

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John 1:11 (ESV)

11 He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.

How to preach this.
There are three parts to the verse
An action: he came
The recipients of the action: his own
The response: rejection

I. He Came

Implications:
a) If he came, he was not there before: why the absence? (Gen. 3)
b) The waiting for the Messiah
c) There was no ability to compel God to come (the idea of compelling God is at the heart of idolatry)
d) Parallels to the parables (e.g. Luke 19:11)

A Miracle
What a wonder is here:
a) The Incarnation
b) The distance between dark & light, creature & Creator

II.His Own
a)His own by creation
b)His own by covenant/promise
c) Contrast, those under the New Covenant will receive him — these will come by conquest

III. Rejection
a) They could see him
b) Killed him
c) They did not understand (1 Cor. 2:8, 2 Cor. 4:4)
d) This will turn to judgment

Wilderness Allusions in John 7

16 Wednesday Mar 2016

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Rough notes:
John 7 comes immediately after the feeding in the wilderness of John 6, where Jesus claims for himself the status of the bread in the wilderness. He also says, 

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. http://esv.to/John6.35
Jesus is walking around in Galilee: there is not much direction indicated (though not pointlessly). He cannot go to the Feast of the Booths (a feast which signifies, in part, wilderness wandering). 
Like Moses, Jesus cannot go the capital lest he be killed.
Jesus performs miracles to those who will not believe it is God’s work (like the miracles of Moses which did not convince the Pharaoh). 
The people murmur about Jesus (and thus about God). 
Jesus is the water (just as Moses had to give them water). 
They do not do the Law which Moses gave (unlike Jesus who does the will of his Father). 
They ask if Jesus could be the Prophet foretold by Moses (Dt. 18).
Something to flesh out later.

What happens in John 15:2a?

25 Thursday Feb 2016

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These are very rough draft notes on John 15:2. I just want to be able to find them again.

The question is whether the phrase “he takes away” can mean, God the Father sees a branch dragging on the ground. He picks it up (a perfectly possible translation), he raises it, so that he will be up off the ground and there the struggling branch will be able to bear fruit.

The word airei merely means to pick up and usually move. It translates the OT nasah bear and so it has a very broad range of meanings. Cicero made a joke about Augustus: “we need to Airei Augustus” which means we need to raise him: first raise him in political power and then raise him onto a cross to kill him.
πᾶν κλῆμα ἐν ἐμοὶ μὴ φέρον καρπὸν αἴρει αὐτό,
all branches in me not it is bearing fruit he raises [?] it

καὶ
and

πᾶν τὸ καρπὸν φέρον καθαίρει αὐτὸ ἵνα ⸂καρπὸν πλείονα⸃ φέρῃ.
each the fruit it is bearing he cleanses it for the purpose/with the result that fruit more it may bear

(The participle pheron mean that the action of bearing is subordinate to what God does about it.)

There are two clauses which are coordinated by “kai” (and). Kai coordinates two separate clauses which have the same value — neither is subordinate to the other. It tells us nothing about whether we should translate the language into English as “and” or “but”.

The question is whether there are three categories of branches or two in the passage: bearing/not bearing [because dead], or three: Living branches which bear and do not bearing, and non-bearing branches.

In the remainder of the passage he contrasts between living and dead branches only. That would lean toward the same two categories in this sentence.

Next point, the first clause (every branch that does not bear fruit) is missing the “in order that” (hina) and the conclusion

If a branch does not bear fruit, he picks it up [______________]
If a breach does not bear fruit, he cleans it off, hina it will bear more fruit.

What is the purpose that God airei the not bearing branch? It must be implied from the passage. It can’t be implied from the next clause: bear more fruit, because it has not given any fruit at all.
And, what is the difference between raising the branch and cleansing the branch? Wouldn’t cleansing include, if necessary, encouragement (which is what the Airei means lift up argument is)?

Another argument

If does not bear, then Raise (?)
If does bear, the cleanse.

If you are not in me, you will not bear.
If you remain in me, you will bear.
Those that remain are those that bear.
Those that do not remain, are those that do not bear.

Those that do not bear = those that do not remain.
They picked up and thrown out.

Those that do bear=those that do remain
They are cleansed and they will ask/glorify/bear

As I go through it, I can’t see how there can be this third category of branches — non-bearing, true branches. I think the appeal is that “prune” sounds wholly painful. But cleanse does not need to be negative. It can be mean to clean a wound, pull weeds, run off monsters, purify blood. Notice also that the cleansing takes place by means of the word I have spoken. Also in chapter 13, Jesus cleans the disciples by washing their feet.

All of the encouragement which is sought with the attractive “he lifts up to help” interpretation of verse 2 is already present in “he cleans” in verse 2.

Final argument: I have never grown grapes, but I am willing to bet that grapes will still fruit if the vine is on the ground. I am thinking about tomatoes which grow best — for human consumption — when the branches are kept off the ground, but the tomato will still fruit even if the branches are on the ground.

Fellowship with the Son

30 Wednesday Sep 2015

Posted by in 1 John, 1 Peter, John

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John 13:34–35 (ESV)

34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. 35 By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”