Joh 12:32-33 . And I shall establish my own dominion in room of the devil’s rule.

] with victorious emphasis, in opposition to the devil.

. ] so that I shall be no more upon the earth. Comp. on , Psa 9:14 . Probably Jesus (differently in Joh 3:14 ) used the verb (comp. Syr.): . This exaltation from earth into heaven to the Father (Joh 7:33 ; Act 2:33 ; Acts 6:31) was to be brought about by the death of the cross; and this manner of His death, Jesus, in the opinion of John, indicated (Joh 18:32 , Joh 21:19 ) by the word (comp. Joh 3:14 , Joh 8:28 ). According to John, it is then the designation of the return from earth to heaven, which Jesus gives by . ., not merely a representation of His death, so far as the latter exalts him to the Father, but an announcement of the manner of the death (comp. Joh 18:32 , Joh 21:19 ), through which He will end His earthly life, because He was to die exalted on the cross. But this interpretation of John’s does not justify us in straightway understanding . . . of the crucifixion (so the Fathers, and most older commentators, including Kling, Frommann, Hengstenberg), which is forbidden by , nor in finding therein [115] a “ sermo anceps ” (Beza and several others, including Luthardt, Ebrard, Godet, comp. Engelhardt), since by the very force of . . the double sense is excluded . It belongs to the freedom of mystic exposition linking itself to a single word (comp. Joh 9:7 ), as it was sufficiently suggested, especially here, by the recollection of the already employed in Joh 3:14 , and is therewith just as justifiable in itself in the sense of its time as it is wanting in authority for the historical understanding. To this mystical interpretation is opposed, indeed, the expression (comp. Isa 53:8 ); but John was sufficiently faithful in his account not to omit this . for the sake of his interpretation of , and simply adhered to this ., and disregarded the context. [116]

On , comp. on Joh 14:3 .

. .] all, i.e . not merely adherents of all nations , or all elected ones and the like, but all men , so that thus none remain belonging to the . But to the latter , to the devil, stands opposed, not the mere , but to myself , to my own community. Comp. Joh 14:3 ; never stands for the simple , not even in Joh 14:21 (against Tholuck). The takes place by means of the Holy Spirit, who, given by the exalted Lord (Joh 7:39 , Joh 16:7 ), and representing Himself (Joh 14:18-19 ), wins men for Christ in virtue of faith, and, by means of internal moral compulsion, places them in the fellowship of love, of obedience, and of the true and everlasting with Him. Comp. Joh 6:44 , where this is said of the Father . The fulfilment of this promise is world-historical, and continually in process of realization (Rom 10:18 ), until finally the great goal will be reached, when all will be drawn to the Son, and form one flock under one shepherd (Joh 10:16 ). In this sense is to be left without any arbitrary limitation (Luthardt’s limitation is baseless: all, namely, those whom He draws to Himself ). For the manner in which Paul recognised the way and manner of the last consummation of the promise thus made, see Rom 11:25-26 .

[115] “His suspension on the cross appears to Him the magnificently ironical emblem of His elevation on the throne ,” Godet. An ironical touch would here be very strange.

[116] Scholten sets aside the whole comment as an interpolation .

Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary

DISCOURSE: 1674
THE EFFECTS OF CHRISTS DEATH

Joh 12:31, Joh 12:32. Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.

INCONCEIVABLY arduous was the work which Christ had undertaken: yet amidst his heaviest trials his confidence never for a moment forsook him. He had just complained of the insupportable weight of his mental agonies; yet not so complained, but that he had desired his heavenly Father to glorify his own name, whatever sufferings he might have to endure for that end. For the satisfaction of those who would otherwise have drawn wrong conclusions from those sufferings, the Father answered him by a voice like thunder, I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again: and immediately Jesus, with his wonted calmness, resumed his discourse respecting the nature and necessity of his approaching death, and confidently predicted,

I.

The issue of his conflicts

The world and Satan were his great adversaries: and though by his death they would appear victorious over him, yet he declared that by his death,

1.

The world would be judged

[What we are to understand by the judgment of this world, we cannot absolutely determine: but we apprehend the import of that expression to be, that his death would be the means of exhibiting in the clearest view, first, the wickedness, and next, the desert of the ungodly world.

Who would have conceived the wickedness of the world to be so great as it really is? Who would have conceived, that, if God himself should become incarnate, and sojourn in a familiar manner upon earth, and cause the light of his perfections to shine around him, and diffuse innumerable blessings by the unbounded exercise of omnipotence and love, his creatures should rise up against him, and put him to death? Who would conceive too, that this should be done, not by ignorant savages, but by the people who had enjoyed the light of revelation, heard his gracious instructions, beheld his bright example, and received the benefit of his miraculous exertions: yea, that it should be done too, not by the inconsiderate vulgar, but by the rulers themselves, and by the priests and ministers of Gods sanctuary? This shews what human nature itself is, even under the greatest possible advantages: and humiliating is the picture which it exhibits to us.

But the desert also of the world is manifested to us in the death of Christ: for Christ suffered the penalty due to sin: to redeem us from the curse of the law, he became a curse; and all the misery that he endured both in body and soul as our surety and substitute, was our deserved portion. He indeed, by reason of his office, could endure it but for a time: but the soul that perishes in sin, must endure it to all eternity. Death, which to him was the period of his release, will be to the condemned soul the commencement of its sorrows, of sorrows that shall endure to all eternity. The hidings of Gods face and the sense of his wrath will be co-existent with the soul itself.]

2.

The prince thereof would be cast out

[Satan is called the prince, and the god, of this world, because he exercises an universal government over men who are his willing subjects [Note: Eph 2:2. 2Co 4:4. 2Ti 2:26.]. That which has given him this power is sin: on account of sin, God has delivered men into his hands as their jailor and their executioner. But Jesus Christ has finished transgression and made an end of sin, and brought in everlasting righteousness; and has thus rescued from the hands of Satan a countless multitude, who shall be eternal monuments of his electing love and his redeeming power. Whilst yet he hanged on the cross, the Lord Jesus bruised the serpents head [Note: Gen 3:15.]; yea, he spoiled principalities and powers, triumphing over them openly upon the cross [Note: Col 2:15.]. At that moment did Satan fall from heaven as lightning: and though he still retains a sway over the children of disobedience, yet he is forced continually to give up his vassals to the Lord Jesus, and is made to flee from those [Note: Jam 4:7.] whom he lately led captive at his will. Moreover, the time is shortly coming, (yea, in the Divine purpose it was, as it were, then present,) when he shall be bound in chains of everlasting darkness, and be cast into that lake of fire which has from the beginning been prepared for him and for his angels.]

Next, our Lord predicts,

II.

The triumphs of his grace

By being lifted up from the earth was meant, his crucifixion. The expression refers to the lifting up the brazen serpent in the wilderness, which was a type and emblem of the death of Christ [Note: Compare Num 21:8-9. with Joh 3:14-15.]. The Evangelist himself tells us, that our Lord intended to intimate the peculiar kind of death which he was to suffer: and the people themselves understood him as speaking of his removal from them by death [Note: ver. 33, 34.]. Nor did his words convey the idea of uncertainty, which seems intimated in our translation: the event was fixed in the Divine counsels from all eternity; and he spoke of it as certainly to be accomplished [Note: should be when, and not if.].

Here then are two things to be noted;

1.

The event predicted

[Christ will draw all men to himself: He is that Shiloh, to whom the gathering of the people should be; and we see on the day of Pentecost the commencement of this great and glorious work. Would we understand precisely the import of the expression, there we behold it exemplified in the clearest view We must not indeed imagine that every individual of mankind will be drawn to Christ; for in every age many have rejected him: but some of all nations, professions, and characters, shall be drawn to him; and at last they shall be found a multitude that no man can number [Note: Dan 7:13-14.] ]

2.

The manner in which it shall be accomplished

[Men are not drawn to him like stocks and stones, but in a way consistent with the perfect exercise of their own free will. The power indeed is Christs; and it is exerted with effect: but it is made effectual,
First, by shewing men their need of him. The eyes of all the wounded Israelites were drawn to the brazen serpent in the wilderness: they felt that they were dying of their wounds; they knew that no human efforts could heal them; and they were assured that a sight of that brazen serpent would effect their cure. This attraction was sufficient: they looked and were healed. Thus the jailor saw his own perishing condition, and asked, What shall I do to be saved? and was glad to embrace the Saviour proposed to him [Note: Act 16:30-31.]. This is universally the first operation of Christs victorious grace.

Next, he draws men by the attractive influences of his grace. Because men know not how the Holy Spirit works upon the souls of men, they are ready to doubt, or even deny, his operations. But who doubts the agency of the wind? yet no man knows whence it comes, or whither it goes. It is visible in its effects, and therefore its operation is acknowledged, notwithstanding it is involved in the deepest mystery. Why then should the operation of the Holy Spirit be doubted, merely because the mode of his agency is not understood [Note: Joh 3:8.]? Were it possible to question the evidence of our senses, we should deny the virtue of the loadstone, and represent any one as weak or wicked who should profess to believe it. But we behold its effects; and our incredulity is vanquished. So then must we confess the agency of the Holy Spirit upon the souls of men, though we cannot comprehend every thing respecting it. Our Lord has told us, that no man can come unto him, except the Father draw him [Note: Joh 6:44.]: and the Psalmist affirms, that God makes us willing in the day of his power [Note: Psa 110:3.]. It is sufficient for us to know, that he draws us rationally, with the cords of a man, and with the bands of love.

Lastly, he draws men by discovering to them the wonders of his love. Let but a glimpse of his incomprehensible love be seen, and every thing in the whole creation will be darkened: just as a view of the meridian sun renders every other object invisible. Paul tells us, that the love of Christ constrained him: it carried him away like a mighty torrent: nor will the soul of any man who feels it, be either able or desirous to withstand its influence. As well might the angels in heaven be averse to serve their God, as the man that has tasted of redeeming love.

In this way then does the grace of Christ prevail; and in this way shall it triumph to the ends of the earth.]

Application
1.

Seek to experience the attractions of his grace

[Nothing under heaven is so desirable as this Say then, with the Church of old, Draw me, and I will run after thee [Note: Son 1:4.] ]

2.

Fear not the counteracting influence of men or devils

[Men may oppose you, and vaunt themselves against you: but they are already judged by the word of God; and, if they repent not, they shall be judged by the same at the tribunal of their God. If they do not themselves become such despised creatures as they esteem you to be, they will ere long awake to shame and everlasting contempt.
Satan too may harass you: but he is a vanquished enemy: yea, he too is judged [Note: Joh 16:11.]: and though, as a roaring lion, he seeketh to devour you, you are provided with armour, whereby you may withstand him [Note: Eph 6:11-13.]: and you have the promise of God, that he shall be shortly bruised under your feet [Note: Rom 16:20.] ]

Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)

32 And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.

Ver. 32. And if I be lifted up, &c. ] Pope Urban VI said that these words, “Give unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s,” were abolished when Christ was lifted up from the earth, and drew all things to him; that is (as he expounds it), when Christ ascended, he drew to the pope’s empire all kings and their kingdoms, making him King of kings and Lord of lords. (Jacob. Rev. de vit. Pen.) Is not this a sweet interpreter?

I will draw all men unto me ] As the wind called Caecias, being a north-east wind, contrary to the nature of the north wind, drives not away clouds, but draws them to him.

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

32. ] See reff. Here there is more perhaps implied in . than in either of those places: viz. the Death, with all its consequences . The Saviour crucified, is in fact the Saviour glorified; so that the exalting to God’s right hand is set forth by that uplifting on the Cross. There is a fine touch of pathos, corresponding to the feeling of Joh 12:27 , in . Hermann’s description of the meaning of exactly gives it: “sumo hoc fieri, et potest omnino fieri, sed utrum vere futurum sit necne, experientia cognoscam.” Viger, p. 832. The Lord Jesus, though knowing all this , yet in the weakness of his humanity, puts himself into this seeming doubt, ‘if it is so to be:’ cf. Mat 26:42 . All this is missed by the shallow and unscholarlike rendering ‘ when ,’ which I need hardly remind my readers can never bear. See on ch. Joh 14:3 : 1Jn 3:2 .

by the diffusion of the Spirit in the Church: manifested in the preaching of the Word mediately, and the pleading of the Spirit immediately. Before the glorification of Christ, the Father drew men to the Son (see ch. Joh 6:44 and note), but now the Son Himself to Himself. Then it was, ‘no man can come except the Father draw Him:’ now the Son draws all . And, to Himself , as thus uplifted, thus exalted; the great object of Faith: see ch. Joh 11:52 .

Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament

Joh 12:32 . is explained as indicating or hinting, , “by what death He was to die,” i.e. , that He was to be raised on the cross. Cf. Joh 3:14 . It was the cross which was to become His throne and by which He was to draw men to Him as His subjects. In therefore, although the direct reference is to His elevation on the cross, there is a sub-suggestion of being elevated to a throne. “ notat aliquid futurum vaticinando cum ambiguitate quadam atque obscuritate innuere.” Kypke. So Plutarch says of the Oracle, .

Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson

John

THE UNIVERSAL MAGNET

Joh 12:32 .

‘Never man spake like this Man,’ said the wondering Temple officials who were sent to apprehend Jesus. There are many aspects of our Lord’s teaching in which it strikes one as unique; but perhaps none is more singular than the boundless boldness of His assertions of His importance to the world. Just think of such sayings as these: ‘I am the Light of the world’; ‘I am the Bread of Life’; ‘I am the Door’; ‘A greater than Solomon is here’; ‘In this place is One greater than the Temple.’ We do not usually attach much importance to men’s estimate of themselves; and gigantic claims such as these are generally met by incredulity or scorn. But the strange thing about Christ’s loftiest assertions of His world-wide worth and personal sinlessness is that they provoke no contradiction, and that the world takes Him at His own valuation. So profound is the impression that He has made, that men assent when He says, ‘I am meek and lowly in heart,’ and do not answer as they would to anybody else, ‘If you were, you would never have said so.’

Now there is no more startling utterance of this extraordinary self-consciousness of Jesus Christ than the words that I have used for my text. They go deep down into the secret of His power. They open a glimpse into His inmost thoughts about Himself which He very seldom shows us. And they come to each of us with a very touching and strong personal appeal as to what we are doing with, and how we individually are responding to, that universal appeal on which He says that He is exercising.

I. So I wish to dwell on these words now, and ask you first to notice here our Lord’s forecasting of the Cross.

A handful of Greeks had come up to Jerusalem to the Passover, and they desired to see Jesus, perhaps only because they had heard about Him, and to gratify some fleeting curiosity; perhaps for some deeper and more sacred reason. But in that tiny incident our Lord sees the first green blade coming up above the ground which was the prophet of an abundant harvest; the first drop of a great abundance of rain. He recognises that He is beginning to pass out from Israel into the world. But the thought of His world-wide influence thus indicated and prophesied immediately brings along with it the thought of what must be gone through before that influence can be established. And he discerns that, like the corn of wheat that falls into the ground, the condition of fruitfulness for Him is death.

Now we are to remember that our Lord here is within a few hours of Gethsemane, and a few days of the Cross, and that events had so unfolded themselves that it needed no prophet to see that there could only be one end to the duel which he had deliberately brought about between Himself and the rulers of Israel. So that I build nothing upon the anticipation of the Cross, which comes out at this stage in our Lord’s history, for any man in His position might have seen, as clearly as He did, that His path was blocked, and that very near at hand, by the grim instrument of death. But then remember that this same expression of my text occurs at a very much earlier period of our Lord’s career, and that if we accept this Gospel of John, at the very beginning of it He said, ‘As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up’; and that that was no mere passing thought is obvious from the fact that midway in His career, if we accept the testimony of the same Gospel, He used the same expression to cavilling opponents when He said: ‘When ye have lifted up the Son of Man, then shall ye know that I am He.’ And so at the beginning, in the middle, and at the end of His career the same idea is cast into the same words, a witness of the hold that it had upon Him, and the continual presence of it to His consciousness.

I do not need to refer here to other illustrations and proofs of the same thing, only I desire to say, as plainly and strongly as I can, that modern ideas that Jesus Christ only recognised the necessity of His death at a late stage of His work, and that like other reformers, He began with buoyant hope, and thought that He had but to speak and the world would hear, and, like other reformers, was disenchanted by degrees, are, in my poor judgment, utterly baseless, and bluntly contradicted by the Gospel narratives. And so, dear brethren, this is the image that rises before us, and that ought to appeal to us all very plainly; a Christ who, from the first moment of His consciousness of Messiahship-and how early that consciousness was I am not here to inquire-was conscious likewise of the death that was to close it. ‘He came not to be ministered unto, but to minister,’ and likewise for this end, ‘to give His life a ransom for the many.’ That gracious, gentle life, full of all charities, and long-suffering, and sweet goodness, and patience, was not the life of a Man whose heart was at leisure from all anxiety about Himself, but the life of a Man before whom there stood, ever grim and distinct away on the horizon, the Cross and Himself upon it. You all remember a well-known picture that suggests the ‘Shadow of Death,’ the shadow of the Cross falling, unseen by Him, but seen with open eyes of horror by His mother. But the reality is a far more pathetic one than that; it is this, that He came on purpose to die.

But now there is another point suggested by these remarkable words, and that is that our Lord regarded the Cross of shame as exaltation or ‘lifting up.’ I do not believe that the use of this remarkable phrase in our text finds its explanation in the few inches of elevation above the surface of the ground to which the crucified victims were usually raised. That is there, of course, but there is something far deeper and more wonderful than that in the background, and it is this in part, that that Cross, to Christ’s eyes, bore a double aspect. So far as the inflicters or the externals of it were concerned, it was ignominy, shame, agony, the very lowest point of humiliation. But there was another side to it. What in one aspect is the nadir, the lowest point beneath men’s feet, is in another aspect the zenith, the very highest point in the bending heaven above us. So throughout this Gospel, and very emphatically in the text, we find that we have the complement of the Pauline view of the Cross, which is, that it was shame and agony. For our Lord says, ‘Now the hour is come when the Son of Man shall be glorified.’ Whether it is glory or shame depends on what it was that bound Him there. The reason for His enduring it makes it the very climax and flaming summit of His flaming love. And, therefore, He is lifted up not merely because the Cross is elevated above the ground on the little elevation of Calvary, but that Cross is His throne, because there, in highest and sovereign fashion, are set forth His glories, the glories of His love, and of the ‘grace and truth’ of which He was ‘full.’

So let us not forget this double aspect, and whilst we bow before Him who ‘endured the Cross, despising the shame,’ let us also try to understand and to feel what He means when, in the vision of it, He said, ‘the hour is come that the Son of Man shall be glorified.’ It was meant for mockery, but mockery veiled unsuspected truth when they twined round His pale brows the crown of thorns, thereby setting forth unconsciously the everlasting truth that sovereignty is won by suffering; and placed in His unresisting hand the sceptre of reed, thereby setting forth the deep truth of His kingdom, that dominion is exercised in gentleness. Mightier than all rods of iron, or sharp swords which conquerors wield, and more lustrous and splendid than tiaras of gold glistening with diamonds, are the sceptre of reed in the hands, and the crown of thorns on the head, of the exalted, because crucified, Man of Sorrows.

But there is still another aspect of Christ’s vision of His Cross, for the ‘lifting up’ on it necessarily draws after it the lifting up to the dominion of the heavens. And so the Apostle, using a word kindred with that of my text, but intensifying it by addition, says, ‘He became obedient even unto the death of the Cross, wherefore God also hath highly lifted Him up.’

So here we have Christ’s own conception of His death, that it was inevitable, that it was exaltation even in the act of dying, and that it drew after it, of inevitable necessity, dominion exercised from the heavens over all the earth. He was lifted up on Calvary, and because He was lifted up He has carried our manhood into the place of glory, and sitteth at the right hand of the Majesty on high. So much for the first point to which I would desire to turn your attention.

II. Now we have here our Lord disclosing the secret of His attractive power.

‘I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me.’ That ‘if’ expresses no doubt, it only sets forth the condition. The Christ lifted up on the Cross is the Christ that draws men. Now I would have you notice the fact that our Lord thus unveils, as it were, where His power to influence individuals and humanity chiefly resides. He speaks about His death in altogether a different fashion from that of other men, for He does not merely say, ‘If I be lifted up from the earth, this story of the Cross will draw men,’ but He says, ‘I will’ do it; and thus contemplates, as I shall have to say in a moment, continuous personal influence all through the ages.

Now that is not how other people have to speak about their deaths, for all other men who have influenced the world for good or for evil, thinkers and benefactors, and reformers, social and religious, all of them come under the one law that their death is no part of their activity, but terminates their work, and that thereafter, with few exceptions, and for brief periods, their influence is a diminishing quantity. So one Apostle had to say, ‘To abide in the flesh is more needful for you,’ and another had to say, ‘I will endeavour that after my decease ye may keep in mind the things that I have told you’; and all thinkers and teachers and helpers glide away further and further, and are wrapped about with thicker and thicker mists of oblivion, and their influence becomes less and less.

The best that history can say about any of them is, ‘This man, having served his generation by the will of God, fell on sleep.’ But that other Man who was lifted on the Cross saw no corruption, and the death which puts a period to all other men’s work was planted right in the centre of His, and was itself part of that work, and was followed by a new form of it which is to endure for ever.

The Cross is the magnet of Christianity. Jesus Christ draws men, but it is by His Cross mainly, and that He felt this profoundly is plain enough, not only from such utterances as this of my text, but, to go no further, from the fact that He has asked us to remember only one thing about Him, and has established that ordinance of the Communion or the Lord’s Supper, which is to remind us always, and to bear witness to the world, of where is the centre of His work, and the fact which He most desires that men should keep in mind, not the graciousness of His words, not their wisdom, not the good deeds that He did, but ‘This is My body broken for you . . . this cup is the New Testament in My blood.’ A religion which has for its chief rite the symbol of a death, must enshrine that death in the very heart of the forces to which it trusts to renew the world, and to bless individual souls.

If, then, that is true, if Jesus Christ was not all wrong when He spoke as He did in my text, then the question arises, what is it about His death that makes it the magnet that will draw all men? Men are drawn by cords of love. They may be driven by other means, but they are drawn only by love. And what is it that makes Christ’s death the highest and noblest and most wonderful and transcendent manifestation of love that the world has ever seen, or ever can see? No doubt you will think me very narrow and old-fashioned when I answer the question, with the profoundest conviction of my own mind, and, I hope, the trust of my own heart. The one thing that entitles men to interpret Christ’s death as the supreme manifestation of love is that it was a death voluntarily undertaken for a world’s sins.

If you do not believe that, will you tell me what claim on your heart Christ has because He died? Has Socrates any claim on your heart? And are there not hundreds and thousands of martyrs who have just as much right to be regarded with reverence and affection as this Galilean carpenter’s Son has, unless, when He died, He died as the Sacrifice for the sins of the whole world, and for yours and mine? I know all the pathetic beauty of the story. I know how many men’s hearts are moved in some degree by the life and death of our Lord, who yet would hesitate to adopt the full-toned utterance which I have now been giving. But I would beseech you, dear friends, to lay this question seriously to heart, whether there is any legitimate reason for the reverence, the love, the worship, which the world is giving to this Galilean young man, if you strike out the thought that it was because He loved the world that He chose to die to loose it from the bands of its sin. It may be, it is, a most pathetic and lovely story, but it has not power to draw all men, unless it deals with that which all men need, and unless it is the self-surrender of the Son of God for the whole world.

III. And now, lastly, we have here our Lord anticipating continuous and universal influence.

I have already drawn attention to the peculiar fullness of the form of expression in my text, which, fairly interpreted, does certainly imply that our Lord at that supreme moment looked forward, as I have already said, to His death, not as putting a period to His work, but as being the transition from one form of influence operating upon a very narrow circle, to another form of influence which would one day flood the world. I do not need to dwell upon that thought, beyond seeking to emphasise this truth, that one ought to feel that Jesus Christ has a living connection now with each of us. It is not merely that the story of the Cross is left to work its results, but, as I for my part believe, that the dear Lord, who, before He became Man, was the Light of the World, and enlightened every man that came into it, after His death is yet more the Light of the World, and is exercising influence all over the earth, not only by conscience and the light that is within us, nor only through the effects of the record of His past, but by the continuous operations of His Spirit. I do not dwell upon that thought further than to say that I beseech you to think of Jesus Christ, not as One who died for our sins only, but as one who lives to-day, and to-day, in no rhetorical exaggeration but in simple and profound truth, is ready to help and to bless and to be with every one of us. ‘It is Christ that died, yea, rather that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.’

But, beyond that, mark His confidence of universal influence: ‘I will draw all men.’ I need not dwell upon the distinct adaptation of Christian truth, and of that sacrifice on the Cross, to the needs of all men. It is the universal remedy, for it goes direct to the universal epidemic. The thing that men and women want most, the thing that you want most, is that your relation with God shall be set right, and that you shall be delivered from the guilt of past sin, from the exposure to its power in the present and in the future. Whatever diversities of climate, civilisation, culture, character the world holds, every man is like every other man in this, that he has ‘sinned and come short of the glory of God.’ And it is because Christ’s Cross goes direct to deal with that condition of things that the preaching of it is a gospel, not for this phase of society or that type of men or the other stage of culture, but that it is meant for, and is able to deliver and to bless, every man.

So, brethren, a universal attraction is raying out from Christ’s Cross, and from Himself to each of us. But that universal attraction can be resisted. If a man plants his feet firmly and wide apart, and holds on with both hands to some staple or holdfast, then the drawing cannot draw. There is the attraction, but he is not attracted. You demagnetise Christianity, as all history shows, if you strike out the death on the Cross for a world’s sin. What is left is not a magnet, but a bit of scrap iron. And you can take yourself away from the influence of the attraction if you will, some of us by active resistance, some of us by mere negligence, as a cord cast over some slippery body with the purpose of drawing it, may slip off, and the thing lie there unmoved.

And so I come to you now, dear friends, with the plain question, What are you doing in response to Christ’s drawing of you? He has died for you on the Cross; does that not draw? He lives to bless you; does that not draw? He loves you with love changeless as a God, with love warm and emotional as a man; does that not draw? He speaks to you, I venture to say, through my poor words, and says, ‘Come unto Me, and I will give you rest’; does that not draw? We are all in the bog. He stands on firm ground, and puts out a hand. If you like to clutch it, by the pledge of the nail-prints on the palm, He will lift you from ‘the horrible pit and the miry clay, and set your feet upon a rock.’ God grant that all of us may say, ‘Draw us, and we will run after Thee’!

Fuente: Expositions Of Holy Scripture by Alexander MacLaren

lifted up. Greek hupsoe. Occurs twenty times. Always in John refers to the cross; see Joh 12:34; Joh 3:14, Joh 3:14, and Joh 8:28. In fourteen other passages (Mat 11:23; Mat 23:12, Mat 23:12. Luk 1:52; Luk 10:15; Luk 10:14.; Joh 18:14, Joh 18:14. Act 2:33; Act 5:31; Act 13:17. 2Co 11:7. 1Pe 5:6) rendered “exalt”, and in Jam 4:10, “lift up”.

earth. Greek ge. App-129.

draw. Greek. helkuo. Same word as in Joh 6:44. Used else- where in Joh 18:10; Joh 21:6, Joh 21:11 and Act 16:19. The classical form helko occurs in Act 21:30. Jam 2:6. It was thought the form helkuo was peculiar to the N.T. and Septuagint, but it is found in one of the Oxyrhyncus Papyri. See Deissmann, Light, &c., pp. 437-9.

all. Compare Joh 6:37, Joh 6:39.

unto. Greek. pros. App-104.

Me = Myself. Greek. emautou.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

32.] See reff. Here there is more perhaps implied in . than in either of those places: viz. the Death, with all its consequences. The Saviour crucified, is in fact the Saviour glorified; so that the exalting to Gods right hand is set forth by that uplifting on the Cross. There is a fine touch of pathos, corresponding to the feeling of Joh 12:27, in . Hermanns description of the meaning of exactly gives it: sumo hoc fieri, et potest omnino fieri, sed utrum vere futurum sit necne, experientia cognoscam. Viger, p. 832. The Lord Jesus, though knowing all this, yet in the weakness of his humanity, puts himself into this seeming doubt, if it is so to be: cf. Mat 26:42. All this is missed by the shallow and unscholarlike rendering when, which I need hardly remind my readers can never bear. See on ch. Joh 14:3 : 1Jn 3:2.

-by the diffusion of the Spirit in the Church: manifested in the preaching of the Word mediately, and the pleading of the Spirit immediately. Before the glorification of Christ, the Father drew men to the Son (see ch. Joh 6:44 and note), but now the Son Himself to Himself. Then it was, no man can come except the Father draw Him: now the Son draws all. And, to Himself, as thus uplifted, thus exalted;-the great object of Faith: see ch. Joh 11:52.

Fuente: The Greek Testament

Joh 12:32. ) and I, I truly. The antithesis is, the prince of this world.-, I shall have been lifted up) See Joh 12:33, and ch. Joh 3:14, As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up.- ) from the earth. Comp. Act 8:33, His life is taken from the earth. In the very cross there was already something that tended towards glory.-, all) even the Gentiles, Joh 12:20 [the Greeks, for instance, who applied to Philip, wishing to see Jesus], Satan shall not be able to retain them; and himself shall give way. Here the answer is given to the request mentioned at Joh 12:21, We would see Jesus.-, I will draw) from earth, upwards. By this word a power is indicated in opposition to the prince of the world, who shall no longer detain his captives.

Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament

Joh 12:32

Joh 12:32

And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto myself.-He again refers to the fact that his dying on the cross and his burial would be the means of drawing men to him by his resurrection from the dead. He was declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead; even Jesus Christ our Lord. (Rom 1:4). So men were drawn to him by his being lifted up on the cross. [He will draw all kinds of men-men of all nations. The relation of what has preceded, to the coming of the Greeks, comes out in this verse. As one king is dethroned, another and mightier one takes his place who invites all men to him by persuasion of the cross.]

Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary

if: Joh 3:14, Joh 8:28, Joh 19:17, Deu 21:22, Deu 21:23, 2Sa 18:9, Psa 22:16-18, Gal 3:13, 1Pe 2:24, 1Pe 3:18

will: Joh 6:44, Son 1:4, Hos 11:4

all men: Joh 1:7, Isa 49:6, Rom 5:17-19, 1Ti 2:6, Heb 2:9, 1Jo 2:2, Rev 5:9

Reciprocal: Gen 49:10 – the gathering Num 21:9 – A serpent of Psa 65:2 – unto thee Isa 11:10 – which shall Isa 45:24 – even Isa 60:3 – the Gentiles Dan 9:26 – Messiah Hos 2:14 – I will Joh 11:52 – not Joh 12:24 – if Joh 18:32 – the saying Act 10:11 – and a Rom 5:18 – all men Rom 11:32 – concluded them all Col 1:13 – the power Col 2:15 – triumphing Heb 12:2 – for

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

THE ATTRACTIVE POWER OF CHRIST

I, If I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Myself.

Joh 12:32 (R.V.)

Nothing had ever happened to suggest to this Galilan carpenter the strange notion that any individual could thus attract the world, much less that He could Himself do so. We wonder at the mere assertionthat the Nazarene should have spoken such words, should have advanced such claims.

I. What, then, is the wonder of His having realised them?Upon any theory, this claim was put on record while the Kingdom of Heaven was like a grain of mustard, the least of all seeds. Here and there, in the midnight of heathendom, glimmered a spark of lightthe stars of the Apocalypse, scarcely visible in the gloom. Do you think that any uninstructed eye could have foretold from these the glory of the morning and the noon? And yet, here is the assertion. And it might help some perplexed student, who fails to satisfy himself with the evidence of minute and detailed predictions (simply because they are minute, and the distance in history is great), if he would fix his attention rather upon two vast and commanding portentsin the Old Testament the expectation of a suffering Hero, a world-wide Benefactor stricken by God and afflicted, this hope cherished by a nation which dwelt alone, and which maintained that the bones of the righteous should be made fat; and again, in the New Testament, the universal claims put forward by Jesus, and accepted by various centuries and diverse civilisations.

II. Christ lifted up has, indeed, demanded and received the homage of all men.

(a) He came to the Jew, and melted his formalism, kindled his narrow bigotry into a generous world-embracing ardour, lighted up his shadowy truths like the pictures on a lampshade when the flame is kindled, and bade him convert the world. Whereupon all of Judaism that refused to join the new movement died; it exists only as a fossil.

(b) Christ came to the Greek, and used his exquisite language, his logic, and his sense of beauty, to acknowledge and celebrate, as fairer than the sons of men, the visage that was more marred than that of any man.

(c) He turned to the Roman and bade him organise the world-empire which asks neither weapons nor territories, and set the crown of the world upon a Christian head.

And the Greek and the Roman obeyed.

(d) He confronted the naked and bloody races which rent in pieces the laws, the civilisation, and the empire of the ancient worldand they, so strangely unlike His earlier converts, they also fell upon their knees before the Cross of Jesus.

Was it a delusion, this, which was predicted and came true, that the same influence which fascinated the Greek and the Roman should draw to itself also the Vandal and the Goth, and float like an ark of refuge, bearing the old literature and the old arts, above the deluge in which all else of beauty or splendour was submerged? As the name of Christ went out among the nations, all who accepted Him were elevateda strange result of any superstition; all who rejected Him were left like stranded hulks upon a desolate beach, and to-day the fullest light of prosperity and splendour of civilisation and power is shining upon those nations who have the freest and most unimpeded access to the four pamphlets which record His story, and kindle the love of Him amid new generations and lands unknown to those who preached Him first.

III. To-day the experiment is being tried by Christian missions upon the vastest scale.Does He really draw all men unto Himself? Go, it is said to the missionarygo and try whether the same story which kindles the soul of statesman and poet and sage at home can also attract and elevate the South Sea islander, the African, the Brahmin with his dreamy intellect and his debased and debasing creed. They went, and now Central Africa is ruled by Christian kings, and the whole of India is moving and turning in her sleep.

IV. Further, it is He, Himself, as He declared, Who is the secret of His unparalleled attraction.Men are not won by any doctrine, however momentous, they are drawn to Himself; and many a strange but well-attested fact is evidence that no man is always and really insensible to His power.

Bishop Chadwick.

Illustration

In the year of revolutions, in 48, when every throne in Europe was shaken, the fierce and godless mob of Paris, having expelled their king, broke into the royal palace, and, after plundering it, proceeded to wreck the chapel. Down in promiscuous ruin went carvings and precious stones, golden vessels and gorgeous robes, until in their hottest rage, they found themselves face to face with a picture of their Lord and ours. And those furies recognised their Friend; the leaders recoiled, their followers stopped and gazed. Some one cried Hats off! and in dead silence, bareheaded, they bore out the picture to a place of safety before returning to prove that nothing else was sacred to them.

(SECOND OUTLINE)

THE CHRISTIAN IDEAL

We must take people as we find them; we must know them as well as we know the message we have to declare to them. Unless we do so, and unless we deliver our message in the light of this knowledge, we have no right to expect for it an adequate response.

I. There are certain main types of character to which the best Englishmen always respond; that, whatever other qualifications they may require, there are certain main characteristics which every one who is to secure their admiration must possess. Let me very briefly notice three of the most prominent of these.

(a) First comes a strong sense of duty. Whether or not Englishmen themselves obey the law of duty, they nearly always respect the man who does. This characteristic certainly lies at the very foundation of their conception of manhood. No man who is deficient in this respect will be accepted by them as realising their ideal.

(b) Then, secondly, the man who is to attract the admiration of Englishmen must be a manly man. No one-sided development will do so. That is why introspective devotionalism on the one hand, the severe and sombre type of saintliness on the other, have never commended themselves to the popular imagination here in England. They may command respect, but only in exceptional instances do they arouse the desire for imitation. Our ideal man must be made of living flesh and blood. However well disciplined his passions and desires, they must be there, and we must know that they are there. His humanity, his kindliness, his sympathy, must express themselves spontaneously and naturally. We must be able not merely to respect, but to love him, to feel at ease with him, to know that in our frailties and weaknessesnay, even in our sins and meannesseswe can readily turn to him for help and encouragement and support.

(c) And, thirdly, the man whom Englishmen respond to must, under the conditions of our modern life, be a man who actively recognises his social responsibilities. Even men who shirk these responsibilities themselves know in their hearts that they are wrong in doing so, and show that they know it by the admiration they bestow on unselfish social work of any kind. Indeed, the fact that a man is doing such work causes the ordinary Englishman to overlook a great deal in his opinions or methods which may be distasteful to him. After all, he will say, he is doing his best; he is really trying to make a difference to peoples lives. He may not be doing it the way which I think best, or from motives which I can understand; but he is doing it, that is the great thing! A man who places duty first, a man who is thoroughly human in his instincts and sympathies, a man who is taking an active share in the struggle for the alleviation of the evils which oppress his fellow-men, and for the establishment of more perfect social conditions among themwhatever else the man may be, he must be all this if the ordinary Englishman is to respond to him, and to see himself at his best in him.

II. How far can the Christian ideal of manhood be said, without any strained interpretation, to meet these requirements?How far can we legitimately present it in terms to which the ordinary Englishman will readily respond? Now what strikes many of us as remarkable is this, that not merely is the Christian ideal capable of meeting these demands, but that the characteristics which I have mentioned are its leading and fundamental characteristics. Take them one by one.

(a) The recognition of the supremacy of the law of duty.What is the master-note of Christs lifeI came not to do My own will, but the will of Him Who sent Mebut this recognition expressed in its highest terms? What was His appreciation of the centurions exceptional spiritual insightI have not found so great faith; no, not in Israelbut the emphatic declaration that the principle of authority lies at the very root of the ordered Christian life? What is sacerdotalism, properly interpreted, but the application of this principle to the life of each member of the body? The Christian, so far as he is a true Christian, is primarily a man under authoritya priest, a man with a special vocation; a man sent, consecrated, set apart to do a certain work allotted to him by a higher Power.

(b) Then, again, the characteristic of full human sympathy and sensibility.Can we give a higher expression to this than that which is given in the fact of the Incarnationthe fact that God Himself used every faculty of our common human nature to express His Divine activity? Nor is this merely a temporary union of two incongruous elements. It is the manifestation of an eternal principle. The grave was empty on the third day. Handle Me and see, said the risen Christ. Hath a spirit flesh and blood as ye see Me have? The ideal which Christianity presents is that of human nature expressing itself in its fullness, not merely in time, but through all eternity as well. Christianity knows nothing of disembodied spirits, whether in this world or the next.

(c) Once more, the claim that the true man should take his full share in the movement which makes for social alleviation and progress; that this ideal must include the establishment of perfect social conditions amongst his fellow-menwhat is this but the foreshadowing of, and the reaching out towards, that ideal of the Kingdom of God established here on earth which stood in the forefront of the Gospel message, and became the dominating vision of those who accepted that message?

Let the Christian ideal be presented to the English people with that special regard for their distinctive ways of thought and feeling which Christ ever showed in dealing with men, and we need not despair of the awakening of a response which will add to the membership of His Church all that is best and strongest in our manhood.

Canon Carnegie.

Illustration

We still speculate upon what might have happened if the august and far-reaching plans of Julius Csar had not been cut short. William the Silent, and Gustavus, and many a hero, and many a reformer died, we say, not too soon for his own fame, but too soon for the nation, perhaps for the race which he would have blessed had time been granted him. Only One ever said: I, if I be prematurely cut down, cut off in the midst of my days, shall then become mighty. Mine is the vitality of a seed, which when it dies begins to live. Yet another wonder. The speaker was a Jew. And Judaism, by the mouth of all its prophets, had bidden men to turn not to them, but to Jehovah. They were the mere voice of One crying through their lips: of One Who would not give His glory to another. And yet, in the very heart of this Hebrew race, One Whose teaching is steeped in the prophetic thought boldly proclaims that His function is to draw all men unto Himself; and the two emphatic words in the sentence are I at the beginning, and Myself at the closeI, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Myself. Nor is there any more pronounced characteristic of His teaching, always and everywhere, than the daring appropriation of the functions of Deity.

(THIRD OUTLINE)

THE MAJESTY OF THE DIVINE HUMILIATION

We may regard the text as our Lords explanation of the purpose of His Passion.

I. What does He mean by the expression If I be lifted up from the earth?

(a) His primary reference, no doubt, is to His Crucifixion, which was so soon to take place. It was, indeed, His lifting up from the earth in a literal and very painful sense. And from Johns comment in the verse immediately following, This He said, signifying what death He should die, it is clear that the inspired Apostle so understood the words. But I cannot think that this is their only meaning; for the word here used is one which generally has an honourable sense. It is hardly likely that our Lord would have used it in a connection which would convey to His hearers only the idea of shame. So, while retaining this as part of their meaning, we must look for a wider reference in His words.

(b) They probably refer, secondly, to the translation of His work from an earthly to a heavenly sphere. Henceforward that work was not to be the close contact with human suffering and the battle with human sin that characterised His earthly ministry. It was to be the exhibition of His triumph over death and of the glory of the Resurrection Body. This was to be followed by His continued intercession for us at the throne of grace, and the assurance of His real though invisible Presence with the Church to the end of time. This sense is very clearly brought out in the other two passages in which this word is used by our Lord in reference to Himself, both of which occur in the Gospel of John. In one He says that as Moses lifted up the brazen serpent in the wilderness, so shall the Son of Man be lifted up. In the other He tells His hostile hearers, When ye have lifted up the Son of Man, ye shall know that I am He. In both these passages the primary reference is to the Crucifixion; in the latter it is very clearly so. But in both there is a reference to something more, viz. successful work and acknowledged power.

(c) This last passage carries us a step further and introduces the idea of glory. The Son of Man is to be lifted up, not only to do His great work, but to receive the worship which is His due. This is the exaltation to the right hand of the Father of which St. Paul speaks. He usesthough in an intensified formthe same word which our Lord uses here: hath highly exalted Him. And the tense of the Greek word shows that it refers to a definite act of exaltation, which must be the Ascension. So in the lifting up from the earth there is a threefold thoughtsuffering, triumph, and glorification. These connect themselves with the great events which were so soon to occur, and which we commemorate on Good Friday, Easter, and Ascension Day.

II. Our second question is what our Lord means by saying I will draw all men unto Me. As to this also there are three things to notice.

(a) First, the fact of attraction involves the exercise of power. Our Lord is therefore making a definite claim for Himself to power over men. But the drawing is with the cords of a man, with the bands of love, as Hosea had expressed it long before (Hos 11:4). It is irresistible, but not violent; the magnetic attraction of a great personality, not the compulsion of overpowering strength. It has that highest attribute of supreme powerthat it not only controls the action, but captivates the will, of its subjects.

(b) Secondly, we note that this attraction is to be exercised on all men. It is not only irresistible in its power, but universal in its scope. No race or order of men is exempt from it. In this the claim made by our Lord for Himself goes far beyond that expected by most Jews from the promised Messiah. He was to be a mighty ruler of the Jews, and the restorer of their national greatness. And it far exceeds the success attained by the founders of other religions. Gautama and Mohammed have drawn millions to their teaching, and have made Buddhism and Islam the faith of great communities; but each has found the limit which it cannot passthe nations that will have none of it, and amongst whom it has hardly made a proselyte. Christ alone has founded a religion which knows no limit of language, race, or territory, but which has met the needs of all who would accept it in every place and time.

(c) Thirdly, the result of our Lords uplifting is to draw all men to Himself. You will have noticed that the Revised Version has unto Myself instead of unto Me. This slight change of rendering is important, as it marks the personal character of the attraction. Our Lord does not say that He will draw all men to His Church or to His teaching, or even to a higher mode of life, but to Himself. Herein He gives us a lesson most necessary in these days. A great German scholar has set the religious world asking What is Christianity? He invites us to find its essence in the teaching of Christ on matters concerning this life and the world to come. Our Lord shows that the essence of Christianity consists in the revelation of Himself. This is a tremendous claim to make, and one which, if made by a merely human teacherhowever holy his life and lofty his teachingwould repel rather than attract his hearers. It is inconceivable that the Preacher of the Sermon on the Mount could have made it had He been less than the Incarnate Son of God.

III. What is the practical lesson for us of this inspiring truth?

(a) First, it reminds us of the infinite range of our Lords sympathy. He shares with us all the sentiments of human nature except those arising directly from sin, and in sharing He sanctifies them. So, whatever our lot in life may be, let us remember that He knows it from experience, and can enter into all our feelings. And surely there is a special lesson for those who are called upon to endure disappointment and humiliation in the sight of their fellow-men. Let such take comfort from the knowledge that humiliation is not degrading, but elevating. It is often the sign of real success, the veil of true dignity.

(b) Secondly, the text bids us remember that our Lord is drawing us to Himself. We may, if we choose to do anything so terrible, resist that Divine attraction, and render it useless so far as we are concerned. But we cannot say that it has never been exercised on us. So, my friends, let us remember the great responsibility which rests on us by reason of this part of our Lords work. We actually have the power to render a portion of that work useless, to deprive our Lord of part of His reward. For is not every soul precious in His sight, so that the loss even of one leaves some place in His diadem unfilled? So let the text lead us to Him; not to any speculations as to the mystery of His nature, or to special explanations of His teaching, but simply to a more devout, intelligent, and single-hearted love towards Himself.

Rev. Barton R. V. Mills.

Illustration

The fulfilment of this prediction is one of the most striking facts in history. From whichever point of view we regard it nothing has had such an influence on the world as the Christian religion. Different thinkers have explained this in very different ways, but none venture to deny the fact. And another thing which is no less true, though perhaps less generally realised, is that the dominant feature in the Christian religion is adoration of the Person of our Lord. The great men of the world are remembered mainly for their teaching or their workPlato for his philosophy; Shakespeare for his poetry, Raffaelle for his pictures, Newton for his scientific discoveries. In all these and in many other cases the work is greater than the man. But when we read of our Lord we think far less of His teaching or of His miracles than of Himself. We honour Aristotle because he wrote the Ethics. We reverence the Sermon on the Mount because it was uttered by Christ. Such is the instinctive and almost unconscious testimony of the human mind to His Divinity.

(FOURTH OUTLINE)

THE POWER OF GOD

What is the secret of Christs attraction? What is the magnetic power of His appeal, as He calls us to-day in His passion, Come, take up the Cross, and follow Me?

I. It is surely, first of all, the appeal of sympathy.This worldif you have not found it out yet you speedily willis a world of suffering, deep-seated, widespread. Much is being done to alleviate physical pain; much is being done to make existence here more cushioned and comfortable; but there are troubles which no surgeon can touch, no benevolence alleviate, no forethought avert.

Man seems to himself sometimes to be playing a game of chess with an unseen adversary, where a mistake is met with a blow, and that a blow without a word. Think of the tragedies which are grouped together within the walls of even one of our hospitals. It is well to face the fact that God allowed suffering, that He even inflicts suffering, lest we should be tempted to imitate the impenitent thief, that unworthy communicant in the sacrament of suffering, and blaspheme God, and doubt His wisdom, and reject His love, in the shattering of our hopes, the desolation of our life, in the pain and anguish which He thinks fit to put upon us. It is in the face of a suffering world that the Cross is raised. And I repeat that the appeal of the Crucified is the appeal of intense sympathy. It has been said that our Blessed Lord never experienced human sickness. It may well be that the Lamb without spot and blemish might not experience this sign of human imperfection. But He did feel and did bear the extremity of physical, mentalyes, even spiritualpain, so that His sympathy is literally the suffering with those towards whom He exercises His tender love; and this is wide and far-reaching. The infinite goodness has arms so widesays the great poetthat it receives that which turns back to it. The Eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms. Round the sacred pool of Christs Blood lie a great number of impotent folk, blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water. Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. This is the message of intense sympathy, with which the Saviour draws all men unto Him with the cords of a man, with bonds of love.

II. But the appeal of the Crucified is more than the appeal of sympathy. It is the appeal of power.Christians are not scholars merely in the school of a master. They are sinners who have found their Saviour. Never let us forget that the Gospel is good news, the best of all news, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. The Gospel of Christ is the power of God unto salvation, and the Cross is the message of power. We have thought already, perhaps you will say morbidly, of the suffering which is in the world. But what, after all, is the greatest pang that the human heart can suffer? It is surely the sense of sin. Do you want to know its malignity? Look at the Cross. Do you want to know its power? Look at the Cross. It is a real work to be good. We are not going to saunter into Heaven, or get there on the wings of sentiment, or the occasional uplifting of a Sunday heart, which we put on with our Sunday dress. It is a real work to be good. For sin must be crucified; it must form part of that burden on the Cross. We must die unto sin, in a way which is something more than a phrase or a sentiment. So that we may be able to say, How shall we that are dead unto sin, live any longer therein? Is it true that the sense of sin in the world is diminishing, that there are few asking now, What must I do to be saved? Are we listening to those who say that sin is inevitable, or at the worst only a struggle of the inner self to emancipate itself from its fleshy envelope, in an inevitable conflict of fluctuating issue? Are we folding our hands to submit to the fatalism which binds our freedom to inevitable heredity, against which it is useless to struggle or protest? Are we to give in to the straitened fetters of environment, and shift the blame for our wrong-doing upon circumstances over which we have no control? Are we to listen to the apostles of human self-complacency, who would have us believe that what we call sin is a positive good; who would say that sin so-called is a stage in mans development, an experience which enlarges his ideas, and gives a foil to virtue, and is an incentive to it? We know how people shrug their shoulders and say, Well, it does no man any harm to have a little knowledge of the world. No one is the worse for having had a past. If temptation be substituted for sin, there may be a partial truth in these statements; but sin can never be anything else but that which the Bible calls it again and againa missing of the mark, a failure in lifes aim, a throwing of ourselves away. Here, as we look at the Cross, there is power. Christ draws all sinners unto Him by an exhibition of power which triumphs over the malice of sin, and by a system of grace which abounds in fuller volume where sin did much more abound. Flowing from the Cross, as we know, there is a vast system of love which meets the sinner on every side with Divine strength. The Cross and all that flows from it makes it impossible for us to say that we sin because we cannot help ourselves. I know it is possible to frustrate the grace of God, to make all the provision for our salvation useless, by one simple thing on our part. All we have to do to make the Word of God of none effect, all we have to do to stultify the Cross, is to neglect it. There stretches the rope of rescue, which has been fixed with infinite pains and danger between the shore and the sinking ship; but here is one and here is another who will not commit himself to it. He is afraid, or he does not understand, or he is dazed, or he believes that the rescue will come in some other way; and he goes down with the sinking ship, simply because he neglects the salvation proffered to him, and proffered with much pain and peril. As you look at the Cross cast aside your weakness, drive away your fears; lay hold of salvation, lay hold of eternal life, for Now is the accepted time; now is the day of salvation. The Cross of Christ is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.

Canon Newbolt.

Illustrations

(1) A well-known man in London has recorded for us in his reminiscences the desolation of heart which he experienced when he learnt for the first time from the doctor whom he had gone to consult that he was the victim of a malignant and incurable disease. He tells us how completely, as he came out of that mans house, the whole aspect of things seemed changed to him, as he came out a doomed man, condemned to bear his burden until death should release him. Sorrows like these burst in upon human life with startling suddenness, and reveal to us that we are all moving onward in a Dance of Death, such as Holbeins pencil had delineated on the walls of the Pardon Cloister of Old St. Pauls.

(2) As we travel in foreign countries we come quite unexpectedly sometimes on the image of a Great Agony, rudely moulded, placed with little respect to artistic fitness. It meets us as we land upon the busy pier; it stands by the roadside where the labourer passes to his work day by day, and the children race along in their glee chasing each other beneath its sombre shadow. Behind it and around it Nature laughs with her merry smile in clustering roses, green lanes, and waving cornfields. Or here it stands at the corner of some street in the grim, gaunt city where men pass and hurry on in the eager pursuit of wealth, or in the despair of dark hours, without one thought either of heaven or hell. Surely, we say, this is out of place; it is an intrusion, this image of sorrow and sadness, in a world which has so much that is joyous in it. It is unwise to intrude this image of failure upon those who at least would fain forget their sorrows, and meet lifes duties as they come, for they are hard enough as it is. And yet, did we but know it, there is many a soul sick with anguish, even amidst the joyous brightness of this worlds fairest scene. There are hearts feeling with ever-increasing bitterness that in the eagerness to gain this world, they are losing their own souls. If it be hid away it is no less there, this seamy side of life, on which that suffering Face looks down, and which that tender appeal alone can reach.

Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary

2

This verse is directly connected with the preceding one, showing that Christ was to be lifted up on the cross to accomplish the sacrifice. Draw all men unto me. Jesus never contradicted himself, and since he taught (Mat 7:13-14) that most people will be lost, he would not here teach that all would come to him. The point is with reference to what person was to be the most important drawing power. Hitherto it had been the influence of Satan and his agents, but the lifting up on the cross of the Son of man would draw men to Him and not Satan.

Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary

Joh 12:32-33. And I, if I be lifted on high out of the earth, will draw all men unto myself. But this he said, signifying by what manner of death he should die. Myself is used in emphatic contrast with, and opposition to, the prince of this world. To Himself Jesus will draw men; and any difficulty connected with this is not to be met by weakening the force of the word draw, but by taking into account the limitations implied in the context, and in the nature of the case. The lesson alike of the whole Gospel and of experience is that some will not be drawn. They resist and quench the light. They love and choose the darkness. In the same way the force of all men must not be weakened, although we ought to keep in view the two thoughts which the context shows us to be prominent(1) that not the prince of this world, but Jesus Himself shall have the empire of the world; (2) that not Jews alone but Gentiles, some of whom had already been seeking Him, shall be drawn. All men, however, is universal in its meaning. Jesus would not merely draw some, He would draw all; and if some are not saved, it is because they deliberately refuse to submit themselves to His influence.

The condition and means of this drawing are the lifting on high of Jesus out of the earth. What is this lifting on high? The word has already met us in Joh 3:14 and Joh 8:28; and in the first of these passages in particular we have seen that it must be referred to the crucifixion. The whole context of this verse demands, primarily at least, a similar reference. The thought of the death of Jesus is prominent throughout. Even when He receives the homage of Mary, of the multitude, of the Greeks, He has upon Him the stamp of death. It is thus too that in Joh 12:33 the Evangelist explains the expression; and his explanation is confirmed by the remarkable use of the preposition out of instead of from. That preposition is much more applicable to the crucifixion than the ascension, and its use seems to imply that simple separation from the earth satisfies the conditions that are in the mind of Jesus. At the same time the thought of glorification must surely be included in the lifting on high. In the teaching of this Gospel, indeed, the facts of crucifixion and glorification go together, and cannot be separated from each other. The dying Redeemer is glorified through death: the glorified Redeemer died that He might be glorified. The crucifixion is the complete breaking of the bond to earth: it is the introduction of the full reign of spiritual and heavenly power.

Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament

12:32 And I, if I be {e} lifted up from the earth, will draw {f} all [men] unto me.

(e) Christ used a word which has a double meaning, for it signifies either to lift up or to get out of the way: for he intended them to think of his death, but the Jews seemed to take it another way.

(f) Chrysostom and Theophylact say that this word “all” refers to all nations: that is, not only to the Jews.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes