This is a study of the texts that tell us that eternal life is given by Jesus, and He is the sole source of this greatest of gifts.

1. JESUS WAS LIFE ETERNAL
EDITED BY GLENN PEASE
John 17:3 And this is life eternal, that they should
know thee the only true God, and him whom thou
didst send, even Jesus Christ.—John17:3.
GreatTexts of the Bible
Life in the Knowledge of God
1. The prayer of Christ from which this text is takenis in some respects the
most precious relic of the past. We have here the words which Christ
addressedto God in the criticalhour of His life—the words in which He
uttered the deepestfeeling and thought of His Spirit, clarified and
concentratedby the prospectof death. Even among the prayers of Christ this
stands by itself as that in which He gatheredup the retrospectof His past and
surveyed the future of His Church; in which, as if already dying, He solemnly
presentedto the Father Himself, His work, and His people. Recognizing the
grandeur of the occasion, we may be disposedto agree with Melanchthon,
who, when giving his lastlecture, shortly before his death, said: “There is no
voice which has ever been heard, either in heavenor in earth, more exalted,
more holy, more fruitful, more sublime, than this prayer offered up by the
Son of God Himself.”1 [Note: Marcus Dods, The Gospelof St. John, 247.]
2. The essence ofeternallife is here defined and representedas consisting in
the knowledge ofthe only true God, and of Jesus Christ His messenger,

2. knowledge being takencomprehensively as including faith, love, and worship,
and the emphasis lying on the objects of such knowledge.The Christian
religion is describedin oppositionto paganismon the one hand, with its many
gods, and to Judaism on the other, which, believing in the one true God,
rejectedthe claims of Jesus to be the Christ. It is further so described as to
exclude by anticipation Arian and Socinianviews of the Personof Christ. The
names of God and of Jesus are put on a levelas objects of religious regard,
whereby an importance is assignedto the latter incompatible with the dogma
that Jesus is a mere man.
3. It may seemstrange that, in addressing His Father, Jesus should deem it
needful to explain wherein eternallife consists;and some, to getrid of the
difficulty, have supposedthat the sentence is an explanatory reflection
interwoven into the prayer by the Evangelist. Yet the words were perfectly
appropriate in the mouth of Jesus Himself. The first clause is a confessionby
the man Jesus ofHis ownfaith in God His Father as the supreme objectof
knowledge;and the whole sentence is really an argument in support of the
prayer, Glorify Thy Son. The force of the declarationlies in what it implies
respecting the existing ignorance of men concerning the Father and His Son.
It is as if Jesus said:Father, Thou knowestthat eternal life consists in
knowing Thee and Me. Look around, then, and see how few possess such
knowledge. The heathenworld knowethThee not—it worships idols; the
Jewishworld is equally ignorant of Thee in spirit and in truth; for while
boasting of knowing Thee, it rejects Me. The whole world is overspreadwith a
dark veil of ignorance and superstition. Take Me out of it, therefore, not
because I am weary of its sin and darkness, but that I may become to it a sun.
Hitherto My efforts to illuminate the darkness have met with small success.
Grant Me a position from which I can send forth light over all the earth.
I

3. Life Eternal
1. What is the meaning of “eternal”? The answerofthe ordinary man would
be, “Something that lasts for ever.” With him eternity would simply mean
endless time; it would mean duration, or permanence, or endless succession,
or unalterability; it would mean adding so much time togetherthat you could
add no more. And so the sort of metaphors that people have used to express
eternity have been the metaphors of the circle or the sand on the seashore.We
have all been told that if we tried to count the sand on the seashorewe should
never reach the idea of eternity. Now, that sort of language is eminently
misleading. “Time shall be no more.” That “phantom of successionof time” is
wholly inapplicable to the life of God. With God there is no time—no past, no
future; all is the everlasting now. It is only in consequenceofour present
limitations, only in consequenceofthat greatcondition of time under which
we live, that we are unable to think of God as living out of time, and that we
are compelledto think of Him as living only in endless time. The life eternal is
the reallife; it is the life that is life indeed.
The Greek wordbios and the Greek wordzoe both mean “life” and are
translated by “life”;but they are words of entirely different significance in the
Greek. The first word signifies chiefly animal life—the brief space of time, the
brief space of life through which we have to pass;bare existence is the word
used, for example, in such passages as “Whatis your life? It is even as a
vapour.” But the other word zoe belongs to an entirely different and higher
conception. In the New Testament, it is used almost, if not entirely, for the
inherent principle of life which is involved in the very being of God Himself,
so that the first word means conscious existence;the secondwordmeans the
sort of life of which God is capable, and we have it in all such passagesas
“should not perish, but have eternal life.” “I am the resurrectionand the life,”
saith the Lord. “I am the bread of life.”1 [Note: Archbishop W. Alexander.]

4. Even so is man: No matter how wellhe may know the law governing his
animal personality, and the laws governing matter, these laws do not give him
the leastindications as to how he is to act with that piece of bread which he
has in his hands—whether to give it to his wife, a stranger, his dog, or eat it
himself; whether to defend this piece, or give it to him who asks for it. But the
life of man consists only in the solution of these and similar questions.2 [Note:
Tolstoy, Works, xvi. 281.]
2. There would be little worth or significance in the mere endless prolongation
of life, apart from the question of the kind of life that is to be lived for ever.
The life that Christ promises us is of an order altogetherhigher than the life
of ordinary experience. It is a life that lifts us up to a new region above the
cares and meannessesofthis world, that makes us indifferent to most of the
ends and ideals for which the mass of men live, and at leastindependent of the
pleasures to which they are so wedded. Eternal life, in fact, is spiritual life.
When the spirit, the highest part of our nature, is called forth unto full
activity and matured to its full stature, and when it subdues and regulates the
whole man, then we have entered on this new plane of existence.
3. This spiritual life may be ours here and now. It is an error to connectthe
thought of eternal life exclusively with the future. If we are of God’s elect, we
are now living this eternal life. At this very moment the eternal life of God is
throbbing in our hearts. Every act of prayer and communion with God, every
effort after righteousness and truth, every enterprise of love and mercy, is a
manifestation of this life. The gift of eternal life is a present possession, not
merely a future expectation. We have all been baptized into this life, we have
all been made partakers ofthis life, we are all exhorted to show forth this life.
Too often is eternal life regarded as the reward of a life of active virtue, as the
far-off hope which stimulates the fainting heart to “patient continuance in
well-doing”;too often is it supposed that only when the battle is over and the

5. victory won shall we pass beneath the dark gatewayofdeath into the bright
peace ofthe heavenly Kingdom. But, on the other hand, the herald of Christ
came with the cry, “The kingdom of heavenis at hand,” a cry which Christ
Himself confirmed by proclaiming to His hearers, “The kingdom of God is
come nigh unto you.” Eternal life, then, is not set before the world as the prize
of patient purity, the rewardof long-continued well-doing, or the stimulus to
incite men to a life of holiness. It is not a glory which only after death will
crownthe successfulendeavours of the faithful; it is the purity, the well-doing,
the holiness itself. It is the knowledge ofGod and Christ, with all the spiritual
virtues which attend it—knowledge which, if the rational nature of man be no
delusion, may be ours now; virtues which, if the life of Christ have any
significance, if His blessedexample and exhortations have any meaning for us,
may adorn our present earthly life.1 [Note: A. Semple, ScotchSermons (1880),
333.]
II
Eternal Life as Knowledge of God in Christ
1. It is knowledge.—Knowledge is a word of more than one meaning, and that
knowledge ofGod which is eternal life has very little in common with that
knowledge ofHim which is called theology. Forthere is a difference, and that
a fundamental difference, betweenknowing a thing and knowing about it;
there is a difference, and that a fundamental difference, betweenthe
knowledge whichwe gain from books and that which comes through feeling.
Those who “know God” most worthily are not the intellectually powerful, but
the spiritually sensitive, and very often such are found among the “poorof
this world.” To them is given the higher vision. The husband knows his wife,
not by keenintellectual estimates ofher character, but by the insight of a close

6. and intimate fellowship. In this way the mother knows her child, and adjusts
all her relations by the knowledge. The friend could not tell us why he loves
his friend, or recount those elements of characterwhich he admires. Heart
knows heart, and love knits bonds. And the innermost secretis that we must
feel God, and by the feeling gainour knowledge ofHim.1 [Note: R. T., Light
for Life’s Even-tide, 79.]
The mere knowing of the understanding is never life, but only the instrument
or tool of life. That which my understanding, my logicalfaculty, knows is, so
far, outside of me. I may build my life on it. But of it I cannotbuild my life. I
know that twelve times twelve are a hundred and forty-four, that London lies
nearly two hundred miles from Liverpool, and that June is likely to bring
warm days and Decembercold. And on eachof those bits of knowledge I build
up now and againfragments of my life. They are useful to me in my planning
and contriving; but they are not life. But I know the remorse that is the fruit
of sin, the pleading of the Holy Spirit in my conscience, the look of love in my
friend’s eyes, the bliss of the summer sunshine, the chill pain of a great
bereavement; and that knowing is itself of the very texture of my life. If you
could take this strange abstractthing, my life, and divide it up into its several
elements, you would find it all made up of knowings such as these. They are of
its essence. Forthese knowings in me are not information given me by others,
not inferences reachedby syllogism, not even convictions graspedby closest
reasoning, but immediate realizations, instant experiences. And so these are
not the furniture of life, but life itself. And if the eternal life consists in
knowing certain objects, then the knowing must be of this immediate kind,
facts of the soul, realizations woven into the very structure of the self.2 [Note:
R. C. Armstrong, Memoir and Sermons, 253.]
Comrades, I said, who to the West
Have through a thousand dangers pressed,

7. Let not the little space
Remaining to our race
Run out before our sensesfind
Experience of the world behind
The courses ofthe Sun,
Where people there are none.
Considerwhat hath been your lot:
Not for brute life were ye begot:
But that ye might pursue
Virtue and knowledge too.1 [Note:Dante, Inferno, xxvi. (trans. by Shadwell).]
2. It is knowledge ofGod.—The one thing needful for men, the greatcry of
our nature, in which all other cries are swallowedup, is for knowledge—the

8. knowledge ofGod. To know the true God has been the deep desire of living
souls through all time. Weariedby the changes ofa fleeting world, finding no
repose in the best that the finite cangive, men of earnestminds long to know
the Eternalthat they may rest in Him. An old mystic has said: “Godis an
unutterable sigh of the human soul.” With greatertruth we may reverse the
saying, and affirm that the human soulis a never-ending sigh after God. In its
deepestrecessesthere lives or slumbers inextinguishable longing after Him,
and the more we considerthe nature of that longing, the more we discover
that what it aims at is not a mere intellectual apprehension of God, but a
personalrelationship to Him. It is essentiallyof a practicalnature. It is an
impulse to draw nigh to God, to place ourselves in personalfellowship with
Him from the convictionthat He hath made these hearts of ours for Himself,
and they are altogetherrestless till they find their rest in Him. And thus the
cry of the earnesthas always beenthat of the disciple: “Shew us the Father
and it sufficeth us.” The dream that has haunted the earnestof the world has
ever been this—to live the blessedlife man must know the true God, and
Christ proclaims that dream to be a fact.
What does knowing God mean? It does not mean knowing Him by name,
knowing about Him, knowing Him as a strangerand foreigner, whose speech
and ways we have not been accustomedto;it means knowing Him in the sense
in which we know a father, or mother, or friend, whom we love and value
above every one else;whose ways and thoughts we are thoroughly acquainted
with; and who, we feel, knows us thoroughly, feels with us, cares forus, and
longs for our being happy.1 [Note: R. W. Church, Village Sermons, 143.]
3. It is knowledge ofGod in Christ.—The greatwant of humanity is the
knowledge ofGod. This want is met by Jesus Christ whom God has sent.
Christ has power over all that He might give eternal life. It is He that gives
eternal life: it is He that gives the knowledge ofthe only true God which is
eternal life. There is nothing that tends to life in the knowledge youhave apart
from Him. Forthe knowledge ofthe true God and for eternallife we are

9. utterly and entirely dependent on Jesus Christ. Christ came to give us this
knowledge, andhow did He give it? Not simply by telling us certain truths or
teaching certain doctrines about God, but by living among us, as God-man in
the flesh breathing our ceruleanair, and speaking our human speech, loving
us with a human heart, and healing and helping us with human hands, and
then telling us that he who had seenHim had seenthe Father. This is eternal
life, that we should see the glory of God—the love of God—in the face of Jesus
Christ.
The latesttakenawayof those who made the happiness of my Oxford life was
Robert Gandell, who ended his days at Wells, of which cathedralhe was
Canon:—but who was chiefly knownat Oxford (where he had passedall his
time), first, as MichelFellow of Queen’s;then, as Tutor of MagdalenHall and
Fellow of Hertford College;but especiallyas Hebrew Lecturer, and Professor
of Syriac and Arabic. I have never known a man who with severe recondite
learning combined in a more exquisite degree that peculiar Theological
instinct without which an EnglishHebraist is no better than,—in fact is
scarcelyas goodas,—a learnedJew.2[Note:J. W. Burgon, Lives of Twelve
GoodMen, i. p. xxii.]
“Jesus Christwhom thou didst send.” He is the keyto the difficulty which we
all must feel more or less whenwe speak ofknowing God. For us men in this
human life the knowledge ofthe Father is the knowledge ofthe Son, the
knowledge ofGod is the knowledge ofJesus Christ. We have before us in the
life of our Lord Jesus Christthe satisfactionofthis need of a divinity which is,
if not nearer, at leastmore apparent, to our human life, and more possible for
mortal men to approach. We have before us in the Gospels the picture of God
clothed with humanity—treading the streets of an earthly city, living that very
life of struggle which seems at first sight to be at the very opposite pole of
existence from God. Again and again, through the prison bars of that
humanity, there flashed forth the light of the divinity that was in Him; but His
life was a human life—a life like yours and mine; a life which felt pain and

10. disappointment and temptation, and a life consequentlywhich, though at far
distance, it is possible for us to know and to imitate.1 [Note:E. Hatch,
Memoirs, 187.]
4. What is it to know Christ? Is it to trust Him? Not simply that, if we trust
only in something He did long ago. Is it to love Him? Not simply that, if we
love Him only as He stands far back in the past, for the redemption He
achievedthen. What is it to know Him? It is to have Him pressing Himself,
with all the powerthat ever was in Him still in Him, upon our hearts to-day. It
is to be consciousthat He is for ever taking my life afreshand impressing
Himself upon it afresh. It is to hear Him calling to me, not down the centuries
from long ago, but from here—closeatmy side, with a voice that is newly
lifted to-day, an invitation that is newly given to-day. It is not to be inspired by
what He was, but to feel His power now coming straight from the living heart
of Him to me. It is to experience, not the reflex influence of what He did far
back in the history of mankind, but the direct influence of what He does. It is
to discern, amid the figures which crowd the canvas of our life, that One
Figure moving ceaselesslyto and fro. The RealPresence,if you like. To know
Christ in this sense—thatevery moment He comes with a new ministry to
snatch me out of my littleness into His greatness—thatis eternal life. To know
Christ in this sense—thatHe gives the secretoflife newly to me ever and ever
again—thatis eternal life. To know Christ in this sense—thatHe repeats to-
day every blessing He bestowedin other days, changing the form of it to meet
the changing need, answering to every hour’s requirement with grace newly-
born out of His greatand loving heart—to know Him so is to take life from
Him now, is eternallife.2 [Note:H. W. Clark, Meanings and Methods of the
Spiritual Life, 21.]
Knowing Christ makes us live as God lives, so far as that can be for us.
Knowing Christ makes us live as God lives—thatis the miracle—sets us into
worlds where limitations and sorrows anddyings ceaseto have any meaning.
Know Christ, and the wearinessesand weaknessesby which an unceasing cry

11. is wrung out from the world cannot touch your true life to harm it any more
than they can touch God’s;for Christ gives you eternal life. Know Christ, and
you cannotdie any more than God candie; for Christ gives you eternal life.
There is nothing partial about the blessing Christ bestows. Eternallife is a
thing others dare not speak of; but He gives that because He Himself possesses
it, and, in giving that, gives all. One may look on this trial of humanity and
another may look on that; one voice may speak a word to make this struggle
lighter, and another may possesssome secretto strengthen the soulin that
conflict—Christ, when we know Him, does not patch and mend life so, but
just lifts us awayout of all these things into the eternal worlds, so that trial
and struggle and conflictare to us no more than they are to Himself, to God.
One has the secret that will make life worthier, he thinks; and another speaks
the word to make life happier, he thinks: Christ bids us just know Him, and
all is done.1 [Note:H. W. Clark, Meanings and Methods of the Spiritual Life,
24.]
(1) Knowledge of Christ implies obedience.—“Toknow Jesus”—whatdoes it
mean? Here is a guiding word from the Apostle John: “He that saith, I know
him, and keepethnot his commandments, is a liar.” Then how many of us
know Him? “He that saith, I know him, and keepethnot.…” Then knowledge
implies obedience. There canbe no knowledge ofChrist without obedience.
Without obedience we may have a few ideas about Him, but we do not know
Him. If we are destitute of obedience, then that which we assume to be
knowledge is no knowledge atall, and we must give it anothername.
Obedience is essential. Whatis obedience? Confining our inquiry strictly to
the human plane, what is essentiallyimplied in obedience? Whenone man
obeys another it is implied that he subjects his will to the will of the other, and
works in harmony with its demands. The oarsmenin our university boats
have to subject their wills to the will of the strokesman, whose stroke
determines and controls the rest. The oarsmen have but one will. That is
obedience, a will attuned to the will of another, and without that attuning of
the will no knowledge ofChrist can ever be gained.

12. And once when he was walking with Francis and came to a cross-waywhere
one could go to Florence, to Siena or to Arezzo, and Brother Masseoasked,
“Father, which way shall we take?” Francis answeredhim, “The way God
wishes.” ButBrother Masseoaskedfurther, “How shall we know God’s will?”
And Francis answered:“That I will now show you. In the name of holy
obedience I order you to start turning round and round in the road here, as
the children do, and not to stop until I tell you to.” Then Brother Masseo
beganto whirl round and round as children do, and he became so giddy that
he often fell down; but as Francis said nothing to him, he got up againand
continued. At lastas he was turning round with greatvigour, Francis said,
“Stopand do not move!” And he stoodstill, and Francis askedhim, “How is
your face turned?” Brother Masseoanswered, “Towards Siena!” Then said
Francis, “It is God’s will that we shall go to Siena to-day.”1 [Note: J.
Jörgensen, St. Francis ofAssisi, 110.]
(2) Knowledge of Christ means love.—“He that loveth not knowethnot God.”
Then how many of us know Him? No love: no knowledge!May we not slightly
alter the former word of the Apostle, and read it thus—“He that saith, I know
Him, and loveth not, is a liar.” It would be just as reasonable fora man
without eyes to claim that he sees the stars as for a man without love to claim
that he knows the Lord. Without love we cannot know Christ. What is love? It
is indefinable, as indefinable as fragrance or light. Our descriptive words are
at the best only vague and remote. Though we cannot define a sentiment, we
can sometimes suggestit by its effects, and this will suffice for our immediate
purpose. Love is “goodwill toward men.” Observe, goodwill toward men, not
merely goodwish; willing good, not only wishing it! To wish a thing and to
will it, may be two quite different things. Wishing may be only a sweetand
transient sentiment; willing implies effort, active and persistent work.
Wishing dreams; willing creates.Love is goodwill, the willing of goodtoward
all men, the effort to think the best of all men, and to help them on to the best.
That is love.

13. The path of the intellect is not the path that brings the soul into that Sacred
Presence whichit seeks. He is reachedby another means altogether. Whatis
it? Let the soultake to itself the “wings of love,” and the distance betweenit
and Him will be coveredin a moment. The mountain will become a plain, and
He who seemedto be afar off will be found to be nigh at hand. Or, to use the
figure which Browning employs, love is the single “leap” that gains Him,
which leap the mere intellectual faculty is powerlessto take.1 [Note:J. Flew,
Studies in Browning, 145.]
(3) Knowledge of Christ is likeness.—Knowledgenecessitateslikeness. Have
we not abundant proof of its truth? Two unlikes cannotknow eachother. Two
men who are morally unlike eachother may live together, and neither can
possibly know the contents of the other’s life. How would you describe pain to
a man who has never experiencedit? He cannotknow it. He cannot even
imagine it. Pain is knownonly by the pain-ridden. Knowledge implies
likeness. The principle has a wide application. To know we must be. To know
music, we must be musical. To know art, we must be artistic. To know Christ,
we must be Christlike. “This is life, … to know Jesus.”To know Jesus is to
share His life! His life is eternal. Life eternal is just Christ-life. This is life
eternal, to have life like Christ, to know Him in spirit and in truth.
All grows, says Doubt, all falls, decays and dies;
There is no secondlife for floweror tree:
O suffering soul, be humble and be wise,
Nor dream new worlds have any need of thee!

14. And yet, cries Hope, the world is deep and wide;
And the full circle of our life expands,
Broadening and brightening, on an endless tide
That ebbs and flows betweenthese mystic lands.
Not endless life, but endless love I crave,
The gladness and the calm of holier springs,
The hope that makes men resolute and brave,
The joyful life in the greatlife of things.
The soul that loves and works will need no praise;
But, fed with sunlight and with morning breath,
Will make our common days eternal days,
And fearless greetthe mild and gracious death.2 [Note:W. M. W. Call.]

15. Life in the Knowledge of God
BIBLEHUB RESOURCES
Pulpit Commentary Homiletics
Knowledge And Life: A Sermon For The Young
John 17:3
J.R. Thomson
We cannotdoubt that God knows us. We cannotconceive ofhim otherwise
than as knowing all things. "He telleth the number of the stars;" and at the
same time he reads the secrets ofevery heart. The psalmist took a just view of
his Godwhen he exclaimed, "Thou art acquainted with all my ways:for there
is not a word in my tongue, but lo Lord, thou knowestit altogether." But
whilst God knows us perfectly, we can only know him imperfectly. Yet it is
both a wonderful and a happy thing that we can know him at all.
I. THERE IS MUCH WE CANNOT KNOW OF GOD. If we are often baffled
in studying the works of his hands, we cannotbe surprised that the Divine
artificer is too high for us to comprehend him. If we are perplexed in our
endeavors to understand the soul of man, how can we expect to fathom the
mysteries of the Divine nature? It is said that King Hiero askedthe
philosopher Simonides, "Who is God?" The wise man askedfor a day to
reflectand to prepare an answer. Finding this insufficient, he askeda week,
and then a year. But time and meditation brought no light which could satisfy
him, and the query remained unanswered. Godin the spiritual realm is like
his universe in the material realm; of which the greatPascalsaid, "It is a
circle whose centeris everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere." It is
said that the Emperor Trajan, addressing a Jewishrabbi, Joshua by name,

16. said, "Show me your God." The sage answered, "Comeout of the house, and
see one of his ambassadors." Leading him into the daylight, the rabbi bade the
emperor look upon the sun, then shining in his strength. "What! cannot you
look in the face of the ambassador? are you blinded by his dazzling presence?
How can you look upon the countenance of the King?" "No man hath seen
God at any time." Who can by searching find out God? We see glimpses, we
hear whisperings, of his powerand wisdom; but there is an infinity which
comes not within our ken. A child follows the course of the brook which flows
through his father's fields; he reaches the point where it joins the river in the
valley; but he dreams not of the sea into which that river empties itself.
II. WE CAN KNOW OF GOD WHAT IS OF MOST VALUE TO US. If we
cannot understand the Divine nature, if there are some of his attributes, as,
for example, his omnipresence, whichutterly baffle our intellect, still there is
much that is within our apprehension. We can know that the Lord our Godis
one God, that he is wise, that he is just and faithful, that he is compassionate
and merciful. Now, whatdoes it matter to a child that he cannot understand
his father's occupations, that he is not able to appreciate his father's abilities,
so long as he is sure that his father will give him goodadvice, so long as he is
sure that his father will provide for his wants, bodily and mental? Suppose the
father to be a statesman;the child cannot enter into the reasons ofnational
polity. Suppose the father to be a lawyer;the child cannot form any opinion of
his father's conduct of a case in court. But the child can know that his father
will receive with kindness any application which may be made to him for
guidance, for help, for the means of acquiring knowledge orrational
enjoyment. The child can know that the father's house will not be shut against
him, that he is ever welcome to the father's table, that the father's time is
always at his service. In like manner we are quite capable of knowing what is
God's will, of understanding the propriety of obedience to that will, of valuing
the opportunities we have of learning and obeying our heavenly Father.
III. THERE ARE SPECIAL WAYS IN WHICH GOD GIVES US
KNOWLEDGE OF HIMSELF. We cannot see him directly, but we cansee
him, so to speak, by reflection. He has given us two mirrors in which the
spiritual lineaments of his Divine characterbecome visible to us.

17. 1. There is the mirror of nature. It is allowedus "to look through nature up to
nature's God."
"There's nothing bright above, below,
From flowers that bloom to stars that glow,
But in its light my soul cansee
Some feature of the Deity." It is said that on one occasionNapoleon
Bonaparte was on the deck of a ship on a calm summer night, when his
officers around him were magnifying nature, and disputing the existence of
God. The great commander listened, and then pointed to the hosts of heaven,
saying, "All very well, gentlemen, but who createdthese?"
2. There is the mirror of our own spiritual mature. The psalmist lookedinto
this mirror, and saw therein the reflectionof the Lord, the Ruler, the Judge,
of all. "As the hart panteth after the water-brooks, so pantethmy soul after
thee, O God."
IV. IT IS IN JESUS CHRIST THAT GOD GRANTS US THE CHIEF
REVELATION OF HIMSELF. Nature and conscience are mirrors; Christ is
the very shining forth of the Divine glory. We must not make an image of
God; but God has given us a perfect image of himself, of his moral attributes.
When we have once seenGod in his dear Son, we recognize his presence
everywhere and in all things. As the sun illumines a hundred snow-cladpeaks,
and every summit glows and glitters forth his splendor, so when Godappears
in Christ, his attributes are seenin all his works and all his ways. Especially
do we through Jesus come to the knowledge ofthe Divine holiness,
righteousness, andlove.
V. IN THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD IN CHRIST IS THE ETERNALLIFE.
Of our Lord Jesus an apostle affirms," This is the true God, and the Eternal
Life." Now, an ignorant, uninformed, uninstructed soul is a dead soul. It is
knowledge that enkindles mental life, that calls forth the intellectual powers.
And it is the highestknowledge which is the Divine means of awakening the
highest life. This life is calledeternal, because it is not like earthly life which
perishes, but because it is of a higher kind - because it is the life of God

18. himself, spiritual and Divine. A boy taken from an inferior position, with few
opportunities of improvement and no profitable companions, may be brought
into a position where advantages are many, opportunities precious, associates
inspiring. He may come to say, "This is life indeed! So Saul became Paul -
when he had seenand known Christ. - T.
Biblical Illustrator
This is life eternal.
John 17:3
The everlasting life
J. Spence, D. D.
I. THE INESTIMABLE BLESSING OF WHICH OUR LORD SPEAKS. Life
is a greatboon. "My kingdom," a dying monarch is reported to have said,
"for an inch of time." Yet after all what is this present life in itself (James
4:14)? And when it is most eagerlyprized and most hilariously spent, its
possessormay in the saddestsense be dead (Romans 8:6). Eternal life is the
highest possible life for man. Two causes may end our life on earth. It may be
terminated by external force or by inward disease.Eternallife —
1. Has nothing to terminate it from without. Force from God alone can end
life; and the Divine poweris entirely on the side of this life.
2. Is without anything to end it from within. Diseasedestroys physicallife. But
eternal life is the progress and consummation of a life begun on earth by a
new birth from God, and has in it no element of evil.
II. HOW CAN THIS LIFE BE REALIZED? It is not that this knowledge
leads or points out the way to attain it. Life itself consists in this knowledge —
1. God and Christ are its objects. The Father is called"the true God" in
opposition to false deities. The juxtaposition of Christ with the Father, and the
knowledge of both being defined to be eternallife, is the strongestinferential
evidence of the Godheadof the Son. But why does Jesus, as Mediator, thus

19. make the knowledge ofHimself essentialto life?(1) Becausethe Father can be
known only through the Son; and(2) knownas gracious towards mankind
only in Him.
2. But we must not suppose that this is bare intellectual knowledge. It is the
conscious possessionofGod. Certain truths about Godmay be seenin many
ways and everywhere;but the spiritual perception of God Himself can only be
reachedin Christ.
3. This knowledge involves spiritual submissionto God, or the personal
receptionof Him. Only to the soul that receives Him will He revealHis glory
(Revelation3:20; John 14:23). To all who receive Him, He manifests Himself
as He does not unto the world. With respectto our fellow-men, we frequently
use such language as this: "I scarcelyknow him," or "I knew him well," and
the phraseologyvaries according to our acquaintance with the man's
characteror his moral and socialqualities. We may believe from report in a
man's generosity;but how different is our estimate or appreciationof his
characterwhen we can sayfrom experience that we know it. Abraham
believed God and obeyed; but when the Divine promise was fulfilled, and the
Divine faithfulness proved, the patriarch knew God in a way that he did not
know Him before.
III. HOW COMES IT THAT THIS TRUE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD IS
LIFE? We know what connectionthere is betweenknowledge andthe energy
and enjoyment of our every-day life. "Knowledge is power." It has the power
of salvation, transformation, progress. It is knowledge whichlifts up the life of
the savage. The highestknowledge for man must be the highestlife.
1. The true knowledge ofour heavenly Father involves the communication of
influence, and influence flowing forth from God is quickening. Real
knowledge cannotbe receivedwithout a healthful influence on the soul. A
penitent child cannot know that his father has forgiven him without feeling
emotions of tenderness and joy. What, then, must be the influence of the
knowledge ofthe true God, our God and Father!
2. This knowledge promotes fellowshipand communion with God, which is
life. To man, as a socialbeing, fellowshipwith others is life. The contactof

20. thought with thought, and the communion of affectionwith affection, are
elements of men's true life on earth. What, then, must be the fellowship of the
soul with God, but life of the highest order?
3. This knowledge promotes likenessto God; and this assimilationto God is
the very highest life (1 Colossians 3:10).
(J. Spence, D. D.)
The knowledge ofGod is eternal life
W. Landels.
I. WHAT IS COMPRISED IN THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD?
1. In answering this question, we need hardly remark that it implies a
knowledge ofGod's existence. The remark is self-evident. The knowledge that
He is the beginning of all knowledge ofGod. But whilst this is comprised in a
knowledge ofGod, it does not constitute the knowledge. A man may know that
there is a God; he may not only know it from the statements of others, but he
may have actually examined it, and may be well conversantwith the evidence
of God's existence with which nature abounds, and be able to give to every
man that askethhim a reasonfor his belief, and yet he may be destitute of that
knowledge whichis "eternallife." How exquisitely the Scripture speaks upon
this point! "Thou believestthat there is one God; thou doestwell; the devils
also believe and tremble." You need to know something more — something
that devils do not, and cannot, know — in order to the enjoyment of eternal
life.
2. Again, it comprises a knowledge ofGod's attributes, such as His eternity.
His omnipresence — that, as He existed throughout all time, so He fills all
space and pervades all worlds. His omniscience — that, existing throughout
all time, and pervading all space, He knows all things. Such are some of the
attributes which are essentialto Divinity; and I need not say that the
knowledge ofthese is comprised in a knowledge ofGod. But, then, all that,
along with the knowledge ofGod's existence, does not constitute the

21. knowledge ofwhich our text speaks.There is reasonto believe that devils
know God's nature as well as existence;and yet they tremble. Ah, my brother,
this knowledge might well drive thee to despair: but it cannotgive thee peace.
It may convince thee of sin, and fill thee with alarm, but it cannot give thee
peace. The knowledge ofsomething more than this is necessaryto eternal life.
3. In proceeding to show what it is which constitutes this knowledge, I beg you
to notice that it is what is describedin the text as the knowledge ofJesus
Christ, whom God has sent. It is so described because it is through Christ that
the knowledge is communicated.(1)And, first of all, you have in Christ a
manifestation of God's hatred of sin. In proof of this I might refer you to the
distance at which He kept Himself from all that was sinful, though inhabiting
a world in which sin was fashionable, and where temptations to sin were
abounding, Not at a distance as regards locality, but distance as regards
character. I might refer you, too, to the manner in which He denounced the
wickednessofthose over whose sin He mourned and wept. If God did not
wink at sin in the personof His own Son, how, think you, will He wink at sin
in you? If it could not be allowedto pass unpunished when it was beheld in
Christ, though He prayed, "Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from
Me," will it be allowedto pass unpunished if found in you? You think God is
merciful, so He is; but He is just, and He is holy — a God of spotless purity.
This truth, at first sight, may excite your fears;yet it is needful for you to
know it, because it supplies a powerful motive which is necessaryto keepyou
back from sin; to lead you to mortify sin, and thus to produce in you meetness
for heaven— the truth that it is not enough to know that God hates sin. This
will never give you a title to heaven, nor will it produce in you a meetness for
the enjoyment of eternal life.(2) You need to have something more than this,
in order to your enjoying eternal life; and this leads me to observe, secondly,
that in Christ you have a manifestation of the love of God. But even this is not
enough. It is not enough to know that God loves us; that though He is just, He
must punish sin. You need have something more in order to your enjoying life
eternal. Oh, then, ponder the statements ofGod's Word in which that truth is
found; and until it falls on your understanding, until it is impressedon your
hearts, never to be erased — and, thank God, you need not wait long — for
oh, it is plain and easy, and even now you may open your hearts to the

22. perception of it, and even now you may enter into faith; even now you may
look up to your God as your Fatherand your Friend; for both by word and by
deed does God say, "I have acceptedMy Son's work for thee, O sinner; I was
well pleasedwith what He has done for thee; His death is a perfectatonement
for all thy sins; I am satisfiedwith it; be thou satisfiedwith it, be at peace, be
thou reconciledto God." I do not mean to say that what I have setbefore you
contains anything like full knowledge ofGod. No man canfind out the
Almighty to perfection. It does not amount to even an index of what might be
known; it is only of the knowledge whichis necessaryto life.
II. And now let me proceed, in the secondplace, to show, as briefly as I can,
HOW THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD IS ETERNALLIFE, or in what sense it
is.
1. And, first of all, it is so, if you considereternal life as consisting in the
enjoyment of God's favour. We read in this book, "And in His favour is life."
Now, the knowledge ofGod is essentialto the enjoyment of His favour. It is
true that His favour rests on men, whether they know Him or not; for how
else could they accountfor the varied blessings which they are daily
receiving? But, then, though it rests on them, they do not enjoy it whilst they
do not know Him. Their own feelings are just as unpleasant; their relation to
God is as painful; they are as much alienated from God as if He were really
their enemy.
2. And, then, again, the knowledge ofGod is eternal life, if you regard eternal
life as signifying the privileges and enjoyments of the heavenly cities. The
knowledge ofGod imparts that character, orproduces in man that character,
which increases the enjoyment of heaven. The characteron which heavenis
conferredis "conformedinto God's image" — sympathy with his feelings and
his desires;or, in other words, it is living in a oneness withGod. Now, the
knowledge ofGod necessarilyand invariably produces this characterin man.
The Cross ofChrist contains a motive powerwhich the human heart,
depraved as it is, cannotboth contemplate and resist. No man can truly and
intelligibly saythat Christ died for me, and gave Himself for me; God's wrath
was suspendedover me, the Saviour stepped betweenme and that wrath, that

23. it might fall on Him, and that I might be saved — no man can say that without
loving God in return.
3. And then, again, the knowledge ofGod is eternallife, if you understand the
knowledge ofGod as heavenly happiness. Whence, let me ask, do the
redeemedin heavenderive their happiness? Is it from the splendour of the
place which they occupy? from the beauty and sublimity of scenes upon which
they gaze? is it from the music with which their ears are charmed, or from the
delicious fruits with which they regale themselves, orfrom their exalted
companionship? No. They know that God is love, and that is their happiness.
God is setforth to their contemplation as a God of love, and they find their
employment, and their enjoyment too, in meditating on the proofs of His love
with which the universe abounds — every new discoverygiving a new impulse
to their zeal and a new zestto their praise. And, hence, you find John
speaking as if this were the consummation of the saint's desire: "We know
that when He appears we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is."
(W. Landels.)
Eternal life in the knowledge ofGod and Christ
Phillips Brooks, D. D.
1. When Jesus saidthese words, the transitoriness of life was pressing upon
Him and His disciples. When life seemedfrailest and most unreliable, they
heard Him praying, "This is life eternal." The assertionof something in life,
which lasted and did not go to pieces, must have come in very solidly and
nobly. So often when we are most conscious ofmortality, when disease is
triumphing over that which disease cantouch, the leastreminder of that
which is immortal restores us, puts courage into our frightened hearts.
2. What is it, then, whose eternity Jesus proclaims so confidently? When
everything else decays, whatis it that is imperishable? Jesus says it is the
knowledge ofGod and of Himself. Now, remember that the knowledge ofGod
and Christ must mean, and in the Bible always does mean, s personal
relationship with God and Christ. It is not mere absolute knowledge. It is

24. what He is to us, not what He is to Himself, that we may know of God. So that
to know Christ and God is to have to do with Christ and God in the wayof
love and service. And Jesus says that the permanent part of our life is the part
which has to do with God.
3. Here is a very clearand simple test of all our life. Our houses must decay.
What is there in them that will last? That which had to do with God. Not their
bricks and mortar, but the tempers and the hearts that were cultivated in
them. Our institutions will perish — even our churches. But that which really
knew God in them no tooth of time can touch. Our friendships and
relationships have a promise of permanence only as they are real spiritual
intimacies knit in with one common union to God.
4. When we fastenour thoughts on this, how it changes the whole aspectof the
lives and deaths of men! Here is a poor, holy man dying. How little difference
death makes to him! He is to keepall that has to do with God, and to lose all
the rest. What is there for him to lose? How much there is that he will keep!
But another man, so much richer, lies dying. What an enormous change death
is to him! All his life has been worldly. What is there that he can keep? How
almost everything he must lose!
5. Thus the eternal part of us is not that which Godshall choose atsome
future day to endow with everlasting life. Eternity is a true quality in the thing
itself. This really brings me to what I wanted to preach about — the regulative
and shaping powerof a Christian faith in this life. What are the great
deficiencies ofdaily moral life?
I. THE DIFFICULT BALANCE OF RESPONSIBILITY. Menknow what
duty is, but the even, steadypressure of duty upon the whole surface of a
man's life is something which thoughtful men are always missing. On one day
the sense ofresponsibility is overwhelming. The next day it is all gone. The
consequence is doubly bad. Some tasks are wholly neglected, and others are
done under a burden and a strain which exhaust us. Our life grows all
spasmodic. Oh, for some power which, with broad, even weight, should press
every duty into its place, coming down from such a height that it should be
independent of their whims and moods, and weighupon to-morrow and to-

25. day alike, calm, serene, eternal. Now hear our text. There is the answerto our
longing! To love God out of gratitude, and to want to serve Him out of love —
there is the rescue!The doing of all duty, not only for itself, but for His sake
who wants it done — this is what puts force and pliability at once into duty,
making it strong enough for the largest, and supple enough for the smallest
tasks, giving it that power which the greatsteamengine has, with equal
fidelity to strike down a mountain and to pick up a pebble, adapting its
movements to such different work. Is not that the redemption of
responsibility?
II. THE DIFFICULT SENSE OF BROTHERHOOD. The decayof the power
of feeling this is one of the sad things of all advancing life. It is not so hard for
children. The young man has not settled yet into the fixed tastes and
occupations which decide for him with whom he should have to do. And so he
easilystrikes hands with everybody, and has a certain superficialbrotherhood
with every one he meets. But as the man grows olderhis life draws in. He
cannot reachout and take in a larger circle. Even patriotism is harder than it
used to be. And to let his affectiongo sweeping out to the ends of the earth and
down into the gutter where the outcasts lie — this seems preposterous. How
can one keepand grow humane? "This is life eternal," &c. If I have lostsight
of my brethren, I must go back to my Father to find them. It is the Father's
house that we must meet. I am not merely a merchant among the merchants, a
lawyer among the lawyers, a minister among the minister. I am a sonof God,
doing His will out of love; a sonof God among the sons of God.
III. THE BEARING OF TROUBLE. Trouble comes to everybody, and what
men ordinarily callbearing it, is apt to be one of the dreariestand forlornest
things conceivable. How you hate and dread to go into that house of suffering.
What you do find is apt to be either a man all crushed and broken into
fragments, or else a man proud, cold, stern, hard, whom you pity all the more
for the wretchedness ofhis proud, hard misery. But now neither of these men
is really bearing his sorrow. Neitherof them has really taken his trouble on
his shoulders, to carry it whither he pleases. Eachofthem, in different ways,
is borne by his sorrow. And now, what is the matter with both these men?
Simply that they laid out a plan of life which was not broad enough or deep
enough to have any place for trouble. When they designedtheir lives, they left

26. sorrow out. So many lives are like. ships sailing for Europe in the brilliant
morning of a summer's day, and, by and by, when they are out in mid-ocean,
and the night comes, andthe sky and water both grow black, finding that they
have brought no lights of any kind. And then, if I turn aside and find a man
who really does bear his sorrow, whatis it that is different in him? It must be
this: that he has some notion of life which is large enough to take in trouble.
The Christian enters into the profoundness of consolationbecausehe loves his
Governorand his Educator. "This is life eternal," &c.
IV. THE LACK OF NOBLENESS.There come occasionalmoments in every
man's long life when he feels that he is living nobly. Something makes him
forgethimself, with ardent enthusiasm fire up for a principle, with easyscorn
push back temptation, with deep delight glory in some friend's greatness,
greaterthan his own. The man is pitiable who has known no such moments.
But one or two such in a man's life only show out by contrastthe generallow
level at which our lives are lived. There is a littleness that wearies us. There is
a drag to everything, that makes us ask:"Is it worth while?" Now all those
qualities which make up nobleness must become permanent and constantin
any man who really knows and loves God and Jesus Christ? Be a Christian
constantly, and you must be noble constantly. Know Christ's redemption, and,
seeing all things redeemed in Him, their possibilities, their ideas must shine
out to you. Unite your life to God's, and it must glow with the enthusiasm of
His certainhopes. Give yourself up to your Redeemer, and you must be
rescuedfrom selfishness. Love God, and you must hate His enemies, treading
sin under foot with all His contempt and indignation.
(Phillips Brooks, D. D.)
On knowing God
I. S. Spencer, D. D.
I. THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD.

27. 1. The existence of God lies at the foundation of all religion: and, therefore,
the knowledge ofGodis the touch-stone of its principles. Error and falsehood
are not going to yield to any science but that of Deity.
2. It is the lack of this knowledge which sustains impiety. The stupidity of
sinners would be gone if they saw clearlywhat God is. That one thing they
shun. They do not like to retain God in their knowledge.
3. If Christians knew God better, their piety would be increased. Those
ancient saints, whose happy attainments held them superior to the world,
always nurtured their piety by much study and fellowshipwith God.
4. This subjectof knowledge canneverbe exhausted. A finite mind, perhaps,
may reachsome point in eternity when it shall have compassedallother
subjects, and be able to look down upon and over all other fields of knowledge
without darkness and without a doubt. But God still lies above it — beyond it!
5. By a true knowledge ofGod, we shall have a clearand experimental
discernment of the beauty and grandeur of His character. Hence, we shallfeel
the desirablenessofbeing like Him.
6. Our relations to God are such that we ought greatly to desire to know Him
well. He is our Maker;He wilt be our Judge.
II. SOME ARGUMENTS FOR THIS STUDY. This knowledge ofGod tends
—
1. To humble us. When we know Him best we know ourselves best. It is this
that dissipates our delusions. "Woe is me! I am undone." Why? "Mine eyes
have seenthe King, the Lord of hosts."
2. To crucify us to the world. To have a spiritual understanding of the
exceeding excellencies ofGod makes the world seembut a very little thing. It
shows us its emptiness. The heart uses that new arithmetic, to count all things
loss for the excellencyof the knowledge ofGod in Christ Jesus our Lord.
3. To purify the heart. No sight is so transforming as that of God. When we
can have our minds and hearts brought so as to see with open face the glory of
the Lord, we are changedinto the same image from glory to glory.

28. 4. To confirm and establishthe believer's heart. Speculationcannot do this.
Self-examination, submission to creeds and forms, and all study of doctrines,
cannot do it. To have full views of God; to know Him by direct fellowship;to
live in His presence, andlie down and feelthat the everlasting arms are
around him, shows to the believer the fulness and the faithfulness of God, and
confirms his heart in something like the full assurance ofhope. Now he can
call God his Father.
5. Hence such a knowledge ofGod is most satisfying and safe.
(I. S. Spencer, D. D.)
The knowledge ofGod
J. Hannah, D. D.
The Holy Scriptures often use the phrase, "knowledge ofGod," or "the
knowledge ofthe Lord," as a characterof true religion. This phrase is
particularly applied to that premised period in which the power of religion
shall universally prevail. "They shall all know Me, from the leastunto the
greatest.""The knowledgeofthe Lord shall coverthe earth," &c. In the
ancient Scriptures the knowledge ofGod was usually propounded simply;
here it is propounded in a manner corresponding to the clearerlight of the
Christian dispensation in its inseparable connectionwith the knowledge of
Jesus Christ. And note that our Saviour connects the knowledge ofGod with
the universal prevalence of Divine truth (ver. 2).
I. THE NATURE AND PROPERTYOF THIS KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. It
comprehends —
1. A just conceptionof His existence, attributes, and administration — i.e., of
Him as "the only true God." Consider —(1) His matchless Deity.(2)His
inimitable truth. "The true God," says our Lord —
(a)In opposition to all the false deities.

29. (b)In His enactments, promises, threatenings;so that He will in no sense deny
Himself.
(c)As the sole and inexhaustible source of truth.(3) His exclusive claim — "the
only true God."
2. Experimental acquaintance with Him as our God and Father and our
portion. This is knowledge ofthe heart. By the other the eyes of the
understanding are enlightened; by this the desires and affections of our hearts
are filled and sanctified. It is this knowledge ofGod which is of the utmost
importance. It is not speculationwhich may teachyou to inquire, but faith,
which constrains you to trust, which gives you the right knowledge ofGod.
3. A practicalacknowledgmentof His authority and government. This last
particular shows that the true knowledge ofGod embraces all religion, as it
elevates the mind, sanctifies the heart, and regulates the conduct. "The
children of Eli knew not the Lord"; that is, they gave practical evidence that
they were utterly estrangedfrom an obedient acknowledgmentofHim. "And
thou Solomon, my son," says David, "know thou the God of thy father." He
amplifies and explains that direction in what follows:— "And serve him with
a perfect heart," &c.
II. THE APPOINTED METHOD IN WHICH THIS KNOWLEDGE IS
ATTAINABLE BY US. By approaching Him through the believing knowledge
of Jesus Christ, whom He hath sentas our Saviour.
1. Man, until visited by the "DaySpring from on high," is destitute of the
knowledge ofGod. Is not his mind coveredwith darkness? Is not his heart
alienatedby guilt and depravity? Is not his life one continued scene of
rebellion againstthe MostHigh?
2. This knowledge ofGod cannotbe obtained by man alone. Man has had
opportunities to try to do so on the largestscale. Go, then, through all the
resources ofhuman wisdom, the splendid sceneswith which His universal
temple is hung around; listen to all the voices which are incessantlysounding
in our ears and proclaiming our Creatorand Preserver;traverse the spacious
Temple, mark its stately proportions, and gaze on its sublime beauty; and

30. when you have done all, inquire, "Whatmust I do to be saved?" There is
nothing in all this that teaches me, a guilty and fallen creature, the way to
God.
3. This is the way — the way which is opened by Jesus Christ. You cannot
come to God as your Father, especiallyto Godas your reconciledand
gracious Father, but by Jesus Christ.
III. THE INESTIMABLE BLESSING WITHWHICH THIS KNOWLEDGE
IS IDENTIFIED. "This is life eternal." Considerthe knowledge ofGod in
Christ —
1. In its commencement. Go to that simple and happy Christian believer who
has just found this knowledge.He will give you, perhaps, not a doctrinal
statement, but a living pattern, which in many respects is better. While he
speaks ofthe knowledge ofGod in Christ, he associatesit with inward
experience. He will testify that he who believeth in the Son of God hath
everlasting life; that he has the life of pardon and peace. He was "deadin
trespassesandsins," but he is "quickenedtogetherwith Christ."
2. In its more mature progress. Go to the experiencedChristian. He may be an
unlettered man, perhaps, and be perplexed if you askedhim a definition, or to
expound a difficult passageofthe Holy Scripture; but, under the assistance of
the Spirit of God, he has embracedthe systemof truth itself. In all his course,
the knowledge ofGodin Christ has been inseparable from advancementin
the Divine life.
3. In its consummation. Then we shall "see as we are seen, and know also as
we are known."Conclusion:
1. Have we acquired this knowledge? Ifwe have not, may I not say, "Some of
you have not the knowledge ofChrist; I speak this to your shame." Have you
spent twenty, thirty, forty, or more years, yet dark, dead, rebels againstGod?
2. Let me earnestlyexhort you who are in quest of this knowledge ofyour
God, that you seek it in the right way. "Yea, doubtless," says the Apostle,
"and I count all things but loss for the excellencyofthe knowledge ofChrist
Jesus my Lord." To know Him is to know the way that leads to the Father.

31. 3. Let me exhort you to do all you possibly can to promote this knowledge of
God in Christ. We ought to do that on a large scale;we ought to unite in those
truly sublime societieswhichare aiming to extend the knowledge ofGod in
Christ to the uttermost parts of the earth. But if it be valuable for the ends of
the earth, it is valuable for your own homes. If pagan families and vicinities
ought to have it, yours ought to have it.
(J. Hannah, D. D.)
Knowledge -- powerin religion
W. Veenschoten
(Text, and Hosea 4-6):— The adage. "knowledge is power, is of universal
application. That many actcontrary to the truth in their possessionis no
proof that this is not so. That the wickedremain wicked, the drunkards
remain drunkards, the selfishselfish, only proves there is another power
within them which decides their course rather than the dictates of knowledge.
I. THE IMPORTANCEOF RELIGIOUS KNOWLEDGE RECOGNIZED IN
THE SCRIPTURES,
1. Mosescommandedthe Israelites to teach their children (Deuteronomy 6:9).
2. The prophets were teachers.
3. The Levitical tribe was not only a tribe of priests, but also of teachers.
4. Christ Himself is a Prophet.
5. The apostles were instruments of salvationby proclaiming its principles.
6. The work of the Church in all ages is to bear witness to the truth — to make
it known.
II. HOW IS KNOWLEDGE POWERIN RELIGION?
1. Necessaryto begin a new life.

32. (1)We are to know God, His law, duty, and our failure to obey, in order to
repent.
(2)We are to know Christ, His power, His acceptablenessto God, His
willingness to save, in order to believe in Him. "How shall they believe in Him
of whom they have not heard?"
2. Knowledge necessaryto the growth of the new life. Life must be fed —
vegetable, animal, intellectual, and spiritual life.
3. Knowledge necessaryto be useful. I do not underrate silent influence of the
faithful. But still the Church needs —
(1)Fathers and mothers.
(2)Sabbath-schoolteachers.
(3)Superintendents.
(4)Helpers in prayer meetings.
(5)Church officers, and —
(6)Christians in the walks of private life, with copious religious knowledge.
III. HOW IS KNOWLEDGE TO BE SECURED?
1. In the early Church it was chiefly oral instruction by preaching and
catechizing.
2. In palmy days of EuropeanProtestantismit was —
(1)Family catechizing.
(2)Extensive religious instruction in common schools,religious text-books.
(3)Catechizing by the Church authorities before confirmation.
3. With us the Sabbath Schoollargelytakes the place of these.
4. What are we to do?

33. (1)Seek to appreciate the fact statedin the text. "Destructionfor lack of
knowledge,"and "Life eternalby knowledge."
(2)Return to perform the parental duties of instructing the young.
(3)Literature inculcating fact rather than fiction, e.g., sacredhistory, Church
history, history of the Reformation, doctrine.
(W. Veenschoten)
Saving knowledge
B. Wilkinson, F. G. S.
I. SALVATION CONSISTS IN THE POSSESSIONOF LIFE. It is clearfrom
the previous verse that the two are synonymous, and it is easyto see from the
frequent connectionof the two by Christ and the apostles how accurate it is to
call salvationeternal life. Men as sinners are spiritually dead (Ephesians 2:1).
The powerof evil has so workedupon their souls as to make them deaf to the
voice, insensible to the goodness,and indifferent to the claims of God. So far,
then, as the life of love, trust, and obedience, and joy are concerned, sinners
are dead. What they need, then, is a salvationwhich shall put them in
possessionoflife, which shall consistin the quickening of their dormant
powers, in the righting of their perverted affections, in the bringing back of
their souls into likeness to, and fellowshipwith, the living God. This was just
the salvationChrist was sent to impart, and for which He had power over all
flesh. Consequently, this is "life eternal," not as being a life that belongs to
eternity, but a life that is distinct from and opposedto temporal, earthly and
carnal — eternal in its quality. From the moment that we acceptChrist as our
Saviour it is ours (John 10:27, 28; 1 John 5:13).
II. THE LIFE IN WHICH SALVATION CONSISTSHAS ITS ROOT AND
GROUND IN KNOWLEDGE. The words must be takenas they stand. This
knowledge is not the means of, but is eternal life-a representationto which
attention needs to be callednow-a-days. Many attach to knowledge a
subsidiary importance in relation to the spiritual life. There is no statement

34. more common in certainquarters than that religion is not a creed, but a life.
This divorces tell. glen from the intellect and makes it a purely emotional
thing. Christ here declares that eternal life is founded on knowledge, thus
teaching that before Christianity canbe a life it must be a creed. Learn here
—
1. The sacredness ofknowledge.
2. Its importance.
3. Its perpetuity.
III. THIS KNOWLEDGE IS THAT OF GOD AND CHRIST.
1. Of God.(1)There is a sense in which God cannotbe known. He is so
different from ourselves in the constitution of His Being, and so superior to us
in His attributes, that there is a greatgulf which no thought or imagination
can overpass (Job11:7, 8). Indeed, if we could know God as we know one
another, He would not be God. He would not be infinite, for the finite cannot
comprehend the infinite.(2) But there is a sense in which we can know Him; in
so far as He has revealedHimself in the gospel, and sufficient for intelligent
and trustful love. This knowledge then —(a) Is not simply the knowledge that
we can gleanfrom God's works. Here we can know God's power, skill,
thought, care;but not Himself: just as from a book we may getoccasional
glimpses of the working of the author's mind and the features of his character,
but fail in any real measure to know the man.(b) Is not merely the knowledge
we can gain from His Word. We may be familiar with the contents of
Scripture and yet know no more of God Himself than we do of a man from
what others have written about him.(c) Is the knowledge whichcomes also
from fellowship betweenour souls and God. This is the true ground of our
knowledge ofothers. Souls must reveal themselves to souls through
friendship.
1. We must study God's works and read His Word, but besides this we must
get into cordial fellowship. In this we must ask for the help of His Spirit, and
lay ourselves opento what His Spirit shall teach.

35. 2. Of Christ also. The line of thought just pursued must be followedhere. The
persons are two, but the knowledge is the same. And for this reasonthe
mission of Christ was the manifestation of the Father. Exactlyin the degree in
which we know Christ the Revealershallwe know God the Revealed. This
knowledge must come —
(1)Through the Scriptures that teachus concerning Him.
(2)Through the fellowshipwhich unites us to Him.
(3)Through the Spirit who takes ofthe things of Him and shows them unto
us.When in these ways the mind has come to acceptChrist, and in the
acceptanceofChrist has acceptedGodin Him, eternal life is ours.
(B. Wilkinson, F. G. S.)
Deathof Fisher
W. Baxendale.
When Fisher, Bishopof Rochester, came outof the Towerof London and saw
the scaffoldon which he was to be beheaded, he took out of his pocketa Greek
Testament, and, looking up to heaven, he exclaimed, "Now, oh Lord, direct to
some passagewhichmay support me through this awful scene."He opened
the book and his eye glancedat this text. He instantly closedit and said,
"Praisedbe the Lord! this is sufficient for me and for eternity."
(W. Baxendale.)
STUDYLIGHT RESOURCES
Adam Clarke Commentary

36. This is life eternal - The salvationpurchased by Christ, and given to them who
believe, is called life:
Becausethe life of man was forfeited to Divine justice; and the sacrifice of
Christ redeemedhim from that death to which he was exposed.
Becausethe souls of men were dead in trespassesandsins; and Christ
quickens them by his word and Spirit.
Becausemen who are not savedby the grace of Christ do not live, they only
exist, no goodpurpose of life being answeredby them. But when they receive
this salvationthey live - answerall the Divine purposes, are happy in
themselves, useful to eachother, and bring glory to God.
It is called eternallife to show that it reaches beyond the limits of time, and
that it necessarilyimplies -
The immortality of the soul;
the resurrectionof the body; and
that it is never to end, hence called αιωνιος ζωη, a life ever living; from αει,
always, and ων, being or existence. And indeed no words can more forcibly
convey the idea of eternity than these. It is called ἡ αιωνιος ζωη, That eternal
life, by wayof eminence. There may be an eternalexistence without
blessedness;but this is that eternallife with which infinite happiness is
inseparably connected.
The only true God- The way to attain this eternal life is to acknowledge,
worship, and obey, the one only true God, and to acceptas teacher, sacrifice,
and Savior, the Lord Jesus, the one and only true Messiah. BishopPearce's
remark here is well worthy the reader's attention: -
"What is said here of the only true God seems saidin opposition to the gods
whom the heathens worshipped; not in opposition to Jesus Christ himself,
who is calledthe true God by John, in 1 John 5:20."
The words in this verse have been variously translated:

37. That they might acknowledgethee, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent, to
be the only true God.
That they might acknowledgethee, the only true God, and Jesus, whomthou
hast sent, to be the Christ or Messiah.
That they might acknowledgethee to be the only true God, and Jesus Christ
to be him whom thou hast sent. And all these translations the original will
bear.
From all this we learn that the only way in which eternallife is to be attained
is by acknowledging the true God, and the Divine mission of Jesus Christ, he
being sent of God to redeem men by his blood, being the author of eternal
salvationto all them that thus believe, and conscientiouslykeephis
commandments.
A saying similar to this is found in the Institutes of Menu. Brigoo, the first
emanatedbeing who was produced from the mind of the supreme God, and
who revealedthe knowledge ofhis will to mankind, is representedas
addressing the human race and saying:"Of all duties, the principal is to
acquire from the Upanishads (their sacredwritings) a true knowledge ofone
supreme God; that is the most exalted of sciences, because itensures eternal
life. For in the knowledge andadoration of one God all the rules of good
conduct are fully comprised." See Institutes of Menu, chap. xii. Inst. 85, 87.
Albert Barnes'Notes onthe Whole Bible
This is life eternal - This is the source of eternallife; or it is in this manner
that it is to be obtained. The knowledge ofGod and of his SonJesus Christ is
itself a source of unspeakable and eternal joy. Compare John 11:25; John
6:63; John 12:50.
Might know thee - The word “know” here, as in other places, expressesmore
than a mere speculative acquaintance with the characterand perfections of
God. “It includes all the impressions on the mind and life which a just view of

38. God and of the Saviour is fitted to produce.” It includes, of course, love,
reverence, obedience, honor, gratitude, supreme affection. “To know God as
he is” is to know and regard him as a lawgiver, a sovereign, a parent, a friend.
It is to yield the whole soul to him, and strive to obey his law.
The only true God- The only God, in opposition to all false gods. What is said
here is in opposition to idols, not to Jesus himself, who, in 1 John 5:20, is
called“the true God and eternallife.”
And Jesus Christ - To know Jesus Christ is to have a practical impressionof
him as he is - that is, to suffer his characterand work to make their due
impression on the heart and life. Simply to have heard that there is a Saviour
is not to know it. To have been taught in childhood and trained up in the belief
of it is not to know it. To know him is to have a just, practicalview of him in
all his perfections as God and man; as a mediator; as a prophet, a priest, and
a king. It is to feel our need of such a Saviour, to see that we are sinners, and
to yield the whole soul to him, knowing that he is a Saviour suited to our
needs, and that in his hands our souls are safe. Compare Ephesians 3:19;
Titus 1:16; Philemon 3:10; 1 John 5:20. In this verse is containedthe sum and
essenceofthe Christian religion, as it is distinguished from all the schemes of
idolatry and philosophy, and all the false plans on which men have sought to
obtain eternallife. The Gentiles worshipped many gods;the Christian
worships one - the living and the true God; the Jew, the Deist, the Muslim, the
Socinian, profess to acknowledge one God, without any atoning sacrifice and
Mediator; the true Christian approaches him through the greatMediator,
equal with the Father, who for us became incarnate, and died that he might
reconcile us to God.
The Biblical Illustrator
John 17:3
This is life eternal

39. The everlasting life
I.
THE INESTIMABLE BLESSING OF WHICH OUR LORD SPEAKS. Life is
a greatboon. “My kingdom,” a dying monarch is reported to have said, “for
an inch of time.” Yet after all what is this present life in itself (James 4:14)?
And when it is most eagerlyprized and most hilariously spent, its possessor
may in the saddestsense be dead (Romans 8:6). Eternal life is the highest
possible life for man. Two causesmay end our life on earth. It may be
terminated by external force or by inward disease.Eternallife
1. Has nothing to terminate it from without. Force from God alone can end
life; and the Divine poweris entirely on the side of this life.
2. Is without anything to end it from within. Diseasedestroys physicallife. But
eternal life is the progress and consummation of a life begun on earth by a
new birth from God, and has in it no element of evil.
II. HOW CAN THIS LIFE BE REALIZED? It is not that this knowledge
leads or points out the way to attain it. Life itself consists in this knowledge
1. God and Christ are its objects. The Father is called“the true God” in
opposition to false deities. The juxtaposition of Christ with the Father, and the
knowledge ofboth being defined to be eternallife, is the strongestinferential
evidence of the Godheadof the Son. But why does Jesus, as Mediator, thus
make the knowledge ofHimself essentialto life?
2. But we must not suppose that this is bare intellectual knowledge. It is the
conscious possessionofGod. Certain truths about Godmay be seenin many
ways and everywhere;but the spiritual perception of God Himself can only be
reachedin Christ.
3. This knowledge involves spiritual submissionto God, or the personal
receptionof Him. Only to the soul that receives Him will He revealHis

40. Revelation3:20; John 14:23). To all who receive Him, He manifests Himself as
He does not unto the world. With respectto our fellow-men, we frequently use
such language as this: “I scarcelyknow him,” or “I knew him well,” and the
phraseologyvaries according to our acquaintance with the man’s characteror
his moral and socialqualities. We may believe from report in a man’s
generosity;but how different is our estimate or appreciation of his character
when we cansay from experience that we know it. Abraham believed Godand
obeyed; but when the Divine promise was fulfilled, and the Divine faithfulness
proved, the patriarch knew Godin a way that he did not know Him before.
III. HOW COMES IT THAT THIS TRUE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD IS
LIFE? We know what connectionthere is betweenknowledge andthe energy
and enjoyment of our every-day life. “Knowledge is power.” It has the power
of salvation, transformation, progress. It is knowledge whichlifts up the life of
the savage. The highestknowledge for man must be the highestlife.
1. The true knowledge ofour heavenly Father involves the communication of
influence, and influence flowing forth from God is quickening. Real
knowledge cannotbe receivedwithout a healthful influence on the soul. A
penitent child cannot know that his father has forgiven him without feeling
emotions of tenderness and joy. What, then, must be the influence of the
knowledge ofthe true God, our God and Father!
2. This knowledge promotes fellowshipand communion with God, which is
life. To man, as a socialbeing, fellowshipwith others is life. The contactof
thought with thought, and the communion of affectionwith affection, are
elements of men’s true life on earth. What, then, must be the fellowship of the
soul with God, but life of the highest order?
3. This knowledge promotes likenessto God; and this assimilationto God is
the very highest life (1 Colossians 3:10). (J. Spence, D. D.)
The knowledge ofGod is eternal life

41. I. WHAT IS COMPRISED IN THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD?
1. In answering this question, we need hardly remark that it implies a
knowledge ofGod’s existence. The remark is self-evident. The knowledge that
He is the beginning of all knowledge ofGod. But whilst this is comprised in a
knowledge ofGod, it does not constitute the knowledge. A man may know that
there is a God; he may not only know it from the statements of others, but he
may have actually examined it, and may be well conversantwith the evidence
of God’s existence with which nature abounds, and be able to give to every
man that askethhim a reasonfor his belief, and yet he may be destitute of that
knowledge whichis “eternallife.” How exquisitely the Scripture speaks upon
this point! “Thou believest that there is one God; thou doestwell; the devils
also believe and tremble.” You need to know something more--something that
devils do not, and cannot, know--in order to the enjoyment of eternal life.
2. Again, it comprises a knowledge ofGod’s attributes, such as His eternity.
His omnipresence--that, as He existed throughout all time, so He fills all space
and pervades all worlds. His omniscience--that, existing throughout all time,
and pervading all space, He knows all things. Such are some of the attributes
which are essentialto Divinity; and I need not say that the knowledge ofthese
is comprised in a knowledge ofGod. But, then, all that, along with the
knowledge ofGod’s existence, does not constitute the knowledge ofwhich our
text speaks.There is reasonto believe that devils know God’s nature as wellas
existence;and yet they tremble. Ah, my brother, this knowledge might well
drive thee to despair: but it cannot give thee peace. It may convince thee of
sin, and fill thee with alarm, but it cannot give thee peace. The knowledge of
something more than this is necessaryto eternal life.
3. In proceeding to show what it is which constitutes this knowledge, I beg you
to notice that it is what is describedin the text as the knowledge ofJesus
Christ, whom God has sent. It is so described because it is through Christ that
the knowledge is communicated.
(2) You need to have something more than this, in order to your enjoying
eternal life; and this leads me to observe, secondly, that in Christ you have a
manifestation of the love of God. But even this is not enough. It is not enough

42. to know that God loves us; that though He is just, He must punish sin. You
need have something more in order to your enjoying life eternal. Oh, then,
ponder the statements of God’s Word in which that truth is found; and until it
falls on your understanding, until it is impressed on your hearts, never to be
erased--and, thank God, you need not wait long--for oh, it is plain and easy,
and even now you may open your hearts to the perceptionof it, and even now
you may enter into faith; even now you may look up to your God as your
Father and your Friend; for both by word and by deed does Godsay, “I have
acceptedMy Son’s work for thee, O sinner; I was well pleasedwith what He
has done for thee; His death is a perfect atonement for all thy sins; I am
satisfiedwith it; be thou satisfiedwith it, be at peace, be thou reconciledto
God.” I do not mean to say that what I have setbefore you contains anything
like full knowledge ofGod. No man can find out the Almighty to perfection. It
does not amount to even an index of what might be known; it is only of the
knowledge whichis necessaryto life.
II. And now let me proceed, in the secondplace, to show, as briefly as I can,
HOW THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD IS ETERNALLIFE, or in what sense it
is.
1. And, first of all, it is so, if you considereternal life as consisting in the
enjoyment of God’s favour. We read in this book, “And in His favour is life.”
Now, the knowledge ofGod is essentialto the enjoyment of His favour. It is
true that His favour rests on men, whether they know Him or not; for how
else could they accountfor the varied blessings which they are daily
receiving? But, then, though it rests on them, they do not enjoy it whilst they
do not know Him. Their own feelings are just as unpleasant; their relation to
God is as painful; they are as much alienated from God as if He were really
their enemy.
2. And, then, again, the knowledge ofGod is eternal life, if you regard eternal
life as signifying the privileges and enjoyments of the heavenly cities. The
knowledge ofGod imparts that character, orproduces in man that character,
which increases the enjoyment of heaven. The characteron which heavenis

43. conferredis “conformedinto God’s image”--sympathy with his feelings and
his desires;or, in other words, it is living in a oneness withGod. Now, the
knowledge ofGod necessarilyand invariably produces this characterin man.
The Cross ofChrist contains a motive powerwhich the human heart,
depraved as it is, cannotboth contemplate and resist. No man can truly and
intelligibly saythat Christ died for me, and gave Himself for me; God’s wrath
was suspendedover me, the Saviour stepped betweenme and that wrath, that
it might fall on Him, and that I might be saved--no man cansay that without
loving God in return.
3. And then, again, the knowledge ofGod is eternallife, if you understand the
knowledge ofGod as heavenly happiness. Whence, let me ask, do the
redeemedin heavenderive their happiness? Is it from the splendour of the
place which they occupy? from the beauty and sublimity of scenes upon which
they gaze? is it from the music with which their ears are charmed, or from the
delicious fruits with which they regale themselves, orfrom their exalted
companionship? No. They know that God is love, and that is their happiness.
God is setforth to their contemplation as a God of love, and they find their
employment, and their enjoyment too, in meditating on the proofs of His love
with which the universe abounds--every new discoverygiving a new impulse
to their zeal and a new zestto their praise. And, hence, you find John
speaking as if this were the consummation of the saint’s desire: “We know
that when He appears we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.”
(W. Landels.)
Eternal life in the knowledge ofGod and Christ
1. When Jesus saidthese words, the transitoriness of life was pressing upon
Him and His disciples. When life seemedfrailest and most unreliable, they
heard Him praying, “This is life eternal.” The assertionof something in life,
which lasted and did not go to pieces, must have come in very solidly and
nobly. So often when we are most conscious ofmortality, when disease is
triumphing over that which disease cantouch, the leastreminder of that
which is immortal restores us, puts courage into our frightened hearts.

44. 2. What is it, then, whose eternity Jesus proclaims so confidently? When
everything else decays, whatis it that is imperishable? Jesus says it is the
knowledge ofGod and of Himself. Now, remember that the knowledge ofGod
and Christ must mean, and in the Bible always does mean, s personal
relationship with God and Christ. It is not mere absolute knowledge. It is
what He is to us, not what He is to Himself, that we may know of God. So that
to know Christ and God is to have to do with Christ and God in the wayof
love and service. And Jesus says that the permanent part of our life is the part
which has to do with God.
3. Here is a very clearand simple test of all our life. Our houses must decay.
What is there in them that will last? That which had to do with God. Not their
bricks and mortar, but the tempers and the hearts that were cultivated in
them. Our institutions will perish--even our churches. But that which really
knew God in them no tooth of time can touch. Our friendships and
relationships have a promise of permanence only as they are real spiritual
intimacies knit in with one common union to God.
4. When we fastenour thoughts on this, how it changes the whole aspectof the
lives and deaths of men! Here is a poor, holy man dying. How little difference
death makes to him! He is to keepall that has to do with God, and to lose all
the rest. What is there for him to lose? How much there is that he will keep!
But another man, so much richer, lies dying. What an enormous change death
is to him! All his life has been worldly. What is there that he can keep? How
almost everything he must lose!
5. Thus the eternal part of us is not that which Godshall choose atsome
future day to endow with everlasting life. Eternity is a true quality in the thing
itself. This really brings me to what I wanted to preach about--the regulative
and shaping powerof a Christian faith in this life. What are the great
deficiencies ofdaily moral life?
I. THE DIFFICULT BALANCE OF RESPONSIBILITY. Menknow what
duty is, but the even, steadypressure of duty upon the whole surface of a
man’s life is something which thoughtful men are always missing. On one day

45. the sense ofresponsibility is overwhelming. The next day it is all gone. The
consequence is doubly bad. Some tasks are wholly neglected, and others are
done under a burden and a strain which exhaust us. Our life grows all
spasmodic. Oh, for some power which, with broad, even weight, should press
every duty into its place, coming down from such a height that it should be
independent of their whims and moods, and weighupon tomorrow and to-day
alike, calm, serene, eternal. Now hear our text. There is the answerto our
longing! To love God out of gratitude, and to want to serve Him out of love--
there is the rescue!The doing of all duty, not only for itself, but for His sake
who wants it done--this is what puts force and pliability at once into duty,
making it strong enough for the largest, and supple enough for the smallest
tasks, giving it that power which the greatsteamengine has, with equal
fidelity to strike down a mountain and to pick up a pebble, adapting its
movements to such different work. Is not that the redemption of
responsibility?
II. THE DIFFICULT SENSE OF BROTHERHOOD. The decayof the power
of feeling this is one of the sad things of all advancing life. It is not so hard for
children. The young man has not settled yet into the fixed tastes and
occupations which decide for him with whom he should have to do. And so he
easilystrikes hands with everybody, and has a certain superficialbrotherhood
with every one he meets. But as the man grows olderhis life draws in. He
cannot reachout and take in a larger circle. Even patriotism is harder than it
used to be. And to let his affectiongo sweeping out to the ends of the earth and
down into the gutter where the outcasts lie--this seems preposterous. How can
one keepand grow humane? “This is life eternal,” &c. If I have lost sight of
my brethren, I must go back to my Fatherto find them. It is the Father’s
house that we must meet. I am not merely a merchant among the merchants, a
lawyer among the lawyers, a minister among the minister. I am a sonof God,
doing His will out of love; a sonof God among the sons of God.

46. III. THE BEARING OF TROUBLE. Trouble comes to everybody, and what
men ordinarily callbearing it, is apt to be one of the dreariestand forlornest
things conceivable. How you hate and dread to go into that house of suffering.
What you do find is apt to be either a man all crushed and broken into
fragments, or else a man proud, cold, stern, hard, whom you pity all the more
for the wretchedness ofhis proud, hard misery. But now neither of these men
is really bearing his sorrow. Neitherof them has really taken his trouble on
his shoulders, to carry it whither he pleases. Eachofthem, in different ways,
is borne by his sorrow. And now, what is the matter with both these men?
Simply that they laid out a plan of life which was not broad enough or deep
enough to have any place for trouble. When they designedtheir lives, they left
sorrow out. So many lives are like ships sailing for Europe in the brilliant
morning of a summer’s day, and, by and by, when they are out in mid-ocean,
and the night comes, andthe sky and water both grow black, finding that they
have brought no lights of any kind. And then, if I turn aside and find a man
who really does bear his sorrow, whatis it that is different in him? It must be
this: that he has some notion of life which is large enough to take in trouble.
The Christian enters into the profoundness of consolationbecausehe loves his
Governorand his Educator. “This is life eternal,” &c.
IV. THE LACK OF NOBLENESS.There come occasionalmoments in every
man’s long life when he feels that he is living nobly. Something makes him
forgethimself, with ardent enthusiasm fire up for a principle, with easyscorn
push back temptation, with deep delight glory in some friend’s greatness,
greaterthan his own. The man is pitiable who has known no such moments.
But one or two such in a man’s life only show out by contrastthe generallow
level at which our lives are lived. There is a littleness that wearies us. There is
a drag to everything, that makes us ask:“Is it worth while?” Now all those
qualities which make up nobleness must become permanent and constantin
any man who really knows and loves God and Jesus Christ? Be a Christian
constantly, and you must be noble constantly. Know Christ’s redemption,
and, seeing all things redeemedin Him, their possibilities, their ideas must
shine out to you. Unite your life to God’s, and it must glow with the
enthusiasm of His certain hopes. Give yourself up to your Redeemer, and you

47. must be rescuedfrom selfishness. Love God, and you must hate His enemies,
treading sin under foot with all His contempt and indignation. (Phillips
Brooks, D. D.)
On knowing God
I. THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOD.
1. The existence of God lies at the foundation of all religion: and, therefore,
the knowledge ofGodis the touch-stone of its principles. Error and falsehood
are not going to yield to any science but that of Deity.
2. It is the lack of this knowledge which sustains impiety. The stupidity of
sinners would be gone if they saw clearlywhat God is. That one thing they
shun. They do not like to retain God in their knowledge.
3. If Christians knew God better, their piety would be increased. Those
ancient saints, whose happy attainments held them superior to the world,
always nurtured their piety by much study and fellowshipwith God.
4. This subjectof knowledge canneverbe exhausted. A finite mind, perhaps,
may reachsome point in eternity when it shall have compassedallother
subjects, and be able to look down upon and over all other fields of knowledge
without darkness and without a doubt. But God still lies above it--beyond it!
5. By a true knowledge ofGod, we shall have a clearand experimental
discernment of the beauty and grandeur of His character. Hence, we shallfeel
the desirablenessofbeing like Him.
6. Our relations to God are such that we ought greatly to desire to know Him
well. He is our Maker;He wilt be our Judge.
II. SOME ARGUMENTS FOR THIS STUDY. This knowledge ofGod tends

48. 1. To humble us. When we know Him best we know ourselves best. It is this
that dissipates our delusions. “Woe is me! I am undone.” Why? “Mine eyes
have seenthe King, the Lord of hosts.”
2. To crucify us to the world. To have a spiritual understanding of the
exceeding excellencies ofGod makes the world seembut a very little thing. It
shows us its emptiness. The heart uses that new arithmetic, to count all things
loss for the excellencyof the knowledge ofGod in Christ Jesus our Lord.
3. To purify the heart. No sight is so transforming as that of God. When we
can have our minds and hearts brought so as to see with open face the glory of
the Lord, we are changedinto the same image from glory to glory.
4. To confirm and establishthe believer’s heart. Speculationcannot do this.
Self-examination, submission to creeds and forms, and all study of doctrines,
cannot do it. To have full views of God; to know Him by direct fellowship;to
live in His presence, andlie down and feelthat the everlasting arms are
around him, shows to the believer the fulness and the faithfulness of God, and
confirms his heart in something like the full assurance ofhope. Now he can
call God his Father.
5. Hence such a knowledge ofGod is most satisfying and safe. (I. S. Spencer,
D. D.)
The knowledge ofGod
The Holy Scriptures often use the phrase, “knowledge ofGod,” or “the
knowledge ofthe Lord,” as a characterof true religion. This phrase is
particularly applied to that premised period in which the power of religion
shall universally prevail. “They shall all know Me, from the leastunto the
greatest.”“The knowledgeofthe Lord shall coverthe earth,” &c. In the
ancient Scriptures the knowledge ofGod was usually propounded simply;
here it is propounded in a manner corresponding to the clearerlight of the
Christian dispensation in its inseparable connectionwith the knowledge of
Jesus Christ. And note that our Saviour connects the knowledge ofGod with
the universal prevalence of Divine truth (John 17:2).

49. I. THE NATURE AND PROPERTYOF THIS KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. It
comprehends
1. A just conceptionof His existence, attributes, and administration--i.e., of
Him as “the only true God.” Consider
(a) In oppositionto all the false deities.
(b) In His enactments, promises, threatenings; so that He will in no sense deny
Himself.
(c) As the sole and inexhaustible source of truth.
2. Experimental acquaintance with Him as our God and Father and our
portion. This is knowledge ofthe heart. By the other the eyes of the
understanding are enlightened; by this the desires and affections of our hearts
are filled and sanctified. It is this knowledge ofGod which is of the utmost
importance. It is not speculationwhich may teachyou to inquire, but faith,
which constrains you to trust, which gives you the right knowledge ofGod.
3. A practicalacknowledgmentof His authority and government. This last
particular shows that the true knowledge ofGod embraces all religion, as it
elevates the mind, sanctifies the heart, and regulates the conduct. “The
children of Eli knew not the Lord”; that is, they gave practical evidence that
they were utterly estrangedfrom an obedient acknowledgmentofHim. “And
thou Solomon, my son,” says David, “know thou the God of thy father.” He
amplifies and explains that direction in what follows:--“And serve him with a
perfect heart,” &c.
II. THE APPOINTED METHOD IN WHICH THIS KNOWLEDGE IS
ATTAINABLE BY US. By approaching Him through the believing knowledge
of Jesus Christ, whom He hath sentas our Saviour.
1. Man, until visited by the “DaySpring from on high,” is destitute of the
knowledge ofGod. Is not his mind coveredwith darkness? Is not his heart
alienatedby guilt and depravity? Is not his life one continued scene of
rebellion againstthe MostHigh?

50. 2. This knowledge ofGod cannotbe obtained by man alone. Man has had
opportunities to try to do so on the largestscale. Go, then, through all the
resources ofhuman wisdom, the splendid sceneswith which His universal
temple is hung around; listen to all the voices which are incessantlysounding
in our ears and proclaiming our Creatorand Preserver;traverse the spacious
Temple, mark its stately proportions, and gaze on its sublime beauty; and
when you have done all, inquire, “Whatmust I do to be saved?” There is
nothing in all this that teaches me, a guilty and fallen creature, the way to
God.
3. This is the way--the way which is opened by Jesus Christ. You cannot come
to God as your Father, especiallyto God as your reconciledand gracious
Father, but by Jesus Christ.
III. THE INESTIMABLE BLESSING WITHWHICH THIS KNOWLEDGE
IS IDENTIFIED. “This is life eternal.” Considerthe knowledge ofGod in
Christ
1. In its commencement. Go to that simple and happy Christian believer who
has just found this knowledge.He will give you, perhaps, not a doctrinal
statement, but a living pattern, which in many respects is better. While he
speaks ofthe knowledge ofGod in Christ, he associatesit with inward
experience. He will testify that he who believeth in the Son of God hath
everlasting life; that he has the life of pardon and peace. He was “deadin
trespassesandsins,” but he is “quickenedtogetherwith Christ.”
2. In its more mature progress. Go to the experiencedChristian. He may be an
unlettered man, perhaps, and be perplexed if you askedhim a definition, or to
expound a difficult passageofthe Holy Scripture; but, under the assistance of
the Spirit of God, he has embracedthe systemof truth itself. In all his course,
the knowledge ofGodin Christ has been inseparable from advancementin
the Divine life.
3. In its consummation. Then we shall “see as we are seen, and know also as
we are known.”

51. Conclusion:
1. Have we acquired this knowledge? Ifwe have not, may I not say, “Some of
you have not the knowledge ofChrist; I speak this to your shame.” Have you
spent twenty, thirty, forty, or more years, yet dark, dead, rebels againstGod?
2. Let me earnestlyexhort you who are in quest of this knowledge ofyour
God, that you seek it in the right way. “Yea, doubtless,” says the Apostle, “and
I count all things but loss for the excellencyofthe knowledge ofChrist Jesus
my Lord.” To know Him is to know the waythat leads to the Father.
3. Let me exhort you to do all you possibly can to promote this knowledge of
God in Christ. We ought to do that on a large scale;we ought to unite in those
truly sublime societieswhichare aiming to extend the knowledge ofGod in
Christ to the uttermost parts of the earth. But if it be valuable for the ends of
the earth, it is valuable for your own homes. If pagan families and vicinities
ought to have it, yours ought to have it. (J. Hannah, D. D.)
Knowledge--powerin religion
(Text, and Hosea 4:1-19;Hos_5:1-15;Hos_6:1-11):--The adage. “knowledgeis
power, is of universal application. That many actcontrary to the truth in their
possessionis no proof that this is not so. That the wickedremain wicked, the
drunkards remain drunkards, the selfishselfish, only proves there is another
powerwithin them which decides their course rather than the dictates of
knowledge.
I. THE IMPORTANCEOF RELIGIOUS KNOWLEDGE RECOGNIZED IN
THE SCRIPTURES,
1. Mosescommandedthe Israelites to teach their children Deuteronomy6:9).
2. The prophets were teachers.
3. The Levitical tribe was not only a tribe of priests, but also of teachers.
4. Christ Himself is a Prophet.

52. 5. The apostles were instruments of salvationby proclaiming its principles.
6. The work of the Church in all ages is to bear witness to the truth--to make
it known.
II. HOW IS KNOWLEDGE POWERIN RELIGION?
1. Necessaryto begin a new life.
2. Knowledge necessaryto the growth of the new life. Life must be fed--
vegetable, animal, intellectual, and spiritual life.
3. Knowledge necessaryto be useful. I do not underrate silent influence of the
faithful. But still the Church needs
III. HOW IS KNOWLEDGE TO BE SECURED?
1. In the early Church it was chiefly oral instruction by preaching and
catechizing.
2. In palmy days of EuropeanProtestantismit was
3. With us the Sabbath Schoollargelytakes the place of these.
4. What are we to do?
Saving knowledge
I. SALVATION CONSISTS IN THE POSSESSIONOF LIFE. It is clearfrom
the previous verse that the two are synonymous, and it is easyto see from the
frequent connectionof the two by Christ and the apostles how accurate it is to
call salvationeternal life. Men as sinners are spiritually dead Ephesians 2:1).
The powerof evil has so workedupon their souls as to make them deaf to the
voice, insensible to the goodness,and indifferent to the claims of God. So far,