We Beheld His Glory # 72

John 20

After having read this chapter of John, we should immediately add Hebrews 13:20:

"Now the God of peace, who brought again from the dead the great shepherd of the sheep by the blood of the eternal covenant, even our Lord Jesus, make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is well-pleasing in his sight, though Jesus Christ ..."

We are nearly at the end of this record, and therefore we would expect to find its message and content embodied in some kind of definite, inclusive summary. And so it is.

In accordance with prophecy, the Shepherd has been smitten and the sheep have been scattered (Zechariah 13:7). That scattering meant that they had been "offended." "All ye shall be offended in me this night" (Matthew 26:31). The offense, or stumbling, was due to a false expectation, a wrong basis of hope.

This was mainly the expectation and hope of something temporal, earthly, tangible, in which they would have personal interest and position.

That was all shattered and lay in ruins. The "sheep" presented a sorry picture while He lay in the tomb!

But the Great Shepherd has returned, and in this chapter we see Him reconstituting everything on the eternal basis. First He moves hither and thither, regathering to Himself the scattered and bewildered sheep.

Then He takes pains to reassure them that it is He Himself who is alive. But, while the same, there is a difference; a constitutional change, in which there is a combination of reality and mystery; a new kind of Man; humanity, but not as we know it.

He lingers long - forty days - to establish His identity, to leave them in no doubt as to His reality; and yet to leave the indelible impression of His otherness.

All this undoubtedly was meant to give meaning to the Church of which they were the nucleus. This chapter is a beautiful and concrete presentation of what the Church is in principle, according to God's mind.

1. The Church - Transition from the Natural to the Spiritual

The Church is the aggregate of those - 
a. who have been completely disillusioned as to this world and as to any hope for it as it is; who have come to an end of all selfish and personal ambitions and interests in the Kingdom of God; who have known that disintegration in themselves which comes from trusting in their own sufficiency; and
b. who have been gathered up and integrated upon a completely other basis - a spiritual and heavenly one.

2. The Church - A Witness to the Resurrection

The Church is an exclusive witness to the Resurrection of Christ in its own experience, and in its very constitution. He confined, and always does confine, the revelation of Himself as the risen Lord to the "heirs of salvation"; it is never given to the world in general.

The Church is constituted a spiritually corporate company or "Body," a heavenly people (by His ascending to the Father as Head, verse 17) - very real but yet inscrutable. There is reality and mystery in the true Church. This mystery or inscrutability is its strength. Remove it and seek to be popular, and you destroy its authority. This is not mystery in the sense of being "mysterious," abstruse, occult, and so on, but possessing a power, a vitality, an endurance, a wisdom, a life, which is not of this creation but of another.

3. The Church - Peace Through His Blood

The Church is constituted upon the basis of the peace which was made by the blood of His Cross (verses 19, 21, 26; Colossians 1:10). "The God of peace ... brought ... from the dead the great shepherd ... by the blood of the eternal covenant."

That title "the God of peace" is used by Paul in relation to the whole matter of righteousness upon which justification rests (Romans 15:33, 16:20). In the same great argument he speaks of the Church in its corporate oneness (12:4, 5). The very existence of the Church demands this great value and effect of the blood. It rests upon an eternal covenant, made and sealed thereby. There is no Church of God apart from that which he purchased with His own blood (Acts 20:28). His Church rests  upon His peace - the peace of reconciliation. There should be no conflict or controversy between the Church of God, or God and the Church. The Church should always mean the place of peace for all its members. So the repeated announcement of peace by our Lord in this chapter carries with it the great and fundamental work of His Cross, and is not just a nice word to allay fears and agitation at His appearances. It links back with chapter 14.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with# 73 - "The Church and the Government of the Holy Spirit")