any mere zealous man could have assumed. His conduct claimed a regard above and beyond that which might be paid to any ordinary reformer of morals. The Jews understood it as a claim to a Divine mission, and required Him to give a sign that He was sent from God. Our Lord showed them by and bye many wonderful works, but His miracles were not to be wrought at the bidding of curious and carnal men. Now therefore He contents Himself with telling them of a sign that shall be. "Destroy," that is, Ye shall destroy, or Though ye destroy, this Temple. Our Lord by this figure of the Temple, which they had so desecrated, signified His own Body, which they were about, so far as in them lay, to destroy; and intimated that by its resurrection he would furnish the most perfect proof of His Divine mission. His words the Jews, as usual, understood literally. They looked merely on the surface, not pausing to consider whether any deeper meaning lay below. Many a mistake still arises from men's taking literally, what in the Scripture is spoken figuratively. These words of our Lord were misquoted afterwards at His mock trial, and made a matter of false witness and accusation against Him. Even as He hung upon the Cross, with malignant mockery, they cast the same in His teeth.2 There was this difference between the Disciples and the Jews. The former were indeed long ignorant, and had most inadequate ideas of their Lord; but they remembered His words; and when the event fulfilled the prediction, their faith was confirmed. They recognised those Scriptures of the Old Testament which referred to His resurrection.3 They felt the force of His word. Whereas the Jews disregarded the voice of their own prophets, which were read in the Synagogue every Sabbath day, no less than the words of Him who spake as never man spake. The miracles, however, wrought upon this occasion, but which have not been recorded, had the effect of convincing some among them as to the justice of His claims. But their faith was not worth much, and Christ could not place confidence in them. He 1 St. Matt. xxvi. 60, 61; Ps. xxxv. 11. 2 St. Matt. xxvii. 39, 40. 3 Such as Ps. xvi. Compare Acts ii. 25-31. See also Hosea vi. 2. knew what was in them, for he knew what was in all men.1 He needed not to be informed concerning any man's character or motives, for He could read every man's most secret thoughts. This is what God alone can do, and Christ could do it because He was God. This thought of His intimate acquaintance with the secrets of our hearts, we may apply both for our comfort and for our admonition; to encourage us in our duty, to scare us from sin. He knows our unseen conflicts with self, and all our silent efforts in His service. And He knows our secret faults; how a man "flattereth himself in his own sight until his abominable sin be found out." Let this thought then of our ever present Lord be ever present with us, to keep us equally from presumption and from despair. There is nothing, whether of secret service or of secret sinfulness, but shall one day be brought to light, to our gladness or to our shame. LXII. St. John iii. 1-5. There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews: the same came to Jesus by night, and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest, except God be with him. Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. Unlike his countrymen, and especially his colleagues, Nicodemus was a man willing to be taught. A member of 1 Consider the illustrations of this knowledge of the hearts of men in this same Gospel, v. 42; vi. 64; x. 14, 27; xxi. 17. the Sanhedrim, or Council of the Jews, his public position, no less than his natural temperament, made him cautious about committing himself. So he came to Jesus by night; and the Lord, who ever encourages good beginnings, made him welcome even so. Nicodemus began the conversation by expressing the conviction of the class to which he belonged that Jesus was "a teacher come from God." "We know," he says, using the language of authority; and this aggravates their sin in afterwards persecuting the Saviour. Had the rest of the Pharisees, with Nicodemus, acted up to their convictions, they would have found with him that Jesus was even more than they imagined. Nicodemus had come to inquire of this inspired Teacher about the expected Messiah, and the kingdom which God, they supposed, was about to set up under Him.2 At this outset of the conversation our Lord arrests the mind of His inquirer, informing Him of what is necessary on the very threshold of that kingdom. In Eastern phrase (subjects in those countries being kept at a distance from their sovereign) to see the face of the king means to be admitted into his presence, to enjoy his favour and society. So here to "see" the kingdom of God, the Church of Christ, is to participate in it And this our Lord tells Nicodemus cannot be except one be born again, after a manner which He proceeds to explain presently. Nicodemus probably knew that our Lord was speaking here after a spiritual manner; so that there seems to be something like an attempt on his part to reduce to an absurdity this statement of a second birth. Our Lord, without taking offence at 6 1 This was a favourite formula with the Pharisees. St. John ix. 24, 29. 2 So Beza. St. Mark i. 14, 15. 3 St. Matt. v. 8; Rev. xxii. 4; Gen. xliii. 3; Ex. x. 28; 2 Sa. iii. 13; xiv. 24, 28, 32; Esth. i. 14; Job xxxiii. 17; Is. xxxiii. 17; St. John xvii. 24; and v. 36 below. See St. John viii. 51. Only the spiritually regenerate can discern that kingdom which cometh not with observation, but is spiritually discerned. St. Luke xviii. 20, 21; 1 Cor. ii. 10-15. Such only can discern the signs of this 5 4 time, and see the reign of Christ already begun on earth. Dan. ii. 44 ; St. John ix. 40, 41. Any or every one-The word man, on which certain Anti-pædobaptists have built a very frail argument, does not exist in the original. Even however were the word expressed, it would by no means countenance their conclusion. Our Lord, it is evident, is speaking generally, of the genus homo. 6 Grotius cites a Rabbi who calls proselytes new-born, this conduct on the part of His inquirer, proceeds to explain and amplify His previous statement. To "be born again," as explained by our Lord, is to "be born of water and of the Spirit." Then He refers, in words which could not well be plainer, to that ordinance which He has appointed as introductory into His Church, the means or instrument by which we enter into the Kingdom, Baptism in both its parts; the outward sign, and the inward grace signified; water, and the Holy Ghost. The rite of Baptism was even at that time well known. The Jews, when they received a proselyte from heathenism into their religion, were in the habit of admitting him by a baptism. The baptism of John was undergone by many of the Jews themselves. Our Lord Himself, at least by His Disciples, baptized also.3 But the baptism of John was incomplete. It was with water only. The Baptism of Christ should be also with the Holy Ghost. The baptism of John was introductory to that of Christ, and was only instituted and intended for a brief period; but the Baptism of Christ 1 "For if they be both necessary ingredients, water and the Spirit, then let us provide water, and God will provide the Spirit. If we bring wood to the sacrifice, He will provide a Lamb."-Bp. Taylor, Life of Christ, Discourse vi. part 2. 2 It will be noticed that our Lord changes the expression in v. 5 from that of v. 3; the variation of the word being probably suggested (if we may so speak) by the use of it just before by Nicodemus: q. d. You speak of one's entering into his mother's womb; I tell you how he is to enter into the Kingdom of God. In a corresponding passage, St. John viii. 51, 52, we have in like manner two words, one exegetical of the other, See, Taste; though used by two several parties. Hooker (Eccl. Pol. V. lix. lx.) speaking of the misinterpretation of certain moderns, says :-" For by 'water and the Spirit' we are in that place to understand (as they imagine) no more than if the Spirit alone had been mentioned and water not spoken of... Of all the ancients," he adds, "there is not one to be named that ever did otherwise either expound or allege the place than as implying external baptism. Shall that which hath always received this and no other construction be now disguised with the toy of novelty?" Dr. Wall in his exhaustive History of Infant Baptism (part ii. ch. 6) says:-" Whereas some people have expressed a wonder at St. Austin, that he should hold that all that are baptized are also regenerate,' no man living can read him without perceiving that he uses the word regenerate as another word for baptized, and that this with him should have been an identical proposition, as if one should say now-a-days' all that are baptized are christened.' If some of late days have put a new sense on the word regenerate, how can St. Austin help that? And the Church of England uses the word in the old sense." See Tit. iii. 5. St. John iii. 22, 23, 26; iv. 1, 2. was to be that by which His people should be introduced into His kingdom to the end of time.1 LXIII. THE SAME SUBJECT-continued. St. John iii. 6-8. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit. Our Lord proceeds to reprove the error of His inquirer's question, exposing here the mistake which the Jews were continually making of confounding that which is carnal with that which is spiritual. The Spirit is distinct from the flesh, and so are the products of each. There is a spiritual, as there is a carnal birth. It is of the former that Christ is here speaking, and this was as needful for Nicodemus and his fellow Pharisees as for others. And our Lord proceeds to remind him who had marvelled at this new and spiritual birth, of things likewise marvellous in the world of nature. He reminds him of one of these phenomena, the wind, whose effects are visible enough, while the agent itself remains unseen.3 We hear its sound. 'The Kingdom of God here means the Gospel-Covenant, the Church of Christ, that society which is being made ready unto the second coming of the Lord, when it shall enter upon the fulness of its inheritance, and the grace begun on earth shall be perfected in Heaven. And into this society, covenant, and kingdom, we are introduced at our Baptism. As by our first or natural birth we are born into the world, so by our second, or new and spiritual birth, we are born into 2 The leaves rustle on the |