‘Having your loins girt about with truth’ (Eph. vi. 14). Gurnall introduces this section of the text with a brief explanation of the meaning of “truth.” What is truth here? Some by truth understand Christ, who indeed elsewhere is called ‘the truth.’ Yet in this place I conceive it is not properly so understood, because the apostle instanceth in here several pieces and parts of armour, one distinct from another, and Christ cannot so well be said to be a single piece to defend this or that part, as the whole in whom we are complete, compared therefore, Ro. xiii. 14, to the whole suit of armour, ‘Put ye on the Lord Jesus;’ that is, be clothed and harnessed with Christ as a soldier with his armour cap-à-pie. Some by truth mean truth of doctrine; others will have it truth of heart, sincerity. Those I think right that comprise both; and so I shall handle it. Both indeed are required to make the girdle complete. One will not do without the other. It is possible to find good meanings and a kind of sincerity without, yea against the truth. Many follow an error as they [followed]* Absalom in the simplicity of their hearts. Such do ill while they mean well. Good intentions do not more make a good action, than a fair mark makes a good shot by an unskilful archer. God did not like Saul’s zeal when he persecuted the Christian church, though he thought, no question, he did him good service therein. Neither is it enough to have the truth on our side, if we have not truth in our hearts. Jehu was a great stickler against idolatry, but kicked down all again by his hypocrisy. Both then are necessary; sincerity to propound a right end, and knowledge of the word of truth to direct us in the right way to that end. —William Gurnall, The Christian in Complete Armour (Banner of Truth Trust, 2002), 1:291.* I have inserted this word because it seems as if its omission is a typo. In any case, it’s the only way I can make sense of it. See 2 Samuel 15:11 (KJV).

Could Jesus get sick? The question came up in a panel discussion during the 2010 Ligonier West Coast Conference last week. The question was secondary to another on the humanity of Jesus. Sproul had made it clear that, while Jesus was fully man, he was not a fallen man, and while sin is the universal condition of fallen humanity, it is not a necessary condition for humanness. Therefore, Jesus’ sinlessness did not diminish his humanity. The panelists, including Dr. Sproul (of whom it had been said, “he knows everything”), batted the question of Jesus’ immune system around a bit without giving a conclusive answer. I suppose, then, that it might seem impertinent for a punk like me to propose an answer, but that has never stopped me before, so at this point I will throw out my opinion. You may feel free to throw it out, too. You have likely heard it said, based on Isaiah 53:2, that Jesus was a homely fellow. I disagree with that assessment. The most we can draw from that verse regarding the appearance of Jesus is that he was, to human eyes, no more than ordinary. He would not stand out in a crowd; you would not see him in a blue jeans ad or on a poster in a teenage girl’s bedroom. On the other hand, it is highly unlikely that he was ugly. I base that opinion on what he came to be: the Lamb of God. Jesus was the perfect sacrifice, the final Passover Lamb. What do we read of that lamb? It was to be “unblemished” (Exodus 12:5). In fact, that was always the requirement of Old Testament sacrifices (Leviticus 22:17–25). Malachi 1:6ff specifically denounced priests who brought defective sacrifices to the altar. Leviticus 21:16ff requires that the priests themselves — and Jesus is our High Priest (Hebrews, beginning to end) — be without blemish. Getting back to the question of illness, then, we have a sacrifice that was without blemish, and a priest without defect. The Levitical sacrifices were only as perfect as the discernment of those who brought them. It is unlikely, to say the least, that any lamb judged perfect by human eyes was perfectly perfect. But Jesus was not chosen by human eyes. God the Father chose and prepared his perfect Lamb to be the perfect sacrifice, and his perception is more than skin deep. Therefore, Jesus would have been without defect throughout. His perfection would have included his entire physiology, including his organs and immune system. He, the last Adam (1 Corinthians 15:5), would have been like the first Adam, pre-fall, untouched by sin in any way. Therefore, I do not believe Jesus could have gotten sick. Is this hard to believe? It shouldn’t be. After all, Jesus was, and is, the creator and sovereign Lord of all creation. He ruled the weather (Matthew 8:23–27, cf. Mark 4:37ff, Luke 8:22–25). He ruled the plant kingdom (Matthew 21:18–19, cf. Mark 11:12–14, 19–21). He commanded animals and demons (Matthew 8:27ff, cf. Mark 5:2–13). He controlled the actions of men against him (Luke 4:28–30; John 10:17–18, 39). He killed diseases of all kinds in others. No creature could resist him, or touch him without his permission. Is it so difficult to believe that bacteria and viruses would have no power over him? This in no way diminishes his humanity; it only separates him from fallen humanity. And that is exactly the kind of man God required to atone for our sins.

I was glad when they said to me, “Let us go to the house of the Lord.” Petitionary Hymns Poem XXIII. Augustus Toplady (1740–1778) Jesus, thy light impart    And lead me in thy path; I have an unbelieving heart,    But thou canst give me faith. The work in me fulfill,    Which mercy hath begun; I have a proud rebellious will,    But thou canst melt it down. Sin on my heart is wrote,    I am throughout impure; But my disease, oh Lord, is not    Too hard for thee to cure. The darkness of my mind,    Lies open to thy sight; Jesus, I am by nature blind,    But thou canst give me light. Send down thy Holy Ghost,    To cleanse and fill with peace; For O, my inward parts thou know’st    Are very wickedness. Thy love all power hath,    Its power in me exert; And give me living active faith,    That purifies the heart. Unrival’d reign within,    My only sovereign be, O crucify the man of sin,    And form thyself in me. Thy blood’s renewing might,    Can make the foulest clean; Can wash the Ethiopian white,       And change the leopards skin. That, Lord, can bring me nigh,    And wipe my sins away; Can lift my abject soul on high,    And call me into day. Fulfill thy gracious word,    And shew my guilt forgiv’n; Bid me embrace my dying Lord,    And mount with him to Heav’n. —The Complete Works of Augustus Toplady (Sprinkle Publications, 1987). The Gospel According to John Christ Heals the Blind Man 9 As He passed by, He saw a man blind from birth. 2 And His disciples asked Him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?” 3 Jesus answered, “It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him. 4 We must work the works of Him who sent Me as long as it is day; night is coming when no one can work. 5 While I am in the world, I am the Light of the world.” 6 When He had said this, He spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and applied the clay to his eyes, 7 and said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which is translated, Sent) So he went away and washed, and came back seeing. 8 Therefore the neighbors, and those who previously saw him as a beggar, were saying, “Is not this the one who used to sit and beg?” 9 Others were saying, “This is he,” still others were saying, “No, but he is like him.” He kept saying, “I am the one.” 10 So they were saying to him, “How then were your eyes opened?” 11 He answered, “The man who is called Jesus made clay, and anointed my eyes, and said to me, ‘Go to Siloam and wash’; so I went away and washed, and I received sight.” 12 They said to him, “Where is He?” He said, “I do not know.” The chapter we now begin records one of the few great works of Christ which St. John has reported. It tell us how our Lord gave sight to a man who had been “blind from his birth.” Here, as elsewhere in this Gospel, we find the circumstances of the miracle narrated with peculiar fullness, minuteness, and particularity. Here too, as elsewhere, we find the narrative rich in spiritual lessons.    We should observe, first, in this passage, how much sorrow sin has brought into the world. A sorrowful case is brought before us. We are told of a man “who was blind from his birth.” A more serious affliction can hardly be conceived. Of all the bodily crosses that can be laid on man, without taking away life, none perhaps is greater than the loss of sight. It cuts us off from some of the greatest enjoyments of life. It shuts us up within a narrow world of our own. It makes us painfully helpless and dependent on others. In fact, until men lose their eyesight, they never fully realize its value.    Now blindness, like every other bodily infirmity, is one of the fruits of sin. If Adam had never fallen, we cannot doubt that people would never have been blind, or deaf, or mdumb. The many ills that flesh is heir to, the countless pains, and diseases, and physical defects to which we are all liable, came in when the curse came upon the earth. “By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin.” (Rom. v. 12.)    Let us learn to hate sin with a godly hatred, as the root of more than half of our cares and sorrows. Let us fight against it, mortify it, crucify it, and abhor it both in ourselves and others. There cannot be a clearer proof that man is a fallen creature than the fact that he can love sin and take pleasure in it.    We should observe, secondly, in this passage, what a solemn lesson Christ gives us about the use of opportunities. He says to the disciples who asked Him about the blind man, “I must work while it is called to-day: the night cometh, when no man can work.”    That saying was eminently true when applied to our Lord Himself. He knew well that his own earthly ministry would only last three years altogether, and knowing this He diligently redeemed the time. He let slip no opportunity of doing works of mercy, and attending to His Father’s business. Morning, noon, and night He was always carrying on the work which the Father gave Him to do. It was His food and drink to do His Father’s will, and to finish His work. His whole life breathed one sentiment,—“I must work: the night cometh, when no man can work.”    The saying is one which should be remembered by all professing Christians. The life that we now live in the flesh is our day. Let us take care that we use it well, for the glory of God and the good of our souls. Let us work out our salvation with fear and trembling, while it is called to-day. There is no work nor labour in the grave, toward which we are all fast hastening. Let us pray, and read, and keep our Sabbaths holy, and hear God’s Word, and do good in our generation, like men who never forget that “the night is at hand.” Our time is very short. Our daylight will soon be gone. Opportunities once lost can never be retrieved. A second lease of life is granted to no man. Then let us resist procrastination as we would resist the devil. Whatever our hand findeth to do, let us do it with our might. “The night cometh, when no man can work.”    We should observe, thirdly, in this passage, what different means Christ used in working miracles on different occasions. In healing the blind man He might, if He had thought fit, have merely touched Him with his finger, or given command with His tongue. But He did not rest content with doing so. We are told that “He spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and He anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay.” In all these means of course there was no inherent healing virtue. But for wise reasons the Lord was pleased to use them.    We need not doubt that in this, as in every other action of our Lord, there is an instructive lesson. It teaches us, we may well believe, that the Lord of heaven and earth will not be tied down to the use of any one means or instrumentality. In conferring blessings on man, He will work in His own way, and will allow no one to prescribe to Him. Above all, it should teach those who have received anything at Christ’s hands, to be careful how they measure other men’s experience by their own. Have we been healed by Christ, and made to see and live? Let us thank God for it, and be humbled. But let us beware of saying that no other man has been healed, except he has been brought to spiritual life in precisely the same manner. The great question is,—“Are the eyes of our understanding opened? Do we see? Have we spiritual life?”—Enough for us if the cure is effected and health restored. If it is, we must leave it to the great Physician to choose the instrument, the means, and the manner,—the clay, the touch, or the command.    We should observe, lastly, in this passage, the almighty power that Christ holds in His hands. We see Him doing that which in itself was impossible. Without medicines He cures an incurable case. He actually gives eyesight to one who was born blind.    Such a miracle as this is meant to teach an old truth, which we can never know too well. It shows us that Jesus the Saviour of sinners “has all power in heaven and earth.” Such mighty works could never have been done by one that was merely man. In the cure of this blind man we see nothing less than the finger of God.    Such a miracle, above all, is meant to make us hopeful about our own souls and the souls of others. Why should we despair of salvation while we have such a Saviour? Where is the spiritual disease that He cannot take away? He can open the eyes of the most sinful and ignorant, and make them see things they never saw before. He can send light into the darkest heart, and cause blindness and prejudice to pass away.    Surely, if we are not saved, the fault will be all our own. There lives at God’s right hand One who can heal us if we apply to Him. Let us take heed lest those solemn words are found true of us,—“Light has come into the world: but men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.” “Ye will not come to Me that ye might have life.” (John iii. 19; 5:40) —J. C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on the Gospels (Baker Books, 2007). Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Free RC! I have recently come into possession of several copies of The Holiness of God by R. C. Sproul, which I will be giving away over the next several weeks. Winners will be chosen by lottery, and all you need do to enter is send me an email that includes your name and — here is the catch — that you follow this blog by one of three methods: RSS, Twitter, or Facebook. (If you’re tempted to lie about it to win a copy, I won’t be checking up on you, but perhaps you should read this excerpt before entering.) Just make sure the subject of your email says “The Holiness of God Giveaway 1.” Entries will be accepted through next Friday (April 2), and the winner will be notified by email. Another giveaway will be announced next Saturday (and the next, and the next . . .), so there will be multiple chances to win. And speaking of R. C. Sproul, the 2010 Ligonier West Coast Conference is currently live streaming here. Update: Important! You must include your subscription information, i.e. RSS, Twitter, or Facebook. If the subject line of your email does not say “The Holiness of God Giveaway 1,” I might miss it and it might not find its way into the drawing.

Our Fridays are dedicated to the promotion of liberty. It has been a sad week in American politics. Liberty has taken a beating unlike any I’ve seen in my lifetime. The Constitution has been wadded up and tossed in the trash, and it remains to be seen if it can be salvaged. It’s almost enough to make me lose my sense of humor. Almost, but not quite . . . Zombies

John 5:20 “For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself is doing; and the Father will show Him greater works than these, so that you will marvel. 21 For just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son also gives life to whom He wishes. 22 For not even the Father judges anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son, 23 so that all will honor the Son even as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him. 24 Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.” Do Christians, Jews, and Muslims all worship the same god? Early last year, we read John Piper’s answer from God Is the Gospel. Today, we’ll see what Calvin says. From his exposition of John:    That all men may honor the Son. This clause sufficiently confirms the suggestion . . . that when it is said that God reigns in the person of Christ, this does not mean that he reposes in heaven, as indolent kings are wont to do, but because in Christ he manifests his power and shows himself to be present. For what else is the meaning of these words, that all men may honor the Son, but that the Father wishes to be acknowledged and worshipped in the Son? Our duty, therefore, is to seek God the Father in Christ, to behold his power in Christ, and to worship him in Christ. For, as immediately follows, he who honoureth not the Son deprives God of the honor which is due to him. All admit that we ought to worship God, and this sentiment, which is natural to us, is deeply rooted in our hearts, so that no man dares absolutely to refuse to God the honor which is due to him; yet the minds of men lose themselves in going out of the way to seek God. Hence so many pretended deities, hence so many perverse modes of worship. We shall never, therefore, find the true God but in Christ, nor shall we ever worship Him aright but by kissing the Son, as David tells us, (Ps. ii. 12;) for, as John elsewhere declares, He who hath not the Son hath not the Father, (1 John ii. 23.)    Mahometans and Jews do indeed adorn with beautiful and magnificent titles the God whom they worship; but we ought to remember that the name of God, when it is separated from Christ, is nothing else than a vain imagination. Whoever then desires to have his worship approved by the true God, let him not turn aside from Christ. Nor was it otherwise with the Fathers under the Law; for though they beheld Christ darkly under shadows, yet never did God reveal himself out of Christ. But now, since Christ has been manifested in the flesh and appointed to be King over us, the whole world must bend the knee to him, in order to obey God; for the Father having made him sit at his right hand, he who forms a conception of God without Christ takes away the half of him. —John Calvin, Calvin’s Commentaries Volume XVII, Commentary on the Gospel according to John, Volume I (Baker Books, 2009), 201–202.