The Internal Evidence of the Fourth Gospel 21 fectly natural that St. John should record it. I t must have fallen upon the ears of himself and his fellow-disciples amidst an awe-stricken Silence in which they could hear the very throbbing of their listening hearts. For their very hearts were listening through their ears as the Son poured out His soul unto the Father. It is a rare privilege, and one from which most men would sensitively shrink, to listen even to a fellow-man alone with God. Yet the Lord Jesus in the midst of His disciples laid bare His very soul before His Father, as really as if He had been alone with Him. He prayed with the cross and its awful death full in view, but in the prayer there is no slightest hint of failure or regret, and there is no trace of confession of sin or need of forgive ness. These are all indelible marks of genuineness. I t would have been impossible for a sinful man to conceive such a prayer. But all is consistent with the character of Him who “spake as never man spake”, and could challenge the world to convict Him of sin. With such thoughts in mind let us now look more closely into the words of the prayer itself. “Father, the hour is come; glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee: As ThoU hast given Him power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as Thou hast given Him. And this is life eternal, that they might know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom, Thou hast sent.” Here we have again the calm placing of Himself on a level with the Father in connection with eternal life. And it is not out of place to recall the consistency of this utterance with that often-called “Johannine” saying recorded in S t Matthew and St. Luke: “All things are delivered unto Me of My Father: and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father; save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son willeth to reveal Him.” We read also in St. John 14:6: “No man cometh unto
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