1. Peter at His Call: From Fear to Faith
A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve (1871), chapter II, “Fishers of Men”. Assigned excerpt. The interpretations are the author’s.
We shall meet with abundant evidence of the crude spiritual condition of the twelve, even long after the period when they were called to follow Jesus, as we proceed with the studies on which we have entered. Meantime we may discover significant indications of the religious immaturity of at least one of the disciples,—Simon, son of Jonas,—in Luke’s account of the incidents connected with his call. Pressed by the multitude who had assembled on the shore of the lake to hear Him preach, Jesus, we read, entered into a ship (one of two lying near at hand), which happened to be Simon’s, and requesting him to thrust out a little from the land, sat down, and taught the people from the vessel. Having finished speaking, Jesus said unto the owner of the boat, “Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught.” Their previous efforts to catch fish had been unsuccessful; but Simon and his brother did as Jesus directed, and were rewarded by an extraordinary take, which appeared to them and their fishing companions, James and John, nothing short of miraculous. Simon, the most impressible and the most demonstrative of the four, gave utterance to his feelings of astonishment by characteristic words and gestures. He fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!”
This exclamation opens a window into the inner man of him who uttered it, through which we can see his spiritual state. We observe in Peter at this time that mixture of good and evil, of grace and nature, which so frequently reappears in his character in the subsequent history. Among the good elements discernible are reverential awe in presence of Divine Power, a prompt calling to mind of sin betraying tenderness of conscience, and an unfeigned self-humiliation on account of unmerited favour. Valuable features of character these; but they did not exist in Peter without alloy. Along with them were associated superstitious dread of the supernatural, and a slavish fear of God. The presence of the former element is implied in the reassuring exhortation addressed to the disciple by Jesus, “Fear not; from henceforth thou shalt catch men.” Slavish fear of God is even more manifest in his own words, “Depart from me, O Lord.” Powerfully impressed with the superhuman knowledge revealed in connection with the great draught of fishes, he regards Jesus for the moment as a supernatural being, and as such dreads Him as one whom it is not safe to be near, especially for a poor sinful mortal like himself. This state of mind shows how utterly unfit Peter is, as yet, to be an apostle of a gospel which magnifies the grace of God even to the chief of sinners. His piety, sufficiently strong and decided, is not of a Christian type; it is legal, one might almost say pagan, in spirit.
The truth of the statement just made may be rendered more apparent by a contrast supplied in another incident from the history of Peter, which occurred towards the close of his disciple-life. It was another fishing scene on the same waters, very like, and also very unlike, that here recorded by Luke. On that occasion Peter and his brethren, by direction of a stranger dimly descried on the shore in the grey morning, caught, as now, a great multitude of fishes. The unusually large draught, taken after a whole night’s toil to no purpose, reminded John of what had happened years before, at that ever-memorable period when he and his brethren were called to be fishers of men, and suggested to him the thought that the stranger on the shore must be the risen Jesus. The beloved disciple communicated his discovery to his friend. And mark the difference between Peter’s behaviour then and now. He shrinks not this time in fear from the presence of the Lord. He has very good reason to do so; for the confession, “I am a sinful man,” would now in his mouth be no pious commonplace, but the feeble inadequate acknowledgment of heinous guilt recently contracted. Yet he has no thought of avoiding or fleeing from Him whom he has personally and grievously injured. On the contrary, it is recorded, that “when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he girt his fisher’s coat unto him, and did cast himself into the sea;” his intent being to swim to the land and embrace his beloved Master. That plunge into the waters reveals a piety now well purged of superstition, and a faith in pardoning grace victorious over guilty fear. Peter now dreads neither divine power nor divine holiness. He can witness a miracle with sobriety and composure, knowing, from long experience, that the wonder-working power of Jesus was ever exercised in intimate alliance with wisdom and love, as a beneficent agent employed to promote the temporal and spiritual well-being of men. And while conscious of being a grievous offender, he fully expects to receive a gracious reception from his injured Master, because he has ever found Him one who overcame evil with good, and forgave not once or seven times, but seventy times seven. He has thus in both respects made a great advance since the time he exclaimed in superstitious terror, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!”
2. Why Jesus Chose Such Men
A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve (1871), chapter IV, “The Twelve”. Assigned excerpt. The interpretations are the author’s.
Such were the men whom Jesus chose to be with Him while He was on this earth, and to carry on His work after He left it. Such were the men whom the church celebrates as the “glorious company of the apostles.” The praise is merited; but the glory of the twelve was not of this world. In a worldly point of view they were a very insignificant company indeed,—a band of poor illiterate Galilean provincials, utterly devoid of social consequence, not likely to be chosen by one having supreme regard to prudential considerations. Why did Jesus choose such men? Was He guided by feelings of antagonism to those possessing social advantages, or of partiality for men of His own class? No; His choice was made in true wisdom. If He chose Galileans mainly, it was not from provincial prejudice against those of the south; if, as some think, He chose two or even four of His own kindred, it was not from nepotism; if He chose rude, unlearned, humble men, it was not because He was animated by any petty jealousy of knowledge, culture, or good birth. If any rabbi, rich man, or ruler had been willing to yield himself unreservedly to the service of the kingdom, no objection would have been taken to him on account of his acquirements, possessions, or titles. The case of Saul of Tarsus, the pupil of Gamaliel, proves the truth of this statement. Even Gamaliel himself would not have been objected to, could he have stooped to become a disciple of the unlearned Nazarene. But, alas! neither he nor any of his order would condescend so far, and therefore the despised One did not get an opportunity of showing His willingness to accept as disciples and choose for apostles such as they were.
The truth is, that Jesus was obliged to be content with fishermen, and publicans, and quondam zealots, for apostles. They were the best that could be had. Those who deemed themselves better were too proud to become disciples, and thereby they excluded themselves from what all the world now sees to be the high honour of being the chosen princes of the kingdom. The civil and religious aristocracy boasted of their unbelief. The citizens of Jerusalem did feel for a moment interested in the zealous youth who had purged the temple with a whip of small cords; but their faith was superficial, and their attitude patronizing, and therefore Jesus did not commit Himself unto them, because He knew what was in them. A few of good position were sincere sympathizers, but they were not so decided in their attachment as to be eligible for apostles. Nicodemus was barely able to speak a timid apologetic word in Christ’s behalf, and Joseph of Arimathea was a disciple “secretly,” for fear of the Jews. These were hardly the persons to send forth as missionaries of the cross—men so fettered by social ties and party connections, and so enslaved by the fear of man. The apostles of Christianity must be made of sterner stuff.
And so Jesus was obliged to fall back on the rustic, but simple, sincere, and energetic men of Galilee. And He was quite content with His choice, and devoutly thanked His Father for giving Him even such as they. Learning, rank, wealth, refinement, freely given up to His service, He would not have despised; but He preferred devoted men who had none of these advantages, to undevoted men who had them all. And with good reason; for it mattered little, except in the eyes of contemporary prejudice, what the social position or even the previous history of the twelve had been, provided they were spiritually qualified for the work to which they were called. What tells ultimately is, not what is without a man, but what is within. John Bunyan was a man of low birth, low occupation, and, up till his conversion, of low habits; but he was by nature a man of genius, and by grace a man of God, and he would have made—he was, in fact—a most effective apostle.
3. Christ’s Argument for Persevering Prayer
A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve (1871), chapter VI, “Teach Us to Pray”. Assigned excerpt. The interpretations are the author’s.
The argument by which Jesus sought to inspire His discouraged disciples with hope and confidence as to the ultimate fulfilment of their desires, is characterized by boldness, geniality, wisdom, and logical force. Its boldness is evinced in the choice of illustrations. Jesus has such confidence in the goodness of His cause, that He states the case as disadvantageously for Himself as possible, by selecting for illustration not good samples of men, but persons rather below than above the ordinary standard of human virtue. A man who, on being applied to at any hour of the night by a neighbour for help in a real emergency, such as that supposed in the parable, or in a case of sudden sickness, should put him off with such an answer as this, “Trouble me not, the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed: I cannot rise and give thee,” would justly incur the contempt of his acquaintances, and become a byword among them for all that is ungenerous and heartless. The same readiness to take an extreme case is observable in the second argument, drawn from the conduct of fathers towards their children. “If a son shall ask bread of any of you”—so it begins. Jesus does not care what father may be selected; He is willing to take any one they please; He will take the very worst as readily as the best; nay, more readily, for the argument turns not on the goodness of the parent, but rather on his want of goodness, as it aims to show that no special goodness is required to keep all parents from doing what would be an outrage on natural affection, and revolting to the feelings of all mankind.
The genial, kindly character of the argument is manifest, from the insight and sympathy displayed therein. Jesus divines what hard thoughts men think of God under the burden of unfulfilled desire; how they doubt His goodness, and deem Him indifferent, heartless, unjust. He shows His intimate knowledge of their secret imaginations by the cases He puts; for the unkind friend and unnatural father, and we may add, the unjust judge, are pictures not indeed of what God is, or of what He would have us believe God to be, but certainly of what even pious men sometimes think Him to be. And He can not only divine, but sympathize. He does not, like Job’s friends, find fault with those who harbour doubting and apparently profane thoughts, nor chide them for impatience, distrust, and despondency. He deals with them as men compassed with infirmity, and needing sympathy, counsel, and help. And in supplying these, He comes down to their level of feeling, and tries to show that, even if things were as they seem, there is no cause for despair. He argues from their own thoughts of God, that they should still hope in Him. “Suppose,” He says in effect, “God to be what you fancy, indifferent and heartless, still pray on: see, in the case I put, what perseverance can effect. Ask as the man who wanted loaves asked, and ye also shall receive from Him who seems at present deaf to your petitions. Appearances, I grant, may be very unfavourable, but they cannot be more so in your case than in that of the petitioner in the parable; and yet you observe how he fared, through not being too easily disheartened.”
Jesus succours the tempted in this argument with such deep fellow-feeling as among other men is attainable only by those who have themselves experienced temptation. Can He, too, have been tempted like as we are with doubts concerning the hearing of His prayers? Yes; here, as in so many other respects, He was like unto His brethren. He had to live by faith as other men, and He knew what it was to wait; and in the days of His flesh, when He was passing through His curriculum of temptation and suffering, He prayed as one whose patience was sorely tried, even with strong crying and tears.
Jesus displays His wisdom in dealing with the doubts of His disciples, by avoiding all elaborate explanations of the causes or reasons of delay in the answering of prayer, and using only arguments adapted to the capacity of persons weak in faith and in spiritual understanding. He does not attempt to show why sanctification is a slow, tedious work, not a momentary act: why the Spirit is given gradually and in limited measure, not at once and without measure. He simply urges His hearers to persevere in seeking the Holy Spirit, assuring them, in spite of trying delay, their desires will be fulfilled in the end. He teaches them no philosophy of waiting on God, but only tells them that they shall not wait in vain.
4. Peter’s Confession: The Christ, the Son of the Living God
A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve (1871), chapter XI, “Current Opinion and Eternal Truth”. Assigned excerpt. The interpretations are the author’s.
How, then, did Jesus receive the report of His disciples? Was He satisfied with these favourable, and in the circumstances really gratifying, opinions current among the people? He was not. He was not content to be put on a level with even the greatest of the prophets. He did not indeed express any displeasure against those who assigned Him such a rank, and He may even have been pleased to hear that public opinion had advanced so far on the way to the true faith. Nevertheless He declined to accept the position accorded. The meek and lowly Son of man claimed to be something more than a great prophet. Therefore He turned to His chosen disciples, as to men from whom He expected a more satisfactory statement of the truth, and pointedly asked what they thought of Him. “But you—whom say ye that I am?”
In this case, as in many others, Simon son of Jonas answered for the company. His prompt, definite, memorable reply to his Master’s question was this: “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
With this view of His person Jesus was satisfied. He did not charge Peter with extravagance, in going so far beyond the opinion of the populace. On the contrary, He entirely approved of what the ardent disciple had said, and expressed His satisfaction in no cold or measured terms. Never, perhaps, did He speak in more animated language, or with greater appearance of deep emotion. He solemnly pronounced Peter “blessed” on account of his faith; He spake for the first time of a church which should be founded, professing Peter’s faith as its creed; He promised that disciple great power in that church, as if grateful to him for being the first to put the momentous truth into words, and for uttering it so boldly amid prevailing unbelief, and crude, defective belief; and He expressed, in the strongest possible terms, His confidence that the church yet to be founded would stand to all ages proof against all the assaults of the powers of darkness.
Simon’s confession, fairly interpreted, seems to contain these two propositions,—that Jesus was the Messiah, and that He was divine. “Thou art the Christ,” said he in the first place, with conscious reference to the reported opinions of the people,—“Thou art the Christ,” and not merely a prophet come to prepare Christ’s way. Then he added: “the Son of God,” to explain what he understood by the term Christ. The Messiah looked for by the Jews in general was merely a man, though a very superior one, the ideal man endowed with extraordinary gifts. The Christ of Peter’s creed was more than man—a superhuman, a divine being. This truth he sought to express in the second part of his confession. He called Jesus Son of God, with obvious reference to the name His Master had just given Himself—Son of man. “Thou,” he meant to say, “art not only what Thou hast now called Thyself, and what, in lowliness of mind, Thou art wont to call Thyself—the Son of man; Thou art also Son of God, partaking of the divine nature not less really than of the human.” Finally, he prefixed the epithet “living” to the divine name, to express his consciousness that he was making a very momentous declaration, and to give that declaration a solemn, deliberate character. It was as if he said: “I know it is no light matter to call any one, even Thee, Son of God, of the One living eternal Jehovah. But I shrink not from the assertion, however bold, startling, or even blasphemous it may seem. I cannot by any other expression do justice to all I know and feel concerning Thee, or convey the impression left on my mind by what I have witnessed during the time I have followed Thee as a disciple.”
5. “Thou Shalt Never Wash My Feet”
A. B. Bruce, The Training of the Twelve (1871), chapter XXI, “The Master Serving”. Assigned excerpt. The interpretations are the author’s.
With which of the twelve Jesus made a beginning we are not informed; but we know, as we might have guessed without being told, who was the first to speak his mind about the singular transaction. When Peter’s turn came, he had so far recovered from the amazement, under whose influence the first washed may have yielded passively to their Lord’s will, as to be capable of reflecting on the indecency of such an inversion of the right relation between master and servants. Therefore, when Jesus came to him, that outspoken disciple asked, in astonishment, “Lord, washest Thou my feet?” His spirit rose in rebellion against the proposal, as one injurious to the dignity of his beloved Lord, and as an outrage upon his own sense of reverence. This impulse of instinctive aversion was by no means discreditable to Peter, and it was evidently not regarded with disapprobation by his Master. The reply of Jesus to his objection is markedly respectful in tone: “What I do,” He said, “thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter;” virtually admitting that the proceeding in question needed explanation, and that Peter’s opposition was, in the first place, perfectly natural. “I acknowledge,” He meant to say, “that my present action is an offence to the feelings of reverence which you rightly cherish towards me. Nevertheless, suffer it. I do this for reasons which you do not comprehend now, but which you shall understand ere long.”
Had Peter been satisfied with this apologetic reply, his conduct would have been entirely free from blame. But he was not content, but persisted in opposition after Jesus had distinctly intimated His will, and vehemently and stubbornly exclaimed: “Thou shalt never wash my feet!” The tone here changes utterly. Peter’s first word was the expression of sincere reverence; his second is simply the language of unmitigated irreverence and downright disobedience. He rudely contradicts his Master, and at the same time, we may add, flatly contradicts himself. His whole behaviour on this occasion presents an odd mixture of moral opposites: self-abasement and self-will, humility and pride, respect and disrespect for Jesus, to whom he speaks now as one whose shoe-latchet he is not worthy to unloose, and anon as one to whom he might dictate orders. What a strange man! But, indeed, how strange are we all!
Peter having so changed his tone, Jesus found it needful to alter His tone too, from the apologetic mildness of the first reply to that of magisterial sternness. “If I wash thee not,” He said gravely, “thou hast no part with me;” meaning, “Thou hast taken up a most serious position, Simon Peter; the question at issue being simply, Are you or are you not to be admitted into my kingdom—to be a true disciple, and to have a true disciple’s reward?”
On a surface view, it is difficult to see how this could be the state of the question. One is tempted to think that Jesus was indulging in exaggeration, for the purpose of intimidating a refractory disciple into compliance with His will. If we reject this method of interpretation as incompatible with the character of the speaker and the seriousness of the occasion, we are thrown back on the inquiry, What does washing in this statement mean? Evidently it signifies more than meets the ear, more than the mere literal washing of the feet; and is to be regarded as a symbol of the washing of the soul from sin, or still more comprehensively, and in our opinion more correctly, as representing all in Christ’s teaching and work which would be compromised by the consistent carrying out of the principle on which Peter’s opposition to the washing of his feet by Jesus was based. On either supposition, the statement of Jesus was true: in the former case obviously; in the latter not so obviously, but not less really, as we proceed to show.
Observe, then, what was involved in the attitude assumed by Peter. He virtually took his stand on these two positions: that he would admit of nothing which seemed inconsistent with the personal dignity of his Lord, and that he would adopt as his rule of conduct his own judgment in preference to Christ’s will; the one position being involved in the question, Dost Thou wash my feet? the other in the resolution, Thou shalt never wash my feet. In other words, the ground taken up by this disciple compromised the whole sum and substance of Christianity; the former principle sweeping away Christ’s whole state and experience of humiliation, and the latter not less certainly sapping the foundation of Christ’s lordship.