Last Sunday’s lessons emphasized the tension between the Risen Christian and the world in which he is a “stranger and pilgrim.” Today we learn that unworldliness is not an unreasoning opposition, but a necessity for those who belong to a “Kingdom not of this world.” We are the world’s nonconformists because we are God’s conformists, and because to love the world as it is opposed to God and His Truth is to hate the Father. The Sunday of nonconformity is therefore followed by a Sunday of conformity.
The Will of God is the Will of a Father, and therefore of One Who is in His very nature a Giver. He is the source from Whom comes “every perfect gift.” He is “the Father of Lights,” both material: sun, stars, of health, homes, friends, pleasures, beauties. And He is the Father of all the true light that exists within, of the light of truth, holiness, reason, joy, love, hope, grace, glory. There is no light of which He is not the Father “in Whom is no darkness at all.”
His will does not change. The Father is unceasingly the same. His will begat us at the first, making us partakers of His own image. The life He gave was His own life, and is in us a life of sonship. When by misuse of will that blessed relationship had on our side been marred, and we had ceased to be sons both in feeling and character, indeed, ceased to be truly human, His will was still unchanged towards us, and He begat us again to a life of sonship through “the Word of truth,” by Christ the Word.
He extends this grace through the Sacraments, which, received in faith, bring us further into sonship. The Church is also a creation of the will of God, created anew unto good works, as the firstfruits of the new heavens and earth and as the earthly Body of the Only-begotten.
Our duty in light of all this is first of all “to be swift to hear,” in order that we may learn God’s will, and to be silent until we have learned it. Too often we speak without knowing; speak even without thinking. And we are to be slow to wrath so that we do not negate His Will which slowly but surely makes for righteousness.
We are to put away every sinful lust and passion from our own hearts, in order that we may be able to welcome in readiness and submission “the implanted Word” which is able to save the soul.
In our Gospel today we see the influence of the Spirit on the will. The Savior comforts His disciples, saddened by the prospect of His departure. All their thoughts were concerned with themselves and their imminent loss. He teaches them that this loss is in reality gain, since by His Ascension, the Spirit, Who has been with them, is enabled to be present inthem. He is to be their Divine Helper, Comforter, and Advocate- their refuge and protection.
Our Lord seems to say to them, “Present the story and the truth of it as you have seen it, and the Holy Spirit will convince those called of its truth, acting upon their hearts.”
He will convince men of three great truths:
Of Sinby showing the world that it is in the wrong, and that it has crucified the Lord of Glory. To have seen perfect goodness, and to have rejected it, is the touchstone that reveals the sinful heart. Not to believe in Christ shows a perverted will which loves worldliness more than God.
Of Righteousness.The world has long asked what is righteousness, and what is it to be righteous. The Spirit gives the answer, that righteousness is the likeness of Christ; “to be righteous as He is righteous.” The disciples would no longer be able to present Christ to the world in visible form as the ideal of righteousness, but what they could not do the Spirit would do as Christ’s Advocate.
Finally, the Spirit will convince the world not merely of a judgment to come, but of one that has come already. “The prince of this world has been cast out” as a pretender by the coming of the true King. The world’s false ideals have been condemned by the very presence of the true.
The darkness has been revealed by the advent of the light, and from now on to reject Christ is to “prefer the darkness rather than the light.” The Spirit will manifest this truth to the conscience, and so influence the will, to lead to action in accordance with the inward convictions.
In the Church, our will has been already convinced and won over to the side of Christ, but Christ once accepted must be ever more fully known.
So the Spirit presents Christ to the heart and mind of the Church for more perfect realization, enlightening the understanding to perceive, molding the heart to love, persuading the will to obey. He does not work by compulsion but by “leading” gradually, patiently, variously, yet surely, into “all the truth” in all its scope and richness.
Our Collect is a perfect prayer for this conformity to the will of God which we seek. The source of our conformity to Christ is not in ourselves. In our fallenness, we will and desire anything but what we should, striving to be our own masters. Our wills and affections need “ordering,” to be brought back again under the rule of God, and led in the direction which He desires. We need to be made “of one mind and will”, the task of God’s Spirit, and of Him alone.
We pray for such conformity of will that we may love what God commands, and of affection that we may desire what God promises, of grace and glory.
Only this conformity can keep us safe and joyful “among the sundry and manifold changes of the world,” securely anchored on Him “with Whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.” In communion with Him the will finds its fixed point, and the affections find their satisfaction “where true joys are to be found.”