Tillotson: what would Abraham do?

Thursday, September 22, 2016
Meditation:
    [Jesus:] “I know that you are offspring of Abraham; yet you seek to kill me because my word finds no place in you. I speak of what I have seen with my Father, and you do what you have heard from your father.”
    They answered him, “Abraham is our father.” Jesus said to them, “If you were Abraham’s children, you would be doing what Abraham did, but now you seek to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. This is not what Abraham did.”
    —John 8:37-40 (ESV)
Quotation:
    Because they were prejudiced against the meanness of our Saviour’s birth and condition, and had upon false grounds (though, as they thought, upon the infallibility of tradition, and of Scripture interpreted by tradition) entertained quite other notions of the Messiah from what he was really to be; because they were proud, and thought themselves too wise to learn of him: and because his doctrine of humility, and self-denial, did thwart their interest, and bring down their authority and credit among the people; therefore they set themselves against him with all their might, opposing his doctrine, and blasting his reputation and persecuting him to the death; and all this while did bear up themselves with a conceit of the antiquity and privileges of their church, and their profound knowledge in the laws of God, and a great external show of piety and devotion, and an arrogant presence and usurpation of being the only church and people of God in th e world.
    ... John Tillotson (1630-1694), Works of Dr. John Tillotson, v. IV, London: J. F. Dove, for R. Priestley, 1820, Sermon LXXXII, p. 524-525 (see the book)
    See also John 8:37-40; 5:39-40; 16:2
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, prevent me from using You to my own ends. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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