Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2677
“It is the spirit that quickens; the flesh profits nothing.” John 6:63.
To a casual reader, it looks as if the meaning of this passage lay upon the very surface, but he who has studied the chapter carefully has discovered that it is a sentence replete with many difficulties as to the exact interpretation of it. I shall not, however, waste your time by entering into any critical discussion of it, but shall only try to give you simply what I believe to be the mind of the Spirit, as uttered by the lips of Jesus in this passage. And after I have done that, I shall then revert to what I shall call the meaning which any person would give to it who is not a diligent and careful student of Scripture. That meaning being true, although not the special Truth of God taught in this passage, I shall briefly enlarge upon it.
“It is the spirit that quickens; the flesh profits nothing.” I suppose there is not a man in the world who could form any intelligent idea of what a spirit is. It is very easy for persons to define a spirit by saying what it is not, but I question whether there is, or ever could be, any man who could form any idea of what it is. We sometimes talk about seeinga spirit—ignorant persons in ages gone by—and some living now in benighted villages talk about seeing spirits by night. They must know that such talk is a contradiction. Matter can be seen, but a spirit, if it clothed itself in any light substance, could not even then be seen—it would only be the substance that would be visible! The spirit itself is a thing which can neither be tasted, handled, seen, nor discerned in any way whatever by our senses, for if it could thus be perceived, there would then be proof positive that it was not a spirit at all, but that it belonged to the material realm. We divide all things into matter and spirit. And whatever can be recognized by the senses in any way, is matter, depend on it. A spirit is itself a thing too subtle to be either seen or in any other way perceived by the senses, so I repeat what I said just now, that I suppose there is no man living, and that there never will be any man in this mortal state who will be able to accurately define a spirit so as to say what it is, though he may be able to say what it is not.
Now, there is a region where there are spirits dwelling without any bodies being connected with them. It is certain that, in the world to come, in that state which now intervenes between the death of the saints and the day of the resurrection, they are dwelling before the Throne of God in a disembodied state—pure spirits, without any corporeal form whatever. It is quite certain that the saints before the Throne have no semblance of bodily shape whatever. They are pure spirits—beings whose substance we cannot imagine—purely immaterial, as they are also immaculate. But, on earth, you can find no such thing as a pure spirit. We are all spirits in bodies and, somehow, from the fact that wherever we find souls and spirits, they are always found in bodies, we are very apt to confuse bodies and spirits together. But let us always understand that bodies and spirits are distinct things and though it has pleased God, in this world, never to make a spirit without making a house for it to dwell in, called the body, yet the body is not the spirit. “It is the spirit that quickens; the flesh profits nothing.”
You will easily perceive the truth of this passage if you will recollect that, in man’s body, no one can tell where the life is situated. In vain the surgeon lays the body on the table and dissects it—he will find life neither in the brain nor in the heart. He may cut the body in pieces as he pleases, but he will not find anything that he can lay hold upon, tangible and real, and say, “That is life.” He can see all the effects and evidences of life. He can watch the various parts of the body
moving. He can behold all the appearances of life which are caused by a supernatural something, but he cannot see life. That is altogether beyond his skill and, after all his searching, he must lay down his scalpel and say at once, “There now, the task is all over. There is a spirit that quickens this body, but in my search after life, this flesh profits me nothing. I might as well search for a soul within a stone, or within one of the pillars that support this house, as search for a soul within mere flesh and blood if I look for something which I can see, which I can lay hold of, or which, by either taste, sight, smelling, or any other sense, I can distinguish and can designate as being a spirit.”
So, Brothers and Sisters, this illustration just brings me to the Truth of God that is taught in our text. We are here assembled, at this moment, spirits, souls. Here we are, also, bodies, but these bodies are not ourselves—they are the houses in which we live. I question whether there is any man who can define what he, himself, is. The most that any man can say is, “I am. I know I have an existence, but what kind of thing my spirit is, I do not know, I cannot tell. I have no knowledge of what it is. I feel it. I know it moves my body. I feel its outward manifestations. I am certain of my existence. But what I am, I know not. God alone can say.” “I AM THAT I AM,” is comprehensible only to God Himself. Man is a being incomprehensible to himself and though the Lord may allow him to say, “By the Grace of God I am what I am,” he cannot tell what he really is—he cannot fully comprehend his own existence!