John 12:26, commentary and pictures

Spoken shortly before His betrayal and death when His soul was troubled and the Father answered His prayer with a voice from heaven, He laid down the one rule for His servants that serving Him means following Him. Following Him requires self-denial and self-sacrifice, bearing the cross in obedience even at the cost of reputation, position, earthly interest, and life itself. It means dying to self by surrendering individuality and natural traits that separate from Him, serving in His selfless way rather than for selfish ends, and daily learning His meekness and lowliness by looking to Him in faith and living as He lived. Whoever so follows Him will dwell with Him in His Father's presence and house. The Father will honor every such servant with eternal life in His kingdom, sharing Christ's glory, throne, joy, and crown, and He already blesses faithful servants in this life with wisdom, power, and strength to bring souls to Him.

Setting and Plain Sense

These words were spoken shortly before betrayal and death. At that hour the speaker's soul was troubled, He prayed for the Father to glorify His name, and the Father answered with a voice from heaven that He had glorified it and would glorify it again.

To serve Him is to follow Him. This following is the one rule for God's servants, instead of precise human rules and Pharisaical restrictions. Acceptable service is not serving for self as the world does, but serving in His selfless way. It is learned by learning lessons from the Great Teacher, with the one aim to be like Him who went about doing good, by studying His life to learn how He lived and worked and striving each day to live His life. It moves through self-denial, suffering, self-sacrifice and obedience to God, even choosing death rather than life without Him.

What Following Christ Requires

To follow Christ is to serve Him through self-denial, self-sacrifice, suffering, and obedience to God. Following means bearing the cross and lifting it, accepting even loss of reputation, position, and other earthly interests, and choosing death rather than life without Him. It requires refusing to follow the impulse of the natural heart, refusing to plan only to benefit self, and refusing to walk in paths where Christ does not lead. His servants who share His sufferings in this way will finally be with Him and share His glory.

Following requires dying to self by giving up personal individuality and the natural and cultivated traits of character that separate from Christ. Those who like Judas hold on to those traits refuse to be drawn to Christ despite every opportunity and privilege. If those cherishing self were admitted to heaven they would create a second apostasy, so God gives a time of probation that through Christ men may obtain the power that makes them sons of God.

Acceptable service means serving in Christ's selfless way and by His example rather than serving for self and selfish ends as the world does. It calls for wholehearted surrender, giving up pride and selfishness, putting God's cause and work first, and sacrificing pleasure, personal inclination, and personal interests for the truth's sake while bearing burdens for others. Service is a willing choice with the whole heart, not something God compels.

Following means making the first duty to learn lessons from Christ the Great Teacher, with the one aim to be like Him who went about doing good. This is done by studying the life of Christ to learn how He lived and worked, striving each day to live as Jesus lived, daily looking to Him by faith, wearing His yoke and learning His meekness and lowliness, which puts workers in the path that leads heavenward. It means abiding in Him, learning the lessons He came to teach, loving and obeying the higher law written in the Word, and receiving and believing and practicing truth as preparation for the life to come. It means working as He worked and going about doing good, carrying truth to the world as light-bearers and helping people just where they are, even lifting those in the depths of degradation, intemperance, dissolute habits, and sin to saving knowledge including present truth, with firm, patient, earnest effort, love, and kindness.

Service is pursued in freedom as willing subjects under Christ's discipline, placing thoughts, will, and all lent capabilities in sacred service to God's glory to be improved with interest. Christ gives grace, power, and supernatural help in weakness to those who choose His will, give themselves wholeheartedly, and rely on His strength. He leads such followers to victory through faith and guides the faithful amid falsehood and opposition on the path to everlasting life.

Promise and Daily Application

To serve Christ is to follow Him, and His servant will be where He is, dwelling with Him in His Father's presence and house, belonging where He is because the servant follows Him. This is the one rule of service, that following in self-sacrifice, even choosing death rather than life without Him, and serving in His selfless way and by His example rather than for self and selfish ends as the world does, brings the servant to where He is. Such following is self-surrender and self-denial, refusing the impulse of the natural heart, refusing to plan only to benefit self or to walk where Christ does not lead, placing thoughts, will, and all lent capabilities in sacred service to God's glory to be improved with interest as a willing subject under Christ's discipline.

The Father will honor anyone who serves Christ, and this is the honor to seek because its reward is eternal life in God's kingdom. Those who bear the cross will share Christ's glory and be glorified with Him, sitting with Him on His throne as He sits with His Father on His throne, entering into His joy, sitting with Him at His table in His kingdom, receiving a crown of everlasting life, and beholding the glory He had with the Father before the world was. Poor fallen sinners may thus become one with Christ, sharing His divine nature, refined, purified and glorified through His grace, and those who follow in His footsteps on earth, laboring as He labored for souls He died to save, will overcome as He overcame and when He comes to claim His own will be glorified with Him. The cross borne in this life is light and is a pledge that the bearer will one day be given that crown, and the glory and gain and enjoyment of that eternal life centers in being in the presence of Christ, with the great joy of the overcomer to be with Him and behold His glory in the unapproachable splendor of His converse with the Father before the world was.

This promise rests on what Christ did, for the Commander of the heavenly hosts clothed His divinity with humanity, and the Highest stooped to become the servant of all, beautifying the meek with salvation and giving wisdom to all who learn from Him and grace to the humble and contrite in heart. He Himself endured shame, humiliation, suffering and death while looking forward to honor at His Father's right hand, and His true followers who share His sufferings will also be glorified with Him. Those who bear the cross with Him will share His glory and be where He is, and the Father will honor them as He honors His Son, for their Christlike character and spirit and the fruit of their labor and sacrifice in other lives are Christ's reward and joy throughout eternity, a joy they share with Him.

The Father's honoring also comes in this life by resting His blessing on willing and faithful servants, giving them wisdom and power and strength, and working with and by them and for and through them to glorify Himself so His work is recognized as His. This service is connected with receiving Christ's life and grace and using one's abilities to bring souls to Him rather than making self the center. Offering possessions while withholding oneself does not bring His approval or blessing, for He asks the yielding of self and not only money upon the altar of God.

In daily life following means wholehearted missionary labor, making God's cause the first interest, sacrificing pleasure and personal inclination for the truth's sake, letting light shine to those in darkness, and carrying truth to the world as light-bearers. It means working earnestly for the salvation of sinners as missionaries where laborers are needed, giving up pride and selfishness, putting God's work first, bearing burdens for others, giving self wholeheartedly and relying on His strength, for He supplies supernatural help in weakness. Such following works as He worked, helping people just where they are and lifting those in degradation, intemperance, dissolute habits and sin, neglected, dead in trespasses and sins, unable to restore themselves and dull to His call, up to saving knowledge of Christ and His truth including present truth and the special truths for this time, by recognizing and encouraging them with firm, patient, earnest effort, love and kindness, a work that will endure in which money and earnest labor may safely be invested. God leads such followers to victory through faith and guides the faithful amid falsehood and opposition on the path to everlasting life.

Serving means seeking to enter and accomplish God's purpose and submitting to His will rather than asking Him to yield to human wishes, so prayer expresses acceptance of His will with desires and interests given over to His purpose. God may not answer when or how wished but does what is better than granting all wishes, because human wisdom is limited, and trusting Him in this way is firm faith, not doubt. Choosing one's own way and will, serving only at will and working away from Christ when it suits inclination, gives Satan advantage to control the mind and ends in loss of the soul. Those who reject or neglect received light and invitation for worldly interests despise God and lose the promised heavenly reward, and those who like Judas hold on to personal individuality and natural and cultivated traits of character that separate from Christ refuse to be drawn despite every opportunity and privilege, and if admitted to heaven while cherishing self would create a second apostasy, so God gives probation to obtain through Christ the power that makes men sons of God.