'_Now there was leaning on Jesus' bosom one of His disciples, whom Jesus loved. Simon Peter therefore beckoned to him, that he should ask who it should be of whom He spake. He then lying on Jesus' breast saith unto Him, Lord, who is it? Jesus answered, He it is, to whom I shall give a sop, when I have dipped it. And when He had dipped the sop, He gave it to Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon._'
St. John has not spoken of himself hitherto. Why does he introduce himself now? When I was quoting, in my first sermon, the accounts which are given of him by the other Evangelists, I did not refer to the name by which he has described himself. Do we not sometimes think that it was a kind of indelicacy and presumption in an Apostle to claim it? Was it not setting himself above the others? Would it not have been better that he should have let them give him the title? Are not those which they do give him less honourable? I do not wish to evade any of these inquiries. Let it be remembered that St. John was writing in the full knowledge that he had been described as a Son of Thunder, that his ambition and his desire to call down fire had been recorded. These signs of what he was, of what he had shown himself to be, could not be separated from him; they were fixed upon him indelibly. None, therefore, could say that he was an object of Christ's affection because he had shown a gentler disposition than his fellows. Could they say, then, that the love of Christ was a partial love, that it was not directed to mankind, that it was not the expression of a universal love? St. John is the especial witness against these heresies. He declares that God loved the world; and Christ came to do His Father's will in saving it. What, then, might be--what has been--the effect of the name, '_the disciple whom Jesus loved_,' upon the Church? It has been felt that the story of Judas needed this foil. The dark, solitary, separate man must be brought into direct contrast to a man who lives only on trust. We understand by the disciple who leant on Jesus' bosom what his condition was who went out into the night. At the same time, we must not be allowed to fancy that the love came forth from John. He could only be the receiver of it. If he ever fancied himself the disciple who loved Jesus, and not '_the disciple whom Jesus loved_,' he would be magnifying himself, he would be claiming to be better than his brethren. As it is, he can only regard it as part of Christ's manifestation of the divine character that this peculiar affection should be displayed to him. In the world of nature the distinctness of each thing is necessary to the harmony of the whole. Can it be otherwise in the world of human beings? Are they to be merged, now or hereafter, in one great chaos of being? Must not each form, each person, be brought out fully and brightly when the mists that prevent us from seeing the perfect unity have been scattered? Personal affections, gradations of sympathy, attachments and affinities between this human being and that, are the barriers which sever the true life of man from that Pantheistical absorption which is another name for death. Should not we expect there to be a witness for these, a restoration of them to their proper unselfish ground, in the acts and the life of the Word made flesh?