Isa 53:11, Jer 9:23-24, Joh 17:3, 1Cor 2:2 | Barnes

Isaiah 53:11

Jeremiah 9:23-24

John 17:3

Verse 3. This is life eternal. This is the source of eternal life; or it is in this manner that it is to be obtained. The knowledge of God and of his Son Jesus Christ is itself a source of unspeakable and eternal joy. Comp. Jn 11:25, 6:63, 12:50.

Might know thee. The word know here, as in other places, expresses more than a mere speculative acquaintance with the character and perfections of God. It includes all the impressions on the mind and life which a just view of God and of the Saviour is fitted to produce. It includes, of course, love, reverence, obedience, honour, gratitude, supreme affection. To know God as he is is to know and regard him as a lawgiver, a sovereign, a parent, a friend. It is to yield the whole soul to him, and strive to obey his law.

The only true God. The only God, in opposition to all false gods. What is said here is in opposition to idols, not to Jesus himself, who, in 1Jn 5:20, is called "the true God and eternal life."

And Jesus Christ. To know Jesus Christ is to have a practical impression of him as he is that is, to suffer his character and work to make their due impression on the heart and life. Simply to have heard that there is a Saviour is not to know it. To have been taught in childhood and trained up in the belief of it is not to know it. To know him is to have a just, practical view of him in all his perfections--as God and man; as a mediator; as a prophet, a priest, and a king. It is to feel our need of such a Saviour, to see that we are sinners, and to yield the whole soul to him, knowing that he is a Saviour fitted to our wants, and that in his hands our souls are safe. Comp. Eph 3:19, Tit 1:16, Php 3:10, 1Jn 5:20. In this verse is contained the sum and essence of the Christian religion, as it is distinguished from all the schemes of idolatry and philosophy, and all the false plans on which men have sought to obtain eternal life. The Gentiles worshipped many gods; the Christian worships one --the living and the true God; the Jew, the Deist, the Mohammedan, the Socinian, profess to acknowledge one God, without any atoning sacrifice and Mediator; the true Christian approaches him through the great Mediator, equal with the Father, who for us became incarnate, and died that he might reconcile us to God.

1 Corinthians 2:2

Verse 2. For I determined. I made a resolution. This was my fixed, deliberate purpose when I came there. It was not a matter of accident, or chance, that I made Christ my great and constant theme, but it was my deliberate purpose. It is to be recollected that Paul made this resolution, knowing the peculiar fondness of the Greeks for subtle disquisitions, and for graceful and finished elocution; that he formed it when his own mind, as we may judge from his writings, was strongly inclined by nature to an abstruse and metaphysical kind of discussion, which could not have failed to attract the attention of the acute and subtle reasoners of Greece; and that he made it when he must have been fully aware that the theme which he had chosen to dwell upon would be certain to excite derision and con- tempt. Yet he formed and adhered to this resolution, though it might expose him to contempt, and though they might reject and despise his message.

Not to know. The word know here ειδεναι is used probably in the sense of attend to, be engaged in, or regard. I resolved not to give my time and attention while among you to the laws and traditions of the Jews; to your orators, philosophers, and poets; to the beauty of your architecture or statuary; to a contemplation of your customs and laws; but to attend to this only--making known the cross of Christ. The word ειδω (to know) is sometimes thus used. Paul says that he designed that this should be the only thing on which his mind should be fixed; the only object of his attention; the only object on which he there sought that knowledge should be diffused. Doddridge renders it, "appear to know."

Any thing among you. Anything while I was with you; or, anything that may exist among you, and that may be objects of interest to you. I resolved to know nothing of it, whatever it might be. The former is, probably, the correct interpretation.

Save Jesus Christ. Except Jesus Christ. This is the only thing of which I purposed to have any knowledge among you.

And him crucified. Or, "even (και) him that was crucified." He resolved not only to make the Messiah the grand object of his knowledge and attention there, but EVEN a crucified Messiah; to maintain the doctrine that the Messiah was to be crucified for the sins of the world; and that he who had been crucified was in fact the Messiah. 1Cor 1:23. We may remark here,

(1.) that this should be the resolution of every minister of the gospel. This is his business. It is not to be a politician; not to engage in the strifes and controversies of men; it is not to be a good farmer or scholar merely; not to mingle with his people in festive circles and enjoyments; not to be a man of taste and philosophy, and distinguished mainly for refinement of manners; not to be a profound philosopher or metaphysician; but to make Christ crucified the grand object of his attention, and seek always and everywhere to make him known.

(2.) He is not to be ashamed anywhere of the humbling doctrine that Christ was crucified. In this he is to glory. Though the world may ridicule; though philosophers may sneer; though the rich and the gay may deride it, yet this is to be the grand object of interest to him; and at no time, and in no society, is he to be ashamed of it.

(3.) It matters not what are the amusements of society around him; what fields of science, of gain, or ambition, are open before him; the minister of Christ is to know Christ and him crucified alone. If he cultivates science, it is to be that he may the more successfully explain and vindicate the gospel. If he becomes in any manner familiar with the works of art and of taste, it is that he may more successfully show to those who cultivate them the superior beauty and excellency of the cross. If he studies the plans and the employments of men, it is that he may more successfully meet them in those plans, and more successfully speak to them of the great plan of redemption. (4.) The preaching of the cross is the only kind of preaching that will be attended with success. That which has in it much respecting the Divine mission, the dignity, the works, the doctrines, the person, and the atonement of Christ, will be successful. So it was in the time of the apostles; so it was in the reformation; so it was in the Moravian missions; so it has been in all revivals of religion. There is a power about that kind of preaching which philosophy and human reason have not. "Christ is God's great ordinance" for the salvation of the world; and we meet the crimes and alleviate the woes of the world, just in proportion as we hold the cross up as appointed to overcome the one, and to pour the balm of consolation into the other.

(*) "know" "make known" (b) "save Jesus Christ" Gal 6:14