Interpret → Preach
For the service
John Wesley’s own Explanatory Notes Upon the Old and New Testament on the day’s readings — his verse-by-verse commentary, not a summary of it. Read the full edition ↗
first Deuteronomy 26:1-11
- v.2Thou shalt take — This seems to be required of each master of a family, either upon his first settlement, or once every year at one of their three feasts, when they were obliged to go up to Jerusalem.
- v.5A Syrian — So Jacob was, partly by his original, as being born of Syrian parents, as were Abraham and Rebecca, both of Chaldea or Mesopotamia, which was a part of Syria largely so called, partly by his education and conversation; and partly by his relations, his wives being such, and his children too by their mother's. Ready to perish - Either through want and poverty; (See Gen. xxviii, 11, 20; xxxii, 10,) or through the rage of his brother Esau, and the treachery of his father-in-law Laban.
- v.10It — The basket of first-fruits, ver. 2.
- v.11Thou shalt rejoice — Thou shalt hereby enabled to take comfort in all thy employments, when thou hast sanctified them by giving God his portion. It is the will of God, that we should be chearful not only in our attendance upon his holy ordinances, but in our enjoyment of the gifts of his providence. Whatever good thing God gives us, we should make the most comfortable use of it we can, still tracing the streams to the fountain of all consolation.
psalm Psalm 100
no note on this passage
second Philippians 4:4-9
- v.5Let your gentleness — Yieldingness, sweetness of temper, the result of joy in the Lord. Be known - By your whole behaviour. To all men - Good and bad, gentle and froward. Those of the roughest tempers are good natured to some, from natural sympathy and various motives; a Christian, to all. The Lord - The judge, the rewarder, the avenger. Is at hand - Standeth at the door.
- v.6Be anxiously careful for nothing — If men are not gentle towards you, yet neither on this, nor any other account, be careful, but pray. Carefulness and prayer cannot stand together. In every thing - Great and small. Let your requests be made known - They who by a preposterous shame or distrustful modesty, cover, stifle, or keep in their desires, as if they were either too small or too great, must be racked with care; from which they are entirely delivered, who pour them out with a free and filial confidence. To God - It is not always proper to disclose them to men. By supplication - Which is the enlarging upon and pressing our petition. With thanksgiving - The surest mark of a soul free from care, and of prayer joined with true resignation. This is always followed by peace. Peace and thanksgiving are both coupled together, Colossians iii, 15.
- v.7And the peace of God — That calm, heavenly repose, that tranquility of spirit, which God only can give. Which surpasseth all understanding - Which none can comprehend, save he that receiveth it. Shall keep - Shall guard, as a garrison does a city. Your hearts - Your affections. Your minds - Your understandings, and all the various workings of them; through the Spirit and power of Christ Jesus, in the knowledge and love of God. Without a guard set on these likewise, the purity and vigour of our affections cannot long be preserved.
- v.8Finally — To sum up all. Whatsoever things are true - Here are eight particulars placed in two fourfold rows; the former containing their duty; the latter, the commendation of it. The first word in the former row answers the first in the latter; the second word, the second and so on. True - In speech. Honest - In action. Just - With regard to others. Pure - With regard to yourselves. Lovely - And what more lovely than truth? Of good report - As is honesty, even where it is not practiced. If there be any virtue - And all virtues are contained in justice. If there be any praise - In those things which relate rather to ourselves than to our neighbour. Think on these things - That ye may both practice them yourselves, and recommend them to others.
- v.9The things which ye have learned — As catechumens. And received - By continual instructions. And heard and seen - In my life and conversation. These do, and the God of peace shall be with you - Not only the peace of God, but God himself, the fountain of peace.
gospel John 6:25-35
- v.26Our Lord does not satisfy their curiosity, but corrects the wrong motive they had in seeking him: because ye did eat — Merely for temporal advantage. Hitherto Christ had been gathering hearers: he now begins to try their sincerity, by a figurative discourse concerning his passion, and the fruit of it, to be received by faith.
- v.27labour not for the meat which perisheth — For bodily food: not for that only not chiefly: not at all, but in subordination to grace, faith, love, the meat which endureth to everlasting life. labour, work for this; foreverlasting life. So our Lord expressly commands, work for life, as well as from life: from a principle of faith and love. Him hath the Father sealed - By this very miracle, as well as by his whole testimony concerning him. See chap. iii, 33. Sealing is a mark of the authenticity of a writing.
- v.28The works of God — Works pleasing to God.
- v.29This is the work of God — The work most pleasing to God, and the foundation of all others: that ye believe - He expresses it first properly, afterward figuratively.
- v.30What sign dost thou? — Amazing, after what they had just seen!
- v.31Our fathers ate manna — This sign Moses gave them. He gave them bread from heaven - From the lower sublunary heaven; to which Jesus opposes the highest heaven: in which sense he says seven times, ver. 32, 33, 38, 50, 58, 62, that he himself came down from heaven.
- v.32Moses gave you not bread from heaven — It was not Moses who gave the manna to your fathers; but my Father who now giveth the true bread from heaven. Psalm lxxviii, 24.
- v.33He that — giveth life to the world - Not (like the manna) to one people only: and that from generation to generation. Our Lord does not yet say, I am that bread; else the Jews would not have given him so respectful an answer, ver. 34.
- v.34Give us this bread — Meaning it still, in a literal sense: yet they seem now to be not far from believing.
- v.35I am the bread of life — Having and giving life: he that cometh -he that believeth - Equivalent expressions: shall never hunger, thirst - Shall be satisfied, happy, forever.