The Father loves the Son, and has given all things [to be] in his hand.
This verse closes John 3 by naming two things about Jesus: the Father's love for Him, and everything placed in His hand. Both stand behind all the Son does with people.
The verse marks a change of voice. One writer holds that John the Baptist's testimony ends with verse 34. Verse 35 comes from the Gospel writer:
The Baptist's testimony closes, without doubt, with verse 34. The Gospel writer then, guided by the Spirit of God, says, "The Father loves the Son and has given all things into His hand" (v. 35). The Lord Himself, in Matthew's Gospel, speaks in the same way — "All things have been handed over to Me by My Father" (11:27; see also Luke 10:22). But it was John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, who received the commission to reveal the Father's delight in the Son as the origin and source of the gift.
The chapter has already called Him bridegroom and heavenly witness. This verse goes higher.
He is "the Son," the special object of divine affection and honour. Here we rise far above His position either as the Messiah, the Bridegroom on the one hand, or the heavenly prophet on the other... Jesus is the Heir of all things. He is the Son of the Father in a way that belongs to Him alone — the true Isaac who remains for ever, the beloved Son who has all that He Himself has, and who has all given to be in His (the Son's) hand.
Why "all things"? Because the size of the gift shows the size of the love — and because only a divine Person could receive such a trust.
"The Father loves the Son;" for divine, infinite, unchanging, eternal love has always existed and must always exist between the Father and the Son... and to show the perfection of the love, He adds, "and has given all things into His hand." This shows us the Deity of the Son, who was able to receive all things into His hands, as no creature could do. It also shows the perfection of the Father's love, which held nothing back in giving everything into His hands. What other object could satisfy the Father's heart? Here we have perfect love in power — giving all things into His hands.
One writer sets this verse beside a later word of Jesus about what belongs to the Father.
John 16:15 gives our Lord pre-eminence from His own lips. Not of Person or relationship, which are both eternal, but of possessions. "All things that the Father has are Mine." Placing beside this the words of John 3:35, we get a most precious distinction. "The Father loves the Son and has given all things into His hand." If all things are given to Him as in Manhood, the same "all things" are HIS OWN as in Godhead.
The Bible describes the Son's place over all things in more than one way.
The Son created all things (John 1:3). All things were His, both as creator and as one with the Father. But as Man He received all things into His hand. The Father showed Him all things (John 5:20), and He had heard all things from the Father (John 15:15). Hebrews 2:8 puts all things under the feet of Jesus as Son of Man. In Ephesians 1, as the Man of God's purpose, all things are not only under His feet, but under His headship.
The gift is not only authority. It includes people.
Love confides, and love gives. Nothing is too great for love to bestow on the object of its choice. The Father's heart of infinite love has given all things into the hand of His ever-worthy Son. All things are given to Him, from authority over all flesh on the one hand to His own that are in the world on the other. How His heart was dwelling on His Father's love-gift as He exclaimed, "Yours they were, and You gave them to Me"!
This knowledge shaped what the Son did at supper.
He knew that universal glory and authority and pre-eminence were His; but that in no way altered His own personal lowliness and loveliness... "Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands," rose from supper, and stooped down, and washed the feet of His disciples. What a sight indeed! One so great and glorious at the feet of His followers!
- Love first. The verse starts with love, not with power. The giving flows from a love between Father and Son that always existed.
- Given without reserve. The Father keeps nothing back. Only a divine Person could receive such a trust; no creature could.
- Given to Him as Man. What the Son receives in manhood is already His own in Godhead. Receiving takes nothing from His glory.
- Given includes us. "All things" reaches from authority over all flesh down to His own people, whom the Father gave Him.
- Given, and He stooped. Knowing everything was in His hands, He rose from supper and washed His disciples' feet — greatness shown by service.
He that believes on the Son has life eternal, and he that is not subject to the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides upon him.
This chapter ends by dividing the whole human race in two. The dividing line is a Person. Everything turns on what a person does with the Son. Commentators press hard on three words: "has," "does not obey," and "remains."
(The writers below quote an older translation, which reads "believes not" where the ESV has "does not obey," and "abides" for "remains.")
The verse offers no middle ground:
Now we come to the result, as far as man is concerned, of the presence and work of Christ on earth, and of the going out of all in gospel testimony… For all it must be either the life or the wrath. The blessing cannot be had without faith in the Person in whom the blessing is.
The reason lies in what the Father has given the Son:
Further, as Son the Father loves Him, and has put all into His hand… He is set up as God's testimony, with God's words from heaven, from where He came… Eternal life and wrath depend on His being believed in or the contrary.
Earlier in the chapter the wording is that the believer should have eternal life. Here the tense changes, and the change matters:
If the word in John 3:15-16 is that the one who believes should have eternal life, it is very definite in John 3:36 of the same chapter that the believer on the Son has eternal life… We do not have to wait until we get to heaven to receive this divine life, or to learn whether it is ours. We have it now, and God's word assures us that we have it now.
What kind of unbelief does the verse mean? One writer answers:
The force of "the wrath of God abides on him" is that he has deserved it, and that if he rejects Christ, he lies under it still… In this last verse of the chapter "the wrath of God abides" if they do not bow to Christ's authority. It is not disobeying Him in the details of a command, or anything of that sort; the "believes not" means "is not subject to" Him.
Submission to Him is where real obedience starts, not where it ends:
Practical obedience flows from submission to His Person, and proves the reality of the heart-subjection of faith.
The change of title in the last clause is deliberate. Wrath is never named as the Father's toward His own:
He that believes not the Son — not obeying Him to whom the Father has given all things — "shall not see life, but the wrath… of God." Not the wrath of the Father. There is no wrath there, not an atom, but perfect fullness of blessing, of love. He is Father, always Father, and nothing but Father in love and perfectness: "the Father loves the Son."
This verse closes two doors. One is the idea that everyone is saved in the end. The other is the idea that the lost stop existing:
This verse entirely sets aside the notion of all being restored and eternally saved… It is quite true they shall not see life; but — tremendous fact! — "the wrath of God abides on him." This, beyond all question, flatly contradicts annihilationism. If the wrath of God is to remain on the unbeliever, it is utterly impossible that he can be made an end of. Annihilation and abiding wrath are completely incompatible. We must either erase the word "abiding" from the inspired page, or abandon the notion of annihilation entirely. To hold both is out of the question.
Yet this wrath is a present condition, and one thing can still change it:
The unbeliever is "judged already." His whole condition is settled by the very fact that he has rejected the Son of God. The wrath of God, instead of His favour, now rests on him and has become his condition. Only one thing reverses it: his coming to terms with the Son of God before it is too late. Otherwise that wrath becomes his fixed and abiding condition for an eternity without end.
Commentators differ over whether verses 35-36 continue John the Baptist's testimony or are the evangelist's own comment. One argues from the content itself:
I think the internal evidence is clear that the testimony of John the Baptist closes with verse 34, and that verses 35 and 36 are the comment of the Evangelist. For John's answer from verse 27, however given of God, does not go beyond the measure of his spiritual knowledge, while the closing verses 35 and 36 reflect the deeper and higher truth which the Lord taught His disciples.
Others hold the words are the Baptist's, and one writer notes that the question does not affect their authority — both men spoke by the same Spirit.
- Person — the verse sorts people by one thing: their response to the Son whom the Father loves and to whom He has given all things.
- Possession — "has" is present tense. The believer holds eternal life now, on the authority of God's word, and does not wait for it in heaven.
- Posture — "does not obey" means refusing to be subject to Him. Real obedience in daily life grows out of that submission and proves it genuine.
- Present wrath — wrath is not only a future warning. It rests on the unbeliever already, and it is God's wrath, never the Father's toward His own.
- Permanence — "remains" rules out both universal salvation and annihilation. Yet the condition can change: a person may still come to terms with the Son before it is too late.