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Bible Dictionaries
Devotion
Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament
or DEVOTION.—The word does not occur in the Gospels, but the idea is present everywhere, as marking the attitude of the man Jesus towards God, and thus providing a standard for imitation by every other man. Intrinsically the word denotes the act of presenting solemnly some gift or service to a deity, or to any one invested in thought for a time with some of the qualities or claims of a deity; but its use has been extended to cover alike such service itself, and even the psychological condition from which the act springs. As such, a correct analysis must find blended in devotion each of the three elements—thought, emotion, and volition—which are the mutually dependent fragments of the unit of personality, expressing itself as a whole in the exercises often called devotions. The intellectual element is a recognition of the dignity and patient grace of God, the sensitive a feeling of gratitude and desire to please, the volitional a strong resolve to carry out that desire; and these three pass together quickly into appropriate action, the whole man in the harmony of all his powers indicating by praise or service the depth of his loving regard.
In some definitions, too much prominence is given to the will, and devotion is confused with religion generally, as in Aquinas, Summa, ii. 2 lxxxii. 1: ‘Devotio nihil aliud esse videtur, quam voluntas quiaedam prompte tradendi se ad ea, quae pertinent ad Dei famulatum.’ In certain phrases the word is used as a synonym for worship, or even for a form of worship, as when devotion to the Sacred Heart is spoken of; and in others, as ‘feasts of devotion,’ it acquires an entirely technical sense, implying the absence of express obligation, with an appeal only to the discretion and good feeling of the worshipper. But. in the better use internal devotion is contrasted with external worship (Atterbury, Sermons, iv. 213), and may he resolved into four principal constituents. The self-conscious determination of the will towards God is followed by the actual exaltation of the soul to God and its suffusion with the reverent sense of His nearness and mercy. This is exhibited in various loving acts and exercises, such as prayer and praise. And the whole is effected in the heart under the influence of the Holy Spirit.
1. In the case of Christ each of these phases of devotion is represented in the Gospels, (a) Though but a mere lad, He indicates already a habitual Godward set of His will (Luke 2:49, Hebrews 10:7); and afterwards He speaks of His purpose, sometimes with quiet assurance (John 5:30; John 6:38; John 7:18), sometimes with a certain glow of satisfaction (John 4:34, John 17:4). Hindrances and sore temptations, in which the play of a natural and useful instinct may be traced, did not divert Him (Luke 9:51; Luke 22:42). Glad, complete conformity with the will of God, such as is an integrant of every right conception of heaven, is set forth as on earth the aim of every disciple (Matthew 6:10), reached at once and maintained without defect, though not without effort (cf. Harnack, What is Christianity?3 [Note: designates the particular edition of the work referred] 129 f.), by Him alone who could say, ‘I and the Father are one’ (John 10:30).
(b) Instances of the exaltation of His soul in the calm sense of security because of the accord of His will with that of the Father, occur in the impression His fearlessness made at the cleansing of the Temple (John 2:16 f.)—in His endowment with ‘honour and glory’ at the Transfiguration (2 Peter 1:17)—in the strengthening ministry of angels after the Temptation (Matthew 4:11), and the Agony (Luke 22:43 (Revised Version margin)). The joy of Matthew 11:25 and Luke 10:21 is another instance, as is also the outburst of triumphant relief at the retirement of Judas (John 13:31 f.). Nor should His perfect repose in the midst of peril (Mark 4:38 f.), and in the presence of angry or eager mobs (Luke 4:29 f., John 8:59; John 10:31 f., John 6:15), be overlooked. Partial and auxiliary explanations may be found in the exhaustion of fatigue or the mastery of His nerves; but the real cause was moral and not physical, and should be sought in the self-consciousness of Jesus, in the stable correlation of His will and God’s. The two streams of volition, human and Divine, met and merged in Him; and thus He becomes for men at once an example of perfect devotion and a pledge of perfect grace.
(c) The exercises appropriate to devotion, which, however, so far from confining itself to them, enriches the entire nature and affects every relation of life, are praise and prayer (see sep. artt.), with the addition of meditation, and occasionally of fasting or some form of self-discipline. The prayer and praise are not exactly such as accompany public worship, but assume rather the character of communion or reverent conversation, the element of specific supplication being often, not always, absent. In the case of Christ the praise is illustrated in such passages as Luke 10:21 f., the practice of meditation and prayer in the lonely night-watches and the desert in Mark 6:46, Luke 5:16, whilst the supplication becomes more specific in Luke 6:12, in Gethsemane, and perhaps also on the Mount of Transfiguration. Of actual fasting by Jesus as a definite process of devotion, there is no certain case in the Gospels; but there is no reason to suppose that He did not follow the usage of His country on the Day of Atonement. Fasting, too, is associated with the Temptation (Matthew 4:2), of which one lesson is that a pure conscience and an ideal conformity with God can be attained or retained only by self-discipline and hard steadfastness under testing. And even in the Sermon on the Mount the practice is guarded from abuse, and implicitly commended in Matthew 6:16 ff.; and the supposition is warranted that our Lord was prepared to exemplify in His own person whatever He recommended to His disciples. His life, as well as His teaching, shows that fasting in itself has no devotional or any other religious value, but is serviceable only when and in so far as it promotes the closeness of communion with God. See Fasting.
(d) The plenary presence of the Holy Spirit with Christ is an implication of the NT, which, however, is comparatively reticent as to the Spirit’s influence in the interval from the Temptation to the eve of the Passion. The action of the Spirit at the Temptation is referred to by all the Synoptists (Matthew 4:1, Mark 1:12, Luke 4:1), and His aid must be regarded as part of the explanation of Christ’s sinlessness on this and all subsequent occasions. Not only were His miracles wrought in the power of the Spirit (Matthew 12:28, Luke 4:14; Luke 4:18), but His oneness with the Spirit made His life uninterrupted devotion, and ‘through the eternal Spirit’ He ‘offered himself without blemish unto God’ (Hebrews 9:14). The rapture of His soul is attributed to the influence of the Spirit in Luke 10:21, though this particular is omitted in the corresponding narrative of Matthew 11:25. And the devotion of Christ is an example for man, not only because it exhibits human triumph over temptation and human fellowship with God, but also because of the similarity of the means and aids. His complete unction is the promise and measure of the anointing available to every one.
2. In the case of man, devotion appears in the Gospels as an act or state of the entire personality, with all its powers harmoniously and intensely engaged. Prominence is given to the same elements as are traceable in the devotion of Christ Himself, whilst ample safeguards against error and fanaticism are provided. The great rule of Deuteronomy 6:5 is adopted by Christ, and applied in each of the Synoptics (Matthew 22:37, Mark 12:30, Luke 10:27) with little variations of phrase that add to the uncompromising vigour. In the Sermon on the Mount the exclusiveness of devotion, as admitting no rival claim and absorbing supreme affection, is recognized in Matthew 6:21; Matthew 6:24; so in another connexion in Luke 16:13. And in the closing discourses Christ puts Himself forward as actually and solely central to the life of His disciples (John 14:6), the source of all their strength, the right object of their trust and love (John 15:9-11, John 16:22), with the recurring refrain, emphasized by its modifications, ‘Abide in me’ (John 15:4-5 et al.). Fruitfulness in the graces of personal character, and then secondarily in obedience and service, results from the deliberate regarding of Christ as ‘all in all,’ as so filling up the sphere of thought and desire as to control everything else therein. The last clause in John 15:5 means by implication that possibilities to the disciple are proportionate to the closeness of his devout union with his Lord; and that union may, and should, reach a stage of completeness, in which the indwelling Christ becomes the unquestioned ruler of all within the heart, and the whole life in the flesh is lived ‘in faith, the faith which is in the Son of God’ (Galatians 2:20). It is the crown of Christian devotion, not the joint sovereignty of Christ and the ego, but the loving and cager retirement of the ego that Christ may be substituted, appropriating its functions and reigning in its stead. Thus Christ Himself teaches in one of the most sacred parts of Scripture: ‘I in them’ (John 17:23; John 17:26) is the final and fullest blessing and privilege conceivable in that hour of vision for those whom He loved ‘to the uttermost’ (John 13:1 (Revised Version margin)).
(a) Specifically, as might be expected before Pentecost, the Gospels give more prominence to the action of the human will as a condition of discipleship than to its subsequent concentration as the condition of progress and perfecting. But the example of Christ Himself is, in this matter, a sufficient safeguard and sanction, and is enforced by teaching of at least two types. ‘If any man willeth to do his will’ (John 7:17), supplies the key not only to the knowledge of the things of the Kingdom, but also to the fulfilment in personal character of God’s purpose of sanctification, Bengel’s suavis harmonia being both a cause and the effect of insatiable yearning. Again, glad consent, with persistency of will, is an important element in our Lord’s frequent exhortations to His disciples to ‘abide’ in Him or in His word (John 15:4; John 8:31 et al.). One of the characteristics of the Johannine setting of the Gospel, as of the prophecies of Jeremiah in the OT, is the emphasis laid on the sustained determination of the will towards God.
(b) The exaltation of spirit, accompanying and enriched by this firmness of purpose, receives more adequate expression in later times, but is far from being left entirely without illustration. Such passages as John 12:19; John 12:32 speak of a magnetie influence on the part of Christ, to which the response was at the beginning more than that of admiration, and soon deepened into supreme and rapturous attachment. The Magnificat (Luke 1:46-55) and the Nunc Dimittis (Luke 2:29-32) anticipate the exultation of men, partly at the accomplished work of Christ, partly at the abundance and the effect of His grace to the individual; and the self-forgetfulness of grateful and passionate devotion is illustrated in Luke 7:37-48. Mary’s ‘Rabboni’ (John 20:16) and Thomas’ ‘My Lord’ (John 20:28) express absorbed attachment as well as conviction. In the parables the joy is occasionally festal and general, but sometimes becomes that of personal and assured possession (Matthew 13:44; Matthew 13:46), or is even lifted up into likeness to the Saviour’s own joy, incapable of dimness or of eclipse (John 15:11, Matthew 25:21). The disciple in his Lord’s bosom (John 13:23; John 13:25) is a type and guarantee.
(c) The loving acts and exercises in which the devout spirit beneficially expresses itself are of almost infinite variety in their character, and, though their most ingenious exhibition is met with subsequently, they are not left without trace or starting-point in the Gospels. Beyond the example of the Saviour, an encouragement to quiet meditation may be found in Mark 6:31, a commendation of private prayer in Matthew 6:6. Self-discipline, as removing the occasions of sin and as aiding the communion of the human spirit with God, is enjoined in such passages as Matthew 5:29-30, though in others the object becomes the avoidance of conduct that might offend or imperil the souls of the weak.
That self-discipline is in itself and apart from its motives meritorious, is nowhere taught by Christ, and such a notion is quite contrary to the genius of Christianity. Christ’s treatment of fasting is an illustration. He evidently looked forward to its practice by His disciples not only in their association and in times of general calamity and mourning (Matthew 9:14-15, Mark 2:18-20, Luke 5:34-35), but individually under the prompting of personal need and as a preparation for personal blessing. That an access of spiritual power might thereby be secured is a legitimate inference from Matthew 17:21 and Mark 9:29, though textual evidence is against any specific reference to fasting in these verses, the corruption of which may well have been due to the incorporation of a devotional gloss. In Matthew 6:16-18 it is assumed that disciples will fast; injunctions are given with a view to secure purity of intention, and the good effect is guaranteed in the ‘recompense’ of the Father. Hence private fasting as an observance is distinctly recognized by Christ. According to His rule, invariable except in the case of prayer (where, moreover, the prescription is that of a model rather than a form). He does not prescribe forms. He puts in its right place of control the object of pleasing the Father, who sees in secret, and knows the whole heart and way of a man. And with this implicit injunction of fasting, and protection against its misuse and perils, He leaves every disciple to determine for himself the best application of the principle in the interest of the well-being and enrichment of the soul.
(d) Before Pentecost the action of the Holy Spirit in human devotion is, for the most part, anticipatory and a matter of promise, but as such is none the less important. His presence is that which will prevent the disciples from becoming ‘desolate’ and without resource (John 14:18) on the departure of their Master; and, being present, He will act in them as the Father’s Paraclete (John 14:16 et al.), advocating the cause of God and promoting all Godward impulse and desire. Specifically, He will guide ‘into all the truth’ (John 16:13), bringing the disciples into right relation, both intellectual and practical, with saving truth, and maintaining within them a condition of composure and serenity (Luke 1:79). The power to do ‘greater works’ is associated with the return of Christ to His Father (John 14:12), and therefore, by implication, with the mission of the Spirit; and if the complaint is sometimes just that those greater works are not being done, the cause is to be found not in the inadequacy of opportunity or resource, but in the defectiveness of personal devotion. Its degree is commensurate with that of right volition on the part of the disciple, and with that of possession on the part of the Spirit; and these two, again, are mutually dependent. ‘In the Spirit’ by fixed and abiding purpose, is the law on the one side; the Spirit in the disciple is the correlated privilege, with the absolute harmony between Christ and the Spirit as the only limit of possible human experience, and as its inspiration and pledge.
Literature.—Dykes, Manifesto of the King, 333–437; Stalker, Imago Christi, ch. vii.
R. W. Moss.
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Hastings, James. Entry for 'Devotion'. Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/hdn/d/devotion.html. 1906-1918.
