God allows a wildness in his creation.  He doesn’t deny it exists, he doesn’t look at creation through rose tinted glasses.  But God doesn’t immediately stop every threat, every danger, God allows pockets of chaos within his created order. The presence of pain and chaos in the world God has made doesn’t declare God’s absence or call into question his sovereignty or his goodness.  But God cares in the chaos, he rules over it, we can trust in his goodness in it.

From 38v39 throughout chapter 39 God focuses Job’s attention on a wide array of animals.  Asking the same questions to draw Job into seeing God’s care, attention to detail and goodness.  From the lions who God satisfies, and the mountains goats who God sees. The wild donkey who God gave freedom to and provides for.  The wild Ox, the weird and wonderful ostrich, the warhorse with its might and power, to the hawk and eagle who fly because of God’s wisdom.
God created each of these animals, he cares for them, provides for them, watches over them.  Whether they are clean or unclean animals, God delights in them.  There’s a sense of divine wonder in what he’s made in God’s description of all these animals.  God is pleased with what he’s made even post fall.  But notice the focus in the animals God chooses to direct Job’s attention to.  It’s not the funny loving puppy, the tame pony, or the loveable hamster.  These animals are wild and powerful, untameable and dangerous.  This is nature red in tooth and claw.  God is showing Job that in his good world that he’s made there is death and danger.  There is chaos in creation but not out of his control or without purpose or design.
And God is good; providing for and caring for even those creatures than would make Job fearful.  Do you see the implication if God cares even for these things how much more for you, Job?
God allows a wildness in his creation.  He doesn’t deny it exists, he doesn’t look at creation through rose tinted glasses.
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Many Johannine tomes are more concerned with rethinking Christology rather than relishing in the old paths, more concerned with literary critique than looking at Jesus, more concerned with hypothesized compositional layers than the coming of the God-man to save sinners. Hutcheson’s aim in writing this commentary ought to be the aim of every biblical commentator—”to do service to the church of Christ in my generation, and to contribute my endeavours for promoting that public design of making the holy scriptures yet more clear unto the Lord’s people.”

One of the reasons I frequent used bookstores is the promise of hidden treasure. Buried beneath stacks of tottering books with faded covers can lie treasure of immeasurable value—gems forgotten by the passage of time. To discover that gem is like knowing a delicious secret before anyone else. I found that secret gem one morning when I stumbled upon The Exposition of the Gospel according to John by the Scottish Covenanter, George Hutcheson.
Hutcheson’s work contains all the hallmarks of robust Puritanism—doctrinal precision with heartwarming devotion to Christ. It is no wonder, then, that Hutcheson was one of Charles Spurgeon’s favorites. Hutcheson’s commentary on John was Spurgeon’s favorite to consult. He said of it, “Excellent; beyond all praise. It is a full-stored treasury of sound theology, holy thought, and marrowy doctrine.”1
For many today, however, George Hutcheson remains a stranger. Hutcheson (1615-1674) was a Church of Scotland minister, biblical commentator, and key figure in the events involving the Scottish Covenanters. He was educated at the University of Edinburgh (MA, 1638) and pastored in the villages of Colmonell and Irvine in the county of Ayrshire. He was close friends with David Dickson, another prominent Scottish Covenanting minister, biblical commentator, and Principal of the University of Glasgow. Hutcheson wrote other commentaries, such as A Brief Exposition of the Twelve Minor Prophets (1653-5), An Exposition of the Book of Job (1669), and more.2
Overview of Work
The Exposition of the Gospel according to John (1657) originated from Hutcheson’s preaching notes on the Gospel of John, likely from sermons preached at Colmonell, Ayrshire. Hutcheson explains in the introduction how he prioritized writing this commentary after he was faced with his mortality from some unknown incident. In the shadow of his own finitude, Hutcheson wrote this work to point to the infinite Son of God, who is “the fountain and preserver of life in living creatures” and who “hath undertaken to work the work of redemption of sinners, and so hath engaged himself to carry it through” (12, 84).
The commentary is a mid-sized volume of 439 pages. However, due to the density of the exposition and Hutcheson’s ability to make every word count, it feels more thorough and comprehensive than the largest contemporary tomes on John. The structure of the commentary is a combination of explanation and application. Hutcheson walks through the entire Gospel verse-by- verse. He first explains each verse and how it relates to the overall scheme of John’s narrative. Then, he has a section labeled “Doctrines,” which is a numbered list of various systematic doctrines and practical applications of the verse.
The explanations of the verses are clear and useful, but what makes this commentary stand out is the depth of doctrinal clarity and the breadth of application after each verse. Hutcheson combines lucid dogmatic explanation with sensitive pastoral application. For example, consider how in the space of a brief paragraph Hutcheson goes from elucidating the unity of the divine essence and the distinction of the persons in the Godhead, to redemptive-covenantal language, to an encouragement for believers to trust in Christ because of his nature and offices:
“The Son’s coexistence with the Father is also a matter seriously to be considered by believers, wherein they may see the deep wisdom and rich love of God, who hath found a way of reconciliation of lost man by the same in nature and essence who is the party offended, and that the unity of the divine essence and the distinction of persons should contribute to make the redemption and reconciliation of lost man effectual by him; wherein also believers, who have fled to Christ for refuge, may not only find him to be true God, able to supply all wants, and to save to the uttermost, but may also find the Father in the Mediator, as being one in essence with him.” (11).
Hutcheson and Reformed Orthodoxy
Spurgeon’s description of Hutcheson as a “full-stored treasury of sound theology” is certainly apt. Hutcheson’s exposition is a theologically sound distillation of the basic tenets of Reformed orthodoxy. His exegesis is doctrinal and biblical; his understanding of the Trinity and Christology is classical and conciliar; and his articulation of soteriology is set within the broader framework of covenant theology. Not only is the content of Hutcheson’s exposition markedly Reformed, but his method of exposition is reflective of earlier theologians, such as the sixteenth-century Reformed scholastic theologian, Girolamo Zanchi. R. A. Muller notes, Hutcheson’s style of adding “a series of doctrinal loci at the end of the exposition of each pericope” is similar to Girolamo Zanchi.3
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Pride obscures our relationship with God by treating God as smaller than he actually is, and treating ourselves as greater than we actually are. Pride is a distortion of reality. God can no more work with pride than reason with a lunatic. Pride is a kind of moral madness, where we see ourselves as gods with intrinsic beauty. With pride goes unbelief, which is refusing to accept what God says about us, himself and reality. We can only love and reverence God rightly if we grant to God his true place of firstness in our lives.

At the heart of reverence, or holy love, are six components: otherness, openness, submissiveness, gratefulness, childlikeness, and wholeheartedness. To rescue reverence is to understand these in turn.
What is the fundamental obstacle to knowing and loving God? Self-worship. Pride and unbelief, the two sides of the coin of Self, are at the root of every sin, and therefore at the root of fleeing from God. Stubborn independence, guiltily skulking away, and refusing to find pleasure in his beauty come from the flesh’s desire to rule. Unbelieving pride is the mother of all sins, and the root of all spiritual malfunction.
If we are to worship God by knowing him, the absolute starting point is that we recognise he is God and we are not. Christianity broken down to its first principle is this: only one God exists, and he is not us. He is not a means to our own ends. We have been created to know and love him for who he is. If we are to love God as he is, we must deny ourselves, recognising that our lives do not revolve around ourselves, since we orbit the sun that is God, not the other way around. We must turn from trying to use God, or manipulate God, and come to him to love him as our only God. We must settle on the fact that there will be only one ultimate love in our lives, and it will be God. A failure to give God his place as God is at the root of all our problems.
This foundational attitude of loving God we could call otherness. It understands that the Great Choice of life is to acknowledge God’s claim on us, go out of ourselves, as Augustine put it, and acknowledge God’s claim on us. Our fundamental posture is oriented away from self towards the other: the Great Other Himself.
Not unto us, O LORD, not unto us, But to Your name give glory, Because of Your mercy, Because of Your truth. (Psa 115:1)
Otherness is to understand that life is not about self. Life is about going outside of ourselves to God. It is about him. He is God, we are not. He is the source, we are not. He is Alpha and Omega, Beginning and End. This is the starting point of the fear of the Lord.
A biblical word for otherness is humility.
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