The Ways of God

J. N. Darby.

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(Notes and Comments Vol. 2.)

How thoroughly, after all the history of man's ways, all the failure and ruin, evil brings out the whole nature, character and ways of God Himself! The Cross is just the central proof of this, but the whole history tends to and flows from that.

I adore the perfection of those ways of God which, while revealing in a living Person, i.e., Himself in a living Person, the perfection of blessedness and grace as the attractive power for the heart, and which thus forms it, yet does so in that which by its perfection judges the conscience and makes the work of this Person necessary, so that there is a setting the conscience on the full ground on which the heart is, without which there could not be perfect blessedness. Were it only the perfect enjoyment, alas! man would think something of himself, but as it throws light on his conscience he is dependent entirely on the work which cleanses (has cleansed) it, and thus is in humility, and yet he gains immensely because his moral estimate of things is thus according to the perfection which has judged his conscience. Then his walk is in the nature which has loved this Object, and according to the light in the conscience which He has thrown on it, i.e., "as God is in the light," see 1 John 1.

This connection of conscience and the Object is very blessed.

The World

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As regards the law and the teachers of the law, the world, as it is, is in no wise save materially the world made by God. God made Paradise and man lost it; and the world grew up as it is as a system formed by the action of Satan on man's lusts and passions, let it be murder or music and civilization, for Cain began both.

Now the way back was wholly closed - man could not return to Paradise. Of this I have often spoken, but the law was the rule for man on earth, but it could not take man back to Paradise, could not carry on a sinner to God in heaven. Man had not been made as man for heaven; the earth was given him, but this the law could not restore - it was given to the first man. Hence now, if we are to be with God it must be a state suited for heaven itself, and partaking of the glory of God. For we rejoice in hope of the glory of God, and in sinning come short of that glory. The law deals with man on earth and applies to him there, but Christ has taken, in virtue of His work, a place as Man in heaven and in glory. He introduces us into that new sphere and heavenly Paradise, into "the holiest by a new and living way." This is a wholly new thing. It shows us, by making us know God, the perfect righteousness and rightness, the perfection of the law as addressed to responsible man on earth as rule of his conduct on earth as the first man. But to bring back the Christian to it is to bring him back from the heavenly position of Christ before God to the impossible condition of the first Adam - sinner on the earth, where there is no way back. They have turned back from the way forward, which is Christ risen and death to the old system, to arrive there.

The law is not made for a righteous man; I must then give up my righteousness to take back the place of unrighteousness out of Christ to apply it.

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The certainty of a fact by sight is not belief, because, as far as it is worth anything, it is certainty not belief - nothing to accredit it but perception.

The Wisdom of God

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The Wisdom of God is a wonderful thing. It must put things in their place or it is not wisdom - that the Cross does. We are sinners - we must come as such; all then is changed. Yet what sin is, what holiness, what hatred, what love, what man, what God, what the world, what its prince, what the Devil, but this by the bye - we come as sinners, then love is there. So Christ always drew out what people were and met them divinely. For surely here is wisdom too. Christ in life, and in death is God suiting Himself to man and drawing man to Himself.

Now philosophy assumed the competency of man, and to make even God the subject matter of its judgment and thoughts. This was necessarily false. It either left God out and all was clearly wrong, or brought God in and it was worse, because God and man were both out of their place - they are both in it at the Cross.

But then further, the saint becomes nothing and God all - Christ all. This is just right, and the very fulness of blessing, to have done with self and have the fulness of God to dwell in and enjoy; and here is the daily process. It is done completely at the Cross. It is brought out practically by all the discipline of God. But then, when we have this place of nothingness as self, there is divine wisdom unfolded to us.

All things were made by Christ and for Christ. All things are to be gathered together in one in Him, and to be reconciled - all to the eternal fulness of God - all that is in heaven and earth. The result is purposed before the foundation of the world, but in the world, in the creatures, responsibility has come in - we are guilty and all is defiled. But it was all ordained before the world to our glory. Christ has perfectly glorified God morally, and brought out what He is as nothing else could have done. Redemption and grace have a glory, and that through perfect separation from evil, and perfect obedience of Man in the midst of evil, which is all its own. Done for us, we have a part in the glory which belongs to it - the glory of God - are the first-fruits of it - the inner circle round the blessed and glorious Centre in which God is displayed in Christ. Then all things will be gathered round as a redeemed and reconciled Creation to the praise of His glory - the glorious result of the hidden wisdom ordained before the world to our glory. Then Christ will be displayed as the Power as well as the Wisdom of God.

237 Finally the great centre, moral centre, is the Cross - Redemption; when in the weakness of the creature, and the fullest effect of the power of evil, and its present effect - death - good triumphed. Its weakness was stronger than the power of what was against it. It was really divine power but in weakness of the creature, at least of what was of the creature, though divinely, for creature it could not be called. Death was the end of the creature in itself, the birth-place of the new Creation as leaving the old wholly behind. I speak of its effect, for none but a divine Person could have done it. It is Christ and He crucified in the lowest place the creature man can be brought to, but Christ, the Wisdom of God and the Power of God. Then we can have a place in the glory itself, the glory of God, because He is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption - not power.

We are brought before God and intelligently according to what God is. We are always dependent and subject - that only is our place, as really with God - our blessedness. To be out of it is everlasting and perfect misery; the pretention to power is man's folly in assumed independence, which is sin.

We are of God - that is our nature, and actual condition in Christ Jesus, and He is of God wisdom to us, and righteousness, etc. So that we glory in the Lord. Power remains in His hand; we may be instruments of it hereafter, and spiritually may be vessels of it now, as far as emptied of self.

I have very imperfectly brought out what I would here. The great point is the place Wisdom has now; subjection and nothingness beginning with the Cross for the sinner which is deliverance - being nothing, for the saint Christ being all. We know perfect love. We know the counsels and purpose of God - have Christ's mind, but as a soldier in an army, he does not know the bearing of each act in carrying out the plan in the presence of the enemy, he marches right and left as ordered, it is all he has to do, and perfect wisdom is in each step of obedience, and inward wisdom in restoration, for he is thus in his place with God, and in motive, for it is love to his Commander, confidence in Him as well as obedience. All thus becomes right.

I return for a moment to 1 Corinthians 1 and 2. The Cross is the end of flesh and the world - death to one, the deepest possible shame and ignominy to the other. Flesh is wholly set aside, and now folly written on its wisdom - no flesh is to glory in His presence, "He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." Flesh cannot glory before Him - we are to glory in Him, but then the whole being of man in the flesh, morally speaking, has ceased for the Christian. "Of him" (God) "are we in Christ Jesus," and "Christ Jesus is made unto us wisdom of God" (for that is the great subject here) and then righteousness, sanctification, and final deliverance - we glory thus in Him.

238 But then the whole thing is new. There is a plan, a purpose of God for our glory - a purpose before the world. The highest in the world knew nothing of it; if they had, they would not have crucified the Head of it. This is revealed to us by the Spirit; man's heart has not conceived it, but God's Spirit has revealed it. And that is the Spirit the Apostle had, and we have in our place. Then the same Spirit gave the words which were the medium of communication, and the same Spirit enables us to receive it. No one can instruct the Lord, but we have the mind of Christ in whom all this wisdom is. So it is a wholly new sphere and form of Wisdom which is in this purpose of God, the hidden Wisdom, before this world of responsibility and failure and sorrow.

But note it was the princes of this world not knowing it which, as to means, brought about what its accomplishment is founded upon. And note, this is a positive fresh revelation - not anything discoverable by man's mind. A man's spirit knows what is in him and none else; God's Spirit knows what is in His mind and none else. It is purpose that was before man or the world existed, and it is revealed and communicated, not by man's wisdom or words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Ghost teaches.

Note how simply the true wisdom is stated in Ephesians 5, as we see it in Proverbs, "Be not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is." Simple obedience and, by singleness of eye, intelligence of what the Lord's will is, is in practice divine wisdom; as to the way of having it, compare Romans 12: 1, 2.

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Axioms have no evidence - they are principles which contain their own evidence - the statement is another form of the definition or nature of the thing. "A whole is greater than a part" - that lies in the meaning of "whole" and "part"; it is given that form for the convenience of reasoning. So "one is the half of two" is hardly an axiom; it is the meaning of the words. "Two" means two ones, and "half" means a part contained twice. Axioms are only convenient forms of tautology, and so is all mathematics.

Fragments

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The Blessed Lord ought to have had some object worthy of His giving Himself for. Infinite love, and unmotived love, save what was in Himself, was shown in His giving Himself for us, and this was all perfect as obedience in a given work, but God's glory was, and all fully, made good. This was an adequate object for Him. Lord of all He is, as Man, through it, but this only partially adequate; but God's glory is adequate.

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The position of Christ is very striking as showing the absolute intrinsic perfectness of His love and obedience. There is an end of man - all that was in man was against - hatred to, God in goodness - so that He has no sustainment from man, only hatred and evil; He turns to God, and then He is forsaken. Broken, and more than broken from man - pressed up to death, He turns to God, and finds forsaking there - He was left alone, repelled by man and, in a certain sense, by God when He turned to Him - was alone, but accomplished all in His own love and obedience, and perfected the work, so that He could say "Therefore doth my Father love me."

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As regards the relationship of Christ with God on the earth - He never, save on the Cross, addresses God by that name, always "Father." It was the name He taught His disciples, and taught them to address the Father with. This may be seen in the Sermon on the Mount even; it was the place in which He set the others, He being there, and this was eternal life. The end of John opens it out. The disciples say "Come forth from God"; when twelve years old, He takes also this place. In reference to the Psalms, this is important. On the Cross, though perfect there, He takes the place, "My God, my God!" Christ entering in Spirit into Israel's sorrows was not His relationship with God. This testimony of the Gospels is very remarkable.

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241 We have thought elsewhere how Jesus, the Son, was humbled, came into the lower parts of the earth, below all things - His very soul brought into the dust of death that He might be above all things. But see also how He was a Servant, that He might be a Son, i.e., as Man He was the Son and owned as such of the Father, but amongst the servants He was the lowest, yea, a reproach of men and outcast of the people, rejected by all the servants, "A worm and no man," put to death as a Servant, as though He had broken the law of which they were the masters, that He might be the First of Sons, "The first-begotten from the dead," having risen out of the law, that in all things He might have the pre-eminence; for just in proportion as we are humbled, we have exaltation of God - ever, ever, ever is this true! Amen.

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I get three facts, partly helped by the researches of others, as to the period of the blessed Lord's ministry. Before He entered on His public ministry calling disciples away from all to follow Him, but after His baptism by John when He had begun to teach and make disciples and had been back into Galilee - John 1: 43 and beginning of chapter 2 in verse 13 we have a Passover; John, as often observed, not cast into prison (chap. 3: 24). In Matthew 12 we have the corn ripe after a Passover, for they could not eat corn till after it, perhaps after Pentecost even, and John was now cast into prison - had been there some time - he had heard there of His works; chap. 11. It is in Matthew 4: 12 that He hears John is cast into prison - perhaps the same time as John 4. He was then, i.e. Matthew 12 in Galilee. In chapter 14, we have the five thousand people fed; after Matthew 12, but then (John 6) the Passover was nigh; John 7 feast of tabernacles. Then He lingers about in Jerusalem, Jordan, etc., and comes up for the last Passover, i.e. three years and a part of a year.

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So far Christ seems to have exercised the office of Priest, before He ascended up on high, in that He confessed the sins to be His on the Cross, i.e., practically, and is so revealed to us in Spirit. But herein indeed the High Priest was rather acting the part of the people. It was on the people's lot, not what was carried within, so that His priesthood office was exercised before God elsewhere; so that, properly speaking, this was not exercised till after His ascension. In Spirit He did as here, so in John 17, but this was a sort of prophetic anticipation. So it was in Spirit we know - the other as in Psalm 38, to be the virtue of what He did, but properly His direct office of priesthood was in - "within the Veil." This was appropriate, only qualificatory for it - He was then teteleiomenos (consecrated - made perfect).

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242 Alas! how the heart can spring up when set at ease after all manner of dealings with it. Peter, so humbled, so wonderfully restored by exhaustless grace, set at ease, must know what was to happen to John - what shall happen to him? He loved John surely, and it served as occasion to revelation - still the Lord must say "What is that to thee" "and turn back to the "Follow thou me."

I add the Jewish commission to Peter seems to me evident here.

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It is important to remark, as regards the question of the house, that the Holy Ghost is never said to dwell in the body - not of the individual, but as a whole.

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I think we get a measure of characteristic knowledge in Adam in his knowing the beasts. It was subjection of them to him, and, I suppose, the faculty of speech connected with the impressions produced by the animals, and some power of sentiment or apprehension, but there was no abstract reasoning connected with the knowledge of good and evil, nor flowing from the absence of God, which is a source of the widest exercise of intellect on which man prides himself, and which is always false and only ignorance, though it may be dealt with as finding limits.

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243 Faith alone is absolute certainty - it alone has an absolute motive for believing. I have an adequate motive to determine my assent practically, as my mind must do one or another if indifference is impossible - I may have the anxiety of doubt. I may have sufficient motive to believe, but never absolute. I do not call mathematics certainty, not because I doubt, but because they are not the subject of doubt. I may be ignorant, or I know that diverse forms are equal in quantity. I do not say "I doubt" - I am certain; but I am ignorant - "I know."

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Tongues were as plainly language as possible - not always consequently understood by the speaker, though he felt the influence and presence of God, and perhaps certain apprehensions; hence his understanding (nous) was unfruitful. If he could interpret (or another) well - but even the prophets, where there was no question of language, had to search out their own prophecies to have their minds fully fruitful through them.

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I am confirmed in the thought of the soul being the seat of I, and the spirit the seat of both intellectual and moral powers (which are to be developed in good and evil) and by the latter of which we are in relationship with God, or capable of being so; but all these are nothing till the will is right by a new nature - nothing but the capacity of error, and misery of a soul separated from God.

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I have fully entered, elsewhere, into the place the "ifs" hold in the Word in connection with our journey towards the glory, not with our place in Christ. This made me think that in Ephesians, in contrast with Colossians where a hope is laid up for us in heaven, there would be no "if" in Ephesians, for there we are sitting in heavenly places in Christ - and so it is. We get helps "till we all come" - the "whole armour of God," that we "may be able to stand" where we are, but no "if" as to the result of the course. This difference from the Colossians confirms strongly the general view.

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244 The one loaf is better than the twelve.

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Note. - The sense of hunger is a necessity - thirst is a desire after some positive drink; there is also anxiety which is met only by the wisdom of Creation which gives repose and confidence.

Christ as suffering - the Bread of life - meets the hunger, meets the necessities of the Church.

Christ exalted - the Giver of the Spirit - believed on, is the Object of the Church's thirst; it thirsts for God there exhibited - the revealing Spirit is the generator. It is an active feeling, a desire of an object, with an Object thirstingly desired.

Moreover He meets also the anxiety of the Church - He guides in it, leads forth, gives us the consciousness of His caring for the Church when we are anxious about it. He is the Shepherd of the sheep, as well as the Food, and Giver and Object of the Spirit.

I feel I have given these thoughts very imperfectly - the subject is wonderful and most blessed.

Testimony

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As to the testimony or Gospel - there will be always a testimony - prophetic within or evangelic without, for that I apprehend is the universal distinction - until, as to Jerusalem, the times of vengeance, of God's judgment preclude it. It may vary its form, adapt itself (as being of God, it must) to the circumstances and time, but there will always be one until the judgment and blessing arrives. I do not see that the times of vengeance at Jerusalem preclude the testimony in the world at large in general.

As to particular revelations as to it - the everlasting Gospel, it would seem, goes out before the coming of Christ or the destruction of the beast, perhaps before the destruction of Babylon; it applies to heathen, at least to idolaters. The mind of this in Israel is in Psalm 96, the judgment and introduction of the first-begotten is in Psalm 97. Query, if the Gospel of the kingdom be not connected with this, though spoken of more generally - Psalm 2 as a great thesis gives the principles.

The Kingdom of the Father

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It appears that not only "Kingdom of Heaven," but so far as I find "Kingdom of my Father," or "their Father's Kingdom" is peculiar to Matthew; and it would seem to meet the notion of the Jews expecting Messiah, King upon earth. They would not be subjects of Messiah's kingdom upon earth, but they would have something much better - they were to be sons, and Jesus ascended (refusing to be touched or worshipped by them as King upon earth then in resurrection, in which character He would reign over the Jews and world) to His Father and their Father, His God and their God. Declared, however, Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead, they then were not to be reigned over by the Son Messiah, but were to be sons, "Behold what manner of love," etc., therefore in the kingdom of their Father, Jesus appointing a kingdom to them, as the Father to Him, they sitting in His throne as He is in His Father's now. In this then, as a Son, He is with the Father and we with Him as sons in His, i.e., the Father's, kingdom. To the Son shall be given the positive kingdom over all under the whole heaven - we being with Him in the Father's sitting there - He as Son with us, for it is the Son of whom we speak, and we sitting on thrones in His kingdom over the world. It is therefore, I believe, never called "the Father's kingdom" - but "My," "Their" - "Your." It is called "His inheritance in the saints," and so "The Father of glory," "Called to his own kingdom and glory." It exalts us then to a very special place, as to us, in our persons. All shall then be subjected to Him, and the glory will be perfect to Him of redemption as regards us, and therefore with us He, as Son, will be in the Father's kingdom as individuals, while He yet reigns in an undelivered kingdom - His earthly kingdom, in which there are yet things which remain to be subjected. In this we are now upon earth, and therefore it is its patience (see Apocalypse), and this is the force and explanation of the latter part of John 17.

All this is very wonderful, but the glory is all to Him who redeemed us. First it sets also Jesus in a wonderful place, and shows the power and necessity of the resurrection, and that too as regards the saints in the beginning of the millennium; and what force there is in the word "Walk worthy of God who hath called us," etc. And we learn also the force of Ephesians 1 at the end, and also chapter 2; and the Gentiles also therefore are brought in, and this I think proves further, as well as the fact of the bride, the Lamb's wife, that all the saints shall be in it, as does, as it appears to me, every other consideration which I yet notice, little as we deserve it.

247 This, I think, fully explains the passage in 1 Corinthians 15, the delivering up the kingdom to the Father; in fact as to the risen saints it is given up - He holds it now as regards them, though apparently quite otherwise, and this is what Revelation reveals - then they will reign with Him.

The view of the Father's kingdom given above, as brought before us in the passages there referred to, has received abundant confirmation from John 14 which was much opened out to me, in faith as to the subject of it, the other night. It hangs on this - "As I said unto the Jews, whither I go ye cannot come, so now I say unto you." The remedy is, "Ye believe in God" - "He is not present with you, so though ye cannot come and I am gone, believe in me" - this is the position of happiness they are placed in. "Believe in me" - then "I go to prepare a place for you, and I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am, ye may be also" this opens out necessarily the position of the Father - this is in the Father's house.

Then comes that which shows that we have no faith save as we believe in what is commonly called "the millennium." We may not know it to be such, but we have no faith in Christ crucified save as we believe in this, for that which gives its value and import to the Cross is the Person, the present personal glory of Him who suffered, His resurrection declaring this; i.e., it is seeing Christ in the glory of the Father and of His Sonship, seeing Him preparing the place now. If that we believe in now be not true, then our faith is false, i.e. if the glory then revealed be not the verification of our present faith, then is our faith false, and in fact it is nothing else. He sitting only now in the Father's throne - necessary to our apprehension of that throne in the place of which we are to be, and therefore which we could not know out of Christ - but our present faith or its Object, is that which gives value to the sacrifice of the Cross; i.e., the faith of the glory (to be revealed) is the only real faith of the Gentile, or rather Church faith - "I go" - "Believe in me" - "I am preparing a place" - "I come again to receive you to myself, that where I am ye may be also." Now what is this "Whither I go ye know and the way ye know?" "I go to the Father," and "I am the Way" - "I am the Way, and the Truth and the Life" - the Life in which you enjoy this. "No man cometh unto the Father," but He went to prepare a place - but He went to the Father - He prepares a place there, with the Father - we know the place, i.e. our present faith is of the place to which He is gone to prepare, even with the Father, but it is where He is we are, i.e., we are sons with Him in the Father's house - sitting in His throne as He sat in His Father's throne, but then not sitting on His Father's throne. He is Son and we are sons with Him in the Father's kingdom, and sitting in His throne with Him in His kingdom as one with Him, as sons, yet seeing the Father in Him - as seeing Him, united yet distinct.

248 The position into which the Lord puts us then is plain as to faith, and as to place, and as to all, save as sitting in the Father's throne which is incident to Himself and makes us know, what otherwise we could not, that throne of the Father in the kingdom of which we are then.

This is all indistinctly put, but will serve as a clue to the apprehension of the Scriptures which is engraven on my heart, and in which, in Christ ministered by the Spirit, I have fellowship - fellowship with the Father and the Son - know where He is gone, and the way, and see the coming glory. If I had not seen Him in the Father's throne, I could not see that throne, and therefore not the place in which I shall be; and He is now gone to it, only revealing the throne to us by now seeing it, for it is by seeing Him we see the Father, though now we (by Him) know the Father - come to Him (as one with Jesus), and know all the glory which is our hope of faith, and therefore, if not verified, falsifying all our hope of faith, i.e., the Father's kingdom - the Son's - and all the glory and blessing of both - we with the Son in the Father's kingdom in blessing - with the Son in His, in association in power as one - and both of them as one with Him.

Such is our fellowship with the Father and with the Son! Lord, realise it to us!

I add here also John 17: 24, with the reason, and this will open up our place.

Note, further, the Father is the Fountain head of love, i.e., it is in the name we, and so alone, really know Love. The Son is the Minister of all power. The Father exercises no power, though He may give it; but He exercises none. Therefore He says, "The glory," i.e., the present glory, i.e., so fulfilled, "which thou hast given me, I have given them, that they may be one, even as we are one," and "that the world may know that thou hast sent me."

249 Then He speaks of all that are called - all that the Father had given Him, "I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it, that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them." So the offices are plain and manifest, distinct though they be combined as they are indeed.

The worship of the Father is then properly in the certainty of love. We look to the Son, even Jesus, for the ordering of providential and all power. Note this well.

The order of this part of John runs thus it would seem - the Lord was not presenting Himself in His own Messiah glory, but declaring the Father's, "I have glorified thee on the earth," and again "I have kept them in thy name"; not that He was not Messiah, but that He claimed acceptance not in His own but in His Father's name.

He presented Himself in the witness of the Son. This was fully brought out in the raising of Lazarus - the quickening power. Here then was the final witness to them. Thereon (chap. 11) from verse 47, is the Jewish national rejection of Him - verse 54, His seclusion from them - verse 56, they inquire for Him - from the companionship of resurrection power He comes out then (just before the Passover showing Himself more or less) and presents Himself prophetically indeed, but as there in reproach and condemnation of the nation that rejected Him, showing what they had refused - their Messiah - in refusing Christ the Son of God.

The testimony of resurrection caused the people to receive Him, and to own Him as sent. Then comes the Gentile power, and for this the necessity of death - what would have been "Beauty and Bands," if not rejected King of Israel, and the gathering of the ammim (people).

Verses 35, 36 (chap. 12), His testimony to the people and hiding Himself - not losing His witness of Messiah, but even then shown and not shrinking from the necessity of His death; verses 37-43, the judicial account of the blindness of the people; verse 44, the great assertion, noted above, declared now that He came, and so declared on His rejection, in revelation of the Father - His word, His revealed glory; then the extent (v; 46), compare verse 36, and therefore (v. 47) "If any one and verse 49, the responsibility in consequence - whatever came of it He spoke the Father's word, believed or not, and showed the Father's glory, seen or not.

250 In chapter 13, we have the distinctive work and office for the disciples, beginning with His sacrifice in love, His service in love though gone to glory - loving to the end - washing the feet and so forward to the close of the Gospel.

There is another thing unfolded in all this, and that is His sitting in His Father's throne is the revelation of the glory of His Person. We know Him in this character now, we are as sons with Him when He is in it as a Man, a Governor over the earthly house, but we here till the establishment of the full order of the kingdom, gathering together in one all things in heaven and in earth in Him - "in him," in the title of His personal glory, His own Sonship with the Father - the association of His own essential unity with Him. This is a most glorious and blessed point of view, and it is in this point of view the Revelation is given - it is Jehovah, but Jehovah in the Son, and yet the throne of God, but the eternal living One in the Person of Jesus, and it is seen accordingly that the Lamb was in the midst of the throne. The Father was seen, i.e. the Father's throne - God's throne - and Jehovah seen revealing God. "The Father," we may say, seen, but seen in the Lamb, the Son; see also Revelation 7: 10, 17, in the Greek. This is a most important and blessed point. Not that they are ever different, but they are distinct - it is "The throne of God and of the Lamb," Rev. 22: 3.

As to the Kingdom of Heaven and of the Father and the Son, developed in the millennial estate, we may further notice as the Kingdom of Heaven is its aspect towards the Jews, so, as regards the Church generally, it is the merged* character of the millennial glory - its suspended estate that is, as then there will be the Son's throne and the Father's throne. So now the Son is sitting on the Father's throne till they are commixed; hence the position of the Church - the earth is the scene of the Son's kingdom, but the Church is to have its portion on His throne in the Father's kingdom, as sons with Him. Hence in the Church on earth we have the apparent anomaly (though the very way of glory), the expecting state, i.e. the Lord sitting on the Father's throne, from which He shall be manifested. So in the Revelation accordingly we have the horns, and seven eyes in the horns of the Lamb. Hence Christ is to be applied to in ministering (the government of) His Church, which are the seven Spirits of God (before the throne as the Object of glory and worship) sent forth into all the earth, quod nota; whence also the second beast as governing the Church or governing Christ (as order in the world too) has horns like a lamb but spake as a dragon, which is plain if we see what the dragon was (Rev. 12); but the position of the Church is most clearly seen by it, and the Revelation much explained. Hence also we see the meaning of the expression "translated into the kingdom of God's dear Son," which see.

{*Rather "mixed" - "suspended."}

The Christian Position

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There have been three characters in which God has been revealed - God Almighty - Jehovah - "Our Father which art in heaven"; all most important. The first inclusive, and, in one sense essential, attached to the name of God. The others bringing into closer affiance, into closer applicability to, the character of God - names of more direct personal relationship. While the glory is maintained, and the blessedness enhanced of the Lord God, we have these definitely set out in Scripture - to Abraham, the representative of all at Sinai, and in the Lord Jesus "Thy holy child Jesus."

But what I would now notice is that in learning the character of God as "Our Father which art in heaven" - the Christian relationship to Him therefore in the New Testament said "Thee, the only true God" - we are not to lose the others. In truth they were all centred in the Lord Jesus as God manifest in the flesh, and there we learn it, and, in proportion to the measure of the Spirit, exercise the faith in it, though the Father is the specific relationship "Our Father," He in whom we know Him being the Son, but we also know the Lord - He was the Lord. "No one can call Jesus Lord but by the Spirit of God." His Almighty Person indeed is not fully manifested, described until Revelation 4 and 11: 17 - yet He was so. Hence it is manifest we have in presence them all; but see farther in Acts 4, that while our relationship is with the Father and to dwell in the Father's house, still we act on the faith of these also "Lord, Thou art God which hast made," etc. Here we have the sovereign pantokrator (Almighty) - men gathered against the Lord, "For of a truth against thy Holy Child Jesus" - here is the fulfilment addressed as to the Father, as to the realised act, but recognised as being the God who made heaven and earth, etc. It was against Jehovah - it all was - but in fact owned as the present Father. Here also we find the accuracy of the scripture Word, for these two are characteristic in fact, or general subjection - this is personally in relationship, "They shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty." It is our duty thus practically to recognise these things, be perfect in them, though specially as children. Jesus shows them, "The same yesterday, to-day and for ever" - "All power in heaven and on earth" - and "The Son, the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person"; here therefore we find it.

253 Now we find the rejection of the Wisdom of God in John the baptist, and in Christ in Matthew 11: 16-19, and then the justification of the children of Wisdom - the thoughts of the Lord upbraiding them for rejection as manifested - His calling the children of Wisdom. Further the comfort of Christ in submitting to the will of God in seeing the counsel of God as to all things, and the call of babes - His actual and moral purpose - upon the trouble, and apparent failure, of the rejection by the world; for His sovereignty and moral character are brought out together, and not one without the other, though the general character also, and the Sovereignty in title of Christ was hence by His coming to the world - all this is wonderfully brought out in the faithful feelings of our Lord's mind at the close of this chapter.

But it leads to something further as to the universality of Christ's work. All Christ's work, as done by Him, must have reference to, must embrace the world - He could take nothing less as His due. The whole was His title - He came as Man to men, and as Son and so heir He had right to all the world. The work of Christ as presented, as what He should expect as the Man of promise, was therefore to have the world. The Heir of the world was the promise - Christ was the seed to whom it was confirmed everyway, therefore, in His responsibility as Man, in His title, and in His dispensation of promise, the world and nothing less was the portion of His work as Man, His title as Son, His inheritance as Heir of promise - in a word, Christ had title to the world, and He came in love - that title He must be conscious of, and He came in love about it, "For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world," etc. Hence as present in humiliation, this was true, and when He takes the inheritance in Person it is equally true - He could have no less expectation as then manifested, for the witness of the love, the necessity was such, "God sent his Son into the world." He will have nothing less when He appears. This was shown in Adam also, in the history, see Genesis 2: 18, 19.

But here was the greatest, the grand hinge of Christ's submission, "Though he were a Son," and therefore Heir of all things, "Yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered." He came in love - He came in title - and the "world knew him not," and "His own received him not"; "Then have I laboured in vain, saith He, and spent my strength for nought." This was His deep anger against the scribes and Pharisees in the Gospel of Matthew - this His upbraiding in this chapter. He had to bear the rejection of the world, not only in the patience of suffering, but as the disappointment of all the purpose for which He was manifested as alive in the flesh, "While I am in the world, I am the light of the world."

254 "At that time" - here was His submission - "Jesus answered and said, I thank thee" . . . "for so it seemed good in thy sight"; the sovereign purpose, also the moral rightness, force, etc., and "revealed it unto babes," and the exercise of it - "Come unto me all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." But here was perfect submission under disappointment. He was righteously angry with those who rejected Him for so doing, but then submitting to God, He saw that all things were delivered to Him in heaven and on earth by His Father "Lord of heaven and earth," and called to Him, according to the mind of the Father, those who laboured and were heavy laden. As he says in John 17, "As thou hast given him power over all flesh, to give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him"; that was the summary. But note, there was the general love in which He was manifested, and so the manifestation to, and also dying for all, as sent into the world, Jews and Gentiles joining too in the guilt.

Then the sovereignty of love in giving certain, in spite of universal rejection, to Him as the Church of the risen Christ; for it was Christ, the Anointed One of the Holy Ghost, who loved the Church which He saw in Spirit when rejected by the world, and the exercise of this speciality of love in dying for them, "Having loved his own which were in the world, he loved them unto the end." He learned this before, in His rejection, He could teach it to others and does teach it to others. In the meanwhile the Church was given to Him, on His rejection by the world, as His comfort and fulness in the world, and in the Lordship of all things in heaven and on earth, in which He should be ruling over it when He bringeth the only begotten into the world. This explains too "The fulness of the Gentiles" - this makes us know what "His yoke" means; see Isaiah 50, and read John 12 too.

But the point is, He could come to and for nothing but the world, as present in it, though in dispensation, exhibited amongst the Jews. This is the point in John. The rejection was the point of submission, and He bowed perfectly and simply to the Father, and this is expressed all through; it was His perfectness, and took for salvation such as the Father was pleased to give Him - a wonderful, most wonderful submission! Yet perfect, and in Spirit, in the knowledge of the Spirit, He loved the Church which was to be His as rejected and risen, and actually as Christ - loved, then given to Him actually in the world. This is the due to that, and in John 17, and, bearing their sins, presents them to the Father, whom He thus perfectly serves, as He sees, and is Himself satisfied. Besides perfection, submission as a Man; as humbled He is highly exalted, and all things given Him not only on earth as Messiah, His due in title, but in heaven and on earth, a much larger portion, yet indeed His due as Son - and the Church out of the world in the speciality of devoted love, and kind to Him in the cognizance of it - His companion, the witness of His faithfulness as itself purchased by it, in the glory with Him - glorified with Him, while over the world that rejected Him, He and it reign more gloriously, infinitely far, than if then received. And thus is this scene accomplished, and the Mediatorial exaltation over the world completed, with the speciality of the Sovereignty in the Church added, till God be all in all, He having brought in the blessing, and given the competency, so to speak, to the Persons of the Godhead to enjoy, because the blessing of Their love was fully accomplished through Him, while the work of each in it is manifested and apparent as They are all united in all. The work of the Spirit is manifest herein, for it is to take of the things of Christ, and show them to us - It testifies in the world, and brings believers, or the elect, by faith into the Church as given to Christ, that they may be heirs with Him and of the world. The whole truth is thus brought out, and its principle.

255 Now our Lord teaches us, from having experienced the blessing of submission, and the bright prospect of love which the submission to this Sovereignty brought in, to take His yoke and learn of Him, for He is "Meek and lowly in heart." This is the point of instruction, though it rested on all things as given. No man knoweth who the Son is, and His ineffable dignity and Person, nor the Father, save the Son and He to whom the Son will reveal Him.

It is a wonderful passage! We have given but a rough sketch of it in this. Well may we say "No man knoweth the Son!" No man indeed knoweth Him, nor the Father - that is the point - save He to whom the Son reveals Him. The moral beauty of the passage we have not touched upon. The force of the "Labour and are heavy laden" cannot but be seen.

256 The principle adverted to above, as to the world and the sheep, applies to any man in whom the spirit of Christ dwells, and we can realise it intelligibly if taught of God.

There can be no doubt that a Christian, with Christ's Spirit, desires the salvation of everybody with whom he is brought into intercourse in that Spirit, and seeks it in Spirit; at the same time he may be conscious, knowing that none but God's elect may come in, that this person may prove a very hater of Jesus, and, when he does so, he abhors him utterly, and he endures all things for the elect's sake that they may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. I am quite conscious of the two feelings - in weakness surely - as distinctly and as knowing them to be of God, as I see them in Scripture. The Spirit of God walks in love through the world, but it endures and labours in the consciousness that the elect are the portion which it shall bring in blessing to God. Thus it is said that "Christ loved the Church," not "Jesus," not simply "God," but "Christ," i.e., He, anointed with the fulness of the Spirit in which He entered into and felt with the mind of God, He, as the Bridegroom, and knowing this place in the Spirit in which as risen He was to be, gave Himself for it. The great point is, in seeing our Lord, to recognise the distinction of His acting - of His earnest desire in acting, and in the highest point of acting, acting from Himself, and yet acting in perfect and sole obedience - Christ did in the Spirit and the Person of the Son. He acted aph e(m)autou (from him (my) self) and so laid down His life, yet He did it as tauten ten entolen elabon (this commandment have I received) in simple obedience. He came to do the will of Him that sent Him, not His own; now this was reconciled in suffering. If I willingly put myself in a place of suffering, I put myself into the place of patience or obedience - so did the Lord, and said "Therefore," as a man, "Not my will but thine be done." Different parties have taken up either of these separate from the other, and both have marred Christ, and this is the real point between the Irvingites and anti-Irvingites quo ad hoc, and while both have one end of truth, it appears to me that they neither know the real truth of the matter, and both have fallen into error - one of ignorance, the other by bringing in truth to dangerous approximation, and, in some instances, the line distinctly overstepped, in words of dangerous and mischievous error.

257 Now it appears to me that the Lord Jesus is the central point, as it were, of this question - we are elect in Him in the full character in which He is known, as to all His fulness of office as risen. The Church is united to Him risen, as in the flesh and as being in the world. Thus God loved the world; as acting towards it in Christ, I find the double service - acting in humiliation as a Man, in service to God He gave Himself a ransom for all "Tasted death for every man" - also, as fulfilling the purpose of God in the Spirit, so known in comfort on the rejection of the world, Christ loved the Church and gave Himself for it, and this is unqualified redemption into glory according to the infallible purpose of God and effectual ministration of it by the Son.

Further, while therefore the testimony of the Spirit goes forth as the truth of God into the world, yet is its specific work, effectual work, exclusively in the elect of God, testifying of Christ effectually and fully, gathering them, uniting them, as life thus to Him and dwelling in them, as so quickened and gathered - a witness to God. It condemns in testimony because of a world-rejected Christ - by it we are saved, in efficacy, because it unites to Christ risen in the testimony of a living faith. The work of God, viewed simply so, was universal and could not but be, while de facto also His holiness shewed all were at enmity too.

The work of Christ, as Man, unto death was individually universal - the work of the Spirit has also its universality of condemning testimony. But looking at them specifically, while God shewed His love to the world, we have the purpose of the Father, the work of the Son having its double aspect, because, though there were some given to Him of the Father, He purchased the world unto Himself. The effectual accomplishment of the Spirit is in the elect; hence in the purpose in 1 Peter 1, the Father and the Spirit are mentioned, for the Son has His own peculiar title (but He might seem really dishonoured in the world which rejected Him) besides His subjection to the Father, though not dissonant from but the very object of the Father's will; and that title is universal, unqualified, and also coincidently in His work perfect in the universality of His love, whence His patience - He has it in His Godhead, as the Father loved the world in His Godhead, though, as the Father, He purposed the salvation of the Church making them therein His manifest children, for, though the purpose of all, Christ continues, so to speak, in His purposing Godhead.

258 The depth of this subject as most blessed, so is most full of the fulness that cannot be reached, while we are filled into it and made the fulness of the Head of the body, and most sanctifying if we receive it in humble reception, enabling us to hold things in simplicity. Hence I say, God loved the world - Christ died for all, so also He loved the Church and gave Himself for it, and the Spirit (the Accomplisher of all individual result) worketh effectually in them that believe.

Note the vast difference of the way of God's dealings in the case of the professing Church and the world at large. To the professing Church which had had the truth and not loved it, God sends strong delusion to believe a lie, whereas to the world at large the Gospel of the kingdom and the everlasting Gospel are sent as a warning and to call men.

Death to Nature

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My dear brother,

Exaggerations are always dangerous, and, where imagination is at work, deceive to people's cost; but the subject is a serious one. "Dead to nature" is not a scriptural expression, so we must see what people mean and what Scripture says. But deadness to the world and all the flesh is after, is what is wanting among Christians.

As regards natural relationships, they are very carefully maintained in Scripture. The matter stands thus: God established certain relationships - "from the beginning it was not so" (divorce) - " God made them male and female"; sin has come in and spoiled all. A new power has come in, which, while fully recognizing them as of God, and using them as images of the highest spiritual relationships with Christ and the Father, has nothing to do with them - is above and out of them. In general those who say much about them and being dead to nature, do so because they are not. Paul lives alone and says as a rule, "Let every one of you have his own wife." The speaking against it is of Satan.

The Lord had considered the lilies and how God had clothed them; seeking these things as an object is another matter. Adam was to dress and keep the garden when he had no sin, but we need to have our affections on things above by a new power, and need a single eye to it to keep us out of the power of what is corrupted. "All things are lawful to me but I will not be brought under the power of any." They even who had wives must "be as though they had none," for the time is a constrained one.

Nature is of God, but its corruption is not, and it is corrupted, under the bondage of corruption and that is the difficulty. But "dead to nature" is legality; to seek it as it is, is not of the Spirit, though He has given us all things richly to enjoy. My body is of the old creation - my life, as born of God, of the new, and we are left for spiritual exercises in this very way. Nor is the matter therefore so simply spoken of as some would, humanly. It is meant to be a holy exercise, and those who do not spare the body may be satisfying the flesh.

The Apostle speaks for spiritual power and for order, "Every man has his own gift"; but it is a gift. He wills that men marry as a rule, but tells them that the married man cares for the things of the world, that they will have trouble in the flesh, but he spares them.

260 We have died with Christ, our life is hid with Him in God - He is our life. We have been crucified with Christ, yet live, yet not we, but Christ lives in us, and this life lives by the faith of the Son of God. But you will find that when applied it is always in view of certain objects which turn the heart from Christ - "All that is in the world, the lusts of the flesh," etc., are not of the Father. We are dead to sin, to the rudiments of the world. You will further find that these are distinguished, and that the highest Christian state does not contemplate this at all.

In Romans the Christian is looked at as a man alive in this world as we are, but justified, and Christ our life. Here we get "dead to sin," Christ having died to it, and our "old man is crucified with Christ, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should no more serve sin, for He that is dead is justified from sin" (not sins), you cannot accuse a man of sin in the flesh if he is dead. In Colossians it goes further. "Ye have died" and here they are risen also, and so are looked at as risen men on the earth; they are dead to the rudiments of the world, are not alive in the world, subject to ordinances. So we are "dead to the law by the body of Christ," in Romans; it is also said, "if Christ be in you the body is dead because of sin." But "dead to nature" is, in all that we are said to be dead to, quite unknown to Scripture in word or thought. It falsifies the idea of the bearing of death there.

But none of these is the highest measure taken in Scripture. These think of sin, though of death to it, but never of our living in it. Colossians goes a step further, and on to ground which is fully developed in Ephesians; here man's highest condition in this respect is spoken of, he has not died to anything - he is viewed as dead in trespasses and sins, and then as a new creation, a creation after God. It is just mentioned, Colossians 2: 13. This is fully developed in Ephesians 2, and here note Christ is not viewed as life-giving, but as raised when a dead man, He having descended in grace to where we were, and in an effectual work for us, so that we rise with Him and into the same place. This is referred in 2 Corinthians 5: 14-17, and in the remarkable summary in John 5: 24. All this stands on a different ground from being quickened and having died - we have changed our place and position, are created anew; but if dying to be brought in and dwelt on, people are really in general under law and do not count themselves dead, and if they talk of dying to nature, which Scripture does not, they will soon find to their cost that nature is not dead.

261 I should earnestly press being dead, crucified with Christ; Christ and nothing else our life - not of the world as Christ is not of the world - that the Spirit of God be the source of all our thoughts and desires to live Christ. Death to sin we have, to the world, our old man crucified with Christ, and, if Christ be in us the body dead because of sin. So all that is in the world, the lusts, and pride is not of the Father. But neglecting of the body may be "being vainly puffed up in a fleshly mind," and "dead to nature" does not enter into the sphere of scriptural thought. Who is dead to it, and what is he dead to? Is the new man dead? The question would be: Is nature dead? And that they will soon find it is not. They should not eat nor drink. Now they should not do this save to the glory of God, and, with prayer and thanksgiving, have no motive but Christ in anything, the body of sin being destroyed.

What is specially wanted now is individual devotedness. I dread anything that would weaken that, but "dead to nature" in word or thought Scripture does not know, and in the highest character of Christ, dead to anything does not come in at all, but a new nature in relationship with the Father and with Christ, and in Him sitting in heavenly places. If I talk much of being dead to nature, I am occupied with it. I write briefly and in a hurry, but you will find I believe the principles of Scripture here.

Yours affectionately in the Lord,

August 16th, 1878. J.N.D.