Table of Contents

Examination of Mill's Logic

Examination of Mill's Logic

Examination of Mill's Logic

Examination of Mill's Logic

VOLUME 2

On the Gospel of John

Introduction

John 1

John 2

On the Gospel of John

John 4

On the Gospel of John

John 8

John 10

John 12

On the Gospel of John

John 13

John 14

On the Gospel of John

John 18

John 19

John 20

On the Epistle to the Romans

Introduction

Romans 4

On the Epistle to the Romans

Romans 5

Romans 7

On the Epistle to the Romans

Romans 8

Romans 9

Romans 10

Romans 11

Fragmentary Thoughts on Revelation

Revelation 1: 5, 6

________

Fragmentary Thoughts on Revelation

Revelation 4

Fragmentary Thoughts on Revelation

Revelation 13

Fragmentary Thoughts on Revelation

Revelation 17

Revelation 18

Revelation 20

Revelation 22

Revelation 22: 16, 17

God in His Essence and Attributes

The Most High

A few words on the Trinity

The Absolute

The Relative and the Absolute

Self-consciousness and the Infinite

Miracles and Infidelity

On Mysticism

On the Government of God and His Counsels in Grace

The Coming of the Lord that which characterises the Christian Life

The Olive, the Vine, and the Fig-tree

The Value of Scripture Knowledge

Some Observations on the Scripture Lessons of the Board of Education

A letter on a serious question connected with the Irish Education Measures of 1832

Speech delivered at a meeting held for the purpose of promoting Scriptural Education.

Deliverance from the Law of Sin

Progress of Democratic Power, and its Effects on the Moral State of England.

Four things we have in Christ

"This one thing"

Philippians 3

The Believer's Place in Christ

2 Corinthians 5

The Narrative of Passion Week, and of the Resurrection

The Facts of the Lord's Resurrection, in their Relative Order

The Closing Commissions in the Gospels

The Faith once Delivered to the Saints

Jude 3

The Public Ruin of the Church

1 Timothy 3: 15, 16; 2 Timothy 2: 19-22

Letter on "Apostasy"

The Person of the Lord

The Humiliation of Christ

[END OF MISCELLANEOUS - VOL. 1.]

Review of "Lectures on the Second Advent," and "The Apocalypse Unfulfilled."

Reply to an article in the "Zionsbote" upon "Darbyism"*

A letter on a pamphlet by Mr. F. Olivier, entitled, "The Body of Christ, and a Misunderstanding on the Subject."

J. N. D.

Is the "One Body" the ground of gathering?

New Lump

Christ and Sanctification

J. N. D.

On Everlasting Punishment "The Eternity of Evil."

_________

Letter on Immortality and Everlasting Punishment

The Deity of Christ and what constitutes Christianity;

Being an answer to the enquiries of an Unitarian student of Divinity.

Development

Letters on the Revised New Testament

_______

Letter on the Parables of the Thirteenth of Matthew

A note on the Parables of the Treasure and the Net

J. N. D.

Romans 7 and 8

Romans 9

Note on the application of the types of the Red Sea and Jordan.

J. N. D.

An Introduction to the Bible

J. N. D.

Notes on the Epistle to the Galatians

Introduction

Galatians 1

Galatians 2

Galatians 3.

Galatians 4

Galatians 5

Galatians 6

The True Path of a Christian

Acts 20: 28

What is the World, and What is its End?

"For me and thee"

Matthew 17: 25-27

1882.

The "Ifs" of Scripture

1882

The Place of Sacrifice in the Ways of God

The Burnt-offering; the Meat-offering; the Peace-offering

The Burnt-offering - Leviticus 1

The Peace-offering - Leviticus 3

Omniscience - God's Searchings

Psalm 139

God's Ways and Testimony

Jeremiah 2

On Matthew 13

Waiting and Working for Christ

Matthew 25: 1-29

"My delights were with the sons of men"

Luke 2

The Saviour and the Sinner

Luke 7: 29-50

A Servant for ever

Luke 12: 35-41

Christ for my sins; and Christ for my cares.

John 4

The Father seeking Worshippers

John 4

The Pool of Bethesda

The Feast of Tabernacles

John 7: 1-44

Christ departing to the Father

John 13

The Father's House

John 14

Our Responsibility

John 15

Christ's Desires for the Christian

John 17

The Responsible Man, and the Man of Purpose

John 17

A word on Cleaving to the Lord; addressed to young converts.

Acts 11

Thoughts on Galatians 3

Romans compared with other Epistles

The Character of Christian Life

2 Corinthians 3

The Law, and the Gospel of the Glory of Christ

The Gospel of the Glory

2 Corinthians 3

The New Creation

2 Corinthians 5: 13-21

The Lord Jesus in Humiliation and Service

Philippians 2

Colossians compared with Romans and Ephesians

Meetness and Growth

Colossians 1

Risen with Christ

Colossians 3: 1-17

The Life of Christ in the Believer

Colossians 3: 18-25; 4

[END OF MISCELLANEOUS VOL. 3]

Nine lectures on the First Epistle of John

Explanatory

1 John 1

13 2.

25 3.

Nine lectures on the First Epistle of John

Nine lectures on the First Epistle of John

JND - Miscellaneous

J. N. Darby

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With the prayerful desire that the Lord Jesus Christ will use this God-given ministry in this form for His glory and the blessing of many in these last days before His coming. © Les Hodgett (contact@stempublishing.com) (2011)

Examination of Mill's Logic

J. N. Darby.

<32007E> 54 {file section a.}

{A System of Logic, by John Stuart Mill, 8th edition.

The reader must bear in mind that these are only MSS notes jotted down while reading the book.}

The question is a grave one, how far, when no general idea or quality is predicated of an object, but it is only said "is," two objects are before the mind. But Mr. Mill is, as to this, all wrong and inaccurate. When I say "the sun," I already suppose such a thing and its existence, or I can have no object before my mind at all. "A round square" gives no object or idea to be - Mr. Mill's example - affirmed about. What he does not see (and the whole book is in my judgment very shallow) is that what is affirmed in saying "the sun exists" involves unexpressed that it exists now. Time present is affirmed; but whether I say "was," "is," or "will be," I have an object of which the existence is before my mind, or there is no object before it. He shirks the word idea, because an idea in the mind supposes an object with which it is occupied. It may be only a poetical possibility, but its existence is assumed poetically. If I say "is," or "exists," I affirm that it is a fact now. It may go farther, for the present supposes in its nature all times or none; it affirms a fact, and leaves past and future wholly out. If I say, "I am," I cannot say "I" without a conscious object; "am" adds little to any idea of it. There is no other object. "I" carries "am" with it; and the only danger is that "am" makes it too absolute by excluding beginning, "was" and "will be." "I" involves my existence as spoken of. "I thought "; that is passed. "I will give "; that supposes an "I," an existing object I have in my mind. Yet I may not exist to do it; but the object is an object in the mind, and existing there as an object thought, whatever is affirmed about it. The verb substantive affirms that it is not only an ideal object, but an actually existing one - "God is." If I say "God," I have a thought object, an object before my mind; if there be no such thing thinkable (as "a round square "), I am talking nonsense. It is an assumed object, and I cannot think it without thinking of it as an existence. I do not say "existing," for that says now, but an existence. When I say "is," I affirm actual existence now, and past and future are not in my mind. It is an existing fact, and, as every present puts me in a present time (that is, has no time at all), it is an affirmation, taken by itself, of eternal existence.

55 It is totally false that no belief can be afforded. If I say "my father," my hearer believes, if he receives what I say, that I have had or have one, and disbelieves what I say if he does not think so. Thus, if I say "Adam's father," I disbelieve the whole account in Genesis. If I say "Cain's father," and another does not reject what is said, it is believing he had one, at least agreeing in it. If I say a "round square," he has no object before his mind to affirm about. When it is said "affirmed of something," something is affirmed before anything is affirmed about it. The sun exists, or my father exists, goes on to say it or he which is exists now. And the present involves no time - that is, contemplates no duration for a time, and hence is either the simple fact of now, which has no duration, or involves eternity - a now that never ceases to be now,* for now is unity, not duration - when the present is used not as now, it is a true unabgeschlossenes Aorist (i.e. Aorist of unspecified time). "I dine every day": what time is that?

{*Hence, when I say "God is," "God" necessarily represents to the mind an eternal, self-existing, or uncreated Being. No beginning and no ending is in the thought; and it can be said absolutely of such only. "Is" affirms being. It may be used for "exists," and then it has not its absolute sense. San and dasein are not the same thing. Man exists; the world around us exists; but I could not say "is."}

When I say, "God is," I affirm no time, but existence: and, if I add nothing, eternal existence. Existence only is affirmed of Him, and, if true, always true. If I say to any one "God," I call his attention to an object, which I cannot do if there be no such object. I do not say in existence now, but as an object to be thought of as existing (I do not say when). But I think of His Sein, though not necessarily as seiend. If "the sun" suggests a meaning, what meaning? That there is such a thing as sun as an object of thought; not "is," as presently existing, but as an existence. If I say "round square," I have no object of thought at all; it is not an existence even for thought; it has no meaning. The importance of this in "I am," "God is," is evident. And this is evident when other words are used predicatively. "God created the world." If "God" does not convey the thought of an existing object, the proposition has no sense at all. That is, without affirming at all that God exists or did exist then, naming Him affirms, not as an inference but in the word itself, an existence, a Being which did that. So if I say, "the sun heats," "sun" gives me the thought of an existing thing. I say something about it, but I speak of something about which I affirm. And one could pertinently say, There is no such thing as a sun to heat. That is, he does not believe, not the proposition about heating or the sun's heating, but what is contained in the word "sun." If I say "The moon heats," one might say, No, it does not. That is, he disbelieves what I say about the moon, he denies the proposition; but, in denying the proposition, he accepts the affirmation that there is a moon to heat or not to heat, and knows it is affirmed, and believes it. In what I have said of the sun, he disbelieves it. Thus if one speak of, say "a round square," I say there is no such thing, I disbelieve what is said.

56 And this Mill really admits in chapter 1, sec. 3 when he says, "What we do, what passes in our mind, when we affirm or deny two names of one another, must depend on what they are names of; since it is with reference to that, and not to the mere names themselves, that we make the affirmation or denial." Just so; but then there is a "that" which we affirm or deny about. This is "what we do, what passes in our mind" - that is, mind takes cognisance of the reality of the object as an existence, believes it, or can have no proposition about it. Again, Names, chapter 2, sec. 1. "Names are not intended only to make the hearer conceive what we conceive, but also to inform him what we believe. Now, when I use a name for the purpose of expressing a belief, it is a belief concerning the thing itself, not concerning my idea of it." If then a name expresses my belief in the thing, he, if he goes in with what I affirm about it, acquiesces in the thing as an existence, a thing; just what I insist on. It is a complete contradiction in terms of what he had said: "There is as yet nothing to believe." If I express a belief concerning the thing, so can he, or (as I said) tacitly acquiesce in the belief I express, to go on to something else said about it.

Names are the names of things. And when I say "Franklin," or "sun," or, what is infinitely more important, "God," I am naming a thing and "expressing my belief" in that thing, and the hearer too, if he acquiesces, whatever else I may affirm about it. But I cannot talk of Franklin if there be no Franklin to talk about; nor about the sun if there be none. All propositions assume then the subject and predicate as things or existences.

57 Hence it is evident that reasoning, inference, logic, supposes existence, an object; that is, it is always preceded by belief. I cannot reason about nothing, I cannot infer from nothing. I do not say, therefore, logic has nothing to do with belief; but that it is based on belief. To put it in a more palpable way, suppose I say "Drumdrum is white." If you think I am serious, you will say, What is "Drumdrum"? If I answer, There is no such thing, you will at once say, Then you cannot say it "is white": that is a proposition, supposes the subject to be a real thing, that is, believes it. "Is" goes farther when it is a copula - that is, affirms a quality of the subject. It affirms present existence. If I say "gold is yellow," I speak of it not only as a thing, but as an existing thing. If I say "Fuimus Troes," "fuit Ilion," I speak of a thing, but as no longer existing. That is, belief is necessarily antecedent to all reasoning, first, of the affirmation in the premises; secondly, further, that the thing affirmed about is a thing, the word therefore conveying an objective idea to my mind. But more, the conclusion is never an object of belief, though in practical life it becomes so. It is a conclusion, a necessary consequence if the premises are true, involved really in them, and so a means of belief practically. But all that is affirmed is, not that the conclusion is true, but that it is involved in the premises and no more. What I believe or deny is what is in the premises. I say, "then so and so follows." What I say is "must be" - "gold is yellow." Then, I believe there is a thing called gold, and that it is yellow. I add, all yellow things are ugly. I believe that of yellow things; but gold is a yellow thing; consequently if these two propositions are believed, gold must be ugly too. But I infer the thing, because I have no direct evidence of the fact, or I should want no inference. I quite admit that practically it induces the belief if gold still exists, but I must believe this to turn the inference to a fact I believe.

I believe by experience or testimony, and by that only; I conclude from the nature of language and thought, which never goes into fact, because it is only the nature of thought, but supposes it, because I cannot have thought without an object thought of, a thing. When my knowledge arises from testimony, reasoning may help me as to the credibility of testimony from experience of the world and men and the like, from which I reason to the credibility; but what I believe is still the experience or the testimony. I believe that there is an innate consciousness of God - not an idea of God. Such as I have may be true or false as to many things I affirm about Him. I believe that He can make Himself known. This is experience. I believe that He has made Himself known in an external way, that is, by a revelation. But this is not a matter of inference, nor can it be, but of experience or testimony, supposing capacity to receive it. I may reason to banish the folly of false reasoning; but that appeals to facts, as all reasoning must. A conclusion must rest on premises, that is, on facts; but they are known by experience or testimony. And so even scripture speaks. "He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself; and he that believeth not hath made God a liar." That is experience and testimony. In conclusion, then, belief precedes logic always. If I say "gold is yellow," I affirm two things - that is, believe them or present them for belief - that gold is, and is of a certain colour; but I have drawn no conclusion at all. There is no reasoning as yet whatever, no logic. It is what is stated as believed by experience or testimony. Mill's statement is wholly and essentially wrong, and is the basis of his infidelity. And a very poor one it is, and only shews how very inaccurate and illogical a mind he has.

58 The extreme looseness and carelessness of the book is surprising. There is a kind of impudence in its character. "Truths are known to us in two ways: some directly and of themselves; some through the medium of other truths. The former are the subject of Intuition, or Consciousness," Introduction, section 4; in the note he tells us others make a difference between the two: Intuition of objects external to our minds; Consciousness of our mental phenomena; but he uses them indiscriminately; and then he admits that something is known antecedent to all reasoning, but, if known, believed; then he gives being vexed yesterday as consciousness, whereas this is memory; by inference only, about what took place when we were absent, the events recorded in history, or the theorems of mathematics. The two former we infer from the testimony adduced; but this is not an inference at all, it is belief of the testimony, right or wrong, without any inference at all; or traces of what has happened. This may be called inference; but to put knowing what has happened by testimony, or theorems of mathematics, on the same ground of inference, is nonsense or impudence, or rather both. It is to get rid of knowledge by testimony, which he states thus: "Whatever we are capable of knowing must belong to the one class or to the other; must be in the number of the primitive data, or of the conclusions which can be drawn from these." Now, I know it is cold at the poles, and that Constantinople is a city in Turkey. But it is not primitive data, nor a conclusion drawn from any such. People have told me so, which is neither one nor the other. This is not honest, that is the fact; and so to state it is impudence. It is convenient for infidelity.

59 I deny that logic judges anything but the justness of an inference; nor does it determine whether evidence has been found. It settles whether, the premises being given, the conclusion is just, and no more. Whether the premises are true is a question with which it has nothing to do, save as they may be a conclusion from prior reasoning. It only says, granting the premises, such a conclusion necessarily follows; that is all. It may use subsidiary helps, as definitions, divisions, etc.; but inference from is all it judges of - of truth, never. Hence the scholastic rule, "Contra negantem principia non disputandum est," page 9.

In page 3 Mill says every author has a right to give whatever provisional definition he pleases of his own subject; but if the definition be false, he deceives from one end to the other, as all the reasoning depends on it. Thus in Milner's End of Controversy, the author says, A rule of faith, or means of communicating Christ's religion, and hence proves the Protestant rule of faith unfit to be such. It sounds all fair, the Bible being used to communicate religious knowledge; but a rule and a means of communicating are not the same thing, and his whole book is a fallacy, unanswerable in great part if the definition be let pass. A mother may communicate Christ's religion, but she is no rule of faith. People have no right to deceive and mislead by a fraudulent or false definition, and this Mill does.* Thus when Mill says testimony to a fact happening when we are absent, or a theorem of mathematics, are alike inference, he is deceiving his reader if he has not his eyes open to what he is about. So, when he says - for thus he uses his false division - "Whether God, and duty, are realities, the existence of which (p. 8) is manifest to us a priori by the constitution of our rational faculty; or whether our ideas of them are acquired notions," etc., not of consciousness or intuition, but of evidence and of reasoning, it does not follow it is rational faculty or acquired notions. It is not necessarily nor really one or the other; nor are our ideas of them the same thing as their being realities; all is grossly loose. Nor is it the same either to say, "not of consciousness or intuition, but of evidence and reasoning." For a priori rational faculty is not intuition or consciousness; and, so far from admitting the greater portion of our knowledge to be matter of inference, I deny that inference gives any true knowledge at all. It may be a help or a short end to get at what is sufficiently near it to act on, but it is never knowledge. I agree with Bain (p. 43), that to say such a smell or sound is not white, is nonsense; colour does not apply to either. It is astonishing what an inaccurate mind Mill has.

{*He also professes to take "cause" as meaning merely an antecedent, without entering into effectual causes, and so to define it; but, when the statement is lost sight of, he takes it as a certain and proved point.}

60 In page 7, "The science, therefore, which expounds the operations of the human understanding," etc. What science is that? We have had none such spoken of. Here he speaks of it to exclude metaphysical inquiries from logic. Be it so, though it be difficult save as a mere examination of the laws of inference, at any rate from its subsidiary parts as definitions. But then logic is a science (page 2). Logic is a science - "the analysis of the mental process which takes place whenever we reason," "a right understanding of the mental process itself, of the conditions it depends on, and the steps of which it consists." Now, these two statements are contradictory to one another, only so vague, so indeterminate, that though one affirms and the other denies as to logic, a certain part of a general science not elsewhere named, it is impossible to say they do or do not so contradict one another. Still "a right understanding of the mental process itself" is pretty much the same as "expounds the operations of the human understanding," and so far he plainly contradicts himself. Again, the whole book depends on the difference of intuition and logical inference, yet no one could tell from it what intuition is. Nay, it is carefully obscured by the statements in page 5: The object of logic is to know how we come by that portion of our knowledge which is not intuitive (whatever that is). Yet "logic neither observes, nor invents, nor discovers, but judges," page 9. But judging is not coming to any part of knowledge, but ascertaining the accuracy of what is before my mind, eliminating what is not accurate. If logic discovers nothing, it is no way of coming to any knowledge. It is not practically true that it discovers nothing; it does not in fact or directly, but it does to my mind. I would dissuade a man from ascending Mont Blanc. Constant white is bad for the eyes, but snow is constant white: snow is bad for the eyes. This is very simple; the conclusion is, as often argued, involved in the premises, but it is not in my mind before, and in this sense I discover it. It is the means of putting two things together in my mind by means of a middle thing, which were not together there before. Everything is not so simple. Every man is an animal; all animals die; man dies. This is not exact knowledge; it involves man being a mere animal, and the second premise assumes that, and may be false if the first be absolutely true. It affirms that an animal necessarily and universally, in the sense in which it is used in the first premise, is subject to death, for that is what "die" means here; and in the absolute sense I may combat both premises. This makes the statement of two names for one thing, as Hobbes, evidently false. Man may be an animal as to qualities which make anything such; but if all other animals die, he may be exempt from it. It states that man and death are colimitaneous, of which we have no proof; though a matter of general observation, which is in general sufficient for conduct, but it is never truth in itself. This could be met by denying the major, that all animals die. Death is not a quality necessary to constitute anything an animal. If it were nothing else, it assumes that what has happened constantly always must happen, which is not necessarily true. There may be impeding causes. Man may have to act on it in the world in which he does observe, but it is never truth.

61 As regards "relative" and "relationship" (p. 45), Mill's adopted statement is poverty and superficiality itself. It has nothing to do with a series of events. They may be the fundamentum relationis, but cannot be the relation itself. Relative or relation is merely that a thing is before the mind in relation or reference to something else, not simply in itself, in what it is related. Where this is an important and constant reference, there is very commonly a word expressing it, as subject, son, father. And even the verb is so used. I say, relatively to Asia, India is a small tract of land, but relatively to England a very large one, and so on. That dissertation relates to political, not physical, geography. Hence more widely; he related to me his history. (This may be from another etymological sense of the word.) At any rate relative is when, in thinking of anything or speaking of anything, my mind or even the word refers to something besides that of which I think or speak, and states, where it is a relative word, the nature of the reference: what I said related to such an one, that is, referred to him. Hence a relative word is one which expresses this reference, as "son" makes me think of "father," "subject" of "king" or other ruling authority, "citizen" of "state." But the thought as to the two is not the same as Mr. Mill asserts. The fact is not the same, not even in father and son. One is the attribute of paternity, the other of filiality. Begetting is only the way it is formed; father is not a series of events, but present reference to what he is towards a son. Begetting, in man's case at any rate, is the cause of that, but not it, for it is continuous and begetting is not. Begetting is not the relationship at all. It is over before the relationship begins. So in king and subject. Subjection is thought of when I say subject, and in the subject; authority in the king, when I say king. And here by what events he got it has nothing to do with the matter. It may be birth, conquest, election: the relation is in all cases consequent on an event if referring to it. It is a character in one which refers to another, and is a link or tie in thought to them. Mill's account is degrading and false too, for the series of events must be finished before the relationship begins. But it gives him the opportunity of denying all moral character to it; whereas relationship in living beings gives duties and affections according to the nature of the being. There is no relationship of this kind between an apple-tree sprung from a pippin and the tree the pippin came from. I he kind, if according to nature, may be the same. So that if I say apple, I suppose an apple-tree, but there is no subsisting tie or link formed by God. In mere animals this is merely animal as long as the necessities of animal nature require it, but that is all.

62 Where there is a moral nature, there is a moral relationship according to it. Husband and wife are that. It means a relationship in which the formed tie is to be maintained according to its nature. I quite admit that this is outside logic; but then all duties and right affections, all thoughts and ideas connected with the relationship are outside logic; that is, everything that man is as a moral being. Hence no rationalist has ever found a basis of morality. Conscience, happily, is often better than logic; but one time it is general utility, another following nature, and other things. It is wholly and only living up to the relationships we are placed in. Yet Mill says (p. 8) nearly the whole of human conduct is amenable to the authority of logic. Logic has nothing good or bad to do with it. Nor is it, as he says, the science of evidence. Logic has nothing to do with it. There is no science of evidence. There is observation of human nature, and the motives which govern it, which help to ascertain whether evidence is reliable. But he carefully obscures this word, as he does others. I must say, to seek to defeat truth. Evidence or testimony has on the face of it nothing to do with proof by inference (see note, p. 5), but he obscures this point too. There testimony is spoken of, and as to this it is said (p. 9), logic does not find evidence. Then we have the evidence of consciousness. But is the testimony of another evidence, supposing it proved credible, or thought so? Find it out from Mr. Mill if you can. It would open a door to faith on adequate testimony, without reasoning or inference, and that would be intolerable.

63 From what I have said of constancy of link or tie, another distinction arises as to relative words and relation. There are many relative words where there is no relation. Thus, robber is a relative word, but you cannot speak of a relationship between them, nor have you a word for him who is thought of in the relative word. I say lessor, that is a subsisting relation, and I have lessee. I rather think, at any rate it is so in many cases; the relative word, where there is only one, exists where the character abides in that one, specially in the active and passive, -er, -or, and -ee. At any rate, where the relative character subsists, there is a relation in common language. Where not, there may be a relative word. Where the relative word expresses a relation, it is never an event or series of events. The assertion is merely an effort to put a pig and a man on the same level, and deny subsisting relationship and duty. (See p. 8, sec. 4.? All active words are relative, but there is generally no relationship.

64 As regards page 49, the only thing logical proof does is to shew that the conclusion, which I have not yet admitted, is contained in the premises, which I have, though of course in reasoning I may deny them. All that is believed is what is stated in the premises, upon whatever ground it may be, consciousness, sight, experience, or previous proof even. The statement implies and means to say that formal proof, as afforded by logic, is that which produces belief, or makes it tantamount.* I believe what I am conscious of, have by intuition, which he admits is no part of logic. I would add experience of what goes on outside us, and, I add, testimony to facts which are not properly propositions, though as to some of course they may be so stated, but are believed, not by logical proof. So that, if a proposition or assertion be made of it, there is no logical proof, it is believed by sight or testimony.

{*But this is wholly false, and at any rate applies only to discourse (Logos). I see a man; I believe it without any proposition. If I say such a one is there or here, there or here is asserted about him; but when I see him I know or believe it without any logical inference at all. Existence, we have seen, asserts nothing save in mentally adding "now."}

All he says as to this is radically false. Nor can existence as a fact be said to be two things, one predicated about another, like qualities. When I say "the sun exists," as we have seen, unless the thought "now" be introduced, it is not affirming a second thing about a first, but that the first "is," which is involved in saying the sun. For if no sun's existence is before the mind, I cannot say "the sun" as we have seen. Introducing the idea of time "was" or "now is" is another thing affirmed about it, when I recognise it as a thing, that is, mentally its existence. Even if I say "the sun was," I say nothing about it; there is no attribute attached to it.

If I say such a man is a good man, it is a proposition, but the facts of his life shew it. My testimony may be believed. I may make a conclusion of it, as he who does so-and-so is a good man, but he does so-and-so; he is a good man, then. That he does so-and-so is believed; there is no logical inference, if I say he does so-and-so as the proof: it is merely defining goodness if I put it in a proposition to infer from it. That is what I mean by goodness; the acts experienced prove the heart of the man, not logic. If I say, he who does so-and-so is a good man; A does so-and-so; he is a good man; I turn it into a logical form; but what I know and believe is that A does so-and-so, from experience or testimony, and that is the proof of his goodness; the first premise is merely what I mean by goodness, or at least the testimony of what I mean by goodness experimentally to my mind. His doing so-and-so, not logic, proves goodness; the facts do, if what I mean by goodness is proved by them; but a definition is not an inference. When I say good, I mean something without any inference at all; the facts that shew it are no inference, but I believe the goodness because of them. But all this is a vital principle. The statement is tacit infidelity, as all that went before is. Belief is not by logical proof, never even. The things believed are in the premises, as I have said; and besides, consciousness and intuition, and, I add, testimony, are grounds of belief. The two first, he admits, are no part of logic; the latter he shirks.

65 Mill's inaccuracy of mind certainly unfits him to write on logic. In his Categories, page 55, feeling is a state of consciousness. This is false really, and according to the next sentence. There it is said, "Everything is a feeling of which the mind is conscious "; but then I am conscious of the feeling, and the two things are distinct, which they are. Feeling is an effect produced in me by some external cause. I am conscious of this. In consciousness there is a reflex activity of "I" as to what I feel. I take cognisance of it. When I say "I am," I introduce an activity of "I" about something. "The mind is conscious," that is, the mind (or "I" mentally) is in operation about something; that something produces the feeling.

Let it be colour supposed in the object, or the effect of it my mind if I am so to take it, is an object of which I take notice. But if it be "of which," it is not the state of consciousness I am in about it. If the language of philosophy is no more accurate than this, it had better not set about to teach. The division, too, lower down, is false; for thought is as large as feeling if it embraces everything we are conscious of; only here he has proved what I have said above. We think and so have the consciousness, and the red colour is something we think of. The whole statement is the utmost confusion and inaccuracy of statement.

I doubt too the accuracy of distinguishing imaginary objects from the thoughts of them; because they exist only in the mind, and what exists there, and only there, is a thought. I may so connect it with other things as to give it a thought reality, as with yesterday and eating the loaf, or the plant and the bud; but the thing itself is only a thought. There is no object in the mind save the thought itself. Existence may be added to the thought by circumstances, but the thought is all there is. His distinction of sound and colour (p. 56) as being, or not, a name of the sensation, is all groundless. I think of the sound in a trumpet as well as in my ear, and the colour in the object as well as in my eye. There is no name of sensation distinct from what produces it. It is merely the nature of sight connecting it more sensibly with the object. A trumpet and sound are two things, because the sound is produced, not in the trumpet. Whereas in a white box I conceive the white as always in it, not being produced in it as sound.

66 What is in page 57 is the same confusion we have spoken of, confounding consciousness with the feeling we are conscious of. If I am hurt in my body and feel it, say pain in my hand, my mind is not pained. That is quite a different thing. My mind is conscious of the pain, but that is not the pain itself. How it comes by nerves is another question. But I may be conscious of a mental sensation or a bodily one, and these are not the same. As to the perception of an external object, no doubt what I am conscious of is the sensation produced in me. But I judge it comes from a given body; for where the action of that is intercepted, the sensation is not there. But this is judgment. But we have certainty of the relative existence of material objects, because they make the action of my will impossible. I cannot walk through a wall. It is not feeling or touch, but my purpose in hindered. But this is only relative, as some other being may be able - I believe, can.

Page 59 is all inaccurate. Some do and some do not. Sovereign and subject do not. "Physician" does not, it is hardly a relative term. Some are a single act, as mortgagor and mortgagee, and with others suppose a title, as sovereign, and no acts. All is utterly inaccurate, but mortgagor and mortgagee connote nothing about a court of justice. The want of accuracy of his mind is puerile. Indeed, superficiality marks the book.

As to substances, I admit that what the mind takes notice of passes in it. Yet, as I have said, material resistance of matter, where my will works, proves the existence relatively to me of matter. It is not a sensation; it is a fact. Thus, when Mill on relation speaks of the judge's dealing with a debtor as only a sensation, supposing he had the debtor put in prison, it is not merely a sensation. Prison means being shut up, so that, sensation or no sensation, you cannot get out. You are a prisoner. Your body is shut in. But further, if white be only a sensation, it may exist without saying "of." I can think of whiteness without an object, and have the sensation, though more dimly perhaps; in a dream quite as vividly, which, however complex, is only sensation. Next, if I say "it produces," I affirm a quality; let it be intuition, or habits of thought and language formed experimentally. When I say snow is white, I have as much the thought of snow as of whiteness. It is defined unexceptionably, he tells us; the external cause to which we ascribe our sensations. Well then (be it that I am so constituted, as the way of explaining it, to which I do not at all except), I have the thought in my mind of an external cause, as well as of that which is the particular sensation or attribute. The sensation in my mind gives me the thought of an external cause, as well as of whiteness or any other attribute. I can say "red snow "; but, red or white, my thought of snow is distinct therefore from my thought of red or white. And I have this thought. So if I say snow is white and paper is white; objects are in my mind, call them bodies, external cause, or what you like, as well as whiteness. When I say external cause, I speak of something, but of what is other than the effect it produces. Cause and effect are not the same.

67 Nor is it the same thing really to say opium puts me to sleep, and to say it has soporific virtues. One affirms the fact as true; the other positively asserts, rightly or wrongly, a quality existing in opium as a universal fact about opium. Nor is it true that a man having no child, I do not call him father merely; he is not a father. This is false, and the whole comment on it is beating about the bush. I do not talk scholastically of substance and attributes. It is a mere ideal abstraction. But an external cause of a sensation and a sensation are not the same thing. And I judge rightly that, if an object always produces a sensation, and in its absence it is not produced, but by an effort of mind having been received, there is what men call an external cause. I may know that it is a mere effect of the reflection of light from a given body, but there is an external cause, be that cause scientifically what it may. I knock my shin against a stone, I have the sensation of pain; pain is not a stone. You will tell me it comes from muscles. Well, pain is not muscles, but a sensation through an effect produced by the stone on the muscles conveyed by the nerves. But whatever the cause, it is not the sensation caused. Further, I doubt the justness of the statement - "to the senses nothing is apparent but the sensations." This is not correct. They produce the sensation, or rather it is produced in them, and the mind takes cognisance of it. The external cause acts on the senses, and, by these, causes, produces the sensation, which, I readily admit, the consciousness of my mind notices (page 63). If I know only my sensations, I cannot conceive an object but by them, nor, consequently, their non-existence. I may conceive the others without one of them supplanted by a different one; but I cannot conceive no conception. Hence the whole argument has no ground at all, and for sensation there could be no residuum when the absence of the sensations is supposed. It proves nothing but that there is no sensation when there is none. I have already noticed sensations apparent to senses as a fallacy.

68 The proof of the existence of matter is elsewhere, and untouched, excluding other matter, and obstructing my will; that is, it exists relatively to me. If there is an external cause, no matter what you call it. But here also is a mistake. The materiality is not the cause of the sensations. There are external causes commonly called qualities or attributes. Of these I can only say there is a cause of something which produces the sensation. The substratum is not, as such, the cause of them, unless it be touch, which in one aspect is the perception of matter. Nature of the thing (p. 65) is too vague to have any value in reasoning. "Nature of" generally means qualities. The existence of matter for me is known; its nature is to hinder progress of other matter, as my body. Beyond this "nature" conveys no idea at all.

I can only know what affects "I." So that the word has no meaning; I can only know it by "I," that is, by my power of knowledge. "I" is necessarily the limit of "I's" knowledge by the power of "I." Only I may be acted on by a power above or beyond "I." But Cousin is wrong; for if there was no "sujet sentant, on ne peut pas dire qu'ils agiraient encore." There would be nothing affected, and I can suppose them physically inert. To conceive them existing, moreover, there is a conceiving power, and, if by acting I mean in a being conscious of it, it involves the consciousness also, and it must be mine, or I know nothing about it. I cannot think of a consciousness I have not got; if I realise it, I have it. Hence all Cousin's argument falls through. I cannot say "agiraient autrement," for I cannot conceive "autrement" than I conceive. All this really means the powers I have cannot go beyond themselves, which is the meaning of the word "power"; but that I am made so as to be acted on, and in this I go no farther than I am acted on. I am conscious of it. That is not the being acted on, feeling, but my perceptions of it. Of course that ends in itself, save that, when acted on, something acts on me, for it is not constant. Of this I am conscious, but only in that in which it acts on me. I am in a relative state, and it exists in that in which it acts on me, relatively to me. The result is really this: I am in relationship with a scene around me, and outwardly part of it, formed to act on certain sensibilities I have, with a mind which takes notice of the sensation produced - is conscious of it by taking notice of it. But this does not go farther than the attributes or qualities which then by long habit and constitution we attribute to the object which so acts.

69 This is not a logical conclusion, nor merely long experience. A child tries to take hold of an object which it sees; it may measure wrong, but seeks the object; so even does a dog when attracted to it. Matter is not perceived abstractedly, but something known sensitively by its attributes or qualities. But matter is proved by its resistance to other matter and my will; for I, having a material body, as well as senses and mind, am in relation to matter as disabling my will from doing what it seeks. Matter is obstructive. But all this is only my relationship with a world, of which, in this respect, I form a part. But then, note, this only recognises a material sensible world, subject to me in thought, if not in fact. I discover it and its qualities, and its materiality, but no more. It is pure materialism in the limits of thought. If I go no farther, all action me other than on my senses, or material obstruction to my will, is ignored or denied. There can in the nature of things be no morality, no influence even of a stronger mind

As to the knowledge of God, or any idea of Him (though idea is an incorrect word), it is impossible, because He is not the object of sense or physical obstruction of will. But this is false upon the face of it, because men have an idea of God, not an object of senses or material. I do not go so far as to say this is a proof that He exists, though this may be strongly urged, and has been, for I think the true knowledge of God is mainly at any rate from another source or inlet; but I say that it proves all this and other metaphysics wrong, because men have, not exactly an idea, for it is not from sense or physically obstructed will, but an apprehension of God for which this system gives no place. I do not say how they got it, but they have it, and that these systems fail to account for moral qualities, goodness, love to a parent, authority, right and wrong, which are in our minds, but do not enter into this account of names or things at all.

70 Mill is so very inaccurate and careless, correcting others only by inaccuracy of mind, that save for this he is hardly worth reading. He says thus (p. 88), we affirm that something is not, which is absurd on the face of it, for if I can say something, I cannot say it is not. I can take a supposed being; there is a griffin, or a dodo; and deny the proposition. There is not, etc. A particular quality may be denied of something. We say it familiarly.

The true word is, there is not anything, or no such thing. If it be merely a predicated quality, then It is a positive affirmation about the subject. "Maoris are not black." This affirms something about Maoris. What? not black. But the secret of this is, he has settled that a copula "is" is another word than "is" exists. But though modified by the predicated quality, it is still the identically same "is." It means not that the subject is simply (that is, exists), but that the quality exists, or does not exist in that subject. But it is always affirmation, or supposition, of existence of something. Where "not" is placed, I am quite indifferent.

Again he says we know mortality by one death as by number. This is an utter blunder. I know death as well, but not mortality, which means that men are liable to death. For men mortality is an inference to universality from multiplied experience; where one man's death does not prove that at all.

I have already said his division of feeling is wholly false, for either thought is a mere sensation (and he confounds consciousness, and what we are conscious of), or it is an active exercise of mind, and not a feeling. Volition is not a feeling, unless I confound consciousness, and what I am conscious of. Matter gives us no sensations (unless the pain of a blow be so called, save obstructing the will, of which he does not speak); attributes or qualities do. So that the unknown body is not the cause of our sensations; for, were it so, it would be known by them. I know white and black. The substratum is assumed to exist as sustaining these so-called inherent qualities, but it produces no sensations.

71 As to mind, I am conscious of knowing, not merely receiving a sensation, but of activity about them. So far I know it. Saying "unknown recipient" (p. 68) means nothing, or supposes it to be an object sensible so as to form an idea, really assuming objective materialism in it (which denies its nature, which is thinking). To say recipient is equally false, as leaving out the principal distinctive part of it. Mind is known in its own consciousness. It knows itself not objectively, but consciously; and recipiency is not its principal character. I am so constituted as to receive impressions of objects, but this is not properly mind, which begins when I begin to judge of the impression, or go on farther. Mind (and other capacities) may be acted on by higher mind, but this is another point.

I add, in page 68 there is the usual looseness. Myself cannot be my mind, because my mind supposes myself distinct from mind, and mind to be something I possess.

As to attributes (p. 69) there are no other states of consciousness, which is the knowledge of attributes, but sensations. They may produce pleasure, but that is not knowledge of an attribute. Relation I have already spoken of. He is all wrong. "Father" has nothing to do with any fact or phenomenon. You can only say we are so constituted as to have a sense of the relationship. Of my being generated I know nothing, and I am a child only after all that is over. I did not exist till it was. It was a relationship with one by whom I was begotten.

As to present facts, the accomplishment of them all would not make a man a father, nor produce the sense of the relationship. Filiality, as in the mind, is a part of our nature, and even of animal nature, as far as it goes. We are so made. In a large class of relations the acting of a cause produces a relationship, but it is not the relationship itself. This is a state in which one is toward another, not what caused that state. Those not such are quantity.

72 I have spoken of propositions. A word on their nature (page 94). I do not admit that "man is mortal" is the same thing as "every man is mortal." The last is a fact as to every individual, the former an assertion as to his nature, which is quite a different proposition. So as to wine or food, it has nothing to do with quantity; it affirms something of the nature or quality. Food is necessary, or metal is requisite, is a thing characterised by that word. It is food, it is metal - that thing.

Assent is merely that I make the proposition mine, and affirm it. "Mahomet is the apostle of God." My assent is merely that my mind too says so. If I say "No, he is not," I reject it, I disaffirm it. If I do not know, it is left as no proposition in my mind about it. The looseness of Mill is inconceivable. In page 93 "general name" is used without a word of what that means. In page 97 we have "these theories" without any distinct theories having been mentioned. Again, "a golden mountain" is no proposition at all. I do not see any difficulty in seeing what the mind does in believing. I affirm the proposition. I say "gold is yellow." Propositions are not assertions about two things, and this contradicts his whole previous system that attributes are never anything but our conceptions; substance or body, an external thing that causes them. When I say gold is yellow, I affirm that gold is the external cause of the sensation of yellow in my mind. When I say Mahomet is or is not the apostle of God, I affirm or deny what 'apostle of God' represents in my mind of the person Mahomet. The predicate is always a conception of the mind, not a thing; the subject is a real or supposed object. If I say a centaur is a fiction of the poets, fiction of the poets is what I conceive as characteristic of it; but centaur is a real thing; not an animal, but I speak of a real thing, a description in the poets. And of that which does exist in that description, I affirm that it is a fiction; what I think of is not an animal, but a description, which I affirm to be a fiction. Further, my belief has not reference to things as he states. The impression made by that outward thing upon the human organs has not, save as a simple sensation in the mind, anything to do with the matter. He denies his previous teaching. And if a sensation, it is his conception of gold.

73 The whole of this (p. 97) denies what is previously taught. He does not believe a fact in saying yellow, but a conception in his mind; for nothing else, he has told us, is meant by yellow. Besides, what does he believe? - a fact relative to the outward thing gold, or to the impression made by it? Two distinct things, the former of which he has stoutly denied before. (See pp. 67, 69, and 70.) We assert simply that we have a particular sensation (page 98). Digging is not a proposition; so that is all nonsense. When I say "fire causes heat," I do say that the thing called fire causes a sensation in me. Yet I admit that logic is not concerned in belief, but in shewing that the conclusion is contained in what is believed already, namely, the two premises. But then he is wrong altogether. I inquire neither into what believing is nor into the thing believed, but into the conclusions being rightly contained in the premises. If I take the simple proposition, the only question is, Do I affirm it in my mind? Does my mind say "gold is yellow"? Of this evidence alone is the ground, and this has nothing to do with logic. The question is, Does or does not gold produce in men's minds the sensation called yellow? That is a question of fact, the effect of something in the mind; and I cannot begin arguing till that is settled. This may be a conclusion drawn to start afresh with as true; but it always starts from what is believed on evidence, and when it is a fact that is believed, logic has nothing to do with it - cannot in its nature. He confounds assent or belief with the evidence of truth.

Hobbes is wrong, because the quality is not the name of the thing which has it. Man, if six feet high, is not called by the name six feet high; one is not capable of being called by the other. Logically, it would make the predicate of an affirmative proposition universal, which it is not. White is not connotative. It attributes the quality whiteness to any given object, and connotes nothing. If I think of white without an object, I can only think of whiteness, and white is the form of word which attributes this to any object. (See p. 104, sec 3.) Snow is white. I think only of snow, and the sensation it gives me. Hobbes's mistake is in calling wise a name of Socrates, as if they embraced the same extent. It is a quality of Socrates, but may be affirmed of a thousand other things, or else we could say, wise is Socrates (page 102). But the explanation of connotation is extremely confused (page 31).

74 So, in page 102, it is not the attributes connoted by man which are mortal at all; they are not necessarily accompanied by the attribute mortal. It is the man in whom they are who is mortal. Man may have all the attributes of a man, except mortality, or many of the same attributes be found in one who is not a man. Hence, he speaks of objects possessing the attributes, which falsifies all his statements. When man suggests or connotes a number of attributes which make up the idea, mortality is another attribute I add to these, but not another name for the united attributes which go to make up the name man. It is not a name of man, but of one of his attributes. The predicate is one attribute of the subject, but, if it have become the name of a class, the class is formed of all that have attribute. "Plato is a philosopher" only says, Plato has the quality so predicated of him; but if men have agreed to make a class of all possessing that quality, the word puts him in that class. If I say a potato is a solanum, deadly night-shade is a solanum. It merely in each case attributes a quality or qualities; but men have agreed, rightly or wrongly, to classify a set of plants by having that quality or qualities. It is not the name which makes them a class, but the common possession of the quality expressed by the name. If I call a monopetalous flower, possessing certain other phenomena of form, a solanum, whatever has these forms is a solanum; the name only states it has. If I say a dog barks, does not mew, barking is not a class, because barking, as a fact, does not make a class, because the thing does not characterise sufficiently other individuals to bring them together in my mind. See further on this point more clearly and fully discussed. I affirm (p. 105) that the object did already belong to the class, though I did not know of it. A single sensible attribute does not make a class, and some classes are in nature, indeed, all really; but many may be formed for scientific convenience which are not obvious classes, as pig, ox, horse are, metal even. If the diamond is combustible, it always was combustible; all the difference was the ignorance of men. Combustible means what can be burnt; and that was always true of diamond, though man, through his ignorance, could not say so.

The more I read on these points, the clearer it is to me that we are created in a system of which, corporeally and in our natural faculties, we form a part; consequently all our competency of perception and conception is within the limits and necessarily so, of the system of which we form part. We may be mentally a more reflective, and so superior, part. I do not speak here of what connects us with the Divinity, but of our natural faculties. We may have superior powers of reflection as to what we perceive, but our perceptions are all of it and necessarily according to it, for we are part of it. And if I can say, as a matter of proof, that what is material exists, I can for that reason, as already said, only know it relatively. My reflective powers create a difficulty, because I know it is an image on the retina I perceive, not the object directly. The dog sees by an object on his retina, and has no difficulty, but seizes a man or a piece of beef, and he is right; and if nothing hinders, he succeeds, and defends his master from a robber, or satisfies his hunger. So does man; but he is not quite sure it is a man or a piece of beef he sees, rather sure it is not, because he is wise. But the whole truth is, that all is relatively true, most of the accounting for it is nonsense; but we belong to a system, and can only think in it. For after all I do not see an image on the retina any more than the object which produces it. It is only an object, and the conception formed in my mind is only that I am created (or, if that offends, constituted) so to perceive; and objects in the same creation or world around me are constituted to produce the impression with which mind occupies itself, no more to be accounted for than the impression produced.

75 We are so constituted (that is the whole matter), and confined to the constituted system we belong to, only perhaps to rule it. Hence language cannot get out of it, for we think and so speak according to this constitution. And these wiseacres cannot get out of it. Substance is something that causes a sensation. Is it then something or not? You only know the sensation, a point further as to your reflective powers of analysis and reasoning. But you must say "something." Try and do without it. Just so of attributes, only another kind of something. You have got sensations; you are so constituted. Something produces it. The system you are in is so constituted. But you have a will as well as sensations. And with the best will in the world a man in a secure dungeon cannot get out. He has, no doubt, the sensation of the door and walls. But he has more - a will wholly arrested, because as to his body he is of the same system as the wall, and, thief or philosopher, he cannot get out. The dog is in the same plight; as to this he is part of the same system. Only the philosopher, seeing we know only sensations, tells me I have no knowledge that a wall is there, or conceals his ignorance on the same ground by saying substance is "something" which produces a sensation.

76 But I will follow yet some details.

All seems to me confusion and inaccuracy in page 98. Heat, we have been told, is only known as a sensation in me. Now it is not my idea of heat, but heat itself. If heat is in the fire, the fire does not cause it; if in other objects, the whole sentence is obscure.

But, to turn to the import of propositions in page 112, I deny that in a noumenon they affirm causation. If I say Socrates, I think of a person existing, but not of his causing anything. If I say John Brown lives in Brentford, I am not thinking of a cause of anything. The definition is false. If I say a stone, as believing the existence of matter as a noumenon, I do not think of its causing anything. If I go on and add its attributes - hardness, compactness, weight, form, whatever else - these are phenomena known by sensation, not as noumena at all. Sameness is not resemblance. Resemblance supposes a difference in something, but certain phenomena in the objects alike. Two perfectly white things have the same colour, they resemble each other in that, but that supposes other phenomena in which they do not. There may be perfect likeness, if the object itself be known to be different, as a portrait, or two brothers. But in some way the objects are known to be different.

Next, all is confusion as to what he says of a class. A class is where many objects, different in a number of qualities, have some characteristic ones the same, and in this sense essential ones, so that a common name is given to them. To call snow, as he does, a class, is just nonsense. It is one thing, though a general name for repeated cases of that one thing existing. But when I say man is mortal, I do not speak of a class at all, though the word may imply it if such a class be known. I affirm of man the quality which makes him a member of the class designated by it, if such a class be known. Some predicates are merely a quality, as mortal; others are a class already formed, as animal. But there is another thing to be noted here. Very often, in predicating a quality which may form a class, I predicate only as regards the subject partially, if the subject be a compound idea. I speak only according to the phenomena.

77 Thus, "man is a corporeal being" does not mean wholly so for one who believes he has a soul distinct from his body. Corporeal means he has a body, which is true, but not that the body is the whole of man, or a different name for the same thing. It only affirms that man has that quality. So man is mortal, that is, he naturally dies. Only that quality is affirmed of him. What else there may be of him, or may not be, nothing is said about. The class is merely by having a body, or dying as a being here; and, so far as regards that quality, he belongs to the class distinguished by it, but no more. If I say man is a corporeal being, but man is one person, composed of body and soul, but all corporeal beings are divisible, therefore souls are divisible as well as bodies, it is sophistry; and here logical forms are justly used to detect it, because corporeal applies simply to the fact of having a body. Here the sophistry is evident; it identifies soul and body, which I have therefore expressly added, which possession of a body, though it classifies man, does not. It is not using the class, but affirming the quality of man, which, if there be such a class, puts him in it, as to the point expressed in the quality.

Now snow is not a class, because it is not a quality predicable of different objects which can be so qualified; snow is an object, and is snow. But then, though Mill has partly stated what I have insisted on above, by want of distinguishing, in fact, he has misapprehended the matter. White is a primary sensation, and indeed hardly makes a class; but the great mass of class words are not so, they are experimentally formed, and the quality experimental, not sensational, or at least scientific discovery of like qualities known by sensation so as to form classes. Hence, though the proposition only affirms the possession of a quality, the quality is as used a general one formed by experiment. Thus, diamond is combustible; combustible means simply can be burned by heat, a word invented on discoveries of what could be consumed by heat. When I say snow is white, white is a simple sensation, though it can in certain cases classify where sensations of colours are in question; but combustible, though a mere quality, is not a primarily sensible one, but a class word. That a diamond is so was not yet discovered, but combustibility was, and by discovery a diamond to be such. So mortal is properly still more a class. When applied to a class, man or all men, it is only a conclusion drawn from all we know dying, affirming that men are naturally all subjected to it, as animals also are. They cease to be in this state of existence; and what is quasi-universal is felt to be necessary. It is strictly a class experimentally formed.

78 A man might die, and I could not say man is mortal. It might be only criminals, or only good people, or only man in some circumstances died, till I found the contrary. Thus some classes are formed, and the only inquiry is, if the individual belongs to it. It can hardly be strictly said so of mere sensible qualities; but belonging to a class even in this case is very often the only important point where the sensible quality connotes some other which constitutes the major. Snow is white, but white dazzles the eye - snow dazzles the eye. But I cannot say, as he alleges, gold is a metal, if there are no others, unless certain various qualities combined are agreed to be called metal; but words are not so formed but by the experiment of several having certain qualities, coherence, weight, ductility, etc. It may so happen, as "Christians are men," and men from singular qualities being alone; but then it is not a class, but observed unity in these qualities. It is a word representing a definition only.

But when I say such a thing is white (p. 116), it is not resemblance. When the name was first given, however this was, it meant that sensation; and when I say a thing is white, I merely say it produces that sensation; it connotes nothing nor any resemblance. My mind may go on to this (page 117). I doubt the possibility of the co-existence of two states of consciousness. As I always find in a thing attributes which cause certain sensations, and pass instantaneously from one to another, I conclude their simultaneous co-inherence. It is not, therefore, simultaneity in time, but a conclusion to coexistence in what produces the different sensations; hence that they are all constantly there.

In page 119, "thoughtlessness is dangerous," is not the same as thoughtless actions; one is a state of mind or character, the other the effect of these. The latter may be actually fatal. Thoughtlessness is dangerous because it tends to these; when the act is there, it is over, and the danger passed in ruin, mischief, or escape. Nor are any of his propositions in this page the same. "Prudence is a virtue," states what prudence is. Prudent persons, etc., affirms something of persons, and may be taken as a conclusion drawn from the other. The attachment of the virtue to a person is different from something being a virtue; and this indeed he goes on to shew. Nor can I say in so far as they are prudent, for, as he says, prudence in a wicked man is no benefit to society at all. But then all his reasoning about it and equivalents is confusion. Prudent persons or acts are no way the same thing as prudence. Prudence is a good thing always in itself; when you pass into persons or acts, the whole matter is changed. A prudent act or person may be pure mischief, and more mischief by being prudent, because acts or persons introduce other things besides prudence into the thought, and what is good per se may lose its goodness when connected with something else mixed with it or using it. I use it now merely to shew that such are not equivalent propositions. Even whiteness as a colour is not the same as the sensation of white; for whiteness is the supposed producer of the sensation, and not the sensation itself. If I say whiteness is not to be attained or produced, it is not the same as to say the sensation of white is not.

79 I return to page 104. What he says here is all wrong, because when I say snow is white, I assume the known class white already gathered up from various objects. The conception of white does not follow the judgments, but, white being known, I know by the conception various objects are so. Now white is a class for me, and so I use it in the proposition, because white connotes other things which I want to affirm of snow, which forms my minor. Thus, snow is white, but white dazzles the eye - snow dazzles the eye. Classes are made by attributing certain qualities to various objects common to them all, and not to other objects, as I say metal. And the objects with the line drawn round them by this word "metal" belong to the class, and, materially speaking, form it. I cannot say, till I have made a class by the conceptions contained in it, gold is metal. I say gold is heavy, malleable, ductile, etc.: when I say so is platinum, silver, etc., I then have a name including these or other qualities, and call those having them "metals" as a class.

It may be one attribute, as white, but one attribute hardly forms a class from its being only a single conception, and it is simply a repetition of the same conception, not a class of objects which has received a distinct common name so as to form them into a class, as metal. If I say white is pleasant, it is really whiteness, and not a class, but a single conception. If I say white flowers are beautiful, I classify them, because I have a selection of objects combined into one set by themselves, and so a class. For a class is a class of some things distinguished from others which might by certain common qualities be confounded with them, but are distinguished by others peculiar to a certain number of them. He is wrong in saying (p. 115) it does not retain the same meaning. It does, but another individual is brought into the class because it has the qualities which form the meaning of that class word. It did belong to that class, but we did not know it. This is unintelligent: and the framers of language did and do what he says is so absurd, as when they said metal. If other metals have been discovered, that is, things having the qualities embraced in the name, that alters nothing. We may, of course, from fuller knowledge of qualities, change or improve classification. Common distinguishing qualities make a class. A mere single conception of sense, to say the least, is a bad class word; because it does not combine by adequate resemblance in what is peculiar what distinguishes things from others generally like them so as to be confounded. Connected with other analogous things it may; nor can it be said it cannot form a class. Classification is "an arrangement and grouping of definite and known individuals."

Examination of Mill's Logic

J. N. Darby.

<32007E> 80 {file section b.}

{A System of Logic, by John Stuart Mill, 8th edition.

The reader must bear in mind that these are only MSS notes jotted down while reading the book.}

Pages 108-9 are also false, because when I say all men are mortal, it is true that I speak of men as known by the attributes expressed by the word. But this is only the phenomenon presented to sense or matter of evidence. Hence I can only say that the connotation is of men as phenomenal here. Hence, really the subject of the proposition is taken strictly in its extension, not in all it does or may connote - all men who are the subject of my observation of men in general down here; and hence it is absolutely necessary to bring in extension strictly, for so only it is true. It is thought of only through the "intension" or attributes; but this only includes ordinary phenomenal man, and can only apply to those whom I know or see; that is, the proposition is TRUE ONLY as taken in extension. Add here, the proposition is only a conclusion from a particular to a universal, for the only phenomenon I have is death, not mortality. The extent of the class, therefore, is "apprehended and indicated directly "; for if I say man from phenomena or attributes, I take in only what is phenomenal. All the cases of ordinary phenomenal man we have seen have died; therefore phenomenal man is subject to death; the phenomenon has accompanied the other phenomena, but this strictly brings in extension. Phenomenal men are all that we speak of, and speak of all of them as such.

81 As to his minuter analysis (p. 119) of "prudence is a virtue," all is as usual vague and unsatisfactory. It gives definitions of virtue which are no equivalents at all; a virtue is not equivalent to a mental quality, etc. Just now prudence was equivalent to prudent persons or actions; they are not a mental quality. Nor is virtue a mental quality. Virtue gives a whole class and order and principle of conduct in spite of difficulties, and when he says a mental quality because prudence is one, he confounds the subject and predicate, because the definition must give the whole of what is defined; and if I say a mental quality, virtue is only one mental quality and if prudence is that, there is no other. His statement is that a mental quality is equivalent to or a definition of virtue - can take its place. But, further, it is not a cause of God's approval but the object of it, whatever causes Him so to approve it; nor, though it is not so thoroughly false, is a quality beneficial. Still beneficial refers to what the beneficial thing causes; approval is a state of mind in another caused by the motives which govern it. What he states of the ground or foundation of the prudence is the prudence itself. If these things are in a man, I say he is prudent, because they are prudence. But if no conduct follows, nothing is beneficial. What he calls facts or phenomena which are the ground of the attribute are no facts or phenomena, save as prudence itself is one. The whole statement is in the highest degree unsatisfactory. When I say "prudence is a virtue," I give a character to prudence, without any facts, phenomena, sequence, coexistence, causation, or resemblance whatever. He admits it does not involve any conduct; consequently there is nothing caused by it. When I say beneficial, I suppose some activity towards others, or deliberate abstinence from it in which others are concerned. Whereas prudence is merely an abstract quality, and I declare it a good one without any facts or phenomena.

But there is a use of logic flowing from classification which I must notice.* A main distinctive feature is taken to form an under-class or species, that is, the under-class is made by it of a wider class (or genus), and by this feature the class is denoted, as rational animal; and the subject comes under it, the predicate expressing the species and genus containing it, the class word forming the species expressing only a given important attribute of the class. But it is important to designate another attribute as belonging to the subject, one unknown to or unnoticed by the person reasoned with. That this other attribute exists in the predicate is affirmed in the minor, and so is affirmed of the subject. Thus, all men are mortal, that is, subject to death, but all mortal beings are so by living by blood (or by blood being their life): therefore all men live by blood. Now mortal, though forming a class, only speaks of liability to death; that is the meaning of the word and no more, and I say no more. I affirm a second truth in the minor - namely, how or why beings die or are subject to death, in no way comprised in the word mortal, but giving a reason for all mortality. The syllogism merely gives a secure method of affirming the facts so that the conclusion follows. The word mortal means something and only that, liability to death; but if man be in this class, mortal, and I shew that something else does belong always to this class, though not in thought contained in the word it is named by, I have added something to the knowledge contained in the major.**

{*Locke takes all the properties. Of this farther on. It is important to note that some predicates express only an attribute, as mortal, though a class may be made out of them; others are a class, as animal.}

{** All this on classification in Mill is wrong.}

82 In verbal or essential propositions classes are of different kinds, some natural and obvious, some from experimental observation, some more arbitrary. A man is a real thing or being. It is not merely that a class of two-legged mammals without reason is not reputed a man. I care not about the word; but here the word does not make the class, but the class the word: call it homo, or anthropos, or mensch, is all alike. Universal intelligence has distinguished that kind of being; the class existed, or the nature which constitutes it, before it got a name. I believe (and important principles are contained in that) God gave it as Adam did to the animals; but whether this were so or not, the thing was there before it got a name. It was not a horse nor an ox, nor a biped mammal with no more reason than these. A man was there to be called and have a name, and a distinguishing name, as horses, oxen, etc., were, and the difference known. In other cases the class was the result of experience, as weight, ductility, and other distinguishing qualities existed, and men made a class for convenience; but the qualities on which the class was founded were not words, but things. I am not now reasoning how or when the knowledge was acquired, whether by sensations produced or not. I accept that in general; but language is formed in the relative sphere of existence in which we are and in which we know, and the language is formed according to the system and accepts the things as real; and if men are to speak, for whom the sphere around them exists relatively, the language which expresses their thoughts must express the existence of things, which, relatively to them and their thoughts, do so exist. They may grow in this knowledge - form, where experiment has been their ground, more satisfactory classes; but, though in different ways, the difference which makes a class is not verbal but real, and the word is only the expression of it.

83 Hence saying a biped mammal without reason is not a man means merely not reputed a man, is false. He is not reputed 8 man because he is not one. Such a thing may exist, but it is not that thing to which the name has been given, and which is in fact a totally different thing from what the irrational biped is. You may call the irrational biped mammal man if you like, and the rational one fear or crut, if you like to be foolish, but the two things are as distinct as they were before. The fear is a fear, and the man is man. Mill's statement is childish trifling. Nor is it the whole of the attributes, which assumes all classes to have no existence but in words, as the nominalists, confounding different kinds of classes. If a man was born with one leg, or six fingers, he is a man still, though some of the regular physical attributes are wanting or excess. You will say this is only accidental difference. That is, you fall into the distinction of essential and accidental. Besides, attributes as a whole differ. There are black or Negro races, Turanian and Caucasian races. Supposing for a moment I say all descendants of Adam are Caucasian. But he Negro is not a Caucasian; therefore he is not a descendant of Adam. Suppose the Negro has the general physical constitution of man, the power of progress, the faculties, language, the consciousness of responsibility, conscience, reference to the idea of God, abiding relative affections of wife and children, has to say to God and men, as subject and fellows, an immortal soul, for we are only supposing, should I say he is not a man?

84 I do not believe a word of the theory of distinct races, and the want of truth in the idea makes the conclusion difficult to me; because known relationship to God is shut out by it, which I believe to be of the essence of man's nature; but if all this were true that God had created two races of men, "A man's a man for a' that." I utterly reject the idea, but the difference of black and white, prognathism, and even woolly hair, would not hinder his being a man if God had created him apart. It would set aside one great and important origin of a class, namely, common origin. The only question would be, Is that essential to being a man? I believe it is fully, but on Mr. Mill's ground it would not. They have not the same attributes, but in his sense they would be men, they have the attributes which constitute a man. His reasoning is false. I believe the theory to be wholly false, because it denies what is, as revealed, essential to man. Actually in relationship to God I do not believe such men could be; but if they were, they would be men, though the whole of their phenomenal attributes were not the same, and they had not the same ancestor. If you take in all men as one race, as I do, there may be several attributes different; but while their moral nature, and even physical, essentially is the same, they are men, Adam's children. If there be no essential attributes (that is, what makes man a man), and accidental ones, a yellow-haired German of olden time is not a man if I am.

This may seem long on such a point, but it is vital; because it makes phenomenal attributes everything, and the real classification of things - the fact that things are what they are besides mere phenomena - is wholly denied. Men may make classes for inconvenience, and give a name to represent each; but even here there is no real ground for a class but in actual things which distinguish some from others; and there are classes of being which God has made, and one wherein man stands alone, though in certain essential aspects, not connoting all that is in him, or in the name of the class, he may be classified in these aspects with others. As I may say, created intelligent beings are responsible. Angels are created intelligent beings, and so is man, or the like. To have classes true, we must have the qualities in common which they have by God's creation, or at least His providential ordering. I have nothing to do with any scholastic speculations on essences to explain essential differences.

85 I have already shewn that to say giving an attribute, as "rational," to man teaches nothing is a fallacy. It is the direct path to knowledge where the predicate involves a quality not affirmed in it about man. Man is a rational being. I only affirm about man that he is a rational being. And it unfolds, as to that, what man is, one particular quality: but supposing that quality involves in man or anywhere else consequences not pressed in it, as every rational being is responsible to God, this will be as true of an angel, say. It is not merely what is in man as an equivalent; it leads me by another larger proposition, applicable to man and other beings, and not known to be true of man till the knowledge of the second proposition acquired. It is not a phenomenal attribute of man like rationality. It is true of rationality wherever it is, from the relationship in which all rational beings stand. I am not speaking of man, but of rationality; but he, being so, comes under my new proposition as belonging to that class.

And this is a most important element of error in these logical and metaphysical systems, that they can only take up what is phenomenal, and all the greater and more important part of what man is and truth is - relationship - is left out. They can discuss his relationship with mere phenomena by sense or consciousness, but this last only mentally or in the reason, and that is all. All that is true and abides, naturally or spiritually, is outside this. Death, or the dissolution of things, closes phenomenal, and, as to mere mind, now possessed state. Hence it is said in Job as to wisdom, "Death and destruction have heard the fame thereof with their ears"; they know the end of what man has now; of what is beyond, of positive knowledge, of what abides, they can tell nothing. All logical knowledge is phenomenal with its consequences. The mind, as such, cannot see beyond the system with which it is in relation as such. Only it should not deny anything beyond it, but own its own limits which indeed it cannot help, only honestly.

But as Mill returns to his classes, I must add a few words to clear this point up. He is all wrong. Some predicates are class words formed by man, some a particular attribute. Thus, man is an animal: that is a class word, a class formed by man as to language, but from nature and by a difference existing in it. So really gold is a metal. This is a word formed to designate, by a collection of attributes, several objects which possess them, and are characterised by them, and distinguish them thus from others which do not. When I say man is mortal, it is one attribute, not a class in itself. I merely affirm one thing about man. Now, if I use a class word which only takes up one or some attributes to make a class, and leave others unnoticed, and if I affirm of the subject all that may be said of my class predicate absolutely, I may contradict something in the subject which does not come in question in the predicate. There may be some quality in the subject which does not hinder the class word being predicated of it, but may make untrue that which is true of others in the class. Thus all animals at some period cease to exist. This is phenomenally true. Man is an animal. Man ceases to exist. I conclude from what happens phenomenally to all animals, and even to man as such phenomenally, what may not be true of him for some other reason. If I assume, as I believe, he has an immortal soul, which does not come into the list of attributes included in the class word "animal," though phenomenally as an animal externally he does. And so Ecclesiastes takes him up. It is what is under the sun, the days of the life of his vanity. This comes from assuming phenomena to be all, which, with consciousness, is all man's reason can do. But he cannot say, man cannot have an immortal soul.

86 And the possibility proves the reasoning defective and false. And this is the whole question with metaphysicians and logicians; for experimental reasoning is their all, and it must be incompetent to pronounce beyond its own power, limited by the sphere to which it belongs, while it cannot say there is nothing beyond it, for it does not see beyond it. When I merely predicate one attribute, it is not quite so much so because I confine myself to the phenomenon predicated, as man is mortal. Only I may pursue it farther, and so run into it; but it is then not speaking from the known qualities of a class, but a positive new affirmation going beyond the predicated phenomenon. If I merely say "man is mortal," I merely affirm the phenomenon that we see men die as a rule, which is true, phenomenally true; though it be not beyond the reach of preventive power if God so will, but for man's sphere it is true. If I say all that is mortal ceases to exist, I go beyond the phenomenon and introduce a new proposition. It ascribes a new sense, or attribute, to mortal. Taken as a phenomenal class, animals do, and man too as animals in this world. It is as a class true; it is not true that the attribute mortality contains in it "ceases to exist." The statement goes beyond the phenomenon, for as to that they do cease to exist.

87 But a word more on classes. The notion that general terms or essences of classes are only the meaning of the name, that the whole of the attributes means the essence, and the taking all classes to be of the same nature, makes all the reasoning of Locke and Mill to be false. Some classes man has made for convenience of arrangement, some more from the nature of things, as a metal; but some general terms are not classes. Thus when I say "man," it is a being I know, not a class made by man from attributes or phenomena. I am conscious of a personal living existence. I know others through intercourse or through facts. They are a race, not a class. I know what a man is, for I am one, and find others of the same race, born as I am, and like me. I am not a dog, nor a horse, nor a pig, nor an ox, nor if there were Houyhnhnms who had reason would they be men. Man is a known race. Reason is essential to man. Yet if there be an idiot born of a human father and mother, he is a man, an exceptional idiotic man; whereas if there were a race physically just what men are without reason, I should not call them men; they are not of the same race.

Races are real things. Essential differences are negative. Not having them excludes from the class, as want of reason the supposed race; possession of them may make a class, but does not make a race, as the supposed Houyhnhnms. Hybrids, which some insist on, only prove this. They are called mules, distinguished from the races their progenitors belonged to. According to creation races may approximate in their extremes as to make it difficult to classify them; but this proves nothing, however interesting, as to God's way of acting. You may shew that the nucleus of a cell is the inorganic seat of life, and write a long book about protoplasm; but this does not prove a man is a pig, or a pig a man. I may have to learn the attributes of this race, or many of them, after I know it. The word "man" is not a collection of attributes, but a general term for that race; and I then learn what the attributes of that race are. He is a living being, with reason and power of abstraction, hence capable of progress. He has an immortal soul. But all this I learn about man after I know him de facto as a race. If true, they were always true of man, at least as now known to me, but they formed no part of my idea of man. I know the race, and then learn about the race. When the word speaks of a class distinguished experimentally, as metal, then, though often vague, still in principle it involves in it the whole of the attributes which constitute the force of the word. So of all races as well as men. What is a pig? It is an animal born of a boar and a sow. I learn that it is carnivorous and herbivorous, but I knew what a pig was before I knew that. Of course there may be varieties and species, and we may turn pig into a class name.

88 What Bain says, note to page 112, is utterly false, indeed absurd. Supposing there was a report that the dodo existed, and search is made say all over the world, Mauritius and all, and I say the dodo does not exist, in fact it really never had, what has that to do with its disappearing and becoming extinct? (My family had a large life-size good picture of a dodo, now in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford.) When I say dodo, I mean a supposed bird thus thought of, and I say it is a supposition, it does not exist. Such reasoning is child's play. I exist, and am conscious of it; what is that in contrast with? I admit relativity in phenomena, and insist on it. But that is not all. I could not use the word "is," or "exists," without its giving the idea of existence to my mind; and, if used with any word by itself, it affirms that idea of it - predicates the fact that there is really such a thing. I doubt its being a category. All the rest, at any rate, assume existence.

I have spoken of classes. White is not a class really, because it does not really give an attribute which adequately distinguishes other like things from one white set (unless I speak of colours, when it does). For class means attribute or attributes, by which certain things are distinguished from other like ones, and so clubbed together. Mill accepts most of what I have said, but by denying races makes all false. I have said that many classes are the act of men, but founded on natural qualities, as metal. That is, man invents a word to combine many distinct things in community of certain characteristic qualities which distinguish them; and the word is invented to give a common name to things which have the qualities, not to express the qualities themselves, so as that, if there were only one, it could be used. It is the result of the experimental knowledge of several having them. But if we call races classes, then it is not the act of man which has formed the class in any sense.

89 I do not think that class is a good word for this. If I say a man and a pig, it is no act of man's mind which makes any class. He calls an animal of that race a pig, and knows it is not a man. But there is no mental combination to form the class, if class it is to be called. A pig is a pig by creation, and now by birth. Nay, so far from it being the whole of the attributes that make a class or verbal general name equivalent to one where the whole of the attributes are included in the idea, there is no class at all; for if all the individuals have them, they are the same, there is no distinction. A class is only, when there are some qualities common to a certain number of objects otherwise distinct, that I classify them by a word expressing their possession of them in common, as metal, including gold, iron, copper, etc.; but if each individual object had all the qualities of gold there would be no class, all would be gold. Thus man is not a class, animal is, because there may be and are man and brutes connected in particular qualities. But he is wholly wrong in taking the general name as being the expression of qualities, so as to make it indifferent if one object or many, and a class or not, as being the meaning of the name and a class word, indifferently or not.

There are class words. Animal is, metal is, founded on qualities no doubt, but qualifying objects by their common possession of them. If I have only a word embracing all the qualities of a being, it is not and cannot be a class; if only some, it may. Thus, God is a general term, he says, to the Christian or polytheist. But the Christian or Jew, when he says God, takes in in principle all His attributes. He is one, almighty, eternal, omniscient; He is, and He only, absolutely. "God" takes in, at any rate, such attributes as absolutely preclude His being a class. There is no quality in common with the polytheist's God, for he has many of them, which exclude the qualities of the one. Even if I say mermaid or ghost, as in thought I take in all that they are, it cannot be a class, for all who are such are the same wholly; mermaid is mermaid. Where all the attributes are not taken in, it may become the name of a class, though where there is a race, and not man's combination, they will be only, as woolly-haired men, accidental differences. In fanciful names it is merely a question whether the fancy has formed a class or not. There may be many dragons having certain fanciful qualities in common, others not, and so be under a common name of class. Here, of course, all is man's creation, and he may invent as he likes. His statement that every name, the signification of which is constituted by attributes, is potentially name of an indefinite number of objects, need not be of any, may be of only one, is false. Suppose unity and omnipotence or even the last, be among the attributes, there can be only one. But if constituted by attributes, and I take in all, it is not a class; it may be a race. If only of one, it is no general term at all. We do not create a class by general names.

90 All this theory is wrong. If I say man, it is a general name; but if I take the whole of his attributes, it is a race of the same beings, not a class. Classes are made by men, by selecting qualities, and combining and distinguishing by them. In a word the whole of this is wrong, and wrong in the most important way. Races are popularly called classes, but then they do not rest on the meaning of words, nor are formed by men mentally (pages 132-139). Pages 139-141 are all obscurity and confusion. The question is not whether one or infinite qualities are in question. The essential difference is negative; it does not make the class, but the class is not the class without it. One quality, as white, or Christian, or mathematician, does not make a class (unless in respect of things constituted by colour or sciences or religions), because a man is just as much a man whether a Christian or a mathematician or not. These ideas do not enter into the conception of man; reason does. A being formed as man, as a general term (a race so qualified), without reason is not a man; but, if reason be in an angel or a dog, he is not therefore a man. A man represents a being not with the knowledge of all his attributes, but of such as constitute a man. (This is a question of the possession of language as expressing thoughts which normally is inseparable from human reason; that is, man is so constituted.) If one of these be not there, he is not a man.

Thus, if Negroes and Turanians were created apart, still if they had these qualities they would be phenomenally men; that is what man means. They might then be considered sub-classes, and man would be a class word, because there would be qualities in the Negro or Turanian inseparable from their being such not in the others which enter into the class. If I say pictures very white in their colouring are not pleasing - are too glaring; paintings are things formed by colours, hence one colour or another is part of their constituted existence, and so as to paintings they form species, though white or green be a single sensation. So in various earthly substances. Some have a set of qualities which make them metals; here, though natural differences, they are of sufficient importance to man by these qualities to make them a class; they melt, etc.; if they will not, they are not metals. Other things may melt, as sugar; that does not make it a metal, but what will not melt is not a metal. It may be one or many qualities which distinguish, but what makes a class is what distinguishes a certain number of objects from others similar in other respects, when the difference is such that where, if what makes it is absent, it would not be of those things to which the name is attached.

91 But when Mill says men have made classes, "a sense artificially given to the word for technical purposes," in the case of races, as man, ox, it is not so; it is merely observation of real differences. The word is expressive of the object as an object. When used as a class, it is not artificial but real, as observed. If a true class, the name is given because of real differences observed. That man gives a name to those that have is merely saying language belongs to him; but he cannot make a class without adequate distinctions belonging to beings of the same general sort, combining many of them together, part from others of the same sort. To lose this by scholastic mistakes of essences is only blinding oneself. Names for classes may be made by men; but if rightly made, the class is not made but discovered or known intuitively, which is only a way of discovering. I know a man is not an ox. Man and ox express this, they do not make the distinction. I may have then to ascertain by thought what makes the difference. They both live as animals live; have flesh, bones, blood, die as existence here (for that is all I can say phenomenally) - that is, in many very important things they have qualities in common.

What makes the difference? It is not artificially given for the purposes of science; the form is different, the race is different. In the genus animal I distinguish two classes; the name is quite immaterial Man has given that (the ox cannot) but I have to discover what is the real point, the quality or qualities without which a man is not a man normally, is not of that class in the genus animal. It is not a question of some or inexhaustible differences, but adequately distinctive qualities which combine a certain set of things contained in a larger class formed by having common properties. I have ascertained these distinctions combining many individuals of a larger division, without which they are not so combined or divided, as contrasted with a quality which leaves the differences which constitute the class where they were, so that, with or without it, the class subsists just the same, as red hair in a man. I thus possess the class. I may discover afterwards differences more or less important, which confirm the justice of the classification, or inform me as to the qualities; but if already adequate, I have my class. Thus language with man, cooking if you please, a sign it may be of the reflective use of materials as contrasted with instinct, but which is useless, as it may be merely the expression of reason, a thing by which reason may be discovered, however poor a one. It is quite immaterial what caused them to have the essential difference. I believe it was God; but for logic or man's mind it is merely phenomenal. And, save the notion of substantial essences, the Schoolmen were right, and Mill wrong. If the Schoolmen seized on what the name connoted, so as adequately to distinguish, by means of certain properties, those things which had them from those which had not, they did right. It is what makes a class, and that only, though others may be discovered.

92 Thus if I discover, by whatever means, that man has an immortal soul, I have a quality which, as well as reason, constitutes man what he is, as contrasted with other animals, and a more important difference; but, with reason, the class is right, because there is in man what there is in no other animal. And when I have arrived at what makes man to be man, all the rest which do not unmake his being man form no species. I have an infima species. Suppose there were men with reason, and not with immortal souls, I have two classes of men, if I still call them men; at any rate I have two kinds, which I can separate into classes. I do not believe this possible, because I have no idea of existence in moral things but as God made them; and thus the thought is necessarily inaccurate. But infima species is right - that is, a class adequately distinguished by qualities which make it what it is, which consequently cannot be subdivided, so that one division should not possess what makes them both the same thing essentially as man, though you may add qualities which leave it what it is, as woolly-haired, black-skinned, etc., Caucasian, Turanian; but all possess what makes them men. For the ethnologist they may conveniently be made species of. A man without a soul or reason is not a man as God made him. A red-haired or black-haired man is alike a man; but if the qualities which constitute the class remain, it is of that. That is the infima species. Whether classes be rightly formed is another question: but it is a question whether we have rightly followed facts; and here races come largely into question, because the distinguishing qualities follow them, and they are more readily perceived than others, and they are classes which God has made, and from which man with all his wisdom cannot get out. If God has approximated classes in given cases as He has, man may make hybrids, but he only proves his impotency by doing so. The distinction therefore between differentia and accidens is in the nature of things, and the foolish instance of cooking proves it. It is merely an expression of man's having reflective reason to use materials. It is not accidental, but what proves, however poorly, the essential difference. What he states as making the difference of genus and species is only true phenomenally or in the measure of man's mind as acting, not as acted on or even conscious.

93 In section 6, page 144, he merely puts forward what I have noticed in the case of colour, that if we take a word for a genus from any real fact, and use the species without adding any quality to make one, confining the difference to what is true only within the genus, then we may form classes, but we no quality. When I say man is a rational animal, I add a quality to animal. It is not merely what is not connoted in the word, but I falsify the use of the word itself as expressing the class if I add it, for thus an ox is not an animal, only man is. But when I say man is an animal, with four incisors, one canine - leaving out erect, for man only is, it is an added quality to animal - with four or two incisors, or no canines, an animal is as much an animal as before. It does not add any quality. These facts do not come into the circle of connotation of animal, and he is as much what is called animal as before, and only animal. When I say rational, it admits animality, but adds what is not in the notion of animality; when I say four incisors, he is no more than an animal, after all, nothing besides being an animal - nothing is added. I have already said the possession of an essential difference does not make a thing to be of the same class (strange to say, Mill takes the two examples I took), the want of it puts him out of it (save the question of normal state of a race); but if a dog had reason, it would not make him a man, but we should have two classes of rational animals.

94 But God has not formed things so. He has made classes; and so man must take them, for his reason is relative, and within the sphere so made, and we cannot really go beyond it. It may (for reasons beyond, sometimes perhaps within, our ken), be morally impossible. We do not know in everything, we may in some, how things are adapted in creation to one another. Comparative anatomy has shewn it within nature. Without it the reasons may be weightier and deeper. Thus os homini sublime dedit, not to go farther than outside, and feet and hands, instead of only hands or feet, may be so adapted to reason, or more, that we cannot suppose, say, that a dog should have reason, with any just thought at all. To meet their reasoning, I have sometimes supposed things which are not: but I deeply feel man as having reason is within the sphere where he is placed - the highest in it no doubt, but in it. I have no doubt there is a relation to God also, but his reason is phenomenal in its source: I deny that it knows God at all. We may prove there must be a cause; but, as said elsewhere, if we can, it proves we cannot know it.

But in this part (pp. 144-147) Mill is again all wrong in virtue of his principle, for Linnean or other classes do not add an idea to animal; they are as much a mere animal as before (very convenient for science no doubt, but that is all); not a species, though possibly necessarily as I have said, suited to it, because it adds nothing to the contents of the word animal - with four or all incisors he is an animal just the same. When I say rational, it adds an idea to animal which makes it really another thing from a mere animal. Man has not really two meanings, because it is not merely an artificial designation, but the name of a being we know, of which we give the true character by the difference or class term, as an animal by what is purely animal. Cooking is really a proprium, and proprium is merely what is caused by the essential difference.

95 Demonstration is not another kind, but merely proving it is so, caused by or necessarily connected with the essential quality, as, save organic defects, language belongs to reason (or rather to thought) in man. It may be convenient to distinguish, but it goes with what makes the species. Only some may be more obvious than others - some essential differences involve more consequences than others - but the propria are really more identified with ess. diff. than with accident. The accident we have practically spoken of; it is what leaves the individual or individuals in the universality of the class they belong to. It adds nothing to what the class name connotes; a yellow-haired race of men leaves what is meant by man where it was. A rational animal does not leave what is so, where animal puts him.

But if there be reality in classes (and there is when justly made), a definition by genus and specific difference gives more knowledge than the sum of all the attributes. In the first place, the latter is impossible and false, because there are many which contradict each other, and have nothing to do with the real explanation of the word, as woolly-haired, red-haired, prognathous, brachiocephalous, and dolichocephalous. I cannot introduce all these and their contraries as describing man. They do not make the difference of man and other things, but only of men amongst themselves. You cannot numerate all the attributes; and if you do, you have lost what makes him man. But this makes differentia and accidens clearly distinct in meaning: one a quality, without which a thing is not the thing named, a difference from other things: accidens, a difference in individuals, which still are the thing named. Proprium also is a constant difference caused by essential difference.

I do not dwell on giving a definition of one's own meaning of a word; it is arrogant. Words may be ambiguous, or their meaning changed by time, then of course we may explain; but it is at best the extreme of nominalism that there can be no definition of a thing. If so, there can be no mathematics, for though words must be used, they are part of human nature, and we are men; but be it circle, kreis, circolo, or what it may (and variety of language proves it), I am defining, if I can, a thing. And if the thing does not exist, you cannot it, as Mr. Mill's "round square." Some definitions are poor ones, as the shortest line between two points. That is a fact about a straight line. I say a line described by a point always moving to the same fixed point; a curve, one described by a point which never does, but always turns farther from it. This is by the bye.

96 (Page 152.) Provided the attributes are what make the difference of man (phenomenal man), and that involves adequacy and reality of difference from things not man. But if I use a class word embracing them, with the essential difference or differences, it is much more informing, because I connect it thereby with a large class in very important elements as such already formed in my mind, as a rational animal formed so and so, as given by Mill. You cannot define a simple sensation as white, because it is that, and that only - has no qualities but whiteness.

What he says of eloquence is all false; he defines it by its effects, which may fail by the state of those addressed, and yet the eloquence be sublime. It is perfectly intelligible to say, "all his eloquence, however elevated, produce no effect whatever: they were stern and unmoved." Eloquent is not the name of one attribute only. It is the power of presenting facts or thoughts in a way adapted to stir up the feelings or thoughts emotionally natural to man, or desired by the speaker or writer. A white object is quite another thing than white (page 155).

(Sec. 3, p. 155.) I do not admit what declares the whole of the facts to be the only adequate definition, but do not enlarge on it; because the difference is often more important, as rational animal denies rationality of other animals than man. This may be inadequate too if there is more than one essential difference, but generally or often these are only propria. But what I have already noted is all important, all this is only phenomenal. The Houyhnhnms, which I supposed before, not being realities, do not really come in question, because it cannot be said that it is possible. The form of man may be a necessary proprium. At any rate, classes are derived from observed facts, and cannot go beyond them. I deny that we can make classes which will be really such; and as Mill admits they are taken from nature, he must admit it. But of this I have spoken, only I should speak more strongly of it now.

It is true that this judgment of definition by genus and difference or differences only applies to the created world. Such only is phenomenal, so that we can in any ordinary way classify it (it is all that is subjected to our language) - at any rate classify adequately. When I come to Creator, it is evident that class can have no sense; but then I cannot define Him either. He cannot be measured by an inferior mind, and if it be not inferior, He is not really God; there is no God. And there is no summun genus at all really, for the highest carries me up to One who cannot be a genus, or He is not what He is. My summum genus must be a creature, not being, unless I deny creation and am an atheist, which, though he may strive to be, I do not believe man can be, though he may forget God for the creature, or corrupt the thought of God. Being is not exact, because though I may take it in a general way as a thing existing de facto, yet if I drop out creation, I falsify the idea of being when not being per se. Because, if I say I or a man exists, it is true; but I cannot say I, a man, without having the idea of having begun to be. And being, when applied to God, means one who did not begin to be, or some one was supremely before Him who caused Him to begin to be; and of one who never began to be I can form no idea, for I am finite; it is out of the sphere in which I exist, out of the power of mind. Human thought always and necessarily ascribes beginning as an idea. Negatively I can speak of it. I say infinite, etc., but I cannot conceive it positively in thought, because I am finite. I exist as to my status of thought in time. I may drop the idea of time, and only think of present being, I, and put together always and is. But when I think of that really, I must think of Creator and created. I can conceive what is always going on, because it is. But I cannot think of a living thing nor a formed thing (and man knows no other), without a beginning in its very nature. We talk of matter, but it is scholastic mysticism, of substance which gives no idea at all. We know nothing but what is formed, whatever formed it. There is no abstract idea of matter. For convenience we may make an abstraction. But there is no idea or conception, all our knowledge is phenomenal.

97 As to page 157, it is all well as phenomenal, but only in that way. And I suspect that all definitions are just solely in the relationship in which they are used, at any rate so far as forming classes. Thus a rational animal, or take all the essential attributes and enumerate them. It is what man is in this visible creation of which he forms a part, corporeally in distinctive form, as compared with other animals. It is man in this created sphere: all well in its way, in what is subject to mind. But if it be in relationship with God, that has nothing to do with it. I must take in an immortal soul, conscience, responsibility, subjection, lusts, passions, love morally to God and man, consequent guilt, and so on. Hence, as I have said, metaphysicians have no ground of morality or obligation of relationship. The very definition becomes different, though the other remains true in its own sphere, but convertible in the sphere it professes to define, only in the sphere and relationship in which it is spoken of; in another it has nothing to do with it, or is false. Mind deals with what is subject to it: subjecta veritas quasi materia; but this excludes God and all moral thought, all I am subject to or any action on me.

98 This confining of definition to particular relationships, a really material point, is proved by Cuvier's definition cited p. 158): Man is a mammiferous animal, having two hands. I have no objection to this. It refers to his classification as an animal. That is a particular relationship in which he stands, leaving out therefore, as to reason, what essentially distinguishes him from other animals. It is just in the relationship he is viewed in, but leaves out, and properly, what belongs to another aspect and relationship. So of the alleged adequate enumeration of attributes. It may be true and adequate in the relationship it refers to, totally false if another relationship be in question. If I say he is only that, it cannot be said. He is that in a given relationship, and that is all the justness and adequacy definition can be said to have. They belong to such a sphere, and are true in it. I admit man's knowledge is phenomenal, or some inference from it as existing in the sphere he does; but the question remains, Is there no other? Cuvier says what man is qua corporeal animality, metaphysicians what he is mentally; and we may add, in connection with the world subject to him, and that is all he can mentally, that is, by the power of intellect. But is that all the relationship he is in? I wholly deny it. It will be said, Prove there is another, or how can we know it? Not by intellect, as is evident, for professedly it is outside it. But intellect never loves: is that nothing in man? Love did not, it is true, exist in Greek.

But to go down - parent, child, husband, wife; I take natural relationships on purpose. Intellect cannot deal with them at all. Have not men hated Christ, the thought of Christ? What has intellect to do with that? Do not they dislike to think of God and responsibility? What has that to do with intellect? Intellect does not hate. Why is a child to obey its parents? - will intellect tell him?

99 While on the topic of definitions, I would notice as a signal instance (p. 153) of utter mental incapacity and incorrectness, I believe through moral blindness and absence of sense of responsibility falsifying every mental apprehension (for man is a moral being, and must think morally to think rightly) - at any rate, as an instance of incapacity to define - "Fault may be defined a quality productive of evil or inconvenience." Unless I introduce character - a fault in his character, which is loose and inaccurate and only fit to be used when it is failure in responsibility - it is his fault, otherwise defect is the word; but unless in this special way fault is not a quality at all. It is an actual failure. All the confusion in pages 160, 161, is from not seeing that his whole system of definition and classifying is false.

Man as such is popularly known, as Mill says. The enumeration of all the attributes never enters into men's minds, nor even a definition, till men begin to think and analyse their thoughts. Thus adequate definition is one thing, complete knowledge another; definition seizes such attributes as suffice to determine and define it in the midst of and from other subjects, as a rational animal of such a form. The thing is known in itself. I can see and hear a man. This defines it in the midst of others only in the relationship in which it is defined. The full knowledge of what man is must tell me all his attributes, and, if really full, in all his necessary relationships, that is, the relationships in which he exists as man.

As to scientific definitions, they are not arbitrary, but pass from the obvious qualities to more exact distribution by the progress of knowledge, and though drawn from nature, are, as a class, made for convenience. Thus acid meant sour, and does, but a man must be a chemist to know what the word has come to mean in chemistry. But, in what is ordinary phenomenal, not scientific, discovery, thought and language cannot be separated; we think in language, and a great deal of the dissertation on "verbal and real" consequently is beating the Horse is a mere word, but I think of a thing if I say air. A horse leaps; it is not a word leaps. No doubt forms of propositions are the same, as I may say a centaur leaps; but if I do say it, I am thinking of a thing real or fictitious, half man and half horse, believed true experimentally, I suppose, from the Thessalians being horsemen; so that Mill is all wrong here. When you come to facts, you can only take in centaur that which is thought, what attaches to the word; in triangle too; only centaur, being taken from imagination, cannot go beyond it, whereas triangle being taken from a mathematical shape, I can pass from the thought thing to the examination of the actual thing. What is implied has nothing to do with the matter, it is what is expressed is in question in any proposition.

100 Again (p. 165) we arrive at no truth by reasoning, but only at conclusions; if the premises are just, then the conclusion is necessary. The name denotes the thing, and in reasoning by means of the name, I reason about the thing, man being so constituted as to think of things by words. He cannot invent a thought; I believe he may put them together, as a centaur or a griffin, but he thinks a thing in doing so. He seems to me always to forget that human knowledge and definition is drawn from phenomena. Thus a circle is not learned by "may exist," but from what I observe and know, even if not physically described, but thought of according to certain known qualities. The whole of the statement in pages 165-7 is absurd.

"Through the point B draw a line returning into itself, on which every point shall be at an equal distance from the point A," is a definition of what you are doing, as circle is a word for what you have done. A circle is a figure every point of whose boundary-line is at an equal distance from a given point (A) within it. You may call it 'bosh' if you like, but such a figure Englishmen are accustomed to call circle; and the thing is what I think of when I say a circle, and so does Mr. Mill, for without ceremony he says, the circle being now described. Hence B C D being a circle, that is, such a figure agreed to be called circle, two certain lines are by supposition equal. All that is a settled fact, when I have got my circle and my radii; but by drawing the secant of the arc within the two radii I have an isosceles triangle, and can go on farther in my mathematics. I do not reason about the word circle, but about a thing to which having certain qualities that name in English is given. When he says B A is equal to C A, not because B C D is a circle, but because B C D is a figure with the radii equal, it is about as much sense that man is not a quadruped, not because he is a biped, but because he has two legs or feet. All I see nearly "self-evident" is that he is talking arrant nonsense.

101 The question of dragons or serpents is decided by the very important principle that the conclusion of a syllogism never states a truth, but a conclusion; that if the premises are true, the conclusion follows. It is a mere consequence of the premises. It does follow justly that there are such serpents, if dragons are such things, etc. The question of truth lies in the premises. A dragon is not a dragon means; this is another statement. Hence the conclusion always is "therefore." The whole of this, too, is nonsense.

A definition does in one sense refer to the meaning of words; but the word represents a reality, and, as we think in language, the word represents the thing thought of as the basis of further reasoning, the attributes of the thing represented by the word being taken, as far as known, for granted. Thus, if I say there can be no quadrature of the circle, it is not of the word circle there can be no quadrature, but of the figure represented in my mind by that word. All this is folly; so of page 168. Suppose I say the figure called circle is a figure having a boundary-line of which every point is equidistant from one given point in it; or a circle is a figure which, etc.; one is a definition as much as another. Adding "idea of" merely puts it in the mind, and defines it there as such. It is just as much a definition of that idea, only dragon having no reality, it makes it untrue de facto; but the two are definitions one as much as another. A dragon being a thing, etc., the idea of the dragon is the idea of the thing, etc.; one is exactly as much definition as the other, one taking it as an assumed fact, really an idea, the other as an idea. It is true that a circle has such an attribute, also true that what has not is not a circle. What man can make is not the question. A straight line is as clear an idea as possible, and justly reasoned about as such; very likely a man could not make one. Points and lines are all ideal; but the great point here is that there is no demonstrative truth, but merely demonstrative conclusions, truth being assumed. The therefore is a plain proof of it.

The absence of all moral feeling and basis for it in the author's mind is shewn in the remarks on "just," as well as the loose character of his thinking. "Just" is what is due to a person in the relation in which we stand towards him. The want of reality, and all being words in his mind, makes even his logic poor. I add a syllogism is really this, If so-and-so is such, and if such be so-and-so, then, etc. There is such a total absence of the power of abstraction and analysis in the book, that it is wearisome to deal with its statements. He has no idea of just, or noble, or mean, but by a comparison of objects so called to find a common principle. The moral instinct of man seizes the force of words so employed without always asking why it so estimates them; but the moral nature estimates morally. Of this, of course, he has no idea. It may be a useful exercise of mind to analyse its thought, but that is all; the apprehension is there without it. Moral sense, though not of course infallible, determines it.

102 A few words as to mathematical terms. All here, too, is superficial. He never can distinguish between objects with qualities and the quality itself. Of length he says, that is, of long objects; but the two things are quite different. In common use we are occupied with objects, but we are here defining. Now we exist in space as in time; it is our mode of existence, and both are measured and partitive. A point is nothing; it is where a thing begins, or, more strictly, a division of space or time begins; it is where a given thing begins, and its absence ceases by the existence of the thing; it is that in which the division of space begins, or of anything existing in space. Length is the distance, when the same direction is followed from a given point to a given point, the part of space in distance between the beginning and end. It is not the thing, but the part of space in which, from the first point of the thing to the last point, the thing exists. Now, we do think of things in space and of space as occupied by them, the object being wholly immaterial; divisible space is our necessary way of thinking: so far from not thinking it we cannot think otherwise. Length is the quantity of space in one direction; breadth is exactly the same thing, only for convenience, as occupied with objects, we take the same thought of one object in another direction, strictly at right angles perhaps; but the direction only is different, not the idea. A point is merely where the distance in space or division of space begins, and can have no existence consequently in it; a line is merely a metaphorical use of a physical thing used to measure distance; length is merely the direct distance between the two points where the division of space contemplated begins and ends. If I postulate, I must think of an object, but space is not an object: it is the manner of existence of objects for us, or of our finite mode of thinking. Everybody knows what space means. No one can define it, because it is the mode of existence and thought for us, in which exists everything we can think of, in the sphere we exist in as thinkers.

103 Nor is the inquiry what is just or virtuous, justice and virtue, the definition of a name merely; because if I define the word, it is by stating what the thing is (if it denote really anything) which the name speaks of. If I say virtue is the moral energy which does what is right and just in spite of the difficulties or temptations which stand in our way, and there be such qualities or character, I state the real qualities or character of which the word stands as the sign in the remarkable instrument of thought and communication bestowed on man, called language. An infidel may think there is no such thing really as virtue, but there is; and when, if needed, I explain the word, I explain or define it by what the thing is. I can hardly conceive a lower moral state, without question of religion, than that of which this part of Mill gives evidence.

A circle seems to me a line described by a point moving round another given fixed one, always at exactly the same distance; it then necessarily, if carried all the way round, enters into and ends at the point started from. There is no postulate to describe it. "Always at the same," or "not always at the same," is as easy one as another; and to say it postulates something is to say that we must postulate describing any figure at all, to deny which is to deny the existence of mathematics. Circle is merely a word which, for the convenience of language, represents such a figure. Take a fixed pivot and move a steel line attached to it round, and you have It as to the means of objective thought; and, so far from it being a postulate that such a line or a circle can be drawn or may exist, I do not believe it can be drawn, and so Mr. Mill states. Whether it may exist I know nothing of; but in both cases I know what I want to draw, and do it as nearly as I can, assuming its perfection, which is in its definition and nowhere else, and from that I reason.

Though, of course, there are equivalent propositions which prove nothing, many are not so. And I reject, as I have done, the sum of attributes being a definition. Objects are really known, as a man, and then defined by what distinguishes them to the mind, and the words stand for the object known, and the distinctive quality may be discovered to involve truths not present to the mind in the object, and so further knowledge be acquired. I reject also, if it is what follows, its being a truth, as he says (page 180). It is not a truth as so following but a proved consequence - if the premises are true, and no more. Logic has nothing to do with truth. Truth rests on testimony.

104 As an instance of the looseness and inaccuracy of Mill's mind, I notice (p. 181) "incapable of reason," which is nonsense - of reasoning perhaps. Nor do I accept his list of predicables. The making the definition of a word the sum of its attributes falsifies the effect of the syllogism, as does his inaccuracy. I have already stated that what makes a being a man to me is not the sum of his attributes. I am ignorant of the half of them; but he is a man to me, and to a savage, and rightly so (yea, even to an animal). Hence if the minor applies a quality from the admitted predicate of the major, not in my idea of man, I increase my knowledge. Supposing I know nothing of life being in the blood, and it is discovered as to animals, and I admit man is an animal, I have to conclude he so dies. I have already said truth and belief are only in the premises. Of course all that is true was always true in the system I am of; but my growth in knowledge is by discovery, and I may by general terms of acquired knowledge learn particular things by just conclusions as to what is included in the general term.

But, further, death is not mortality. There is an inference that because so many have died, all do; but this has nothing to do with the syllogism, save as the believed premise. The kind of syllogism is not a fair test, because the subject of the minor is only an individual of that of the major; whereas, as said above, a class word justly predicated may contain or involve an attribute not included in the mental idea of the subject of the major; whereas, by the rule de omni et nullo, in the instance given, it is on the face of it not true when it is an individual of the class. But no observation has made me know even here that the Duke of Wellington dies. It is a direct and mere inference from the premises that all men do, however I had learned that. Unless I had heard of God's sentence I could not have told it, that I know of, for Adam's lifetime. It might have been a puzzle for centuries. The syllogism never proves the fact, but the consequence. All men are mortal is not the cause that the Duke of Wellington dies. It assumes it, if he be a man; but it proves it to me because I cannot deny either of the premises. Logic has nothing to do with facts, but with mental consequences. It is this (as often said) that makes all Mill's reasoning false. It proves he must die, not a fact but a consequence. For here the fact is not so. The Duke of Wellington is not dead; but, as men are mortal, and he a man, he must die - at least is mortal. Testimony is the only proof of truth or fact, save personal experience. Nor was mortality known because death was, identified here with Mill's usual inaccuracy.

105 But the whole idea of Mill as to syllogistic reasoning is wrong. It is only reasoning, and this to prove the justness of a conclusion, not heretofore admitted, from what I do admit; and he admits "it is indispensable to throw our reasoning into this form when there is any doubt of its validity." This is all it is meant for. It may thus convince of facts as to a given subject which form no part of my idea of the subject, which having been otherwise discovered and admitted are predicated in the major, and then, the subject of the major being in the class predicated, this asserted in the minor brings the subject of the major into the condition so asserted. But, as I have already stated, the only thing believed is what is in the two premises (which of course may be contested but is assumed by the syllogism); but if the form be right, no doubt remains as to conclusion so far as phenomena go. A syllogism is only, "If so and so, then "; and this it does perfectly in the sphere of man's knowledge, what is subject to sense and experience; but the statement that the inference is in the premises, as I have said, has nothing to do with the matter. They are assumed truths, and the syllogism has nothing to do with how acquired; they may be by observation, or consciousness; they may be, if I believe it, by revelation, or by any other way. The syllogism assuming their truth says that excessive brightness dazzles the eye; I say to one who has never seen snow, But snow in sunshine is excessively bright (which he believes on my testimony); therefore, snow in sunshine dazzles the eye. The syllogistic conclusion is just, there is no difference at all in the premises. He knows by experience what dazzling the eye means, by testimony what snow is. The conclusion is certain - he knows what snow does, which he did not know before.

106 But all Mill's ground is false. In reasoning from particulars to particulars, the fact may be true, but it is false reasoning, and not what thoughtful men do. His instance only shews his inaccuracy. "A burnt child dreads the fire," is not reasoning, it is instinctive fear; and if a thing looks like fire, it is equally afraid of it - an instinct mercifully put in animal life even, but not reasoning; its reasoning value is found in another proverb, "The scalded dog fears cold water." The man must have had an extraordinary opinion of himself, with such a mind, to undertake to write on logic, pace Sir J. Herschel, Archbishop Whately, and Mr. Bailey. But it is also all false that, if John and Thomas die, etc., the Duke of Wellington will die. I suppose before Adam died, Enoch went up to heaven; should I rightly say Adam will? If ten had done so, not more truly. When Cain killed Abel, I had seen death. Man was capable then of being put to death. But would he die if let alone? I had seen him live 600 or 700 years, and nobody died; then I should have concluded he could not, he was not in se mortal. But when I have seen or known everybody die for thousands of years, I conclude that man (this being, this race) is mortal - that is, dies as left to the natural phenomenonal course of his race. It is not that particular men have died. Man is mortal, or even all men are mortal, is quite a different proposition. There has been an induction as to the nature of the race, Enoch and Elijah being excepted, as happening by the intervention of extrinsic power. Consequently I say the Duke of Wellington certainly (if no such power intervenes) will die, for he is a man, and such is the fate of his race. I can say, as a conclusion phenomenally considered, the Duke of Wellington must die, etc. It is a perfectly correct conclusion, supposing I believe in revelation, and, spite of all the Mills and Voltaires, there are those who, by grace at least, have sense enough to do it; but this is not my question. Supposing I believe that the sentence of death lies on man, I say man is mortal (save by intervention of extrinsic power). Some may suppose that great men or wise men do not, are taken to heaven like Hasisadra, or deified like Hercules or Nimrod; I say, No, he is a man, and he is mortal. The conclusion is as perfect and as certain. And that is what the syllogism is and does; it draws a conclusion from assumed truths. How they are discovered has nothing to do with the syllogism, which is just as sound a conclusion if the premises were false as if they were true. The premises being true has nothing to do with the justness of the conclusion, nor has the way the truth of them has been discovered. It is not necessarily by inference at all. The discovery, be it of Sir W. Hamilton, Mill, or Berkeley, is a mare's nest (pages 209-240). The form merely assures accuracy in drawing the conclusion.

107 I repeat here (p. 232), saying that man is mortal is not the same as that A B C, etc., died. The difference is as real as it is grave. It may be, if universal, a just induction; but dying as a fact, and subjection to death, are distinct things. I might have seen the whole world destroyed by the flood, and not justly conclude that men must die of themselves naturally, as we say, and therefore I could not have said the Duke of Wellington will or must die. Put the syllogism and try. So many millions of men died, perished in the flood, therefore the Duke of Wellington will die (without it). Is there any just conclusion there? As to conclusions to particulars and general formula being the same, it is the same; it is every way false; the induction in either case is false as reasoning. It may contain motives in the structure of the particular case involving the result; but then it is a general formula, in its nature applying to that structure, and the proposition is only true because it is general - that is, true in the nature of the thing, so that it is false from particular to particular, and always is so as reasoning. But Mill is all wrong (as is Whately) when he says that the major is an affirmation of the sufficiency of the evidence on which the conclusion rests. It states the proposition, but says nothing of the evidence one way or another, nor of the induction on which it is founded, nor is it necessarily founded on an induction. It is the basis of assumed fact on which the syllogistic reasoning is founded. In the common disputations they denied the major or the minor as facts (or distinguished), or the conclusion, which last alone referred to the syllogistic process.

(Page 235). All his reasoning here shews nothing but the grossest mental incapacity. No one doubts we infer from particulars very often, as that Tenterden steeple was the cause of Goodwin Sands; but it is never sound as reasoning, save as above when it involves a general proposition which sagacity often instinctively sees. So that Mill is wholly wrong, does not see how it becomes a general proposition, which alone makes the conclusion just. Some men die, therefore others do, is never just as reasoning; all men do, therefore such and such will, is; though I may call in question the truth of the general proposition. And though all men include the one, the reasoning is just because it does. The question is, if Thomas will die? I say all men do, and he is one of the all, therefore he will - not that he dies because of it, but that I know he will because he is. He dies because he is mortal. The conclusion is not generally necessarily, but to the truth as to some from what is true as to all; and the conclusion as to some from other some is no just conclusion at all - never is. Why should I die because Socrates does? But if I have justly arrived at the subjection to death of all, with which induction the syllogism has nothing to do but assumes it, it is true of Socrates or any one else. That is, the general proposition is essential to the conclusion; if not, the dying of all other men would prove nothing as to all. Man is mortal, such as he is; it is his nature. Man is mortal, that is, the general proposition, which is everything; the "conditions of legitimate induction" (p. 236) cannot be realised as to the Duke of Wellington at all without the general proposition, however arrived at. Mill does not even see what he is reasoning about. I admit that "the general conclusion is never legitimate unless the particular one would be so too," that is, as to the fact; if it were not, the general one would not be true. But that is arguing from the general to the particular; which is exactly the conclusion of the syllogism, by means of a middle term.

108 The question is, Can we arrive at the conclusion as to the particular one without the general one being true first? That is, can we justly say A B C died, therefore the Duke of Wellington is mortal? That is "Mill's logic." His statement is quite true, being the principle of syllogism, and refutes, if it were needed, his whole system. That we take the trouble of stating the general proposition has nothing to do with the matter; but it is an indispensable condition of the validity of the inference. Thus if I say A B will die, for he is a man, this truth assumes that all men do. For clear inference the latter is stated as the major premise. If all men do not die, I cannot say the Duke of Wellington will; he may be of those who do not.

I have, singularly enough, anticipated in my notes nearly every question Mill has raised. Here (p. 224) he confutes himself completely. "There is no contradiction in supposing that all these persons have died, and that the Duke of Wellington may notwithstanding live for ever." Just so; that is, you cannot argue syllogistically or really from particulars to particulars, which is what he says you can. If 999 millions and 900 thousand had died, and 100 thousand not, there is no proof at all that A B will die; it may be 9999 to one he will, but there is no proof of anything. You must have a general proposition for proof. The way, as I have said, I acquire the general proposition has nothing at all to do with the proof in the syllogism which assumes and starts from the general one (liable, of course, to be contested by the adverse disputant). If I had lived in Adam's time, and no one had shewn mortality (not death merely), and I believed scripture, I should have said all men are mortal. Adam and all his children will die, for they are men (save prevention by power). If observation was my ground, I could not say any one would die. The general proposition may be rightly or wrongly accepted, but that is another question. But, as he says, there would be a contradiction if the general principle be assumed, not if only particular cases; that is, a syllogism is sound reasoning because it lays the basis in a general proposition; and Mill talks nonsense in his reasoning about it. But I repeat, with the reasoning of the syllogism the actual truth of the premises has nothing to do. It is a contradiction not to admit the conclusion, assuming the premises. That the premises may be obvious or require proof is evident, and may be partially true, as I have said as to animals. Animals cease to exist; man is an animal; therefore man ceases to exist. As existing here in time, qua animal he does; but it is only partially true, because animal and man are not equivalent terms - man is more comprehensive.

109 Water dissolves lime; if I put this lime into this water, it will dissolve it. But the water is already saturated. We have thus to distinguish the accuracy of propositions. Water will dissolve some lime is alone true; and this water is water with its full complement of lime. What a weariness to turn to this from the truth, from the word of God! But I pursue, the rather as here (pp. 240-247) the cloven foot comes out, though it is really only going over again the same false ground; and Mill clearly proves, in seeking to do the contrary, that general propositions are the only way of real conclusions. Thus as to arsenic (page 242). I have no need to go to other inductions from qualities. What produces a black spot under such circumstances, etc., poisons. No matter whether metallic, volatile, or what else, if everything that does so poisons. The induction is as to the nature of the thing which does produce blackness, that is, to a general proposition: All that does so poisons. Supposing all that does so does not poison, I can draw no conclusion from such a spot. That is, a general proposition which states the nature of what does is absolutely necessary to the argument. If only some articles, alike in this, do, I may add, A spot-producing article if also metallic, volatile, etc., does these qualities are necessary to make it universal, that is, determine its nature as poisonous; but I have my general proposition. Everything that produces such spot, being also metallic, volatile, etc., poisons, has that nature destructive of physical life in man. I learn it in every known instance, and when I have (any exception being from an extraneous cause), I say "every," I have a general proposition as to its nature, and hence only applied to every case because it is its nature, and so always such. The justness of the induction has of course to be settled. That is, my major premise may be contested, but with the conclusion this has nothing to do - that is based on its being true, and, if true, the conclusion is simply certain.

110 And this he admits in the government case. No government: that general proposition is the foundation of all - "a generalisation from history." The similarity is not the question - another false principle of his. It is in this the same, it desires the good of its subjects: the nature and principle which governs the point is ascertained. This government acts in the same way. It certainly is not likely to be overthrown (for likeliness is the point to be proved here). Then comes question as to the fact. Now this is not a question of inference at all, but of testimony. Is it a fact that I believe the testimony, or not? If I do, I say with certainty. Supposing twenty instances of disinterested intelligent witnesses had occurred. This may or may not be true, and may or may not be believed to be true. To draw my conclusion, the government must be the same in this; if I believe the testimony, I say it is the same, as no government, etc.; this is not likely to be overthrown. This is an inference justly drawn, and the inference certain according to the premises, but "may be believed to be true" gives no inference as to fact at all as to this government. The witness of intelligent disinterested witnesses affords no ground of inference. It may be all necessary and right for common human life, but has nothing to do with logical inference. I may be a bad judge of the witnesses, or ill informed as to them, and other witnesses being true does not prove them to be so. Moral probabilities are very important, but they have nothing to do with logical inference. I can say, if these say true, this government is not likely, a certain inference on a hypothetical truth, and so far logical; but what depends on the moral estimate of my mind as to the personal qualities of witnesses has nothing to do with logical inference. It only proves incapacity to judge of reasoning to say it does. The resembling other cases is no part of what I believe on testimony at all even, but the fact of that in which they are the same. Nor is it reasoning from particulars. His starting-point was no government, and supposing this true only of some, the possibility of overthrow even, if so, not its unlikeliness, would be proved. The whole argument is trash, save as it clearly proves he is all wrong. Being asserted to do so by intelligent, etc., was no mark that it did so in its nature or qualities, but merely a question, Do these de facto speak truth as to its qualities? of which their testimony is no mark at all as an attribute in the government. But all this is to get rid of evidence, and subject the matter to logical inference that nothing might be believed, and always rest in this "may be believed to be true," and nothing be believed at all. Now, reasoning or syllogistic conclusion is certain if the premises be true, and evidence may be morally or absolutely certain too. This makes all uncertain in logic and in testimony. I do not a moment admit that every step in the deduction is still an induction. The deduction does not begin till the general proposition or nature of the subject expressed in the predicate is, through induction or other means, assumed to be true. In the deduction there is no induction at all.

Examination of Mill's Logic

J. N. Darby.

<32007E> 111 {file section c.}

{A System of Logic, by John Stuart Mill, 8th edition.

The reader must bear in mind that these are only MSS notes jotted down while reading the book.}

All he says as to mathematics is mere unintelligent materialism; as if, because his fingers and compass could not be absolutely true, his mental apprehension of it could not. His head is no wiser than his fingers. The certainty is no illusion. He supposes that mere materialism is all we have. But we exist in space and time, and space is divisible. What is material phenomenally exists in space, and the matter is not the subject of thought but that mode of existence, and this gives form and measure, and of this mathematics are cognisant and demonstrate the equality of dissimilar forms, etc. But his idea of a point, etc., is not only false, but wholly inapprehensive of the truth. A line is that at which divided space begins and ends, the limits of any such division, or of two which meet. And if I enter on existing matter, or the space it is in, I am not at the limit at all. Hence a line properly is a non-existent thing, as the limit of a thing, or of two spaces which meet, must be; but I necessarily so think from my nature. A point is the starting-point or end of the line, or any point where the mind divides it. A straight line is that whose direction is invariably to a fixed point. So surface is that where matter ceases or begins. If I pass into an existing thing, I am not on its surface. When we make lines physically, they are sufficient to represent them to the eye for the mind, but this is all. If I take what is physically marked, I have lost the idea of line. And we, as finite, living according to space and time, necessarily think in it. If the radii are not equal, it is that the circle is not a true one, not that equal radii are not true of any circle: if not, it is not a circle at all. And so far from a right angle never being true, it is necessarily true, and I cannot help thinking of an exact one if I think of it. Supposing a line so conceived as above, and for practical use any line drawn, let one cross another at any angle. Let one move round in the direction to enlarge the smaller of the two angles. I necessarily pass through all angles till the lines are identical, and at a given point a right angle; I must do it. The physical exactitude is a mere question of physical skill. In the case of a line one cannot form a mental picture of a line, for its essence is not to be a material existence at all, but the mode of existence of that of which I can form such a picture, that is, existence in divisible space; and it is his reducing all thought to mere objects, so as to apply the phenomenal facts as to that to all thought in the mind, which makes all his system false. Geometers just define it for practical use; but Mill never thinks nor gets beyond what he picks up to comment on. All human reasoning is built on hypothesis necessarily. The only difference of geometry is that, occupied with what actually exists in nature, the hypothesis is incontrovertible. Mere definition or axiomatic assertion may be well or ill founded, but the relations of space, quantity, inequality exist in the necessity of our thought; and geometry has only to discover what they are, and, as in all true deductive reasoning, the conclusion is necessary.

113 Some mathematical definitions are very stupid. "A straight line is the shortest line between two points." This may be and doubtless is true, but is no definition, not what a straight line is, but a quality of it. "Straight" is whatever never swerves from one direction towards a point fixed as regards the point from which it starts. Every basis of deduction is an assumed truth - and as to the nature of what is spoken of - only mathematics dealing with the forms and measures of space deal with that which exists as true in the nature we belong to. Man is mortal, or man is a rational animal, may give rise to a thousand questions other than such as belong immutably to the nature of space, the sphere or time, the condition in which we now exist.

His change as to equal magnitudes (p. 264) makes the whole thing false. There are equal magnitudes which cannot be so applied to one another as to coincide, though those which do are upon the face of it equal. I suppose "magnitudes equal to the same" to be a delusion in terms, even if convenient for practice. The magnitudes here are the same. I think the proposition that two straight lines cannot enclose a space may be demonstrated, for let them start from two separate points and these are not united by them. Let them start from the same point - either they are identical (only one line really) or perpetually diverge. The true definition of a straight line, one which never diverges from direction to one fixed point, makes all this simple. I dare say geometry may be more convenient as we have it; but what we want in it logically is to give right force to terms, and so to definitions. What we have said of straight lines is not (p. 266) an induction from the evidence of our senses (rather nonsense, by the bye) but is necessarily demonstrated from the meaning of "straight."

And this introduces another fallacy of Mill's, founded on his assertion of general propositions and ignorance of their nature. Of course they may be contested, but in all deductive reasoning are assumed. But as reasoning from particulars (Mill's theory) is clearly false on the face of it, and no reasoning at all - that is, no legitimate inference of any kind - so the universality of a general proposition is not all. That all men are mortal is a fact. They have been so in all known cases; but the induction goes farther, and involves, perhaps is even tacitly based on, another: Man is mortal, which affirms something of the nature of man which is other and more than the fact that all are involved in it. And this is the meaning of what is universal is necessary - that is, certainly must happen according to the nature. "Straight" is a line of a particular nature, one which never deviates in its direction; if it does, it is not straight. So a circle; it means a boundary line enclosing space whose distance from a point within is always equal. Now Mr. Mill's reasoning that it comes from observation is false upon the face of it; for he says there never was a perfect circle nor line seen, nor can there be, he declares. Hence it cannot be observation which has given me the idea of a perfect line or circle, for there is no such thing to be observed. It will be said, I correct its aberrations in my mind. Correct it by what? By the idea I have of it; that is, I have an idea to correct it by, not an idea in the sense of a mental image. I know what equal means. This I may have learned experimentally; but knowing what equal means, I know what circle means without seeing it or forming any image of it in my mind.

114 Saying, too, I cannot reason about nonentities is false; for modes of existence (as time and space) are not entities, and I can, though with perhaps more difficulty, reason about them. And here the part which language takes is forgotten. I may have learned what "equal" is by observation (not by inference and inferring nothing from it); but I exist in space, and divisible space and time, and I know what number is, and I think in this order, and equal becomes an abstraction from the things I may have learned it by. I apply it to entities; but it is not an entity at all, yet it is a perfectly intelligible word. I have no mental image before me when I say equal or unequal, though modes of existence suppose for us that things exist; but they are not existing things imaged in the mind. This materialism has rendered all Mill's reasoning false. I have an idea of straight and circle, lines or forms, with certain qualities which exclude from them all lines and forms which have them not. And if nature or art does not, as Mill says, furnish such, then I say a true circle does not exist in nature, and art cannot make one, though what it makes is meant for it, and answers practically for deductive reasoning, because it is meant for it, and supposed to be it. I do not take Euclid's axioms; because they are taken as sufficient for mathematical purposes, not meant to have the precision necessary for logical discussion. Let us bear in mind that all syllogistic reasoning is on the assumption of the truth of premises - that is, hypothetical; and if true, the conclusion is always "must be," never really "is "; never truth affirmed in itself, but a conclusion, though always a necessary one. That two lines cannot include space is demonstrable, and no real axiom, but a necessary consequence of their nature, the meaning of "straight" being assumed, of which, whether I have ever seen an exactly straight thing or not, I have a perfectly clear thought.

115 As to the burden of proof (p. 267), it is a feeble defence, but Mill has proved it; for he tells us that no one has ever seen a true straight line or true circle. I have already said that the only difference of mathematics is that the truths we start with - space, divisible space, form, etc. - are in the certain nature of things, that is, our own mode of existence. Hence unless I know God and what "I am" means, in which there is no space or time, all thoughts, or rather attempts at thought, of what is eternal outside them are negative and cannot be otherwise - infinite, immense, and so on. I exist in what is divisible space and time, and with human power I cannot go beyond it. When I say I am, the thought has no past, no future - that is, is negative of finite time. It is the nearest to eternity I can come, and by a tacit negation. It is always now.* Hence, when used absolutely, it negatives time absolutely; when said of myself, it says, I exist now.

{*Everlasting only supposes continuous existence from now, ex parte post, so called, or ex parte ante.}

What Mr. Bain says is clearly false (p. 272), for we have no really straight objects to compare, and I cannot say "bent or crooked" without understanding what "straight" means, to which another object may be an approximation. That the knowledge which makes it understood suffices to verify it, is true; but for a very different reason. Straight means what does not deviate; but from what? All his reasoning in pages 274-5 is founded on different meanings of inconceivable. Whewell used it as tantamount to impossible, Mill as what the mind may or cannot apprehend, he having nothing but observation and experience to judge by, but the impossibility is in the nature of the things. Two are not three in the same sense, nor bent and straight. It is not simply that I cannot conceive two straight lines enclosing a space, but they cannot enclose it. It has nothing to do with the information of my mind or its habits, which is all Mill can speak of. The thing, according to our mode of existence and thought, cannot be. It is not merely that in my condition of mind it cannot de facto be thought: in my state of existence it is not thinkable. All his reasoning is not worth a straw. One is the effect of prejudice or education; the other is in the nature of the things. My having ascertained it or not is the state of my mind; the other is the state of two straight lines. And it is quite possible that, while my ascertaining the fact is a matter of scientific progress, I may learn, too, that, things being what they are (and so only can I think logically and as to nature), it could not be otherwise. Thus it took great progress to learn the uniform and universal laws of gravitation; but, once learned, the sun being an enormously greater mass, that principle being true, the earth, once set in motion, must go round the sun.

116 So with combinations in the reasoning of both these gentlemen. If things were not definitely combined (though experimentally learned), we could not have a kosmos, an ordered universe. There might have been another combination possible (but not according to that in which we live, hence not conceivable by us); but to have order and distinct bodies, there being diverse elements, they must be definitely combined to have these distinct bodies. Uniformity and order cannot exist without it. Whewell, on the main point, defends himself needlessly and to no purpose (page 283). The question is not, save for myself, if I conceived distinctly or not, nor do I trouble myself with actual axioms more or less correct; but is there such a thing as a straight line conceivable which is not a crooked one, and a circle which is itself not an ellipse nor a square? Necessary conclusions are those rightly drawn from admitted premises; necessary truths are those which follow necessarily from the facts certain in nature. They are also facts. I learn them perhaps by reasoning. Geometry proves the equal quantities of distinct forms. I join by a straight line two radii of a circle. I have an isosceles triangle; whatever may be deduced rightly from that necessarily follows, and may involve important discoveries. The uncultivated mind has no clear idea of what makes it impossible for him, therefore it is not so, of course. And though I cannot conceive a world with different chemical combinations, as I belong to this and am not a creator, I can conceive there may be; just as I may conceive there are a thousand chemical combinations yet undiscovered. But chaos man cannot conceive. It is combination in a definite way which comes into his mind, if any; but any particular combination must be for an ordered kosmos.

117 True axioms, then, are relationships which are in nature and for our existence always and necessarily true. When I define a thing in mathematics, I take a fact in the relations of space or number, not an existing object, but a relationship mentally conceived, one which is important for further reasoning, though there may be a thousand others; not, as Mr. Mill says, denying other attributes, but selecting that which makes it important. What I take necessarily and absolutely exists, not a physical object, an object of sense, but a relationship in the nature of things, say a right angle. Now all angles exist infinite in number. I take one where, two lines crossing each other, all the angles are equal. There must be such, for all angles exist (they are the mere relation or difference of direction of two lines from one point),* therefore this does: only I take it for further use. So there are infinite forms circumscribed by a continuous line, never straight, but returning to the same identical point. There is, therefore, one of which the circumscribing line is always equidistant from a point within, that is, all whose radii are equal. I take this one, because from this quality (there may be twenty others) all the system of trigonometry (its sines, cosines, versed sines, etc.) flows. But the existence of these relationships is in the nature of things, not objects (though if true they may become such), but as to which it is impossible that they should not be. I learn many consequences, as I do from the ellipse or other forms which in astronomy become of the greatest importance: consequences that are also true as relationships - say as Kepler's laws - much more certain and certainly accurate in mathematics than by observation. If facts, they may be observable of course, but their certainty is mathematical, that is, in their nature not experimental. I repeat, all deductive reasoning is hypothetical; that is, it assumes the truth of the premises.

{*Angles are mere quantitative angular space, part of the whole circle of space round a point. A right angle is one of four equal ones which take in the whole space.}

118 (Pages 290, 293.) I come to numbers. Mr. Mill tells us that 1 = 1 is not certain, because a pound troy is not equal to a pound avoirdupois. This is a sample of Mill's logic. He says we must think of ten bodies, ten sounds, etc.; but I do not think of bodies or sounds at all, not even if such are before me, only of their relation in number. I think of ten. I can say ten is not nine, and think of no body or thing at all. Two and one is no definition of three at all; it merely states that, if I add one to two, it makes what I call three; but two and two making four, 3 + 1 making four, and so on, shew this has nothing to do with definitions. We cannot define numbers, because they enter as a primary idea into my condition of existence in the divisibility of quantity or the unity of an undivided object, as three parts, one sum. You cannot define colours for an analogous reason, nor sounds. They are primary sensations in the latter cases, the mode of my existence in the former. The word is merely the sign of it; but I am one, another person speaking to me is one, and we are two. When I say "two," it shews that it is not the object of sense, for the two are different, but unity or numerical quantity that I think of. The word "four," as applicable to all objects, represents none. It represents four, the number, a mode of separate existence. The objects are not the subject of thought, but the number of them, and therefore I can compute without referring to any object; the relations developed are relations of number, and nothing else. Nobody denies that objects are numbered, but thinking of number is not thinking of the objects. They exist in space, in time; but space and time are not the objects of sense that exist in them. To confound reasoning of "one" and "one pound," as if it were the same thing, shews an incapacity of mind which may not be impossible, but it is certainly "inconceivable" in one pretending to teach reasoning or logic: the difference is in the pounds, not in the one. But mathematical arguments as to quantity are just as certain. What have quantities, as man has combined them in commerce, to do with abstract relations of quantity? This is all child's play in logic.

I need not enter at any length into the question between Mr. Mill and Mr. Spencer. Both base their reasoning on exact experience, and both are all wrong. If, as Mr. Spencer says, I feel I am cold, and cannot conceive I am not, this is not past experience. Nor is it necessary to talk of the opposite being inconceivable. A present positive feeling is for him who has it certain. Mr. Mill's answer is simplest nonsense. He says, I can conceive not being cold; but Mr. S. evidently means that when I feel cold I cannot conceive being not cold then. But they are, in order to make experience the sole test of truth, making my conception of a thing the only question, not the thing itself If I have a toothache, the pain is something, though, of course, I conceive it; and in the cases we have been considering - circles, numbers, etc. - my conceiving it has nothing to do with it. The thing has the qualities; the form or number is what it is. There are numbers which convey no idea to the mind, but I can calculate them with as much certainty as if it were two or three: the certainty is in the numerical relation, not in any conception; and, be the circle big or little, the relations of sines, cosines, etc., are just the same. Conceiving depends on the conceiving power, not on the truth of the thing. "That what is inconceivable cannot be true," is as false as can possibly be; for conceivable depends on the capacity of the conceiver, not on truth or not. Besides, a man may be certain in his conception, and deceived - think himself made of glass, or Louis XVI; he is mad, no doubt, but just as certain. It is inconceivable for him that it should be otherwise. Mr. Mill distinguishes between inconceivable and impossible. I may use the former for the latter; but if the difference is made and it is just, I had already made it. The whole argument is not worth a rush. What is impossible cannot have been a matter of experience, and rests on the nature of the thing, not on conception or experience at all. And a thing may be impossible and yet supposed, or so far conceived, as that the square of the hypotenuse is not equal to the squares of the two sides. This is impossible to be true from the relation of the quantities. I may have to discover it, but it is in the nature of the thing always so.

119 As to contradiction or an excluded middle, I must add used in the same sense. Thus, snow is white; snow is not white. If snow is white, what is not white is not snow. What is red snow? It is in all its essential qualities what makes it snow, but it has been coloured in some way; and contradiction is simply such negatives that is, says the affirmation is not true, consequently the negative cannot be true if it is. But this supposes the term used in the same sense. A man is one single I, but there are body, soul, and spirit, which may be separated. But what Mill says is, as usual, wrong (p. 321); for an unmeaning proposition is none at all - is not true nor false, not as a proposition, but because it is not one at all. He is wrong, too, as to matter. What is infinitely divisible cannot be said to be not infinitely divisible. Whether matter exists or not has nothing to do with the question. The existence of matter is another proposition, the truth of which is assumed in the one we are treating of, as is always the case mentally. The incapacity of Mr. Mill in analysing is really astounding. Nor has sight or touch anything to do with it. Thus, if chemistry has shewn, as alleged in the atomic theory,* that divisibility cannot be carried farther, then the up to that divisible thing is not infinitely divisible. Infinite divisibility may be applied to space without matter in thought. If I get space, I get extension; and if I do, I can conceive part of it.

{*But this is merely physically. Mentally space is always divisible, because it has extension, or it is not space.}

120 In the quotations from Spencer we get the usual reference of everything to experience. Now as to phenomena I should insist on it. But reasoning has nothing to do with it. I know, without any phenomenon, that when I say a thing is not, I do not mean that it is, but to contradict it, that I am saying that the proposition is not true; if it is true, it is not true to say it is not. I have nothing to do here with the experience of objects, beyond which these men cannot get. I say, whales are mammals; it is said that whales are not mammals. If I use the word in the same sense both cannot be true, because one says the other is not, and it cannot be true and not true in the same sense. Yet I have no experience of whales - never saw one to examine it - only I know that in the usual ordinary sense of the term it is a great fish; but I have no experience of the matter; only I know what a proposition is, and what not means.

I deny altogether that all our knowledge comes from induction, or that induction gives us any truth at all. Induction gives us what we have to act on as men, in a multitude of cases; for Mill carefully leaves out belief in testimony. But induction only gives us a high degree of probability. Induction does not give us truth; testimony alone gives us truth. But he admits that what induction does is to discover and prove general propositions. He insists on ascertaining individual facts, but all this is sophistry.* Because I do not infer from some observed cases to one, unless it be the observation of all; for if not, you can draw no inference; it concludes from constant recurrence in all cases without other cause; it is true in all cases, hence in any given one; otherwise in none, unless that it is uncertain, for some are and some are not alike, or at least only probability. It never gives truth as such. "Observation of known cases" means of all known cases, or is quite false; but from all known cases universality is concluded. But this is the general proposition.

{*Indeed in page 331 he says, "In strictness, indeed, the result of the problem is a general proposition." To be sure it is, and must be - here in the case of mathematics.}

121 The inference is to a whole class, because it is true of the whole class in all observed cases. "It does not hold at all, or it holds in all cases." Just so; but my induction is from its having been so in all observed: if it has not, I cannot infer that it will; and of cases not yet observed I only infer it of one, because I infer it of all. Only, as I have said, it tacitly but really affirms the nature of the thing. "All men are mortal" is really a conclusion as to man's nature from having known all to die as to human knowledge. All diameters of a circle are equal is the nature of a circle having all its radii equal. But here again the cloven foot comes out, that the inquiry into a scientific principle or an individual fact is just the same induction. Now, a principle or the nature of things is a matter of induction from many or all observed facts, but an individual fact (save as identical with a scientific principle) is never a matter of induction, but of testimony. I know he reasons about it to shew that I believe by an induction as to credibility; but this, however much it has its place, does not in itself give any induction in believing the fact. I believe the testimony that the fact is, and infer nothing about anything. I may shew it is folly not to believe the testimony, and infer I ought; but that is reasoning or inferring as to the testimony, if I do this (not always the ground or belief, nor even of divine faith), not as to the fact. I believe on testimony, which is no induction at all; and this in the next pages he does not deny.

Page 329). The senses or testimony must decide on the individual fact. Inductions may, of course, then be made; but what he says about the syllogism is all false, as before. It is always and only deduction, and not induction. Even in practical affairs the inference to a particular case would not be just, unless true of all such cases, for if not, this one may be a similar exception; and so he admits in the first sentence in the next chapter. It is really wearisome to pursue such absence of all exactness of mind. This definition of induction? (p. 333) says all I have insisted on, as to the whole class or general proposition being its true character. But syllogism is not induction, but deduction. It does not give probability, however high, which is all induction can do, and therefore nothing certain, but a necessary and certain conclusion if the premises be true. The case Mr. Mill puts is induction, and of it syllogism says: Argumentum a particulari ad universalem nil valet, and for a deduction certain in its nature, that must be; it is an induction from given cases to a class which may or may not be well founded. It is an induction; there is a conclusion, namely that every A is B; whether it be fairly conclusive depends on circumstances. If this and that A are sufficiently numerous and none contradictory are known, then it is a fair induction, such as men have to act on. But it is not a syllogism - must be if the premises are.

122 Of the use of syllogism I have spoken; it connects with certainty, by means of a middle term, ideas or an idea not connected or contained in the subject as announced, and which is called in question. Every man is an animal; every animal lives (as such) by blood; therefore man lives by blood. The middle term animal connects life by blood with man, which is supposed to be in dispute. He is wrong in saying ascertained as to every individual in it. That is not it. It is ascertained as to every individual that has come under observation, and so I conclude as to one which has not. That is induction, the nature being really always introduced, though the process be not analysed in our minds. And this view of induction he admits to be true in pages 334, 335. But syllogism is wholly distinct in its nature, and gives on admitted premises a certain conclusion from them. The induction, if it be sufficient to prove the nature, is practically sufficient so far as phenomena go; but never in se certainty. But this point of the nature of things is of great importance, though it simplifies things much.

I need not follow the mass of useless verbiage in the controversy between Mill and Dr. Whewell. Mill sums it up in one sentence as to Kepler, but shews himself wrong therein; for, as is evident, Kepler's law was an induction, only one ready-made for him in the necessary rules of an ellipse. Having found a number of places and movements of Mars, he inferred all the rest: only the inference was ready-made for him. But as to the question of nature itself, what is in Mill (ground of induction) and Whately is vague and unsatisfactory, though there is a general presentiment of truth in it. Nature and its uniformity come up in three distinct ways. First, uniformity of relative existence, that is, of what is always true in nature as it subsists, as space and form, mathematical induction, which is really merely discovery of what is constantly so. Secondly, the effects of power in nature, which may or may not operate constantly, as gravitation or certain chemical affinities or effects. Thirdly, subjection to some law or power which operates universally. The second is probably the law of nature. I do not conclude because John and Peter have died that all will. Abel's death by violence, and all men's, save eight, by the flood, could not have proved it, because it was not the course of nature that all would have died by nature; but I conclude that John and Peter will die because all have. My reason is that the universality of it, without other external cause, makes it a law of man's nature; but as it is not in the subject itself apparently, but subjection to a law of necessity, I must shew its universality in the natural course of things, which practically proves its necessity in every cause. Yet it is not proof, that is, certainty, though quasi-certainty. He who believes scripture knows we shall not all die. It is what in a person or being in his normal state is contrary to his nature, for he lives. He is subjected to it, he may be even violently. Hence I can only conclude while that subjection continues. But in chemical affinities or gravitation it is in its normal state that it so acts; it is its nature. Seeing this, namely it is its nature, the law of it if you please, I reckon on its doing so in all cases, because it is its nature. This may be both learned and confirmed by observation, and, no doubt, possibly the generalisation induced; but from one clear adequate instance or many I have its nature.

123 In geometrical induction it is, as I said, discovery of the nature or essential qualities of one form; and these never vary, they are the qualities of that form. What he says of only proving that that circle is only so and-so is a mistake. It is what a circle, any circle, is. Colours do not give just ground for induction. They are not what the thing is - its nature. Black swans, however, were known - rara avis in terris, nigroque simillima cygno. What he says of abstraction is wrong. It abstracts a quality from all it may be found in, as whiteness; or a thing as a nature abstractedly from all in which the nature is found, as a man, or man; a circle, etc. It is not connecting known facts by common characters, but taking the characters apart from the facts. Man is so-and-so, whiteness dazzles. It is the quality of being in its nature apart from the objects in which a quality is, or individual instances of a being or an act: as "Reading much tries the mind": "Living by warm blood is the property of all beings who breathe through lungs." It is really that the nature of the thing has been discovered. In all cases it is, so far as one instance shews, the nature of the thing that the induction is sure (for mathematics is a discovered fact of relation of quantity). When it is only from all known instances (though adequately for human conclusions) and the nature of the thing not shewn, it is not, properly speaking, certain; as mortality is not the nature of man - that is, a living being; but subjection to something which produces it. But there is another kind of inference, not from cases or all cases to the one not observed, but to the cause of the case itself. This may be from other similar cases, but not necessarily. Thus if, having gone round part of an island, I find in a strait I have not surveyed the tide setting in strong through it, I conclude it is open at the other end, for the current could not so set through it under given circumstances if it were not. This is a legitimate induction to the cause of the phenomenon, and then to the state of things which allows the cause to operate and is its formal occasion.

124 But I deny wholly that belief in oracles, or Whately's popular superstition, is induction from experience. They may try and justify their opinion by experience. It is evidently the power of unseen things on the human mind. Its cause is not experience. What invented it? What set it up? I do not admit any proof in induction (page 352). When one man has died, the conception of being mortal is not arrived at at all. Nor is it properly a conception. I conceive death. Mortality is a moral judgment as to the condition of the living where that conception has no place. Nor is abstraction description. But I do not dwell on these points. But if generalisation from experience be induction, it cannot be proof. In material facts of the course of nature it may, but that is not really an induction from instances, but the discovery of the uniform law of the course of nature in which we exist. It does not assume the uniformity of the laws of nature, but discovers, and in that sense proves, it in the cases where it is so. I do not (from some cases of bodies falling, since nature is uniform) infer that other bodies will fall, but learn weight or gravity as a law of nature from all bodies (not hindered) falling. What I have discovered is the law (or uniformity) from all known cases, not some from an abstract idea of uniformity.

125 I have no contest with uniformity of laws of material nature; my question is about the inductive process. I admit habitual experience gives a general feeling of a uniform law in the order of nature. But even in this it is only present phenomena. The sun rises and sets, and I expect it to do so. But the most accurate science says this order must have begun, and it must end. I shall be told this is a mere general law; be it so (though it makes phenomenal induction a poor and foolish thing). But it proves that proof by induction from observed instances to others, on the assumption of uniformity in the course of nature, is no solid ground of reasoning. For this reason: the earth had a beginning, that is, as Mill admits, there was a change. That is, uniformity, which means no change, is not true.

If one boldly says beginning to exist is from a law (not to say that it is nonsense), where is the proof of it as a law? from what other causes is the induction made? What was the antecedent of which its existence is the sequence (called cause)? If I am told it was the effect of cast-off portions of a revolving sun and cooling mass, what was the antecedent of that? Whatever cooling of the sun may be affirmed, if matter be inert and has been set going, some force has set it going which is not in the inert matter. So, if the uniformity of the principle of weight is there, what put it there? This regards change and beginning, and motion is change. Where there is none, the case is even plainer. "Fire burns," he tells us, does not relate to time. Of course not, but "fire burns" is a statement of its nature, and what it is as such, what consequently it always as such does. There is no inference at all from cases known to cases unknown; it is known already and always that fire burns. He tells us (p. 254) that this uniformity of the course of nature, or government by general laws, "is an assumption involved in every case of induction." In page 255 again:" That the course of nature is uniform is the fundamental principle or general axiom of induction. It would yet be a great error to offer this large generalisation as any explanation of the inductive process. On the contrary, I hold it to be itself an instance of induction . . . . Far from being the first induction we make, it is one of the last." This is singular. It is an assumption involved in every case of induction, the fundamental principle or general axiom of induction; but then it is a late induction - that is, it is not an assumption at all, but an instance of induction, which of course must have been made without it, for it is one of the last inductions made-that is, it cannot have been assumed before. It is known by induction, the fruit of it; but the induction was made always by assuming it. It is always taken for granted to have proof by induction, but the induction must be made or it is not known; it is itself induction, in which it takes itself for granted.

126 His only answer to this is, for he admits it, that it is no more than the major of a syllogism. But this is no answer at all, for he admits that the major is necessary to prove the conclusion, though no part of the proof. What is necessary thus to prove all inductions is itself a matter of induction, when it is not there though necessary! But the answer is in itself unfounded. The major is part of the proof - ground I have already gone over. Thus man lives by blood, therefore man is mortal. Here is no proof whatever of anything. I say, Why so? I answer, which is the major, because everything that lives by blood is mortal. My minor only brought it into this class, the major proved it was mortal. He would say, Your major had to be proved. Of course it had. But that has nothing to do with the proof of the syllogism.

In fact, moreover, universal laws of nature are not assumed. A universal law of gravity is discovered by observation, generalises withal by finding that it explains all the phenomena of movement in the universe, though gravity is only a name for the fact. But nothing of a universal law is assumed here. It is, as he admits, an induction, and an induction which could not yet be made. I find by experiment that water presses equally in every direction, another general law, but no assumption of universality. But when I find in every case coming before me that there are fixed principles of nature, and that it is in a general way necessary for the order which constitutes the kosmos, I accept it as a general principle of that kosmos--that is, in the physical order of things. It is a result of induction. But this proves the inaccuracy of Mill in saying that it is the basis in every induction; for it is not in any of these, by which it is ascertained. That is, his principle is wholly false. Nor does it go beyond material elements or physical nature; but we cannot expect Mill to get beyond materialism.

127 But then to assume it is a universal basis of induction because it is in material things is wholly unfounded. He may amuse himself with chemistry from Bain and Sir John Herschel, but this is superficial work, and shews a will. He says (p. 329): The validity of argument, when constructed, depends on principles, and must be tried by tests which are the same for all descriptions of inquiries. Now an inquiry whether alkalies neutralise acids is not tried by the same test as whether man is morally responsible to God, and what God is, what morality is. And Mill has shewn elsewhere the effect of this materialism in declaring his belief of an impotent God, partially good and unable to do better with the materials ready to His hand, whencesoever they came. Doubtless he had felt physical evil personally, and knew, as evidently he did not, nothing else, nothing of the truths involved in conscience. His theory is - we are to perfect what has been made imperfectly.

The induction by simple enumeration is true where it is the expression of nature, for that reason; one instance of an effect well ascertained to be attributable to a chemical agent is so for the same reason. When I cannot say it is nature, it is the highest probability where no other cause is, as ordinary mortality. Violence, disease, or not, men equally die as to animal life; phenomenally animals the same. I then say it is the present order of nature. When I say alkalies neutralise acids, or hydrogen and oxygen in given proportions make water, I get, as far as men can ascertain, their nature as to that. And I to not, however, draw an induction properly in this case. It is the nature of alkalies, and these gases so united make water. I do not predict, save to the ignorant. They do not resemble, as Mill would say; they are the same, not in corporate unity, which has nothing to do with the matter, in action. Alkalies do that, not "have done" nor will," though each be true; they do it. When I conclude from instances to instances, it may be more or less likely, because, if tolerably many, there is probably a common cause; but it is no proof of anything: but if I ascertain the nature of the thing, that is an induction, and so far practical proof. But this only applies to material nature, not to a law binding everything with a phenomenal kosmos. Consequences prove antecedents, but only where it is the nature of the thing; sequence in itself has nothing to do with it. He admits the fact; but if it does not in one instance, it is no proof in any.

128 Day follows night, that is, light darkness; but it is not of the nature of darkness to give light, or to cause it, and the sequence has nothing to do with causation, laws of nature, or induction. That is propter, quia post. Where a thing produces anything, then I pronounce on its nature, and it is always itself when not hindered. His chemical instances may be all very well as trivial illustrations of means to discover producing causes, though he never travels beyond materialism; very pretty experiments borrowed from others, which not only are confined to material things, but do not analyse the true principles even of them. They are mere means of scientific discovery, beyond which his mind cannot go. He does not see the difference I have noted. The black or white swan, or grey crow, says nothing as to nature; it is a mere fact, and swan or crow is merely a class made ill or well; and all the white swans in the world would not prove there was not a black one - has nothing to do with it. The only important principle evolved here is that he is obliged to rest all on testimony, as in all questions of fact we must. Most of the laws of nature are simply facts, and there is no induction whatever, but adequate ascertainment of a fact; as that hydrogen and oxygen make water: only in the details we must see that other causes do not come in to produce or have hindered.

As to cleverness in experiment, his cases may be all very well, but have nothing to do with the logic of causes. I cannot see any induction in ascertaining the laws of nature, though clever induction may shorten the work in guessing or probability (not proper invention). The fact is there, and the fact is learned. A clever mind may think of means to ascertain whether the fact is such; a well-informed mind knows what may eliminate, what would confuse. But if hydrogen and oxygen always make water, there is no induction. If a third element be there which hinders it, I have to ascertain where the true law or uniform fact is; but all this is mere ascertainment of facts by observation. As to the result, that is the fact. You have nothing to do with following them.

129 I quite admit cleverness and knowledge in the use of facts. When Leverrier or Adams discovered that Uranus's motions could not be accounted for, all the difference was that they could not see what caused it. The law of gravity was known: it was an instance of it. The irregular movement proved the presence of the object, just the same as sight would. The cause and result were identified.

The reason why testimony that there were black swans could be received was that colour does not alter the nature at all. Wearing heads under arms clearly ran counter to the natural structure of a man. You cannot say there can be none such, but it is too contrary to nature, and so to probability, to receive it. Experience would not help us with the swans. If colour had to do with nature, as the black spot from arsenic, it would at once affect our judgment.

As to his case of abuse of power, there is generalisation, but his conclusion is, as usual, a Tenterden steeple one. How does he know that education will ever elevate character, or destroy the love of power or its abuse? The only conclusion to be drawn is that no forms hinder the love and abuse of power found in man, and no system of education yet invented has corrected his nature (pages 354-372). He had before told us (p. 258) that mathematics were not certain: now their laws are rigorously universal.

If truth is investigated by evidence, neither induction nor logic is such at all. He naturally avoids all efficient causes, looking only to physical ones; in which, too, all is false, because he has confounded cause and sequence, and things apparently necessary with cause. It is the merest fallacy to call it causation where it is simply sequence. Be it that I learn what is a cause from it by eliminating other concomitants, but then it is a producing cause. Whether there be a constant sustaining will is another question: I believe it, but I may consider the ordered sequences apart as ordered. In that sense he is superficial and unanalytical still. Events, as we know them in the kosmos, have had not necessarily antecedents; this is not so, but causes. Gravity is not an antecedent of centripetal motion, nor impulse even of rectilinear. They act in the motion. What we call gravity is only the force so displayed. But the real cause is not all the antecedents where there are such. Poison kills one man, not another, the former being unhealthy, but the latter is not the cause. The poison destroyed the tissues, or corrupted the blood, etc;, that killed the man; in the other case there was adequate force to resist, which there was not in the first.

130 (Pages 378-9.) Language may be used carelessly, and occasion used for cause, and Mill's mind not get beyond this. We do so when, without the occasion, the result would not have happened; but this is only language. The man falling from the ladder broke his neck - suppose this was the cause of his death; but I say slipping from the ladder, because otherwise he would not thus have broken his neck, and his weight would not have done it at all. A stone falling to the bottom is caused by gravity simply, partially hindered by the medium. It is immaterial what might hinder. It is evident that it cannot come into the cause of what it is not hindered in. He is wrong as to the surprise. The absence of the sentinel did cause the surprise, not the attack; but it was the cause why that attack was a surprise on the others; and that is what causing a surprise means, not causing the fact, but causing that fact to be a surprise. Absence may be a cause. Absence or non-existence of light (darkness) makes me lose my way. There must be a way, and a man purposing to go it; but this has nothing to do with the cause of his losing it.

I may say, in common parlance, Faust died (p. 383), because he was a man; Mephistopheles not, because he was a spirit. But this does not say what was the cause of Faust's death. Poison killed Faust, his being a man did not. But the operation of the poison did not exist as to spirit. There was no cause at all at work. In comparing and saying why there was not, it is all well to say because, etc., but this has nothing to do with the cause. His whole system as to causation is wrong. To say that the existence of tissues is the cause of their destruction, because there must be tissues to destroy, is trifling nonsense, and that it is not alleged as a cause only, because taken for granted. The existence of tissues is no cause at all of their being destroyed. In page 383 he says this, in page 380 he says it is vicious tautology.

131 The movement of a projectile is the effect of the combination of two forces. More than one cause may be in operation, but the collection of all conditions being causes is unfounded. And he takes states of objects as causes, but this is all the grossest delusion. If a stone attracts the earth, that is not what makes it fall; were it big enough the earth would go to it. So colours are states of an object. There being causes of sensation in me is a wholly different matter. He has really a most incompetent mind.

The thing caused in my mind has nothing to do with the colour being a patient, but my senses. The action and passion refer to different objects in which the result is produced. If I give a blow and produce pain, I am in no way the patient. The whole of this in page 388 is utterly false, because the object is not agent in that in which it is patient, nor vice versa. The case of the scholar and teacher is sophistical in this, that in both mind is brought in. But even here, qua recipient from the teacher, the scholar is not active. It may set his mind working. Mill is all confusion, too, here.

In page 62 a substance or body is the external cause of our sensation. Hence, if I paint the wall white, the cause of my seeing whiteness is there. It is a simple direct cause, not an induction, at least if page 62 be just. Painting the wall is merely putting on that place what does so; the wall has nothing to do with it. Nor do I see that what he says of cause, or of conditions to define cause, is just. Cause means what produces an effect. Be it that Hume will have that we only know what is constantly antecedent. This is not true, as Reid's case of night and day shews. Mill adds unconditionally. But this is not true. His elaborate proof to shew that there is the condition that the sun must rise and set is absurd; for I have his experimentum crucis of the sun making daylight the cause of daylight - that is, the cause known by the effect. And if I say, accounting for the sequence, it is the rotation of the earth which causes the sequence, as it is, there is the condition of the sun or light being there, and even here, as much as before, the earth may cease to rotate, or the sun to give light. But the rotation is none the less de facto the cause of the sequence - I cannot say it will be for ever, but will be, nature being what it is: a necessary condition in every case. The man whose side was shot away led to experiments on the power of the gastric juice in digestion, the proportional ease of digestion of different edibles; but when they put the gastric juice into a vial, it was found that it did not digest save at the heat of the stomach. Here it was clear there was a condition, a certain degree of heat. But gastric juice digested the substance. If not, what did? Gastric juice in its normal condition, not else. Hydrogen and oxygen produce water by being mixed, but if mixed with a certain force the hottest fire; here is a condition, the absence of a certain degree of force in mixing them. It is not unconditionally that the mixture produces water, but the mixture of hydrogen and oxygen for all that is the cause of water. And, according to his own statement, in the case of the surprise of the army, non-existence cannot be a cause of anything. The absence of force is not existence; so that cannot be a cause. But even there he was wrong, because the army reckoned on the sentinel, and therefore it did not watch.

132 And now, let me ask, what sequence of antecedents and consequences, conditioned or unconditioned, makes me find the light of the sun by day an experimentum crucis that it is the cause of day? But further, this is merely an effort to insist on laws and nature's order. Supposing I make a lamp, what sequence, conditioned or unconditioned, is the cause of its existence? Every fact which has a beginning, he tells us (p. 376), has a cause. All right. And the invariable antecedent is termed the cause (page 377). The lamp had a beginning, consequently it had a cause. That is an invariable antecedent, and we learn farther on that it is always followed by the same consequent; whereas there is no invariable consequence in the lamp. The lamp is certainly an existing phenomenon. Between the phenomena which exist at any instant, and the phenomena which exist at any succeeding instant, there is an invariable order of succession. Now if his explanations and definitions apply only to one class of objects, and are untrue of all the rest, they are false as such. Thus every fact which has a beginning has a cause; that is, according to his definition, an invariable antecedent. Both these are clearly not true.

I admit, every one admits, that as a general principle the course of nature proceeds according to established laws. It would not be a course of nature if it did not. This does not preclude the possibility of interference, but it is there to be interfered with if it be. But Mr. Mill's theory of causation is wholly false and wrong. But further, every fact which has a beginning has a cause. Now in the course of nature there is no beginning phenomenally, or it would not be a course. Particular effects may begin, as the procession of the equinoxes returning on their course; but this is really a continuous effect, a regular thing. Thus there is no beginning of anything, consequently no cause of anything at all, save petty details man can make by his activities. Nothing ever began, and nothing ever was caused. A thunderstorm begins, but it is the regular course really of the operation of electricity and heat. It is as regular a course of nature really as the sunrise. But what made electricity have this course?

133 In truth Mr. Mill merely states a phenomenal course, but cause is no real word for it; hence, to slip out of the difficulty, he confines himself to course of nature where general laws are admitted, and avowedly confines himself to phenomena, by which he means merely the visible or discovered course of nature around us, where nothing phenomenal had a beginning, that is, now apparent as apparent, or it would not be an established law; for if established now (or any time), something established it, and there is an efficient, not a mere phenomenal, cause. If constantly in operation, it has not a beginning. The whole theory is utterly shallow.

If we are to believe Thompson, the earth must have had a beginning; so that there was a cause when it was not. But that is another question of fact. Phenomenal laws do not begin, and there is no beginning at all, or, in Mr. Mill's definition, a cause before the beginning of phenomenal laws. An established law now going on is not a beginning, but a going on; and he shirks the whole real question, falsifying all the principles he lays down himself. So he says (p. 397): - The beginning of a phenomenon is what implies a cause, and causation is the law of succession of phenomena. This is a contradiction in terms, or reduces phenomena to the subjective perception by me. The light of the sun causes day - his own example - but that is merely my seeing it, for it is always light; day is merely that I see it. As the moon always reflects the light, the waxing and waning and lunar months, etc., are merely a question of my seeing it. The moment I have a law, I have what always is, that is, no beginning and no cause, on his shewing of what "cause" is. But this involves most important principles. A course of nature phenomenally is clearly not beginning. It is not a law nor known phenomenally as a law till it acts, and has acted regularly, as such. If learned by experience, it is going on (though if the nature of the cause be ascertained, I may conclude to its being so from one instance). That is, the fact of beginning, implying a cause, and a law of nature or regular sequences (cause meaning no more), as ascertained by experience, are contradictory to one another.

134 Hence of two things, one: either the course of nature began, and then I have a cause, that is, an efficient cause, outside and before that course; or it went on eternally without any cause at all. Not merely matter existed (we do not know matter unformed and whose state is uncaused, and no part of the kosmos), but the whole perfectly ordered system (with the force that governs it in its movements, regular as no man could devise it - scarce discover, and multiform as no man can think) is perfectly uncaused and invented itself before it existed; for invented somehow it is. Matter, we are told, is inert; but it moves with a speed thought cannot realise, yet nothing has made it do so! It is here we may say Credat Judaeus Apella. Mill says he is not obliged to treat this question. But all his theory is false without it, because regular phenomena going on by established laws are not beginning. Day begins, no doubt, that is, I see the sun at a given time; but nothing is really beginning: the rotation of the earth is, as a law of nature, perpetual. If he says it is no law of nature, as it may naturally terminate, so begin, what gave the impulse? He cannot avoid efficient causes, for there are no other real ones. The attempt to reduce phenomenal causes to efficient ones was the intuitive sense that there must be such; the discovery of regular laws gradually did not falsify this, but merely the place they sought them in.

Discovery of gravity, a few general laws in chemistry - as the law of general proportions, etc., - proved it was not in essences of things efficient cause was to be sought (though there is more truth in it than in the denial of it). His changing conditions into causes is false as to causation. But the necessity of a cause somewhere is evident, and Mr. Mill admits it elsewhere, only an impotent one that could not make things better than they are, and we are to perfect the poor result! And the fact of general laws leads us up to a general or single cause which caused the course of nature to begin, and consequently was not of it (in the beginning was the Word and by Him all things began to be, or took place. Das Wort war, und durch ihn alles ward). But this, then, was by a will. Hence they can only continue by a will, the same that formed and gave the impulse. If the impulse was necessary to move originally, that only could cause the movement, and that will only can cause it to be now. By Him all things consist.

135 This is the only possible conclusion. Descartes may have gone wrong so far as not allowing secondary wills, as man's, which in their allowed spheres may be causes. All Sir W. Hamilton's reasoning (p. 417) is just nil. Is the steam not the cause of propulsion, because there are cranks and condensers, etc.? The intermediate instrumentality has nothing to do with the cause or efficient power which produces the effect. All Mill's statement refers, with his usual want of sagacity, not to the point itself, but to the means of ascertaining it. Supposing I learn it by experience - a dog, without learning anything, or using any reflex action of mind at all, moves his foot as much and as well as, or better than, I do. The cause of his action or moving is the same as mine. Foolish man may reason as to matter not acting on matter, or mind not acting on matter; but I and the dog do will, and do move our legs because we do will it. The case of paralysis proves nothing. It only shews that the machinery is out of order which communicates to a certain - say, as they do - distant lump of matter. Does it shew that steam is not a motive power if the crank be broken? The ascription of life by savages to sun and moon, because they had motion marking a plan, was a mistake as to the fact; but supposing it caused, as Mill and Reid say, which is only partially true, it was at the utmost a wrong deduction from too widely generalising a true fact; and this is their account of the matter. That is, they had always experienced that will in themselves gave rise to motion when so willed.

Examination of Mill's Logic

J. N. Darby.

<32007E> 135 {file section d.}

{A System of Logic, by John Stuart Mill, 8th edition.

The reader must bear in mind that these are only MSS notes jotted down while reading the book.}

Mill (p. 410) says volition is a physical cause, that is, an antecedent invariably producing a given consequent, which is absurd on the face of it, for thus it is not will. I may say, In three minutes I will strike the table; there is no consequent at all when this will exists. In three minutes I strike it when the will is positively active. Will cannot be physical, even if thought may be. Motives may produce will, conscience restrain it; but will is not subjective feeling, though this may tend to produce it; as, if a man irritates me, I should like to strike (not his talk but) him. It is not a consciousness of effort, but a consciousness of intention. Effort brings in the machinery; intention, not. If they say, and it is all they say, "I don't know how will sets the machinery in motion," I agree entirely, I insist on it. I have an intention and a will, and by nerves and muscles and a pen I write these lines, each word being what my intention makes it, if I am careful and wide awake. Can they tell how? Of course not. Is that a reason for saying, if I intend so to write, that I then have an active will to do it which puts these means in motion and produces the effect? The instruments have nothing to do with it. I must have a pen and ink. What then? They are as necessary conditions as nerves, and, say, electricity, if so it be. I speak to my friend: he understands and receives the deepest truths, say the nature of God. All I do is to modify the movement of the air by my lungs and throat and lips. Other spiritual power may be necessary; but this would only additionally prove that the animal economy through which the action passes has nothing to do with the cause. "Conscious of power" may be incorrect, because that may include the instruments of a body so wonderfully constructed to follow will; but "conscious of will" as that which somehow when in practice acting (for it may be there when it is not) causes the effect to follow. Paralysis has nothing to do with this. It refers to the machinery the motive power sets in activity: how, none can say. He can carry up the machinery to the nearest point where it receives the impulse, but that link no human mind can find; in no case can he. But however it acts, or however we learn it, active will, when the machinery is in order, does produce effects. Nothing can be without it, and no human mind can tell us the links between matter and mind and will. Mill has no idea of anything but theories of others and natural laws (p. 419); the truth that lies behind he avowedly avoids; and when he touches it collaterally, he goes all wrong by the help of others (pages 411, 413). In pages 393-426 I only find shirking the truth, feebleness of mind, and want of sagacity.

136 The chapter on the composition of causes is all to no purpose. There is no analogy between the cases. The composition of forces is one and the same case, motive power (or attraction) acting on a distinct object. Chemical composition is one thing acting on another, or rather two things acting on each other, so as to produce a result within themselves, combining elements which, when together, form a third thing. One is mere force on an inert mass, the other the combination of elements within themselves. The total absence of all moral sense and responsibility, and the degrading character of his philosophy, are shewn in the way he speaks (p. 432) of the laws of life. The way gastric juice produces chyle, or gastric juice is formed, perhaps that is within his sphere of vision, and no one doubts there is a chemical action in the development of animal life; but beyond that his thought cannot reach. What a son is to a father, a man to God, this never crosses his path. I shall be told it is no part of logic. In a direct way I fully admit it; but neither is chemistry, which is his constant hobby; and the life has nothing really to do with chemistry save in its external causes and sustainment.

137 It is proved now that there is no production of life from matter of itself, and that life precedes organisation and produces it. That much is hid from man, nay, all these things, I fully admit. But all his laws of life are only the form of operation when life is there. Matter does act on mind, as a knock on the head or a bad cold makes me senseless, mad, or stupid; and mind acts on matter, for I move, in spite of all the Cartesians (though in substance I agree with Leibnitz) in the world: bow I cannot say. Muscles, nerves, perhaps magnetism, only bring me to more subtle matter, and the question is untouched. Of this I have spoken. The effect of progressive heat (p. 434) may be merely increased power of separating the particles. But this is no matter. It is fatiguing, his never getting beyond the nearest materialism; and we must ever remember that laws leave the question of real cause wholly untouched, as I have said.

To say that social and political phenomena are the effects of the laws of mind, is simple nonsense. It is the effect of passions, prejudices, unknown impulses, with which mind has nothing to do. Motives - and men have to be governed by motives - are not mind; and, whatever Utopia he may conceive, he cannot get rid of them or govern others, nor has he by any possibility a standard of result or principle which can form society. He may easily say "the good of all"; but what is that good? If reason governs each individual, is each individual competent to discern the best good of all, and to act upon it without caring for self? Love governing where it is, I understand. But reason and laws of mind never made a world happy, nor have they anything to do with it. Cold never thawed the hard earth, nor reason selfishness in man.

138 As to induction (p. 444), I deny that its object is to ascertain what causes are connected with what effects. It is to ascertain what things are. No doubt it may be used for the other; but every major premise of a syllogism, when believed by induction, is not the statement of the effect of a cause. 'Every man is an animal' is fact derived from observation, and has nothing to do with cause and effect. This is merely the blinding effect of being engrossed by laws of nature, and incapacity to get out of the material rut in which his very narrow mind moves. And this, as the end of inductive philosophy, is the low fallacy of his whole book. That his principles are incapable of anything beyond it I fully admit.

But Mr. Mill assumes that chemistry, life, social and political questions, are all problems of the same nature; he leaves out not only the whole higher sphere of thought, admitting that induction has made nothing even of most of these, and drawing all his instructions from chemistry and mere physical nature. But this false view of induction destroys the basis of his reasoning. And it is every way and wholly false and illogical; for laws are not really causes, and physical laws are not everything - at any rate cannot be assumed to be such; so that his whole system is false from beginning to end. The introduction of another element besides physical uniform sequence makes, or may make, all untrue; and it is wholly unfounded. He is obliged to make human will a mere physical cause or law, having never proved it is so, which makes evidently the whole system foundationless, a rehearsal of chemistry and the way of discovering facts in it, which is not logic (see p. 410), but which betrays the system, and shews the flimsiness of the whole of it.

His statements as to methods of agreement are not correct. The effect of it is not necessarily A; because it is possible, and indeed common, that A without B produces nothing at all. But it is not material, as it is merely means of discovery.

The same objection applies to Canon 4, as indeed he admits. On his own shewing they are not shewn to be unconditioned, therefore not shewn to be a cause. The principle (p. 466) is a false principle. Gastric juice (cold) and heat produce, neither of them, any effect on a piece of meat: join them, and they digest it. In moral things the contrary is constantly true: a woman has nothing to do with me, and no effect on my position; she marries my father, and I am turned out of the house. Nor is it evident in the case of the stars, though it may be true. The conjunction of two suns might alter every condition of man's life, in many respects morally, or burn him up; one changes nothing as originally adapted to his nature, though the last instance is less strictly exact, as one (though, as adapted, unfelt) does act on him.

139 Physical "phenomena" only (p. 470) come under these rules, right or wrong. Organic life consists, Mill says, in a continual state of decomposition and recomposition of the different organs and tissues (p. 473), and yet more strongly, "the chemical actions which constitute life." Now this is alike folly and impudence. In life in the body these changes take place: but who says this is life? In the first place, it is proved that life precedes and produces organisation (the inorganic nucleus in the cell); but at any rate the body being subject to these changes by vital power in no way says that they are life or constitute life. They are a corporeal process where life is, but more cannot be said. Of course he cannot get beyond it; and note here that he pretends to go beyond phenomena or physical causes. He may say these are the regular phenomenal causes; but, when he says this constitutes life, he touches the efficient cause, so as to settle there is none else but the phenomenal.

The dispute between him and Whewell I leave. I think some of his cases inconsequent; but all this is merely verifying inductions on chemistry and the like, interesting in their way, but which concern me little. All is material. On the composition of forces I do not think his conclusions just; the distance gone is not the same, nor is time the same; nor can rest be estimated as the same as twice the distance in opposite directions. Its consequent effects clearly are totally different. If the force were attractive, not impinging, it would not be so. Some of the difficulties he escapes by tendency and pressure.

For the mere history of science in its deductions I have no remark to make. His making induction a part of deduction is clearly false, as already noted. It is merely ascertaining the general premise for the deduction, and so he says (page 534). Nor is his statement in page 536 true in proper deduction, when the nature or law is adequately ascertained. If deduction be just, I say "must be." In mere material phenomena verification may be all well, because it is a question of material facts, which may be mistaken. But this is a question of the truth of the premise, not of the deduction which assumes it, and we are where we were, subject to particular observation of cases, unless the law or nature of the thing be ascertained: then the conclusion is certain. Verification may be all well, but it is testing the justness of the induction which establishes the major premise.

140 As logic, all his statements are very poor indeed. That he has interested himself in physical science may be all very true; but though it may seem harsh, the whole tone evinces, I judge, a bad vitiated mind. I am led to say this by the way he speaks so lightly and flippantly (p. 534) of constructing an organic body, and trying whether it would live. The tissues at the instant of death are the same. An organised body constructed is not a living body, nor an organ's inactivity of themselves, or movable by will, the same as a constructed organism. He is no Prometheus. He admits he is quite ignorant, only flippantly taking occasion by his ignorance practically to deny life or a soul distinct from body. If a man believed there were, he could not talk of trying whether it would live. And this is flippant on what is solemn, if it be only to be or not to he; and flippancy on solemn subjects is the proof of a vitiated mind.

VOLUME 2

Why must there be ultimate laws? All may be summed up in one, and that one a constant acting of force in One who can originate force. His limiting it to sensations is limiting it by effects on us, beyond which I suppose his mind cannot go. Colours, for instance, are the result of degrees of refraction, and red is contained in white. A coloured object is from some special power of reflecting that ray. He affects to speak only of phenomenal sequences, and not of efficient causes; but if the reader be attentive, he will soon find Mill speaks of them as efficient. Causa causata perhaps; but this he will not have, because it leads to a causa causans, which no human mind can escape or conceive.

Bain's statement (p. 7) is merely that we cannot now give an ultimate cause, or one nearer to it, to two phenomena. Sameness is constantly treated as similarity or resemblance, which is a misleading blunder, failing in abstraction (page 11). Induction has nothing to do with deduction, nor has verification, which is merely a means of testing its justness. It is clear that I cannot verify till the deduction is completely made; and verification also is in particular cases, and the conclusion might be true in them, yet the deduction unsound as a general one. All is superficial here, and a mere recital of material means of scientific research. Hypothesis is the short cut of genius versed in general relations and power of memory as to them, merely concluding it must be so. If proved that other circular forms did not produce equal spaces, then the proof was complete; practically it was that, supposing no cause did. As to causes being causes, see page 15, second paragraph.

141 I have not much to remark in this part of the book: only notice the careless fallacies of Mill (page 57). The effect might not be produced if A were alone. In the calculation of chances he changes probable into "probable to us." But this changes the whole idea, and makes the probability depend, not on the calculation of the chances based on the fact, but on my knowledge, different it may be in all, so that there is no calculation of chance. He does not believe in the Jesuit's middle knowledge. What means certain here? Some event does happen, we can say, in result. But events are not certain a priori. It was the sense of this made him add to Laplace. The two events must be of equally frequent occurrence. To get out of this he turns probable into "probable to us," unless all this is confusion. Evidently it is more probable that a man in the last stage of consumption will die within a year than that a man in good health, caeteris paribus, will. Our ignorance of it does not affect its probability, though it may our estimate of it. The logical ground (p. 66) is not our knowledge, though we may have to act on it. Pages 67, 68, are all nonsense. The fact of credibility of witnesses is clear judgment of the individual, no average question at all.

In page 69 we have a very important false principle, arising from his rejection of testimony, and resting all on inferences and averages. The probability of a fact rests on our knowledge of the proportion of cases in which it occurs. Now, supposing it occurred but once, and never before, the real question is of adequate testimony, not of probability at all. Say the deluge: I have a positive testimony, confirmed in every way, supposing the earth to bear evident marks of its having taken place. I have no question of probability, but of adequate testimony; and this false and evil dependence on inference confounds past facts with possible future ones, putting them on the same ground. Testimony has nothing to do with probability; but he seems to have no idea of such a thing as truth. Besides, here and throughout we have it assumed that there can be no power in operation at any time other than phenomenal sequences; not merely that he will only consider these; which, if there be others, must put him on false ground, and which are no causes at all (from which yet he cannot escape). But he denies all others: they are not supposable to him. It is only causes in operation which tend to produce, admitting, in spite of himself, efficient or productive causes, but limiting all active power to existing phenomena.

142 As to past fact, probability is nonsense, or a denial of all possibility of adequate or certain evidence. In reasoning (p. 82) on the sun rising he tells us: If it do not, it will be because some cause has existed, the effects of which, though during five thousand years they have not amounted to a perceptible quantity, will in one day become overwhelming. He then goes on to assume that only some long existing cause, or one arriving suddenly from a distance to be the cause, can be supposed. But this assumes there can be no agent or power beyond known phenomena. I believe in constant agency of divine power, and that this is the ultimate law; but he has no right to assume that there can be no intervention of power beyond observed phenomena. We know that it is the infidelity of the last days; but it is an arbitrary and ignorant assumption.

(Page 95). It does not prove A to be the cause, but only a necessary condition. Thus the universality of causation as a general proposition is not what is believed; but when I find a formed thing, I believe there was a former; so, if anything occurs, I believe something has made it occur. The return of day, save religiously, is not a question of general causation at all. The peasant expects the sun to rise, because it always has, by simple enumeration; and when he sees his cart, he believes somebody made it, without any generalisation, and he would think you mad, or perhaps a philosopher, if you doubted it. Thus the mental principle in these cases is quite different. But in neither case is there belief of universality of causation. Nor is universality of causation the truth we cannot help believing, that is, an abstract proposition; but, having an effect, we cannot but think there is a cause. Nor is he right in saying belief is nowhere without proof at all. Nor is it the truth of a fact in external nature which I believe here. The cart is the fact, and with it comes the belief that it was made.

143 Man does believe that effects, as the word intimates, have a cause. Reason never believes anything; it may test the credibility of evidence; but it is not its function to believe, but to reason. Nor does it follow that, if I cannot help believing that there is a cause for an effect (that is, that it is of necessity I do so), my belief may be of what is not true; for if there be such an instinct, it may be, and is, a truthful instinct. It is not that any particular thing is the cause, but that there is one. This assertion of Mill is from the primary fallacy that there is no ground of truth but reason, which I wholly deny. And what he says (p. 99), shews the fallacy he labours under. Man cannot conceive chaos, because he is part of an order or system; nor events in it without a cause, because he belongs to a caused system; and there can be events in chaos only by action on it. If I have a notion of events in chaos, I have the notion of cause and effect; and effects are still the proof of a cause.

The belief in human will does not affect in the least the general principle of fixed laws. It is bound by them in its activity: cause and effect remain in nature where they were. Arbitrary intervention, even where there is almighty power, leaves them where they were as a fixed rule, and supposes them. What was not known was the universality, which is an abstraction quite distinct from the facts on which it is founded. And all his reasoning fails; because, if his discovery of the law uncontradicted is only simple argument and simple enumeration, all subsequent reasoning is no stronger than the basis, and this is founded on each particular case. It is merely a measure of probability; and the allegation that the major is no part of the proof, because it may have been previously proved by induction is a fallacy already exposed. All men are mortal is a proof that Lord P. is mortal, if he be a man; and all he can make is a material improvement in a fallible process (p. 101): but the ground was not rigorous induction (page 102). All this is very lame.

The belief in a cause has nothing to do with uniform sequence. This is the effect of laboured investigation, and gives that persistence of causes in their effects which makes an ordered system and fixed laws, and applies only to the sphere in which they are observed. Whereas the belief that what occurs has a cause is instinctive part of my nature, and hence, as far as my capacity goes, applies to all that occurs any where. Be it true or false, it is a wholly different thing; for we must not think that the law of causation is the same thing as the fact of an event or effect flowing from a cause. The former is simply the uniformity of sequence (p. 108) in phenomena. Consequence connects the two ideas; but an effect flowing from a cause is really its producing it. In spite of himself, saying he will not speak of efficient causes, Mill speaks of one thing producing another. He says not efficient; but says "effects of different causes," in his other books constantly; thus pages 246, 247, 203, so 160, "the effects of causes," "the effects which these causes produce." All this is mental dishonesty. What is an effect of a cause not efficient? I have no objection to recognise the operation of supernatural power in some miracles as a case of the law of universal causation - that is, the existence of a cause. But it clearly is not a case of invariable sequence, for the cause is set in motion by special intervention; yet invariable sequence is all he owns as cause from observation of nature. This is quite clear, however he may muddle it together. He admits, moreover, the instinctive action of mind by a law of our nature (p. 110); but on this I need not comment.

144 His answer in page 111 to M'Cosh is null, for the law of causation is "the uniformity of the course of nature." The uniformity of the course of nature has not any exceptions that I know of, nor do events succeed one another without fixed laws. But it does not thence follow that there are events which do not depend on causes: but if there are such which are not according to fixed laws of nature, there are causes which are not the fixed laws of nature. His tacit denial of God, and of all efficient causes in order to that, plunges him into incessant illogical statements. So ultimate co-existences force him up p. 113) to eat his words by admitting either things without a cause, or a cause found by ascending "to the origin of all things." And he cannot deny the fact. He is obliged to come, where all open honest minds come, to a causa causans for the ultimate coexisting properties from which uniform effects follow. There is no uniform sequence, or they are not ultimate. When he says, "if the properties do not depend on causes, but are ultimate properties," could there be a stronger evidence of will to deny a first cause? For an ultimate property is not an invariable sequence; and how did it come to exist? (See p. 115, at the end.)

145 The rest of that chapter is all talk to little purpose about kinds. Note his only idea of moral inquiry (p. 130), the chance of human actions so as to predict them. All his reasoning as to existence is false; because, when he says the Emperor of China exists means that I should see him at Pekin if there, he confounds cause and effect. He has defined qualities to be something which produces a sensation. The existence of the something, then, is necessary to the sensation. Existence is not its being perceived (p. 142); it is that which is the occasion of the sensation. I may have the sensation even without the existence of the thing; I can dream or remember. But the object of what follows is to deny the force of testimony; it is an inductive law of succession or coexistence. It is neither. When I am told by a credible witness - by one I believe - the Emperor of China exists, there is no proof of its connection by succession or co-existence with any other thing. When the outermost planet was discovered by its disturbing Uranus in its orbit, it was no conviction that with more power it might be seen. That followed, of course; but a certain power of gravity was there, as the course of Uranus shewed.

As to resemblance, all is a mistake. When mathematical quantities are alike, they do not resemble one another, they are the same. Figures resemble each other, because in that they are the same. Two things equal to the same are equal to - one another - convenient for Euclid - means nothing; it is one and the same quantity in all three. As I have said, mathematics are identity of quantity in different forms. If I have a foot-rule, it is only that, as to quantity, all three are one and the same. When it is said two straight lines which have once intersected one another continue to diverge, it is no matter of induction or observation. A straight line is one which always follows the same direction. Hence if they diverge in starting by supposition (for once intersecting one another means that), they always diverge or they are not straight at all, that is, they do not follow the same direction.

146 Other facts are matters of observation empirically, or may be traced to causes. We must not forget that confessedly constant sequence in itself proves nothing, not even a phenomenal cause, as day is the cause of night. He, we may be reminded, says unconditional sequence, as if the sun was always up, it would be always day - always light, not day. Many things which are causes are conditioned, as heat with gastric juice, a certain proximity for the attraction of cohesion. All this confusion arises from real causes not being owned Hydrogen and oxygen make water, but under the condition of the power which unites them atomically according to certain laws.

The whole of the chapter on grounds of disbelief is founded on an entire fallacy, that is, assumption that that is true of which no proof whatever is given; just what I said at the beginning as to using a word with his own definition of it as if it was the truth. He assumes that experience of natural laws is the only foundation of knowledge. Evidence can only be a proximate generalisation. Possibly so on his ground, that belief of testimony is only matter of inference. But this is simply begging the question. It can only be a question of superior generalisation, because that is the only ground of evidence. But that is just the question. It assumes that God, or man, cannot reveal himself so as to enforce belief which is not true - certainly cannot be assumed, specially when it is the point in question.

I know I am. What generalisation is that? I know that Mill elsewhere tells us that even this is known by his kind of knowledge. But this is making a farce of reason. So he asserts, if an alleged fact be contradictory of a rigorous induction from a completed generalisation, it must be disbelieved. Now his complete generalisation, agreement and difference and all, is merely inference from observed phenomena; but this assumes that any power beyond observed phenomena is impossible. But this he cannot assume, and if he does, it is merely a begging of the question and is contrary to truth, and to what he is forced to admit, that ultimate properties must have had a cause, for we have then ascended to the origin of all things; but this must have been antecedent to the laws these properties act by. One could not have a more complete proof of the fallacy of his system than this chapter. So his defence of Hume is simply the same fallacy. Whatever is contrary to a complete induction is incredible: induction from what? This merely says there can be no cause but what we see of fixed laws, which even Mill admits there must be.

147 Nor is it merely (p. 166) that B did not follow A. This assumes only the negative of existing causes or laws. But supposing X comes in, which was not there? He does not even consider the possibility of another power which may act from itself so as that no observed action of A has anything to say to it. It is not to be credited but on evidence which would overturn the law. It has nothing to do with the law - may confirm it. Thus resurrection supposes the law of death, is an action of power not in the sphere of observed sequences. And note here, our question here is not if it be true, but if it be impossible, for which the only ground is the positive assumption that there is no power possible outside observed sequences, which he alleges are no efficient causes at all. If what a human being can see is no more than a set of appearances, either there is no ground of believing anything, and complete induction is a fable, or I may have as good or better evidence of what power extrinsic to observed phenomena and sequences has done. So when he says (p. 167) he cannot admit a proposition as a law of nature, and yet believe a fact in real contradiction to it. Now law of nature is merely existing phenomena; and this is the absurd idea that the ascertained phenomena of nature are the only possible things that can be, and not a conclusion within nature, but the denial of all action outside it, and that as possible; which is simply nonsense as reasoning, and the more so as he is obliged to admit such action at "the origin of all things." Because such a thing is, as far as we know it, there can be nothing else! There can be no other ground for this but the positive denial without proof that God can act, and affirmation that there is nothing possible but what we have observed. Yet the ultimate properties and their cause he confessedly has not accounted for. Nor within the limits of fixed laws, quite another question, is all so certain, though enough for all human purposes in the sphere man is in. Because if ABC produces abc, and BC only bc, this does not prove A is the cause of a; it may be a necessary condition of B being the cause. I must have ABC produce abc always, BC not produce a, and A by itself produce a; a concatenation of proof hardly ever to be found. And this supposes I know all possible causes which could produce a, and all to be absent. (See p. 168.)

148 The question of miracles is not (p. 167) of any cause defeated, but generally of positive power producing an effect of its own, as health restored, the dead raised, sight given - natural laws remaining just what they were. There are the cases of frustrating the action of poisons; but there is the power of evil defeated, and all power in good operative. The moral character is as strong a part of the evidence as the power, and there is even power to communicate power. I deny that belief of a supernatural being is necessary first in order to believe miracles, because the exercise of a power wholly above nature is the proof of supernatural power; it is, on the face of it, that power. If the dead be raised, that is not a sequence of nature.

As to believing oneself capable of judging what the supreme God ought to do, it is above all things presumptuous in one who has no foundation of morality at all, though Christ's miracles are the supremacy of all good in power where evil was, of others sometimes judgment in its place. Supreme power and perfect goodness used to lead men to trust God, as leading to a yet higher good when they were in misery, is not unworthy of God. A word giving sight, the lame from birth walking, the dead raised, goodness in power meeting every case in sight of hundreds, is not possibly the case of natural causes. They do not operate so; there is no experience of it: the wish is father to the thought; and he admits the facts may be proved. The whole of this argument mocks at reason. And his other ground is the character of duty as they conceive it, in which the conceiver may be judged rather than God. One who can see no beauty in the uniform patient exercise of power in goodness to lead man's heart to trust it, may find others will know his state more than he is aware of.

No one desires to deny that "on the whole" the government of the universe is carried on by general laws. But this is no presumption at all against miracles, that is, the intervention of divine power when man is in misery to recall him to God, and give the ground of confidence in goodness in power. With a weak, scarcely benevolent, God doing the best He could (and that very bad as Mr. Mill holds), there is no need to believe anything about it. Man, he thinks, is to do better if he can. (It is a disgrace to Oxford to allow such a book.) But he contradicts himself here; practically he admits such acts of power may be satisfactorily certified (page 168). Now, supposing resurrection from the dead is (and I repeat it is not a question of a counteracting cause defeating an effect, but of power acting when the effect is produced, acting by its own energy), it may set ordinary laws in motion again, as in many cases it did, but did its own work independent of them. There was no counteracting anything generally, and, if the fact be certified, it is no question of probability or improbability. Supposing one rising really from the dead who stank after four days in the grave, what probable sequence of nature is there in that? There is no mental honesty here. And that there is deliverance from death and misery by goodness and power is worthy of God, but not to take man out of his present place of responsibility till full accomplishment be come.

149 He tells us (p. 171) that the law of causation, number, and extension are the only cases of absolute incredibility of any exception; but what does extension apply to but to matter? Consequently there is no such thing as spirit at all. As to number, eternity, I am, is an exception. It is the stupidest limiting of everything to observed matter. To the whole class of moral motives in man even, number and extension cannot apply. What is the number and extension of a mother's love, of a child's attachment? It is brutish, his system; and if there be a cause for everything - which I believe there is for this creation, and that cause is God - belief in a fact (not exactly contrary to, but) independent of some recognised law of nature, has nothing to do with shaking conviction of the truth of the law (p. 175), as I have said. Resurrection does not make me doubt of death as a law of nature in us now; quite the contrary. - As to his throws of dice, I leave them to him and D'Alembert.

We have now to come to the great question of motive, human will, and fixed laws. Whatever reasoning may make of it, the responsibility of man remains untouched, because he does act by motives which determine him. But all in Mill is so loose and unanalysed that it is difficult to deal with. Thus a motive, what is it? Is it a motive when it does not move the will at all? If it is that which has determined the will, then it is mere tautology to say he is governed by motives, for it is only a motive when it does determine or govern it. Yet is there a will when nothing is willed at all. If I will a thing, the determination is made, morally the act is complete. Free to will is quite true as far as compulsion goes; for if it be compelled it is not willed, it is another's will.

150 Now, in all the flimsy language in which he speaks of antecedents, the difference is plainly this. In fixed laws of nature it is compulsion. Gravity acts; the earth, the moon, follow fixed laws - cannot do anything else. It is compulsion; the movement, centripetal or centrifugal, is imposed. The action itself is a necessary one as far as observed nature goes; it is strictly compulsion both as the act and as to the acting thing, it having no thought or will or consciousness in the matter. So in all cases of fixed laws. They mean this: but there is another point. In the case of man's will the motive produces no action. Man's will or mind is the thing acted on. It is a state of mind, determination by motive. It does no more than be a motive; consequently a man may act or be hindered acting, or defer to act when the will is there, and only when he acts comes the analogy with physical effects. With the previous part, the production of the will, there is no analogy at all. Till the will is determined, there is no motive in the mind; there may be reflection of the mind on it, but it has not become a motive to me - has not produced any effect in me. When the man acts, his will is the antecedent cause, by whatever bodily machinery it is carried out.

But another point comes in here: an object may attract the desire without determining the will, which may utterly refuse it. It is not an actual motive to the man as to his conduct. All this, which is of the essence of the question of will, to say nothing of the conscience controlling it when otherwise the will would be determined, is left out by the superficiality of Mill. Of course he has not in view divine objects, which take the mind clean out of the whole sphere he moves in, and by grace determine the will. But on his own ground the phenomenal antecedent to effect in man's conduct is his will. Motive produces no act; but, where operative, produces a state of will and no more, or rather is one, which is not a phenomenal effect at all. It is not true that the action of masses is merely individual will. Motives vary from individual to individual, and may in any individual from moment to moment. This is lost in masses which follow a general impulse, or there could not be a mass. But he admits that the causes are so endless and unknown that we cannot predict action, at most tendencies. But this is not invariable sequence or a fixed law at all.

151 Now a general course of corrupt human nature I do not deny.; but if I take up individual man, the whole idea is absurd. A man's recollection of his mother stops him in evil. The scriptures, a sermon, a thousand things impossible to count on, come in and arrest or form the determination of the mind called will. All he can pretend to is to see the tendency of corrupt human nature without God, which, for my part, I should not deny. If he say this is an antecedent cause, no doubt, only he cannot know of its existence, nor, if it exist, of its effect; that is, it is no matter of invariable sequence nor of fixed law at all. But even here his statements prove only that he cannot do what he pretends to do. He is obliged to do what he condemns in Bacon, only pretending to get up to the principles of human nature and bring in deduction, but forced to admit we have no sure elements to reason from. This brings in another difficulty, that all depends not on the discovery of a necessary fixed law of force (as gravity or chemical action), which cannot act otherwise, but on my sagacity in estimating motive, which involves my moral state as well as the state of those I reason about.

How clearly Christianity is above and outside all this, by a revelation of God, a new nature, and objects wholly outside the world! Mill has a feeble and partially benevolent Creator who did the best He could out of the materials He had to hand, and we are to mend His work. But then what of necessary effects of causes? This he feels and seeks to shrink from. Now that man has got philosophers (not for the first time, however) and "the highest thinkers," we may expect something of this poorly-constructed world. It has been a long while coming to find it out; nor would they, without Christianity, have had even the thought they had. Plato not only did not know God, but taught the most brutish communism, which Aristotle disapproved because, base as trade might be, selfishness was a stronger motive. The world by wisdom knew not God. It pleased God, by the foolishness of preaching, to save them that believe. But these have gone farther: when they knew God as revealed in Christ, they did not like to retain Him in their knowledge.

But I will take up a few details. All the statements of Mill are vague, as we have seen; lusts, will, conscience, are all huddled up together; motives present to an individual's mind and character; but is it yet really motive till the will be determined by it? Then it is inducements which act upon him, and so we could foretell his conduct with as much certainty as we could any physical event. He admits fully afterwards we cannot, but only tendencies. In physical nature the physical event may be hindered, but the cause remains absolutely invariable; and this is utterly false as to the influence of motives on a man. You must know not only the man's character, but the circumstances at the moment, for a moment may wholly change what acts on him. (See pp. 433, 466 sec. 2, 452, 450, 1, 2, 480, 492, 513, end of 4, 515, 540, 541, etc ) If I knew what acted on a man as an inducement - if it be merely a thought, desire, powerful pressure on his inclinations - I do not yet know how he will act. I quite understand that Mill would hold that the hindrance to his acting on this is one of the antecedents, but this is not merely character. I may have motives which determine wholly above character, and which subdue my nature. If these be taken in so that the purpose is determined by them, then it is merely saying if I know what has determined the will, as I have said.

152 Now masses, as already said, are masses in virtue of not controlling impulses, but acting on the passions, or perhaps wants, pushed to an extreme, so that passions broke out; and here, but really in each case only when all is known, the general result may be better judged of. Conscience is always individual. But this independence of individual character and principle is lost in the infidel and liberal system, as indeed Lecky admits in his history. I deny that the knowledge of circumstances and character would enable us to tell how people would act (p. 422); for motives outside both, and governing a man in spite of both, not counteracting the will but determining it, may be in operation. Of this, of course, Mill has no idea. In physical causes there is nothing to form. Counteraction is another thing, the motive power remains the same.

But the slovenly mental habits of Mill are again found here. Our volitions and actions are invariable consequents of our antecedent states of mind. The volition is the state of mind, and may be produced by a motive which is no antecedent state of mind at all, nor even my natural character. It may control it, and never have been in me before; yea, set me free from it. Nor is any foreknowledge the same as divine foreknowledge. God knows what will be and absolutely, and He does not reason on tendencies and effects of character and its probable results. When I speak of will, I speak of actual determination of purpose, not of a religious or metaphysical faculty.

153 "There is nothing (p. 423) in causation but invariable, certain, and unconditional sequence." "There are few to whom more constancy of succession appears a sufficiently stringent bond of union for so peculiar a relation as that of cause and effect." Even if reason repudiates, the imagination retains the feeling of . . . some constraint exercised* by the antecedent over the consequent. Now, first he had said he would not consider efficient causes, but only physical or phenomenal causes; here he does consider them, to deny them absolutely. But uniform consequence has nothing to do with cause. It may be a cause with no uniformity, uniformity with no cause (while fully admitting regular order in creation). Day and night we have seen, but so of all seasons, summer, winter, etc., so of the moon's phases; but of even more important things death uniformly follows life. Is life the cause of death? We must turn Buddhists and seek Nirvana. Sequence deceives; it is merely that a thing comes after in point of time, which in itself proves nothing even if constant. A cause is the why it follows.

{*Given certain institutions, and customs, wages, etc., will be determined by certain causes . . . but this class of political economists argue that these causes must by an inherent necessity . . . determine the shares." (Autob. 244.) Is no constraint exercised here in either view of the case? The first is Mill's.}

Now there is force in existence. That is admitted, and force produces effect, movement, etc.; it becomes heat, etc. It is an efficient cause, an agent, uniform or not. It turns to heat where it cannot move, to movement from heat, etc., not uniform, but a power. Electricity knocks a thing down, sets fire to something, melts, kills, or takes away consciousness. If the same as magnetism, it turns iron north or south, it operates with power not uniformly, it strips a strip of bark from a tree from top to bottom, leaving the tree as it was; it twists another into small fibres in all its growth. Here I have force in this shape; power operating gives light, and makes a clock go. This is not mere uniform sequence, but operative force - an efficient cause. But, as I have said, ascending to ultimate properties and "the origin of all things," you have clearly and avowedly no sequence, uniform or other, but operative power - a cause.

154 If I only take present order, I may stop at a constant law without seeking the cause, and this is what he professed to do, but does not do, but denies any such: it is not mysterious compulsion as if there was a will but ordained effect, an effect produced, as he is forced, unconscious of self-contradiction, to say. And necessity it is in this sense, as to matter, that according to its ordered nature it cannot be otherwise. It is compelled by the original orderer so to be. It is its nature without a will. Gravity is always the same, so that I can predict, not a tendency, but a fact. It may be hindered, but not changed while the kosmos subsists. And if we are to believe Mr. Mill (p. 433), "it needs scarcely be stated that nothing approaching to this can be done" (in the case of mind). (See pp. 424-5 also.) If I can change or conquer my character, can he do this as regards the ordering of the spheres by gravity?

His discussion on pleasure, pain, and habit, is empty. "We still continue to desire the action"; but I do not go further into it. In page 434 he admits motives in large masses which cannot be so accounted in individuals, again contradicting himself. And I admit, taking the run of masses of men, if sufficiently sagacious, we can judge of the motives which will govern them, though after all very inadequately, from a thousand causes. Still there may be a general estimate of the working of motives in uncontrolled man. Only most do not believe how bad he is when uncontrolled. They are, however, "the lowest kind of empirical laws," and they must "be connected deductively with the laws of nature from which they result." This, then, requires a sure knowledge of the nature of man. And here is a field of inquiry and moral judgment. One believes he is good; another, that no good thing dwells in him in the flesh; what is to be done here? Mill, that the world is such a miserable world that an impotent half-benevolent God must have made it out of the materials He had to hand. Only man, being, I suppose, better than He, is to try and perfect it. What are the universal laws of human nature? (page 435). How ascertained but by the empirical laws observation affords "of the lowest kind," unless we believe in revelation? Of the mind's own nature (p. 436) he will keep clear; the laws of mind are for him mental phenomena, but this is empirical. Nature has another meaning than in human nature, which is disposition and motive, here nature properly. Mind, if it means anything, he tells us (p. 436), means that which feels - does not reason or think.

155 Pages 436 and 437 directly contradict each other as to what laws of mind are. In page 437 one kind are called laws of body, in contrast with mind; but it is no matter, save to shew the slovenly superficiality of Mill. What he calls confusion in page 436 he lays down in page 437. Nor is sensation really a state of mind. It is the point of mysterious union between mind and body of which the mind takes or may take notice, reflecting. But note further, though body and other states of mind may produce a state of mind, he excludes absolutely all action on the mind by mind or power extrinsic to itself, which is as important as it is absurdly false. It is to make its law like matter, the laws according to which one mental state succeeds another. But suppose a state of mind began by an influence extrinsic to it - the commonest thing possible, for this he has no place; so that all his statement is false as a system.

In page 441 he is all wrong. When white is there, there are no various colours, they have ceased, they are not white; but white is before my eye. The rest I deny and leave.

Belief may come from habit of the idea in the mind, but there are other sources as testimony of that, as to which I have no habit. To make moral reprobation consist in association with a disgusting idea is worthy of Mill and disgust. It is curious to see how carefully he excludes testimony; one thing is recognised by the mind as evidence of another thing.

Page 449. The statement as to old and young has very little or no foundation. The formation of character has of course certain truth in it, but it is not by the laws which form it that the whole of the phenomena are produced. As to the action of circumstances on man, I must know what character is actually formed to judge of that. All this is in the air, besides all special action on man being ignored. So all on to page 456 is nothing but his fancies, and groundless too; denying not only higher principles, but natural characteristic differences of race, as of sex too. It is not true (p. 458) that bodily strength tends to make men courageous. It may make men bullies over weakness if not courageous, but this all is excessively superficial and worthless.

I admit (p. 459) we must know, as I have stated, the nature of a thing to have a proposition. But Mill cannot deny that all his mental laws are from empirical laws only, for even character is that. See pages 454, 455, as the result. If they are laws of formation of character, this is clearly empirical. It supposes a character must be formed to judge; but then laws of human nature abstractedly have no place, because a formed character is what I have to discover. The whole system is superficial and arbitrary. (See p. 451, first paragraph.) So page 450, "impossibility of establishing any but approximate empirical laws of effects."

156 Laws of matter in their nature we have as gravity; it cannot be otherwise. But when I come to character and circumstances, this is not the case, though there may be empirical laws making conduct probable. But this is what he admits is not science at all, and such formation of character must be, that is, it is no science at all, besides leaving out other deeper principles. Indeed he contradicts himself, for if psychology, that is, the nature of man, be the science, then formation of character is not. Yet here psychology is the science studied (page 461). This formation of character follows, which is by circumstances, and then comes the action in circumstances. As far as this is mere knowledge of human nature or mankind, no one would deny it. It excludes all but circumstances and human tendencies as they exist, no action on the soul being admitted. All moral considerations are of course excluded, all basis of moral obligation. "Congenital predispositions" are not so far (p. 462) to seek, and will never be found when man's being evil is rejected as a starting-point. It is not a law of man's nature to lie, but what makes him lie? Selfishness. Hence "lying is nearly universal when certain external circumstances exist universally" (page 449). But I do not dwell on all this part. The statement (p. 469) that "the actions and passions (of masses) are obedient to the laws of individual human nature" is utterly false. Page 466 is not true. He always forgets the power of an objective end of action. The law of the individual as to this is selfishness or his own interests; of a society it is the supposed interests of the society, and more or less the individual is sacrificed to it.

Nothing can be more utterly futile and empty than all this part of the book. He takes up the principle already laid down; that, having empirical general laws, he hypothetically puts great general principles of the nature of mind, laws of mind, thence deduces consequences as to forming character in given circumstances, and so how men will act, only admitting that we can only have tendencies, and never conclude to facts. And what are these few and simplest laws of mind; few but not simple, and running into one another? (page 489). Memory, imagination, association of ideas. Now I suppose nobody denies these three things; but can anything be more absurd? Where are the passions and objects of man, his affections, and the positive influences exercised upon him? Mill admits that we must know what they are before a child can speak, the circumstances of ancestors, and what not. He admits our mental states and capacities are modified for a time, or permanently, by everything that happens to us in life. But this is experimental (p. 451); the generalisations which result will be considered as scientific propositions by no one at all familiar with scientific investigation (page 452). Are the laws of the formation of character susceptible of a satisfactory investigation by the method of experimentation? Evidently not (page 452). These laws are to be obtained by deducing them from the general laws of mind, by supposing any given set of circumstances, and then considering their influence in forming character (p. 457); these laws, or the principal ones, being memory, imagination, and association of ideas - the result to be verified by observation. It being impossible to obtain really accurate propositions respecting the formation of character from observation and experiment alone (p. 456), and so, knowing memory, etc., we possess psychology, the laws of mind, and draw corollaries from them, which is the new science of ethology not yet created. Yet, after all (p. 458), psychology is altogether, or principally, a science of observation and experiment, by which (we have read) it is impossible to obtain any accurate propositions. Consequently we must have the generalisation of laws of mind; but they are hypothetical, only in result affirming tendencies.

157 Now remark here, that in true science we have nothing to do with tendencies, but with facts. The forces of gravity and laws of motion do not give tendencies, they produce certain resulting facts. They may be counteracted, and that even by the operation of the same laws; but they have nothing to do with tendencies. Hypothesis may come in to get at the law, verified by the ascertained result in facts, and it then ceases to be an hypothesis. It is a principle or law demonstrated by facts. The whole argument is trifling nonsense. Yet the constituent elements of human nature are sufficiently understood to create a science of ethology. Yet the laws are modified by everything in our life, that is, as to our mental states and capacities, are no laws at all, are matter of observation and experiment, or principally so, that is, empirical; and all the science flows from knowing there is memory, imagination, and association of ideas forming character by circumstances we do not know, and then, middle principles of how to form being obtained, we, by education, form the character to be desired. And what is that? We perfect the bungling of creation, while we must know what the nurse has done with the baby and act as a despot alone could, and not even he, for he could not manage the nurse, the passions and governing objects being wholly left out of both sciences. Now that there are these three principles in human nature everyone knows; that education tends to form character is not denied; that the observation of human nature helps to know how the general mass will act, at least tendencies hypothetically, no one denies; but such a mare's next of hypothetical science I never met with.

158 It is again curious to see the effort to set aside belief on testimony by attributing to it associating ideas. Such practical impotency in judging of "the laws of human nature," leaving out passions, objects, selfishness, is hard to conceive any one capable of; but there it is, and a science made of it - one created by Mr. Mill. No doubt it is. If you want to see uncertainty and folly, read page 466. Happily there is an impassable limit to the possibility of calculating (the facts or results) beforehand (p. 467); the data being uncertain and varying, only the laws are not. Now that certain principles govern human society as a general rule, no one can doubt; but the discovery of the result depends on data so complex that we cannot calculate on it. Just so; we are left where we were after the exact science of psychology, ethology, and all - only the last science has not been created yet. Is that the case with the results of the law of gravity?

I do not admit that the sequences and co-existences result from the law of the separate elements. So that the effects amount precisely to the sum of the effects of the circumstances taken singly (page 488). Men acting in a mass are quite different from the individuals taken singly. Confederacies of men are in a moral state, and have a sense of power which takes them out of what controls individuals; and even conscience is necessarily individual. Logical deduction has not to be verified, an hypothetical generalisation which is not deduction has (page 490). It results at best (p. 491) in what is useful for guidance, but insufficient for prediction, and that is an "exact science."

159 But even with respects to tendencies, "it would be an error to suppose we could arrive at any great number of propositions which will be true in all societies without exception." No doubt. "All the propositions are in the strictest sense hypothetical" (p. 493), and cannot be verified, of course, till it is too late, because there is no constancy or uniformity of data as there is in exact science. Our conclusions are soon deprived of all value by accumulating error (page 494). So much so that "the more the science of ethology is cultivated, and the better the diversities of individual and national character are understood, the smaller, probably, will the number of propositions become which it will be considered safe to build on as universal principles of human nature." That is encouraging. (See again p. 503.) The confessed fact is that, while there are assuredly principles which actuate human nature, the path as to the masses of mankind is so modified by circumstances that we must know the effect of circumstances on human nature, and the practical effect on men, and this is always changing; the "properties are changeable." That is, however, controlled the inquiry may be by the general laws of human nature, yet we have to know, if we can, its circumstantial condition, and how one state of society produces another, and that itself in given circumstances, for violence may come in, and one state not be a simple sequence of another; and of these we cannot judge even empirically; of a few tendencies we may, perhaps, if nothing intervene - as increase of wealth, commerce, etc.

But one thing is wholly left out here even in the inquiry what is the end society tends to: what is the good and goal to be sought? It will be flippantly said the good of the whole. What is that? Who is the judge of it? I do not attach importance to his discussion on society; but though it is difficult, from his want of precision, to compare what he says, yet I make a few remarks. "The succession of states of the human mind and of human society cannot have a law of its own; it must depend on the psychological and ethological laws, etc. It is conceivable that these might be such as to determine the successive transformation of man and society (page 512). But . . . I do not think anyone will contend that it could have been possible setting out from the principle of human nature . . . to determine a priori the order in which human development would take place" (page 513). There is an end of hypothesis and deduction from psychological laws. "What we now are and do is in a very small degree the result of the universal circumstances of the human race, or even of our own circumstances acting through the original qualities of our species," there is an end to psychological science, "but mainly of the qualities produced in us by the whole previous history of humanity." This series of action and reaction of man and circumstances could not possibly be computed. All is therefore uncertain and empirical. There is no science from psychological generalisation, "while it is an imperative rule never to introduce any generalisation from history into the social science unless sufficient grounds can be pointed out for it in human nature." Then he goes on to say what I have quoted, that the result is in a very small degree that of the original qualities of our species.

160 As to progress, which he yet admits may not be improvement (p. 511), it is all a fable. Not that there may not be progress in civilisation (not morally); yet is there progress in the Copts, in Assyria, Persia, Turkey, in the barbarian inroads? In mere physical arts and sciences there is in modern Europe, but not even there in fine arts. What is the progressiveness of the human race which is the foundation of philosophising? Christianity has elevated the standard of conscience, bringing in withal the knowledge and reference to one true God. But outside its influence where is the progress? But in this progress "often . . . we cannot even shew that what did take place was probable a priori, but only that it was possible," and this from psychological laws! And this is an exact science, like the invariable effects of gravity! "Nothing is more probable than that a wrong empirical law will emerge instead of a right one (p. 515; see pages 523, 524). Here we must know the laws according to which social states generate one another; but (p. 512) the succession of the states of the human mind and of human society cannot have an independent law of its own. It must depend on the psychological and ethological laws. Here little progress can be made in establishing the filiation directly from laws of human nature without having first ascertained the immediate or derivative laws according to which social states generate one another." Only, unhappily, they have no independent ones at all - cannot.

161 The vapid infidelity of page 527 I leave. "We have to take into consideration the whole of past time from the first recorded condition of the human race." Recorded where? What was that condition, and in what place? History, moreover, is too broken and interrupted to have a course of progress, whatever "the superior minds" may think of themselves. No doubt they are the men, and wisdom will die with them. See the self-complacency of page 530. The intellectual element is the predominant circumstance in determining their progress. Progress in what? I only note it here to recognise the principle. Philosophy and religion are abundantly amenable to general causes (page 539). But if there had been no Christ, no Paul, there would have been no Christianity. His perfect ignorance of the person of Christ objectively being the all of Christianity, with what it involves, has necessarily made him talk nonsense here. Circumstances may have been prepared for it; but his total ignorance of what Christianity is (or even Judaism) necessarily makes him grossly superficial.

As to the general principle of progress, it is (p. 540) only precarious approximate generalisations confined to a small portion of mankind, and there is need of great flexibility in our generalisations. And "who can tell?" etc. See, too, page 541, how much "remains inaccessible to us." Unhappily the art of life (p. 523), to which all other arts are subordinated, has still to be created. Rules of conduct (p. 549) are only provisional. Right and wrong he has not an idea of. Morality, prudence, and aesthetics, all have to be created; but (p. 544) the ends to be aimed at must be known, or laws of phenomena are useless. Most true. Some general principle or standard must still be sought (page 555). The end, however, is conduciveness to the happiness of mankind, or rather of all sentient beings. Has man no higher or better? What is that happiness? On this he is silent, save that present happiness may give way to ideal nobleness; but this in result will be mere happiness existing in the world. Of happiness, divine or heavenly, of course he has no idea. It is, at best, what is under the sun, the days of the life of our vanity. Life now is almost universally puerile and insignificant; it is not happiness such as human beings with highly developed faculties can care to have. Moral, spiritual, divine happiness, grace in the heart towards others, is simply absent from his mind. It is a blank.

162 I see nothing in the book but an overweening estimate of himself and his own mind, and the grossest absence of every moral feeling - a blank, an incapacity for anything higher than reasoning on current facts, which he does superficially; not aware that there is anything beyond, which he does not possess, with only that which always accompanies it - the secret (so not honest) pervading effort to undermine the grounds on which the assurance of it is built in others. It is a petty, superficial, pretentious work, without one tinge of any moral or elevated feeling, but the contrary; a miserable attempt to spin, out of a world he holds to be badly created by a feeble God (the only one known), by a creature badly created or grown up by evolution, a system that is to be objectless as causeless, which this creature is to perfect as well as he can without knowing what good is. Impossible to conceive anything more beyond the power of conceiving truth.

The fact is, it is simply positivism borrowed from Comte which knows nothing but what is presented to the senses, with perhaps some inferences, and leaves every moral and divine idea wholly out, and covers absurdities and rejection of what is intuitively known by what is illogical and contradictory too. It is merely the absurdity of positivism; conscience and morality all gone, as is the possibility of a higher power acting influentially on me. I am to seek the good of all. Why so? What motive have I for doing so? What is the good? Am I the judge of it, or are they? And who are they? It is as empty as it is bad. His affinity with another man's wife he calls his first marriage to her (one of mind and affection, I dare say); and then he married her after her husband's death, who was a convenient sort of man that let things go on. There was immense moral and mental weakness in Mr. Mill, he was in a state of despairing melancholy for a long while.

Now his logic does not bring out all the results, but it sows the seed in denying causation, and in teaching positivism, on which, with some intellectual principles borrowed from Kant, it is wholly based.

On the Gospel of John

J. N. Darby.

<33014E> 126 {file section a.}

Introduction

The Gospel of John has a special character, which has struck the minds of all those who have given it a little attention, even though they have not always clearly understood what it was that produced this effect: it not only strikes the mind, but attracts the heart in a way not to be found in the other parts of the holy book. The reason of this is, that the Gospel of John presents the Person of the Son of God - the Son of God come down so low, that He can say, "Give me to drink." This attracts the heart, if the heart be not altogether hardened. If Paul teaches us how a man can be presented before God, John presents God before man. His subject is God, and eternal life in a man, the apostle following out the subject in the Epistle, shewing us this life reproduced in those who possess it in possessing Christ. I speak only of the leading features which characterise these books; for many other truths besides those which I have just noticed are to be found in them, it is needless to say. Indeed it is John's Gospel which gives us the doctrine of the sending of the Spirit of God, that other Comforter, who is to abide with us for ever.

The Gospel of John is very clearly distinguished from the other three synoptical gospels, and we shall do well to pause for a moment to consider the character of these last, especially as this concerns the difference between them and the Gospel of John. The three synoptical gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, afford the most precious details of the life of the Saviour down here, of His patience and His grace: He was the perfect expression of good in the midst of evil; His miracles (with the exception of the cursing of the fig-tree, which expressed the truth as to the state of Israel, that is, of man in possession of all the privileges which man could enjoy from God) were not only a confirmation of His testimony, but were all miracles of goodness - the expression of divine power manifested in goodness. Here we find good; God Himself, who is love, acting, although, in a certain sense, still hidden, according to the grace which was soon to be plainly revealed. Thus was the blessed Saviour presented to man, to be recognized and received: He was unknown and rejected. It has often been noticed that each of the three evangelists presents the Saviour in a different aspect: Matthew brings before us Emmanuel in the midst of the Jews; Mark, the Servant Prophet; Luke (after the first two chapters, which present to us the most interesting picture of a remnant with whom God was, in the midst of a hypocritical and rebellious people) gives us the Son of man, more in relation with that which exists at present; that is, heavenly grace; but all three, in the main, present the Saviour in His patient ways of grace in this world, that man may receive Him; and man rejected Him! Mark's Gospel, relating the service of Jesus, has no genealogy. Matthew, in relation with the Jews and earthly dispensations, traces the Saviour from Abraham and David, and also shews the three things, which take the place of Judaism; that is, the kingdom as it exists in the present time (chap. 13), the church (chap. 16), and the kingdom in glory (chap. 17). Luke, which presents to us grace in the Son of man, follows His genealogy up to Adam. These three Gospels always speak of Christ as a Man down here, presented to men historically, and they follow up their account until He is positively rejected, announcing then His entering into the new position which He has taken by resurrection. The ascension, which is the foundation of our present place, is only given in Luke directly; allusion to it is made in the last supplementary verses in Mark.

127 The Gospel of John regards the Lord in quite another manner: it presents to us a divine Person come down here, God manifested in this world; a marvellous fact, upon which all in man's history depends. It is no longer a question here of genealogy; it is no longer the second Man responsible toward God (though that be ever true), and perfect before God, and all His delight, while we see upon every page that it is no longer Messiah according to prophecy; it is no longer Emmanuel, Jesus, who saves His people; it is no longer the messenger who goes before His face: in John it is God Himself, as God, who in a Man shews Himself to men,* to the Jews - for God had promised Him - but first of all to put them entirely aside (chap. 1: 10, 11), shewing at the same time that nothing in man could even comprehend who was there present with him. Then, at the end of the Gospel, we find the doctrine of the presence of the Holy Spirit, who should replace Jesus here below, in revealing His glory on high, and in giving us the consciousness of our relationships with the Father and with Him. It is also to be remarked that all John's writings, and amongst them his Gospel, look upon the Christian as an individual, and do not recognise the church, either as the body or as the house. Further, the Gospel of John treats of eternal life; he does not speak of forgiveness of sins, except as a present administration confided to the apostles; and, as far as Christ is concerned, he treats essentially the subject of the manifestation of God down here, and of the coming of eternal life in the Person of the Son of God; consequently he hardly speaks at all of our heavenly portion, three or four allusions excepted. But it is time to leave these general reflections, to consider what the Gospel itself teaches us.

{*Having come as a Man, Jesus never leaves the place of obedience, and receives everything from His Father's hand.}

128 First of all, then, let us look at its structure. The first three chapters are preliminary: John had not yet been put in prison, and Jesus, although He taught and performed miracles, had not yet begun His public ministry. The two first of these three chapters, up to chapter 2: 22, form a whole. Chapter 3 gives us the basis of the divine work in us and for us - that is, the new birth and the cross, this latter introducing heavenly things as to us, and as to Jesus Himself. In chapter 4, Jesus passes from Judea into Galilee, leaving the Jews who did not receive Him, and takes the place of Saviour of the world in grace. In chapter 5 He gives life as Son of God; in chapter 6, He becomes, as Son of man, the sustenance of the life, in His incarnation and in His death. Chapter 7 shews us that the Holy Spirit should replace Him - the feast of tabernacles, the re-establishment of Israel, to take place later on. In chapter 8, His word is definitely rejected; in chapter 9, His works: but he who has received sight follows Him. Thus, in chapter 10, He will have His sheep, and keep them for better things to come. In chapters 11 and 12, God bears witness to Him, as Son of God, by the resurrection of Lazarus; as Son of David, by His entry into Jerusalem; as Son of man, by the coming of the Greeks; but this title of Son of man, brought in with it death, a subject which is then treated of. Bethany is a scene by itself; Mary seized in her heart the position of Jesus; He who gave life must Himself die. His title of Son of man closes the history of Jesus down here, introducing Him by death and by redemption into a far wider sphere of glory. But then (chap. 13) the question arose naturally, Was Jesus going to leave His disciples? No; being glorified on high, He would wash their feet. But whither He went the disciples could not follow Him now. In chapter 14 we find the resources of comfort during the time of the Lord's absence: the Father had been revealed in Him already during His life down here; when He should have gone back on high, He would send another Comforter; by His means, the disciples would know that He was in the Father, and they in Him, and He in them. Chapter 15 shews us the relationship of the disciples with Him upon earth, taking the place of the Jews; the place of the disciples before the world, that of the Jews in rejecting Him, and then the Comforter. Chapter 16 tells us what the Holy Spirit would do when come; what His presence would be the proof of in the world, and what He would teach the disciples, putting them at the same time into immediate relationship with the Father. In chapter 17 the Lord, taking His stand upon the accomplishment of His work, and the revelation of the Father's name, places His own in His own position before the Father and before the world; the world is judged, in that it has rejected the Lord, and His own are left here in His place. In chapters 18 and 19 we have the history of the Lord's condemnation and crucifixion; in chapter 20, His resurrection and manifestation of Himself to His disciples, as well as their mission. Chapter 21 gives us His interview with His own in Galilee, Peter's restoration, and the prophecy of Jesus as to the latter, and as to John.

129 After this short sketch of the Gospel as a whole, we will enter now upon the detail of the chapters.

John 1

The first chapter presents to us the Person of the Lord in all its positive aspects - what He is in Himself. Not in His relative characters; He is not here the Christ, nor Head of the church, nor High Priest - that is to say, what He was, or what He is, in relationship with men down here, whether Jews or Christians. But it is Christ personally who is presented to us as well as His work.

The chapter begins with the divine and eternal existence of the Person of Jesus, the Son of God, with that which He is in the essence of His nature, so to speak. Genesis begins with the creation, and the Old Testament gives us the history of responsible man upon the earth, the sphere of that responsibility; John begins with that which preceded creation; he begins all anew here, in the Person of Him who became the second Man, the last Adam.

130 It is not, "In the beginning God created"; but, "In the beginning was the Word." All is founded upon the uncreated existence of Him who created everything: at the beginning of all things He was there, without any beginning. "In the beginning was the Word," is the formal expression that the Word had no beginning. But there is more in this remarkable passage: the Word was personally distinct, "the Word was with God"; but He was not distinct in nature, "the Word was God." Thus we have the eternal existence, the distinct personality, the identity of nature, of the Word; and all this existed in eternity. The distinct personality of the Word was not, as people have wished to make it, a thing which had a beginning. "In the beginning the Word was with God," v. 2. His personality is eternal as His nature. This is the great and glorious basis of the doctrine of the gospel and of our eternal joy, what the Saviour is in Himself, His nature, and His Person.

Now comes what He is in His attributes, being such. First of all, He has created all things, and here we come to the beginning of Genesis. We have to do with Him in that which He is; the world is but that which He has made. All things were made by Him, and there is nothing created of which He was not the Creator. All that subsists, subsists by Him. He was (een); all that began to exist (egeneto) began "by him." He was the Creator of all beings. (Compare Heb. 1: 2, 10.)

The second quality found in Him is, that "in him was life," v. 4. This cannot be said of any creature; many have life, but they have it not in themselves. Christ becomes our life, but it is He who is it in us. "God hath given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son; he that hath the Son, hath life, and he that hath not the Son of God, hath not life." This is a very momentous truth, as regards Himself, as regards us, and as regards the life that we possess as Christians.

But more; this life is "the light of men," a word of immense value for us. God Himself is light, and it is the divine light as life which expresses itself to men in the Word. It is not the light of angels, though God be light for all, for He is it in Himself, but, as it is relative, adapted to other beings, it is not to angels; His delights were in the sons of men; Prov. 8. The proposition is one which is called reciprocal; that is, the two parts of the proposition have an equal value. I could say just as well, the light of men is the life which is in the Word. It is the perfect expression of the nature, counsels, and glory of God when all shall be consummated. It is in man that God will make Himself to be seen and known. "God was manifest in flesh . . . seen of angels." The angels are the highest expression of God's power in creation; but it is in man that God has shewn Himself, and that, morally, in holiness and love. We ought to walk as Christ walked, to be imitators of God as His dear children, and walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given Himself for us; and also, "we are light in the Lord," for He is our life. If we know love, it is in that He laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. If God chastises us, it is to make us participators of His holiness. We walk in the light, as He is in the light. He has chosen us in Christ, to be "holy and irreproachable before him in love," which is the character of God Himself, a character perfectly realised in Christ. We purify ourselves, even as He is pure, knowing that we shall be like Him - being transformed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord - being renewed in knowledge after the image of Him who hath created us. And this is not a rule, although there be in it a rule (for we ought to walk as He walked), but a life which is the perfect expression of it, the expression of the life of God in man. Ineffable privilege! Wonderful nearness to Jesus! "Both he who sanctifieth, and they that are sanctified, are all of one."

131 Redemption develops and manifests all the moral qualities of God Himself, and above His qualities, His nature - love and light, and that in man, and in connection with men. We are, as being in Christ, and Christ in us, the fruit and expression of all that God is in the fulness and revelation of Himself. He will shew, in the ages to come, the exceeding riches of His grace, in His kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. But then, in order that all this should be brought out, love and even light, an occasion must present itself; and that, not in an object amiable and intelligent in good (for then man could love), but there, where all the opposite of this nature shewed itself; it was necessary also that good should be proved superior to evil, in letting evil have its free course. "The light shone in the darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not." Not only was man not light, not only was he darkness, without any glimmering of the nature of God, but there was no power in him of receiving this light; there was opposition of nature. They saw no beauty in Him to desire Him. In that which was nothing else than the exhibition of the divine nature in itself, it was impossible to go further. In natural things, if there is light, there is no more darkness; but in the moral world it is not so; the light, that which is pure in itself, and manifests everything, is there, and it is not perceived who is there. "Is not this the carpenter's son?" "If thou knewest who it is that saith unto thee, Give me to drink." "If this man were a prophet" - it is a definite judgment, pronouncing Him not to be a prophet, when God is there, and shews Himself as such. For since that which God is in this world reveals that which is above, the mind that reigns there does not associate itself with a single principle which governs the heart and the habits of men. There is in that heart no knowledge of sin, no knowledge of God, no knowledge of the state into which sin has plunged us; sin itself is estimated according to the evil which it has done to ourselves, not according to its opposition to God's nature, although I admit that a conscience has been acquired by the fall; egotism has become the starting-point for everything. Then, when the light comes, which, on the contrary, shews what sin is, where this has placed man morally before God, everything is judged of according to egotism as a starting-point; and the manifestation of God finds no entry into the heart. This is an unknown field for man: it is the truth, and man is in a state of falsehood, as he is without God, and he understands nothing here. God is light; and when He is manifested such as He is, but adapted to man, man's state is such that nothing responds to this manifestation. If the conscience, which is from God, is reached, the hatred of the will is awakened. (See the end of Acts 7 and John 3: 19.)

132 We have, then, in an abstract way, in these first five verses that which the Lord is, divinely, in Himself; and together with this, at the end, the effect of His manifestation in the midst of men, such as they were, still in an abstract way. Thus it is as light that He is here presented; it is not love which is revealed. Come down here as love, He has been active, both towards the world, and efficaciously towards His own, which implies the cross, that is to say, the light rejected. But here it is what the Lord is which is presented to us, not that which He does in divine activity. Verses 16-19 of chapter 3 give us the summary of what He is in these two particulars. God is love; but Christ was the activity of this love, according to the nature and settled purpose of God. (Compare verse 17 of the chapter we are examining.) The law demanded of man that which man ought to be; in Christ something "is come" from God - light and love; but this subject will occupy us more fully in a moment. I only repeat, that what is given us, up to the present, is what the Lord is in Himself, but in the character which puts man to the test, which shews what man is; and the passage terminates with the effect of the manifestation of what He is, without His being named. This Light can manifest itself there, where there is nothing that answers to it: it is not comprehended. It is moral incapacity, not hatred; the latter is opposed to love.

133 We may remark, that, in being made partakers of the divine nature, we become light; Eph. 5: 8. It is never said that we are love. God is sovereign in His love; without doubt it is His nature, in communion, and in goodness, and in mercy, but free. We are made partakers of this nature, and we walk in love, as the love has been manifested in Jesus, because He is our life; but it is in obedience that we walk thus, it is a duty, a joyful duty - easy, if we walk with joy, and stronger than the evil, but not free, having its source in ourselves. We cannot say that we are supreme love, a source from which love springs; but the new man is holy in himself; it is that which he is, although this be, in our case, in relation with an object.

In the sixth and following verses we begin the history: Christ should appear. It is not now what He is abstractedly; now we find a forerunner - John the Baptist. God, in His goodness, was not satisfied with giving the light: He announces it - by another, so as to draw men's attention. John the Baptist bears; witness to the Light, but here it is that all may believe, and not for Israel only: John the Baptist was not the Light, but he came to bear witness to Him who was. Now the true Light is He who, coming into the world, is light for every man, Pharisee or sinner, Jew or Gentile. He is the Light, who, come from on high, is such for every one, whether He be rejected or received: for a Simon or a Herod, for Nathanael or for Caiaphas. He is the expression of God, and of the mind of God for every man, whatever state he may be in. The subject here is not that of receiving the light into the heart. In that case it is a question of the state of him who receives; here, of the fact of the appearing of the Light in this world. It was in the world in the Person of the Saviour; the world was made by Him; but when He was in the world, the world did not know Him; He came to His own, the Jews, He who was their Jehovah and their Messiah, and His own received Him not (v. 9 - 11).

134 This is the result of the manifestation of the Light in the midst of men, historically - incapacity to understand it, and rejection when it was directly addressed to those who had already been in relation to it by promises and prophecies, and who had received the law from it, the rule of human life - though always remaining Light. Some, however, received it; and to those He gave the right to take the place of children of God, not that there were some of a better quality, or of a will less perverse than the others; no, they were born again, born of God; "born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." The exterior revelation of the light in the Word was accompanied by a quickening power of God, which gave it a vital reality in the soul, in forming the incorruptible seed of God. As life, Christ was there. The man was born of God.

This terminates the exposition of the Word as light in itself, and as revealed in the world and in the midst of His own; presented abstractedly in verses 1-5, and in verses 7-13 historically, but still in its nature as light, and not as a man; then, after all, if it were received, in what the difference consisted.

At verse 14, historical Christianity begins. Up to that, it is what Christ was, as well as what was the state of the sphere in which He was manifested. Now we have that which He became - "The Word became flesh." It was not an appearance, as in the Old Testament, but He took a tabernacle to dwell amongst us, even though it were but for a time. It was a Man in the midst of men (He will keep the tabernacle for ever); but He has lived down here full of grace and truth, love and light, adapted to the state of man down here; then we, believers, have received of His fulness and grace upon grace; in short, as the only begotten Son in the bosom of the Father, He has revealed the Father. The Word made flesh has been among us, revealing the glory of an only-begotten Son with His Father, full of grace and truth: we have all received of His fulness: then He has revealed the Father. He was the Son in manifestation, Man in the midst of men, the Word, which was God, made flesh. In Him grace and truth came into the world; He is a full source of grace for us, from which we have all received abundance of grace, and He has also revealed the Father.* This is the second part of our chapter, the history of the Person of the Christ. To this also John bears witness: he was not the Christ, but His forerunner, the voice that cries in the wilderness, and who, in calling to repentance, prepares the way of the Lord.

{*Compare 1 John 4: 12, where the difficulty, that "No one hath seen God at any time," is resolved in another way; this comparison furnishes the most profound instruction as to the Christian state.}

135 This introduces a third point. Whilst announcing His Person, he who presents Him hides himself; he is neither the Christ, nor the prophet promised by Moses, nor Elias, promised by Malachi, but only according to Isaiah's word, the voice to announce another, whom the Pharisees did not know, He who was coming after him, but who was preferred before him, the latchet of whose shoe he was not worthy to unloose. This is turned into personal testimony when Jesus appears before John the next day. (Verse 29, and following.) John designates Him here, not as the Messiah, but in connection with His work, of which there are two parts: He takes away sin, and He baptises with the Holy Ghost.

Jesus is "the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world." Sin must be taken away from before God. The time will come when there will be no more sin before the eyes of God, nor before ours, a time of eternal repose for God and for our hearts. What a true rest, and how blessed for the heart! There has been a paradise of innocence, which depended upon the creature's faithfulness, a state of innocence uncertain, and at once lost: there has been a world of sin, where nevertheless God has been acting in grace: there will be a world of new heavens and a new earth, where righteousness will dwell, a state of things which cannot be shaken, morally immutable, for the value of Christ's work remains always the same. This will not be a state of innocence where all depended upon obedience put to the test, and in which man failed, but a happiness where obedience was perfectly tested, and accomplished. Righteousness ensures the stability of this state of things, for God cannot slight the perfection of the work of Christ, for His glory. Also there will be nothing there but holiness. All there will glorify God in all that He is; nothing will be contrary to His nature. Sin will be taken away from before God in the new heavens and the new earth. Jesus is the One who takes it away: the work is done, the result is not yet produced. The passage does not say, "The Lamb of God who hath taken away," nor, "who will take away" - it presents the character of Him who was there before the eyes of John the Baptist, He who was doing the thing. The passage does not treat of the guilt in which we are (a most important subject in its place), that is evident, but of a state of things before God. John takes things habitually thus in their great principles. It is God who has appeared, and all is judged according to the light of His presence. His holiness demands - yea, His majesty, inasmuch as He is holy - that sin be taken away from before His eyes. He who accomplished the work, who was doing it, was now there. present upon the earth. He was "the Lamb of God," the Lamb who suited perfectly the glory of God, the Lamb that God alone could have provided for Himself, who was able to establish His glory, His highest glory, there where sin was found; the Lamb who could give Himself freely for this glory, and to accomplish thus a work which should be the moral foundation (its value being immutable, and subsisting without the possibility of change, for the work was always itself) of an eternal blessing, according to God, and before Him.

136 The cross is the basis of this blessing. All the moral elements of good and evil have been clearly brought to light, and have been shewn each in its proper place, and Christ is at God's right hand, as Man, in the divine glory, in virtue of having resolved every question that was thus raised. There could have been seen, man in his absolute hatred of good, of God Himself manifested in goodness, and that for him, "they have both seen and hated both me and my Father" - all Satan's power, "the prince of this world cometh"; "it is your hour, and the power of darkness" - man in his absolute perfection in Christ; "but that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father hath commanded me, so I do"; and that when both had been tested in the most absolute manner - then God, in His righteousness against sin, as nowhere else: sin in us, but God in His infinite love to the sinner. Thus man, in the Person of the Son of God, has entered into quite a new position, in the glory, beyond the reach of sin, death, the power of Satan, and the judgment of God after having passed through it - man, according to the counsels of God, putting the most positive seal upon the responsibility of man as a creature, meeting the consequences of this responsibility, and glorifying God in such a way as to obtain for man, from the love and the righteousness of God, a place which should be the eternal glorifying of God in His sovereign counsels and in His glory, the glorifying of Him who introduced man there to be the vessel of it, whilst, at the same time, the order of creation should subsist in result before God in a state where He would find the repose of His nature, and where Christ, the glorified Man, should be the centre of all God's ways in their blessed result.

137 The Saviour was to do yet another thing; that is, to baptise with the Holy Ghost. This is introduced by one of the most interesting and touching facts: Jesus receives the Holy Ghost as Man, and the scripture employs the same words as to Him as when it speaks of us: "Jesus of Nazareth . . . whom God anointed with the Holy Spirit, and with power"; and the Lord Himself said, "Him hath God the Father sealed." Jesus has been sealed as Son, Man down here, in virtue of His own perfection, and His own relationship with the Father as Son; we are sealed, being sons by faith in Him (Gal. 3: 26; ch. 4: 6), in virtue of the redemption that He has accomplished. We, consequently, could not be sealed before He had taken His place as Man on high - witnesses at the same time of the efficacy of redemption, and of that which redemption has acquired for us. "Except a grain of wheat fall into the ground, and die, it remaineth alone; but if it die, it beareth much fruit." Thus we read (John 7: 39), "The Spirit was not yet [that is, not yet on earth in believers], because Jesus was not yet glorified." It was the witness that He was the Son personally. Now that redemption is accomplished, and that Jesus is glorified, after its accomplishment, the Holy Ghost is given to us who believe in Jesus.

Thus also, although the result of the sacrifice of Christ, taking away the sin of the world, be not yet brought out, we know that that which forms the basis of this blessed result is accomplished, and we enjoy its efficacy in the perfect purification of our conscience, and in the glorious hope of being with Christ, like Him in heaven, the Holy Ghost assuring us of one of these things, in being the earnest of the other. Christ baptises (or rather now we say has baptised) His own with the Holy Ghost, giving us the consciousness of being sons in full liberty before the Father, who hath sealed Him as being personally the Son of God, perfect in everything. It was this sign given to John the Baptist, that opened his mouth to bear witness that Jesus was the Son of God. John saw clearly that Jesus was a glorious Person, whose shoe-latchet he was not worthy to unloose, and he felt that it was not his place to baptise this Person. But the descent of the Spirit upon Jesus is the clear, heavenly testimony, shewing who Jesus was, as to His Person, as Son of God: John saw and bore witness that He was the Son of God Himself in this world. It is very precious for us (although in our case it is no question of our persons, but of sovereign grace) to think that, if ascended into glory He has baptised us with the Holy Ghost (the witness that we are sons and giving us the consciousness of it), He the eternal Son received Himself first of all as Man down here this same testimony. the seal and unction of the Spirit, which enables us to cry, "Abba, Father!" It is the foretaste of that truth, that He which sanctifieth, and they who are sanctified, are all of one; Heb. 2: 11.

138 But if down here, a divine testimony has been given that Jesus was the Son of God, His title as Lamb of God is that which characterises Him. John the Baptist's heart recognised Him already as such, for the witness he bears here is not a testimony borne in his preaching. He saw Jesus walking before him, and his heart, full of the deep truth, exclaims, "Behold the Lamb of God!" He had already announced Him in that character, and no one had followed Jesus; but now that which came from his heart in grace attracted hearts; two of John's disciples hear him, and follow the Lord. Thus Jesus begins to gather His disciples. He accepts the position of the centre of gathering. The two disciples had received the word of God from the mouth of John the Baptist; but neither John, nor any one of the prophets, had ever taken the place of being a centre, around which those who received God's word assembled; now there was One in the world around whom they could thus gather; it was "the Lamb of God." Jesus, seeing the two disciples following Him, said to them, "Whom seek ye?" They said to Him, "Rabbi, where dwellest thou?" He answered, "Come and see."

139 This is an important principle and fact; there was not only upon earth a testimony but a Person who was a gathering-point for those who received God's word, and this from God Himself. This was the fruit of John the Baptist's testimony. Andrew, one of John's two disciples, finds Simon, his own brother, and announces to him that they had found, not the Lamb of God, but the Christ. The testimony which we receive, always attaches itself to that which is already in the heart; it does not go beyond that which adapts itself to what is there. If all God's love in Christ is preached, if work is done in the soul, this will produce a conviction of sin, perhaps even to make us nearly despair of salvation. "The Lamb of God" goes infinitely further than "the Messiah"; but these sincere souls that we see here, and who had received the word of God in their heart, had found "the Messiah," v. 42. Andrew brings Simon to Jesus, who calls him Cephas, otherwise Peter. The right of giving names is the expression of sovereignty, as we constantly find in the word; only Christ gives the names with a divine knowledge of the persons. He appropriated to Himself supreme authority, but with the competency of a divine Person. Never would John the Baptist have given names to his disciples in this way.

But although Jesus was the centre that gathered those who received the testimony of God, He was come to bear witness to the truth, and in carrying out this work He had nowhere to lay His head. He begins this active service in verse 43: He would go into Galilee, where His testimony was to be borne amongst the poor of the flock, and He finds Philip Himself. This is the second character of testimony. The first was John, and that which followed; here it is Christ, and it is a question of following Him, Him who was a pilgrim and stranger in this world. Christ thus appears also in another character; up to this time we have seen Him as centre, He received believers, and surrounded Himself with them there, where He dwelt; here they must follow Him, where He was a pilgrim - a second testimony of all-importance.

As the object of John the Baptist's testimony, Jesus was the centre, and He is always; but, in fact in His own testimony down here, He was a stranger, and had nowhere to lay His head; He began at the manger, and ended at the cross. All His life was the life of One who was a stranger down here, who walked in the world to bear witness in it to God in grace, but in following a path which no vulture's eye hath seen. The two characters of testimony bring out into bold relief, the state of the world, on the one hand; and on the other, that which Jesus was doing there. Why have in this world a centre of gathering, on the part of God, if it be not that the world, and even God's people according to the flesh, had entirely got away from God, and that it needed some one to draw souls out of this state by the revelation of God in the midst of this world? And now, again, the principle is the same, only the blessed Centre is in heaven: He gave Himself for our sins, to take us out of this present evil age. Then, why follow Jesus, to be a pilgrim as Jesus always was down here? Adam was not a pilgrim in paradise; we shall not be pilgrims in heaven: there was no need of a road in the one, and we shall find none in the other, as if we wished to get out of it. It was the sabbath of God below; it is the eternal rest of God on high; one will not go out of it; there was no need, and there will be no need, in the one, or in the other, of a path where some one is to be followed. Here it is not so; neither the rest of God, nor the rest of man, is to be found upon the earth, and what we want is a path across the desert. There is only one which is sure, and One alone could trace it; and faith alone discerns it; it is Jesus who says, "Follow me." We need a path, and the path is found. Philip also was of Galilee. God's work was not built upon Jerusalem, the old centre according to the flesh; but the basis, the path, and the centre, is the Son of God, the revelation of God Himself in the world, Himself the First of all, the despised and rejected of men, but the image of the invisible God.

140 Philip finds Nathanael, an Israelite, full of prejudices, but a guileless heart, for the Lord found under the fig-tree even, men of this stamp, attached to Judaism - a remnant whose heart was opened to the truth, faithful men, who waited for the redemption of Israel. Nathanael did not think that anything good could come out of Nazareth, that place which, far from being the Jerusalem of promise, was one of the most despised and disreputable places. But it was to Jesus that one must come, it was to His Person that souls were invited to come: "Come and see"! The Lord shews His perfect knowledge of what was passing in Nathanael, declaring him to be without guile, and shewing this knowledge in a way to penetrate his heart. Nathanael recognises Him, according to Psalm 2, as King of Israel and Son of God. In His answer, the Lord recognises Nathanael's faith, founded upon what He had told him of himself, and He announces to him His own glory, according to Psalm 8, the glory which belonged to a rejected Messiah; for in Psalm 2 the Messiah is rejected, in a passage quoted by Peter to this effect, the psalm announcing that God would establish His anointed King over Israel, notwithstanding His rejection. But after the prophetic recital of the sufferings of the remnant in Psalms 3-7, Psalm 8 announces God's counsels as to man in the Person of the Son of man. This guileless man, who is here presented to us under the fig-tree, becomes thus the occasion of the revelation of the Messiah in His connection with Israel, then of the revelation of His glory as the Son of man, whom all the highest creatures should serve, and who should be their object as the means of established relationship between the heavens and the earth.

141 We should notice that it is here, as we have observed, the second day of testimony; the first being found in verse 35, the second in verse 43. It is not the history of the Gospel, but the testimony borne to Jesus by John the Baptist first of all, and then the testimony borne by Himself. In the first case He takes John the Baptist's place; in the second, it is the manifestation of Himself, a testimony which goes on from His service on earth until the accomplishment of Psalm 8. Looked at already as rejected of the Jews, and unknown to the world (chap. 1: 10, 11), He takes, from this time, the title of Son of man, the title by which He constantly calls Himself, although He could not take the position itself until He had passed through death. These are the two days of testimony borne to Christ as having come into this world, which are developed in the supremacy which He possesses over all things, presented here in its nature only. For the rest, the heavenly position of the Lord is hardly the subject of the teaching of John's Gospel: allusion is made to it, indeed, but that is all.

John 2

That which follows, in chapter 2, reveals in principle what will happen when the Lord takes His place of authority over the Jews; the wine of gladness of the wedding will take the place of the water of purification, and Christ will purify His Father's house by judgment. But it will be a risen Christ who will accomplish these things. It is the resurrection that is presented to us, the fact of having left all His relationships with the world, and with His people down here according to the flesh, and of having placed man in quite a new position, the position which bears witness to His rights to execute the judgment of God. But notice, He was already the true temple. Jehovah was no longer really in the temple at Jerusalem, although that temple was owned as an outward thing by the Lord Himself until judgment was executed: only, at the time of His death, He no longer calls it His Father's house, but their house. God, in fact, was in Him; His body was the true temple.

142 These words of the Lord terminate this presentation of His Person, and of the position that He took in this world until the end, shewing us at the same time that it was in resurrection that His glory should be accomplished. He declares also here that He would raise Himself up; He had, therefore, perfect right to judge the corrupt and defiled temple.

What follows speaks of the relationship of the Lord with others; the subject begins from verse 22. It is a question of man's state, and of the work that God was doing in him, and for him. The great principle that all blessing belongs to the resurrection-state, or is based upon it, man in his natural state being left completely behind, recurs constantly in John, as one may see in chapters 5, 6, and indeed all through the Gospel. We have then, here, the two great foundations of Christianity, as far as our state is concerned; that is, the new birth and the cross, both being absolutely necessary for our salvation; but the second going further than that which was necessary, according to the nature even of God, and introducing us into heavenly things.

To have a part in the kingdom, one must have an entirely new life. Even faith in Jesus, as founded upon a demonstration which could be addressed to human intelligence, was worth nothing. Men might be truly convinced (there were such at that time, and there are still such), whether by education, or by the exercise of their mind, but in order to be in relationship with God, there must be a new nature - a nature which can know Him, and which answers to His own. Many believed in Jesus when they saw the miracles that He did (v. 23); they concluded, like Nicodemus, that a man could not do what Jesus was doing, if He were not what He pretended to be. The conclusion was perfectly right. Passions to be overcome, prejudices to be laid aside, or interests hard to sacrifice were not concerned in the question. Man's reason judged rightly enough of the proofs given, the rest of his nature was not aroused. But the Lord knew man; He knew, with divine intelligence, what was in him. There was no lack of sincerity, perhaps, but what there was with these men was but a conclusion, a human conviction, which had no power over man's will, nor against his passions, nor against the wiles of the prince of this world. "Jesus did not trust himself to them." There must be a divine work, and a divine nature, to enjoy divine communion, and to walk in the divine path across the world. That which follows is very distinct.

143 John 3

Nicodemus comes to Jesus with the declaration of the same principle which had produced the conviction of those in whom Jesus had no confidence - the miracles were to him a demonstration that Jesus was a teacher sent from God. I even think that the others went further than Nicodemus; it is said they believed in His name (chap. 2: 23). As to Nicodemus, he was convinced that Christ's teaching must have God for its source, thus he was disposed to listen. The belief of the former did not produce any need in their souls; in this case conviction may go as far as you like, without the soul's being troubled, or any effect whatever being produced: it costs nothing - we often see this.

But in Nicodemus's case there was more, and it was a proof of the action of God; there was with him a need. The Holy Spirit of God always acts thus, even in the Christian. This feeling of need which He begets produces activity in the soul; this is what had happened to Nicodemus. More, when the Spirit of God acts in a soul, the word of God asserts its authority over it, and creates the desire to hear that word; this never fails. There are so many unsatisfied desires in the soul, that when it is awakened, the need to know what God has said is produced in it. The soul has the consciousness of having to do with Him, and the need of knowing what He has said becomes the spring of its activity, and characterises it. It is not the reception of a system of doctrine, or of dogmas about a divine Person; it is the soul that hungers and thirst for what God has said; ignorant of everything but its need, it wishes to receive. It is a good thing for the soul to trust in God's word, in the source of truth (this is already implicit faith), without the truth being, as yet, communicated in fact; for it listens with confidence. Nicodemus was in this state; the Samaritan woman also, but, in her case the conscience was more in question; so also with the twelve; when several of His disciples abandoned Jesus, they would not leave Him, for He had the words of eternal life. When God acts, the link between God and the conscience and soul is not broken; I am not speaking of union, but of a moral work in the heart. But notice, as soon as ever the need is produced in Nicodemus's heart, he feels instinctively that the world, and the religious authorities - the worst part of the world - will be against him. There is fear; Nicodemus comes to Jesus by night. Poor human nature! If a soul puts itself in relationship with God, in recognising His word, the world will not stand it. We know this. But Nicodemus's faith did not go farther than to recognise the authority of the Saviour's word as a word which came from God, grace having produced in his heart the need of these communications from God.

144 It is a great thing to have a real need, feeble though it be morally; for here, in Nicodemus's case, there was little need in the conscience, and no knowledge of himself. He was cleaving to religious hopes, to doctrines, and a revelation given from God; he was seeking instruction from Jesus, but he had his part in the general conviction that the miracles of Jesus produced - a conviction strengthened by uprightness, and by personal need; Jesus was a teacher sent from God. But Jesus stops Nicodemus short; the resurrection and kingdom were not come, but in order to receive the revelation which had been given of it, there must be a divine operation, a new nature; it was necessary to partake of an entirely new life. The kingdom was not coming in a way to attract attention, but the King, with all the perfection that belonged to Him, was there present, and consequently the kingdom itself, presented in His Person; only this kingdom, not being revealed in power, the rejection of the King caused by the very perfection of His Person, as well as the work accomplished in His rejection, introduced a heavenly inheritance. Further this work, and this rejection, brought those who should be identified with a rejected Christ into those courts above where God displayed His glory, and this is far higher than the glory of the Messiah, if it had been then accomplished. It was already the dawn of the accomplishment of the counsels of God not yet revealed.

145 Two things are presented to us in the first half of the chapter before us: first of all, the kingdom, and what is needed to have part in it, and, in measure, the earthly things, and what is necessary to enjoy them with God, but also the kingdom, as it was then presented in its moral character. Then, secondly, heaven, eternal life, that which is essential to our most real and intimate relationship with God, namely, the possession of eternal life before Him, in contrast with the thought of perishing. Here it is no question of the kingdom, it is eternal life, such as Jesus, come from heaven, could reveal it to us. But this supposes the cross: it is no question of Messiah, but of the Son of man, and of the love which God has had for the world, not of His intentions with regard to the kingdom, and the promises connected with this kingdom, but of plans far more vast and exalted, heavenly in their character, in which God reveals what He is; and Jesus, rejected as Messiah, dies, and enters into glory as the Son of man who has suffered. No doubt this new birth is in any case necessary, subjectively, even that we may see the kingdom, and enjoy it, much more, that we may enjoy heavenly things in the presence of God. But as the passage speaks of the new birth, it does not treat of the heavenly glory; for this the cross must be brought in also. However it is Well to remark that this whole passage, in its two parts, supposes the new order of things, where grace was acting, and that not limited to the Jews. It was an entirely new thing that was being brought in; the kingdom was not established in glory, but founded and received in the Person of the King, demanding a new nature to see it, and extending itself to every one whom grace could reach. It was morally and subjectively, the new thing; only in the first part, we have neither heavenly things, nor eternal life; in the second, we have not the kingdom.

The first thing the Lord does in stopping Nicodemus short - who only spoke of being instructed in the state in which he was, he, a child of the kingdom according to the flesh - is to tell him that it was not a question of that, but that he must be born entirely anew. We will look into the details in a moment; it is, however, important, first of all, to seize, that the Lord speaks of the two characters of blessing, that is, of the heavenly glory, and of the kingdom according to promise, but that He speaks of them according to the aspects they presented at that very time. We may say that He presents them, with regard to His Person in their spiritual character; on the one hand, the King despised, and that which was heavenly meeting with the cross in His Person; but, on the other hand, the new birth and life-giving power, the Son of man, the love of God, and consequently what concerned the world and man, not only dispensations and the Jews. For, faithful though God be to His promises, He cannot, when He reveals Himself, confine Himself to the Jews.

146 First of all then, the kingdom was being revealed in a way which did not attract attention, not by a power that should rule over the world, nor by its outward glory; a new nature was needed to perceive it. The King was there, and He gave proofs of a divine mission and of the presence of Him who was to come, but in humiliation; to the natural eye He was the carpenter's son. Nicodemus reasoned well in saying, in verse 2, "We know . . . for no one can do the miracles which thou doest, unless God be with him"; but God had His, "Except a man be born again" - born entirely anew. This life is a beginning again of life, of a new source, and of a new nature - a life that came from God. But Nicodemus still remained within the bounds and limits of the flesh, of the natural man. They are the limits of what man is, of his intelligence. Man cannot be more than he is; he cannot get beyond his nature. But the class of infidels who boast of having made this immense discovery, shew, on the one hand, the limit of the human understanding, so that they can discern nothing beyond what man is; and, on the other hand, the absence of solid reasoning in themselves; for, from what they have discovered, there is no proof that a more powerful Being cannot introduce something new. Their wisdom is a self-evident fact; man by himself cannot see beyond that which is in himself; their conclusion is absolutely without force. By their principle they can conclude nothing beyond the limits of humanity; but the limits of active power are not necessarily those of receptivity. Let us return to our chapter, and seek to listen to and understand the Saviour's words better than Nicodemus.

147 Nicodemus, as we have said, confines himself to the experience of what happens in man; Christ revealed that which was being accomplished on God's part - the key of all the Lord's history. He had spoken of that which was necessary to see, to discern the kingdom: one must be born of water and of the Spirit. It is the kingdom of God, in whatever state it may be, and one must be made meet for this kingdom, must have a nature fit to take part in it. Two things are found here, water and the Spirit - a nature thus characterised, morally and in its source. Water as a figure, is always the word applied by the Spirit; it brings the thoughts of God heavenly, divine, but adapted to man; it judges what is found in him, but it brings in these divine thoughts, and so purifies the heart. For water purifies what exists; but also it is the new man who drinks it, and this is not separated from that which is entirely new. "That which is born of the Spirit, is spirit," partakes of the nature of that of which it is born; this is, in truth, the new nature. The practical purification of our thoughts and hearts, of which we have spoken, is indeed the effect of that which this nature receives, of things for which the flesh has no desire. We could not say, "That which is born of water, is water." Water purifies that which exists; but we receive a new life, which is really Christ Himself in power of life in us, that which Adam innocent had not. We partake of the divine nature, as Peter expresses it; and where this expression is found, in the Second Epistle of Peter, it is connected with birth by water; we escape the corruption that is in the world by lust.

It is thus only that we enter the kingdom. The kingdom of God is more than a paradise for man, it is what is fitting for God, and it is necessary that we should have a nature that answers to it. Adam, in his state of innocence, had not this, his level was man, as God had created him. For the kingdom of God, he who finds himself there, must have that which - in man however - is suitable to God Himself. Notice, that the Lord goes outside all questions of dispensations, He has in view the moral nature, that which is born of the flesh, is flesh, has that nature; that which is born of the Spirit is spirit, that is to say, corresponds to the divine nature, which is its source. But then it could not be a question only of the Jews; if any one had this nature, he was fit for the kingdom. It was not a question of a people already chosen of God, but of a nature suitable to God.

148 Two things are brought to light when these principles have been laid down; first of all, the necessity of this new birth, in order to enjoy the promises made to the Jews for the earth; and secondly, that this work was of God, who communicated this new nature. God could communicate it by His Spirit to whom He would, and this opened the door to the Gentiles. Nicodemus, Jesus told him, ought not to have been astonished at the Saviour saying that the Jews must be born again; the prophets had announced this (see Ezek. 36: 24-28), and Nicodemus, as a master or teacher in Israel, ought to have known it. The wind, too, blew where it listed (v. 8); so was the operation of the Spirit. It was a work of God, and thus could be accomplished in any one.

There were still the heavenly things. Now if Nicodemus did not understand these earthly things of Israel's blessing, how would he understand if the Lord spoke to him of heavenly things? Now no one had ascended to heaven, so as to be able to bring word of what was there, and of what was necessary to be able to enjoy it, save He who had descended thence, who spoke of what He knew, and bore witness to what He had seen; not the Messiah - that had to do with the earth - but the Son of man, who, as to His divine nature, was in heaven.

Thus we have a revelation of heavenly things brought directly from heaven by Christ, and in His Person. He revealed them in all their freshness, a freshness which was found in Him, and which He, who was ever in heaven, enjoyed; He revealed them in the perfection of the Person of Him, who made the glory of heaven, whose nature is the atmosphere which all those who are found there breathe, and by which they live; He, the object of the affections which animate this holy place from the Father Himself down to the last of the angels who fill heaven's courts with their praises, He the centre of all the glory. Such is the Son of man, He who came down to reveal the Father - truth and grace - but who divinely remained in heaven in the essence of His divine nature, in His Person inseparable from the humanity with which He was clothed! The deity which filled this humanity was inseparable in His Person from all the divine perfection, but He never ceased to be man, really and truly man before God.

149 But we have another truth here: the Son of man was to re-enter heaven as Man, to be Head over all things. As Son of God He has been appointed Heir (Heb. 1); He is such as Creator (Col. 1), but also as Man and Son of man, according to God's counsels. (Psalm 8, quoted in Ephesians 1, in 1 Corinthians 15, in Hebrews 2 - passages which develop clearly His place in this respect.) Proverbs 8 teaches us that He who was Jehovah's delight before the foundation of the world, rejoiced then in the habitable parts of the earth, and His delights were in the sons of men. The angels (Luke 2) recall this truth, or rather the proofs which His incarnation gave of the thoughts of God in this respect; they speak of this incarnation as the manifestation of God's good pleasure in men. As then He has been the manifestation of God upon earth, He enters as Man into the glory of God on high. He will reign over the earth as Head of the creation, gathering together all things under His authority* (Col. 1); but here we speak of heavenly things. The Son of man takes His place on high to be Head over all things (1 Peter 3: 22; John 13: 3; ch. 16: 15). Man, in His Person, has entered heaven, into the presence of God Himself, without a veil, and all things are to be subjected under His feet. But will they be so, such as they are, and men who are to be His joint-heirs, will they be so, such as they are in sin, enemies of God by their wicked works? It is impossible. Another fundamental thing is necessary, redemption. Man, with a thousand times more sin than that which caused him to be driven irrevocably from the earthly paradise - man, who had gone so far as to have accumulated upon his head, the rejection of God, of grace, and of the Son of God - could not, such as he was, enter the heavenly paradise: it was impossible. If, then, Christ should as Man possess the glory which in the counsels of God was the portion of man, and if He was to have joint-heirs, and introduce them into His Father's house, He must redeem them and purify them according to the glory of God. He must also redeem creation from the yoke under which sin had placed it, and from Satan's dominion. Here it is a question only of the state of the heirs, and of their deliverance from death and condemnation. Now, when the Son of man is presented to us, His sufferings and death are constantly introduced. As Messiah He was rejected upon earth by His people; but the only result of this was His passing into the wider sphere of Son of man, Head of the entire creation, and Head, in a special way, of those whom He is not ashamed to call His brethren. But for this, redemption was needed; we learn this in Matthew 16: 20, 21, and more definitely in Mark 8: 29-31, and Luke 9: 20-22, with the consequences which result from it for us. In John's Gospel too, before He leaves the world, the Father would have a testimony borne to the titles of glory of Jesus. As Son of God, He was glorified by the resurrection of Lazarus; as Son of David, by His entry into Jerusalem on the ass's colt; finally, the Greeks, who had come up to worship at Jerusalem, having sought the disciples in their desire to see Jesus, and the disciples having communicated this to Him, the Lord says, "The hour is come that the Son of man should be glorified. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit," John 12: 23, 24.

{*As to the earth, see Psalm 80: 17, where it is in relation with Israel.}

150 Thus, in all the Gospels, we find the Messiah giving place to the Son of man, but in each case the Son of man passing through death, in order to enter into His new and universal position of glory. He might have had twelve legions of angels, but then God's counsels, as revealed in the Scriptures, would not have been accomplished; Christ would have been without joint-heirs.

We have already remarked, and we recall the reader's attention to it, that in this chapter, the presentation whether it be of life, or of the work which procures it for us, is given in connection with its present and personal application; it is a presentation of what these two things are in their nature, not as to the extent of their result, but in their application to us as a means of having part whether in the kingdom, or in heavenly things. The lifting-up of the Son of man on the cross corresponds down here, both on the side of our need, and that of God, to the revelation of the heavenly things which the Son brought down - to that which is found in heaven. It is a question of being before God when He is fully revealed, not only when the Messiah promised to the Jews had been rejected (so that the right to the accomplishment of the promises was lost for those who possessed this right, after that the law had been broken), but when man's hatred against God - against a God revealed in goodness - had been clearly manifested. It was no longer merely sins, and the violation of the law, it was the rejection of grace, when sins and the violation of the law were already there. Man would not have God at any price (see John 15: 22-24); how could he have part with Christ in God's presence, a part in heavenly glory? Still, the sin of man has not brought the grace of God to nought. But if, as Son of man, Christ had undertaken man's cause, He must undergo the consequences of this, since He had become responsible for it before God; Heb. 2: 10. In order that we might have part in the heavenly things, it was necessary that the Son of man should be lifted up,* and that according to God's glory, in connection with that which had so much dishonoured Him; now it is, as made sin, Christ accomplished this, Himself also bearing our sins. Far from God, we must have perished in our sins; He came forward for us, receiving all, as Man, from the hand of His Father, and obeying Him ever; He took the form of a servant in a nature which He will never leave, and in this nature He has become, by right, according to the righteousness and according to the counsels of God, Lord of all things; He whom no one knows but the Father only, but who reveals the Father to us, He who came down close to us - who has touched us, so to speak - who took our nature, though He could say, "Before Abraham was, I am." He of whom our tongues and intelligence can speak but imperfectly is the Creator of everything; but His place as Man is at the head of the creation. He it is who came to reveal heavenly things to us, and to shew their effect in His Person as Man, while living in the midst of heavenly things all the time; so that, being Man down here, He should reveal them in all their freshness, adapted at the same time to man, so that he should live by them, and enter in spirit with Him there, where that was which He revealed, and later on should enter there glorified and like Him.

{*The final result is, that sin will be taken away from heaven and earth, as we have already remarked. Three other motives are given in Hebrews 2 for the sufferings of Christ. (See verse 9.) The destruction of Satan's power; the expiation of sins; the ability to sympathise with us.}

151 The Son of man is then the One who, as Man, is to be Head over all things in heaven and earth, according to God's counsels. Already Messiah and Son of God when He was upon earth, and rejected as such (see Psalm 2), He must take the more extended position of Son of man, set over the works of God, all things being put under His feet; Psalm 8. We find Him also in Daniel 7, brought to the Ancient of days to receive the kingdom. The fact that He had created all things is given us in the Colossians as the motive for (in taking His place in the result of the counsels of God in His creation) being there as Firstborn, first, to bear the sorrow of it before God, to be the propitiation for our sins, and to blot them out for ever, so that we should not perish. There it was that, in an absolute manner, He who had not known sin was made sin before God, it was there that absolute obedience was perfect; "That the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father hath commanded me, even so I do." He must be lifted up, the necessity for it was weighing upon us; righteousness - the very nature of God - demanded that our sin should be put away. But the sinner could not put away his own sin; burdened as he was already with this sin, what could he do to put it away? But the Son of man, rejected by men, has been lifted up before God, to be sin, without any other thing or person - alone before God. It was no longer any question here of Jew or of promise, but of satisfying God's glory in this place; it was the last Adam, not disobedient, when he was enjoying all the blessings of God, but obedient, there, even where He was enduring - He who had dwelt eternally in the Father's love, and in holiness itself - not only the suffering of death, but that of the curse and the forsaking of God. No one could fathom such a thing; nevertheless, we can even by this recognise that the suffering was infinite, but necessary on account of what we were, if God's glory was to be guarded, and if we were to be saved. The more we see who He was, the more we feel the depth of the abyss into which He descended; but in that very thing He could say, "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again," John 10: 17. The glory of God has been manifested as it never was, and never could have been known.

152 The Son of man had to be lifted up. In taking this place (which He took for us also in grace), He was free. "Then said I, Lo, I come." His sufferings were necessary for us. Oh, solemn word! But God having been there perfectly glorified, the work in all its value being perfectly accomplished, whosoever believes shall not perish, but has everlasting life. Our lot was to perish; to have eternal life, to be with Christ, and like Christ in glory, is the effect of the sufferings, of the work of the Saviour for all who believe. This is one side of the truth: as Son of man Jesus went to meet the judgment which was about to fall upon us. The Son of man must be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. He that believes does not perish; but, much more, he possesses eternal life, now as life, soon as heavenly glory with Christ. Lifted up from the earth, Jesus draws all men unto Him. A living Messiah was for the lost sheep of the house of Israel; in the Son of man lifted up upon the cross, it is no longer a question of the promises, but of an accomplished work, available in God's sight for all those that believe. For God so loved the world, that He gave His Son; this is the source of all. Here the end is the same; "that whosoever believeth in him, should not perish, but have everlasting life." These are two aspects of the same Person; Son of man down here, but at the same time Son of God. God hath not spared His own Son. But it is a principle, a fact of all importance. The must of verses 14, 15, although it flows from God's very nature, and from man's state, bears the character of a requirement on God's part: it clothes God in our mind with the character of a judge. There is, doubtless, much more: God's holiness, His glory, that which becomes Him (Heb. 2: 10), are to be found here too; but the thought of a judge is in effect connected with culpability. Now all this gives still a very imperfect idea of the truth. The work bears this character; it is a propitiation; without it we should perish, shut out from God's presence; one would perish necessarily, if this work were not accomplished, on man's side, by man. But where could be found one who could accomplish it? It must: Jesus could say this, for He came from heaven. God is not named in the passage, for Jesus speaks of the necessity in which man was, if he would enter into heaven. But God is sovereign, and God is love. Divine love is sovereign; it is above evil, although it rejects it by the necessity of its nature, and judges it with the authority of its righteousness. God is love; this is the sovereign liberty of His nature. This is why, according to Ephesians 5, we ought to walk in love; but we are not love, we are light. God is love and light. Well, then, it is in this sovereign liberty that God so loved the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son (He who, in consequence, became the Son of man), so that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life (v. 16).

154 It is of all importance to understand this well, otherwise God must always bear for the heart the character of judge - a satisfied judge, it may be - and He who is love is not known; God is not known. As to that which relates to us, we have made Him a Judge in falling into sin; but in His supreme nature, God has risen above everything, and the result for us is a blessing answering to this supreme nature, a blessing infinitely higher than the blessing which we should enjoy as perfect creatures, a blessing given to us in His Son Jesus, as only-begotten Son of the Father. It is not, the Father so loved the world; it is, God as God, and we know Him as Father as a consequence of this grace. But He has revealed Himself, in this grace towards us.

What immense grace to be able to say, I know God; and again, I am known of Him: I know Him, Himself; not only, I am saved, however precious it may be to be able to say that, but, I know the One who has saved me! The thought of this salvation comes from Him; it is the revelation of what He is, even for the angels. His love is the source of it; His nature, the depth of His heart, is revealed in it; His glory and His own nature are revealed in it. Son of God, Son of man, Jesus meets man's need, and reveals what God is. He who hath seen Him, hath seen the Father. Blessed be God! we know Him.

The purpose and consequences of His coming are then established. God has not sent His Son into the world to judge the world - He will come back in glory to do this - but that the world might be saved through Him (v. 17). The world has rejected the Son of God, but such a manifestation of God in the Word made flesh, and such an accomplishment of the work which glorifies God, bear their consequences, and bear them necessarily. He who believeth in Him is not judged. All that concerned God's glory as to man's sin has been accomplished; the righteousness of God, His love, His holiness, His majesty - all that He is, has been clearly brought out, and that in the judgment which fell upon Christ, made sin for us, and bearing our sins in His body upon the tree. Thus the whole question of responsibility and the glory of God as to the believer is resolved and settled; there can be now no judgment for him, otherwise all would not be settled; it would be a denial of the efficacy of Christ's work. The soul would be placed upon another ground; a ground necessarily false if that of Christ be true, for nothing and no one can be what He has been.

155 He, then, that believes in Him shall not be judged, as it is said also in chapter 5 of this same Gospel. He who believes has everlasting life, and he shall not come into judgment. But he that believes not in Him is judged already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God. The presentation of the Son of God, of the Word of God, made flesh, had already put man to the test; the question of his state had been resolved, he rejected God in the Person of His only-begotten Son, the full Light; and God is light, as He is love. It is not here sovereign love, but conscience and responsibility. The light has been in the world, and has shone clearly; the light of men, adapted to men. They loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. Conscience feels the light, but that does not change the will; and if the will remains perverse, conscience makes divine light insupportable. The state of the will, as to God manifested down here, when conscience recognises the light, is that which forms the basis of an existing judgment, present, but final, there where Christ has been thus presented.

The end of the chapter determines the relative position of John the Baptist and of Christ. John's proper mission was an earthly one; he spoke of the Messiah to Israel, of the kingdom in connection with this people; as the immediate precursor of the Christ, the nearest of all those who, vessels of the testimony of God, had preceded him, he was, by this fact, greater than all the prophets: but he did not come up to the manifestation of that which is heavenly. Those who have believed since Christ's ascension enjoy this; the least even in the kingdom of God is greater than John. In the Person of the Christ, the Baptist glimpsed the glory which belonged to Him, and which, by grace, belongs to His own also; but the veil was not rent, and there was not a man in heaven. Personally, Jesus had brought that which was heavenly; He revealed the Father, He spoke the words of God; but the grain of wheat remained alone, redemption was not accomplished, although He who came from above was there, and spoke that which He had seen and heard in words which were the words of God. No one received His testimony.

Verse 29 is rather a figure, and the bride he speaks of is not a particular bride. If one wished to apply it, it would indicate the earthly bride.

156 This difference between the prophetic testimony, which, although divine, is an earthly testimony, and the revelation of heavenly things, of God Himself, and the portion we have in the glory, is of all importance; it corresponds to the essential difference between Christianity and all that preceded it. Man glorified in heaven, the veil rent, the Holy Ghost come down here, and dwelling in us, to put us in living and actual relationship with heavenly things - all this differs entirely from the promises, and even from the prophecies of the coming of Messiah upon earth. That which relates to the personal history of the Christ, up to His session at the right hand of God, is found as prophecy in the Old Testament; but all that the accomplishment of these things reveals to us morally of man and of God, all that is the consequence of the Holy Ghost's presence in believers down here, could not exist before Christ, as Mediator, had accomplished His work and had gone up on high. John the Baptist was evidently, of all the prophets, the nearest to these things, having seen the Saviour; still, the work was not yet accomplished, and John could not enter into the heavenly things, although he knew, as an inspired witness, that Christ had come down from heaven, and as such was above all.

Let us see how John presents the difference of which I speak. He could not do it as possessing these things, for they were not yet; but his testimony as to the rights of the Person of Christ, goes a long way in this passage, where he is speaking to his disciples. His joy was to have seen the Bridegroom, and that in the character of a friend: this is the first difference. He to whom all belonged by right was there: He had the bride, perhaps here the earthly bride, I have already spoken of it, but He was the Bridegroom. John's joy was to see Him. It was a great thing even to compare himself to Him who was come from heaven, although he accepted the disappearing of his own importance with unfeigned piety and joy, because He who eclipsed the brightness of John's testimony, by the presence of the object itself of that testimony was there. John's piety shines out in its clearest light as he thus goes into the shade, in order to exalt the One who, although unknown, was the true divine light, and who made His forerunner disappear by His divine brightness. Truth in the inner man manifested itself by the effect which the truth he announced should produce; his soul was at the height of the testimony he bore. This is much to say of a man; but this was the fair fruit of grace in this honoured witness of the Saviour.

157 The divine, heavenly Person of the Saviour is then put in contrast with the testimony of John, inspired as he was, his testimony was only a testimony, and a prophetic and earthly testimony: Christ came from heaven, and spoke of what He Himself had seen and heard, not as a prophet, whether, of future things, recalling the law of Moses, the servant of God, or of a Messiah to come, and even upon the earth; no, Jesus spoke of the actual things which existed there whence He had come. No one received His testimony, for these were heavenly things, things which existed in God's presence, of which He spoke: man did not understand them, and did not want them. But the nature of the testimony was nevertheless divine; it was no longer the Spirit "by measure," a "Thus saith the Lord," where the prophet, having finished, all was said - perfect truth, but truth limited to that which was expressed - and again, it was of earthly things, the veil not being rent. The truth itself was there, the Spirit without measure (up to that time upon Him alone), filling Him with the things that were found there whence He was. He whom God had sent always spoke the words of God Himself in all that He said, and that in a man, and by a man, but who was the Son of God, and by the Spirit without measure.

It is very possible that the last two verses of the chapter are by the evangelist, and not by John the Baptist, as it has been thought; but I see no peremptory reason why they should not be by the latter. Up to the end of verse 34, it seems clear to me that they are the words of John the Baptist; and John mingles his testimony with the things he relates, the whole being of God. The last verse might make one think that the words are those of the evangelist, as they contain a testimony so often repeated in his writings. There is also in the testimony a change analogous to what we have seen in verses 16-18 of chapter 1, as to the use of the name of God, and of that of Father. We must here notice carefully this fact, that the thing in question is not to know whether the testimony of the two verses is of God, but that it is only for our instruction, and as an interesting subject for our hearts, that we may take into account the person who was the vessel of this testimony. The Spirit of God committed the word to John the Baptist; the same Spirit directed the evangelist, whether in bringing to our memory that which John the Baptist said, or in the words which he himself pronounces. The last two verses, however, seem rather the expression of a reality that the evangelist knew and possessed by the Holy Ghost, as a present and actual thing, than a prophetic testimony, however high it might be.

158 The difference between the names of God and of Father is always distinctly maintained in John's Gospel. When it is a question of the nature, and of the acting of God according to that nature, as the origin of redemption, and of the responsibility of man, the word God is employed; when it is a question of the grace which acts in Christianity, and by Christ in us, it is the name of Father. Thus "God so loved the world"; and in chapter 4, "God is a Spirit, and they that worship him, must worship him in spirit and in truth"; but, in grace, "the Father seeketh such to worship him"; and here, "the Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hands." (Compare chapter 13: 3.) The Father has been revealed in the Son, and we have received the Spirit of adoption; the little children in Christ have known the Father. "The only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath revealed him"; and on the other side, "No one hath seen God at any time." Thus the Person of the Son come into the world, and for us, the exaltation of Jesus, after He had accomplished the work which the Father had given Him to do, then the descent of the Holy Ghost, in a word, the grace which operates in the Person, and for us, by means of the work of Jesus - there is where we find the Father revealed. Jesus revealed this name to His disciples, although they had understood nothing of it (John 17: 26); and now that the work which purifies us and justifies us has been accomplished, we have received the Spirit, by whom we cry, "Abba, Father." The name of Father is a name of relationship, revealed by the presence of Christ, and which one knows and enjoys individually by the Holy Ghost. This is what characterises Christianity, and we may say, Christ Himself. God is what God is in His nature and His authority, the name of a Being, not of a relationship, except in the rights of absolute authority that belong to Him; but of a Being who, being supreme, enters into relationship with us, in grace. We see the importance of this distinction in the words of Christ Himself. During the whole of His life He does not say, "my God," but, "my Father," even in Gethsemane; and the enjoyment of this relationship is perfect. "I am not alone, for the Father is with me." He says again, "Father," when He explains what it is for Him to drink the cup. On the cross He said, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" Made sin for us, He felt what it was to be it before God, God being what He is. After His resurrection He employs the two names of God and of Father, when He introduces His disciples into the position into which He entered, from that time forth, as Man, according to the righteousness of God. "I ascend unto my Father, and your Father, unto my God, and your God." His own were, by grace, as Himself, in their relationship with God as Father; they were, by His work, before God such as He is in His nature, and that in righteousness, according to the value of the work that He had accomplished, and according to their acceptance in His Person, well pleasing in the Beloved. But what a wonderful privilege to know what the Father's affections are set upon and to know Him who is the object of them, and who is worthy of them - who suffices for these affections! What happiness to know the Lord, for the Father wills that there where He finds His delight we should find ours. What perfect, infinite happiness!

159 Finally, all things are given to Him, and set under His feet; it is to Him they will be subjected, although they are not yet, as far as the accomplishment of God's ways are concerned (Heb. 2); but He has all power in heaven and on earth.

It is well to remark here, that it is always the Word made flesh,* He who emptied Himself, and took the form of a servant, as a man down here, who is before the eyes of John. Consequently, although the divinity, or rather the deity, of the Saviour appears on every page of the Gospel, Christ is presented to us in it as receiving everything from His Father. He is God, He is one with the Father; men should honour Him as they honour the Father; He can say, "Before Abraham was, I am"; but He never goes out of the place He has taken, and while speaking to the Father as to an equal, everything, glory, and all things, are given to Him. No one knows the Son, but it is very beautiful to see the perfect faithfulness of Jesus, in that He does not glorify Himself, but remains, without effort, in the place He has taken. Blessed be God, it is always a Man!

{*We may except the first four verses of the first chapter. Compare for what is said in the text, 1 John 1; there, too, we find again the difference between the names of God and of Father.}

160 We have already said that this third chapter lays the foundations, and does not develop the results. We find there the possession of that which enables us to enjoy these results, that is, the new birth and the cross. This is the subjective side of the thing for us. And so we find again here at the end, whosoever believes in the Son, whom the Father loves, has eternal life. (Compare 1 John 5: 11, 12.) He who does not believe on Him, who does not receive the witness He bears (compare chap. 5: 21), shall never see life, but the wrath of God abides upon him (v. 36). The Son of God, Jesus, in His Person, is the touchstone of every soul, precious to those who believe; He is it as the manifestation of God Himself, adapting Himself to man in grace. We can see here also how the change of the name of Father to that of God is found again, when the Holy Ghost passes from grace to responsibility. When the Father is brought in, it is always grace acting by the Son, and in the Son who reveals Him.

Let us notice here, that in these first three chapters we have a preface to the Gospel, before the public ministry of the Saviour. The fact is established in chapter 3: 24, compared with Matthew 4: 12, 17, and Mark 1: 14, 15. John 4 confirms this appreciation of the facts. No doubt Jesus had already taught and performed miracles, but He had not yet publicly presented Himself, so as to say, "The time is fulfilled." He announces Himself thus in Luke 4: 18 and following verses, although His preaching then in the synagogue at Nazareth was not His first, as verses 15 and 23 testify. But this preface of the first three chapters is really an introduction to the whole of Christianity, at least in its great and divine roots. It begins with what Christ was in His essential nature, and what man, alas! was also. It is not yet a question of God's acting in grace. It was the light; man was darkness; it was necessary to be born of God in order to receive Him who was it. Then we find that which He became; the Word was made flesh, and the only-begotten Son revealed God, being Himself in the bosom of the Father; it is grace in His Person. Then we have His work in all the extent of its effect, and the gift of the Holy Ghost, so that we may enjoy it now. And then the work of gathering, but this latter carried on on the side of the ways of God more upon earth, but in general according to the rights of the Person of Christ, the Jews, except the remnant, being set aside. Christ, recognised by this remnant according to Psalm 2, passes on, and presents His place, according to Psalm 8, as far as that regards His Person; after which the espousals and their joy, as well as the judgment, are brought in. But it is by resurrection, in raising Himself from the dead, in raising His own body, God's true temple, that the demonstration of His title and power will be given. That which is subjective in us, and the work for us, follows; His reception, according to human conviction, founded upon miracles, was worth nothing; it was what was in man; whilst, to see the kingdom, and to enter into it in its earthly and Jewish form, one must be born entirely anew. But there were also the heavenly things which Jesus revealed. He came from heaven, He was there - He alone could announce the heavenly things. And the natural man, too, was not fit to enter in; it needed that He who had undertaken his cause, whether for the glory of God, or for man's guilt (for the new birth does not purify the conscience), it needed that the Son of man, unless He should remain alone, should be lifted up. But then it was not merely entrance into the kingdom, and the enjoyment of the promises, which were thus found, but eternal life, that which is in Christ Himself. The blessed source of all is given to us after that; God so loved the world, that He gave His Son, that we might live eternally. Thus we find, first of all, the righteous necessity, that which the nature and rights of God over man demanded, accomplished by the Son of man, then God's infinite love revealed. The Son of God had become Son of man, but the Son of man could take this place, because He was Son of God. At the end of chapter 3 we find the testimony of John the Baptist carried to its highest point, a witness of the deep and perfect personal piety of him who bore it. Still, he was of the earth - more than a prophet, yet always earthly; of dust, and speaking as being of the earth, belonging to that which was outside the veil, not yet rent. Christ came from within the veil, and His flesh was this veil. He spoke of that which He knew thus, and no one received His testimony. John had the joy of hearing the voice of the Bridegroom; he was not that; that which he said was given of God as testimony, but the testimony being borne, all on his part was accomplished. Christ was Himself the subject of the testimony, and, more than this, the words He spoke were God's words, for God did not give the Spirit by measure. All His words were God's words; He was above all. Finally, we find still one thing remaining to complete this revelation of Christ, and of God Himself, in the great elements which were in connection with Christ's Person and our state: the Father and the Son are presented to us. This is the crowning point of all in grace; He was the satisfying object of all the Father's divine affections, He in whom the infinite and perfect love of the Father found its delight: also to Him He had given all. As Son, come down here, Jesus receives all from the Father. But the Father and the Son do not remain alone in the plenitude of their perfection; we are brought into it to enjoy it, although, in a certain sense, they remain necessarily alone in their perfection. But he who believes in the Son has eternal life already, although down here in weakness; he possesses subjectively that which, later on, will be his glory with Christ. (Compare the first verses of chapter 1.) Now this revelation of the Father in the Son became the definitive test of man: he who did not receive this testimony, who did not submit to Him by faith, should never see life, but the wrath of God abode upon him. That which refers to the Holy Ghost, whom those only who had believed in Jesus should receive, is already found in verses 32-34 of chapter 1. The development of the subject is found in the Saviour's last discourses; the history of His presence is to be found in the Acts and the Epistles, and in the consciousness of His presence which believers possess.

162 Having completed the review of the three introductory chapters, it may be well perhaps to give a kind of index of the chapters of the whole Gospel; for there is much order and system in John's writings.

The rejection of the Messiah by the Jews is already stated in chapter 1; the judgment of the people, which results from this, shews itself clearly in the course of the Gospel, and in many of the chapters. The doctrine of each chapter is often in contrast with Jewish things, this contrast furnishing the occasion and basis of the doctrine. Another characteristic feature flows from it; the judgment bears on all the world (chap. 1) that had not known Him, and upon His own, the Jews, who had not received Him; it opens the way for the establishing and development of sovereign grace which alone produces the divine life in us. This implies the admission of the Gentiles into the enjoyment of the blessings of grace, and then the important fact that these blessings would be found in a world, and also in a state, altogether new, into which one enters by the resurrection. In the synoptical Gospels Christ is presented in His three characters of Jesus Emmanuel, the Messiah; of Prophet; and of Son of man; His history being traced in these three points of view, with the account of His rejection and death. In John, who shews us God manifest in flesh, His rejection is established at the beginning; for, being light, the darkness did not receive Him. The result is, that, unlike the three other Gospels, where Christ is presented historically to be received, and where His rejection is recounted to us, but in connection with man's responsibility, John though he affirms this responsibility as doctrine, presents to us the sovereign grace which, we have already seen, sought His sheep among Jews and among Gentiles, for life eternal. Finally, we must not let pass without notice, the feature, that in John all is individual; he never speaks of the church.

On the Gospel of John

J. N. Darby.

<33014E> 163 {file section b.}

John 4

After the introductory chapters, the Gospel of John begins by shewing us Jesus leaving Judea, and quitting the Jewish capital, the centre of the throne of God on the earth, the ancient seat of Him who, now come down in grace, could not find where to lay His head in an adverse world. The jealousy of the Pharisees gave occasion to the departure of Jesus. But here already we can perceive that the Lord, having the consciousness of an origin and of a purpose which went beyond all the thoughts even of those who had received Him, does not act to gather together those who received His word, according to the thoughts of the disciples who surrounded Him with affection: Jesus Himself baptised not, but His disciples. The Word made flesh, Son of God, Saviour of the world, Redeemer, Son of man, He could not baptise in order to attach them to Himself as Messiah, although He was the Messiah; for He knew too well His rejection, and, as Peter expresses it, the sufferings which were to be the portion of Christ, and the glories that should follow. As to what was outside His position, Jesus could but allow His disciples to baptise thus; for them it was the truth, even the whole truth, although they had learned to add "living" to His title of Son of God. But if He Himself had baptised, He would have been entirely below the consciousness which He had of the object of His coming, and of that which was going to happen: it was not the truth for Him; although He was truly the Messiah, He came not to take this place then, but to give His life a ransom for many. That which drove Him away from Jerusalem, hindered Him also from baptising. The city where formerly He had been seated between the cherubim, and whose children He had often desired to gather together, drove Him from its neighbourhood; He went away, the despised and rejected of men, without having where to lay His head, to carry the testimony of God's love elsewhere, and to display it in His Person. This supposed that He was rejected as Messiah; but more, God manifested in grace, and coming, according to the promises made to the Jewish people, He was the last test of the human heart, which was thus found to be enmity against God, and against God come in grace. It was a question, then, of God's sovereign grace when man would not have Him; it was necessary then that He should be found quite apart, that He should have nothing down here - He who, coming amongst men to bring them love, a love which answered to all their necessities, was at the same time light for their consciences, put Himself within the reach of all, used their very necessities to gain them in love, but called them to the enjoyment of heavenly things, which He, and He alone, was able to reveal to them.

164 We shall see that the fourth chapter answers perfectly to this position. But what a precious and deep truth to see the Son of God, God manifest in flesh, rejected; He who had come according to the promises, giving up everything down here, made nothing of, and abased, and shewing in this very thing the fulness of the Godhead in love and light - always hidden in lowliness, so as to be near all, and taking nothing of that which was His own, so as to be Himself alone everywhere, as God must be, and always manifested, if any one had eyes to see - all the more manifested because He was hidden, that the love might come nigh unto all, this infinite love of God manifested in His humiliation, in order to reach those who lay low, in alienation and hatred - infinite love, love which was above everything, in its exercise towards those who hated it - Master of Himself, in order to be the Servant of all, from His Father down to the most; wretched of sinners, and that even unto death! Shall we not love Him? We cannot fathom these things; but that which He has been manifestly, can take possession of our whole heart, and form, or rather create, its affections by the object presented to them. He has sanctified Himself for us, that we might be sanctified by the truth. Looked at in this way, this chapter has an immense bearing; but we will follow out the facts historically as they are presented to us.

165 In going from Judea into Galilee, the Lord, unless He made a circuitous journey, must pass through Samaria. Now Samaria, whilst seeking to appropriate the promises, was outside the circle of them: they belonged to the Jews. But the pretensions of the Samaritan to have part in them excessively irritated the Jews. Indeed, though mixed, the population of Samaria was, in great part, of heathen origin. "Thou art a Samaritan, and hast a devil," said the Jews to Jesus. The Samaritans were in fact outside the promises and people of God. The Lord recognised these promises and that people, but He introduced that which was above both, and set them aside (v. 21-24, and already v. 5, 6). If Jacob's well was there, the Son of man was there too, the Son of man, weary with His journey, thirsty, and without water, in the heat of the day, with no resting-place but the side of the well where He might sit, and dependent for a little water and to quench His thirst, upon any one who might come - upon a poor Samaritan woman, abandoned, and the offscouring of the world. This woman, tired of life, comes to draw water. Isolated in fact, isolated in her heart, she did not come at the time when women draw water. She had followed after pleasure in doing her own will; she had had five husbands, to whom, probably, she had been devoted, and the one she had was not her husband. She was weary of life; her will and her sin had left her heart void; she was isolated and abandoned by the world: her sin had isolated her; respectable people did not want her; nor was this astonishing. But there was One who was more isolated than she, who was alone in this world, whom no one understood, not even His disciples! What man, in the midst of this perverse world, understood the heart of Him who brought the thoughts of God into a world of sin, His love into a world of selfishness, His light into a world of darkness, heavenly things into the midst of a world which grovelled in material interests? This was good in the midst of evil, perfect good there where there was none. There was a point of contact between these two, love on the one hand, and need on the other: but grace was necessary to produce the consciousness of the need.

166 The manner of Jesus had attracted the woman's attention: a Jew speaking kindly to a Samaritan woman, content to be beholden to her! The Lord begins from on high, by divine grace, joined to the perfect humiliation and lowliness which set the goodness of God within the reach of man, grace which shews itself, which is measured, in going down so far as to meet with sin, and the misery to which sin has reduced us. The Lord indicates the two things. "If thou knewest the gift of God." In Jesus, God does not demand anything. He produces every kind of good, but He makes no demand. There was here no right to anything, no promise; there was no morality, no link with God existed; but grace existed in God for those who were in this state. The woman's attention was arrested; she saw something extraordinary, without rising above the circumstances in which her spirit moved. But the Lord goes to the source of all, or rather He came from it in His spirit. Two things are seen here, as I have just said; God giving in grace, and the perfect humiliation of Him who was speaking. Next, what this gift of God was is revealed, that is, the present enjoyment, by the power of the Holy Ghost, of eternal life in heaven.

How many new things these few words contained! God was giving, in grace and in goodness; He was making no demands, He was not turning back to man's responsibility, which is the basis of eternal judgment, but was acting in the freedom and power of His holy grace. Then, He who had created the water was there, weary and dependent, in order to be able to drink of it from such a woman, who did not know what she was. He does not say, "If thou knewest me," but, "If thou knewest who it is that saith unto thee, Give me to drink," who He is who has come down so low, surmounting all the barriers which kept Him from thee, "thou wouldest have asked of him." Confidence would have been established: as to goodness and as to power, He could, and would, give that which brought into relationship with God. There was the answer: "He would have given thee living water"; words clear enough, it would seem; but the poor woman cannot get further than the circumstances of her daily labour. It is not now with her, astonishment in seeing Him who spoke with her, passing over religious barriers, but the impossibility, as He was, of having water; for she goes no further than her daily toil, though seeing plainly that she has to do with an extraordinary Person; the Lord was leading her on, she knew not yet where. Was He, then, who spoke to her greater than Jacob, the stock of Israel, who had given them the well? The Lord now expresses more clearly what was in question: "Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again, but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him, shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water, springing up into everlasting life."

167 But to arrest the attention of a soul, however useful this may be, is not to convert it: the moral communication between the soul and God is not yet established by the knowledge of oneself and of Him; the eyes are not yet opened. Thus the heart remains in its natural surroundings, absorbed, or at least governed, by the circle in which it lives. The poor woman, attracted by the Lord's manner, which had gained ascendency over her, asks Him to give her of this water, so that she need no longer come there to draw laboriously. All true intelligence was wanting to her: she was absorbed by her weariness and labour, and the circle of her thoughts went no further than her waterpot, that is to say, than herself, but herself possessed by her circumstances. This is human life, and people judge of revealed things by their relation to these circumstances; sometimes we find moral truth, as here; sometimes open unbelief. How can an entrance be found into the heart of man? This is easy for God, and for man this entrance is found when God is there, and reveals Himself, and man's conscience is touched. "Adam, where art thou?" He hid himself, because he was naked. All was out. The fig-leaves that could set him at ease in hiding him from himself were simply nothing when God was there. The first manifestation of this new faculty in man, conscience, this sad but useful companion that always goes with him now through his career, as a part of his being is, for God, the only door of entrance to the heart, and for man, of intelligence. Only here it is love, never weary, that acts. God and the sinner are found each in his true place; man, responsible entirely known of God, but feeling that all is known, and that He who knows him is there.

I dwell a little on this point, because it is the opposite of the entrance of paradise; it is not paradise regained, or even that which is much better, but the soul receiving subjectively truth and grace in the Person of Jesus, who gives it the capacity for this. In either case its state of sin is revealed to the soul; but in paradise it was to judge, and begin a world where God was not, but where Satan reigned; here sin also is manifested, but God is manifested in this same world in love; formerly light and judgment; now, light and grace. All understanding as to the gift of God, of the Person of Christ, of eternal life, was wanting, and had no place in the woman's heart. "There is none that hath understanding." But whilst, formerly, God had driven out man, here love remains perseveringly near the sinner; when it is God, love is persevering and patient. Only all must be real: "Go, call thy husband, and come hither." "I have no husband," replies the woman. It is shame which, though speaking the truth, hides the evil; not an upright conscience before God. But patient love still carries on its work; it pursues it there, where entrance is found into the understanding - or rather into the soul of man, which is thoroughly wanting in understanding as to divine things - conscience. "Go, call thy husband." Then, upon her answer, the Lord tells the woman enough of her history to make her know that she has to do with Him before whom all is naked and laid bare.

168 The work was going on in this soul; her attention, we have said, had been arrested. The effect deserves to be well considered; the woman neither excuses herself, nor is astonished, nor asks, How dost thou know this? The word of God is for her the word of God. "Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet." She does not only say, That which thou sayest is true; no, the authority and source of the word of Jesus were for her divine. All He says comes from God, who reveals Himself by this means among men. This is a deep change in the soul's condition. God has spoken to her, and she has recognised that it is He; but more, that His word, as a whole, as a source, is of Him. What she thought was, not only that Jesus, in this particular case, spoke the truth, although that was the means by which her conscience was reached, but God was speaking to her conscience, and that always produces the effect we see here: He who was speaking was a true and sure source of divine communications. It was faith in the word of God, the soul brought into communication with Him: all that He said had for her a divine authority. Divine intelligence was there with regard to the things in which God was drawing near to man.

169 Nevertheless the woman was still pre-occupied with that which filled her mind: Ought we to worship at Jerusalem, or on Mount Gerizim? It was the external aspect of what existed, and her mind had been exercised about these things: Where was God to be found? - but in a way which did not go beyond what was in man. God takes the opportunity of revealing the true, the new worship, the worship of the Father, of God, in spirit and in truth. This change characterises the whole of the chapter, that is, the introduction of heavenly relationships in the place of the earthly Jewish system, a change which depended upon the revelation of the Father in the Son, a change but little known as yet, but which was necessarily connected with His Person, and of which consequently, He could say, "the hour now is" (v. 23).

Two things, based upon the revelation which was being made, characterised this worship; the nature of God, and the Father's grace. The worship of the true God must be a worship "in spirit and in truth." God's nature required this; God is a Spirit; and the worship would not be according to what God is, if it were not "in truth," for what is false is not according to what He is, and the revelation of that which He is has come in Christ, who is Himself the truth, for "grace and truth came by Jesus Christ." The law given by Moses told what man ought not to do, and the Lord knew well how to find in this law that which man ought to feel; to love God and his neighbour. But the law does not reveal what God is, it reveals what man ought to be. Now here was God fully revealed in the world, who, rejected as Messiah, object of promise, leaves His special connection with the Jewish people, although it had been (outside that which was earthly and legal) established by Himself, and comes to reveal Himself in the Person of the Son, substituting God amongst men, in grace, for all the forms in the midst of which, hidden behind the veil, He forbade all men to come near Him - to reveal Himself I say, to all this ignorance, which worshipped she knew not what, and where there was no answer whatever to the needs of the heart. It was the Father seeking true worshippers in spirit and in truth, according to His own nature fully revealed; for "God is a Spirit, and they that worship him, must worship him in spirit and in truth." But grace precedes; the initiative is with God; He comes Himself to seek such worshippers. We have seen that it was the gift of God; but God is Light, and He reveals Himself. It is, we have also seen, God revealed in goodness, but the conscience reached by the light, and God giving that which springs up unto everlasting life.

170 Thus it is the grace of the Father which seeks, the light of God that acts on the conscience, grace which gives divine life, according to the presence in power of the Holy Ghost, and all the truth which unfolds itself in this: this is what produces true worship in spirit and in truth. All that belongs to Jerusalem and Samaria is necessarily left behind by the presence of God Himself, the Son revealing the Father, and communicating eternal life in connection with heavenly things; the Messiah being rejected, and the Father's heart being the source of all, which places us necessarily in connection with heaven, by Him who can reveal these things, Himself the Son of the Father.

We may remark here that our Gospel speaks of the revelation of the Father in the Son; of what God is, who is the object of worship; of that which reaches the conscience; of eternal life; but not of that which purifies the conscience. This last subject is not that which John treats of in his Gospel, but John speaks of the revelation of God the Father in the Son; of this revelation for judgment, as to its result, and according to grace, as to its object; it is the Son in the world, to reveal His God and Father, and as eternal life. At the end of the Gospel, the Holy Ghost is introduced in place of the Son, that we may know Him as Man in heaven at the right hand of God.

We find an example of the isolation of the Lord in the total want of intelligence in the disciples, when the Lord opens His heart, in the joy that the prospect of the conversion of sinners gave Him - of the fruit of His ministry. Except communion with His Father, which He always enjoyed, the Lord had no joy upon earth but in the exercise of His love in the good that He did. that was worthy of God. Perfect whilst being truly Man in His communion on high, and exercising His love down here, He went about doing good. Such was His whole life, except the sufferings He endured at the hands of men, He, a Man of sorrows, and knowing well what languor was. Not that He was without human affection: He loved Martha, and Mary, and Lazarus; He loved him whose Gospel we are reading; but this does not appear till His hour had come. He defers all expression of it until then, explicitly as to His mother, and, as we see in the history, as to what concerns John and the family at Bethany. In His ministry He was wholly for His Father, and for the sinners of the world; His meat was to do the will of Him that sent Him, and to finish His work (v. 34).

171 The result for the woman, who received a flood of fresh light in her soul, and who, even while being enlightened, had suddenly too much light to see distinctly, is, that she refers it to Christ. God had brought it about by a real work in her conscience. She thought that if only she had the Christ (for Him she believed in, and knew He was to come), He would tell her all clearly, and make her know all things. It is there that the woman was brought; and Christ was there before her. It is always thus. Many questions arise in an awakened and sincere soul, but when Christ is found, all comes out clearly, there is a full answer to all the soul's needs: all is found. But who was He who had acted upon the heart and conscience of this poor woman, and who had been good to her, when He knew all that she had done? When the word of God reaches the conscience, it is not the flesh that acts, it is the Saviour-God, who has been there all along.

There is another interesting little circumstance to be remarked here. We have seen the isolated woman bowed down under the burden of life, whose ill-requited labour was represented by the pitcher: she was absorbed by it, her heart could not throw it off: now (and it is not for nothing that the Holy Ghost presents to us these little touches) the pitcher is entirely forgotten. The woman does not seek isolation any longer; she goes to announce to everyone what she has found; this Man was surely the Christ (v. 28, 29). No doubt she had to draw water again, but the burden that weighed upon her soul was taken off, the energy of a new life was there. What she said touched very nearly on her shame; but Jesus filled her heart, and she can talk of these things, in finding Christ there - Christ who preoccupied her by the light of His grace: "Come, see a man who hath told me all things that ever I did; is not he the Christ?" When she got home, she could think of the gift of God, and of Him who had said to her, "Give me to drink"; but all her further life is lost in the splendour of the revelation of God in Christ.

We may remark that the reapers gathered fruit unto life eternal, and also received their hire. The prophets had laboured (the woman was expecting the Christ), also John the Baptist. The disciples were only reaping, but the fields were white unto harvest. In the very worst times, when judgment even is close at hand, God has His good part, and faith sees it, and is consoled by it.

172 Notice, too, that the Samaritans call Jesus "the Saviour." They knew very well, at bottom, that their Gerizim was nothing, but under the influence of grace, that opened their hearts to a wider conception of the Saviour's work. No Jew would have said, "the Saviour of the world."

As His field of work, Jesus does not take again the road to Jerusalem - He goes away into Galilee. His own country had rejected the Prophet, and lost the Saviour. This expression, which embraces all the extent of the scene of His redeeming work as Saviour, closes this account, where His departure from Judea to introduce it into the sphere of sovereign grace is given to us, while presenting the principles of eternal life, and of the worship to be rendered to the Father.

The following episode, in which the illness of the courtier's son is related to us, begins, I think, to unfold to us the great elements of the revelation of God in the Person of the Son, first of all in healing that which remained in Israel, but ready to perish. Further on He shews that man is dead spiritually; but there were in Israel quickened souls, as we see indeed in the beginning of Luke. But all was going to perish; the nation was going to be judged, was going to terminate its existence under the old covenant, no longer to subsist in relationship with God as a vessel of blessing. But He who is the Resurrection and the Life was there, to awaken and sustain life individually, to be its bread, there, where faith received Him. He shewed this, too, at Jerusalem, but it began naturally in Galilee, in the midst of the poor of the flock, where He went when He was driven out of Judea. Faith receives the word of Christ, and He who is the Life and who brings it, re-animates it taking away weakness, and communicates life. This application that we make of physical restoration is fully sanctioned by the use the Lord makes of it in the following chapter. The principle and faith are equally simple here; the father believed in the power of Jesus, but his faith was like that of Martha, Mary, and the Jews; he believed that Jesus could heal* - nothing more. He prays the Lord to come down before his son dies. Jesus would have men believe on a word, and not only in seeing signs; however He does not raise the question of the power to quicken, but He has compassion on the poor father, making everything depend, nevertheless, on faith in His word, when He says to the father, "Thy son liveth." The father believes the word of Jesus, and goes away; on the way he meets his servants, and they announce to him that his son is healed, and that this was so at the very moment when Jesus said the word. "And he believed, both he and all his house." The power of death had been arrested by the power of life come from above, and the man that had profited by it believed in Him who had brought it, and who was it; for in Him was life. (Compare 1 John 1: 1-3 and ch. 5: 11, 12.)

{*This doctrine is fully developed in chapter 5.}

173 John 5

There still remained amongst the Jews some fragments of the ancient blessing: "I am Jehovah that healeth thee"; and by the administration of angels, a general principle of the ways of God among this people. It was but little, but a sign that God had not entirely abandoned His people; there were still cures in the pool of Bethesda; he who was the first to throw himself into it, when the angel troubled the water, was healed. The man who thus went into the water shewed faith in the intervention of God, and the desire to profit by it. But the history recorded for us in chapter 5 leads us to a far greater power, and to far more important principles.

A poor paralytic man was there, in the midst of all these infirm people who were lying in the porches of the pool; Jesus comes there. What is presented in Him has a double character; He is the answer in power to all need, and He also gives life.

There were needs in Israel at that time, needs of the soul, as well as of the body, and a consciousness of these needs. The Lord could say, "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." The poor paralytic man is the type and figure of this. In order that the object of the blessings which were enjoyed under the law should be able to profit by them, he must have power in himself. Whether it be to have righteousness according to the law, or whether to enjoy other blessings, there must be, in the man who wished to possess them, a subjective state fitted for this; there must be power in man. The paralytic man's disease had deprived him of that power which was necessary in order to profit by the means of healing. It is the same thing as to sin. The blessings and means which the law offers, demand strength in man. The desire to be healed is supposed - "Wilt thou be made whole?" The Lord puts the question thus. Power was wanting, as in Romans 7, to will was present. Jesus brings with Him the power that heals; the good which He does, does not demand power in us. It was when we were deprived of all strength that His grace acted. (See Romans 5: 6.) In John, we must remember, it is a question of life; even when he speaks of the cross, it is for eternal life, not for pardon.

174 Jesus then comes: power is in what He says; it accompanies His word - and the man is healed. Now that day was the sabbath. God's rest is the portion of His people; the sabbath was thus the sign of the covenant made with Israel; Exodus 31: 13; Ezek. 20: 12. The sabbath was the rest of the first creation, and of the first covenant, which depended upon the responsibility of man, and upon his strength to accomplish that which it demanded of him: "Do this, and thou shalt live." It was for man to act in order to get blessing. Here all is changed. God could not rest where sin was, where misery was; His holiness and His love made the thing equally impossible. Corruption, depravity, the horrors that sin produced, did not make of such a scene the scene of God's rest, of which the sabbath was the expression and the figure, but upon the principle of obligation and law. But before the law even, the sabbath had been instituted as the rest of the old creation. The law imposed it, but man never entered into it, and a ruined creation was not God's rest, and did not give rest to man's troubled spirit. But God, if He could not rest, could work in grace: and this is the answer, infinitely beautiful, and beautiful because it is true, that the Saviour makes to the accusation of the Jews. It was the judgment of the entire old creation, but it said that since the fall, the grace of Him who was now fully revealed, the Father, in the coming of the Son, was working, to quicken and bless, at the work of the new creation (viewed in its moral aspect); for everywhere here it is this side, not the outward manifestation in result that we find. "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." Unless it be in His infinite essence, God has no rest: infinite blessing! grace without measure! God acts, He works now. When He shall have rest as to His operations, we shall have it with Him, and in the knowledge of the Father and the Son. God will rest in His love, in the blessing which surrounds Him in the glory of the Son, in the accomplishment of His counsels, in the eternal blessedness of which He is the centre and source.

175 We shall now see what this work is which the Father and the Son are doing, for it is of them that he speaks, of these names which John always uses in speaking of the operations of grace. He says, indeed, that God so loved - which is the source and foundation of all; there the Son of man and the Son of God, and God Himself, are introduced as source and foundation of all blessing; but when the subject is the operations of grace, in John, we always find the Father and the Son.

The Jews understood perfectly the position which Jesus took, and sought to kill Him. The Lord does not refuse this position which the apostle John recognises as His (for in verse 18 it is John who speaks); but He puts everything in its place. All that the Father does, He does it; but it is not as another, a second and independent authority, that He acts. He does that which the Father does, and He does nothing else: He acts in agreement with the Father, and moved by the same thought as He, and He does an things that the Father does. But having taken the form of a servant, He does not leave it, and whilst declaring Himself one with the Father (for before Abraham was He was the "I AM"), He receives all, in the position He has taken, in these operations of grace, and in their fruits in glory, from the Father's hand. This is striking in this Gospel, where the divine side of His Person is more fully brought out than in the others, although it be not more definitely affirmed. We find constantly that when He speaks of being on the same footing as His Father, He places Himself, nevertheless, ever upon the ground of receiving all from Him.

Jesus then goes on here to the work which, in fact, was being accomplished, and is being still accomplished, whether by the Father, or by the Son only, and He does all that the Father does. There is one work which He does as Son of man, and which the Father does not. "Father" is the name of grace and relationship; "Son of man," that of conferred authority. If the Father and the Son work, it is a work of grace that is in question. But the Father has not been humbled; He remains in the unchangeable glory of the Godhead. All judgment is committed to the Son, so that those who shall have despised Him, will be compelled to recognise Him by this means.

176 But let us take the instructions of the passage in their order. The Son does more than heal; "for as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them, even so the Son quickeneth whom he will. For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son: that all men should honour the Son even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son, honoureth not the Father which hath sent him" (v. 21-23). Thus the Son's glory is maintained in a twofold manner, in that like the Father He quickens, and this we can understand, for we are in relation with the Father and the Son, as partaking of the divine life; then by judgment, for the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment to the San, that all may honour Him. Those who are quickened, honour Him with all their heart, and with goodwill; those who do not believe, judgment will compel to honour Him, in spite of themselves.

To which of these two classes do I belong? The 24th verse furnishes us with the answer to this question - a simple, complete answer, and full of precious light. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but is passed from death unto life." The word of Christ is that which is presented to the soul, to bring the glad tidings of grace: the effect produced, where this word is received, is faith in the Father as having sent His Son. But He who thus believes in the Father as sending His Son, grace and truth thus come in Him, has eternal life. That is one side of the answer; he who believes is quickened. We have seen that this is one means of ensuring the Son's glory: the other means is not mixed up with this one. If Christ has quickened, it is not to put His work to the test of judgment; that is impossible: Christ would judge His own work, and would call in question its efficacy; and who is the judge? The consequence is evident: the other means of ensuring Christ's glory is not employed; he who has received life does not come into judgment. I limit myself to what the passage before us says; otherwise we should remember that He who sits as Judge is the same One who bore the sins of all those who believe. But John does not treat this side of the subject: to judge him who believes, would be to call in question the quickening work of Christ, and that of the Father also.

177 Here is what is precise and formal as to the two things by which the Son is glorified; that is, the quickening of souls, and judgment; the first which He accomplishes, in common with the Father; the second, which is entrusted to Him alone, because He is the Son of man.

This is not all that is said here. He who has eternal life is "passed from death unto life." It was not a cure: the soul had been spiritually dead, separated from God, dead in its trespasses and sins, and it has come out of that state of death by the quickening power of the Saviour. It is not merely that, being quickened, it escapes the consequences of its responsibility when the day of judgment shall come: the Lord has taken the other means, in grace, of glorifying Himself with regard to it. The soul was already dead: it is the teaching of the Epistle to the Ephesians: a new creation. The unrepentant sinner will come into judgment, if he who is under grace escapes it. But we are all dead now; it is the state of us all already: we are dead as regards God, without a single sentiment which answers to what He is, or to His call, and if it were a question merely of that which is found in man, it would be impossible to awaken any. But God communicates life, and the soul passes from death unto life. It is a new creation; we become partakers of the divine nature. At the same time it ever remains true that we shall give account of ourselves to God, that we shall all be manifested before the judgment-seat of Christ; but it is not a question there, for us who believe, of any judgment as to our acceptance. We are in the glory, like Christ, when we get there; Christ Himself will have come in person to seek us, that we may be there, and He will have changed the body of our humiliation into conformity to His body of glory.

Let us continue to study our chapter. The Father quickens; the Son also quickens and judges. The hour was coming, and had then already come, when it would not only be the Messiah, Jehovah Himself, who would heal the sick in Israel, in keeping with the promises and prophecies given to Israel according to the government and discipline of God in the midst of His people, working a cure which might give place to a more severe discipline; but from this time quickening power and eternal life in the Person of the Son, who revealed the Father in grace, were come, so that the dead should hear the voice of the Son of God, and those that should hear it should live (v. 25). This was the great proclamation as to life: it was there, and as the Father had life in Himself, He had given to His Son, a Man upon earth, to have life in Himself - a divine prerogative, but here found in a Man, come in grace upon earth.

178 I have already noticed that, while shewing us in Christ things which belong to God only, and that absolutely, in the Gospel of John, the Son, having become Man and Servant, never leaves the position of receiving everything. He has received authority also to execute judgment, because He was the Son of man. But one might be judged upon earth, and in fact the living will be judged there.

There still remains an important part of His power which belongs to the teaching of this chapter: the dead shall rise again, and, according to that which has already been declared in verse 24, life and judgment are not mingled here. Men were not to marvel that the souls who should hear His voice would live by the spiritual life which He could communicate: the hour was coming (and that hour was not yet come, and is not yet come) when all those who are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth . . . . It is no longer here, "those who shall hear shall live," but all shall hear, and shall come forth; those who have done well to the resurrection of life, those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment.

Notice carefully, that, although the judgment assigns to each one his place according to his works, it is not the judgment that separates the risen; the resurrection itself makes the separation. Those who have done well have not part in the same resurrection as those who have done evil. He does not here speak of the interval of time which separates the resurrection of the one from the resurrection of the other; that must be sought in the revelation that God gives of the dispensations. Here it is a question of the essence of things: there is a resurrection, which is that of the just, called thus; and another resurrection, distinct from the former, a resurrection of judgment, in which the living, glorified in the first, do not participate. Sometimes, indeed, a difficulty has been raised as to the word, "hour," which is employed here, but it is a poor argument, for the same expression is found again in verse 25, which presents to us as an "hour," a space of time which has lasted nearly two thousand years, and which comprises two distinct states of things - one in which Christ upon earth acts personally, and the other, in which Christ glorified acts by the Spirit. These two epochs, nevertheless, make up but one "hour," from the point of view in the passage; it is the same thing here. The first hour is the period during which Christ quickens souls; the other hour, the period of verse 28, is that during which Christ raises bodies. This is quite simple; one of these hours, as I have said, has already lasted more than eighteen centuries.

179 Having declared these great truths, which reach to the end of God's ways with men, in His Person, as to life, and as to judgment, Christ goes back to the great principle which was at the very beginning of His discourse; that is, that He could do nothing as an independent Person from the Father. If it had been otherwise, it would have been, indeed, the denial of that bond between Him and the Father in which they were one, and which was found in everything, with this additional fact, that He had the form of a servant, of One sent by the Father. He did nothing of His own will: according as He heard, He judged, and His judgment was just, for He sought not His own will in anything, but that of the Father who had sent Him (v. 30). No selfish motive whatever was to be found in His manner of viewing things, but the judgment which He formed, whatever it might be, flowed from the communications that the Father made to Him: this was divine perfection. He acted as Man, and as sent, but He did so according to the immutable perfection of God, not of Himself as a Man, which would not even have been human perfection, but forgetfulness of Him whose Servant He had become. Still, it was as Son of man, in this title of glory as of grace, of Him who had been humbled, that He executed judgment with authority.

The rest of the chapter treats of the question of man's responsibility as to life, as that which precedes presented to us the sovereign grace that gives life. Divine life was present in the Person of Jesus, and God had vouchsafed four testimonies to men that it was there: the testimony of John Baptist; the works which the Father had given Him to do; the Father Himself; and the Scriptures. They had been glad to rejoice in John the Baptist for a time, for the people held him to be a prophet. Now John had borne a clear testimony to the Lord on the part of God. Then the works of Jesus were an unexceptionable testimony that the Father had sent Him: the Father had given Him these works to do, and He did them. The Father Himself also had borne witness to Him: the multitude had thought they heard thunder; but His word did not dwell in them, for they believed not Him whom He had sent Finally, they had got the Scriptures; they boasted of this, they thought to find eternal life in them; and what they did was to bear witness to Christ, to Jesus, who was there before their eyes. The Life was there, living before them; they had these testimonies, but they would not come to Him, that they might have life. The life was there, but they would not profit by it (v. 40). It was not that the Lord sought glory from men; but He knew them, and knew that they had not the love of God in them. He was come in His Father's name, revealing what He was; they would not receive Him, alas! because He revealed Him perfectly. Another should come in his own name, with human pretensions, and adapted to man's heart, not to God's heart, him they would receive (v. 43). Terrible prophecy of that which shall happen to the people, as a consequence of their rejection of Jesus, and of the motives which impelled them to reject Him. The Antichrist will deceive them in the last days, because he will come with pretensions and motives adapted to the heart and desires of carnal men; the Jews will give themselves up to his deceptions and pretensions. The state of their souls hindered them from receiving the truth; they sought to receive honour and esteem from men, not the honour which comes from God alone. They were not following the path of faith, but quite the contrary; not that the Lord would accuse them before the Father: Moses, in whom they boasted, sufficed for that. He, in whom they placed their confidence, bore the most explicit testimony to the Lord. If they had believed Moses, they would have believed Jesus also: Moses had written of Him.

180 It is important to remark one or two things here: first of all, the clear testimony which the Lord bears to the writings of Moses; the writings were the writings of Moses; he had written concerning Christ. That which he had written was the word of God; one must believe what he said. More, that which is written is authority pre-eminently, as Peter says: "No prophecy of scripture"; and Paul, "Every scripture is inspired of God." Besides, it is evident that if men ought to believe in what Moses had written of Christ so many centuries before His coming, that which Moses wrote was divinely inspired. It is evident that what Jesus said had divine authority; but as to the form of communication, the Lord attaches more importance to that which was written, than to that which was communicated by the living voice: God had deposited it there for all times - a very important testimony for these days of infidelity.

181 John 6

The fifth chapter presented to us Christ quickening whom He will in common with the Father, then judging as the Son of man. It is Christ acting in His divine power. In the sixth chapter He is the food of His people, as Son of man come down from heaven, and dying. It is not His quickening power in contrast with the obligation of the law, but who He was, the history of His Person, if I may dare to say so - that which He is essentially, that which He became - a history which terminates by His entering again as Son of man there where He was before: it is essentially the humiliation of Jesus in grace, in contrast with that which He was in right of enjoyment, with that which was promised in the Messiah when He should be upon earth. The teaching of this chapter embraces all, from His coming down from heaven, until He enters it again, so that in descending and ascending, He fills all things; but this teaching rests especially on the Lord's incarnation and death, in connection with which He gives eternal life, and introduces His own into the glory of the new creation, far above and beyond all that an earthly Messiah could give.

Jesus went away beyond the sea of Galilee, and sat there upon a mountain with His disciples. Now the passover was near; and this fact gives the tone to all the discourse we have here. Lifting up His eyes, Jesus sees the multitude that had followed Him, and asks Philip where they should buy bread for all this people, knowing well what He would do. The disciples think, not according to the thoughts of faith, but considering the resources upon which man can calculate; one thinks of what would be needed, the other, of what there was. There was indeed an immense disparity between the five loaves of bread and the five thousand men. Now one of the promises made for the time of the Messiah, was, that Jehovah would satisfy His poor with bread (Psalm 132); and Jesus accomplished this promise, working a miracle, which had its effect on the crowds which surrounded Him; there was abundance, and there remained over and above.

182 This gives occasion (v. 14-21) to a kind of framework of the Lord's whole history, a history in which He replaces the Messianic blessings by spiritual and heavenly blessings which should be consummated in resurrection, upon which He insists four times in the course of the chapter. He is recognised as the Prophet who was to come; they wish to make Him a king; but He avoids that by going up to pray alone, and the disciples cross the sea without Him. They are looked upon here in the character of the Jewish remnant; still, it is this that has become the Christian assembly. But these few verses give us, as I have said, the framework of Christ's history, recognised as Prophet, and refusing royalty, to exercise priesthood on high, whilst His people cross the waves of a troubled world with difficulty. As soon as Jesus rejoins them, they arrive at the place where they were going; difficulties are over, their goal reached: here the disciples represent entirely the Jewish remnant.

The multitude rejoin the Lord on the other side of the sea, astonished to find Him there, knowing that there was not, where He had been, any other boat but that of His disciples. The Lord accuses them of seeking Him, not because they had seen the miracle, but because they had eaten the loaves, and had been filled, and He invites them to seek that food which abides unto life eternal, which the Son of man would give them; for Him had God the Father sealed (v. 26, 27).

In the fifth chapter Jesus is Son of God; here, Son of man, and we shall see what faith in Him as such works. The legal question of the crowd (v. 28), rather vague and trivial, introduces this development. What shall we do (they say), that we may work the works of God? This is the work of God (the Lord replies), that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent. Thereupon they ask of Him a sign, led of God in their question, remembering the gift of the manna in the desert, as it was written: "He gave them bread out of heaven to eat."

This quotation introduces directly the doctrine of the chapter. Christ was the bread. It was not a question of shewing a sign to men; He was Himself the sign of God's intervention in grace, in His Person as Son of man come down here upon earth, and not as Prophet, or Messiah, or King. My father gives you the true bread which comes from heaven. The Father - it is always He when it is a question of active grace - gave them the bread of God. The true bread, in its nature, is He who cometh down from heaven, and giveth life to the world. This goes entirely outside Judaism: it is the Father, the Son of man, He who comes down from heaven, and whom God gives for the life of the world; not Jehovah fulfilling the promises made to Israel by the coming of the Son of David, although Jesus was this indeed. Like the poor Samaritan woman - but impelled here by a vague need of the soul, they ask that the Lord would give them part in this bread of God which gives life. This furnishes the occasion for the full development of the teaching of Jesus. "I am the bread of life. He who cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth in me shall never thirst" (v. 35). If you would have bread for ever which is food indeed, come to Me; you shall never hunger. But, adds the Lord (for such was Israel's state, always thus looked upon in John), ye have seen Me, and ye believe not. If it be a question of you, and of your responsibility, all is lost: the bread of life has been presented to you, and ye would not eat of it, ye would not come to Me to have life; but the Father has counsels of grace, He will not allow you all to perish. "All that the Father has given me shall come to me"; for grace, sovereign and certain in its effects, is clearly taught in this Gospel: since it is the Father who has given him to Me, I will never cast out the one that comes to Me, however wicked he may have been, or insolent enemy of Myself. The Father has given him to Me, and I am not come to do My will, but the will of Him that hath sent Me. What a humble place the Lord takes here, although all was fulfilled at His expense! He had made Himself a Servant, and He accomplishes the will of another only, the will of Him who sent Him (v. 38).

183 This will is now presented to us in a double aspect, and in a very striking manner: "This is the will of him that sent me, that of all that he hath given me, I should lose nothing." Their salvation is assured by the Father's will, the fulfilment of which nothing can hinder. But it is in another world that the blessing will take place. It is no longer here a question of Israel and of the Messiah, but of the resurrection at the last day. The expression, "the last day," which we find four times in this part of the chapter, designates the last day of the legal dispensation in which the Messiah was to come, and will come.

The course of these dispensations has been interrupted by the rejection of the Messiah when He came, which has given place to the introduction of heavenly things, which are brought in parenthetically between the death of the Messiah and the end of the weeks of Daniel. Those whom the Father gives to Jesus will enjoy as raised, the heavenly blessing which the Father's love keeps for them, and which the Son's work assures to them. Not one of them will be lost: all will be raised by the power of the Lord. Such are the unfailing counsels of God.

184 It is also the Father's will that whosoever sees the Son, and believes in Him, has eternal life: and the Lord will raise him up at the last day (v. 40). The Son is presented to all, that they may believe in Him, and whosoever believes has everlasting life. Here, again, it is not a question of the Messiah and of promises, but of seeing the Son, and believing on Him, of eternal life and resurrection. Before, it was the Father's counsels that could not fail; here, it is the presentation of the Son of God as the object of faith; if, through the humiliation of the Lord, one saw the Son, and believed upon Him, one would have everlasting life, and the result would be the same. In the first case it is a question of the Father's counsels and of His acts, as well as of those of Jesus in raising them: the Father gives them, Jesus raises them, not one of them is lost Next, we have the presentation of the Son in connection with man's responsibility: if a man believed, he would have eternal life, and would rise again. These are the two aspects, brought together, in which these great truths are presented.

The Jews murmur because the Lord said that He had come down from heaven. They saw the Son, and did not believe in Him: they knew Him after the flesh; He was, for them, Joseph's son. The Lord then insists upon the fact, that no one can come unto Him unless the Father draw him; He insists upon the necessity of grace to be able to come, not that every one was not free, as people say, to come, for whosoever should see the Son, and believe on Him, would have eternal life; but He shews that the mind of the flesh is enmity against God. There is the blinding of sin, of the flesh, and hatred of God, as far as He reveals Himself; there is none that understandeth, none that seeketh after God; so that the power of grace is needed to dispose the heart to receive Christ. Now when the Father draws to Jesus, it is by efficacious grace in the heart: the eyes are opened, one passes from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God; one passes into a salvation assured by Christ, who will raise up such a soul at the last day. It is the revelation of Jesus to the soul by the grace of the Father: the soul sees the Son, it receives eternal life, it shall never be lost, but raised up at the last day. It is important to observe, that he who is drawn by the Father will never be lost, and that at the last day he will have his part with the redeemed in an entirely new world, in an entirely new state. Such a soul is taught of God to recognise the Son; the Father has spoken to it; it has learned of Him; it comes to Christ, and is saved; not that any one hath seen the Father, save Christ Himself. Christ had revealed Him, and he who believed in Christ had everlasting life (v. 47). Solemn but precious assurance! Eternal life has come down from heaven in the Person of the Son, and he who believes in Him, possesses it, according to the efficacious grace of the Father, who draws him to Christ, and according to the perfect salvation that Christ has accomplished: his faith lays hold, as to life, of this Son of God, who will manifest His power later on, in raising the redeemed one from among the dead.

185 We see that, as in chapter 5, Christ is presented to us as a quickening power, He is here set before us as the object of faith, and that in His humiliation, as come down from heaven, and put to death. It is not the promised Messiah. It is Christ come down from heaven to save those that believe. His re-entrance into heaven is mentioned at the end of the chapter as testimony, with the title, "There, where he was before."

As we have seen, the multitude, under the hidden direction of God, had alluded to the manna, asking some similar sign of the Lord. Jesus had said to them (a touching reply!): I am the sign of God's salvation, and of eternal life sent into the world; I am the manna, the true bread, which the Father, God acting in grace, gives to you: "He that comes to me shall never hunger, and he that believes on me shall never thirst." I recall all this, although we have already spoken of the verses which follow, in order to bring together what is said about the bread, and I pass now directly also to verse 48. "I am the bread of life. Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die . . . . If any one shall have eaten of this bread, he shall live for ever." Here it is Christ come down from heaven, the incarnation, setting aside all idea of promise; it is the great and mighty fact, that, in the Person of Jesus, people saw Him who was come down from heaven, the Son of God become Man, as we see in the first chapter of the First Epistle of John: "that which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have contemplated, and our hands handled, concerning the word of life . . . the eternal life which was with the Father, and has been manifested to us." It was as to His Person, not yet as to our entrance into it, the beginning of the new order of things. Come of a woman, so that, according to the flesh, He was connected with the human race, Son of man, but still come down from heaven, one with the Father, in order that we might have part in this life, that we might be of this new order of things, He must needs die; otherwise He remained alone. But He had taken this flesh; He had been made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, having taken this flesh, which He was going to give for the life of the world.

186 The first great point, then, was the incarnation, Christ come down from heaven, the Word made flesh - life in Him - and to give eternal life to him who should eat Him. The second point is, that Christ gave this flesh for the life of the world. He must die, close all relationship with the world, and the lost human race, by death; and begin a new seed, that He would not be ashamed to call His brethren, because He that sanctifieth, and they that are sanctified, are all of one; then, redemption* being accomplished, He would introduce them, risen, into the glory of the Father's family, according to the counsels of that Father who had given them to Him. This arrests the Jews: How could this Man's flesh be eaten? But Jesus does not spare them. He is, thus known, eternal life. It was no longer a question of conciliating the Jews, but of giving salvation and eternal life to the world by faith in Him, who had come from heaven for this, and of presenting to the Father those whom the Father had given to Him, such as the Father would have them in His love, and in His counsels, according to His nature, if they were to be in His presence. If they did not eat His flesh, and drink His blood, they had not life. In themselves there was none for that new world of glory, that blessed race. For that, it was necessary that a divine and heavenly life should come down from heaven, and be communicated to souls, and that in a Man; it was necessary that this Man should die, and terminate all relation with the fallen race, and risen, should begin a new race,** possessing the divine life (inasmuch as they had appropriated Christ to themselves by grace), and which should be raised again by the Saviour's power, when the moment should come, "at the last day."

{*This is not our subject here.}

{**I have no doubt that the Old Testament saints were quickened; but we are speaking here of the work upon which their blessing, as ours also, was founded.}

187 This work is accomplished. Now it is not of its efficacy to redeem our souls that we are speaking at this moment, nor of the pardon which we enjoy in virtue of its accomplishment, precious as these truths may be, but of the connection which there is between these divine events and the possession of life, in virtue of which we have part in this redemption and in this pardon, with all the consequences which flow from them. Christ is received in His incarnation; but, though the incarnation preceded necessarily, historically, the Saviour's death, I do not think that one can really seize the bearing of this life of humiliation, unless one first enters into that of His death. Personally, the new thing, as we have already said, was presented in His Person - a Man, God manifested in flesh, but He in whom was life, He who was this eternal life which had been with the Father, and which was now manifested to the disciples. But, in this state, the corn of wheat remained alone, however productive it should be; in order to introduce those whom God gave to Him into the position of the last Adam, of the second Man, it was necessary that He should die, that He should give up His life in this world, to take it again in the state of resurrection, beyond sin, death, the power of Satan, and the judgment of God, after having passed through all these things, and having taken again His life of Man, but in a spiritual and glorified body. Now His death was, morally, the end of man driven out of paradise; His resurrection, the beginning of the new state of man, according to the counsels of God. Now man in Adam had no life in himself; he had not the life of God, and, in order to have it, he must understand and receive not only the incarnation, or a promised Messiah, but the judgment on the first man, borne by Christ's death; he must enter, as to himself, into the conviction, the realisation of this state thus shewn forth, although in grace, in the Saviour's death. He who appropriated to himself the death of Christ, accepted this judgment with regard to himself, when sin (not sins) was condemned in another. Sin in the flesh, which is enmity against God, has been condemned for us. In receiving by faith Christ's death as the absolute condemnation of that which I am, I have part in the efficacy of that which He has done: sin has been before God, and has disappeared from before His eyes in the death of Christ, who, however, had not known it. I say to myself, That is I. I eat it; I place myself there by the operation of the Spirit of God, not that I believe that it is for me personally, but I recognise what His death signified, and I place myself in it by faith in Him. There, where I was, in death spiritually, by sin and disobedience, Christ entered in grace and by obedience, for the glory of His Father, in order that God might be glorified. I recognise my state in His death, but according to the perfect grace of God, according to which He took my place there; for it is in this that we know love, that He laid down His life for us. Now, if one died for all, then were all dead. By faith and repentance I recognise myself there, and I have eternal life. Now I can follow Jesus through the whole of His life, even the fact of His having been a Man down here, and I can feed upon this bread of life, upon all His patience, His grace, His gentleness, His love, His purity, His obedience, His humility - upon all that perfection of every day, and all the day long, which ended only at the cross, where all was consummated. "He who eateth me shall live for ever." I have everlasting life, and Jesus will raise me up at the last day.

188 We have still some points to notice in this chapter.

The verb, "to eat," is employed in it in two different tenses. He who has eaten, has eternal life; he who, by grace, has taken his place in the death of Christ, outside of all promise, of all title of any kind whatsoever, feels that he depends upon the sovereign grace that has placed Christ there, and believes in it. He who shall have eaten of this bread, shall live for ever. But in verses 54 and 56 we have the character of the man, and his eating is a present thing. Two things are the consequence of it: first, he has eternal life, and shall be raised up; secondly, he who feeds upon this bread, dwells in Jesus, and Jesus in him: first of all, general blessing, with salvation present and to come; then communion, and the permanent presence of Jesus with us, and even in us. For as the Father, who has life in Himself, sent Jesus, and Jesus lived because of Him, as inseparable from Him, so he that eateth Christ shall live, because of the life that is in Christ. "Because I live, ye shall live also." It is a union in life, by grace, with Jesus: life in us is inseparable from Him; we live because He lives. He is our life. As He is inseparable from the Father, and even as Man down here, living because of the life that was in the Father, this life in Him could not be separated from the Father, and our life should not be separated from Jesus. That is the bread which came down from heaven, that one may eat of it, and not die.

189 We may also notice that the passage before us comprehends more than a single discourse. The beginning refers to the moment when the crowds met the Lord again after He had crossed the sea, whilst the last part was spoken in the synagogue at Capernaum (v. 59). The Jews were scandalised at it, taking what He said literally, and thinking that Jesus wanted them to eat His flesh; many of His disciples even said, "This is a hard saying, who can hear it?" The Lord appeals to the fact, that He was going to ascend up where He was before. He was not an earthly Messiah, but a heavenly Saviour, come from heaven into this world, come down into this world, in order to accomplish that which was necessary to make us ascend up there, to give eternal life to man, and to raise him up when the moment should come, to give him a part in the second Man, in the Man and in the world of God's counsels and grace, an eternal part in His favour, by redemption, according to His counsels in grace. It was not a succession of dispensations, a Messiah come in glory to terminate them, a Son of David according to the promises; but it is He (and that as a present thing) who came down from heaven to communicate eternal life, and to place the believer in heaven, as to the state of his soul, and finally, as to his body, fit for the light and the divine glory. But to have part in this, one must see Him who came down, not only in humiliation, as the bread come down from heaven, but who has been rejected, such as He was, by man, in order to enter into the presence of God, according to the true state of humanity which was enmity against God - passing through death and judgment, when He was made sin for us - and recommencing His life of Man in an entirely new state, beyond death and judgment. All relationship of God with the first man being impossible, save by the cross, where Christ in grace made a Substitute for the believing sinner met with God; man, dead in trespasses and sins, must know Him in this character, recognising there his own state; that is to say, in Christ dead, made sin, and sin condemned in Him. But the believer, in the fact that he died in thus identifying himself with Christ, as with Him who was made that which man is really himself, and who endured the penalty of it - in this fact, the believer, I say, is dead unto sin, he who before was dead in his trespasses and sins, for he has known himself there where Christ died to sin. Christ died there in grace, as sin condemned before God; and the sinner says to himself, That is really myself; I am that in the flesh; and now, Christ having offered Himself for that, God has made Him sin for us; but Christ, in dying, has done with sin, and therefore I have done with it too. There is, then, no existing relationship between God and the race of the first Adam: the death of Jesus has made evident this fact, when God had tried everything, even to the gift of His Son. God has done with all this race of the first man upon the cross; and as for me, I have done with sin, which was the basis of all this. Oh, how marvellous and perfect are God's ways, full of infinite grace!

190 I recall also that it is not here a question of our present heavenly position; John, as we have said elsewhere, hardly ever speaks of it. Christ will raise up the believer at the last day. He speaks of His own ascension to complete the truth: come from heaven, He will go back there; but He does not associate us with Himself in heaven as a present fruit of His work. For us, He passes from His ascension to the resurrection of our bodies.

One remark more. I have spoken of the incarnation and of the death; and, as to that which is reached here, it is the knowledge of these things that sets us clear, and that delivers us. But the Lord says, in verses 40, 47, that He is come, that whosoever believeth in Him may have everlasting life, and that he that believeth on Him hath everlasting life; so that whosoever really sees the Son of God in the despised Man of Nazareth, has everlasting life. The Lord, however, does not hide the bearing of this fact; His rejection, His death, could but be the consequence of His presentation to a world such as the one in which we live, and of which we are according to the flesh; it is important we should know it.

191 In answering the Jews, offended at the fact of His ascension, Jesus adds, that it is the Holy Ghost that quickeneth - the flesh profiteth nothing - that He did not speak as though they were to eat of His flesh in a material sense. The words He spoke to them were "spirit and life." It was by the word that spiritual things were communicated; and by the power and by the action of the Spirit they become realities, and living realities, in the soul, a real part of our being. But the Lord knew well that there were, even amongst those who followed Him as His disciples, persons who believed not, and He told them so; He well knew, too, who it was who should betray Him. These were the branches that were to be cut off, and that have been. Jesus must walk in the midst of those whom He knew to have no root, of whom He knew even that they would betray Him, and He adds: "It is for this that I said unto you, that no man can come unto me, unless it be given unto him of the Father" (v. 65). From that time many of His disciples left Him, and walked no more with Him.

It is striking to see how the Lord would have that which was true, divine, permanent, and nothing else. That which had led many to follow Him was not hypocrisy; there were, no doubt, hypocrites, but many had come under the influence of a passing impression, which wore off in presence of the difficulties of the way, and before the stumbling-block which was found in the truth, or rather in the prejudices which the truth offended. Jesus therefore said to the twelve, "Will ye also go away?" Simon Peter, always ready to put himself forward, prompted by a warm affection, but full of an ardour which sometimes betrayed him, and involved him in a path, out of which it could not take him with an undefiled conscience, this time becomes, happily, the mouthpiece of all to express true faith. There was with him - with all of them - (not to speak of Judas) a real need, to which Jesus alone answered. This is very important. It does not at all appear that Peter had understood what Jesus had said: he knew not how to accept the sufferings of his Master, who called him Satan on that occasion when the flesh shewed the supremacy it exercised over him. Still, the root was there with Peter; the need of possessing eternal life was awakened in him; he was conscious that this life was only to be found in Jesus, and that He was the sent One of God, come from God; Jesus possessed the words of eternal life. Whatever want of clearness might be in Peter's views, Peter thought of eternal life, with the need of possessing it himself; he believed and knew that Christ had the words which revealed it, and, by grace, communicated it, and that He was the Holy One of God, the One whom the Father had sanctified, and sent into the world. True faith was there, as well as the needs which God produces. There was not knowledge either of the deep truths which Christ was teaching, or of the persons for whom Peter answered, when he said, "we"; but the needs of the soul were there, as well as faith in the words and in the Person of Christ. Thus, through many falls, Peter was kept to prove himself to be faithful to the Saviour to the end, and the Lord confided to him the sheep and lambs He loved - the apostle's ministry amongst the Jews - and also gave him to be the first who should bring in a Gentile. It is interesting to see that if the knowledge of the truths taught in this chapter was wanting, if there was true faith in the words and in the Person of Jesus, as sent of God (not merely as a prophet who spoke that which God gave him to say, but as being personally the Holy One of God, who had the words of eternal life), one possessed this eternal life, one possessed all.

192 John 7

The fifth and sixth chapters, which we have just been through, contain the doctrine of the Person of Christ: the fifth chapter presents Him as the life-giving Son of God, the sixth chapter, as Son of man come down from heaven, dying for men, and thus an object of faith.

In the fourth chapter Jesus had left Judea, to go into Galilee: it was there that He stayed, and presented Himself to the people; He would not walk in Judea any more, for the Jews sought to kill Him. The occasion of this special hatred was His having healed the paralytic on the sabbath-day, and that He presented Himself as Son of God, making Himself equal with God. The first of these acts set aside the Jewish system - not only according to the law, but in that which was the seal of the covenant, and the sign of the part which the Jews had in the rest of God; the second was the introduction, in His Person, of an entirely new system: later on, the healing of the man born blind excited their anger, as we shall see, God willing. A little remnant only attaches itself to Him, with a true, though ignorant, faith, receiving only that which was necessary to have salvation, namely, Christ and His words, as He presented Himself to them; but, I repeat, by a true faith given by God.

193 We find therefore now, in the seventh chapter, the Lord's refusal to present Himself to the world, His brethren's unbelief, and the declaration that the time was not come for Him to celebrate the feast of tabernacles. But this needs some development.

There were three great feasts of the Jews: every male who was a grown up man had to go to Jerusalem to celebrate them; these were, the Passover, Pentecost, and the Feast of Tabernacles. The antitype of the Passover is found in the cross; that of Pentecost, in the descent of the Holy Ghost; but the antitype of the Feast of Tabernacles is still wanting: no event answers to it. Nevertheless, the ordinances established for this feast throw light upon that which should be its antitype. The Feast of Tabernacles derives its name from the fact, that the Israelites, once entered into the land of Canaan, ought, according to the law, to live during eight days in huts, made of branches of trees, bearing witness thus that they had been pilgrims in the desert, but that God, in His faithfulness, had brought them into the promised land. Moreover, this feast was celebrated after the harvest, and after the vintage, two events employed everywhere in Scripture as figures of the judgment: the harvest, of the judgment, which separates the good and the bad upon earth; the vintage, of the extent of vengeance on enemies, when Christ shall tread the wine-press. The fulfilment of this feast will take place when Israel shall no longer be dispersed, but shall enjoy the effect of the promises which God has made to them, after the judgment which will separate the tares from the good grain, and after that vengeance has been executed, the wine-press of God trodden, according to Isaiah 63, by the Lord Himself.

Now the time for these things was not yet come when Christ was upon the earth; it was needful for their accomplishment that He should be manifested in glory. To give life as Son of God He could; to suffer as Son of man, it was what He had before Him; but to shew Himself to the world, to fulfil in power all the promises made to Israel, after having judged and destroyed His enemies; for that the moment was not yet come. What He was going to do, but after His rejection and death down here, was, being glorified, to give His Spirit to believers (v. 37-39). The bread come down from heaven He was; as to dying and shedding His blood, that was soon to happen to Him; but if it were a question of judging, of accomplishing the promises down here, and of shewing Himself to the world, it could only take place later on, when He would take His great power, and act as a King. In the meantime, having ascended on high, He was going to give His Spirit, until He returned.

194 Such is the teaching of this chapter: we are going to consider some details of its contents. Times are of God, as well as facts. It was not then for Jesus the time to shew Himself to the world, nor to observe the feast of Tabernacles. All times suit those who are of the world to profit by that which is worldly They are of the world, and float with its current. The world does not hate them: there, where God's testimony is, is the object of its hatred. An upright mind may be struck by the testimony that God bears to the truth, but there is not in this, sufficient motive to break with those who desire opposition, and it is this that the intelligent leaders of evil always desire. Besides, in the world there are opinions for or against a thing, not a conviction of heart and conscience, and thus a need for oneself: it is there that the soul meets with God, and braves the world (chap. 6: 68).

The Lord does not go up to the feast, but when His brethren had gone up, then He also went up, and He taught in the temple (v. 9, 10)

Let us notice, in passing, that we must not confound the people and the Jews. The people were composed of Galileans and others, who had come to take part in the feast; the Jews were those of Jerusalem itself, or at least of its environs. Thus, in verse 20, the people did not know that they wanted to kill Jesus; those of Jerusalem, on the contrary, well knew what they were plotting there against Him (v. 25).

The Jews, accustomed to listen to the rabbis, were astonished that Jesus, an illiterate Man from their point of view, could teach as He did. His doctrine was of the Father, not human. The means of understanding it was a state of soul answering to such a mission; the desire to do the Father's will would recognise the word which came from Him (v. 14-17). The moral state of the soul, the single eye, is the means of receiving, of intelligently discerning, the doctrine that comes from the Father; the conscience is open, the heart quite ready to receive the truth. Many things in the teaching may go beyond the knowledge possessed by such a soul; but the teaching answers to its needs; it bears to it the impress of truth, of holiness; it suits God; there is not self-seeking; the good of souls is sought, the conscience is sounded, however dealing in grace. Now there is a conscience in all men; and here the desire to obey is supposed. Such a man discerns that which is of God, when God speaks. It is not reasoning which convinces the mind: reasoning never convinces the will; but the desire being there, it is God who adapts Himself in His teaching to the wants and to the heart of man. It is the truth here, the words of God Himself. But amongst the Jews, and in the mass of the people, all was in confusion. Without scruple as to circumcising, and thus as to violating the sabbath by working, the divine power which healed by a word exercised no influence over them, unless that of producing in them the desire to put to death Him who had given this proof of the goodness and of the power of God, whose rights were beyond even the sabbath. This confusion amongst the unbelievers is striking. Those who came from a distance jeered at the thought that some wished to kill Jesus: those of Jerusalem, who wished to kill Him, on account of the miracle He had done, were astonished that He spoke thus freely, and asked themselves if the rulers had then recognised Him as the true Christ; nevertheless, said they, "when Christ cometh, no one will know whence he is" (v. 27). Further, they wished to take Him; but, says the evangelist, no one laid hands upon Him, because His hour was not yet come. God's ways are sure.

195 Nevertheless many believed on Him (v. 31). The Pharisees heard the people murmuring these things of Him, and sent officers to take Him. These found Jesus occupied in teaching the crowd. There, too, was the same uncertainty: some said that He was the prophet, others that He was the Christ; but others objected that the Christ could not come from Galilee, but that He should come of the seed of David, and from the town of Bethlehem, without giving themselves the trouble to ascertain the fact. Some would have wished to take Him, but no one laid hands on Him, and the officers return under the influence of His words: "Never man spake like this man!" The Pharisees and rulers did not hesitate: they sought to put Him to death. They disperse, disgusted. This is the picture of the heart of man, in presence of the truth; the mind made up of the religious leaders, confusion and uncertainty in the mind of the masses, who waver between prejudices and the power of the word of God. Faith was neither in the one, nor in the other. As to Jesus, "his hour was not yet come"; His hour, remark, is the hour when He gave Himself on the cross for our offences.

196 Let us now go back to the teaching of the Lord, and to His position relatively to the people, from whom He was in a certain sense already separated, by refusing to go up to the feast, whilst continuing to teach them in grace.

Some details of the Saviour's teaching mark out His position, before He speaks of the promise of the Holy Ghost, and after the discussion which took place about the desire to kill Him, when they made the remark, that they knew not whence the Christ would come. Jesus formally declares that they knew whence He came, but that they did not know the Father who had sent Him (v. 28). Terrible accusation! The proof was there in their conscience: they would not have wished, as they did, to get rid of Him, if they had not had the inward consciousness that He came from God. The proofs were there: the testimony in their conscience. The multitude (v. 25-27) seem to have had the same conviction in the main, although they excused themselves by the fact that they knew whence He came; to which the Lord replies, but in words the bearing of which went far beyond the application that the crowd, taught by tradition, could make of them to the Messiah's character. "Ye know me, and ye know whence I am." Terrible testimony, the truth of which we see in the words of Nicodemus that are related to us, and which, although they do not go so far, attest the conviction that the miracles of Jesus were producing in hearts. It was their will that opposed itself to this condition, and if Pilate was able to discern the surface of their motives (they had delivered Him up through envy), he was not able to understand a hatred against God which decided to kill Lazarus, rather than allow the people to believe the coming in grace of the God, who had so often wished to gather them under His wings. They were disputing confusedly about the Messiah, and their God was there in grace, the Son sent by the Father. Their leaders knew very well, at bottom, that He who was doing these miracles, did them not by human power; they might attribute them to Beelzebub, but certainly not to man. The character of the miracles of Jesus, and the power that was manifested in them, confirmed His words: these shewed the source from which they came, and words and miracles shewed who He was, and whence He came. But they had no knowledge of the Father, of Him from whom Jesus came; they were not of those who desired to do His will, and they sought to blind others. The ignorant people strove, in the confusion, with some passing convictions; their leaders resisted, with an intelligent conviction that He who came from God was there, but decided not to receive Him. All this is developed further on, and affirmed by the Lord Himself (chap. 15: 22-24).

197 It is important, painful though it be, to bring out clearly the state of this poor people, whether as to the leaders, or as to the mass: the mind of the former made up to reject Jesus; the moral, and, alas! wilful, blindness of the multitude. Jesus had no longer any place amongst them as Messiah; He must take a place far otherwise important and excellent - that of Man at the right hand of God. Still, He was the Good Shepherd, and the porter opened to Him; and, accomplishing His will, He went through the dangers, and His sheep heard His voice. So it was at this moment; a great number, "many amongst the multitude," believed on Him, saying, "When Christ cometh, will He do more miracles than this man hath done?" (v. 31). Then the Pharisees send officers to seize Him, which becomes the occasion of a touching answer of Jesus, an answer which clearly sets forth the situation, "Yet a little while I am with you," says He, "and I go to him that sent me. Ye shall seek me, and shall not find me; and where I am ye cannot come." You have no need to be in a hurry to seek Me, to get rid of Me; you will have Me for a little time longer, and then all will be over; it will no longer be a question of the Messiah; you will seek Me then, but you will not find Me. I go unto My Father; there you have no access. All will be changed; it will be all over as to the Messiah; the Son, as Man, will go to sit at the Father's right hand - there you will not be able to come.

This was indeed where things were with regard to the Jews, and with regard to Jesus. The blindness of the Jews, and their religious pride, were as great as their hatred of the true God. They understood nothing of what the Saviour said, only suggesting among themselves that perhaps He would go to the dispersed amongst the Gentiles, to teach the Gentiles. The position was clearly defined.

198 Now the Lord shews who should come to take His place, since the hour was not yet come for Him to celebrate the feast of Tabernacles, and to shew Himself to the world. It was the great day of the feast, the last day, for the feast of Tabernacles had one day more than the two other great feasts, an eighth day, which was the great day of the feast. This day began a new week; the earthly testimony was complete, but with this eighth day we go beyond that which was complete down here. The two other feasts had their sabbath on the seventh day; this one had its great day, its solemn feast, afterwards. I do not doubt but that this was, as a type, the beginning of the new week of God, that which is heavenly . and eternal, as the resurrection of Jesus was the first day of the week. Now the Lord gives to that day its true significance. It was no longer a question of the effect of the Messiah's presence, but of Him who should be the representative of a glorified Saviour, rejected in His humiliation. The manifestation of Jesus in glory down here could not take place now; but He could give to those who should believe upon Him, thus rejected upon earth, the earnest of the heavenly glory, and by this means a present joy which overflowed in blessing, as testimony of salvation and of the glory. On the great day of the feast, a day specially called "solemn," or "a day of obligation," in the Old Testament, Jesus stood there, and cried: "If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink. He that believeth in me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. But this spake he of the Spirit which they who believed on him should receive" (v. 37-39).

That is the great teaching of chapter 7: The Holy Ghost here below in believers, following upon the glorifying of Jesus as Man, instead of an earthly Messiah, according to the promises of God. Rejected as Messiah He takes His place as Man, according to the eternal counsels of God, in the heavenly glory, at God's right hand, and that according to the righteousness of God, who has glorified Him with Himself. After having established all God's glory at the cross, and taken this place in the glory as having accomplished redemption, He sent the Holy Ghost, witness of the glory into which He had entered, and of the redemption He had accomplished. To possess the Holy Ghost is the Christian position; not merely new desires, but the full answer of grace to these desires in the revelation of Christ glorified. We await participation in that glory, but we know that it is our portion, and the accomplishment of redemption gives us the right to be there. We wait for the return of Jesus to enter into it, that our body may be transformed into the likeness of His glorious body; and the love which has given us all this which has thought of giving it to us, is shed abroad in our hearts.

199 There are some details to be noticed here. The Lord invites those who thirst to come unto Him, and drink. This principle is to be found in John, although sovereign grace, which quickens, is very clearly and positively announced in chapter 5, as also the fact, that those alone whom the Father draws come in reality. In calling the reader's attention to this point, I would wish to bring out the important difference that there is, between the work which disposes the heart, and produces needs in the heart or in the conscience, or, as it always happens, at the same time, in one and the other, and the answer to these needs in the Person and work of the Lord Jesus. This desire can produce a true kind of piety, but never peace, nor a state of soul distinctly Christian; for this, the knowledge of the Person and of the work of Jesus, and the presence of the Holy Ghost, are necessary. One may feel that he has need of Him, and even love Him, but he is not yet, in the true sense, "of him." See the prodigal son, before and after he had met his father; and the poor woman that was a sinner. Everything belongs to such a soul, but it does not possess it. The prodigal had not yet the best robe, and the poor woman had not yet heard the voice of Jesus saying to her, "Thy sins be forgiven thee, go in peace"; but she loved much. So, again, the thief on the cross shews a remarkable faith, but it is the answer of the Saviour that gives him the certainty of his present happiness, founded on the work of Christ. I notice these cases, that the reader may distinguish between the word that attracts and awakens the conscience, and the answer, founded upon the work, which gives one to enjoy pardon and salvation.

It is well that we should also call attention to the three operations of the Spirit of God. In chapter 3 we are born of the Spirit; in chapter 4 it is a fountain springing up to everlasting life. Here the new man enters into the enjoyment of things not seen, of things heavenly and eternal; when they fill the heart - when the heart, drinking of that which is in Jesus, is satisfied, then these things overflow, and refresh thirsty souls; heavenly affections meet souls, shewing what it is that revives a soul without God, which groans, without knowing, perhaps, what is wanting. The words of Jesus were truly some of those waters.

200 The people who were not armed with a breastplate of ill-will, and determination already come to, felt this; and, without any miracle, under the influence of the words of Jesus, cried out, "Of a truth this is the prophet." Others said, thinking that Jesus was the Christ, "Shall Christ come out of Galilee?" But the reasoning of the human mind raises difficulties, and closes other hearts to the power of the word in His mouth. The people are divided, and the officers return, under the impression which the words of Jesus had produced, to throw into the same confusion the minds of those who, pretending to guide Israel, were the blindest of all. Nicodemus expresses a thought of equity according to their own law. They attack him, he also must be of Galilee. The theologians of the Sanhedrim shew their contempt for those who, according to the prophets, were the sphere of the light which God sent in Israel, the poor of the flock; claiming for Jerusalem and for themselves the glory of all that God had given, they affirm that no prophet had arisen out of Galilee (v. 52). As a matter of fact it was false; and then, again, how had they treated the prophets, of whatever country they might have been? Where was the city who had slain the prophets, and was going to slay Him of whom all the prophets had spoken? Irritated at their powerlessness, being able to do nothing to hinder the testimony of Jesus, they disperse, and every one goes to his own house. His hour was not yet come.

On the Gospel of John

J. N. Darby.

<33014E> 200 {file section c.}

John 8

The history which is given us of the Lord in this Gospel of John to replace the Jews, and their portion in the Messiah, according to the promises, ends with this chapter 7, which has just occupied us. In the fifth chapter Jesus is Son of God, who quickens; in the sixth, Son of man in incarnation and in death, His return to heaven being in view; then, in the seventh chapter, not being able yet to shew Himself to the world, but, being glorified, He gives the Holy Spirit to believers, that which could not take place till after He was glorified; He is rejected, but, as we have seen, His time was not yet come. In the two chapters upon which we are now entering, we find His word rejected in chapter 8, His works rejected in chapter 9. These are the two great personal testimonies which declare His origin. (See chapter 15: 22-25.) In the tenth chapter He declares He will have His sheep for Himself nevertheless, notwithstanding the obstinacy of the leaders of the people. The eleventh and twelfth chapters shew us, in a very interesting way, the testimony which the Father bears to Him as being the Son of God, Son of David, Son of man, when man has rejected Him. Then, from the thirteenth chapter onwards, come heavenly things, and the gift of the Holy Ghost, that other Comforter, who should replace Him on earth.

201 At the beginning of our chapter 8, the law in man's hands, raised against outward immorality, but without uprightness, without life, and without grace, is put in a striking manner, in contrast with the word of God, that searches hearts, that turns the sword of the law against every one, and leaves room for grace, not quickening, or pardoning grace, but the grace which at least does not give its force to the law to condemn; that was not the Saviour's mission. The whole world was placed under condemnation by the law, if God were to apply it; God had not come for this; but in shewing them to be all condemned, without exception, on this ground, entire humanity disappears under the sentence of the law, at least the humanity which takes the law as a means of righteousness, and the ground is cleared to bring in the light of life, from God. The position of the adulteress is only negative; it is quite a different case from that of the woman that was a sinner, in Luke 7, where the full grace which saves is established. All were guilty, but the Lord was come to reach the conscience of all, not to apply the law to the guilty. He does not condemn - only every mouth is stopped. The conduct of these men was wretched; sinners, like the accused one without mercy, and without pity, they desired to expose this woman, so that the Saviour might find her guilty; for, if He condemned her, there was no advance upon the law, He was neither Messiah nor Saviour; if He did not condemn her, He put Himself into opposition with the law of Moses. The scribes and Pharisees did not know with whom they had to do. The penetrating voice of God needs only a word to reach the conscience: "Adam, where art thou?" or, "Let him that is without sin among you cast the first stone!" - suffice to lay bare the conscience, because the power of God is there, and man is found necessarily revealed to himself in the presence of Him who is light. But the will is not changed, and man avoids that presence; one takes refuge amongst the trees of the garden; others, rather with shame than with a sincere conscience which leads to confession, slink away, each one alone, to preserve his reputation; the eldest first, but fearing, even to the last, that presence which pierces them through, and ashamed of finding themselves in each other's presence. Then, having given the law its full force upon all, Jesus allows the poor woman to go away, according to divine mercy.

202 After this, we have the doctrine with regard to the Saviour, which is connected with the preceding fact: "I am the light of the world" (v. 12), not yet here the Messiah of the Jews, but the presentation, on the part of God, of light in the world, light which manifested everything, but which remained alone, for the whole world was darkness, far from God, and the heart of man himself darkness. This light manifested the effect of even the law, it shewed where man was, as placed under it. But it was far more; if man followed it, it was "the light of life" (compare chap. 1: 4), that which made manifest as the revelation of the divine nature, but that which communicated life to those who received this light. It was an entirely new thing come into the world, God Himself, in the power of grace, become Man; rejected, all was morally judged; but, received by grace, it was the new life, the life eternal, for Christ is eternal life come down from heaven; 1 John 1: 1, 2. As light and life, it was for us, for it was communicated to us; the new man is created according to God in righteousness and holiness of truth, and there is also the renewing of knowledge according to the image of Him who created us. But it was the word of life, and it was a question of receiving that word; and here it is the light in conflict with darkness. All depends, as we shall see, on the Person of Him who speaks.

The question is put in verse 13: "Thou bearest witness of thyself; thy witness is not true." Now, they might have spoken in this way, if it had been a question of a man who bore witness of himself; but if God speaks, that which He says is necessarily the truth, and reveals Him. One question only arises: Do men know Him, and is the soul capable of receiving the truth even? The two things go together, as we shall see. Jesus came from heaven, from the Father; He was going back there, and had the consciousness of it; it is the lowest point of His testimony here; He is forced, by the opposition He meets, to go to the end and to say "I am" (v. 56); but here it is as Man in the world, who nevertheless had the consciousness of whence He came. (Compare chap. 3: 11-13, 33, 34.) His words were the words of God, but by the Spirit, without measure, in a Man, who also could say of Himself: "The Son of man who is in heaven."He spoke with the consciousness of whence He came. They knew nothing about it; for them He was a carpenter of Galilee, who had not even learnt letters. But it was the divine nature in the presence of that of man. They judged according to the flesh; He, as He had just shewn, judged no one. He had not come for that, but to bear witness. Nevertheless, even if He judged, His judgment would be just, for not only He knew whence He came, but the Father was with Him - He was not only such a Son of man, but He was also Son of God. The law said that the testimony of two men was true; well then, He (the Son) bore witness of Himself, and the Father, who had sent Him bore witness of Him. Then they ask Him: "Where is thy Father?" for there was no divine light in them, not even a conscience sensible to the truth, unless when the eye of the Light penetrated it, in spite of them. No man, however, laid hands on Him; His hour was not yet come (v. 20). We cannot separate this divine testimony from that which is given at the end. He spoke the words of God; but the form is different, He did not speak directly in His divine nature, although that which He said implied it; but as Man upon earth on the part of God, and as Son, by the Holy Ghost.

203 The Lord begins again by telling them, that all was over, that He was going away (v. 21, etc.). They would seek Him, indeed, but they would not find Him: "I go away, and ye shall seek me, and shall die in your sin: where I go, ye cannot come." The separation, fruit of their unbelief, was complete and final; they, dead in their sins, He in heaven; but He did not say openly where He was going. The Jews only looked upon Him as a man, and remained in their self-righteousness, as heirs of the promises. "Will he kill himself?" and thus deprive Himself of them. The Lord's answer is decisive: "Ye are from beneath; I am from above." There was absolute opposition, moral and actual - with a terrible supplement for all that surrounds us: "Ye are of this world" - of this world, of which Satan is the prince, and those who are of it in heart are of him. Christ was not of it. He was, indeed in the world, but He was not of the world. He was essentially of heaven, the bread which had come down from heaven, personally and morally; but here He is speaking negatively, and this is the chief point for us. He was not of this world: He brought the divine light, God Himself, into this world; but He was not of it. This is why He had said to them, "Ye shall die in your sins"; for they were rejecting the Light which had come into this world, grace, the Son of God. "If ye believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins."

204 But this introduces a principle of all-importance; that is, the identification of His word with Himself. He was God; His words expressed God; it is this that left the Jews without excuse; in rejecting Him, they despised God who was speaking to them. In answer to the words of Jesus, they say "Who art thou?" (v. 25). The answer of Jesus declares this identification: "Absolutely that which also I speak unto you": - perfectly, in principle and in reality, that which I speak unto you. The words of Jesus expressed what He was; and being thus the true expression of God manifested to man, they put man into the place of either receiving or rejecting God, and God as light of men. If God speaks, and expresses Himself, man accepts what He is, or rejects Him. The Saviour was in a position to say many things to them, and to judge them; but now He was communicating to them, as a faithful witness, that which He had heard from the Father. This was, indeed, the truth sent by the Father: He was telling the world that which He had received of the Father. This was now His service as the sent One. The Jews did not understand of whom He was speaking. Later on, when it would be too late to receive Him as come to them in grace, but when the thought of God should be accomplished, and their own hands should accomplish His counsels in crucifying the Son of man,* the consequences which would flow from this for the Jews, would cause them to know (Jesus does not say, to believe) that it was indeed He, that He did nothing of Himself, but that He spoke as the Father taught Him. His word was the demonstration of that which He was, and though He could say many things to them, and judge them, He only told them now that which He received of the Father. Once rejected as Son of man, and put to death, then, when He should no longer be there, they should know that it was He, the Messiah, and that He had spoken to them from the Father. But more, He who had sent Him was then with Him; He had not left Him alone, because all that He did was pleasing to the Father. Under the effect of His testimony, by the weight of His words, the expression of what He was and that all His conduct confirmed, many believed on Him (v. 30).

{*This title of Son of man, which Jesus always takes, goes a great way further than that of Messiah. It is taken from Psalm 8 and Daniel 7; Jesus always takes it in contrast with that of "Christ," which He only gives Himself once, that is, at Sychar, in chapter 4; but He constantly adds to it His death upon the cross. (See Luke 9: 21, 22.) It is the second Psalm that regards Jesus as Messiah, and shews Him to us rejected as such, but established in glory and authority later on by God.}

205 That which this chapter puts forward most distinctly, is, the divine character of Jesus, demonstrated by His words, and the diabolical character of the Jews manifested in the way in which they had received Him. Already, in verse 23, the Lord announced it, with the terrible testimony, that that which was of this world was from beneath, that is to say, of the devil, whilst He was from above, and not of this world. That which He said expressed His nature, His divine character. He reveals the Father: His words are the words of God; that which He said revealed Him to the world (v. 26, 27; ch. 1: 10; ch. 3: 32, 33). That which follows, on the other hand, throws into relief the character of the Jews.

The Lord declares to those who had been brought to believe in Him, that, if they remained firmly attached to His word (for it is a question of His word), they should be His disciples indeed, they should know the truth, and the truth should set them free (v. 31, 32). The truth supposes the full revelation of that which is divine and heavenly, that which was revealed in His Person, and in His words, and would be fully made evident when He should be glorified, and the Holy Ghost should have come. I do not think that those of whom verse 23 speaks were those who believed in Jesus, but the Jews in general. They trust to their outward position according to the flesh: they had never been in bondage, they say, forgetting, however, all their history, and their position at that very moment. The Lord passes over all that, to present the ground of the truth as to the state of man before God, and the effect of the law; for He identifies these two things - being a slave of sin, and being under the law, as the man of Romans 7 "Every one that practises sin, is the slave of sin," captive of that terrible law of sin that is in his members; but being a slave, he may be sent away from the house, and sold. The Jews, sinners under the law, would be sent away from the house of God; but the Son belonged to the house, and dwelt there always, and necessarily; if He made them free, they should be free indeed, free from sin, and free from the law. The Son, the revelation of the Father, as object, and power of life in him who shall have received Him, acting by the word, takes the place of the principle of sin in man, and the law which in vain forbade man to commit it.

206 Outwardly the Jews were indeed the children of Abraham; but the word of Christ had no place nor entry into their hearts, and they sought to kill Him. Here the contrast becomes formal: Jesus spoke (for it is always His word) that which He had seen with His Father, Himself the Son who revealed Him, and announced that which was heavenly and divine; but this brought out of their hearts the Satanic hatred against God which fills the heart of man. Here, then, the two great principles of sin which characterise the adversary, manifested themselves in them - murder, and the absence of the truth (v. 44, 45). This opposition between the revelation from above, and that which is in the world and from below, characterises the chapter, and forms its basis. Their descent from Abraham is for the Lord but a circumstance of no value. If, in the moral sense, the Jews had been the sons of Abraham, as the believer is, they would have done the works of Abraham; but instead of that, they sought to kill a Man who had told them the truth He had received from God. The Jews take still higher ground: Abraham no longer suffices for them, it is God who is their Father (v. 41). They are conscious that the words of Jesus come more home to them and they retire into the stronghold of their privileges. The Lord follows up the side of moral and essential truth, whilst avoiding, so to speak, to declare everything openly at once; but He is obliged, as it were, to say it, both as to them, and as to Himself.

Until now we have had the revelation of the thing heavenly and divine, in itself, in a positive way, outside and above all that was Jewish; here we are come to the conflict between man's heart and this revelation, and there, where the privileges of a religion which was composed of the elements of the world (separated from Him who, all earthly as was this religion, was its centre), only blinded the more the hearts which made their boast in it. The divine word, in the Person of Jesus, the Father's word, which was in His mouth, pierced through all this religious drapery, and manifested man's heart. The Lord, in His answer to the assertion of the Jews that God was their Father, shews that the rejection of His Person gave the lie to such a pretension. The question was raised and decided by His presence and by His word: if they had had God as their Father, they would have loved Jesus, for He came from God; He did not come of His own will; God had sent Him. It was necessary to speak openly, for things were being fulfilled: truth, and hatred against the truth, against God, are found in presence of one another. The Jews did not understand the words, because they did not understand the things, a very important principle in divine things: in human things, words are explained, in order to learn what the things are; thus we but designate by a word things which come under the senses, or things of the intellect, for these things are within man's grasp; divine things are not so. If I say, "born again," to understand the words, I must know what it is to be born again. Let us remember this.

207 The Lord allows no uncertainty to remain here any longer: you have the devil for your father, and you will do his works; and "he is a liar, and the father of lies" (v. 44). As we have said before, the double character of Satan and of sin, is to be "a murderer" and "a liar"; man has added to it corruption. Such was the character of these poor Jews. They did not believe Jesus, because Jesus spoke the truth, and they were going to kill Him. They claimed, indeed, to be of God - sad and blinding effect of an official religion; but if they had really been, they would have listened to the words of God. There is a certain perception which belongs to the life of God, which recognises that which is of Him, and especially His words. It was, for a Jew, a monstrous thing, subversive of all his pretensions, of the whole divine history of the ages, to say to Jesus that He was not of God. Who, then, was He? A Pagan, a Samaritan? This was enough to shew whence Jesus was.

Jesus continues to shew the effect of His word where it is received into the heart. "If any one keep my word, he shall never see death." This put Jesus above Abraham and all the prophets. Who, then, was Jesus? For, with all their pretensions, the Jews were really in great embarrassment; they felt the force of His words; this can take place where the will is not at all changed; but they sought to justify themselves in their own eyes by interpreting His words according to human reasoning. The Lord does not spare them any longer, for they were enemies of the truth. He spoke in His Father's name, and He knew Him: He would have been a liar, like themselves, if He had denied it. The second character of the enemy was thus realised in them. "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it, and was glad" (v. 56); for it is He who was expected, according to the promises. The Jews, who only saw things according to the natural mind, cry out at the folly of it: then, as He had declared of whom they were, the Lord now openly declares who He is Himself: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am" (not, I was). The Jews were speaking with God, and they resisted His words: their hatred bursts forth, and they take up stones to stone Him.

208 Note here, that Jesus gave eternal life by His word; He was the accomplishment of the promises; but, again, He was God in this world; life and truth were on one side; murder and falsehood on the other. It is this that makes this chapter so solemn. That which, grace excepted, was the whole life of Jesus in the midst of this people, in this world - the truth, the life, the sent One of the Father, God manifest in flesh - in the presence of hatred of the truth and of God, are concentrated in this chapter, and are in presence of one another.

It is important also to remark, that it is a question, not of miracles, but entirely of the word of Jesus. The Jews do not ask for a sign, as they often did: it is not the ordinary current of incredulity that we have here before us; but the truth, the light, are in direct conflict with the darkness which does not understand them, but which, at the same time, is troubled by them; for the light shines even when it is not received. It is not in man's heart; and that makes itself felt in the heart: nothing can be imputed to the witness which weakens the testimony; no one could convince the Lord of sin; they did not believe, because He told them the truth. Here it is the pure opposition of man's heart to the truth, because it was the truth. Light may reach the conscience, and if the will is not changed, this only produces hatred, as in the case of Stephen; but here, I repeat, it is the truth itself and the light that are in conflict with the darkness, He who came from above, with whom the Father was, and then men, who alas! were from beneath. What could be more solemn than such a meeting? God, in the presence of men, to be rejected, and that for ever and ever!

209 It may be useful here to notice some details: the Lord begins by announcing Himself, personally and distinctly, as the light of the world. In John, it is always a question of the world; also, it is not a question of the Messiah according to the promises, but of what the Lord is in Himself, of what He is, He only, in the midst of the darkness. In following Him, one would have the light of life; for the life was the light of men. We see how this chapter reproduces that which is said in chapter 1; only here it brings out historically the contrast and the conflict between the light and the darkness, for the world was in it, and Satan was the prince of the world. The Lord having thus announced Himself as light (and light manifests itself, and manifests everything), His testimony is rejected, as being that of a Man who bore witness of Himself (v. 13). They do not see the light, they reject it; that which is divine is hidden, although it is light. He was the light, and His words were the expression of what He was; but He had not come to judge, as the case of the woman shewed, however just His judgment would have been, for the Father was with Him. But the law was their law; then Jesus was the revelation of God Himself in that which He was as light: it was Himself and the word of testimony, the Father being with Him. If that were rejected, it was not disobedience to a commandment, but the rejection of divine life and light, so that those who rendered themselves guilty of it should die in their sins.

All chapter 8 is the expression of the divine light by the testimony of the Lord; but the chapter treats of more than one subject, where this testimony is given in more than one aspect. The first part is to be found from verse 12 to 20, which present the position in itself: the Lord is the divine light; He is not come to judge, but the Father is with Him; God and the truth are presented to men; He is rejected by the darkness of man's heart, but His hour is not yet come. Then (v. 21-29) He goes away. In John His death is never what is spoken of, but He goes away, and the Jews would know when He had been lifted up as Son of man, that it was He; it would then be too late to find Him again. After that (v. 30), many having believed in Him, He announces to them what their position should be, if they persevered; the Son would make them free, and they would be free indeed; this in contrast with the Jews. There was a complete change of position. Man committed sin - he was the slave of it: the Jews, no doubt, were in God's house, but by the law as slaves; for to be under the law, and to commit sin, is the same thing. The Jews, therefore, had no sure place in the house; and they would even lose the one which they had: but Christ then would have His place as Son over God's house, and those who believed in Him, who persevered in His word, made free by Him, should possess true divine liberty. As to the promises, they were indeed, according to the flesh, the seed of Abraham; but they were not sons of Abraham according to God. Being come personally as light, the Lord would have what is true, not merely dispensations; they were, in reality, sons of him who was a murderer and a liar; they were rejecting the truth, they were going to put Christ to death, and did not believe Him, because He spoke the truth. Finally, for He was the life as well as the truth, he who should keep His word, would never taste death (v. 51); He was not only the light, but the light of life. Besides, not only was He the object of the promises which Abraham's faith had realised, but He existed with an eternal existence, God - "I am," before Abraham was. Then the hatred of unbelief burst out. Before, they had maliciously sought to turn away the truth, and to justify themselves before one another in rejecting Him, but as soon as what He was is fully revealed, their murderous hatred shews itself by violence.

210 John 9

In the eighth chapter we had the testimony given, the divine word of the Saviour: the ninth chapter relates to the testimony of His works. The Lord sets aside the entire governmental system of the Jews; He speaks, too, of Himself as being only a little longer of this world; but so long as He was, He must do the works of His Father who had sent Him, for although He was God present in this world, He always takes the place of a Man subject to God, and He does so specially in John's Gospel, where His Person is set in relief. It is this position Satan sought to get Him out of, in the temptation in the wilderness, a position in which He remained firm and perfect. He is always the sent One, although He be Son of God, and one with the Father.

211 Crossing this poor world, the Lord meets with one born blind, a picture of man, and specially of the Jews. Here He is truly the light of the world, while announcing, as I have just said, that He was going to leave the world. But there is more; He works in grace, He gives life. Not only is He the light of the world as long as He is in it, for this is only for a time; but He is powerful in grace to give the capacity of enjoying the light. Nevertheless, although it be divine power that communicates it, He must be received as the sent One of the Father; He never leaves His position. His presence, without His work, only blinds the more, at least presents an outward difficulty; He is a stone of stumbling. The spittle (v. 6) presents the efficacy which came from Himself; the earth, the humanity which He had taken. But that, in itself alone, only made the blind man doubly blind: a positive obstacle was added to natural blindness: but it was necessary that this object should be before his eyes. Jesus sends the poor man to the pool of Siloam. The text itself gives the meaning of this word: it signifies "Sent." The moment this truth is connected with the Person of Jesus, in the blind man, all is accomplished; the man sees clearly, with a clearness which is according to the power of God: "I washed, and I see" (v. 11).

In the eighth chapter it was a question of man's responsibility, a responsibility connected with the testimony of the word of God: here it is its powerful efficacy to give sight to the blind man, in revealing the Son sent by the Father. Man's folly, his religious blindness, are made manifest: for him, Jesus was not of God, because, although He did works of power and of divine goodness, He did not keep the sabbath. Now, the sabbath was the sign of God's covenant with Israel, the sign of the rest of God. But in Jesus, God was there, and the Son of man was Lord of the sabbath, and the rest of God was not for those who rejected Him. Further, this rest became heavenly at that moment.

What is striking in this passage is the perplexity of religious people, and they instructed in their religion, characterised by the elements of this world, when they are in the presence of divine power. "He does not keep the sabbath!" What a subterfuge! Others said, "How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles?" The evidence was too strong: there was a division among them. Then they would not believe that the man had been born blind, until they had called his parents. These feared to compromise themselves, but bear the only testimony that it was of consequence to hear from them, that is, that the man was really their son, and that he was born blind. The Jews call back the man himself for the second time, and seek to cover up the whole question by their religious authority. They are quite willing to recognise the fact that the man had been blind, and that now he saw, and they invite him to give glory to God for that; but, as to owning the truth and the Son of God, they will not do that; it is with them a foregone conclusion. The poor man is indignant at their blindness, wise as they were, and guardians of their religion, for he had personally experienced the powerful efficacy of the word of Jesus. His testimony is clear and simple: "he is a prophet," and taught of God, he does not understand how the Jews can hesitate to receive the brilliant proof of it, that was there before their eyes; for simple faith, that had experienced the power of God, does not understand the difficulties which religious learning opposes to it, when will does not want the truth and Jesus. This man did not know what governed the hearts of those who were questioning him; but, as for them, they well knew that they were resisting the light of divine power. Disgusted at his bold frankness, which wonders at their unbelief, they arrive exactly at the conclusion that the Lord had condemned; that is, that the man's blindness was the effect of his sin: and they cast him out.

212 Thus the Lord's sheep finds itself outside: the Lord rejected already, having heard of it, seeks it, but to bring it into the flock of grace, by the knowledge of His Person. All that belonged to those who found a place there, was not yet developed; but the Person of the Son of God was down here, and the Father's name was revealed, for he who had seen the Son, had seen the Father. Expiation was necessary, in order that all the privileges might be revealed, and that the door of heaven might be opened, for entrance into the most Holy place. Until Christ had been glorified, the Holy Ghost had not come down to reveal these things: but the Good Shepherd seeks His sheep, and puts the question to him: "Dost thou believe on the Son of God?" (v. 35, 36).

213 Remark here, that the man had received the Lord's word as the word of God; he had said, "he is a prophet."To speak thus was, like the woman of Sychar, to believe what Jesus said - not only to own the truth of something He had said, but the authority of what He said. Further, this man's heart was attracted; fully persuaded of the folly of his religious leaders, he sought that which the prophet of God would say to him. This reception of the word as having divine authority, and the desire of the heart to possess it, and to possess that which it reveals, is of all-importance; we have already seen it in the case of the Samaritan woman. Here, the fact that he had already personally made experience of the power of Jesus, grace acting in his heart with this work, disposes the man to believe what Jesus would say to him, and gives implicitly in his soul a divine force to that which the Lord says. Now Jesus says to him, "Thou hast seen him, and it is he that speaketh with thee!" Then the man owns him explicitly - "Lord, I believe"; and he worships Him. He believes in His Person by the means of the word, which he had believed already beforehand, when he said, "He is a prophet."

Thus the Lord had found His sheep; it was delivered from the fatal influence of false shepherds, who held the souls of the people in captivity. Come to save, and, in any case, not to judge, but to bring the word of life - through man's perversity, the effect of His coming would be judgment. Those who pretended to see, but who were blind leaders of the blind, would be blinded all the more that the light was there; but it was none the less true that He was there in the sovereignty of grace, to give sight to others who were blind (v. 39, 40). As light, the Lord put man to the test; as Son of God in power, He gave sight to those who saw not, but who had the consciousness, by His word, and by the knowledge of His Person, that they were blind; knowledge founded on faith in His word.

John 10

The tenth chapter, in John's Gospel, terminates the history of the Lord down here. The Good Shepherd, come from the Father, will find His sheep, notwithstanding the opposition of the enemies of the truth and of God, and will give eternal life to those who hear His voice.

This chapter, so precious to believers, gives us a picture of the entire work and position of the Lord. Nevertheless, we do not see Him driven away here, as He is however constantly in John, but we see Him putting forth His sheep Himself, according to the will of God; His sheep whom He knows, and of whom He is known. Then He is "the door of the sheep"; He lays down His life Himself, no one takes it from Him; lastly, He and the Father are one. A Servant sent and obedient, He is nevertheless one with the Father; the sheep, too, are His, although it be His Father who gave them to Him. Note here, and I repeat it, because of its importance, and as characterising the Gospel of John, that the Lord is a Servant, and receives everything, even the sheep, from His Father's hand; but He is, at the same time, one with Him; a Servant, as Man down here, but Son of God, God, one with His Father.

214 We must examine these details more carefully.

In the first place, all those who, before Him, had pretended to be the shepherds and leaders of Israel; all those, whoever they might be, who did not enter by the door, were thieves and robbers, climbing over the wall, forcing an entrance by violence or cunning; thus they betrayed their true character. The sheepfold was Israel. These men sought to get possession of the sheep for their own profit, for their own glory: they were neither Messiahs, nor servants of God, nor sent by Him, very far from being one with the Father. I say this in order to establish the Lord's position more distinctly. The second verse presents to us this position in its first features: "He who enters in by the door is the shepherd of the sheep." He entered in by the door; He came by the way chosen by Him who had established the sheepfold, there, where the porter was; he who could open the door, or keep it shut; thus He attracted the attention of him who was the keeper of the fold.

The door is always the place indicated and appointed by the architect to enter by it. This is why Jesus says lower down, "I am the door of the sheep," because, it is He that God has appointed as the door of exit for the Jewish remnant, and as the door of entrance for us all into the sanctuary, into His holy presence. Christ Himself had entered into the fold, following out what God had prescribed for the Shepherd. All that was laid down in the prophets, all that was fitting for Him who walked according to God's will, Jesus followed out, and accomplished at every point. He did not seek to arouse men by exciting their passions, like the false Messiahs, nor to draw in His footsteps an unconverted and stiff-necked people; meek and lowly in hearts, He followed the path Jehovah had traced for Him; He entered by the door. Providence and the Spirit of God opened the way for Him. All the efforts of the high priests and scribes could not prevent His voice from reaching the ears and hearts of the sheep. God opened the door to Him, and the sheep heard His voice. Here it is not a question of any other than they; they are the real object of His service, carried into effect, in spite of all the power of Satan. The Lord knows His sheep; they are His; He calls them each by his name, and leads them out of the fold.

215 It is interesting and touching to see how Jesus' own sheep are here the only object of His heart, and with what intimacy He knows them individually; He thinks only of them. He comes, and calls them, to the exclusion of all the other Jews. He does not fail either in His purpose. He does not leave them in the Jewish fold; He leads them out of the fold where the Jews abode, outside the enclosure where those who were "of their father, the devil," still remained. Moreover, He does not leave them when they are outside; He goes before them in the way of life and of faith. They are His own sheep, they belong entirely to Him, and in leading them out, He goes before them; He conducts them Himself; He is Himself at their head in the difficulties they should meet. His voice is known to them; they follow Him. If He is exclusively occupied here with the sheep, they recognise no other voice but His. In Him, and in Him alone, they have confidence; they trust in Him, and in Him alone. Every other voice is, for them, that of a stranger; it is enough that they do not know it, that it be not His. It is His voice that inspires them with confidence: weak in themselves, they flee when the voice is not His.

In that which we have gone over, up to the present, we find, at the same time, general principles, and the description of the Lord's work in the midst of the people. He makes use of the customs known in the country with regard to flocks, to describe that which He had been, and that which He had done in His life and in His service down here. But it was all over with the sheepfold. He leads the sheep out; the others were only reprobates, rejected in rejecting Him; all who recognised Him, Him and His voice, followed Him, and were led outside. This very fact sets forth the divine Person and authority of the Saviour. The law and the ordinances had been established by the authority of God Himself, and the law was the perfect rule for the children of Adam. But here we have to do with the law as a dispensation of God, not with what it is in its intrinsic nature. Who could take away men from the authority of Him who had established His ordinances, and had invested them with that authority? He alone, who Himself was invested with the authority which had established them and possessed it. (See chap. 15: 22-25.)

216 Christ ends His discourses on this subject by the statement of His divinity, as He had done before, in chapter 8; but He begins here, as in chapter 8, in His character of a Servant who accomplishes the service confided to Him.

The men whom the Lord addresses do not understand the parable He spoke to them; He Himself, in grace, furnishes the application. Resuming His discourse, He says, "I am the door of the sheep" (v. 7). God has set Me as the One by whom My sheep can go out without fear, for it is there that God has placed the way out. In following Jesus, he who believed in Him could leave the fold that God had set up. Jesus was Himself the door. If a Pharisee were to ask, "Where are you going thus?" the sheep could answer, "I am going where the Shepherd sent by God will lead me." He is the door, not of Israel, but of the sheep. All who had come before, and who pretended to present themselves as divine leaders of Israel, were but thieves and robbers; the sheep had not listened to them. Now, to go out, although authorised by the voice and conduct of the divine Shepherd, was a small thing; the Shepherd's Person implied something positive; He was also the door by which to enter. He had said nothing of this in His parable; only shewing that He called His own sheep, and led them forth, going before them, a sure warrant that they did well in leaving the fold; His voice was enough. Now He reveals the effect.

Before pursuing this subject, I revert for a moment to verses 1-5, in order to fix the bearing of it more exactly. It is the life of Jesus that is presented to us, in connection with the Jews, who were God's fold. The true Shepherd, Jesus, entered by the way chosen and ordained of God. Born at Bethlehem, born of the Virgin, He had submitted to all the ordinances that God had established; this was the mark of the true Shepherd. God, by His Spirit and by His providence, opened for Him the way to the ears and heart of the sheep; the rest remained deaf to all His appeals. It was not a Messiah come to establish the glory in Israel, but the only true Shepherd, who would have His own sheep. They listened to His voice. He knew them, and called them by their names, and led them out of the Jewish fold, to put them in the possession of better things. Then, in putting forth His own sheep - the only ones He sought here - He had been before them, and they followed Him, for they knew His voice. This was the mark of the sheep. He did not leave them in the fold, but led them outside. The form of what is said is abstract, and in the present; it is that which is always true of a good Shepherd.

217 We must notice here, that, although the man born blind had been driven out, and also Jesus Himself, the Lord speaks here as having authority. The sheep are His, He puts them out; He goes before them; the sheep follow Him, they will not follow a stranger. It is the history of what Jesus was doing in Israel. Jesus says nothing, as yet, of the blessings towards which He was leading His own, nor of His death, the foundation of these blessings.

Now, having entered by the door, according to God's will and testimony, He was, for every other person, Himself "the door"; that which God had ordained as the means of having part in His blessings.

It is not (as I have already said in passing, and we should notice it well) the sheep's knowledge of the stranger that keeps it from the snares which he tries to set for it; but there is one voice which is known by the sheep, the voice of the Good Shepherd, and they know that what they hear is not that voice. It is thus the simple are kept; the wise wish to know everything, and are deceived. The voice and the Person being known, encourage and authorise the sheep to follow them. Israel remains there, in the hardness of its, heart: the Christ is the door of the sheep.

Now the happy results are given to us - the position of the sheep that follow this voice. If any one enter by that door, he shall be saved. Salvation was found in the Shepherd, that which the fold could not give. The sheep should be free; the fold afforded it a kind of security, but it was the security of a prison; it would find pasture, it would be fed in the rich pasturages of God: it is Christianity in contrast with Judaism. Christianity was salvation, liberty, and divine food. Security is no longer imprisonment, but the care of the Good Shepherd. Free under His care, the sheep feed in safety in the vast and rich pasturages of God.

218 This is the general position, but there is more (v. 10). Jesus, in contrast with all the false pretenders, who only came to steal and to kill, came that we might have life, and that we might have it in abundance. The first expression is the object of His coming in general, which characterises the Gospel, and also the Epistle, of John: it is the Son of God come down, that we might live through Him. He is the eternal life which was with the Father, and gives life, and becomes Himself our life. (Compare 1 John 4: 9; ch. 1: 2; ch. 5: 11, 12; John 3: 15, 16; one might multiply quotations.) The second part of the sentence shews the character and fulness of this life: this life is in the Son. Having the Son, we have life, and we have it according to the power of His resurrection. The faithful in old times were quickened; but here it is the Son Himself who becomes our life, and that as Man risen from amongst the dead. We have it "abundantly." This 10th verse gives us the great purpose of the coming of the Son of God; but His love must unfold itself fully; He is not only the Shepherd, but the "Good Shepherd," and the Good Shepherd lays down His life for the sheep. His death has done everything for them; it has redeemed them, washed them from their sins, justified them, purchased them for heaven; however, I think the object of the passage is the love and devotedness of the Good Shepherd; rather than lose His sheep, He lays down His life. The hireling thinks of himself, and runs away; and the wolf comes and seizes* the sheep, and scatters them. In Gethsemane, Jesus said: "If ye seek me, let these go their way." Those who have the place of shepherds, abandon the sheep when the enemy comes; He lays down His life, rather than leave them a prey to the wolf. But there is yet more: the Good Shepherd knows His own, and His own know Him, as the Father had known Him, and He had known the Father. Wonderful position! Wonderful relationship! Jesus had been the object of His Father's heart; in the same way His sheep were the objects of His heart. Taught of God, His sheep knew Him, and trusted in Him, as He trusted in the Father; and He lays down His life for them. But in laying down His life, He opens the door to the sheep from amongst the Gentiles, which He must also bring, and they should hear His voice. With both one and the other, all should be the fruit of His heart and of His mouth, and there should be but one flock, and one Shepherd. As to man, this completes the fruit of the Lord's work, at least down here.

{*The word, "seizes," in the sentence, "the wolf seizes them," is the same word as that used by the Lord, when He says: "No one shall seize them out of my hand." The wolf scatters the sheep, but does not pluck them out of Christ's hand, nor deprive them of everlasting life.}

219 It is important to remark that, whilst submitting in everything to the will of His Father, it is He Himself who acts here: it is not a rejected Messiah. In the activity which belonged to Him, He puts forth His own sheep. He was rejected: He had sought one of His sheep that had been rejected (chap. 9), to reveal Himself to it. But here it is the divine side. The Lord enters according to the will of His Father, proof that He was the Good Shepherd; but once entered in, the action is His own. He is recognised by the porter, His voice is recognised by the sheep; He calls them by their names, and Himself leads them out. It is not, I again repeat, a rejected Messiah, but the divine Shepherd, who knows, and who leads His own sheep, for the sheep are His; when once they are outside, He goes before them, and they follow Him, for they know His voice. He gives His life, no one takes it from Him. He brings other sheep who were not of the Jewish fold.

In this act of devotedness, the gift of His life, the point is not only the feelings of the sheep, but of the Father. Jesus could give a motive to the Father that He should love Him: it is only a divine Person who could do this. The Father takes pleasure in the faithfulness of His children; but to lay down His life, to give Himself even unto death, and to take His life again in resurrection, whilst re-establishing the Father's glory, tarnished by the entrance of sin and of death, was a motive for the Father's affection. Glorious and devoted Saviour! Although He felt everything, He never thought of Himself, but of His Father, and, blessed be His name, of His sheep. To give Himself thus was His own act, an act of voluntary devotedness on His part; but, having become Man and Servant, an act, nevertheless, according to His Father's will. The act about which we are now occupied, is not the gift of His life for the sheep, but the fact that there, where death had entered, and where man was subjected by sin to death, He who had life in Himself gives His life, to take it again beyond death, and all that was its cause and power, and to place man, the being in whom was God's good pleasure, in an entirely new position, according to the divine glory, and that by an act of voluntary devotedness, but of obedience. (Compare chap. 14: 30, 31.)

220 The Lord now, in a second discourse, still speaking with the Jews, develops the blessings which His sheep should enjoy, blessings eternal and immutable. The Jews were in the moral embarrassment in which we have already seen them. Good sense said: "These words are not those of one possessed by a demon; can a demon open the eyes of one born blind?" (v. 21). But the prejudices of many of them got the better of all their convictions. They surround the Saviour, for they could not free themselves from the influence of His life, and of what He said and did: "If thou be the Christ, tell us plainly." Jesus had already told them, and they did not believe; He appeals to His works, that bore witness of Him; but they did not believe, because they were not of His sheep. It is only a question of His sheep, of those that belonged to Him, outside the external election of the people of Israel; but the Lord finds here the occasion to bring out the blessedness of His sheep.

The first mark that characterises the sheep of Jesus, and that we so often find here, is, that they listen to His voice (v. 27, see v. 3, 4, 5, 16); then come two other marks which belong to them: the Good Shepherd knows them (compare verse 14, and for the sense, verse 3), and they follow Him. (Compare verse 4.) Then the Lord declares plainly to us what He gives them; that is, eternal life, in the full assurance of the faithfulness of Christ, and of the power of the Father Himself. Already had He declared that His object in coming was, in grace, to give life, and life in abundance; not to seek booty, like a robber, but to give life from above, in grace. We have here the nature and character of this life, in grace: it was eternal life, that life of which Christ was the source and representative in humanity (compare 1 John 1: 2, and also John 1: 4), that life which was essentially in the Father Himself, which was in the Person of the Son down here, the life that God gives us in Him (1 John 5: 11, 12), and by Him, which we possess in Him; for He is our life (Col. 3: 4; Gal. 2: 20); which bears the impress of Christ, new position of man, according to the counsels of God. For us - first character of this life, for we were dead in our trespasses and sins, and under the power of death - down here - Christ is, then, the resurrection and the life, a life which ought to manifest itself in us now, and which breathes, so to speak, by faith in Him (Gal. 2: 20; 2 Cor. 4: 10-18), and will be fully developed when we shall be with Him, and glorified (Rom. 6: 22), but which subsists in the knowledge of the Father, the only true God, and of Jesus Christ whom He has sent. (John 17: 2, 3; see 1 John 5: 20.) It is the gift of God, but it is real and moral: we are born of water and of the Spirit. (John 3: 5, 6.) Of His own will He hath begotten us by the word of truth (James 1: 18). Thus it is that that which was in Christ reproduces itself in us, according to the word which is the expression of it. (1 John 2: 5-8; ch. 1: 1; 1 Peter 1: 21 - 25.) This word nourishes the life (1 Peter 2: 2), and thus we can say of this life, or rather the Lord says it: "Because I live, ye shall live also" (John 14: 19). Here it is the life itself; but to complete the character of this life in the Christian, we must add, "the "Spirit of life": then that becomes "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus" (Rom. 8: 2); then, according to John 4, with heavenly objects before it, it is a source of living water springing up into everlasting life.

221 But if Christ is thus our life, then life in Him does not perish, nor fail in us: because He lives, we shall live also. Can He die, or can the divine life in us come to decay? Assuredly not. We shall not perish; the life of which we live is divine and eternal life. But the wolf is there that ravishes and scatters the sheep. The sheep would not be able to defend themselves from this ravenous wolf, but the Good Shepherd is there, the Son of God, and no one can pluck them out of His hand; there is no greater force that can do anything against Him who keeps us.

There is more: the sheep are the object of the common care of the Father and the Son. Precious thought! The Father, who gave them to the Son, is evidently greater than all other: who should pluck them out of His hands? And the Son, that Good Shepherd, who humbled Himself, to have them and to save them, and to keep them, is one with the Father. The Shepherd entered, doubtless, by the prescribed door, but He is God, one with Him who had prescribed it; He is the Son of the Father, one with the Father; such is the security of the sheep.

The Jews take up stones to stone Jesus. The Lord, calm in faithfulness to His Father, shews them that according to the language of their own scriptures they were wrong, but appeals, at the same time, to His works, as proof of the truth of His testimony, and that He was Son of God, and the Father in Him, and He in the Father. Then they seek to take Him, but He escapes from their hands, and goes away beyond Jordan, where many come to Him, and own that all that John the Baptist had said of Him was true.

222 Before going further, I think that it will be useful to recapitulate what we have gone through in detail, so as to give the whole together. Chapters 8 and 9 give us the side of the responsibility of the people, in that they reject the testimony of the word, and of the works of Jesus; chapter 9, in particular, presents to us the Jews driving out of the synagogue the man who had believed that Jesus was a prophet, after having learnt in his own person, by experience, the power of Jesus that had miraculously cured him; but there Jesus and those that believe were rejected, and put outside. Now in the tenth chapter it is the divine thought and operation that are presented to us. Christ, without doubt, enters in by the door, in obedience; but it is to accomplish the work and the will of God with regard to His own. The sheep belong to Him; He calls them by their name; He leads them out; He goes before them, and they follow Him: it is the true work of the Lord. No doubt the responsibility of the Jews in rejecting Him subsisted all the same, but did not frustrate the counsels of God: the Shepherd did not intend to leave the sheep in the fold. The Jews were guilty of the crucifixion of the Lord, but His death was according to the counsels and foreknowledge of the Saviour-God: it was the same here as to the Jews; they drove out this sheep, the man who was born blind, who had been healed; but in fact it was God who freed this man from the prison of the sheepfold, to place him under the care of the Good Shepherd (v. 2-4). After that, the Lord gives life, life abundantly, to His sheep, who enter by the door, by faith in Him - who enter into the enjoyment of heavenly things: they have a life which belongs to heaven; they are saved, free, fed in God's pastures. Next, the Good Shepherd does not spare His own life, but lays it down for them, that they may enjoy salvation, and the privileges prepared by God; then it is a question of the value of the death of Jesus for the Father's heart; also it is He Himself who gives His life, it is not taken from Him. Finally, in another discourse, the Lord presents to us the blessedness of the sheep, in all the fulness of grace and of security which is bestowed on them under His and the Father's protection.

223 John 11

Chapter 10 ends the historical part, properly so called, of John's Gospel. The Lord had left Judea in chapter 4; but the history of His habitual ministry in Galilee is not recorded for us in this Gospel; the Lord, on the contrary, is with the Jews at Jerusalem, presenting to them the new things which are connected with His Person, His death, and His being glorified, in chapters 5 to 7. These communications are terminated by the rejection of His Person, of His testimony, and of His works, which closes the question of their responsibility. Then we have His actual work in Israel, and that which would follow, according to the counsels of God, and by His power in His Person, in chapter 10. Chapters 11 and 12 contain the testimony that God bears to Jesus, and that in every respect, when man rejects Him; then the Lord's declaration, that death is necessary, that He may take His title of Son of man; chapter 13 looks at Him as going back to God again.

Chapter 11 presents Jesus as Son of God: the raising and giving of life to a dead man is the witness of it.

Lazarus, a member of a family beloved of Jesus, was sick. Jesus Himself, away from Jerusalem, had withdrawn to the side of Jordan. The sisters of Lazarus, one of whom, when He frequented the house, had remained sitting at His feet to hear Him, whilst the other was preoccupied with household service, and had complained that she was left alone, sent to tell the Lord that their brother was sick. Jesus answered: "This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified thereby" (v. 4); after this, He remained two days in the place where He was; then He said to His disciples, "Let us go into Judea again." The disciples raise the objection that the Jews, a little before, had sought to kill Him. The answer of the Lord reveals to us the principle which governed all His conduct. During these two days He had received no direction from His Father to go to Bethany, and, in spite of the affection He had for this family, of which He was reminded by the two sisters, He remains there where He was, without stirring. Then, His Father's will being revealed to Him, He goes away without hesitation to the place of danger He had left. The light of day was on His path, the light of His Father's will. There He always walked.

224 After this, Jesus said to His disciples, "Lazarus, our friend, is fallen asleep; but I go that I may awake him out of sleep" (v. 11). Jesus spoke thus, because death took this character in His eyes, the power of resurrection and of life being in Him. The apostles apply His words literally to natural sleep, upon which He explains them to them. How many things passed in the heart of Jesus which did not come out! For His walk, the will of His Father was enough, and He had the discernment of that will. But His own death was before His eyes, the dominion of death over man, the power of life in Himself, the glory of God manifested in the exercise of this, the fact that He was the Son of God in whom the resurrection and the life had come, the ways of God that brought Him back there, where, in effect, death awaited Him, the affection of the family of the deceased man, which, real as it was, did not for a moment set aside His waiting upon the will of God, His isolation - for His disciples did not understand Him - all the immense consequences of this journey, where the dominion of death over man, the presence of the Resurrection and the Life, the subjection to death of Him who was both one and the other, and that for man - all this weighed upon the Saviour's spirit, His spirit alone in the midst of the world! But for Him, I repeat, His Father's will was sufficient to light His path; He needed but this. Invaluable teaching for us, and for our feeble hearts, but which have divine power with them in that path. One does not stumble there. The precious Saviour never failed in it, either in life or in death; He led a hidden life with His Father, a life which shewed itself in obedience and perfect love for Him, but which made up His life where hatred and death reigned, these, however, only leading Him to the end He was pursuing, namely, perfect obedience to, and the absolute glory of, His Father. Oh! may we be able to follow Him; and, if it be afar off, at least may it be Him that we follow while walking in His footsteps, in the inner life which looks to Him, and in obedience, and seeking what He wills!

"Let us go to him," said Jesus (v. 15). He goes to meet death as a power that exercises its dominion over man; and to undergo it Himself, He who was the Resurrection and the Life, in view of our salvation, and for the glory of God. In His walk of obedience down here, the Father always hears Him, and He exercises thus divine power, even to raising a dead man; but He walks in this path of obedience to obey to the end, finding that He could not be heard until the cup, of which He had a holy fear, had been drunk; that cup that He was going to drink, in being abandoned of God in His soul, then heard, doubtless, and glorified, but after having experienced to the end what it was not to be heard.

225 But whatever may have been the Saviour's thoughts and the pressure of circumstances upon His soul, they never overcame Him, nor hindered the exercise of the most perfect love. "I rejoice, on your account, that I was not there" (v. 15). If He was tried by seeming to be wanting in affection for these poor women, not only was He perfectly obeying His Father's will, which is confirmed here, but, in the midst of the deep exercises of His heart, the power of life and all the weight of death meeting in His mind, He rejoiced at the profit that the disciples were about to have from it.

Another testimony of the grace of God is found here, in the fact that the devotedness of Thomas, who, later on, was wanting in faith, is recorded, so that we cannot doubt of his loyalty to Jesus. But let us follow this important history of the resurrection of Lazarus.

The fact of the death of Lazarus was clearly established, by the delay, that God's wisdom had caused in the intervention of the Lord; Lazarus had been four days in the tomb. That which is but obedience to God's will at the moment when it is a question of submitting to it, later on displays the wisdom of God. Jesus had healed many other persons; but here, close to Jerusalem, in the sight of the Jews, the power of life, divine power in Jesus was manifested at the moment when He was about to die, and that in a very striking manner. It was a power unknown to all, although He who exercised it, and who was it, had already restored life to the dead. Jesus, then, being come, found that Lazarus had already been four days in the tomb (v. 17). Bethany being near to Jerusalem, many Jews had gone there, to testify their sympathy with the dead man's sisters, and to comfort them, a crowd of witnesses were thus brought upon the spot, to verify the Lord's wonderful work, to spread the report of it in the holy city, and establish the authenticity of it without possible contradiction, and thus bring on the crisis, which was soon to have a solemn result in the death of the Saviour, according to the counsels and determinate purpose of God.

226 The news of the arrival of Jesus reached Bethany, and Martha heard of it, and arose immediately and went to meet the Lord (v. 19, 20). Martha's heart was governed by circumstances, and the tardy arrival of the Lord sets her at once in action. What would Jesus say? What would He do? There was with Martha confidence in Him, but nothing was weighed. Mary was more serious; she was accustomed to sit at the feet of Jesus, to listen to the divine testimony that issued from His mouth; there was, perhaps, more perplexity in her heart as to why the Lord had not come earlier, but with more reverence for His Person, she was more influenced by the sense of His divine character; she remains quietly in the house waiting until God ordered for her that she should be found with Jesus; her heart full, ready to burst forth, still counted upon Jesus and relied on Him, cast down I have no doubt, but knowing that there was in the Lord a heart more deep, more full of love than her own. Martha, having come to Jesus, is quite ready with a word; she recognises Him truly as Lord, she believes in Him truly, but with a faith that knows little what He is. "Lord, if thou hadst been here," she says, "my brother would not have died," but still she knew that as Messiah, what Jesus asked of God, God would give Him. It is not here a question of the Father, of the Son who had life in Himself; but Martha had known too well what Jesus had done to suppose that God would not hear Him. All this passage is interesting, for it shews us a soul that believed in Jesus, a soul that loved Him, but a faith - one sees many thus - where all was vague, a faith that recognised in Jesus a Mediator, whom God would hear, but that knew nothing of His Person as come into this world, nor of the quickening power which was found in the Son of God, come into the midst of the scene where death reigned. The Lord's answer raises this question and gives room for the public testimony of God on this subject. "Thy brother shall rise again," said Jesus. Martha, an orthodox Pharisee, answers, "I know that he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day"; she might have said as much of the greatest enemies of Christ. These will certainly rise again, the power of God will effect it. Martha's answer did not say more of it, did not say one word of what the Saviour was. Jesus says, "I am the resurrection and the life" (v. 25). As in the whole Gospel, we have here what Jesus is as light and life, in His Person, as come into the world, in contrast with all the promises made to the Jews, even though they had been justly appreciated. They were scarcely so here, they were at least in a very vague manner.

227 The Lord speaks here (v. 25, 26) as already present to accomplish the great result of His power, still hidden in His Person, but of which He was going to give the proof in the resurrection of Lazarus. When He shall exercise this power, he that believeth* in Him, even though he be dead, shall live; and whosoever liveth, and believeth in Him, shall never die. Power is in His Person; the present proof of it was found in the resurrection of Lazarus; the accomplishment of it will be when He shall come back to exercise this power in its fulness. In the meantime the thing is realised according to the place that Christ has taken; He raised up Lazarus for life in this world where He was. Now that He is absent, the soul that is quickened by His power goes to Him where He is; when He comes back, He will raise the believing dead in glory; believers who are alive will not die. Evidently we find in this the power of life that is in the Person of the Saviour, in contrast with Martha's vague thought, so common among Christians, too, that God will raise up all men at the end of time. The words of the Lord apply only to believers.

{*Literally "the believer," it is his character.}

Note, that the resurrection here precedes life, for death was before the eyes of Jesus, and weighed upon all hearts. But also Jesus had the power of life to raise from the dead, when death had already exercised its power, and this is what was needed for man over whom death reigned.

The Lord puts the question formally to Martha: "Believest thou this?" Indeed this was the great crucial question, for death reigned over man, and Christ Himself was about to undergo it. Was there anything more powerful in the world, on the part of God? Martha had not been sitting at the feet of Jesus; she does not know how to answer, nor Mary herself: Martha's precipitation, however, had served to bring to light the question which she knew not how to answer, and the state of ignorance in which all hearts were. But the glorious Person of Jesus, the Resurrection and the Life, was there. Martha, feeling that the Lord went beyond her spiritual intelligence, makes a correct confession of faith, according to Psalm 2, but altogether general; and feeling that Mary knew the Lord's mind better, she goes to call her, saying, "The Master calleth for thee"; which, though not formally true, expressed that which she felt morally, that which the Saviour's question implied; for the "Believest thou this?" was addressed, she felt, not so much to her, as to Mary.

228 Mary rises at once, and goes to Jesus. Her heart was, the needs of her heart were, there already; her respect for the Lord, and the perplexity of her soul, agitated by the power of death, had kept her in the house until then: but that shewed that death weighed upon Mary's soul also; all was subjected to it. Jesus could heal; but death ruled over the living as well as over the deceased. Mary, with a subject heart, though exercised and perplexed, for the Deliverer in whom she trusted had not arrested the evil, comes near to Jesus. Attached to the Lord, who possessed her heart's confidence, a confidence which Martha's words had revived, but having still the weight of death upon her soul, Mary falls down before Him as soon as she sees Him, for her devotedness was connected with deep reverence for the Person of Jesus, a reverence engendered by His word. But Mary, too, was under the weight of death; in that respect she did not go beyond Martha, but sure of the goodness of Jesus, as indeed Martha also had been, she said, "If thou hadst been here, my brother had not died." Death was between her hope and Jesus, since Jesus had not been between Lazarus and death. Death, for her, had shut the door to all hope; Lazarus was no more in the land of the living, there was no longer any one to be healed.

The Jews, seeing that Mary had got up and gone out, followed her, thinking that she was going to the grave to weep there; they but thus add their voice to the testimony rendered to the power of death over the body and the soul, "Could not this man, who opened the eyes of the blind, have caused that even this man should not have died?" (v. 37). Jesus feels it; He groans and is deeply moved* in His spirit, but the love which animates Him and the testimony which He had come to render to the truth, press Him on towards the grave where the body of Lazarus lies. He asks, "Where have ye laid him?" They conduct Him to the sepulchre. There Jesus relieves Himself by tears, which are the witness to His estate as man, and to His sympathy for men and as a man, but also the expression of a heart moved by divine love. It was not however the loss of Lazarus, nor His love for the dead man's sisters that was the cause of those tears, for Jesus was going at that very moment to raise Lazarus. In thinking of the latter, that which He was going to do would have made joy spring up in His heart. No, these tears of the Saviour were profound sympathy for the human race crushed under the weight of death, from which it could not raise itself, as also for these tried souls. The Jews thought that the tears of Jesus had their source in His affection for Lazarus: "See how he loved him!" they say. This was very natural, but that which He was about to do forbids us to entertain the like thought. The remark, already quoted, of some amongst them (v. 37) only renews the groans of Jesus, in recalling the thought of the subjection of men, not only to death, but to the dominion of death over their spirits.

{*The expression here used is a very strong one.}

229 This is what caused the Saviour's tears to flow. Poor Martha cannot conceal her unbelief, that is to say, the influence that external circumstances exercised over her soul. Lazarus had been in the grave four days already! Corruption must have already begun, she says. God permits that there should not be the slightest doubt, and that the proof of the reality of Lazarus's death should be given; but the glory of God did not depend on the facility of the work, it shewed itself in its impossibility. Then they took away the stone which closed the sepulchre where the dead body of Lazarus lay.

Jesus here, as always in this Gospel, attributes the work to the Father's will, and accomplishes the work as heard by Him: His hearing Him being the proof that the Father had sent Him, and bearing witness to it. This is the position that Jesus places Himself in; He does not leave the character of Servant that He had taken; He could do, and did, all that His Father did: but it was as sent of Him to accomplish it, as having made Himself a Servant, whilst being one with the Father. He never glorifies Himself, nor departs from this dependence on His Father, in His course down here. He would have failed in His perfection in doing so; He could not. Also, His mission from heaven, on the part of God, was the chief point for the multitude.

Then with the powerful voice that raises the dead, the voice of the Son of God, He cries, "Lazarus, come forth!" (v. 43) and the dead man came forth, bound with the sheet in which he had been buried, and with his face bound about with a napkin. Jesus commanded those standing by to loose him and let him go.

230 The effect of this miracle was, that many of the Jews believed in Him; but others, hardened by their prejudices, went away to the Pharisees, and told them what Jesus had done. Israel was laid under the necessity of believing or of shewing an incurable hatred against God, and against His will: for, let us remember it, almost under the walls of Jerusalem, and known of all, the God of light and truth shewed Himself as the resurrection and the life, and raised from amongst the dead a man whose body was going to corruption. At the powerful word of Him who, nevertheless, owned His being sent from the Father, the dead man buried already four days, comes out alive from the tomb. The power of God entered, even as to the body, into the domain of death, from whose dominion no human being could free himself, that no living being could avoid, that all were condemned to undergo by the power of Satan and by the judgment of God. Here was a Man, who, insisting that He was sent of the Father in grace, calls a dead man from the tomb with authority, and in fact quickens him and raises him. The Son of God was there, overturning the power of Satan, destroying the dominion of death, and setting man free from the state to which he had been subjected by sin: He was there the Son of God, the Resurrection and the Life, presented to man, declared Son of God with power. Would man receive Him?

The news of the wonderful event of the resurrection of Lazarus having reached the ears of the Pharisees, they gathered together to take counsel as to what was to be done. Avowed adversaries of Christ, whatever might happen, only thinking of their national importance, their consciences and hearts remaining alike insensible, they were afraid that the manifestation of such power would awaken the jealousy of the Romans; their hatred against the divine light being greater, however, and having more effect on them than the fear of the Romans, for when occasion arose it did not cost them much to excite disturbances and rebellions. Caiaphas, for the counsels of God are about to be accomplished, declares that it is better that one man should die for the nation, than that it should entirely perish. "Ye know nothing, nor consider that it is profitable for us that one man die for the nation, and that the whole nation perish not" (v. 50). God put these words in his mouth; the evangelist adding that Jesus was going to die, not for the nation only, but that He should gather together in one the children of God who were scattered abroad. Enmity against the light come and manifested in grace, and against divine power, which did not now seek to shelter itself, but accomplished the will of God - absolute enmity against the Son of God, in whom these things were realised, and who was manifested by these things - was indeed determined on, and without scruple. From that day, therefore, they consulted together that they might put Him to death (v. 53). It was a diabolical will to put to death Him in whom was life, and in whom God Himself had visited this poor world in grace - a will without any scruple whatever, for they wanted to put Lazarus also to death, a witness too irrefragable of the power that had raised him. Nothing is more frightful, but it is man laid bare.

231 Jesus therefore walked no longer openly among the Jews; He went away until His hour should be come. They asked each other if He would come to the feast, for the passover of the Jews was near; and the chief priests and the Pharisees had given commandment that if anyone knew where Jesus was, they should make it known, that they might take Him.

What a testimony we have here to the entrance of the power of life into this world of death, of its entrance in grace, and victorious over death, however real this might be! Let us remember that resurrection comes first, for in reality we are all dead. Yet another thing was needed, the death of Him who possessed this life; for we are sinners, and the mind of the flesh in all is enmity against God: redemption was needed as life was needed where death reigned, and reigned through sin. (Compare 1 John 4: 9, 10.) But we possess the testimony of divine power come into the domain of death - how God glorifies Himself - and the Son of God revealed as the one in whom that life is for us; we see, too, who He is who was going to give Himself for us on the cross.

John 12

But the solemn hour of the Lord's death was approaching, and six days before the Passover of which He was to be the real lamb, Jesus comes back to Bethany (chap. 12: 1), and what a wonderful scene unfolds itself there! Seated at the same table, there was Lazarus risen, come back from hades, and He who had brought him back, the Son of God. Martha, according to her ordinary practice, is occupied with service; Mary, completing the moral picture, is occupied with Jesus. Mary had tasted the word of the Lord: that word, full of love and of light, had penetrated her heart. Jesus had given her back her beloved brother. She saw the hatred of the Jews rise against Him whom she loved, and who had introduced into her heart the feeling of divine love; in proportion as the hatred rose, her affection for the Saviour rose too, and gave it courage to shew itself. It was the instinct of affection which felt that death was casting its shadow over Him who was the life, as Jesus felt it also; - the only case in which Jesus found sympathy on earth. The Lord gives to Mary's act, instinctive fruit of affection and of devotedness, a voice that came from His divine intelligence: what she had done she had done for His burial. He knew that He was going away; Mary had spent all for Him; Jesus was worthy of it, for her heart. As I have said, her affection rose in the measure in which the hatred of the Jews increased. The shadow of His approaching rejection reached her already. Indeed, everything was centred, everything assumed its form, in Him and around Him; in Him, the power of life, and devotedness unto death; in Mary, affection which made of Jesus everything for her heart; in Judas, the spirit of lying and of treachery; in the Jews, hatred against that which was divine, even to wishing to put Lazarus himself to death - inconceivable malice and hardness that would not have the light! On the occasion of the remark of Judas, the Lord expresses the consciousness He had of His approaching departure from this world, but with striking patience and gentleness.

232 This brief history contained in the first verses of this chapter, has a special character, introduced, as it is, in the midst of the testimony that God caused to be borne to the personal glory of His Son, at the moment of His rejection. But, at this very moment, and in the midst of the increasing hatred of the heads of the nation, this little flock gathers together, a witness to the divine power of which one amongst them had been the object, a power which led many of the Jews to believe in Jesus v. 11). Jesus must go away, He must die; but before He dies, there are men who are witnesses of the quickening power of the Son of God, and see in it the glory of God, witnesses of what He was already, of what He was in His Person. The verses which follow shew what He was going to be in His position - that which belonged to Him, but which He did not appropriate to Himself, and which, in one way, He could not so appropriate before He died.

233 The first two titles to which testimony is borne here, belonged to the Lord while He was alive, but the first was connected with His Person, was inherent in Him; He was Son of God, He was the Resurrection and the Life, so that the little assembly that surrounded Him, was gathered about Him on a principle with which eternal life was connected, and upon which the Christian position (not yet developed nor known, it is true, either as a principle or as a fact) was founded by anticipation - Christ, Son of God, Resurrection and Life, going away to the Father, by the way of the shadow of death, and His rejection down here. In fine, the three characters of Christ, of which the two first are found in the second Psalm, and are recognised by Nathanael at the beginning of our Gospel, and of which the third, contained in Psalm 8, is reproduced in the answer of the Saviour to Nathanael, are found again here; only there is this difference with Psalm 2, that the first of these names is presented here not only as by right of birth in this world, but as the exercise of divine power that raises and quickens. As to the two others, we are about to pursue the manifestation of them as it is given us in our chapter.

Before going further, I wish to draw attention once more to this solemn bringing together of the power of death over man's heart, over the first Adam, and the power of divine life in the Son of God, present in a man in the very heart of the dominion of death, destroying this dominion, and He who possessed it in His Person, giving Himself up to death, in order to deliver from it those that were subject to it. That Jesus had this in view is apparent: (See chap. 10: 31, 40; ch. 11: 16, 53, 54; ch. 12: 7.) He had it on His spirit when He came back to Jerusalem, and when He spoke with Martha and Mary; He must Himself undergo death for us.

The next day (ver. 12, etc.) the people, having learned that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, struck by this great miracle of the resurrection of Lazarus, go forth to meet Him with branches of palm-trees, and salute Him as the King of Israel that cometh in the name of Jehovah, according to Psalm 118. It is the second character in which God would have Jesus recognised, notwithstanding His rejection. The resurrection of Lazarus had shewn Him as Son of God; now He is owned Son of David. Here the event is in direct connection with the resurrection of Lazarus, and the title of Son of God; in Luke, and even in Matthew and Mark, this circumstance is connected rather with the title of Lord, and we find there the details of the manner in which Jesus found the ass's colt. In these three Gospels too, although this difference is less striking in Matthew, the disciples are put forward, whilst here it is more the people, moved by the noise which the resurrection of Lazarus had caused. It is the prophecy of Zechariah, but leaving out that which, in the prophet, refers to the deliverance of Israel. John and Matthew mention it, for it was only after that Jesus was glorified, that the disciples could connect the prophecy with that which they had themselves done to honour Him, and to cause Him to enter in triumph into Jerusalem, Jesus, however, having given the order about the ass's colt.

234 Such are, beside the divine power that quickens, the two titles that belonged to Jesus, as the Christ manifested upon earth, the titles of Psalm 2.

After this the Greeks, from amongst those who had gone up to worship during the feast, arrive and desire to see Jesus. They come to Philip, who tells Andrew, and then Andrew and Philip tell Jesus. Although coming to worship at Jerusalem, they were strangers to the covenants of promise; an entirely new order of things was needed to introduce them into it. They had no right to the promises; Jesus must die to lay the foundation for this new order of things. Jesus is here, not the promised Messiah, but the second Man, head of all things that God had created, that He had Himself created: but He must receive them by redemption, and especially His co-heirs. "Except a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die, it remains alone; but if it die, it bears much fruit" (v. 24). He must redeem the co-heirs in order to have them with Himself. If He were King of Israel and Son of God according to Psalm 2, He was, as Son of man, Lord of the whole creation; only He must die that His co-heirs should have part in the inheritance that He had acquired. "The hour is come," said He, "that the Son of man should be glorified" (v. 23).

It is well to remember the testimonies that the Old and New Testament furnish on the bearing of this title of Son of Man. The Psalms and Daniel speak of it. We find it in Psalm 80: 17, where the point is, the blessing of the Jews, when they will return to Jehovah; in Psalm 8, after having been rejected in Psalm 2 as Son of God and King of Israel, the Son of man appears as Lord of all; it is still here, when the name of Jehovah, the God of the Jews, is "excellent in all the earth," but His glory exalted also above the heavens, that Man, at the same time the Son of man, is set over all the works of God. This Psalm 8 is quoted by the Lord to justify the cries of the children when He entered into Jerusalem (v. 2); and by the apostle Paul (Eph. 1: 21, 22; 1 Cor. 15: 27), in view of Christ's position as Head over all after His resurrection; and in Hebrews 2, to shew His glory in this position above angels (chap. 1 of this epistle having presented this position as a consequence of His divinity), but when this human supremacy had not yet taken place, although He was crowned with glory and honour. These three passages develop clearly the position of Jesus as Son of man; one other (Dan. 7: 13, 14) completes the picture of the place of the Son of man in the government of God. In this passage the Son of man is brought to the Ancient of Days in order to take up the government, not of the Jews only, but of all kingdoms, exercising from on high, from heaven, the universal dominion of which He holds the reins, by it replacing all the powers that have held a more or less universal sway after that the throne of God had left Jerusalem on the Babylonish captivity.

235 Now to take this position of dominion not only over Israel and over the nations, but over all the works of God, over all that He Himself had created, Jesus must die, not to have right to everything, but to possess on the ground of redemption, all things reconciled to God, and then to have co-heirs, according to the counsels of God, He being the Firstborn among many brethren. This death is the first thought that comes to the mind of the Lord when the arrival of the Greeks brings forward His dignity as Son of man. Death and the curse were man's inheritance; Jesus must undergo them, to raise man from the state in which he was found, and to place him in the lordship which had been destined for him according to the counsels of God. He was the second Man, the last Adam; but sin having entered into the world, He must redeem the co-heirs, purify them, that they might have a place with Him; He must take away all right from the enemy, so as to deprive him later on of his power over the heritage that he had acquired by man's sin, and even by the judgment of God, and to reconcile all things to God having made peace by the blood of the cross. In this path of death, for it was indeed the death of the cross, if any one serve Him, he must follow Him. Whosoever loves his life shall lose it, and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal. Solemn word! But we have already seen that His rejection must, according to Psalm 2, be associated with His character of Messiah and Son of God: He should be no more of this world. His position as Son of man, Head over all things, only comes afterwards in Psalm 8.

236 From the tenth chapter, we find ourselves historically in the shadow of His death, which made thus an absolute breach between Him and the world, and was also death in all its terror as the judgment of God. He has borne the judgment in our place; but it was there the judgment of a world that should see Him no more. The friendship of the world henceforth would be enmity against God; it had been always so in reality, but now the fact was publicly manifested; it is the rejected Lord who is the Saviour. It is He whom man has crucified, that God has raised to His right hand. He had fully revealed the Father, and they had seen and hated both Him and the Father, as He says (chap. 15: 24), and in appealing to the judgment of God, "Righteous Father, the world hath not known thee." To be a Saviour, He had to be lifted up from the earth; the Son of man had to suffer and die; a living Christ was for the Jews. The shadow of death only grew thicker up to Gethsemane, where its deepest shades enveloped the soul of Jesus, and where He took in His hand the cup which contained that which had thrown its shadow on His soul all along the way, but which now penetrated it with its most profound darkness. One only thing remained to Him up to the cross, and even in the sufferings of perfect obedience - communion with His Father; at the cross, obedience was accomplished, and the communion was lost, to make His obedience and His perfection shine the more. It was man's hour and the power of darkness which only drove Him on towards the judgment of God, more terrible than the subordinate instruments that darkened the path of obedience and of sufferings, in which He perfectly glorified God, there where He has been made sin for us, and has blotted out our sins for ever.

237 The Lord speaks in an abstract way, as of a rule or principle, the ground of which He Himself was going to lay for all; only He was giving Himself that others might have eternal life; and He could have delivered Himself, or have obtained twelve legions of angels; but then, how would the scriptures have been fulfilled? The thing could not be; He had not come to deliver Himself. He would have remained in heaven, and have left us exposed to God's righteous judgment; but that could not be either: His love did not allow Him to do this. He had also too much at heart the accomplishment of the counsels of God, and the glory of God His Father, which should thus be made evident in a remarkable and perfect manner. The Saviour's rejection on the part of the world has been the rejection of the world on the part of God. The last effort to find or arouse good in man's heart had been made, and they had "seen and hated both me and my Father." God could save out of this world, in grace; but the world was lost, it was in a state of enmity against God. He therefore who attaches himself to this world, who seeks his life in it, or who keeps it as a life to which he clings, in contrast with the rejected Christ, loses it. We are not always called upon to sacrifice our lives outwardly, although this might take place, and has often happened; but morally this applies always: he who loves his life, who cleaves to it as if it belonged to this world, loses it. It is a life of vanity, alienated from God as the world itself to which it attaches itself, a life which ends only in death; for here Jesus does not speak of judgment.

The Lord adds, to that which precedes, a most important principle of conduct: "If any man serve me, let him follow me" (v. 26). It will be in principle, through death, that we must follow Him - death to sin and to the world; but the consequence of such a path is simple; where the Saviour is, there shall His servant be. Such an one follows Him through death into the heavenly glory where He has entered, and "If any man serve me, him will my Father honour."

But the heart of the Lord, if He exhorted others to take the narrow road in which one was to deny oneself, and the world that was enmity against God, whilst losing a life identified with the world which rejected the light when it had come into it in grace - His heart, I say, realised what was before Himself, for He was going to meet death, death armed with its sting - the judgment of God against sin, and the power of Satan - but a death in which we find all the more the perfection of Jesus. "Now," He says, "is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour; but for this cause came I unto this hour"; it was for this that I came into the world. Then the Saviour goes back to the true motive of everything, a motive always present to His heart: "Father, glorify thy name!" Cost what it might, this was what He desired always. There was no delay in the answer of the Father: "I have both glorified it, and I will glorify it again." I have no doubt that this "I will glorify it again" was to be accomplished in resurrection. The Father had glorified His name in the resurrection of Lazarus, a resurrection in this world; He was going to do it again in Christ Himself, in a better resurrection, a true answer to death, where the sovereign power of God in grace, and towards Christ in righteousness, has been manifested; a new state in which man had never been, but which was, according to God's counsels, the expression of what He is in Himself, and perfect blessing for man: "Christ (says the apostle) was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father."

238 The multitude did not know what to think of this voice that it had heard; they said it was a clap of thunder; others, that an angel had spoken to Him. Jesus answers: "This voice came not because of me, but for your sakes"; the Father's voice was in His heart; for the people, it was necessary to have that which was sensible; grace gave it to them. But the Lord explains this solemn sign, by that which was in His heart, and that He knew to be taking place at that moment: "Now is the judgment of this world." Then, indeed, took place the judgment of the world, which is condemned absolutely and finally in rejecting the Lord; but in this also is accomplished the work that has broken for ever the power of Satan, prince of this world; and, on the other hand, a Saviour has been manifested, point of attraction for all men, instead and in place of a Messiah of the Jews, for these things He said to signify by what death He should die. The multitude (ver. 34) oppose to Him that which was written of the Messiah, and ask: "How sayest thou that the Son of man must be lifted up [from the earth]? Who is this Son of man?" The Lord answers by warning them that the moment was approaching when the light, He Himself, would be put out for them, and when they would lose it for ever: they would walk in darkness, not knowing whither they went; for them, wisdom was to believe in the light before it went away, that they might be sons of light; then He went away.

239 Remark also here, a very important expression. The Lord says, "And I, if I be lifted up out of the earth, will draw all men unto me" (v. 32). He is no longer at all of this world, nor in heaven either. It is a Saviour rejected, suffering, dying, who has left the world for ever, a Saviour ignominiously rejected, driven away, cast out by the world; it is He who, being no longer on the earth, nor in heaven either, I repeat, exposed to the gaze of men, lifted up from the earth and not yet in heaven, but alone between the one and the other with God, like the altar that was neither in the camp nor in the tabernacle - it is He who is the attractive refuge of those who would flee from the world that has rejected Him to enter heaven, to which He thus opens the way for us.

The rest of the chapter is a summing up of the position. In the first part, it is the evangelist who records the obstinate incredulity of the people, and the sad motives that governed their minds, preoccupied with the approbation of men, rather than looking to God. In the second part, Jesus Himself shews two things; first of all, that in rejecting Him thus, those that did it, rejected the light itself, come into the world, that those who believed on God should not remain in darkness; then, that in rejecting Him, they rejected the Father, for what He said were the Father's words. Thus He did not judge him that heard His word, but did not keep it, for He was not come to judge the world, but to save it; His words would judge them at the last day. Now, that which He said was the Father's commandment, and this commandment (He knew it, He had faith in it, the certain consciousness in Himself) was eternal life. All that He said then, He "spoke" it, as the Father had spoken to Him.

This summing up of the rejection of Him of whom the prophets had spoken, of the light, and of the words of the Father, closes the history, properly so called, of the Saviour's life. That which follows refers to His departure, to the gift of the Holy Ghost, as well as to the ministry of those whom He left down here as witnesses in His place. But before entering into this new portion of our Gospel, I would remind you that the 41st verse, quoting Isaiah 6, and applying it to Christ, shews that Jesus was the Jehovah of the Old Testament. I would point out too, how the fear of man and the pursuit of his approbation, obscures the testimony of God in the heart, and stifles the conscience. If the eye be single, the whole body is full of light.

On the Gospel of John

J. N. Darby.

<33014E> 240 {file section d.}

John 13

In chapter 13 the instructions begin that relate to a heavenly Saviour. Although He was upon earth, He was the Light come from heaven, the eternal life that was from heaven; but, rejected upon earth, He now takes His place in heaven - not God manifested in human humiliation down here, but Man glorified in the glory of God above; and He exhibits and develops what He is for us in this position, before entering into it.

From this thirteenth chapter, then, the Saviour presents Himself as having finished His testimony upon earth, and going to the Father. This leads Him to speak of His position and of His service on high in heaven, of the position of the disciples, and of the other Comforter, that He - and the Father in His name - would send from on high. He was seated at supper with His disciples, their friend and companion at table down here, one of them, whatever might be His glory, and their servant in grace. But He must leave them and go to His Father; solemn moment for them: what would become of them, and what would be their relationship with Him? Their thoughts hardly went further than this with regard to Him; they thought that they had found the Messiah who was going to set up the kingdom of God in Israel, although the Holy Ghost had attached them to His Person by a divine power. They knew that He was the Son of the living God, He who had the words of eternal life. But He was going to leave them: He had been among them as one who serves; must His service of love come to an end? The Father had given all things into His hands, He knew it; He was come from God, and was going to God; could the link of His service of love with His own continue? If it should, it was necessary that they should be fit for the presence of God Himself, and for association with the One to whom all things were committed.

Now Jesus had loved His own that were in the world: it is the precious source of all His relations with us, and He does not change. He had loved His own, He loved them to the end; His heart did not give them up, but He knew that He must leave them. Would He cease to be their servant in love? No, He would be it for ever. Everything was ready for His departure, even the heart of Judas. But neither the iniquitous treachery of Judas below, nor the glory into which He was about to enter above, separated His heart from His disciples. He ceases to be their companion; He remains their Servant; it is what we read in Exodus 21: 2-6.

241 Jesus rises from supper and lays aside His garments; He takes a napkin and girds Himself with it: then, pouring water into a basin, He begins to wash the feet of the disciples, and to wipe them with the napkin with which He was girded. He is ever a Servant, and does the service of a slave. Wonderful truth and infinite grace, that the Son of the Most High, humbling Himself even to us, is pleased in His love to make us fit to enjoy the presence and the glory of God. He took the place of a Servant to accomplish this work of love, and His love never gives it up. (See in the glory, Luke 12: 37.) He is a Servant for ever, for love delights to serve.

Peter, who in giving way to his own feelings, though very natural, gives occasion so often to the words of the Lord that reveal to us the thoughts of God, objects strongly to the Lord's washing his feet. The answer of Jesus discloses the spiritual meaning of what He was doing, a meaning which Peter could not then understand, but which he should understand later on, for the Holy Ghost would make them understand all these things. One must be washed by the Lord in order to have part with Him: this is the key of all that was being done. Jesus could no longer have part with His disciples down here, and the disciples could not have part with Him, and before God Himself, to whom He was going, unless He washed them. There must be a cleanness such as could suit the presence and the house of God. Then, with his ardent spirit, Peter desires that the Lord should wash his hands and head, and Jesus explains to him the import of what He was doing.

We must remember that here it is a question of water, not of blood, however necessary the blood of the Saviour be. It is a question of purity, not of expiation. Note, in the next place, that the scripture uses two words here which must not be confounded; one means to wash the whole body, to bathe; the other to wash the hands, the feet, or anything small. The water itself, employed here or elsewhere as a figure, signifies purification by the word, applied according to the power of the Spirit. One is born "of water"; - then the whole body is washed: there is a purification of the thoughts and actions by means of an object which forms and governs the heart. These are the divine thoughts in Christ, the life and character of the new man, the reception of Christ by the word. Christ had the words of eternal life: this was expressed and communicated in His words, where grace acted, for they were spirit and life. The disciples had received these words, except the one who should betray Him; but although they were thus washed, converted, purified in reality, by the Lord's words, yet they were going to walk in a defiled world, where they could indeed defile their feet. Now this defilement does not suit God's house, and the love of the Lord does what is needed that the remedy should be soon applied, if they contracted defilement which shut them out. Ready to do everything that they might be blessed, Jesus washes their feet. This action was the service of a slave in those countries, where it was the first and constant expression of hospitality, and of the attentive care it claimed. (See Gen. 18: 4; Luke 7: 44.)

242 With this washing of the feet is connected the truth that conversion is not repeated. Once the word has been applied by the power of the Holy Ghost, this work is done, and it can never be undone, any more than the sprinkling of blood can be repeated or renewed. But if I sin, I defile my feet; my communion with God is interrupted. Then the Saviour occupies Himself with me, in His love.

It will be well to notice here the difference that there is between the Priest and the Advocate. In practice the difference is important. Both offices have to do with intercession; but the Advocate is for sins that have been committed; the Priest is there that we may not sin, and that goodness may be in exercise in respect of our weakness; I speak of the Priesthood in heaven. Upon the cross Jesus was Priest and Victim (the goat Hazazel); but there the priest represented all the people, confessing their sins on the goat's head. This was indeed the work of the priest, but not properly a priestly act; and, as I have just said, the priest acted there as the representative of all the people, these latter being looked upon as guilty. This work is accomplished by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ, made once for all: by His one offering He has perfected for ever those that are sanctified, so that we have no more conscience of sins. But Christ intercedes for us, in order that we may obtain mercy, and that we may find grace in time of need; so that, in our weakness, we may be the objects of the care of God's goodness, and that we may not sin. The Advocate intercedes, when we have sinned, to re-establish the interrupted communion, for it is a question of communion in 1 John 1. Righteousness and propitiation remain always perfect, and form the basis of that which is done for us when we have failed; 1 John 2: 1, 2. The effect of this grace in Christ is, that the Spirit applies the word (the water in figure), humbles us in convincing us of sin, and brings us near to God. The red heifer (Numbers 19) is a very instructive development of this renewing of communion. Notice here, that the Advocate does His work in order that we may be cleansed, not when we have been: also, we do not go to Him that He may do it; it is He who takes the initiative in grace, as He did for Peter, that His disciple's faith might not fail, when He should be obliged to leave him to himself for a moment, that he should make experience of his weakness.

243 The washing of the feet is therefore a service with which Christ is now occupied for us. When by our negligence (for there never is a necessity that we should do it) we have defiled our feet, and we have made ourselves unfit to enter spiritually into the presence of God, Christ purifies us by the word, so that communion may be re-established between our souls and God. It is a question of our walk down here essentially. When the priest amongst the Jews was consecrated, his body was washed, then he washed his feet and hands at the time of the accomplishment of each service. Here it is only the feet that had to be washed; it is no longer a service of work that is in question, but our walk down here.

The Lord gives what He had just been doing as an example of humility; but the spiritual intelligence of what He had done would only come when the Holy Ghost had been given. Still, we are called, in this sense also, to wash one another's feet, to apply the word in grace to the conscience of a brother who needs it, and in the humility, of which Christ has given the example. But the teaching refers to what Christ is doing for us on high, remaining ever our Servant in grace.

The Lord, in speaking here to His disciples, makes an exception of Judas, for He knew that Judas should betray Him, and He warns the disciples of it, that it might not be a stumbling-block. Still, in receiving one sent of the Lord, as sent of Him, they received Him; and in receiving Him, they received the Father Himself that sent Him. But although the Lord knew who should betray Him, the feeling that it was one of His own companions grieved Him; He even opens His heart before them: "One of you shall betray me." (v. 21). Sure at least of the truth of His words, of the certainty of them, they look at one another with the sincerity of innocence. Now John was near the Lord; Peter, always ardent, wishes to know who it is, and makes a sign to John to ask Jesus, for he was not himself near enough to Him to ask the question. Peter loved the Lord, a sincere faith attached him to Him, but he lacked that concentration of spirit that would have kept him near the Lord, as Mary, the sister of Martha, was kept there. John had not placed himself near Jesus to receive this communication; he received it because, according to the habit of his heart, he kept near Him, glorying in the title, "the disciple whom Jesus loved." Thus John was there where he could receive the Lord's communication. This is our secret, too, in order to have the intimate communications of the Lord. Blessed place, where the heart enjoys the affections of the Saviour, and where He communicates to us what His heart contains for those whom He loves.

244 But nearness to Jesus, without faith in Him, if the heart overcomes the influence of His presence, hardens in a terrible manner; the morsel which shewed that one was eating of the same dish, the morsel which Judas received, dipped by His hand, is but the sign of Satan's entering into his heart. Satan enters into this heart to harden it, even against every amiable sentiment of nature, against every remembrance of that which could act upon the conscience. There are many unconverted persons, who would not betray an intimate companion by covering him with kisses; many wicked people that would have remembered the miracles they had seen - perhaps done themselves. Covetousness had been there, it had never been repressed; then Satan suggests to Judas the means of satisfying it. For myself I have no doubt that Iscariot thought that the Lord would escape out of the hands of men, as He had done, when His hour was not yet come: his remorse, when he knew that Jesus was condemned, makes me think it - a remorse which only found other hearts as hard as his own, and indifferent to his misery; an appalling picture of man's heart under the influence of Satan. Then, almost the final phase of this influence, Satan hardens Judas against all feeling of humanity, and of man towards the man of his acquaintance, and finishes all by abandoning him, giving him up to despair in the presence of God.

245 Morally all was over when Judas had taken the morsel that had been dipped: and Jesus charges him to do quickly that which he was doing. The disciples did not know why the Lord said this; they thought of the feast, or of the use which might be made of what was in the purse; but in the heart of the Lord, all the import of this solemn moment is realised. As soon as Judas had gone out, He declares it: "Now is the Son of man glorified." It is no longer affection, wounded by the treachery of one of His own, that expresses itself in the anguish of His heart; His soul rises, when the fact is there, to the height of the thoughts of God in this solemn event, which stands alone in the history of eternity, and on which all blessing depends, from the beginning, to the new heavens and the new earth. It rises even above the blessings, to the nature of God, and to the relations of God and of Christ, founded on His glorious work. This passage is thus of great importance; the cross makes the glory of the Son of man. He will appear in glory, the Father will subject all things to Him; but it is not this glory that is here in view; it is the Saviour's moral and personal glory. He who is man, who (although in a miraculous way, so that He was without sin) was, on His mother's side, of the nature of Adam, has been in suffering, the means of establishing and bringing to light all that is found in God, His glory. God is righteous, holy, and hates sin; God is love: it is impossible to reconcile these characters in any other way, than by the cross. There, where the righteous judgment of God is in exercise against sin, infinite love is manifested towards the sinner. Without the cross, it is impossible to reconcile these two things, impossible to manifest God such as He is: in it, holiness, righteousness, love, are manifested as a whole; then obedience and love towards the Father were accomplished in man, in circumstances that put them to the test in an absolute manner. Nothing was wanting in this test, either on the part of man, of Satan, or of God Himself. It is in Christ, made sin, that obedience has been perfect; it is in Him, forsaken of God, that His love for God was at its height. The forsaking of man and his hatred, the power of Satan, had been fully realised, so that when He appealed to God, He found no answer, but that in the solitude of His sufferings, He had the occasion of shewing perfection in man, and of bringing out the glory of God Himself in all that God is, the foundation in righteousness, of the blessing of the new heavens and new earth, in which righteousness dwells - a righteousness that has already placed the Son of man, in the glory, divine righteousness that cannot but recognise the value of this work, by setting already at His right hand, the Man who has accomplished it, until all shall be manifested in the ages to come.

246 Thus the Son of man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in Him; and God, having been glorified in Him, has glorified Him in Himself, and has not waited for the display of all His glory in the future, but has glorified Him straightway at His right hand (v. 31, 32).

There is found the demonstration of God's righteousness; that is, in the exaltation of the Lord Jesus as man to the right hand of God, God having withdrawn Him from the world, so that the world should see Him no more, as the way of the tree of life was closed, when man forsook God for sin. But the second Man, the last Adam, having passed through death, having been made sin, having passed out of the power of the devil and the judgment of God, takes His place in heaven, in the divine glory in righteousness, when the first Adam had gone out of the garden of Eden in sin.

For the moment no one could follow Him. Who could pass through death, Satan's power, and the judgment of God, being made sin before God, and enter beyond it all into glory? It was thus for them as well as for the Jews. For the Jews, it was an outward thing, but looked upon in connection with God's glory and the power of evil; but a thing as impossible for the disciples as for them. The Lord shews His disciples that their strength would be in the love they would have to each other, loving one another as He loved them: this was the new commandment He gave them (v. 34). He was love; He had loved them; His love had been like a strong central stake, which held up all the poles that met around it. He had been the bond of their union; now, this same love in their hearts should bind them together, as poles that supported each other, when the central support should be taken away. In reality, this would be the power of the Holy Ghost who would fill their heart with this divine love of Christ Himself, and would thus make them all one. Their love for one another would be the characteristic proof that they were disciples of Jesus, for He had loved them, and He was shewn out by love in them.

247 Peter, always ardent, asks Jesus where He was going (v. 36). The Lord answers him that he could not follow Him now, but that he should afterwards, announcing to him his martyrdom. Peter insists: "I will go with thee to prison and to death," "I will lay down my life for thee"; but Jesus said: "The cock shall not crow till thou hast denied me thrice."

John 14

In chapter 14 the Lord presents to His disciples the consolations which were suited to make them accept the revelation He had made to them of His approaching departure.

The first thing that He declares to them, in His grace, is, that if He was going away, it is not to abandon them, but to prepare them a place elsewhere, that is, in His Father's house. There, there was not room for Him alone (perhaps He alluded to the temple?) but abodes for them also; and then He Himself would come for them, so as to have them with Him where He was Himself. He could not dwell with them down here, but they should be with Him; and He would not send to seek them, but He would come Himself to take them to Himself. Precious and tender love that associated His own with Himself, according to the place they had in His heart, and according to the eternal counsels of the love of God. Instead of the kingdom of an earthly Messiah, they would have the eternal and divine glory of the Son of man in heaven, to be like Him, and with Him. Man having entered there, consequent upon redemption, the place was prepared for them. It was not a question of preparing them for the place (that is the subject of chapter 13), but of preparing the place for them. The presence of their Forerunner, where He was going, accomplished it. The blood made peace according to divine righteousness, the water prepared them to enjoy it. The entrance of Christ left nothing to be done that they might enter; only the co-heirs must be gathered, and till then, the Lord remains seated on His Father's throne.

The return of the Saviour is therefore the first consolation given them, and it would introduce them, where Jesus was, into the Father's house, being themselves made like Him in glory, instead of His remaining with them down here - which, moreover, was not possible, since all was defiled, and unfit for the Lord's continuance with His own. Jesus will come again, and take us to Himself, that where He is, we may be also (v. 1-3).

248 But there was more. The Lord says, "And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know" (v. 4). Thomas objects that they did not know where He was going, how therefore could they know the way? In His answer, Jesus shews them that what they had possessed during His stay upon earth, would furnish an immense blessing when He should have left them. He was going to the Father, and the Father had been revealed in His Person down here. Thus, having seen the Father in Him, they had seen Him to whom He was going, and they knew the way, for in coming to Him, they had found the Father. He was the Way, and, at the same time, the Truth of the thing, and the Life in which it was enjoyed. No one came to the Father but by Him; if the disciples had known Him, they would have known the Father, and from henceforth said He, "Ye know him, and have seen him" (v. 7). Philip says, "Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us"; for the disciples, although they were attached to Jesus, always had in themselves a reserve of uncertainty. The Lord blames Philip for his want of spiritual perception, after His having been so long with them; for they had not really known Him in His true character of Son, come from the Father, and revealing the Father. The words that He spoke were not as coming from Himself as man; and the Father, who dwelt in Him, was He who did the works; that which He said, that which He did, revealed the Father. They ought to trust His word, if not, on account of His works; and not only so, but glorified on high He would be the source of greater works than those which He did Himself in His humiliation, for He was going to ascend to His Father. All that they should ask in His name, He would do it, that the Father might be glorified in the Son. He was the Son of the Father; His name should avail for all that they could desire in their service; and the Father, to whom He referred everything, would be glorified in the Son, who would do all that they should ask in His name. His power had no limit: "and whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, I will do it." In fact, the apostles gave proof of a greater power than the Lord when He was down here. Peter's shadow healed the sick; one single discourse of his was the means of converting three thousand men, and the napkins, carried to the sick from Paul's body, drove away the sickness from them, and cast out the evil spirits.

249 It is well to remark here, that the disciples never did any miracles to save themselves from suffering, or to heal their friends when they were ill. Paul left Trophimus sick at Miletus; it was only God's mercy that healed Epaphroditus. The miracles performed by the apostles were the confirmation of the testimony, of which Christ glorified with the Father was the object and source.

In the next place, obedience would be the proof of love when the Lord should be gone away. This introduces the second principal revelation of this chapter; that is, the effect for them of the presence of the Holy Ghost, the other Comforter.

Verses 4-11 had given the revelation of that which Jesus had been for the disciples during His stay upon earth; but the Holy Ghost would teach them more still, and would procure advantages for them that they could not have during the stay of Jesus down here; whilst, at the same time, that which they had possessed by this means, would remain always true, and be understood in quite another manner.

But there is a difference between these two Comforters. To begin with, there was no incarnation in connection with the second; the spiritual power of God was in Him, and the power of the truth, but not an object for the soul. He was characterised as the source of truth and revelation, there where He acted; but He was not presented to the world as an object to be received by it. The world cannot receive Him. The world would not receive the Lord, but He had been presented to it to be received, and He had manifested the Father; He could say of those amongst whom He came, "They have both seen and hated both me and my Father." As to the Holy Ghost, the world could not receive Him; it did not see Him, neither know Him; He presented the truth, and acted by this means. But He should be given to believers; they should know Him, for He would dwell with them, and not leave them, as He [Jesus] was doing, and He should be in them.

Here also we find the other Comforter, in contrast with the Lord. Jesus was going away at that moment, then He had been with them; but the other Comforter should be in them.

The presence of the Comforter is the grand present fact of Christianity: its basis is the revelation of the Father in the Son, then the accomplishment of the work of redemption by the Son; but the fact that man in His Person has entered into the divine glory, has given occasion to the descent of the Holy Ghost down here, given to believers to dwell with them and in them, that they may realise the fulness of this redemption, their relationship with the Father, the fact that they are in Christ, and Christ in them, and the heavenly glory where they will be like Him; and that He may lead them across the desert, with spiritual intelligence, and having their conversation in heaven, till they arrive there. The Spirit also gives us to realise the presence of Jesus with us here below. Jesus does not leave us orphans; He comes to us, and manifests Himself to us. Strengthened in our hearts by faith, the joy of His presence makes itself felt to our souls during our pilgrimage below.

250 Soon the world would see Him no more (ver. 19); His relations with the world were ended, save as Lord of all, but they were not with His own; they would see Him, not yet with their natural eyes, but by faith, and revealed by the Spirit - sight far clearer and more excellent than that which their natural eyes had given them. It was a sight that became identified with the possession of eternal life. Their eyes had seen Him bodily here, but they would have the sight of Jesus glorified, and who had accomplished the work of redemption, and that by the power of the Holy Ghost, that other Comforter. The sight of the life of faith identified itself with a real union with Him, so that if He lived, they should live also; He Himself would be their life. Rather than that they should die, it was necessary that He Himself, such as He is in the glory, should die, and they would have by the presence of the Comforter, the consciousness of being thus in Him. "In that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you." The disciples ought to have seen the Father in Him, and to have recognised that He was in the Father during His sojourn upon earth, however little intelligent they might have been. Now, in that day, when the Holy Spirit should have come, they would know Jesus as being in the Father (the Father in Him is omitted, because it was no longer a question of His manifestation in Him down here). Thus Jesus would be in the Father in His own deity; but, more, the disciples should know that they themselves were in Him, Jesus, and He in them.

After that, the Lord establishes, as in all this part of the Gospel, man's responsibility, here that of the Christian, "He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me" (v. 21). This supposes that we pay attention to what the Lord says: one listens to the voice of divine wisdom, as a child who seeks to please its parents, or a wife her husband, observing the words of the parents or the husband, without even their having the form of a commandment, and knowing what they wish. Thus the Christian attends to the words of Jesus; he is familiar with that which the Lord wills, and desires to do His will. This is the proof of true affection. Now, he who is thus attached in heart to Christ, and obeys Him, shall be loved of the Father, and Christ will come, and will manifest Himself to him. The manifestation of which He speaks here is a manifestation of Himself, and from Him, to the soul which He causes to realise His presence and makes him sensible of it. This is what Jude does not understand; he does not perceive how Jesus could be manifested to His own, without being manifested to the world (v. 22). Alas! it is just what too many Christians do not understand. Jude, too, was only thinking of some outward manifestation, of which the world could necessarily take knowledge; but the Lord was speaking of a manifestation such as we have just shewn, adding still something more permanent; that is, that if any one loved Jesus, he would keep, not only His commandments, but His words, so that the Father would love him, and that the Father and Son would come, and make their abode in him (v. 24).

251 We see everywhere here responsibility. It is not sovereign grace which first loves the poor sinner: here the Father loves the soul which shews its affection for the Saviour in keeping His words. It is fatherly government, the satisfaction of the Father's heart because the Son is honoured and obeyed. "If a man love me, he will keep my word," and then - precious words - "my Father will love him, and we will make our abode with him." The Father and the Son come to dwell in the loved person; and this does not take place merely by the Holy Ghost, as every divine activity; but by the Spirit we enjoy the presence of the Father, and of the Son, their dwelling with us; and the Spirit does not leave us, so that we enjoy constantly in our hearts the presence of the Father and the Son. The kind of communion, of the realisation of the presence of the Father and the Son, is of all-importance, and gives an ineffable repose and joy. We shall dwell in the Father's house, and we shall find there the Son in glory; but, till then, the Father and the Son come, and reveal themselves in us, and make their abode in us. All is done by the Spirit, but it is the presence of the Father and the Son that makes their presence felt in this character of Father and of Son; and the Son is Jesus, who loved us, and gave Himself for us. The Son had revealed the Father, for him who had eyes to see; and now the Holy Ghost makes us enjoy the presence of the Father and Son, but "in us," if we keep the Saviour's words.

252 We may remark that the scripture employs two different words here: "commandments" and "word." Both have their importance, in that the first speaks of authority and obedience, the second of attention to what the Lord says, each having thus a special bearing. To the soul that has the commandments and keeps them, the Lord manifests Himself, and it is the fruit of obedience; but the blessedness of the abiding of the Father and Son in the heart, is the fruit of the word of Jesus, exercising its rightful influence in the heart. Now he that does not love Him, he, whose heart is not governed by this personal affection, does not keep the words of Jesus; and the word that they heard was not their Master's word, as of a man, of a teacher who spoke on his own account, but the word of the Father who had sent Jesus. All the work of grace is indeed the Father's work, but the Son's work also, the Spirit having His place in it in immediate operation in the soul. Thus the miracles of Jesus were really His own works, but it was by the Spirit of God He cast out demons; the Father also, who dwelt in Him, did the works. Here the Spirit would teach the disciples and would call to their remembrance that which Jesus had said to them; but that which Jesus had said to them was from the Father; He spoke the words of God, for the Spirit was not given by measure. Here again we find the Father, the Son, and the Spirit.

We have seen that the Father and Son make their abode in those who keep Christ's word; but also it is by the Holy Ghost that this abiding is realised, not that we should not feel the presence of the Father and Son, but to make us feel it. It is a lasting thing, not that our thoughts are always there, that cannot be, but the consciousness and influence of their presence are always there. I think of working at something which my father, according to the flesh, wishes; but if he is there, in thinking of the thing, the consciousness and influence of his presence will always make themselves felt.

253 To the things which He had just said to them, and which terminate this part of His discourse, the Lord adds the precious revelation, that the Comforter, the Holy Ghost, whom the Father would send in His name, should teach the disciples all things, and should bring to their remembrance that which He had said to them. We enjoy every day the effect of this precious promise.

There are here other points of great value which is it important to notice.

The Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are not separated in this work of blessing. The Holy Ghost comes to communicate all, but it is the Father that in His love, sends Him: but He sends Him in the Son's name, for His glory, and as Mediator in grace, in virtue of the redemption He has accomplished. The Holy Ghost should make the disciples realise according to the thoughts of the Father, all that had happened, all that manifested God's ways in grace during the Son's stay here below. This is what we find in the Gospels, which give us, not a human recital of things that come to the mind, but the communication (according to divine intelligence, and according to God's intention in the facts) of that which happened in the life of Jesus; for there is a divine intention in the Gospel recitals.

Finally, if the Lord leaves His own, He leaves them peace, which He could not have done had He remained with them, for peace would not have been made; but He defines this peace in a way that gives it a perfection which the fact of the purifying of the conscience would not have procured for them. That indeed took place by His blood: the disciples would be perfect as to the conscience. His conscience was always perfect; ours is made perfect by His blood. But, with the exception of the cross, and the anticipation of the cross, the heart of Jesus was ever with God. Feeling everything in love, nothing distracted Him, nor weakened His communion with His Father. Perfect obedience and confidence maintained in Him a peace which flowed from a walk with God, and from communion with His Father that never belied itself. The current of the life that He lived on the part of the Father was uninterrupted: there were no breakers in the life of Jesus. The difficulties He met with were but the occasion of the shewing forth of divine life in the heart of a man, of the peace which the consciousness of being always with God gave Him. Thus His words and actions were words and actions that came directly from God, in the circumstances in which He found Himself as man. A perfect sensibility, a perfect measure and characterising in His mind of all that acted upon Him, gave occasion to the answer, to that which the presence of God and the divine impulse produced in man. What could trouble the peace of Jesus? When it was a question of being made sin, and of bearing our sins before God, it was another thing; because that was taking place, the answer of God in His soul was not the effect of His perfect and blessed presence, but the being forsaken, according to the perfect opposition of His nature to sin. But here we approach sufferings that no one can fathom.

254 The Lord does not give as we give anything which consequently we do not possess any longer; He brings us into the enjoyment of all that He Himself enjoys: the glory, the Father's love, His joy. He keeps back nothing for Himself, which is reserved to Himself, and in which we have not part.

The verses that close the chapter contain a touching expression of the manner in which the heart of Jesus expects the affection of His own. "If ye had loved me, ye would have rejoiced that I go to the Father" (v. 28). If you think of yourselves, it is quite natural that you should be troubled; but if you could think of Me, it would have been your joy to think that I leave this world of sorrow and suffering to go to the Father, in taking again My glory and entering again into the land of holiness and peace, where all My rights are recognised. Thus the Lord places Himself near us, and desires that we should think of His happiness. What Christian is there that does not rejoice at the thought of His glory?

Jesus can still speak, while making His way towards Gethsemane, of what His own had had in Him, and of the gift of the Holy Ghost, but in reality, His communications in their midst were at an end. The prince of this world was coming: it is this character that Jesus now gives to Satan. The disciples were fled in fear; all the rest of the world united together cheerfully to drive out of it the Son of God, come in grace; they had seen and hated both Him and His Father.

It is not all that man has sinned. After the sin, God came in; God worked in a world too evil to be any longer borne with. The promise had been given to Abraham, called from the midst of the idolatry which overran all; the law was given; the prophets were sent; last of all the Son came, healing all those who were under the yoke of Satan (the strong man having been bound, his victims were delivered) - the Son, God's last resource for putting man's heart to the proof, to see if that even could produce in him any return towards God, and discover any good that might have remained there hidden in the midst of the evil. But God was manifested there; and if the effects of sin disappeared by His means, the presence of Jesus awakened the enmity of the flesh, and Satan's power took possession of the world, or rather shewed that Satan was its prince. Up to that time - that is, until all the means that God could employ to reclaim men had been exhausted, this title of "Prince of the world" had not been given him; but when He of whom God had said, I have yet My Son, had been rejected, Satan was called by this terrible title. There was One, One only, in the world who was not under this power of Satan, One only in whom the prince of this world had nothing, One only who was not of the world, One only, who though truly a man in the world, and who passed through all its temptations, sin apart, had nothing whatever in Him, either before or after, that gave Satan a right over Him, even in death which now He was going to meet. Neither in His walk, nor in His Person was there anything whatever that exposed Him to the enemy. Satan had tried, he had used the power of death to hinder Jesus from obeying unto the end, but his efforts had been vain. The death of Jesus was the effect of obedience, and of His love for the Father. "The prince of this world cometh: and hath nothing in me: but that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father gave me commandment, even so I do" (v. 30, 31). That which brought death for Him, was not sin in Him, or by Him, but it was His perfect obedience and His love for His Father. Jesus warns His own of it beforehand, so that, knowing it, their faith should not be shaken by it.

255 John 15

The Lord had then spoken to His disciples of His Person, above all dispensations, and of their place in Him when the Holy Ghost should have come down, and He had told them how He would make Himself known to them when afar, adding that He left them peace, even the peace He Himself possessed. Now, in chapter 15, He comes to the truth of His position down here in contrast with Judaism, of their position in relation to His, of their service following upon this position; then of the testimony rendered by the Holy Spirit of promise to the glory into which He was entering on high; and of their testimony as eye witnesses of that which He had been down here.

256 Judaism is thus entirely set aside, and its place taken by Christ Himself. This is what has happened with regard to all that God had established: the first man himself has been replaced before God by the second; the priesthood of Aaron by that of Christ; the king, son of David; Israel the servant (Isaiah 49: 1), by the Christ (v. 5); even the earthly tabernacle by the true heavenly tabernacle, as well as all its service. Thus here, Israel was not the true vine, although it had been transplanted as God's vine out of Egypt into Canaan; Psa. 80: 8-16. Christ was upon earth the true vine of God, the disciples were the branches. They still thought that Israel was God's vine, and Christ the long-expected Messiah, the principal branch. But it was not so; Jesus was the vine, they were the branches; His Father, the husbandman. And they were already clean through the word He had spoken to them. The passage has occasioned difficulties to many souls, because they have applied these words to the church,* but the union of the church with Christ takes place when He is glorified on high, and then we are complete in Him. There it is no question of bearing fruit, nor of being pruned, but as it is said in 1 John 4: 17: "As he is, so are we in this world." In our chapter, Jesus is the true vine upon earth; and there, although Christ could declare them to be clean, their responsibility is developed, in order that they may bear fruit. They were already clean by the word He had spoken to them.

{*John does not speak of the church, either in his gospel or in his epistles; but that which is said in the text is as true of our individual place in Christ, as of the church.}

The union which is in question here is association with Him as disciples. He no doubt knew them, but they are looked at as being in a position of responsibility. It is a question of fruit-bearing; if a branch did not bear any, the Father removed it entirely; if it bore fruit, He purified it, that it should bear more. Not that it was Judaism, far from that; it is Christ, on the contrary, who takes its place. We see this more than once in the word. Thus in Isaiah 49, Christ is the true servant in place of Israel. He is the Son called out of Egypt, a position that Israel occupied: "Let my son go"; Jehovah said by Moses. In the same way, He is the true vine. Consequently, the Father is introduced: He is the husbandman. Thus we find the true moral position that the disciples occupy, as well as the important principles upon which it is founded, but which are connected with that which we have already found as characterising this Gospel. That which had cleansed the disciples was the word that Jesus had spoken to them; but this cleansing is the same as the Father's. The Father can use the pruning knife. He does so evidently as to the branches that do not bear fruit; He does so as to those that bear it.

257 Now, all this is in connection with the revelation of the Father by the Son. The word that He had spoken to His disciples, was not the revelation of the Son glorified, by the Holy Ghost, but of the Father by the Son. It was this entirely new things; not what man ought to be according to the law, but what Christ was: grace and truth come by Jesus Christ. It was the communication of that which was divine, the words of God realised in the life of a man. The words of Christ were Himself (chap. 8: 25); but they were the words of God (chap. 3: 34), although of a man, by the Spirit without measure; they were of God, revealing the Father in sovereign grace by the Son, sent according to that grace. (Compare chap. 14: 11.) It was in the name of holy Father that the Lord kept them during His stay down here: now the Father Himself becomes the husbandman.

Now this chapter (except the last verses) does not speak of the testimony of the Holy Ghost, but of that of the disciples (with the help of the Holy Ghost, chap. 14: 25); and it is a testimony, not to His glory on high and the consequences which follow from it, but to that which He had been, and to what He had revealed being down here, to the subjective state of the divine life in a man in this world. This is what the Gospels essentially present to us; the epistles, in general, have the glory as a starting-point.

Thus the first three verses give the position as to detail: then come the exhortations founded upon this. The first, is to abide in Him. Let us remark; here that it is always the side of man's responsibility that comes first. It is not: "I will abide in you, and you will be able thus to abide in me"; but "Abide in me, and I in you." The second thing is the effect of the first: there is no verb in the second part of the phrase; it is not that which He would do, but the consequence, the effect stated. If a soul dwells in Christ, Christ dwells in that soul. Now a soul dwells in Christ, when it lives in uninterrupted dependence upon Him, and assiduously seeks to realise that which is in Him, that which His presence gives to us, for He is the truth of all that is come to us from the Father, and one lives in it in dwelling in Him. That which is in Him is communicated to us, as the sap flows from the vine into the branches. All comes from Him, but there is activity in the soul to cleave to Him, and it is thus that fruit is produced in the branch. Now we do not dwell in Christ that there may be fruit, but fruit is produced because we dwell in Christ. We dwell in Christ in the consciousness that we can do nothing without Him, but it is for the love of Christ. This is the first exhortation, and the first statement of that which we have to do.

258 In the sixth verse, He says no longer "you"; but "If a man," for He knew them, although this be not the subject treated in the passage, yet once one is really in Christ, one is there for ever. Here, also, it is as in chapter 13, "Ye are clean"; then He adds: "but not all"; for Judas was still there. If a man did not cleave to Christ, even though associated with Him by profession, he was cut off as a branch to wither and be thrown into the fire. There is another very important principle found in verse 7. If the disciples dwelt in Him, and His words dwelt in them, they should have at command the power of the Lord without limit. Always in the spirit of dependence, it is true, they should ask what they would. This is the true limit of answers to prayer. The request is produced in a heart formed by the Saviour's words, and according to the desires created by these words, that is to say, of God Himself who should dwell in the heart. We never find that the apostles healed, or prayed for the healing of persons who were dear to them, although it be perfectly lawful in such a case to present our requests to God. But Paul says: "I have left Trophimus sick at Miletus." And again: "Epaphroditus was sick, very near to death, but God had mercy on him." The works of power they accomplished, had the confirmation of the word as their aim; but it was an immense privilege, in their work of faith, to be assured of the intervention of God when they should ask for it, and that, when the wisdom of God had formed their thoughts, His power should add [to it] His efficacious working. Christ is the wisdom of God, and the power of God.

It will be asked how far we can apply this now. I do not expect miracles, I do not think that we ought to have them, except lying miracles from Satan; but I believe that if we dwell in Christ, and His words form the heart, if we live by every word that comes from the mouth of God, then when we find ourselves in the conflicts of faith, God gives faith for the circumstances of the service. He will answer to the faith given, and will hear us, He who disposes of all by means unknown to us, of all hearts - of the unrighteous as well as of those of the righteous. But it is important for us (first, so as not to make mistakes; and secondly, to seize the thoughts of God in all their import) to understand the true limits of this promise. God will never fail of His promise. The fulfilment of the promise is sure for faith, but the words of the Saviour form the thought of faith to which the promise answers. It is thus the Father should be glorified, in that they should bear much fruit - fruit of souls saved by their means, by the revelation of the Father in the Son, that the words of Jesus, words of God in grace, should communicate to them.

259 Then there comes another precious side of these exhortations: "As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you; abide in my love." This is in connection with obedience. but the declaration is one of infinite grace. The Father had loved the Son, Jesus, in His course down here; He had loved Him according to the perfection of divine love, but as man in this world. So Christ had loved them: it was the love of a divine Person, for a man who perfectly accomplished all His will with an absolute devotedness, but it was also a love of communion, and that when He was in antagonism with evil. In the same manner Christ had loved them also. They were to dwell in this love. It is constancy in their relations with Christ that is the great point in all the chapter. They were to continue in the realisation of this love, truly divine but which yet adapted itself to their human state, and thus it should be if they walked in the path where Christ had walked. "If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in his love."

It is not here a question of the Father's eternal love for the Son, nor of the unchangeable love that God bears to His children, but of the path in which these should enjoy divine love. Jesus, as man here below, never got out of the enjoyment of that love of the Father. His obedience had been absolute and perfect, and no cloud had ever found place between His soul and His Father. His life was a life of perfect obedience and of communion. They should keep His commandments, and thus they should dwell in His love, even as He dwelt in the Father's love. He told it them in order that His joy, the joy He had possessed down here, might abide in them, and that their joy should be full. Here it is Christ's love in a direct way; we are in contact with the Vine, not with the Mediator; with Him in whom we are, not with the Father. It is a human love, although divine, a love consequently full of sympathy, which comes in in all the details of human life, and of the service of ministry. This is what took place at the time of His sojourn here below. It was impossible for the Father to forget Christ one moment in His service down here. He took knowledge of it; He was there. It is the same thing with Christ towards us, as far as we keep His commandments.

260 But His first commandment is that this kind of love should be realised amongst themselves also. Perfect communion of love with one another; but superior (in that this love was divine) to all the infirmities that might weaken it, so that they were but the occasion for the exercise of this love; still that which should characterise it was the bond which made them all one by its means; the love was mutual, in that Christ was all for each, and that, each one living in dependence and obedience, self-love disappeared. As being the branches, each one drew everything from the vine; Christ's words were the source of all the thoughts of the heart, in the consciousness of His perfect love.

Now if His life had been the continual expression of this love, His death was still more so. He could not have greater love than to die for them. We must notice here that it is not the love of God to poor sinners, a love purely divine and sovereign, but the love of Christ for His friends. Neither is it Christ, who is here the Friend, but the disciples who are His friends, those in whom He has confidence: "Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you." We communicate to a friend all that we have upon the heart, because we count upon the interest he bears to us. Christ had communicated to the disciples all that He had heard from the Father. There is the action of the human mediator, the vine with the branches. It is important to remark that He does not here place His disciples in His own relationship with the Father - that will be developed later on - but He communicated to them as from Himself all that He enjoyed. The relationship was with Himself, as He personally had been in it with the Father down here. It is in this relationship of intimacy in which He was with them, faithful in keeping His words, that He looks upon them when He lays down His life for them.

261 Their relationship with Christ was that of those sent by Him, as He had been by His Father. Jesus had chosen and sent them, in order that they might bear fruit in their work, and that this fruit might be lasting - of which we are the blessed result today; but being sent thus by Christ, the Father, so to speak, was pledged to give all that was necessary for the work, so that all that they should ask the Father in the Saviour's name, the Father would give them. This places the twelve in their position as apostles, sent by the Lord, the Mediator, in the great work of salvation - the vine from which the branches drew all their strength - under the faithful care of the Sovereign Husbandman. Such is the moral position in which the Lord places them; it is union in love. They form a body of workmen apart, united to Him as to the vine, in order to bear fruit; but now the fruit is borne by the branches, and not by the vine.

The bond between them should be love; but what should characterise the relationship in which they should find themselves with the world? The world would hate them. The world had hated their Master; they had seen and known Him. Christ was not of the world, but He had been in the world, bearing witness, in His life and by His words, to that which the world was as seen in the light of God. If the disciples had been of the world, the world would have loved them, but because they were not of it, although they were in it, the world would hate them. All their ways, their walk, their motives were different from those of the world. It was a company of men apart: the world is very susceptible; its happiness is not real i its glory is false and transitory: all there is hollow, and will not bear a little reflection. The world will allow you to say this in maxims and proverbs, but that there should be men whose lives tell constantly the truth with regard to the state of the world that surrounds us, that is what is insupportable. The relationship and connections of the disciples with the world were to be the same as those of the Saviour; the branches would be treated as the vine had been. But it is on account of the name of Christ that these things would happen, fruit of this hatred, because they had not known Him who had sent Him It was always the manifestation of God in Christ, of the Father in grace, in Jesus, that had awakened this hatred and had given it its true character.

262 This is the grave and terrible question that has been raised. God the Father presented in grace to men, and especially to Israel, where all His promises and oracles had been deposited, but God presented to men in Jesus, the word of God in grace; otherwise their state would not have been manifested as being a state of sin, and nothing else, a state of hatred against God, come into their midst full of goodness. If there had been any good in man that the presence of Jesus could have awakened, faults and grave sins might have been committed, but there would have been also remedy and forgiveness, for the bottom once reached would have been good. But now there was no longer any cloak for their sin. Their state was that of absolute sin in the will. In hating Jesus they had hated the Father, for Jesus manifested Him. His words were the words of God, of the Father; and more than this, He had given the clearest proofs of the revelation of the Father in Him. There never had been any like them; for not only was divine power shewn even in raising the dead, and in giving power to others to perform the same works, but His miracles were acts of goodness Divine love was displayed in them, and united itself with the power whilst directing it. Thus they had seen and hated both the Father and the Son.

But terrible as that was, and it was fatal and final for man (save sovereign grace that created him anew), it was but that which was written in their law: "They hated me without a cause"; terrible judgment given upon man, such as he is. But it is sweet and beautiful to see that the sin of man does not stop the current of the grace of God. The Lord continues thus: "But when the Comforter shall come whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth that proceedeth from the Father, he shall bear witness of me. And ye also shall bear witness; because ye are with me from the beginning."Another order of things was necessary; man dead and risen, man in heaven even, redemption accomplished, the Holy Ghost come. This hatred of man would only accomplish that. Then the Holy Ghost would communicate to them the heavenly glory of the Son of man, the result of His rejection. Proceeding from the Father, sent by the glorified Son of man, the Spirit of truth, the Comforter come down here, would bear witness to this Son of man, to Him who had been rejected, perfect here below, but now in heavenly glory. They also should bear witness, having been with Him from the beginning of His public ministry down here. The same Comforter should be their power, to make them competent for this (chap. 14: 26), but they would bear testimony as eye-witnesses of His life of suffering.

263 John 16

Now the Lord goes on to speak with them, not of the position they had enjoyed with Him upon earth, adding promises with regard to the Holy Ghost, but of what was about to take place, of the presence of the Comforter, and of the testimony He would bear. He had spoken of Him indeed in connection with the relations in which they should be with the Father: there this Comforter replaces Him, and it is the Father that sends Him.

Although the Lord comes spiritually to reveal Himself to them, and, with the Father, to comfort and strengthen them in making their abode with them in chapter 14, the Holy Ghost rather takes the place of the Lord. In chapter 15 the Saviour speaks of the testimony that the Comforter would bear. The apostles, with His help, should bear testimony to what Jesus had been down here. They could not be eye-witnesses of what He is above. The testimony they would have to bear to His life down here, should be of a much more living character, more rich than a pure revelation from on high would have been, on account of the relations they had found themselves in with Him, all unintelligent as they had been. But it was a part of His life down here not to be understood by any one.

The testimony they have given to us is indeed that of the Holy Ghost (chap. 14: 26), who has chosen the incidents suitable to communicate the true character of the Saviour, the divine life in Him. But the grace which manifested itself in Him was exercised every day towards them, or at least in the midst of them. Always Himself, in a life that He lived on account of the Father, He adapted Himself nevertheless (and could do it because His life was inseparable from the Father) to all the weakness of the disciples, to all that grace required from Him. It was not purely and simply a divine testimony, but as His own Person, never losing its divine perfection. His unalterable purity took all the colours that the circumstances which surrounded Him gave to this life in His grace. The account is a wholly divine account, but which, in that which it relates, expresses itself, by human hearts who have passed through it. That which Christ is on high would not be expressed thus. There all is perfect, His personal glory is accomplished. Patient gentleness, unshaken firmness, divine wisdom in the midst of evil, and of adversaries, are no longer in place; it is the glory that is revealed. And who shall reveal it, if not He who came from it, and who is ill it?

264 In chapter 14 the Father sends the Holy Ghost in the name of Jesus, and gives us the consciousness of our place before Himself, as sons with the Son. Here, it is Christ, the Son of man, who sends Him from the Father, from whom the Holy Ghost proceeds, and He bears witness to Christ Himself. He is the "Spirit of truth," a purely divine testimony of the things that are above; the Spirit that is of God, that we may know the things that are freely given to us of God. The testimony borne to the life of Christ down here, is a testimony fully divine, but that is borne through the circumstances through which Jesus passed, and by persons who were themselves in them, so that we may know what God was in the midst of fallen humanity; immense grace that awakens all the affections of a heart taught by the Holy Ghost, and engrosses it.*

{*If we examine with spiritual intelligence the different accounts of the gospels, we perceive at once a purpose that is not expressed in so many words, but by means of the circumstances themselves, although in relation with men. For instance, John does not speak of the agony of Jesus in Gethsemane, although he was nearer to Him, and of the number of those that Jesus awakened from their sleep. It is, that in John, the Holy Ghost gives the divine side of this touching history. Thus here also the band of men is spoken of, who, coming to take Jesus, were thrown down at His presence. Matthew, who, nevertheless, saw it, does not speak of it. For him, Christ is the Victim, suffering and put to death; for John, He is the One who offers Himself without spot to God. It is the same everywhere.}

But whatever might be the privileges of which they were going to partake by the Holy Ghost's presence, they would have to undergo at the same time the consequences of their Master's rejection, a rejection which was not merely that of an enlightened reformer who was not liked, but the expression of the enmity of man's heart against God, and against God manifested in goodness. He was going on high, and was going to make them partakers of the Spirit; they remained down here, furnished no doubt, with that spiritual power up to the point of doing miracles, which would bear testimony to the source whence they came; but the continuance of the testimony and of the power, would bring against them the same hostility which had been manifested against Jesus. If they had called the Master of the house Beelzebub, much more would they treat those of the household in the same way.

265 And more, it was a religious hatred. If a religion adapts itself to the world, and costs the selfish principle nothing, it is held to; one prides oneself upon it still more if, by the truth that is recognised, one can raise oneself above others. Now this hatred, whilst recognising indeed its object - that is, the revelation of God in this world - was an ignorant hatred, especially for the multitudes. The hatred of the leaders was more moral, more positively diabolical, as the Lord had said to them. (chap. 8). The masses were jealous for their religion, as Paul acknowledged (Acts 22: 3); the leaders detested that which was manifested, because it was the light. Terrible state! But what can a state be that opposes itself with a resolute will, with animosity, to such a Saviour? The Lord says that he who should kill His disciples would think to do God service. It is what Saul of Tarsus was doing. But the leaders, the Lord said, "had both seen and hated both me and my Father."

But here some practical truths come out of what is said. It is by the revelation of a new truth that the heart is exercised and tested; I say new, at least for the heart that finds it. One gains credit by an old truth; the Jews believed in one only true God, and they were quite right. It was a privilege, a moral advantage of immense bearing. In truth, there was but that God; as far as there was reality in Paganism, the gods of the pagans were demons. But, although the pious Jew acknowledged this true God, obeyed Him and trusted in Him, it was the glory of the nation to have this God for God, and the Jew without piety boasted also in Him. But alas! he saw the power that bore witness to God's presence, elsewhere than in the temple, its earthly abode. The house, fine as it was, was empty; and a double hatred broke out against that which was the proof of it. God had brought in quite a new thing; the Father had sent the Son in grace, and had manifested Himself in Him, and this grace could not be limited to a Jew alone. It penetrated as light to the bottom of the heart of man, whether Jew or Gentile. The one and the other were sinners. The Jew had manifested it in the rejection of this Son, and sovereign grace extended itself to the Gentiles. The Jewish sinner had just as much need of it; the partition wall had fallen down at the cross. It was God and man now, not Jew and Gentile. In vain God had recognised the privileges of the Jews; in vain had He sent His Son, according to the promises, to the lost sheep of the house of Israel; Israel would have none of it; they desired their own glory. From this comes that for them, the Jews, he who would destroy such a testimony, the testimony of an infinite grace, of the Father sending the Son into the world, of grace exercised in salvation towards sinners, Jews or Gentiles - he who would destroy it, I say, would do God service. He would think to render service to God, to his own God, the God who made his glory. As to the Father and Son, he did not know them; this was the new truth that put to the proof the state of his heart. A good Protestant can boast in rejecting the deification of the host, and in believing in justification by faith as a dogma: that is his glory as a Protestant. But where is his soul as to the presence of the Holy Ghost, and the expectation of the Saviour? New truths always confirm the old, judging at the same time superstitions; but faith in the old, which make our own glory, is not a touchstone for the state of soul, although we are to maintain them carefully.

266 There is another remark of the Saviour which merits our particular attention. It is simple, but exposes the state of our souls. "Now," He says, "I go unto him that hath sent me, and none of you asketh me, Whither goest thou?" Sorrow had filled their heart. It was very natural, and in a certain sense very right. They felt the present and actual effect of the departure of Jesus. This touched them very closely, but they judged of the circumstances entirely in connection with themselves. They had given up all for the Lord, and they were going to lose Him; and not only that, but they must give up all, that for them was connected with His presence down here; all their Jewish hopes were fading away. They felt the effect of the circumstances upon themselves, but did not think of the purposes of God which were being accomplished in those circumstances, for the Son of God was not going out of this world by an accident. It is the same thing in our most minute circumstances: not a sparrow falls to the ground without our Father. That which troubled them was in reality the work of redemption. Moreover, that which constitutes our cross in this world answers to glory and happiness in the other. Preoccupation with the circumstances, hid from them heavenly things, and the glory into which the Lamb was entering.

267 But this remark introduces, not the heavenly glory of the Lord - though what He says depends on it - but the consequence for them down here, which is what should occupy us now. It is the coming down here of the Comforter, of the Paraclete. His presence in this world should have for its object to convince of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. It is not the question here of demonstrating to a man's conscience the sins of which he is guilty, but of a testimony as to the state of the world, and that by the very presence of the Holy Spirit, though He bore it also to men. Sin had been manifested for a long time in the world; the law had been transgressed; but now God Himself was come in grace. All His perfections, His goodness, and His power, which were in exercise to deliver from the effects of sin, had been manifested in this world, and all in grace towards men, with a patience which remained perfect to the end; and man would not have God. God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them; but man would none of it. This is sin: not the conviction of disorderly lusts, nor of transgressions against God's law, but the final and formal rejection of God Himself. The Holy Ghost would not have been there if that had not taken place. Moreover, we have the solemn spectacle of the only righteous One, who had glorified God in everything, and had been obedient to Him in every trial, abandoned by God, when, persecuted by men, He appealed to Him, and all is over for the world. No righteousness is seen, except in the judgment of sin in the Person of Him who had not known sin, but who had been made sin before God, having offered Himself to God for that, that God might be glorified in it.

Where can we seek for righteousness down here? Not in the rejection of God by man, not in the forsaking of the righteous One by God. Where then look for it? On high. The Man Christ, in suffering thus, had perfectly glorified God in all that He is - righteousness against sin, love, majesty, truth. He gave Himself up for that. And righteousness is found in that He who gave Himself to glorify God is upon the Father's throne, seated at the right hand of God;* of which the presence of the Holy Ghost was the witness, with this terrible consequence, that as Saviour in goodness and in grace, the world would see Him no more. Thus He said: "Henceforth ye shall see the Son of man seated at the right hand of God, and coming in the clouds of heaven": but this will be in judgment. Supreme and terrible moment for this world truly, although grace gathers many out of it for the heavenly glory, and though a remnant of the Jews should enjoy, by the same grace and in virtue of the same sacrifice, the effect of the promises to which the nation has lost all right, in rejecting the Person of Him in whom the promises are accomplished.

{*See John 13: 31, 32; ch. 17: 4, 5.}

268 But although the will and lusts of men, their hatred against the light, and enmity against God, made them responsible for this crime, who was it that directed them, and concentrated their animosity on one single point? Who was it that induced the haughty indifference and the cruelty of a Pilate, warned and alarmed as he was, to connect himself, for the rejection of the Son of God, with the inconceivable hatred of the leaders of the people filled with jealousy, and the empty prejudices of the multitude? Who was it that united them to be co-partners in this crime? It was the devil. He is the prince of this world, shewn and declared to be such in the death of the Saviour by the hand of man, but judged by that very fact. He who ruled the world, its prince, shewed himself such in the death of Him who was the Son of God come in grace. Before and after, he could excite passions, entice men's lusts, produce wars, stir up the wrongs of one against another, provide for the corrupt desires of the heart; but all this was selfish and partial. But when the Son was there, he could join all together, those who hated and despised each other, against this one object - God manifested in goodness.

The prince of this world is the adversary of God. The moment had not yet come for the judgment of this world, but its judgment was certain, for its prince, he who ruled it entirely, was Satan, the adversary of God, as the cross of Jesus shewed it. Now the presence of the Holy Ghost was the proof, not only that this Jesus was recognised of God as His Son, but that, as Son of man, He was glorified at God's right hand. In fact this is the testimony of Peter, that is, of the Spirit, in Acts 2. The Holy Ghost would not have been in the world, if that had not been the case. The rupture between the world and God was complete and final: a solemn truth not sufficiently considered. The question that God puts to the world is: "Where is My Son; what hast thou done with Him?"

269 But is not this presence of the Spirit an advantage, a better thing for the world? Is it not a more blessed relationship than all that has preceded? Blessed be God! sovereign grace is in exercise toward the world in virtue of the death of Christ; but, except His sovereign rights, God has no relationship with the world. The Holy Ghost is amongst the saints and in the saints, but as we have read, the world cannot receive Him: He is given to believers. Between the rejection and the return of Christ, He bears witness to the grace manifested in the death of Jesus, and to the glory in which Christ is, to bring those who believe in Him into a heavenly association with the last Adam, delivering them from this present evil world. And it remains ever true, that "if any one love the world, the love of the Father is not in him"; and that "the friendship of the world is enmity against God." Now these new relationships are maintained by the Spirit in these earthen vessels; later on, those who possess this Spirit shall be glorified with the Lord Himself. Later still, when the judgment shall have been executed, this same grace towards man will establish the Lord, according to what is due to Him, and according to the eternal counsels of God, over a blessed world, where the enemy's power will not be exercised. But this is not our subject here.

Now it is with the last Adam who is from heaven, with the glorified Son of man, we have to do. That which exists is a complete rupture between the world and God, and a heavenly Christ who has accomplished redemption. But the testimony that the Holy Ghost bears, the truth of which He is the proof, is twofold, and divides itself here. What we have gone through is the testimony that His presence down here bears with regard to the world; that which follows is what He should do for the disciples amongst whom He was found.

What a solemn judgment is that that has just been before us, coming from the mouth of the Lord Himself! The whole world lying in sin by its refusal to receive the Saviour come in grace; righteousness according to God not to be found save on the throne on high, where it had placed Him whom the world had rejected, and in that the world would see Him no more as such; finally, if the execution of judgment was still deferred, this last was not the less certain, for he who was in possession of the world, had shewn that he was the adversary of God, in leading on the world that he had subjected to himself, to crucify the Lord.

270 But with regard to the disciples, the Spirit would reveal the truth fully to them, and lead their minds into the knowledge of all the truth. The truth is the manner in which God regards all things, and what He reveals of Himself, of His own thoughts, and of His own counsels. Now Christ is the expression of it on the positive side, as being God manifested to man, and Man perfect before God. Being the light, He manifests all that is not according to God's thoughts. The veil too, being rent, and Christ having entered into heaven as Man, and seated at God's right hand, that which was not within the province of human knowledge, "that which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard," the Spirit reveals, and He reveals even the deepest things of God. All, from God's eternal throne down to hades, and from hades up to the throne of God, and redemption which is connected with it, all is disclosed. And it is in Christ that all this revelation is made to us; but also, all that is revealed on God's part belongs to Him. "All that the Father hath is mine," He says; and it is not only that which is of God, as God, as creation for example, but all that which, in the counsels of grace, forms the new creation in relationship with the Father; that belongs to Him.

Thus the Holy Spirit would take of what was of Christ and shew it to the disciples, and this was all that the Father possessed. Grace and truth were come in Christ into the midst of the old creation. Man refused this grace, and rejected this truth, but now God would communicate to those who should believe in Christ the new things that were in His counsels, of which Christ was the centre and the fulness.

Into what a glorious scene we are here introduced, a scene which replaces that which the disciples were losing by the death of the Messiah! All the glory which belongs to the Person of the Son, whether as the One in whom all the counsels of God are concentrated, or as to what He is in Himself, is fully revealed. If, in that which we have first gone through, we have found the terrible but just judgment of the world, what a glorious scene, I repeat, opens itself here in the revelations which the Holy Ghost communicates relative to this new creation, of which the second Man is the centre, He, the Son of God who reveals the Father - another world, where all that is in the Father and of the Father is revealed.

271 But this involved the death and resurrection of Christ, the end of all connection with the old creation, and a new state of man for the new. Now the glory of this new creation was not yet revealed, nor even established objectively; but the state of man subjectively, a state immortal, pure, spiritual even as to the body, was realised in the resurrection, even while the external glory was still wanting. The new and eternal thing existed in the Person of Christ, and as to Him personally, it was realised in that He was going to His Father, the source of all, "the Father of glory" - as it is said.

Now this new state of man was familiarly manifested to the disciples, during the forty days that the Lord passed upon earth after His resurrection, before He ascended to heaven. The return of the Saviour, when He shall come back in His glory, will be the moment when His dominion will be established over all things, when God will put them all under His feet, with an authority and power that He will make use of to subject them to Himself. Now that of which we speak, whether with regard to the state of man, or relative to the glory, is evidently something more than the presence of the Holy Ghost, precious as that is, and it is that which now occupies the Lord. The Holy Ghost was to be given to the disciples, but more than this, He should see them again. No doubt they would see Him, when He will return in glory, but then it will be no longer a question of a testimony to render. Before that time they should see Him for a little while, for He would then go to His Father. This was the introduction of the disciples into the realisation of that new state which Christ inaugurated by His resurrection, Son of God in power. They should see the second Man beyond death, and be in living communication with Him. It was not the revelation of the glorious things of the new creation by the Holy Ghost; this revelation was going to be given to them: it was Christ Himself, the Christ they had known during the days of His flesh. "Handle me," He said, "and see that it is I myself." Touching and precious word! It was He whom they had known and accompanied every day and all day, who had borne with their infirmities, sustained their faith and encouraged their hearts; it was the same Jesus who shewed Himself as familiarly with them as before, though in quite another state. He shewed Himself, said Peter, "not to all the people, but to us, who did eat and drink with him, after that he was raised from the dead." It was the same Christ, but what is of all importance, the basis of all for us, it was Christ beyond death, the power of Satan, the judgment of God, and sin; He who had been made sin for us, by whom our sins had been borne and put away, that God might remember them no more. We see here the link between Jesus, known in His humiliation in our midst in grace, and man in his new state, according to the counsels of God, a state in which He could no more be subjected to death, nor put to the proof.

272 The Holy Ghost is the blessed source of our right affections, but He cannot, like Jesus, be the object of them. As God, we love Him; but, we know, He was not made flesh for us, He did not die for us, we cannot be united to Him. We cannot say of Him as of the precious Saviour: "He that sanctifieth and they that are sanctified are all of one; wherefore He is not ashamed to call them brethren." It is no question of preference or of comparison; it would be folly to speak thus of the divine Persons; but the Holy Ghost, as to His Person, has not placed Himself in the intimacy into which Jesus has entered with us; a Man who calls His own His "friends," who is indeed the Son of God and with power, but who is a Man and a Man for ever; the same who has been in our midst as He who served.

These words then (ver. 16, etc.), although their full and entire accomplishment should only take place when Christ returns, refer to events of all importance, which, in His death and resurrection, shewed, in a characteristic way, what He was doing and who He was. First of all, He was going to leave His own, and to put an end by His death, to all the relations of God with Israel and with man: "A little while and ye shall not see me" - He was going to die. "And again a little while and ye shall see me." He was not going to stay like other men in the dust of the tomb; He would be with them again. But once more they should not see Him, for He came not to be a Messiah upon earth, but He was going to His Father who ruled over death, and who, after having raised Him, according to His glory, would take Him to Himself in the glory that was His. It was a series of events, which, while they constituted the disciples eye-witnesses of the fact of His resurrection, belonged to His personal glory and to redemption, to the setting aside of all that is connected with the first man, to the glory that He, the Son of God, had had with the Father before the foundation of the world, and into which He was about to enter again as Man to order all things at the suitable time, according to the glory of God and His counsels with regard to the Man in whom He would glorify Himself.

273 The Lord answers the hidden desire of the heart of His disciples, who sought in vain to solve the enigma lying in His words, and who feared to ask Him anything; but it is by shewing them first of all, the feelings that would possess their hearts, and then the true character of His coming and of His departure. Their hearts would be deeply afflicted; they were going to lose Him for whom they had left everything: hope founded upon Him was fading away. The world, on the contrary, would be quite happy to be rid of Him who troubled it by the testimony of the truth. But Jesus tells His own that He would see them again, and that their sorrow should be turned into joy, as when a woman brings forth. And in fact it was the child-birth of the new creation. Thus the joy with which they should be filled in seeing Him again would be an eternal joy - a joy that nothing could take from them.

Thus far for the human details; but the ground of the truth is that the Son had come forth from the Father and come into the world, and that He left the world and went to the Father. This was a declaration of incalculable importance, and before which both the disciples' sorrow at the loss of their Messiah, Son of David, and their joy at seeing Him risen again, faded entirely, real and important as they were. Indeed, it was the revelation of God Himself in grace, and in the accomplishment of all His ways; Man in Christ was the object of them, and the heavenly glory into which He was now entering was the result, the real fact that was taking place. The Son, Man in this world; the Father, perfectly and fully revealed; those who had received Him set in the place of sons with the Father, co-heirs with the Son; and the Father's house the place of their dwelling and blessing: this is what the presence and departure of Jesus meant. It was laying the foundation of the whole of eternity; the full revelation of the Father and of the Son.

Indeed, it was not speaking in proverbs; but the disciples did not understand it. They fully admitted that He had spoken to them plainly, but their mind did not enter into the force of His words. "By this," they said, "we believe that thou art come from God." He had known what was passing in their minds, and that had produced its effect; besides, His words were simple. But to come from God, true as that was, was not saying that He had come from the Father, and was going back to Him. "Do ye now believe?" said the Lord; "all ye shall be offended because of me this night," "and shall leave me alone; and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me."

274 We may remark here that which characterises this Gospel all through, that is, that though the Lord must pass through death, He does not speak of it. He was come from the Father, and proceeded thither again. We see this at the beginning of chapter 13, and elsewhere.

This terminates the Lord's discourses addressed to His disciples. He, in presence of that which His soul experienced, could think of them and tell them that which was suited to comfort them and to strengthen them in the time of His absence; it was the spiritual knowledge of Himself; the seeing Him after His resurrection, which would strengthen their faith powerfully; the presence of the Holy Ghost; and finally, that in going to the Father, it was not to abandon them, but that He was going there to prepare for them a dwelling-place on high. Spiritually He would be with them. If they confessed His name, this would bring upon them persecutions. In this world they should have tribulation, but in Him they had peace. Blessed thought! In the circumstances and in the things that were passing, they would have testing, painful no doubt, but which would detach them from the world, and make them feel the contrast between what was such and their position. Inwardly they should have peace, divine peace in Him who appeared to them spiritually, yea, who should dwell in them.

Besides, He had overcome the world. This, indeed, gives courage, to think that what we have to overcome is an enemy already overcome; it is a blessed word for our souls. He went before us in the battle, and He has gained the victory. Thus, as I have said, the Lord's discourses to His disciples terminate here; but this brings us into a still more blessed position. It is given to us not only to hear the divine words of Jesus, who was thinking of us with a love that knew no bounds, with a devotedness which makes us know what love is (1 John 3: 16); words of grace, words of truth, words of God Himself, but which were adapted to man (John 3); words whence we derive the knowledge of what God is for us - it is given to us, I say, not only to hear and to meditate on these words, but we are admitted now to hear Jesus pour out His heart into the Father's bosom, and to understand that we are an object of common interest to the Father and the Son: this is the subject of chapter 17.

275 John 17

The key to this chapter is the word "Father." At the commencement, the Lord lays the great foundations of the position that He was taking at that moment, and then those of the position of the disciples. After that, He states what is their relationship with the Father, and their place before the world, and He closes by making known their place with Him in heaven, and the power of the Father's love during their stay here below.

The Lord, here, as in the whole of John's Gospel, is regarded from the point of view of His divine nature, the Son of the Father, but at the same time never leaving the place of service. He receives everything, and appropriates nothing to Himself. Once only, in contrast with an empty temple, He presents Himself to the Jews - at least He presents His body - as the true temple which, as God, He would rebuild in three days. But in His teaching, in the personal expression of relationship with the Father, He never leaves the subordinate place that He had taken in His service. Satan, in the desert, had tried, but in vain, to make Him leave it. He would obey, and He was obedient unto death. Here also, He does not appropriate to Himself the glory, but the hour being come, He asks His Father to glorify Him. It is the Son of the Father who is glorified, it is His personal glory; it is not the Son of man glorified according to the counsels of God. It is the Father who does it. In chapter 13, Jesus speaks of Himself as the Son of man who has glorified God, and that in His work on the cross. Then God, as God, having been glorified, the Son of man enters, according to the value of His work, into the glory of God, which He has established on earth where sin reigned. There, man made sin, and the power of Satan, the judgment and love of God met together, and God has been fully glorified; what He is has been manifested and made good In the obedience of man. Here, it is the Son, who, having perfectly manifested the Father and glorified Him, re-enters, being Man, into the glory that He had had with Him before the world was, in order to glorify Him in this new position also.

276 His position as Son, and what belongs to Him being Man, is then stated. His rights are twofold: He has power over all flesh, but with the object of giving eternal life to those whom the Father has given Him. His title to power with regard to man is universal.* If the first man should have power according to nature, the Son, become man, has it in a supernatural manner. But here, in the words of the Saviour, one of the most precious truths for us comes to light. There are those whom the Father has given to the Son. It is the thought and settled purpose of the Father. They are given to the Son; the Father has committed them to His hands, in order that He may bring them into the glory, in order that He may fit them for the presence, the nature, and the glory of God, for all that was in this settled purpose; and that He may place them, according to God's infinite love, in a position which should satisfy this love, and which is that of the Son, become Man to this effect. We can add that it is a position that answers to the value and efficacy of the work of the Son to place them there, not only externally (which, however, would be impossible), but in endowing them with a nature fit for such a position. Marvellous grace, of which we are the objects! This position is eternal life, a word of which we must examine a little the meaning. It is spiritual and divine life - a life capable of knowing God and of enjoying Him, as answering morally to His nature, "holy and without blame before him in love." Eternal life, that is to say, a life not merely immortal, but which belongs to a world that is outside the senses; for "the things that are not seen are eternal."

{*It is universal, that is, it extends to everything; but here man only is in question.}

But there is something more precise than that. In 1 John 1 we see definitely what eternal life is: it is Christ. That which they had seen, contemplated, and handled from the beginning, it was Christ, the eternal life which was with the Father and had been manifested to them. Thus again, in chapter 5: 11, 12: "This is the testimony, that God has given unto us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son, hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God, hath not life." Paul, in the Epistle to the Ephesians (chap. 1: 3, 4) presents to us this life in its double character. In the first place, that which answers to His nature, that which Christ was and is personally; and secondly, our relationship with the Father; that is to say, sons, and that in His presence. We participate in the divine nature, and we are in the position of Christ: sons according to the good pleasure of the Father's will. That is the nature of this life.

277 Here it is presented objectively. In fact, in our relations with God, that which is the object of faith is the power of life in us. Thus Paul says: "When it pleased God to reveal his Son in me"; but in receiving, by grace, by faith, the Saviour that he was to preach to others, he received life, for Christ is our life. But, as I have already said, it is the name of the Father that is the key to this chapter. God is always the same; but neither the name of Almighty, nor that of Jehovah, nor that of Most High, carries life in itself. We must have it to know God thus, but the Father sent the Son that we might live through Him, and he that has the Son, has life, and he only. But the Son has fully manifested the Father; so that the Son being received, the Father was also; and the life displayed itself in this knowledge, faith in the mission of the Son, and by Him, faith in the Father in sending the Son, in love, as Saviour. The glory of Christ Himself will be the full manifestation of this life, and we shall participate in it, we shall be like Him. Still it is an inward life, real and divine, by which we live, although we possess it in these poor earthen vessels. It is no longer we that live, but Christ that lives in us. Infinite and eternal blessedness which belongs to us already as life, according to these words: "he that hath the Son, hath life." But this places us also in the position of sons now, and brings us, later on, to bear the image of Christ.

Note also that all the fulness of the Godhead dwells in Christ bodily. However, this is not what is presented to us here, but the ways of God as Father in grace, and source of all in blessing; it is the Father who sends the Son. (Compare 1 John 4: 14.) No doubt, it is the Holy Ghost that makes us to know the Father thus, and who renders us capable of having communion with Him, and with His Son Jesus Christ. In this development of grace, He is the power that works in us. The Father, who had in His grace the thought of sending, and who in fact has sent, His Son into the world; then the Son thus sent, in whom this grace is known; such are the effects that we know. The Father, in His divine and eternal thoughts, is the source of all this infinite grace, and the Son is the One in whom these thoughts are realised, who gave Himself to accomplish all, and that we might have part in all. He gave Himself, in order to accomplish all that was needed to bring us to the Father according to these thoughts; fit for God's presence, like unto Him who has brought us there. "A body hast thou prepared me; lo, I come to do thy will, O God!"

278 Observe also, that it is not the essence of His nature that is presented here, but the development of grace. Although He had had, with the Father, before the world was, the glory into which He was going to enter again, nevertheless, as we have seen everywhere, He is the sent One of the Father; He receives all from Him, and takes the initiative in nothing of His own will, except in undertaking the work that He should accomplish; but comes to do the Father's will. He empties Himself of this part of the divine rights, free then to undertake all, having the same will with the Father. But the work that He undertook was, from one end to the other, a work of pure obedience. It was at His expense that the work was done, but according to the thoughts and will of the Father. He never left this position. He could say "I am" John 8: 58); but He lived by every word that came out of the mouth of God. The perfection of the work was obedience in love. Adonai (the Lord) whom we see in Isaiah 6: 1, this Jehovah whose glory fills the earth, it is Christ; John 12: 39-41. He is Adonai, at Jehovah's right hand, Adonai who smites the kings in the day of wrath; Psalm 110: 5.

Such then are the relationships in which we know God now. It is not simply a supreme God, the Most High; it is not only He "who is, who was, and who is to come," He who, always the same, accomplishes His promises; nor any more the mighty God, the all-powerful who keeps His own. All this is true; but these titles are connected with God governing the world, accomplishing His promises, and keeping His own down here. Here it is God Himself who reveals Himself, as the Father who has sent the Son, to bring us to Him according to the full manifestation of what He is in Himself, partaking morally of His nature, His own sons, and destined to be like Christ.

Now the Son had fully glorified the Father down here; He had finished the work that the Father had entrusted to Him, and He asks to be re-admitted into the glory that He had had with the Father before the world was. The Father had sent Him, He had glorified the Father and finished the work He had to do, and now He was going to return into His former glory, the glory of the Son, but He re-entered it as man.

279 Up to this the foundations are laid; Christ ever seeking to glorify the Father, even when He should have re-entered into the glory that belonged to Him. All was accomplished with regard to His mission. Sent on the part of God, and from Him, become man to glorify Him down here, He had done it; for he who had seen the Son had seen the Father. Then He receives the glory from the Father, and sits on His throne, a glorified Man, but Son, in the eternal glory He had had. But the object of His mission was also to give eternal life to those whom the Father had given Him. Now, those who knew God thus, the Father, and Jesus, the Christ whom He had sent, possessed this life.

The basis of the whole position of His own being thus laid in Jesus, the Son of the Father, and in His work, Jesus continues, still addressing the Father. He shews how He had revealed Him to His own,* and created thus in their hearts the consciousness of the ineffably blessed position in which, in virtue of His manifestation and of His work, they were now placed; and first of all in relationship with the Father. The Father's love was the source of it: "those," says the Saviour, "whom thou hast given me." The Father had confided them to the Son's faithfulness; first of all, faithfulness towards the Father, to bring His beloved ones to Him, according to His thoughts of blessing and of glory, as sons, that is to say, as Christ Himself; then consequently, according to His own heart of love, unfailing faithfulness towards us - blessed be His name! Without it, we never should have been in the enjoyment which has been destined for us; it is exercised through all the sufferings that sin, in which we were, rendered necessary; it is exercised as to the burden of care that our weakness, the presence of the flesh in us, and the wiles of Satan required, and require from Him.

{*"I have manifested thy name to the men whom thou hast given me out of the world."}

In order to place us in the consciousness of the position which the Father's grace had given us, and that His faithfulness assured to us, He has revealed the Father's name. The only Son who enjoyed ineffably the Father's affection (John 1: 18), which was visible as a fact in this world,* if the world had eyes to see it (John 1: 5, 10, 11); He, the Son, who knew the Father as such, has revealed Him to the disciples. He was ever a revelation of the Father before their eyes (John 14: 9), but, more, He had spoken to them of Him: this is one of the things that characterise His communications. It is true that before having received the Holy Ghost, they scarcely profited by them, but that by which they might have profited was there before them. Alas! never once did they understand what the Lord said to them. But He does not speak here of their want of intelligence, He speaks of the revelation itself that had been made to them, attributing to them the possession of all its value. Moreover, it is what He always did, even when they declared that they did not understand it (John 14: 4, 5), for they had a true faith in Him, in whom all was found.

{*For indeed, the world has both seen, and hated both Him and His Father.}

280 He says also: "They have kept thy word"; and, in fact, whatever their ignorance might have been, they had, by grace, walked faithfully with Jesus. "To whom should we go?" said Peter; "Thou hast the words of eternal life." They had also recognised Him as Son of God; He had communicated to them therefore the relationship in which He was with the Father in this world, and whatever their degree of intelligence, He placed them in the same relationship.

But He did more; He communicated to them all the privileges, which on the part of the Father, belonged to Himself on earth; the privileges inherent to His position of Son down here. It was no longer the glory and royal honour that the Messiah should receive from Jehovah; they had understood that what He had, belonged to the Son, to the Son who had emptied Himself, and come down to a state of abasement and humiliation here below, to shew forth all the glory of the power of God in goodness, taking away not yet the sin, but all the miseries that were the fruit of it. They had understood that that which Jesus had received from the Father was all that belonged to the Son of God, as Son of man on earth.

But this privilege that had been accorded to them, depended upon another, or was realised in another, which was still greater. He had shared with them all the intimate communications that the Father had made to Him as Son down here. It was all that belonged to this position which occupies us here - that of the Son upon earth. "I have given them the words that thou hast given me." Immense grace! It was in effect placing them in the same position as Himself with the Father. He had revealed to them the name of Father. It was placing them, in title and in fact, in His own relationship of Son with the Father. But Christ, having been Son here upon earth, and having come to accomplish the work the Father had given Him to do, had of right received intimate communications from Him, in order that all might be done in a perfect and unfailing unity with the Father. This was, for the Saviour, the blessed side of His life. Now, having placed the disciples (for He speaks here of the eleven) in the same relationship with the Father, as that in which He was by nature and by right, their position was not to be barren and dry, but furnished with all the communications which belonged to Him, and which Jesus enjoyed. And this is the grace which has been made theirs. It would be well, before going further, to make one or two remarks here.

281 This part of the Saviour's words (verses 6-10, and even up to verse 19, although this last portion treats of the disciples from another point of view) applies to the eleven, as companions of Christ upon earth. He had revealed the Father's name to them; He was placing them in the relationship in which He was Himself with the Father, as Son, but dwelling upon earth. The communications which He received were made to Him as being there, and were those that He communicated to them. I have no doubt whatever that Jesus spoke of what He knew, and bore witness to what He had seen; nor that the fact that He could say of Himself, "the Son of man that is in heaven" (John 3: 13), bad an essential influence upon His ministry. But He was the manifestation of grace and truth down here, and up to the time that He was speaking, it was not a question of giving the disciples the consciousness that they were in Him in heaven; that was about to take place. In verse 24, this thought, not yet of union, but at least of association with Him in heaven, begins to dawn. His object assuredly was not to maintain Judaism, but to present that which manifested the Father, grace and truth come in Him, the character of God in a Man down here shewn out fully. It was not, either, to develop the counsels of God and the mysteries of grace, as Paul teaches them to us; that is a fruit of Jesus being glorified. The sun had shone behind the clouds in the previous dispensations; even now it is faith that lays hold of it; at the end, its manifestation will have an earthly character; but here the clouds disperse, and the sun itself appears. The Father in the fulness of grace, sends the Son; the Son manifests the Father perfectly, and glorifies Him, and the disciples understand that all that the Father had given to Jesus was the gift of the Father to the Son down here (not, as I have said, of Jehovah to the Messiah), that the Father had sent Him in sovereign grace, and that He had come from the Father.

282 Such is the basis of the prayer of Jesus. It was for them that He prayed, not for the world. The world was judged, but the Father had given Him His disciples; most precious truth, source of all our blessings and that which characterises them. Now the Lord, in leaving His disciples, prays for them, and with infinitely touching motives, which open also to our view the sphere into which we are introduced. All belongs to this revelation of the Father in the Son - the Object, and at the same time the Revealer, of His most tender love, and to the introduction of the disciples into the same relationship.

The first motive is found in these words: "I pray for them, because they are thine." For the beloved Son, the Father was everything; He lived to glorify Him, and He prays that the Father may be for those who are His, such a Father as He Himself knew Him.

The second motive is the Son. The Father cared for the Son's glory; because of this, He was to take care of His disciples, for now that Jesus was going back to the Father, it is in them that He was to be glorified. The Father would keep them because they belonged to Him, and that in them the Son should be glorified. It was necessary that they should be kept if the Father cared for the glory of the Son. Now there was no separation between the interests and glory of the Father and the interests and glory of the Son. All that belonged to the Father belonged to the Son, and all that belonged to the Son belonged to the Father. What a bond between the Father, the Son, and the disciples? They belonged to the Father, the Father had given them to the Son, and it was in them that the Son was to be glorified. Their present position, which gave occasion to the request, was that Jesus was going away from the world to the Father, and that He was leaving His disciples down here.

283 Then Jesus indicates the name according to which the Father was to keep them: "Holy Father," to keep them with the affection of a Father, and according to the holiness of His nature. He had kept them Himself in this name during His sojourn here below, and now He gives them over to the immediate care of the Father, according to the love towards them common to the Father and to the Son, and always under the name of "Holy Father." "Holy Father, keep them in thy name that thou hast given me."* Christ was down here the Son of the Father, and as such He answered also to the Father's holiness in all His ways and His thoughts. The Father's will was exemplified in His life; He manifested in Himself the Holy Father. Now He prayed that the disciples might be kept by what the Father was in this relationship with Jesus. The Lord was in it, lived in it; he who had seen Him had seen the Father. As with Israel, He could have said: "Obey his voice, provoke him not; for my name is in him," Exod. 23: 21. Thus the Father and He were one, not only in nature, but in thoughts, acts, motions of the will. Christ, in His life, was one with the Holy Father.

{*This is the best reading: the Received Text has, "those whom thou hast given me."}

Christ prayed for His own, that they might be kept by the Father in that name. He was there by nature; it was His place upon earth; they needed to be kept there. He had kept them thus as long as He had been in this world; now He gave them over to the Father, that He should keep them thus, that there might be the same thought, the same purpose, and that all their words and actions might answer to it; that the expression of the life of each of them and of all together, might be that of the Lord in His relationship with the Father, according to the import and value of this name. Presently the Lord will speak of the mediatorial means; here, it is the fact that He presents. The disciples were to be one - a single vessel of the life, of the thoughts, of the revelation of the Father Himself, as Christ had been. "Father," the name of grace, of God sending the Son, the Son revealing Him as such; and "holiness" according to that which the Father is - this is what was to characterise them, and by the power of the Holy Ghost,* all, as a single existence, were to be only this in the midst of the world; they should represent Christ in this relationship with the Father. It is evident that if there were amongst them different thoughts or purposes, they would fail as to this position. The Father and the Son were thus one when the Son was down here; this is what they were to be amongst themselves according to the relationship in which Christ had been. It is the name of "Father" that had been given to Him, in order that He might manifest it in this world; and, according to His holiness, there was nothing of this world in Him to obscure the revelation of what the Father was.

{*The Holy Ghost is not the subject here, but He is nevertheless the power that was to produce this life in the disciples.}

Such was their position; it was not yet their mission. Being such, it was to have the joy of Christ fulfilled in them. Indeed, it was the joy of the Saviour, man here below. Infinite grace for them, and in a certain sense for us all. (Compare 1 John 1: 1-4.) The sum of all is, that the relationship of the Son down here with the Holy Father, the name in which He had kept His disciples when He was here below, was to be their safeguard directly on the Father's part.

284 He sends them into this world, having confided to them the Father's word - this revelation, not of the dispensations of God in His government of the world, but the revelation of the Father in grace - a revelation, not of the counsels of God for the future in Christ, but a revelation which made known the Father Himself, as having sent the Son, and putting in relationship with God according to His nature, that which will be the eternal blessing when there will no longer be any dispensation.

Now this is what drew upon them the hatred of the world. Their presence, representing the Father in testimony, told the world that everything did not belong to it; that that which was of God did not. There were men who were in relationship with the Father; but the consequence of this was that they were not of the world. Judgment was not executed, but the separation was made.

Christ did not pray that they might be taken out of the world, although they did not belong to it, as He Himself did not belong to it, but that they might be kept from the evil, negatively from the influence of the world that surrounded them. Not only so, but that they might be sanctified, set apart in heart and in fact by the Father's word; it was not prophecy, nor the government of the world, but the revelation of the Father in His grace in Christ: the eternal joy of His communion. It was the immutable, eternal truth: Christ had been and always is it, but they were to be witnesses of it, being sent by the Son into the world, as the Son had been sent into it by the Father.

285 Now for the accomplishment of this sanctification in them, an object is introduced in the Person of Christ Himself - Christ, I believe, glorified; however, His Person remains the same. One might have supposed that the Son, eternally One with the Father in His divine nature, and who had been Son down here, introducing this relationship into human nature, but always able to say: "I and my Father are one"; one might have supposed, I say, that He would have laid aside this human garb in leaving this world, in order to enter again into His simply divine position. But no! He keeps it in the glory. He sets Himself apart in the glory as Man; always Son, but in the glory that He had with the Father before the world was, in order that this relationship with the Father, in which man is placed in His Person, might be effectively revealed in its perfection and in its fulness to the hearts of the disciples, that these hearts filled with what He was, might be at the same time sanctified according to this perfection, and thus made fit to be the vessels of it in their testimony. Thus the truth of what the Father is - the truth that sanctified them - was not, so to speak, a dry doctrine, applied to their souls to form them, judging evil and communicating that which was suitable, but a living reality which placed them in this position, with all the affections which were connected with a Person, in whom they were and who was in them, a Saviour known and beloved, who had been bound up with them in grace. All the fulness of the result of this relationship, established in its perfection in heaven, formed their heart according to this perfection.

This is what completes that which Jesus asks for the disciples before the Father, and in testimony before the world: the revelation of the name of the Father known in the Person of the Son, Man in this world and in the glory. But His prayer does not stop there; blessed be His name for ever!

Jesus prays also for those who were to believe through their means; but the request is not the same as that which He made for the disciples, although it depends upon it. For them He asked a unity analogous to that which existed between the Father and the Son in the work of redemption; the same thoughts, the same counsels, the same truth. The Son accomplished the Father's thoughts in the unity of the same nature. They were, by the absorbing power of the Holy Ghost, to act in the work of testimony, as being absolutely and entirely one. No divergence existed between the thoughts, the counsels, the will of the Father, and the testimony and obedience of the Son; and, by grace, the disciples became the depositary, one and all together, of the testimony of the revelation of the Father in the Son. Also, the Father's word having been confided to them, their function was to communicate it to others. They were communicators of these truths; the others, for whom the Saviour now prays, received this testimony, and thus entered into communion with those who were in the unity of this grace. (Compare 1 John 1: 1-4.) They enjoyed all that of which the disciples were the depositaries. The Lord prays that they may be one with them, the Father and the Son. It is always the Father revealed in the Son that is the basis of their union. Now this revelation gave them a heavenly object, one only and the same object that absorbed the heart's affections, and thus destroyed the influence of the earthly objects that would have tended to divide them, such as their social or national position, and even what was still more difficult, their religious position. They were Christians, sons of the Father, associated with Christ; their fatherland was heaven. Pilgrims and strangers down here, they declared plainly that they sought their native country. Now, in this, they were necessarily one; one in their origin, one in their object, and that with Christ Himself, the Son of the Father. He that sanctified and they who were sanctified were all of one. (See Heb. 2: 11.) They formed part of the company of those to whom the Saviour had said: "I ascend unto my Father and your Father, unto my God and your God." In this spiritual position, they were one in the Father and in the Son, who were one in themselves, and all together lived in this communion. Thus in 1 John 1, we read: "that ye may have fellowship with us: and our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ," and then we have fellowship "one with another."

286 Thus, inasmuch as Christians, brought to the knowledge of the Father in the Son, the motives that animate and govern the world, had disappeared: "As is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly." In this case John never speaks of the inconsistencies that may be shewn in the walk, nor the Saviour either, but He speaks of the thing in itself. Now the world was to see this unity (compare Acts 2 and 4), and the disappearance of all the motives that govern this world, a clear testimony to the revelation of the Father in the Son. It was the testimony that the Father had sent the Son into the world; for there is seen a people there formed by a power that was not at all of the world, and which, in overturning all human barriers, would give them but one heart and one soul, so that they were irrefragable witnesses of the reality of that which governed them. Such are Christians, led by the word of the Father, subject to the influence of this word, and living by it.

287 Note, that the subject here is not of the unity of the church - John never speaks of it - but of the family of God. It is not the counsels of God, but the effect and realisation of the revelation of the Father in the Son sent from Him; but in everything they are identified with Christ.

The third unity is in glory. The first was expressed by these words, "as we" (ver. 11); the second, by "one in us" (ver. 21); and this one, by "as we are one" (ver. 22), and by "I in them, and thou in me"; thus accomplished, brought to perfection in one. It is here the result in glory.

We have seen that the doctrine of the chapter, even eternal life, is the knowledge of the Father, and Christ sent by Him. Now this is accomplished in the glory. First of all, Christ a man, Son of God, in glory, is the source of the sanctification of His own according to that knowledge, the disciples and those that believed, being introduced by their means in spirit into the position where Christ was. In the second place, this relationship of association with Christ is transferred into the glory before the Father; not as now, realised by faith, but they themselves are transformed in this glory. It is union, perfect in nature, thoughts, and state - "as we are one"; Christ in them, so that their position was fully realised, and the Father in Christ, so that the spiritual connection that we have seen all through the chapter - the Father revealed in the Son, and Christ revealed in the disciples and believers - was now not only spiritually known, but gloriously realised.

But let us here notice what is striking and important. The three unities relate to the world. First, the word of God had been confided to the disciples, conjointly depositaries of the truth, so that the world hated them (vers. 11-14); then, secondly, we have the unity of communion, that the world might believe (ver. 24) in seeing the effect and the power of the present testimony; then, thirdly, the disciples and believers are made partakers of the glory given to the Son as Man; He in them, and the Father in Him, so that the whole of these thoughts, of grace so infinite which unites the Father, the Son as Man, and believers, being manifested in glory, the world will know (and not believe) that the Son had been sent from the Father, and that believers were loved by the Father as the Son Himself. The proof of it will be there: the Son manifested in glory, and believers in the same glory as He. This will be the visible accomplishment of the doctrine, of the marvellous truth with which the chapter is taken up: the Father in the Son as Man, and believers glorified with Him. But whether it be a scene of testimony or of glory, it is the world that is before our eyes.

288 In what follows, this is not the case, and it is this that gives quite another character to these last verses. "Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me, for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world." We see here, as we have seen throughout, that Christ speaks of Himself as man, though also as Son of the Father; as man, divested outwardly of the divine glory in which He had been - "the form of God" as we read in Philippians 2 - and having taken "the form of a servant" in humanity. The Father has given the glory on high to the Man Christ. He had had, He says in this same chapter, this glory with the Father before the foundation of the world, but He was going back into it as man, for as man it is clear that He had never had it. He was not yet glorified. Never, down here, though He said and shewed that He was one with the Father, and "I am" (John 8: 59), and said to the Jews: "Destroy this temple [His body where God was], and in three days I will raise it up"; never would He go outside this position of servant: He took a body in order to be obedient to His Father; Psalm 40. Moreover, a man who had not been so, would have been by the very fact, in evil: it was this that Satan sought to lead Him into; Matt. 4. The Father had proclaimed: "This is my beloved Son"; and in the first temptation, Satan says to Him: "If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones become bread"; but the Lord withstood his wiles, refusing to leave the place of obedience: "Man," He says, "shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." Thus, in speaking as Man in the midst of His own, He speaks of the glory into which He was going to enter, as being given Him of God. Nevertheless He presents it here objectively as His personal glory.

289 He had been loved before the foundation of the world. We have learned, at the beginning of the chapter, that He had had with the Father, before the foundation of the world, the glory into which He was going to enter as Man. It is not that there are two glories; but I do not believe that human eyes down here can bear the glory as it is seen in heaven. The glory seen upon earth will be like that in which Moses and Elijah appeared upon the mountain - the glory of the kingdom. But we read in Luke 9 that the disciples entered into the cloud, the shekinah. Moses had spoken to God, when God came down in the cloud, but he did not enter into it. But we shall see Him such as He is there, in the Father's house. The disciples had suffered upon earth, and had seen Him suffer. He was going to be crucified, and He asked therefore that they should see His glory on high, with the Father. It was the answer to the ignominy to which He had been exposed for His love for us, and for the glory of His Father.

But this request relates also to another solemn truth. He was going to suffer; the history of His sufferings begins with the nest chapter. The world had rejected Him; the Father must decide between Him and the world. He had fully revealed the Father, and the world had not known Him who had manifested Himself in Christ. It was moral blindness that only saw the carpenter's son there, where the Father had been manifested in all His grace and all His goodness. But Jesus, as man in the world, had known the Father, and the disciples had known that it was the Father, who had sent Him. Now the end had come, the close of His earthly career; the result was to declare itself. The Father's righteousness was about to place Him in His house, and the world was left without God, who had been there in grace, and without the Saviour.

Notice that when He prays for His own, Jesus says, "Holy Father." He desired that they should be kept according to this name - sons with Him, and sanctified according to this revelation of the Father that Christ enjoyed, and of which He was the vessel for the others. Now He says "Righteous Father." The Father was to decide between Him and those who had received Him on the one hand, and the world that had rejected Him on the other. A solemn moment for the world, when He who had come in pure grace (2 Cor. 5: 19) prayed, after having faithfully manifested and glorified the Father, that the Father Himself should decide in righteousness between Him and the world. The answer very soon followed, when Jesus sat down on the Father's throne.

290 But we have something else to remark here. First the union of the divine Person of the Son, and of the humanity of the Saviour. The Father had loved Him before the foundation of the world; Himself, Son of the Father, before there had been a world. But in contrast with the world, He had known the Father, that is to say, as Man down here, and He associates the disciples with Himself, demanding that they should be there where He was going to be, at the same time owning His personal glory. He demanded that they should see His glory, the glory that He had as loved of the Father before the world existed. It is the precious truth, which is like a thread uniting all the chapter; but here, that which is put more forward, is His Person as Son of the Father, and Man, and the association of the disciples with Him. But what grace is presented to us here! We shall be with Christ, like Christ; we shall see His glory, the glory of Him who has been humbled for us; a glory that He had with the Father before the foundation of the world - but Man for ever and ever.

This is not yet all. There is our relationship with the Father, the same as that of Christ: "I go to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God"; that is to say, where Christ is still as Son, and as Man. We enjoy this relationship already. When Christ shall come again, the world will know that we have been loved, as Christ has been loved; but we have the enjoyment of it already, down here. The Father's name has been already declared to us when Christ was upon earth, although little understood by the disciples. But from the descent of the Holy Ghost, come down in virtue of the presence of the Man Christ in heaven, this name is declared again, and the Spirit is the Spirit of adoption.

What immense, perfect, and intimate grace! Love, which is the love with which God loves, infinite, perfect, in its nature shutting out all that is not itself; intimate, it is the Father's love for the Son Himself, and Christ in us to draw it into our hearts, and make us capable of enjoying it, and that in its perfect intimacy, for it is Christ in us, to give it its proper character in us.

291 The world will know objectively the love wherewith we have been loved, when we shall appear in the same glory as Christ; we ourselves know it, as being the conscious objects of it; knowing this love in the Father, in the Son as being its worthy and infinite object, and we - He being in us - participating in it in the manner in which He enjoys it as Man. God alone could have such thoughts.

On the Gospel of John

J. N. Darby.

<33014E> 291{file section e.}

John 18

We have been through the wonderful chapter, in which is presented to us the touching development of the communion of the Son with the Father with regard to the object of their common interest, the children, believers put into relationship with the Father by His revelation in the Son. The more we think of it, the more we feel how marvellous it is to be admitted to hear such communications.

But let us continue our study of the Gospel. That which follows, is the account of the last events of the life of Christ, as also of His death, of His resurrection and all that belongs to them. The sufferings of Christ are not the subject of John's Gospel, but His divine Person, and this character is found again here. We do not find suffering either in Gethsemane or upon the cross, but a direct testimony borne to His divinity, as to His perfect human obedience. There is another element less important, but which comes out in a clear light; it is, the moral setting aside of the Jews, a subject of sorrow for the Saviour Himself and for us, for which the sovereign grace of God will provide a remedy; but here they fall into marked contempt, even from the Gentiles.

The sufferings of Christ not being related, there is far less detail. It is great principles, great facts, that are put in the foreground in the account, or at least spring out of it. I hope it will not be hazarding too much for souls, to pass in review the different accounts found in the Gospels of what took place in Gethsemane and upon the cross.

In Matthew, Christ is the Victim; there is neither comforter nor consolation, but the sleep of His own, and betrayal with kisses in Gethsemane; and upon the cross: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" Mark gives very much the same facts in this respect. In John, we shall soon see, it is not a question of sufferings, either in Gethsemane, or upon the cross; it is the Son of God who gives Himself. In Luke we have more human anguish in Gethsemane, but none upon the cross. We will speak further on of what is related in John's Gospel. In Matthew's Gospel it is simple: it is the Lamb led to the slaughter, the Lamb that opened not His mouth, except to own Himself such, and forsaken of God for us. In Luke, I see the Son of man, and each circumstance answers to the character of the Gospel. Thus, as Man, His genealogy goes up to Adam; He is the Man who is always praying; in Gethsemane, in sight of the terrible cup that He had to drink, He is the Man realising beforehand that which He would have to suffer, as being made sin. He was in an agony (which is in Luke alone) but that only served to shew His perfection; He prayed the more earnestly; He was as a man with God; He went through all the anguish in His soul. Upon the cross, no sufferings at all. All the rest (that which we see in the other Gospels) remains true, but it is seen from another side; it is in another aspect that the precious Saviour is presented. The sufferings are past; He asks forgiveness for the Jews; He promises paradise to the thief; then, when all is finished, He gives up His spirit to His Father. It is grace and peace in His soul, when He has realised all. The forsaking of God had taken place, but this is not the side of the history that Luke presents.

292 It is well to remark too, that the three other Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) relate His controversy with the different classes of the Jews at His last entrance into Jerusalem, the unbelief of whom is set in clear light. In John, when this unbelief as to His word (chap. 8), as to His works (chap. 9), has been made manifest, and He has declared that He is come to seek His sheep, Jews or Gentiles, and God has borne witness to Him as being Son of God, Son of David, and Son of man (but as such He must die), then it is not controversy with the Jews, a matter already settled, but communications to His disciples about the privileges and the position they should enjoy when He would be away. This brings us back to the history.

The few verses that tell us of Gethsemane, present to us the Saviour in His divine power, then giving Himself for His own, and finally perfect in obedience as man. Nothing is said of what passed before the arrival of Judas. but then the whole band, upon His voluntary avowal that He was Jesus of Nazareth, fall to the earth, confounded by the divine power which was revealed in Him. He could go away, to escape from them; but He was not come for that, and declaring again that He was the One whom they sought, He adds: "If therefore ye seek me, let these go their way"; that that word, so precious for us also, might be fulfilled: "Of those whom thou hast given me, I have lost none." He puts Himself in the breach, that His own may be sheltered from harm.

293 Peter draws his sword, strikes the servant of the high priest, and cuts off his ear. Jesus heals him, but saying these words: "The cup which my Father hath given me to drink, shall I not drink it?" Perfect submission to His Father's will, while shewing that by a word from Him they were rendered powerless, and He free.

In that which follows, we find, it seems to me, that Jesus hardly takes account of the high priest. He does not give account of His teaching to him, but refers him to those who had heard Him: what He had spoken was in public. In the other Gospels, we see indeed that Jesus replied, when He was asked who He was. But here the high priest's authority disappeared.

Peter's fall is stated carefully, then left. In the examination that he makes Him undergo, Pilate receives a fuller answer from Him. His reticence before the high priest is not found here, which is striking. With Caiaphas, He refers to what he could have known from the multitude who had heard Him. With Pilate, He enters into conversation; He recognises the governor's authority, but the Jews are set aside, placed in the position of false accusers, and, when their enmity is rendered evident, He explains to Pilate, that, King though He was, His kingdom was not of this world, and never will be, even when it shall be established here below. The heavens shall reign; the world will acknowledge it; Dan. 4: 26.

Pilate would have liked to have left the matter to the Jews; he saw well that it was only envy and hatred without cause; but the Jews were to be the instrument of Christ's being treated as a malefactor, and not even stoned as a blasphemer, as Stephen was. In God's wonderful counsels, His Son was to be put to death as a malefactor among the Gentiles - cast out of the vineyard, but the guilty ones, those who were the authors of it, were the Jews (v. 29-32, 35). What terrible blindness was theirs! They did not want to defile themselves that they might eat the passover (ver. 28), at the very moment that they were giving up the true Passover Lamb to be sacrificed. Scruples are not conscience. We must not violate scruples, if we have them, but conscience looks to God and to His word. Conscience did not prevent the Jews buying the blood of Jesus for thirty pieces of silver; but a scruple forbade their putting into the treasury of God in the temple, the money rejected by Judas, because it was the price of blood. (Compare Rom. 14.)

294 Pilate asks Jesus if He was the King of the Jews. The Lord explains that His kingdom is not of this world, otherwise He would have made good His claims as the world does. But in every sense, His kingdom, at this moment, was not established in this world as a kingdom of the world. His presence as accused before Pilate was the proof of it. Jesus does not fail to confess openly that He is King, when Pilate asks Him He will establish, later on, a power which nothing will be able to resist, but the time was not yet come. According to the truth, He was King, and He bears witness to the truth. According to the work of God in that moment, He was numbered amongst the transgressors. For Pilate, an infidel and a rationalist, what was truth? He was very guilty in yielding to the urgent demands of the Jews, but it was the Jews who were the instigators of the death of Jesus. They were accomplishing, without knowing it, the counsels of God, and Jesus was there in His perfect obedience. We have before us the truth, the King, the propitiatory Victim, accomplishing a work far deeper and more important than even royalty; we see there also the head of the Gentiles, representing the emperor, then the furious hatred of this poor people against God manifested in goodness, their Saviour. Everything assumes its true character, God's counsels are accomplished, and every actor in this scene takes his true place. But the actors, Jews and Gentiles, are to disappear condemned, but for grace; and the condemned malefactor, who, humanly speaking, disappears, leaves the scene to be Lord over all, to sit upon the Father's throne.

Thus things go on even on a small scale, in this world. It is striking to see these poor Jews make use of, at the cross, the very words that, in their own scriptures, are put into the mouths of atheists and of the enemies of God. (Compare Psalm 22 and Matthew 27.) But wisdom is justified of her children.

295 Every one's position is clearly established. Pilate, the judge, convinced of the Lord's innocence, wished to rid himself of the Jews' importunity, and to avoid enmity without profit. The Jews are enraged against the Son of God come in grace into this world, and prefer to Him a robber guilty of murder. Jesus submits to everything: condemned on His own testimony, He was to be cast out of the camp, and undergo the kind of death of which He had spoken, and the Gentiles were to be guilty of it. But the acts of Pilate and of the Jews were to bring out still more in relief the spirit that animated them. Pilate without conscience; the Jews full of hatred - they wished, at all cost, to put Him to death. This is what follows, and that we find at the beginning of chapter 19.

John 19

In reality the judgment of the Saviour has been pronounced. He had been give up to the outrages of the Roman soldiers. The details of this part of the history are found in Matthew 26: 24-31. The Jews, notwithstanding Pilate's timid resistance, had chosen Barabbas the robber and rejected the Son of God; and Pilate, yielding to their solicitation, had given up in an unprecedented way his position as judge, to please a turbulent people.

But he was not easy. The majesty of the ways of Jesus gave the accused ascendency over the judge. There was in Christ something superhuman that made Pilate afraid; besides, we know that he had received warnings that God had sent to him in a way such as a Gentile could receive them; Matt. 27: 19. But the relations of the Jews, not with Christ - that is found more clearly and in a more terrible manner in Matthew - but with Gentiles, and those of the Gentiles with God, were to be manifested with more evidence. Pilate brings Jesus back, and He is presented to us hated and rejected of the Jews, and condemned solely by Pilate upon words known to all: "Behold the Man."

It is God who presents Him to us thus. There was the Son of God as He was in this world. The world did not know Him, although it had seen Him, and His own received Him not. He was the despised and the rejected of men

Pilate, ill at ease from a mingling of fear and of a bad conscience, and at the same time full of a feverish anxiety to maintain his authority, and to throw upon the Jews the guilt of the condemnation of Jesus, presents Him again to the Jews to tell them that he finds no fault in Him. This excites the Jews to demand with loud cries His crucifixion. Pilate wishes them to do it, as he finds no fault in Him. Then the Jews, to whom the Romans had left their own laws (except the right of putting to death), insist that Jesus deserved death because He made Himself the Son of God, which increases Pilate's uneasiness.

296 He goes again into the judgment-hall and asks Jesus whence He was. Where was now the judge? Jesus does not answer him, Pilate having publicly owned that Jesus was not guilty. It was not a question of instructing Pilate; who, moreover, did not seek instruction, and who, in presence of the silence of Jesus, appeals to his authority and to his power over Him. Jesus declares to Pilate that he would have none if it had not been given him from above - for the crucifixion of the Saviour was in the counsels of God, and Jesus was now giving Himself to accomplish them; but that only increased the sin of Judas, who, witness of the divine power of Christ, had delivered Him up, as though there were none.

From that moment, Pilate seeks to deliver Jesus; but to avoid a tumult amongst the Jews who reproach him with being unfaithful to Caesar, since Jesus called Himself King, he resists no longer, but irritated, he derides the Jews whom he despised, and not concerning himself as to either the truth or as to Jesus, says, "Shall I crucify your King?" - hiding thus his uneasiness, his vexation, his weakness, and want of conscience. This is the occasion of the public apostasy of the Jews, who declare, "We have no king but Caesar!" The counsels of God are being fulfilled; Pilate's hands are stained with the blood of the Son of God; the Gentiles who had the authority, are guilty of His death; the Jews abandon all the privileges that they had from God, and Jesus, with His innocence judicially owned, occupies alone the place of truth and faithfulness, and gives Himself up (for He might have escaped as in the garden, or indeed at any moment) to fulfil the counsels of grace. The Gentiles are compromised without resource, the Jews lost for ever upon the ground of their own responsibility, and that not only as to the law, but as having renounced all right to the enjoyment of the promises; and if God fulfil them later on for His own glory, they will be compelled to receive the enjoyment of them as poor lost sinners from among the Gentiles. Jesus, condemned purely and simply for the testimony that He bore to the truth, as had also been the case before the high priest, stands alone in His dignity and integrity in the midst of a world that ruined itself in running counter to Him, to the grace and truth come from God by Him who was in His bosom.

297 Here, Jesus recognises no authority among the Jews - they were adversaries - nor in the head of the Gentiles, except for the accomplishment of God's counsels. He explains to him first the position, but denies his power, if it is not for that. To see His condemnation by the Jews we must go to the other evangelists, as Matthew 26: 63-66, where we see Him condemned for the witness He had borne that He was the Son of God; and Luke 22 where they take upon themselves the terrible responsibility of His blood. Here, in the Gospel of John, it is only the adversaries that the Lord does not recognise. Jews and Gentiles, they disappear in the darkness of hatred, and of an act of injustice proceeding from feebleness of soul and want of conscience, and Jesus is there, having borne witness to the truth, alone, accepting the consequences from God, in order to accomplish the unspeakable work of divine love for the one and the other. Oh! that we may know better how to meditate on and realise these things!

In the history of the crucifixion of Jesus, as we have seen in Gethsemane, the sufferings are not found. If He is placed between the malefactors, it is to throw contempt on the poor Jews. But if Pilate had yielded without conscience to their violence, he by no means concerned himself with the honour of their nation, and he insolently maintains what he has written. The will of God was, that this testimony should be borne to the state of the Jews and to the rights of His Son, rejected of the people, but King of the Jews. Prophecy is accomplished with regard to them in the smallest details.

After that, we find One who has completed His blessed course; it is the Son of God. During His service here below, He did not recognise His mother. In reality His human relationships were not in question; He was the bearer of the divine word in this world, the expression of this word in His Person, and nothing else; separated from everything for this. Now that His divine ministry is ended, He recognises this relationship, not as a link with the Jews, this was over, but as human affection. He commits her to John, the disciple He loved. To have always repelled her was not a lack of natural affection, but faithfulness, whether in His position outside the Jews (Matt. 12: 46), or in absolute devotedness. Now that His service is finished, His affection is free, and He shews it.

298 Then, the last little circumstance which was to be found in His death, according to the Scriptures, being accomplished, in perfect peace declaring that all was finished, He gives up His spirit Himself. No one takes it from Him; it is He Himself who gives it up. A divine act: after having suffered everything in His soul by the forsaking of God, in perfect calmness He owns that all is accomplished; He Himself separates His spirit from His body, and gives it up to God, His Father; a divine act that He had the power to accomplish. In Luke's Gospel, we have the human side of man's faith: "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit." Here it is the divine side, where He lays down His human life.

The Jews, full of zeal for the ordinances, whilst neglecting the mercy, righteousness, and love of God, desire that the bodies may not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, and a centurion is sent to put the crucified ones to death. He breaks the legs of the two malefactors; but Jesus was dead already; not one of His bones was to be broken; but to assure himself that he was not mistaken, and that (although he understood nothing of it) the world had got rid of the Son of God, he pierces His side with a spear. It was the last outrage the world inflicted upon Him, to make sure that they had done with the Son of God. The answer of grace was the water and the blood that purifies and saves. Man and God met; the insolence and indifference of hatred, and sovereign grace that rises above all the sin of man. Wonderful scene, wonderful testimony! There, where sin abounded, grace has much more abounded. The thrust of the soldier's spear brought out the divine testimony of salvation and of life.

Notice also how opportune this circumstance was. If they had pierced Jesus before His death, and had killed Him, He would not Himself have given up His spirit: if they had pierced Him without putting Him to death, His blood shed thus would not have had the value of His death. But He gives His life Himself; He is dead, and all the value of His death, in its two aspects of purification and expiation, was manifested, when His side was pierced and the water and the blood came forth; 1 John 5.

299 How little the outside of what goes on in the world corresponds with the reality! Scruples and brutality hasten to take away the life of the thieves: they little thought that thus they were sending the poor believer straight into paradise! The Scriptures were being accomplished on every point. Not one of the bones of Jesus was broken, but His side had been pierced, and now God provides the rich man with whom Jesus was to be in His death. Joseph of Arimathea has obtained the Saviour's body from Pilate, and he and Nicodemus place it with aromatic spices in a new sepulchre that had never been used for an interment. The sabbath being about to begin (at six o'clock in the evening), they placed the body there, so as to arrange everything becomingly when the sabbath should be passed. What a solemn moment when the earth received the dead body of the Son of God, and the world had no more of Him down here!

Remark here, in passing, how iniquity carried out to its full height, leads the weak to shew themselves faithful. These two men who believed in Jesus, but whose position and riches hindered them from shewing themselves openly, or only allowed one of them to do so, but in a timid and indirect way - now that all are afraid, except a few women - come out boldly. This evil in the midst of the Jews had become intolerable to them, and their position was of real service to them in their devotedness. It was the patient grace of God and His providence that brought out the rich at this moment for this service.

In the invisible world, Jesus was in paradise; as to this world, an interrupted funeral, that was all He had. Sin, death, Satan, the judgment of God, had done all that they severally could do: His earthly life was ended, and with it all His relations with this world, and with man as belonging to this world. Death reigned outwardly, even over the Son of God; serious souls who were aware of it were perplexed. But the world went on just the same; the Passover was celebrated with its usual ceremonies; Jerusalem was what it had been before. They had got rid of the two thieves; what had become of them, one or the other, did not concern society. Its selfishness was delivered from them, and from Another that troubled it by telling too much about it. But it is not the outside of things that is the truth. One of the thieves was in paradise with Christ; the other, far away from all hope; the soul at least of the Third was in the repose of perfect blessing, in the bosom of the Deity. And as to the world, it had lost its Saviour, and was to see Him again no more.

300 But it was impossible, on account of His Person, that Jesus could remain under the power of death, although He submitted to it for us. On account of divine righteousness He was not to remain there. True Son of God, the Father's glory was concerned in His not being holden by it; He could not suffer His Holy One to see corruption. The absolute darkness that had come down upon the world, spoke on God's part of the dawn of a new and eternal day that was going to rise beyond death, for God's glory, upon those who, attached to Jesus, saw in Him the Sun of Righteousness. Sorrow, where there is faith, may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. For the righteous, light arises in the midst of darkness. Man has to be condemned, but God is sovereign in grace, glorious in righteousness. Christ, a man, had to die, according to that grace, and according to righteousness against sin; but He had to be raised according to the unfailing righteousness of God. It is the basis of the truth as regards Christ's work, but it is the principle of all God's ways with us. We must die with Him and rise with Him. If we always appropriate to ourselves this truth, for it is our privilege (Col. 2, 3) we enjoy a life that is not in this world, bearing about always in our body the dying of the Lord Jesus. If, in anything, this life of the flesh is not mortified, death must be applied to it: we experience this in the ways of God. It is the history of our Christian life down here. As to the efficacious accomplishment of the thing, it was done, once for all, on the cross.

John 20

In this chapter, the history of the resurrection, or rather of the manifestations of the Lord to His own, is full of interest and of important principles. The first person who is presented to us is not even the Christ: it is those who were to surround Him spiritually, and who had in fact surrounded Him down here. It was good and suitable that the state of their affections - and affections nourish faith - that this state, I say, as confidence in Him and attachment to His Person should be manifested, and that then He, revealed in resurrection, should be the answer to this state, and should lead them on further.

301 The first person that presents herself, and whose history is of profound and touching interest, is Mary Magdalene. Her name has become the expression of a bad life, or at least that of a woman come out of licentiousness, but there is nothing to justify the tradition. But that she had been completely under the power of the demon is no tradition; the Lord had cast seven demons out of her. Her state therefore had been most miserable, and she loved much. We find her with a woman constantly called "the other Mary" (Matt. 23: 1), accompanying the Lord with others, and rendering Him the assiduous services of a devoted affection. But sincere as the affection of these women was for the Saviour, it was more so for the heart of Mary Magdalene than for all the others. They were fully prepared, buying aromatic spices and perfumes to embalm Him, to do all that was necessary to honour their Master; but Mary Magdalene thought of Him. They waited therefore the suitable time, and arrived at the sepulchre at sunrise. But Mary Magdalene's heart was devoid of everything save the grief of having lost Him whom she loved so much, and she was at the sepulchre whilst it was still night.

The Lord was already risen, and the great stone rolled away from before the entrance into the sepulchre. She did not seize the import of what she saw, but went to Peter and John. These, to see what had happened, ran to the sepulchre that was supposed to be carefully guarded. John looks into the sepulchre and sees the linen clothes in which Jesus had been wrapped, left there upon the ground. Peter, arriving directly after, enters in and sees the linen clothes also, and the napkin in which the Lord's head had been wrapped, folded apart. All bespoke tranquillity; nothing indicated haste or precipitation. It seems that Peter was astonished at what he saw (Luke 24: 12), and hardly knew what to think of it. Then John, in his turn, entered; he saw and believed, but his faith rested upon what he saw, and not upon the word. They knew not the scriptures which declared that thus it must be. Alas! Jesus did not possess their heart, nor the word their understanding. They go to their own home; they look no further; they are astonished, John at least convinced; divine intelligence did not enlighten them, affection for Christ did not move them: they went to their own home.

302 It is not thus with Mary Magdalene. For her without Jesus the whole world was nothing but an empty sepulchre; her heart was more empty still. She stays there at the sepulchre, where the Lord whom she loved had been. As it is said of Rachel; she could not be comforted, because He was no more. Stooping down into the sepulchre hewn in the rock, she sees two angels, who ask her: "Why weepest thou?" God allows the full expression of this strong affection. It is no longer, "They have taken away the Lord," as she said to the apostles, but, "They have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him." But Jesus was not far from a heart thus attached to His Person. Mary hears someone moving behind her. She turns and sees a man whom she takes for the gardener. He asks again: "Why weepest thou? whom seekest thou?" Then we see the affection that appropriates to itself the lost Saviour, as if He belonged to her, and that does not imagine that the gardener can think of any other object than that which occupies it. "Lord," she says, "if thou hast borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away." If I had a sick friend, I should ask at his house, "How is he?" and all would understand what I meant, of whom I was speaking. Mary supposes that everybody thinks of the Lord, as she does herself, and that her affection gives her full right to dispose of Him. It was not intelligence; He had said that He would rise again, and she sought among the dead Him who was living. But the Lord was everything for her heart. It is what Jesus seeks, and He makes Himself found as living. He acts in His divine and human affection, and calls His sheep by her name; "Mary," He says. This was enough, and a single word from a satisfied heart answers to the call. His sheep hears His voice, and mistakes it not. "Rabboni!" she says. That was all; Mary had found Him, and found Him living, and He had brought out in Mary's heart all the affection which His love would satisfy.

Now intelligence comes, and it is Mary, she who sought the living among the dead, but with a heart that belonged to Him, a heart attached to His Person, she it is whom the Lord employs to communicate to the apostles themselves the knowledge of the highest privileges that belong to Christians. We see clearly the importance of this devotedness. It was not knowledge that characterised Mary, but her affection brought her spiritually near to the Lord, and made her the fitting vessel for communicating what He Himself had in His heart. She possessed, as a vessel, this knowledge, but better still, she possessed the Lord.

303 As to her position, Mary Magdalene represented the Jewish remnant attached to the Person of the Lord, but ignorant of the glorious counsels of God. She thought to have found Jesus again, risen no doubt, but come again into this world to take the place that was due to Him, and satisfy the affections of those who had left everything for Him in the days of His humiliation, despised of the world, and denied by His people. But she could not have Him thus now. A glory far more excellent, of far greater extent, was in the thoughts of God, and blessing for us far more precious. In receiving Christ, she could not rightly receive Him, but according to the thoughts of God with regard to the Saviour. Only her attachment to the Lord opened this blessed path to her. "Touch me not," the Lord says, "for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren and say to them, I ascend unto my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God." She could not have the Lord, even when risen, as come again as Messiah upon earth. He must first of all ascend to His Father and receive the kingdom, then return: but there was much more. A work had been accomplished that placed Him, as Man and Son always, with the Father in glory, Man in this blessed relationship; but it was a work of redemption that set His own, redeemed according to the value of that work, in the same glory and in the same relationships as Himself. And this was based upon the sure foundation of that work, in which God Himself and the Father had been fully glorified, and had made themselves known according to all their perfections. (Compare John 13: 31, 32 and chap. 17: 4, 5.) According to these perfections, the disciples are introduced into the position and according to the relationship of Jesus Himself with God. This was the necessary fruit of the work of Jesus; without this, He would not have seen of the travail of His soul.

For the first time Christ calls His disciples His brethren, and places them thus in His own relationships with God His Father. Judaism has disappeared for the moment, and as far as the old covenant is concerned; and the full effect of Christ's work, according to the settled purpose of grace, is revealed; believers are placed there by faith, and we possess the knowledge and power of it by the Holy Ghost which has been given to us, consequent upon Jesus having entered personally, as Son of Man, into the glory that resulted from His work.

304 The resurrection of Jesus has left behind man, death, sin, the power of Satan, and the judgment of God, and has brought heavenly glory into view; although, in order to bear witness to the reality of His resurrection, Jesus did not yet Himself enter into this glory. But as far as concerns the basis of the thing, that is to say, the relationship, it was established and revealed. The Jewish remnant, attached to Christ, becomes the company of the Son associated with Him in the power of the privileges into which He has entered, as risen from amongst the dead.

Mary having communicated these things to the apostles, the course of the outward development founded upon this revelation, is related. The disciples met that same day in the evening, and Jesus, the doors being shut because of their fear of the Jews, appeared personally, but in a spiritual body, in their midst, bringing them the peace that He had made by His blood. Divine peace, the gathering together, and the presence of the Lord, characterised their meeting. The apostles were to be eye-witnesses, and He shews them His hands and His side, irrefutable evidence that it was truly the same Jesus they had known, and they rejoice when they see Him. Then they were to be His missionaries or apostles (sent ones), and He lays down divine peace as the point of departure: "Peace be to you," He says to them; "as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you." Then, as God breathed into Adam's nostrils the breath of life, the divine Son, the same God - here a risen Man - breathes upon them, communicating to them the Holy Ghost. Although symbolising the gift of the Holy Ghost, He was not yet sent, for Jesus was not yet ascended on high; but He was communicated as power of life by the risen Saviour, divine life - life according to the position in which He was, and which was its power. They lived by the divine life of the Saviour, and according to the state He had taken in rising. The Holy Ghost, descended from heaven, was to reveal to them the objects of faith, and lead them. Here, that which they receive is the spiritual and subjective capacity to enjoy them, making them personally capable of running the race in which the Holy Ghost was to lead them. They were fit for the service of their mission: He who should guide them was the Holy Ghost, who was going to descend from heaven.

305 This difference is found in Romans 8. Up to verse 11, the Holy Ghost in the believer, is the spirit of life and of liberty, of moral power in Christ. After that (from verse 11) it is the Holy Ghost personally, acting as a divine Person. This goes on to verse 27.

Nevertheless, in this picture, which is the summing-up of the whole position, this fact (the Lord breathing on them) points to the gift of the Holy Ghost. Now their mission, the salvation that Jesus had just accomplished, was characterised in its first application by the remission of sins, the first need of the sinner, if he is to be reconciled with God; Luke 1: 77; Matt. 9: 2. It is not here the eternal efficacy of Christ's work in itself, but the application of its efficacy here below, as a present, actual thing. In examining the bearing of this work, we find that the worshippers, once purged, have no more conscience of sins; but here it is the present application in this purification. The eternal efficacy of the work is not the subject of John's Gospel, which does not speak of it; but it is its administrative application.

Verses 19-23 of our chapter resume the position of service, in which the Lord places His disciples, as well as the gathering together of the children of God. Notice here that He said, in His life upon earth before resurrection, "Fear not": and if, as Immanuel, the Messiah, He disposed of everything in favour of His own when He sent out His disciples, here, on the contrary, they fear the Jews, and the Lord does not take away that fear, but replaces the power of His presence as Emmanuel the Messiah, by His presence in their midst, and by the peace He had made and that He conferred.

Thomas was not there. Eight days after, that is to say, on the following Lord's day, Thomas was with the others, and Jesus came into their midst. Responding to the doubts that Thomas had expressed before Jesus came, the Lord convinced him, by shewing him and making him touch His hands and His side. Thomas's doubts disappear. It is the expression, in this remarkable resume or sketch of the dispensations of God, of the position of the Jewish remnant in the last days. They will believe when they see Him, and Jesus makes the difference between believers who have not seen Him - our position - and those who will believe when they see Him. The blessing rests upon us. Thomas's confession, true and just as it was, shews, it seems to me, the Jewish position. It is not the glorified Son of man, Jesus on high, but it is what the Jews will own when He returns; that is to say, that the Jesus whom they had rejected was their Lord and their God, their Deliverer and Saviour, the Jehovah who was to deliver them. The testimony of the others will not have convinced them. They will see and look upon Him whom they have pierced. Thus we find, in this chapter, besides the resurrection of Jesus, the epitome of the dispensation of grace from that event up to the Saviour's return: first of all the Jewish remnant, represented by Mary Magdalene, but introduced by a risen Christ into the knowledge of the Christian position and privileges - privileges that she announces to the disciples. Following upon this communication, the assembled disciples find the Lord Jesus in their midst, pronouncing upon them the peace that He had just made: then He sends them forth, founding their mission on the peace given, and putting in their hands the administration of the forgiveness of sins, communicating the Holy Ghost to them. Finally, the Jewish remnant at the end, which believes when it sees, but which does not enjoy the same privileges as those who believe during His absence, at a time when we do not see. Thomas (the remnant) would not receive the testimony that had been borne to him of the resurrection of Jesus.

306 John 21

This last chapter is purposely mysterious, and it presents to us what will take place when Jesus returns; but besides, the restoration of Peter's soul after his fall. Verses 1-14 shew what follows the return of Jesus, the third time He shews Himself. The first time is the day of His resurrection; the second time, a week after, when Thomas was there; these two occasions present the remnant become the church, and the remnant at the end. Here, in this chapter, it is what is called the millennium. It is the third time that Jesus shews Himself to them, when they are together; in figure it was first of all for Christians, then for the Jewish remnant, and finally for the Gentile world. This is why Jesus had already here some fish on the fire, that is to say, the Jewish remnant. But, throwing the net into the sea of nations, the disciples gather together a mass of fish, without however, the net breaking. In the beginning (Luke 5) they had taken a mass of people, but then the net gets broken. The administrative order that contained the fish could not keep them according to that order, but here the presence of the risen Saviour changes everything. Nothing breaks, and He is again associated with His own, and in the power of the fruit of His work.

307 After this mysterious scene, He restores Peter, but it is by probing his heart, in making him known to himself. This is what the Lord always does. Peter had said, that if all denied Him, he would not. The Saviour asks him if he loved Him more than the others loved Him. Peter appeals to the knowledge that the Saviour had; Jesus confides His lambs to him. Once humbled, and having lost all confidence in ourselves, the Lord can confide to us that which is most dear to His heart: "Feed my lambs," He says to him. Note well that Jesus does not reproach Peter with anything that he had done, but that He goes, for his good, lo the very bottom of his soul, even to that false confidence in himself that had brought about his fall. Then, repeating His question even to the third time, which should have recalled to Peter his denial, three times repeated, He widens the sphere of His confidence, and says to him, "Take care of my sheep." Peter had strengthened the expression of his affection,* saying, "Thou knowest that thou art dear to me." The Lord takes up the word, and says, "Am I dear to thee?" Peter was troubled because the Lord again called in question his affection, and said to Him: "Thou knowest all things, thou knowest that thou art dear to me." He appeals to that knowledge that sounds all hearts, but this was to confess that it needed that in order to know it; for, according to all appearances, when put to the proof, he shewed himself unfaithful at the moment that demanded devotedness on his part, and men might have said that Peter had proved a hypocrite. But, thank God, notwithstanding all our weaknesses, there is One who knows what He Himself has put at the bottom of our hearts, and if He searches us and compels us to know both ourselves, and the root of evil in us, He recognises still deeper down that which He has created there; blessed be His name; and He overwhelms with grace that which His grace has put there, and trusts, once we are humbled enough, this grace in us, maintained, however, by the continual flow of His grace.

{*The two first times, Jesus says to Peter: "Lovest thou me?" using the Greek word agapao. Peter answers always, using the word Phileo: "Thou art dear to me"; and the latter is the word that Jesus employs the third time.}

308 We see further in this passage, how dear His sheep are to Jesus. It is of them He thinks in going away, to provide their food and the care they need. But there is more in His grace towards poor Peter. He had lost the fine opportunity he had had. To save his life he had denied the Saviour, and that which the want of faith had lost is not always given back, even if something better be given us. If we cross the Jordan,* we cannot go up the mountain of the Amorites any more, we wander in the barren desert. Only, God accomplishes His counsels. But here, the strength of Peter's will having been proved to be weakness before the power of the enemy, the immense blessing of suffering and even of dying for the Lord is granted to him; and that should take place, when it should no longer be a question of his will, but of submission to the power of others, where his faithfulness should be set in a clear light. Another should bind him, and carry him whither he would not. He should die, after all, for the Lord. It is then, when there is no more will of our own, no more strength, that we can follow the Lord.

{*Read and compare Numbers 13 and Deuteronomy 1.}

Afterwards, in terms purposely mysterious, John's ministry and work are stated. The lambs and sheep of Jesus were the Jewish believers confided thus to Peter. The testimony was to be rejected by the nation, and terminated by Peter's death. But it should be otherwise with that of John. Peter, who sees him also following Jesus, asks the Lord what would happen to him. "If I will," says the Saviour, "that he remain till I come, what is that to thee? Follow thou me!" He did not say, as was supposed, that he would not die; but in fact his ministry makes known the ways of God to the end. All is left in suspense after him, until Jesus come, whilst the sphere of Peter's ministry has disappeared from off the earth.

Remark, too, that it is no question here of Paul's ministry. Peter had the ministry of the circumcision; the earth was the scene of it, and the promises its object, leading at the same time individually to heaven. John, whilst revealing the Person of the Son and eternal life come down from heaven, occupies himself also with that which is upon earth, then with the government and the judgment of God at the Saviour's manifestation down here. Paul treats of God's counsels in Christ, and of His work, to introduce us into the same heavenly glory, like Him before the Father, His brethren already down here. This is not the subject of our Gospel.

On the Epistle to the Romans

J. N. Darby.

<33015G> 310 {file section a.}

Introduction

In the Epistle to the Romans, Christians are looked at as men living and walking on the earth, but possessing the life of Christ and the Holy Spirit, so that they are in Christ. Their sins are forgiven; they are justified by the work of Christ. Their duty is to present their bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, as they have been transformed by the renewing of their mind, that they may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God (Rom. 12: 1, 2).

The epistle begins with the responsibility of man, proving all to be guilty on the ground of what they have done, and then shewing the result of the death of Christ in the forgiveness of sins and the justification of the believer. Afterwards the apostle considers the condition in which man is found consequent on Adam's sin, and shews how he is delivered from the power of sin.

In Romans it is not a question of the counsels of God, except in three or four verses of chapter 8, and then only to prove that the work of His grace is unchangeable, and that, when once it has been appropriated by the call of grace, it is stable and sure, and is carried on until the glory. The work of Christ is accomplished, and those who believe in Him will be conformed to His image. Thus all is perfectly secure. Possessing the life of Christ, so that we suffer with Him, we shall be also glorified with Him. The epistle contains nothing more relative to the counsels of God. If we want to learn about them we must turn to the Epistle to the Ephesians; while the Epistle to the Colossians instructs us as to the life of a man who to faith is risen. But in Romans we find the work of God in grace for the justification of the ungodly by the death and resurrection of Christ, and their acceptance in Christ, believers being looked at as in Him.

As already intimated above, the doctrine of the Epistle to the Romans divides into two parts, the first of which, up to chapter 5: 11, treats of sins, the putting away of these, and the grace of God therein unfolded. From thence up to the end of chapter 8, the second part is taken up; namely, sin in the flesh, the condition in which we are found consequent on Adam's sin, as well as our deliverance from the same, and our new condition in Christ. Then follow as an appendix three chapters explaining how the doctrine of the universal condition of sin in which man is found, and of the reconciliation by faith of all with God, can be compatible with the special promises made to the Jews. The conclusion is made up of exhortations and the rehearsal of certain important principles. The exposition of the doctrine of the reconciliation of man with God by faith, contained in the first part of the epistle is introduced by a preface in which the gospel is founded on the Person of Christ, and is presented as the revelation of the righteousness of God.

311 We see then in this epistle how God has met us in perfect grace, when, according to our responsibility as men and according to His righteousness, we were totally lost; how out of pure grace He has provided for us salvation and eternal life, when we were alienated from Him by sin; yea, when, according to the flesh, we were in enmity against Him.

But before considering more closely the doctrine of the epistle, and the order and contents of its different parts, we may say a word about the apostle himself. He had never been at Rome; but, endued with divine authority, he was the apostle of all the Gentiles, and for this reason he could write to the Romans, although he had not been the instrument of their conversion. Some of them, indeed, he knew, for Rome itself being the metropolis of the known world, people from all countries met there. This, however, gives a special character to the epistle, different from that of most of his other writings. It is more of a treatise than a letter from the apostle to one of the assemblies founded by himself. Personal relations are omitted to leave room for positive doctrine, although at the close of the epistle Paul salutes many saints whom he knew, as at its commencement he sought to establish a link of affection with the Christians at Rome; still his apostleship is primarily the basis of his communications to the believers at Rome. No apostle had founded the assembly at Rome. Paul had not yet been there; and if later on Peter went there to offer up his life in testimony for the Lord, until then he had had nothing to do with Rome, being the apostle of the circumcision.

312 Romans 1 and 2

Paul begins the epistle with a reference to his office. He was the servant of Jesus Christ, a called apostle, separated unto the gospel of God; that is, so to speak, his title. He served the Lord, and to this end he had been called and separated, in quite a special way; he was not amongst those who had followed the Lord on earth; he did not know Him thus. On the contrary, he had been the most violent enemy to the name of Jesus on earth, and sought to exterminate this new doctrine - that is, faith in Jesus - from the midst of Israel, and to punish every adherent of it. This path was put a stop to by the Lord, who revealed Himself to him in glory, and now this very glory became the starting-point of Paul's service. It was the most signal proof of the work of reconciliation being accomplished, that He who had suffered for sins was now in glory; and not only that, but the persecuted Christians were acknowledged by the Lord, not as disciples, but as united to Him - the glorified Man, the Son of God in heaven. Thus Paul was called in an entirely special way; but he was separated also in a special way. The revelation of the Lord in glory separated him first of all from Judaism, yet not that he should turn to paganism; but, acknowledging Christ in divine glory as Lord, he was taken out "from amongst the people and the Gentiles" (Acts 26: 17), and was sent into the world by the glorified Man, the Lord of glory, to proclaim an accomplished redemption, to deliver from sin all who should believe in Him, and the Jews from the yoke of the law. Therefore, henceforth, he knew no one after the flesh, not even the Lord Jesus; that is, not as the carnally-minded Jews desired to have Him here in the world, as Son of David, although fully recognising that He had come as such, and that He had a perfect right to this title. But the Lord had been rejected as Son of David, and now all should be pure grace, as well for the Jews as for the Gentiles, since the first had lost every title to the promises through their rejection of Him in whom they should have their fulfilment. God will assuredly make good His promises; but now all is of pure grace, and, through the risen Man, whom Paul had seen in glory. This point is clearly established further on in the epistle.

For the better understanding of the epistle, it may be well to remark, that Paul, although the Lord Jesus in glory was the starting-point and foundation of his ministry, goes no further in the doctrine of this epistle than the resurrection of the Lord. It is quite true that the position of the Lord in glory is assumed, and in the few verses which set forth the order of the counsels of God, the glory of the children of God is also not wanting; it is part of these counsels that the elect should be conformed to the image of His Son (chap. 8: 29, 30). Nevertheless, when the apostle speaks of the groundwork of salvation, how one is justified and saved, he goes no farther than the Lord's resurrection; for what Christ has acquired for us is another thing from the answer to the question, How can a sinner be accepted by God, and how is he brought into the position of an heir of God?

313 In the Epistle to the Romans we find precisely this position of the heir, as made fit in Christ to stand before God, and to inherit with Christ as man, according to righteousness, as a new quickened man accepted by God; but the glory and the inheritance itself are mentioned but briefly. As soon as Christ, as a dead man, had been raised, man was brought into an entirely new condition, quickened according to the power of the Spirit and of resurrection. The work which abolished sin had been accomplished; our sins had been borne and made an end of by death; God had been glorified in the place where sin was; the strength of him who had the power of death had been annulled, even as death itself. There was a new man over whom death had no power. I do not speak here of the Person of Christ, of what He was in His nature, but of the new position of men into which we are brought by the resurrection of the man Christ Jesus - of man in his new condition according to the counsels of God. It is there that we see the proof of the acceptance of the finished work of Christ according to the righteousness of God, as well as the pattern, if not yet of the glory, still of the normal condition of every believer in Christ. They are, so to speak, on the other side of death - of Satan's power, sin, and the judgment of God - because God had been perfectly glorified in Christ: they stand in the favour of God according to righteousness. That is the importance of the resurrection of Christ as the fundamental doctrine of this epistle, His death being presented as the basis of His resurrection, and that which gives to the latter its value - "Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again."

Thus Paul was called and separated from all men to preach the glad tidings of God, the message of this work of His love. This gospel had already been promised beforehand by the prophets in holy scripture, but now the announcement was no longer a promise. We have, it is true, precious promises for the path we must tread through this world, but the gospel is no promise. It is rather the fulfilment of the promises of God, in so far as they relate to the Lord's incarnation, His finished work, His resurrection (1 Peter 1: 11, 12), and to His being glorified, although this last point is not treated in the Epistle to the Romans. It should be observed here that the "holy scriptures" are the promises of God, and that the prophets by whom they were given are prophets of God.

314 In what, then, do these glad tidings consist? They are "concerning his Son" (the Son of God), "Jesus Christ our Lord." The Person of Christ is the primary subject of the gospel; it announces His having come into the world. But here we have two things: First, the promises are fulfilled; inasmuch as He is Son of David according to the flesh; secondly, He is "marked out Son of God in power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by resurrection of the dead." These are the two great accomplished facts which constitute for man the value of the coming of the Lord into the world. The promises are fulfilled; the Son of David was there. The Jews would not receive Him, and have thus lost the fruit of the promises, although these had their accomplishment, inasmuch as the Lord had come. But then the power of God has been revealed in the fact that the Lord, after having submitted Himself to death, has by resurrection been proved to be Son of God. Although the strongest proof of the power of God has been given in Christ's resurrection, yet we see already in the raising of Lazarus a manifestation of this divine power, as well as later on in the resurrection of all saints. "This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby," John 11: 4. He was, and is, the resurrection and the life. The power of resurrection is the proof that He is Son of God. This is not a fulfilment of promises, but the power of God there, where death had intervened as the consequence of sin.

With regard to the expression, "the Spirit of holiness," I would notice that the Holy Spirit is, so to speak, the operative power in the resurrection as in everything that God has created or done. Thus Peter says, with regard to the Lord's resurrection, "Put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit" (1 Peter 3: 18); and of the believer it is said, "But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you," Rom. 8: 11. But why is it spoken of as "according to the Spirit of holiness"? Because the Holy Spirit is, as it were, the operative power of God for producing in man all that is well-pleasing to Him. This power is, of course, always in God. By it He created the world; by it He wrought in the instruments of the Old Testament and in the prophets. But now He had been acting in the human life of Christ, and in the production of the new form of humanity, according to this divine power. The prophets uttered what was given them to say, and with that the divine inspiration ceased; besides, what they announced was not for themselves. John the Baptist was filled with the Holy Spirit from his mother's womb. But Christ as Man was born of the Holy Spirit; His life, though human in every respect, was the expression of the power of the Holy Spirit. He cast out devils by the Holy Spirit. His words were spirit and life. The fulness of the Godhead dwelt in Him bodily, but His humanity was the expression of that which was divine by the Holy Spirit, in love, in power, and specially in holiness. He was the Holy One of God. By the Holy Spirit He offered Himself without spot to God. In all things He served His Father; but His service was the perfect presentation of what was divine, of the Father Himself, in the midst of men - He, as to His humanity, by the Spirit, at every moment answering to the Godhead, the expression and effulgence of it without spot or blemish. All the offerings of the Old Testament are types of Christ; but in this connection the meat-offering is the corresponding and most striking type. Cakes of fine flour, unleavened, mingled with oil, anointed with oil, parted in pieces, and oil poured upon them. What a striking type of the humanity of Christ, which, as to its nature, was of the Spirit, and anointed with the Spirit, every part being characterised by the outpoured Spirit, and by which all the incense of His perfections was offered up to God as a sweet-smelling savour! So He had to be tried by fire, in death, to shew that all was a sweet savour, and nothing else. Finally, the power of the Holy Spirit was shewn in the greatest and most perfect way in the Lord's resurrection. Being put to death in the flesh, He was quickened by the Spirit. The Spirit, who in divine power had been energetic in His birth, and in His whole life, and by whom He at length offered Himself to God, manifested all His power in quickening Jesus from death. It is true indeed that He was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father; also that He Himself raised up His body, the temple of God (John 2: 19); but the Holy Spirit was the immediate agent in His resurrection (1 Peter 3: 18); the body also of the risen One is a spiritual body.

316 Thus man has been brought by resurrection in the Person of Christ into an entirely new condition, beyond death, sin, judgment, and the power of Satan; and it was thus that Christ was proved to be the Son of God according to the Spirit of holiness by resurrection. This Spirit was the power of holiness throughout His whole life; for "by the eternal Spirit he offered himself without spot to God," and according to this Spirit He is proved to be Son of God, and by Him was, even on earth, justified. As all was accomplished for God's glory by a man, who was the Son of God, and who, as man, had manifested His perfect obedience and love to His Father, man, according to the value of this accomplished work and the quickening power of the Holy Spirit, has been brought into an entirely new position in the Person of the Son of God, so that by faith we are accepted and are sons. Christ, who, as Son of David, was the fulfilment of the Old Testament promises, being rejected on earth, after He had accomplished the work entrusted to Him by the Father, entered as the risen One, beyond death which He endured as the fruit of sin, into the position of the second Man, the last Adam.

Thus we have here presented in the Person of Christ the two main points in the ways of God - the fulfilment of promise (although the Jews by His rejection have lost all right to it), and the revelation of the Son of God, proved to be such according to the quickening power of the Holy Spirit in a risen Man. Thus the power of God is manifested, not in the fulfilment of a promise, but in the present life and position of the second Man in connection with an accomplished redemption. But here the divine power of life and the new position brought about by resurrection are specially connected with the relationship of man to God, as put into this position, yet in the Person of the Lord Himself in power.

How blessed is the thought, that the eternal Son of God, become Man, has taken up this new position of which we have spoken, and that, as pattern and Firstborn among many brethren, who will be perfectly like Him according to the living power of the Holy Spirit, and in the glory itself. "For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one; for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren," Heb. 2: 11. The subject here, indeed, is not the glory; but the Lord could say, after His resurrection, when all was accomplished (not before), "Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father, and unto my God, and your God," John 20: 17.

317 Thus the subject of the gospel, to which Paul was separated, is Jesus Christ our Lord as Son of David for the fulfilment of the promises, and declared to be Son of God in power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by resurrection from the dead. It is true, the apostle speaks in this epistle of righteousness, and sets forth all clearly and fully; but the principal object which he has in view is the Person of Christ Himself, and what He is as the fulfilment of the promises and as Son of God in power and in resurrection - that which the Holy Spirit presents as God's own object in the gospel. From Him, as already glorified, Paul had received grace and apostleship, for obedience of faith among all the nations for His name. The Romans were amongst these nations. He does not address them as an assembly, as he usually did when writing to an assembly he had founded, but he addresses his epistle to all the beloved of God, called saints, which are in Rome. As apostle of the Gentiles, he could write to all with the authority of Christ.

In his epistles, he always gives the salutation of grace and peace from the Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ, names to which we often pay too little heed. In the one we have God Himself as Father, known as such in grace; in the other, the glorified Man, the Son of God, who is invested (and that officially) with presidency over the house and people of God. With the one we stand in the relation of children, with the other as servants.

The apostle would have wished to visit the Christians at Rome sooner, but had been hindered by Satan; for the work of the Lord is always pursued in presence of the enemy, who seeks to stay its progress, be it through persecution, or through stirring up evil in the assemblies, with which the labourer must be occupied; be it through heresies, which absorb his time, or through all sorts of other devices. It is important for the labourer to observe this. He thereby learns dependence, and that the strength and energy of the Lord are absolutely needed. Therefore Paul, while giving thanks to God for the faith of the believers at Rome, which was spoken of in all the world, besought in his prayers that God would open his way to them. He longed to see them, that he might impart unto them some spiritual gift, to the end that they might be established; but in the same breath he takes his place in love among them, by saying, "That is, that I may be comforted together with you by the mutual faith both of you and me." He was an apostle, and should act in love; as an apostle then, he should come down to the weakest, to raise them up to divine confidence. Often he had purposed coming to them, that he might have some fruit among them also. He was under obligation to all nations to bring the grace of God to them; and so, as far as depended on him, he was ready to preach the gospel to them also that were at Rome.

318 How anxious he is to express himself suitably! He could not call them Greeks, nor yet barbarians, for that would have been an offence to the inhabitants of the imperial city. He thinks thus of everything, so as to be useful to all.

This leads the apostle to the doctrine of the epistle. He was ready to preach to those who were at Rome because he was not ashamed of the gospel; "for," said he, "it is the power of God unto salvation, to every one that believeth." Power of man it is not - this he explains afterwards still more distinctly and fully - not even for acquiring human righteousness. It is a salvation brought to man - a holy, a righteous salvation - but a salvation from God, by the power of God, and this, because the righteousness of God was therein revealed, in contrast to human righteousness. It is God's own righteousness in which we participate by faith; His righteousness on the principle of faith. All as to it is already perfect, before we believe in it. By faith we have part in it. This righteousness is not by the works of man, nor by the law, else it would be only for the Jews, who alone had the law. It avails rather for all men, because it is by faith, and so the Gentiles, if they believe, have part in it.

It will perhaps be of use to say a word as to the meaning of the expression, "Righteousness of God." Although it is quite simple, much misapprehension prevails as to its meaning. The Lutheran translation has instead, "The righteousness which avails before God." Now man's righteousness, according to the law, avails before God; none such may be found, it is true, but it avails before God; but it is not the righteousness of God, were it ever so perfect. In John 16: 10 we see wherein the righteousness of God has been shewn; namely, that God has set Christ at His right hand in His own glory, because Christ has perfectly glorified Him. The righteousness consists in this, that the Father has exalted Christ as Man to His own glory - the glory which He had with Him before the world was; and God, as a righteous God, has glorified Him because He has been glorified in Christ on the cross; John 17: 5; ch. 13: 31, 32. In the above-cited passage (John 16: 10), the Lord says: The Spirit "will convince the world of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and ye see me no more." By the rejection of Christ, the world has for ever lost Him as come in grace; but God has accepted and glorified Him. When the Lord speaks of the world, in John 17: 25, He says, "Righteous Father!" on the other hand, in His prayer for His own, He says, "Holy Father!" (v. 11). Thus the proof of the righteousness of God lies in His having glorified Christ. When God was in Christ in the world, it had either to accept or reject Him. It has rejected Him, and is thereby judged, and will see Him no more until He come in judgment; but Christ, as Man, has perfectly glorified God in all that He is, and God according to His righteousness has glorified Him. Now the gospel announces this righteousness of God; namely, that Christ, in what He has done for us, having glorified God, has been glorified as Man, and is seated at God's right hand, clothed with divine glory; moreover, that our position before God is the consequence of what Christ has accomplished. Our justification and being glorified are a part of the righteousness of God; because what Christ has done to glorify God, has been done for us. We are the righteousness of God in Him; 2 Cor. 5: 21. Christ would lose the fruit of His work if we should not be with Him in glory as the fruit of the travail of His soul, after He has glorified all that is in God, although in ourselves we are absolutely unworthy.

319 The apostle then sets forth why such a righteousness, the righteousness of God Himself, was necessary, if man was to be saved. Human righteousness was not to be found on earth, and yet righteousness was necessary. But since it is God's righteousness, and certainly not by our works, it must be reckoned to us through faith, on the principle of faith; for if the works of man contributed towards it, it would not be the righteousness of God. But if it is through faith man participates in this righteousness, then believers from amongst the nations had part in it just as much as the Jews.

320 We see, then, that as the Person of Christ was placed in the foreground as the first, the second main subject of the epistle is the righteousness of God revealed upon the principle of faith, so that it is for all, and to be received through faith, and thus appropriated by the soul. What made this righteousness necessary is the universal sinfulness of man, for the wrath of God has been revealed against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who possess the truth in unrighteousness. With regard to the heathen, the apostle gives two reasons for this wrath. First, the testimony of creation (vers. 19, 20); and, secondly, that, knowing God, they did not wish to retain Him in their knowledge but preferred idolatry (v. 21-24). For the invisible things of Him are seen, that is, His eternal power and Godhead, perceived by the things that are made from the creation of the world; so that what can be known of God is manifested among them, and consequently they are without excuse (v. 20). This does not imply that they know God according to His nature, but that they should have known Him as Creator; unless one is blind, a Creator is seen in the creation.

But God has not only revealed Himself as Creator. Noah did not only know Him as such, but also as a God with whom man as a responsible being had to do, as a God who had judged the world for its wickedness, who took note of man's ways, and who would not have unrighteousness and violence. At the building of the tower of Babel they had learnt to know Him as a God who had scattered them, because they desired to become independent in their own wisdom, and powerful in their own strength. Such a God, however, the heathen would not retain in their knowledge or acknowledge; they made themselves gods such as man could make, gods which favoured their passions; and instead of glorifying the true God, or being thankful to Him, they relapsed into the darkness of their own hearts. "Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like unto corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things." And because they would not maintain the glory of God, but gave it up for their lusts, God gave them over to these lusts. He gave them up to shameful passions in which they did things unbecoming nature itself, and filled with all ungodliness and controlled by their passions, they not only did such things themselves, but with deliberate wickedness they found pleasure in those that did them. There were, it is true, some who judged these infamous ways (chap. 2: 1), but they did the same, and thus condemned themselves, and became subject to the just judgment of God, while also they despised the riches of His goodness and patience, not perceiving that this goodness led them to repentance. Instead of yielding to this leading, with a stubborn and impenitent heart, they treasured up unto themselves wrath against the day of wrath.

321 The apostle comes now to an important principle, simple indeed, but throwing clear light upon the whole subject. Now that God is revealed, He deals with man according to his actions. In the day of judgment He will render to every one according to his deeds, be he Jew or Greek; for there is no respect of persons with God. He had indeed chosen a people, and brought them near to Himself, to put man to the test, and to maintain the truth that there is but one God; but fundamentally there was no difference amongst men. All were sinners by nature, and all had sinned. We see also that God with regard to His people, although He had given them a law, always remained behind the veil without revealing Himself. But now the veil is rent, and man - first the Jew and then the Greek - must be manifested before Him, each one according to what he is in his walk and actual moral condition; and here there is no question whether his position be that of Jew or Greek. God, according to His righteousness, takes into account only the measure of light which each possesses. The apostle when he speaks of those who seek for glory and honour and immortality, supposes Christianity, for the knowledge of these things depends upon a revelation. God will give eternal life, without distinction between Jew or Greek, to those who by patient continuance in well-doing seek these things. God would have the reality of divine life, not a mere external form. Those who do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, must expect "indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil, of the Jew first, and also of the Gentile; but glory, honour, and peace, to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile." All will be judged, every one according to his works, according to the light which he has possessed, without respect of persons. "For as many as have sinned without law, shall also perish without law: and as many as have sinned in the law, shall be judged by the law . . . . In the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ." "For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified." If one from the Gentiles does what the law requires, he is accepted, and has the advantage over one who possesses the law and does not observe it. As we have said, it is no longer a question, now that God has been revealed, of external relationships, according to which some are "near" and others "afar off," but of what is just in the sight of God. In reality, one of the Gentiles who in spirit walked in love, did that which the law commanded; while a Jew, who had the law and walked in sin, could not be accepted of God. It is no longer a question of outward relationship with God, of His government of the world and of His people - in a word, of the government of God upon earth - but of the condition of the soul before God, and of the day of judgment, when the secrets of the heart will be brought to light, and man will be judged according to his works.

322 After the apostle has clearly laid down these great and important principles, he goes on to describe the actual condition of the Jews, as he had done with regard to the Gentiles in chapter 1. The Jews boasted of the law, and of the privileges they possessed; they knew the will of God, and were able to teach the ignorant; yea, they even boasted of God. But did they also teach themselves? On the contrary; they did all that which in their wisdom they taught others not to do. They dishonoured God whilst bearing His name. The one true God was blasphemed amongst the Gentiles through them, as it is written. They possessed privileges, but if the law to which those privileges belonged was broken, their circumcision became uncircumcision. And the Gentiles, if they observed the law, condemned those who, possessing the letter and circumcision, transgressed the law. For he was not a true Jew who was one outwardly, but he whose heart was circumcised, who was a Jew in heart and spirit, not in the letter; "whose praise is not of men, but of God."

323 Romans 3

The apostle now begins to meet the Jews on their own ground. Their advantage was great; the profit of the circumcision was "much every way," chiefly because that unto them were committed the oracles of God. The apostle certainly believed this, and rightly. It is not a question, in this respect, of their all being individually converted; they enjoyed the privileges of the people of God which were nowhere else to be found; and if they did not believe, their unbelief could not set aside the faithfulness of God. (It is just the same now with professing Christianity.) The promises of God will be fulfilled through His faithfulness to His people Israel, although they have lost every right to them. But the apostle does not speak of this until later on (chap. 11).

But, it might be said, man's unbelief, then, brings out only the more conspicuously the infallible faithfulness of God. And does not this fact of man's unbelief, causing the faithfulness of God to come out more plainly, do away with God's right to judge man? By no means; for according to this principle He could judge no one, because the wickedness of the nations also brings out His faithfulness all the more clearly. The Jews are just as responsible as the others for their unbelief, and that these would be judged the Jew did not in any way doubt. Thus, in spite of their privileges, the Jews also have fallen under the judgment of God. The apostle does not stoop to reply to the wicked insinuation of some - "Let us do evil that good may come" - but merely says, "Whose damnation is just." Christians were, indeed, accused by the world of speaking thus. Grace is always the occasion of accusation, as long as the soul is not convinced of sin; but as soon as the conscience comes to the knowledge of sin, grace becomes the occasion of heartfelt gratitude.

If, then, the Jew had such privileges, was he not better than the Gentiles. No, in nowise. The apostle had before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they were all under sin. And now he cites a number of passages to prove that the Jews in their own scriptures are considered as being under the guilt and power of sin. With regard to the heathen there could be no doubt of it; they were entirely alienated from God, sunk in idolatry and the service of false gods, and living in lawlessness. But the Jew thought quite otherwise of himself. He had been brought near, and made to participate in all privileges. The apostle had himself acknowledged it as the greatest privilege of the Jews, that to them were committed the word of God, the oracles of God. But now what said these oracles, which related to the Jews, and in which they boasted as belonging solely to them? They said, "There is none righteous, no, not one." A whole series of passages, quoted by the apostle from the Psalms and Isaiah, demonstrate the thoroughly sinful condition in every respect of those of whom they speak. And that they speak of the Jews, they themselves must allow, according to their universal principle; for "we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law." Thus every mouth is stopped, and the whole world guilty before God. The Gentiles are wholly without God; but the Jews are condemned by this very word of God in which they boast. So that by works of law shall no flesh be justified in His sight; "for by the law is the knowledge of sin." The law, that they accepted as the rule of righteousness, proved that man was a sinner; it convicted and condemned him, and that expressly in his conscience, producing at the same time the consciousness of sin in him.

324 When the apostle had in this way proved that all men are sinners, he returns to what he had already laid down in chapter 1: 17, as the principle of the gospel; namely, the revelation of the righteousness of God. All that comes between chapters 1: 18 and 3: 21 forms a parenthesis to shew that the righteousness of God is necessary because there is none in man. After this is done, the apostle enters more closely into the subject of the righteousness of God and its application to man. This righteousness stands in no relation to the law, which was only the perfect rule for man. But God cannot measure His righteousness by the standard of man's righteousness, or his responsibility. It is according to this standard that He judges those who have had the law. His righteousness must be measured according to His own nature, and His nature is revealed in what He does. He must glorify Himself; that is to say, manifest Himself; for with God to be manifested is also to be glorified. If He judges, He judges man according to his human responsibility; if He acts, it is in accordance with His own nature. The law knows nothing of this nature; it says we ought to love God, but what is He? The law is adapted to man and his relationship towards God. The righteousness of God stands entirely outside all question of the law, of every description of law, unless the nature of God be regarded as such. He is a law for Himself, perfect in His nature. His righteousness is now shewn in what He has done with regard to the Person of Christ, by having set Him at His right hand as the result of His finished work. The law and the prophets testified of it. The righteousness of God has been exercised in the acceptance and glorifying of Christ in virtue of His work, and in this acceptance we share by faith, because He accomplished this work for us. Precisely because it is the righteousness of God founded on the work of Christ, in that He died for all, it has to do with the whole world and with all men. All who believe on Christ, whether Jews or heathen, have part in it, and in all the privileges which flow from it. Were it human righteousness it would have to be according to the law; were it according to the law only the Jews would have had part in it, because they alone had the law. But as it is the righteousness of God it is manifested for all, and righteousness is reckoned to all who believe. Thus the righteousness of God by faith of Jesus Christ is manifested for all sinners; it rests on all who believe in Him. "For there is no difference: for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus."

325 By nature, then, all are found in the same condition, because all alike are in sin; but likewise grace also is the same for all, because the righteousness is God's righteousness, and is the same for all believers, and, in consequence, all believers stand accepted in this righteousness on the same ground before God. God has openly set forth Jesus Christ as a mercy-seat, through faith in His blood, and has thereby shewn His righteousness in regard to the sins of the Old Testament saints, which in His forbearance He had passed over. But now, inasmuch as Christ has died for them, His righteousness in thus passing over is shewn. By reason of this expiatory death which God had in view He could pass over those sins. Further righteousness is also declared at this present time. It not only throws light upon the ways of God in the past, but is also, for the present time, the manifestation of the ground of justification of believers through an accomplished work; it is therefore a present thing realised in the justification of all believers, according to the righteousness of a righteous God. God is just, and justifies in virtue of the work of Christ; yea, He shews His righteousness in doing so. Not as though we deserved it; but in justifying us God recognises the value of the work of Christ. Thus justification is a manifest known thing, because the work is accomplished.

326 There is, then, no room for man to boast, not even for the Jew, in spite of all his privileges. All boasting is excluded. On what principle? By what law? Of works? Nay, but by the law of faith. Man, whoever he may be, occupies the place of a sinner. Grace, and grace only, avails for all in the same way; for the conclusion has been reached, that one is justified by faith without the deeds of the law. "Is he the God of the Jews only? Is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also." Such He must be, and such He was even in the Old Testament; although when all races of the earth were sunk in idolatry, He chose Israel out of their midst, in the person of Abraham, to preserve on the earth the knowledge of the one God; but now in grace He has taken His place as God over all men according to the truth of His immutable prerogative, inasmuch as it is one and the same God who justifies the circumcision by faith, and the uncircumcision through faith. The difference between the expressions here used - "by faith" (or "on the principle of faith") and "through faith" - is explained by the fact that the Jews did indeed seek after righteousness, only on a false principle; namely, that of works. They must have righteousness, a divine righteousness surely, but on another principle - that of faith; and because it depends on the principle of faith, the believing Gentile participates in this divine righteousness through faith which is wrought in him by grace. Does this principle, then, make void the law? By no means. The authority of the law is fully established and confirmed, but to the condemnation of all those who are found under its authority. Nothing could so completely establish its authority as the fact, that the Lord took upon Himself the curse of the law.

Romans 4

But there was yet another proof that righteousness does not come from works of the law; namely, the example of Abraham, who had the promises before the law was given or promulgated. The apostle makes use of this part of Israel's history and privileges in order to establish his main principle. "What shall we then say of Abraham?" he asks. "For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory; but not before God. For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness." Thus the principle of justification by faith is fully established in the example of Abraham. It is not of works; were it so, then the reward would have to be regarded, not as of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifies the ungodly, faith is reckoned for righteousness. And it was with David as with Abraham. (The apostle adduces the example of these two men, because they form the chief sources of Israel's blessing.) David also describes the blessedness of the man whom God justifies without works, saying, "Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord doth not impute sin." Acceptance in Christ goes farther, it is true; but here, with regard to man's responsibility, we have the truth expressed, that for those who believe in Christ all is accomplished. Sin is not imputed to them at all; they are free from all guilt; there is no more any charge against them for ever. Of our position in Christ the apostle speaks later on. To be accepted in a new position in Christ, according to the value and acceptance of Christ before God, goes farther than justification. But this justification is perfect for us as responsible men.

327 But now arises the question, Is this blessing only for Israel? The example of Abraham decides this also. Faith was reckoned to him for righteousness. But when? Was it when he was in circumcision or when still in uncircumcision? In uncircumcision. We see, then, in this old decisive example of Abraham that, according to the will and declaration of God, the faith of an uncircumcised man is reckoned to him for righteousness. Circumcision was given afterwards to Abraham as seal of the righteousness of faith which he had being uncircumcised, that he might be the father of an them that believe, as well of the uncircumcised (that after his example righteousness might be imputed to them also) as of the circumcised, so that he is the father of a true circumcision, not only of those who are of the circumcision, but also of all believers, who, in separation to God, walk in the footsteps of Abraham's faith which he had in uncircumcision.

328 Moreover, the promise that Abraham should be the heir of the world was not given through the law either to him or to his seed, but through the righteousness of faith; for the law came much later. Thus the whole history of Israel proves that it is not through the law that one participates in the blessing, but through faith. For if they which are of the law, as such, are heirs, then the promise is annulled, and faith by which Abraham received it is in vain and without result. More than this, the law worketh wrath; for where no law is, there is no transgression; sin indeed exists, but one cannot transgress what is not commanded or forbidden. But the apostle further develops from the Scriptures this fundamental principle of the blessing of believers from the Gentiles. He says, "Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace; to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed, not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all" (believers of the Gentiles as well as of the Jews), "before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were" (v. 16, 17). These words contain a new truth. They point to the power of resurrection, to the power of giving life where all lies in death, to creative power. This power admitted the Gentiles also. Abraham counted upon it when his body was in a manner already dead, and Sarah's womb likewise. All depends for faith upon the activity of this power which brings about what God wills. It is not only that there is presented a mercy-seat for all those who draw nigh through faith in the blood of Christ to the place where God meets with the sinner, but there is a power which there, where there was nothing, creates children for itself out of dead souls. Still there is a difference between Abraham's faith and ours. He believed, and rightly so, that God could raise the dead; we believe that God has done it. And this is a very important difference. Abraham was right in believing God's own word; we have the same faith, but it is founded upon a finished work, and there the soul finds rest. Christ is risen. He, who was once offered for our offences, has been raised again that we may believe and be justified.

On the Epistle to the Romans

J. N. Darby.

<33015G> 329 {file section b.}

Romans 5

We are then justified by faith. With this the doctrine of Christ's work, in so far as it is a question of His blood and of the putting away of our sins through the shedding thereof, in a manner closes. The resurrection of Christ is the proof, that God has accepted this work as satisfaction for our sins, and assuredly for His own glory. What a blessed thought! The righteousness of God rests in the value of the work of Christ. This righteousness has been displayed therein by His having raised up His Son from among the dead, and justified us on account of Him; our sins are forgiven, we are washed clean in His blood. We have contributed nothing to our justification, and can contribute nothing; we are justified solely by the work of Christ. Our sins are the only part we have in the sufferings of Christ, by which we are cleansed before God. The value of this work has become our portion by faith, which, however, can add nothing to it. This work is our highest motive for serving Him and for praising Him unceasingly for ever, but neither by it do we add aught to the work of Christ in the sight of God; it is complete, and not only that, but it is accepted and owned as fully sufficient before God. How blessed it is to know that all our sins are put away by God Himself, and this conformably to His own righteousness; inasmuch as He has raised Christ, on account of the work done by Him for us, an ever subsisting proof that God has accepted this work as fully satisfying His glory. This would be enough for our justification, but God has done yet more. He has raised Christ to His own right hand; there He sits now as Man at the right hand of God, until His enemies be made His footstool. "By one offering he has perfected for ever" (as regards the conscience) "them that are sanctified." If they are not perfected by this offering, they never can be, nor can their sins ever be put away. For without shedding of blood is no remission, and Christ cannot shed His blood for us afresh; the work is done, or it can never be done at all.

The first part of chapter 5 (vers. 1-11) summarises all the features of this infinite grace of God. Let us briefly consider the contents of these precious verses. The work is accomplished; faith knows that God has accepted it, because He has raised up Christ and seated Him at His right hand. Nothing remains between the man, born again and sanctified, and God, but the value of the work of Christ, and the acceptance of His Person. The blood of Christ is ever before the eye of God, and He Himself appears in the presence of God for us. This gives us, in the present, the most blessed privileges, as well as the hope of glory for the future which we shall enjoy with Him. We will not, however, go outside our chapter, but confine ourselves to the consideration of the perfection of the grace of God, so wondrously developed in it. We find here what God is for us, whilst our position before Him in Christ is only taken up later on.

330 The first eleven verses contain the development of grace and the ways of God in grace; they speak first of what grace gives, and then of the experiences of those that are the subjects of grace. Christ having been delivered for our sins, and raised again for our justification, we are justified by faith; it is a complete justification; our sins are blotted out, our conscience is purged, and since the value of this work is immutable and for ever before the eye of God, so our justification is valid for ever. Consequently we are in possession of unalterable peace with God. No sins can be imputed to us, for they have been already borne, so that we can have no more conscience of sins. We are, it is true, conscious of the presence of sin in the flesh, but there can be no question of sins that Christ has already borne for us. We have indeed to humble ourselves, when anything occurs to remind us that we were guilty of the hateful fruits of sin, and have brought the load of them upon the beloved Saviour; but in the presence of God, where Christ and His blood are for ever present, we can never question whether all is forgiven. It is important that I should not confound the state of my soul with the value of a work accomplished outside me, with the accomplishment of which I had nothing to do, unless by my sins. But if my sins were laid there on Christ, they cannot any longer be before God. Christ has not got them on Him in heaven. If I come before God, I find there, on the one hand, because Christ is there, infinite, unchangeable love; and, on the other, nothing but perfect and divine righteousness in Him, also because He is there. Infinite love, perfect and divine righteousness, and unchangeable favour, have become the believer's portion in Christ before God.

This leads us a step farther in the consideration of the fruits of grace. Not only are our sins put away through grace, so that we have peace with God, but we can also enjoy the grace of God by which peace is made, grace which is now ever in the heart of God for us. Grace has not only set aside every obstacle through the work of Christ, but it remains unchangeably the same in the heart of God. His eye rests on us with the same love as on Christ. Through Christ we have peace, through Him also access by faith into the grace and favour in which we stand in Him before God. We enjoy this favour in the presence of God. Not only does the heavenly Judge justify us, but a heavenly Father receives us; the light of His gracious countenance, beaming with a Father's love, illumines and gladdens our souls, and comforts our hearts, so that with perfectly restful hearts we are in His presence and walk in His ways; we have the precious consciousness of standing in favour. As regards our sins, they are all put away; as regards our present condition before God, all is love and favour in the bright light of His countenance; as regards the future, glory awaits us; it is our portion, although we do not yet enjoy it. Peace, divine favour, the glory in expectation, such is the portion of the believer, the blessed fruit of God's love.

331 Here it might, then, be said, We have all, for past, present, and future. The apostle has still, however, something to add. The glory being still a thing of the future for us, we have yet a path to trace to reach it, and God does not forget us in the path also. Therefore the apostle says, "Not only so, but we glory in tribulations also." The wilderness is the place where the experiences of the redeemed are gone through with regard to their actual condition and the ways of God in government. Redemption is accomplished; we have been brought to God, as it is written: "I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself." This is a fact, determined beforehand in the counsels of God, and now accomplished. The glory forms part of the counsels of God, and this also must have its fulfilment for those who are justified. The wilderness forms no part of these counsels, but it is the place where we learn His ways with us. Assuredly the thief on the cross went the same day to be with Christ in paradise, to dwell with Him there. His condition was fit for such a position. If on the part of man he has to suffer the consequences of his misdeeds, on the part of God Christ bore for him all that he was guilty of before God, and the justified sinner follows Him the same day into the mansions of bliss, but had not therefore to enter upon a long pathway of experiences. But in general, the believer has to tread his pilgrim way through a world where difficulties and temptations encounter and surround him on every hand. Christ has gone before us through this world, and we are called to walk in His footsteps; but our condition is thereby tested. Redemption does not here come in question, for it is just that which brought us into the wilderness. But we are responsible according to the calling and position in which redemption has placed us, to walk "worthy of God who has called us to his own kingdom and glory."

332 The soul is tested by afflictions as to how far self-will is active; they make manifest the working of sin in us, that we may be able to detect it. God searches us. By this means we learn on the one hand what we are, and on the other what God is for us in His faithfulness and daily care. We are weaned from the world, and our eyes become better able to discern and appreciate what is heavenly. Thus the hope that is already in the heart becomes more lively and clearer. It is in this light we can view all our afflictions, because we possess the key to everything - "The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us." The providential care of God in this respect is wonderful. "He withdraweth not his eyes from the righteous." He thinks of everything that concerns His children, their characters, their circumstances, their trials; He does all that is necessary to bring them to the blessed end of their pilgrimage. After forty years' wandering in the desert, the feet of the children of Israel did not swell, neither did their clothes wear out. He makes all things work together for good to them that love Him.

But we have yet to consider some other and very important points. We find the Holy Spirit mentioned here for the first time. The Holy Ghost shed abroad in the heart is quite another thing from the new birth. We must, of course, be born again to be able to receive the Holy Ghost, but the sinner needs something more than the new birth. In this passage the Holy Ghost is looked upon as the seal given to the believer of the value of the blood of Christ, and of the perfect purification in which he participates by the application of this blood. Washed from his sins, he becomes the habitation of the Holy Spirit. He is the unction, the believer's seal, and the earnest of glory. By Him we cry, "Abba, Father," Gal. 4: 6. By Him we know that we are in Christ, and Christ in us; John 14: 16-20. And here, in this passage, we learn that by Him also the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts. The ordinance of God for the purification of the leper (Lev. 14) furnishes us with a striking type of what takes place now with the believer. The leper was first washed with water, then sprinkled with blood, and finally anointed with oil. So now, also, a man is first converted, then made a partaker of the perfect purification wrought by the blood of Christ, and finally he receives the seal of the Holy Ghost. It is by Him we have the full assurance of our participation in an accomplished redemption by virtue of our blessed relationship with God and with Christ, and He is the earnest of the future glory. But all is the result of the sprinkling of the blood of Christ.

333 Thus we know God, we are made partakers of the divine nature, we have apprehension of our redemption and justification, and experience His faithfulness. He reveals Himself to our souls, and reveals to us also the glory which lies before us. We know that we are in Him, and that God dwells in us. Thus we glory, not only in what He has given us - not only in our salvation - but also in God Himself. A grateful child is not merely happy to have received much from his father, but his heart rejoices in having such a father as he has shewn himself to be by his loving ways. He is happy because his father is all that his heart could desire; he rejoices in what he personally finds his father to be, and glories in him. What a privilege for us to be able to boast in God Himself! That enhances the joy, and the enjoyment of grace. The highest character of our eternal joy is thus already realised here below, and profound peace accompanies this joy. What God is in Himself is the infinite yet present object for a nature that is capable of enjoying Him, the Holy Ghost revealing Him to the soul.

With this ends the first part of the epistle, and the doctrine of the whole epistle. What follows is our standing in Christ, as well as the experiences which the soul goes through in entering upon this position. Then follow exhortations to those who are delivered. Our position is not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, or in Christ. But to be truly delivered we must learn what the flesh is, and that by experience; then, and then only, do we pass from the legal condition of the soul into the spiritual in Christ, by virtue of the death and the life of Jesus Christ. But we shall return to this later on. We must first consider the position itself, or rather the two positions, and the doctrine relating thereto. It is of importance to remark here, that for deliverance it is a question of experience, by which alone it can be known. It is quite otherwise as to the forgiveness of sins. It is indeed true that God must teach us in all; but to believe that something is done, or has taken place, outside me, is entirely different from believing something about myself of which I do not find the practical realisation in myself. The work of Christ on the cross, by which I obtain forgiveness and peace, in so far as it has to do with forgiveness, is a thing accomplished outside me, and I am called to believe that God has accepted it in satisfaction for my sins. It is indeed the work of God in my heart that I believe this, but the thing in itself is simple.

334 A child who has to be punished understands perfectly what is meant by receiving forgiveness. But if it be said, If you believe, you are dead to sin; I reply, and all the more that I am in earnest and sincere, That is not true, for I feel the activity of sin in my heart. The question, then, of our condition, is treated in the second part of the Epistle to the Romans. Are we in the flesh or in the Spirit? Are we in Christ, and Christ in us? Have we thus died to sin, or are we merely children of Adam, so that sin exercises its power in us even when we would not have it so?

The consideration of this question begins with chapter 5: 12. The apostle speaks no longer of what we have done, as in the first part of the epistle, but of what we are, and that in consequence of Adam's sin. By the disobedience of one, the many (that is, all who are by birth connected with him as their father) were made sinners. "Wherefore as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned" (v. 12). The continuation of this statement is found in verse 18. Verses 13-17 form a parenthesis, the object of which is to shew in what relation the law stands to this question, and to prove that man, without having received a law from God, is under the yoke of sin, and subject to judgment. Death is the proof that sin reigns over all men. Adam was under a law; he was forbidden to eat of a certain tree. The Jews, as we all know, were placed as a people under the law of Moses. Now, if Adam did not observe the original commandment, nor the Jews the law of God, they were definitely guilty in those points wherein they had disobeyed. They had done that which the law had forbidden. Verse 14 refers to what is said of Israel in Hosea 6: 7: "They, like Adam, have transgressed the covenant." Adam, like Israel, stood in relation with God by a positive law. With the heathen it was otherwise, they possessed no law. They had conscience, indeed, and obedience to God was obligatory, but one could not say that in this or that point they had transgressed a known commandment of God, because there was none. No law existed for them, so what they had done could not be reckoned to them as transgression. But sin was there; conscience took cognisance of everything that was done against its voice, and death reigned over them. The reign of death accordingly demonstrated the existence of sin, of which it was the consequence. Each one, even if not placed under law, had defiled his conscience, and death was the constant proof of the existence of sin. The Gentiles, who had no law, died just as much as the Jews.

335 Were the operations of grace to be limited, then, to the narrow circle of Judaism, because the Jews alone possessed the promises and all the privileges of a revelation, specially the word of God? On the contrary. Christianity was the revelation of God Himself, not merely of the will of God with regard to man; therefore this revelation necessarily reached far beyond the limits of Judaism. In Christianity there is no nation singled out with a law given to them. To Israel a law was given which taught what man ought to be, but it did not reveal God. It was accompanied, it is true, by promises, but promises which were not yet fulfilled; and at the same time it precluded man from approach to God. But Christianity brought in a revelation of God in love in the Person of His Son; it announced an accomplished redemption through His death, a perfect, present, justification by faith, in virtue of His death. It testified that the veil which precluded access to God was rent, so that access became perfectly free, and the believer can draw near with boldness by this new and living way. Thus eternal blessing is not in the first and sinful man, nor yet through the law. For this, as applied to him, could not do otherwise than condemn him, because it formed the perfect, divine, rule of conduct for man; and since man is a sinner, it puts all under the curse who were placed under the law. The blessing of God is in the last Adam, the second Man and that as glorified, after having been previously made sin for us - in Him who met the power of Satan and subjected Himself to death, although He could not be holden of it; who underwent in His soul the curse and the forsaking of God, and whom God, having been perfectly glorified by His work, raised from the dead and seated as Man at His own right hand. A God who has revealed Himself in such a way could not be God of the Jews only.

336 In verses 15-17 the apostle shews that grace far surpasses sin. If (ver. 15) the consequences of Adam's sin did not remain limited to him, but extended also to his descendants, how much more the consequences of the work of Christ extend to those who are His! According to verse 16, by Adam's sin all his descendants are lost; but grace, the free gift, is not merely efficacious for the lost condition, but also for many offences. The superabounding of grace comes out in special relief in verse 17, where it says, "For if by one man's offence death reigned by one" - one would expect the corresponding thought to be "much more life will reign"; but no, "much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ."

The parenthesis closes with verse 17, and the apostle resumes in verse 18 the train of thought interrupted at verse 12. The consequences of Adam's fall concern all; in the same way the free gift through the work of Christ concerns all. The gospel can thus be applied to all; it addresses the whole world, all sinners. In verse 19 we have the actual application. By the disobedience of one man, the many connected with him, that is to say all men are found in the condition of this one, which is a sinful condition. By the obedience of one man, all who are connected with him, that is, all Christians, are found in the position of this One, namely, in a position of righteousness before God. Adam was the figure of the Man that was to come. In the one we were lost, in the other all those who are connected with Him are saved, righteous before God. The guilt of a man depends upon what he has done; his actual condition, on the contrary, on what Adam has done. Adam and Christ are the heads of two races; the one of a sinful, and the other of a race righteous before God, and here life and standing are inseparable. The law came in by the way between the first and second Adam. The root of the fallen human race was Adam, the first man. The Head and the root of life of the blessed and saved race is Christ.

But "the law came in by the way," as the measure of what fallen humanity should have been, but never actually was. The law was never the means of life or of salvation, but the rule of what man ought to have been down here, connected with a promise of life: "the man that doeth them shall live in them" (Gal. 3: 12); but it commanded sinful man not to sin. Its object was, as the apostle here says, to make the offence abound, not sin, for God can do nothing to augment sin; but when sin was already there, He could give a rule to bring the fruits of it to light. Thus, although the law formed the perfect rule of conduct for a child of Adam, yet as a matter of fact it was always something by the way. Man was already a lost sinner, and the law brought out the fruit of the rotten and corrupt tree. We shall see, further on, that it did more than this In this passage we are only told that it made the offence to abound.

337 We get a glimpse, indeed, of the ways of God in the first, as in the second Adam. Man was a sinner, a lost sinner; Christ, a Saviour. The law was of use as a proof of what man was, because it required righteousness from man, according to the measure of his responsibility. The object of the law in the government of God was to manifest man's self-will in disobedience and transgressions, for without law there is no transgression. Now that supposes sin, as may be seen in the law itself. The judgment of God is exercised according to man's responsibility according to what he has done, whether without law or under law. His lost condition is another thing. He was lost in Adam; the world furnishes a proof of it in a terrible way, and our own hearts even more if indeed we know them. The disobedience of the one has alone brought in the condition. This condition is not a future judgment, but a present fact; we are constituted sinners. The whole family is, through its father, in the same condition with himself; separated from God, yea, driven out in enmity against Him, shut out from His presence, and without even a desire to enter into it. Man prefers pleasure, money, vanity, worldly power, fine apparel, in short, everything, to God, even when he professes to be one who believes that the Son of God has died for him in love. There is but one subject which in the world is intolerable; namely, Christ, and the revelation of God in Him, although it be a revelation of love. By the disobedience of one the many have been brought into the position of sinners.

Thus the important truth here set before us is not the guilt brought about by wicked works, and the grace by which it has been put away, but the condition of the fallen children of Adam, as a general principle. (This is why the law is set aside as a secondary thing, although it was valid for the conscience of the Jew, and remains always a perfect rule of human righteousness, and also represented that rule wherever, supported by the authority of God, it was applied.) In connection with this there is the introduction of a new or second root of saved men, and this in the risen One, just as Adam is the root of fallen man. Adam did not become the head of a race till he became sinful, and Christ was not in fact the head of a new creation (although God from the beginning had wrought by His Spirit) until divine righteousness had been manifested in His being glorified. Now when the righteousness of God had been revealed, and indeed become applicable to us, in that Christ was glorified after He had borne our sins, and perfectly glorified God when He had been made sin - not till then did Christ become the life-giving Head of the new race, accepted of God; and all, from first to last, is the fruit of the unfathomable, infinite, and unutterable grace of God. Grace reigns, but being founded on the work of Christ, reigns through righteousness. The end is eternal life, and that in its full and true character, according to the counsels of God, in the glory where Christ, according to this righteousness, has already entered as Man. Righteousness does not yet reign; it will reign in the day of judgment. But then human righteousness, namely, that which was due from man, will form the measure of judgment; man will then be judged according to the duties towards God and towards his neighbour, which were imposed upon him by the righteous claims of God. But the original source of salvation for man is grace, because God is love and we are sinners; for grace is the exercise of love towards those who have no desert, no merit. And love has therein been manifested, so that the angels learn to know it by God's ways towards us. But God is also righteous, and must maintain righteousness, and His holiness cannot for ever tolerate sin in His presence. He has proved that all men lie under sin and are guilty, and then He has acted in His infinite love, not merely in forgiving sins (of which we have already spoken), but in providing an entirely new position according to His eternal counsels, and for His eternal glory, according to what He is in His own nature. The carrying out of this counsel, and that too in virtue of the work of Christ according to His perfect righteousness, is the expression and the manifestation of His infinite love. Love is therein manifested, in that He sent His Son and gave Him up for us to death and the curse. Righteousness is manifested therein, in that He has set Christ, who had glorified Him perfectly, at His right hand in divine glory - in that glory which as Son of God He had already with the Father before the world was, but to which He had won His title as Son of man, so that divine righteousness must of necessity give Him this place. And we have part in this glory of God, because the work by which God has been perfectly glorified was at the same time accomplished for us. We form part of the glory of Christ for eternity. He would not see of the fruit of the travail of His soul, if He had not His redeemed people with Him in glory.

339 Romans 6

But here the flesh, which wants to have its own righteousness, and the world, which affects to be the guardian of morality, brings forward an objection in order to resist the truth and grace which shew man to be lost on account of sin. They say, if by the obedience of one we are constituted righteous, it is then just the same whether we be obedient or disobedient. This objection only proves that he who makes it knows nothing of the truth, that he has no apprehension whatever of his own lost condition, nor of the new life which the believer has received, and which, because it is of God, cannot tolerate sin.

Let us observe here what important truths are involved in the change of ground on which man's relation with God rests. The turning-point is the cross, the death of Christ. The old man, Adam's race, has been tested without law, under law, and then under the revelation of grace and truth when the Son of God was in this world as Man. God Himself was come, manifest in the flesh, not to impute sins, but "reconciling the world unto himself"; and if the blessing of the race of the first Adam had been possible it ought to have taken place then; but it was impossible. Much is said of a connecting link found between God and man, but even God manifested in grace and truth found none. On the contrary, the death of Christ is the positive, definitive, and absolute breach between man and God. It was not only that man without law was under sin, nor that under law he was openly disobedient to it, but in rejecting Christ he refused the grace of God which shone forth in Him. The Lord said (John 12: 31), in speaking of His death, "Now is the judgment of this world"; and in John 15: 24, "They have both seen and hated both me and my Father." Therefore it says, in Hebrews 9: 26, "Now once in the end of the world hath he appeared." The cross was morally the end of man; but at the same time, and by the same fact in the death of Christ, was laid the foundation of the new creation according to the righteousness of God. The same fact which on God's part has made an end of the first Adam, inasmuch as his race rejected the Son of God, has also laid the foundation of the new condition of man in the second Adam. Christ was made sin on the cross; sin was there judged, and the old man for ever set aside. Now access to God through faith has been made possible; in the resurrection, the new life, even for the body, has been actually brought to light, and the second Man has taken His place in glory. Just as the first man was driven out of the garden, to become the root of a sinful and lost race, so the second Man has entered the heavenly paradise as root and head of the saved race, as the righteousness of God which is valid for man; and so life and righteousness have become inseparable. Forgiveness through the blood of Christ is the most powerful motive for an upright walk; the resurrection of Christ in itself unites righteousness and life; it is a "justification of life" (chap. 5: 18).

340 The truth that we are risen with Christ is not further developed in the Epistle to the Romans. As to the part we have in His death and resurrection, it only says that by faith we reckon ourselves dead to sin, that the glorified Christ is our life, and the Holy Spirit is given to us.

If, then, by the obedience of the One we are constituted righteous, and if there, where sin abounded, grace did much more abound, "shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?" "Far be the thought," says the apostle. But in his answer to this question, he does not place us again under law. That would be nothing short of recognising the old man, the flesh, and, when we are already lost, to introduce afresh responsibility and condemnation; for the flesh is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. The answer of the Spirit points, on the contrary, to the death of Christ; but all that He has done is valid for us. The old man has proved itself irremediably bad, and this was, in fact, shewn in the death of Christ. It is impossible for me now, who am crucified with Him, to recognise the very man that put Christ to death - I am come to Christ, because man (I myself in my old condition) was such - and because I have now received a new life, Christ risen from amongst the dead. But we must consider this somewhat more closely.

341 In having been baptised unto Christ Jesus (our true confession of faith), we were not baptised to a Christ whom the world has received, or who found a connecting link with the first Adam. On the contrary, the world, man, rejected Him, and drove Him out of the earth; and in this way, as already said, it was shewn that a union between God and man as a child of Adam was perfectly impossible. Therefore God has begun afresh; we are born anew; Christ has, thanks be to God, as the rejected One, accomplished the work of atonement; He has acquired for those who believe on Him, justification, forgiveness, and glory. But He is the second Man, and in Him man is found in an entirely new position before God, as well as in an entirely new condition. A risen Christ is our life, a risen Christ our righteousness; the old man is for ever condemned. He who possesses Christ as his life shares in all this, because he has part in His death and resurrection. In Romans the first part only is developed - we are dead with Him, have died with Him. He is indeed presented also as our life; but our resurrection with Him is not treated of, because the Holy Spirit here looks at Christians as men living on the earth. Christ is dead and risen; we are baptised unto His death. We have part in His death, inasmuch as He is our life. He, who is my life, died, and He died to sin. I recognise Him alone as my "I," and as this new "I," I reckon my old "I" as dead. According to this new life I am alive to God; but as regards my old man I have died with Christ. How could I still live the life of the old man, if as such I have died? Therefore, buried with Christ by baptism unto death, it behoves us to walk in newness of life. If we have part in His position, as dead to sin, we shall also have part in His resurrection. The apostle does not say that we have part in it, but that we shall have part in it. This resurrection life will be perfect in glory; but it expresses itself now already in a new walk; just as the power of the life of Christ, which, in a positive way, came out in His resurrection, was also actually manifested in His walk on earth. "Knowing this," says the apostle, "that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed" (that is to say, that sin in us as a whole might be annulled), "that henceforth we should not serve sin" (ver. 6); "for he that is dead is freed [or justified] from sin." But this requires fuller explanation.

342 First it is important to seize clearly that the Christian has not yet to die to sin, but that he has died inasmuch as he is crucified with Christ; now that he has received Christ as his life, he reckons the old man dead. It is not only particular sins or lusts from which he has been delivered, but the old man as a whole is set aside, dead, and to be held for dead by faith which acts according to the new man. It is true that the nature of the old man is still present in us; our having died with Christ does not result in its having no longer any existence in us, but it has no more dominion - "that henceforth we should not serve sin." There is no necessity to have even a single evil thought, although the nature which produces them still exists; but we do not in any way serve this nature, not even in thought, when the new life and the power of the Holy Spirit are active in us. The Christian is made free, not because his sins are for ever pardoned, but because he is dead to sin, crucified with Christ. As dead with Christ he is justified from sin, just because he is dead; but he is also alive in Christ. It is not only true that sin has no longer dominion, but the Christian is also free to yield himself up; he possesses a new nature, a new holy life. But to whom shall he now yield himself?  - to righteousness and to God. This yielding of oneself is not the act of the sinner, as is very often falsely affirmed, but that of the delivered soul. The Christian, because he is purified, justified, assured of the love and favour of God, and in possession of a conscience made perfect through the blood of Christ, in that no sin can any more be reckoned to him, is free, has boldness before God. The same blow that rent the veil removed also all his sin. Now through the rent veil the light of God shines openly upon him, to shew that his garments are white as snow. He is set free from the power of sin, because Christ is his life, and, crucified with Christ, and now living by Him alone, he reckons himself dead as regards the flesh. He is free before God, and also freed from sin. In this liberty he yields himself to God.

343 Thus the new life, walking with God, gains already something along the way. We have fruits, even before we reach the glory, and this fruit is holiness. Blessed fruit! Beginning with being made partakers of the divine nature, we grow also in practical communion with God, by the growth of holiness in us. This growth does not set aside the truth that the new nature which we have received is perfect in itself. We belong absolutely to God, are bought with a price, separated from sin and the world. We belong to God, according to the value of the sacrifice of Christ, according to the new nature, and the power of the Holy Spirit. After the inward man we already belong to the new creation, although "we have this treasure in earthen vessels." We are in Christ, and in Him we are perfectly accepted. He is our righteousness, a righteousness which is fit for the glory; for He is in the glory according to this righteousness. But He is also in us as our life, and according to the power of the Spirit. This life in itself is perfect, and cannot sin; but we must also have a sanctifying object before us. Therefore the Holy Spirit takes what is in Christ and reveals it to us; yea, He reveals to us all that is up there where Christ is, and where the Father is also. By this we grow objectively in that which is heavenly; we are weaned from the world, live in spirit in the heavenly places, enjoy the Father's love, and become thus holy in practical ways.

We are sanctified according to the counsels of God the Father, through the sacrifice of Christ, by His blood; we are so, as to our being, because we possess a new nature, a new life; we are so by the presence and operation of the Holy Spirit; and we may add, by the word of God. The sanctification of the Spirit is brought about by our being born of God. But we must, as I have said, have an object, and the divine nature, the life which we have received, is capable of enjoying this object, God Himself. By the word the Holy Spirit communicates to us the objects that are holy and divine. We are first born anew by the word through faith; then we are nourished by the same, and the heart is purified also by faith; and, indeed the one as well as the other by the revelation of Christ in the heart - "Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth . . . . And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth," John 17: 17-19.

If we would be accurate, we could not say that the new man, the life which we have received from God, is being sanctified; for the new life itself is holy, and inasmuch as we have received it, we are sanctified for God; therefore it is that in the apostolic epistles believers are called saints. But holiness in us is relative; that is to say, it refers to God, because we cannot be independent. No doubt an actual condition is thereby produced in us; but we are not holy as independent; for it is sin for a creature to be independent, nor is it possible to be really independent. Thus holiness in us is objective; this is an important principle. All that the Holy Spirit has revealed to us - the love of the Father and of Christ, the holiness of God, the perfection of Christ, His Person which has been given to us and delivered up for us, His being glorified now in heaven - all this operates in us, and forms the heart, the thoughts, the inward and thereby also the outward man, according to the object that we contemplate. All that Christ has done and suffered is concerned in it, not only because His walk and His ways are a pattern for us, but because they engage the heart with Him. The affections of the heart are occupied with Christ and with His perfection, and He fills our hearts. That is sanctification; for this also fills the Father's heart. "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life," John 10: 17. The Father appreciates what Christ has done, and what He was in doing it, and it was done for us. We have holy thoughts in loving and appreciating what He has done, and what He was. Thus we have in us the mind which was in Christ. It is one side of the Christian character.

344 But the power of sanctification is wrought in us especially by the contemplation of the glory of Christ. The heart is indeed nourished by all that He was down here; we eat His flesh and drink His blood, enjoy also the bread which came down from heaven; but what transforms us into His image (2 Cor. 3: 18; 1 John 3: 2, 3) is the glory in which He now dwells. Beholding this glory we are changed into the same image. The glory of Christ produces in us the energy of life, because we count all else for loss. The life and the sufferings of Christ engage the heart with Him. (See Philippians 2 and 3.)

He has for our sakes sanctified Himself, so that we might be sanctified by the word. Wondrous grace! wondrous association! This separates us from the world, associates us with what is heavenly, and conforms us to the heavenly. The end is eternal life in this very glory, when our earthly vessels also shall have been transformed into the likeness of this glory.

345 With regard to holiness we learn further, in Hebrews 12: 10, that the discipline of God has for its object to make us partakers of His holiness. In this passage we discover not only the unceasing care of God, but we learn also the precious character of this holiness. We have deserved death as the mournful wages of our sad work; eternal life, the gift of God, has become ours through Jesus Christ our Lord; and this is pure grace. Who else could give us life - eternal life, divine life, but God Himself? Christ Himself is this life, sent from the Father into the world, and here revealed in manhood. Now "he that hath the Son hath life"; "he that believeth on him hath everlasting life," 1 John 1: 2; ch. 5: 12; John 3: 36. Although in the last verse (of our chapter) the reference is more to the result in glory, because in the counsels of God eternal life means perfect conformity to Christ in glory; yet it is none the less given to us now as life, although we are not yet in the glory. It is important for us to remark that it is the gift of God. Man had through sin earned death for himself; life, eternal life, in which we are capable of having fellowship with God, must be given of God. This life is Christ Himself; I John 1. He is the life which was with the Father, and came down here. In Him was life; he that hath the Son hath life, and this life will be fully manifested in glory. That is the principle of the new standing. We have died with Christ to the old standing, and Christ is become our life.

Romans 7

The apostle treats a new question in this chapter: What is the effect of the law in relation to our new position? The principle is simple. We have died with Christ; but law has dominion over a man only so long as he lives. If a murderer is condemned to death, and suffers death according to the sentence, the judicial authority has nothing more to do with him. Now we have died; yet if it were only by the law that we were put to death, we should be not only dead but condemned also. But now we have died with Christ, and He has borne for us the consequences of sin, as guilt. Thus we are dead, and the law, therefore, exercises no more authority over us. Christ has taken the place of the law. Instead of a law which forbade sins and lusts, and must of necessity condemn us (because the flesh, to which the law addressed its claims, was not subject to it, nor could be), we possess a new life in Christ; while by faith we reckon the flesh dead, which is disposed to sin. The apostle makes use of marriage as an illustration; death dissolves the tie between husband and wife. Thus we are dead with respect to the law, and are connected with another husband; namely, the risen Christ. The figure is employed here inversely. Not the law, but we, as having had our life in the flesh, have died. Such is the doctrine. In what follows, the apostle speaks of experience. This in no wise annuls the important principle, but rather confirms the deliverance of the soul from the law by having died with Christ, who is now become our new life. According to the figure of marriage employed by the apostle, we are connected as by marriage with Christ, and thereby are brought into an entirely new position - that of relationship. Therefore it says, "When we were in the flesh." Being "in the flesh" means standing on the ground or in the position of the first Adam before God, and being responsible to Him according to this position. It is not a question here of guilt, but of the deliverance of the soul from the yoke of sin. When one is lawless, and seeking nothing but pleasure, the conscience can indeed be awakened for a time, but the power of sin is not felt. He goes with the stream, and is not aware that he is under the dominion of sin. When one is converted one is first occupied with guilt, with the burden of sins. Even when one has learnt to know the forgiveness of sins, and to believe that one is a child of God, the form of experience may indeed be changed because it is no longer a question of justification; but the soul is none the less troubled so long as, in the path of experience, it is not delivered from the power of indwelling sin. The question ever afresh arises, "How can God accept me, or how can He delight in me, when sin, which I cannot overcome, is still present?" As long as forgiveness is not known, the question is, "How can I obtain forgiveness?" If it has been found, the question still remains, "What am I before God? How can such an one as I be accepted? May I not really have deceived myself?" In a word, the eye is solely directed to that which we are in ourselves before God. We see that sin is still there, and yet a Christian ought to obtain the victory over sin. Such an one is in fact, or in the condition of his mind and thoughts, still in the flesh.

346 We have already remarked that the position is found in the first four verses. The fifth and sixth verses lead us on to experience. In the flesh we were connected as by marriage with the law. This gave neither life, nor strength, nor confidence in God; it forbade sins, and imputed them to me. Not only that, but it gave occasion to sin in the flesh to become active so as to bring forth fruit unto death. It brought sins and lusts before the heart by forbidding them. If a heap of money lie on the table, and I am told not to take any of it, immediately the desire to do so is awakened in me. Or if I say, "I have something here in this drawer, but no one must know what it is," instantly every one, small and great, feels a desire to open it. The passions of sins are in no way of the law, but by it. It supposes, however, the existence of the flesh, and that we do not possess the strength of Christ. But now (in Christ) we are delivered from the law, being dead to that wherein we were held. In the flesh we were under the yoke of the law; the flesh was the source of sins, and now for faith it is dead, that we may serve in newness of spirit. The death of the flesh, of the old man, forms the basis of the transition from bondage in the flesh to liberty in the Spirit. At the same time this death stands in connection with redemption.

347 But how is this end to be attained? This is quite another thing from desiring it. The doctrine is presented very clearly and simply in the word of God. But there are many who, according to this doctrine, know that the Christian is dead with Christ, and even raised with Him; who believe also that they have died with Him, because the word of God so plainly declares it; who do not doubt that they are children of God, and that such a position belongs to the child of God, and who, in spite of all this, are not delivered. There are even upright souls, who, seeing that they do not walk as they would wish, begin to doubt, and to ask if they are not hypocrites, if they have not deceived themselves. They believe, and rightly, that God looks for something in them other than He sees. They make everything depend on what they are in themselves before God. But that is law, and not grace. The answer to the question, how the condition of liberty is reached, is developed from verse 7 onwards.

In order to be truly delivered, one must learn, and that by experience, that one is captive to the power of sin, and has no power to deliver oneself, even when desiring to be free. To this end God makes use of the law, and the desire of the new man to be free from the yoke of sin that he hates. Thus the Christian learns, not that he has sinned - this is not here the subject under consideration - but that while he would like to attain to holiness, a principle of sin is at work in his flesh. The law teaches him that God cannot permit this; his renewed mind recognises that God could not allow it; neither does he himself desire it. And yet this principle of sin exists, powerfully active, too strong for him to be able to free himself from it.

348 On this account the law has not only established with divine authority, the duties for all human relationships, but has also added, "Thou shalt not lust." That is a touchstone for man, bringing clearly to light what his state is, even if he has not outwardly sinned, even when through conversion his will is directed to holiness. This holiness after which he seeks he cannot attain. When he was without law, the sentence of death was not felt, if he had not done anything against the voice of his conscience. He lived on at ease, not carrying about with him the sense of condemnation. But the law came, and pronounced condemnation on lust. Experience teaches that this lust exists in the heart, and now conscience feels the sentence of condemnation; lust itself is awakened, and all comes to light. Conscience feels the sentence. One would like to do good, but finds that evil is constantly present.

The law says, "This do and thou shalt live." The converted man, over whose conscience the law exercises its power, regards it as the law of God. The fear of God is in his heart, and he would fain do what the law says. We speak here of the condition of one who is converted, not of a delivered soul. Since the law promised life to the one who kept it, it was accordingly given for life; but since the flesh is not subject to the law, it was found to be in reality for man unto death. The upright converted soul makes experience of this. It is well to remark here the difference between a natural man who has only conscience, and the condition of a man as here presented to us. The conscience discerns between good and evil. God has taken care that man, become a sinner, should bring conscience with him into the world. It condemns according to its nature what is evil; man none the less practises evil. A heathen, whose will is not changed, might say, 'I approve indeed what is better, but I do not desire what is good, and follow what is evil.' But it is not thus with the man of whom the apostle here speaks. His will is renewed; he delights in the law of God. That is the mind of Christ Himself, and proves that the man in whom this mind is found is converted, and in the bottom of his heart has received a new life. Conscience in the unconverted man leads him to acknowledge what is good; but the will of the flesh remains ever the same. He lives even in the flesh, has indeed a conscience, but not a new will. The will, on the contrary, is not lacking in the man described in Romans 7, but the power to do what he would. It is the condition of a soul which desires good which is in question here.

349 In verse 13, the apostle goes on to describe the effect of the law on the experience of the soul who thus desires what is good. In the previous verse it is recognised that the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good. The question now naturally arises, "Was then that which is good made death unto me?" In nowise. But sin worked death by that which is good (the law) in order that sin might be fully manifested, might assume its true character, and become exceeding sinful, in that it has made use of what is good to bring about death. The evil does not manifest itself only as evil in itself, but also as disobedience, because it is forbidden, and thus through the prohibition becomes exceeding sinful. Sin in man has a strong will; in that he wills to do what is evil, even when God has forbidden it. If my child runs out to amuse himself instead of doing his tasks, it is a bad habit; but if I forbid him to run out, and he still goes on with the bad habit, it is disobedience besides. By the commandment sin has become exceeding sinful. It shews that in me not only were there evil lusts, but that self-will which commits the evil, in spite of God's prohibition, is also there; God and His word are despised.

But we learn yet more from the law; namely, our weakness, even when we would do good. The converted but undelivered man does not find it in him to do what he desires to do; he lacks the power. He finds that he is carnal, sold under sin; that is to say, a slave to it. He knows that the law is spiritual; but he is in the flesh, carnal, under the yoke of sin, to which he is sold as a slave. Conscience is active in so far as by the law he knows the will of God, and he sees indeed in the law not only external precepts, but something which condemns the springs of evil in the heart. He may be outwardly blameless; Saul and many others were; but they were thereby full of self-righteousness. But the law in forbidding lust might as well forbid us to be men; therefore God has added the commandment, "Thou shalt not covet."

350 It is not here, then, a question of what I have done, but of what I am, and thus for the first time I discover that in me there is no good thing. I would do good, but I do it not. I am under the yoke of sin in the flesh. I acknowledge that the law is good; I hate sin, and yet I do it. But what I hate, I am not myself; I do, indeed, hate it. Thus taught of God, I learn to distinguish between myself and what I do. As the apostle says, "Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me." Yet this is not liberty; that requires power. But it is none the less a very real comfort, by the way, to have learnt not only that in me dwells no good thing, but also to distinguish between me and the sin that dwells in me. I delight in the law after the inward man; the conscience is in activity, and the will is controlled. What is still wanting is power, and that is not there because of redemption not being fully known. We learn, experimentally, not only that we do nothing good, but also that we are unable to do it; the yoke of sin is ever there. And this is precisely what has to be learnt; viz., that one has "no strength" to do the will of God.

Up to this, then, three truths have been spoken of, which have to be learnt experimentally:

1. In the flesh dwells no good thing.

2. We have to distinguish between the self, that would do good, and the sin that dwells in us.

3. There is no power in us to overcome sin in the flesh as long as we are not delivered; we are rather overcome by it.

We cannot then deliver ourselves; on the contrary, we have to be delivered; and the soul must be brought to the knowledge of this. "Who shall deliver me?" is the expression of the consciousness that we cannot do it ourselves; we look round for another. That is what we have to learn, not our guilt, but our weakness - our utter powerlessness, our dependence upon God. But here there are several things for us to notice.

Only one who has been in this condition, and has come out of it, can describe it. It is impossible for a man, who has got into a bog, quietly to describe his situation as long as he is in it. He only feels that he is sinking and perishing, so that he can do nothing but call for help. But after he is delivered, he can calmly describe it all. One who has never been in such a situation might perhaps say to him, "Why did you not go on until you found a firm footing?" "Well," may the other reply, "that is easily said, but in the bog when I lifted up one foot the other sank in all the deeper." That is just the state of the soul in Romans 7, described, it is true, by a Christian who had himself been in it, but is now delivered. I say, "by a Christian"; for when the apostle says "we know" (ver. 14), this is Christian knowledge. But the experience is that of individual consciousness. Thus, when he says, "I am," it is experience and not doctrine. Everything in the experiences communicated to us here is legal throughout. The person concerned consents to the law that it is good; yea, he delights in the law. The conscience and the will are right in divine things; but both have the law as object and measure. We do not hear a word of Christ or of the Spirit; the law is the only object before the soul. But in verse 25 true liberty is reached, and the delivered Christian thanks God. Conflict, it is true, continues; we find this in Galatians 5: 16-18. But there it is said that the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, but the Spirit against the flesh. If, however, we are led by the Spirit we are not under the law; that is, not in the state described in Romans 7.

On the Epistle to the Romans

J. N. Darby.

<33015G> 351{file section c.}

Romans 8

This deliverance stands in the closest connection with redemption, not so much with regard to forgiveness as with regard to our having died with Christ. We have already seen that there are two main points in redemption: namely, the forgiveness of sins, or justification, and deliverance: liberty before God, and liberty from the yoke of sin in the flesh. Now if we have died with Christ, we have died to sin, and are no longer in the flesh before God. Life in the flesh is no more our position, because Christ, after having died, has become our life. Sin in the flesh is judged, condemned - not forgiven - and that in the death of Christ on the cross. The power of the life of Christ is in me, is my life; yet not only that. Sin in the flesh, which was my torment, is already judged, but in another; so that there is for me no more condemnation on account of the flesh. Death has entered in where this condemnation, the judgment of the flesh, has been executed, and those who are in Christ Jesus have died with Him, so that there is no more condemnation for them. What has happened to Him has happened to us; He died to sin, and the condemnation is passed. This is our condition with respect to sin in the flesh. If the first part of the epistle has shewn clearly how sins are taken away, we find here as clearly how sin in the flesh and condemnation are taken away; yea, for faith the flesh itself is done away with, since we are dead.

352 This condition is described in the first three verses of chapter 8. The Christian is in an entirely new position: he is in Christ. Not only has the grace of God been manifested in the sins of the old man being forgiven, but his position also is an entirely new one; we are redeemed. It does not say, "There is therefore now no condemnation for those whose sins are forgiven," but "to them which are in Christ Jesus." This position is the result of the work of Christ, of redemption. The Christian is delivered with Christ from his position in the flesh because he has died with Him, and has part in the life of the risen and glorified Christ. Thus he no longer stands before God as a child of Adam responsible in the flesh, but as one who has actually, by death, left this position, and who is alive in Christ. The flesh is considered as dead, as condemned, as no more to be seen, but as vanquished in the death of Christ. The Christian is alive in Christ; he is no longer in the flesh. (Compare Galatians 2: 19, 20.)

The expression, "The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus," in the second verse of our chapter, may appear strange to many readers. It means, I believe, that the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus operates constantly, unceasingly, according to one and the same principle, in order that, since the flesh has been condemned in another, it should be dead in the believer. Through the life of Christ and the Holy Spirit the believer is in Christ. How could there be any more condemnation there? God has already occupied Himself with sin in the flesh at the cross, and now, if one may say so, is done with it. The new life and the Holy Spirit give to the quickened believer his place in Christ; he is redeemed and alive before God in Christ. It is not a question here, as already said, of forgiveness of the sins of the old man, but of a new living position in Christ. This is what is presented in the first three verses of chapter 8.

After that, in chapter 7, the experience of the first position, as well as deliverance through redemption in Christ, and the continuance of the two natures as an actual fact, have been described, the first three verses of chapter 8 give us the new position in Christ in contrast with the position in the flesh, or in the first Adam. In the first verse, no condemnation; in the second, the power of life; in the third, the judgment of sin in the flesh in Christ on the cross. The second verse is characterised by life in Christ according to the power of the Holy Spirit, and that as a principle unceasingly in operation. The judgment of sin in the flesh in the sin-offering of Christ marks the third verse. Sin is, indeed, still there, and, if we are not faithful, if we do not practically bear about with us the dying of the Lord Jesus, it is active in us; we lose communion with God, and dishonour the Lord by our behaviour, in not walking, according to the Spirit of life, worthy of the Lord. But we are no longer under the law of sin, but, having died with Christ, and become partakers of a new life in Him and of the Holy Spirit, we are delivered from this law. We are in a new position, in the second Adam before God, and our normal walk is according to the Spirit, not according to the flesh. Thus the law of God and its requirements are fulfilled in us. The doctrine does not go beyond that, because it is a question of one who desired the law.

353 But the law is not the measure of Christian walk; it only says that he who walks according to the Spirit fulfils it. When I was in the flesh I could not fulfil it, because the flesh is not subject to the law, nor can be, but only follows its own will. But the Spirit will assuredly not lead us into that which is contrary to the law of God. The law is practically fulfilled, while we are not under the law, but under the guidance of the Spirit. We are under the influence of the Spirit and it is not a question of a law outside us, but of a nature in us, which possesses an object suitable to it. They who live after the Spirit, according to the new man, desire the things of the Spirit; but they that are after the flesh set their minds on the objects of their fleshly lusts. We have not to do with an imposed law, but a new mind, the mind of a nature which is born of the Spirit, and which seeks what is spiritual; a holy liberty, in that the man, as having died with Christ, is delivered from the yoke of sin possesses a holy nature born of God, has holy objects before him, and is the habitation of the Holy Spirit, who produces holy thoughts in the heart, and reveals the things that are above. The minding of the flesh is death to the soul; it bears no fruit, and separates the soul from God, now and for eternity. But the minding of the Spirit is life, a well in us which springs up into everlasting life, and fills the soul with peace. The mind of the flesh rebels against the authority of God. Inasmuch as it makes up the activity of the natural man, it has to do with the law, which is the expression of this authority of God over man, and the rule of his responsibility as a creature of God. But it is not subject to the law, neither indeed can be, because self-will will go its own way; besides it has no love whatever for what pleases God. Thus they that are in the flesh, who are found before God in the position of the first Adam, and walk according to the life of the first Adam, cannot please God.

354 In verse 9 we find a very important principle. When can one say, "I am not in the flesh"? The answer is: When the Holy Spirit dwells in him. A man may be converted, and yet be found in the condition described in chapter 7; as, for example, the prodigal son before he met his father. He was converted and in the right way, yet he desired only to become a hired servant of his father. But as soon as he had met his father we hear nothing more of that, but only of what his father was and what he did for him. Deliverance comes through the personal knowledge of what the Father is, known in Jesus Christ, through the knowledge of redemption. And this knowledge is only found in a soul in which the Holy Spirit dwells. A converted man, as such, is only in the Christian position when he has been anointed. When the prodigal son was on the way to his father's house, his conscience and heart were reached by grace and rightly directed; but he was not yet clad in the best robe, nor did he yet know the father's heart. He first entered upon the Christian position when he reached the father; and from that moment we hear no more of him, but only of the father. Before that, his condition was not fit for the house.

In verse 10 we see the other side of the Christian relationship At the beginning of the chapter it says, "Which are in Christ Jesus"; and here, "If Christ be in you." Thus on the one hand the Christian is in Christ; and on the other, Christ is in him. We are in Christ, according to His perfection before God; Christ in us is the ground and measure of our responsibility, but in which He is the source of our strength, and that according to what has been said in the beginning of the chapter. A Christian is a man who has not only been born again (which is absolutely necessary), but in whom also the Holy Spirit dwells. He directs the eye of the believer to the work of Christ, and teaches him to appreciate its worth. He it is who gives him the consciousness that he is in Christ, and Christ in him (John 14), and fills his heart with the hope of glory, with the certainty that he will be like Christ and with Christ for ever and ever. When the converted man knows that his sins are forgiven; when he can cry, "Abba, Father"; when he has the knowledge that for him there is no more condemnation, he is delivered; he stands in liberty before God, and is freed from the law of sin and death. But he is a full Christian, "perfect," only when he understands by the Holy Spirit that he occupies the position of Christ, that God is his Father and God in the same manner as He is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ - when he understands that he has passed out of the position of Adam into the position of Christ, that he has died with Christ, and thus that it is no more he who lives, but Christ in him; Gal. 2: 20.

355 This liberty is presented and developed very clearly in the Epistle to the Romans, but only so far as that the believer is there looked at as having died with Christ, and possessing Christ as his life, whereby he has been delivered from the law of sin, as well as from the law of Moses, because this has dominion over a man so long as he lives, and cannot go further. The epistle, however, does not take up the counsels of God and the glory of our new position, though this doctrine is approached in chapter 8: 29, 30. But in general the epistle treats of man's responsibility, as well as of what God has done to cleanse and to justify us from our guilt, teaching us at the same time how we have been delivered from the law of sin and death by our death with Christ. The above-mentioned verses open out a somewhat more extended view; but the new position is not further developed. The epistle does not go beyond the truth that we have been quickened by Christ; it does not speak of our resurrection with Him. This, the starting-point of our new position, we must look for in the Epistle to the Colossians. That to the Ephesians develops this doctrine yet further, from another point of view, however. There we do not find that a child of Adam must die, and rise again, and that the believer has died, although he is represented as risen with Christ. The unconverted man in the Ephesians, is looked at rather as dead in sins, and all is a new creation. We find there all the counsels of God, both as to believers raised with Christ, as to Christ Himself, as to the children of God, and our union with Christ as His body.

356 It is well to remark, that while the first three verses of chapter 8 give us the principles of deliverance, so the following eight verses describe the practical character and the result of deliverance. The Holy Spirit acts in the new life, instead of a law given outside it to which the flesh opposes an insuperable resistance. The Spirit furnishes the new life with heavenly objects, in which it finds its joy and sustenance. "The mind of the Spirit is life and peace." All this depends on the dwelling of the Holy Spirit in us. "If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his." We have already said that the condition of such an one is similar to that of the prodigal son before he had found his father. If, on the other hand, the Spirit of Christ dwells in one who is converted, the body for him is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. If the body lives by virtue of its own life, it brings forth nothing but sin; the spiritual man, according to chapter 6, reckons it dead.

The Spirit is not to be separated from the new life. He is the source of the life, and characterises it. Now if the Spirit of Him who raised up Jesus dwells in us, He who raised up Christ from the dead will also quicken our mortal bodies on account of His Spirit which dwelleth in us. That is the blessed end of the life of the Spirit in Christ Jesus, or rather the beginning of it in its true perfection. The Spirit is God's Spirit. God has raised up Jesus as Man - Jesus is His personal name. But it was not for Himself that He lay in death; Christ is His name, as come for others. If, then, the Spirit of God dwells in us, He who raised up the First-Begotten, will raise up also the sheep He has redeemed.

Three characteristic names are here attributed to the Holy Spirit - the Spirit of God (ver. 9) in contrast with the flesh; the Spirit of Christ as the formative power of the new man; and the Spirit of Him who raised up Christ from among the dead, because He is in us the pledge of our resurrection.

The glorious end of delivering grace is reached; the circumstances by which we are surrounded remain indeed the same; and the following verses of the chapter give us our position before God in connection with these circumstances.

357 "Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh" (v. 12). That brought us into a bad condition and a bad position; nor are we any longer in the flesh, but are delivered from it through redemption; through the Redeemer's death we have been brought into a new position, of which we have also the consciousness by the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit. The two lives, the two principles, are directly opposed to each other; and it is important to observe (what has already been set forth as a principle in chapter 2) that where these natures act, they bring forth their natural results. I can overcome the flesh by the Spirit; I have the right and the duty to reckon it dead. But if the flesh lives, it brings forth death; and if I live according to the flesh, death is my lot. The nature, and the working of this nature - its result - are ever the same. God can give me a new nature, and - His name be praised for it - He gives it to me in Christ; and that in such a way that I have part in redemption, and in the power of the Spirit can overcome the old nature, and walk according to the Spirit. But the nature of the flesh is not changed essentially, any more than its consequences. If I live after the flesh I must die. Grace redeems; gives me a new life in which I walk after the Spirit and reckon the flesh dead; and, finally, it gives me the glory. But this new life does not live after the flesh; nay, it cannot do so. If I live after the flesh, I die, alienated from God; for the fruit and wages of the life of the flesh is death. But if through the Spirit I mortify the deeds of the body, I live, and shall live for ever with God from whom this life of my soul flows, and whose Spirit is its strength and guide.

This gives the apostle occasion to speak of the position of those led by the Spirit of God, and in the first place of their relationship to God. The Spirit that they have received is the Spirit of adoption; they possess Him because they are children. But extensive results in blessing flow from this relationship; if they are children, they are also heirs - heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ. Meanwhile the condition of the creation around us here below, and particularly that of our own bodies, is not yet restored. The mind of the flesh is enmity against God, just as also the friendship of the world is enmity against Him. The principles of the flesh, as of the world, are opposed to us; both are subject to the bondage of corruption. Moreover the world through which we have to pass as pilgrims, being alienated from God, and under the dominion of Satan, furnishes us with innumerable sources of sorrow and pain. The Lord Jesus was in this world "a Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief." A world of sin in contrast with His holiness, a world of sorrow and suffering in contrast with His love, could not but be for His heart a source of sorrow and pain. He found Himself isolated and alone in such a world, and not even His disciples understood Him. Full of sympathy for all, He found sympathy nowhere for Himself. If such did once break through the darkness of man's heart, it was something so wonderful that the Lord says, "Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached throughout the whole world, this also that she hath done shall be spoken of for a memorial of her," Mark 14: 9.

358 Could we, if we have the Spirit of Christ, go through such a world without feeling its condition? Should not our hearts be sad when at every step we see the dominion of sin, and have daily before our eyes the sorrows of sinful man, when we see that all is subject to the bondage of corruption? The time will come when we shall behold the universal blessing of the world, and when we shall rejoice with God Himself in it. But now, as those that are renewed in heart, and delivered, we can but suffer in the midst of an undelivered creation.

Let us remark, however, that this is suffering with Christ, not for Him. To suffer for Christ is a privilege, a special gift of God; Phil. 1: 29. One cannot be a Christian without suffering with Christ; for how could the Spirit of Christ produce in us a different mind from that which was in Christ as He passed through this poor world? The glory of the children of God is a subject of hope; now the sufferings of Christ in weakness are reproduced in a heart in which Christ dwells. We suffer here, where Christ suffered, as joint-heirs of the kingdom of love, where all will be joy and gladness. Although we are already, as a present thing, children, or rather sons, and therefore heirs also, we do not yet possess the inheritance; indeed, we cannot yet possess it, for it is still corrupt, defiled, and in this condition would not be suitable for us. Christ is seated at the right hand of God until His enemies be made His footstool. Then shall we reign with Him and be like Him.

359 Therefore the apostle, who knew well what suffering was, could say, "I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us." We possess the relationship of sons, and have besides the consciousness of it, and therefore no longer fear. Where there is fear, the heart has not the knowledge of this position. The Spirit in us cries, "Abba, Father!" and it cannot be otherwise, for He only came after all was accomplished which has placed us in this relationship. Christ has given us His own position before God. After accomplishing all that was requisite, as well for the glory of God as for our redemption, and, indeed, where it was necessary for both - namely, in the place of sin - "made sin," as Man He has gone up into heaven. In Him a Man has entered into the glory of God, beyond sin, death, the power of Satan, the judgment of God against sin, so that He could send the message by Mary Magdalene - "Say to my brethren, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God." Thereupon He sent down the Holy Spirit as the blessed result of His ascension as Man into heaven, after having accomplished all for our redemption. This Spirit dwells in believers who rest in the value of His blood, so that their body is a temple of the Holy Ghost; 1 Cor. 6. They are sealed by the Spirit and have the earnest of the inheritance, the consciousness that they are the children of God. He makes present to us Christ who is in heaven, and causes us to enjoy unseen things. It would therefore be impossible that He should be a Spirit of fear or of bondage.

But the operation of the Spirit in us is two-fold. He leads us to appreciate the glory that lies before us, and gives us the sense that the sufferings into which we are brought in endeavouring to reach this glory, and in faithfulness to Christ, are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us, so that we can pursue the path of God with fresh courage and endurance. He helps our weakness likewise, that we may take part, according to God, in these sufferings; and that, by the Spirit, our hearts may be vessels of sympathy answering to the heart of Christ, while by our groans we give expression before God to the groans of a suffering creation. What a precious position, to be able thus to realise His glory and love, who came down into the midst of a suffering creation, so that, while by our bodies having part in a fallen creation, our hearts by the Spirit can be the mouth-piece of the whole creation, and can express according to God its groans before Him. Into this feeling the heart of Christ entered to the full, in perfect love and perfection. Inasmuch as He, though truly Man, was in Himself absolutely free from sin, which had brought this suffering upon the creature, His sympathy with the consequences of sin for us was all the more perfect. "He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows," Matt. 8: 17. At the grave of Lazarus, seeing Mary and all the Jews weeping, He groaned in His spirit, and was troubled.* To us also, though as fallen creatures, weak and imperfect, is given by the indwelling Spirit to take part in the sufferings of creation, and that not with selfish impatience, because we suffer ourselves, but according to God. The way the apostle presents the condition of creation around us will make this experience clearer; although we have already considered some points of it, we can nevertheless begin afresh at verse 19.

{*Both the words employed here in the original Greek are very strongly expressive of inward emotion.}

360 It has been already observed that we have to suffer in the world because it is all lying in sin and disorder, while we have been brought back to God; and further, that we have also to suffer in heart, because we dwell in the midst of an undelivered creation. But the eye of faith is directed to the glory which lies before us, and this joyful prospect, together with the fellowship which we enjoy with God, already down here, makes us realise that all around us is unreconciled.

This creation awaits its redemption; but it cannot be delivered and restored until the children of God, in the glory of the kingdom, are ready to take possession of it as joint-heirs with Christ. Christ sits at the right hand of God until these joint-heirs are gathered. It is a blessed thought, that as we have brought the earthly creation under the bondage of corruption, so now it must wait for our being glorified, to be restored and delivered from this bondage (v. 19). It is not the will of the creature that subjected it to this bondage; we have done it - but in hope; for this condition will not continue always: the creation will be restored. God, however, in the counsels of His grace, begins with the guilty, with those who are most alienated, with those in whom He will, in the ages to come, shew the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness towards us in Christ Jesus; Eph 2: 7; compare Colossians 1: 20, 21.

Creation, inasmuch as it is only physical, could not enter into the liberty of grace; it must await the liberty of the glory of the children of God. When they are delivered, and their bodies which belong to this creation are changed and glorified, and when Satan is bound, then the creature also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption in which it lies enthralled. For we know, we that are instructed in Christian doctrine - that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. We know it yet more because we have the firstfruits of the Spirit; and "we groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body." Thus we wait to possess that which is saved in hope; not only to possess eternal life as life - that we have already - but to be glorified, by our bodies, which belong to this creation, being changed, and we made like unto Christ the Lord, according to the power whereby He is able to subdue all things unto Himself (Phil. 3: 21).

361 Thus peace is made; our sins are put away, we have a new life, possess the earnest of the Spirit, the glory lies before us in hope, and we shall be like the Lord. But as long as we have not reached the glory, we groan with the creation. For while realising our glorious hope, we feel the sad condition of the whole creation being connected with it as fallen, by our bodies. Free before God, free from the law of sin and death, filled with the hope of glory, we are led, through the knowledge of this glory, and of the full deliverance of the creature, to groan, which is the expression of its groan to God. But our groaning is not a complaint, the fruit of discontent, but the operation of the Holy Spirit in the heart. The Spirit directs our eye to the glory, where we shall have no more occasion to groan; and leads us to feel according to the love of God, the suffering of a creation under bondage; we at the same time feel it, because by our bodies we still belong to it. The Spirit of God which dwells in us forms these feelings according to God. God searches the human heart, and He finds this operation of the Spirit in the heart of the delivered Christian. The Spirit Himself is there, the source of divine sympathy with a groaning creation (v. 27). The eye of the Christian will be, by the indwelling Holy Spirit, directed above, to the glory and the rest of God, where all is blessing. With joy he realises what is before him. But, as he is still in the body, he feels so much the more the condition of a fallen creation, shares its groans, and thereby becomes the voice of a creation groaning before God. But his groaning is in the spirit of love, according to God, because in his relationship with God he is perfectly free. With regard to his condition, he is saved in hope; but before God his heart is free in the consciousness of His love. He can rejoice in hope - the hope of glory; his conscience is perfect; the love of God is shed abroad in his heart by the Holy Ghost. And thus according to this love he can sympathise with the universal misery around him. He knows not, it is true, what remedy he ought to look for in his prayers; perhaps there is none. But love can express the needs, and does it according to the operation of the Spirit; and although the Christian does not know what he should ask for, He who searches the hearts finds the mind of the Spirit in his groans; for it is the Spirit that in the depths of the heart gives expression to the feelings of need. Being ourselves still in the body, and as to our own condition forming part of the groaning creation and awaiting the redemption of our bodies, our sympathy is the more heartfelt.

362 But although we know not what we ought to pray for, yet there is what we know with perfect certainty, namely, that God makes all things work together for good to them that love Him, whom He has called according to His purpose.

What privilege is ours through grace - privilege that we enjoy by the Holy Ghost! We are children of God, we know our relationship with God, and can realise it by the Holy Ghost; we cry, "Abba, Father!" are children, therefore heirs - heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ. The Spirit reveals to us our inheritance, and gives us to understand what it is. We shall be like Christ in the rest of God, and in His own rest - perfectly to the glory of Christ, and shall reign with Him over all things. As men upon earth we lift our eyes to the glory of God which is our hope, and which we shall share with Christ, there where all is pure conformably to the purity of God. Looking at this poor world, our hearts are filled with the love of God, in which we share the sufferings of an undelivered creation, and that according to God; so that He who searches the hearts finds therein the mind of the Spirit, who produces in us this sympathy with the sufferings of the fallen creation in order that we in our groans may become the mouthpiece of the creation before God. And as from our lack of intelligence we do not always know what we should pray for, the word of God comforts us with the assurance that God, according to His own will and love, makes all things work together for our good.

363 This leads the apostle to say a few words as to the counsels of God, although this is not the subject of the epistle. He does so only to shew the foundation of all blessing. Otherwise the epistle treats, as already remarked, of man's responsibility, as well as of the grace and the work of God to deliver us from the consequences of this responsibility.

God acts constantly in behalf of those who are called, for they are foreknown; and whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son. Moreover, "Whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified." All is grace, and therefore all is secure. Thus also God does not terminate the course of the manifestations of His grace until the object is attained; the activity of God's grace does not cease until they that are called are glorified. The whole teaching of the gospel leads us back to God and to His thoughts, which cannot fail, and cannot be hindered. And there we find, His name be praised for it, that God is for us. The apostle develops this doctrine in verses 31-39. We see the proof of God's being for us, first, in what He gives, then in His justifying us, and, finally, in that nothing can separate us from His love. Such is the blessed consequence of the whole teaching of the Epistle, "God is for us"; that is the source of blessing; that is the conclusion the heart draws from all that is here revealed of Him. Not only has the righteousness of God been glorified and satisfied in the work of Christ, but we see also that the love of God is the source of all; and that changes all our thoughts as to God. It was just on this point that the doctrine of the reformers of the sixteenth century was defective. Far be it from me to depreciate the value of these men. No one could be more thankful for the deliverance from superstition which we gained by the Reformation; no one can more highly appreciate than I do the faith of those who even sacrificed their lives for the truth. It would be impossible for me now quietly to write of what was wanting in their doctrine, if they had not joyfully given up their lives for the maintenance of the truth. Nevertheless, the truth remains ever the same in the word of God. The reformers taught, it is true, that Christ had done all that was requisite to satisfy the righteousness of God, but not that it was the love of God that gave the Lamb, His own Son, to accomplish the work. According to them, God was ever the Judge, reconciled indeed to us through the work of Christ, but not known as the One who loved us when we were yet sinners. In John 3: 14 the Lord says, "The Son of man must be lifted up," for God is a holy and righteous God. Then in verse 16 follows the motive of all: "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son." The practical consequence of the teaching of the reformers was - not that they thought of or perhaps desired it - that the love is in Christ, and that God sits on the judgment-seat as a cold Judge. But "grace reigns through righteousness," Rom. 5: 21. In the day of judgment righteousness will reign. Love has established the righteousness of God in our favour in Christ. Righteousness was needed; love has provided it.

364 Thus we know that God is for us according to His infinite love, and according to His eternal and immutable righteousness. The first proof of it is that He spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us; "how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?" Yes, we can count on Him to give us every good thing; but how can He, the Holy One, be for us in view of our sins? It is just in that, that we have seen how fully He is for us, for He has given His Son even for our sins. "Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?" God Himself justifies us, who shall condemn us? Let us observe that all is here attributed to God. It does not say, we are justified before God, but "It is God that justifieth"; so that the apostle may well exclaim, "Who is he that condemneth," whoever he may be?

Then he changes somewhat the form of the sentence. He must think of Christ, and then through Him he sees also all the difficulties of the way disappear. Not as though they did not exist; they are there; but they disappear because Christ Himself has passed through every difficulty. Become man, in His love, He has experienced all the trials of the way, all human sorrow, all that in which the enemy has sought to oppose the faithful servant of God in the path of holiness, even unto death. Accordingly, not only do we overcome, by His assured power, but we make experience of His love in a special manner. The sufferings are the pledge of a better glory; and while as Man He has passed through everything, as God He has thereby proved His infinite love, and we know that nothing can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus.

365 In every respect God is for us. Precious truth! He has given His own Son, He will give us all things. He Himself justifies us, who shall condemn us? And nothing can separate us from the love that has been thus proved. All that is against us on the way to glory cannot, as the creature, be greater than He who is above all. God is for us in Christ, in Him who overcame all. Not only is the path which He trod - as Man so as to suffer, and as God to manifest all love in the sufferings - the proof of His love, but, following Him in this path, we also experience His love. Nothing can separate us from this love.

Romans 9

The doctrine of the epistle closes with chapter 8. The two principal questions which concern man as a sinner - his guilt and his sinful condition; in other words, what he has done and what he is - have been fully treated. Christ died for our sins, so that we (believers) are justified; and we have died with Christ, so that we are delivered from the power of sin and the flesh. All the deeds of the flesh are forgiven us, and we are no more in the flesh, but in Christ. There is, therefore, no more condemnation for us, and no more separation from God.

But this doctrine, complete in itself, still left a difficult question unanswered; that is, in respect to the condition of the Jews. The apostle has clearly demonstrated that the Jew is guilty because he has transgressed the law, and that consequently there is no difference between the Jews and the heathen; all have sinned, are guilty before God, and subject to His judgment. The Jews could not deny that they had transgressed the law; but they could appeal to the unconditional promises made to them in Abraham and their other forefathers. Now chapters 9-11 meet these difficulties.

There are undoubtedly unconditional promises made to the Jewish nation. But, in the first place, they are not all Israel that are of the stock of Israel; and what is still more important, they have rejected Him in whom these promises were to be fulfilled, and in whom their fulfilment was offered to them, thereby losing all right to such fulfilment; "they stumbled at that stumbling-stone." But then, after that all blessing, for them no less than for the heathen, is become a matter of pure mercy, the apostle shews that God, who is unchangeably faithful, will in grace accomplish all that He has promised. We find the proof of these principles in chapters 9-11.

366 In the first place, the apostle gives expression to his unalterable love for his people. His heart was filled with sorrow at their rejection; yea, so far was he from being indifferent as to this, that he would rather have seen himself accursed, separated from Christ, than the beloved people. As Christ Himself, when from the summit of the Mount of Olives He saw Jerusalem stretched out before His eyes, wept over it on account of the hardness of heart of the people, or as Moses once (Exod. 32: 32) interceded for the idolatrous people, so here we find the apostle giving expression to the same feelings of love and sorrow. This wish was not the expression of serious and calm deliberation, neither did it belong to the moment then present; but it had arisen from a heart deeply oppressed by the thought of the rejection of the people beloved of God - his kinsmen according to the flesh. It was the exclamation of a heart unable to repress its overwhelming feelings. He enumerates their privileges up to the Messiah descended from them according to the flesh, for his heart was yet full of all that appertained to them in connection with God. Moreover, he does not speak as if the word of God had failed in its object, "For they are not all Israel which are of Israel, neither because they are the seed of Abraham are they all children." In Isaac only had the seed the children's place before God. The children of the flesh are not on that account children of God, but the children according to the promise are alone counted for the seed. Ishmael did not belong to this seed of God; for the word, "At this time will I come, and Sarah shall have a son," is a word of promise, and does not refer to Ishmael. If it be objected, "But Hagar was only a bondwoman, a concubine," such, however, was not the case with Rebekah; and to her it was said concerning the children which should be born of her - of her only, and at the same time, and that before they were born, or had done either good or evil (that the purpose of God according to the election of grace might stand) - "The elder shall serve the younger. As it is written: Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated." If, then, the Jews would not recognise God's sovereignty, but desired to take their stand upon their descent from Abraham after the flesh, they must also allow the Edomites and Ishmaelites to have part in the promises; this, however, they would not tolerate.

367 However, important as this may be, it is not all that the apostle has to bring forward as proof of his position. He asks, "Is there unrighteousness with God? Far be the thought." According to His divine title He can without doubt shew mercy to whom He will, as He says also to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy." "So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy." And what was the occasion on which God spoke thus to Moses? When Israel had made the golden calf, at a time when God, if He had not retreated into His own sovereignty in which He was free to shew grace, must have destroyed the whole nation except Moses and Joshua; so that then, according to the carnal Jewish principle, the Ishmaelites and Edomites must have become heirs of the promises, while Israel would have been shut out. We find the same principle in Israel's deliverance out of bondage in Egypt. God had not made Pharaoh's heart bad, it was so already; but He hardened it, that He might glorify His name and power in all the earth. Thus He shews mercy to whom He will, and whom He will He hardens. His ways with Israel were a clear and indisputable proof of it; for otherwise their enemies would have become heirs of the promises, but they themselves would have been excluded, and the glorious beginning of their history would have been falsified.

Further, the apostle proceeds to consider the doctrine which is connected with this exposition, and applies the whole to the ways of God with Israel and with the heathen of that time, anticipating the objections of the flesh. What becomes, then, of man's responsibility? Why does God still impute sin to man? Who hath resisted His will? The apostle answers these questions in a threefold manner. First, as creatures of God we have not the right to judge His actions; that which is formed cannot say to Him who formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? This absolute right of God forms the foundation of the apostle's argument. If the rights of the creature must be maintained, how much more then must the Almighty God have His own? He judges men, but men are not competent to judge Him. The apostle here comes to facts, and shews how God had endured the wicked with much long-suffering, in order to make known His power despised by them, and has revealed His wrath against hardened wickedness in them; how, on the other hand, He makes known the riches of His glory in the vessels of mercy which He had afore prepared unto glory. God is not subject to the opinions of men; but the order of His revealed ways is, that He endures the wicked for whom judgment is meet, and prepares the vessels of mercy for glory, that is to say, Christians from among the Jews and Gentiles. The force and bearing, thus, of the apostle's argument is this: If God is not entirely free to act according to His election and His determinate purpose, and the Jews would rely upon their natural descent (as they actually did), then they must admit the Ishmaelites; but if they refuse their admittance on the pretext that Ishmael was the son of a slave, on no pretext can they reject the Edomites. Not only so, but with the single exception of the family of Moses, and perhaps that of Joshua, the Jews themselves would have had to be excluded, because it was only by the will of God that they were spared at Sinai. Since, however, God does what He wills, He also saves souls from amongst the Gentiles, as it is written in Hosea. The apostle says, in verse 24, "Us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles." Accordingly verse 25 has its application to the people of Israel; verse 26, however, to the Gentiles, who are not called His people, but "sons of the living God." Peter, writing to the Jews, quotes only the first passage. Paul brings forward besides a passage from the prophet Isaiah, in proof of God's having foreseen and predicted the setting aside of Israel. A remnant only should be spared; had this not been the case they would have "been as Sodom, and been made like unto Gomorrha."

368 The Gentiles, who followed not after righteousness, had then attained to righteousness, but the righteousness which is of faith; whilst Israel, following after the law of righteousness, missed the mark. And why? Because they sought righteousness by means of the law, and not by faith. "For they stumbled at that stumbling-stone; as it is written, Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling-stone and rock of offence: and whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed."

Romans 10

The apostle then enters more fully into this subject - the difference between legal righteousness, and that which is by faith, the righteousness of God. This is of the utmost importance. Legal righteousness is human righteousness. True, there is no such thing; but conscience feels, and rightly so, that man must have righteousness. Where there is confidence in self, one presumes to accomplish this righteousness, and to be able to offer it for God's acceptance. That man is responsible is perfectly true; but not only has he never fulfilled his responsibility, but he has not even made a beginning, because the flesh is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. The carnal man is contrary to God. The righteousness of God is in God Himself, in His being; it is exercised in grace towards men, and imputed to them through Christ. One's own righteousness is nothing but pride and want of conscience; it is only found where the heart is not divinely enlightened. For the light of God gives us clearly to know that we are sinners, and brings this upon the conscience before God. In this light the law also, applied by the Holy Spirit, can convince of sin, but it cannot produce righteousness for us; for the ministry of the law is the ministry of death and condemnation; 2 Cor. 3.

369 The righteousness of God is revealed in the gospel (Rom. 1: 17); and we have become this righteousness in Christ; 2 Cor. 5: 21. Let us examine how this has taken place. On the cross Christ was made sin for us, and there bore all the believer's sins. In this position He perfectly glorified God - His majesty, truth, righteousness against sin, His love to sinners, yea, all that He is; and that by having proved His obedience unto death, and His love to His Father in perfect self-sacrifice. The proof of the righteousness of God, and that with regard to what He is in Himself, to what sin is, and what it is in relation to Him, is now shewn in God's having glorified Christ, who perfectly glorified Him in all that He is, in this place of sin, where by man's sin, all this had been dishonoured; and His having set at His own right hand the Man who died - His own Son - and crowned Him with divine glory. This is what the Lord says in view of His death after Satan had entered into Judas. "Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him. If God be glorified in him, God shall also glorify him in himself, and shall straightway glorify him," John 13: 31, 32. The Son of man has glorified God on the cross, and God has glorified Him with Himself. A man is ascended into the glory of God. (See John 17: 4, 5; Phil. 2: 5-11.) The righteousness of God has been revealed in that He has given Christ, who glorified Him, a place with Himself in divine glory. In John 16: 10 this is expressly declared. The descent and presence of the Holy Ghost upon earth is the proof of righteousness, because, since it did not believe on the Son, but had rejected Him, there was none in the world. The presence of the Saviour in heaven at the right hand of God is, likewise, the proof of the righteousness of God: the same Person who was rejected by the world, has been accepted by God, and is now, as come in grace, for ever separated from the world.

370 But now the question arises, How can we have part in this? It is because the work which placed Him in the glory was accomplished for us. Through it He has glorified God. If we, who believe on Him, were not justified and made like Him, He would not see of "the fruit and travail of his soul." It forms part of the righteousness of God to give Him this fruit. Individually, of course, He is glorified; but a Redeemer without the redeemed would have lost the reward of His work and sufferings. We form part of the glory of Christ; and it is a deep source of joy to our souls that we, by our likeness to Him, in eternity shall be the proof of the value of the work of Christ. God only manifests His righteousness towards Christ in giving us the same glory with Him. How sure is our hope! We shall be with Him in the righteousness of God throughout eternity.

The Jews wanted to have their own righteousness according to the law - a human righteousness, had such a thing existed, which, however, was not the case; therefore they stumbled at Christ, the stone of stumbling, because for this purpose He had to be abased. His death was necessary to redeem us, and to acquire righteousness for us, and even glory, according to the counsels of God. Thus Christ was the end of the law for righteousness to every believer. It was impossible for the law to be maintained any longer as the rule and measure of righteousness for man, after divine righteousness had been revealed in Christ, and bestowed on believers. The righteousness of the law was human, and besides, did not exist at all; the righteousness imputed in grace to the believer was divine and perfect. The law has not lost its validity for those who were under it, for they who have sinned under the law shall be judged according to the law. But we have died with and in Christ, and the law has dominion over a man only so long as he lives. Whoever wants human righteousness must accomplish it for himself, for the man which doeth the requirements of the law shall live by them.

371 The apostle then quotes a passage from the Book of Deuteronomy (chap. 30: 12-14), on which I would say a word. Moses had in this book declared the commandments of God, to the observance of which was attached the possession of the land into which Israel should be introduced. He had presented the blessings as consequent upon obedience, and the curse as consequent upon disobedience. Then in the chapter quoted (ch. 30) it is presupposed that Israel, in consequence of their disobedience, would lose the land; and a promise is given as to what the mercy of the Lord would do, after the people, languishing in captivity, are through grace brought to repentance. As this promise will be fulfilled in Christ, the apostle applies verses 12-14 to Christ. It is impossible for Israel to fulfil the law in a strange land; but when the people return in heart and in obedience to Jehovah, then God will bless them, although the law could not be observed. And since the doing of the law was impossible, this blessing will take place on the ground of a righteousness which is of faith, as Paul shews in verse 6. Therefore Christ, being Himself for the Jew the object of hope, is here introduced as the restorer of the nation. The apostle says it is not necessary to go far, to ascend or descend, to find Christ. If the word, which, according to the power of the Holy Ghost, reveals Christ as risen from among the dead, is in the heart; if in sincerity of heart one confesses Him, one is saved. "For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth [that is to say openly] confession is made unto salvation." And this applies to the Gentiles quite as much as to the Jews, for "whosoever believeth on him [whoever he may be] shall not be ashamed." There is no difference between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord over all is rich in grace towards all that call upon Him. How beautiful this verse is when one compares it with chapter 3: 22, 23. There, there is no difference, for all have sinned; here, no difference, for the same Lord over all is rich in grace towards all that call upon Him. "For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved" (v. 13). But to be able to call upon Him one must believe on Him; and to be able to believe on Him, one must have heard of Him; but to hear of Him, He must be preached, and for that there must be a preacher. As it is written: "How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!" (ver. 15); that is to say, divine blessings. But all have not obeyed the gospel, as Isaiah says: "Lord, who hath believed our report?" So then, faith is by a report, the report is by the word of God.

372 The apostle then alludes to the relative position of the Jews and Gentiles, with regard to this report. Of the Jews Isaiah says, "Who hath believed our report?" But it was the purpose of God that the testimony should sound forth to the ends of the earth, and be heard by the heathen. For Moses says that God would provoke Israel to jealousy by them that are no people, and by a foolish nation would anger them. "But Esaias was very bold and saith: I was found of them that sought me not, I was made manifest unto them that asked not after me. But to Israel he saith: All day long I have stretched forth my hands unto a disobedient and gainsaying people." Israel accordingly fell under God's judgment, was excluded from His presence, and, on the ground of responsibility, had lost all claim to the promises. Was he then rejected for ever? By no means. Such is the answer, the teaching of the following chapter.

Romans 11

Israel is the subject of God's counsels. God does not cast away what He has foreknown and appointed to blessing. This rests upon positive grace; God does not change His counsels though Israel have no righteousness. The righteousness of God will save him. God is faithful, if all men are liars. "I say then," says the apostle, "God hath not cast away his people." The apostle gives three proofs of this truth. First, there was a remnant according to election; next, salvation is come unto the Gentiles to provoke the Jews to jealousy: thirdly, the Deliverer shall come out of Zion to turn away the ungodliness of Israel.

We have here much to consider. The first proof was that there was a remnant. The apostle gives the instance of Elijah. The faithful prophet believed that he alone remained of godly men. Faithful though he was, this was pure unbelief. God had reserved for Himself seven thousand that had not bowed down to Baal. The eye of God better knew how to discern His own, was more faithful in taking account of them, than was the faith of the prophet, dismayed by the threats of Jezebel, to seek them out and find them. And so at the time of the apostle there was a remnant according to the election of grace. But if it was according to grace, it was not according to works, otherwise grace was no more grace. Thus Israel had not obtained what he sought for. The election had obtained it. The others were blinded, and that according to the words of the prophet; Isa. 29: 10. What David had said was confirmed by the words of the prophet. Their table would become a snare and a trap unto them. Did they then stumble that they should fall? By no means. Rather through their fall salvation had come unto the Gentiles, to provoke them to jealousy. Now, if their fall had become the riches of the Gentiles and of the world, how much more their fulness! Consequently the apostle of the Gentiles magnified his office, because it served to provoke Israel to jealousy. He sought thereby to constrain some of them to this jealousy. For if the casting away of them were the reconciling of the world, what would the receiving of them be? For they shall certainly be brought back. But this gives occasion to the statement of the relation borne to the Jews by the Gentiles that were accepted, and of the responsibility of the latter in the position in which they were placed: a statement covering principles of the highest importance.*

{*The above (in German, from which this is a translation) was broken off by the last illness of the writer.}

Fragmentary Thoughts on Revelation

J. N. Darby.

<34009E> 136 {file section a.}

{For the remaining papers in this series, the reader is referred to the Editor's Note, Vol. 12, page 1. They are mainly notes of Addresses, not known to have been revised by the Author, save where this is specially indicated.}

Revelation 1: 5, 6

The ways in which the gospel may be preached and reach the heart are so many, that one has to look to the Lord to direct one, that it may be brought so as to comfort the saint and awaken the sinner. The moment the word is revealed to the soul in grace, the point is gained. There may be a thousand thoughts on men's minds, but there is enough in this blessed word to meet these thoughts, and to bring every one of them into captivity to the obedience of Christ. He is the Lord of all; and in His Person all truth centres. He is the substance of all truth - the ground and centre of truth to the soul. As we know Him, we get comfort, peace, and joy; as we walk with Him we have power to overcome. In verse 5 we have Christ presented in a threefold character. He is the one most drawn out by the Spirit of God. Alas! it is not always so drawn out in our heart. The answering character to that in the spirit of grace is, "To him that loveth us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood." In verse 7 is an application to the world - it will be a day of mourning to them. The Jews behold Him whom they have pierced, and the nations wail because of Him.

Let us especially consider the way in which Christ is presented to the soul. First, we have grace and peace in a peculiar form from God, that is, Jehovah; and the seven spirits, His spiritual perfectness, not the Father speaking to His children, buy the Eternal, and the seven spirits, the Holy Ghost exercising the varied power of the throne. Christ is brought near as connected with the earth; the faithful Witness when He was here below. This is what our souls need to remember - faithful testimony to what God is; for without this we have no certainty, whether as saints or sinners. A holy man cannot know God without the witness, nor whether the witness would suffice to meet a holy God. When I know God, I get sure ground to go upon, I shall know where I am - a terrible thing if I am walking in sin; but there is only uncertainty out of Christ, for He is the light.

137 There are sufficient traces of power in creation to serve as a witness of the eternal power and Godhead - enough of misery around us to see ruin - enough in conscience to learn that we have sinned; but we cannot learn God in providence, for we know not why He does this, or refrains from doing that. Providence is a depth out of our reach; we are not able to find out and judge the ways of God, nor indeed of the thoughts of a man's mind very often. There is another, the law, which appears to be a clear witness for God against sin. It is true that this is a witness of God's claim on man. We ought to love God with all our hearts, mind, and strength, and our neighbour as ourselves, but it reveals nothing of God's thoughts to us, and if this were the only witness, we should be ruined for ever. The object of the law is not love, but righteousness - God's everlasting claim of righteousness. But the law cannot meet what we want, for it says, "Thou shalt not covet," and there was never a man since the days of Adam that did not covet. If you do not satisfy God's claims, there is a curse upon you. Thus the law is man's letter of death. We turn to Christ, the faithful Witness, "the same yesterday, today and for ever" - the Witness down here amid the same circumstances in which we are placed, and dealing with men in all the feelings of life.

Jesus Christ was not as a king shut up in His palace, but in the midst of all man's wants, passions, propensities, and desires. The first grand comfort is when I see Christ, the faithful Witness, in the same circumstances as I am in: our hearts can say what God is to us. When I look at Christ down here, I see the faithful Witness, and I am brought into certain ground as to what I should meet in God. Jesus did not come claiming from man what he ought to be, but shewing out Himself in all the circumstances of man - shewing us what God is.

Whatever character I meet, Christ is the faithful Witness - the life and the light of man. This faithful Witness owns no goodness but in God. When the young man came to Him, Jesus does not tell him that He Himself is God, for that was not the time to do this. The young man was very lovely, and he thought by adding something to what he had already done he should go to heaven. He came to seek teaching of Jesus, and he gets Him as the end of the law. The faithful Witness touched him. All was laid bare, and the young man's heart was found given to mammon. With the Pharisees the faithful Witness shewed that their righteousness was only adding the sin of hypocrisy, as all outward show is. He knocked down men's righteousness with a terrible hand. What was the company that Christ came to? He was the friend of publicans and sinners. This upset the whole standard of man's righteousness. How came this? Because all pretences to righteousness were found to be false. This is a terrible thing for those who are building their hopes of heaven on their character. The world is constantly presenting their character at the expense of their conscience.

138 On the other hand, we see that Jesus did not want a character from man, but from God. John the Baptist came in the way of righteousness, and he went into the desert, and was company for no man. He came in the way of righteousness, not in grace. It is commonly said, a man is known by the company he keeps; and this is true, in a certain sense, of Jesus. How? He who in His own nature was holy, undefiled, and separate from sinners, was the companion of publicans and sinners, the faithful Witness to them of grace, that God is love. Jesus would make no allowance for man's claim to righteousness. He had compassion for sinners - He was always grace.

Whatever your state, come to Jesus, and you will find that He is always gracious, that He has always grace. The disciples would send some away when they brought young children to Jesus. They thought Him a great doctor, and that He must not be approached. Jesus took them up in His arms, and blessed them. The disciples had no sympathy with the thoughts and feelings of Jesus; yet He spoke to them as if they had sustained Him. "Ye are they which have continued with me in my temptation." "They all forsook him, and fled" (Matt. 28: 5, 6), Peter even denying that he knew Him.

If I find difficulty in the way of the sheep, Jesus goes before them. In everything He had gone before us. Do I fear death? Jesus set His face stedfastly to go to Jerusalem, knowing that He should there be crucified. In this faithful Witness we find the activity of love. He came to seek and to save those that were lost, to bring them to Himself. The moment I find Christ I find a true God and Saviour. I may have been walking in all sin, but when I find Christ, I find One who was such to such as I am - to sinners. If I take God's witness of Himself, and give up reasoning, I know what God actually is - He is seeking sinners - and have no uncertainty at all. I may think I may get better, and may put off coming to God; the God who has come down first in Christ, or I should never repent at all. God, who so rich in mercy to come down into all my loneliness, He has come down as the faithful Witness to take up such as me - He could be the Friend of publicans and sinners: He was despised for it - faithful in love going through all the scene of man, because He was the faithful Witness, that grace may come to me where I am ashamed to be seen of men: there Christ comes to seek me out, determined to be the faithful Witness of God, who is rich in mercy. It is not that God has given a good character of Himself up in heaven; but it is goodness come down to earth, to identify Himself with all the misery of man. The One above all, our Saviour, is God, and God is love, and Christ came to be a faithful Witness of this. You cannot be in any condition that Christ did not come into. He plunged into the very sea of men's misery to help you out. It is a comfort to get man's sympathy, but he often cannot help us. What is it to get God's sympathy, which has power in it? This was the accepted time, from the time of Jesus, coming into the world, to His coming again - the day of grace.

139 What a comfort to the saint to meet the faithful Witness, who never reproached the disciples' negligence, but said in the tenderest manner, "Could ye not watch with me one hour?" He waits upon all our circumstances upon all our anxieties. As our High Priest He bears us always on His breast - the accomplishment of God's love to saints, as well as to sinners.

The conscience makes even a saint afraid of God; he finds an evil will in himself, and the devil often gets an advantage over a sincere saint, and keeps him away from God; but the comfort is, Christ met the enemy in all his power, and He is presented to me as the First-begotten from the dead, the One who has put Himself under all the consequences of my sin, and now in His new character I find Him "the faithful Witness" - One who has borne all my sins - not now under them. The Father in righteousness was obliged to raise Him from the dead, and I can say, as a believer in Him, that I have no guilt - He sees all washed away. This is beholding Christ as the First-begotten from the dead. I see One who has blotted out my sins before Him who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity, and I get true and settled peace - not a cold, hard-hearted way of saying I have peace; but I look to Jesus as my Saviour, and this re-kindles love, and impels me to keep His commandments.

140 We are by nature under Satan's power the end of which is death; but the Lord Jesus overcame through death him that had the power of death, that is, the devil, and through this I have not only victory over Satan in Christ, but I may say all things are mine, whether life or death, etc. Satan could not deal with the heirs of salvation, unless he had foiled the Captain, and Jesus submitted Himself to the power of Satan, but in the resurrection that power was broken for ever. Liberty and joy are ours; not freedom from conflict, but deliverance from Satan. Now the way that Satan gets power over us is by his wiles, persuading us to receive him as a friend, instead of treating him as a fiend - "Resist the devil, and he shall flee from you." It is not said, Overcome him, for this Jesus did before.

Jesus was the expression of grace and truth, the blessed Son of God before; but now in resurrection, He presents us with a new character to God, such as man never had before - a Man who had put Himself under the power of death, risen to absolute dominion: a new thing - man once without God, now in the very presence of God, and the very pattern of God's mind and delight! Sin is done with in Christ, and our standing in Him is quite a new thing - "Bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh." There is no past history of this, no experience, not any old thing; all is done away, there is an entirely new Headship in the second Adam, the Lord from heaven. Is this my place? Yes; but we find difficulty in apprehending this, because of the weakness of the flesh; for the moment I look at myself, I have another man full of failure; but my standing before God is in Christ the new Man, not in myself that I have to struggle against, but the new Man, the Lord Jesus Himself I am one with, who bore my sins and put them away for ever. "Beloved, now are we the sons of God," etc. (1 John 3: 2), but it is not by being in glory that I shall be justified, that is by faith now. Justification is from two causes; first, that Christ bore my sins; secondly, that He is before God without sin.

141 "Prince of the kings of the earth." I would say a few words on this point, together with the response from the heart of the saints. We see not here the dominion of Christ over the kings of the earth, but we shall shortly. As to the response of the church: when God enables me to believe the testimony of the Son, He gives me the Holy Ghost, He puts the Spirit into man's heart as a seal, and earnest of glory. What is the effect in this verse 5? It gives power to say us - "To him that loveth us," no uncertainty: the Holy Ghost always says to us, not them (1 Pet. 2: 21), not that we shall be loved, but He does love us - no room for doubt, but the fruits of the Spirit, consequent on the Holy Ghost's dwelling in me. Things were not so ministered to the Old Testament saints, though they may be as holy. Christ has come, was dead, has accomplished righteousness, has sat down, so now the answer to all His titles is, "To him that loveth us and washed us," etc. All the promises of God are in Him, Yea and Amen, to the glory of God by us; 2 Cor. 1: 20. God hath anointed us, hath sealed us. Do I doubt? What do I doubt? That the Father sent the Son for poor sinners? If you believe this, you cannot doubt that you are saved. Your salvation is based upon the unchangeable revelation of God; and what a tide of affection flows from knowing this! God, through Christ, has saved not me alone, but the whole body of saints. What a difference does it make to me, in thinking of the joy and blessedness, whether I am going alone, or in looking at many of you, and being able to say, "He has made us kings and priests!" Just exactly what He is Himself - the highest in authority, and the nearest to God. Can you all, dear friends, say this according to the Spirit, "To him that loveth us?" - so settled in the consciousness of it, that the heart can only go out in fulness of praise! If it is not so with you, dear friends, it is because you have not received the testimony of the faithful Witness, who was grace, and the Messenger of God's grace to us. The Lord give us to give place to the Holy Ghost in His thankful testimony to His love, and grant us to walk nearer to Him, in the conscious power of it.

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There are certain expressions in the word of God which unfold, in the most familiar manner, what the Christian is; and which, if there was but the most ordinary attention on the part of the reader, would lead him to say, "Well, if that is what a Christian is, I know nothing of the matter."

142 These expressions are not the violent stretching forth after some hope, but they are characterised by the quiet certainty with which they appropriate the blessing. As John here says of all the Christians to whom he was writing, "unto him that loves us, and has washed us from our sins in his own blood," etc. Now, if I were to ask you - you, perhaps, who would be affronted if I should say you were not a Christian - if I were to ask you, are you sure that Christ loves you? that He has washed you from your sins in His own blood? No, you would say, if honest, I know nothing of it. Yet these are the expressions of the common recognised state of Christians. Or can you say - Yes, blessed be God, though a poor thing in myself, I do know that God loves me? To be able to say this is the common portion of the believer. And so it is written, "we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in the wicked one." All Christians are recognised as knowing salvation. And in 2 Peter we read of one who had forgotten that he was purged from his old sins. But he could not forget what he had never known. Forgetting "that he was purged," was backsliding; the christian state was knowing that he was purged.

You will find every kind of exhortation addressed to the believer; but they are all based on the ground of his having been brought to God. I ask any one, would there not be a quieter, happier state of soul if you were certain that God loved you? There cannot be happy affections if the soul is not in confidence with God. That is the kind of knowledge of God which is life eternal. God is love, and if you do not know that, you know nothing. And where are you if you know not God? If you believed fully that God is love, love toward you, what kind of thoughts would you have of Him? Would you think that you must obey, or else He will punish you with His vengeance? Would you think of Him as a Judge? No. Such thoughts are not the thoughts of one acquainted with His saving love. Of course there is a judgment, but there is no mercy then. When Christ comes to judge, can you stand if He marks iniquity? can you answer Him for your transgressions? No. But if you really believed in His righteous judgment now, you would say, "enter not into judgment with thy servant, for in thy sight shall no man living be justified." But Christ is not now a Judge; He is a Saviour. It is all mercy now. He is not imputing to any their trespasses. Every eye must see Him. We Christians see Him now as a Saviour. You who do not believe put it off till the judgment, hoping to be able to meet Him then; but then "all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him." He is a Judge when He is not a Saviour. It is judgment then, not trial as to whether you will pass. Now there is a trial going on, not indeed as to whether you are a sinner or not; but as to whether you will receive Christ or not. Now your heart is put to the test: alas! your wilful heart would still reject Him, if grace does not bow you in the sense of sin. God will justify Himself in that day, and no one else. In that day He will demonstrate the sin which is the ground of the judgment. Every secret thing will then be made manifest. It is not then that the question is raised, but that the judgment is manifested. Now the question is raised. All this is brought into the soul now. In spite of all the fair appearances of the world we justify God now, we accept the judgment God gives of man now, we justify Him in condemning us. The eye of God brings the judgment into my conscience now, and I bow to it. I feel and say that God should not let such a wretch live before Him. That is what will be when every eye sees Him; but it is also what is now in the soul, when the Lord reveals to us our state by faith. I now justify God. I say I have been all darkness and sin, and I abhor myself in His presence. Conscience is dumb in the light of God. If you have been brought to this, you know yourself. If you seek to hide it you are not the better, but the worse.

143 Suppose that I am brought to this, I shall not now be trusting to a vague feeling that God is merciful. It was not so with Peter when he found himself a sinner in the presence of the Lord. He said, "Depart from me, O Lord, for I am a sinful man." He felt that sin and Christ, as the holy Lord, should not be together. So is it ever when the soul is brought to be jealous about God. The idea of compromise is a horror to one whose conscience is active about sin. Well, when brought to this, what can the soul have confidence in? Oh! in this - that when we were in such a condition we have full assurance of the love of God toward us.

Now if I turn to nature, I see signs of goodness, but widespread misery and wretchedness too, so that I know not how to say God is love; and these very signs of goodness shew me that I have lost it all, for this God I have offended. If I turn to providence, I find it all confusion - how often have the wicked the upper hand! If I look to the law, it condemns me, and leaves me without hope. In all these I see things about God; but nothing that reveals Him. In Christ I get what reveals God. I, for myself, just where I am, find that He is the "faithful witness" of God. For it is in this world, where all the sin was, that Christ was the faithful witness.

144 There will be no need of a witness in heaven. Now I can go to Jesus and see God in Him. Do you ever find a single act or word of this faithful Witness that was not love? Never. Of course He would unmask the hypocrite. But the moment a person is true - were he the greatest sinner in the world - the moment he is contented to be what he is in Christ's presence - you will never find that He was anything but love. Of course God must convince of sin. He will write on the sepulchres and tell what is within. God will unmask what we are; our self-deception He will discover to us; but then He is perfect love, and nothing else. What brought Christ here? To know that there was sin? Oh no! He knew it well; but He came here because there was sin. The very sin I am confounded at, is the very thing that brought Him here in love.

In the case of the woman who was a sinner, in Luke 7, Christ puts down Simon, and He does not care for the guests. Why? Because a poor woman was to be comforted in love. Christ came into the very place where sin was. If it is a question of truth, He knows my sins. When I speak of Christ loving me, it is that He loves me knowing all that I am; it is not loving, surely, the sinful condition I am in, but loving me when in it. He will write on the ground to let my conscience act; He will bring my sin into my conscience. He will not let me get satisfied with myself, but He will have me to rest in His thoughts of me. What the heart struggles to do is to be satisfied with itself; but God will break that down; and the moment you are brought to that, He will make you to be satisfied with Him, just as you are. He will not leave you there, of course; but He will have you to rest in the knowledge of His perfect love: "Unto him that loves us"; then I find rest.

But that is not all: it is added, "And washed us from our sins in his own blood." It is not said, will wash us, but has washed us. We want it now, for peace, and for holy affections. "In his own blood." Who has done this? Christ. He has done it. He has made us "clean every whit." And if He has washed us He has done it in righteousness, knowing all our sin, and maintaining all this perfect righteousness which made us tremble because of our sins; but in accordance with it all He has washed us from our sins in His own blood. He knew what our sins were in the sight of God, and so He gave Himself up - Himself entirely He gave for me. An angel could not, nor should not, do it - he is called to keep his first estate - but Christ only. In this act of Christ in washing my sins I find Him giving His blood, His life, Himself, for me. Not one single spring do I find that was not love to me. Such is the knowledge I get of Christ.

145 He has washed me from my sins in His own blood. Do I believe this? Oh yes! I do. I believe that every one of them is washed away, and that He has done it, as it is said in Hebrews, "By himself purged our sins." Ah! you say, if I only felt this! But let me ask you, will your feelings add to the value of Christ's blood? Oh no! Then why not rest on it, as that which has perfectly satisfied God on account of the sins? The question of sin Christ settled between God and Himself; "When he had by himself purged our sins": He did it according to the holiness of God, and according to my need. And what cleanness do I get? The cleanness which God's eye requires; all that which shut us out from God being perfectly put away, so that we are brought into the light as God is in the light; and in doing it His perfect love has been revealed.

"And hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father." If I take a person and bring him into the enjoyment of everything that I have myself, I give the fullest proof of the perfect outgoing of my heart towards him. Kindness may give something for a person; but that is perfect love. I cannot do more. Well, that is what Christ has done. He is the King and Priest; and He makes us kings and priests too: and it is worth so much the more because it is the very thing He has Himself.

Another thing we get - the perfect love of the Father. Not the love of Jesus alone, but the love of the Father, the knowledge of which Jesus gives us. He makes us priests unto His Father. Was ever love like this? Never. Was Christ ever anything else? Never. He is nothing but this perfectness of love for us. And the sum of it all is, "he loves us." Has He anything else to say to us? No. What love had to do, it has done. Oh, in the simplicity of thankful hearts, to say, "he has made peace by the blood of his cross!" "Unto him that loves us, and has washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion, for ever and ever. Amen."

146 Revelation 2: 1-11

It is good to be occupied with spiritual affections, or rather with the subjects which vivify them, with those things which are not seen, which God has revealed to us, and which are of the world to come. The Holy Spirit presents to us many of those things which we shall enjoy later, and with much more detail than we can expect.

That which the Spirit says to the churches is for the peace and the joy of the children of God in the glory which is coming The Spirit says, "He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches." This, therefore, concerns us individually. According to His faithfulness, the Lord Jesus takes cognizance of the present state of the church. That which is in question here is not accomplished salvation, but the particular state in which the church is found, or even the state of such and such an individual, as we may judge from verse 2. "I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience," etc. Then also, "He that hath an ear, let him hear," etc. At the same time, Jesus is there revealed to us as judging the state of those to whom this is addressed. There are also particular promises fit to sustain the remnant of faithful ones, in the midst of the special circumstances by which their faith is tried. The promises which are presented here, differ from those which are made to the church in an absolute and general manner. They apply also to the church, and the church enjoys them. However, they have particularly as their object to sustain faith in the circumstances in which we may be found, whether as a remnant in the midst of the unfaithfulness of the mass of the professors, or as faithful in the midst of the trials which we are called to pass through. Now, for the conflict, we need discernment, in order to understand where the conflict is found; what is its main point or speciality. Faithfulness is found in contrast with the evil which the Lord reveals, because we are on God's side in this world.

147 We need to understand that the interests of Christ are our own - that His battles are our battles; and the more we lay hold of this idea, the stronger and happier we are (Exodus 17: 16). Happily, in Jesus these things do not fail us. Although Jesus identifies Himself with the church, He nevertheless judges the state of the church, and here He presents Himself as judge, but in love.

The book is divided into three distinct parts: first, the things which John saw; secondly, the things which are; thirdly, those which are to come. The things which John saw are mentioned in chapter 1; those which are, in chapters 2 and 3, including that which concerns the seven churches; those which are to come begin at chapter 4, and fill the remainder of the Apocalypse. Christ manifests Himself here as judge, not as in the latter day for the wicked, but as a priest who discerns all in order to remedy the evil.

You will find in Leviticus that, after the consecration of the priests, all the things as to which it was a question of being clean and unclean are presented together. It was they who were to know how to discern between the clean and the unclean. The priesthood had to discern everything. And it is also what belongs to the Christian, not as to one who fears the imputation of sin (although he has a responsibility), but because he has been anointed by God to distinguish between good and evil, according to the holiness of the service of God.

That is why Jesus takes to Himself this character of authority; that is the general idea which He gives of Himself. "These things saith he that holdeth the seven stars in his right hand, who walketh in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks," v. 1.

We find in all the addresses to the churches these words, "I know thy works." He takes cognizance of all that is done. It is very comforting that God has put us in such a position; and we are responsible according to the grace of the position. This responsibility increases according to the measure of grace in which we are placed. A servant and a slave do that which the master demands; but the child enters more intimately into the interests of the family, and he is responsible according to the position in which he is placed. It is good that we too should consider ourselves under this point of view. An Israelite might have done things which a priest would not have dared to do; many things were required of the priest for the service of God, to which no other man among the people was bound; then he was to discern good from evil, according to his nearness to God, as the anointed of God. We ourselves also, are priests. We have the knowledge of good and evil - a privilege acquired through sin at the beginning; so that this has been our ruin, but, at the same time, a thing which proceeded from Him who willed it thus - a thing good in itself, and which we possess now according to the intelligence of the Holy Spirit, in virtue of the obedience of the second Adam. When Satan led away Adam to infringe the prohibition which God had made him, Satan added, "God doth know, that, in the day ye eat thereof" - of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil - "then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil." The word adds, "The LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil."

148 Two things are always found, as in the garden of Eden, responsibility and life - the two trees. Adam acted in his responsibility, and failed as to it, before having life. This is why God must needs drive him out of Eden, because God did not permit that he should have life together with sin. There are the two great principles, responsibility of good and evil, and life: Christ alone has reconciled them. When the law was introduced, it presented responsibility, and not life. The law places man in responsibility as to his salvation; but instead of life, it pronounces condemnation and death. Christ, on the contrary, takes the responsibility on Himself, and becomes at the same time the source of life. Christ took upon Himself our responsibility before the judgment of God, and has placed us under a much higher responsibility - responsibility according to that life which He has given us. Consequently, He judges Christians, not to condemn them, in their everyday conduct. But treating them according to the holiness of this life, He judges their walk, that grace may always be given them, according to their need, and to maintain them in communion with the Father and with Himself. He intercedes at the same time for His own before God, not to obtain their justification, which He has perfectly accomplished, but to take them out of their difficulties and maintain them in the path of faith.

149 Jesus, therefore, takes notice of the state of the church and says, "I know thy works." It is not to condemn, but it is as being priest, and thus having to manifest the new man according to all the grace which is given him, and we shall see how far this responsibility goes.

Verses 2, 3. "I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou canst not bear them which are evil: and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars: and hast borne, and hast patience, and for my name's sake hast laboured, and hast not fainted." Here are many excellent things, and one might have thought that there was nothing but approbation; but it is not so. "Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee." Christ cannot come down from the height of His love. He would have fruits according to the love which He has for us. A worldly person would say, Is it absolutely necessary that I should do that? Have I need of these things? Am I bound to do that, as a Christian? But the love of Christ cannot be content without seeing fruits. It is like a father who loves that his child should succeed, that he should bear fruits capable of rejoicing him, and in keeping with the love which he shews him. The child may be slothful or lazy, but the father devotes himself to him; if there is not a response to the care taken by that love, neither is there contentment on the part of the father. If there is not with the conscience of that love, the same ready response as at the beginning, there is not the sound which goes to the heart of Jesus. It is better not to play at all than to play false tones. One has abandoned one's first love, and there is not that love which responds to love. Jesus is not a hard Master; He only requires these things from us in love. He says, "I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love." It is something which does not suit the ear of Christ, something which is not in tune: it is the first thing of which Christ takes notice - "thou hast left thy first love." They had patience; they could not bear them which were evil; they had laboured for the name of Jesus, but - "they had left their first love." If love is wanting, something essential is wanting. The heart has begun to be occupied with itself. A wife may do for her husband all that she did before, work as much, be wanting in nothing as to her duties; but if the husband does not find in her that which satisfies the heart, all is wanting: the wife has ceased to be occupied with him in the same manner.

150 We love something, and if it is the affections of faith, Christ is the object of them. As soon as He ceases to be the object of our thoughts, the thing is seen; He at least perceives it. After being delivered, we are full of love, and we only see the light. We think that sin is dead within. In the measure that the heart is filled with other things, the springs of this love are weakened; and if we ask ourselves, Do you still think as much of your Saviour as when you received Him for the first time into your heart? We notice that we have left our first love. I can be occupied with good things; I may seek souls; but if I no longer think as much about Jesus - about what He is for me - all is marred. If I am before God, I am always little; I feel myself responsible to God, and I am nothing. I judge myself, there is love; but if I get far from Him, I think of myself, and weakness increases. There is no longer the same discernment. There is no longer the same love. One is no longer at a height to view things as Christ views them; one is not at a height to shew grace. This is the leaving of one's first love, and of the patience of our hope.

The apostle Paul, writing to the Thessalonians (1 Thess 1: 3), reminds them continually of "their work of faith, and labour of love, and patience of hope, in our Lord Jesus Christ." In the Ephesian church are found works, labour, and patience; but they are no longer the work of faith, the labour of love, the patience of hope. The Lord says to them, "Thou hast abandoned thy first love." Each one of us can address the same question to himself, "Am I as much occupied with Christ? Have I not left my first love?" And, if we are in this state, cannot the Lord apply these words to us? "Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent."

Verse 7. "To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life." It is not with us as with Adam, who had only a responsibility of obedience: our responsibility refers to a conflict with Satan; and the proof that we are the strongest is that we can conquer the power of Satan. We may fail, it is true. If we were in nowise in the conflict against Satan, it would be because we had not life; but, besides this conflict in principle against him, one must also conquer in the details.

151 The tree of life, which is here referred to, is no longer in man's paradise, but in God's. In Eden, the paradise of man, there were two trees. Satan succeeded in entering there, and all was marred; but God's paradise was arranged by Him and for Him, after all was lost, and that by a work of love and glory, which causes the other to be forgotten. The paradise of God is a work of grace, which is the consequence of what it is God's good pleasure to do when man has failed. The paradise of man was a test of what man is; that of God is the consequence of the fact that Christ has resisted and overcome all evil. As the other was the place where the responsibility of the first Adam was - responsibility as to which he failed - we are placed with the life of Christ in us, and put to the test in the midst of evil with that life, not as men, but as Christians. The world thinks to be put to the test as men, but they are mistaken; the Christian alone is put to the test, in order to manifest in the world a life which is not of this world. Now let us see how Christ introduces us into the midst of all that.

The question is not, if I conduct myself well, I shall be accepted. No, it is not a question of that. The world thinks that it is a question of a conflict, destined to satisfy certain demands of God; it is an error. For the Christian, the conflict is the exercise of the power of the Holy Spirit in him who has already eternal life, who obtains the victory over the world, of which Satan is the prince and the head. In order for us to enter into the conflict, it is necessary for Christ to take away all our sins; for if any remained, it would be with God that we should have to do. The difficulty was found on that side, and it is the practical state of souls not set free; but we must be without sin before God; and being His in this world, and He being for us, we can enter into this conflict - where evil does not enter at all, where flesh cannot subsist - and there have the victory over Satan.

Verses 8-10. The Lord addresses Himself here to the church of Smyrna, as being "the first and the last, which was dead and is alive; I know thy works, and tribulation, and poverty (but thou art rich), and I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan. Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer; behold, the devil shall case some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days. Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life." It is very evident that the promises, and the character of Christ, apply to the circumstances of that church. Here is something striking. It is not a question of knowing how far the heart responds to Christ; but of knowing if it is worth while leaving everything, even one's own life, in order to enjoy the privileges which are in Christ.

152 That which comes in here is the result of leaving the first love, as a church: for it is not necessarily true as to individuals. Persecutions follow as the consequence of that which is not in the mind of God. The widows complain of being neglected in the daily ministration; Acts 6: 1. It is no longer Christ who alone occupies the thoughts: they have left their first love. When that happens, the world holds somewhat the place of Christ.

The church must learn that everything is above. "Fear none of those things which thou shalt have to suffer." Christ might have said, Thou shalt not suffer; but He wishes us to understand that we must be little, poor, and despised, and that one cannot be rich. I do not speak of temporal riches, but of that poverty which has nothing but its faith to present; and that is what God wishes. If the church suffer, if it is tormented in different ways, there is also another suffering. The church had nothing to present but its faith, which could sustain it. Now the Jews who were there boasted of being the true people of God; they said they were rich, and blasphemed. The Christians, for them, were only miserable heretics, and sectarians: and the church felt its position contemptible in the eyes of those who, according to appearance, were the people of God. That is more painful than when the world speaks evil of us. The church was afflicted, persecuted, and poor; but Jesus says to it, "Fear none of those things." The Jews said insulting things; but the Lord said, "Thou art rich." In this we have a lesson. Christ does not prevent our suffering: we must make up our minds to suffer; but if Christ says to us, "Thou art rich," that is enough for us. And He will only have for disciples those who are content with what He says, "Thou art rich." If any one is not satisfied with that, well, let him go to the world.

There is, however, something remarkable here. Jesus says to them, "The devil shall put some of you into prison." He attributes it to Satan, as if He were not able to prevent it. He says you shall be tried (v. 10). I leave thee to suffer; it is the time of the power of darkness, but it will end. Whatever, then, may be the power of Jesus, He changes nothing in the position of actual suffering. It is necessary that the moral ways of God should have their course, and that the work should be accomplished according to the good or the evil which is found in those in whom it takes place. It is necessary that He should leave to the enemy his own part, according to that which is due to him, so to speak - according to the state of those who are the objects of the government of God. He leaves power to Satan in order to manifest the glory of Christ by the church; and if we are not near Christ, Satan gets the victory as to things present, and Christ is not glorified.

153 All power belongs to Christ: we have nothing to fear. But Satan is there, and the church is responsible for the manifestation of the glory of Christ; and as soon as we leave Christ, we can no longer do it. It is a question of realising all this power of Christ, according to the position where we are individually; and we must be near enough to Christ to get the victory over Satan, and to do perfectly well all that we are called to do according to our position. It is not a question of leading or of being a general. If each soldier does his duty in his own place, the victory is won; and that may go so far as to lay down one's life. It is not a question of getting life: we have it; and we shall reign. It is a question of the church placed there to manifest the power of Christ by the Holy Spirit, to manifest His glory where evil exists, before spiritual wickednesses, and to enjoy the same results of the victory as Christ Himself: the crown of life in the paradise of God, as Jesus has Himself, and with Him.

It is not only not being lost; but it is to be with God, and to get the victory over Satan, who has the power of death. What we have to understand is that each one in his place, from the head down to the skirts of the garment, and however little he may be, has his place and his responsibility to manifest the power of Christ; and if he is not in the power of Christ, he is overcome. May God give us this strength, and render us capable of accomplishing in all things His will!

154 Revelation 2: 8-17

Last time we were speaking of the character of judgment running through this book of Revelation. We see the Lord in these epistles judging the churches, and then the world; we see Him taking notice of everything: "I will judge every one of you according to his works."

It is well to see the difference between the church as seen in Christ, and as on earth representing Christ. She partakes of His glory, as united to Him; and as a vessel contains His glory, and represents it on earth - the "epistle of Christ, known and read of all men." Responsibility down here does not touch salvation in any wise. He had promised, in His faithfulness, to carry them on towards the fulness of His glory, and He judges them for failure in the use of the responsibility He laid upon them. God's own people are profited by it, but the "simple pass on, and are punished," and at length, as a body, they are "spued out of his mouth."

All chastening is intended to turn to profit for the church. In the address to each church there is a particular revelation of Christ corresponding to the peculiar judgment, and there are special promises to each. It is not here the supply of grace from the Head for the body, as in Ephesians, but the responsibility of individuals in their walk. Another thing we have to remember is, that the object of these addresses is not to shew the power of the Holy Ghost actively at work. If it is judgment, it clearly is not this. Christ cannot be said to judge the work of the Holy Ghost. It is power in grace if the Holy Ghost works, but Christ's judgment is His estimate of the practical use made of the privileges given. The Lord looks at the church as responsible for all the love of which it is the object. The candlestick is to be taken away when there is no profit. It is not individuals judged here, but churches - what "the Spirit saith to the churches," and there is no return found; therefore it is to be taken out of its place.

Then the address is to "him that hath an ear, let him hear." There is individual energy to overcome, and it is overcoming in the condition in which they were - it is overcoming things within, not overcoming the world. "This is the victory that overcometh the world, even your faith" - there was that as well, of course; but here it is overcoming evil in the church. We must remember that the church has fallen from its first love, when Smyrna is addressed; and the church ceases to be a place of security to the saint, the moment the Spirit so addresses the church as failing; therefore individuals are singled out. I get myself as an individual singled out, but the church addressed. I have to make good my certainty by the word. The church may be right in this or that; but I have to discern by the word what I can follow, and what I cannot. This is a principle of great importance. It is not that there were no blessings for these churches - they were highly commended in many things. But the churches were being judged by Christ's word.

155 Development is a common word in use now, but it has in it the principle of infidelity. There is nothing in God to be developed. The word is a revelation of God in Christ. In 1 John 1 we find it said, "That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which our hands have handled of the word of life: for the life was manifested," etc. It is clear there can be no development of that which has been manifested. Unless we can get something beyond "God is light," there can be no development. There is much to be learnt about Him; but it is a Person here presented, not a doctrine. If it were a doctrine, we might get something added; but it is not a question of doctrine, but a living Person that has been revealed, and in the address to this first church we find that they have left their first love - they have left something; there is no development in that. God cannot set up anything but what is perfect, nothing contrary to His mind, or inferior to His mind. Look at man. We see him brought out perfect, but he could not keep his first estate. Then there was a perfect priesthood established, but there was failure in Nadab and Abihu. He "planted wholly a right seed." What comes from God must be perfect, and cannot by any other operation. There may be decline, and there is decline. This is a very simple truth, but it cuts up by the roots a whole system of thoughts and feelings and judgments.

Then we find another grand principle brought out here. He exercises the heart by bringing in the hostile power of the world to hinder decay, and to separate from the evil around - and this is tribulation. Take Christ Himself, see His perfectness as the Servant of God: "He learned obedience by the things that he suffered." Much brought out through trial, opposition, slighting; His path led, darker and darker, down to the cross. He met Satan's power, and even the wrath of God. He overcame all, and is set down with the Father on His throne, and in it all, it only brought out the growing manifestation of the perfection in Him.

156 There is another thing with regard to us. Persecution and trial are used to hinder our departure from God. There is the constant tendency in the heart to take rest in prosperous circumstances, the flesh turns to what is agreeable in the world; but it will not do. God says, "Arise, and depart hence, for this is not your rest." Persecution is the natural portion of the children of God. When the church was taking rest at the beginning, persecution soon came in. In Matthew the principles and character of the kingdom were brought out in the sermon on the mount: "Blessed" - "Blessed" - "Blessed," etc. Blessing is the character, and then the grace of Christ was just beginning to be manifested; the miracles had begun to be performed, etc., and God was now shewing them what was "blessed" in His sight. Towards the end of the Gospel, instead of blessing, it is, "Woe" - "Woe" - "Woe"; "your house is left unto you desolate"; because the opposition was fully brought out by the perfect manifestation of what was in Him.

God sends us tribulation, opposition from without, to bring out grace, and to hinder decay. With Christ it was always and only the former. But take the case of Job: God uses Satan as an instrument of blessing to him, as He does with the church. About Job God begins the conversation, "Hast thou considered my servant Job?" etc.; and God uses the trial to bring out to him what Job had never known before. Then, again, take the case of Paul. He had to be taken up into the third heaven, to get such a sight of the glory as to fit him for the peculiar service to the church to which he was called. Then what use would the flesh make of this? It would puff up. Then a messenger of Satan is sent to buffet him, and he prays that it may be removed. But he is not to be rid of the thorn in the flesh, but gets the assurance, "My grace is sufficient for thee; for my strength is made perfect in weakness." This it was that strengthened him for after service, not the being in the third heaven and the sight of the glory, in one sense, for it was to be God's strength, not Paul's. Take another case in Peter. He needed to be sifted, because of the self-confidence in him: therefore the Lord allows Satan to sift him, but He prayed for him. When confidence in self was pulled down, then he could be used to help others.

157 It seems astonishing that God should use Satan as the instrument to try the saints here; but it is so, and He says, "the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried." In this church we find the state is decaying (they have lost their first love), and God has to put her into the furnace. She gets into the place where Satan persecuted before; she gets where Satan's seat is. "I know thy works, and tribulation, and thy poverty (but thou art rich)." God knew that they were rich, they were multiplied in the world, and then there was a tendency to rest in the circumstances put into, instead of in the Lord Himself. The Lord would not suffer this. He must put them into trouble, because He would make them lean on Him. He would cast the church on her own proper position altogether. He will give them to find the hostility of the world, in order that they may be brought back to know their own privileges in their own real position. How strange that the church should need persecution, not only that Christ should suffer them to be cast into prison, but also that they were to be faithful even to death! And the promise to them is "the crown of life." They may be martyrs, but there is positive blessing and honour for them. Christians are seeking what the world does. If the Lord turns the current, He puts them through the fire. If the church has the world, in any sense down here, it must give up a heavenly, a crucified, Christ.

You cannot associate the world and religion, but it was the object of Judaism to connect them. It set about to mingle the tastes and feelings of nature with God, and whenever the world is connected with religion, there must be priesthood let in, because the moment you get man as he is, he cannot stand before God. But now Christians are priests - no need of an order of priests between God and you; you are a heavenly, not an earthly people. "He suffered without the gate, let us also go forth therefore unto him without the camp, bearing his reproach." The moment the blood is carried into the heavenly places, we are associated with Him, and we are taken outside the world altogether, and connected with the heavenly places. Judaism connected the two. Our place is outside the camp, and inside the veil, with Him. Carnal ordinances connected man with God under Judaism; but when Christ is rejected on earth, the place is in heaven, and there cannot longer be the mixture of the two. We are raised up together, and made to sit together in the heavenly places in Him. We have no middle thing if Christ is our portion. The moment we lose the sense of this, God must let loose the power of Satan to keep us in a straight path.

158 The character in which He addresses this church is as the First and the Last, One dead and alive. Looked at as man, He is dead to this world, cast out and rejected. We now must, like Mary Magdalene, get an empty tomb, or a living Christ. If your heart is upon Christ, all that you can find in this world is an empty tomb with nothing in it. Then you have nothing to do with the world, for all heavenly blessing is yours. The constant tendency is to slip away from this, because, if we do not cleave to the world, it cleaves to us. This was the case of the churches here. They needed to be put through the fire to separate them from the world. Judaism had crept in; then development (Gnostics, etc.), "intruding into those things which they have not seen, vainly puffed up by their fleshly minds." Then persecution comes, and blows upon all this. The history of these times shews that the living power in the church was not in its doctrines, but in its martyrs.

Verse 13. "I know where thou dwellest, where Satan's throne is." Here is another and more subtle character of evil. The Lord gives them all the credit He can. It has passed through tribulation, sent on account of worldly corruption from without, but here there is doctrinal corruption within It is in the world where Satan's seat is, and it has been living there ever since. (It is not a question here of individual conduct, but of the corporate position of the church.)

It was at the cross of Christ that the world emphatically became the seat of Satan - not that, as some say, his power was then defeated. The world had been first put under man, tried on the ground of responsibility; then it had been under trial in the exercise of power in Nebuchadnezzar. Satan risked everything upon getting rid of Christ, but then it was his own power was really broken - he just destroyed himself; but he has ever since led the world (as the universal instrument of Satan) to reject Christ; from that moment he is the prince of this world - until that rejection he could not be said to be so. It was when Christ was on the cross he led the mind of the world. The church has been taken out of the world, to be associated with the true Prince; but alas! it has taken an earthly character. But if it is taken up, and rejected with Christ, then what has it to do with the world? "Why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances?" etc. There is no possibility of escaping it in any other way but as being dead with Christ. Ordinances are not Christ. They have been nailed to the cross of Christ. If we are dead with Christ, we are dead to ordinances. Man in the flesh must have something between him and the Head. If united to the Head, there is nothing wanted to bring near.

159 "But I have a few things against thee. Thou hast there them that hold the doctrine of Balaam." He had taught them the evil of this corrupting association through a persecuting world; but Christ could never say, "There is Balaam's teaching for you." He could never talk of the moral acquiescence in evil as the proper trial of the saints - not like the tribulation before. You have got Balaam then, not Jezebel yet. Balaam would associate them with the world, but Christ says I have passed through death for you, and now you must for Me. He would not step in to hinder the consequences of the position into which they had brought themselves, but He could own their faithfulness.

Balaam could not succeed in enchantment against Israel. The question was whether Israel might pass into Canaan, and Balaam (a frightful character) was employed to hinder them if he could. The effort was to get Jehovah to curse His people, but he could not, and he was forced only to bless. There is no possibility of using Satan's power against the people of God. God held the lips of Balaam, and obliged him to bless in spite of himself. "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." He has no power as an adversary. It is as a tempter he has power. When the enemy could not succeed in bringing a curse upon the people, he sought to seduce them into wickedness, and then how could God bring them in? (Num. 25). In this church we find he has come in as a seducing Satan, instead of being without as a persecuting Satan. Then they were exhorted to fear none of those things which should come upon them. Weakness is in fear. When we look into the persecution we tremble. Out of it we look out to Christ, where there is faith Thus the faithful one is separated from the world by that persecution, and made to feel what his own proper portion is. But when the church is on Satan's territory, he says, You shall have as much as you like - as much as ever I can give you - for I will seduce you into it. In enriching them with earthly things, he seduces them from God. Balaam was a prophet, but a false prophet, just as the evil servant who hid his lord's money was a servant, though an evil one; and we find him coming in within the church (ver. 14), and if he can make it all ease in the world, comfortable in the world, his end is gained. Then they might go and eat in the idols' temples: doctrine of the Nicolaitanes follows - internal corruption. In Nicolaitanism we see the flesh acting in the church; through Balaam the world had come in. It is very sad to see how the church declined after the tribulation had brightened it up for God, and our hearts ought to bear the burden. By being thus associated with the world, by being content to dwell where Satan's seat is, they had got the door open for evil doctrines - Antinomianism, a fleshly religion of demons. Satan did not want to persecute when he could corrupt. Here it is only teaching false doctrine, in the next church we see there are children born. The promise to the faithful here is a very sweet and peculiar one.

160 The word is that by which Christ draws the church to Himself. He comes out with a "sharp sword with two edges," v. 12. The word of God is the resource of the faithful, and the promise is more individual. In the sorrow and pain of seeing those belonging to God not departing from iniquity, there is bound up in the heart this link of secret fidelity to God which associates them with a suffering Christ. They shall have to eat of the hidden manna. It was hidden faithfulness which was to be rewarded with this hidden manna; the fruits, indeed, would be manifest to all around, but it was a secret between God and the heart, an inward link with that which never changes in its character. What is this hidden manna? We find manna spoken of as the bread which cometh down from heaven: "My Father giveth you the true bread from heaven." The manna for the Israelites was spread about the camp, not hidden. Christ is the provision for daily walk. But besides this they were to take a pot, and lay it up before Jehovah: when they had got into the land, they were to have the memorial of what they had enjoyed in the wilderness. So we in heaven shall have God's eternal delight in what Christ has been down here as the suffering Christ. The memory of what Christ has been in the wilderness is God's eternal delight. With us, he that has been faithful with Christ in rejection from this world will have the everlasting joy of fellowship with God in the delight in Christ as the suffering Man, which He had and has and will have for ever. It will be the same kind of delight, though of course always in different measure. If we are walking faithfully with a rejected Christ, instead of letting Balaam into our hearts, we shall enjoy Christ down here now; but we cannot enjoy Him while we are going on with the world. If we so pretend, it becomes Nicolaitanism or Antinomianism. Even in the Gospels what enjoyment can we have if walking in the spirit of the world? The imagination may be fed, but the soul is not satisfied. God has not given His Son to be played with, but to be fed upon.

161 There are public joys in heaven, thousands of voices echoing the song, but there are secret ones also. Joys with Christ we all share in common, but He must have our individual affections as well as our common affections - "a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it." That name has no meaning for any one else but him to whom it is given. Christ reveals Himself to the soul, "and a stranger doth not intermeddle with its joy." Christ has joys for us as individuals, and my joy you cannot have, and yours I cannot have. This joy of communion will never be interrupted, and individual communion will not hinder the universal joy. This promise specially relates to the future, but it is the source of joy and strength now. The Spirit of God makes it anticipative of that day. We may have now this "white stone" from Christ, this secret expression of His grace and love to my heart. Others cannot have it for me. How it makes this white stone more precious than anything else, though all the world may think I am wrong! Of course, I must judge of all by the word. The world may talk about things, but Christ has talked to me, and He will own in that day all He has said to me.

What a sorrowful thing that Balaam should be teaching the saints! But, never mind: there is no trouble whatever in the church that does not bring the soul into deeper communion with Christ than anything else could. Then is the opportunity afforded for overcoming the evil within.

162 Revelation 3 and 4

The contrast between the addresses to the church at Sardis and Philadelphia is similar to what is found in 1 Thessalonians, where to the world the coming of Christ is spoken of as a thief in the night, but not so to the saints in the world. "Of the times and seasons, brethren, ye have no need, that I write unto you." The professing church at Sardis will have the character of Christ's coming in judgment.

Verse 2. "I have not found thy works perfect." No decay of spiritual life ever lowers God's standard of holiness in the church. The church at Ephesus is reproved for losing first love - here it is "works," v. 1. All resources of spiritual government and power are perfect in Christ. "These things saith he that hath the seven Spirits of God and the seven stars." Christ has the perfectness of seven spirits and seven stars.

Whatever we have to do in this world - common occupation, business, anything - the great object is to represent Christ. If my soul is knit to Him ("my soul followeth hard after thee"), we shall measure all our path as to how far we can do justice to Christ. "If thine eye be single," etc. There may be a hundred wrong ways, but I must take care to get into the right one. Whether I have made much or little progress as a Christian, I must have Christ my object, as the end; Christ will be reflected all down the path, then every step onward will be brighter and brighter. It is not going fast on the road, that is the great point, but going always in it (the faster the better too), "forgetting those things that are behind, and reaching forth to those things that are before, I press towards the goal for the prize of the calling on high of God in Christ Jesus." We must have our hearts set upon Christ, though, in one sense, not nearer Christ at the end than at the beginning; in another, we are a great deal nearer. The fact of our resurrection is not nearer, but we are nearer in the moral effect of the expectation. Of the church it is said, "that he might cleanse it by the washing of water." In one sense it is perfectly clean, but in another it is getting cleaner through the application, by the Spirit, of the word to the individual members of Christ's body, and so producing in the whole moral likeness to the image of Christ. So the outward fact of resurrection is, and may still be future, but it is the power of the truth of resurrection wrought in his heart that Paul desired.

163 There are some in Sardis of whom it is said, "they shall walk with me in white," but the Philadelphian state is one of far more blessing. There is energy in the midst of Sardis encouraged, but there is approbation given to Philadelphia - "hast kept my word." The great exercise of faith will be keeping the "word of Christ's patience," for the days are come in which it is said, "Where is the promise of his coming?" The heart set on Christ Himself gets such a sense of His blessedness, that it is kept fresh in the hope of seeing Him. "For we shall see him as he is," it is said, not "shall be." We shall see Him as He is now, the glorified Man, and we should so realise Him now, and so realising Him, I have so tasted what He is, that I want Him to come. In one sense He cannot come, but is waiting in patience till His word be fulfilled. "All that the Father giveth me shall come to me." He waits, He has not got it yet; and I must wait. My heart has got such a connection with what Christ is, is so knit up with Him, that it can find no satisfaction in anything else. "My patience", "He shall see of the travail of his soul and be satisfied." The Father's will is that He shall lose nothing.

The character of the promise to him that overcometh corresponds with that which they were exercised in. What is the promise? He shall be a pillar in the temple of my God; it is not said, the temple of God merely. Mark the number of times "my" comes in in this verse. You have been associated with My patience, and now you shall have the same association with God that I have. "Thou hast a little strength." See what little strength comes to: a crown then! Great strength now, is mixed with carnal things, and will be weakness then. "I will keep thee from the hour of temptation." Mark that word "from." Does the Lord delight in trying His people? No, He would rather keep them from it, but He must try us for our good. Still, we may well use that petition, "Lead us not into temptation," for it is a sad thing if God is obliged, as in Job's case, to try us by throwing us into Satan's hands for the destruction of the flesh. There will be trial come upon all the world; as long as there is a grain of wheat in it, He will sift, sift, sift it, till every grain is separated; but He will not have us to be so separated. "I will keep thee from the hour," etc. If the saint goes on in the consciousness of little strength, keeping the word of Christ's patience, in fellowship with God's long-suffering, he will be kept from it.

164 In passing through the wilderness God gives us two things as means of blessing down here - the word of God and the priesthood of Christ. There is the promise of entering into His rest, and to everything that comes in between our apprehension of that rest and us, the word of God comes as a two-edged sword. The word of God is "sharper than any two-edged sword," etc. What tends to unbelief? Every thought and intent, every little root that strikes into this world, everything not from God, everything that separates from our desire to see Jesus and be with Him. We are in the wilderness but every heart rests either in Egypt or Canaan: it is Canaan in hope, or Egypt in heart. Whatever does not bear the thought of God separates from Him, as the word shews us Sorrow, affliction is not wrong, but if the will does not submit it is rebellion, and that is wrong. All open sin is cut up by the word, the two-edged sword. All our weakness and infirmity are borne by Him who is touched with the feeling of our infirmities. We must be going on with Christ, and in the consciousness of going on. "Now is our salvation nearer than when we believed."

"I will write upon him my new name": He will stamp it on those who overcome as associated with Him in the temple of His God. He will give us His own portion as risen and heavenly.

The inscription to the epistle to the church of the Laodiceans (or in Laodicea, as in the margin) differs from those to the other churches, inasmuch as here it is the character of Christ in Himself, apart from the body, instead of His relationship with the church. Christ remains the same, although the church is gone to ruin. God could put His Amen on Him if the church fail ever so, and He is available for every opened ear. The titles belonging to the Lord are applied to each, answering to the condition of the church; and here there is the positive declaration that He will spue them out. There is nothing owned - all good shut up in Christ - but there is rebuke and chastening. He is outside, standing at the door and knocking, "if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him." There is the entire definite and final rejection of the professing church pictured, no hope held out but judgment, positive and definite, prophesied of - nauseous to Christ, as lukewarm water.

165 There is, however, love at work still, as with Israel in Jeremiah 2. Repentance is called for, but, of course, God knew the body would not repent. "Behold I stand at the door and knock." These words of invitation to those who hear are of a different character from those in Canticles: "The voice of my beloved that knocketh; open to me," etc.; where it is awakening the heart afresh of the Jewish people, who had been asleep a long time, stirring up the stupid, sleepy thing, by appealing to the affections. Here it is at the close of the testimony Christ is seeking to gather up any lingering desire after Him; but the promise to those who overcome, though most blessed, is of a lower and more general character than that given to the other churches. To sit with Him on the throne - this is what all will have who reign with Him a thousand years. All who are raised reign with Him. To the other churches there is something more special promised - this is only trenching on the kingdom. But Christ Himself will come in to him, "and sup with him, and he with me." He says Christ will come, and give you to enjoy with Him at His table, not come down with you to your things.

Verse 17. "The wretched one" is more literal. If a person says, I have got Christ, and so is careless about his walk, thinking he has got all he wants, it might come up to this state of things. But the whole description seems to apply more to those who have not Christ at all. They had got all that could make a fair show in the flesh - numbers, learning, prosperity - like Babylon, which says, 'I sit as a queen, and have need of nothing.'

Verse 18. "Gold." Divine righteousness is what the soul wants in order to be with God. "White raiment" shews the purity of the righteousness of Christ. The wisdom spoken of in Proverbs is a spirit of value for these things.

It is a dreadful thing to be associated with a form of things, when the spirit and life are wanting. The fig-tree was, as regards Israel, an exhibition of this state. The thing to be overcome in such a state of things is lukewarmness; and to be able to overcome lukewarmness you must be hot yourself. "Moab had not been emptied from vessel to vessel." Affection to Christ in hidden ones, as individuals, may be found, but faith is not so much brought out in the assembly - a strong manifestation of the declension in the corporate state of these Christians and of the fact that man spoils everything God sets up amongst men.

166 Verse 19. "As many as I love I rebuke and chasten" - convicting the conscience. Nothing is healed until that is done; it is not only an expression of His displeasure, but bringing it home to the soul - it is to "as many as I love." Whatever amount of exercise of conscience there may be, it is a proof of God's love; this is comfort to many a troubled soul. Men often speak of judgments as if they were from man, not God, but man's heart rebels more against God than against man. Job complained of God more than of the Sabeans. It is because God touches the conscience. It is a sorrowful thing when God's voice is not heard in the chastening. There are more pains taken with this Christian than with any. It is a different thing from Paul in 2 Corinthians 12, where he says, "Though the more abundantly I love you, the less I be loved"; as if he said, I shall not cease to love you, though the way I take to shew it to you makes you love me less. Here the meaning is, although they did not love Him, but were sunk amongst the rest, He would not give them up "He that hath an ear," etc. Christ is a Son over His own house. "To him that overcometh . . . even as I also overcame," etc. Christ had to go through all this, and to overcome. Blessed grace! He has made us heirs and joint-heirs. Let us take a lesson from Saul as to overcoming. He overcame the Ammonites; but the Philistines, whom he was specially raised up to conquer, he never overcame. If people do not do the thing they are sent to do, it does not matter how much they do

Notice that this address to the Laodiceans is a threat - it is not said, Except ye repent - not the fact of its accomplishment: their moral condition. They will be totally done with morally, but the Philadelphian state of the true Christian may run into it - only we must remember, the "spueing out" will be after the remnant are gathered out of it, after the church is taken away. The outward state may go on to Antichrist, and then be given up.

Fragmentary Thoughts on Revelation

J. N. Darby.

<34009E> 166 {file  section b.}

{For the remaining papers in this series, the reader is referred to the Editor's Note, Vol. 12, page 1. They are mainly notes of Addresses, not known to have been revised by the Author, save where this is specially indicated.}

Revelation 4

There are two points I desire to notice in this chapter in connection with the perfect peace of the soul which belongs to the redeemed, and the consequent spirit and character of their worship. The subject matter of this book consists of judgment, for, with the exception of the church in bliss, the character of all is judgment. God is sitting on a throne, and His throne is not in the character of grace, but in that of Sinai. Not that the throne will be on the earth, but that the judgments, the lightnings and thunderings, which are coming on the earth, will issue from this throne. In this introductory chapter (which it is as to the earth) we have God in the character of Lord God Almighty, and not in the character of Father; but the names given in the Old Testament - Jehovah, Lord God Almighty - are in connection with His power which will be put forth in the coming judgments.

167 Now what shews out the perfect peace to which we as believers are brought, is seeing the twenty-four elders sitting on thrones round about the throne, whence those judgments are issuing, in perfect peace. They are close to the throne, round about the throne from whence all flow, and yet they are not at all alarmed - no disturbance, no trembling - because associated with the very throne from which all the judgments come. Then mark another thing. They are sitting, not even here seen standing, but sitting in perfect peace, like David, who went in and sat before the Lord. They worship, it is true, and fall down, which is a much higher thing than sitting. But how thoroughly this scene shews into what a place of perfect peace we are brought, that, when the judgments break forth, there is nothing in them to alarm us. They were seen sitting in perfect peace, and this is our place; so that however we may be tried down here in the world, when we come before God we can and ought to sit in peace, and rest there.

Then there is another thing. When the character of God is opened out in the threefold ascriptions of "Holy, holy, holy," does this disturb them? No. So with us, when the full character of God's holiness is seen in His justice, making good His holiness. If in the presence of this holiness I thought there was a spot on me, I could not be at peace before Him. What a blessing to have our home and place of rest where the thrice holy God is!

When they hear, "Holy, holy; holy, Lord God Almighty," their affections move them, and they fall down immediately in worship. While the judgments move them not the least, their affections take them off their thrones in their falling down to worship. It is the effect of being in perfect undisturbed peace that their affections find utterance in praise. They lay their crowns at His feet, attributing all to Him. They fall on their faces; this is a deeper thing than even sitting in peace before Him. "Thou art worthy . . . for thou hast created all things," etc. This is intelligent worship; they know why He is worthy  - they know it for themselves (as in chapter 5), for He bought them to God by His blood.

168 There was no terror awakened in them when the thunderings and lightnings were going on; no, nor when the character of a thrice holy God is opened out: but when the glory is spoken of they worship. If there is fear, there can be no worship. "Thou meetest him that rejoiceth and worketh righteousness." But grace has set us in the place of worship by the power of the Holy Ghost: being made kings and priests unto God and His Father, we can worship Him. We are not in the glory yet, but may we grow in the sense of what He is, and worship Him who is worthy to be glorified.

This is God's claim as Creator; chapter 5 is the Lamb's title in redemption, leading to worship. The kings and priests in chapter 5 include more than the church. They have a royal, a priestly character, being more than the bride. The bride restrictively, does not come in until chapter 19. The subject of the whole book of Revelation is the throne preparing the world for the kingdom; but the kingdom is not ready without the bride, and therefore she is mentioned before the close of the book.

In verse 4 it is "four-and-twenty thrones," not "seats." Our translators were afraid to go so far as to say "thrones," but the word is the same as in the first clause of the verse. Here we see the happy place the church is brought into. They are sitting in dignity and peace, while all the circumstances of judgment are proceeding from the throne. They are unmoved by the lightnings and thunderings, etc. But mark the difference when the living creatures say, Holy, holy, holy, and give thanks. Instead of trembling at the holiness of God - which as sinners they would have done - they fall down to worship; and it is intelligent worship, for they say, "for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they were, and have been created."

169 Revelation 4

The fourth and fifth chapters of this book help us to understand the present heavenly character and position of the saints, being descriptive of their actual position during the time of the judgments being poured out. The church is not actually seen as such, until she appears as the bride at the close of the book.

The proper subject of this book is not grace, but judgment; though, no doubt, the patience of God in executing judgment is grace. But the book is one of judgment, even as regards the churches; for the Son of man is seen walking among them, taking notice of their conduct. Having gone through the professing body, judging its ways and its works (while those who overcome have their portion in blessing) He spues its last state out of His mouth; and then He enters on the judgments which befall the world. Before entering on the detail of these judgments, He gives a preliminary view of the position of the saints, as we have it in this and the next chapters.

There are three subjects distinctly marked in the first chapter as comprised in this book. First, the glory and the manifestation of Christ Himself, the things seen; second, the churches, "The things which are"; third, the things hereafter, or "after these," that is, the things which do not belong to the position of the church in its testimony down here as a corporate body, but after it is as such spued out of Christ's mouth.

First, then, what is seen is the glory of Christ; secondly, "The things which are." The only question that can arise is as to the force and bearing of the expression "things which are." They are looked at as the condition of the church as a whole (not merely local churches). Thyatira was told to "hold fast till I come"; and to Philadelphia He says, "I will keep thee from the hour of temptation which shall come upon all the world"; clearly shewing it was not any mere local body that was addressed. We get in these instances the clearest intimation of its being the general aspect of the whole church looked at in the character of judgment, from the time of its leaving its first love, until it is entirely given up. The thing Christ is dealing with is the church, until an entirely new dispensation commences.

Another characteristic there is, as connected with "the things which are," the church is a witness for God. In the first church we see this ceased to be the case; and at the close of all, when it has entirely lost its character as such, Christ Himself, in the fullest and completest sense, presents Himself to take the inheritance, and takes up the character which it should have maintained, namely, the "Amen, the faithful and true witness." Then, as having taken up this character, He assumes the government of this world again; and that is quite a different thing from His walking amongst the churches in His judicial character upon earth, passing judgment upon those things that should have been a faithful witness of Him. Then the prophet sees Him in heaven, having done with the church upon the earth. He is not seen there as the Head of the body, but as the "Lamb that has been slain": the One rejected upon earth is upon the throne in heaven, from whence the judgments are to proceed. This is a most solemn moment. We see how the world is all going on under God's eye, and with what patience He has been bearing with it.

170 In regard to God's dealings with man, as man, after his fall, there have been, to speak generally, three great epochs: first, the period before Christ came; secondly, the present interval; thirdly, after He comes again. In one sense there were many epochs during the time He was trying man with constant and unwearied patience, to see if good could be got from him, before Christ was rejected. He knew full well what would be the result, but He was putting man to the test. He planted a vineyard: it brought forth wild grapes, the hedge was broken down, and a wild boar out of the forest devoured it; and at last He said, "I have yet one Son, they will reverence Him; but they said, This is the heir, come let us kill him." Then the world was in a certain sense judged - not the judgment executed, but probation was ended. Satan, the prince of this world, is cast out. This took place when the true and rightful Prince, the Son of Him who owned the vineyard, was rejected. The world was then judged as to its character and ways. It is under condemnation, and therefore we are exhorted not to be conformed to this world. The plainest testimony is thus given against it morally. "The fashion of this world passeth away." "If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him." "The friendship of this world is enmity with God." Having rejected His Son, the sentence of rejection is passed on it by God. The Son leaves it, and it would see Him no more. Satan is proved to be the prince of it. The Holy Ghost comes to convict it of sin, because of unbelief; of righteousness, because Christ had left it to go to the Father; of judgment, because the testimony of judgment on the prince of this world is passed. The world is convicted of righteousness by these two things - the Son of God being rejected and ascended to the right hand of the Father, and the world seeing Him no more. And the Holy Ghost is given to the church, the vessel to contain the witness of the glorified Man till His coming again. The saints are gathered by the Holy Ghost, out of the world, to go forth to meet the Bridegroom.

171 What peace there is to our souls in seeing Christ's power over all creation, in connection with Satan's power being all broken! In the new age this will be fully manifested; and the working of miracles by the disciples was a sign of that energy and power of the Son of man which will be known in the world yet to come. "Behold I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you, but rather rejoice that your names are written in heaven."

The earth then was set aside when the rejected Man took His place in heaven. The Jews were the immediate instruments of His rejection; but man, the first Adam, was utterly set aside through this act; and the Jew was to be brought to see that in the flesh dwelleth no good thing, and that heavenly grace was entirely in connection with the new Man. He is gone into heaven, that "He might fill all things." He came down in grace as the last Adam, that He might bring in glory; and thus when the church is being formed, we get this double character: the heavenly Man taking His proper place in heaven, the earthly man judged. It is henceforth all new. "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature." We know not Christ any more "after the flesh." It is as Head of the new creation that we are united to Him. "The first man was of the earth, earthy; the second man, the Lord from heaven." The second Man has ascended; "but in that he ascended, he descended first into the lower parts of the earth." He has ascended as the second Man to take His glory with the Father. As the result of all this, the church is looked upon as dead and risen with Christ - "sitting together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." The new character for those who thus belong to Him is to manifest this heavenly Man by the power of the Holy Ghost down here; and thus the church becomes the living witness of Christ's rejection on earth and acceptance in heaven.

172 The church being set in this place, the Lord goes on with it, so long as He could in any way regard it as His witness on the earth.

Having disposed of "things that are," we now see that in order to be associated with God's thoughts and God's ways, the prophet has to be taken up to heaven. "A door was opened in heaven," and he sees the Lamb upon the throne, and those who had been faithful upon earth are with Him there. See the character of the throne itself: it is a throne that is going to vindicate the rejected Lamb, and the judgment to be executed. "A voice said unto me, Come up hither . . . and immediately I was in the Spirit"; but being in the Spirit, it was not to look round on things on earth, but go up into heaven.

In connection with the throne we see a display of power and majesty. It was so at Sinai, where there was judgment attending the giving of the law. The mount was to be guarded. "Whosoever toucheth the mountain shall be surely put to death." Then in Jerusalem His throne was established again; and there was the manifestation of His glory, as sitting between the cherubim over the mercy-seat. Through the mediation of Moses (after the golden calf was set up), we see God forgiving sins, though not clearing the guilty. He said, "I will make all my goodness pass before thee." It was always the terms of God's government with an earthly people. There is another throne now - the throne of grace. This is not our highest place, which is to be sitting in heavenly places in Christ Jesus; but it is a great mercy to have boldness to come to this throne, "that we may obtain mercy," etc., while walking down here in weakness, trial, infirmity, and perplexity; it is from this throne of grace that we find the power of God available for all we need to guide and help.

Here the throne in heaven is neither of these, but a new thing, a throne set in heaven and executing judgment. It has nothing to do with a throne of grace, and is not the object of supplication. In one sense they are all alike, because God's throne; but that is all. So thoroughly is this different from the throne of grace, that the effect of prayer was judgment. See chapter 8, where, when the prayers of the saints were offered, and the incense ascended, fire and judgment came down upon the earth. "There were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and earthquakes." With us we get by prayer "grace to help in every time of need." Here the censer being thrown on the earth brings down judgment.

173 But it is not the Lamb executing judgment; nor is it the word of God either. But we see the throne before He comes out. It is the interval between His having done with the churches on earth (for there is nothing left in the church to judge), and His coming to the earth again as the Faithful and True Witness.

The throne is set up for the introduction of the "Only-begotten into the world" in judgment. We have in this chapter God's relationship with creation set forth. God comes out in the character of Creator. If He is coming in judgment, everything must be set right before Him. It is not God enabling man to go against the stream which is wrong, but the stream itself must be set right. He must have creation itself brought into order. Every kind of glory belongs to Christ. As to Israel, He is King of Israel. When He is born into the world, it is as Jehovah-Jesus, "for he shall save his people from their sins"; Hoshea meaning Saviour, Jah Jehovah - Jesus meaning Jah-Hoshea, Jehovah the Saviour. He is Lord over all creation. "All things were created by him," etc., and He is Lord over the Gentiles too.

As Son of David, then, He has Israel; as Son of man, He has the world - everything; as Son of God, He has His own title to all glory as Creator and Head over all to the body, which two things we get in Colossians. The sign God gave of His covenant with creation was the rainbow, the token of God's faithfulness; and when these judgments are coming on the earth, there is the sign at once of His covenant faithfulness in relation to creation.

Verse 4. "Seated on thrones." The symbols here represent the saints in their heavenly condition, but not as the church, Christ's body. They are "kings and priests." In this chapter we see them as kings; in the next as priests. The one is their kingly office, the other is their priestly character as worshippers. The moment God is going to deal with creation, the saints are seen sitting on the throne with Him. What a wonderful place is given to us! We are a "royal priesthood," etc. We do not belong to this creation, but are a kind of first-fruits of His creatures. The glory and profit is all His, though the blessing is ours. We have a special place of glory, "heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ"; but that is not all, we must be His bride. In Colossians we have both First-born of every creature as the heir of God's estate, and beside that, He is first-begotten from the dead. He is Head of the new creation. He has come up from among the dead in the power of that life which could not be holden of death. In Ephesians there is another thing: "He gave him to be head over all things to the church." All things are His, and He is Head over them to the body. Not Head over the body (though He does judge it), and therefore it is added that the church is the "fulness of him that filleth all in all." The head without the body would be incomplete, and the church makes up His completeness. We are completely associated with Him. We are not of the old creation, but of the new. It is true we are still in the body, and have to carry it about with us in the bondage of corruption. We are part of the new creation as being one with Him who filleth all in all; while, looked at individually, we have the character of "kings and priests." Here we see all the saints who will be raised, sitting round the throne of God; round the very place from whence proceed the thunderings, etc.

174 "The Spirits of God." The imagery is taken from the temple. What a place for us to be in! "Know ye not that ye shall judge angels?" Do not think that these things are too high for you: they are not the highest. You must bring the heavenly character of them down to every-day practice. When Jesus was on earth, the lowly Man here below as "sent into the world," He brought down the principles of the heavenly spirit in all His ways and words - "the Son of man which is in heaven." And He says to His disciples, "Ye are not of the world, even as I am not of the world." This sweeps away every principle of conduct which cannot connect us with Him whom the world has rejected. The world hates what is heavenly in it. It cannot bear the testimony of what it has done. We are called to be nothing in the world. We must be contented to be despised; and find Christ in such a way our heavenly portion, as to have no ambition to be anything where He was nothing. "How can ye believe who receive honour one of another?" Our calling is to manifest the spirit and temper of the heavenly Christ.

"Seven lamps of fire." All this is judgment - sevenfold perfection, but sevenfold judgment. It is not here, as in Zechariah, the "eyes of the Lord, running to and fro in the earth," but consuming everything that does not suit the presence of this heavenly throne. It is a solemn thing, this judgment from heaven. "The leaves of the tree shall be for the healing of the nations." Our whole relationship with God is founded on grace. We dwell in Him and He in us. The revelations of the Spirit of God to us are about Him as our God, and heaven as our home. "The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts, by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us." Stephen, full of the Holy Ghost, looking up to heaven saw the throne, and Jesus on the right hand of God; but the character is very different here, not all that makes delight and blessing, but the Spirit itself is as "lamps of fire." What will the earth do when heaven has this character of judgment, when there is neither throne of grace, nor patience, but all is judgment?

175 Verse 6, etc. Now we come to another part of the scene altogether: "Four living creatures full of eyes before and behind." They are symbolical as heads of the judicial power of God. He may use angels, or He may use the saints as His instruments. We often find cherubim mentioned in scripture. The first time is when they were placed in the garden of Eden to keep the way of the tree of life. In Ezekiel they are connected with judgment. In chapter 9, when the glory of the Lord is gone up from the cherubim, there is the execution of judgment upon all those who had not the mark. Then again, within the veil, was to be seen the symbol of God's judicial power, for the cherubim looked down upon the ark, the throne of God's power. He was governing Israel. God was using this power in the midst of creation around. When the temple of Solomon was built, the cherubim were not looking down into the ark, but their wings reached from wall to wall, and they looked outward. This is a figure of the Solomon reign of Christ, when all His judicial power will look out to bless. In Psalm 72 we see His reign extending over all the earth, yet over Israel especially. "By me kings reign, and princes decree justice." In the four living creatures we see the four classes of creation which we have in Genesis: the first creature like a lion, the type of wild beasts; the second like a calf, the beasts of the field; the third, the face of a man, human beings; the fourth, the flying eagle, the fowls of the air. So that here we have the symbols of God's power and judgment in connection with the creation on the earth, whatever the instrument may be - Nebuchadnezzar, the angels, or the saints.

176 "They were full of eyes before and behind." The figure is very intelligent; it means secret intuitive intelligence - seeing all before and behind. Nothing escapes the eye of God and the power of God. Where man cannot see, He sees. All things are naked and open to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do. "They had each of them six wings," as in Ezekiel, and this signifies rapidity of execution of God's counsels and purposes; alacrity in the service on which they were sent. They cry, "Holy, holy, holy." This is something distinct from worship. The four creatures are found worshipping in chapter 19; but it is not so here. God is celebrated here in power and glory. The elders, whose hearts' affections are drawn out in the appreciation of the Lord, fall down and worship; but there is the celebration of power besides - the public celebration of it. All creation will be the perpetual celebration of the holiness, and wisdom, and power of the Lord God Almighty.

Everything the rainbow encompasses in heaven and in earth owns the creative power of God. The sun and stars will tell of His power and glory. "Every creature on the earth and under the earth," etc. All the mute creation will have a voice in perpetually celebrating His eternal power and glory. "There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard." When God brings in His reign of power in the Lord Jesus, creation being delivered from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God, we shall see that His government, as well as His grace, proves that He is the holy God. Sin will not be known there. Defilement will not be known there. On the day of atonement, both the tabernacle and all the vessels of the ministry had to be sprinkled with blood. In this chapter we have what is anticipative of that which will be, and which we get in redemption in the succeeding chapter. The one being a picture of the power of God in creation, the other in redemption, both are shewn out before the revelation of the judgments which will bring in the glory.

We find nothing of the Father here. It is the Old Testament titles of God, as Almighty, and Lord as revealed to Israel: Jehovah, "which is, and was, and is to come," the Almighty as revealed to Abraham. The character of Father with the children is not brought out at all, nor Jesus as Head with the members, but God as publicly celebrated. When we speak of the Father, it is mansions we have got, not thrones; we are at home with the Father, we delight in the Father. "I go to prepare a place for you, and . . . I will come again and receive you unto myself." But here it is the majesty of God; the voice of creation and providence celebrating through eternity Him "which is, and was, and is to come." We get two facts connected with the heavenly saints. When the throne is set, they are sitting in the very midst of judgment, in calm, quiet repose. The thunderings and lightnings neither shake the crowns upon their heads, nor their hearts within. It is all perfect peace with them. Blessed testimony this, of our place! The Lord grant us to enter into it, to get our hearts up to the height of God's thoughts about us. We should be amazed at the wonderful grace of His ways towards us, when we think of the perfect peace which grace has given us to enjoy above, even in the presence of the tokens of divine judgment, and the redemptive power which has given us a capacity to be there.

177 The second point is, that when God Himself in His majesty is brought out, it does not excite fear. There they are in His holiness, set in the light, not in spirit merely, but in fact. They are made "partakers of his holiness"; and when they hear the living creatures, which rest not day and night, saying, "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty," worship is excited, not fear. "Glory, and honour, and thanks unto him that sat upon the throne," does not leave them seated on their thrones; and they "fall down and worship him that liveth for ever and ever." Such a sense they had of the glory of Him who sits upon the throne, that it took them out of their own personal glory, and they used it only to celebrate that glory which they have to acknowledge.

The saint in glory is glad there should be something above himself there. He can strip himself of glory that the Lord should have it all. What a contrast to the spirit of infidelity in the heart which does not like this! The pride of the heart cannot bear that something should be above it; but the saint in light is glad that Christ should have all the glory. The saint can delight in the character and honour of God. The heart delights in His being glorious, and in His intrinsic glory. "Thou art worthy, O Lord." What a sense is here of His worthiness to be exalted! This is the first instinct of their life, however weak and feeble it be. See the thief on the cross; he had got the secret of God about His character: "This man hath done nothing amiss." And what was the consequence of this capacity to see His glory? He wanted to share it, and Jesus said, "To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise." Here were the first workings of life in his soul; but immediately we find that instead of the desire to pull Him down whom God would exalt, there was joy to find something above himself. Shall we not be glad to see Christ's glory? Glad of the excellence of heaven? Shall not I be glad to see Paul in a higher place than I? It is the character of the spirit and temper of heaven. Man is entirely changed here, for he would pull down God Himself if He did not suit him, according to the natural impulse and bent of his mind. All this celebration of God's power brings out worship: "They cast their crowns before the thrones," etc.

178 Another thing to remark here is, that in connection with this spirit of worship there is an intelligent understanding about it. "Thou art worthy; for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are, and were created." Look at the expression in Hebrews: "It became him," etc. What an astonishing thing to be able to say it became God to treat His Son in this way. The first two chapters are full of the glory of Christ. How at home the apostle is in the things that became God; and then again, "Such an High Priest became us," etc. We belong to a heavenly people in connection with Him who is made higher than the heavens, and we want a priest there. When a soul is emptied of itself, it begins to know and love the glory of God; it is not as a dull, senseless thing, but there is understanding and knowledge, and this is life. You will find this intelligence in the next chapter, likewise, "Thou art worthy; for thou hast redeemed," etc.

Mark two things: the entire prostration of heart before God, and the blessed intelligence of the titles of God. How it does take the poorest of this world out of the miserable tinsel of its corruption, when God reveals Himself thus to the heart and understanding! The selfishness of man would shut him up into narrowness of spirit, instead of being taken up with God. Are we not glad to have crowns to lay at His feet? "For thy pleasure they are, and were created." It is God's delight, and God's good pleasure that is the spring of everything. If I am right with God, I say, Let Him have His way. If I am away, I shall not like Him to have His good pleasure; but to let Him have it is the only spring of blessing. The Lord give us to know Him in this way; and we can say that in Jesus and by Jesus, we do now know His love; and, through the good pleasure of His will, we have been made His children, adopted unto Himself. When the Lord Jesus was born, He became the link between God and poor sinners, for He was the gift of God's love in "good will to men"; in Him, dead and risen, we are through the Spirit brought to God. The Lord give us rightly to estimate Jesus! With Him in our hearts, all will be simple, all will be peace, all will be love.

179 Revelation 5

We saw, in the fourth chapter, the throne of God set in heaven, the great purpose of which was to bring into the world the Heir of all things - as is expressed in Hebrews 1, "when he bringeth in again the First-begotten into the world." This purpose, for which the throne was set, is not as yet accomplished; for the First-begotten is not actually brought in till chapter 19. At the end of the third chapter we have the Lord's own testimony as to the failure of the church on earth, in that it is spued out of His mouth. Then Christ takes the place the church was unable to maintain, that of the "Amen, the faithful and true witness." And thus, the Lord's judicial power having ceased among the candlesticks on earth, we find in the fourth chapter a throne, not of grace, but of judgment, set in heaven, round which the glorified saints are sitting on their thrones, perfectly undisturbed at the thunderings and lightnings that are issuing forth from the throne; but when the majesty of God is celebrated, they cast their crowns before Him and fall down and worship Him as Creator. In this fifth chapter we get the things between the spueing out of the church from the mouth of Christ, and the judgments preliminary to His taking His rightful throne on the earth.

It is not the manifestation of the general glory of God, in this chapter, but the unfolding of a book, or rather the preparation for it, as it is not actually unfolded till chapter 6. Neither do we get a throne which gives promises of blessings to the earth, as in chapter 4, where the rainbow was round about it, as typical of God's covenant faithfulness with the earth. Nor do we get the Old Testament titles of God, as "Lord God Almighty"; nor do we see God, as "Creator," as it is said, "for thy pleasure they are and were created"; but it is as the "Redeemer" that He is celebrated here. In chapter 5 we get the purposes of God, the church being gone. God then begins to act in various ways, ever patient even in judgment, until the accomplishment of His one great purpose bringing in the "First-begotten" into the world. We get nothing of God's purposes in chapter 4, because creation alone cannot meet them; therefore, the moment God's purposes are mentioned, redemption must come in to accomplish them. Mark also, that God's purposes here are in connection with the earth, and not, in any way, as having anything to do with His purposes of grace to individual souls. Redemption must come in, that God may be glorified in salvation, as well as in creation.

180 "I saw in the right hand of him that sat on the throne a book," etc. Here we see the purposes of God in the right hand of Him that sat on the throne: they are in the right hand of power, that they may be accomplished, for He who sits on the throne is able to bring them in. There is great comfort in this thought too, that how dreadful the judgments may be, and truly they are terrible, the book is in the hand of God: so that when we read of the seals, the trumpets, and the vials of wrath, we see them in God's hand, as the settled expression of the accomplishment of His purposes; so, too, when we see that the Lamb that has loved us, and given Himself for us, is the One to take the book in the same quietness with which God holds it in His hand.

The natural mind, and we are still in the body, would tremble at these things, as it is said in Luke's Gospel, "Men's hearts failing them for fear, for looking after those things that are coming on the earth." But faith gets its settled place in the purpose of God, and is not afraid; it sees all to be in the hand of God, and for His glory. God, in the stability of His own power, holds the book upon the throne, for God alone knows His own counsels, and faith recognises this. Thus He who has loved us and washed us from our sins, in His own blood, is Christ, who is the wisdom of God, and the power of God, and the unfolder of these purposes of God. These things do not apply to the church, but the Christian is to have an understanding concerning them, for he has "the mind of Christ." When anything comes out in the way of prophecy, the Lord unfolds it to us, that we may intercede with Him about others. It was so with Abraham, for after God had called him out of his own country, and set him in the road of faith, revealing Himself to him, and giving him the promises, then God shews him other things which did not concern himself. He tells him His purposes as to Sodom, besides giving him the second promise, "Unto thy seed will I give this land." The Christian is entirely out of the scene of judgment here. No doubt the Christian gets the present judgment of evil, while walking down here, in the shape of chastening for his profit; but when judgment is spoken of prophetically, it always refers to others. Take Enoch who prophesied, saying, "The Lord cometh with ten thousand of his saints to execute judgment." He was walking with God, and had the secret of God's counsels as to the judgments that would be executed, and yet not at all as applying to himself, for he was to be taken away out of it all; and this is true of the church of God. These terrible judgments from the throne do not touch her, though she is to be the vessel of testimony as to what is coming and in the place of intercession, as Abraham was. "God said, Shall I hide from Abraham the thing that I do?" Then when Abraham gets the knowledge of what God is going to do, he gets into the priest's place of nearness to God and begins to plead for Sodom. This is, in a higher sense, the place of the church, as far as she has faith for it. "We have the mind of Christ." In this sense it is that the Christian is a prophet, having the mind of Christ; and also, as having the spirit of intercession, he is a priest; and likewise, he is the vessel of ministry for carrying the gospel to poor sinners; and he will reign when Christ reigns. At present, the church, having received grace, through the cross of Christ; is the messenger of grace to those who are ready to perish.

181 But now we will turn to our proper subject, for in chapter 5 we pass into fresh ground again. When God begins to unfold His purposes, Christ must come in, for not only does all belong to Him by divine title, but He is also Heir of all things by divine appointment. Therefore, when we have the redemption of the purchased possession, the taking the inheritance out of the hands of the usurper by judgments, we find the book of God's counsels, as the conveyance of the inheritance of the rightful heir who won His title to it by His work. Consequently when the book of God's purposes concerning the inheritance comes on the scene, we also get the Son whom "He hath appointed heir of all things." It was customary among the Jews (Jer. 32: 11), on conveyance of property, to have two books, an open one in which were title deeds, etc., and a sealed one laid by, in order that no mistake might be made; and this book which God put into the hands of the Lamb, was a sealed one, sealed with seven seals." "And I wept much because no man was found worthy to open and to read the book, neither to look therein." Of course, there could not be any thought of looking therein as to how God would accomplish His purposes; for I would here remark that where the heart is brought near to God, it is not that there is a disposition to pry into these things, for that would he sin; but when we find God has purposes to reveal to us, it would be sorrow not to know them But some might say, surely salvation is the all-important thing; but I ask, Is not that settled? That ought to be the question, most surely, if it be not yet settled; but if I am a child, I have the interest of the family at heart, and, therefore, when that which concerns the First-born is brought out, I am interested in it, because my affections are drawn out by it. For there are affections which flow from this relationship itself, as well as those resulting from the fact of being saved. Of course, it is nothing but idle curiosity to be looking into prophecy before the great question of salvation is settled between the soul and God. When the conscience is set at rest before God, there will then be liberty for the exercise of those affections which flow out from such relationships. But still there are affections flowing from the relationship itself, and felt in measure, it may be, as soon as that relationship is effected in the soul, and before the soul itself is conscious of its portion. That is, we often meet with those whose hearts are towards God, without having settled peace in their souls. Take Job, for instance: he said, "Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him." God was breaking him down, and breaking him up, just to shew Job what he was all the while. Job had full confidence in God, although his soul did not know real peace. Affection was there, and when the soul got peace, then the pent-up affections flowed out. For I do not mean to say that there is no affection until the soul has got peace; but when the question of salvation is settled, then there is unhindered liberty for the affections to flow out. And when the soul has got peace, then it is ready to learn in quiet communion with God, all that He is about to do.

182 "And one of the elders said unto me, Weep not." It is most striking how much these twenty-four elders are found occupying the church's place of nearness to God; and we constantly find intelligence in these elders - not merely worship, but intelligence. They are always the persons who are the vessels of understanding - "made kings and priests." The church has a much higher kind of knowledge than that of the prophets, who prefaced their messages with a "Thus saith the Lord." What the Lord had communicated to them, they delivered, and after they had delivered their message, they had to search into its meaning, for, as Peter says, "Not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things which are now reported unto you." So, here, we find John in the character of a prophet had not the same kind of intelligence as the elders; he had just so much light given him as was revealed at the time, just so much as was needed for the delivery of his message, and no more. But now the Holy Ghost is come down, and the full revelation is given of the mind of God in His written word; the church, as such, having the mind of Christ, not only knows the message, but knows the mind of Christ about that which is revealed.

183 John sees no one in heaven, or on earth, or under the earth that was able to open the book, neither to look thereon, and then, naturally enough, he "wept much." But what is the result of the elders sitting round the throne? Do they weep? Are they disturbed by it? No, not any more than they were by the thunderings; for with the utmost calmness and composure they at once say, "weep not." Could they doubt Christ as being the appointed Heir of all things? Certainly not. That was a settled thing, and more than this, they knew Christ as the Lion of the tribe of Judah: the lion, denoting power - the having full power to take the inheritance. But the elders knew what redemption was, and therefore to them it was a peaceful, settled thing that this "Lion" had all power to open the book and to loose the seven seals thereof, to unfold and fulfil the counsels of God, and to bear the glory. The two things that most peculiarly belong to Christ, are power and wisdom - "Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of God"; and He makes the church to participate in His wisdom, for "He is made unto us wisdom," etc., and He will give her to share His power. We see this order beautifully maintained in the history of Joseph: when in the prison, God gave him wisdom to interpret dreams; and afterwards we find him at the right hand of the throne of the king, exercising all power. So, likewise, the church will share the power with Christ, for she will reign with Him, and will be the sharer with Him in everything, the essential glory of the Godhead excepted. Our proper portion now is not power (I am not here speaking of spiritual power to overcome evil), but now is the time for the church to manifest wisdom in the understanding of the ways of God; having the Holy Ghost, who, as the Lord said, shall guide into all truth; but this must be through the written word, as the written word of God is the only depository of the truth of God. Therefore, it is the great instrument in the hand of God for communicating this knowledge through the teaching of the Holy Ghost, although at the same time He may be pleased to make use of various channels to accomplish it. Thus we see that where there is the desire in the heart according to God's mind, He cannot fail to satisfy that desire. If the desire is expressed, even to weeping, it is infallibly answered with a "weep not"; for this reason, that Christ has done that which will enable the mind of God to be communicated to every seeking soul. But this could not be before Christ came, as the Lord Himself says, "Blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear, for many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them." But the moment the work of redemption was accomplished, and Jesus sat down at the right hand of God, the Holy Ghost was sent down in testimony of the acceptance of the work and Person of the risen Man, now in glory. And, therefore, now, whenever there is a desire in the heart according to God, it is always met and answered in the power of the Holy Ghost; for if Christ is revealed, then it is God's mind that we "should grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ." But then there must be a lowly mind to receive it: "The meek will he guide in judgment, the meek will he teach his way."

184 "Behold the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David, hath prevailed to open the book." In the first place we get here the special definite counsels of God, as to the centre of His purposes on the earth. Judah was the one in whom the promises were centered. When Jacob blessed his sons, he said, "Judah, thou art he whom thy brethren shall praise," Gen. 49: 8. The general promise at the beginning was, "the seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head." Then all was vested in Abraham's seed, "In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." The line became narrower and narrower, Judah was chosen from amongst his brethren, and last of all, the family of David; as it is said of the Lord, "He shall sit upon the throne of his father David." It is not a throne in heaven, as governing creation, but a throne set up on the earth, to govern the earth. "When the Most High divided to the heathen their inheritance, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel." He is called the Lion of the tribe of Judah, because it is by power that He will accomplish God's counsels. He is the "Root of David." David, looked at as a type, and as a responsible man, had failed, and his family failed also; and this has always been the way whenever God has put man in a place of trust. But God cannot fail, and He must raise up a seed to David according to His promise. At the end of the book we see the Lord spoken of as the Offspring of David, as well as the Root, but before He can be manifested as the Offspring, He must be proved the Root. For He is the root and source of all the promises of God. In Him they are "yea, and amen," whether for the church of God, or for Israel. If David bears fruit of blessing, he is not the root, though he may be the stem; if he bears fruit, it must be through Him who is the root.

185 The Lord meanwhile, takes another character, that of the Lamb. "In the midst of the throne stood a Lamb, as it had been slain" - the poor lowly one with the marks of humiliation. "As the sheep before his shearer is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth." In the "Lamb as it had been slain," we find the Lord taking up a dispensational character, because of redemption; and thus we find Him as the lowly, uncomplaining, unresisting sufferer, in a world of sinners, and that is where real power is found. It is the same for us now; we dwell where evil prevails, and it is our place to suffer as Christ suffered, to have discernment between right and wrong, and to suffer, rather than yield for a moment to the evil. "In the midst of the throne stood a Lamb." Although He was the suffering Lamb as regards the earth, still His real place was upon the throne itself. How blessed is the thought that Christ fills all things! If I go down into the lower parts of the earth, I find Him there. If I reach up to the throne of heaven I find Him there; and not only as God, but as the One dealing with good and evil. What a blessed thing it is to find all this in the One who is so near to us! He who said, "I am among you as he that serveth," He who washed the disciples' feet, is not going to cease to serve them; although He could not continue in companionship with them, He serves them still; yea, He will yet "come forth and serve them." He who was one with the Father, to whom as the Son, God had given everything, humbled Himself to be the servant! How blessed to see our full and perfect association with all that love and righteousness could bring! Oh! it is a solemn thought that there is no place in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, that is not filled with the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, except indeed in one sad exception, that of the heart of the poor, wretched, unbelieving sinner. There is no place from Calvary to the throne of God, that is not filled with the love and righteousness of God, as manifested in Christ; and if we could always give ourselves up to the knowledge of this, what quiet peace of heart should we enjoy! The very peace of God Himself would be keeping us, for we could get into no place or circumstances, sorrow or suffering, but we should find Christ there; and, as we were remarking, if Christ be between our hearts and the suffering, instead of the suffering getting between our hearts and Christ, we shall find the place of suffering to be the best place on the face of the earth for us, as all suffering will then bring us nearer to Christ. There is no middle place. The bodies of those beasts, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned without the camp; Heb. 12: 11-13. You must take up the cross outside, if you get the heavenly place inside. There was a veil over God for Israel, but we have liberty to enter into the holiest of all by the blood of Jesus. The veil is done away in Christ, and to us it is the throne and temple up there, and the cross and the Lamb down here. Those who are in heavenly association with a risen Christ must have the cross down here, because we are alive and accepted within the veil. All that is precious is there. The church is brought to see sin as God sees it - brought into the light as God is in the light, and, being cleansed from sin, gets into the sanctuary through the rent veil. That is our proper and only place, the earth being entirely shut out from us, excepting we are just strangers and pilgrims through this wilderness world. And just in proportion as we practically know the cross down here, will be our enjoyment of fellowship with Christ up there in heavenly places. Light fills up all the space between the cross and the glory. There is no possible place that we can get into but we shall find Christ there; for to simple, single-eyed faith there is no spot between the cross and the glory, be it earth, or be it heaven, that is not filled with Christ.

187 When John gets into this church-understanding (as we may call it), he sees a "Lamb as it had been slain"; and he sees power given to the Lamb, for in seven horns and seven eyes we have the perfection of power and all-seeing wisdom which is given to the Lamb, before a single seal is opened. And before we get the unfolding of God's purposes, we have the presentation of the Person of His Son. It is just this in God's dealings with a soul: the eye of the soul being fixed on the Person of Christ is the way in which it gets peace; as before you can get peace of soul through the work of Christ, your eye must have rested on the Person of Christ. It was so with the thief on the cross, with the poor woman of the city who was a sinner, who stood at His feet weeping. The soul must first be fixed upon the Person of Him who has made the peace, before there is the knowledge of the work which has wrought the peace. Before it all and after it all, it is Himself that is presented.

"No one was found worthy." None could touch or even dare to look upon the book, until the Lamb, so to speak, had filled his eye. And this is that that gives peace and steadiness to the soul while searching into prophecy; for if you get into prophecy without Christ, you may be able to understand it, but it will be the mere result of the rambling of an unsanctified mind; but if you learn it with Christ, you will find Him the key to the whole thing; for if He is the centre, He is also the key to the glory about to be revealed; and if you thus learn prophecy in connection with Christ, it will be to the glory of God.

"A Lamb, having seven horns and seven eyes which are the seven spirits of God, sent forth into all the earth." It is not said here ten or twelve. The number "seven" denotes divine perfection; the number twelve denotes human perfection in its administrative power - there were twelve apostles, and twelve patriarchs. The seven eyes shew the wisdom which sees everything, and the seven horns denote power. A horn is used throughout scripture as a symbol of power, whether in speaking of an individual or a kingdom. We will now refer to a few passages as shewing the importance of the expression, "seven eyes." The perfect harmony of this blessed book is a wonderful testimony (were it needed) to its divine origin, as no human skill or intellect could have preserved the connection between passages written 2,000 years apart. But we see the secret of it is, that the divine mind is running throughout the whole of scripture. (See 2 Chron. 16: 9). "The eyes of the Lord run to and fro through the whole earth, to shew himself strong in the behalf of those whose heart is perfect towards him." Simply rely on the Lord in everything, just to do His will quietly, and He will shew Himself strong on your behalf. Then in Zechariah 3: 9, "Upon one stone shall be seven eyes." It was the figure of the establishment of God's authority in Jerusalem. Then in Zechariah 4: 10, "The eyes of the Lord [not in Zion merely, but going further out] which run to and fro throughout the whole earth."Besides seeing the general truth of the providential vision of God, we see that in a future time, when the true branch is introduced, perfection is established in Jerusalem as the centre of peace and blessing. Then these seven eyes will be established in Jerusalem as the centre of peace and blessing. Meanwhile God is dealing with the earth, taking notice of everything, and manifesting His power in governing all things. And our place and portion is not that of power, but that of suffering with Christ. "If we suffer with him, we shall also reign with him." But in Revelation 5 we find these eyes of God in the midst of the throne in heaven. We hear nothing about the Father with the children, nor Christ as the Head of the body, with the members; but it is the rejected Lamb upon the throne of judgment in heaven, as He is not yet come forth to take His earthly throne, but on the throne of judgment "set in heaven," having these eyes of wisdom and intelligence to unfold all God's purposes.

188 Now, then, having the Person of the Lamb set before us, we get Him taking the book; and what a picture of full peaceful power (full power is always peaceful) when He takes all the purposes of God to unfold and accomplish them! It was not so when He took the cup of trembling; then He said, "Now is my soul troubled, and what shall I say?" And in order that the blessed purposes of God towards us might be fulfilled, He passed through that dreadful hour, the very thought of which made Him say, "My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even unto death." He came under the full power of the wrath of God, for our full, perfect, and eternal blessing. It is the same Lamb in the midst of the throne, that drank the cup of wrath to the very dregs, that there might not be left one drop of sorrow, or trouble for those who know Him, which enabled Him as the slain Lamb, and at the same time, as the wisdom of God and the power of God, to take the book and unfold and accomplish all the deep purposes therein contained (v. 8-10).

189Here we have "kings and priests" again - "they sing a new song." It is not here the celebration of the praises of God in creation, but in redemption, for it is in connection with the slain Lamb. If the glory of the Lord God Almighty as Creator, brought out worship, so is the praise of the Lamb in redemption adequate to call it forth. If the display of the majesty of God brought out worship without fear, so here the same who were fit to worship His majesty, have their hearts' affections and thoughts called forth by the display of the glory of the Lamb. It is a blessed thought that He that descended so low for us, has the adoration of the whole mind of heaven; and having made us kings and priests, we have communion with the mind of heaven, even now; and mark how immediately this connects itself with our daily walk. If I were a Jew, I should want a priest; but I am a Christian, and therefore I could never so far disown redemption as to say that I want a priest; for I am a priest, and we have a great High Priest, who is "higher than the heavens," so that we go at once to the throne of grace, for through Him we have access by one Spirit unto the Father. If I have got Christ, He is God; and never let me lose sight of this one blessed truth, that I am brought to God. Anything but Christ allowed to come between my soul and God, dims Him before my eyes. He is the great High Priest; and we enter, because He enters, into the very holiest of all; so that we are more than mere priests, for they never got beyond the holy place, but we have boldness to enter into the holy place, because Jesus is there, and we degrade the efficacy of the work of Jesus, if our hearts do not go straight up to God Himself, in testimony to the value of the blood of Christ. All was adoration here, and with a free heart. A child is at liberty with its father; it will reverence its father, but its heart is free before him, not fearing and trembling as to what will please him. It should be so with us before God. His love is as perfect as His glory; and if He brings us near to adore, He will bring our hearts near in the confidence of the love that has brought us there.

190 Verse 9. "Thou art worthy, to take the book, and to open the seven seals thereof." Here as in the former chapter we have the intelligence of the elders brought out - full, blessed, intelligent worship indicated by the expression, "For thou wast slain and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood." Now mark, besides the titles of Christ, as Creator, as man, as the Son of God, we get here the grand thing which is brought out the moment the "slain Lamb" appears, which is redemption. And it is redemption that calls forth new praise, as it is redemption that displays everything that God is. Do I think of the holiness that cannot bear sin? I see it there; of love to sinners? I see it there; of the justice that must punish sin? I see it there. I see God fully glorified in this book, whether in His love, holiness, majesty, grace, judgment against sin, all has been fully met as well as brought out in this grand work of redemption. The Son is equally glorified also, for if Adam had never sinned in eating the fruit, he would have gone on in innocence; but what would that obedience have been compared with Christ's, which was obedience to death, even the death of the cross? Then see the entire devotedness of Jesus; and we have God glorified in Him. "Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him"; and all the other titles of Christ find their full display and development in redemption. How infinitely higher are God's thoughts than ours! They write folly and confusion upon every thought of man. For while men were saying, "Ah, so would we have it," and their enmity to God's Son was displayed by their nailing Him to the cross, at that very moment the love of God rose to the highest; for when man was insulting Christ to the very uttermost, then it was that salvation was accomplished. God's love rose above man's wickedness, without in the least degree lowering the standard of God's holiness: when sin was carried to the uttermost pitch in the crucifixion of Christ that only served to bring out more prominently and give freer exercise to that divine love which was at that very moment saving lost sinners.

Thus while we have seen the character of the Lion of the tribe of Judah to have been fully maintained, God never giving up one iota of His justice and holiness, and at the same time through His wondrous wisdom, by the very rejection of the Lion of the tribe of Judah, poor sinners of the Gentiles are brought in. The gifts and calling of God are without repentance; therefore Israel will be restored according to His word. But meanwhile, He is bringing in Jews and Gentiles in a heavenly way. Redemption does not set aside the Lion of the tribe of Judah as the future source of blessing to Israel, but all kindreds of the earth must celebrate His praises in redemption.

191"And hast made us unto our God kings and priests," etc. We see here two things, royalty and priesthood. Besides the joy of being with God, as we have seen, we are also the nearest to God in power and worship. As the kingship brings us nearest to God in power, and the priesthood brings us nearest to God in worship, it is the blessed Person of Christ, the slain Lamb, that introduces poor sinners into such high and blessed privileges; for Christ being made King and Priest, we also are made kings and priests. All that Christ is made we are made, in Him now in the day of grace, and with Him then in the day of glory. We have the joy of this even now in our souls when walking close to God; but being still in bodies of sin and death, and thus still linked to the old creation, we groan being burdened: the presence of evil makes us groan. But when the throne is set in heaven, it will be for the deliverance of all that is now under the bondage of corruption, into the glorious liberty of the children of God - not the liberty of grace, but the liberty of glory. Now the souls of those who believe are brought into the liberty of grace, and in the glory we shall be delivered from the body in which we now groan. Now it is the power of the Holy Ghost sustaining us against the streams of evil, but then it will be the exercise of divine power setting the evil aside. The Lord will reign then. If the Lord were ruling in direct dominion now, should we have all the misery and wretchedness that is around us on every hand? God does reign in one sense now, and in a most blessed sense for His children, for the very hairs of our head are all numbered. Yet now, as it is said, "One event happeneth alike to all, the righteous and the wicked." But when Christ comes in power to take the universal dominion as the Son of man, He will discern between the righteous and the wicked, the evil and the good. Then the wicked will not prosper. The sun of grace has arisen in our hearts, and now it is given to the righteous to suffer for Christ's sake. But when the Sun of Righteousness ariseth on the earth, when power comes in, in direct dominion, then a man shall be a covert from the storm. Now man does not know where to find a hiding-place. "The dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of cruelty."

But then the earth will rejoice in the fruit of the reign of Christ. Now we are to suffer with Christ, then we shall reign with Him. "When the heavens do rule," then the saints of the Most High take the kingdom and reign with Christ. We are not to be reigned over, but to reign with Him. Our joy will be in and with Christ, but our official place will be reigning with Him.

192 Verses 11, 12. "The voice of many angels saying, Worthy is the Lamb," etc. We do not find the same measure of intelligence in the angels as in the elders. The angels do celebrate the glory and honour and worthiness of the Lamb, but we do not find them using that little word "for," as was used by the elders, first, in connection with creation, "For thou hast created all things," etc.; secondly, in connection with redemption, "For thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God," etc. The church is much nearer to God than angels, being one with Christ, and our bodies the temples of the Holy Ghost. This can never be said of an angel, although they are infinitely above us as creatures. "They excel in strength and hearken to the voice of his word." Christ never died for an angel, and therefore took not on Him the nature of angels, but was made man for sinners; nor did He send the Holy Ghost to angels; and though they excel in strength, and as creatures are greater in power, still what is this to the display of His grace to a sinner? It is in redemption that God is fully glorified, and therefore it is that the redeemed ones get the nearest place to God, because in them redemption is unfolded. What amazing grace it is that could take up vile, depraved sinners that we are, and place us nearer the throne than those holy ones that never sinned, and always do His will!  - "that in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness towards us through Christ Jesus." Ought not our hearts to be moved by this? We cannot understand the loving-kindness of God, if we do not know the value of redemption. Affections flow from the apprehension of it, and praise will be the result. The lispings of a babe are acceptable. But our hearts ought to be able to tell an angel what Christ has done for us, and why He is so precious to us. We shall be associated with Himself in the very presence of the glory of God. The angels are round about the throne. They know what power and blessing mean, for they ascribe it to Him who sits upon the throne. They see the glory of the Person of the Lamb; but they know nothing of redemption. That word never comes out of their lips. How wonderfully we see that everything has its place in the counsels of God!

193 In verse 13 we see creation joining the full and universal chorus, ascribing glory to Him who sits upon the throne. They are in everlasting companionship with that divine glory. Not only do they worship Christ as God, but as the Lamb. It is as that glorified Man that they acknowledge His Lordship. He is "God over all" truly, but takes a peculiar glory as Son of man, and this peculiar glory that Christ has got by redemption, will never be dimmed. As the Lamb He will always have it. Praise to the Lamb for ever and ever! The very one whom we have loved, whom we have seen with our eyes by faith, whom we have handled as the Word of life, will be the object of eternal and unceasing adoration. What a thought it is! And we learn what the thoughts and counsels of God about us have been, when we see this company in the everlasting glory. He who became as one of ourselves; He who stooped to take the lowest place, and as having no sin to be made sin for us, is there as the universal object of praise. The place peculiar to the church will be that of worship. It is a most blessed scene! The great thing that our hearts should rest upon, is the blessed character of the counsels of God as regards the church, for we see the church to be so thoroughly identified with Christ, that the moment God is going to bring in judgments for Christ, we find it has its place with Him in heaven. If the church is His body, His bride, He cannot leave it behind, it being the fulness of Him who filleth all in all. There is no unfolding of the book, no sound or sign of that judgment which is to be brought in, until we have been in perfect peace around the throne, before the Lamb, praising for redemption, that glorious, wonderful work of redemption. And while the rolling tide of judgment sweeps along, and like the deluge, rises higher and higher, until there be not one mountain-top left uncovered to escape upon, what we have to do is to sing of the glory of that redemption, which has delivered us from the wrath to come. The Lord grant us to find in those things which redemption has wrought out, not merely peace of soul, but understanding of all God's counsels of glory about the Lamb who has accomplished it all.

Fragmentary Thoughts on Revelation

J. N. Darby.

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{For the remaining papers in this series, the reader is referred to the Editor's Note, Vol. 12, page 1. They are mainly notes of Addresses, not known to have been revised by the Author, save where this is specially indicated.}

Revelation 6 and 7

The ways of God with the church and with the world are always intended to have a practical application to our own individual souls. The expectation of the coming of the Lord changes the moral bearing of everything. There may be many a detail we are incompetent to explain, but we get from God a positive revelation which gives another aspect to all else. "The wise shall understand." Knowledge is not given for the sake of mere increase, but to "profit withal." There are general principles which set the church right on many things. If I have been working for the conversion of the world through the spread of the gospel, what a different thought is presented in the three unclean spirits, like frogs, gathering the whole world together to fight against God!

In teaching we never should say anything that we did not feel to be God's mind; and even then, of course, we might be mistaken in what we believed to be true. A great question has been raised as to the prophetic part of this book. Does it apply to the whole period of the church of God, from the beginning onward to the close; or does it give the character of God's dealings with the earth in the great crisis in which the church is not involved at all after the first chapters? I feel quite clear that it is not about the church, but about the world. The book is given to the church, but it does not in the strictly prophetic parts apply to the church. This part shews us the elders looking down from heaven, seeing things which are going to happen to others, not to themselves. It is a history of God's future dealings with the earth.

When Abraham was on the mountain, God came and told him what was going to happen on the plain, things in which he himself was not at all concerned. This thought is of great importance, because, with the thought of being in the judgments, no wonder we should be like the men spoken of in Luke 21, whose hearts fail for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth. "Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked," Psalm 91. When Abraham rose in the morning (blessed morning for us!) and saw the smoke of the cities going up, where was he? On the mountain, where he had stood before the Lord, and where the Lord had talked with him. Our place is not like Noah, floating on the waters while the judgments are abroad. For him it was a question of being moved with fear and preparing an ark to the saving of his house; but we are destined by grace to be as Enoch, after walking with God here, looking down from heaven on things below. He prophesied of the Lord coming "with ten thousand of his saints"; but his own portion was on high. There will be a remnant on earth saved as by fire through the judgments; but this is not the church. What a place this puts the heavenly saints into! What a character it gives to the Christian who should be ever expecting Christ! We are not of the world, even as Christ was not of the world; we are quickened and risen with Him. By-and-by we are to be caught up in our place as associated with Christ, before He visits the earth to make inquisition for the blood that has been shed from righteous Abel to the blood of Zacharias. What God is going to do upon the earth is not our happiest study, but it helps to keep our affections set on the right objects. The Christian can say to those who are busying themselves about the politics, the riches, the hopes, the improvements, of the world, See where your world is going to end! it is not my world at all. There may be a carnal seeking for detail in the study of this book, but to know these things from God solemnises the heart, and puts the world into its proper background as a doomed system. God does communicate His purposes to us now, as He did of old, to Abraham.

195 In chapter 6 we have the course of the six seals. At the seventh trumpet the whole thing finishes; chap. 11: 18. The scene in chapter 10 is parenthetical; it has this place given in the general history, but it is the last great scene, which is afterwards more fully unfolded. It shews Christ's title to dominion and power. From chapter 11: 19, to the end of chapter 14, we have a series of subjects. In chapter 12 is disclosed the secret agency, or the dramatis personae, as men say. The springs and source of all the evil, and the hidden cause of the final crisis are here explained. Chapter 13 gives the providential instrumentality under the instigation of Satan in the worldly and the religious powers. Chapter 14 is God's dealing in judgment with respect to all these, and in testimony, with the results also. Chapter 15 is another scene altogether. The sea of glass mingled with fire shews us the martyrdom of the faithful remnant. With this is connected chapters 16 in which the vials, which are God's wrath, are filled up and poured out. Then we have in chapter 17 and 18, Babylon connected with the beast, and her judgment. Above, we see in chapter 19 the marriage of the Lamb, and then the Lamb coming to execute His judgment, preparatory to the closing scene of blessing on the earth during the millennium, followed by the eternal state.

196 To get the moral influence and right understanding of these things, it is most important to remember that the church is a heavenly body connected with the Lamb in heaven. I believe there has been, in a certain measure, a lengthened accomplishment of the opening of the seals. This is a general principle in scripture. Thus our Lord could say, "If ye will believe it, this was Elias which was for to come." John said, "even now are there many antichrists," but this was in no wise the fulfilment of all that was true about the Antichrist. It was not yet the person, but it was evil and error which had the moral stamp of him who was coming. Antichrist is the great characteristic of the "last times," growing out of the corruption of the last good thing that God brought in before judgment. When the heavenly thing that God sent into the world, was, as a dispensation, spoiled, Antichrist entered. "He is the Antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son"; he also denies that Jesus is the Christ. It is the activity of the false spirit, instead of the true. Could anything more be revealed than the Father and the Son? The presence of many antichrists was not the accomplishment of the coming of Antichrist, but it was and is a state which answers in spirit and character to it. When such a state is tried to be proved to be the full accomplishment (as in the historical scheme), Christ is not put in His right place in connection with it all. But, from this book doubtless, we may discern the elements of all that evil which will hereafter be ripened - the principles now, but not the accomplishment till by-and-by. The spirit of Babylon is in Popery: but Popery exclusively is not Babylon. We go morally wrong as to what God is about, if we do not keep in view the great end which He is unfolding in the Revelation, namely, the introduction of Christ into the world as the "First-begotten," and this, too, as the "Faithful Witness," after the failure of the church to be the true witness.

The great thing is to know, by God's teaching, what God is occupied with. Suppose David had gone and put the ark into the tabernacle after Ichabod had been written upon it, it would not have been piety, however it might have been thought so; to do so, would have been like going back and saying, "It is not Ichabod." God was going to supplant the tabernacle and set up the temple. The ark had been carried into captivity, and God had let it go. How could it have gone into captivity without Him? as David says, "He forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh, and delivered. his strength into captivity, his glory into the enemies' hand" (Ps. 78: 60, 61), and this because He had given up the people. This is all simple to him who understands. "The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but those that are revealed belong to us." If a person is not spiritual, he cannot understand: he has no moral or spiritual power to discern God's mind. But where there is spiritual discernment, things get simple and clear as daylight. "The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him, and he will shew them his covenant." Where there is the fear of the Lord, there will be the understanding of His word and mind. But the word of God will not be simple without subjection to Him.

197 We will now turn to the progress of the evil as it will be in the latter day. The first thing is the general providential coming in of trouble and sorrow. Symbols are a regular language, conveying certain universal ideas. It is important we should be clear as to the abstract principle. The sun, for instance, used in scripture continually, as a symbol means supreme power. It is said, "the sun of righteousness shall arise," etc.; but it may not be always used for Christ. Sometimes it may be used of God's enemy; Ezek. 32: 7. It simply means the ruler of a given system. Trees, thus employed, signify the greatest in a kingdom as distinguished from the grass. The horse denotes imperial power in aggressive exercise; and a white horse is that power victorious. Thus victorious, subjugating power, whether of Christ, or Antichrist, etc., might be represented as a white horse. Other features enter and decide who is meant.

In chapter 6: 2, the rider on the white horse goes forth conquering and to conquer. Then war comes on (v. 4). Then comes a "black horse": here we see anxiety as to provisions. The colour denotes mourning. Verse 8, is the "pale horse." It is distress among nations, closing in with God's accumulating judgments, famine, etc. - what He calls His "four sore judgments" in Ezekiel. Then the fifth seal opens to us what has been going on in the earth. It is a very definite scene. We see the souls of those who had been slain like victims for God; therefore they are under the altar of burnt-offering. Mark what they say, for this shews who they are: they cry for vengeance. They who have been killed for God at the time meant are in the spirit of retribution. They have not the blessed hope of being taken up to glory, but they cry, "How long dost thou not avenge our blood, on them that dwell on the earth?" They had been mixed up with the dwellers upon earth; they have suffered from them, and it is upon these they cry for judgment. It is a blessed thing to see divine deliverance from the power of evil on the earth. In Psalm 94 we see the same thing, in a lower measure, but the same spirit. "O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, shew thyself . . . . Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee?" God was going to set up the throne at Jerusalem, and these godly ones caught the tone of the coming day. We do not say, "How long shall the wicked triumph?" (though we anticipate in spirit the Lord's setting aside of evil) but, How long before Thou takest us to Thyself? How long before Thou takest Thy bride to be with Thee in heaven? The difference is very great, and so are the practical results in communion and ways. And mark another thing, They are told that they must wait. They find their place, and the white robe is given them, but they have to wait until others are killed, and the number fulfilled (that is, those who would not worship the beast, chapter 15). They have thus a partial answer, but not a full one yet. The sentence of judgment is not executed yet, because iniquity is not filled up to the uttermost. They are getting the silent fruit of righteousness and their place above, but not judgment, because there is a distinct epoch to come in before. In chapter 20: 4, the other class is completed, and then there can be judgment to the uttermost.

198 As to verses 12, etc., this is not the appearing of the Lord, which is much more terrible, as we see in Revelation 1: 7; ch. 19: 18. He will come like lightning, and His presence thus will be worse than all the earthquakes that ever were. He will come to tread His enemies Himself; whereas verse 12 described one of a series of providential events which awakens the uneasy dread of that day. They are panic-struck. Everything that seemed steady and stable is moved and overturned; and this not merely among the crowd. The "stars of heaven" here are the powers of the world, the symbols of subordinate governments. The kings of the earth and the great men hide themselves from the face of Him, that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb. But it is not the Lord who tells them He is coming; their consciences utter this in their terror. Here is a plain proof that the seventh seal is not yet opened; the wrath of God not filled up. But we get the close of God's providential dealings with the earth. Then follows the public, open history of the Roman imperial world, that would be set up. Last of all, the final blasphemy of the beast against God must be dealt with in judgment.

199 Before the judgment comes out, the Lord shews His saints all cared for. In the first eight verses of chapter 7 we see the sealing of the elect 144,000 of Israel 12 being a mystic number). In verse 9, onwards, we see the countless company out of every nation under heaven. These are distinct from the elders who have intelligence. One of the elders says, "these are they which come out of the great tribulation." The church always has intelligence. "We have the mind of Christ." What are the blessings of this remnant? Simply relief. They have neither joy nor intelligence like the elders. It would be a great comfort to have rest in this way, but that is all. They have been through tribulation, and they shall now have no more of it; but we do not find them filled with the Spirit, worshipping in the fulness of joy: "Thou art worthy," etc. By-and-by will be fulfilled in the crisis of the world the time of Jacob's trouble; but he shall be delivered out of it. So will these Gentiles also. They cry, "Salvation to our God which sitteth on the throne and unto the Lamb." This is to me a proof that it is not the church here speaking, for there is nothing of the Father. The place and character given to their salvation is that it is from God upon the throne. It is real salvation, of course, but of a different character. It is not they who go in with Christ into the Father's house, or are coming with Christ to the judgment. It is the throne of judgment, and God has delivered them from the great tribulation: "Therefore are they before the throne of God," and "God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes." In the gospel we may say God is doing all this for us now; He wipes away all tears from their eyes, and gives rest to our hearts now. Tears we may have for others, but not for ourselves. The saints are going in triumph to heaven; they even sit with Christ in the heavenly places, while here. They have got nearer to God in a different revelation from this. They have lived near Christ - members of His body; in an atmosphere which this language will not suit.

200 How much our hearts should seek while seeing God's government and care, to get into the peaceful, happy consciousness of the place that Christ has given us; that our souls may live in the enjoyment of our common portion in Christ. It is not vengeance we look for, or such deliverance as this, but Himself. The soul, knowing this, has a quiet, happy, peaceful sphere, separated from all around. It does not want the world, nor the things of the world. It can say, "I know whom I have believed." "To depart and be with Christ is far better," not for a term to our sorrow, but that the very radiance of Christ may shine in full power into the soul. Stephen, looking up, saw heaven opened, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God. It is a terrible world we are passing through: vanity that attracts the flesh, and misery that rakes the heart. But in Christ we get that which makes the vanity tinsel. When Jesus walked through the world He saw nothing but trouble and misery in it, while He came to bring in blessing: "He was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief." Alas! for the man who is not this, but finds pleasure in vanity, and that which is contrary to Christ. It is not with ill-will, not with scorn, that the saint looks at this poor world, but his heart is weaned from it, and he does not want it. A heart that is weaned from the world can pity what is great in it, if Christ is not known, and can comfort where there is sorrow, because he can speak of Christ as the remedy who came to pour oil and wine into the rent sin has made: he can pity what is great, because it is not Christ, and he can comfort what is sorrowful because it is Christ. Let us seek to get through this world in His spirit and mind, carrying Him with us.

Revelation 11 and 12

We find ourselves here in the midst of Jewish circumstances, not earthquakes, horsemen, etc., as before, but the ark, the covenant, Moses and Elias testimony, etc. The reason is simple, namely, the government of the earth is connected with Israel. Israel is the centre of Gentile blessing and judgment. The church is in heavenly places with Christ, but the object round which all God's ways on earth centre is Israel (See Deut. 32: 8.) There we see the grand centre round which He portioned the nations at first. (See also verse 15.) They forgot God, His anger is stirred, He scattered them among their enemies. Then, verse 36, the Lord turns His hand again upon them for good. He has mercy on His heritage, and then judges the Gentiles. (Read to verse 43.) To this point of the history we have now arrived; but the subject of Revelation is judgment upon the apostate part of the Gentiles, not the Gentiles generally. It is where the light shined and has been rejected. Here in the true sense of the word are adversaries, and we have to notice the rebellious character of this apostasy, and Jew, Gentile and church of God (so-called) are in open opposition to Him who has the right to reign. The time will come when there will be only a passive testimony for God, in those who refuse to worship the beast; and as the iniquity ripens, there will be no testimony for God at all, when those who are in Judea will flee to the mountains.

201 Let us turn and see in this chapter 11 the condition in which Israel will be in that day, then the Gentiles themselves, and the testimony of God to them then. When God begins to measure in this way (v. 1), there is something to measure, but there is something left out: God says, there is something I own as My portion. First, those who are worshippers are taken account of, those who have a priestly character; they are not going with the multitude, but are within. All this language is connected with Jews; the locality is the holy place, properly so called, and the people are those who own the true God, and all the rest is given up to the Gentiles; the holy city is given up to be trodden down of the profane.

Verse 3. God has a witness. It is not the gospel but His power over the earth. It is not the same testimony now, for He is gathering out a people to be to the praise of the glory of His grace. In these witnesses, we see there are not only those in priestly character, but prophets, and they are in sorrow - they prophesy in sack-cloth: opposition is their portion, and it is for a limited period.

Daniel 9: 24. Bear in mind that Israel were to be cast aside until he saw what the end would be. In Daniel we never find the blessing fully given. Daniel is in the place of a remnant, and sees the blessing just about to be brought in. Millennial blessedness is not yet come. Here the thing closes at sixty-nine weeks, the last week is wanting. Afterwards the prince comes, not Messiah, but the anti-messiah for the overspreading, etc. He will make alliance with the Jews (the first half-week), and in the midst will be the overspreading of desolation, utter desolation comes in because of this idolatry or abomination in Israel. Idolatry will come in to Israel (Isa. 66: 17), sanctifying themselves behind one tree in the midst, etc. There is an interval, how long we know not ("it is not for you to know the times and the seasons") between the rejection of Christ and His coming again; Dan. 11. Desolations are determined, the history of the evil is narrated, the ships of Chittim shall come; and in verse 33 of that chapter, the expression "days" alludes to the present - it is a picture of what is going on, and we are now in the unlimited period signified by the expression "days." The week, which remains to be fulfilled after the interval, is taken up in the Revelation.

202 The mission of the two witnesses (Rev. 11) is not to preach the gospel, but they come with the testimony that Christ is Lord of the earth. There is a God that judgeth in the earth. It is true that God's eternal righteousness is connected with the Man in heaven, for the only righteous One has been rejected from earth and accepted in heaven, and now the angels are learning the manifold wisdom of God through the church, His body, down here. Then He will turn round and shew that He has a right on the earth, and He will not give it up. Then He says to His people as in Isaiah, "Come ye into your chambers," etc. This claim the men of the earth will not hear, and as soon as God gives His two witnesses leave, they devour them with fire (v. 5).

There is an allusion to Zechariah in the account of these two witnesses. Zechariah shews how this is all set up in order in Israel (Zech. 4): the candlestick of gold and a bowl on the top of it, and its seven lamps thereon, and everything is in its place. The source of the two olive-trees is shewn - Christ in Melchisedec order, ministering the oil; shewing that Jehovah takes the name of God over all the earth, maintaining the brilliancy of the testimony, and the Jewish people as the candle of God's government. In Revelation we do not get the establishment of them on the earth, and therefore there is opposition: it is the time which precedes their establishment We find that the character of the testimony of these two witnesses is judgment: "let favour be shewed to the wicked, yet will he not learn righteousness" - there are two witnesses, "that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established." Verse 5, there is present, living, manifest power against the people that oppose them. Elijah-power is first, and what was that? The testimony of God in an apostate people. Moses-power is last; turning everything into death. As the Mosaic plagues characterised the testimony in the midst of an oppressed Israel, so when they are captive amongst the Gentiles in the last days, there will be the same kind of testimony. Then as soon as the Lord has given an adequate testimony, they are given over to believe a lie: there is power from beneath permitted to influence them. The beast comes out with Satanic power. All power comes down from heaven. "The powers that be are ordained of God," magistrates, etc.; even Pilate's power to crucify Jesus was of God, as the Lord said, "Thou couldst have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above." But the question is, what use did he make of it? But in the day that is coming, after the witnesses are removed, the power will come from beneath, from the devil.

203 The judgment then becomes alarming, and after the Spirit of God has raised up the witnesses, and they have ascended to heaven, the remnant being affrighted (not converted) give glory to the God of heaven. But it is too late. No wonder the Lord says of that time, it is such as never was, and except those days should be shortened there should no flesh be saved. These prophets tormented them that dwell on earth; the "remnant are affrighted." There is alarm at the judgments disclosed, but no reception of the testimony. There is zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. The Jews had this before, and how did they shew it? By killing the disciples and thinking they were doing God service, because they knew neither the Father nor the Son. There was nothing but the fruit of alarm in them, as in Judas when he went and hanged himself. They give glory to the God of heaven, but they should have given glory to Him as God of the earth.' We see in the chapter a very special definite form of evil and also of good, and the centre is Jerusalem.

In the seventh trumpet nothing is entered into, because it is the opening of the seven vials. Faith anticipates the blessing coming - no woe here. He is going positively to reign, and have things His own way. Would God have such a world as this is now, if He had taken to Himself His great power and reigned? His patient grace is being exercised, but not His right to reign asserted. The nations are angry, and that is what His coming produces. "Thy wrath is come." They see the whole result of God's taking all into His own hand. If the wrath is come, who are the objects of it? (v. 18).

204 The last verse of this chapter is connected with chapter 12 and in it we get two things: the ark of His covenant symbolical of God's faithfulness to Israel; and earthquakes and judgments on the earth.

The outline of chapter 12 shews the same thing as we have noticed in others: God's purpose of bringing in the First-begotten into the world. We must know the value of the symbols, to be able to understand the language at all. The sun always means supreme power - the woman is clothed with sovereign power. Christ is to be born of her - clearly not of the church. The church is the woman out of the man, but Christ is the man out of the woman. The church is the Eve, the woman taken out of the man. Here we have the man born of the woman, and it is a far more blessed thing to be in the position of the church than of this woman. But Christ was born of Israel. The moon is seen under her feet: all the passing phases which have been her glory are all done with - Judaism in its old form is gone completely. The twelve stars are all its administrative power in perfection, subordinate power.

Verse 3 has in it the principle of strength out of weakness. It is the Roman Empire historically, but literally Satan's power. It has ten horns, not seven, and not the human administrative perfection of twelve. The child that is to rule does nothing at all, being caught up to God, and the woman who is to be the centre of God's power is hidden in the wilderness. The church is included in the Man, all through the Old Testament; Isaiah 50, etc.

Satan's being deprived of a place in heaven, causes him to stir up war on earth (v. 12). There is war in heaven first, and then Satan is cast out and makes war on earth. Connect Daniel 12 and Matthew 24 with this account. While Satan is in the heavenly place, whatever God has done in goodness man has spoiled in wickedness. This terrible power that man is unable to cope with (that the saints cannot is their own fault, it is true), which hinders God's testimony on the earth, will be cast down, and he can then rage against heaven, but he cannot corrupt from heaven. Christ anticipated this when He said, I saw Satan fall like lightning - "the accuser of our brethren is cast down." This is the last woe to the earth: Satan rages on it. A flood issues from his mouth (v. 15). He tries to overwhelm Israel, but God will not suffer it.

205 The subject of the chapter is the dramatis personae, as men say, of the great flood of evil coming on in that day. The testimony of Jesus is the testimony of the whole book - not preaching the gospel; as in 1 Peter 1 we see the preaching of the prophets, as the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven. So here it is not the Holy Ghost sent down and making you see with unveiled face the glory of the Lord. The testimony of Christ is of a different kind, the testimony of power, not of grace. The cherished place is to be above and see the thunderstorm rolling beneath.

Revelation 13

In this chapter we have the history of the two beasts, and they are something distinct from Babylon. One point must be remembered, that beasts are great temporal powers or empires; instead of being in subjection to God's authority, they are ravenous and exacting. Nebuchadnezzar was the first and Babylonish power; and all the four great empires have taken the same character. They rose out of the sea (unformed peoples) and became great corporate powers, ruling the world. Notice that it is not only the ravenous character of the beast, but here the dragon gives it its power.

Being cast out of heaven, Satan rouses the earthly people in rebellion against the Lord and His saints in heaven. This character of the beast exclusively belongs to him for the halfweek. In speaking of this beast or empire, the beginning of its history is given. Its origin we have in verse 1. The form of the beast is the same as the dragon in many respects. It has seven horns and ten heads. Chapter 12: 3 and 13: 1 compare together. The Roman Empire is divided into ten kingdoms - the world acknowledges it as the rightful power. The crowns are on the horns, and on the heads, the names of blasphemy. The heads are characterised by blasphemy, not power. Daniel 7: 7 is identical with this in Revelation 13. Satanic power characterises this last empire. Satan resists Christ; and the Roman world in the beginning, by the power which was vested in the person of Pilate, was that which rejected, condemned, and crucified God's king, the King of the Jews, and stamped its own condemnation upon the act, by writing over them, "This is the king of the Jews." Thus it was not done in ignorance, but "Jesus of Nazareth, king of the Jews," was written there distinctly, and with authority. As soon as Satan is cast out of heaven, he gives his power to the beast - which had the character of beast before - he is the open opponent of a Christ in power as he had been of a Christ in weakness. Seven heads imply Satanic wisdom, and the expression [of it] is blasphemy. All the characters of power are associated with the beast here. He is wounded to death and healed - the same power, imperial power, revived. This power had been lost, but it revives and gathers up to itself all that the ten horns wield. They worship the dragon. There is direct thorough adoration of this power which is opposed to Christ; the giving up the earnestness and the energy of the soul to all this, not actual bowing down to Satan.

206 He boasts as man and blasphemes God. The tongue is a little member and boasts great things, a world of iniquity, as James says. Men are just preparing for this great wondering after the beast. Society is worn out, and wants something new - some energising centre, something it can follow, for old things are broken up. All the old things were broken up at the old French Revolution, and they have never been repaired. Whatever has been set up has been only breaking and breaking ever since, but this great power that is to come will just supply the lack. He blasphemes the name of God and His tabernacle, and theirs that dwell in heaven. Satan can blaspheme the saints in heaven, but he cannot hurt them, they are in the heavenly Jerusalem of which the Lord God is the temple. Satan can never get back to heaven when once cast out; when loosed from the bottomless pit, he will not get beyond the earth. He will make war with those on the earth, but he cannot touch those in heaven; and we are associated with Christ there, and can sit in as much composure and peace above the devil's blasphemy, for we are with God, as while the "lightnings and thunderings and voices" were proceeding from the throne. It is a blessed thing to be so identified with God in being thus the objects of Satan's blasphemies. We want to get our hearts filled with the sense of this connection with God in the heavenlies, and it is this which is always in contrast with the dwellers upon earth; but just as far as we are mixed up with the dwellers upon earth, we lose the sense of our identification with Him.

207 "It was given to him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them." There are some killed, for example, the two witnesses. This could never have been before - God never allowed them to be overcome. All that dwell on the earth are swayed by this power except those who were elected from before the foundation of the world. These do not worship the beast, the vessel of Satan's authority. There are four things specially to be remembered: first, the dragon is worshipped; second, those are blasphemed who dwell in heaven; third, those on earth are overcome; fourth, all the characteristics of the four beasts are to be found in this one. "If any man have an ear to hear, let him hear."

Now we find ourselves, as in chapter 11: 19, in Jewish circumstances. Verse 11 of this chapter introduces us to a sovereign power in his way, and he assumes to have Christ's power. He has horns like a lamb, and yet if you really hear what he says, you find it is a power in opposition to Christ; though pretending to be Christ, he has a mouth like a dragon, he has the devil's energy against Christ, and pretends to be the Messiah. Christ was a prophet when down here, and He will be a king when He comes again, and both these this second beast takes to himself, so that he is the Antichrist (Herod being a figure of him). We find in him the pretension to Christ's royalty, and His prophetical character, but the priesthood of Christ he cannot claim. In the three great powers in action at this time, the dragon, the first beast and the second beast, we find a mimicry of the Trinity - Father, Son, and Spirit.

"He maketh fire come down out of heaven" (v. 13). This miracle resembles that of Elijah's with Baal. The very thing that was done to prove Jehovah God is done here to prove Satan's power. He mimics that which proved Jehovah to be God, and he will also mimic those which proved Jesus of Nazareth to be the Christ of God. Thus we see that idolatry will be again set up in the earth, for man after all, infidel as he may be, cannot get on without religion, because he must have something that is above and greater than himself, for his thoughts to rest on. Man by nature in every act is infamous, and he is not only blasphemous in heart, but idolatrous in ways. The character of idolatry is to consecrate what is in man's heart already, will or lust, in absolute subjection - as much will as you please may be allowed, provided it be consecrated - to this beast. Chapter 19: 20, refers to these two beasts of this chapter. It becomes quite Jewish at the end; but the character of evil working now we see from 2 Thessalonians 2. The expressions used in verse 9 of that chapter in reference to Satan's powers are just the same as those applied to Christ in Acts 2: 22. The words in Greek are identical - miracles, wonders and signs. All the pride now rolling around, and the intellect setting itself up, wasting itself for want of an object, will here find its focus. All the pride of man will be as a mere puppet show, for Satan to stand behind and pull the strings.

208 What painstaking care was given the apostle to warn us of these buddings of evil! We have more than buddings now - Judaism attached to Christianity, ordinances added to the work of Christ, instead of the Holy Ghost recognised as uniting the members to the Head in heaven, with nothing between. They who hold such things deny that the members on earth are Himself; but He says of them "I am Jesus." They have begun in the Spirit and end in the flesh. The stamp and character of apostasy is upon it: denying the Master that bought them, going back to days and months and times and years - and this with the Galatians was going back to the heathenism they had given up. The flesh makes an effort to accredit itself with what God accredits Christ with. But if we take Hebrews 10 as our stay, we shall be glad to part with all this as a mere lie: believing God's word from verses 19-23, it will all be gone like a mere fog (the mere form of godliness). The energy of Satan is now being exercised in the mystery of "iniquity," and this will continue so long as Satan is in heaven, from whence he corrupts all the truth God has ever given to the church. Therefore in 2 Thessalonians 2 we get the link between the mystery of iniquity which is now working, and the man of sin; between the false Christianity which now exists, and the false Christ which will then appear. False Christianity is now deceiving the Gentiles; but when it takes its ripened form under a false Christ, then it will be connected with the Jews. Those who have not the love of the truth, God says, shall love a lie. There are even now plenty of lovers of religion, and but few who love the truth. This is a sad and solemn truth, to believe and witness. May the Lord give us to be very plain in our testimony, and to have our souls entirely separated from a form of godliness without the power thereof, for when it becomes a mere form it is the direct power of Satan. Do not let us be violent in our efforts; for if we are convinced of the truth of it, we can be quiet, and let God work in His own way; and as to persons, treat them graciously, taking all things quietly. May we so experimentally know what a saint is as united to Him, as to be following Him, and not denying His name, for the contrary would be blaspheming it.

209 Revelation 14, 15, 16

Before the judgments are poured forth, not before tribulation, you get the redeemed from earth hid - their place marked out; not delivered, but sheltered before the Lord appears. The moment they see Him, it will be the defeat of the antichristian action. Those who obey the word of prophecy will not be exposed in the last three and a half years. This chapter 14 stands alone. Whether in testimony or in judgment, it contains the Lord's dealings while this evil is going on.

(1) Verses 1-5. Zion is royal grace, after failure at Sinai: Zion in Hebrews 12 is earthly. The passage takes in the millennium up and down - church blessings and earthly blessings. Zion is of great importance in scripture. "Ichabod" was pronounced by the faithful on Israel, the ark being taken into captivity; there is a thorough break up, and then comes in a new thing by the divine interference of David, and the ark is then placed on Zion. Those who had faith went to the ark in David's time. All was confusion in David's reign. The ark was brought back, but the ark and the altar are never united again; the ark never set up again in the tabernacle. The priest walked before God's anointed; but now it was before God where the ark was. A believer would say, I go to the altar, and there is the priest, but I find no ark, no cherubim; and the faithful would connect themselves with David, and then get the ark of the covenant. The high place was at Gibeon, and there God did visit His people, as Solomon: to faith the Solomon-reign was inferior to the David. This is the state of things now. "Ichabod" is written on the whole system of things; Christ is the ark.

These 144,000 are not the same as those sealed in chapter 7; they are Judah, and do not include the ten tribes; the saved remnant of those who pass through the tribulation three and a half years, "continuing with me in my temptations." It is "the" Lamb, not "a" (as in common editions). The remnant are in an analogous position to Christ (and now His body), only on earth, and not united to the Son of man in heaven. Therefore they are learning the song from the church in heaven, and in principle like Christ, suffering from the evil around.

210 There are two points distinct in repentance: two kinds we get in the Psalms and also often in our own hearts. Deliverance by power, and this answering to the ark on Mount Zion. Then when delivered, they see their horrible sin against Christ who has delivered them. It is worship as on Mount Moriah. "Cleanse me from blood-guiltiness," etc., also Isaiah 53 is an expression of it: we have done it. This is what is now called evangelical repentance; not merely the cry of fear, "Who shall deliver me?" "Out of the depths have I cried unto thee."

"First-fruits" (v. 4) has always the same general meaning, gathering out from the old into the new thing. These have nearness to heaven. This scene is the Lord beginning with the world. The character of salvation we get all through Revelation is coming from the throne of God - not the Father's house.

(2). Verses 6, 7. God is setting things to rights on the earth. This same gospel was given in Eden, not the gospel of the glory in heaven as now - the peculiar gospel given to Paul. Gospel means good news in all ages. It is "every family" in Ephesians 3: 15, not "the whole family." See Amos 3: 2. Every being who comes into connection with God, angels, Jews, Gentiles, the church - come under the name of the Father of Jesus, not Jehovah.

The everlasting gospel - good news to the earth - is that which will bruise Satan's head, and set up the kingdom. It is the same as the gospel of the kingdom, and there is nothing to hinder that being extended over the whole earth. It goes on through all the tribulation; Matt. 24. Psalm 96 is the expression of it. There is a cluster of Psalms all connected with the setting up of the kingdom: Psalm 93 gives the consequences - Jehovah reigning, and the throne established in holiness after all the raging of men; Psalm 94 is a cry for Jehovah's coming in vengeance from the remnant; in Psalm 95 the Jews are called to come up; Psalm 96 - testimony goes out to the Gentiles because Jehovah is coming; Psalm 97 - He is actually coming in the full power of His reign; Psalm 98 - He is come; Psalm 99 - He is seen sitting between the cherubim in Jerusalem on earth; Psalm 100 - all in order: they are worshipping. Jesus is Jehovah the Saviour, Jah, the Saviour, Joshua, Jesus. This gives the character to His people; Matt. 1: 27.

211 Psalm 32 is just the character of verse 5: that the Kingdom-character of the gospel; this the Creator character. Here is all the difference.

(3) and (4). This chapter gives us an epitome of God's dealings. Babylon falls first, then the beast. Revelation tells the end of the thing. There are many lanes leading into the great thoroughfare of judgment. The spirit of Babylon is one.

The Book of Revelation will be of special use to those living at that time. We have to do with the book: but the book will have to do with them.

There are two principles of evil at work. In the beast there is the principle of association, or despotic power. This we see in France. Babylon is a weaker system - commercial in its character, but also papal idolatry. This we have in spirit in England, everything to quiet the conscience, and anything done for the sake of peace to carry on her commerce; and so there is the setting in of all evil. Commerce destroys principle, but it promotes civilisation; they will not scalp people, but goodness depends on paying bills. Verse 10 is fear, and not the blessed attraction of grace, as we have it. The fear of God is put in contrast with the fear of the beast. The fear of the beast is no doubt great, but the fear of God is to be greater. (See verse 7.) Here (v. 12) is the patience of the saints to be tried, of those who keep the "commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus." There is belief in the promises - confidence in Him, which enables them to walk as He walked, looking for deliverance from God.

(5). Verse 13. "Blessed are the dead." God is coming in judgment and in power; the dead will get their full blessedness at once without waiting longer - "dead" are those who have been slain, not those who are going to die, but those who have died.

(6) and (7). Verses 14-17. There are two judgments, one distinguishing, the other crushing. The harvest applies to what is good; not so the vintage, all is crushed in that: when reaping, some may remain untouched The vine of the earth in the Jews and Antichrist. Babylon is degenerate Christendom: Israel is called a vine. In John 15 it is not the church, because we never get the church till the day of Pentecost. We find all through scripture Christ supplanting Israel. (See Isaiah 49.) I suppose that it is in Edom that the Jews are judged: see Isaiah 63. The Mahometans and Jews with all their corruptions hold a personal Antichrist. Some suppose the reference (v. 20) is to the length of the land of Palestine, but it is tremendous slaughter.

212 Attention is here drawn to a second great wonder. There was one great wonder (or literally sign) in chapter 12, and in this chapter 15 there is another.

The seven last plagues give us the wrath of God, not of the Lamb - we do not get that until chapter 19. Here God is dealing with those on the earth; nor yet the destruction of the beast, when the Lamb comes forth, but the filling up of the preparatory judgments after the woes. The wrath is filled up when the Lamb comes forth.

In verse 2 we have a second set of martyrs, not those under the altar (chap. 6), who have been beheaded in an ordinary way, but those who have been under the beast, and refused to worship him. They are distinguished in chapter 20: 4.

These martyrs on the sea of glass are singing the song of Moses and of the Lamb: Moses and the Lamb are connected. There are those who understand His ways by going through the same with Him; and others understand His works by His judgments on the enemies. Some "follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth." In verse 3 the critical reading for "saints" is nations, the same persons as are mentioned in chapter 5. There the celebration is about them, here by them. He who had the lowly place there of the Lamb slain is here celebrated as "King of nations."

The "sea of glass"; it is not merely water, purity, but glass, stability. It is not only water to wash defiled feet, as in the tabernacle service, but here it is solid purity to walk upon, and mingled with fire. They had passed through the fire of tribulation in the judgments. Two things have brought them there: it is not like the elders who are seen in heaven, as in their natural place, but they have got there, so to speak, through the judgments - saved so as through fire. They have not got clear of these dwellers upon earth, and they have to escape for their lives, like Lot. How came they down in the tribulation at all? They were doubtless faithful when in it, but, like Lot, who would never have been in Sodom if he had not liked the plain of Sodom, they have liked the comfort of the world while they could get it. To Philadelphia the promise was to be kept "from the hour of tribulation," but here they are not kept from it, but taken through it. They were truly a testimony in the tribulation, but it was inactive testimony, not worshipping the beast. In chapter 20 there are two classes of martyrs spoken of - those beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and those who have not worshipped the beast. In chapter 6 we see those who have been beheaded for the witness of Jesus. This is the positive actual testimony of the faithful, three and a half years. In this chapter is no testimony, but a negative one - they had not worshipped, etc. We see in both that they had not been faithful as the church, or they would never have been in the tribulation. Better to be like Abraham on the top of the mountain, than like Lot in the plain of Sodom, vexing his righteous soul from day to day with the filthy conversation of the wicked. God has sometimes to pass us through a kind of trial on our own account, as well as in testimony, which would not have been necessary if we had been more faithful. The song we learn in tribulation we sing in glory (v. 4). So with Christ. So here with the remnant. The manifestation of the judgment of God was their salvation. These nations had been oppressing them, and now they will be brought into subjection.

213 There is not historical order pursued here, for it is anticipative, as are all these scenes with the elders now. This remnant have to go through the tribulation to get at what is here presented. God has come in, in the way of deliverance. Enemies now begin to be made His footstool. Satan has to be cast out of heaven. He does not yet rule with a rod of iron. He has taken His friends to Himself, and the first thing is to cast Satan down. As soon as this is done, Satan begins to stir up the earth against Christ. The woman then flees: the half-week. If these two sets of martyrs were not mentioned (chap. 20: 4), as having part in the first resurrection, we should be left to infer that neither had they heaven nor earth. As they did not go up with the church, and were cut off for their faithfulness, so that they could not have earth, if they had not resurrection, they would have been shut out from both, without getting a reward for their faithfulness. The twenty-four elders probably include all who have part in the first resurrection.

214 The vials are direct judgments here. The temple is taken possession of in judgment. The preliminary judgments prove of no use, and then these positive judgments are filled up in wrath. The former were in the character of chastening, but we do not talk of chastening when wrath is to be filled up. Heaven in Revelation becomes the scene of judgment, and the time is between the church being spued out, and the Lamb coming forth in chapter 19. The Witness does not come out on earth until then.

Verse 3. "Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty." This was the original title in the book. "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty." Then the Lamb's song, "King of nations," all anticipative of the double judgments of God and the Lamb.

Verse 5. Remark "the temple of the tabernacle of the testimony in heaven." (See chapter 11.) All this is an earthly thing in connection with God's covenant. The testimony is not the gospel, but according to law - Jewish ground being merely secured in the covenant. The temple is the house (naos) - the place of approach. Compare Acts 7: 44, "the tabernacle of witness" - the tent within. It is here opened for man to see what had been God's ways within.

These angels (v. 6), in their clothing give us the figure of human righteousness (white clothing), and divine righteousness (golden girdles). They were vials of the sanctuary that the angels threw out upon the earth. "Bowls" is more simple than "vials," but there is no difference - vessels of God's house: the idea is golden bowls, divine righteousness, looked at in its judicial character, within. Blood was on the outside of the mercy-seat, signifying divine righteousness had to be satisfied. We have got into the house, as it were. And here is one of the things given from the throne by one who is there: "Him who liveth for ever and ever." This stamps eternity on the wrath, as well as its being the moral nature of God. "The temple was filled with smoke." Man is excluded from the temple which is filled with wrath, and they cannot get in. So Sinai was all of a smoke. "Smoke went out of his nostrils." It is constantly used as a figure of consuming fire, in opposition to grace clearing transgressions, etc. "No man" (v. 8) merely means no one - it often does not mean man at all. Here none could enter in, priests, angels, or any. God alone fills the house with His glory, as in the Solomon reign in type. Even the angels have come out. "God chargeth his angels with folly." None can be there when the house is filled with His glory.

215 Chapter 16: 1. It is between God and man now - the wrath of God with man on the earth. The temple in heaven is shut up. There is a glory of God "no man hath seen, or can see"; but there is where the devil goes near. See Job and Zechariah for different characters of His dwelling-place.

Verse 2. There has been an analogous course going on a long time. The system of the earth is going on - Babylon, and other evils, even many antichrists, and God is taking things into His own hand now. The character of His dealings is like those through Moses in Egypt, quite different from the description in chapters 12-14. It is another sign, and quite distinct, "grievous sores" and "boils breaking out." All those giving themselves up to the influence of civil power will get some terrible judgment, and men will see it - a "mark," a sign upon them, of being a slave - what we should call a brand, a Taw, as in Ezekiel, for service and worship - as people mark cattle now - a mark of entire possession of and authority over. It is terrible thing to be marked by the devil. Paul suffered for Christ, having been faithful to Him, and he was branded for it. It is the same thought.

Verse 3. "Sea" is the unsettled mass of nations. The difficulty here is that every man died in it. Verse 4. The springs that should have been life became death - everything is polluted, deathful. Everything which should have been death bringing to life is life bringing death - every principle in the world turns to death. Any remnant will be kept clear of this. The "earth" is that part brought out into connection with God. There are certain floating, unformed nations besides, and these represented by the "sea." They have been inflicting death, and now they are drinking in death. Gentile apostasy is centred up in Jerusalem.

The temple is still the place from which the judgments proceed. None can enter into it while all this is going on. In the previous chapter we had the things prepared; in this it is the pouring out of wrath. Now it is not the testimony or dealings with saints, but we see God's dealings with the Jews as a people, something the same as the last verse of chapter 11, but there is a difference. Here it is more in the way of government, the throne; in chapter 11, faithfulness to His promises; therefore the ark of the covenant is mentioned. See also the allusions to God's covenant-dealings with them in the next chapter; the figures are connected with the Jews and God's covenant people. Smoke from the glory of God filled the temple - not leading to worship, as in Solomon's time, but it is filled with wrath. It is all Sinai character, only it is in heaven, instead of on earth.

216 In the pouring out of these vials, we see the usual division of four and three. The first four are poured out upon the earth, the sea, the rivers, and the sun: and the fifth upon the beast, and the "sore" upon those who have the mark of the beast. The rivers of water are symbolical of classes of popular principles, masses of people moved along by a certain class of principles, for example, the French Revolution. The sea is the great mass; the river the floating population, a particular local influence. The king of Egypt said, "My river is mine own." All they had to drink was the power of death - the water turned into blood.

The restitution of all things, spoken of in Acts 3, begins as soon as Satan is cast out of heaven, but it is not accomplished until after the millennium.

The "sun" (v. 8) means public authorities, "and men were scorched with great heat." Tyranny becomes intolerable when fire is poured out. The principle of the thing was seen in France, where you used to have a padlock on your lips, if they did not know what kind of a person you were. "Blasphemed the name of God" - this shews the effect of judgment when the heart is not changed.

Verse 10. The term "beast" is used, because of the ravaging power of this king. A beast's heart was given to Nebuchadnezzar. Man's heart looks upwards to God; a beast's heart looks down and ravages others. A beast is a wild ravenous creature, which devours all below it. They "blasphemed the God of heaven": but faith would have owned Him as the God of the earth as well as heaven - "because of their pains and their sores," they ascribe them to Him.

Verses 12-14. "Kings from the east" are connected with the same subject. The barrier of the empire will be broken. The seven heads on the beast denote forms of government: the ten horns, its division into ten kingdoms. The miracles wrought by the spirits of demons are those which are so beyond the power of natural science to interpret, that they cannot be understood in the age in which they are worked. A more advanced age might be able to understand them. The devil has uncommon knowledge of the resources of nature and science; they may be beyond the power of man to effect, but such a combination of natural things as to be within the reach of Satan. There are things very like miracles performed now through electro-biology and animal magnetism. The brain is a voltaic battery, the nerves the wires, etc., but the question is, who is to fire the battery? They could not make an animal move itself, and they could not make the animal. In chapter 13: 15 it should be "breath," not life, given to the image of the beast. It is life to man's eye, but not really so.

217 The three unclean spirits are: 1, the dragon: this is infidelity, war against Christ; 2, the beast: pretensions to imperial power, given by the devil; 3, the false prophet: antichristian Judaism. The saints are endangered, and therefore exhorted to keep their garments (v. 15). "Garments" in scripture mean our daily habits or daily life. How needful it is to keep oneself in death, while walking through the world! The great thing is to keep nature dead. "Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame." "I die daily," Paul said. "When I am weak, then I am strong." When God's mind, or God Himself, comes in, natural joy would be confusion and disgrace.

Verse 16. When both Hebrew and Greek are named as in chapter 9: 11, there is connection between Hebrew and Greek power; but when Hebrew is alone, it is solely Jewish.

Babylon (v. 19) is idolatry; commerce, too, and worldly power connected with civilisation. The things men are judged in are not always those they are judged for. Here men are judged in wealth, because of the abominable heart which sought the wealth apart from God. So was the merchant city of Chaldea, whose cry was in the ships. The thing judged is the idolatry, but the judgment reached their commerce. When you get the abomination for which God strikes her, she is spoiled of her comfort. The "great city" means the civil association; the "great Babylon" is its recorded character, idolatry.

Fragmentary Thoughts on Revelation

J. N. Darby.

<34009E> 217 {file  section d.}

{For the remaining papers in this series, the reader is referred to the Editor's Note, Vol. 12, page 1. They are mainly notes of Addresses, not known to have been revised by the Author, save where this is specially indicated.}

Revelation 17

"Judgment" (v. 1) does not merely mean the execution of punishment, but the sentence pronounced or accusation. There are here things with which Babylon is charged: it is said of Christ that Pilate put up His "accusation"* - the thing for which He was sentenced. Babylon here has the character of the church, and yet it is the most wicked system in the world. John, having part in the poor despised church, was banished to the isle of Patmos for the testimony of Jesus; and yet he saw that which was called "the church" governing this Roman empire which had put him in prison, a constituted system controlling peoples, etc. No wonder that he marvelled (v. 6): it must have been astonishing to him. The expression means, he wondered with a great wonder, somewhat as we should say, dying the death. "They that dwell on the earth shall wonder" - in their moral character, dwellers upon earth: it is general. The place to be looked to as the scene of it is the Roman empire.

{*[But this is aitia, Matthew 27: 37; Mark 15: 26.]}

218 The special character of the whore is seductive influence of the masses, and alliance with the leading powers. The kings commit fornication with her, and the masses are made thoroughly stupefied - drunk with new wine - not like those who were accused of being so in Acts, but in truth filled with the Spirit. In their sober senses they would have seen the corruption, but they are made drunk. It can only be understood in "the wilderness" (v. 3), where it is seen there is not one green blade for the soul. Upon her forehead was a name written, "Mystery," etc. If a person is drunk, you may write on his forehead anything, things that were never heard of. She would not have taken such names as Mother of Harlots, etc., if her eyes had been open. The character of it is very plain, except to the besotted mind. John was in the Spirit led into the wilderness, and therefore he could understand it. A "MYSTERY" can only be discerned by revelation and the power of God. It is simple to him who understands, but "great is the mystery of godliness; God manifest in the flesh," etc., is a riddle to those who have no spiritual understanding.

This false thing which has the name of "mystery," to those who are used to it, is as rotten as possible. The priest, with all his mummery, genuflexions, etc., can laugh at it; but the simple man who is ensnared by it thinks it all piety, and he is deluded by it. Absolution is thought to be a very wonderful thing - it quiets his conscience, and then he begins sinning again. Men call it a mystery, and so it may be, because it is the devil's work. There is only one thing to keep a man out of popery, and that is the knowledge of divine righteousness. If one has got that, he will never want to try putting a cross on the ground, and then licking the dust. Divine righteousness can never be made a whit better by any works of self-crucifixion, mortification, etc., and therefore the man who knows he has this will not be trying works of his own to add to it.

219 Popery not only wants to add works, but it wants a priesthood. In Christendom, wherever there is a pretension to priesthood there is the devil. There is something that separates between me and God: there may be ever so little a germ of it, but still it is there. Priesthood in any shape is a denial of Christianity, though there may be a great deal that modifies the case. It brings a veil between me and God, as though Christ had not accomplished the work. Priesthood and clericalism, as set up by man, are both against God and the priesthood of Christ, interfering with the work of redemption as though this wanted something to be added to it. A man-organised ministry or clergy, denies liberty to God's love; and virtually says, If you do not let me cut the channel, the gospel shall not go forth. I believe in ministry, but that is the very reason I will not admit clericalism; just for the same reason that, if I support royalty, I shall not admit a usurper. If I am not spiritual enough to get to God myself, I naturally enough get someone else to go for me; that is why priesthood and the clergy are set up. Popery is denying not so much truth as the application of truth. They allow there is efficacy in Christ's blood-shedding, but how am I to get it? is the question. Oh! said Luther, get it by faith. Here is the application of it.

There is another thing that characterises Babylon - idolatry; like Balaam, who set a stumbling-block before the children of Israel, etc. When priesthood comes in, there is always more or less of idolatry also. If I know how to come to God, I do not want a priest any more than an idol; but if not, I want both. "Abominations" (v. 4, 5) simply means idols. The word 'abomination' constantly occurs in the Old Testament, meaning an idol. It is connected with all that is degraded; and the moment man gives up belief in the true God, he is sure to degrade himself. If man does not look to something above himself, he will sink to that which is below him, as we see in Romans 1. The attributes of God Himself were made to be symbolised in the cherubim which the Ninevites, etc., used to worship. They stopped short at the symbol, instead of going beyond to Him who was symbolised, and this was idolatry. In Israel they made pillars of God's throne. What men had formerly about the Creator, they have now about the Intercessor. The truth of God is thrown into a channel that suits nature, but it is opposed to the Holy Ghost.

220 Then the next thing is murder. Satan is a liar, and the "father of lies"; and he is also a "murderer from the beginning." So, in the working of Satan, we find there is first idolatry, and then it leads to murder. The "woman is drunken with the blood of saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus." This is the time of prosperity to her. She is drunken. There are two characteristics given of those with whose blood she is drunken. It is not said any Christians; but they who "will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution." "I have given them thy word, and the world hath hated them." The terms, saints and martyrs of Jesus, witnesses for Him, are given to characterise them. They are not characterised as those who are settling down here upon earth.

"The kings of the earth have committed fornication with her" (v. 2). This, in a hidden way, we may find going on now. The departure of the pope from Rome was the beginning of it. The kings of the earth are allying with the pope, in order to keep down radicalism, which is an enemy to them. The woman sits upon a scarlet-coloured beast (v. 3), and the beast must carry her, but she governs the beast.

"The beast that was, and is not," etc. (v. 8), means the Roman empire - an expression that is intended to characterise it, not date. It "shall be present"; that is, it is the resurrection of the Roman empire in a devilish way - the perfection of power in a diabolical energy. There are seven heads and ten horns - neither spiritual nor human perfection.

Verse 14. "They that are with him are called and faithful, and chosen." This is the bride individualised. When Christ is spoken of as Bridegroom, she is spoken of as bride, and that is in the Father's house; but when the throne or the Lamb is spoken of, they are individualised who are connected with them.

Verse 15. "The waters which thou sawest" are not only dwellers on the Roman earth here, but China and all over the world. Wherever Christ goes, she, the mother of abominations, thinks she has a right to go. Kings mean kings as such; horns mean kingdoms - the whole power, such as France, where there may be no king reigning.

221 The beast was the vessel of Satan's power against the vessel of God's power - Christ. There is the holiness of the one city - the heavenly Jerusalem; and the scenes of corruption God judges in the other: and it is well to notice that what is after the flesh is always successful at the first, in order to put the faithful to the test. "That was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural." Cain and his doings are first narrated, before we hear of the true seed; Ishmael, the apparent heir, was long before the birth of Isaac; Esau remained in the promised land, while Jacob was a fugitive; Saul was king before David, and, to all appearance, Saul possessed the title to God's power for a long time, while David did not resist him. We may see it in Jesus Himself, when He said, "I have laboured in vain, and spent my strength for nought"; while others said, "Aha! aha! so would we have it." Yes, and Jesus said to His disciples, "Ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice." It is God's way, in His rule of government, to allow it to go on for a time. He will put to the test whether the heart will go through the trial of being put down, but when God takes His power He will have it otherwise; until then, the Lord says, "I waited patiently" (Psa. 40): take no rescue till He comes. When did Jesus ever save Himself from all that came upon Him?

The whore sits upon "many waters." The wicked may have children at their desire, and have substance; but the saint says, When God fills all things, I shall then be satisfied, and I shall awake up in His likeness. We have a description of Babylon before the heavenly Jerusalem - the whore in chapters 17 and 18, and the bride in chapter 21.

There is imperial glory in Babylon also - all that could attract - purple, scarlet, and precious stones; but John saw by the Spirit the true character of it all - the beauty which attracts man but disgusts God, and He will never be mocked. He will have us walk by faith, and though He shews us the woman riding the beast, and the beast carrying the woman, He holds the bridle till the church is gathered. "Babylon the great"! This is the character of it, and in this way it is the world, it is the source and spring of all the idolatry, the rival of the Jerusalem of God; and she is not the only one, but the mother of all, and in her was found the blood of saints and martyrs. As Babylon she had corrupted all the nations, and here she is drunken with blood. You always find the great opponent of truth is the corrupter. See it in the chief priests, who gave up Christ; they were more guilty than the soldiers. After paganism we have corruption from what bore the name of Christianity; and not only so, but oppression; in her the blood is found - that which called itself the holy city!

222 In verse 8 the beast was, and is not. The Roman empire ascends, for there is a connection between the two - the seven heads and ten horns. The Roman empire was, and is not, but comes back again, and comes under the influence of Satan, for it ascends "out of the bottomless pit." Christ came out from God's throne, and the beast out of the depths of the pit - an antagonistic power; one out of the light, the other out of darkness, and they wonder who are not guarded by God's electing grace. The shadows are coming over the renewed Roman earth, the principles are at work. But verse 9 is a distinct character, the woman is on the seven hills, not on the beast - Rome, and marked to shew not merely a beast, but Babylonish power: the whole power so concentrated in the last head, that it becomes the beast. Christ wields the power of heavenly things, and in the same way (v. 12) for a season, no kingdom yet. But the ten horns receive power for one hour with the beast: they are contemporaneous - did not supplant the beast, but received power with him. We have seen, in a sense, they have power with the woman, but here it is a person in whom the power is concentrated, but I get in the ten horns the federacy, associated with the beast, they give "their power and strength," "their kingdom" unto the beast. Western Europe will present it, they will have one kind of general unity, not individuality of the nations but unity, and they cannot go on without a head; so they are content to give power to the beast, and they say, "Who is like to the beast?" And they make war with the Lamb, but the Lamb overcomes them and we have the church with Him. Angels are not called to this; they are upheld by grace, but not "called" (v. 14).

In verse 16 the ten horns hate the whore, for, after all, the woman will be in the way; they will not bear to be priest-ridden, and they will destroy her. All that is ripening up will be destroyed by the people in an ignominious way; for though thus corruption is trying to keep down the people, it will not succeed.

223 This is the latter-day scene, and, in closing, I would say, it is a solemn scene; but what can we expect from sinful! man? and, I must say again, there is no corruption so terrible as the corruption of the mediation of Christ. The heart that is brought to Him is astonished to see how people are attracted by the external, which has not one trace of Christ in it. But the soul that is brought to God has got divine righteousness, and if one comes to me to offer pardon of my sins, I say, I have got it. And if I receive from you, I must get it again and again; but through Christ's blood my sin is remembered no more. The thing offered is not Christianity, for the Christian has got his place; and it has got Babylon on its forehead, and if you cannot see, you have not got a spiritual eye. The Lord help us, for all are in danger who are not on simple ground. I have no thought that man's wisdom will do anything; but He will keep the feet of His saints. If the woman is destroyed, the horns give power to the beast: if corruption ceases, these make war with the Lamb, but the soul that is brought into peace, and holding the Head, shall be hid secretly; near to Jesus is a hiding-place, and there we shall be spared from all that is around. The Lord keep us from the spirit of the world, and guard us from the corruption of the mediatorial work of Christ!

Revelation 18

The other angel (v. 1) is not the Lord. Babylon (v. 2) "is fallen," or morally sunk into the lowest degradation. The actual fall is narrated in chapter 19: 2. The consummation is openly diabolical, because Satan is cast out of heaven.

Verse 4 is a cry to the people of the Lord to come out, etc. The mixture of Judaism and Christianity will be such as never was known before: Judaism, which is really heathenism, as in Galatians 4, where Paul calls observing days and years a turning back to the beggarly elements - being circumcised to keep the law, etc. It is the religion of the flesh. Up to the cross of Christ God was dealing with all this; but when Judaism is grafted on Christianity, it is hateful to Him. What are prayed to as Saint Peter and Saint Paul are demons: as they used to introduce false gods, so now they introduce false mediators. Puseyism is heathenism. The shapes of evil, counterfeiting God, are Judaism, demonism, and heathenism. Infidel latitudinarianism is the character of evil in England, different from what it is in India. Popery slurs over sin; no matter how they sin, an indulgence will atone for it. It is a shame for His people to be there, but still He remembers them (v. 4). People who are in the ark cannot be touched, but an apostate protection He will judge thoroughly.

224 Verses 12, 13. Everything not heavenly is mixed up with her: "Souls of men." "Through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you," 2 Pet. 2: 3. There is a time "to love, and a time to hate," and there are certain things which if a person does not hate, he has no right estimate of God. Some things ought to be hated - not the persons of course - "Let not the sun go down upon your wrath." We must not confound natural kindness with grace; but it is easy to do it, and to be indifferent to God's honour. The popish hierarchy has been guilty of shedding all the blood that has been shed upon earth. It is the centralisation of all the wickedness that has been done on the earth from the time of Abel downwards, and Rome will be judged for it (v. 24).

Chapters 17 and 18 are a parenthesis in the history, which is continued from chapters 16 to 19. Chapters 17 and 18 are descriptive, not historical. In chapter 21: 9, we have a description of the heavenly city after the Lamb is come, just as we get this description, in chapter 18, of this other city, the object of God's wrath; first that which is carnal, and afterward that which is spiritual. There is the false and the true, and it is after the false is set aside that the true is put in its place. The corrupt pretended to be the heavenly thing, but the Lord will take His bride, and produce her before the world in glory.

Babylon is "the mother of harlots, and abominations of the earth." The whole character of it is idolatry and hostility to God. The Lamb does not execute judgment upon her, but the one true God executes the judgment upon that which had come in between Himself and the souls of men (chap. 19: 1, 2).

We are little conscious of the blessing granted us, in being made acquainted with God's purposes, even those of judgment. The first thing, of course, for the soul to be anxious about, is the possession of peace with God. But then the heart will not be shut up to that, but is enlarged of God, to enter into the whole scene and scope of glory, in which the Lord Jesus Christ delights, and in which He will have us with Him, and in connection with this scene, into the judgments on opposers and enemies, consequent on His taking His inheritance.

225 If we think of the past or the present, in scripture or profane history, and consider how power has been abused, we cannot wonder at the joy heaven evinces, and the song of praise bursting forth at God's taking the government: "The Lord God omnipotent reigneth!" Trace it back to the flood. After delegating the new world to Noah, we find man despising the authority of God, and idolatry coming in; in fact, the whole course of the world is according to the prince of the power of the air - according to Satan - and not according to God; all is apostate from God. The more religious they were, the more Satan was honoured. As the apostle says, "The things the Gentiles offer, they offer to devils and not to God." It is not simply the natural lusts contending, and the motives enlisted on the side of sin: every way, it is all the devil's. What a change, when God shall take the power into His own hands, and we can sing, "The Lord God omnipotent reigneth!"

All idolatry is summed up in Babylon, "the mother of harlots and abominations of the earth." Go back to Nebuchadnezzar. The head of gold turns to idolatry. And I would note here, all that was connected with the worship of Pluto in pagan religion; and you will see that the unity of the Godhead was not the truth denied (a shadow of truth men never effaced even here, though hell and the devil were all that remained of it). That which man quarrelled with was that which reveals the Mediator. Satan cannot deny there is a God, but he will try to hinder (by putting another object between) His light and love from shining into the heart and conscience, and so revealing Him who alone can give us peace. When the golden calf was made, the devil did not take away the name of Jehovah; for they said, "To-morrow is a feast to Jehovah." So now it is not the name of God cast out; but the introduction of that which hides the truth. All Satan's aim is to blot out the Mediator. So John, in his epistles, when heathenism and Judaism were combined in this one object, meets it by "God is light," and "God is love." And the saints are to be partakers of the same. So long as Satan can hinder that, he will give the name, and call it Christianity; but his object is to keep up the distance between our souls and God, and to prevent us from reaching the blessed end for which Jesus suffered - "who suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God." Blessed be God, we have such a mediator, who brings us to God, raising us up to Him; not as Satan tries to bring God down to us - "after the similitude of a calf eating hay." The corruption of the mediatorial work of Christ is Satan's widespread power over the nations in the hands of Babylon, - but "Strong is the Lord God that judgeth her."

226 The first verse ascribes salvation and glory, etc., to God - not to the Lamb - but to God on the throne, reigning; first, executing judgment, then reigning; to the God of heaven sitting on the throne (not coming to earth) in the characters known to the Old Testament saints as Shaddai and Jehovah, judging Babylon. He reserves to Himself the judgment which puts down Satan's power and malice. Be not surprised at power unintelligible, yet chaining men's minds. It is Satan's work. It is quite beyond us, and cannot be put down till the Lord God takes the power and gives perfect deliverance. Christ cannot display His long-affianced bride until the evil is removed, that which is false and corrupt put aside, and that which is true brought out in its place. The pretended heavenly thing removed, Christ will bring forth His bride and produce her before the world in the glory prepared for her. While He is hid with God, we are hid too. Our display shall be with His display. The church and the world cannot go on together. By the Holy Ghost she is planted and set down here in the character of witness. In as far as she is true, she is hated by the world. For a brief season there was gladness, and the people glorified God; but she has to walk by faith, not by sight now. A heavenly character is hers. "Ye are not of this world." And He cannot appear till we come forth with Him.

God will have realities. Now although He is bearing with corruption, it is only in order to the gathering His church to Himself. She having gone up and been received of Christ, He will come back with her, and be manifested to all. May we keep ourselves for Him until He comes!

Protestantism is what Sardis characterises, and comes to nothingism - a name to live, but dead, etc. In Thyatira it is positive, active corruption. Jezebel is a religious character or Babylon, the world-church system. Jezebel is popery, producing papists. Babylon is popery governing the world. Her final condemnation we have in chapter 19: 2. The rule of God and the marriage of the Lamb are kept back until this great system is judged. No wonder there is the voice of much people heard, saying, Alleluia, etc. "The twenty-four elders and the four living creatures fell down and worshipped." Verse 8 explains verse 7.

227 Verses 6, 7 are the song; the following verses are the history. It is necessary to see the distinction. His wife hath made herself ready by being faithful in what God had given her. "Righteousness" should be plural, and I believe it is God owning the practical walk of the individual saints that compose the bride. They were given to have resurrection-life with Him. What is produced is the righteousness of saints, and seen before God in resurrection character - the display in glory of responsibility as to service done in the Holy Ghost by us down here. "Their works do follow them." "Was granted that they should be arrayed in fine linen" shews it is grace, after all. The Lord is pleased to own the work wrought in us, and by us, in the Holy Ghost down here. In virtue of life in my Head I stand before God: in virtue of what He has done in me, the manifestation of that life, I stand before the saints, before man.

"These are the true sayings of God" (v. 9). "Sayings" have a very large meaning. Christ is the Word of God, and His are the sayings of God.

The parable at the beginning of Matthew 25 is not Jewish, though the hidden bride is the earthly Jerusalem. The wise virgins are true Christians, and the foolish those who profess, have only the name, in this dispensation - going out to meet the Bridegroom. The Jewish remnant does not "go out," but Christ comes to it. The figure of virgins characterises them as individual saints, not in their corporate character as the church, though they are of the church (that is, the true and faithful virgins). In the Gospels, when the bride is alluded to at all, it is usually in this way (namely, as individual saints). The difference between the wise and the foolish virgins is not in their watching, for they all go to sleep, but it rather consists in the reality of what they have got. If they were caring for Christ, they would be thinking of the light He would want to see, and would look to the oil; but if they only cared about the company of the other virgins, they would be thinking about their dress, and many other things, rather than the light. In Matthew 24 Christ was giving instruction to those who inquired of Him about Jewish things, down to verse 44. Next, from verse 45 down to verse 31 of chapter 25, He applies to His disciples while He is away. Then, to the end, He takes up earthly things which will be known in reference to the Gentiles.

228 The bride in Revelation 19 and 21 is the church. The symbol of the "city," in chapter 2 I shews the glorious character of the saints. The heavenly people have more enjoyment than the earthly, in the same way that I get more happiness than the poor family I go to visit. They may enjoy the thing, but I enjoy something quite different. The heavenly people will be a medium of communicating blessing to the earthly.

The marriage supper (v. 9) introduces the millennium.

The "fellow-servant" (v. 10) is an angel. All that John is here is as a prophet, a servant, not as one of the church, indwelt by the Holy Ghost.

"The testimony of Jesus is the Spirit of prophecy." This is distinct from the gospel - His prophetic testimony, and the people are named "servants" rather than sons.

Two words are used in Revelation generally, "diadems" and "crowns." Here it is "diadems." If they gain a victory, they put on a crown; if it is to signify royal power and authority, it is a diadem.

Verses 11, 12. There is a difference between warlike and sessional judgment. This is, of course, the first. The Lord is coming out to execute judgment on the beast, who took the character of the false prophet, and was cast alive into a lake of fire, whilst Babylon was burnt with fire. "And I saw heaven opened." This expression occurs four times in scripture connected with the Person of the Lord: first, in Matthew 3, the Holy Ghost descends, and bears record that God's object of delight being on earth, heaven is open upon Him. The Spirit, as a dove, rests upon Him, and bears witness to Him as the Son of God. Secondly, in the end of John 1, the Lord says to Nathanael, "Ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man." It is not the Holy Ghost here, but the angels, and if those around had had their eyes opened, they might perhaps have seen them, for after His temptation angels came and ministered unto Him, and in the garden of Gethsemane one "strengthened" Him. The third time there is a difference, for the Son of man is gone up: God has taken to Himself the Objects of His delight. Then the Holy Ghost fills the saint on earth. He looks up and sees the heavens opened and Jesus standing on the right hand of God. The link is broken with earth, and the heart of the saint is taken up to heaven. The testimony of this is corrupted and lost, and we have now a great tree instead. Then here, for the fourth time, heaven is opened again, and Christ comes forth in judgment against hostile power; and, when thus opened, it is for us as well for Himself, for we belong to Him, and come with Him. "The armies which were in heaven followed him."

229 The white horse is the symbol of triumph, and He who sits upon him is called "Faithful and True," the same character in which He is presented to the church of Laodicea, though there He is the "Witness" and the "Amen." Here it is not as a "Witness," but as a Judge, and as executing judgment in the character of God, and He is always the "Amen" to that. His eyes are as a flaming fire, shewing how piercing the judgment is; and then "on his head were many crowns" - or royal glories. His name none knew but Himself. This is Christ's consciousness of what He is. So, in Matthew 11, He says, "No man knoweth the Son but the Father." And why? Because no man can fathom incarnate God; and the way He maintains it is by going down and down, for "He humbled himself," and became obedient unto death," etc. But He is exalted, and "His name is called the word of God," the Revealer of God. He appears in "a vesture dipped in blood," significant of His coming forth as a warrior.

Isaiah 63 is the same scene. There He is described as treading the "winepress of Almighty God" - executing judgment indeed as Son of man; but He could not tread the winepress of God if He were not God. In His lowest services He was still God. None could have put his hand upon the leper but He without being defiled. The priest was only able to look, not to touch the leper; but here is One who could touch. It is sweet to know how near He is to us; and yet how great. His name is publicly written: "he hath on his vesture, and on his thigh, a name written, King of kings, and Lord of lords."

How Paul to Timothy rests upon the glory of His Person, when he says, "the only Potentate, King of kings, and Lord of lords," etc., "the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever."

And Christ comes forth here to judge the quick. The subjects of His judgments are not the nations, which are connected with the throne, or sessional judgment: but here it is as seated upon a horse. This is judgment on hostile power, the place where light has been - the Gentile and the Jewish given to them by Satan - the Roman emperor, and the false or pretended Christ.

230 God sends His Son to get men out of heathenism, idolatry, etc., and they turn that into idolatry. There may well be joy in heaven when there is an end to it; for Christ now sets it all aside by judgment on the earth - but as come down from heaven. The kings and their armies gather together; but all to the setting up of the Lord Jesus Christ as Prince of Peace, and we have our position with Him, and come out with Him.

Beloved friends, it is very important to see the solemnity of the judgment about to be executed on Babylon. The effect will be to separate our hearts from all around, and keep us looking for that blessed hope, and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour, keeping our garments white. It will be a struggle, but now are we the sons of God, and "when he shall appear, we shall be like him" - He will come out with us. May we seek to realise it even here, keeping distinct from everything that is to be judged, and our heart's desire be to see His face with joy, to be with Him who has given Himself for our portion now and to all eternity.

Revelation 20

The beast and false prophet destroyed, Satan is bound and put into the bottomless pit. Then comes sessional judgment. It includes Matthew 25, but it is not that only, for it is going on - they sit on thrones all along - through the millennium. Then Satan is let loose and deceives the nations; namely, those who are not kept by grace: he gathers them around Jerusalem, and fire comes down and destroys them all. Then follows the judgment of the dead: the 8th verse of chapter 21 finishes the book.

Revelation 22

The prophetic part of the Book of Revelation closes at chapter 21: 8. Then we get from verse 9 a description of the heavenly city, in that shape and form: as to what it is, what cannot enter into it, and what it reveals. This chapter gives more the outgoings of it, the river of the water of life, [the tree of life, and the leaves of the] tree for healing of the nations, etc. This closes at verse 5, and ends entirely at verse 7. Then it was; "I, John, saw these things," and certain addresses are given which I desire to speak about; also a general truth, bringing down the light of the heavenly city on us now.

231 The Lord put Israel under the law, and there was complete failure; but still He will accomplish, in infallible power, what He had promised to Israel, for He will write His law on their hearts, He will accomplish in power to Israel what He had given in responsibility. It is the same in regard to the church - He has set it in responsibility among men now.

The practical application we should derive from these promises is, that there is nothing here morally that we ought not now to be looking for. By the power of the Holy Ghost we should have a present anticipation or realisation. Of course, when there is the full result, there will be a great difference - the body freed from sin and death, etc.; but still more, "The river of the water of life"; for it is said now, "He that believeth, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water." The tree of life was the manifestation of grace, the leaves being for the healing of the nations - a beautiful character of the church, to be ministering the healing power of grace. In Israel will be seen, when righteousness is reigning, "the sinner, being a hundred years old, shall be accursed." But here I find, even in the glory, the blessed principle of divine grace through which we came there. The earnest is given us now, "Christ having been made a curse for us." "The throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it": the immediate throne of God is now within the church. Do we not judge those who are within? The Holy Ghost also sets up His throne in the heart of the saint, because it is the witness that there is no curse; he is not judged for sin - the word of God being the judge, a discerner between good and evil according to God. When this is not accomplished, it is a testimony against the saint.

"His servants shall serve him." Now there are many hindrances and conflicts with the enemy in service; but still, what I am called on to do now will then be fully accomplished; now, as far as we are spiritual, we enter into the anticipation of it. "His name shall be on their forehead." By-and-by there will be a perfect display of Him whom we serve; but now all men ought to see the display of Christ's name in us - to speak, and walk, and meditate as He did. In the glory it will be Christ reflected in everything; so now it ought to be. The more we search into the details of the glory in this blessed book, the more shall we learn the higher blessings to enjoy. The Holy Ghost brings it out for us to anticipate now, learning the grace that comes in, and the life that flows out. God will accomplish the highest desires that now we have for our comfort and joy to anticipate; all will be accomplished. God produces desires within us that nothing but the glory can satisfy. The Holy Ghost produces the power now to enter into these things. This shews the importance of our minds dwelling there. The lovely fruit then is seen, "Whatsoever is lovely" or "of good report, think on these things." How bright the heart would be! What growing up to the knowledge and preciousness of Christ, if accustomed to be where God dwells! Christ was one over whom circumstances had no power, except to draw out God's grace; and so should we be, for He is our example. Mark the outgoings of His grace to those in need. Christ was not governed, though of course acted upon, by circumstances to shew grace, the power of His affections being drawn up to His Father: there was no effect in Christ, only expressive of what was in Him - the very fountain of life, the source of all He did.

232 "He that testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly." Three times it is repeated. What has the Spirit of God declared? Two things have been shewn in this book. The terrible history of man's pride, and God's judgment against it. Then He takes the saint out of that scene, and sets his heart at the end of these things, even bringing before him the heavenly Jerusalem. This has always a sanctifying effect, it stops many a haughty word. In the former part of the book I see God knowing everything. This I might not be able to explain, but I see the result of all. We are called on to "keep the sayings of the book." The soul has been given a sort of gravity in the world, not to be meddling with what will be judged. The next thing - He goes a step further when addressing us, on what has been before, or going on now, or is to be hereafter: whoever receives these things may find this stay for his soul - "I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last." There is the rest, as to all that has been performed, and what is unaccomplished: the heavenly Bringer-in of the light that is to shine in the world - the Star of heaven to arise on this benighted world.

233 What is the spiritual feeling of the church after all has been gone through - after the terrible schism between light and darkness? What does the church say? "The Spirit and the bride say, Come." Those who have the place of the bride desire the Bridegroom, having the blessed fellowship together. Look at chapters I and 3; there you see the full expression of this. As the Faithful Witness He was seen on earth; for no man could see Christ on earth, but saw God in Him. Whether He took the little child in His arms, or comforted the poor widow whose son was stretched on the bier, all exhibited God, and I know Him as such. He is also "the First-begotten from the dead," witness to God for us, hereafter as "Prince of the kings of the earth." What does the church cry at this contemplation? The Spirit of God in her breaks forth at this revelation of joy, and says, "Unto him that loveth us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood." She testifies to the world, "Behold, he cometh": the church's own position is of the testimony for Christ. The Spirit cannot speak to the saint's heart without that saint giving a response. Now we get the result of all the testimony, closing with what Christ is in Himself. It turns from the city to Him who is the centre. Why am I in the golden street? Because Christ is in the midst of the city, not now washing my feet, for the place I walk on cannot defile, for it is righteousness and holiness of truth.

In the whole scene all is summed up - "I, Jesus." He must have the heart of the church, He may tell the church many things, open to them His mind: as to Abraham, it was said, "Shall I hide from Abraham the thing that I do?" Also says Christ, "Ye are my friends." After He has communicated what He was going to do, and done all, He says, "I, Jesus." He Himself comes and addresses the church. Beloved brethren, when the Spirit of Christ works in the heart, it says to Christ, 'It is You I want - come and bring in the glory.' "The Spirit and the bride say, Come." Not merely the bride, but the Spirit. The source and substance of what is in the heart is the Bridegroom. What is the next desire? "Let him that heareth say, Come." He calls on the saint to join and say, "Come." Those who have entered into the full apprehension say to others, "Come." This is the next step. The church at the same time has the blessing in itself, that is, the water of life, and turns round and says, "Let him that is athirst come," because we have the waters of life - not yet in all the blessed fulness, but we are sure the river of life is flowing in the heart of each saint, however feeble. Christ said this first, in John 7, "If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink," and now sets the church in the very same place of invitation, because it has got eternal life. See here the blessed consciousness of what the church has got: salvation - no uncertainty, though many may pass through trial in getting it; but I speak of the portion of the church. "He that believeth not God hath made him a liar, because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son." But what is the record? Not one of uncertainty, "and this is the record, that God has given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son." There is the gospel, the answer of peace given by God to those whose souls are working in this way. Peter, in his address to the Jews, shews this: the gospel, the revelation of what is in Christ, is the answer of peace to the conscience under all the anxieties produced by having neglected Him. "He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit," so the Christians can say, "Let him that is athirst come" - not merely say it, but go and testify to Christ as hard as ever he can.

234 "Whosoever will, let him come," is another step. There is the same certainty of having life. It comes fresh from the throne of God and the Lamb. Having the water of life, I am looking for the glory in saying all this. "Behold, I come quickly." Mark the way in which, both importunate and solemn, Jesus presses it on the hearts of His saints, to say, "Come": "I come quickly," as much as to express, 'I leave on your hearts these last words' - with which He closes the book, and solemnly adds, "Amen." The Christian again breaks out, "Even so, come, Lord Jesus." Whatever has been testified about, this is to be laid on the heart of the church. Could your heart say, "Even so, come, Lord Jesus"? Having heard this word of comfort and encouragement, can you say this? If you are not at peace, you cannot say so, but would rather the Lord would come and take you to-morrow, and not to-day. If I look for Him as a Judge, I cannot say, "Come." If the conscience is at peace, it does not enter into the question of sin: having blessed me with every spiritual blessing, Christ comes without sin to receive me to Himself. In practice the affections enter in. You may see a person truly in Christ, and not happy in God, not before God; the conscience active, but the affections not right there. I must have my affections in my conscience. The effect of His work is to bring me to God. The Holy Ghost sets up His throne in the heart, and judges what we are not to be judged for. If, by careless walking in the flesh, or having my interest in the world, I cannot disown my state, the Holy Ghost takes these things that are in my heart, and makes me see what I have allowed, and I get exercised, troubled, and ashamed. I doubt not of being saved, but have lost the fountain of joy. My heart cannot be in this state, if I am doing things in His house that are not pleasing to Him: I shall not like for Him to come and see I am neglecting Him. Any one of these things, contrary to His mind, will hinder our looking to God. There ought to be that sifting in the heart, that the desire of our souls may rest in confidence in the work done for us; and the desire too, that the Holy Ghost may drive away everything from our affections that is not of God, and that our affections may be so brought into our conscience, that we may say, Come, Lord Jesus; even so, come.

235 There is peculiar graciousness in this invitation to the world to come and take of the river of the water of life. Here is the authority of the church for considering herself as the bride before she really is so manifested. The angel (in verse 16, and other passages) is the representative of the Lord; even though declared to be an angel, he stands as the distinct messenger of the Lord Jesus, and speaks as His representative.

Revelation 22: 16, 17

The Morning Star is the place Christ has taken so as to have the church with Him in that character. Christ is the subject of prophecy as regards the earth, and then disappearing and going up: never the subject of prophecy as hid in God.

Chapter 1: 5. Earthly association with Him is spoken of first. The church has her own proper place, and says, "To him who loveth us, and hath washed," etc., and then turns round to speak of His manifestation on earth. His earthly work for me was when He washed me from my sins. He is not only the "Faithful Witness" for me, but the faithful worker. In every sense He was a faithful witness for God. But we begin not with that, but, "He loveth us, and hath washed us from our sins in his own blood"; we look back, too, and see He has all the rest. He has put us in the same official nearness with Himself to God - "king and priests, unto God and his Father."

236 In chapter 4 we see the church now in heaven. The judgment of the churches down here in chapters 2 and 3; judgment of the world afterwards; and then, at the close, a description of the heavenly city: "Behold, I come quickly," etc. All is closed: just as revealed at the beginning, so it is at the close. "I, Jesus, have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches" - a personal word after the book is closed. The beginning of the book opened also with what He was.

Chapter 22: 16, being in contrast with what had been said for the world, draws out the expression from the saints of verse 17; this shews our position till He comes. "The Root and the Offspring of David" is the Source of all, and the Heir of all - the holder, or vessel, in which all the blessing is set. This does not draw out the peculiar feelings of the church; but when He says, "I am the Bright and Morning Star," it calls out the expression from the church, shewing her secret or private knowledge of His own personal value. In rejection while in the world, Christ was keeping up connection with it. Death comes in: the witness closed. Then redemption's history begins - "Except the corn of wheat fall into the ground and die," etc. Moreover, when He is manifested to earth, we shall be manifested with Him. The Bright and Morning Star stands contrasted with the blessing the earth will get. Then comes the invitation of the Spirit and the church; it is Himself she wants, and, until then, she is the full vessel of the grace of God, and says, "Come." Israel is not that. They do not know relationship and deliverance in consequence of that, but they wait for deliverance out of the sorrow - "out of the depths." They groan for deliverance, that is, the coming in of power to set them free.

The hope of the church is by the power of the relationship. She is the bride, she has the Spirit, and does not wait for it. Israel says, "Thou to whom vengeance belongeth, shew thyself." Does the bride say that? Does she call for vengeance? No; she is waiting for the Bridegroom. It was that which closed the relationship with the world, that began our relationship with Christ. His death was the ending of that in which God could have anything to say to man as man. As connected with Him in manifestation (not union - never that), all closed at His death. I can say, I am dead, crucified with Christ, my life is hid with Christ in God. The centre and root, too, of all our relationship to God is Christ's death. Sins are gone, not existing any more: the being is gone in which they were, that is, I. We begin by death, and we are never clear unless we see that. It is not by His death I am put into union with Him, but by the Holy Ghost come down from heaven. They would not hear, killed Stephen, and the like; and then comes out this position - exclusively a heavenly Christ; and then we get the Morning Star. He is not only a Christ in heaven, but He has associated believers with Him while He does not come to the earth: His blood-shedding is the ground of it all. The revelation to Paul after this is "I am Jesus whom thou persecutest." Paul got the teaching of the church, and said afterwards, "I know no man after the flesh" - I know no such people as Israel on the earth - no such Head as the Messiah. My connection is with Christ risen and glorified on high. In John 14 He says, "I go to prepare a place for you." He does not say, I will prepare a place for Israel. We are going to the Father's house. We are connected with the Father and the Son by faith while waiting for Him, and we shall be with the Father and the Son by-and-by. Christ, the hope of the glory to be revealed, is the foundation of that, and therefore it is said, "Christ in you, the hope of glory." How can we tell that? We know it, for He "shall be in you." The Holy Ghost is an unseen Spirit in the world, but He is linking you with an unseen Saviour in heaven. This is our proper hope, as being of the bride through the Holy Ghost dwelling in her.

237 What is the Morning Star? The revelation of Christ to the church when He is not seen by the world - the completion of present privilege. In 2 Peter 1: 19 Christ is the "day star." The allusion in this passage is to the transfiguration, recorded in the three Gospels. The kingdom is the earthly glory spoken of. The heavenly thing is the hidden part. "They feared as they entered the cloud." It was not a common cloud, but significant of the presence of God - the Shekinah, where God dwelt in connection with Israel. They did not see from without what was WITHIN. The Shekinah frightened those in the wilderness. Moses and Elias went into the cloud: the others did not see them then. The word of prophecy is confirmed by the glory revealed - a candle that shineth in a dark place. The Father was in the cloud. Moses and Elias went in, and the others could not see in. Paul only knew afterwards what was within.

238 There is to be something besides broad day. This is the night; but the Morning Star is to be seen by those watching through the night. Prophecy tells you of the day, but not of this Star. Prophecy could not tell you of the hidden Christ, "until the day dawn." Those who are waiting for the day see the dawn, and watch for the day. They do not belong to the earth (as in darkness of night), because the spared remnant on the earth are that; but they belong to heaven as well as to the power of the day before the day comes. We get Christ Himself as He will never be seen in the day. Hence in Revelation 2: 28 the address to Thyatira says, "I will give him" - the overcomer, not only the glory of the kingdom, as revealed to Peter, but that within the cloud not revealed to him - "the Morning Star." Here the bride responds to Him - the Morning Star. Now I shall have my proper place. He has washed me from my sins long ago. The relationship is understood, and enjoyed - no need of explaining it. Did you ever hear a person explaining to a child what its mother is? The relationship is there. There is no explanation when He says, "I am the Bright and Morning Star." Those who have got hold of the relationship say directly "Come." They know Him as the One who has loved them, and washed them from their sins, etc., and they are within the veil. The Spirit leads the chant, "Come." The church has the consciousness in herself of the relationship, and the coming of Christ to receive the church could not be a matter of indifference; it could not be understood by a person who has not the living relationship. If I have the relationship, and He knocks, do I want an explanation of who He is before I open the door? Does the wife wait before she opens to her husband, when she knows his knock? "The Spirit and the bride say, "Come." Are all Christians saying, Come? No! Then what is to be done? The church is corrupt: there is the great house. But there are individual hearers; let them say, "Come." The first desire is to have Christ, and to Him she says, "Come"; the next, that all who hear should have right affections towards Christ, and say, "Come." You that hear, do you join, and say, "Come."

You get the whole circle of right affections in this verse: first, that arising from the consciousness of being the bride; secondly, desire for all the saints. Why are you lingering outside Christ? Are you waiting for judgments on the earth? There is a desire that the saints should have no hindrance to the single eye, and readiness to say, "Come," knowing the heart is not right if not saying, "Come." Then is that all? No; there is a third thing - the gracious perception, that there are thirsty souls wanting to be refreshed. She says to them, 'I have the Spirit, I have been refreshed.' The church does not say, 'Come to me' - the false church says that - but says, "Come." I have not got the pure flowing of the river yet (Rev. 22), but you come. The next thing to the supply of our own need is the discernment of the wants of these thirsty ones. We can say, I have part in the Bridegroom - I have rivers of living water. We ought to be able to say, I have got the river. Anyone can say, There are rivers; but we ought to be able to say, We have them. If our hearts are in the circle of these affections, we shall say to others, Come, and have them too. Is that all? No; there are yet others invited: "Whosoever will, let him come and take of the water of life freely." Thus the church is seen, first, in its full bridal place and desire for Christ's coming without a question of judgment; and so in the individual that hears His voice; then follow the invitations of grace.

239 "He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus."

God in His Essence and Attributes

J. N. Darby.

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What is fundamental in speaking of attributes, is inherent in the very term itself. It is not the being in its essential nature, even though always found there, but what is rightly attributed to the being as such; and in speaking of God this is not without importance; and the difference will be found very simple. Attributes are relative; hence God, who is absolute, cannot be spoken of as being the attribute itself. It is only a character which belongs to Him. God is something in Himself. But He is also something in relationship to other things when they exist or are supposed to exist. The attributes may be a necessary consequence of what He is, and I suppose in God always are, but they are not what He is Himself.

Further, no attribute can be rightly appropriated to God, which removes Him from His place as God, in necessary and absolute supremacy. The Being to whom I attribute it is gone if I do so. God cannot be the object of judgment, or He has wholly lost His place as God; yea, he who judges sets himself up in His place, and puts God in subjection to him. Evidently He is thus no longer God. Cicero says in the de Officiis, "Quasi material . . . subjecta est veritas." Now this evidently God can never be, for my mind is here supreme, and God subject to it. This is at once the pride and the folly of man. This is what modern Rationalism (and I suppose the mind of man has always so acted) calls the supremacy of conscience, by which revelation and everything else is judged of. But if conscience, as my action and judgment, is supreme, there is no God at all. A God who is not alone supreme, is no God.

Has man, then, no thought of God at all? Not so. He cannot judge by his mind, but he has the knowledge of good and evil - conscience. It may be corrupted, perverted, hardened, but he makes the difference of right and wrong. Scripture shews us he got this by the fall, and so as under sin. Still it brings in God, saying "The man is become as one of us, knowing good and evil." It is not a law, a rule from without, imposed, but what is intrinsic (in man). He says, That is a good thing, that a bad one; and he concludes at once, God cannot approve a wrong thing, nor condemn a good thing. A man may, from passions, education, habit, have a very wrong measure of right and wrong; and demon-gods may make him put evil for good, and good for evil; but he makes the difference, and the sense of right or wrong in itself leads him to attribute right to God, and not wrong. "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?"

2 But this right and wrong is connected with obligation, and is measured by relationships. I owe to a father, a husband, my neighbour, what belongs to that relationship: so to God. That is, the unperverted sense of right and wrong puts God in His place, does not judge Him. It is not an idea formed, but a relationship recognised, and hence subjection. Thus Adam lived in peace before the fall. Divine supremacy and authority was there, and owned, and then with knowledge the relationship was transgressed.

But supposing this sense of right and wrong in man, and that it is connected with the relationships in which we stand, I do hold that God loves righteousness and hates iniquity, because I intrinsically know right and wrong, but right and wrong being apprehended in the relationship, God is supreme to my mind; that is the first of rights. He is God, as much as my father is my father, and I own subjection to Him as God. I do say, He must be righteous, for that is the expression of acting on what is right and good in the relationships in which He has placed others, as far as consistent with supremacy and righteousness. But this is not supremacy of conscience, as if I were judge, and my measure of right and wrong, or my discernment of it perfect; but that I do conclude from right and wrong abstractedly to right in God, but at the same time to supremacy and perfection as the point I start from. One must not confound the measure of right and wrong with the sense of it. To speak of the supremacy of conscience, is to assume that its measure is perfect and adequate, not obligation under it. When I judge God or any one, I take a measure to judge by, and may misjudge from the state of my own mind. That is not conscience. Conscience with God recognises authority also over it, and supreme authority, or God is not recognised at all, and that is simply atheism. What these modern infidels claim - is to make their consciences the measure of right and wrong. This is false and grossly pretentious, and destroys the nature of God, and right as regards Him.

But we have already got into the discussion of relative qualities in God. This is what supposes other things besides the absolute being. If God is righteous, though He be so, He must be so towards others; it is relative. There are two words applied to God, which reveal His nature - Love and Light - and only these two. They affirm what He is in nature - not any attribute. Love is goodness, but in supremacy; for, in its abstract nature goodness is identified with supremacy, for it must be free. It is in this it is different from desire, even when it is a holy desire.

3 Love is used, I know, in human language for desire, in the best and most amiable sense. But though the same word be used in the sense of an inferior to a superior, or even an equal, this is in connection with a motive - is moved.

But love, as goodness itself, is blessed in itself and free in its actings, unless want or misery draw it out; but it has not a motive which characterises it by its object. This is always the case in desire, even when it is in no way evil, but has the character of affection. In ordinary desires it forms so far the character; money, power, pleasure, give their character to the man who seeks them; but though love be used as to them, it is evidently in a lower sense, and, where desires are, the desired object so far rules over us. Where love exists in a divinely-formed relationship, it is, or may be a just affection. I say, "may be," because it may run into a mere desire and be idolatry, and the relationship falsified. But when rightly in exercise, save as man in certain aspects represents God, it looks up, and characterises the person in the affection. It is conjugal, filial, and the like. A husband and a father in certain respects represent God in those relationships, and so far it partakes of what He is. But in the closest relationship where it is not this, it has the character I speak of: "Thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee."

But God suffices to Himself, and goodness makes Him infinitely happy in Himself. For goodness is happy if it has no object, though happy in goodness when it is exercised towards one. Hence it is free, because it suffices for itself. Hence though, in certain relationships, man may be the image of God, yet as he cannot suffice to himself, and so be free and sovereign, he is not said to be love, though he is to walk in it. He is as to any right state subject and recipient. The divine nature is in the Christian, and he loves; still "we love because"!

4 But we are light in the Lord. The purity of nature which belongs essentially to God is made ours in the new man; as far as it acts in us it manifests everything around us in its true character. Christ was love in the world, and the light of the world. He is the measure of both for us. It is a blessed thing that the two essential names of God should be the expression of the new man in us; only, as we have seen, we are not said to be love. But that which is the nature of God characterises us, and makes us to enjoy Him, and to act according to that character here through grace.

These, as I have said, are not attributes. Attributes are ideas which we attach to God in connection with what is outside Himself, though belonging necessarily to Him as God. He is omnipotent, omniscient, supreme; even righteous, holy; these, though more connected with His nature, are relative terms. I must think of God's dealings and claims to call Him righteous. He judges of something when He is righteous, only it affirms He always judges right. To call Him holy, I must think of evil which He rejects. Hence He is not called righteousness and holiness, but righteous and holy. What He says is truth, but He is not truth. Truth is what is rightly affirmed of something else. But God is not affirmed of something else. We can say Christ is the Truth, because He does tell exactly what everything is - what God is, perfect man is, and by contrast what evil man is, what the world is, who is its prince. Through Him all is exactly brought out in its true character. Hence we say, God in Himself is absolutely Love and Light - the last expressing perfect purity (invisible in itself), and manifesting everything as it is before God, and shewing the way before us: and God is righteous, holy, omniscient, omnipotent, supreme, and the like - all of which are relative terms - the former moral, the latter natural attributes.

Righteousness is perfectness in, or consistency with the relationship in which anyone stands; evil and good being known. Holiness, the aspect of heart, which intrinsic purity of nature bears towards other things, according to their character. We may speak of things as holy when entirely set apart to God, and separated from all profane use; but properly it applies to persons expressing their abhorrence of evil and delight in that which is pure and good. God is holy in Himself, abhorring evil and delighting in what answers to His perfect nature. The creature can only be holy as separated to God in what He is in His perfectness, because its nature can have no true and perfect object but Him, and its object gives its character to a nature in a creature, and holiness is the expression of a nature, not the obligation of a relationship. We are holy as far as every movement of thought answers to the impress and character of God, having Him for its object. Anything taken up in itself, apart from Him, is necessarily independency and sin. So far God is set aside. We have no object which makes the heart right but Him. Although we cannot leave God out as the author of, and as giving authority to, the relations in which we stand; yet, as we are placed in certain relationships, righteousness has somewhat more extensive range, though as a sanction God must be brought in. But whenever a relationship owned of God exists, it is unrighteous not to act up to it: not to be faithful to obligation in it.

5 Now God, as righteous, maintains judicially every obligation which any relationship imposes on us. But first and above all, relationship to Himself according to His supremacy and moral nature; this is the basis and stay of every other. Only Christianity has brought out a second and more perfect measure of this. It recognises what is due from man according to the measure of man, his obligations in the place he is in towards God and his neighbour. Of this the law is the perfect measure, God making allowance for ignorance of the measure.

But besides this, God Himself has been perfectly glorified by the blessed Lord. All that He is, where sin gave occasion to the full revelation of all that He is, has been glorified in Christ, and a new ground of relationship formed according to what He is, based on what Christ has wrought. Hence man is in the glory of God, and God's righteousness is displayed in that.

Judgment is based on the actual obligations founded on the relationship in which man is. Acceptance goes much farther, and is according to the worth of the Lord's work; we are made the righteousness of God in Him. But God in righteousness maintains all the relationships in which man stands according to His will.

It is well also to distinguish between the righteousness of God in government, and the immutable character of God, according to which we must stand before Him, if in His revealed presence. His revealed requirement of righteousness forms, with long patience exercised on His part, through goodness, the basis of His righteous government, never to be fully revealed until Christ comes; partially displayed in Israel, where needed to maintain the recollection of it everywhere; and in a signal way in the flood which closed the old world.

6 But standing before God fully revealed, supposes not our obligations to Him in government exercised to maintain His authority, and the natural sense, or revealed rule of right or wrong, but fitness for His own presence. This is in Christ only. This is fully revealed in Christianity alone, and wrath from heaven in connection with it; Rom. 1: 1-20.

When I speak of what is holy, it is not judicial authority, as in the case of righteousness, but what purity of nature abhors and rejects, or delights in. Righteous and holy are the attributes which attach themselves to the moral nature of God and His supreme authority.

But there is that in God, the sense of which is with difficulty lost in man, though he be without God in the world. This has turned the sense of a being above himself, perfect in knowledge and power, a Supreme Being, into what is the fruit of imagination or servile dread - Mythology and Fetishism. The visible powers of nature were deified, because a God was wanting for the heart. The legends of ancient days were turned into myths of the gods. Terror told of a revengeful power, and a world of retribution loomed to an unsatisfied conscience. Man would animate planets, because they moved without him: he would have poetical lusts in superficial and self-satisfied Greece; more calculated sobriety in Egypt, a sunny south of gods, and northern immensity of giants, and storms, and mountains in Scandinavia; or seek to solve the mystery of good and evil in Ahriman and Ahurmazdha in Arva, or revel in monstrous reveries in India. Cruelty and poetry might divide the world under the name of gods, but behind all there was everywhere Tertullian's "Testimonium animae naturaliter christianae," an "unknown God" - a Brahm, the origin of all things, a primeval source or power.

In Fetishism - degraded into a dread of some terrible unknown power, which priests used for their own purposes; in more cultivated religions, kept as the secret mysterious knowledge belonging to them, or to the initiated only, while the vulgar were kept in play with the more convenient everyday materials of popular mythology - the gods and goddesses of nature and imagination; yet still, though inconsistently, clothing them with attributes and powers which, if true, could only belong to one supreme God. And this was so true, that each local mythology had this twofold character, and that, even to particular cities.

7 In India, in the sects of Vaishnavas and Saivas, and one supreme God above the rest, the idea of God, and attributes of supremacy, omniscience and omnipotence, ran through all, however confused and inconsistent. These attributes were symbolised, too, as in the winged bulls, and lions, and men of Assyria - symbols recognised in Scripture; with this immense difference, that in heathen symbols, save in the vague idea of divinity, God was thought of no further than the attributes or symbols.

In Judaism, these formed but the throne of a known God who sat above them; the clearest expression, on the one hand, of the mind of man losing itself without God in knowledge it could not retain or carry, and on the other, of the clearness of the revelation which made one true God known.* Supremacy, omniscience, omnipotence, attach themselves necessarily to our idea of one God the moment the thought takes a definite form, and the attributes involved in them are not lost in mythological associations.

{*See the beginning of Ezekiel: God was seated above these figures. The extreme perverseness, and I must add, superficiality of man's mind and infidelity are shewn in Max Muller's "Science of Religion," and such-like works, licensing and promoting mythology, because it had the thought of God behind it all, as if it were the expression of it; whereas it was the gross departure of man's mind, when he had it, to degrade the idea of God when he had departed from Him; and that in connection with the basest defilement and cruelty, so that God in His true nature and conscience were alike lost - morally gone - though neither could be destroyed.}

In heathenism, where these activities are attributed to subordinate energies, the one original God was mere abstract, inert godhead - abstract existence.

In India, sole existence, sometimes springing into activity of thought and desire, all which became creation, including the gods, and was Maia, or Illusion, and returning into abstract godhead again, when Brahm's occasional activity ceased.

Modern Materialism does little more than substitute scientific activities of nature for poetical activities, and is worth about as much; for after all, we must want a cause. Phosphorus may put activity into the brain, not moral thought; but what puts activity into phosphorus, or gives it this mental character? Indeed, wherever I find a regular difference in a like agency, I find a difference-maker! The tubers of a plant, which convert the elements of the same soil into a geranium or an oak, force on me the conviction of design and mind.

8 I do not connect omnipresence and eternity as attributes with God, not because they may not, in an ordinary sense, be said to be so; and Scripture itself so speaks practically, and it always speaks practically, because truly; but that in our minds they are connected with time and space, which do not apply to God. There is no time when God is not; no place where His eye and hand, to use human language, are not. "I AM" is the proper expression of His existence. While time rolls on "I am" remains unchanged, and when time has rolled away "I am" subsists the same. It can hardly be called an attribute. This being understood, we may speak of eternal as a natural attribute of God.

As to omnipresence, God has no more to do with space than with time. He has created all things in a way apprehensible thus to us. In this creation nothing escapes Him. He is, morally speaking, omnipresent. He is not of, or in it, but pervades it. He is "through all"! He upholds everything, as He creates everything. He is not morally concerned in any motive (save as working in man in grace), but not a sparrow falls to the ground without Him.

Omnipotence is involved in this - the power to do whatever it is His will to do. Omniscience is involved in it also. Did not God know all things, He could neither know what to do rightly, nor judge morally. Supremacy is involved in our very idea of God as one, and active in power. They are inherent in our idea of God, and (when once the heathenish additions of what are confessedly imaginations are removed) cannot be separated from the idea of God. That which it is important to get fast hold of is, that there is a will in God. No moral being can be without it; a will guided by righteousness and holiness, and to which omnipotence and omniscience are subservient, but which is the source and origin of all that exists outside Himself, not of its state, for moral beings have a will, but of its existence.

He is a Creator. I do not say that simple existence can be proved to be a matter of creation by logical deduction. But simple existence is an abstraction. Man sees trees, planets moving; in a word, evidence of design, and that, which has been so often argued, involves a designer. The distinct knowledge of a Creator is a matter of faith. Yet if man does suppose the abstract existence of matter without a cause, he violates the first principles of necessary thought. He is accustomed to see man form many things out of comparatively formless matter, so he has an idea of this latter. But if he begins to think of why anything existed, he cannot avoid the thought of a cause. Why, implies it? and I can say Why? and it is my nature to say Why? I am so constituted as to look for a cause. I may not be able to define cause,* nor can I conceive creation; but I cannot conceive, on the other hand, a thing existing without it. My mind may be inert, and so far take what exists as I find it; but as soon as it is in activity, it looks for why a thing exists. The same thing proves I cannot know a first cause, but only that there must be one. I cannot conceive a thing existing without a cause, therefore I say there must be one. But a first cause means what exists without one. That is, I cannot conceive it. Hence, too, I cannot conceive creation, though I know there must be a Creator. It is merely saying, I am a creature, and must think in the order of my being.

{*A cause, I apprehend, is power producing from a will working somewhere. I say "somewhere," as school-men speak, there is a "cause causata," and "causa causans."}

9 Goodness or love, omniscience and omnipotence, involve in them perfect wisdom; only all this supposes a God, with a free will to exist, before any attribute can be assigned to Him. If not free to act, omniscience and omnipotence are simply null.

One class of philosophers - unable as we are, in the nature of things as creatures, to conceive a creation (for the creature must think in his own order, that is, creature order; he can no more have an idea of creation than create - power is not in him), judges "Ex nihilo nihil fit."* For him it is true; but it is only the great fallacy, common to philosophy, of taking our capacity of thought and action as the measure of what may be, which is simply absurd. It is our measure as to power, be it of thought or action; we must think or act according to our nature, and can think no more as to forming ideas. But it is wholly false if it deny the consciousness of what is above us and applicable to us receptively. We may be acted on mentally and physically by that which is no possessed power in us. Active power or capacity for it is not the measure of receptivity.

{*Out of nothing, nothing is made.}

10 Further, I may negatively be conscious of the necessity of a thing of which I can form no idea, because it is beyond my order of being. Thus I naturally ascribe an effect to a cause, a power producing it. I see a thing becomes, begins to exist, as it is before me; I at once ascribe it to some cause. I am so formed as to suppose a why? It cannot be without some cause. It is not a formed idea of what the cause is, but the conviction that there must be one. It appears to me as an effect, and effect contains the idea of a cause in it. Hence I believe in creation. Not that I form an idea of it, but that negatively it cannot but be.

I have already said, the nature of the proof demonstrates that I cannot form an idea of the thing proved in itself. But there is clearly seen eternal power and godhead. And here note that creative power involves eternal power, for all begins by creation, and all creation begins. But what creatures must be, that is, exist absolutely without a beginning. "I am," therefore, or absolute existence, is the one just revelation of God as such.

We have thus one personal God - "I am," supreme, absolutely free, omniscient, omnipotent, wise, the Creator. These are, so to speak, natural attributes; moral ones are righteous, holy, good; known to man not by ideas or thinking, which is impossible, for then man's mind would be at least the equal of God, that is, He would not be God at all; but by conscience, or the knowledge of good and evil, the proofs in the creation around us of creative power and wisdom, and in spite of the undeniable, utter degradation of man, in corruption and violence, and the monstrous deities into which he had merged it, the idea of God, the abiding sense of unity, supremacy, absolute godhead, everywhere found.

If Jupiter be suckled by a goat in Crete, the idea of supremacy remains. If Krishna lives with the milkmaids, in time he is an incarnation of Vishnu, and Vishnu is Brahm, the rest Maia or Illusion. The gods are mortal; God is not. It may be Bathos, or Silence, or as unknown as you please, when the feeble mind of man tries to have a formed idea; but before it acts, behind the gods of imagination or lusts or fears, there is not only godhead, but one God. The Manitou of the Indian, the eternal being before Ahurmazdha, was active for good, or Ahriman, to spoil his work.

11 And remark here, that where ideas flow from a relationship in which we exist, which belongs to our nature in its original constitution, it may be by thinking and imagination, education, habit in religious things, priestcraft, be perverted, falsified, degraded (and the mind with it), or reasoned against from the inadequacy of the mind to master it as an idea; but the roots of it are in the nature. To have it falsified, there must be something to falsify. "Naturam expellas furca, tamen usque recurret." Hence, prone as the human mind is to indulge its imagination, stop short of God whom it fears, and have gods and idols which it can manage after its own lusts and thoughts, yet, when the truth of the relationship is brought out, the soul recognises it.

The unity, supremacy, omniscience, omnipotence, of God, and our responsibility to Him, are owned, when divine revelation has brought them out, as the only truth, by all. I do not mean by that, that the mind of man cannot or does not seek to disprove it, and have no God at all, because it does not like one, does not like responsibility, and likes to be supreme - at least to have no one above it. But this is an effort, and an effort whose effects never last with the masses; that is, with man according to nature - an effort, too, always connected with oppression or violence and profligacy, as in the fall of the Roman Empire and in the French Revolution. Morality must disappear; for there can be no morality without responsibility, and responsibility without God is impossible. For to whom am I responsible if there be not one above me? Responsibility refers to relationship, and all relationship, even human, is founded on relationship to Him. Without Him self-will acts; each one will have his own, and man becomes a mixture of the devil and the brute, or is kept down by power because it must be, or worse; while power in result will cultivate superstition, because of its sway over men's minds. And, indeed, where faith or revelation does not give a true sphere outside self, man cannot rest in self, and he will make a false one. Hence, under Satan's power, the religions of the world.

Revelation, in making known the true God, meets - not the knowledge, but the wants of the human mind. It is the witness of its own truth, because it meets and clears out those springs in the soul which were the subjective adaptation to the relationship in which it stood in truth with God; and the objective revelation perfectly meets them, fits in, and so far God is known.*

{*Hence, where revelation exists, God is owned where there is no true conversion. Hence the superiority morally of Protestantism (which owns the true revelation, and uses it personally) to Popery, which has set up a mythological system of saints, etc., and established a priesthood, which is always, and must be, if God be not known directly and immediately. In Protestantism the conscience has to say to God immediately as revealed: in Romanism not - the priest is a director.}

12 If we take Scripture, we find there the attributes of God - the one true and only God - shine out, and in every page, with unclouded lustre. He is one, supreme, the Creator of heaven and earth, of all things; knows all things. If we go to heaven, He is there; to hades, He is there (Jer. 23: 24); can do all things. His eye and presence are everywhere; He is the eternal God; He is righteous and holy ; His goodness is over all His works. The cravings of the heart of man are met with the clearest and fullest revelation of God. I refer to the Old Testament, because there God, as such - the one true God - is fully and specially revealed in contrast with idols and man's imaginations. It is its special, direct revelation, with the law of His mouth - though promises and prophecies accompany it.

The New fully confirms it, I need not say; but there is a much fuller revelation in the Father sending the Son for the accomplishment of His ways in grace, and this characterises it. He does not give a revelation, He is revealed. Hence, though of course the attributes remain true, it is not attributes which characterise it, but what He is - light and love; righteousness and holiness necessarily coming in - but His own. Not the requirements of man's for Him, which quite alters the character of them as revealed. In the Old we could say, "The righteous Lord loveth righteousness." "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" Now, He - Christ - is our righteousness; we are made the righteousness of God in Him. It is in the New Testament we find God revealed in Christ as light and love, and we, "light in the Lord," and partakers of the divine nature, have to walk in the light, and know, through the redemption that is in Christ, that perfect love that casts out fear.

This is more than attributes, as we have said, though it confirms, is in a certain sense the source of, and makes us to know them all, and give each its own and full place.

The Most High

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I have been looking into the force of the Hebrew words for most High. That it ultimately refers to God in the millennium as the supreme God then manifested, to the exclusion of what is false, is evident. This is the force of the word - One who, to the exclusion of and superiority over all others, holds the place of the one true God, but exalted as supreme in government. Jehovah is, as we know, the God who is in relationship with Israel, but He is the supreme God, the Most High. The full statement of the title, and the time of taking it, is in Genesis 14: 19, 20, 22. Israel's enemies are entirely discomfited, and delivered into his hand, and the heir of promise blessed of Him who possesses heaven and earth. He is supreme, and has taken all things into His possession.

Still God is, of course, always such, and referred to in trial as the One who will set all right. When the Lord is just coming into the world to set all in order, the question is raised, Where is the secret place of the Most High? Where is He to be found as a protection? Whoever finds Him will have the protection of Abraham's God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the place of promise. Jehovah is it, the God of Israel. And in fact the full divine care of the supreme God, the God of promise, is found, possessor of heaven and earth, revealed in connection with the Melchisedec priest.

Hence, too, when Nebuchadnezzar is restored from a state that represents the character of the empires which began in him, he owns the Most High; Dan. 4: 25-34.

In the Psalms the use of it is frequent. In Psalm 21 it is connected with the royalty of Christ as the glorified Man and King. His hand will find out all His enemies and by the favour of the Most High He will not be moved. In Psalm 46 God is again in the midst of His people on Messiah's triumph (Psalm 45). The tabernacles are those of the Most High. His power is fully displayed in the earth, Jehovah being with Jacob. So more fully as to the world in Psalm 47. In Psalm 50 Most High is connected with the judgment of God in power. In Psalms 9, 10, 55, and 57, it is calling upon Him in this character by the remnant when in distress, the first of the two latter speaking of the distress, the second of the delivering supremacy over all the earth. Psalm 73 is the first of the third book, and the power of the Most High despised by the adversaries; but, going into the sanctuary, their judgment is discovered. The years of the Most High are remembered in Psalm 77, His way is in the sanctuary and in the sea; not looking to heart-failing in man, but to Jehovah, the Supreme, who accomplishes His good pleasure. In this and the next it is Jehovah's right to this name, as in all the history of Israel. For this is all Israel. Psalms 82 and 83 are both judgment at the close, and in the fullest way to recognise that Jehovah is the Most High over all the earth. Psalm 91 has been spoken of. Psalm 92 is the same perishing of the enemies, and exalting the true David. Psalm 97 is expressly as Jehovah reigning, and as Most High over all the earth, and exalted above the gods when He comes to judgment. In Psalm 107 it is Israel re-gathered, who celebrates God's government, and His chastisement for their rebellion against Jehovah who is the Most High.

14 We have the Most High in Daniel 7, though in most of the occurrences it is in the plural for "high" or "heavenly places." There its connection with God's title, and making good His dominion, and this connected with Israel, is evident. Thus, though Jehovah is looked back to in self-judgment in the history of Israel, as Psalms 56, 57, 73, 77, yet the force of the title is evident.

A few words on the Trinity

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The application of numerals to divine or any moral being is absurd.* We do not mean the same thing by unity in figure and in minds. But I deny that God was, or ever could be, fully revealed as one. He is one; but He never was revealed as one. He was revealed to be one in contrast with a multiplicity of gods. But when revealed to be one, He was not fully revealed. He existed always in trinity in unity - not that I pretend to fathom this, but I know it, because, when fully revealed, He is so revealed. When He was revealed as one, He did not suffer Himself to be approached, carefully shewed this, dwelt (as so made known) behind the veil. In a word, He used various sensible figures to shew that He was not known, that the true light did not shine, and that the way into the holiest was not yet made manifest.

{*This refers to ideas opposing the Trinity as set out in Scripture.}

But when He does reveal Himself, the Son is on earth, yet in the bosom of the Father. He is the image of the invisible God. He that has seen Him has seen the Father. The light of God was in the world, but man did not see or comprehend it. The revealed One, the Father, was known or to be known in goodness by the Son. Though the invisible God was made known by Him who was His image, yet if He had ceased to be invisible, Christ would have ceased to be a special revealer and image. If He had not perfectly shewn and revealed Him as really manifested (that is, if He had not been God), no love, goodness, forbearance, patience, power - no revelation would have been. If He had not been Son, He could not have revealed the Father to us as such.

But this is not all. The darkness comprehended not the light. The Holy Ghost became power (when the needed work was done to put us according to God's holy and righteous nature into that place, without which He would not have been so known, that is, in truth) to give competency of apprehension, and to reveal, not as object but as communicating power, having quickened us so as to have a capacity to apprehend. I am not saying this by mere deduction, but from the revelation of God.

Without the Trinity love was not known, righteousness, holiness - the spiritual nature of God and purity as such. That is, He never was revealed as He is and always was. All the true nature of God, that is, what He is, without the Trinity is unknown. The Father wills; the Son quickens whom He will; but because we have separate wills, why necessarily have the Father and the Son? The Spirit distributes to whom He will; but this is not separate from the will of the Father and the Son. They have not the same counsel but one counsel, mind, purpose, thought; yet they act distinctly in the manifestation of that counsel. The Father sends the Son, and the Son the Spirit. Yet when the Son comes, He is not thereby separate from the Father. "The Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works." So He casts out demons by the Spirit of God; yet He casts them out. There is unity in all that constitutes oneness when we speak spiritually - not unity as one by arriving at the same things, or union, or by being united, as we are by having only one Spirit dwelling in all, but - by being one in eternal being; so that all else flows from that one will and counsel, yet so as that distinction in action in that will is revealed to us: not distinct will, but distinct willing.

16 Not that I have the least pretension to fathom this divine mystery where all are God, all one God, God all three; yet the Father is revealed, the Son reveals, the Holy Ghost quickens and makes known. The Son who reveals is not different from the Father whom He reveals, or He would not reveal Him. By the Spirit who quickens and makes known, we are born of God and know God dwelling in us. He reveals Him to us by His own presence and is in every way the power of God, active in the creature.

Nor could the creature reach to God; or God would not be God. It is simply impossible; for if finite reach to infinite, there is neither finite nor infinite. And the infinite God could not, as such, reveal Himself to a finite creature. Nor is this mentally true only; for if God in His glory had done so, the creature could not have existed before Him. So if morally revealed (that is, as righteous and holy, and simple glory, that is, "in essential glory"), man could not have stood before Him. There was contrariety morally. Not even love would do; for what was it to man as he was? No link, no desire, and, if man was a sinner, no fitness in the simple display of it.

But in the Son by the Holy Ghost, by the work of Christ and the operation of the Holy Ghost, God is revealed; and in the love of the Father, righteousness and holiness are maintained and glorified, with capacity of communion in enjoyment of both the Father and the Son and intelligence of all these ways conferred by the presence of the Holy Ghost.

17 Hence, while John says God so loved the world, we find, whenever he speaks of grace and power bringing man into the knowledge and enjoyment of God, he speaks of the Father and the Son, adding afterwards in the words of Christ the presence and work of the Comforter. John is the one who speaks specially of the revelation of God, not of the presentation of man to God, though he does this; as Paul also speaks of the revelation of God, but specially of man's presenting to God.

Thus we see that there could be no full revelation of God, but through the Son by the Spirit, and thereby of the Father. The full revelation of the one God is only thus - Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. This, this only, is what the one God is, one identity of will and being, so that they are essentially one and one only, yet distinct in willing and acting (and we can distinguish them in willing and acting: hence we commonly speak of persons), yet never willing or acting but in the common will and unity of nature.

I fear much human language on this. But I affirm that the only full revelation of the one true God is the revelation of Him in the Trinity. Our prayers rise up the same. Through Him (Christ the Son) we have access by one Spirit unto the Father.

The Absolute

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There can be no absolute knowledge in man by his own reason, but only relative. God only is absolute; all other existences can be only relative, because there is only God absolute.

There is that which is next to it - the "I," which is out of time and space, and by its nature as such precludes relation; but it does not make the "I" absolute. First, there is no consciousness of absoluteness in it, though it helps one to the idea from the negation of relationship, while a negation is not a notion of the thing contradictory of that denied. But, further, consciousness (or the "I") is corrected by perception; for I perceive other things - not the "I." Be they ideas or things, it is all one, they are not the "I"; and the "I" becomes relative, is not absolute, existing in itself or infinite. The "I" is not "I am." "Am" is affirming something about "I": and as man I get into relativeness at once. When one says "I," infiniteness is excluded as time; but when the "I" reflects on itself, there is (I do not doubt) the consciousness that it is not absolute but dependent, has a source or cause, cannot say "being," though it can say "am" - not "becoming" (that is false) but "am." If I say "being" in any other sense than "am," I make myself God, as "I am." But, not being, I have to inquire what I am becoming, because what is not absolute has possibility of change: and what has possibility of change in becoming has necessity of becoming to be, that is, though existing, is not absolute, but flows from and depends on an absolute Being.

If it be inquired, if my relationship even with perceived things denies my absoluteness, has God not relationship with what exists, with me? None but what is the fruit of His own will. I am necessarily in relationship with what has caused me to be, by reason of which I have become, or with things which exist without my will. I am in relationship according to my being; I exist in that condition: God does not. He may form such relationships; but they are the fruit of His will; and His being remains in its own absoluteness. I have no doubt that man has an intuitive consciousness of relationship, and of relationship to a superior Being, independent of himself, with whom he is in relationship, though his ideas of that Being may be utterly false and corrupted; but that which is false and corrupted is in his natural intuition. Mind cannot know God, because relative cannot know absolute. But if imagination works, it corrupts the intuition mythologically. If mind works, it shews by its efforts its incapacity to reach what it is; but both the mythology and the efforts shew that there is the intuitive idea which sets the imagination and mind respectively in movement. But there is more than this. The immensely wider extent and preponderance of superstition, the rareness and shortlivedness of mental rejection of God theoretically, prove the power and strength of the intuition above mere mind. This may despise in its pretentiousness the intuition of a Being above us on which we are dependent; but the intuition is master of it always. Indeed, in detail the strongest minds are therefore grossly superstitious, because the want of the soul has not through the mind its natural pabulum.

19 Hence Renan and Scherer are perfectly right when they say, "all is relative"; and perhaps even when they say, "all [save the 'I'] is relation." Even what the "I" is, is entirely relative. But it is because they are wholly ignorant of God, who alone is absolute.

That science is become history is true, because thought has run itself out to the conviction of its incompetency, and can only relate what it has been thinking with a partial point of truth in it, but not the truth, of which the mind is incapable and owns itself such by making history of science. That this is all that can be, it is incompetent to say. It can only say and does admit that this is all it is competent for; because it cannot go beyond itself, and, being only itself cannot say of itself that there is nothing else which is competent, or that in some other way it cannot be arrived at or received. I admit and accept of its confession of incompetency.

Scherer reduces man to the lowest estimate of judgment of God and good. "Le vrai n'est plus vrai en soi" (the true is no more true in itself): a ridiculous sentence, because "le vrai" then cannot be. "Le vrai, le beau, le juste meme se font perpetueilement . . . ils ne sont autre chose que l'esprit humain." (The true, the beautiful, the just reproduce themselves perpetually: they are nothing but the mind of man). - (Revue des deux M., Feb. 15, 1861.) Now this is a statement that no nature can be, in apprehension or being, above man; or else "le vrai, le beau, le juste," may be "vrai, beau, juste en soi." Nor is this all. As to man they are relative, because he is so; yet, if there be a superior relation to One who is absolute, there is a fixed "vrai, beau, juste" morally in relation to Him, because He is the Absolute. It is simply a total denial of God or anything beyond the changing states or apprehensions of man; and makes man the end and beginning of himself; for if there be another thing or being to which he is in relation as end or beginning, there is as regards man a fixed measure of true, beautiful, just. So that this is merely the declaration that there is no relation beyond self; for if man is the measure and changes, it is simply self. This is philosophy.

20 Now I admit the partial truth (with a cloud of thoughts about it in philosophising), of which modern philosophy can only give a history, being, even as to this partial truth, past the power of conceiving truth. But progress is questionable. One man reasons from perceptions and sensation to prove God, another from final causes, another from intuitions, another from an innate perception of the absolute. All are true as a subjective, intuitive, or intellectual necessity; but they never reach objective knowledge either way: and man vacillates between all of them and arrives at - concludes - nothing! But the want and the craving do prove the truth, not of what the object is, but that there is an object - an unknown one. It is the "unknown God." You cannot know, but you cannot dispersuade that there is something to know. Hunger is not food, or the knowledge of food as possessed; but it is an undeniable proof to the hungry (take it as reasoning or want) that there is food to be known. And this moral condition is because man, in whose nostrils was breathed the breath of life from God, is thus in nature formed for God, and has not God.

Thus, when men have made the Logos the human mind or the human reason - the impersonal reason - with a vast system of philosophy to give it a body, there is a germ of truth; for there is that spirit in man which comes from the inbreathing of God originally. Yea, in wretched Pantheism there is a germ of truth; for God is above all and through all. All too live and move and have their being in Him. By Him all things consist. But where God is not known objectively, this centres in self: "Ils ne sont autre chose que l'esprit humain" (the most degraded of sentences); and centring in self is the perfection of degradation. But all these germs of truth, the truth (the word of God) gives us as certain truth in two words without the cobweb spinning of philosophy which proves its incompetency, the mind of man vacillating between systems formed from their germs without the true object of them; for that is philosophy.

21 But the truth does more; it gives us their true object as beginning, present fulness, and end, with the assurance of knowing as we are known, knowledge being now in part. And it takes us out of self by an object. And now see the divine wisdom with which this is done. I want the absolute but cannot have it, because I am in a relative condition; yet, if I have it not, I am reduced to what "n'est qu'humain" - self occupied with self. In Christ I have the absolute become relative, giving me the absolute goodness in coming into relation, perfect love and perfect light. But I have it more fully. I have the truth as to everything from the supreme God to sin, the world, the devil its prince, death itself and the dust of death with triumph over it. If I can see, I have the perfect "vrai, beau, juste"; and if not, I have it relatively to me - to man. But now I have it maintained to my soul in God, in Christ's life as perfect man relatively to God, and to the whole character of God in the atonement on the cross. I get absolute moral attributes glorified in God at the cost of abnegation of self in man (that is, in man who was the Son of God), love, righteousness, majesty, and truth. God was glorified in Him.

Thus I have the absolute in qualities maintained for my mind - my moral mind - in the cross, and self absolutely gone in man; I have the absolute in good become relative, so that my heart can and does know and delight in it. Could God's ways be more perfect or more wise?

Wise philosophy objects to this display of God's absolute character at Christ's expense, not seeing that it is the additional beauty and moral excellence of His giving Himself - the moral perfection of man, as absolute as what is relative can be, and absolute in Christ because He could give Himself. "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again," yet this, that it might be perfect in man, obedience to His Father - "this commandment have I received of my Father." But how can philosophy understand this? "Ils ne sont autre chose que l'esprit humain"; that is, self varied in its hopeless efforts to enlarge but never getting out of self. We cannot but in a subordinate sense give ourselves, because we are relative: we are not our own; for what is relative is bound to conformity to that relation. But, God having revealed Himself in Christ in grace to us, the discovery of this supreme relationship in absolute claim does free us from all others and lead us to give up self in all things in which it is sought, while sanctioning the relationships in which God had originally placed man, or to which he is rightly subjected as being of God Himself, such as magistracy, etc. Yet these may be given up (I mean natural relationships as connected with self) by a superior motive, the divine object taking possession of the soul in active love to others.

22 How admirable and divine the whole scheme is! The very wants suit, taking man out of self by the absolute become relative and perfection in the relative toward God and toward man, while the absolute is maintained to our souls in every sense by the sacrifice of Christ and man's perfect abnegation of self in the same to glorify God. The result is man dwelling in God (and God in him) and that in glory; this last known only in hope through positive revelation, yet felt to be necessary because of the preparation laid for it (see beginning of John 17), the rest enjoyed now, though this could only have been by divine actings (and we have it by divine communication as to truth and power, which is another subject), but when known, enjoyed as known truth in itself. He that believes not has made God a liar; he has not believed the record or testimony; but he that believes on the Son of God has the witness in himself.

But if all be relative and relation, according to logic by the doctrine of excluded middle there must be an absolute. Not that this makes us know anything but that there must be the thing. For the truth of excluded middle is, I suspect, always simply that the term is really a negative or involves one - that is, proves that there is an intuitive consciousness that there is the thing negatived, not that we know it, and I suspect is never true but in the case of the absolute. Thus, if I say, It is good or bad, it is only if I view the term absolutely that I can say so. It is a colour, therefore not white or black, both which negative absolutely all colour. It is when a term implies that it embraces in its nature all but its opposite. Both need not (indeed cannot) be absolute, but one must be; and the reasoning is always from the non-absolute to the absolute, which can exist without anything else existing. Nothing else can; for a thing, not being absolute, is in relation. It is simply therefore the proof of the intuition of the existence of the absolute.

23 It is a mistake to suppose that metaphysical scepticism denies the certainty of knowledge within the sphere of knowledge. It only affirms that the finite cannot know the infinite - that no conclusion is the truth, because it is not the knowledge of God. Truth is what is told, not what is concluded; and hence, as to what is beyond physical fact, it must be a revelation. Once God is admitted, certain abstract general conclusions can be drawn because they are involved in the meaning of the word; they are merely the expression of the relation. But they are not the truth, because this speaks of fact. Now it is not necessarily a fact that the relation subsists intact, and that man has not denied it: Christianity teaches that he has. At any rate, it is not proved he has not - yea, it may be proved he has. For fatalism and the moral immutability of man are absurdities. Our will is at work. Nor does the unchangeableness of general laws as to facts or results touch the question of will. If it proves motives, it proves a will to be moved: of this I have spoken elsewhere. Until a will be denied, it cannot be denied that a given state in relationship may be departed from. Hence even right conclusions as to the relationship are not necessarily the truth, though they be right. Indeed all the effort to insist on general laws is the revolt of man's heart against the relation with God being according to what we are, and the unwillingness to admit we have broken it.

I do not enter on the proofs of general laws from without, because physical general laws do not touch the question. That man acts by a will, without contradicting them, is evident; yet as to him all depends on what his will was. He builds or does not build a house: gravity and every other law remains the same. But he may have been selfish, or unjust, or generous in doing it, whether they be or not. I think my nature as ideally abstract as most philosophers'; but this does not affect the question whether there are divine facts which meet these ideas, and whether they are not the just idea for which God formed as so having them. Thus, supposing man God's image in his constitution, the ideas flowing from this would not be the source or end. But God (or the revelation of God as being the truth) the cravings of a dependent creature sought after, but heeded not. Yet it is equally true, whenever he pretended to have anything to meet the wants or to form a system by them without God, he was in open rebellion by independency. And this is what shews the fulness of simple Christianity (which totally rejected, as evil, heathenism and philosophy), and yet the measure of truth but real departure from God of the Clements and Origens, [that is, the so called "fathers,"] who accepted these cravings as part of the truth. They were not, though the truth met them when not simply lusts. Christ alone is the truth; His word is, because He is as He said, "altogether that which I also say to you," John 8: 25.

24 I do not lose sight of the absolute in speaking of absolute qualities: if I have one, I have the other; and what is relative is, if simple, absolute as a quality. In common use it is found by negation of what is or of variety. Some words or qualities are only relative. Still, when truly known, they become absolute. Thus "heavy" is simply relative; but when I know it, it is attraction: if there were none, it is absolutely negative in respect of weight; and as weight is relative, I can conceive its absence, because its presence is not necessary; for it is a relative quality. Absolute Being is God alone. But, taking man as a centre, we may speak practically of certain things as absolute when they are negative.

The great blunder of Schleiermacher, and the source of the worst infidelity now, is that he has taken the Holy Ghost's work in us - very likely in himself - for intuition, or specially collective Christian consciousness. He made divine teaching, in which case it is real, to be a title of human judgment on what the Holy Ghost gave. This is, I suspect, the key to the whole system, itself probably the fruit of Kantian philosophy and its offsets. The whole hangs on the church's not believing in the positive operation of the Holy Ghost. For all that Scherer and Bunsen, etc., pretend on their best side is simply Schleiermacher. Thus the Bible is Christian consciousness then: we judge it by Christian consciousness now. Hence it is, as Scherer says, the mere history of partial apprehension of truth; and of course, as every philosopher trusts himself, we judge scripture. That is, there is no revelation; for revelation must have authority or is false. Be it that the church was before the New Testament and the latter written for believers; yet the question is not thereby touched, whether it was not written by the power and direct inspiration of the Holy Ghost to give certainty and a divine record of those things in which they had been instructed. If the consciousness of believers was there, it was not to reproduce this but something else. It was to confirm and correct theirs by a divine statement of it, and give a sure record of that divinely-taught truth. Thus its being given to believers is, as far as it goes, a proof that it was not merely the expression of religious consciousness as then developed.

The Relative and the Absolute

J. N. Darby.

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I have largely sought to shew elsewhere that knowledge is relative; that is, necessarily according to the form and measure of being which knows. I am so constituted as to conclude certain things; and they are true to me. I meet a closed door, and am such that I say, matter exists, and is extended, etc.; and two cannot be in the same place at once; and it is true for me. But a spiritual body could pass through a closed door. This, however, is not my manner of existence nor consequently of knowledge. I cannot know what is true for spiritual bodies, because it is not my mode of existence.

But when Mr. Mansel accepts Hegel's dictum that the Absolute must include all that is actual, even evil, I deny it. It is all a confusion of terms. What is relative or moral is confounded with essential attributes. I do not say with Augustine, that evil is a negation; but I do say it is failure or inconsistency with a relationship in which anything is, and supremely with God; and hence it cannot be connected with Absolute, because this is the opposite of failure in the relationship. In a creature there is nothing absolute, and the only right thing is dependence and obedience. If I cease either, I get out of relationship to the Absolute, and yet I cannot be the Absolute; I am only false to what ought to be my relationship to it. Absolute is the truth of everything: but in all but the Absolute, in the nature of things there is only dependence on it; and if not this, there is not truth (that is, there is the opposite of the Absolute, and this cannot be in the Absolute). Satan was a liar from the beginning and stood not in the truth, for there was no truth in him. Dependence in nature, in independence of will, is not in the truth; but that, in the nature of things, cannot be in the Absolute.

Mr. Mansel's pretended analogous syllogism is false in every way. A circular parallelogram is a contradiction in terms, and within the scope of human knowledge it cannot exist. The Absolute can exist. Hence there is no comparison. The contradiction in terms is in saying evil can be in the Absolute, because evil is falseness to relationship, and this is, by the very idea of the Absolute, a contradiction. The whole in Hegel and Mansel is a want of moral discernment. Power is in the Absolute, as is the truth of everything. Hence power (that is, independent power) out of the Absolute cannot exist - is a lie if it be set up. But a lie cannot exist in the Absolute, because all in it is in the truth of it, for it exists; and what is pretended to and is evil, because it exists only in the Absolute, does exist in truth in the Absolute, and therefore it is not evil.

27 There is another point. It is a mistake to suppose that I cannot be certain of the necessity of the existence of that of which I cannot conceive as existing. For my form of existence obliges me to recognise the existence of that which is out of the form of my existence, and which I consequently cannot conceive. If I have a relative existence, it is in relation to an absolute; for, in result, relation supposes this; but because it is relative, I cannot conceive it. Thus in a particular instance argued on elsewhere, I am so constituted as to see that there cannot be a thing existing stamped by design without a designer. In a word, I am so constituted that I believe in causes - hence in a first cause. I feel that for what is there must be a cause. But this is just what is false as to a first cause. I am so formed as to have the sense of cause and effect, because I exist as an effect. This is my relationship. Hence I have no idea of what an existence is which has no relationship to a cause, because, in my nature and necessary form of thought, I exist in such relationship; yet this very relationship forces me to see and own there is. Hence I have an idea of the Absolute, but not of how it subsists. But if I set up to be without the Absolute (that is, not in relation to a cause), or to be absolute, it is evil - false. But this evil is not therefore in the Absolute, because that existence in Him is truth, not false; the evil does not, cannot, exist in Him; for the Absolute is, in the nature of things, absolute truth. That is, each thing in Him is the truth - is what it is in its true nature, or is not the thing. All that Hegel and Mansel say is from the want of perceiving what Absolute and evil mean.

But I do think, in spite of all that has been said, that in Christ we have a revelation of the Absolute, not in itself (for a revelation seems to me to deny this in its nature, for it is not being, but the revelation of being); but still that which is is revealed. Hence He is the truth. But He is, and so manifests Him who is; He emptied Himself to do it; Phil. 2. Now reason has nothing to do with the truth, because it has only ideas in the mind; and they must exist in the mind. It can only conclude what must be, never what is. This is in its very nature the nature and value of reasoning, such as it is. But truth is the declaration of what is; it is not what is, nor is it a conclusion of what must be, which is only a result in my mind; but it is the declaration of what is.

28 Hence no theology is the truth. But Christ is the declaration of what is; He declares what God is. He that has seen Him has seen the Father. "I have manifested thy name." He is not as truth the Absolute in itself; but He is the Absolute in Himself. All the fulness of the Godhead dwelt in Him. Hence, as revealing it through a medium, as a concrete person down here, He is not the Absolute; but as the Absolute is in Him, and He makes Himself nothing (He is, as man, a mere servant), the Absolute is perfectly revealed. And so even as to man; because man being in Him an absolute and perfect servant, yet perfect in service, we have the truth of man. As to evil, it was revealed as to both its weakness and its power in man and Satan by its relationship to Him and God in Him: so this was the truth.

What is the Absolute? Self-existence, love, purity. I do not think there is more. If I have a feeling that is not love, I am acted on by something (that is, something is above me). I am not independent; but divine love is not moved by what is lovely (though God may delight in it when it is). And purity (figuratively light) means that there is nothing inconsistent with perfect existence - independence of all that could be or make inconsistency with love. If corruption were there, something has acted on self-being to make it what it was not when incorrupt. Light is not hidden by anything and shews what everything is, and hence is justly called by the image - name of light.

I do not call power the Absolute (though God be Almighty); for its action supposes will; that is, it is not what is in its nature. The Absolute can be preceded by nothing, but is itself: love is itself; light is itself. Power is wielded by - it is what the Self-being ('who is') has, not what He is. God, though all-wise, is not wisdom more than power, and for the same reason. I do not call righteousness or holiness the Absolute. They are the relation of power and nature to something else. Hence the written word, which is the truth, calls God "God," "love," "light"; not power, nor righteousness, nor holiness. Power and wisdom belong to Him: He is righteous and holy. But these are relative, particularly the two last - hence not what is, though they characterise.

29 But then man has no apprehension at all of love and light by reasoning; he may have in effect of power and righteousness by seeing the effects. God reveals Himself, and makes us partakers of the divine nature, by which we understand it. It is not as if we were it; for as men, we must be nothing (as Christ made Himself) to be in the truth and know God. For if we are something in ourselves, we deny the one Selfbeing and our relationship to Him. In the degree in which we are nothing by the revelation of God and the enjoyment of Him in the divine nature, so far we know the Absolute. But God has outwardly, that we may be nothing, revealed His love and acted in it when we were nothing - were independent in will without self-being, and hence haters of God. This was fully brought out in the cross where we had only sin, and thus it was pure and supreme love in God; and hence death of the old man that hates is brought in, by which it is nothing; and then the willing nothingness of the new man (we are servants) in which we enjoy the Absolute, God, and serve, which is love - the proof downwards that we are partakers of the divine nature. In the temptation in the wilderness the enemy sought to take the blessed One out of the place of God being all and Himself the servant.

Mysticism (and self-scrutiny as often preached) has a right principle; but from ignorance of there being no good in us, and that it is by positive action of love and light towards us that we are made nothing of, and that God in love and light is all, it goes all astray and sets up the self it would have done with. It is by the foolishness of the cross and of preaching - by divine love wholly outside us, and our salvation accomplished wholly outside us, and grace so manifested, our sins so purged by a work of God in Christ and dealing with Him - that self is made nothing of. We never know we are nothing, nor are glad to be it, till we know we are worse than nothing.

But no Hegelian or Fichtean spreading out of individuality into the race, or a kind of absolute of humanity, can do this; because after all self makes a part of the whole, though largely volatilised. It is not the denial of self, because I go to make up a part of the idea - that is, self does. But God is outside myself, and I as a Christian am absolutely delivered from it. Christianity seems to me in this divinely wise; and the more simply it is received, the more we have its wisdom, because self is thus done with and God glorified. On the other hand, it is true that we must be born of God. If I am not partaker of the divine nature, I cannot know Him. I am light, and I love in my new nature in the Lord and in the power of the Holy Ghost, or I could not know God who is such. It is not knowing myself, because I am no self-being, but a partaker of this nature; but being so, I am capable of knowing the Absolute morally, though not as a self-being. And thus I am in the truth, because this dependence is my true relationship. A holy loving nature delights in God being what we are not - in His being above us: if not, self would not be destroyed, we should be evil and not the Absolute.

30 "Cogito; ergo sum" (I think, so I exist) does not seem to me unambiguously true. If I say, I think or feel, and therefore there must be an "I" (that is, I must exist), it is true. But "I am" is something more; it means properly self-being. Now, I apprehend, self-being does not think, it knows. Thinking implies ignorance, imperfection, drawing conclusions (which is the opposite of knowing). "I am" is the necessary source of all - hence must know all. "I know" expresses the order in necessary precedence of things (perhaps this led to Plato's idea). "I think" is therefore not I am, but I exist.

I do not admit that, if I could judge of the attributes of God by my mind, I do not need a revelation; because acts may be needed for my reconciliation, both as to guilt and moral condition, and the exercise of grace which I may require to know to make them available. I may need, in order to the attribute being exercised, to know them from Himself. The only other supposition is that I so know what God is that I can conclude absolutely to what He will do, so as to be able to announce all He must do. But this would not reveal that it was done. It would be only a mental deduction. Nor would this be possible, because it supposes that I am as perfect as God, or I could not judge, as He, what to do. Besides, His doing may be in connection with some constitution of the Godhead which is not an attribute at all, but a fact known only by revelation. Note, as such, action of God must be in time for us, because we are in time. There is the question of its being done; and if God is love, He will shew it at some time and in some way suited to the object. If I am a sinner (and who will be mad enough to say that this world or his own heart is in its normal state? All know they are not), the whole thing is absurd, because it disables me from knowing intellectually, and the exercise of attributes must be of a special kind toward such, which a perfect man could not even conceive - he could not even understand the want. The sinner confessedly would be alike incapable of knowing; and his supposing himself an object of it would prove him unfit for it and insensible to it. In every point of view the supposition that a knowledge of attributes (if it existed) would preclude a revelation is wholly false. If God be love, the knowledge of this would make His own expression of it (that is, a revelation) a part of the display of that attribute, and a necessary one.

31 It is a great blunder to think that our knowledge of qualities is all that constitutes religion or even the basis of human affection. All this reasoning I deny. Besides, attributes are not known by man so as to form a religious basis. If they are, shew the example before Judaism or Christianity. The theology of Kant is as bad as the religion of the devil, or worse - it has not a divine affection in it.

For two and indeed three reasons, I do not think much of the argument from qualities in us to the attributes of God. For if I say I feel goodness is a good thing, and it must be infinite in God, it is really an innate consciousness of God, of which I suppose the seed is in every one; and I should not say much against it. God must be perfect: I feel this is good, and it must be infinitely in Him. But there is a combination of qualities - goodness, justice, holiness, power. In man, say goodness, justice. Now in finite and imperfect man I understand this, though they may be at the expense of each other. But when I make them infinite, they really exclude each other logically. I do not know how to combine them; and my infinite perfection of a quality in me becomes absurd. First, because we must look for combination; and this in infinitude I am incapable of. I doubt very much that there is any combination of qualities in God. Each act is right relatively to Himself and displays Himself; but we must speak of them so. Next, according to my powers what is infinite excludes all else. Thirdly, when a being is superior, the qualities of attributes are completely changed. I believe the cross has taught me the perfect reconciliation of these attributes in infinitude; and now I have the way, it confirms me in the conviction that they could not be in God Himself simply as such. "Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him."

32 The reasoning which speaks of the Absolute comprehending all is to me mere confusion, because it takes physical and moral infinitude as identical, as if being and qualities were the same. The Absolute, if I connect it with physical existence, becomes simple pantheism, because being or existence must be absolute. And all these things have a side of truth. But qualities are not beings. In particular, evil cannot be infinite, because it is relative and supposes something pre-existing as to which it is evil.

Further, all the reasoning as to forgiveness by God, simply because we can, is stupid confusion. I admire one that forgives, because he gives up self. And in this sense God may be said to forgive freely, though it is not quite exact. But when one forgives in the sense of wrong or disorder (not to self, but) either to others or to common moral order, there is a giving up not of self but of good. It is either indifference to evil, a giving up of all public moral order, or saying that there is no moral government nor ought to be. And so we judge in human things. A judge or a law that forgave all crimes would be nonsense; nor would men admire it at all even if selfishness were not concerned. Ought there not to be a moral government testifying to the difference of good and evil, right and wrong? The beauty of forgiving personal wrongs has nothing to do with it, proves nothing about it, is sophistical clap-trap. They have to prove, not that it is beautiful for man to forgive as giving up self, but that there ought to be no moral government, which is quite another question.

"Sustaining modes of being" is, I apprehend, very confused and loose language. Is it a mode or a being which is contained? What contains them? What is a mode of being? or can there be modes of being in the Absolute? I should deny it. Absolute is really an abstract conception, not a being at all. A being is itself, and cannot have or contain modes: if absolute, it has its own. When men speak of an absolute being, they do not think of a personal being. Supposing an absolute personal being to create, does the being cease to be absolute because a creature exists and is in relation to it? Yet it cannot have a creature mode of being, for it is absolute. Absolute (unless it is a mere abstraction, that is, nothing) supposes nothing before it on which it depends, but does not suppose nothing after it and dependent on it - does not hinder its being infinite, unless we confound ideal with physical infinitude. But its being absolute precludes its containing a mode of being which is not absolute. The Absolute supposes not only a possible but an actual existence out of all relation; but it toes not suppose that it ceases in se to be absolute because it becomes a cause. A cause cannot as such be absolute: the terms have no correlation. But a Being who is absolute does not cease to be so by being a cause, by willing. That is, there is no contradiction.

33 So when it is said, If infinite, it cannot become (that is, a cause), this is merely a loose employment of the word "become." It becomes nothing in se by being a cause; it remains absolutely the same. Something is produced outside itself by its will. If infinitude meant material extended, then indeed it would be impossible. It will be said that it acts, while before it was quiescent. It does not change, but displays itself. Display of self is not change, or self is not displayed. Had it been always displayed, it would be in a limited, not absolute, state. If creation were always, then it was not creation, or display had a necessary relation. Will was part of the Absolute. It displays will in creating and in not always creating. Had it always created, it would not have been a display of self in this respect. It was absolute and sufficient in itself: this was displayed by only creating when it pleased. By creating it displays that it was not necessarily quiescent (that is, dependent on something, not absolute).

Thus the difficulty (that is, if it be good to create and will was to be a cause, must it not have been always?) is only introducing time into the thought of the Infinite and Absolute. It is a confusion of thought; and this does prove that I cannot conceive how the absolute exists - though I know it does - because I exist not absolutely.

There is no necessary relation in causing: indeed the idea of causing denies it (though I am aware there are those who hold a law of order and no being, but this is not properly a cause). When there is an I a Being - who causes, there is no necessary relationship but the contrary; in the caused being there is. If it can be said, I am, I create, I destroy, there is absoluteness and no necessary relation. Aristotles, and Origens, and Fichtes may deny it, because they introduce time (that is, my mode of being, into God's) to get an idea of how. But if this confusion be avoided, and it is only confusion, creation and absoluteness are not contradictory. The idea of eternal matter is not really possible to us if we reflect; because we, being caused, are so constituted as to feel the need of a cause for existence, forcing us to infer that there must be a self-existent Being, but making it impossible to conceive that mode of existence. Pantheism reduces existence to matter, and so denies absoluteness and unchangeableness.

34 I admit creation is an object of faith, not of knowledge; I can only know it when created. But it is no coming out of God as emanation, and going back. What I am in relation to, God has formed according to the apprehensions of it He has created in me. There is no existence independent of Him, nor place where He is not sustainingly; but He does not exist in it. All these difficulties the simple words of scripture make as plain as possible: "God created"; but "by him all things consist." Their difficulties arose from making pure intellect God. Then you must have the intelligent and the intelligible (that is, ideal objects in the mind at least).

Self-consciousness and the Infinite

J. N. Darby.

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All effort to make consciousness, or self-consciousness, a rational perception of difference and identity is simply infirmity in abstraction. If I think of another, I know that I am not that other; but this is not necessary to, and no part of, the consciousness that I exist. When not asleep, I live in the perpetual consciousness of my existence without thinking of any other. Consciousness is necessary to human psychical existence. When I reflect on it, I may draw conclusions as to another; but this is reasoning about consciousness. Neither is it intelligence. This means "I know," and has an object; but I am conscious of myself. To say that I am conscious of "I" makes "I" an object of "I" is absurd, and is really a denial of consciousness. When I speak of it to another and reason about it, then I make the conscious "I" an object of my reasoning; but then it has ceased to be consciousness.

It is this supposing with Plato that pure intellect is the beginning of existence which has falsified the reasoning on these points. Take Hegel's definition of subject without predicate, and you get at once the counter-proof of what I say. My affirming something about "I" does determine it; but this is a proposition, not consciousness, which, it must be repeated, ceases the moment I reason. For thus I have before me a thought which is not consciousness. It is the thought of "I" looked at as an object of reasoning. And this is not self-consciousness of existence; for "I" as a thought is not "I" existing, but a mere thought. The moment I have a thought, I have something about which "I" is occupied, which is not self-consciousness. Where logic begins, self-consciousness ceases. We are constituted so as to be conscious of ourselves.

There is every confusion by making infinitude of good in God an extension; and this runs through ancients and moderns, Aristotle, Hegel, etc. Mansel answers them well, but does not, I think, reach the truth. If we speak of ideas we have human thought, and, of course, no conception of the infinite. Thus, when Aristotle says, The infinite is the whole potentially but not actually, we have parts, extension, and - nonsense; but not an approach to infinitude as it refers to God. "The whole" - of what? If applied to God, this is necessarily materialism or pantheism; it is very true if speaking of mere mathematics. But it is only an abstraction; and, applied to being, it is a contradiction; for a being is actual, and has ceased to be simply potential. The secret of all their fallacy (into which Mansel has fallen) is this: their infinite is the infinite of matter, that is, the infinite of finite, which is infinite nonsense. It may be all well enough on their ground, because they go no farther. But as to consciousness and infinitude, Mansel has not taken up any ground of truth as to man or God. The whole theory is materialism or Brahminism.

36 But consciousness, self-consciousness, is the hinge of all this. I affirm that I am so constituted that I have the instinctive consciousness of "I." This Mansel has not at all seen. I do not take Descartes' dictum - "I think and therefore am" (that is, as if it made no difference). When one says "I think," one must have a thought to think (that is, an object, the intelligible as well as the intelligent). But when one says "I," there is self-consciousness. I am so created as to say "I." This does not say Descartes is wrong: he is right; but in his syllogism consciousness is the object of his reasoning. "I" is a thinking being, and therefore "I" is a being. But this is drawn from consciousness, and has no force save in it. Yet it remains true that I can say "I" as the expression of self-consciousness. But, having this self-consciousness, I have senses; I am so constituted as to have the knowledge of existence with self-consciousness, and that as an excellence. It is that to which thought attaches itself. I cannot have knowledge without it; I can have sense and memory, but not reflective thought.

Hence, I attribute self-consciousness to God as necessary to intelligent existence, though I may not know the mode of it in God; I have no doubt it will be different and infinitely superior. I believe it to be different in God, because these reflex acts on self appear to be a state of imperfection - those reflex acts which are not consciousness, but through which I reason and estimate it. I cannot have consciousness of an object, and therefore cannot say that a dog has self-consciousness, because, it cannot be such if I see it in another. My knowledge of what it is in myself is imperfect: there it is an object; but the consciousness is there to have knowledge (perfect or imperfect). Hence I do not know how it exists in God, because I cannot have knowledge of it. This is objective knowledge, imperfect even as to myself, absolutely impossible as to the how in God.

37 Only unconscious existence is brute matter - is what we mean by brute matter. It may have power by attraction, whatever it is; but consciousness makes the difference of having a basis for reflection: hence language.

The confounding moral infinitude (that is, absoluteness of perfection) with extension, which I have noticed is a very great blunder. But then I freely own that in strictness we cannot speak of attributes in God (moral ones). It is only a human way which (speaking reverently) divides God into parts. God cannot be or do evil: to say this is a limitation of power is only a delusion. If I say that He cannot do what He pleases, for He cannot do evil, the "cannot" applies to "what He pleases," not to the power of God. As to acts of power, He can do everything. It is morally impossible that there should be in Him the contrary of what He is, that is of good and right. But this is not limiting power or anything; it is denying a limit to goodness, and saying it is absolute. Infinite goodness means merely goodness always perfect as goodness. That this is after an imperfect thought as to God I admit, because it takes one characteristic by itself (that is through our finite nature), for nothing in God is characteristic (that is, special and in part). It has been noticed elsewhere how thus Christ had no character, but was always what He ought to be wherever He was. Perfect goodness He was, but not goodness by itself as we conceive it. He was firm and severe where He ought, and good in that; He was tender and affectionate where He ought, and good in that; He was seemingly hard and deaf to seed, and unchanged in goodness in that - in all love to His Father, and obedience. The divine nature in man which produced one produced all, perfect in each place in relation because perfect in itself.

Fichte's statement as to personality is totally false. It is not what you have become acquainted with in yourself, but the you that has become acquainted. Mansel's answer is economically true, because they go on this ground, but it is inadequate. I judge the whole system false for the reason stated, that thought is confounded with consciousness. Further, all confound the knowledge of with the knowledge that. I know certainly that I am; I have no real knowledge of what a soul is, or of its mode of acting through senses and a body. Whether it be separate or not, I am so constituted that, when I do not think or reason (perhaps if I do), I believe in a cause of effects, and that existence in form or with anything characteristic supposes a cause - hence, a First Cause. But for the same reason that I know there must be, I cannot know or conceive it. That is, knowledge that is not and may prove that I cannot have knowledge of. So I may have knowledge that there is such a thing as endless, infinite, eternal; while the very words prove that I do not - cannot - conceive it. But the negative of finite is not the same as the conception of infinite (that is, as its affirmation); and I have the sense of negativing finite though no positive conception.

38 Further, if I think about myself, I am finite and relative. If I judge the consciousness in connection with other things, consciousness is not relative and not finite or the contrary in itself. I do not admit that absolute must be infinite or finite. Consciousness is absolute; it has no qualities, no objective appearances or anything else. It is "I." I am something; I think, do, perceive, etc. Hence I learn that the "I" is finite; but consciousness is only "I."

Now I cannot conceive an infinite "I," because I am a finite "I"; that is, I can have no positive knowledge of it; but its absoluteness as consciousness in me makes me understand the possibility of the existence of another absolute consciousness which may not be finite. As I learn the finiteness of my conscious "I," and can in certain respects understand it, so I learn the certain existence of an "I" which must be conscious (that is, not as a stone), and that it cannot be, as I am, finite, which is absolute in its "I," but relative if it pleases, because I know it has pleased. But the how or what of its consciousness or relations (that is, creation, sonship, redemption) I do not and cannot know that, because I negative the finiteness of that which is my knowledge. But I do not think a negative is the same as an affirmative, or is nothing in mind, though it be nothing positive. To say so is to say that all must be clear in my mind or that it does not exist, which is false. I have a thinking, feeling, perceiving, judging, and, if right, adoring, if wrong, God-hating, inward existence. What it is I have not in the smallest degree a clear idea of. So I have of God, to whom I clearly deny necessary relationship, finiteness or material infiniteness, whom I do not limit in will so as to deny relationship, yet in finite knowledge I cannot say what He is, but existence of whom (I can say what He is not) is not nothing in my mind, though I cannot say what it is, because I do know by consciousness what it is to exist, and I deny the conditions in which I exist.

39 I cannot quite accept the denial of capacity to abstract in the human mind (that is, the estimate of a quality without a being it is attached to). It is apt to run into personification in order to get a clear idea. To say I must think of some one good to think of goodness is not true. It is merely saying that, if I think of good acts, I must think of some one. But attributes, though for us a necessary conception, are a very inadequate one of God; if pushed to consequences, even false. We may speak attributively (practically), but not predicate anything of God; because then I separate the quality and get it in itself. I must make it infinite, and so exclusive in my mind; and other attributes are reasoned against. Thus if I say God is good, and therefore cannot do this or that, I have made Him only this, and all is false.

I deny that consciousness is in time, or has a "before" or "after." Consciousness denies it in fact and in the nature of things. You must add "was," or "will be"; but then I have lost consciousness, which is necessarily only present, and this is not time - is not measured, nor is time thought of.

Mansel at the end of Lecture III happily contradicts himself. He is not exact. Thus, when he says we can conceive such attributes at the utmost only indefinitely . . . but we cannot conceive them as infinite, how can he make the distinction if he cannot tell what infinite is? That one word proves the fallacy of his whole statement. But infinite, I have already said, does not mean material in infinitude; and attributes (that is, predicates) spoken of God are always false when taken as the truth.

To say that things may not be what their appearances are is nonsense. What is a thing? what an appearance? I know nothing of a thing save its appearance, that is, its relation to me. I have no other thing as a thing than that. The only other thing to mark it is its resistance to will, its contrast with the "I"; so that will goes where I cannot. It hinders the change of the relationship of "I." That is, I know its existence in contrast with "I" active in its absoluteness, or "I" as a spirit. This we call matter: why not? Hyle, if you please (a spiritual body not so; but this is faith; it confirms the other).

40 Indefinite and infinite are not the same. Indefinite does not know whether a thing stops or where. We are so constituted as to believe necessarily in the infinite (finite implying it), but the reason of that precludes my knowing it. Finite is some apparent (or possibly apparent) being in what is the object of perception; but because that is finite as perceptible existence, I speak of its ending. Being limited, I must and do therein suppose and mean that beyond a limit there is what is beyond limit, illimitable. My idea of limit supposes this: I limit knowable existence, but its being a limit is in my mind in every case in spite of me. A thought that its being stopped or limited is a possibility of prolongation. It might go farther (that is, I have an idea of what is beyond limit). Finite instead of excluding is founded on the idea of infinity. I have the idea that it is, must be, in idea; for stopping gives (or is identical with) as an idea, not stopping, but proves that the sense that there must be is identical with the sense of. The thought that it stops is founded on being stopped somewhere, that is, that it might go on. It is merely saying, I am constituted with the sense that there is space (that is, where a thing may stop or not stop) and duration (that is, where it may or may not cease). I cannot but think infinite must be, but never think of it as the object of human power of thinking, for when, as to a clear conception of what is, I think of what is, I think of what stops so far as any object of thought can go. I deny that mere infinitude in the sense of space has anything to do with God. Endless time onward is more accessible to me because I can have the idea of continuance when I have existence.

In space the object of thought becomes itself extended, whereas a thing only exists in time or eternity. It is no part of itself. It may always exist, does not need to stop, the past (as they say) cannot in itself be thought of, because I have no known existence to go on with but in time or now. Taking now, however, I can conceive continuance; but the thought is more imperfect though certain in its nature.

We feel no need to suppose God infinite in space (on the contrary, it shocks us); but in time we do. The reason is simple. Infinitude in space is gross, material not a moral central will and action. I do not judge of God as finite in space, because I do not materialise Him; but if He ceases in duration, and that is finite as to it, He ceases to be, because to endure when anything exists is not to cease to be. I fully believe there is an instinctive sense of God as supreme, that is, supreme as to us, and reasoning on what He is is consequent on this. It is a blunder to suppose that not being the author of evil limits Him. He can, as to power, do anything; but limiting means a stop being put to something in the direction in which it tends or might continue; whereas no evil is in God to be stopped. Power does not create evil. Were God the author of evil (save physical evil or punishment), it would be a limit to what He is - good. Mansel has not kept clear of the material idea of infinity. His adversaries are on that ground; but his great defect is not seizing consequences, at least in his reasonings, for he does state the thing in Lecture IV.

41 But I deny the sense of responsibility and a law to be the same thing or either of them the knowledge of good and evil. A law may be the rule according to which we are responsible to One who has authority over us, but it is not the responsibility itself. Man was responsible before he had the knowledge of good and evil; and he had a law which implied no such knowledge. Responsibility is to a person: a law may be its measure. The knowledge of good and evil is a capacity of nature to discern right and wrong where there is no law. "So the man is become as one of us, knowing good and evil." A law may give me God's measure of it as to me, and so the divine law did as to man. But obedience always and in everything is what we are responsible for if the One above us is supreme - has such claims over us - to keep the law, if He has given one, and every commandment He gives. But this is only what the responsibility is shewn in. The knowledge of right and wrong is in itself a contrast with law, because it is in us, and there is no one to whom (if that be all) we are responsible. We may be also responsible to another; and he, if a moral governor - not otherwise, holds us responsible according to that knowledge.

All as to law, moral obligations, man a law to. himself by reflecting God's law, is false. Conscience is not pleasure, because there is lust; and conscience and sin came in together. Will and lust combine, and conscience is against them. But moral obligation is only rightly known at all when God's claim of obedience is allowed; for mere conscience is mere misery, or combines with pride and self-approbation. To say that the knowledge of good and evil is necessarily implanted as a law by a lawgiver is utterly false. For this knowledge is in God, and what higher spiritual being has implanted it in Him as a lawgiver? It can therefore be otherwise. We have it by sin.

42 The absolute claim of obedience is the highest obligation, moral obligation, if you please. Now that I have got a knowledge of good and evil, I shall surely attribute that to God and own His judgment. But only when Christ is revealed can it be said that the nature of the Deity is the absolute standard; for requirements from, are not necessarily conformity to, His will, which cannot be dissociated from His nature as a requirer. But duty does not flow from the nature of the superior, but in all cases (superior is not) from the relation in which the obliged person stands to the superior or any other person. No doubt, if the relation be with a divine Being or formed by Him, it will be right, and from some higher motive be right, though the relation be evil as a Christian slave. But obedience is right to God, though there be no law (it may be tested by a law) and no knowledge of good and evil in itself. Then a knowledge of good and evil enters by disobedience. We become as to this as God; Gen. 3. Hence there is the knowledge of right and wrong without reference to a superior, though reference may exist, and, I doubt not the least, has been perfected with it. Lastly, a law may be given, testing the obedience, not in innocence, but with a perfect measure of right and wrong, including all moral relationships. Christ is more than all this. He is the manifestation of the divine nature in man, and, when we are partakers of it, becomes the model and example, as well as the source of our walk and duty.

It is obedience as His was, because He was a man, to His Father, in the place in which He stood, and so our mould of obedience, not to a claiming law, but having no will but God's perfect in moral estimate; but it is also love as Christ's was, because it is the divine nature. Being holy too (that is, with a knowledge of good and evil), it has a horror of evil and is separated from it, but in us it is separated to God, which alone can be the separation from evil in us - in a creature which must have an object.

This gives a special character to Christ though He ever looked to His Father, and, as man, lived in dependence on Him, and, as man too, rejoiced in the joy that was before Him. Yet He was an object, instead of having one.

43 As regards personality, the conscious "I" is personality, though it cannot explain by reason in what it consists; but absolute dependence on God destroying personal freedom is all confusion. Dependence is equivocal. It means that I must derive existence and all here - more, have all from Him, or that I feel dependent on Him - look to Him. All this leaves out will, as contrasted with the obligation of obedience. Most of what is called personal freedom is simply sanction of sin. I ought always to obey - "Lo, I come to do thy will" was Christ's uniform and sole motive. If freedom means that God does not purpose evil or hinder good, it is quite true; but if it means a right to have a will of one's own, it is sin - atheism. A man being really set to choose between evil and good (he may be, for trial to shew him what he is) is alike horrible and absurd; because it supposes the good and evil to be outside, and himself neither. If he is one or other in disposition, the choice is there. To have a fair choice, he must be personally indifferent; but to be in a state of indifference to good and evil is perfectly horrible. If a man has an inclination, his choice is not free: a free will is rank nonsense morally; because, if he have a will, he wills something. God can will to create. But will in moral things means either self-will, which is sin (for we ought to obey); or an inclination to something, which is really a choice made as far as will goes. In truth it is never so. Man was set in good, though not externally forced to remain so. He first exercised his will - free-will, morally speaking - in eating the forbidden fruit, and was therein and thereby lost, and since then he has been inclined to evil. Dependence lies in this - that a creature must depend on God. He does so joyfully in perfect good, and on whom it comes has the claim when he knows God. Independence in will (there cannot be in fact), and disobedience, its fruit, are the condition of the old man. Dependence and obedience are the characteristics of the new man - of Christ. Save what grace works, God does leave the will free; but it tends in its nature away from God; because it is will. And the not looking to God must have an object below man. That wretched freedom man has, and perseveres in it but for grace, and resists the motives of grace, because it calls to God, to dependence and obedience of heart. And will wills itself: only one can be born of God, and have a new nature - Christ as our life, and so be a new creature.

44 Personality is evidently in self-consciousness. Reality, that is, material reality, is that which hinders in its nature my will from finding nothing. I cannot of course have the consciousness of another's personality or self-consciousness; but I can see that he is one who has it, and know what it is by my own self-consciousness. Is a person in a swoon? I have lost part of the evidence of what shews personality. And if personality be lost in a swoon or like state, it only shews we do not know by reason what constitutes it, the link between soul and body being momentarily suspended; but the spring from which to reason is gone, has ceased, so that there can be none: I cannot say "I," which begins reasoning. I have no doubt it is the soul. But if the swoon was for ever, and I knew there was no self-consciousness, I could not conceive of it as a person. Yet if a soul was there and it could be two hundred years asleep with the body, I should conceive of it as a person. If I did not know it had a soul, I should say I could not tell.

Mansel's notion of body is merely the scholastic notion of substance. I say there is matter because according to my constitution two bodies cannot be in the same place. I cannot go through a door (a spirit can); but by God's will it is such that what I meet resists my will without any will of its own.

Nor do I say consciousness moulds, nor that we only know phenomena, as Kant, etc., though there are apparent truth in this. God has so constituted things, and me, and others, that certain things produce certain effects and impressions on me. If a man with jaundice sees yellow, it is merely that he for the moment is so constituted, being in an abnormal state; but the knowledge of the constitution in both is in the same thing producing regularly the former effect.

To say with Kant, that the object is a phenomenon is nonsense, because the phenomenon includes the perception in me. If it appears, it appears to some one. But a thing is what produces the effect. If it be asked, What is it? I cannot tell. Not a phenomenon, but what has produced a certain idea in me and others. What I think of first is my perception; but perception makes me think of what produces it. A dream only shews that memory and combination, without the conscious will. may continue in that state.

45 That the truths as to God are only regulative is abominable and untrue. Truths do not regulate passions; and in religion, if true, God is revealed in His absolute nature: not as material extension, of course, it is a low material idea, but as He is. He is light - He is love; Christ is the perfect revelation of Him. It does not satisfy philosophy, because philosophy has nothing to do with it - it has only ideas, and no idea is love. "He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love." To say that action, not knowledge, is man's destiny is very bad indeed. The knowledge of God - that is, the Father - and Jesus Christ whom He has sent, is eternal life. And we have fellowship with them. Action is a mere consequence in its place, because we are then, as partaking of the divine nature, like God, and have to act in love in our little sphere. And this correspondence with the Absolute is exactly what, if not required, is given. We know God and are imitators of God; we are dependent, no doubt, but truly.

The energy of matter is said to be motion; of mind, consciousness. I doubt this. Mansel always leaves out self-consciousness - its truest and deepest name. Will is the energy of the soul. For either consciousness or will we cannot find the link with matter. There are pairs of nerves, one of sensation (consciousness), another of motion. But the energy in Mansel's sense - analogous to motion - is clearly in the latter. No man can discover the link, it is true, how will raises my hand. But Mansel is infected with what he reasons against. Gracious kindness, goodness, relationship with man according to divine qualities, are not inferior to the natural notions of infinitude, etc, which are really material.

It may be alleged that will is no action of the mind. This is matter to be decided by the definition of mind. If taken strictly as the thinking power, thinking (not consciousness) is its energy. Mansel has blundered all through, because he has judged thought to be the first element of mind, and infinitude to relate to matter or space where God is spoken of. In the last he has fallen into the trap of the enemy.

As to cause, it is power operating by design; not that the design and the power are necessarily united in the agent producing. The design may be in one only mind, and power set in motion in another. Hence causes have been distinguished in nature, inaccurately perhaps in division, but justly, into causa causans and causa causata. Will. design. Power in activity are a cause. The how may not be known; but this does not hinder my seeing a cause and effect. When I say cold causes water to swell, God is supposed to have so constructed as to design, His will to have led Him so to form it, and the power is seen in effect. How it comes about physical science may or may not discover, but can only come at last to created ordinances. God may have produced uniformly or universally operative force, which we call a law, and sustains that continually by His will. It can only be so at any moment by His will. When He does not will it, it ceases. Laws need not be changed for a miracle, but that the same will should operate sovereignly by those laws. Thus suppose the presence of the soul in a body according to a given law animates it in a given way which we call life. A person dies. God calls the soul back into the body to be perfect according to the given law. No law is changed, but a miracle is performed. Supposing nerves and muscles operate in a particular way where communication is established with the brain, the communication has been interrupted, never formed. By one word (that is, by His will) God, or one acting by His command, restores the communication. Now law is changed, but a miracle is performed. It is not a mere general law. It is the will which formed the law acting, not in suspending it in any case, but causing by an act of power the existence of a case in which its operation was renewed or begun where it did not before. A body specifically heavier than water sinks. The attractive power of the earth is not changed, but the body is so constructed by will and power for a time that it does not operate on it, and a man walks on the water. This does not suppose the action of the will and power of God: that is a miracle, but not a change in the laws of nature. The will of God may withdraw an individual from the power of a law without changing the law as a law at all. The exception only proves the rule. Men have said, If God stopped the earth for Joshua, so as to make the sun and moon stand still for Joshua, all would have been flooded and destroyed; just as if He would not have stopped the motion of all at the same time (that is, the action of the moving power). What stopped the earth stopped all with it, my head as well as my heels. This is ridiculous. The question is, Can God will? He is not God if He cannot. Can I?

46 Mansel is on wholly false ground as to this, because (while saying it is impossible by ideas) he confounds the revelation of God with ideas of Him, or human knowledge. He does not see here revelation of God in Christ, with the Holy Ghost giving perception of it and dwelling in us. Hence he runs back to acknowledge the incapacity which is true of mind as absolutely true, and makes the test of truth the harmonious consent of man's faculties. If so, I have no test as to God; for they cannot know or test Him. A revelation is another thing; first, objectively, and then by divine capacitating power to the soul. God is light; Christ was the light of the world. God is love; Christ was love in the world; but the eyes must be opened to see the light, a new nature be communicated to enjoy it. The same thing must be to estimate the love, as shewn to me a sinner (without which in its own uncaused unsustained character, that is, as divine, it is not known) and as enjoyed by a saint - perfect as putting me in the absolute enjoyment of it, for it makes us to be as Christ (see 1 John 4), and that in full righteousness and holiness. (See his Lecture 5.) How sad that any sentence should be exactly the opposite of what Christ meant!

47 Even if I take the conscious "I" as marking knowledge of a person, I have no objection to use it as regards the Trinity in speaking of human language. For why - because the conscious "I" in man supposes distinctness from any other "I" - should the divine consciousness be a human one? Why not the consciousness of subsisting in unity - not ours? We cannot conceive it by our minds so as to explain it in language, but yet can recognise as truth undoubtingly "I and my Father are one." We apprehend it not by thought, but by the Spirit. He "hath given us an understanding that we should know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life." The perfect revelation of God in Christ is the strongest proof that limited existence to our minds (or the contrary) has nothing to do with the perfect revelation and knowledge of God. Love, holiness, absence of evil, presence of good, were there. He was limited as a man on earth as to space, yet He was all the while in heaven. He conferred power to work miracles elsewhere, and wrought them far off from Himself; yet it was a power in Him. He was the truth. He shewed that everything was from God by direct revelation, and all evil, its opposition to Himself, vanity by the revelation of the true God. I recognise a perfect absolute revelation of God in Christ. I "know God." But this is a revelation of the Trinity - Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, yet one God.

48 When I have spoken of the consciousness of personality, yet of unity, I would not darken counsel by words without knowledge, or pretend to speak metaphysics on what is known only by revelation (but of which, when revealed, I may see the perfectness), but find the Lord saying, "I and my Father" (that is, consciousness of personal distinctness), yet He adds, "are one"; so that there was the consciousness of unity. And why not? Why should not distinctness of willing and acting, and the consciousness of it be there, yet in perfect community of undistinguished Godhead without separate being, as a source of being able to say "I am"? None could have known it (part of its character as known is in revelation): but when revealed, I see not why we may not see its perfectness, and that indeed (which is the way we know it too) man would have had nothing to say to God as a moral being without it, or only in this way. And so it really is; but we come to it by our wants, not by metaphysics, which I have no thought of applying to the doctrine. But having a revelation, one sees how it connects itself with the human conception of it.

As to moral law, the notion that it is of necessary and universal obligation, and so absolute (that is, not subject to the forms of human conception), that it must be "the measure and adequate representation of the moral nature of God," and that our knowledge of the divine Being is identical with that of our own moral duties, is just the fruit - wise as men may think themselves - of unsound educational or traditional ideas about the law, as if it were the highest rule, the transcript of the divine mind. It is nothing of the sort. Had men only seen God's activity of love in Christ, and that it is our pattern and rule - in a word, Christ as the full revelation of God in every way, all this confusion would have been avoided.

Law is an authoritatively imposed obligation. This cannot be God's nature and position. His liberty in love (and there is no love without, but in, liberty) is wholly set aside (that is, the whole activity of His nature, His nature itself, for He is love) if this principle be true. To make law my nature is to make love impossible.

Besides, the application of the moral law to God as law is impossible, whether we take it as love to God or your neighbour, or the prohibition of evil, as is evident. But it is not because i the moral law is not absolute, that is, above human thoughts. Such reasoning is just the fruit of not getting beyond thought (Mansel's and Kant's error here).

49 Morality, or moral obligation, is in the nature of all relations which imply a claim; it is the bond flowing from them. That man has had all manner of rules is true; but when God says, "The man is become as one of us, knowing good and evil," it certainly implies that right and wrong was of an absolute nature. But it is the application of a law which makes obligatory a course imposed by authority (though it may be moral too). The knowledge of good and evil is the perception of it in itself, without a law or its being imposed. God does know, doubtless, good and evil according to the perfection of His own nature. But it is a condition of His nature to discern it; it was not of Adam's before his fall. He was innocent; he enjoyed God's goodness unsuspectingly, and did nothing else. There was no occasion to discern, nor capacity to do so. In the fall he acquired this capacity. He could now say, This is good and that evil; but he was under sin.

That moral law is excellent and absolute, because we discern good and evil, is a mistaken way of putting it. What we have is a capacity to discern right and wrong, not a law, but a moral condition of my mind. But, on the other hand, it is not subject to forms of thought, because it is not a question of thought. It is in the nature of the relationship; it is conscience, and not thought; it may be in us misled by thought.

It is all a blunder to say obligations cannot arise by relationship; because I may learn the existence of a relationship, or I may be brought into a relationship. Thus, so far from thinking a moral obligation cannot be formed, I affirm that all obligations of a Christian are new, because he reckons himself dead and alive to God through Christ as risen. His obligations flow wholly from his new condition. This may call for recognising under the condition something that subsisted before, as parents and children, etc.

The reason it is wholly untrue that the knowledge of good and evil gives us God's nature is, that the knowledge of good and evil is the source of discerning right and wrong, which right and wrong flow from the relationship a being is in. Now God is either in none (unless within Himself, of which we cannot judge, because it is so), or, if He enter into any in creative will, He is not in the same as we are. Hence the obligation cannot be the same. All we say is, that He will not destroy (as between ourselves or between us and Him) the terms of relationship in which He has set us. If I had slaves or children and gave them something to enjoy in equal shares, it would be wrong for one to take from or defraud the other; but if I had not given up the title, I might do so. If God has revealed His nature to me and my relationship to Him, He does not change, and so the duty abides. But if the relationship changes and I become a son, the duty does.

50 The capacity to discern good and evil is the capacity to discern these duties or the breach of them. But if the relationship is one of authority, then there is duty to obey. There may be a mere arbitrary command; and I say the thing (if I have the knowledge of good and evil) was not bad in itself, but obedience is the place of one subject. Thus it was with Adam: there was no evil in eating of the tree if it had not been forbidden. It was only the test of obedience. Now we have more than this. I say such a thing is wrong even if not forbidden. As to the measure of it, I may be misled Hence God has given a prescribed measure - the law. But the faculty of such discernment is in me. I call something wrong. I have a personal faculty to discern that the act does not suit - is not conformed to the relation in which the responsible being stands. One takes a knife from another: I hold it to be evil. A parent does so from a very young child: it is not evil, but good. It depends on the relationship.

Hence the only true absolute good is free. It is love, God Himself, and that in fact in the highest sense where there is no obligation at all, but where the responsible one had failed. If God, though surely sovereign, gives a promise, I expect Him to fulfil it, though I do not deny higher reasons may lead to its not being accomplished. But as a general promise, I reckon on it, because in that act He has been pleased to put Himself in relationship. If there be a higher claim, it may fail, but is in His own sovereign knowledge. But I can say, It is impossible for God to lie, because when He has given His word, He has been pleased to oblige Himself. He might for higher reasons destroy the one to whom the promise was made, and it would fail; but He cannot be inconsistent with what He is. But it is important to remember, what moralisers seem anxious to forget, that the knowledge of good and evil came to man in and by that in which he fell.

51 That relationship is the basis of the sense of right and wrong is every way evident. Thus, not knowing the relationship of angels among themselves, I cannot tell what is right and wrong among themselves; I do of human creatures; I say they must love one another, and love and obey God. I must not worship them: they must worship God.

Moral duties then are absolute in so far as that they do not depend on ideas as formed by any means at all, but are the judgment of an internal capacity; they only subsist in known relationships and last as long as they. But they belong to relationships; they are the expression of one's consistency with it. And as long as I conceive it, I conceive the duty. Right and wrong did not exist for Adam in themselves (that is, without a command). It is not merely responsibility personally to God; that there was. God forbade. Man might not eat; but there was no sense of a thing wrong in itself, because inconsistent with a relationship, he being able to judge of it itself. There was nothing inconsistent in Adam's mind with his relationship to God; his mind followed it without a question. He could think of nothing in itself inconsistent with it; that nature of thought was not in his nature.

But there is a difference between God's knowledge of good and evil, and mine. I deny wholly that human morality is manifested in the form of a law of obligation. The knowledge of good and evil is the internal consciousness of what is conformable to position and relationship without a law of obligation. Yet it is not properly absolute, because it flows from relationship; only it attaches to the idea of the relationship as so contained in it. Moralists on both sides seem wholly wrong here. Goodness, properly speaking, is not morality, but love exercised where there is not an obligation. The only difficulty is to distinguish Adam's case from right and wrong. The eating of the tree was no departure from conformity to the relationship Adam was in to God; he would have eaten it innocently as a matter of course. It was wrong simply to do what was forbidden, because forbidden. This leads to distinguish responsibility to a person absolutely, and the knowledge of right and wrong. That is, law and morality are opposed in nature; though law be the right measure of right when it recognises existing relationship, but where the law makes the obligation of the particular case, this means that otherwise there was not and could not be any knowledge of right and wrong (it would have denied Adam's innocence to suppose any), but an arbitrary command, however wise a one.

52 To say that duty ought to be followed, is only saying there is duty. But two straight lines enclosing space is somewhat different; it means if two do not approach they do not meet. God knows good and evil, that is, He recognises relationship as it exists. I know good and evil now (that is, my will apart). I recognise these relationships as they exist; but what has this to do with God's nature? His morality, speaking reverently, would be based on the relationship. He is in Himself; but He is in none, as we have seen, unless He pleases to put Himself in one: I am by virtue of my place. He recognises mine, and judges, but is not in it. I deny eternal morality save as an idea; it has no relation to Him at all. Absolute morality is nonsense. God did not create morality, but the relationship without which there could be none. If one supposes only the absolute God, there is no morality. Morality in respect of what? I cannot suppose it but with created responsibility, that is, creatures and consequently relationship.

I am disposed to think that, such as man was, he must have fallen to get the knowledge of good and evil. He knew no good objectively so as to prefer it in innocence. The test he was under was not preference of good to evil or evil to good, but obedience. It could not have been the former, because he must have known the two to decide (that is, not have been innocent). But then to go right with that knowledge he must have been a holy being, that is, a being with a spiritual nature divine or sustained of God which in nature delighted in good and abhorred evil, so as not to be in a state of probation because the decision was in the nature itself, so that there was nothing to test. But if he came to know good and evil, and was not decided against evil, he was already in an evil state. Besides he could not get into a condition to decide between good and evil; and if he had not known them before, he must decide; he has to exercise a will as free, and thus he is out of obedience (the only right state) and is in evil. A nature formed holy and sustained of God is decided in nature, and then only obeys. God could have given such a nature to man; but then it would have been a new creation, as it is now.

53 It is a mistake to think infinite power in itself inconsistent with finite power. Two infinite independent powers cannot be, because they contradict each other. They are not infinite, for they cannot destroy each other. But power being only the faculty to do all things, not the actual doing of them, the existence of a finite subordinate power is no contradiction to God. Creation tends to give the idea of a final cause, a framing will, and hence can hardly be ascribed to a finite agent. But forming new objects on subsisting laws may well belong to such.

Miracles and Infidelity

J. N. Darby.

<32008E> 163

I send you some remarks on the scriptural view of miracles, from which infidels and the defenders of Christianity seem to me to have alike wandered.

As to infidels, any moral apprehension of what miracles are, or anything else is, of the misery of man, or the love of God, or the power and value of the truth, is absent from their minds. Exalting man as he is, the false fancy that in these days of enlightenment the lancet and the microscope have found out everything, and exploded God's truth and love and man's ignorance both together, reducing everything to general laws without being able to tell us where they came from, and thus to a materialism, which, as an able but honest materialist has said, leads them up to a blind wall beyond which they cannot get. Such is the true character of modern science: very interesting in the discovery of laws which govern matter (that is, the material world beneath us), but excluding from man every moral principle, every excellent affection, and all divine goodness and truth. They tell us that this is no part of science: I quite agree.

But are there no such things as love, and goodness, and morality, and right affections? no knowledge of God? When they come to "the blind wall," can they assure us there is nothing behind it? or tell us something of what is? Neither. It is simply excluding man from everything beyond matter, even to openly denying all responsibility, degrading man and denying God. The first they do, pretending to exalt him; the other is the stupid pretension to deny that of which they confess they are wholly ignorant (and they are quite right); though (thank God) it is a knowledge that is as open to them in God's love as to those who already enjoy its light.

There is an evidence of truth which one who has the Spirit of God cannot use to a mere natural man, though it often carries the strongest evidence with it, and in that way may tell upon him - the possession of the thing that the other is disputing. To him who has it, it is the strongest of all evidences, different in its nature from external proofs. Take even natural things: - I am in pain. No surgical evidence is required for him who is in pain in order to make him know it; there is no deception as to it for the man who suffers. The surgeon may shew the physical cause, a stone in the bladder, or what produced it; inflammation either of the blood, or of some mucous membrane; but with all his science he cannot tell me why it gives me pain, nor what pain is. Yet who that suffers it does not know what it is? He may talk to me about ganglions, or sensitive nerves distinguished from motor nerves. But this does not tell me one atom of what or why pain is; though he may talk, and in a surgical sense rightly, of what its cause, its material cause, is; but this is not what pain in me is. Does anyone doubt what it is when he suffers it?

164 That is, the most certain knowledge even in the lower creation is entirely out of the reach of science. I do not blame science for this; it is not its sphere. Science arranges phenomena, learns by experience their sequence and often with great sagacity. Nobody denies it. But it cannot go farther. I can say I suffer; I am so made, so constituted, that under certain circumstances I suffer. But no one can tell me what makes me suffer. He can tell me, very likely better than I can, the circumstances through which I suffer, and perhaps relieve them; he can relieve an animal that knows where and what it is suffering; he can trace the material part, bring in electricity or any other biological power; but what makes me sensible and suffer pain, he cannot tell me. Let him trace it to nerves and electricity and whatever you please; but electricity does not make a tree or a stone suffer, though it may make a dead frog leap perhaps (that is, produce material effects), but it cannot make dead matter feel. I feel, and hence have no doubt of it; I have absolute certainty of it, much greater than any of his science, however extensive and accurate it may be. You will tell me a dog knows it. Just so, but the scientific man does not; and that is the point I am upon just now - that there are kinds of knowledge which are the most certain of all, which science knows nothing of - has nothing to say to, which the boor is just as certain of as the philosopher.

Now I say distinctly there is the same kind of knowledge in the things of God; its effects may shew to others that it is there, but it is not to be explained to or by men. A man groans or writhes, and a dog howls, if he is in pain. That is not the pain, but a testimony to it. So where God dwells in man, where His Spirit dwells in him, there is no uncertainty in himself: the effect is one of which he is perfectly conscious in himself. It cannot be in itself a proof for another, because it is in himself, and another cannot be a partaker of that any more than he is of another's pain; but it is absolute certainty for him who has it, and its effects make themselves known to others as pain and illness do to those who are not suffering. It has another effect which can hardly be communicated to another. It confirms, by its inward effects, the truth and authority of the word of God; because - if the love of God is shed abroad in my heart by the Holy Ghost given to me; if I enjoy that love inwardly as a deep source of happiness; if I can look up and cry Abba, Father, in the unquestioning consciousness of what He is for me; if my soul is at liberty before Him in unfeigned confidence, and at liberty from sin that beset me before, and from a sense of guilt which I had; if I am conscious of my connection with Christ and His presence with me - I find all these things which I have in my heart, recognised and taught fully in that word. I find what is there said connected with the glorifying of the man Jesus when He had accomplished the work of redemption; this, with a life here wholly without parallel in holiness and love, absolutely unselfish - meekness and self-denial and patience, understood of none - a life which condemns me in spite of me by its perfectness, and which is yet not what men admire in their heroes, though more heroic in reality than all. This, with a statement that this Man that none was like - save indeed in a distant measure as following Him - was the Word (that is, God) become flesh.

165 I find, that is, to say my own every-day new but actual and known happiness (proved to others by the change they see in me) connected with an immense system of truth unfolded in the word, but which I find experimentally verified in my own soul (though the source of it be hidden from sense and science, and science can go no farther than inference from sense); but what that word declares to be the effect in me, by which the unseen is known and the revelation of what is divine is made to my soul - is in fact produced there, so that what is unseen is known, and what is divine revealed; not a history, but what God is now, though revealed in that history in its outward facts; and I know the truth of it by what I possess, and the inseparable connection with all the revelation made, which is but the divine development of that of which the effect is in me.

And so scripture speaks. "He that believeth in the Son of God hath the witness in himself; and he that believeth not God hath made him a liar, because he hath not believed the record that God hath given concerning his Son." The infidel will say, That is no proof for me. In effect it may be; in itself I recognise that it is not. He has it not, and of course cannot have the proof that having it gives. But this does not weaken it for those that have. No more does the doctor's not having pain alter my knowledge of having it; and if he were to tell me "I was perfectly in health: all the tissues right, and there was no cause for pain, it was imagination," I should know better; it would only prove his science did not reach to the knowledge of the cause. He will despise, too, my enjoyment of divine things, because he does not know what is enjoyed. He will tell me it is imagination; but imagination does not produce holiness and godly affections, but poetry. There is nothing permanent. It may take me out of self and sorrow for a moment, but never delivers from either - leaves the man what he was, or worse. No man can stay the hungry edge of appetite by bare imagination of a feast. Imagination deals with things outside us which are not real; this is what is actually and abidingly in us, a present reality. It is based on what is in its perfectness objective as a source outside us, just as my friend is, though I am conscious of my affection and of his. And when human imagination seeks to make a scene with which it can be occupied, it fails entirely, bringing cannon into heaven, and making Satan the most interesting person in the dramatis personae.

166 Proofs may and do leave responsibility without excuse; but enjoyment of the thing itself within takes the need of proof away. "Whether he be a sinner or no, I know not; but one thing I know: whereas I was blind, now I see." Where was the proof that Christ could open the eyes of one born blind for him who was so? And, note here, we are not speaking of the truth of that history, but of the nature of the proof.

Let it be remembered that of love, obligation to God or man, or a father, or a wife, science can know nothing; it is not its business. But man's happiness or unhappiness even as man here, and everything right and comely, depends on this. Science knows material phenomena and laws and connections, and no more. Up to a certain point they may prove a connection of thought and organic structure; but of one single moral idea it is incapable. I do not blame science for this. Phenomena and their laws are its sphere. It is degrading man's moral nature I denounce. There is no love in geology or chemistry; and if, as men have done, they deny responsibility, the best answer is they are not to be trusted with my keys. Who would trust his child to them, if he had any love or sense of obligation?

167 They have assumed that science has left all witchcraft, possession, and the like, far behind in the dark, and in the light they have these things dare not shew themselves. But they delude themselves. That if men are completely infidels, trusting their puny reason, there is no need of superstition to dazzle them with what is false, is true because they are stone-blind already. But what is all the spirit-rapping that is in the midst of their pretended light, and putting people to sleep, and taking their minds, in a certain sense, into possession, and the coming up of spirits of the departed, the identical necromancy of which we read in scripture?

That there is a vast deal of deception I have no doubt, but they have not explained and cannot explain the half of it. Witchcraft is not gone. You may find half the housewives in parts of England stop haemorrhage instantly with a few muttered words; you may give them the number of your warts one day, and have none the next. To this day there are in France stones with certain marks upon them, to which women who desire to have husbands or children go, and which they worship, and which have jovial celebrations attached to them. They are similar to others consecrated to Mahadeva (Siva) in India, whose symbol is the linga, and worshipped by women in the same way a little more grossly. They come with a dead child in them to revive it. They are probably also connected with the worship of the dead or fairies. (See Materiaux pour l'Histoire de l'homme, 1878, 6e livraison.)

It is very easy to sit in a drawing-room or a lecture-hall, and say, See how, with our wisdom and science, all these things have disappeared! They have not disappeared; it is mere pretentious ignorance to say they have. It is very possible that infidelity, if it had penetrated where superstition reigns, might make it disappear, though bringing up the dead or spiritism is no great proof of it. Our infidels may not believe that these are spirits of the dead (I do not); but their science cannot explain what happens now.

It is very easy to say, I do not believe the facts, but plenty of other people know they happen, and at any rate the superstition is there if the facts are not facts. There is no difficulty in distinguishing such things from real miracles; but the things to be accounted for are there. It is quite idle to say it is in dark places - I do not doubt or question that certain of them are - not spiritism. If a man finds to-day he has no warts when he had yesterday, and you tell him he is living in an ignorant condition, he may say, May be so, but I have no more warts; and if he has been among the more enlightened, he may reproach them with spiritism, a great deal of which none of them has explained yet. If you ask me, I say a great deal of it is deceit; but there is that wherein there is power, not of man, and certainly not of God. Of what, then, but of Satan? In their infidelity all is of Satan, to shut out God more completely in another way.

168 Nor is it in the country parts of England alone that superstition wields its power. I suppose we have infidelity and scientific light enough, and philosophy of all sorts in France; yet superstition reigns there. Not only has the worship of the Virgin Mary taken largely - increased proportions in general, but La Salette (proved false by judicial investigation of the civil authorities, and condemned by the prelate of the diocese thereupon) is now approved and in full vigour, and the poor railway that passes by Lourde makes a very good business with holy water and pilgrims; confessed to be false, yet educated English pilgrims going there. And what has science done to hinder it? It leaves both the imagination and the higher wants of man's heart and conscience wholly unreached; it cannot satisfy heart and conscience, having none; it can explain the development of ova and protoplasm; but of what comes of me when all my ova, and what they tell me can alone rightly be called protoplasm - a living combination which chemistry cannot reach, are gone in death, not one word can they say; no gleam of hope, no cry of conscience met. A God unknown on earth makes all darker still beyond it: for God, or even for man, no love; for self, no conscience. What has science to do with them? Affection is at the utmost warmer blood as to this world!

The whole moral world is wholly and absolutely outside their reach. Morality they have - none; they will tell me it is the pursuit of the good of all. And what is that good? and who is to decide it? Their happiness; but for no two men is it the same, if I take man's thoughts. It may be scalping, or opium, for the existence of passions forms no part of their philosophy. Many good people are not aware where philosophy has got to. Kant, in his treatise on morality,* - a man not nearly so bad as the fruits of the philosophy he set going - declares in terms that if the will of God, or fear of God, be introduced, there can be none. It is a principle outside man. Morality is the principle of pure reason applied to practical conduct. But he admits at the end that how the principle of pure reason can be so applied it is impossible to say. Mill tells me that justice is the animal desire for vengeance modified by utility to all. Kant's is merely natural conscience with the name changed, and shutting out relationships with God and man, on which all morality is based. Mill, remark, feeling a motive was needed as a rule, makes vengeance the motive. Animal vengeance the sole motive of morality - the rule; one which has been never settled yet, save by Christ.

{*A translation of it is used in Dublin University.}

169 But my object now is to take up specially the question of miracles, and see how scripture presents them. There are those who are opposed to infidelity who take them as the basis of Christianity. Infidels tell us there cannot be miracles in the nature of things; that general laws cannot be infringed; that the vast mass of evil alleged to be removed by them is the effect of natural laws, and cannot be taken out of their uniform operation; that where they are such as cannot be so viewed, as demoniacal possession and the resurrection, they are proved to be mere superstition, or false.

The first famous proof is, that they are contrary to experience; and we had not experience of miracles, but had of human falsity. But first it is to be remarked here that it is a question of induction (not deduction), which only affords probability, and this Mr. Hume admits. He weighs probabilities, the greater against the less. But inductions have nothing to do with facts. Hume says, "When at last he fixes his judgment, the evidence exceeds not what we properly call probability." Now I conclude, for all practical purposes (and man as an earthly creature has to act on such induction), that, the sun having risen day after day, it will rise to-morrow. But do I believe it shines today by experience, or induction? Clearly not induction. That is induction which calculates in the future from experience of the past, having nothing to do with facts at all. And, note here, talking of concluding for a long time hence how it will be, is throwing dust in the eyes. For it is because it has always been the same I conclude it will be. But the whole proof rests on its remaining the same. There is nothing to foretell. One is the certainty of a fact, the other the probability of an induction. I may deceive myself, reasoning badly; my senses may deceive me as to facts. But the nature of the proof is different. Induction has absolutely nothing to do with facts. Take even sunshine. I believe the fact that the sun has risen every day, not by any induction but as a fact on testimony, and hence conclude that it will; but the ground of my believing is distinct. I may question the evidence of a fact; but, question it or not, it is not induction; and if I have to reason on experience of motives or circumstances, and bring in induction, it is then only a probability and not a fact.

170 The scientific men say the course of the physical world is such that it must have had a beginning, and must come to an end. If they are right, the sun will cease to give its light as it has done, and the experience of the past would not be a sound induction in an absolute way. And this leads me to another important principle, the character of the experience and the induction from it, and the whole basis of reasoning from it. It is based on this, that the material phenomena in which we live are the limits of all man has to do with. Hence, in speaking of the good of all, the view of the object of man's life is confined entirely to the material system in which he lives. It is perfectly clear that phenomena and experience exist only in what is phenomenal; and induction from experience, as to what may or must be, cannot go beyond the sphere to which the experience applies. It belongs to this. It may so far go beyond what is material, as that we have a certain experience of men's passions and motives; but the motives are too various and unknown, and the will and circumstances have too much to do with it, to have any definite general laws. And this Mr. Mill admits, though reasoning as if it were not so, and declares that he was founding a new science, to which he gives the name of Ethology, as sure as any science referring to matter! for these men can pretend to anything.

But this system of general laws, which in ordinary material things no one denies, is assumed to be the only possible existing cause for anything. Yet no one can go one step beyond observed facts with which reason has nothing to do, save classifying and binding them together by experience as cause and effect, from which man has an instinctive habit of thought that they will continue. But it is only what is observed, and continuously observed. Take such a thing as death. It was only after centuries - if the patriarchal ages are true, many long centuries - that death could be taken to be a law of nature. Seeing a man die, or a world destroyed, would not prove it, as Mill so illogically states. Man must have seen (what was practically) all die, to make it a general law. Till then life was the general state, and death might be casual. Thus the conclusion as to anything could be only after a regularly consecutive experience of facts not known by reason at all, but by sight or testimony - facts which (in its very nature, as I have said, and it is all-important to observe) reasoning never gives. It gives conclusions, or the natural tendency to think that what is, as a general law, will go on as it has because it has hitherto; which, while sufficient to act on, and no doubt meant to be acted on, yet can only give probability, which is never a fact, but necessary if the principles are true. That is, reasoning never can, in any case, give us a fact or truth, but a conclusion by deduction, or by induction a mere probability.

171 Let us have it fixed in our minds - no facts are known by reason. Thus the fact of Christ's existence in the world, or His miracles, cannot be the subject of reasoning, but of sense or testimony. All the conclusions of reasoning, or the induction of man's mind, are founded on facts which are known without those, and form the basis on which they are grounded. But, further, experience does not touch the origin of that of which observation takes notice. The experience being of phenomena cannot go beyond phenomena. Thus, the sun rises; but what makes it rise? We may find successive sequences, and come to where we can go no farther, as well as immediate ones; but this alters nothing. First or last, we come to a point where something has produced the facts, or produces the facts, which form the experience. With that something science has nothing to do. Science does not go beyond the phenomena and conclusions drawn from it. But here I come to a power producing these facts or these laws, of which reason has no cognisance. I do exist. I do not always exist. I began to exist. Of that, the first cause to which it leads, there can be no experience. Now whether I take "causa causata," or "causa causans," is all one. I have something that has given rise to the phenomena, something which science cannot touch or reason about - admits it cannot (even Mill and materialists do). That is, a thing being, no matter of experience and yet existing, is certain. If I say, anything had a beginning; clearly when it began, it was contrary to experience, or rather no experience did or could exist. This cannot exist, till the constant succession expressed by general laws had lasted long enough to be known as such. Science tells us things had a beginning. That is, there was a time when judging by experience had no place at all, and yet facts were there and true, or experience never could have come to exist.

172 I quote one passage from Mill: "This class of consideration leads to a conception which we shall find to be of great importance; that of a permanent cause, or original natural agent. There exist in nature a number of permanent causes, which have subsisted ever since the human race has been in existence . . . . These have existed, and the effects or consequences which they were fitted to produce have taken place (as often as the other conditions of the production met) from the very beginning of our experience. But we can give no account of the origin of the permanent causes themselves Why these particular natural agents existed originally, and no others, or why they are commingled in such and such proportions and distributed in such and such a manner throughout space, is a question we cannot answer . . . . The co-existence therefore of primeval causes ranks to us among merely casual occurrences. Not only, for instance, is the earth itself a permanent cause . . . . the rotation itself is entitled to be ranked as a permanent cause. It is, however, only the origin of the rotation which is mysterious to us." This last I may touch on, but do not pursue here. He then states that no event happens in the known universe, which does not depend on some preceding one, the necessary, or in other words the unconditional, consequence of some former collocation of the permanent causes. He admits that these effects, though invariable while these causes co-exist, would, if the co-existence terminates, terminate along with it. "We can only calculate on finding these sequences or co-existences where we know by direct evidence that the natural agents - on the properties of which they ultimately depend - are distributed in the requisite manner," (Logic, ed. 8, pp. 398-400). But all this, "at least unless some new condition of a power capable of constructing the universe should supervene" (page 400).

173 Another able materialist, but who declares himself at the same time a Christian, arrives at the same result, after quoting indeed part of what is quoted above from Mill.

The method of science is thus essentially sceptical, and continually leads to reject all interference of casual powers not themselves phenomena, till we reach a point where analysis can go no farther, and we are compelled to admit a primordial cause or causes, of whose nature logic and science can tell us nothing.

Thus we are conducted to a blank wall by a method which is wholly powerless to penetrate the mystery which lies behind. The only thing it conducts to is not really what these authors say. The last says, "What we may term logical or negative atheism"; the former, who could not - being melancholy almost to madness for several years - but see the misery and degradation in which men were, and even creation itself, and not believing in the fall of man, concluded that a God of very feeble power, but in the main benevolent, had made the best He was able out of the materials He had at hand! The simple and only true history of the matter is this - man is so constituted that he cannot conceive a thing which has a form or individual existence without a cause. He sees something so existing: it came into existence by a cause. Hence he goes on to a primordial cause because he cannot conceive anything existing without one. But this is exactly what a first cause does, it exists without one. That is, he cannot conceive it. He knows it must be. What it is he cannot conceive. That is where man's mind ends, so that such is the result of science; "it conducts us to a blank wall by a method which is wholly powerless to penetrate the mystery which lies behind." Poor comfort to those led by it! Or, to use the larger work, and say with Mr. Mill, "We can give no account of the origin of the permanent causes themselves. Why these particular natural agents existed originally, and no others, or why, etc., is a question we cannot answer."

Now, in these statements, the substantive truth of which cannot be denied, we have the proof that the whole a priori argument against miracles entirely fails. Science, based on experience, reaches no farther than the actual sensible course of things already set in motion within the present limits of our senses or experimental discovery. Now, within that course - and science knows nothing but that, as science - we have, of course, no reason to expect a change so far as we reason from that, and this is all we can do. It is indeed tautology. It would not be a course of things else.* But it does do something more. It leads us to the blind wall, to its own end; but to what discloses that there is something of which it knows nothing, for it proves that everything we know comes from something that preceded it. This is a fixed principle, then. There are primeval causes of which we know nothing but that they exist, save that they must have a cause of which science is simply and wholly ignorant - cannot touch, as beyond its kind, and sphere of knowledge.

{*This is not strictly true, if, as men of science affirm, the course itself proves its beginning and its ending. But this hardly affects present practical uses of it.}

174 Things exist of which to science the origin is not known. What the men of science know is only the actual course they follow when they exist. Of their origin, of the force which gave them that course, what imposed on them the form of operations we find them to have, of everything that is constituent, science is ignorant; the constituted it can inquire into. Not only this, but it must, for its conclusion, have the circumstances, the collocations of existing things, their conditions of existence, just the same, or else all conclusions fail, indeed are false, have no bases, for they are drawn from what exists. Hence the condition is inserted by Mr. Mill, and very justly, "unless there is a counteracting cause." One step farther. Mr. Mill tells us, that any one who knew all the agents, their collocations in space, the laws of their agency, could predict the whole subsequent history of the universe, at least unless some new volition capable of constructing the universe should supervene. Now, there is not much science in this, which merely says that a state of things going a regular course would continue what it is unless something changed it, a proposition which I suppose no one would contradict, save by reason of another possibility that the course is a changing one (as is said to be the case), so as to come to an end.

Further, I must add that it is not necessary to change the universe: a power which could originate anything could do that without changing an atom, anything whatever, of the regular course of things, though it might introduce something new which was not of that course. Thus a man might rise from the dead and go to heaven, or an angel come down from heaven and leave the course actually known to science untouched. I am not saying any such thing ever happened, but a power which can originate does not necessarily change anything in that beyond which science cannot go. Men may go on eating, drinking, dying, and an angel come down, or a man may be raised, without anything of experienced phenomenal order being changed. This might go on as usual, and, physically speaking, its course be predicted just as before. When the man died, science came to its absolute end, to the blind wall, as much as in primeval causes at the other end, and the angel go away again, and no one care whether he had been there or not. Science can know nothing but the existing course of sensible phenomena, and presume its continuance as it is, if nothing interfere. If it attempts to go farther, it must say, I cannot answer, or knock its head against a blind wall.

175 But then, mark, we have this positively recognised, that there is a primeval cause, perhaps causes* (for they do not like to own one - it would be too near God - though Mr. Mill in the most wretched way did), whose origin is wholly unaccounted for. Science has its sole task to investigate their course when they are at work, but their origin and the origin of the laws which govern their course must be ascribed to a source of which science is ignorant. The course they follow is the whole it can inquire into; their existence is a "casual circumstance," stands by itself, is no part of the general law which science can discover when it is in operation. The conservation of force now insisted on alters this in nothing; it is only a more general law, which we cannot apply beyond the universe subject to observation, nor does it reveal its origin more than the rest. Let evolution be true, which in some respects it may be, and cells and protoplasm be the starting-point of everything: you only have the starting-point of development, only what is material with possible action, as organic, on mind. As to the origin you are exactly where you were.

{*Yet the unity of plan and law is the strongest possible inductive proof that the primeval cause is one.}

A volition capable of originating, science can tell nothing of - cannot say that it does not exist. For science, save that there is the insuperable conviction of a cause, it is the other side of a blind wall. This being so, all that denies the possibility or credibility of a miracle is wholly out of court. Experience has nothing to do with it. It is not the subject of its knowledge, or this knowledge would not be experience. That knows the course of what is, and nothing more; but the origin of all that is, and of the force that acts in the uniform operations which they call a general law, is out of their reach, but must be, for these things so governed exist; and it may, of course, operate independently now, as it did in the origin, when it could not be a matter of science, for the knowledge of a general law was only when they had existed long enough, and been so operated on as to be able, to predicate a course. Of these causes or cause there never was knowledge in science. They were there when the ground of science was laid. They had an origin, and what originated them may originate a miracle, a casual circumstance, for what were originated were only "casual circumstances" at first. Science can tell us nothing about those "casual circumstances"; such are altogether out of its sphere. No experience applies here, and so of miracles.

176 I do not say this proves any particular miracles to be true, but it proves the reasoning as to their credibility and possibility utterly foundationless and false. Whatever power produced or was the origin of the first, may be of the other, and is just as active in one as in the other. All the appeal to experience is only to say that the continued action of general laws, which they can explain as a mere fact, is not the same as the power that originated them, which they cannot explain at all. And even this, which in a certain sense may be admitted, so far as that it is a different kind of exercise of it, they cannot say. For my own part, I am satisfied that the force or power which created and set the universe in movement is a power which keeps it in movement. The material world would not move itself unless it was moved, and the power and will which started it must always operate to continue it, or it could not continue. This is the true conservation of force: the perpetual operation of divine will, just as it operated at the beginning in setting what appear now as general laws a-going. It is always exactly the same thing.

This force was acted by and followed a certain order in starting, by will and power; and it continues by the same power and will every instant. It has never been proved that the power which sustains is not the same power which at first originated. Science knows no more of one than the other. It only knows phenomena and the recognition of general laws by which they are governed, that is, the fact of constant sequence, or uniform effects when all is already there, the whole of which is as to its existence confessed to be a casual circumstance, just as a miracle is. Both are known by sense or testimony, and by no other means.

177 The infidel argument is utterly illogical. It is this - "We cannot admit a proposition as a law of nature, and yet believe a fact in real contradiction of it. We must either disbelieve the real fact, or believe we were mistaken in admitting the supposed law." But this is merely saying there is no possible power in existence but the law of nature; which is not only not proved, but the contrary is admitted. We have seen that it is admitted that there are primeval causes, of which science knows nothing - that it were contrary to experience. The effect B, they say, must follow from A, as it has always done, unless there be some counteracting cause; confining thus all possibilities to the existing phenomena, that is, assuming the whole question; denying anything else can be, yet admitting primeval causes. That anything happens not the consequence of existing phenomena, they say, must be disbelieved. A general conclusion that the usual phenomenon will follow no one disputes, because it always has. How the phenomena themselves did originally, unless it be a changing, not an unchanging, course. But it is not the question. That is, whether Z cannot do something, which is neither A nor B, or set A in motion to produce B. The consequence is supposed in the order of known phenomena. But the conclusion cannot go beyond a positive one: that there will happen a consequence when these causes act according to the known course. The action of power (for law is not power, but order produced by power) cannot be touched by that order, unless originating be denied, for this is power independent of existing order, and an origin, no part of the sphere of science, is admitted, were it not, its possibility cannot be denied. With that science has nothing to do.

Mill then takes the ground that we must believe in the existence of a being with supernatural powers before we can believe miracles. Now this proceeds on the supposition of our large ignorance of natural causes; a pretty plea for men of science who profess so to know nature, that the course of it is so fixed, that we cannot believe anything which contradicts that course; nay, which is not part of it. Now, when there is the consciousness that they cannot be denied, there must be previously the belief of supernatural power. But supposing we did so believe, which it is clear to me that we may and must without any miracles at all, this would not help us on a bit, because on their own shewing it may be from some unknown cause. Nay, they say that He who formed the course could not interrupt it. But this previous belief is not necessary. I may now assume miracles, for the question is their cause. Events happen which no known cause ever yet produced. They happen not of themselves. There is no antecedent natural cause discoverable; they happen only by the intervention of particular persons, and do not exist when these are not there. A man walks on the sea, stops the earth going round, raises a dead man who was buried and passing into corruption. All outward evil disappears before a given individual, a word suffices even when He is not there. No sorrow or evil withstands His word. The facts happen before hundreds of thousands, and to thousands, and nobody is able to call them in question: they cannot deny it.

178 You say, But I do not believe what really would be miracles, as Joshua's stopping the sun's course, or Lazarus's resurrection, etc. I quite understand you, but you do not, because they would prove the supernatural power if admitted. Now that is our present question, and you contradict your own statement; and I say, that a man who could deny that miracles cannot prove miraculous or supernatural powers, as they might be attributed to causes unknown to boasting science, ought not to write on logic, or pretend to analyse the true character of induction. "Thy wish was father, Harry, to that thought." The truth of alleged miracles may, of course, be disputed, their character be investigated; • but to say that miracles, if true, cannot prove supernatural power, but that this must be first assumed, is in every sense absurd, and worthy only of infidelity and men of science, who cannot get beyond phenomena and the petty investigations of the general laws which govern them; very entertaining, I admit, but which in no possible case lead to a right affection or to the sense of moral obligation.

And this is the proposition of the Humes and Mills, and of the anonymous author of Supernatural Religion.

179 But Mr. Mill makes one or two remarks of great importance here: "The miracle, as an extraordinary fact, may be satisfactorily certified by our senses or testimony." But then there is a power which can interrupt the course of general laws and act by its will so as to produce "casual circumstances." Mr. Mill will say there is no miracle, but a previously unknown law. I only admit an extraordinary fact. But I have a fact that is not accounted for by any known law or cause. Adequate evidence is admitted of facts, and that there is no way to account for the fact. Suppose the fact to occur at the command of an individual, and repeatedly, and to be contrary to every known law, as walking on the sea. We have clearly what is not the effect of general laws, but contrary to them, and attached to an individual and those empowered by Him. That there may be evidence of it is admitted; to deny it is merely returning not to evidence or science, but to the assumption that there cannot be, which is just a begging of the question, which before he did his best to deny practically, but now, pleading the ignorance of science, he seeks to throw necessary uncertainty on its being supernatural. We find, if adequately certified, they always happened by the intervention of given individuals, never without them; that they never happened before at any time, by any natural cause known or unknown. They belong to no general laws, and they always happened when the will of these gifted persons interfered.

The other remark is that an important element of the question will be the conformity of the results to the laws (read characters, for with "laws" given to others, save as sanctions, they had nothing to do) of the supposed agent.

I have said that the statement that a miracle can be certified by observation or testimony is important, as it was sought to be proved impossible. This may be easily understood by the statement, "If an alleged fact be in contradiction, not to any number of approximate generalisations, but to a completed generalisation grounded on a vigorous induction, it is said to be impossible, and to be disbelieved totally." (Mill's Logic, 8th edition, chap. 2, page 115.)

We have already seen there is no ground for this, for the induction is only from the course of nature known as general laws. And the miracle, if such, is a casual circumstance, like the origin of permanent causes, and has nothing to do with these laws, or it is not a miracle. The statement, then, that "we cannot admit a proposition as a law of nature and yet believe a fact in real contradiction to it" (Mill, chap. a, p. 167), is simply a statement that there can be no exercise of power other than the course of nature known to us: which is simply absurd and a mere assumption, contrary moreover to their own admission - that the origin of all is by some power which science knows nothing of.

180 In sum, we have come to the conclusion, or rather gathered up their admissions, that casual circumstances have taken place revealing power not within their experience or the general laws of science, and of which science can give no account. And that is just what a miracle is.

Let me now consider the way in which scripture presents miracles. It is alleged, and Christian apologists seem to acquiesce in it, that miracles are the proof of Christianity. This is a great mistake. They are graciously given of God in compassion to man's weakness to confirm the word. But the revelation of God in the word, His nature and actings, are the first things. Thus we have in Mark 16 the Lord working with them, and confirming the word by signs following; so in Hebrews 1, God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders and with divers miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost. And this is so much the case, that a faith founded on miracles is not owned of the Lord: the moral element which links man's quickened soul with God is wanting. "Now when he was in Jerusalem at the passover on the feast day many believed in his name, seeing the miracles which he did; but Jesus did not commit himself unto them, because he knew all men and needed not that any should testify of man, for he knew what was in man." It was a human conclusion, drawn from the testimony of His works, and a just one; there was no new life, no moral renewal, it was "what was in man."

Hence we find as a fact in the ways of God, that, as a rule, miracles were wrought only at the introduction and establishment of a divine religious order, or where it was abandoned by those whom He had not yet abandoned; in a word, where a testimony needed to be confirmed in this way. Thus Moses wrought miracles, but no prophet in Jerusalem, where (however evil the people were) as a system the religion established by Moses remained, ever wrought miracles. When Israel had set up the golden calves, and God visited the people to maintain a testimony of the truth for a poor remnant, Elijah and Elisha work miracles. Again, whatever the miraculous power, it was to confirm the truth proposed, never for self. Paul leaves Trophimus at Miletus sick. Yet how many had he healed? Epaphroditus was sick nigh unto death, but God had mercy on him. Hence, if a miracle was wrought leading away from divine truth the miracle-worker was to be stoned; Deut. 13. In mercy to man, adequate outward testimony was given, leaving man without excuse; but faith which God owned rested in the word, and its effectual working morally in the heart.

181 So the Lord puts the double character of His testimony: "If I had not come and spoken to them they had not had sin, but now they have no cloak for their sin. If I had not done among them the works which none other man did they had not had sin, but now they have both seen and hated both me and my Father." But while condemned for rejecting this testimony, faith formed on this alone is not owned, because it was purely human assent and not the moral power of the revelation working in the heart, and faith which is owned is always by the word. Of His own will begat He us by the word of truth. "My sheep hear My voice." "He that heareth My word and believeth on Him that sent Me hath everlasting life." "The words that I have spoken unto you they are spirit and they are life." It is equally even the ground of judgment. "The word that I have spoken the same shall judge him in the last day."* Thus, while special miracles confirm the truth, yet if they are not attached to the truth known from the word, they are to be rejected. The word is the test.

{*See John 10: 38; ch. 14: 11; and other like passages.}

Further, closely connected with this is the fact that these miracles were entirely separated from any honour attached to the persons who wrought them, though of course they attested the divine character of their ministry; they were wholly a testimony borne to the Living Word, the Lord Jesus Christ, and all He taught. This is true even as to Moses' works of power; as Exodus 16: 8, and elsewhere, "What are we? Your. murmurings are not against us, but against the Lord." And when once they provoked his spirit, so that he spake unadvisedly with his lips, saying, "Hear now, ye rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock?" as an expression of the strict regime of the law, he was not suffered to lead the people into Canaan; Num. 20: 10. So, Acts 3: 13, Peter disclaims all regard to himself or John, putting Jesus alone forward. The Lord's power and resurrection are that to which the miracles testified. This gives a definite character to them. There was no personal relief, as we have seen, no self-aggrandisement by them, no glory sought for themselves or for their company. So Paul and Barnabas; Acts 14: 14.

182 Now, it was the opposite of this in every other case. It was to glorify the individual, a St. Anthony, or Gregory Thaumaturgus, or Martin, or the church corporately - in a word themselves. They were always from motives, or for objects, which the scriptural miracles never were. The religion was already established as a religion, for which they had been needed. They were wrought in mercy to a tigress who brought a deer-skin in recompense to the saint for giving sight to her cubs, and who was told the saint could not work miracles for her if she went on with such work; or a cow was set right on which a demon was riding, whom the saint only could see, and the cow, coming and kneeling to him, was ordered to go quietly back to the herd, which she did. This saint promised Satan salvation if he ceased to tempt man. Or let any one compare the miracles of the pseudo-gospels with the miracles attributed to Christ; and if they cannot discern the difference of these and scripture, we need not be troubled about their judgment as to anything. The things I have referred to were in the very first centuries. The church was utterly fallen.

It is a constant fact in the ways of God that He gives counterchecks. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth. The form of holiness cannot be received as of God if it be not founded on the truth, nor what is presented as the truth if it be unholy, nor one who presents truth itself as a minister of God if he be unholy. So pretended miracles, or apparent works of power, if used to confirm what is not the truth of the word, are to be at once rejected. I may be unable to explain them: that alters nothing; they are not of God. He can only give testimony to the truth. Let the sign be one of real power, as we have seen in Deuteronomy 13, if it deny the Lord or His word, it condemns the worker, but does not deceive him who knows the Lord and walks with Him. This supposes the truth known, the testimony of the Lord, in the word received (and that is our case), or else a heart deceived by falsehood, which, of course, cannot discern.

And here we see the importance of the scriptural fact that miracles were on the introduction of the truth and to confirm it. Their holiness of walk, truth and power, went inseparably together. It was not a record of past miracles; nor, on the other hand, when truth was there, a means to judge pretended ones by, but the truth introduced with the accompanying testimony, which none could deny. In the case of Christ, neither heathen nor Jews denied them; they might ascribe them to Beelzebub, or magic, or the shem hammaphoresh; but the facts were there.

183 Miracles were a present visible testimony which, in point of fact, did so affect men that the religion was established in the face, and in despite, of all the power of the world. For, after all, Christianity exists, and has had a cause of its existence. That that existence was identified with the person of the Lord Jesus Christ is unquestionable for any sober-minded person. Next to His Person and death, of which even heathen authors (of course of more weight with infidels, because they believed no truth) testify, came the truths they testified of (which indeed could not be separated from Christ's Person and work); but with these, both in the case of Christ Himself and those He sent out, miracles accompanied the testimony to confirm it, and the testimony was believed, and the religion was founded, in the midst, doubtless, of violent opposition and persecution. But the testimony and the miracles were before the eyes of those who did believe. The account is, that they saw persons who had been dead and buried, alive again and conversant with men; all sickness at once healed; lunatics, and those held to be possessed - for the difference is clearly made - instantly healed and delivered. And a religion, which has possessed the civilised part of the world, was founded through the effect produced making head against every prejudice and the whole power of the Roman Empire; and divine truth such as meets and heals man's soul was introduced by it.

Other religions have been compared with it. Mahometanism, everyone knows, was propagated by the sword, and gives a sensual paradise of houris, consecrating men's lusts. Buddhism, the most interesting phenomenon in the world, had no god, it was despair at the state of human nature without a remedy, and its founder obtained - Nirvana - practical annihilation by eating too much pork when he was fully eighty years old. Now he is a kind of god, and in one vast country where it prevails, is embodied in a man and, when he dies, another is ready prepared, and the living power passes into him. The miracles the word of God insists on were for the establishment of the faith, and the faith was established, and the grace and truth taught in it shine yet with undiminished and undeniable moral lustre, while its shell is picked at by those who do not like the truth itself, because it has a power which speaks too plainly to conscience - proves itself too clearly for the conscience to like it.

184 And this leads me, too, to the character of the miracles, which, as Mr. Mill says, ought to be characterised by what suits the law (character) of the author of them. Let us consider them in this view.

Christianity views man as guilty and lost by sin, and (while recognising the law as the just measure of what was required from man, yet none having fulfilled it) purports to be the revelation of God in sovereign goodness to save what was thus lost. Now, Christ's miracles and those of His disciples were not merely signs of power, but all of them of goodness as well as power. There is but one absolute exception, and the accessory of another: the cursing of the barren fig-tree, a usual figure of the Israelitish nation, that is, of man under the old covenant (this is finally judged, and it was never to bear fruit); the other was the case of the swine, when the miracle itself was a striking and mighty act of delivering goodness, and a sufferance thereupon of the demons shewing themselves such as they were - a sad picture of what happened to the Jews when they rejected Christ as the Gadarenes had. The allowance of the manifestation of the reality of these evil spirits is a remark of one of the old so-called fathers.

With these exceptions, all the miracles of the Lord were the expression of goodness present in power, that man might be won back to confidence in God. Every outward effect of sin, all the evil that was in the world, was removed and set aside when met by the power that wrought in goodness amongst men. This did not change man's heart, but it did reveal God's, and this was what man wanted. God came into the midst of sinful men shewing that love flowing from His own thoughts and nature was greater than the sin and evil that was in the world. For what we have in Christianity is what never was before: God come out in grace revealing Himself in goodness when man was a sinner; and man gone in, in righteousness, into the divine glory, so that God's love and God's righteousness should be revealed to sinners far from Him.

185 Now, no one can shew that one miracle of Christ's, or of those sent by Him, was not thus power displayed in a way suited to the present need and sorrow of man. Moses' miracles, though partly the glorious deliverance of a people and the proof of governmental care, were not always this. There were judicial wonders suited to the position of the people when God was hid behind the veil and the people placed under the law and tested there. To be exact, I should add one temporary judgment pronounced by Paul on Elymas (a sad picture of the state of the Jews resisting grace), and, after all, the means of far better blessing to the proconsul, before whom the question of the truth of Christianity was raised.

The miracles of Christ were, then, not only perfectly suited to God's nature and character, but perfectly suited to man and the purpose of Christ's mission, and the expression of it where man's heart could feel and understand it. His birth (if God was to be thus manifested, so that man should learn God's nature and feel His profound interest in him) was exactly what it must have been, a true, real man, born of a woman, but perfectly sinless; such was the suited temple of God as near to man as God could be, and yet God near to him. As to the resurrection, He having become capable of dying to accomplish the work of redemption, and having accomplished that work, there was the recognition of its effectual value for the justification of everyone that believed. God had accepted it, and inseparably from this - a to us - new life,* and a new state of it beyond the effects of sin, in a people of which He was the first-born and head. And thus mark that all His miracles were an essential part of an immense scheme of truth, the only key to man's state in connection with God's righteousness and mercy, and the only full and real revelation of what He is which exists in the world. The infidel may condescend to have to say to God, provided He keeps far enough away from him for them to have nothing to do with one another; but this is a revelation, when man, beyond all controversy, is in sin and misery and degradation, as a fact, if there be no revelation - a revelation of God having to do with him in grace and love, and yet maintaining His holy and righteous nature, no trace of which is found anywhere else.

{*Christ had life in Himself, and could not be holden of death; but I speak of what it is for man in general.}

But, further, while miracles were a confirmation of the word, which was the proper and express revelation of God's mind, they were also a testimony in and of themselves; for they told, not simply of power but of goodness, of God working in goodness in the midst of sorrow and misery, and that in the most definite and distinct way. "He had compassion on the multitude." Still there was distinctly and definitely a testimony to the person and truth, or, to speak again as scripture speaks, the grace and truth which came by Jesus Christ, and word and works were a like testimony to it. Hence, too, both belonged specially to the Person of the Lord and His immediate followers, whose part after His death I will speak of just now.

186 Thus in John 10: 37, 38, we read, to the world, "If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not; but if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works, that ye may know and believe that the Father is in me and I in him": to the disciples (John 14: 10, 11), "Believest thou not that I am in the Father and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me: or else believe me for the very works' sake."

I add what follows for another point that will come before us. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also, and greater works than these shall he do, because I go to my Father." Again, chapter 15: 22, "If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin: but now they have no cloak for their sin. He that hateth me hateth my Father also. If I had not done among them the works which none other man did they had not had sin, but now they have both seen and hated both me and my Father." Thus both the word and the works give testimony to all the expression of the perfectness of the person who was there - of God's living dealing with men. As to the word, this is the force of John 8: 25: "in principle and wholly what I say to you"; His words were the expression of Himself. He was the truth, and the truth thus expressed was the revelation of Himself and so of the Father. This gives a distinct character to His words and miracles, and the difference between His and all others. None could be in themselves a similar testimony. The fact that the apostles, and probably some on whom they had laid their hands, wrought miracles, and more and greater works than Christ Himself, may seem a contradiction to this.

187 A few words here may be called for. It was a necessary consequence of the truth as to Christ. As to His life He was the necessary and natural witness to Himself. But this manifestation of God in grace in the world was only half the truth. If He as God descended here in love becoming a man, as man He is gone up into heaven, the righteousness of God being so revealed to men through the Holy Ghost sent down. Of this the Holy Ghost, speaking and acting in men sent out by Christ, was the witness. "Greater works than these shall ye do because I go to my Father." But the testimony was still to Jesus alone: the apostles disclaimed all glory for themselves . The miracles were all for the establishing of Christ's religion upon earth, and belonged entirely to that testimony, either to His coming here from on high or to His being gone up on high as man.

No miracles of wandering Jews or Christians in subsequent times can be compared with them, and he who can compare warnings to grateful lionesses and demons riding on cows' backs, done to the honour of Thaumaturgus, must have lost every trace of moral sense and divine apprehension.

The infidels must remember that the judgment we form on things is sometimes a test of the state of our minds. The state of the church fell with the departure of the apostles, and even in their time. All, says the apostle, seek their own, not the things of Jesus Christ; and John and Jude both testify that the failure was come in their days. The history of the church shews it utterly fallen in doctrine and practice at once, as all that had been entrusted to man ever had. It is all very well to talk of the primitive church with those who know nothing about it. But the doctrine and practice were such as are not fit to be put upon a drawing-room table for common reading, and that what was read in the churches forty or fifty years after John's death; one hundred years after, this corruption was general.

That superstition and spiritual ignorance governed the "Fathers'" minds, there is not the smallest doubt. Milner in his Church History admits that not one ever held the fundamental doctrine of justification by faith. I should go farther, but let that suffice. It became quite early the practice to get drunk in the churches in honour of the saints whose memorial had taken the place of that of the demi-god on the same site. In Africa Augustine tried to put a stop to it, and was nearly stoned for his pains; he excuses "the primitive church" by saying, they thought it better to get drunk in honour of a saint than in honour of a demon. But more of this in detail hereafter.

188 The disposition of the Jews to believe all sorts of signs and wonders is insisted on by infidels, as in the book Supernatural Religion, referring to Lightfoot, and Schoetgen, and Gfrorer, who quote the Talmud, etc. Now this is freely admitted. But such infidels forget that the Jews as a body did not receive Jesus as the Christ. Light had come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light. John the Baptist claimed repentance without miracles; those whose consciences were reached received the Lord's testimony, but none else. They might rejoice in the miracles for present comfort, but did not believe, so that the faith in Christ was exactly in contrast with this superstitious temper of the Jews. One would think that these wise men had forgotten that Christ was rejected and crucified, and that the Jews' wonderful love of the marvellous failed to reconcile them to the light - perhaps helped to darken their eyes. At any rate the argument is worse than nothing, because they did not believe because of the truth that came with the miracles, but rejected Him that wrought them; ascribed them to Beelzebub - anything rather than receive the truth; and the judgment they were warned of came upon them.

I should not demand better evidence of the difference of the human mind and the divine as communicated in the Gospels than for a person to read the spurious gospels, if he has patience to get through them, and compare the senseless fatuities of what was not written by inspiration in those days and the four Gospels; and if he cannot find out the difference, he is quite fit to be an infidel author. Christ, it is said, when a child was making mud birds and ponds, and it was the sabbath, and a big boy came and broke His ponds, the birds took flight and went away, and Christ said, As you have dried my ponds, may you be dried up! So he dried up and died. In this kind of way He became the means of the death of so many that His mother had to keep Him at home in the house. He maltreated the master that taught Him His letters in a like way.

Let me remark here that scripture gives perfectly and soberly according to God, what there are legendary traditions of, or the truth of God's ways in connection with Himself, where man's imagination has invented a mass of false statements to impose on man's fears or love of the wonderful. Thus, take the Book of Tobit (the expression so far of Talmudical and Jewish ideas when they had not present revelation, and the scriptural account of the service of angels), and see how the last is worthy of God and comfortable to us. The denial of these things, as if it was a settled point, and sober men had given it all up, is all very well for infidels and those who are afraid of them; but they must know that men as sober and as sound as they, fully believe in the scriptural statements of angelic administrations and demoniacal power. The Sadducean denial of a world of spirits is prejudice, not sober judgment, as if power (because it was not visible and material) could not exist.

189 The scriptures - and in spite of infidels, Christians believe them - are plain as to the ministration of angels: "Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister to them who shall be heirs of salvation?" As regards the wickedness of man they do believe in the fall of man, they do not believe that God made the world as it is morally. They see man degraded in abominable idolatries where Christianity has nothing to do with it, where in the highest state of civilisation they worshipped and do worship objects that mark the lowest possible degradation, and indulge, even the wild Indians, in the careful practice of nameless degradation themselves. They know that in the centre of modern civilisation, man is let loose and boastingly casting off Christianity and God, indulging in horrors too horrible to repeat. They know that where there are not such outbreaks, and where there is a great profession of religion, sin and vileness prevail and scarce hide their face; and they do not believe that God made the world in this state - they leave that to infidels. They believe, knowing God to be holy and good, that man is a fallen being. The evil state is a fact. They will excuse its violence as rising up against oppression, there is a measure of truth as to certain parts of this, but they are only deeper in the mire. Where did the intolerable oppression come from? and is violence, glutting in blood and debauchery, the only remedy they have? Further, God's remedy they reject, and are helping people to reject, to their own destruction.

Kuenen is referred to in Supernatural Religion as a very able book. With sufficient contradiction to make their judgment of little worth, all these rationalists are in substance on the same ground. The Pentateuch is not a really historical book at all, but a compilation from a few old documents, partly made in the time of Judges, partly in David's or Solomon's reign, partly after the exile. There, at any rate, it received its priestly form. Every divine element is completely excluded; of course therefore, no prophecy. Hence, when events later than the professed date of the writing are found, it was written after these events. Jahve was the national god, but Monotheism was only that into which they gradually grew up (through a Semitic tendency). Some think Jahve (Jehovah) a Canaanitish god; at any rate it was one party, and a small one, who held to his exclusive worship; other gods being equally recognised, even in the Pentateuch, and by the best kings. One party would have fellowship with the Canaanites; another drive them wholly out.

190 I may mention two cases as specimens of their systems. As it is rejected as historically true, and what professes to be of Moses invented or legends, they try and compose a system, putting things together by the probabilities drawn from man's motives; rejecting all thought of any revelation of God - of course all prophecy and any mind of God in the matter. The whole is put together and compiled finally after the exile, with the object of exalting the priests and the authority of Jahve But I must give in my specimens:

Abimelech was disposed to unite Canaanites and followers of Jahve, and did get power thus. Gaal was a Jahvist, according to the system. Genesis 49 was written in the time of the Judges. But what is to be made of verses 5-7, the judgment on Simeon and Levi? According to them, the then state of Simeon and Levi led the poet of Genesis 49 to put into Jacob's mouth this judgment of the tribes. That comes, says Dr. Oort, from Genesis 34, written at that time, "for we know of no other inducement for the invention of this story than the covenant made between the cities of Shechem." But it is not certain that we should know the inducement, says Kuenen, and chapter 34 was written long after. Oort himself had a difficulty - the statement in verse 13, that they dealt deceitfully. That is easily met: it is interpolated. No, says Kuenen; it is a confused reminiscence of the time of the Judges, long after Gideon and Abimelech.

It is well that those interested should know the principles of Dr. Kuenen, so lauded by the author of Supernatural Religion. At the beginning of his book, speaking of the standpoint of his history, he tells us it is one of a number of monographs of the principal religions. The idea of including the Israelitish and the Christian among the principal religions deserves approbation and applause only if there exist no difference between these two and all the other forms of religions. The idea of a special divine revelation, he says, would place too deep a gulf between them and others to count these among them. And at the end he adopts the statement of Mr. Reville, that if liberal Judaism prevails (for they have their rationalists), it will closely approach liberal Christianity, which, by its openly avowed Unitarianism, will not excite the same repugnance as orthodoxy. A fusion is hardly probable; but if all religious sects laid down their weapons, religious sentiment would only gain by it. Of course, if a man believes nothing, though there are principal religions, there is nothing to fight for. Divine revelation does not exist; and then, whether Genesis 34 be an existing fiction of the time of Abimelech, or a much later writing of confused reminiscences of that time, is very little matter, and may be left to Drs. Oort and Kuenen, who would hail a fusion of Judaism and Christianity on the ground of there being nothing divine in either.

191 The other specimen I would cite is, that the prediction of Genesis 49: 16, 17, is a clear proof that the chapter was written in the time of the Judges, more precisely of Samson; for then Dan rose up with some vigour. Such are the speculations we are to have, instead of the word of God, publicly accredited by the Lord Jesus and the apostles. These are merely instances that occur to me, or rest in my memory; the whole system is composed of such. I have entered more into it elsewhere. I have read Kuenen, Ewald, Bleek, Graf, and looked at others. But, as I have said, they are - though the one upsets the other in detail so as to destroy their proofs - just the same in substance.

Supernatural Religion is a catalogue raisonne of all the infidel German books; an advocate's special pleading against revelation. But while I avow I have not read the half of those he quotes, I cannot say he is fair in those I am acquainted with. I do not charge the author with false quotation, but with leading the reader, as to what he quotes, to the opposite conclusion to that the quoted book would, if the context be read.

I quite agree with Dr. Trench that possession means possession; the case of Legion leaves no manner of doubt. But, whatever Mede and others may say, these cases are expressly distinguished from lunacy, as in Matthew 4: 24; and not only do the Evangelists speak of devils coming out, but the Lord expressly desires them to come out. And the case of Legion seems given expressly to shew it is really so, as one of the "Fathers" remarks. Even now, with all their boasting, in cases of epilepsy the doctors on post-mortem examinations fail generally to find any adequate trace of disease. Scientific men have to learn that they are not all the world; and Christians who are afraid through their pretensions, and yield to semi-rationalism, are the most contemptible of all writers. Milman says our Lord adopted the current language of the day because unbelief in spiritual agency was one of the characteristic tenets of the unpopular sect of the Sadducees; as if the Lord Jesus would maintain as a truth in the minds of the people a false doctrine on a most important point where the Sadducees were right, for fear of losing His popularity by identifying Himself with them by speaking the truth. Why should He even have said anything and not merely heal the sick person? It is next door to blasphemy. Meyer says, all the efforts to explain away the history of Legion are useless: either you must take it as a true history; or recognise legendary parts and separate them, and take the story of the swine as the reminiscence of some mishap. He is as unbelieving on these points as the rationalists could wish. Lange's explanation, which Canon Farrar has borrowed, Meyer treats with the contempt it deserves.

192 The existence of good spirits and bad, the very dread expressed by them of judgment as yet "before the time," and the operation of divine power in miracles, are too interwoven with the whole structure of the Gospels to take them out without destroying its whole texture. I have already remarked, that the allegation that the superstition of the Jews accounts for it, proves only the folly of the reasoner who makes it, for they were not believed in by the Jews at all. That there are many inexplicable facts, false miracles also, and wonders done by evil power is recognised in scripture; but we are tested in such cases by them; they would deceive, we read, if it were possible, the very elect, and the power of spiritual discrimination, or the want of it is shewn; and all that the author of Supernatural Religion does is to confound them all together, shewing his own incapacity to discern. Real miracles, such as those of the Old Testament, are not at all the same as the New Testament. Divine power was of course shewn, and in grace to a people owned of God to found or guard a testimony; but the whole scene of the Lord's ministry was the expression of power in goodness in a living person there, or in a still mightier testimony to His name and redemption when He was gone.

193 But I ought to state why I account the statements of Supernatural Religion to be unfair. I just remark that the statement as to the book of Enoch, though very common, is entirely unfounded. The doctrine of Jude and that of this book are quite different as to the passage alleged to be borrowed. I do not call this unfair; it is too common. There was a tradition probably as to this prophecy, and the author of the book of Enoch uses it for his own objects; and in Jude the Holy Ghost gives us it, according to the truth of it. It is to me pretty clear that the book of Enoch was written by a great partisan of the Jews and enemy of Christians, and not long after the destruction of Jerusalem. He sees up to the destruction of his tower, but then can see no farther, but is full of all promises to those faithful to Judaism. Enoch, chapter 88: 22, 23, refers pretty clearly to the destruction of the temple by the Romans, and he could not perceive whether they afterwards entered the house; in chapter 92 we have the final judgment. Lawrence gives the passage in question thus from Enoch, "Behold he cometh with ten thousand of his saints, to execute judgment upon them, and to destroy the wicked, and reprove all the carnal for everything which the sinful and ungodly have done and committed against him."

Now there is in Jude a prophecy in general analogous; but copied they are not. In the book of Enoch the saints are judged, and the wicked destroyed. Judgment on the saints is unknown to Jude. It is the doctrine of the book of Enoch, because he holds the Jews to be God's people. He says just before, "while judgment shall come upon all the righteous"; executing judgment on the preserved is the doctrine taught. Nor is the destruction of the wicked in Jude; nor is there anything of the speaking of ungodly sinners in the book of Enoch. Both the words and doctrine are different; nor is there the least proof that the book was before Jude. My own conviction is that the book of Enoch was written after the destruction of Jerusalem - I suppose, in that case, after Jude's epistle. The idea that the prophecy was current before both is fair enough, but for copying there is no ground whatever.

There are many passages in the book of Enoch which would lead us to suppose they were taken from the New Testament - doubtless some merely proverbial sayings used by both. Both the chronological elements and the contents of the book lead, on the closest scrutiny, to the supposition that the book was written by a Jew, who was obliged to admit the judgment of his saints (those faithful to Judaism) and treated the Christians as a perverse set, had picked up a good many truths which a Jew could own, and wrote after the destruction of Jerusalem, but sought to make the Jews still believe in the accomplishment of the promises made to the nation. It is curious as exhibiting a picture of the current notions of that day. He puts the Christ as existing before the creation, but hidden; he calls Him Son of man; but this is in the Old Testament. He makes the flood come by the world getting a tilt. I do not then speak of this as unfair. It is second-hand and superficial; but it is a current notion, only it has no foundation.

194 But there is what I consider unfair. The author - as he does in countless other instances, stating as proved and certain, because the infidel clique he belongs to have so settled it, what is far removed from being so - tells us, "It has been demonstrated that Ignatius was not sent to Rome at all, but suffered martyrdom in Antioch itself on the 20th December 115." He quotes then Bleek as witness of this statement. Now Bleek adopts the date, which had been greatly disputed, but in these words (Clark's Eng. trans., chap. 1, p. 158), "Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, who was martyred at Rome under Trajan, A.D. 115." In the same place (Sup. Rel., chap. 1, p. 268-9), we find "there are no less than three martyrologies of Ignatius, giving an account of the martyr's journey from Antioch to Rome; but they are all recognised to be mere idle legends, of whose existence we do not hear till a very late period. In fact, the whole of the Ignatian literature is a mass of falsification and fraud."

The author quotes Milman, chap. 2, p. 101; but Milman says nothing about it there. He does reject the acts of martyrdom, but expressly declares that he was sent to Rome, and in 102 gives a summary of his journey to Rome as we have it in ecclesiastical history, and quotes Cureton's epistles as of authority, and fully receives the account of his journey and seeing the brethren on the way, using it as proof there was no general persecution. The author also quotes Ewald, chap. 7, p. 314. Now Ewald does reject entirely the three martyrologies published by Dressel. But he not only holds the whole history itself to be true, and the author's statement wholly wrong, receiving Cureton's Ignatian epistles, but he discusses it at length, and considers that the Syrian epistles have lost some passages which have been found in the Greek. As to Polycarp's epistle, he not only receives it, but says, appealing to Irenaeus' (3: 3, 4, a e) quotation of it, that its originating with Polycarp, people in our time have doubted and even denied, but that they were utterly wrong. "Es ist die grosste Ungerechtigkeit."

195 That a mass of infidel Germans, no two of whom have the same theory, and make systems at pleasure, refuting one another, and agreeing only to doubt what is true, may be cited, or Davidson, who does nothing but copy from them, no one need deny. But this seems to me very superficial, as well as unfair, in cases I have quoted. There is no original research into the questions, nor even care or fairness in quoting what is cited in the cases referred to: a vast number I have not examined. That many German infidels sustain the author in many things he says, I have no doubt.

As regards Justin Martyr, with all his details he seems to be very weak; and here also he has either borrowed or is only on the surface. That there was a multitude of accounts of Jesus current, written and unwritten, is notorious, and it is stated in Luke's Gospel. That Justin, who was of Palestine, had heard and refers to such is most probable. But these accounts never stood on the ground the four Gospels did. Origen notices (be his remark solid or not is alike as to this) that the others had taken in hand, which was merely human, not as Luke. Irenaeus insists that there could not be more than four Gospels, of which I will speak farther on, and Tatian made a harmony of these four - plain proof that in the very earliest ages these four were distinctly recognised. That Justin, who was of Palestine, was familiar with the accounts current as published there, and reproduces them, is most probable; but no one can read even what is cited by the author of Supernatural Religion without seeing that Justin was fully acquainted with and recalls what he has read in the canonical Gospels. He does not take the roll down to copy it, but we could not have what Justin gives without our Gospels.*

{*Curiously enough, I have had to correct several quotations, carelessly made like Justin's, in reading over this paper.}

As regards the Gospel to the Hebrews, it can hardly be doubted that Matthew wrote some account of Christ in Hebrew: at any rate early Fathers so state; but, after all, their statements are very vague as to what it was, Epiphanius saying it was corrupted, Jerome that he translated it, which would go to prove that it was not the canonical Matthew. What did he translate? It does not affect our Gospel, which is clearly original, as even the language proves. Jerome says he saw it at Caesarea and translated it; so that there was such in the fourth century. Still the statements of Jerome are so inconsistent that it is hard to draw any clear conclusion from what he says. He says he translated it, and that it was practically the same as Matthew: this it certainly was not, by his own testimony elsewhere. The writers of introductions, Bleek, De Wette, etc., say he gave up afterwards this thought, and I suppose did not like saying plainly he had been wrong; but it seems to me the dates do not bear this out. I do not think he is much to be trusted in the matter. Papias - a man sphodra mikros noun - assumes there was such a Hebrew Gospel by Matthew, but there were afterwards seemingly two differing editions; a few of the "Fathers" accepted it; but Origen, disposed to receive everything, says every one was free to use it if he thought it genuine, only not as authority. But it was in Aramaean; and there is no proof that Justin, a Greek, understood the tongue. He was a Greek, and though living in Palestine, it was in the Roman town Flavia Neapolis. Further, though he preferred being put to death rather than deny Christ, when, as is said, brought to martyrdom through a jealous philosopher, Crescens, yet he never gave up his philosopher's cloak, was a Platonist, and unsound in fundamental doctrines; and, though we cannot doubt his sincerity, was on the surface of Christianity. At any rate, the Gospel to the Hebrews is surrounded critically with the greatest obscurity, with no proof that Justin understood it, or was one of Papias's "every one interpreted as best he could." All this part of the book comes to nothing.

196 The inspiration of scripture is known by divine teaching; it asserts its own inspiration formally, more formally if possible, than the spoken word; but its authority is demonstrated by evidence of every kind, such as no other book in the world possesses. The author quotes the writers of the Baur or Tubingen school in numbers, which is merely part of a progressive effort, not simply to undermine the authority of the New Testament history, but to do so by the invention of a system already seen through and refuted as alike historically unfounded and absurd, and which has now not merely lost its weight outside a few partisans, but has demonstrated the animus of the inventors and their untrustworthiness in every respect. It is this school that the author of Supernatural Religion relies on. We have seen that his quotations from others, themselves rationalist enough, cannot really be trusted.

197 There has been little real research into the character of the Gospels. The Fathers say Matthew wrote in order - chronologically in fact; Mark, on the contrary, no one knew how (supposed as he heard it from Peter; this from the foolish notion than an apostle must be the author, from not really believing in inspiration). Now it is exactly the contrary, Matthew's Gospel bringing forth Christ as Messiah, Emmanuel sent to the Jews, but rejected of them; the kingdom of heaven, and the church and the kingdom in glory being substituted for the present establishment of Messiah's glory, gives a perfect moral order of subjects with this view. Hence, too, you have in fact no proper history with a chronological sequence. This is given in one single verse (chap. 4: 23); and we have His service in Galilee, and at the very end no ascension, but the whole closed with the remnant in Galilee and their mission to the Gentiles. In all the three Gospels blind Bartimaeus at Jericho begins the last events. There He is Son of David.

Mark and Luke are chronological, and relate events in the same order, as far as they are the same, up to the middle of Luke 9, which terminates the history of Luke (save always the last events). See Luke 9: 51. From that verse to chapter 18: 34, it is in general His last journey up to Jerusalem, introducing various discourses by the way, and adding others to the same purpose, without note of time. In general, Luke will give a quantity of events together, and develop facts which have a strong moral bearing. The difference of John is essentially this; it gives not a history at all, but Christ as God, the Word made flesh, the Jews being rejected altogether early in: the first chapter, and so treated all through.

The three first chapters are preface before His public ministry, John the Baptist being not yet cast into prison - the two first going together; the third, the foundation principles of the new thing, being born again and the cross; fourth, Judaea left, and the transition to the worship of the Father; fifth, life-giving power, and exclusive judicial authority of the Son of God as Son of man; sixth, self-emptied and suffering Son of man; seventh, glorified Son of man, giving the Holy Ghost instead of appearing to the world; eighth, His word rejected; ninth, His work; tenth, He has His sheep at any rate (for John all through goes on the ground of electing grace), also the Gentiles ones; eleventh and twelfth, He is testified to of God as thus rejected as Son of God, Son of David, Son of man. But to take up this He must die - episode of Bethany. In the thirteenth, He begins with what refers to His departure out of this world. These rationalists find the resurrection of Lazarus out of place, not having the most distant thought of the mind of God in scripture, nor any idea, of course, that there is any.

198 To return to Justin Martyr, the author's account of his quotations is not all trustworthy, and all that really bears on the true character of Justin's citation is left out. In the first place, Justin's manner of quoting is practically that of all the Fathers. They habitually quote not verbally, but put two passages together if it meets their point, just as Justin does constantly. Secondly, Justin also quotes very largely indeed from the Old Testament, which there is no question he received as proper scripture, exactly in the same way he does from the New. He writes as a philosopher to the Gentiles, and habitually quoting the Christian writings, as authority would have been useless. He calls the Gospels memoirs (a term borrowed probably from Xenophon's account of Socrates, shewing the tone of his mind), the Gospels written by the apostles and their companions, and he says they were read in the Christian assemblies. He quotes them as such expressly - seven times we are told by those who have exactly examined the details. Five agree with our Gospels; the others have variations; one a transposition of words, probably right; the rest inaccurately recorded with the same sense, and two words added - "and walk" - found nowhere else. He gives the substance as it stood in his mind; the common way of patristic quotation, as of our own.

As to the other professed quotation, we find it in others of the earliest Fathers in different words and order; and, just as in Justin, by Fathers who beyond all question recognised the four Gospels and nothing else. That Justin used other traditional accounts, and perhaps the Gospel to the Hebrews, is very likely, There is no question that the four Gospels were held to be of paramount authority at that date. Tatian's harmony of the four was made only some twenty years after; and Jerome recounts the same of Theophilus a few years still earlier. When the Supernatural Religion says competent critics agree, it only means the infidel Tubingen school so hold. Take not only Westcott, who may be thought a prejudiced churchman, but Bleek's introduction, a theologian sober-minded and candid, but as free-thinking as any rationalist could desire, and the statements alleged in Supernatural Religion to be quite certain are treated as certainly false. The system followed by the author is a mere and evident effort to get rid of the large and developed testimony given with so much fulness in Justin to the Christian Gospels. The citations, says Bleek, are for the greater part unquestionably taken from our present Gospels.

199 Few, as I have said, in words saying it is written in the memoirs, but quoting them as they were in his mind with a reference to other current statements as to those found in other writings of the Fathers. The allegation which refers them to one given writing or to heretical sources has no foundation, though the doctrines and position of Justin would give no guarantee for his own soundness. He was doubtless a Christian, but still a Platonist philosopher. It seems another philosopher got him put to death through jealousy. This statement, accompanied by a reference to Bleek in page 289, contradicts all Bleek's teaching (as does page 293), and is as careless as it is unfounded. As to inspiration, indeed, none of them believed it; but as to the repute and esteem in which our four Gospels were held in Justin's days, Bleek is as clear and decided as possible, and as to the use of them by Justin Martyr, among others. See with other places sections 261, 2. That infidel Germans have disputed over it, as in page 288, is perfectly true, seeking by all means to undermine the scriptures and contradict the testimonies which support their authenticity. The whole of this part of the book is full of statements which are unfounded. It is not my part to go into it in detail here.

When he says (page 215) that the first and second epistles of Clement have a canonical position, it is merely trifling with the fact of their being in Cod. Alex. (There are three hymns there also.) He himself says the second was rejected, as every one knows who has inquired. In Justin's reference to the Lord's baptism, instead of all being referred to the apostles' memoirs, he carefully distinguishes what is in them, which is found in fact in our Gospels, the Holy Ghost coming down like a dove, from other things which are not there but stated by other Fathers. And this is also the case in his second reference to Christ's baptism (Supernatural Religion, page 317); what follows is special pleading. I have no interest in defending the "Fathers": one has only to read them, and specially the Apostolic Fathers, to see the difference of inspiration and the unsound and immoral stuff they write. You fall down a precipice from God to man!

200 It is treated as an extraordinary anomaly that Justin could quote as he did if he really received the four Gospels. It is a common thing with Fathers. Thus Bleek speaks of this when insisting on Justin's use of the four Gospels (section 87). These variations are of little moment when we remember that the Fathers seldom quoted scripture verbatim and word for word. It is in this place Bleek gives the true account of what the author makes so much about (in 288). He assumes (367) that there were a number of Gospels current - "In how many more" Gospels; but this is falsifying the facts That there was probably a Gospel according to the Hebrews is not denied; but if there was, it was in Aramaean, which, as a rule, not one of the Fathers whose works are in question understood. A mass of apocryphal Gospels we have; one has only to read them to judge of them. Traditions no doubt there were and referred to, but gradually lost. My business is in no way to justify the accuracy of Justin, but the attempt in chap. 1, page 370, to prove his altering the text is the weakest absurdity.

Such passages are justly quoted by writers on the canon to prove that Justin was acquainted with the Gospels; but to look for the words and to insist that these must be found, and that it must be a quotation from some other, is trifling with scripture. If I were to say Jesus condemns a person looking on a woman to lust after her as much as adultery, would people justly conclude I had read the Gospels? but who that it was some other apocryphal one? It is just folly.

In communicating Christ's doctrine to the heathen for their information, it seems to me that Justin's statements are just what we might expect in a philosophical mind like his, proving clearly that he had read and used our Gospels, though occasionally referring to other traditions, as all the Fathers did. If men were to consult him for various readings, it would be the same kind of folly as the author's who is looking for the identical words. Justin is communicating Christ's moral instruction to the heathen, and it is done in the most natural way. His repeating the summing-up and motive is thoroughly so. He spoke thus, He taught thus, He said thus, just shew the true character of the citations.

201 The author of Supernatural Religion does not even understand the force of the reasoning. The existence of the Gospel according to the Hebrews is admitted and known, though perhaps seriously altered by certain parties, and never in the canon. The possibility of Justin having used it is not generally denied. What is said is that his quotations are sufficient to prove that he knew our Gospels. That is a question of judgment on comparing them. The possibility of another Gospel having what is in Justin does not alter this. If it be produced with the whole passage as he has it, and all else is consistent, we shall have another witness. I do not believe it is or can be. Nor have. they any hint of the existence of any such thing in all the writings of that day, save the Gospel according to Peter, the supposed reference to which is quite otherwise understood by sober critics, as it is in the only place in which Justin refers to it.* What were the numerous other works in use in the early church? Various accounts were current but were lost, I may say, at once, in the prevalence of the four Gospels recognised as an authority and divine, and so used. And the author must remember that what we have in the written Gospel are the accounts of what Jesus said; and as to three witnesses or four it alters nothing if they are true. The facts may be called to memory by the Holy Ghost according to Christ's promise, according to the point they were connected with, and a writer quoting it may give it according to the point which is in his mind, and in the connection with the subject he is on suggests.

{*The Gospel of Peter is a well-known but lost book. We are chiefly acquainted with it through an extract from Serapion of Antioch in Eusebius, H. E. 6: 12. He had found it in the assembly at Rossus in Cilicia, and not read it through, but hearing some had been misled by it, he got it and read it, and tells them that there was a great deal that was right, but some parts were perverted; but this was in 191, twenty or thirty years after Justin's death. It is mentioned by Origen in Matthew 13: 54-56 (3: 462, De la Rue). But he merely says that it was held by some that James and Jude, etc., were sons of Joseph by a former wife, and that they had received this as a tradition taken from a Gospel entitled of Peter or James. Theodoret mentions it as the Gospel used by the Nazarites. There were two kinds of Ebionites, one using only the Gospel of Hebrews, the other only that of Matthew, so that he had no idea they were the same. The Nazarites, a sort of Unitarians, holding the law as valid, who used only the Gospel of Peter. (Theod. Hoer. Fab. 3: 1, 2.) Jerome under Peter, the first of his De Viris Illus., says the Gospel of Mark was called the Gospel of Peter; but under Serapion 41 he speaks of a current Gospel under the name of Peter, under James 2 a foolish story out of the Gospel according to the Hebrews, which he says he had lately translated.}

202 The question, further, is not whether Justin may not have known other current writings or traditions, but whether what he writes furnishes evidence of acquaintance with the scriptures, particularly with the Gospels, as we have them. We have only to read what he says to be convinced of it, the four canonical being acknowledged thus as such. The way in which the Supernatural Religion insists on verbal quotation is, for any one who has read Justin or other Fathers, perfectly absurd. Indeed, in the Apologies it is the last thing we should look for; these are addresses sent by a philosopher to the heathen authorities to give an idea of what the Christians were and did, to clear them from certain charges, and sometimes appealing, to shew the principles they held, to what their Master had said. I must say the discussion on Justin Martyr, and other like writers, seems to me to be the poorest piece of superficial criticism I ever wearied myself with reading,* full of unproved assertions too, the difficulties raised by Fathers and traditions diligently searched out second-hand. The reconciling Papias and Irenaeus, and Jerome and others, proved to be difficult, but no serious research after truth at all. It is simply putting into English the infidelity of the Baur school, Schwegler, Hilgenfeld, etc., and nothing else. Of course, all inspiration is ignored. It is bringing up uncertainties of what may be, to prove what is to be uncertain, and the positive testimonies to mean nothing. What is not spoken of may be true; hence what is said cannot be. The Fathers, as to their judgment, are worth nothing; tradition is as untrustworthy for certainty of details as you please; but they suppose and prove to an intelligent mind certain facts. My faith does not rest on external evidence, but there is a certain kind of pretentious destructive criticism which is profoundly contemptible.

{*To tell the truth, I never yet thought it worth while to finish the book.}

203 Our critic speaks of many other Gospels, our four thus coming into an uncertain mass. But no one can examine the facts without knowing that these four were, from the earliest days, recognised as distinct. But which are these many? He speaks of the Egyptian, the Gospel according to Peter, the Ethiopians, and all depends upon this kind of thing. But these - unless the Gospel of Peter, once mentioned in a phrase of disputed meaning - are all the same, if we can trust various patristic accounts. Adapting an account (say the Gospel according to the Hebrews) to the Ethiopians was very natural, but is not another, and says nothing about the recognition of the four which were not counted with them, nor does it alter anything. The Gospel according to the Hebrews and the Ethiopian were not in Greek, so that reasoning from quotations is utterly without force; but it serves a turn.

I must add that I do not think an honest man, knowing our Gospels, could read the passage in Justin throughout, and hesitate one moment as to his acquaintance with them. It is a long discourse, in which he brings forward, so as to satisfy the heathen, the various teachings of Christ as they stood in his mind from the Gospels, to clear the Christians from the false notions held of them, quoting as I might quote scripture myself, sometimes verbally exact, sometimes the sense, and bringing in passages from another place which gave the connected thoughts which were in his mind for the heathen. There is one passage, "and walk," not accounted for, in reference to the cross, and not a whit more accounted for by the infidel writers. For their view of Justin's quotations there is not the least ground whatever. In one place the author of Supernatural Religion, to make it easy to think that he used a Hebrew Gospel or other Jewish traditions, says Justin was a Jewish Christian; whereas he states himself, as was the case, that he was a heathen, and after trying Stoicism, Peripateticism, Pythagoreanism, and Platonism, found rest in Christianity; visited many Grecian cities, and afterwards went to Rome. The best thing the reader can do is to read the passage chiefly referred to (in my copy of Justin, col. 1686, pp. 61-66, about a tenth of the whole Apology from the beginning).

As to the apocryphal Gospels which remain to us, of which there are several, their contents speak for themselves; a proof of the total want of spiritual discernment in the primitive church, and also how impossible it was than an age which concocted, and more or less valued, such stuff, could have produced anything in the least resembling our Gospels. In this sense they afford the strongest proofs of the inspiration of the others. The Epistles according to the Hebrews, of Peter to the Egyptians, are not extant, and so afford a fine field for rational criticism; the connection of these with Justin I have spoken of. In Bleek's introduction, sec. 119, and also 87, 88, the reader will find the whole system fully judged. Bleek is a rationalistic critic. Perhaps it may be well to quote his words (Clark's Translations, Lec. 119, 1, 335): "But with regard to the memoirs of the apostles, so repeatedly cited by Justin, it is at once quite clear that these were not some single treatise, but a collection of writings differing from one another, and usually called Gospels."

204 Now, since he expressly attributes these writings to the apostles and their coadjutors, we are directly led to conclude that they were the canonical Gospels we have, which ecclesiastical traditions and their very titles assign partly to the apostles and partly to their fellow-labourers and disciples. The citations made from the memoirs are, at any rate as to the greater part, unquestionably taken from our present Gospels: only, like most of the Fathers, and according to his own practice in Old Testament passages, Justin uses greater freedom in quoting, and mixes together the text of different Gospels, especially Matthew and Luke. He describes them as written by the apostles and their companions. The supposition of some modern scholars that what Justin refers to and makes use of was some one distinct work is clearly false. Again: "His own words (Justin's) explicitly declare that they were more than one, and the citations themselves witness that all our four canonical Gospels were included." (Sec. 87, p. 242.)

De Wette says (sec. 74, p. 124) of the Gospel to the Hebrews: "This is the oldest (of the uncanonical Gospels), but its use is traceable no farther back than Hegesippus (about A.D. 160), nor beyond the circle of the Jewish Christians; for the orthodox Fathers, far from placing it on a par with the canonical Gospels, reckon it among the ungenuine." And (76, 125) as to the current acceptance of the four Gospels: "Various countries and parties in the church also furnish testimonies which run back nearly to the Apostolic age." Again, as to the Gospel to the Hebrews, he says, "But the oldest accounts contradict the idea of its being an original and independent work by representing it as apocryphal, and as wavering between Matthew and Luke." (Sec. 63, p. 88.) "One of these alterations indicates a Greek original. Hence the opinion that the Gospel to the Hebrews is the most ancient Gospel writing falls to the ground." (Sec. 65, p. 93.)

205 "Justin mentions as the source of these sayings and accounts, writings left behind by the apostles and their assistants, which he calls memoirs of the apostles, also Gospels. The old opinion that they mean our canonical Gospels is by no means contradicted by the inexactness of the citations; for it is probable, nay it is established by the repetitions that occur, that parties cited the Gospels, as sometimes the Old Testament writers, freely from memory . . . and Gospels which were read in the assemblies of the Christians cannot well be other than our canonical Gospels, all of which (Mark and John more seldom) he made use of." (Compare sec. 66, p. 94.)

De Wette goes into the objections which I have already gone over, but I do not go farther into them. Those whom I have now quoted are in the fullest sense rationalist writers, but sober and serious men who weighed facts, instead of indulging in inflated and foundationless speculations, where there is no trace of a search after truth, but merely the effort of an advocate to prove his point.

It is perhaps well to remark that the Gospel according to the Hebrews indulged in the grossest form of Jewish mysticism. We read, "The Saviour said, My mother the Holy Ghost took me by one of my hairs and carried me to the great mountain Tabor," and much more. (Gfrorer, Tahr. der Heils. Stuttgart, 1838, pp. 332 ff.) This is quoted by Origen only saying, "if any one received it," in Jer. Hom. 15: 4. He elsewhere definitely declares the church had only four Gospels, the heretics many. Jerome quotes it, on Micah, lib. 2, cap. 7, vol. 6, 521, ed. Vall., where he states he had just translated it, so that it was not a mere Ebionidsh addition. So in Comm. Isa. 11, Vall. 4, 156: juxta Evangelium quod Hebraeo sermone inscriptum legunt Nazaraei. But it came to pass that when the Lord went up out of the water, the whole fountain of the Holy Ghost descended and rested upon Him, and said to Him, My Son, in all the prophets I expected Thee, that Thou shouldest come and I should rest on Thee, for Thou art my rest, Thou art my first-born Son, who reigneth for ever.

206 So 4, 485. He quotes the strange phrase, "my mother the Holy Ghost took me by a hair, etc.," from the Gospel according to the Hebrews, which the Nazareans read, adding that no one ought to be offended, as spirit is feminine in Hebrew, masculine in Latin, and neuter in Greek; that thus being of the three genders in the three principal languages respectively, we might know that what is different is of none - going pretty far in owning the work. Origen excuses it also, De la Rue, 4, 59, but on the plea that as Christ called those who did His Father's will, brother, and sister, and mother, so we might call the Spirit His mother. But the passage of Jerome on Isaiah 11 proves it was a systematic doctrine, and the Gospel probably heretical, on the system of Simon Magus and Helen. Yet Jerome translates it and says, many call it the authentic Matthew. This, it is said, was in A.D. 398. Later still, A.D. 415, he says it was in the library of Caesarea (the Nazarenes there using it); the Gospel according to the apostles, or, as many think, according to Matthew. (Dialogus 3, contra Pelagianos.) He quotes or refers to it very often. Circa, A.D. 321 he speaks of it as in the Caesarean library, and composed in Hebrew letters and words. Who translated it into Greek was uncertain. (De Viris Ill.) The Ebionites, he says, used it, joining them and the Nazarenes, where he speaks of lately translating it. But the Nazarene copy he translated. The Ebionites at any rate were divided into two classes, one certainly heretical, as were the Nazarenes or Nazarites. Origen, he says, often used it. Jerome translated it into Greek and Latin; strange if he thought it the same as Matthew, and Matthew translated by we know not whom.

That there were but four Gospels recognised is perfectly clear; for Jerome, Irenaeus, Origen, all speak decidedly. Jerome speaks of the others as concocted of the writers without the Spirit and grace of God, that to the Egyptians among them - not naming that according to the Hebrews, but he does that according to the twelve apostles, and this (in Dial. 3, contra Pelagianos) he declares to be the same. He then goes on to say that the church has four, which the Lord poured forth as the four rivers of paradise, and four angles and rings, by which, like the ark of the Lord and keeper of the law of the Lord, she is carried on unmoveable bars (liguits); and then speaks of our canonical Gospels, and referring them to the cherubim, connects the four animals there represented with the four Gospels, and declares that only four ought to be received, and the rest as useless fables to dead heretics. (Preface to Matt 7, p. 1, Vall.) Irenaeus was somewhat late in date, but he says the same thing. He says, lib. 3, 8, "There can be no more than four, nor can there be fewer. There are four regions of the world, and four principal winds; and as the church is spread over all the world it must have four columns, whence it breathes forth life. So he who sits between the cherubim has given us a fourfold Gospel, composed by one Spirit, referring, I apprehend, to the Word, the Artificer who maintains everything." And he then enters largely into the four cherubim, saying the Gospels are consonant to those in which Christ is seated. Irenaus had been shewing that the heretics themselves received, one kind one Gospel, another another, but in result all four, and were self-condemned by what they did accept; but the church all four, the sure and full pillars of the truth.

207 I will now cite one or two of the miracles of the apocryphal Gospels, heretical often it may be, but in general mere fables, but notwithstanding often valued by the "Fathers."

Christ was sent to one master, and told him all the letters and their meaning, and the master brought Him back, and said He must have been born before Noah. Then to a more learned one, and the master having raised his hand to beat Him, his hand withered and he died; then Joseph said to the divine Mary, From this time we will not suffer Him to go out of the house, since every one that opposes Him is struck with death.

There was a rabid boy who, when the fit took him, bit every one, and being in company with the boy Jesus, sought to bite His side, and struck it so that Jesus cried, but Satan fled out of the boy like a mad dog. The boy was Judas Iscariot, and it was the side that was pierced with the lance.

Then He was making figures of animals and birds out of mud. Now, He says, I shall order them to move. Are you, said the boys, the Creator's Son? But then He ordered them, and they went and came back when He called. At another time at a dyer's He threw all the articles out into the yard; the dyer was in a great way about it, when he returned them piece by piece of the right colour. He made all Joseph's work fit exactly.

208 He went out to play, but the boys left and hid themselves, and when in each house they were denied to be there, What (said He) have you there in the furnace? Three-year-old goats, said the woman; and He said, Come out here to your Shepherd, goats, and they came out like goats and leapt around Him, and the women were all terrified, and besought Him; and then He said, Come, boys, and let us play, and immediately they were restored to their proper form.

Then He made ponds and twelve little birds, three of a side and a Jewish boy, Hananus, it being the sabbath, came up and reproved Him and destroyed His fish ponds, but He, clapping His hands on the birds, they flew away piping; and Hananus coming up to destroy the fish ponds of Jesus also the water disappeared, and He said, as the water disappeared, Your life shall disappear also, and immediately the boy was dried up.

I will now take up some of the Gospel miracles, and, first of all, using that of Matthew, as the structure of the Gospel is very evident with a little attention, and the place and character of the miracles through it.

The difference of the three synoptical Gospels and the fourth is this. The three first present Christ as Emmanuel - Messiah, the prophet-servant, and Son of man, to men, and, in a narrower sense, to the Jews. Whereas in John this is not the case: it reveals what Christ is in Himself, that the world (when He was in it) did not know Him, though He made it, and that His own rejected Him; but that He put into the place and privilege of sons those who did receive Him: a new thing, but then they were born of God, not of the flesh nor of man's will. The Jews are therefore treated all through as reprobate, but He declares that He would have His sheep out from their midst, and others from among the Gentiles; and then the Holy Ghost is spoken of as living on the earth instead of Him, when He has gone as man to the Father.

Now this presentation of Christ in the three first terminates and reaches its climax in the transfiguration, which changed all; for it was as a revelation bringing in a glorified Christ. This divides the three first Gospels into three parts: the history of the Lord up to the transfiguration (His birth, as Mark gives the prophet, being there left out); the continuance of patient mercy up to blind Bartimaeus, with various instructions, chiefly for the coming time; and, from meeting with the blind man, His last presentation as Son of David to the Jews, and the details of His being taken and crucified. Miracles Christ wrought at all times, even to the last days, when He was free in the temple, healing the ear of Malchus at the moment of His capture. Perhaps we may call the greatest of all His living miracles was His giving up His own spirit to His Father on the cross.

209 But, in the active life of Jesus, it is the time which closed in the transfiguration, beginning after His temptation in the wilderness, which forms the proper period of His working miracles as a testimony. The goodness expressed itself at all times in them, but that on which it rested ("or else, believe me, for the very works' sake") was from His victory over Satan, binding the strong man, till the transfiguration revealed a wholly new order of things coming in connected with a rejected Christ, from which time He forbade His disciples to tell men that He was the Messiah, saying the Son of man must suffer, though still till His hour was come continuing His work of grace. The general character of the Lord's miracles I have spoken of. The revelation of God in power and goodness is that He might be known and trusted by man, and man, wicked as he might be, have confidence in Him. As the beginning of Eve's sin was losing confidence in God's goodness by the guile of Satan (if God did not seek their happiness fully, they must seek it for themselves, as even now), hence will, lust, transgression; so now, God was there to give in perfect goodness a blessed ground of confidence in Himself; but, I add here, so graciously and perfectly suited to the state and need of man. The person who can be insensible to the perfectness of the revelation of God in goodness to man, in Christ down here, is incapable of feeling what God and goodness are.

But I turn now to look at the miracles recorded in particular as suited to the special testimony given, and first at Matthew. The general testimony is in chapter 4: 23. "And Jesus went about all Galilee teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people," or, as expressed by Peter (Acts 10), went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil, for God was with Him. Matthew's testimony is to the Lord as Emmanuel and as Jesus, that is, Jehovah the Saviour. For He shall save His people from their sins. He was Jehovah; but first of all Jehovah, according to promise to His own people. Hence His genealogy is traced from Abraham, and also David, to whose seed the promises were made; as Paul states it in the Romans, of the seed of David according to the flesh, a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to perform the promises made to the fathers. As this He was rejected; and then comes in another character and title, proved Son of God with power, according to the "Spirit of holiness by resurrection of the dead." This last, on which Christianity is really based, is not our subject.

210 The order of the Gospel is this: chapter 4: 23, He had gathered multitudes around Him. He announces to His disciples, but in the audience of the multitude, the principles of the kingdom, and who were such as could enter, adding reward in heaven itself when suffering for Christ existed. There is nothing of redemption or justification in it. In chapter 8 we have the Lord personally as Jehovah, still as rejected Son of man; in chapter 9 the character of His service down here - grace. Chapter 10 is mission to the Jews alone, any other forbidden; but from verse 15 carried on after His departure, but still in the cities of Israel, till the Son of man be come. Chapter 11 is His ministry as well as John the Baptist's in their midst rejected, but John owned by Him, and He as Son of God revealing the Father and calling the weary to Himself for rest. Chapter 12 is His utter rejection of and by the pharisaic Jews, and final break in principle with the nation. In chapter 13 He is out of the house, and unfolds the status of the kingdom when the King was rejected. In chapters 14 and 15 His mercy as being still there continues in a sovereign way, but the principles of what is brought in anew, as to both dispensational position, trial, and relationship, are unfolded; then Pharisaism, man's religion, man's heart and God's laid bare, the great foundation truths of His dealing in Christ. In chapter 16 the church replaces Judaism. In chapter 17 the glory of the kingdom does: only for all this He must die. Chapter 18 is individual and collective direction founded on the new thing. Chapters 19 and 20 to 28 complete these new principles and their consequences. Verse 29 of chapter 20 begins the last events up to the Lord's death and resurrection, only you have no ascension: the remnant are sent out from Galilee to the Gentiles.

Now in chapter 8 we have the person of the Lord as present here. First, He meets the leper. The cleansing of the leper was a simply divine work. On the other hand, not only the leper was put out of the camp, but if any one touched him he was put out too. Here the leper had seen the exercise of power in the Lord, but was not sure of His willingness, His love. "If thou wilt, thou canst." With divine authority and reassuring love the Lord says, "I will, be thou clean." But more, though He were Jehovah who cleansed in love, He had become a man in grace; He touched man, so to speak, not infected or unclean with the uncleanness of man, but healing and cleansing them in grace through faith. "He put forth his hand and touched him, saying, I will, be thou clean." Impossible to have a more striking testimony of all that the Lord was in this world than this miracle. Next I find the recognition of universal divine authority in a Gentile. Though come amongst the Jews according to promise, God could not be confined to Israel. There was greater faith here than in heartless self-sufficient Jews; speak with a word and all was done, and so it was. Next, in home mercies, He bears our griefs and carries our sicknesses (not our sins here, though these were the fruit of sin being here). He not only heals with a word divinely, but comes as man in this power to know our sorrows. Still He is the rejected Son of man, not having where to lay His head, but come into the midst of an evil world, God manifest in the flesh. Adherence to and following Him at all cost was the test of righteousness, but following Him led into dangers and difficulties. Calm in the midst of the power of evil, rejected though He might be, He commands creation. All the power of the enemy, moreover (allowed therefore to be manifested) quails and bows before Him; He not the less rejected for that, for man, who cannot drive away Satan, gets rid of God by his will even when come in grace.* His presence disturbs him too much.

{*But at the end of chapter 14 we have Jesus after the trials received joyfully, after He had rejoined the disciples in the country where He had been rejected.}

211 In chapter 9 we have the same divine power in the midst of Israel, but the character of His mission, through His Person of course as manifesting God, still shines out. It is grace. He declares to the poor paralytic that his sins are forgiven him. The scribes in their hearts within judge Him as guilty in attributing to Himself what belonged to God only. He replies by exercising the power united to that of forgiving in Jehovah's ways with Israel in Psalm 103, while taking still the place of Son of man: "Who forgiveth all thy sins, and healeth all thy diseases." Forgiveness and healing, such was His mission if they would receive Him come in grace in the flesh. He proved the announced power and dealings of Jehovah present, but as Son of man by the exhibition of it in that part of what was announced which was sensible to men in goodness. Then He calls Matthew, not come to call the righteous, but sinners. The departure of the present Bridegroom is noticed, and the change from form to power. But then what was passing in Israel? Come to heal what was ready to die, He has in fact to raise the dead, for dead in sins we all are; but whoever by faith touched the hem of His garment was even then healed of a disease which no human physician could cure. But blind and dumb were men (Israel), as well as spiritually dead. We have here, then, miracles which shew present healing there for faith which nothing else could afford; we have what was really in its fulness being wrought, raising the dead, the blind eyes opened, the tongue of the dumb loosed, and also, as ever, the harvest more plentiful than the labourers; forgiveness and grace, the true character of what He was, being brought in, but shewed in acts which manifested in present power what man could feel in his body, as in sorrow and evil down here, what God was, and that as present in goodness in the midst of man. The character of the mission and the character of the miracles are inseparably interwoven, and both the expression of the character of God come down here and dealing in grace with man.

212 In the sad close of this chapter we see the effect, on man's unchanged heart, of goodness in power of this manifestation of God: rather than receive the Lord they ascribe miracles which they could no. deny to the power of the devil. But the time for entirely giving them up was not yet come. Divine patience had yet a work to do. The unfaltering love of Jesus continues to seek the poor of the flock, if the Pharisees preferred blasphemy to grace, preaching the gospel, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people, for He had compassion on the multitude, weary sheep without a shepherd. And this led to a further manifestation of power and grace; He sends others into the field, the harvest was plentiful and the labourers few. Ever is it so.

213 In chapter 10 we have not only power in goodness but power to give power, and this is properly divine. Their work here is wholly confined to Israel. The mission to the Gentiles was from Christ as risen (chap. 28), but by His gift they were to exercise the same power as He did. But it was seeking the remnant in Israel. If the house was worthy, peace was to rest upon it. The chapter is divided into parts all referring to Israel: their work then, to the end of verse 15; from verse 16 more general and continued, still in Israel, after His death till the Son of man came; but at present they must expect rejection; it is our lot in this world. They were not to fear. Not a sparrow fell to the ground (not merely without God but) without their Father. For the Son revealed the Father's name; but we have seen this tested men. They could not stand the revelation of God. It brought out the enmity of the human heart against good, and especially against God: an enmity which, stronger than natural ties, wrought most where the relationship was nearest, and where the hated object - for hated, alas! as Christ has proved, it is - is more galling. The disciple is not above his Master; we have to take up our cross and follow Christ. Thus divine power and its manifestation in goodness, and its rejection, go together as before. This is fully developed in a solemn commentary on all in chapter 11. The ways and works of the Lord are summed up as testimony to John Baptist, now in prison, on the question, Art thou He that should come? The blind saw, the lame walked, the lepers were cleansed, the deaf heard, the dead were raised, the souls of the poor were cared for; but blessed he who was not stumbled at the rejected Son of man-power in goodness and rejection; the Lord gives, not receives, testimony. But the solemn warnings of the Nazarite prophet of. the wilderness, and the gracious association of grace with sinners to win them, men alike rejected. But this brought all to a point, the mighty works were in vain.

In fact the truth of His Person, too glorious for man as he was to receive, and in the perfect submission of Christ to His rejection as come among the Jews, His eternal personal glory, the Son revealing the Father in grace to burdened and needy hearts, taught submission withal by His own, that they might every way have rest, was what was really there, the new thing, and glory in grace shine out through the rejected but obedient Son of man. The twelfth chapter completes the statement of the position in which Christ is here found, as well as that of the Jews as a body. There are but two particularised miracles referred to in it. The sabbath was the seal of Jehovah's covenant with Israel; as with the rejected David, so with the rejected Son of David, all things in Israel were made common; a greater than the temple, too, was there, the Son of man was Lord of the sabbath; had they understood mercy as contrasted with mere law, they would not have condemned the guiltless. Under the Son of man's authority as Lord of the sabbath they were guiltless, but in their state of soul the Jews could not understand this.

214 In the synagogue there was a man with a withered hand; convicting them of hypocrisy, well-doing was the manifestation of God and not the legal sabbath. The old covenant was passing away. He withdraws and heals all that come. Meek and lowly, the time would come for Him to shew judgment. He then works the second miracle referred to above, casting out a devil. The people say, Is it not the Son of David? The Pharisees repeat their blasphemy - He casts them out through Beelzebub. Now all was brought to an issue. If it was by the Spirit of God, the kingdom of God* was come amongst them, they were openly blaspheming; divine power they could not deny; they were fully condemned, and at the end of their history would come under the full power of Satan. He did not own relationship in nature with Israel down here; those in whom His word wrought were His true relations. His connection with man was through what He brought, not what was in man, though He was a true man.

{*Note here, Matthew says "of God." That "of heaven" could only be when He was gone to heaven; it was at hand.}

This closes the proper history of His ministry or service in Israel, though in divine mercy it continued, but with a testimony modified in character. But what His miracles were in testimony is clearly seen, and what they meant and said. His final breach with Israel leads to His going out and announcing the kingdom of heaven, but without the present King; full of interest, but not introducing any miracles. It is the first thing presented as taking the place of Messiah then presented on earth; but in chapter 14 His mercy continues, though in a sovereign and divine way, not as Messiah, Son of man, presented to them. The putting to death of John Baptist brought actual rejection close to His spirit: a solemn moment, felt deeply by the Lord, so that He retired apart, yet the multitude came; but the feeling for others or the solemnity of the moment never hindered the readiness of divine goodness. He was moved with compassion when He saw the multitudes; He meets it as Jehovah will fully in the last days, according to Psalm 132. He will satisfy her poor with bread. This as a sign He does. He then goes on high to pray - as He now is - the disciples left to toil their way across the sea without Him, and rejoins them and all is still; and then is joyfully received where once He had been rejected, but historically exercises the same divine power in goodness; goodness above all the rejection and heartlessness of men, those that touched the hem of his garment made perfectly whole.

215 Chapter 15 is a very remarkable chapter, but I must touch on it only in connection with the miracle. There human will-worship, as contrasted with God's law, and really to the temporal advantage of the priests, is utterly rejected; man's religion in alleged offerings to God as contrasted with God's law. Next man's heart, the source of all the evil; and then with one of the accursed race of Canaan, so that as come to Israel there could be no blessing for her, the reckoning on God's heart in sovereign goodness met at once a response. He could not deny Himself, or say God is not as good as you suppose. He was divinely above the barriers of Judaism and dispensation, and divinely good. Again, the miracle is a present witness of what and who He is. He returns to the field of ministry in the land of Israel, and satisfies yet again the poor with bread in the same divine way. I have no doubt there is an intentional specific difference between this and the five thousand, the 12, and the 7. The latter is more specifically divine with the remnant; but it is not here the place to enter into these details of interpretation. The general principle of wonted mercy, verse 30, gives us again His full and constant character. In chapter 16 we find the church substituted for a Christ present on the earth, on the confession of Jesus as Son of the living God, and the keys of the kingdom* given to Peter, but no special miracle demands our attention. In chapter 17 we have the kingdom in glory. This was the Son of man revealed in the glory of the kingdom.

{*Not of the church. Keys of the church is a thought unknown to scripture.}

Here we find the disciples themselves unable to use that power in Christ which faith would have done. Only separation of heart and spirit, and reference to and confidence in God, could wield it and set aside the power of Satan down here. This answered, so to speak, to the coming glory of the Son of man, and made Satan powerless in presence of a humbled Saviour. But now, for all that, the new place belonging to the disciples, connected with His resurrection, is strikingly brought out. The coming glory did not belong to Christ's then position (this was the fasting and praying part of His path); they were not to speak of the vision of glory till He was risen. But meanwhile He shews divine knowledge and divine power over creation. Those who collect the didrachma for the temple ask Peter if his master was not a faithful Jew. Christ shews His divine knowledge of things in anticipating Peter, but puts Peter in the same place with Himself, "that we offend not." They were both sons of the great King of the temple. Then (that we offend not) He shews His power, making the fish bring the needed money, two didrachmas, and Peter was to give it "for Me and thee." Redemption has brought us into the place of sons with Christ. Grace bowed to the lowly place, but power over all creation shewed Who was there; but grace then brought believers into the place of new and infinite blessing in which Christ stood. This blessed "Me and thee" closed, in fact, the path of Christ here with the displayed glory. We have characteristics with the walk suited to this new place of the disciples individually and collectively; but the present testimony to Christ was over: they were charged indeed not to say any more that He was the Christ.

216 We have one notable miracle in chapter 21. The fig-tree of God's planting, Israel after the flesh, man under the old covenant (when the Lord of the vineyard came seeking fruit), was judged as fruitless for ever. Herewith the manifestations of the truth of Satanic power in the swine are the only miracles which were not the direct exercise of power in goodness. But they not only confirm the constant character of all the others; but shew the state of man and God's judgment of that state as to man's responsibility, when all the testimony of grace and power had been given. The story of the didrachma shewed the new place in grace; that of the fig-tree, man's condition under responsibility and law as he was. In chapter 20: 17-28 are shewn Christ's and the disciples' place here below as finally rejected. Then verse 29 begins His last presentation to Jerusalem as Son of David, and God's testimony to Him by the mouth of babes and sucklings. The mercy indeed continued; but the testimony was closed. He who believed He was Son of David received sight; the rest were judged. The greatest miracles of all were His death (giving up His spirit, when He could say, It is finished) and His resurrection. But these were either for stability of faith to believers or for the display of powers in others as the subject of their testimony. Our subject has been Christ's own works as a testimony to His Person, and the true character of God as so revealed.

217 For the present I close this paper, already extended far beyond my thought in commencing it. It may be interesting to examine the other Gospels, and study any peculiar aspect of the miracles connected with them. But for the general principle what we have found in Matthew fully suffices, and gives a character of divine goodness and entering into our sorrows which infidelity cannot touch, and, through the hardening of heart it always produces, cannot feel or see the beauty of.

On Mysticism

J. N. Darby.

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Montpellier, May 29th, 1849.

Dear Brother,

While travelling I read your "Life of Madame de Krudener," and I must tell you that it did me good. Occupation, without any relaxation, tends, if one is not very near the Lord, to impair the most intimate affections; and when the details of the work constitute the chief part of such occupation, they tend to narrow the heart. It is not so the moment one is near Him: then, on the contrary, such details exercise the best affections; and we delight ourselves in Him. It was so with Christ, because His life of details flowed from the fact that He lived by His Father, and was nothing else than the perfect manifestation, in man, of what the Father was. It was the produce of a heart filled with a perfect love, the expression of an infinite love.

The life of Madame de Krudener, which was passed outside the narrowness of secondary questions, recalled to me this love; for she certainly had a heart of spiritual love for the Lord; and, for my part, I have no difficulty in judging the things that are to be condemned in her walk, so that I need not dwell upon them. The one who is constantly a working bee within the hive, is free to gather only honey when he approaches flowers in the open air, whatever they may be. But I will say a few words as to what strikes me when I consider mysticism, as it is found in its best forms in Madame de Krudener and others.

Desire and love may be very exactly distinguished. Desire supposes the capacity to enjoy the thing we desire, that is to say, spiritual affections, which, as to their very nature, have God for their object. It supposes one to be born of Him, although Satan often, in an astonishing manner, imitates this class of feelings; but this state also supposes that one does not possess what one desires.

Love supposes that we have full possession of the object of our desires. It is no longer a want, but enjoyment, appreciation, delight in the object itself.

Now mysticism, while boasting much of its feelings, never gets beyond desire; while simple Christianity, giving the knowledge of salvation, puts us into full possession of the love of God. I know that He loves Christ; that love has saved me; it was He who desired me. In love He had need of me; and this love is perfection in Christ. In peace I contemplate this love, and I adore it in Christ. I dwell in Him and He in me.

219 I have never seen a mystic whose idea of love was not entirely at fault in its nature: it was something in man, which needed to be satisfied, instead of being something in God, which satisfied the heart deeply, infinitely, and perfectly. Thence unheard-of efforts to abase oneself, to vilify oneself, and to speak evil of oneself, as if a saved one could be anything in the presence of a Saviour, instead of being nothing and forgetting himself in the presence of so much love. When one is truly delighted in the presence of God, and beholding His excellent beauty in His temple, is one occupied with the hideous forms which hide themselves in the heart of man? I think not. We think of Him. He has given us the right to do so, by a grace which has really set aside all that we were as alive out of Christ, as in the flesh. Do we then make no humbling experience of self? I say not so. Yes, there are moments when God reveals to us the frightful secrets of that heart in which no good exists; but we do not boast, we do not say much of it, if we have truly seen God. If we try to find in man, in his love to God, something as good as the love of God to us, then we talk about it, and fancy we are humbling ourselves. This is but the vanity of the heart which knows not God, and knows not itself either; it is the true character of mysticism.

But does not such a sight of God produce a humiliating knowledge of self? Yes, when we have not known what we are, nor known the gospel which gives us the right to say, "It is no more I that live." Such was the case with Job, as with many others. He had thought of himself, of the grace in him; then he had to learn himself in the presence of God. But the gospel is the answer to all these disturbances of the soul, by the revelation of what God is, and of what God has done for him whom He knew to the. bottom, just as he was, and who has learned in the cross of Jesus what the love of God is when there was nothing but sin, and sin seen by God as we could not see it, but seen only to be the occasion of a perfect work of love.

God in His holiness, His majesty, His righteousness, His love, has found His rest in the work and Person of Christ: I have found mine there. The mystic never has rest, because he vainly seeks in man what he ought to seek in God, who had accomplished all before he ever thought about it. This is why they seek a disinterested love; but where? In man! Poor worshippers of man deified in their imagination; of a man who will never be found! Here sin is in him, in heaven he will think only of God. This is why the imagination plays so great a part in mysticism, and Satan can so often deceive by it, because the imagination and the heart of man are called into play. I do not say that spiritual affections are never there: far from it; nor that God never reveals Himself to such affections. I doubt not that He does it and thus renders the person happy, but you will find him, after all, occupied with the affections and not with God Himself. It is the chief defect of mysticism. In a word, I see it in an effort of the human heart, trying to produce in itself something strong enough in the way of affection to satisfy a heart awakened by the excellence of its Object: for I am now supposing a true awakening of the heart.

220 In Christ I see a divine heart, reflecting the perfect certainty of a love whose perfection cannot be questioned. It is peace. Now He says to us, "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you." What peace is there expressed in those words: "I know that thou hearest me always, but because of the people that stood by I said it." And this same peace is ours now; see 1 John 5: 14, 15. What peace again in those words, "I know whom I have believed," as well as in so many other passages?

Are there not, then, these exercises of the soul's desire before God? Yes; but this again brings out a marked difference. Before having understood redemption through the cross and our portion in Christ, which is its consequence, the awakened soul is exercised; it often seeks peace and rest in a spiritual progress and a love for God which are never found. But the effect of all this exercise, under grace, is to bring the conscience into play and to produce the conviction of its uselessness; that in us, that is, in our flesh, dwells no good thing. Conscience takes full account of what passes in the heart and of what we are, so that we are brought to renounce all attempt to find peace in the state of our souls. We need to be pardoned, saved; we place ourselves at the foot of the cross, but not as having immutable affections. We have discovered that we have them not, and it is not only the heart which is troubled by this, although such is the case, but conscience knows that we are lost, dead under condemnation. We see things as they are in the presence of God; we need to be saved. We no longer seek good in ourselves, under the form of divine affections; but we find it in God, in His kindness towards us by Christ Jesus; and we have peace.

221 Have the deep affections with which the cross inspired me ceased, because I am no longer crushed with the sense of need? No; conscience has intervened, and has set me in my place. What God has done, what He is, has given me peace; and I have divine leisure (because nothing is uncertain in my portion) to contemplate that which is perfect in the object of my affections, without being occupied with myself.

The mystic humbles himself because he still hopes to find good in himself, or he occupies himself in this, as if there might be some, and he finds only evil. The Christian is humble (and that is quite another thing), because he has given up seeking good in himself to adore the One in whom there is nothing else. Now it is not that he deceives. himself, but that the intervention of conscience, by the light of the Spirit and the truth, has put him in his place. I believe, for example, that Madame de Krudener only fully reached that position in her last illness. This is what often happens. The Moravians, while sweetly enjoying Christ, often remain at this point. She was under an obligation to love: a true thing; but she did not know love. She knew that God was love, but she wished to be it also; and this is closely allied to pride of heart, until we have taken our place, as dead in trespasses and sins, and have understood love towards us in that Christ died, and that we are dead and risen in Him.

The truth is this: there is still conflict because the flesh is in us, and the Holy Ghost has sometimes to occupy us with ourselves, and to humble us. God being Infinite and His work perfect, there is always in Him, even when our peace is perfect, that which awakens all the energy of an affection which cannot satisfy itself, although perfectly assured of the love of Him with whom it has to do. This suits the relations of a creature with God, and it is a good thing for us and does not lessen our peace. It is quite a different thing from the mystic desire to love, which is true, but which turns in upon self, because it knows neither God nor self. Yet I find my heart so cold that it sometimes does me good, because I know well enough that I was lost and am saved, not to mix this with my knowledge of a free salvation, accomplished without me, and which fully glorifies God, and God alone. But it often does harm to souls who have not been emptied before God, not having had the work transferred from the heart to the conscience in His presence.

222 It is astonishing from how many errors this delivers without a word being said. My human affections may attach themselves to the Virgin, but conscience . . .? Is there any blood-shedding there? The Virgin is no more, as to that, than the most miserable sinner; she is a creature before God. Purgatory, the pretended repetition of the sacrifice, absolution, holy unction, and many other things vanish without controversy, like shadows, like apparitions of darkness in the face of the light, before a conscience which has already found itself, such as it is, in the presence of God, and has there been thoroughly purged by the knowledge of His work in Christ. The needs of conscience may throw a sincere soul into these superstitious practices; but for a purged conscience which knows God they are nothing. This is what gives me such horror of a system which traffics with the terrors of conscience to hide the love of God: manifestly the work of the enemy. But see, to say no more, in 1 John 4: 7-9, which touches the borders of mysticism, but with the finger of God, in what a manner, side by side with the highest elevation of communion with Him, He always replaces the soul on the simple ground of salvation by objective faith. This is what corrects the heart of man with his wings of Icarus.

Now, a few words upon your work. You are conscious that it is rather made for the world, so that it must be considered with respect to this. A life of Madame de Krudener carries us into the midst of emperors, queens, and titles. I agree that one loves to see grace everywhere, that grace which despises neither great nor small. However, the ways of God are different when He acts in the power which is proper to Him. The world is then left in its true place; and His Son, with His apostles, and His servants, are brought before its great men seated in tribunal, and this turns for a testimony. It is thus that God makes His voice penetrate into the places most distant from Him, while preserving, in its perfection, the character of His own, and of that which belongs to Himself. I admire His grace which deigns to act otherwise; but I admire His perfection as He has Himself presented it to me.

223 I have said that I take, as given, the worldly form of the book, and that you have therefore left to each the responsibility of forming a judgment for himself on the worldly life of Madame de Krudener, by passing lightly, and without remark, over her wanderings; the grace which pardoned all being the true contrast to the evil. I think that this reproduced itself and is found again in her spiritual wanderings, for the ways of God are just.

Her devotedness awakened my deepest interest. It is refreshing in a selfish world, the slave of formalities behind which it hides; because it is too hideous to be seen, desiring to preserve its egotism as intact as possible, without confessing it - a world without heart - a world without independence because it is without heart. It is refreshing, I say, to find something which overleaps the barriers and acts from motives which shew heart and love - that love which is only true liberty.

Thus the devotedness of Madame de Krudener interested and also humbled me much. The little that I have had of it in my life made me enjoy hers, and it has been so little that it makes me admire what I see in her. But here again I trace the ways of God. When the devotedness came directly from Himself and was manifested in her ways, the energy found in them attained a result which was altogether of Him, and was guarded from the seductions of the enemy. Now God can never abandon His own ways. If man abandons them, even while devoting himself, the result is of the enemy under one form or another. One sometimes wonders that a good part of the life of a devoted and spiritual person should be passed in mistakes and wanderings; one asks oneself how the presence of the Spirit of God, necessary to produce this life, comports with these mistakes. I say, on the contrary, that in the government of God it is a necessary consequence. Can God place His stamp upon that which is contrary to His thoughts? Will He refuse blessing as the answer to real devotedness, because there is error? He cannot sanction the former, nor deny Himself to the latter. What is the consequence? Blessing is found, as well as His tender care. He keeps the foundation, even through all the wanderings; but He abandons to their natural consequences the evil and the false confidence which accompany it; otherwise He would justify evil.

If the work of Madame de Krudener had had the character of that of Paul, the seal of God would have been upon that which was contrary to His will. The mercy of God does not permit that. An ardent woman, impulsive, full of imagination, acting under impressions and influences, subject to the excitement of circumstances - this was Madame de Krudener. The principle at the bottom was divine, that is found in the work: Satan meddles with it; he always makes use of the flesh when we allow it to act. This is the history of all such cases, and if the world judged itself aright, if it were in the truth before God, there would be no difficulty in unravelling them. But God does not explain these things to those who have them not: this would be to sanction evil, although He may bring us out of this state of grace, and He is faithful not to allow us to be tempted beyond what we are able. If we wait upon Him, there is no danger. If we are hasty, He must let us see the consequences of it. If that which is spiritual exists at the bottom, it will be found again in eternal happiness; but, in government, each thing brings its own consequences. He can, in grace, honouring the instrument, make use of a repentant and devoted woman, He has done it in His grace; but an excited woman, and one who, it seems to me, was little sensible of what she had been, is not the perfect instrument according to the ways of God, for carrying on a work. We see the consequences of this, in order that the perfection of the ways of God may be known.

224 I even think that a certain state of things in the kingdom of God, or in Christians, may not, according to the thoughts of God, comport with a perfect instrument and mode of action. It would be out of place; it would not even do His work. Such a thing may be extraordinary, but I do not know what the apostle Paul would do (or rather Paul would not know what to do) in the actual state of things. God always knows what to do, because He is above all. He will judge at the end. He will cause His grace to shine forth by transporting to glory those who are faithful in the confusion; but the creative energies of a perfect order are not suited to the confusion and moral culpability which result from having spoiled that order. It would be to dishonour that fresh light of first love of which Christ is the Centre and Object.

Christ Himself begins with - "Blessed, blessed"; it was natural that this should come forth from the heart of the One who had come from heaven; but He ends with, "Woe unto you, woe unto you." Had His grace diminished? No indeed, it had but been tested, approved more glorious, His unfailing faithfulness more than ever made sure to our hearts. But He could not be at the end what He was at the beginning.

225 It is the same with the work. Still, the love and blessedness of the one who understands this grace are greater than before. Paul in the Epistle to the Philippians is more matured, knows himself more profoundly in Christ, than when he was in the energy by which he confounded his adversaries. His experience of Christ is more complete, and his heart thus more perfect in its feelings. Elias might compare himself to Moses, for they were together glorified companions of the Saviour on the mount; but Elias, in presence of the golden calves, could not make a tabernacle as did Moses. He was, by this very reason, a still more striking witness of the grace of God.

One more remark about Madame de Krudener, without doubt less important, but, I think, true. There was in her a lack of spiritual originality, not of sincerity: this serious fault betrays itself also in her work, and, among other things, has given it its character. She received impressions from Jung Stilling, from Oberlin, from Tersteegen, from Maria Kummrin. Perhaps this was natural in a woman; but that is why a woman cannot be a principal agent in the work. It is contrary to the ways of God. She may help, GREATLY help, but not be a principal agent; she may do things man cannot do, but not do what he does. This is true in a more important point of view. She could not receive from Christ impulses for a position which He did not give her. The love of Christ was there; the impulse came from elsewhere. Now, when it is Christ Himself who sets the heart in motion, He acts upon the man, as He also forms in us that new man whom the wicked one touches not. His presence acts upon the conscience, silences the flesh, makes nothing of man - his vanity, his self-love, and his good opinion of himself. The whole man is judged in His presence, and the work produced is of Christ Himself, whatever may be the vessel. If there is a danger of its being otherwise, a thorn in the flesh is sent.

When we receive our impressions and impulses second-hand, the flesh and the heart are not judged at all, although the love may be in us. Flesh and the heart are reproduced, and the agent is exposed, by his very activity, to all sorts of traps of the enemy, which, on their part again, are reproduced in the work. This was the case with Madame de Krudener; but she certainly will not lose the fruit of her devotedness, of which I do not in the least, for my own part, doubt the sincerity. But there was too much of man in her, and man is always false. It is so true (it is important to notice it) that, while tasting the love of Christ, she never really knew the gospel, as being herself in the presence of God, until her last illness. And then she immediately perceived that she had often mistaken her imagination for the voice of God; for it is only there that man dies, and that God shews Himself alone such as He is. Now as long as man is not dead, Satan can use him, and spiritual discernment is wanting. The fact of the accomplishment of visions proves nothing in these things. All that also accompanies the power of the enemy; but the spiritual man, being humble, easily judges these things when God places him before them, and when he takes the word of God as the absolute guide of his judgment.

226 These, you will say, are remarks upon Madame de Krudener, and not upon my work. Except a few words of blame, you have said nothing about it: this is a poor compliment. You are mistaken. Of compliments, it is true, I make none; but the best, the true, praise of a work is that it produces thoughts in the one who reads, and such has been the effect of your work.

In our state of imperfection, every moral position has its own season, and, instead of starting clear from the perfection and riches of Christ, the process with us is generally gradual, and thus alas! we reproduce ourselves in our work, even after we think we have judged all.

In a life of Madame de Krudener, it would be important to know what works she habitually read; they betray themselves sometimes! Oberlin may be recognised. He was a devoted man, but with an unbridled imagination, a heretic, whose errors bear their fruits now, while that which might be admired by man, and even by the church, is lost and forgotten; for the judgment of God is not that of man. Tersteegen also may be recognised: I do not know if we could trace any others; but this would be one of the elements which formed Madame de Krudener's public character. It is well, in order not to feed the vain curiosity of the public, that your volumes contain so little of the views which acted so powerfully upon her life; yet in order to judge rightly of it, we should need to know a little more.

On the Government of God and His Counsels in Grace

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Although we may speak of change or variety in the revealed ways of God, there are certain fundamental principles of His acting which remain unchanged. These are things which flow from the nature of God, and must be. So a man "must be born again" to enter the kingdom of God, whether the man is Adam, or Paul, or any one else; he must get a nature which can enjoy God. So also as sinners we must be washed in the precious blood of Christ before we can have any part with God. But the character of His ways, His mode of acting, is not always the same. And this is simple; for our individual salvation and what concerns this is not the first thing in God's revelation, but the glory of God. He is displaying His glory, and He has ways of glorifying Himself.

There are two great subjects set before us in scripture in connection with this (that is, always supposing salvation settled, as the groundwork of all for us; for it is not till we are born again, and have peace with God, that we are free to enter into His mind as revealed), viz. -

1st, The government of God in this world; and

2nd, The sovereign grace which gives sinners a place according to His own counsels.

There is a direct government of God, and there is the exercise of sovereign grace which gives special blessing in His own presence.

The Jews are the centre of the one, and the church of the other, after Christ, of course, who is the Centre of all.

By the government of God in the world I do not mean that universal government which He exercises over the universe - what is called providence - in the exercise of which even "a sparrow does not fall to the ground" without Him; but the direct government of God on the earth. There is no doubt He also deals in government with His children even now, but as to this world the Jews were the centre of His acting in that respect.

You will see what I mean in Deuteronomy 32: 8, 9. "When the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the peoples (not people) according to the number of the children of Israel; for Jehovah's portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance."

228 "Most High" is always the name of God used to denote Him as supreme over the earth. See, for instance, what Melchisedec said to Abraham, when he came out to meet him, after the defeat of the kings who had carried off Lot, "Blessed be Abram of the Most High God, possessor of heaven and earth" (Gen. 14: 19); and also in Daniel 4: 24, 25,9 where God is announced by this name to Nebuchadnezzar as the One who in His government of the earth was about to interfere in judgment upon him. "This is the decree of the Most High which is come upon my lord the king: that they shall drive thee from men, and thy dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field, and they shall make thee to eat grass as oxen, and they shall wet thee with the dew of heaven, and seven times shall pass over thee, till thou know that the Most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will." And this is also what Nebuchadnezzar was brought to own as the fruit of that dealing. See verses 33-36.

In connection with the earth and His people at different times, God has revealed Himself by different names, which are characteristic of different relationships. It is, of course, always the same God, although known in a different relation. In Psalm 91 we get all these names of God (except Father, which was not then revealed) grouped together in their proper connection. "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of Jehovah, he is my refuge and my fortress: My God [Elohim]; in him will I trust." That is, he who has the secret of who the Most High is, shall have the blessings of Abraham's God. Jehovah is the God of the Jews, and so Messiah, in the second verse, answers as it were, the riddle put in the first, saying, "I will say of Jehovah, He is my refuge and my fortress: my Elohim; in him will I trust." In verses 3-8 the Spirit declares the consequences of this (verse 9 is the Jewish people speaking), and Jehovah puts His seal upon it in verses 14-16.

God revealed Himself to Abraham as "the Almighty" (El Shaddai). Abraham was called to be a pilgrim, with none but God to look to, so He is revealed to Him as the "All Powerful One."

To the Jews He is "Jehovah," the force of which is, "Is, and was, and is to come." See Exodus 6: 2, 3: "And God said unto Moses, I am Jehovah. And I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob by the name of God Almighty, but by my name Jehovah was I not known to them." (See also Ex. 3: 18; 5: 3; 7: 16; 9: 1, etc.)

229 "Most High" is not yet fulfilled. (See Rev. 19, etc.) "Father" is the name by which He is known specially to Christians. (See John 17: 26, and 20: 17.) On these revelations of Himself God has also founded responsibilities as to the walk of His people, which are specially connected with and always dependent on the relation in which He is known.

Thus, to Abraham, in Genesis 17: 1, God said, "I am the Almighty God: walk before me and be thou perfect." Abraham is called to walk before Him in the power of His name as the Almighty One, not allowing anything inconsistent with this, for nothing but perfection in the relationship which God has established will suit His nature. To the Jews He says in Deuteronomy 18: 13, "Thou shalt be perfect with Jehovah thy God"; for what characterised the Jews was that, as a redeemed people, they were brought outwardly near to God. We hear of His dwelling with men for the first time (Ex. 15 and 29: 45); for God's dwelling with men is consequent on redemption. To us He says, Matthew 10: 48, "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." We ought to manifest the Father. Brought as children to God, we are responsible to shew what our Father is; for we are the epistle of Christ, of Him who perfectly manifested the Father, overcoming evil with good, and displaying the grace of God amongst men. The relationship of Father is revealed only in Christ. The prophets are occupied with God's claims on Israel from the past, or Israel's future, according to God; or with God in the government of this world.

As Most High He will settle this world as He pleases; and Deuteronomy 32: 8, 9, shews us that Israel is the centre in His actings in this character, "He set the bounds of the peoples," etc.

In another place (Eph. 1) we get the Second Man charging Himself with our failure as responsible men (the first Adam being thus, so to speak, set aside for us) and glorifying God in this place; and we get the sovereign grace of God connecting men with the Second Man, who has cleared away our sins as responsible under the first Adam, and perfectly glorified God where the evil was and as made sin; and thus the perfect foundation was laid for the accomplishment and revelation of the counsel of God. It is God's thought and purpose to have us with Christ and like Christ, His own blessed Son in glory, and to give us now, in this present time, the knowledge that we have this place. We have this place now, though we are not in the glory yet; we are associated with the Second Man in glory, and are to be like Him. "The glory thou hast given me I have given them," etc. "Beloved, now are we the sons of God; and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.

230 There is no uncertainty about this; it is sure; although Christians have even been bold enough to say it is a humble thing not to be too confident about salvation: a sad proof of how Satan can use for the time being even a Christian to carry out his lie against God. Faith is always sure. It has set to its seal, by grace, that God is true, and "We have the earnest of the Spirit," says Paul; "therefore we are always confident." (2 Cor. 5). It is no humility to be uncertain or to doubt, but the opposite. True humility is to own the grace as entirely of God, and our place in Christ in the full sense that we are nothing in ourselves, and what is of self only evil and without God; but that now we are in Christ. If you doubt, it is thinking your own thoughts when God has spoken. When God puts the best robe on a worthless sinner, the greatest humility is to bow and wear it, knowing that all else is unfitness and rags, and that God has given us that. If you begin to wonder if you are fit, or to say I am not fit to wear it, it shews that you think it possible you could be fit. The Father "hath made us meet for the inheritance of the saints in light." True lowliness is to accept God's gift in grace. It would be folly or worse for us to think of being like God's Son; but when He says so, we must just own it, and give up our own thoughts as bad and take Him as good. We have no business to think when God has spoken; our business is to believe.

If God says we shall be like His Son, we know we shall, for He has said it. This is the only true humility - giving up the thought of what we are for God as perfectly bad, and taking the thought of what God is for us as perfectly good. The prodigal may have thought he was humble, and may seem to some now to have been very humble when he was saying that he would ask his father to "make him as one of the hired servants." But this was before he met his Father, and was just the reasoning of his own heart, but a reasoning founded on weighing the sense of sin with some sense of God's (his Father's) goodness which did not yet know how to take all from love. It only shewed he did not know the Father's heart. So, when really in the Father's presence, there was no place for such a thought; nor did he then say so. It was not the prodigal's fitness that was in question - hell was his desert - but grace found the Father on his neck with the kiss of reconciliation. Did the prodigal question the Father's act? Did he say then, "make me a hired servant"? No, he could not then; he simply received the Father's goodness and lost sight of himself in His wondrous love, and, as has been remarked, we then hear only of the Father, not of the prodigal.

231 And so it is: true humility will always receive from God. It is no question either of thinking or reasoning about the possibility of what God has said. What right have we to think or reason when His word is that we are to be like His Son? We are to take as a gift from God what He has for us, what He has wrought for us, and what He has made us in Christ. Our fitness is for hell, neither more nor less; but God has chosen to put us in the place with Christ, not to our glory, but to Christ's, though glorified we are. The counsels of God come first, for they were before the world; but they were not revealed till Christ had died in the world, because this was the ground on which all rested in their accomplishment. God goes on through scripture revealing His ways, and (as it is His history of the world, His ways in the world, with man in the world, too) thus the word of God is, in its testimony, from the fall of man right on to the book of Revelation, my history in some form or other - what man is, what I am, with whom God thus deals. Every individual believer goes through it in his own soul - some quickly, some slowly; but each, individually, experiences the character of that which God was bringing out from Adam to Christ.

But before the world existed at all, as Ephesians tells us, God had His counsels about a people who were to be in particular association with Christ. I never get the counsels of God, properly speaking, that is, we never get them brought out (I do not speak of election), till Christ died. See Ephesians 1: 1-4. "According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world," etc. It is not the choosing being before the world which constitutes its sovereignty, because the grace of God would be just as sovereign if it chose us now, to-day, or any time. But this expression shews that before the world existed He had His thought and counsel about a certain set of people. He chose them independently of the world; and therefore this shews that they are not of it, although in it, of course. Christ confirmed this of those whom He chose, "they are not of the world even as I am not of the world" (John 17: 16).

232 We find the same truth in 2 Timothy 1: 9, 10: "God, who hath saved us and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began, but is now made manifest by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ," etc. This is no question of election here, even if it be involved, but that a place in Christ - the sovereign calling - was given us before the world began, but was not made manifest till Christ came.

See also Titus 1: 2, 3: "Eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began, but hath in due times manifested," etc. The counsel of God - that which was in God's mind connecting us with Christ, and was before the world existed - came out in the gospel, and never came out till after Christ came and died and made atonement.

In creation we get another thing, and a different thing - not a counsel but a responsible being placed in this world. The first thing he does is to fail. This is so all through the history of man; the first thing he does is failure. The first thing we hear of Adam is that he fails; the first thing we hear of Noah when he had offered his sacrifice after the flood is that he gets drunk; the first thing we hear of after the law is given is that, before Moses came down from the mount, it is broken; the priesthood is set up, and the first day, they offer strange fire, and the high priest never puts on the garments of glory and beauty to go into the presence of Jehovah in the most holy place, nor it would seem at all, except when consecrated. So even in Christianity, as responsible to God, for Paul says, "All seek their own and not the things that are Jesus Christ's," and that after his decease evil would prevail from without and within. And John can tell us there were many Antichrists whereby it was known it was the last time.

233 Man in responsibility always fails. Man was never in his innocency the head of a people; and as for Noah, he was, so to speak, a drunken head over the world. In Adam there is only and total failure and judgment executed. Created in innocence and beauty, he distrusts God and listens to the devil, who said that God had jealously kept back the best thing: then lust comes in, next transgression, and all is over as to his state; he shrinks from God, and is turned out of Paradise. The world goes on and is so wicked that God brings in the flood. After that Noah fails directly. And as I have said, the priests never put on their garments of glory and beauty except when consecrated; and the Jews were a law-breaking people. In every place of responsibility the first thing we hear is man's utter failure. Not that there were not exceptions through grace; but, as to man, the inevitable result of responsibility is failure. As to principle Cain completed the sin of man: the main feature of Adam's sin was sin against God, that of Cain's was sin against his neighbour; and these two make up the sum of all sins.

In Paradise we get side by side the two principles about which men have been fighting ever since, namely, man's responsibility and simple communicated grace; the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and the tree of life. We find these two trees in Eden: the tree of responsibility, or the knowledge of good and evil; and the tree of life. In Christ alone are both principles fully brought to an issue, God glorified as to them, and blessing secured. He has met the failure in the fruit of the tree of responsibility, and secured eternal life, and the accomplishment of God's counsels in sovereign grace, and that in righteousness. God shut man out of Eden before he ate of the tree of life, and thus reserved His principle of grace for fuller hopes. Indeed to perpetuate life in sin would hardly have been in the ways of God.

God's promise to Abraham raised no question of responsibility; it was a simple promise in grace. See Genesis 12 simply, "I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing, and I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee; and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed." God took care that before the law came ("the law was 430 years after," Galatians 3: 16, 17) the principle of grace should be maintained. But righteousness was all-important, and the law raises the question of righteousness, recognising man in responsibility; and so in it we get the two trees in principle, but the tree of responsibility before life: "Do this and thou shalt live."

234 Israel failed, as all have but Christ, who was perfect in every way. God still tries man, however. He sends prophets to call the people back to law, and so "the law and the prophets were until John." Obedience was the way of happiness for man under God's government of the world, so the prophets called back to obedience as the way of man's happiness. This, too, failed, as God says, in touching grace, "And the Lord God of their fathers sent to them by his messengers, rising up betimes [or continually and carefully] and sending; because he had compassion on his people and on his dwelling-place; but they mocked the messengers of God and despised his words, and misused his prophets, until the wrath of God arose against his people, till there was no remedy" (2 Chron. 36 15, 16.)

At last God sends His Son. He said, "I have yet one Son, it may be they will reverence my Son," and He would try man by His coming. "They cast him out of the vineyard, and slew him." In Matthew 21 we find God seeking fruit from that which ought to have yielded it; and so Christ, when He came, first looked for fruit. He desired to find (v. 18, 19). "He hungered. And when he saw a fig-tree in the way he came to it, and found nothing thereon but leaves only, and said unto it, Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever; and presently the fig-tree withered away." He cursed it - this was nature judged, that flesh should NEVER produce fruit, for there was nothing in man in the flesh to suit God. Plenty of profession, outward show, and assumption to be something, "but leaves only." "There is none good; no, not one." And so He said, "Now is the judgment of this world." The world was judged then, although that judgment is not executed yet; in grace God tarries the execution; but still there was the complete ending of all human responsibility as regards the record of it. Each individual may have to come to conviction of it, of course.

But according to the gospel, Christ came to seek and to save that which was lost, not in probation whether he would be so. All is proved worthless; for the husbandmen not only killed God's Son, who came looking for fruit, but also rejected all His invitations and Himself come in grace. If God spent His Son in the effort to get man's heart back to Himself, it only shewed that his heart was enmity against God, and would not own Him. He came with perfect grace, and shewed He had power sufficient to bring every blessing to man; all His miracles were blessing to man except the cursing of the fig-tree, which was not, because, after all, there must be the judgment of the flesh. The cross then comes in, and proves not only that man is a sinner (we get that in his being turned out of Paradise), but that man is in himself irreclaimable. This closes the first Adam's history - the history of man responsible in the flesh, and it was the end of the world; that is, morally, the world was ended and judged. So the apostle speaks in Hebrews 9: 26. "Now once in the end of the world" (literally "in the end [or consummation] of the ages," those ages in which God was testing man in responsibility as a reclaimable sinner) - "hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself."

235 Christ came to seek fruit and they had none for Him. He came to make a feast, as the expression of God's grace to them, and they would not sit at it. In the two parables (Matt. 21 and 22) there is not only the end of the history of man in responsibility, but also the rejection of Christ come in grace. The mind of the flesh is proved to be enmity against God; and we must learn that there is no good in us. But God does not give up His grace, it superabounds over all man's condition as a sinner, and an irreclaimable one.

This is just the difference between the synoptic Gospels and John. The first three - Matthew, Mark, and Luke - are the presentation of Christ to man to be received, and with proofs of power sufficient to remove all the effects of sin; but behind all you find the difficulty that man is in the flesh, and the mind of the flesh is enmity against God. John's testimony starts with this, that He was not received, and therefore coming in that grace which was above all the rejection. In chapter 1, "He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. He came to his own and his own received him not"; so God comes out in grace. The flesh is looked at in John as having disowned Christ, and therefore his Gospel all through is election and grace. There is no such language in the other three Gospels as He uses here in speaking of man. He goes to the roots and principles of things in John, and so He says, "Ye are of your father the devil," speaking to sinners, and "no man can come to me except the Father which hath sent me draw him." But He says, I'll have my own sheep notwithstanding what man is. Thus, on the rejection of His word in chapter 8 and His work in chapter 9, He gathers them, whether of the Jews or of the Gentiles, to the one Shepherd, and gives them eternal life. So in John 1 we find Him received by those who were born of God, not of the will of man. "To as many as received him to them gave he power [that is, title, authority, or right] to become children of God, even to them that believe on his name, which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God," John 1: 12, 13. There I get the people of God. Man's responsibility is closed: he is a lost sinner; he has been in a state of probation, and it is over.

236 Now, although the ground of man's responsibility is over in the sense of having wholly failed under it, when proved in every possible way, yet as to moral dealing with each individual, the responsibility is there to the full; and as an individual under moral dealing, a man has to go through the history of the process of responsibility and its failure; but he goes through it to bring out this, that he is lost already. He has to prove the truth of God's verdict that in man there is no good thing; and so the result of the principle of responsibility is for him to find out that he is lost, that the responsibility is over; not as if it was not true, but because he is lost and ruined, as the man who has lost all his money by foolish ways. It is important to keep up responsibility, but the individual is brought to the consciousness that on that ground it is all up with him. Man is lost. We have spent every farthing, and have only debts; these we have if that is any good. It is all over with the first man, and no mending of him will do: he is lost and ruined; but Christ came to save the lost.

Now the Second Man is set up. It is not a mending of the first man, but the substitution of the Second. There is no improvement or correction of the first man (although we are practically changed if we come to Christ), but the sins of the first Adam are all cleared away; and, secondly, the tree itself is cut down by the roots for faith. In the cross we see the responsibility met completely; Christ has met all the failure, the fruit of the tree of responsibility, and has glorified God in so doing. Man has brought in confusion; but Christ came, met the case, and cleared the scene, and triumphed over all. When He came, God's character as to facts was compromised, and there was no escape. If He had saved none, but at once cast off sinners, it were righteousness, but there would have been no love. If He had let all pass, when man was a sinner, and in such sort saved all (which man would call love, but which would not have been divine love, for God is holy), where were the righteousness? But Christ came. Well, surely in the cross there is righteousness against sin, as nowhere else, yet there is the infinite love of God to sinners.

237 In Him, in Christ, I get both the trees of Paradise united, fulfilled in grace, bearing our sins and putting away sin by the sacrifice of Himself, and becoming life according to righteousness. I am brought to the discovery of what I am, and then I see Christ has died on the cross and has taken the whole thing on Himself. When I see Him - the Son of God - dying on the cross, I say if this is not righteousness judgment against sin - I do not know what is. But whom is He dying for? - the guilty sinner. Well, if this is not love, I do not know what is. On the cross we get every attribute of God perfectly maintained - His majesty and truth, as well as His righteousness and love very claim met, and God perfectly glorified in the Person of Christ, the Lamb of God. He was there making atonement for sin that the gospel might go out to all the world; and as to believers, bearing their every sin. The whole thing is met there, and the believer's responsibility cleared away, as to sins, that he may enter into responsibility on a new ground, that of a child of God. He has met fully, and completely, and absolutely, all the fruit of man's eating the tree and all the sins of the believer (his responsibility). This, of course, does not touch the believer's responsibility to Christ or to God as a believer in Christ; for this is of a new order, and comes in upon a different ground.

But in the cross God's character is not only maintained but fully glorified; for the death of Christ is the perfect putting away of sin* and of all that belonged to the first man. We, therefore, as believers, are crucified with Christ; we are not in the flesh but in Christ. We are dead to the condition in which we were as children of Adam, and we are in a new position altogether; in Christ we are children of God. All that we were has been met and settled on the cross, and a new life has been given to us, so that now we are not in the first Adam but in the Second Man. The fruit of the first is all taken away, and the tree itself cut up by the roots for our faith; we have died with Christ, been crucified with Him. The responsibility is met by the atonement, and He Himself is the eternal life; so the two trees of Paradise are fully reconciled.

{*This, in its fullest effect, reaches, I doubt not, to the new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. But the believer knows its efficacy for himself now. I do not here speak of those who believe not. They are doubly guilty.}

238 Now the counsels of God come out, because He could not bring them out till redemption was accomplished, and righteousness fully established, and in respect of all that, too, which called it in question. The ground we stand on is not now God's forbearance, because what we have is not promise, but the accomplishment of promise. It was forbearance He exercised towards the Old Testament saints, passing over their sins, but it is in the atonement we see His righteousness in doing this. Now God is righteous in saving a poor sinner - just and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus; and because righteousness is now established, my standing is not founded on responsibility as a child of Adam, but on redemption as a son of God. It is a new footing and foundation. Not only are my sins put away, but that which has put them away has so vindicated the righteousness of God, and glorified Him, that man has a place at the right hand of God in glory.

With regard to this Christ could appeal to the Father righteously to give Him that place. "I have glorified thee," He said, "glorify thou me," and Jehovah answered, "Sit thou on my right hand, till I make thy foes thy footstool." This puts the Son of man in the glory of God; and God has given us a place and standing in Him, clear of all the responsibility of the first Adam. But there is responsibility now for us, and it flows from and is measured by this very standing.

We have thus the two trees in grace - the tree of life, and the tree of responsibility. Under the law we saw it was responsibility first, and then life. In grace it is first life, then responsibility.

Not only are my sins gone, but I and everything belonging to me buried in the death of Christ; the "I" merged into Him as to life, as it is written, "Yet not I, but Christ liveth in me," and the life I now live is in the Risen One. He rose, and is now seated in glory in virtue of what He did as man, and has sent down the Holy Ghost to unite to Himself as Head (having taken this place as man in heaven) believers as members of His body, and to reveal all the counsels that were about us before the world was; and this is the church. The Christian is united with Christ, where He now is, we are seated there, and blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Him. The Head is there, and we, the members, are, by the Holy Ghost, united to Him.

239 Now comes in the responsibility of the Christian. True responsibility flows from the place we are in - not as having to get into the place, but as being in it. Seeing our place we can learn what our responsibilities are; else we never can assume responsibility. You are not responsible to me as children or servants, because you are not my children or my servants. If you were my servant, your duties and responsibilities would flow from your being so. You have totally failed as a child of Adam; and now, if a believer, God says you are a child of God. Well, now, let us see if you are walking as a child of God in all your ways. This is our responsibility. We are heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ, and are left in this world to shew out the character of such. We are the epistle of Christ, and have to see that we are a good one, known and manifestly so before all men. Christ should be so seen in us that he who runs may read.

If you are in Christ, Christ is in you; and our place is a settled one. Christ is before God for us, and we are before the world for Christ. What is laid on us is not responsibility before God as a child of Adam, but as a child of God. I am not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, and the life of Jesus is to be manifested in our mortal bodies. There is our responsibility, and it is an individual thing. You will see the individual put always first in scripture, because the individual must be put right before there can be any church. The epistle to the Romans deals with the individual, so also does the first chapter to the Ephesians, till we come to the last verses. We always have truth brought out for the individual before corporate blessing is unfolded or responsibility is enforced. We are saved by Christ individually and owned as brethren.

This leads on to relationship with Christ and with one another. Our relationship with the Father is that of children; our relationship with Christ, first, that He is not ashamed to call us brethren, and then as members of His body, and so baptised into one body by the Holy Ghost. This is the effect of God's work, and we are created unto good works, which God has fore-ordained for us. The ground we stand on is not our works: Christ stood on that ground once for us, and if we did we should be lost. We stand on Christ's work and are saved, and the Holy Ghost has come down and united us to Christ as His members; and he that is joined to the Lord is one spirit.

240 This brings out what the church of God is. The Holy Ghost never came down to earth before that, although He was the immediate agent of all God's works. All immediate action from creation onwards is the Holy Ghost - He is the direct agent, but never came till the day of Pentecost.

We must never confound the action of a divine person with the coming of a divine person. All things were created by the Son and for Him, but He never came till the incarnation. So the Holy Ghost wrought all through, in creation, prophecy, etc., but never came till Pentecost; and speaking of this Christ said, "If I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you," John 16: 7. Not only has He come, but what is of special importance is that when on earth He dwells in the believer and in the assembly. This gives another character to the church. God never can dwell among men except on the footing of redemption. We never hear of such a thing in the Old Testament until redemption has been accomplished in figure. He visited Adam, but never dwelt with him - He talked with Abraham often, but never dwelt with him. But as soon as He redeems Israel, though only figuratively and outwardly, for the first time in scripture, we hear of His coming to dwell. (See Exodus 15, and 29: 46.) He came in the cloud, and His presence and glory dwelt in the camp of Israel.

When the church is brought out, it is said God dwells in it spiritually: "Builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit," Eph. 2: 22. This dwelling of God with us is the fruit of redemption. It is distinct from being born again; it is founded on redemption; and the Holy Ghost dwells with us because we are washed pure and spotless by the blood of Christ. Immediately after redemption holiness is mentioned as a necessary consequence of God's presence. "Glorious in holiness" is His name this side the Red Sea. "Ye shall be unto me a holy nation," Ex. 19: 6. "Be ye holy, for I am holy." He must have a clean house to dwell in. In the Old Testament figure a man was washed with water, sprinkled with blood, and anointed with oil. So we are quickened, and feel our need, are brought under the blood of sprinkling and cleansed by it, and then sealed by the Holy Ghost. It is God's stamp on us that we have been cleansed through faith in the blood of Christ. God cannot seal an unbeliever; this would be sealing wicked men, and sins, and corrupt flesh. It is God's seal on one that has life. "Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying Abba, Father," Gal. 4: 6.

241 By the indwelling of the Holy Ghost we are sealed and linked with Christ in heaven. Our place is on high, though we walk on earth. The church is associated with Christ in heaven; but it was in consequence of His ascension that the Holy Ghost came. He could not have come before. The church could not exist as an actual thing on earth till the atonement, till Christ had died and risen; and the idea of the church could not be revealed till after His death. The Jewish system was maintained by the middle wall of partition being kept up; there was to be no connection with the Gentiles. The church is founded on the breaking down of the middle wall of partition. You cannot take scripture and not see that even the idea of the church could not be revealed until Christ had died, gone up on high, and the middle wall of partition had been broken down. In the church there is no difference between Jew and Gentile, but this would have been sin till God removed the wall of division by the death of Christ; Eph. 2.

We get before that (in Deut. 32: 43) such a word as "Rejoice, ye Gentiles, with his people"; but there is His people: the nationality is kept up, and the Gentiles are kept distinct from His people. The Jews were the people who had the promises; but the One in whom all the promises centred came, and they refused and crucified Him; so they must now come in on the ground of mercy like any poor Gentile. There is no difference, for they have all alike sinned. God fulfilled His promise, but the Jew who had it rejected the fulfilment. So then the middle wall of partition could be broken down, for both came alike under mercy. All nationality now is merged in Christ. He now sits in glory as man, and the Holy Ghost whom He has sent down links us with Him. The distinction of Jew and Gentile is abolished, and the church is the dwelling-place of the Holy Ghost. If you had had a mention of the church in the Old Testament, Judaism must have gone. The church is a heavenly body, the Head being in heaven.

242 Now, if you appropriate Old Testament promises and apply them to the church, you drag it down from heaven to earth, and put Israel quite out of that place which God in His sovereignty gave to His chosen people. Individually we get much comfort for our hearts and instruction, too, from God's dealings with Israel; for (besides great truths as to God's nature), what happened to them happened to them for ensamples, and is written for our admonition on whom the ends of the world are come. See, for instance, Deuteronomy 8: 2-4, which is the history of God's dealings with them in the wilderness. So we too, in a spiritual sense, are put through the wilderness, and learn God's care of us and our continual dependence on Him for every need and each step of the way. God took care even of the wearing out of their coats all the time, while He sought to teach them what they were. We are in the wilderness, and need to learn to know the God of the wilderness. We are left here to find out both what we are and what He is, and we have the same principles to guide us as led Israel in their wanderings.

Being children of God, however, our home is the Father's house, and Christ has gone there to prepare a place for us. This leads us at once to the coming of Christ, not as a matter of prophecy, but for us, as He said, "And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am there ye may be also," John 14. This is not prophecy, which is concerned with the government of this world, and is connected with the Jews who are the centre of prophecy. We are identified with Christ, and were in the counsels of God before even the world was, and so are not of the world at all. He has promised to come first and put us in our right place beside Himself; and when prophecy comes true we shall be with the Lord. We are in heavenly places in Christ, and our conflict is there now; "we wrestle . . . against spiritual wickedness in heavenly places."

So completely is this in Paul's thoughts that he does not once speak of going to heaven - it is to depart and be with Christ, not go to heaven, though no doubt it is heaven. But we must wait till He comes to be fully in the same likeness with Christ. As an individual, the promise I have got is that I shall be conformed to the image of His Son, but I must wait till He comes and I see Him as He is for that; and so I try to be as conformed to Him as I can in this poor mortal body. (See 1 John 3.) If I should be absent from the body while I wait, I shall be present with the Lord - in heaven doubtless, though this is not the thought. But I am not conformed to the image of Christ till He comes and I am raised or changed.

243 The appearing of the saints in glory (Col. 3: 4) will prove to the world the oneness of the place which God has given us with Christ. He is the first fruits of them that slept; not of the wicked, but of His saints; and they will be raised because He delights in them, as Christ was, because God delighted in Him, though He indeed could not be holden of death. They will be raised in glory, fashioned like unto His own glorious body, and this is the fullest seal put upon the righteousness of God. We shall all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ, but we shall appear in glory. It is not then our eternal state has to be settled and judgment pronounced whether we are saved or lost: we shall be glorified when we get there. Paul has been with Christ these 1800 years, and are you going to bring him out to have his case settled? We shall give an account of everything to God from the time we were born, but we shall be in glory when we give it. We have an account to render as Christians, for we are responsible as to how far we have glorified Christ with gifts and all He has given us; and as to how far also we have grieved the Holy Spirit who has dwelt in us; but it is the saved who give this account (the others at the day of judgment, of course, before the great white throne).

When I die I shall be happy; but this is not, however, blessed as it is, fully what the Lord promises me; I am told I shall be "like Christ." "As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly," 1 Cor. 15. This is our hope. I am to be like Christ when He raises me, and glorifies me; I am to be conformed to His image when He comes; and as regards the church, the marriage of the Lamb does not come till then.

The only proper hope of the Christian is to wait for God's Son from heaven. When He will come, no one knows. The church was in the counsels of God in eternity in Him before time began, and the Holy Ghost said, "Of the times and seasons ye have no need that I write unto you." When the last member of the church is gathered in He will come; but whether at midnight, or in the first watch, or in the second watch, or at cock-crow, neither you nor I know. It may be to-night, but this is known only to the Lord. He is Sovereign, yet He "is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness, but is long-suffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance."

The Coming of the Lord that which characterises the Christian Life

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I purpose to take up a subject which I feel to be deeply important - the coming of the Lord Jesus - and to take it up, not proving it as a doctrine, but shewing that it was originally a substantial part of Christianity itself. The groundwork is Christ's first coming, and His atoning death; but when we look beyond the foundation, then we see that the coming of the Lord Jesus is not merely a bit of knowledge, but a substantive part of the faith of the church of God, and that on which the moral state of the saints, and, indeed, of the church of God, depends. You will see, in going through the passages which I will now quote, that it connects itself and is mixed with every part of Christianity, characterises it, and connects itself with every thought and feeling of the Christian. A person could not read the scriptures with an unprejudiced mind without seeing it: it presents itself to you in almost every page.

Some people have taken the pains to count how many times it occurs; but what I say is not merely this, but that it is so connected with every part of Christian life that, if you take it out, you take away what gives its character to the whole Christian life. It was identified with the system as announced to the world. I take conversion: people say what has that to do with the Lord's coming? That is part of what they were converted to: "to wait for God's Son from heaven." This waiting for God's Son from heaven characterised their conversion. They were converted to serve God, surely; but, also, "to wait for his Son from heaven," 1 Thess. 1: 10.

There are two subjects with which scripture is occupied, when personal salvation is settled: one is the sovereign grace, which makes us, redeemed from sin, like Christ in the glory: this is the blessed portion of the church of God; and the other is the government of the world. The Jews are the centre of the government of this world; Deut. 32: 8. "When the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel. For Jehovah's portion is his people, Jacob is the lot of his inheritance." There we get, in the government of the world, Israel as the centre. Israel would not have Christ, and so was set aside for the time. God's throne was taken from Jerusalem at the Babylonish captivity, but a remnant spared and brought back, that the king might be presented to them; but Him they refused, and are now set aside till His return. There are only sixty-nine weeks of Daniel definitely* fulfilled. The last week is not fulfilled; it is not come.

{*Christians know that half the last week is passed, comprising the time of the ministry of Christ. But for unbelief only sixty-nine are passed. Hence the covenant is made for a week. But God only counts from the beginning of the last half week, a time, times, and half a time.}

246 So as to the great feasts. You have got the Passover fulfilled. "Christ our passover is sacrificed for us"; and the feast of Pentecost has its fulfilment in the descent of the Holy Ghost; but the feast of Tabernacles is not fulfilled at all: you have no antitype yet whatever.

But here the other blessed work of God comes in, that meanwhile God is calling out poor sinners to have a part with His Son, and be like His Son; for we are predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He may be the firstborn among many brethren. He has taken us poor sinners to have us in the same glory as His Son. That is another thing from prophecy, which gives us the portion of this world and the Jewish people. When He shall appear, we shall appear with Him in glory.

The Christian's position, as to the coming of the Lord, is that he is waiting for Christ to come according to His promise. People say He comes at death; I reply, Do you make death the same as Christ? If this were the case, we should have Him coming hundreds and hundreds of times; whereas we only read of His coming twice (Heb. 9: 28). Shall I tell you what will happen when Christ comes? Resurrection! This is quite a different thing from death. The coming of Christ is, for the saint, to be the end of death - exactly the opposite; I believe nobody can find a trace of the thought in scripture that Christ comes at death. Instead of Christ's coming being death, it is resurrection; we go to Christ at death, it is not Christ who comes to us. Blessed it is "to depart and to be with Christ"; "absent from the body, present with the Lord." But I am to shew that this thought of the coming of Christ mixes itself with and characterises every part of Christian life.

247 In the first place, we have it in conversion, as already said. They were converted to wait for God's Son from heaven. I will turn to other passages in support of it, but I will go through Thessalonians first. In chapter 2 of the 1st Epistle, at the end, the apostle speaks of what his comfort and joy in service were. He had been driven away by persecution from the midst of the Thessalonians, and writing to them speaks of his comfort in thinking of them. But how? "For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming?" He cannot speak of his interest in them, and joy, without bringing in the coming of the Lord Jesus. Again, as regards holiness (end of chap. 3): "The Lord make you to increase and abound in love . . . to the end he may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God and the Father, at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints," 1 Thess. 3: 13.

As to the death of a saint, they were so thoroughly looking for the Lord, that if a person died they thought he would not be there, ready to go to meet Him. They were wrong in this, and the apostle corrects their mistake. But now people say, when a saint dies, we shall go after him, we shall follow him. Here there is not a word about it. Suppose I were to go and say to a Christian now, who had lost some one dear to him: "Do not be uneasy, Christ will bring him with Him," he would think me wild, or find it utterly unintelligible; and yet that is the way the apostle does comfort them: "Them that sleep in Jesus will God bring with him" (chap. 4). He then shews the way He will do it: "We which are alive . . . shall not prevent them which are asleep." "Prevent" is an old word for anticipate or go before. The first thing the Lord will do when He descends is to raise the sleeping saints. He is going to bring them with Him: if they have fallen asleep in Him, their spirits will have been with Him meanwhile; but then they will receive glory, be raised in glory, be like Him, as they had been like the first Adam, and, going to meet Him in the air, will be for ever with Him; and when He appears He will bring them with Him, and they will appear with Him in glory.

You get it in a general way in chapter 5, where he desires their whole spirit and soul and body may be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. This hope, then, is a part of the Christian state in every aspect. Conversion, joy in service, holiness, a believer's death, the goal of blamelessness, all are connected with the coming of the Lord.

248 Turn now to Matthew 25. The wise virgins take oil in their vessels, but they all go to sleep and forget that the Bridegroom was coming; but what I have specially to inquire here is, What was the original calling? The statement, clear and positive, is, that they went out to meet the Bridegroom, but while He tarried they "all" slumbered and slept - they all forgot His coming, the wise as well as the foolish. They got into some comfortable place: bivouacking in the open is not pleasant to the flesh. But at midnight the cry is heard, "Behold, the Bridegroom!" The thing that roused them up from their sleep was the cry, "Behold, the Bridegroom!" The original object, then, of the church was to go and meet Him who came; but even true believers forgot it; and, further, what awakes them up from their sleep is their being again called out to meet Him at His coming. Then you get in "the talents" the same thing in regard to service and responsibility. He takes His journey and tells them: "Occupy till I come."

Another very striking fact as to this truth is, it is always presented as a present operative expectation. You will never find the Lord nor the apostles speaking of the Lord's coming, with the supposition that it would be delayed beyond the life of those to whom they spoke. It might be at cock-crowing or in the morning; but they were to be waiting for God's Son from heaven. In the parables referred to, the virgins who went to sleep were the same virgins as those who awoke up; the servants to whom the talents were entrusted were the servants who rendered an account of them at His return. We know centuries have passed, but He will not allow any thought of delay. "In such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh." "Blessed is that servant whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching." Again, what was the cause of the church's ruin? It was, "My Lord delayeth his coming." It was not saying, "He will not come, but he delayeth his coming." Then the servant began to beat the men-servants and maid-servants, and to eat and drink with the drunken; and this brings on his judgment. If the bride loved the Bridegroom, she cannot but wish to see Him. Her heart is where He is. When the church lost this, she settled down to enjoyment where she was; she got worldly; she did not care about the Lord's return.

249 Turn now to Luke 12, and you will find how this waiting for Christ characterises the Christian, and therewith the serving Him while He is away. "Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." They were to have their loins girded, their lights burning - such was the characteristic of a Christian. They were to be as men that waited for their Lord to open to Him immediately: their affections in order, and full profession of Christ, but watching for their Lord's return. It is not having the doctrine of the Lord's coming: the blessing rests on those who are watching, "like men that wait for their Lord." "Blessed is that servant whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching." They must be girded and have their lights bright while He is away, and watch for His return; and then He makes them sit down to meat, and girds Himself, and comes forth and serves them. Now they must be girded and watch; our rest is not here. But, says the Lord, when I have things all My own way, you shall sit down to meat, and I will gird Myself and come forth and serve you; I will make you enjoy all the best that I have in heaven, and I will minister it to you: only be found watching.

Christ is for ever, in grace, a servant according to the form He has taken. He is girded now according to John 13. They would naturally think that, if He were gone to heaven in glory there was an end of His service to them. But He tells them, "I am going away; I cannot stay here with you, yet I cannot give you up; but as I cannot remain on earth with you, I must make you fit for Me in heaven. 'If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with Me.'" It is water here, not blood. "He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet." Lifegiving conversion, as well as salvation, is fully wrought; but if we pick up dirt in the way, even as to communion and the walk, grace and advocacy is there to wash our feet and have us practically fit for being with God where Christ is gone. Growth there is or ought to be, and, as to the unchangeable cleanness of the new man, this is certain; but if I have not been watchful, I shall pick up dirt in my path. I cannot have this in heaven, nor in communion with what is there, and the Lord says in effect, "I am not going to give you up because I am going to God and glory, and so I must have you in a state suitable to that, and washed as you are (though not all, for Judas was there), keep you fit, restoring you when you fall. But you must be watching while I am away."

250 It is a comfort to me to know that all the virgins woke up in time, and I believe all His saints will wake up before the Lord comes. The difficulty to the heart in looking around is that so many do not receive it. But the true service of the Lord is connected with watching. That is the state to which the blessing and the heavenly feast is attached. Then you find another thing, serving while He is away; and the result of this is, "Of a truth I will make him ruler over all I have." It is far better to eat, as is said of Israel, of the finest of the wheat, and that in the Father's house; but if we suffer with Him, we shall also reign with Him. With the serving in His absence, I get the ruling; as the heavenly feast with watching. The Lord then goes on to what we had in Matthew, the saying: "My Lord delayeth his coming."

What the Lord is pressing as to watching and serving is, "I am coming again; you must be watching for Me, as men that wait for their Lord": that was to be their character as Christians. Supposing all the people in this town were actually watching, waiting for the Lord from heaven, not knowing the moment He would come, do you think the whole town would not be changed? A person once said to me that, if everybody believed that, the world could not go on at all; and the Christian cannot in a worldly way.

If people were waiting for the Lord from heaven, the whole tone and character of their life would be changed. I may have the doctrine of Christ's coming, when I am really not looking for Him; but I should not like to be heaping money together when the Lord comes - I should, if possible, huddle it away out of His sight.

Turn now to Philippians 3. Paul was running a race, and he forgot all things else but the goal; and how does he speak of Christ at the close of that chapter? "Brethren, be followers together of me . . . for our conversation [our living association] is in heaven, from whence we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ," etc. He had seen Christ, and would not be content till he was like Him in glory. To be with Him then, was, no doubt, far better; but it was not the goal of his heart. People talk of going to glory when they die. There is no such thought in scripture as being in glory, when we depart to be with Christ. Most blessed and happy to be with Him! This I would surely press; but it is when He comes that He will change these vile bodies and fashion them like unto His glorious body. I am waiting till I get my body changed, to be like Christ in glory; and, what is more, Christ is waiting too.

251 The Lord's coming affects all the truths of Christianity. Christ is not now on His throne at all. He is sitting now, according to the word in Hebrews 10 (and quoted from Psalm 110), at God's right hand, sitting on the Father's throne, as He says Himself in the promise to Laodicea. He has settled the question of sin for them at His first coming, and they have no more conscience of sins, they are perfected for ever; and to them that look for Him shall He appear a second time without sin unto salvation. He is expecting in the heavens till His enemies be made His footstool. Why does He say "His enemies"? Because He is sitting down after He has finished all for His friends, that is, those that believe in Him. Have all your sins been put away out of God's sight? If not, when will it be done? That you grow in hatred of them all - All right! But if they are not borne and put away on the cross, when will it be done? Can you get Christ to die again? Can you get any one else to do it? If it is not done, it will never be done at all: but it is done, and therefore He says, the worshippers once purged "have no more conscience of sins"; "for by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified."

If you look now at Colossians 3, you will find the same thing in its full result held out as our hope. "When Christ who is our life shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory." The first promise He gave the disciples when going away was His coming again. Do not be troubled (as they naturally would be on losing the Friend for whom they had given up all); I am not going to be all alone in My Father's house. There are many mansions there, I am going to prepare a place for you: do not be uneasy; I cannot stay with you, so I must have you up there with Me, and the first thing is, "I will come again and receive you to Myself." It is not one by one by death, but by resurrection for the dead, and change for the living, His actual coming to receive them, raised or changed, to be with Himself where He was gone, and like Himself, that we shall be in glory with Him.

Again, at His departing from His disciples left down here, what was the last they saw of Him? They saw Him go up before their eyes, and the angel said to them, "Why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus shall come in like manner." His coming is wrought into the whole texture of the Christian life.

252 What is scripture's last word? "Surely I come quickly Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus." In the same way you get it at the beginning, with warning and threatening, Jesus Christ, the Faithful Witness, the First-begotten, etc, "Behold, he cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see him" (v. 7). Then at the end (prophetic instructions are over: I do not enter into them), "I, Jesus, have sent Mine angel," etc.; "I am the bright and morning star." Now I get what these saints who were watching, and those only, see. There is no star to be seen when the sun is risen. They see the morning star, while it is yet early dawning; for the night is far spent, the day is at hand. Here He calls Himself "the root and offspring of David; the bright and morning star. And the Spirit and the bride say, Come." If the bride has got the sense of being the bride of Christ, she must desire to be with the Bridegroom; there is no proper love to Christ unless she wants to be with Him. Abram said of his wife, "She is my sister"; then the Egyptians, the world, took her into their house.

I just add that you get here the whole circle of the church's affections. "The Spirit and the bride say, Come [this is to the Bridegroom]; and let him that heareth say, Come!" That is, the Christian, who has heard the word of his salvation, joins in the cry. Then those who thirst for some living water are called to come. The saints of the church can say, though they have not yet the Bridegroom in glory, that they have the living water, and so call, "Let him that is athirst come," and then address the call universally, "Whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely." This they have, though not the Bridegroom. What I find then is, that, in the word of God, the thoughts, and feelings, and conduct, and doings, and affections of Christians, are identified with the coming of Christ. Take all these things, and you will find that they are identified with the coming of the Lord.

Take the first Epistle of John, chapter 3. "Behold, what manner of love," etc. "Beloved, now are we the sons of God [that is settled], and it doth not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is." Beloved friends, we are "predestinated to be conformed to the image of his Son." This is what God has purposed for us. When are we to be like Christ in the glory? When He comes. It is not when a person dies, and the spirit goes to be with Christ, for then he is like Christ when Christ was in the grave; and I do not want to be like Christ when Christ was in the grave; but if I die, I shall be like Christ as to that, but this is not what I want, though blessed in itself. I want to be like Him in the glory. When will that be? When He comes, He will change our vile bodies and fashion them like to His glorious body; so here "it doth not yet appear what we shall be, but when he shall appear, we shall be like him." Now mark the practical consequences upon the man that has been in his faith brought up to God's purposes. "He that hath this hope in him, purifieth himself, even as he is pure." I know I am going to be perfectly like Christ in the glory; therefore I want to be as like Him as possible down here.

253 You find here again what the holy scriptures are explicit in teaching, that holiness also is always referred to conformity to Christ in glory. I shall have that likeness to Christ in glory, and nothing else is my standard. You will find one passage already quoted: "That he may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints." The perfection of the Christian is to be like Him when He comes. What again I find, as to Christians, in 1 Corinthians 15 is, "It is sown in dishonour, it is raised in glory." We have the blessed assurance that accompanies true assured hope of the first resurrection and its results.

We shall be perfectly like Christ when we are raised from the dead. We give an account of ourselves, but it is when we are like the person to whom we are to give an account. The full efficacy of His first coming has been lost, and therefore people are not comfortable when thinking of His second coming. But for the saint "Christ is the first-fruits, then they that are Christ's at his coming." Is Christ the first-fruits of the wicked? Surely not. Just as Christ's resurrection of the saints will be a testimony of God's approval of them as in Him. As we find in Luke 20: 35, 36, "They which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage. Neither can they die any more, but are equal unto the angels, and are the children of God, being the children of the resurrection"

254 Could anybody shew me a single passage about a general resurrection? There is no such thought in scripture. You get Matthew 25 quoted for it, that the goats and sheep represent the two classes; but He has come in His glory down here. He is not sitting on the great white throne: before this heaven and earth flee away. Here He is come and sits on His throne. When He does come and sits there, He gathers all the Gentiles, the nations, to judge them. It is the judgment of the quick or the living. You have three sets of people, not two; and you have nothing of resurrection. You have sheep, goats, and brethren. (Matt. 25: 40.) So far from its being a general resurrection, there is no reference to resurrection at all; it is quite a different subject. Further, the only question is, How have they treated His brethren? The ground of judgment does not apply to ninety-nine out of a hundred of those who are to be judged, if it were a general judgment. Those that have had the testimony of the kingdom before He comes to judge the quick, will be treated according as they have received God's messengers, but such only are in judgment.

And now the point I return to is, that the coming of the Lord influences and forms the whole life of the Christian. You cannot separate anything in the whole course and ways of the Christian from the coming of the Lord Jesus; and there is but the first coming and the second coming. He has appeared once in the end of the world, and to them that look for Him shall He appear the second time unto salvation. It is true that He comes and dwells in us, but we speak, with scripture, of actual coming. If you take holiness, or service, or conversion, or ministry, or a person who has died, they are all connected with Christ's coming. He warns them to be found watching.

I might quote other passages, but I have quoted enough to shew that the Lord's coming is connected with everything in the Christian life. When we see Him as He is, then and then only shall we be like Him, according to God's purpose. And now I only ask, Are you waiting for God's Son from heaven?

His bearing the sins of many is the only ground of hope for any sinner: that is, the finished work which enables us, through faith, to look for Him when sealed by the Holy Ghost. Then, I say, what am I waiting for? I am waiting for God's Son from heaven. Can you say, I am watching for Christ? I do not know when He will come. "Blessed are those servants whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching." I do not ask you, Do you understand about the coming of the Lord? To wait for Him was the thing they were converted to. The thing that woke the virgins up was, "Behold, the Bridegroom!" Are you actually waiting for God's Son from heaven? Would you like Him to come to-night? Peter explains the delay. He says His long-suffering is salvation, not willing that any should perish. What would you think if He were to come to-night? Would it just be what your soul was looking for? I am going to sit down to table, and He is going to gird Himself and come forth and serve me. People think that it would stop the gospel to be waiting for God's Son from heaven. Did the acceptance of God's testimony about the deluge stop the preaching of Noah? Far from hindering, it was what gave edge to all. May the Lord give us to be ready, when He comes - found watching for Him!

The Olive, the Vine, and the Fig-tree

J. N. Darby.

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I trust, dear brethren, that our souls may be directed to the importance of speaking as before the Lord. What we are speaking of is not merely like man's thoughts and circumstances, but the things of the Lord. May we all keep this in mind.

I would take up in connection with Romans 11 the wild olive-tree. It is the expression of the character of the Gentiles, who are told, in the Epistle to the Ephesians, to remember that they were "strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world." It is of great importance to understand the exceeding wideness of that expression, "Gentiles in the flesh" - "the wild olive tree." What we want is "to have no confidence in the flesh." We see what the flesh is in Philippians 3. "We are the circumcision," says the apostle, "who worship God in the Spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh." All the character which he gives to the flesh is the "concision," strictness of ordinances, legitimacy of descent, works of our own: these three things are marked as repudiated flesh, though of a religious claim. They are also of great importance as marking the character of the flesh under all circumstances. The resurrection cuts off all boasting in natural descent. My descent is that I am born of God; John 1: 13. We are "sons and daughters of the Lord God Almighty." When we come to look at the fairest character of the flesh in the world, what is it when compared with being sons and daughters of the Lord God Almighty? If there were any title to anything in the flesh, the Jew had it; for the Gentile to talk of ordinances, descent, etc., is indeed folly.

When God has settled anything, it is settled. In the flesh we are Gentiles; in the new man we are born of God If I get out of this, I get out of the Spirit into the flesh. In the third of Philippians we have very severe names - dogs, evil workers, the concision. It is too bad for the Gentiles to come in and attempt to bring in that which has been set aside in the Jew by our Lord. Judaism had proper glory in the flesh; as concerning the flesh, Christ was a Jew. Here would have been the crowning of the flesh, if there had been anything good in flesh. But He was rejected. There was no good thing in man, and therefore death intervenes.

257 We have the two principles of descent and works brought before us in this chapter. Works never satisfy the conscience, for it appeals to something that is not in itself. This is all set aside, and therefore the apostle says, "What things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ." The character of the flesh is that it is "without God in the world." This leads us to see the character of the "wild olive tree" - the Gentiles. When the commonwealth of Israel is spoken of, it is not that they are strangers to the covenants of promise, without hope, but the contrary. (See Rom. 9: 4-6.)

The point of distinction between the wild olive tree, and the good one, is this: the last was an election of grace and promise; the first, the nation itself which failed. From the days of the fall there has been a remnant according to the election of grace. Abel, in this sense, was a remnant and a suffering one; but there was no interfering in judgment till the flood; then the world refused the Lord, and the remnant was preserved.

Here was interference in judgment, God's acting in the world; thereon Satan came in, and pretended to be the agent in the good and evil that was going on in the world. Then came in idolatry. Satan, having reduced man to misery, set himself up as God over him. Next Abram was specially called out as the remnant, as one connected with God. The church comes in on the accomplishment of redemption, though its glory is still held in hope, a remnant according to the election of grace, made the deposit of promise. All this is the olive-tree. It is true that it becomes afterwards Israel nationally, and "the gifts and calling of God are without repentance." God never repents of His calling, either of Abraham, or of Israel. All our hopes would be shaken if that purpose were not infallible, but (before this) faith is spoken of as accounted for righteousness.

Faith is never spoken of in the scriptures as brought out before the time of Abraham. Abraham believed in Him who was to raise up Jesus from the dead. The character of his faith was, that it was faith in the resurrection. Resurrection alone takes man ruined in sin and brings in something beyond the reach of evil in a new scene - the risen man. We get the promises made to Abram (that are alluded to in the Galatians) in Genesis 12, when he is first called out. There was the first breaking of the whole link of flesh as regarded Abram, and then the promise was confirmed to his seed after being risen from the dead; Gen. 22. The promise was given to Abram, as the remnant called out, then confirmed to Isaac consequently on the resurrection (in figure). The reasoning out of this we have in the Epistle to the Romans. The apostle there shews that the ground on which the promise comes is justification by faith.

258 The Jews chose to take the promises, not on the ground of the faith of Abraham, but on that of their own obedience conditionally; and the moment they got on this ground they failed. They tried to do some good thing, like the young man in the Gospels, who, wrong in principle, knew not that "none is good, save one, that is, God." Israel took the law, not on the ground of promise, but of law. The law rests on the stability of another party; the promise rests on the stability of the Promiser. The prophets always take Israel off the ground of law on that of promise. In taking the law they must rest on descent and ordinances; and this is what the apostle combats in Romans 3 and 4. Up to chapter 3 he proves the universality of the guilt of the world, and the necessity of the blood of Christ to cleanse from sin. In chapter 4 we have the principle of the resurrection. He leads us out of natural life, out of the law, into the Spirit of life that is in Christ Jesus. Chapter 8 plants the Christian in his own proper place in the grace of God.

Then the apostle turns to the question of what becomes of the Jew. Has God cast them off? No; their bringing in again rests on the promise of God in resurrection, as we read in the Acts, "And as concerning that he raised him up from the dead, no more to return to corruption, he saith on this wise, I will give you the sure mercies of David." The apostle's argument in chapter 9 is just this: he asserts God's title (the election of the nation of the Jews still subsisting) to elect whom He pleases. How come believers to have all these privileges mentioned in chapter 8? Because they are God's election; the principle is in God, not in the circumstance only of the election of Israel. Christ, while necessarily the root of blessing, is also the object of the promises.

Then there is another principle brought in, God's enduring with great long-suffering the vessels of wrath. God's dealings are suited to the bountifulness of His grace. The Lord brings out the remnant associated with Himself in an entirely new character; as we read, "the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent taketh it by force." "If by any means," says the apostle, "I might attain unto the resurrection from the dead," and it cost him a great deal of suffering. This is the character which the Lord attaches to His ministry. He came to the lost sheep of the house of Israel till John 9 and 10. Then He puts forth His own sheep, taking them out of the fold, to be one flock, one Shepherd.

259 What the church has to do now is to pitch its tabernacle outside the camp. We read in Exodus 33 that every one which sought Jehovah went out unto the tabernacle of the congregation that was without the camp. Israel had failed, and then there was this seeking Jehovah, and Moses talking to Jehovah face to face. Christ's character is that He went without the camp, and in Hebrews 13 we are told to go forth also unto Him without the camp, bearing His reproach. Israel's camp was not properly the world. If you look at it in its moral character, it was the world; but still it was called the holy city. But the believer is now called to go without the camp.

The children of the flesh, or Israel (the apostle shews in Romans 11: 7), reckon on what the flesh could reckon on, and are cut off; and if the Gentile branch continue (or have faith) in God's goodness, well. If I am bringing in anything between me and God's goodness, I am not continuing in God's goodness, though this may be only failure for a moment. He who has the Spirit, seeing what the apostasy of the flesh in him may lead to, watches against that power of the flesh that would separate him from God; and this is the right use to make of the lists of the evils of the flesh that we have in the word of God. Continuance is not of the flesh; it does not depend on ordinances, but on living faith: "otherwise thou also shalt be cut off."

Thus the remnant is clearly brought out. Inasmuch as the first remnant was amongst the Jews, the flesh in them turned back to ordinances. Will the remnant make progress? Undoubtedly, though it will always be comparatively a little flock. The majority will turn back to the flesh, and we shall have to say in humbleness of soul, "my work is with my God." The aspect of the work is towards all - the end towards God. Our strength in the way should be drawn from God only. Nothing may seem to be produced here sometimes in the way of results, but this should not cast us down. Our temptation is to look to the blessing that is produced, and not to the source that produces it, and that is the cause of much weakness. In the Galatians and other parts of scripture we have this most important and clear testimony that it is mere fleshly unbelief to go back to descent and ordinances - to the weak and beggarly elements. The moment we rest in them, we go on the ground of Judaism. "Ye observe days, and months, and years, and times. I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed labour on you in vain." This was judaising clearly, and Peter himself was ensnared by it. (See Gal. 2.)

260 The flesh is not opposed to religion, but to Christ who brings the flesh to nothing. The Christian's character is not to be respected in the devil's kingdom. When God came into the world, where was He found? Go to the manger, and there you see Him; but there was no room for Him in the inn. If the Christian take the place of rank and honour in the world, it is not of the Father, but of the world.

All this being settled as not being of the Father, it is quite enough to settle what is of man, and the Lord's answer to Peter on the point was, "Get thee behind me, Satan, for thou art an offence unto me; for thou savourest not the things which be of God, but those which be of men." This turning back again to Judaism, to the weak and beggarly elements of the world, is in the judgment of the Spirit of God exactly identical with the worshipping of Juggernaut, and of stocks, and stones, and demons. It is contrary to the fundamental principle of justification by faith. This is the reason why the apostle says, "I desire to be present with you now, and to change my voice, for I stand in doubt of you" - you have gone off the ground of Christian principles. There he changes his voice, and talks of the old law to those who wish to be under the law.

The remnant running all through from Abel downward was a poor remnant, not having its life below; it had no continuance here, for death must come in, and their hope must therefore be in the morning of the resurrection, for the sentence on the nation was, "they shall never see life."

I would say that I believe the vine is more ecclesiastical in its character, the fig-tree national. We have the fig character in Luke, where the nations too ("the fig-tree, and all the trees") are brought in; Luke 21: 29. We read of the vine in Psalm 80: "Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt, thou hast cast out the heathen, and planted it." The vineyard was the circumcision, the nation generally. It was planted to produce fruit, but it failed. The distinctive character of the true vine is that it is judged by its fruits; it is not a question of ordinances.

261 Matthew 12 is clearly judicial judgment on the nation. The parable of the sower (chap. 13) clearly, to my mind, presents an external operation after the nation had been found to be without fruit. There was no tree in human nature that produced fruit, and then it is said, "Behold, a sower went out to sow." The three first parables are addressed to the multitude; the four last are the Lord's own mind about things addressed solely to His disciples.

In the first place the Jews rejected John the Baptist, next they rejected the Son of man. Then there was the testimony of the Holy Ghost that the atonement had been really made, and that, if they repented, Jesus would come back again: all this closed with Stephen's rejection, whose spirit goes to be with Christ in heaven. Then Paul is called out to carry the testimony of grace to the Gentiles; but Israel, having rejected grace themselves, became the deliberate opposers of grace to others, as it is said, "forbidding us to preach to the Gentiles that they might be saved, to fill up their sin alway, for the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost." They would not allow grace to go to the Gentiles any more than they would receive it themselves.

Still, dear friends, it is a blessed testimony to the patience of God that, after the church had been established from its Gentile centre - Antioch, Paul is found at Rome, a prisoner, testifying of Jesus still to Jews, the Lord standing with him and strengthening him in the very lion's mouth - in Caesar's household. When brought before the Emperor, there was no dimness of light in the apostle, no hiding that all which is not of the Father is of the world, but the expression of this plainly to the powers that be. God does not depart from His principles, nor dim His light that men may bear with it.

After David's house had failed, the sentence of blinding passed on Israel. It hung over them through this long period, and was not fully executed until they had rejected the testimony of the Holy Ghost, and resisted the grace of God to the Gentile.

As to the word "mystery," I believe, in principle, it may be thus explained. There is such a thing as loving righteousness and hating iniquity acting on the conscience: "Thou shalt not kill," for instance; there is no mystery in this. God could not deal in righteousness with the world. We know how it failed in this. Then the secret came in. Anything that was above and beyond the principle of the law of righteousness were "the secret things," Deut. 29: 29. "The secret of Jehovah is with them that fear him," and here comes in faith. The bringing in of the Gentiles, for instance, to be one body, the body of Christ, was known only by fresh revelation.

262 All that is consequent upon man's sin can hardly be "the mystery of iniquity." The mystery of iniquity is Satan's taking the form of God's goodness, and claiming the worship that belongs to Him; as what the apostle calls the worshipping of angels (referring to something that was not of God), will-worship, and the satisfying of the flesh. Paul was, when he came to be the object of worship, a more dangerous demon than Theseus or Apollo. (See Acts 14.) The way to judge of a thing is by the way in which it acts on the conscience, and the tendency of it is to draw away the soul from God and His worship. The Athenians worshipping the "unknown God" shew the very extremity of evil - the confession that in utter iniquity they did not know God.

Then as to "apostasy," it is simply the departure from the principle of faith, on which the dispensation is based, to the law for instance, the very taking of which at Sinai was an evidence of Jewish unbelief. God had borne them on eagles' wings on their way, given them manna for their food, held them up in blessed dependence on the constant exercises of His grace; but they chose conditions of their own, and then departed from the first principle of obedience. "Thou shalt have none other gods but me." Man's doing was making the calf. When it was made, Providence, they said, did it (as Aaron told Moses, "I cast it into the fire, and there came out this calf"); then they worshipped it. When Moses saw it, he had it ground to powder, and made them drink it with water. This was faith.

The church is set on the ground of faith, on the discovery that the flesh has utterly failed, and that the risen Saviour has to be looked to; but it has departed in principle from being in the favour of God in grace as united to Jesus, and the apostasy is coming in. The record of the apostasy is in Jude and John especially. The spirit of Antichrist is not merely natural enmity to God, but "they went out from us because they were not of us." There is no hope at all then of restoration. There is unbelief; and is this continuing in God's goodness? "That day shall not come except there come a falling away first." The flesh always fails in the deposit entrusted to it. This is apostasy, darkening God's light. The flesh may have the form and keep up the form, but it will end in apostasy. What does Stephen say as to the rejection of the Holy Ghost by the Jews in that dispensation? He does not refer so much to the rejection of Christ or of the intermediate prophets, but he goes back to their original departure from God in the wilderness.

263 Church history is just the progressive history of what the church has done when, having ceased to lean on God, it began to lean on itself. This is a most solemn thing. We have indeed "seen the end of all perfection"; but God has given us one thing on which the soul can rest, the Lord Jesus Himself. "He is precious," not only because He has redeemed us, but if "we have tasted that the Lord is gracious" in the consciousness of failure, how blessed to have something that the eye can rest on and be satisfied with! And God the Father is satisfied there. There our hearts are sure to get rest, and we can get it nowhere else. When the eye of Jesus passed over the wide field of His labour, and He could see no answer to it and could do nothing but pray to the Father, He was able to say, I rest in the Father, and the Father rests in Me, and here you may find rest. We find rest in the One in whom God the Father finds rest - in Jesus. What rest there is to our souls, in the sense of their feebleness in glorifying the Father, to know that in Jesus He has been perfectly glorified, and that now there has been fresh glory brought to Him by what Jesus has done for the church, and here the church is united with the glory of the Father.

As to the remnant, I believe it is properly Jewish. They are those who, in the midst of apostasy, are leaning only on God.

What is the duty of the saint as to those relations in which the word does not recognise him? 1 would leave a great deal to the individual's own conscience. Unless the principle were held, I do not see any good in enforcing effects. Many who are most faithful in pressing things on the consciences of others did act for a long time in those things they now condemn, when in principle they were just as faithful as they are now. We must have patience very often with those who do not understand. I like never to sanction the principle that is evil, but to stretch out my hand to help out the person who is in the evil. When Moses had been talking to God, and returned to the people, did he sanction their evil? No, not a bit, though he pleaded with God for them.

264 As to the fact of what the world is, when we say of a person, "He is getting on in the world," is it not well understood? God does not own those relations which constitute the world. All natural and personal dependence can be owned by God. In these we have given directions how to act; in none else. The moment this is departed from, you must get another principle to act on than simple fidelity to the service of Christ.

The place of the Christian is that of implicit obedience to "the powers that be," even supposing that Nero were king; for he could not touch my portion which is heavenly, and therefore whatever the question be, unless it interfered with my obedience to God, I would not mind, for he could only bring me into "the lion's mouth," and this might turn to a testimony; but he could not touch my resurrection life. Unless it were a question concerning God's honour, I would not come down from this principle and judge of what is right or wrong as to the things of the world. We are told to submit "Whether it be to the king as supreme, or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of them that do well," 1 Peter 2: 14. Whoever is king, he is "supreme"; for there can be no power but of God, or we deny the omnipotence of God. I have nothing to do but to own what God owns. I get my example in Christ, who appealed to none but God; but still in. the darkest hour of iniquity, when God's priests were interceding with Gentile power for the crucifixion of His Son, the Lord says, "Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above." The power from God was submitted to by our blessed Lord, who committed His cause "to him that judgeth righteously"; and this is our example.

I could not be a magistrate while Satan is the god of this world, for I cannot serve two masters; and if I cannot say on the bench that what Christ says is true, I must be dishonouring Him and serving the world. In the millennium it will not be so. Then we shall rule; but I cannot now, because the principle on which power is exercised is not the honour of God. The magistrate is the resister of evil; but God's word is, "If when ye do well and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God." I would rather have what is acceptable to God than all the civil rights in the world. The duty then of the saints is submission: I know no other, or I must act on the principles which the flesh recognises; I cannot seek a good object in a bad way. The object must be God's, and the way God's.

265 The Christian, having a new nature, is entitled to judge all things, and to ask, Does this come from the Spirit, or from the flesh? What is the standard of the new man? "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." Christ's example and the Father's perfectness are the principles on which the Christian ought to act, as it is said, "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you." How have I drunk into the understanding of God's love? In His having brought salvation to my own soul? And I am therefore called to be the personal witness to the world that "none is good" but God, and that "He is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil." It is not now, "be perfect with the Lord, thy God." This has been settled in Christ, but the Father sends me now to present His perfectness to the world. The world is withered in the activity of disappointed selfishness, and wants the beneficence of God. If a Christian gets his heart sunk in the listlessness and vanity of the world, a pretty witness will he be of God's character to it.

I see the Lord going "about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil, for God was with him"; seeking not "his own," satisfied with the Father, and we ought to be satisfied with Him, and not to be seeking our own, but to be seeking grace from the fountain of grace. How can a Christian broil and travail his soul in the things of the world? If the Lord said that there was no rest to be found in the world, it is a foolish thing to seek. There is only rest in Him, who said, "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Fellowship with Christ in the expression of God's goodness is the place of the Christian.

Strange to have to discuss whether the honour or power of the world belongs to the saint! As it is said, "that no flesh shall glory in his presence." What is honour in the world? There is no good in it, but that it be given up for the Lord's sake; this is the only good that I know of. Let me spend every shilling that I have in the service of the Lord, still it will be the mammon of unrighteousness; but the Christian has the privilege of even turning the mammon of unrighteousness into the expression of grace. There would be no money or rank at all if there were not sin in the world. The person of rank is the receiver of respect, and others are the givers: as a Christian I give willingly; but he is the beggar in the world. I do not say this in the spirit of disrespect; that would be quite wrong; for disrespect toward others is ruinous in Christianity. Still the secret of the Lord is that what passes current in the world is given by those who, having heavenly riches, can give freely, because they have nothing to hinder them. Am I in principle to take what Christ did not? Never. If heaven rejoiced over the Son of God and the King of Israel placed in a manger, what should our feelings as to the honour of this world be? And yet we know how we should feel under similar circumstances in this world, where everything is measured by the standard of selfishness.

266 Let us remember those words about our Lord, "though he were rich, yet for our sakes he became poor, that we through his poverty might be made rich."

The Value of Scripture Knowledge

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I feel strongly that one has to cast oneself on the Spirit of God, for speaking of mere circumstances sometimes creates difficulty. I would say that it has struck me, where the King is spoken of, the bride is Jerusalem; when the Lamb is spoken of, the bride is the heavenly Jerusalem. Of course, there are many analogous principles in both. Psalm 45 is entirely about the King's wife - the Revelation entirely about the Lamb's. Assuredly there is a good deal of interest in seeing the different characters of blessing in their relationships.

I see two grand characteristics in the Lord's dealings: the one that of righteousness, as it is said, "The righteous Lord loveth righteousness, his countenance doth behold the upright"; and the other grace. Not that in His dealings in grace He gives up righteousness, but righteousness, simply as righteousness, could not be to sinners; for they needed grace, which is maintained in righteousness in the Lord Jesus. The position of the church, as knowing divine righteousness in Him, comprehends the character of grace.

I see this distinction going on all through. In Isaiah 60 we have the King and the bride. God could not identify Himself with His people Israel when they failed in their responsibility to Him, and He cast them off; but when, in Isaiah 60, we see them in the stability of glory, their iniquity having been forgiven and carried away into the land of forgetfulness, "the sons of the strangers are to build their walls, and the nation and kingdom that will not serve them are to perish," etc. They will exercise dominion, but not in grace; power is mentioned in the seat of righteousness at Jerusalem. This made the apostle cry out, "O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his ways, and his judgments past finding out!"

He saw Jerusalem to be the place, properly speaking, of righteousness, and yet if God had received the Jew on his own proper ground of righteousness without Christ, it would have been unrighteous, for they were transgressors. But they rejected the Messiah and hated the gospel to the Gentiles, and this brought out the fulness of their iniquity, and if God concluded all in unbelief, it was thus that God might have mercy upon all. The just "as ye in times past have not believed God, yet have now obtained mercy through their unbelief; even so have these also not now believed, that through your mercy they also may obtain mercy," has been brought forward to prove that through the mercy of the church the Jews are to come in. But it should be rendered, "even so have these also now not believed in your mercy, that they also may be the objects of mercy." They would not believe in the Gentiles' mercy, and are themselves therefore made the objects of mercy. Even the Jew, who stood on the principle of righteousness, comes in on the ground of mercy.

268 We see how different the character of the bride, the Lamb's wife, is from that spoken of in Isaiah 60. In the first place, of the former it is said, the nations [of them which are saved] shall walk in the light of it, etc.; not only light goes out from it, but life and grace are its characteristics. The fulness of the love and grace of Christ is expressed in His receiving the church, and it becomes His helpmeet in expressing His grace in that day. In the second place, of the latter it is said, "For the nation and kingdom that will not serve thee shall perish; yea, those nations shall be utterly wasted," Isa. 60: 12.

As regards the heavenly Jerusalem, it is not righteousness maintained in power, but grace that will be its characteristic. There is nothing more instructive than taking that which is to be the character of the heavenly Jerusalem, and comparing it with that of the church now. We ought to be now anticipating what we shall become actually in the day when the Lord gives us glory. Nothing that defiles was to enter into that heavenly city: the leaves of the trees were for the healing of the nations, etc. - this should be the character of the church now, purity, love, and grace towards the world. Our place is just that of drawing down now the character of grace that will be displayed in the glory. We do not see in the heavenly Jerusalem the security of righteousness exhibiting itself in power against others, but in grace. Paradise knew nothing of grace; innocent men might live in it; but there was no tree of life there for those who had failed. We read that "the streets of the city were pure gold." Gold is that which the mercy-seat and girdle were made of. Righteousness is the very walking place of the saints there. Instead of its defiling us, as the world does now, and making our feet need the washing of our High Priest, the very place on which they walk will be the righteousness of God. "Transparent glass" denotes true holiness The character of the divine purity is aimed at in the laver, ministering death and resurrection. Then the place of our conversation, that on which we stand and walk, will be righteousness and true holiness. In us the world will see that glory which we shall see immediately. "Every several gate was of one pearl." They will discern in us then the beauty and comeliness which Jesus will have put on us.

269 We read of the church under the character of a goodly pearl, which the merchantman finding sold all that he had for it. Its comely beauty is thus exhibited, and its desirableness to the merchantman, which made him willing to sell all that he had for it; and Christ, for that loveliness with which God clothed the church, did the same. The doorway of the city has the character of grace in the flowing forth of the river of the water of life. Here are no plagues and curses. It is most profitable to bring the light of the glory of the coming dispensation to the circumstances in which they are, so that the character of that light may be expressed in these circumstances. In the case of the Jews who walked in the light of the coming dispensation, those who had faith and hope in that which was not present, and who thus obtained a good report through faith, brought in the energy of the divine thoughts into their circumstances, though walking obediently to the dispensation they were in.

I would refer to a passage in Psalm 145, speaking of the blessing of that day, where we have brought before us the blessing of the saints on earth when Messiah takes His place in the kingdom; a conversation between Messiah and the Jewish saints in that day, stating what their happiness will be, etc. The deliverance of Israel, and God's dealings with them, will make them competent to declare His acts to the people which shall be born. Messiah and His saints speak these things together, and they tell the nations what their God is (vers. 11, 12); and then we have the character of the kingdom. Israel's business will be that of learning the character of God, to make it known to the Gentiles; and this should be the business of the saints now. The world cannot know God, but we are called to be the "epistle of Christ, known and read of all men." The church has to be Christ's letter of recommendation to the world. The church, being made a partaker of grace, can rise above all law demands. Innocence could not do this. There was no healing-tree in the garden of Eden, but, the church being made partakers of grace now, the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.

270 The greatest part of the church's blessing consists in being united with the Lord Himself. It is not merely that it is glorified and loved, but the Father loves us as He loves Jesus. The best proof of this love is that He has given Jesus for us. That love which is brought out through the glory associates the church with the Son: He comes in the glory, and the glory which it will have is consequent on love. The source of the glory which will be displayed is more blessed even than the manifestation of it. It is blessed to be manifested in favour; and why? Because the favour of the person is precious to me. In John 17: 23 the Lord prays that the world may know that "thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me." While the Lord has obtained all for us, yet, when He comes to give His bride her glory, He does not say that it is a proof that He has loved her; but, in the blessed self-hiding of love, He says that it is the Father's love: "and thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me." This is exceedingly blessed and beautiful. The Lord gives witness before the world, not that He loves her, for this was shewn in the necessity of her sinfulness. There is nothing more precious than the love between the church and Himself; but to the world He exhibits the church as loved by the Father, which gives it honour, not in connection with sin and shame. We see the same principle brought out in the history of the prodigal son, however touching that love may be between the ruined sinner and the Father, which causes Him to fall on his neck and kiss him; yet before the servants He takes him home in honour, with the best robe on, and the ring on his hand, etc.

We have to understand the depth of the love of Christ in meeting the sinner. This brings out the costliness of His love; but there is something besides this. When He loved the church before the world, it is as the Father's giving her glory, and taking delight in her. The love of our Lord Jesus is perfectly blessed, touching, and considerate towards us; there the heart's affections learn to delight in Him. I would now merely refer to one passage, Ephesians 5: 27, "that he might present unto himself a glorious church," etc. As God took Eve, and presented her to Adam, so the last Adam will present the church unto Himself. There will be all the divine delight in doing it. The church is called the Lamb's wife, because He suffered for her. It is impossible without suffering to bring out the fulness and savour of love.

271 The heavenly Jerusalem is shewn [in Rev. 21] to be really of divine source, "descending out of heaven, having the glory of God." When we think about sin, without reference to the glory of God, we come short of a right estimate of it. The moment we have tasted of the "glory of God," compared with this everything is sin. The blessing of the church must not come short of this glory. The Father has loved the church and given it to the Son. The bride is taken out of Christ (as shewn in Gen. 2 if not Psa. 139: 15, 16), and has the "glory of God." Man, having got the knowledge of good and evil, must either be miserable in using knowledge against God, or by faith rise above the evil as God is above it. Hence it is this which is the place of the church in union with Christ, and grace is wrought into glory. We see that "the glory of God did lighten it," and that the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it, not the Father. While God unfolds Himself in His various characters, in His wisdom, in different dispensations, the very place of the worship of the church is that which is the whole display of God's wisdom and power: "the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it." In Ephesians 3: 21 we read, "unto him be glory in the church, by Christ Jesus, throughout all ages, world without end." This seems to raise the church as the crown of all dispensations, set up as over, and the link of God with, all dispensations. The glory will then be His: "to him be glory in the church," etc., according to the power which worketh in us.

In revealing God there are three great characters in the dispensations: first, that of Almighty ; then of Jehovah; then that of Father. The apostle, in 2 Corinthians 6, speaking of the place of the church as being separate from the world, says, "wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, and I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty." This was the first character in which God manifested Himself in dispensation; but at this time God Almighty did not say, I am your Father. The very principle and essence of this present time is that God is revealed in the character of Father. Jehovah and Almighty are not the proper relations of God to us. When the glory comes, there will be the full perfection of everything: "The Lord God Almighty and the Lamb." The Lord God Almighty as concerns the glory, and the Lamb as having brought us into security through His sufferings, are united. For eternity, in chapter 21: 1-8, it is simply, "the glory of God did lighten it," etc. We have nothing about the Lamb after the millennium: the bride, the Lamb's wife, will be His helpmeet, as the minister of grace, and God is the Most High.

272 I would now turn to the question of Messiah's kingdom. There is a difference between the state of things in which there is a King reigning in righteousness, and "the new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness." If it dwells there, there is no need for rule. When there is a liability to evil, we want power to secure good. During the millennium there will be the King reigning in righteousness - not merely dominion in righteousness, but securing righteousness by power. I distinguish between the states of "dwelling" and "reigning." The time when God will be all in all will be analogous to that of paradise in its character; the millennial time, to that of Noah's power, though there will be a great deal of the Adamic power brought in. Noah, if he had been faithful to the power given him, would have had a great deal of the Adam blessing; but he failed entirely, and then failed family discipline. The character of millennial blessing on earth will be the security of righteousness by power. But when "God shall be all in all," the new Adamic character of Christ will be displayed over a new creation, and all evil will be done away: "the tabernacle of God shall be with men, and he will dwell with them; and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be their God." Therefore on the incarnation the heavenly host sounded, "Peace on earth, goodwill toward [or, in] men." But when the Lord Jesus rode into Jerusalem, the word was, "Peace in heaven." If Christ takes His place over earth and heaven, there must be peace between God and the people on the earth.

Then, as to the scriptural phrase "for ever," there are one or two points on which I would speak. I do not acquiesce in the alteration of that passage in Hebrews 10: "But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God." I believe it is right as we have it in some Bibles - the comma after "for sins," not after "for ever." It does not refer to the length of the time that He sits there, but to the fact that Jesus is not as those high priests who stand daily offering the same sacrifices, which can never take away sin, but that He has sat down, as the continuous evidence of the perfection of His sacrifice, that the believer might have always a purged conscience. This is the force of the passage, and not that He is perpetually in heaven.

273 I see distinctly, in regard to the saints as to Christ, that they shall reign for ever and ever. It is not said with Him for ever, but more generally as regards His reigning for ever. I see distinctly in Daniel 2: 44 the same thing presented as in the passages which have been quoted, namely, the merging of the human character into the divine perpetuity of the kingdom; not looking at the King in relation to the speciality of the kingdom as to the necessity of its continuance, but shewing the blessing of supremacy that belongs to Him as Lord. In regard to the quotation in Ezekiel, it must be taken in a modified sense, because it is about Israel, a mere question of generations in the land; "your children's children shall dwell in it for ever." Now the very elements - not the earth only, but the elements - are all to melt. The kingdom of the Lord God of Israel shall not be destroyed. They are but witnesses for an appointed time that Jehovah reigns.

I will now turn to 1 Corinthians 15. It does not refer to Messiah's kingdom down here. The kingdom that is to be given up refers to that spoken of in Psalm 8. Here is the question of all things being put under man's hand. When judgment comes, the Father (we read) judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son. Thus the Son has a sort of independent kingdom. In the Person of the Lord Jesus God has set man over the works of His hands. Is this tide in Christ now? Yes, and the church owns the tide, while the world does not; but if He were to take the power, He must exercise it in righteousness. In the sense spoken of we own Christ as reigning, but not as sitting on His own throne. Psalm 109 describes die rejection of the Lord, and His deep humiliation. In Psalm 110 Jehovah says to the Son, "Sit on my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool." He shall judge the quick and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom. His kingdom comes at His appearing. This is a question between man and God, not the question as to Messiah's kingdom. Does He deliver up the rule as man when He appears? Clearly not; but He must reign until His enemies be under His feet, till He has put down all rule and all authority and power. His enemies are not yet put under Him, though the Father has put all things under His feet in title now.

274 But you must recollect that Satan is to be let loose at the end of the millennium, and fire comes down from heaven, and devours those whom he deceives. If death, as has been said, will be used to destroy the enemies, still this proves that there must be enemies to be destroyed, and we must look to something afterwards to render death void; as to the saints, we know that it is rendered void. The apostle, in this chapter, drops anything but the resurrection of Christ and the saints. When all things shall be subdued, then the Son, as man, the Last Adam, shall be put in subjection at the end. It will not be then man governing the world, but man will be done with, and God (the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost) will be all in all. God shall wipe away all tears. Nothing about the Lamb; the mediatorial character will be then removed.

I separate entirely Messiah's kingdom from the bride, though both are most blessedly connected. His glory will shine upon the earth, and the nations will see the glory in us; we shall see it in the Lamb. Seeing Him as He is, we shall be made like Him. We shall have nothing to do with the destruction of the Beast; Christ will not be revealed as Prince of princes, but as the Lord from heaven. In the description of the Beast, in Isaiah 14, we have first his human love of power: then thou hast said, "I will ascend into heaven," etc. He takes every character of Christ, and asserts that he has it. The Son of man, who is in heaven and from heaven, comes down in power, and puts down this man, and people must then believe that Christ is King; Messiah's kingdom will not, in its full sense, be established then. The character of the rule of the Beast is that the pride and power of His kingdom proceeds from self, and God will shew man's will to be a horrible lie against His power, and prove the truth of that word, "by me kings rule"; but Antichrist cannot be touched till his iniquity is full, and he says, I will go up to heaven, I will be like the Most High; and, therefore, because sentence against an evil work is not speedily executed, the hearts of the sons of men are fully set in them to do evil.

I believe there will be a testimony of remission of sins preached in the name of Jesus, the instrument of the Holy Ghost to effect a penitence, an Elias ministry that will draw out the hearts of the remnant after Him, something similar to that described in the Song of Solomon; then, when they have looked on Him whom they have pierced, they will mourn because of Him. Whilst Antichrist rages, they are preserved. Israel is brought up through the wilderness, and they appoint themselves one head, and great shall be the day of Jezreel. In this David-reign of Christ He has also to subdue the enemies that are in the land; and after the Assyrian comes up and is destroyed, the indignation is over and will cease. Thus Christ is associated with Israel and begins to secure the earth, while the gospel of the kingdom goes out to the nations; after this the Son of man sits upon the throne of His glory, and judges the nations according to the manner in which they have treated His messengers. Messiah having thus established His kingdom, there is peace, and then the heathen know that Jehovah He is God.

275 I would here remark that all the nations mentioned in Genesis 10 are comprehended under the two powers, Gog and the Beast; and it is remarkable that the nations are now arranging themselves just according to the order which scripture describes, though I would not speak as the oracle of God as to their identification with present circumstances. The Lord may hold back His hand, but I believe it hastens greatly. In Isaiah 18 is described the land shadowing with wings, spreading its protection over other nations; indeed the whole chapter is a distinct account of what will happen to Israel at the time of its restoration. Many details are given elsewhere.

There is a little confusion sometimes as regards the instruments of power. The promise to the saints is that they shall reign with Christ as kings; but when Christ takes the earth, it will be as Prince of Judah. It is also written, "Know ye not that the saints shall judge the world?" We find the blessings of the world secured by righteousness and true holiness - heavenly rule. The saints may accompany Christ in glory when He comes to judgment, but His robe will be red, theirs white. Though the saints are with Him, they are the executors not of vengeance, but of grace that sustains all righteousness.

As to the third part of the question, let me say that these words, "differ essentially," must refer to the standing of the saints; for, as to the ground on which any man is a saint, there cannot be any difference. The development of the character of God does alter in different dispensations, but we know His character can never alter. For instance, take sanctity: God is known in this character, whether it be among the Jews, or in the church; and two cannot walk together except they are agreed. Fellowship may not have the same external form, but it must have been the same principle. The Lord Jesus Christ is "the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever," and the Spirit of Christ is the same. This is always the ground on which there is dealing on the conscience. "If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth." The principle is essentially the same, before the flood, after the flood, and at any time. Holding fast these things is very important. Certain things that we have learnt from God become necessary principles in all dispensations; but as to the character and form in which they are developed, they are different, save that this great principle is the same. Sin having come in, there must be grace, and there must be righteousness.

276 As to the difference of the saints' calling, therefore on the earth during the millennium, it will be quite different from that of the saints now on earth, for the obvious reason that the millennial dispensation, as regards the saints on earth, will be a dispensation of judgment. In one sense it was grace to the Jew, yea, even in paradise. There can be no dealing with the sinner except in grace; but the Jewish economy is not one of grace, but of the law. The law is of works, but grace is not. There never can be departure from the principle on which the soul can stand with God, but the economy of a special time is a different thing. The economy of the church is judgment within itself. The church consists of persons separated by internal sanctity from the rest of the world. Into the church's outward forms a person may enter, but the church is essentially an assembly of separated persons. The moment it is not, it ceases to be a church. It consists of those whom God has called out of the world. In the millennium it will not be so, inasmuch as the Lord Jesus will manifestly govern the world on another principle; until Satan is loosed again, there is no necessary manifestation of who is not of the world, and who is; but the character of the church is quite different.

When persons speak of an invisible church, it is merely the assertion of apostasy, for the Lord says of the church, "Ye are the light of the world." Now what is the good of an invisible light? "No man when he had lighted a candle," etc. (Luke 11: 33). I do not say that there are not invisible saints as individuals; but the term, "invisible church," conveys no other idea to my mind than that of apostasy, and that the church has ceased to be what the Lord set it to be - the light of the world. The church is to be a distinct, manifested, gathered body, while the world is under the dominion of Satan; and in this dispensation is that special manifestation of the church. The Lord gave Himself to gather together in one the children of God scattered abroad on the face of the earth. This oneness can only be maintained through the power and energy of the Holy Ghost. Wherever the Holy Ghost has been grieved, the church has ceased to fulfil in the world what it was sent for; though God's purposes cannot be altered. Then the church is not one, and the world does not believe that the Father has sent Jesus. The church will be displayed in the glory that has been given them, that by their being one the world may know that the Father has loved them as He loved Jesus. This will be known in the millennium. Then it will not be the Holy Ghost working secretly, as He does now, but the manifestation in the world of God's reign in righteousness.

277 The proper duty of the saints now is by secret association with Christ to withstand evil, that they may be fashioned in suffering and grace with Christ. There all the fine traits of fellowship with Christ are brought out, "the trial of your faith," etc. The vessel of earth being put into the furnace, it shines forth, when it comes out, with all that was in its Master's mind. In the millennium we shall shine as the sun in the kingdom of the Father, and the government be of the Son of man. A new nature is always necessary to fellowship with God. The man who is taught of God knows that his old nature is bad, learning by experience "that in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing." The knowledge of this principle I believe the Jewish believer had, and he had a new nature above the dispensation. If he could say, I delight in the law of God after the inner man, then he had a new nature and the Spirit of Christ, as the apostle says, though he might not get beyond the standing of the dispensation; but in the millennium it will not be merely that man born again will be a new creature, but the creation itself will be also new; Satan will not then be corrupting it by our lusts. Now the whole creation is subject to vanity, then it will not be so. Still, man will exist in nature, but the whole creation will not be actually subject to vanity. We are subject to vanity as to the fact of man's will in it, and the consequent dominion of Satan over it. When permitted, he could bring down a great wind on Job's house. When the Lord comes as the Last Adam, the saint shall be clear out of all present subjection to vanity - it will be gone, because Satan will be bound.

278 Through our fallen nature and lusts the creation is wholly under Satan's power - not that he can do a tittle more than he is permitted. The more blessed man is, and the more blessings he has by-and-by, the more will he enjoy God. It is not so now. I believe they will then have an enjoyment of natural happiness of which we can scarcely have any idea. God having stamped vanity on everything that is under the sun, whatever is sought as an object takes us away now from God. Happiness in the things of nature must therefore now be restrained, as the security of the man-slayer was in the city of refuge, though we have liberty through other hopes. There will be a vast difference between the position of the saints on earth and ours in this respect. The affections of their hearts can fully flow forth on everything around them. The happiness of the saints on earth will be in ministering fulness of joy and blessing through Christ to others: their joy will not be merely in being blessed as recipients, but in having the mind and joy of the blesser. Being the administrators of government, they will be the ministers of blessing. Then will be fulfilled that promise, "They shall not build, and another inhabit; they shall not plant, and another eat; for as the days of a tree are the days of my people, and mine elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands."

It will not be then, as now, "one sowing, and another reaping." They will not only not have to stir up their hearts to watchfulness against the flesh, having no temptations to resist, but, Christ then ruling over the world, men may lawfully enjoy everything that is in the world. When temptation comes, then those who have not faith will fail. No hypocrite could enjoy natural things unto God, but, the temptation not being there to draw out his evil, it remains unknown to him. "The man who anon with joy received the word" was not a hypocrite; but, when trial came because of the word having no root in himself, he is offended.

As to the fitting posture of the saints. This is a very solemn question; it takes the heart out of the things of knowledge to that which acts on the conscience. The Lord constantly speaks according to His claim of revelation, and not according to our knowledge of it. The Lord said to His disciples, "Whither I go ye know, and the way ye know. Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest, and how can we know the way?" The thing had been revealed, but he answers on unbelief. The measure of our apprehension of it must be according to our faith. The fitting posture of the saint is to have his mind completely in heaven, knowing that he is redeemed and made a priest to God, and that he shall reign over the earth. The things of the flesh cannot enter here; but it is quite another thing how far the body may hinder us. This throws us, day by day, on the Lord for strength in our inner man. While we can say, we are raised up together, and made to sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, in fact we are in an unredeemed body, waiting for the Lord from heaven. This is all I want. And what sets me to work now? The knowledge "that when he shall appear, I shall be like him, seeing him as he is." As the apostle says, his hope was not to be unclothed, but clothed upon; having the resurrection-life in his soul, he reached over everything that may come in between the present time and the coming of the Lord Jesus, when he should be clothed upon.

279 The apostle was morally right; he was not looking for death, but could say, "not that he would be unclothed." If he died, he would be happy, being always ready; but a special revelation was needed to tell Paul and Peter that they were to die. When the disciples were in sorrow because they had lost Jesus, they were told for their comfort that Jesus should so come, in like manner as they had seen Him go into heaven. And the Lord tells His disciples that "they should be glad, because he was going to the Father, and would come again and receive them unto himself." If the kingdom and glory are mine, what difference is it whether I have to put off this tabernacle, or not? It will be only waiting here or there. The crown of righteousness is laid up by the Lord, the righteous Judge, for all them that love His appearing. Right habits of thinking are formed by looking at the glory. A person's whole habit of thinking is often a lie of Satan. All knowledge that gives another set of thoughts, and a link of mental association with Jesus in glory, is very valuable. All these great facts, which upset all things here, say, "I am not a debtor to you, body." All the Lord's judgments are promises to the new man. If judgment did not come, evil would be perpetual. It is deliverance to the saint. The promise of the Lord may shake something on which your heart is set; if this is broken by the hand of the Lord in chastening even, there will be blessing and benefit; but it is more blessed to be separated in obedience by the word of the Lord.

280 The posture of the Thessalonian church was that of suffering, and looking for rest from that suffering; this is the proper posture of the saints: not wanting to be terrified by the prospect of suffering, but needing the prospect of something to relieve them from the suffering they are in; 2 Thess. 1: 6, 7. This they have in the coming of the Lord Jesus.

Let us then exhort one another, and so much the more as we see the day approaching. When you see these things, do not be disturbed, look up, do not look down, for your redemption draweth nigh. I do not deny that dark circumstances are coming; but may this cause us only to look up like Stephen, and see the glory that is also coming! This would separate us from all that is contrary to the purity, holiness, and love of the Lord Jesus. We much want this separateness. We should look at ourselves in thorough and deep humiliation, seeing how divided and scattered and weak the church of God is; Isa. 22: 9-14. We go and philosophise about principles; but the Lord tells us that we are but making a ditch. There is a great deal of planning and wisdom and order - a great many sacrifices - to make up the ditch; "but there is not a looking unto the maker thereof, nor having respect unto him that fashioned it long ago." That is what we want. As regards our moral condition, and as regards results, we have to be looking for the Son from heaven. May the Lord keep us firm, looking unto Him that fashioned the church long ago.

Some Observations on the Scripture Lessons of the Board of Education

J. N. Darby.

<32014E> 281

{A letter intended to have been addressed to a periodical publication, by J. N. Darby. Dublin: R. M. Tims, Grafton Street, 1832.}

Sir,

If we set his relationship for God apart (and if they on whom the education of the country is made to depend are to be trusted, we want no God, or at least can do better than He), I believe it is a just definition of man that he is a laughing animal; for there are some things, speaking as a man, essentially ridiculous; and this, sir, is one of them. Of course you know that I mean the so-called scripture lessons of the Board - the new authorised version of the lovers of education for the instruction of the poor Irish - a Board that honestly desires to provide the well-being of the conductors of schools. How kind and considerate!

But, sir, this is not all. Mr. Carlile, I suppose, knows Hebrew, and this is a translation. Nothing else would answer the purpose - "meet the exigency of the case" - cut the Gordian knot that tied the destinies of just education, but that some one should sit down and make a new translation of the Bible, or at least such parts of it as were fit to be translated; and here it is with notes, critical, explanatory, and practical. I trust, sir, you will give due publicity to this important fact, for the benefit of others as well as the poor Irish children, that the translator knows Hebrew. He does know what Eden means, and he does not exactly know what Shaphan means; but, for the purpose of making it more clearly intelligible to the rising generation, he proposed to call it Shaphan; neither Coney nor Ischin, nor Daman - Israel, which it is called when the unknown animal is known, answering the purpose at least for Irish children: so we have given the original Hebrew.

As for Eden, very intelligible it would be to say, The children of pleasure which were in Thelassar; or Hasan, or Camah, and pleasure, the merchants of Sheba, and, or planted a garden in pleasure. However, the translator says it may be rendered either as a proper name, or as an epithet. And the translator knows Hebrew - knows Hebrew! knows enough of that, and everything else too, to set at rest all the difficult questions which have hindered Irish education time out of mind, and give just the quantum of scripture which will satisfy Papists and Protestants, Presbyterians, Arians and Socinians, and above all himself (God, sir, we must remember, is put out of question), with just the right sense and nobody to dispute it. O happy ages, that we should have one such man! Nothing wanted and nothing too much - a little bit of David's piety, and that, of course, rightly applied and understood; and a little bit of his own, which others may apply and understand as they like - a little of St. Paul's commentary with his to explain it; and a little bit of his own without anybody to explain it at all; and those who shall not worship the golden image, set up, as it is, by these monarchs of education, with the trumpet of their own unanimous recommendation! A golden head of wickedness they are. Happy age! that we should have one such man to be the common instrument of so noble an oligarchy in enlightening the happy children of this once unhappy land; that Sabellians, and Papists, and Socinians, and doctors, should find one to make a new translation of the scriptures of God, which should satisfy them all, and enlighten the Irish in Hebrew, and the world as to his attainments. How interesting to see the poor little Irish children considering what Zaphnath-paaneah meant in the Egyptian language upon the authority of St. Jerome, and comparing it with what others think, and the habits of the Chinese language; or studying the distinction between doctors and Heliopolis without knowing what others think at all! But then indeed the translator knows all this, though what all this is is hard to tell.

282 There is one thing indeed I had forgotten, that the Board honestly desires to provide the well-being of the conductors of schools. Why the translator must have been aiming at the literary education of the priests - cramming them, I suppose, to appear in the new schools; and this is an instance of "the Board's" friendship and affection for them. Conceive, sir, I pray you, the thought that would sparkle in the mind of a poor little garcoon (after an account that lambs are supposed to signify some unknown coin, though the translator and the commissioners call them lambs) at these ominous letters, the LXX, and that coupled with such a rapid accumulation of uncouth names, Vulgate (pity we had not St. Jerome again and his prologus galeatus too about the Maccabees and some other books - I wonder will they appear in the new translation: why not? It is only a history framed without the slightest influence from any peculiar view of Christianity), and ancient versions. However, in the midst of these wonders, he has this comfort, that, though last not least, the new translation leads him to the conclusion, which, with his ability to estimate an unknown Hebrew word, will be particularly satisfactory - that lambs mean an unknown coin. O fortunati nimium sua si bona norint Agricolae! More might be added, sir, to illustrate the mass of learning which has been accumulated in the new translation, as that Syrian means Aramite, for the use of schools.

283 But I have done with the translator now, sir. Of all the egregious instances of self-confident flippancy, this provision of Hebrew annotations for the benefit of the Irish children is the most ridiculous. We shall see just now its evil. But there is one serious comfort in it; the translator was even thought to be a Christian, and it gives one hope that this may yet be true, and that it is but a fall, a case when Christians may yet pray for him. It sets beyond all doubt what the writer has never doubted - that it was the snare laid for a man who felt dissatisfied with his situation as inadequate to what he supposed to be his powers, and was led to embrace one which seemed to give him the consequence to which he was entitled. We may trust he may feel the evil honour he has received, and that the praise of God is better than the feeling of self-consequence of ungodly men. I said, sir, I had done with the translator. With the Commissioners I must deal seriously; for the weakness of self-confidence is a different thing from iniquity of principle and the mischief flowing from it.*

{*It were easy to shew the baseness - infidelity is always base - of the cringing fawning language of this preface on the worst pride of evil; how while everything has been done to please Popery in the work (and they were right in giving up all thoughts of pleasing Protestants. They gave up that when they gave up the scriptures), the scriptures with them must be aut Caesar aut nullus, for they fear God; yes, the opposition of the priests - always wise in their own generation - has been deprecated, even for this wretched production, with the most servile subserviency. But it was alike unprofitable and unnecessary to degrade the Board lower than it is in the eyes of every good and upright and God-fearing man. It was of more importance to shew the use which Satan proposed to make of this, in doing evil in the country, in the public renunciation by Protestants of the fear of God. For example, the cheerfully leaving to instructors the use of the sacred volume; the not imposing the lessons, but leaving them to the willing adoption of the conductors, whose well-being the Board honestly desires to promote; all this is an ill-concealed profession of leaving everything to the priests, who might themselves, as we know, kick, if anything were done which touched their absolute authority, in spite of the government, while it would blind the feelings of infidels. But, I say, it was of more importance to notice the effect of this, where this subservience was leading us, than merely take notice of the fact, for who could expect to bring a clean thing out of an unclean? The fear of God takes away the fear of man; but infidelity always makes a man a slave of the passions and baseness of others; "he that committeth sin is the servant of sin," and of course must do the work of his master. But we may warn others from the effects.}

284 We must bear in mind, for I, sir, at least shall never let it out of my mind, that the system has been introduced in lieu of one in which the scriptures were read, whether Douay or Protestant version - that this was the vital defect of the system, and that because it was opposed to the principles of the Roman Catholic religion. That is, sir: - God in His wisdom had been pleased (for the mere right of man is the feeblest side of the question) to write a book for the instruction of His creatures for men. Certain men have stepped in and said, Men shall not read it; virtually alleging either the incompetency of God to do it fitly, or His want of authority to do it at all; and rising up in effect to say, that what God had sent, the message of His love and wisdom and mercy, is unfit for man, or at any rate man shall not have it. This is the blasphemy of a system with which we, as Christians, have to contend - the blasphemy of prohibiting, not man, sir, to read, but God to send to His creatures the message of His own will in His own way.

The existing government, of which these commissioners are the instruments, have acquiesced in this. The principles of the Roman Catholic religion are in this to be acquiesced in. God is to be held not to be so entitled; and to hold that He is, renders any system, however otherwise innocent, vitally defective. To the maintenance of these principles the commissioners have set their hands, and that the devil may degrade, as far as possible, any who have any pretensions to Christianity, one becomes the instrument of producing a book which is to take the place - no, that it can never do, but be instead - of the scriptures: which alters them, because they will not do as they are. People may reason and tell falsehoods in prefaces. The scriptures are not used or allowed in the schools, and these lessons are; that is, they are instead of them. Men may talk, in miserable dishonesty, about introduction to the scriptures: are the scriptures allowed to be in the schools? Are they not excluded, and these brought in, because they are so excluded? I would rather far, sir, meet an honest opposer of God's word, than a disingenuous excuse for an act, which is to support the worst and most comprehensive blasphemy against God's authority which can be till Antichrist is revealed - the denial of God's right to speak to every one His will as He has thought fit.

285 I do not altogether accuse the translator of this disingenuity. He has hired himself to a citizen of that country, and they have sent him into the fields to feed swine. But, sir, in attempting to colour the effect, we have the real character of the work admitted. Then, when they get to a certain point of the devil's delusions, they are unconscious often that their excuses are their condemnation. "No passage has been either introduced or omitted under the influence of any peculiar view of Christianity, doctrinal or practical." That is, the selections have been made without the slightest reference to the truths which they contain. What could the devil himself wish more than to divest the scriptures of those powers of truth which apply themselves to the heart of man, and so turn them into a history, or vague and powerless exhibition of facts, without any purpose, unless to tell us what Shaphans were!

God has always a purpose, and a well-ordered purpose, in all He writes: this doubtless man would avoid. He would cull and pick and choose, and think it wisdom, with professed indifference to the purpose of God. Has Christianity no view of its own? Has God no peculiar view of man, in respect of which He has selected those things from his history, in which the character of His dealings has been manifested, and recorded as such, for those on whom the ends of the world are come? Yes, sir, but these are offensive to man, and God's selection will not do. A Mr. Carlile, or an enemy to God and man, one whom he believes to be the servant of Satan, must come and make selections, in which he must be either wiser than God in doing it, or else do it in order to divest it of all the power and point for the purpose of which God had so selected and arranged it. Away with the disgusting blasphemies! Such must be the result, sir. If I have the wisdom of God, I must have given it just as God gave it; if I have not, I must break in, in ignorance, upon the very purposes and the very connection which God has purposely, in His divine and active and considerate wisdom, therein established. But here, sir, it is made a boast that the influence of any peculiar view of Christianity has been excluded, that is, any view at all: for when there are many, which is in this sentence assumed, each must be peculiar. But they must have introduced the extracts with some view, or they could make no selection. They have a view, but a view which purposely excludes every object with which God caused it to be written.

286 But, sir, the point is, that God has a view, and has given scripture with this view. It is God's select history of the world, and it is from this that the enemy of God recoils. If it be a matter of indifference which of two views of Christianity I adopt, it is perfectly clear that both are immaterial. And this is the form which infidelity is now assuming, and this is the form in which it is expressed in this selection. The next thing is, sir, that it is a comment; and a comment cannot be made without any peculiar view. If I apply one scripture to another, I affirm at once its sense. For example, I think many of the quotations from the new translation remarkably calculated to mislead, as affirming that to be their application to which they allude merely, having some other object in view, or which is merely the occasion of much further testimony. They have been taken out of the associations in which God has placed them, and set in those in which these infidels have placed them, without the opportunity of seeing or comparing them with those in which they really stand. And observe, sir, it is done with purpose. They are to learn the use of the sacred history from this. So that it is an authorised comment giving the sense and use of what they read; giving it as a poor wretched man has taken it from a few parts, perhaps misapplied, of God's vast and all-comprehensive word. Wretched compiler! I pity the degradation to which he has been brought. So that while they have not been introduced or omitted under the influence of any peculiar view of Christianity they do teach the use of the sacred history, which has therefore in fact no peculiar view at all, doctrinal or practical. This notion of peculiar view is very plausible with the infidelity of the present day, as it hates any peculiar view which will give that energy of truth which will rescue from the domination of Antichrist. Give all the scriptures, and we want none, for God will give His own. But a selection without a peculiar view is nonsense, save in the pointed deprival of scripture of all power of truth; and a selecting, for other reasons besides the truth which it contains, must turn the very word of God itself into a broken cistern which holds no water: the last form of infidelity, the essence of it in those days, short of open rebellion against the Lamb, and the preparation of men for it. In a word, it amounts to an assertion that we may learn the use of the sacred history, its piety, and its doctrines too, without receiving any truth by virtue of which blasphemies against that truth should not be indifferent to us.

287 The divinity of Christ is a peculiarity with a Socinian. The distinction of persons is a peculiarity with a Sabellian. The unity of Christ's mediatorship and justification by faith, and the final sufficiency of Christ's one sacrifice, are peculiarities with the abettors of Popery; and I must divest myself of the consciousness of the existence of these truths, before I can select from scripture for the instruction of the young. The moment you select, you become a teacher. This book proves it. You must select for some reason. Give all the scriptures, and let them teach, and God's blessing will follow. But as a selector you are a teacher - a responsible teacher; and the point here selected to be taught is, that you may learn the use of the sacred history in total indifference to all the truths it contains; for a selection can be made from which its use can be learned where these truths have not been allowed to exercise the slightest influence on the introduction or omission of any one passage in it. In a word, not merely is the scripture thus excluded, but that is introduced from which children are to learn its use, independent of and to the exclusion of the truths which it contains. And the real way we are taught to read it profitably is to read it apart, and as man shall select it too, from the influence of those truths; in a word, to turn God out of His own word.

The peculiar truths of the Bible, sir, are the weapons of God's power over the heart of man. Take these out of the scriptures, and the salt has lost its savour, and wherewith shall it be salted? What is the history of Abraham to me, but that he was the friend of God, that his very name reminds me that he is the father of all them that believe, that have the faith of that Abraham who believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness; and that it was written not for his sake only, but for us also to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on Him who raised up from the dead our Lord Jesus Christ, who was delivered for our offences and raised again for our justification. But the selection must be made without the influence of any of these things. The ties by which God has linked Himself with the wants, the necessities, and the sorrows of His creatures that He might deliver them out of them, developed in dispensations unfolding and unfolded by the glory of His Son Jesus, the Word made flesh, must be broken, defaced. Anything which under divine grace could raise the energies, the feelings, and the thoughts of man, by the sympathies of God, and a love which provided objects such as nought but grace could give to hope through a freely wrought redemption, ending in the glory of Him who established it - all must be concealed. It is a peculiar view of Christianity; and the selection must be compiled from a book which contains it all fresh from God's own hand, and fraught with the tender character of God's own wisdom; and the child must read (without permission to wander into fresher pastures of liberty under the security of the good Shepherd) with this only care, that their influence be utterly excluded. Such, sir, is the professed object and principle of this new translation. As far as anything of scripture goes, we are to be delivered up to "the blighting influences of a cold and heartless scepticism, which, whilst planting nothing in the mind, can produce nothing but the extinction of its best hopes and efforts."

288 But, sir, there is a remedy proposed. I know not, sir, why it is, but I am not yet quite used to the iniquity of these days. I never doubted the infidelity on which the whole of the new system of education was based, but the unblushing effrontery with which it is carried on in this preface (while it cannot rouse my indignation - for these men are too bad for me to feel indignant about - while I doubt not they are wise in their generation in it), so far amazes me as exhibiting the extent to which Satan reckons on the very form of principle being gone. There is a remedy proposed for the professed emptiness of all scriptural truth and principle by which this new translation is characterised. "To the religious instructors of the children they cheerfully leave, in communicating that instruction, the use of the sacred volume itself as containing those doctrines and precepts, a knowledge of which must lie at the foundation of all true religion."

The first thing which I may remark here, sir, is the full confirmation of what I have previously said as to the exclusion of all scripture principles from that which has been substituted for the scriptures in the instruction of the children. For it is to another source here described they are left for the acquirement "of those doctrines and precepts, a knowledge of which must lie at the foundation of all true religion." That then which is given in the school, as instead of the scriptures, is not merely free from peculiar views of Christianity, but does not contain those doctrines and precepts, a knowledge of which must lie at the foundation of all true religion. For these they are referred somewhere else. Does it contain what constitutes the superstructure first? I suppose not. What then? Nothing; and it is from that which thus confessedly contains nothing that the use of the sacred history is to be learned. And it is such a compilation which is an introduction to the sacred volume, and which is to lead to a more general and more profitable perusal of the word of God.

289 But we have here, sir, honestly afforded us what is really done, and the gross dishonour done to scripture, and the disgraceful character which is really meant to be by these lessons associated with it in the minds of the children, just dawning into thought. But it is ever meant that the poor children have the opportunity of receiving their impressions of scripture from scripture itself? Far from it, sir. These things, such as they are, are an introduction to scripture; but where is the scripture they are to be introduced to? Recognised in the schools? Oh no! Excluded from them, by way, I suppose, of introducing them to it, making them thirst after forbidden fruit, while the selection is left empty of the doctrines and precepts which lie at the foundation of all true religion, in order to teach them what they are to thirst after; but where are the scriptures they are to be introduced to? They cheerfully leave the use of the sacred volume - to whom? to "the religious instructors of the children!" No, sir, the children must never have them. The rich may, because they will; instructors may, of what sort God knows - the commissioners are upon friendly and affectionate terms with them; but the poor, sir, the poor children, are never to have them. It is not to their well-being the commissioners are looking. Well, indeed, they wrote their own judgment when they said, "They were honestly desirous to promote the well-being of the conductors"; for if ever there was anything which marked their heartless and base apathy, as to the poor children, it is this book; indeed as far as priests and infidels go, their honest desire, if honest it can be called, is to promote the well-being of the conductors.

290 And is it really so, sir? Does Dr. Whately - I cannot bring myself to call him Archbishop of Dublin - does Mr. Carlile - I sorrow when I think - does Dr. Sadleir, cheerfully leave the use of the sacred volume to priests to instruct children out of? Do they take away the scriptures out of their hands, and cheerfully leave them to the priests for their instruction? Am I right, sir, in reading that "the use of the sacred volume is left to the instructors"! That it does not enter into the contemplation of these persons, that the children should ever see the book, but that they cheerfully leave its use to others to instruct them as they see fit out of it? This is such a gratuitous profession of apostasy of principle, such a profession of heartless disregard for the interests, nay the rights, in the sight of God, of the poor children, that (save as an evidence, as I said before, Satan was exhibiting how far he reckoned upon the destruction of the form of principle) it would be utterly unintelligible. They might have left it in the dark; they might, however heartless and unchristian, have said, They can get Bibles for themselves if they like it; but to shew that they positively dissociated the children and any use of the scriptures, they leave it to the use of their instructors, and cheerfully too!

Oh! sir, if I were not used to these things, if I were not accustomed to evil, I could weep - I could weep for the church (oh! how fallen) whose leading characters are identified with such a system. But it is not to a haughty enemy I should tell my sorrows. The path of faith lies difficult but clear. But, sir, while they speak of a system to associate children without peculiarities, the whole system is in itself the infidel development of popery. The children were associated on the principle of reading the scriptures - a strong broad principle in which, God being sought, His views of Christianity, and His authority were recognised; for the subjection to His word was the recognition of His authority. Here the children are given such parts of scripture as man chooses to select, as the authority of man - that is a fact - thinks fitting, and in such connections as man thinks fitting; and the use of the sacred volume itself is left to the instructors.

Why talk of different denominations being brought together? This is precisely Popery. The system is Popery. I care not now as to the principle (however I might in effect) whether the instructors are ministers or priests: the children are not given the scriptures, but delivered up to men, to whom the use of those scriptures is left for their instruction in the doctrines, precepts, and glories of Christianity. There is no other principle recognised in this statement. If you wish to exist, if you wish the principles of God (the principles on which and with which God has blessed you) to exist, arouse yourselves, ministers, Christians, you that fear God. Talk not of parliaments and petitions, but arouse the minds of the people affected by these things. Testify about them to the people whose children would be sent to these schools of Satan, whose only dealing with scripture is to extract all the virtue from it, that the last instrument of God to rescue man may lose its reclaiming power. A mutilated scripture! (surely shall God's judgments come upon them!) from which that which is peculiar in Christianity has been excluded, that the comments of men to explain the nothings that are left may be introduced to them, their wisdom, and beguile the simple.

291 All that is valuable in scripture is peculiar, for it is a revelation, a revelation of that which is the supreme actings of God's love, whose thoughts are not as our thoughts, but as far above them as the heavens are higher than the earth. All that is the mere fruit of God's will, all that is the object of faith, must by virtue of its existence be peculiar both from what it is, and from being the object of revelation. Poor ruined lost man wants what is peculiar, or he is lost for ever: everything that is not is but part of his ruin; all else is blessedly peculiar. By this as the subject of revelation man is subjected to God, for he receives it on the authority of God's word. It is the obedience of faith. Hence the two great points, the presenting the contents of scripture (the great peculiar facts and truths as such in their reclaiming power), and the authority on which we receive them; so that on the one hand we might be certified that the love contained in them was God's love indeed; and on the other, that we might be subjected to His authority; in a word, that our faith and hope might be in God.

In contending against scripture, Popery covertly, and infidelity openly, deprive us of both these. And so do these commissioners. The authority and instruction of man is substituted for God's, and the lessons are framed upon the principle, that nothing should be introduced or admitted from any peculiar view of Christianity. But this is not all, sir. They positively teach none. Here is that which is given of scripture to the children in the school - that which it affords suitable to them. Here are the lessons which they can learn out of it. But they are taught by the arrangement of their schools that these cannot teach them the doctrines and precepts, the knowledge of which must lie at the foundation of all true religion. They must go to instructors - to men - for that. Such is the direct conclusion from the arrangement, that which is meant upon the face of it, and indeed so stated in this preface, the use of the Bible being left in it to the instructors. This is a positive profession of the worst form in which Popery arrays itself on this subject. If, sir, the publication of this preface shews how completely infidelity prevails, that the contrary feeling does not even arouse the professors of it to any guardedness in its expression, we may at least feel thankful that those whose eyes have not been closed by its delusions should receive a warning from its openness as to the position they are placed in. But I cannot help asking what will the clergy do as to the archbishop, who cheerfully leaves the use of the sacred volume to the popish instructors of the children? Is there any integrity left?

292 But I must turn briefly to a few details as to the volume itself. All that is objectionable it would be endless to notice. In the first place, What is the effect of the existence of such a book? Two translations were in existence. One which Christians in this country put forward as substantially containing the words of eternal life, and for which they appeared in verification of the things which they brought forward to those whom they believed to be in darkness as of the love and mercies of God Himself, concerning their everlasting peace. But there was also another in use among a large body of those amongst whom they laboured as witnesses for the word and love and truth of God, or at least recognised by them as more peculiarly their own Testament. But on comparison of these they were found to be so similar as to give credit to the version which they had been taught to consider as heretical, and very commonly the work of Satan himself; and to discredit those who had attempted to invalidate its authority as a bad book, and thereby keep them in darkness; whereas it was now found to be so much accordant with their own, and, what was more important, to substantiate all the truths by which those who laboured among them as Christians sought to deliver them from their darkness into the light of God's own truth. And thus, under the circumstances of the case, that which was in itself an evil became in effect, in many instances, the instrument of God.

293 But what is the effect of this new translation but to declare that neither the one nor the other of them was a sufficiently correct representation of the scriptures to be used in the ordinary instruction of children in the schools? A portion is taken from one here, and from the other there, while both are frequently made to yield to the fancies of the new translator, who can validate the one here, and invalidate the other there, or often reject, and whose authority therefore is paramount to both. Nothing can exceed the malignancy of thus unsettling the authority of the only sources from which the peasantry of Ireland drew their knowledge of truth, and to which alone they could refer as corrective of errors, or by which whey might know the certainty of those things which have been taught by the Lord and His apostles. It is precisely the point at which Popery had been aiming all through. Thus far, then, the direct object of this work is to deprive the peasant entirely of the authority of scripture in any reference he may make for truth, by virtue of that in which he is instructed from infancy, under the authority of those to whom that instruction is entrusted, in which Protestants themselves have acquiesced! And if he be indeed led to scripture, as the preface states, he is led to a discredited version, for which he has now no substitute; for the other is alike invalidated, and the unhappy man is left in all the uncertainty as to his best hopes, in which it is the delight of infidelity to plunge him. And can we be surprised, if we know anything of human nature, and especially of the habits of those to whom this work is addressed, if the authority here put forward shall effectually invalidate their confidence in scripture?

And thus for the sake of a paltry selection for the use of schools, from which the truths of scripture are excluded, and to minister to the vanity of one man, all the existing translations are declared worthless, all the corrective sources of truth are, as far as these Commissioners are able to do it, at one blow annihilated for the whole unlettered population of the country. Here is a work coming with the authority of Government. The Commissioners of Education; two archbishops, and they both of one place; a doctor of divinity, who is one of the educators of ministers themselves; and a dissenter who has a great deal of divinity without being a doctor at all (besides dukes, and remembrancers, and lawyers) agreeing not only to reject the scriptures, but in what they did admit of them, to reject both the existing translations; and this, not even preferring any other, but that in fact and representation of the mind of God it was so imperfect and so uncertain that the opinion of a single man was sufficient to subvert it. Nevertheless, the authority of these Commissioners is pledged to this: not only that this is truth, but "truth recorded under the influence of inspiration." Whatever previous translations may have been, this the child is given to know is a record "under the influence of inspiration."

294 And thus again, further, we have practically the authority of man made available for what is truth, and what is recorded under the influence of inspiration. The scriptures they had certainly were not; for the translator is sufficient authority to alter them, but on the authority of Dr. Whately, Dr. Murray, etc., the children may receive this, and this much, as recorded under the influence of inspiration, and therefore trust in it; and therefore, observe, not trust in either of the existing translations, for if this be, they are not. But this is not all: much is added and mixed up with the extracts which is not scripture. I shall be told that usually this is printed in different type. Why usually? But in point of fact they very constantly are not so printed. And can we be surprised if, with the authority there is for this work amongst the people, such a radiance of light and authority sanctioning its statements, a mere mask such as this be lost sight of by a child?

And not only are large portions given with only this discrimination, but even a note appended upon a point of translation, so that the distinction between what is scripture and what is not (some of the abstracts being printed in smaller type) is made as indeterminate and various as possible: but the whole, observe, given to be received as conveying the history upon the authority of man. It is quite manifest that, while what is scripture is made to rest on the authority of man, the whole would be received by the children at school as one book with equal authority, as coming from the men from whom the authentication of the scripture itself came: if there were any difference, the notes being looked upon, filled as they are with a smattering of learning, as the most important, and freshest from the authority itself, of the whole; for we must observe that this further principle of Popery has been secured in this selection, namely, that the scripture is not intelligible without notes. I am not conscious of a single principle between God and Popery (for that is the true light to see it in), which has not been carefully secured on the side of Popery, with the acquiescence of Protestants, by this little but most important tract.

295 Extracts under the influence of inspiration, as man will have it, abstracts, headings, and notes; they are all, moreover, presented to the child as scripture lessons; and this, sir, you must observe, is no augmentative effort, in the course of which its real character may be brought to light, but the habituation of the mind from childhood to these feelings and thoughts, by Protestants and Roman Catholics both, and the practical obliteration of every point which characterised Protestant truth and the authority and certainty of the word of God. Besides this, sir, care has been taken to separate one part of scripture from another; so that, such as it is, it should not be received in continuity and associations in which God has placed it, but in those into which man should draw it; and this, sir, instead of the healthful and refreshing streams of God's word.

In a word (while the testimony of God has been impugned in its authority, deprived of its authenticity, but presented ordinarily to the poor, and all its truth abstracted as here given, so that irreparable mischief has been done to all) care is taken that the poor little Roman Catholic shall not see the light, the Protestant is ensnared by the wicked and lying presence of Scripture Lessons. I would call them Commissioners' Lessons that people may know and note the real baseness of their origin, that they come from a body the majority of whom deny the faith of God, as all are unworthy of the confidence of men. Let scripture be given in the full current of its own blessed truth, and it will not only refresh those that indeed drink of its waters, and carry comfort and fertility all around to the dwellers on its banks where we perhaps can trace no immediate communication of its life-giving power, but, if the evil of man should be thrown upon it, carry it all down till it is lost in that ocean from which it took its source; and all shall still drink of its streams in abiding freshness and unchanged purity. But if we will be turning it into the reservoir which our pride has made for itself, the petty pools which may seem indeed great works for man, not only shall we lose the blessing, sir, but mound upon mound may be raised to stem the evil of its perverted power, and alas! in vain. It will surely break all through, and lay all below in one wide scene of stagnant desolation and corruption, which none shall inherit, and none shall stay; but the cormorant and bittern shall possess it, the wild beast of the desert, and the wild beast of the island. Evil shall reign there; and he who would then seek to remedy it shall but lose himself in the deadly evil and malignancy of the whole scene around, the seat and witness of the power of the enemy and of the wrath of God.

296 Such, sir, will be the sure result of an effort to make communion between that which God has utterly separated by the very existence of the stream of His living word. It shall prove the desolation of infidelity and wickedness over both. No person can estimate the mischief which the successful use of these falsely called Scripture Lessons would work. It is the most deliberate triumph of papal infidelity which has yet been achieved. This has been put out as a trial. The man, sir, who voluntarily gives up one sentence of scripture breaks his responsibility to God and gives up all. He gives up its authority, and then all is given up. He has given up the great point of allegiance to God. But in point of fact, I challenge Dr. Whately, Dr. Sadlier, and Mr. Carlile, to shew one single point on the scriptural question between Protestants and Roman Catholics, which has not been given up to the Roman Catholics by the publication we are considering. I challenge them to shew a single point yielded by the Roman Catholics, and a single one not yielded by themselves. And, Protestants, remember, this is a point of allegiance to God; and God will judge by the public acts of the body, and will take the acts of its leading individuals as the act for which all are responsible. For how came it to be done, if it was only the act of an individual? These things will be taken by God, and are, as representations of the state of the body. No church ever fell by evil from without; but if it give up its allegiance to God, why should God preserve it?

If Protestants looked upon Dr. Whately, Dr. Sadlier, and the like, as mere common blasphemers of God's word, and with much more responsibility than the Roman Catholics, because they say "we see," and therefore their sin remaineth, could these acts of their take any effect? Clearly not. If, on the other hand, I am told the nominal place of authority in which Dr. Whately is set makes it wrong so to deal with them - makes it necessary to own them, then, I say, the church of Ireland is gone, its judgment is pronounced, the sign of judgment is on it from God; for by virtue of its very structure, by the obligations it is under, it is obliged to allow of evil, of the denial by its authorities of the principles on which it was founded, as acknowledged by God. The Protestant church exists by virtue of the acknowledgment of the word of God. This word has been denied by its public authority, and the inhabitants of the country cheerfully left for the instruction of popish priests. The church of Ireland either can or cannot reject this apostasy, from the public sanction which it now receives within its bosom. If it can and does not, its guilt will be apparent. If it cannot, then, I say, God is exhibiting the circumstances which will justify His proximate judgment. It has ceased to be available for the purpose of His public testimony in the land, the very object for which it had its position. The hand of God is upon it. He may bless its ministers individually; but the authority of the system may be used for the purpose of denying the principles on which God founded it. It has been so used, and then comes judgment.

297 If Dr. Whately must be recognised, after this book and its preface have gone forth, in the place of authority in what God heretofore set as the Protestant church, the judgment of God must be recognised also by the church to which he belongs, as impending on it. I repeat it, a shameful and vital dishonour has been done to God by the Protestant church, as to the very principle for the maintenance of which God instituted and owned it. If it cannot reject and repudiate it, then, I say, it stands with the public acknowledgment, that it is absolutely incompetent to maintain this position; nay, that it is competent for one holding its authority to be joined with Papists and Socinians in denying this principle: and for what is God to own it any longer? Is Protestantism to be sustained when it allows of the far worst part of Popery? and for what? Those concerned may slight the question, but this will only prove the truth of the result. We shall see how it will be in fact. Which is worst, the Roman Catholic who instructs, or the Protestant teacher or professed teacher who cheerfully leaves the instruction to them, and the children, of course, to their instruction, taking care only that they shall not have the scriptures? Judge ye. I know how God judges; and if the Protestant ministers do not exert themselves, they shall have a share of the judgments that must follow.

298 To secure the better acquiescence in the authority of this tract, the translator in the preface tells us that the extracts are a literal translation from the original; but, in the unhappy blindness which often accompanies the desertion of God's word in seeking another object, he has contradicted himself in the same pages: "The translation has been made by a comparison of the Authorised and Douay versions with the original." Now every one knows, sir, that the Douay is not, and does not profess to be made from the original at all, but from the Vulgate; and, truly, forming a text by the comparison of this and another translation with the original is not translating at all, certainly not literally from the original. And there are passages taken from the Douay, and important ones too, where is little or no authority for positive variations from the original save that of the Vulgate itself. It may be very well to set upon the front of the statement that it is a literal translation of the original. It was thus Mr. Belsham exerted himself. But it is too bad to find in the same page that it is a comparison of the translation of a translation with another translation which we have after all; and that, in fact, this authority is knuckled to in many instances. Will anybody believe that planting a garden from "the beginning" in Eden was introduced instead of eastward,* because it was more literal? In "Eden" he was forced to retain the authorised translation for sense's sake, though the Douay and Vulgate translate it otherwise; but then he was to give no advantage to either side: so Mikkedem must be translated "from the beginning," though he confesses the Hebrew word has both senses, and the place is confessedly to the eastward. But he was not satisfied with putting "in Eden," but he must assert the integrity of the Douay, "pleasure," in a note, the assertion of which would make nonsense of this and other places if "translated literally," and which is directly negatived by the point as far as they go. But this, sir, is comparatively an immaterial instance, save as to the wickedness of unsettling all the certainty of scripture in the minds of man.

{*I doubt myself that Mikkedem is ever used in the sense here given to it. It is used for "of old."}

We may pass to others. The Second Man from heaven, heavenly; here we have in a note, or the Lord from heaven. Now, sir, this is no question of translation at all. If the compiler translates "heavenly," he does so by admitting a different reading, which, though probable, is not received in the original by any. But it is in the Douay: and here the Douay has not merely its own value as a witness, but its conventional value as one of the things to be compared with. Therefore, in spite of the original, we have the Douay version; and indeed I have not stated this fully, for although several manuscripts exclude the term "Lord," the "heavenly" has scarce any support at all. This is pure concession to the Douay and Vulgate.

299 In the same lesson we have the note to the Douay version, of which so much has been heard; that the sense is the same, whether we read it according to "the original" "it," that is, Jesus Christ, or "she," the woman. What do people mean by the sense being the same, "for," etc.? Do the Commissioners think the sense is the same? No, sir, the children must be troubled with the intricacies of philological speculation. Not that any honest man would have any difficulty here, but Popery must be yielded to in its worst form: this is a pure concession, and that of the word of God, to Popery.

The Commissioners, or some of them, it is manifest, did not think the sense the same, or the note would not be given as a "note to the Douay version." But they would not exercise an independent opinion. It was not the truth of the thing, but concession to what they believed to be false. And this is the character of the whole work. "Divers of the fathers and the Latin." What is all this? Is it right, or is it wrong? "Translated literally from the original." Why so carefully preserved, if it be wrong? What is there of it in the original from which the translation has been made? It is written, sir, "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." I do definitely charge here the whole of the Commissioners with introducing here what they know to be false, to yield to, or secure, according to the credit of their respective parties, the credit of papal falsehoods. But are the poor children to be subjected to this? They must, sir; they cannot help themselves. These are days of liberty, but not for them.

If ever there was thorough devilish wickedness, it is this Commission; and the worst people in it are the so-called Protestant ministers: we shall see their end.

300 I may note here a most important comment in the shape of a question: "Why has death passed upon all men?" - a question no way warranted by the structure of the sentence.

In the next lesson, sir, we have a gross dereliction of the original to let in the Douay, and that in a point directly involving the worst principles of Popery. "Whosoever is not just [or righteous] is not of God, nor he that loveth not his brother." Now, sir, what "original" is this translated from? The Vulgate and some of the fathers: what miserable dishonesty is this! "He that doeth not righteousness" is the original and the English version. But the Douay must be conciliated. No other possible reason can be assigned for the deviation from the original.

I said, sir, that it was in connection with the worst principles of Popery by which a man is not just as before God by virtue of the work of Christ, but his own state. We have a very Jesuitical note on this subject which shews that it did not escape the Commissioners' observation, and may account for the departure from the original here. "Righteousness, justice. The word rendered in the Authorised version, righteousness, and in the Douay, justice, sometimes signifies the virtue of justice or uprightness, and sometimes the condition of a man, who is just, or justified before God, through the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. To express the latter sense, Roman Catholic English translators are accustomed to use the word justice. Protestant translators more frequently use the word righteousness" (p. 39). The cold-hearted wickedness of these men! Well said the prophet, "The unjust knoweth no shame." They use a different word, and to shew their unity the commissioners will use both; but as to sense Roman Catholics and Protestants are quite agreed as to righteousness or justification. "This latter sense," common of course to both, is expressed by one, so, and by the other more frequently (not always, I suppose), so. Indeed! In fact, translators are the only people concerned.

It is a pity we had not Mr. Carlile before, and we should have been spared all the trouble about this way of righteousness. There is no question as to the truth of God. All the artillery of the Council of Trent might have been spared. "A man," quoth the note, "just or justified before God through the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ," and this "latter sense," etc. The Council of Trent says, "if any one says that men are justified either by the imputation of Christ's justice (or righteousness, as Protestants) alone, or by the remission of sins alone, grace and charity being excluded, which is poured into their hearts by the Holy Spirit and inheres in them; or also that the grace whereby we are justified is only the favour of God, let him be anathema." Again, sir, "this disposition or preparation justification itself follows, which is not the remission of sins alone, but also sanctification and renovation of the inner man through the voluntary reception of grace and gifts; whence a man from unjust becomes just." Again, the instrumental cause is baptism; and again, "with which endued" (that is, the justice of God) "we are renewed in the spirit of our mind; and are not only accounted but are truly called and are just, receiving justice in ourselves which the Holy Spirit distributed (or bestows) to each as He will, and according to the proper distribution and co-operation of each."

301 Convenient it may be to Mr. Carlile, and it may be to others of his coadjutors to get this "latter sense" identified with the righteousness which is imputed to us if we believe on Him who raised up our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead. Convenient it may be to shew that Protestants, when they speak of righteousness before God, have the same sense (merely more frequently using a different word) as when a poor misguided Roman Catholic talks of justice, which, according to the well-defined opinions of the apostate Council of Trent, he is taught must be inherent; and that all simple confidence in the remission of sins by the offering of Jesus Christ once for all, by the which He has perfected for ever them that are sanctified, is but the vain confidence of the heretics.

But where is honesty and the truth of God? The direct force of this passage is to give the notion that justification before God, through the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, is held in the same sense by Protestants and Roman Catholics. Perhaps Mr. Carlile does, and very likely his so-called Protestant coadjutors may; but if it be so, where is truth, or what are we to expect as to the education of the poor, if the Protestant Commissioners forsooth think thus? Here is a positive announcement, under the notion of accounting for two words being used, that the sense in which Protestants and Roman Catholics consider this subject is the same; and yet, if I am not much misinformed, Mr. Carlile thinks he gains much from his Popish coadjutors in this matter. But I never knew a case in which the devil was not more cunning than any one that undertook to do his business in the hope of cheating him. And so it is here. I said the note was Jesuitical; Popish hands have been in it, I am sure; for, while it identifies the Protestant righteousness with Roman Catholic justice, it completely secures the Popish view of the subject itself. And in anxiety for this, the very sense of the passage is sacrificed; for the note, if scrutinised, is nonsense. It first states that justice, in the Douay, means either the virtue of uprightness, or the condition of a man, etc.; and then states that Roman Catholic translators use the word justice to express the latter. And now notice the result: justice, and therefore Protestant righteousness, signifies the virtue of uprightness or what? The fact of our acceptance with God? The forgiveness of our sins? Righteousness being accounted to us? Are these ideas admitted? Not at all, but the condition of a man who is justified before God, through, etc. Now this is exactly the distinction of Popery, the distinction of the Council of Trent.

302 This one note is the surrender of the vital question between Protestants and the deniers of the truth of the church of Rome; and for which the Lord gave Himself, just as the book itself gives up the authority of the scriptures. Say, that Protestants mean by righteousness, besides practical uprightness (as in the previous perverted text, "he that doeth not righteousness"), a man's being accounted absolutely righteous before God, by virtue and on account of the death, and evinced by the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ; and that this consists in the absolute non-imputation of all or any sin: the Roman Catholic starts away. The truth has touched the vitality of his system. Tell him that justice means the condition of a man who is just or justified before God through the atonement, etc., and he agrees at once. Tell him, this is all a Protestant means by righteousness, and he says, You may fraternise with us: there is nothing to hinder you. And in truth there is not. And why put in the note at all? The text told the truth; therefore the note must be put in to say, that, by believing in God, Abraham was in the condition of a man who was justified before God through, etc., and that in fact this was all Protestants meant by the words.

What God means, sir, is not the question with the Commissioners. They must, somehow or other, make the scriptures suit both parties; but the way we see they do this is, where the scriptures speak plain Protestant sense, the passage is not to be left out (that might give a handle), but, what is worse, it being introduced, it is to be shewn in a note that Protestants understand it in no other sense than Roman Catholics themselves do. Either Mr. Carlile and the other so-called Protestant members introduce this note, or the Popish members. If the former, then we have an open wilful purpose upon their part to neutralise the truth of scripture; where left to itself, it speaks Protestantism. If the latter, where scripture passages speak Protestantism, the former are obliged to allow the latter to introduce their comments with their sanction, that Protestants themselves think no otherwise on these subjects than they do. But they do, sir; and though Archbishops may deny the faith and take part with Papists, and though Mr. Carlile should give up the authority and obliterate the truths of scripture which he once professed, I trust there are many, if need were, to lay down their lives for what they have been doing their utmost to suppress in this book and their whole work in this matter, and to deprive their poor countrymen of (though that they are not). They have taken away the key of knowledge; they would not enter in themselves, and those that would enter in they hinder. They have done worse; they are giving the sanction of the profession of the truth to those who are doing so of old. Of the two at this moment, far rather would I be the Roman Catholic Archbishop than Dr. Whately or Mr. Carlile; and I must ask, if Popery be recognised, what business has Dr. Whately to be Archbishop at all?

303 I have said sufficient to shew the character of this book to those who have ears to hear. Others I cannot expect to influence in these days of apostasy. Those who love money better than principle, and seek the cover of the name of Archbishops and Protestants for their own acquiescence in infidelity and Popery, may be expected to receive their bounty and rejoice in the wages of their iniquity; but the curse of deceived thousands will await them when all is unveiled.

I might mention other instances of the sublime morality which their suppression of parts of scripture has secured; as that concubines were an inferior sort of wives which men were permitted to have in ancient times - by God, I suppose, though it is not stated whether before the fall, or whether it was an allowance to their passions after it. But when principle is gone, such things can excite no surprise. They fancy it is virtue, and they must rescue scripture - virtuous men! - from the charges to which it might be liable, when they cannot help stating the facts as God stated them. Though why this should have been introduced at all, unless to state that "concubines were permitted," it would be hard to tell. But these are trifles; the principle of the book is the thing. It is badly executed indeed besides; immaterial things introduced, no scriptural thread in the story, as alienated from the scriptural concatenation of the subjects as possible, a sort of epistle and gospel, collectanea to suit the tastes of the compiler, everything to efface the forms and associations of God's scriptures, and to present merely an allowance framed by the wisdom of man out of scripture; and this itself not under the influence of any peculiar views of Christianity, doctrinal or practical; the open renunciation of Protestantism in form and substance; in form the scriptures, in substance as here stated. And so much so, that, where a passage might seem to favour Protestantism, it is expressly renounced in the note.

304 Now, sir, to preach Protestantism is one thing. That was not done in the old schools, unless the scriptures, even the Douay version, are Protestantism. But openly to renounce it and deny the scriptures is another; this was reserved for Dr. Whately, Mr. Carlile, and Dr. Sadlier, not for themselves, but under colour of their profession, for all the poor children in the country. A comfortable conscience they must have at the thought, if this system succeeds, that, as far as they can do, the children of 2,000,000 have been deprived of the scriptures, and of 5,000,000 completely, whom they cheerfully leave to the instruction of Popish priests. So at least, they say. I do not envy them their cheerfulness.

And here I close my painful task, in which we have seen the first fruits of a commission, founded on infidelity, in a work whose chief object is to desecrate the authority, and destroy the certainty, while it robs us of the truths, of scripture; and delighting in a scepticism, which, having no peculiar religious views at all, if the scripture should force any upon us, will take care to explain them away; and, having lost all regard of God in its desire to please men, will take care to do this toward those who are in authority, while the poor children, who are nominally committed to their care, they cheerfully leave to their instructors to teach whatever they please; only taking care of this, that, so long as they are under their control, the fresh breathings of God's healthful and health-giving word and Spirit shall never reach their thirsty and gasping lips, while all they shall mix up for them, willing or unwilling, they must take. Well done, good and faithful servants!

305 Christian friends, the true light in which to look at it is this: there is no government in Western Europe now (that is, within the limits of the Roman Empire), which is not either infidel or papal. Almost the only public profession of the form of truth, which substantially remains within its existing limits or power, is the profession of a large body, however faithless, in Ireland. Against this the powers of Satan are directed, and in this effort the leading moral instrument is the new Board of Education. The document on which it was founded was a public manifesto of this. The conduct which it has pursued is here shewn to be suitable and accordant to it. The authority of the scriptures is surrendered and their truths covered .

Rouse yourselves, therefore, Christians. Trust not in man, nor in any child of man. It is better to trust in the Lord than to put any confidence in man. It is better to trust in the Lord than to put any confidence in princes. I expect them to have much success. It is a day in which wickedness is allowed to have much success, that it may meet its reward: but if we are faithful to God, they can have no success against us. Christians, therefore, exert yourselves; it is the wily effort of infidelity to poison and destroy your children, and the children of all around you. There is no help in your effort, I warn you so, but in God. Trust not in yourselves; lean upon God, and He will be with you. I have told you, nay they have told you themselves, that the governments of the earth with which we are concerned are infidel. Do you think they will care for the truth, or those who hold it? They do not pretend to it; but there is strength and favour in God. T say, trust in Him, act as Christians, and God will own you. I beseech you, by the mercies of God, that you bestir yourselves, that those who have ears to hear may escape this engulfing effort of infidelity. This is a question of Christianity: let every man do something to rescue the children from them. I do solemnly warn you all, Christian friends (and I think I have proved it, if proof is needed) that this is the effort of infidelity to destroy the public profession of the truth, and the souls of the children that are ensnared in it, and I warn those that are engaged in it, that they are involving themselves in the final judgments of God.

A letter on a serious question connected with the Irish Education Measures of 1832

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Sir,

I address you thus formally in a public document in which it is my object, not to express any personal feelings, but to investigate principles. Your language (as reported) has given me occasion to address you on the subject on which I write: a matter which I confess has occasioned some astonishment to my mind, though other principles than astonishment bring it into action. The character of the public meeting held in this city on the subject of the anti-scriptural system of education needs no comment at present. You were present at that meeting and spoke; but it is not my object to discuss the character of your speech. The unholy marriage between Infidelity and Popery - the devil's apostate counterpart of the union between the bride the Lamb's wife and the great head of the church - whose banns have been first published in this unhappy country, if not adequately exposed (as I think none can feel its evil sufficiently), has yet given occasion to so loud an expression of principle as I trust will, under God, give stability to those who might otherwise have been entangled, and maintain the public expression of the right, here at least, before God, when all principle and allegiance towards Him have been so atrociously invaded. But you were following in your opposition in the rear of those to whom you owed canonical obedience. It was at least, sir, an unfriendly way of doing it.

But not to leave seriousness, considering the path which the Archbishop has trodden, it was well you were behind him. Authority and circumstances hide much from the world, and I must feel that it is the assumed orthodoxy of official situation, which could alone blind the clergy of this country to the principles of the Archbishop by whom they are governed. Such principles known I should be sorry indeed to follow, and the fulness of an episcopal robe does but ill conceal - even though one be behind it - the false principles which may be set before its face. The circumstances of the case are these: a scheme is set on foot whose professed object is to exclude the scriptures from the school instruction of the children of this country, and this not for the purpose of meeting the poor people or consulting their feelings. It had required, Mr. Stanley states, the energetic exertion of the priests to prevent the people from embracing the proffered boon of instruction in the word of God, the boon of God Himself; not then to meet the prejudices of the people, but in acquiescence, we learn from the same authority, with the principles of the Roman Catholic religion. The scriptures are the witness, not only of the holiness of God, but of His love, of His prerogative love in Christ. The Archbishop has set himself forward as the main effectuator, as under the circumstances he certainly is, of a scheme which is professedly to meet the priests, in accordance with their principles, in excluding from the schools this witness of God's love in Christ; for their introduction Mr. Stanley himself states to be the vital defect of the previous system.

307 But the clergy are more deeply concerned in this and the laity too, than, as far as I can see, they are aware. The only discerning spring of Christian activity, synergism in God's love (for Christianity is the activity of God's love), is the knowledge and love of Christ. The perception of His Person is the great centre and spring of all vital theology. To see this is the material of faith. "He that seeth the Son, and believeth on him, hath everlasting life." Not to see this leaves a person in the darkness of this world.

The Archbishop of Dublin is a Sabellian. Of the painful situation in which this may place the clergy it is not for me to judge. What the laity will feel in thinking of their association with him, on the general superintendence of the establishment, they must consider for themselves. But Sabellianism may be considered some questionable opinion or difference. But you must know, sir, that it strikes at the root of all vital as well as orthodox Christianity, by neutralising the distinction between the Father and the Son. The Father's sending the Son - the Son's obedience to the Father - the whole scheme of mediatorial Christianity - that is, Christianity itself becomes lost in this form of infidelity. A Trinity in character, but not a Trinity of persons, in the essential; force of that word, may ease the proud mind of man of that which is beyond its natural powers, but takes away, at the same time, the whole basis on which a sinner can rest by faith. Men may be guilty of Tritheism, and Sabellians may avoid this. But they also may undermine the faith in another way.

308 I shall extract, pretty much at length, the statements of Dr. Whately on this subject in the article on the word person, in the appendix to his Logic, "Ambiguous Terms." "Person, in its most ordinary use, always implies a numerically distinct substance; each man is one person, and can be but one. It, besides a peculiar theological sense, is more closely connected with its etymology. It is well known that the Latin word persona signified originally a mask which actors wore on the stage; each of which being painted in each instance suitably to the character to be represented, and worn by every one who acted the part, the word came to signify the character itself which the actor played; and afterwards any character, proper or assumed, which any one sustained; as for example in a passage of Cicero (De Oratore) where he is describing the process by which he composed his pleadings, by imagining himself in the place of his opponent and of the judge, as well as his own. 'Tres personas unus suscipio, summa animi aequitate: meam adversam, judicis.' We should render this by saying, 'I assume these three characters,' or 'I place myself in these three situations.' The further transition, by which persona, and, as Anglicised by us, person came to signify commonly a distinct being, is very natural, though I believe it never took place while the purity of the Latin idiom lasted. Persona, in some sense, not far remote, it may be supposed, from its classical signification, was adopted by theologians to distinguish the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, in the blessed Trinity, so as to imply the strict and proper unity of the divine Being, Who is all and each of these: and the word person was employed by our divines as a literal, or rather perhaps an etymological, translation of the Latin word persona. In this sense, its difference from person, as employed in ordinary discourse (in which, however, it seems to have been much less common at the time when our liturgy, etc., were framed, than in the present day), is of the highest importance: since it is evident that 'three divine persons,' in the ordinary meaning of the word, is precisely equivalent to 'three Gods.'"

Again - "In this, our church, very wisely and scripturally, sets before us the relations in which the Most High stands towards us of Maker, Redeemer, and Sanctifier: thus adhering to the apparent design of Holy Writ," etc. "The same consideration has induced me to insert in the present edition some extracts from the theological works (less known than they deserve) of the celebrated Dr. Wallis's, the mathematician and logician, who appears to have been the church's most powerful champion against the Arians and Socinians of his day. Not that I wish implicit deference to be paid to any human authority, however eminent: but it may be worth while to correct the notion, if any shall have entertained it, that the views of the subject here taken are, in our church, novelties. That which makes these expressions (namely, those respecting the Trinity) seem harsh to some of these men, is because they have used themselves to fancy that notion only of the word person, according to which three men are accounted to be three persons, and these three persons to be three men. But he may consider that there is another notion of the word person, and in common use too, wherein the same man may be said to sustain divers persons, and three persons to be the same man; that is, the same man as sustaining divers capacities. As was said but now of Tully, tres personas unus sustineo. And then it will seem no more harsh to say, the three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are one God, than to say, God the Creator, God the Redeemer, and God the Sanctifier, are one God - it is much the same thing whether of the two forms we use." (Letters on the Trinity, p. 63.)

309 "The word person (persona) is originally a Latin word, and doth not properly signify a man (so that another person must needs imply another man); for then the word homo would have served, and they needed not have taken in the word persona; but rather one so circumstantiated. And the same man, if considered in other circumstances (considerably different), is reputed another person. And that this is the true notion of the word person, appeared by these noted phrases, personam induere, personant deponere, personam agere, and many the like in approved Latin authors. Thus the same man may at once sustain the person of a king and a father, if he be invested both with regal and paternal authority. Now, because the king and the father are for the most part not only different persons but different men also (and the like in other cases), hence it comes to pass that another person is sometimes supposed to imply another man, but not always, nor is that the proper sense of the word. It is Englished in our dictionaries by the state, quality, or condition whereby one man differs from another; and so, as the condition alters, the person alters, though the man be the same. The hinge of the controversy is that notion concerning the three somewhats, which the Fathers (who first used it) did intend to design by the name person; so that we are not from the word person to determine what was that notion, but from that notion which they would express to determine in what sense the word person is here used," etc. - (letter in answer to the Arian's Vindication).

310 This article was much altered in the fourth edition, and a good deal added, in the way of explanation, to guard against the too evident conclusion from the preceding extract. The date of this, sir, is 1831. But, however guarded, there is no repentance from the heresy itself. I shall insert a short extract, which may be sufficient to shew this: -

"Person, in its ordinary use at present, invariably implies a numerically distinct substance. Each man is one person, and can be but one. It has also a peculiar theological sense, in which we speak of the 'three persons' of the blessed Trinity. It was probably thus employed by our divines, as a literal or perhaps etymological rendering of the Latin word, 'persona.' I am inclined to think, however, from the language of Wallis (the mathematician and logician) in the following extract, as well as from that of some others of our older writers, that the English word person was formerly not so strictly confined as now to the sense it bears in common conversation among us." Then follows the extract from Wallis; and he adds in a note, "We are taught to call no man master on earth; but the reference to Dr. Wallis may serve both to shew the use of the word in his day, and to correct the notion, should any have entertained it, that the views of the subject here taken are, in our church, anything novel."

Having quoted so largely from the other edition, it is needless after this to quote more. The circumstances connected with these alterations I shall not touch upon: if authentically stated, they do not weaken the inference naturally drawn from the papers themselves. I care not, sir, for the term Sabellianism: but when the personality of the Son of God is avowedly attacked, I cannot be surprised that the person who does so should be the instrument of establishing the first open public act of infidelity - avowedly rejecting the scriptures, to meet the principles of the Roman Catholic religion. It may not be unprofitable to see the suitableness of the agent to such a work. With what satisfaction any one can follow in the rear, or own canonical obedience to such a one, I must leave to their own consciences and their fidelity to Christ to determine. Certainly the fate of the Archbishop has been unfortunate. Famous, if fame is to be trusted, for being opposed to the union of church and state, he has with painful singularity united himself to it in its first public act of professed infidelity, to be the solitary agent of any consequence in carrying the blighting influence of that infidelity into general and diffusive operation. But he denies the personality of the Son of God, and I am not surprised. But are standards of truth no security as regards those who have solemnly signed them? Sir, whatever scripture may say of the personality of the Son of God, you must own it, and Dr. Whately ought; but his mind seems vague in this on principle, as it is far from scriptural truth. He thus writes, in a note to the same article, in the appendix to his Logic (4th edition, p. 331): -

311 "And truly, it is much better thus to consult scripture, and take it for a guide, than to resort to it merely for confirmation, contained in detached verses, of the several parts of some system of theology, which the student fixes on as reputed orthodox, and which is in fact made the guide which he permits 'to lead him by the hand'; while passages culled out from various parts of the sacred writings, in subserviency to such system, are formed into what may be called an anagram of scripture; and then by reference to this system as a standard, each doctrine, or discourse, is readily pronounced orthodox, or Socinian, or Arian, or Sabellian, or Nestorian, etc.; and all this on the ground that the theological scheme, which the student has adopted, is supported by scripture. The materials, indeed, are the stones of the temple; but the building constructed with them is a fabric of human contrivances. If, instead of this too common procedure, students would fairly search the scriptures, with a view, not merely to defend opinions, but to form them; not merely for arguments, but for truth: keeping human expositions to their own proper purposes (see Essay 6, first series), and not allowing those to become practically a standard - if, in short, they were as honestly desirous to be on the side of scripture, as they naturally are to have scripture on their side, how much sounder as well as more charitable would their conclusions often be!"

The note of admiration as well as italics in the several quotations are Dr. Whately's. Dr. Whately may be amiable, affable in manner, and efficient in business; but truth is truth, and principle is principle, and talents (however great or overestimated), and the most candid kindness of manner are but snares to the unwary. Satan is not foolish enough to make mischief disagreeable. These things appear to me, sir, not only heretical, and (as I should call it) infidel, on the most vital principle of Christianity, but, considering the circumstances in which the author of them is placed, sad want of principle. But when I consider that one who has sworn that the essential point of popish instruction and worship is a "blasphemous fable and a dangerous deceit," as Dr. Whately has, should be the principal agent for securing the instruction of the majority of the children of this country in it, and their actual attendance on it, I cannot be surprised, sir. There never was a stronger instance of the principle, that, where the truth of the gospel did not exist, the grace or principle of it could not be found. I confess, sir, more heartless unprincipledness I never heard of. Nor, slight as Dr. Whately's tie may be to standards which have elevated him to the place from which he throws them down, will the refuge this may be afford him much shelter. The results of such instruction as he is putting the children under I shall state in his own words. They are from a note to the same article. There is some ignorance on the subject shewn in it, but it is immaterial to the present point.

312 "The correctness of a formal and deliberate confession of faith is not always of itself a sufficient safeguard against error, in the habitual impression of the mind. The Romanists flatter themselves that they are safe from idolatry, because they distinctly acknowledge the truth, that God only is to be served (namely, with latria), though they allow adoration (hyperdulia and dulia) to the virgin and their saints, to images, and to relics. To which it has been justly replied, that, supposing this distinction correct in itself, it would be in practice purgatory, since the mass of the people must soon, as experience proves, lose sight of it entirely in their habitual devotions."

It must be a happy office to one who has a heart and a conscience to secure to the mass of the people instruction which must plunge them into idolatries, however people may flatter themselves. But I must not pursue this part of the subject, or I should say a great deal more than is needful; and the general principles of the subject are already before people's minds. There are two points which do not seem to be generally felt: that this is the first public leading act of infidelity, namely, a professed rejection of the scriptures, to meet the principles of the Roman Catholic religion; and, secondly, what it specially behoves the clergy to look to, that, under the garb of that which might seem to afford security for principle but may be the hiding-place of the contrary, we have one holding principles anything but a security against infidelity, a denial of the personality of the Son of God in anything like the sense in which that is ordinarily understood; and who holds that, as applied to the Son of God, it means no more than if I should say in making an oration, I put myself into three positions with the utmost equanimity - my own, my adversary's, the judge's. What use standards or undertakings may be to secure the principles of any connected with, or admitted into, the church under such circumstances, I must leave to others to judge. Of one thing I am sure, which keeps my own soul in peace, that in the midst of this "all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to his purpose."

313 But I should be sorry, sir, to follow in the rear of a diocesan who denied the Lord that bought me; and when I see even the primate expressing his assurance of the zeal for Protestantism of the Archbishop of Dublin, if I respect the feeling which prompted it, I cannot but feel it important to inquire upon what ground of security in the truth the Protestants of this country rest, as regards one (as the Archbishop is) in perhaps the most important human station which any one can fill in it. Few, I dare say, read Dr. Whately's Logic, and few know, therefore, his principles. I have transcribed his own statements here: let Christians judge.

Some question having been raised about the principles of the Roman Catholics as to reading the scriptures, it will be seen, by the following translation of the fourth rule of the Council of Trent respecting the Index, that a person reading them without the written permission of the bishop is refused absolution.

"Whereas it is manifest from experience, if the sacred Bible be allowed everywhere without discrimination in the vulgar tongue, more injury than profit arises thence on account of the rashness of men; let the judgment of the bishop or inquisitor be abided by in this respect; that, with the counsel of the parish priest, or confessor, they may allow the reading in the vulgar tongue of the Bible, translated by Catholic authors, to those who, they shall understand, may receive not injury but increase of faith and piety: which privilege let them have in writing. But he who without such privilege shall presume to have or read them cannot receive absolution of his sins, unless he shall have first given them up to the ordinary. But let booksellers who shall have sold, or in any other way given to those who have not the aforesaid privileges, Bibles written in the vulgar idiom, lose the price of the books to be converted into pious uses by the bishop, and let them be subjected to other penalties according to the quality of the crime at the discretion of the bishop. But regulars without a privilege from their prelates cannot read or buy them."

314 I close a letter, sir, written under a sufficient suffering of body to have disposed me to keep quiet, if I had not felt it a duty. I have very briefly brought the subject forward, stating little of my own views or feelings, not because I have them not, but because I rather desired the facts should be presented for consciences of others. God may bring good out of evil. But these sorts of circumstances are just the trials of the faithfulness of God's children. Let it be known only that, though God may be in a distinct position, there is, according to Dr. Whately, no distinction in the person of the Father and the Son. What may be the duty of the clergy in such a case I leave to themselves: of that of a Christian I can have no doubts.

O God, to what a pass is Thy church come, when those who govern and should feed it are found, even where the truth seems specially professed, deniers of that upon which Thy whole glory rests, even the person and therefore the mission of Thy Son, who loved it and gave Himself for it! O Lord, regard Thy people, and give them faithfulness and wisdom to do that which becometh Thy saints for the glory of Thy name, and acknowledgment of Thy love through Jesus, Thy sent One, come in the flesh that, according to that which is given them, all men should honour the Son even as they honour the Father by one Spirit! Amen.

I am, sir, faithfully yours, J. N. D.

Speech delivered at a meeting held for the purpose of promoting Scriptural Education.

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{Banbridge, 1834.}

Sir,

My only title to the attention of the meeting, especially at this very advanced stage of our proceedings, is the deep interest which I take in the question before us. I shall not, however, long occupy your time. It was spoken of, as supposed, that the existence of the new system of National Education arose out of the inefficiency of Educational Institutions. But this is an error - for such a supposition there is no ground whatsoever. The real cause was, as expressed and avowed in a letter upon which the new system is based, that making the use of scriptures in schools a sine qua non was a "vital defect"; because doing so was inconsistent with the principles of the Roman Catholic church. These are the words of Mr. Stanley to the Duke of Leinster. This was the principle upon which the new system is based, because the scriptures were opposed to the principles of Roman Catholics, and because Scripture Educational Societies would not mortify this principle; that is, because they would not remedy this "vital defect," by giving up, either wholly, or partially, the Book of God! because they would not relinquish a duty which they owed to God, and to their fellow-creatures, by giving up all that is valuable in time and in eternity. The scriptures are valuable, because they came from God. Give them up and what have we that we can sanction, as having proceeded from Jehovah? Nothing in the world. This is the foundation of the Board - that in the use of the scriptures by other Institutions there was a "vital defect."

This consideration should prevent all adhesion, or countenance, to the Board of Education. It is an infidel expression to affirm that instruction in the Bible is a "vital defect"; but it has been acted on, and what is the consequence? That there is not one single principle of truth concerning the gospel, which rests on revelation, that is not given up by the new system. I say, every one of them is given up. The principle of justification, the authority of the word of God, and all that useful and absolutely necessary knowledge which revelation imparts - all are discarded from the Book of Extracts.

316 I quite agree in the observations advanced by Mr. Bagot, on the part of all who value, and who can appreciate revelation. There should be no compromise. By the Board these extracts are allowed - religious teachers are allowed - Protestant and Roman Catholic teachers are allowed; but there is one thing unallowable - the scriptures. These are to be removed from the schools.

Observe, it is also stated in Mr. Stanley's letter that, though there was no attempt made to proselytise by Educational Societies, yet there was in them a "vital defect"; because they required the Bible to be used in their schools. It was then not any unavowed use of the opportunities which these schools afforded which formed the ground of objection to them - any attempt to proselytise. This is professedly disclaimed by Mr. Stanley's letter. He declares there was no such attempt made. It was solely, singly, and simply the use of the scriptures. This was the "vital defect." This statement of Mr. Stanley's puts in the strongest light the discharging the schools from all other offence than the real point that they had - the scriptures. This, and this alone, was the thing which made the other schools necessary; in order to the exclusion of these they are professedly set up.

There is another point in Mr. Stanley's letter: he states that the strenuous exertions of the priests were directed against these scripture schools. Now, this shews distinctly that the objection to the attendance of children at schools, where the Bible was taught, was not on the part of their parents, but on the part of priests. From whence arose the necessity of these strenuous exertions on the part of the priests, but because, that without them the children would have been sent, and that it required them all to keep the parents from so sending their children? And it is further evident, because in spite of the priests, large numbers of Roman Catholics attended scripture schools. I think there were not less than 133,000 children attending the one class of schools in which the scriptures were read, and from which the government grant was taken away, at the time the Education Commission inquiry was appointed. At that time the priests were exceedingly active to diminish the numbers; but, notwithstanding all their exertions, there remained about 100,000 children in those schools. It need hardly be said that the thirty-odd thousand which were removed were Roman Catholics. But it appeared from the report of the Commissioners, founded on the returns of both persuasions, that the majority of these 100,000 which remained were Roman Catholics, shewing the very great predominance of Roman Catholic children attending the scriptural schools, in spite of the exertions of the priests, which Mr. Stanley affirmed to be so unceasingly used. And thus we find, that the scriptures were not objected to by Roman Catholics, but that they were unpalatable to the priests.

317 I believe the principle upon which this Board is founded is infidelity. I believe it to be the grand expression and instrument, in this country, of that infidelity which is making such rapid strides. This Board professes to give a translation from the original. But what has it done? It has completely removed from the mind any resting-place at all. It gives us a few extracts as a substitute for the entire word of God, and which we are to believe will answer every purpose. By giving us a new translation, it discredits those which exist as unworthy of all credit - that it would be improper to put them into the hands of children; and it dissociates the minds of children from their phraseology, so as just to make them used to neither of them as the accredited testimony of God. It depreciates not only the authorised version, but also, with all its faults, the Douay version. But let the Roman Catholic read the Douay version. With all its defects, he will learn there all the fundamental truths of Christianity; and what is more, if he take the trouble to compare it with the authorised version, he will discover a real similarity - he will discover that the one is so like the other, as to be convinced that the authorised version is the word of God. But those extracts are not like either - and yet, the scriptures are taken away - the ordinary translations discredited - and none whatever given in their room, but a set of extracts afforded, which equally reflect on the authorised and the Douay:, so that when the child, in after days, should turn to them, he will find, what from his early days he has learned is no authentic testimony to the truth. This is the great effort of infidelity, to sweep away from man the only warrant he has for faith and practice - the word of the living God - to give up the profitable study of which we are to be supplied with extracts which give no instruction on subjects doctrinal or practical; and yet we are informed in the preface, "that these extracts have been compiled in the hope of their leading to a more general and more profitable perusal of the word of God."

318 I beg your attention to this further point: we have seen it stated that these extracts have been compiled in the hope of their leading to a more general and more profitable perusal of the word of God; and yet, a little lower down, we read, "that no passage has either been introduced or omitted under the influence of any peculiar view of Christianity, doctrinal or practical." The only authority for doctrine or practice is God's word; but in extracts information on neither is to be had. There we can ascertain no views of Christianity. And yet they were "compiled to lead us to the more profitable perusal of God's word." That is, while the word of God is taken away from the children in its own simplicity and fulness, with the aid of extracts (which cast contempt on our translation, and the Douay) we learn that we profitably peruse the word of God, when we deduce no views from it either doctrinal or practical!

Thus, in these extracts I find not only the foundation of its authority, but the superstructure of the value of all Christian truth completely swept away. I am now reasoning on the shewing of the abettors of the Board of Education. But is not every view of Christianity peculiar? The natural mind wants no Christianity, because it loves sin; it hates religion. Take away then from the Bible all the peculiar views of Christianity, and you take away all religion. Every view is peculiar to sinful man; and those peculiar views are alone contained in that revelation, which Jehovah has communicated to the world. They are peculiar, or it would not be a revelation. Take away what is peculiar, and you take away all that is revealed - all that is valuable to a sinner - and leave him to the natural and prejudiced darkness and infidelity of his own mind.

Again, the Commissioners say that they offer these extracts from scripture to the careful attention of teachers and children, not only as truth, but as truth recorded under the influence of inspiration, etc. This thing is so far from correct that in these extracts we discover the most wicked garbling of truth; and in connection with this monstrous production, one circumstance I must allude to is the change discoverable in the type. In one place it is large, in another small; as if the passage printed in one description of type imported that they were scripture, and those printed in another description of type were not scripture. This is not the fact. Following extracts, or parts of this pretended new translation, are passages in precisely the same type which are not extracts of any sort, but abstracts in man's language; and, of course, according to man's judgment. How then is the child to ascertain what is scripture, and what is not? Besides, except the difficulty of reading where the type is different, as it sometimes is, will a child make such nice distinctions in a book presented to it, as truth recorded under the influence of inspiration? Moreover, the introduction of small type gives, if it does anything, authority to the large as the word of God; and thus, what is partly extracts from God's word, and partly man's statements is given on the authority of men, of the Board, as truth recorded under the influence of inspiration. Could anything be more remarkable than to exclude the word of God, and to substitute these extracts with such a character? The poor child is given the book of extracts, abstracts, and notes, not only as "truth, but as truth recorded under the influence of inspiration"; that is, it is truth "recorded under the influence of inspiration," whether we believe that the woman, or our Lord Jesus Christ, is our Saviour.

319 Now, I ask, where will the child learn the difference whether the large print - the small print - or the note respecting the Virgin Mary, is or is not scripture? And are not all these peculiar views alone contained in that revelation which Jehovah has communicated? They are peculiar, or would not be to the world a revelation. Take away what is peculiar, and you take away all that is revealed - all that is valuable as mercy to a sinner; and leave him to the natural total darkness or infidelity of his own mind.

Again, the Commissioners say, that "they offer these extracts from scripture, to the careful attention of teachers and children, not only as truth, but as truth recorded under the influence of inspiration," etc. And why have they taken the scriptures away? They cheerfully leave them to those they think wrong; they care for nothing more. They who call themselves Christians and Protestants would leave the rising generation to the religious instruction of the Romish priesthood! I could not cheerfully leave them to such "religious instructors"; nor will you, I trust, sanction such a system. But such is the professed plan of the Board.

320 But we find men who would divest the word of God of all authority - who would take out of it everything which regards doctrine or practice - who would deprive children of that word, which is able to make them wise unto salvation, "through faith, which is in Christ Jesus." They would first do all this, and then transfer them for instruction to a priesthood who are opposed to the use of the scriptures in any form. But why leave religious instruction in the word of God to the priests? The Board has no influence over the priests to command them to communicate religious information, even if they were qualified. It is said, the Lord dements those He would destroy. In these lessons, which we are told are drawn from the sacred volume, we discover every principle of infidelity and enmity arrayed against the children who are under such instruction; and yet these things are called "Scripture Lessons"; but they are "Lessons" which have garbled scripture - which deprive the children, by such a miserable substitute, of the use of scripture.

But who are those men who have thus attempted to mistranslate and garble God's holy word? It is time that Christian principle should avow itself, and that Christians should abide by the word of God, in spite of infidelity. Shall we, as Christians, acquiesce in such a deliberate exclusion of the word of God from the education designed for the instruction of the children? The scriptures are for the use of all. It is the privilege of all to read them. But this is not the ground the question stands really on. The Board hinders, and joins even in hindering the reading of any but such part as in its wisdom it thinks fit to give; but it does a great deal more: in asserting the communication of the scriptures, it is not merely the hearers' or readers' right that is impugned, but God's who gave and sends them. If I were to send a letter to my servant, and you should intercept it, you not only wrong my servant and hinder him, but you interfere with me. You prevent my message from reaching him - you are interposing between my authority and my servant - you are destroying my right to direct, as well as, and much rather than his. The Board has entered into direct conflict with God. Its conduct admits of no palliation; nor does it admit of the question of arrangement - for all who join such a system are also at direct issue with God.

The question is, Shall I adopt these extracts for the word of God? shall I attend to the directions of the Board of Education, and violate the command of God? The Board says, "we cheerfully leave the children to their religious instructors" - that is, they leave the great mass of the children to no instruction at all. Just think of those who profess to believe in the doctrine of justification by faith, cheerfully leaving children to the religious instruction of individuals, who deny what they hold to be a fundamental truth - to those who deny the divinity of Jesus - or who reject that salvation which He accomplished when He offered Himself as a sacrifice for sin. Remember the principle on which this Board was established. Was it that Scriptural Societies making the Bible a sine qua non was a vital defect in their systems, because such a rule was contrary to the principles of the Roman Catholic church? But was this principle contrary to God's command, contrary to His rule? No! Are we then to go at the bidding of man, contrary to God's command? I hope not.

321 The character of infidelity in these days is not the avowed rejection of the truth. It is latitudinarianism in spirit and the conduct of the Board is the very representation and type of this. Instead of uniting men by bringing them to principle, it leads them to give up all principle, and acts upon their giving up all. Here we have a Protestant and a Roman Catholic Archbishop and others, giving up some one principle or another peculiar to themselves, that they might be qualified to combine to give up God's principle - that all the country might be educated "without any peculiar view of Christianity, doctrinal or practical." This is an insult to God. Why has God caused the Bible to be written? But here are men, who by their conduct say they are wiser than God, by giving us their book in place of His. We are also told that these are but extracts from the Bible, and don't all of you use extracts? They are not merely extracts, but they are given as a succedaneum for the Bible. Suppose you purchased a loaf for your family, you take off for your use a slice, that is, an extract of the loaf; but you have always free access to the loaf when necessary - you would never imagine that, when you took an extract from your loaf, the loaf itself was taken away. That is quite another thing; yea, that you were given nothing but soiled and musty crusts, by one who kept the loaf to himself.

Extracts are exceedingly useful - I make use of extracts every day, when I read a chapter or more in the Bible; but if I read an extract from my Bible now, I have it to go to again, when I require it. I have my loaf always to go to; but the advocates against this "vital defect" of having the scriptures have no loaf. As regards them there is an end to the whole affair. The children of God owe to Him an undivided allegiance; they are bound, therefore, to abide by the word, which is able to make wise unto salvation - which makes the man of God perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. I trust, therefore, that those who have the means will support an institution whose great object is to communicate that instruction which is based on the unmutilated word of God. This is the day of decision.

322 The question now is - will the children of God be faithful or not? Will they secure to themselves the whole of God's word; or will they, for the sake of a temporary advantage and at the command of man, give it up? I hope not. I believe this Board to be simply the work and instrument of Satan, though God shall overrule it to His own purpose. For to Him all power belongs; and though Satan may be permitted for wise ends to manifest himself for a time, yet the Lion of the tribe of Judah will ultimately overcome him, for He is King of kings and Lord of lords.

Deliverance from the Law of Sin

J. N. Darby.

<32017E> 323 {See Doctrinal, Vol. 9.}

When I finished my tract on the "Sealing of the Spirit," I intimated that I thought of taking up some detail as to deliverance. Other occupations and want of strength combined to hinder me. But intercourse with others, and some passages of scripture, have re-aroused the desire to dwell a little on some points which present difficulty, even where in theory all is plain, and especially the want of deliverance from the law of sin where liberty with God is known. It is very evident that deliverance from the law of sin and death ought not, indeed cannot, remain in theory. Yet we find those who avow they are sealed, and have the consciousness of the effect of the Spirit's dwelling in them, are not delivered from that law of evil which works in the flesh. That conflict will remain to the end, though perhaps in a more subtle form, is certain. "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." We deceive ourselves; the truth, in the inward effect of its presence on our conscious state, has not produced its effect. Where the truth of Christ is in the heart, there is the consciousness that there is that which is not Christ. Where this is not so, the conscience has not been so wrought on as to give in the new man begotten by the word the sense of that which is contrary to Christ, who is the life of the new man, the spring of its sensibilities and moral feelings. Where this has been wrought in us, it gives its own consciousness of anything and everything that is contrary to it. There is no need of yielding to it, for Christ's grace is sufficient for us, and His strength is made perfect in weakness; but the being out of its power supposes the power of Christ, and diligence in looking to Him, that we may have that power to use, "always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be manifested in our body."

But let us weigh the effect of the sealing with the Spirit. Scripture is plain that it is consequent on faith in redemption, as His coming is the consequence of the accomplishment of redemption. Acts 2: 38 gives us the plain declaration that it is in having part in the forgiveness of sins that the Holy Ghost is given. (So Ephesians 1: 13.) Hence liberty is there at once for the forgiven soul. It has remission of its sins, is conscious of it, and is before God, with a purged conscience, in peace. Romans 5 is the expression of this - the general normal state of a redeemed soul. It enjoys that favour which is better than life.

324 But there are two things consequent on this, connected more immediately with deliverance - our new relationships, and power over sin in the flesh. The presence of the Holy Ghost is the power of the new relationship and liberty with God, but there was a work done by Christ to bring us into it - His dying unto sin once, and our having died with Him, that we may be free, and wholly, for faith in this new relationship. Now there may be faith in the efficacy of that work of Christ; that He has set us in the place where redemption brings us, and in favour under grace, and delivered us from the responsibility of making out righteousness to meet God, without that experimental acquaintance with what we are delivered from, which results through grace in deliverance, in practical reality, in the conscious state of the soul. This is not mere forgiveness and justification from guilt. That applies to the old standing in the flesh, and to its works. That is needed for the possession of the Spirit and deliverance, but is not its fruit and consequence; it is the clearing away the guilt of the old man, not the position of the new. But there is a more general aspect of redemption, in which it exists in the minds of many, in which it mixes itself up with the new.

We read, "In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace." Now this, where there is no definite apprehension of truth as to the sealing of the Spirit, leads the mind into the feelings and peace which the sealing of the Spirit gives the definite consciousness of, in our relationship with the Father and the Son. I do not doubt that many sealed ones remain in this true but indefinite sense of grace, and count on divine love; for you have more than forgiveness, you have the riches of His grace, and you have redemption through His blood - not merely forgiveness - a rescue from a state you were in, and introduction into eternal blessings. But it is not, after all, conscious sonship, and being consciously in Christ, and Christ in us.

Having noticed and guarded these collateral questions, I turn to the direct point which is connected with the failure in practical deliverance from the law of sin which is in our members - namely, the state of a soul which enjoys the liberty of its new position in grace, but does not find power against evil as it would wish. Now, we have already noticed that there are the two things: the presence of the Holy Ghost, by which we know we are under grace, and enjoy the relationships into which we are brought - the Spirit of adoption, and that work by which the deliverance has been wrought; not forgiveness, or the blessed Lord's dying for our sins, but His dying to sin, and rising again. This last was closing all association with the first Adam place, and law, its rule from God, which could bind no longer than a man lived and the entering into a new place and standing with God, based on redemption and divine righteousness. The place is now according to the riches of God's grace, and past all that separated us from God, accomplished for us on the cross, and according to this place in sonship through redemption - "My Father, and your Father; my God, and your God." The Holy Ghost gives us the consciousness, shedding withal abroad in our hearts the love of God. Blessed be His name, we are in Christ before God, and we know it.

325 But then Christ is in us. But it is not difficult to understand that the soul which, through grace, has believed in redemption and the grace that gave it, should know and have the consciousness of this acceptance. This depends on our being in Christ, and this known by the Spirit; it is objective, our standing in faith; and the new man acquainted with redemption cannot but know its place in Christ, though it may be little realised. But when I speak of Christ in me, it applies to my actual state - is subjective. "If Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin." Now I fully admit that we are brought into this place by Christ's work. Still, the state of the soul is connected with it, not simply relationship. With whom does death put us in relationship? It puts us out of relationship with all a living man is connected with - sin, the world, and all in it; and that is a very great thing indeed, but it is what has happened to us if Christ is in us. Of this more in a moment. But if knowing that I am in Christ, and Christ in me, I look up. Is there any flaw, or something wanting to my position? Why, Christ (and I am in Him) is the very object and perfection of God's delight; I lack nothing; acceptable according to God Himself, I have nothing unacceptable to what He is. I may realise it more or less, but what I realise is perfection itself. But Christ is in me - I look down. Is all perfect, nothing wanting here? Not in Him abstractedly; but if I am true, earnest, loving holiness, loving Christ, I find what displeases me, how much more God! No excuse, for Christ is power as well as life; but all is not what I would have it to be, even according to the light I have.

326 The Christian's responsibility is here to walk as Christ walked, to manifest the life of Jesus in his mortal flesh. Without Christ he can do nothing, and diligence, a heart exercised in dependence, prayer, the word, watchfulness - all have their place; exercising oneself day and night to have a conscience void of offence towards God and towards man, not grieving the Holy Spirit of promise by which we are sealed, so that He be not a rebuker, but the spring of joy in that which is heavenly. It is not now a question of righteousness or imputation. As to that, Christ has borne our sins, and we are in Him, according to His acceptance before God. The question is now brought into one of holiness, of acceptableness, not acceptance; and with a true heart this is of the utmost moment. For though God's sovereign grace has found a way in the unspeakable gift of Jesus on the cross, of meeting our sins according to His glory, so that grace should reign through righteousness, and guilt be no longer in question, yet what is really acceptable to Him is the basis of this very judicial estimate, and as partakers of the divine nature, His judgment is ours.

But this leads us to the very point in question. We hate the evil, yet the flesh is in fact there, and the practical question of deliverance is, how far we are free from it, or how far it has still power in us. I may writhe under cords which bind me, and yet not be able to break them and be free; and we have to learn our own weakness and want of power as well as our guilt. But, being renewed, born of God, I hate the evil, I groan under its power. I earnestly seek and strive to live free from it. I do not succeed. I learn that there is no good in me; I learn that it is not I, for I hate it, but I learn it is too strong for me when I do.

Into the detail of this I do not enter: it has been treated of elsewhere; it is in principle always law, the thought of God's judgment of us depending on our state. This is not - in its grosser form - guilt; for that is through sins committed; but being lost through what we are, perhaps a terrible question of self-deception, if we have made profession. We may writhe under the cords that bind us, and rub ourselves sore, but the cords are not broken, but a most useful lesson has been learned - what we are, and that we have no strength. And now comes deliverance, through the working and power of the Holy Ghost, but in the faith of what the blessed Lord has wrought. He has not only borne our sins, redeemed us, and cleared us from guilt, but He died unto sin. The full result will be the new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness, but the work itself is done. He appeared once in the end of the world to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. See Hebrews 9: 26, and what follows as to our sins: and John 1: 29. Now thus as a sacrifice to put away sin, we find its practical application in Romans 8: 3. When Christ was for sin, that is, a sacrifice for sin, God condemned sin in the flesh, not that Christ surely had any, but that He was made sin for us, Him who knew no sin, and died to it on the cross. I have part in the efficacy of His cross, and this hateful sin in the flesh, condemnable in me and everywhere, has been condemned there, condemned in Christ's death. He died unto sin once; and while the condemnation is accomplished, and most solemnly and fully for me, in that blessed One, who was made sin for me in grace, it was so in death, so that, as done effectually for me, there is no condemnation, but I reckon myself dead. I have been crucified with Christ, my old man is crucified with Him. We are not actually dead, of course; but faith, according to the word, appropriates this truth.

327 Up to this point I had been as a quickened soul in the position of a child of Adam, and practically under the law, labouring to have done with the old man, with sin in the flesh, but without success. Now I have died with Christ, and so do not belong to the old position of a child of Adam. Death clearly closes all relationship and bond with it.* I cannot speak of a man who is lying dead as having evil lusts and a perverse will. The law might shew me the evil, but could not remedy it. But I have died with Christ, and am delivered from the law; the condemnation is passed, being accomplished on the cross; but that was in death, so that I reckon myself dead, and no condemnation there. Up to that it was effort to overcome what remained untouched there in its vital strength. But God has dealt for us with this in Christ, Himself sinless. And we have not overcome but been delivered, having died in that wherein we were held, for Christ has died for us. Hence in Colossians 3, God pronounces on our position: "Ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God."

{*In Romans this is applied to sin in the flesh; in Colossians, to the world.}

328 With God the question is settled. I am not in the flesh, not in the standing of a child of Adam. I have died in that when Christ died. The judgment of God, declared in Colossians 3, is deliverance; for that which I was hopelessly struggling under is dead and gone - the old "I" of my corrupt and sinful nature; not only that I have received divine life in power in Christ (Rom. 8: 2), but that the sin of the old man has been condemned in the cross, and I, as such, died there. My standing is in Christ, not in Adam or flesh at all. It is not that the flesh is not in me, but it is not my standing and place before God. I am in Christ, or in the Spirit: in Christ, consequent on His having died and risen, and gone up beyond sin and death and judgment; or in the Spirit, which is the power of it down here.

Faith, in Romans 6, takes up the judgment of God in Colossians 3, and I reckon myself dead to sin, and alive to God; not in Adam, but in Jesus Christ our Lord. Hence, while "where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty," this liberty has a double aspect - conscious liberty in the light before God as in Christ, and a son; and liberty from the law of sin in the flesh. I have got into the new place in Christ, in that I have died to the old thing - Adam - and am alive in Christ. Had I to die, or to get free, by my own victory, I should not succeed, but I have found the need of a deliverer, as unable myself to set aside flesh, and have by grace found one - in, by faith, having died and risen with Christ. I have not to die; I reckon myself dead, because by the Holy Ghost Christ who died is in me as my life. The Holy Ghost gives me adoption, and the consciousness of being in Christ a son. It does give me faith as to having died with Christ; but it cannot give me the consciousness that the flesh is not there, but that I am not a debtor to it, nor that I am living after the Spirit when I am not. I know the conflict exists, that the flesh lusts against the Spirit, but that, the Spirit being there, I am not under the law. There I was captive to the law of sin. In the Spirit I am not; on the contrary, Christ's grace is sufficient for me, His strength made perfect in weakness. I am at liberty, because the sin I have discovered in my flesh has been condemned in the cross of Christ, and that was in death; so that for faith I am crucified with Him, and got into the new place of man before God, after the cross, and in resurrection, past sin, Satan's power, death and judgment. That place is liberty - liberty before God and from the law of sin. I am dead to it, having died with Christ. Romans does not go farther than death in this doctrine, and Christ being our life. In Colossians, resurrection with Him is introduced; and we are dead also to the world.

329 As to our life, the old things are passed, and Christ is our life, we having with Him died to sin, and now alive to God with Him (my whole spiritual condition, in connection with sin in the flesh, having closed by death); and this is so perfect, that we could, if God's time were come, go, and be as the thief Christ's companion in paradise. But generally we are left here and have to do with the old man - the flesh; free, redeemed out of the state and standing we were in, but having to do with the existence of flesh in us, with Satan and the world around. It is with the first I have to do now. Now in this state of things, that is, in a believer sealed with the Spirit, the conscious relationship is with God as sons, and true liberty is there. But there is more: when we have learned what it is to have died with Christ, the soul is set "free from the law of sin and death." He that is dead is justified from sin - not sins. You cannot accuse a dead man of a perverse will or evil lusts. But the flesh is in me. Now, captive to the law of sin in my members is not the place of conflict nor of victory, any more than Israel had to fight in Egypt. There may be carelessness as regards our communion with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord; but this is only deadness of soul, and the power of present things, the want of spiritual feeling. But if we do not mortify the deeds of the body, there is a positive evil power at work, positive evil rises up; if there be conscience, the sense of a bad state is there, and a worse one if there be not - the spiritual judgment is deteriorated. The flesh has a power which does not answer to deliverance, and we see persons who have not lost the sense of their standing with God, and are in that sense at liberty, in whom the flesh works as if spiritual power in Christ were not there.

Now, in such cases, the remedy is not to deny the deliverance; "where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty," "the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free." Entangling the soul again in the yoke of bondage is not what gives power. Slaves are not combatants, the yoke has to be broken. Where there is liberty and spiritual power, there is conflict. "The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh." Hence it is so beautifully put in the end of Romans 6. Now you are free, dead to sin, and alive in Christ to God, to whom are you going to give yourselves? to sin, or to righteousness and God, with fruit to holiness, and the end everlasting life? Such is God's way, by freeing us from the law of sin, and putting us in the liberty of adoption with Himself, to set us in the conflict, to realise fruit unto holiness here. Our standing is perfect, our state in no way; meet in Christ to be with Him, but exercised in daily spiritual life, if left here, how far we live up to the life which is ours in Christ, through Christ in us. God's view of our position, as noticed, is in Colossians 2 and 3. Faith takes this up (Rom. 6), and the believer reckons himself dead to sin, and alive to God in Christ. In 2 Corinthians 4: 10 we have the practical carrying it out, and God's dealing with us in view of it. "Always bearing about in the body the dying [not the death] of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our body."

330 Theoretically there ought to be no movement of the flesh in us, being suppressed by this application of the dying of Jesus. This supposes the activity of the new man to keep our thoughts and ways up to the level of the blessing into which we have been introduced, practically the life of Jesus manifested in us. It supposes a lusting flesh, but always absolutely kept down. If Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; if it lives of its own life and will, it will produce only that, and the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But, alas! this normal condition is not always maintained, as we know, if we know ourselves, and God disciplines us. We are delivered to death; well for us if it be for Jesus' sake. If we fail, we have an Advocate with the Father, or we may have a thorn in the flesh that we may not fail. Our normal condition is to be beholding with open face the glory of the Lord, and being changed into the same image, and feeding by faith on Him in His humiliation as the bread come down from heaven, and so living by Him, abiding in Him, and growing up unto Him, who is the Head, in all things. When walking thus, the flesh has no power; it is there, but the heart is elsewhere. Still, down here, we are passing through temptations and snares, and watching and praying constantly is needed not to enter into them, because the disposition of nature, if not will, is there. Power is there in Christ for us. We are not under the law of sin, but spiritually free, and there is no excuse for failure, but we do all fail. Where there is not diligence in watching and praying, we do not lose the sense of our position, but we act inconsistently with it. A son may never for a moment have such a question rise in his mind, but he may be a naughty, rebellious son.

331 So sin has power over the unwatchful unpraying believer, who yet never doubts of his place in Christ when he has been set free. He is not a slave, but a son, but more faulty than if he were a slave. He is not under the law of sin, but he is practically governed by it in his ways, because he is not profiting by the grace and power of Christ, his conscience and heart keeping far away from Him. The standard of his Christianity becomes frightfully lowered, and he sees "no harm" in things from which, in times past, he would have shrunk - not because they were prohibited, but because the life and Spirit of Christ in him found no food or attraction in them, but the contrary. Yet he may not have lost the sense of his place before God; in that sense he has deliverance, as a child goes on in the sense that he is a child, though heedless of his father's will, and of his father's pleasure. But this is a sad state. The remedy is not making him doubt of his adoption, but pressing with the claim of Christ's love his walking worthy of the calling wherewith he is called.

But it is of all moment to see that deliverance in the sense of known relationship with God, our place in Christ, not in Adam or in flesh, is a distinct thing from deliverance in the sense of the realisation of death and resurrection with Christ. This is the basis of that, known by the presence and power of the Holy Ghost. But one is the place we are in, the other the experimental power of walking according to that place, and, as the flesh is in us, requiring diligence of heart in seeking grace and strength (for without Christ we can do nothing), seeking Him, and the things which are above, where He is seated, and bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus.

But it is of all moment that we recognise deliverance from the law of sin as the Christian state. Here only is power, the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, the power of the Spirit of God working in the life of Christ. There is true liberty, and that based on Christ's dying to sin once, and for sin; Romans 6 and 8. There is, for such, a grace sufficient for us, and strength made perfect in weakness; so that there is no excuse for the commission of sin, though the flesh be in us. And here spiritual exercises have their place, to the acquisition of heavenly things in spirit, and a heavenly character down here. It is evident that the grace and strength of Christ only can enable us to walk in the path in which He walked, but that grace is sufficient for us. But His strength - it is its nature and character - is made perfect in weakness; and there must be known weakness in us to find this strength. Hence those exercises of heart before deliverance, in which we learn our weakness, that we cannot get the victory (even when we desire it), which lead to the felt need of deliverance. This we find in the death of Christ, and are thus free - "free from the law of sin and death." Consequent on this there is victory, and, if kept in the sense that we have no strength in ourselves, the peaceful though watchful consciousness that He is with us, as well as that without Him we can do nothing. Deliverance is His dying to sin once, and we in Him, and, while thus free, having the strength in Him which is made perfect in weakness in us. Till we have learned that we cannot free ourselves, we do not get freedom. Freedom is the portion of every Christian so taught of God; strength, of him who abides in the sense that he has none, and looks to Christ; only there are the Lord's gracious dealings with us to keep us in this position.

Progress of Democratic Power, and its Effects on the Moral State of England.

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I need hardly assure your readers that I have no desire that they should meddle in politics; I do not do so myself, nor do I think that a Christian ought. He believes that God governs, and governs with a view to the glory of Christ, and that He will infallibly bring about His purposes. But it seems to me to be well that Christians should apprehend what they have to look for, and be prepared for it, if the Lord tarry. Did it not concern them religiously, you would have no word from me on such subjects.

What I purpose doing is to review briefly the course of events, and state what seem to me their results. Parties are all alike to me; they are all alike guilty, and have all alike had their part in what is going on. Lord Derby it was who banished the scriptures from Irish schools and set up the Irish national (really, Popish) school system. He stated that there was no proselytism, but that "the use of scripture" was a fatal objection, because it was displeasing to the Priests. We must remember that politicians have no idea of principles, but only of existing influences to which they must be subject.

The next step was that of that most short-sighted man, however great a general he might have been, the Duke of Wellington. I take no side with any party - I distrust them all; but he was a Tory as they call it, aristocratic in principle. He, with Sir R. Peel, passed the Catholic Emancipation bill, so called, which admitted some sixty or seventy violent democrats into the House, and by that party (as it is well known) the Reform bill of 1832 was passed; the majority of English members were against it. Now, for a State with a political machinery like that of England to work smoothly, a large portion of influential masses must not be outside its institutions. The Duke of Wellington declared the system perfect which did shut them out, after introducing elements which made it impossible to hold that ground. He thought to stem it by the House of Lords, and nearly brought on an open revolution; and Lord Harrowby and the waverers (as they were then called), gave a majority to the Reform bill in the House of Lords.

334 That bill was a revolution. That is, it was not an admission of excluded influences into existing institutions, but a total change in the institutions themselves. Democracy became ascendant, and possessed the power. The Lord's House became insignificant, and populous boroughs acquired the power once wielded by the land. Old habits modified the effect, but every one knows that this is what took place. The ancient institutions of the country were in principle overturned.

With this, railroads and the commercial movement, and the refusal of landlords to increase the population on their lands, concurred to throw the population into the towns. Vaunted education ministered immensely to general infidelity, Satan in that being let loose in that respect, and by the growth of this and of dissent, which predominates in the great towns, the clergy were, on the one hand, thrown into ritualism and popish principles, or, on the other, adopted infidel or semi-infidel principles; and (the bands of the Establishment and its general hold on the population of the country loosened) infidel notions acquired a powerful influence over the mental activity of the country, and exercised a very great power in the governing body, the House of Commons. Morally speaking, the Protestant church was gone, and rationalism and popery, in principle, divided the country. Evangelicalism became practically null in the Establishment.

In this state of things the democratic influence has acquired an immense accession of power by the new Reform bill. It is an immense stride in legally revolutionising the country; checks, and balances, and reckoning on the English character and history is all nonsense. Power is put into hands which will use it. The forms are immaterial; they will probably be changed immediately or ere long.

But my object is to notice the effect on the state of society. God cares for the poor. But the poor have ceased to be so in the scriptural sense of the word. They are masters. The effect on the masses and on the active minds of the country will be infidelity, exalting man. Even popular religious preaching will take this character. It will keep up the name of Christian, but will exalt man in its statements, not Christ - despising government, says the apostle, presumptuous, self-willed, not afraid to speak evil of dignities. Human reason, not God, will be the arbiter of good and evil. What already prevails so largely, will be open to a vast party in the country. The will of the people, confidence in man, his rights, his general perfectibility, will be the banner of all this class. The aristocracy, on the contrary, having lost power will seek to compensate themselves (vexed and dissatisfied in heart) by luxury and pleasure. To maintain quiet (principle having gone in both classes), and some influence - some barrier against the strong will of the people, they will rapidly seek to increase the influence of the clergy - the only one remaining over those that constitute the bulk of those around. In the country it will be the body of the poor subject to priestcraft, and in the towns a very large increase of popery, so as to have an integral place in the population (the bulk of those who are not so, or who do not side with them, being infidel).

335 It may be thought that I have not sufficiently allowed for the influence of religious dissenters. It is, really, next to nothing, and will be always becoming less. Already exalting man is the system that most widely prevails, going on with the age. But there is another thing, they will join with the Roman Catholics in putting down the Establishment, which has little or no political hold on the country. The Episcopalian must then, as against dissenters, base itself on its distinctive character, in alliance with (if not in the form of) popery, successional grace and sacraments, and the clergy the only channels of it. I do not expect Protestantism nominally to cease, but it will be really infidel. You may find individual ministers, Independent or Episcopalian, preaching Christ, but the disruption that is taking place is a disruption into infidel radicalism or popular will, and popery in the aristocracy and in all that they can bring under its influence, as a check upon that will. I have no doubt that God will keep every faithful soul, and maintain every needed testimony; but it is well that Christians should know what is before them, as time goes on more rapidly, perhaps, than we are aware.

I do not look for violence, because I believe there is no courage anywhere to resist the course of events. I do not pretend to say how long it may take to bring these things about. God knows, and God holds the reins or looses them; but I have no doubt as to what is coming on. The Christian may walk in peace through it all, waiting for God's Son from heaven, and keeping the word of His patience; yea, he may have a specially blessed place of testimony in the midst of it all, but a lowly one, content to be nothing in a world which has rejected Christ and is ripening for His judgment. Our part is to keep His word and not deny His name.

336 The result as to the western world will be, as known to students of prophecy, that the Babylonish or idolatrous power, with which the kings of the earth had committed fornication, will be utterly destroyed, and the popular will in the same sphere will give itself to the beast destroyed, with the false prophet, by the Lord Himself coming from heaven.

The present result of what is now enacting will be: the aristocratic part of the community giving itself up to luxury and pleasure, and, with the dependent part of the population, to Popery; the independent and mentally active part, to infidelity. The opposition to Popery will be infidel, not Protestant. The general public effect will be a great and rapid increase of centralisation or despotic power, and loss of personal liberty. Individual personal independence of character will disappear almost entirely. Men must go with others to be anything. Protestantism having lost its integrity and energy, God allows infidelity as a check on Popish power.

If things go smoothly, I apprehend the first move towards centralisation will be the substitution of a paid for an unpaid magistracy; to set aside, nominally, local territorial influence and gain efficiency, but throwing a vast increase of power into the centre of government, and being the first move towards despotism or central power, as a counter-balance to multitudinous self-will or anarchy (personal liberty and independence being proportionately set aside). Other social questions, as primogeniture, will soon come in; the importance of money and luxury, the necessary consequence of its abolition, will rapidly increase, and the moral degradation and dissipation which go with it. All this will be modified by existing habits, no doubt, and the love of something aristocratic is inherent in the human mind,* but this will not materially affect the result.

{*In New York, liveries and armorial bearings are coming in, and carefully studied genealogies where there are any.}

Four things we have in Christ

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It is very striking to notice, when the eye is opened to see it, how the manner of Paul's conversion brought out to his soul the entire contrast of all that was in man, and what was in Christ. Every principle on which man could rest was gone; conscience had failed to be a guide. Paul thought he ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth, so that his conscience led him, making him destroy Christ if he could; his righteousness, according to the law, wrought to the same thing. He could not have Christ, he was a Pharisee; his religiousness too made him bow to the authority of the chief priests. By conscience, law, and religiousness, he was against God. All the things which could act religiously upon the senses, which God had Himself appointed, and had been present Himself upon the earth to maintain, all had brought man to enmity against God. Paul had lived in it all, and found himself thereby only in activity against God. His religion as to the flesh was all smashed; it all went for nothing: of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews, as touching the law, a blameless Pharisee - all was gone! It had brought him into enmity against the Lord of glory. And, let me say here, that ritualism, by which in these days people are seeking to build up all this again, is the denial of Christ; before He came and wrought redemption it was only ignorance of Him.

When Paul by grace got hold, not of external morality, as to which he was blameless, but of the spirituality of the law, he found that by the law was the knowledge of sin. Very useful it now is in that way; but you cannot build up service to God upon that whose only true effect is to convict of sin, nor on the flesh that is not subject to God but is enmity against Him; that is quite clear. It is of the greatest moment for our understanding God's ways, and for our having peace, that we should clearly see this. God bore with Judaising tendencies till Jerusalem was destroyed; but in Paul, for his deliverance, it was all smashed up at once. Blind outwardly, and his eye turned in, he found everything in him was enmity against God. He had been brought up in, what would be called in these days, a famous university; but now, instead of himself, he had got Christ, and all the rest was judged by this revelation of Christ.

But the philosophical wisdom of man is no better. It is never true, nor can it arrive at any true knowledge of God or of man. It is false in its basis. As legalism takes up sinful flesh to make out righteousness, so rationalism takes up man's mind to know God, of which it is so incapable that what it is capable of cannot be God; for it must be master of the subject to know it rightly, which it cannot be of God. A God that reason is equal to is not God at all. God has chosen the foolish things, a gibbet, to glorify Himself by, so that no flesh should glory in His presence. What is all the wisdom of this world? Only that in which the flesh clothes itself. A conscience dealt with by God alone puts God in His place and ourselves in ours; the moment I get the moral system of the world, I find what is not of the Father, and it is all judged. Paul started there, with human righteousness and religious standing with God, razed to its foundations; all the more powerful as a testimony, that he was a blameless man personally. But our whole position is changed from that of being in the flesh ("Of God are we in Christ Jesus"); we do not want a system that builds it up in ceremonial righteousness or rationalistic pretensions, for we are of God.

338 The Greeks were spinning thoughts out of their own heads, which, like spiders' webs, could catch flies and nothing else. Some said: God was too high to notice man. It sounded very grand, but then what was to become of man? Some would exalt man to an equality with God; Epicureanism and Stoicism are of all ages. God puts man in his place as a responsible person, not a reasoner. The world by wisdom knew not God. Why did the Athenians set up an altar to the "unknown God"? It was the only bit of truth Paul could pick up to use among them.

God chose all the foolish things, the weak things, to put down what was wise and strong in man's sight - a parcel of fishermen; and to Paul he gave the thorn in the flesh, lest he should think it was by his own power the work was done. Nothing has gone over the world like Christianity. Even the unconverted have felt its effect: people do not do in the light what they do in the dark. So it has had an effect where there is no conversion.

But then He comes to - "of him are ye"; not only conscience and heart work, but the new life. Of God are ye: an immense and precious truth; we derive our own moral and spiritual existence from God Himself. It is not our puny reason, as we are, striving to fathom what, if it could be measured or known by it, would be proved not to be God at all, but subject to it.

339 Half a century ago a sentence of Cicero's shewed me there could be no knowledge of God by reason. The words are these: "Quocirca huic, quasi materia quam tractet et in qua versetur subiecta est veritas." (De Officiis I . v. 16 ed. Orell. iv. 317.) That could not be God. I saw that faith only could put God in His place, and me in mine; not an attempt to satisfy God as Judge, with what sinful flesh can do, quieting our conscience for a time with what never purges it. "We are of God." But another truth connects itself with this, through what the law did do in the conscience: "I, through the law, am dead to the law." But, if only killed and condemned, that would not do of course; so he adds, "I am crucified with Christ." He found Christ had taken the curse which the law pronounced, and death to sin was ours through Him, and Christ was living in him: "Not I, but Christ liveth in me." Then there is also the object of this life by which it lives: "The Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me."

But that we are of God thus is only one side; what we are ourselves of God in Christ Jesus. Besides that, we get what Christ is for us on the part of God. We are of God in Christ, a completely new thing; and He is "made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption." We have all these things of and from God now. The passage gives us the character and quality of the things as of and from God. It is not righteousness, nor is it sanctification according to the law. In Philippians Paul (for he does not here contrast it with sins) says: "not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is of God" - another kind. He had given up all thoughts of righteousness as a man; he was not ashamed of the gospel, for therein was the righteousness of God revealed. There are fruits of righteousness, of course, but this is entirely of grace.

We have these four things: wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, redemption (there are many more, fellowship with the Father and the like); but we get these four things as the basis of all.

It is not of man. Christ is divine "wisdom" for us: God has made foolish the wisdom of this world, but "we speak wisdom among them that are perfect." He has "abounded towards us in all wisdom and prudence, having made known unto us the mystery of his will." (See Eph. 1: 8-10.) The divine revelation of all God's thoughts and intentions is in Christ; "the wisdom of God in a mystery," which word means what only the initiated understand: as in Freemasonry, I do not know anything about it because I am not initiated.

340 God's delight was with the sons of men, before the foundation of the world; Prov. 8. Angels were there already when the world was created, but they were not the objects of God's delight and purpose; they were the testimony that God could make a glorious creature and keep him. But we are the testimony that He can make an inferior creature, and, when he has fallen into sin, He can redeem him. All the display of what God is in redemption is unfolded in and through man. We are lower than the angels as creatures; so Christ became lower than the angels for the suffering of death. But all the result of that wondrous dealing of God we get; we have peace with God, redemption through the blood of Christ, "in whom also we have obtained an inheritance."

Some have thought that, as Christ is made these things to us, the passage speaks of imputation. It does not, however. Imputed wisdom, or imputed redemption, has no sense; other passages do shew that imputation is true in the case of righteousness. But here the thought is not found; it is, that Christ gives the true character and reality of these things on the part of God.

Christ is "made wisdom." All the mind of God is revealed, which never was till the cross; this mystery, of connecting persons with Him by the power of the Holy Ghost, was never revealed before. "Who hath saved us and called us . . . according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began, but is now made manifest." (2 Tim. 1: 9, 10; also Titus 1: 2, 3.) The cross having laid the foundation of righteousness which was consistent with God - and more than consistent, for it glorified Him - those things are revealed which eye had not seen, nor ear heard. He gives us spiritual occupation in that way.

Then we get "righteousness" - the righteousness of God revealed on the principle of faith, so that we have no part in its accomplishment at all. Supposing you kept the law to a tittle, this would be man's righteousness, not God's. God's righteousness is revealed in His setting Christ at His right hand, as in John 16 the Spirit convinces the world "of righteousness, because I go to my Father." Christ having perfectly glorified God, it was due to Him on the part of God, to set Him in the glory, as He says: "He will straightway glorify him," John 13: 31, 32. "Sit thou at my right hand." There was righteousness! but it was done for us; and, because this work of redemption was done for us, we get the result of it all. God is "just, and the justifier of him who believeth in Jesus"; not "just and yet the justifier," but just in justifying.

341 And it is a different kind of righteousness in which we stand. Man's righteousness is the measure of the judgment; but the righteousness of God is the measure of my place before Him. What a poor sinner needs is that his sins should be met; and, thank God, they are met. But Christ has done more; He has glorified God. Where has God's love been manifested? In the cross. Supposing He had cut off Adam and Eve, there would have been no love in it, though just. If He had passed over all sins simply, we should have called it love; it is what man calls mercy; but then it were no matter about righteousness. But, in Christ dying on the cross, I get all that is in God perfectly glorified; and therefore He puts the Man who did it into the divine glory.

He is "made unto us righteousness." It is of faith that it might be by grace. A man may believe me when I tell him I have paid his debt, but his belief does not add one farthing to the payment. All the good comes to us, but all the glory comes to Him, and He is worthy of it.

Then there is "redemption." He is "made unto us redemption," which is the full accomplishment, in full deliverance, of all God's plans and counsels as to us; all these are in Christ.

And now we come to sanctification; He is "made unto us sanctification." People sometimes say this is imputed; but we have seen that you cannot impute wisdom or redemption, though it may be true as to righteousness. But Christ is the whole thing. Whatever wisdom I have is only the wisdom of God in Christ; it is God's wisdom revealed in Christ; so God's righteousness, and so redemption - He changes our vile bodies. It is what these things are in Christ Himself in every part. What is this wisdom? God's in Christ; He gathers together all things in Him. What is this righteousness? Christ. What redemption? Christ. And so with sanctification; Christ still.

342 I desire to open out a little what is this sanctification. We must remember that God is perfectly revealed in Christ. We walk in the light as God is in the light; this is our place as Christians; no veil now. The Jews had to be holy, but they had no idea of this. God's presence being there, they had to walk in a way suited to that presence in the tabernacle; but it went no farther. The way into the holiest was not then made manifest; but now it is, through the work of Christ. But then also I am set apart for God; the veil is rent; we have boldness to enter into the holiest; we have to do with God in the light.

It is no question of what man ought to be, but whether he is fit for that presence. If God is revealed, where do I get the revelation of God to bring me to Himself? In the rending of the veil. If I am not fit to be with God there, I am not fit at all. What is the vital measure of this? Christ, as gone into the holiest, the One who answered in everything to His Father's mind. He said of Him: "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." But I cannot be thus down here, because in Him was no sin, and, if I say I have no sin, I deceive myself. But I am sanctified to God by the death of Christ; He offered Himself without spot to God; nothing was kept back; no suffering stopped Him; not one thought or feeling that the blessed Lord reserved, but all was to God, and now "In that he liveth, he liveth unto God." He has set Himself apart as Man in glory, that we also might be sanctified through the truth. Nothing short of what Christ is, as set apart in glory, is sanctification.

You find it attributed to the Father in the First to the Thessalonians 5: 23. He has taken us up to be for Himself; we are sanctified to something, and that is to God; a great principle.

I get Christ, who perfectly satisfied God all His life long, manifested in His resurrection. All His life through there had been nothing but what was positive fruit according to the Spirit of holiness. This was as Man here. But now "the holy place," where God sets man, is up there; as the Father raised Him from the dead and glorified Him, even so we also should walk in newness of life. It is a totally new thing, "That he might sanctify the people with his own blood," Heb. 13: 12. "By the which will we are sanctified," Heb. 10: 10. What puts an end to everything of flesh, and of the world, is the cross. I am occupied with Christ - a rejected Christ as regards the world.

343 The whole Trinity is occupied in this work. The Father sanctifies, as we have seen; we are set apart through the blood; but, in the appreciation of it in our souls, in the effectuation of it in us, it is the Spirit who operates and applies it. All immediate action from creation onwards is by the Spirit; but we do not get the full value of what sanctification is, if we do not see the Father, as setting us apart for Himself; and, if we leave the cross out, we do not get its value. We are sanctified by God's will, through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all, set apart to God according to the value of His precious blood, and lastly as effectuated in power by the Spirit: "He hath chosen you to salvation, through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth," 2 Thess. 2: 13.

It is a complete setting apart for God, according to the revelation He has given of Himself in Christ; in the light as God is in the light, according to the value of the cross, which has judged the world, written death on the flesh, and rent the veil. It is by a new life and nature: "That which is born of the Spirit is spirit." As born of God he "cannot sin"; not "ought not." He is of the nature of that which he is born of; so born of God by the power of the Holy Ghost in the soul, and this by the word, the revelation of His mind and thoughts, quickening and forming us. There are fathers, young men, babes; but the nature is there, and it is a holy nature.

He has opened to us all the treasure-house of His glory in Christ as an object, and He has given us the divine nature that we may delight in it.

The measure and character of this sanctification is Christ in glory; Christ up there. Is not that a Man set apart for God? - Surely He is! He never had anything of the Spirit of the world at any time; our flesh ever has, and this is the difference. In Him there was no sin; if we say we have none, we deceive ourselves. What He was is not a model of what we can be. The flesh is in us, an unchanged evil nature though we may not allow it to act; not in Him; but then we ought not to walk after the flesh, we ought to walk even as He walked. "The life which I live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God," my mind entirely occupied with Christ. "Beholding with unveiled face the glory of the Lord, we are changed into the same image." The Spirit takes the things of Christ and shews them to us.

344 "We know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him," and "he that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure." The believer has got the consciousness and certainty that he is going to be like Christ when He appears; and, having that before his soul, he runs after it. And the more our eye gets opened to see the blessedness of Christ, the more capable we become of doing so. But each step introduces us into more light, so that we are able to detect other things not of Him, which were before unnoticed by us; because we purify ourselves ever onward, as He is pure. As to my person, I am sanctified once for all; but, if I come to my heart practically, it is following after holiness, never attained here, because the thing that acts is the glory, and every revelation of the glory purifies and judges us, so that we can see more.

Paul says, "I count not myself to have apprehended . . . but I press towards the mark." We go into the holiest, in the light as God is in the light, not only forgiven, but divine favour resting on us as upon Christ; and all that is there may be realised by us here. There is the divine excellency that is there, and the word communicates what is of Christ, and all the affections of the heart are linked up with it. "That ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints, what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height" - of all the glory into which you are brought; and then he returns to that with which we are intimate - "and to know the love of Christ."

We have these two great principles: the new nature, holy and without blame before Him in love. Christ was holy and blameless, and always before the Father in love; He is our life, and that is what we are called to. I have a title in perfect boldness to enter the holiest; and, besides that, I have a divine nature which has its delight there, and also the Holy Ghost, which is the power of apprehension to us.

What is the character and measure of that holiness? Christ - Christ Himself now in glory. Christ crucified is the end of the flesh, and of the world. What is there positively, if negatively I am crucified with Christ? I am alive unto God by the faith of Him, in Jesus Christ our Lord, and I live. And what else? Nothing! We fail, I know, all do fail sadly; but that is what God's thought is. We have a new start in Christ; not of the world as He is not of the world; the measure of our sanctification is Christ in glory, and to be conformed to Him there. I have to learn what Christ is. As a person set apart, I am sanctified for ever; but, when I come to the Holy Ghost's work, I have to learn every day, to judge every day. We are to follow after as Paul pressed towards the mark. If there is negligence, God will chasten us; He is very jealous over us in His love; but, when things are going on right, there is activity of soul - going on after Him.

345 Christ then is made all these four things to us. And when I say: What is all this? God's wisdom? It is all yours; "Ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things." Christ is our righteousness, He is our sanctification. Christ in glory, that is what God has set before me as the true measure of it. I wait for redemption, and look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change this vile body and fashion it like unto His glorious body. We get deliverance from sorrow, and the like, when we go to be with the Lord; but, what we wait for, is the redemption of the body.

It is not that a man will think about what is wrought in him, whatever his progress; as has been said of Moses, his face shone, and he was the only person who did not know it. Being occupied with Christ produces its effect in our walk and ways with others, but our hearts enjoy Himself.

We are always sanctified to something; you cannot be sanctified without having an object: "Changed into the same image from glory to glory." Fruit unto holiness there will be, if I walk in obedience; fruit here in separation of heart to God. Babes know the Father; even babes have the Spirit of adoption, but the fathers know Christ - get their hearts enlarged (after all they are narrow enough).

And then we wait for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of the body.

I shall not have, save actual glory, a source of joy in heaven that I have not got here. The Holy Ghost is the power of joy there, and I have Him here. Christ's perfect love? - I am the object of it now. The Father's love? - He loves us now. Eternal life? - that I have. The blood that gives me a title there is effectual now. Here, no doubt, we see through a glass darkly; I may see obscurely through a haze on the window, but I see the same objects as if there were no haze. If walking practically in fellowship with the Father, we should see a great deal more.

346 The Lord give us to know His strength made perfect in weakness; but, at the same time, to know we shall never attain here, because the only object is Christ, made perfect in glory.

"This one thing"

Philippians 3

<32020E> 347

There are two ways in which we may look at the Christian. One is according to the counsels and thoughts of God, and the efficacy of the work of the Lord Jesus Christ; "by one offering perfected for ever," accepted in Christ Himself before God, everything that stood against us put away, and the believer cleared completely and for ever from his old condition in Adam, taken out of that old condition, and put into the acceptance of Christ Himself: this is the grace wherein we stand. But evidently there is also another condition in which the Christian is seen, and that is as walking in this world.

This walk of the Christian we get in two ways - in the Epistle to the Philippians and in Hebrews. In Hebrews it is looked at in respect to the grace Christ obtains for us as Priest on high; not the operation of the Spirit in us, but the work of Christ for us, and grace to help in time of need. But if in Hebrews you see the Christian down here in weakness, needing help and getting it, in Philippians you see him down here, and the energy and power of the Spirit of God working in him. We have to pass through the world, and there are difficulties in our path, temptations to draw us aside; but one walking in the power of God's Spirit rises above all the difficulties in the midst of which he is. In Philippians is brought out the power of God's Spirit acting in one walking in the right path, and the result is a person entirely above it all, one who can "rejoice in the Lord alway." We may remember, too, that Paul had been four years in prison at the time, two of them with a soldier chained to him; and, what was still more trying, his work as an apostle put a stop to, his activity all come to an end. He might have reproached himself as to going up to Jerusalem, and so on, but he does not; he rises above it all. You never hear sin mentioned in this Epistle - it is never spoken of; nor is the flesh, except as having no confidence in it, in a warning to avoid its religiousness; it is simply a walk in the power of the Spirit. In the previous chapter you get the graciousness, and in this the energy of the course - the full energy of the Christian going through this world. He does not here speak of the cross as that which puts away sin; it has another character here, being looked at practically; here it is being "crucified to the world." It is the book of experience, according to the spirit of the Christian on earth.

348 Imprisoned, so that he cannot be active, yet Paul says, It will all turn to my salvation; it will all turn to good: and I can rejoice in the Lord always. This comes with power when we remember where he was when he could write thus. He looks back and contrasts his own course with that of those who had made profession but were still going on with the world.

Let us first look at the character of the energy with which the apostle ran this race. He says he has not yet attained, is not yet perfect: this is because he is looking at his state. We must just see what he means by this. In the first place, he has not a thought of his own righteousness at all. There was a righteousness which he had had; there was a righteousness which he had boasted in; he had had it, all that which depended on himself: "touching the righteousness which was in the law, blameless." But the moment the spiritual character of the law was seen it was all over; all that flesh could trust in was gone for him. We all know how, when he was in the full flush of his career, the Lord met him, and he discovered that all that had been gain to him; all of which he had boasted, had only served to bring him into open enmity with God. All this knowledge, all this energy of character, he had only made use of to try to destroy the name of Christ. It was not a question of his sins; it was that all he had valued as good was gone, his conscience proved to be misdirected, his legal righteousness nothing worth. There, on his way to Damascus, with authority from the high priest, he found himself in the presence of Christ, and in open enmity with Him; and in that presence all that he was as a religious man, "blameless" - in the outward sense, of course, for he found himself to be the chief of sinners - all that Saul could clothe himself with outwardly was utterly smashed, and he himself left to dwell in darkness three days, to go through in his own soul what this terrible revelation had discovered to him.

The practical effect of thus seeing the Christ in glory was to put down in the most powerful way all that was of man. The first thing we need as sinners, and get through the cross of the Lord Jesus, is "redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins"; but here it was not sins, it was righteousness put away. What he had stood before God in was all gone; it was brought out in the strongest way in his own experience what man was in his best estate: the upright, honest, law-keeping Pharisee was only enmity against God. And it was not only that he had failed - that was not the thing; it was that the whole structure, the moral structure of man, was brought out in the sight of God and done with. It was the end of the first man; and this not as a doctrine, but practically, for we must learn everything in our own consciences if it is to be a real thing. It was total, entire, condemnation of man in the flesh in his best form; the best man in the world (best as man goes) was the chief of sinners.

349 This is a truth that we can learn in different ways, either as seeing ourselves open sinners in rebellion against God, or by discovering that what we esteem best is utterly valueless before Him. Innocence is gone; man fell from paradise, and that is all over. There is no going back to the tree of life; and from that time forward man must be either an alien from God, an enemy in his mind by wicked works, or else he must have a heavenly place with God. On the road to Damascus Saul meets the Man in the glory, and then he is judged in his own conscience, and is found to be an open, ceaseless, enemy of God. It is easy for us to see that our sins must be judged by God, but we do not see at first that the mind and affections of the flesh are enmity against Him. But here you see there is an end of Saul, and of everything that the flesh was in this world - this world that was not paradise, and certainly was not heaven; this world in which the good things were worthless in the sight of God, and certainly the sins were not of any use.

Outwardly Saul was the best man possible - as man goes; conscientious, religious, righteous; and there he was an open enemy against God. Nothing was to be found here; consequently he looked out of this world and saw Christ in glory; he saw Him there where he stood; and the effect was, the old man was perfectly judged, and there was a new one in heaven. All that he was was gone. It is not a question of sins, but of righteousness. In another place he says, "I had not known sin but by the law." But supposing there were a righteousness according to the law, no man had ever reached it except the blessed Lord Himself; but even if Paul could have reached it, he would not have it now, for he says, I have got another; there was "the righteousness of God" for him now. The law required righteousness from man for God, but this was now all given up; besides, none had attained it. It is "not having mine own righteousness"; it does not say, not having my own sins. It goes a great deal farther than that, and I press it on you. Theoretically it is a man blameless, who says, I will not have it at all. The whole standing, place, and condition of the first man is a judged thing in his soul; and another Man, Christ in glory, shall be for him that which he was. The condition of the first man has been shewn out by the revelation of the second Man, and Paul follows Him. Thus I get the whole ground and standing of legal righteousness swept away. Nobody had it, of course: still that was altogether the ground he was on; but now, he says, I will not have my own at all, for I have got another.

350 You cannot have the two before God. Seeing this sets aside a thousand things that are floating in the world. A man will have perfection nowadays; he says, I will not go on sinning. And he is quite right: he has no right to go on sinning. But God would not thank me for my righteousness, not when I clothe myself in an Adamic robe, for I have got another thing altogether in Christ. Paul does not speak here of his position in Christ; it is not here: "There is, therefore, now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus"; it is the condition of soul of those who possess this "no condemnation." And the condition of Paul's was that the revelation of Jesus Christ had set aside in him all that was of himself; it was the righteousness of God that he had, and this does not go from man to God but from God to man. When did the prodigal get the best robe? when the Father put it on him. "I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing." The whole nature, the character, and the quality of it is a judged thing. But mark, when this Christ was revealed, his mind and heart and desire never stop short of reaching Him, and then what happens? Away goes all your perfection here. He says, The glory I saw in Damascus - that is what I want. It was no longer the judgment of the old man; it was the hopes of the new.

He says to him, "I am Jesus of Nazareth." There was no longer any question about it: that Man was there in the glory - the carpenter's son - the One whom they had rejected. They all fell down at the glory of that light, though they knew not what it meant. And in that light Paul was totally and entirely condemned and done with: Christ took the place of everything. All that he had counted gain was gone. Supposing he were a learned man - well, to whom was that gain? To Paul, not to Christ; it is only building up, and furnishing, and giving credit to, and adorning that old thing that has been judged as enmity against God.

351 And it is not only "I counted," but he has gone on with Christ; he adds, "I do count," as a present thing. All that I esteemed best - righteousness, learning, birth, everything - "I do count them but dung"; for I have seen Christ and I want Him, and the things of this world I count nothing. He has revealed Himself to me in grace; He has proved His love to be above all my enmity, and now I must have Him. Paul was a man whose whole course and career were marked by an object that was before him: and it is the object which is before us that marks our course and gives it its moral character. Paul followed after Christ. Let us ask ourselves, Are we following Christ in this way? Is this what governs us? I do not say we may not be distracted, but is He the object after which we are running? We cannot have two at the same time. Has there been such a revelation of Christ to our hearts that we have Him as the only object before us?

And I will ask here - for it is very current in some places, called "higher life," and truly, alas, for so many Christians follow the world - what is true Christian life? It is "higher life," and no mistake, for our calling is a "calling above" - that and no other; I have no calling to anything down in this world. There is no calling for the Christian according to the word of God but the calling to a risen, glorified Christ. What is put before us is a glorified Christ; we are going to be like Him; and you cannot have a right object except as that object is a glorified Christ, because this is the only Christ. Christ down here is a pattern for our walk, but there is no such Christ now to attain. I cannot win a Christ down in this world, because there is no Christ here to win. Attempting it only lowers the standard of holiness, and, instead of being "higher Christian life," it is lower. It is the hope of being like Him in glory that makes a man now "purify himself even as he is pure." The object that I get before my soul in this race that he speaks of is a glorified Christ, and this only; that is what I am going to attain; I am going to be like the Christ that I have seen. Whatever progress Paul made he was so much the nearer to Him, but he had not got Him; he would only get Him when in his glorified body. There is no other Christ to run after or win; not that our affections do not cling to Him in humiliation, but it is a glorified Christ only who is the object of our hearts. I may get to heaven now in spirit, and be happy there with Him, but I never attain to Him, I never win Him, until I am with Him in the glory; it is then I shall have won Christ.

352 When all that was Paul was judged, it brought him into all kinds of difficulties; for instance, now he was going to be tried for his life; but he had done with Paul, he had the sentence of death in himself. Many may not, none perhaps, so realise it as he did, but the consequence was, he was always "bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus," so that the life of Jesus was made manifest in his body. He had the sentence of death in himself, that he should not trust in himself, but in God, which raiseth the dead: that is, he says, The God I know has raised Christ from the dead, and therefore I am not afraid of death, of trial, of anything that may come on the road; I can glory in it all.

It is not only patience and hope as in Romans; but it is "the fellowship of his sufferings." We are always called on to suffer with Him here. We hardly know what it is to suffer for His sake - a little trial perhaps now and then; but to suffer with Him we do know, for we cannot go through this world of sin and sorrow without suffering in principle what the heart of Christ suffered. We can rejoice in the saints when they are going on well, but there is nothing else in it to rejoice any one; it is only the world that crucified Christ, except of course, poor sinners, and he must speak to them; that is all he saw in this world.

"If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of [from] the dead." This does not imply doubt; but he says, Even if death be on the road I will go through it, and shall only be made like Him if I die. Here I get the apostle fixed on an object - Christ in glory, and nothing short of it; and here he will have suffering with Christ, let it cost him life and everything, if but only he may get this place - part in the first resurrection; for he is looking at it here, not as our position, but as attainment. It may be a bad road that I tread, but I get refreshment by the way, and it is the road He travelled.

"Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect; but I follow after." There is the activity of the life. In these days, when people are giving up Christianity on all sides, it is well to know what Christianity is. Christianity is perfect peace, perfect reconciliation with God, to be perfected for ever before Him; and as regards my path in this world, it is the eye on Christ Himself in glory, and one undivided energy to get after Him. Every step we take we get more of Christ, and are more capable of knowing Him, and thus the effect is practically to form me into His likeness. This bringing in of the life of Christ to my soul enables me to see Him in the glory, so that even now I get more like this resurrection I am aiming after. The resurrection from among the dead identifies itself with winning Christ; to be raised from the dead speaks to us God's perfect delight in us in Christ.

353 Then he speaks of perfection - "as many as be perfect." A perfect Christian is a full-grown man in one sense; it is the same word as the "perfect man, the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." And what is that? It certainly is not being like what Christ was when He was down here, for there was no sin in Him; so the thought of being like Him is a mere delusion. He that walks with Him up there walks like Him down here; but to be like Him as He was down here is not possible. To walk like Him, I repeat, is said; but to be like Him would be to be absolutely sinless. To be conformed to Him in glory, that we shall be, and therefore the heart desires and runs after it now; and this is what he calls a perfect Christian. It is not one who knows what it is to have got the sins of the old creation cleared away - it is not knowing the work of Christ which puts sin away (hardly measured either by the sin, for it is the whole state of the creature); all is settled, and I know that "by one offering he has perfected for ever them that are sanctified," that there is no more a question of anything to be settled between me and God, that I have liberty before Him in the sense of His favour; but then I say, Is that all? All my debts are paid, but am I to have nothing to go and buy anything with? Am I henceforth to starve, without possessing a farthing? Then it is that the soul comes to see that, having part in this forgiveness, it has also part with the last Adam. One has got hold by grace of this Man in the glory, and knowing this, I say, my whole soul is in that. I have seen the excellency of Christ Jesus, my Lord, and it has set aside everything here. I have done with it all; I belong to another place, and no longer own this old man.

354 It is then the Christian has got to be what he calls a perfect man; he has this object before him, he has got Christ's place before God, and he grows up into the stature of Christ; not that he has not still very much to learn, but he has got into his place; he is of full age, he discerns good and evil, he has real hold of his place in Christ, and he knows it. This sets aside the flesh altogether, and also that which is a deceptive thing to many, perfection in the flesh, for Christ in glory is my only perfection. In the world I am running a race, I have not attained yet, but Christ has laid hold of me for it.

He then puts in the strongest contrast those who are not thus perfect: "If in anything ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you. Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing." I can walk with one who only knows his redemption in Christ with just the same love, but I look for him to get hold of this also.

Then he talks of another thing, of those who have the profession of Christianity, but who are "enemies of the cross of Christ"; they are not exactly enemies of Christ, though in the end it comes to the same thing. In paradise God got rid of man as a sinner; at the cross, as far as his will was concerned, man got rid of God in grace. The very disciples ran away; they could not stand it; as He said to one of them, "Thou canst not follow me now, but thou shalt follow me afterwards." Amiable or unamiable, all either ran away or banded themselves together against Him. Satan was proved to be the prince of this world. People fancy he is not the prince of it because the gospel is preached in it; but the gospel never would be preached in it if he were not the prince of it. He brought all the world up against Christ, so the world is judged, and all that is in it. "The world is crucified to me." The cross - really a gibbet - put an end to all human glory. He came down to that, to put an end to everything of man. There is no such infamy as the cross: no one but a slave or a bad criminal was ever put upon it. Thus Satan was proved by his influence over the world to be its prince; this is what the world is, and this is the very reason that the Lord says, "O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee"; and therefore the world is convinced of judgment, and righteousness is proved how? "Sit thou on my right hand till I make thine enemies thy footstool," is God's answer. And He sits there till the judgment of the world is to be executed; it sees Him no more as the Saviour. And now, because He glorified God in that place of sin, we carry out the testimony of the grace that seeks sinners.

355 These were enemies to the cross of Christ. They carry the name of Christian and go on with the world. Of course the true Christian may get into the world and be ensnared; it is not that. The enemy of the cross of Christ put Christ there, and now if I look for righteousness, it is not to be found in the world that did that; I must look for it in Christ up there, for righteousness has done with the world.

Then see the place that he puts the Christian in, "for our conversation is in heaven"; our whole relationships in life - all that my life is involved in and develops itself in - are in heaven; I am to run here having all my relationships up there, because Christ is up there who is my life. What a definite thing the Christian life is! it is not here at all.

"From whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ." Now what is He called "Saviour" for here? We are all saved in a certain sense - we have got eternal life; but in this epistle salvation is the result of redemption, not merely redemption. Practically Israel was saved out of Egypt as soon as the Red Sea was crossed, but they had not got the place till they had got through the Jordan too. We get in the Red Sea Christ's death and resurrection. The blood upon the lintel gave them safety while God was passing through destroying the first-born; the question between God and the people as to their sin was settled, still God was in the character of judge there, and He passes them by. But it was not deliverance. But when they come to the Red Sea He says, "Stand still, and see the salvation of God." God has now come in as a Saviour and taken them out of the place they were in; and now they are delivered. When I get to Jordan, it is yet another thing: the waters open, not to bring them out, but to bring them in; not that Christ was dead and risen for them, but that they were dead and risen with Christ. So you get the Red Sea smitten, so to say, whilst in Jordan the ark stays in the water, and we go through with it. The reproach of Egypt was never rolled away till they got into Canaan; and so with us: I do not get deliverance and full power in heavenly places until I see that I have died and risen with Christ; I do not get into my place until then.

Now have you got there, beloved friends? If so, all your desire will be there, and you will be longing to be there too. Christ is there, and the Christian's heart is with Christ, his affection is in heaven, and he looks for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ. He gives the Christian as one who has seen Christ in the glory, and who says, That is my hope; my citizenship is in heaven, and here in this world all I am to do is to run after Him as fast as ever I can to get there.

356 All my hope is not to die, blessed though that be, but to look for the Saviour, "who shall change our vile body that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body." We are running the race towards the place where our standing is. We are in Christ, but that is not the thing here. Got it we have; but how far does the cross really tell us the tale of what we are? not only that our sins, but that we ourselves, are put away. Can you say with the apostle, "The life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God"? Is there nothing in the circumstances down here by which we live? We must go through them, but are we living by them? Are we living to Him in that sense? There are many Christians who have no distinct idea that they are to take up their cross and follow Him. May we learn that the times press. May our hearts so really look at Christ that we may be in conscious relationship with Him, our affections there with Him, and because they are there, looking for Him to come from heaven to change this vile body because it will not suit that place! Where are our hearts? Have we the deep blessed sense that He has associated us with Himself? "Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory." The Lord give us so to have our eyes on Him that we may have all the blessedness of the consciousness that He has taken us to be with Himself in His unutterable love, and that we may thus know real deliverance from the power of sin and the world! The Lord fig our eye on Him with steadiness and earnestness of heart, so that we may say with David, "My soul followeth hard after thee."

The Believer's Place in Christ

2 Corinthians 5

J. N. Darby.

<32021E> 357

The great thing in these ways and works of God in the gospel is to bring us to Himself. Groaning, burdened, if you like, still we are brought to Himself through infinite grace - grace reigning through righteousness - brought into the presence of God with a full sense of divine favour resting upon us. We are "reconciled to God," and that is a large word. Being reconciled to God in all that He is in the full revelation of Himself through Christ, our hearts at ease with Himself, else we surely are not reconciled. We are going through the wilderness as regards these bodies, with all the government of God over His children; but there is no question of our place with Him, that in which the perfect revelation of His grace has set us with Himself. Christianity brings us into a new life - makes us partakers of a divine nature.

In Israel it was all an outward deliverance, but all written "for our admonition." They were brought out of Egypt - their whole state and condition changed; they were brought into the wilderness, but brought to God there. And we have been brought out of the flesh and our place in the world as Adam's children, and are now sitting in heavenly places - brought to God, with a nature capable of enjoying God.

It is not at all now whether a man is a righteous man according to the law - that is not the question now. The law was, of course, all right, and, what is more, a perfect rule for a child of Adam, for it took up all the relationships, in which we stand, forbidding every breach of any in which God has set us. But Christianity, while putting its seal upon what man ought to be, and giving its highest sanction to the law, comes in behind all that - is another thing altogether; it shews that the law was just man's righteousness, which never could be wrought, out, and brings in a distinct testimony as to the condition of man; proves "both Jews and Gentiles that they are both under sin"; "they are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one." Then comes in the dealing of God with men when they were proved to be such, and this very dealing of God demonstrates fully what man was.

When God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself the world would not have Him: "He sent unto them his son, saying, They will reverence my son. But they caught him and cast him out of the vineyard, and slew him." Man has been fully proved, as He says: "What could I have done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it?" They rejected His mercy when He came into the world in goodness, and with the manifestation of a power which was sufficient to heal man of all his diseases; all the effects of what sin and Satan had brought in, a single word from Christ was sufficient to set aside. But, "for my love," says the Lord, "I had hatred." "Now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father." They had not merely sinned against God, but, when God was there in full manifestation of goodness, they rejected Him. Therefore, "now is the judgment of this world."

368 If you would walk with God in the comfort of His love, you must get it distinctly before you that you are lost, as well as guilty - "dead in trespasses and sins." It is a question of the state we are in by nature as well as the guilt that we have incurred. But when I see that the old man is hopelessly bad and condemned - when I understand that my whole history as a man in Adam is closed - then I get Christ instead of myself before God.

Guilt is brought out by the cross of the blessed Lord: "He hath made him sin for us who knew no sin." But besides that, there is a new place and condition brought in for the believer; a new creation, in the midst of weakness and infirmity, yet in which we walk with God fully reconciled. God is fully revealed; nothing so revealed Him in His righteousness and in His love as the cross. There it is that all that I need He has met. But He has done more, though I have the treasure in this poor earthen vessel. It is an entirely new thing that He has brought me into. I am redeemed out of the condition of the fallen first Adam into the condition of the glorified second Adam; I am brought into the condition in which Christ stands before God as man; I am "made the righteousness of God in him." All that He is is mine. And this is how Christ says He gives - not as the world gives. When the world gives, it gives away - it has no more the thing that it has given; but when Christ gives, He gives nothing away, He brings us into everything that He has Himself. The peace that He gives us is "my peace"; the words that He has given us are "the words which thou gavest me"; the joy is "my joy"; the glory is "the glory which thou gavest me"; and the love is "the love wherewith thou hast loved me." He brings us into the enjoyment of all that He enjoys Himself. It is a wonderful thing this: it is set before us as the object of hope.

359 There are two ways in which happy thoughts and feelings are wrought out. One is by living in the midst of happy relationships, as in a family. The other thing that gives us energy and joy is having an object before us that we are pursuing in hope. Now God would use both of these means to produce the happiness of the Christian state in us. As to the place of relationship He has brought us into, we have in it "fellowship with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ." God has given us the same place with His Son - as to the actual glory, of course we have not got it yet; but we have got the place and relationship now, and the joy also, and the object, and the hope of knowing that we shall be with Him and like Him in the glory.

"We know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." That is all settled. "For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house that is from heaven." It supposes that my heart is with Him. He had been "not looking at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal", so he goes on, "we know." It is quite a technical expression in scripture. "We know that the law is spiritual." "We know that whosoever is born of God, sinneth not." "We know that we are of God." "We know that the Son of God is come."

"For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened." I do not want to die as if weary of conflicts, and wishing to get out of this world. But I see in this world of death the power of life comes in in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, who has destroyed the power of him that had the power of death in such sort, that I can look, if the time were come, to not dying at all, that "mortality should be swallowed up of life." That power of life has come in which can change the living saints into glory without anything more. And so it will be, in fact, for those who are alive when Christ comes: "We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed," so that not a trace of mortality remains. Ruin and death have come in, but the power of life of the second Adam has come in, and so completely set aside the power of death and Satan, that, if the moment were come, it would be all swallowed up in a moment. It does not make any difference if we do die, for we shall be raised. But One has come in who has gone into death, and spoiled it completely, and who has the keys of death and hell in His hands. The first Adam plunged me in death and ruin; the second Adam has come in - has gone into the ruin, and destroyed the power of it. If He were to come now, and close this scene, and the long-suffering of God were to cease, we should pass into glory without death at all.

360 But we have then our present state. Not only the redemption work is accomplished, but we are God's workmanship now for the glory. "He that hath wrought us for the self-same thing is God." He has wrought us for it; "We are his workmanship." God wrought us for that self-same thing, the unseen glory in which Christ is. He predestinated us "to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the first-born among many brethren. Moreover, whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified." "As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly." Here we are in these poor dying bodies, but He has wrought us for this; it is a new creation. It is not a question of my responsibility as a child of Adam, but God's intention - what He is going to do with us; He is bringing us into the same place in glory as His Son. It is not the clearing away my sins, though that was needed, and it is done, but it is God has wrought us for it.

Then comes another question for people's souls: "Who also hath given unto us the earnest of the Spirit." We have not got the glory yet, but we are sealed for it, and we get the knowledge of it. The great and distinguishing characteristic of the believer is that he has the earnest of the Spirit - he is "sealed with that holy Spirit of promise." It is most important to see that a believer may not as yet be brought into the Christian's place. But when he is sealed, the Holy Ghost gives him the consciousness of that place. The effect of the presence of the Holy Ghost in the believer is to give him the consciousness that he is in Christ, and Christ in him. His place is settled before God, and settled before the world. What he has to do, consequently, in the world, is to shew forth in it the life of Jesus. As Christ represents us before God, so we represent Him before the world. That is where we are seen, and this is what is so blessed, and what indeed you should not be satisfied without possessing - the knowledge of this relationship. The babes cry, Abba, Father.

361 And mark this, that if we have not got the consciousness of the relationship, we cannot have the affections that belong to it. The consciousness of it is that upon which all holy affections are grounded. I might say, If only such an one were my father, what affection I should have for him, for he is such a good kind father! But if conscious of the relationship, the feelings come out at once. We must know the Father as such, and that is not great growth. It is the babes that know that - the fathers are characterised by being well acquainted with Christ. Christ in us, we cry, Abba, Father: "Ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear: but ye have received the Spirit of adoption whereby we cry, Abba, Father." I insist upon it, not as a special growth, but as the place of the Christian. My responsibility as a Christian is the consequence of my being a child. I am to be a follower of God - "followers of God as dear children" - peaceful, blessed, I am now to manifest the life of Jesus in everything - my life shewing out the reality of the work, the life of the Lord Jesus Christ in me.

Now God has wrought us for the glory. This is the very thing that proves that we never can be perfect here. A Christian is a man who is walking with God now in the full consciousness of his relationship, and who is wrought to be like Christ when He shall appear. Well, can I be like Christ in glory, when I am down here? Impossible! But whilst he cannot be like Him here, there is only one object before the Christian, and that is to win Christ, and to be raised in glory - changed into it, if he be alive - but there is no other - none! Christ is the object. The only thing that is set before us to attain is a thing that is unattainable in this world, and that is, to be like Christ in glory. We cannot have what is set before us until we are there. I am going to be like Him in glory, and I long to be like Him, and I am trying to be as like Him as ever I can.

My relationship with God and the Father is all settled, and settled for ever. I am a child, and my relations with God flow from that. It is important for us all to get hold of this, that we are not in the flesh at all. Then where are we? In Christ. Put into this totally new place, where Adam innocent was not, as to our life and course here. "The calling above," that is the one thing; the pressing forward, the pursuing; but the very pursuit gives a consciousness that it is not attained. I am a son with Christ, but I am not yet glorified with Christ, that is clear; but I am wrought for it, and I "look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body." I try to be more like Him every day; we are chastened for it, if need be, in our course; but we are wrought for it, and we shall be it when He appears. The moment my mind descends below what Christ in glory is now, that moment my mind descends below what is my proper object as a Christian. If you look for perfection down here you have lowered your standard.

362 You say: But am I not to be like Christ? - Yes, but not down here. He was a perfectly sinless Being - so born into this world, as it is said: "That holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." But we are born sinful: "By nature children of wrath." And if I say, How can I have a ground for such a wondrous hope as that I should be made like to Christ? - my answer is at once: I know the blessed Son of God has been made sin for me; "He made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was found in the likeness of men: and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross." The moment I really believe that, I can believe anything as the result; nothing is too great for Him to do for me. He is to receive the fruit of the travail of His soul; what is the fruit? That He shall have sons with Him in glory. If I am "made the righteousness of God in him," why I may expect anything! We have got these two great parts of the intervention of God for us: God in Christ in this world in grace to reconcile it, and our being made the righteousness of God.

I will say one word here on "the righteousness of God," as many find great difficulty in understanding what it is. The question is: How can a righteous God justify sinners? Well, the proof and testimony of God's righteousness is, that He has set Christ at His own right hand. When Christ had perfectly glorified God, and that as made sin on the cross, God places Him at His own right hand in heaven; and there only do I see righteousness. But this work, though perfectly to God's glory, was done for us, so that it is God's righteousness to give us a place with Him. In Christ we are thus made God's righteousness. So it is said, "He is righteous and just to forgive." But Christ is gone there as man, and I am united to Him, and I get, with this righteousness, Christ my life in which I am capable of enjoying all the blessedness of that which I am brought into. I have power to enjoy it, because Christ is my life.

363 The apostle, having considered the purpose of God, now turns to the side of man's responsibility. That place, as sinners, is death and judgment; where is the Christian as to these? If I die, he says, I am absent from the body, and present with the Lord. In dying for us, He has made death, which closed our path in darkness, the way, as with Israel at the Red Sea and Jordan, of getting out of all the ruin here, and the way of getting into blessedness with Christ. When I take up, not the purpose of God, but that which lies on me in my responsibility as a child of Adam, death becomes a positive gain: I have done with trial, temptation, sin, the world, and I have begun with Christ in heaven: "present with the Lord."

But judgment must be considered also. We cannot say that is gain, nor that it is ours, as we can of death; but we see here the way it works upon the Christian. All will be manifest before the judgment-seat of Christ: "That every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad." We must all give an account of ourselves; nor does the apostle seek to conceal the solemnity of this. He calls it the terror of the Lord. But does he tremble? He does not think of himself in this aspect of it. The love of Christ constraining him, he persuades other people, the unconverted, who have reason to tremble at the thought of judgment. This is the effect it has upon Paul; he presses upon others that, if their sins are not gone, they cannot carry them to heaven.

But it has also another effect upon the Christian - a sanctifying effect upon the conscience: and that is, that we are manifest now, not shall be. "We are made manifest unto God." This is a present thing for the heart and conscience. The effect of the judgment in this way is most useful; there is no fear as to the result of the judgment, but the sense of that judgment acts in sanctifying power on the heart. Whilst Christ has put away our sins once and for ever, yet I am manifest to God now; and I am before God estimating things that I do and say as they will be manifest before Him in the day of judgment. How many things would be judged and done with if we were now before God as we shall be in the day of judgment.

364 These two things are quite distinct: the purpose of God in putting us into the glory of God; and, that He has wrought us for it, and has given us the earnest of the Spirit. I know that many think it is all presumption in people, their professing to know that they are saved; but it is not presumption to know God's thoughts when He has revealed them. It is presumption to call in question what God has said. There is no such thing in the New Testament, after the day of Pentecost, as a Christian being uncertain about his salvation. Not that there is not exercise in getting into such a place, but there is no such thing as uncertainty as to our standing when in it. If I see that His blood cleanses from all sin, and that the salvation wrought through that blood-shedding belongs to the believer, it is no good saying, I do not know whether it is for me. If you believe in that work, God seals you with His Spirit. If you have got the Holy Ghost, you will know it is yours. The Lord expressly declares, "at that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you." Nothing else is owned as the Christian place. How can I doubt, if the Spirit of God dwelling in me makes me know? and that Christ has positively declared. How can I doubt with the earnest of glory and seal in my own heart? "We have received the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father," and I know He is my Father.

And now let me add another word in connection with this which comes farther on in the chapter. "If one died for all, then were all dead." It does not say "guilty" here; it is "dead": "dead in trespasses and sins." Death and judgment came in by sin; we read, the dead shall be judged "according to their works"; and Christ came down into this place of judgment that our sins might be purged and put away. But there is another aspect of man here; one in which he is looked at as "dead"; dead as regards God; not a movement in his heart towards God. Now if dead can you as such awaken any feelings in him? When I discover that not only I have sinned, but that in nature I am a sinner, I find that I am dead in sins. I am lost as well as guilty.

365 What is my state before God? It is "enmity against God." There is not a thing which man will not bear and put up with in one way or another, but he will not bear to have Christ brought in. From the lowest and the grossest society up to the most elegant and refined, Christ cannot be brought in; it spoils everything. It is not so in false religions: men who have a false religion are not ashamed of their religion; it is only Christians who are ashamed of theirs. As a matter of courtesy, I will listen to anything any man says, but by nature I cannot listen to him speaking about Christ: conscience cannot bear it. If I look at man as we all are naturally, I find nothing but "enmity against God."

But now in Christ I get the end of man's history. I read: "Now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." Why does He say that when the end is not come yet? It is because the breach is total at the cross between God and the world; as to the full history of man's probation the end is come; it was the end before God when once man had rejected God's own Son. I look at myself as man, I am a sinner without law; and I find I have broken the law if I take that as my rule. But when all this was already true, God came into the world in grace, and the world rejected Him. And now, if Christ be presented to me - I mean as a natural man - I cannot stand it at all. My moral history is closed; I am a lost sinner. But in Christ I get brought out of this state altogether. "Ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit." The sins are not only cleared away for ever and always through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, and I stand for ever perfect before God through this work, but I am in a perfectly new state. Where are sins? - Gone in the cross of Christ. Where is righteousness? - He is my righteousness at God's right hand. I have got a totally new place; not only are my sins put away, but I am brought into the place of Christ the second Man. Therefore you find it said, not there is no condemnation to those whose sins Christ has borne - true as it may be; but there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ. "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus." How can you condemn what is in Christ in glory? It is a new creation. The life of God in us; the righteousness of God ours, and we standing before God in this entirely new place. "It is a new creation; old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new."

366 "And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ." A blessed word! It is the very ground of blessing! Here God fully reveals all His holiness - all His hatred of sin. If His own Son go to the cross He must bear the consequences. All is righteousness. We are now "after God created in righteousness and true holiness"; our sins for ever gone, entirely gone, and we brought to God in the full revelation of Him as He is - "in righteousness and true holiness" - and knowing Him as thus revealed in Christ. We, as in Christ, are brought to God now according to what God is as perfectly revealed. He will "reconcile all things unto himself - whether things in earth, or things in heaven"; the whole state of things will be reconciled to Him. "And you, that were sometime alienated, and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death." "He hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ." Could you say that there, where there was a full revelation of what God is, you see Him as one who has given His Son for you, so that you might be brought back to Himself without a single doubt, without a single question left to settle between your soul and Himself?

"Who hath reconciled us?" Oh! beloved friends, are you reconciled to God? We have not got the glory now, clearly; but we have got the work done, so that Christ is sitting down at the right hand of God, the question of righteousness settled, nothing more to do, but all finished. It says of the Jewish priests, that they stood "daily ministering, and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins; but this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins, for ever sat down on the right hand of God." He has no more to do for this. He has not merely borne my sins; but "when he had by himself purged our sins, he sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high." And then I get the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, that I may know it and my part in it.

What I am in Christ is a new creation. It is not what Adam was. He was an innocent creature, just as God made him. But now we have got Christ substituted for what we are, and we here with the Holy Ghost in us. And, if you have not got that, and just think of the day of judgment, you are not at ease, though you may have hope through the cross. But if I know that "by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified"; and if I set myself before the judgment-seat of Christ, I find I have a settled place there. There is no place where the Christian has such a settled peace as standing before the judgment-seat of Christ, for when He shall appear we shall be like Him. We are raised in glory. What fear can I have if I am like the Judge? God has come in to save, and now sees a totally new thing before Him - the second Man. And though we are here tempted and tried, our place is in Him where He is; we are now in Him and know it by the Holy Ghost. Israel was not put to pass through the desert till Israel was clean out of Egypt. We are first reconciled to God, the soul has peace with Him; and then it seeks to glorify Him in everything it does. You are called upon to have no object at all in your life down here but Christ; of course there are necessary duties in which we serve Him, but no object; the Christian recognises where God has set him as to things here, but I have no object but Christ in all that I do upon earth. He is the one thing that I am running after - no other object whatever. If I eat, or drink, or do anything, it is to be "to the glory of God," and "in the name of the Lord Jesus." A man is characterised by his object; if money, he is avaricious; if power, he is ambitious; and so on: the Christian is a man who has Christ as his object.

367 Surely he will find temptations here, and snares, and he will have to overcome; all that is true; we have to learn and unlearn a great deal that is humbling to ourselves; but we have got our place, and our duties flow from the place we are in. No duty ever was the means of obtaining a place; if you are my servants, you have your duties because such; but you first get into the place, and then come the duties of it. You first get into your place, and then comes service for Christ in that place. In these days it is all-important that Christians should understand they are to be Christians. You have got your own place, and your own relationships, and you are to walk according to them.

The Narrative of Passion Week, and of the Resurrection

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I apprehend that the consideration of the different structure of the days makes the Last Supper and passover quite intelligible.

Thursday evening was their Friday. Thus our Lord ate the passover on Friday, and yet was offered up on Friday. We know that it was late; for it was night when He was betrayed, just after the supper. (John 13.) This was on their Friday night (preceding the day). The blessed Lamb of God was offered, being crucified the third hour; and the scene closed just after the ninth hour, about three hours within the Friday.

Learned men say between the two evenings means between three and six; but why? What is their authority? It is remarkable that the unleavened bread was to begin at even (that is, at 6 o'clock on Thursday, or their Friday), but the paschal lamb to be slain between the two evenings. Query whether it be not between the beginning of Friday (our Thursday evening) and the beginning of Saturday (our Friday evening)? It was strictly fulfilled in our Lord; and upon this supposition every statement in the scriptural account is consistent.

The order would then stand thus: -

Our Thursday evening = their Friday, Last Supper.

Friday = Friday, the Crucifixion.

Our Friday evening = their Saturday, the Sabbath.

Saturday = Saturday, the Sabbath.

Our Saturday evening = their Sunday, or First-day.

Sunday = First day of the week.

Thus our Thursday night, their Friday, was spent in the judgment-hall, though they would not go into Pilate's that they might eat the passover.

The words "bought" in Mark 16: 1, and "as it was dusk" in Matthew 28: 1, have led me to new apprehensions as to the visits of the women to the sepulchre.

In the first place, it is to me beyond controversy that several things supposed to happen in the morning really happened on (to us) Saturday evening. The sabbath closed at 6 in the evening as is known, and from Saturday at 6 in the evening, the women were free to buy their spices or to do anything else. The Greek for "as it was getting dusk" as in Luke 23: 54, does not mean solely nor properly "dawning." Here the Friday evening of our reckoning is "the sabbath drew on," it was the evening of the day that preceded Saturday, the dusk of the commencing Sabbath.

369 Hence, secondly, in Matthew 28: 1, "in the end of the sabbath as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week," is properly what we call Saturday; but this, being sabbath, it was only at the close of it, that is when it was over, that they went. However, the Greek words for the time differ, and "late" in Matthew 28: 1 is not the same as "hespera" used for "evening" in Luke 24: 29. The former (opse) means "after," and even "a good while after." See Wetstein on Matthew 28: I; but it is given as "late." We learn also from Marsh (whose reasonings on the passage are unfounded) that the Syriac has translated Luke 23: 54 and John 19: 31 (which is certainly the evening) by the same word, that is, because it was the preparation; the same word as Luke; and this word has the natural signification of "becoming dusk," Syriac being the apostles' language.

Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses, etc., saw where they laid Him; Mark 15: 47. The sabbath over, the two Marys and Salome buy spices. That is, on Saturday evening they "bought" (not "had bought") them; and Mary Magdalene and the other Mary after this, "late in the sabbath" (Matt. 28: 1), go and see the sepulchre. It was thus late, after buying the spices. But Mary Magdalene was absorbed with thoughts of Jesus and not resting at all; while it was yet dark, she comes to the sepulchre (that is, on Sunday morning before day) runs and tells Peter and John, who come and examine the sepulchre and return home. Mary remains and sees Jesus, and then goes and tells the disciples in general (not to go to Galilee: that was not her message, but) that she had seen Jesus, and that He had told her He was to ascend to His Father and their Father, to His God and their God, that is, their new divine heavenly relationship according to His own through His Person and work.

Mark, who relates the message of the angels to the women as to Galilee, states also that He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, of which John gives the detail. Mary Magdalene's occupation of mind is evident all through, and John to whom she went gives the detail of this part in accordance with the subject of all his Gospel. She did not wait to see anything else at the sepulchre. Seeing the stone rolled away, she set off at once to Peter and John (those specially attached to Jesus) to tell them the sepulchre was empty. The risen Saviour appears to her with the message cited. Jesus Himself drew her as an object of affection.

370 The women in general came to anoint Him. It was all well. It was the manner of the Jews to bury, and they would pay their crucified Lord honour thus. But there is no such hurry with them. They did not set off early, but are there only at sunrise. The scene with Mary Magdalene was all over. To them angels appear, a gracious but ordinary Jewish intervention on God's part; and Jesus is associated with Galilee - His place of connection with the poor Jewish remnant. There they would see Him, as indeed they did. They are rejoiced and alarmed at the same time, and go off from the sepulchre; and as they go, they meet Jesus who also tells them to say that they will meet Him in Galilee - the same association. And they touch Him: to Mary Magdalene this was not permitted; for He was not returned to take the kingdom and be bodily present there The close of Matthew connects itself with the Galilean position.

The only passage here which presents any difficulty is "they said nothing to any man," Mark 16: 8. From verse 7 it is evident that in result they told the disciples; only in going (fleeing) they said nothing to any one on the road till they reached the disciples. Matthew, indeed, does not say they executed their commission. Christ met them in Galilee on a mountain where He had ordered them to meet Him. The last words of this Gospel take up distinctly the Galilean place, and shew that He had now authority given Him for more extension, sending them out to all the nations with a new mission; but the point of contact with the old mission was Galilee, the seat of the poor remnant according to Isaiah 8 and 9.

I have here omitted Luke, because always in his Gospel he gives the general broad facts, without occupying himself with their order or connection in time. This is universally his character. He is perfectly exact, and in this way gives much additional moral light on many points. But as he is occupied with this, it is not the purpose of the Spirit in his Gospel to narrate historically. He will take from many periods what will bring out in common the same truth; or single out one fact which shews it forth without heeding the other accompanying ones, or name them without reference to their order in time, if their moral order be different, as in the temptation in the wilderness. So he passes over the flight into Egypt; and shews how, things being accomplished in the temple, they went to Nazareth, because he was not to take up the Jewish character of Christ, but the contrary. And hence, when obedience to the law was personally accomplished, Jesus gets at once into His Nazarene character.

371 It is the same in principle in the history of the resurrection. The women who had accompanied Him from Galilee (that is their character), having followed, beheld the sepulchre and how His body was laid; and having returned they prepared spices and ointments. He does not say, they bought, nor when they prepared. Perhaps they did on Friday night as well as Saturday: I doubt it, however; for at 6 o'clock sabbath began, and it must have been about that, if not quite, when they returned. They rested the sabbath, but the Greek here in Luke 23: 56, gives it a moral character, and not the date after the buying.

So, in chapter 24: 8-10, we have merely the general fact as to all the women that came from Galilee, without any detail; and to the eleven and all the rest Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary the mother of James, and the others with them, told these things to the apostles. It was the affair of the women: where, and when, or who, to each or to several or collectively, is passed over entirely. It was not the object here of the Spirit of God. What He does tell us is the fact, and He gives it a moral character, and some additional particulars which are not elsewhere, but no details. It is possible that more than one party of women went to the sepulchre, and that hearing from the first party or through their means they went down. However, I have no object in supposing it: verses 22, 23 would rather say otherwise, as also verse 1. I do not speak here of Mary Magdalene. But this the scripture was not concerned to tell us. Each word of what it does tell us bears truth in it for the soul. So verses 23, 24. It is all put generally together; for we may well suppose that verse 24 refers to Peter and John, though most likely the two that went to Emmaus only heard this as a general report.

372 Verse 12 also is thus given as a confirming fact after the very vague general statement of all the women - telling the apostles and all the rest. They were about one hundred and twenty, men and women. These preparatory facts are really introductory almost to the account of the journey to Emmaus, which is also alluded to in Mark. The general effect of the women's statement is given in verse 11. However, there was exception. For instance, Peter (it is not "Then Peter" as in the English; but should be "But Peter") arose and went and saw and departed, wondering at what had happened; but, as John tells us, he had no scriptural understanding of, or faith in, the resurrection.

See the remarkable confirmation of this character at the close of this account of Luke, where verses 43, 44, 50 seem all continuous; and they are so morally. An infidel might say Luke clearly did not know that there were forty days, but supposed He went up to heaven at once. Now Luke is the person who tells us in Acts 1 that there were forty days.

The Facts of the Lord's Resurrection, in their Relative Order

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Each Gospel has only a selection or summary connected with its own immediate subject. Thus, in Matthew, no interview of our Lord with His apostles is mentioned, but on the mountain in Galilee where a specific commission is given. Now, we know from the Acts that He was seen of them forty days, and conversed on the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. John gives His meeting with the apostles on two successive Lord's days, not to speak of the subsequent scene at the sea of Tiberias. 1 Corinthians 15 relates several distinct appearances of the risen Saviour, in one of which He was seen of above five hundred brethren at once.

All this shews how entirely these accounts are matters of inspiration, and not merely the memory aided or directed by the Holy Ghost. The things which, in such a case, Matthew, for instance, must have recollected, and might naturally have been expected to record, he does not, but simply gives (or rather the Spirit by him) what was suitable to the special aim of his Gospel. Not a hint is dropped of those meetings with the apostles in Jerusalem, though Matthew beyond doubt was there. But the Spirit led him purposely to omit all notice of Jerusalem, and of the Lord's visits there after the resurrection. His business was to shew the Lord in His accustomed place with the disciples, only widening their mission from the lost sheep of Israel to all the nations, in virtue of the universal power given to Him, the risen Son of man, and the name of God now fully revealed according to the dispensation which superseded Judaism. The scene of the ascension is also omitted there. A similar principle applies to the three other accounts.

Comparing the Gospels, we find, first, that the disciples were all in great perplexity. They had no idea of resurrection. So John expressly tells us; and this same thing appears in the avowal of the two on the road to Emmaus. "Yea, and certain women, also, of our company made us astonished, which were early at the sepulchre, and when they found not his body, they came, saying, that they had also seen a vision of angels, which said that he was alive. And certain," etc. Though some of the particular circumstances, or facts, were credited by individuals, there was no understanding of the great truth. Then we learn that Mary Magdalene, the other Mary, and Salome, if not more, came to the sepulchre with spices.* These found the stone rolled away. Mary Magdalene runs and tells Peter and John of the empty tomb; and they, hastening, found it so, and went away again to their own home. The women go in, and the angel or angels address them, announcing His resurrection according to His own word.

{*I think it is certain, from Matthew 28: 1, and from Mark 16: 1, 2, that the coming of Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, was during the twilight of Saturday evening.}

374 At this moment, as at the former, Mary Magdalene seems to have been alone outside, weeping, when the angels addressed her; then, turning round, she sees and converses with Jesus Himself, receiving a special message to the disciples. Jesus met all the women subsequently, and gave them a general message to the disciples. They had fled away affrighted before, and said nothing; reassured now, they told all. It appears that Mary Magdalene went off as soon as she saw the stone rolled away, and had then seen nothing of the angels; and that as the women went in fear to tell the disciples what the angel said, the Lord met them, and added His personal testimony to that of the angels. From Mark we learn that He was first seen of Mary Magdalene. From Matthew we gather that, soon after, He met the women on their way to the disciples.

In Luke 24: 10, Mary Magdalene is united in a common general statement with the other women - no infrequent thing both in Matthew and Luke.

In verse 12 the Authorised Version might mislead. "Then arose Peter," etc. The Greek here translated "Then" is not an adverb of time, but a conjunctive particle used to mark opposition or mere transition. In the course of that day the Lord appeared to Simon Peter, also to the disciples journeying to Emmaus. When these two got back that night, they found the disciples occupied with the Lord's appearing to Peter. But there was much incredulity in their minds, though such a testimony seems to have had much influence on them. But there was not real faith in the matter. Then came the statement of the returned disciples; but, as Mark lets us know, "neither believed they them." While thus gathered and speaking, Jesus Himself appeared. They were, or had been, at supper - at least the eleven. Even then, till He ate, they believed not for joy.

375 Of the remaining facts I need not speak, as their course is plain. But it seemed desirable to give an historical outline as it appears to me, where many find difficulties.

The Closing Commissions in the Gospels

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There are four different addresses or commissions in the four different Gospels, each of them distinct and consequent on the character of the Gospel. In Matthew 28 it is the exaltation of Messiah to all power in heaven and earth, from which flows the mission to disciple all the Gentiles. This was a specific commission, contrasted with that to the lost sheep of the house of Israel - "the children." Now His exaltation, on His rejection by them, took a wider scope. They were to disciple all the nations. Such was the consequence of His rejection by Israel. The baptising of the Gentiles was not to be into John's or Messiah's baptism, but into that of which the full revelation was by His death and resurrection - into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. This was the position and unfolded fellowship with God into which they were brought; and all that was brought out, on God's part, both for the display of Himself and the economy of grace. It was not Jehovah and Messiah, but Father, Son, and Holy Ghost - something paramount and superior to the relationship of Messiah on the earth having followers, or Jehovah in heaven, however blessed. They were brought into distinct known relationship with or in the unfolded fulness of the Godhead. They were children of the Father, in fellowship with the glorified Son, and the Holy Ghost dwelling in them; and they knew all three. It is the most formal statement of the Christian revelation as replacing Judaism; the sphere is enlarged to embrace all nations, and the observance of what Christ commanded is substituted for the law of Moses. Those who went forth to disciple the Gentiles were messengers of the King, whose presence would be with them till the end of the age, when He Himself should appear in the glory of His kingdom.

Mark, being more especially the witness of the ministry of Christ, gives (not the outreaching principle of dispensation now opened by His death and resurrection and founded on the place of power where He was, but) the principle, the new principle, of the ministry itself and its consequences. "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to the whole creation." We may compare Romans 1, and Colossians 1: 23. It is a question here, not of the kingdom, but of salvation; and hence baptism as a fact and personal confession of Christ is insisted on, not its form in contradistinction to Judaism. The unbeliever shall be condemned.

377 In Luke, suitable to that Gospel, we have not the economical change which went forth to reduce all the Gentiles to a recognition of Christ, or the character and universal extent of the gospel, but its moral subject and scope, involving withal Jew and Gentile alike as sinners; for he specially looks at man. Hence it runs there: "Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem." It is beautiful to see that while the need and ruin of man are fully met, testimony to "the Jew first" is not forgotten, even if Jerusalem were first in guilt as well as privilege.

In John, as the Sonship of Christ is the great subject (who He - the Son of God - was in Person), the authority and power of His Person in mission was the thing brought forward. "As my Father hath sent me; even so send I you. And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost: whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained." We have here the authority of the Sender from His Person, tide, and work. This was authority delegated in grace by the rejected but risen Son of God, giving peace to His own and sending forth with peace for others, in a world which knows neither Him nor it.

As to these commissions (while the spirit and principle of all remains, and so far as we have spiritual power, we can realise them), yet all, I believe, have been perverted and have fallen, like all else in man's hand. As the Jewish economy received a deadly wound by the golden calf for example, so did this very soon; and though the energy of God's grace and Spirit prerogatively might work and produce effects in sustaining and prolonging power and mercy in righteousness as such, the thing was gone; but it is the same power which originally constituted it which always lives and acts, though not in justifying the iniquity, for it is the power of the Spirit of God. And in measure as we act on this, the results are produced pro tanto.

Here is spiritual wisdom, to see, and own, and bow under the sense of the apostasy (that is, under God's judgment of man's unrighteousness - God is always abidingly righteous in all His ways), and yet still hold fast to the living power which is the energy of the Spirit of God which works prerogatively in blessing. Of this the extraordinary example and scriptural illustration is Paul - the abortion of other hopes. And God is glorified in this; for the failure of man always brings out further and better things, though it may be in trial, than that which has decayed and passed away in his hands. The death of Stephen in fact was the turning-point and formed the occasion of the bringing in the character of the dispensation as now exercised.

378 In the calling of the centurion by Peter (Acts 10 and 11) God shewed that He never departed from His purpose of associating the Gentiles as brought in with the Jews; and that, as regards administration, they bore not the root, but the root them. And so says Paul, bowing to this in his ministry, "It was necessary that the word of God should be first preached unto you; but seeing ye count yourselves unworthy of eternal life, lo we turn to the Gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee for a light to the Gentiles" (a sentence used on the Lord's rejection by Israel, "Then have I laboured in vain and spent my strength for nought and in vain"; whereas Peter was the minister of the circumcision, and could not take this ground, blessed in office as he was) "and that thou shouldest be my salvation unto the ends of the earth." Thus they take the spiritual interpretation of a passage significative of the dispensation, as a command which guided their conduct, though something else was first necessary. It was just following the Lord's own way, taking up His primacy and bowing to it ("it was necessary," etc.), and then His glorious mission according to the energy of the Holy Ghost. Yet were Israel and Zion still well-beloved; and so Paul shewed ever.

The Faith once Delivered to the Saints

Jude 3

J. N. Darby.

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It is a great thing for us, beloved friends, in all our path to know where we are, and then to know the mind of God, not only as to where we are, but as to our place in the path in which we find ourselves.

Not only has God visited us in grace, but we have to take into our minds what the actual present result of that grace is, so that we hold fast the great principles under which God has set us as Christians; and at the same time be able to apply those principles to the circumstances in which we find ourselves. These circumstances may vary according to our position, but the principles never vary.

Their application to the path of faith may vary and does. I mean such a thing as this: in Hezekiah's time they were told, "In quietness and in confidence shall be your strength," and the Assyrian should not even cast a bank before Jerusalem. They were to stay perfectly calm and firm; and the host of Assyria was destroyed. But when a certain time of judgment was come, in Jeremiah's time, then he that went out of the city to the Chaldeans, their enemies, should save himself.

They were still God's people as much as before, though He was saying for the time in judgment - "not my people," and that made the difference. It was not that God's mind was altered or His relationship to His people changed - that never will be. Yet the conduct of the people was to be exactly the opposite. Under Hezekiah they were protected; under Zedekiah they were to bow to the judgment.

I refer to these circumstances as a testimony, to show that while the relationship of God with Israel is immutable in this world, yet their conduct at one time had to be the opposite to that at another.

Look at the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles, as regards the church, God's assembly in the world. There I find the full display of power; all had one heart and one mind and they had all things in common; the very place was shaken where they were. But suppose I take the church now, including the Roman Catholic system and all, if we look at all that and own it, we bow down to everything that is evil at once.

380 While God's thoughts do not change and He knows His people and so on, yet we need spiritual discernment to see where we are, and what the ways of God are in the circumstances, while never departing from the first great principles which He has laid down for us in His word. Another thing, too, we have to take account of as a fact of Scripture, is that wherever God has set man, the first thing man has done has been to spoil the position; we must ever take that into account.

Look at Adam, Noah, Aaron, Solomon and Nebuchadnezzar. God goes on in patient mercy, yet the uniform way of man, as we read in Scripture, has been at once to upset and destroy the thing which God set up good. Consequently, there cannot be any walking with a true knowledge of our position if this is not considered. But God is faithful and goes on in patient love. Thus in Isaiah 6 we find "Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes" and so on, but it was not fulfilled for 800 years, and when Christ came they rejected Him.

Patience went on in that way, individual souls were converted, there were various testimonies by the prophets and a remnant was preserved still. But if we should plead the faithfulness of God, which is invariable, to put a positive sanction upon the evil which man has brought in, our whole principle is false.

That would be exactly what they did in Jeremiah's time when judgment was coming, and what Christendom is doing now; they said, "The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, are these," and "The law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise," when they were all going to Babylon. The faithfulness of God was invariable, but the moment they applied that to sustain them in the place of evil, it became the very ground of their ruin. The same principles which would be our security become, if we leave out the sense of where we are, our ruin.

We get the word, "look to the rock whence ye are hewn, and to the hole of the pit whence ye are digged. Look to Abraham your father and unto Sarah that bare you; for I called him alone, and blessed him, and increased him" (Isaiah 51: 1); a passage constantly misapplied. God is saying there, Abraham was alone and I called him. Israel, to whom God spake this, was then but a little remnant - Do not let that make you uneasy, I called Abraham alone. Their being little was of no consequence - God could bless them alone as well as Abraham.

381 Now in Ezekiel, a similar statement by the people in different circumstances, is denounced as iniquity. They said there, "we are many," "Abraham was one and he inherited the land" (Ezek. 33: 24); God blessed him and so He will bless us still more. From want of conscience, really, they misapprehended the condition in which they were, and with which God was dealing. So now, if we leave out the sense of our condition - I mean that of the whole professing church in the midst of which we stand - we shall be utterly wanting in spiritual intelligence.

We are in the last days, but sometimes I think people do not weigh the full force of that. I think I can show you from Scripture that, the church as a responsible system down here was, from the very outset, that which had got into the condition of judgment, and the state of it was such as to require individual faith to judge it.

The great thought that is current among hundreds and thousands is to get away from the present confusion to a kind of resource, that the church teaches and judges and does this and that; but, on the contrary, God is judging the church. Patience He does show and grace, calling souls to Himself as He did in Israel; but what we have to look in the face is that the church has not escaped the effect of that principle in poor human nature, that the first thing it does is to depart from God, and ruin what He has set up.

When we speak of the last times it is not a new thing, but one which we have in Scripture, one which God in sovereign goodness has given us before the closing of the canon of Scripture. He allowed the evil to come up so that He could give us the judgment of Scripture upon it. If you look at Jude - and I take now merely some of those principles which the church of God wants - he says, "Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith once delivered to the saints." The faith was in danger already, they were obliged to contend for that which was slipping from them, so to say, for there were "certain men crept in unawares," etc., so that you must look at judgment now. God saved the people out of Egypt and afterwards had to destroy them that believed not. So, too, with the angels in like manner.

382 Then again Enoch prophesied of those of whom Jude speaks, the ungodly, on whom the Lord will execute judgment when He comes again. These were then, and the starting point of it in the apostles' days was sufficient to give the revelation of God's mind by His word. The ground of judgment when the Lord comes again was there present already. If you take John's first epistle, chapter 2: 18, he says, "Little children, it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists, whereby we know that it is the last time." So that it is not a new thing that is developed, but it began at the first, just as in Israel they made the calf at the outset, yet God bore with them for centuries, but the state of the people was that which a spiritual man judged. John says, "we know that it is the last time." I suppose the church of God has hardly improved since then. In verse 20 he adds, "But ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things" - you have that which will enable you to judge in these circumstances.

Again, take the practical state of the church as seen by Paul in Philippians 2: 20, 21, "I have no man like-minded, who will naturally care for your state. For all seek their own, not the things that are Jesus Christ's." That was in his day. What a testimony! It was not that they had given up being Christians.

He tells Timothy, "At my first answer no man stood with me, but all men forsook me; I pray God that it may not be laid to their charge," 2 Tim. 4: 16. Not one stayed by him! Peter tells us that "the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God," 1 Pet. 4: 17. I name these as the authority of the word of God, showing even then, at the very beginning, there was that going on outwardly which the Spirit of God could discern and testify to as being the ground of final judgment, but already manifest in the church of God.

There is another thing that shows this principle strongly, and that is the ground of action, under the circumstances disclosed in the seven churches in Asia; Revelation 2 and 3. I do not doubt but that it is the history of the church of God, but the point is, "He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches." The churches could neither guide nor have authority. nor anything else of the kind but whoever had an ear to hear God's word had to judge their state. That very evidently is an important principle, and a very solemn thing it is. Christ is speaking to the churches, not as Head of the body, though He is that for ever and ever, but they are being looked at as responsible down here on the earth. It is not the Father sending messages to the church, as in the different epistles; it is not that, but it is Christ walking in the midst of them to judge them. He is here, therefore, neither the Head of the body, nor the Servant. He has His garment down to the feet (I tuck it up if I want to serve). He is walking in the midst to judge their state. That is a new thing.

383 It is a question of responsibility, and so you find some approved and some disapproved. Their condition is the subject of judgment on the part of Christ, and they are here called to listen to what He has to say. It is not the blessing of God properly, which you get in the churches, though they had many blessings, but the condition of these churches when these blessings had been put into their hands. What use had they made of them?

Look at the Thessalonians in their freshness - the work of faith, labour of love and patience of hope are manifest. But in the first epistle to the churches, that to Ephesus, we read, "I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience." here were the faith and the love? The spring was wanting. The Lord had to say "I will . . . remove thy candlestick . . . except thou repent." They were put in a place of responsibility and He deals with them according to it. The first thing is, "thou hast left thy first love"; so the time was come when judgment should begin at the house of God.

Peter's words allude to Ezekiel, when he says, "begin at my sanctuary," Ezek. 9: 6; God's house at Jerusalem, for that is where God looks first for what is right - to His own house. I feel it is an exceedingly solemn thing, and one that should bow our hearts before God. The church has failed in being the epistle of Christ - it was set as such in the world - but now is it anything like it at all? Can a heathen - that is the way to look at it - see anything of it? Individuals may be walking blessedly; yet where do we get faith like Elijah's, though he knew no one in Israel who was true, while God knew seven thousand. Blessed man he was, but even his faith failed and God asks him, "What doest thou here, Elijah?" This should not be discouragement either, for Christ is sufficient for us. Nothing reaches the full perfect faithfulness of God's own grace, and our hearts ought to be thoroughly bowed as to that.

384 Neither is it the thought of attacking or blaming, for we are all in it in one sense, but our hearts should take notice, that what was set up so beautiful in the power of God's Spirit - what has it all come to? It casts us on the strength that can never fail!

When the spies returned to Israel, the faith of ten gave way. Caleb and Joshua say, "neither fear ye the people of the land for they are bread for us." It is the same for us in view of difficulty and opposition now. We are called to see where we are, and what the path and the place are, in which we have to walk, and to have a consciousness of the state all is in around us. Yet if the church has utterly failed, the Head can never fail. Christ is just as sufficient for us now, in the state of things in which we find ourselves, as at the first when He set up the church in beauty and blessedness. It may require us to look at His word and see what His mind is, but we are not to hide our eyes from what the state is in which we are.

In reading the Acts it is most striking to see that there is power in the midst of evil. When we get to heaven there will be no evil at all, we shall not want faith or conscience in exercise then, but now we do, and the only thing we have is the power of the Spirit of God where evil is dominant, and by it we should be dominant over the evil in our path.

It does not say that every Christian will be persecuted, but it says, "all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution," 2 Tim. 3: 12. If a man show the power of the Spirit of God, the world will not stand it; that is the principle. In the Acts, when we get the power of the Spirit shown in miracles, as in Christ before, what did it draw out? The enmity which crucified the Lord. What we have now is good in the midst of evil - that is what Christ was, perfect good in the midst of evil; but the effect of the display of God in Him - inasmuch as the carnal mind is enmity against God - was that it drew out hostility, and the more the display, the more the hostility drawn out; and so for His love He had hatred. As yet we have not come to the time when evil is removed - that will be when Christ comes again - and that is the difference between that time and this time; that time will be the coming in of good in power, so as to bind Satan and put down evil. But Christ being in this world, and afterwards His saints, is on the contrary, good in the midst of evil, while Satan is the god of this world.

385 When once these became mixed up, the good was swamped and all floated on together. Take the wise virgins and the foolish; while they are asleep they can all stay together - Why should they not? But the moment they trim their lamps comes the question Of the oil, and they do not go together any more. And we shall find it the same. Again in Joshua it was a time Of power. True they fail at Jericho and get beaten at Ai, but the general character is power. Enemies were subdued and cities walled up to heaven were taken, faith overcame all, and that is a blessed picture - good in the midst of evil and power carrying on the good and putting down enemies. In Judges it is the contrary; God's power was there, but power was manifested by the evil because the people were not faithful. They got at once to Bochim (Judges 2: 1-5), i.e. tears, weeping, while in Joshua they went to Gilgal, where the total separation of Israel from the world had taken place; they had crossed Jordan and that was death, and then the reproach of Egypt was rolled away. But the Angel of the Lord went to Bochim; He did not give up Israel though they had left Gilgal. It was grace going after them. And on our part, if we do not go to Gilgal, if we do not go back to the utter humiliation of self in God's presence, we cannot come out in power.

If a servant's intercourse with God does not surmount his testimony to men, he will break down and fail. He must renew his strength. The great secret of Christian life is that our intercourse with God should make nothing of ourselves. God, however, did not give up Israel, and they built an altar to the Lord, but they were weeping at the altar; they were not in triumph, but were constantly being triumphed over.

Then God sent them judges and He was with the judges, though the people had lost their place. That is what we have to consider in the same way. "All seek their own, not the things that are Jesus Christ's." Was not that losing their place? - not that they had ceased to be the church of God, I do not mean that. Unless we consider this, we, too, shall get to Bochim, the place of tears. The whole state of the church of God has to be judged, only the Head can never lose His power, and there is a grace that fits the condition, too.

386 What I see in the beginning of the history of the church is first this blessed power converting 3,000 souls in one day. Then came opposition; the world put them into prison, but God shows His power against that, and I do not doubt that if now we were more faithful there would be a great deal more of the intervention of God. But the power of the Spirit of God was there, and they were walking in a blessed unity, showing that power, and that in the midst of the power of evil, though we do not leave that scene until we find, alas, evil working within, as seen in Ananias and Sapphira. They got credit for giving up their goods falsely. The Spirit of God was there, and they fell dead and fear came upon all, both inside and outside. Then, before the history of Scripture closes, the time has come that judgment must begin at the house of God. It is a most solemn thing characterising the present time until Christ comes, and then His power will put down evil - a very different thing.

Next we get the testimony to the gross evil where good ought to be: "in the last days perilous times shall come; for men shall be lovers of their own selves" and so on; 2 Tim. 3: 1, 2. There the professing church - for such it is - has the same description as is given of the heathen in the beginning of the epistle to the Romans. It is a positive declaration that such times should come, and that the state of things would return to what it had been in heathendom. It goes on to say that "evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived," 2 Tim. 3: 13. But Paul tells Timothy to continue in the things he had learned.

People say now the church teaches these things, but I ask, Who is that? The church? What do they mean? It is all something in the air - there is no inspired person in the church now to teach. I must go to Paul and Peter and then I know from whom I learn. Just as he said to the elders from Ephesus, "I commend you to God and to the word of his grace." Evil men and seducers had waxed worse and worse, but the apostle casts Timothy on the certainty of the knowledge he had received from particular persons; to us now, it is, "the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation." We have to learn all this, when the professing church is a judged thing, and the mere form of godliness characterises it. Here we get, I think, what Christians must look in the face. Do we not see men now turning away who were once called Christians; such turning infidels?

387 Mere formality is turning into open infidelity or open superstition. It is notorious, even in an outward way, how things are going. In itself, Christianity is Christianity as God gave it, but outwardly, as seen around us, it is gone. It is Christianity that we want, as it is in the Word of God. Not that there is anything to fear - it is a blessed time in a sense, casting us upon God, only we must look at these things simply and steadily.

There is not a more blessed picture of lovely faith and godliness, before the gospel came in, than you find in the first two chapters of Luke. Amidst all the iniquity of the Jews, we see Zacharias, Mary, Simeon, Anna and other like minded ones. And they knew each other, and Anna "spake of him to all them that looked for redemption in Jerusalem"; just as we ought to be in another way.

But as to the present state of things - taking the side of man's responsibility - man departs at once from what God sets up, and then comes in a growing corruption, till judgment is necessary. John spoke of the last days being come in, because there were then already many antichrists; but God's patience has been going on, until at the close perilous times have come.

Now I add a word as to how we are to walk in the midst of such a state of things. It is clearly by the Word of God - by immediate reference to it. Not that God does not use ministry - ministry is His own ordinance - but for authority we must turn to the Word of God itself. There is the direct authority of God, as determining everything; and we have the activity of His Spirit to communicate things. Yet it is an unhappy thing if a person goes only to Scripture, refusing help from others, or looks at men as direct guides and denies the Spirit's place.

A mother ought to be blessed in the care of her children, and so should a minister among saints; that is the activity of the Spirit of God in an individual - he is an instrument of God. But while owning that fully, we must go to the Word of God and that directly, and that is what we have to insist upon. We all say that the Word of God is the authority, but we have to insist that God speaks by the word. A mother is not inspired and no man is, but the Word of God is, and it is direct, "He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches." I never get the church teaching - the church is taught and does not teach; individuals teach. But the apostles and others whom God used in that way, were the instruments of God, to communicate directly from God to the saints, so it is, "I adjure you by the Lord that the letter be read to all the holy brethren," 1 Thess. 5: 27. This is of all importance, because it is God's title to speak to souls directly. He may use any instrument He pleases, and you cannot object - "the eye cannot say to the hand, I have no need of thee" (1 Cor. 12: 21); but when you come to direct authority, it is a most solemn thing to touch that. Neither do I talk of private judgment in the things of God, I do not admit it as a principle. You have to discern about other things, but the moment I get into divine things am I going to talk of judging the Word of God? That is one sign of the evil of the times that are come in.

388 When I own the Word of God, brought by His Spirit, I sit down to hear what God will say to me, and then it judges me, not I judge it. It is the divine word brought to my conscience and heart, and am I to judge God when God is speaking to me? It would be denying that He is speaking to me. To have real power it must be the Word of God to my soul, and then I do not think of judging it, but I sit down before it to have my heart drawn out and my conscience exercised. Then I must take it up, as that which gives me what was from the beginning. Why? because God gave that. At the beginning we have not the thing as it was spoiled, but that which God set up.

It will not do to bring me the primitive church; I must have that which was from the beginning. I then get the inspired word and the unity of the body. But after the beginning, the very next thing in ecclesiastical history was all wretched division. John says, "If that which ye have heard from the beginning shall remain in you, ye also shall continue in the Son and in the Father," 1 John 2: 24. You lose your place in the Son and in the Father if you go away from that which was from the beginning. It is evident, then, in applying this, that I must take notice of the circumstances we are in, for in them I get, not what was from the beginning, but what man has made of what God set up at the beginning. People say the church is this and that, but if I take what God set up, I see the unity of the body, and Christ the Head, and that is what the church was manifested to be on earth. But do we get it now?

389 On the contrary we get warned. Paul, as a wise master-builder, laid the foundation, and when others build he warns them not to build with wrong materials - wood, hay, stubble - which will be destroyed; 1 Cor. 3: 12. The building work was put upon man's responsibility, and as such became the subject of judgment. "Upon this rock I will build my church" (Matt. 16: 18), gives me Christ's building, and that is going on; it is not finished yet. Again in Peter, "To whom coming, as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious, ye also as lively stones are built up a spiritual house," 1 Pet. 2: 4, 5. There, too, it is seen as still being built up; then in Ephesians 2: 21, Paul says the building "fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord." Now all that is Christ's work, what men call the invisible church, and so it is. But on the other hand, "Let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon" (1 Cor. 3: 10), i.e., upon the foundation laid by Paul; there you have man's work as a responsible instrument.

Now men confound these two things; they go on building in wood, hay and stubble, and then they speak of the gates of hell not prevailing against that, because they do not give heed to the Word of God. We have to look at God's principles and the power of the Spirit of God, to hear what the Spirit saith to the churches, and to discover truly where we are, so finding the path which God has marked out and in which we are distinctly to walk and I add, faith in the presence of the Spirit of God. That Spirit will use the Word and make us take notice of the state of things, not confounding God's faithfulness with man's responsibility - what the superstitious world is doing - but owning that there is a living God and that that living God is amongst us in the Person and power of the Holy Ghost. All is founded on the cross, surely, but the Comforter did come, and by one Spirit they were all baptised into one body.

Whether I take the individual or the church, I find this is the secret of power for all the good against the evil, outside or inside, this fact - the Word being the guide - of the presence of the Spirit of God. "Know ye not," Paul said, to people going on very badly, in order to correct them, "that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God," 1 Cor. 6: 19. Do you believe, beloved friends, that your bodies are the temples of the Holy Ghost? Then what kind of persons ought we to be?

390 In 1 Cor. 3: 16, we get the same thing said of the church, "know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" The presence of the Spirit gives power, and practical power, too, for blessing, whether in the church or in the individual, and He alone can do anything for real blessing.

Again, it is only on the footing of redemption that God dwells with man. He did not dwell with Adam innocent, though He came down to him. He did not dwell with Abraham, though He visited him and ate with him. But when Israel came out of Egypt, God said He brought them to Himself "that I may dwell among them." And at once the tabernacle was built, and there was God's presence in the midst of His people.

Of course, now, we have true and full redemption, and the Holy Ghost has come down to dwell in those that believe, that they might be the expression of what Christ was Himself when He was down here. "Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him and he in God" (1 John 4: 15); and "Hereby know we that we dwell in him and he in us, because he hath given us of his Spirit," 1 John 4: 13. Where a person is really a Christian, God dwells in him; it is not merely that he has life, but he is sealed with the Holy Ghost who is the power for all moral conduct. If we but believed that the Spirit of God dwells in us, what subjection there would be, and what manner of persons would we be, not grieving that Spirit!

Further, in 1 Cor. 2: 9, I find, "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him, but God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit" - "Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God." The Spirit of God and of the world are always in contrast. But then I find the revelation is in contrast with what is our state. We have to say, "Eye hath not seen"; these things are so great we cannot conceive them, but God has revealed them by His Spirit. The Old Testament saints could not find out or know these things, but with us it is the opposite; we do know them, and He has given us His Spirit "that we might know the things."

391 In this passage the Holy Ghost is seen in three distinct steps; first, these things are revealed by the Spirit; then, they are communicated by words the Spirit taught; and then, they are received by the power of the Spirit - are "spiritually discerned"; all three are the operation of the power of the Spirit of God.

If I were to take the Word of God by itself and say I can judge of it and understand it, then I am a rationalist; it is man's mind judging the revelation of God. But where we get God's mind communicated by the Holy Ghost, and the Holy Ghost the power to receive it, then I get God's mind. There is just as much wisdom and power from God for us to meet the state of ruin in which we now are, as there was at the first when He set up the church; and that is what we have to lean upon.

The Public Ruin of the Church

Notes of a meeting in London in September, 1847

1 Timothy 3: 15, 16; 2 Timothy 2: 19-22

<32026E> 392

Ques. What is the church, and in what sense is it now in ruin?

J N.D There is, dear brethren, great importance in the subject we are about to enter upon, and I feel that the Lord is particularly gracious to us at this time. It is very certain He is always so, whether we apprehend it or not, but He manifests His power in working in the midst of His people. It is not that I am unconscious of the trials and difficulties of "brethren," but at the same time I do discern the Lord's hand at work, and it is ever cheering to see this, for when He takes anything in hand, the soul that trusts Him is sure to get blessing, because He is ever working for our good, though He may sift and humble us. I see that some of the saints are brought more than ever to value their position, and if asked as to this would say, Yes. In this I see positive blessing. I see there is flesh (and the sifting in many cases will manifest it) but still blessing, and this is a comfort to those who know how to trust God. Assuredly there is failure, great failure, but our failure does not close the eye to the fact that God is working. It is true the world has crept in among us; I admit it; but I do not dwell upon it now, but when God begins to work there must be blessing, although, of course, when the Lord stirs up the pool a little of the mud will appear, because it is there.

Many dear brethren have been troubled at the expression "the ruin of the church"; now I can quite understand this, and I make no complaint about their jealousy lest it should be thought that the church could fail, because in one sense it is impossible that the church can be ruined; but there is confusion in some minds between the purposes of God, and present dispensation in which man is placed under responsibility. In speaking of the ruin of the church, we speak of it as down here, set to manifest Christ's glory in unity on the earth, and we must remember that there we are placed, and as in this responsibility, there we must stay. If it could fail spiritually it would be disastrous indeed! There are two thoughts respecting the church in ruin which are full of mischief. The thought on some brethren's minds is, that we intend by this the interruption of God's purpose, which evidently cannot be. There is a jealousy, which I respect and for which I have no regret, lest the idea of the church in ruin should seem to affect the purpose of God. As regards the purpose of God the church cannot be ruined, but as regards its actual present condition as a testimony for God on earth it is in ruin. The other thought is: Well, suppose it is in ruin, so it must be; there we are and there we must stay; so that we are saved at last, never mind; we will take no thought about the present condition of the church, being satisfied that we are saved from the wrath to come. This listlessness and hanging down of the hands, causing cessation of all spiritual energy, is induced by a want of apprehension of what the church is in God's sight. But practically many saints think they are to remain content in the ruin. There is danger in taking up such a thought, because it would be the denial of the power of God. To unbelief discouragement may be the result of this idea of the church's ruin, but I do not look at it as discouragement, because I believe the grace and power of the Lord is suited to the need of the church such as it is at all times. I should feel it to be a very sad effect if the expression "ruin of the church" were to dishearten a soul about the operation of the Spirit in bringing blessing to the church. Neither of the suppositions I have alluded to can be proved, for it is impossible that the church can be in utter ruin in the sense of upsetting God's purpose, or that the power of the Lord is enfeebled when there is actual present ruin. His working will be according to the state the church is in, not to the state she is not in. We are all liable from the feebleness of our minds to say too much or too little, even where truth is held. Man is in a sad state, and I should get disheartened unless I saw the power of Christ to meet that state. God's purpose, of course, is unfailing, and therefore it is not true that the church can fail as it exists in God's purpose. What we want is not so much an abstract notion that the church will be saved, but real practical faith in the application of the resources of God to meet present circumstances. If a Christian is in a bad state, and I do not look beyond it to Christ I am troubled, but if I do I have confidence, and in that sense I am at rest, because I know the Lord can and will bring it right by His power working for him. I should feel sorry if seeing failure should enfeeble faith as to the Lord's care of the church, and I have felt the danger of this; still I say He introduces blessing according to the present condition of the church. We must not say, if we are looking for blessing in the path of faith, the church is sure to be brought through according to God's purpose of grace, it would produce listlessness; we have to look to the present working of His power in blessing to glorify Christ. God always takes an interest in the church's circumstances, and if we are looking for blessing, we shall find it even in times of the greatest failure, for God will have His church in glory, and living faith sees not only the need, but sees also the thoughts and mind of the Lord about that need, and counts on the present love of the Lord. It is as true of an individual as of the church. As having the Spirit of Christ I cannot rest in the thought that a Christian is secure in Christ, and therefore not endeavour to instruct and exhort him and lead him on. The church will be saved, and so will every member of it; but if I have the affections of Christ, I cannot be contented unless I see the power of the Spirit in any individual saint manifesting that saint's relationship to Christ, and just so is it with the church of God; if my faith is in exercise, I am not satisfied unless I see the carrying out of its relationship to Christ as a present thing. If I see in an individual saint that which is not consistent, I am not happy, and so of the church. I do believe in these latter days that the Lord has awakened the minds and souls of many of the saints who were walking in single-eyedness, to examine what the church of God is. Therefore it is not surprising that Satan should come in to resist the truth of the Lord's coming, and the church's relationship to that. Besides this, many have come into the position of blessing, without knowing in themselves what the church's blessing is, and therefore feebleness is the result, for when worldliness crept in they fell backward and were discouraged. They had fellowship in the blessing, but they had not intelligence and fellowship in the principle and grace that produced the blessing, and consequently when there is the want of blessing, restless apprehension and uncertainty will be the result, for when Satan comes in upon our souls, the shallowness of our faith appears.

394 Well, I see this, and bless the Lord that He is awakening in the souls of many saints everywhere the question - "What is the church of God?" I have no doubt that with many very dear saints we should find that they have no definite idea of what the church is beyond the thought, that there are certain persons who are saved and brought to glory. This is true, but then it is clear that the understanding of the relationship in which the church stands to Christ is the basis of all its affections to Christ. If the Lord is now awakening saints to the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the relationship of the church of Christ, and it is not understood, we cannot be bearing a true and faithful testimony for God; and I add further that the truth which does not come up to any special testimony of God at a given time is used by Satan to hinder its reception. Satan will use a past testimony to hinder the reception of the testimony God has raised up for His saints. Thus, the unity of the Godhead is a truth we all hold, but it was held by the Jews for the upset of Christianity. They held "Jehovah our God is one Jehovah," but they did not hold the Father and the Son. Thus they strove to upset the special testimony by which God was then acting - the revelation of the Father and the Son. If God is presenting truth to set His saints in a place of testimony, Satan will also seek to perplex their minds about that very truth, so that they should not be able to give any testimony concerning it. If Satan succeeds in distracting their minds so that they become tired of it, and go back to past truth, then Satan has gained his point by perplexing their minds. Now this is most important. Yet the Lord has always the upper hand of Satan. I doubt not there will be some Lots, who will get tired, but I believe the exercise of soul on the subject will be used by the Lord to bring the souls of those who are faithful on to more solid ground. Thus as to the Lord's second coming, and the presence of the Holy Ghost in the church, many may get hindered, but souls walking in simplicity will be more strengthened by these efforts of Satan.

395 As regards the salvation of any soul, it is by the blood and work of the Lord Jesus Christ, but I do not dwell now on the great truth of the work of Christ, and the quickening of the Spirit; neither do I dwell on the fact that the Old Testament saints were saved by the blood, and will be in resurrection glory with the Lord. I assume all this as acknowledged truth, taking it for granted that the soul may rest there, while I go on to other points. And first, Has God taught us anything about the church of God?

396 Now there are many very precious saints, sound in the faith, who are not prepared to accept what the church of God is as set forth in the word of God. If it is meant that all the saints ever saved will in the end be in company in glory, and surround the second Adam as His family, so to speak, in redemption and life through Him, and they call that the Assembly of God, I have no objection. I do not doubt that the second Adam will have all around Him in glory, as the first Adam had all around him in sin. But scripture speaks of another thing which greatly concerns us - of our place, our privileges and responsibilities. In Israel it was the same thing; it was true that there was salvation before Israel was a people, for Abraham was saved before Israel was brought in, and yet there was a distinct revelation concerning Israel, and relationship based on it; and if any neglected the revelation, they would not only have been unfaithful, but would have lost blessing. David was saved as Abraham was, but the manner of his relationship and responsibilities towards God on earth were not the same as Abraham's, because David formed part of a people placed in a position, the claims of which did not apply to Abraham. If Samuel and others had neglected this, they would have been unfaithful to God, because the ground on which God had set them as a nation was the measure of their special responsibility to Him. In the word of God I find that the church of the living God is a body brought into testimony by the Spirit of God definitely and distinctly, as set in a special relationship to God. And now, as the Lord may enable me, I will shew you what the church is.

The church of the living God is the body of saints formed on earth in unity with Christ in heaven as the Head, by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven to form them into unity with Christ at the right hand of God. The church is not merely a number of saved persons, but a body formed into unity with Christ their Head, by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven consequent on the exaltation of Jesus to the right hand of God. There has been a habit of calling all the saints from first to last the church, and there is a fear lest tender-hearted saints who have done so should be alarmed by altering it. I greatly respect the jealousy of souls (who have the consciousness of the electing love of God, in saving every one whom He has called from Adam downward), in being alarmed lest this distinction should affect the foundation of salvation through the blood according to God's electing love; but still it is my duty as well as my privilege to understand the position in which God has set me, and to call by the right name what God has called by name in scripture.

397 The Lord said to Peter, "On this rock I will build my church." He had not been building from Adam downwards, but He says, "I will build." What do I find people talking about? A visible and invisible church. Now this is Satan's lie. The so-called visible church is in fact the world, and cannot give any testimony at all for Christ. If I say it is an invisible body, the testimony is all gone. In Israel, what was the visible body then? A nation. God's unity then was the unity of a nation, ninety-nine out of a hundred of whom were not converted - the true saints were invisible for God had His hidden ones among them. When Christ came Anna spake of Him to all who waited for redemption in Israel. But the church of God is very different, though so often confounded with this state of believers in Israel. The saints are now formed on earth into a body in unity with Christ risen by the Holy Ghost come down from heaven in consequence of the exaltation of Jesus. Our relations, our affections and our duty to Christ are all founded on this truth; and if it be not understood, there must be defect in the walk and in the consciences of the saints. When the Lord said to Peter, "I will build," of course it was a thing not yet done. The foundation stone was Christ.

We all know the way the Epistle to the Ephesians speaks of this; indeed that epistle is founded on the truth that God has set Christ far above all principality and power in heavenly places consequent on His death and humiliation. Redemption work gave Him the title, although as the Son it was His already. The church is put into association with Him there; Eph. 1 and 2. Before Christ came they waited for righteousness, and God forbore, but now we are waiting for the hope of righteousness; not waiting for righteousness, but for the hope - what belongs to righteousness. The righteousness of God is perfect in its accomplishment, Christ the Righteous One being set down in glory. God has now set up a people in union with Christ their Head by the power of the Holy Ghost; hence I find that Jew and Gentile distinctions are done away. Before, the whole ground of God's dealings was the distinction of His people the Jews from the Gentiles, but now there is "neither Jew nor Gentile, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free." Was that ever before? At that time they were Gentiles in the flesh, but now made nigh. He "hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition." God had Himself built up the wall between them which He has now broken down, to make of twain one new man. Now many a Jew had been saved, but had not been made one new man with Gentile sinners called by God, through Him who hung upon the cross and abolished the enmity, and having ascended on high formed both into one new man in Himself. Simeon and Anna and many godly Jews who looked for redemption in Israel were saved, and saved, of course, as alone any can be, as saints are now saved; and what did God do with them? left them Jews. But when Peter preached and three thousand souls believed, what did God do with them? He added them to the church "In whom also ye are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit." The old habitation - a temple made with hands - is cast down, and a new one formed both of Jews and Gentiles. Ephesians 3 opens out this mystery and adds, "Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly . . . according to the power that worketh in us"; not for us Chapter 4 is practically speaking of the vocation. If we get away from what has previously been spoken of, we cannot walk worthily of the calling by which we are called, and God has called the saints to be His habitation. It is not enough to be merely saints, but they must listen to the vocation, and endeavour to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. It was not enough for Abraham to be a saint, but he must leave Ur of the Chaldees, because this was his calling, and if he had not obeyed, he would have acted most inconsistently as a man of God. When God had given him a sign to keep of His covenant relationship with Him, if his posterity had neglected to keep it, they would have been cut off from God's people - outwardly manifested as such on the earth. So also we do not answer to God's calling unless we obey it. Of course, the church will form a glorious body in heaven, but the Spirit in addressing the church does so as on the earth. The Holy Ghost has come down and formed the church for a habitation of God here on the earth, not in heaven. In Ephesians 4 we find certain gifts for the edifying of the body of Christ on the earth, not to edify it in heaven; "edifying itself in love" that is not in heaven; "making increase of the body" must be on earth.

398 In 1 Corinthians 12 I find the same testimony most distinctly. The Spirit baptises into one body on the earth, not in heaven. "Now hath God set the members every one of them in the body"; this was not done before. Israel was the body, as far as there was one in any sense, or God's assembly in the wilderness, and most of them unconverted. "Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular." Nothing can be plainer than that the body is formed on earth (of course to be glorified in heaven) by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven after Jesus was glorified. This is what the church is as taught by the New Testament.

399 When I look at the church in glory, I look at it as a body securely and infallibly perfect in God. There will then be no question of glorifying God, for God will glorify Himself in us. I see that whenever man is put in a place of responsibility, in which he fails, God brings in a better accomplishment. Thus Adam fails, and the Lord Jesus becomes the fulfiller of his responsibilities for the glory of God as the second Adam. Israel failed; God gave them His law and thus brought them into a certain relationship with Himself which did not exist with any other people, and He required them to bear testimony to this, and for this they were responsible. Under God's new covenant the law will be written in their hearts, so that they will yet keep it. The priesthood itself failed, and I see the same thing in the church - at first set up, and then failing, but God will accomplish all in full purpose in glory; but there I see an important difference, for we ought to be by the Holy Ghost the manifestation of God's thoughts down here. What do I see in the church? The bride of Christ, engaging His affections as His bride, and her affections should be according to her relationship.

Now what do I mean by the ruin of the church? A simple question will answer this. Who will shew me the manifestation of the unity of the body of Christ? I cannot find it; but I can find saints that will be saved; I can find the unfailing faithfulness of God in manifest tokens of His faithfulness, "for where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst" - and therefore blessing, but the church as a manifested body on the earth is ruined. When Lo-ammi, not my people, was written upon Israel, still the Lord in Haggai comforts them with "according to the word that I covenanted with you when ye came out of Egypt, so my spirit remaineth among you: fear ye not." The power of God could not change, and hence the word, "fear ye not." When God said to Israel, "not my people," it was not that God gave them up. He did not change His mind; no, never! They shall be His people at last, because He did not mean in purpose when He said Lo-ammi but now they are Lo-ammi still.

400 I have been much struck of late with the fact that the Lord never addressed Israel as His people in the three prophets after the captivity (though He says they shall be hereafter) still the word was "fear ye not." It is not simply, then, the evil amongst "brethren"* that gives me sorrow, but a certain character of discouragement among them (because of circumstances) from the lack of simple faith to rise above the circumstances to Christ. Does Christ love the church less? Is He less powerful? Faith has constant unfailing confidence in Christ. I know what sorrow is, but discouragement I do not know. If you are counting on your own strength, then I am not surprised at your discouragement, but "He that keepeth Israel neither slumbers nor sleepeth." We ought to be humbled - ah! humbled in the dust, if you please, but never discouraged. A truly humble man is not discouraged; the discouraged man is not a humble man, for he has trusted, as man, to something beside God; true nothingness cannot. "While men slept, his enemy . . . sowed tares." Does this discourage? No. "Let both grow together until the harvest." Some years after the conversion of my soul I looked around to find where the church was, but I could not find it. I could find plenty of saints better than myself, but not the church as it was set up with power on the earth. Then I say the church as thus set up is ruined, and I cannot find a better word for it. The church is ruined as Israel never was, and will be cut off as though it had never been, for this reason: when Israel was God's witness on the earth, the veil was not rent, and therefore if Israel failed under the old covenant, they can be brought in under the new, but the church was founded on the earth in the spirit of the new covenant, and if it fails, there is no veil to be rent now. Judgment has been executed on Israel, and Israel has no place now as a nation, but on the church God has not executed judgment; we must not confound ruin with cutting off.

{*The Plymouth breakdown had taken place.}

I feel the importance of definitely apprehending the relationship in which the Lord has set us; it will touch us in our consciences, not merely saying the church is secure - surely it is, but we ought to be touched with the sense of our relation to Christ, and the responsibility of that relationship. Hence would flow that rigid obedience, and obedience is the only thing in which a Christian should be rigid, it would keep us from latitudinarianism; and there should be nearness to Christ which would keep us from sectarianism, the most natural weed of the human heart (sectarianism is getting an interest in a little circle round ourselves), and would give us a feeling as to, and an interest in, the whole church of God, for Christ can love nothing less. Then I shall refuse to own anything that is not the bride of Christ, but be ready always to acknowledge and receive that which is the bride of Christ. Will Christ have an English bride - a Swiss bride - a French bride? No. The evangelical alliance, is that it? No. At home and abroad I find this question, What is the church of God? One says, The church is visible. What do you mean? - that the professing church is the visible church of God? What is its testimony? Is it to Christ its heavenly Head, separate from sinners? Another says, It is invisible. What? the church of the living God invisible! What then is its testimony? It is only invisible because in sin. There is a false church visible, a true one invisible.

401 But there is no enmity produced by such a conviction against those mixed up with the evil, or in ignorance of it, because the man who is certain, though he may be pained, can never feel enmity. When "brethren" came out, what were they? Nothing. What was their feeling? They took up the interest of the church of God, desiring to see all who loved God manifested in it. A large measure of blessing followed; numbers joined. Then came trouble and trial within, and that plentifully occupied their hearts, and practically that became their circle, and consequently not the church of the living God. People say, we have been too narrow, we must mix up a little. No, never, I cannot go back. "If I build again the things which I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor." I have nothing to go back from. The one desire of my heart is the beauty and blessing of the church - the bride of Christ. That will make me earnestly love all saints for they are of it. I desire its entire separation to Christ to whom she belongs - espoused as a chaste virgin. My feet in the narrow way - my heart as large as Christ's.

402 It occurs to me to add a thought as to difficulties in some minds. The church of God as distinguished from other things which are found in scripture. This is not only a question of interest to our minds, but one of extreme importance. First, the question as to Romans 11. To many minds it has the appearance of grafting the church on to the previous system. This has the effect of keeping the mind in abeyance. If our souls are kept in hesitation there is no affection at work, and what I desire to see is active affection. Secondly, Ephesians 2: 19, "Fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God." Lastly, distinguishing between the church of God and the kingdom of heaven. There are two things (Matt. 16), "On this rock I will build my church"; there is no key there. Then it is further said to Peter, "I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven."

It is clear to me that Romans 11, properly speaking, has nothing to do with the church as such, though it has to do with those who go to form the church. There is no thought here of the body in unity with the Head in heaven. The unbelieving Jews were broken off because of unbelief. Now in no possible sense could it be said that the Jews were broken off from the church, for they were never in it. The apostle speaks also of breaking off the Gentile branches. That cannot be the church, because in no possible sense can it be said that the church of the living God in its true sense is broken off. The whole wording of the chapter proves that the olive tree has reference to the line and channel of the administration of God's promises on the earth. In that all this takes place. The children of Israel were heirs of promise according to the flesh; they were broken off and the Gentiles graffed in. The Gentiles will be broken off if they do not continue in God's goodness, and the Jews graffed in again. The church cannot be broken off nor graffed in again; the olive tree shews the successional administration of God's promises on the earth. It is connected with God's outward dealings, and the moment this is seen the difficulty of the chapter is removed. The Jews will be graffed into their own Olive Tree again, not into this new thing, the church of God.

The passage in Ephesians is in direct contrast with what is here spoken of as the olive tree; it owns neither Jew nor Gentile. It is the position of the church down here, "fellow citizens with the saints." It is a simple fact that the Gentiles are what they never were before, but so, too, are the Jews who believe. The Gentiles are not brought into the previous condition of the Jews. The passage does not speak of a previous Jewish state, the Jews themselves together with Gentiles are brought into a new condition where both are made one new man; they are "fellow citizens" together. It is not uniting the Gentiles to the previous Jewish constitution, but bringing Jews and Gentiles into a common new one.

403 Now one word as to the kingdom of heaven. It is in one point connected with the church, because it is the administration of the power and authority of the Lord Jesus Christ, though it is invisible or in mystery now. It is not the reign of Satan or of the four beasts, but the reign of heaven. It is the reign of righteousness and judgment, and the thought of its being the church will not do, as I do not find grace characterising it. When the kingdom of heaven was preached by John, he said, "Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor." "He will gather out of his kingdom all things that offend." Now this is judgment, and though the church will be associated with Christ in it as reigning with Him, yet the kingdom of heaven has not the same character as the church of the living God. Again, "Those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me." This has nothing to do with the church of God or the gospel. Still the church has a testimony to the kingdom of heaven, that it is to be set up. Again in Psalm 68: 23, "That thy foot may be dipped in the blood of thine enemies, and the tongue of thy dogs in the same." Now this is vengeance, and not the characteristic work of the power of redemption. This greatly facilitates the understanding of the psalms, for in them we constantly find the Spirit of Christ crying for judgment on His enemies. The dreadful expressions of vengeance in the psalms apply to the judgment of enemies on the setting up of the kingdom. In Psalm 21: 8 we find that in consequence of the exaltation of Jesus to the right hand of God there will be judgment upon His enemies, as it is said, "Thy right hand shall find out all thine enemies"; it speaks of Him as King. But in Psalm 22 there is not a word about enemies. When He cried out, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" He was suffering for sin in the way of atonement. When it was that kind of suffering, His soul entered into it, as He, and He alone, could know it. Then I find nothing about enemies, but "I will declare thy name unto my brethren: in the midst of the congregation will I praise thee." The principle is, that He takes His place among a happy people. The church is altogether above and beyond the kingdom; the church is a happy people associated with Christ in the love God has for Him. The church will reign with Christ over the kingdom, and she now owns Christ as King by right.

404 To return to Ephesians 2. There is something entirely new. "We are his workmanship" (v. 10), "and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets," (v. 20). They are not the prophets of the Old Testament, but of the New. This we see by comparison with chapter 3: 5, "it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit." What is here spoken of as revealed is something entirely fresh There is one new man made of two sets of people. Jew and Gentile are done away with, and "He is our peace, who hath made both one." Jew and Gentile are brought in as "fellow citizens." The Gentiles could not be made Jews, but both are reconciled to God in one body by the cross. The apostle addresses those near and those far off, and of both one new man is made in Christ. They are "fellow heirs" in the new thing, the heavenly Jerusalem if you like it.

In Romans 11 the point discussed is whether God has cast away His people. Whether Israel whom He foreknew should be cast off? "God forbid!" says Paul, "for I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God hath not cast away his people whom he foreknew"; though He may have cast off the nation temporarily. Now this question applied to the church would have been utter nonsense, as He was then and ever since gathering the church of God in by the gospel. "But to Israel he saith, All day long I have stretched forth my hands unto a disobedient and gainsaying people." Was this casting them off? In verses 4, 11, 26, the apostle gives three proofs that God had not cast off His people. God replied to Elijah when he said that he was left alone, It is not so at all, for "I have reserved unto myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to Baal." "Even so then at this present time also," says the apostle, "there is a remnant according to the election of grace." Again, God is caring for them in the very bringing in of the Gentiles "to provoke them to jealousy." And again, "So all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob." At the close of chapter 8 the apostle had finished the salvation question - "no condemnation." Then comes the difficulty that in planting the saints in Christ he threw down the special place of the Jews - "there is no difference." He then reconciles this with God's immutable purposes towards Israel, and in chapter 9 reasons thus: If you say that as a child of Abraham you have a right, then Ishmael and Esau come in. Your national claim is through God's sovereignty, your own title of descent from Abraham will not stand, for then Ishmael and Esau have a title to come in. God exercises this same sovereignty in letting in Gentiles. Then in chapter 10 he shews the Jews how they stumbled. This is not the principle of sovereignty as in chapter 9; it had happened according to the plain testimony of the Old Testament: "They stumbled at that stumbling stone." God has not ceased to care for Israel, He is still carrying out His plan as to them, and the Gentiles have been graffed in. If some of the branches are broken off it shews there must be some remaining, and He cares for them. "If God spared not the natural branches." Now who are the "natural branches" of the church of God? The natural branches are looked at as having been in the position of heirs of promise down here on the earth, and God is able to graff them in again (these Jews who were broken off) into the position on earth of heirs of promise. It is impossible to apply all this to the church, "Blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in." How can this be the church? "The Jews beloved for the fathers' sakes." Is this the church of the living God?

405 Ques. Suppose a child of God recognises what the church of God is, and its ruined condition, is he to labour and pray for its restoration; or what course is he to pursue?

J.N.D. Well, if it is so (ruined) the conscience cannot be satisfied with it. If the church of God is responsible in walk and affection and everything to God, the conscience acknowledging the ruin, what is it to do? It cannot be satisfied for it cannot rest in a sinful state. Now the Lord remembers the kind of relationship in which we know ourselves to be, as in Jeremiah 2, "Go, speak in the ears of Jerusalem, I remember thee, the love of thine espousals" - not God's love to Israel, unfailing as this proved to be, but Israel's love to God, when they thought God worth following for Himself, when they had nothing else beside. Then Jehovah asks, "What iniquity have your fathers found in me?" Have I failed towards you in goodness? Their being in the wilderness, in a land of deserts and pits, and being brought safe through, was the very proof that God was with them. They went on badly enough, they went back in heart to Egypt, and Dathan and Abiram despised Him; still, their being there in the wilderness proved that they cared for the Lord so as to follow Him, and the Lord here complains that no one said, "Where is the Lord that brought us up out of the land of Egypt"? that no heart referred to that time? Now Gideon did plead in this manner; his faith was in the Lord that brought them out of Egypt, and herein was the secret of his strength, for God said to him, "Go, in this thy might." It is impossible, if the word has reached our ears, that we should be contented where we are, for there cannot be contentedness where there is a sense of failure. As regards what I look for, and it is the one sole object before my soul, it is Christ's coming. If I have the spirit of the bride I shall desire the Bridegroom, because He is the Bridegroom. "The Spirit and the bride say, Come." There may be much ignorance as to what to do, but let the relationship, the affection to Christ be seen.

406 I should feel disappointment at the thought of reconstruction; if I have the Spirit of Christ I shall be sensible of the loss of suitability in the bride to Him, and the sense of unfaithfulness will be accompanied with the wish to become fitted for Him. "He that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure." That is the principle; the bride that is looking for the Bridegroom will seek to be purified for Him; to be prepared and ready for him through "the washing of water by the word." Spiritual energy will seek that the church be ready for Christ. The Lord, spiritually, has brought us into a land of blessing, but we have lost the consciousness that we are for Him, and have become occupied with one thing and another, and are not sensible that we are for Him and for Him alone. It would be immeasurably happy for our souls if we knew nothing whatever of all that is passing around us, save as God Himself brings it before us, and had the light of that truth in full power on our souls, that we are for Him - the whole soul should be His, and His alone. Reconstruction is not the object of pursuit. Whenever a man from desire is in God's service, if he has not entirely God's object, he will succeed because he will be setting up something instead - some other object looking like it, but quite another thing. Paul did not succeed, for the end with him was "all seek their own." When a man has God's object, and is thoroughly working for God, he must be a man of sorrows. Paul never got the faith of his fellow labourers nor the church up to his own. The true notion as to the church now is - a people made ready in spirit for their Lord; not as adorned, because that is resurrection glory, but kept ready in spirit by the "washing of water by the word." I believe the sole object in all ministry, even in evangelising, is to present the church to God as Christ's bride - wholly separated unto Him as a bride ought to be. Ministry, and reconstruction of the church, are quite different things. I am ministering to-night, but not reconstructing. Many may be confused in their minds on this point. Now I do not doubt that ministry comes in as "washing of water by the word" in order to "make ready a people prepared for the Lord."

Now I must guard against any thought that I undervalue order. Subjection to the Spirit of God is shewn in subjection to what the Spirit of God gives; but I am not pursuing that as an object, but looking for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Still I do not doubt but that all my service to the saints down here will come in as ministry.

407 Ques. Is there a church now on earth or not?

J.N.D. Is there an army or not? Suppose an army not destroyed but scattered to the four winds - why, there is an army, and there is not an army; it has lost its corporate character.

Letter on "Apostasy"

J. N. Darby.

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{Also published as 'The Bridegroom Cometh'.}

Beloved brethren and sisters in Christ,

The day of the apostasy is hastening on with rapid strides, and also the day in which the Lord shall come to snatch His own away. The present moment is of so solemn a character that I feel constrained to address you this word of exhortation. Godly men everywhere, who watch the signs of the times, see the moment approaching which shall terminate the present actings of grace. The time has evidently arrived when one must speak plainly and decisively, and ask you where you are, and what you are about. You have by grace, which has shone brighter and brighter as it has approached its termination, been gathered out of the seething mass of idolatry and wickedness which now threatens Christendom and the world with an overthrow more awful than that of Sodom and Gomorrah of old; and the question is whether you are adequately impressed with the responsibility, as well as the blessedness, of the ground you are on, and walking like men and women whose eyes have been opened. Believe me, there has never been in the world's history such a time as the present, and Satan is occupied with none as he is with you; and his occupation with you is the more to be feared because of the subtlety of his operations. His object is to withdraw your attention from Christ, while you suppose you are on safe ground and have nothing to fear. He would destroy you with the very truth itself. For mark the subtlety: you ARE on safe ground but ONLY while Christ is your all in all. Here is where Satan is drawing some away. Interpose anything between your soul and Christ, and your Philadelphia becomes Laodicea; your safe ground is as unsafe as the rest of Christendom; your strength is gone from you, and you become weak, like any ordinary mortal. Some of you are young, recently converted, or brought to the right ways of the Lord, and you do not know the depths of Satan. But you are hereby solemnly warned of your peril; and if mischief overtake you, you cannot plead ignorance. Again I say, Satan has his eye especially upon YOU, for the purpose of interposing the world in some form between your soul and Christ. He cares not how little, or in what form. If you knew but how little will answer his purpose, you would be alarmed. It is not by that which is gross or shameful; such is the DEVELOPMENT, not the BEGINNING of evil. It is not by anything glaring that he seeks to ruin you, but in small and seemingly harmless trifles - trifles that would not shock nor offend anyone as things go, and yet these constitute the deadly and insidious poison, destined to ruin your testimony and withdraw you from Christ. Do you ask what are these alarming symptoms, and where are they seen? The question does but shew what is the character of the opiate at work. Brethren and sisters, you are being infected with the spirit of the world. Your dress, your manner, your talk, your lack of spirituality, betray it in every gathering. There is a dead weight, a restraint, a want of power, that reveals itself in the meetings, as plainly as if your heart were visibly displayed and its thoughts publicly read. A form of godliness without power is beginning to be seen among YOU, as plainly as in Christendom generally. As surely as you tamper with the world, so surely will you drift away to its level. This is the nature of things. It must be so. If you tamper with the world, the privileged place you occupy, instead of shielding you, will only expose you to greater condemnation. It must be Christ OR the world. It cannot be - ought not to be - Christ AND the world. God's grace in drawing you out of the world in your IGNORANCE is one thing, but God will never permit you to prostitute His grace, and play fast and loose, when you have been separated from the world. Remember you take the place, and claim the privilege, of one whose eyes have been opened; and if on the one hand this is unspeakably blessed (and it is), on the other hand it is the most dreadful position in which a human being can be found. It is to be at the wedding feast without the wedding garment. It is to say, "Lord, Lord," while you do not the things that He bids. It is to say, "I go, sir," as he said who went not.

409 Beloved, I am persuaded better things of you, though I thus speak; and I have confidence in you, in the Lord, that you will bless Him for these few faithful words. Nothing can be more glorious than the position you are called to occupy in these closing days. Saints have stood in the breach, have watched through weary days and nights these eighteen hundred years, and you only wait for the trumpet of victory to go in and take possession of the glorious inheritance. Other men laboured, and ye are entered into their labours; and yet, forsooth, you are lowering your dignity to the level of the poor potsherds of the earth, who only wait for the rod of the Victor (and yours too) to be dashed into pieces. Oh, awake, then from your lethargy: slumber no longer; put away your idols and false gods; wash your garments, and get you to Bethel, where you will find God to be better than ever you knew Him, even in your best days. Lay aside your last bit of worldly dress; guard your speech, that it be of Christ and His affairs, and not, as you know it now often is, of anything but Him. Let your prayers mingle with those of other saints at the prayer meetings; they never were more needed. Neglect no opportunity of gathering up instruction from that word which alone can keep us from the paths of the destroyer, and let your life be the evidence of the treasures you gather up at the lecture, or the reading-meeting, or in secret with the Lord If you want occupation, with a glorious reward from a beloved Master, ask that Master to set you to work for Him: you will never regret it, either in this world or in that which is to come.

410 Beloved, bear with me; I am jealous over you with godly jealousy. You belong to Christ, and Christ to you. Break not this holy union. Let not the betrothed one be unfaithful to her Bridegroom! Why should you be robbed and spoiled? And for what? Empty husks and bitter fruits, while you waste this little span of blessing! All the distinctions acquired here in the energy of the Spirit will but serve to enhance your beauty and render you more lovely in the eyes of Him who has espoused you to Himself. Can you refuse Him His delights in you? Can you refuse Him the fruit of the travail of His soul, who once hung, a dying man, between two thieves, on Calvary, a spectacle to men and angels, and for YOU - you who have FORGOTTEN (for you cannot have DESPISED) this devotedness for you. He could have taken the world without the cross, and left you out, but He would not; and now will you, having been enriched by those agonies and that blood, take the world into your tolerance and leave Him out? Impossible! Your pure mind did but need to be stirred up by way of remembrance.

Let us therefore take courage from this moment. We have lately been offering up prayers, confessing the lack of piety and devotedness. May we not take this word as the answer of our ever-gracious faithful Lord, to arouse us - to re-awaken our drooping energies? And then the more quickly He comes the better. We shall not be ashamed before Him at His coming.

(Hebrews 10: 23-25, 37 )

The Person of the Lord

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How beyond all our wonder and praise is the Person of the blessed Lord! As an apostle could say, and more, because he knew it better "Great is the mystery." But in one respect Paul was one with us all, great as his revelations were - no man knows the Son. Yet He lets us see that He is that which no man knows. Who could say but there 'God is known in death'? Is it not there love, God's love is known, never known really till known there? Yet it is weakness, and, as to His place as man, the very end of man. But in Himself God is known in love by His being down here with sinful men - by that love reaching even to us. He made Himself of no reputation, emptied Himself - not that He could be other than God - there is the mystery - but as to the form of God he did. Hence having taken the form of a servant, He is always such - receives all. Even when He takes the kingdom, He goes a long journey to receive a kingdom, and, when, by His perfection in power He has subdued all, He gives it up to God even the Father. He gives up His own spirit when the time comes, but recommends it to His Father - raises up the temple of His body? but is raised by the glory of the Father - grows in wisdom, speaks what He knows, but He is the wisdom of God; He can do nothing of Himself - is obedient, but He is the power of God, and quickens too whom he will; created all things and upholds them by the word of His power. And this was His perfection, with the whole power of evil against Him, never to go out of the path of dependence and obedience - never to use power by His will. Thus He bound the strong man as in the wilderness - in death how much more even - He could have had, even in dependence, more than twelve legions of angels, but it would not have been obedience fulfilling the Scriptures.

But what an emptying that was when He who was God could come into death, through suffering, through obeying, bring all that God was in His moral perfection into death, and then when it was needed, in man's extremity through sin, in man's weakness, in the place of Satan's power, there glorify it - love, righteousness, majesty, truth, all found glorified there. God is glorified in Him, yet it was in death, and because it was death in all it meant for God; but it was all the power of love, i.e., God, in the emptying. I do not turn to John's writings here, already elsewhere spoken of, where the Divine nature of the Lord is so distinct,* where He comes out as God - not genealogic from - takes the place of receiving everything. It is contemplation of the wondrous and unsearchable fact I seek, not Adam or Abraham or David - and yet, as made flesh, always proofs which are everywhere where He is.

{*John 5 gives plainly this position of the Lord; chapter 6 is more distinctly as man, still He comes down and goes up again.}

412 But I would weigh some facts in the Gospels as to the manifestation of God in Him. When the blessed Lord had to do with unbelievers whom He knew and had to treat as adversaries, though His being God comes out - save His knowing all men, as yet not judging - what God is does not come out at all; it is only when driven, by the wilful blindness and hostility of the human heart, to speak of things as they are, that forced and driven to the necessity of it, so to speak, the fact of His being God comes out, "Before Abraham was, I am. Then took they up stones to cast at Him, but Jesus hid himself." There is no revelation of Himself in John 8. He does not come to judge, and the woman is not condemned - she is to go and sin no more. He gives Divine power to the law, or rather. He is, by His word, Divine power in the conscience - no grace is in question, and they all go away one by one - Divine power in the Word awakes the conscience. He is the Light of the world, and he who follows Him does not walk in darkness. But here there are none such; it is simply the Light shining in darkness and the darkness comprehended it not.

But Christ is divine - He can bear witness of Himself, yet He says "as the Father has taught me" as ever, in John, receiving all. Nothing inconsistent with grace, but the simple absence of all contrary to it. He could not contradict Himself, but He is only Light in darkness. As Man He hardly appears here, for that is grace; other cases present themselves where grace is at work. We may first take the woman of Samaria - but here away from Jerusalem, where with the Jews (not the people) He is always in judgment - where the great change of leaving them and having to do with the world, and bringing men to have to do with the Father and with God spiritually, and that by life in the power of the Spirit, is brought out, and where Christ is the rejected Man and feels it, but is thereby thrown into the consciousness that He is the Divine Giver of eternal life in the power of the Spirit. But here we have the Lord fully as a Man; the Jachin and Boaz of Christian truth had been set up in chapter 3 - Man or Jew was naught, must be born again, and the Son of Man must be lifted up. God had loved and had given. Christ was a rejected Christ - He left Judea where the Pharisees were jealous and would none of Him. Christ must be a rejected Christ for us to have part with Him - sad thing to say, but so it is - if it die not it abides alone. No doubt He could always quicken whom He would, but without His death we could not righteously see God, and if a man received a new nature without His death, there would be no putting away of the old; we must be risen as well as quickened - a new place and a new life - and that is only by His death. But He was rejected, felt it, afterwards wept over the city, felt it deeply as none of us could feel - we see Him comforted, as rejected by His own to whom He came, by fields white to harvest.

413 He was weary with His journey and sat alone in the world - O wondrous place! The world He had created, but more, into which He was come in love: and here only a weary Man feeling the rejection of His love, but, as to the place He had taken, dependent for a drink of water - He who had made it - upon this poor sin-wearied woman. But He had come where He could only come in grace; salvation was not of Samaria but of the Jews - promises were theirs, but they had rejected all - grace had its work outside, but then it was humiliation and on rejection He must needs pass through Samaria. He submits to human circumstances and conditions - He acts in divine grace. Here therefore where grace, free grace, works, we find Him fully Man - a weary rejected Man, bound in spirit on a way He must needs take, and waiting on the kindness of another for a drink of water. Grace is in the humbled and obedient Man - there it is that what God is shines out. It is not "before Abraham was I am," but "if thou knewest the gift of God," i.e., grace, and who it is that saith to thee, give me to drink." It is not the supreme God forced, so to speak, to say He is so to heartless adversaries without conscience, but God revealed in what He was in a lowly Man, and by His being a lowly Man; and surely if grace is, that is grace.

What heart is in the words! What a need to win the confidence of a weary soul! Yet the simple expression of what His own heart was full of, of God as goodness and brought out, as to circumstances, by the pressure on that heart of the rejection by His beloved people which He was suffering under! How wonderful to hear Him saying just then "Salvation is of the Jews!" Perfect owning of God's counsels and ways! But in His rejection in them grace flowing freely out - the natural expression of what He was full of, but as that was love, love which seeks to bring a weary soul to confidence in God by bringing that love down to lay its wants at the feet of such an one, to win confidence in a love that could do it. "If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith" - there He was - "give me to drink" - come even there - "thou wouldest have asked" - He would have given, for He was the giver. What a scene! Such a lowly place! And to learn what God is in it! Yea, what He is by it!

414 There is no feeling like that of the perception of the Person of Christ, and His words and He are one - He was what He said, always. Yet it is thoroughly in human nature I look at Him here, yea, that is the way and here I learn it. With adversaries He is simply God - in grace He is a Man yet God, and only precious as a Man because He is, and, as a Man, dependent. Yet we have seen the Father in Him.

I do not go into the state of the woman, that is another part of the question of the chapter. But He is the object of adoration for eternity.

I turn then to the Syro-Phoenician; here it is "He could not be hid." It was not the flowing out of a pressed heart to sorrow and need, but what God, so to speak, must be where faith is - Himself - He cannot deny Himself. Still grace rises above all promise and curse, and God is revealed. It is not as in John 4 where the pressure on His heart of the rejection of His beloved people, and all it implied had brought out what was in that heart; deeper still, the divine overflowings of goodness not meeting promise, but finding its comfort in going out in free grace to need where no promise, no title was - rejected love making new channels for itself; God giving, and hence naturally where need, not where promise was, and giving eternal life and bringing to God in Spirit and in truth, for God, as He is was revealed, and so the Father seeking worshippers. This was John 4, and hence we find the opened heart of the Samaritans wider than promise, knowing more than appropriating pride, own Him as the Christ, the Saviour of the world.

415 But in the Syro-Phoenician woman it was different; He goes to the borders of His earthly mission, retired to be alone (Mark 7) and would not have it known. Here it is not His own rejection, He labours among the poor of the flock - His mission according to prophecy: and as to Israel the designs of God, He is servant of this mission, nothing more, as to the place He takes; He is not rejected by proud Jerusalem, but sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. But He is in His mission, but in His divinely traced, not free path, He goes out of the sphere of active service to the borders of the curse without.

Meanwhile moral truths had come largely out; ceremonial observances contrasted in Israel with divine commandments, but, still further, the heart of man, called in question in contrast with all such mere ordinances, lost in importance, not merely in contrast with divine commandment, but in their nature as merely external; God looked at what came from the heart, not what went into the belly - a simple truth, but which for man is hard to learn. God goes to the true nature of things in respect of man - what comes out of the heart - what he is; but what did come out of it? Murders, evil thoughts, all manner of evil, and the Lord had no more to say. Then He leaves this scene of labour, is alone personally - as Man in position He would not have it known; but it was. Then we come to what was known; He goes, as I have said, to the borders of the curse - the place which served Him as an example of hard-heartedness - the people on whom God's curse rested as compared with Israel. What wondrous elements are all brought together here! But He sought to be alone, i.e., out of His sphere of labour. His mission, as a sent one, a servant, He insists on. But a want was there, a want which sought goodness in power, and God was there; the poor woman drawn by it, though purposely repelled to prove her faith (the disciples would have got rid of her - neither owned promise, nor in fact exercised love as above all promise) draws out what is above all promise, what recognises fury the right to possess where promise was, but appeals to goodness as, after all, reaching over it, fully recognising man's complete misery and wretchedness without a title - a vile dog, which there was saying everything that was unclean and vile, but appealed to a riches in goodness which could reach in mercy even to that. Could Christ say "No! God is not that"?

416 No! God was there manifested and faith had all it sought for - it had found Him; there was no need of claim or goodness, but the confession of worthlessness and absence of all title - a need whose resource was in the goodness of God. The Servant who held Himself to His mission, as service He had to do, was after all the God of all grace, and God revealed in Him, and while owning God's ways in Israel, standing alone in the presence of the curse and the absence of all claim, what faith owned, but therein found God and infinite goodness - Israel's servant was God manifest in the flesh, was goodness, above all evil, above all curse, was God and God manifested. What God is is known in His being revealed in Man - being a Man; for that was infinite love.

But there was more than the revelation of His Person and the exercise of His power; I turn to another case, Luke 7, the Pharisee and the sinner. Here we have not the rejected state of man and free grace rising above it all, but actual degrading sin in contrast with human righteousness - a legal condition as man stands in it, and what this blessed One was for sinners. Three hearts - man as he stands in his own righteousness - God's in Man - and the poor and degraded sinner touched by grace and won, in a certain sense unconsciously (i.e., with no dogmatic knowledge) by what was manifested in the Lord, what He was in blessed love first, then forgiveness. The legal man thought to judge, by human competency, if the Lord, this Preacher going about the country, were really a prophet, but he judged according to human righteousness - what man should be for God, but only in an outward way; his own heart, God's heart and light, and even this poor woman's heart unknown - light and love, light and conscience, and love in the heart, i.e., God, alike wholly unknown. God was in his house, in light, as He shewed, and love, and he never found it out - despised Him - had no civilities or courtesies for Him - and judged from his own heart - while He was not like it He could be no prophet. Here self-righteousness, divine grace and sin come together in fullest juxtaposition and contrast, and divine light which makes all things manifest too, and that in the Person of the lowly Preacher, the Son of God. The Pharisee is wholly blind - says he sees - judges from his own heart, and sees neither the manifestation of God in Christ, nor the work of grace in the woman. Light and love are alike wholly foreign to him.

417 The Lord shews fully that He is the light that makes all manifest - knows what is in the Pharisee's heart - knows the woman's sins - and what the Pharisee was thinking of Him and her. But more - His grace, the grace that was in Him had attracted the heart of this poor sinful woman - her need was great, her shame great, her sin deplorable, to no human eye could she turn that would not scorn her but One, and that was God; there her heart found confidence - the more she was distressed and brought low, the more was her comfort in finding that heart; there, in that mercy, her shame could hide itself, for it was grace to her - scorn was not there. But all this, through grace, had won her to hate and own her sin. It was the meeting point of sin and grace, confession of a convicted heart through confidence in goodness in Jesus - sin seen and God seen, and because God was seen in love. Divine sight was there, not blindness, divine love had brought in divine light, so that God and sin in self were both known, and God trusted, and a guileless heart produced because grace was trusted. How deep a work to bring a soul to God, and have sin judged and God known! And then Christ was all - she thought little of Simon and his guests save One, Jesus was there and that absorbed her, she was delivered from her shame even as to all the rest, but not her shame before God. Then a silent heart wept, and washed His feet with her tears. There was boldness in her confidence, yet lowliness and thanksgiving in the boldness, she kissed His feet too, and spent what she had of precious on Him. Then as He had occupied that heart with Himself in grace, He occupies Himself with that heart - He has done with Simon and the rest - to such a heart He must give peace. But first He takes her part in that which shows not only that He knew Simon's heart and all about it, but there was that of which Simon knew nothing - besides blindness as to His Person - forgiveness. God, happily for her, knew all her sins and had forgiven them - wondrous revelation! The grace that revealed love and goodness, had brought forgiveness with it - relief, full and perfect, from God - when sin had confounded the soul before God, was seen as sin because God was seen and in grace, the grace could tell that it was all gone - before God forgiven.

The Person of Christ had drawn - she loved much. The grace of God in Christ had forgiven - of that, of God, Pharisaism knows nothing. The Lord takes up the woman's case in presence of the Pharisee's contempt, and shews what he was - what she was - what God was - what He was in Himself. Then He occupies Himself with the woman alone, "Thy sins be forgiven thee"; their remarks do not arrest Him, "Thy faith hath saved thee - go in peace." He had sounded the Pharisee's heart, sounded and brought to light her's - revealed God's, and conferred forgiveness. Confession of sin and forgiveness of sin (and that is the Cross for us) are the meeting place of the sinner in truth and God in love. Here again we have God revealed in a man, but specially in respect of sin.

418 In the first case He does not come to judge, but He is simply with adversaries, and is simply in result "I am." In the woman of Samaria, He is rejected of the Jews and grace flows out giving life, going up to eternal life above, bringing to the Father - God known as a Spirit - and this by grace going out where promise gave no salvation and no claim to righteousness, but sin and need.

In the Syro-Phoenician, where faith comes, grace rises where grace is gone above all barriers - God is revealed to faith, and must be above them all, must be what He is in grace, cannot deny Himself, and faith pierces through all barriers, urged by need to appeal to what God is in Himself, in grace, and He cannot but be what He is, or be kept in by the barriers when that was reached, though He was there in One serving as sent where promise was; still God was there.

Luke 7 goes deeper and light is there - Pharisaism and sin brought fully to light; the utter and deplorable blindness of Pharisaism manifested what man in self-righteousness is - no perception of God at all, nor of anything in Him. Then to the sinner a deep true perception of what He was as grace meeting need, and hence brought to God according to the power of His presence, and the grace of His nature, He being known, humbled fully before Him, but brought to Him according to what He was, the bond of the heart with Him formed, with Him known, and forgiveness, peace, and salvation received. It is deeper, because it goes into the full moral question of the state of man with God - light in the heart and soul of man as he was.

The case of the palsied man in Matthew 9 is somewhat different. It is not God revealed in His nature of goodness, what He is in Christ for men; it is relative - Jehovah of Psalm 103, manifested in Israel, His ways in Israel in grace, but relative - what He was, of course, but according to promise and prophecy.

419 I do not again enter into the full bringing out of the three hearts in Luke 7: 36 to end, the Pharisee's, the sinner's looking to Christ, and, blessed be His grace and name, God's own heart already spoken of; light and love were there, neither the least known to Simon - he was blind, thinking he saw. Christ, in whom it is revealed, is the subject of our adoration. I only notice now "Thy faith hath saved thee" - how God owns as, that which He sees in the heart of the poor convicted believer, what He has wrought. Tears and repentance were there, true love to the Saviour, excellent fruits of faith; but faith by grace gave her Christ; hence faith saved her - God's work in the heart, by which Christ was seen and appreciated. Her heart was thus shown, what God indeed had wrought in it, but in it; but then it was what it was, fixed it wholly on another, it was not objectively itself nor reflectively - it knew Christ only. It produced lovely fruits, most lovely, which the Lord owns, but it saved because it saw Christ only. But what is lovely here, that Christ owns, attaches value to what was in her heart, wrought there surely, but was in it; its action on Him as its object gives us to see divine appreciation of the state of the heart thus having Him for its object. He does not say, "Grace has saved thee," though true, "My work, My blood-shedding has saved thee," - that would have been speaking of something in God, of His own work; but He speaks to her of divine value for something in the heart of the poor woman. This is unspeakable goodness, divine tenderness and favour. If it be a wonderful picture in presence of Pharisaism, we have to leave the Pharisaism to itself, as the Lord did, and see the Lord owning what was of God in the heart that turned to Him. The poor, desolate, and lonely woman could go away and say, "I have His approbation on what is in my soul" - the comfort of His approbation, yet thinking of Him still, not of herself, for thinking of approbation, a father's approbation, is not thinking of what is approved, or of self. Faith had saved her, and she could go in peace - she had it from Christ - and her faith in His Person gave divine weight and grace to His words.

The Humiliation of Christ

<32029E> 420

The humiliation of Christ opens out to my mind in a very full and blessed character. The essential being of Godhead cannot change, as is evident - the Absolute, as men speak - and whatever His humiliation, all the fulness of the Godhead dwelt in Him bodily. His emptying Himself applied to the form. He was in the status, condition of Godhead, of which, not to speak of outward glory, will and acting from His own will (though one with the Father, see John 5) was proper and essential. But the full purpose of His will in free devotedness, and always so, was to give up His own will, and this according to eternal counsels; Psalm 40.

It was not a lowly being, to whom it is evil to have a will of its own, who had none - that would have been nothing; nothingness was the place of nothingness. But He who in His essence could will, gives up His place, or condition as such, and says, "Lo, I come to do thy will." It was a divine act, always so, but a divine act of making empty. He was thus relative to the Father, not only as Son but as Servant - an immense truth! He gave up, not Godhead - that could not be - but the status and position of it, and came not to do His own will, but the will of Him that sent Him.

Man answered to this place according to the counsels and glory of God, as the angels, the obedient administrators of power, witnesses of a sustained creation. But he who had been made in God's image, and now fallen, was in the condition to be the sphere of the display of all God's moral glory, mercy, grace, righteousness, above all, love, for God is love; in a word - redemption. Christ was a man. And now, in the same perfectness, He takes no will, not even of man, not even to eat when He was hungry - He lives by every word out of the mouth of God. He humbles Himself and is obedient even unto death, and that of the Cross - no resistance - no escape, though legions of angels would be ready at His call. He perseveres in submitting to all - a tested obedience, even to death. Not merely obedience in peace, as Adam innocent might, or an angel (though doubtless they must feel the ruin) but tested by unvarying giving up of self and where evil was.

The absolute in nature becomes relative as a Servant in place - and "no man knoweth the Son but the Father" - but the Father is revealed; and in this character exalted as Lord above all now. We adore Him as God, we see Him gone down under death as man, yet emptying Himself, humbling Himself, laying down His own life what belonged to, what was divine all through. Now, the centre of all the sphere of display of the divine glory and of all in which it is displayed; but this is an outward consequence; Philippians 2. But the place of Man and Servant never given up - wondrous truth! Only He rules over all the sphere of His humiliation - heaven and earth are subjected to Him - as Man while such subjection is called for - He reigns till all things are put under His feet.

421 But in His own personal place, in which He is in connection with us, or rather we with Him, He never gives up the serving place - He takes it now; John 13. In Luke 12 He takes it in glory, but in the heavenly blessedness connected with us - those His Father has given Him. And finally, when the reigning and subjecting process is complete, and He gives up the kingdom whose power was needed for that, He takes the simple subject place as Man in the eternal blessedness of God - still "God over all, blessed for evermore," One with the Father - but His place as the subject Man perfect, and we with Him. Wondrous thought! The Firstborn among many brethren (companions metokoi), not, note (common equal sharers koinonoi) we could not be that. Compare Hebrews 2: 14, consequent on 11.

God - and no mediatorial kingdom and power - being all in all - His emptying is no more undone than His Godhead. He always was and is Son with the Father - was and is always God; and now is and ever will be Man, who emptied Himself. It was, and so ever is, His own divine act; only He has a temporary kingdom according to eternal counsels in this character, a kingdom which He gives up. The apostle John enters largely into this; his Gospel is the expression of it, but it comes out elsewhere in connection with the names of God, Light and Love, both of them essential names of God, yet with some difference, for Light has something of quality in it belonging to a person - Love is more absolutely personal. God is purity and manifests all things. But we are light in the Lord; as partakers of divine nature, we partake of this quality. In 2 Peter 1: 4, we are made partakers of divine nature, not of the, and it is by promise our own state. But we w not love, for Love is sovereign goodness - that we cannot be; we love as partaking of divine nature too, but we cannot be sovereign goodness.

422 But in Christ's emptying of Himself, and the course of His humiliation unto death, we find this love exercised - it is divine love expressed - we have seen the Father in Him - love brought to need - love active; "Hereby know we love, because he laid down his life for us." So that the revelation of God, that in which His Being acts, according to what He is, was in this way of emptying and self-humbling of Christ; only we add "He gave his only begotten Son," when we speak of it historically in its external action. And Christ, thus the expression of Love, i.e. of God, in the world, God manifest in the flesh, was also necessarily Light in the world - purity, and showing what all was, but showing sovereign goodness to it when thus manifested.

Formally, grace and truth came by Jesus Christ - He was the love of God in the world, and light in it. The darkness comprehended it not. But it was in Man, and it became thus impartitive, the Word of life, "He that hath the Son hath life," they that received Him being born of God; and being cleansed, the Holy Ghost could dwell in them in order to be the power of realisation. Thus the apostle prays that they "may be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ might dwell in their hearts by faith," not merely be life and righteousness, but dwell there in the power of the realisation of faith - He who is the expression and revelation of love - that we may be rooted and grounded in it. We dwell in love and in God, or rather here He in us, and thus are at the centre of the display of glory; the more external thing, and so far finite that it is in that which is created, but the display of God's glory in it, though not without love as its source and sustaining, for it is in redemption. Christ thus takes in all - first descended then ascended that He might fill all things - but then the saints, and this is their wondrous place, are associated with Him personally here, and we "comprehend with all saints"; for they are indeed His companions, loved as He is loved, however personally infinitely above them.

Christ has taken this place in the same divine, perfect love, self being gone, that He might put us in the same place with Himself - whom the Father had given Him - and even now, His peace, His joy, the Father's words, the Father's love, and the glory given to them - gone to His Father and our Father, His God and our God - to be with Him where He is; for in emptying Himself and becoming a Man, it was to associate us, the joint heirs in the same place, though ever Firstborn. Hence the apostle adds "and to know the love of Christ" - not abstract here, "rooted and grounded in love," through His dwelling in our hearts, who is the divine fulness of this love - Himself; but now He has entered into the counsels of actual glory, length, depth, etc. - it is the love of Christ, the actual, manifested, exercised love, yet still divine, "it passes knowledge," that we may be thus filled into all the fulness of God Himself, which indeed dwelt in Him bodily; compare 1 John 5: 20.

423 Colossians does not enter on this ground, only touching it in "Christ in you, the hope of glory." It is blessed to see how the highest being of God is exercised in grace towards any poor sinner. It is there it is, though afterwards perfected in us; see 1 John 4: 12, 13. This has partly led us in this inquiry into the counterpart, that "as he is, so are we," because it is thus we enter into and understand it; "we are in him that is true, i.e. in his Son - he is the true God and eternal life."

But the gospel of John gives us large communications on this humiliation of Christ. His Godhead shines in every page of all the gospels, but John, as everyone knows, in a peculiar way gives us the Person of Christ - the Word made flesh Now I have remarked elsewhere the fact of the way in which He is everywhere One with the Father, yet receives all. But it is the direct expression of the truth we are studying - He is God, He is one with the Father, He is I Am. Everywhere He speaks to His Father on a divine footing of unity; "I have glorified thee, now glorify me." But He has taken the form of a Servant, never "now I will glorify Myself." "My Father is greater than I"; "Father, glorify thou me" - yet it was a glory He had - "along with thee (the Father) before the world was," "Thou hast given him power over all flesh" - "I receive whoever comes, for I came not to do my own will, but the will of him that sent me." He finishes the work the Father gave Him to do - it is the Father that sent Him; so chapter 8: 26. But it is in this chapter the Lord says: "Before Abraham was, I am," which the Jews well understood.

In a word His path was "that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father hath given me commandment, so I do." His divine nature and Godhead shine throughout, but He receives everything - is sent - and has taken the relative place of recipiency and subjection. John 5 has a peculiar character in this respect, and presented at first some difficulty to my mind. "As the Father raiseth up the dead and quickeneth them, so the Son quickeneth whom he will"; "My Father worketh hitherto and I work," as the apostle notes, from the Jewish consciousness, making Himself equal with God. But in verse 19 He at once takes the place He is come into. "The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do." "Whatsoever he doeth, these doeth the Son likewise," and quickening comes as part of this - "The Father loves the Son and shews him all." But He, though He acts with the same divine power as the Father, yet is shewn all - does nothing of Himself; and in verse 26 He hath given to the Son to have life in Himself, i.e. the Son in the form of a Servant down here, and given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is Son of man. So that we know that it is in this humbled state that this applies.

424 Thus it becomes the clearest exposition of this unspeakable truth, the result of that, when in the form of God, He emptied Himself - His own act - divine all through, at every moment. How true it remains, "No man knows the Son but the Father"; but we adore Him. He is not ashamed to call us brethren, for now we are all of one.

But the point my mind rests on is the emptying of Himself; the rest is consequence, however blessed; Psalm 45: 6, 7, and Hebrews 1: 8, 9. Christ emptied Himself, taking upon Him the form of a Servant. Our best delight will be to be hidden behind Him and see Him have all the glory. It is interesting to see that whatever depth the Person of the Lord may give to this, the blessing itself, which has its very character from its adaptation to our state, is enjoyed by the simplest faith, and the more simple the more it is enjoyed. Christ dwelling in our hearts by faith is enjoyed by him in whom He dwells, not by him who can explain it, though it be true it must be enjoyed in order to be able to explain it.

But this humbling of Christ by Himself is divine love, and in exercise - we know God by it. It is Himself in activity, yet in giving Himself up in this unspeakable way. In the Father God remains in essential Godhead; in the Son, one with Him in the exercise of it: coming down to serve, the Object in which we know God and see the Father. God is objectively before us in the Spirit power, operative power in us to be able to apprehend, and have the love shed abroad in our hearts so that we dwell in God and God in us.

[END OF MISCELLANEOUS - VOL. 1.]

Review of "Lectures on the Second Advent," and "The Apocalypse Unfulfilled."

*

J. N. Darby.

<33001E> 1 {*By the Rev. William Burgh, A.B., Tims, Dublin, 1832.}

To the Editor of the "Christian Herald"

Dear Sir,

The increasing extent and progress of conviction as to the truth and nearness of our Lord's coming (to which I can bear personal witness), and the practical shape which it has assumed, makes it the more important that those most occupied in it, and therefore most likely to speak much of it, should have clear and consistent views upon the subject - clear, and consistent with the full statement of scriptural truth.

The publications which are set at the head of this article contain the most popular and common exposition - perhaps the only full one - presenting, on some very important points, a very distinct view, commonly current amongst the expectants of our Lord's coming. Into this view many have been led by the actual clearness and apparent accuracy of the statements in these very books. You will not, therefore, I trust, think it amiss that I should briefly attempt to inquire into their soundness, and expose the error into which the author appears to me, as to a part of his subject, to have fallen. They have, however, I should state, very different value in my eyes. Of the first of them, I can say that I read it with the greatest satisfaction; perhaps the more so, as, with the exception of that part which more properly belongs to the second publication, I found it so exceedingly consistent with my own views. I should except, indeed, also the view given of the seventy weeks, on which I will offer some comment.

The introductory and sixth lectures are as clear and succinct an exposition of their distinct subjects as one could desire in so brief a shape. In fact, on all prophecy that is properly Jewish, it appears to me that Mr. Burgh has been favoured (with the exception only of what I conceive to be a confusion between the Assyrian and Antichrist) with great clearness of apprehension; as all, I suppose, will recognise the lucidness of statement which, with a supposed carefulness of proof from Scripture, has given currency to his views, even where they appear to me to be unfounded. But, on the other hand, I think that Mr. Burgh has wholly failed in this - that he does not see the mystical use of the language and circumstances of literal prophecy to the great parenthetic anomaly of the Gentile dispensation; and that consequently, as a whole, his exposition of the book of Revelation, which is the expression and history of this, is founded on a false principle, and fundamentally erroneous. It is a transfer of that in which he is right as to the Jews, to that which uses the characters for another purpose, and in which, therefore, because he continues its original use and force, he is precisely and exactly wrong: that is, his view of the book of Revelation arises from his not seeing that in which it consists - the use of the language and characters of prophetic testimony in another and special way, by which the history of the mystical body of Christ is developed, as that of His literal bride, the Jewish church, was by its ordinary use. This is a definite and important principle, as it is evident that upon its truth or error depends the whole tissue of the interpretation of the book, whatever diversity there might yet be in detail; while we shall see that the principle on which it is founded affects many other scriptural interpretations. The confusion which has consequently arisen in Mr. Burgh's mind, by the exclusion of any general development of the character of the Gentile apostasy, and the confinement of the statements of the Revelation to "Crisis," has, as I think I shall be enabled to shew, by leading him to confound Antichrist's actings amongst the Jews, where it is in Crisis, both as to them and the Gentile powers, with his actings in the general Gentile apostasy, induced direct contradictions and inconsistencies in his statements. And at this we cannot be surprised; for, if he has forced himself to apply to one period, passages applicable to two very distinct states of things, it is no wonder that, when brought into juxtaposition, they are not found to hold together.

2 Some of these contradictions I shall now notice - not, I trust Mr. Burgh will feel, with any invidious object, but as illustrating the error on which, it appears to me, he has framed his system. I will only make two observations before I do so. One is, sir, to complain of the Church a little, for their readiness to receive a system when any one will make it for them, without investigating the proofs of its statements; and the other is, that the importance of my present inquiry consists in this - that Mr. Burgh's views divert the attention of Christians from the present actings of antichristian principles, as now deceiving the nations, to some supposed or future actings of a personal Antichrist, with which they may have nothing to do; and this I conceive to be most injurious. The time and principles of Antichrist I believe to be daily developing themselves, and the time to be fast approaching in which it will be said, "He that is unjust, let him be unjust still; and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still. And he that is righteous, let him be righteous still; and he that is holy, let him be holy still." Nor do I know a more solemn consideration, nor one which drives a believer closer to Christ, and the supply of the Spirit, for salvation and direction.

3 The first example which I shall take, as illustrating the careless confusion of Antichrist's actings in Jerusalem, and his evil in the Gentile apostasy, is the exposition of the little open book, in the Sixth Lecture on the Apocalypse. Mr. Burgh applies the whole of this to the personal acting of Antichrist in the literal temple of Jerusalem. Now that Antichrist will place his abomination there, in the way understood by Mr. Burgh, I fully believe, and think it a very important truth. But it is equally evident to me that this passage can have nothing to say to it; for the very gist of this passage is precisely opposed to the special point of Antichrist's actings there. There the point of Antichrist's actings, is, that he sits in the temple, and the sanctuary is defiled. Here the precise point is, that they are measured, and the rest is given - the court without and the city is given - to the Gentiles; so that they are diametrically opposed in their essential characters. I do not notice this as an error merely, but as illustrating the confusion of principle in applying what is literal, and Jewish, and consummating, to what is Gentile, and moral, and mystical.

Take another point, arising from the same principle - page 152 of the "Lectures on the Second Advent."

"For half of the week (three-and-a-half years) he (Antichrist) is true to this covenant; but he then breaks it, and for the last half, the remaining three-and-a-half years, the "time, times and a half," "forty-two months," or "one thousand two hundred and sixty days," he "causes the sacrifice and the oblation to cease"; and . . . "he places the abomination that maketh desolate.""

4 Now, if we turn to chapter 8 of the same book (of Daniel), we shall find the consequence of thus forcing all interpretation into the literal crisis; for there we learn - "How long shall be the vision concerning the daily sacrifice" (that is, "by him was the daily sacrifice taken away, and the place of his sanctuary was cast down"), "and the transgression of desolation, to give both the sanctuary and the host to be trodden under foot? And he said unto me, Unto two thousand and three hundred days, then shall the sanctuary be cleansed." Now, if I am to take these things as declaring the literal actings of Antichrist for so many days, I have, in one case, the dominion and treading down of Antichrist to continue 1,260 days, or half the week; and, in the other, 2,300 days, or very nearly the whole week. (Compare "Lectures on the Revelation," pages 133, 134.)

Again, in Lecture 8 on the Revelation, the 144,000 are the remnant among the Jews.

"In verse 6 commences the part of the prophecy which more immediately and exclusively affects the Gentile world." "Hitherto we have been occupied with the future destinies of the Jewish people; . . . now the Gentile world and the other nations of the earth come under consideration. This is after the beast has arisen, etc. Nor even is this preaching of the gospel for the purposes of conversion; it will be to test, not convert, the nations - "for a witness to all nations"; that is, as I take it, finally to decide the great controversy between Christ and Antichrist - to shew who is for Christ, and who is against Him."

Mr. Burgh then refers to the warning of the third angel, as confirmatory of this character of the testimony: that is, that "If any man worship, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God," etc. (Rev. 14: 9).

Mr. Burgh continues: -

"As, then, I before said, the period here alluded to is the period set for the decision of the great controversy on this earth between Christ and Antichrist - between the true God, as revealed in the gospel in the Person of Christ, and him who will then "sit in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God." This eventful crisis will be ushered in by a renewed preaching of the everlasting gospel to every nation under heaven," etc.

In the ninth lecture we then read, that in which I fully agree: -

"The faithful servants of God are removed from the scene of judgment.'' (Page 158.)

But previous to this crisis, every nation under heaven has been tested. Those that have been faithful, and killed, or appointed unto death, removed; and those that worshipped the beast are to be tormented, day and night, for ever and ever. Who is for Christ, and who against Him, has been shewn. But

"The apostasy must first be consummated, and afterwards judged, before there will be a free course for the word of God." (Page 160.)

And

"Then shall the nations be converted to the faith of Christ." (Page 161.)

5 Here, again, in the course of these two chapters, from this love of crisis, concentrating all the prophetic testimony of the Revelation to the actings of Antichrist in that crisis, we have a positive interpretation inconsistent with itself. For, after the withdrawing of the saints, and giving up of all others to the worshipping of the beast, and therefore to irremediable torment consequent upon the critical test of the everlasting gospel being put to them, we have, upon the judging of Antichrist, the nations converted by another and subsequent preaching of the gospel, as associated with the new dispensation.

Another instance of inconsistency, arising from the same cause, is to be found in the view taken of the dragon and the beast, in Lecture 3, on the Second Advent, and Lecture 7, on the Revelation. All is to be forced into the crisis in Judea. But what is the consequence? The dragon is the fourth beast, previous to the existence of the ten kingdoms; the little horn, before whom three fell, is the Antichrist, the second beast, during whose continuance the ten horns are in existence. That is, Antichrist personally, as the head of the ten, or rather seven, horns, is the persecuting power of the Jews in Judea. But this dragon, during whose time the horns had no existence,

"Persecuted the woman, that is, the Jewish nation, against whom Antichrist, in this his short reign, will, for reasons before stated, direct all his malignity," etc.

So that, from pressing it all into one scene, the identity of the dragon and the beast is denied and affirmed almost in the same breath; for the dragon is affirmed to be the fourth beast, exclusively before the ten kings, and they to have their place with and under Antichrist, directing all his malignity, when thus formed, against the Jews. Yet have we the dragon, as Antichrist, acting against the woman, that is, the Jews, and that in the land (see page 136, on Revelation), though, as yet, characteristically of his dragon state, there are no kings at all. And yet, Antichrist is the horn that rises after the ten horns, or kings, and subdues three. The cause of the inconsistency is obvious: all was to be brought, at any rate, into the climax. And indeed, though all the malignity of Antichrist is here directed against the Jews, elsewhere we learn that he is to kill all the Gentile saints also, or, at least, they are to be delivered to death. What conclusion do I draw from all this? That the attempt to force everything into the three years and a half, during which Antichrist is to sit in the temple of God in Jerusalem, involves necessarily, in contradictions and inconsistencies, which prove the falseness of the principles from which they flow; besides that, the exercise of that power by which all the nations are wielded against the Jews in that day, supposes, and especially as regards the ten kings, the exercise of all that evil and deceivableness, as "man of sin," previous to the holding and exercise of that power in Judea, which especially concerns Christendom to beware of; and that the system, which supposes the dangerous actings of Antichrist to be confined to the time of his evil reign in Judea, necessarily, in contradiction of itself, supposes him to have previously so powerfully practised by deceit or violence, that the ten kings have given their power to him, and that he is there, by virtue of those deceivings, as agent of Satan, the prince of this world. And, what is remarkable, Mr. Burgh's system precisely puts out of sight, and treats as a nullity, all that part of Antichrist's actings, in which alone, even according to his own system, we are concerned; that is, the power by which he deceives and carries after him the ten kings, or kingdoms; and, I may add, this confirms the argument previously gone into, as to the everlasting gospel. For the kingdoms of Christendom have manifestly been deceived previously to the preaching of the everlasting gospel, if that be subsequent, as Mr. Burgh supposes, to the setting up of Antichrist's throne in Jerusalem.

6 You will observe, sir, that I am not considering these merely as particular misinterpretations, but as inconsistencies flowing from, and therefore shewing the fallacy of the system of interpretation. It seems to me exceedingly inconsistent to call the beast Antichrist, when Antichrist cannot be till the horns are all crowned; for he is to arise up as a little horn after them, and subdue three; and yet the ten are to "have power as kings one hour with the beast."

7 But I have no object in going at large into mere errors. One or two, which in another way affect the system, I shall notice. Popery, by those who hold these views, is made but little of, and all that is not concentrated in the personal Antichrist is immaterial. Thus, the fifth trumpet having been settled (for no other reason, that I can see, but having a king called Apollyon) to be Antichrist, that is, observe, the last great final opposer of Christ, including everything, of the next, "far more terrible," nothing decided can be spoken. No wonder! Again, the sixth seal, it is quite clear, we are told, can be nothing but the final wrath of the Lamb, closing the whole scene of earthly power. It is so plainly His second coming, that "there is no room for difference of opinion" (page 52). Yet the next thing we read of, is, the holding of the winds, previous to the outbreaking of all Antichrist's doings; and, says, Mr. Burgh, "the trumpets are but the detail of the seventh seal" (page 87); that is, after the final wrath of the Lamb, which none could abide, come all the manifestations of Antichrist's power; and the kings of the earth, and of the whole world, set up against the Lamb; and Antichrist himself desolates, according to Mr. Burgh's system, for the whole period of prophetic history, sitting in the temple of God, as God, raging against all, even to death, who will not worship him. The question, then, sir, is, who is able to endure his wrath?

I confess, sir, that, plausible and easy as it may appear, when read by itself, it appears to me a very superficial system, and, when compared with Scripture, not to be for a moment tenable, and the whole of it arises from the effort to contract all to the three years and a half, and apply it to Judea, with yet the forced consciousness that it does concern the Gentiles. Thus, the prayers of all saints are the prayers of the hundred and forty-four thousand sealed Jews, wherever all the other saints are, and whatever they are doing; yet, the first four trumpets, in answer, fall literally on the earth, sea, rivers, and trees, sun, moon, and stars. The fifth, however, and (page 87) all the trumpets, afflict only the Jewish nation; though, what part of the Jewish nation the literal sun and moon are, it would be hard to say; however, so it is argued (pages 87, 88). Again, as to the seals, we are told to conclude that, because there is, "Behold a white horse, and one that sat on him," and that a white horse is mentioned in chapter 19, therefore he that sat on him is clearly the same. It may be so, but I do not see why, on any ground that would not prove each individual in the armies of heaven to be Jesus Christ also, for they all sat on white horses. The emblem of the white horse has nothing to do with who sits on him. But we are told that it is Christ's second advent, and the horses which follow it are the actings of Christ in judgment, as come - I say, as come, or else the coming, after all, is figurative; and, to say the least, Mr. Burgh's language here is very vague. But, as far as I understand, it is King Messiah Himself come forth to destroy His enemies; and then we are referred to Matthew 24 for the identical signs. But there, all these things precede the coming of the Son of Man; and we are expressly told, that "the end is not yet"; in a word, they are but "the beginning of sorrows"; and, after all, the coming is as the lightning. Yet we are told that the parallelism is perfect, not only in the events, but in the order of their occurrence. I wonder the preaching of the gospel of the kingdom, the great test, as Mr. Burgh has stated elsewhere (a statement I am by no means disposed to question, though I do his use of it), did not arrest his mind as to the accuracy of this most unfortunate comparison.

8 Again, sir, the supposed uncertainty of interpretation, as to the two-horned beast, is made the subject rather of triumph, on the part of Mr. Burgh, though he gives no additional light whatever on the subject. But it ought to have led Mr. Burgh, I think, to more soberness of consideration on the subject, when he found, besides his favourite Antichrist, the beast, the third, or two-horned beast, at Armageddon, as the false prophet, and a distinct subject of destruction. He appears, too, in his zeal to substitute the personal Antichrist for Popery, to forget, that whatever may be the wicked and monstrous presumption of the Antichrist in Jerusalem, in Babylon "was found the blood of prophets and of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth." I leave to more full development the connection between this and chapter 17. This only, that it is not itself the beast, and that in her was found, etc.; and that, supposing, now, it be merely the literal city of Rome (the lowest supposition), it is not Antichrist at Jerusalem which is thus charged with the accumulated guilt of the blood of all that were slain upon the earth. In a word, sir, it is plain to me that there are two characters in which Antichrist (I use it now in an extended sense) is developed. The one of deceivableness, and perhaps using power, and so sometimes causing to be killed; the other of power, in which he acts haughtily against God as the revealed "man of sin." In the latter of these two characters he acts against the Jews in Jerusalem; in the former, and now especially, in deceivableness as separated from power, we particularly have to do with it, and in this is his great guilt. In this way he gathers the power which he will use to his own destruction in that day. I say not what desperate deception, as well as power, he will use in that day amongst the Jews; but I say that the spirit of evil, by which he gathers and carries up there the power which he then exercises, is that with which we have to do. And "the deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish, because they receive not the love of the truth that they might be saved," will find its application, not amongst Jews, but amongst Gentiles, to whom the truth was preached. And this character, though finding its full manifestation in his false anti-regal power, and therefore not excluding this, is that in which he is also fully developed in the New Testament scriptures. And if this be once admitted, the system on which this interpretation of the Revelation is founded falls to the ground; and we are enabled, with whatever additional light the investigation may have afforded us, to pursue our inquiry into the Revelation, unfettered by a system which, as it appears to me, must be added to the many which it rejects; and which, while I must feel it to be superficial in its inductions, is founded on a principle as all-important, which, to my mind, is simply ignorance of the whole frame of New Testament prophecy, and mars its great aim - the warning of the Gentile church. For, I repeat, it is quite clear that, with all its confusion of application, Mr. Burgh's system does not at all contemplate those actings of evil, by which the nations are carried up by Antichrist to, and against, Jerusalem, and their doom irrevocably sealed.

9 Save as applied to the point in question, I have stated little of my own views. I confess I find it more profitable to learn from Scripture, than to frame a system. If the Lord permit me, in time and service, I will send you some things which appear to me the mind of God in Scripture, and shall be glad to be corrected by any of your correspondents; merely saying, that the two great symbolical powers of Nebuchadnezzar and Darius seem to me to give the full clue to the history of the times of the Gentiles, ended in and by Antichrist.

As regards, then, the Jews, and the great results, it appears to me that Mr. Burgh is exceedingly clear, and may be always read with profit. As regards the Revelation, I think he has manifestly mistaken the whole principle and structure of the prophecy, from beginning to end. I must also add, that his views of symbol appear to me to be without any principle whatever, as his statements on the subject are most astonishingly hasty and unfounded. It would be impossible to go into this at large in such a communication as the present; I will only remark, that his assertion (page 83 of the "Lectures on Revelation"), "Scripture history affords a precedent for one interpretation, but Scripture does not afford any precedent for the other," is one of the most unprecedented assertions anybody ever met with, to a person who had ever read the Scriptures at all.

10 And I would here, sir, remark, that, clear as Mr. Burgh's interpretation of the seals may seem to some, I confess I can gain no determinate idea of what he means from it. I find, in page 28, that

"The book of Revelation is thus the book of the Lord's second advent, and is solely occupied with the account of the last great crisis, with the coming of Christ, and the attendant events, during the several acts of His taking to Himself, and redeeming, His inheritance."

Accordingly, the first seal is Christ going forth, to which he makes parallel the question, "What shall be the sign of thy coming?" though, what the force of such a question can be to the parallelism, I cannot see. However, it is the last great crisis, and Christ's going forth to it. Now, I must ask, What does Mr. Burgh mean by "Christ's going forth to it"? It is not, manifestly, His personal coming in Judea, though the quotation of Psalm 45 would lead one to suppose so; for, in page 55, we have merely preparatory judgments, instead of improvements, till "God's four sore judgments shall have devastated the world. And all this is to be but "the beginning of sorrows" - the beginning of sorrows, I will here ask Mr. Burgh, to whom? He has parallelised Matthew 24 with this: whose sorrows does he think Matthew 24 refers to? Here he says, "Will the Church of Christ remain couched?" etc. However this may be the first seal is,

"The Lord Jesus Christ Himself going forth - going forth in the character of His second advent - going forth to redeem His inheritance, and rescue it from the hand of the enemy, and assert His claim to His possession."

11 Then, the following seals are the arrows in His hand (see page 48), and are said (page 47) to be

"Sharp in the heart of His enemies, in reference to His conflict with the confederate nations, who, at the era of His advent, shall oppose Him; and shall then fall under Him, as in Revelation 19; and thus is every part of this seal proved to refer to that conflict."

That is, Mr. Burgh allows (and indeed reasons at large elsewhere, and, as I have said, I think very clearly), in Judea; yet, as we have seen, all these arrows are the judgments which devastate the world, and all this to be but the beginning of sorrows. Again, all the arrows refer to that conflict, the book being occupied solely with the last great crisis; yet, speaking of these very seals, or arrows of judgment Mr. Burgh says:

"And when these several signs have been developed, these several seals opened, then the sixth seal opens with the day itself of His coming, or, at least, those signs by which it is more immediately announced."

So that, after they have been shewn to be arrows in the hearts of "the confederate nations, who, at the era of his advent, shall oppose them, and who shall then fall under Him, as in Revelation 19," we find the sixth seal itself to be after all those as signs - "at least those signs by which it (His coming) is more immediately announced." To me, clear as it may seem to others, there is nothing but confusion in all this; and the confusion, it appears to me, is simply this - that Mr. Burgh saw nothing but with the last great crisis before his eyes, and it mingled itself confusedly with all, while the intrinsic evidence of the passages gave them a positive force which he could not help stating; and in the system he had formed obliged him to put them in an order, which made the confusion more determinate and marked.

I think students of prophecy are indebted to Mr. Burgh, as to every one else who has written candidly on the subject; but I do not think he has interpreted the book of Revelation rightly or successfully, and, by making a system of it, he has made all his errors hang together. I will freely submit my own thoughts to his judgment and criticism, I trust for the same just and useful purpose that he has done, when opportunity is given me.

I have merely been able, my dear sir, in much occupation, to trace hastily those things which appear to me evidences of the fallacy of the system which Mr. Burgh has put forward in his Lectures on the Revelation; and I point this out as the fallacy - the concentrating the actings of Antichrist to the last exhibition of him in Judea; and it is exceedingly material for us to see it so, because it is his previous actings with which we are concerned, and by which, as Mr. Burgh's system implies (while it denies), we are liable to be deceived. And here I must charge these lectures with inconsiderate confidence of haste; because, if Antichrist was to sit in Jerusalem, as head of a great apostate system, it ought to have involved, instead of refuted, the consideration of the apostasy of which he had previously made himself the head - an apostasy at present working in the world, and in which we are all vitally and immediately concerned. How much this presses upon my mind, I shall not at present dwell upon; and

Remain, dear sir, Yours unworthily in the Lord,

John N. Darby.

12 P.S. - This paper has extended to such a length, that I have omitted some remarks I had to make on the seventy weeks, and the days. I shall only now say, that I do not think (though quite open to believe it) that the covenant is Anti-christ's, as Mr. Burgh supposes; and that he is unwarranted in so constantly putting 62, 7, 1, when the Scriptures as decidedly put 7, 62, 1; yet on this his view depends; I have already stated that it appears to me erroneous. As to the days, the readers of The Christian Herald may recollect a principle once stated by me in it,* that, as to the Jews, we might look for what was literal; as to the power of the Gentiles, and their times, we might expect protracted symbol. However imperfectly stated there, I am still inclined to believe in the truth of the statement. If you, or your correspondents, think it worth while, I will give you the evidence and interpretation which is connected with this subject, and the distinction between Antichrist and the Assyrian, as well as some remarks on Matthew 24, and the analogous passages.

{*See an article on "The Twelve Hundred and Sixty Days," in Vol. 1, No. 12, for December, 1830. (Collected Writings, Vol. 2.)}

Reply to an article in the "Zionsbote" upon "Darbyism"*

J. N. Darby.

<33002G> 13 {*From the German.}

"Now if any man build upon this foundation [Jesus Christ] gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble, every man's work shall be made manifest, for the day shall declare it." . . . (1 Cor. 3: 12, 13).

It is, although not a pleasant, at any rate an exceedingly easy task to answer a hostile attack, when the opponent himself gives the answer. Such is the case with the article contained in the "Zionsbote," "upon Darbyism." The arguments of the writer are chiefly summed up in the statement of two antitheses, expressed in the words: "We say, Everything must be restored, as it was in the apostle's time; We can never return, the Darbyites say, to what existed at the time of the apostles." In his opinion everything must be revived in the church according to apostolic model; and his censure affects the so-called Darbyites, because, instead of assenting to his conception, they rather maintain that, since the church has abandoned her first state and is in apostasy, according to the clearest and most unambiguous testimonies of the Scriptures, she is not capable of restoration.

Then, after the writer has been somewhat zealous over the bad principles of the brethren he indicts, he finds occasion for the remark, which defeats his contention: "Moreover nothing remains until the Lord come, but that every Christian take pains according to the best of his knowledge and conscience to ascertain and to carry out the mind of Christ; but so that the fullest brotherly relationship may obtain between the different church parties." In fact, no Christian who is unprejudiced and free from bias will be able to close his eyes to such contradictions. What is the meaning, then, of wishing to restore everything in the church as it was in the apostle's time, if it must be confessed that at the end nothing remains but Christian parties, in which every member has to ascertain and carry out the will of Christ according to the best of his knowledge and conscience? Were there such parties in the time of the apostles? Do they so much as bear the seal of apostolic recognition? Certainly not. Jewish prejudices, as we know, threatened to split up the assembly at Antioch into two parties; but the wisdom of God prevented the deadly evil; and peace even and prosperity grew out of this very evil for the assembly at Jerusalem; Acts 15. In Corinth also church parties displayed their first germs; but apostolic power was present, and apostolic energy was exercised to restore divine order in the church. But where is there now that apostolic energy? Where is there an assembly that sends its ministers into all communities, so that all can enjoy the blessed message? Neither such energy, nor such an assembly is within the range of possibility in our days.

14 The restoration of the church according to apostolic model, consequently, makes the previous restoration of apostles an absolute necessity. As Christians will not recognise their inability to restore everything, they sink into the state of indifference in respect of the evil which they cannot remedy. But instead of a recognition of their own incapacity, the willingness to continue in a bad, unscriptural, condition is in fact one of the saddest phenomena amongst Christians of our day. They refuse to bow in the dust, and humbly acknowledge, "We are to blame, we have abandoned the first state of the church, and are unable to restore everything; God is faithful; we are to blame."

The writer must allow me to alter a word in his thesis; for without this alteration, the sentence is devoid of force and meaning. He says, "We must restore everything, as it was in the apostles' time." He ought to have said, not we "must," but we "can," restore everything. For if we cannot do it, our labour is useless. We know well - and the Lord be praised for it - that His grace is fully sufficient, just as much for our low state, as for that of the apostles. But to what a degree the pretension of such Christians has reached, who ascribe to themselves the ability to restore to its old state whatever the power of the apostles wrought and set up, I leave to the judgment of the reader. Christians need apostolic power in order to be able to do apostolic works. They are able by grace to be faithful, amidst the circumstances in which they are found as the result of the continuous power of evil. They can abandon the evil, but as we have said, to be able to do what the apostles did, they need apostolic power. Why do they not restore apostles? why not gifts? Why not prophets, and miracles? In fact, to restore everything is a wide field! Where do we hear in our days words like those of Paul, of Timothy, and of Barnabas? Where is the power of the Spirit, which in the days of the apostles was so very active? Paul says, "For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock," Acts 20: 29. Why such intimations for times after his departure, if others could do everything which he had done?

15 The principles which the writer supposes to be scriptural only help to confound ideas still more; and they betray only too clearly how little people in general seek to inquire what holy Scripture says about God's assembly. It is clear that Scripture knows only of a general assembly of God. Christians are regarded as members of the body of Christ. To be a member of on assembly is a thought of which one finds no trace in the word of God. And yet this thought forms the basis of the whole system to which the writer addresses himself. As we are shewn in 1 Corinthians 12, as well as in Ephesians 4 and Romans 12, all gifts were introduced of God not in one fixed and local assembly, but in the whole assembly. Apollos ministered with his gift as teacher as well in Ephesus as in Corinth, because this gift had been bestowed upon him not for an assembly but for the assembly, and consequently, for the whole body of Christ. But where do we find in our days anything like the condition portrayed in 1 Corinthians 12? "Now, that was for apostolic times," our brethren will answer. But how can they then say, "We must restore everything as it was at the time of the apostles?" Will they then imitate only outward forms? That power cannot be imitated, no one will dare to dispute; for one needs the power to be able to exercise it. But they have not even the form, for to be teacher of an assembly is not scriptural.

But how does it stand with the question of elders? Scripture teaches us that they were not elected by the assemblies. As we find in Acts 14, Paul and Barnabas "chose them elders"; and of Titus we know that he was sent back to Crete to appoint elders; Titus 1: 5. Who now could claim the right to do that for which the persons named were divinely authorised? Where is there now in our days a Paul and a Barnabas, a Timothy and Titus? Moreover, there still remains the question which settles everything, whether it is in general the will of God to restore all as it was at the time of the apostles. As we have said, "we must" is without force and meaning if it cannot be supported by a positive "we can." Therefore Scripture must decide whether restoration is a thing permitted or required by God. We deny it. For "we must" is not scripture; and the writer has in general brought forward no passage for his assertion. He speaks of a command, but he assigns no command. Let us examine then the word of God, to see if it does not speak of the results of man's unfaithfulness in respect of the kingdom of God, and His assembly upon the earth.

16 First of all, I would refer briefly to the "Parable of the Tares." I find on the part of the writer - in noticing some thoughts from a tract dealing with this parable - many hard and bitter expressions, accompanied by the remark: "How much might be said upon this fundamental principle!" But he neither gives another interpretation of the parable, nor does he seek to refute the "singular" one given, by the citation of even one passage. But all such shibboleths are powerless, if not founded upon the word of God.

Let us turn therefore to the alone infallible word. The tares are sown by the devil where good seed has been sown by the Lord. The subject is, of course, not the church itself, but the kingdom. The field is the world. But this parable is of great importance if it be a question of the restoration of the good state of Christianity. The question of the servants, if they should root up the tares, the Lord answers in the negative with the words: "Let both grow together until the harvest." A restoration of the earlier state is not prescribed, and consequently is impossible. The judgment alone will deal with it. But someone might object, "Why do you not remain in the state-church?" I answer: Because Scripture knows of no state-church, but only of the church, and because it expressly says, that in the last perilous days everything will demonstrate the ruin, and men have the form of godliness but deny the power thereof. "From such turn away," says the apostle; and thus in following the divine exhortation and turning away, I act in obedience, even if I remain alone. But why, it might be further asked, since everything is not to be restored, do you not remain alone? and I bring forward in reply 2 Timothy 2, where I am taught that, since the Lord knows His own in spite of the confusion in the last days, I am not only to depart from iniquity, but to walk with those who "call upon the Lord out of a pure heart" (v. 19, 22); whilst at the same time I possess the precious and comforting promise: "Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them," Matt. 18: 20. So saith the Scripture. And if now I order my course according to these divine directions, the pretension to wish to restore everything is in no wise hidden therein; but with thankful heart I make use of the instructions which God has given for the last days in His precious word, in individual obedience.

17 As a whole, the passage quoted enlightens us clearly as to whether a restoration will take place in the last days. But "this know also," says the apostle, "that in the last days perilous times shall come," 2 Tim. 3: 1. Then follows (v. 2-5) a picture of the sad state of Christendom, become like heathenism. (Compare Rom 1. with 2 Tim. 3.) Will the church then, not be roused again out of this state? No: it will grow worse and worse (v. 13). There is not a trace of restoration. In 2 Thessalonians 2 we see that the apostasy comes, and the man of sin, the son of perdition, shall be revealed (v. 3). Will the apostasy have an end, or the man of sin be removed, by the renewed power of the gospel? By no means. Already in the time of the apostle, the mystery of lawlessness was at work. And this fire, smouldering in ashes, has developed - "worse and worse," as the apostle foresaw, and will not be stayed until, as soon as every hindrance is taken out of the way, the lawless one shall be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of His mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of His coming (v. 7, 8). There is nowhere a thought of restoration. Jude also teaches the same truth. In his epistle we see that false brethren had crept in, of whom Enoch had prophesied: "Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints," . . . (v. 14). They go the way of Cain, give themselves for reward to the error of Balaam, and perish in the gainsaying of Korah (v. 11). That is the character of the evil in the last days, which already had begun in the days of the apostles. For in 1 John 2: 18, we read, "Little children, it is the last time, and as ye have heard that Antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time." Already, then, as Peter teaches, the time of the judgment of God's house had come; 1 Pet. 4: 17. In short, everywhere we find testimony to the apostasy, and nowhere 8 word of restoration, although in the days of the apostles the principles of evil and apostasy had already penetrated into the church.

18 It may perhaps be asked, "Shall not the world then be filled with the knowledge of the Lord by the gospel of grace?" No. The gospel of the kingdom will indeed be preached amongst all nations, but then will the end come; Matt. 24: 14 "The everlasting gospel" will be sent to every nation and every kindred and every tongue, with the announcement: "Fear God and give glory to him, for the hour of his judgment is come," Rev. 14: 6, 7. Then follows the destruction of Babylon, and finally the appearing of the Son of man on the cloud. But then, will not the world generally be filled with the knowledge of the Lord? Certainly. But how? By the gospel of grace? Not at all. There are three passages in holy Scripture in which mention is made of this subject: Numbers 14: 21, Isaiah 11, Habakkuk 2: 12-14. But none of these passages speak of grace: all speak of judgment; and in Isaiah 26: 9, 10, it is declared definitively that the inhabitants of the earth will learn righteousness when the judgments of God are in the earth; but that, though favour be shewn to the wicked, "they will not learn righteousness." The reader will also see in Isaiah 25: 7-9, that at the time when the veil that is spread over all nations is removed, the resurrection has taken place, and the Jewish people is restored in blessing.

It is therefore a lack of spiritual understanding, and is nothing short of disobedience, to desire to restore everything, since for such a work there is not only no command, but Holy Scripture teaches exactly the reverse. It is not obedience to content oneself with Christian parties, because Scripture condemns them; it is not obedience to form a so-called church, and to be a member of it, because Scripture knows only of members of the church, as the body of Christ, but not members of a church calling itself so-and-so; it is not obedience to elect or appoint elders, because in the New Testament this was never the act of the churches; it is not obedience to institute an office of preachers because Scripture knows nothing of such an office, but speaks only of gifts which God bestowed, with which to serve the whole church. But it is obedience to keep aloof from a Christianity which has the form of godliness but denies the power, because Scripture in 2 Timothy 3 expressly exhorts us to do so; and it is obedience to assemble ourselves with those who call upon the Lord out of a pure heart (2 Tim. 2), and not to neglect the assembling of ourselves together, because Scripture enjoins it, and promises the precious and blessed presence of the Lord to all those who gather in His name.

19 Certainly a calm consideration of the word of God teaches us that the different churches which call themselves Independents, Baptists, etc., do not answer to the churches at the time of the apostles. For could the apostle send to one of these so-called churches an epistle addressed "To the Church of God at N."? Which of them would obtain the letter at the post office? If on the other hand I go no further than Holy Scripture allows me, I profess a principle which makes it a sacred duty for me to acknowledge as members of Christ all Christians, whether in the Baptist or Independent communities, or in the state-church. And that I do with all my heart. I am fully convinced that with regard to church questions they do not walk in paths marked out by the word of God, but that they are, notwithstanding, dear to the heart of the Lord; and I hope that in these lines I have said nothing by which the heart of an upright brother could be wounded. If, however, it should be so, I beg beforehand for forgiveness.

The small compass of these few pages allows of my only briefly adducing, and by passages of Scripture establishing, some elementary principles. It were to be wished that the writer of the article which occasioned this reply had in like manner supported by the word of God the points he has brought in question. It only remains for me to appeal to this word, alone infallible; and I hope that the brethren who heap so many charges upon us will perceive why we cannot recognise their path as the path of obedience. In my judgment, but small measure of intelligence belongs to the pretension of desiring to restore everything as it was at the time of the apostles, to the recognition of anything else than obedience. God has never laid down such a path. He does not improve the old man who has fallen, but introduces the "second Man," and gives us a portion in His glory. He does not renew the Jews according to the old covenant, but we find, after long patience, grace and help at the end of judgment, then to establish with them the new covenant upon the ground of grace. And with regard to the church we can say: What Christ has built for ever will endure for ever, what is divine and heavenly will be indestructible; but wood, hay, and stubble, with which man has built, must perish in the fire.

A letter on a pamphlet by Mr. F. Olivier, entitled, "The Body of Christ, and a Misunderstanding on the Subject."

J. N. Darby.

<33003F> 20 (from the French) May 6th, 1870.

Beloved brother,

The pamphlet you sent me shews me I did not miss my object in the one I had previously published.* There is progress in the development of the question. I make no reply to the review of the brethren's course. It is best to go forward. I will only remind Mr. O. that, at one time, he had wanted to join the brethren at Lausanne, and to preach in their room, he having hitherto had a separate meeting of his own at Montbenon, and, the brethren agreeing to his proposal, one fine day they found a pulpit in the room, without their being informed of it, and, at the same time, they learned that Mr. O. purposed having his own separate meeting at Mountbenon permanently. The matter was (dropped) not carried out. What had induced the brethren to accept the proposal of Mr. O. was, the scandal of two meetings, without adequate reasons.

{*"What is the Unity of the Church?" (Collected Writings, Vol. 20.)}

But let us probe the question. I shall bring to light some facts, and then speak of the principles. Mr. O. says: "All I know, is, that some of those who had held with him (Mr. N.) were admitted to the Lord's supper, at the church called Bethesda. For this the whole assembly of Bethesda were excommunicated." If Mr. O. only knows this, he knows very little, and would have done better not to speak of it. It appears that Mr. O., while saying all he can for Mr. N., considers his doctrines such, that the Lord's table must be denied, not only to the one who teaches them, but to those who are drawn away by him. He says that, on his own authority, he declared to a young sister, by letter, dated 21st May, 1867, that she could not break bread with the worship-meeting of the Rue du Lac, although she had said she did not admit the doctrine, which, however, Mr. N. taught in his tracts, which tracts she could not disavow, as she did not think their author could be mistaken in anything. If a poor victim of his influence, who does not admit his doctrine, must be rejected, we surely were right in rejecting the one who wrote the tracts, and boldly maintained blasphemies. Neither is it true that Mr. N. did not want to "weaken propitiation." Mr. N. said the death of Christ was only an incident of the life of Christ. This expression was taken up. To excuse himself, he said he was accustomed to use the word 'incident' in a special sense, and not as others employ it. But he also said that Christ suffered far more before the coming of John the Baptist than after; that, on hearing the gospel from John the Baptist's lips, He passed from being under law to being under grace.

21 Well, we have broken off with all this, and Mr. N. got a chapel built for himself, where he preached the doctrine which he had, unknown to the brethren, been teaching secretly for six years.

Now this is how the Bethesda meeting got involved in the question. A lady, who liked Mr. N.'s teaching, left the Bath meeting when he was no longer allowed to preach there. She was at once surreptitiously brought into Bethesda. Then seven persons of the chapel and meeting of Mr. N. were received at Bethesda, some of whom agreed fully with his doctrine. Some pious brethren in Bethesda protested, and entreated Messrs. Muller and Craik, the two pastors, to examine the doctrine, and not to let persons from Mr. N.'s meeting in, without having first subjected them to an examination. They refused, and several meetings were held, and a letter was signed by the ten elders, or labourers, of the assembly, declaring that they would not do it, and that it was a new test of communion to examine them on this point; and Messrs. M. and C. asserted that they must be justified, on that ground, according to the principles of this document (called the letter of the ten), otherwise they would cease to be the pastors of the assembly, and they got the whole meeting to vote, by rising, and sitting, so that the whole meeting, as a meeting, justified the admission of persons whom Mr. O. would exclude. This letter remains in force to this day. Not long ago, Mr. M. refused to withdraw it, on being requested so to do.

Now, why should I separate from the people at Plymouth, and be in fellowship with them at Bristol? But what is of importance to note, is, that the meeting voted that it was not necessary to examine if Christ was thus blasphemed, or not. The fact is that Mr. C. favoured the doctrine, and taught, in great measure, the same errors. It is not a question of excommunicating an assembly. It is individuals that are excommunicated. One separates from an assembly, and this is what was done with regard to Bethesda; but the individuals coming from a meeting which has, as a meeting, received the evil into its bosom, may be guilty of the act, and responsible for what the assembly has done. Thus, when the meeting voted the acceptance of the letter of the ten, and a good number of Christians had separated from it, because, in reality, they had voted that they would not, and should not, examine whether to accept blasphemy against the Lord, when, to say the least, it was habitually heard - when the members of the assembly had voted that indifference to blasphemy was a good thing, were the individuals not all under responsibility for the action of the assembly? There was no question of whether the individuals held the doctrine, or not. (The young person excluded by Mr. O. did not admit Mr. N.'s doctrine; like Bethesda, she did not disavow his tracts.) The assembly had taken the ground of indifference to blasphemy against Christ, and the persons constituting the assembly (save in the case of real ignorance as to the facts) were defiled with the defilement of the assembly. This is the doctrine of Scripture: "Ye have approved yourselves to be clear in this matter"; they were not incestuous, but, as long as incest was permitted, the assembly was guilty of it, and was not clear of it, neither were the individuals composing it. So the apostle says: "Purge out, therefore, the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump." Therefore they were not a new lump, unless they purged out the old leaven. The assembly, and those composing it, were old leaven, unfit to celebrate the feast. But all the assemblies of God are jointly responsible; and, whether God's assembly, or not, an assembly which chooses to accept the principles of fellowship with Bethesda is identified, has identified itself, with Bethesda.

22 A distance of twenty, or two hundred, leagues does not alter the moral fact in anything; in what is moral, space is of no account. If an assembly, knowingly and wilfully, accepts fellowship with Bethesda, it is defiled, as Bethesda is - it accepts the principle of indifference to blasphemy against Christ. Some meetings invited Mr. N.; in some neutral gatherings influential persons went to Bethesda for the purpose of testimony; and some have boldly avowed their opinion, and published, with their names attached thereto, tracts, advocating the principle of Mr. B. cited by Mr. O., namely, that if an assembly permits fornication, the assembly cannot be defiled by it, but only the guilty person. Now, I do not consider blasphemies against the Lord less serious, if less shocking, than moral corruption; yet the principle, that an assembly cannot be defiled, is taught by several tracts on their side. Now, it is all the same, if there are two, or two hundred, meetings consecutively; it is only throwing dust in the eyes. This is the question: Has such and such an assembly identified itself with the impure principle that wishes the evil to be admitted? As I have already said, in America the question was not Bethesda, but non-eternity of punishment. The question which I here state is all the more important, since, in these last days, the principle on which we have to meet, is, separation from evil. The second and third chapters of 2 Timothy are clear on this point.

23 Now, as regards the principles of gathering of the children of God in these times, it is well to notice that Mr. O. frankly admits that he does not profess to meet on the principles laid down in Scripture - on pages 31 to 33 he declares it. I only quote two sentences. "The principle asserted is that of the primitive church, but can it be the principle of the dismembered church?" That is the question. Then (page 46) "Mr. D. professes to be able to realise to-day what was the principle of the unity of the church when the church was one; whereas, I consider that this principle is, nowadays, quite impracticable." He wants a principle in the air, deprived of its substructure. Now it is certain that God's word knows of none other, and has no two principles of gathering. We say, the word must be reverted to, and, whatever our low condition, we must go by the word, where we find what may be applied to the present time. Now, to gather two or three in the name of Jesus belongs to all times. If Mr. O. cannot meet on scriptural principles - and this he admits - then his meeting is merely a human meeting, on human principles; if it is not on the principle of the unity of the church, it is independent churches.

What is not within the unity is, by the very principle of its existence, outside it. Here is what Mr. O. says: "This is the problem to be solved: to find a means of constructing worship-meetings which depart as little as possible from the notion of the unity of the church, and which, at the same time, permit of a connection subsisting with the dismembered church." One cannot act on the recognised primitive and scriptural principle, that is, the principle owned of God, and one must depart as little as possible from it. And who is to be the judge whether the departure is to an allowable degree, or not? And if the gathering is not on the scriptural principle  - that is to say, that which alone has God's authority - each one is free to select the principle he chooses to meet on. "The dismemberment rules everything"; that is to say, the effect of man's sin liberates us from the duty of returning to the word and the will of God. Impossible to have a more distinct admission of his having abandoned the principle of God's word, than what is found in the pages I have indicated. When this is once done, God's authority is null and void. A little, more or less, departure is, comparatively speaking, indifferent. The principle is not a divine one. Let this avowal be well weighed. If it is impossible to meet according to the Word, better not meet at all. We believe God is faithful to His children. The Lord has a flock, and He has given in His word what is appropriate to all times. Here it must be explained. Mr. O. would have us profess to re-establish the primitive unity of all Christians as a whole. But it is not so. I hope there will be much more seen, and I do not think the thing is complete. This ought to be. I doubt whether unity will be re-established in an absolute way. But that is not the question for us. What God will do is not our rule of conduct, but what He wants us to do, what is found in His word. There is a great system where the form of godliness is found, the power of it being denied. I ought to separate from it. I do so. Other Christians are unwilling to do so. I must leave them, and follow the Word. Also, as regards details, I name the name of Christ; I must depart from iniquity, and I do so, wherever it may be. Then, in a great house, there are false teachers; I purge myself from these, and follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.

24 But on what principle am I to meet? Must I depart from scriptural principles? Why is it more difficult to meet on scriptural principles than on others? Where two or three are gathered together in the name of Christ, there is He. As to the ground, the primitive church could have no more; this is a promise made at the brightest time of the apostles, a promise available for us in times of difficulty and dispersion. We cannot control others, but, by grace, we can ourselves, as obedient children, act according to the Word. Mr. O. wants us to depart as little as possible from the Word. Be it so. But that one must depart from it, and that obedience is impossible, I do not think. He says we should have a centre of attraction to unite everything; we should - I do not deny it - I have often even said so. The whole church should be one, and I accept that we are all responsible for the lack of unity, and that the brethren, as all who meet according to the truth, should be, or should have in their midst, the magnetic pole, which would attract and bow every heart; but if we do not possess it, we are not thereby hindered from yielding obedience to the Word, and from enjoying the blessing attached thereto. We dare not do otherwise. The question is thus definitely laid down. Mr. O. thinks he must - I do not say wishes to, but is forced to - depart from the principle of the Word. We think it should not be departed from at all, that if anyone departs from it, little or much, he has abandoned it; it is no longer obedience; the authority of God is no more the basis of gathering. If the body is separated from the Head, much or little is all the same. If our walk is not obedience, it is man's will. I do not accuse Mr. O. of wilfully departing from Scripture, but he considers himself forced to do so. I think it is want of faith, to say that what he calls the dismemberment of the church has rendered a Christian's following the Word impossible. For months after I discovered the ruin in which everything was found, I knew not what to do. Then I saw that the Word supplied what is needed for these very times, and that one had only to follow it. One might count on the Lord for the difficulties of the road.

25 If Mr. O. says we have been poor labourers, I have no reply to make. But we have met with blessing, and certainly the patient grace of the Lord has not failed us. Moreover, I think the firmness of the brethren regarding Bethesda has reacted on those who condemn them. They have not always been so decided in rejecting everything in connection with Mr. N.

I touched slightly on the subject of discipline, but more must be said, and I must justify what I said about the principles enunciated by Mr. B., and cited by Mr. O. "Where will you find," says Mr. B., "a meeting defiled, on account of one only of its members, in such a way, that any member communicates this defilement to every other meeting with which he has communion?" I know of a case, where two persons got into the brethren's meeting at Vevey. I had not the slightest idea of the Vevey meeting being defiled because these persons had deceived the assembly, and the assembly had received them in good faith; but if a meeting, knowingly and wilfully, accepts the wicked person it is not a new lump, if I am to believe 1 Corinthians 5. If the meeting judges the evil, or even if it has been admitted ignorantly - in such a case it may be that there has not been sufficient vigilance - but the assembly is not defiled, because the conscience has not been engaged in it. But if the evil is there, and brought to light, the assembly must shew itself pure in the matter, otherwise it is not a new lump; it is impure, none of the members call upon the Lord out of a pure heart, unless there is real ignorance of the fact; and this is true ad infinitum, two, or two million, meetings do not alter the matter. In every case the question is: Has the assembly, knowingly and wilfully, admitted what is impure? Has it willingly associated itself with that which is impure? If so, it is itself impure, and so are those forming it.

26 What Mr. O. wants, is, that if the assembly even is rejected, those coming from it, who are pure, should be admitted. So do I: however, the question is not that, but to know if those coming from it are pure, if they are knowingly associated with impurity. 1 Corinthians 5 settles the question. The word of God, in these last days, requires us to separate from evil - this is the clear, precise, and pointed instruction of 2 Timothy. An assembly such as we speak of will not do it, and we cannot go on together, and persons who are willingly in such a position are not what the apostle insists on, for walking together. It is not a question of re-establishing Christians, as a whole, in unity - a thing much to be desired in itself - but of being faithful to the Word and to the Lord in these last days.

Now, on another point, in connection with discipline, as to the independence of the assemblies, Mr. O. fully confirms what I say about it. Here are his words: "Every act of discipline in an assembly should be respected in the others, as long as one has no ground for considering it unlawful; but when one sees that a meeting has judged unjustly, then its decision is no longer binding on the other meetings." "For my part, I could never submit to a discipline which I could not judge." There is complete independence; Mr. O. is right in saying the assemblies should respect each other, but, as a natural and necessary consequence of having abandoned the primitive and only scriptural system, there is no joint responsibility. One respects the other when they are independent; one accepts when one thinks it is right, otherwise the discipline is in no way binding. Good people respect each other; if a man has been driven from the house, the other will reflect before receiving him, but they are independent, and each one will do in his own house what he thinks proper. It is certain that it was not so at first. The church, being one, whoever was put out at Corinth, was put out of the church on earth. The church was united. It will be said I have already spoken of it; I repeat it, because it is the universal objection. I am bound by a judgment I disapprove of, you will say. Confess, at least, that you are independent, and that you want to judge for yourself, and only accept what you approve of. This is the system of independent churches, in contrast with that of one sole church - the only system found in Scripture. But because the church is one, every member is at liberty to object, and to communicate with those who act, though not claiming competence to judge, refuse, or receive, at will, but, as a member of the whole, acting also according to his gift. Paul and his companions did so here (Corinth), to urge on to discipline when this course was not desired. It may happen - as Mr. O. himself admits - that one rejects the discipline of an assembly; but then one entirely rejects the competency of this assembly to act in the name of the Lord. Mr. O.'s system is, then, the system of independent churches, which respect one another, but not the unity of the church; only he adds to it his own competency to act in his own right, to judge the verdict of the whole church himself, and upon his own authority to reject a person he may consider unsuitable for communion. He has added the clerical principle to the independent church principle; neither of them is found in the word, unless one assumes the rights of an apostle, which should be supported by the power of an apostle. My purpose is only to ascertain the principles.

27 Mr. O. may have found contradictory expressions in my writings, that the totality of the churches constitutes the church, and that the totality of the churches does not constitute the church. There is a contradiction in the form, but none in the intention of the phrases; I believe both. The one meant that all Christians, and the churches containing them, are not independent bodies, but one whole. The second meant that the churches do not compose this unity as a body corporate, but that individuals, and not local corporations, form the body of Christ. I fully believe both - Mr. O. also, as it appears.

28 I do not care to make further reply to remarks referring either to my labours or my writings. It is God who justifies and condemns. I know I am very incapable of doing as I would, but I can leave myself in His hands. The important question is: What is the church, and what is the Christian's course to be in the midst of these times of ruin? Must we give up scriptural principles as impracticable, as Mr. O. would have us do? Or must we humbly submit to His word, confident that God will never abandon those who seek to obey Him, and that the word of God, and the grace of the church's Head, suffice, and ever will suffice, at all times for those who are satisfied to walk in littleness, and unappreciated by the world?

There is still one idea I wish to point out. Mr. O. wants to keep himself free to join the dismembered church. I am united to all Christians as a member of one only body, and am happy to be united with them, wherever this would not call me from the path traced out in the Word. Disobedience is not communion, and communion is not to be found in disobedience. Some souls will be more scrupulous than others in this respect; each conscience must be left free. I do not join the system I have left, and do not build up again what I destroyed, to make myself a transgressor, but I rejoice to meet every child of God in the path of obedience to His will, wherever it be. My reader will find that Mr. O. has added a word as to what makes the link of his churches. In his first pamphlet he said: "United by the same worship, by the same faith" - what evidently does not make them one, not recognising the unity of the church at all. Now he adds, "and by the same Spirit"; but this alters nothing; they are still independent churches respecting each other. It is not the one church; they are still separate associations, whether Mr. O. likes the word or not, and each one acts in its own sphere as an independent body, and the case being such, judges of the other's discipline. The word, "and by the Spirit," where it now stands, has hardly any sense, except it be an exceedingly vague one.

29 As for the passage out of Clement,* Mr. O.'s remark leads me to the belief that he never thoroughly examined the passage, otherwise I should have to accuse him of insincerity, which I have no desire to do. It is impossible for him to have examined the passage, without coming across a word acknowledged by all as difficult, which, in reality, presents no difficulty, and for the sense of which one might even have done without Alexandre non-revised. I did not name the difficult word, and I spoke of another word with quite another object, as everybody can see. But if Mr. O. had looked up the passage, he would have seen it. Now, I suppose that the eleventh edition of Alexandre, and certainly Stephanus, Pape, etc., will give it a sense which is impossible to apply to its use by Clement, and no other, and he will find but little more than I have said of it in my pamphlet, except that, I think, they quote Aelian also. Let us see if Mr. O. can enlighten us further as to its force. Such may well be. As for me, I have no time to make deeper researches, but I can only think, that, if he had searched the original, he would at least have encountered the difficulty.

{*See "Collected Writings," Vol. 20.}

To sum up, here is what is stated in the pamphlet that I have examined. By Mr. O.'s admission, the meetings he would like to establish are not set up on scriptural principles. The principle we follow, Mr. O. himself admits is the one recognised by the word, and which governed the path of the church as God established it, but it is impracticable, he says, to act on this principle at present. Having abandoned the principle of the unity of the church, he cannot meet on the principle of this unity. That is impracticable, and he forms independent churches, which respect one another, and mutually accept each other's discipline from each other, provided it be judged expedient, otherwise not. This is not the discipline of the church according to the promised presence of the Lord, but the discipline of a voluntary association, accepted, or not, according to circumstances. An assembly may admit sin or blasphemy, and the assembly not be defiled; the one who committed the sin is guilty; those who accepted him, and remained in fellowship with him, are clear of all defilement. Then the minister may exclude on his own authority. I admit that Mr. B. did not speak of the permission of sin in an assembly; he tries, as all the Bethesdaites, to hide facts under their common formula. "If there is a wicked person in an assembly," then this story of defilement communicated by one assembly to another; but it is only hiding facts; but the point is, when the matter, being done wittingly - the sin, or blasphemy, knowingly and voluntarily admitted - whether the assembly is defiled, or not. Mr. O.'s system would entail the consequence that I might participate in the exclusion of a wicked person in one meeting, and take the Lord's supper with him in another.

30 It is also recognised by Mr. O., and this is a point gained, that Mr. N.'s doctrine has not been retracted, and that those who will not reject his tracts should be excluded. Now this is not what Bethesda did, and numbers of the neutrals, or intermediates - if Mr. O. prefers the word - have declared that one ought not to exclude. But I do not know what an intermediate position, between the worship of God and the acceptance or admission of blasphemy against the Lord, can be.

I have only to add, that Mr. O. has confounded the church corporate with the persons composing it. John speaks of the latter, but never of the church. On the other hand, he confuses it with the kingdom, but to discuss all this would lead me too far. It seems to me that all who have spiritual intelligence can discern that John 17 applies to a moral and spiritual union among Christians, and not to the idea of the body of Christ; besides, John always speaks thus - he speaks of individuals, not of corporations.

This is my reply to Mr. O. I have indeed done it in haste, my time being already well filled. You can use it as you may find good.

Yours ever affectionately,

J. N. D.

Is the "One Body" the ground of gathering?

J. N. Darby.

<33004E> 31

"Is the 'one body' of Ephesians 4: 4 the divinely constituted ground of gathering?" A small paper with this title has been sent to me, signed C. E., initials with which I am not acquainted. The reply is very simple. It is. A very little attention to the passage itself and others which I shall cite, will prove it to every spiritual mind. It is, Christ being the centre and head, the great principle of gathering which has been the basis of those called Brethren, and has governed at any rate those of them intelligent in God's ways from the beginning. I add intelligent, because a person may be recently converted, and be sealed and of the body and so have title to be there, though his knowledge be defective. I shall quote a few passages to shew this point very quickly, profiting by the attack made upon the principle, to keep the point before the minds of Christians, which it is always profitable to do. As to making it clear and proving it, it has been done, not only in tracts drawn from Scripture, but in discussions with Christians of various phases, National and Free Church, since it came up, and dissenters of all classes, mostly, but not exclusively so, in Switzerland some thirty years ago or more, but translated most or all of them, into English.

It is clear that the perfection of the body of Christ, united to the Head, will be in glory. This has been contested, however, on the plea that Scripture never speaks but of the body on earth. But it seems to me that the end of Ephesians 1 clearly teaches the supremacy of Christ over all things as Head of the body, as the counsel of God in this respect. That was one extreme;* the other is, that the unity of the body is not on earth, but only in heaven.

{*There is really only one church spoken of in Scripture, though the state be different in heaven and on earth; but of this further on.}

The tract confounds the kingdom with the church, quoting Matthew 13, as to tares being among the wheat. But this would deny all discipline; both are to grow together till the harvest. Final judgment would be the only putting out. This I may dismiss. It is simple nationalism or popery, no present gathering of saints at all.

32 It also confounds the house and husbandry of 1 Corinthians 3 with the body, which is not spoken of at all. We have a temple, that is, where God dwells, but in which there is no union with Him who dwells there. Here we have three cases. He who builds with God's materials; he who, himself a saint, builds with bad, and loses his labour; and he who seeks to corrupt and will be destroyed; but no thought of the body. The writer tells us the word church, or assembly, denotes in their collective character those who profess to have obtained salvation, as when Paul addresses his epistle to the church of God which is at Corinth. The example is an unhappy one, because the apostle states what he means by the church, and makes the difference of those who profess, though these are assumed to be genuine unless proved otherwise. The address of the apostle is as follows: "To the church of God, which is at Corinth, the sanctified in Christ Jesus, called saints, with all that in every place call upon the name of the Lord Jesus." That is, universal profession and sanctified ones are clearly distinguished, the former looked at as composing the assembly at Corinth, and that by God's calling. And the difference is maintained in the epistle; it is only in chapter 10 that the apostle comes to speak of the body.

Again we are told that in Acts 20, Paul speaks of grievous wolves entering into the church. Nothing of the kind. The church of God spoken of, is what is purchased with His own blood, I suppose the true church which belongs to Christ for ever, and which He will present to Himself. All we have is, that wolves would not spare the flock, from which true members of Christ might suffer, if they could not be lost. I suppose, feeding God's assembly was on earth, yet it is viewed as purchased by the blood of Christ. Now the church or assembly of God, here, though set up in perfection by God, was, as man, as Israel, as everything God has set up, placed under man's responsibility; and man, as he has already done and that the first thing, has failed. But that failure was not the principle on which it was set up, any more than sin was the principle of man's standing in creation, nor disobedience and idolatry the principle of Israel's standing under Sinai. In each case it was man spoiling what God had set up. Even in Matthew 13 (which I do not refer to as the church) it was an enemy's doing, while men slept. The opposite doctrine is what Jeremiah so sternly denounces: "We are delivered to do all these abominations." What the Lord did is clearly stated, Acts 2: 47, "The Lord added daily such as should be saved."

33 Why does Paul say in the passage on which C. E. relies, "after my decease," but to shew that spiritual energy preserved what God had set up, as long as it was there? C. E. with his independent churches, and others, and I holding the unity of the body, all believe that the church on earth has been corrupted, and that in the last days perilous times would come. That is not the question; but, is that corruption part of the divine principle of meeting, or a corruption which makes us guilty? Is it a part of the divine intention or man's fault? What I find in Scripture, in the seven churches C. E. refers to, is, that it ends in the terrible judgments of Thyatira, and being spued out of Christ's mouth as nauseous to Him, and the threat of judgment if they did not repent so soon as they left their first works. But what the author cites of Jude teaches us the same truth; certain men had "crept in unawares"; but creeping in unawares was not the principle upon which the saints were gathered, was not accepted as the order of the place. They were spots in their feasts of charity, feasting with those among whom they had crept. Enoch had prophesied of them. Nothing can be clearer than that they had nothing to do - their being there had nothing to do - with the principle of the gathering; they had crept in. Jude writes to them that are sanctified by God the Father. In John they were not in the assembly at all, but antichrists who had been in it, and were to be manifested that they were not of it.

Another objection, which is not new to me, is more plausible, and goes upon a certain borrowed acquaintance with Scripture, namely, that the unity of the body was not known till Paul taught it. Now, there was a time of transition of God's patience with the Jews, and Paul, called specially out to be the minister of the Gentiles, was the instrument in God's hands for unfolding the mystery of the union of Jews and Gentiles on the same footing. But God took care that it should not be a new, separate thing in its nature and essence. After Paul was called he was not allowed to begin the introduction of the Gentiles, and Peter insisted on this in Acts 15. He, not Paul, was the means of introducing Cornelius, and C. E. confounds the existence of the thing and the development of the doctrine. Paul was the great instrument, both of promulgating the doctrine, and carrying it out in practice; a dispensation was committed to him. But God graciously took care to guard against the mistake of C. E. by employing Peter to begin publicly that work as a fact, and securing its stability by not allowing Paul to make good at Antioch the truth he had received; and the church remained one from the beginning. But what is its essence is much more important. The union of the body subsists from the day of Pentecost. It was established as to Gentiles, before Paul's ministry, at Caesarea in the bright and godly centurion, and Paul, in God's wisdom, was not allowed to secure it among the Gentiles. That was to be done (where it was important to do it) among the Jews at Jerusalem. No doubt the union of Jew and Gentile was of importance, especially in those days; but it was not the essential principle of the body or its unity. That was union with Christ, the Head, by the Holy Ghost. That was what made the body and unity, and each Christian, so sealed, a member of Christ.

34 Was there no body of Christ till Paul spoke about the mystery? Yet, if the confusion made by C. E. between the existence of the body, and the knowledge of the mystery be accepted, there could not have been. Thousands have come into communion amongst those whom C. E. attacks, who know nothing but to cry Abba, Father, as sealed with the Spirit, and learn the mystery there. It is much to be desired that they should be intelligent as to it, and that they should know the place they are in. But I never heard of such being a term for communion. I suspect a very large number would have to be put out. That it is as such the assembly meets, that the truth as to this is found in tracts and writings, is quite true. The writer does not mean to say that we should meet as if there were two churches of God on earth. Meeting on that principle, as an expression in common use, means quite a different thing. We cannot meet as being the one assembly, because a great number of Christians are outside of us, but we meet on the principle of that unity. It is this unity of the whole body on earth which C. E. denies. What a new believer is introduced into, is that unity which unquestionably existed in the beginning, and which we seek to realise as far as we can. Supposing I was to say that we meet on the principle that holiness becomes God's house. C. E. seems hardly to think so, but who would say that could not be the bond of union? Unity with the Head by the Holy Ghost is the only bond of union, but that produces the unity of the body of which we are thus all members. We meet with the conviction that the gathered saints were at the beginning the body of Christ, and members one of another, and as such all one on earth (does C. E. mean to say they were not?), and that we ought to seek to realise it. To be of the assembly as having the Holy Ghost, and to understand and explain it, are two things; to deny it, which is C. E.'s place, is a third. But his statement goes further. God formed the church - for it began down here - on the ground, according to his system, of there being evil in it, tares. They hold the church met on that principle; not that men crept in unawares, but that it is the principle they are united on. Now holiness is not what binds us, nor the principle of unity, yet the assembly meets as composed of those who are sanctified, called saints, sanctified in Christ Jesus, on that principle, and as all one (all saints are one body), and we seek to realise it as far as we can. The principle or ground of gathering is that of all saints being one in Christ, and as such forming the one church of God on earth. Christians had lost this principle, and it has been recovered; hence much, and rightly, put forward.

35 I shall now shew, that what Scripture presents to us is a body on earth, formed on earth as Christ's body, the Head being in heaven, by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven. Let my reader look at 1 Corinthians 12: 12 to the end. It is perfectly impossible for a man in his senses not to recognise a body on earth. The apostle compares it to our natural body: we have body and members, and all the members of that one body being many are one body; the body is not one member, but many. But C. E. will say that this is in heaven. But, unfortunately, it is by one Spirit we are baptised into one body: now this was on earth. "Ye shall be baptised with the Holy Ghost, not many days hence." They were to tarry at Jerusalem for the power of the Holy Ghost coming upon them. It was one of the two great characters of Christ's work. He it is that baptised with the Holy Ghost. The Spirit of God came down to earth and formed one body before Paul was called. If anything need be added, it is found here, verse 25: and there was to be no schism in the body, the members were all to have the same care one for another; if one member suffered, all the members suffered with it, or one member were honoured, all the members rejoiced with it. "Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular; and God hath set some in the church, etc . . . ." Will C. E. tell me which of these gifts are to be exercised in heaven? The whole passage is as clear as language can make it, that there is a body on earth formed by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, and recognised on earth with these words, "so also is Christ." Chapter 10: 17 does not refer to the connection of the heathen with idols, or Jews with the altar. It is used in reference to this as the basis of the argument. "For we, being many, are one bread, and one body; for we are all partakers of that one bread." The same principle is recognised as known truth in Romans 12, "For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office; so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another." And all that follows applies to the saints down here exclusively. It is now (Eph. 3: 10) that the manifold wisdom is to be made known by the church to principalities and powers in heavenly places, the Gentiles being a joint body. So in chapter 4, the very verse cited by C. E. It is exhortation to us now to endeavour to keep the unity of the Spirit, and what we are called to is still a hope, as the verse itself says. It will be said, "But the hope of the calling is glory with Christ above." Undoubtedly, but it will then have ceased to be a hope; it is when we have been called and have it as a hope (for we are saved in hope) that there is one body and one Spirit; there is that, as there is one faith and one baptism. The whole passage plainly shews that it is the present time, the time when the Spirit is personally down here, and faith has its place - hence the apostle speaks of the edifying of the body of Christ, "till we all come," etc. Hence C. E. cannot speak so; He has given these ministries, not for the edifying of the body, as Scripture speaks, but "the members of His body on earth." He has lost the great truth, that God has revived in these last days that presence of the Holy Ghost down here. He confounds the kingdom of heaven with the church and the body of Christ, and so will have tares in it, and tares to remain in it till harvest. In Scripture, "an enemy has done it."

36 I find in this same passage, Ephesians 4: 15, 16, "Speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things which is the head, even Christ; from whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love." A husband is to love his wife as the Lord loves and cherishes the church, for we are members of His body. The only other passages, as far as I am aware, are Colossians 1: 18, and 3: 15. The former does not help us one way or the other, saying Christ is the head of the body, save as far as shewing, a remark that has its importance, that the apostle does not make the difference C. E. does. The latter passage clearly applies to earth as a present exhortation to peace; it shews clearly, as I said, that as to the unity of the body the apostle makes no distinction between the calling of God in its responsible effectuation now, and its sure divine effectuation when all is complete in result. There is one passage which speaks of it in this result, that is, takes in this view, Ephesians 1: 22, 23, but even so - looks at the church as an existing thing. I have not to complain of the spirit in which the leaflet is written, but I am surprised in realising the complete loss of truth by those to whom the writer belongs.

37 I add a few supplementary words, to shew how this evil system destroys the whole idea of the church of God. First I would remark, that Christ gave Himself to gather together in one the children of God which were scattered abroad. Now I admit that this is not properly the body. John never speaks of the body. But it is unity, and it is down here, for those who were scattered will all be one any way up in heaven. Their being scattered abroad down here makes no difference as to that; there is no scattering there; yet whereas they were scattered, they were now to be gathered. This unity is ignored by C. E. The word 'church,' says C. E., denotes in their collective character those who profess, whereas in Scripture it is certainly not so at the founding of Christianity. There the Lord added daily* such as should be saved. Further, who added? The Lord. Did He add mere professors? That such crept in ere many years were past we know. So later, "As many as were ordained to eternal life believed." C. E. does not believe in a divine gathering at all at any time. God does not gather professors. And here the language is not quite honest. The writer says: "they (who profess to have obtained salvation) compose the assembly or assemblies." Which? for they are not the same thing. Hence the assembly is slipped out directly, and we read, "the church of God which is in Corinth," "the seven churches in Asia." Hence we read (page 3) that Christ, in His love and care for the members of His body on earth, provides for their edification, through various ministries and gifts of the Holy Ghost. But this does not alter the character of the assembly, whether in Corinth or Ephesus. He then speaks of evangelists as having their service outside the assembly, while gifts of healing were intended to meet the physical needs of men as men. All very well if we do not go to Scripture, but the assembly is wholly lost, save to say that the service of the evangelist is outside it. But where were the gifts, whether their service were in or out of the assembly, or for men as men? Here is the answer of Scripture: "Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular; and God hath set some in the church, first, apostles; secondarily, prophets; thirdly, teachers; after that, miracles; then gifts of healings, helps, governments, diversities of tongues," not all in a church, but in the church - the assembly. Nothing can be more clear or definite. Evangelists are not there. The gifts are viewed simply as the power of the Spirit. In Ephesians 4 we find only gifts of edification, and they are attributed to the gift of Christ, in His care for the church, His body. There, there are evangelists: "He gave some apostles, and some prophets, and some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ" - even the evangelists, for though they served in the world, they did not leave the fruits of their service there; they were brought into the church, never into a church, but into the church. And then pass on to verses 15, 16, "but speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ; from whom the whole body fitly joined together, and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body to the edifying of itself in love." Can anything be clearer or more definite?

{*I do not add "church," as the reading is generally rejected. I quote for the character of those gathered, also who were the gathered.}

38 But this passage leads me to the remark that this distinction, of what is here from what is in heaven, is destructive of the whole nature of Christianity, and the holiness that belongs to it. I have clearly shewn from Scripture that the word of God speaks of the body on earth, that its unity is there, its members are Christ's members,* and members one of another. But I go further, and add that while, as was predicted, the church on earth has corrupted itself, the blessing that God had established being confided to man in responsibility,** yet to separate the two in faith is to destroy not only the scriptural idea of a church, but the whole divine principle of holiness, individually and collectively. Our calling is heavenly, our hope is heavenly, our standard of walk only heavenly. Not seeing this was the source of the folly of the perfectionists. There is no goal, no measure of attainment down here. They took the deliverance of Romans 8 for perfection. The Christian has no goal of attainment but Christ in glory. If faithful, he does that one thing, runs to win Christ, and by any means to attain to that first resurrection; that produces the effect, so far as it operates, of walking like Christ down here. The believer's conversation (his living associations) is in heaven; he looks for Christ to change his body and conform it to Christ's glorious body. We say therefore, with Paul to the end, "not as though I had already attained," but we have no other measure of attainment, and he who best knows Christ, best knows how far he is from having attained. Every step of progress enables him to see more clearly what Christ is and how far he is from it. But there is no other goal, no other measure known or given. We are predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He may be the first-born among many brethren. He that sanctifieth and they that are sanctified are all of one.

{*I have not cited the latter part of Ephesians 5: 30, as probably the words are not genuine. Nor "to the church" (Acts 2: 47), for the same reason.}

{**So it ever has been since Adam, the first thing man has always done being to fail, while God's patient goodness has continued till the time of judgment came.}

39 Now it is the knowledge of this glorified Christ by the Holy Ghost which is the formative power of holiness. This I proceed to shew from Scripture. God chastises us (Heb. 12: 10) that we may be partakers of His holiness. Hence, in a very remarkable passage in 1 Thessalonians 3: 12, 13, "and the Lord make you to increase and abound in love one toward another, and toward all men, even as we do toward you: to the end he may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints." Where is the difference for faith between our responsible state here and our presentation before God our Father there? How far we realise it, is another and important question; but the measure and principle is the same, or rather, blessed be His name, all one. And this is wrought by the revelation of Christ to our souls by the Holy Ghost, and Christ as He is in glory. Hence He says: "For their sakes I sanctify myself [set myself apart as the glorified man in heaven] that they also might be sanctified through the truth." And this is as clearly taught as possible. "Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. And he that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure," 1 John 3. Again, "We, beholding with open [unveiled, alluding to Moses' veil] face the glory of the Lord, are changed from glory to glory, into the same image, as by the Spirit of the Lord." All this is as clear as possible. There are not two holinesses; we cannot say, any of us, that we have attained, but our conversation is in heaven; and as we have borne the image of the earthly, we shall bear the image of the heavenly. There is no other goal after which we run: our object is to grow up to Him who is the Head in all things, to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ. And note well here, this is not the question of our acceptance in Christ. There, there is no growth. As to that we say, "As he is so are we in this world."

40 It will be said, "But this is individual." I admit it. I quote it to shew the principle on which God deals with us as regards our responsible state in this world. Being made partakers of the divine nature, having the risen and glorified Christ as our life, and the revelation of this glorified Christ by the Holy Ghost, we cannot look at anything as goal of attainment but that glorified Christ; and as He could say being a divine Person "the Son of man who is in heaven" - making, and in Him perfectly, His life, what it was down here - so we (united to Him in glory, sitting in heavenly places in Him, and the Holy Ghost revealing what eye has not seen nor ear heard nor entered into the heart of man to conceive) take the affections, spirit, self-denial, practical realisation of what answers to Him in glory, as the motive and measure of a holy walk here; and thus, he that saith he is in Him ought himself also so to walk even as He walked. Hence it is said "Be ye therefore imitators of God as dear children, and walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us and given himself for us, a sacrifice and offering to God for a sweet-smelling savour." "Hereby know we love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren." And in this chapter of the Ephesians referred to, the other essential name of God is taken, Light, and we are declared to be light in the Lord, and are to walk as children of light; and if our poor eyes have drooped in sleep, and we are lying among the dead, we are called to awake from sleep and Christ shall give us light. Our life is hid with Christ in God; we have no other measure than what He is.

41 There is not one holiness for heaven, and another for this world, as 1 Thessalonians 3: 13 so remarkably teaches. We have our treasure in an earthen vessel, know in part, see through a glass darkly, but the treasure, what we know and what we see, is one and the same. Eternal life is the end, but it is eternal life we have, but that life is Christ, the present Christ. "He that hath the Son, hath life"; then we shall have it as He is, but it is not another. I repeat he who is nearest to Him by faith, in whose heart Christ dwells, knows best how dear he is to Him, but how far he is from Him as an object of attainment. But he has not two Christs, but one. This is the principle of Scripture. We are in Christ as to acceptance, and Christ in us as present life, and the hope of glory before us; our path, as we are yet in the body, is always to bear about there the dying of Jesus, that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our body.

This principle would involve the church on high and below being but one, though here hindered by weakness in a responsible condition as individuals are. There is really no difference, but happily we are not left to draw conclusions on the subject. The word of God is formal and positive on the subject. "Christ loved the church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it by the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish." C. E. may say this means the members. Of course it takes place in the members, though collectively too; but the church that was loved, and that will be presented to Christ without blemish - the assembly that was loved and for which He gave Himself, the church that will be presented without a wrinkle by Christ to Himself - is the church that He has sanctified down here in time by the word. The same thing is expressly taught in chapter 4 already quoted, except that it is also called His body, Christ being the Head, to whom we are to grow up; verse 16 specifically presenting the present operation in grace, and the increase of the body by the effectual working in the measure of every part; so that it is impossible to separate that body of which Christ is the Head, from that which grows and edifies itself here - and the whole body, and an edified and increasing body. There is but one. Nothing can be more specific, positive, and formal.

42 Even as to a particular assembly, this as owned of God, is not as C. E. states. As such its members are not viewed as professors, but as to be presented blameless before Christ. In Corinth, blamed in all its ways, so bad that the apostle could not go there, he says, "Ye come behind in no gift; waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, who shall confirm you to the end, that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ." That was their present calling, that their final state, called into His fellowship (koinonian, to partake of His state) now, and blameless in it there. The beginning of the epistle to the Ephesians largely confirms this principle. In chapter 1, from verses 3 to 8, what time is it that is presented to us? When are we holy and without blame before Him in love? It is evidently the thought of God about us. Is it something else we are to realise now? And is what is here, the spiritual blessings with which God hath blessed us, only for the heavenly places, and our calling different now?

I admit surely the difference of realisation in human responsibility by the power of the Holy Ghost, and the perfect accomplishment by divine power when Christ shall come and change our body of humiliation, conforming it to His glorious body, when we shall be to the praise of His glory; but there are not two things. It is spoken of in itself: "to the glory of His grace" now, "to the praise of His glory" when all is perfected. And so in what follows as to the church. It is presented as in the purpose of God, with this much accomplished that Christ is set at His right hand in heavenly places, and the result is there stated as part of the same thing; "though we see not as yet all things put under him." But in what follows He takes care to shew that "we are quickened with him," according to the same power which raised Him from the dead where He lay for our sins in which we were dead, "raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ." Is this present or not? he does not say "with Christ," but "in Him," but this is to shew in the ages to come the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. Is that of which He speaks, as shewing in coming ages the exceeding riches of His grace, a different thing from that which He has wrought now? But this is identified with "head to the church, his body." I admit fully it will be accomplished in glory. We have the spirit of adoption now; we wait for the adoption, to wit the redemption of the body. But I close.

43 The word of God is perfectly clear, and the identity of what is revealed and discerned by the Holy Ghost with what will be revealed in us, is seen to be of the very essence of Christianity, as Scripture presents it in its fulness. It is the very meaning of the phrase "we are saved in hope," and "though now we see Him not, we rejoice with joy unspeakable and glorified, receiving the end of our faith, the salvation of [our] souls." A church of professors denies that it is the church of God. He does not form one of the professors, that is quite clear. The thought is next door to blasphemy. The system denies Christian responsibility, and that the professing church will be judged for its unfaithfulness. It falsifies the nature of holiness, and Christ's present relation to the church. There is no bride to say "Come!" No purity according to what there will be then, as in Thessalonians, or according to what Christ is now as in 1 John 3. No recognition of the predicted corruption of the church, for even now we have to walk with those who call on the name of the Lord out of a pure heart. If it were to be a church of professors, and God would have it so, how many are to be allowed? That such may creep in unawares nobody denies, but the theory is that this is what God owns, His church on earth; that we are not to purify ourselves from vessels to dishonour, or go outside the camp.

For one thing I am thankful to C. E.: he has clearly brought out what has been really at stake in the painful questions which have lately exercised the saints he blames, in London, and which all have felt. It is because this was in question, without my having an unkindly feeling toward a human being, that I took my stand in the matter. The whole testimony of the unity of the body, and even of our heavenly calling was at stake, and in great danger, I admit too. Many of the brethren were much more immediately in the conflict than myself, and I thank God for giving them to be faithful in it; and while, I dare say, all was not perfect wisdom, God sustained them in grace. I speak thus as personally distinct, because I was almost all the time out of the country. But C. E. by his tract shews what was at stake, the whole special testimony of God as distinct from gospel truths as to pardon. As to this I say no more. If my reader wished to see where man's responsibility is taught, where the church is viewed as the house or temple, he must turn to 1 Corinthians 3, "Let every man take heed how he buildeth thereon!"

44 I should never have replied to this tract, but that it offered an opportunity of shewing from Scripture the real character of the church now, and its identity for faith - though placed here under man's responsibility (save God's infallible grace) - with the church and spouse on high; and that Christians were bound to recognise and act on this, and so responsible for the state C. E.'s church of professors is in; and that even present individual holiness cannot be separated in its measure from what it will be in glory. All that is there, is brought down here now, as that which we are in the new creation and by the Holy Ghost, and according to which we are to live, and seek withal the unity of the Spirit.

I recognise that the brethren in question were well nigh in utter failure. I trust, humbled before Him, we may be allowed to maintain better than ever the holy testimony of God. As to the one who gathers, it is a present power here, the Holy Ghost. As to the centre to which they are gathered, it is Christ; but that makes all saints one, and on that principle they meet.

New Lump

J. N. Darby.

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It may be well to state directly from Scripture what the new lump is, as it is now so much spoken of. Such a thing as leaving an assembly to be a new lump is not thought of in Scripture. I may have to leave an assembly on other grounds; but it is not what is spoken of here. The assembly of God is looked at in its true nature as an unleavened body; thus we are called upon to keep the feast with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. And as leaven had got in, they were called on to purge out the old leaven, that they might be a new lump as they were unleavened. The discipline applied to all, the putting out all leaven, that the assembly, as a whole, might be a new lump. Thus, there is no such thing as leaving to be a new lump. The only new lump contemplated, is the whole assembly purified by putting out leaven - the passage is as clear as possible. The great body of the saints is everywhere to be a new lump.

But, as I have referred to the currency of these questions, it is well to notice another element in operation, more moral, and wider in realisation. The discussions at London Bridge had given rise to the most widespread distrust of various brethren; the feeling being - I am in communion with B., as I am of them, and thus in communion with positive evil; and getting away from evil governed the heart, and wide distress existed. Now, here, I fully recognise, was real trial; he who names the name of Christ was to depart from iniquity; yet these brethren were corporately connected with unfaithfulness. I do not identify a person bearing the name of Christ, and individually walking badly, and ecclesiastical connections with those who do. Actual right is right, and wrong wrong; still, it is very unsatisfactory to the heart and conscience to be in full confessed communion with evil; and as the evil thing judged was allowed to exist by those immediately concerned, their consciences were not at their ease. Many thought of leaving brethren. I had been in the deepest degree exercised by the very question; I agreed with them as to their judgment of the evil. But I did not think desertion was the remedy; it did not remedy the evil - satisfied, perhaps, the individual conscience, but left the saints to their fate. I not only felt the evil was not remedied, but could not be, humanly speaking. But there was another difficulty: the door was closed against the interference of those who might have sought to apply one. Still, I felt the Lord had not given up His people, and it was not my place to flee as an hireling. I was accounted an unfaithful person by those disposed to leave; but, while I sympathise with those disposed to leave, as having personally done with evil, I do not think it was the path of faith. I trusted God for His testimony; I do not find it has been in vain.

46 There was a third principle of extra excellence which prevailed, under the popular name of Cluffism, which professed this superiority, and does, where it still holds its ground. It took a very high ground, carrying up to the third heaven, and making the Christ who is there, as communicated in all He is there to us, to be divine righteousness, though I always found it filled people with themselves. But the truth is, its origin was a filthy, carnal mysticism, not unfolded to all, but was such, that one of its adepts admitted it could not be propounded in a mixed company, where females were present. I know this was professed to be given up, but I doubt, from what I have heard, that it is thoroughly. But it is certain that from out of this resulted a pretension of a special remnant, brethren (so called) being Laodicean. This was based, too, on theories, and all sorts of theories, as to Philadelphia. The theories I believe to be all delusion. First, the four last churches all go on to the end, and what is found is a general estimate of the church by Christ, and of its result, with a promise to him who overcame, in the circumstances in which the church was. It is a mistake to think that the churches passed, by a kind of natural sequence, from one into the other.

But having taken up the proposed remedies for a low state of things - my reader may have noticed three - the first, some "silly women" plan of a new lump, clean contrary to the whole sense of the passage; secondly, conscience justly at work, but faith failing as to trusting Christ's faithfulness in taking care of His, and His testimony; and, thirdly, Cluffism, full of pretension and want of self-knowledge (though I fully admit several dear people got among them, misled by its promises of more spirituality, which suited itself more to their cravings). Still, two of the principal adepts of the system at Edinburgh, and a third at Cork, were put out for immoral conduct. Of that I think worse than I did, for, though wild, I thought it honest, which I do not now, as a system. But having briefly reviewed these, I add the new lump, as given in Scripture, as the great point for believers - that is, the application of the divine principles of truth and holiness, and devotedness in testimony to the whole body of testimony-bearers; for that is the very force of the new lump. It might seem premature to speak of the company of testimony-bearers, but I do not believe it. I believe there are details to be carried out of God, but He does very much of it by the faithful testimony-bearing; but what He looks for now, is, not occupation with evil, but the springing up of testimony in grace - plants of the Lord's planting by clear shining after rain.

Christ and Sanctification

J. N. Darby.

<33006E> 48

{A Letter on "Christ and Sanctification," by Dowgan Clark, M.D. (1879), and "Perfect, but not Perfected; or, Entire Sanctification," etc., by the Rev. G. O. Eldridge.}

My dear brother,

I fully recognise a deliverance, and have for fifty years, having then got it - a deliverance which the evangelical world denies; and Pearsall Smith admitted in his last tract that all he meant by the "better life," was passing from Romans 7 into chaps. 6 and 8; which is what I insisted on. My tract on cleansing with water goes into this. It is the passing from being under law, or the reference of acceptance to our state by redemption wrought in Christ, and experimentally known by the sealing of the Spirit, into the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free; indeed it is one special ministry in which I have been blessed, and on that deliverance I should insist.

Further, it is a subject to be treated delicately, lest any should comfort themselves with the thought that you are content they should stay in the state spoken of in Romans 7, a supposition I should earnestly oppose. I do not think it is a Christian state at all: it is a man born again, but under the law, the state under the first husband. The deliverance is found in chapter 8, or more exactly the state of one delivered But my objection to the Wesleyan system, is, that it falsifies the whole Christian state as presented in Scripture; and, as to Dr. C., there is scarcely one definition or position right or scriptural, and all so loose and incoherent, that it is difficult to deal with.

Perfection is simply, as used in respect of man, being of full growth, neither more nor less in Greek. It is the word used in Hebrews 5, "them that are of full age," and referred to in Hebrews 6: I. The question is, what is the perfection held out to us in the New Testament?

All our blessings are in connection with the second Man, not with the first. "As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy; and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly." We are predestinated "to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren"; and the effect of this, as to our present state and hopes, is seen in 1 John 3, "Beloved, now are we sons of God; and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure." Hence a thought of perfection down here is foreign to the whole thought and scope of Christianity; lowers its standard, and, note - it is not makes "mistakes in judgment,"* etc., but "purifieth himself even as he is pure."

{*"Mistakes in judgment will lead to mistakes in practice, even in the most holy person; and thus we conclude that, while it is the privilege and duty of the Christian to expect . . . a restoration unto man's original condition, so far as moral purity is concerned; yet, in the present state of being, he must ever be subject to weakness, infirmities, and mistakes."}

49 Reference to innocence, or the first Adam as innocent, is a ruinous mistake as to the whole nature of Christianity. That wholly refers to the second Man. Innocence has gone for ever with the entrance of the knowledge of good and evil. Holiness is the character of the new man, likeness to Christ, as He is the object set out before us: and this only, and being with Him, the object we run after. This "one thing I do"; it is that, and that only, goal, that is before us, never fully attained till He has changed our vile body, and fashioned it like His glorious body. The apostle denies all other object in his race; this "one thing I do"; and mark, this was his calling; first, that he might win Christ, not as life and station - that he had - but Himself; next, that he might attain to the resurrection from among the dead. He pressed towards the hope of his "calling (not "high," which is vague) above, of God in Christ Jesus": hence the apostle does not leave the subject without bringing in the changing the vile body. This object, sole object and goal of progress, leaves us always with the only end we aim at unattained here: we are always, not correcting "mistakes," but "purifying ourselves as he is pure.

The perfect, or full-grown, Christian is one who in faith is in the place that is ours in the purpose of God, one not merely knowing that Jesus is the Christ, and that his sins are forgiven him, but that he is in Christ before God, dead and risen with Him. Forgiveness refers to the works of the old man, to sins committed: perfection, to the new place into which we are entered in the second Man, to the actual possession of which we press forward, to lay hold of that for which Christ has laid hold of us. This is the teaching of Philippians 3. Christ is our life; He has laid hold of us for that, and we are pressing forward towards it: there is no other object before us.

50 Romans 1 to 5: 11 treats of forgiveness and justification as regards our sins and guilt; chapter 5: 12 to the end of chap. 8, our new place in Christ; and though it does not speak of our resurrection with Him, makes Christ our life, and we in Him, and He in us. The last is deliverance; the ground in chapter 6; the state in chapter 8; the bearing of the law on a soul renewed, not yet possessing the deliverance, is described in chapter 7. The full-grown Christian, one who has apprehended his place as such in Christ, has his conversation (all his living associations) in heaven as a new creature, and presses forward for the possession of it, only must wait for the changing of this poor vile body, but can have no other goal.

There is another point which makes all this system false. There is no communication of a new life, which Adam innocent had not, did not need. "That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." Of this Wesleyanism knows nothing; the man is changed by the operation of the Holy Ghost. But what Scripture says is, "He that hath the Son, hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God, hath not life." "Nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." "When Christ, who is our life, shall appear." Both these things, the new life, and the only true calling, are left out in the system and in the tract, and change the whole form and system of Christianity. I do not call a person in Romans 7 properly a Christian; he is born of God, under the law, like the prodigal before he met his father.

But I turn to the definitions. All is wrong: conviction and repentance come before faith. Now if the Word had not reached the conscience, how was he convicted, and how did he repent? Nor is even conviction, that (save in the vaguest way) of "his undone condition," but of his guilt, and so danger of judgment. His state is a distinct thing, and a deeper lesson. One refers to what we have in Romans 1 to chap. 5: 11 - all the world guilty by their own sins; the other to man's state by Adam's disobedience, as to which I discover that in me there is no good thing, and that the flesh cannot be subject to the will of God.

In repentance there is a change of mind, but there is no firm resolve to take any steps at all:* that is a sign of its being untrue or superficial, though it may follow. Repentance is the self-judgment we pass upon ourselves in view of God's goodness, and refers to what we have done, not to what we shall do. As to his account of faith,** it is so muddled, that it is hard to say anything of it. It is not the acceptance of God's mercy in Christ Jesus: it is, "He that hath received his testimony hath set to his seal that God is true." It is the word of God brought home to the soul by the power of the Holy Ghost: it is then mixed with faith in those that hear it. Whenever what God presents to us in the Word is believed (as when Christ personally present here on earth was believed in as God's revelation of Himself and His mind to the soul), the testimony of God is received, "not as the word of men, but, as it is in truth, the word of God," which works effectually in them that believe. Peter's sermon told the Jews what they had done, and God had done, to Christ, and then, on their being pricked in heart, so that they believed God's testimony as to that, he announced forgiveness and the gift of the Spirit.

{*"Repentance is change of mind, a firm resolve to take the necessary steps for securing salvation."}

{**"Faith is the acceptance of God's mercy and grace in Christ Jesus. The grace of faith, or the power of believing, is the gift of God; the act of faith, or actual believing, is the exercise of that power. When God presents His truth to us . . . He holds us accountable for the exercise of the faith He has given us."}

51 The particular subject of faith is not faith itself, nor is it the acceptance of anything, but believing the testimony, and here in a divine way by the word. All the rest is without any authority of the Word, or indeed any sense. "The grace of faith or power of believing!" What is that when nothing is yet believed, for the act of faith comes afterwards? Yet he contradicts even his own distinction, for we are accountable for the faith which He has given to us, and this is so in the case when it is he that believeth not. That man is accountable, as in John 5, on adequate evidence from God, I fully own; but all this statement is an utter muddle.

Next, right and necessary as repentance is, justification is never referred to it.* The end of the sentence may have a right use, which I therefore accept; but "his sins" leave it vague whose. The next is all confusion and error.** What is his whole spiritual nature before its renovation? "The mind of the flesh is enmity against God," "is not subject to the law of God," cannot be; lusts against the Spirit when we have it; requires a thorn, a messenger of Satan, to keep it down, if a man has been in the third heaven. Does what is renewed and revolutionised require buffeting by Satan's messenger to keep it down?

{*"By repentance towards God, faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the sinner experiences justification . . . . By the atonement  . . . . the guilt of his sins is taken away, their legal penalties remitted, and his indebtedness cancelled."}

{**"He experiences conversion. This implies a change of heart; a renovation and revolution of the whole spiritual nature."}

52 I must ask, too, was repentance a mere change of mind, and conversion a change of heart, and a distinct thing? Is all this before, what he calls, regeneration - a word he does not explain? Does he really mean a new life, something he had not before, a new man contrasted with the old, something born of the Spirit which is spirit? Is there renovation without being born again? Is this being born again a new spiritual life he had not before, or a mere change? Is the eternal life that Christ is (as come down from heaven, 1 John 1) and gives, a mere change, or a new thing conferred? All turns on this. The eternal life which I receive was with the Father; is that a mere change?

His explanation of adoption* is not correct, but not such as needs large remark. We are waiting for the adoption, to wit the redemption of the body, but we are sons by faith of Jesus Christ, and receive therefore the spirit of adoption. All this comes from their not seeing that our only place in result is association with Christ in glory, though we here wait for the hope of righteousness by faith.

{*"He experiences adoption - God takes him into His family for Christ's sake, and he becomes a son."}

It is worthy of remark, that though the atonement is mentioned in an early part of the series as ground for experience, the blood of Christ, in its efficacy with God, is never mentioned: it is a sinner experiences this and that. Nor is there a hint of our being in Christ, or the righteousness of God in Him; nor indeed of God's love to the sinner when he was in his sins.

All believers are said to be sanctified - sanctification as all the rest of the blessings, being through faith. I do not only recognise, but insist on, the gift of a holy nature (but I do not see hinted at, Christ being our life); a nature which hates sin; and I see progress and growth taught and insisted on in the word of God, but I find no such statement as is here made. Where is "holiness" taught to be "sanctification in perpetuity"? Holiness as a quality is heart purity, not implies it, but it is according to the divine nature: He chastens us that we may be partakers of His holiness.

53 'Freedom from sin' is an ambiguous term in English, and this ambiguity is used here. A captive is set free: a horse is free from vice, that is, has none. Now in the last sense we are never said to be free from sin: set free, not from sin, but from the law of sin and death, with a real, true deliverance, we are said to be. It will be said: Is it not written, "He that is dead is freed from sin"? Now the word is really "justified from sin" as you may see in the margin.

But I turn directly to the statement: who is freed from sin? He that is dead, no one else: death of the old man alone frees me. Are we to wait, then, till we are actually dead, that there should be no sin in us? If you mean that there should be death in the nature of the old man - "sin in the flesh" - I say certainly; but to be dead, we must die. But that is not the doctrine here, save quite in the abstract. We are to reckon ourselves dead to sin, as having been crucified with Christ, yet living, but not we, but Christ living in us. Before this, we are captive to the law of sin in our members - not the full, true Christian state: now, as having by faith reckoned ourselves dead to sin, and alive unto God, we are not in Adam, but in Christ Jesus our Lord. Then, "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death"; not free from sin, so that there is no sin in the flesh, but made free from its law. "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us"; but it is now no law to us. Romans 8: 2 answers, as deliverance from it, to chapter 7: 23; the way of it is in chapter 8: 4.

I totally deny* the utterly false definition of sin given in this paragraph. Paul made a great fuss about nothing in Romans 7, if that be what sin is. It certainly was not voluntary, for the point insisted on (is), that he was doing what he would not, and hated. He was not delivered, but to will was present with him, but he could not perform; he was a captive. Besides, it is written, "Until the law sin was in the world," it became exceedingly sinful by it; and they that have sinned without law, perish without law. All this is false theology, not scripture.

{*"The term sin, is used in the Bible, either in the sense of sin committed - an actual transgression in thought, word, or deed; or sin indwelling - that depravity of heart which leads to all sinful acts . . . .. In the one sense, sin is a voluntary violation of the divine law, in the other, it is an involuntary state of the heart! . . . Now our definition of holiness is intended to apply to sin in both these aspects. It is freedom from the guilt of sin," etc.}

54 But the new man being denied as a distinct thing, he makes it a mere state of the heart; whereas Scripture speaks of sin in the flesh, a mind which cannot be subject to the law of God; and the lusts of the flesh, sin working lust in us, flesh lusting against the Spirit, a thing which ceases by death, only actually by actual death, as to its present power, by reckoning ourselves dead, and always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus; death working in us, and that, that the life of Jesus might be manifested in our bodies. Why death working in us, if there was nothing to be kept down? We are not under the law of sin; not only have we a new life in power, but sin in the flesh is condemned (not forgiven) in the cross, and we have died with Christ for faith there; but to make this good, we must carry about the dying; death must work in us.

Further, Christ's grace is sufficient for us. His strength is made perfect in weakness; and God, as to our walk, is faithful not to suffer us to be tempted above that which we are able, so that we have no excuse when we do fail, and can walk, as far as sufficiency of grace goes, in growing joy in God. Further, holiness has nothing to do with freedom from guilt; that is, by the blood of Christ. To have part in this, a man must be born again, but holiness does not efface guilt. The deliverance we get does deliver us from its dominion, but not from the existence of the flesh; hence the standard of holiness is always lowered by those who pretend to it.

I do not deny walking in constant communion with God. I do not believe Romans 7 the true state of a Christian at all; but to say sin is not in the flesh, is not opposed to the Spirit, is wholly anti-scriptural. There is a sealing and anointing with the Holy Ghost, which delivers from the dominion of sin, but does not alter the nature of the flesh. I deny Adam was created in a state of holiness: Scripture never says so. He was innocent, and had not the knowledge of evil: there was a tendency to sin.

55 Scripture says, "If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light, having no part dark." The tract says we are liable to false perceptions, etc., because of imperfect physical organisation.* Does want of a single eye come physically from the body? All this lowers the idea of holiness. They deny that in many things we all offend, and what Christ ascribes to want of a single eye they excuse, and make compatible with the original condition of moral purity in which unfallen man was: growing conformity to Christ in glory, by purifying ourselves as He is pure, doing this one thing, never enters their mind.

{*"There are, doubtless, differences, which need not detain us, between the perfection of Adam before the fall, and the Christian perfection which is the object of this essay. The differences arise chiefly from the diseased and imperfect physical organisation which now appertains to our race, and which did not appertain to Adam; in consequence of which, the mind, through its connection with such a body, is liable to false perceptions and erroneous judgments."}

It is false to say He will not reign in a divided heart: Christ's statement is totally different, and indeed contradicts this. He does not reign at all there.* "The will of God, even your sanctification," is an abuse of the passage (1 Thess. 4: 3); the end of it is left out, which totally alters the sense. Peter says, "holy in all manner of conversation."

{*The new Jerusalem is not down here.}

The blood of Christ cleansing from all sin is also an abuse of the passage. John is speaking of sins and righteousness in a passage which declares, "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves." It is a question of our standing before God in the light, while we cannot say we have no sin. I am sanctified and cleansed; though I fully insist on walking by grace up to the place I am in - but not in lowering God's holiness and my thought of what sin is, by pretending to be as pure as Adam, and talking about physical organisation when I fail. Had Adam any lusts?

I fully recognise the power of the Spirit of God to keep us in peaceful communion with God in love, but will not lower the standard of holiness to excuse what is of the flesh. It is not without meaning that the author quotes only the Old Testament for his promises, where we know the way into the holiest was not yet made manifest, and the question of purity is quite different. One has only to consult the passages to see they have nothing to do with it. It is the removal of evil men and wickedness by judgment, in Isaiah 1: 25. In Ezekiel 36: 25, it is the cleansing of Israel from filthiness and idols when they are restored, and making them walk in His ways, with no word of absolute internal purity of soul. The Lord's allusion to it with Nicodemus is not a state of perfection, but being born again.

56 If the Spirit be distinctly the sanctifier (p. 10), as distinguished from the blood-cleansing, why did he use before the latter for meaning sanctification? 'Convicted for sanctification,' I find nothing of in Scripture; I deny the very state they speak of (which is a mere ignorant confusion with the deliverance of Romans 8), as being what the Christian is running after. He has Christ glorified for his standard, and is changed into the same image from glory to glory, as by the Spirit of the Lord, and judges as sin what they excuse.

The whole system naturally takes them out of grace: they must be absorbed by the idea of attainment, and the consecrating act is our own. That we should yield ourselves to God, as those alive to God, is blessedly scriptural, and have fruit unto holiness with the end - not a state of holiness, but everlasting life; but it is the peaceful consciousness of a delivered soul who feels the claim of infinite love, and that it is not its own, but bought with a price. Here we are 'to do all we can,' even when dead in sins, whereas Scripture says, then we are quickened, created in Christ Jesus. We are, when dead, to 'surrender ourselves to be saved,' a thing never said in scripture; we are to submit to God's righteousness. And now mark the phrase, 'measurably quickened.' Are they born of God, or not? Have they life, eternal life? 'There is some life in them.' Those to whom Paul writes are viewed as having the old man crucified with Christ, and alive in Him; and what they are called to is, not to dream there is no sin in them, when there is, and call lusts no sin unless the will consents, but not to let sin reign in their mortal body, to fulfil it in its lusts. For sin should not have dominion over them, because they were not under law, but under grace, and, as alive and set free withal from the law of sin, given the blessed privilege, as being so, to yield themselves to God. It is a lovely passage, but exactly the contrary of what is stated in the tract. It is a freed man blessedly giving himself to God; not a man wanting to be free, able to do something, as having some life, to get free in another sense, altogether free from sin, a sense not in Scripture at all. It is Christ, not his own faith, nor repentance, nor prayer, that justifies the sinner; albeit the repentance, the faith, the prayer, are all necessary to the bestowment of the pardon. He puts this on wholly wrong ground, but I do not dwell on it.

57 The whole position of Adamic purity is false, never found again here; and not the object, which is the state of the last Adam, not of the first. But what has, "I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty," to do with perfect holiness? The apostle is speaking of an unequal yoke, and the manifested acceptance of faithful Christians in the position of sons. He talks of self-consecration, of being accepted of God; he does not know what it means, nor the liberty in which a Christian serves. We are Christ's. He tells us, "Ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you," is the baptism by the Holy Ghost. Now Christ is careful to tell His own they were already clean by the word, when they had not yet received the Holy Ghost at all, of which He goes on to speak to them as of something to come. The constant abuse of scripture is really deplorable.

Then he tells us that by the baptism of the Holy Ghost the soul is freed from the dominion of sin. Now this I fully admit, but free from dominion of sin, and freed from sin, so as to be pure as Adam, are two different things. "Victory" is anything but the absence of an enemy. The life of a Christian is a life of faith, moment by moment, but his being purged from his sins by Christ's blood is once and for ever, if Scripture be true. He did not sit down on the throne on high till "he had by himself purged our sins," or, as it is said in Hebrews 9, "must he often have suffered"; but, as to the conscience, "by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified," so that "the worshippers once purged" should, as to imputation, "have no more conscience of sins," but "boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus." Then let the believer, knowing that his old man has been crucified with Christ, seek to grow up to Him who is the Head in all things, and walk as Christ walked, "changed into the same image from glory to glory, as by the Spirit of the Lord." The evil one cannot touch him, if he walks with Christ in lowliness and diligence of heart, "always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body."

58 I would press his believing in deliverance, if he has not found it, but not excuse evil, and the workings of the flesh within, to maintain a fancied purity and absence of sin, instead of judging himself for not having been enough with Christ to prevent it stirring, and purifying himself, as Scripture tells him to do, as Christ is pure, because he knows he is going to be like Him.

The other tract - though I doubt not the sincerity of either - is more mature, and goes further; but with more light, the root of bitterness still there. I agree with it that the only normal state of Christians is what they call perfection, but this is merely the deliverance of Romans 6 and 8; falsified by calling it perfection, with which it has nothing to do, and thereby most mischievously lowering the estimation of sin. It tries to ground this by distinguishing in the same passage perfected and perfect, and giving the latter a sense it never has in Scripture.*

{*"In this verse (Phil. 3: 15) he claims perfection for himself and some others; though, in verse 12, he acknowledges that he has not been perfected."}

Paul was doing only one thing, seeking to be perfected, but not being so, nor having yet attained, doing only that; yet he is made to affirm some other perfection, of which there is not one idea or thought in the chapter, which is wholly occupied with the first kind of perfection, ending with changing his body, which he has not apprehended or laid hold of, and which alone occupies him. The winning Christ is not what the author says. Paul was now seeking to win Christ: "do count them but dung, that I may win Christ." The statement falsifies the whole passage. 'Now his one ambition'* hence is false; it is, "if by any means he might attain to the resurrection from among the dead." No doubt he sought to know Him better here, but it was all one thing, and Christ had been always everything to him from the beginning (v. 7, 8), and he had been running the same course, and was all through; his conversation was in heaven, and he had been, and was always, looking to win, and be conformed to Christ in glory.

{*"Now his one ambition was to know Christ more fully, etc., that he might attain in the resurrection complete likeness to his Lord."}

The sense given to "perfect" is not given in the chapter, and is wholly excluded by it. Yet, after all, "perfection" is only spiritual infancy, the foundation of a healthy growth.* Deliverance, the normal Christian condition, is. But, after all, though we are in moral purity, like Adam before the fall, it is such a state (p. 10) that we 'could not stand for a moment before God, if tried by the law.' Was this Adam's state? And why not? Then we get the abominable doctrine, that 'temptation is not sin.' Temptations from without are not sin: Christ went through everything that could try a holy being, but this is not the point. (See James 1: 2, 14.) They are suggestions, and he talks of supposing our hearts to be impure. Had Adam these impure suggestions? And they are 'vile suggestions,' only our 'will rises up in opposition to them,' 'we are in heaviness through them' (this applies to the other kind of temptations, trials which it is our joy to fall into). Had Christ any of these vile suggestions? Did Satan ever succeed in putting them into His mind? Mr. E. avoids the point; but are lusts not sin? James is quoted to prove it; but James speaks of effects, and Paul tells us that sin produced all manner of lusts - goes to the root, the evil nature. It is the ignoring this which is one grand evil of this system.

{*"Entire sanctification is a healthy spiritual infancy, which leads on to Christian maturity."}

59 Now, if we were humble and faithful, I believe that Christ dwelling in our hearts by faith, these evil suggestions, these impure thoughts, would not arise; but in this false perfection they are allowed, instead of the heart being judged for having them, to keep up the credit of fancied perfection. I asked a perfect person once, and I believe a sincere, good person, whether, if the devil suggested to her to eat a handful of mud, she would do, or desire it. She owned she would not. There was something more than a suggestion, there was the sinful nature - the lust, that met it where it was. There are fiery darts, temptations to blasphemies, yet even these, if Christ dwells in us, if really delivered, do not come; but that is from the evil, sinful nature, and is to be judged, as shewing the sin that dwells in us. Satan has nothing for the life of Christ; if we do not keep the dying of Jesus on the flesh, he has for that. The dangers of it are justly depicted by the author: I have seen plenty of it.

My objection to it is not that, but that it connects a vital Christian truth, the passage from Romans 7 to 8 with false doctrine; denying sin in the flesh, and the communication of a wholly new life - Christ our life ("he that hath the Son, hath life"); denies lust to be sin, consequently, which betrays this nature, and mischievously lowers the standard of Christian holiness, palliating what a true soul knows to be evil, and falsifies the race and object of a Christian. That Mr. E. presses it in a true love of holiness and self-consecration, I do not doubt, and in this I should sympathise wholly with him; and he has got on a good step when he says it is the normal Christian: with that I fully agree, only that he is tied up by his doctrinal system to a false presentation of it all. His separating perfected and perfect is a poor attempt to put it straight, I mean to reconcile his sincere desires and his old doctrine. I have written in haste, being excessively occupied, which has also caused delay.

Ever affectionately yours in the Lord,

J. N. D.

On Everlasting Punishment "The Eternity of Evil."

J. N. Darby.

<33007E> 61

"Finding that great misconception prevails with regard to the views propounded in a course of sermons lately preached at Eaton Chapel, I think it well to give the following summary of them.

"1. Scripture declares that the 'everlasting punishment' of the wicked will consist of 'everlasting destruction,' after the infliction of 'many' or 'few stripes,' according to their several deserts. The popular theory teaches that it will consist of everlasting pain.

"2. Scripture declares that God will 'destroy both body and soul in hell.' The popular theory teaches that He will destroy neither one nor the other; but preserve both of them alive for ever, in unmitigated agony.

"3. Scripture declares that 'our God is a consuming fire.' The popular theory teaches that He is only a scorching fire.

"4. Scripture declares that the 'fiery indignation' will 'devour the adversaries.' The popular theory teaches that it will do no such thing, but only torture them.

"5. Scripture declares that the wicked will perish 'like natural brute beasts.' The popular theory teaches that there will be no analogy whatever between the two cases.

"6. Scripture declares that whosoever 'will save his life' by unfaithfulness to Christ, shall ultimately 'lose it' in a far more terrible manner. The popular theory teaches that no man can lose his life more than once, and that 'the second death' is no death at all, but eternal life in sin and misery.

"7. Scripture declares that whosoever 'doeth the will of God abideth for ever.' The popular theory teaches that every man will abide for ever, whether he does the will of God or not.

"8. Scripture declares that if we desire 'immortality,' we must seek it 'by patient continuance in well doing.' The popular theory teaches that every man possesses inherent indefeasible immortality, and what we have to seek for, is, that it may prove a blessing, and not a curse, to us.

"9. Scripture declares that 'the wages of sin is death.' The popular theory teaches that it is eternal life in misery; in other words, that God will inflict upon impenitent sinners a punishment infinitely greater than what He has pronounced to be their due.

"10. Scripture declares that 'the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord.' The popular theory teaches that eternal life is the common possession of all men, and that the gift of God, through Christ, is the privilege of spending it in holiness and happiness.

"11. Scripture declares that 'the Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the devil.' The popular theory teaches that they never will be destroyed at all, but that a portion of the universe will be specially set apart for the eternal exhibition of them in their fullest maturity.

"12. Scripture declares that Christ is to 'reconcile all things to God.' The popular theory teaches that all things will never be reconciled to God; that discord and disorder will never cease, but only be confined to one particular locality.

"13. Scripture declares that in Christ 'all things consist.' The popular theory teaches that a whole kingdom will 'consist' for ever, although not 'in Him.'

"14. Scripture declares that 'he that hath the Son, hath life; but he that hath not the Son of God, hath not life'; that 'if we live after the flesh, we shall die, but if, through the Spirit, we mortify the deeds of the body, we shall live.' The advocates of the popular theory, say, that the life of the believers and unbelievers, of natural men and spiritual men, must be of equal duration - that the doctrine of eternal happiness, and the doctrine of eternal misery, must stand or fall together - in other words, that if what scripture asserts be true, what it denies must be also true.

"I take my stand, therefore, on the plain, consistent, emphatic teaching of the whole bible, from beginning to end, as opposed to the 'traditions of men,' which have so grievously perverted it, and thereby obscured the glory of Christ, reduced to an unmeaning form the declaration that 'God is love,' produced a frightful amount of infidelity, robbed the law of its terrors, by making it threaten sinners with what they are sure will never be executed, incalculably weakened the saving power of the gospel, and damaged the believer's whole spiritual constitution, by putting an unnatural strain upon it, that God never intended it to bear.

"The three or four passages that are thought to confirm the traditional view have been examined in a volume entitled, 'The Glory of Christ in the Creation and Reconciliation of all Things' (Longmans), and been found either to entirely fail in lending it even the appearance of support, or to be but as dust in the balance against the overpowering weight of testimony on the other side.

"Samuel Minton, Incumbent of Eaton Chapel, Eaton Square."

_________

60 I see, as I have ever seen in like cases, simply Satan and the will of man, in the paper of Mr. M. on "The Eternity of Evil." The accompanying inquiry,* is in a different spirit; but it is a mere fallacy. The scripture does not merely teach that the "wages of sin is death," though this be true; it states that after death comes the judgment - that is, that the whole proper final punishment of sin is after death. It never speaks of everlasting death; it does several times of everlasting punishment or torment. This no one can deny. That is, the facts are quite opposed to what the inquirer states. It does speak of everlasting destruction. But this proves, not that they cease to exist, but that destruction does not mean what they say, as it may last. And those who hold these doctrines admit it does last, and may a long time, for the everlasting destruction is at the coming of the Lord to be glorified in His saints (that is, at the beginning of their punishment, not at the end). That is, "destruction" does not mean their ceasing to exist. Adam was not threatened with never-ending torments! Quite true. Life, incorruptibility, and wrath from heaven (though gathered from a few passages in the Old Testament, and rightly) were not revealed and brought to light but by the gospel. The gospel does speak expressly of everlasting punishment. And everlasting (though accommodated to what lasts as long as the thing it is attached to - to what only ceases with the existence of the object spoken of) yet properly means eternal, always existing. We read of the "eternal God," the "eternal Spirit," and "eternal redemption," and "eternal inheritance," and "eternal life." It means eternal, or everlasting; and eternal life and eternal punishment go together in Matthew 25, as of equivalent import as to the word 'eternal.' Any attempt to get rid of the force of this word, proves the will of him who attempts it, and nothing else. Further, the same words are used as to torment and the existence of God. He lives "for ever and ever," and they are tormented "for ever and ever," Rev. 14: 11.

{*"The bible teaches that 'the wages of sin is death'; its general teaching is not endless pain, but everlasting death and destruction. Adam was not threatened with never-ending torments. Do favour me with your thoughts on this great subject."}

63 1. As to the first statement of the accompanying paper, it is false. Scripture does not speak of everlasting destruction after the infliction of many or few stripes. It is simply false; it speaks of everlasting destruction from His presence, when Christ comes, and it speaks of many or few stripes at the same time in Luke not after; proving quite the contrary - that destruction does not mean ceasing to exist.

2. Destruction does not mean causing to cease to exist. "The lost sheep of the house of Israel" is the same word. "O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself." "Carest thou not that we perish?" Destruction cannot be everlasting, if it means causing to cease to exist. Indeed, it is not said (which I merely note to shew the carelessness of the writer) that "God will destroy both body and soul in hell," but that He is able. Man can only kill the body. It is a question of power to be feared.

3. As to the third, it is clap-trap; and when Scripture is consulted, it proves the contrary. In Deuteronomy 4: 24, God is a jealous God, a consuming fire, and Israel are destroyed (that is, perish off the land, and are scattered). They are destroyed, and perish, but do not cease to exist.

64 4. This, again, proves the idle inattention to Scripture on this weighty subject. If devouring adversaries means ceasing to exist, it is the end of sore punishment, and is the same result as for those who died without mercy. Yet it is "much sorer punishment"; that is, the whole principle of interpretation is careless and false.

5. As to this, the scripture never says anything of the kind. The people are compared to beasts, not the destruction. The word, too, itself is used here for moral corruption, shewing it does not mean mere ceasing to exist. Compare 1 Corinthians 3: 17 in Greek.

6. As to this, Scripture says nothing of the kind. This is too bad, because Scripture speaks expressly of the second death, which is the lake of fire; that is, as far as language goes, that he does lose his life more than once. A second death is declared to be the torment of the lake of fire, not its termination; at any rate, a second death is a statement of losing life more than once. I notice it to shew the extreme carelessness of assertion; for I do not believe that, in the full sense of ceasing to exist, life ceases in either case.

7. In saying he that does the will of God abides for ever, it is wholly in contrast with the fashion of this world, and there is no allusion to the wicked, good or bad; nothing is said about them. Elsewhere it is taught that they survive death, and are punished eternally.

8. It is false; it speaks of incorruptibility, which Scripture distinguishes from immortality; and in the passage, a state of glory is referred to, not the mortality, nor immortality, of the soul, neither of which is spoken of.

9. Of this I have spoken. It is dishonest, because all admit judgment comes after.

10. Eternal life and immortality are distinct things. Christ is eternal life (see 1 John 1), and God gives it us in giving Christ; nor is it ever said even to be in us, but in His Son; and so we have it. Eternal life is in the Son; and he that has the Son, has life. This the wicked have not. The angels are immortal, but they are never said to have eternal life. There is no such thought as that eternal life is the common possession of all men; there is, that men have immortal, undying souls - a very different thing.

65 11. It is a gross blunder. The punishment of the wicked is not the work of the devil; he is in the punishment himself.

12. This, again, is quite false. Destruction is a strange reconciliation! But it is not said. It is said, in Colossians, that God will reconcile all things to Himself, in heaven and in earth, by Christ. But in Philippians it is said that all things bow, in heaven and in earth and under the earth (infernal), shewing that there are things forced to bow which are not reconciled.

13. It is another blunder. All things are said to consist in Him now, or subsist by Him; and so, if this argument be of any avail, the devil and wicked men do so now - and may much more reasonably when presented. But it speaks of all as creatures simply being upheld in existence by Him, as they must be by God. There is no kingdom at all.

14. It proves simply nothing. It speaks of spiritual life. "He that hath not the Son, hath not life"; but he is fully alive now in this world; existence has nothing to do with the matter. All this is really trifling with Scripture.

But I have a word to add. The doctrine presented does not say all. I have not, according to it, an immortal soul, now or at all, but a mere animal life, such as a beast has, though superior in degree of intelligence. God, it may be alleged, could give eternal life to a beast. Be it so; but the beast cannot be responsible for sin while he is a beast, nor repent of what he had done; nor can I; nor can any atonement be made for it. Thus, with a pretended doctrine of eternal life and love and mercy, responsibility, repentance, and atonement disappear. This is wholly of Satan. Scripture everywhere teaches these truths; and I cite, as first distinctly establishing it, the case of Cain; Gen. 4: 6, 7. The creation of man brings out as distinctly as possible, the difference of man's position as to his soul; Gen. 1: 24. "And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind." And man is not included. "God saw that it was good." It was the subject creation; man's is taken up apart in verse 26, when man is created in God's image, and after His likeness. And the manner is taught in chapter 2: 7. He formed man out of the dust, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. That is, it was by a direct communication from God Himself that he became a living soul.

Hence we are declared, in Acts 17, to be the offspring of God. And the body is distinctly and expressly said to be mortal, in contrast with the soul, as in 1 Corinthians 15, 2 Corinthians 4, etc. And where it is said, "Be not afraid of them which kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do . . . . Fear him who, after he hath killed, hath power to cast into hell." The testimony of Scripture is express; "their [not, the] worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched." "These shall go away into everlasting punishment." It is not punishment, if there is no one to bear punishment; and the contrast with life leaves no ambiguity as to the force of everlasting.

66 There is a passage which illustrates this doctrine: "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die."

I can only briefly reply to what is before me. It is much more elaborately taught in other publications. Nor does it in any shape approve itself to a right-feeling mind. A hater of God, if immortal, must be miserable when time has ceased to be. Pure vengeance for a lengthened period on which is to perish is gratuitous misery. I admit fully this is no proof. It merely shews that what men may allege as better to attract may, when rightly viewed, repel as offensive.

The remarks of Mr. M. seem to me singularly weak and careless; but it is these I have to meet here. I know it is spreading; but so is infidelity in other shapes. I have had a good deal to say to the doctrine elsewhere. Responsibility and the atonement are lost, and must be so, wherever it is received. It is simply a work of Satan. It is infidelity even as to what man is; for in this case we are beasts with a bigger brain. The creation of man directly contradicts this.

Letter on Immortality and Everlasting Punishment

J. N. Darby.

<33008E> 67

My dear brother,

As this question, this evil heresy, is the one by which, most commonly just now, Satan seeks to perplex the minds of the simple, I write a line to you in connection with the tract sent to me. A great many human names are introduced, but Scripture is little inquired into. In this doctrine the great point of consequence to me is that the true character and import of sin, of atonement, of repentance, are overlooked, and the responsibility of man. Atonement is either denied or dropped out. Here it is entirely dropped out. Now it is evident, if temporary punishment is the whole desert of sin, Christ had only to suffer accordingly. Repentance is proportionate. And one of the chief teachers in the United States declared in his book, that the deep distress of conscience and terror about sin committed was a base servile fear and wrong. To one who found he had lost the atonement and the sense of responsibility out of his mind, and who asked him what he made of responsibility, he replied, it was impossible to reconcile it with his system, but he saw it in Scripture, and so did not deny it. They insist that souls of men and beasts are the same, and plead Genesis to this end - all in whom was the breath of life perished in the flood - that beasts have a living soul and so has man. If this be so (that we have more intelligence, but a living soul like a beast's), you cannot charge a beast with sin, nor make Christ die to put away a beast's sins. What did Christ do for us - not as giving life, but in the way of atonement? That is the grave question. Again, they confound eternal life and immortality, which is not honest.

Save as to the immortality of God, where it declares death, of course, has no part, mortality and immortality as to men, are applied solely to the body and have nothing to do with eternal life. Eternal life is what we have in the Second Adam: the question is the condition of the first. Thus, "when this mortal shall have put on immortality," "the life of Jesus in our mortal flesh." The places are these - Romans 6: 12, "mortal body"; chap. 8: 11, "mortal bodies"; 1 Corinthians 15: 53, "this mortal"; verse 54, where it is the resurrection, that is, the body (or change); 2 Corinthians 4: 11, "our mortal flesh"; v. 4, "mortality swallowed up of life," when he speaks of the tabernacle we are groaning in. Mortality is always of the body; immortality is put in contrast with mortality (not mortality of the soul, but of your present mortal condition). 1 Corinthians 15: 53, 54, is the change from a mortal state. Otherwise it is used only of God. In 1 Timothy 6: 16, He is undying in nature. Mortal is applied to our present state, but is not applied to the soul at all. That God only has immortality does not affect an undying existence conferred; for angels are not mortal, as all admit, and as Luke 20: 36 shews. With these and the state of the fallen angels these teachers never trouble themselves. Men must not suffer; their love goes no farther than themselves. Now the everlasting punishment is prepared for the devil and his angels, and there the judged of Matthew 25 are sent; so Revelation 20: 10, 15; chap. 21: 8.

68 As to the life we have naturally, beasts were formed by God's word out of the ground, and there the ordinary creation ended, and then beasts were pronounced good; Gen. 1: 25. And then God proceeds in solemn consultation to form man as His image, as lord of all that had been created, and in His likeness, and first makes him a frame out of the dust, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man by partaking of what came directly from God became a living soul (not at all as the beasts), God's image on the earth. Hence he is called (Acts 17) His offspring. He has a spirit as well as a mere soul, when the distinction needs to be made, which death does not touch. We are not to fear them which kill the body and after that have no more that they can do - that death does not touch what is beside bodily life. I will speak of "destroy" in good time; but death leaves the soul in existence, not merely the souls of saints. When the resurrection was called into question by the Sadducees, it is not said of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob only, that they are alive, nor is this founded on their being saints, though they were such, but it is added, "for all live unto him." Death does not affect the soul, All live, not for man indeed on the earth but, for God.

The case of Lazarus and Dives clearly teaches the same solemn truth; the sinner was as much alive as the saint. They allege that this is a Jewish figure. I admit it fully as to the form; but it is not a figure of a person's not existing. The second death is the lake of fire - is punishment. They allege that it burns man out in time, and that ceasing to exist is the second death; but Scripture says the punishment is itself the second death. Death never means ceasing to exist.

69 Then as to this word "everlasting." It is incontrovertible that its proper sense is everlasting. It is defined carefully to mean it by Aristotle and Philo (the last a religious Jewish writer of the apostles' age) and others. Scripture speaks of the eternal God, the eternal Spirit, the eternal inheritance, eternal redemption; and what makes it conclusively evident that the word in itself means it is the statement of the apostle in 2 Corinthians 4: "The things which are seen are temporal, and the things which are not seen are eternal," where it is used in express contrast with temporal, without any subject (as they allege) which on other grounds shews what it means. So eternal life and eternal punishment are used in direct contrast - eternal life is in Christ, the gift of God. It is only named twice in the Old Testament, and both refer to the millennium (Dan. 12; Psalm 133); for life and incorruptibility were brought to light by the gospel. In Romans 2: 7 it is incorruptibility, not immortality.

None of the quotations following, apply to the subject at all. I have eternal life now; yet I am as mortal as ever. That life is not touched in any way when I die; 2 Cor. 5: 6-8. It is in full glory, when I get a glorious body; mortality or immortality it has nothing to do with, nor they with it. It is "life and incorruptibility" which are brought to light by the gospel. There is a resurrection of the unjust as of the just. They subsist meanwhile, or there is no one to raise; their judgment comes after their death. At any rate eternal life does not touch OF take away mortality - has nothing to do with it, nor does it give immortality. It is only the darkness of common doctrine that has given rise to these statements, which have no real foundation at all. "All live unto him." Destroying the body does not touch the soul. "Who only hath immortality" does not apply to created existence. The angels are not mortal as we are, but they have no existence independent of God any more than we have.

Dr. Whately is wrong altogether - * "of those only," he says, "who shall," etc. Now it is not so. Immortality is only used twice, applied only to the body, and when it has ceased to be mortal.

{*"It is certain that the words, 'life,' 'eternal life,' 'immortality,' etc., are always applied to the condition of those, and of those only, who shall at the last day be approved as 'good and faithful servants,' who are to 'enter into the joy of their Lord.'" DR. WHATELY.}

70 Another thing important to remark here is the abuse of the word "die." We may be quite right in seeing, as spiritual persons, that men may be dead while they live; and that we may be dead in sin, as towards God, when alive; and that the judgment of death implies estrangement from God, as the gift of life is bringing us, in principle, in blessedness to Him. But dying in its positive sense is never applied to the soul. Thus Ezekiel 18, constantly quoted for this, and used by good people with good intentions, speaks only of death in this world - present judgment here; not for a father's, but for our own sins.

Quoting such a passage as "He that hath not the Son of God hath not life" proves utter confusion of mind; for if I were a living sinner, I have not life in that sense, yet am alive all the same; and if I never died at all, was not mortal as to the body, I should not have it a bit more. What lost life has the sinner no power to regain? Not the fact of life (namely, conscious existence); he has it as much as ever. It does not touch the question; and I know from Christ's word that death to which I am sentenced does not affect the soul. Why so diligently confound spiritual life and actual existence? And this is the whole secret of the way they puzzle people - poor work! Death as judgment on man may intimate a great deal more, just as life does. But "thou shalt surely die" was bringing in mortality; and hence man was not allowed to touch the tree of life lest he should eat and live for ever - live for ever as a sinner in the world. Here, as a matter of fact, God was not precluding him from getting spiritual life; and if when actually alive, as he was, he had eaten of the other tree, he would not have died at all. Immortality in his then state, before or after the fall, would have been immortality as a living man as he then was. The death threatened we have plainly declared to us - "till thou return unto the ground, for out of it wast thou taken; for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return."Did the spirit God breathed into Adam come out of the dust? It returns to God who gave it; and the body will be raised, and then judgment come, and only then the award of sin by judgment. The corruption of the body is only an intermediate state. common alike to saints and sinners, just as death itself is, save by special intervention of God's power.

71 As to union with the Saviour giving life, it is all a blunder. It has no such effect. None but already quickened ones are united, and that by the Holy Ghost. I need not say that all he speaks of the end of all things at a common resurrection is no part of our belief; but it is one of the acts of Satan to take fresh light and use it, where it has not been, to pour in his darkness.

The statement of everlasting punishment to a simple soul is as plain as possible in Scripture: "These shall go away into everlasting punishment, and the righteous into everlasting life." To a simple soul it would be monstrous to say that "everlasting" was not meant to mean the same thing. They are "tormented for ever and ever." Death gives up all it held, into the lake of fire - that is, for ever and ever; the same word always used in that book for God's existence. "They are punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord." Now everlasting destruction has no sense if non-existence be meant by destruction. Total destruction I understand; but everlasting destruction in such a sense, is nonsense. And in this case, on their own theory, it is no destruction then at all; for 2 Thessalonians 1 is at the beginning of the millennium, when, according to their own system, and my own full conviction, they are not destroyed at all.

This leads me to the word "destroy." It is, like death, used for the ruin of a present state of things, even moral ruin, not for cessation of existence. "O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in me is thy help." "I am not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel" - the same word. "He that loseth [destroyeth] his life for my sake, shall save it." "Carest thou not that we perish?" Zacharias "perished between the temple and the altar." Take an English-Greek Concordance, and you will easily see. So destruction; waste of the ointment; the son of perdition; damnable heresies - heresies which ruin people. Moral ruin is meant, as well as destruction of existence, if that is ever meant. The world of the flood perished - the flood came and destroyed them all; Yet they are spirits in prison after that another proof that death destroys no soul; does not mean it. Abaddon and Appolyon are the Hebrew and Greek for destroyer: are they able to make to cease to exist finally? Take "abad" (Englishman's Hebrew Concordance p. 8); I do not think "destroy" is ever used for finally ceasing to exist, but totally ruining as to the state anything has been in. When men are everlastingly destroyed from the presence of the Lord, it confessedly is not so; they then go into punishment; but that is final. And when it is said, "their fire is not quenched," to assert that it means that they do not exist at all is a miserable come-off, not more. It is a figure no one denies, and refers, as is stated, to Isaiah; but the figure is one of the continuous existence of the objects of punishment. "From one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another. shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord; and they shall go forth and look upon the carcases of the men that have transgressed against me, for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched, and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh." It is continuing abiding objects of punishment which are now before the eyes of those who come up. It was not a supply of fresh material, etc. All this is false. The opposite is what God is teaching. It is of continued existence; it is the carcases that were indestructible - at any rate undestroyed: an external matter, no doubt, in Isaiah, and used by the Lord as a figure, but a figure of continued shame and misery, and no fresh supply. And what is the meaning of everlastingly supplying hell, where body and soul are, with fresh materials? "Destroyed for ever," Psalm 92: 7, applied to this world; so Psalm 104: 35, "consumed out of the earth." You may take it as a general rule, that in the Old Testament, judgment, destruction, etc., refer to this world, though a future state is referred to in the Psalms.

72 Again, the passage "seek for glory, honour, and immortality," immortality is incorruptibility. God is immortal in His present existence - cannot die. Man is looked at, when spoken of as such, as body and soul, and now mortal in that condition; and mortality is used only in respect of his existence in the body, and immortality too, only in another state. In Romans 2: 7 and 2 Timothy 1: 10, it is incorruptibility; but it is always a state in the body, now mortal, then immortal (i.e., the soul separable from the body or inseparable). It does not touch the question, though habit uses it for it. Ignorance or dishonesty can alone quote the word. Angels are acknowledged to be immortal - and what we have to do is to learn from Scripture what becomes of that which was directly communicated from God when He breathed into man's nostrils, and which, most certainly from Scripture, death does not touch.

73 I have already said eternal life has nothing to do with it; I am as mortal when I have it as before. Now Scripture is positive that death does not touch the soul. It subsists after death and apart from the body. There could not in their use of it be a second death, if it meant ceasing to exist. Death does not mean for men ceasing to exist; neither does the second death. That is going into the lake of fire, not getting out of it. And this driving out of the presence of the Lord is for ever; punishment is everlasting. When dead, all live for God; when raised, they are cast into the lake of fire, and that is the second death, and the final state spoken of. They shall then have their part in it. This is "for ever and ever" - the term used for the duration of God's own life, and the duration of His glory; Rev. 4: 9; ch. 5: 13, 14. It is exclusion from the presence and dwelling-place of God: "Without are dogs," etc. The time when God is all in all, and no more death, sorrow, etc., is the time when the evil are cast into the lake of fire. For death is separation of soul and body, which will never take place again. There will be no more dying, but just punishment on the raised wicked, but no more death; that and hades are over. But that judgment is destruction from the presence of the Lord.

What they specially insist on is that, till we get eternal life, we have, though more intelligent, life like any other animal. Now the falseness of this is evident. So we have seen, we are God's offspring, but I speak of it for another purpose now. I have a conscience; I have a soul that can hate God and did - formed to have to say to Him - that can be rebellious and disobedient, and enter into appeals to my conscience. In a word, I am a moral being. When I am converted, I feel how I have failed as to my previous responsibility; I repent, I feel I am guilty - liable to judgment from God: what has this to do with animal life? If I get eternal life, it makes me look backward on all my previous course as guilt, as subjecting me to divine punishment. When I know myself, I know that the mind of the flesh is enmity against God. God claims moral authority over the unconverted man. For these sins Christ, I find, has died. I was dead in sins. With Him I have died to sin. If I am a mere nephesh chayah,* as they speak (and we are that physically), I cannot repent nor think of atonement for what I did as such. The idea of sin is lowered. All there is, is merely a temporary punishment for certain faults which takes place now and also hereafter. For Scripture, it is enmity against God, and the remaining so is infinite misery, when the veil of sense is taken away and final judgment pronounced. The atonement, responsibility, the true sense of sin, repentance, all go when this fatal falsehood and device of Satan gets into the mind. It is a soul as to its nature capable of hatred and love of God. Would you put the cleverest elephant into this place of responsibility? or could it have a need for its sins to be borne?

{*Living soul (Hebrew).}

74 If you deal with a simple soul, shew it the plain language of Scripture: "These shall go away into everlasting punishment." Conscience will tell what that means, and if they have been dealt with to prove eternal does not mean eternal, shew them what is said in 2 Corinthians 4: 18; and simple souls, souls where Satan's wiles have not polluted them, will bow to the plain word of God. I have nothing to do with popular statements (though better, if essentially sound, than these immoral deceits); but the conscious subsistence of the soul after death, and eternal judgment and punishment of the wicked, are as plainly taught in Scripture as possible. Men have spoken of it (though sound in intentions) in a way designing people can lay hold of, specially from the Lord's coming not having been seen. But the word of God is clear. It does not detail the misery as it does the blessing, and this is its perfection; but it declares it, and this is right. "I am" is essential existence. No other word is used for the duration of God's existence which is not used for that of the punishment and torment of the wicked. And while a few persons have been scandalised who seek their own thoughts and take their own feelings, when there is no just sense of what their sins have deserved (for this is the secret of it), how many thousands of thousands have been awakened by the just terror of judgment!

I write thus to you because you will have to say to it. I have not entered into all, nor could in this letter. Save a few misapplied texts, there is no serious investigation of Scripture, as bearing on a responsible soul, the offspring of God - no sense of what sin is; and that is the evil of the matter.

The Deity of Christ and what constitutes Christianity;

Being an answer to the enquiries of an Unitarian student of Divinity.

J. N. Darby.

<33009E> 75

In the first place, there are the direct passages - John 1: 1: "The Word was with God, and was God." This is in every way a striking passage: when every thing began, He was - that is, had no beginning, was God, as indeed it must be, yet was a distinct personality; He was with God, and always such, was so in the beginning, that He created everything. Subsequently we find the Word made flesh. The effort to weaken the force of the word of God here by the absence of the article is perfectly futile; unless in reciprocal propositions the predicate never has the article.

We find in Hebrews 1 the same truths. He the Messiah, for of Him he speaks, the Son, is God, is worshipped by angels, in the beginning laid the foundations of the earth, and is "the same" - in Hebrew (Psalm 102), atta Hu, Thou art the existing One, the Being, where the testimony is so much the stronger by comparison with verse 12 of the Psalm, where Christ in humiliation addresses Jehovah.

In John 8 we find, "before Abraham was I AM," in contrast with His age as man; which the Jews perfectly understood, and would have killed Him for blasphemy.

Colossians 1: 16: "All things were created by him and for him," where it is unquestionable Christ is spoken of, the true force of verse 19 being "all the fulness (pleroma) was pleased to dwell in Him," and spoken of Him as man living upon earth, and accomplished in fact in chapter 2: 9, "in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily."

John 10: "I and my Father are one."

His name is called Jesus - Jehoshua, that is, Jehovah the Saviour, for He shall save His people - who, and whose people, in connection with the explanation of such a name? Christ is the Jehovah of the Old Testament. Thus John 12, Isaiah saw His glory, and spoke of Him, quoting Isaiah 6. Whose glory was seen there? Jehovah of hosts.

Hebrews 12: 24-26: whose voice spoke from heaven (compare chap. 1: 1, 2) - whose at Sinai on earth? Hence His name was also Emmanuel, God with us.

76 So John the Baptist's ministry was preparing the way of Jehovah, Matthew 3: 3, quoting Isaiah 40: Malachi 3: 1, "I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me, and Jehovah, whom ye seek, shall come." (Compare Mark 1: 41.) If the judgment to come on the earth is referred to, difference of interpretation as to this, or the passing on from Christ's first coming to His second, does not affect the question of the Person who comes; He who first came will come again.

The more we compare passages as to this, the more we shall see this identification, and that it is not forcing one or two texts, but the doctrine of Scripture woven into its whole texture. Jehovah is Israel's righteousness, but Christ is made our righteousness. "The Lord (Jehovah) my God shall come, and all his saints with thee" (Zech. 14: 5) . "and Jehovah said . . . a goodly price that I was prized at of them, and I took the thirty pieces of silver," etc. "Then shall Jehovah go forth . . . and his feet shall stand in that day on the Mount of Olives," chaps. 11, 14. So, as to Redeemer, Jehovah alone is their Redeemer. In Isaiah 63 this Redeemer is clearly Christ. So in Isaiah 50: "Thus saith Jehovah . . . . Wherefore when I came was there no man?" And then He goes on, and asserts His unenfeebled divine power, yet He continues, "Jehovah-elohim hath given me the tongue of the learned," and the sufferings of Christ are then spoken of.

In Psalm 2 the kings of the earth are called to trust in the Son - the Christ - yet a curse is pronounced on trusting in man, or in any one but Jehovah. See Revelation 22, He who comes quickly is Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, the first and the last. (I do not quote chapter 1: 11, as it is probably not genuine, nor verse 8, because its application to Christ may be questioned, although I have no doubt of it.)

In many of the passages in which God and the Lord Jesus are mentioned, with one article in Greek, it may possibly unite them, only in the subject matter of the sentence. Hence, although I think they prove a great deal as to the identification of God and the Lord Jesus, I do not quote them as simply proving, in an absolute way, the divinity of Christ. But the force of the passage in Titus is apparent, "Waiting for the appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ." It is unquestionably Christ who appears; as it is now in the face of Jesus Christ that we see the glory of the Lord.

77 This unity of God and Christ is manifest throughout John's writings, "I and my Father are one." "We are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life." Take, again, such an example - for it is only an example - "And now, little children, abide in him, that when he shall appear we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before him at his coming. If ye know that he is righteous, ye know that every one that doeth righteousness is born of Him. Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God; therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not. Beloved, now are we the sons of God; and it does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is." Now, who will say to whom this applies Christ, or God? It is impossible to distinguish them. What characterises all the writings of John, in the language of Christ, is One who has the place and title of perfect equality, yet now being a Man, takes nothing, never glorifies Himself, but receives all from His Father, as in John 17. In them we have God over all, blessed for ever (Rom. 9: 5), which, I doubt not, for my part, is the only true sense; and other passages I do not quote, as they are matters of criticism. Indeed, I have only cited such as suggest themselves to my memory. So Thomas - "My Lord and my God."

But there is another class of tests, which to the mind, sensible of what is due to God, evidently shew who He is. Grace coming from Him, as is found everywhere - "Out of his fulness have we all received, and grace for grace." Christ is all. His love passes knowledge. Christ is to dwell in my heart by faith. If Christ be to me what the scripture says He is to be to me, and be not God, He must exclude God altogether. The very fact that Christ made Himself of no reputation when in the form of God, is again a moral proof of His divine nature. Every creature was bound to keep its first estate; He who was high and sovereign could, in grace, come down and take another nature.

Everything confirms this. He does not merely work miracles and cast out devils, but sends others out, and gives them authority over all devils. When He says, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up," who was dwelling in the temple? This kind of proof shines forth in every page of the gospels, and to the mind whose eye is open to see, affords a proof more powerful even than individual texts stating it in the letter, as I speak of the letter.

78 Let me add the remark, that when it is said the fulness of the Godhead dwells in Him bodily, it is not a vague word, as we speak of what is divine. The Greek has a distinct word for these two things; for the vague thought it is theiotees, used in Romans 1; and theotees, used in Colossians 2.

Where the leper says, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst, and He says, I will, be thou clean - who can so speak? The proofs that He is a man must not be cited against it. We hold to this as anxiously as any one. His being God is only of special value to us because He is man - a true very man, though a sinless one - God with us, and then we in Him before God - One who took flesh and blood, that He might die, and partook of flesh and blood because the children were partakers of it - a dependent, obedient man, who, though He had life in Himself, lived by every word that proceeded out of the mouth of God.

When I am called to believe in Jesus Christ come in flesh, which Christians are, they hold He is a man; but why insist on this? If He was simply a man, how else could man come? Not an angel, for an angel must not leave its estate, and He did not take up angels - words which have no sense if He had been one, and was taking up the cause of others as such. When He says, "the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father," and that He is in the Father, and the Father in Him, the last might be said of a man, perhaps; the former impossible as a mere man, or of any but a divine Person. So, when He says, "None hath ascended up to heaven," that is, to state what is there - "save he that came down from heaven, the Son of man, who is in heaven." And, if all men are to honour the Son even as they honour the Father, it cannot be that He is a mere man, or not have the nature which is to be honoured.

Jehovah has sworn that every knee shall bow to Him, and every tongue give an account of himself to God, but it is at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow. Hence, though the Son quickens whom He will, as the Father, yet the Father judges no man, but hath committed all judgment to the Son, that all may honour the Son as they honour Him. There is no God but Jehovah - I know not any, as says the prophet; but we have seen, by multiplied examples that Christ is Jehovah.

79 That as Son He has taken a place subject to the Father as man, every Christian believes - receives the glory He once had with the Father before the world was - every one who bows to Scripture joyfully accepts; for He is a man for ever, in that sense a servant, but He who is the servant can say, I and my Father are one, and I am in the Father, and he who has seen Him has seen the Father also.

Compare the description of the Ancient of Days in Daniel 7 and Revelation 1, and see if the Ancient of Days, who receives the Son of man in Daniel 7, be not the Son of man in Revelation 1, and in Daniel 7 too; from verse 22 of the chapter the Ancient of Days comes. Hence we have, "the blessed and only Potentate, King of kings, and Lord of lords" - then, the appearing of Christ; but in Revelation He who comes on the white horse has on His vesture and on His thigh, King of kings, and Lord of lords. You see, the more Scripture is gone through, the more comes to light that He is the true God and Eternal Life.

I know not that I need multiply passages, after these I have quoted. What you will remark, is, that it is not a question of expressions as to which criticism may be exercised, but the doctrine and system of Scripture. It is Christianity, as it is given to us in Scripture. I take up Christianity as the truth, and that is Christianity. A religion is what it professes itself to be, and that is what Christianity professes itself to be - the revelation of God, and eternal life in the Person of Christ.

It professes another truth, that is, atonement, or expiation of sin. It does not teach a goodness of God which can bear with any sin, but maintains the perfect holiness of God, and the putting away of sin, but it does it in a way which equally maintains infinite and perfect love. Man instinctively felt the need of expiation. This is publicly known in heathenism; but there it was very much the dread of a god who had passions like ourselves, and men might justly say, tantaene animis coelestibus irae (can such anger dwell in heavenly minds)? Judaism, as revealed of God, maintained this thought, but it began by a deliverance of the people, and witnessed a God not revealed, but who gave commandments, ordained sacrifices, which kept up the thought that sin would in nowise be allowed; but it was the "forbearance of God" in view of a work to be accomplished, the way into the holiest not yet having been made manifest, nor peace given to man's conscience, though it was relieved through sacrifice when occasion called for it; Christ appears in the end of the world to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself; was once offered to bear the sins of many, and give a perfect conscience, without diminishing - nay, in maintaining in the highest way - holiness, in the judgment of sin in the conscience, according to the majesty of God; and withal giving the perfect sense of unbounded love, in that God did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us - the love that gave Christ. Christ gave Himself in a love that is divine, and passes knowledge.

80 The foolish question has been asked, What righteousness is there in an innocent being suffering for the guilty? It is a foolish question. There is no righteousness in my paying my friend's debts. It is kindness, love; but it meets the righteous claim of his creditor. The claims of a holy God are maintained - intolerance of evil; and that is of the last importance for the conscience and heart of man; it gives him the knowledge of what God is in holiness. There is no true love without it. Indifference to good and evil, so that the evil-doer is let pass with his evil, is not love, and the dissociation of right and wrong, by God's authority - the highest possible evil. Now, good and evil are elevated to the standard of it in God's nature. We walk in the light, as God is in the light, and the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanses from all sin. The glory of God is maintained, and the heart of man placed in association with the perfectness of that nature, and in peace with the perfect knowledge of His love, and that is the highest blessing, the highest good. Diminish the holiness, diminish the love - I have not God, I have not my soul formed into communion with Him. Take away the character of judgment or righteousness exercised, as regards evil, and you obliterate the authority of God - the creation, place, and responsibility of man.

This part of the truth, again, enters into the whole texture of Scripture, from Abel to the allusions to it in Revelation. I shall merely quote a sufficient number of passages to shew that Christianity must be given up, as taught by Christ and His apostles, if expiation be. I do not quote the Old Testament; expiatory sacrifices are, beyond all question, its doctrine, and prophetic testimony is clear that He was wounded for our transgressions, the chastisement of our peace laid upon Him, and that with His stripes we are healed; that He made His soul a sacrifice for sin, and that He bare our iniquities.

81 When I turn to the New Testament, I find Christ stating that He came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many (Matt. 20: 28). The Lord's supper - the standing institution of Christianity - is the sign of His blood shed for many, for the remission of sins. John the Baptist points Him out as the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world; John 1: 29. Paul tells us that God hath set Him forth as a propitiation, through faith in His blood (Rom. 3: 25); Peter, that we are redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot (1 Pet. 1: 18, 19); John, that He is the propitiation for our sins and the whole world (1 John 2: 2); Peter, again, that He bare our sins in His own body on the tree; 1 Pet. 2: 24. The Hebrews enlarges on it fully as a doctrine. He must offer for sins (chap. 9). He offers one sacrifice for sins, and then sits down (chap. 10). We have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins; Eph. 1: 7. We are justified by His blood; Rom. 5: 9. Without shedding of blood is no remission; Heb. 9: 22. He gave Himself for our sins; Gal. 1: 4. It is when He had made the purification of our sins that He sat down on the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens; Heb. 1: 3. Cleansing, justification, forgiveness, peace, redemption, are all attributed to His blood. He bare our sins, gave Himself for our sins, makes propitiation for the world, is delivered for our offences.

As I have said, it is a doctrine interwoven with all Scripture, forms one of the bases of Christianity, is the sole ground of remission - and there is none without shedding blood - and that by which Christ has made peace; Col. 1: 20. The thought that He was sealing merely His doctrines by His death is utterly groundless, it is never stated as its force in Scripture, expiation is constantly; and if it was a mere testimony - perfect as He was in it - it does not serve for one, for the testimony would be, that the most faithful of men was forsaken of God. What testimony would that be? Take out expiation, and Scripture becomes impossible to understand: introduce it, and all is plain.

I have not written a treatise, but simply recalled what must present itself to every unprejudiced reader of Scripture, as memory furnished it, and what the soul convinced of sin cannot do without. If Christ be not God, I do not know Him, have not met Him, nor know what He is. No man can by searching find it out. If Christ has not offered Himself as a sacrifice for sin, then I had neither peace of conscience according to the holiness of God - but pass lightly over the guilt of sin, remaining at a distance from God - nor do I know God's love, who so loved as not to spare His own Son. There is no true knowledge of sin without it, no true knowledge of God.

Development

J. N. Darby.

<33010E> 83

I deny absolutely development in divine things. In the human mind there is development; in the present truth there cannot be, for God has been revealed. There is no revelation more, nor meant to be any. Individuals may learn more and more, but it is there to be learned. The Scriptures give two positive grounds for this - that I am to continue in what I have learned as the only true ground of safety, and that I know of whom I have learned them. There is a negative ground of proof - the apostles committing us, when they should be gone, to that which would be a security for us. If the Person of Christ be the foundation-truth of Christianity, as Scripture declares it is, as the Son revealing the Father, it is clear there can be no development. His Person cannot be developed.

I quite understand it will be said, Of course not; but the revelation of it can. Equally impossible. He Himself is wholly fully revealed, and reveals the Father. The Holy Ghost has revealed, and is, the truth. Hence John, who treats this subject, declares that was to continue (abide in them) which they had learned, and they would so abide in the Father and in the Son. They could not have more. If any doctrine "other than (para, beyond, or on one side, besides) that which we have preached," says Paul, was preached, neither the doctrine nor the preacher was to be received. If the church did not possess fully the revelation of the Father in the glorified Son by the Holy Ghost, it did not possess Christ at all as there revealed. If it did, it could not be added to nor developed. If it did add to it, it falsified Christ. That men speculated about it, and their foolish and irreverent speculations had to be rebuked, repressed, corrected, this is true; but whatever was more than returning to the simplicity of the first revelation, or went beyond its fulness, was pure mischief. Either the apostles and first church had a full revelation of Christ, or the church never was founded on it. If they had, there was no development of it. So of His work. It is complete, or the church is not saved; it was completely revealed, or the church had not its ground of justification and peace. If it had, there was no development. That much was lost, I believe. The greatest stickler for church authority does not pretend the church receives a fresh revelation. He merely says that the church pronounces on truth as having been revealed. But then there can be no development. Till revelation was complete, there were further truths unfolded, but it was by revelation. Once that is complete, all is closed; and Christianity completes it. The word of God is fulfilled, completed, says Paul to the Colossians. We are to walk in the light, as God is in the light It was an unction of the Holy One, by which we know all things. "The Spirit," says the apostle, "searcheth all things, even the deep things of God." And then the apostle tells us he spoke by the Holy Spirit, in words which He taught. The true light now shines. We have the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. The Holy Ghost may guard the saints against error, and shew it is error; but the apostles were guided into all truth. Thus John, in a passage quoted, "Let that therefore abide in you which ye have heard from the beginning. If that which ye have heard from the beginning abide in you, ye also shall continue in the Son and in the Father." We have "the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." So Paul: "Continue thou in the things that thou hast learned, knowing of whom thou hast learned them." Paul, in going, commends them to God, and the word of His grace, as sufficient. Peter writes that they should have, after his decease, these things always in remembrance. As Tertullian justly says, "What is first is the truth." If Eutyches introduces error, Eutyches may be condemned, and truth stated; yet this is not development, but maintenance of the truth as it had been revealed.

84 It is plain, then, that the church does not teach; the teacher teaches. The church abides in and professes the truth she has learned. She is, or ought to be, the pillar and ground of the truth; but she does not teach it. The mystery of iniquity began in the apostles' days: the last days were already come. The Truth was there; but men, like Satan, abode not in it. But abiding in it, walking in it, in the truth perfectly revealed in Christ, this was the duty of the saint, even if the professing church would not, and the time should come when they would turn away from the truth, as Paul declared they would

Letters on the Revised New Testament

J. N. Darby.

<33011E> 85

My dear -,

I have no pretension, with the leisure or ability I have, to give even a summary view of the Revision of the New Testament, which now occupies every one. But it seems to me, that, while there are many excellent changes in it, it is, for any practical purpose, a failure. It might seem invidious in one who has published a new translation to comment on this; perhaps presumptuous for an individual, when so many learned men have been engaged in it. But I might quote a crowd of passages in which they have adopted as their version what I had also adopted from the Greek, and that in some very important passages, besides a crowd of less important ones. I do not set about to criticise their text, though I should strongly demur to some changes; nor do I pretend to have gone through the whole in detail. But where the word of God is in question, our minds should rise above all considerations but one: Is the mind of God, as given in His word, substantially afforded us in what we possess in the Revision? Two objects may be sought in it, to this end: it may be before us as a public Bible for the country, taking the place of the Authorised Version; or as a book of reference for the student of the word, to have a more sure and certain sound for his own soul. It does not seem to me it can be either. If, indeed, it had, so to speak, a divine stamp upon it as a translation, this might have overcome the nature influences of a long and, in very many excellent qualities, justly cherished translation. But I do not think this is so. We have many appliances in the version - learning, scholarship, textual criticism, and, I do not a moment doubt, assiduous care. But I do not see the mind of Christ, the spiritual-mindedness which alone can reproduce the word of God; nor do I think there is a fine sense of many Greek usages of words, nor of the finer shades of English ones. The definite article is put in, with no notice that it is not in the Greek, where it makes a very great difference. Thus Kurios (Lord), without the article for Jehovah following the LXX, and the Lord, what the Lord Jesus became. God hath made Him "both Lord and Christ." You have the two in Psalm 110: "Jehovah said unto my Lord." The distributive article, "a," is put in where, without it, the word gives the character of the person or thing spoken of. Thus, "a righteousness of God," so that you might think there were several, whereas, "righteousness of God," is in contrast with righteousness of man. In some cases this only drops the true force. "Paul an apostle," as one of many, instead of, "Paul, apostle of Jesus Christ," simply what he was.

86 So they have added pronouns, which destroy the whole force of the scriptural statement. Thus they have added "our" to redemption - "in whom we have our redemption" - instead of, "redemption." Now, "our" redemption is our personal deliverance - a great and saving blessing surely - but redemption is the great and stupendous work of the Saviour. I would add, before going further, that I can gather why they have used pronouns with it, namely, to distinguish it from the price of redemption, such as antilutron - ransom price. But this does not in the least authorise the use of the pronoun not in scripture, raising a question as to its limits, and making it solely something about us, which scripture does not. The thing itself is lost, in its application to us, whoever we are.

They have in no way the force of the preposition en, in Greek. Thus, "hath at the end of these days spoken to us in his Son," but that is not the force of "in Son"; difficult it may be to translate into English, and the margin is worse - an example of their use of "a." "In Son" is the character of the speaking, as contrasted with the prophets. The italics of this save the translation here a little; but it is as doing a thing (en pneumati), in Spirit - (en sarki), in flesh. The Greek en has a very varied force, from its abstract nature, especially when used anarthrously; i.e., without the article.

I take up some passages now which are crucial. First, Romans 1: 17. "Therein is revealed a righteousness of God" - "a righteousness of God" I have already noted, it is as if there were several - but "a righteousness of God by faith unto faith." Now this changes the whole sense of the passage; the Greek has apokaluptetai ek pisteos, is revealed by faith, if "by" be used, but that is nonsense; so, to use "by," they have transferred ek pisteos to 'righteousness,' separating it from 'revealing.' The point is, it is righteousness of God, hence clearly not man's work - it is revealed already, of course, in existence to be so. Is it revealed on the principle of man's works fitting him for it, or the means of getting it? Clearly not, or it would not be God's righteousness. Is it proclaimed on the principle of faith? whoever believes, then, has it, be he Greek or Jew. The whole statement of what made Paul not ashamed of the gospel is lost; the very hinge of all the truth is broken, the foundation-statement of the gospel gone. The righteousness is a righteousness by faith, something realised in man, not simply "God's righteousness."

87 Verse 23. I object to "for," but it is of minor importance. Verse 28, "refused" is false. Verse 32, "ordinance of God," very bad morally; and the verse very weak. So the instructive abstraction of chapter 2: 15 is taken away. "Therewith" is not in the sentence, and mars it; and the sense of the closing phrase is lost by inserting "them" - it is not what is said. In chapter 1: 17, 18, "righteousness of God," and "wrath of God," may be a little bold, but alone give the sense and are in the fair analogy of the English language - not the abstraction of something known, but what can be known in its nature. Colour is so, and so darkness causes fear; light saves from stumbling. Here "of God" gives the character, but the subject is known.

The "you," in 2 Corinthians 5: 20, destroys the whole bearing of the passage; the Authorised Version had the same.

In Colossians 1: 16 we have, "in him" (Christ), which has no sense at all. It is ignorance of the force of en. It is not 'by' as an instrument (dia), but the power and energy, or character, of that which works - difficult, I admit, to put in English, but they have made nonsense of it. That all things were created by Him is said in John 1; Hebrews 1. En is different; it is the one in, through, whose power a thing is done (Matt. 9: 34; Acts 17: 31). It is used generally for the character in which a thing is done, or the power. "All creation" (Col. 1: 15); though I have much hesitated, I believe the change to be right. "Every creature" makes up the whole creation, but "every creature" takes up each individually; "all creation" takes it up as such, and sets Christ as Head over it as a whole; "first-born of every creature" sets Christ, no doubt, as first among them, but more, apparently, as one of themselves, and this has been used for mischief; but I notice it, as leaving without excuse their translation of Ephesians 2: 21, as the fruit of a doctrinal predilection, of which I will speak more fully further on. It is sad to see verse 19 (Col. 1) retained - a complete change in sense from the Greek, and utterly false. It states that the Father has willed about the whole Godhead, that it should dwell in the Man, Christ: the fact is found in chapter 2: 9, the thought of the Godhead, chapter 1: 19. To those acquainted with Gnostic follies, and Paul and John's use of the word, "the fulness," or "completeness," of Godhead has a distinct and unquestioned force.

88 I am aware that 2 Corinthians 5: 14 and following is a controverted passage; but I cannot but regret that, where it is so, they should lead people wrong, as I have no doubt they have. The question is, is the true sense, "then had all died," or, practically, as in the Authorised Version, "then were all dead"? How does the love of Christ constrain him, as One dying for all, because saints have died to sin? But if all had died through Adam, Christ's descending into death for them all is that by which we know love. The apostle judged that if one died for all, it was because death was the condition of all; and what makes it to me incontrovertibly the sense is, that he speaks of "they that live" as a portion out of them, whereas, if it be the saints dying with Christ, they are the same people. It was not a Messiah of the Jews he now knew, but a Christ who had died for all because of their condition, and was now glorified. The revised passage is, moreover, nonsense - "that one died for all, therefore all died." How did Christ's dying for all make all die?

I take another example of fancied accuracy - 1 John 4: 16: "We know, and have believed, the love that God hath in us," which has no sense at all. In the margin, you have sense made of it, but the translation is wrong, nor do I understand why they put the tenses of the verbs as they do. I quite admit the perfect may be sometimes translated by the present. In the case of the Greek "to possess" it is regularly done so: but why one should be present, and the other past, is hard to tell. It is done so, because the Greek perfect is what is clearly done, but which continues to be, and so is, a present; but here both verbs are perfect.

In Galatians 2: 17 the force of the passage is greatly lost by not seeing the force of the absence of the article. "While" is all wrong; it should be "if, in seeking to be" - then Christ is a minister of sin. "For I through law have died to law." . . . "For if righteousness is through law." So verse 16: "by works of law"; and "save" is very bad, for it would affirm we were, only that it was through faith it was so. So in chapter 3: 18: "law," but not "the" law. There is also a grave question as to the tenses; using imperfect for aorist may be right, no doubt, but may be wrong, as it in English implies a denial of the present: thus, Romans 12: 3, "the grace that was given" - "has been," or simply "given." Chapter 11: 31 maintains the old error, contradicting exactly what he is teaching.

89 Romans 10: 5 is quite false, and justified only by a new reading, but, as a question of criticism, I leave it; but it is a most twisted sentence.

I now take an ordinary passage, where supposed refinement and exactitude has, in my judgment, injured their rendering of the passage, and what needed correction remains as it was, Phil. 1: 4 - I believe a mistake in the stopping. "Always, in every prayer of mine, making," etc. So verse 7: "because you have me in your hearts." Then, "Ye all are partakers with me in the grace," or "in my grace"; that is, took part in helping the activities of the gospel, as he goes on to say. Grace wrought in Paul in both service and suffering, and they shared with him in them. Verse 12, "have happened." They are mistaken in fancying they can render the aorist by the English historical imperfect. There are no aorists in English, save as the only two tenses are often such in English. Here the effect remains, which is the Greek perfect. I speak of principle, for there is no verb here in verse 12; "things concerning me" - "what concerns me has resulted . . . so that my bonds are become (or, abstractedly, should become) manifest." The truth is, they have not understood what Paul was saying. Verse 22 has very little sense. Verse 26, we have the unhappy phrase - "in Christ Jesus in me" - in which I can see no meaning, it is, "as to me," "in my case," or "through." This leads me to another case I lit upon, 1 John 4: 16: "We know, and have believed, the love that God hath in us."

In chapter 2: 25, "the life eternal" is simply wrong; the abstract use of a word has the article in Greek, not in English. So, in Ephesians 3: 21: "glory," not "the" glory; so, verse 7, next chapter. In using, "have ye been saved," Eph. 2: 5, the real force of the perfect (present continuance) is greatly lost. "With him . . . in Christ Jesus" (v. 6) has no true sense. There is no "him" in Greek. Verse 13: "in" the blood is all wrong. I have no doubt that the "yet" of the Authorised Version, in Hebrews 4: 15, is a great mistake.

90 I need not add any more, for this is no systematic criticism; then there might be often controversy, and the system of manuscripts, and modern judgment of them, would come in question. Nor is it saying there are no improvements, as words have been justly changed, as "lawlessness" put for anomia ("transgression of the law" - Authorised Version); "judge" for "condemn" (John 5), and other changes, which give the sense more clearly. But, as a whole, it will be of no use to give the mind of God to one turning from the Authorised Version to search it, but often merely perplex him. In this respect, which would be its main practical use, it seems to me a total failure.

I do not think their system of tenses clear; their use or disuse of the article is all wrong, so as to surprise me, in men, many of whom, I do not doubt, are better scholars than I am; nor is their estimate of the force of prepositions more than superficial.

But my great objection is, that I do not find the mind of God apprehended, so as to help a simple Christian; nor do I find, though the grace of Almighty God is referred to, any reference to the Spirit of God as Author, or as help in the work. I have not, of course, read it through, and compared it, but taken passages of considerable importance here and there, and noticed different details in running through it; but it has, I confess, surprised me. But the word of God is only apprehended [discerned] by the Spirit of God.

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My former letter consists of mere desultory remarks, occasioned by passages which had caught my eye, or were important, so that I looked at them. At present I will write more studiedly.

It is a mistake to think that English tenses are simply grammatical expressions of time, or that they answer to Greek ones. The common use of auxiliary verbs makes them less such; for the auxiliary verb may be one time, the participle another, and give together the metaphysical force which connects both. 'We saw his star,' 'we have seen his star,' are not different in time, but vary in the force of the expression. One is the simple historical fact, what happened a long while ago; the other - and these are much more striking and important - is the present state of their minds, what rests upon them now, though the fact of seeing be passed. As to this last form, in general it would be taken for the perfect of the Greek, a past thing continuing. But to take it as regularly answering to it is a mistake. 'He took the city, but lost it the next day.' 'Took' is an aorist. It is a fact that happened, and no more - past, no doubt, when I say so, but true in the past. If I said, 'He has taken the city,' it supposes he is in possession of it, because 'has' is present, and adds its force to taken - he has taken possession of the city. But to apply this rule as constant would mislead. One says he lives (or is living, the true present) in London. I say, No, he has lived there; that 'lived' is a past participle; 'lived' is continuing, but 'has' here denies the present continuance; the continuance is in the past participle; 'has' only affirms as a present conviction of my mind, that once he did so continue to live there; 'has' affirms something presently, but the thing affirmed is past - it is a past thing present in its moral force to my mind. 'He did live there' affirms that the fact is past. 'He has lived' is no affirmation of time, but of a fact in question, but being a fact must have previously existed, characterising him in that particular respect. If I say 'he has lived there a long time,' it supposes he lives there still. If I spoke of time past, I should say, 'he lived there a long time' - this is an aorist. The other is an affirmation as to a fact characterising him, meeting the question whether he ever did - 'he has.' It is a present truth, to my mind. 'He lived there,' 'did live there,' 'has lived there,' in themselves are all, as to the living the same time, but the mental effect quite different. I say 'in themselves,' because if I say, 'he has lived there nine years,' it goes up to the present time; on the contrary, 'he lived there nine years' supposes it was in past times, because 'lived' is historical and past; 'has' is present, and characterises the person. Thus the preterite - or call it what you please - is a past historical fact, that is all. 'I ate at his table' - that is an historical fact. 'I have eaten at his table' is a characteristic, or, perhaps, questioned fact, an affirmation of intimacy. The difference is not one of time, but of mental or metaphysical force.

92 Let us take the passive, 'I am crucified.' The participle is a thing done, and I affirm I am as a present thing in that accomplished state. 'I was crucified' is a past historic fact. 'I have been crucified' is no doubt a past fact, but the 'have' gives a present moral power to it, which is no question of time: I am not a living man, I have been crucified. 'I have' has always a present application, though the thing spoken of be past. Hence, 'he has taken the city,' supposes he has it, because 'taken' means taking into possession, and 'has' affirms that as a present fact. 'I have,' 'he has,' is present; it may be only the moral force which is present, but this depends on the force of the participle it is connected with. 'He wrote, but I never got the letter'; 'Yes, he has written, but I shall pay no attention to it.' 'Has' involves its present moral value, to my mind.

Now, in the case of the blessed Lord, this difference is of the last importance. "Thou gavest him power over all flesh" is an historical fact in past unknown time, and no more. "Thou hast given" is the eternal counsels of God as to Christ in the power of present fulfilment.

I would now apply these remarks to the revision. The Revisers have, in their Preface, raised the question as to the use of the auxiliary verb in the case of the aorist, and even referred to John 17 to illustrate their course. After quoting a few passages dependent on this question, I shall do the same. If what I have said above as to the metaphysical or moral force of the expressions in English be just, all their reasoning, which depends merely on the force of the Greek text, falls to the ground.

The Greek and English do not answer to one another. Take Matthew 2: 2. They have used the preterite (or imperfect) in English. "We saw his star in the east." This is a merely historical fact. There is nothing wrong in the translation, but 'we have seen it' has quite a different force to the mind. 'We saw' is the simple fact for some past time or another. 'We have seen' is a present abiding effect in their minds. His star had been revealed to them, and under the present, and then present, influence of that, they were come to worship. "We have seen" expresses the present state of their minds, and what acted on them; "We saw" is a mere past fact, a bald, naked fact. In Matthew 28: 5 they have used what, I suppose, is called the English perfect for the Greek participle; 'was,' it seems to me, would be better. The word is characteristic; but 'has been' brings time as a present thing in that character, in which the whole point is to shew He was not. "Jesus, the crucified," might do; but in turning it into a verb the mental link is lost. (The Revisers have changed the reading, or they would have an analogous case in John 12: 1. The use of the Greek article, with a participle to characterise a class, is quite common, without any reference to time, sometimes where a reference to it is impossible.)

93 I shall now give a summary of John's Gospel, interesting in other ways, to lead us to the position the Lord takes in chapter 17. The first three chapters are introductory, but in some respects chapter I stands alone. It gives the Person and work of Christ, but not His relationships as Christ, High Priest, or Head of the church; it begins with His divine nature - the world did not know Him, and the Jews did not receive Him. Those born of God did. Hence the Jews are treated as reprobates in all the Gospel, and the elect recognised. Then His work; setting the world right, fulfilled in the new heavens and new earth; and baptising with the Holy Ghost, by which we know our relationship with God, the Father's love, and are cognisant of heavenly things. There is yet another point. Nathanael, the godly remnant, owns Jesus, according to Jewish promise, developed in Psalm 2, but a psalm which reveals His rejection by men (so quoted by Peter), and makes way, in Christ's answer, for larger hopes (Psalm 8), when He is set as Son of man over all the works of God's hands. This change characterises the Gospel all through.

Chapter 2. - We have the wedding-supper, and judgment which will characterise His return. This completes the earthly hope.

Chapter 3. - We have the great principles which form the basis for us of our part with God, a new birth and the cross. This, too, judges Israel as a nation, though to be restored, and in what was needed for men, opens out heavenly things in a crucified Son of man, Son of God, given in love. But this closed His history as the living Messiah of the Jews. It was the crucified Son of man, and carries the Lord's coming, out and away from the region of promise into the testing of man by the manifestation of God as light - what His testimony was as speaking the words of God, and then that as Son He was loved of the Father, who had given all things into His hand. Entered on this larger sphere, there was one point of contact between man and God, believing on the Son. Jew or Gentile were here nothing. He that believed had eternal life, and he that believed Him not would not see life, the wrath of God abode upon him. The whole of John goes on this ground. The Jews are a rejected people, according to chapter 1. And all is in resurrection, and consequent on death.

94 Messiahship to the Jews is repudiated, and all the blessing is in resurrection, and through death. What I have to say on the following chapters will be much more brief. The fourth is the transition from Messiahship in Judea, where He was practically rejected, to the worship of God in spirit and in truth. Jerusalem and Samaria both gone. The Father in grace seeking such worshippers, and here, in one alien in position from the promises, and fallen in her ways. But all now depended on a God who gave, not required, and gave eternal life, in the power of the Spirit, in Christ, and this springing up in its full development on high.

Chapter 5 is the Son of God, who quickens as the Father, and alone judges, as Son of man, with divine authority.

Chapter 6. - It is the humbled Son of man, on whom we feed, and thus live spiritually, and abide in Him. He is viewed as incarnate, and dying. His going up where He was before is just alluded to, but four times over the blessing is said to be in resurrection and the last day.

Chapter 7 introduces the millennium, typified by the feast of tabernacles, the feast of Israel's rest in the land, and of Christ's shewing to the world, which could not be then. Instead of it, Christ's heavenly glory is introduced, and the consequent giving of the Holy Ghost sent down, revealing His glory from heaven.

Chapter 8. - His word is rejected, and that word expressed Himself.

Chapter 9. - His works are rejected.

Chapter 10. - He declares that He takes His sheep out from the fold of Israel - that was the purpose of God, and would not be hindered - gives them eternal life, and never lets them perish. He had sheep not of that fold; these (the Gentile sheep) He would bring, and there would be one flock and one Shepherd. Being thus rejected, though God's purpose was accomplished, God does not allow that rejection without giving the blessed Lord a full testimony, and that in His three characters - Son of God, Son of David, and Son of man. In the resurrection of Lazarus He is manifested as Son of God; in riding on the ass's colt into Jerusalem, He was declared Son of David. The Greeks then come up, and He says that the hour was come for the Son of man to be glorified; but then He adds, to gather the fruits of that Name, the corn of wheat must fall into the ground and die; and then He looks at the cross, bows to His Father's glory in it, and sees His new and more glorious place by it. A living Jesus was the Messiah of the Jews, a dying Saviour was the attractive object of all men in the world.

95 We have, moreover, in the first two, Messiah's titles, or position, on earth - Son of God and King of Israel - but rejected, as given in Psalm 2; in the third, that of Son of man (Psalm 8), to which that led, but which could not be taken in its divine development but through death. Christ could ever, surely, have gone back perfect to His Father, but He would have remained alone. The corn of wheat must die, for Him to take His true place as such. Here, then, the development in John of the place and Person of Christ, as come down here, closes. His heavenly place, and what led to it, now begins, and this is expressly stated in the beginning of chapter 13. His hour was come that He should depart out of this world unto the Father. And we have then the whole scheme of God's thoughts, partly revealed in His Person, and in what had been done through that; and then, in contrast with that, what was to come on His being glorified, and the sending of the Holy Ghost, and the fact of His return in glory, but to give His disciples a heavenly place.

The change is stated in chapter 13. What had taken place, is - after the statement that He went on high to prepare a place, and return, in chapter 14: 6-11 - the Father had been revealed in the Son. What follows - the Spirit, giving us knowledge of our place, was to come.

Having given from Scripture the great basis of God's thoughts as to that, as to which chapter 13 brings in the historical moment of accomplishment, I proceed with the chapters to chapter 17, where we shall enter into fuller development.

Chapter 15. - He, not Israel, was on earth the true Vine, and the disciples the branches, already clean through the word ("now," in verse 3, is "already"). He exhorts them to abide in Him - that was future.

96 Chapter 16 continues with the presence of the Holy Ghost, entirely then future.

Chapter 17 returns to the change, only addressing the Father for its accomplishment. "Father, the hour is come, glorify thy Son."* He states what He had done, and looks to the future for them, and that on to the time of their glory, and being with Himself on high, already held out in principle in chapter 13. The Son of man was personally entering into glory. I now take up a general truth in direct connection with this, the basis really of the development of all the Gospels. It was in the eternal counsels of God that all things should be in the hands of the Son of man. All things even were created by Him, and for Him; Col. 1. As Son He was the appointed Heir (Heb. 1), and, in the purpose of God, it was to be in man's hands, according to Psalm 8, as applied in Hebrews 2, 1 Corinthians 15, and Ephesians 1, already noticed. It was part of this purpose that He should have co-heirs - how rich the blessing for us! - and the creation itself be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the sons of God.

{*Chapter 13 gives the ground in God's righteousness, and the wider general place given of the Father. In chapter 17 it is the Son's title, and the place of sons with Him, and first of all the disciples, and that on to their glory.}

At this moment I only occupy myself with the committal of all things to Christ as Son of God and Son of man, though our place in this scheme, as fully associated with the blessed Lord, may be the most precious to us, save His own glory in it. He came as the Heir of promise here on the earth, as Seed of David and Seed of Abraham as to His place, but personally the Revealer of the Father - rejected because He really was so - men not bearing light, though it came in love; John 15: 22-24; ch. 3: 19. But this gave occasion to the bringing forth the eternal counsels of God in the second Man, through death and redemption, from behind the working of man's responsibility under law and promise, His government of this world. For this, too, the cross must come in, because of man's sin (hatred against God in goodness, as well as breaking the law), because of God's glory (John 13: 31, 32), that the promises made to Abraham without condition, might be forfeited - forfeited by man - yet fulfilled hereafter in the second Man, but all lost as to the first man by his rejection of Him in whom they were. The cross closed up the history of the first man, and the world was judged (John 12: 31), and then, through redemption and the glorifying God, God's history began in the second Man in a new state, risen from the dead - sin, death, Satan's power, God's judgment, all passed through, and left behind, a place and state beyond them all, God being perfectly glorified; John 13: 31, 32.

97 Now, the fulfilment of the counsels of God as to the glory, always comes after this, and necessarily must. As regards the Person of the Lord, His title and competency were ever complete; but that is not the question, but of the accomplishment of it in His manhood. Thus, if He created all things, as He did, they were created for Him as well as by Him, but not to take them as man in their corruption.

So, as Son He is Heir of all things; Heb. 1. His given glory is a consequence there, and as to His title as Son of man, though personally glorified, the psalm (as we see in Heb. 2) is not fulfilled; and as to the earthly royal part (Rev. 11: 17), we have - as indeed many parables and passages teach us - the testimony that He has not taken it. Psalm 110, too, is simple and plain on this point. David's Son was to sit at God's right hand as David's Lord till the time came.

But our inquiry now is not as to personal title and competency, but as to what is said as to the given glory. I should insist upon all being His in personal title from creation on, only that He must be a man, and that the counsels of God as to this were identified with His Person, so that I could always say all was His. There remains the question of any scriptural statements of the fulfilment in fact.

I will now cite the passages of scripture as to this glory belonging to Him. We read in John 3: 35, "The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand." Here we have the title of His Person (v. 31), and the rejection of His testimony; no man received it, though He spake the words of God coming from heaven. What God was in His nature is stated up to this, here the relationship of Son with the Father. It is the absolute gift of all things by the Father to the Son - as to facts, the cross, and the universal rejection of His testimony, and then the Father's counsels in love to the Son. So, in Hebrews 1, where, again, it is, when He had by Himself made the purification of sins, that He sat down on the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens as man, as such become more glorious than angels, as He had by inheritance a more excellent name than they; this, was His title; that, the place He took, or what He became as man, consequent on the cross.

98 So, in Matthew 11, it is on His entire rejection, and taking knowledge of it in His heart, that He says, "All things have been* delivered unto me of my Father, and no man knoweth the Son but the Father, neither knoweth any man the Father save the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal him. Come unto me . . . learn of me." In the following chapter Israel is cast out. The direct teaching is, that the rejection of Christ was the proof of the helpless state of man, but led to the unveiling of the counsels of God, which were behind, in which all things were delivered to the second Man as Son, the full purpose and grace of God; and here again it is the Father. The moral principle of it, then, receiving His word, is at the end of Matthew 12. In chapter 13 the kingdom of heaven is brought in. I may add chapter 16, the church; chapter 17, the kingdom in glory. In chapter 13, at the end of the age the Son of man exercises His power. His place down here is in chapter 20: 23. The end of Matthew is His closing controversy with the Jewish people; but in Matthew 28: 18, 19, He bases His commission to His disciples on all power being given to Him in heaven and on earth - a commission never fulfilled historically in Scripture, unless alluded to at the very end of Mark. The disciples gave up the gospel to the Gentiles to Paul; Gal. 2: 7-9. The change of position is noted in Matthew 26: 64, where, for "hereafter," read, "henceforth." From that onward they would only see Him in His heavenly glory at the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds. (John 1: 51, read also "henceforth," where it is personal title to the service of angels down here; but by many the word is left out here.)

{*This is an aorist passive, where the Revised Version puts 'have been' quite rightly. But if it is right here, it is right elsewhere. On their system it should have been 'were.'}

The statement of Matthew 11: 27, is found in Luke 10: 22, but is the same, and again the Father and the Son. The kingdom of God was come amongst them, proved by the casting out of Satan's power. Yet He could say, Ye shall not have gone over the cities of Israel, till the Son of man be come. (See Luke 12: 50.) He must die to let loose (so to speak) the purpose of God in grace. (See chap. 19: 12.) He went away to receive the kingdom, and return. The Lord tests them with the perplexing point of David's Son being David's Lord. But we have further light in Scripture on the actual historical time both of the glory and the dominion - the great and glorious work of the cross being the moral ground of it all. "Now," we read - John 13 - (when Judas had gone out) "is the Son of man glorified" - in accomplishing, that is, the work of the cross - "and God is glorified in him; and if God be glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself, and will straightway glorify him" - not wait for His taking the public and manifested glory, but do it now.

99 The cross, then, as that in which all the moral glory of God was made good, and the Son of man glorified in doing it, was the basis and the point of departure of the given glory. Divine glory had been eternally His with the Father, but now there was a glorifying of the Son of man in connection with His perfectly glorifying God. So it is said, "To him that overcometh will I give to sit with me in my throne, as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne." This was the ground and the epoch (with forty days interval on earth) of the personal glorifying of Christ. He suffered, and entered into His glory. The prophets even spoke of the sufferings of Christ, and the glories that should follow. The difference between this and exercising dominion is clearly stated in Hebrews. Revelation brings it out in detail. Based on Psalm 110, in Hebrews 10, we are told He is sitting at God's right hand, expecting till His enemies be made His footstool. So, in Hebrews 2, "we see not yet all things put under him, but we see Jesus, made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour." There Stephen saw Him, not yet sitting down, His intercession on the cross having suspended judgment, till rejected in glory as He had been in humiliation, but returning then (Acts 3) if they repented. The history of that people, and indeed of man, as responsible, was closed, but the foundation laid in His work, and in eternal righteousness, for sovereign grace to bring the saints into the same glory in which He will appear.

All authority is His now; its development and display are according to the purpose and wisdom of God, who is gathering in grace His joint-heirs, while He sits - proof that His work is finished - at the right hand of God, till the fulness of the Gentiles be come in. All dominion is His now as Man, Satan's having been annulled by death, though for us that last enemy is not destroyed, only it is become gain to us. What we have seen, then, in Scripture, is the full title of the Person of Christ as Creator, Son of God, and Son of man; and in application - sin and Satan's power having come in, and through man, the ground having been laid in the cross for taking it according to God - a special work going on which delays its public assumption, namely, the gathering the joint-heirs to be with Him in glory, and for ever with Him; and then (though title was always His - personal position in glory, founded on the cross now His) He will, as Son of man, openly take and display His power and glory, and us with Him, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father, all things in heaven and earth being headed up in one under His authority. This glorifying and giving all power to man in the Person of Christ, is the great central truth and fact of God's counsels.

100 And now let me recall and define the difference between the preterite, and the participle and the auxiliary verb. The preterite states that a fact has happened long ago, or, more exactly, in a time separated from the present; 'has,' with the participle, clothes the person or at least his position, as a present thing, with the character flowing from the thing spoken of. The subject here spoken of is the counsels of God as to Christ, and 'has given' views Him as clothed with what is given - those counsels of God clothing His Person, first, in the thoughts of God; then, in the accomplished fact, those thoughts realised. Now, the thoughts of God - as is amply revealed in Scripture - were, that the Son as man should inherit all things. On this point Scripture is quite clear. It is equally clear that the possession of this place of glory and dominion was to be after suffering. It is difficult to separate the two, as historically the suffering was necessary to the possession of the glory; still, some passages contemplate distinctly the purpose of God. Thus, in John 3, "The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand." This, though rejection had been spoken of, speaks of what was in the Father's mind.

In Ephesians 1, in the dispensational arrangements of God, we learn that His purpose was to head up all things in Christ - all things in heaven and on earth. So, in Matthew 11 - though here rejection comes in - the purpose, "All things have been delivered unto me of my Father." So Psalm 8, used by Paul as to Christ in 1 Corinthians, Hebrews, Ephesians: "He hath put all things under his feet." It was not in this character of glory He came. He was to assume it after suffering; this characterised it. He emptied Himself, and took on Him the form of a servant, and was found in the likeness of man, humbled Himself as man, and was obedient unto death; wherefore also God hath* highly exalted Him, and given Him a name, which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things on earth, and things under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. His obedient descent to death was the ground of His ascent to glory and universal dominion. "Ought not," says the Lord Himself, "Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory?" So Peter: "the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow." So, in the passages cited for the general fact, John 3; it was when, though He spoke the words of God, no man received His testimony, that the giving all things into His hand is spoken of. The cross had been brought in, and it was when rejected as presented to man that this new glory of God's purpose was brought in, in the risen and glorified Man. So, in Matthew 11, it was when John and Christ's testimony had been both rejected, and terrible judgment was to come in consequence, that He says, "All things are delivered unto me of my Father." "God," says Peter (Acts 2: 36), "hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ." The passage referred to in the Ephesians is as plain as can be: "What is the exceeding greatness of his power, which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come; and hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be head over all things to the church." So, indeed, in the psalm quoted here; it is when rejected as the Christ, in the second psalm, that He is set as Son of man over all the works of God's hands. But Ephesians is as plain as possible. It is the Christ raised from the dead that becomes Head over all things. He that ascended is He that descended into the lower parts of the earth, and thus ascended that He might fill all things. It was when Christ was raised that He says, "All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations." We have thus clearly taught, the Father's giving all things to the Son to be the mind and counsel of God; that this purpose of the Father was to be fulfilled in Him as man, and that, founded on His sufferings, He glorifying God in them.

{*Here we may see the force of the difference of the preterite and 'has.' 'God highly exalted Him 'is a past historical fact; 'has exalted Him' - He is in the glory.}

102 Hebrews 2 shews the fulfilment of Psalm 8 in part, after He had come down, and been made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, in that He was crowned with glory and honour, but all things not put under Him. And the important point which is fully developed in the first three Gospels, is, that He came according to promise as the Messiah prophesied of, and this, though far from being all even then, yet was of moment as regards the faithfulness of God. The testimony to who was there was full in word and work, and therein man was finally and fully tested, but therein, not only man's state was shewn, but God's, who said, "It may be they will reverence my Son," and closed the whole history of that people - that is, of man under God's culture, His vineyard and fig-tree - and the Lord pronounced its judgment in cursing the fig-tree. Man under the first covenant should never bear fruit, and the Lord says, "Now is the judgment of this world." The whole dealing with men, not only on the ground of law, but of promise, in the Person of Christ, the Messiah, was over, till He return in glory; and then it will be in grace under the new covenant, when they shall repent. But this rejection of Christ in this character gave occasion to the more glorious and wide-reaching position of Christ as Son of man, He having in death, and as made sin, perfectly glorified God in all that He is, and that, as made sin, obedient unto death.

The Messiahship of promise was closed; and God brought out, through the faithfulness of Christ, these counsels which, existing before the worlds, had been held in abeyance till man was fully tried, and as to sin, God fully glorified. He passed from a rejected Messiahship into the present Heirship of eternal glory, and the accomplishment of eternal redemption; and, being that eternal life to believers which was manifested in Him, not merely to quicken in a divine way, as He had done from Adam on, but to be the present manifestation of that life in a Man down here, and the communicator of it to others, so that they should be sons brought through redemption into His place - "My Father and your Father, my God and your God" - He Himself taking His place as a Man in glory. But while He entered into the glory He had had with the Father before the world was, He did so as Man, gone to prepare a place for us, entered as our Forerunner, but entered into heavenly glory, according to the counsels of God, as contrasted with an earthly Messiahship and an earthly kingdom.

103 Christ's position was wholly changed - a change than which there could be nothing greater morally, or in the manifestation of glory. A rejected Messiah becomes a divine Saviour and Lord of all. Such had ever been God's counsels, but now the accomplishment of them was come to the birth. It is touching and instructive to see, how fully Christ felt this rejection, while yet His heart goes out in grace, weeping over the now God-deserted city, but then bows in perfect obedience to His Father; and then, how the new universal and heavenly glory, the counsels of God as to Him hidden (so to speak) in His Messiahship before, burst in upon His sight. We have examples of this in Matthew 11 and John 12.

Now the preterite in English is merely an historical statement of a fact which is viewed as past, and past at a time looked at as apart from the present. 'He lived in London'; 'he walked the whole journey': 'we saw His star.' The participle, with the auxiliary, embodies in the person spoken of, as a present thing the character or thing which is the subject spoken of in the sentence; only, when God's counsels are spoken of, very constantly the thing spoken of is spoken of as existing, because it exists and is certain in His mind. Its being there is a reality. This is well known in the prophetic writings. Thus, "Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me;* . . . then said I, Lo, I come to do thy will? O God." These were the counsels of God freely accepted of the Son, written in the volume of the book; but it is said, "A body hast Thou prepared." So Psalm 110: so frequently. In time comes the accomplishment, the actual realisation in time, of God's eternal thought. The Father loveth the Son, and hath put all things into His hand. This is God's mind and counsel, which we have seen was connected in its accomplishment with the cross - the proof of the total sinfulness of man, the close of the Messiahship of Christ, as a relationship with Israel on the ground of their responsibility, come according to promise. As said in the Hebrews, "He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second." It was a Man despised and rejected of men (so that all connection of God with them was broken on that ground for ever, the fig-tree never to bear fruit), but, through the cross and suffering even to death, entering into the glory purposed of God from everlasting for Christ, and that on high.

{*So translated in LXX, and quoted in Hebrews. It is not, 'Hast thou opened,' but 'Thou hast dug ears for me'; that is, put me in the place of a servant - that was in taking a body. (See Phil. 2.)}

104 Now John 13 and 17 give us the moment of this change. Chapter 13 is not my direct object now, save as presenting the moment in question, and what attached to it. The hour was come that Jesus should depart out of this world unto the Father. The history of the sufferings of Christ is not the subject of John's Gospel, but nothing can be clearer than the passage from the old position of Christ to the new - His position of humiliation, and position of glory, which enabled Peter to say (1 Pet. 3: 22), "Who is gone into heaven . . . angels, and principalities and powers being made subject unto him." In the other Gospels you get allusions to it, as in Matthew 11, and what is connected with it, as the change from Matthew 12 to 13, but there more connected with His Person, but here we find precision as to the time and way in which the change took place. He would not desert His disciples, nor cease to serve them; if He could not be associated with them here, He must fit them to have a part with Him where He was going. Clean they were by the word, as to what they were, but their walk in a defiling world might render them unfit to have a part with Him, for He was going to God, and He girds Himself, and washes their feet - a beautiful and blessed expression of grace, but it must not detain us here - for His hour was come that He should depart out of this world to the Father, and He knew that the Father had delivered all things into His hand, and that He was going to God. That which we have seen doctrinally stated in Ephesians 1, 1 Peter 3, and elsewhere, is now presented as a fact in the consciousness of Jesus,* a fact in the counsels of God, and now historically realised. His tune was come, when He should take the place - His in God's counsels - where everything was delivered into His hands, according to the statement in John 3, Hebrews 1, etc. Here it is connected with His work, and the position based on the righteousness of God; John 13: 31, 32.

{*We have an example here John 13: 3) that it is impossible to render the aorist by the preterite. The Revisers have changed the TR. perfect into the aorist, but it was impossible to use the preterite, and they have properly translated it, "had given," as in T.R.; but then their grammatical rule is gone. In edoka and dedoka a the readings are perpetually interchanged: Tischendorf says Luke constantly prefers the perfect.}

105 Henceforth the Son of man was to sit on the right hand of power. In His lifetime, in virtue of the dignity of His Person, and His perfectness, angels came and ministered unto Him; the time was coming when all things would be put under Him, but His present glory was to be immediate. In chapter 17 the connection is with the Father, and Christ's place of Son, but the event is the same. The hour was come for Christ to take His glory, according to the purpose of God. The Son was to be glorified, and this lays the basis of the whole chapter, which treats of the new place of the saints, up even to the glory, and being where Christ is, and as distinct (though both were the Son's) from what had been while He had been on earth. Now here they have changed the word into the preterite. "As thou gavest him power." This is merely an historical fact at some distant epoch of past time, and may have been merely temporary. It merely recites a past fact at some period distinct and separate from the present. If I read, "As thou hast given him authority over all flesh," etc., it is the counsels of God as to His Son as Son of man (which I have therefore gone through) but withal His being now - for the hour was come to glorify Him - clothed with the purposed glory in which He was to have dominion; the whole chapter stating what had been, and the change now taking place. All this - the counsels as abiding in the mind of God, their accomplishment in clothing the Saviour with glory consequent on the cross, the glorious arrangement by which every attribute of God [had been revealed and glorified], the judgment of man's estate, what had been done already in the Person and service of Christ here below, a service now closed, with the consequent position of the disciples, as developed in the chapter - all is lost to give us a very inadequate translation of a Greek aorist. Some time or other God had given Him this power, effectually exercised, when given is not said. As the present moment of change for the accomplishment of God's counsels, expressed in "Thou hast," all is clear. The Father had been revealed in Him (John 14), could not before the Son came, for in whom was it, or could it be?

106 God's rule for man had been given in the law. Jehovah's will was made known. He had preserved in faithful mercy, as the Almighty, the patriarchs He had called. He had warned by prophets, and spoken to Israel of a Saviour to come - had given precious revelations of His ways and goodness, and by grace met the faith of those that trusted in Him; but He was not there, or, if there, professedly hidden behind the veil where it was death to intrude. The law and the prophets were until John, and he came - still, earthly - before the face of Jehovah, to prepare His way before Him. And the clouds broke, and the Sun of Righteousness was there (though not yet in judgment, as in Malachi). The Father Himself revealed in the Son, only in humiliation, that He might in grace be close to man, as He touched the leper, saying, "I will, be thou clean." And the knowledge of the Father thus revealed, and of Him who came down as life from Him, was eternal life. It was not the just and perfect law of God, and obedience to it, required from men; it was He in whom was life come down to manifest it to men, and communicate it in grace to them. (See 1 John 4: 9; ch. 1: 2; ch. 2: 8.) He came also to make propitiation for our sins, but this regarded our being made fit for the presence of God, and though not separated from, yet not in itself life. That was in the Person of the Father, and of the Son revealing Him. And now note, that while it was the eternal purpose of the Father thus to glorify the Son, and that the title over all creation belonged to the Son as Creator, yet this supremacy was to be in the hands of the Son of man. Thus, till the Son was on earth, the Father was not, and could not be, revealed; nor could the Son till He was a man hold it; nor, though personally qualified, could He, in point of fact, take it into possession till He had suffered, and was risen.

Hence the historical vagueness of the preterite is quite out of place. It was the hour of His being glorified in order to His taking it, and the whole matter was confined to His life here, and His glorious position which followed His faithfulness in it; as I have said, at the moment of passing from one to the other, He declares what belonged to each. "Father, the hour is come, glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee." First, the Father, in grace infinite, original, and uncaused save by what was in Himself, sent His Son, before which the passage has no application. The Father was known in Him; the Son, in absolute obedient grace, came, at all cost, to do His will, not sparing Himself, that the Father might be glorified, and we, poor sinners, blest. The Sent One had come. He had glorified the Father on the earth, but to this time only it applies, and to the place of the obedient Sent One. "I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do." The hour is now come that this is closed, but now He can say as to that definite time and place, now presently closed, I have finished the work, and glorified Thee in what Thou sentest Me to do.

107 Here is a true aorist, no time, but the object of sending. Had it been said, "Thou hast given me to do," it would be a present unfinished task; and yet, "I glorified thee on the earth, I finished," etc., is a past historical time. From fancied, not real, accuracy as to Greek, they have constructed what is no grammatical English at all: 'I finished a work some time ago (namely, a time apart from this), which Thou hast given me to do,' which has a present sense. The reading they adopt makes no difference. 'I glorified (past historical) Thee, having finished the work,' etc. Indeed, reading as they do makes it worse, because the finishing is in the same historical time, and has the causative sense common to this participle. He 'glorified His Father' is past time, 'having finished the work.' This destroys the whole force of the passage, that the hour was come.

There are only two states of the Son of man (though many details may be added, as His taking the kingdom, giving it up, etc.); but as to His own state only two: a sent, humbled Christ, obedient unto death; and Man exalted consequently into the glory which, as Son, He had with the Father before the world was. It is of the moment of the change from one to the other He is speaking. He looks to the Father to glorify the Son in the glory which had been His before the worlds, but in a new place and state, as Man; one of these states was then closed, the other just about to begin, and He states what He had done in the state now passing away for ever. But it is not, 'I glorified Thee on the earth when I was there' - perhaps a long time ago, at any rate apart from the present - which is the sense of the revision; it is what He had been doing up to the moment of change now come, and could be no other time. He had glorified the Father on earth, seeking that the Father should now glorify Him with Himself, had finished (or, if the reading be preferred, 'having finished') the work the Father had given Him to do: and this could only be just then, if Christianity be in question. And now that the work was finished, the Father was to glorify Him - this between Him and the Father.

108 Then, as to the disciples, He had manifested the Father's name to them, which indeed could only be done then. Now they knew that what the Father had given Him was of the Father to the Son, not of Jehovah to Messiah, for all the words the Father had given to the Son as Man down here He had communicated to them, and they had believed in His coming out from the Father. Now He prayed for them as left down here, when He was going, for they were the Father's, and He was glorified in them. In verse 12 you have the difference of the preterite (imperfect) and 'have.' "I kept" is historical. "I have kept" up to now, so that none (save Judas) is lost. He has prayed for them as put in immediate relationship with the Father, like His own (v. 9). He then prays for them as set in the place of testimony with the Father's word, as He had been (v. 15), and thus sets them, in both respects, in His own place, they being formed by His now being sanctified in glory. Then, He prays for those who believed through their word, that they may be all one; and finally, gives them the glory given to Him - in everything put in His place, and associated with Him - loved as He was loved; and at last will have them - blessed be His name! - where He is; gives them to enjoy this love meanwhile, when the world does not know it as it will when they are seen in the same glory. It was the present full revelation of the Father's name, for their place with Him and testimony in the world: and lastly, brought where Christ was going. The Father's name is the key to the whole chapter. All depends on its being the present moment of change, as stated in the first verses. It is a chapter of known, of imperfectly known, blessedness, but presents the disciples as loved of the Father as Christ was, and Christ in us, that we may enjoy it; and the whole counsels of God in this, and their accomplishment, are sacrificed, as far as such splendour of grace can be, for a fancied Greek aorist.

109 A detail in verse 18 here shews the absurdity of it, and how the point of the chapter is lost. "I sent them into the world"  - whereas the only time He sent them out in His lifetime, historically, they were strictly forbidden to go near it, or to any but Israel; so utterly were the Revisers ignorant of the mind of God here. And while, in many passages, the preterite, or participle with 'has,' may be a matter of taste, or delicacy of apprehension, yet often it is of all-importance. I might go to other examples, but I have taken one where the fulness of the grace into which we are brought on Christ's going away is unfolded, that we may see of what moment it is; and that where the foundation is laid in Romans 1, and in crowning the blessing in John 17, the Revisers have wholly missed the mind of God. I do not the least deny they have rightly corrected many sentences - I think they have - but it is not a translation to be trusted, as giving us the mind of God; and this alone has made me write these remarks.

A few special cases have caught my eye in the revision, which I notice. 1 Corinthians 15: 49 they have translated "we have borne," quite rightly, but proving that their rule of adapting the preterite to the aorist cannot be carried out as a general rule. Here, too, also - I doubt not rightly - they have not followed mere diplomatic criticism, and read "let us bear" for "we shall bear." Even if the Vatican MS. opposed, it is a pity they were not equally bold in Romans 5: 1; [where they have put 'let us have peace'].

In Acts 2: 36 we have a passage rightly, I believe, translated, but which shews the fallacy of their rule, the observance of which in John 17 has deprived it of all its force. "God hath made this Jesus whom ye crucified both Lord and Christ" - one of the verbs they translate by a preterite, the other by 'has,' and the participle. But this passage proves also clearly an ignorance of Greek, which has destroyed the sense of a passage, which, if not fundamental, is one of the richest parts of the structure of truth - Ephesians 2: 21, where they have translated "every building," not, "all the building." One would have thought that the whole tenor of the passage which insists on the middle wall of partition being broken down, and both reconciled in one body to God, would have guarded them from such a blunder - for blunder it is, but a blunder affecting the whole doctrine of the church, the absence of unity being ostentatiously put forward in the epistle consecrated to its establishment. Every tyro knows that, as a general thing, pas in Greek, with an article, is 'the whole' - without it, 'every,' but to make it an absolute rule is only ignorance. The received text has it, with very good authorities, as A,C,P, correction of the Sinaiticus, and many others; and if not the original reading, it was added to make plain what the Revisers have set aside. But it is false that it is a universal rule as to pas. Where there is a genitive which determines, the article is left out - for example, "every house of Israel," is nonsense on the face of it; indeed, where the noun stands as a composite whole in itself, no article is added, as Romans 1: 29. Oikodome (building), though one word, is a composite word, and oikos is a practical genitive after dome, and the whole word a composite whole in itself. The doctrine is false. No particular church is the habitation of God through the Spirit; nor can what is said of oikodome here be said of any particular church, that each is growing to a holy temple. Was Thyatira doing so? Was Laodicea doing so? to say nothing of Ephesus and Sardis. And where are all the early Christian churches? The attempt to make it "every house," in Acts 2: 36 (marg.), is a want of common sense, and ignorance of Greek.

110 I confess I am surprised with men, some of whom (and, I doubt not, others whom I do not know, are so) I sincerely believe to be much better Hellenists than myself, that such evidence of want of scholarship should crop up. They have not attempted it - not even in the margin - in Romans 11; it would have been too absurd; and in Ephesians 2 there was doctrinal purpose, for they have, "each several building," and "every building," in the margin. Why, if "every" was a universally binding rule, as to the meaning, not stick to it? But to make it, after the verses 19 and 20, from which it cannot be separated, "each several building" is perversion, not translation. Oikodome is not a classical word, and does not receive an article at all, but in special cases, even where we might expect it, in Greek - only three times in the New Testament, where it is plural, and refers to the various constructions of the temple: Romans 14: 19, where it is specified in character by the Greek article following, not used in the abstract, and 2 Corinthians 12: 19, where it is also specially determined by the Greek pronoun for your. Taken simply it qualifies the act, and is not a direct specified fact; nor does an article after pas always make it signify 'the whole,' but distinctly the contrary, as with participles, as Romans 2: 10; ch. 10: 4; ch. 1: 16. It characterises pas; so Romans 12: 3; but I need not multiply instances. There is another case, where pas is used without an article, not in the sense of 'every': moral ideas, which embrace a number of thoughts or acts composing the idea, as people compose the house of Israel; as "in all goodness and righteousness and truth"; Ephesians 5: 9; "all deceit," Acts 13: 10; where there are four other cases; "all wisdom and understanding," Colossians 1: 9, and "all power" verse 11; "all lowliness," Eph. 4: 2; "all fear," 1 Pet. 2: 18; "all honour," 1 Tim. 6: 1; "all joy," James 1: 2. Probably others which are not recorded in the books which furnished me with these. 'Whole,' in the sense of holos, which is often used, would not do; nor would 'every'; the thought is composite, and "all" is justly used, but 'every' would be false, as in power, lowliness, fear, so in "joy and peace," in Romans 15: 13, where compare "the hope," in the same verse. To make pas without an article, as necessarily always 'every,' is a blunder, and in the Revision it is put in the margin, Acts 2: 36, as we have seen, as if this were the case, where it would be simple nonsense. 'All,' and in German allerlei, which Luther uses, specially the English, all convey the meaning. I had nearly forgotten one instance of a different character - flesh, used as denoting men, in Matthew 24: 22, etc., in English, 'no flesh' - an article could not be used. It is, again, a word embracing many individuals in one thought, "all flesh," and then, viewed as a whole, the verb as to it, negatived what is said.

111 Let me add here, as the subject has been before us in the passage, that we must not confound the "house" (church) built by man, according to 1 Corinthians 3, and the "house of God" built by Christ (Matt. 16), against which the gates of hell cannot prevail. The latter is found in the passage which occupies us (Eph. 2: 21), Matthew 16, and 1 Peter 2-1 am not aware of any other place. In these it is Christ who builds, or no one else is spoken of; the "living stones" come, or "the house" grows.

The more their use of the word en is examined, the more erroneous it will be found. In 1 Corinthians 8: 11 they have been forced to put 'through'; in chapter 6: 11, 'in,' as to the Spirit, hardly makes sense; but such passages as Colossians 1: 16, 17, as indeed others, are not only wrong, but shew they have not seized the force of en, where not used locally or materially at all. Compare 2 Corinthians 6, where en and dia, and a third reciting form are used, with substantially the same sense; in en and dia, the latter with the genitive is the instrumental means, en the character or power of that in which a thing is done. Either would often do. 'His graciousness was shewn by his kindness to those who deserved nothing, in his kindness to,' etc. - either would do; not that they ever mean the same; one was the means of shewing; the other, the character of that 'in' ('by,' 'through') which it was shewn, but the result is the same. They are really changed for style in 2 Corinthians 6; one may suit one word better than the other, but, 'in much patience,' or 'by much patience,' though not the same idea, if analysed, is the same thing: in verse 7, "through the arms of righteousness," en would not do so well, and the apostle changes to dia, and then uses it four times, where en would do very well, and where dia has pretty much the sense of en - his mouth was opened. But for this reason - to make en mean simply 'in' is a gross mistake. "In spirit" - "in flesh" have a sense difficult to put in English, but which in many cases 'in' could not render. I pray "in (en) spirit"; so 2 Corinthians 7: 1, "in (en) the fear of God." Here the English use of 'in' answers to en, but it is characteristic of the moral state in which the perfecting was done.

112 But what is the force of 2 Corinthians 7: 7? The Revisers are obliged to say 'by.' But the attempt to force the use of 'in,' as if that was the literal translation always of en, has falsified different passages. To "baptise into" is not the sense of the preposition eis with baptise; it is that to which you are brought, and with which you are associated. "All baptised into Moses" is flat nonsense, or, "baptised into John's baptism." This is simply prejudice. Were I to go through the book, many things might call for remark.

I think Galatians 4: 13 a complete mistake; verse 14 makes it plain, I think, comparing, too, other passages; but controversy on particular passages is not my object, but what affects fundamentally the whole character of the translation and that as affecting the foundations of truth. I have just come across another case, which has a peculiar character, but shews their rule to be untenable. John 3: "We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen"; and again, "What he hath seen and heard, that he testifieth, and no man receiveth his testimony." Now there is no aorist to the Greek verb horao, "to see" or "take heed," but the irregular tense, which is found in the conjunctive in Luke 13: 28, only there in the New Testament, I believe. In John 3: 32 we have "what he has seen and heard"; the first a perfect, the second an aorist. They have translated, "What he hath seen and heard," to which I have no objection; but their rule is given up - could not be applied. They may take the form of the word as used for the aorist, for the reason above mentioned, but then the rule is doubly given up, as it is in verse 11. The truth is, the preterite is historical of past facts, and when the aorist is so used is all well - "Jesus having entered," but 'has' is much more so, which states a past fact, present to the mind, but whose object is not time at all.

113 But in the first passage which struck me in Matthew 2: 2, their rule fails, or their translation - it should be, 'was born,' and verse 3, 'was troubled'; and again, if they put 'saw,' they should put 'came.' Now in this case it is not of any consequence, save the force of the language; I use it to shew that their rule is a fallacy, and that they cannot maintain it. And this affects the whole translation, and in John 17 deprives us of the true force of one of the most blessed portions of scripture. There is a use of the aorist which is a conditional future in English, as where hina (that) is used (John 3: 20, 21), but it is a delicacy of language difficult to reproduce, though often of moment; it is not that the thing may take place, but that it may have taken place. (See Matt. 3: 13, 14.) It is found in exhortation, not as the desire that they become so, but so have acted as that the subject of the exhortation may be already true of them: there, with hina, John 3: 17; Matthew 5: 18 - here a future perfect might do.

I may cite some passages to shew a false licence in translating, which wholly spoils and destroys the sense. Thus, Ephesians 2: 6, they have added 'him,' which is not in the Greek at all, and makes nonsense of the passage, "made us to sit with him [Christ] in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." The passage means that the Jew by nature is a child of wrath, like the Gentile, being quickened with Christ, is raised with (the Gentile), a state in which there is no difference - both are sitting in heavenly places 'in' Him; 'with' Him, neither are Then, in Romans 5: 1, I have not the smallest doubt that "we have" should never have been changed into "let us have" - indeed the Fathers, who quote it thus, cannot give a simple sense to it, and I affirm that it has none. 'Let us have peace.' What does that mean? I am exhorted to have peace with God. How? And in what state is the Christian, or any one, when he is exhorted? Grace was at once forgotten after the apostles were gone - often before, as Galatians shews - and all made to depend on man; but He has made peace by the blood of His cross. They have not ventured to accept the reading, "we should bear," 1 Corinthians 15: 49 (which would have made nonsense); yet, though they have the Vatican MSS. (corrected) for "let us have" in Romans 5: 1, not for "we should bear," they have the Sinaiticus and others for the latter. I am glad they have not accepted it, but the reasons were not the manuscripts, but the spiritual absurdity of our being called to bear the glorious image of Christ here. But Tischendorf, 8th edition (not 7th), and Tregelles give us "we should bear" they go by manuscripts; spiritual apprehension would have taken "we have" in Romans 5 too; Tischendorf, till the Sinaiticus MSS. influenced him, had this.

114 I add, in passing, we have the usual perversion of the text, 'We have had our access,' of which not a word in the Greek: so, in our tribulations - I suppose ignorance of the abstract use of the article. I notice this passage because of such importance to souls. In Luke 2: 49 they translate "I must be in my Father's house," putting the evident sense "about my Father's business," in the margin; indeed, often the margin is only proper to lead the reader to uncertainty where there is none. "Extort no more" (Luke 3: 13) is nonsense. Luke 1: 35 is, I have no doubt, false. Chapter 3: and "he shall thoroughly cleanse" should at least be in the margin Chapter 2: 14: There is no possible ground for translating, "in whom he is well pleased," even if - which I do not believe - we should read, as the Revisers have. I am satisfied it is a corruption, as all theirs are, to exalt man. I do not accept their critical text; it is the vulgar acceptance of the Sinaiticus and the Vatican - valuable manuscripts if used with discrimination, and testing them by others and versions, but which it is now the fashion to swallow down undigested. We have no manuscripts which have not been tampered with by the clergy, and that when the church was thoroughly corrupt; for our Puseyite friends know - if they were honest enough to own it - that the church was, and had long been, thoroughly and utterly corrupt in doctrine and in practice; doctrines which denied the foundations of Christianity read in the churches, and practices and habits not fit to be left in English on the drawing-room table. But I do not enter into the criticism of the text, it is too wide a subject, on the one hand, and I have learnt that I am not competent to form a clear and decided judgment, but know enough to judge those who pretend to do so.

115 I do not doubt the value of the Sinaitic and the Vatican manuscripts, but I do not accept their authority as conclusive; I confine myself therefore to the translation, and I must say, that I judge it to be a bad book, and that those who trust to it will lose in their knowledge of divine truth. I do not see the Spirit of God owned, nor the effect of owning it produced, nor the acquaintance with the mind of God drawn from Scripture, which qualifies for the performance of it, and the discovery of the force of particular passages. It is private interpretation, and very often only such. Much is lost by needless changes in the language, but this is a trifle comparatively. I will instance, "Jesus advanced in wisdom and stature." Authorised Version, "increased"; the sense is the same; but, besides the prestige of the old, the change is for the worse. I take this merely as an example. I believe that a person who takes it up for his daily use will injure his own soul. I have no doubt that Ephesians 5: 13 is wrong. Whatever "is made manifest is light" is not merely not true, but it is not the object of the passage - it is speaking of being made manifest by the light. I admit the passage is difficult, but I believe the sense to be, "what makes everything manifest is light"; or, "it is the light which makes everything manifest": the form of the Greek word is found only here, and would be a middle with an active sense. There is no article with pan (everything); the sense would be different, and out of place - it would be the universe. Philippians 2: 4 is, I believe, a mistake. What he seeks is, owning the good and gifts in others. Verse 10: 'At' is the sense - 'in' has none. What is "bowing in his name"? They violate their rule of the preterite twice over: Acts 2: 36; Romans 6: 7. "United with him by the likeness" (v. 5) gives no sense. What does 'unite by a likeness' mean? No one who knew what being livingly united by the Holy Ghost to Christ is, could have penned such a sentence. "Be in bondage to sin" is not what is said; verse 6. In verse 10, "The death that he died" is not what is said; the margin, or old translation, is alone right. Verse 16: "Present yourselves" is very bad; 'yield,' or 'give up,' or 'deliver up.' Verse 4: "through the glory" is also bad - better, as in the Authorised Version, "by." Verse 17: "Ye have been instructed," the commonest use of the Greek word with Paul. Chapter 7: 3, 4: "joined" better left out. Verse 13: "by" not in Greek - better left out. Chapter 8: 4: "ordinance" very bad; in walking after the Spirit the righteous requirement of the law is fulfilled. Verse 5, and elsewhere - Spirit with a small s misleads and confuses; their rule for it is badly imagined. "They that walk after the spirit, mind the things of the spirit," Romans 8: 5; and then "the Spirit of God"; and even there "in the spirit" (v. 9) with a small s. Romans 8: 26,27: "how" is wrong, and the big S here makes the little one totally wrong elsewhere, and seriously so.

116 In 2 Timothy 2: 26 - a confessedly difficult passage, they have introduced words, without any warrant at all, most unwarrantably. The margin, with their words in the text, makes it worse. The "Lord's servant"; margin, or "the devil." The Greek word in 1 Corinthians 5: 1 does not mean 'actually,' but 'commonly.' I merely give all these as leading to an estimate of the character of the work.

There is another point, not unimportant, I would notice: "the Lord added those that were being saved," Acts 2: 47. It is not correct. We have a different translation of the same words in Luke 13: 23: "Are they few that be saved?" The article, with the present participle, has constantly the same character, without reference to time. With the past participle it is so in English; 'the saved' and 'the lost.' In 2 Corinthians 2: 15, "are being saved." Both this and Luke 13 cannot be right - in truth neither are. Revelation 21: 24, they leave out, "of the saved"; if they are in the right, the common text shews the use of the word - it always means those who have this character, as also "those perishing," in 2 Corinthians 2: 15; so "him that was to come,' Rom. 5: 14; "who is to come," Rev. 1: 4, i.e., 'the coming One,' of Christ. See 1 Thess. 5: 7; ch. 3: 5; Matt. 10: 20 for other examples. Instances without number may be found. As to the particular word, it refers to the spared remnant among the Jews, the number of whom was much discussed amongst the Jews. (See Lightfoot and Schoetgen.)

117 In Ephesians 1: 11, they have translated "we were made a heritage." Besides the false preterite already sufficiently spoken of, the Authorised Version is alone right, and the revision a false rendering. The Greek means, 'we have been placed by lot in possession of,' 'have obtained a lot, or inheritance,' and the point is of importance. We are joint-heirs with Christ.

On the whole, then, I accuse the Revisers of having mischievously erred as to the use of prepositions, particularly en, to have been entirely ignorant of the force of the definite article, and to have made a complete mess of the Greek aorist, blundering as to Greek and English.

Letter on the Parables of the Thirteenth of Matthew

J. N. Darby.

<33012F> 118 [From the French.}

I think, dear brother, that there are already explanations of Matthew 13 published, but as it appears that several brothers have not read them, in reply to the request of your correspondent, I shall give a short explanation of this chapter.

The end of Matthew 12 had terminated Christ's relations with the Jews, and even with man according to the flesh; seven spirits, worse than the one which had gone out of this people, would re-enter with him into the empty, swept, and garnished house, abandoned, alas! to the enemy, but not for ever. Jesus no longer owned the ties which were of the flesh. Those who did His Father's will were His brother, and sister, and mother. With regard to His teaching the people, as being Himself the Prophet that should come, all was ended. He leaves the house, and seated Himself in a ship on the sea. He no longer thinks of gathering fruit from His vine. He sows, He brings with Him that which, being received into the heart, will bear fruit, but He no longer seeks it in His vine, as He had done; still less does He look for fruit in the world

Now let us come to the parables of the chapter. We find seven; the first is not a similitude of the kingdom, but it treats of the effect produced on the individual by the word. Then follow three parables, similitudes of the kingdom, proclaimed in the presence of the multitude. At last, when Jesus had gone again into the house, He gives the disciples alone an explanation of the first of these parables; then He adds three others, declaring on this subject, that He spoke in parables, because it was no longer given to the people to hear the kingdom announced as being still for them; this was only given to those who had received the testimony of Jesus, and Jesus Himself as the Christ (v. 11).

The first parable is, indeed, the word of the kingdom, though not a similitude of the kingdom. The point in question is the reception of this word in the heart, not the establishment of the kingdom in this world. There are four classes: the careless hearer; here, just as the birds pick up the seed sown by the wayside, so the devil takes away the word sown in careless hearts, for the word coming from God's heart is adapted to man's heart. Next comes a heart receiving the word with joy. The glad tidings of the kingdom, and of divine blessing, rejoice the heart, but the conscience is untouched; there is not consequently any root, and when persecution and tribulation arise on account of the word, as the careless one had only received it for the joy it brought him, he renounces it on account of the tribulation that ensues. There is no fruit. A third case appeared to give hope of the seed germinating, but the briers and thorns choke it; cares, the love of riches, do not allow the word to bring fruit to maturity. Finally, the seed falls into good ground, there is spiritual intelligence; the heart understands the word, it receives it; then it produces more or less fruit in each one. The cases are not presented as declaring the doctrine of grace and of the operation of the Spirit, no - the contrary, but the actual result that is manifested as the effect of the sowing of the word. Still, these various cases are placed by the Lord before the conscience. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.

119 Then come the parables of the kingdom. The first three present the external appearance of the kingdom, what it becomes to the world's view. The first of these three adds the separation of the wicked from among the righteous; it ends by the order being given to the reapers to gather the good seed into the granary. Save the fact announced by the Lord, that the wheat was, according to His orders, to be gathered into the garner, we have in these parables only the public effect in the world of the establishment of the kingdom of heaven; that is to say, of the kingdom of God while the King remains hidden in heaven, and has not yet either taken His great power, or acted as Ring, so that the kingdom without a recognised or manifested king, progresses, takes certain forms which testify of the Ring's absence, and makes its way as though He was not occupied with it, although He, in reality, does act, in His grace, to call His own, and make them grow. (Compare Mark 4: 26-29.)

The Son of man sows good seed (the word of God). While men sleep, Satan comes, and sows tares where the good seed had been sown. It is not the natural condition of a heathen or unbelieving heart; it is what Satan has introduced among real Christians, to spoil the crop on earth. He cannot injure the good seed, nor prevent its being gathered into the garner, but in this world the crop is spoiled. This must last till the time of harvest. Then the Son of man will again personally occupy Himself with it. In the meantime His servants are not to be occupied with the tares in the world, with the purpose of purifying the crop in the world. Their business is not with the tares; the crop, once spoiled, remains spoiled to the end. But this refers to the state of the crop in the world, that is, to Christianity. We have nothing to do here with the church, the assembly of God. Here the good seed is not united into an assembly. At the time of harvest all will be put in order. In rooting up the tares of the field (the world), one might also pluck up the good seed; it is just what occurred when Rome wanted to destroy the heretics.

120 The second parable presents the kingdom as a great power in the earth. (See Daniel 4.) This is what a great tree is always a figure of in Scripture, as Assyria, Egypt. The seed of the word, in appearance insignificant at the beginning, has in fact become a great, and even the greatest, power on earth.

The third of our parables - that of the leaven - shews not an individual and real effect, as was the case in that of the sower, where the effect disappears when the word does not take root in the conscience; but it is a question of a general influence, which completely fills a limited sphere. Moreover a term (leaven) is used, which everywhere else has the sense of corruption. This is Christianity again.

After this the Lord sends the multitudes away, re-enters the house, and there speaks only to His disciples. He explains the parable of the tares, then adds three others. We have some remarks to make on the Lord's explanation of the parable of the tares and the field. (Verses 36-43; compare v. 24-30.)

The judgment of God manifests publicly what is only spiritually known before the judgment. Thus every explanation of parables and prophecies introduces elements which are not to be found in the parable or prophecy itself. Here the tares, already bound into bundles (in masses associated together and remaining on the field), are cast into the fire. Christ, by an earthly judgment, takes out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them that do iniquity. The earthly part of the kingdom is purified. Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. This is the heavenly part; then the kingdom of heaven will present two distinct parts - the kingdom of the Father above, and that of the Son of man below.

121 The three parables which follow (v. 44-50) shew the intention of Christ, and divine intelligence, in these things. The field is purchased to obtain the treasure. Christ has bought (not redeemed) the world to possess His own. His power over those who refuse His rights will be manifested in judgment, but this is not the subject of the parable.

Next (v. 45, 46), the moral beauty of the church engages His affections. He seeks what is lovely. There He finds it. In these two cases He renounces all His rights as Messiah Son of God on the earth, to the promises as Son of David, and come in the flesh. He went so far as to empty Himself of everything, to have the fruit of His humiliation in the glory of His own, the fruit of the travail of His soul.

Finally (v. 47-50), the kingdom takes at the end the character of a net thrown into the sea, and which gathers every kind of fish, good and bad. The subject is Christianity, which does not embrace all the people of the world, but a limited number, although composed of all sorts of men. Here the fishermen are employed in separating, and again the divine purpose is found that would have good fish, whereas the fishermen's labours have collected all sorts; however, they separate the good. This is what they sought, and they leave the others there. Then the explanation goes outside (the parable) to judgment. The angels separate, not the good from the bad, but the evil from among the good; then the bad are thrown into the furnace of fire. The act of the fishers is one of spiritual intelligence, when Christianity is formed as it is at present.

Thus you have in a few words, dear brother, the true sense, I believe, of these parables, full of instruction for us. The scribe, instructed in the things of the kingdom, possesses, indeed, that which the prophets announced; and he adds to it explanations which are the fruit of the coming and of the rejection of Christ - facts which give the kingdom a form which is presented to us in these parables.

A note on the Parables of the Treasure and the Net

J. N. Darby.

<33013E> 122

To the Editor of an American periodical.

Will you allow me to call in question some details of your explanation of the parables of Matthew 13? No matter of faith is in question, or indeed of doctrine, in any way, for I suppose on this we are quite agreed, but merely the interpretation of certain passages; but we lose by any mistake in this, and Scripture is too precious to allow of it, when in a form that acts on souls, for we are sanctified by the truth.

I suppose that the kingdom of heaven, in the six parables in which it is here spoken of, means the same thing. It is the subject of comparison. It may be, and is, viewed in various aspects, but the thing compared is the same. Your interpretation of the last makes of it an entirely new dispensation, when Christ has taken to Him His great power, and is reigning and judging; or, at least, you mix these two together as one. I am not aware that, though "the heavens rule," the term "kingdom of heaven," is applied to the earthly dominion of the Son of man. The Son of man gathers out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them that do iniquity, and the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.

It has been long ago noticed that the first three of these parables present the outward apparent effects of the gospel in the world, the last three the thoughts of God in it; one, the result in man's responsibility; the other, the intention of God. We get the manifested effect on earth in the first three. The crop spoiled in the world, and to be left so till the harvest; the spread of a common doctrine in place of individual conversion, and that doctrine corrupt; a great power in the earth. Hence, in the parable, the tares are only gathered together in bundles on the earth, and the wheat gathered into the garner. The scene has ceased on earth, save that the tares are gathered in bundles for judgment. The wheat has disappeared there. Then God's actual judgment in power explains what now is known only spiritually. Hence the explanation of symbolical prophecy and parables always goes further than the parable or prophecy, because these give the facts in their enigmatic form, which the spiritual mind alone can explain. In actual judgment all is manifest. In the explanation, the tares are cast into the fire, which they were not in the parable, and the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. The parable closes with the closing of the public state of things in the world - the closing of the present state of things. The explanation (not the parable) gives the judgment of God on the wicked, and the shining forth in glory of the saints. The Son of man in judgment gathers out of His kingdom all things that offend.

123 In the last three parables we have the mind of the Lord in what took place; and first, it seems to me, in contrast with Judaism. Judaism, and Israel itself, was no hidden treasure, no mystery of the kingdom. The Lord gave up nothing to have it. They were His known people and inheritance in the world. He came to His own, though His own received Him not. When He comes again, He will take them to have the world, not the world to have them. In no case has the Lord, it seems to me, taken the world to have the Jews.

To come more directly to what drew my attention to these statements, or (to speak more exactly) to which my attention was drawn, the net cast into the sea. I cannot receive the thought, that it refers to the preaching of the gospel of the kingdom, after the church is gone. As to the facts of that day, and that the preaching will take place, we are agreed. It is to the parable and its explanation that I refer. In the tares you have the position of the kingdom in the world. It is not the work of Christ and the Spirit for His own objects. Simply the facts, and the result, till the close of all here. They are found as such in the world, and dealt with. In the parable of the net, the net is cast into the masses of population, the sea, and gathers out, the object being good fishes, though the net enclosed all; but they are taken out of the sea, and brought to be handled by the fishermen who drew the net. In the parable of the tares there is no gathering a company into one net-full, with which the fishermen are occupied. The whole, in the case of the net, is their work. In the tares it is the Lord's, and Satan's, who spoils it in its effects on earth, though he cannot injure the wheat, or hinder its being put into the garner. It is the effect in the world till harvest, with the fact that the wheat is hid in the garner.

124 Further, in the gospel of the kingdom, when the church is gone, there is no gathering a net-full of good and bad. All is individual; and in the judgment, all the world is brought together, without exception; not a net-full gathered, and the separation made between those only who are in it, the mass of fishes being left in the sea. The kingdom of heaven, the subject of all these parables, never embraces all the world, but is a partial thing - save buying the field to have the treasure hidden in it, which makes the special object more distinct, but the operation of the Lord is partial. The field is the world, but the operation is sowing, and tares, and a treasure which is there; but in the parable of the sheep and goats it is expressly all the Gentiles who are gathered, and no partial collective operation at all. Nor am I, indeed, aware that the throne of judgment set up on earth is ever called the kingdom. The parable of Matthew 25: 31 seems to me to make a clear distinction.

Besides this, the comparison of the use made of the sea does not seem to me to seize the true use of these figures. In Isaiah the wicked are like the troubled sea, casting up mire and dirt. This is a special action of the surf, and the wicked are viewed in this character, and compared to it. That is another idea from the vast sea of nations, out of which a net-full of fishes is taken, good as well as bad. The sea and the fishes of the sea are distinct things; and it is a different thing to bring up all the nations - everybody - for judgment, and to gather every kind and leave the mass of the rest where they were. There is no bringing to shore in the judgment of the nations, before the judgment, but a gathering of all together. The fish are brought out of the sea into a net: that is the fishing work. I do not enter on the analogies of the days of creation, as not necessary to my object; but I think in the remark, that this subject occupies thirteen out of twenty-two chapters of Revelation, there is confusion between the beast and the Gentiles outside.

I have only one more remark to make, already alluded to as a principle. The statement of the parable is overlooked, and confounded with the explanation. In the parable of the net, as in the tares and wheat, the explanation is, and is meant to be, different from the parable. In the parable it is carefully stated that the persons who separate are the persons who have drawn the net: "which when they had drawn to shore, they sat down, and put the good into vessels." They are occupied with the good, and simply reject the bad. In the explanation, the angels - certainly not the fishermen - separate the wicked from among the just - another kind of act - and cast them into the fire. In the parable we have the fishermen's work carried out to the end of the fishermen's part in it. The two previous parables give the thought and purpose of God in the kingdom of heaven; this, the part His servants take in it. In the tares, further, you have no action of men, but of Christ, and Satan, and then judgment in this world, providential and actual, the wheat being gone out of the way into the garner. The gathering into the net, and out of it into vessels, is a distinct part of the parabolic action, and done by the fishermen. In the parable of the tares and wheat, the servants are forbidden to meddle with what is to be done, and the work of judgment, which is all, save the Lord's and Satan's, committed to others.

J. N. D.

Romans 7 and 8

J. N. Darby.

<33016E> 374

To understand well any part of Scripture we must not take an isolated passage (though, when understood, such may be rich in edification) but read, as we should in every writing, each passage with its context, and in its place. It is with this view that, in treating of Romans 7 and 8, I take a rapid survey of the structure of the whole Epistle.

After an introduction, stating what the Gospel of God is about, and his interest in the Romans, the apostle proves and dissects the sinful state of Gentiles, philosophising moralists, and, finally, Jews; admitting the external advantages possessed by the latter, but using even these to bring them in guilty, and thus have every mouth stopped, and all the world guilty before God. This guilt he shews to be met by the blood of Christ. All that the old man is or has done, Jew or Gentile, lawless or under law, is met by the work of the Redeemer on the cross, whom God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood; accounting thus, in righteousness, for the remission of past sins, and setting forth, as a present standing, the righteousness of God thus declared. The great roots of Jewish hope and glory, Abraham and David, testified to the same truth of justification by faith. But another principle is now brought in: faith, not in a dying Saviour, but in God that raises the dead - not the meeting the sins of the old man by propitiation through blood, but God coming in, as perfectly glorified by that work, to deliver completely from that state, and shew us Christ raised from the dead. Abraham believed that God could so perform His promise; we believe He has raised up Christ, who was delivered for our offences and raised up again for our justification (chap. 1-4).

The resurrection of Christ, His being raised by the power of God after being delivered for our offences, forms the ground of the following chapters. It is not only atonement for sin, but bringing man into a new state by the power of God, perfectly accepted, consequent on Christ's being delivered for our offences. But in this Epistle the apostle only sees the fact in Christ, not our being raised with Him. Thus, however, we have peace with God through faith, and have our portion in the glory of God, being reconciled to Him by the death of His Son. The blessing flows to men from the Second Adam through faith, as the judgment from the first through sin. The law came in by the bye, that the offence might abound; chap. 5.

375 Chapter 6 applies the same principle to Christian life. The flesh pretended, being (it would make us believe) very jealous for God's holiness, that if Christ's obedience was the one means of righteousness before God, we might continue in sin. This, while pretending to care for holiness, is the confession, that, if not restrained by fear, and if God shews man grace, man is so irreparably bad that he will only seek evil. I admit it; but God would have hearts; and the spirit of bondage again to fear is not His way of sanctifying. What then is the answer? You are dead with Christ; but one who is, cannot be alive in that to which he is dead. "In that Christ died, he died unto sin once; in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord." Thus Christ's resurrection had been applied to justifying and to newness of life, we being accounted, and to account ourselves, dead unto sin.

Chapter 7 applies this principle to the case of law. It is that we have now to consider. Law has dominion over a man as long as he lives; but we have died in Christ, and its dominion is closed with our life. We are to another, Christ raised from the dead. This is the principle. The chapter is divided into four parts. The first is the great principle we have just stated (vers. 1-3); the second is its actual application to those under law (vers. 4-6); the operation of law on a man under it, man having lusts (vers. 7-12); the experience of a man under law, though renewed in the desires of his mind, viewed in the light of Christian knowledge, that is, by a person out of that condition (v. 13-24). The last verse arrives at the deliverance, and the abstract principle brought to light by all this.

Nothing, after all, can be simpler than the principle the apostle lays down, and which he exemplifies under the figure of marriage. Law has power over a man as long as he lives; has he died? the law binds him no longer. Thus, a woman is bound by the law under which she is to her husband, as long as he lives; but if death comes in, the bond has ceased, and she is free. Now we have died in Christ, that is the theme of chapters 6 and 7. We have died therefore to the law by the body of Christ (that is, in Christ's death), that we should have another husband, Christ raised from the dead. The two - law and a risen Christ - cannot have authority over us together, and this second marriage is alone fruitful. The Christian, then, is distinctly held to have died, and thus to have ceased to be under the law, and that by the body of Christ; and to be to another, the risen Christ.

376 Consequently he is not in the flesh - in the first Adam - and the responsibilities which attach to him; nor under law, even if he had been, because the bond of the law ceased with the life it had its claim over. Hence the next paragraph turns back as to a past time, when it speaks of the state of man under the law, and still alive in the bond of the first husband. "My brethren, ye are become dead to the law . . . for when we were in the flesh the motions of sin which were by the law did work in our members." When we were in that condition, as alive in the first Adam state and under law, the motions of sin were working, set in activity, as an occasion, by the law. Flesh and law are correlatives, save in the case of mere wicked lawlessness. But now we are delivered from the law, having died in that (not that being dead) in which we were held. We were, as thus alive, under the bond of our first husband - law. But we have died and the bond has ceased - cannot exist, for we are to another. Thus we have the doctrine and its application to us, the cessation of relationship with the law, its bond and authority over us, by our having died in Christ, and this state brought more strongly out by our being to another, Christ risen from the dead; but hereby the character of our service changed, it is in newness of Spirit, not in oldness of the letter.

The apostle now proceeds to discuss the operation of law on man in the flesh. Is the law to be charged with being sin because the motions of sin, as he had said, were by it? That is not it all; but this is true, he would not have known sin but for the law. No doubt, if he had been a criminal, natural conscience might have pressed on him. But he would not have known lust unless the law had said, "Thou shalt not lust." Crimes, sins against natural conscience, he might have felt; but sin would have been hidden from him - inward sin, lust, his state of sin. For of this the apostle specially speaks as the real question. In his own case he was blameless. Often the work is much deeper and more painful when there is only inward sin. A wicked sinner stops at the outward fruits, sees his guilt, and that it is gone. The man in whom evil is more refined sees it more twisted round his heart and difficult to overcome. The wicked man, no doubt, will have to judge lust; but often, if he is tempted by it and resists, he is happy in victory: the other is desolate because he finds it there. The inward man is far more exercised than in the case of positive wickedness. However, to have solid peace, the principle and root must be judged, and with this especially we have to do here.

377 Chapter 3 had judged sins and applied the blood; we have now the discovering of sin in the flesh, a still more terrible enemy, one which presses on the spirit more than past sins, where the heart is in earnest. Through the precious blood of Christ we can understand that a God of love has forgiven the sins that are bygone and now not loved; but to have it still there as a principle, working in the shape of lust, this is a burden and a grief. How am I forgiven, how accepted, if this be so? Yet the flesh lusts. Natural conscience takes little heed of this. But the law comes and says, "Thou shalt not lust." Sin profits by this prohibition, attacks the conscience; it says to us, There, you have broken the law, you are under the curse. And so, as far as that goes, we are. The conscience was easy, felt no judgment of death on it, till the law came; but when the commandment came, sin took fresh vigour - took the commandment as a base of attack against the conscience, and brought the sentence of death upon the soul. And the law which was to life - for it said, Do this and live - the soul finds to be to death. These two, then, are the effects of law upon living man, man in the flesh. It provokes concupiscence, it brings death on the conscience. Sin profits by the commandment, which, by restraining, rouses the will and suggests the lust, to deceive and slay the soul. Was it then the fault of the law? No; the law was holy, just, and good. Was that which was good the cause of death? No; but it brought out into evidence the true character of sin, that turned what was good into death; and sin by the commandment became exceeding sinful. Such is the operation of law on a man having lusts and self-will, that is, on every child of Adam who comes under it. Such is man in the flesh under law.

The apostle now turns to the way the actual experience of one in this condition presents itself to him who, being free, can calmly estimate the working of a soul in that state; can read aright what passes in it; who knows what law is, being partaker of divine teaching in a spiritual nature; and can judge what flesh is, because he is not under its influence. We, we Christians, know that the law is spiritual, but he does not say "we" (that would be saying Christians were carnal, as such, whereas they are spiritual men), but "I am carnal [he puts the case], sold under sin." That is the man in the flesh under law. What the reader has to remark here is, that the whole subject is the law, and that Christ and the Spirit are not mentioned. He consents to the law that it is good, delights in it after the inner man, but knows nothing of redemption or the Spirit. His husband is the first one - the law; not the second  - the risen Christ.

378 But we have fuller detail than this, experimental discovery of the truth of his state by the conflict that was going on. First of all, he has found a carnal "I," sold under sin; that is, captive to it as a slave, for he did not allow what he did, nor do what he would, but did what he hated. But if he would not do it, it was consenting in his will to the law that it was good; but if he did so consent, it was not that he was doing it, for he would not do it though he did. It was sin dwelling in him. Here the apostle teaches him the meaning of his experience. There is an "I" distinct from the sinful principle: an "I" that was not his flesh; and he could look at the sinful working of the flesh as being from sin that dwelt in him, not from the "I," which he was conscious was his own inmost will.

But he learnt another truth. In him as born of Adam, that is, in his flesh, there dwelt no good thing at all; for even when he willed to do good, the other was only a hindrance. To will was present with him, but how to perform that which was good he found not. But this brought out a second truth: he had no strength to do good when he willed to do it. For the good he willed he did not do, and the evil he hated that he did. In verse 20, the "I," in "I would not," is emphatic. So it is in "no more I that do it." He now sees he does more than consent to the law in his conscience, he delights in it after the inward man, but another law in his members brings him into captivity.

But in all this he only thinks of law and self (I would, I do not; I hate, I do), not of Christ at all. But this serves, under the divine teaching which the apostle here gives us, to lead him to the discovery of, first the two natures; then that he is without strength, led captive by a law of sin which is in his members. There all his efforts end. But it is a great deal to learn: to get the knowledge of self, one's total want of strength, of the effect of being under law; to know enough of "I" to be glad to get rid of it. This is the process of Romans 7. Peace, by progress or by victory, so as to be content with self, is found to be impossible. One has to own one's sinfulness, and submit to the righteousness of God. It is not contentedness with one's state, but the discovery that one needs deliverance, the work of another. "O wretched man that I am!" Man is here emphatic - such is the condition of man. If he be renewed in will and heart, with the sense of what he as man ought to be by the law, he is a man, and that is a being with evil lusts, under sin, led captive by it; one without strength for victory. But if our God has brought us to this consciousness of what we are - has wrought this work of truth in us, the grace which has wrought it will not fail in completing its work, to give peace and rest of spirit in confidence and communion with God.

379 In the following chapter the way of deliverance is unfolded: here only the Deliverer is named, and this truth is brought out that the deliverance is complete and immediate, and only thankfulness remains for us. Moreover, God is looked to instead of self. It is not what we are for God, and satisfaction in that, but what God is for us. Not, I am now what I would be; but, I thank God: a deep and wonderful change, the true and deepest result of all this humbling exercise, the soul occupied with God instead of self, and occupied with Him in thanksgiving. But the soul sees something more definite than this. It knows divine love and goodness, as the source of deliverance, but it knows Christ and His work as the deliverance itself; and, as to the work, the Deliverer. It is "through Jesus Christ our Lord." The moment, in this self-knowledge (that is, the consciousness of an evil nature, and no strength), we seek, not to be better, saying, How shall I do to gain rest? but deliverance, Who shall deliver? the soul finds it, and its expression is, "I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

The apostle has thus celebrated deliverance with thanksgiving, but the great deep truth learned in the conflict, that of the two natures, abides, and their character in view of the claim of God. With the mind he himself serves the law of God (this alone he really owns to be himself), but with the flesh the law of sin. This is not a question of deliverance, or success, or of failure; but the natural and characteristic tendency of the new and of the old man. In heaven we shall not have the old nature, the flesh; in Christ we are delivered from its power and are no longer under law, having died in Him. But that does not alter the fact, that the disposition of the new nature in itself is to serve the law of God, when it has to say to it or the thought of it, of the old, the law of sin. Nor is strength to fulfil the law in question, nor whether I am under it, but the character and disposition of the new nature

380 The eighth chapter states the principle of deliverance and describes the state and security of the delivered. The law is only noticed as incapable of delivering. Even the seventh chapter comes in only indirectly, as the law did itself. What the fifth chapter does, is to place in contrast ruin in the first Adam and salvation by the Second, and to shew that this cannot be confined to those that had law; that as all connected with the first Adam were made sinners and sinned, so all connected with the Second were made righteous; the disobedience of the first bringing in sin and ruin, the obedience of the Second, and that even unto death, righteousness; but that the law entered, by the bye, that the offence might abound. Now the deliverance was twofold in its nature: Christ died for us, we are justified by His blood; much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. But He died to sin also in dying: so we, if we come to have a part with Him, have part in His death; we are to reckon ourselves dead to sin and alive to God. This is the deliverance: justification, death to sin, and life to God. Faith in the Christian recognises this: it is his whole state as a Christian - justified perfectly as one dead: as to sin, no more of it as to title over him, or the possibility of being charged with having it, than it has over a dead man; yet he is alive, but this is to God. For Christ, in that He liveth, lives to God, and we are alive through Him. Then just as the law came in by the bye, so does chapter 7, as a collateral point, to shew that the law could not deliver. It made sin exceeding sinful, provoked it as an occasion, and left man captive to the law of sin which is in his members. The struggles under it were useful, if there was a sense of its spirituality; because it brought the knowledge of the two distinct natures, and of our total want of strength, and that in us (that is, in our flesh) there is no good thing; so as, through grace, to cast us on the Deliverer. But all this was legal work and not deliverance, but most useful in searching out self, and casting on a deliverer, the need of which was thus fully felt.

Chapter 8 returns, after this experience under law, to the true deliverance itself in Christ. But the deliverance is a real one. It is not merely the fact of putting away the sins of the old man: that indeed, thank God, is done. By Christ's obedience we are made righteous; we are justified by blood. But the question has been raised of sin dwelling in us, and of victory or being captive to it. Now there is deliverance and victory. But how is it arrived at? It is victory, for the law of the Spirit of life in Jesus Christ made free from the law of sin and death. The dominion of sin is broken, as stated in chapter 6. But how do we, I repeat, get at it? You, sinner, renewed in your mind, are you not more troubled at this principle, this law of your evil nature, which leads you captive, than even at your past sins? Certainly, if you have learned the desolateness of succumbing when you would go right, you do. How can you be forgiven and a Christian, you say, with sin having the mastery over you as it has? Is it not said that it shall not if we are under grace?

381 How then, you ask, can I be under grace when sin has dominion over me? I answer, Grace has wrought in you, but you are not under grace in your standing as to your conscience before God. You are under law, you are thinking of your own responsibility, and having to answer for yourself. You say to me, And am I not then responsible? have I not to answer for myself? Doubtless you are responsible. But I ask, in my turn, As a Christian or as a man? If the former, you have eternal life. If not, but the latter - and that you have to answer for yourself in the sense of bearing the consequences of what you are and have done - are you not simply and for ever lost? You are responsible: to be sure you are: but you have not yet learned that upon the ground of that responsibility it is all over with you. But you will say, Yes, I do not deny that: I could believe easily my past sins forgiven; but if they were, ought not I to be delivered from the power of sin? I answer, Yes. The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and of death. To be carnal, sold under sin, is not the true Christian state. But you have probably to learn one thing more if you thus reason - that you are without strength. We must learn, sooner or later, that in us (that is, in our flesh) there is no good thing; and that when even to will is present with us, how to perform that which is good we find not.

But there is a truth that you have not yet learned, and which, when you are once convinced of your own wretchedness, will give you infinite comfort - may be the means of setting you free, and sparing you much wearing conflict. You feel this principle of sin, this law in your members, a condemning thing, a greater proof of your wretched state before God than even the past evil fruits. It is so. It is well you do. It is the evil nature, the very sap that produced the evil fruit brought out to light. So much the better; and what is to be done? There it is in itself, it does not change, it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.

382 How can you be relieved from the burden? CHRIST has died for it. God has condemned sin in the flesh. But how and where? See the grace of God: "What the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin [that is, as a sacrifice for sin], condemned sin in the flesh." God has condemned sin in the flesh, that which is troubling you; but He has done it in Christ as a sacrifice. He, the sinless and holy One who knew no sin, not only bore our sins in His own body on the tree, but was made sin for us. Come in the likeness of sinful flesh, taking the form of man in our nature and place, though holy and sinless in it, yet in the likeness of sinful flesh, He was made a sacrifice for the putting away of sin. God condemned the whole nature and condition we are in, but for him that believes He did so in that which has put it away, just because the blessed One did suffer the condemnation of it there. It is sin, the whole thing and state and condition of our nature, that He suffered for - was made a sacrifice. He was a sacrifice for sin, not merely for sins; He did not suffer for the fruits of the tree, and leave us the evil of the tree itself to appear in before God. God condemned - has condemned - sin in the flesh; your judgment of it cannot be too bad, but He has condemned it in Christ's being a sacrifice for it. Now you can lift up your head. The thing that has justly tormented you has been atoned for, put away out of God's sight. Christ has died for your state of sin as for your sins. Nothing shews so clearly its unbearableness in God's sight; only, when so shewn, it is, as existing before God, put away for ever out of His sight in the sacrifice of Christ. You, as in the flesh, have died in Him. You are not in it before God. You are in Christ, who has suffered and atoned for it, and He is risen.

383 I have dwelt on this, and in an experimental way, because it is the hinge of peace for an exercised soul. A person thus tormented thinks he sees clear and that he is not under the law, and is only looking for the just consequences of faith. But he is looking for victory in order to be content with self, instead of seeing it to be a condemned thing which he has no strength to get the mastery over, but that it has been condemned in the cross, and thus submitting to the righteousness of God, owning Christ to be his righteousness, and joining, so to speak, with God in condemning the flesh. This he is able to do because he knows that it is gone in the cross as to his standing with God, and that he is free. Thus he is and will be free, because now the new nature, the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, acts freely in confidence in God, in grace; and he knows he is alive in it, not in the flesh before God. This has been settled. It has been condemned and put to death in Christ. He is not under it nor does he belong to it. He is not in it at all before God. The new "I" is free; the life he has from and in Christ is all he is before God. The other he may have to overcome as an enemy, but he has nothing to do with it as to his place before God. He is in Christ, not in the flesh, before Him.

To be in Christ is the scriptural opposite to being in the flesh. This opposition the apostle now proceeds to unfold, first shewing that the righteousness the law required was thus fulfilled, but not by being under it, not by taking it as a rule, but by walking after the Spirit. The fruits of the Spirit, as the apostle remarks in Galatians, no. divine law can condemn. We love our neighbours and so fulfil it. The two natures are opposed. It is not now a law given to the old and sinful one. What characterises the sinner and the saint is walking after the flesh and after the Spirit. It is not merely such an such an act condemned, but whatever is not of the Spirit - does not flow from the Spirit - flows from some source in us. There is but one other, the flesh.

They, then, that are after the Spirit walk on this principle, live by this life; mind, have their minds set on, the things of the Spirit. Those after the flesh, that live taking what the flesh wills for their object and sole motive and guide, have their mind on the things of the flesh. Now the mind of the flesh is death, the mind of the Spirit life and peace. All the workings of the desire and will of the flesh end in death - yea, have the principle of death in them, for it is a living without God. It works apart from God, turns its back on Him, and passes on into death; while the free energy of divine life before God and peace of heart is the condition of those who walk in the mind of the Spirit, that is, the thoughts fixed on what the Spirit reveals and introduces into. The mind, the union of desire and will, of tile flesh, is enmity against God. It not only goes its own way with lusts contrary to God's nature, but it would not have God to control or hinder it, and, as He must, it is enmity against Him. His law claims obedience on His authority. It is not subject and cannot be, or it ceases to be flesh - is not. So "they that are in the flesh cannot please God." In its nature - will, lusts - it is against God; it is not, if it is not this: of course, it cannot please Him, but is contrary to Him. They that stand on this ground before God cannot, of course, please Him. Such is the hopeless condition of man as in the flesh. But this is not the Christian standing at all He is not in the flesh: "Ye are not in the flesh," not standing as a child of Adam in your natural place as born after the flesh, and to answer for yourself according to law. Ye are in the Spirit if the Spirit of God dwell in you.

384 Mark, now, the steps of progress. They that are after the Spirit mind the things of the Spirit: this is characteristic. Next, this is life and peace. Next, we are in the Spirit if the Spirit of God dwells in us. Further on he shews us that not only is our standing in the Spirit; not only that which we have by the Spirit dwelling in us, is what characterises us as living persons in God's sight; but that we are sons, heirs, heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ, the true Son and Heir of all things. The man lives in and by the Spirit, and God sees him only as having this life; for this is what He has made him. The flesh is not himself, as we have seen; it is a mere enemy to be overcome: we are no longer in it before God.

This Spirit, whose presence in the believer characterises him, is spoken of in a threefold aspect here. It is the Spirit of God as contrasted with the flesh. It is in nature, source, character, divine. Next, as the Spirit of Christ, it shews us as being of Christ, His path and walk as ours, and manifests us in His likeness. This is its formal character as displayed in this world. Still the body in which it dwells is mortal. "But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus [its third character] dwell in us," even these poor bodies, over which Satan has now no claim at all (they are Christ's) shall be raised because of His Spirit that dwells in us.

385 Thus deliverance is complete in the fullest sense. The liberty of grace, in our standing in Christ through the Holy Ghost, we have; the liberty of glory we have not, and wait for. But now, if Christ be in me, this is my life; the body is to have no will or life of its own. This is always sin. A life where man wills in flesh is enmity against God. I hold it dead. If it be not, it is in it itself lawless - with law, therefore, a transgressor: what life then have I? If, as one born of Adam, I hold myself dead because that life is only sin, the Spirit is life because it produces righteousness. Hence we are not debtors to flesh at all. It is only the old man, from which we are delivered by the precious death of Christ, and our having died in Him. Flesh has no claim upon us; it has done mischief enough, it must now be silent as dead. It does not say we are debtors to the Spirit, for He is power and liberty in life in us, and by Him we mortify the deeds of the body - which end in death as they flow from sin - and live.

The first eleven verses of chapter 8 shew the deliverance even to our resurrection; verses 12, 13, give the practical abstract conclusion; verse 14 and on, shew us into what state we enter as in Christ and the Spirit, the Spirit dwelling in us. He had shewn His work in life to the end of verse 11 - that is, in nature, character, and standing. Now it is His personally dwelling in us, in our bodies. This gives conscious relationship with God, and our place, as regards all around us, and our being in the body through which we are linked to the creation around us. Before, life and character: now, relationship and position, and relative feelings to all around us; this to the end of verse 28.

We are now, then, brought to the immense and blessed truth of the Holy Ghost dwelling in us personally. It bears witness with our spirits that we are the sons of God. It is not merely operations in a derived life; it is "the Spirit itself." But practical consequences flow from His presence: we are led by the Spirit, no doubt, in a spiritual mind; still it is the Holy Ghost guiding by His direct action. But further, it is no spirit of bondage again to fear that we have received, but the Spirit of sonship, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. There is then in our spirits the consciousness of sonship, but the Holy Ghost present in us, which is a distinct fact, bears witness with it. This is true liberty, liberty with God; the heart fully free and happy with Him, redemption having wholly cleared away the old past, in the new place of sons in divine favour, and conscious of it through the Holy Ghost.

386 But this leads us yet onward: if we are sons, we are heirs, heirs of God and joint-heirs with the great Heir of all things - Christ Himself. But this association leads farther, and brings in sorrow, though sorrow of a divine character, so that it is really a step in advance. If we are heirs with Christ, we must suffer with Him, must tread the path He trod; and, having His Spirit in us, we must in our measure have the feelings He had. We cannot follow the world, it will be against us; but the sufferings of this short moment are, for faith, not worthy. to be compared with the glory to be revealed in us.

We have now a view of the state of things around us as known to the Christian, and our position in it and connection with it. The sons of God are not yet manifested, and till then the whole creation groans and travails. All is under the ruin brought in by the first Adam, still not to be left there; but it cannot be freed till the manifestation of the sons of God They themselves, as regards the body, belong to the old creation; though they rejoice in spirit in hope of the glory. The creation was subject to vanity (not by its own will, but through its head, man), and waits for the manifestation of the heirs of the new creation according to God: but till then it groans, as we Christians know, and travails in pain; and we, as to our body, belong to the groaning creation. We are, as to the full and final deliverance, saved in hope; we do not see it yet. In the inner man we are of the new creation and see the glorious inheritance before us, and therefore groan. We do not groan as if we had to be redeemed, or were uncertain if we are - far from that. It is because we know we are sons and heirs of God's inheritance that we feel the burden of a body which can have no part in it. We groan, not because we are uncertain if our soul is saved, and that we have no power against evil in ourselves as being in the flesh, but because being free we are burdened. As sons and heirs of God we have the joy of our relationship, and the bright and sure hope of the inheritance. The last we have not yet; and, as to our bodies, they belong to the old creation, and we are awaiting the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our bodies - not our redemption, this we know in Christ, but that of our bodies. We groan because of the knowledge of our being children, while the vessel is of the old thing, unredeemed as to power.

387 But this puts us in a very blessed, and, in its nature, divine place. Through our bodies, we take up the sorrow, and sympathise with it. The state of things, the power of death, and general ruin, makes us groan, as Christ at the tomb of Lazarus; but it is according to God. We see sorrow and evil - we who have tasted by the Spirit of Christ everlasting good, and are animated with the spirit of love as He was; for however feeble ours may be, yet His Spirit must be as He was. We have not perhaps knowledge enough to discern what to ask for, but the groan expresses the want. He who searches the hearts (that is, ours, for it is our feeling in love and hence in grief) knows the feelings and mind, the purpose of thought, produced by the Spirit. This is the feeling produced in us according to the Spirit; but it is more, it is the Spirit Himself who is there, for the Spirit makes intercession for the saints according to God.

Thus, as regards the inner man, the Holy Ghost gives us the consciousness of being sons, of our relationship with God, through the grace that has redeemed us, and we look to be manifested in glory when the creation shall be delivered. As regards the body, and the old creation to which it belongs, He takes part in our infirmities, taking up for and in us, and teaching us to take up in divine love, the sorrows of a groaning creation. What a wondrous place, what a privilege to be of it! This is analogous to Christ, for sin is not here in question, but only its present sorrowful fruits. He felt perfect sympathy with sorrow as being a man, and a divine sympathy, but perfectly, and perfect in it, as a man; we, no doubt, imperfectly, and with sad defect in love, yet by the spirit of Christ - not in selfishness, but according to God. We suffer where Christ suffered, and by His spirit; and groan where He groaned, as we shall be blessed and reign where He reigns.

This closes the second part of the chapter, where the personal presence of the Holy Ghost, as the power of joy and hope in the consciousness of sonship with God, and as the helper in our infirmities, by reason of the vessel in which we are linked to the old creation, is unfolded to us.

The residue of the chapter speaks of God being for us, not of His work and presence in us. We know not what we should pray for as we ought; but we do know (such is the connection that all things work together for good to them that love God; and the source and security of all is set forth; they were called according to His purpose; He foreknew them, predestinated them to be conformed to the image of His Son, called them, justified them, glorified them. God (says the apostle, in the name of all the saints) is for us; who can be against us? Nor is this all. As regards the way of assuring us, He is for us in the gift of His Son. This secures to the heart His freely giving us with Him all things. Nor is this all - there is the question of guilt: "Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?" (Compare Zech. 3.) Is Satan to cast into the fire a brand God has just plucked out on purpose? And note, there God spoke for Joshua; and so here. It is God that justifieth, who is to condemn then? He does not say "justified before God," but God justifies - who then can condemn?

388 But there is more; there are the difficulties and dangers of the way - death, hostile principalities, the glorious height where Christ is: is He not too far above? Christ has died, yea more, He is risen. He makes, if He is on high, intercession for us. He who has so loved us, fills all things from the death He has overcome and left behind Him to the throne of God where He is not less for us than when on the cross, is not changed. Tribulation they were in, killed like sheep: was not He, in love to them? All the sorrows, even to death, were the proofs of His love. As to constancy of love, what could separate? as to power, all against us overcome; as to temptation and trial, all gone through. All besides are but creature difficulties or powers, they cannot separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Thus, great as the blessing is, great as the dangers are, we are secured to enjoy the one and to get through the others, more than conquerors, by God being for us, through Him that loved us. They are the trials of a redeemed spirit, who has the Spirit of God as the source of his life, and dwelling in him; set free, through the work of Christ from all that his flesh involved him in; passing - in the consciousness that he is a child of God, His heir, and joint-heir with Christ, in a body not yet redeemed by power from its old creation state - through a world of sorrow, but knowing that God is for him. Not the sorrows of a soul overcome by sin, and groaning under captivity; but one set free, and feeling the sorrow sin has brought in, and the burden of an unredeemed body (not in captivity to the law of sinful flesh), according to God.

Romans 9

Revised Notes of a Lecture delivered in Davies Street, London.

J. N. Darby.

<33017E> 389

I will say a few words on Romans 8, which we did not quite finish last week. We considered the three subjects it contains. First, The living work wrought in us connected with no condemnation. Second, Not merely the work that is wrought in us by the Holy Ghost, but the presence of the Holy Ghost Himself in us, as distinguishing between that which is born of the Spirit, and the personal indwelling of the Holy Ghost. Third, Not only what God has wrought, or is in me, but what God is for me in His outward operations.

It is the third point which forms the subject of the closing part of chapter 8, which omits the work in us altogether, and brings forward the security, that is to say, what God is for us; which introduces the sovereign power of God acting in grace for us - "whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate." In this passage, sanctification and the whole work of the Spirit is therefore omitted (while it is fully brought out in other parts of chapter 8) and the apostle turns to God's foreknowledge, and what He is and does for them whom He foreknew. And mark, the foreknowledge here is that of persons: it is not said "what he foreknew" in them, or that, because of that, they should be predestinated; but "whom he did foreknow, he has also predestinated to be conformed."

In verse 29 we see what the wonderful thought of God about us is, that we should be conformed to the image of His Son. There is a spiritual conformity, even here, in the saints; but it does not stop at spiritual conformity, for the predestinating purpose of God was to conform them to Christ Himself. In the wonderful purpose of God He had set up the man Christ Jesus, in whom He took all His delight, in His presence in glory. Looking then at Christ as the second Man, we find that He has sanctified Himself, set Himself apart as the One to whom we are to be conformed. He has gone up into glory, and has sat down at the right hand of God, before the church is gathered; and although we do not yet see all things put under Him, we see the Man Jesus crowned with glory and honour. Now, "as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly"; for God's wonderful thought about us is, not only to bring us into His presence, but that our very bodies even should be conformed to the likeness of the glorious body of His dear Son, "that he might be the firstborn among many brethren." For, as I have remarked before, it is not exactly the church, as a body, that is presented in Romans, but the individual relationship of the saint with God. As the brethren of the Lord Jesus, God has not only foreknown them, had His purposes and thoughts about them, but God has called them, and, through grace, they have listened. God called them - they became partakers before Him in blessing - not by ordinances, nor yet by descent, but by His calling them; and here comes in another feature of God's character - the activities of His own love in calling souls out of this evil world. "Whom he called, them he also justified"; for if God had foreknown these people, He has called them; not to reject them - God Himself has done it; for I am not only justified before God, but it is God that justifies me. He will not have us in His presence with one sin upon us. It is His doing, to have us with Himself according to the purposes of His love and the holiness of His nature. If I am justified in His sight, it is God who justifies me, according to the perfectness with which He does everything. He speaks of it as a great fact (the inward working being left out here), as the wondrous basis on which He rests this justification - it is on what God is, and in His own work. Indeed, it is observable in a most remarkable way all through this Epistle, how everything is made to rest on what God is. Man having been tried in every way, without law, under law, under grace, is brought out and proved to be good for nothing: then God comes in and acts in His own sovereignty, according to what He is. This shuts out the possibility of anything whatever, be it sin or Satan, coming in against us - God is for us. This is the grand result which the soul discovers, and the Holy Ghost reasons from. The heart may argue, Why then am I finding all this tribulation if He so loves me - if He be for me? But faith interprets the tribulation by the certainty of God's being for us, and is more than conqueror. Everything is made to rest on what God is; on this great leading truth, proved in His sovereign ways to us as sinners, ways rehearsed in the preceding verses, which shew what God is for us; and if God be for us, who can be against us, for who can put himself in competition with God? - "is not this a brand plucked out of the burning?" If you ask a proof of God's being for us, the proof is, He gave His Son. If I come to God, and say, What will He do for such a wretched sinner as I am? why, He has done more than the greatest sinner can ask, more than the greatest saint could think of, for He has given His Son for me; therefore, not only have we done with everything that was against us - Satan, every accuser - but the very sin that made me tremble, becomes a witness of the extent of the love of Him who is "for us." There it is I have learnt it: for He has shewn Himself for me in justifying me. But if God be thus for us about our sins, we may count freely for all the rest. "He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him freely give us all things?"

391 The Spirit never (as before remarked) reasons upwards from what man is, but downwards from what God is as known in grace in Christ. Thus God being for us, we are entirely free from the possibility of any charge being brought against us; for "Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth." And mark here, that it is not the elect merely, but that it is God's elect. Well, but the soul says, this may all be very true, but how many things I have to meet; there is life before me and all its cares, the trials of the world, and death before me; how can I reconcile all this? if God be for me, how is it that I have all these things against me? We get the answer to all this in the application of Christ's love to all our present circumstances. It is not merely the immense truth that God is for us, which the Holy Ghost puts before us; it adds, that Christ is for us, who came down into all these trials even unto death; as it is said, "Christ that died; yea, rather, that is risen again"; therefore, "who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" He not only says that nothing shall separate us from the love of God, but he brings it down to our daily weakness, saying, "For thy sake we are killed all the day long"; that in all these daily trials in the world, we might be "more than conquerors through him that loved us."

But you say, How can this make trials seem for us? Why it is not only that I have got the victory, that "we are more than conquerors," but we have Christ with us in the combat, who loved us enough to die for us, and has overcome death. All that might pretend to separate me from this love is the demonstration in detail of the interest this love of Christ takes in me If you say, But Christ is too high up to help me down here; He is up there at God's right hand. Yes, blessed be God, the very Christ that died is risen again, and is at the right hand of God making intercession for us. Because He lives I shall live. But if you ask, Will not death separate me from the love of God? No; Christ died and is risen again. "Things present" - can they? No; for in these everyday trials I learn His love. "Things to come"? No; they are all met by Christ: as regards difficulties here, He has overcome the world; as regards another world, things to come will be my participation in His glory. "Principalities and powers" - can they? No; they are but creatures at best, and no mere created being can be stronger than God. God is the source and the power of the blessing; and the One who went down under the power of death and Satan, though He could not be holden by it, is now risen again, and is at God's right hand in heaven making intercession for us, and by the power of the Holy Ghost brings home the blessing to us, in every detail of daily life. Thus has God completely shut us up - just as Noah was shut up in the ark, and floated over all the trouble; Noah went into the ark, but it was God that shut him in.

392 The great secret in the Epistle is, that man is reduced as low as he possibly could be, that is, to his own real level, being proved to be everything that is bad, feeble, and good for nothing; and then God comes in in grace, and says, That is what God is for you; and this gives the heart quietness, and sets the conscience in full liberty, in virtue of the resurrection of Jesus, and closes it up from all questionings by shewing that that on which it rests is outside man altogether - based on the stability of God Himself; and brought out in the work and Person of Christ; though a real work be wrought in the soul to enable it to enjoy it. God is in us, and for us, and has brought down everything to meet our daily need in Christ; and we can only adore, and wonder; and yet it ceases to be wonderful when we see it is God's doing: we know He must do something superlatively great to shew the exceeding riches of His grace; what He does returns up to Him again in adoration and praise: yet goodness, acting in its own sovereignty, must do something which is above all praise. As in Psalm 84, where we get the double blessing, "blessed are they that dwell in thy house, they will be still praising thee." In the house - there where God is - is the first and proper blessing; there there is nothing but praise. Then, "blessed is the man whose strength is in God" - the strength needed by the way - "in whose heart are the ways of [that is, the way to] God": for having learned grace here, we shall learn glory there. Let us now turn to chapter 9.

393 The first thing in the Epistle to the Romans is, that the apostle reduces man to his true level as a sinner, whether under or without law; and this is met by the bloodshedding spoken of in chapter 3. Then chapter 4 brings out faith in God who raiseth the dead - not my working to meet God, but believing in God who had come in with power and raised the One who was under the power of death and set Him at His own right hand. In chapter 5 we get this faith applied to justification; the results of His being delivered for our offences and raised again, are given - we are saved; thus assured of love we are able to joy in tribulation, and, the grand result of all, in God Himself. In chapter 6, we are dead to sin. In chapter 7, dead to the law: and in chapter 8, we have the full liberty of the Christian. Chapter 8 being the summary of the whole Christian position, the result for the believer of the work of God in grace. God acting in the power of His love, brings us into His presence in the Person of Christ; being justified we get liberty, and God, in His own sovereign power of grace shuts us up in the ark - I mean, in Christ - in the security of His own grace. But then comes in a difficulty: what becomes, not merely of the broken law, but of the special promises made to the Jews? If Jews and Gentiles are thus reduced to one moral level, how are we to reconcile the fact of the unconditional promises made to the Jews, such as those made to Abraham in Genesis 15, 17 and 18? This difficulty is met in chapters 9, 10 and 11.

In chapter 9, the apostle speaks of the absolute sovereignty of God. The potter may do what he pleases with the clay. The question is, not what God has done, but His title to do what pleaseth Him. The close of chapters 9 and 10 brings out how the Jews' own prophets had forewarned them of what would come to pass. It was a known scriptural thing, Israel's failure and consequent rejection. But though it is the will of God to deal thus with them, He will never give them up; as we see in chapter 11, that Israel are still God's beloved earthly people.

The sovereignty of God being asserted does not affect the apostle's love to Israel; as he says, "I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost, that I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart: for I could wish myself accursed," or, "I have wished myself accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh"; for this is the force of verse 3; that instead of despising his brethren, a charge the Jews were perpetually bringing against him, the real impulse of his heart had led him - not in cool reflection, for the thing was impossible, but in the earnestness of his soul in love to them - to express a feeling that never could be accomplished indeed, though spoken in earnestness, but which proved that Paul loved them quite as much as Moses ever loved them, and was willing, as far as affection went, to be like Christ, an anathema "for his brethren, his kinsmen according to the flesh."

394 Here you see the power of divine love, which is willing to be and do anything and everything for those whom it would serve. It seeks all the good it can find in its true object - affection must do so; though the same affection may make it earnest in reproof. Just as the same Paul says to the Corinthians, who were convicted of sin not found among the Gentiles, "I thank my God on your behalf, that in everything ye are enriched by him, in all utterance, and in all knowledge; so that ye come behind in no gift, waiting for the coming of the Lord." Yet when he visits them, he will not spare; he will come with a rod. He gets at their consciences by opening their hearts to their privileges, and then he can rebuke them, when the will has been broken down by the sense of the love. You will be ready to say yourselves, However can such a favoured people act thus? And they felt that if he had not been forced to rebuke them, he would never have rebuked them at all; and thus what he said came home with additional weight and power on the conscience. So here Paul speaks to them of all that he can, "Ye are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, and the covenants." Do not you suppose that I want to undervalue your promises: I hold them up. You Israelites do not value them as you ought, you do not know them; you do not know that you have God over all, blessed for ever, for your Messiah.

It is thus, I believe, we should deal with poor Jews now. "God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew." For a time, indeed, they are set aside as a nation, in order to reconcile the world; and they are considered in their nature and condition of sinners as levelled to the condition of the Gentiles, the apostle having proved in chapter 3 that they are both alike under sin. But here the apostle reconciles the fact of the unconditional promises made to the Jews, with this doctrine as to their common sinfulness with the Gentiles, and he proves that they will have the promises in a much higher way than they could have had them at first; and while bringing both Jew and Gentile alike under sin, he raises up God above His promises (though He will accomplish them, of course, though Israel had forfeited all title to them, for it had rejected them when their accomplishment was presented in the Person of Jesus), and shews Israel from their own history that they must leave God to His sovereignty, or else they must lose their promises; and then that in the exercise of this sovereignty He will let in the Gentiles, as well as the Jews. They would have them by descent, which, of course, excluded the Gentiles. If, says Paul, you Israelites will take your promises by descent, we will just see what comes of it. You say, we be Abraham's seed, and have a right to the promises by descent; for these Gentiles are but dogs, and have no right to share with us in God's promises. Well, if God has His sovereignty, He will in grace let in these Gentile dogs. But now I will prove to you that you cannot take the promises by descent. In the first place, "they are not all Israel which are of Israel"; yet if it is by descent you must take in all Abraham's seed. And if you take in Abraham's children, then you must take in Ishmael - those Arabians. Oh no, say they, we cannot allow that; what! Ishmaelites in the congregation of Israel, and heirs of promise? Yes, if by descent. If you do not take it by descent, you must take it by grace; and if it is by grace, God will not confine this grace to you, but will exercise it toward the Gentiles.

395 But now, to go further down in your history,* and then you have Jacob and Esau; and if you go by descent, you must let in the Edomites by the same tide as yourselves. But in verses 8, 9, it says, "the children of the promise are counted for the seed": so that it must rest on Isaac and Jacob, and Ishmael and Esau remain outside; therefore your mouth must now be closed as to descent, for your mouth is bound up by God's saying, "Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated." He has chosen, according to His sovereign title, to bless you, and on that alone your blessing depends; as your own history shews, your own prophetic testimony proves, you cannot rest it on a mere title by descent. But is there then unrighteousness with God? for such is the natural objection of the flesh. No: "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy." If we begin to ask, Is there unrighteousness with God, as really calling Him in question, we are seeking to judge God, instead of God's judging us. Whenever the sovereignty of God is called in question, it is the soul saying, in effect, I am to judge God, and not that God is to judge me. But further, see how their mouth is stopped; for when did God say, "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy"? When every Israelite had lost all title to everything God had to give, then God retreated, if I may use the expression, into His own sovereignty, that He might not cut them off.

{*At verse 9, the proper rendering is, "this word is of promise, at this time will I come and Sarah shall have a son."}

396 Israel did pretend to take the ground of righteousness, as in Exodus 19, and what followed? The golden calf was made Was God to share with the calf in having them as a people? No: by this, the very first link that bound them, that nearest to God, was broken; by this act Israel had forfeited everything; they had cast off the promises, which they had accepted on the condition of their own obedience (Moses might have had them) and the God that had made the promises, and who alone could fulfil them. Could God overlook this sin? Israel had undertaken to have the promises by their obedience; if God had dealt with Israel in righteousness, every one must have been cut off. What could God do but retreat, as I said, into His own sovereignty? There He had a resource; for if any of them are to be spared, it must be in this way of mercy. "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy." Man is entirely lost, so now God says, I will act for Myself. Taking a truth in connection with all other truth gives it its right and proper place, and its own divine force. Turn now to Exodus 19, 20 and 21. Israel undertaken to have the promises on condition of obeying all that God would command. God had said, "If ye obey my voice"; they answer, "all that the Lord hath spoken we will do." But before Moses came down, God tells him, "They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them, they have made them a molten calf, and had worshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto"; then, "the Lord said unto Moses, I have seen this people, and behold it is a stiff-necked people; now, therefore, let me alone, that my wrath may wax hot against them, and that I may consume them," Exod. 32: 8-10. Then Moses says, "Forgive them their sin." Here the mediator is brought in, a figure, of course, of the true Mediator. Moses goes up to make an atonement for them; "Peradventure* I shall make an atonement for them." But let us see the effect of his mediation. First, God says, in chapter 33: 3, "I will not go up in the midst of thee; for thou art a stiff-necked people; lest I consume thee in the way": but "I will send an angel before thee" (v. 2). Then in verse 7, "Moses took the tabernacle, and pitched it without the camp, afar off from the camp": then in verse 13, Moses says to God, "Now therefore, I pray thee, if I have found grace in thy sight, shew me now thy way, that I may know thee, that I may find grace in thy sight; and consider that this nation is thy people." And God replies, "My presence shall go with thee" - not with the people, but with the mediator. And then God proclaims the name of the Lord to the mediator, at the same time bringing out this principle, "I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy."

{*Though we have here the general analogy of mediatorial intervention, remark here the difference of that of which it was a shadow. Christ is gone up because He has made a perfect and effectual atonement, the efficacy of which He presents on high so as to secure our blessing; that, of course, Moses could not do. There is no "peradventure I shall" for us; He has made it before He went up to God to appear in His presence for us.}

397 When Moses pleads with God for Israel, notwithstanding all their departure from God, yet Moses identifies them with God, and says, "Thy people which thou hast brought forth out of the land of Egypt"; while God calls them the mediator's people. Remark here, in passing, one thing most beautiful to observe: God, after first threatening to consume them, by coming up into the midst of them in a moment, (chap. 33: 5), had said (ver. 3), "I will not go up in the midst of thee, for thou art a stiff-necked people." Yet Moses says in chapter 34: 9, "If now I have found grace in thy sight, O Lord, let my Lord, I pray thee, go up amongst us, for it is a stiff-necked people. Grace had come in in the interval, God's goodness had passed before him. This changed all, and the people being so stiff-necked, Moses says, we cannot do without God; so that Moses, when once the foundation of grace is laid, makes the very condition of the people, which would have led God to consume them, or at least not go amongst them, the reason for God's going up amongst them. It is a question of who is to go up; therefore Moses says, Do thou, O God, go with us. Grace had come in and therefore he could say to God, Go with us; thus bringing in God for us. The moment grace is brought in, even in the way of government (and here the question is one of government), we feel that our very sinfulness is a reason why the presence of God cannot be dispensed with.

398 We will now turn again to the subject of descent. We have seen Paul saying, If you Jews will have the promises by descent, then you must let in the Ishmaelites and Edomites; and, on the other hand, if you say you will have them by righteousness, you know that if God had dealt with you in righteousness there would not have been one of you here at this moment; say now (and you, my reader, ask yourself the question), will you be willing to be dealt with in righteousness? No, you would not; then do not you talk about it, until you can go to God on that footing. But if, says Paul to Israel, you still say, We will have the promises by righteousness, the golden calf has proved, at the very outset, that you cannot have them on that ground, and that your mouth must be for ever closed. But if you have such a conviction of sin as stops your mouth about righteousness, and so excludes all boasting, you will rejoice in the "mercy" and "compassion" of God, who retreats into His own sovereignty, that He may know how to spare; because in thus sovereignty He can shew mercy. If I am convicted in my heart of sin, I shall be glad enough to hear of grace, be it ever so sovereign: "So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy." God is not bound up to righteousness; He can shew mercy, and "whom he will he hardeneth."

Turn now to Pharaoh's history. "The scripture saith, for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth." And here, I would say, I do not wish to enfeeble or escape the full plain sense of this passage, because it has been made a doctrinal question. There is a hardening in certain cases. It is impossible that God can make or tempt a person to be wicked; but He can harden, and give up the sinner judicially to blindness. I would here speak with reverence; but the scripture is very plain. Mark God's ways, and first with the natural man, and how it ends. See Romans 1. After giving a long detail of wickedness, he says, in verse 24, "wherefore God gave them up to a reprobate mind to work all uncleanness." In verse 25, "they changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator." "For this cause God gave them up to vile affections." And then in verse 28, "even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind." Now in all this history, it is to be observed, that God does not make man wicked, but simply gives man up to what he is. Again, of Israel God says, "make the heart of this people fat, and their ears heavy, and shut their eyes." And so with professing Christians in this last dispensation of mercy, "Because they received not the love of the truth that they might be saved and for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie." It would be a horrible blasphemy to say that God made them wicked. But those who received not the love of the truth were judicially sent strong delusion. And here, observe, it is not said that God fitted the vessels of wrath to destruction, but "what if he endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction"; that is, after long sufferance, God makes an example of what righteous judgment is; as He says to Pharaoh, "even for this cause have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee." And in effect says, Now you shall see who Jehovah is; for Pharaoh had said, "who is the Lord, that I should obey him?" "Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault, for who hath resisted his will?" That is not your business to inquire; you are but a man, and yet you are replying against God! shut your mouth, for God gives no account of His matters to man. The first of all justice is, that God should have His rights; and if God have not His rights, who ought to have, who shall have? It is morally important that you should take your place, and leave God His place; you are but a mere man, and therefore it is not your place to be replying against God; you are to hold your tongue when God speaks.

399 But further, it is not said that God has made any vessel to dishonour: but "hath not the potter power over the clay, to make one vessel to honour, and another to dishonour?" Of course the potter has power to make what he pleases; but if we do not let God have His right and proper place, who is to set things in order when sin has brought in disorder? The mark that a soul is right, morally right, is saying, I am a sinner, deserving everlasting destruction, and all my trust is in sovereign goodness. Faith says, I was bringing on myself "swift destruction," but God's grace stopped me; this is taking my true place before God. It is always seen (even in those systems which differ in this) that individual faith feels and acknowledges itself to be a debtor to sovereign mercy alone. But again, "hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel to honour, and another to dishonour?" Now, in this passage, though we have strongly asserted the absolute title of God to do what He pleases, it is not said that He made any vessels to dishonour; but the passage simply asserts His prerogative, His title to make of the same lump what He pleases, and that unqualifiedly and fully. But God does bear with these wicked men, as He said to Israel, by the mouth of the prophet Isaiah, "thou hast made me to serve with thy sins, thou hast wearied me with thine iniquities" (chap. 43: 24). Then again by the prophet Amos, "behold I am pressed under you, as a cart is pressed that is full of sheaves" (chap. 2: 13). Thus God "endures with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction," willing to shew His wrath and make His power known. But when speaking of mercy, the apostle instantly brings God in; "that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory." It is moral dealing here, and not mere cold barren doctrine. We see how God deals with these vessels which He had afore prepared unto glory, and then how He endures with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction. And again, mark, that it does not say that these vessels of wrath were afore prepared for destruction, neither does it merely say that the vessels of mercy were fitted unto glory. No; for the vessels of mercy were afore prepared of God unto glory, while the vessels of wrath are fitted to destruction by their iniquities having come to the "full." But whatever there is of good must come from God, and God only; the evil, alas! is already in us. But if the question still be put, Why has God been bearing with this wickedness, and only at last shewn out His wrath in those vessels fitted to destruction? The answer is, that after He has proved the ways of men, and shewn all shut up under judgment, He then comes in with mercy, sovereign mercy; and so the apostle applies it. Cannot He then let in the Gentiles? Surely; for if God is setting up vessels of mercy, He can prepare a Gentile as well as a Jew. If the Jews, in their folly, arraigned God's sovereignty - very well, says the apostle, let them have righteousness, and where then will they be? and having proved that law and descent have both failed as a title, he shews, if you Jews will not let in the Gentiles, you must yourselves be shut out. For if, they will not bow to God's sovereignty, let them take Sinai, where they have lost all title to all the promises, and are thus necessarily thrown on the ground of God's doing what He pleases, or on judgment. God forces them to own this, that He may call in the Gentiles; as God says in Hosea, "and it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there shall they be called the children of the living God." Romans 9: 25 is the call of the Jews, and verse 26 the call of the Gentiles. Verse 25 calls the Jews from the Lo-ruhamah and the Lo-ammi state of Israel. (See Hosea 1: 6, 9.) But in verse 26 it is the call of the Gentiles; it being the special and proper privilege indeed of the Gentiles to be called the sons of the living God, but not to be His people as a specific title. Thus in the very place where Lo-ammi was universally applied, the blessed title of the sons of the living God - for indeed it was by spiritual life - became the portion of the called, according to Hosea 1, latter part of verse 10. And this is confirmed by the fact of Peter's only quoting, in his writing to the dispersed of Israel who believed, the closing part of verse 23 of Hosea 2; the very same that is quoted in Romans 9: 25; because Peter refers to the Jews only, and therefore only takes up those who, having been Ammi (my people) had become Lo-ammi (not my people); and though Ruhamah (mercy) had become Lo-ruhamah (no mercy) - but having obtained mercy, have become Ammi and Ruhamah, which they will continue to be in the millennium, after being as a nation brought back to God. While Paul, speaking of the Gentiles as well as the Jews, quotes in Romans 9: 26, the latter part of Hosea 1: 10 also; "and it shall come to pass in that place," etc.; so that these verses are taken by Paul to shew the whole bearing of the argument as to the calling of Jews and Gentiles, as well as peculiar mercy to Israel. In verse 27, Isaiah is introduced, clearly shewing the actual setting aside of the people as a body by the judgment of God, whatever mercy might be in store for them.

401 To us, all this is very simple, having become familiar to our minds; but to them, it must have been a tremendous and inexplicable thing that God's people should be set aside as to the actual administration of God's government on the earth. While God has no earthly people, He gives up the earth, as to immediate law (while providentially watching over events, of course). While Israel were God's people, on the earth, there was a direct interference of God as to executive government on the earth; but now God is not dealing with His people on the earth as for the earth, but as a heavenly people - a mystery. God's power was shewn on the earth, but now God has given up the government of a people on the earth, and taken up a heavenly people - "blest with all spiritual blessings, in heavenly places in Christ." Israel for a season is set aside; and Christ, the only door by which any can be saved, being exalted on high, the calling is that of a distinct people, not for the earth, but for heaven; and therefore the word is, "If any man will come after me, let him take up his cross and follow me." The idea of Christ having members on earth while He, the Head, is in heaven, no Jew would have understood; and before the Jew will own this in his conscience, they must be brought to see that they have been cut off for rejecting their Messiah. And the earth also is guilty; as having rejected God's Son; and for this, God, "will finish the work and cut it short in righteousness, because a short work will the Lord make upon the earth." Well, dear friends, are you prepared for God to make a short work on the earth? But we know it will not be till after the last elect one of the church is gathered in; and if we are "keeping the word of his patience," He will keep us from the hour of temptation; and, meanwhile, He has set before us an open door, that no one can shut. In verse 32, "they sought it not by faith" - "Israel, which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness: wherefore? because they sought it not by faith." Israel did not keep the law; and when the object of faith came, Him they crucified, so that, although to Israel the promises were given, we have seen how they were forfeited by them, as far as their title went to the promise. And here is the wonderful wisdom of God shewn out in bringing failing Israel, and the poor Gentile dogs, both in alike on the ground of sovereign grace. One had not got the promise, the other refused it when presented to them in Christ; so that both should be objects of mere mercy.

403 In principle, all these great truths are for our own souls. The history of the world is the history of an individual soul. And God has taken pains to detail elaborately that wherein we may read ourselves as in a glass, and see that we are shut up to grace; and having come to that, nothing can separate us from the love of God. It depends on sovereign goodness; therefore I lean on what God is for me, and not on what I am for God. The moment our souls are brought to God, we find that Christ has more than overcome in love and put away all the evil we have learnt of ourselves, bringing His love into it. The ways, purposes, counsels, and power of God for man can never fail.

The Lord give us understanding, a divine understanding, of all His thoughts and ways; and let not our thoughts and affections be running out after the world, that does not know Him, nor yet the hidden mystery which He reveals to those who love Him; but may our hearts and souls know God Himself in all these things! They are precious and valuable, because they are the various parts which make up the glory of the Lord Jesus: therefore valuable because they belong to Him.

Note on the application of the types of the Red Sea and Jordan.

To the Editor of "Things New and Old," April, 1881.

J. N. Darby.

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I do not doubt that your whole desire is to put things scripturally, and that you will bear with me in stating that I think what you say in the article of Correspondence, entitled J.H., Fenihirst, is not scriptural. It is possible that you might find a similar statement in some of my former writings where the points were not so clear to my mind. Yet I think I ever held the Red Sea to be Christ dead and risen for us, and Jordan we dead and risen with Christ. I took this ground in the Archer Street conference and it was resisted on ground like your article, and I examined it afresh. Only, in my case, if it were so, it was merely want of being clear, while a whole system is now made to hang upon what is not correct. The theory is that the passover was Christ's dying for us, the Red Sea our death with Christ, and Jordan our death and resurrection in Him. All this, except the first, is wrong. First, there is no dying in Christ, nor such a distinction as with Him and in Him. If a person long exercised said, 'O, I see I died in Christ,' I should be delighted. He has seen his deliverance, though he expresses it wrongly. But the difference is real and practical. When we die with Christ, it is we, "I am crucified," a real experimental thing, not judicial, though we get liberty by seeing it accomplished in Christ. So we are always dead to something, dead to sin, to the rudiments of the world, dead to the law. Scripture does say that we are alive in Christ, because that is an actual, subsisting thing; He is our life, we are in Christ.

In the passover, there was one simple truth, God was passing through as a judge, and passed over, was shut out as such. The Red Sea is Christ's death, and resurrection - more than mere non-imputation; Ex. 15: 13. It is redemption absolute and accomplished. God is a Saviour and deliverer; Ex. 14: 13. The Egyptians were to be seen no more. It was nothing done in us, but for us; the command was, "Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord." Death and judgment were for God's people's deliverance, and the result was, "Thou in thy mercy hast led forth the people which thou hast redeemed: thou hast guided them in thy strength unto thy holy habitation"; and afterwards, "Ye have seen how I bare you on eagle's wings, and brought you unto myself." As a type, all was closed for Egyptians and Israel. The latter were not in glory (Canaan), not in the wilderness, not in Egypt, but brought to God - not their subjective state, in any respect. That was experimental; this, judicial and final. This was returned to at the end, whatever the exercises and "ifs" of the wilderness. Concerning Jacob and Israel it shall be said as at this time, "What hath God wrought?" whatever Moses, that is the Spirit of God, might give the conscience of among them. But from the mountain where they came to meet God, their journey was an experimental state, to humble them, and to prove them, and know what was in their hearts. And so was the crossing of Jordan, though in another way. The priests' feet must touch the water, the ark is with them, they with it in the passage. There was association. Moses did the work of authority at the Red Sea. The people stood still and saw the salvation, and when the work was done passed over dry-shod. Death had lost its power in Jordan, but in the ark's going through it with them. It is Christ's death, but not redemption; it was going in to what was promised, not going out to God. Hence the stones of death are set up in Canaan; Gilgal comes in. It is experimental, though of faith. At any rate we have no dying in Christ, but with Him. The nearest to it is Colossians 2, where we have the true circumcision in Him, but this is in nowise the same, not even saying how, save by His circumcision, we have the true thing in Him, not the mere Jewish figure. There is a connection between the Red Sea and Jordan. Both are Christ's death and resurrection, but one is for us, where we stand still and see; the other, our having part in it, we have died with Him and risen with Him. The passages (Col. 2: 12; Eph. 1 and 2) are entirely misapplied. There is no dying at all there, but sovereign power comes in, and, when we are dead in sins takes us and puts us into Christ, as it raised up Christ when He was dead, and put Him into glory. Many other truths connect themselves with these points, as the character of the wilderness, with which the conditional "ifs" of the New Testament connect themselves: and the confounding Ephesians 2 and Colossians 2: 12, with Romans 6, two totally different systems of doctrine, has given rise to wild wanderings of fanaticism; but this would lead me too far.

406 I crave the forbearance of my brethren, my excuse for criticising their explanation being the immense practical importance for souls. For mark the effect, you have God shut out by the blood on the door posts, and that is all as to Him, and no redemption in the scheme at all; for if the Red Sea be our resurrection with Christ, that clearly is not redemption, that which is designated by "our" as the ones engaged in it. By redemption I do not mean here the forgiveness of sins by blood, but as used for the operation of God's power in freeing Israel from Egypt. That involves the blood-shedding and the forgiveness, but went much further. It was the accomplishment of the statement to Moses (Ex. 6: 6, 7), when the power and title of Pharaoh were destroyed by judgment, as Satan's for us. So Exodus 3: 8. So Christ (Gal. 1) gave Himself for our sins, to deliver us from this present evil world. (1 Peter 1: 18-20; Psalm 106: 10.) That sin in the flesh was condemned when Christ was a sacrifice for sin, is blessedly true for us, but that was between Him and God; God sending His own Son did it; our coming into it is another thing. Its being perfectly done there when it was God's work alone, and hence perfect, is our comfort now. One is God for us, the other - our death and resurrection is wrought in us, in receiving Christ, that we may be rightly before God.

J. N. D.

An Introduction to the Bible

J. N. Darby.

(Translated from the French)

<34001F> 1

To write an introduction to the Bible seems to me a deeply serious and difficult matter. To take up a Book which is the harmonious whole of all God's thoughts, of all His ways with regard to man, and of His determinate purpose as to the Christ, and as to man in Him; wherein also is set forth the revelation of what God is, of man's responsibility, and of what God Himself has done for man, as well as of the new relationships with God into which man enters through Christ; - a Book which reveals what God is in His nature morally, and the dispensations in which He glorifies Himself in the sight of the heavens and their inhabitants; which lays bare the secrets and the state of the human heart, and at the same time unveils before it things invisible; which begins where the past touches eternity, and leads us on through a development and a solution of all moral questions to the final point where the future merges in eternity, according to God; - which fathoms moral questions in the perfect light of God revealed, and makes known to us the groundwork of new relationships with Him, according to what He is, and what He is in infinite love . . . to undertake, I say, to open up the path (in as far as it may be given to man to be the instrument for it, for God alone can do it effectually) so that the mind of man may understand the ways of God as He has revealed them, is a task that may well make one recoil before its difficulty and seriousness, when we reflect that we have to do with God's thoughts as revealed by Himself.

How marvellous indeed is this divine parenthesis in the midst of eternity, in which the febrile activity of the fallen creature displays itself in thoughts which all perish, urged on by him who wields his power as a liar and a murderer; but in which also the nature and the thoughts of God, His moral being and His determinate purpose, until then eternally hidden in Himself, are, while testing man and manifesting what he is, revealed and fulfilled through the Son, that they may in their final result appear in an eternity of glory to come, in which God, surrounded by blissful creatures who know Him and understand Him, will manifest Himself as Light and Love in the full results of His own eternal and imperishable thoughts; but where also all that has been wrought by His grace and wisdom throughout the things that are seen here below, will be displayed in its glorious and eternal fruits; where God - Father, Son, and Holy Ghost - known of Himself before time was, will be known by innumerable blessed beings - known by them in their own happiness when time shall be no more. And this world is the wonderful sphere where everything is made to work to that end; and the heart of man the scene wherein all takes place and is morally wrought out, if so be that God, in whom and by whom and for whom are all these things, dwell in him by His Spirit to give him intelligence; and if Christ, who is the Object of all that is done, be his sole Object. The Bible, then, is the revelation which God has given to us of all this wondrous system, and of all the facts which relate to it. Is it surprising that one shrinks from the task of opening up such things? But we have to do with a God of goodness, who delights to help us in everything that may conduce to an intelligent apprehension of the revelation which He has been pleased to give us of His thoughts. There are certain great principles that mark this revelation, which we would notice before going into the details.

2 The first great idea that stamps its character on the revelation of God, is that of the two Adams: - the first man and the Second; the responsible man, and the Man of God's counsels, in whom God, whilst confirming the principle of responsibility, reveals Himself, as well as His sovereign counsels and the grace which reigns through righteousness. These two principles predominate throughout the contents of the Bible. But although, in the ways of God, His goodness shewed itself continually until His Son came, yet grace, in the full force of the term, was only prophetically revealed, and withal veiled so as not to interfere with the then subsisting relations of man with God, and often in forms which can only be understood when the New Testament has furnished us with the key to them.

This brings me to two other principles which are found revealed and developed in the Scriptures. The one is God's government in the scene of this world, a government sure and certain, though long hidden, unless indeed on a small scale in Israel, and even then obscured in the eyes of men, because iniquity prevailed (Psalm 73), and because God had ways of deeper moment as well as greater blessings in store for His own in the midst of this government, - ways, in which, for the spiritual good of His people, He made use of the evils He permitted to arise. The history contained in the Bible unfolds to the spiritual man the course of these ways; the Psalms give reflections upon them by the Spirit of Christ in His own, rising betimes in their expressions up to the experience of Christ Himself, and thus becoming directly prophetic. But I am anticipating a little. The other divine principle is sovereign grace, which takes up poor sinners, blots out their sins, and places them in the same glory as the Son (become man for this), "conformed to the image of his Son," effecting this according to the righteousness of God, by means of Christ's sacrifice, by which He has fully glorified God in respect of sin. Some features of this sovereign grace are found in God's government, and are displayed when the result of His government is brought out; but it is fully disclosed in the heavenly glory.

3 Intimately connected with this government of God is the Law; it establishes the rule of good and evil according to God, and founds it upon His authority. The Lord furnishes us with the expression of it, in drawing from various parts of the Pentateuch principles, which, were they established and operative in the heart, would lead to obedience, and to the accomplishment of God's will, and would be productive of human righteousness. The Ten commandments do not create duty, the existence of which is founded on the relationships in which God has set man.

There is this difference between the principles of the law as laid down by Jesus, and the Ten commandments, that the principles drawn by Him from the books of Moses comprehend absolute good in all its extent without question of sin, whilst the Ten commandments suppose sin to be there, and, with one exception, are prohibitory of all unfaithfulness to the relationships of which they treat. It is important to notice that the last of these commandments forbids the first motion of the heart towards the sins previously condemned: "the sting is in the tail." Moreover, the various relationships were the basis of duty, the commandments forbidding men to fail in them. But the principle of law, of any law, is this: that the approbation of Him to whom I am responsible, my reception in favour by Him who has the right to judge of my faithfulness to my responsibility, or of my shortcomings - in a word, my happiness - depends upon what I am in this respect, upon what I am towards Him. For the relationships are established by the Creator's will and authority, and when I fail in them, I sin against Him who established them. Although the sin may be directly against the person I am in relation with, yet as the obligation was imposed by the will of God and is the expression of His will, I in fact despise His authority and disobey Him. The principle of law is that the acceptance of the person depends upon his conduct; grace does what it pleases in goodness, in conformity to the nature and the character of Him who acts in grace.

4 There was another important element in the ways of God, contrasting with the law, and that is the promises. These began with the Fall itself, but as a principle in the ways of God, with Abraham, when the world was already fallen, not only into sin, but into idolatry, Satan and demons having taken possession of the place of God in man's mind. Now Abram's election, his call, and the gift of the promises made to him, were all connected with grace. Thus Abram followed God* towards the country that God pointed out to him, but in it he possessed not whereon to set his foot. This introduces another vital principle, that of living by faith, receiving God's word as such, and counting upon His faithful goodness. The promise evidently depended upon grace; it was not the thing given, though this was assured by the word of God; and faith counted upon the promise, and more or less clearly introduced the thought of blessing outside the world; otherwise, he who had faith obtained nothing by his faith. The consciousness of God's favour was doubtless so far something, but it depended upon faith in His fidelity as to what He had promised. But in connection with promises there is an important point to notice: there are unconditional, and there are conditional promises. The promises made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, were unconditional; whereas those made at Sinai were conditional. God's word never confounds them. Moses calls to remembrance the promises made to Abraham, Isaac, and Israel (Exod. 32: 13); Solomon, what came in under Moses (1 Kings 8: 51-53); Nehemiah 1, refers to Moses; Nehemiah 9, first to Abraham as the source of all, then to Moses, when it becomes a question of God's ways. It is of this difference that the apostle speaks in Galatians 3: 16-20. Under the law, when there was a Mediator, the enjoyment of the effect of the promise depended upon the faithfulness of Israel, as much as upon the fidelity of God; but then all was lost from the outset. The fulfilment of the simple promise of God depended upon His fidelity; in this case, all was sure. We learn further, by the passage alluded to in the Epistle to the Galatians, that it is to Christ, the Second Man, that the promises made to Abraham were confirmed, and they will be fulfilled surely - all of them Yea, and all Amen - when His day, which the prophets had ever in view, shall come. But here the difference, already pointed out, between the government of this world and sovereign grace, again finds its application. The grace that sets us in heaven is not prophesied of at all; prophecy belongs to what is earthly, and so far as relates to the Lord Jesus, contains the revelation of what He was to be upon the earth at His first coming; and then continues with what He will be upon the earth when He comes again, without alluding to that which should take place in the interval between those two events. Still, the facts as to the Person of the Lord are announced in those Psalms which reveal to us more of His personal history; His resurrection (Psa. 16), His ascension (Psa. 68), His session at the right hand of God (Psa. 110); and as to the Holy Spirit, they teach us that Christ would receive it as man - that the gifts are not only gifts of God, but that Christ would receive them "in Man," that is, as Man in connection with mankind. On the other hand, except the desires of David in Psalm 72 and 145, where the subject treated of is what concerns the Lord's Person, the Psalms do not take up the state of things that shall follow His return: whilst in the prophets, this future state is amply described in the fulfilment of the promises made to the Jews, and its consequences for the Gentiles. There is another point that may be noticed: when the prophets on God's part give encouragements to faith for the time then present, and to meet trying circumstances, the Spirit of God uses this to penetrate into the future, when God will interpose in favour of His people.** But I am going, perhaps, too much into detail.

{*He only partially did so at the outset; but I speak here of the ways of God.}

{**This is connected with what is said in 2 Peter 1: 20, 21. The circumstances of the moment do not explain the full bearing of the prophetical scriptures; what is said forms part of the great system of God's ways.}

5 Finally, when sin had already come in, when the law had been broken, and when too the prophets sent by God had in vain recalled the children of Israel to their duty and claimed fruit for God from His vine, - the promised Messiah came with proofs of His mission so evident that human intelligence could, and in fact did, recognise them (John 2: 23; ch. 3: 2). God spoke in the Person of the Son (Heb. 1), the great promised Prophet. But at the same time the Father was revealed in the Son, and man would not have God. The Son of God was delivering man from all the outward evils sin had brought into the world, and from Satan's power in this respect; but this manifestation of God in goodness did but bring out the hatred of man's heart against Him; the Jews also lost all right to the promises, and man rejected God manifested in goodness here below. The history of responsible man was closed; for we are not here speaking of grace, except so far as God's presence in grace tested man's responsibility: not only had sin come in, and the law been broken, but men could not endure God's presence when He was in their midst in goodness, not imputing to them their sins. All relation of man with God was impossible on the ground of what man is in himself, notwithstanding the miracles accomplished by Jesus, which were all goodness,* and not merely power; it was as He Himself said (John 15: 22-25): "They have no cloke for their sin . . . they have both seen and hated both me and my Father" (the expression always used by John when he speaks of God acting in grace). Yea, and this is a solemn statement, man's history morally is ended. But, blessed be God, it is in order to open the door of infinite grace to Him who reveals Himself as the God of grace in the Son (John 12: 31-33). The cross of Christ said, Man will not have God, not even when come in grace (2 Cor. 5: 17-19); but it said also, God is infinite in grace, not sparing His own Son, in order to reconcile man to Himself.**

{*The only exception was the cursing of the fig-tree, which was the expression of this state of things, at the close of the Lord's course here below.}

{**The rejection of the Christ, come as the promised Messiah, and being at the same time God manifested in flesh - the end of God's ways with His people, and the manifestation of man's hatred of God coincided; and Israel's forfeiture of all right to the promises, and man's condemnation in his natural state, on the ground of responsibility, took place simultaneously.}

6 I turn back now to trace the ways of God briefly, and historically, in connection with man's responsibility. It is striking to observe in man's history, that whatever good thing God set up, the first thing that man ever did was to ruin it. Man's first act was an act of disobedience; he fell into sin, and broke all relation between himself and God; he was afraid of Him who had filled his cup with blessings. Noah, escaped from the deluge which had swallowed up a whole world except his own family, becomes drunken, and authority is dishonoured and lost in him. Whilst the law was being given, before Moses came down from the mount, Israel made for themselves a golden calf. Nadab and Abihu offer strange fire on the first day of their service, and Aaron is forbidden to enter into the most holy place in his robes of glory and beauty, and indeed in any robe at all, except on the great day of atonement (Lev. 16). In the same way Solomon, David's son, falls into idolatry, and the kingdom becomes divided. The first head of the Gentiles, if we go on to speak of him on whom God conferred the ruling power, made a great image, and persecuted those who were faithful to Jehovah. Nor has the external or professing church escaped the common law of disobedience and ruin any more than the rest.

7 If we now consider God's ways as to man in the interval of time between Adam and the Christ, we find first of all, man in a state of innocence placed in the enjoyment of earthly blessings, without trouble of any kind; evil having no existence. Responsibility was set forth in the prohibition to eat of a certain tree. This prohibition or law did not suppose evil: Adam might have eaten of the tree, as of any other tree, if it had not been forbidden; it was purely a matter of obedience. Man yielded to the temptation; he lost God, hiding himself from His face, before he was driven out; then he was judicially driven out of the garden where he could enjoy God's presence, who in fact came to seek him there in the cool of the day: and he acquired a conscience; he learned, and that in spite of himself, not by an imposed law, but inwardly, to make the distinction between good and evil. No doubt, conscience may be dreadfully hardened or misguided, but still it is there, in man; when a man does what is wrong, his conscience condemns him. God's law is the rule of the conscience, but it is not itself the conscience which makes use of this rule, But from that time forth man was fallen, he had disobeyed, and renounced his allegiance to God, dreading Him, hiding from Him if that had been possible; and then was driven out of the garden, deprived of all those blessings through which he had enjoyed God's goodness and was able to own Him and even to enjoy His presence, for God came to walk in the garden. Self-will and lust had entered into his nature, guilt and the dread of God into his position; and then, too, he was judicially driven out from a place which was no longer suited to his condition, and, morally, out of God's own presence. What a horrible thing, if he had been able to eat of the tree of life, and fill the world with immortal sinners, having no more fear of death than of God! God allowed it not.

8 But there are some very interesting circumstances to note in connection with the judgment under which man had fallen. We have seen that Adam fled from the presence of God. The judgment pronounced upon him, upon Adam and Eve (Gen. 3: 14-19) is an earthly judgment, not a judgment of the soul. Adam, and Eve also, are placed in a state of misery, and under the yoke of suffering and death. Before being driven out, Adam, by faith, as it seems, recognises life in the place wherein death had entered (Gen. 3: 20); but there is more; there is the promise made to the woman, of the seed which should bruise the serpent's head: the Christ, seed of the woman by whom evil entered into the world, was to destroy all the power of the Enemy. Then as sin had destroyed innocence, and given, through the shame of nakedness, a conscious sense of its loss, God Himself, by causing death to intervene, clothed Adam and his wife, and covered their nakedness (Gen. 3: 21). Before this, there was unconsciousness of evil; now evil is known, but is covered by God's own act. Man had sought to hide his sin from himself; but when he hears God's voice, his fig-leaves are nothing worth; they are of no avail to an awakened conscience in the presence of God: "I hid myself," he said, "for I was naked." So also before driving him out, God did not restore his innocence, which indeed was impossible; He did better: He clothed Adam and his wife, so that He might see His own work, that is, what was suited to Him in the state in which they were, accomplished by Him in His grace, besides the crushing of him who had led them into evil. Still man was driven out of the garden, where he had enjoyed all God's blessings without faith, to till the ground, to die, and until death to be separated from the God who before had walked in the cool of the day in the garden where he had dwelt. Man, thenceforth, knew God only by faith, if faith was in his heart - a new, all-important principle: he had lost God, had acquired a conscience, and, if he could, must live in painful toil to gain a temporal subsistence; he must find God, if he could; but he was from thenceforth outside the precincts which God frequented, and where His abundant blessings were dispensed without suffering or labour. Man had fled from God's presence, and God had driven him out. Adam was no longer in the relation in which God had formed him to be with Himself, either as to the state of his soul, or judicially: he was in sin. I repeat, man had fled from the presence of God, and God had driven him from the position in which He had placed him when He created him; he was estranged from God with a bad conscience, knowing God just enough to be afraid of Him, having learned however that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head, and being clothed by the grace and the work of God in a garment that bore witness to death, but which, as coming from God, covered, and that perfectly, the nakedness, the consciousness of which was the expression of man's fall and of his state of sin. Man was now outside - could he enter, anywhere, into God's presence to adore Him, to be morally with Him whom he had forsaken?

9 This fresh question now arises in Adam's history.

Abel offered a sacrifice, which cost him nothing, so to speak; but he offered it by faith, owning that he was a sinner, outside the garden, at a distance from God, and that death had come in; but recognising in God the grace that had covered his parents' nakedness, and drawing nigh to Him by a propitiatory sacrifice, which alone could take away sin, and through which alone a sinner could draw nigh to God in virtue of the death of another. God's character in love and righteousness, and on the other hand, the state of Abel, were recognised in his offering: he offered it by faith, and God accepted it, as He accepted Abel himself with it, bearing witness to his gifts (Heb. 11: 4). Abel was accepted of God according to the value of his gifts, that is, of Christ. God Himself covered Adam's nakedness, Abel comes acknowledging his position, and the expiatory sacrifice by which alone he could enter into God's presence. Cain, on the contrary, presents himself with the fruit of his hard labour. Man, since he was out of God's presence, must draw near to Him to worship Him: all who are not openly apostates, not only from Christ but from God, acknowledge this. Cain acknowledges it, but how? He thinks he can come just as he is. And why not? As to sin, he thinks not of it. The fact that God had driven man out of paradise made no change in his thoughts; he presents himself as though nothing had happened; and, morally blind and insensible, he offers the fruit of his own work, it is true, but which was in itself the sign of the curse that was then lying upon the earth. He neither recognised what he was himself, nor what God was; neither sin, nor the curse that was lying on his work, as the fruit of sin. Once outside paradise, man had to approach God; and God Himself tells us for all ages, in this treasury of great principles laid up in Genesis, how this can be done. All these histories contain the groundwork of our relations with God, while shewing at the same time the state of man.

10 Sin becomes complete: we have already had sin against God; sin against a brother follows. Cain was irritated because God had refused him, and murder comes in: Cain kills his brother. God puts the question to him, not now saying as before to Adam: "Where art thou?" for Adam ought to have been in the presence of his God full of joy, and "Where art thou?" involved his actual position; but God says: "What hast thou done?" First of all, however, God addresses Cain on the subject of his relations with Himself. "If thou doest well," He said, "shalt thou not be accepted?" and: "unto thee shall be his desire,* and thou shalt rule over him" - "if thou doest not well, sin, or a sacrifice for sin (the Hebrew word has both meanings) is ready to hand" (literally, "is lying at the door") - that is, there is a remedy. It is parenthetical, but these are the general principles of our relations with God. If a man does what is good, he is accepted of God, and if he does what is evil, there is a sacrifice for sin which the grace of God has set at the door. Notice here that Abel's sacrifice was not a sacrifice for sin: neither Cain nor Abel came before God with the conscience oppressed by a known transgression. It is the state of each of them that is in view, the state of man before God: the one, the man who owns himself driven out from God's presence, and who draws nigh to God according to grace; the other, the natural man, insensible to sin. In God's answer to Cain, the subject is positive transgression, and this confirms the idea that in the passage (v. 7) a sacrifice for sin is meant, and not sin itself. But Cain, as I said, becomes guilty of sin against his brother; he fills up the measure of sin in its second character, which for Adam was impossible. God pronounces sentence upon Cain, who, cursed in his labour, fugitive and vagabond, abandoned himself to despair; then, leaving altogether the presence of God, who spoke with him, he proceeds to establish himself in the land where God had made him a vagabond ("Nod") and the world begins. Cain builds a city, and calls it after his son; his children grow rich, they invent working in metals, and the refinements of the arts are introduced; they make themselves as happy as they can without God. I have no doubt, that besides the general truth, we have in Cain a type of the Jews as having slain the Lord: they carry their mark on their forehead. Lamech follows the bent of his own will, and takes two wives, but he is, I think, a type of Israel in the last days; Seth is the man after God's counsels - Christ. The two families are established upon the earth; but already the hatred of the one against the other shews itself in Cain and Abel. (Compare 1 John 3: 11, 12.) In the meantime we have God's testimony: Enoch, who announces the coming of the Christ in judgment, and Noah, who passes through the judgment of the earth, and, as it were, comes to life again for a new world.

{*Compare the sentence pronounced upon the woman (Gen. 3: 16).}

11 I have enlarged somewhat on this part of the history, because it gives us the state of fallen man, and the principles according to which he is in relation with God, without religious institutions, though not without testimony on God's part. Eternal life is also shewn figuratively in Enoch, as in Abel the sacrifice by which fallen man can approach God, and in Adam and Eve (in the state of judgment in which man is), sovereign grace, which clothed them before driving them out; then, in Noah, the end of the age is announced, and the judgment is gone through. We find all this in its main principles in grace, recalled in Hebrews 11: 1-7. But fallen man grew worse and worse; Noah alone remained, whom God saved when He destroyed the world.

We should note carefully as to the facts thus far recorded, that although far deeper principles, eternal in their nature and their effect, are contained in them, the history of this epoch of judgment upon Adam and of the judgment of the world, is a history of this world, and that the judgments are governmental, and belong to the course of things here below.

12 A new world begins with Noah. It begins with sacrifice; and here "burnt-offerings" are expressly named; they were acceptable to God. God would no more curse the earth, nor again smite every living soul, but the seasons should follow in their course, according to God's established order, as long as the earth lasted. But man is no longer, as he was before in paradise, the authority that in sovereign right gave names to the animals in peace: the fear of man was to keep them in awe; man might eat them, but blood, the sign of life, he was not to touch. Then magisterial authority was established to restrain the violence that had broken loose. He that should take man's life must lose his own. God would require blood at the hands of him who shed it; and man was invested with the authority necessary to enforce this law. And God gave the bow in the cloud as a sign of His covenant with the whole creation, in witness that there should no more be a deluge.

It is under this order of government that we live now on the earth. But Noah, in the enjoyment of the blessing granted to him, failed to maintain his position, became drunken, and was dishonoured. The world is divided into three parts: one in relationship with God; another, a cursed race, named in view of Israel's history; thirdly, the mass of the Gentiles. Man seeks to become great upon the earth, and to centralise the power of the race, yet one; but God confounds their purposes with their language: then imperial power is set up on the earth in Nimrod. Babel and the land of Shinar begin to be conspicuous: this is our world.

Another important element now stands out in the history: the introduction of idolatry. Not only does Satan, as tempter, make man wicked, but he makes himself into a god for man, in order to help him to satisfy his passions. Having lost God, with whom, nevertheless, he had been in relation, and had made a fresh beginning in Noah, man made a god of everything in which the power of nature shewed itself, making of it a plaything for his imagination, and using it to satisfy his lusts. It was all he had. Even that part of the race that was in relationship with Jehovah (Gen. 9: 26) is specially noticed as having fallen to that depth (Joshua 24: 2). Terrible fall! Although man could not free himself from the consciousness that there was a God, a Being who was above him, and though he feared Him, he created for himself a multitude of inferior gods, in whose presence he would seek to drive away this dread, and obtain an answer to his desires, hiding that which always, in reality, continued to be an "unknown God." Everything took the form of 'God' in man's eyes; the stars, his ancestors, the sons of Noah, and members of the human race still more ancient and less known, the power of nature, all that was not man but acted and operated without him - the reproduction of nature after its death, the generation of living creatures. The true God he had not; yet needed a God, and in a state of dependence and wretchedness, he made gods for himself according to his passions and imagination, and Satan took advantage of it. Poor mankind without God! Then God interposed sovereignly, reducing also, as we may note in passing, the length of man's life by half after the flood, and by as much again in Peleg's time, when the earth was methodically divided.

13 But, as I have just said, the universal influence of idolatry led to an intervention on God's part which stamped its character on His most important ways: He called Abraham, and caused him to come out from the surrounding corruption, in order to have him as the stock of a people that should belong to Him. In him, the father of the faithful, are shewn forth three or even four great principles: God's sovereign will, otherwise called election, then God's call, the promises, and continual worship by a man who was a stranger on the earth. This last circumstance, the possession of the promises with the non-possession of the things promised, drew out the affections and hope to that which was outside this world, though still indeed in a vague way; but other revelations were added. These principles have characterised the people of God from that day forth.

This, then, is the sum of these new ways of God: the world having given itself up to idolatry, God called out a man to belong to Him, outside the world, making him the depositary of His promises. There had been faithful men before, but not the stock of a race (as Adam was of the fallen race); but Abraham is the head of a race, for even we ourselves, as being Christ's, are the seed of Abraham.

Nothing can be more instructive than the life of Abraham; but here we can only notice that which characterises the ways of God. Abraham declared that he was a pilgrim and a stranger, he erected an altar to God when he came into the land which God had given him, but in which he possessed no place whereon to set his foot; he had nothing but his tent and his altar. He pitched his tent, and built his altar, wherever he dwelt. He failed, and without consulting God, went down into Egypt. God preserved him, but Abraham had no altar from the time of his leaving the land of Canaan, until his return to it. A numerous posterity (Israel) to whom the land was to be given in possession, was promised to him; besides that, all the nations of the earth were to be blessed in him. After the son, in whom were the promises, had been offered to God, and he had received him again as risen, the promise of blessing to the Gentiles was confirmed to the seed - that is, to Christ. (Compare Gal. 3: 16.) The promises are without condition, that is, they belong to God's determinate purpose. Israel will be blessed through them in the last days; Christians, not to speak of other revelations and things fulfilled that are of infinite importance, enjoy them already. Sarah desired "the seed," according to the flesh, before the time. But all had to be on the ground of promise: it is grace, faith and hope; for at that time nothing was fulfilled (and this still remains true as to the glory, except in regard to the Person of the Christ), only God was the God of Abraham, as also of Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise. In Isaac, we have the type of the relations of Christ to the church; in Jacob, we descend into the sphere of the earthly people.

14 Afterwards, when Jacob had come into Egypt, the Israelites were subjected to the yoke of slavery, to the hard bondage of the Egyptians, as we are to sin in the flesh. This introduces another deeply important principle, that of redemption, and in connection with it yet another, the existence of a people of God upon earth, in the midst of whom God dwelt (Ex. 3: 7, 8; ch. 6: 1-8; ch. 29: 45, 46). It is sovereign grace that considers the affliction of the people, and hears their cry; but the Israelites were in sin as well as the Egyptians: how could God deliver them? He found a ransom; the blood of the Paschal lamb, figure of Christ, was sprinkled in faith on the lintel and two sideposts of the door, and God, who was smiting in judgment, "passed over" the people sheltered by the blood. Israel ate the lamb that had been sacrificed, and had secured them from judgment; they ate it with bitter herbs and unleavened bread - with the bitterness of humiliation and truth in the heart, their loins girded, their staff in their hands, their sandals on their feet; they left Egypt in haste. Then follows the deliverance of the people when they were come to the sea: "Stand still, and see the salvation of Jehovah." Egypt's power falls under executed judgment; Israel is out of Egypt, delivered and brought to God: redemption is complete, and the people shall no more see the Egyptians for ever (Ex. 14 and 15).

15 There was also a life that God cherished: Israel had to drink of the bitter waters of death (Marah), which Christ underwent in its reality for us. They were fed with the manna (Christ), were made to drink of the water from the rock (the Spirit of God), and were sustained from on high in conflict. But all is grace; God acts in grace and is glorified where man fails; man too is with God, for redemption brings us to God (Ex. 19: 4); only the journey under grace, in order to attain this, is added in its great principles. The Sabbath is established: the redeemed people had their part in God's rest; this is connected with the manna, Christ, as is conflict with the water from the rock.

Some verses of chapter 15 of this Book of Exodus here claim our attention. We find on the one hand: "Thou by thy mercy hast led forth the people that thou hast redeemed; thou hast guided them by thy strength unto the abode of thy holiness" (v. 13); but on the other hand, we read in verse 17: "Thou wilt bring them in, and plant them in the mountain of thine inheritance, the place that thou, Jehovah, hast made thy dwelling . . . ." That is, they are brought to God Himself; their redemption is absolute and complete; but they were also to be introduced into the promised inheritance. The reader will notice, that it is no question of the wilderness, either in Exodus 3 or Exodus 6, or here, Exodus 15: 1-21: the work of redemption being perfect, the wilderness is not necessary: the thief was fit to be with Christ in paradise, and so are we (Col. 1: 12). The wilderness forms no part of God's counsels, which, so far as we are concerned, refer to redemption, and the inheritance; but it does form part of God's ways. See Deuteronomy 8: 2, 3, etc.; God proves us, that we may know ourselves, and know Him. Those who make a profession are put to the test on the ground of an accomplished redemption: if they have not life, they fall on the way, whilst true believers persevere to the end. Then again, the state of the people is tested, and they are chastened (Deut. 8: 5, 15, 16). In this position we are, in principle, under the law; it is what we are before God in respect of His government; but it is under the rod of the priesthood we are led. (The death of Aaron ends this part of the type; and the "red heifer" is a special provision for the defilements which are contracted in the wilderness.) It is otherwise when justification is the subject: then, at the end of the wilderness journey - our life of probation here below - it is said: "According to this time (that is, at the end of the wilderness) it shall be said of Jacob and of Israel, What hath GOD wrought?" All through the wilderness, the question was, What had Israel done?

16 As the Red Sea, in type, was the death of Christ for us, so the Jordan represents our death with Him; then comes our warfare, as God's host, with spiritual wickedness in heavenly places. But before this, there is Gilgal, the application of our death with Christ to our state of soul, in practical detail. The camp was always at Gilgal: the remembrance, by faith, of our identification with Christ in death (in the Jordan), is at Gilgal; then, the manna, the provision of a Christ come down here below, for the wilderness, is replaced by the old corn of the land, a heavenly Christ; and the Captain of Jehovah's host comes forward.

Success in warfare, and blessing in the wilderness, depended upon the state of those who were in close connection with God Himself: He blessed them, but He ruled in the midst of His people. These two things, the wilderness and warfare - the warfare waged by Israel as Jehovah's host - are found not indeed at the same moment, but during the same course of human life. But salvation, that is, redemption, is at the Red Sea; deliverance, as a thing experienced, is at the Jordan. The rod smote the sea; and the sea was no more, unless indeed as a safeguard for the people: the ark remained in the Jordan until all had passed over. It is well to notice that conditions and "ifs" do not refer to salvation, but to the wilderness journey; then, for those who have faith and life, there is, together with the "if," the promise of being kept until the end, so that there is no uncertainty for faith; but here it is a matter of relations with a living God known experimentally, and not an accomplished work.

As to Israel historically, they had accepted the promises at Sinai, on condition of their own obedience. That is the first covenant established by means of a Mediator, which supposes two parties; the enjoyment of the effect of the promise, depending as it did upon the faithfulness of man quite as much as upon the fidelity of God, was not more sure than the weaker of the two parties; and in fact the golden calf had been made even before Moses came down from the mountain. The new covenant will be established with Israel and Judah as the old one was. It will be when the Lord shall return and forgive their sins, not remembering them any more, and accomplishing His work in writing His law in their hearts, and not upon tables of stone. But the fact is of all importance that the people, at Sinai, consented to receive blessing on the condition of precedent obedience: this changed and aggravated the character of the sin, inasmuch as not only were the things themselves evil, but they amounted to a breach of the law, which formally connected God's authority with the obligation of the relationships which it forbade to violate. The relationships and obligations existed already, but the law made the breach of the latter a positive transgression against God's express will: under it, not only was human righteousness at stake, but also God's authority. The last commandment, "Thou shalt not covet," etc., as we have said, did not deal with actual sin, even in the flesh, but with its first motions, and, for a soul born of God, led to the discovery of the root of sin in the flesh. But if all were fulfilled, it was never anything more than human righteousness.

17 Another great truth already noticed now found its realisation: God dwells on earth in the midst of His people. God had set up His throne in the midst of Israel: two things were in connection with it - first, the direct government of God, known by faith as the God of all the earth, and next, it was there that God was approached. God did not reveal Himself, He was hidden behind the veil; but there the sacrifices were presented: all the relations of religion (or at least of worship) of the people with God were carried into effect and centred there. There God's dwelling was purified yearly; there Israel's sins were blotted out by sacrifices that were figures of the sacrifice of Christ. At the same time the tabernacle was the expression of heavenly things; only the veil which closed the entrance into the most holy place was not yet rent, and man could not enter the most holy place, save only the high priest once a year. Such was the state of the people. They had accepted the law, as the condition, from that time forth, of the fulfilment of the promises; God's presence was in the midst of the people, but inaccessible, behind the veil, and God's government was carried on in the midst of the people, and for their good. But the tabernacle and all its ordinances were only a shadow, and not the "very image" of the things: and this is the reason why we have more of contrast than of comparison in the Epistle to the Hebrews.

18 Let us notice, in passing, God's grace and condescension in His ways with His people. Was Israel in bondage? God came as Redeemer. Must the people wander as pilgrims in the wilderness? God also dwelt in a tent in their midst. Must they wage war in Canaan? God appeared with a drawn sword, as Captain of Jehovah's host. Were they established in peace in Canaan? God had a dwelling built for Him like to the palaces of the kings.

The journey through the wilderness accomplished, a few words require to be said on Deuteronomy, which is a book by itself. This will give me the opportunity of noticing the character of the entire Pentateuch; but my remarks shall be short.

GENESIS lays the foundation and all the great principles of the relations of man with God; there we find creation, Satan, the fall, sacrifice, the separation of the saints from the world, the judgment of the world, government to put a check upon evil, the call of God when idolatry set in, the promises, the seed of God; those that were His, pilgrims and strangers, but with a regular worship - otherwise no religious institutions; then the resurrection, in Isaac; the Jews, the earthly people, in Jacob. In EXODUS we have redemption, the law, the tabernacle, a people of God, the presence of God on His throne on earth, the old covenant, the priesthood. In LEVITICUS, the detail of the sacrifices, ceremonial purity, and particularly that which concerns leprosy, the great day of atonement, the feasts, the Sabbatical year, and the jubilee, when every one returned into his inheritance; and prophetical denunciations in case of disobedience. In NUMBERS, the numbering of the people, the separation of the Levites, the law of jealousy, Nazariteship, the history of the journey through the wilderness under the leading of the Cloud and under the priesthood, and, together with the history of the conduct of the children of Israel during this journey - the red heifer; the people, except two men and the little children, perish in the wilderness: the judgment of God is pronounced, according to His sovereign grace, by Balaam. We find also in this book the details of the sacrifices for feast days and especially for the feast of tabernacles, vows, the taking possession of the land on the eastern side of Jordan, the brazen serpent, the Levites' inheritance, and the cities of refuge. Though there be history in all these books, the history itself, not only the rites and ceremonies, is typical of spiritual things: "All these things happened to them as types," says Paul, "and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages are come," 1 Cor. 10: 1-13. We have no proof that, with the exception of Leviticus 8 and 9, one single sacrifice was offered in the wilderness, unless to Moloch and Remphan. The Book of DEUTERONOMY occupies a place by itself: it supposes that the people are in the land; it reminds them of their disobedience, and insists upon obedience: its object is to keep the people in close connection with Jehovah. A place was to be appointed in the land, where the ark and worship should be set up, where all the feasts were to be celebrated, and all offerings and tithes brought, except that which was given in the third year, to the Levite, in the place where he dwelt;* the priests are scarcely mentioned; it is the people in direct relationship with Jehovah: blessing would rest upon obedience, and judgment upon disobedience. The book concludes with a prophetical song, announcing the apostasy of the people and the judgment of God, a judgment which would fall upon the nations that should oppress Israel. In Exodus and Leviticus, the point is approach to God; here, in Deuteronomy, the enjoyment of Jehovah's blessings (and that, too, in a spirit of grace toward those who should be in need), both as directly under the hand of Jehovah, and in faithfully keeping the law given by Him. Several ordinances, relating to feasts and to the cities of refuge, are repeated; but the distinguishing character of the Book is a people without king or prophet (although the priests are named, they hardly ever appear) put in possession of the land to serve Jehovah, who had given it to them. God, however, raised up, when necessary, at the time to which this book refers, extraordinary men to re-establish the affairs of the people, when they were fallen into decline through their sins; but it was, essentially, Jehovah and the people.

{*This may be seen historically, in the Apocryphal Books. (See Tobit 1: 6-8.)

20 The taking possession of the land of Canaan is related in the Book of JOSHUA. The people's responsibility is clearly brought out, but, on the whole, God was with them, and no enemy could stand in war against them. God was with Joshua as long as he lived, and this continued during the life of those who had been eye-witnesses of the marvellous works of Jehovah.

But immediately afterwards (in JUDGES), the people fell into idolatry. Having failed to exterminate the nations upon whom God was executing judgment by their means, the children of Israel learned their wicked and idolatrous ways, fell under the judgment of God, and were given over into the hand of divers tyrants and persecutors. God raised up a judge from time to time, and there was relief and blessing during his life; but after his death, the people fell again into the same disobedience, and were afresh given over to their enemies.

At length in time, the ark was taken, and the relations of Israel with God on the ground of their own responsibility, were at an end. God, however, continues His ways, and the taking of the ark becomes the occasion of making them evident: Christ is the centre of them; He is Prophet, Priest, and King. The high priest was the point of contact between the people, as responsible, and God; the ark, the place where this contact was maintained: but the ark was taken. There could henceforth be no more day of atonement, no more throne of God in the midst of the people, no more sprinkling of blood according to the order of the house of God! Where was He who sat between the cherubim? He failed not to smite the false god with His mighty power, only He did it not in Israel, but in the Philistines' land. All was over for Israel on the ground of their responsibility; but God's sovereignty and His supreme goodness could not be set aside, nor limited. God intervenes by a prophet, and raises up Samuel, as He had in bygone days brought the people up from Egypt, before the ark was with them. The prophet sent by God in His sovereignty, is the link between the people and God. God Himself was the King in Israel; but the people wished to be like the Gentiles, and to walk by sight, and not by faith, and they set up a human king, Saul. He was in general successful; but being abandoned of God through his disobedience (which was that of Israel), he fell by the hand of the enemies for whose destruction he had been raised up. But God, in view of Christ, would have a king, and David was this king. The priest, the prophet, and the king reveal God's thought as to the Anointed. But the son of David, blessed as he was, failed, as man has ever done, and the kingdom was divided.

21 Some remarks should be made as to royalty itself. Royalty is properly effective power in action, and, in the kingdom of God, it is God's power, the king who reigns for God in Israel, the intervention of God in power. We have had the walk of responsible man under the priesthood, and side by side with that, the prophet who acted on God's behalf, by the word; this in itself was grace: but now the power is joined to grace to accomplish God's designs. God knew well how to deliver and avenge Himself of false gods, without man; but He was minded to reign in Man: this is the third character of Christ. As Prince of peace, it is indeed Solomon who is the type of the Lord; but the exercise of His power is shewn characteristically in David as a sufferer and deliverer: this will be the means of the re-establishment of Israel in the last days. In Psalm 72 we have the king, and the king's son. It is David who brings back the ark from Kirjath-Jearim, but he does not place it again in the tabernacle where the outward form of worship existed, but upon Mount Zion, which God had chosen to be the seat of royalty. (See Psa. 132; 2 Sam. 7; 1 Chron. 16: 34.) Then, for the first time (for here it was grace, and grace exercised in power), David institutes the singing of the hymn: "For his mercy endureth for ever." This hymn was again sung under Nehemiah, a striking occasion for it, and we hear it already, as prepared for the last days, in Psalms 106, 107, 108, 136. Although royalty was historically placed on the footing of responsibility, the great and unfailing principle of grace acting in power was now established - the sure goodness of God toward Israel, in the Person of the Christ: "For his mercy endureth for ever." An unfailing posterity and house were promised to David. (2 Sam. 7: 12-16; 1 Chron. 17: 11-14.) The Christ, the true Son of David, had a place clearly defined and determined by God, although for the time being, the house of David was set under responsibility, and failed forthwith (2 Sam. 23: 5; compare Heb. 12: 18-22). The temple built upon Mount Moriah, although surely the habitation of God, had not this promise of enduring for ever.

22 JOSHUA, beginning with death at Gilgal, gives us the spiritual power of Christ, the Chief and Leader of His people. The Book of JUDGES shews to us the people's fall, but the intervention of God in grace; then comes SAMUEL, the last of the Judges, and then Royalty.

Israel, that is the ten tribes, soon abandoned Jehovah, though priding themselves in His name; Judah's decline was less rapid. This is the history related to us in the KINGS and CHRONICLES, the last being written, or at any rate finished, after the return from Babylon. The Book of Kings is (after the division of the kingdom) especially the history of Israel, and that of the intervention of Jehovah by means of Elijah and Elisha; but the history of Judah is continued, up to the captivity. The Book of Chronicles is the history of the family of David.* Israel severed themselves from the temple, and in fact from Jehovah, by setting up the worship of the golden calves. Responsibility is attached to the kingly functions, but Israel never departed from their false position. But whether for Israel or for Judah, this period is characterised by prophets sent of God. God thought of the faithful in Israel, when the prophet could find none, a touching testimony of His grace! Great as was the prophet, who did not even pass through death, Elijah found but himself alone where God knew seven thousand. But the prophets in Israel, and those that bore testimony in Judah, had very distinct characters. A large portion of the Book of Kings relates to us the history of Elijah and Elisha: their testimony referred to Jehovah's rights in the midst of an apostate people, and served to maintain, in the heart of the faithful hidden in the midst of this people, faith in Him whom the people had abandoned. There was no testimony as to the coming Messiah,** nor as to God's ways in general; but there were miracles that we do not find (except a sign given to Hezekiah) in the prophets of Judah, because in Judah, the profession of the worship of Jehovah still existed. Elijah and Elisha kept up in their persons the testimony of Jehovah in the midst of an apostate people, and, as did Moses in setting it up, performed miracles to maintain this testimony personally. The prophets in Judah insisted upon faithfulness in the midst of a people that professed to serve the true God and to possess His temple, and encouraged personal faith, not by miracles which declared that Jehovah was mighty, but by promise, which belonged to the people according to the love of God and His unfailing faithfulness.

{*There is a great difference between the David of Chronicles and that of Samuel. The king in 1 Chronicles is the David of grace and blessing according to the counsels of God. The king in Samuel is the historical David exercised in responsibility. In Chronicles we do not find the matter of Uriah nor that of Solomon. It is a question of God's mind: no evil is reported, save that which is necessary to make us understand the history. Even Joab with all his crimes, who is not cited in 2 Samuel 5 and 23, is here mentioned because he took the stronghold of Zion. This shews what value Zion has in the eyes of God, and in what way the Chronicles regard the history. In the Book of Kings, it is the history of Israel and the conduct of the kings under responsibility.}

{**I have no doubt that we have, for the spiritual eye, a hidden testimony in their persons. Elijah places again, so to speak, the violated law in Jehovah's hands, in Horeb; then he follows each step of Israel: Gilgal, where they were set apart for God; Bethel, the place of the earthly promise made to Jacob; Jericho, the place of the curse; then the Jordan, or death; and Elijah goes up to heaven. From thence Elisha passed through death again, and enters upon his career of service. But Elijah's miracles are miracles of judgment; Elisha's, except the second, are miracles of goodness and grace.}

23 Israel was lost amongst the nations, led captive by the Assyrians, but not for ever (the Messiah, when He comes, will find the ten tribes again), whilst the public ways of God were pursued in the history of Judah. The ministry of the prophets continued until, as Jeremiah says, there was no remedy, that is, up to the Babylonian captivity, and even after it. But the Babylonian captivity was of immense import, as regards the earth: the throne of God ceased to be upon earth, there was no longer any throne of God upon it: the times of the Gentiles, of the power of the Beasts in Daniel, had begun, and will continue until the last Beast be destroyed by the power of the Lord Jesus, at His coming. Only the Christ had to be presented to them as King: this is the history of the gospel as far as concerned the Jews, thenceforth vagabonds upon the earth, although not lost, as was Israel, amongst the Gentiles, but having God's mark upon them to preserve them for the days of blessing that await them when they shall repent - a remnant at the least - and shall look upon Him whom they pierced. The expressions: "God of the heavens," and "God of the whole earth," are never confounded in prophecy. The history of Israel under the old covenant, under which blessing depended upon man's obedience, was at an end; but promise still remained, - the promise, that is, of the Messiah and of the new covenant. Then God, in His goodness, put into the heart of Cyrus, who had not given himself up to the gross idolatry of Babylon, and hated idols, to cause at least a remnant of Israel to return to the land of promise, and further, to help to re-establish the temple of the true God, and His worship. Thither the promised Messiah came in His time, but for purposes yet far more glorious, putting man, nevertheless, to a last test. Come in humiliation in order to be near to man, shewing at the same time by His words and His works who He was, that He was over all, but come in goodness and grace towards man, accessible to all, abolishing all the effects of sin, He encountered sin itself manifested in its true character in man, in the rejection of God thus present.

24 Man, then, was tried in his innocence by the Enemy, and fell; he was tried without law, and sin reigned; under the law, and he transgressed it; afterwards, when man had become a sinner and transgressor, God came in goodness, not imputing his sins to him, and man would not have God. The history of responsible man was ended from that time forth; Israel also had lost all claim to the fulfilment of the promises, otherwise unconditional, - having rejected Him in whom this fulfilment was to be found.

It only remains for me to give some idea of the prophecies, in order to facilitate the understanding of these revelations of God; and then to pass rapidly the Hagiographa in review.

Of all the prophets, ISAIAH takes in the most extended horizon. As long as Israel is owned of God, the Assyrian is the enemy. It will be thus in the last days, and whilst that which the prophets say of him encouraged the faith of their contemporaries, what they announced will not have its complete fulfilment until those days. A brief analysis of Isaiah will furnish us with the entire compass of prophecy, the other prophets giving us details that require but few words. The first four chapters form a preface which shews the moral ruin of Judah and Jerusalem and the judgments which should fall upon her, and her restoration, bringing in peace and turning to nought man and his glory, and revealing Christ the glory of the remnant. The judgment in chapter 5 is founded upon the people's giving up what God had made them at the beginning; in chapter 6, it is based upon their incapacity to stand in the presence of God, who was about to come; - these are the grounds of the judgment of man, of Israel, and of the church: but there was to be a remnant in the midst of the blindness of the people. Then we find Immanuel, the Son of the Virgin, the sure foundation of the confidence of faith; and the Assyrian, the rod of God, but also (until the end of chap. 9: 7) the effect of the presence of Immanuel, a stone of stumbling for the people, from whom God hides His face, but yet a Sanctuary, and finally the Restorer of the people in glory. Chapters 7, 8, 9: 1-7 are a parenthesis to introduce Christ. Chapter 9: 8 resumes the thread of the people's history with its different phases, verses 8-12; 13-17; 18-21; ch. 10: 1-4; then comes the Assyrian, through whom the chastisements are brought to an end. Chapters 11 and 12 depict the full blessing at the end: the Holy One of Israel is again in the midst of the people. This completes the review of the great elements of the prophecy. Chapters 13-27 announce the judgment of the Gentiles, of Babel where Israel was captive, the characteristic city of the times of the Gentiles and Israel's captivity. The judgment of the Assyrian comes after that of Babylon, shewing that the last days are in question, for in history, Babel's greatness and empire were founded upon the fall of the Assyrian. After Babylon come the other countries; only, in chapter 18, we have Israel brought back to their land, but despoiled by the Gentiles just at the moment when they seemed about to flourish. Jerusalem and its head undergo judgment; then the whole world is convulsed, and the Lord comes, whom the faithful were awaiting. The powers of evil, on high, are judged, and the kings of the earth, upon the earth (chap. 24: 21). The veil which hindered the Gentiles from seeing shall be taken away, the reproach of the people shall be abolished, and the first resurrection will take place; the power of the Serpent among the peoples will be destroyed; Jehovah will care for Israel as a vineyard in which He finds His pleasure (chaps. 25-27). In chapters 28-33 a series of special prophecies portray the last assault of the Gentiles against Israel, in which the Edomite and Assyrian are conspicuous, but each of these prophecies ends with the full blessing of Israel, and the presence of the King (Christ). Then come four chapters containing the history of Sennacherib, which furnished the occasion for the prophecy, but in which Hezekiah healed - figure of Christ risen - and the deliverance from the attack of the Assyrian, prefigure the events of the last days. From chapter 40 to the end, we find the controversy of Jehovah with Israel, because the latter had forsaken Him for idols, and, with this, the judgment of Babel, the great vessel of this idolatry upon earth, which Cyrus (called by name) captured - in a word the judgment of idolatry; and then the rejection of the Christ. The first part reaches up to the end of chapter 48; then Christ is the subject from chapter 49 until the end of chapter 57: God will have righteousness. Then, after some reproaches addressed to Israel, we have their glory in the last days.

26 I have enlarged a little upon Isaiah, because the whole range of prophecy, at the time when Israel was owned, is contained in it, as well as the thoughts of God. Daniel, on the other hand, gives us the history of the "Beasts," when the Jews are in captivity, and, consequently, outside God's direct government in Israel. The other prophets take up details: Jeremiah, the ruin of Judah, the state of things within; Ezekiel, Israel already rejected.

JEREMIAH insists upon the iniquity that had brought on the ruin, but in chapter 31 he announces grace and a new covenant with Judah and Israel, and in this chapter, also, and the two following, full blessing upon Judah and Israel; after which is the judgment upon the nations.

EZEKIEL introduces Jehovah Himself, executing judgment upon Jerusalem, when, at the same time, He quits His throne which is there no longer; thus Judah and Israel are in the same position before God, and Ezekiel speaks of them both. In chapters 34-37, Israel is restored by God, and purified, Judah and Israel are joined together to be separated no more; Christ (David) is there, and the tabernacle of God is with them. In chapters 38 and 39, the northern power, Gog, the prince of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal, rises up to lay waste the land, making known by the judgment that Jehovah then executes upon him, the name of Jehovah, and that Israel had been in captivity on account of their iniquities. Then Ezekiel gives the plan of the new temple.

To DANIEL, captive at Babylon, but keeping himself pure from all defilement, are confided all the events of the history of the four Gentile monarchies. The first six chapters of this prophet relate the histories of these empires as belonging to the world: Daniel is but an interpreter. The last six chapters shew us the same empires in their relations with captive Israel. As always, Israel's deliverance and the judgment of their oppressors come at the end. Daniel shall have his part in this joy.

27 HOSEA predicts the transporting of the ten tribes, and then he announces that by the captivity of Judah there would no longer be a recognised people of God upon earth, but that at the end they should set up for themselves one only Head (Christ): and the day of blessing should be great. Israel should remain a long time without the true God and without false gods, without sacrifice and without idols, but would own Jehovah and David (Christ) in the last days: their repentance is depicted in the last chapter.

JOEL foretells, on the occasion of a famine, the destruction of the northern army, and then the gift of the Spirit to all flesh before the terrible day shall come.

AMOS, after having threatened judgment that should be executed upon different nations of Canaan, declares that the patience of God will no longer bear with the iniquity of Israel, but he sets forth also (as do all the prophets) the return and blessing of Israel, adding that they shall never more be rooted out of their land.

OBADIAH is a prophecy against Edom, whose jealousy of Jerusalem and implacable hatred are often spoken of; then he announces the day of Jehovah for the judgment of the nations, and the deliverance of Zion, as always.

JONAH has a special character; if Jehovah had chosen Israel to be a people set apart to preserve the knowledge of His name upon the earth, He is none the less the God of the Gentiles, and a God of goodness and mercy. When privileges put into the shade the knowledge of what God is in Himself, the possession of these privileges becomes a stern party spirit: thus was clearly shewn in the Jews. It is remarkable that in Jonah the testimony of divine mercy is addressed to the great enemy of God's people. We see also in this prophet, the ways of God when repentance is manifested; furthermore, in some respects Jonah is a well-known type of the Saviour. The subject of chapter 4 is in contrast with the special blessing upon the Jews at the end; God is likewise the God of the nations.

MICAH resembles Isaiah in many points, but the development of God's plans is much less complete in his book, while he appeals more to the conscience of the people; but the promises made to Abraham and to Jacob will be fulfilled.

28 In NAHUM, God's indignation is aroused against the pride of human power and dominion, and Nineveh (the Assyrian) is destroyed: the race will never be reinstated, and Judah is finally delivered.

HABAKKUK is the expression of faith in Jehovah, in spite of everything, and of God's ways in the history of the people. The prophet complains of the iniquity that surrounds him in Israel: God shews to him the Chaldeans, whom He is bringing to visit the land in judgment because of this iniquity; then the prophet's affection for the people is awakened, and he complains of the Chaldeans; and God shews him that he must live by faith: He will punish these violent enemies, whose passions He had used as a rod to chasten Israel; but the man of faith must wait. The day of Jehovah shall come, and the earth shall be covered with the knowledge of the glory of Jehovah as the waters cover the sea. The prophet recalls the former deliverance of Israel, and rejoices in Jehovah, although no blessing from Him be apparent.

ZEPHANIAH announces a judgment upon the land, which will allow no iniquity to escape, - the day of Jehovah, a day of wrath, of trouble and of anguish, when the land shall be devoured by Jehovah's wrath. The meek will have to seek Jehovah to be "sheltered" (chap. 2: 3); first of all Israel, then the Gentiles shall be judged, the Assyrian being their head (for here Israel is owned); then comes that which concerns Jerusalem, as though God had said, She will repent; but she became corrupt, going from bad to worse. The prophet takes this opportunity to call the remnant to wait upon Jehovah who was about to gather all the nations to judge them in His anger. Then, everything would be changed: all the nations would call upon Jehovah out of a pure heart, and Israel should be brought back to Him in hearty repentance, iniquity would be found in them no longer, and they should be for a people of renown and glory amongst all the nations of the earth; a fitting conclusion to all God's ways spoken of by the prophets.

The prophets that follow, prophesied after the return from Babylon, and have another character.

HAGGAI is full of interest, though simple and short. He would have the people to think of Jehovah and not of their worldly interests; he would have them to set to work again to build the House, whose progress the enemies had interrupted, and that they should do it, trusting in Jehovah, and without waiting for the leave of the king of Persia: the Jews did so, and in fact, when they acted by faith, Providence helped them by the king's authorisation. But for faith, God undertook all for them, and He controls the hearts of kings. It is the order of faith acting according to God's word, here given by the prophets Haggai and Zechariah. At the same time this furnishes the prophet with the opportunity of announcing that God was going to shake the heavens and the earth, so that all human power, as well as the spiritual powers in the air, should be set aside. Then will be fulfilled that which the children cried by inspiration when Jesus entered Jerusalem: "Peace in heaven" - and the power of Christ, the Head of Israel, will be established, identified with that of Jehovah.

29 ZECHARIAH takes up the re-establishment of Jerusalem at that time, but giving the history of the city until the first coming of the Christ, and even until the second. He speaks, indeed, of the destruction of the nations who laid Jerusalem waste, but of this only incidentally. Jerusalem is justified, then blessed by the administration of grace, according to perfect and divine order; the wicked are segregated, and find their place with Babylon; and Christ is brought in. There is a second prophecy beginning with chapter 7, and which, in chapter 11, introduces the rejection of Christ at His first coming; and Israel is given up into the hands of a wicked shepherd. Then Jerusalem will be the place where the nations shall be judged, and the spirit of repentance shall be poured upon the people because of the death of the Man who is Jehovah's fellow. Jerusalem will be taken, but Jehovah shall come forth to judge her enemies, and everything in her shall be sanctified.

MALACHI shews us the moral decay of the people after their return from Babylon; but there will be a remnant. John the Baptist's mission is predicted, the day of Jehovah is coming, and the advent of Elijah is announced, the people are brought back to the law. Notice carefully that Christianity does not appear here, but the Christ and His rejection; the Shepherd (Zech. 13) is smitten and the sheep are scattered, then follows the judgment. It is easily perceived that, in these three prophecies uttered after the return from Babylon when one of the "Beasts" had already fallen, although the nations be necessarily alluded to (for it was their time - they possessed the world), the range of prophecy grows considerably narrower, and we find much more direct detail in relation to the Christ. The great actors amongst the nations are there, and there they find themselves judged; they are there awaiting the last judgments, to make way for Babylon and the Beasts, whose history we have in Daniel, all associated with the captivity of the Jews in that city, for this captivity characterised the position. Up to that time there had been the Assyrian, but the throne of God had been in the midst of the people at Jerusalem; now, though the captivity under the dominion of the Gentiles still subsists and is recognised, the horizon, I repeat, gets narrower, and the scene is more filled with Christ Himself, and details in connection with restored Jerusalem; then comes the great day of Jehovah.

30 It remains for me to say a few words on the Hagiographa.

DANIEL is reckoned among the latter by the Jews. We have spoken of his book as a book of prophecy, although it has a distinct character, the throne of God having disappeared from off the earth, and the prophet being at Babylon; but still it partakes of the character of the other Hagiographa, which are moral discourses, histories of detail, when Israel was rejected - the expression of the Christ's affection for Israel: we find God's relations with man in them, and the providential care He takes of His people, when He had no relations with them as a people, and did not own them as such.

The Book of JOB* shows us man under trial (put to the test). Will he be able, as renewed by grace, as we should say with our actual knowledge - man just and upright in his ways - will he be able to possess in himself righteousness, and be able to maintain himself before God in the presence of the power of evil? Such is the question raised in this book. One sees in it also the ways of God for sounding hearts, and to give them the knowledge of their true state before Him. This subject is all the more instructive in that it is presented to us outside of all economy - of all special revelation from God's side. Job is a pious man, as one descended from Noah could well have been, one who had not lost the knowledge of the true God at a time when sin was propagating itself afresh in the world and where idolatry was beginning to establish itself, albeit the Judge was ready to punish it.

{*From the French Edition, but omitted in the English Editions.}

31 One sees also in Job a heart, which, though in rebellion against God, depends on Him; a heart which turns towards God, whom he finds not: a heart which because it knows God, though insubject, claims for Him qualities which the cold reasonings of his friends know not how to attribute to Him; nevertheless he is complacent in his own integrity of which he makes a covering for himself in self-righteousness which hides God from him and which also hides Job from himself.

Elihu reproaches him with these things, at the same time explaining to him the ways of God. Finally God reveals Himself to Job and his heart is broken. Then God heals him, lavishing blessing upon him in peace.

This book also furnishes a picture of the ways of God towards the Jews as well as the Spirit's teaching regarding the part Satan plays in the ways and government of God on the earth.

The PSALMS exhibit this state of things more completely than any other book whatever. Two principles lay the foundation of the entire Book (Psa. 1, 2): the first, that there is in the midst of the wicked a God-fearing remnant; the second, that Jehovah and His Anointed meet with opposition from the people and the Gentiles. Then we have the counsels of God in the Anointed, Son of God, and King in Zion, and then Ruler over all the earth: if He is rejected, His people must suffer, take up their cross (Psalms 3-7). In Psalm 8 He is the Son of man set over all the works of God's hand. With Psalm 9 the history in the midst of Israel begins. Some principles may here be useful, as a clue to facilitate the reading of the Book. It is well known that the Psalms are divided into five Books, as follows: Psalm 1-41; 42-72; 73-89; 90-106; 107-150. The form of the Book in general lays down a basis of thought, then provides expressions for the experience of the remnant in the circumstances given as the basis. Thus Psalms 9 and 10 lay the basis; the Psalms following, until the end of Psalm 18, are the expression of the sentiments that are in connection with them: only the last three more directly present Christ. Psalm 18 is remarkable in that it connects all the history of Israel, from Egypt until the end, with the sufferings of Christ. Psalms 19, 20 and 21 are the testimonies of God; the Creation, the Law, and Christ, Psalm 21 introducing Christ in glory. Psalm 22 presents Him, not in connection with the Jews, but made sin before God. Prior to Psalm 25, we do not find confession of sins. It is more a question of the Christ personally in this first Book; the remnant, too, is at Jerusalem, but in presence of the power of the wicked. In the second Book the remnant is outside Jerusalem. In Psalm 45 the Messiah is introduced, and thenceforward the name of Jehovah. When we meet with the name of Jehovah, faith recognises the relationship. (Compare Psalms 14 and 53.) I may here remark that the first verse or verses of a Psalm habitually give the thesis, and the following verses describe the path by which this point is reached. In this second Book the afflictions of Christ are fully described, and then the desires of David for the establishment of his Son in His millennial kingdom. The third Book, whilst mentioning Judah and Zion, takes in the whole of Israel, and thus goes back and reviews the people's history, following it up to the sure covenant made with Abraham and with his seed. The fourth Book, after recalling Moses, and how Jehovah had been the God of Israel in all times, and after speaking of the Messiah and of the Sabbath, introduces the reign of Jehovah, and describes its progress from above until He shall be seated between the cherubim and the nations called to worship before Him. We have there the principles of the reign of Christ, His rejection, His divinity, and the duration of His days as the risen Man, the blessing of the people and of the world by His presence: God remembers His promise to Abraham. Israel has been unfaithful, but God, in grace, remembers them. The fifth Book goes on to the end; it sets forth the principles and ways of Jehovah, the return of the people to their land (the Psalms of Degrees), Christ in the meantime having sat down at God's right hand, Lord, as Son of David. The goodness of Jehovah endureth for ever, the law is written in the heart of Israel which had been astray. Then, after the Psalms of Degrees, and the judgment of Babylon, comes the great "Hallel" or Hallelujah, a series of hymns of praise. The only Psalms which describe, even prophetically, the kingdom itself are 72 and 145. The Book begins by a rejected Christ; then, introducing His return to set up the kingdom, it speaks of the ways of the people, and their return to their land. Note also that you never find the Father in the Psalms, nor the feelings that belong to adoption. Confidence, obedience, faith in the midst of difficulties, devotedness (as in Psalm 63), faith in the promises, fidelity, all these things we find, but never the relation of son with a father. Through not paying attention to this point, the character of the piety of many sincere souls has been lowered by the very reading of this precious Book.

33 The PREACHER, or "Ecclesiastes," inquires whether it be possible to find happiness under the sun. All is vanity in man's efforts; but there is a law, the perfect rule of man's conduct, and every work shall be weighed at the judgment of God. There is no positive relationship with God in this book; we find it in God the Creator, and man in the world such as it is - not Jehovah, still less the Father.

In the PROVERBS it is otherwise; they present to us the wisdom of that authority which restrains man's will, corruption, and violence, the satisfying of self which is man's danger; then the counsels of God, in that the Wisdom of God (Christ), the Object of God's good pleasure, finds its delight in the sons of men, and that before the world was (chap. 8). All here is either Jehovah or God who has made Himself known and acts by means of an authority confided to man, to parents, etc. Then God supplies us in this Book with that which teaches a man to avoid the snares laid in this poor world, without being obliged himself to learn all its iniquity.

In EZRA and NEHEMIAH we find the nationality of Israel doubly reinstated, religiously and politically. Ezra comes after Joshua and Zerubbabel. In the latter we see men who act by faith: in the midst of their enemies, they erect an altar to be a defence against them; they count upon God (Ezra 3: 2). The prophets Haggai and Zechariah encouraged the Jews on God's behalf, and God answered their faith. Later on comes Ezra, a faithful man, devoted and confiding in God: instructed in the law, he brings order into their walk. Yet it seems to me that under the influence of the natural soil of the human heart, this order degenerated into Pharisaism. For the moment, faithfulness on their part demanded that they should keep themselves separate as the people of God, require a known Jewish genealogy, especially so in the case of the priests, and that they should send away the strange wives. Nehemiah restores the walls and the city: he is a faithful and devoted man, but one who likes to talk of his faithfulness; for the word presents these two things as they are.

34 The Book of ESTHER tells us in what manner God in His providence, whilst hiding Himself, takes care of Israel. It has often been remarked that God is not named in this book: this is just what is fitting, for the subject is God's providence when God does not openly shew Himself.

The SONG OF SONGS is, I believe, the renewal of the relations of the Son of David with the faithful remnant of Israel in the last days, when that remnant shall be for Him Hephzi-bah, "my delight is in her," Isa. 62: 4. We may remark that He always speaks to the Shulamite when He speaks of her; she speaks of Him as the object of her affections, but not to Him. The church's affection is calmer than that which we find here, because the church already enjoys the love of Christ as a known thing, being in a well-established relationship, although the consequences of it be not all accomplished. Individually the believer can enter more fully into it.

There are two little portions of the Hagiographa that in our Bibles are detached from them; they are: The LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH and RUTH. The touching story of this latter, which reveals the most primitive customs, and, at the same time, the most delicate and beautiful incidents of character, bearing unmistakably the stamp of reality, is important as retracing the genealogy of David, and consequently that of Christ, a Gentile woman being admitted into it. The LAMENTATIONS have that character of sorrow which is imparted by the feeling that God has smitten His people, overthrown His altar, and destroyed His house. For the time being, under the old covenant, it is all over with Jerusalem and the people of God. Jeremiah sees, as with the eye of God from within, and there is no longer any remedy! Now, it will be remembered that the books of Ezra and Nehemiah relate the return of a Jewish remnant, brought back by the mercy of God, in order that there might be a people to whom grace could present Him who had been promised.

The responsibility of man, as man, as being answerable for his own conduct, had been fully put to the test without law, and under the law; but the goodness of God from the time of the fall, before man had been driven out of the garden of Eden, had given the promise of a Saviour, who was to crush the serpent's head. Except that which was necessary to replenish the new world, the flood made an end of the fallen race plunged in corruption and violence. In this new world all soon fell into idolatry. Then grace called Abraham, and the formal promises of the Seed were given to him. Four hundred and thirty years later, the race, separated for God, was put under the law, a perfect rule of what man ought to be, if we take into account the prohibition of lust. The prophets recalled the law to the people's conscience, but at the same time they sustained the faith of those who remained true in the midst of general unfaithfulness, recalling, confirming, and developing the promise of the Seed, and of the coming of the great and terrible day of Jehovah. See, as an instance, the last words of Malachi's prophecy (chap. 4). The promise of the Seed was repeated by the prophets constantly, and the appeal to conscience, until there was no longer any remedy. Yet God fulfilled the promise in sending the Christ, the seed of David. This was grace - faithfulness to His promise, without doubt, on God's part, and in this sense righteousness in God (this is the force of 2 Peter 1: 1), but it was not a question of man's responsibility to keep a rule that had been imposed upon him, but of receiving the Christ. There was more: Christ was the Word made flesh. God Himself was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their sins to them. But He came to His own, and His own received Him not; the world would not have Him, it knew Him not; His own did not receive Him; yet the Father was manifested in the Son, in His words and in His works, and the world knew Him not: "They have both seen and hated," said the Saviour, "both me and my Father." Thus the Jews lost all right to the promises in rejecting Him in whom they were being fulfilled. But what is much more, not only was man disobedient, he was that already, but whilst thus disobedient he shewed his hatred against God manifested in grace. On the side of man's responsibility, all relationship with God was impossible. The cross was the public manifestation of this rejection, of this enmity against God; but it was at the same time the manifestation of the love of God for man such as he was. But more than this, it was the accomplishment of a perfect work of propitiation - a sacrifice to take away sin, an entirely new basis of relationship between man and God, depending, not upon man's responsibility - on this ground man was lost - but on the infinite grace of God that spared not His own Son, who, by the eternal Spirit, offered Himself without spot to God, so that grace might reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. The promises will be fulfilled; and the believer possess eternal life, and will possess it in glory, made like unto the Son of God, re-entered as man into the glory, in order that the heart of God may be satisfied in love, and His holy righteousness manifested and honoured, and that His Son who left the glory for us and humbled Himself in obedience unto death, may be fully glorified, according to the glory that is His due. Thus we have entered upon the ground of the gospel.

36 The NEW TESTAMENT, as we readily perceive, has a very different character from the Old, in that, if the latter gives us the revelation of the thoughts which God communicated to those who were the instruments of this revelation, and makes us adore the wisdom that is there developed, yet God Himself in the Old Testament remains always hidden behind the veil. In the New Testament God manifests Himself; there we find Himself, gentle, meek, human: in the Gospels, God upon earth, - and then God enlightening by a divine light in the subsequent communications of the Spirit. Formerly God had made promises, as He had executed judgments; He had governed a people upon earth, and had acted towards the nations in view of this people; He had given them His law, and had bestowed on them, through the medium of the prophets, a growing light which announced as nearer and nearer the coming of Him who should tell them all things from God. But the presence of God Himself as Man in the midst of men had the effect of changing everything, where man ought to have received Him in the Person of the Christ, as the crown of blessing and glory - Him, whose presence was to banish all evil, and develop and bring to perfection every element of good, furnishing at the same time an object and a centre for all the affections rendered perfectly happy by the enjoyment of this Object. Or else, in rejecting this Christ, our poor nature must manifest itself as it is, enmity against God, and must prove the necessity for a completely new order of things, in which the happiness of man and the glory of God should be based upon a new creation. We know what happened. He who was the image of the invisible God, had to say, after the exercise of a perfect patience: "Righteous Father, the world hath not known thee"; and alas! yet more than that: "they have seen and hated both me and my Father," John 17: 25; ch. 15: 24.

37 This condition of man, however, has in no wise prevented God from accomplishing His counsels; on the contrary, this wretched state gave Him the opportunity of glorifying Himself in fulfilling them. God would not reject man until man had rejected Him; as in the garden of Eden, man, conscious of sin, unable to bear God's presence, withdrew from Him before God had driven Him out of the garden. But now that man, on his side, had entirely rejected God come in goodness into the midst of his misery, God was free - if one may venture to speak thus, and the expression is morally correct - God was free to carry out His eternal purposes. But here God does not execute judgment, as in Eden, when man was already alienated from Him: it is sovereign grace, which, when man is evidently lost and has declared himself the enemy of God, carries on its work for the shewing forth of His glory before the whole universe in the salvation of poor sinners who had rejected Him. But in order that God's perfect wisdom should be manifested even in the details, this work of sovereign grace, in which God revealed Himself, must be seen as having its due connection with all His previous dealings revealed in the Old Testament, and also as leaving its full place to His government of the world.

From all this it results that, apart from the main idea which predominates throughout, there are in the New Testament four subjects which unfold themselves to the eye of faith. The grand subject, the fact above all others, is that the perfect light is manifested: God reveals Himself. But this light is revealed in love, the other essential name of God.

Christ, who is the manifestation of this light and love, and who if He had been received, would have been the fulfilment of all the promises, is then presented to man, and particularly to Israel looked at in their responsibility, with every proof, personal, moral, and of power, - proofs which left this people without excuse.

Secondly, Christ being rejected - a rejection by means of which salvation was accomplished - the new order of things (the new creation, man glorified, the church sharing with Christ in heavenly glory) is put before us.

Thirdly, the connection between the old order of things and the new one upon earth, with respect to the law, the promises, the prophecies, or the divine institutions on earth, is set forth. This is done, whether in exhibiting the new order as the fulfilment and setting aside of that which had grown old, or in making evident the contrast that exists between the two, or in demonstrating the perfect wisdom of God in all the details of His ways.

38 Finally, the government of the world on God's part is prophetically unfolded; and the renewal of God's relations with Israel, whether in judgment or in blessing, is briefly but plainly stated, on the occasion of the rupture of these relations by the rejection of the Messiah.

It may be added that everything that is necessary for man, as a pilgrim upon earth, until God shall accomplish in power the purposes of His grace, is abundantly supplied. Come forth, at the call of God, from that which is rejected or condemned (and not yet put into possession of the portion which God has prepared for him) the man who has obeyed this call needs something to direct him, and to reveal to him both the sources of the strength he requires in walking towards the mark of his calling, and the means by which he can appropriate this strength. God in calling him to follow a Master whom the world has rejected, has not failed to supply him with all the light and all the directions requisite to guide and encourage him in his path.

The GOSPELS relate to us the history of the Lord's life, and present Him to our hearts, whether by His actions or by His discourses, in the various characters which make Him in every way precious to the souls of the redeemed, according to the measure of intelligence vouchsafed to them, and according to their need. These characters together form the fulness of His personal glory, so far as we are capable of apprehending it here below in these our earthen vessels, saving always that which concerns the relations of Christ with the church; for, except the fact that Christ would build a church upon earth, it is only by the Holy Ghost, sent down after His ascension, that He made known to the apostles and prophets this priceless mystery.

The Lord, as is evident, had to unite in His Person upon earth, according to the counsels of God and according to the revelations of His word, more than one character for the accomplishment of His glory, and for the maintenance and manifestation of the glory of His Father. But in order that this might take place, He must also be something, whether we consider Him as walking down here on earth, or from the point of view of His real nature. Christ must needs accomplish the service which it behoved Him to render to God, as being Himself the true servant, and that as serving God by the word in the midst of His people, according to Psalm 40, verses 8-10 for instance, Isaiah 49: 4, 5, and other passages.

39 A multitude of testimonies had announced that the Son of David should sit, on the part of God, upon His Father's throne; and the fulfilment of God's counsels as to Israel is connected, in the Old Testament, with Him who should thus come, and who on earth should stand in the relation of Son of God with Jehovah God. The Christ, the Messiah, or, as is but the translation of this name, the Anointed, was to come and present Himself to Israel, according to the revelation and the counsels of God. And this promised seed was to be Immanuel, God with the people. The expectation of the Jews scarcely went beyond this character of Christ, Messiah, and Son of David; and they looked even at that in their own way, merely as the exaltation of their own nation, having no sense of their sins, nor of the consequences of their sins.

This character of Christ, however, was not all that the prophetic word, which declared the counsels of God, had announced about Him whom even the world was expecting. He was to be the Son of man, a title which the Lord Jesus loved to give Himself, a title of great importance to us. The Son of man is, it appears to me, according to the word, the Heir of all that the counsels of God destined for man as his portion in glory, of all that God would bestow on man, according to those counsels. (See Dan. 7: 13, 14, and Psa. 8: 5, 6; Psa. 80: 17; Prov. 8.) But in order to be Heir of all that God destined for man, Christ must be a Man. The Son of man was truly of the race of man (precious and comforting truth!) born of a woman, really and truly a man, and partaking of flesh and blood, made like unto His brethren, sin excepted. In this character He was to suffer, and be rejected, that He might inherit all things in a wholly new estate - raised and glorified. He needed to die and rise again, the inheritance being defiled, and man being in rebellion against God, the co-heirs of Christ as guilty as the rest.

Jesus, then, was to be the Servant, the great Prophet, though the Son of David, and the Son of man, and therefore truly a Man on the earth, born under the law, born of a woman, of the seed of David, Inheritor of the rights of David's family, Heir to the destinies of man, according to the purpose and the counsels of God. But in order to this He must glorify God according to the position man was in as fallen in his responsibility, meet that responsibility so as to glorify God there; but, while here, bearing a prophet's testimony - the faithful Witness. But who should unite all these characters in one person? Was it to be only an official glory which the Old Testament had said a man was to inherit? The condition of men, manifested under the law, and without law, proved the impossibility of making them, as they were, partakers of the blessing of God. The rejection of the Christ was the crowning proof of this impossibility. And, in fact, man needed, above all, to be himself reconciled to God, apart from all dispensation and the special government of an earthly people. Man had sinned, and redemption was necessary for the glory of God and the salvation of men. Who could accomplish it? Man needed it himself: an angel had to keep and fill his own place, and could do no more; otherwise he would not have been an angel. And who amongst men could be the heir of all things, and have all the works of God put under his dominion, according to the word? It was the Son of God who should inherit them; it was their Creator who should possess them. He, then, who was to be the Servant, the Son of David, the Son of man, the Redeemer, was the Son of God, God the Creator.

40 To these different aspects of Christ is due not only the special character of each of the Gospels, but also the difference that exists between the first three Gospels and that of John. The former present Christ to man, in order that man may receive Him, and they shew His rejection by man; whereas John, on the contrary, has this rejection as the starting-point of his Gospel, a Gospel which is the display of the divine nature, and that in presence of which man and the Jew were, and which they rejected: "He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not . . . ."

But let us go back a little. MATTHEW is the fulfilment of promise and of prophecy. We find in his Gospel, Immanuel in the midst of the Jews, rejected by them, who thus stumble at the stone of offence; and then Christ is presented as being really a Sower; fruit-seeking was in vain; then come the church and the kingdom, substituted for Israel blessed according to the promises that they refused in the Person of Jesus; but after the judgment, when they shall receive Him, the Jews are recognised as objects of mercy. We do not find the ascension in Matthew; and we believe that it is for this very reason that Galilee, and not Jerusalem is the scene of the interview of the Lord with the disciples after His resurrection: Jesus is with the poor of the flock who owned the word of the Lord, there where light had sprung up to the people sitting in darkness. The commission to baptise goes forth hence, and applies to the Gentiles. MARK gives us the Servant-Prophet, the Son of God. LURE presents the Son of man, the first two chapters affording a lovely picture of the remnant in Israel. JOHN, as we have said above, makes known to us the divine and incarnate Person of the Lord, the foundation of all blessing, and a work of atonement which is the basis even of the sinless condition of the new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness; at the end, the gift of the Comforter: and all this in contrast with Judaism. Instead of tracing the Lord's pedigree up to Abraham and David, the stocks of promise, or to Adam that, as Son of man, He might bring in blessing to man, or of relating His service in ministry as the great Prophet that was to come - John brings into the world a divine Person, the Word made flesh.

41 Paul and John reveal our being in a wholly new place in Christ; but John is mainly occupied with revealing to us the Father in the Son, and thus life by the Son in us; whilst Paul presents us to God, and reveals His counsels in grace. If we confine ourselves to the Epistles, Paul alone speaks of the church, except that Peter (1 Pet. 2) gives us the building of living stones, an edifice not yet completed; but Paul alone speaks of the "body."

The ACTS give us the account of the founding of the church by the Holy Ghost come down from heaven, and then the labours of the apostles at Jerusalem or in Palestine, and of other free labourers, especially the work of Peter, and afterwards that of Paul, the scripture history ending with the account of the rejection of the latter apostle's gospel, by the Jews of the dispersion.

To expound even summarily the contents of the Epistles would lead us too far: we will confine ourselves to a few words on their chronological order, merely noticing that they develop the efficacy of Christ's work, and the Father's love revealed in Him.

We must place in the first rank those whose date is sure: 1 and 2 THESSALONIANS; 1 and 2 CORINTHIANS; the Epistle to the ROMANS, those to the EPHESIANS, COLOSSIANS, PHILIPPIANS, PHILEMON, the last four written during Paul's captivity. The Epistle to the GALATIANS was written between fourteen and twenty years after the call of the apostle, and after he had laboured for some time in Asia Minor, perhaps when he was staying at Ephesus, although it was not long after the founding of the assemblies of Galatia. 1 TIMOTHY was written on the occasion of the apostle leaving Ephesus, at what time exactly is not clear; 2 TIMOTHY must be placed at the close of the apostle's life, when he was about to suffer martyrdom. The Epistle to TITUS is connected with a journey of Paul to Crete, though we do not know when this journey took place (it has been thought that it was perhaps at the time of the apostle's sojourn at Ephesus); it is morally synchronous with 1 TIMOTHY, for it was not God's purpose to give us chronological dates: divine wisdom was not pleased to give this, but the moral order is quite clear, as we already see in the way in which the second epistle to Timothy is connected with the ruin of that the order of which was established by the first.

42 The Epistle to the HEBREWS was written at a relatively late period, in view of the judgment that was going to fall upon Jerusalem: it called the Jews who had become Christians to separate themselves from that which God was about to judge.

The Epistle of JAMES belongs to a time when this separation had in nowise taken place; Jewish Christians are there looked upon as still forming a part of that Israel which was not yet finally rejected, only owning Jesus to be the Lord of glory. Like all the Catholic Epistles, that of James was written in the last days of the apostolic history, when Christianity had gained a wide entrance into the midst of the tribes of Israel, and judgment was about to close the history of the Jews.

In 1 PETER, we see that the gospel had spread widely amongst the Jews; this Epistle is addressed to the Jewish Christians of the dispersion. The second Epistle, of course, is later, and belongs to the end of the apostle's career, when he was about to put off his tabernacle and be separated from his brethren; he would not leave them without the warnings that apostolic care would soon no longer furnish: hence, like the Epistle of Jude, it contemplates grievous departure from the path of godliness on the part of those who had received the faith, and a mocking of the testimony that the Lord was coming.

In 1 JOHN, the apostle insists on its being "the last time": apostates were already manifested, apostates from the truth of Christianity, denying the Father and the Son, as well as, with Jewish unbelief, denying that Jesus was the Christ.

43 JUDE comes morally before John; in his Epistle, we find false brethren who had furtively crept in amongst the saints, the scene extending itself, however, to the final revolt and judgment. It differs from Peter's second Epistle in viewing the evil, not simply as wickedness, but as departure from first estate.

The APOCALYPSE completes the picture by shewing Christ judging in the midst of the candlesticks, the first church having left its first love, and being threatened that if it did not repent and return to its original estate, its candlestick would be removed, the final judgment being found in Thyatira and Laodicea; and then it shews the judgment of the world and the Lord's return, the kingdom and the heavenly city, and the eternal state.

The general character of apostasy and of ruin which is stamped on all the later books of the New Testament, from the Epistle to the Hebrews to the Apocalypse, is very striking. Paul's Epistles, except 2 Timothy, which affords individual guidance in the midst of the ruin, whilst announcing beforehand this state of things, express the labour and the care of the wise master-builder. The interest of their dates is in connection with his history in the Acts; but the Epistle to the Hebrews, the Catholic Epistles, and the Apocalypse, all shew the predicted departure already set in (Peter's first Epistle which least of all bears this character, tells us that the time was come for judgment to begin at the house of God), and consequently the judgment of the professing church, and then, afterwards, prophetically that of the world in revolt against God. This closing character of the Catholic Epistles is very striking and instructive.*

J. N. D.

{* [It may be of interest to note, that all that concerns the Old Testament in this Introduction was written by the author (in French) in October, 1881, namely, as far as page 34. The remainder was compiled for the French Bible which appeared early in 1885, from other writings of his that had already been published, especially from the Introduction to the Synopsis (New Testament), and the Preface to his translation of the New Testament (French).

The above translation of it was carefully compared throughout with the author's original French MSS., and with the latest editions of the other writings referred to, one note on 1 Chronicles being added from Collected Writings, Vol 20.]}

Notes on the Epistle to the Galatians

J. N. Darby.

{Translated from the Italian.}

<34002I> 44

Introduction

The occasion of the Epistle to the Galatians was the evil effect of the activity of certain Christians, who contended for the permanency of the Jewish law, asserting that true faith in Christ was not sufficient for salvation. Thus they taught, that, after having abandoned paganism and idolatry, and after being baptised - thus linking themselves with the Christian assembly - those who believed must be circumcised, and must observe all the precepts of the law of Moses, otherwise they could not be saved. (See Acts 15: 1.) To this false and evil teaching was added the rejection of the ministry and the apostleship of Paul, who, said they, had not been sent by Peter and the other apostles. They insisted upon apostolic succession, as is so much done in these days.

Now Paul did not retreat before this attack, an attack, moreover, which he encountered everywhere. But in this case all the Galatians were led away by the evil, and Paul presents the point of the sword to the enemy - for it was indeed the work of the enemy of souls - in order that the truth of the gospel might remain with these poor deceived ones. He insists that it is impossible to combine the law and the gospel, although the latter fully confirms the authority of the former, as given of God. He who is under the law must needs fulfil it, and do all that it requires, but then it follows that Christ is dead in vain.

Moreover, he declared apostolic succession to be a fable, that ministry has not its source in a mission of men, nor by men, but, is, on the contrary, derived immediately from Christ Himself, and from God, by the power and operation of the Holy Ghost. Paul boasts in his independence of Peter and the other apostles, with which they reproached him, as though he lacked something, refusing his apostolic authority, which Paul drew immediately from the Lord. It is thus he begins his epistle.

It is remarkable that Paul was more troubled when considering the state of the Galatians, who were putting themselves under law, than he was as to the Corinthians, who were walking very badly. He would not go to Corinth, but he said all the good he could of them, in order to recall them to a walk becoming Christianity. But here he at once sets himself against the evil into which the Galatians had fallen, without one gracious word (if we except the blessing with which he began all his epistles), without salutations at the close, without one word of affection, which nevertheless filled his heart: all is dry and severe. Was it because the apostle's love had grown cold? On the contrary, it was because he was full of love: he clearly shews it, for he was ready to travail in birth again with them, and he does it. Moses had not been able to bear the burden of the people, and had refused the thought of having begotten them even once.

45 The Galatians were abandoning the foundations of the Christian faith, with respect, at least, to the means of applying its efficacy to the soul. They had not forsaken the truth as to the Person of Christ, nor the faith which owns Him; but, as regards the justification of the soul, they had totally abandoned the ground of faith. They did not believe in the sufficiency of the work of Christ, without adding to it the observance of the law of Moses - source of all the corruption that has been introduced into the church, not perhaps, under the same form, and openly, but the same in its governing principle. According to this principle, works are necessary for justification, and blessing is obtained through ordinances.

And the difference is a fundamental one. The one system makes life flow from the operation of the Spirit of God by means of the word, the other from ordinances and works of man. The one presents man as a sinner who needs to be born again, which is effected by the Spirit of God and by the word; it shews that, having been called by the grace of God, the believer finds himself perfectly and for ever justified through the blood of Christ, that is to say, through the work that He has accomplished on the cross, and is accepted in Him before God - a new man, created in Christ unto good works, which manifest the life he has received. The other system teaches that sinful man is born again in the ordinance of baptism, and is forgiven when as yet he has committed no sins: then he receives grace through various ordinances, is from time to time pardoned afresh through the sacrament of penance for some small venial sins, and also when he receives the host, and finally, goes into purgatory to be punished, so that God may be satisfied by the amount of suffering, according to the sins committed.* In this system life is obtained by one's own works, with the help of sacraments. The other teaches that the believer has a perfect justification before God, through the work of Christ, in whom he believes, and partaking of the divine life, and being sealed by the Holy Ghost, he has peace with God, and he awaits the coming of Christ to take him to be in heaven with Himself, where He has gone to prepare a place for us. The apostle insists upon this truth of justification by faith, and that there is in us a new creation, a new life, asserting that if anything is added to Christ, salvation being sought by one's own obedience, Christ is dead in vain. It is another gospel, which cannot be gospel. But let us attentively examine what he says.

{*The common thought, that the flames of purgatory purify the soul, is opposed to true catholic doctrine: those who are not justified are not consigned to it; such go to hell.}

46

Galatians 1

He begins, as I have said, with the history of his call to the ministry - the way in which he had been made an apostle. He announces himself at once, and boldly to be an apostle (which they denied), but an apostle not of men, neither by man - not by Peter, nor by any other, whoever it might be, but - which was far better - by Jesus Christ and God the Father, who had raised Him from the dead, the true source of all blessing and all authority. It is always the way of those who do not love the truth to ask by what authority it is proclaimed. The Lord Himself was asked this; so were the apostles, and the same thing is done in these days. Ecclesiastical authority, as such, as established by means of ordinances, is always the enemy of the truth. When its ministers lean upon authority, they are accredited as of God, but they do not allow God Himself to work outside those ordinances which give them their importance.

Paul would own no other source of his ministry but God Himself and the Lord Jesus Christ, who had chosen and also prepared him for this service, who had called him, and had afterwards formally sent him by the Holy Ghost, giving him the proofs of his apostleship in its success, as also in the miracles which he had performed. Now the faith of believers ought to rest upon the power of the Holy Ghost, which had been manifested in him, and had been efficacious in their own hearts by the power of God. God was free to send His gospel to the Gentiles, causing it to reach them by whatever means seemed good to Him. He chose Paul, proving this by the power of the Holy Ghost. The fruit manifested the tree. This is the only true ministry, though all are not apostles.

47 Verse 2. Paul linked with himself all the brethren who were with him. In accepting Judaism, the Galatians were placing themselves in opposition to all Christians who had been enlightened by heavenly truth, and who, through grace, enjoyed true Christian liberty. The Jews might indeed seek to subject souls to a system which had been abolished by the death of Christ, in order thereby to maintain their own glory; but the time was passed. It was a question of the freedom of the word of God, that is, of God Himself, who certainly was free to send His gospel, His salvation, wherever He would, and by the means He Himself chose. What is His will He always performs; and the Porter (the Holy Spirit and the providence of God) opens the doors, as was the case with the Lord, the sole Head of all true ministry.

Now miracles are not wrought to prove ministry, even as no miracles were wrought by John the Baptist or the prophets amongst the Jews. The word, and the fruit which it bears, are the evidence of the reality of the ministry: the word by the truth itself, and the fruits by their character and power. There may be opposition and persecution, but that is nothing new; the Lord and the apostles encountered it, in spite of the mightiest miracles. God will accomplish His own purposes, and His word will not return to Him without prospering in that whereunto He sent it.

The law applies to man in this world: it supposes that man belongs to this world, and it furnishes him with a rule, by which he ought, as a child of fallen Adam, to direct his steps. It is the duty of man, in all the relationships in which he finds himself, both with God and with his neighbour; and to this is added the prohibition of lust, a prohibition which judges not only the outward conduct, but also the inward movements of the heart. A man might possibly keep all the external commandments, and think himself righteous, but the flesh being evil and sinful, he cannot fail to detect lust in his heart. An outwardly righteous walk may produce self-righteousness: but before God who searches hearts, the presence of lust, which is always sinful in His holy eyes, constitutes us sinners, and makes us unfit to enter heaven.

48 We have not only committed sins, we are sinners; and therefore false Christianity does not allow that lust in the baptised is sin: it has no true remedy for the evil tree, the law does not furnish one. It judges sins: where God is working it can discover sin; but it does not take it away; it cannot justify the soul if it finds sinful acts or sin. It cannot give a new life; that is not the work assigned to it. It is the rule of God, invested with His authority over the children of Adam, as responsible in this world; consequently they are lost, for no child of Adam is without lust, or even without actual sins. Now the law pronounces a curse upon those who have sinned, and it likewise forbids lust; it must needs do so, as the perfect law of God. Grace, on the contrary, Christ, the Son of God, comes to redeem us, and to set us free from the condition in which, both through Adam's sin and our own sins we are found. Christ gave Himself that He might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father (v. 4): and if we profess to be Christians, we profess to be dead with Christ, and no longer of the world, which has rejected Him, no longer in the flesh, which was crucified with Him.

Verse 6. But the apostle begins abruptly, as has been said, rebuking the unfaithfulness and inconstancy of the Galatians. They had abandoned the truth of the gospel which they had received from the apostle - that is, grace revealed in Christ - in order to give themselves to another gospel, which in reality was not another, or different one, but was the corruption of the gospel of Christ. Moreover, it was the giving up of the only true gospel, to put themselves under law - they who had been called by grace - for there were some who troubled them, and would pervert the gospel of Christ. There is, and there can be, but one gospel; God has given one gospel alone for the salvation of sinners.

Through His infinite grace, and His grace alone, He gave His only-begotten Son, to become a man and to die for us. The only source of all was His love: no one suggested it to Him, or persuaded Him thus to have compassion upon sinners. None could feel it divinely but God Himself, none but a divine Person could accomplish what was needful. The Father prepared a body for Him, and He, the Son, came to fulfil His will, to save. Thanks be to God, the Son has fulfilled the work that was entrusted to Him, and the Holy Ghost has announced this gospel - that the love of God has been manifested in the gift of His Son, and that He, having finished His work, sits as Man, at the right hand of God - and with this gospel He leads souls to repentance.

49 God Himself has not, and cannot, have another gospel. He cannot forget the work of His Son, in which He has found complete satisfaction, in which He has been fully glorified. He cannot set forth another gospel, or add something on man's part, as though the work of Christ were imperfect, and lacked something to complete it. Christ, as Man, sits at God's right hand, because He has accomplished the work of salvation for all believers, having by Himself purged their sins. And when He had sat down on the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens, the work which saves us was announced to be finished. And then all teaching that requires anything else, that assumes to add something of man to complete it, denies the perfection of the work of Christ - that is to say, denies that He has completed the work of redemption. That the Spirit of God works in the heart to produce in us the sense of our guilt before Him, and our need of the sacrifice of Christ - that we need to be born of God in order to enter into His kingdom, and further, that the Holy Spirit, who dwells in the Christian, brings forth the fruits which suit the new life in which we participate through grace - all that is true; but for the work of redemption, for the putting away of sin, and cleansing us from it, for making us divine righteousness in Christ, God will have nothing else but the death of Christ. God has shewn that He has accepted His death, in that He has raised up Christ from among the dead, and has set Him as Man at His right hand in the glory which He had before the world was. He will not allow man to add anything to that work; whatever it might be, it would deny, in so far, the sufficiency of the work of Christ.

These heretics do not say that Christ has not finished the work; nor did the false judaizing teachers among the Galatians say it. But they insisted that man must on his part add his works, the law, circumcision. They said God had done His part, and now it remained for man to do his. This is always the way of a man who does not know himself, does not own that in himself he is but a miserable lost sinner who ought to have kept the law, who was responsible to do it, but that he has failed, that his flesh is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.

50 Man feels his responsibility; but instead of saying, alas! I have failed, I am lost and guilty, I cannot satisfy the demands of the law; he seeks to work out a righteousness when it is too late. False teachers who know not the grace of God, or the value of the work of Christ, use the law for self-righteousness. As conscience cannot be pure, satisfied and quiet before God, nor make itself so, men have invented various means which man can accomplish, in order to quiet the conscience without cleansing it. Thus they do the devil's work, hindering conscience from feeling the depth of that sin, to which man has become accustomed, and which reigns in the flesh. This is always done by means of ordinances; * these, man can fulfil; but make the flesh holy he cannot. A new life is received from God in Christ, who came that we might live through Him. But man likes to do his own pleasure and will not submit himself in heart to Christ. He feels his responsibility, and in order to quiet his conscience, he accepts these means at the hands of men, who pretend that these human expedients come from God, and have His authority, while they only seek, as the apostle says, to glory in the flesh of those who listen to them, and for their own advantage, to hold them under their authority.

{*We have indeed two Christian ordinances - baptism and the Lord's supper; but both of them refer to the death of Christ, so that instead of linking us with the world they are witnesses that by the death of Christ we are totally separated from it, that it is a dead Christ who is the object of faith, and that it is as dead that we enjoy Christian privileges.}

Zealous and ardent (if you believe them) for the glory of God, and for the authority of His commandments, they take possession of that authority through the rules they impose upon others, wielding it at pleasure over the conscience, and thus over the man himself; as the Lord Jesus said, "they annul the commandments of God by their traditions." Thus did the Pharisees, who were so strongly condemned by the Lord. Thus also do those who in this day follow not the word of God, who will not allow Christians to be taught by the word, the scriptures, which are addressed to them by God Himself, and which therefore, they are bound to obey; they would not, I say, that others humbly learning by the help of the Spirit of God, which belongs to all believers, should follow the precepts of that word, and enjoy the blessing which is found in the pure faith, there presented to us.

51 They always place souls under the law, to which they add traditions, which, together with the interpretation of the word of God, they hold in their own hands, and thus they can teach what they like. Let believers remember, that if a master - and God is master over every conscience - had given commandments and directions to his servants, or a father to his children, and another prevents those commandments or directions from reaching the servants or children directly, and as they were given, he would hinder the exercise of the master's or father's authority, and moreover would deprive the servants or children of their rights.

Now the whole Scriptures are in fact addressed either to the Jewish people, or (if we except three short epistles) to believers who are now sons of God by faith; and no one has the right to prevent those to whom they are written, from knowing what revelations have been made to them, and what precepts have been addressed to them. He who does so opposes himself to the authority of God, who has made these revelations, and has placed all His own under obligation to obey the precepts contained in them.

God can give gifts for the purpose of helping believers to follow His precepts. Paul was thus helping them in this very epistle; but the true servants of God have never sought to take from His children's hands, His word which He has given them, which is their blessing and their light, and by which He Himself speaks to their souls, shewing that in His infinite grace He has desired to speak to them, and to communicate to them amid the darkness of this world, the knowledge of His love and of His will, to shew them the path in which they may walk in simplicity, in spite of the enemy of their souls, and enjoy - immense happiness! the love of God and the light of His countenance. What unbounded grace, that God should deign in such a world to communicate to us His own thoughts, divine light in the darkness; and how terrible to take away these divine communications, and bide them from the eye's of His own. Alas! man is but too readily disposed to neglect them; yet to take them from souls who desire to have them, is iniquity, it is open opposition to the sovereign grace of God which has given them. Those who seek to rule over souls in God's stead, take from them the revelation He has made to them. They are then free to preach and teach what is not according to the word of God, and to impose the yoke of the law and traditions, as well as their own authority upon the necks of man.

52 The forms of this departure from the truth may differ, but the principle is always the same; that is, the law and human traditions, imposed upon souls, and the authority of men. Here among the Galatians, it was openly the Jewish law and circumcision, by which they were held to observe the whole Jewish system, and submit to the authority and tradition of the scribes and Pharisees. In this day, it is still the law and traditions of men and then clerical authority, and that, in place of the direct authority of the word of God.

But it will be said, were there not men appointed of God to teach others? Yes. God has by the Holy Spirit given various gifts; the evangelist, the teacher, and the pastor; these gifts are exercised through the grace of the Holy Spirit, under the authority of the Lord Jesus. The difference between the various gifts of God and the clergy is this. The gifts which are really of God, are exercised by applying the word of God to the conscience, and the word always retains its supreme and absolute authority over the soul. Everything is referred to that authority. The clergy place themselves between the soul and God, as if possessing His authority; the word of God disappears, and does not act directly on the part of God; the soul does not go to God, is not subject immediately to Him, but to man; God's own light does not shine into it, the conscience does not find itself in the holy presence of God, the heart is not irradiated by the beams of His love. Servile fear takes the place of confidence and joy. God is not a Saviour and a Father for the heart, but a God of judgment, who exacts the last farthing. The grace of God is unknown, the law is unfulfilled, and the heart full of terror submits to a poor sinner like itself. Man degrades himself, instead of being at once elevated and humbled by the presence of God, and by communion with Him. If he commits sin, his conscience is quieted by a human being, without being cleansed, and at last disgusted with everything, he neglects and entirely abandons religion and the fear of God.

The gospel of grace to every creature under heaven had been committed especially to Paul by the Lord Himself, as was the gospel among the Jews to Peter. Paul maintained this gospel in its purity as being of God Himself. An angel even had no right to alter it; and he pronounces an anathema and curse upon any who might have preached a different gospel. How shall we know what he taught? The answer is simple. Read what he has written, which remark, he addressed to the whole Christian people, even as to those who were forsaking the truth.

53 The ardent words of the apostle are very remarkable. The Holy Ghost has given us God's own testimony, that if an angel came to teach what the apostle had not taught, he would be under the malediction of God - he would be anathema. It little mattered who he might be, if he contradicted the testimony of God. Paul well knew that he had received it from God Himself, and he who opposed or falsified it, - opposed the authority of God, and the truth which He in His grace made known.

Let Christians take heed to the solemn words of the apostle. We possess them in this Epistle, as well as in others which he wrote. They are the touchstone for all teaching; and we need to study them in order to know if he who speaks tells us the truth of God. So solemn was this point, so deeply was it felt by the apostle, that he again repeats what he had before said - that whoever should preach any other gospel than that which the Galatians had received from himself, should be anathema. He did not seek to please men in what he announced, or to satisfy man. If he sought to please men, he would not be the servant of Jesus Christ. It was He and He alone whom he ought to seek to please; to abandon the gospel would not be the way to do it.

Verse 11. He begins then by declaring that the gospel which he preached was not after man. He had not received it from man, neither from Peter nor from any other. It was not by man, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ. He had not learned it from any man, he held it immediately from the lips of the Lord, when He revealed Himself to him in glory. Among the Christians at Jerusalem, he had been an enemy and a persecutor. Jesus Christ Himself had taught him the gospel, and had revealed the truth to him. He might well hold it firmly, refusing all else that man might add to it, whatever might be their pretext for teaching better than the Lord Himself - whether they sought to add the law to the gospel, or assumed to know a better way of producing holiness, than the means employed by God.

54 It is not usually the knowledge of what is right that is lacking among men, so much as the power to resist and overcome lust, subduing the flesh and being filled with motives which lead us in the way of God, in which the heart loves to please Him. Christ is all this, as power, as motive, as way, if we follow His steps. From Him we receive the Spirit, who causes us to desire to know His will, and gives us power to do it. The law gives neither life, nor strength, nor an object to attract us. If we walk by the Holy Spirit we keep the law, and in no other way.

Verse 13. The statement that he had not learned the gospel from man, leads the apostle to relate the history of his life, a history which the Galatians had already heard - but he repeats it afresh, because in that history was found the source of the authority which he possessed from Christ, for announcing the gospel as it had been committed to him by Christ Himself, whose heavenly glory he had seen, and who had sent him to preach it. And he had even been a persecutor, zealous of the law, and had sought to get rid of the name of Christ from the earth! He had been a Pharisee, living according to the straitest sect of his religion, persecuting the church of God with all his strength, and wasting it. Moreover he had excelled many, his equals in his own nation, in the knowledge and observance of Judaism, being more exceedingly zealous for the traditions of the fathers. He was ruled by the law and traditions.

We see in Saul a zealous and religious man; one too, who was unblameable in his conduct. And now God, who had in fact separated him from his mother's womb, came in, and called him by His grace, revealing His Son in him, that he might preach Him among the Gentiles. The ways of God as to this call for utmost attention. He first prepares a vessel - a man full of energy, courageous, bold, ready to undertake all things, full of zeal for the cause which he espoused, and having moreover, nothing as to his life with which to reproach himself touching the law, with a powerful mind, that could enter into the highest subjects, and yet know how to come down to occupy itself with the smallest details, and to think of individual circumstances, with a heart full of affection. Taught of God, he could, through grace, understand the greatest and most glorious truths, and at the same time he could fully enter into the relations of a poor fugitive slave with the master from whom he had fled. Naturally independent, he had enough greatness of heart, to submit himself to all who held a position, entitling them to exercise authority, and honouring also each one in his place. It is the mark of greatness of mind to despise none, if not wicked men assuming to exercise authority against that which is good; but even in such, to recognise the authority of God, in the position in which God has set them.

55 But all these fine qualities were marred and hidden by the activity of a will, which sought only to please itself, and to increase its own glory in upholding the honour of the sect, and the traditions of the fathers, making use of the name of God for this end, and carrying on persecution, even to strange cities: so that the energy that characterised him was but the means of satisfying the malice and passions which sought to destroy the name of Christ.

But God had used Saul's energy and ardent will, to separate him from Jerusalem, where the apostles were, who had been already called by the Lord and sealed by the Holy Ghost. At Jerusalem it would have been difficult for him to be entirely independent of the other apostles; he would have come into the Christian assembly under their authority and directions; it must necessarily have been so. But his energy, under the hand of God, had led him away from a position, which was not in accordance with God's thoughts. He had asked for letters from the High Priest, to bind and bring prisoners to Jerusalem, all who in strange cities called upon the name of the Lord.

And thus he found himself on the road to Damascus, accompanied by his travelling companions. But the Lord had His eye upon him; and suddenly, as he drew near to the city, there shined round about him a light from heaven They all fell to the earth; they all saw the sudden light; Saul alone saw the Lord. All heard a sound, but not the voice of Him who spoke to Saul. They were to be witnesses that the heavenly vision had appeared to Saul, but it was for him alone to receive the revelation from the Lord. He was to be an eye witness of the glory of the Lord, and a testifier of the words which He had personally spoken to him. For him, it was a revelation of the Lord and of His will, a direct and personal revelation; he must be able to say, "Have I not seen the Lord?" (1 Cor. 9: 1). But it was the glorified Lord. He bad not known the Lord in His humiliation, he was to begin with the glory.

56 The other apostles had known the Lord in humiliation, as the earthly Messiah, in His life of grace and patience. They had followed Him to Bethany, had seen Him go up into heaven, they knew that He was set down on the right hand of God, but they saw Him no more after His ascension. Saul appears for the first time, as taking part in the death of Stephen; that moment when the Jews shewed themselves to be enemies of the glorified Christ, as they had already shewn themselves to be the enemies of the humbled Christ; for the testimony that Stephen gave, was that he saw the Son of man in glory at the right hand of God. It was the end of all God's relations with the children of the first Adam. They had already rejected Christ humbled upon the earth, sin was complete: but Christ had interceded for the Jews upon the cross; God had heard His prayer, and the Holy Spirit answered by the mouth of Peter (Acts 3), announcing to them the glad tidings, that God had set Christ at His right hand, according to Psalm 110, and that if they repented of their sin, He would return. They took Peter and shut his mouth. And finally, when Stephen had plainly declared His heavenly glory, they rose up with fury and stoned him. The Christ in glory was rejected, even as Christ in grace had already been crucified upon the earth.

And here we find Saul, helping on Stephen's death by word and deed. Spurred on by these events, and still breathing out threatenings and slaughter, he asked and received from the high priest, who was prompt to help him in his zeal against Christ, letters for the prosecution of warfare against Him. Thus engaged, the Lord took him up, the apostle of the hatred of the human heart, and of God's chosen people against Him and against His Christ, in order to make him the apostle of His sovereign grace, which in his own person he had experienced, as also of the glory of Christ which he had witnessed.

What grace in God; what a change in the man! It is the same grace towards all who are saved, but Saul was a marvellous testimony to it: a testimony which would make it plain and manifest to all, as says the apostle himself: "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief. Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might shew forth all longsuffering, for a pattern of them which should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting," 1 Tim. 1: 15, 16.

57 The way in which the Lord prepared the two chief labourers among the Gentiles and the Jews is remarkable. Peter, cursing and swearing, declared that he knew not Christ. Paul sought to destroy His name from the earth. Neither the one nor the other could have opened his mouth, except to declare the sin of man and the sovereign grace of God.

But we shall do well to examine what the revelation made to Saul was. First, as has been said, it was the revelation of the heavenly glory of Christ, the Son of God, who still was man. The twelve had followed the Saviour till the cloud received Him; beyond that, they could not be eye-witnesses. Saul had not seen the Lord, except beyond the cloud: his knowledge of Him began when Christ was in the glory. He was to declare the gospel as he had received it. A Messiah living down here was for the Jews. A Christ who had died and been glorified after having been rejected by man, became the Saviour of the world. He had died for all men, and thus His work was complete. God had owned Him taking Him up to His right hand, into the glory which He had with the Father before the world was. And yet He was the same Jesus, the Nazarene (Acts 22: 8), marvellous truth! who had before walked upon the earth among men.

Moreover He said: "I am Jesus whom thou persecutest." But how? If He were in heaven, Paul could not persecute Him. But He esteemed His own as Himself: they were united to Him, so united by the Holy Ghost, that they were members of His body. He loved them as a man loves and cherishes his own flesh. The Head and the members were but as one person before God. These are the two great principles of Christianity as Paul taught it; a Christ glorified after all had been accomplished, and Christians united to a glorified Christ, were the germs of all Paul's teaching; Christ, a man beyond death, beyond the sin which He had borne, beyond the power of Satan and the judgment of God against sin, redemption being complete.

Saul having left Jerusalem, bold and full of confidence, is arrested in the way, when on the point of carrying out his purpose. He falls terror-stricken to the earth, at the sight of the Lord. He heard a voice calling him, and discovering that it was the Lord, all is at an end as to his own will; he surrenders himself to the will of the Lord, and is sent by Him into the city, that he may there humbly learn what is that will. In other words, he at that moment submitted himself to Christianity in the ways of Christ's will. But he was blind; that so the inward work might be perfectly accomplished, and the immense change in his soul, might be experienced before God, in its true power, without any hindrance or interruption from man. Also, he neither ate nor drank for three days. But although he was to go into the city in order to learn what he was to do, yet many and great things depended upon the revelation that had been made to him.

58 First, the glory of the Lord had appeared to him, the Lord Jesus of Nazareth, rejected of men but declared to be the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead. Immense truth! A man was in heaven, a man, the Son of God; but He was there because the sacrifice for sin had been accomplished and accepted by God, a sacrifice so perfect, that He who had presented it was set down in His own Person at the right hand of God in His glory, and that, according to the righteousness of God.

Man, at the same time, was shewn to be wholly evil and corrupt, for he had rejected God when He was present in perfect goodness, in the midst of men. Israel had forfeited all their privileges and their right to the promises by rejecting Him in whom all the promises are Yea and Amen; and not only the dispensation of the law had come to its end by the coming of Messiah, the Head of the dispensation that was to follow that of the law, but the title to the promises was lost by His rejection; and thus He being rejected, all God's relations with the people to whom He had given the law were at an end. The Gentiles had never had it; they had never been in relationship with God; they were outside the promises made to Israel, and they had fallen into the most complete darkness. (See Romans 1.) There no longer existed any relationship of men with God, if not that of sinners and rebels with their Creator.

But on the other hand, the sovereign grace of God had been manifested to the greatest sinner in the world; to the apostle of rebellion and rejection of the Christ of God, apostle of the enmity of man against God manifest in grace, against Christ exalted in glory. Important moment in the history of man! when redemption being accomplished, and love being free according to righteousness and divine glory, God rose above all the sin and enmity of man to work in sovereignty according to His grace; not only to manifest love - that, He had already done at the coming of Christ down here - but to cause grace to reign through righteousness, unto eternal life through Him: righteousness which had placed Christ, as Man at the right hand of God, because, as Man, He had perfectly glorified God. (John 13: 31, 32; ch. 17: 4, 5.)

59 But there was yet more in this revelation of the Lord. We have spoken of the dispensation of grace which was founded upon this revelation. It was needful that the soul of Saul should be in a state suited to the service of God in the dispensation that began by that revelation. And this is what took place. First, all the things in which he had trusted were utterly condemned: judged by God Himself, they no longer had any value. His own heart was all upset: all that he thought to be of God, and which was so until the cross, was set aside. His conscience - for he thought he ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus - had deceived him. His confidence in the law as given of God, and by which he had hoped to obtain a righteousness before God - the authority of the heads of the Jewish religion, their fathers - in a word, all these things had but led him to find himself in open enmity against the Lord; there was nothing left upon which his soul could rest. He was the enemy of the Lord Himself, boldly seeking to destroy those whom He loved. Saul was all this in the presence of the Lord!

What a revolution! Saul himself, instead of having an externally pure conscience, found himself to be the chief of sinners, the enemy of the Lord, the apostle of that hatred against God, which had rejected from the world the Lord of glory, the Son of God, and which was still rejecting the testimony rendered by the Spirit after He had been glorified. The old dispensation, the law, the promises made to Israel, had disappeared; and instead of these, the Lord of glory, alive in heaven, is revealed by sovereign grace to him who sought to abolish the memory of His name. Eternal life is communicated to him, eternal salvation through the work of Christ is presented to his heart, in the glorified Man who had borne his sins, and was now making the work effectual by the operation of the Spirit of God. The Son of God is revealed in him.

60 This is true conversion, true faith. Sovereign grace reveals the Son of God in us, a glorified Man, and - if we have already understood the truth - a Saviour who has borne all our sins. But it is the revelation of Christ in us. In Saul's case, this revelation was also in order that he might preach Him among the Gentiles.

Thus, he who had been exceedingly mad against Christ and against the Christians, persecuting them even to strange cities, is sent forth with these remarkable words from the Lord Himself. "For I have appeared unto thee for this purpose, to make thee a minister and a witness both of these things which thou hast seen, and of those things in the which I will appear unto thee; delivering thee from the people, and from the Gentiles, unto whom now I send thee, to open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them that which are sanctified by faith that is in me," Acts 26: 16-18.

Thus, Saul was taken from among the Jews (it is the real force of the words), separated from his nation, to belong to Christ; but he did not therefore become a Gentile. The starting-point of his new life was a glorified Christ, for the announcing of that which he had seen, and by the power of grace had received in his heart, besides other revelations which were afterwards made to him: always, however, of a Christ rejected by the world and glorified by God. Knowing by the experience of Christ revealed to him and in him, that the mind of the flesh was enmity against God, as was also his religion, and his past life, Christ glorified was thenceforth his all: a Christ who had wrought redemption for him, and who had cleansed him from his sins: a Man in heaven for whom he waited, as the Fulfiller of the glorious hope of His own who were already united to Him, and were esteemed by Him as Himself.

Called by such a revelation of the Person of the Lord and by the words of His mouth, it was not the moment to go and consult others, whoever they might be; but he does not go. His mission was from the Lord Himself, from a Lord who had not been thus revealed to others. He was the Lord, it was the same salvation; but it was a special revelation which stamped its character upon the whole ministry of a servant, who knew Christ Himself no more after the flesh; that is, no more as the Messiah of the Jews upon the earth.

61 But it was needful that all should be wrought as experience in his soul; he was therefore made blind, in order that he might be separated from every external thing which could distract him, and that he might be entirely occupied with the change that had taken place in him, and that this revelation of the Lord, this total revolution in the state and relations of his own soul, might without interruption be felt, and might work within. It was needful that the condemnation of the law, the sin of having persecuted the Lord of glory in the persons of His people, the glory of His Person, the perfect grace which had called him, should be realities for his soul; that the new man should be formed by this means.

Thus he is left to himself. He does not think of seeking the rest of the apostles at Jerusalem; the Lord Himself had called him to Damascus, and Saul had received his mission from Him. He had not to consult the apostles, for the Lord had taken him for Himself. He was the servant of Christ immediately dependent upon Himself. He goes into Arabia and returns again to Damascus. After three years he goes up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and stays with him fifteen days. He did not see the other apostles. He also visited James, the Lord's brother. He is careful to recount all these details, that the Galatians might understand that his apostolic relation was directly with the Lord Himself, that he owed nothing to the other apostles.

Thus he, who but a little time before, had been a persecutor, advanced in Judaism beyond many his equals in his own nation, is now laid hold of by sovereign grace, in the midst of his greatest activity against the name of the Lord - an apostle sent directly by the Lord to the Gentiles, sent by a glorified Jesus.

But though chosen and called, he must await the positive direction of the Holy Ghost for entering upon the field of his apostolic labours; this was afterwards given at Antioch. It is a most important principle; we need in order to work according to the Lord, not only the call of the Lord, but also the positive direction of the Holy Ghost.

Saul immediately confessed the Lord as a Christian; he did not delay, he waited for nothing: his faithfulness in publicly confessing Him is at once manifested.

62 This done, he all but disappears until the time when the Holy Spirit sends him as a witness for Christ into the heathen world. Only those things which shew his perfect independence of the apostles and of men, are here recalled. He gloried, as in an honour, in that with which his enemies and the enemies of the truth reproached him. He did not hold his mission or his authority from any man, nor by means of man, neither of Peter nor of the other apostles, but from Jesus Christ Himself. We shall see that Peter had no share in the mission to the Gentiles.

Paul was not known by face to the churches of Judea; when he afterwards visited Syria and Cilicia, they had heard only, that he who persecuted them in times past, now preached the faith which once he destroyed, and they glorified God in him. This was the truth, as in the presence of the Lord. Later, he was sent to the Gentiles, not from Jerusalem, but from Antioch, by the Holy Spirit, as we read in Acts 13. Neither Peter, nor the apostles, nor the church at Jerusalem, had anything to do with it; it was a wholly independent mission: they knew not even what was being done. He carried on the preaching of the gospel among the Gentiles (always, however, evangelising the Jews where he found any) taking with him various brothers, whom grace had prepared for the work, as we find it stated in Acts. But this is not the place to speak of such details.

Galatians 2

After fourteen years he went up again to Jerusalem, precisely on account of the Judaising Christians; false brethren, unawares brought in, who came in privily to spy out the liberty, which the Gentiles had in Christ Jesus, that they might bring them into bondage. It is probably this to which Acts 15 refers. Barnabas accompanied him and he also took Titus with him. Paul and Barnabas had greatly withstood these false brethren, who had come down from Jerusalem; but God had not allowed them to succeed, in order no doubt, that it might be Jerusalem and the apostles as linked with the assembly at Jerusalem, who should recognise the liberty of the Gentiles. There would otherwise have been two churches; a church bound by the law at Jerusalem, and a church free from the law at Antioch. Thus, by the wisdom of God, it was Jerusalem itself who declared Christians from among the nations, to be not subject to the law, and thus all remained united.

63 But we find here other important points relating to the subject treated of by the apostle, important for us also. First, we see that Paul (such had now become his name) went up by revelation. In Acts, nothing is spoken of, but the decision to which the Christians at Antioch had come. We may often accept and follow the advice of others, though if we are keeping near enough to the Lord and learning of Him, our decision may depend upon the communications that are made to us by Him. In this case, it was a direct revelation; but the principle is the same for us. I do the thing because I know the will of God, although I may do that which is the fruit of the counsels of others. Paul went as sent of God, and this inspires confidence, and gives firmness in the path. We feel that we are doing the will of God.

Moreover, Paul speaks of it here, to shew that he went up only because it was the will of God, not because it depended upon the authority of those at Jerusalem. As however, the gospel itself was in question, he was content to communicate to the others what he himself had preached; but privately to those who were pillars, lest in any way he should have run in vain. But neither was Titus who was with him, being a Greek, compelled to be circumcised: he would not yield to them, not even for a single moment, as though he were subject to them, whether at Antioch or Jerusalem, in order that the truth of the gospel might continue with the Gentiles.

Besides he had received nothing from those who seemed to be pillars in the assembly at Jerusalem: "whatsoever they were," says Paul, "it maketh no matter to me; God accepteth no man's person." And again, those who were in the greatest esteem among them, had added nothing to him. For him, God was all; Christ had sent him, he had learned the truth by revelation; all the rest, for him, were but men - beloved brethren indeed, each one of whom he owned in his special place, but he drew his authority from Christ alone: independent of all men in order to obey Jesus, yet necessarily through love to Him, at the service of all men. But we find yet more.

These brethren of Jerusalem, pillars of the assembly, James, Peter, and John, saw that the gospel of the uncircumcision, that is of the Gentiles, had been committed to Paul, as the gospel of the circumcision, that is of the Jews, was to Peter. For he that wrought effectually in Peter to the apostleship of the circumcision, the same was mighty in Paul toward the Gentiles; they gave therefore to Paul and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, that they should go to the heathen, while they themselves went to the circumcision. We find here facts and principles of the highest importance.

64 He puts James first among the pillars, as we see in Acts 15. He held the first place at Jerusalem; when he speaks of gifts and the apostleship he only names Peter. Apostleship in the work of the gospel depended upon the gift of God. Now as God had wrought among the Gentiles by means of Paul and Barnabas, He had likewise wrought among the Jews by means of Peter. He had wrought powerfully in the one toward the Jew, and in both, though chiefly in Paul, toward the Gentiles; and owning the grace of God in the work, they agreed that each should labour according to their gifts, in the spheres entrusted to them of God. Paul thus became the apostle to the Gentiles, to whom Christ had sent him: Peter, to the Jews only, among whom God had blessed him. Peter had however, begun the work with the twelve, and God had used him at the first, to open the door to the Gentiles; but he did not continue to labour among them, and renouncing the commission given to him in Matthew 28, he left the apostleship of the Gentiles wholly to Paul and Barnabas, who had been sent to that work, and blessed in it by the Lord.

This latter - Barnabas - soon disappeared; he was too much linked with Mark, his kinsman according to the flesh, and Paul remained as apostle of the Gentiles throughout the whole world, and of the assembly of God which united both Jews and Gentiles in one - a subject of which he alone spoke - the assembly composed of true Christians, united to Christ by the Holy Spirit, the body of Christ, in which there is neither Jew nor Greek; for the two have become one assembly, one body, united to Christ the head of the body, and members one of another. Such is the apostle to the Gentiles: with them Peter had nothing to do.

It is evident that these facts are of great importance in the history of the church of God. How often have we not heard Peter spoken of as head of the church. That Peter, ardent and full of zeal, began the work at Jerusalem, the Lord working mightily by his means, is certain; we see it plainly in Scripture. But he had nothing to do with the work carried on among the Gentiles. That work was done by Paul, who was sent by the Lord Himself, and Paul entirely rejected the authority of Peter. For him, Peter was but a man; and he, sent by Christ, was independent of men. The church among the Gentiles, is the fruit of Paul's, not of Peter's work: it owed its origin to Paul and to his labours, and in no way to Peter, whom Paul had to resist with all his strength, in order to keep the assemblies among the Gentiles free from the influence of that Spirit which ruled Christians, who were the fruit of Peter's work. God maintained unity by His grace; had He not kept the church, it would have been divided into two parts, even in the days of the apostles themselves.

65 It is marvellous that so many should hold as head of the church among the Gentiles, Peter, who was the apostle of the circumcision, and who openly left the work amongst the heathen to Paul - who had already laboured in it independently for more than fourteen years, sent and blessed by the Lord and by the Holy Ghost, without any reference to Peter, and who had, moreover, expressly rejected Peter's authority, which the false brethren sought to impose upon the Gentile churches. Peter, though greatly blessed by the Lord, is the apostle of the circumcision and of the circumcision only: Paul, of the uncircumcision, that is, of the Gentiles. Paul alone among the apostles, speaks of the church, the body of Christ: this truth was confided only to him as its administrator.

Verse 11. Paul recalls another case: one in which he had been compelled to reprove and withstand Peter, who had come to Antioch, where the church had been founded among the Gentiles, though there were Jews among them also. Poor Peter! he shewed himself at the beginning, quite ready to eat with the Gentiles, he was free from the prejudices of his countrymen: but alas! when certain came down from Jerusalem, from James, who was the leader of the work and of the assembly in the civil and religious capital of the Jews, where the law was still observed by the Christians - then Peter, full of ardour but sensitive to the opinion of others, and timid in the presence of reproach, withdraws, and no longer eats with the Gentiles.

This was to destroy the divine work, which had already been wrought at Jerusalem - an evident act of unfaithfulness. The more a man is honoured - and in this case, there was true ground for respect - the greater the stumbling-block to others, if he fail, and thus it happened here. All the Jews and even Barnabas also, dissembled with Peter, and no longer dared to walk with the Gentiles. The unity of the Spirit was lost, as also the truth of the gospel. Paul could not let this pass; and when he saw that Peter walked not uprightly, he reproved him before all. Authority cannot make evil good nor good evil. We see moreover, that Peter had not the very smallest authority over Paul; and this is why the latter recalls the fact. Peter deserved to be rebuked, and Paul rebuked him in the presence of all, saying: "If thou, being a Jew, livest after the manner of the Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, why compellest thou the Gentiles to live as do the Jews?"

66 This leads us away from the history and from the question of owning Peter's authority, to that of the truth of the gospel, which he was imperilling. Not only did Peter shew a false and deceitful spirit - boasting of his liberty one moment, and the next, concealing what his previous walk had been - but he was establishing error; and there was danger; for inasmuch as in him lay, and as far as it depended upon his authority he was destroying the truth of the gospel: "we" continues Paul, "who are Jews by nature, and not sinners of the Gentiles, knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified. But if, while we seek to be justified by Christ, we ourselves also are found sinners, is Christ therefore the minister of sin? God forbid. For if I build again the things which I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor."

Paul begins here to treat of doctrine, not merely of Peter's authority, leaving aside the question of the work committed to him among the circumcision. He reasons thus. Peter, being a Jew like the rest, was building again the system of the law, when he refused to eat with the Gentiles; he was seeking to be justified by works and by the exact observance of legal ordinances. But he had abandoned this means of justification, in order to believe on Christ, that he might be justified by the faith of Christ; and in building again the system of the law, he made himself a transgressor in having left it. But it was Christ who had led him to do it. Christ then was the minister of sin! this could not be. If he built again the things he had destroyed, he became a sinner in having destroyed them - and Christ had led him to do it! The apostle then gives an admirable compendium of individual truth, in respect of his Christian position.

67 The law requires righteousness in man: it could not do otherwise, for it was the perfect rule of such righteousness. But neither Paul nor any other had fulfilled it; therefore it pronounced the sentence of death and condemnation, not death only, but also condemnation. He now sets forth how this sentence had been carried into effect, how he had escaped the condemnation and had died to sin: yet he was not dead; Christ had taken the condemnation upon Himself: thus his death was but the death of the old man, and this was an immense gain. The law had slain him, but Christ had died in his stead: once dead, the law could do no more, it had dominion over a man as long as he lived. If a criminal dies in the hands of the officers of justice, or in his prison, the law cannot punish or take action against a dead man: all behind him is closed, he lives no longer in the life he had previously possessed.

In Christ, all this is accomplished for us, but there is yet more. He took the condemnation and passed through death: we are associated with Him, and thus dead to sin without there being any condemnation for us; moreover, He is become our life.

Thus we are dead to the law that we might live to God. I, said Paul, have been crucified with Christ, who has taken the curse of the law; nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. This is death, both to the flesh and to the law. Thus, there is no condemnation for me, since Christ has taken it, inasmuch as He charged Himself with my sins, and bore them upon the cross, abolishing them by His death. Sin in my flesh is condemned, and in the cross of Christ I was crucified with Him. (Compare Rom. 8: 1-3.) Thus, are we set free, not only from the guilt of our sins, but from the power of sin in the flesh, the old man is for the believer, crucified with Christ (Rom. 6: 6), that the body of sin might be destroyed. Having been redeemed, we are not subjected afresh to the law, to which we have died as if our salvation were still uncertain; for the flesh is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be; but through faith, we hold ourselves to be dead, crucified with Christ, who risen from among the dead, has really become our life. Christ lives in us, and we can thus reckon ourselves to be dead to sin (Rom. 6: 10, 11) and alive unto God in Jesus Christ our Lord.

68 We are no longer debtors to the flesh, which for faith is dead: but since Christ who has died is our life, we, living by this life, reckon ourselves dead; for Christ who is our life has died, and the power of the Spirit which acts in this new life, sets us free from the law of sin and death (Rom. 8: 2). Thus, Christ being in us, the body is dead; for if it lives of its own proper life, it only brings forth sin; and the Spirit is life, the source of practical righteousness in us. Thus the wisdom of God, instead of placing the flesh under the law, to which it was not and could not be subject, gives in sovereign grace a new life in the risen Christ, who died for us. There is therefore no more condemnation to them that believe, and we reckon ourselves to be dead, since Christ who is our life has died. We are by the law dead to the law, crucified with Christ, nevertheless we live, yet not we, but Christ liveth in us. The bond of the law is broken; not that its authority is despised, but that I am dead; it can no longer touch me, for I am dead. Nevertheless I live, yet not I, but it is Christ who lives in me, a life which is holy, just, and good.

But another truth is found in this passage. It is not merely a holy life (being that of Christ Himself), but this life has its object, its manner of living. All life in the creature has an object, we cannot walk without one. If the Lord Jesus is our life, He is also personally the object of the life, and we live by faith in Him. The heart sees Him, looks to Him, feeds upon Him, is assured of His love, for He gave Himself for us. The life that we live in the flesh, we live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved us and gave Himself for us. Happy certainty, blessed assurance! This is not a subject of hope: the glory, though it belongs to us, is a hope; but in this we know the love in which He has given His life for us. It is a new life, the old man is crucified, and Christ whose perfect love we know, is the object of faith and of the heart. One cannot give more than oneself.

The conclusion drawn by Paul is of the utmost importance. "We do not frustrate the grace of God, for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain." Let us suppose that a righteous man could knock at the door of heaven, and claim to enter by right on the ground of his own works. Such an one would never know God; love would not have introduced him there, and God is Love. It would have been the wages of his own work, he would have deserved to enter. But it is not love when a workman is paid the wages he has earned; it may be done with courtesy, but it is always a debt - there can be no love in it. It is love that has saved me. It is the operation of love in God's gift of His Son, and in the blessed Saviour's own sufferings for us, when He drank the cup which the Father gave to Him, the cup of death and of the curse which our sins had filled. By this we understand through grace the love of God.

69 But if righteousness can be obtained by observing the law, the death which Christ in His infinite grace suffered for us, is not needed: I am righteous by my own deeds: I frustrate the grace of God. "If righteousness is by the law, Christ is dead in vain"; a principle of the utmost importance. Legal righteousness (that is righteousness by works) and Christianity cannot go together, the one annuls the other. It is not that the law is bad or imperfect: it is the perfect rule of human righteousness, the righteousness which becomes the children of Adam; but no righteousness is found in them, they are sinners. There is none righteous, no, not one. The law being perfect condemns us, but we have died in Christ who bare our sins in His own body on the tree, and the law can no longer slay or condemn us. The Saviour has borne all for us who through grace believe on Him. Moreover He has given us, or rather He is in us, a new life, which is holy and obedient.

Thus, we are dead to the law, that we might live to God; righteousness is obtained, for we have become the righteousness of God in Christ, sins are put away by His death. But if I had obtained righteousness by keeping the law, there would have been no need that the Son of God should die for me. If Christ has put away my sins and become my righteousness before God, I am not justified by works of law but by faith in Him. If my righteousness is by works of law He is dead in vain.

Galatians 3.

The apostle now looks at the position of the Christian, from another point of view. True Christians are possessors of the Holy Ghost; their bodies are the temples of the Spirit which they have received of God (1 Cor. 6: 19). "If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his," Rom. 8: 9. By the Spirit we cry, Abba Father (Rom. 8; Gal. 4: 6). It is by the Comforter that we are in Christ and Christ in us (John 14: 20). The apostle therefore asks, How did you receive the Holy Ghost? Was it by the works of the law or by faith in Christ? It was not questioned that they had received Him nor how they had received Him. The Galatians had never been under law, they were heathen. It was not by the works of law they had received the Holy Ghost. Moreover, some among them possessed His gifts, a fact which rendered the presence of the Spirit not more important, since He is the seal and proof of our salvation, and of our life in Christ (by whom ye are sealed until the day of redemption), but more evident. "Who then," says Paul, "has bewitched you, O foolish Galatians, that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ has been evidently set forth crucified among you? This only would I learn of you; Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?" They well knew it was not by law, but by faith, and all now who have received the Holy Ghost know well that it is by Jesus Christ they have received Him. Christians in this day believe so little in the presence of the Holy Ghost, that there is less force for them in this argument of the apostle; but to the Galatians it was conclusive. They had received Him by faith.

70 It was not in that day only that Judaisers sought to introduce the law, and to subject to it Christians who from the outset had received the Holy Spirit. Therefore the apostle says, "Are ye so foolish, having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect in the flesh?" For the law applies to man in the flesh, and puts him to the proof, so as to manifest whether, as a man alive in the flesh, he can obtain righteousness by keeping the law. What folly! having received the Spirit, the seal of divine righteousness, to desire to seek righteousness by carnal means, by human faithfulness to the requirements of the law, which addresses itself to man in the flesh, but to which the flesh is not subject, neither indeed can be! Amongst the Galatians were persons who wrought miracles by the Spirit, so that His presence as a seal, on God's part, was very evident. In the present day many believers are inquiring whether God's Spirit dwells in them. We will say a few words on this point.

If a man, convinced of sin, and believing in the Lord Jesus as the alone and perfect Saviour, who has finished the work committed to Him by the Father, can, from the bottom of his heart, say, "Abba, Father," such an one possesses the Holy Ghost (Rom. 8: 15; Gal. 4: 6). Not only does he see the truth in the word, and accept it, but in the presence of God he enjoys liberty, and possesses the consciousness of His relationship with God. He will have much to learn, much, perhaps, to correct, much to forget, much to alter in his spiritual condition, but he possesses the consciousness of his relationship with God. This is not simply conversion; a sinner, as a sinner, cannot be sealed. God cannot put His seal upon sin; but when a man has been cleansed by the blood of Christ, then the Holy Spirit comes and dwells in him.

71 We see the difference in the case of the prodigal son. He had come to himself, had owned his sin, and that he was ready to perish. He arose, and set off to return to his father. He was acting aright; he was truly converted; but as yet he had not on the best robe, nor the ring on his hand, nor shoes on his feet; as yet he had not met his father; he knew well that kindness and happiness were to be found in his father's house, but he knew not if he might enter there, he knew not if he would be received. He had not the sense of being a son, though he was such: he says, "I am no more worthy to be called thy son." This is not the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, "Abba, Father."

How many sincere and truly converted souls are in this state! They are not sealed. I do not say one must be able to explain how one cries, Abba; nor to explain the doctrine of the presence of the Holy Ghost - acquaintance with the word is needed for this. But we must have the Spirit to be able in truth to cry, Abba. There are many souls who, from bad teaching, fear to say they are children of God; but when in the presence of God, they unhesitatingly, and from the bottom of their hearts, cry, Abba. In such a case, the lack of liberty and of power to say, "I am a child of God," is the result of bad teaching; but if the soul has been sealed, when it finds itself in God's presence speaking to Him, it well knows that He is its Father, it has the sense of relationship with Him. "Where the Spirit of the Lord is," says the apostle, "there is liberty" - liberty in the presence of God, and also from the law and the power of sin.

We can now look for a moment at that which the Holy Spirit gives when He dwells in us. First, He is not a spirit of bondage, but of adoption: we know that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ. Marvellous and ineffable privileges! though to be thus in relationship with God and with Christ is still more than the inheritance, which is but the consequence of that relationship.

72 Moreover, the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given to us. A simple expression, but how precious! We dwell in love, the love of God, for God, who is love, dwells in us. The proof of the love is that God gave His only-begotten Son for us, and that He died, gave up His life for us. But we enjoy this love through the presence of the Holy Ghost; by that presence the love is shed abroad in our hearts.

The apostle John speaks thus: "No man hath seen God at any time: if we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us. Hereby know we that we dwell in God, and he in us, because he hath given us of his Spirit." And to shew that this belongs, without question, to all Christians, he says, "Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God," 1 John 4: 12-15.

It is difficult for one who does not walk with God to believe that we can dwell in God, and God in us. But it is clearly said, "If any man hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his." He dwells in us, and the soul that walks in communion with God enjoys this, rejoicing in it with humility and gratitude.

The presence of God never makes us proud. He is too great for us to be anything before Him. It was not when Paul was in the third heaven that he was in danger of being exalted above measure, but when he came down again. Moreover, the Holy Spirit gives us to know that we are in Christ, and Christ in us (John 14: 20). There is no condemnation for them that are in Christ Jesus. Not only are our sins forgiven, but we are made acceptable to God in Him who is the Beloved, accepted in Christ, according to the preciousness of Christ Himself, who is our righteousness, and loved as He is loved.

Here, again, we see the believer's perfect acceptance, as also his responsibility. Before God I am perfectly accepted in Christ. But if I am in Christ, Christ is in me as life and power, and I am responsible to manifest this life before the world. Christ is for us before God, and we are for Christ before the world.

We know, then, by the Holy Spirit that we are in Christ, and Christ in us. What a magnificent fact, that the Spirit of God dwells in us! the effect of the perfect redemption accomplished by Christ. But what a responsibility likewise for the Christian! God did not dwell with Adam innocent, even in the garden of Eden. He did not dwell with Abraham; but as soon as even the external redemption of Israel was accomplished, He came to dwell in the midst of His people, and sat between the cherubim, as on His throne. And now that true and eternal redemption is accomplished, He comes to dwell in believers individually, and in His people, gathered by the Holy Ghost. His presence is more than conversion. The converts washed in the blood of Jesus become the habitation of God, sealed thus for glory by means of the gift of the Holy Ghost.

73 The apostle insists upon the folly of these poor Galatians; they had suffered much on account of the gospel, and if the gospel were insufficient and vain without circumcision, they had suffered in vain.

He then takes up the case of Abraham, whom the Jews so highly esteemed. He had believed God, and it was imputed to him for righteousness. Thus at the present time it is those who are of faith who are the true sons of Abraham, not those who are sons according to the flesh. "And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be blessed."

Mark here the authority and importance of the word of God. It foresaw what God would do; it is that which comes forth out of the mouth of God, so that it is looked at as God speaking anticipatively. The apostle speaks of Scripture as of that which possessed the thoughts of God, since, in fact, inspired by the Holy Ghost, it communicates these thoughts to us. Know, then, says the apostle, how that the patriarch, Abraham, the father of the faithful and the depositary of the promises, received all by faith: thus those who are of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham. Those, on the other hand, who are of the works of the law, are under the curse. The law is good and holy, but it does not give a new nature, it does not give life, nor the strength needed to do what it requires. He who seeks blessing by the law is like the man who lay in the porch of the pool of Bethesda; his sickness had deprived him of the strength needed for his cure.

The law exacts; it requires man to keep it, it must have obedience: but it neither gives a nature that desires to keep it, nor strength to do it. It exacts, and that is all. Man ought to love God with all his heart: he has not done it - he does it not. He ought to love his neighbour as himself: he does not do it - he is more grieved if he loses his own fortune than if his neighbour loses his. He ought not to lust, but lust is there. Therefore the law pronounces a curse upon the man who is under its power, because he has not kept it. It knows not how to forgive.

74 The apostle alludes to a remarkable fact, which is found in Deuteronomy 27: 26. The tribes of Israel were commanded to stand, six upon mount Gerizim, and six upon mount Ebal, these to curse and those to bless. But when it comes to speak of those that were to bless, we find no blessings. In chapter 27: 12, we get the six to bless, but no blessing: then in verse 13 the six to curse, and then follows: "The Levites shall speak and say unto all the men of Israel with a loud voice: Cursed be he," etc.: and then at the end, the words quoted by the apostle. In the following chapters, we get God's ways with Israel in the land of Canaan, but under the solemn declarations of the consequences of being put under the law; and no blessing is found there. Thus, those who are of the law are under the curse.

The prophets likewise taught that life is through faith, that the law does not justify saying: "The just shall live by faith." Now the law is not of faith, but of works; moreover, the man himself must do them, for the law requires that he should work out his own righteousness: it says, "the man that doeth these things shall live in them." Does it then follow that the authority of the law must be despised, since those who have been under it, have not kept it, or that all must be condemned? Not so. Christ has redeemed us (we who believe on Him) from the curse of the law, being made in His infinite grace, His immense love, a curse for us, as it is written: "Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree; that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith."

We find then here, the ways of God for blessing the nations. The Jews were under the law, as in fact all are, who have not been delivered by Jesus Christ, known by the Holy Ghost. If we were not wholly corrupt and without conscience, we yet were as to the state of our souls before God, under the curse. Now if the Christian adopts this principle, he puts himself under the curse; that is why the apostle is so earnest about the question. Christ gave Himself upon the cross, to take this curse upon Himself, and thus it does not fall upon us. He has also borne the sins of those who believe on Him. Thus the blessing comes to the nations, to whoever believes on Him whether they be Jews or Gentiles.

75 But this is not all. We find in the Old Testament the promise of the Holy Spirit, a promise renewed still more clearly in the words of the Lord Himself. It was written that the Spirit should be poured out upon all flesh, that is, the Gentiles should have their part in it. This was Peter's authority for receiving Cornelius among the Christians. The believing Gentiles were sealed as much as were the Jews. God had put His seal upon them as His children, and they were united in one body with the Jews and with Christ Himself. The blessing of the Gentiles was the same as the blessing of the Jews. The Jews had not received the Spirit under the law, when the Gentiles were excluded; and now that all were manifested together as sinners, grace which had cleansed both the one and the other, admitted one and the other to the same privileges. Thus the promise already made to Abraham and to the nations in him was fulfilled in the gift of the Spirit, given through Christ, to those who believe from among the Gentiles.

He now insists upon this promise, upon the circumstances under which it was made, and the way in which the Gentiles enjoyed it. The starting-point of his argument is, that the nations were to be blessed in Abraham, according to the promise of God. It was by faith, that Abraham had received the promises, and the Gentiles were upon the same ground - that of receiving all through faith. Afterwards, the law was given to the seed of Abraham according to the flesh, but it was only a curse to the soul, for the flesh is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. Moreover, the just shall live by faith, and the law is not of faith, it requires works. But those who were under the law were redeemed from its curse by the death of Christ. The believing Jews were therefore freed from it; and the blessing they received through faith in Christ, extended to the Gentiles who had faith in Christ, but certainly did not place them under the curse from which Israel was delivered through this same faith. The Holy Spirit already promised, became the heritage of the one and the other: a magnificent testimony to the acceptance of the Gentiles! The history of the promise to Abraham shewed the same truth. But a sure and simple principle is first stated.

76 Verse 15. If a covenant is not only made but confirmed, it cannot be disannulled, nor can anything be added to it. The promises were made to Abraham and were afterwards confirmed, as we shall see, to his seed. Now the law which was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul the covenant that God had before confirmed, that it should make the promise of none effect. The promise remained always sure, and nothing could be added to or taken from it.

The character and details of the promise are also important. It was made to Abraham and confirmed to his seed. But in the "seed" one only is spoken of, not a numerous progeny: and this is most exact. We find many promises made to Abraham, when it was said that his seed should be as the stars of heaven, and as the sand by the sea shore. But there was one promise made to Abraham alone, without mention of his seed. In Genesis 12 it is said that all nations should be blessed in him: and in chapter 22 this promise is confirmed to his seed, and that when he had offered Isaac upon the altar, and had received him again as risen from the dead (see Heb. 11: 19) - a remarkable type of Christ in whom it was fully and literally accomplished. In chapters 15-17, we find the promise of a numerous posterity, which promise was fulfilled in the nation of Israel. But in chapter 22 we get the two promises distinctly stated.

We have then here the promise, the true seed, one single person, the confirmation of the promise to that one seed, and the blessing promised to the Gentiles with it. It is no question here of a numerous posterity, but of one single Person, and that Person is Christ. Isaac was but a type. The law, says the apostle, which came in four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul or add anything to the promise which had been so solemnly confirmed after the sacrifice of Isaac upon the altar (Gen. 22). If the inheritance is of the law, it is no more of promise, but God gave it to Abraham by promise.

Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added on account of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the promise was made; that is, till Messiah, Christ should come. God never intended to save through the law, but through Christ His Son, by His death for us upon the cross, where He bare the sins of all who are saved: those sins can be imputed to them no more. Christ is the Judge of the living and the dead, but when believers appear before His tribunal, they will find there the One who has already put away their sins by His death. The law came in between the promise and the fulfilment of the promise: it was neither of faith nor of promise, nor was it the fulfilment of the promise by the coming of the Son of God.

77 The law required obedience from man, producing human righteousness if obedience were accomplished. But flesh was not subject to the law, neither could it be; so then those who are in the flesh cannot please God. Why then did God give the law? In order that man might, through transgressions, learn his real condition. God could do nothing to produce sins; man was committing them already; but sins became transgressions through the law, in order, as Paul says in the Epistle to the Romans, that by the commandment sin might become exceeding sinful.

The law worked in two ways. In the first place the sins which man committed became exceedingly sinful, because they not only practised what was evil, but they did so after God had plainly forbidden it. In the second place, sin in the flesh, lust, the condition of man after the flesh was detected. The flesh loved sin; and even a converted man who sought to conquer it, was overcome and made captive by the power of sin which ruled in the flesh. By the law is the knowledge of sin, that is, sin in the flesh, and through the law, sins became exceeding sinful. If my child is accustomed to be idle and run about the streets, it is a bad habit, but if I forbid him to go out, and he does it again, it is a positive transgression and much worse than a bad habit. It was for this, to instruct us, to teach us what we are, that the law was given. The law is holy, just, and good; it presents to man his duty as a child of Adam before God, but it was given to man when he was already a sinner not surely to produce sin, but to change sin into offences. The apostle speaks still more positively to the Romans: "The law entered that the offence might abound," v. 20. Moreover, it disclosed to man his evil nature: but I will not here say more. It is enough if the nature and working of the law are understood.

Verse 20. The law, says the apostle, was ordained by angels in the hand of a Mediator. We here find a new and important principle It is plain that a mediator is not a mediator of one; but God is one. There was then another party between whom and God the Mediator fulfilled His mediatorship; in fact, there was Israel, that is, man. The enjoyment of the results of the covenant, depended on the faithfulness of both parties; for since God had upon Mount Sinai promised blessing on His part, if Israel were faithful to His will, so Israel was bound to be obedient, in order to enjoy the privileges granted under the law. That which had been promised unconditionally to Abraham, was accepted at Sinai under condition of the people's obedience. "Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people," Ex. 19: 5.

78 Moses (the mediator) therefore came and proposed to them all these words, and all the people answered together: "all that the Lord hath spoken we will do," and Moses brought back to the Lord the words of the people. Thus the covenant was made. Then they made a molten calf before Moses had come down from the mount. The covenant was broken in its primary obligation, "thou shalt have none other gods before me," and Moses broke the tables at the foot of the mount, and they never came into the camp. Mercy spared them, but the covenant had been broken, and a new one had to be afterwards established. It had no more stability than the faithfulness of man in the flesh. The fulfilment of God's unconditional promise to Abraham, depended only on the faithfulness of the God who had made it; it could not therefore fail.

And remark here, that it is not a question of Christ the Mediator to bear our sins and save us, but of the promised seed. With that a mediator had nothing to do. It was simply a promise that the seed should come, and it came. The law intervened between the promise and its fulfilment to put man to the proof, in order that the weakness and iniquity of the flesh might be manifested. It was not against the promises of God, but it shewed that man could not secure the accomplishment of those promises by his own faithfulness and his own works. For if the law could have given life, the new life given by the law would naturally keep its commandments; this would have been human and legal righteousness, and although human yet pleasing to God. But sinful flesh was detected, not righteousness accomplished. If they had kept the law, under which they had placed themselves at Sinai in order that they might enjoy the promises, they would have enjoyed that which was promised: but they did not keep it. All - Jews as well as Gentiles, those who had the privileges as well as those who had them not - were concluded under sin, so that the promise made to Abraham might be fulfilled to all believers through faith in Jesus Christ.

79 Now before faith came, that is, before the system founded upon faith in Christ had come, the Jews were kept under the law, shut up to the faith that should afterwards be revealed. Therefore the law was their schoolmaster unto Christ, that they might be justified by faith. It was in fact, the goodness of God, which when all the earth had fallen into idolatry, kept one nation, which unfaithful as it may have been, yet preserved the knowledge of the only true God. The law was not, it is true, the means of justifying them, for they did not keep it; but they were shut up under obligation to keep it, and prided themselves in the promises.

The unity of God, and the fact of the promises made by Him of the seed to come, remained in their integrity among men. But once faith - that is, Christ and the system of faith - had come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. What was only for the time of expectation lost the whole ground of its existence when the object of expectation had come. It had been useful for preserving them until the appointed time; but once that which was waited for had come, to preserve the schoolmaster had no longer any motive - it belonged to the time of waiting. This would, in reality, have denied His coming and His work. Those who had not kept the law, when they were bound to do it, desired, from pride, to keep it, when every motive for having it was entirely passed. Such is man!

Verse 26. The apostle no longer speaks of us, that is, of the Jews. They had been kept under the schoolmaster, but he now addresses his words to the Christian Jews and Gentiles together. "Ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus." He no longer speaks of Jews or Greeks, or slaves or free men: being baptised unto Christ, they had put on Christ, they had assumed the name, the profession, of Christ; every other name was lost in this. They were Christians, united together under this name. The resurrection had for all put an end before God to man in the flesh: they were all one in Christ Jesus.

The place of external profession is here spoken of, what a Christian was as such, not whether he was a true Christian or not. We shall see that Paul was a little doubtful as to this; nevertheless, in looking to Christ through grace, he was able to reassure himself.

80 In the Christian system, faith, as it is here called, does not refer to a name, nor to a party of any kind, but to Christ alone. They were Christians, and nothing else. Now, if they were of Christ, the only true Seed of Abraham according to the promise, through whom the nations were to be blessed, they were of the seed of Abraham, and heirs according to the promise.

All this contains important principles. Partakers of the promise in Christ, they could not be under the law. To put oneself under it, denied Christianity; Christ was dead in vain. We cannot be of any class, nor bear any other name, than that of Christ Himself.

Galatians 4

The apostle now goes on to speak of the consequences of the truth, that we are children of God by faith in Christ Jesus - a truth which had been stated as a principle in chapter 3: 26, and which is here developed in its effects. He draws the contrast between the heirs under the law and the heirs through faith in Christ, who had come, and was risen from the dead. Under the law they were as a child who does not understand the father's thoughts, nor does he even know them: he is as a slave, to whom it is said, Go or come; do this or that. Although by-and-by he will be lord of all, yet he is under tutors and governors until the time appointed of the father. Thus believing Jews had indeed a part in the promises, yet, being under the law, they were as children under a schoolmaster. But this introduces a very important principle.

The institutions of the law were adapted to man in the flesh. A magnificent temple, beautiful vestments, a God present to the senses upon earth, though man was not permitted to draw near to Him; trumpets, visible sacrifices - all these things were ordained that man in the flesh might be in relationship with God, according to the elements of the world, which are suited to man in the flesh. Christians are a heavenly people; they see not the objects they adore, except by faith. God is worshipped in spirit and in truth, not with bulls and goats. The Spirit reveals to them that which they see not; they know that Christ is ascended into heaven, having finished the work which the Father gave Him to do; and the heart rises up into the heavenly temple, by the grace of the Holy Ghost come down from heaven, there to adore God. Thus the heirs themselves were as children, bound to accomplish an external worship, to offer beasts. The cleansing was an external purifying of the body by water; the sacrifices - types for the time then present - could not purify the conscience from sin; they were not offerings of praise, and thanksgiving, and adoration, founded upon the accomplished sacrifice of Christ. It was all "the elements of the world," which were adapted to man in this world.

81 Every religion accomplished in external ceremonies, and composed of such things, is but "the elements of the world," and resembles heathen worship. The favour of God is sought by means which an unconverted man can use, quite as well as, or even better than, one that is converted; for his conscience does not make him feel that these things cannot cleanse the soul. Those who seek to obtain righteousness by works are greatly irritated against those who have peace with God through faith, for this declares all their labour to be in vain. There was but one city where the Gentiles persecuted Paul in which the Jews did not stir them up to do it. They boasted in what man could do, and maintained their own glory; they were not willing to see it trampled under foot. But faith gives the glory of salvation to God, and seeks in a new life, the spring of which is love, to glorify Him by obedience and the fulfilment of His will.

The law was then a schoolmaster until Christ, the promised Seed. In its forms and in its ceremonies, it resembled the religion of the Gentiles. God, while ever maintaining the perfect rule for the conduct of man and the unity of the Godhead, yet condescended to adapt Himself, in the worship He ordained, to the ways of the spirit of man, coming near to him, in order to make manifest whether it were possible for man in the flesh to walk with God. Man has not kept God's rule, but he has clung to the ceremonies, in order to make out by them a righteousness of his own - a way that is morally easy, since he can pursue it without governing his passions, but which becomes, if conscience is aroused, an insupportable yoke. Alas! it is always thus, even in our own day.

But when the fulness of time was come - praise be to God! - after man had shewn himself to be wholly corrupt and without restraint when he had no law, and when he possessed it, with all its accompanying privileges, had broken it, not being able to keep it, even while desiring to do it - then, in the sovereign love of God, the promised Seed came: God sent His only-begotten Son, the second Man, the last Adam, the Word who was made flesh, and dwelt among us.

82 Marvellous grace! God Himself was manifest in flesh, that He might give Himself, and might, after having been raised from the dead, become Head and Source of a new spiritual race, instead of the evil and perverse race. He becomes the life of all believers; they are redeemed to enjoy the glory with Him. Old Testament believers will, without doubt, enjoy the glory, partaking in the result of the redemption wrought by Christ, although they formed no part of His body upon earth, for the thing itself was not come. The promise had been given, as we have seen; now it was accomplished, not fully, but nevertheless accomplished as to the resurrection of Christ, when life and incorruptibility were brought to light, and were preached through the gospel. For the gospel announced, not the promise, but the fulfilment of the promise, in the coming of Christ, come down to accomplish the work of redemption.

God sent His Son: He came and took the form of a man down here. Born of a woman, under the law, He took His place in the world in two relationships: with man, through the woman; with the Jews, as born under the law; and every one, when converted, puts himself under it, unless, indeed, he be already there in spirit. This is very useful for the soul, as it thus learns its weakness. Redemption places all, that is, all who believe in Christ and in His work, under the benefit of that work, whether they be Jews or Gentiles; they are redeemed before God, who has accepted the work of His Son according to His own righteousness, even as He gave Him in His love, in order that those who were under the law might be delivered from it, and might receive the adoption.

Christ has ordained for the one and the other His own place before God. When He rose from the dead, He said to Mary Magdalene, "Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend to my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God." Precious and marvellous words, which had never been uttered before His resurrection. But now all was accomplished; their sins had been borne and put away; God, in all that He is, had been glorified; their persons were redeemed, and, according to the sure purpose of God, Christ had acquired glory for His own through His sufferings. He could announce it to them, though the time was not yet come for glorifying those whom He had already introduced into the position in which He Himself stood, as Man and as Son of God, before His Father. What words! Brethren of the Son of God! If God was His Father, He was their Father; if He was His God, He was their God: not only pardoned and justified already an immense blessing - but introduced into the relationship with God in which He Himself stood.

83 Was He any longer under the law? No surely. Under the law He had died, had borne its curse, had fully glorified God upon the dreadful cross; but that was all passed, and now He was risen, to bring His own redeemed ones, who were made partakers of the life in which He stood in the presence of God, into the glory in which He soon would be, but for which they must wait till He should return to take them there, where they would be for ever with Him, made perfectly like Himself. All that gave them the right to enjoy these privileges was now finished, and though the time had not yet come for entering there, the Spirit could be given so that they could enjoy the privileges in their hearts, and understand the position to which they belonged; the privileges could be announced, and this is what the apostle does. He could not, it is true, unfold them all, for their subjection to the law had dimmed their eyes to the understanding of divine things; but He could at least make their position clear, that they might be able to understand them.

Faith, then, places the believer in the position of a son with God, according to the value and efficacy of the redemption wrought by Christ Jesus; and because they were sons, God had sent forth the Spirit of His Son into their hearts, crying, Abba, Father. Thus the believer is no more a servant, but a son, and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ. Under the law believers, although born of God, were but as servants in position; now Jews and Gentiles together are sons, according to the position of Him who has redeemed them. The elements of the world were adapted to man in the flesh: the Spirit puts us in communion with the Father in heaven as His sons, united to Him who is risen from the dead. As Jews they were dead to the law by the death of Christ: the Gentiles, redeemed by His death, took up that yoke only when it had been broken for the Jews, and that by the death of Christ.

84 But the apostle takes up a still stronger ground. The Galatians were Gentiles, and had been as heathen under these same elements of the world. Not knowing God, they did service to them who by nature were no gods. Their worship was necessarily according to the elements of the world - what man in the flesh could offer: they could not conceive of anything else but a worship of ceremonies, the observance of days and the offering of beasts. The true God condescended to place Himself upon this ground in His relations with man, as has been said. He drew near to man where man was. Nevertheless, upon this footing He did not reveal Himself. He hid Himself behind the veil, though He made a covenant with man: He gave a law which was to be observed, while He remained behind the veil, and He ordained sacrifices, most beautiful and instructive types of the true sacrifice of Christ, which is of eternal value.

Everything was made according to the pattern shewn to Moses in the mount, and was thus a type of the heavenly things; but the things themselves were only earthly things, worldly elements, suited to mortal man, and which mortal man, converted or unconverted, could accomplish - principles of the world, according to the need of the human heart, and that which man could offer, in the hope of propitiating his God. God suited Himself to man, while hiding Himself, and proposing to man that he should accomplish human righteousness. God put an end to the whole of this system when He sent His Son, and more especially by His death.

The law came in to prove whether man in the flesh was able to please God: but the law was broken, never observed. Moreover, the promise was despised, and the promised One rejected. The cross ended the system which put God in relation with man in the flesh, or rather which shewed such a relationship to be impossible; and the work of redemption being accomplished, God began, with the second Adam risen from among the dead, spiritual relationships by the Holy Ghost come down from heaven, in His sovereign grace placing those who believed in the same position as His own Son. Marvellous, and for us how blessed a testimony to the value of the redemption He has accomplished!

Yet these poor Christians now desired to return to the weak and beggarly elements from which, when heathens, they had been delivered, through the knowledge of the redemption that is in Christ Jesus! Mark well that all their ceremonies are but the same thing as paganism, the elements of the world. Even if those who subject themselves to them be Christians, yet the principles according to which they walk are the elements of the world, and their practices are heathen practices. We learn this here as doctrine, but the history of the church shews it to us as a fact. Holy days and holy places were taken from the heathen, who had holy places and days on which they held festivals in honour of deified men, such as Theseus, Hercules, and others. The names of saints were afterwards attached to these places and days, and the saints celebrated instead of the demi-gods.

85 St. Augustine has told us what was done, and how it began. He sought to put an end to these evil habits, not to the days, but to what was practised upon them, for they got drunk in the churches. This occurred in Africa, and the same thing was done elsewhere. The feast of the Nativity was the worst of all the pagan festivals, and it is still celebrated among the heathen in the East. Not being able to prevent those who, emerging from paganism, called themselves Christians, from continuing the disorders practised at this festival, the leaders of the church decided to put in its place the Nativity of Christ. Augustine also says, respecting the memory of the saints who took the place of Theseus, etc., that the church thought it better for people to get drunk in honour of a saint, than in honour of a demon. It is certain that Christ was not born in December. The time at which Mary went to visit Elizabeth proves this, if compared with the order of the twenty-four courses of the priests. Zacharias was the eighth course.

In taking up again from the Jews these elements of the world, the Galatians were returning to their former heathen practices. Until the coming of Christ these things had an important meaning; they were figures of that of which Christ has been, or is now, the reality: moreover they tested man, and shewed that he cannot walk with God as man in the flesh. But when once Christ was come, the substance was there, and the figures had no more ground of existence, the test had been already applied. What is done in fulfilment of the law is but the denial of the fulfilment of all in Christ - heathen elements of the world, in which the Galatians walked when they lived as heathen in the world.

Verse 11. The apostle feared that his labour might have been in vain, that they had not the real knowledge of God and of Christian truth. They were ready, as we have seen, to despise the apostle; and with cutting irony, which came, nevertheless, from the depths of a wounded heart, he says to them (v. 12), "Be as I am." The Galatians, who desired to Judaise, accused the apostle of being no better than the Gentiles with whom he ate, of refusing to circumcise their children, of having freed himself from the Jewish yoke, and of walking as a Gentile. Be then as I am, he says, free from this yoke, for I, like you Gentiles, am free from the law. You have not wronged me at all - I am free; be ye free also.

86 In former days they had not despised him, in spite of the infirmity in his flesh: when he had brought them the pure gospel, unmixed with Judaism, they had received him as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus Himself. They had accepted it with such joy, had felt and declared themselves to be so greatly blessed, that they would have given their own eyes - what they most valued - to Paul, so rejoiced had they been to receive the pure gospel, free from all mixture of law. Where was now their blessedness, if they found it needful to add the law in order to enjoy the blessing? Had the apostle become their enemy in speaking the truth to them? They had at first received it with joy, but now that he sought to lead them to cleave firmly to this blessed truth, was he become their enemy? The Judaising teachers were zealous, but not rightly so. It is possible to be zealous in binding souls to oneself, or to the sect to which one is attached. The Pharisees compassed sea and land to make one proselyte, and they made him twofold more the child of hell than themselves.

These likewise (for they were such) wrought with the object of drawing the converted Gentiles into Judaism, hiding the truth of the gospel under circumcision and a mass of observances, which led men to seek their own righteousness by their own works, and denied the perfection of the work of Christ. They shunned the reproach of the cross, for man is never ashamed of a religion he himself can accomplish. Neither Pagans, nor Mahommedans, nor Jews, nor those who follow a corrupt Christianity, are ashamed of their religion. Alas! we find many thus ashamed among those who confess the truth, and Christ according to the truth; a remarkable fact, and one that shews where poor human nature is!

And again, the preachers of the law sought to shut the Gentiles out, hindering them from hearing the truth, for fear they should receive it, and become too clear in spiritual intelligence to listen to error, too enlightened not to perceive that the system of the law and of Judaism, denied Christianity. This is always the way. The leaders of a false system seek to prevent souls from hearing the truth; they desire to attach them to themselves alone. If the doctrine of the apostle had been good, they ought to continue to hold it primarily as he had taught it, and be zealous at all times, not only when he was present with them.

87 But this made the apostle long to be with them. He was perplexed as to them, for the gospel had in reality been abandoned by them; yet when looking to the Lord, he always hoped that Christ was truly in their hearts, and that only in their heads they had accepted a doctrine, which totally perverted the gospel of Christ. He needed, so to speak, to travail in birth afresh with them till Christ should be formed in them. Nevertheless, he calls them his children: his love inspired him with confidence, and yet filled his heart with uneasiness. He would have desired to be with them that he might change his voice, suiting it to their state; not only teaching them the truth, but doing whatever their need required. Mark here, the deep love of the apostle. Moses, faithful as he was, grew weary of the burden of the people and said: "Have I conceived all this people? have I begotten them, that thou shouldest say unto me, Carry them in thy bosom, as a nursing father beareth the sucking child, unto the land which thou swarest unto their fathers?" (Num. 11, 12) but the apostle is willing to travail in birth with them as his children a second time, in order that their souls might be saved.

Verse 21. He already changes his voice. "Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?" He desires that the law should speak, since they were abandoning the grace of the gospel. In the law it was written that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a free woman; the one born after the flesh, the other of the free woman born according to the promise of God. But these things were an allegory, shewing forth the two covenants: the one from Mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Hagar, the bondwoman. Now this Hagar is Mount Sinai, which answers to Jerusalem (that is, the system of the law of which Jerusalem was the centre), with her children, as also to those who are under the law. But Jerusalem which is above, the true church of God viewed in her heavenly state, is free; and she is our mother.

88 Such was the application of the history of Abraham and Sarah, and her servant Hagar. But the apostle also quotes from the prophet Isaiah another passage, to shew that it is when Jerusalem is forsaken of God, that she brings forth more children than when she had a husband. These children are ourselves, Christians, during the time of the church (Isaiah 54: 1). The passage is addressed to Jerusalem, restored in the kingdom to come, but it owns that the forsaken one has more children than she which had a husband. The children born according to promise, are more numerous in the present time, than those born when Jerusalem was owned.

Then he turns to Sarah. "Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise. But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so it is now." The cases were too much alike, for the principle not to be evident: and in fact it was always the Jews who raised up persecution against Paul. There is but one case when it was not so. The word of God plainly declared His judgment: "Cast out the bondwoman and her son; for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the free woman." The two things cannot be united: if man is heir through the law, he is not heir through promise and grace. Obtaining righteousness and blessing by our own works, and receiving it by grace through the free gift of God cannot go together, the one is opposed to the other.

Thus we are not the children of the bondwoman, but of the free woman. We cannot possibly be the children of both, otherwise, as says the apostle, grace is no more grace. We are freed from the law, from its ceremonies, from its service, from the elements of the world, to belong to a risen Christ, who has cancelled our sins, and also all the ordinances of the law; who has borne its curse for us, and who has communicated to us a life which is in liberty and holiness before God. Christ Himself is this life in us: in it we rejoice in holiness, as well as in forgiveness, and in God Himself instead of living in fear. We are children of the free woman and of her only. The apostle now begins to exhort them to be faithful to this principle.

89

Galatians 5

"Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage." Paul even avails himself of his personal apostolic authority, and that towards the nations, which was strengthened by the work he had wrought among the Galatians. They had, in fact, received the gospel from his mouth, and had received it with joy. "I, Paul," he says, "I say unto you, that if ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing." They would have put themselves upon another ground, that of human righteousness by works, not of divine righteousness through faith in Christ. They could not be justified in two ways at once. If they were circumcised, they were bound to keep the law. The thing is very simple: if a man puts himself under the law, he is bound to keep it. If righteousness and acceptance with God are through the law, it must be kept in every point. They were fallen from grace.

The Christian state is this. We do not hope for righteousness, but, through the Spirit, we hope for that which belongs to righteousness, on the principle of faith. They possessed righteousness, divine righteousness in Christ, and that on the principle of faith. But glory belonged to this righteousness, and that they did not possess: they hoped for it. Thus, by the faith through which they possessed righteousness, they by the Holy Spirit hoped for that, which belongs to the righteousness possessed by those who are in Christ. Blessed state! Righteousness is our possession, and the glory which belongs to it is our hope; the Holy Spirit the source and strength of this hope. Faith, the spring and realisation of our relationship with God, is that which discerns the glory which as yet we possess not, and rests upon the righteousness which makes us know that we have a right to it. How blessed not to be seeking righteousness! it is ours; we are it in Christ; our hope is to be with Him in glory, according to this righteousness. It is by faith, since everything in Christ is by faith.

In Him, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avail anything, but faith which works by love: that is the reality of divine life, which enjoys peace with God, which rises by faith to divine glory and to heavenly things, where it finds its portion. While waiting for it, it works by love, which flows in the heart from its source, even God Himself, who gave everything, even His own Son.

90 We see how disturbed and troubled was the spirit of the apostle. He felt that the truth was lost, and that his beloved children had left the right path. "Ye did run well; who did hinder you that ye should not obey the truth? This persuasion cometh not of him that calleth you." The Galatians might know that what they were now receiving, was not that which they had received from the beginning. They well knew that when God, by the mouth of Paul, had called them to enjoy the only true salvation of God (which had been a source of happiness to their hearts), it had not been by the law nor by circumcision, human righteousness or human works, nor by the forms through which man seeks to repair the defects of those works, so as to obtain righteousness by them.

This was not the gospel Paul had preached, when they had been brought to the knowledge of God; it was grace and a perfect salvation in Christ. The new teaching did not spring from the same source; it was not therefore of God. But a little leaven leavens the whole lump. Through the gospel souls are converted: it is the power of God which works individually in the soul: it gives life: it is contrary to the natural heart. False doctrine, human righteousness, works, forms, are not contrary to the heart of man: they are a leaven which spreads and penetrates the mass of the people and their ways.

Verse 10. Yet it is beautiful to see how the apostle, amid the grief of his heart, finds peace and confidence as to the Galatians in looking to the Lord. He had said that he stood in doubt of them, not knowing what to think. Now he says: "I have confidence in you through the Lord." How sweet is the introduction of this name, in the consciousness that He loves His own, that He thinks of them, and that we can cast all our cares upon Him, in the certainty that His heart is occupied with them. "Be careful for nothing," says Paul to the Philippians (chap. 4: 6). We see how earnestly the heart of the apostle longed for the blessing of his children, and for the maintenance of the truth: but he knew how to carry his anxiety to the Lord. He then had confidence where before he had been perplexed - confidence that the Galatians would be none otherwise minded; but he that troubled them should bear his judgment, whoever he might be.

91 We find here other characters and effects of faith, besides restoration of confidence with regard to God's children. Though Christ might be hidden, yet He ruled in the church of God, and all power in heaven and earth was His. He who troubled them would not escape the judgment of God, whoever he was. Paul was convinced of the faithfulness of God, he knew that Christ loved the church, and would do what was needful to protect it from the malice of the enemy. Faith rendered him confident and happy in the conflicts of his service by it, he could rest in the faithfulness of the Lord. This faith inspired confidence as to the state of the Galatians, and convinced Paul that he who deceived them should be taken away by the hand of God.

Paul then returns (v. 11) to speak of himself. If I yet preach circumcision, why do I yet suffer persecution? For it was the Jew who everywhere raised up persecution against him. If he preached circumcision, the offence of the cross would have ceased. We see, moreover, the trouble of his spirit; this characterises the epistle: "I would that they were even cut off that trouble you. For, brethren, ye have been called to liberty"; a principle, which in connection with what follows, is of the utmost importance. The Christian was called to liberty, the holy liberty of the new nature, but yet liberty. It is no longer a law which constrains, or rather vainly seeks to constrain a nature whose will is contrary to it, to satisfy the obligations which accompany the relationships, in which by the will of God we find ourselves - a law imposed, forbidding evil to a nature that loves evil, and commanding the love of God and of one's neighbour, to a nature whose spring is selfishness.

Had it been possible to take away Christ's moral liberty - which was not possible - it would have been by preventing Him from obeying the will of the Father. This was the food He ate (John 4). As a perfect Man, He lived by every word which came forth out of the mouth of God. He chose to die, to drink the bitter cup which the Father had given Him, rather than not obey Him, and glorify Him in drinking it. Christianity is the liberty of a new nature that loves to obey, and to do the will of God. It is true that the flesh, if not kept in subjection, can use this liberty to satisfy its own desires, just as it used the law, which had been given to convict of sin, to work out righteousness. But the true liberty of the new man - Christ our life - is the liberty of a holy will, acquired through the deliverance of the heart from the power of sin, liberty to serve others in love. All the law is fulfilled in one word - "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." The Christian can do still more, he can give himself for others; or, at the least, following the direction of the Spirit, he fulfils the law in love. But if they devoured one another in selfishness, contending about circumcision and the law, "take heed," says the apostle, "that ye be not consumed one of another."

92 The apostle here establishes the principles of holiness, of the Christian walk, and brings in the Holy Ghost in place of the law. In the preceding part of the Epistle he had set forth Christian justification by faith, in contrast with works of law. He here shews that God produces holiness. Instead of exacting it, as did the law with regard to human righteousness, from the nature which loves sin, He produces it in the human heart, as wrought by the Spirit. When Christ had ascended up on high, and was set down on the right hand of God, having accomplished a perfect redemption for those who should believe on Him, He sent down the Holy Spirit to dwell in all such. They were already children of God by faith in Christ Jesus, and, because they were such, God gave them the Spirit of His Son. Born of God, cleansed by the blood of Christ, accepted in the Beloved, God seals them as His own, by the gift of the Spirit, until the day of redemption, that is, of glory. Having the new life, Christ as their life, they are bound to walk as Christ walked, and to manifest the life of Christ down here in their mortal flesh.

This life, produced in us by the operation of the Holy Ghost through the word, is led by the Spirit which is given to believers; its rule is also in the word. Its fruits are the fruits of the Spirit. The Christian walk is the manifestation of this new life, of Christ our life, in the midst of the world. If we follow this path - Christ Himself - if we walk in His steps, we shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh. It is thus sin is avoided, not by taking the law to compel man to do what he does not like; the law has no power to compel the flesh to obey, for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. The new life loves to obey, loves holiness, and Christ is its strength and wisdom by the Holy Ghost. The flesh is indeed there; it lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit lusts against the flesh, to prevent man from walking as he would. But if we walk in the Spirit, we are not under the law; we are not as the man in Romans 7, where, impelled by the new nature, the will desires to do good, but, a captive to sin, he finds no way of doing what he desires; for the law gives neither strength nor life. Under law, even if life is there, there is no strength: man is the captive of sin.

93 But sealed by the Holy Spirit, the believer is free, he can perform the good he loves. If Christ is thus in him, the body is dead, the old man is crucified with Christ. The Spirit is life, and that Spirit, as a divine and mighty Person, works in him to bring forth good fruits. The flesh and the Spirit are in their nature opposed the one to the other; but if we are faithful in seeking grace, the power of the Spirit - Christ, by His Spirit in us - enables us to hold the flesh for dead, and to walk in the footsteps of Christ, bringing forth the fruits that suit Him.

There is not really any difficulty in distinguishing the fruits of the Spirit and the fruits of the flesh: the apostle names them, those, at least, which are characteristic of their respective actions. Of the sad fruits of the flesh, he positively declares that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God: but the fruits of the Spirit are love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, etc.; against such there is no law; God cannot condemn the fruit of His own Spirit. Remark, that the first of these fruits are love, joy, peace. The Spirit will surely produce those practical fruits which manifest the life of Christ in the sight of men, but the inward fruits, the fruits Godward, come first, the condition of soul needful for producing the others. Many converted persons seek for the practical fruits in order to assure themselves that they are born of the Spirit and accepted of God. But peace, love, joy are the firstfruits of the presence of the Spirit; the others follow. In order to know what is in the heart of God, we need to see the fruit of His heart, the gift of Jesus.

If I believe in Him, and through Him in the love of God, sealed of God by the Spirit, I have the sense of His love: love shewn in the death of Jesus is shed abroad in my heart by the Holy Spirit, which is given to those who are washed from their sins through faith in His blood. By that Spirit we have the consciousness of our position before God, and love, joy, peace are in the soul. The fruits which follow are, moreover, the proof to others that my certainty and assurance are not false, that I am not deceived. But for myself, it is what God has done which is the proof of what is in the heart of God, and through faith I set to my seal that God is true. Then, sealed by the gift of the Spirit, I rejoice in His goodness, and the fruits of the new life manifest to others that this life is there.

94 Moreover, "they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with its affections and lusts." They have not got to die: Christ died for us, and He who died being our life, we hold ourselves for dead, crucified with Him, as though we ourselves had died upon the cross, since it was for us He suffered. Possessing another life, I do not own the flesh as "I," but as sin which dwelleth in me, which I hold to be crucified. The faithful Christian realises this continually. God. declares us to be dead with Christ: He looks upon us thus (Col 3 . 3). Faith, accepting God's declaration with thankfulness; holds the flesh, the old man, to be dead (Rom. 6), and through the Spirit, if he is faithful, he applies the cross in a practical way to the flesh, so that it may not act (2 Cor. 4); besides this, God in His government sends that which is needful to test the Christian, and to effect this.

The apostle adds the exhortation, "If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another." The law nourishes rather than destroys vain glory, for the law makes us think of self. When rightly employed, it is most useful for convincing of sin, not for producing righteousness.

Thus the operation of the law with regard to justification and holiness has been fully examined, and set in a clear light. It does not produce righteousness, it exacts it. It cannot be linked with Christ as a means of justification: "if righteousness is by the law, Christ is dead in vain." Man ought surely to have kept the commandments of God, but that is not the real question. He has not kept them, therefore, upon that ground he is lost. Christ, on the other hand, brings salvation because we are guilty.

Then, as to holiness: it is not God's way to seek to produce holiness in the flesh through the law, for the flesh is not subject to the law, neither indeed can be. God gives a new life in Christ, and the Holy Spirit, to produce fruits which are acceptable to Him, and against these fruits there is certainly no divine law. God cannot condemn the fruits of His own Spirit. It is the new creature, the new life, with its fruits by the Spirit, which are acceptable to God; it is this new creature which seeks to please Him.

95 Strengthened by the Spirit, and instructed by Him, according to the wisdom of God set forth in the word, let us seek to walk in the footsteps of Christ, that perfect example of the life of God in a Man, which has been given to us.

Galatians 6

The apostle now adds some special exhortations. First, as to the grace which we ought to shew one towards another, coupled with the sense of responsibility in oneself. The spirit of the law naturally leads to righteousness, and then to hardness towards another, if he is overtaken in a fault: it makes us forget our own weakness. This was seen plainly in the Pharisees, and is found among Christians also; therefore the apostle exhorts them, saying, "Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted." The sense of one's own weakness makes us meek towards others.

Then (v. 2) we get a law; he calls it this because they wanted a law: the true law, if they must have one, is to act as Christ did - that is, to bear the burdens of others, and thus fulfil the most excellent law, the law of love. He would not have them to be indifferent to sin, or to fail in needful discipline when sin had been manifested. But when a brother had been overtaken in a fault, he would have them seek his restoration with love, with the faithfulness of holy love. The danger, and even the effect, of a legal spirit is to make us think ourselves something when we are nothing; we deceive ourselves. Simple words, but full of power! We need to prove ourselves and our work, that we may have to boast as to ourselves alone, and not as to others; a principle which is always true, and such was then the case with the Galatians. Whose had the work among them been? Paul's. Others desired to appropriate that work; but when they had been heathen Paul had worked among them, and had been the means of their conversion. Through his instrumentality they had received Christ into their hearts. But each should bear his own burden. Grace may bear the burdens of others, but, as to responsibility, when the Lord shall judge, each shall bear his own burden.

96 Here ends the exhortation which treats of the relations of brethren in their responsibility one towards another, as also of that which regards each one. He adds the desire, that those who learn through the labours of others should think in love of the needs of those who teach.

The apostle then returns to the fundamental principle of the Christian walk. It is not a law given to a nature which always, by its very nature, resists the law: it is a power which works in a new life, the Spirit given to those who believe on the Lord Jesus. The government of God ensures the consequences which flow from the walk. God does not allow Himself to be mocked; "whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap." "He that soweth to his flesh, shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit, shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting." The path of sin and the path of the Spirit, in which the true Christian walks, both infallibly lead to the ends which suit each - the path of the flesh to corruption, even in this life; the way of the Spirit to life eternal.

Verse 9. But we must not weary in the right path, for God is faithful, and if we persevere, we shall reap in His own time. We often want to see the fruit of our labours at once, like one who turns up the earth to see if the seed is springing. But the work, if real, is the work of God, and we must wait till His work is accomplished; then we shall see the fruit matured according to the perfection of His workmanship. Let us, then, not weary in well doing, but whilst we have opportunity let us do good unto all men, especially to those who are of the household of faith.

Verse 11. The apostle returns to his chief subject, shewing the preoccupation of his spirit, which is also expressed in the fact he mentions. He was greatly troubled because the Galatians were abandoning the principles of grace in which they had been instructed, and through which they had been converted. He had written this letter with his own hand, though habitually he employed another to write (Rom. 16: 22; 2 Thess. 3: 17). Those who constrain you to be circumcised, says the apostle, desire to make a fair show in the flesh. They themselves did not keep the law, but in order to bring honour to themselves, they sought to put others under the law - the religion in which they had boasted in the days of their ancestors, and thus to glory in the flesh, in the proselytes from among the nations. The apostle desired to glory only in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world was crucified to him and he to the world. To seek a good or even a religious appearance before the world, is to seek the honour of a world which has dishonoured, rejected, and crucified Him who has loved us and given Himself for us.

97 The cross, for us, is salvation, the proof of the infinite love of God; but it was the shame of the Lord of glory to which He submitted for us. There, the world finally condemned itself, and God was glorified in love. Paul did not want the honour of a world, which at the cross dishonoured Him who had so loved him; he would glory only in the cross - the proof of the Lord's love and of his own salvation. He identified himself with Christ, he was crucified to the world which had crucified Him, and the world was likewise crucified to him. A world that has crucified the Lord is not the place where a Christian can seek honour; it has, by the cross, manifested what it is. Shall we go with the world to crucify Christ, or shall we own Him who gave Himself for us upon that cross, and love Him there, where He shewed His love to us? In Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision - that is all past with the cross, with death to the world and its elements - but a new creation. This is the Christian's rule, not the law which is adapted to man born of Adam, after the flesh and living in the world, though the flesh is not and cannot be subject to it. As many, says the apostle, as walk according to this rule, peace be on them and mercy, and upon the Israel of God - not upon man according to the flesh.

Paul, conscious of what he had been in his service, with a patient heart and elevated spirit exclaims, "Henceforth let no man trouble me, for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus." It is sad to see that the apostle, himself in affliction, was obliged to appeal to such a proof of his divine calling. There is no salutation, no word of love or confidence. "Let no man trouble me" is all he can say to those who formerly would have plucked out their own eyes in love to him.

All this shews plainly to what an extent the error of the Galatians weighed upon the apostle's spirit. How serious is this perversity of the human heart, which really unconscious of its state of sin and weakness, instead of finding in the law the proof of that state, uses it to produce its own righteousness, human righteousness, after the gospel has revealed the righteousness of God for us in Christ, just because we had none for God. But from that day, this error everywhere abounds, and it even characterises actual Christianity. It is the doctrine of all the branches of Christianity.

98 This is a most interesting epistle, but a sad one; it brings us back to the basis of Christianity, the foundations of our relationships, rather than to the development of the privileges which belong to the Christian and to his standing in Christ. But it is all the more needful for the soul that desires to grow in grace. For if we are not well grounded in grace, and in the efficacy of the work of Christ, it is impossible really to grow in the development of life, and in fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. It is ever needful to lay afresh the basis of our relations with God.

The True Path of a Christian

J. N. Darby.

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Allow me to present to you a brief outline of what has struck me as to the true path of a Christian, or rather the principle and measure of his walk, as taught in Ephesians 4 and 5. I purpose merely to draw attention to the great principles.

I should gladly see some application or exhortation added by yourself.

We get the principle and the measure of this walk; its double principle in chapter 4. If we have learned the truth as it is in Jesus, it is that we "have put off" (not to "put off") "as concerning the former conversation the old man which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and that we have put on the new man." And here we at once get the true character of this new man. It is "created after God in righteousness and true holiness" - not yet love, though this will never be separated, but its intrinsic moral nature in respect of good and evil.

God has been perfectly revealed through the work of Christ, and revealed in respect of evil and sin. He has been revealed in His dealing with others, with evil and with good where it is, with what glorifies Him, that is Christ. He is righteous. He has been revealed in His own nature too, as regards good and evil: abhorrent of evil and having His delight in what is pure and good, He is holy. Adam was innocent; he did not know good and evil till after he had eaten the forbidden fruit. Now we know good and evil, and if we are to be "after God" it must be more, far more, in nature than Adam's estate. It must be in righteousness and holiness of truth. The power of the divine word revealing God, as Christ as now sitting at the right hand of the majesty in the heavens has brought Him to light, and quickening us, gives the true character of holiness in which we are created after God. (Compare John 17: 17, 19.) God is known now not merely as a Creator who saw all as very good which had come out of His hands, but as one whose whole nature is revealed in the dealings and work of redemption, when evil and good are fully manifested, when evil is there and rife. But redemption, the new creation in which we are quickened out of our state of death in sin and raised as Christ out of His grave, has taken us completely out of that condition, and has made us, as so quickened, the living expression of the divine nature thus fully revealed. We are created again after God, in righteousness and true holiness. (Compare Col. 3: 9-11.) What God is, in respect of good and evil, we are in nature as having put on the new man created again in Christ Jesus; and this, as we see in Colossians, connected with a true full knowledge of God as so revealed. We are partakers by a new creation of the divine nature as fully revealed in Christ.

100 This is the first great principle of our walk as Christians. It is our life, what we are.

The second is the presence of the Holy Ghost as dwelling in us.

God Himself dwells in us by His Spirit, and sheds His love abroad in our hearts. We have been thus sealed for the day of final, full redemption. We are not to grieve so holy and blessed a guest. Nothing inconsistent with His presence, where all is peaceful and holy love, is to be allowed in our hearts. It is not now merely a new nature, holy and righteous in itself, and capable of enjoying God blessedly revealed in Christ, but God dwells in us, shedding His love abroad in our hearts, sealing us for the time when we shall fully enjoy Him. He guides, orders, reveals the things of Christ to our minds, communicates what is blessed to us, filling us with what is divine; but especially, here, is present in us, so that nothing inconsistent with God's own presence in love is to be allowed in us. Nay more, we are to walk according to the love of the divine nature.

Such are the two great principles of the Christian's walk. He has put off the old man, the first Adam, with all its lusts and will, and put on the new man which, with the knowledge of God's estimate of righteousness and holiness, is created after God according to this righteousness and holiness; and the Holy Ghost is present with him and in him, and he is not to grieve Him. No word or temper unsuited to that holy guest who sheds abroad God's love in our hearts, and seals us for the day when all will be holy and blessed, is to find a place in our mouth or in our heart. In a word, the divine nature with its moral effect, and the presence of God in love, and the power of holy hope, form the Christian. We now get the measure of this. In the latter we already get the walking of love. Chapter 5 gives us the measure, if measure indeed we can call it.

God takes two essential names: Love and Light - none else. These are taken as characterising the walk of the Christian. The measure of it Christ Himself, being the practical model, Christ in whom we see the life of God, God Himself, in a man. And this it is leads us to the full extent and character of what is looked for from the Christian. We have seen that we have been made partakers of the divine nature, created after God, and that the Holy Ghost is given to us - we are sealed by it. The measure of the Christian is not what man ought to be, but what God is, and has been to him; of course this does not refer to His Omniscience and Omnipotence and the like, but morally, in holiness and love. The latter we are never said to be. It is the prerogative of God to be it, and love without a motive. We, that it may be also holiness, and withal as creatures, must have an object, and a motive. We cannot be it and love sovereignly; for we are not sovereign but subject. Yet we shall see how blessedly the divine character of this love in us is maintained, though God Himself becomes its full and final object. Light we are said to be, for purity of nature we can have, and have, as regards the new man.

101 We are called then to be imitators of God as dear children. Being born of Him we are to imitate and follow Him in our actions and spirit, as partaking of the divine nature, and in relationship with Him as children. We are to be followers of God and walk in love. We find a double character of this, by which, as I just now intimated, its divine perfectness is maintained. We are to be tender-hearted and forgive, shew grace to one another as God has forgiven and shewn grace to us. Compare Matthew 5: 48, and the preceding verses; see also Colossians 3: 13.

But there is another element in divine love in man, which has a very deep stamp of perfectness on it. I have said Christ is given as the model of the display of God's character in man, as naturally it must have been. It is said here, "And walk in love as Christ has loved us and given himself for us, a sacrifice and an offering to God for a sweet-smelling savour." Perfect love was here shewn in giving up Himself. So we are called to present our bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, our intelligent service. Two principles characterise this perfectness. First, offering up himself. It is not loving my neighbour as myself - a true and perfect principle where evil is not, a state which the law as such would produce if efficacious to do so - but where evil, moral or external, or sorrow requires it, wholly giving up offering up oneself. This Christ did. He offered up Himself, perfect in love. Our path is to follow Him in this. As in 1 John 3, "Hereby know we love, because he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren." The second seal of perfectness is that it was an offering to God. The object and motive were perfect. If He had only given Himself for us, there might have been touching generosity, nobleness of character; but the object which formed the motive was inadequate to give perfection to the act, take men as good, or simply evil; for it was love in a man and had a motive, though divine love; and it is in that He is a model to us. But He offers Himself to God, though for us. Here our worthlessness only adds to the proof of the perfectness. But the offering being to God the motive was adequate - the act of love perfect. Hence, too, we are called to add to brotherly kindness charity or love, which, we are told, is the bond of perfectness. Absolute, sovereign love is where there is no motive in the object. This we have seen in the last verse of chapter 4 and in Colossians. And this we are called to imitate as concerns our matters, that is, when any wrong is done to us. But when it is love with an object or motive in a man, when the motive gives its true character, then to be morally perfect, self must be given up to God. In us it may have been an evil self. But whatever it may be, it is given up, and, in our own case, the body presented a living sacrifice.

102 We are not, then, said to be love, for sovereign love we cannot be; but we are called to be followers of God in it, as forgiving in grace, which rises above all injury, and to walk in a love which gives self wholly up to God, as Christ did. Blessed privilege!

The other essential name of God is Light - essential purity of nature. And this in the Lord we are said to be. For in as far as Christ is our life, as having put on the new and put off the old man, we are so. Christ is our life. This is not prerogative with an object in grace, it is a nature which we have. We were darkness, but now are we light in the Lord. It cannot be separated from the love, because that gives us purity of motive, setting aside self. (Compare 1 Thess. 3: 12, 13.) Yet it is a different thing. It is the purity of nature, thought, and object which were manifested in Christ. I do not add conduct, because that is a matter of exhortation. "Walk as children of light." God is light, purity itself, and making all things manifest. Whilst Christ was in the world, He was the light of the world. "In him was life, and the life was the light of men." And in Him we have life, and thus become light in the Lord, in a crooked and perverse generation, among whom we shine as lights in the world, holding forth the word of life, as Christ (1 John 1) was the manifestation of the word of life. God has shined in our hearts to give out the light of the knowledge of the glory of the Lord in the face of Jesus Christ. Then indeed it was for the full purpose of apostolic testimony. Still as having Christ as our life, the fruits of light are manifested, divine intelligence of good as in Christ Himself contrasted with the darkness of the world (a darkness which belonged to our nature) and the separation of good from the evil by the word, but by the living knowledge of Christ as He is, which was practically expressed in all His life. As it is written, "Sanctify them through the truth; thy word is truth. For their sakes I sanctify myself that they may be sanctified through the truth." So even in our intercourse with God, "Such a high priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners and made higher than the heavens." It is the revelation of Christ as He is now that acts by the Holy Ghost on our souls, "We beholding with unveiled face the glory of the Lord are changed into the same image from glory to glory." The effect produced, in walk, is what His walk was on earth; and for the same reason He could then say the Son of man who is in heaven. That, no doubt, was the glory of His Person, but so far as we are introduced by faith, livingly, through the power of the Holy Ghost into what is heavenly, we, as to object and motive are purified according to that in our walk here, while His lowly path here engages our affections in imitating and following Him. That of which the power is seen in what He is was manifested to the understanding heart in His life down here. He was declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness by resurrection from among the dead. In us it is a nature, a new man, but, as the creature must, having an object, Christ. "I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God." So in Ephesians 5, "Ye are light in the Lord." Then not only are reproveable things manifested by the light, but Christ is Himself the perfect standard and light of the soul. "Awake, thou that sleepest," sunk into ease and apathy as a Christian, like the dead, though not dead, "and Christ shall give thee light." God is light, we are light in the Lord, and the perfect divine expression of this light in man, in which we are to walk, is Christ; The eye is upon Christ "Christ shall give thee light."

104 Such, then, is the true measure of Christian walk - what God is in His nature as love and light, brought down to its true, perfect, and blessed expression on the earth, in man, in Christ. Thus we are to be followers of God as dear children, the fruit of the light, the purity of the divine nature to be seen in us.

Acts 20: 28

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As regards the translation of the Greek in Acts 20: 28 ("with his own blood," A.V.), I have not much to say. As to the fear of its touching the divinity of Christ, a person must be very ill-grounded in that fundamental truth to have any such feeling; the fulness of the Godhead dwelling in Christ, His being truly God, Jehovah, I AM, is too inseparably a part of the whole texture of Scripture, too plainly stated in Scripture, and still more strongly proved, if possible, by the way it is supposed or assumed and implied in passages where it is no direct subject of revelation. Nothing could be more mischievous than the resting the divinity of the Lord Christ on this passage - a passage tortured by critics, no two of whom hardly can agree upon it. With the exception of Scholz, hardly any noted critic has simply 'God' in the passage at all. Indeed, as far as I know Mill is the only one; the principal ones have not 'God' at all, reading 'Lord' instead. Griesbach, Lachmann, Tischendorf, all read 'the Church of the Lord' - Matthaei, 'Lord and God,' which Middleton approves, and Alford and others of more weight than he reject as perfectly untenable. Alford read 'Lord' in his first edition; and saying? that as B in the Vatican has it by the first hand, the evidence of manuscripts is balanced; but on internal evidence he reads 'God' in the second. To me it remains uncertain if it be by the first hand, for the transcript of the MS is not to be trusted. Wetstein prefers 'Lord.' The new Codex Sinaiticus reads 'God' But A C D E and many others read 'Lord.' Many more, but modern read 'Lord and God.' It would be monstrous to rest a vital doctrine on a text evidently tampered with. Even in Athanasius to Seraphion (1: 522), the printed text has 'God,' but other MSS 'Lord' or 'Christ.' I suppose we may account Athanasius as a sufficient champion of the true divinity of the blessed Lord. Of all ancient writers he is known to be the undaunted and suffering defender of this truth against the whole body of Arians, the Emperor and all, and died an exile for this truth. Now, not only in the passage quoted by critics he declares that the blood of God is never used by itself, and that it is Arianism; but the argument of his two books against the Apollinarians, particularly the second book, is based on this. It forms, I may say, the whole point and subject of the second. He denounces as Arian such language as saying, 'God suffered,' or speaking of His blood flowing. He treats it as the madness of the Arians. He says that 'if it be said that God suffered, "in flesh" even, then the Father and the Comforter have suffered, for they are all one'; and concludes, 'The Word is God, if you look at His immortality (athanasia) and incorruptibility and immutability; but man, in His nailing to the cross, and the flowing of His blood, and the burial of His body, and descent into Hades and resurrection from the dead. Thus the Christ is raised from the dead, and being God raises the dead.' He says we are to be content to say, 'Christ has suffered for us in the flesh.' I cannot quote more here: it is, as I have said, the argument of the whole second book. The reader may find a multitude of the Fathers also object to the expression too. They may be found in notes to critical editions. Wetstein gives many of them. At any rate, speaking of the sufferings of God or His blood-shedding is denounced as being Arianism by him, who best knew what Arianism was, and the greatest champion for the blessed truth of Christ's divinity who ever lived. The Arians and Apollinarians did so speak; because the Arians did not hold that Christ was of one nature with the Father, and the Apollinarians held that Christ had no human, intellectual soul, but that the divinity took its place in the Christ. Hence, the former had no difficulty that what was a creature, however elevated, suffered; and the latter must have made God suffer as the mind in Christ, or else He must have ceased to be. Hence, Athanasius opposed them so energetically, and said it was running into Arianism; and hence we can easily see how he rejected an expression such as the one we are considering. Now I admit it was reasoning, not criticism. If I found it in Scripture, I should certainly not mind Athanasius, but take it as what is called koinonia idiomaton, dangerous and slippery as that ground is, if it ever be justified as to the natures of the Lord. I read, "the Son of man who is in heaven"; but that by His Person passes into His divine nature. But I do not believe the natures are so spoken of. They are not to be confounded any more than the Person divided. I do not want to speculate on such subjects. I only say this to express my subjection to scripture language, if such there be. But it is ridiculous to make a matter of orthodoxy, as a fundamental proof of Christ's divinity, what Athanasius denounces as denying that divinity, and being Arianism.

107 Now for my own part I believe - have always thought - the reading 'the church of God' to be right. If dia tou idiou haimatos was the reading in this place, then "the church of God which He hath purchased with His own blood" would be the only right translation; and so the English translators read it. But I confess I agree with Athanasius that such language is not according to Scripture analogy and its expression of the truth. It is not a question of the divinity of the Lord, one way or the other, but of the fitness of speaking of the blood of God. I do not think such an expression scriptural. I do not accept the title even of the Mother of God. I believe it revolts just and divinely-given thoughts in the mind, and turns away from the true, eternal divinity of the blessed Lord. He who was God had a mother, and He who was God shed His blood; but I do not think Scripture speaks of God's shedding His blood. I think it revolts the mind as wrong, unseemly - I will say, profane. I know what a person means and I bear with it, because I delight in his holding the true, essential deity of the Lord. But I agreed with Athanasius, when I had never read him, when I examined the passage in this view, in thinking such expressions contrary to the analogy of the faith. As regards the translation of 'dia tou haimatos tou idiou' "by the blood of His own," that it is Greek is I judge beyond controversy, in spite of the confident pretensions of some, and the slighting remarks of others. In John 15: 19, we have this usage, which anyone may find in a dictionary. "If ye were of the world, the world would love its own" - 'to idion ephilei.' It is an unquestionable Greek usage. Of course, it can be translated, "by His own blood." The question is, which is right. 'To idion' is that which is specially near and identified with any one, as our word, "own." Hence it is said, "He spared not his own Son." God has purchased the church with that which was His own, nearest and dearest to Himself: a thought as apt and beautiful as possible here. Of that there can be no question. The singular seems to me more intimate than the plural, but I could not here give any proof that I am right. At all events, no expression would be more appropriate, hardly any, it seems to me, so strong. God purchased the Church with that which was most near to Himself and most dear to Himself. This seems to me a most forcible expression, peculiarly expressive in the circumstances - more so, it seems to me, than that which would have expressed the relationship of the blessed Lord to His Father, whatever the essential importance of that may be in its place. The force of the sentence is in the word 'idion' (English own), which is to me a deeply touching expression.

108 Since I translated the passage, I have found the first biblical scholars, dead and living, discussing this translation without the smallest idea of its not being sound Greek. Doederlein proposed it. Michaelis suggests this rendering. Meyer says the text was changed from 'tou haimatos tou idiou' to 'tou idiou haimatos' because the latter, which is admitted not to be the true reading, obliged men to translate it, 'the blood of God': allowing this, that with the true reading it is not necessary to do so. The only other translation is the one I have given. I am thoroughly satisfied that all the tampering with the text, which for so short a passage is almost unexampled, arose from not simply taking it as I have done. For my own part I think that 'tou haimatos tou idiou' applied to God, is unnatural and objectionable. This use of 'idios' after a substantive is rare in the New Testament, just because it has a contrasting and emphatic force. When it is used with 'haima' elsewhere, it is put before. Hebrews 9: 12; ch. 13: 12. When 'idios' is put after, it is contrast or special emphasis. Of Christ it is said (Mark 15: 20), they took the purple off Him, and put on Him His own clothes ('ta himatia ta idia'). Judas went 'eis ton topon ton idion' - "to his own place," not meaning that which was naturally his, but as could be said really of no other man, one appropriate to himself. Any man may go to his place (eis ton idion topon) but 'eis ton topon ton idion' raises the question, why is it so peculiarly his own? It is to that place which was peculiarly his own. So He spared not His own Son 'tou idiou huiou,' not 'tou huiou tou idiou,' 2 Timothy 4: 3: their own lusts 'tas epithumias tas idias,' their own proper lusts in contrast with God's will, which they ought to have done. When it is simply the fact, it is (James 1: 14) "his own lust" (tes idias epithumias). I have given all the cases, I believe, in the New Testament of this emphatic use. It is the general force of an adjective so placed after with an article. Now I confess this seems to me to make it singularly inapposite to be applied to the blood of God, that blood which was peculiarly God's own in contrast with all other. I would not fail in reverence in speaking on such things, but it does seem to me that such a contrasted use of God's blood as distinguished from all other is irreverent and somewhat shocking. The question is not on the divinity of the Lord, I repeat. Athanasius even charges such kind of language with being Arian. It is whether we are authorised (again I dread irreverence, but it is not mine but theirs who would insist on it) to speak of God's own blood as God, for that would be the proper force of it.

109 Of the genitive 'idiou' after a noun, there is no example in Scripture. For my own part I am perfectly satisfied that "by the blood of His own" - that is, what was more than our words of 'near' and 'dear' can possibly convey, it was God's own dear and beloved Son - is the true translation.

What is the World, and What is its End?

A serious question for those who are of it.

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This is the question I would now discuss, according to the light Scripture affords us. Nor am I going to forget that the world we live in has taken a Christian form.

And first, What is the world? Men are apt to think that this world is as God made it, and that all things continue as they were at the creation, only that man has made great progress in prosperity and civilisation. Now, in material comforts, none will deny it, though the men of a past age would hardly think our refinements comforts; and, while passions subsist, the difference is not so great as is supposed. Men have telegraphs, railroads, Armstrong guns, and iron-clads; but I hardly know in what respect they are the happier for it. It is a question if they have not excited the passions more than they have satisfied them. Children are not more obedient, families not more united, servants not more honest and respectful, masters not kinder, wives not more faithful. Morally speaking, I do not see what the world has gained. It thinks better of itself, and vaunts its powers: I do not know that this is any advance. Christianity, as light come into the world, has made a difference. Men do not do in the light what they do in the dark. But if we look beneath the surface, even that is not much. But the world is in no sense as God made it. He overrules all, has patience with it; but He never made it as it is. He made Paradise, and the world has grown up as it is through man's departure from God. It has been destroyed once since, because of its wickedness. It is conscious at this moment that things cannot go on long as they are; that we are in a crisis of the world's history which must result in some great disruption. Some will tell us that democracy is the evil, and it must be put down; others, that it alone can save the world. But all feel things cannot go on as they are.

I do not participate in men's judgments in this respect; but these fears, even if they magnify the apprehensions of men on one side or the other, are the fruit of the restless working of some principle which man cannot control, and hence his fears; they are the confession of the instability of the order on which he relies; and they presage, and in the world's history have ever presaged, some violent disruption, because they were the expression of the consciousness of the force of what was breaking all up - that passions are stronger than what controlled them. The bonds of society are too tight or too weak. Power is not in them, but in the force which is working underneath them. Some would slacken them to give vent to the power at work; some would tighten them, hoping to break or repress it; some hope, and many more fear; none know what is to come. 'After us, the Deluge,' has become the proverbial expression of this in men's mouths - the exaggerated expression of self-importance, but the accepted utterance of general fears. The Christian knows that God overrules all things, and he does not fear in this way, but for that reason he is more calm and clear-sighted, less interested in the maintenance of particular forms, and hence more interested in judging the effect of principles on them. And, if indeed taught of God in this, guided by His word in the knowledge of what the result will be, yet a large number of Christians, however, add to the delusion, because, even among them, man's capacity for doing good is worshipped. Yet even these are getting uneasy at the influence Popery has acquired and is acquiring.

111 What is, then, the world? It is a vast system, grown up after man had departed from God, of which Satan is actually, though not by right of course, the god and the prince. Man was driven out of the place in which God had set him in innocence and peace. He gave up God for his lusts, under the influence of Satan, who thus got power over him. His way back to the tree of life was barred by divine power. He has indeed built a city, where God had made him a vagabond, and adorned it by the hands of artificers in brass and iron, and sought to make it agreeable by those who handle the harp and organ. But he is without God in it. Left without law, the world became so bad that God had to destroy mankind, save eight persons, by the Deluge. Under law, man plunged into idolatry, from which no prophetic warnings could ultimately deliver him. God sent His Son; "God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them"; but man would have none of Him: He was cast out of the vineyard and slain. The world in its origin, is a system sprung up from man's disobedience and departure from God, and which has turned God out of it as far as it could when He came into it in mercy. Hence the Lord says of it as a system, "Now is the judgment of this world." This is its state of sin. But it is also a system in which men have been proved in every way, to see whether they could be recalled or recovered from this state, by promises, by law, by prophets, yea by God's own Son. Especially among the Jews was this process carried on, as represented under the figure of a vineyard, where the owner sought fruit, but no fruit was to be had. The servants, and even the only-begotten Son, were killed. And when we look now at the principles and motives of the world, are they other than "the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life"? Do not pleasure, gain, vanity, ambition, govern men? I do not speak of exceptions, but of what characterises the world. When we speak of men rising in the world, getting on in the world, is it not ambition and gain which are in question? Is there much difference in what Cain did in his city, and what men are now doing in theirs? If a Chinese, who had heard a missionary speak of Christ and Christianity, came to London to see what it was, would he find the mass of men, the world, governed by other motives than what governed the masses at Nankin, or Pekin, or Canton? Would they not be seeking gain, as he would have done there, or pleasure, as they do there, or power and honour, as they do there? What is the world in its motives? A system in which men seek honour one of another, and not the honour which cometh from God only. In a word, the world having rejected the Son of God when He was here in it, the Father set Him at His right hand - fruit of that solemn appeal of the Blessed One, "O, righteous Father, the world hath not known thee, but I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast sent me." Then comes the sentence: "All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world."

112 But it will be said, Yes, but now Christianity has come in, that applies to the heathen world. I answer, "The kingdom of God is not in word, but in power." The lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life are not found only among heathens; if comparison is to be made - how much more among Christians. But it is important to take up Christianity as a system, because, not only does faith recognise it as the truth and true revelation of God in Christ, but it has in sum formed the world in its present condition. If I go to inquire what the world is, I cannot turn to heathens or Mohammedans: I must look to Christendom. This is what characterises the state of the world. Now I have already spoken of the motives none can deny which govern men in it - as pleasure, gain, ambition, vanity. They may pursue these things, preserving a good reputation before men; it is only another snare to make Pharisees of them, or without conscience. But they pursue this, and a man is morally what he pursues. He is covetous if it be gain, ambitious if it be power, a man of pleasure if it be pleasure, and so on. But we must look at Christendom itself. At the beginning, the exhibition of the grace and power of Christ's operation by the Holy Ghost in raising men above human motives, and uniting them in the enjoyment of heavenly things with one heart, and so displaying a care for each other which the world does not know, and a deadness to the world which is the opposite of the very principle of its existence - pure in walk and unselfish in its ways, the church forced itself on the attention of a hostile yet admiring world. Now, and for centuries, the seat of anxious and tortuous ambition, of crimes and deceit of every kind, haughty power over others, and worldly luxury and evil, characterise what pre-eminently calls itself the church. The name of its most active supports has passed, in common parlance, into the name of cunning, falsehood, and want of conscience. The world has been driven into infidelity by what calls itself the church.

113 Take the Greek church. Where does ignorance reign pre-eminently? There where its clergy sways. Where all seems fair as regards profession, infidelity reigns universally in the active-minded population of the Romanist system. As to Protestantism, every one knows, because their all is open, how it is sunk into infidelity. Christianity only adds this additional feature to the world's history, that the worst corruption has come in - the corruption of what is best. The Reformation was caused mainly because the iniquity of the church was intolerable. This was predicted by the apostles: so that it confirms, instead of shaking, the faith of him who believes and reads the Word; but it teaches that reference to Christendom does not do away the proof of Satan being the prince and god of this world. He has proved it more than ever, by making that which was brought in as a witness of God to be the seat of the power of his own corruption. Taking in Christendom as a whole, what do we see? Mohammedanism has overrun the eastern part and Popery the western. The north of Europe has been delivered from the latter: and what is its state? Overrun with infidelity and Popish tendencies. I do not mean to deny that the Spirit of God is active, and that good is done in the midst of all this. I believe it, and thank God for it. But that is not the world, but a distinct power which works in the midst of it. In influencing the world and its government, Popery has made more progress the last thirty years than the power of truth. We may deplore it, but it cannot be denied. The world is far more guilty by having Christianity in its midst. But it has not ceased to be the world.

114 Remember, reader, that it was at the death of Christ that the devil received the title of prince of this world, and as to his religious influence, is called the god of this world, who blinds the minds of them who believe not. God did not call the devil the prince of this world till He had fully proved and tested it. But when it followed Satan wholly in rejecting His Son (the few who owned Him, adding confirmation to it by their fear), then the name is given to him. When God's throne was at Jerusalem it was impossible; but, when the true ruler of it was rejected, then it was plain Satan was its prince. The intrigues for power when the empire became Christian proved, not the exclusion of Satan from the throne of the world, but his acquired dominion over what was called the church. No doubt the cross gave his power its death-blow in the sight of God, and of faith, but not in the world. There it was his victory; and the Christ was called up to sit at the right hand of God, till His enemies were made His footstool. Then men stumbled on the stone. When it falls in judgment, it will grind them to powder.

Now, though Satan's worst reign is his religious one, far the worst, even when the blasphemous beast is raging (Rev. 13), as any one may see in reading the character of the second beast, yet he reigns anywhere only by the corrupt motives of man's heart. We may add, indeed, the fears of a bad conscience to his means of power. He leads men astray by their lusts, and then gives them his religion to quiet their consciences, which he cannot cleanse. He makes religiousness (characterised by certain forms which strike the imagination, and a diligent activity in what flesh can perform) minister to the power of those who rule for him, and excites the passions of men to contend for their religion, as for something in which their own interests and honour are concerned; thus making religion the activity of the flesh to sustain, superstitiously or through interest, a system, and capable of any wickedness to sustain it, so that wickedness becomes religious wickedness, and the conscience even thinks it is doing God service, while Satan's craft directs all this to his own ends. Still, outside all this direct system of Satan's religious power he governs the world - the Christian world, as all the rest and more than the rest - by men's ordinary lusts. But the eager pursuit of gain is more ardent than ever, leading to less scruple in acquiring it; and pleasure holds its sway over men, in defiance of Christ, as it did when there was no such motive to restrain them; war rages as it ever did; conquest and oppression range over a wider sphere than of old, while the nominal power of Christianity, with all men's boastings, has receded to smaller limits than in the seventh century, when it ruled over known Africa, filled Asia, and was almost the established religion of China.

115 Such is the world which is attached to its own objects, grandeur, power, pleasure, gain, not to Christ; and thus is enslaved to him who governs the world by these motives. The external system of Christianity, instead of delivering souls from them, is the seat of the highest exercise of these worldly principles; and where it is not the sphere of the concentrated influence of them, it is sunk into philosophy and unbelief.

What, then, is its end? Judgment, speedy judgment. Of the day and the hour, no man knows: it comes as a thief in the night. The world will not get really better. The thoughts men have of its doing so are one of the worst expressions of its evil confidence in man, man's development, man's energies. Man is to be made better. Nay, Christianity, say some now, is only a phase of man's history; and now we are to have a better. What is it to come from? What are its motives?

Commerce, we are told, civilises. Education enlarges and improves the mind. Commerce does take away grossness and violence; but gain is its motive. Its earnest pursuit tends to destroy higher motives, and to make a moral estimate of value sink into money and selfishness. It has nowhere elevated the tone of society, but the contrary. It has not stopped wars; it has caused many. Commercial nations have, in general, been the least scrupulous, and the most grasping. Excuses may be formed; but none but a commercial people would make a war to sell opium. What has education done? It enlarges the mind. Be it so; of course it does. Does it change the motives which govern the heart? In no way. Men are more educated than they were; but what is the change? Is the influence of superstition really diminished? In no wise. On the contrary, the infidelity produced by dependence on man's mind has forced men, who are not personally established in divine truth, back into superstition, to find repose and a resting-place. One of the worst signs of the present day, and which is observable everywhere, is that deliverance from superstition and error is not now by means of positive truth; but that liberty of mind, sometimes called liberalism, which is bound by no truth, and knows no truth, but doubts all truth, is simply destructive. Go anywhere and everywhere, to India or England, Italy or Russia, or America: deliverance from superstition is not by truth, but by disbelief of all known truth. The blessed truth of the gospel is a drop of water in the ocean of mind and error. And even Christians reckon, not on the Spirit and word of God, but on progress, to dispel darkness. It is building up Popery and mere church authority, without the soul knowing truth for itself, for those who dread with reason the wanton pretensions of the impudence of the human mind; which, satisfied as to its own claim to judge, has no real taste for, or interest whatever in, truth itself. On the other hand, the utter absence of truth in church pretensions, and its claim independent of godly fruits, drive even honest minds, not divinely taught and guided, into the wanton pretensions of that mind which has no truth at all.

116 The manifest conflict of the day is between superstition and the mere pretensions of man's mind (i.e. infidelity as to all positive truth, or standard of truth, or acquired truth). Neither superstition nor infidelity knows any truth; nor have they any respect for it. One recognises authority; the other is the rejection of it. One is the church, so called; the other, free thought. Faith in the truth is known to neither. I appeal to every intelligent person if this is not a true description of what is going on: rest in authority; or the mind of man is to find out truth. Where it is no one knows; the business of man's mind being to disprove any existing claim to it. One of them is no better than the other: church authority, the most hostile to God and His people, as the judgment of Babylon shews all the blood of saints is found in her; but the other, a rising up of man against God, which will end in his destruction.

117 It is as needful, in referring to the state of the world, to refer to its religious aspect, as to the lower and more material motives which govern it. I do not doubt for a moment (God forbid I should) that the Spirit of God acts for the blessing of some in the midst of all this scene, but it does not affect the state of the world. It is one of the striking phenomena of the liberal, or infidel party, that where it is free (that is, where it is not itself oppressed by Popery), it prefers Popery to truth. Truth is divine, and it cannot be borne. Popery is human, and liberality will be liberal to it, not to truth. So governments, when too rudely pressed by it, pander to Popery, because it is a strong and unscrupulous political power. Truth does not concern them. If it presses on their party, it annoys them. All this has an evident tendency - the giving power to superstition as long as governments hold their own, but when human will grows too strong, a breaking up of all that, and the destruction of the whole system. A well-known specimen of this has been seen in the French Revolution.

If we turn to America, to what (to many) would be the most attractive part of the new world, what do we see? Large profession and religious activity, but the churches the great promoters of the dreadful conflict now going on*; Christians more worldly than the world; money supreme in influence; and the world, save as partially prohibited by law, overrun with drunkenness, pre-eminent in profane swearing, and demoralised by the corruptions which follow the absence of family habits. Intelligence, activity, energy, education, reign there. None of the supposed hindrances of the old world exist there. None can have been there and not have seen in this immense country the amazing development of human energy; but, morally, what is the spectacle it affords?

{*[Written during the War in America, in 1862.]}

The world, then, has been evil from its origin, for the horrors of idolatry cannot be denied. Christianity, then, has been corrupted by man, and has not reformed the world - is actually the seat of its greatest corruption. Commerce, a partial civiliser of men, absorbs them with the lowest of motives - money, and is wholly indifferent to truth and moral elevation; for it, a good man is a man with capital. Education, which also frees from what is gross, has not, with all its pretensions, changed the motives, ameliorated the morals of men, nor even freed from the bonds of superstition, save as it has set aside all positive truth, and every standard of it; and thus, while wounding infidelity on one side, riveted the chains of superstition on the other.

118 I appeal to facts. Is not Popery or Puseyism on the one hand, and infidelity on the other, what stamps the activity of England at this moment? It is not otherwise elsewhere. Will God be the idle spectator - whatever His patience with men, and how blessed soever the testimony of His grace - will He be the idle spectator without end, of the enslaving power of superstition, and the rebellious rejection of truth by the pretended lovers of truth, who cast down all foundations? He may, He does testify, as long as souls can be won and delivered. But is He to allow the power of evil for ever? He will not. He will allow it to fill up the cup of falsehood and wickedness. He declares that evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse; but they are filling up the cup of wrath for themselves. He is patient till no more can be done. "The iniquity of the Amorites," He says, "is not yet full"; but then He will remove the evil and bless the earth.

My object is not here to enter into any detail of prophecy; it has been amply done elsewhere. But as the course of the world's history points to judgment, the removal of the power of evil by power as the only remedy, so that the end of this scene is judgment, is as clearly stated in scripture as possible. I do not mean the judgment of the dead and the secrets of their hearts before the great white throne, but the judgment of this visible world. God has appointed a day in the which He will judge this habitable world (such is the force of the word in Acts 17: 31) in righteousness, whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath raised Jesus from the dead. Man has multiplied transgression, and will continue to do so till judgment comes. But the central sin of the world, that by which its true character has been stamped, is the rejection and death of Christ. But whom the world rejected, Him God has raised from the dead, and to Him all judgment is committed. Every knee shall bow to Him; and the more boldly they have rejected and opposed Him, the more terrible will be their judgment. But all man's pride, and vanity, and pretensions must come down. See Isa. 2: 10-22; ch. 24: 19-23; ch. 26: 21; Zeph. 3: 8.

119 So the corrupt and idolatrous system. "And the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell: and great Babylon came in remembrance before God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath," Rev. 16: 19. "And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters: with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication. So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication: and upon her forehead was a name written, Mystery, Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots and Abominations of the Earth. And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration," Rev. 17: 1-6 "And a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, and cast it into the sea, saying, Thus with violence shall that great city Babylon be thrown down, and shall be found no more at all. And the voice of harpers, and musicians, and of pipers, and trumpeters, shall be heard no more at all in thee; and no craftsman, of whatsoever craft he be, shall be found any more in thee; and the sound of a millstone shall be heard no more at all in thee; and the light of a candle shall shine no more at all in thee; and the voice of the bridegroom and of the bride shall be heard no more at all in thee: for thy merchants were the great men of the earth; for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived. And in her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth," Rev. 18: 21-24.

So the haughty power and rebellion of man. "And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet. For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty," Rev. 16: 13, 14. "And I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse; and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war. His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head were many crowns; and he had a name written, that no man knew but he himself. And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and his name is called the Word of God. And the armies which were in heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean. And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God. And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written King of kings, and Lord of lords. And I saw an angel standing in the sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God; that ye may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of captains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses, and of them that sit on them, and the flesh of all men, both free and bond, both small and great. And I saw the beast, and the kings of the earth, and their armies, gathered together to make war against him that sat on the horse and against his army. And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone, and the remnant were slain with the sword of him that sat upon the horse, which sword proceeded out of his mouth: and all the fowls were filled with their flesh, Rev. 19: 11-21.

120 Figures these are, no doubt, but figures whose meaning is plain enough. Thus, "Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces. Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshing-floors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them: and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth," Dan. 2: 34, 35. "I beheld till the thrones were set, and the Ancient of days did sit, whose garment was white as snow, and the hair of his head like the pure wool: his throne was like the fiery flame, and his wheels as burning fire. A fiery stream issued and came forth from before him: thousand thousands ministered unto him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him: the judgment was set, and the books were opened. I beheld then because of the voice of the great words which the horn spake: I beheld even till the beast was slain, and his body destroyed, and given to the burning flame," Dan. 7: 9-11.

121 Such, then, is the end of the world as it now is. The Christianity which it professes Will have increased the severity of its judgment. They that have known their Master's Will, and not done it, Will be beaten with many stripes. Can we say that Christendom, as it now subsists, is the least like the heavenly state in which we see the disciples in the New Testament; Acts 2-4? True, we find there that they soon declined, and that evil came in. But the record that tells us this, tells us it would wax worse and worse, and ripen for the judgment which surely awaits it. Flee from the wrath to come.

"For me and thee"

Matthew 17: 25-27

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This chapter, when the connection is clearly seen, is of profound and touching interest. The transfiguration spoken of in the earlier part of the chapter was a turning-point in the life and ministry of the blessed Lord.

After the character of those who were suited to the kingdom had been unfolded, the divinity of His Person and character of His ministry are brought before us. His disciples are then sent out with the ministry of the kingdom to the Jews, at least the poor of His flock, in His lifetime, and then till He came as Son of man. Then we have the record of the rejection of John the Baptist's ministry, and that of His own, as come in grace: and standing on the edge, so to speak, of the world, He is witness that no dealings of God could reach where His grace found, like Noah's dove, no place there for the sole of her foot; and declares that the world has been tried, and He could find no entrance for divine goodness, and they must come to Him if they would know the Father, and have rest (for the Son revealed Him in grace), and learn of Him as the man meek and lowly of heart, and find rest to their souls in a world where evil ruled, and no rest could be found, as He knew.

In chapter 12 the Jews, as a nation, are finally rejected, under Satan's power as a people in the last days, and the Lord disowns association with them according to the flesh; relationship with Him was by the word He preached. He leaves the house, goes to the seaside, not any longer seeking fruit in His vineyard, which bore none but bad - sowing that from which fruit was to come. The kingdom of heaven in its mystery, with an absent king, takes the place of Messiah upon earth.

In chapter 14 we have the whole scene ripening historically. John the Baptist is actually put to death, and the sovereign grace of Christ continues while the coming scene is opened. He satisfies, according to Psalm 132, the "poor with bread," but there, I believe, according to the Messiah order. Then He dismisses the mass of Israel, and sends His disciples off, and goes up on high (a priest on high), and the disciples are tossed on the sea. Peter goes on the sea to meet Him: as soon as He is entered into the ship the wind ceases, and He is gladly received where once He had been rejected.

123 In chapter 15 the hollow and false religion of the Pharisees is rejected, while fully owning Israel's privileges, and sovereign grace goes out to awaken and meet faith in the rejected race of the Gentiles - according to Jewish standing, the accursed race. He was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, but God would not be Himself if only the God of the Jews, and the Gentiles were to glorify God for His mercy. We have then the five thousand fed, the same general principle; only now, I believe, the sovereign patience of God.

In chapter 16 the church, as built by Himself, takes the place of Jewish Messiahship, and chapter 17 the kingdom in glory. Thus we have the kingdom, as it is at present, the church, as built by Christ, and the heavenly glory of the kingdom, taking the place of the earthly Messiah. This is the point I desired to reach, which, indeed, characterises all that follows - the revelation of the heavenly glory on earth, what will be in the world to come, and was now revealed to establish the faith of the disciples; though the Father's house is yet a better portion. It is found in the description of this scene in Luke 9, where they* enter into the cloud from which the Father's voice came. For the scene itself see 2 Peter 1: 16-19, reading "the word of prophecy confirmed." I have gone through the previous chapters because they lead up to the rejection of the Jews, and the new character in which Christ's Person and work were to be displayed. Here (chap. 16: 20), they are forbidden to say to any one that He was the Christ. We find the same injunction in Luke 9: 21: that ministry was over. Here He tells them the Son of man must suffer and rise again. The Son of man was about to come in the glory of His Father with His angels. So Luke 9: 22-27.

{*I suppose Moses and Elias, but the truth expressed remains the same. The cloud was the dwelling-place of God in Israel. [See Volume 33, page 289. - Ed.}

In a word, the suffering Son of man and the glory that should follow, take the place of Messiah on earth, now disowned there, and even forbidden to be any more preached. Thus the beginning of Psalm 2 was now before Him, bringing about in another way the purposes there spoken of, and Psalm 8 in part accomplished as spoken of in Hebrews 2. But the old things of Messiah on earth were over, redemption was about to be accomplished, and the new things of a glorified man introduced. In Matthew 17: 22, 23 this rejection is pressed on the disciples, and then comes the blessed and touching way in which He shews them their association with Himself, as Son of God, in the new place into which He is introducing His people.

124 The tribute here spoken of is not tribute to the civil power, but the didrachma which every grown-up Jew paid for the temple service, and which they had voluntarily imposed upon themselves in Ezra's time - a tribute to Jehovah. The question which the collectors put to Peter was really whether his master was a good Jew according to the earthly system now passing away. Peter, with the zeal so often there, yet in ignorance, at once answers "Yes." The Lord then shews divine knowledge of what had been passing by anticipating Peter, to introduce in touching grace the new place He was giving to Peter and those with him "Of whom," says the Lord, "do the kings of the earth take custom or tribute, of their own children, or of strangers?" Peter replies "of strangers." "Then," says the Lord, "are the children free." We are the children, you and I, of the great king of the temple, and as such, free from the tribute. "Nevertheless that we offend not" - bringing in Peter, as one of the children of the great king with Himself free, but not willing to offend, and then shews, not divine knowledge but, divine power over creation. "Go thou to the sea, and take up the fish that first cometh up, and when thou hast opened his mouth thou shalt find a stater [two didrachmas] that take, and give unto them for me and thee"; shewing now His divine power over creation, making the fish bring just what was wanted. And then again He puts Peter with Himself in the place of sonship by the overwhelming, but unspeakably gracious words, "Give unto them for me and thee."

Do our hearts echo these words, moved to their foundations? If Christ said "me and thee" to us, how should we feel it? Yet He does say it. It is when a rejected Messiah, His Person and the effect of His work too (but the expression of His boundless grace in it) come forth to give us our place in the purposes of God, but as His heart delights to see it and make us see it too. Oh! for the Son of God to say to such an one as me, "Me and thee." I know it is the effect of redemption, but of a redemption He has accomplished, and a redemption which gives us a place where He shall see the travail of His soul and be satisfied - in seeing us in a blessing which only His heart, which answers to the Father's counsels, could have thought of for us. But what a comment of Christ's heart on the ways of God unfolded in the foregoing chapter! Thinking first of us to apply it.

1882.

The "Ifs" of Scripture

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The word of God always maintains the responsibility of man; indeed it must, for no morally intelligent creature can be other than responsible. Grace and redemption may introduce principles and facts which modify the operation of the principle, but the principle remains true. But I think that the word casts a more definite light on the place responsibility holds in connection with the grace that is revealed in Christ, than many are aware of.

I would lay down a principle evident to every one, and incontestable in human relationships, but forgotten in divine ones (and with one only exception not based on relationship, which I will state in its place), that as a general principle, responsibility is based on, and measured by, the relationships in which we are. Parent and child, husband and wife, master and servant - evidently in all these the responsibility is based on, and measured by, the relationship. The one exception is where God, or one having competent authority in the case, claims the recognition of another in any given position or authority. Thus, if Christ, Moses, or a prophet be sent, adequate testimony being given, we are bound to receive them. The mission is, in fact, an instituted relationship.

Now our original responsibility is no longer a question for those who know the truth. It is no longer, "if thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted?" - always abtractedly true; we have sinned, and on that ground are guilty and lost. But the great truth of Christ and redemption has come in. If I call myself a Christian, I place myself on this ground - the ground of redemption. The question is, to put responsibility in its place, where this is owned. Now redemption is a work of God, and not responsibility on our part. Yet they are constantly mixed up together, and uncertainty introduced where all is perfect, and confusion where all is clear. But there are two things generally in the position of the Christian - redemption wrought by grace for him, and his actual attainment of glory. Now "if" - that is a condition, is never connected with redemption. It is always connected with our course towards the glory, and here it is of continual occurrence.

In the purpose of God there is no variation or uncertainty. In His government He may set conditions, and in fact does so: it is connected with our conduct, but in purpose - not so; and in redemption even, taken in its application to us there is no uncertainty. In Ephesians you have no "if": "We have redemption through his blood." In Titus, it is "Not according to works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy, he saved us." "By grace ye are saved." The value of Christ's work admits of no "if," nor its application even to every believer. "He hath saved us, and called us with a holy calling, according to his own purpose and grace, given to us in Christ Jesus before the world began."

127 So in type Israel stands still, and sees the salvation of Jehovah, who led forth the people He had redeemed, and guided them by His strength to His holy habitation. And again, "Ye have seen . . . how I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself." The whole was absolute and complete redemption. So we have no more conscience of sins, but are accepted in the Beloved. He hath by one offering perfected for ever those that are sanctified. Here it is the application to conscience. But not only is a full title made in righteousness, not only are the sins blotted out, and we are justified from all things, accepted in the Beloved, and our consciences purged, but we are made meet [fit] to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light. Nothing lacks in completeness. Hence the thief could go straight to paradise, fit, through the travail of His soul, to be Christ's companion there. Yet ordinarily we are left to tread longer or shorter time our pilgrimage here.

Now this, as in Deuteronomy 8, is to humble us, and prove us, and know what is in our hearts. We enter on it on the ground of redemption. All Christendom stands on this ground, may little realise its value, but it is Christendom because redemption is accomplished. The first thing tested is - is it realised? Are we really so? If not, we perish in the wilderness in unbelief. On this point I do not enter. But the question remains then - Shall I arrive safe in Canaan? for we are not yet there. And here come in all the "ifs": if I hold fast the beginning of my confidence firm to the end: if ye continue in the faith, and the like.

I believe there is a full answer given to what is in question, practically realised, in Philippians 2 and 3; in others it is doctrinally set forth. But the answer is not redemption - a finished work. This is the basis of all, and if one imbued with the mind of God had seen one drop of blood sprinkled on a door-post, he might have been certain on to Solomon's, and yet far better, Christ's millennial glory, but it was not accomplished, and God teaches us by what is revealed, whether historically as to His ways, or prophetically in His word, as to things to come, and all His counsels given us in the New Testament.

128 But the wilderness was not redemption, and God would have us to look at redemption as complete. He suffered, the Just for the unjust, to bring us to God. We are complete in Him (Christ). But, as I said, whatever exercise of conscience we may have had before knowing the value of the blood of Christ, or what the lingerings of unbelief cradled by self to make out our own righteousness, it is usual in God's ways to have a practical wilderness course after redemption, when the knowledge of ourselves, and of God and His ways in grace and government, are developed, to humble us, and to prove us, and to do us good in our latter end.

When we come to see what we have to lean on at the end, we are brought back to the beginning, though one who has walked faithfully with Christ will surely have a sweeter and deeper knowledge of Him who began and finished all. All Balaam can say is, when the question was, Could Israel enter into Canaan, I can do nothing. There is no enchantment against Jacob, no divination against Israel, as at this time it shall be said of Israel and Jacob, What hath God wrought? But meanwhile, between the two we are in weakness, and in temptation, and real perils. The flesh is in us, and what pleases it is there. Shall I arrive safe in Canaan? is the question. If I mix up this with redemption, all is confusion, all is uncertainty; for while it was said to be finished, and all our sins remembered no more, here all is in question again, and, imputed or not imputed, I lose heaven by sins which have been borne: if they have not been borne, then redemption is unfinished and incomplete.

Now the government of God, though in perfect love and grace - "whom the Lord loves he chastens" - yet has always a legal principle in it; that is, the ways of God depend on what we are, not in the perfectness of His love, but in His ways with us. Besides, the heart craves holiness, and knows God can bear with nothing else. We would not that He should. He makes us partakers - blessed truth! - of His holiness. Now the mass of Christendom are really unbelievers, and, like Israel, perish in the wilderness, never do get into Canaan. Those fear who are true of heart, and, if there is no distrust of grace, it is a salutary fear, lest any of them should seem to come short.

129 There will be found in Numbers two great principles (found again in Hebrews) which characterise the position; the red heifer, practically answering to John 13, 1 John 2: 1, 2, but here known to believers for restoring communion after they have practically failed; and the priesthood: the former meeting a failure in the wilderness, the latter the sustaining power for weakness - "grace to help in time of need." In Numbers 19 we have the red heifer out of its place, say the wise rationalists, whereas the essence of its meaning depends on where it is. Then (chap. 20) Aaron dies, and after Sihon (Balaam, as we have seen), comes God's judicial estimate of His people. In Deuteronomy 9 we find His moral estimate - this, What has Israel done? that, "What hath God wrought?" and the comparison is full of instruction.

The statement, "What hath God wrought?" is an accomplished thing - it is wrought. Now in the wilderness, though redemption was the basis of all, an accomplished work was not what was wanting for the wilderness itself, but living care, guidance, ministry and constant need to be met; and this was what was found, and what we find in that of which this was only the type. They had to reach Canaan, as we have glory, and that where there are spiritual wickednesses on the way, in a wilderness where there is no way, nor bread, nor wine, and we ourselves without strength. And the dangers are real and present. It is not a full and finished salvation - which, thank God, there is - but daily dependence, and a living One who can sustain, guide, and protect us. God, that we may know ourselves and Him, puts us in this place of danger, real danger and difficulty, where by ourselves we could not get through, and gives us to find it out, but with the testing and trial, with the question, "If we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end": all these are most real, and forgiveness itself leaves all vague, but there is the infallible promise for faith to lean on, and divine support: "We are kept by the power of God, through faith, unto the salvation ready to be revealed."

The well-known passage (John 10) assures everything: "They shall never perish, neither shall any one pluck them out of my hand." No perishing either; Christ is our life (no greater power to pluck us out), and that according to the divine power of the Father and the Son. So in 1 Corinthians 1: 8: "who shall confirm you to the end, that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus"; so "God is faithful by whom ye were called." There is no uncertainty or doubt, then, in the wilderness; but the kind of certainty is different, and the difference practically important. Redemption is accomplished, and Christ our righteousness, according to all the value of what He has wrought for the glory of God. It is finished, perfect, and accepted of God. But in general the race is to be run, that we may win Christ, be found in Him; we have to hold fast to the end, that He may present us blameless, as in Jude.

130 This is a never-ceasing work, but as certain as if all was done. "He withdraweth not his eyes from the righteous." It is constant dependence, in order to get safe to the end, but dependence on what is sure, as God is sure. We work out our salvation with fear and trembling, but God works in us to will and to do. The wolf seizes and scatters the sheep, but he cannot seize them (the same word) out of Christ's hand; the faithfulness and the strength are alike, and both divine. The "if" is there, and dependence constant, and diligence in it called for, but God, with whom is no "if," is there to meet it.

There are uncertainties and questioning experiences of this kind, when all our Christian life and happiness are lumped together, and which are confounded where redemption is not known, but the soul has really to say to God. It will say, "Without holiness no man shall see the Lord"; but this is an abuse of terms; the soul is looking for a certain state as ground of acceptance. Now this is really a question of righteousness. What is said is surely true, but holiness is what is holy - yea, God Himself loved for His own sake. It is not holiness when it is desired with a view to acceptance. That soul does not know redemption, Christ as its righteousness, and is looking at its own state as its ground of acceptance. It has to learn that it is guilty and lost, not something to be desired - right and essential as the desire is - but to learn that it is not what, nor has done what, God desires, and has to be saved, must cross the Red Sea, and that its business is not to wait for what is desirable, but to acknowledge its own sinful state, and that what it needs is redemption, to stand still and see the salvation of God.

1882

The Place of Sacrifice in the Ways of God

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If we take the history of the garden of Eden as a whole, we shall see it is such a whole, and, in brief, a complete picture of the ways of God. Man placed under responsibility (and even under law failed and broke it) was sinful, and an actual sinner, and was driven out from the place of sojourn, where God visited him for fellowship. But God did not send him out to begin a new world away from Himself, without giving the fullest testimony to the sovereign grace that has met the evil. Man's nakedness was the expression of innocence being gone. Shame and guilt, and a guilty fear of God's presence, was now man's estate. God, in sovereign grace, met this. He clothed Adam with robes which came from death, and His eye had His own work before Him. That did not say man was not naked in himself, but that God Himself, having taken knowledge of it in grace, had covered his nakedness. The present state was perfectly provided for in full, and the power of evil judged in the future. Hereafter the power of the serpent's seed would be destroyed.

But man thus driven out from God, and innocence gone, began a new world, and the question necessarily arose, Can man have to say to God, and how? Now it is clear that if God wrought in man, He could not for a moment be indifferent to what had happened, and still clearer that God could not be indifferent to the state of evil which had brought man where he now was, and was expressed by what he was - in sin and away from God. That which was the sad effect for man, God saw as the evil state in him.

The driving him out of paradise had placed man in a judicial way in this place, though not irrecoverably. He was in it morally, and the question arose: Could he approach God - go to God? Now he could not really, while insensible to the state he had got into; he would be still as far from God as ever; and, in the public government and testimony of God, God could not give a testimony to His so receiving him: and this is the new platform of Cain and Abel - approaching God when in a state which was the result of being driven out from His presence. Do we approach God as if nothing had happened, in connection with the everyday circumstances and duties of the place we have got into, or in the sense of the sinfulness of this state, the sense of our fall, and looking up to God in our consciences, as those who have got there by sin? Every Christian knows. And here note, it is not committed sin, but the consciousness of our true standing before God. Cain goes with the fruit of his toil (man had been sent forth to be a tiller of the ground) - the actual practical state of man driven out. In Abel faith had its perceptions. Sin had come in and death by sin: faith recognised it. "So Christ appeared once in the consummation of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." This was not the clearing the individual's sins actually committed: they are spoken of immediately after as a distinct subject, adding judgment - but, a judgment past for those who look for Him seeing He has borne their sins Himself, who becomes Himself the Judge; Heb. 9: 26-28.

132 We have four worlds, so to speak, in this aspect: the garden of Eden; a world no longer innocent, but departed from God and driven out, where sin reigns and Satan; a world in which Christ reigns and in righteousness; and the new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. We have an innocent world (now gone), tested without evil being it, by simple obedience. The final world as based in righteousness, which in its nature never changes, cannot change in its moral stability.

But the moment sin had come in, and characterised the world and the state of man, the terms on which man could be with God must be altered, must be changed, because God could not change. That a holy God and a sinful creature should be on the same terms as an innocent one, could not be. Free and happy communion would be impossible: cry for mercy there might be - challenge on what ground he was there; but no free intercourse. That God is love does not alter this. His love is a holy love and He is light, but "men love darkness rather than light, because their deeds are evil," John 3: 19.

Now, I admit and believe, that the free, sovereign self-originated love of God is the source of all our joys and hopes and blessings, eternal and infinite as they are. But God exercises that love by bringing in a Mediator in death: not here by blood-shedding to meet guilt, but in perfect self-surrender to God in that which was death, as such, and the fruit of sin. Fat (Gen. 4: 4) was forbidden as much as blood, but not offered as such for forgiveness, but for acceptance in another, who gave Himself wholly to God in death which had come in. And remark, this was that souls might approach to God: each came with his offering.

133 Cain came, as I have said, as if nothing had happened, so much so that he brought to God, as offering, what was the sign of the ruined state into which he had got, but which did not reckon it as ruin. There was no faith in it. In Abel's there was; he offered by faith, which recognised that death had come in, come in by sin, but that another had given Himself for him "an offering made by fire of a sweet savour": for there are two things - "unto him that loveth us and washed us from our sins"; "Christ also hath loved us and hath given Himself for us to God" as an offering made by fire, "and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savour" - one to clear foregone sins; the other, the value and preciousness of the One in whom we are accepted - "Accepted in the beloved." Now this was a question of acceptance in coming. God did not accept Cain. He did accept Abel, but the witness was borne to his gifts. He was accepted, but God's testimony was to that which he brought - the life of another in all its energies and perfectness given up to God in death.

Another thing we have to remark here, it was not God setting forth anything to the sinner. That was "a mercy-seat through faith in His blood." It was Abel presenting himself to God, but coming by the acceptance and perfectness of another, who had given his life for him. And this is propitiation. Now to say that God could receive a sinner as He received an innocent person is to say that God is indifferent to good and evil. And note here, it was not by the eye of God resting on an inward change that a difference was made: there was such a change, for faith was working in Abel's heart; but it was a judicial estimate on the part of God of the gifts he brought - Christ, Christ offered in sacrifice - and for this we have the express authority of the Hebrews. It was a propitiatory sacrifice - a ground of acceptance, or the whole basis of the standing of a fallen world is gone - the whole moral basis of the preference of Abel to Cain is gone.

That love may have been there, nay, if you please, electing love, I admit, but the ground of acceptance, as stated in scripture (see Heb. 11), is gone if propitiatory sacrifice be not accepted: and to win secure righteousness before God, and for the believer's acceptance, according to the value that is in Christ, He offered Himself absolutely without spot for God's glory. "Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him. If God be glorified in him, God shall also glorify him in himself, and shall straightway glorify him." Faith believed in it then and found its fruit. Abel was accepted, and distinctively on the ground of what he brought - his gifts: Cain brought no such offerings, he had to be accepted in himself only, and he was not. Faith looks to this sacrifice, and comes by it now, and finds acceptance and blessing according to the value of Christ in the eyes of God.

134 I only add, now, that God gave Christ to us to this end. He "sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." The self-originating work of love is in it, but the effectual work of suffering is to make good in righteousness that love. God forbid that I should weaken the feeblest confidence in the Father's love. "He that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him," "And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us."

It is certain, then, that Abel, man being fallen, sought God's face and acceptance, by a sacrifice, to the value of which God bore testimony: "By which he obtained witness that he was righteous"; a sacrifice which recognised death as come in, but which, as so presented, bore the character of perfect self-offering to God's glory. It was not actual sins which were in question, but the state of man and his acceptance upon the ground of mediatorial death, in which God's own glory alone was sought on man's part in obedience, and in which the highest gift of grace shone out on God's part in love.

But I add, here, as it immediately connects itself with our subject, there is another point, less abstract, narrower possibly in effect, but dealing more immediately with conscience, and hence of present necessity. If a man believes in heart, that is as convinced of guilt, in the Lord Jesus Christ, he will not come into judgment, he knows he is justified, forgiven, has peace with God, and so rejoices in the hope of the glory, and trusts God for the road on to the end. "Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputes not iniquity" - not that he has not done any, but it has been dealt with, borne by another. Another has been substituted in his place by grace, who has taken charge of it in Himself - "Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree." It is not here the basis on which the race is before God, as in Abel's case, and which, as a general principle, recognises the whole truth, but actual sins committed, which are dealt with and put away out of God's sight by One "who was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed," Isa. 53: 5.

135 Now this, call it by any word you please, was one person put in the place of another, and then in such sort taking the sins and their consequences on Himself as that they should not come at all upon the person who was himself guilty, in judgment or penal consequences. Upon all who are not under this substitutionary benefit they do come, and God enters into judgment with them concerning them. For the believer it is said, "according to this time," not, what have men wrought, but "what hath God wrought," Num. 23: 21-23.

Thus, substitution is as certain a truth as scripture can afford, that is, one person standing in another's place, bearing his sins in His own body on the tree, bruised for them instead of the guilty, who is healed by the other taking the stripes, for "All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned every one to his own way, and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all," Isa. 53: 6.

February 25th, 1882.

The Burnt-offering; the Meat-offering; the Peace-offering

J. N. Darby.

<34010E> 240

{Notes of Addresses, 1880.}

The Burnt-offering - Leviticus 1

There is a very definite distinction between the first two sacrifices we have here, to which the third is an appendix, and the others. The burnt-offering and the meat-offering stand alone; dependent on these you get the peace-offering, and then those of another character, the sin and trespass offerings.

Wherever we meet the actual use and presentation of the offerings, it is in the opposite order to the revelation of them here. In the revelation we get them as God presents them, as He sees Christ: but in the use of them, my need comes first. Here, it is God's side, a sacrifice by fire of a sweet savour to the Lord: that expression is never used of the sin-offering, except in one single verse.

It gives a very definite character to these two first, that it is their aspect towards God, His character and nature. When we come as sinners, we come in respect of what our sins are, but our apprehension of what the meaning and value of Christ's death is, is greatly enhanced by seeing God's part in it. I must confess my sins - it is the only true way of coming; and I find there is propitiation through faith in His blood, and then I find all that is essential in these sacrifices as regards God.

There is no particular sin here: it was for sin of course, but it was not an individual confessing some particular sin. It is striking enough, that until you come to the institution of the law, you never get sin-offerings, except in the case of Cain, of which I do not doubt myself (though I know it is a question of interpretation), that it is, "a sin-offering lieth at the door." Sin and sin-offering is the same word; that word is never used again in that way, till the law - we get burnt-offerings and peace-offerings often.

The burnt-offering is the great basis, because it is God's glory in what has been done for sin. We must come, as I said, by the sin-offering. "He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins"; but it is another thing, beloved friends, when I look at Christ's offering and sacrifice, as glorifying God perfectly in all that He is, and that in respect of sin. He said, "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life," a very remarkable word, for none could give a "therefore" to God for His love; Christ could. The difference between divine love and human love is, that God commendeth His love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. If man gets sufficient motive, he will sacrifice his life; but without any motive, Christ gave Himself, God gave His Son: it characterises the love. In John 10: 11, He lays down His life "for the sheep"; but in verse 17, He does not say it is for the sheep. He has glorified God in death, in the place of sin, and He is glorified as man at the right hand of God. He goes up into that place where we get morally what the sacrifice was in God's sight.

241 There is nothing about sins in this chapter, though sin was there, blood-shedding, death, shewing sin was the thing in question; and yet the sacrifice was absolutely a sweet savour, that blessed character of the sacrifice of Christ, which settles every question of good and evil in God's sight. There was this terrible thing, that sin had come in, in the creature of God's predilection. People say that Adam learned to know evil, whereas he had only known good before; but that is not at all the point. "The man is become as one of us, knowing good and evil." It is knowing the difference between right and wrong.

Man was the one in whom God was going to be perfectly glorified; His delights were with the sons of men, and He did not take up angels, but the seed of Abraham; we are to be eternally conformed to the image of God's Son. In the meantime, Satan had prevailed over the first man; after lust came transgression, and all was over as regards his responsibility. His state was made to depend on one single thing that required obedience. He might have eaten of all the trees in the garden, if God had not told him not; it was not a question of any positive sin, but the claim of obedience. It was a thing to put angels to confusion, God's beautiful thing ruined! Lust and violence came in, till God had to destroy it all. Everybody knows what the evil is; you cannot go into a great city like this, without knowing that the evil is such, none but God Himself could have patience with it; it has been truly said, if trusted to one of us, we should destroy it in an hour. Man, in the hand of Satan, degraded himself and turned everything to confusion.

242 Another thing, beloved friends; God tried man in every way. The question was raised, was there any remedy for this? In the first place He destroyed them with judgment - then He called Abraham - then came the test of the law; all the things required by the law were duties already - the law did not make them duties, but it was God's statement of the obligation of those duties and God's claim upon man to fulfil them. The sacrifices were introduced consequent upon that. As to the state of man's heart, nothing could have been more decided, than when he cast God off, for the one thing he was told not to do. Then came a totally distinct thing. Man being not only a sinner but a transgressor, God comes in goodness reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing trespasses. He came in perfect goodness close to man, touched man, so to speak - holiness in all His walk, but divine love in everything He did - made flesh and dwelt among us; not visiting merely as with Abraham; but He was down here as a man, manifesting what He was towards men. That was the last trial to which God put man, to see whether there was anything He could awaken in man towards God. Come in goodness from His Father, walking amongst men in grace, so that there was no sorrow He did not meet - and we know how it ended for the time; He was totally rejected, and that closed man's history, his moral history. Not only had he sinned so that he had to be turned out of an innocent paradise, because he was not innocent, but he had rejected God's Son, come in love.

But now came the accomplishment of the divine work of redemption; there was a sacrifice! I get the blessed Son of God giving Himself, made sin in God's sight, totally alone, and, as to the suffering of His soul, forsaken of God. I get the sin dealt with. I must come by my guilt, but this presents it from God's end. I get absolute evil in man, and He met man with the perfect revelation of good. But it drew out hatred - that was the effect; the carnal mind, enmity against God - hatred against God manifested in goodness. I get Satan's power complete over man; Christ's own disciples forsaking Him, the rest wagging their heads at Him, glad to get rid of God and good. He had gone so low for our guilt and God's glory, that even the thief hung with Him could insult Him!

243 With the blessed Lord Himself I find just the opposite: Man in perfect goodness, love to the Father and obedience at all cost: "that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father gave me commandment, even so I do": perfect in the place of sin, where this question had been brought to an issue, made sin in God's sight in perfect love to His Father and perfect obedience. But further, in the cross, I see God in absolute righteousness against sin, in perfect love to the sinner; man in absolute badness; Satan's complete power; man in absolute obedience.

That laid the basis of it all; it brought angels desiring to look into it, to see the Just suffering for the unjust! It was not weak mercy giving up holiness and righteousness, but the absolute expression of majesty and righteousness. "It became him," that if God's Son were made sin, He must be dealt with as such, there was no escape! He gave Himself for it, "a body hast thou prepared me." Totally alone there, none to comfort Him, strong bulls of Bashan around; He says, "Be not thou far from me, O Lord," and He had to be forsaken of God.

The condition man was in was that it was his delight to get rid of God, and God, too, not come to judge him, but to reconcile him to Himself! But God's eternal counsels were in it, and Christ gave Himself. All that God is, was brought out and made good there, when man under Satan's power had succeeded in getting rid of Christ, He giving up Himself. God was glorified in Him. There was the secret work of God, God using the very thing by which Satan sought to frustrate it, to accomplish it. Satan's power seemed to have its way when he got rid of Christ from the world, but all was then brought to an issue before God; and that gives the immutability of the blessing. All was finished on which everlasting righteousness is founded. It was not a state of innocence whose preservation hung on yet unsatisfied responsibility: the unchanging blessing of the new heavens and the new earth, depends on that - the worth of which cannot change.

Morally speaking, the cross maintains it all. The question of good and evil, raised in the garden of Eden, was settled in the cross. I get the blessed Son of God, never using His divine power to screen Himself from suffering, not using it to hinder the suffering, but to sustain Him in it, to enable Him to bear what none could have gone through without it. When I come to God in this way, I apprehend what sin is, not merely my actual sins, but that in me dwelleth no good thing. I get One, hanging upon the cross, made sin before God at the very moment when the full character of sin was manifested in the rejection of Christ. And there, where man was wholly a sinner, and Christ stood in that place for him, all that God is, was brought out. Where could you find full righteousness against sin? In no place but the cross, which gives perfect righteousness against sin and love to the sinner in that same blessed work, and that in a man, and when sin was brought out in its worst character.

244 Look at Him at the grave of Lazarus; a wonderful scene! The Lord was there in perfect obedience, for when they sent the tenderest message to Him: "Lord, he whom thou lovest is sick"; He abode still two days where He was. Death was weighing upon their spirits: what made Him weep? He was not weeping for Lazarus. Death was there, and it seemed all over; but no, "I am the resurrection and the life." I am come into this scene where death is lying on your hearts. I am the resurrection and the life in the midst of it; and when that was shewn, which even Thomas saw was on His path, He goes out Himself to die! There did not remain a slur or stain upon what God is. Not only was His righteous judgment against sin shewn, as it could be nowhere else, but His love, in that He spared not His own Son. That work and act of Christ, went up as a sweet savour to God; He gives Himself in perfect devoted love to His Father; perfect love was manifested, and all that God is. "Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him": outward dishonour, but moral glory; what was in the nature of God, and what was in man as hatred against God, all brought out, Christ giving Himself up wholly and totally, that God should be perfectly glorified; so that in that sense of the word, God was a debtor to man for the infinite glory brought to Him, and that where sin had come in, where death had come in! He hung there as made sin, and God is more glorified, than if sin had never come in. It is a wonderful thing - nothing like it! He does bear our sins, blessed be His name, but when we see the blessed Son of God made sin, there is nothing like that! None of us can speak of it properly, but I trust your hearts will look at it and feed upon it.

But what I have not yet referred to is, that the offerer was to do it, for his acceptance. I leave the offering now, for the man who comes by it. "By faith, Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts." Coming by that sacrifice - it is important our hearts should get hold of it - I am accepted in the Beloved, in all its sweet savour. I go to God in the sweet savour of all that Christ is; not simply that my sins are put away - there I can stand in righteousness as to my sins before God - but coming by that in which God delights, He delights in me as in it, loved as Christ is loved; it brings into fellowship and communion with God, as to the value of Christ's place. I know He takes perfect delight in me - a worthless creature in myself - and the more I know it, the better; but there is no condemnation for them that are in Christ Jesus. I go to God in Him, in the perfect sweet savour of Christ. It is not a question of any particular sin, but I go to God with the consciousness of being received and delighted in; I go, as the fruit of the travail of His soul. God sees in me, the perfection of Christ's work, and it is for ever and ever; but it rests upon our hearts now.

245 We must come by the sin-offering, but we get in this a great deal more; no actual sin spoken of, but the sense of what His glory requires, accomplished in Christ where sin was, so that there is nothing also in the character of God not perfectly glorified, and that in love to us. Not merely my sins are put away, but I go offering Christ, so to speak. I present Christ, and God testifies of the gift. I say, what is the measure of my righteousness? Christ; and therefore we are received to the glory of God. And now, in weakness and infirmity here, speaking of our standing before God, it is in all the delight He had, not merely in Christ as a living Man, but in all the perfection of His work in the place of sin, where all that He is was glorified - obedient unto death.

I do not like saying, Where are your hearts about it? but - what I do desire for us all - Does my soul go to God, owning that righteousness of God, that love of God, the gift of God in it, and that He testifies of the gifts?

May He give us to see, what we never can fathom, what it was to that Holy One to be made sin, He who was the delight of the Father's bosom; that our souls may feed on Him, eat His flesh and drink His blood - not only know that we are washed from our sins.

246 The Meat-offering- Leviticus 2

In the burnt-offering, beloved friends, we had the way in which Christ, sin being in the world, offered Himself without spot to God. Here, we have more His perfectness in detail, brought down to us. The priests ate part of the meat-offering, they ate nothing of the burnt-offering. We get what Christ was in His perfectness down here, all the characters and traits of that perfectness, but brought to us; the burnt-offering was not brought to us, but was burned entirely before God. Sin was there, atonement made - not sins, but sin - and it was a perfect sweet savour to God. Here, it is more the detail of what He was as a man, but burned with fire - the test of His perfectness.

Verse 1. Here, I get the general character of the Lord: fine flour, perfect humanity, "this man hath done nothing amiss," as the poor thief said on the cross. Then the oil (the Spirit) and frankincense put upon it: perfect in Himself, without sin, in every sense, and then the Holy Ghost sent in bodily shape like a dove, and abiding on Him. He could not join Himself with Israel, for they were sinners and unbelieving, but there was a remnant called out of God by the ministry of John the Baptist, and He goes with them in their first right step. When He thus came out publicly, the Holy Ghost came upon Him. He takes His place, in a public way, among this remnant who were going right, under the testimony of John the Baptist, and so, blessed be His Name, He does with us in our first right step. We need redemption to bring us into the place where He stood by reason of His own perfectness. He was sealed with the Holy Ghost; we get it because of the blood; the leper was first washed, then sprinkled with blood and then anointed with oil. He made the place into which we are brought by redemption. Heaven opened, a Man upon earth, upon whom the Holy Ghost descends and abides; and the Father's voice came, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." But He must die, to bring us into it. The gift of the Holy Ghost was confined to Him until redemption was accomplished, He had to finish the work and take His place on high.

We get the fine flour, and the oil, and the frankincense upon it, the perfect sweet savour of His life to God; not the sweet savour of the sacrifice, but all His life His words and works, a sinless Man, passing through this world; all He said and did was by the Holy Ghost. He was the Anointed Man, which is what the name Messiah or Christ means. "He whom God hath sent, speaketh the words of God, for God giveth not the Spirit by measure."

247 Verse 2. Here we get what was very sweet, as to the path of Christ, in which we have to seek to follow Him. The handful was all burned to God. Christ, looked at as Man, was burned to God; "the flour thereof, the oil thereof, and all the frankincense thereof." Here I get the perfectness of Christ in His path - that He never did anything to be seen of men; it all went entirely up to God. The savour of it was sweet to the priests, but it all was addressed to God. Serving man, the Holy Ghost was in all His ways, but all the effect of the grace that was in Him, was in His own mind always toward God; even if for man, it was to God. And so with us; nothing should come in, no motive, except what is to God. We see in Ephesians 4: 32; ch. 5: 1, 2, the grace towards man, and the perfectness of man towards God as the Object. "Be ye imitators of God as dear children." In all our service as following Christ here, we get these two principles; our affections towards God and our Father, and the operation of His love in our hearts towards those in need: the more wretched the object of service in the latter case, the truer the love and the more simply the motive is to God. We may love down and love up; and the more wretched and unworthy the persons are, for whom I lay myself out for blessing, the more grace there is in it. "God commendeth his love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." But while that is true, yet as to the state of my heart, the higher the object, the more elevated the affection. With Christ it was perfect. How can a poor creature like me be an imitator of God? Was not Christ an example, God, seen in a man? And we are to "walk in love, as Christ also loved us, and gave himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God." He gave Himself for us, but to God; it was God's grace towards poor wretched sinners.

If we look at ourselves, we shall soon see how motives get mixed up, and things come in, even where there is right truehearted purpose; and that is where we have to watch. In Christ, all was perfect; all, every bit of it, as to spring and motive, was for God's glory in this world. No thought of men, as to pleasing them, but that singleness of eye which looked to God alone, though full of kindness to man - loving down, in that sense, but ever looking up, with His God and Father before His eye, which made Him perfect in everything. He was perfect, of course, could not be anything else.

248 Now, it is not that the priests could not smell the sweet savour of the sacrifice, but it was not offered to them, it was all burned to God: as regards His own path, not a feeling that was not entirely to God - for us, but to God. It was that which was perfectly acceptable to God.

Verse 3. Here is where we are brought, looked at as priests, our eye opened. It was the food of the offering of Jehovah, but it is our food too; we must be priests to have it, it is most holy to the Lord. I may see external beauties in Christ, I might write a book on the beautiful traits in His character - but that is not Christ's life. It is an entirely different thing when the priest gets it as God's food. (I am bold to use the word, for scripture does so.) The priests ate it, while as to the frankincense everything was burned wholly to God. In the burnt-offering the priest did not eat anything; it was the absolute offering of Himself to God. There was a sustaining power, a perfectly holy power, and all perfectly acceptable to God; but then at the same time, it is what we feed upon as priests. We get our souls formed into delighting in Christ, by realising in our spirits, what God Himself, the Father, takes such delight in. It is a blessed place; we need, and have to seek spiritual apprehension, to find what it is that makes Christ the delight of the Father - what was the expression of that grace, always well pleasing to Him.

We follow His path in the Gospels, and we see always perfect love to us poor things, but everything perfectly and absolutely done to the Father. Turn to Matthew 17 where we get a bright example of the condescending grace with which He associates us with Himself, while shewing Himself to be the Son of the Father, in divine knowledge and power. It was just after the transfiguration, where the heavenly glory of the kingdom was revealed; His ministry as come into the midst of Israel, according to promise, closed, so that He strictly forbade them to say that He was the Christ. But what does He give them instead, if not yet in the glory revealed on the mount? This tribute was not to the heathen emperors, but what had been ordained in Ezra's time for the expenses of the temple services. They come and ask Peter, Does not his Master pay it? in fact, was He a good Jew? Peter says, Yes; he does not look further. But when he comes into the house, the Lord anticipates him; He shews who He is, He knows all divinely, the Son of the great King, Jehovah, and He joins Peter with Himself; children of the great King of the temple. Then He shews His divine power over creation, and makes the fish bring Him the money and the exact sum,* and again puts Peter with Himself; "that take and give them for thee and me." We find the place He took in lowliness down here, but while taking the low place, bringing us into the high place with Himself. We are changed from glory to glory as we gaze upon Him, but it is the humiliation side, as in Philippians 2, which wins our affections.

{*The word translated "piece of money" is Stater, just two Didrachmas, the name of the coin due for one, also found here.}

249 Satan sought to get Him out of that absolute singleness of eye, in which He was perfect: "command that these stones be made bread"; but He had no orders to do it, no word out of the mouth of God: that was His manna, and He came as a servant. In Philippians 3 you get the other side - Christ glorified, and Paul running after to win Christ; the energy which hinders other things getting possession of the heart. But it is the humiliation side we get here - Christ humbling Himself, making Himself of no reputation, that I may run in the same path and spirit, for the glory of the Father. Was He ever impatient? Did He ever do a single thing for Himself? It was always God, His Father, in one sense, His disciples and the poor world, in another. And where the affections are drawn out, it is always on this humbled side. It is touching to go through the gospels, and to get sufficiently intimate with Christ, to see His motives in everything; but this is much to say, and requires to live much with Him; but this is blessing. When I get "thee and me," what a strange putting together that is! And He does it with us too: knowing who He is, the Son of the Father down here, He says, "thee and me." If you get to trace Him through all the path, you never get anything but perfectness.

When I think of the death of Christ, His love to the Father, taking the cup the Father gave Him to drink, I find my delight, my soul bowed down at the thought of all the love and obedience that was in it. And He says, "Therefore doth my Father love me." It is God's food too! We shall soon see how far He is beyond our thoughts.

250 Now (verse 4) we get some details, to bring out Christ more perfectly. "Unleavened cakes." The general truth was there before, but here we get no trace or form of sin in Him: nor indeed employment of mere amiability of nature, or what refreshes nature; neither can be in a sacrifice. Unleavened cakes with no honey in them. Leaven is not found in an offering except on the day of Pentecost, when we come in; there, consequently there is. The cakes were offered to God, but not burnt on the altar for a sweet savour, and a sin-offering was offered with them. There are two characters here: Christ, looked at as man, was born of the Holy Ghost, no sin in Him; we are born in sin, and get a new nature, but He was personally perfect, no leaven in Him at all. Instead of leaven, it was fine flour mingled with oil - as to His flesh, He was born of the Spirit. Then it is added, "unleavened wafers anointed with oil": Christ received the Spirit as man, down here, to walk as man, in the power of the Holy Ghost, in obedience; and then, having gone up on high to the Father, He sends the Spirit down upon us. The Father (John 14) sends Him, that we may cry, Abba; and on the other hand, Christ sends Him from the Father, as the testimony to what He is at the right hand of God. We cannot get the anointing and the sealing, that is the Holy Ghost, till we are washed with water and have faith in the efficacy of Christ's blood.

Verse 6. "Thou shalt part it in pieces"; every bit of Christ (in figure), every word He said, everything He did, all was perfect, the expression of what was divine in a man down here: not only that His general life expressed the fruits of the Spirit, but every word, every work, all absolutely perfect. Now, we may in a general way walk in the Spirit, but we often fail. But I can follow Him any day, and every day, and find "nothing amiss." It is a wonderful thing to look round this world of sin and wretchedness, and be able to trace one Person everywhere and every when, and find nothing but what was perfect. No matter what it was - obedience, love, grace, firmness - all that came out was the expression of what was perfect, in and for the place where He was. Beloved friends, I am sure I trust you do, but I would exhort you, in that way, to feed on Christ; "he that eateth Me, even he shall live by Me." In studying Him down here, the soul gets intimate with Him; we feed on that on which God our Father feeds.

251 Verses 7-9. Here I get another element. When the fire of God's judgment tested Christ, there was only a sweet savour. Now, if we get tested, alas! often the flesh comes out - I do not say always. He got tested by the evil of man, the terribleness of death, the power of Satan, and finally by the judgment of God (the proper meaning of fire as a figure), and nothing came out but what was absolutely a sweet savour. God says He is the elect and precious stone, and to the believer He is precious too!

Verse 11. "Brought to the Lord," that is the point; I must have a Christ, wholly and entirely giving Himself up to God. "Nor any honey": mere sweetness of nature cannot come in. There are sweet things which God Himself has established, but Christ was entirely outside all these things: not as condemning them - when His work was over, He could commit His mother to John. There are things which God graciously gives us here, but you cannot put them as a sacrifice. They are of God in themselves: only sin has come in and spoiled the whole thing. The honey itself was not wrong. The coming of Titus comforted Paul; he got in the conflict, like Jonathan, a little honey on the top of his rod, so to speak. And the comfort was of God, who comforts them that are cast down. The poor woman at the well, the thief on the cross, were Christ's comforters. Honey cannot come into the sacrifice: neither the sin of nature, nor mere natural joy, can come into the sacrifice of Christ. The condemning it is all a mistake; Christ carefully maintained what God had originally established: but now, we get a drunken husband beating his wife, children who are a torture to their parents; for sin has come in, though the relationships are of God. But when you come to what is for God, there can be no more honey than leaven.

Verse 13. Another principle here. I get "salt," that is not sweetness. It is complete separation of heart to God - the salt of the covenant of our God. God in sovereign grace has taken me up, and separated me to Himself; it is the positive side, which preserves me for God and with God; and that, beloved friends, is what we are to desire: it is not merely no leaven and no honey; that is the negative side. There is no separation by ourselves in us; we cannot make holiness: it is holiness to the Lord, the heart separated to God in everything; a separation of heart and spirit with no pretension in it, for we are bought with a price, therefore glorify God in your body. Through the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, the everlasting covenant, we are brought to God. Do I go and leave God to go to some vanity? - I do not say sin: I do not care what it is - the savour of Christ, of God, is gone. But in Christ, and walking with Him in the heart, I see a Man always separated in heart to God; it stamped everything.

252 It is not that we are to be heroes every day. I may see a person energetic in his service, but it may not come directly from God; it is a totally different thing, as regards our service, when it does. Look at 1 Thessalonians 1: 3; Revelation 2: 1, etc. You get here the three things spoken of in 1 Corinthians 13; faith, hope, love. In 1 Thessalonians 1 I get the principle of direct association with God in each operation of grace, which gives it its power and character. It is work, labour, and patience, but "work of faith, labour of love, patience of hope of our Lord Jesus Christ before our God and Father." I may go and serve the poor - very right and sweet - but is God's love in it? Patience is a very good thing, but am I waiting for Christ to come? In Revelation 2 there was work and labour and patience; but they had left their first love; the freshness and spring was not as it had been, not coming forth from and in immediate intercourse with God, so as to carry it in the power of God to the person's soul. There should be the salt of the covenant of our God; it is obligatory to have our service right, though sovereign grace; always serving in immediate intercourse with God. It is not merely that there is no sin, leaven, or honey, but positive spiritual energy, that associates my heart with God in all that I do. Only remember, that with us, there is no holiness without an object, "changed into the same image from glory to glory." We cannot have holiness in ourselves; that is God's prerogative; we cannot do without that which is perfectly blessed before us - only God has so bound us up with Christ, that while He is the power of the life in which we walk in it, He is the expression of that divine life in a man down here, and beholding Him in glory, we are delivered from the motives which would have hindered our walking thus, and furnished with those which form us into His likeness.

Verse 14. Here, I get Christ as the first-fruits to God. And another thing: He has been in the fire. All this blessed grace in His life has been fully and perfectly tried, even to death and judgment - not looking at Christ's death as atonement, but looking at Him in His trials to see whether nothing but a sweet savour would come out. The only time when He asked that the cup might pass from Him, it was piety. When it was the terrible cup of God's wrath, He could not go through it without feeling what it was: it was piety, which shrank from the forsaking of God, it was the thing that tested His obedience absolutely. He had been tried by man's hatred, by Satan's power in death and the terror of judgment; but it was a very different thing, when He had to drink that cup, the Holy One of God to be made sin and He before God as such - the One eternally in the bosom of the Father, having to say, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" But here was His perfectness; "The cup that my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?" He was tested and was always perfect. Supposing it had been possible He had not gone on, it would have shewn all His obedience to be imperfect, that when perfectly tested, it would not stand. But there was not a single thing but His own absolute divine perfectness that stood! His disciples forsook him. All else were against Him, and when He turned to God, it was, "Why hast thou forsaken me?" There was absolute testing, and He went through the fire as a sweet savour. "Therefore doth my Father love me." Sin, death had come in, Satan's power; and He goes through it all, in the power of absolute obedience and love to His Father - the testing to the end. There is the perfection of the thing which we have seen; perfect in its origin, perfect as sealed by the Holy Ghost, and now perfect when tested to the utmost, obedient unto death. Therefore God also hath highly exalted Him and given Him a Name which is above every name. He has gone back there as Man, in virtue of what He was down here.

253 And here, beloved brethren, is what we have got to think of; all Christ's perfectness in His life, and on the other side, perfectness according to the covenant of salt in His death: not then saying, "I know that thou hearest me always," but, though doing that which perfectly pleased the Father, of which He could say, "Therefore doth my Father love me," yet, as to relief and comfort at the time, none from man (there could be none from Satan), none from God The basis of eternal blessing was laid then according to the glory of God.

254 I have got Him in all His life through, as the meat-offering, to feed upon, study, get acquainted with - to feed upon that which was perfectly offered to God.

The Lord only give us to do it, and then, when we meet Him, it will be joy.

The Peace-offering - Leviticus 3

This portion is different in character from what we had before, and closes this particular class of offerings.

The burnt-offering was not for particular sins, but it was atonement: Christ made sin for us (the difference may be clearly seen in Hebrews 9: compare John 1) but offering Himself entirely to God, so that in the fact of being made sin, the highest perfection of love and obedience was found: all the perfectness of Christ Himself towards God, and surely of love to us; but more - all that God is, perfectly glorified.

Chapter 2 takes up Christ as a man upon the earth, the character of Christ as thus come: burned in the fire, that is, tested by the perfectness of divine judgment, and nothing but a sweet savour: all the frankincense went up to God. It is a wonderful description in detail of what Christ was in all His path - no leaven, no honey, no earthly affection, or comfort in His sacrifice (He was a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief), but salt and a sweet savour to the Lord. In one case the cake was broken into pieces, and every piece was anointed, to shew that everything He did or word He spoke was by the power of the Spirit.

Chapter 3 gives us not only the offering, but the fellowship of the saints in the offering. While in the previous ones Christ Himself was presented, He is here presented along with our partaking of it: they ate it: the blood and the fat offered to the Lord, and then the offerer partaking in what was offered. Other elements were connected with it; but in all this there was nothing to say to sin - an immensely important principle as to what is properly worship.

In the burnt-offering, there was nothing of positive acts of sin, but we get the notion of sin being in the world, and approach to God referring to its presence there, and Christ glorifying God, as a victim for it, doing such a service that He could say, "therefore doth my Father love me"; but the work in itself was a perfect glorifying of God, as He could not have been glorified otherwise. "That the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father hath given me commandment even so I do." There was perfect love to the Father, besides the question of our sins, and perfect obedience: perfect love when He was forsaken, and the obedience was perfected when it cost Him that forsaking. His motives too were perfect: love to us surely, but love to His Father, obedient when God was forsaking Him. The more terrible the suffering, the more dreadful the cup, the greater the sacrifice. It is such a comfort for us that that question of sin before God has been perfectly gone into and settled. That solemn question, Christ takes up and puts Himself forward in grace to glorify God in it and by it: where man was against Him, the devil against Him, all the world against Him, the disciples ran away, comfort He had none, and in death, God Himself forsook Him. When everything outward, human and devilish was against Him, and He cried to God, then He was forsaken of God: it was the righteous judgment of God against Him, because He was made sin for us: then He goes as man to sit down on the right hand of God. That is all settled; and I can look at Christ as the sweet savour, in the absolute perfectness in which He offered Himself to God and was tested in His obedience. Then in chapter 2 all the blessed perfectness of Christ in His life, tested, tried, broken to pieces, comes out.

255 In chapter 3 we get worship: they fed upon what God fed on. In our association with God, our intercourse with God, in worship, there is nothing about sin: it is that which is all gone, through Christ's offering Himself for us, and then I come to God with Christ in my hand, so to speak, I present Him to God and I feed upon Him. I come with that which is perfectly acceptable to God. It is not that there are not faults and failings in us - but here I dwell on the offering itself; it was a perfect burnt-offering made by fire unto the Lord. All that was in the inwards, everything that is in Christ was absolutely offered to God. I get the blood, which was the life; the fat, the sign of the energy of nature, all given to God - no thought with Christ, no act, no object, but His Father. It was for us, thank God! but still absolutely to God: no infirmity, no listlessness of heart, but all given to God entirely, all the inward fat burned to God. Mark, not bearing our sins - that is never called a sweet savour except in one particular case. He was made sin, and that was not a sweet savour, though He was never so holy and perfect as then.

256 When we come worshipping, it is not even about Christ as the One who put away our sins; I can approach to worship because of that, my conscience being purged; but worship is in the sense that the thing I am feeding upon is a sweet savour to God, what my soul feeds on, nourishes itself by. The worshipper is connected with the sacrifice, and the question of sin is not touched in it, though blood always supposes it to have been there: it is the food of God become my food. It is a blessed thing to see Christ's perfectness; that every thought, feeling, motive, everything He was, every movement of His heart was absolutely to God. "In that he liveth, he liveth unto God." (I take the principle merely.) In everything in which there was energy, there was no energy of self-will; it was a perfect giving of Himself to God - the only One in whom it ever was in that perfectness. "Hereby know we love, because he laid down his life for us," 1 John 3: 16. We ought to walk like Him, love the brethren, lay down our lives for them, but then it should be to God.

I bless God, that in His sovereign grace, His blessed Son took my sins and bore them upon the cross; but when I go to God to worship, it is as occupied with that One who is perfectly acceptable to God. Abel came with the fat of his lambs and God gave testimony to his gifts. Here, the worshipper comes and feeds upon it, and the Lord had His food of the offering; it was what characterised it. And see how close it brings us to God; why, so to speak, I am sitting at the same table with God, feeding on the same thing He is feeding on (only all was offered to Him and so I eat it)! - the Lord's food of the offering. I sit down and eat, there is no question of my sins, but of the sweetness of Christ - I talking to God about it; our true intercourse with God is that. "He that eateth me," etc. Here I get that the very thing my soul is feeding on, delighting in, is the food and the delight of God; we get this nearness to God, the soul enjoying what God Himself is delighting in; the offerer comes to God by it, has intercourse with God about it. It is not prayer, the peace-offering was never prayer; when I pray, I go to God about my wants, and prayer will occur even in the highest place - for when I think of the blessedness of Christ, I say, Would to God I were like Him! and it turns to prayer; but still that is a different thing from worship, though it may and will accompany it. I pray as regards my need; I worship in the sense of what I have got. God delights in what Christ is - inexpressibly of course; my soul draws near with Him in my hand, and I find I am going on with God. It was put upon the burnt-offering, identified with it. But all this worship of God supposes no more conscience of sins. "Their sins and iniquities will I remember no more." It is no question whether I can be accepted or not, but coming with Christ in my hand I come by Him, as having offered Himself, in the consciousness that my soul is occupied with that which is God's highest delight. A wonderful thought! it shews what we ought to be and what our worship ought to be; and what we eat turns to be part of ourselves.

257 The character of the peace-offering was, it was presented to the Lord, not as bearing our sins; all true worship of God supposes the question of sin to be totally settled for ever. Chastening, we may get in passing through the wilderness, but the question of imputation, of having sins on us before God, is done with for ever. Sin is a dreadful thing, but it was all settled between God and Christ, when He was made sin for us. But the heart is apt to stay there in thinking of that. Well, without that, we could not get into heaven; but the proper worship of heaven consists in delighting in what God is, what Christ is, when He offered Himself a sweet savour to God. We cannot come at all except by that sacrifice: we turn to God and we find Christ bore our sins; but what I press now is, that as regards that, the whole thing is settled. "Where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin." "When he had by himself purged our sins he sat down." We are not like the poor Jews - I enter into the holiest, but more than that: have I nothing to bring, my heart no offering to bring to God? Yes, in Christ there is that in which God delights, and I come to God presenting Him.

Chapter 7: 13. Besides the unleavened cakes leavened bread was offered; here we have got ourselves. I come with the offering that has been slain, with Christ in my hand, and I find too all the blessed perfectness of the meat-offering, His perfection as Man, the fine flour, no leaven at all: God delighted in Him as a living Man. I get it anointed with oil, mingled with oil, the perfectness of His manhood and besides that, now leavened bread; there am I, the worshipper. If I come to God, I own the sin, the leaven in me, but that cannot be burned as a sweet savour. I come with the leaven. I cannot say I am sinless, as Christ; I cannot be "that Holy thing," but I come with Christ in my hand. I come with the knowledge of my imperfection, but with that in which I am most perfectly accepted. God takes knowledge of that by which I come; all sins blotted out and forgiven, but I cannot say I have no sin, that is all a mistake; it is leavened bread, the leaven within, and we cannot help its being there, though not allowing it to act. The point is, I go with the sense in my soul that I have leaven: if I say I have no sin, as a present thing, I deceive myself, and the truth is not in me. There is no forgiveness for sin; for sins there is; but "what the law could not do," etc., "God condemned sin in the flesh." I get deliverance from any thought of this leaven hindering me, for I find God condemned it when Christ died. I do not talk of His forgiving it, it was all gone when Christ died. I cannot say I have none in me, but I can say I died with Christ, and I am not in it. "I write unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for his name's sake," 1 John 2: 12.

258 There is no such thing as an unforgiven Christian. It is very interesting to see the work of God in a soul on the road towards peace; all that has its place; but that is before I have got the knowledge of the blood which cleanses it all, of the blessed truth that the blow which rent the veil and opened the holiness of God upon me, presented me there without a veil, but fit to stand in it. A Christian is a forgiven person; but I cannot say sin is not there. When I see the sin, I say, why God must condemn me for it! and in one sense it is quite true, He must; but why condemn you when He has condemned it in Christ already? I do not come denying that I am leavened; I own it; but what I present to God is not myself, it could not be burnt for a sweet savour, and I have a title, in that sense, to forget it, because God has dealt with it in Christ, and then I come with unleavened bread to keep the feast.

When the offering was a vow, they could eat it for two days; when a thanksgiving, for one day only. If my heart is full of Christ in the power of the Spirit of God, it connects all my worship with the value of Christ's offering to God, it is associated with that before God, I have fellowship with God as to it. But supposing I go on, and sing, say a hymn, and instead of thinking of the blessedness of Christ and of the Father's love, I get enjoying the singing; I disconnect the worship from Christ. Take our common worship; is it connected with Christ's acceptableness to God? if not, it has lost its savour; apart from that sacrifice, what is it worth? There may be enjoyment of the ideas, it may go as far as that, but it has lost its savour, and that is a thing that creeps in very easily. I cannot be with God to know the blessedness of what I have, unless it is connected with the sacrifice to God. And what a thought, beloved friends! that when I do go, it is with the acceptableness of Christ, with what God finds His delight in! If I go to pray - all perfectly right - I am a poor needy creature, who wants everything from God: but worship is another thing; I go with that in my hand which I know to be of God's delight. I go, Christ having died for me, my soul having the consciousness of God's positive delight in the sacrifice of Christ, and if my worship in any part gets separated from that, it has lost its sweet savour.

259 One other thing. The priest who offered it, ate part of it. It was a joy to all, but Christ takes His part, His joy in it too. God has His food in it, I have my food; but the priest has his part too. It is the fullest association of God with Christ and the worshipper. It was for all who were invited too - love to all saints, the heart takes all in to love. It shews what true worship is, when I get there: it is not merely my sins are borne, but I get my delight in what I know is God's delight, and must be. It is what the whole community of the saints must delight in, and He says, "In the midst of the church will I sing praises unto thee." It connects all with the glory in blessedness: being such in ourselves, we anticipate in the weakness we are in now, the worship of the saints in eternal ages.

I desire that the two great principles and substance of the thing may rest upon our hearts - that I am there with God, the heart giving itself up to God in thanksgiving. I go to God with this offering of Christ, and I know He does not impute anything to me; when I look up to God, I know He cannot. Here, God has found in Christ what His soul feeds on - what He delights in - we may say it reverently. I delight in it, a poor weak creature, and I know God delights in it. He receives me in worship according to His judgment of Christ.

260 How far do our souls so enter into God's thoughts, that when we come to God in worship (all our lives ought to be in the spirit of worship) it is in the spirit of our minds, as connected with God's value for the offering of Christ, in our every-day walk, never to lose sight of what the sweet savour of that offering was to God? The Lord only give us that it may be thus associated in our hearts with what Christ was towards His Father!

Omniscience - God's Searchings

J. N. Darby.

<34011E> 261 {1853}

Psalm 139

It is a solemn thought for the soul to be under the searching of Omniscience itself. Yet this is the foundation of solid peace to him who believes the gospel of the grace of God. The searching of Omniscience, moreover, gives real value to the present priestly ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ; and it will be found also the only ground of practical holiness. In this respect there is an essential difference between him that is spiritual, and a man even of deep thought and high intellect. He that is quickened by the Spirit is frequently able to interpret things strange and paradoxical to others. "The spiritual man judgeth all things," and he knows "the end of the Lord."

Every human being has been searched by Omniscience, whether he is conscious of it or not. This will be made clear "in the day when God will judge the secrets of men." The searching of "the thoughts and intents of the heart" by the word of God now, is the means of bringing God's knowledge into application to our conscience before that day. And when this is the case, then are we conscious that our thoughts are understood afar off, and that there is not a word in the tongue, but the Lord knoweth it altogether. He has "beset us behind and before." He can look backward, and He can look forward also. All our history is before Him, as if it had been written after we had run our course. "O Lord, Thou hast searched me," is the language of the Psalmist - not "Thou art doing it now, or wilt do it hereafter, but thou hast done it already." "O Lord, thou hast searched me and known me. Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising, Thou understandest my thought afar off. Thou winnowest [marg.] my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways" (v. 1-3).

We do not like to have our paths winnowed. We like to be accredited by men for our zeal and devotedness. But when our paths are winnowed, all our thoughts are discovered and opened to us. If God acted toward us according to our experience of ourselves, what believer would not have his peace disturbed? The practical experience of "the deceitfulness and desperate wickedness of our hearts" is from bad to worse. Herein is the great error of that which is termed progressive sanctification. God is not forming a people for their own, but "for His praise." He is shewing them what they are in themselves, in order to shew them by His Spirit the blessed suitability of Christ to all their need. If God be winnowing our path, it is on the ground that He has searched us already, known us altogether, and provided for what He knows we need. "The word of God is quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow." This is a painful process, either pricking the heart, and leading to godly sorrow (Acts 2), or cutting the heart (Acts 7: 54), stinging the conscience, leading to murderous anger. And the word of God is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in His sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do. And when the word thus performs its office, it leads us to value the priesthood of Christ. "Seeing then that we have a great High Priest," etc.

262 We can never get from under this searching process. "Whither shall I go from thy Spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee" (v. 7-12). The Lord Jesus says to the church of Thyatira: "All the churches shall know that I am he which searcheth the reins and hearts." When God quickens a sinner, dead in trespasses and sins, He makes him to know what it is to be, not only a sinner by acts of disobedience, but a sinner by nature, that sin "dwelleth" in him. And this He does by searching him, and winnowing his paths, and making him, in measure, see himself, even as God sees him.

The Lord Jesus did not commit himself to those who believed in His name, when they saw His miracles, "because he knew all men, and needed not that any should testify of man; for he knew what was in man," John 2: 23-25. With the fairest outside, both as to candour and religion, He knew what was in man. Others might have judged, that conviction was the groundwork of their faith; but such is man's heart, that miracles do not produce solid conviction. Jesus knew this, for He knew all men. Israel of old saw "the great work which the Lord did upon the Egyptians." Then believed they His words, they sang His praise. "They soon forgat his works." And when the Lord again visited Israel, this was the testimony, "Ye also have seen me, and believe not." "Though he had done so many miracles before them, yet they believed not on him." His own select disciples, the eye-witnesses of His miracles, forsook Him and fled, when He was betrayed into the hands of men.

263 When the searching of omniscience discovers to one, what it really is to be a sinner, and that good does not dwell in him, that is, in his flesh, it discovers, also, that the ground on which God is acting towards him is that of the fullest grace.

The God who knows all our hearts, knows that these hearts are beyond measure worse than all the sins we have committed. His verdict against man is still the same that it was before the flood, "the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth," "every imagination of the thoughts of his heart is only evil continually." All the progress of man has not set aside this verdict of God. We must recognise then that God knows us, knows us just as we are, knew us from the very outset, as He says to Jeremiah, "Before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb, I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations" (Jer. 1: 5): or as later with the apostle: "When it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb and called me by his grace," etc. (Gal. 1: 15). God knows us from the beginning to the end of our course; His estimate of us is, "the flesh profiteth nothing"; and it is well, if we lay down this estimate as our first axiom. But then the same God has spoken to us in the gospel, of the remission of sin. But it is remission of sin according to His omniscience, therefore of all sin - and if God speaks to us of the righteousness of faith, it is according to His omniscience, "everlasting righteousness." "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever," has thrown the efficacy of what He Himself is into all that He has done. He has offered one sacrifice for sins, of abiding efficacy. He has "obtained eternal redemption," and "brought in everlasting righteousness." He has "perfected for ever them that are sanctified." He is "consecrated a priest for evermore." All the value of the work and offices of Christ flows from the glory of His Person. The whole question between God and the awakened sinner is settled upon the ground of the unalterable value of what Christ has done. In this sense, the word 'progressive' is human, not divine. "It is finished" excludes the idea of progression. "I know that whatsoever God doeth, it shall be for ever: nothing can be put to it, nor anything taken from it: and God doeth it, that men may fear before him." 'Progress' is necessarily associated with change, but truth is immutable. "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever." We have all truth in the word, and the Spirit to guide into all truth. The work of the Lord Jesus Christ is commensurate with, yea, rises infinitely above, all our need as sinners. There are things reported unto us by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, to tell out heaven's estimate of Christ's sufferings, and the glory to follow, which angels desire to look into; 1 Peter 1: 12.

264 The great hindrance to solid peace, is a reasoning still in our own minds, as to whether we are really as bad as God knows us to be. It is expecting to find ourselves better and better in ourselves, instead of seeing that God acts upon His own omniscience as to what we are, and not upon what we are thinking of ourselves, and presents to us His own estimate of Christ's work and priesthood. The gospel is "the gospel of God," Rom. 1: 1. It is God who bears witness to the total ruin of man, and it is the same God who bears testimony to the complete efficacy of Christ's work. This is of all importance; for no one perfectly knows the badness of his own heart, and no one perfectly knows the perfections of Christ. We shall be learners throughout eternity of Christ's perfections.

"I will praise thee, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works, and that my soul knoweth right well" (v. 14). Most marvellous! Look at man; is he not most skilfully and wonderfully contrived? See in the same person the loftiest flights of thought, and the most debasing passions! Physically and morally, we are fearfully and wonderfully made. If we regard the second Man the Lord from heaven, Immanuel, God with us, the One testified unto by Jehovah of Hosts, as "the Man my fellow," Him who fills the highest heavens, and yet was down here a babe in a manger, who could command the waves, and still the storm, but was buffeted by His creatures - how fearfully and wonderfully made! But we are looking at the Psalm in another aspect, and who so fearfully and wonderfully made, as one quickened by the Spirit, the believer in God's testimony to His Son? The believer holds to two heads. As naturally constituted, we are under "the law of sin and death." Men may deny that man is so constituted, but the fact is before our eyes, that no progress man has made, no advancement, no cultivation, no invention, has liberated him from "the law of sin and death." This is what human philanthropy cannot achieve. But it is here divine philanthropy begins. "God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ," Eph. 2: 4, 5. "The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death," Rom. 8: 5. How fearfully and wonderfully are believers made, holding both to the first, and to the Second Adam! And when we look within, how fearfully and wonderfully made! Our souls know what it is to leave things here behind, and to find Christ excellently precious: and then some vain trifle comes in, and pulls us down, and makes us more intensely interested about the passing trifle, than all the solid realities which are in Christ Jesus. Those who have learned something of themselves, know how often their songs of gratitude and praise are succeeded by murmurings, as with Israel of old - yea, they know how the atheistic thought, that would dethrone God, has battled with the spirit which would fain praise God for redeeming grace and delivering mercy. Those who are taught by the Spirit of truth, are learning the unmitigated evil of the flesh. - "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning." In practice we often contradict this truth, probing into that which is below, and only learning disappointment. But God is never disappointed when we are disappointed. He allows us to be disappointed with ourselves, in order that we may better learn our need of, and be satisfied with Christ. It is hard and painful to us, to be stripped of self, to be searched, and winnowed. We become disappointed with the world, disappointed with other Christians (and this may be needful), but when God winnows our path, we learn to be thoroughly disappointed with ourselves.

265 The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament sheweth His handiwork. But "we are his workmanship." We are not workers, for "by grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God; not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship." And this we are "to the intent, that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God," as well as that "in the ages to come, he may shew forth the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness towards us, through Christ Jesus." The church of the living God is God's peculiar workmanship. There is a false church, the workmanship of man under the guidance of Satan, a foil to the true church. If Christ has a bride, there is a harlot audaciously claiming this honoured place. If God has His city, the heavenly Jerusalem, man is rearing Babylon (let us beware of her delicacies). If there are those who are sealed with the seal of the living God in their foreheads, there are those who have the mark of the beast. But the church of the living God is so peculiarly the workmanship of God, that whenever man has attempted to uphold, strengthen, or form it, he has undermined, weakened, and marred it. God is a jealous God - and He is very jealous of man's presumption in interfering with His church.

266 "My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect, and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there were none of them" (v. 15, 16). We may remark in passing, that "substance yet being unperfect," is one word in the original. Our translators have made use of a strange word 'unperfect,' in order to shew that the sense is not that of imperfect. The new-born babe is a perfect human being, as truly as a man. The rudiments of man are all wrapped up in the babe. The eye of God sees all these rudiments, before they are unfolded. When a sign was given from heaven to the shepherds, it was, "Unto you is born this day, in the city of David, a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you. Ye Shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger" - a strange sign! yet the testimony of heaven (and faith's acknowledgment) was to that babe, as Christ, Jehovah.

Disappointed as we must needs be with ourselves, let us well mark this, that with respect to the members of Christ's mystical body, God sees in every one of them, the rudiments of that which shall shine forth in the day of Christ, to the praise of His glory. We might avail ourselves of many things in nature in illustration, as for instance, the fragile egg of a bird. That egg is perfect - but we do not see in it the bill, the foot, or the wing on which the future lark shall rise toward heaven, trilling its sweet song. But God sees all these there. He did not tell Abraham, A father of many nations will I make thee, but "I have made thee." It is written - "Whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate, to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the first-born among many brethren. Moreover, whom he did predestinate them he also called; and whom he called, them he also justified; and whom he justified, them he also glorified." God must speak His own language. There are links in the divine chain - and our experience may come in, as though to separate them; but God sees in each "vessel of mercy," one "afore prepared unto glory." The members of Christ's mystical body are being here formed out of strange materials, and in a strange place, for that hour when they shall be glorified saints. Angels see God's works in creation, in providence, and in those things in which they are the executors of His will, but they see nothing to compare with the wonderful workmanship of God in quickening into life those who were dead in trespasses and sins. But how unlike are such to glory! groaning in bodies of sin and death - groaning in the midst of, and with, a groaning creation - how unlike glory! But God sees us "yet being unperfect." He sees us through and through, and He sees us as His grace has made us to be in Christ. He too has made provision for us in Christ, for all that He knows we need. "He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from death unto life."

267 There is a blessed turn in the Psalm, at verses 17, 18: "How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them! If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand," etc. This is a blessed theme, the theme of God's thoughts - higher, as the heavens are higher than the earth, than our thoughts, the theme of God's fathomless and illimitable grace. Here there is real liberty. Do we know what it is to have our own thoughts, so narrow, so beggared, so mean, beaten down by God's high, generous, liberal thoughts - His thoughts of us as to what we are in Christ? "It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man, therefore [says Jesus] that hath heard, and learned of the Father, cometh unto Me." Jesus is the great thought of God - God's thoughts are expressed to us in Him. It is not an unfallen angel, but a sinner quickened by the Spirit of God, who can thus get into the deep thoughts of God When he is winnowing our ways, how precious are His thoughts to us: we sometimes try to put one another to shame, to degrade one another - but God works for an expected end. He only humbles us, in order to exalt us; He suffers us to hunger, in order to "prove us, and do us good at our latter end."

268 The time is come when judgment must begin at the house of God. He will search each individual Christian, and make him consciously know the ground on which he can stand before God. "If it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God? and if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?" We can understand the meaning of the word 'scarcely,' when our path is winnowed. It does not imply either uncertainty or imperfection in the salvation which is of God, but we learn that salvation must be of God, and our constant need of it. Finished and complete in itself, faith apprehends it as continually needed, as though our whole life was one of escapes, and "He that is our God is the God of salvation." "He hath delivered, he doth deliver, in whom we trust that he will yet deliver." Those who, in exercise of soul, find out what is in their own hearts, well know that all that is going on in the world around them, is but the manifestation of the very evil, the principles of which God has been discovering, and they have been judging, in their own hearts.

There is a present restraint, under God's hand, on man's evil. Once for a moment God removed it - "This is your hour, and the power of darkness." Again He will remove it, and men will be given over to "strong delusion, to believe a lie, that they all may be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness." The present moment is a solemn one, popery and semi-popery spreading on the one hand, rationalism and infidelity on the other. Of our own selves we must judge righteous judgment. "Surely thou wilt slay the wicked, O God" (v. 19). If He is sifting His own people, He will judge all this proud Christianity, whether sacerdotal or sacramental efficacy, or despising lordship and government. But is the knowledge of being delivered from the wrath to come to settle us in self-complacency? By no means - but under the sheltering certainty, that God has searched and known us (as expressed in the first verse of this Psalm), we can turn this truth into a prayer, and say, in the words of the concluding verses, "Search me, O God, and know my heart, try me and know my thoughts, and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting" (v. 23, 24). None but he who knows the shelter of the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the mercy-seat of God, and is conscious that God has already searched him, and known him, could put up such a prayer. God must be acknowledged as omniscient. We need Him to help us in searching ourselves, because we are partial in self-judgment. The beam is in our own eye, the mote in our brother's eye, and nothing but the Spirit of God can enable us to get the beam out. It is He who searches the reins and hearts, who has said, "Your sins and iniquities will I remember no more," and it is because He remembers them no more, that we can ask Him to shew us what debtors we are to His grace.

269 There was once a man of like passions with ourselves, one who had cursed, and sworn, and denied his Lord, but for whom that Lord had prayed, "Simon, Simon, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat, but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not; and when thou art converted strengthen thy brethren." And after this terrible sifting, when the Lord searched him, twice he answered readily to the challenge, as oft repeated - "Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee." But the question was repeated a third time: "And Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me? And he said unto him, Lord, Thou knowest all things - thou knowest that I love thee." The Lord, in order to get at the bottom of our hearts, may have to remove a great heap of rubbish, such as self-confidence, pride and vanity, but He knows what His own grace has done for us, and He will find His love at the bottom of our hearts; He had to remove a great deal from Peter, a mass of fleshly confidence and forward zeal: He may have to take away from us much of that in which we have gloried, but after all, He will bring out, "Thou knowest that I love thee," personal affection for Himself. In the winnowing of our paths, much may have to be winnowed out that has been cherished more than Christ Himself, but there is at the bottom faith in Christ, and love to Christ. What a mixture of double-mindedness, of pride, of vanity, there is in the best thing we do! Our prayers, our praises, and our service, are so poor and worthless, and yet we are proud of them. We seek praise from our fellow-men for the very things we have to confess, as tainted with sin, before God. What need therefore, to bare our hearts, and say, "See if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." We, perhaps, are not able to detect some particular evil in our own souls, and others may not suspect it. There are instances in which we may thankfully say, "I know nothing by myself" - yet how needful to add, "yet am I not hereby justified; but he that judgeth me is the Lord." But when the Lord applies Himself to His priestly discerning judgment, as the One who searcheth the reins and trieth the heart, we may be led to one discovery after another of some crookedness of motive, sufficient of itself to disturb our peace, but used by the Lord to lead us into "the way everlasting." And is not this way Christ Himself, the only way, the true way, the living way, the way everlasting?

270 How prone are we to depart from this way, therefore is He pleased to search out our own ways, that He may lead us therein - to shew us that Christ must be practically to us that which He declares Himself to be in His word, "The first and the last," our "Alpha and Omega." Happy is it, if we are under that process which, however humbling to ourselves, and humiliating in the eyes of others, leads us still to justify God in using it, and to say, "Search me, O God." All is well that leads us "in the way everlasting," that beats us out of our own ways and brings us there, that makes us in result value Christ for the way, as well as at the outset, and the end - Christ learnt as our portion to live upon, as well as known for the pardon of our sins.

The Lord grant to all His people the blessed secret of self-judgment. "If we judge ourselves, we should not be judged." But if we do not, and are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, "that we may not be condemned with the world."

God's Ways and Testimony

Jeremiah 2

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There are two distinct points in the ways and testimony of God as regards us: first, faith is the condition of soul in us which, as it is in exercise or otherwise, may either hinder or favour the enjoyment, which habitually the testimony of the word is to give to us. Then in presenting the object of faith to our souls - the Father's love, the Son's work - the word of God applies itself to the conscience and heart; for where the conscience is not in exercise the heart will not be, and all will be hollow. When the affections are dull then self comes in, and I attach these holy affections to myself; for when I am thinking about my affections I am thinking about myself. But when the conscience is in exercise we are thinking of the object presented: otherwise the heart is turned in upon self, the Lord is forgotten, and weakness ensues; consequently we sink into a feeble state; but then the word of God presenting the object of faith applies itself to the conscience, bringing that into exercise, and thus the heart is brought back to God.

There can be no true love to Christ while there is the sense of wrong done; for I cannot love a person I have wronged. What is needed then is the consciousness of the wrong done. "I have sinned, and am no more worthy to be called thy son." When the conscience is aroused, and the heart is brought into play, we rest in the presence of God. The Spirit of God may humble us on account of what we have done, but when conscience is in play it brings out our whole condition before God. It is not the law coming in again, but God presenting Himself; thus there will be right affections, and the conscience will be in exercise. Self-confidence and self-exaltation in every form are always the effects of an unexercised conscience. Only put a man in the Lord's presence, and that will keep him lowly, and in a spiritual state of discernment; but there is nothing out of which we so easily get as the consciousness of the presence of God. So also in our prayers. You may often be sensible that you go on praying after you have lost the consciousness that you are speaking to God, still the soul goes on expressing itself; even when led by the Spirit the consequence will be that the manner will be all wrong, though the words may be right. Well, though all this be true, whenever the Lord recalls a soul He recalls it to His own presence. He will act on the conscience; He will speak plainly to us. Why? Because He is conscious of the relationship which ought to have produced the conduct befitting the relationship which we have forgotten. "Is Ephraim my dear son? is he a pleasant child? for since I spake against him, I do earnestly remember him still: therefore my bowels are troubled for him." When the Lord recalls a soul to Himself He may reproach it with having forgotten the relationship in which it stood to God, and God to it; but He cannot reproach it as not having known that relationship. The power of every rebuke is founded on the relationship, and God remembering the relationship acts on the ground of it with all the affections belonging thereto. Thus every rebuke comes to us as the expression of the most wonderful tenderness; and the more deeply we learn that there is no failure in God's affection, the more deeply we lament our short-coming and failure in that relationship which never fails.

272 God said to Jeremiah, "Go, say in the ears of Jerusalem"; but, alas! Israel would not hear. Now this was most disastrous; but God remembers His relationship to them, and says, in Hosea 2: 16, "In that day thou shalt call me Ishi"; that is, my husband, "and shalt no more call me Baali"; that is, my Lord. Evil as their state was, He recalls with all its force and energy the remembrance of their relationship - "Go, cry in the ears of Jerusalem." It is not, "He that hath an ear let him hear," but God goes and speaks in their ears. Oh that He may speak in our ears! When God spake comfortably to Jerusalem then He spake to the heart, and that was after chastening; but here He is at another work, speaking in the ears of Jerusalem that they might hear what God had to say to them. He could say - the true Servant - "The Lord God hath opened mine ear" to hear what God had to say to Him, and He was not rebellious, neither turned away back; but Israel "had forsaken him days without number"; they had done a terrible thing, such as no other nation had done. "Hath a nation changed its gods, which are yet no gods? but my people have changed their glory for that which doth not profit." And again, "Be astonished, O ye heavens, at this, and be horribly afraid, be ye very desolate, saith the Lord. For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water." And now that God is sending a message after them, does He say, 'Go and cry in the ears of Jerusalem, I remember thy sins"? No, but "I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thy espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown." He is recalling what Israel was to God Himself: I remember the outgoings of thy heart towards Me; "I remember the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals."

273 Now what a thing it was for God to say to Israel, 'I have not forgotten what you were to Me in the days of thy youth, when the heart first turned to Me.' In all this we have the same principle as "Ye are they which have continued with me in my temptations," when they were quarrelling which should be the greatest. And so Israel were always murmuring, thinking their leeks and cucumbers better than God; but God remembers the principles on which Israel acted - "When thou wentest after me in the wilderness." They got much of this world's goods in Canaan by following God; they got cities that they had not built, wells that they had not digged, palmtrees that they had not planted, and the like. All these things were the consequences of following God; but He does not mention these. But "thou wentest after me in the wilderness, which was a land of deserts and pits, a land of drought, and the shadow of death, a land that no man passed through, and where no man dwelt"; 'thou wentest after Me in the wilderness, where there was nothing to set your affections on but Myself; I Myself was the whole and sole object of your affections'; and this it was that God remembered. He overlooks all failure, and the condition which God notices is that He Himself was everything to them; and this is what characterises a heart when first converted to God - the Lord is everything to it. What is the world to that heart? Dross and dung. Everything, cares and pleasures are alike forgotten, everything counted as nothing, except what is found in God Himself. The praises of Israel were freely given - "I will prepare him an habitation"; "my father's God, I will exalt him," because they had found Him who was everything to them, and the world and all it had to give a mere nothing.

Now let us look at the other side of the picture, and see the desperately bad state which the heart of Israel had got into, remembering they are but types of us. They were dissatisfied, and cried, "Would to God we had died in Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots, and ate bread to the full." And again, "Wherefore have you made us to come up out of Egypt, to bring us into this evil place? it is no place of seed, or of figs, or of vines, or of pomegranates; neither is there any water to drink." In the wilderness there is nothing to see, nothing to look at; and this is what Israel wanted. God says, "I brought you into a plentiful country to eat the fruit thereof, and the goodness thereof; but when ye entered ye defiled my land, and made my heritage an abomination." They felt their own importance, and forgot the Lord; they had the blessing, and did not want the Lord of the blessing (v. 6-8). And is not this true of the church of God? We bring in self, which is but a broken cistern, and depart from Him, who is the living fountain and power of blessing, forgetting that "a Syrian ready to perish was my father." Consequently there is moral weakness, and Satan gets power. A believer cannot get back into the world: a mere professor may, and enjoy it; but a Christian cannot. An Israelite could not get back through the Red Sea again. You cannot think of yourselves and the Lord together with satisfaction to your own souls. The Lord's presence in the soul will bring self into utter ruin and nothingness. We have only to let the Lord have His place in our souls, and that will put us into our place. If I am walking through the world, shall I find it a wilderness? To be sure I shall; but then I shall not be thinking about the wilderness if the Lord is my joy and my strength. Are your hearts saying, This is a land we cannot see? If so, what does that prove? Why, that you are looking for something to see; and this is the thought you will find in your hearts, "It is a land not sown," although you may be ashamed to own it. But God remembered Israel when they thought it worth while to follow God for His own sake. We feel bound to say it is a happy thing to be a Christian; but when we are alone do not our hearts say, "It is a land not sown"? If it be so with you, do not rest until the Lord Himself alone satisfies your soul; for you should delight yourself in Him. Lot saw a well-watered plain and a city, and then dwelt in it on the earth, and consequently was in the midst of judgment; while Abraham sought a city out of sight, and he enjoyed the blessing and comfort of God being with him, go where he might. When the soul is down, like a ship when the tide is low, it is in danger of shoals and sandbanks; but when the tide is up there are no sandbanks, because the ship is lifted up above them all. Thus when the soul is happy in Christ it will go on peacefully, independently of all the trials we may be called to meet with in our fellowsaints. We are called to walk together through the world, and a mere natural fitness will not do for that. No, we can only go on so far as Christ fills the soul; and thus going on in the tide of divine goodness, forgetting everything else, we can walk together happily, being occupied with Christ, and not with each other.

275 But notwithstanding what Israel was, still God does not forget Israel. And why? Because He remembers her affection in the day of her espousals, "when thou wentest after me in the wilderness." The soul, when occupied with God alone, is holiness to the Lord. God says to Israel, "If thou wilt return, return unto me." It is of no use to attempt to set the soul right except it be set right with God. Israel was "holiness to the Lord." Now holiness is not innocence. God is not what we call innocent, but holy. He perfectly separates between evil and good. So Christ Himself when on earth was separated unto God; and when about to depart out of it, He says, "For their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also may be sanctified through the truth"; for the meaning of the word "sanctify" in this place is separation to God. So it is with the church of God. She is separated from the world unto God, taken out of creation for Himself, the first-fruits of His increase. There will be a harvest of blessing when Israel and the nations are brought into blessing, but the church is the first-fruits of God's increase. God remembers this, though the church may have forgotten it; but if we know what it is to get back into the affections of God, we must enjoy the love that fails not; for God says, "I remember." The soul then apprehends what the church of God is in the affection of God, and not what it is down here. Christ was the corn broken and bruised, and afterwards the wavesheaf before God. So the church is to be in a low and oppressed state, and afterward to be exalted to where Christ is. God will have the whole harvest, but the first-fruits of His increase is that which occupies His affections.

"What iniquity have your fathers found in me?" Have I failed towards you in goodness? What is the matter now? Is the Lord changed? Is He worth less now than when thou wentest after Him in the wilderness? No; but we have got far from Him, and have walked after vanity, and have become vain. We have enjoyed His blessing, and have got fat and kicked, and consequently have fallen down into the weakness and wretchedness of our own hearts. When did the Lord bring up His people? When the very circumstances through which, and into which, He brought them was the proof that the Lord was bringing them there; for He brought them into a land of deserts and pits, where they had no need to lean on "a broken reed, whereon if a man lean it will go into his hand and pierce it," because they leaned on God Himself. "Neither did thy raiment wax old upon thee, nor thy foot swell, these forty years." And why? Because "the Lord alone did lead them, and there was no strange god with him." So was it with Gideon; Jud. 6. He remembered what God had been to Israel in the day of their espousals, saying, "Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt?" And the Lord looked upon him, and said, "Go in this thy might." Thus we see that Gideon's remembrance of what God was to Israel in the day of their espousals was the secret of his strength. In Gideon was a soul near enough to God to say, "Where is the Lord?" and then what a burden is taken off the heart. Only let us place ourselves before the Lord, and see if He does not come in remembering the day of espousals.

276 If I am thinking of the cucumbers of Egypt, the wilderness will not suit me; but if I am thinking of the Lord, I shall have no thought at all whether I am in the wilderness or not. The affections of my soul will be going on with God's affection for me; for He ever remembers "the love of thine espousals" when He first revealed Himself to our souls. It is true we may see chastening, but God never forgets the work of grace in our souls. He never forgets "the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals when thou wentest after Him in the wilderness, in a land not sown." And now thou art "holiness to the Lord"; and though God will have His joy in the harvest of the earth, yet thou art the first-fruits of His increase.

On Matthew 13

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In these parables we have the character and importance of the word shewn, and its effects. The object of revealing truth in this manner is made known to us by the Lord in His answer to the disciples, saying, "Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given." Parables, then, we find, unfold the word to those who already know Jesus; and they are spoken consequent upon the unbelief of the Jewish people, amongst whom the Lord had previously ministered, and cast out devils, and healed the sick, and who then, in the very principle of apostasy, had asked a sign. The character of this evil and adulterous generation is spoken of as having corrupted themselves; their spot is not the spot of God's children; they are a froward generation, children in whom is no faith; and here it is as though He were just declaring, "I will hide my face from them, and see what their end will be." And this is the reason why He speaks in parables. The spirit of unbelief was clearly developed in the Jews after His taking the utmost possible pains with them, and then He hides His face from them, telling them their condition is this, "When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest, and findeth none. Then he saith, I will return into my house from whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth it empty, swept, and garnished. Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first. Even so shall it be also unto this wicked generation," Matt. 13: 43-45. Having seen this then, we see that the parables are the unfolding of mysteries to those believe.

The Lord, as the Apostle of our profession at His first coming, spoke the word of God; and when He returns to judge the world, He will judge by the word which He has spoken, as He says, "The word that I have spoken the same shall judge you." The Lord's testimony was of grace, expressive of all that God was in grace to sinners. And when He comes again, He will come judging by it. Having given the mind of God, He returns to heaven; and then He returns as King to judge by the word which He had spoken.

In the first of these parables, we find the Lord going forth sowing the seed. I would speak of the effect and operation of this. The six following parables have a very distinct character.

278 The first three unfold what goes on in the world, consequent upon the sowing of the seed; and the last three, the mind of Christ internally as regards the effect.

First we have the seed sown in the field; and parallel to this is the field bought for the sake of the prize which He knew to be in it. The grain of mustard-seed becoming a tree in which the birds of the air lodge, is the indiscriminate place of shelter afforded by the organisation of professed doctrine: on the other hand, we have the pearl of great price, and understood in its value by a merchantman; here we find the spiritual understanding of Christ, and what every Christian has in his measure. The leaven, which is a corrupt and a hidden thing, leavens the whole three measures of meal; that is, a given part is filled with it. The whole from the field is gathered, and the whole of the net is drawn to shore, and then comes the separation.

We always find in the interpretation of parables and symbols, more is included than the parable or symbol states. So here, the explanation states what the Son of man should do when the angels are sent forth. And here we get the Lord's judgment consequent upon the effects of the seed sown and that which follows - even that all things that offend and do iniquity shall be gathered out of His kingdom and cast into a furnace of fire, where shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth; and then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. The interpretation here embraces more, and carries us farther than the parable itself. So in Daniel 7. We have first a vision declaring the power of four beasts, and of a little horn which should come out of them; then their destruction, and the setting up of another kingdom: but it is in the interpretation, in verses 18 and 22, that we learn that the saints of the Most High shall possess that kingdom.

These interpretations carry out the child of God into the next dispensation. In the parable of the tares, the servants ask if they shall gather them out; that is now, at the present time: but the interpretation shews us what takes place consequent upon the time which the parable describes. Christ came into the world and sowed wheat, the devil sowed tares; this is not simply unconverted men, but the operation of Satan to injure and mar the work of God. There were unconverted men before Christ came, and Satan presented adequate temptation to man's pride, covetousness, and self-esteem to guide them to his principles; and this is the wise man of the world. But there is another thing now. Satan comes to introduce mischief where God had introduced good. The world is not now in its natural state. Jesus as the Apostle of our profession has come and sown good seed; but while men slept, the enemy has come in upon this, and sown tares to injure and corrupt the profession of the church. It may be great and flourishing in appearance as the tree; it may fill the three measures of meal as the leaven; but it is a corrupt thing.

279 But to confine myself to the parable of the tares; it is not only the weeds of the field, that is natural evil, but the subtle evil of the tares growing up to a harvest of judgments; that is the church nominally: but where were they to be let grow together with the wheat? In the world. There is not to be the judicial process of excision here. The Son of man sows; the Son of man, as king, gathers out of His kingdom all things that offend and do iniquity; but what is this but the condemnation of a judicial process of excision in the world now by the saints? This is not to be executed until He comes.

I take notice in passing that this has nothing to do with discipline, because this is exercised in the church, on the children, or on those we hope to be such; while the proposed excision was to be exercised on the tares - those known to be tares - that is, discerned iniquity.

The parable of the net cast into the sea comes within the class which is the subject of the spiritual apprehension of disciples only, and is addressed only to them, its very subject being within the scope of their understanding only; while on the other side it presents the gathering of a company out of the world, in which good and bad are alike found, the process on which is the subject of their occupation and apprehension, and which the fishermen who draw the net carry on and not the angels.

Note here, the servants or the fishermen are not occupied with the bad. Extermination from the world was not their business. Here the dealing with good is the subject of the parable; the explanation determines the portion of the bad. So the tares are gathered into bundles to be burned; and before they are cast into the furnace of fire, the wheat is gathered into His barn. We find in this the separation of the saints from the evil, and not the carrying into effect the judgment of the wicked; the good are gathered previous to the judgment upon the ungodly. In the parable, we find they are told to gather together the tares in bundles ready for the burning, but they are not told to burn them; then the wheat is to be gathered into a barn, a place of security. But in the explanation, there is the gathering out of all things that offend and do iniquity, and, they are cast into the furnace of fire; and then the righteous (before gathered into the barn) shall shine forth in the kingdom of their Father. The principles of iniquity and the providence of God now go on together. First, the tares are gathered, and then the wheat; then the tares are judged and the good shine forth: that is, first of all, we have the practical separation, the providential gathering of the wheat out of the way of judgment into the barn, and then the actual judgment of the tares, and, consequent upon that, the wheat shines forth. When the fish are separated we have (not the good shining forth in glory, but) the good gathered into vessels, and then the bad destroyed.

280 In this parable of the tares we find Satan was waking, and men were sleeping, and the effect produced is the mixture of the evil and the good; and this is now the work of the devil, mixing evil with good in this world; and we can still say "an enemy hath done this." Competence to remedy it is another thing. But let us settle this as a first principle: that if we see evil and good mixed in the profession of Christianity, this is the work of Satan; and, remember, the tares are not simply unconverted men - there were plenty before the Lord came - but the tares are the work of Satan consequent upon His coming.

Is the thing the Lord proposes, in sowing the seed, to set the world right? No, for the servants ask, Are we to root out the tares? and the answer is, No, they are to grow till the harvest. In the world the process of mixture will go on till then, when the Lord will interfere Himself. Here then we have the express revelation, that the idea of setting the world right by the word comes not from a spiritual understanding. But the Lord's answer to whence these things came, and whither they should be, is, I have bought the world for the sake of the treasure that is in it; and the saints learn to their comfort, that the good are gathered into vessels while on the shore, that is, while they are practically together, and of course while they have to contend with open and subtle evil; and this we must expect in the world, until He gathers out of His kingdom all things that offend and do iniquity.

281 In the practical application of this, it is of great importance to see that the mixing anything with God's wheat is sanctioning the iniquity of the world. If I see anything with the spirit of the world, or the power of it stamped upon it, I see a plant which is not of the Lord's planting; and if I see this mixed with Christianity, that which is of Christ, and that which is not of Christ, I say, "an enemy hath done this." We have been slumbering, but the enemy was awake. The spirit of a believer necessarily involves total separation from the world, for where there is a spirit to join the world, there is not the Spirit of God, but the spirit of the world. But this state of things will not go on for ever. I would ask you, dear friends, whether there be in you this recognition of the total separation in spirit which these things mark out to us? If this is not the case, we are either the natural weeds of the field, or what Satan has sown to do mischief. You may be those God will convert, but you are one of these, or you have the principle in your hearts, and the love of the world is enmity against God.

The thing of price to my soul is that Christ is coming. The beauty and glory of Christ is clearly opposed to the things of the world. Are your hearts under the control of the spirit of obedience? or if the Lord were manifested, is it the thing you delight in? Because He will appear the second time without sin unto salvation. And you who love Christ, cannot you discriminate between Christ and this heartless evil world? Have you given up its interests and its intercourse, save in doing good? Can it be that the things by which Satan governs our hearts are topics of mutual interest to Christians and to the world? No. All that is of the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. The world is alienated from God, and if mixed up with the saints, it is "an enemy hath done this." The saints of God, taught of Christ by the Spirit, know that it is an enemy. May the Lord press its truth, dear friends, on your hearts, that you may be separated from the world. The Lord shew you it is impossible to mix these things, and keep you from the wish to do so.

Waiting and Working for Christ

Matthew 25: 1-29

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In these two parables we see evidently the Lord dealing with the responsibility of those who have been called out for Him; some of them not only called, but called upon to act, whether in thoughts, or feelings, or outward actions, in reference to His return to them.

The coming of the Lord is not merely some special doctrine, but is what ought to, and at first did characterise the Christian; not merely the fact that He will come again (every person that calls himself a Christian believes that): the present expectation of the Lord characterises the Christian. Here they went out to meet the bridegroom. Again the apostle says of the Thessalonians that they were converted to wait for God's Son from heaven - they were converted to wait. So in Matthew 24, it was not that they denied His coming. "But and if that evil servant shall say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming": it ceased to be a present expectation. So with the virgins, "they all slumbered and slept": it was not given up as a truth (though in fact it has been given up in a great measure), but it ceased to be a present expectation. Therefore when the Lord is exhorting His disciples He says (Luke 12: 35), "Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning, and ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their Lord." Then He adds, "Verily I say unto you, that he shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meat, and come forth and serve them." He ministers to their blessedness. What I press, then, is, that the more you look at the scriptures, the more you see that it was constantly as a first principle before the hearts of the saints.

The Thessalonians were not converted above a month. The apostle was only a few weeks with them; a persecution arose, and he was sent away, yet there he had fully brought it before them. There is no epistle so full of the Lord's coming as the two to the Thessalonians, the first as to the joy of the saints (the Lord taking them to Himself), the second the solemnity of His coming in judgment. They were quite recently converted to God, yet they had learned all this. It was the thing brought before their souls: "Ye turned to God from idols, to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven." Two things characterised them: they went out to meet the bridegroom, and they served Him meanwhile. They were like unto men that wait for their Lord. As we all know, even unconverted men know perfectly well, if saints were waiting for Christ their whole lives would be changed. There is not a man does not know it. Do you think people would be heaping up money, or dressing themselves in finery, to meet the Lord? If this was acted upon, it would change everything in our lives; that is what the Lord gave it for. "Let your loins be girded about" - a figure for all the heart in order, the state you are always to be in - like a porter at the door, "that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him immediately." That is what the Lord looks for in the saints.

283 This truth is everywhere strikingly presented all through 1 Thessalonians. This characterised them there. Their faith to God-ward was spread abroad: the world was saying, What an extraordinary set of people! They have given up all their idols (and you can have idols without being heathen), and have got one true God, and expect His Son from heaven to take them up there. The world was in one sense preaching the gospel, declaring what these things were. Because they were waiting for His Son from heaven, their walk and ways in respect of that became a testimony that all the world talked about. They were persecuted for it, but that is another thing. In the second chapter he speaks of the coming in connection with joy in service, Ye are my crown and joy - I shall have it when the Lord comes, "for what is our hope or joy or crown of rejoicing? Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming?" In the third chapter it is connected with holiness - "To the end he may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints." He is looking for the practical effect in conduct. Then in the fourth chapter he explains how they will go up. "Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air." As He was coming to execute judgment (I mean on the living), so when Christ comes to judge this world, we come with Him: a blessed part of it - our thorough association with Christ. He still speaks in the same way in the fifth chapter, where it is more judgment and the day of the Lord, with some remarkable signs. "For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night; for when they shall say, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape." The elements of the thing are seen now, the full time is not yet come, but it is a solemn thing. It seems a contradiction: people are saying, Peace, peace; yet their hearts are failing them for fear, and for looking after those things that are coming on the earth. It is just what is going on now. Progress, progress, everybody says, and yet all in confusion, and they do not know what is coming.

284 But my desire now is to look at it as to the saints. All the Epistles (except Galatians and Ephesians) take up this; and the Gospels. When the Lord was comforting His disciples, how does He begin? "Let not your hearts be troubled . . . . I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go and prepare a place for you I will come again" - the thing He first of all holds up. My object is to shew the way the word of God kept it before the hearts of the saints, that they might live in that expectation. When the Lord was ascending to heaven, the angels say, "Why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner." If the Lord was leaving comfort in the hearts of His disciples when going away, He says, "I will come again and receive you unto myself." If angels are comforting them, they say, "He shall so come in like manner." It is thus practically pressed on the disciples. The last word in scripture is, "Amen. Even so come, Lord Jesus."

Accordingly, the more you look into scripture, the more you will see not merely that it is a truth taught, but a truth held up before the hearts and minds of the disciples, that they should habitually be looking for the Lord. It would change everything; it is no use saying it would not: every unconverted person knows it would. They would do their ordinary duties, of course, and be the more diligent in them. This is the special blessing in Luke 12: "Blessed are those servants, whom the Lord when he cometh shall find watching." He ministers to them heavenly blessing. Then when He goes on to service, "Who then is that faithful and wise servant whom his lord shall make ruler over his household, to give them their portion of meat in due season? Blessed is that servant whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing." When I get the state of the heart watching for Christ, it is heavenly blessedness with Him: when I get service, it is the kingdom.

285 Thus we see here or elsewhere, in the word of God, the coming of the Lord is kept as a present thing before the heart. If I take the unconverted person, there cannot be a more solemn thing than to be kept in constant expectation; he cannot say the Lord will not be here to-night. The Lord alone knows when He is coming. They were to wait for Him. If the saints were waiting, there would be the testimony; and do you not think the unconverted would find it out? They might hate and persecute them; but they would know that the saints had something that they had not, something which characterised them in their walk and affections. Two things are needed for this. There are two characters in which the Lord comes: He takes them to be with Himself; and then comes the question of judgment. First, then, the judgment must have no kind of fear or terror for me; but, on the other hand, to really expect Him, the coming One must be the object of my affections and my delight. If you told me some Prussian was coming, I would not care about that; but if it was my wife or my mother, how different! To have it really as our desire, then, all questions as to judgment must be settled, and we must have our affections on the Lord. We get this by the first coming of the Lord. We wait for His Son from heaven - even Jesus, which delivereth us from the wrath to come. There is wrath coming; but we know the Lord's coming is before the scene of judgment, and it is the coming of the One who has wrought salvation: we wait for the One who has delivered us. Judgment to me is not a subject of fear.

A word on this: what God has done in the coming of the Lord Jesus (I speak of His first coming) is this - all that would have to be dealt with in judgment at His second coming has been, for the believer, so dealt with on the cross: He who is to come as judge, has come as the Saviour. That is what I get in the gospel. He who is to come as judge, has come in an entirely different way and character: He has come as a Saviour. "God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself"; "He hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin." Suppose I believe the testimony that the Lord is coming and am not ready for it, I fear judgment; then I turn to the first coming and see He has delivered me from the wrath to come. God has dealt with the world as to its sins in grace before He deals with it in judgment. He deals with them as sinners, as responsible and lost, but not in judgment - He came "to seek and to save that which was lost."

286 Suppose my heart looks, then, at Christ, I ask, and this is important, How was it He came into the world? My sins brought Him. But what was His motive in coming? What put it into God's heart to send Him? Was it any asking of mine? Any wish I had for Him? None. When He did come they rejected Him. Thus I am brought to the simple blessed truth - "God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son." I get the knowledge of what was in God's heart as proved by His acts. He has thought of my state when I was a mere sinner and needed His love - "God commendeth his love towards us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us." I have thus the heart of God, as the spring and source of all this - that His own Son has become a man, and has put away the sin that He would have to judge me for if He had not so put it away. I get Him as a Saviour before He becomes a Judge. Just see the place this sets us in. I see God occupied with my sins already on the cross. When? Long ago. I learn this as a fact, that He has been occupied with them: He knows all about me. I see Him there bearing my sins in His own body on the tree, and faith says, "The Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all." He bore my sins; He sweat great drops of blood at the thought of it, but He has done it, and was made a curse, in the same blessed love. He has bowed His head under the weight, this terrible weight, and goes through it. All was against Him. Satan's power was there - broken by it, but still there; and all that God is against sin. Thus He goes down to death and the grave, and is risen in glory now. Where are all the sins He bore? Does He bear them in glory?

I get this truth, then, that the Saviour has thus given Himself for me, and God has been occupied with my sins before Christ comes as judge. The apostle speaks of it as the "terror of the Lord," 2 Cor. 5: 10, 11. But when the believer comes before the judgment-seat, he finds there the Person who has put away all his sins, and has the peaceful settled consciousness that his sins are all gone. "Having made peace through the blood of his cross," God has attested the value of it by raising Him from the dead and setting Him at His own right hand: and has given you the peace, that you might believe and know the love that God has to you. "When I see the blood I will pass over you." He has set forth Christ to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, and instead of fearing His coming I rejoice. I could not desire His coming if a stranger: but we see the way Christ has interested and brought back our hearts. "The life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me." Out and out Christ has given Himself for us, not only His life - His precious blood - but Himself. Thus I find One who loved me, and purged my conscience; Heb. 9: 14. And not only is my conscience perfectly purged, but my heart is free to be on Him, because I have learned the perfect love of Him who gave Himself for me.

287 Now I get the flow of blessed affections: the Lord Jesus is coming - now I care for it! The one whose visage was more marred than any man's, who loved us, and charged Himself to put away our sins, who drank the bitter cup, and has taken away my terror - taken it away justly too. That is where the believer is. Then I say, Oh, what I would give to see Him! the One who hung upon the cross for me, where Satan's power was and God's wrath, but with a love stronger than death! Nothing stopped Him, the love with which He loved us, going through that which no heart can fathom - the bitterness of death and the cross. It is finished and done. And the One who thus loves me becomes the object of an affection which completely commands the heart. The heart longs and desires to see Him, and He gives the blessed assurance that we shall see Him, and (what is more) be like Him. "We know that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is."

The thing, then, that is set out before the Christian is, that Christ Himself will come. He is waiting now, but He will come and receive us to Himself, that where He is we may be also. And therefore the heart waits thus; Christ is waiting, expecting till His enemies be put under His footstool. He is not slack concerning His promise. As to the desires of our hearts, I am waiting to see Christ, to be like Christ, and I have the certainty of it because I have His word - "We know that when he shall appear we shall be like him."

There are the two things that make the heart ready, to be in a condition to wait: His first coming to salvation - "The grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared," and "looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us." The grace of God has brought salvation. Then we have the whole Christian life summed up: denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world, looking for that blessed hope: grace has appeared and brought salvation, and we look for glory. The passage sums up the whole condition, only that besides, the Holy Ghost is given us that He may be the earnest of the inheritance. A Christian is a person who stands between the first coming of Christ (the Holy Ghost dwelling in Him), and the second coming. He looks back at the perfectness of what Christ has done, and he looks forward to be with Him and like Him, while he is expecting: just as a mother would expect her child from a far country - constantly expecting because her heart is on the one that is coming. That is what forms the affections, to be waiting for Christ to take us out of the world. The friendship of the world is enmity with God; our hearts with Him, we are waiting to be taken out of it. The Christian has to wait God's time, yet knowing the value of Christ's first coming as taught of God, and the Holy Ghost dwelling in him, he has learned to love that One, and is waiting for Him. Salvation is accomplished, and the hope certain, because Christ has accomplished it. Thus we have seen the blessed ground upon which the Christian has his hope - that is, the value of the first coming of Christ as a Saviour. We get this so distinctly that the whole object of His coming in judgment hast been met, for the believer, by His coming in grace. Now His coming again is to us all joy and blessedness; He comes, and raises or changes us, and makes us like Himself in the glory: the first coming gives the ground.

288 Now, when you come to apply it, first there is what we have in the parable of the virgins: there is the spiritual warning of the appearance of Christ. "While the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept." I press this, that you will find - so careful is the Holy Ghost to keep this thought as a present expectation - that neither in this parable nor elsewhere, does He present a circumstance, which would force a person to put it beyond his own lifetime. Thus, as to the form of the parable, the virgins that went to sleep are the virgins that awoke. Similarly in that of the servant. The Holy Ghost will never give anything beforehand, so as to weaken the present expectation. It is a moral thing affecting the condition of the soul: the evil servant says, "My Lord delayeth his coming." This is the judgment of the professing church.

289 But to apply the parable before us individually - "They went out to meet the bridegroom." That was their business, what characterised them. All had their torches, their profession: the foolish had no oil. "The bridegroom tarried": now I get the fact, not what ought to be, but what was; for all slept. How is it, it is asked, that men for hundreds of years saw nothing of it? They all slept, wise as well as foolish - " While the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept." They slept together, they woke together. What would be the meaning of separating them while asleep? But the moment they woke at the cry, "Behold the bridegroom cometh, go ye out to meet him," He calls them back to the place they were originally in. "Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps" - immediately they had some work to accomplish. Now comes the separation: "And the foolish said unto the wise, Give us of your oil, for our lamps are going out." After the awakening cry, the Bridegroom delayed long enough to test the heart, whether there was that real grace which kept the heart waiting for Him. Now it was the time of judgment for the foolish virgins, not of their getting oil; they were not fit to go in. Here it takes the character of warning: while they all went to sleep together, the moment they were awake to the fact of not having grace, they could not stand. There could not be a more solemn warning. "Watch therefore, for ye know not the day nor the hour." Now let me ask, Is this so in your case? Are your affections enough upon Christ to be watching for Him, because you do not know the moment - still watching for Him (for "we shall not all sleep"), so that if He came you could say, This is the Lord, we have been waiting for Him? Are your hearts actively waiting, set on His coming, bowing to God's ways as to the time, but still waiting as to your hearts' affections for Christ; your lamps burning, your loins girded, so that you could open to Him immediately if He was to come this moment? It is the state of the heart I look to, so that if Christ were to come this moment, it would be that which you were looking for. Then will all His saints be with Him, and all glorified.

Now, the other thing is service. The twelfth chapter of Luke gives us not only watching but serving. So here (Matt. 25: 14-30) it is the servant. You get more of the sovereignty of God here, than in the analogous parable in Luke, where it is more the responsibility of man. Here the Lord gives to every man according to his several ability: to one five talents, to another two, etc. Every one will be responsible for his wealth, but this is not a talent. The talents are what Christ gave when He was going away. He gave gifts - apostles, prophets, and so on. He did not give money! I quite admit the responsibility of it, but it is not the point here.

290 Thus, then, when Christ went away, He called His own servants and gave them according to their ability. When He comes back, He reckons with them. He that had received five talents made them other five; he that had received two had also gained two. But their lord was dealing in grace and wisdom, and says to both alike, "Enter thou into the joy of thy lord." Then comes the third: what characterised him was want of trust in the character of his master. It was not a question of not having oil in his lamp, but he says, "I knew thee that thou art an hard man," etc. He did not know the blessedness of the grace that is in Christ's heart. The others had the mind of Christ; they trusted His heart, and were therefore good and faithful servants. Thus I find the responsibility of service resting upon the knowledge of the heart of Christ. One said, "I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth"; he judged by his own selfish heart; the others trusted the heart of their master and acted on it. He trusts us if it is only a cup of cold water, or the gift of an apostle; He trusts His servant and expects him to act. If you have five talents, trade with them; if a cup of cold water, trade with it. I get this blessed principle that, perfect grace having been exercised, and you see how it is so, the heart in cheerful readiness trusts the grace - trusts the Lord Himself.

Now, take the case of Peter, and you will see how it is connected with the conscience. Peter had to learn himself; he had confidence in himself, and it all broke down; he little knew Christ. And now just see how the Lord deals with him. He says, "Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat, but I have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not," and it did not fail. He needed to be sifted: it was good for him, as it is often for us, to be sifted and humbled. If he had been left to himself, it would have been all over with him. But here was the Lord just going to be crucified, answering for Himself against His bitter enemies: but you never find Him in any place or circumstances where, if one wanted Him, His heart was not free to go out to the need. He looks at Peter, whose heart is broken down: he caught the Lord's eye just at the right moment, and weeps bitterly for his sin. Now, when He comes back to Peter, there is another lesson. He says, Well, Peter, "lovest thou me more than these?" That is what he boasted of doing. He does not say, Why did you deny Me? but "Lovest thou me?" etc. He tests Peter's heart to get it right with Him. "Thou knowest all things," says Peter, "Thou knowest what is at the bottom of my heart." And then, when thoroughly humbled in the dust about the sin, Peter is given to take care of the things dearest to Him. As soon as He had entirely broken Peter down, and taught him not to trust in himself, then He says, If you love Me, feed My sheep. In the exercise of perfect grace He trusts Peter because He had taught Peter not to trust himself. Look now how Peter stands up and says to the Jews, "Ye have denied the Holy One and the Just." Did he blush? He can bring the very things he had done himself on their conscience. Why? Because his conscience is as white as snow. He had learned to trust His love. He can charge them with the sins he had done himself; his conscience is purged. He has been thoroughly probed, but he can through the work of Christ and the power of the Holy Ghost stand up and speak of his own terrible sin. Just as I can say to a sinner, You are lost in your sins: that is what I was myself.

291 It is this confidence in Christ that is the spring of all true service; that entire blessed confidence in the grace of Christ, in His heart for us, who are unworthy of anything. He has trusted us, and the heart trusts Him, and the servant goes on to serve Him and trade with his talents; with the consequent effect, that we enter into the joy of our Lord, with Him and like Him, in the sense of His love because He is love. And there will not be a soul that it will not be my delight to see there. I am sure that, after the glory of Christ Himself, it is the next best thing to see the saints with Him and like Him. What is the great desire of the heart now but to see them as like Christ as possible? Then it will be perfectly. He comes and takes us there, and brings us into His joys - "Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord."

If you want to go on well and brightly, then, it is resting on the perfect work of Christ at His first coming (the Holy Ghost dwelling in us), and looking for that blessed hope, with true liberty of service, and the confidence that, when He comes, it is to enter into that blessed place of joy with Him. It is His own joy that He gives. The joy of our hearts is to think that He is coming, and soon, to receive us to Himself.

292 The Lord give you to understand that the soul stands in the efficacy of His work at His first coming, so that with unclouded confidence you may look for His second coming, saying, "Even so come, Lord Jesus." The state of a soul in the church really hangs upon that: the simple, constant, blessed expecting of Christ to come for us.

"My delights were with the sons of men"

Luke 2

J. N. Darby.

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Familiar as we are with the thought, it is after all a wonderful thing that the Son of God should come into this world of sinners, and still more wonderful that He should die for them. Into this world the Son of God came, fully bringing out what we are, by the way in which He was received; but at the same time His coming was full of joy and blessing for us. He was the immediate object of the express delight of the Father; then He died and rose again, and so brought us into the same place - into light and blessing with Himself.

It is a wonderful thing, in the first place, to have God come into the world, grace and truth in the world; and that we have in the Lord Jesus Christ. It is not a question of our duties, or of future judgment; but it is into the midst of this world of defilement, violence, corruption, evil, and enmity against God - into the midst of it He came. What makes it so especially wonderful is, that He came as a babe (though miraculously born) as one of ourselves, a real true man in this world of woe. Still there was more: for it is a totally different thing for God to deal with men as children of Adam, as to what they are, and what they can bring to God, and what their righteousness is - there is a great difference between looking at a man as responsible to God - and God dealing with Him according to His own thoughts. This is the truth, when grace is rejected. It is not that God overlooks our responsibility; but it is a totally distinct thing for God to reveal and fulfil the thoughts of His own heart, and for Him to investigate those of ours. Dealing with man on the ground of what he is, and what he has done, goes on to judgment. In Christ he is revealing the thoughts of His heart.

Thus we get His own intentions before ever the world was; the purposes and counsels of God, which were not in the first Adam at all, but in the last. That runs through the whole of scripture from the very beginning. As soon as ever man had sinned, grace opens the door to reveal it: there was the seed of the woman that was to bruise the serpent's head. Adam was not the seed of the woman. The promise did not refer to the first man at all, nor was it a promise to him; but it was a revelation that there was one coming, the seed of the woman, who should bruise the serpent's head and destroy his power. Therefore there was ground for faith to lay hold upon. Promises and prophets were always referring to the same thing. "In thee shall all families of the earth be blessed": "To him give all the prophets witness." Prophets had to deal with men, and bring the law to their consciences; but here is one in whom all the thoughts and counsels of God rest, and in grace to poor sinners - "All the promises of God in him are yea, and in him amen, unto the glory of God by us." "All things are for your sakes," though all surely for God's glory.

294 Another thing in connection with it is, that it is only when we come to Christ, that we can reconcile the purposes of God in the full blessing of life, and man's responsibility. Heathens and Christians have disputed over it. In the garden of Eden there was the tree of life, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil: life on the one side, responsibility on the other. Man failed, ate of the tree of knowledge, and could not get to the tree of life. Now the law took up the same principle - here again you have responsibility and life - and said, "Do this and live." The Lord Jesus Christ, the second Man comes, does His Father's will in everything, and sovereign grace takes up our responsibilities; He takes the consequences of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and He is the life. He bears the consequences of responsibility in His own body on the tree. It perfectly meets all our need, and a great deal more - God is perfectly glorified; and we get eternal life in Him, and the joy and blessing of it all in the full result of all these counsels of God, to be conformed to the image of His Son: nothing short of this.

Though the responsibility is proved, yet to be like the Son of God in glory has nothing to do with my responsibility. No man could have dared to think of such a thing; but it was the mind and counsel of God in Christ. It did not come out till after the cross, for we could not have had any part in it but by the cross. Before ever the world was, it was the thought of God to have a saved and redeemed people brought into the same place as, and associated with, Christ. Of course the preeminence is His. "Thy God hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows." Who could pretend to be the "fellow" of the Son of God, if it were not the fruit of the work of the Son of God? The mind of God rested on Him in connection with man.

295 The first Adam is totally set aside, having been tested, tried, and proved, up to the cross; then the Second Man is brought in. God never would set up the last Adam along with the first: the first Adam was a fallen man, the last was the man of God's counsels, and He sets Him up instead, when we had failed in our responsibility. Titus lays down (Titus 1: 1, 2, 3) the other principle. "In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began." Then it was the hope of eternal life. 2 Timothy 1: 9 gives the same truth: "Who hath saved us . . . not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began." These thoughts and purposes of God were given us in Christ Jesus before ever the world was. Now if you look for a moment at Proverbs 8, you find a remarkable passage connected with this. There I see that before the world was created, Christ was there as wisdom, daily the Father's delight, and having His delights in the sons of men ("delight" is the same thought as "good pleasure").

We have then man put on his responsibility, and the first thing he does is to fall; he distrusts God, and that before there was a lust. He listens to Satan, he questions the love of God, he eats the fruit, and he falls. Then comes the law; man sets up the golden calf, and broke it. Last of all God sends His Son - "It may be they will reverence my son"; but "now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father"; "they cast him out." That closed the history of responsibility.

It was when man was a sinner and had broken the law, that the Son of man came into this world in grace. "Now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." He calls it the "end of the world" because man's moral history is ended - grace is not ended. Man is not less intellectual than before; he can invent railroads, telegraphs, and I know not what, but what have these things to do with the moral character of God or man, or with heaven? Death has come in, and this is all over. There are no telegraphs in heaven! Men are blinding themselves; there is not one single link with God, of thought or feeling of heart, but plenty with this other world. Remarkable persons there are; but all belongs to the fashion of this world that passeth away, and when man's breath goes forth his thoughts perish. You may put up a monument to him, but it speaks of death! God has put this world into man's power and he has invented much; but, are children more obedient, wives more faithful, servants more honest? And since we have had all these developments of intellectual capacity, taking it even on the lowest level, are people happier - more to be trusted? A world in which people cannot trust each other, is a miserable world! What is called progress, does not give more confidence from man to man, to say nothing of God. There is not a single thing in it connected with the soul.

296 Man's history was thus closed at the cross. First, lawlessness, then law-breaking, and then enmity to God; then comes that blessed perfect work of the last Adam, who met the need in His own Person, and brought in the full accomplishment of the purposes of God. He has brought man into an entirely new sphere by death and resurrection, and eventually glory, and has settled the whole question of responsibility.

But God speaks to our hearts, and says - and I desire that you should take this to your hearts - 'Now you must understand what I am doing: I want to get your hearts into perfect confidence with Mine, by the testimony of what is in My heart, and as to your sins I have settled that.' This is the blessed truth, that when God could not bear my sins, instead of putting me away, He has put my sins away, and I stand before Him according to the value of that which was done in putting them away. What I have on my heart to shew you is, how God brings us into the consciousness that when this work is done, the bad tree is done with. Not only had I sinned, but I was a sinner, and the question of what I am is perfectly settled. It is not character, for there are no two alike; each one of us has a different character. I may say, that is a humble trait in me: so I may say of a crab-tree, the flowers are more beautiful than those on an apple-tree; but what do I care for the pretty flowers when the fruit is bad? I cut the whole thing down! That is what God has done. When I have a spiritual judgment of the thing in my mind, I do not think of the pretty flowers on the wild tree, but of the fruit. So with man: God has sentenced the whole thing entirely; it is all cut down, and grafted with Christ, and then I expect fruit.

When I turn to look at the thoughts and counsels of God, I see His "delights were with the sons of men." His "good pleasure" was not in angels; they are witnesses of His keeping a creature unfallen, but we are witnesses of His redeeming a creature who has fallen. There is no purpose about angels; He did not take them up, but He became a man. Now we get the moral character of the world tested by Christ. He came in goodness, not requiring anything from men, but bringing goodness to them. If you look at His life, He came in a power which removed all the present effects of sin. Death disappeared before Him; devils, disease, sickness, all fled away. He comes in a power sufficient to remove all the effects of Satan's power, and He does it in grace. That is the character of Christ's work: there was no miracle that was not the expression of meeting a need in man, or of setting aside Satan's power. The cursing of the fig-tree is the only exception; there, responsibility was in question: He cursed the fig-tree, and it is the judgment of man. Israel was under the culture of God. He looked for fruit, finds none, and says, "Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever." The flesh is judged, set aside; and my heart is brought to own it - brought to the acknowledgment of its sentence at the cross.

297 Let us look at the Lord, the second Man, coming into the world. I see the place that He gets in this world; but when the angels begin to celebrate His praises they go much further. What is the sign of the Son of man coming into this world? First, of course (but on that I do not now dwell), the promises to Israel must be fulfilled; but this is the sign (Luke 2: 12), "Ye shall find a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger." An inn is the place where a man is measured: it touches the pride of man. The first floor for the rich, the garret for the poor: there was no room for Him! No room in the great inn of this world! He could go into the manger when He was born, to the cross at the end, and meanwhile have not where to lay His head. Is that the way you estimate the blessed Lord Jesus Christ? We are accustomed from education to exalt Him; but that is the world's estimate still, there is no room for Him! The world is never changed till the heart is changed; it is just what it was then, with the addition since of the rejection of Christ. Is this then your moral estimate of the world, that the Son of God got no place in it? That here He began with the manger, and ended with the cross, and meanwhile had no place to lay His head?

The Son of God comes in grace, and that is what sounds from heaven when the angels praise. It is beautiful to see them delighting in man's blessing, though they themselves were passed by. They are celebrating His praise - "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will towards men." Do our hearts understand and estimate this, that God's heart was delighting in the sons of men, not by a general mercy, but by His being a man? There I have the object, the Person, before God's eye. He has come down into such scenes as these, and God says, Sinner though you are, I want your heart to trust Me; and that you may do so, there is My Son come down, and as a babe. God's love was beyond a human thought. Why do they say, "Glory to God in the highest"? It is because His Son has become a man. It was not in the fact of angels' glory, but when I get this lowly babe, that has not a place in the world, then the angels come out with this song.

298 There is nothing like this wonderful fact, "The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us." I get the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, present with me, a poor sinful man, that I may know how God reached me first where I was. He has come down to me as a man, and to prove God's good pleasure in men. The result, "peace on earth," is not seen yet, but you have "glory to God in the highest." I have now this blessed truth, I have learnt where and how God has met me. If a man was a leper, He touched him, when another would have been defiled: He used His holiness in grace to reach the most defiled.

At the end of Matthew 3 He takes up this wondrous place for us: Jesus comes to be baptised of John, and says, "Thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness." He takes this place, the moment the Word of God has met the heart of these poor sinners, and He says, I must go with them, because the Spirit of God has wrought in their hearts. It is that which defines the place of the Person. He takes His place amongst us; and mark, He was always the same Person from the manger, at twelve years old, and all along His path. But now He cannot let His people take one step, in what God had wrought in their hearts, without saying, I go before, I go with you. The Christ that could tell the woman all that ever she did was not there for judgment. If a person was convicted of sin, the Lord had been there. What for? To judge me? No, to bring me to Himself in grace. Now mark the wondrous bringing out of this place: "And Jesus, when he was baptised, went up straightway out of the water: and lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him: and lo, a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." The heaven opened! There was never a person there before on whom heaven could be opened, and to whom a voice, the Father's voice, could say, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." There was not a thing in Him, but what heaven could delight in. This is to me a wondrously blessed truth. In this world is the Lord Jesus Christ, the man in whom is the Father's necessary, perfect, delight, and He owns Him as His beloved Son; and then the Holy Ghost comes down to seal and anoint Him. I have the place man must have according to the counsels of God, and heaven is opened on the world.

299 Another thing comes out, if possible still more wonderful - man gets into this place, which is in the thoughts and counsels of God for him. It is then that Satan is fully manifested. And here I get the first revelation of the Trinity: but it is when man gets into this relationship, with the thoughts and actings of God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, all in connection with man, and heaven opened: and it is that all the counsels of God might not only be in counsel, but in fulfilment and manifestation. To think that Christ, the Son of God, should thus come, not for a judgment on sinners, but to open heaven for sons! It is the pattern place of the saints. When He had thus publicly taken His place in grace with us, then God says, I will own you as My Son, and the Holy Ghost comes down and seals and anoints Him. And "Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts."

But whatever the grace, you will always find that the Person of Christ is maintained secure. Heaven is opened to Stephen, and he looks up and sees Christ there: he is full of the Holy Ghost, and he looks up to heaven. But heaven looks down on Christ. Here Stephen had an object, but Christ was the object of heaven. His Person is always maintained and secured. Thus we are brought into the same wondrous place as this wonderful One. We always find the Person of Christ pre-eminent, but we find the saints brought into a place where He can take us, and call us the "fellows" of the Son of God, with whom we are brought into fellowship. Take another example of this, the mount of transfiguration. Moses and Elias are shewn in exactly the same glory as Christ, but the Person and place of the Son of God are most fully maintained. Peter thought it a great thing for his master to be like Moses and Elias, but when he says, "Let us make three tabernacles," the voice from the cloud says, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased: hear ye him." Again, in the case of the tribute-money, Jesus says to Peter, "Of whom do the kings of the earth take tribute: of their own children or strangers?" "Of strangers." He was the great king of the temple, and yet, lest He should offend them, He disposed of creation to find money to give, and says, "for me and thee," thus bringing man into association with Himself. His Person is maintained, but this blessed Son of God cares to win the confidence of our hearts.

300 But though thus in association with man, He was there alone. "Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground, and die, it abideth alone," John 12: 24. There are three glories that are His, brought out there. He is Son of God, chapter 11; He is owned as Son of David, riding upon an ass; then the Greeks come up and the Son of man must be glorified - that is the revelation of Psalm 8. But if He was to be the Son of man, He was to be over all the works of God as man - "He left nothing that is not put under him, but now we see not yet all things put under him." As yet He is seated on his Father's throne, not on His own. He is Son and heir. What He is doing now is gathering out the joint-heirs. He is only waiting for that, and when they are all gathered He will come. And the thing that we are all waiting for is that He should come. Then we shall be like Him, and with Him in glory. But He was alone until, as the corn of wheat, He fell into the ground, and died. But the moment redemption is accomplished He can say, "Go to my brethren." And, "I ascend unto my Father and your Father."

Mary Magdalene was watching at the sepulchre. She was so near to the heart of Christ that all the world to her was but an empty tomb, when Christ was not there. Her heart was right, though her intelligence and her place were wrong. She was seeking the living among the dead! The disciples went to their own home - sad work! So Mary gets the message, "Go to my brethren." He called His own sheep by name - "Mary." Then she thought she had Him back again, but He says to her, "Touch me not": You cannot have me back for the kingdom yet. He lets Thomas touch Him, but He was telling far more to her. Now the moment that redemption is accomplished, that the work is done, He can say, according to Psalm 22, "I will declare thy name unto my brethren." Having been heard from "the horns of the unicorns" (a figure of speech of course of impalement, of intense suffering), His first thought is, I must have my brethren in the same place. He was alone till He died, now He was risen into the new place, and He can say, My Father and your Father, My God and your God. "In the midst of the church will I sing praise unto thee." It is the song of perfect redemption, and He leads the praises. He puts them into the relationship, and when thus brought and gathered together, He sings in their midst. All this is fulfilled in John 20. Now if Christ is leading our praises, is redemption uncertain? I should be out of tune if I were not joining. Is He to sing one song of praise and I another? That would be discord, not harmony. He has brought us into the same place as Himself, and triumphantly He leads our hearts to join in the song He sings.

301 Let us see the full and blessed perfectness of that work. We were under the power of sin and Satan, and God's wrath had come in. What do I see this blessed One doing? Displaying God. He puts Himself alone in our place, to finish and complete that work where God must be glorified on account of sin, and man brought to be saved. If God had passed over the sin of Adam and Eve in the garden, I should have been able to say, sin is no matter, but when I look at the cross I cannot. There I see God perfectly glorified in every respect by a Man, and so much the more because sin was there. If God had cut off Adam and Eve, it would have been righteous, but no declaration of His love. So it was not possible for the cup to pass from Him; and at the cross I get God's full dealing with sin in righteousness, but with infinite love. It is beyond our need. God's majesty was maintained where all had been trampled in the dust, and now the Son of man is gone into the glory of God, and is sitting on the Father's throne, the witness that love has had its way, that grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.

I have the pattern then, when the Lord was upon earth, of my place with Him. I see the work done on the cross, that was needed to put me into it, and then I learn what the work is worth. It is worth the glory of God in heaven. And now I have the place before God, which is the consequence of that. I can rejoice in hope of the glory of God, and I have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby I cry, "Abba, Father." He has brought us into the place that the counsels of God required. We are in relationship to God as a Father, and Christ is the first-born among many brethren. He brings us into this in John 17: "The glory which thou gavest me I have given them . . . that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them as thou hast loved me." Then speaking of the present state, He says, "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." The Holy Ghost thus conducts down the fulness of the Father's love to the Son into our hearts. It is perfect.

302 It is all unutterable grace, and therefore humbles us to the dust. But, has not God a right to have thoughts for Himself? Surely He has. He is going to shew "the exceeding riches of his grace, in his kindness towards us by Christ Jesus," and if so, nothing is too good for me. Can you think that it is so? What else can I think? Shall I think my own thoughts when He has sent His Son to die for me? The poor prodigal thought, "Make me as one of thy hired servants," but never says it when he comes to his father. He confesses his sins, of course, but when he has had the kiss and has been clothed, there are no more thoughts of the son. All is the effect of the thoughts of the Father, so that even the servants are rejoicing that the son is brought back. What the Father thinks has come out. I can now say, with a purged conscience, I am nothing; but I am loved as Jesus is loved; not only saved by Him, but blest by Him: "Thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me." Is this where our thoughts are? He passes on everything that was His to us, though it may be we are toiling along down here. If I walk in the Spirit, if my mind is full of Christ, I have no occasion to think of myself at all. If I have not to judge myself, I can think of Him; but if I fail, then I have to humble and judge myself. And the normal state of a Christian is to do all "in the name of the Lord Jesus." It may be the commonest affairs of daily life, buying and selling, furnishing my house, or dressing my body; but it is a very simple rule and cuts away a great deal.

We are sanctified to the obedience of Christ. Let me say one word on this obedience. I say of my child, who wants to go another way, but who yields to me, It is very pleasant to see such obedience: but it was not so with Christ. He never had a will to wish to go the other way. When the tempter came to Him, he said, "If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread." What was His answer? It was as though He said, Nay, I am a servant, I cannot command, I obey; "It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God." That is the obedience of Christ. The Father's will was His motive for everything. There are thousands of things we do from habit, and we say we must do them: there is no "must" for me, but Christ's will. I have to learn what His will is; for we are made epistles of Christ, and the path we are to walk in is to manifest the life of Jesus in our bodies. Everything I do should be the expression of the allegiance of my heart to Christ; and the manifestation of Him to others. The standard of walk is, what is "worthy of the Lord," not of man. Sometimes it is very difficult to be peaceful, patient, gentle, when a man wrongs and insults one; but were you not the enemy of God, and did not God forgive you when you were His enemy? Well, you forgive your enemy. I quite understand the difficulties, but we have the blessed privilege of walking as He walked. If you want to do this, go and study Christ, learn what His path was down here, after you have learned your place in Him on high. It is a great comfort that, in looking at Christ, I not only see the thing I ought to be, but I get the thing I ought to be, "grace for grace."" We all with open face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory." There is real growth there, not in fitness and acceptance, but in likeness to Christ, and it ought to be growth every instant.

303 We are in this place of Christ then before God; and what I would press upon you is to study Christ, so that we may be like Him here. There is nothing that so fills the soul with blessing and encouragement or that so sanctifies: nothing which so gives the living sense of divine love, that gives us courage. The Lord give us this courage, and enable us to study Him. "He that eateth me, even he shall live by me."

The Saviour and the Sinner

Luke 7: 29-50

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This is one of the passages, found here and there in Scripture, which brings out in strong relief the grace of God, and what is in man's heart too.

Here we get the Pharisee, this poor sinner, and the Lord Himself. We see these three characters, these three hearts all together: the man righteous in his own eyes; a person outwardly in wickedness; and then the heart of God, and the way in which He looks at and judges these two cases.

What precedes in the history is this: John the Baptist sends two of his disciples to ask, "Art thou he that should come; or look we for another?" (v. 19), and this gives occasion to the Lord to speak of God's ways and dealings, the principles of which are of all importance to us. John had come with his solemn testimony, but the conscience did not bow to it. Then came the gracious testimony of Christ, but the heart was not moved by it. "But wisdom is justified of all her children." God's ways, whether in the testimony of John the Baptist, or in that of the Lord Jesus, are justified by the children of wisdom. The Pharisee is here, and the poor sinner: then comes the question, which is the child of wisdom?

We get a most important principle here: these publicans and sinners "justified God" both in the testimony of John, and in that of the Gospel. When we know what we are as sinners, we justify God, never ourselves; and then in His ways with us He justifies us. The moment we begin to justify ourselves, it is only the utter darkness of the human heart. We find these two testimonies. John the Baptist came requiring fruit, calling to repentance: the publicans and sinners justified God in this: the axe was laid at the root of the trees, these poor sinners acknowledged it and repented: they justified God. The first good fruit that is produced is always the acknowledgment that we produce bad fruit. Then came the blessed Lord, telling of sovereign grace that rose above all their sins; they justified God in this too. The man that justifies God in condemning him most thankfully justifies God in sending His Son to save him. Those who owned the truth of God's judgment, and that they deserved it, confess their sins; Matt. 3: 6. Are we willing to justify God in condemning us? John was so strict he would not even eat with any one; he could have nothing to say to these sinners: that was the reason they said, "He hath a devil."

305 "There is none righteous, no, not one," Rom. 3: 10. This is plain enough; the "great white throne" will not make it plainer. "That every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God," Rom. 3: 19. This is God's testimony, and in the gospel of grace too. Now we see around us numbers of religious people, going on decently and reverently; but their delight is not in God. Take such a person, and see where his heart is; leave a man alone three or four hours, and he thinks of his cares, game, pleasures, never of Christ. Christ has no place at all in his heart. We all have the idea that we shall be happy in heaven; so we shall, perfectly, blessedly happy. But put the natural man there, and he would get out as quickly as ever he could: there is nothing above he would like. When the blessed Lord came down in grace, man would not have Him. If you take a false religion, you never find a man ashamed of it; you never see this among Mahometans, heathen, or even in corrupt Christianity. Take a Christian, a real Christian, is he not ashamed to confess Christ before men? He is ashamed of himself for it, surely. You never find a person ashamed of a false religion, but you find Christians ashamed of the true.

Take man as man, and every mouth is stopped. Do we justify God in condemning us? The child of wisdom says, "It is true, I deserve to be cut down: I am a child of wrath; I justify God!" When that is the case, at once we are thankful for grace. When I am personally convinced that I deserve condemnation, I say, 'I justify God in the grace that rises up above all my sins: I do not justify myself.' The Son of man came in grace carrying the testimony of goodness wherever there was a poor sinner who would receive Him. God's wisdom in this double way is justified. Wherever there is truth in the inward parts, we justify God. Then as to the fact of the history, we find who this child of wisdom was. We see it was not the Pharisee who set up to have a righteousness for God. The woman justified God's testimony by John (I do not mean in fact, but it was the same testimony); she acknowledged her condemnation; but she justified God, too, in another way.

We cannot pretend to be righteous (I do not speak of what grace produces, but of the natural man); we do not love our neighbour as ourselves, we are not troubled if our neighbour's house is burnt down as if it were our own. If I take the law of God, we may deceive ourselves about loving God with all our hearts, but a man must be a dishonest man if he says he loves his neighbour as himself. Paul could say of himself, "Touching the righteousness which is in the law blameless" (Phil. 3: 6); but the moment the law said, "Thou shalt not lust," it might as well say, 'Thou shalt not be a man.' If I take the law, you see it is most useful; it probes the heart, and brings the consciousness that we have not kept it. Take all who are here; God has said, "There is none righteous, no, not one." Can any of you say He is mistaken? It is perfectly true that, unless we are probed, we are all disposed to have a good opinion of ourselves; we are all disposed to be Pharisees. When a man is in this state, Christ is not the object of his heart at all: he calls himself a Christian, but, if he is honest, he will have to acknowledge that Christ has no place in his heart.

306 In this wonderful history in Luke 7 we get these three hearts unveiled: the man's heart, not that of an open profligate sinner; the heart of the woman who was such; and God's heart. We see, too, who was the child of wisdom.

The Pharisee, who is curious to know about Christ, asks Him to dinner; but he gives Him no water for His feet, and no oil. He is curious to know this preacher, and he thinks himself perfectly competent to judge about religion. The Lord noticed it all. There into this fine house the woman comes, confounded as to her sins, but her heart fixed by what is in Jesus, her whole heart going out to the blessed One. The Pharisee sees the woman washing the Lord's feet with tears, and anointing them with ointment, and he says within himself, That is no prophet. When the conscience is reached, it is under judgment; but when it is not reached, a man thinks he is perfectly competent to judge whether God is right or wrong. "And Jesus answering said unto him, Simon, I have somewhat to say unto thee. And he saith, Master, say on. There was a certain creditor which had two debtors: the one owed him five hundred pence, and the other fifty. And when they had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both. Tell me therefore, which of them will love him most? Simon answered and said, I suppose that he to whom he forgave most. And he said unto him, Thou hast rightly judged." He says to Simon, You are right - shewing that He was more than a prophet. "Seest thou this woman?" Her whole heart is upon Me. We see, too, a person who has had the Lord Himself in his house, and he is settling that He could not be a prophet!

307 Where the conscience is exercised, it never judges, but it is judged. We all have a natural conscience, that is perfectly true: God took care man should have that, but the intellect of man knows nothing of the things of God. If my intellect could measure God, I must then be the master of my subject: If I understand mathematics, I am master of that subject; if my mind were capable of judging of God, my mind would be the master of God. When conscience awakes and says, "Thou art the man"; you have been sinning against God, there is no attempt then to judge. All true knowledge of God comes in through the conscience. Nothing but faith, which is the eye of the conscience, can put man in his right place with God. God brings me to justify Him: He is a holy God, I am not holy. That is the way the knowledge of God comes in. God is love: that is true, of course, but this is the way true knowledge of Him comes. The Pharisee thought he was all right, but in the presence of the Lord in grace he settled that He was no prophet. The mind of man is pitch darkness when we justify ourselves, not God.

When we turn to the poor woman, we find her owning in the fullest way her sinfulness, confounded by it; but what had she found in Christ? What does Christ mean? Who was He? What brought Him here? Was it our wishing, our asking? We rejected and crucified Him when He came. I find God acting when man was an utter sinner, all mouths stopped, then God manifest in flesh comes down amongst men. What brought Him down? I see in the life of the Lord Jesus Christ, and more fully still in His death, that "God so loved the world." This love of God had come into the world, so that sinners could look to and trust Him, while owning their sins.

The two names of God which express what He essentially is are light and love, light which is the purest thing we can conceive, and love. You see the law did not reveal God. It gave a perfect rule for the children of Adam, but Christ is not that (I do not say that He is not a model for Christians): but He is God Himself come into this world as light and love, shewing me my sins because He is light. Shew me any society you please where men are enjoying themselves, bring in Christ, and this spoils it all. But then if God is light He is love too. When God has shewn me, as light, all that I am, I find I am in the presence of the perfect love which brought Him here; and now, instead of fancying I can meet the judgment, I have God Himself here shewing me what 1 am. The heart of this poor woman and the heart of God had perfectly met. "God is light," and the woman had not a word to say for herself, but God is also love, and so she goes into the Pharisee's house. The light and the love manifested in God are both revealed to this woman's heart: the light shewed her that she was an utter sinner; the love was what brought her there. She did not yet know that she was forgiven, but there was this blessed revelation of God which required nothing from her, but which was for her just what she wanted.

308 Christ was God in this world come to win back the confidence of man's heart to God. I get this blessed One in this world, and He says, Are you ashamed to shew yourself to a decent person? Well, come to Me. He was here in this world, using the holiness that could not be defiled to carry the perfectness of His love to every poor sinner. We see a perfect example of this in the poor leper of Matthew 8: 1-4. If a man touched a leper he must be put out, according to the law. Well, this poor leper saw the power that was in Christ, but he did not know His heart, and he says, "If thou wilt thou canst make me clean"; then the Lord put forth His hand, and touched him. I find the blessed Lord using the holiness that could not be soiled, that He might touch man in his sins! When my heart has seen that, I have got both truth and grace: truth in the knowledge that I am a sinner, and grace in Christ. The poor leper might have said, I am vile, not fit to shew myself to God or man, but I find One who can touch me.

Christ is God come down to sinners in their sins. The law could only say, If you do not do this, you are cursed. Christ comes to these sinners, and He shews us what we are; but He shews us also what He is: love, that brought Him down to us as we are, the vilest, the most wilful, sinners. Have not you committed sins, all of you? Well, how much sin will shut you out of heaven? Why did you sin? Because you liked it; your conscience tells you so. You cannot say to me, You are a big sinner, and I am a little one. Suppose you have committed ten sins, and I eleven, then am I to be shut out, and you let in? If I find two crab-trees, one bearing one crab, and the other one hundred, I say the one is a crab as well as the other. How many sins had Adam committed when he was driven out of paradise? One. That one sin proved his distrust of God, and his confidence in Satan. One crab proves the tree. It is quite true that some are living in flagrant sin, like the poor woman: it would be well if they were like her here! There is no good in sin, but there is good in being convinced of it as she was. God must deal with all sin, and this is what He does. If you have not found Christ, if you have not been washed in the blood of the Lamb, you are under judgment. The woman could not talk about theology, but she has found God, and what is in God's heart.

309 The Lord could say to the Pharisee, You are perfectly dark as to your own heart and as to God's heart. If you gave no water for My feet, this woman has washed them with tears; if you gave Me no kiss, she has not ceased to kiss My feet. Everything she had she has given Me. You had the Lord in your house, and you did not know it. Then He says of the woman, "Her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much; but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little." She had really met God's heart, as expressed in Christ, though she could not explain how it was: light was in her heart, love too, and they met. Why do I go to the cross? God manifests there His righteousness against sin, and His love to the sinner, and I justify God in His blessed love: as a child of wisdom I justify wisdom.

Then we get Christ's answer to the woman's faith: "Thy sins are forgiven." She did not know it when she came in, but she loved Christ, she trusted Christ; and now the sins are all gone. He said to her - it was not a mere doctrine in the air, but He gives her the comfort of it - "Thy sins are forgiven." God has sent love and light here, but He has sent forgiveness here also, "according to the riches of his grace," not narrowly, closely, measuring our need. He pronounces this judgment upon her, "Thy sins are forgiven"; as He did to the thief, who was fit to go to paradise, "Verily, I say unto thee, To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise." The dying robber was bearing the fruit of his ways before man, but Christ was bearing it before God, and therefore he was a fit companion for Christ in paradise. This is true of every believer. "Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light," Col. 1: 12. "For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified," (Heb. 10: 14): this sanctification is entirely uninterrupted because Christ gives it perfection.

310 People call in question what the Lord has said to the woman, "Who is this that forgiveth sins also?" What is the good of preaching the remission of sins, if you do not believe it? Do you think, when God calls you by His grace, that He means you to be happy with Him or not? If we do not know we are forgiven, it is impossible to be happy. John, writing to all Christians, says, "I write unto you, children, because your sins are forgiven you for his name's sake," 1 John 2: 12. You will not find after the day of Pentecost unforgiven sins in a believer. Did Christ die for half my sins? I believe Hebrews 10: "Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more." Though I deserve death and condemnation, I believe that Christ, in the fullest grace, has taken my place, and He did not sit down till the work was perfectly finished. If the work that puts away your sins has not been done perfectly, when is it to be done? Can Christ die over again? Can another Christ come and die? "Without shedding of blood is no remission." Christ cannot shed His blood over again, but the work by which He put away our sin never loses its value in the presence of God.

All through the Gospels we see that it is the soul that clings to Christ, touched by His love and grace, that learns most: that is where light and understanding come in, and so here the first full testimony of the Gospel is given to this woman - "Thy sins are forgiven?" Did He deceive her? "Thy faith hath saved thee" - a blessed word! If you have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, you are saved. What did He come for but "to seek and to save that which was lost"? It is an accomplished work, that can never be repeated. There is no veil now: we are brought into God's presence by Christ's work. If our sins were as scarlet, they are now as white as snow, because this work of Christ, perfectly accomplished, puts me before God in the value of it.

Mark another thing. He says to the woman, "Go in peace." "Peace I leave with you." Are you before God in the perfect peace He was in? He has made peace by the blood of His cross. He met God there on the cross, and the testimony of the Gospel is that of a finished work. Now, let us remember, the Lord's love takes all pains that He might do this for us: His sweat was as it were great drops of blood, when He was only thinking of the cup He was about to drink. I justify God in condemning me, but I justify Him also in saving me. He is righteous and holy, and He could not bear the sins; but He is love too, so He put away the sins.

311 Whatever I do now is to be done in the name of the Lord Jesus; I am called to walk like a child of God. All duties flow according to the place we are in: duties cannot exist till we are in the place to which they belong. How can I have a child's affections if I am not sure if I am a child? You must be a Christian before you can have Christian duties. We have duties as men, but we are lost on that ground. Be assured of this, that Scripture is perfectly plain on the point that we know our relationship with God. We own the judgment that was due to us, but we know the relationship in which we are. "At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you." This is the effect of the presence of the Holy Ghost. Am I to doubt the value of Christ's blood-shedding? Does the Holy Ghost make me doubt? God says, "Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more." I do not doubt it: the Spirit cries, "Abba, Father." Ought I to doubt it? We shall go through exercises - the deeper the better; but the love of God has been revealed, and the fact is that I was a poor sinner, but here this blessed One came into the world when I was such, and died for me when I was such. The Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are all engaged in this work.

Have your hearts been opened to see the unutterable love in the Son of God coming to die for you, and that God has accepted this work? We shall have conflict with ourselves surely, conflict with Satan and with the world; but we are in perfect peace with God. God calls us to own our sinfulness, but to know His love. The Lord grant, if this is not yet your case, that you may submit yourselves to God's righteousness. Then "thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace."

A Servant for ever

Luke 12: 35-41

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These verses, and indeed the whole chapter, shew how the saints are viewed apart from this world. There was a scene around which was plotting against them. They were not to fear - "Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do." But there was something in it that they were to fear; they were to beware of hypocrisy (v. 1), for all would be disclosed. He presses that they should have their treasure in heaven. It is not as people often say, "Where your heart is, there is your treasure"; but, "Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." They were taken out of the world to serve in it; and He encourages them to have entire confidence in the care and love of God watching over them, and tells them that in God's mind and thought they were of value - of value to God. Not a sparrow falls to the ground without His care. "Fear not therefore: ye are of more value than many sparrows." He is your Father - "Fear not, little flock; it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." You must trust Him. For the present they were obliged to have their loins girded. This was not rest. They were to be tucked up ready for work and service; their lights burning, and they watching - ready for their Lord.

While that was their character in this world, there was a world that belonged to them - to the Father, and He was occupied with them about that world, though taking care of them through this. We have thus the constant abiding of His love. The Son of God has taken "the form of a servant," and He will never give it up. He is the Lord Jesus Christ, one with the Father, God over all, blessed for ever; but that gives the more force to His being a servant. He has had His ear pierced through with the awl at the door-post. The Hebrew servant, when he had served seven years, if he said, "I love my master, I love my wife, I love my children, I will not go out free," became a servant for ever; his ear, the sign of obedience, was bored. That is what He has done, and it is His glory - outward humiliation, but divine glory and love.

Love always delights to serve, but selfishness to be served. He is love, and He delights to serve; but if He is to serve us, He must come down low, and He comes in a love that is above everything that hinders; and the more He humbles Himself, the more I can see a love that can only be of God! It is this that is so touching in His life. He sits weary with His journey on the well, and says, "If thou knewest the gift of God, and" - not, who it is that speaketh to you, but - "who it is that saith to thee" (who it is that has come low enough to say), "give me to drink, thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water." He was a divine Person sitting talking to her, and He was her servant. He says again, "I am among you as he that serveth." He was their only Master and Lord, but being above all, He has the privilege of taking the title of servant; and having refused to go out free, He has taken this place of serving love, for ever. It is His glory, and has nothing to do with His Godhead, except to shew His unutterable grace.

313 We find in Philippians 2 His coming down to take this place. "He made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant." He served God; served us too in grace. He took the place in willing love. "Lo, I come to do thy will, O God." And He was obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. He lays the form of the glory of Godhead aside (Godhead He never could lay aside), and thus we find His perfect, infinite love. Where should we have been if He had not taken the form of a servant? Lost for ever. But there was love enough in Him to come to this place. He goes to death, and there I find the power of divine love in His service. Nothing stopped it; Satan's power was there; man's bitter and base ingratitude, as He says in that beautiful fiftieth of Isaiah, "When I came, was there no man? when I called, was there none to answer?" He goes on: "Is my hand shortened at all that it cannot redeem? or have I no power to deliver? Behold, at my rebuke, I dry up the sea," etc. As Jehovah-God - He did as He pleased. He not only did miracles Himself; but what proved His divine power much more, He gave others power to do them. "He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also, and greater works than these shall he do, because I go unto my father," John 14: 12. He is working in that perfectness of love in this world, and nothing stops it at all. "The Lord God has given me the tongue of the learned that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary." I have not ceased to be Jehovah, but I have taken the place of a servant, to take up every sorrow you are in. And see the return - men found it an occasion to reject Him! "I gave my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: I hid not my face from shame and spitting." Nothing stopped Him - death did not stop Him. He came to die; and felt what it was to die as none of us can; for He has taken the sting out of it. He came to be "made sin," and felt how dreadful it was; for He was holy. He came to bear the wrath, and felt what it was; for He knew His Father's love. Desertion was there and betrayal, and the cup He had to drink was there. He felt it all; but in it all, divine love was there to serve and go through it, to serve us wretched sinners.

314 There was the power of divine love, when everything was gone (for God had forsaken Him), except bitterness and death, Satan's power, and the wrath of God. There you get divine love, and service too. It is a divine power and a power of love to us - to His Father, but to us too - a power that carries Him through everything, when everything was against Him; divine love that made Him serve through it, till it was finished. Then I adore the love that led Him to be made sin for me. There was the full testing of the love that carried Him through all. It is deeply instructive, though very dreadful to see there what man is. What do I expect of my friends if I am on trial? At least that they will not forsake me. They all forsook Him, and fled! In a Judge? I expect him to protect innocence. Pilate washes his hands of His blood, and gives Him over to the people! In a priest, what do I expect? That he will intercede for the ignorant and for them that are out of the way. They urge the people, who cry, "Away with him, away with him!" Every man was the opposite of what was right, and that One man was not only right, but in divine love He was going through it all!

First, I get Him serving me in His life; then, when He served us in death, in spite of ourselves (for man was against Him), there He was alone, all forsook Him, and God hid His face from Him. He went into the desert (Mark 6), and had no time to eat, but when the people come He ministers to them; "He could not be hid." If He is in agony on the cross, there is a poor thief to be attended to. He tells him, "This day thou shalt be with me in paradise." If He sits weary on a well, and a poor wretched woman comes, He waits on her. All through He takes the sorrows of human nature - weariness, hunger; but with a heart that never was weary when a service of love was to be performed; a Man who does not shrink from all the vileness and wretchedness of the world; a Man in all the perfection of holiness, carrying divine love to serve every need. It was, what was divine, in a Man who took the lowest place, and there is nothing like it. It is most sweet and blessed to see it, and to see He had no will of His own in it. When they tell Him, "He whom thou lovest is sick," we should have thought He would have started off at once. No, He abode two days still where He was, He had no commandment from His Father. We see it was to shew His Godhead. Still, as a servant, He had no word, and He did not stir. It seemed very hard. His home, if He had one on earth, was that house at Bethany. You never find Him going out of the place of a servant, and He was never anything but the perfection of love in it. That service He took, and performed, and finished, and now His service is over, and He is going to glory; Luke 12.

315 In John, where we find more the divine side than the servant's side, He shews that His going to the Father does not change His service, save the character of it. He is not serving among men, but He is serving His people up there. When He was going away, there came the thought that, now He is in the glory, His service is ended. That would not do for His heart. He says, In the glory I am not going to stop serving those poor things. Could His heart stop serving them? No, it could not! He is the Advocate, we find in the Epistle of John, and that is not in the world. He does not take it up till He goes to heaven. How could a heavenly person know the sorrows, temptations, and trials of us, poor sinful beings? He comes down here, sinless, of course; and, after being acknowledged by the Father, He is led of the Spirit to be tempted in the wilderness, because we were there. As soon as He has given the pattern of the place in which we are by redemption (Matt. 3: 16, 17), He says, I must go there; and He is led of the Spirit (we are often led by other things) into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. Now (John 13) He is going to glory, having so glorified God here as to have an earned place there, as well as having a rightful one there - an official place as well as a moral one. The world will not have me. I cannot stay here with you. You cannot have rest here; it is polluted. I can serve, but not rest here. He must go up to God. I must go on serving. He says, "If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me." I cannot have part with you in this sinful place, and I must fit you to have part with Me on high. Though we are washed so as to have part with Him, we pick up dirt by the way; but He is our Advocate, and is still serving. He brings the heart to be humbled and broken at having dishonoured His name, and it is restored. His blood is on us, but He is still washing our feet. I must make you clean, according to my idea of cleanness. That is what He is doing now. It is blessed love, but it is service. Is He going to give up this satisfaction of His heart in serving us (it makes us adore Him)? He is not going to give it up, and never will. He is a Man, and a Man for ever; that is what we have in this chapter. He is more than that, for in Him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.

316 There is one thing new for God, and that He could only do: to come down a Man here. No angel could do it; but God could come down, acting in divine supremacy and love. I cannot take the form of a servant, for if I am not a rebellious sinner, I am a servant. (I may have got into rebellion as one - that is another thing.) A divine Person can "take" on Him the form of a servant, and that is what He has done.

He says, "Let your loins be girded." Here I am in the middle of a world that says, "To-morrow shall be as yesterday, and yet more abundant." I am to be expecting Christ; the world goes on (He alone knows how long); but "the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night, for when they shall say, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction cometh upon them." That is the character given it. "As in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the Son of man." (There is sin, and still more now, but that is not the point.) I believe that - not that it is the portion of believers - then I must have my loins girded. I cannot go on loosely with a world that is not going on for ever. There ought to be a better motive: the heart drawn out to Him - oh! if it were only that. They go on saying, "To-morrow shall be as yesterday," etc., and yet terror is in their hearts; for there is uncertainty - nothing to reckon on for a day, or a week, or a year. He calls all Christians to take their places with their lights burning - the distinct, unequivocal testimony of what they are, carrying their lights as servants, and not going on with a careless world that is going to judgment. You cannot say when it is coming. The saints will be with the Lord before then. Can you say that it is the first thing the Lord will do - take you up in the air, to be for ever with Himself? Can you tell what day He is coming? Are you ready for Him? You do not know what hour He is coming. I believe it is hastening on rapidly. The saints were converted to wait for God's Son from heaven, and when they lost that, all the mischief came in. It is their character - not a bit of knowledge, that is stuck up as a chief thing in teaching; but that is what you are to be. If you were constantly waiting for Him, would it not change you? Finding duties to do, and doing them quite right; but would people be heaping up money or treasures when they know He is coming? They enjoy themselves while they can, and then comes death, and they hope it will be all right. If you are expecting the Lord and ready to open to Him, it gives a character, "Ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their Lord" - like a man that has his hand on the lock of the door, "that when he cometh and knocketh they may open unto him immediately." The Lord keep us in that readiness of condition and heart as servants, waiting! That is our present condition when the Lord is not come. You cannot float down the stream of the world that is going to the ocean of judgment. You are to be looking for Him. If, by His first coming, I have been saved and justified, I look for Him to come again, that I may be where He is. Here we get what the believer's portion is who is waiting for Him.

317 Now, what follows? The characteristic of a person who has his ear open to the Lord, is watching. "Blessed are those servants whom the Lord when he cometh shall find watching: verily I say unto you that he shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meat (that is a figure), and will come forth and serve them." I find Him serving then, in divine love, still in the same character. He comes and brings us to heaven - to His Father's house, that where He is, there we may be also. While you were in that wicked world, He says, I was obliged to keep you on the watch, in a state of tension, with diligent earnestness to keep the heart waiting, but I bring you to a place where you are to sit down, and it will be My delight to minister to you.

It is one of the greatest comforts to me that I shall not want my conscience in heaven. If I let it go to sleep for a moment now, there are temptations and snares, there, there is no evil, and the more my heart goes out, the more good it is. Here I dare not let it, but I must watch and pray. I shall not need that in heaven. The full blessedness of it is, the Lord being there, of course; and next, the saints being perfect. What does the heart desire that cares for the Lord's people? That they should be just what Christ's heart would have them. That will be there; He will see of the travail of His soul, and be satisfied. Then there is after that this comfort, that my heart can go out - here it cannot - to God and the Lamb, and to the saints in measure too; but then, roam as it will, there is nothing to roam over but a Paradise where evil never comes, and it can never go wrong.

318 He comes then, and takes us there, and what heaven can find there for the heart to feed on is spread on the table of God. You shall rest there and feed on it, He says, and I will gird Myself and come forth and serve you. I am not going to give up My service of love. Thus, while I have the blessedness of feeding on what God has to give, I have increased satisfaction, that if I put a morsel of divine meat into my mouth, I receive it from the hand of love that brings it to me.

When He brings us there, all is turned round. Here He says, you must have your lights burning, and be watching; when I get My way, I must put you at ease, and make you happy. "Then shall the Son also himself be subject." He was serving here. It was man's perfection to serve - the very thing the devil tried to get Him out of. If he had, it would have been doing His own will; but "though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things that he suffered." But when all things shall have been subdued unto Him, He is subject after that. In the meanwhile He has been on His own throne; now He is on His Father's throne, our High Priest; but He will take His own throne and power, and reign, bringing everything into subjection. Then it is not serving, but reigning: afterwards He gives up the kingdom in that sense to His Father, for everything is brought to order. In the millennium it is a king reigning in righteousness; but then it is a new heavens and earth, wherein dwells righteousness. Innocence dwelt in the first Paradise; sin dwells in the present earth; and then, in the new heavens and earth, it will be "wherein dwelleth righteousness." He gives up the mediatorial kingdom, as it is called, to God, and takes His place as a Man, "the first-born among many brethren." He never gives up a place, in which He can own us as associated with Himself in the blessedness of first-born of many brethren. As all was ruined in the first Adam, all shall be blessed in the Last. "As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly." Then I find myself enjoying everything that God can give to the objects of His love, and enjoying it with Christ then at the head of everything - Son of God and Son of man; we associated with all the blessedness, and He administering it to us, so that the heart can taste His love. And He does not just bring us there, but it is to all eternity. He has purchased us too dearly to give us up. His love will be in constant exercise towards us. It leads us to adore Him more than anything that can be thought of; but we can trust a love that never ceases in heaven.

319 You see here His heart going out to do it. Then you must have your lights burning. "Let your light (not your works) so shine before men," that they may know where your works come from, and "glorify your Father which is in heaven," that they may attribute them to God. I do whatever God tells me to do, and it is a testimony to Christ; people say, that is what comes from a man being a Christian! It is that there may be no uncertainty as to what we are, a well-trimmed lamp, the testimony of the life of Christ, that it may be manifested what I am, and what I am about - a pilgrim and a stranger, in a thousand different circumstances, the ordinary duties of life to perform, but one service, to be the epistle of Christ. I may be a carpenter, or a shoemaker, I must be a Christian. In various relationships, servants, masters, in eating or drinking, in our houses, wherever it is, I must be a Christian.

What characterised these servants was waiting, and they got the blessing. "Blessed are those servants whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find so watching." Ah, beloved friends, are you watching, waiting for Christ practically? I cannot be watching, and going on in my own way. Are our lights burning, or have we slipped down to the ease and comforts of this world like other people? That is not having our loins girded. And it is not as a doctrine we are to have it only.

He refers to serving in verse 43, but the reward is connected with another thing - made ruler over all that He hath; it is the kingdom, the lower part. In my calling, I look up; in my reigning, it is looking down. It is better to look up than down.

The watching person gets the Person he is watching for. The calling is better than the inheritance - "Heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ." You find in Revelation 4 the elders sitting on thrones ("seats" they put in, for they thought it too much for us to be seated on "thrones" and crowned when He is there, but that is what it is); but when the nature of God is proclaimed, they leave their thrones, and that is the higher place. When they were on their thrones they had their own glory; when they are prostrated, they adore His glory. So, in the transfiguration, the voice came out of the cloud (the cloud was always the sign of Jehovah's presence in Israel), and they went into the cloud; that was more than the kingdom. A voice came from the excellent glory, and where it came from, they went into. It was a great thing to be standing there on the mountain, but still greater to go into the cloud - the Father's house, and they were afraid. It is a wonderful thing that the ruling is for us (v. 44); but it is not the greatest thing. His love takes us into the enjoyment with Himself of every place He has - not the Godhead of course - but of everything He has received from the Father as Man. He, in divine love, gives it to us; He gives not as the world gives. It gives liberally sometimes, but it gives away. Christ does not give away; He takes us where He is, and gives us what He has - His own peace, His glory.

320 It seems strange to Peter that the Lord should wash his feet. But where should we be if He did not wash our feet? In one sense we ought to be ashamed; but where should we be? If He were not a servant now, we should have our feet dirty, poor creatures that we are. Then it will be fulness of joy, His ministering of God's table in heaven to us, and half the happiness would be lost if it were not that. Now the Lord takes pains to assure us of His love, to persuade us of His love. "You are of more value than many sparrows." He says, do not fear, and then gives the strongest motive to serve Him. In the epistle of John He does not say we ought to love Him, because He first loved us - it is quite true; but He says, "we love him." Where there really is the sense of the Lord's love to us, there is the return of it. If you hear a child saying - oh! if you only knew my mother, her patience, her love, I am so tiresome, she never fails in affection, I cannot tell you what she is! I say, that child loves its mother; it has the sense of its mother's love in its soul, and that is love. It is the going back of the heart in the consciousness of the blessed love He has to us. The inflow of the love, with a new nature capable of receiving it, is the love.

321 How sweet and blessed is it thus to see how He has come down! He has not loved us from on high. He never says to the poor sinner, "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden," till He had come to them. He never called for confidence in His love, till He had come to them Himself, however vile they might be. It will surely make us adore Him. A divine Person come to be a servant, that our hearts may know His love, and He wants us to know it. Does the Father say, This is My Son whom you ought to love? No, He tells His affection for Christ to lead us into it. Therefore, we are in fellowship with the Father. What is that? It is having the same thoughts and joys in blessing, the same feelings and affections in blessing. Depend on it, if you get near to God, it will not make you think lightly of Him. If you get near to the greatest man in the country you will find out his foibles; but being near to God will never give you want of respect to Him; you find out what God is. It is not dangerous, as people often say, to be on the mount; but to have been there. When Paul got out of the third heaven, he wanted the thorn in the flesh. Then there was a danger of his saying, no one but you, Paul, has been there. Everything is dangerous for the flesh to get hold of - law, gospel, and everything. Being near to God, never lets the flesh in.

If the Spirit is the spring of our thoughts and feelings, He can never give us anything but thoughts of the Son. We are poor, feeble things, and He is infinite, there is that exception, of course; but if I look at Christ's death I say, Look at that obedience; there is love to the Father, and giving up Himself, and love to us. Look at His devotedness, obedience, and giving up of self - love beaming through the agony of the cross if ever it did! Did not the Father delight in it? To be sure He did! Of course, all our thoughts are poverty itself; but He brings His love down to us in grace, and then takes us up to the glory. We learn the power of His obedience when nothing stopped Him. He brought it to us in grace here; washes our feet by the way, and then will serve us in glory up there. The Lord give us to have our loins girded and our lights burning, that we may be found watching: living in this town, or in any other, in our common every-day life; but that we may be there with our loins girded and our lights burning, and we like men that wait for their Lord, that when He comes and knocks we may open to Him immediately. "Blessed are those servants, whom the Lord when he cometh shall find watching." "He shall gird himself and make them sit down to meat, and come forth and serve them."

322 May the Lord's love and approbation be the things that govern us; and not the things that fade away!

Christ for my sins; and Christ for my cares.

John 4

J. N. Darby.

<34018E> 323

It is a wonderful thing to think of the reality of the intimacy with which the Lord carried on intercourse with people in this world - His ways and manners with them - and who He is. In truth it changes all our thoughts of God.

He has visited men before the day of judgment, and we find Him giving, and not judging - dealing with them in quite another way. He who is to be the Judge had to come beforehand to be the Saviour; came in grace, seeking worshippers; came to visit the hearts of men where they were - naughty hearts; coming to such, not to judge at all, but to deal with our souls about the very sins for which He would have had to judge us. If I see Him there I find He has dealt with my sins already in a totally different way. It confirms the judgment, of course - puts the seal of God's testimony on it in the strongest way; but at the same time it gives me to know and understand, that the whole thing has been decided in a totally opposite manner. Instead of coming to claim the debt, He comes to pay it; both ways prove the debt was there, but the dealing is totally different.

He comes and deals with sinners then, in exactly the opposite way to claiming the debt, and deals effectually, and that is the Gospel. "We have seen, and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world." It is a Saviour we have to tell of, and I could not stand here to speak thus if He were not a Saviour who has wrought an effectual salvation. Then comes exercise of heart, and the discovery of what we are by His word, to bring us to repentance; but it tells us we are saved. "Thy faith hath saved thee, go in peace." It was at all cost to Himself that He could say it; but He did not recall it, or deceive her. Can we go in peace? We go out of this room with the consciousness that we go on the Lord's own warrant in perfect peace, and with nothing to fear as to the consequences of sin, if He has said, "Go in peace." Therefore He sends out the word to the children of Israel, "preaching peace by Jesus Christ." And "that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem."

324 Beloved friends, have you got peace? Have you got what He announced and sent out to be preached? It is no good telling me you cannot have peace. There it is. Was it to be preached and not believed? God would have us happy with Himself, and therefore sends the testimony of peace. It is no light thing, for He has made peace through the blood of His cross; and being justified by faith, we have peace with God. It is a real thing, an effectual thing, a divine thing, founded on what has been perfectly done. If I believe, I come into this to enjoy it. It is that God has visited us to bring us peace. "In the world ye shall have tribulation; in me ye shall have peace." Hence God gives Himself, over and over again, the name - "God of peace." It is the name of predilection which He gives Himself. He never calls Himself the God of joy; that may change, but peace is eternally settled.

We see how He dealt with this woman. It was thorough grace. "Salvation is of the Jews." They had the law, the temple, everything that belonged to God, like the elder brother. But the Jews cast Him out, and He must needs go through Samaria. This was the beginning of His ministry. The Pharisees were jealous of Him; so He goes out and leaves this place of salvation according to promise. It is the terrible condition of the world that the Son of God has been in it, and they cast Him out. He came there and has been rejected, hence the testimony is, that the whole world lieth in the wicked one. The world not only sinned, but rejected Him who came into it when man had sinned - the world that had grown up since God cast man out of Eden. If I call myself a Christian, I profess that the world has cast out and crucified the Son of God. Still the grace goes on. God took that as the means and occasion to bring it out. That is what is so glorious in the cross; that that which was the perfect expression of man's enmity, was the perfect expression of God's love. There was the meeting-place between man's hatred against God, and God's sovereign love to man. He was not at it yet, but was walking in the grace and spirit of it.

Here, rejected out of Judea, He must needs go through Samaria, and we get the blessed truth that God is above all sin; because Samaria was most hateful. He can exercise His love in the scene of the thing He abhors. "God commendeth his love towards us, in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us." He gave His blessed Son, one with Himself, down to death, and to drinking the cup of wrath for those who were nothing but sinners. "God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself."

325 Now, mark another thing we have here. We find Him thoroughly a man, coming down to this world - "Who made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men." Oh! that some hearts could get hold of this! I speak now of the way that He came - of His death I will speak again - that though He was rich, yet for our sakes He became poor. It is brought out in the circumstances of this history. In the heat of the day, wearied with His journey, He comes to the well and sits down where He can find a seat. Do our hearts really believe that this was the Lord? Why was He in a condition to be weary? Why there? It was perfect love. He comes down to take this place. He passes through the world - the Holy One that could not be contaminated, and uses this to go through a world of sinners to bring them the love they wanted.

This was expressed in the most lovely way in the case of the leper in Luke 5, "who besought him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean." The leper was sure of the power, but did not know the love that was there. He carries the love right up to the leper, "and touched him, saying, I will, be thou clean." If man touched a leper he was unclean, and put out of the camp. But He cannot be defiled. This is a picture of the way the Lord was here. Holiness, undefiled and undefilable, carries to sinners the love they need.

"Jesus therefore, being wearied with his journey, sat thus on the well," and the disciples go away to find meat. Oh! to think of the Lord Himself, whom none of the princes of this world knew, but who was the Lord of glory, sitting weary on the well, thirsty, and dependent upon this world for a drink of water - the world that was made by Him, and knew Him not! "There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water; Jesus said unto her, Give me to drink" - dependent on this woman for a drink of water. In this very fact she finds out that there was something remarkable in the Man. It was extraordinary that a Jew should speak to her, a woman of Samaria, and her mind is attracted by it.

Let me say a word as to this woman, so full of blessed interest for us, drawing out into exercise the heart of the Lord. She was a poor vile creature - alone there. We read of the time when women come to draw water - talking together of all that was passing; but she does not come when the rest came. Hers was an isolated heart; she had isolated herself by sin, and had got nothing; an energetic woman, who had been seeking happiness by the energy of nature, and found wretchedness and ruin. She was out all alone at that unusual time of day, with a heart full of cares. Alone, because of her shame, she finds One only more lonely than herself, and that One was the Lord! She could go to the men of the city, but He was totally alone, had not one to go to, though Himself the most affable and accessible of men.

326 There were no circumstances in which He was ever found where power, love, goodness, and truth were not readily in exercise. There was no weariness, if a poor desolate sinner came. When the disciples returned they say, "Hath any man brought him meat to eat?" No matter what company He was in, He was always accessible to their hearts; but there was no sympathy for Him. No love and goodness met Him in going through this world; His heart was utterly a stranger in it; yet all sympathy for others. If He had to answer for Himself before the chief priests, who were hunting Him to death, the moment the cock crew, His eye was upon Peter - never wearied. No circumstances He was in, could ever touch the spring of grace and goodness that was in Him. But mark what comfort for us! Here was the Judge of quick and dead - not as judge, of course, but the Person who is to be judge, meeting with the poor sinner in grace, sitting with the very person that deserved to be judged. In that sense, in the communion of grace, He is sitting with us. It is just what is going on through the Gospel. "We are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech by us."

Well, He is sitting on the well asking drink. She says, "How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria?" Mark the answer of the Lord. It has two distinct points in it. "If thou knewest the gift of God"; that is, what God is doing to you. It is the ground He takes with you: "The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ." The next thing is, "And who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink." That is, if you knew - not, who I am, but  - who it is that has come down so low as to ask a drink of water; if your eye were opened to see God giving eternal life - come to require nothing (and who would not get it if He did) - you would be in perfect confidence before Him. He once came looking for fruit and found wild grapes. Under the law He sought for fruit and had His servants killed. He said, I have yet one Son - but when they saw the Son they said, "This is the heir, come let us kill him." The effect was, no fruit, but hatred to Him and His Father. Now He does not come (I do not say producing fruit - He does - but) looking for it. He has come to sow (not looking for fruit), dealing with the sinner personally in the Gospel: and where there is grace, and the sense of need, there will be the fruit of the Spirit, and He will look for it. Human nature judges God, but God's nature comes out entirely superior to that. He gives. Thus we get these two blessed principles, that God is giving, and that the Lord has come down to such poverty as to be dependent upon a creature for a drink of water; come to put Himself down under the wants of those that had nothing but wants, so as to meet them. She is attracted; there is power in His word; and He begins speaking of spiritual things to her.

327 We see, then, the way in which the woman is absorbed with her cares. Verse 15 is a remarkable expression of confidence in His word - "The woman saith unto him, Sir, give me this water, that I thirst not, neither come hither to draw." But mark the state of her heart - entirely occupied with her waterpot and her wants. Do you know nobody like that? People who own the word of God to be the word of God; who own its authority, but are in heart completely occupied with the things of this life. As a natural person she received not the things of the Spirit of God. Her mind was awakened to respect for His word, so that she could believe what He said, but she could not grasp spiritual things; they had not the smallest entrance into her heart, so full was it of temporal things.

What was to be done? He had been pouring out words of grace; all had flowed over her head - passed over a heart absorbed with the things of the world. He takes the other side, not the gift of God, but the state of man - "Go, call thy husband, and come hither." The woman answered and said, "I have no husband." Quite true. She tells the truth to hide the truth - as often in this poor world. The conscience is reached now: and there is where the word enters always. It is quite right it should attract the heart, but the conscience must be reached. "Jesus said unto her, Thou hast well said, I have no husband: for thou hast had five husbands; and he whom thou now hast is not thy husband: in that saidst thou truly." It is all out now; her conscience is brought into the presence of God. Everything must be out in the light that has come into this world. It is wonderful how quick memory even becomes under this action of the light. Sins are recalled which have long been forgotten. Light has come in; she has understanding now; before she had not understood a word; she was completely buried in her cares. "The woman saith unto him, Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet." The word of God had reached her conscience, and wherever it does it has authority, and it is the only way. When I find a book that tells me all things that ever I did, I know what it is. It does not require to be proved by man. No book in the world has authority till it reaches the conscience. Then it is its own witness to the folly of attacks made upon it, and proves the folly of unbelief. It is the word of God itself, its own witness. I do not take a candle to see if the sun shines! But do you not see that it shines? Then you are blind. The only thing that brings authority with it is the word of God coming into the conscience - "Come, see a man that told me all things that ever I did. Is not this the Christ?"

328 God is love; His blessed Son, a poor man speaking to the woman; but He is also light come in. These always go together. You never find when the Gospel is received, that it does not get in as light to the conscience. There is no fruit without it. Where it gets in, it will be light exposing all that is there; and if not, there is no root. The point where intelligence is brought into the heart of this poor woman, is where her conscience is reached. How would you like Him to tell you everything? Does He not know every wicked thing I have done? It should come up in judgment; but my comfort is, that it was all out before Him, when He was dealing with me in grace. Now I can bear it that the eye of God searches everything through His word. In dealing with the soul, love has brought the light there. Love attracted Peter; Luke 5. Why does he not run away? Why go up to Him, and say, "Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord"? He was drawn by the love and grace, and convicted by the light that the love had brought in. Light, that manifests to myself what I am in the sight of God, brings me there, so that I am in the light as He is. There must be truth in the inward parts, but did that hinder the Lord saying, "If thou knewest the gift of God"? Now, instead of trying to make things straight with God, I have found Him, knowing everything I have done, in perfect grace. There is then no hiding sin. All is brought into the light by God.

329 Mark another thing. God is bringing in something new. Was He going to trust the heart of this poor woman? No. He was going to get her to trust His heart. People say, May not my heart deceive me? To be sure it may! Will His deceive me? The grace of God brings salvation to us - brings us everything we want. So He brought strength at the pool of Bethesda - "Take up thy bed and walk." He is not requiring anything from us, but brings the thing we want - brings Himself: and there is nothing we want like Him. He brings us to repentance - to the conviction of what we are, as here. But He comes saying, "If thou knewest the gift of God." God has something to give - eternal life through Jesus Christ. But I shrink from coming to God. Quite right, to a certain extent. But who is it that I am with, that is bringing in this light? The very Man that asked for a drink of water. "If thou knewest who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink" - a poor man with nothing but words of grace; you would have trusted Him. "Thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water." Do you think I could trust God in the day of judgment? But can I trust the poor man sitting on the well-side? It is when my eyes are open upon the Person and work of the Lord, that I find I have been talking with the Lord Himself, and He had not a word against me, and yet knew all that ever I did. My heart has the blessed consciousness that it has met God.

There are the poor infidels beating out their brains to find out about God, but I have met Him. He had nothing but kind and gracious words, though He knew all my sins. His whole ways and words and works are perfect love to me, and the love of one come to seek me as a sinner. The Father seeketh worshippers. You have not to go to this mountain or that. He sent the Saviour seeking. How many does He find? Does He find hearts here that would pass by the Lord Jesus - that have read hundreds of passages in which His grace was manifested, and gone away untouched, unmoved, though God was spending His heart on you?

See how even the heart of the Lord rejoices over this one poor sinner (v. 32), "I have meat to eat that ye know not of." Do you believe that of Christ? He had come to open her eyes, and that was the Lord's meat. "My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work." It is lovely to see the Lord's heart in this way. Just see how it opened out to all the rest. "Say ye not, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? Behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest." He has actually been rejected out of Judea, but the case of this woman has so comforted Him now, it opens out His heart to say, "The fields are white to harvest."

330 Then we have to go on to see that, sins having been perfectly manifested, and love, the cross of the Lord Jesus comes in, because sins never could be allowed, nothing but the love, that comes for the sinner, and gave Himself. The heart was won, the conscience was reached. But what about these things that she had done? The very Lord who was speaking to her goes under them and puts them away. We do need something else than that which reaches the conscience; we need that which purges it. Though our sins were as scarlet they are made white as snow, and we are bound to believe it, for "his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree." He has charged Himself with them. I am convicted, and then humbled about them. But before the day of judgment comes, Christ came, and on the cross was bearing the sins He would have had to judge. The cross was God dealing with Him about them. When He comes in judgment I say, That is the Man who put away my sins. Before the time comes for judgment, the Person who is to be the judge has come Himself to bear the judgment. The question is not, then, whether I deserve condemnation - "There is none righteous, no, not one"; but what has God wrought? Can I dare to doubt it?

If I am out in the light before God, there is no place where I see sins so terrible as in the cross. But if they are not all perfectly put away for ever, they never can be, for Christ cannot die again; Heb. 10. He will rise up for judgment, but He is sitting down now, because all is completely done; if not (I mean as to the work, not as to your feelings), it never can be. That being so, therefore, when the soul is exercised, I look at the cross and say, He has borne my sins. I hate them the more. That is all right; it is the work of the Spirit in us; but I speak of the work done for us. Do not speak of past, present, and future sins; it is a foolish confusion of the time my heart thinks of it, and of the work that put them away. As to future sins, I ought never to think of sinning again. As to past sins, how many were past when Christ died? The work was done when they were all future. It is confounding the work done, with the effect in me. He is raised in glory; is there then any question whether I am to be glorified? There is another thing as to the cross. It all passed between God and Christ perfectly alone - of which the outward darkness was the sign - according to the exigencies and righteousness of God; where it must be according to the absolute perfectness of those who wrought it. Men had nothing to do with it; all we had to do with it was our sins, and, we may add, the hatred that killed Christ. It was a divine work about my sins.

331 Now as to the effect of it. We saw the poor woman absolutely absorbed with her water-pot; but the moment her conscience was thoroughly reached, she goes off to testify to the others - If you only get Christ, He will tell you all things. She leaves her water-pot. The Holy Ghost has not recorded it for nothing. The thing that absorbed her is gone. The word and power of Jesus, that gave her conviction of sin, also substituted Christ for the things that had power over her heart: Christ for my righteousness instead of my sins; Christ as the object for my heart instead of my cares.

I add a word for the comfort of any soul that is convicted of sin, but has not peace. Supposing a person had received the word of Christ, but cannot say he has got Him - but says, If only I could find Christ! I find so much sin in me: I would give anything to have Christ. What put that desire into the heart? You have got Him as a great Prophet; His word has reached the heart, you are convicted of sin, but do not know if you have Christ as Saviour. He has spoken to you about eternal life, and you have received a word that has made Christ precious to you, and your conscience bad. Then you have got Christ. His word has had the authority of the word of God in your conscience. If that be so, the Christ that has visited you, is the Christ that has borne your sins. The Christ who thus speaks to us to bring these thoughts to our hearts, is the One that through grace has borne our judgment before the day of judgment comes.

Now, how is it with you? Has your heart given up its water-pot for Christ? I do not mean that there will be no conflict. But has your heart so heard His word that it has penetrated into your conscience? Do you think that you are going with your sins into heaven? How many sins had Eve committed when God turned her out of Eden? One? You have committed more. Do you expect to get into heaven with your sins or without them? Are they all put away? How can you rest a moment until you know it? What madness and folly it would be!

332 The One who deals with our conscience is the One who came where we are, and is now beseeching us to be reconciled to God. It will be a terrible thing in the day of judgment, to have had the heart closed against the voice of the Charmer. Has not He charmed wisely? Were ever words like His - words of grace, unutterable grace, with which He has sought to win us? It is a blessed truth, that before the day of judgment comes, the Judge has come Himself to deliver. Of course you will have to be judged then, if you do not accept the deliverance now.

The Father seeking Worshippers

John 4

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In this chapter we have the blessed ways of God's grace in dealing with a sinner. Jesus is here in a world where sin is, and here to bring in grace which is above all the sin. But it is more: it is the soul brought to worship the Father in the blessed relationship in which the Son of God was here to reveal Him; and not only so, but to worship Him as God, who in His nature is revealed. "God is a Spirit, and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth." It is thus a soul brought to the personal knowledge of God, in the relationship of grace as the Father, revealed by the Son. It is, consequently, the same knowledge as we shall have in heaven. It is not one kind of knowledge here, and another in heaven. No doubt there is growth in intelligence, I admit all that; but as to what is revealed, and the One who is revealed, there is no difference between what is known now and what will be known in heaven, because it is the same God and Father we shall know for ever.

When we turn to the woman's thoughts of worship, all was confused. She speaks of the Samaritan's worship, and the Jew's worship, and she knew not what she worshipped. In fact, she only speaks of worship to turn the conversation when the Lord began to probe her heart. There must be salvation known before there can be any true worship. You cannot worship a God you do not know, and whose presence would cause you to fly from Him as Adam did in the garden. It is not questioning the fact that God is to be worshipped by His creatures - of course He is. It is due to Him - your duty to Him. Quite right to own and feel the obligation; but the thing is, you are unable to do it because you are a sinner. The only worship that man can offer is Cain's worship, which originated in hardness of heart. He was so indifferent to his condition as one banished from Paradise, and the ground cursed for his sake, that he brings the very fruit of that curse as an offering to God.

Mark, it is quite right to worship, but you must be in a state to do so. But you find some men acting in ignorance of this. They own the duty to worship God, without any sense of their state as sinners before God. It is quite the same with the law. Of course it is a duty to obey the law of God. But if a man takes the ground of keeping it, he has denied his condition as a sinner. He owns the duty, but does not own what God's word declares: "There is none righteous, no, not one. There is none that seeketh after God." "In me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing." It is like a child whose place is to be in his father's arms; but he has been very naughty. Of course he ought to be in his father's arms, but what he ought not to do is to think that he can be there as if nothing had happened. It is hardness of heart if he does not see this.

334 Now, God took care that when man ate of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, he should get a conscience. Persons talk of the law written in the heart of man, and all that fine kind of thing, but man got his conscience by his fall. It may be terribly blunted, and nothing deadens it more than false religion, but still there it is in every one - a blessed thing that it is so, for God works on it to bring the soul to know what God is, when He deals with the sinner in grace. But it is a mistake to mix up conscience and the law. If there had been no law, man would have known good and evil. Do you not think a son would have known he had done wrong to murder a father, though he had never heard of the commandments? If a boy pilfers from his comrade at school he knows he will get into a scrape if found out, but he knows, too, the thing is wrong in itself. Conscience in a man makes him know good and evil, and the law coming in only tacks on God's authority to conscience.

Before Adam fell he had not the knowledge of good and evil. There was nothing evil in eating the fruit unless God forbade him. There was no harm in the thing itself, but forbidding it was solely an expression of God's will, and he got the knowledge of good and evil by disobeying God and eating of the tree. It is a blessed thing that man has this conscience, for it is what God works upon in grace to bring in the revelation of Himself. Nothing perverts this knowledge of good and evil more than false religion; still, however depraved, conscience is there, and the effect of the revelation of God to the soul is, to bring into the conscience the remembrance of all that wherein we have sinned against Him. Therefore, to draw near as a worshipper, I must know that work whereby God has put away sin, and how I have entirely got freed from sin by the work of Christ. As we read in Hebrews, "That the worshippers once purged should have no more conscience of sins."

335 Now, dear friends, till your conscience is thus purged you cannot worship God. I do not say there may not be craving desires - a going out of the heart after Christ - all that I grant. But there can be no worship till you have salvation. How is it thus with you? Are there not some here whose consciences are not purged? Well, you take up a kind of worship; you profess to draw near to God, but you would fly from Him if He were to come in where you are carrying on your worship. Mark, I do not say He would drive you out; you would run away from Him. Just as with Adam; the voice of God walking in the garden did not drive Adam out; he ran away and hid himself in the trees of the garden.

Now, just take the Lord's prayer as a simple illustration. You say it; it is what you have been taught from your childhood - the kind of habits we have all been brought up in. Mark, I do not accuse you of insincerity, but I ask you, when you call God your Father, do you know Him in this relationship? Oh no, you say, I could not take that ground. Then you are none of God's children! Again, with the words, "Thy kingdom come." What do you mean by the Father's kingdom? Why, you have not one distinct idea about it; all is vagueness. Well, if that kingdom comes it will be heavenly glory, but the day of judgment must precede it. Are you ready for that? No! you cannot say you are saved from "the wrath to come." I take the Lord's prayer as a common illustration of what your worshipping God really comes to. You own the duty, but you have got a conscience which would make you flee from the presence of God whom you profess to worship.

In this chapter the Lord had gone away from Judea into Samaria because He was rejected. God was in the world, come there in grace, and the world would not have Him. The chapter opens with His leaving Judea - the place of which He says in this chapter? "Salvation is of the Jews." We begin, then, with a rejected Christ. There is no gospel without a rejected Christ. If you call yourselves Christians you are owning this. For you own that Christ has been crucified, and what does that mean but that the world has rejected and turned Him out. As the prophet says of the way the nation treated Him, "Who hath believed our report, and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?" "He is despised and rejected of men, and when we shall see him there is no beauty that we should desire him." Put 'Christian' for 'Jew,' and it is just the same story now. I do not say that there may not be the outward confession of His name, and respect, too, to the outward cross. But if you are honest you will say of your heart, 'It does not desire him.' You know this is as sure of you as it was of the Jews. You may have the outward form of Christianity, but you know you have no desires after Christ. When you are alone do you find your heart going out in love for Him? Even a Christian finds it hard to keep this desire for Christ fresh, for he has the flesh in him, and the flesh has no desire after Christ. The Lord says to His disciples when the Comforter comes, "He shall convince the world of sin, because they believe not on me." It is not a class of sinners, but the whole world is under sin, proved guilty all alike of the rejection of Christ; and if an individual is taken up in grace like the woman here, the same thing comes out in detail. She is convinced of her sins in the presence of Christ.

336 Have you been brought to this, dear friends? Not only that you are sinners, but that you call yourselves Christians, and yet have no desires in your heart after Christ? This is a worse condition than the heathen. They never heard of Christ to despise Him; but here we find those who take the ground of being Christians. They say, we believe in Christ, that He is the Son of God, and that He came here to suffer and die. What then? The very one that owns this religiously, goes away and amuses himself as if it were nothing at all. God is not only saying to you now, as He said to Adam, "Where art thou?" (which was man at his best, and yet man got away from God); but since the day of Pentecost the Holy Ghost is asking, What have you done with My Son?; as God said to Cain (where we have man at his worst), "Where is Abel, thy brother?" You have to answer, I have turned Him out of the world. If you say, My fathers did it, but if I had lived in their days I would not have done it, you are a Pharisee. You bear witness to what has been done, and pride yourself on being better than others. Well, the end will be, if you take that ground, you will come off worse than the publican. I grant there are differences. Everybody has his tastes; one follows pleasure, one ease, another money. But the thing is, God has been into the world in grace in the Person of His Son to win the hearts of sinners to Himself, and though you profess to know it all, it has not won yours.

337 The next point is that the grace that is in Christ, thus rejected, rises, blessed be God, completely above and over it all. We see Him in this chapter cast out of Judea, but nothing chills His love. He has come into our circumstances - taken the lowliest place - known by the proud world as "the carpenter's son" for many years. We see him here rejected and despised, and in His circumstances, "wearied with his journey," sitting at the well's side in the heat of the noonday sun (which in that country is terrible heat). But there was no chilling of His heart for the lost - He sat there to save. He stoops to ask drink of a wretched woman, for He had nothing to draw with; and although He had created the water of the well He would not work a miracle for Himself. He never worked miracles for Himself, but for others. He had taken the place of perfect lowly dependence, and He asks drink of a Samaritan - of one belonging to a people which were everything that is bad. They had a mixture of religion, adding the worship of Jehovah to their own idolatries. They were - what shall I call them? - what we should now say were half heretics, half apostates; and the Lord was sitting talking to one of these people whose personal character was all that was evil.

It is not that judgment against sin will not come - it must come. But before it is executed, we have in Christ love, that is above all the sin, come into the place where the sin is. It is God displaying Himself in grace, and not revealing righteousness in judgment. This was the error of Job's friends. They were looking for God bringing in righteousness in this way in punishing iniquity. That day has not come. Not that God does not restrain the evil passions of men. We can thank Him for the magistrate to keep down the evil, and prevent the world being an impossible place to live in through the violence of men. But God has not revealed Himself yet in judgment. God has been in the world in grace. As we read, "God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them." It is not judgment, but God come into the evil, and come there active in love. And so it is still; for though Christ has been cast out, the Holy Ghost has come down to carry on the testimony of God's love - love that goes after the lost. You may reject the love and be lost, but there the love is. You may be like the elder son, who will not go in to share the love bestowed on the prodigal, even when the father went out and entreated him.

338 Is there only a true want in your souls, dear friends, towards God? There is Christ to meet it. If man had no heart for Christ, Christ had a heart for man. He had come into a place where He could say, Salvation is not of Samaria; but that was not saying, Salvation is not for Samaria. There was nothing but sin in the woman, but He creates a want in her heart. She had lived a shameful life, it was the result of her character. Doubtless there was natural energy and self-will in her, and as it always is where this is the case, it brings more misery; and she was miserable. Her sin had isolated her; she came alone to draw water, not wishing to be with the other women, and hear their gossip. She was too miserable for that kind of thing, and she came alone. But God, too, was alone there! and she was to meet Him, and have her tale told out in His presence when He was come to meet her in perfect grace. And, beloved friends, it must be so with us. Our tale must be told out to God some day. If not now, in perfect grace, it will be by-and-by in judgment. How wonderful! How blessed! All the sin brought out in the presence of One who brings in the love and grace of God now, which is above all the sin.

Yet, alas! she does not understand a word about it. "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God." The Lord tells her of the gift of God. God was there to give salvation. It was not a question of salvation being of the Jews. It was the grace of God bringing salvation to the lost, as the Lord said to Zacchaeus, "This day is salvation come to this house." So here, "If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water." Christ was there, and He was there to give eternal life. It is not God come requiring that we should labour for it. He comes to give. If you are labouring you have not got what God gives.

But you may say, If God gives to a vile woman like this He makes nothing of morality. It offends your good opinion of yourself that He should talk thus to such a woman. Ah! you are a Pharisee, and the publicans and harlots go into the kingdom of God before you; so yours, after all, is a poor case. You must toil and die, because you will not stoop to Christ's gift. He had come to reveal the Father in grace, and He gave that which springs up in joy to the Father. It is a well in us, which springs up to God in joy, who has brought us to know Him, as revealed in grace and love. Do you know God thus? Do you know what it is when no eye but His sees you, so to have that knowledge of Him in grace as the Father, in your heart, that joy and gladness springs up to Him?

339 The woman understood not one word about it. Christ had to go on with her in patience. She had not this new life, and so she had no intelligence about it. Now, dear friends, God deals with you in patience, but is there a want for Him in your soul? Or are you like this woman, who did not know what Christ and heaven could give, and had only known the misery of sin? I do not ask you about your lives; hers was a shameful one. I doubt not yours may be outwardly proper. But every one who does not know Christ, has either a disappointed heart, or a heart seeking what will disappoint it.

It was contrary to man's thoughts that God should stoop so low, as to sit thus talking to a vile Samaritan woman. The disciples marvelled that He talked thus with her. It was not fit, they thought, for a Rabbi. Very likely! But it was fit for God in grace.

The woman's heart is closed to all He had said. She cannot get above her daily toil. "Sir, give me this water, that I thirst not, neither come hither to draw." But the Lord goes on. And now we come to the next instruction. Her conscience must be reached. "Go, call thy husband." A little word will do when He speaks. The Lord was not dealing with her as a judge. He was there in perfect grace; but grace tells terribly when sin is on the conscience. Like the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden, and Adam hides himself. God had not spoken to drive him out; God was there, and he fled from Him. So here with the woman. "Go, call thy husband." Immediately sin is before her, and she tries to evade by answering, "I have no husband." The Lord's reply made her know that He knew all about her. Immediately she perceives that He is a prophet. I am Master of what I know. Here was a stranger who knew all about her, and God is known thus by the conscience. She was exposed in the presence of One who knew all that ever she did.

Has the word of God ever brought you to this, dear friends? Have you ever seen a man that has told you all that ever you did? Has your memory ever been active in the presence of God? You must be laid bare some day: either in judgment, when mercy is over; or now in perfect goodness in a day of grace. Have you been brought now to God, so that you have taken your place as condemned, and what must come out in the day of judgment has come out now? Has that goodness of God led you to repentance? Not merely outward sorrow for sin, saying, We are all sinners, in a general way. But have you confessed your sins to God from a need you had of being reconciled? Have you ever had a visit from God? I do not mean by dreams or visions; but has God so spoken to your conscience as for you to have known Him and yourself together?

340 The woman now turns to worship. The Lord tells her that salvation was of the Jews; the Samaritans worshipped they knew not what; but the hour was coming, and now was, when the true worshippers should worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for it was no longer a question of what man ought to be for God, but of what God is for the sinner. "The Father seeketh such to worship him." As for man's worship, it was all worthless. You may get a machine to do ceremonies if you only are clever enough to make one. As we read in the prophet of the outward worship of Israel. God calls it, "bowing the head like a bulrush." It is utterly worthless. You must have to do with God who knows you, and whom you must know if you would worship Him in spirit and in truth. It is not God requiring worship - all very true, as man's duty - but the Lord is here in grace, and out of the abundance of His heart He says, "The Father seeketh" worshippers. He is not regarding forms of worship, but He is seeking vile, broken-down sinners to make them worshippers. He is not seeking the Pharisee: his worship proceeds out of himself; he thanks God for what he is.

Here it is God who is revealed as giving living water; going on with the poor dull heart to bring it to repentance, that there might be a want there for what He was giving. It is no longer seeking good in man. God had tried him without law, and He had to drown the world with a flood; He tried him under the law, and he broke it; sent His own Son in grace, and they rejected Him. What was left for the world but judgment? All is over with it. But now when there is the judgment of the world - not executed, but pronounced - "now is the judgment of this world" - God brings in His grace for the world that is under judgment; and so it is when He works in the individual conscience. He brings out all the sins, but He is there to give eternal life. So with the poor woman. Where did He find you? I speak now to believers. He found you in your sins; but the one who has reached the conscience is the One who has come and given Himself for the sins. Directly the woman's sins are out in His presence, as the prophet, she wants to know Christ. "When he is come," she says, "he will tell us all things." He will say who are saved and who are lost. Ah, says the Lord, "I that speak unto thee am he." If He is known to her conscience as a prophet, He will reveal Himself to her as the Christ that she needs - the Christ who could save; whenever the word of God reaches the conscience, Christ has been there. What Christ? Why, the Christ who gave Himself for the sins which He brought to light. The cross puts all the sins away. He puts you into the truth about yourself, that He may put you into the grace which has taken the sins away.

341 There must be the ploughing up of the conscience, and there is God's patience in His dealings with us individually, until the soul is broken down and submits itself to His righteousness: but when once there, it is not a question about making peace - the peace has been made: "Having made peace through the blood of his cross." "Who, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high." Why is He sitting there? It is because, "By one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified." He will rise to judgment; but as to the question of our sins, the apostle says, "After he had offered one sacrifice for sins, for ever sat down on the right hand of God."

Are you, beloved friends, thus reconciled to God? We cannot worship Him until we are saved. When I think of what Christ has done, I can say, All is settled. God has given Him in love for my sins, and has accepted Him in righteousness. Thus God is revealed, and the sinner is brought in truth into His presence to know Him there in grace. What a poor thing it is to live in a lie; to have a bad conscience in order to keep up a character. It is always so. Men are walking in a vain show, disquieting themselves in vain. Dear friends, is it always to be so - always to live in a lie? Or is it a good thing to be out in the presence of God, where I find that perfect grace has visited me, to present me in Christ in perfect righteousness to God? What a place to be in! To be thus, in Christ, all out before Him, and all put away by Himself in perfect love, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment, "because as he is, so are we, in this world."

342 Now, what was the effect on the woman? She left her waterpot; what she had once lived for, occupied her no more. She was now occupied with Christ, in contrast with her cares; and as she had had all out before God, she can go out boldly to the men and say, "Come, see a man which told me all things that ever I did: is not this the Christ?" She had got Christ, and had forgotten her water-pot. She had everything settled with God, so that she had nothing any longer to conceal. There is no fear of man where there is the fear of God; so she goes to tell the men - before this she avoided the women. This is the practical effect of the revelation of Christ to the sinner.

Is Christ, beloved friends, thus in your hearts? Has He so entered that He has taken the place of the things which kept Him out? The Lord grant that it may be so.

The Pool of Bethesda

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In these chapters something of the Jews is brought forward, just to shew out the blessing God was bringing in in Christ, in contrast with all that had gone before. Here it is the Pool of Bethesda - angelic ministry. Though the people were captive, and the ark stilt gone, God had preserved a remnant to present Christ to them; He kept them tilt they had rejected His Son; and there were the remains of blessing stilt with them. He was still the Lord that healed them, and angelic ministry was still there.

A man was here at the pool, but the character of his sickness was such that it had taken away his strength, so that the sickness from which he wanted healing had taken away the power to use the means of being healed. It was not a question of being willing - he was willing enough; but this disease had taken away the power of using the remedy. The great thing we have to learn is, that "when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly." We are slow to learn this - that we have no strength. The first man you meet in the street wilt own that he is a sinner, but if you tell him there is no strength in the flesh, he wilt think you are going to condemn him to be a sinner all his life.

I do not know a more precious word in the spirit and character of it than this portion. The poor man had been ill thirty-eight years. The Lord asks, "Wilt thou be made whole?" He had the will, but explains he had no strength. Christ brings the strength with Him. This is what is so distinctly and definitely brought out in contrast with the law.

It was the Sabbath-day: the Jews draw attention to the fact, and the Lord takes up the blessed character He had as Son, and says: "My Father worketh hitherto and I work." How can God rest where sin is? where misery is? He cannot have His rest in a world like this. Christ had come to work: but what makes it so blessed, beloved friends, is this truth, it was not man's work and man's strength; the Father and the Son are the workmen in our salvation. God might have cut off Adam and Eve, and there would have been an end of them in righteousness, but His nature would not let Him do that. He sets about to work; we see the Father and the Son working in grace; the Son had come to work. Instead of cutting off the sinners or leaving them to their wretchedness, God had made Himself a workman in His grace, and the whole thing was changed. The law required man to work, just as the Pool of Bethesda required a man to be quick enough to get himself into it. But in the gospel, it is God who works: "My Father worketh." What an answer to their wretched malice, in accusing Him of breaking the Sabbath! The Father and the Son working in grace to save man, because God had no rest when he was in misery and sin. But though a vivid picture of the principle of grace in teaching, the Lord goes beyond this, and shows it is really life-giving.

344 They charge Him then with saying He was equal with God, which He did say, because He was one with Him, but He never puts Himself out of the place of servant, which He had taken. He unfolds to them His Father; the Son would do nothing by Himself; He was a divine Person, but He had taken the place of servant, and He had one object in everything.

In verses 21-23 he goes into the work of the Father and the Son in two distinct things. There are two great ways in which the glory of the Son is displayed. The Father quickens, and the Son quickens whom He will; and now mark: we are dead in sin and the Father comes and quickens, the Son too. But it is not so when it comes to judgment. The Father has not been incarnate here, spit upon and trampled on. The Father judges no man, and He has secured in this way that all should honour the Son even as they honour the Father, by committing all judgment to Him. They have blessed fellowship in quickening souls, but the Son having come down as Son of man, having been outraged and insulted by everything man could do when he got the chance, all judgment is committed to the Son. Every knee shall bow; things in heaven, on the earth, and under the earth: no matter how wicked or how infidel and rebellious, he will have to bow to Christ just the same as any saint, though in a very different way. Thus we get the Father and the Son both giving life - a divine work and power exercised in our favour; and then we get judgment - the way of securing honour for the Son; the Father judges no man, but puts it all into His hands.

And now comes this solemn question, beloved friends: In which way have I to do with the Son? In quickening or in judgment? as the blessed One who loved me and gave Himself for me, washing me in His blood, or as the One who is executing judgment because I would not own Him? To this God gives an answer in His own blessed way: "He that heareth my word and believeth him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but is passed from death unto life." Those that believe do not come into judgment, do not come into Christ's second way of dealing. The thing is done. Christ has wrought in His blessed quickening grace, and the judgment is over. We are not called in question, because the place, the life, the condition we have, are the effect of the work of the Father and the Son, and He will not call that in question.

345 Whenever a person has heard His word - believed Him that sent Him - that is eternal life, and he has got it. If the Shepherd's voice has been heard, I say, Yes, I know whose voice that is; it is the voice of the blessed Son of God. As He said to the poor woman at the well: "If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water." I know the Father sent Him that I might have life: not by my wishing, for it was when I was a sinner.

If I have heard His word, the voice of the blessed Son of God, I shall not come into the judgment. All stand before the judgment-seat of Christ, everything will come out there, and so much the better; but there is no question of judgment for the believer, because Christ has borne the sins for which he would have had to be judged. The Person who is to be the judge has first of all been the Saviour. When I come before the judgment-seat of Christ, I say, There is the Man who bore all my sins! But more, we are in glorified bodies when we get there: "It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption; it is sown in dishonour, it is raised in glory." We are glorified and brought there like Himself."

The one who believes has been quickened, does not come into judgment, and is passed from death unto life. Not only that when he was living in sins he learned to hate them, and put them away, but he is brought into a new state altogether: "Alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

And then He goes on to the display of still further power: "All that are in the graves shall hear his voice." There is the resurrection of life; the power that quickened the souls, now raising the bodies; He carries on and completes as to the body the work which He had begun in the soul. People talk of fitting themselves for heaven; you never find such a thing in Scripture. "He hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light," and therefore the thief, when he died upon the cross confessing Christ to be the Lord (a most glorious confession of faith, for He was rejected and forsaken of all) goes straight into paradise, and I suppose he was quite fit to go there. I am not saying a word against growth; there are abundant scriptures for that, but you will not find one of them in connection with being fit for heaven.

346 "The resurrection of life" is the carrying out fully this blessed work of the Father and the Son. The bodies of the saints are raised, and all is complete; and then comes the resurrection of judgment. Of believers it is said: "He shall change our vile bodies, and fashion them like unto his glorious body." But this is not the case with those who have been walking in evil: they are raised for judgment. I do not know anything that has done more mischief than the thought of a general resurrection, because it throws back the question of the justification of the Christian to a day of judgment that has not yet come. There is no such thought in Scripture. "Christ, the first-fruits; afterwards they that are Christ's at his coming." "The dead in Christ shall rise first." The resurrection of the saints, as explained in 1 Corinthians 15, is the fruit of the quickening power of the Lord Jesus, applied to the bodies of His saints. It is the resurrection of life; we are raised in glory. Scripture does not throw us back into uncertainty to be judged; and why? Because the Lord is my righteousness, God's righteousness is shown in glorifying me. Whoever is judged for his works is infallibly condemned. But if I have no righteousness for God, He has righteousness for me, and how can that be a thing to be called in question afterwards? But if I am in Christ and so accepted, He is in me, and here is our responsibility. And this I press, if we are alive to God, let us see this life come out. The only thing we have to do here is to live Christ. Responsibility flows from the place I am in. I am to glorify Christ in the place that I am in as alive to God in Christ.

And then He takes up their responsibility in rejecting Him as come in grace. He had shown the operation of sovereign grace in quickening, so He shows how they had neglected every testimony: His Father's, that of His own works, of John the Baptist, and their own scriptures. In the folly of their hearts they rejected Jesus, rejected or neglected Him, and they have to be judged.

347 We have got the quickening power of the Father and the Son, that exercised in giving divine life, and in consequence no mixing up of the resurrection of life and the resurrection of judgment. But there is another thing that is important for our peace, the knowing it now. "He that heareth my word and believeth him that sent me, hath everlasting life." The Spirit gives power to the quickening word. It is a blessed thing to find we can know this now. If I have heard Christ's word, and believed the Father, who in unspeakable grace sent the Son to be the Saviour, I have everlasting life, and I recognise not only that I was guilty through my sins, but dead; and when dead, quickened, and have passed from that state, out of it, into life; and if Christ come soon enough I may not have to die at all.

How little, beloved friends, have we realised the completeness of the work Christ has done; we do not believe that He has so completely overcome the power of death that we need not die at all. We may be all changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye.

We have to learn ourselves and God's faithful patience and grace, and God knows how long to leave us to learn this - but we have got life in the Son. An unconverted man has not got life at all: he is dead in his sins, though that is not the first thing that reaches his conscience, but his guilt. But when we come to learn our state, it is important we should know what we are. In the flesh the tree is bad; but I have got life in Christ, and that is another thing.

Do not confound things and think of a future judgment which is going to settle everything. It will settle nothing: it will manifest and execute, but it settles nothing. "He that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed on the name of the only begotten Son of God"; and if he die in that state he dies in his sins.

Do you believe there is no good in you at all? It is a most bitter thing to say. No one denies there are amiable qualities, but you find them in animals too. Who would be morally in a better state before God: a person with a shocking bad temper, who was looking to God earnestly every day to control it, or one with a good temper, who was pleased with himself? God tells us we are dead. It is hard to learn, for our experience contradicts it. We are to "mortify our members"; and I have got power and duty too, for Christ has died. There comes this everyday conflict, but I have both the title and duty, and power to say: I am not a debtor to the flesh. "God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh." It is all settled: Christ died. Then I am dead, and I have got Christ for my life; and having Him for my life, I have Him after He has put away all my sins.

348 Now, do you honestly say, I know that in me, that is, in my flesh - dwelleth no good thing? - Do you believe that of yourselves? You will never get full liberty till you do, and you will never know what it is to be settled and steady in your soul till you have learned it; for then you get not only forgiveness and justification, but deliverance. It is a very different thing to contend with the flesh when it has got the upper hand, and when you have.

Do you say: Yes, I am a poor nothing, but I have passed from death unto life; I shall not come unto judgment? I have heard His word, I know that the Father in unspeakable, unutterable love, has sent the Son, and I have heard Him, and got everlasting life.

And oh, see, beloved friends, the infinite blessedness of it, to be walking with God in the full sense of His unclouded favour resting upon us as it did upon Christ!

And we want to know more: First, of the place by faith, and then of the power where God has set us through this astonishing work of the Lord Jesus Christ: that, while He has put away all the sins the flesh produces, He has given us eternal life, and that here we are called to manifest the life of Christ in everything, as dead to sin, crucified with Him, and always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus - not only to avoid open sins, but to be epistles of Christ, that men should read Christ in us as they did the law in the ten commandments on the tables of stone. We shall soon find what we are - poor feeble creatures - but that with Christ we can do all things. We need diligence in seeking His grace, but with Him there is positive strength to overcome.

The Lord give us simplicity of heart to see the fulness of His grace, and then to live to Christ here through all the circumstances of life; the only object before us, the only motive in the thousand things we have to do - Christ.

The Feast of Tabernacles

John 7: 1-44

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You see the utter darkness in which the Pharisees and all of them were; they said, "He deceiveth the people." The effect of the presence of Christ is always to produce darkness where faith is not. The Lord had wrought miracles and so on, but the natural heart never can perceive the light, so there is nothing but confusion. There is always positive wilful rejection by the natural man, as there was by the Pharisees; but where Christ is known, there all is light. There is a great deal for us to learn of course, but it is God's light that we have, and in that light we shall see light. We go on learning truth about God, truth about the world, truth about the vanity that deceives men's hearts: but grace through the gospel and the testimony is there, speaking of Christ, and, thank God, all in perfect grace. There is the manifestation of what we were: "Ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye the light in the Lord." So that though there is much to learn, still I have got now what reveals God's heart and discerns mine. The Son came to reveal the Father. It does not say grace and truth were revealed: "The law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ."

As we see here, it is a rejected Christ. It is always, "Take up thy cross and follow me." All the glory becomes a cross in this world. In His humiliation the glory was there: His disciples "beheld His glory," but still it was rejected; there was always the enmity of man against it. So it is written, "Marvel not if the world hate you." And He said, "If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you." We take up our cross and follow Him. "Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." So, the Lord says, if you go with me, you must go that road. It was "If it die." He stopped alone till then; nobody touched Him. His proper work in this world was only at the cross. "He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not." Born of God was another thing, and they received Him. But by the world He was rejected. Thus we see our place, the Christian's place, is this: He having been rejected, we have the counterpart of it.

350 But not only is He the rejected One; He is also the glorified Man in glory. There is one Man where I get life; one Man in whom righteousness is displayed; and that is Christ at the right hand of God. There our hearts must go up and find the only thing to which we belong; though of course our bodies belong to this world. Man took his place in the glory of God consequent on redemption being wrought, and the Holy Ghost was sent down and our bodies become the temples of God. That which characterises the Christian is that the Holy Ghost dwells in him. It is this which the Lord speaks of in the passage we have read - the outflowing of it.

There were three great feasts among the Jews, three very important ones to which all the males had to go up, all gathering round God. The passover, to which they all went, though it had not so much the character of rejoicing, and the feast of weeks, and the feast of ingathering. The passover had not so much the character of rejoicing; it was rather God in His character of Judge passing over them. So the unleavened bread that followed the passover was called the "bread of affliction." God is the God of holiness, so He must have holiness. So after the passover each person went to his own tent; there was no rejoicing, or anything of that sort.

But in the other two feasts they were to go with an offering in their hands, and to rejoice before the Lord with their sons and their daughters, their manservants and their maid-servants, the Levites, the strangers, the fatherless, and the widows. They were to rejoice in their feast and all others with them. And in this feast which we have in John, when the harvest was over, when the discriminating judgment of God had taken place, they were to dwell in tents, and with the fatherless and the widows they were to rejoice. They were in rest.

The first, the passover, was just escaping out of judgment; the next is the enjoyment of the first-fruits; and then the getting into the rest of God, the full thing; God had blessed them in everything. That is the one that we get here. The Pentecost does not connect itself with this, though of course everything is connected with the passover. Here they are not escaping from the condition they were in, but they are in the living enjoyment of the condition they are brought into, of that which God has brought them into.

This is what we have to look at in our worship: we should be enjoying more what God has brought us into. We have to watch that our worship should not be only the remembrance of what we have been brought out of, but the enjoyment of that into which we have been brought. Here it is all joy, and rest and blessedness. You will find in Leviticus that it is all connected with the people being brought out of the land of Egypt. It is all one thing - the passover, of course, is the foundation of everything; but besides this, I see that man has got into this perfect place of blessing: of our bodies it is not true yet, of course; they belong to this old creation; but in the new man we are connected with Christ up there. And our place down here is that of having the Holy Ghost, who takes of the things of Christ and shews them to us. But it is all connected with the passover, with the feast of unleavened bread, and that was connected with the Sabbath; though it began the evening before the Sabbath, it went on after Satan's power and death and judgment were all over, passed and gone.

351 What characterises Christianity is the ministration of the Spirit. The Holy Ghost is here consequent on the exaltation of Christ. In this feast of weeks we get, in a certain sense, the coming of the Holy Ghost. Pentecost came in as a kind of annex to the feast of the firstfruits, only there was leaven. Then after the harvest and after the vintage came the feast of tabernacles, when they were to keep not only seven days but eight; which brings in heavenly things. When Christ comes the Jews will literally get their rest, and they will celebrate the grace which has given them all this blessing.

What the unbelieving brethren of Christ sought was that He should shew Himself. He says, I cannot do that; I can die, but I cannot shew myself to the world; my time is not yet come; I cannot keep the feast of tabernacles in any true sense. And so there is no such thing in the present time as keeping the feast of tabernacles; there is no antitype of it. "Jesus said unto them, My time is not yet come, but your time is always ready; the world cannot hate you, but me it hateth, because I testify of it, that the works thereof are evil. Go ye up unto this feast: I go not up unto this feast." That word "yet" should not be there. He just goes up privately afterwards to leach the people. Then on the eighth day He says (for there was an eighth day): "If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water." This brines in the Spirit. He gives us the Spirit now instead of the feast of tabernacles - a full, flowing stream. This is our portion till He comes.

352 But now mark, beloved brethren, it is "If any man thirst." It is not as the Holy Ghost came upon Balaam, and other cases. That might be without any thirsting at all. But it is "If any man thirst." We get the same thing in Revelation: "Let him that is athirst come."

Thus we have poor bodies, bodies of humiliation, but we have got the Holy Ghost, and therefore "our conversation is in heaven." And that word means all the associations, everything belonging to a man; as we say, "That man is a Dublin man"; which means that his family, his business, his belongings are in Dublin; so our place and belongings are in heaven, and we are just looking and waiting for Him to come and take us up there. For the Holy Ghost comes down, not only to associate me with Christ risen, but with Christ glorified. We are not yet in it, but, where the heart thirsts, it already gets full satisfaction there; otherwise people are thirsting after other things, and there is a famine in the land. Wherever the flesh works there is thirst; there is no such thing as the new nature thirsting. When a man has once come to Christ and drunk, then "out of his belly flow rivers of living water."

You see the Holy Ghost is the source of life. We are "born of the Spirit" in chapter 3; in chapter 4 we get the full purpose of the Spirit in worship; and here it is flowing forth from the believer as "rivers of living water." We have the full power and life and liberty of the Holy Ghost in spite of all that is around us in this world. So we have it instead of the feast of tabernacles. The Jews will have the literal thing soon, but with us it is entirely heavenly.

People sometimes say they will not know till the day of judgment whether they are saved or not. But before the judgment day comes, as all here I trust know, Christ is sitting at the right hand of God, and thence comes the Holy Ghost to be rivers of living water in believers; so that I do not wait until Christ comes out to tell me whether I am saved or not, because He has sent the Holy Ghost already to tell me, and I know it. "Rivers of living water." All these blessed things flow out. He is the source of refreshment and blessing. I am told in Colossians 3 to "set my affections on things above." How can I set them if I do not know what they are? Now the Holy Ghost shews us our present relationships. "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit." "We have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God." We have received the Holy Ghost, and what does He do? He tells us about our sins, our failures, most certainly, but He has come to tell us, not of things of this world but of the things that are freely given to us by God; and we do know something of those things. When Moses and Elias came to the Mount of Transfiguration did they not freely talk with the Lord? and does that tell me nothing of what the intimacy up there is? If I am going to walk in white with Him up there - if I am going to have a white stone with a new name in it, the pledge of His secret approval, just as in a family a child has a pet name that has no meaning to strangers - is that nothing? There will be walking on streets of gold - holiness. We get the blessedness up there more and more revealed, the Lord using figurative expressions to let us into it.

353 And then another thing. Supposing my heart is right with God, what will be my desire for the saints? That every one of them should be exactly what would be to Christ's glory; that there should not be a single thing in one of them that should not answer to Christ's desire for them.

These things are spiritually discerned of course. The Holy Ghost comes to take these things that are not seen to reveal them to us. We get these grapes of Eshcol brought into the wilderness for us, the grapes of Canaan, of the land.

Then, in view of all this, what is my responsibility? As to my acceptance, that is not my responsibility.

I was lost, entirely lost, but that has all been settled by God Himself, and now I am in Christ. My responsibility is now that I should represent Christ. He represents me before God, and my responsibility is to represent Him before the world; and that is where failure comes in. That is what I have to look at in every step that I take in this world. I have to ask myself, Shall I be an epistle of Christ or not, in doing this?

"Out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water" - out of his inmost affections - out of what a man is in the bottom of his heart, as we say, shall flow streams of refreshment to others; the poor vessel is so full that it overflows. We cannot bring it out as it is in heaven, of course: but we can bring it out as the Holy Ghost brings it in to us here; and then we have the feast of tabernacles. When the Lord comes again the feast will be literally come: there will be the harvest and the vintage, and then the full blessing; but, until it comes, we have the Holy Ghost instead of it, and our place that of waiting for Christ; we are converted to wait for God's Son from heaven.

354 Until then what characterises the Christian is that he has the Holy Ghost. God had sealed him by the Holy Ghost, made him know Christ by the Holy Ghost, brought him in spirit and heart into those things where Christ is, with whom God has associated him. If I am careless, of course it is not so, but if I am walking in the Spirit all these things will shine out in me. He has made us the habitation of the Spirit; our bodies are the temples of the Holy Ghost; so that all that God is, in its right time and place and measure, flows out from us as refreshing streams in a dry and thirsty land where no water is. That is what a Christian is; and may God give us to walk faithfully, and lowly, and humbly with Him in it to His glory. Amen.

Christ departing to the Father

John 13

J. N. Darby.

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This chapter begins the communications of the Lord as regards His going away. In the previous chapters we have had the account of His ordinary ministry, and statements of the glory of His Person, the power of the divine life come into the world, and light too. All that had been gone through, and then in chapters 8 and 9, you get the rejection of His word and works. Chapter 10 is a statement of what the real purpose of His coming was - to get out His sheep. "He calleth his own sheep by name, and leadeth them out." In spite of all opposition, He could not be hindered from having His sheep. It is our heavenly portion in contrast with the fold. The "porter"  - God in His prophets, opening the door. He did come in at the door, born at Bethlehem in the appointed way; and then He becomes the door to anybody else. He had come in in God's way according to prophecy; but any who come in by Him "go in and out and find pasture," perfect liberty, not shut up as in a prison, but the Shepherd's care instead of the prison-fold. There they were, saved by Him, and God's pastures to feed upon.

That closed what He was doing on earth, and what He was bringing them into - heavenly blessedness. Then the hour was come that He should depart out of this world unto the Father. He was come there to be put to death, so that all through these chapters He is looked at as actually gone. Having shewn that the Jews would not receive this light of life, they remained in darkness, of course. He was putting before His sheep much better things. Now that He comes to the point that He was actually going away, He takes up the heavenly things to which He had gathered these poor sheep, and unfolds them in chapter 13.

In the gospel of John the blood of Christ is not the subject, though we cannot think too much of it, and that is the reason it is said in the epistle, "This is he that came by water and blood"; not merely by water that purifies and cleanses, but by the blood too that expiates. The cross was the absolute wickedness of man, hating Christ who was come in love, God having displayed Himself in all Christ's walk on earth; it revealed God, and they could not stand that. It is not only that man has been turned out of the garden of Eden on account of his sins, but man has turned God out of the world when He came in grace. In this chapter we find it is water spoken of, that is, the practical purifying of man's heart. There is no repetition of the blood, but there is of the water. To have the work done that clears our sins, the blood must be shed. Nothing ever shewed what sin was as much as Christ's death did; He was sweating as it were great drops of blood only at the thought of going through it.

356 The point here is, that He was going to His Father. The Father had put all things into His hands, and He came from God and went to God; and the question necessarily was with the disciples, How could He be with them or they with Him? It looked like giving them up, and so He presses on them His unalterable love; nothing stopped it, He went perfectly on till everything was done, and everything done that would bring us into the same place He was in. After His resurrection He sends Mary Magdalene to say what was never said before: "Go tell my brethren I ascend unto my Father and your Father, to my God and your God." 'Looking at God in His holy righteousness, you are before Him just as I am; looking at Him in the Father's love, you are before Him just as I am.' And in John 17: "Hast loved them as thou hast loved me." A wonderful word, beloved friends; but that is where we are brought, and that is what Christ does, and it is well to have it thoroughly before our souls in thankfulness for this love. "Peace I leave with you," a peace made at the cross. When the world gives, it gives away; that is, it has not got it any more. But Christ never gives in that way; if He gives us His glory He does not lose any of it Himself. He puts us into the same place with Himself. What the Lord was telling them about was, that He was going up on high to God. He "came from God" in all His absolute purity, and "He went to God" in the same holiness in which He came from Him.

They were sitting at the evening meal. It is not that supper was now ended, but it was going on. They were sitting together, and He gets up from supper; that is, from association with His disciples in this world - He among them, and they with Him. He had been among them as one that served; they had been with Him day by day, and seen the gracious condescension of His ways, and it is well to see it, and eat the bread of God which came down from heaven. But if He is going to God, and the Father has given everything into His hand, there is an end of His service, they thought. 'No,' He says; 'I am not going to give up this service,' so He gets up, and girds Himself, lays aside His garments; that is, sitting at ease in this world. 'I have done with that,' He says; 'but I have not done with service.'

357 I have spoken of the blood as the basis. If the Lord Jesus could not stay with them down here, they must be fit practically (down here on the earth, I mean) to be with Him in God's presence. "If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me." He could not have a part with them any more. The world had rejected Him, and in that sense He had rejected the world, except to gather souls out of it. 'I cannot have a part with you, and now the thing is for you to have a part with Me.' Here it is having a man in a fit state for communion with God in His own holiness. And that is the question for the Christian every day. If I have not light, the sin is not on my conscience. God may see failure, but (speaking of our walk) He is looking at our walk according to the light we have. He chastens us that we may be "partakers of his holiness." There is no measure of holiness for our hearts but God Himself: to be in the presence of God without a jar between us and Him: we come short of it, I know - that puts an end to all perfection here. It will be perfect in glory; "holy and without blame before him in love." There is no other kind of holiness, and Christ in glory is the expression of that. "We all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord." In contemplating, looking at, dwelling on Christ, you get every day more like Him. "It doth not yet appear what we shall be; but we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him: for we shall see him as he is." The Christian's eye has been opened on the blessedness of Christ; he knows he is to be perfectly like Him by-and-by, and he wants to be as much like Him now as he can. "Sanctify them through thy truth, thy word is truth." That is the means God employs - the scriptures. "And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth." He has set Himself apart - the model Man - that the Holy Ghost may take of the things of Christ, and make us like Him. That is where the Christian is who is in earnest; and now his heart wants the holiness. I press that. As regards acceptance, you are in as much acceptance as Christ is, because you are "accepted in the Beloved." We are in this new place before God (not our bodies yet, of course). Real, true holiness is based on the fact, that the question of guilt is settled. But here we soon find out from day to day if things are going on rightly. We come then, besides that, to go through the practical realisation of it day by day, to be as like Christ as we can.

358 He was going up into heaven; how would He do the service up there? 'If I do not do it,' He says, 'you will never be able to be up there with Me.' He takes the form of a servant, then Peter says to Him, "Thou shalt never wash my feet." Jesus answered him, "If I wash thee not thou hast no part with me." We get the truth from it as we often do from Peter's haste (right feeling of respect for the Lord too). But this is the great point of the chapter. If He did not wash them clean enough as to water merely - not blood here - they could not have a part with Him; He must make them fit for the place He was going to be in. If the guilt is not put away, and we not purified, we are undone. Then Peter says, "Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head"; and the Lord says, "He that is bathed needeth not save to wash his feet" - the whole body in contrast with the feet. Here I get the difference between this actual, absolute cleansing that has never lost its value; but in walking through this world they would pick up dirt on their feet, and so I get the feet-washing. "Born of water" never has to be repeated, and it never loses its efficacy any more than the blood. When the guilt is cleared away, when I am born of God, I see all my sinfulness according to that; so when I see thus my place with Christ in heaven, and like Christ in heaven, I see that I am all the opposite; but I have a holy nature, and Christ is my life. The life of Christ is a holy thing. It is not mending the flesh (I cannot deny amiable flesh), but I get there to judge sin as God judges it. I do not say, 'That will not suit an honest man,' but, 'That will not suit God.' It is a new life, and it shews itself in cleansed habits and ways. The word is applied with divine and heavenly purity, and light which comes down from God - "the Word made flesh" - and yet perfectly suited to man. I am going to be with Him, and before Him, and things here do not suit me, and the more so because the blood has given me a title to be in God's presence. I am cleansed by the blood to be able to walk in the light as God is in the light. The character of this holiness is, that we can be with Christ when He is gone to God. A thousand things we know of in this world; well, I say, that does not suit Christ, and so I want my feet washed. It is not any uncertainty as to my relationship; for I have started with, "I write unto you, little children, because ye have known the Father." I know I am a child, I say, "Abba, Father." If I sin the Spirit becomes a rebuking Spirit in me, because Christ has been the Advocate. I do not call in question that I am a child, but I say I am a naughty child; I have picked up dirt on my feet; I have got that which does not suit me in going into God's house and God's presence; there is something in my walk which is inconsistent with the blessed relationship we are brought into. With a holy nature I am to count the rest dead, and therefore when it stirs in any way I feel it, because I am in that place that does not suit it. Even an evil thought grieves the Spirit.

359 The place that Christ takes is, that He has not given up being a servant. 'I shall have to be washing your feet; ye are washed, ye are clean, and I am not going to repeat your conversion. The word of the God has been livingly applied to your hearts and consciences; you are brought into the light as God is in the light, without any imputation of guilt: now walk according to it.' We are in the true knowledge of God as He has revealed Himself now, which gives us the certainty of salvation. But supposing I have boldness to enter into the holiest and find dirt on my feet (no imputation of guilt), well then communion is interrupted, and I need the Advocate. When we walk in heaven it will be on streets transparent as glass, righteousness and true holiness. We are "after God created in righteousness and true holiness," and there we are, washed (in that sense) before God, not in our wretched selves, but Christ. If Christ is in us, the body is dead because of sin. Supposing one of you say, I know through grace that I am in Christ, then mark this, if you are in Christ, Christ is in you; do you shew it? Now do not let people see anything else. There is where the responsibility of the Christian comes in. We are apt to pick up dirt on our feet, but we are to walk as Christ walked. It does not say we are to be as He was, because He had no sin in Him, and "if we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves." But "These things write I unto you, that ye sin not." Supposing we fail, "We have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous." My righteousness is up there before God for me, and we are in Him. In virtue of this, if communion is interrupted (as it must be if I let only an idle thought in), it is not then a question of imputation, but a question of communion, and Christ lives as the Advocate to do this very work. By His Spirit and word the effects of this advocacy are carried on. The state that I am in is such that communion is totally interrupted, and the Spirit becomes a rebuker because Christ is my advocate. "If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father." He says "the Father," because it is a question of fellowship and communion. It is not "God," because my guilt is put away.

360 If I have grieved the Spirit, and have dirty feet, I do not suit fellowship with God. Does grace give me up? No; the Spirit of God takes the word, and applies it to my heart and conscience, and humbles me. I first see the horribleness of sin, as sinning not only against the holiness of God, but against the love that saved me. I have found my pleasure in the things that caused Christ's agony on the cross. I ought to feel the sin as He felt it. I have been doing a thing for which Christ had to be burned, so to say. (See Numbers 19.) There is no imputation, of course, but it makes sin much more terrible to my heart and conscience. I do not go to the Advocate to ask Him to do it, but He goes to the Father for me. He goes as an Advocate with the Father, and the Spirit brings the word home to my conscience, and I hate myself for the sin, and confess it. You first feel this hatred at having sinned against Him, and then comes the blessed thought that His love is above all my sins; but the measure of all this to our souls is boldness to be with Christ in the holiest. Whatever does not suit my being with Him (which is the key to this chapter) must go. There is progress, of course, the Spirit taking of the things of Christ, and shewing them to us; but the divine nature we have is perfectly pure, and cannot sin. The flesh is not dead, though it ought to be kept as dead; but we never find any allowance in Scripture for letting it act. We are obliged to have a thorn in the flesh sometimes, lest we should be puffed up. When He could not stay with us here, then He takes us to be there, perfectly by-and-by, and in spirit now. He has died that we might be there; He has given us a nature that is capable of enjoying God, "created after God in righteousness and true holiness." He has gone in as Man - set Himself apart. It is not only that the holiness is wrought practically in us, but all our affections are delighting in looking at Him. Of course there is progress in the development of that nature, in realising where Christ is, "that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith." It brings us into that blessed communion with His love, and then whatever there is inconsistent in us, there He is to wash our feet.

361 And now, beloved friends, where are our hearts? Have we so seen Christ that all our desire is to be with Him, and like Him? "So shall we ever be with the Lord." Still now He manifests Himself to our hearts, so that we know it. It is Somebody that has loved us, and goes on as a Servant to do such work for us as to wash our feet. Is all our desire to say, "This one thing I do"? "My soul followeth hard after Thee - thy right hand upholdeth me": there is the strength to uphold me. We all fail, I know; but there is no necessity for failing. I desire with all my heart, beloved friends, that every one here may realise the value of that blood-shedding that leaves us without spot before God. Where the soul has tasted the love of Christ, knowing that He has loved it and given Himself for it, it loves Him because He first loved it. And we have this immensely blessed privilege to be like Him by-and-by.

The word of God brings down the perfections in Him to our hearts to suit us where we are. Think of our having the words that came out of the mouth of God, and the living One that practised them down here in this world where we are! He has loved us, and given Himself for us, and He does look that our hearts should own the value of His blood. He has brought us to be with Himself now, though of course actually hereafter in glory. I desire our hearts should rest in His perfect love. Being brought to God, He is looking for our walking with Him, and it is a poor thing to give Him the work of washing our feet. He does do it, so as to restore our souls, and I only beseech you that you will never distrust His power to do it. "My grace is sufficient for thee." Not only has He cleared us from our sins, but He has revealed to us the place of the new man in Christ. We may realise it in the Spirit - never perfect though down here. Only may He be precious in the blessed consciousness that if He has gone up there, He has not forgotten us; He washes our feet when we fail.

The Lord give us the sense of the abidingness of Christ's love. And only see the pains He took to persuade His disciples of the constancy of that love; and it is the same now. There we are called up to have a part with Him in the heavenly things. "Christ is all, and in all." He is "all" as an object, and "in all" as the power of life, and ever lives there to wash our feet. May the Lord make Him constantly and alone precious to us. It is a blessed thing that the Father has given Him, who is the object of His love, to be the object of ours too.

The Father's House

John 14

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In this part of the gospel of John the Lord is leading His disciples away from earth to associate their minds with Himself up in heaven. That begins from chapter 13. In chapters 8 and 9 we have His rejection. Then, chapter 10, He states He will have His sheep in spite of everything. Chapter 11, that which He was on earth as Son of God borne witness to. Chapter 12, the Son of David riding on an ass, and Son of man when the Greeks come to Him; but He says, "I must die." He cannot have to say to the disciples on the earth, though loving them to the end. Then He washes their feet, and says, "If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me." The possibility of His having a part with man down here was over - the world had rejected Him; and now instead of blessing the disciples here, He was taking their hearts up there. The thread that runs through the rest of the gospel, up to the last chapter, is - not here, but there, and you must take up your cross here.

In chapter 14 the Lord gives us our portion on the ground of taking us up there. They would not have Him with them; but He says, "Let not your heart be troubled" at My going away. You do not get the comfort of God by seeing Him in bodily presence, and so with Me. "Ye believe in God, believe also in me." He is going to prepare a place, that is the whole thing. 'I am going to My Father. I have brought you redeemed ones into the same relationship as I am in; He is your Father as much as Mine, and your God as much as Mine. I am not to be alone there. In My Father's house are many mansions. I go to prepare a place for you.' The place He was going to prepare (and that He was putting before their hearts) had this specific character, that the children were at home there. He had brought them into this place of children before God and the Father; and therefore, when the time was come, they should go to the Father's house. The thought and purpose of God was to have us with Christ and like Him, His own blessed Son, in His house. "I will come again, and receive you unto myself" - in the Father's house - "that where I am, there you may be also." Where the Son is, in the joy and blessedness and rest and glory of the Father's house, there we are to be with Himself. That is His purpose - what He is bringing us to. Then He adds this blessed truth, that He is coming back Himself to fetch them. He is interested in them, and it is a fixed abiding interest. He would not be satisfied to send, but would come Himself. What wonderful blessing! It would be an honour to be sent for as redeemed ones who are everything to Him. I may send to meet a person I make something of; but if I make a great deal of him, I go myself.

364 He goes on to tell us how we know it all now, so that our souls live in it while He is away. The blessed Lord's death - redemption - giving us a title to be in no less a place than the Father's house, like and with Himself. But while His death accomplished that for us, it was a total breach with the world. "The world seeth me no more." He is going to the Father's house, and the world and the Father are in direct opposition. "The friendship of the world is enmity with God." They saw no beauty in Him that they should desire Him. And when He was rejected by the world, He went up to sit at the Father's right hand. The accepted One of the Father was the rejected One of the world. Man may have hopes that he is going to do a great deal with man. God has done all as to responsibility. And at last He says, 'I have one Son, they will reverence him.' But they said, "Come, let us kill him." The Lord says, "Now is the judgment of this world." The obedient, accepted One of the Father sits on His right hand, on His total rejection by the world, and He takes His redeemed ones with Him there. We get the place of sons; we are to have the glory; to be conformed to the image of His Son, the First-born among many brethren. While His work on the cross put away our sins, it gives us a place with Him and like Him in the glory.

After the statement of this in the first three verses we get how to realise it now in our souls. There are two parts - First, the object that is before us; and second, the power that is in us. First He tells us the place He is going to take us to - it is the Father's house. And what makes the Father's house of importance to the child - if he has right affections? It is, that the Father is there. The blessedness of being there is that the Father is there. Christ is there too. However feebly we may enjoy it now, when we talk of 'going to heaven,' it is going to the Father. The Lord says, "No man cometh to the Father, but by me." He was going to the Father, and bringing us in spirit there now, hereafter actually in glory. Therefore they say, "Shew us the Father." No one has seen God at any time; but there is that blessed relationship of the Father to the Son, and to us as putting us in His place. He brings us to the Father. So He says, "Where I go ye know, and the way ye know." Thomas thought of a place. "We know not whither thou goest, and how can we know the way?" The Lord says, "I am the way, the truth, and the life." And then we get the point - "No man cometh to the Father, but by me." If I know the Father, I know where He has gone and where I am going. When Philip says, "Shew us the Father," He answers, 'You have the Father this long time with you revealed in the Son. He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father.' There we have this blessed truth, that when the Lord tells us He is going to bring us to the Father's house, we know what the blessedness of that house is, we know the centre of it. We know the Father because He is perfectly revealed in the Son. In coming to Christ I have found the way. I may see "through a glass darkly"; but as to the object, I have got the Father Himself revealed in Christ, so that in believing on the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ I know the blessedness I am called to - the place of Christ as Son, He who is the source and centre of eternal blessedness, loving-kindness, and favour. It is not the mere abstract theory of God and of a holy place that it is; but I stand in a perfect relationship, and the Spirit of adoption crying Abba in my heart, there is a consciousness of the love that has put me in this place of favour. If I say, How can I know I have seen the Father, a poor worm such as I? Have you seen Christ (not with the outward eye, but seen Him by faith)? "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father."

365 The spring of all our blessedness is in Christ, actually when He comes, and the soul lives in it now as far as he is in heavenly-mindedness, and in spirit enjoys it all, looking forward in the brightness and blessedness of hope to being there. I must for this understand the work as well as the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is my title. I know in His death my sins are perfectly put away, and what He has done is so perfect in glorifying God, that He has taken His place at the right hand of God as man, and that gives me a place. He can say, "Glorify thy Son." There we get the relationship, and then, "I have finished the work that thou gavest me to do. And now, O Father, glorify thou me," etc. That is the title by the work, and He has done the work for me. He has gone to the Father, and in Him is the way to go. He makes us feel that blessing is for us as a present thing. I quite admit we see through a glass darkly; but the things I shall get in heaven are not things I have not had revealed on earth. I have not seen the glory, but if I speak of the Father's love as my portion there, it is that which has given me Christ now. If of my title, it is no new thing, but the work and blood-shedding of Christ; if of eternal life, I have it now in His Son (shall have it fully then). Whether the thing enjoyed or the title to enjoy, we have it now, though we do not apprehend it fully. What a thought to be able to say, according to Christ's own thoughts of the blessedness of heaven, I have it now. He was revealing the Father's name. "I have declared thy name unto them, and will declare it." What He tells them is: 'Now you have seen the Father, the very one my delight is in, and my joy (eternally infinite, of course), the One that I walk on earth with, that I am one with. I have brought you into this relationship with Him, and revealed Him to you.' How far can we say, I have got on earth what I am to have in heaven - the revelation of the Father in the Son? What settled quietness of spirit it gives, to have found yourself with the Father, through the knowledge of the Son, in confidence of heart! Have your hearts got that? Are they really occupied with the Father? (worshipping, of course; but the clearer the knowledge of the relationship is, the more worship there will be). He is the way. Can you say, I have been that way, and He has brought me to the Father? That is, in this world; it will be no new thing up there. "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." Can our hearts say, I have found the Father in Christ? That is what the Lord was insisting on; and there was far more ignorance then than now, for the Holy Ghost had not come.

366 The second part of this chapter - the power that is in us - begins at verse 15. The Lord says, I cannot stay, but I will send you One who will abide with you. The Holy Ghost is only known by being in us. Christ was before them, they could see Him. Everything that came out from Christ to the world was the manifestation of God, His words and His works, and the world was called on to believe that He was there, the blessed testimony of the goodness of God in the midst of their needs and their wretchedness, and they would not have Him. That is not the way with the Comforter - they cannot see Him. Fruits ought to be shewn; but no person is manifested. When the Holy Ghost came down, there was power that struck them, and fruits of grace where the Spirit works, which are a deeper testimony - for a wicked man can do a miracle, or a dumb ass speak, if God choose. Therefore He is only known where He dwells. The effect of the Spirit is, "I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you." The Holy Ghost brings Christ to our hearts, and He dwells in our hearts. "The world seeth me no more; but ye see me"; and mark what it is connected with, "Because I live, ye shall live also." The power of divine life was triumphant over death, and where a person believed on Him, Christ is brought, through the presence and power of the Spirit, to that man's heart much closer and nearer than if He were on earth. Not that the eye sees Him; but He says, 'I am going to be with you and in you, in a far better way, that the world cannot see or know.' The Holy Ghost testified to the world of all this; but He is not here to be received by the world, but is given to those who believe, and the moment He is given He brings Christ down to the heart. Our immediate intercourse with Christ is established. He comes to us by the power and presence of the Holy Ghost. The One who "loved me, and gave himself for me," that He might redeem me by blood, and who has washed me in His blood, and done everything for me - I have got Him. A poor vessel I am for Him to dwell in, but when we are cleansed by the blood, fit for God, He comes and dwells in me. How far do all our souls know that? He has not left me comfortless, He has come; I know what it is to have Christ, to hear His voice. In the world I have tribulation, but I know what it is to have peace in Him. "Ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also." He is in us, the power of eternal life, and He must die before I die. The life I have got is, "Not I, but Christ lives in me." What a thing to be able to say! He has overcome death, broken all its bands. He lives as man; and if He lives as triumphant over it all, I shall live also. How blessed to have it from His own lips, anxious to have us happy! He says, 'Do not be uneasy, I am going to prepare a place for you, and meantime I will come to you and reveal Myself to you. I will not leave you comfortless.'

367 "At that day ye shall know," etc. (v. 20). The believer I knows the Lord Jesus Christ. The lowly Man down here has gone up there, and he sees himself in Christ, and Christ in himself. We get the consciousness of His standing before God and before the world. I have a place - what a place! - in Christ, where the Father's delight is; delight in His obedience, His perfection, His glorifying God; a place in Christ Himself, with the affections that flow from it: "My Father and your Father, my God and your God." We get at the same time, beloved friends, what we are before the world. If I am in Christ, He is in me, and what I have to do is to manifest the life of Christ, that others may see Christ in my walk and ways and spirit. What a blessing to be able to say, I know I am in Christ and He is in me, as to present relationship! It is God's delight to make us sons with Christ; and His work is so perfect in cleansing us, that the Holy Ghost can come and give us the consciousness of it: it makes us heavenly in our ways. We have seen that we know the place we are going to, we know the way, we know the Father and the Son; and now we get that, in order to have the present consciousness of it, we have the Holy Ghost.

368 Now He takes up the practical realisation of it: obedience is the path. Not only He dwells in me and comforts me, but there is manifestation in the path of obedience. The characteristic of those that love Him will be obedience (v. 21). When we get to this close relationship, the sign of love is knowing the wishes of the person you love. Where Christ is precious, there is attentiveness. It is not, "Can I do this?" but, "Is it pleasing to Him?" Many Christians have not His commandments. Why? Because they have something else. If we had an open ear - wakened morning by morning - we should have His commandments, we should know His mind, and what He wishes. I can find out the wishes of my father if I am thoughtful and attentive. He that has them, and keeps them not, is worse, of course. He that loves Him gets the "secret of the Lord." There are Christians who do not get the manifestation of the delight and favour of Christ; but there it is for them. We are very feeble; but the Lord's heart is true if our hearts are not; and if we loved Him, we should want to have things according to His wish and mind, and that only; if I could please Him I should be satisfied, and should have the present enjoyment of Christ because my heart was walking in obedience. There is the anticipation of what is heavenly when walking in this path. The Father and the Son come and make their abode with us (v. 23). How little we have this manifestation! The Lord's heart is on them, they cannot be happy here; but they are to look for the blessedness of being with the Father, and 'we will come and abide in you, till you can come and abide with us'; but it must be in this path.

369 Mark what He says in verse 27. He has not only made peace, but "my peace I give unto you," as He always does; He has brought us into the same place with Himself. What was the peace of Christ? He was here in uninterrupted intercourse with the Father, carrying His joy with Him. He had "meat to eat ye know not of," joy where all were rejecting Him - the peace of perfect communion. Christ puts us into His place, and we have fellowship with the Father; and when we walk in that, we have this peace of Christ, like Matthew 11: 29. Where the will is broken, we have the peace of the man who has no will but the will of Christ, keeping His commandments, nothing disturbing communion. The saint passing through this world in obedience and communion, where there is no self-will, walks in peacefulness, the peace that Christ had! His love will give us all He had; the same place as sons by grace, the same place in heaven, in the glory. His heart is bent on blessing us. He may chasten us if necessary; but He gives the consciousness of being in Him and He in us. The world gives liberally; but it gives away. Christ never does; He brings us into the enjoyment of what He enjoys. Because His love is perfect, He brings us where He is Himself, and His delight is that we are enjoying it.

One more thought, which perhaps is the most wonderful of all: the way Christ shews how completely His heart has associated itself with us, and us with it. We worship Him as the One who is worthy of all worship, but inasmuch as He has exercised love to us, He associates us with Himself, and expects us to rejoice in His happiness (v. 28). What a place to give us! To be able to say, 'I am happy because He is glorified'; our hearts satisfied that Christ, who has loved us and made us happy, is contented! We see Him in the glory due to Him, and we are satisfied. He says, 'If you think of yourselves, you are sorry; but if you were thinking of Me, you would be delighted.' He expects us to be glad in His happiness! Are our hearts there - so resting in the fulness of His work, having His peace and joy in this world, that we can be interested in His glory? Do you accept that place as to the state of your hearts? He has purchased a "peculiar people, to be zealous of good works."

He has brought you to Himself, to have your whole heart wrapped up in His interests, your thoughts, actions, everything for Him. I am sure we shall find our weakness; but are we living enough out of the world (not merely out of its pleasures, but its cares, and enough with Christ, for Him to have a large place in the daily thoughts of our hearts? The more my eye is open on His unspeakable blessedness, the weaker I am; but have we the consciousness from the time we get up in the morning till we go to bed at night, that our hearts are with Christ, as redeemed ones in the place we are going to - a consciousness that He is in us, and we identified with Him? The Holy Ghost is given that we may know what a place it is. The Lord give us diligence of heart to feed on Him, and get our hearts associated with Him, that we may find not only contrast with this evil world, but also know the place into which He has brought us before His Father.

Our Responsibility

John 15

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It is to be remarked that in this part of the gospel of John you get, not the sovereignty of grace towards us which saves, but our individual responsibility and blessing consequent upon our known relationship with the Father as we walk in this place. Christ is looking for their walk as disciples consequent upon their position as clean through His word. "He that hath my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me; and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him and will manifest myself unto him." This is the order here.

It is not "We loved him because he first loved us"; but "He that loveth me shall be loved." He first puts us in a place of favour, and then there is the consequent responsibility. There is not, of course, any question of uncertainty as to salvation; but He has put us into a certain position as saved, in which, through grace, we are to glorify Him. The path in which He enjoyed His Father's love was a path of unclouded joy, and it was a path of undivided obedience. He here shews His disciples if they are to walk in the light and favour of His countenance, they must walk in the same path as He did Himself. We should so walk, that we should have Christ's joy fulfilled in us.

There are one or two details connected with this, to which I wish to refer. When I speak of an unclouded joy belonging to my place in heaven, it is another thing. We are simply perfect if looked at in Christ in heavenly places. Here He is looking at Himself as on earth, and we are also seen on earth, and it is as here below that He would have His joy remain in us and our joy full.

Christ here takes the place of the true vine in which Israel had totally failed. His disciples were the branches, and He looks at them to bear fruit down here. You find all through this chapter He puts our responsibility first. He says, "He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit." He calls upon them to abide in Him in order that He may be able to abide in them. If we look at chapter 17 the order is reversed. There it is "I in them" first. It is not here a question of safety or of God's keeping them on to the end, but entirely one of fruit-bearing. We are called in the active reverence of our hearts to stay continually with Christ; to abide in Him; to draw strength continually from Him in active diligence of heart. The words "I in you," in this passage, are the consequence of our first abiding in Him. "Abide in me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself except it abide in the vine, no more can ye except ye abide in me." "He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit." That we may bear fruit is what He is thinking of here, and so be truly His disciples. "Herein is my Father glorified that ye bear much fruit."

372 "If ye abide in me and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will and it shall be done unto you." By abiding in Christ I get guidance of heart; for then the words of Christ direct all my thoughts. Here I also get the power of abiding. Complete dependence on Christ, and His words abiding in me, I can ask what I will, for it will be what He wills - and it shall be done. There is in this such dependence on, and living with Christ, that my mind, and will, and thoughts, are all formed by Christ's words; and I have full power to ask what I will. He was constantly looking to, and living by, His Father; with Jesus, it was always perfect fruit-bearing; and we are His disciples if we follow Him in that path.

"As the Father hath loved me so have I loved you." It is not here simply the eternal love of the Father to the Son, but divine love to one walking in this world, whose word was, "I do always those things that please him." This was a love which took up the disciples as walking down here. He could put them in the same relation to Himself that He was in to His Father. "As the Father hath loved me (the Son) so have I loved you; continue ye in my love." They were walking here on earth in that blessed relationship which He Himself had known. He wants us not only to abide in Him and get strength, so as to bear fruit to His and the Father's glory, but that we may abide in the continual, uninterrupted sense and enjoyment of His love. He gives Himself as our example: "As I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love." I need not say how He abode in it! "If ye keep my commandments ye shall abide in my love": still our responsibility - obedience to Christ's words. It is not here a question of the Father loving the Son, as from eternity the beloved One. It was as He is seen walking in this world in a path of perfect obedience, and abiding in Him. If there is in us a spirit of simple obedience to Him, we abide in His love. If we do a thing because He said it, we abide in His love.

373 "These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you" (that is, "abide in you"; it is the same word all through). He had no joy from the world. He had perfect joy in the Father. His joy was in bringing forth fruit to the Father's glory. He is thus shewing to us how in fruit-bearing we can have joy and blessedness down here. "That your joy might be full." That is what He wants us to have - fulness of joy: and it is not from the world, but the kind of joy He had. It is His desire that we should have His own joy. "That my joy should remain in you, and that your joy should be full." So it is to the heart that is walking with and abiding in Him. If we have joy, it is His joy. If it is reproach, it is His reproach. It is His, whatever it is, to the heart that walks in the blessed consciousness of being in the same path that He trod here; and nothing else will do for the devoted heart. We ought not to be content without it, without the sense that we are abiding in His love, keeping His commandments, and walking like Him, in the fullest enjoyment of the Father's love, taking His words as our guide, keeping His commandments, and abiding thus in Him, He puts this confidence in us, but all connected with responsibility.

"This is my commandment that ye love one another, as I have loved you." If I look at the love of Christ for them, what I see in it is, that it was above all the wretchedness of the poor disciples - above all their failure. When I am not above a thing it acts upon myself, but when I am entirely above it I can think for it all, as well as with it. The Lord being above all the failure and wretchedness could, if a right feeling, feel with His disciples; if an infirmity, He could feel for them. He can enter into it all in a divine way, because of a divine mind; and with divine goodness, because He is above it all! His word to us is, "Love one another, as I have loved you." By clinging close to Christ, and learning from Him, we can love in the same kind of way in which He loved; and in this way we can recognise anything good, and of Him in our brethren, and learn to esteem others better than ourselves; that is what He expects - looks for in us. It is impossible unless we keep with Christ. What a path was His here! There never was such an isolated man as Christ, and yet there never was one who felt for others as He did.

374 "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends; ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I command you." He does not say He is the friend of sinners here; He speaks of their being His friends if they did what He commanded. Still our responsibility. He is treating them with perfect confidence. The true disciple He treats with the confidence of being His friend, otherwise He was betraying the confidence of His Father in telling His secrets. If I go to a person on a matter of business, I merely tell him my business, and have done with him; but if I go to a friend, I can tell him all that is on my own mind, even about what does not concern him at all, having full confidence in his love and his interest in what concerns me. "Henceforth I call you not servants but friends, for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you." Whatever I have had in my heart I have told you. What a place He sets us in! How we ought to hate ourselves for the constant way in which self hinders us from this blessed place of enjoyment. But what a comfort to the restored soul it is to find, that when we have learnt totally to distrust ourselves, Christ strengthens us and trusts us. He did so to Peter by those three questions - "Lovest thou me?" When Peter replies, You know, Lord, that I love you, He puts confidence in him, and says, "Feed my sheep; feed my lambs." But until all that is in us is perfectly humbled, He cannot put trust or confidence in us. How could He do it, when we cannot trust ourselves?

"If the world hate you, you know that it hated me before it hated you." "If ye were of the world, the world would love its own; but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you." Here we get the source of the world's hatred. Not only is it our walk that the world does not like us for, but for the place Christ has chosen us for, "out of the world" - a peculiar place, that we may be a peculiar people. It is because they are Christ's that the world cannot like them. We should let our light shine forth, and our confession of Christ be so distinct, that the world might know who they are to reckon the good works to - that we belong to Christ. We must take that place as thus confessing Christ here. He takes us to be His people, and we walk upon that ground. Of course there must be consistency on it. He looks for it; so does the world! Whatever would not suit Christ would not suit the Christian. We should not take that name to dishonour it. He has called us out to go with Him. How far are our hearts prepared to take our place before all the world and say, I am Christ's; I belong alone to Him? If, in reply, they ask you what right you have to take that place, and say, "We, too, belong to Christ," you can ask them to come and take their place with Him, else how could you own them as His?

375 What we look for is to abide in Christ, and to bear fruit to His and the Father's glory. It is a lowly place - a blessed place; one of entire dependence upon Him, for without Him we can do nothing. May we know its exceeding blessedness for His name's sake. Amen.

Christ's Desires for the Christian

John 17

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This chapter has a very peculiar character, in that it is not the address of the Lord Jesus to His disciples even, much less to the world. It is their admission to hear Him address His Father about them. And we can easily understand that, where such a privilege is given them, we should be let into the fullest possible apprehension of the place in which He has set us. When He spoke to the world, Christ suited Himself to their capacity; and we, in our measure, ought to seek to do the same. But when He was addressing His Father, we can naturally understand that He would speak freely of what He had on His heart about His disciples. But still, as it concerned them (now, through grace, we have received the Spirit, who communicates these things to our souls), He spoke it in the audience of the disciples, so that they should hear and know what His heart felt about them. Let me ask you this: If we find that Christ has an interest in us, and that He is speaking to His Father, and speaking of us, of what He has on His heart for our blessing; do our hearts turn with interest to listen, and to know what He feels about us? We have wretched, cold hearts, it is true; nothing is worse than their deadness and indifference to God. An openly bad, vile man of the world is bad enough; but if I saw a son do what was wrong, and if his father went out and entreated him with all the tender affection of a father, and he did not trouble his heart about what he said, I should say, There is no hope now.

Therefore, when I find this first truth, that Christ has us on His heart, and can speak to His Father, about us - that we are become the object of their common interest, surely our hearts should turn to it. "These things," He said, "I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves" (v. 13). The character of Christ's love, being perfect, was to bring us into the same blessing with Himself. It is very true, but it is not all the truth, that we are blessed through Christ: we are blessed with Him, and that was the perfection of His love. He loves us enough to have us near Him, and have us all in the perfectness of His own heart; and having opened our understandings to see what He is, He gives us the consciousness of His own perfect love. "We shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is." If I always saw perfect blessedness before me, with the consciousness at the same time that I never should have it, that would not give comfort to my heart; but if I have a perfect object before me, with a certainty that I shall possess it, I shall be occupied with that object. Whilst here below we have the consciousness in looking at our blessing in Christ, that we are not perfectly like what He is; we desire it, we long to be conformed to the image of Christ. But still, if we have in any measure tasted the loveliness of Christ, what distresses the heart is that we are not like Him. But here Christ engages the affections, and brings the heart to this point - the consciousness that this is our place in Him before God, and that all the blessedness that He has is ours. Does it become us to say no? Is it humbleness to be short of that, to say we are unworthy? Is God right? But it is no humbleness to refuse grace. And then, when it is seen to be such grace - unmingled grace - it is no humbleness to speak of not being fit to have such things. If I talk about not being quite worthy, there is the thought that if I were worthier I should be fit to have these blessings. Here is just where the want of humbleness is. You ought to be on the right ground with the Lord. That which enables us to have this thought and desire of being brought into the presence and blessing of God, and to be like Christ, is, that all is grace; we are nothing. If we look at the glory that is before us, it at once puts out the thought of all worthiness in ourselves.

377 Here, then, the Lord is just setting us in His own place upon earth. Poor feeble creatures we are for it; but He is setting us in His place on earth. "Father," He says, "I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me." This chapter is often spoken of as being a prayer. The half is a prayer; but all the other part is a plain and full exposition of the ground on which He places us, beginning with His going up to heaven, and then going on to the glory which He will give us. There is the prayer too - a prayer for us while we are passing through the trials and difficulties of this world. Christ gives us this place with Himself above; but He speaks while still in the world, that we might have it from His own lips in the world. It is not as taking us out of the world; but He begins it all from that starting-point, that we Shall be in the glory. When He was here He did not want any witness; He was Himself the heavenly witness; but now He is gone He sets His saints as His living active epistle in a world that they do not belong to, any more than He did.

378 First, then, look at the way in which He introduces us into this place. You will see in the first few verses that it is a question of Himself being glorified: "These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, Father, . . . glorify thy Son: . . . as thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him . . . . I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do. And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was." Now there are two thoughts which the Lord brings out here. He says, "Glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee" - that is the title which His Person gives Him to this glory. And the other is, "I have glorified thee on the earth," etc.; "And now, O Father, glorify thou me," etc.; that is, the Lord presents these two grounds on which He is asking for His glory as man. He is glorified in virtue of His Person, and then glorified in virtue of His work.

It is in connection with both these titles that we have to see our place on earth. He takes His place with the Father in virtue of His own personal title, and in virtue of His accomplished work. There is the basis which He lays for our admission into this place of blessing; and at the close He says, "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." The love wherewith the Father had loved Christ should be in the disciples. They should enjoy it; they should have His joy fulfilled in themselves. It is this that we are called to: the enjoyment in this world of the love that Christ knew here below - of His Father's love. He was there the Son of God, as man in this world; and what was His delight? Was it from the world? Surely not. Was He of the world? He was not. He was walking in the world; but His character and place while there was as the Son of the Father. There was His joy; not from the world, any more than He was of it, but from the Father. There was His constant blessedness. The wellspring of His delight in a world that hated Him was the constant inflowing of the Father's love to Him. He was His beloved Son, in whom He was well pleased. Now the first point is, how such as we are can get into such a place. The Lord always retained the perfect consciousness of His Father's love. How can a sinner get there? Though He had declared His Father's name to the disciples (take, for an example, the sermon on the mount), did they understand it? No; they had not the Spirit of adoption. He revealed the name and character of the Father, but their hearts did not enter into this relationship. Christ, as man walking down here, was the Son of man which is in heaven. His Person gives Him this title. He walks through this world in suffering and trial. He suffers from man for righteousness' sake, and for love's sake. But whatever the suffering through which He was passing, He always addressed God as His Father during all the time of His life in this world; every expression of His heart was of His conscious relationship to God as Father. But when He comes to the cross, it is, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" Upon the cross, all that God was in His holy hatred of sin fell on Christ for our sakes; and hence it was not then a question of love and fellowship; but all else that God was, His holiness, truth, majesty, righteousness, all was against Him, because in the cross He was as the One made sin for us. The one other thing in God's nature was His love, and that Christ necessarily could not then taste; therefore, on the cross, He does not say Father, but it is, "My God, my God!" Afterwards, when just expiring, He does say, "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit." Never was He more perfect, never more acceptable to God, than on the cross. God was a debtor in that sense to Christ; for His character was brought out as it never had been before. If God had merely swept away all men in anger, there would have been no love; if He had spared all in mercy, there would have been no righteousness. But Christ giving Himself up to death, and to the bearing of God's wrath on the cross, there is perfect righteousness against sin, and perfect love to the sinner. God was there fully glorified in all that He was. And now, the whole question of sin being settled, and all Christ was being proved in the resurrection - He says, "I will declare thy name unto my brethren." The Lord Jesus then comes, having been heard and answered in resurrection; and now He says, "Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God"; that is, He brings out both these names now: the relationship in which He had been as a Son with the Father all His life long, and the full effect of all that God was as such, which He had borne as wrath against sin, He now brings out as entirely for us. If it is a question of God's righteousness, we are made the righteousness of God in Christ. If it is His love, we are loved with the same love with which Christ was loved. Grace is reigning through righteousness by Jesus Christ. Everything that the Father can be towards sons that He delights in - as He was to Christ, so He reveals Himself to us. Sin is put entirely away, and by the very word of Christ Himself the disciples are even brought, by the efficacy of His work of redemption, into a place along with Himself. He declares His name unto His brethren, "Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father"; and He puts them in this place after death and judgment have been gone through, and He is risen out of them. While Christ was upon earth He remained entirely alone, because the atonement was not made. "Except a corn of wheat. fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone." But He has died, and now He can bring them into the place belonging to Himself; and that is what He is doing now. Did sin hinder it? Yes; but it is put away. Did righteousness? Yes; but it is for them and for us.

380 If we speak of the sufferings of Christ, there were two kinds of suffering, quite distinct one from the other. In one sense He went through every possible kind of suffering. He suffered from man for righteousness' sake, and He suffered from God for sin's sake. The suffering from God for sin He took for us entirely alone; He suffered it that we might not suffer it. He took it fully - drank the cup to the very dregs, and it is done with. In His sufferings for righteousness' sake, He gives us the privilege of suffering with Him. "Unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake." If we suffer from man for righteousness' sake, there we are with Him; but with suffering for sin we have nothing to do. He has taken it entirely alone: not one drop is left; no particle or trace of it remains for us. He took it that we might never have it. And now, having done that, He takes another place, in which man, as man, must necessarily remain a stranger to Him. But the fact, that Christ is gone up on high, is the reason why I can be with Him. When He was upon earth, I could not be in any full sense with Him. Why? Because He was holy, and I was not. But when sin has been put away, and He is gone into heaven, and has taken a place there in the presence of God, He has done that by which I can draw near. He has gone into the presence of God, and gives me a title to be there (Heb. 10: 19, 20). Thus, the glory in which Christ is, which He has entered as having accomplished redemption, enables me to be with Him, instead of being a hindrance. I never could be with Him, if He had not been in this glory. He might visit us in mercy, but it is as risen from the dead and gone up on high that He gives us the place of union with Himself before God.

381 What He is doing now, is to reveal this name of the Father to us. When He spoke to Abraham He said, "I am the Almighty God; walk before me." God revealed Himself in a character on which Abraham's faith was to act: it is the revelation of Himself as the One who was all-powerful, whatever might be the difficulties of the path; and Abraham was to live by faith in that name. He says to Moses, "I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob, by the name of God Almighty, but by my name Jehovah was I not known to them." Now He takes this name with Israel: He puts Himself in relation with Israel by the name of Jehovah. He was the unchanging One, who would be faithful to His word and oath, however many the changes that Israel might have to pass through. He was thus a perfect Protector; He was the Almighty One; He was Jehovah; but that is not what I want, blessed as it is in its place. I want eternal life. But He comes now with another name. The Son reveals the Father's name. If I have found this, that the Father has sent the Son to be a Saviour, and that this work is accomplished, I say this is not now merely a Faithful and Almighty Protector, or the one true God that governs the world righteously: He is interested in my salvation. He takes this place of a Father to me, if I receive His Son. I get in Christ the revelation of my place with God, and that, consequent upon the blessed truth that He has taken away the sin that shut me out from the presence of God, and has gone up before the Father, that I may have the very same place that belongs to Him as the Son of the Father. Can I possibly have more than that? Yet there is even more than that. In virtue of it, there is the Comforter sent down. "If I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you." The Holy Ghost comes down because of Christ's being exalted at the right hand of God. He becomes the Spirit of adoption. "Now he which stablisheth us with you in Christ, and hath anointed us, is God; who hath also sealed us, and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts." So that the place in which we find Christ thus glorified, we find the believer set in, as this righteousness presented to God. The Holy Ghost is given as that which seals me, and gives me the power and blessing of the place into which Christ has brought me. "This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." There is the relationship. Then there is the work, "I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do." He asks then that the Father should glorify Him, and adds, "I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world . . . . Now they have known that all things whatsoever thou hast given me are of thee." It was not merely what Messiah received from God, but what the Son had from the Father, that was made known to them. And He adds, "I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me; and they have received them," etc.

382 Two things you will find connected with the position in which the disciples are thus set; first, that which ministers to their joy, and then the place which they have as witnesses for Him in the world. He has communicated to them all the means of this joy: "I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me." "Henceforth," as He said before, "I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth; but I have called you friends: for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you." Now He puts us in the place of sons, and as sons the words that the Father gives Him He makes known unto us. What Christ does is to bring us into the enjoyment of His own relationship and place with God. The first thing He does is to secure our being in it by this work of atonement. Then, having wrought this, the next thing is to give us the name by which we are called to know God as the Father; and accordingly He gives us the words of the Father, that we may have the joy of this place in which He has set us. "I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine . . . . Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are." He puts them under the shelter of the name "holy Father." He looked for them to be kept with all the Father's tenderness; that is, they are in this world under this name of holy Father. And then He presents these two motives to His Father for keeping them: first, "for they are thine"; and the other is, "I am glorified in them."

383 Do you believe that the Lord was speaking the truth? When He says He tells us these things that we might have His joy fulfilled in ourselves, did He really mean so? I believe it. I believe that the Lord meant us to have His joy fulfilled in ourselves. If you tell me that we are poor feeble vessels to have it, that is most true; but He did not speak thus. The possession of life is not power. Power is in Christ, and in Christ alone; for the character of the new man is dependent and obedient. If you say, I have life from God, and therefore I have got power, it is not true; but if you say, I have not got power, it is not true; but if you say, I have got life from God, but I have got the temptations of Satan and the world, and all that can seduce me away from the range and exercise of this life, and you say, "Father, keep me, I want to be kept," then there will be power. When Paul gets into the third heaven, what is the effect? When there the flesh is not puffed up; for he is there to hear things which he cannot even utter down here. But when he comes down, the flesh would use it to say that no one had ever been in the third heaven but himself. He must get that broken down; therefore the thorn is sent which brings consciousness of weakness where boasting had been before. We are never in danger when in the presence of God; but when we are thinking of having been there, danger is there: the thorn gives conscious weakness to the man himself. In Paul's case we know, it was something that made his preaching contemptible. The Lord has to put us down in every way. The danger of the Christian is, that he is not consciously weak, that the flesh is not put in its place, that he thinks he can do something; but when the flesh is put down, where it had pretended to be something, then the believer can say, "When I am weak, then am I strong," and Christ is exalted. For when Paul, with all this incompetency, was the means of such blessing to others, it is quite clear that it was Christ, and not Paul, that was the strength. This is the truth that is brought out before us in 2 Corinthians 12: perfect righteousness and glory, which are ours, or the man in Christ; and then the man made nothing of, and Christ in him everything. There is where we get the Christian complete. In both cases it is Paul; but in the one it is the man in Christ, and in the other it is Christ in the man, and the man thus made nothing of. That which the believer has on earth is not only this place in Christ in heaven, but the power of Christ in this world. While we certainly shall have the experience of what we are, at the same time the scriptures shew us always, as such, no necessity in this world for being anything else but Christ. "To me to live is Christ." The fact that the flesh is in me is no reason that I am to walk after it. The power is not in the fact that we have the life, but in exercised dependence upon the life that we have got in Christ.

384 We have seen the full blessedness of this place, that we may have His joy fulfilled in ourselves, and now He goes on to their testimony before the world. "I have given them thy word, and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world." Here I find the Christian's place in the world: he is no more of it than Christ. He does not say, They ought not to be; but "They are not of the world even as I am not of the world." As Christians deriving your life from Christ, and having your place with Christ, you are not of the world. The life, the place you have in Christ, all flows from the fact that He has given you a relationship with the Father, in virtue of which you are no more of the world than He Himself was. There is the manifesting of Christ to the world; but these duties and affections flow from a relationship that is established already. It is not as the way of getting into the relationship; but when Christ has become my life, then I must walk as He walked. To the world this becomes a testimony. Of what? What became of Christ Himself? The world would not have Him. "O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee." It was as good as saying, "There is a complete breach between the world and me." Christ comes into the world in grace, revealing the Father, and the world hated Him; and therefore He goes out of the world, and brings us into His place as gone on high. Will the world bear us any more love than it bore Him? It will not. He is there because the world would not have Him; and it is only as having entered that place by blood and death that He can say, "My Father and your Father, my God and your God." Now, He says, I will make you a witness of that. You are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. "I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the world," etc.

385 How are we to get the character and spirit proper to us as such? It is not that we can always be in the third heaven, but that if living the life of Christ, in the power of the Spirit, we shall be manifesting it before the world as it was with Christ Himself. He could say even as to His path down here, "The Son of man which is in heaven." Was there ever anything in Christ inconsistent with the third heaven? Therefore my life being there, and my care and affections, I shall walk according to that place. Where is the pathway for such a life through this world? "I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them," etc. "Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth." That is not quite all. Christ is the truth: the word of God is truth about everything. Do I want to know what my heart is? The word tells me. Do I want to know what God is? The word tells me. What Christ as a Saviour is? What Satan and his wiles are? The word will tell me. And therefore I have the word to make all plain, when I want to go through the world, which is a labyrinth for any one else; for a labyrinth it naturally must be to all, and to the infidel specially. God is love, and yet here I see such misery of every kind around me: the child of three days old agonising perhaps through the fault of its parents; suffering and sorrow everywhere. Nobody, I say, can understand this: it is unaccountable, except as the word of God, which is truth, explains it all. Take Christ Himself; He can appeal to them and say, "Which of you convinceth me of sin?" Yet how does it end? He is obliged to confess before men that God has forsaken Him. Their hard hearts take advantage of this, and say, If God delight in Him, let Him deliver Him. All is inexplicable; and those who would make this world, as it is, a proof of the righteous government of God, are just doing what the friends of Job did. They were saying that this world could be explained as the present expression of God's moral government. But no; there is Job, and he is in the depth of suffering. He was very naughty, but he spoke more rightly than they. He says I have seen the righteous man suffering. He wants to find God. He says, Oh, if I could see Him! but I cannot find Him. All this, I again say, is in itself inexplicable. But the moment I search into the word of God, I have got the key to it all. Take the infidel upon his own ground, and he has not a word to say: he is the least capable of any of explaining the facts that are going on every day; for they are inexplicable, except as sin has come in.

386 "Sanctify them through thy truth." It is the word of God applied to judge every thought and feeling that is in me. He does not say, "Sanctify them by the law," but by the word. Persons take the law as a rule, but you want power; you want an object that seizes your affections. What object does the law give you? Where is the thing, the One, you are to love? Where is He? Who is He? The law cannot and does not tell me, save of a Judge: I have no object before my soul to give me blessed and holy affections; but the Father's word does give me this. That is what He goes on to immediately. "As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world. And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth." Now I get something more than the word; it is Christ Himself who is the substance of all that the word speaks about. And therefore Christ says, as regards His place, "For their sakes I sanctify myself." He has gone up to glory, and there sets Himself apart as the object for our hearts. The Holy Ghost reveals Him to me, and the word is the revelation of all that is in Christ; it brings to me all that Christ is: "Sanctify them through thy truth." How? "For their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also may be sanctified through the truth." I have now got an object: it is the truth, which will judge everything that is in my heart. This it is that sanctifies me, by shewing me the one whom I love, and who has said that I am going to be like Him. Christ has got hold of my heart, has given me a place with Himself and has fitted me for it by the revelation of Himself to my heart. And that is what I find here. And besides this place, I get the Comforter sent down, taking of the things of Christ, and shewing them to me; revealing to me that He has given what He has, that I may have it with Him, that I may be like Him, when I see Him as He is. And now the sanctifying power is, that the Spirit takes of these things and shews them unto me. More than all, Christ Himself is mine. He is the perfect and blessed Man set apart in the presence of God; and that, transported into my heart in the living power that it has in me through the Spirit, sets me apart to God. It is the truth that sanctifies me; but if I look at what the truth is perfectly, it is Christ. We, "beholding the glory of the Lord, with unveiled face, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord." "For their sakes," as our Lord says here, "I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth."

387 "Neither pray I for these alone" (He brings in other Christians here), "but for them also which shall believe on me through their word; that they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us; that the world may believe that thou hast sent me." He imparts to us all that He has taken as man in blessing and glory. He will have us enter into His joy while upon earth; and then I find, "And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one even as we are one." When the Lord comes, and when the saints are displayed in the glory of Christ, and with Him, that will be the revelation to the world that we have been loved as Christ has been loved. "I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one: and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me."

But even this is not the best thing He has to give us. He goes on to say, "Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world." While He has given us the glory of the inheritance, He puts us before the world as those who have been brought into the same glory with Himself. "When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory." And then the world will say, These poor people, that we have despised, are loved with the same love Christ was loved with. But while all that is true and most blessed, we shall, besides, have the enjoyment of Himself. We ought to have it now. "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." We get the present knowledge that we are loved as Jesus is loved; for He has declared the Father's name to us, and will declare it, that the love wherewith He is loved may be in us, and He in us. There is the place in which He puts the Christian now. Christ will bring us into the glory; but even that, in a sense, is an inferior thing, compared to the enjoyment of Christ Himself. I do not wait till then to know that I am loved as Christ is loved; I know it now; the world will know it then. All being founded upon this work that He has done, and upon His being thus in the presence of God, who puts us in this Himself, we can say, I know that I am loved as the Father loves Jesus, if Christ says it; "that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them." Is it in you? Have you believed Jesus' word, that the Father has loved you as He loved His own Son? It was not enough for Him to give His Son for you, but He puts you, in the same place, and loves you with the same love. If we grieve the Spirit we may not enjoy the power of it; but there is the place in which Christ has set us to stand with His Father and our Father, His God and our God, and to enjoy Him who is the truth, and who gives us the consciousness of being loved as He Himself is loved. It will be manifested before the world when He comes, but it is ours now; the Lord only give us to believe it. If we are seeking the world, that is not the Father's love, but enmity to it. "All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away," etc. You will find these three always opposed the one to the other - the flesh and the Spirit, the devil and the Son, the world and the Father, "All that is in the world," if our hearts seek after it, damps the enjoyment of the Father's love; for we are not of the world, even as Christ was not.

388 The Lord give you to know it, as it is testified of Jesus Himself, and then, as walking in His steps, and sanctified by the revelation of Himself in your heart, to enjoy the real consciousness of the blessedness of the love wherewith the Father loves you.

The Responsible Man, and the Man of Purpose

John 17

J. N. Darby.

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I notice first in this chapter that there is responsibility, but of an entirely new order; a responsibility which is connected with Christ, and which He has discharged; "I have glorified thee on the earth," "I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world": a responsibility which in righteousness towards God, and in grace to us, has put us into the same place as Himself. The Word has come down to us; and words have been brought, and we have believed them, and have known surely, as Jesus said, "that I came out from God."

If we think of what was previously given by Moses, the law; it was but the measure of man, come down to the earth, and which claimed from man what he ought to be: a perfect rule for man. It was connected necessarily with responsibility, but the responsibility of the creature, and in which he failed; God was hidden behind it - He not coming to man, nor man to Him. But under it man fails. Then because of this breakdown, "Grace and truth came by Jesus Christ," but came in when this need was thus made plain. Man failed in paradise, and failed out of paradise. He failed upon the question of righteousness by law; and rejected Christ come in grace. If we look at Jew or Gentile, we see Christ taking up this responsibility too before God, and putting away sin for us, by the sacrifice of Himself. He dies and closes up the whole scene in which that responsibility was. All is summed up in the words of Jesus, "I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do."

Another thing is stated in this chapter, "I have glorified thee on the earth." He came into the world not only as a man, but as the heir of promises; and they rejected Him in whom these promises were, as the promised seed. But He has secured the promises by the cross; and also laid the foundation for the eternal purposes of God in His death and resurrection. He who came with all the promises of God in His hand was rejected and killed. Salvation on God's part is the answer to this wickedness on man's. It was not merely that man was a sinner, but all that God would do for a sinner was refused - "Last of all he sent unto them his Son." My soul and conscience are cleared by the very blood which was the proof of my sin and guilt. The purpose which was before the world can now be brought out, for righteousness has come in, and Christ as man has got a place in the glory of God, because He deserves it! This is the righteous foundation of the purposes of God; and He is there too in a work done for us.

390 In this ascended Lord we see the power of a life which has triumphed over death, and all the testimony that now comes to us, comes from thence. The Son is there, and there as a man in righteousness, according to God's own nature. But God is not merely glorified in righteousness; but the Father, in love - "I have glorified thee on the earth, I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do. And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self." The Father's name is the spring of eternal life to us in the Son; and the Son as man has brought it in, and we have received it. It is not what Jehovah had given to the Messiah, but what the Father has given to the Son. "These things I speak in the world, that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves." He has given the words to us that the Father gave to Him. These are the privileges that belong to us as believers.

The first three gospels present Christ to be received by man; but in John's His people are called out by grace: it begins with His rejection; and they are separated from the world, and brought into this place of possession also. "All mine are thine, and thine are mine, and I am glorified in them"; this is the full grace of Christ. The Father's words communicated to Christ are to bring us into every place which belongs to Christ. This is the revelation of God's heavenly thoughts through His Son, where there can be nothing of responsibility as to man, as when under law; though man is treated by the gospel as a sinner, and needing grace. Christ is the revelation of what a perfect man is, and what everything in the world is to God. We are not of it.

When we look at Christ's Person, what do we see? The Father in His Son! For it was the revelation of the Father in Christ. Philip said, "Shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us. Jesus said unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me? He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." The expression of the Father was the living Christ. It was a revelation in the way suited to man as He was down here; for it was seen in the Man, who tabernacled with us, that He might associate our hearts with the Father as His was. "The glory thou gavest me I have given them"; again, "that the love wherewith thou lovest me may be in them." Everything which He is and has Himself He brings us into; except, of course, what is essential to His eternal Sonship: the Father's words, the life, the glory, the love, with all the blessedness He has, and, what is not so pleasant to us, His separation from the world. But it is a portion with Himself now and hereafter. Moreover, He puts us in His own place of testimony to the world. "As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world." He was of God in the midst of the world, always Himself the revelation of God. And this is what a Christian is likewise.

391 "Sanctify them through thy truth." The Word of God comes down (not like the law) and brings to my heart the measure and character of what Christ is. The truth, His word, which tells what God is, tells me what I ought to be as a child of the Father. Till God is revealed, how can I tell what I ought to be? But grace and truth tell me what the Father is, and what the world is: this is Cain's city. What are the inventions of it, the telegraph and the like, to a man when he is going out of the world by death? But there is something more - "for their sakes I sanctify myself": not simply a word come down, but a man gone up! Now I get where righteousness takes us, entirely separated from sinners, and gone into the place where my affections are fixed on Him. He is the model Man in glory, and I must purify myself by the hope of being with Him, as He is pure. The work is perfectly accomplished which makes me meet for the same place. The Holy Ghost takes these things and shews them to us. God hath revealed them to us by the Spirit, according to the purpose of God up there. The truth comes down through the rent veil to us, but I get the glory of the Man gone up, and who for our sakes has sanctified Himself that we also may be sanctified through the truth.

Another thing is, we should think of His glory and happiness. He expects us to be interested in Him; "If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I go unto the Father." So entirely are we one with Him, and He one with us, He brings the love of God, wherewith He is loved, into the heart. The Christian is made up from this Christ. The eye that is upon Him sees God's path even through this world. The responsible man has failed, but the Man of purpose was in love and grace below, and is now in righteousness and glory above.

392 The difficulty is to get a path, through the world where all is wrong, and I have got it, got it in Christ. He has met and cleared away the sins that were ours, and we have put off the old man, and got into the place of the second Man, in perfect acceptance with God. Our responsibility now is to manifest Him in our mortal body. "Holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners," was His character, and this is ours. We shall find out our shortcomings, no doubt; but perfect grace has given us a place with Christ everywhere, and this must be held in spite of all failure. In truth, it is the recovering power of grace. The Lord gives us to believe in His love; that He has sanctified Himself for our sakes: and He expects our hearts to meet and answer to His own. Blessed place and portion! He sees in us morally, even now, the fruit of the travail of His soul.

A word on Cleaving to the Lord; addressed to young converts.

Acts 11

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It is worthy of remark, that in this chapter we have the first account of Gentile converts: of the receiving, in sovereign goodness and grace, poor sinners who had not even the promises to boast of which God had given to the Jews. To such it is, too, that Barnabas comes with the earnest exhortation contained in verse 23: "That with purpose of heart they should cleave unto the Lord." What Peter was taught here as to the Gentiles we all have to learn as to ourselves. When the blessed news of grace and pardon first reaches a sinner's ears and heart, he rejoices in the thought of pardon and forgiveness. He does right. Jesus, the blessed Son of God, has met him in mercy with His precious blood. But with this the light enters into his soul. When there have been deep discoveries of sin before the soul has become happy, the peace of the soul is more settled. The sin to which grace is applied is in a measure already known. But when, through the proclamation of divine pardon, without previous convictions, the soul has suddenly received joy, though there is always the discovery that we are sinners, the knowledge of the depth of sin in the heart, and what has to be forgiven and cleansed, is very small. The consequence is, that, after God has called us, and the divine light has broken into our souls, we feel disturbed and uncertain, and even begin sometimes to doubt the fact of our being cleansed. This is wrong. The deeper discovery of sin and the knowledge of our own heart is useful. If we walk humbly and near to God, this knowledge will be made, comparatively speaking, peacefully; if not, in humiliation and failure. But you may not call unclean, what God has cleansed. God has brought cleansing and pardon to us down here. We have not to wait for it until we go up there. God has cleansed you. You are clean now. But I desire to lead you to some further exercise of heart upon it, and clearer apprehension of God's ways: a fuller exercise of conscience, that your peace may be as solid as your joy was genuine when you first heard of grace and forgiveness.

In Luke 15 the great principle set for this, that it is God's happiness when we are brought back to Him. Of course the joy of the restored one comes in, but is not the primary thing. The object of all three parables is not to shew our joy, but the joy of God in our restoration. The three parables all teach the same grace, but we get, I believe, the joy of the Son, of the Spirit, and of the Father. But remark, that in the two first we find a grace which finds and brings back what was lost, without any further question of the state of the soul. In the third we have man's departure even into the lowest degradation of sin, and what passes in his soul on his return, till he is clothed in divine righteousness, with Christ in His Father's house. God has foreseen and provided for the whole case of the sinner. The younger son was as really a sinner when he left his Father's house as when he was eating husks with the swine. He had abandoned God to do his own will. But the Lord pursues the case to the full degradation of sin, for sin degrades man. The young man comes to himself, turns back towards God, is converted; but he has not yet met God, nor has he the best robe on him. He did not know in his conscience divine righteousness. When he really meets his father, not only is he in tender love - only the more shewn because he has been lost - received when in his rags into his father's arms, but he is made righteously fit for the house, clothed with Christ. His father was on his neck when he was in his rags, but he was not received into the house in that state; he could not have been. But God has provided for the sinner what Adam in his innocence had not. He has provided Christ. Grace reigns through righteousness. The best robe, no part of the son's portion before he left, is now put on him, and he is fit for the house to which that robe belonged. All the extent of the soul's departure from God has been weighed. The soul may be exercised about it, and will till self is wholly given up as a ground on which we can stand with God: no going in legally as a hired servant. Before God it is rags and exclusion, or the best robe and joyful admission. All true experiences lead to that emptying of self, and Christ all, and we in Him before God. Then, as I have said, our peace is as solid as the joy of the thought of forgiveness was blessed, and the joy itself deeper, if not more genuine.

394 Another truth is connected with this. God having perfectly cleansed us by the blood of Christ, the Spirit dwells in the cleansed heart. "As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God." The Spirit gives us the consciousness of our relationship as dear children. "Because ye are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father." What manner of persons ought we to be, who are the temples of the Holy Ghost, we may well continually ask ourselves. But do not let failures make us doubt that we have it. Low and wretched as was the state the Galatians had fallen into, they never doubted they had the Spirit of God; but they were getting wrong as to the ground of their standing, as to how they received it; so that the apostle had to ask them, "Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?" (Gal. 3: 2). We are sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance. We have life as truly as Christ is alive; but we are not yet in heaven. The thief, indeed, was privileged to be taken directly home, believing only to-day, but to-day the first companion Christ had in paradise. We do not look for such immediate departure, but our ground is the same; we are as truly saved, but not so soon to be in heaven. Rather have we to go through this evil world: to go through it as crucified with Christ, dead indeed, but risen - to go through it with His Spirit dwelling in us. Be careful lest you grieve that Spirit. You have to go through the world, bearing the name of Christ upon you. See that you bring no reproach upon that blessed name by being inconsistent. The world will be sharp to exclaim, There are your Christians! You will have to go through the world with God dwelling in you; to carry this treasure in an earthen vessel: entrusted with this treasure, an habitation of God through the Spirit. Of course it is only through His grace that you can carry such a treasure through an evil world; but there is power in Christ, there is sufficiency in Christ for all He would have you to do or be.

395 He exhorted them that they should cleave to the Lord. Depend on Him. Some are allowed to have a long season of joy on first believing, but God knows our hearts, and how soon we should be depending on our joy, and not on Christ. He is our object: joy is not our object. Do not let your joy lead you to forget the source of it, and then it need never wane. This joy is right and beautiful in its place; I am not saying a word against it - God forbid. But I warn you against resting in it. Do not lean on it for strength. There is danger of joy, however genuine, making you forget how dependent you are every moment. Depend upon Him: cleave to Him with purpose of heart. Do not be content with being happy (may you continue so!), but with Paul, forgetting the things which are behind press on, etc. (Phil. 3). I have seen many Christians so full of joy that they thought there was no such thing as sin left. It is true sin no longer remains on you; but the flesh is in you to the end. The old stock is there, and you will find that, if you are not watchful, if divine life is not cherished and cultivated in your hearts by looking at Christ and feeding on Him, it will be putting forth its buds; if it does, they must be nipped off as they appear. No good fruit comes off the old stock. It is the new that bears fruit unto God. But though the flesh is in you, do not be thinking of this, but think of Christ - cleave to Him; and may your souls be maintained in this truth, that Christ is your life - aye, that Christ is so your life that Christ must die (the thought of which is blasphemy) before you can perish. And as He is your life, so is He the object of that life. "The life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me," Gal. 2: 20. As you grow in this knowledge of Him, a joy grows deeper than that of first conversion. I have known Christ, more or less, between thirty and forty years, and I can say that I have ten thousand times more joy now than I had at first. It is a deeper, calmer joy. The water rushing down from a hill is beautiful to look at, and makes most noise; but you will find the water that runs in the plain is deeper, calmer, more fructifying.

396 Observe, they are exhorted with purpose of heart to cleave to the Lord. A distracted heart is the bane of a Christian. When my heart is filled with Christ, I have no heart or eye for the trash of the world. If Christ is dwelling in your heart by faith, it will not be the question, What harm is there in this, or that? rather, Am I doing this for Christ? Can Christ go along with me in this? If you are in communion with Him, you will readily detect what is not of Him. Do not let the world come in, and distract your thoughts. I speak especially to you young ones; we, who are older, have had more experience of what the world is, we know more what it is worth, but it all lies shining before you, endeavouring to attract you. What else does it fill its shop windows for? Its smiles are all deceitful, still it is smiling upon you. It makes many promises it cannot fulfil: still it promises. The fact is, your hearts are too big for the world, it cannot fill them; they are too little for Christ, for He fills heaven; yet will He fill you to overflowing.

Observe again, it is to the Lord they were to cleave: not to duty, or law, or ordinances (though these are good in their places), but to the Lord. He knew how treacherous the heart was, and how soon it would put anything in His place. You will have to learn what is in your heart. Abide with God, and you will learn your heart with Him, and under His grace; else you will have to learn it with the devil through His successful temptations. But God is faithful, and if you have been getting away from Him, and other things has been coming in and forming a crust round your heart, and you want to get back again, God says, What is this crust? I must have you deal with it, and get rid of it. Remember, Christ bought you with His own blood, that you should be His, and not the world's. The denial of this fact is an artifice of the devil. Do not let the devil come in between you and God's grace. However careless you may have been, however far you may have got away from Him, return to Him: doubt not His joy in having you back; count upon His love; look at the sin which led you away with horror, but do not wrong Him by distrusting His love, any more than you would an affectionate husband or wife, by throwing a doubt on their love if you have been for a moment ungracious. Hate yourself, but remember how He has loved you, and will love you until the end. Mistrust not His work: mistrust not His love. God had also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life (v. 18). All is of God.

397 I would have you carry away in your minds three things which by grace are given you. First, cleaving to the Lord; second, perfect forgiveness; third, a purged conscience. To illustrate this last, take the case of Peter. He denied His Lord - denied Him to a servant-maid; but the Lord had turned and looked on him, and he had gone out and wept bitterly. A few weeks after this (Acts 3), he could say that they were a lost and ruined people, because "they denied the Holy One and the Just"; the very thing he had done himself, in a worse way, too, for he had been with Him as His friend for three years. But his conscience was purged; he knew he was forgiven; and now he could turn round, and fearlessly charge others with the very thing he had done himself.

One word more. Talk with Him. Never be content without being able to walk and talk with Christ as with a dear friend. Be not satisfied with anything short of near intercourse with Him who has loved you with such manner of love!

Thoughts on Galatians 3

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The apostle has been speaking to the Galatians in chapter 2 as having had a sense of what they had gained in Christ, and now in chapter 3 he has to address them thus: "Who hath bewitched you" - to make you go back to law when you have been justified not by the works of the law, but in Christ? It is impossible for a man to be justified by the law. I cannot live to God till my accounts are settled with God. I have no fortune to spend until my debts are paid. The effect of the law being given is to kill man, but the apostle can triumph in the killing power of the law, because it has killed Christ instead of him, "I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God. I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless, I live," etc.

All the promises were made to Christ, or rather confirmed to Christ. They were first made to Abraham (Gen. 12) and then there are gospel promises in view of the Gentiles. It is "thee," not "thee and thy seed," as in Genesis 17, where the nation is spoken of, and which was to be as numerous as the sand on the sea shore. This is a Jewish promise, but in Genesis 22 it is to Abraham's "seed," not to him and his seed, but to his seed Christ; for Isaac, received back from the dead in a figure, is a type of Christ, and it was to Isaac that the promise was confirmed or ratified, though given to Abraham. The promises are taken up in Christ, as risen; and this is of the last importance to us, because before they are made over to us, there is a righteousness wrought out for us. The law comes in meanwhile to raise the question of righteousness, and in such a way as to condemn men. God was righteous and the question has to be raised on that subject, not as to goodness. Man could not meet the demands of the law, because it required a perfect righteousness; but Christ could and did, and has put us into the place in which we can receive the promise. The law has dominion over a man as long as he liveth, but when he is dead, he is freed from that law. Well then, the law has no more power over me. If a man who is in prison dies, there can be nothing more done to him. The apostle not only says "dead to the law," but "crucified with Christ." I have died to the law through Christ having died to it. It killed Christ, and now I live by Christ. The death of Christ closed the whole scene morally. It was the end of law, the end of man, the end of the world; and a wholly new scene commenced from that point.

399 There are two ways of looking at righteousness. If I had kept the law, I should have been a righteous man. But to keep it I must love God with all my heart, soul, and spirit, and my neighbour as myself. This is human righteousness, which is never found in any man save in Christ. The law is founded on the knowledge of good and evil which he got by sinning; then there is a righteousness needed to meet its requirements. There is another thing needed, which we read of in scripture, and that is, God's righteousness. All that God is was displayed in Christ; human righteousness was perfect in Him; but there was another thing needed, and this need He met on the cross. He was not keeping the law on the cross. If God were to shew perfect righteousness towards sinners, they must die. Then there would be no love displayed. But if love were shewn to the sinner irrespective of the question about his sins, there would be no righteousness. Christ glorified God on the cross in the display of His righteousness and His love. Then, having thus glorified God, He had a title to be glorified by God, and therefore God raised Him from the dead and set Him at His own right hand in glory. There is the righteousness of God. All in which Christ glorified God on the cross, I am accepted in; therefore there is more than the cleansing from my sins, through the blood of Christ. All the devotedness of Christ to His Father's will as far as death, is accepted of God, and by virtue of God's acceptance of Him, He is at the right hand of God, and in that I stand. I am as Christ, as Luther has expressed it.

Christ was born of a woman; born under the law. As a man He was obedient to it; but God could not be obedient to the law. He emptied Himself and humbled Himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. "If a law had been given which could have given life, verily righteousness had been by the law." Law was not given till long after promise. The law was not given in paradise. There was a law, but the question of right and wrong was not raised, but simply obedience then. There was no knowledge of good and evil in paradise, and therefore no law required to measure the evil. The delusion people fall into about trying to be justified by law, is owing to man taking up that, which God gave to prove what a sinner he is, to work out a righteousness for himself. The law was not given to bestow life, but to make sin appear sin.

400 As a man, Christ did what He was bound to do, in fulfilling the law; and therefore there would have been none in that righteousness to impute to us. If He had failed (which, of course, He could not), if He had had a blemish or a spot, He could not have been a fit sacrifice for our sins. He had to make good to God, He had to make good before Satan, a perfect human righteousness. Therefore this was a part of the thing, because it proved the fitness of the sacrifice. Promise preceded law, and it was abstract and unconditional. It was revealed that it was part of God's counsels that they were to be blessed, but the question of righteousness was untouched by promise. The law comes in and raises that afterwards.

If God had made the accomplishment of promise dependent on the fulfilment of the law, it would not have been pure promise. If you make a promise to your child, and he disobeys you afterwards, you do not make him forfeit the promise, to do which would be to break your word; but you cannot pass over the offence without taking any notice of it. Your promise stands, but you must deal with him about his conduct, and not let him take what you have promised him, as if he deserved it. God made a promise, and man would come in and take the promise on the ground of his desert. Then God must bring in a law to prove his unrighteousness. The gospel is not promise but good news, after all is broken, to put us into possession of divine righteousness. Israel in their folly took up the law, as being able to keep it, instead of throwing themselves back upon God's promise to Abraham; and in their pride and presumption, they thus took on themselves that which God alone could fulfil as the accomplishment of promise. Now the promise was really given to Christ. How? Was He to enjoy it alone? No! This was not God's thought. But how then can He bring in all these sinners, these law-breakers? He works out a righteousness for them before He claims the promise, that we poor sinners might share the promise: and this is the gospel. Much as man boasts of conscience, he gained a conscience by sinning. There are two characters of conscience - the conscience of responsibility to God and the knowledge of good and evil, and this man got by sinning.

The promise is made to Christ (not the Jewish but the original promise of blessing). God does not make a promise to man as a sinner - He could not do that; but the serpent is told what He will do to Christ; and Abraham becomes the root through which the promise is to come. "He saith not unto seeds as of many, but as of one, and to thy seed, which is Christ." After that the law comes in to shew the utter sinfulness of man: in his lusts, he is corrupt; and in his will, perverse. Thus man, as to corruption and rebellion, was proved to be bad by the law. So in 1 Corinthians 15 it is said "the strength of sin is the law." It brought out the sin which was there already, because it immediately created the desire to do the thing forbidden.

401 Man shewed his inability to take the promise, because Christ was the embodiment of the promise, and they rejected Him. Man is left by the cross, convicted not only of a bad conscience and a broken law, but of a rejected promise.

Verse 13, 14. The blessing is put upon all who are along with Abraham, through Jesus Christ, and the curse on all under the law. The promise takes its unhindered course through the blessing of Abraham which comes by faith. God could not disannul, by another act, a previous one. The mind of man having a good opinion of himself, the law brings out all the rebellion of the will. The law was not against the promises, but put man under obligations. The law does not promise life, and gives no power to do it, because it does not give life.

Verse 20. This is on the ground of the contrast between promise and law. When the law was given, there was a mediator needed, because there are two parties, God and the people to whom the law is given. The stability of promise depends on the faithfulness of One: there is no need of two. Under law, God does not reveal Himself. He reveals what He requires of man, but there is no love and no grace in love. The mediator Moses reported the words of God to the people. The thought in this verse, "A mediator is not of one, but God is one," is not about Christ, the Mediator, as in 1 Timothy 2, but rather the abstract notion, that if you have a mediator you must have two parties; whilst, by contrast, a promise is given from one. God giving promise and Christ receiving it are one - God is one. The church, as such, was never the subject of promise. It was hidden from ages and generations, and revealed now. That which makes obscurity in the passage is that the conclusion is not drawn, though the premises are laid down.

402 Covenant in scripture is different from covenant as understood by us in common language. It is the form of dealing God takes with man, not an agreement between God and man, or man and God. The church gets all the spiritual blessings of the new covenant, because in Christ. Thus we have all the moral blessing of the new covenant, in the Spirit, though not in the letter. "The blood of the everlasting covenant" in Hebrews 13 is that which is finished and done with, and will go all the way through, and is available for all. The blood will never lose its value. It is the groundwork of all God's dealings with man in all ages. The full display of the value of Christ's death was made in the resurrection of Christ from the dead. The power of it was proved in the salvation of the thief on the cross. Psalm 40 may be a sort of embodiment of the book, or counsel between God and the Son from all eternity; and the divine power of the Son was shewn in His being able to accomplish what was written in the volume of the book. For there was as much the power of God needed to be able to say, "Lo I come to do thy will," as to will it. If Christ undertook to do God's will, He must be able to create a world if God wills it. The Father gives them to the Son, and He takes them back with Him into glory. The "sheep" in Hebrews 13: 20 are not looked at in the unity of body, but as individuals (as they are throughout the epistle), and in that way I want the power of the blood.

"The law is a schoolmaster unto Christ." God does not reveal Himself in law. The schoolmaster is not the Father, but one under whom the child is put to be taken care of, until he is fit to come into direct communication with the Father's mind. Under law, it was like saying to a child under age, Do this, and do that, without giving reasons. But "ye (those who are brought to be Abraham's seed by being put in Christ) are all the children (sons) of God, through faith in Christ Jesus."

Romans compared with other Epistles

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Generally speaking Romans gives us entirely the responsibility of man: we get there no counsels of God before the world began. God did not begin with bringing out His counsels; He created the first man in responsibility, and He went on with that until the cross. Then we have the supplementary testimony of Stephen rejected, and then, the foundation having been laid in righteousness, the counsels of God that were before the world was came out. It is quite a distinct thing, these counsels of God and what He gives, from our responsibility: the history of the first man is the history of our responsibility as such. There is no reason why I should have the same glory as the Son of God; this has nothing to do with my responsibility. We get both through the cross - our responsibility met, and the foundation for the counsels of God laid (2 Tim. 1: 9; Titus 1: 2). A man's debts may be all paid, and yet he may have nothing. This is not the way in which God has dealt with us; our debts are paid, and God gives us "to be conformed to the image of his Son" too.

"The scripture of the prophets," in Romans 16: 26, does not mean the Old Testament prophetic scriptures, but those of the New Testament. In Colossians we get the two parts of Paul's service: he was the minister of the gospel to every creature, and also the minister of the church, to fulfil or complete the word of God; that is, the whole truth could come out then. When we speak of the mystery, it is not merely that individuals are predestinated to be saved. You always find that we are predestinated to something, "predestinated to be conformed to the image of his Son," to be "holy and without blame before him in love."

In Ephesians Jews and Gentiles are looked at as one, the middle wall of partition having been broken down. In Colossians Paul preaches entirely to the Gentiles. That side of the "mystery" is not our place with Christ, but Christ being in us. In Colossians there is a hope laid up for us in heaven.

The cross met our responsibility; there the first man, whether Gentile or Jew, came to the last pitch of wickedness. This closed all the history of responsibility. Now, when my mind is open through grace to look at my responsibility, it is not a question whether I can stand in the day of judgment; the gospel starts with the declaration that I am lost. I have lots of debts, and not a penny to pay: it is all over with me on that ground; but Christ "came to seek and to save that which was lost." "Lost" was never said till man had rejected Christ, though it was true before. When the glorified Christ was preached by the apostles, the history of responsibility was closed. In that work on the cross Christ met our responsibility, and laid the foundation for all the counsels of God. This is summed up in Acts 7. "Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost: as your fathers did, so do ye." They had broken the law, killed the prophets, crucified Christ, and resisted the Holy Ghost. The Lord said on the cross, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Then came the testimony of a glorified Christ; it was rejected, and that closed altogether - not responsibility, but the history of it. Then in the cross Christ has perfectly glorified God Himself in the place of sin, where He was "made sin." He goes into God's glory, which was the foundation for the counsels of God. Then the whole mystery of the church could come out.

404 The Epistle to the Romans never takes man out of the earth; you do not get him risen with Christ. In Romans here am I, a man walking in this world, justified, and having the life of Christ.

In Ephesians we are actually sitting in heavenly places. You do not get man's responsibility at all there, because he is "created in Christ Jesus." The way in which he is looked at is, not as alive in sins, but as dead in them. In Romans man is alive in sins. First the sins are dealt on, then the evil nature, when death comes in, and the believer is to reckon himself dead. In Ephesians man is dead towards God (alive enough in sins surely), and he is a new creation altogether: God does not want to justify what He has created. The same power that set Christ at God's right hand took us up, and set us in Him. In Romans we see a man in Christ down here in this world. In Colossians he is risen. When I come to Ephesians, I have done with all that question of responsibility: man is looked at as dead in his sins, and he is "created in Christ Jesus." Therefore the exhortations differ. In Romans we are to present our bodies as living sacrifices; in Ephesians we come out from God, and shew Christ's life in this world. In Colossians you do not get a word about the Holy Ghost (except that the apostle speak of their "love in the Spirit"), but you get life. In Ephesians we have the power of the Holy Ghost, and the contrast of our place now with what we were, the thorough contrast of the old condition and the new.

405 In Philippians we get experimental life down here, but no doctrine: the latter is not in that category of epistles. It shews the practical power of the Christian; no sin or flesh is spoken of.

In Colossians we are risen with Christ. It is very precious to get the different parts - to know that I am alive. Christ is my life, and I have the Holy Ghost too, so there is power. "The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." Those who believe are alive, but alive with the power of the Holy Ghost. "God, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh." The old man is a condemned thing; where it was condemned, it died - not that Christ had it, but He was "made sin" for us, and I am to reckon myself dead.

Romans does not go beyond our responsibility, and it does not bring in the counsels of God, except in the one sentence, "For whom he did foreknow he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren" (chap. 8: 29); and this is a link with the other epistles.

There is an analogy between Ephesians and Colossians. In Ephesians we read, "And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; and that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness"; and in Colossians, "And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him." My mind is alive in Christ. "The truth as it is in Jesus" is the having put off the old man, and having put on the new. In Colossians it is not an abstract idea as in Ephesians, but a matter of fact. Ephesians 4: 22 is past, and verse 24 also; verse 23 is the present tense. There are two senses in which we use the word 'new' in English: we speak of a 'new fashion,' and of a 'new coat.' "Renewed in knowledge" in Colossians 3: 10 is a perfectly new thing, like a new fashion: "renewed in the spirit of your mind," in Ephesians 4: 23, is like a new coat, constantly renewed by the grace and Spirit of God.

406 Men are judged according to their works: in the beginning of Romans that is fully gone through: in the second part of Romans he takes up the nature; therefore I am to reckon myself dead. We all know, if we know anything, the difference between past sins (or present) and the evil nature, the fruit and the tree. If it is asked, Is a man condemned for both? I should say that he is "lost," rather than condemned for one. You never get forgiveness of a nature; but where it was condemned, it died: so condemnation is past, and the flesh is gone under it for faith. "The life I live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God." There I get another point - the object. "I through the law am dead to the law": if only the law, it would be condemnation as well as death, but "I am crucified with Christ." Life in us must have an object. The life of Christ in me looks out at Christ for me.

You see three steps: the truth in Colossians 3, "Ye are dead"; next I get faith taking it up in Romans, "Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin": then, when I come to 2 Corinthians 4, we have carrying it out in practice, "Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh." Realising you may take as owning the truth in your own soul, or you may take it as carrying it out in practice. I have been crucified with Christ, but I have to bear "about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus." It is a great thing to say honestly that we are dead: a dead man cares for nothing. I must begin by faith that I am dead. "Ye are dead," "Mortify, therefore, your members which are upon the earth," Col. 3: 5. It is never said in scripture that we have to die to sin. "Mortify, therefore" - there is power. Suppose that I hold my flesh always as dead, just as if hanging on the cross, then God comes and puts it to the test: "We which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus' sake." The Lord put Paul through these circumstances, delivered him to death.

Paul, in Ephesians, does not own any apostles except through the power of the Holy Ghost come down. He did not know Christ in connection with this world or the Jews; he started from glory. Peter was the first person that ever confessed Jesus to be the Son of God, but he never preached Him as Son of God: Paul at once preached Him as Son of God. Ephesians 3 speaks of his ministration of the mystery: chapter 1 speaks of God's counsels.

407 In Romans we get the two parts of our liberty. When I know my sins are all forgiven, then comes the question of being free from the law of sin and death.

I do not believe you ever get out of Romans 7 till you get into it; Perfectionists say you can jump over it. The fact is, you cannot get into justification till you find there is no hope for you. There is no forgiveness for an evil nature: God condemned "sin in the flesh" on the cross. If I have got to the real conviction that "in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing" - just as a man in my house may be a rogue, and perhaps I do not distrust him, but once I know he is a thorough rogue, I lock everything up; so once I have got to know what my flesh is, the trusting it is over: I may be careless, but I am not under the power of it.

Conformity to Christ, as down here, is a simple and absolute impossibility, for He had no sin; and conformity to Christ is always conformity to Christ in glory. There is no conformity to Christ at all for the Christian except in glory: he is called on to walk like Him. The only Christ a Christian is called on to be conformed to is Christ in glory. It sounds very nice to speak of conformity to Christ as He was, but it is frightful in many cases the way the standard is lowered by taking this up.

The Character of Christian Life

2 Corinthians 3

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There are two characters to be noted in Christian life down here: one is running a race towards glory, as in Philippians 3: 14, "I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus": another aspect of Christian life is the manifestation of the life of Christ in the world. The apostle shews how it is that the Christian thus becomes the manifestation of the life of Jesus. He is reconciled to God as the starting-point of his course. Both these characters are real. We are the epistle of Christ; men are to read Christ in our lives, we are to be the "imitators of God as dear children": there, in Ephesians, we are looked at as seated in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. On the other hand, in Philippians 3, Paul says, "That I may win Christ . . . if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus": He has laid hold of us for glory. We are running the race through the wilderness, but sitting in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.

Men had been calling in question Paul's ministry, and he had been forced to commend himself. "Do we begin again to commend ourselves? or need we as some others of epistles of commendation to you, or letters of commendation from you? Ye are our epistle written in our hearts, known and read of all men." If I want to prove my apostolic service, you Corinthians are my epistle. They were the epistle of commendation of Paul, because they were the epistle of commendation of Christ; "Manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ ministered by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not on tables of stone [like the law], but in fleshy tables of the heart." He puts Christians in contrast with the law. The Christian is a person in whose heart Christ is engraved. Just as they could read the ten commandments in the tables of stone, so they are to read Christ in you.

Such is the thesis of the chapter that takes up the special side I refer to. That is what Christians are, the epistle of Christ before the world, Christ being engraved by the Holy Ghost on their hearts; therefore, in going through the chapter, he puts before us the contrast between the ministration of the law and the ministration of the gospel. We cannot understand what it is to be an epistle of Christ unless we have Him written on us by the Spirit. What is the world to read in us? Christ; but what kind of Christ? How far do you know Him?

409 The apostle puts the law as the ministration of death and condemnation, not from any fault in the law (the law is holy, just, and good), but from fault in us. The law wrote nothing on men's hearts; it was the testimony of what men ought to do, the perfect rule of what the children of Adam ought to be. It takes up the general principles of relationship to God and to our neighbour, which were obligatory all through before the law was given, so that "sin by the commandment" became "exceeding sinful." The law said, Do this, and live; and if you fail to do it, you will be cursed (Gal. 3: 21). The law is the perfect maintenance, with the authority of God, of the relationship in which men stand; the righteous measure of what they ought to be: it forbids sins, it forbids lust even. Paul, as touching the righteousness of the law, was blameless; but when the law said, "Thou shalt not covet," then, as he said in Romans 7, "sin revived, and I died." The moment he got hold of the fact, that the law went to the inner man as well as to the outward, it brought death and condemnation. The law does not tell us what we are; it tells us what we ought to be, and, if it really comes home to my conscience, I know I am not that.

It is not only that the things we have done are bad things, but they are open violations of God's commandments. The law pronounces God's sentence of judgment on the person who has not kept it; and none of us have kept it. It is all well when we keep to outward commandments, like the young man who had kept them from his youth up, but who went away sorrowful because he had great possessions. There we get what the law does as a perfect rule for the children of Adam down here. That connects itself with judgment: Christ bore the curse of the law. But the gospel is just as opposite to the law, as coming to pay £10,000 for one who was in debt would be from coming to demand it. The law comes and demands; Christ comes and pays - more than that, He gives eternal life. When the gospel comes, it does not say merely what we ought to be, but what we are. It says all are guilty, Jew and Gentile, "that every mouth may be stopped"; none are righteous. That is where the testimony of the gospel comes and deals with man; it comes and tells us what we are, and tells us of propitiation through the blood of Christ. It is a ministration of righteousness, and a ministration of the Spirit; thousands of blessings, moreover, are connected with it. The moment we get the least reflection of the glory of God with the law, we cannot stand it: Moses had to put a veil over his face when he came down from the mount. In John 8 the light of God comes in, where the Lord says, "He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone at her"; and they went right out, beginning at the eldest even unto the last: they got out of the way, out of the way of mercy too. Bring the testimony of what God is really in the light, and man cannot stand it.

410 Well, you see Christ comes to detected sinners. God is light and love; He cannot be the one without being the other. He comes as light to shew us what we really are. 'There you are, sinners before God'; then He comes, and says, 'Now that is the reason I have come to save you.' Before the day of judgment the Lord comes to be a Saviour; He has not waited for the day of judgment; the person who is to be the Judge has come to be the Saviour. The question now is, What has He done? Whether through the natural conscience or the law, or by Christ, I am a convicted sinner. Has He come to judge me? When I am a convicted sinner in His presence, the question is, What has He done?

Then I get the ministration of righteousness. I find Christ at the right hand of God, not now on the cross. I see a Man (much more than man, the blessed and eternal Son of God, but still a man) on the throne of God: how came He there? He came by the road of the cross; He came there as the propitiation for our sins. Man is not now in a state of probation; he is lost, and God has visited him. What part had I in the cross? Well, my sins, and the enmity that slew Christ. When we look at the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ, the only part we had in it (morally I mean - we were not there in fact) was the sins and enmity of heart that put Him to death. There I find God using this wickedness of man to bring about His own work. Full enmity was brought out, but where my sins and enmity were brought out (at the cross, I mean) before God, God was doing a work that put them all away. Looking at the cross on God's side, "God so loved the world, that he gave his onlybegotten Son." All my sins, and my sinfulness too, came out, but all has been put away. God is there meeting me in my sins, making me feel them as He is light, but He is there as love too, putting them all away. I get the blessed Lord Jesus becoming a man to suffer death, and put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself; and I see Him now at the right hand of God. Suppose I am brought to fed that my sin has been the occasion of His death (He is not there on the cross now), I find that He is sitting at the right hand of God: is He there with my sins? No; that will not do, I find them gone - God raised Him from the dead: all is settled, blessedly settled. It is the Person who is to be the Judge who has put all my sins away; it is impossible that the Person who put away all my sins could impute sin to me.

411 Mark, beloved friends, how this righteousness comes in: "When he had by himself purged our sins," He "sat down on the right hand of the majesty on high," Heb. 1: 3. That is where I know Him now; that is where I get righteousness - God's righteousness; I own I have none. Taking men as men, "there is none righteous, no, not one," Rom. 3: 10. Where is righteousness then? It is in God: then God must condemn me, as I am a sinner. People seem to think that, because God is merciful, a man with fifteen sins may be let off, while a man with twenty sins must be condemned. You let loose thus all the iniquity of man: all sin is condemned of God - is, and must be so. People say God is merciful; and that means with them that He is perfectly indifferent to good and evil. Where am I to find the testimony and witness of this righteousness of God? In Christ at the right hand of God. "When he is come, he will convince the world . . . of righteousness, because I go unto my Father, and ye see me no more," John 16: 8-10, The world sees Him no more in that character. I get righteousness manifested - how? By putting Christ, who bore my sins, at the right hand of God. Christ so perfectly glorified God on the cross, that God in righteousness set that Man at His right hand.

Supposing this righteousness of God places Christ at His right hand, where would the Redeemer be without His redeemed? This places us there - not at the right hand of God, that belongs to the Son of God, but in the glory of God. The gospel is thus the ministration of righteousness. In it the righteousness of God is revealed, and the sin of man is revealed too. Wrath being revealed from heaven (Rom. 1: 18), in comes God in love to sinners, bringing righteousness, because we had none. In Christ He brings in eternal life, but divine righteousness too. The law came, and required human righteousness, but did not get it; sovereign grace in the gospel ministers righteousness to us.

412 There is a second thing in Christianity - it is "the ministration of the Spirit." The moment Christ sat down at the right hand of God (it was ten days after, in fact, but morally speaking it was the same thing), the Holy Ghost came down on the day of Pentecost, and sealed all who believed the gospel. "Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father," Gal. 4: 6. In virtue of this work of Christ, I, through grace, believing in it, am sealed by the Holy Ghost to the day of glory. "In whom also, after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of the inheritance, until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory," Eph. 1: 13, 14. Mark the effect of the presence of the Holy Ghost here. I see Christ sitting at the right hand of God; I am between the work of Christ and His coming again, and I have the Holy Ghost, the blessed seal of the efficacy of all He did at His first coming. I own in myself that I deserve utter condemnation; not only am I guilty, but lost. It is not a question now of what I can be for God. The gospel has come, and told me what God did when I was lost. The love of God is now shed abroad in my heart; I see the infinite love of God. Who put it into His heart? He has given the very best thing in heaven out of His own heart to save us, and now He has given His Spirit that we may believe in this love. That is not all: I find in John 14: 20, "At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you." People say that I cannot know; Christ tells me I shall.

Further, He is the Spirit of adoption: I know I am in Christ before God, and I know I am a son; I cry "Abba, Father." Mark the practical power of this. Suppose a child with his father; if there is a question as to whether it is his father or not, he cannot have the affections of a child. A child has a nature capable of those affections, but he cannot have the feelings proper to a child till he knows his father. We are in the consciousness of relationship: the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost. I know I am in Christ, and Christ is in me, and I cry, "Abba, Father." In the gospel of Christ I get the ministration of righteousness from God to me, and I get the ministration of the Spirit; I get the Holy Ghost sealing me for the day of redemption. There is no question as to love now, for God has given His Son; none as to righteousness, for Christ is at the right hand of God; nor as to relationship, for the Spirit teaches us to cry, "Abba, Father."

413 Mark where we have got now. We have got righteousness; we have got life; we are in Christ; we are loved as Christ is loved. When we appear in the same glory as Christ, the world will know it, but He gives it to us now. The love of Christ is perfect. I may love a little, then I shall give a little; I may love much, then I shall give much; but if I love perfectly, I shall keep nothing back. This is the way Christ gives; this is the meaning of the sentence, which is very sweet to me, "Not as the world giveth give I unto you," John 14: 27. The way Christ gives is to introduce us into all He has Himself. I do not speak of His eternal divine glory, but into all He has as man. "My peace I give unto you," John 14: 27. "For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me," John 17: 8. "And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them," John 17: 22. All that He has as man He has introduced us into; He has given Himself for us: when He comes He brings us with Himself.

I am looking for this, "That I may win Christ" (Phil. 3: 9); I say 'That is mine - it is my portion; I must get that.' I have got it in title, but not in fact yet. We are in Christ before God; but then another thing is true, Christ is in us. The Christian is running the race towards glory, and he has to manifest the life that is in him. Duties always flow from the place we are in. You never could make yourselves my children, or even my servants; but if you were my children, then the duties would follow. When I am a Christian, then I have Christian duties: I had duties as a man, but I was lost on that ground. Redemption puts me on higher ground. Christ is in me; I am to shew Him out. I cannot shew out Christ if I have not got Him. The great principle for us is Christ in glory. I am redeemed: glory is mine. Christ is our forerunner: I am in Him before God (every Christian, I mean). Now I have one single object ("a double-minded man is unstable in all his ways"). I want to win Christ in glory: I want to win Christ, and to be with Himself. You cannot have two objects and run after them. The only thing I am looking for is to "be conformed to the image of his Son" (Rom. 8: 29); that is the reason that there is no such thing as perfection here. If I have got Christ here, I cannot be satisfied till I get Christ there. "We all beholding the glory of the Lord, with unveiled face, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord," 2 Cor. 3: 18. This is where progress comes in. Suppose I am in a straight passage with a lamp at the end of it, every step I take I shall have more of the light of the lamp, more of the lamp too, though I do not get the lamp till the end. There is a great deal in 1 John 2 about "children" and "young men"; but what is all the apostle has to say about "fathers"? That they "have known him that is from the beginning." Real knowledge of Christ is the thing. The thing that characterises the Christian as such is that he has been made "meet for the inheritance of the saints in light." What made the thief meet? We have blessed testimony of conversion in his case (we do not get, perhaps, so striking an instance as this in the word of God); but there was no time for progress: yet he was fit to be Christ's companion in paradise. The Christian who has the Spirit of Christ is running after Christ in glory. We are in Christ, and Christ is in us. "Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be made manifest in our body," 2 Cor. 4: 10. Men are to read Christ in me. There is progress there.

414 Still the principle from the beginning is that Christians are the epistle of Christ: Scripture does not say ought to be, but are. You are my son; do not dishonour the family. The Christian is to manifest Christ in everything. There I find (not the running after Christ in glory, as in Phil. 3 but) in a world of temptation, a world that does not know God, that I should be a constant witness of what Christ is. The way of that is seeing the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. I have got settled in my place before God; I have got Christ in me - Christ is my life. We have the two things in Galatians 2: 20: "I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me." You are the epistle of Christ: the world is to read Christ in you. We "beholding the glory of the Lord are changed." The Spirit of God works, making me see these things; there is progress here - there ought to be, of course.

Such is the Christian, Christ's epistle in this world, in which men are to read Christ; the living expression of Christ because he is in Christ, "accepted in the Beloved." There is no perfection till we get to glory. There is nothing before me as an object of attainment but to be like Christ in glory. "And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure," 1 John 3: 3. Every step he takes he sees more of what Christ is.

415 Are you thus before God in the sense of the infinite love that gave Christ, and that, Christ being our righteousness, we are before God in the value of what Christ has done, brought thus into divine favour? If your souls are before God on this ground (conflicts you will have, and ploughing too, the deeper the better), then are your hearts content to say, 'I want nothing but Christ; I do not care what it costs me?' While we have Christ as our life, the flesh is there still, but I am not in the flesh, I have got into a new place before God. "There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus," Rom. 8: 1. Not only is the blood on the door-posts, but we are out of Egypt, "delivered from the power of darkness, and translated into the kingdom of his dear Son." It is not only that life is in me, but that I ought to be "always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus." I must apply the cross constantly to the old man. God has "condemned sin in the flesh," Rom. 8: 3. It does not now disturb my peace, but I am to reckon myself dead. Faith puts me where God has put me: the flesh is not changed, but I put the cross on it. Paul could say, "We which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus' sake" - we must often say for our own sake - there we get the apostle practically carrying it out. Let me ask the question, Are you content to be this? Are you content to be the epistle of Christ, or would you like a little of your own way? It is most important to remember, that there is positive strength in Christ to deliver us from every temptation.

I would like to leave on your hearts the sense of the perfectness of God's love, and that His love has done all that is needed for us. God's love was not exhausted - it was proved at the cross.

The Lord give us to know what it is to have fellowship with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.

The Law, and the Gospel of the Glory of Christ

J. N. Darby.

<34031E> 416

We learn here what a Christian is, and how a man comes to be one. First, we notice what introduces the subject; and next, the circumstance to which the apostle alludes as bringing out the true character of Christianity.

The apostle had been forced, by the attacks of those false Judaizing teachers, who said he was no apostle, to speak of himself, though he is grieved to have to do so. He began, in the end of the previous chapter to say a few words which lead to this: "We are not as many who corrupt the word of God," etc. Then he asks, "Do we need letters of commendation to you, or from you?" He means just such letters of commendation as are given now. But he tells them, "Ye are our letter of commendation." He had them so much on his heart, that, if people asked him for proof of his apostleship, he just said, Look at the Corinthians. At this time they were going on well; they had received the first epistle, and the apostle had seen Titus, and learnt that it had produced its effect. They were brought back again to a right walk; his heart was enlarged towards them (chap. 7: 11), and he could say, "Ye are our epistle." He could hardly have said so in the first epistle, though he was the means of their conversion.

Next, he shews how or why they were his letter of commendation. "Forasmuch as ye are manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ," etc. (v. 3). They recommended Paul, because they recommended Christ. He then passes to a comparison of this with the law, which introduces the general subject of the chapter. "Written . . . not in tables of stone, but in fleshy tables of the heart." The law of the ten commandments, as we all know, was written on tables of stone; the Corinthian Christians, in contrast with that, had Christ graven on their hearts. This is what a Christian is: an epistle of recommendation of Christ to the world, by having Christ engraven on his heart by the power of the Spirit of God. It is spoken of the Corinthians collectively, though it is true also individually. He does not say, Ye ought to be the epistles of Christ, but "Ye are." This was the position they were in. If I call myself a Christian, even without being one, I am in the position of an epistle of Christ. My profession, though it be merely profession, is a profession of Christ. The apostle could hardly have had the heart to say that of the Corinthians, when they were walking badly. Still they were in that position. They were before the world to shew out Christ, as it is expressed doctrinally in chapter 4, "that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh." At the end of this chapter he speaks of it as growth into the image of Christ. It is the same thing under a different figure. There, too, we see how it is brought about.

417 To return to how this is introduced. These Corinthians were a testimony to Paul's ministry - a letter of commendation of him - because they were a letter of commendation of Christ before the world, shewing what the power of Christ's life was in a man; his motives entirely changed, and above all that is in the world; a walk of holiness; unselfishness; self-restraint; the power of money gone; a conversation in heaven. He had alluded to the tables of stone on which the law was written, and he follows out that line of thought in the chapter. He refers to the fact that, when Moses came down from the mount the second time, his face shone, so that the people could not look at him, and asked him to put a veil upon his face. That veil is done away in Christ; nevertheless it is still upon the heart of the people when the Scriptures are read, but when they shall turn to the Lord it shall be taken away, just as Moses put off the veil when he turned to the Lord. They will look upon Him whom they have pierced, and mourn. When Moses came down from the mount the first time, it is not said that his face shone, because then he brought pure law; but the second time a certain measure of grace was added: God had been revealed as "the Lord, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth." The way in which He spared Israel then was by His goodness, which He had caused to pass before Moses (he could not see His glory). The people could not look on the glory of God - not even at the reflection of it in Moses' face.

It is a most touching history, shewing out again and again the grace, and forgiveness, and patience of God. First, Moses went up and got the law, graven by the finger of God on two tables of stone; but before ever he had brought it to the people, they had broken it. They had made a golden calf to worship, and thus broke the very first link with God: "Thou shalt have no other gods before me." Moses, seeing this, cast the tables of the law out of his hands, and broke them. Thus pure law never came into the camp at all. Law came in afterwards, when mercy was shewn too, but unmixed law never. How could Moses carry the tables of the law into the midst of a people who were serving other gods? How could he put the ten commandments beside the golden calf? When he comes within hearing of the voices of them that were singing and dancing, his indignation is kindled, and he casts down the tables and smashes them. That was where pure law ended.

418 Moses went up again, taking new tables, according to the word of God, who wrote the law upon them afresh. He had told the people, "Ye have sinned a great sin: and now I will go up unto the Lord; peradventure I shall make an atonement for your sin"; and it is lovely to see how he pleads for them, and how God answers in goodness and grace. He reveals His mercy in government, as "forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin." This is sometimes called the gospel, which it is not at all. God did indeed bear with Israel in patience, but still he adds, "In the day when I visit, I will visit their sins upon them." It was not forgiveness as we know it now. He forgave them in not cutting them off, and putting Moses and his seed in their place, as He had threatened. Moses had said, in beautiful disinterestedness and love for the people with whom God's name was bound up, "If thou wilt not forgive them, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book." The Lord shews present mercy and forgiveness, but at the same time puts every one of the people on his own responsibility. "Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out of my book."

This is the first part. Even this (law qualified with mercy), so far from being the gospel, is what the apostle calls the ministration of death and condemnation. Then, in contrast with this, he speaks of the gospel - of Christ's work - as the ministration of the Spirit, and of righteousness. A person not in the presence of God may not find the law a ministration of death and condemnation, because his conscience is not awakened. He is like Paul, "touching the righteousness which is in the law blameless"; "alive without the law once." But that is never found in the presence of God; there it is, "There is none righteous, no, not one." The young man who came to the Lord asking, "What good thing shall I do?" and saying, "All these things have I kept from my youth up," had not got a bad conscience, in a natural sense. He thought he was going on very well, and he came to know what was the best thing he could do; he did not ask to be saved. The Lord dealt with him as He dealt with Saul. He brings down the law upon the very motives of his heart. Saul might be satisfied that he was blameless touching the righteousness which is in the law, but when the law said, "Thou shalt not lust," all was over; he was discovered and condemned. "I was alive without the law once, but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died." Why? Not because the law is wrong, but because it is right, and I am not right. The Lord did not say to the young man that he had not kept the law. He told him to go and sell all he had, and give it to the poor. This immediately brought out the lust of money: "And he went sway grieved, for he had great possessions."

419 See, again, how the Lord uses the law in the case of the woman taken in adultery (John 8). The scribes and Pharisees bring her before Him in a most wicked way, hoping to entrap Him. If He said, Stone her, He was no more a Saviour than the law; if He said, Do not stone her, He was breaking the law. The Lord does not weaken the authority of the law, but He applies light to them all, telling them, "He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone at her." They found they were in the presence of God, and they went out, one by one, owning practically that they had all sinned, and were under the condemnation of the law. They felt the detecting power of God - the veil was taken away, and they could not bear it.

Our consciences may be quite at ease while we are far from God and unawakened; but the moment we have to face what we are in the presence of God, we see that our case is desperate. We all know, more or less, what self-righteousness is, and we can go on with it well enough till we get God's eye upon us. There is not a man in this town who is not washed in the blood of Christ, that, if called apart to answer for himself to God, would not try to get away as fast as he could. He may have an excellent character, and deserve it too, but he has not a perfect conscience. We may go on for a long time as decent natural men without anything to shock the conscience; but the moment God's presence is recognised, the veil is off, God is seen, and His word searches the thoughts and intents of the heart: then we can understand the words of poor Job (and there was none like him in all the earth), "He cannot answer him one of a thousand." "If I say I am perfect, it shall also prove me perverse. If I wash myself with snow water, and make my hands never so clean, yet shalt thou plunge me in the ditch, and mine own clothes shall abhor me." That is, though clean in the eyes of men, he would be in God's sight like a man brought out of a ditch. Then he goes on to say, "Neither is there any daysman betwixt us that might lay his hand upon us both. Let him take his rod away from me, and let not his fear terrify me." That is what we have got in Christ; God has taken away our fear.

420 The law is most useful in this way to convict the soul, where known in its spirituality. It demands from us what we ought to be for God, as God's law must do, and then tells us, if we do not answer to it, we are cursed. The apostle goes even a step farther in Romans 7. A man may be quickened, born of God, so as to say, I hate these evil things, that I do. The law says, So do I, and that is the reason I curse you. It is because the law is right, "holy, just, and good," that it kills us morally because we are sinners. It is useful in this way, but it always ends in condemnation. The time will come when God will write it in the hearts of His people, and then the case will be different. The law will not curse, but bless. When the law comes to the conscience, saying, "Thou shalt not lust," no man can stand it; the lust of the flesh is detected, and it is shewn to be not subject to the law of God. "So then, they that are in the flesh cannot please God." This is the sum of it. Sometimes the flesh may run to excess of riot, and sometimes it may be very respectable; but this is true of all, in their natural standing as children of Adam. Man is a bad tree, and cannot bring forth good fruit.

The law deals with our consciences. It is not an arbitrary thing. It takes up the relationships and duties which already existed among men before the law was given, and were owned of God, as father, husband, wife, child, etc. It comes with God's sanction and authority to these relationships, and gives His rule for them, and says, If you do not maintain them according to it, you will be cursed. Conscience owns the propriety of it, and says it ought to be so. The law does another thing. It not merely says, "Thou shalt honour thy father and mother," etc., but it says, "Thou shalt not steal," "covet," etc. It is an instrument and weapon in God's hand to restrain and punish the evil propensities of men. But a man might not be a thief, or an adulterer, or in any other outward way offend against the positive prohibitions of the law, and yet it will take hold of him. Here comes in the great principle upon which all hangs: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy strength." Is it what you do? People can delude themselves sadly about it, and say they do love God thus, not knowing themselves. But then comes the second great part of the law: do you love your neighbour as yourself? Are you as sorry when your neighbour loses his fortune as if you lost your own? Oh! you say, you are expecting something supernatural. Just so - I am. You do not love your neighbour as yourself; you do lust. And if you do not love your neighbour whom you have seen, how can you love God whom you have not seen? If you are on the ground of the law, God comes, and demands (though you may be free from theft, murder, and the like), Do you love your neighbour as yourself, or do you lust in your heart? When the conscience is really touched by this, it cries out, "O wretched man that I am!" The use of the law is to bring us to this, and not merely to convict us of open sins, which it does. It adds this detection of lust to all its rules for human relationships, and all its prohibitions; for otherwise a man might be a hypocrite, and live outwardly very fairly, and so be righteous according to the law, which could not be.

421 The law does not give life, and it does not give strength. Man's great need is power to do right. I may know what is right well enough, and even have the desire to do right, and yet something else have power over my heart, so that I do wrong. Neither does the law give a motive to love. It tells me to love God with all my heart (and conscience owns I ought to do so), but why? Because I shall be cursed if I do not. But that will not produce love. Thus law gives neither righteousness, life, nor strength; for, though it puts an object before us, it gives no revelation of God to draw love out. In Christ we get all these. He sets His seal upon the law, as a perfect standard of what man ought to be. He charges Himself with our sins. He does give life, and strength, and God as an object. Conscience consents to the law that it is good, but feels that for this very reason it must condemn me because of what I am. There is no mercy, or salvation, or redemption in the law; it is a ministration of death and condemnation. Have you kept the law for a whole week? Have you loved God with all your heart? Has there been no love of anything else? Has nothing else possessed your heart at any time? Have you been thinking for your neighbour as for yourself? Have you not, perhaps, been thinking of getting on in the world? Well, that does not do for God - it could not; if there were such a state of things in heaven, it would not be heaven at all. What, then, can the law do but announce condemnation; for it cannot sanction sin? In the very nature of things it must be so. Men would like to be in heaven, because they think it is a happy place (and so it is); but if a man were taken as he is, and put there, he would get away if he could. Do you think he would find pleasure and delight in Christ being glorified, and in having nothing but Christ and the Father's love to occupy his mind and heart? He could not bear it - it would be to him a most monotonous and tiresome thing. It is only deceiving ourselves to think that heaven is a place where a man in his natural state could be happy. I have dwelt upon this to shew where we are on the ground of law, but I turn now to the ministration of the Spirit. Let us see how God deals with us in Christ.

422 Men had been sinners, lawless sinners and law-breaking sinners, before Christ came. His coming brought an additional element of sin. God came into this world in goodness. What did it do to Him? Speaking of the ministration of the Spirit, a part of His mission was to convict the world of sin, because they believed not on Christ (John 16). His message to the world from God is, Where is My Son? He has been among you in grace and love: what have you done to Him? Just as He said to Cain, Where is Abel, thy brother? The unconverted heart is still the same; it would get rid of Christ, though it cannot kill Him now, of course. What did He do here? He healed the sick, cleansed the lepers, raised the dead. But God was too close to men, and they took Him and crucified Him. I cannot even call myself a Christian, without saying, in effect, I am in a world in which the Son of God has been rejected and cast out. His murder was, of course, a deed of law-breaking, but it was a great deal more - it was rejection of God come in love and grace. It was the display of this, that the carnal mind is enmity against God. I insist upon this last point. When it is really seen and brought home to the conscience and heart, a soul is in a condition to receive blessing from God. He sees himself to be a lawless sinner, a law-breaking sinner, and one that preferred the world, and its vanity and dross, to Christ. When we see this, all our sins are out before God; we are law-breakers and God-haters. This we learn in the cross, though the law shewed it too. "For my love, hatred," Christ would say.

423 But when I come to that in which my hatred for God is thus manifested, the cross, then I learn that Christ died for it. This is the fulness of the triumph of God's love over my sinfulness. After God had tried man in every possible way, without law, and under law mixed with mercy and longsuffering, He sent Christ, saying, Surely they will reverence My Son; and we know what they did to Him. God came into the world to save us, that where sin abounded, grace might much more abound; and it was in that very act in which man shewed that he hated God, that the work was done which saves us, shewing that God's love is superior to man's wickedness.

What I see first in the blessed Lord, even in His life, is God coming down to men, and walking in grace and holiness through the world, in order to bring God's love to every one in it. "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them." He brought divine love to those who owned what they really were. He tore off the mask of pretended righteousness from the Pharisee, but where he found a poor wretched soul - like the woman of the city, who dared not shew her face among decent people, much less to God - He said I will have you. To the proud and insensible Pharisee He said, "You gave me no water for my feet" - he did not even offer the common courtesies of life; "but this woman hath washed my feet with tears." Thus the self-righteous man is exposed by the light, but the poor woman - a sinner confessed - finds divine love, and, more, forgiveness. All this is a great deal more than promise. There are blessed promises to believers, but God's dealing with the soul of a sinner is not on the ground of promise. The Syro-Phoenician woman, for instance, being a Canaanite, had no promise, except to be exterminated. When she cried to the Lord as Son of David, He did not answer her; He did not know her in that way at all. She drops that, and the Lord graciously waits upon her till she gets down to her true place. "I am not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." He tells her "It is not meet to take the children's bread, and cast it to dogs": how can I give the things promised to Israel to Canaanites? What does she say? "Truth, Lord" - I am a dog - "but the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters' table." Her heart apprehends that God is good enough to feed people who are not children; He is good enough to receive a wretched sinner who has no righteousness, and not even a promise. God revealed in Christ shewed her there was love in God, even for a person who was entitled to nothing. Christ could not, would not, deny this.

424 Thus God brings down souls into their real condition before Him, where they have not a word to say, and not till then do they get the blessing. This is what I get in Christ as to salvation. It is not a promise only: He was the Messiah who had been promised; but He was there as God present with the sinner; and now we have got even more, for He died for us. Think of this, that God Himself came down to meet me, a poor sinner, when I could not lift up my head! And what did He bring? Perfect love; God so loved the world, that He gave His Son. He could not allow sin, but would put it away. I get a step further when I see that He was the Bread of life that came down from heaven. Then there must be eating His flesh and drinking His blood.

I turn now to the cross. It was the manifestation of goodness, in the midst of the wickedness of the world, in a way never to be found anywhere else. During Christ's lifetime the heavens would open upon Him, and testify to His perfection and the Father's delight in Him; and thus I learn the terrible evil of the heart that could resist such goodness. When I come to the cross - supposing I am thus convicted of sin - what a wretched creature I see myself to be; I have hated this blessed One, and, more than that, my sins brought Him there. But He is not there now! I come to the cross, and there is no Christ on it. Where is He? He is sitting at the right hand of God. But my sins brought Him to the cross; they were on Him there. Has He gone to God's right hand in glory with them upon Him? No. What has become of them? I find in the cross that God has dealt with my sins, when they were upon Christ. It was when He had by Himself purged our sins that He sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high (Heb. 1: 3). This is the contrast in Hebrews 10. The Jewish priests were standing daily, offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, but this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins, for ever sat down. He will rise up for judgment when the time comes; He is now waiting, not on His own throne, but on the Father's, till His enemies be made His footstool. We get there this special work of the Lord Jesus Christ. He died for our sins, according to the Scriptures. He was made sin for us there; He bare our sins in His own body on the tree, and in consequence had to drink the dreadful cup of God's wrath. But it is all over, and now that I see Him seated at God's right hand, I am bound to believe in the efficacy of that work once for all. The word used there is a very strong one; there is no interruption, nor discontinuance of its efficacy. Therefore the worshipper once purged has no more conscience of sins. He cannot come to God without finding that Christ, who bore his sins, is there, and entering into the blessedness of the man whose transgression is forgiven, and whose sin is covered, and to whom the Lord imputes not iniquity.

425 There is a great deal of looseness and unbelief at the present time (thank God, not so much in these countries) as to the immense value and import of the death of Christ. In that death God has been perfectly glorified in all that He is, and, at the same time, man's need has been met. If God had merely manifested His hatred of sin in the destruction of the sinner, it would have been righteous surely, but where then His love? If on the other hand, sin was passed over, men allowed to keep sins, and no more about it, there would be no righteousness.

When I come to the cross, I find what could be found nowhere else - righteous judgment against sin, but perfect love to the sinner at the same time. The more we look into it, the more we see the value of the cross, the more precious will Christ be to us. I get in the cross man in absolute wickedness, hating what is good, hating God, who had come down in mercy to him, who had shewn love and compassion to him in all his sufferings and yet had for His love hatred. Satan had complete power over man - "this is your hour, and the power of darkness." Not one remained with the Lord in that hour, even the disciples ran away. I further get there, absolute perfection in Man - that is, in Christ - taking even the cup of wrath in perfect obedience, "that the world may know that I love the Father."

I get there also God in perfect love towards the sinner, and in perfect righteousness against sin. Every question of good and evil, in their deepest and highest character, is settled there (I do not say for them that slight it). The first man stood upon his responsibility in the old, or first, creation, and he failed, and ruined all. The second Man glorified God in the midst of the ruin; the results are not all seen yet, but they are all secured - even the new heavens and the new earth depend upon His work on the cross. All that man is in evil, and all that God is in righteousness and love, are exhibited there. Thus it was the ministration of righteousness. The thing that manifested God's righteousness was this, that, Christ having glorified God in the place of sin and ruin, God glorified Him at His own right hand. That is where I know Christ now; the cross is over once for all, though its value abides perpetually, and the man who was on it is at God's right hand - the place which He had before the world was, in His own divine Person, but which He now occupies also in virtue of His work. He is there because He put all my sins away, and glorified God in doing it. On this the Holy Ghost comes down, and makes known that Christ is there; He makes known a great deal more, too, as dwelling in me. That is how it is the ministration of the Spirit.

426 Thus the gospel ministers righteousness for my soul - righteousness for those who had none for God. When man had nothing but sin, Christ was made sin, that we might become God's righteousness in Him. All that is over, and righteousness has been testified in setting this blessed Man - not an ordinary man, of course, or he could not have done it - at God's right hand. Such is my position now, as to my acceptance with God. This ministration of the Spirit was not merely the Spirit speaking in prophecy of a work to be accomplished, but the Holy Ghost come down because it had been done. There were promises before; the life, and death, and resurrection of Christ all clearly testified of; but the thing was not actually done. Saints then rested on promise, and God owned their faith; but I do not rest on promise now, but upon this, that Christ has finished the work which His Father gave Him to do, and that, having borne my sins, He is now at God's right hand in righteousness. Therefore when I come to the cross, I find He is not there; He has been there, but He is gone up on high, and the Holy Ghost has come down to make known to those who believe that His work is finished, and their sins all put away. And, not only so, but that work has put a Man into the glory of God: He is entered as our Forerunner, and He will come again to receive us to Himself, that where He is, there we may be also.

427 We are not there yet; we have the treasure in earthen vessels, but the gospel we have received opens up heavenly scenes: it is the revelation of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. We see the effect of this, for example, in Stephen individually. I am not now speaking of the work of the Holy Ghost to convict of sin, and to point us to the cross of Christ, but of His sealing of believers (Eph. 1: 13). God gives the Holy Ghost to dwell in a man after he believes. A Christian is a person whose body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, and therefore John is not afraid to say, "Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God." The Holy Ghost thus dwelling in a man gives him to know that Christ has completed the work which saves and delivers him, and gives him also to look forward to the glory. What was the effect of looking at the glory in the face of Moses? They were afraid, because it convicted them of their sins. But when I look at the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, far more glorious than in Moses, does it alarm me? No, on the contrary it is the proof that I am brought to God; it is the testimony that I am saved, because I see it in the One who bore my sins on the cross. I see the love that He shewed in dying for us, and I see the efficacy of His work in His being there, because He is there and glorified as the Man who died for me and bore my sins. Instead of being terrified, "we all with unveiled face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Lord the Spirit." This glory is presented in three ways: the glory of God; the glory of the Lord; and the glory of Christ. I see it in the One who has put away my sins, in the One who did not spare Himself, but drank the dreadful cup for me; and I can delight to look at it. I have got an object that makes my conscience perfect before God (Heb. 9).

The effect of thus thinking of the Holy One who gave Himself for my sins is, that I am changed into the same image; it has this sanctifying power. I can look into the very glory of God with joy and delight, and know, moreover, that I shall be like the One who is there (1 John 3: 2). As we have borne the image of the earthly, so shall we also bear the image of the heavenly. The heart is thus filled with Christ, and the effects are soon seen. Of course there is progress in this, and watchfulness in our ways is needed to preserve and manifest it; but how we get it is by contemplating the Lord Jesus Christ in glory. There is also the fulfilment of the Lord's promise of what would take place when the Comforter was come: "At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you." People tell us you cannot know that you are in Christ; but my answer is simply, I do not believe you, for Scripture says ye shall know it. What did Zacharias say of even John the Baptist? "To give knowledge of salvation unto his people by the remission of their sins."

428 Then I am called to walk in this, and the more closely I walk, the more my heart is purified, and I see more clearly. The word of God, and all the helps that He has given us, come into operation, that we may grow up unto Him in all things. I am not trying to find out how I can get accepted; I am accepted. All that is settled, in order that I may be free to think of holiness. You cannot think of holiness really till you have peace about acceptance. You ought to think of being accepted first. It is the most solemn question possible, Can God have me? We are judicially before God according to the righteous requirements of His nature. But this is not holiness. Holiness is that I delight in good because it is according to God, and hate evil because it is contrary to God. Naturally I cannot turn to that until my soul is settled as to whether I am accepted or not. Then I can go on to follow holiness, not to get acceptance, but as that in which God delights, and I delight too, and bear more of Christ's image every day.

A little further on, in this very epistle, the law is brought in as requiring righteousness from man, and man cannot give it, and therefore there must be death and condemnation. But when all that man is - lawlessness, law-breaking, Christ-hating  - is manifested; when sin has come to its highest pitch in the cross, God's wonderful grace comes in, and makes that cross the very means of salvation to sinners. When the soul is awakened to what it has done, and then finds that God has already dealt with its sins on Christ, once for all, that He has by Himself purged our sins, then the conscience is purged from dead works to serve the living God. I have a new nature in the light, as God is in the light, and I look to have my heart answer to this in practical holiness, because the question of acceptance is settled. I am separated to God personally. I look at the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, the testimony that I am a saved man, and I seek to walk in the Spirit, as I live in the Spirit. We must not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, whereby we are sealed unto the day of redemption. We are to be followers of God, as dear children, walking in love, as Christ also has loved us, and given Himself for us. We are to walk in the consciousness that we are God's children, and to behave ourselves as God's children. Thus we are the epistle of Christ. The soul has received this full and blessed truth, that, if I am in Christ, I am in perfect acceptance before God, and Christ is in me. Then let me take care that nothing else comes out of me.

429 I only add one word, which clears up many a difficulty. Very often, in divine things, we cannot see a ray of light, when the same principle in human things is as plain as A B C. Our duties always flow from the position we are in. It would be foolish to expect persons who are not my servants, or my children, to behave as my servants or my children; when they are, then they must behave as such. You must be a Christian, a child of God, before you can behave as one. You do not become a child by trying to act like a child; but when you are a child, you are bound to behave as such. But your being a child does not depend on your behaviour. Think of any one saying, You are my child, and you must try and continue to be my child still.

I just put this to each of our souls: are we the epistles of Christ, known and read of all men? Are we practically in the place which belongs to us? Take a heathen who has heard of Christianity, and what it is, and who expects that all Christian people are living for Christ. He comes here, and he sees people running after money, and pleasure, and honour, and what will he say? Why, that Christians are no better than the heathen; that people here are running after just the same things as in China. They are not epistles of Christ. Let our consciences consider this: how far we really are a letter of commendation of Christ before the world. It is an immense privilege. It should be like what the Lord said to the poor man who had been brought to his right mind: "Go home to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee." What a blessing and honour it is that He who loved us, and gave Himself for us, can use us poor worms as a practical, manifest, testimony for Himself before the world!

The Gospel of the Glory

2 Corinthians 3

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The apostle's statement is this, that there is now no veil over the glory of God. If there be any veil now, it is on our hearts. This is a solemn truth. All the glory, all that God is, shines in the face of Jesus; and there is no veil over it. The veil is all on us. This we find in the next chapter: "But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: in whom the God of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ" (for so it really is, not "glorious gospel"), "who is the image of God, should shine unto them." This veil is on your hearts if the glory of Christ be hidden; for the apostle says, "We all, with open" (or unveiled) "face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord." This is the glory of God displayed in Christ.

Now we will see what the Christian is, what his place is in this world, and how he gets there. The apostle shews us all this in contrast with the law. The Corinthians had called the apostleship of Paul in question; they had said he was not one of the chosen twelve. He had spoken a little about himself in the previous chapter; they had forced him to do so. Now the Corinthians had been going on badly, but afterwards they were going on better; and Paul could say that his mouth was open to them, and his heart enlarged towards them. He gave them many signs of his apostleship; but after all it was not needed. He needed not letters of commendation to or from them as others did, and as we do now; for they themselves were his epistle, known and read of all men. They were the witnesses of the truth of his ministry; and that, because they were manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ ministered by him - written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in fleshy tables of the heart. Such then is the Christian - a person in whom the world can read Christ, because Christ has been engraved upon his heart by the Holy Ghost. Let us remember that it does not say this ought to be, but that it is so, whether he walks so as to manifest it or not. A child is a child, whether he act up to the relationship or not. The Christian is the epistle of Christ, to be read of all men; it is his place just as truly as the law was written upon tables of stone. He has to realise it. And more, beholding with unveiled face the glory of the Lord, we are changed into the same image; he grows in it also. It is from glory to glory, and by the Spirit; and this is the Christian in contrast with the law. Law shews what a child of Adam ought to be. The Christian is the living epistle of Christ. The Holy Ghost engraves Christ upon our hearts, and then it comes out in our lives.

431 There is the greatest possible contrast between law and gospel. Paul calls the one the ministration of death and of condemnation, and the other the ministration of the Spirit and of righteousness. This is what I propose we should now look into. When Moses received the tables of stone the first time and came down from the mount, we hear nothing about the glory of his face. He never brought those first tables into the camp at all. He hears how the people are behaving, pleads with God for the sake of His great name, when God offers to destroy them, and make of him a great nation; but when he came down, and saw the calf and the dancing, he cast down the tables and brake them beneath the mount. How could he bring God's law into the midst of the people who were breaking the very first command contained in it? When Moses entreats the Lord, as to His present government, the Lord forgave the people's sin. Moses could not make atonement, and they were put back under law - the soul that sinneth it should die. Then he took with him two other tables like the first, and emboldened by God's graciousness to him, he asks that he may see His glory. But this may not be; but He makes His goodness pass before him, and proclaims before him His gracious name in government, and then He put them under law again. Moses had proposed to make atonement for them, but could not; and God proclaimed Himself as the One who would by no means clear the guilty. After this, when Moses came down, all this intercourse with God caused his face to shine, and the people could not bear to see even the reflection of the glory of the Lord, so he puts a veil over his face. Here we learn that God deals in mercy with His people, but we do not get a perfect atonement made. The promise of a deliverer came in from the beginning, even in the garden of Eden; but there was only One who could make this atonement. In all the revelation of goodness one fundamental point was wanting, and that was the clearing the guilty. Then guilty Israel asked that a veil might be over his face, and to this day the veil is over their hearts; but when they shall turn to the Lord the veil shall be taken away. The law could but point in many sacrifices to the one perfect Lamb, and Israel could not see through the figures to the thing figured; but the veil is done away in Christ. There is no longer any veil over God's thoughts towards us, although the god of this world may still keep it on men's hearts. It is because this veil is done away with that it is called the gospel of the glory.

432 We find God acting according to two great principles - law and grace. Law is God requiring from man what man ought to be. It takes up all the relationships formed of God towards God and man. The duties were all there before the law was given, but it gave the rule of them, and attached God's express sanction to them. The law came and claimed from man obedience. Our Lord sums up the whole law in two sentences: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart," etc.; and, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." The law came and claimed from man what he ought to be. It gave no life, no power, deliverance, or object to be a motive; it could not clear the guilty, nor was it any help or strength, although God does help His people at all times. But the law itself could do nothing but demand obedience; and as man was a sinner, and incapable of obedience to a holy law, it was a ministration of death and condemnation. There is no grace in law (the two are opposed to each other), but God's grace dealt with individuals. The law was a ministration of death and condemnation because it gave from God what man ought to be, and what man is not. If a man's heart is not exercised towards God, the law does not trouble him much. He thinks he has not done anything very bad; he is no worse than his neighbours; he has not committed any very gross sins. Besides, he says, God is merciful; for he is sure to bring in the thought of a little mercy to meet his need; for deep down in the heart of every man is the sense that he has sinned. He is pretty comfortable, and it is all very well as long as it is a question of natural conscience; not of God's eye reaching the heart and thoughts. When the law says, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself," we are at once convinced of sin; we know that we do not. Who is as troubled at a loss to his neighbour as he would be at a loss to himself? But if we get a revelation of God ever so small along with the law, we are utterly condemned at once; for no flesh can stand His eye. Now one of two things will happen. You will either seek to hide from God, as Adam did in the garden of Eden, or you will seek to hide God from you, as Israel did when they entreated that Moses should put a veil upon his face: for if a man once gets but a sight of God, he can say with Job, "If I wash myself with snow-water, and make my hands never so clean; yet wilt thou plunge me in the ditch, and mine own clothes shall abhor me." Whatever I may have thought of myself before, I see that in God's eyes I am only like a man that is just dragged out of a ditch - utterly unclean. Under the law the soul may feel all right when it is not exercised towards God; but in His presence no man can stand it. Lust is there in the heart.

433 The principle of the law is, that what God is for me depends upon what I am for Him. But God has brought out that I am a sinner, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. It is a manifestation of death and condemnation, and nothing else. Law will never give peace. It is not grace; it is looking not at what the Lord does for me, but at what I find in myself for Him; and I may be under law in looking at the cross itself. I see a display of perfect love towards me on the cross, and I look into my heart and see there such a feeble response to His love that I begin to doubt whether I really love Him at all. It is quite right that I should desire to love Him; but it is not the gospel, and you can never get peace in this way. It is putting a question as to your relationship, founded on your conduct; and what confusion would it cause in a family if the children began to question whether they were their father's children or not. I may ask, Am I walking according to my relationship? but I must not question whether I am a child or not. This is all law, though in a more subtle form. I am still looking to get peace in what I am for God, and not in what He is for me. This is the state of a Christian who has not found peace. Like the prodigal, who, far off from his father, asks to be made as one of his hired servants. When he comes into his father's presence, no such word: he knew his relationship. Before he was only thinking of what he was to his father, and not of what his father was to him. In the first two parables in Luke 15 we get the grace that goes out to seek what was lost, and then reception on the return; and the Lord shews how the work goes on in the heart, how the soul is often still upon the principle of law, saying they are not what they would like to be. This is looking inside to see if they love God, and when they see no signs of love in their own hearts they then begin to doubt whether He loves them. This is a more subtle form of law; but it is still the same principle - looking at what I am for God, and not at what He is for me.

434 Now I turn to the gospel of the glory. Into the midst of a law-breaking world God came in grace. Before Jesus came God had not come out to man, and man could not go in to God. He gave man law and promises, but He did not Himself come to man. But the great fact that we have now before us is, that God has come. "The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us"; and man is gone right in - into the presence of God. When I say man, I mean Christ Himself; but who as the Forerunner has entered in for us within the veil. I find that God came in perfect goodness, and not in manifestation of His glory. He came when we were sinners and law-breakers, when we were far off. "God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son." We get the manifestation of the purest love in our Lord's life down here; His miracles were not only power, but power in love to meet every want in every man. He removed every effect of sin; He was the manifestation of God in perfect goodness; and the result was that man spit in His face and rejected Him. May the Lord give us all always to remember, that we are in a world that has rejected God when He was in it in grace! The world now is as bad as it was then; it is no more in relationship with God; souls are not nearer God by nature than they were. In fact, as we look around, we can see things are in a worse condition than they were. Sin has reached its climax. And it is not only that God has turned man out of the garden of Eden, but that when God came into this world man turned Him out. As Jesus Himself says, "If I had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin: but now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father." He passed through this world in goodness, healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with Him. The Son of God has been in the world, and been rejected by the world. God revealed Himself to us in the Person of His Son while we were sinners. He shews His perfect holiness in His life; this is brought out in a striking and touching manner when the poor leper comes to Him. He was with sinners unsullied by them; but there in perfect love. Here was one who came acknowledging His power, but doubting His love. And what is His answer? does He reproach him? No; His answer is, "I will: be thou clean"; and He put forth His hand and touched him. One who touched a leper was unclean like the leper; but Christ acquires no defilement by His contact with men, but cleanses them in grace. It was divine power touching and driving sin away: it was a most beautiful expression of what His grace is. But such as He was, they rejected Him; and in this act sin was completely manifested, for it was the rejection of God in goodness. But God uses this crowning act of man's sin for his salvation; Christ was the Lamb of God, who puts away the sin of the world: and here we come to the cross. The work was done which was the expression and accomplishment of the height of wickedness on the part of man; but it did but manifest the supremacy of grace on God's side. I get God's righteousness against sin manifested, but more than that, God perfectly glorified. All Satan's power is put forth, and it but serves to bring out God's perfect love to the poor sinner. There where sin abounded, grace did much more abound; as it says, "If one died for all, then were all dead." If you will not come to Christ, you are still preferring other things to Him; but there is a very solemn thought for you, and a solemn question for you to answer. Where are you going to spend your eternity? The question must be settled now in this life. Men shrink from the thought of eternity; and where there are infidel thoughts about God, they deny it altogether, or at least hope there will be none.

435 If I come to the cross, knowing that my sins brought Christ there, shall I find Him? No; when I get to the cross I find He is not there, and where does my faith know that He is? I know that my sins brought Him there, but my faith sees Him at the right hand of God, and that is why it is called the gospel of the glory; for He is entered into it for me. He is there now sitting at the right hand of God; but He has not got my sins upon Him now. No, He is sitting there because all my sins are clean gone for ever. By one sacrifice for sins He has perfected for ever them that are sanctified. When I come to give account of myself, whom do I find as judge? The very One who by Himself has put away my sins. For a soul perfectly established in grace there is no thought more happy than that of the judgment seat of Christ; for when I am manifested before it, it will be in my glorified body made like the Lord Himself. He said the work was finished, and the person who judges me is the One who bore all my sins away. The gospel of the glory is, that the One who died for my sins is there in the glory with all my sins put away for ever; and that is where the gospel in its fulness begins. It was not till Christ sat down at the right hand of God that the Holy Ghost came down, and that the disciples could go out in the power of the Holy Ghost. It is righteousness that has set the One who bore my sins at the right hand of God, and He is there without my sins upon Him; and having so borne them and glorified God as to them, it is the ministration of the Spirit - the Holy Ghost bearing witness in the gospel that the One who did it all is the One who is now exalted at the right hand of God. I see a Man in the glory, the Forerunner entered in for me. We had no part in this wonderful work that was done, except our sins and the hatred that put Him to death. He died, and God set Him in the glory because He had done a work which perfectly satisfied God. As we get in John, speaking of the Holy Ghost, He will convince the world of righteousness "because I go to my Father." He sits there in the glory because the work is perfectly done - their sins put away for ever for all who believe. It also convinces of sin, because it was my sin which brought Him there on the cross, where He bore all, and perfectly satisfied the righteousness of God.

436 The law cannot give life; it can only convince of sin. The work was done between God and Christ; the whole question of sin was settled and done with, and He is my righteousness before God. God's righteousness has been displayed in putting the Man who bore my sins at God's right hand in glory. The Holy Ghost comes and says to me, You have no righteousness for God. Then I try to grow more holy. Quite right in itself that I should long after holiness; but as a means to peace it will not do. But here in Christ I have a divine righteousness that is fit to put me into glory. They that are led of the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. In the cross of Christ it is not merely that my debt is paid, for that might be, and yet I might have nothing as it were to live upon; but God has made me a joint-heir with Christ; and now down here I live looking for Him to come to take me to Himself, to be for ever with Him in the glory where He is.

The New Creation

2 Corinthians 5: 13-21

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It is blessed to see in this chapter how the thought of God comes out in the new creation. In this aspect man is gone as to his sins and responsibility - dead in them. The judgment of the first Adam is complete. The old thing is entirely gone. It is a new creation now, and in this new creation I find God instead of man. Even Christ Himself, as known after the flesh, is known no more. True, He was, when down here, the hope and expectation of faith as coming into the world; but the apostle only knows Him now as having died for all and been glorified - all under death whether Jew or Gentile, and Christ no more known after the flesh (that is, as come after the hopes of man in it) but Head of a new creation, where all things are of God, and in which we have been made in Him the righteousness of God. God has manifested Himself in the second Man, and wrought atonement in His death, and now we are the righteousness of God in Him.

In the first creation we see man and his responsibility. In the new creation, all things are of God, and man is reconciled by Jesus Christ unto Himself. We want to have the power of this in our souls, to live as belonging to the new creation, as reconciled by God to Himself, all that belonged to the old creation for ever gone to faith, "old things are passed away, behold all things are become new."

We see how the apostle walked in the power of this in verse 13. "Whether," he says, "we be beside ourselves, it is to God." That is, if he were beyond the influences that belonged to him as a man, it was not an excitement that belongs to those influences, it was because he was absorbed in God. It is what is called ecstasy. When his spirit was free to rise above present service in what he was in Christ, he was lost in God, carried out beyond himself. If he were sober, if he had to weigh difficulties - come down into the sober estimate of what was before him - it was God in love working in him. His thought was entirely for others in that love. This was his daily life; as to himself, transported with God; and, when he did think about things down here, all his thoughts were for others. It was the love of Christ that constrained him, and he looked upon all around in connection with the death of Christ. It was no longer a living Messiah in the flesh with promises for Israel. All this was over. Christ had died, and he judged that Christ would not have gone into death if men had not been there. The whole history of Adam's race is closed in death. If they had not all been dead, Christ would not have been found in death; why have gone down there if others were not lying there? And therefore those who from amongst these lived were now to live not to themselves, but to Christ who died for them, and rose again. Thus, if he me. an unconverted man, he would not think of him as an old acquaintance, and know him as such. He would look upon him as one that was dead and needed to be saved by the death of Christ. Or, if the person was a Christian, it would be just the same. He would not know him after the flesh according to an old acquaintance with him; he would look upon him as one alive with Christ, and his one thought would be that Christ might be glorified in him. Even Christ Himself was not to be known any more, in connection with this creation. He had died to it, and if any man is in Christ, he is of the new creation, where old things are passed away, and all things are become new, and all things are of God. Man is looked upon as dead, and God brings in a new creation.

438 We have the same aspect of truth, when in verse 19 he speaks of Christ coming in the flesh. It is not looked upon as fulfilling promises to Israel, but God revealing Himself in grace to the world. "God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them." This was the aspect of Christ's first coming, in which the apostle thought of Him. We know He came to His own, and was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God to confirm the promises made to the fathers. All this is blessedly true; but here we have God in man come here, and the apostle sees neither Jew nor Gentile. If God were in Christ, He acts toward the world. To what portion of it can you confine Him, if it be a question of God displaying Himself in grace in the world? For the same reason, when he speaks of the love of Christ, he judges all to be dead, and sees neither Jew nor Gentile, but a new creation, in which God counts every man that is in Christ.

We know that that is God as to the glory of His divine Person, but the apostle is speaking here historically; and therefore when he looks upon the Lord Jesus living in the world, he sees God in Him acting in overtures of grace to the world. God was in Christ; that is the great fact, that God has been here as the Reconciler, and man would not be reconciled. Does the apostle say that God is reconciling us? No, but that God has reconciled us by Jesus Christ unto Himself, and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation to the world: specially, no doubt, the apostles, but in their measure true of all. Man would not have God when He came, and therefore He had to make Christ sin, to work atonement for us, and now He is at God's right hand, in whom we become the righteousness of God. The apostle does not say to the Corinthians, Be "ye" reconciled, for they were reconciled; but Christ being in heaven, having gone there through death in working out atonement for us, and His presence there being necessary to complete all in glory, He must have ambassadors to carry out His work of reconciliation here; so the apostle says, when he preaches - that is the gospel to sinners - "We pray in Christ's stead, be reconciled to God." That is what he had to say to men as Christ's ambassador. How far are we living thus? Living in the power of God's new creation, judging the whole thing belonging to the first creation as gone to faith, and entering into the blessedness of our place in Christ, in the power of an ungrieved Spirit? Exercised for others, that the life of Christ may have power in their walk and ways; judging evil practically in our own path through the world, but yet having our souls so full of our blessedness in Christ, of what it is to be reconciled to God, that directly opportunity arises, our hearts burst forth in praises to God, and ever go forth after others still dead in their sins. That this may be so practically, we must bring the death of Christ to judge everything in ourselves and in our ways. As the apostle says, "Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body," 2 Cor. 4: 10. If we do not daily, and hourly, bring everything under. the sentence of Christ's death, and judge everything by it, the Spirit will be grieved in us, and, instead of filling us with the joy of our portion in Christ, He will cause the light of Christ to awaken us to the judgment of ourselves, and of our ways.

439 May the Lord give us to walk in the power of an ungrieved Spirit, bringing everything into subjection to Christ, that we may know what the apostle goes on to say, "Death worketh in us, but life in you." In thus bearing about in his body the dying of the Lord Jesus, Paul found death to self, and the result was life to the Corinthians. Paul held the power of Christ's death on the natural man, so that when he ministered among the Corinthians, there was no Paul at all, but only Christ. It was life to them, because death was working in Paul.

440 May the Lord give us thus to live! And may He grant us, especially in a day like this, to judge of men as Paul did, so that whatever the boast of human nature may be, we may see that all are dead, because Christ died for all in grace - for the highest act of grace and love is the proof of it - and that the only living ones are they that live to Him who died for them and rose again, while in our own souls we enter into His new creation. We may have to go down to babes, and feed them with milk, and not with strong meat; but may we ourselves live in the light of this new creation, where all things are of God. We must pass through exercise, and be tried and tested to learn what is in our hearts, and to have our senses exercised to discern good and evil. This is all needful and profitable, but then there is our distinct place in Christ as part of the new creation, where instead of having the first man responsible to God, we have God in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself in grace, and making Christ sin for us, to bring us into the new creation, where all things are of God, and where man is before God in divine righteousness, and, as to his enjoyment, finding himself lost in God. It is God, and not man. It is what God is to man, and the blessedness of man being with God: God we know, revealed in Christ; but nevertheless God revealed, and man made the righteousness of God, a part of God's new creation.

The Lord Jesus in Humiliation and Service

Philippians 2

{Revised.}

<34034E> 441

It is ever happy to have the Lord Himself before our minds as the object of our thoughts. The Christian is so completely brought to God, that He goes out from God to shew the character of God to the world. The subject of this epistle is Christian Experience. And you get this experience in the power of the Spirit of God so completely, that you never get sin mentioned in the epistle from beginning to end, nor the flesh, looked at as bad flesh, save to say he did not trust in it. Paul here does not know which to do - die or live. If I die, I am with the Lord; that is better; but I cannot work for His saints. If I live, there is the activity of love for them: and so he does not know which to choose. There is utter absence of self in that, and power. Then, he says, it is more needful for the church that I stay, and so I know that I shall be acquitted; deciding his own case. It is all power, the power of the Spirit of God leading a person out of the reach of sin. If you look at the detail in verses 15, 16, You will find his exhortation to others is an exact picture of what the life of Christ really was: "blameless and harmless"; that is what Christ was - "the sons of God"; that is exactly what He was, Son of God - "without rebuke in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation"; such was Jesus - "among whom ye shine as lights in the world"; when He was in the world He was the light of the world - "holding forth the word of life"; He was that word of life. The detail is precisely the same power of the Spirit of God, and the exhortation is just the detail of Christ's life in the world.

In this epistle there are two great principles of Christian life (the last chapter is, he is superior to all cares and all circumstances). In chapter 3, it is the energy that carries a man on, so that everything else is dross and dung - that is Christ in glory. He has seen Him up there, and he says, I must get that. There are hindrances in the way. I will throw them aside, he says. You will lose everything. I cannot help it; I must get Him. Oh, but you will die. No matter; that will be all the more like Him; I must get on to Him, the One up there in the glory, whom I have seen. "If by any means"; that is, whatever it may cost me, even life itself. "Resurrection from among the dead," that is the character of Christ's resurrection. The resurrection of the saints has nothing in common with the resurrection of sinners. Christ is the firstfruits, then those that are Christ's at His coming: He is not the firstfruits of sinners to be judged. Not a hint in Scripture of saints and sinners being raised together. "That I may attain unto the resurrection from among the dead" (the apostle uses a rare and emphatic word to explain his meaning) - what is there to attain to, if the wickedest man in the world goes up at the same time and in the same way? "Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection." What is the good of that, if all rise together? The character of Christ's resurrection was the positive seal of God's approval on Him and His work, and so is ours. As regards justification His resurrection is of all importance, for it is the seal of God on the excellency and perfectness of the work of Christ. He was taken out from among the dead as a perfect seal upon His work and Person, and everything else; and so is our resurrection the seal of our acceptance. Because God delights in us, we are taken out from among the dead, as Christ was. So he continues his running till he gets that. You have Christ in glory, and all is dross and dung except that. He wants Christ instead of Paul, and all he gets by the way is nothing - if he gets even death, it is all the more like Him.

442 In chapter 2 you do not get Christ in glory as the one he is running after; not Christ gone up, but Christ coming down. One whom I am to be like in this, the graciousness of the walk that He displayed; and that is always going - down - going from the form of Godhead down to death. Where do I find what God is fully displayed - righteousness and love perfectly displayed? In death. It is a wonderful riddle that has come out, the Holy One going down - the Prince of Life going into death. We never completely learn, till we see it there - the things that the angels desire to look into. No one knows the Son but the Father. We know the Father, but no one knows the Son; the divinity of Christ is maintained by the inscrutability of the incarnation: God becoming a man - that is unfathomable - and the meekest, lowliest man that ever walked this earth. Paul is taking up the truth of lowliness, etc., but the moment he begins he must bring out Christ. The motive of all exhortations is nothing less than the whole scope of Christianity. God come down and bringing salvation, and gone back again as man. Take the commonest exhortations, the spring and motive is nothing short of obedience to the word of God Himself. Eating and drinking even is sanctified by the word of God and prayer. I am merely eating like a beast if it is not. He exhorts them to walk in lowliness and love (there had been some little squabbling, I suppose, among them). These Philippians had been sending help to the apostle from a long way off, and he will not reproach them, but says, Now I see how you love me; I see how you care for me and my being happy. Now, if you want to make me perfectly happy, walk in love among yourselves. It is a reproach so delicately brought in that their hearts could not resist it. "And let each esteem other better than themselves." It sounds unpractical and impossible; but if I think of myself with the mind of God, I see the evil, the sin in myself. If I think of another, and I am full of Christ, I shall see all the value of Christ upon him, I shall see with Christ's heart, and I can esteem him better than myself, for I see evil in myself, and I see Christ in him. "Let this mind be in you," etc., that is, the spirit in which Christ was, always going down; first, being in the form of Godhead, and in the glory, He takes the place of a man, and then He humbles Himself again to death. He is the first grand example of "He that humbleth himself shall be exalted," and that is what we have to do - go down.

443 Here we get the principle of Christ's whole personal course, and we get not only what He was, but the delight He took in us. He took us up. His interest is in us, and the expression of this delight was not simply He acts graciously towards men, but He Himself becomes one of them. He went down to death. We go down to death by sin, He by grace; we by disobedience, He by obedience. So He gets by obedience and grace what we get by disobedience and sin. From the first step that we go He takes us up till He has us where He is. Speaking in a general way, I cannot look at Christ in His life and walk till my soul is at peace and settled. If a soul has not settled peace, you will find it wants the Epistles first, not the Gospels; because the Epistles are the reasonings of the Holy Ghost on the value of Christ's work. John's writings bring God down here in grace to sinners. Paul takes man up there in righteousness to God. Paul takes man up to God in the light; John brings God down to man. You get in the Gospel of John, God brought down to us in our need, get Him talking to the woman at the well, and His disciples wondering, and she finds that in this tired man at the well, she has been speaking to the Lord of glory. I thought, she said, He was a poor tired Jew, who wanted a drink of water. Oh, He says, if you knew how that God had come so low as to be dependent on you for a drink of water, you would have confidence in Him at once.

444 This poor, tired man was the Lord of life and glory, who not only could lay all her life bare before her in its sin and shame, but could fully meet her heart, meet her need, and attract her to Himself, so that she loses all her sense of fear and shame in her anxiety to bring others to Him too. When our consciences are awakened, we want then to know how a sinner can be just with God, and so we turn to Romans and the reasonings of thy Epistles; but when the heart knows I am a child, and that the same favour rests on me as on Jesus, I turn back to the Gospels and say, I must look at Jesus - what a Saviour He is! I want Him close, close to me then! brought close to my eye. Then I look back to the Gospel of John and see God come down in Him. I get in Him one who, instead of driving the one who had the defilement away, drives away the defilement, and leaves the poor leper clean and near Him. Where do we find the blessed Lord going as soon as He is called out to His public ministry? To the baptism of repentance. Why does He go there? Oh, He says, these poor people going there are those in whom God is working. They are taking the first step in the right direction, and I must go with them. I find this perfectness and love in Him. I cannot leave them to go alone, He says, I must go with them. I need not say He needed no repentance, but it was the first right step of that poor remnant, and He will be associated with them. This is not your place, says John. Yes, He says, but "suffer it to be so now, for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness." He does not haughtily say "becometh me," but "becometh us." He takes His place in grace along with us (here it was with the Jew), and the heaven is opened for Him, and the Holy Ghost descends upon Him, and the Father's voice proclaims Him Son; the model of our place in grace through redemption.

445 I get heaven opened four times. At His baptism, when the Holy Ghost comes down on Him. Then heaven is opened, and the angels of God ascend and descend on the Son of man, that is, the highest angels become His servants. Heaven is opened, and He comes out on the white horse to judge. And between these two I get heaven opened for Stephen to see Him. The heaven was opened to Stephen as to Christ. But mark how the glory of His Person is always maintained. When heaven is opened to Stephen, it is that he may look in and see Jesus; but when at His baptism heaven was opened, it is for heaven to look at Him. He was not looking at an object in heaven. Heaven was looking at Him. Heaven was never opened for heaven to look down on anything in this earth till that divine blessed One is there. The fulness of the Godhead is in Him, but He is sealed as a man. The Father says, All My delight is there. What is most despised on earth is the One heaven cannot but be opened to, and the Father cannot keep silence about Him. A man is the delight of God. Heaven is opened to Him, the Holy Ghost comes down upon Him, and the Father's voice proclaims Him His Son. And it is of profound interest to see that here first the whole Trinity is fully revealed, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

First, then, His place as the manifestation of accepted man is settled. As soon as that is settled, Yes, He says, but these people are in conflict and difficulty, and have got this tyrant over them, I must go and meet him for them. He meets the devil - overcomes him, of course. The devil wants Him to go out of His course, to keep not His first estate; he would have Him leave the place of obedience and a servant on the plea of His being a Son. The written word was sufficient to conquer the devil, and enough for the Son of God to use. All possible salvation depended on His victory; all that victory depended on the written word of God. Never, save at His death, was there such a solemn moment. What He held for enough, and what Satan held for enough, was the written word of God. He bound the strong man by that means, and set about spoiling his goods. There is one man who knows the truth because He is the truth, who is satisfied with the written word, and that is the Lord. There is no craft of Satan that the word of God is not sufficient to meet. There was One as a man wielding a power that was sufficient to deliver man from all the effects of sin. If sick, they were healed - healing all that were oppressed of the devil, for God was with Him - power working in goodness. And what is the effect? They would not have Him. The Lord on earth had power to remove the effects of Satan's power, but behind those was man's heart, which could ask Him to depart. Where there is a legion of devils, and He sends them off into the herd of swine, the men prayed Him to depart out of their coasts - did not want Him. The quiet devil that influenced their hearts was worse than all the legion of devils that ran noisily down the steep place into the sea.

446 Satan says, If you take this people up, you take them up at your cost. I have got the power of death over them. But He goes on. Presently Satan, prince of this world, raises all the world against Him. The disciples are afraid, and leave Him; one betrays Him, one denies Him, and the rest run away. Well, then, He says, since this hatred is so great, I must give up My life to redeem them out of it - "Through death, destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage."

They ask Peter, "Does not your master pay tribute?" Peter comes to Jesus, and He shews He is God by shewing that He knows what is in Peter's heart, and says, "Of whom do the kings of the earth take tribute; of their own children or of strangers?" "Of strangers," Peter says. "Then are the children free." He was the Son of the Great King of the temple, and free; and so was Peter. He puts Himself with Peter. "Notwithstanding, lest we offend" (puts Himself with Peter again), then shews He is God over all, and Lord of creation, by disposing of creation, commanding the fish of the sea to yield up the tribute money, "that give for thee and me" - puts Peter and Himself both together again. It is lovely!

While He was God in everything, He was the humblest, most affable man that ever walked this earth. In death only is He alone. He looked for compassion and found none. "Tarry ye here, and watch with me." In His sore trial He looked in Gethsemane for them to watch with Him; they could not, and an angel from heaven comes to strengthen Him. Will He ever give up being a servant? Never? That form of servant He will never give up. Selfishness likes to be served. Love likes to serve. That is just what I find in Christ.

No intellect knows God. We only know God by our wants. Infidels say you cannot have more than the power of man's mind. If I see a decrepit old woman leaning on the arm of a strong man, and supported by his strength, it is not in herself that she knows what strength is: and that is how we know God. No man can know God by knowing; he would not be man if he did, and God would not be God at all. It is conscience that knows the way God meets us. It is a want in me. Look at Simon the Pharisee and the woman. What did he know of Christ? He felt no need of Him; thought he was putting honour upon Him in asking Him, though in curiosity, to his house, and does not shew Him courtesy even as to a guest. And Christ is not inattentive to neglect. He knows and feels it. If I am cold and indifferent to Him, He knows and feels it all; it touches His heart. God's essential names are Light and Love. Look at the woman: the light made her know herself, and the love made her know Christ and trust Him. Christ thoroughly knew her heart, and she thoroughly knew Christ's heart. While Simon had thought Him unworthy of the common courtesies of life, she found a fulness of grace, and of light, and love that could meet all her need. Her sins, which are many (He knew them all), are all forgiven, for she loved much. God's heart and man's heart, through grace, met in blessedness where the Pharisee was an utter stranger.

447 I learn this lesson here, that the Person of the Lord Jesus may have full power in my heart before I know the fact of forgiveness. The essential names of God, Light and Love, I find both brought out in Christ 5 the light that reveals everything in me, and the love that puts it all away. When the light comes and manifests me before God, I find myself in the presence of love, that has done everything for me. If I had the light without the love, I must run away and hide myself. If I had the love without the light, it would not do at all. It could not be. I get both in Christ - the divine Light that discovers all, and the divine Love that makes me know that all is put away. When light comes in, the conscience is honest. Take the thief, and hear him - "We indeed justly" - light had discovered that to him - "but this man has done nothing amiss." How did he know? By divine teaching. Would not our hearts all say, He has done nothing amiss? Then again, "Lord," he says - that is divine teaching as to His Person. All His disciples had run away; he alone owns His Lordship there on the cross - comforts His heart in that hour. And what does he ask? Is it relief from his pain? No. Suffering all that terrible agony on the cross, does he ask the One hanging by his side, whose power he owned, to lessen the suffering? No; but to be remembered by Him in His kingdom; and the effect of this is, "To-day thou shalt be with me in paradise." Oh, here was a heart that had found out what He was. A Pharisee is a Pharisee, and a whited sepulchre, but a broken heart is suited to a heart-healing God.

448 Is He a Servant in the glory? Oh, yes, He says, indeed I am. He says to His disciples, I am going to the Father; I cannot be your companion any more on earth; but I am not going to give you up. What is to be done? I must fit you to be with Me; give you "a part with me." You are clean, but you will be picking up dirt in your walk in this world, and this will not do to be associated with Me in glory; I must wash your feet. And that is what He is doing now. He is a Servant to wash our feet now.* He sets Himself to that service. We do not cease to be clean, looked at as to our standing before God, but we walk through the world and pick up dirt, and Christ is our servant to wash it away. In Luke 12 we find He will be our Servant in the glory. "He will gird himself, and come forth and serve them." It is divine love unspeakably blessed. He will never give up being a Man. "Let your loins be girded, and your lights burning." I must have a full profession of Christ, that is, lights burning. Have your loins well tucked up for service, while I am away; when I come again I shall have My own way, and you shall sit down, and I will serve you. Shall I ever forget the humiliation of Christ? Shall I ever forget His manhood in that way, giving Himself for me, and then taking me up there to be with Himself, where He is remaining a Man for me through all eternity; shall I forget? Never! never! through all eternity. I shall never forget His humiliation on earth. While seeing Him in glory animates the soul to run after Him, what feeds the soul is the Bread that came down. That produces a spirit that thinks of everything but itself.

{*"Washed," in John 13: 10, refers to the whole body; "wash," to feet or hands. The words are different in Greek.}

I need not go into detail, but you get in the rest of Philippians 2 all the delicacy of feeling brought out which flows from absence of self, and love to others, because the soul has got imbued with Christ, and is feeding upon Him, till unconsciously it grows to be like Him. I must have the second as well as the third of Philippians: all the energy you like, but then go and study Him, and live by Him, and you will come out in His likeness, in all His grace, and gentleness, and loveliness. Oh, what a place - redeemed by Him, going to be with Him in glory, and set meanwhile to manifest Him on earth!

449 The Lord give us to be so occupied with Him who was so full of love, so full of gentleness, so full of lowliness, that we shall manifest the same! The first sin of the world was losing confidence in God. He comes back to us in all these sins of ours and says, Now you may trust me. It is God winning back the confidence of your heart, unbounded confidence in unbounded love - and that not by exhortations from heaven, but by His presence on earth. If you are a poor woman, not fit to face any of your fellow creatures, come to Me; I will have you, trust Me: if you are hanging on a cross for your crimes, you shall go up to-day with Me to paradise. My blood is enough to put your crimes away; my heart is open to receive you."

The Lord give us to know more of that One, who, when He put forth His own sheep went before them - met the lion for them, and delivered them! The Lord give us to realise what He was!

Colossians compared with Romans and Ephesians

J. N. Darby.

<34035E> 450

In taking up Colossians, I will begin by comparing it with the epistles to the Ephesians and Romans, in order to help us in understanding the different ways in which the condition of the soul is treated. The chapter I have read (chap. 1) connects itself too, in a remarkable way, with the counsels of God, as well as containing some of the more elementary truths, such as our hope of glory and our responsibility, which makes it practical to all our souls. You will never rightly connect the doctrines of man's responsibility and God's free grace, until you see them united in Christ. From Paradise and onwards you find these very questions proposed by God Himself in the tree of life, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But man broke down in his responsibility, and was shut out from the tree of Life. Thus there were the two sides of the question from the very starting-point of God's ways. The same question was raised by the law. The two things were there, and by satisfying the responsibility man was to find the way to life. Then came Christ, who did satisfy the responsibility, and is the Life. Grace, which bestows the life, gave Christ, who met the responsibility. I receive eternal life through the righteousness of God when I have none, and I have to glorify Him in exhibiting this life in my body.

In divine things, people forget (what they see every day, and which is as simple as possible in human things) that duties flow always from the relationship in which we are already placed. Putting a person into a relationship, puts him as naturally as possible into the duties belonging to that relationship. If the place is a constant one, the duty is a constant one, as with parents and children, husband and wife. The statement often made, that if I am saved I may do as I like, is thus disposed of. Can my child say that because he is my child he may do as he likes? No; the duty flows from the relationship. If I am a child of God, duty is always there; I may fail in it, and be chastened as a naughty child - quite true; but the duty is there. That is what redemption does; on the total failure of man under responsibility, it brings me the gift of eternal life in Christ Jesus. Thus praise, service, obedience - whatever belongs to the child of God - flows from it.

451 Now the epistle to the Ephesians gives us the counsels of God, while Romans takes up the responsibility of man, and his failure in it; then his justification from this state. These are connected with two aspects of sin; first, in its lusts and passions, in which man lives in sin; then its aspect as towards God, in which he is dead in sin. On the one hand I find him alive in sin, away from God, seeking to gratify his lusts. Then, I ask, what is the state of this soul towards God? He is dead. Scripture speaks of both states. In Romans, man is alive in sins; in Ephesians, as towards God, he is dead. If looked at as alive in sins, it is a question of putting them away and justification. If looked at as towards God, dead, there is nothing of this; it is his being quickened out of that state - and, therefore, life and a new creation; all that side is connected with the counsels of God. Taking man as dead, there is nothing to be got out of him; he has not a feeling or a thought towards God: evil goes out towards evil, but not a feeling stirs towards God. When Christ is brought in, he sees no beauty in Him that he should desire Him; that is man.

In Colossians you find both states (chap. 3: 7), "In the which ye also walked sometime when ye lived in them" (that is Romans); and chapter 2: 13, "You being dead in your sins" - which takes in Ephesians. This epistle then comes between Romans and Ephesians, and takes up both sides.

When we come to Ephesians, we find the counsels of God, the sealing of the Spirit, the inheritance, and then our being made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Consequently, in the conduct of the Christian, it is God Himself who is given as the pattern of it - "be ye imitators of God, as dear children"; and we get the truth in Jesus, which is, you have put off the old man, and have put on the new. It is not a system of doctrine, but that I have done with the one, and have passed into the other. In Colossians you never find the Holy Ghost mentioned, except incidentally and exceptionally, as "love in the Spirit"; but life is the great subject. In Ephesians, the old man having been put off, and the new man put on, the Holy Ghost is in the Christian, as the power to manifest God in his ways, and thus be the expression of God in a man. God is love, and God is light; "walk in love," and "now are ye light in the Lord"; Christ is the pattern for light, and the pattern for love. There are two ways in which love is manifested; first, the divine love, which shews its greatness in having to do with the vilest, in rising above the evil, and putting it away; secondly, where the object characterises the affections in giving oneself up in devotedness to Him who has so loved us. If I love what is base, it is a base affection, and so on; the affection corresponds with the object on which it fixes itself. I find both these characters of love in Christ, in Ephesians 5: 2, and it is the path for us. He "loved us," answers to the first; "to God for a sweet-smelling savour," answers to the second. Love going out to us in every need, but to God as its constant object. It is so with us; we must have God always before the soul, to keep up the character of our love. Here, then, I find the fullest description of what the walk of the Christian is: I am sitting in heavenly places in Christ, not in Adam at all. The works are suitable, and, moreover, fore-ordained. They are suited to the place we are in. If the position is Jewish, the works are legal; but the child is not a servant, nor the servant a child. We are called to walk in works as new in kind, as our position. There I find the Holy Ghost, consequently, as the link to connect me with Christ.

452 Now, in Romans I find the responsibility and failure of man thoroughly examined and proved. Among the Gentiles there were things too horrible to mention; among the Jews, the law broken; in result, "every mouth is stopped." The judgment of God is in the simplest and most absolute way revealed. Sentence is pronounced, "there is none righteous; no, not one."

The apostle is not ashamed of the gospel, because "therein is the righteousness of God revealed." Why? Because "the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness." Whatever is inconsistent with God's presence He will not have. Mark, the wrath is revealed, not hidden, and the revelation is just as complete as if He were sitting on the great white throne.

In the second part of the epistle (chap. 5: 12 to ch. 8) he turns to the nature that produced the fruit. It is not guilt, but state. The guilt is met by Christ dying for our sins, and we have redemption through His blood. The state is met by our being crucified with Him. Then "the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in us," but it is not bringing back the law to give us a rule for right conduct (it required righteousness, but never produced it), but by our walking in the Spirit. He produces the righteousness which the law required. Christ is my righteousness, and the Spirit is the power of life in us, producing righteousness. The law produced nothing but condemnation, provoking the sin. Life and the Spirit of Christ give us the path of godliness in contrast to law, beyond which the epistle does not go as to practical righteousness. Then having been justified by the blood of Christ, and brought to God through Christ, the hope is fully given of being like Christ in glory.

453 The three following chapters (9, 10, 11) are to reconcile the unconditional promises to the Jews, with the declaration "there is no difference." They might ask, What will you make of the promises to Abraham? He shews they could not take the ground of promise at all, and shuts up all to mercy.

In Romans, redemption meets the whole case I am in: Ephesians is the answer to the counsels and purposes of God. In Colossians both are found; and as between the two, you have not the full consequences of Ephesians, but you have more than in the Romans: you find in Colossians "risen with Christ"; which is an immense thing for the soul, as all other things are left behind. If merely quickened, I cannot say that. I was lying dead in sins; Christ comes down in grace to where I was, clearing away, as He comes down, all that belongs to sin. Then God comes in and raises Him and us up together. This involves union; I do not say more, because union is actually by the Holy Ghost. Romans does not give that; for this reason; he takes up an individual and says, You have been living in sins - you must personally be justified. Each has to answer for himself; "I am carnal," - not "we" are - that would take in all. The moment I find that we are all dead together in sins, we are all brought together out of death, God has quickened us together with Christ; wherever you find death and resurrection, it is a step towards union, and involves "one body."

If you are dead with Christ, I have it in Romans; if you are risen with Christ, I have it in Colossians; but I do not go to sit in heavenly places - that is Ephesians. Consequently (in Colossians) I am seeking the things that are above, not sitting there. I am here - not as alive in the world, but risen - and my affections set there, occupied with Christ, going up after Him. If I speak of the Holy Ghost, I must have union. In Colossians it is life, not the Holy Ghost uniting in one body in the heavenlies in Christ. Heavenly things are our hope (chap. 1: 5). Instead of beginning in Colossians with the counsels of God, as in Ephesians, we have a long preface of the apostle's desire for the saints to set them thoroughly in this hope of heavenly things. Both aspects of the truth are important. It is most important that we should learn in Ephesians "to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus" - most important, too, that my heart and affections should be set there; this Colossians does. My hope is laid up in heaven, but I am not sitting there.

454 We will now look at the prayer of the apostle (v. 9, 10), which comes instead of our calling, as in Ephesians. There you get the blessings and the privileges of the church - the whole body; in Colossians the value and fulness of the Head. It is well for us to see where He sets us. How often we find ourselves doubting about the will of God, and it is always because we have not a single eye. Perhaps we have never thought of the thing before; still if there is doubt, the eye is not single. God puts us through all sorts of things to test the state of the soul. If you do not see, the eye is not clear - the thing is clear. It is the condition of the soul that is tested by all these spiritual exercises. I may think I require wisdom, while all the time it is God testing me. The measure and character of the apostle's desire is, that we should "walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing"; nothing short of this. Here, again, the state is tested. I must know the Lord, to know what is worthy of Him. I must know His mind and feelings - must be spiritually minded. It is increasing in the knowledge of Him, and thus we know how to walk. "Strengthened with all might according to the power of his glory." To what? Oh! how different are God's ways and man's! What a poor kind of result it seems! "Unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness!" but nothing tests the state of the heart more. "Patience" - that is just what characterised the Lord's path. Had He a will? Never! He came to do the Father's will; He was patient right on to the cross, and nothing else. In Philippians 2 - emptying Himself, He only goes lower and lower - He is the first example of "He that humbleth himself shall be exalted." "With joyfulness" - that, too, was seen in Him, therefore He could say "that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves." Will does not connect us with God; broken will leaves us free to enjoy Him, and I find the very thing that breaks my will in fellowship with Him, and thus it gives me joy.

455 Now, having this growth, what do we find? Why, the man was meet to be partaker of the inheritance of the saints in light all the time (v. 12), so that after pressing this "growing by the knowledge of God," he can give thanks to the Father for having made us meet. Am I going to be with saints in light? Then I must get all the sanctity and light I can have here. If I am looking for holiness in view of acceptance, it is not really holiness I want, but righteousness. People call it holiness, but it is not really so. There is no proper holiness until there is certainty of salvation. A child has a nature capable of filial feelings, but he may be an orphan and cannot have them, because he has neither father nor mother. So one born of God cannot have holy affections as such. He wants a spirit of adoption, "whereby we cry, Abba, Father," before there can be true holiness. You have been washed clean in the blood of Christ. Have you been allowing in yourself anything contrary to that? It will not do. The blood has been put upon your ear, and upon your hand, and upon your foot. Nothing must be let into the head or done by the hand or foot that is not fit for the blood of Christ. This is how sin becomes so exceedingly hateful. You have gone and found pleasure, if only for five minutes, in that which gave Christ His agony. It is horrible! We have it in the case of the red heifer, in Numbers 19, whose blood had been sprinkled seven times before God. Sins had been consumed when the heifer was killed; but the ashes of the heifer bring me back to the sufferings of Christ, and shew me the horribleness of sin by the very place I am in. This is for holiness, and is not a question of acceptance. It is the place we are in that gives the measure of the evil.

Now he comes to look at the double character of Christ's glory, and of the reconciliation, unfolding specially the glory of the Head, not of the body. In verses 16, 17, He takes His place as Head of creation - of course, because He is Creator. Then He comes to resurrection from the dead and Headship of the body (v. 18). Here He is not "first-born of creation" as Man, but "first-born from the dead." Then you get all the fulness pleased to dwell in Him. It is not in verse 19, "it pleased the Father"; for given Godhead would be nonsense; but as in chapter 2: 9, it is the glory of His Person.

456 Now we go back to get everything brought into order by reconciliation, and this has also a double character. "By him to reconcile all things unto himself" is not yet accomplished. "You . . . hath he reconciled": that is done. We are a reconciled people in the midst of an unreconciled world. There is no such thing as an unreconciled Christian; but our bodies are not yet reconciled: they belong to the old creation. There is not a thing between us and God, unless you put Christ. If there is the least thing between us we are not reconciled - "to present you holy and unblamable and unreprovable" in God's own sight! (v. 22).

"If ye continue in the faith." The moment you find saints on earth, you get "if." Now we have the double ministry - "the gospel which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven," not like Peter's to the circumcision. And "the church, whereof I am made a minister, according to the dispensation of God which is given to me for you, to complete the word of God." The moment the church was revealed, the whole circle of the testimony of God was complete. Verse 27 gives us "Christ among you, the hope of glory." The Christ of the Jews was not "the hope of glory," but "a crown of glory" when He came, and not among the Gentiles at all. But now Gentiles who have no title to glory have Him as "the hope of glory." The epistle to the Colossians is a word on the way, in which you get between the two.

Then I have all the fulness of the Godhead revealed to me in Christ, "for in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily." When Christ came there was nothing more to be revealed. To preserve the connection of verses 9, 10 (chap. 2), read "all the completeness of the Godhead," and "ye are complete in him." The completeness of the Godhead is brought to us, and we are complete before the Godhead in Him. Thus we have real circumcision of heart. But what becomes of "the principles of the world"? They are all put away - "Ye are complete in him," and do not want any of these things. First, I go to death as a living sinner, and have the truth of Romans (v. 12). Then I am dead in sins and quickened, and have that in Ephesians (v. 13), in an entirely new creation. He put away my trespasses coming into death, and now He raises me up without them. He does not take the Christian to the heavens, but gets hold of the conscience as to where they are. Ritualism and all the rest of it is smashed. Put a gold leaf between the Head and body, and all is gone - it is death! I can have nothing before God, but that I am complete in Him. All these things were but "a shadow of things to come." What do you know about angels? (v. 18). How do you know they can hear you? Do you know they care for you? Will you say, It is a great thing to have a friend at court - denying you are in Christ? We have Him as a mediator for our weakness: and I trust His heart more than I do an angel's. He has been a Man in my circumstances, and knows what I feel; angels have not.

457 Here we are in Romans again. "Why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances?" (v. 20). You have died with Christ, and you have done with the whole position in that respect. It was only a satisfying of the flesh. We have come to the practical application of it all. Here we are risen with Christ (chap. 3), and so far on Ephesian ground, only that we are not sitting in heavenly places; we seek them. You have Him in your heart here that your affections may be where He is. Having died with Him, if He is hid we are hid, if He appears we appear. Then we have the most complete statement of what Christian life is, that we find anywhere in the epistles. He will not own any other life, but speaks of "when ye lived in them." First, you find the gross sins spoken of in verse 5, then in verse 8 - no great lust, but the will not broken; and verse 9, untruth. You are to put off all these. They combine the two great characters of sin, violence and corruption. We are never told in Scripture to put off the old man, nor to die to sin. Tell the new man to die? I hope not! Tell the old man to die, and he says, Indeed, I will not; I will live as long as I can! "They that are Christ's have crucified the flesh," not have mortified it. I am an active person in putting all these things to death; to mortify is to put practically to death, supposes power - the power of life. Dying is not power. So we read, "seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds."

Now I find the knowledge of holiness according to the nature of God, "renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him." This goes far beyond the mere absence of sin like innocent Adam. "Put on, therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind," etc. "Holy and beloved"; I am that, He puts them into their place always. This is not what I am to put on, but I am to put on what suits this character and relationship; verse 16 looks for the heart being enlarged in the knowledge of divine things. Verse 17, "Whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus." This gives us a rule that goes far beyond 'what is the harm of this or that?' and is so simple. It comes into any common thing in the day, such as buying a dress. Are you doing it in the name of the Lord Jesus? Can you go to a concert in His name? Of course not. The thing may not be wrong, but it settles everything - hundreds of questions that might arise. It gives me as my measure and rule to be walking in Christ, and living for Christ. I have Christ as my life, and He cannot do it. Then I have got away from Him; I leave Him to do it. If I am in earnest, it is the most comfortable rule possible; but if I am not, it pinches dreadfully: because you may say, Am I never to do anything to please myself? Ah, you betray yourself! What a comfort it is to know what He likes! In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, we know perfectly well if we are doing things in the name of Christ. It goes through the whole character of life in Christ, this "putting off" and "putting on." It does not bring in the Holy Ghost, but life in us - what life is - He is the power of the life, but it is the life of Christ that is in me.

458 To speak of the Holy Ghost dwelling in me as my life, would be an incarnation of the Holy Ghost, which is nonsense. Christ is my life; but it is by the Holy Ghost, on the other hand, that I get life and liberty, power and conscious union with Christ.

And now, in closing let me ask: if you can say you have the consciousness of the place you are set in, as made meet for the inheritance of the saints in light, can you honestly say, as to the purpose of your heart, I do all things in the name of the Lord Jesus? Are you conscious of having that as the bent, and aim, and settled principle of your life? I may fail in it, but is that my object? If I am going one way, I may trip or go slowly, but I am not going the opposite way. I know you may trip, but I ask, is it the principle of your life to do all in the name of the Lord Jesus? It is an immense privilege. In the commonest things we are able to bring in Christ. The apostle cannot tell the servant in the house not to purloin without going through the whole scheme of Christianity; that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things, for the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared," etc. (Titus 2). When the heart is set upon an object, it judges of everything according to it. I do a thing because He likes it; this shews I care for Him. If my heart is set upon pleasing Him, I shall have things as He likes it, and simply because He likes it. If we have our hearts filled with Christ, we shall count it no great sacrifice to do without the dross for His sake!

Meetness and Growth

Colossians 1

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It is a wonderful thing, and the more wonderful the more we think of it, the way we are, as Christians, associated with the Son of God! We are made members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones; of Him, who is the beginning of the creation of God. In the same scripture, where He speaks of being one with the Father, He says, "ye in me, and I in you." The more we dwell upon it, and think of it, the more wonderful it is; and it is all grace. As we read, "That in the ages to come, he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us by Christ Jesus." This is the way the angels will learn, and principalities and powers in the heavenly places, the meaning of "the exceeding riches of his grace." They will see the poor thief; and the woman of the city that was a sinner; ourselves, too, in the same place and glory as God's Son!

Now, He has brought us into the present intimacy of it, by giving us Christ as our Life, and the Holy Ghost to dwell in us. He has brought us into the closest intimacy and relationship with Himself; as He said, "I go to my Father, and your Father, and to my God, and your God." Think of the eternal Son of God saying that of us! It ought to be peaceful joy to us, simply settled in our soul. It is just the one who is dwelling in it, and at home in it, who will feel and know how wonderful it is. It is that which you cannot understand if you are not dwelling in it; but when you do get inside, you begin to be conscious of what it is.

God has shewn to us all the fruits of the flesh put away perfectly - that in raising up the blessed Lord Jesus Christ who stood in the place of death for us, and in setting Him in glory, and giving us the Holy Ghost, all that is of man and sin is put away. "When he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the majesty on high." It is a blessed thing to know that by His work on the cross, He has cleared away everything that stood between us and the righteousness of God. So that there should not lurk a single suspicion in our hearts as to our place before Him. Looked at as guilty, we are justified; as defiled, we are cleansed: as having offended, we are forgiven. He wants us to enjoy all this; and therefore does not leave us in fear of judgment. God has brought us in Christ to Himself - set us there, and given us the consciousness of it by the Holy Ghost come down from heaven. Not yet in possession of all - in that sense we have nothing but the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven - but to faith we have everything. It is this which makes the riddle of a Christian state: we have everything in Christ - glory, eternal life, forgiveness, justification, Christ in us the hope of glory. The work He has done is complete, and we are quickened and have part in it, and therefore the apostle says, "we are saved in hope." But, as to possession, we have got nothing yet, save the Holy Ghost, and God's love shed abroad by the Holy Ghost in our hearts. Looked at as to place and title, I am accepted in the Beloved: but looking at me, I am wandering in this world very far from it all; and yet, having the consciousness of all I possess in my heart. The heart thus rests in His love, and can have nothing to desire. He has given us His own Son: His own love has put us in Christ - the very best place that can possibly be conceived, and in that sense has left us nothing to desire. We are here upon earth to be exercised and tried and tested; and to learn His faithfulness and grace.

461 You will find in this chapter how growth is spoken of, and the supply of strength; and the total separation of these from meetness for heaven. Scripture never speaks of any need of becoming meet for heaven for the Christian. There is - there ought to be - growth. God will chastise us if we go wrong - we shall find out all these ways and dealings of God with us; but all carefully disconnected from meetness for heaven; and wherever this is not practically known - I do not mean as to words - wherever there is a want of clearness as to meetness hanging about the heart, you will find it hinders peace, because fulness of love is not seen, and present association with the glory. Accordingly the standard of walk comes down. I get occupied with my own heart's state, instead of being occupied with Christ's heart. I never saw a person yet who was occupied with himself, who - to repeat the words - was not occupied with himself! and that is the greatest mischief in the world.

We have sometimes to be occupied with ourselves; there are errors, and we have to judge them; and we have to look not only that there should be no evil, but that there should be growth. But still, if I am much occupied with self, self takes the place that Christ ought to have, and therein is the mischief.

A person will come and tell me a long story of what is in his heart; and, of course, a deal of evil. But if I ask him what is in God's heart, he cannot tell me a word! Do you think that a good state? Certainly we shall get into scrapes if we do not judge ourselves; but the judgment of self is an easy and simple thing though requisite, if I am close to God, and in communion with Him. But, if I am away from Him, prying into my own heart, and all that is there; why there it is still!

462 You will find what an amazingly high standard there is in this chapter, "that ye might walk worthy of the Lord, unto all pleasing," for growth and practice. But when I talk of meetness, it is "Giving thanks unto the Father which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light." When I get that, I can look for growth and a walk worthy of the Lord, and this, because I am associated with Him who has made me meet. Do you think the poor thief was meet to go into paradise? What made him meet? The proof of his meetness was that he went there, and surely he did not go un-meet! He went there because Christ died, and He had made him meet. It is that as to which we have to be clear and distinct.

He says, "Ye are complete in him"; that is, where He has put us; and here the apostle goes through the various things which, as a Jew, he might have known. Circumcision: he might be so, or not: a philosopher, or not, and so on; but then he shews, you have got everything in Christ. It is very beautiful the way we find this here (chap 2). "In him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily." In Him, as a man - all the completeness of the Godhead. "And ye are complete in him." The words are the same root. We get all the fulness of the Godhead brought to us, close down to us here, in Christ: but if I look up and see Christ there, I see too, that I am complete - filled up to fulness in Him before God. It is a wonderful place indeed, in which sovereign grace has set us. Grace alone could think of such a thing.

If you want to know God the Father where are you to learn Him? "He that hath seen me, hath seen the Father." Have our hearts ever looked at Christ as our object, and said while looking - I have nothing more to seek? Think, beloved friends, what it is to look at the Lord with the power of the Spirit of God, and to see in Him - that poor, despised Man - God walking on the earth! and when one sat down by His side, and told Him one's tale of sin, even if confounded unto tears, she was telling it out to God! Is that the thought we have about the Lord Jesus Christ? and He is the same now. God has come, beloved friends, in Christ, and said, as it were, Do not you know Me? in a certain sense like any man, and in a sense not the least like a man at all. Not one single motive ever governed His heart that governed the heart of man; and not one motive ever governed man's heart that governed His. It was a perfectly new thing in the world. The blessed manifestation of a divine path with a Man in it: not only by outward miracles, but by His ways and words. He made the hearts of those who were with Him burn in them as He talked to them, as He walked with them by the way.

463 Then, when I look up to God, I say, "complete in Christ." I have committed sins and the like, but I say, I am not in the flesh, but in the Spirit - I am in Christ, and I know it as He said I should, when He would send the Holy Ghost. "At that day, ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you," John 14: 20. So I find my place in Christ before God, and myself in Him, and God has been glorified as to the way I came there. "Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him." I can therefore give thanks to the Father which hath made me meet, to be a partaker of the inheritance of the saints in light. True, we have not got the inheritance, and we have to learn our weakness, and failure, and the like. But this casts no cloud on the heart as to what it is before God, because it is in Christ. "He that hath wrought us for this selfsame thing is God" - that is, for the glory. "Who hath also given unto us the earnest of the Spirit." Do you suppose that when God has "wrought us" He has done so badly? Do you think God has done His work well? Surely He has! What peace this gives to the soul! But the moment it becomes a question of meetness, depending on growth, let a man look at his own heart and say it is meet for God! When then, does he expect it to be so? I do not doubt such desire holiness, but it is a mistake in them as to the way of getting the holiness even as a present thing. There is no mistake in saying that "without holiness no man shall see the Lord"; else the person does not know God at all. But the question is, how to get all this holiness? God chastens us that we may be partakers of His holiness. Not exactly that we may be holy, but "partakers of his holiness."

464 Now, having seen this ground on which we are set, we are complete in Christ, meet for the inheritance, and brought into heart association with it all by faith, and as having the Holy Ghost dwelling in us; then the apostle begins about the walk of the person. He says, you must "walk worthy of the Lord" - of the Person to whom you are brought - proving what is that good, and perfect, and acceptable will of God. God has given you a place in His own Son; and His Son a place in your hearts, the hope of glory. He who is the Heir of glory is there in your hearts, you Gentiles. They had title to nothing.

Take a Jew, with whom he is comparing them in this passage. He was looking for Messiah to set up the glory in a carnal way; he had the promises, and forfeited them entirely when he rejected Him, and so is thrown entirely on sovereign mercy. Christ was the minister of the circumcision for the truth of God to "confirm the promises made to the fathers," Rom. 15. What then? They rejected them; and we read "that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy." He distinctly states the two points. People talk of promise to Adam. There was none whatever. There was a statement in his hearing on which Adam could rest; but there was not any promise to him. A promise to Adam would have been a promise to man in his sins. It was a judgment on the serpent made to the second Adam, the Seed of the woman - Adam was not that. "It shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel." Meanwhile Abraham and the Jews got the promises. The latter took them under law conditionally, and lost them. God will accomplish them all yet in spite of their failure. They are for the present cast aside.

As to the Gentiles, what of them? What had they? Nothing. Christ was there; quite true. But mark the way, when one came to look for blessing to Him, in the case of the Syro-phenician woman. Our Lord goes out of Israel, and this woman comes and speaks to Him, as Son of David, of her need. Well? "He answered her never a word." She tries again, calling Him "Lord." He replies, Let the children first be fed, that is, the Jews. "It is not meet to take the children's bread, and cast it unto dogs" - Gentiles. She answers, "Truth, Lord, yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their master's table."I am a poor Canaanite - a dog - with the curse upon me. I am entitled to nothing; I have no promises. Still, there is goodness in God even for such. Do you suppose Christ could say there was not? Impossible, for it would not be true. "Oh, woman, great is thy faith, be it unto thee even as thou wilt." The effect of it not being promise, was to bring out the way in which God was above it all in grace. There was the blessedness in God to be brought out for the want and wretchedness of sinners. Christ makes propitiation, and grace reigns through righteousness. It is God coming in and rising above all dispensation to reveal Himself, and to bring back the soul with confidence to Himself, to enable it to say, Well, I know God, as a Jew under law and promise never could have known Him, and all because I have no right to it. I have a right to nothing, and I have got God! So here we find He speaks of "Christ in you" - not yet "the crown of glory," as He will be to the residue of Israel (Isa. 28: 5) - but "the hope of glory." It was altogether a new thing that Christ should be amongst the Gentiles; not bringing in the glory, but as the hope of the glory that was to come, and that of heavenly glory.

465 By this way of complete grace to a mere sinner I get what God is Himself in love, and what He is in righteousness. These both go together in my favour, and that to which grace in righteousness has entitled me - the hope of glory, so that I "rejoice in hope of the glory of God." The double character of the work of the Holy Ghost in our hearts is thus brought out. He is the earnest of the glory, the inheritance which is mine; and God's love is shed abroad in my heart by the Holy Ghost, for He is there. The glory is our portion, and therefore we are strangers and pilgrims here, until the redemption of the inheritance.

There is this difference between the Ephesians and the Colossians. In the former we are looked upon as already sitting in heavenly places - not, with - but "in Christ." In the latter we are dead and risen with Christ; but are looked at as down here upon earth all through, but the hope laid up in heaven. Consequently this epistle, which puts us upon earth, shews us what our path is here. He says - "that ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing," this is the measure, "worthy of the Lord"; as we read again, "He that saith he abideth in him; ought himself so to walk, even as he walked." Again, "Ye are the epistle": (not, ought to be, which is true also); but, "ye are the epistle of Christ." You cannot say honestly you are that, if you are going crooked and astray. But that is the place you ought to be, "unto all pleasing" - so that there never would be anything in you that is not pleasing to Christ. God has put you by grace into this place, and now do you walk accordingly. If I have a child who does dishonourable things, of course that is thrown back on the father, and the father will feel it. "Being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God." You know God. Bring this into everything. Do everything in connection with Him. "Strengthened with all might according to his glorious power" - there I get strength. What is its measure? "His glorious power." Beloved brethren, do you really believe these things? Do you believe that it is truth concerning us?

466 Take another verse of which I said but little. The ninth. "For this cause we also since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding." How often we say these words, and yet what have you been seeking in the wilderness? Is it not just your own comfort - your own will? No wonder then that you do not know what God's will is. Where is there a right path in this world apart from His will? I do not know one: and there cannot be one, I am bold to say. Suppose a child has left his father's house, he never can go right till he has first got back there. He is not a thief in South America perhaps. He may have a very good character there; but he ought to have a bad conscience, and he never can have a right one until he goes back to his father. There is no path for me in this world as such, but the moment I get Christ then there is a path. You go and walk after Him! Poor followers we may be, but "He has left us an example that we should follow in his steps." "Blessed is the man whose strength is in thee, in whose heart are the ways." If only my heart is in the way following Christ, I shall be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding. Mark the wisdom of the Lord in this. Suppose I get a director - well, he directs me aright, I get no credit at all; and so there is no wisdom or spiritual understanding in me. But God has taken care to provide for me in His own way. Oh, but, says some one, I do not see the Lord's mind clearly. Then I ask, Is not your body full of light? Then your eye is not single - that is a clear case. Whenever I find that I do not see clearly what to do, there is something that is not single-eyed in me.

467 Now, all this has nothing to do with meetness for heaven, but a great deal to do with the state of the soul. Well, now we have seen there is this "wisdom" and "strength." Do you suppose you are now going on with brilliant effects, and manifestations of power? Is it to be all a going on with a flourish? Indeed it is not! You are strengthened unto "all patience and long-suffering with joyfulness." What a come down that is! It is no easy thing to be patient. Never to have your own will one minute. Is that dreadful? Stay! Ought you not to be doing God's will? Did Christ ever do His own will? He came to do His Father's will, and never thought of doing anything else. Why do you think of doing anything else? Because you like your own will best. We look at our own poor foolish hearts thus, and we find the will at work; but we should be doing His will - this is liberty. Suppose I send my child with a message, and he wants to get a run out - why, that is "the law of liberty to him."

Look at the unspeakable patience you see in Christ. Look at Paul - "truly the signs of an apostle were wrought in me with all patience." But mark what was inside it all - "joyfulness." He was the man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: still He could desire that His joy might be fulfilled in themselves. Paul asks - "Who is afflicted and" - not I relieve him but - "I burn not." We find that this world is not a place of rest, but of trial. Does this not make the heart say, Why I am going to see Christ as He is? - and hope brightens in the heart at the thought, and enables me to glory in tribulation by the way; knowing that tribulation works patience, and patience experience, and experience hope; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost given unto us. It is not putting on outward joy, and a canker in the heart i there are sorrows no doubt in all that we pass through, but at bottom there is joyfulness, and at the end of all Christ Himself. We have got Him as the spring of all joy in our hearts now, and we shall have Him when we are in His presence.

There is a word in verse 13, "Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son." It is a total taking us out of the place we were in. It is not simply you are born of God - not the communication of life merely: nor (what is the foundation of it all) the precious blood of Christ cleansing us from all sin. The blood has put away my sins; and I am born of God, truly: but there is more, I have been translated out of the kingdom of Satan, who rules the darkness of this world; and into the kingdom of the Son of God's love. It is the only place where the kingdom is called so, as in contrast with that of Satan. I was a slave of Satan, and I have been taken right out of it all. It is what the soul cries out for in Romans 7, "Who shall deliver me?" It is not, "Who shall cleanse me?" It is not merely that the blood is there, and the judge cannot touch me; but the salvation of the Lord has delivered me clean out of it all - into the kingdom of God's dear Son.

468 The apostle goes on to shew how Christ created everything, and so is to have everything. "All things were created by him, and for him." He is before all things, and by Him all things consist. The One who created them sustains them all. Again, "He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead." Death is below the lowest creation, and Christ went down below it all; the creation got under its power by sin. He went there in grace; tasted death as others never did. The more He knew what life was - the more He felt the power of death. The more He knew what holiness was, the more He felt to be made sin. The more He knew what love was, the more He knew what it was to bear wrath. But He has come up from death, and thus as risen, He is Head of the body; He takes us into closest association with Himself. He went down to death for us, and now takes us up where He is. God raises us up with Him.

We were alienated and enemies in our mind by wicked works, yet He hath reconciled us. All things are going to be reconciled in earth and heaven - created things; but the saints are reconciled. We are a reconciled people in the midst of an un-reconciled creation. God has not left you part of this unreconciled creation. It groans yet, and we groan too; but we are reconciled to God. So now I understand why I have the patience and long-suffering and joyfulness too. Very unsuited these two in themselves - but very suited to glorify God in. "Reconciled" is a strong full word - everything brought into God's presence, as God would have it; and we are reconciled.

I add one word more. "If ye continue in the faith, grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel which ye have heard." Here I get what I always do in Scripture. When you look at a saint in Christ, it is all a settled thing for him. But when you look at a saint as here in Colossians, passing through this world, you will find "ifs" and exhortations (and God forbid that we should weaken one word of scripture), uniformly saying to him, Well now you must get to heaven - you must hold fast - judge things in yourself - lay hold, and the like. But if I am looked at as in heaven, I am "complete in him." Nor is there any question about the faithfulness of God in helping us through the journey. Knowing I am in Christ, my soul can say "Abba"; for I am made meet for the inheritance of the saints in light, by the Father; He has done it. What do I learn then, in going through the wilderness? If the manna fails me a day, I shall be starved. What am I to feed upon then? Or, how am I to get clothes? God took care of the nap of their coats, and the manna never did fail. God must sift us and exercise our hearts, and pull us to pieces here, but none shall pluck us out of His hand: no use telling me this if I was not in danger of being plucked out. I learn, then, the patient faithfulness of God in my circumstances. I would not weaken these words one bit. Christ ever lives to make intercession for me, and I am getting grace from Him every moment; but this is not a question of being made meet. "If any man sin we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous." The foundation is not touched, but when we fail we need to be restored, so that we are kept where we ought to be; that is, dependent upon God.

469 We want to be settled in Christ, that our hearts may be happy and joyful; and we want to be dependent too; and we learn, as we pass through the wilderness, that if He were to leave us for one moment (but He will not), we have no resource at all. We get these things together in this epistle: the saint reconciled to God, but still journeying on with the hope of glory before him, knowing that he is made meet for it; that now he has to walk worthy of the Lord, and trust the blessed faithfulness of Him who will confirm us to the end, that we may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ; meanwhile growing by the knowledge of God. You see how these things come together. 1. "To present you holy, and unblamable, and unreprovable in his sight." 2. "If ye continue in the faith grounded and settled," etc. But looked at as to acceptance, I am made meet to be a partaker of the inheritance, and am giving thanks to the Father who has done it.

Risen with Christ

Colossians 3: 1-17

<34037E> 470

We get here the blessed side of the Christian state - being risen with Christ, the great groundwork on which we are. It is not that Christ has died for our sins, but that we have died and are risen, and this is the starting-point of the exhortation. We have done altogether with the old man, having died as children of Adam; and we are also risen, having totally done with the world, and yet in it, but risen with Christ; therefore you get the practice of a person risen, and the affections and state and condition of the heart. The Christian is looked at as a person not alive on earth at all; he has died, and now, "If ye be risen with Christ, seek those things that are above." In chapter 2 you get, "Why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances?" You are not living in the world - you are dead. Now set your affection on things above. You belong there; you have not gone there yet, but the new man is not in you to put you into earthly things. The Spirit takes of "the things of Christ" and shews them to you, not to fix your hearts on earthly things, but to deliver you from them; we are to be, in spirit, mind, and affections, up there. We are risen, and having nothing more to do with the world, as to our affections and object, than a man who has died out of it. It does not say, "You must die," but, "You are dead," for that is the Christian state. Christ having died, and He being my life, my life is hid up there in Him. There is complete association with Christ. He has died; I have died. He is hidden up there; my life is hidden. He will appear; I shall appear with Him in glory. Thorough, complete, blessed association with Christ is the place into which we are put; and it is the starting-point of the character of this life displayed on the earth to which we do not belong. If an angel were here, he would do that which was God's will for him; but he would have nothing to do with the earth as to the object for which he lived.

The apostle does not allow that we have any life here, but talks of our members: "Mortify" - put to death - "therefore your members which are upon the earth." All that proceeds from the flesh the Christian is not to allow for a moment. Mark how different it is to dying to sin. Mortify is just the opposite, it is putting to death. That is power. If I say, "I must die," that is being alive. We are dead to sin, the world, and the law. Christ having died, we have died. What is true of Him is true of us. Having now life and power, we are to put these things to death. There is no more lust, or self-will, or working of the flesh, if a man is dead. I am to reckon myself dead, not setting about to die to sin, for I should not be able; that is, the flesh, the old man, does not want to die. The apostle says, "Reckon yourselves dead." You have died. Then put off the old man. "Our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed." Sin has been "condemned in the flesh." Now I have the place of power to put to death every evil that the flesh would produce. Put to death your members, not your life in Adam. You are dead; therefore put to death your members. If you let them act, it is the flesh. The Christian has power in Christ - "I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me" - to put down everything inconsistent with the life in which this power is. The life is hid with Christ in God, but our members are on the earth; and he says, Now keep them in order; you have the power in Christ.

471 There is not deliverance till you get to that. "The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death." We have to watch, not to be careless and let these things spring up; but we have the power to say, Not a single sprout of the old stock shall spring up. The old tree is cut down and grafted. The old stock may begin to sprout, but that is not the tree in common parlance; it has been grafted. We know the stock is there, and so is our flesh there; but we must remember we have power, and we must not excuse ourselves. Our will is not changed; but if Christ is our object, there is power. There is still the law of sin and death; but I am not a debtor to it; it has no claim or power over me. It will have power enough if we allow it; but we have a power entirely above it. The Lord leaves us here to learn to have our senses exercised to discern good and evil, to be tested and tried. The flesh is there; but if we are full of Christ, we are masters of it; if we are not full of Christ, it masters us: but it is our own fault - we have no excuse. We have to exhibit this life of Christ, or else the flesh acts, and then the old man is exhibited. The apostle says, You are not living in the old man at all now; you are living in Christ, and you are not going to walk in these things.

472 In verse 7, he applies it to their walk. It requires us to make active use of the power. The flesh is soon up if we are not full of Christ. We are to arm ourselves with the power of Christ, and be active in keeping the flesh in its place - down altogether. If I am not full of Christ, for Himself, for His own sake, enjoying Him, the flesh comes out. It will not do to put on your armour at the battle. Everything we pass through in this world is one of two things: either an occasion of obedience to the new man, or of temptation to the old. The Lord prayed in an agony in Gethsemane; and when they come to take Him, He says, "Whom seek ye?" He had gone through it with His Father, and it was an occasion of obedience when it came. "The cup which my Father hath given me shall I not drink it?" Peter was asleep in the garden; and when the Lord is witnessing a good confession, he is cursing and swearing he does not know Him. If we were full of Christ, temptations would be nothing but occasions of obedience and glorifying God. We need self-knowledge and diligence of heart in abiding in Christ for Himself, so that when the temptation comes, we do not enter into it, and it is an occasion of blessed obedience.

In verse 8, we come to another thing - there is no lust, but the flesh is not subdued. We have no lust to be angry; it is an unsubdued nature, and that is not Christ. This is a second step - "also put off all these." We have done with these horrid evils that God abhors (and He abhors them even more in His children than in others; His delight in us does not change the holiness of His nature) now put off these which express an unsubdued will, and unarrested action of the flesh. If a man says something to me, and I get in a passion, that is not Christ; it is that which unsubdued flesh gives forth. "Lie not one to another." Satan was a liar and a murderer; we are to put off lying and violence. Put these off, because "you have put off the old man [faith has done it] and put on the new." You have done with the old as to its very nature, you have put on the new; now do not bring forth the fruits of the old - the crab apples of the old stock. The new is "renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him." The new man knows God, and takes nothing as the right thing but what suits God. It is not merely an intelligent creature; he is not received in that way; but the Christian knows the love and holiness of God in Christ. It is the knowledge faith has of God. There is no measure of the path I am to walk in as a new man but God Himself. That is where the Christian is set. Act in the same spirit and character as He has shewn in Christ. Did He not shew grace to you when you were an enemy? Then you go and show grace. Was He not full of mercy to the unthankful? Then you go and do the same. "Be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect."

473 Verse 11. There is no motive, no life, no character but Christ. "Christ is all and in all." I am not a Jew, a Gentile, or an Englishman; I am in Christ as to my life, and "to me to live is Christ." What we are brought into is Christ, and our object is Christ, and nothing else whatever. The life was expressed in Him, and the power of it is in us as alive; we are brought into it by redemption, and Christ is the whole object and character of it. It is Christ subjectively in me, and objectively outside me. I get in Christ Himself the knowledge of God. He is Himself the image of God. Look at Christ, and you see it all in a man. Christ is everything, and He is in the Christian. The whole sphere of the life, and the object of the Christian, is Christ. Where Christ is the divine life, He is the object of the life. The Father's love is fully revealed in Him too. Then what comes in most blessedly is, that I have His place.

Verse 12: "Put on, therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved." Was He not the "elect of God"? He was God's beloved Son. Having thus brought in Christ, the apostle looks at what we are to put on in practice. "That is your place," he says. You are the objects of God's delight, holy and beloved; His nature is in you; now walk in the consciousness of it, and your heart will be in a state to put on these things that are suited to Christ. If Christ has put us into this place, He looks for fruit. He has cut the tree down, and it is the graft that now lives. Then, Paul says, shew all these blessed fruits. If Christ is my life, He is in me, and He is my object. Remember, he says, what you are before God; walk in the affections of it, in the consciousness of it. You are to have the sense of it, as a child has of its mother's love. A child has the consciousness of the place it is in, and it ought to walk worthy of it, and please its mother; but it must have the consciousness of the place it is in first. It may do every duty without that; but it is only show, there is no heart in it. In Ephesians we get much the same thing: "Be ye therefore followers of God, as dear children"; go and act like your Father. Here it is another aspect of the same thing: "Put on, therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved." There is the character of Christ, and you are in His place of relationship to God; let us see the spirit that belongs to such a place - the place of Christ in this world. It is hard to be put down, and trampled on; but that is what Christ had. "If when you do well, and suffer for it, you take it patiently, this is acceptable to God." That is Christ's character. Did He not do well, and suffer patiently? You do it. It is more important to keep Christ's character than to keep my coat. That is the way it works in the heart. I do not expect righteousness in a world of sin; my business is to shew the character of Christ before the world - gentleness and meekness in a world of wrong - that is superiority. If a man vexes me, we are on the same ground. If I have the Spirit of Christ, the Spirit of power, it lifts me above the flesh.

474 But all this is not natural gentleness. He says, "Above all these things charity, which is the bond of perfectness" - the real love of God, that perfects a thing, and makes it divine; and not merely a gentle nature that we see constantly with no power to resist, no firmness of character, one who cannot say "no." There are plenty of people to whom it is torture to say "no," and where it would be grieving the Spirit not to say "no"; that is human kindness, not divine love. This bond of perfectness is a holy thing. Gentleness is very sweet to see, but it will not stand good in a world of temptation. If it is the grace of Christ, and I have divine love and power, I do go through it; for it is divine godly love and obedience.

"Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts" - with the spirit of peace, the Holy Ghost not grieved, peace is enjoyed with God in a conscience not injured. Then he adds, "Be ye thankful," for I get everything from God. I cannot be thankful for everything if my will is not broken; but the moment I look to God as counting the hairs of my head, I glory in tribulation, and count it all joy, every trial and exercise. There is the Christian's place - the place of Christ ruling in his heart, walking in peace through the world, thankful for everything he gets; it is for his good. Now he is to enjoy the things of his own world. "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly." That is the positive world into which you are brought - "The unsearchable riches of Christ." It is not head knowledge, but spiritual things - "Singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord." We know God's ways and thoughts in the wonderful word we have, and we have the mind of Christ. The men of the world sing in their enjoyment: you sing together to the Lord. Now the Christian is enjoying his own world with his heart's affections. We get the rule for his conduct. It is very simple, very sweeping, and uncommonly satisfactory to the heart that really desires to do the will of God. "Whatsoever ye do, whether in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus." If we look at that "Whatsoever ye do, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus," it is bringing all the principle and motive for our conduct from the revelation of a Person who is everything to us, not forbidding things. We know in how many things during the week the question arises, Shall I do this or that? Not as to absolutely wrong things; but a person says, What is the harm of that? Are you going to do it in the name of the Lord? No! Then you are getting away from the Lord, and that is the harm - a great harm for the Christian. In taking a house, or buying a dress, in the way I manage my house, is it "in the name of the Lord Jesus"? What can we say? It is leaving the Lord out (not leaving Him altogether), and letting self in. That is what the will of the flesh is.

475 The Christian has the privilege in every-day things of doing everything in the name of the Lord Jesus. People ask if there is any harm in a concert of sacred music. It is a cheat of the devil. Ask if they are going in the name of the Lord Jesus. They know they are not thinking of Him. Some one says, Can you not come and see this beautiful scenery? God made it. I know He did. Are you going in the name of the Lord Jesus? It is the object, that is the thing. God sent honey to Jonathan when he was going through the wood, and he was refreshed by it. Very right and nice. But if he had been looking for honey, it would not have been fighting the Lord's battles. There was to be no honey in the sacrifices; but if God sends it, it is right to be refreshed by it, and I am thankful for it. The question is - where the mind of the man is set and living. If a person is in earnest to do the will of God (and the Holy Ghost could not lead us in our own will to amuse and please ourselves, He is not down here for that), if a person is anxious to live to God, and no one else, he says, Give me a simple rule for the things that turn up every day. "Do all in the name of the Lord Jesus." Then I live with Him in the everyday things. Suppose my father wants this book put that way, and I put it this way; it may be of no importance, but it is a proof I do not care for my father. If the blessed Lord is all to me, I shall be seeking to do everything in His name. We may forget - alas! we do - but if it is on my heart to please a person, I do not forget. Suppose I am walking thus in everything, I shall taste more of Christ, and it will give fixed happiness, instead of grieving the Spirit for some foolish thing I shall not care for in a few years. I shall have Christ for my object in everything I do. We do think much of those we love in our conduct, and I shall have in my mind what He likes, if I love Him. That is what the Lord looks for as One who has loved us and gave Himself for us in grace.

476 As Christ is everything to me, and I have Him for my life, now I must walk in it, and do all in the name of the Lord Jesus. I am sure it is what makes us happy. We shall find what weak creatures we are, and that is humbling and very useful. There will be that walking with Him that gives the secret of His presence and counsel, as He says Himself, "I will manifest myself to him." There is the positive living of the heart in the enjoyment of the Lord's presence, in consequence of living for Him. Are we content to live like Lot, vexing ourselves with the evil we are amongst? or do we give it up, and joy to think of the time when the Lord comes and says, as He did to Abraham, "I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward"? Are we content if God says that? It was seen in Abraham's walk. He was called "the friend of God"; and God says, "Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do?" The secret of the Lord was in his heart. We find then in what has been before us the remarkable expression of what the life of Christ is, and its workings in us; and it all starts with having put off the old man, and put on the new. God has fully revealed Himself in Christ, and we have received the divine nature. There we are put to understand in our souls what God is thus revealed - Christ the pattern of our walk, and Himself our strength for it.

The Life of Christ in the Believer

Colossians 3: 18-25; 4

<34038E> 477

What characterises Colossians is the life of Christ in us; not the effect of the presence of the Holy Ghost, as in Ephesians, but the life of Christ. The Holy Ghost is the power that acts in me: the power and presence of the Holy Ghost is everything to me, assuming that I have life. I am led by Him, the love of God is shed abroad in my heart by Him, He is the earnest of the inheritance: the consciousness and power of all our relationships is by the Holy Ghost; so that our bodies are His temples. Life is equally important; for if we had it not we could not have the Spirit. He could not put His seal and dwell in us on the mere ground of life; but we being sprinkled with blood, He comes as the witness that we are whiter than snow, and dwells in us. The new life has a capacity to enjoy the things of Christ, but no power of revelation; and we need the power of the Holy Ghost to bring these things to us. They are spiritually discerned. We cannot even use the Word without the Spirit; it is the sword of the Spirit. It is not the life that unites me to Christ, but the Holy Ghost - "By one Spirit are we all baptized into one body." It is the Holy Ghost that is the power, and it may take me clean out of all relationships with this world (the Lord says to Paul, "I have delivered thee from the people and the Gentiles, unto whom now I send thee"), and yet in the fullest way He owns the relationships.

We find here some that God did create, and some that He did not. In marriage I get, not redemption or the Holy Ghost, but what was set up at the creation; and what God created God owns. All these relationships are owned in the fullest possible way; they may be dreadful snares, now sin has come in and made everything miserable, and spoiled and corrupted what God made good. Then a power comes in, not grace, but the Spirit, and takes Paul out of Jew and Gentile, and identifies him with a glorified Christ, who sends him with the message of what is heavenly into the world; but he is not of it. "As my Father sent me into the world, even so send I you." Their bodies were in it, but they were not there morally. They came from Christ; He had sent them. That lifts them above relationships, though God puts His seal on them; and it is one of the signs of the last days, that men are without natural affection. He sanctions them, but they are all to be given up to serve Christ here. Creation is God's own making, and He never gives up the title to it. Only another power has come in, and from the moment it is a question of Christ I have to give up everything. "Salute no man by the way." The closest ties were the most dangerous; not that they were not fully owned by God, but "if a man hate not his father and mother . . . he cannot be my disciple."

478 The world - the state of things around - is not what God created it at all; it is sin's making. I get His beautiful workmanship in it, but spoiled by the devil getting man's ear. The whole creation is under the bondage of corruption; that is not God's doing. It is a labour to make people happy; they seek in a thousand ways to forget God, for if they think of God they know they are lost. But there is the world of God's providence, where not a sparrow falls to the ground without Him; everything is under His hand. He has committed authority to magistrates and so on, and He owns it. If I were innocent as Adam in Eden I should not need magistrates; now this world would be a kind of pandemonium without such. The Christian is to be subject to such authority - the Queen of England or a Turk, wherever it is. It may not be righteousness. I do not look for righteousness but at the right hand of God - Christ. I do not mean it ought not to be, but I do not expect it. My business is to walk as a Christian, and shew the character of Christ, not to set the world right; when Christ comes He will do that, for He will take it into His hand. If I could only set myself and other Christian right, that would be the thing. The Christian should be the perfect presentation of the character of Christ in the world that has turned Him out. We are the living witnesses of what we are enjoying of the Christ they will not have. The world is under judgment, but in grace God has not executed it; He is sending out His gospel.

Now there is a great system of government going on, and God owns it. There were no servants in paradise; there was no stealing. Now God owns property, etc., it is not the original thing that was instituted in goodness, nor the heavenly condition, nor is it in itself what the Christian is (though Christianity maintains it all) - he is the expression of what Christ is; but he owns and submits to all that God has established. "Servant" here is slave, and nothing but sin brought in slaves. There would never have been such a thing if sin had not been there; but the apostle does not meddle with it. He does not say he approves of it, but he leaves the government of the world just where it is. If I can relieve bodily wants as a Christian I am bound to do it, or prevent one beating another if I can do it by kindness; but I am to leave the world alone. It is hard to do it; in our hearts we do not like it. Suppose a war is going on, we wish success to one side; it was all settled before you ever heard it. There is a hard-hearted emperor wishing Rome had one neck that he might cut it off, or setting the city on fire, and then accusing the Christians of it; well you must be subject - "The powers that be are ordained of God."

479 Wherever I find real power exercised I find God's authority. If there is a rebellion, and other powers rise up, I am submissive as before. It is my Christian path, though not the relationship God created; there the bond is maintained on the principle of Christianity. Where it is a question of slaves it is - If you can be free use it rather; but if you are bound never mind. You are the Lord's free man, and Paul sends the runaway Onesimus back to his master. He expects Philemon to set him free, and speaks very touchingly - "I beseech thee, being such an one as Paul the aged, and now also a prisoner of Jesus Christ." But he would do nothing "without thy mind," "knowing thou wilt do more than I say." He expects grace; but he leaves the thing where he finds it. You will never set the world right; you have no principles nor power to do it. You can control an unconverted man with unconverted principles, but you cannot deal with him as a Christian. If I am to set the world right I must join with the world, and cannot have any principles but theirs. Then I must give up Christianity: for they have none to be governed by. You can use gracious influence as Christ did, and that we have to do. The Christian is to let his light shine, and the testimony of what his principles are is so distinct and positive that they "see your good works." If he joins with an infidel he owns infidelity can set the world right. The Christian by himself has his own gracious godly principles to act on, that the testimony may be there of what his principles can do (Christianity has reformed the world in a sense; for it brought in the pattern of things better, and they are ashamed to do in the light what they did in the dark). A man will not do what is unworthy of a man: but "unworthy of the Lord," you never find that; and that is where the Christian is to walk.

480 Paul says to masters, "You have a Master in heaven" who will take notice of everything you do. Your part is to shew what Christianity is and does, and that is good to an infidel, or whoever it is. Your confession of Christ is to be so positive, that they should know what to attribute these things to. Let the world go on its own way, and you go yours - that is Christ's. If not, you compromise Christianity, instead of maintaining its testimony.

Remark here, that the obedient side comes first in everything. It is the natural thing the Christian gets into. He is "sanctified unto obedience." He never gets out of it; he fails in it, of course. The Lord says, "As the Father gave me commandment, even so I do." The apostles never said, what often jars on one, I have a right to do so-and-so. It is, "We ought to obey God rather than man." If man hinders me from obeying God, it is wrong. But it is not, I have a right, but I must "obey God rather than man." You get in the path of Christ, the path of divine wisdom, that the vulture's eye hath not seen; and the way to keep yourself in it is to "continue in prayer" (ch. 4: 2), incessantly referring everything to God. There is the positive direct intervention of God, everything working together for good; and by prayer our hearts get through grace in connection with this overruling power of God, whether to stop some mischief Satan is doing, or to open a door of utterance. "We will give ourselves to prayer, and the ministry of the word" - not the ministry of the word and prayer. Whatever the subject of prayer is, there is continually bringing in God, so that the heart is with God. If I am entirely dependent on Him, living in Him, and His word living in me to direct my thoughts, I am sure to get what I ask. Then there is most gracious dealing with regard to my requests - "Be careful for nothing." "Make known your requests to God." It does not follow that they are right; but do not brood over anything, bring it to God. Perhaps He may say He cannot grant it; as when Paul asks for the thorn to be taken away, He says, I have given it to you for a purpose; I am not going to take it away. And the power of Christ rested on him through the very thing that had broken him down. So the peace of God keeps my heart.

481 "Watch in the same" here (v. 2). If I am living with God, I know what to ask God for - I see Satan and danger coming; or else when a snare comes I may not be thinking of it, like the disciples sleeping for sorrow: they were not watching. If I am watching and see temptation, I get power to obey and to shew Christ in it, "with thanksgiving"; for if a person is walking in a path of intimacy with God, thanksgiving is there. Before I get the actual thing I ask for I get His answer, and say, Thank God, He has come in, though not seeing the fruit of it at the moment.

Verse 5: "Walk in wisdom." As "dead flies cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth an ill savour, so doth a little folly him that is in reputation for wisdom" - godly wisdom; to give no occasion to the enemy. A foolish word, a rash expression, may hinder a person receiving the gospel. It may be a slight thing; if it is a stumbling-block to hinder the gospel, that is not slight. You have to carry Christ, and it behoves you to be fit carriers of Christ in the relationship in which you are. "Let your speech be alway with grace" (v. 6). If Christ is dwelling in my heart by faith, and my habitual habit of mind and thought is with Christ, Christ will come out. How many words - not bad or evil - but idle, for the moment without harm meant, do we speak in a day? It is not Christ, and mark, if it is not Christ, it is something else - the flesh. It is not that we are not to be happy, Christ makes us happy, and that will be seen; but our speech is to be "alway with grace." If we carried Christ in every word, what a life we should live! The joy of heaven to me is, I shall not want my conscience at every step. Here I cannot let myself loose, there are snares everywhere, and I require to keep a wonderful check on myself.

Verse 12. He looks that they should stand "perfect in all the will of God", not perfect in the flesh, but "growing up to him who is the Head in all things." The Christian who begins to want proof in his walk that he is a Christian is wrong; others do look for testimony. He is to be totally given up to God, and looking for nothing but His will, the eye single. Do you ever doubt about anything - taking a house, or the like? Ask what the will of God is. If you doubt then, I say your eye is not single. Perhaps you have not found out the cause; but He is teaching you, putting you in circumstances to detect motives you never knew were in your heart, that you may be like Christ, and "perfect and complete in all the will of God." Is the energy and purpose of our heart that? It is connected with the consciousness that we belong to Christ. We are set in the world as the epistles of Christ, known and read of all men, that we may manifest the life of Jesus in our mortal bodies. We look to Him for strength and wisdom, and to grow up to Him in everything. Is that the purpose of our hearts in all we do? Is it, I want to do the will of God? The Lord give us to have that as our desire, constant and earnest, and then to "continue in prayer, and watch in the same." If you want to be happy as a Christian, it is in not grieving the Spirit; and not to do that is to walk close to Christ, and get the secret of His will, that you may enjoy Christ with ungrieved Spirit. I do not say you will see your growth. Moses did not see his face shine; but it was the witness to the people that he had been with God. The Lord grant us to be with God in the dependence of prayer, and we shall get the strength of the Lord, and clear-sighted as to where we are not walking with Him.

[END OF MISCELLANEOUS VOL. 3]

Nine lectures on the First Epistle of John

J. N. Darby.

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Explanatory

It should be stated that these Lectures on 1 John were delivered in London more than thirty years ago, and also that, while there is abundant evidence that they were carefully reported, they have never been seen or revised by the Lecturer. Many will be interested in their perusal, as well as in comparing them with the Lectures of a later date; and beyond this, they contain so much valuable truth, and truth so simply put, that, with the Lord's blessing, their publication cannot fail to be for the profit of His people.

London, 1882.

1 John 1

1.

The great purpose of God in all His dealings is grace, is to bring us - and to bring us individually, too - into fellowship with Himself. "Truly our fellowship is with the Father." Thus we have the full knowledge of God as far as it can be known, and that in full communion with Himself. It is not in the way of creation; that is, not merely as creatures, for we are made partakers of the Holy Ghost that there may be power. "We dwell in Him and He in us." There cannot be anything more intimate.

It is not knowledge or science that has anything to say to this; for if it be but the human mind working on the things of God, it is but that "high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God." Babes in Christ have possession of these things; they have not to seek them; they are in possession of them, though of course they have to ripen in acquaintance with them. Knowledge itself - mere knowledge - puffs up; but, being brought low, the Spirit of God can act upon the soul and give knowledge in communion with God.

Although the epistle of John is very abstract, yet it is abstract about things that the very feeblest saint knows in Christ. God is brought down to our nature, for God can come down to us in our weakness in Christ. The difference between the writings of Paul and John is this, that Paul unfolds to us the counsels of God in grace; whereas John may be called more abstract, because he speaks of the nature of God Himself. The purpose and object of God is to bring us into full fellowship with Himself.

6 There are three things I would notice here: first, the work of God, by which we can stand in His presence perfectly free from any question of sin, so that we can enjoy all that God is; second, justification by faith and acceptance in the Beloved - the perfect cleansing of the conscience, knowing we are accepted so as to be able to be before Him in perfect peace; third, the new birth, commonly called regeneration. There must be a new nature capable of affections towards God. An orphan who never knew a father has the affections of a child, is capable of loving a father; and is often very unhappy because he is without the object towards whom those affections would naturally flow. So the capacity to love God is that which we get by being partakers of the divine nature.

The Holy Ghost is that which gives us competency to enjoy these things. We have an unction from the Holy One given to us, to enable us to enjoy what God has given to us. There must be our standing in the presence of God without our conscience being at work at all; a nature capable of enjoying God - a new nature, and power to walk in that new nature, which is by the Holy Ghost dwelling in us.

The thing brought especially before us is what that is we are to enjoy - the nature of the thing brought down to the understanding of a poor sinner. That tries the conscience, just as it moves the affections. God is light, and if I am brought into the blessedness of what God is, it must put the conscience to the test; and I ask, "Am I standing in it?" If I am capable of it, then I enjoy all the blessedness of standing in the light, and am in a position to test all that pretends to possess this character. "God is light." He is bringing this home to the hearts of the saints. This must be by presenting Christ Himself.

There was, at the time this epistle was written, a great deal made of development, and he wanted to bring them back to the truth. Science, so called, hat come in. The character of apostolic teaching was to bring them back "earnestly to contend for the faith once delivered to the saints." "But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned." "That which was from the beginning."

7 My soul ought to know Christ better every day. The moment I get "God manifest in the flesh," I cannot know anything outside of Him, but that which is false. The question of knowledge is to give place to Christ. If I get there, nothing can shake me; I am in Christ. "These things write we unto you that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God." Do you believe on the Son? Then rest here.

Verse 1. First, it was from the beginning; second, it was a real substantial person they had known familiarly, not a doctrine; that is the blessed secret of all. If they have Christ, then they have all that the Father has, all that is revealed of Him; and they cannot go from that without being wrong. They have eternal life, the perfect revelation of God - the power of life in Christ. This is what is presented to us as the full enjoyment and the safeguard of the saint. It is ours, though that which was with the Father, yet was so near to us; not union, but so near to us that nothing could be so near as Christ Himself. Instead of wanting anything between myself and Christ, it is revealed to me, so that nothing could be so near to me as Christ Himself. This is the eternal life that was with the Father.

It is as we contemplate the Lord Jesus Christ that we shall have affections established towards Him, which nothing can break. The poor woman who was a sinner had such confidence in Him that she had come to Him, and loved Him; but the secret of our joy is to know the love of Christ to us; then we have confidence in Him, understanding that God has come so near as to reveal Himself, and inspire confidence.

8 The more we look attentively at Christ - the more we penetrate into His ways - the more we learn the depth of all these riches in Him, the more is His divine fulness revealed to us. If it is His taking little children up in His arms, I see in it what God's character is. "He that hath seen me, hath seen the Father." Having truth thus revealed in a person, I get it for the humblest, lowest, poorest sinner, because it is a personal act of our Lord Jesus Christ.

"That which was from the beginning." Now, mark, this "Word of life," while it shows what God was in Christ, shows it communicated to us; and everything, true or false, is tested by this. So he asks, "Is there love?" No. Then it is not of God. "He that loveth not knoweth not God." This is now what he teaches. He brings me up to the object - what God was: "That which we have seen with our eyes"; "God is light"; "The blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin"; the communication of life to the Christian; the height of the source of the life communicated to us. In the Gospel of John we find, "Of His fulness have all we received, and grace for grace," "which thing is true in Him and in you."

"An old commandment which was from the beginning"; now a new commandment, become true in Him and in you. He called it a new commandment, though an old one - a simple truth that Christ Himself is become our life, "that the life of Jesus might be manifest in our mortal bodies." If a poor sinner is converted, he has the life communicated from Christ up there, which comes down to the lowest need in us; and yet how high it rises!

This gospel begins before creation. Genesis begins with creation, and gives the scene in which all is to be acted; but John gives Him who created. So also in the epistle to the Hebrews: "Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth," "Thou art the same" - we get Christ before the creation, and then in creation.

9 "The word was made flesh, and dwelt among us," and became the source of life; and we receive our life from Him who existed, before all worlds, from everlasting. We receive our new nature from Him, and are united to Him who was before the world, and who created the world. This has a double effect (if right with God), lifting our hearts up in ten thousand thousand thanks, if it does manifest the life of Jesus. The least thing manifests the life of Jesus. Whatever does not manifest Him is of the world; whatever is not the manifestation of the life of Christ in our souls, that is sin. Do not think that a hardship. No; rejoice in it. I would have your hearts enlarged; as the Apostle says, "Be ye also enlarged." Oh to have Christ so before the eye as to be able to judge everything in His light! Do not think it is great learning; no, there may be the lust of the mind as well as the lust of the flesh; but if in communion with God, it discerns all things.

I call your minds back to see the way we received the life; it was in the humblest and simplest way. He who came into the world to save sinners, has made us vessels of His fulness. Thus we have fellowship with the Father and with the Son, and display it. "Truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ." The effect is, we have the Father and the Son, and we have nothing more to seek. I have the Father and the Son.

Can I get truth outside the Father and Son? I may have more to learn. If a man is on the ocean, there may be a great deal he has to discover of it, but he has not to get there; he says, "I am there." So I am in the truth. I have a great deal to learn; but I am in the Father and the Son, and I am in the truth. I do not want to seek it if I am in it. I have the very eternal God in whom I dwell - I have come to the Father. When there is a consciousness of this, oh, what comfort and what peace! It not only guards us from evils without, but it gives spiritual rest within. If I am striving to get something, I have no communion. If I want to get to the Father, when I am in His presence already, I have no communion; and if I am not brought up there, I cannot have the sense of what the conscience ought to be in God's presence. The joy is, that our fellowship is with the Father, and not in the hope of getting there.

10 "These things write we unto you, that your joy may be full." There is where God brings the saint if there is humbleness. If there is not humbleness, we shall slip. When we lose the sense of God's presence - the sense of it, I say (because we are always in His presence in truth) we are at the point to sin. My natural character or flesh will show itself if I am out of His presence.

There is such a thing as the saint's dwelling in the conscious presence of God without fear. If there is anything between me and God, my conscience will be at work; but when the Spirit is not grieved, the soul is in the presence of God for joy, learning holiness, it is true, but in joy, because occupied in communion instead of in detection; and that is a great thing.

There is such a thing as being in His presence without the conscience having to be exercised, and in perfect joy. "My peace I give unto you." What was that peace? There were no wandering affections - there could not be, and so there was full peace of heart with God. Christ was divinely perfect - all His affections always in tune with God. Now, through the grace and power of God, we may be brought to that; Christ having been revealed to the soul, the world is cast out, and Christ is everything, and there is perfect joy. This is often what our experience is after conversion, but afterwards the love of Christ grows less fervent - the world creeps in little by little, and we have less joy.

11 There are three things which characterize a Christian.

First, "he is in the light as God is in the light." Now God had said to Israel, "I will dwell in the thick darkness"; and at Sinai He told them to keep off; "for if so much as a beast touch the mountain it shall be stoned." There was a great deal of good there, but He was in His pavilion of darkness, not seen. God acted towards Israel, but did not show Himself. Now the veil is rent from top to bottom, and all is light. It is the very nature of the truth we are in, that God is now manifestly revealed; and he that is come in through the rent veil stands in the light of God's holiness, perfect purity in itself, and it shows everything that is not so.

Second, "we have fellowship one with another." We are there together, and all have fellowship by the same Holy Ghost dwelling in all.

Third, we can be there because "the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin." The more thoroughly in the light, the more it is seen that there is no spot on us through that blood. This could not be said of a Jew; but now the righteousness of God is set forth, and we are brought into the light as He is in the light. Is this a thing that makes us unhappy, or that gives you joy of heart? If we are true of heart, we shall be glad of the light to detect the darkness in us. "Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." We do not want to escape from the light, but to be searched by it - not with a pretension that we have no sin, but the consciousness that the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin. For the effect of being in the light is, that we confess our sins. "In whose spirit there is no guile." There are two things there, the confession and the love.

Verses 1-4 are that there may be no deception. Then in verse 5, "This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all." Now that is the test when Christ is known in the presence of God: there is no question about sin. How came I there? I came through the blood - then I have peace. If I am reasoning about God, this is another thing; but if we are there, we got there through the blood, and that gives peace, a peace which is never lost. There is a peace which may be lost: happy at first, while fresh from conversion, and all is easy and smooth with us, our hearts are attracted by the grace of Christ; but if failure comes in, conscience is awakened, a sense of sin alarms, and we lose our peace, so that we do not know where we are. Until we have apprehended that we are brought to God - where we never could be brought if there remained a spot of sin upon us - we cannot know settled peace in our souls, as spoken of in Hebrews [ch. 10: 3], "no more conscience of sin[s]"; and that is enduring peace. The power of the affections of the new nature forms a link of fellowship with God; and only as we keep in the light, shall we know the practical enjoyment of it. We must be in the light that evil thoughts may be shut out, so that we may have fellowship with God. In how many things, in our intercourse with one another or with the world, self comes in and is not judged by us! There is a practical consciousness in the Christian that he cannot go on without God, and he judges, waits, and confesses, trusting in God, and thus his heart is kept calm and in peace.

12 There are two things: first, the manifestation of the eternal life - for it has been manifested to us; second, we are partakers of it - I have fellowship with the Father and the Son. He has communicated to us that nature, so that we can delight in His fellowship.

The Lord give us to keep ourselves in the love of God - in His presence, in the light, detecting everything that is not of Him, judging it, and thus to be in the enjoyment of His love.

13 2.

The beginning of this chapter refers to the preceding chapter; there he is speaking of the manifestation of the light and life, for the life is the light of men. "If we say we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth." Then in the second chapter he is speaking of the resources of a Christian when he fails, as, alas! we know we all do fail.

In the former chapter, as we are seeing, he speaks of three things: first, in the light, as God is in the light; second, fellowship with God; and third, the blood of Christ cleansing from all sin. There, in the second chapter, the Christian having sinned, has an Advocate with the Father - this is bringing out quite another principle altogether.

It is not merely having a divine nature, because he has that when he fails; but he is not walking in the power of it, and consequently fails, and therefore needs an Advocate with the Father. This is quite another aspect; it is not joying in God, but the interference of Got in grace in the person of a Mediator, one between God and us. This is not a question of justification; there is no possibility of anything being imputed to me. Christ was made sin for us, and His work has put us in God's presence without any question, and that we never lose. It is not that here, but another thing of importance to me the daily exercise of affection. It is not said that we will fail before Him, but down here we do. In many things we offend all; we fail constantly, inwardly and outwardly; but there is the exercise of affections, according to what we are town here, an increasing in the knowledge of God, what His love is, and what our real state is.

14 God demands righteousness; but it is not, as many think, that the work has to be done over again; for the moment I believe, I am God's righteousness in Christ. There is no decay of it; it is always of the same value; it is a question of who He is; it is founded on the fact that in virtue of this sacrifice I can now exercise my conscience in a way I could not. He is Jesus Christ the righteous. The righteousness is always in the presence of God. He has not to look for that now in His dealing with us; He is always there. God has been perfectly displayed in the Lord Jesus Christ, and now I can go into His presence and not be afraid, because of this righteousness.

How is my intercourse with God to be carried on by such a poor, failing thing as I am? It goes on in virtue of what I am in Christ. Christ's righteousness does not need to be maintained, but I need to be sustained. Suppose I have failed - well here the advocacy comes in; Christ's intercession comes in to meet me. It does not acquire the righteousness, but lifts me up if I fail. The intercession of Christ as the Advocate with the Father leads me to judge myself according to the light I have been brought into by this righteousness. My discernment of good and evil increases as I grow up into God.

Here are two things needed: grace to keep us in the way, and mercy to restore us to communion. There is all the grace we need by the road, and he is assuring us constantly of the certainty of our position before God. Peter did not lose his trust and confidence in God, though he denied his Master. Satan might come and say to the soul, "It is all over with you; you are too bad; His sentence is gone out against you, and there is no hope." So confidence in God may be lost; but before Peter failed, Christ had prayed for him. Thus he learned what he was in himself, and knew the grace that sustained him - then he uses it to profit. "Strengthen thy brethren." He was competent to help those who were weak and failing like himself. It is exactly the same grace that met us at the first that sustains us all the journey through.

15 Here is the government of God, as a father with his family. It is not like "Ephraim is joined to idols: let him alone"; no, God having an interest in us will never leave w alone or give us up; but He will deal with us according to our ways. As I have before remarked, His governmental operations depend on our acts and doings, as in John 14: 23; 15: 10; but God's love to us is not made to depend on our love to Him, or on our conduct; for after all it is grace that enables us to go on well. God, and Christ as a Son over His own house, deals with the children.

If we speak rashly to our brother, or walk abroad carelessly through the streets, and see some vanity; we shall find the effect of it in our own souls at the end of the day with God. If any angry word escapes me, I feel the effect at the end of the day with God; but grace will restore us; He will follow us and bring us back. If we have a child that is unruly we will not give it up, but wait upon it in love, and correct it in hope of reclaiming it. I may see a child go wrong and leave it; but because it is my own child I must go after it and bring it back. This is the patience of His grace. At the same time God can never give up His holiness; no, He could not pass by or suffer unholiness in His child, therefore it was needful Christ should die. Thus God was debtor to Christ, on account of His work for the glory of His character. "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again." "I have glorified thee on the earth."

The same thing is true in regard to His advocacy in virtue of the propitiation. Christ exercises His advocacy for us. If there is failure God sees it; but Jesus comes in and intercedes for us. Some say that we have to use the advocacy of Christ, but it is not so. Christ uses it for us. Why do I turn to God when I have failed? It is because He uses advocacy, and fresh grace is applied - fresh grace is wrought in my mind. There is nothing in us that brings us back to God but fresh grace working in our conscience. Therefore it is said, "If any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father." It is not "if any man repent."

16 It is just as much pure grace as at the first looked upon us when we were in our sins. In the case of Peter, the Lord foretold him what would take place. "Satan has desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat." We all need sifting; "but I have prayed for thee." Before Peter got into the danger the Lord had prayed for him, and His grace is in exercise, and at the moment when it is needed. "He looked at Peter," and his weeping was an avowal of Christ's intercession.

The grace and intercession of Jesus is towards us in all the grace and wisdom of God. It is grace which makes our very failure the occasion of God's coming in with more grace. The righteousness is not called in question; it is not touched. It is through the intercession of Christ that I can get to God about my evil thoughts. All the consciousness of failure, all the exercises of heart, are the occasion of my going to the Father, and so many links to link my soul to God. We learn it in our every-day wants and failures; we are all astray if we do not see that God has a holy foundation for all this.

It does not follow that we must fail any more than that we must sin. We ought not to fail, though we all do. Our wretched self-confidence makes us fail, and then comes in the advocacy.

In a similar manner it was Aaron's rod that swallowed up every other rod, showing divine power in Priesthood; that is the way grace takes away the murmuring of the heart. Two years Israel were in the desert, and thirty-eight years more because they did not go up and take the land as they had been told; and if we, like Israel, will not go up it detects our state - we are making the long way. Israel had not the faith to go up to the Anakims.

17 If we would break with the world, and take up the cross properly, it would give us the enjoyment of the full power of communion with God at once; if not, we must learn by its daily mortification in the desert what flesh is. If we think to escape dangers by leaving the path of faith, we shall surely get into sin. Israel found the same people were there, the giants still there, when they got into the land at last that had frightened them at the first, and hindered their taking possession.

What is the reason Christians have often more joy on a death-bed than all their life through before? Why, the reason is, they have never till then surrendered up all for Christ, and never learned Christ to be everything, and everything else to be dung and dross. Israel's raiment had not waxed old for forty years in the wilderness, neither did their feet swell. They learned in all this way the wonderful detail of all God's goodness.

The manna never ceased, and the patient grace never failed to the end; but our foolish hearts will not trust God, and so the Lord shows us the patience of His grace. He goes with us wherever we go, even in our failures. If our hearts have experienced the exercises of the desert, we have learned the vanity of earthly things, and after all have found it better to give it all up, and trust God, that He may be everything to us. If we had done that at first we should have had it at once.

Now as to the constant exercise of Christ's intercession; it is carried on in heaven in connection with our heavenly standing, and is also made to bear on our actual daily state down here. Christ was a man down here; we are joined to Christ by one Spirit. "He that is joined to the Lord is one Spirit" - mark the effect.

18 What was Christ? Not only the obedient Man, the perfect Man under the law, but He was the perfect manifestation of the divine nature in man; there was in a Man all the effect that Godhead could produce of goodness in a man. I am not speaking of miracles, patience, endurance, love, etc.

It is not that we can be as Christ was, because sin is in us but there was none in Him. We are called to walk as He walked; we are called not to walk in the flesh; but we do not walk as He walked; there is not a willingness to walk, there is a will in us. He must break our will so long as our walk does not flow from the word of God.

There is flesh working and must be weakness. Well, but one may say, "I am so young a Christian, I am so weak." It is not a question of age in grace; Christ would not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able, but would, with the temptation, make a way for you to escape

We may be weak, but that is no hindrance to our walking as He walked, for His strength is made perfect in weakness; but He cannot be the strength of our will. One born only yesterday may follow Christ as much as an old Christian, and Christ is as much for him. There may not be so much wisdom, but in the child there is often more singleness of eye, and more of undividedness of heart. The great thing is, that the will does not work. There again we see where Christ was so perfect.

The will of God was the spring of all Christ's conduct. He came to do His will - "Lo, I come to do thy will, O God." "Mine ears hast thou opened" - put Himself in the place of obedience. "A body hast thou prepared me," He became a man, took the place of a servant. He was to walk by what He heard. He was willing to do this: "Lo, I come." "Not my will, but thine, be done." The will of God was the spring of all His conduct. He was not only the obedient One, conformed to it - "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God." "As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father, so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me." We are not only so to walk, as He walked, but the way He walked.

19 The spring of Christ's conduct was never His own will; not that His will had to be corrected, but He came to do His Father's will. Satan tried to hinder, man tried to hinder, but He goes through it all. He takes the place first, He must go first in the difficulties; when He putteth forth His own sheep He goeth before them. He was led by the Spirit to be tempted; everything that could put His obedience to the test must be tried on Him.

We see the difference in the glory of Christ's person from another. Moses had to fast forty days to be with God on the mount. Christ as a living man on earth was always with God. He fasts forty days to be with Satan tempted in the wilderness, and you could not see Him in those circumstances without seeing who was there. If all the glory of the world was offered to Christ there, it is offered to you every day, and we see in a day like this people are hurrying after it with all their hearts. Well, Christ meets him. "Make these stones bread," satisfy your hunger by your own will. He had no word from God for it. His will was never shown; it was perfect obedience - the humble, holy, patient life that does not stir without God. If you will not do anything without a word from God, then you are sure to have the strength of God in what you do. "Cast thyself down." No; He would not put God to the test. He was not going to tempt God by trying whether He would protect Him. He had confidence in God; so we read, "The people tempted God, saying, Is God among us?" They would prove whether He was among them or not, and this is called "tempting God." He was sure in the way of obedience to find Him.

20 When Mary and Martha sent to the Lord, saying, "Lazarus is sick," He did not stir. He had no word from God, and Lazarus died. Mary might think it cruel that He should abide two days in the same place, and not come immediately to heal him. If He had been there He might have wrought a common miracle; but His raising him from the dead is for the glory of God.

Satan then tries Him in another way: "If thou wilt fall down and worship me, all shall be thine." "Get thee behind me, Satan," He again takes the word, "It is written." Satan has power against pretension, against knowledge, but no power against obedience if we are acting by the Word - no will of our own. He ordered His conduct from the Word. It was the source of His conduct.

If we say we abide in Him, we ought to walk even as Christ also walked. Satan was baffled, the strong man was bound, and that is how He bound him, by simple obedience. The exercise of power, as healing the sick, is a distinct subject. He would have set men right if they had been capable of happiness and prepared to enjoy God.

Christ passed through everything that could be put before Him to hinder Him in the path of godliness, everything that could test the divine life. Christ knew in that sense what it was to be tempted; it was all the exercises He went through which prepared Him to be our High Priest. We need sympathy in the exercises of the divine life in our souls, not sympathy in our lusts; those we must mortify. Everything that could try a living man, He passed through, perfect in all. He learned the application of it all in the peace which He experienced, and now He can say, "My peace and my joy."

If the world has hated me it will hate you; but "be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." He knew, and understood experimentally and practically, as a man in passing through this world, how the grace from above, in the comforts and applyings of divine grace to His soul, was sufficient for every soul's need to live in holiness, not applied to a testing from sin, but a life of holiness. "He suffered being tempted." The Lord knew what trouble was; His soul was bowed down with trouble; but the first word is, "Father."

21 The first moment we are in sorrow, instead of looking around for comfort, for sympathy, or to the actings of the flesh, as to what I have done, or what I have not done, and pouring forth our sorrow in nothing but fleshly murmuring, let us turn immediately to God; then the heart would be cast down in perfect submission to the will of God, and thus the sting of the sorrow would be removed. The instant there is perfect submission there is perfect peace. "Now is my soul troubled, and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour"; "not my will, but thine, be done."

Another thing: He could have raised Abraham and Isaac as He did Lazarus, and have brought in all the promised blessing at once; but men did not like Him to be there. Man showed himself to be alienated from God, and was proved utterly incapable of enjoying happiness. "Now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father." Christ could not have anything to do with the world in its mortal state. He now had to meet the effect of sin in the power of Satan - holding man captive under death to the judgment and wrath of God against sin - to redeem man, and now He takes His place in resurrection to apply redemption.

The righteousness was worked out that we should take our place in heaven. We must be broken off from the world. He gives us everything needed in the way, but never presents that as our end. This world is neither Canaan nor Egypt, but a wilderness. By clinging to it we are not in the wilderness but in Egypt, and that is why we need chastening; for if we make a Canaan of this world, then it becomes Egypt to us. The moment we make it our home, and settle down in it, it is our Egypt.

22 The Lord must break our will. He says, "A little while and the world seeth me no more." It is all done with. He puts a distinction between Himself and the world; therefore if we take Him we cannot have the world, and if we take the world we cannot have Him - we cannot have both. "If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him." "Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world."

Men are everywhere playing into the infidel's hands in thinking to make the world better with their brotherly love, their arts and sciences, their social intercourse, making themselves happy without God; for while they make a show of their cleverness, and talk a great deal about acknowledging God's gift in the skill and ability He has bestowed upon man, they continue still to reject both God and His gifts, and will not have a "God in Christ."

Men think the world can be set right by cultivation and science, by encouraging the arts, and such like. Why, Christ could not set it right. Infidels are saying, Christianity is all a figment, for it has not set the world right. Men are taking the words of Christ in their mouths, saying, "Men should love one another as brethren," and bringing all nations together to cultivate amity and goodwill; and the very words that they take in their mouths while they are thus seeking to make the world happy are the words that the infidels use. The world - its day is over. Christ was rejected by the world, and its day is closed. God's grace is gathering out sinners; but as to the world, the Lord said, it "seeth me no more." Either it is to get better without Christ, or not to get better at all. "It has hated both me and my Father," and its day is over. "I have got one Son; it may be they will reverence my Son." They took Him and slew Him, and said, "The inheritance will be ours," and they are making the world comfortable. The Lord preserve us from all deception which by the side of Christ we so soon detect. He has taken a heavenly place. "Such a high priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, made higher than the heavens." He exercises His ministry where we belong. We do not belong to the earth; we have a heavenly calling, and need a heavenly Priest, who has gone up on high to take our hearts up with Him. Our bodies have not gone up yet, but we have our place with Him up there. Christ Himself, who was a man on earth, manifested a heavenly character down here.

23 Christ, having given us our place down here, and taken away all our sins, sends down the Comforter, that we, being the living epistle of Christ, known and read of all men, may manifest Him in our walk down here. God loved us when we hated Him; we are to love those who do not love us, and thus show the character of God down here. Christ was the living expression of it as a man. "He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself so to walk, even as He walked." By His intercession Christ obtains for us all we need, and lifts us up if we do fall. He sustains us to walk as He walked, having the word of God as the source of our actions, as God was the source of all His thoughts; but if we fail there is grace to restore us.

"These things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous." Flesh ought never to work; your life ought never to be an expression of the flesh, but the obedience of a child. The youngest child in Christ cannot walk as a father in Christ, but he can walk in the obedience of a child with Christ. I have the flesh; but if I am in the light practically with God I know all about the flesh; then all that I am is judged. A child of two years old can be as obedient as a child of twelve years. It is not a question of age, of strength, but obedience. We have the pattern of Christ at twelve years old. He was obedient to His father and mother, and went home with them, being subject unto them.

24 "He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself so to walk, even as He walked." Is this the delight of your soul, to walk as He walked, as self-denying, as separated from the world, with as much love? or would you spare something - a little bit of the world, a little bit of comfort? Christ never did, or you could not have been saved. Peter said this, "Be it far from thee, Lord; spare thyself." His reply was, "Get thee behind me, Satan." How often does our wretched heart say, "Spare thyself"? That is not walking as Christ walked, not doing His bidding as our Master.

Have your hearts been attracted by the beauty of Christ? It is real liberty. The world is merely a snare to entrap us - not that I would scorn the world. Christ did not scorn it; but the world is just this, Satan using all manner of things to seduce the flesh. Satan attracts us by his snares, and has the soul in bondage; but the liberty in which the Son has set us free from the flesh, the world, and sin, and Satan; not only to walk as He walked, but to walk with Him in perfect freedom, and in the comfort and consciousness of walking with Him. May we find our joy in Him, not pursuing a life of our own hearts, but a life of His grace and goodness, and may He keep our hearts fixed on Him and on a crown with Him.

25 3.

It was not my thought to go through the epistle; but as we were lingering last week on the intercession of Christ, I take up the subject again - that is, the communication of divine life from the Father Himself in the person of the Son, who comes down on earth, and by Him it is communicated to us. There is the manifestation of all we ought to be, and a test by which we may prove what is of Christ, and detect that which is not.

The greater part of the New Testament (the epistles) owes its origin to the mischief Satan did in the Church. The mischief was only permitted that the folly of these things might be made manifest, and that the full glory of the truth might be brought out. "These things have I written unto you concerning them that seduce you." The things here written of are what some pretenders held; they were persons of the highest pretensions, that would seduce them. Not the gospels of course, but the great body of the epistles, of which those to the Thessalonians, Corinthians and Galatians are examples were occasioned by the mischief the adversary brought in.

The attack of the enemy brought out in the epistle to the Corinthians the truth of the resurrection; in Thessalonians the coming of the Lord; in Galatians justification by faith. This was hardly the case in Philippians, because Paul was comforted by the love of those at Philippi. It is the same in regard to the mischief he has done from the beginning. The fall itself is the occasion of God's introducing greater blessing than before.

Whatever Satan seeks to do, as he has done from the beginning, must ultimately tend to the divine glory, and the comfort and blessing of our souls, who seek to serve God. Of course man gets humbled in it; but God overrules it for greater good. If we turn to Christ's rejection by the Jews, it brings out the Church. Though He wept over Jerusalem, the energy of Satan was there exhibited against the Lord Himself, so He said, "Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour . . . For I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto me." He looked with sorrow at the evil; but it was the occasion of infinite blessing brought out; for if Jesus had not died, we had not been saved; and though Satan thought he had triumphed over Him by the cross, God raised Him from the dead. So whatever Satan does, it is always bringing out on God's part of greater blessing, and so it is in our day.

26 We find man spoiling that which has been committed to him, and God bringing in something much better. What do we find here? Antichrist was going on, and it led to the bringing out of the workings of divine life. It is the occasion in God's hands of bringing into greater blessing them that trust Him. The history from the beginning is just that, so will it be to the end, until Satan is cast into the burning lake of fire and brimstone. It will be then to bring in heavenly blessing. The power of divine life, first manifested in Christ, is then manifested in us. We shall see the instructions He gave, guiding us by His precepts according to His life. "He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself so to walk, even as He walked" - not so to be, because we have sin, and He had none; but so to walk. "Again a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in Him and in you, because the darkness is past, and the true light now shineth." Here we get a very important principle of the divine life - what is our life, and whence its source.

There are two points of the manifestation of the divine life. What He was in His own person down here, and now what He is as exalted - what He manifests through and in us of the divine life.

27 First, Christ is the source of it for us. "The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us."

Second, He is the manifestation of it through and in us. There we can correct every estimate we form of our lives, because we have the perfect and wonderful model of it in Christ Himself, who is the power of it. He is the very eternal life that was with the Father, and He has given us that eternal life. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him; and without Him was not anything made that was made. In Him was life." He was eternally with God before He created. "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us;" and he adds, "Of His fulness have all we received."

There are two things: first, "The Word was made flesh," as also in Hebrews: "The brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person." "The image of the invisible God," as in Colossians, the perfect representation of what God was. "Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." We get in His person the life itself that was with the Father "from the beginning." He was the life, it was in Him. Now it is never said eternal life is in us - it is in Him; but it is given to us; that is a different thing. He Himself is our life - He has life in Himself. "God has given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son"; but the Son has life in Himself. My hand is alive, but my life is not in my hand; my hand lives by virtue of its union with my body; take it off, and I shall live still. So the Church or an individual soul lives by virtue of its union with Christ, the Head. It is in Him the reality of the life is.

Second, when Christ was down here, all His instructions were the expression of this life. It was not like a commandment given by the law, because the law exacted from man what was becoming, and what man ought to be in relation to God. It took the responsibility that attached to man's character as man, and did not go beyond it; but we get in Christ the manifestation of what God was to man - love acting in the midst of evil. It was no part of the law to love sinners; but it was a part of the Lord to come down to love. Another thing - in all His thoughts and tones of feeling for us He went far beyond the mere letter of the law; for the law could not say, "Blessed are the poor in spirit" - that must arise from an estimate of God. The law could not proclaim, "Blessed are the peacemakers"; Christ was Himself the Prince of Peace, showing there was peace to be made. There was a spirituality in the law beyond what we see; but there was a power of good in Christ, that went beyond the evil. The law never manifested power over evil in the shape of love - there was manifested in Christ the power of good over evil - and that was Christ's life. We get in all His actings the character and expression of what God was in man when on earth - and that is lovely. He was the eternal life that was with the Father.

28 John the Baptist - who was next to Christ, and immediately preceded Him, of whom the Lord testified, "Of them that are born of women there has not been a greater than John the Baptist" - came in the way of righteousness, and therefore went away from men altogether. He was in the desert, kept no company with any, was a herald before Christ to announce Him, had nothing to do with any, ate locusts and wild honey. God, being the person that was offended, could come in grace near to them, in the person of Christ, and speak to them in the spirit of grace, which rises above and overrides the evil, and expresses what God is; and they said, "Never man spake like this man." Then it is said, "He went about doing good." In Him was found the activity of good; the suffering for righteousness' sake, and for "His name's sake"; the exercise of love in the activities of grace.

29 There is another thing which specially characterizes the divine life of Christ: the discernment of it in those who possess this life, the power of discerning the spirit of life in another. It has been said, "It requires much grace in oneself to discern a little grace in another." There is an attractive power in grace which recognizes the spirit of Christ in another. He could say, "Forasmuch as this man also is a child of Abraham." There was that in Christ which attracted. The moment a Christian recognizes divine life in another, in spite of difference of education, rank, and many other things, he will be drawn towards him. It is characteristic; he cannot help it. The moment a man discerns the Spirit of Christ in another, there is a necessary attraction to him. At once they are united together in love. "By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." The instant the Spirit and character of Christ is manifested, there is necessarily an attraction of where the Spirit of Christ is. "He went about doing good." Then there is the blessed discernment of the traits of it - its discerning Christ, "Love your enemies . . . do good to them that hate you." In Christ we see God coming down, and manifesting this life in a man on the earth, so as to attract towards Him, and to bring into His presence in rest. "As I have loved you, you ought also to love one another." "Be ye perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect." He overcometh evil with good; you must do as God does - love your enemies. It proved Him to be God, in that He could love that in which there was nothing lovable. In God, the spring of love is from Himself; but we need something to attract us.

The primary revelation is that which was from the beginning, and however much we may go on, we must come back after all to it. It is always perfect, because it is God Himself who is manifested. You never can bring me to anything where God was manifested but to the living word of Christ, or the written word of Scripture. We have only to ask, "Is it that which you have had from the beginning?" If not, it is evil seducers. If it is that which we have had from the beginning, it is of God, and that must test everything, for that is the character of the Word. Bring a sinner opposite the Word, and you learn what he is, as in the case of the poor Samaritan woman.

30 The written Word is the manifestation of Christ, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Man cannot judge God's word without judging himself; so if he judges it to be wrong, he is judged himself. "He that believeth not is condemned already." He is incapable of seeing Christ, who was God manifested in the flesh, and the Word judges him. You may talk about colours or light to a blind man; but if a man is blind he cannot understand you; it is his non-perception of light and colours that proves he is blind. It must be so where God is manifested. If I am incapable of discerning what manifests Christ, and the Word does not reach my soul, it is that which judges me. "The Word that I speak, the same shall judge you in the last day."

All God's ways now are presenting His moral manifestation; next it will be His judicial manifestation. If the moral manifestation is not received, "the Word which I have spoken will judge him in the last day." The Lord did not accompany the Word with judgment when it was spoken; but that Word will judge him at the last day, and he will be condemned; and man still is proved. The first way God taught them was through the Lord Jesus Christ, "whom ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain." Being rejected, and having ascended up on high, and become the expression of what we should be, the Church should be the manifestation of what Christ is.

31 Then comes the communication of the life from Him in heaven. This was the new thing: "A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another." It was not a new commandment to love one another; it was the old commandment, and yet new, because it was now given in the power of it, being not merely commanded in His word, but communicated to you by the power of the Holy Ghost, to reproduce in you the life of Christ. There is a new thing, and you are to manifest it. The Church of God is to be that vessel for the manifestation of Christ down here, according to the power of the life of its head in heaven.

God acted in government towards Israel when He dwelt in thick darkness; He acted in government according to a known law; but He was hid behind a veil, "set bounds about the mount." But now, when Christ died, the darkness was passed in the cross, and there was a full display of the holiness of God. At the same moment His wrath burst forth against sin, the light burst forth which fully manifested His character. "The darkness is past, and the true light now shineth." The veil is rent, and we can now enter into the presence of God Himself, into the holiest, which is opened to us. "Walk in the light, as God is in the light." "Ye were sometimes darkness, but now ye are light in the Lord." "If we walk in the light as God is in the light." Nothing must be allowed that cannot bear the light. Men perish for lack of knowledge, alienation from the life of God. "The true light now shineth."

The veil is rent. God is fully manifested in truth and love. If He had been only just, we should have perished. If He had been only love, there would have been no justice; but there was justice and holiness with love, and God has been glorified about our sins in the death of the Lord Jesus Christ.

32 The light now is shining. Christ is the source of that light, to be manifested in us, which thing is true in Him and in you. It is an old commandment which was from the beginning, Christ Himself. You cannot have a better than that; and now the manifestation of it is learned in us. If we want it as a test, it must not be the imperfect light that is in us, but in Christ Himself. While it is given to us as the means of detecting errors, it is also to build us up in what Christ is. In looking at these traits we discover more and more that they are thoroughly divine. I learn in Christ such and such a trait, and I say, "That is God manifest in the flesh"; and thus I learn what I shall know in heaven. You have "seen the Father."

We learn the beauty in Jesus, and learn that it is divine; and learning what God is, we are happy and peaceful. If you have seen a saint dying, who has faith in the blood of Christ, he will have peace; but if you look for joy, it must spring from the affections being acquainted with the Lord Jesus Christ. You will sometimes see a saint, and there is joy, but by-and-by his peace is gone. That is where the soul is not settled; there ought to be both. The blood gives peace; but it is my acquaintance with and knowledge of Christ that gives me joy.

Three characters are presented here. He says, "He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother." The Apostle always speaks of the abstract principle, "He that loveth his brother." "Whosoever is born of God does not commit sin." "He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him." If he stumble at Christ, it is his own fault. We should never be, by not being like Christ, a stumbling-block. There is no greater snare than the fear of offending, and no greater sin than the fear of offending, if Christ is the offence. If it is Christ that offends, the offence of the cross has not ceased; you will never please the world with the cross of Christ. If I am walking in perfect love, my love will flow out to others; if I have the affection in myself, I shall love my brother, and shall not stumble. If I am not walking in love of the brethren, I am going all crooked myself. I may rebuke, Christ did that; but if the desire to do them good is not in me, I am going crooked myself, I have not the Spirit of Christ.

33 (Verse 12). "I write unto you, children" (not little children, but all saints) "because your sins are forgiven you for His name's sake." A settled thing - you are not Christians at all unless your sins are forgiven you. The poor jailer wanted salvation, and that is what he got. He cried out, "What must I do to be saved?" That is what he wanted. If I come to hear the testimony of God, what I want is to be saved, to get life. Nicodemus came by night with his question. The Lord said, "You must be born again." He that is in Christ is a new creation. The jailer did not know what being in Christ meant, but he believed. What is the consequence? He was saved by a work which was accomplished before ever he asked to be saved. If he believed in Christ, he was saved; he had eternal life. If the light gets into the soul men cannot be happy until they have peace with God.

There is difficulty now with Christians having peace. Before Christianity became a profession in the world a Christian was counted and understood to be saved; but now all pretend to be Christians, and they who really are want to know if they are true Christians, whereby the simple fact of redemption is very much lost sight of. "Your sins are forgiven you for His name's sake." God's judgment is passed already on your sins in Christ. If I looked to Christ to be saved, as bearing my sins, His judgment is, "You have eternal life." That is just as much the judgment of God as if Christ had pronounced it on His judgment-seat. God knows the value of the work of His Son. He is the judge, and not you.

34 "I write unto you, little children." He can add a great deal to the little children; but to the fathers He has only one thing to say, "You have known Him that is from the beginning." Whatever else it might be, it ends all in this, "Known Him that is from the beginning"; that is, Christ. If anything is brought to me that is not of Christ, I reject it. If I know a person, it is himself that I know. I am to know that my sins are forgiven me for His name's sake; but I am to know Him that was from the beginning. "No man knoweth the Son but the Father." What is the object of all this knowledge of Christ? All the promises are in Christ; He is the object of the Father's delight.

The Apostle distinguishes growth. The fathers have known Christ, who is from the beginning, the true Christ who guards the soul, knowing Him perfectly - no ambiguity, no uncertainty; and all the exercises and experiences of the Christian, which are often so much dwelt on, are but the scaffolding of the soul to get at this - "known Him that is from the beginning."

The young Christian is full of the joy, and is thus taken up with himself, whereas the old Christian speaks less about the joy; but says, "It is Christ Himself possessed that makes me happy." His heart trusts in the Lord. The things of the world, even the things of the Church, do not disturb him. He counts on the love ever watchful, and is not afraid of any evil tidings. He knows that though heaven and earth were to dissolve and crumble into pieces, and even the Church itself (which is impossible) God's throne remains. There is a steadiness in the man's soul, because he knows "Him that is from the beginning" - knows and manifests Christ; one whom John had looked upon with his eyes, and his hands had handled. He was speaking of a Christ he had known, and seen, and handled, and which was from the beginning and says, "There is the Father's character"; and he has nothing to add.

35 How far have your souls found steady rest in Christ? or how far are they satisfied with Christ? Forsaken of friends, are you still satisfied with Him? or how far are there things that you crave and have to resist? Have you done with the world, not as tired of its vanities, and weary of its pleasures, but because your souls have found something in Christ that satisfies for all? Is He found such a manifestation of God to your souls that you rest in Him? Have you found such a ripeness in Christ that the soul is satisfied, so as not to want other things? Then, if you have, you can say, "None of these things move me."

The two points to young men and little children are: first, the young men have overcome the wicked one, the prince of this world.

Second, the little children have known the Father through believing in Christ, and have therefore the Spirit of adoption, and have no doubt of the Father's love.

The young men overcoming the wicked one is connected with their having the word of God abiding in them, and overcoming the world. "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world."

Then the little children are warned against the seductions of false doctrines, etc. "But the anointing ye have received of Him . . . Abide in Him."

I would remark that what specially characterizes the young men is conflict with the world, and if we would be satisfied with the knowledge of Him that is from the beginning, there must be the overcoming of the world. "All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world." There must be conflict with the world if the soul is to grow up into Christ in all things; there must be the giving up of the world. "They are not of the world."

36 May we so see the excellency of Christ, and so know, in the ways of that lowly man, the full expression, unfolding, and manifestation of the character of God, that our hearts may be knit to Him; and soon we shall see Him face to face, "and know, even as we are known."

Nine lectures on the First Epistle of John

J. N. Darby.

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4.

Any of you who were here last Tuesday will remember we were dwelling a little on the three characters of the common position of Christians, which are twice repeated; viz., fathers, young men, and little children. Fathers are addressed in the fourteenth verse, young men from the fourteenth verse to the seventeenth, and little children from the eighteenth to the twenty-seventh. That which characterizes the fathers is the knowledge of Him that is from the beginning. "Ye have known Him that was from the beginning"; that is, Christ. In the Gospels we get what He was from the beginning; but John goes further than the other Gospels. These pretenders thought to bring in something else, to add something else by the way of precept to what He was down here, and the Apostle draws their attention to Him that was from the beginning.

Now Christ being risen, and ascended up on high, has become the communication of that life (which we have received) of which He was the expression. The fulness of eternal life was manifested in Him, and is reproduced in us. The only real value of experiences is, that they are the means of developing what Christ is, - breaking down what we are, so that we may gradually lose sight of ourselves, and grow up into Him. When he comes to young men and little children he has a great deal to say; when speaking to the fathers he has nothing to say but "ye have known Him that is from the beginning" - simply tells them of the fulness of Christ, and that is sufficient to draw forth their affections; but to the young men and children it is different: "I have written to you, young men, because ye have overcome the wicked one." The characteristic is not that of knowledge of Him that is from the beginning, but conflict with Satan. That which characterizes the babes in Christ is the knowledge of the Father. They were more sensible of His love as little children, and as such were in danger of being seduced; "but ye have an unction from the Holy One" to judge them that would seduce you. The Apostle refers to that which is the power by which they are to overcome them.

37 You will find three great contrasts: Christ in contrast with Satan; Spirit in contrast with flesh; and the Father in contrast with the world. Christ put the world to the test, and found it wanting when He says, "But when the Spirit of truth is come, He shall convince the world of sin" - not wicked men of their sins, but the world that rejected Christ. "The Word was made flesh." The Son of God came and is gone away.

What the Holy Ghost calls the world to account about is the absence of Christ; as in the case of Cain and Abel: "Where is Abel thy brother?" Adam had been turned out of Paradise because he did not obey God in the garden. Now in his posterity there is hatred in his heart against his brother, but more than this, against Christ. Christ was presented, and man's enmity broke out. It was not only that Cain had slain Abel, but his blood cried from the ground; and as God said to Cain, "Where is Abel?" so now He says by the Holy Ghost, "What have you done with my Son?" It is not merely that the law of God has been outraged, but when God Himself came into the world as a man they rejected Him.

38 Satan is the prince of this world, was always so from the fall of man, but was first called so in connection with the scene of Gethsemane. "I have yet one Son"; and I will send Him, it may be they will reverence my Son; and when He came they said, "This is the heir, come let us kill Him, and the inheritance will be ours." They crucified God's Son, and there is no more to be offered to the world, nothing to be presented, as if it were a question whether the world should be condemned or not. Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God to confirm the promises made unto the fathers; but the Jews would not have Him, and the Jew now has no title whatever to the promises, but must come in as a sinner on the same ground of mercy and grace as the Gentiles.

The testimony of the Holy Ghost is, "that the whole world lieth in wickedness" - all that is in the world. Therefore these things are valuable in the world: "the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life." Satan manages the world by them, and men manage one another as well as they can. Satan is of the world, the Son is of the Father. He gave Himself for our sins that He might deliver us from this present evil world, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, and the energy of nature.

Just so far as we have the Spirit of Christ in us we shall be dead to the world, not for peace, for that God gave us in Christ - inward peace I mean. Here he puts the young men in contrast, as overcoming the world, and shows where their real strength is - divine strength. "The word of God abideth in you," not merely you refer to it, but it abideth in you. If you look to Christ in the temptation, His answers to Satan, there was no lust of the flesh, there could be none; but He was hungry. Satan says, "Make these stones bread," to tempt Him; "Cast thyself down"; then shows Him all the glory of the world, and says, "All the glory of this world is given to me; the world is given to me; worship me, and all shall be thine; own me as the prince of this world, and you shall have it all." His answer was in every case the word of God.

39 All Christ's thoughts and life were the expression of the word of God abiding in Him. He was the Word, the living Word. So what characterizes the young men is having the Word abiding in them. It is not merely recollecting something to say, or finding out something in the Word when one wants it; but the word of God must be the spring of one's actions, and that's what he means by the word of God "abiding in you." A "young man" does not fly to it just when he wants it, but lives in it. God's words living in his mind, he knows all that is in the world is not of the Father.

If I get my thoughts from this world, and talk of riches, I shall say, "That man has a fine fortune." The Lord says it is almost impossible for a man with a fine fortune to get to heaven, though all things are possible with God. Many are the expressions of our desires in this world. If the mind is living in that sphere of thought, our taste and habit will be formed by it. The Spirit of God has a world of His own, and the written Word becomes the guide for everything. That is how we are to judge everything by the word of God. I can do so according to the state of my soul. If the word of God is abiding in me, the world and everything beside will be judged by it.

For example, Israel was called out to be put into the land, and certain things were stated on the ground of which they might get into the land; but they had totally failed, and they were in a peculiar condition. One book (Deuteronomy) contained the precepts which were to conduct them into Canaan. Well, Christ was sent in the proper time as Messiah to take this position with the poor people, but their consciences did not recognize Him. That book formed His mind. The Lord quotes out of that book: "Cast thyself down." No, He was with His people to obey God. He had got into Israel's place where God's mind and Spirit put the godly. His soul was fixed: His soul and life were in God's thoughts, and so if your mind were habitually formed by God's word, instead of living in the world, you would not want to be getting a text for what you do, but you would be living in the Word, and the world would be at once judged; that is what it is to have the word of God abiding in you.

40 Some did not discern Christ, because, as He says, "Ye have not the word of God abiding in you." If their hearts had not been in a fleshly state they would have known John the Baptist. All the poor and needy ones did. They would have known Christ; but they said, "He hath a devil, and is mad." John came in the way of righteousness, dwelt in the desert apart from all men, and ate locusts and wild honey, and they said, "He hath a devil." Christ came in grace, eating and drinking with men, and they said He was a glutton, and a wine-bibber; but God's wisdom was in Christ, and in John, and wisdom is justified of her children. John proclaimed that the axe was laid to the root of the tree; but when Christ came it was to "bind up the broken-hearted." The poor broken heart said, "That is what I want." Wisdom is justified of her children.

The Word abode in Him, that is how the strong man was bound. It was not by a miracle wrought by the putting forth of His power, or we could not be enjoined to do it; but by meeting him with "It is written." We are to use Scripture as He did, not looking for a scripture to meet it when the temptation comes, but having the soul in that state through the word of God abiding in us, that Satan cannot reach us. Satan attacks the flesh; but if I am walking in the Spirit he cannot touch me, for the new nature cannot sin when cast into temptation.

Thus I have not to seek the Word for a text to suit my case, but to be living in it; for it is the delight of the new man to be living by every word of God. There is strength and real liberty, and Satan cannot touch me if my soul is living in that; all the rest is set aside. I am not harassed or uncertain. I may have sin in me, but my meat is to do the will of God. The heart is at liberty, and the Spirit of God feeds it with Christ.

41 We are not perfect (indeed, none of us is as perfect here as he might be); but we have the privilege, that though we have the flesh in us, we are not obliged to live and walk after it, or even to think of it. "The word of God abideth in you," not for you to fly to it when temptation comes. We are to keep Satan out, to have the door barred against him. "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." A woman may be alone in a house, and a robber be attempting to break in; but if the door is shut, she is not in danger. As long as she keeps the door shut she need not fear robbers; for the question is not as regards her own weakness, but the strength of the door. So we are to be dwelling in the Word to keep out Satan. Having Christ between us and Satan we are safe, whatever his artifices.

A Christian has no right to have a will of his own, nor should he desire it, but rather "to know what is that good and perfect will of God." All that is in the world is not of the Father; the affections of the flesh are in the world, and there is the power of Satan. The Father delights in Christ. If I delight in Christ, there is communion of affection. I have the affections of the Father: "If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him," and the fashion of this world passeth away; "but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever." All His counsels He will make good morally. I am brought into the way of God's will, and He is not going to destroy His own will; it abideth for ever. I am to grow up into Christ.

42 The address to the little children would be esteemed by many the most obscure part of Scripture. It is the last time. The thing that marks it is, there are many Antichrists. That which characterizes the last time is the corrupting and spoiling of God's last testimony of good, and thus bringing weakness where there should be power. We see in the case of the disciples and the dumb spirit that man is not able to use the power God gave to cast out Satan's power. "Why could not we cast him out?" This brought out the exclamation: "O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you?" It is as much as to say, "It is no use my staying here if there is not power to put out the evil."

It is the last time. There are many Antichrists. That is a solemn thing. God's patience, how wonderful! As long as there is a soul to win, God's patience goes on bearing with wickedness and corruption; but many Antichrists are come in. It is often thought to be something requiring depth of knowledge. No; little children are told of it; it is a common truth. Antichrist was to come in; but that before he comes there are many Antichrists, and they might seduce them - there is danger. The Antichrist is to come, who will deny both the Father and the Son.

They cannot mistake him; there is no subtlety in Antichrist. His is a bold, open denial; but John speaks of Antichrists already come. He says, "They went out from us because they were not of us." Jude says, "There are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation." It was a common doctrine that Antichrist was to come, and the babes knew he would come in opposition to Christ, to oppose and set aside what Christ had done, but the Apostle tells them there are many Antichrists now; there were those before the Antichrist came. He tells them they will need the unction of the Holy One, as well as the warning of the Apostle, to be able to detect; for "Satan transforms himself into an angel of light." It is the seductions of the Antichrists now in the world, against which he warns them; those who, by the power of Satan, set up to seduce away from Christ, not to frighten away, but to ensnare those who have not the unction from the Holy One.

43 He does not tell them there were many Antichrists to come; but many now, and it is the direct power of Satan. That is what characterizes properly Antichrist. Satan is not only called a liar, but a serpent. Antichrist is a religious character; he works miracles, and all that have not received the love of the truth are seduced by him. He is a prophet, and has a religious character, as spoken of in Thessalonians, with all power, and signs, and lying wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness, not merely civil power.

Of what is Satan the Prince? Of this world. And how? By the lusts of this world. Where the object of the heart is the grandeur of the world, or prosperity in this world, the character of it is to obliterate that which shows what man is. The spirit of the world hides from man the secret of man's departure from God. I must keep myself from it. The saint has to be kept out of the spirit of the world. Whatever has not the character of the word of God is of the world, and Satan is the prince of it, and I cannot have Satan's prosperity without having Satan's idols.

If you take Christ and His glory, you must take His cross; you cannot have Christ and the world that rejected Him. Where there is the unction from the Holy One (if the Spirit is not grieved in us), though only a babe, we can say at once, "It is not of the Father, but of the world." The Apostle said, "He that is of God heareth us." Where there is not due place given to the word of God, there is no protection against the seducers. Is the place of the Church of God in the world that rejected Christ? No; it is in heaven, joined to Christ, and the Church takes the word of God as a guide while on earth. If I desire for a single thing in the world, it is not of the Father, it is of the world. Speaking of responsibility in Christ, I do not see how we can be kept from imbibing the spirit of Antichrist, except it is as being not of the world, even as Christ is not of the world.

44 First, then, we must have the word of God abiding in us; next, there must be the unction from the Holy One, by which everything will be judged; and, lastly, there must be the perception of the distinctness and definiteness of the place of the Church of God. The world cannot know the place of the Church. "They went out from us, but they were not of us. But ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things."

We are to judge before the Antichrist comes, the many Antichrists, who minister to the flesh and seduce from the Father. "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues." It is a moral thing to be kept from the things of the world; they are not of the Father. We must be identified with Christ if we would realize joy and strength.

5.

In speaking of the three classes of Christians, we were led to see, in the last specially, it is warning against the seductions of Antichrist.

In the first, to the fathers, it is, that they have known Him that is from the beginning. In the second, to the young men, they have overcome the world; and in the last, to the little children, it is warning them against the seductions of Antichrist. Now we resume at the 28th verse, "And now, little children, abide in Him; that, when He shall appear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before Him at His coming. If ye know that He is righteous, ye know that everyone that doeth righteousness is born of Him." On this the third chapter is founded. Being born of Him, there will be the nature and character of Him of whom we are born.

45 That is the character throughout the epistle. "He that does righteousness is righteous." If the life of Christ is there it will show itself; if the eternal life that was with the Father was manifested in righteousness, it will be manifested in righteousness in us. If I see righteousness in the sense that Christ is righteous, I say the eternal life is there; that person is born of God. I do not mean righteousness as between man and man. We see in Christ that righteousness is having no will of one's own; that is never found in an unconverted man. Again, we see He never did a single thing for Himself, yet we find Him full of joy. Well, that kind of righteousness is only to be found where divine life is.

Where God is the motive for everything to the heart and conscience, the motive of the heart characterizes the man, the thought of the presence of God governs the conduct. Take an honest man in the world. There is righteousness between man and man, but what detects the unrighteousness of the world is, God is entirely shut out. It is man's righteousness, and not Christ's righteousness.

If a man has wronged his neighbour, he is condemned by all as a bad man. God may be wronged over and over again, all their life through, and they do not care. They say nothing about it; they will let God be what a man pleases, and say, "It is between man and God; it does not concern us. We have nothing to do with it, provided only that he is honest with men." That is horrid unrighteousness, because self is the centre from beginning to end; that is how the world is governed. It may be seen in a child at school wanting to get a prize, to the exclusion of others; for only one can get it. That is what is called emulation, which men are so ready to praise.

46 Self is the spring of everything, and not God; so if there is righteousness in the things of men, righteousness in the things of God is altogether left out, and God must call that horrid unrighteousness which is called honour in the world. We should be thankful for government; but when the young man in the Gospel came to Jesus, and said, "Speak to my brother, that he divide the inheritance with me," He replied, "Who made me a divider and a judge?" He leaves the question of right according to man (for it was right that he should have that which belonged to him), and shows what is under the surface: "Beware of covetousness." The Lord is our pattern in everything, and when the Lord is the pattern it detects the motives of the heart; so He said, "Beware of covetousness." The one desired to have it, the other desired not to give it up. Take care that the motive and spring of conduct is God, and not self. There He strikes at the principles of covetousness; there must be that state of heart in which God is the spring of the will. Christ is the test - "He that is born of God."

Chapter 3. "Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God." Now let us see what are the privileges and condition of those in such a state. Born of God, think of the love expressed in our being called "sons of God." What a thought it is; not merely I am safe, but I am connected with God's nature. I can delight in God's nature and affections. I have the nature of God to delight in, and enjoy God in the character of a son; and knowledge of the nature Christ came to tell of and to declare in the character of Father. He who knew it as dwelling in His bosom from all eternity - "No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him" - told us God's character. He who had enjoyed the outgoings of the Father's love, came to tell us of that love as He knew it to be. If I am to give you the character of my father, it must be as I have known him.

47 Christ has entered into, apprehended, and enjoyed all that God was as the Father. "In Him dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead bodily." He in whom all the divine nature rested, has declared Him. Christ having become a man, and come down from heaven to declare the Father, takes this place as Son on the earth, that we might know the relationship of sons; and the heart of the Father came out in approbation, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." Christ having enjoyed His sonship down here, desires that we should know down here all that love, that our souls should understand the relationship of what God was to Christ down here, and know that the Father loves us as He loved Him. "I have declared thy name unto my brethren, and will declare it, that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them" - this our souls may know. It may be very feeble, but we are called to know God in fellowship with Christ; that while down here we are to see in what He was to Christ, what He is to us, called sons of God, "that the same love may be in them, and I in them." He is the conductor of all this love into our souls.

How can we know God? The mind can never find out God. "Who by searching can find out God?" Nothing but faith can put God in His place. If I am to find out God by searching, my mind must be master of my subject, and then God would not be God. The mind cannot judge the character of God; we can only take it where it is revealed. It is in Christ. We learn it there, not as a matter of knowledge, but as that which should sanctify our souls. I know we fail, but there is such a thing as dwelling in God.

48 There is acquaintance with God, so as to give settled peace. "Acquaint now thyself with Him, and be at peace." "This is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." Do not say it is too high for us, as if it were an attainment in philosophy. No, it is not the mind. How do I begin to know God is love? Why, He loved me, a sinner. I thus begin at the lowest point. "Herein is love; not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." I know it by the incarnation of the Son of God; He is become everything to us. He is perfect love, perfect patience, perfect goodness; all that is nearest to the every-day needs of a soul, the commonest needs of humanity.

"Beloved, now are we the sons of God" - we are called sons of God, thus called by the same name as Christ, and the world knows us not, but thinks we are mad - "therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew Him not." It was just the same thing with Christ. They said He was mad, had a devil. No wonder they do not understand what we are: "Therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew Him not." Who? Him, Christ.

The Apostle's mind was so occupied with Christ, he did not even name Him; he thought everyone must know. Suppose your child was sick, and I were to ask, "How is he?" you would know directly I meant your sick child, because your mind would be dwelling on nothing else, so here it is taken for granted, you know; therefore he does not tell us, does not say who it is. His mind is occupied with Christ, the eternal life that was with the Father, and has been manifested to us. He dwells in you, and you in Him; that is where the world has no knowledge, and that is how the world is no match for a Christian. It does not know his resources; nay, it will taunt him on that score, even as Rabshakeh did Hezekiah, when he said, "Now I will give thee two thousand horses, if thou be able on thy part to set riders upon them."

49 "Now are we the sons of God"; not merely when we are up where we shall be, but now. It is the only relationship we can be in to God. A man under the law was a servant; but now the Son has come, born of a woman, born under law, and we are sons. We cannot be anything else, as in the case of the prodigal son. God cannot take His child into His house as a servant, because His heart could not be satisfied. He could not treat as a servant for this reason one whom He loved as a son. When the prodigal knows the father's love, he does not say as he had intended to say, "Make me as one of thy hired servants." How could he say it when his father's arms were hanging on his neck, and when all the house was to be happy because the father was happy and satisfied with his son? He could do nothing but wonder and adore; and, as it has been remarked, we lose sight of the prodigal, and all we think about is the father and his house. Now as the father's house was approached, what fears and tremblings, what questionings were in his mind, such as, What will he say to me? and the like; and the nearer he got, the more uneasy he grew, until the father was on his neck, then all was over. So it is with a soul getting to God.

There is uneasiness, if the work of the Spirit is there, until God's mind has been accepted from Himself; not from any progress or experience we may have known, but from Himself; and the nearer our hearts get to God, the more uneasy we are until we know God's mind and get it from Himself. Then we know it for ourselves. When we have learned to take our thought of our case from God's mind we get peace. It would be inconsistent for us to say we are not sons because we are so failing; for if the Father is Father, the son must be son. He has no other place to give us but sons; for He cannot take us out of Christ and make us something else. "Now are we the sons of God." We have our place as sons on earth. We know the perfect relationship, but we do not know the glory yet, "what we shall be." "We, through the Spirit, wait for the hope of righteousness." I do not wait to be a child, I am one, neither do I wait for righteousness which I have already in Christ; but I wait for the glory which is the hope of righteousness.

50 How am I to know the clue for all this, that I may understand it? I must get back to Christ as the pattern of revelation, the model Man; "for we know that when He shall appear we shall be like Him." He is the first-born among many brethren. "We shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is." All the glory is His who became a man, that He might take us back into all the joy of the Father's presence. It is this that makes Christ's coming again the one object, the one hope of our heart, though death would be gain to me. I do not hope for death. I might rejoice, but I do not hope to die. I hope for Christ to come; "not that I would be unclothed, but clothed upon"; not to put off this tabernacle, but that mortality may be swallowed up of life.

Paul had eternal life, having got hold of it in Christ; and he has such a sense of the power of life, that he longs to be in the enjoyment of all its consequences. He is always confident: "Absent from the body, present with the Lord." If I drop the body I have life, eternal life, in my soul, and I am looking for the glory if I die. Blessed as it is to see a saint die (and it is the most lovely sight in the world), that is not the hope of the saint. Our only hope is, when Christ shall appear "we shall be like Him." We shall not all die, but we shall all be conformed to the likeness of God's Son.

It is God's intention to conform us to the likeness of His Son in glory. I do not look to be conformed to Him in the grave, but as He is; for we shall be witnesses of His victory over death. The thief on the cross said, "Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom." Christ said, You shall not wait till then; you shall be happy today with me in Paradise, thus bringing in the separate state of blessedness of a soul; and it surely is a blessed thing. God's intention is to conform us to Christ in glory, and Christ's coming is the only hope of the Church. "It doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him." What is more, "We shall see Him as He is"; not see Him as He was, but as He is. In one sense, I am not nearer to His likeness at the day of my death than at the day of my conversion; but morally I am, and they are never separated. The revelation of the glory of my soul shuts out everything inconsistent with it.

51 Paul says to the Philippians, "If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead" - nothing can ever satisfy my soul but that. There is present fellowship with His sufferings, looking forward to the prize of His high calling; but he says, I have not got it yet, "I press toward the mark." "Our conversation is in heaven, from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body." It will be actual glory with and in Christ, "forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth to those things which are before." He would not have or allow one atom of his life to be inconsistent with the resurrection. We ought all to be able to say, "This one thing I do; forgetting the things which are behind, I am reaching forward to be like Christ." "He that hath this hope in Him purifieth himself, even as He is pure."

Take Christ's love in Ephesians: "Christ loved the Church, and gave Himself for it; that He might sanctify and cleanse it by the washing of water by the Word, that He might present it to Himself a glorious Church." The application of the Word did not make the glory brighter, but was preparing for it.

52 The revelation of Christ as He is, forms the soul to think, "If I am to be like Him by-and-by, I will be as like Him as I can now." "He that hath this hope in Him purifieth himself, even as He is pure"; so that he may be like Him now, having the blessed privilege to get this as the measure, "even as He is pure." "I sanctify myself"; that is, He is set apart as the one according to God's mind, as the model, that we may look at Him and be like Him. "That they also might be sanctified through the truth," is the Holy Ghost taking of the things of Christ and showing them unto us.

"We beholding, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory." The real practical power of the hope of the coming of the Lord sanctifies and forms the affections of the heart; and the revelation of the glory of Christ is the means of my purifying myself as He is pure, the Word revealing Christ, and drawing forth the affections of the heart to Him, that I may grow up to Him in all things.

In Colossians it is that he might present every man perfect in Christ Jesus; that is, having the heart fully set on everything that belongs to Christ, "who is the image of the invisible God," in whom all the fulness was pleased to dwell. After developing all these things of Christ's glory, he says, "I want to get every man perfect according to these glories of Christ"; and that which makes it so blessed is, that it is the joy of being like Christ. It is not as giving us a law to walk by, or precepts to guide us. There are precepts; but that which purifies is the affections being set on Christ, to be like Christ now, as it is the purpose of God that we should be conformed to the image of His Son.

53 I would just say, Christ's coming is to receive the Church to Himself before He appears, as in Thessalonians; and this is the delight of the heart's affections (it is a little different to the appearing with Him in glory); "so shall we ever be with the Lord." We get the thought, we are all to be caught up together to meet the Lord. I might say, "There's one so strong in faith and good works, he will surely go up first." No; all distinction fades away in Christ; all is gone in the thought, we all get there together. When I look back and see the devotedness of Paul, I think of the love of Christ, who takes us all up together, to be with Him for ever. That there may be no difference, all alike are to be conformed to the image of God's own Son.

Christ's love rests perfectly upon the Church, because it is Himself; He cannot hate His own flesh. That which is most intimate in affection is common to us all. We go to be with the Lord; not to appear with Christ, blessed as that is, but to be with Him. It is a special blessing to be with Christ, which is far better than to appear with Him as partaker of the glory. It is a marvelous honour to be honoured with Him, but it is better to be with Him; therefore, the apostle says, "So shall we ever be with the Lord." He is satisfied with that.

In Colossians it is, "When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with Him in glory"; and he immediately connects it with responsibility. "Mortify therefore your members which are on the earth"; but when he speaks of being with the Lord, oh, that will not be connected with any growth or progress I may have made, but on the common ground of Christ's love to His own! I can look at the saints, even at Paul, and say, "We shall be with Him together." The appearing with Christ is connected with responsibility of service.

54 I shall delight in the Thessalonian believers when in the glory as well as Paul; but they will not be my crown of rejoicing, but Paul's - the reward of his service. That principle is never to be the motive of our conduct.

The hope of reward should never lead me into service; but when tried in service, as we surely shall be, then it sustains the soul in the path. What was Christ's motive? Infinite, divine love. What is said of Him, "who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross," is also said of Moses: "He endured, as seeing Him who is invisible; for he had respect unto the recompense of reward." If I am preaching to sinners the love of Christ constrains me, but I want something to sustain me in the path. Love is the motive, but we need to be sustained by the hope set before us as we tread the path from the cross to the crown, when we shall be conformed to Him.

"Beloved, now are we the sons of God." We have not to enquire if we are sons, but take that as the ground of our now being conformed to Him.

Our souls must get to delight in God. God has unfolded Himself. "Oh," you will say, "that is so high!" Well, but Christ has come as the link to what is so high by coming so low (and He stooped lower than any), and He made Himself our only object. It is not the power of the mind that thinks about it, but the singleness of the eye that looks at it; the single eye has no object but Christ. The old nature is not to act. The new man has no other object than Christ.

You are called to know God. "Acquaint now thyself with Him, and be at peace." That was always true, but you are now called to know God in Christ. Oh that the world may not get into our hearts in such sort as to make us incapable of enjoying God! He is leading us from circumstances by the communication of the divine nature to the knowledge and enjoyment of God. If I am in sorrow, God is my comfort; if I have suffered loss, Christ is everything to me. We are to cast all our cares upon Him, great and small; and so "the peace of God shall keep our hearts and minds by Christ Jesus." Is His throne shaken by our cares, because they are so many, and so great? No; His throne is unaffected by them all. Thus, while it is applicable to the commonest cares, all these things but bring us into the knowledge of God.

55 May our communion and fellowship be such as that we may know His peace; not peace with Him, but the peace in which He dwells; to know that His throne is not disturbed by all our cares, and thus to know Him, and find our joy in Him, and wait to be like Him, "purifying ourselves even as He is pure!"

6.

It was not simply now (any more than with us) the setting forth of the grace and goodness of God in a world that knew Him not, in the midst of a world of sin and misery, though it was a blessed privilege that one should be permitted to be the channel of such a testimony as the Gospel, the messenger to bring in the wondrous message of love to this wretched world. That, of course, met with opposition, but it was a wonderful and sensible blessing to man.

The Spirit had another service to perform, another truth to unfold. "Ungodly men had crept in unawares," and it became necessary to warn against evil. It is far more difficult to preserve blessing when it is brought in than to testify of it at the first. So we find in Jude the exhortation given to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints, not merely to publish the tidings of the blessing that had been brought in pure and uncorrupted. "Believe not every spirit." Far happier to say, "Believe the Spirit"; but because of error it had to be said, "Believe not" - the mystery of iniquity which was to come in, and was already in the world, required it. All the Apostles had to warn thus against the evil which had come in, and John more especially, as being the last of them.

56 "Try the spirits, whether they are of God, because many false prophets are gone out into the world." Men had slept, and the enemy had sown tares. Satan always seeks by violence and opposition to resist the coming in of truth, and to hinder its reception; or if he cannot do that, then, when it is come in, he will corrupt the truth. "Evil men have crept in unawares," false prophets (or false spirits) are gone out into the world - holy kind of men, it may be, in their way, but false prophets, who attack true and simple souls, with great apparent power, a mingling of much real truth; but error must be put down in the heart and conscience.

It is a great mercy to have orthodoxy professed; by orthodoxy, I mean the cardinal truths of the Gospel, although, of course, the profession of orthodoxy is not life. There may be orthodoxy, and yet not life, especially in these days; and we have come back to where the Spirit of God will keep the soul in possession of the truth. There may not be salvation, though there may be orthodoxy of profession.

The Lord may allow intellect to work, and then the question may arise, as with Pilate, "What is truth?" We find in men two things: scepticism and infidelity. The sceptic doubts all the truth; the infidel denies the truth altogether, and says there is no truth, no knowledge, no doctrine; that is what infidelity always will do. There is difficulty in every truth; the consequence is, that when men get tired of their sins, and think about giving them up, or are troubled about the consequences, they begin to enquire about truth, turn very serious for a while, attend to their religious duties, as they call it, and all that. Finding it difficult, though, they tire, and soon grow weary of it, and seek to get hold of something that promises certainty, and at the same time saves them the trouble of knowing truth for themselves. So they look for something established on human authority, and lean on the judgment and opinions of men. This is authority in a bad sense, man's word.

57 God exercises true authority over the conscience. The truth is authority, but men want something that will save them the exercise of their hearts and consciences before God. On human authority the conscience is not with God, and they would be independent of God. Now this degrades man beneath what he was intended to be; for his true position was to be dependent on God. This is man's true glory. The conscience must be brought into contact with God, into the presence of God, and this is true ministry. Whatever ministry fails to do this, or has not this for its object, is not of God, because it is putting something between the soul and God.

If ministry be real, it brings God directly to the conscience through the Word, whereas that which is false stands between God and the conscience; and this will enable us to detect the difference, and to discern at once what is false or true ministry. God has promised to guide the humble, and He will secure the humble soul against false prophets.

The word of God never treats man's mind as being competent to judge it; for it would be the judgment of what is authority itself over the conscience. People have confounded the power of the Word to work in the conscience, with a competency to judge the Word, and it is an awful thing! Man's mind is incapable of judging God's word. If he could, it would not be God's at all; for that would be supposing man's mind equal to God's, and there would be no God. The natural conscience may judge of individual commands; such as, "Thou shalt not steal." I am capable of also judging, so far as to know that it is good when it has acted on my soul. It is like taking food. I may be entirely ignorant of the process of nutrition and digestion, yet I may know the full value of food, and be conscious of the invigorating effect produced by the food when eaten.

58 There are many things that may be estimated when they have acted on me, though I may have no competency to judge of them but by their effect. God's word tells me that I am thus or thus. The soul receives the effect by divine power. That is the Word judging me, not my judging the Word; but the Word can produce in me the competency to judge, and these are often confounded in reasoning, Where am I to find the competency? that is the question. It is in the Word, because it comes and approves itself to the heart by acting with power on the conscience.

Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God; it begins with power. "Believe not every spirit." It is not simply the truth, and men's minds at work; there are false spirits acting on man's mind, certain energies are at work acting on man's mind. While poor man thinks himself independent, there is a spirit working which is either of God or of the devil, either truth or error to the soul. "False prophets are gone out into the world."

The confession of Jesus Christ come in the flesh is of God. That which puts all to the test is the real acknowledgment of Christ come in the flesh. It proves the truth of the person; it is the proper faith of him that speaks, and not a mere confession, because if I have faith in a thing I am subject to it; that is, I am subject to Christ. No evil spirit is so subject. It would not be an evil spirit if it were. "Try the spirits." Unless Jesus Christ is owned as God manifest in the flesh, it is not of God. "Many false prophets are gone out into the world," and the owning of the lordship and authority of the Lord Jesus Christ is to be the test of everything. You will find a thousand things set up instead; but that spirit that does not bow to the Lord Jesus Christ is not of God. "Ye are of God, little children." There is no thought of putting them on their own competency or ability to judge, or on the authority of other men, but on the Spirit of God; "for greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world." It is as much as to say, "If the Holy Ghost is in you, He will overcome; if not, Satan will surely get the better."

59 The Church of God is, as it were, the great prize between Satan and God. So with Pharaoh and Israel when he refuses to let the people go. "Thus saith the Lord, Let my people go." Immediately the answer is, "Who is the Lord, that I should obey Him?" There, though it was to bring out the manifestation of the power of God in His judgment upon Pharaoh that He might prove Himself the mightier, as Jethro speaks, "Now I know the Lord is greater than all gods: for in the thing wherein they dealt proudly He was above them." (Ex. 18: 11). By-and-by He will show this out more fully. When the Lord appears, and Satan is bound, there will be an end to this conflict; but now it is carried on in our individual walk, and God would now exercise men's faith and conscience, and manifest His power in keeping them. We get here the power of walk: "Greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world."

One of the most alarming symptoms in the religious world at the present day is the idea that there is power in the truth to preserve. There is no power in the truth to preserve; but the question is, whether the soul holds fast the truth. Unless my thoughts, my heart, are in the truth, there will be no power in the truth to me. It is very certain that God will keep His truth; but is my heart kept? If not, it is the mere confidence of man's mind; for "greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world."

60 The only ground of victory is the power of the Spirit of God in the affections and consciences of the saints; and then the heart will be set on Christ, and the things of Christ, to love Him, enjoy Him, and serve Him better. The conflict and difficulty are rather when the truth is brought in question than when it first goes forth in power. If I am not kept by the Spirit of God, I shall not be able to resist the daily solicitations of sin.

Man may grow tired of his sins, and tired of the world; for he has long been in bondage to them, and desires sincerely too, to break off from his sins. He is attracted at first by that which promises him deliverance, and is glad to close with the offer, and so breaks off from his sins for a while, and is very religious, and seems devoted too; but his soul does not continue. He does not like the trials and tribulations which arise. He cannot bear to lose his friends, and his prosperity, and his place in the world, and then error is found the easier thing, and there must come a falling away, and so it will be but a little flock.

False religion might make a monk, but can never put the conscience into the presence of God. Error quarrels not with men's passions; for false religion in the man ever ministers to the passions, the thoughts, the feelings of men. Thus, it is false religion that suits the world better than truth, because it suits itself to man, and the mass will ever follow error. Paul had to say, "All in Asia are turned away from me." The Apostle did not expect that truth would have power over the world, but plainly declared that error would. So we see, when the Lord allows the sifting of a large body of people on a point of truth, the greater number will adopt the error.

61 "They are of the world, therefore speak they of the world, and the world heareth them"; but "ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them." If God were in them, they were kept; if not, they would fall away from the truth. We must rely on what has been declared by the Spirit of God, rather than on what is the expectation of men.

The Apostle himself believed in the power of truth as much as anyone, but he had not the vain expectation that the truth had power to reform the world. "Ye are of God, little children." This is the guard, not of the power, but of the means. We are of God. "He that knoweth God heareth us." It is not said "overcomes," but heareth us - he is of the truth. They had the spiritual power of discovering what was truth. The means of ascertaining truth from error was the recognition of the Word. Whosoever did not submit to the inspired Word was not to be listened to. Though they might speak like angels, it was not of God, it was of themselves.

"He that is of God heareth us." I could not say, "You must hear me or you will be lost"; but I could say this: "If you do not hear the message of the Gospel which I speak to you, you will perish, because it is the truth of God, and you are to search for yourselves and see." I am no guarantee of truth. I have it from God; but in the Apostles themselves I get the guarantee and the test of truth. If you are of God you will believe it; but if anyone hindered another from hearing an Apostle he could say at once such a one was not of God; for "he that is of God heareth us." Their immediate testimony was the test God was using of truth and error. No man now is the immediate vessel or guarantee of truth.

62 Mark further, the moment I require anything to establish the authority of the Word, I take the authority of the Word away; for the thing rested on is, of course, that which is supposed to establish the Word, and not the Word itself. If I take anything as proving the Word of God, and so believe it, that is not believing the Word.

The Spirit of God and the word of God must go together. The word of God will not do alone; for I may attempt to judge the Word by my own private judgment, and so get wrong. The Spirit of God will not do alone either; for I may mistake my own fancies for the Spirit; they go together. Then the moment the Word reaches my heart it is absolute authority, and the Word judges me. When they are both received into the heart, when thus in complete possession of me, Satan cannot touch me, because they will allow nothing of the flesh, self-will, etc., to work. Is there evil in me? They will enable me to judge it in myself and in everything around me. Such a one is guaranteed against all error; he has the Spirit and the word of God. These are the comforting, peaceful, blessed means of guarding us from all evil.

The effect of a man's being saved is that he is brought to God, having perfect peace - brought into an entirely new world. He has his soul constantly delighting in the Word, where all the wisdom of God is brought out for his soul to be exercised in, endless and safe, learning all that God is. What we all have to seek is to be occupied with the truth every day, knowing more of delighting and feeding on Christ, as the true God, and as the perfect Man, subject in all things to His Father; and all this is not so as to be able to write an essay on it, but as the Christ, in whom I know God and man, the One who lived by the Father, depending on the Father. Then everything that is not of Him strikes upon my soul. It is THAT CHRIST who is touched, and it affects the whole harmony of the soul.

63 Be sure of this, if it is not the living power of a living Christ known and enjoyed in your soul, you cannot withstand error. It must be truth held in connection with the person of Christ or it will not guard you against error; the mere truth is no match for Satan. I would not venture to meet Satan on the truth if I were not called to do it, to warn the saints, and for the glory of God, because I should be afraid, but I know God will keep me when in His service. I do not therefore cast myself down from off the pinnacle of the temple, because it is written in the Word, "He shall give His angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways."

We get set forth in Cain and Abel the traits of the two families; viz., in Cain, hatred, violence, and wickedness; in Abel, suffering, righteousness, and love. The eternal life which was with the Father is communicated to the Christian, producing in him Christ's ways, thoughts, and feelings. "Everyone that loveth is born of God." "He that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God," for God is love. Love is the inner development of the divine nature. As I cannot enjoy or exercise the faculties and affections of a man if I have not the nature of a man, no more can I enjoy God's affections unless I have the nature of God.

It is an old remark, that "knowledge cannot love." You must have this nature, be born of God, or you cannot love. Man's searching gets nothing. Unless he know the love of God in the Lord Jesus Christ he cannot love.

Suppose there is a general notion of God, and that His eternal Godhead is seen and acknowledged. If I have knowledge, and try to understand things, I shall be confounded; for when the state of the whole world is looked upon, what do I see? Why, three-fourths of it given up to idolatry, worshipping the devil, and oppression, degradation, and misery overwhelming multitudes even in this great city; and the mind gets into confusion. Men may try to say that it is all needful for the general government of man, but this will not do for those who are suffering. If it be said, "Sin is the cause of it all," then I say, "If sin has come in, what can I have, as a sinner, to say to God? How can I meet God?" It is of no use to tell me that He is good. He is that; but I am responsible to God, and the more I get into the truth, the more I am confounded, and thrown almost into despair.

64 Neither scepticism nor authority will do anything for me here; but the moment I get Christ the whole thing is clear; Christ clears it all up. I have not something now that can deal with it, but God who has dealt with it. God is seen in Him as dealing with this creation in all its sin and misery. Then, I say sin has ruined us; all are guilty. I am guilty; but He has met my sin in the very way I wanted it.

When I was in perplexity and despair about my sins, and when I found no way of meeting God, then it was God who met me, and showed me how He had settled it all to His glory in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, who has met all for me. He came into the world to be a propitiation for our sins, into all the misery, to put it away, and give Himself as the source of life, and putting away of that sin which would hinder the enjoyment of God; and then, to the perfecting of this love, to introduce us into that which is above. He came down that He might take us up with Him.

"Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." "Herein is our love made perfect" (or love with us made perfect), "that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as He is, so are we in this world." I get the love manifested in His coming to me, and taking me up into the presence of God perfect in Himself.

65 The communication of the nature gives the power to love, and then it is, "Not that we love God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins"; thus giving us the object for our love to rest upon and work upon, always elevating, always satisfying. It is not the mysticism that delights in its own exercise working on itself; but there is an infinite and blessed object, and we are brought into association with and likeness to that blessed object, not allowing in us the least fear, all being taken away by His divine work, and we at rest, perfectly happy with God. Whatever does not make our hearts know God as perfect in love to ourselves and in ourselves, is not the whole truth; whatever does not set me in the presence of God without a single fear remaining, so that I can enjoy His love, is not adequate to His love to me.

Nine lectures on the First Epistle of John

J. N. Darby.

<37000E> 65 {file section c.}

7.

The apostle in this part of the chapter returns to the great doctrine of the whole epistle. It is not here so much the great truth which sets the soul before God, but the truth we have when we are before God.

We have already been noticing the difference between Paul and John. While Paul sets the Church as justified before God, opening out the counsels of God, etc., John brings out the nature of God in the saints. It is not so much the ground of that which brought the soul to God, although he does speak of that too, but it is the character of the life that is communicated - the life which is in God the Father, derived through Christ; it is first in Christ, and then manifested in the saints. The traits of the divine nature are brought out through the Christian, and this is particularly brought out in John.

66 There is also another thing in this chapter. It is not merely that there is a nature and capacity to enjoy God, but the Holy Ghost is given as the power of that nature. The Holy Ghost dwelling in us gives us the power of enjoyment; but that there may not be mysticism, that there may be no vacillation or uncertainty, he grounds the testimony in the public manifestation of the Lord Jesus Christ. The capacity of enjoying the source of the life is by the power of the Holy Ghost dwelling in us.

God is love, and that is first openly seen at the cross of Christ; and then in the new nature we have a capacity to enjoy that love; but the fear must be taken away, because fear hath torment, and torment is not enjoyment. Then he shows what removes the fear. "Perfect love casteth out fear" - not perfect righteousness; that had given the peace before God, but the revelation of Himself, and what He is, alone casteth out fear.

If it be asked, "How do you know God loves you?" "Oh," I reply, "I have a certain and constant proof of that in the gift of His Son! Besides that I have the daily and hourly enjoyment of God as my Father, and I know it because I am enjoying it." I may prove to another the love of God by certain acts, such as the gift of His own Son, which is an open manifestation of God's love; but this does not take away from the daily enjoyment of God, the capacity for which I get in the new nature and by the power of the Spirit.

It is remarkable to see how the apostle guards from mysticism by bringing the mind back to the plain statement of the gospel. "We have seen, and do testify, that the Father hath sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world." In the seventh verse be begins by saying, "Beloved, let us love one another." Here we have the love of God in exercise in the new nature, and the characteristic of this nature is to recognize it in another. If I have this divine nature, I cannot help liking it in another. I may have many prejudices to overcome, but there is an attractive power in the thing itself. I do not speak of it as a mere duty; it is there in the nature, and being divine it is much above angels, although they are higher creatures.

67 We are to love all men, to do good to all; that is, benevolence which acts toward that which is in need. I do not speak of that now; but there is an attractive power in the communication of the divine nature which necessitates love, which links one to another, and to Christ. There is power there; it may be very imperfect in us, but it is real, and attracts to the Divine Person.

We need something more than the new nature, because it is a dependent nature, therefore wants something else. Christ, when down here, lived a dependent life. "I live by the Father."

The old man sets himself up and pretends to be independent, but all the while is under the power of Satan; but the new nature is a dependent nature. It leans on power, and delights to do so.

The Holy Ghost is the power, "strengthened with all might by His SPIRIT in the inner man." That is the full blessing, both in the individual soul and in the Church of God. Though we have the new nature, we want the power of the Holy Ghost in us to remove the obstacles to its display.

Labour will not do; you may labour, but just as a mountain of cold snow, which no labour may remove, melts before the bright shining of the sun, and all vanishes away; so nothing but the warm kindlings of divine affection in the soul by the power of the Holy Ghost will dissolve the thick ice of our hearts, and melt away all that which is in us to obstruct and hinder its fuller manifestation.

"Love is of God, and everyone that loveth is born of God." When I have received this nature I am born of God, and am brought into a position to refer everything up to God; for the nature we get from God has God for the object of that new nature to act upon. When I see the traits of this nature in another I say he is born of God. I see love in natural affection, but here it is in a divine sense. In natural affection selfishness is the ground of it all; but in the saint "he that loveth is born of God," while selfishness is the spring of everything out of God.

68 We find in the soul that is born of God another principle which takes a man entirely out of himself. A man makes himself a fortune by some new invention that makes the world more comfortable, and what is this but selfishness? All that gives an impulse to the progress of the world is selfishness. Here is the difference - we are in a world where we all have to follow our various occupations and callings. In a Christian it is not selfishness; it is love. He has got out of every other motive; he is born of God, and love is the spring of all his actions, as love is the principle of God's nature. It may be very feeble in me; but am I to be satisfied that it should remain so?

Whatever is born of God came down from God, and returns to God again; therefore "be ye imitators of God, as dear children." This perfect love came down from God that it might return to God again; for whom did Christ come down to glorify but His Father? For all that Christ did, returned to God, a sweet-smelling savour, or else it would have been lost.

There are many beautiful qualities in a creature of God; but do they return to God again? No; then it becomes sin. I get a good thing, and enjoy it, and leave God out. That is man's sin. There may be a great deal of selfishness under that which outwardly appears like liberality.

You will see a Christian help his brother, and look up to God as doing it to God, because He loves God; but if he helps him and says to himself, "I have done well," it ceases to be love; it is self-applause, and that is selfishness.

69 The new nature gets God as the source, and God as the object, and thus is the truth of the new nature guarded, by being connected with this counter truth, that God is the object for this new nature to act upon. The new nature acts in us like God, so that others can see it; but then it knows God, and I can conceive of nothing higher than to know God. "Everyone that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God"; and it is a great comfort to say in everything, I have found God.

Then mark another truth (v. 8), "He that loveth not knoweth not God." There is no knowledge of God but in the possession of the nature of God - there is no power to apprehend Him. You may see His works, and say there must be a God; but is that knowing Him? I must have God's nature to know Him, because none can know love but by loving, and he who thus knows Him will apprehend Him. Take a philosopher who talks about God, and set him in the presence of God - you would find it is the last place he would like to be in; and why so? Because he has never been there before.

"In this was manifested the love of God toward us." This is no abstract notion about love; it is not said merely, "In this was manifested the love of God", but, "In this was manifested the love of God toward us."

Man's mind cannot measure God; mind can only measure mind, measure thoughts; but mind cannot measure love, for love is only known by loving and being loved. If man's mind were a competent judge of what God should be, God would not be God, and how must this love of God be found? In a most humble way (so much the better) the soul must come in as wanting this love; for if it can come in any other way, it does not want God.

The moment any soul finds its need of God, there and then God is waiting to meet its need. It was so in the case of the Syrophoenician woman, who brought forth that word of the Lord - "O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt!" The great faith is knowing my need, counting on God's willingness to meet it. It may be vague; it was in the woman who came into the house; but still there was faith. When I find that manifested in God which meets my need, that is faith. I never get into the place of God's meeting my need till I know God is God and I am a sinner.

70 When we are in our place we shall find God in His; when I am brought down to the sense that the only thing I have is sin, then God can act - "when we were yet without strength" God acted "in due time." God being the doer, He does it in the perfectness of His own love and time. "In this was manifested the love of God toward us." I can stand before God and talk to sinners, and say, "I know God in a way in which angels do not know Him, which things the angels desire to look into - God's love toward us." I do not say me, but toward us, taking in all the saints - that little word, us, ceaselessly rung in our ears by the Holy Ghost putting us in the full consciousness of the favour of God toward us, "that we might live through Him."

Not only is God's love manifested when it is needed, but where it must have its own proper perfectness, and it comes out perfectly where nothing depends on man to bring it out or make it clear. It was manifested when we were dead, "that we might live through Him."

If I examine my own heart I cannot find it out. I know more of God's heart than I do of my own; for my own is so subtle I cannot get to the bottom of it; for "the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?" and the best man upon earth will be the first to confess this.

71 I do not get the full character of God to my soul till I see it in the cross; for what was in man was nothing but sin, and when that sin was met there was nothing between God and His Son; and if He was alone in that work, this is a proof of what God has done in my circumstances of death.

He sent His Son that I might live through Him, and not only live through Him, but my sins being all put away, I see eternal life through Him for me, and He being the propitiation for my sins, I find my sins are gone, and life is come. Well then, after such a proof of God's love, let us not be thinking of our love to God. Who am I that I should be coupling God's love with mine? Do not talk to me about loving God; it is a wretched poor thing (I do love Him); but let us talk of God's loving us. The moment I begin to think of my love to God, that moment it ceases, it is gone; the manna I gathered yesterday has turned to corruption.

Heaven will be when I have entirely forgotten myself, and am filled with God. That very same love which will fill heaven was manifested in the cross; for there it put all my sins away, and in heaven there are none. I want something on which my soul may be stayed. Well, God loves me; and that which makes me know how much He loves me is, that He gave His Son for me. Then, as my soul rests upon this love of God, no measure of failure can be adequate to shake my confidence, as I estimate God's love in the gift of His Son. His love is not exhausted, though my need may be great and my failures many; but I have a constant abiding proof, which follows me all my life through.

How much He loves me is shown in the gift of His Son; and my soul rests in peace on this love, as manifested in the cross, which is "the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever." It was proved at the cross, and abides there; it was outside us in the world, and it made known to us when we wanted it in getting life, finding nothing in us but the need that depends upon it. The enjoyment of this love is another thing, and that is carried on by the daily and hourly communion with God as our Father, by the Spirit in us.

72 Verse 11. The Apostle having given a proof of God's love goes on to the exercise of it in us while down here. "Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another," and this principle we find brought out in other parts of the Word, as in Eph. 4: 3 2: "Forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you"; also in Col. 3: 13.

Verse 12. "No man hath seen God at any time." I cannot know God by seeing Him; but in John's Gospel (John 1: 18 ), "The only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him." He who knew what was God's love has told it out - the Son who dwelt in the bosom of the Father, who enjoyed the Father's love without any alloy, He is the One who comes to tell it to me, as He knew and enjoyed it Himself, and I know God according to that revelation He has made; for "He hath declared Him." In the Epistle of John he goes a step further. It is communicated livingly to us. "True in Him and in you." (1 John 2: 8). It was true in Him, and now it is true in you who believe.

"If we love one another, God dwelleth in us." That is the source of it, and the enjoyment of it is by the power of the Holy Ghost. "His love is perfected in us." It is not my love perfected in God, but His love is perfected in me; and I know, being in Him that is infinite, I shall never get out of it. It is not that I am infinite myself, but I am in Him who is infinite. His love is perfected in us. "Hereby know we that we dwell in Him, and He in us, because He hath given us of His Spirit" (v. 13). Here it is communion, and not merely power. It is in the nature of God, and not merely the power of God. I enjoy it because He has given me of His own Spirit, the joy of communion being by the power of His Spirit.

73 Angels know not this joy; and why is this? Because they never have the Holy Ghost dwelling in them; but God hath "given us of His Spirit," because we are members of Christ, the fruit of the travail of His soul, what He desires (not we), for we are lost in Him. Therefore, having received of His own Spirit, we ought to seek to have the life of Jesus made manifest in our mortal bodies. The divine nature in a man is shown by having God for its object.

"And we have seen and do testify, that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world" (v. 14). Observe, the apostle gets back to the person of the Son, but in a more advanced state of soul, as knowing Him who sent the Son. "We have seen." Thus it was a known and enjoyed love. While Paul gives us the Church and the purposes and counsels of God, John speaks of the nature in which God dwells; and what is the effect of this? It is Worship, because that is the highest thing we can enjoy in the knowledge of God. Look at the scene in the Revelation. God is on His throne, and the elders are on thrones around. Can anything be higher than this? Yes, they fall down and worship before Him who sat on the throne, and cast down their crowns before the throne, saying, "Thou are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honour, and power." Then observe, when the apostle realized the privilege of getting up to the Giver of every good and perfect gift, then he turns to the very simplest truth - "The Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of he world."

Thus we see the very highest saints are the best evangelists. The father in Christ links himself with the weakest babe, and the very way of bringing God into a world of sinners was by linking Himself with the most needy thing on the face of the earth. It is not the extent of knowledge that is needed, but the knowledge of God in the power of living communion, that is the power of evangelizing. The love that reaches the highest will stoop the lowest. The Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world; it is not here merely as the Messiah to the Jews, but as the Saviour of the world.

74 "Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God" (v. 15). God dwelleth in the soul that has this fellowship and communion, and it in God; for "whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ, is born of God." "The Father sent the Son." Here we have the subordination of the Son in connection with the Father. "The Father sent the Son." His eye rests on Him, on the Man Christ Jesus. We are not to reason about it. I must not have philosophy, but faith; and the soul taught of God can say, "I know that the Man Christ Jesus was the Son of God."

"Herein is love with us made perfect . . . because as He is, so are we in this world." (v. 17). Here he is not speaking of the love of God manifested to the sinner on the cross, but the extent of it in the saint, who is taken up in and with Christ. As He has been made sin for you on the cross, so you will be made the righteousness of God in Him in heaven, therefore there can be no question of judgment unless Christ can be judged.

"We have known and believed the love that God hath to us." Love cannot be enjoyed where there is a bad conscience, therefore you must get the conscience purged.

Satan may act on the conscience, as well as the Spirit of God, but you may always detect the difference, as Satan always acts in the way of despair; while the Spirit of God always points to a resource in God, and the soul, however much distressed, feels there is goodness in God if it can only get at it. So the prodigal knew his need, and said, "There is bread enough and to spare in my father's house." Thus the soul knows God's love, and believes in it; and when the Father is on the neck of the prodigal that settles every question; for the son is lost in the testimony of what the Father is. Having peace with God, we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand.

75 "God is love." There is not a word here of what man is. God is love; that is the only God I know, and the only way that I can know Him. If I am in Christ, is God going to impute to me the sin Christ has put away? Certainly not. I have sins, but they have all been judged in Christ; then God will not judge them again. What difficulty we have in believing what God really is, because we have been so long away from God, that we have become so narrowed in ourselves; but if we do come to know Him, then our hearts should be as wax, ready to receive the impressions of His love.

8.

The last time, speaking on the preceding verses of this chapter (4), I was, in closing, referring to two things here the first, in verse 9, the love of God as manifested to the world in giving His Son for us; and the second, in verse 17, its double fruit of love and life in us. God's love, in contrast with man's, is distinguished by this, that while man must have something to draw out his love (as it is said, "For a good man some would even dare to die; but God commandeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us"), God's love is without motive, their being nothing attractive in the object that draws it out. "In due time Christ died for the ungodly." God's love sees no good in us.

76 The brightest proof of God's love and man's enmity was seen in the cross; they met there, and thus showed the superiority of God's love. As Jethro says, "In the thing wherein they dealt proudly He was above them" (Ex. 18: 11). Verse 9 sets out the open manifestations of His love to us while we were yet sinners.

We learn His purposes and counsels about us as saints, in the second place, in verse 17: "Herein is love with us made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as He is, so are we in this world." This is a very different thing from His first visiting us in our sins. "Herein is love with us made perfect." The perfectness of God's love towards His saints is seen in the bringing them to be like Christ Himself.

The sovereign grace of God puts the saint into the same place as Christ, that we may have the same kind of fellowship with the Father that Christ had. So in John 14, the Lord says, "My peace I give unto you" - that is, the peace He had with His Father - "not as the world giveth, give I unto you."

The world has the character of a benefactor; and that it sometimes gives generously I do not deny. It is done by helping a man as he is, out of the resources which it has - which may be all very well; yet, while helping him, it is only taking care of itself. It is evidently a different thing here; for Christ takes us entirely out of our condition, putting us into the same relationship with the Father as Himself. The world cannot give in this way.

There is no guarding anything for self in Christ's unjealous love; but in us there is. Therefore He could say, "Not as the world giveth, give I unto you." His delight was to show that the Father loved them as He loved Him. "The glory thou hast given me I have given them . . . that the world may know that thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me." Jesus not only loves them Himself, but He will have it known by the world that they are loved by the Father as He Himself is loved. Can there be anything more disinterested than this? (although the word "disinterested" fails to give the full meaning). Still all this is guarded; for Christ ever keeps His place as the eternal Son of God.

77 At the mount of transfiguration, the moment there is the question of putting Moses and Elias on an equality with Jesus, they both disappear; for when Peter said, "Let us make three tabernacles; one for thee, and one for Moses and one for Elias . . . While he thus spake, there came a cloud, and overshadowed them," and instantly the glorified men vanished. "And there came a voice out of the cloud saying, This is my beloved Son: Hear Him." It is not said, "Hear them," but "Hear Him." "And when the voice was passed, Jesus was found alone." If Christ, in His wondrous grace, reveals Moses and Elias as His companions and associates in the glory, the moment Peter, in his foolishness, gives utterance to the thought that would place them on an equality with Christ, they must both vanish from the scene.

It does not say, "As the Father has loved them," but "As He has loved Me" (as a man); for however Christ may bring us into the same place with Himself, He abides the object of homage and honour, even as the Father. If we elevate ourselves to an equality with Christ, immediately we set ourselves above Him; but it is ever the case, that the more a saint enters into his elevation, as being brought by grace into the same place with Christ, the more he adores Christ as over all, God blessed for evermore. This is ever to be borne in mind.

The thought in verse 17, "As He is, so are we in this world," is that the saints are in the same place as Christ. If I have righteousness, it is a divine righteousness: we are "made the righteousness of God in Him." If I have life, it is a divine eternal life. "When Christ, who is our life, shall appear." If I have glory, it is the same glory: "The glory thou hast given me, I have given them." If we have an inheritance, we are "joint-heirs with Christ"; if love, it is the same love wherewith the Father loved Christ: "Thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me."

78 The love is the most difficult thing for us to enter into, but the Lord would have our hearts enjoying it. All that we have in Christ is brought out in this passage, in the general expression: "As He is, so are we." It is the thought and purpose of God's grace to bless us not only by Christ, but with Christ. Christ could not be satisfied unless it were so, we being the fruit of the travail of His soul. "Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me." Again, "I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also." The Father's love is seen in giving His Son for us, and the Son's love in His giving Himself for us, and thus bringing us into His perfect place.

Some Christians do not give this verse 17 all its power; they refer it simply to our position before God respecting the day of judgment. Whatever judgment may come, the saint has nothing to do with it; for where there is a question about judgment, there can be no boldness. There is nothing more comforting than the perfect confidence of having God as my Father. I cannot get the affections in full play if I think God is going to judge me; but I have the Spirit of adoption, and if I sin or do wrong, I run to my Father directly, because I know my Father is not going to judge me for it; for God is my Father, and will not judge (save as a Father, now, for my correction, by the way). Therefore boldness is needed for the exercise of the spiritual affections in me. We ought to remember this, for Christians often shrink from it; but it is evident that if I am hesitating whether God is going to bless me or to judge me, I cannot love Him.

79 Then observe another thing - there is a great difference between spiritual desires and spiritual affections, although they both have the same root. The spiritual desires (if the relationship which would meet them be not known) only produce sorrow. Take an orphan, for instance, in a family where the parent's love to the children is witnessed every day - the sorrowful experience would be, "Oh that I too had a father!" The child who has his parent has the same desires, but he knows the joy and gladness which flows from the relationship existing between himself and his parents. So also that we may have joy and gladness as the children of God, we must have the consciousness of the relationship in which we stand to God. It is not merely that we have a divine nature which gives us spiritual desires, but we must also have the consciousness of the relationship into which we are brought by the power of what Christ has done.

It is clear there never could be a question between Christ and His Father. He daily and hourly enjoyed the consciousness of His Father's love. "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." So also He says, "My peace I give unto you." Again He says, "That they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves." The Father's delight was in Christ, and He knew it in the daily enjoyment of it. Now "as He is, so are we in this world."

While Christ lays the ground of our relationship by being the propitiation for our sins, and the source of our life, yet it is not by Christ's righteousness that I get "boldness." I must be righteous, of course - I cannot have boldness without it; but besides this there is the character God has towards me that of a Father; and I have another character towards God - as a child. I have not only righteousness, but I am a son.

80 Here I would notice the defectiveness of some of our hymns which call Christ our brother. We never find in Scripture that Christ is called our Elder Brother. In the fulness of His grace He is not ashamed to own us as and call us His brethren. My father is a man, but I do not call him a man; it would show a want of filial reverence in me if I did. In nothing is the power of the Spirit of God more shown in the child of God than in the suitableness of his expressions and feelings towards God. If we are really enjoying our place of infinite privileges, the Source and Giver of them will maintain His own proper place in our hearts.

Theorizing about it will not do. A common expression is, "We cannot be always on the mount." So far that is true, because we all have our place of service down here. I would observe, however, that when we are in the mount of God, it always humbles; although when a saint gets down again, he may be proud of having been there. He is never so when there. Paul was not puffed up when he was caught up into the third heavens; but after he had been there, he needed the thorn in the flesh to keep him humble. The heart is never proud in God's presence, and only when it is really there is it in its right place; for when out of it, the flesh turns everything into mischief.

"As He is, so are we in this world" - not only in the same standing as to acceptance with God in Christ, but we are brought by the communication of His life into the same relationship as Himself. While in the beginning of the epistle the foundation is laid deep and wide in the blood which cleanses fully, still the grand subject of the epistle is the place into which we are brought.

"Herein is love with us made perfect." If my heart has seized the truth that God as a Father is acting in grace towards me, there is no place for fear. In all my need, and even in all my sin (with which I ought to have nothing to do) I fly to Him. I could not in my sin fly to my Judge, but I have confidence in my Father's love, and I fly to Him because "perfect love casteth out fear." In all my sins and follies I can look to Him who gave His Son for me. That is where grace puts me.

81 The proof of God's love is, that He has given His Son; the perfection of it is, that we are as He is; and fear is cast out even in view of judgment. If we ask how this came to pass, the answer is, "We love Him because He first loved us." (v. 19). There we are brought back to the simplest principles - we love God because He first loved us. We did not come to God because of His loveliness: "we love Him because He first loved us." We do not come in by loving God, but we come in as sinners, as debtors to His grace; and then, having come in as such, and finding God to be what He is - love, meeting us in our every need - then we love Him.

Verse 20: "If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar." Here is a check upon man's deceitful heart. If a man does not love his brother he cannot love God. Wherever the divine nature is, it is attractive to one born of God.

Verse 21: "And this commandment have we from Him." We have another important principle in this verse: whatever the energy of the divine life in me, it always will have the character of obedience. While there was in Christ the devotedness of love, there was also obedience. We are to love the brethren as being led by the energy of the Spirit; but I am to love them in the path of holy obedience. There is nothing so humble as obedience, and love never takes us out of the place of obedience.

The Lord Jesus said, "As the Father gave me commandment, even so I do." When Lazarus was sick, and they sent to Jesus, He abode two days in the same place where He was, because He had no word from His Father; and so, if I have any little service to do for my brother, it must be as in the path of obedience to the word of God. This is what Satan tried to get the Lord out of in the wilderness. "Oh," says Satan, "have your own will, if it is only in ever so little a bit, by making these stones into bread since you are hungry!" "No," the Lord says, "it is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." Here we get a countercheck to all the workings of nature; for if it is not a command, it is not of God, and we are here to obey.

82 1 John 5: 1: "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God." Here we get the link between God and the family. When anyone is born of God, he is my brother. If the question is asked, "Who is my brother? How am I to know my brother?" Everyone that is born of God is my brother. I may have to sorrow over him sometimes, but still he is my brother, because I am related to him by the same divine nature. It is of great importance to remember this in the present day, because, where the Holy Ghost really acts, there will be a constant tendency to follow different courses.

There has been an awaking from the dead mass around by the power of the Spirit. There are glimmerings of light. Mere stones would be motionless, but there is life; therefore the moving power would lead in different directions, because of what we are. If we were all subject to the Spirit of God, we should all go one way. There is another thing also to be observed - we are not at the beginning of Christianity, but at the dark end, and escaping as it were by different roads. The very fact of the operation of the Spirit would be to produce perfect unity if we were subject, but we are not so.

The remedy for this is for the heart to be in close fellowship with Christ; and in proportion as this is the case, will love for all saints be there. To the same extent as Christ is valued will the saint be valued. In proportion as Christ's thoughts about His saints are known to me, will all saints be in my thoughts. I do not know Christ's love aright if one saint is left out; as it is said in Ephesians 3: 18, "Ye . . . may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height, and to know the love of Christ." I can only enter into this in any measure when I embrace all saints. If I should leave one out, I leave out part of Christ's heart.

83 In Colossians we have "your love to all saints"; and in that epistle we have the fulness of the Head; in Ephesians the fulness of the body. God's grace working in me makes every one born of God the object of my affections. I cannot go every way at once, and a real difficulty arises how to walk in fidelity to Christ, and in love to the brethren, so as not to let the affections get into a loose and general way. I cannot be loving God without loving all the children of God. "By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God, and keep His commandments." (v. 2). Now men would say that is reasoning in a circle, but there is in it a deeply practical check against the evil of my own heart. If I love the Father, I shall love the children for the Father's sake, and not lead them into wrong paths, because this would displease and grieve the Father. If I should lead them into anything wrong, I should prove that I do not love them for the Father's sake, but for my own pleasure and comfort. If you truly love them, you at the same time love God and keep His commandments.

Obedience and faith in your own walk will prove that it is as God's children you love the brethren. If I know that a member of Christ's body is going wrong, does this make me cease to love him? No; but because he is going wrong my soul is more deeply and affectionately going out after him, as being one with Christ. To be able to love the brethren faithfully we must keep close to Christ.

84 Again, we have another counter-check: if one comes to me with a vast amount of truth without holiness, or if there be a great show of holiness and truth be absent, neither is of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth. Satan never touches that which is born of God; he cannot touch it.

Worldliness is a terrible hindrance to the saint. We have the threefold opposition: the world, the flesh and the devil. The world is opposed to the Father, as the flesh opposes the Spirit, and the devil opposes Christ.

The difficulty lies in not maintaining nearness to Christ, which the world would come in and hinder. Then I am open to all sorts of error, for I shall not take the trouble to be right if I am not near Christ. It is very troublesome and disagreeable sometimes to have to do even with saints: one will not give up this thing, and another that; and if we are at a distance from Christ, we shall be ready to give them up, and shall not take the pains to get them right when they are wrong. So Moses said, when in a wrong spirit, "Have I conceived all this people? have I begotten them, that thou shouldest say unto me, Carry them in thy bosom?"

Paul says, "My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you." You have got off the right ground, and I must have you, as it were, born again. I am travailing over again for you, that you may be right, because you belong to Christ. When Paul looked at them in confusion, as they were, away from Christ, he could only say, "I stand in doubt of you"; but when he looked at them as in Christ, he could say, "I have confidence in you through the Lord."

Faith not only sees Christ in the glory, but sees also the connection between the glory of Christ and the saints, the link and tie between God and His people, and it is that which enables one to get on. So Moses said of Israel, not only God was their God, but they are "Thy people." The real hindrance is the world.

85 See Gehazi in the king's court: his heart had drawn in the spirit of the world, and he was able to entertain the world with accounts of the mighty actings of the Spirit. The world must be entertained, and it will be entertained with religion if it cannot get anything else.

All that I know of the world's path, spirit, affections, and conduct is, that it has crucified my Lord; not in its affections and lusts merely, but by wicked hands it has crucified my Master. Suppose it were but yesterday that you had seen Pontius Pilate the governor, and the chief priests, and the elders, putting Christ to death, would you feel happy to-day in holding communion with them? The stain of Christ's blood is as fresh in God's sight as if it had been done but yesterday; the time which has elapsed since then makes no difference in its moral guilt.

The question then is: "Am I to get under the power of this world, or am I to overcome it (in my heart I mean)?" When Christ was down here, in all the beauty and attractive grace in which God the Father could delight, there was not found in the world one thought or sentiment of common interest or feeling with Him. The world in all its classes - rulers, priests, Pharisees, and the multitude - have all been associated in hanging the Son of God upon a gibbet. Such is the world's heart. If I have seen the glory of Christ's person, and see that He is the very Son of God who came down and was turned out by the world, can I be happy with it? The link between the natural thoughts and affections and the world exists in every heart; so that in all kinds of things, even in walking through the streets, I constantly find that which attracts my eye, and my eye affects my heart.

86 Nothing will overcome the world in my heart but the deep consciousness of how it has treated Christ. Take my children for instance. Do I want them to get along well in the world? must I have good places for them in it? Nothing but knowing the place Christ had in it will overcome the world in my heart. There is no possibility of getting on with God unless the world is given up, and the heart is satisfied with Christ. Christ must be everything.

Look at Abraham's history. He sojourned in a strange country, where he had not a place so much as to set his foot on. So we are not of the world; and this is the test of our affections; for as we are not at once taken out of evil, we must have our hearts exercised to godliness. It is very easy to overcome the world when the love of Christ has made it distasteful. Satan is the god of this world. Perhaps you will say, "That is true of the heathen world." Yes; but it is true of the whole world; although it was not till after the rejection of Christ that it was brought out, it was true before.

God has spoken by His servants and prophets, and the world had beaten one, and stoned another, and killed another; then He said, "I will send my beloved Son: it may be they will reverence Him when they see Him." But Him they crucified, thus proving that Satan was master of man. So the Lord said, "O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee."

You will not have spiritual discernment or power of motive unless the heart be kept near to Christ. I shall not want the world, if Christ is in my heart; if my delight is in that in which God delights - that is, in Christ - then I can overcome. "Whether therefore ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God."

What! must I do everything to Christ? Oh, that very question proves a heart away from Christ, showing it is bondage for you to do all to the glory of God. It is not that we are to scorn the world in the least; for God's grace is for every poor sinner that will receive it. It is the spirit of the world in my own heart which I have to overcome - that which my heart is in danger of being led by.

87 I will now just look back to the three points on which I have touched.

First, there is not merely the manifestation of God's love to the poor sinner, but perfect love with us, the association with Christ's life, putting us into relationship with God.

Second, we are to love every saint - love them as God's children, and keep ourselves in the exercise of love to God and keeping His commandments.

Third, we are to overcome the world. The heart, resting on, looking to, eating, feeding on Christ, gets the consciousness of what the world is, and overcomes.

The Lord keep us in humble dependence on Himself. His grace is sufficient for us; His strength is made perfect in our weakness.

9.

We were noticing last evening in the preceding verses that the question between God and the world is brought to an issue; for the Son of God having been seen in the world, and in the world and by the world crucified - thus putting the world to the test - God could do nothing in the world in the hope of finding good in it, after it had crucified His Son. Jesus had to say, "O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee." Having hung God's Son on the cross, it is plain that this act cut the world off from all possible association with God, and thus the world has become a thing to be overcome by the saint, as the apostle says (v. 5), "Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?" He then adds, "This is He that came by water and blood."

88 That is, he now presents the character and value of the cross - "He came by water and blood." The water and the blood are as a witness on God's part, or the testimony that God gives; for it should be observed that the words "witness," "record," and "testimony," are all the same word in the original.

You may remark here that "this is the witness, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son." This is the thing witnessed. "This is the record" (or testimony) "that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son." It is not in the first Adam, but in His Son; not in man, nor by his works, nor by any means whatever, but it is God's gift. "He hath given," and though we possess the life, it is not properly and intrinsically in us. but IN HIS SON.

When we are quickened, the life is not looked at as in us; for Christ says, "Because I live, ye shall live also." It is therefore immutable. If Christ's life, indeed, can in any way be annulled or set aside, then can the life in us be so likewise, and not otherwise. If Christ can die, so can we; but if death has no more dominion over Him, no more has it over us. This it is that gives the amazing value and the most blessed character of this life; namely, that its spring and source is in Christ.

It is given to the Son to have life in Himself (John 5: 26). Thus He becomes, through grace, our life. For example, my finger has life, my natural life flowing through it; but the seat of my life is not there. My finger may be cut off (I am not here supposing that a member of Christ can be cut off, which is impossible); but if my finger be cut off, the life still remains in my body, the seat of life not being in my finger. My finger was as much alive as the rest of my body, but the seat of life was not there. The seat of life is in Christ: "Our life is hid with Christ in God." Hence all the character of the life and all the communion flows from the blessed truth - "in His Son." The character of this life is nearness to God. Christ Himself is my life.

89 It is of the last importance for the strength and comfort of our souls, and for all blessed delight in God, clearly to understand what our life is; for our thoughts on regeneration are necessarily altogether imperfect until we apprehend that it is a real life which we have, a life associating us with God's Son, a life not possessed before, and in virtue of which we get communion with the Father, who has given us eternal life - not in us, but "in His Son."

We get brought out in various testimonies what Christ is to us, as in 1 Cor. 6: 9-11, where the Apostle, speaking of the offscouring of the earth, says, "Such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God." So here we get a corresponding testimony brought out in these three witnesses - the water, the blood, and the Spirit.

In John 19: 34 it is recorded that "one of the soldiers with a spear pierced His side, and forthwith came there out blood and water." The blood and the water flowed from a dead Christ. Hence we see how manifestly the link between the natural man and God is broken, and broken for ever. For "in that He died, He died unto sin once." All that Christ could have blessed in nature is now entirely and for ever gone; and if there is to be any blessing now, it must be in a new nature, and through a dead Christ; as also all connection and association with God. Expiation, purity, life, can alone be had through a dead Christ. It is a dead Christ that must purify me if I am to be purified; for it was from a dead Christ that the water (the symbol of cleansing) flowed.

90 Until the death of Christ, God was dealing with nature, to see (or rather to teach us, for He knew what it was) if any good thing could come out of nature. The cross, however, proved - God's rejected Son proved - that it was not possible that any good thing could come out of nature. Man is not merely a sinner driven out of paradise, as we know Adam was; but man's state now results not only from his being turned out of God's presence because of sin, but from the will and energy of his evil nature, which has cast God out of His own world.

The cross shows that man's nature is utterly incapable of being acted on by any motive whatever which could set it right. This is very humbling, yet very blessed. Heaven will not do, earth will not do, the law will not do. "I have yet one thing in heaven - my beloved Son; I will send Him. It may be that they will reverence Him when they see Him." But no. The determination of man's will is to have the world without God. This is what man wants. He will not have God in any sense. Here it is brought to a climax; and the very worst display of Christianity will be just this.

If any of you should be seeking pleasure in the world, you know you do not want to find God there; for if you did, it would upset it all. Thus are you saying in spirit, "Let us kill the heir, and the inheritance shall be ours." You may not have lifted up your hand to slay God's Son, but you have kept Him out of your heart.

Man's great abilities will be much more developed in the day that is just approaching, than they have ever yet been, in trying to make the world go on thoroughly well without God. When was there ever a time when everything was going on so well, as men speak, such unity among nations as now, or such drawing out of resources? The cry is, "Peace, peace," by the energies and working of man's will without God.

91 Man looks for progress in the philosophy, commerce, politics, and comfort of this world; but still there is in his heart a dread of the consequences of the progress of this self-will. Thus is fulfilled the apparent paradox of Scripture, the cry of peace combined with "men's hearts failing them for fear." Now, men would say this is a contradiction, but it is not; for while men are building up commerce and arts and science in the energy of self-will, who is there among them that would undertake to answer for the state of any nation in three years' time, or for even a much shorter period? Man is afraid of the working of self-will in his neighbour, though he likes to exert it in himself. The Christian has learned that the question as to the world is settled in the rejection of Christ. At that moment it was all over with the world.

The question between God and man is settled as to man himself; for not only is man turned out of paradise, but when God's Son came, they crucified Him, and now grace comes in; and the Christian goes outside the world to get, in God's rejected Son, the life which is to be had in Him alone. This is God's record, that He has given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. Amidst all this turmoil and trouble where shall I get peace? The moment I see a pierced Christ, I have that which expiates and purifies. All this is not a theory, not a doctrine merely, but a reality; for the moment my conscience begins to work, I find that by nature I am separate from God; that my carnal mind is enmity against God; that it is not only the world that has crucified God's Son, but my sins pierced Him. This is an individual thing, for this is how individual souls are brought into the blessing. When I have real faith in what God's Word tells me about my own evil, then the question arises, "What am I to do?" All that which makes me a mere moral man declares that I could have nothing to do with God; but through a pierced Christ I have three witnesses that I can have to do with God.

92 First, the highest act of insolence that it was possible for man to do against God brought out the very thing that put guilt away, even the blood and water flowing from Christ's pierced side. Suppose it was but yesterday that I wielded the spear against Jesus; the very act that showed my enmity brought out that which put it away. I cannot estimate sin aright until I see the water and blood flowing out of the pierced side of Christ, putting it away. Then I must be brought to the consciousness that in spirit I was there; my enmity to God did it; my sins pierced Him. It was thus God addressed the Jews, telling them that they had killed their heir; that is, their hearts had consented to it.

Those Jews whom Peter addressed, saying, "Ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain," had not actually murdered the Prince of life. They did not hold the spear any more than you did; but in the same spirit they refused Christ a place in their hearts; and it is thus God deals with the world. His question with the world is, "What have you done with my Son?" With Cain it is "Where is Abel thy brother?" The only answer they can give is, "We have slain Him."

The moment the Messiah was rejected, that moment all title to the promises was lost to the Jews. All hope of salvation - everything is now gone from them as a people; and now, if they would get blessing, they must come in as sinners, and have their sins put away by the blood that flowed from the pierced side of the Messiah. Now, then, as all title on the part of man to everything is gone, God is giving eternal life.

93 God must direct the heart away from itself (except to the sense of its sinfulness) to Christ. Have I estimated my own sin as the murderer of Christ? Well, the blood has put the sin away; for the blood has cleansed the man who held the spear that pierced His side. We are nothing but sin; well, Christ was made sin for us, and through a dead Christ we get the blood as a witness that our sins are all put away; the blood being a witness of the perfect expiation of all sin. Christ "hath appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself." Here, however, it is not looking at the part man took in it, but at what Christ came into the world for, and what He accomplished.

Second, there is, however, the water as well as the blood; and what is that? The water cleanses as the blood expiates, "that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the Word." While the blood expiates, the water cleanses. The water bears witness to the same life-giving power. "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God."

The Spirit of God is the source of life and the power of the Word, and gives life. Practically, the Word is the instrument, the incorruptible seed; and it is also a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart; and it is that by which God's thoughts are communicated to us. It is out of the pierced side of Christ that these testimonies of God flow, thus writing death upon every production of nature. For it is not a modifying of the nature which now exists that the cross brings in, but the counting everything outside Christ to be dead, as there is not a thought, lust or desire about the world upon which Christ does not write death; and thus it is that we get altogether new affections, "dead unto sin, but alive unto God," through the life in His Son. The real character of purifying is this writing death upon everything that flows not from a pierced Christ. The water is the purification, but the purification is through a dead Christ. Christ all His life through was the pattern in man of what man ought to be; but our participating in this could only be by the cleansing of His death.

94 There is a third thing - we have not only the blood which expiates, and the water which purifies, through which we are dead to sin, but He has obtained for us the Spirit, the presence of the Holy Ghost, as the power of the Word. It may perhaps be objected, that I do not find myself thus dead to sin and purified. You have a hatred to sin, however, which is a proof of your having died to it. "In that Christ died, He died unto sin once: . . . likewise RECKON ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin"; for God ever treats us according to what He has really given us, treating us as though we had realized it all. So in John the Lord says, "And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know." Now they did know HIM who was truly the way to the Father, yet Thomas objected, and said, "We know not the way," because they had never realized it.

The instant I believe in Jesus, I am called on to reckon myself dead. I am never told to die, but I am told to mortify my members that are upon the earth. A man under the law will be trying to die with all his might, but he will never succeed. A Christian is dead, and his life is hid with Christ in God, and therefore he mortifies his members which are upon the earth, as living in the power of the life he has in the Son of God.

Observe, he does not speak of our life being on the earth, for that is above with Christ in God; therefore he treats us as dead, but our members which are upon the earth we are to mortify. He never tells us to kill ourselves, but faith takes God's testimony as true, therefore I say I am dead, and because I am dead, I have to mortify my members, being as dead to the world as Christ was, for I have God telling me that I am dead through believing. This is most practical as to peace of soul; for the moment I believe in Christ, I am delivered from all these things.

95 I am not seeking to die, for I have the secret of power, and count myself dead. There is a practical difficulty as to the water; for how can I say I am washed, if I still find myself to be dirty? I can say I am dead with Christ though, for I shall never succeed in killing myself. The moment that I believe in Christ, all that He has done as a Saviour is mine, and God appropriates and applies it to me. I may have failed to realize it, but the treasure is put into my possession.

Some souls often say, "I believe all the value and efficacy of Christ's work, but I cannot apply it." Who asks you to do so? It is God who applies it, and He has applied it to you, if you believe in its value and efficacy. The moment we believe in Christ, we have the Holy Ghost as bearing witness: "He shall take of mine, and shall show it unto you." Just as the Son came down to do God's will, and then ascended up again into heaven, so, at the Son's ascension, the Holy Ghost came down as a person on the earth; for the Holy Ghost is always spoken of as being now on earth, and it is this which gives the true and peculiar character of the Church of God.

Here we get the third witness in the Spirit of truth coming down to the earth. The moment I believe, I am sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise. All that I can produce of God's good fruits as a Christian is in consequence of being sealed by the Holy Ghost. Redemption being perfectly accomplished, then the Holy Ghost comes down in person; so that the position of the Church on earth is between these two things - the redemption made, and the glory in prospect - as the Holy Ghost comes down between the Church's redemption and the Church's glory.

96 The knowledge of being dead with Christ gives me a pure heart as being myself dead to sin, the world, and law. By the blood I get perfect peace and a good conscience; and then the Holy Ghost comes down from God; thus we have perfect peace with God, having God's own witness. Well, then, I have left the whole scene; I have done with it altogether; my sins are all gone, the blood has put them away, and I am now dead unto sin, and alive unto God. The cross, the wounds of Christ, are the door by which I entered, and the presence of the Holy Ghost is the power by which I enjoy the fruits of it. As we have seen, the witnesses of God on the earth are three - the Spirit, the water, and the blood, and these three agree in one; "for this is the witness of God, which He hath testified of His Son."

The heart is constantly looking for God to give it a testimony about itself; but God is giving a testimony about His Son, and not about what we are. If God were to give a testimony about us, it must be about our sin and unbelief of heart. It is of great importance in this day of infidelity to see that, if God gives a testimony, it is about His Son, and what He is to the sinner. If you believe that, you will get peace.

If I am going about to get a standing before God on the ground of my holiness, that would be self-righteousness, and of course I shall not get a witness from God as to that; but if my soul takes its stand with God, on the testimony God has given as to His Son, then I get the witness in myself. When I have this faith, I have the thing in my own soul. For instance, look at Paul before Agrippa: "I would to God, that not only thou, but also all that hear me this day, were both almost, and altogether such as I am, except these bonds." He was so thoroughly conscious that the Christ in his soul was the Christ in heaven, and he was so happy in this consciousness, that he wished the whole company were like himself (except the bonds), having Christ as a well of water springing up within.

97 That which makes heaven to be a heaven to the saint is just this - that he finds the same Christ in heaven that he has in his own soul; and all the subtleties of infidelity cannot touch the soul that possesses Christ thus within. No reasoning of an infidel can shake my confidence if I am happy in Christ; for if a man came to tell me there was no Christ, when my soul was happy in Him, I should not believe him.

There may be no intellectual or logical proof on my part, but there will be, to a certain extent, a moral testimony in the happiness of my soul, and the warmth of my affections being centred in Christ. I have often found how much it tells with men of all conditions to assure them that I am perfectly happy in Christ, and quite sure of going to heaven. "Are you so?" they say; "I only wish I could say it." It would not be a proof to an infidel, his merely seeing you were happy; but it comes home to the heart of man, as there is a craving in man's heart that will never be met till he gets Christ there; for man is never happy without Christ, whatever he may say.

"He that believeth not God, hath made Him a liar." The sin of men is in making God a liar when they do not believe the record God has given of His Son; for men do quarrel with you when you tell them you know that you are saved. They ask how you can know that - which is just as much as saying that God is not capable of communicating any blessing to man. It is calling God's wisdom in question, as well as His power, in the testimony of His mercy and grace. This is what I have felt in the great question about the Bible. It is not whether it is the people's right to have the Bible, but it is questioning God's right in giving it. The treason is in keeping away God's message from His servants. It is not merely the servant's right to have the message, but it is God's right in giving it that is called in question, as it is interfering with God's right of communicating His thoughts in His word. Whenever God gives a revelation, man is responsible to receive it. God has given a witness in which He reveals the glory of His Son; and when man calls in question that word, he is disputing with God in the testimony of His grace as to what He is.

98 Who can explain the riddle of this miserable world without Christ? Go into the alleys and lanes of this vast city, and see the woe and degradation even in this best and most civilized of countries, and learn there what sin does. In the drawing-room you may philosophize about it, but it is not in a drawing-room that you will learn what the world is. When you tell me that it was because of all this sin and wretchedness that God's Son came down into this world to put the sin away, then I can understand it; and God gives eternal life - not life for a moment, or a life we can sin away, as Adam's, but eternal life, which is above and beyond sin altogether - being in His Son, and therefore as near to God as can be. "This life is in His Son," who was ever the object of His Father's delight; for when Christ was down here God could not be silent in His expression of joy, "This is my beloved Son."

God, in giving me eternal life, has also given me a nature and capacity to enjoy Him for ever. I am brought into an association with God, a relationship to God, and an enjoyment of God, which the angels know not, although holy in their nature, and exalted. We are thus brought near that we might "know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled to all the fulness of God."

99 In what a wondrous place we are set, if we could but be purged from the vanity and earthliness that fills our minds, to enter into all our blessedness, and the association which we have thus with God, the very same which Christ has! He has borne the wrath of God for our sins, that this full cup of blessing might be given to us. In all this God would have simplicity of heart. A man may talk about many things, but knowledge apart from Christ will never do. If we possess Christ within, however, Satan can never touch us; and if he comes, he will find Christ there, who has overcome him. It is a sweet, and blessed thing, that any saint, though born but yesterday, has all in Christ that I have. If one says, "But I am such a great sinner"; well, the blood has put sin away, and settled that question for ever.

"And this is the confidence that we have in Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He heareth us." Here is a confidence in God that applies itself to all the details of life through which I may be called to pass. This is the confidence we have in Him: His ear being open to us, we have what we ask for, when we ask according to God's will. How wondrous this is, that God's ear is ever open to us; for surely we should not desire to ask for anything contrary to His will. "And if we know that He hears us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of Him." I am so made to know the love that, if I ask, I shall have. If I am really in earnest to do God's will, to preach the gospel for instance, and there are hindrances in the way - Satan in the way - I have only to ask, and I have all God's power at my disposal, His ear being open to me. If you know what conflict and difficulty are, what a blessing is this, to have God's ear open to you, and to know, if you are doing God's will, you will always succeed in doing His will.

"There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it." Temporal death is here intended as chastening in the way of God's government. There is a sin not unto death. If there be real intercession, God will forgive us (James 5: 4-15). See also the case of Stephen, when he said, "Lay not this sin to their charge." If you ask me what the sin unto death is, it may be any sin; it may be the telling of a lie, as in the case of Ananias and Sapphira. Peter did not pray for them. In Corinthians, "For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep." The horribly confused state of the church causes the government to be kept more in the hands of God; and from the saints incompetency to walk in the power of the Spirit, they are necessarily more thrown on the Lord, whose faithfulness to us will not allow our sins to go unjudged. "He withdraweth not His eye from the righteous."

100 May we be so walking in the power of holiness, that we may not be struggling with sin under His correcting hand; may we be walking in full communion with His grace. Amen.