1. The death of Jesus, God's executed judgment against the law of leaven in us -- because executed on Him, we are free from its guilt, and thereby called to purge out all practical leaven from ourselves. (1 Cor. 5: 7.)
2. The Lord's death, as exhibited in the supper, the guard against the abuse of that which God has made the centre of the church's gathering upon earth. (1 Cor. 11: 26.)
3. The Lord's death, His only way of putting away our sins, and having the church in fellowship with Himself in resurrection. (1 Cor. 15: 1-7.)
4. The memory thereof, the Christian's stimulant to be ready to he always delivered unto death himself for Jesus' sake. (2 Cor. 4: 10.)
5. As (in the last context) His preparative for suffering, so also for doing all the will of Christ; yea, for living entirely to Him. (2 Cor. 5: 13.)
6. The Lord's death, the entire rupture and breaking up of all Jewish and earthly order, and blessing, and authority. (Gal. 1: 1.) And this on account of the imbecility thereof, through man's sin -- for no righteousness could be found for man, but by and in the death of Christ. (Gal. 2: 21.)
7. The Lord's death, His clearance of the church from all charge against her, being the power of the judgment He bore for her, ere He rose into newness of life with her, in Him. (Eph. 1: 20.)
8. Jesus' death, the measure of His obedience, and the procuring cause of His redemption honours. (Phil. 2: 8.)
9. Conformity thereunto, the believer's path to glory as to outward experience (as in Rom. 4: 23, in the trial of faith). (Phil. 3: 10.)
10. The Lord's victory, in resurrection, over death, the precursor and mean of all resurrection. (Col. 1: 18.)
11. The Lord's death the means of our privilege of being reconciled unto God in Him, presented holy, unblamable, and unreprovable in His sight. (Col. 1: 22.)
12. Fellowship in the benefits of the Lord's death and resurrection inseparable. If the believer can plead any benefit from the death, he has all benefit from the resurrection. (Col. 2: 12.)
13. This leads him into practical freedom from subjection and bondage to ordinances as of the world, and the conceits of man's mind about service and duty. (Col. 2: 20.)
14. The knowledge of the resurrection of Jesus, by God, from death, the church's and the saints' secret of power, and health, and strength. (1 Thess. 1: 9, 10.)
15. The death of Jesus, the pattern of what we have to expect from man while so standing. (1 Thess. 2: 15.)
16. And this to the saint is no sad commandment; for in the pattern he sees the judicial act whereby his own sins are for ever put away, and the pledge given to him of his coming in glory with Jesus. (1 Thess. 4: 14.)
17. For Jesus' death has been to him the mean of fellowship in the present life of the Lord, so as to enable him to live as in the power of his life, who is upon the Father's throne. (1 Thess. 5: 9, 10.)
1. "Purge out the old leaven, that ye way be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us." (1 Cor. 5: 7.)
There is much worthy of observation in this context. Every believer, as we see from Romans 8, has in him the carnal mind which is enmity against God, yet power withal provided for him to walk contrary to it; for he knows that though this be so, yet he has also the spirit of life in Christ Jesus in him, and that God estimates him according to this -- one with Jesus, and free from all condemnation through the death of the Lord upon the cross vicariously for the sin of the church. But these Corinthians not only had this evil in them, but had been walking according to it; and we find that fornication (and that of a very offensive kind) had been allowed. It is about the correcting the working of this leaven that Paul is here writing: "Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump? Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened." Observe they had leaven in principle in them in nature, and this leaven moreover, had been allowed to work, and therefore the apostle was rebuking them: and yet he says, "as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us." Were they, then, at one and the same time, leavened and unleavened? Yes, in two different ways. In Christ they were, as we all (who are Christians) are, unleavened, for Christ our passover is sacrificed for us. This sacrifice has made atonement for the sin in us; and in His Person we find full unhindered access to God, to whose eye the principle of leaven in us is not counted as sin, so lone, as it be not allowed to work. In Christ they were unleavened; but this very thing brought with it the claim and responsibility to purge out the working of the old leaven. This they had neglected to do, and so in themselves not only they contained leaven, but had leaven working. The principle they could not purge out; the working they could, and were bound moreover to do. There were many offerings of the old sanctuary which typified this state in the church, such as loaves having leaven but baked; as having leaven, unfit to be offered up to God; yet as being baked leaven, in a state not able to work. Now, as it was the death of the lamb in the passover which was the sign for the leaven to be put out of the house, as it were, so truly, antitypically, it was the death of the Lord which did put the leaven out in principle, and as before God, from the church. "Ye are unleavened, for Christ our passover is sacrificed for us." And this, dear brethren, is universally the way of our God in teaching us obedience. You have a spiritual privilege in Christ, which requires you to act in practice in this way and that way. Oh! this is a loving way, in which He leads us on into the perfect liberty of His service. May we all then keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. A little, and not a grievous commandment is this, if we remember in whose house, and at whose cost, the Lamb has been provided, and we have eaten of it! Too poor, and our family truly too little, to provide a lamb, our lot in this matter has been thrown into the hands and house of another, according to the liberty given even to Israel of old. (Ex. 3: 4.) Our God has provided Himself a Lamb -- truly one without spot and blemish -- and in His house have we fed upon that Lamb. The door into this holiest is by a new and living way consecrated for us, even the rent veil of Jesus' flesh. Surely if in spirit, and by faith within the veil, feeding in blissful security in God's house (as one with Jesus) upon Him, as the Lamb slain and alive again for evermore, it is a little thing, in the ample and rich provision there found, to put away our own poor, stale, defiled, and defiling provender. And if we feel there is a little self-renunciation in so doing, what is it more than the children of this world do daily, in the hope of regaining health of body -- giving up the food they love for, or exchanging it with, bitter, nauseous medicines? May we be wise in our generation, as they in theirs.
2. "As often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death till he come." (1 Cor. 11: 26.)
The especial sins which drew from the Spirit the portion in which this is found, were these defiling the supper of the Lord, by making it a place of riotous eating and drinking, and neglect of brotherly love thereat. And both of these sins had their cure in the meaning of the supper, if rightly understood. Death, the Lord's death, the death of the Son of God, was God's estimate of man's way of choosing to please himself. In the supper, this too was presented as being the subject of mutual delight to God and the church; to God, because therein was the expression of His own grace and truth, and of the inestimable value of His Son; to the church, because therein she found that by which alone she could rejoice in the holy justice of God, as being, through grace, for herself, though most strongly against her sins. And how, while so exercised in such delights, could so filthy a mean of self-pleasing be indulged? Impossible. Ere the body could be given to such scenes, the soul must needs have lost its fresh savour of the very truth of the supper. And, on the other hand, if the truth presented in the supper met man's passion in their very root and source of self-pleasing, how distinctly does the way in which that truth is presented correct the attendant sin of neglect of brotherly love. He died for the church collectively; and no man can know his own fellowship in the blessing, without having at the same time strongly brought to his mind those who are thus bound up in one bundle of life with Himself; and this most especially at the supper, where the many brethren are always assembled together in celebration.
These seem to have been the two sins at Corinth. But it is blessed to see how the Bible is a book of principles, and how, therefore, the failure in one instance brings in from the Spirit a correction to ten thousand others. Had man been looking at the case, he would have satisfied himself by setting the failure in practice to rights. Not so the. Spirit; in doing this, he will so do it as to give the church a principle to guide her, not only in a case exactly similar, but also in others, in which, though the form of the evil may be different, the principle of it is the same; and therefore, he goes on (ver. 27), "Wherefore, whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink this cup of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord." Here is the universal rule, as it were, of which the former is but one instance -- eating this bread, and drinking this cup of the Lord unworthily. And then He first blessedly defines the church's mode of escape, "Let each examine himself, and so let, him eat of that bread, and drink of that cup;" and, secondly, guards what he has said, lest any (as so many have) should suppose that even this sin could unchristianise them. It is not so; if judged, they are chastened, that they may not be condemned with the world. If they fail, He fails not, and though it may be by chastening and discipline, yet will He keep His own in spiritual separation from the evil of the world, the ways of which, as well as its character, tend to judgment.
I would only further notice the expression, "Ye do show the Lord's death till he come" (ver. 26), as proving (like 1 Cor. 10: 16, 17, etc.) the supper as the rallying point of the saints' upon earth.
3. "I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand; by which also ye are saved . . . . how that Christ died for our sins, according to the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day, according to the scriptures: and that he was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve: after that, he was seen of about five hundred brethren at once . . . . after that . . . . of James; then of all the apostles. And last of all . . . . of me also, as of one born out of due time." (1 Cor. 15: 1-8.)
The assertion I am about to make may seem to many strange (nevertheless I believe it to be truth), that great and general as is the profession of religion in our own day, so little and so rare is the understanding of the gospel, that not one out of ten of the religious would be able to give a simple and a scriptural answer to the question, "What is the gospel?" If any one calls this assertion in question, let him go into the coteries of his religious society, and try whether the question, simple as it is, will not elicit answers so various, as to prove that either there are many gospels, or that the one gospel is most strangely misrepresented in the minds of most. "'The vagueness of the answer, when the question has been raised about this or that minister's preaching the gospel, also has often struck me forcibly. "Is the gospel preached where I attend? Oh yes! I thought you knew what an excellent, or what a pious, or what a devoted man our minister is," is a frequent reply, as though there were no such a thing as distinct truth in the world. And so, I believe, in many minds the case is, that there is no clear, simple, distinct truth known; but truth, instead of being known in that firm, unvarying form in which it has been presented to us by God in the word, is looked at rather in the fickle, changeable forms in which it has been received by man, taught the fear of the Lord by the traditions of men. To illustrate what I mean, I would say, that in any mixed religious society, the mooting such a question as, What is the gospel? would be felt to be throwing down the gauntlet, or perhaps something worse. The Baptist, the Wesleyan, the Independent, the Nationalist, each has his own points in connection with the subject peculiar to himself to be defended. True, he may tell you they are minor points of difference, and that essentially they all agree: but this is a mistake; for, in the first place, they are so far major points, as to constitute, practically, that which fills and holds the mind: and secondly, if you hear the answer, you will find it is not the same gospel at all which is stated. Moreover the effect of introducing the division of clergy and laity (a division which practically holds quite as much among Dissenters as in the Establishment), has been to make almost every Christian who is not pledged in some way by office to the work, to feel that the task of answering questions is not his; and I do believe, that three out of four of Christians you might meet, would feel this was one of the questions which it would be expedient thus to avoid answering. Not that I mean to say that they have not their own statements of the gospel, but that, in the known multiplicity of thoughts about it, they would rather not risk, as it would seem to them, entering upon controversy. Now it does seem to me a most gracious thing on the part of our God, to have given us such a testimony upon the subject, as for ever to set aside all reasonings thereupon; while if I have been right in my estimate of Christianity in our own days, most fully to exhibit its poverty. The statement to which I refer, is that which precedes these remarks. The way in which the apostle gets upon it is remarkable; not saying simply, now I declare unto you the gospel; but introducing it as connected with so many little circumstances affecting those to whom he wrote, as to give it the more point. "I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you . . . . which also ye have received . . . . and wherein ye stand . . . . by which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain . . . . For, I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received," etc., etc. Such a way of introducing his subject was, in a peculiar way, calculated to call attention to it. And how blessed that subject! "That Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day, according to the scriptures; and that he was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve. After that he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep. After that he was seen of James; then of all the apostles. And last of all he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time . . . . so we preached, and so ye believed." This is the gospel! an artless simple tale of what befell Jesus. Observe, it is all about Jesus. The only actor, the only sufferer here is God. Man may be a spectator, and, through grace, a witness and a recipient, but the whole tale is about God, and his Christ. God, the Holy Ghost, had traced in the word many of the Father's thoughts about Jesus; and here we have this One anointed of the Father gleaning them all up for Himself, and fulfilling them all. Now, do let us remark how the whole action, from first to last, in the gospel, is God's, and how there is no place assigned to man in it, but that of standing still, and seeing or telling of what God wrought. If we look also a little closely at the text, we shall find the matter dividing itself naturally into four parts; the death, burial, resurrection and manifestation of the Lord. And I think I may justly say here, that the maintaining the proportions of the component parts of truth is not an unimportant matter. To make the ointment used in the sanctuary, not only was the presence of all the appointed ingredients needful, but due attention to the just proportions was requisite likewise. Surely, in like manner, we corrupt the truth, when, knowing all the parts of it, we give a prominence to any one of them beyond or less than that which the. Holy Ghost in the word has; and, indeed, I do see truth now-a-days constantly so misused, and rendered of little effect. And is it not so with this very truth? The great stress which is now laid is upon the death of Jesus, so much stress, indeed, as almost to overlook the other three points: but here THE great stress is upon "the manifestation of the blessed Lord after the resurrection." even as throughout the Acts we find the theme of testimony to have been Jesus and the resurrection. So strongly, indeed, does the apostle (Acts 17) seem to have pressed resurrection, that the poor ignorant ones to whom he spake thought that resurrection was a person as well as Jesus, saying (ver. 18), "He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods," because he preached to them Jesus and the resurrection. Just so here, the great stress is upon his manifestation; for while his death, burial, and resurrection are each of them mentioned but once, his manifestation is repeated six times over -- to Cephas, to the twelve, to five hundred brethren at once, to James, to all the apostles, to me also.
It is a blessed word, "that Christ died for our sins." I need hardly say that this is true only of the Christian; for though Christ bore the sin of the world, he is never spoken of as having died for its sins, the extent of the value of vicarious suffering being limited to the church; but yet to the intelligent Christian, the whole force and value of it is seen to be in the resurrection, for this is the proof of the success of the other. He was delivered on account of our sins, and (when they were all put away), raised on account of our justification; for if Christ be not raised from the dead, your faith is vain, ye are yet in your sins. But Jesus is risen, and we know all our freedom, and liberation, and coming glory, as well as present privilege, to have been brought by Him through the narrow gate of His death, without which -- his vicarious substitution -- we, through sin, could not have shared in His joy; "for except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone, but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." And this is what the Spirit goes on to show out. (Ver. 12.) "Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen: and if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised: and if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins. Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable. But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead." I have quoted the whole of this context, because it seems most, blessedly to show how everything, as to the Christian, turns upon the Lord's resurrection from the dead. To man it may seem a little thing, for those who lived in times past to deny the resurrection; and a still less thing for those who live in times present, so to overlook it practically, as that orthodox faith does which is current about it, where men believe it rather because the church has laid it down as a thing to be believed, than because found in the word of God; but truly both the one and the other to the sound Christian are very fearful things. Resurrection is the fundamental doctrine of scripture, and involves the questions of God's estimate of Christ, of the personal glory of the Son, and the glory of all those offices, which by resurrection have been manifested as His, in which He is to display God's glory. I would press much the careful study of chapter 15 of the first Epistle to the Corinthians. It is divided into three parts; the first, the statement of the gospel (vers. 1-11); the second, the opening of the paramount importance of the Lord's resurrection; and third (from ver. 21 onward), the fruits, pleasant and blessed, of this resurrection, so presenting us with a most beautiful summary and outline of truth. And this stands upon the surface of it -- the whole glory was Christ's in resurrection, that is, in newness of life, after having died for us, his Father's poor church, that we might share the glory with Him, and there in death He rolled off the heavy burden of our sins vicariously borne by Him, and then rose as the firstfruits, the pledge and pattern to us of victory over death and the grave.
4. "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. For we which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh." (2 Cor. 4: 10, 11.)
Two very different things are taught us here, yet the two blessedly united together, and in an order in sweet harmony with the rest of scripture: -- The dying of Jesus as the indwelling thought of the believer, and the deliverance of the believer in circumstances always to death for Jesus' sake. Alas! how we forget Jesus dying here, and therefore how strange, oft, does that experience outwardly of the cross, and trial, and deliverance unto death of us always for Jesus' sake seem. Nothing but the memory ever fresh of Jesus' experience while in the world, can make a similar path a matter of course with the believer. But as surely as we are one with Him, one in spirit, and hope, and life, so surely must we have here in the world that which He had. May we then learn to bear about while in the body, the memory of His dying; and thereby learn to count upon being alway delivered unto death ourselves also for His sake.
5. "Whether we be beside ourselves, it is to God: or whether we be sober, it is for your cause. For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead, and that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again." (2 Cor. 5: 13-15.)
As in the last context, the memory of the Lord's death was presented as the Christian's power of being willing to be alway delivered unto death for Jesus' sake -- so here we have, on the other hand, the connection of the Lord's death with all the believer's conduct -- for all his suffering and all his action alike grow up out of the Lord's death.
The passage is evidently a church portion, and should be more correctly read, "if one died for all, then all died;" for "then were all dead" means the church in Him. And observe how sweetly it all flows out -- the love of Christ constrains us, ah, this is the secret of our happy obedience -- service, not because the things we do are right in themselves, or because the saints around expect us so to act, or only because we know that such things are commanded us; but this blessedly given to us in the intelligence of love to Him who seeks and commands our obedience. His love constrains -- a strong yet sweet power of restraint! and how, but by the blessed exercise of our souls in the privilege of reading the connection between the thoughts of His mind, and the love of His heart, as shown in His wondrous work. We thus judge, that if one died for all, then all died. Ah! this is judgment beyond that of mortal man's, for it traces the vital union between Christ and the church; sees them one with Him: sees them reaping, in present blessing, the fruits of the travail of His soul. None but the new mind can broach such judgments -- "If he died, all died." But this is not all it can do; it can tell you also its estimate of His object herein, "and that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again;" and then, having thus judged, it has told its own simple tale of the reason why it does His will. May it always be thus with us! Surely, such service is perfect freedom.
6. "Paul, an apostle (not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead)." (Gal. 1: 1.)
The apostleships of Peter and of Paul had their respective peculiarities and points of difference: Peter received his from the Lord while on earth; Paul his from the Lord in ascended glory. In the opening of this epistle his great desire seems to have been to prove that neither he nor his doctrine were, before God, subject to the work at Jerusalem; but, if anything, upon a higher and more glorious standing, though both entirely of grace. And this he sought to establish, not in pride or self-importance, but as showing the folly of those who having learned Christ from him had turned to Judaism. It could not be said of any of the other apostles, "not of man neither by men, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead;" for, to say the least, they were apostles before God the Father had raised Jesus Christ from the dead: and the pre-eminence of glory as to Paul's apostleship will be found, by those who read the New Testament carefully, to attach itself also in a peculiar way to our standing, which is not, in any sort in nature, a Jewish one; but, every natural tie of connection with the Jews and with the earth having been broken by the crucifixion of the Lord, He, when raised from the dead by God the Father, has given Himself in resurrection and ascension-glory to the church. And this seems to me the Spirit's object in here introducing the subject of the Lord's death; namely, to show the entire rupture and breaking up of all Jewish and earthly order, and blessing, and authority.
"I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain." (Gal. 2: 21.)
The law was given by Moses; but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. And the law could not give righteousness; it described health to the sick patient, but gave him neither medicine nor a cure -- if it could have done so, there would evidently have been something good in man, and then why need Christ have died? But this was not so; and there could be nothing done for man, no righteousness found for him, but in and by the death of Jesus Christ. Oh, that we might cleave fast to grace, and get our hearts established therein and filled therewith: it is a sad thing even in this present day among the saints, to see how little establishment in grace there is. Believer! let it sink down into thy mind, that every question thou dost entertain, such as, "Am I accepted of God?" (for that is righteousness) goes to
ward frustrating the grace of God, toward making the death of Christ to have been in vain, and therefore must be false. And most clear -- it is that if thou hast not acceptance of God (and there is no acceptance now but acceptance in the Beloved), then thou art entirely without any blessing, a lost thing, under judgment. Marvellous have been God's ways! Out of blessing in Eden man cast himself; and now he must either be blessed and loved together with Christ, the Son and Heir of all God's glory, or cursed and damned with Satan, the enemy of God and man. But we are not of those that are cursed, for we have known the grace of God, and seen in Israel's history the entire irremediableness, under the best circumstances, of man; and grace (the grace of God, which, when righteousness could not come by the law, caused Christ to die) is our plea and boast. May our hearts be filled therewith continually.
7. "That ye may know . . . . what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe, according to the working of his mighty 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. . . . and you who were dead in trespasses and sins . . . . hath he raised up together and made sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." (Eph. 1: 18-20; Eph. 2: 1-6.)
The wondrous mystery of the union between Christ and the church is here presented to us, and the blessed truth that when God raised His Son from the dead, the church was raised up together, and made sit together, with Him in heavenly places. The truth here taught is not, as some would have it, that the resurrection of Jesus from the dead is a type of the quickening of the soul from its death in trespasses and sins, but a much more blessed and marvellous display of grace; even that the whole body of the saints were seen by God in Christ Jesus, when He, Jesus, was raised from the dead: just as the rib which God took out of the side of Adam, and wherewith He builded the woman, was seen by God in Adam when Adam laid. him down in sleep. And this blessed truth it is which meets the soul in its weakness; not setting it upon the unhappy question (as such a mis-explanation as I have referred to would) "How far am I quickened?" never honouring God's word and promises at all, by resting the whole matter upon experience of what is to be seen within, but upon rejoicing in God's blessed testimony that we were seen by him in Jesus, when Jesus rose from the dead and sat down at His right hand. And, surely, if we credit this assertion of our God, it must give strength and peace, as showing how completely our blessing is secured; the whole work been finished, and seen to God as finished, now more than 1800 years: for observe if we were raised up together Christ was raised up 1800 years ago, therefore, so we must have been; aye, and made to sit together with Him even then in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Blessed and wonderful mystery, gracious and glorious privilege! how completely does faith herein meet all the reasonings and cavillings of nature, and how blessedly does it enable us to plead the death of our Lord as the answer to all the strivings and workings of death in us! We were raised up together with Him; we were morally dead, He judicially dead in our place, and when He arose we arose with Him; so likewise does it most blessedly enable us to use Christ in life, as our reservoir of life and blessing. And I would notice that, though men call this the mystic union of Christ and the church, it is a most true and real thing; not merely a union supposed or reckoned to exist by God, yet having, no real being, but contrariwise, a most true, and real, and substantive thing, being in the power and work of God the Holy Ghost, and through that new nature derived from Him in us made known to us.
8. "He humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore," etc. (Phil. 2: 8, 9.)
There is not, perhaps, a more deeply interesting portion in scripture than this; and, like all the rest of the word and thoughts of God, it has a fulness and unsearchableness about it which are altogether infinite. The outline of the matter it contains is, the presenting as a pattern to the believer, the humiliation of the Lord as His way into the glory which has been conferred upon Him, with this blessed additional thought, that such is that glory to Christ as to involve the fulness of power for all such service to the believer. "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made 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. Wherefore God also 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 in earth, and things under the earth: and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure." The first thing which may be noticed, as standing upon the very surface, is that the mind which was acted upon by the Lord, is presented to the believer as that on which he is to act. But then, secondly, we have the range of the Lord's obedience as connected with the church presented to us; and this ought to be noticed. The sphere of His service extended from the throne of the Father, where He was before the world was, down (through death upon the cross for atonement, with all the circumstances of the world, the flesh, and the devil connecting themselves with that death) to that full exercise of supremacy and power which He shall yet exercise over all things in heaven, and in earth, and under the earth. I would notice this particularly, because it is the obedience of the Lord herein which constitutes the church's righteousness; not His obedience simply in fulfilling Adam's duties as set in the garden of Eden, nor simply as a Jew in legal righteousness loving the LORD His God with all His heart, and mind, and soul, and strength, and loving His neighbour as Himself: though, of course, that was true of Him, and formed a part of His obedience, even that which will constitute strict Jewish righteousness, and wherein as wrought by Messiah, the nation shall stand accepted. But the church, though she knows and surely glories in these things, knows much more; for the unction of the Spirit upon her eye has opened it to gee these things afar off, higher and deeper and fuller and broader; even the Son leaving His own rightful place upon the Father's throne, and, through all the tissue and entanglement of things present, so acting as to put each one of them into the place of subjection, and, as it shall be hereafter manifested, subjection to God; so that be it what it may, all things are to the glory of God. I would notice, thirdly, as connected more immediately with the course of thought I am endeavouring to pursue in this paper, the Lord's death. is here presented to us as at once the measure of His obedience, and the procuring cause of His redemption-honours. "He humbled himself [it is said], and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross." Surely none but He that can measure fully and aright the contrasts between that cross and the throne of God, whence He had come, can tell the extent of the obedience expressed in His bowing to it. True He saw the grace of His Father's heart in it, as the way for the revelation of His own character bringing glory to God in the highest, and in earth peace, good -- will toward man; but while His own soul fed on these things, and the glory to Himself and the joy to the church, still the bitterness of the cup was in it, and all for Himself alone. At His proper and alone charge and cost the whole was to be effected -- and He became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. And with Him it was no obedience as of constraint or of expediency; but to obey was all His heart's desire and the very thought of His mind: "I delight to do thy will, O my God; yea, thy law is within my heart." Blessed Lord! how does Thy perfect obedience shame us, yea, cause us to blush before Thee! Was obedience of such beauty in Thy sight, and Thy way in it so perfect and so complete; and shall it stand with us upon such low grounds as it does? Shall our ways in it continue weak, so uncertain? But not only is this obedience to us most humbling, as contrasted with ourselves; it is likewise most consoling and encouraging as connected with its reward from God, and with that which is involved in that reward. "Wherefore God also 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 in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." This is the reward -- the redemption-glory conferred on Jesus; and surely, as knowing our oneness with Him; that we are one spirit with the Lord -- made for His glory -- the church of God, which He loved and for which He gave Himself, that He might, in all the fulness of His, glory, present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, we must rejoice therein with exceeding joy and with great delight. And besides this joy in His reward, which we have as able (because we have the mind of Christ) to rejoice both in God's joy, and so honouring Him, and in His joy in having such a proof of His God and Father's love to share with the church (and He fully knows the joy of that word, in His own soul, "It is more blessed to give than to receive"); beyond this, I say, as well as beyond the blessed security His possessing such glory, with such a heart as He has, gives to us of blessing in ourselves -- there is to us this comfort, that God is now acting in the church upon the principle of the glory so conferred on Jesus; and because He is, we have assured to us the full power, of serving the Lord.
"Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure." This, as I have shown elsewhere, is just a showing of the church as the place in which the Lordship of Jesus is now displayed and recognised, in the power of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost -- and enables me to say, because I know the counsel of the Lord and stand in it -- "As all service is but a recognising of the Lordship of Jesus, for what service to which I am called can there be a deficiency of strength -- seeing it is God that worketh in me to will and to do of his own good pleasure!" Alas! how do we come short here. Perhaps our failures are very much from looking at the Lord's death as in itself redemption, instead of His resurrection from death.; for this last it is which is as well the power to faith, as the real security of the blessings of redemption.
9. "That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death." (Phil. 3: 10.)
How impossible is it to the natural mind to understand such passages as this! The most it can know of God, is as the God of nature; now, with this light, it must do one of two things, either recognise that there has been some great event intervening between His creation of the world and its present standing, in which view, attributing all the manifestly existing evil to such an event as the fall really was, it would surely, recognising God's goodness, calculate upon the present exercise of His power in behalf of those that serve and faithfully obey Him, to deliver them from the present evil; or, on the other hand, not adopting, indirectly from scripture, any such view about the fall, it must, gathering its judgment of God from the daily experience of the creation, most sadly misapprehend the real character of God, and suppose Him to take pleasure in the sorrows which sin and Satan brought into the world. Contrasted with both these views, the context before us presents God, in all the grace of His love, giving up His own Son to redeem from under the hand of Satan and the power of the fall, and yet, in His wisdom, so far from granting present deliverance to His servants from sorrow and trial, making it, because part of their association with His Son, a most especial part of His love toward them and proof of His favour for them. Such is the general instruction I should glean from this desire of the Spirit in the apostle to know Jesus, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His death -- the inseparableness of God's favour and suffering; at the same time it may be well to notice that there is clearly a stress upon "the fellowship of his sufferings" -- suffering in itself not necessarily being the fulfilment of the Spirit's desire here expressed. As Peter expresses it, "Rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ's sufferings; . . . . If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; . . . . but let none of you suffer as a murderer, or as a thief, or as an evil-doer, or as a busybody in other men's matters. Yet if any suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed; but let him, glorify God on this behalf. . . . Wherefore, let them that suffer according to the will of God, commit the keeping of their souls to him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator." There are two classes of sufferings, which may be ours as Christians: 1, Those which come upon us only because we are Christians, as persecution for His name's sake, and for testimony; 2, Those which, though they may be ours in common with the men of this world -- the sufferings of fallen humanity -- we yet bear for Christ's sake; for instance, a Christian may be subject, in common with others, to a great deal of oppression and tyranny, it may be -- the worldling will bear it only just so far as his own advantage makes useful; the Christian will bear it all for Christ's sake -- because he can say, "All things are of him who hath reconciled us. unto himself." This differs from the truth taught in Romans 4: 23, in that it presents trial of circumstances -- that in Romans the trial of faith as the believer's portion. The passages (2 Cor. 4: 10; 2 Cor. 5: 13) present the same subject, only as connected with "the motives of the mind."
10. "He is the head of the body, the church; who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the pre-eminence." (Col. 1: 18.)
That He should be pre-eminent in all things, was the good pleasure of God; but the church heartily coincides, as having the mind of the Spirit, that so it should be. Having received all things through Him, and knowing Him as her treasury of blessing, to magnify Him is to fill her with delight. Blessed position to find oneself in, blessed in its many points of contrast to the world -- blessed point of agreement with the mind and will of God! And surely there never was either death or resurrection comparable to the Lord's; and His resurrection from death was the precursor and mean of the resurrection of all others; well, therefore, may it be said that in it also He had the pre-eminence! I say His resurrection was the precursor and mean of all resurrection, for surely the general resurrection at the last day, as much as the first resurrection of the saints, is owing to and flowing from the incarnation death, and resurrection of Jesus.
11. "And you . . . . hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable." (Col. 1: 22.)
The apostle is here speaking (or rather the Spirit by the apostle) of the reconciliation of those Colossians who, in a double sense, as heathens, had been reconciled in the body of Christ's flesh through death, that they may be presented holy, and unblameable, and unreproveable in His sight. In mind they had been alienated, and enemies by wicked works, but now had been reconciled in Him. The. first part, their past experience, seems to refer to their state of mind; the second -- their blessing in Christ, to the privilege true of them in Christ; the root and means, surely, when known, of a reconciled state of mind in them, yet a very distinct thing from it, though, through grace, ever connected in the believer with it. And oh, what a blessed thing it is, notwithstanding the memory of all the proofs in wicked works of years past, and the sense it may be, by the carnal mind still strong in us, of our natural enmity to, and alienation from, God; yet to know that in Him we are reconciled unto God -- presented holy, and unblameable, and unreproveable in His sight.
12. "Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead. And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him." (Col. 2: 12.)
The Spirit is here arguing the question of the full assurance of understanding, as found in connection with the mystery of God, even of the Father, and of Christ. And He presses this most gracious truth, that in place of the believer morally dead, Christ became judicially dead. And by the same grace, that actual union in the Spirit, whereby, through Christ's death, under judgment, the believer gets free from all charge; the same union, I say, makes him one with Jesus in resurrection and all its blessings. No benefit has the believer from Christ's death without full benefit from His resurrection; blessed truth this, and all security for him in Christ Jesus, and seen by God as his, out of himself, and in spite of all his weakness and infirmity, in the Beloved. The saints in our own day have most sadly separated Jesus and the resurrection, and tried to rest upon His death apart from this resurrection. The early Christians' salutation one to another is said to have been, "The Lord is risen." The Lord is dead, would have been no gospel; for if Christ is not risen, we are yet in our sins; and, be it remarked, that in pressing this we do not set aside, in any way, the Lord's death from the saint's thoughts, but contrariwise establish it, for there can be no resurrection where. there was no death; but the important thing is to see, which can alone be when the two are kept together, what death was to the Lord -- a thing most dreadful, as it might be, yet voluntarily undertaken and borne by Him, and which had no power whatsoever over Him, but over which, even when underlying it, He was more than conqueror.
13. "If ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances? (Col. 2: 20.)
Following up the same subject of the full assurance of understanding, the apostle here turns from the side of privilege to that of practice therewith connected. Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances (touch not, taste not, handle not, which all are to perish in the using), after the commandments and doctrines of men? How many poor weak believers are there just in this state! not walking as having their citizen. ship and conversation in heaven, but living down on earth, and in the world, and making their religion to consist very much in self-imposed ordinances, after the commandments and doctrines of the foolish thoughts of themselves or other human minds, and not after scripture. Let such look well to it; such a state is not merely a loss of comfort to themselves, or a state of christian weakness or infirmity; it is a state most inconsistent with the faith they profess; so that Paul could say, "How is this, if ye be dead with Christ?" It goes very close to prove that word of Paul as being true of them, "not holding the Head;" and savours most sadly of anything but grace and truth, show of wisdom it may have in will worship, and in false humility, and in vain neglecting of the body; but before God it is not in any honour, being, after all, to the satisfying of the flesh, and conformity to the world. Dear reader, is it so with thyself? If so, plead simply what Christ has done for thee, and so get thy mind enlightened in the full assurance of understanding, and thou wilt find power to live as one freed, by thy knowledge of thy death and resurrection with Jesus, from all such follies.
14. "To wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come." (1 Thess. 1: 10.)
There is a blessed fulness about the whole of this epistle, as indeed about which of the scriptures is there not? a divine fulness. Yet perhaps to us, in the close of this dispensation, some parts seem more sensibly to address themselves, and among others this in a most peculiar way. For this epistle to the Thessalonians shows how the hope of the glorious appearing of the Lord Jesus, is the power of the church's strength and health, and forasmuch as we are daily learning more and more of the church's weakness, failure, and infirmity, this truth, so strikingly exhibited in this part of the word, becomes in a peculiar way commended to us. It is blessed to see, as elsewhere, how privilege and responsibility hang together. In no other epistles have we such a title of address to the saints used, as, "To the church which is in God the Father, and in the Lord Jesus Christ;" this was doubtless for the meeting of those shrinking feelings of nature, when the coming of the Lord is recognised as near, but the saints' true place before God, both now and then, not also borne in mind: and no one surely can read the epistle, and not be struck with both the character of the service of the Thessalonians, and the powerful exhortations of the apostle. This was the position they held, "serving the living and true God, and waiting for his Son from heaven." Blessed position! oh that the saints in these last days might return to it, at once and fully -- you and I, dear reader, among the number. But mark, I pray you, the connection of this with what follows ". . . . . . whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come." Aye, mark this, for this was the secret of the ability of these Christians to hold the position we admire and covet for ourselves. We cannot serve God unless we know Him as the creditor to whom we owe this debt -- He raised Christ for us from the dead; He raised Him and set Him at His own right hand that we might have hope in God; hope that when Christ, who is our life, shall appear, we also shall appear with Him in glory. This enables the soul to count itself, and to act, as a servant of the living and true God; this and this only enables it likewise to wait for His Son from heaven. So that we find the Lord's resurrection from death here presented to us as the power of the church's strength, and health, and service. Had He not died, our sins could not have been borne by Him, yea, and He could not have been raised; and had it not been God that raised Him from the dead, the deep sin of our hearts would not have been met; we could not have served God, nor waited in confidence for Him who is coming forth as God's avenger, if not knowing God to be our sure friend.
15. "The Jews: who both killed the Lord Jesus and their own prophets." (1 Thess. 2: 15.)
The Spirit is here tracing the outline of the experience of those who, knowing themselves to, be of that church (made so of God) which is in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ, are serving the living and true God, and waiting for His Son from heaven. "For ye, brethren, became followers of the churches of God which in Judea are in Christ Jesus; for ye also have suffered like things of your own countrymen, even as they of the Jews: who both killed the Lord Jesus and their own prophets, and have persecuted us; and they please not God, and are contrary to all men: forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles, that they may fill up their sins alway: for the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost." Jesus treated by His own like all the prophets -- put to death -- is then to be the saint's expectation, if, knowing his fellowship with that which is in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ, he really is serving God and waiting for His Son from heaven. I do not say, that because such things befall us not, therefore we are not Christians; but I do say, and with confidence, that the want of preparedness of mind, yea, and expectancy of such things among Christians, does show most painfully how far those things which are outside of God the Father and of the Lord, yea, often opposed to these, how far these things have gotten a wrong place in many of our hearts, even as they have leavened the whole lump of the professing body. And there is this too we may lay to heart, if not ready to be killed for Him, we are not ready to dig daily for Him. This may startle some who think they could give up much for the Lord, only reserving life; but I believe their calculation is in the flesh, and that there is no dying daily save in the Spirit in grace, and that where this is there is both the sense of innate weakness, and also preparedness for all surrender to the Lord. Religion not built upon grace, not based upon Jesus and the resurrection, not sustained by the Holy Ghost and the hope of the Lord's coming, may enable us to do many things, but sooner or later it will break down and show not our want of more religion but want of true religion altogether. This is a hard saying, but so are all those sayings which are the counterparts of the glorious privileges given us in Christ Jesus; and indeed I do not know but one thing that can nerve the soul for this, and that is a most simple yet blessed truth -- part of the believer's portion in Christ Jesus; namely, that --
16. "If we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him." (1 Thess. 4: 14.)
And who that knows the church to be in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ, but must believe that Jesus died and rose again -- since the Lord, in whom the church is, bears the form of the Lamb as it had been slain. The saint does and must believe this; but, oh most blessed grace! he cannot do so but by the Spirit, and simply because he does so he knows he has the Spirit, and therefore is one with Jesus: and so most simply and naturally it comes to pass that he can say, "If we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him." They are one with Him, bound up in one bundle of life with Jesus -- no more two, but one; and that which God has joined together let no man put asunder. God has joined them -- the church and Jesus. He will not put them asunder. Devils and the world cannot! Oh that we might, in more childlike simplicity, cleave to the portion our God has given to us, and walk worthy of it. A poor pitiful way it is to be one day filled with thoughts of union with Jesus, and therefore of the Father's love and our coming glory; and the next to be filled, through want of watchfulness or a little self-denial, with thoughts of the world and self and sin! May we learn that we are in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ, and that therefore our portion here is to be dying daily; and may we be sustained therein, in patience of hope, knowing that if Jesus died and rose again, even so them which sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him, Amen and amen.
17. "God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him." (1 Thess. 5: 9, 10.)
This little word comes in as a very sweet little close to the testimony of the Spirit in this epistle to the subject we are considering. Some might, looking at the last quotation, covet to sleep in Jesus, but, as He goes on to show even in that context, when Jesus does come the sleeping and the waking shall be all together with Him; though as it is ever the way with our gracious Lord to show grace first and foremost to that which is in greatest weakness, "the dead in Christ shall rise first," here He proceeds to show how the matter He is anxious about is one of daily, hourly moment -- and He does it by bringing in the gracious yet deep thought of God toward us. He hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus; -- this would have been most gracious, but how much more the opening to us of His own deep thoughts about the way in which the blessing came to us -- "He died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him. Wherefore comfort yourselves together, and edify one another, even as also ye do." It is not simply the saint is to live to God or as Jesus lived, but "live together with him," which is just this, being a channel for that fulness, which is ours in God the Father and in Christ Jesus the Lord, to flow out by. Yea, even more wonderful still, what our reptile thoughts cannot attain to, to live together with Jesus -- that the lives, that is, which we live in the body, should be in the power of His life who is seated at the Father's right hand. And thus in the saints, while in the world, is to be seen in their lives the verity and reality of their portion being in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ, for He died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him. I would only add that while assuredly this takes in the question of putting off the body before, or remaining in the body until Jesus comes, it goes a great deal farther, even to that morning waking and evening sleeping, the natural extremes in our daily lives of the actings of our bodily service. God grant we may know the power of these things.
