“UNTIL I WENT INTO THE SANCTUARY”

God is light, therefore the first effect of coming into the presence of God is exposure. We are made to know that all things are naked and exposed to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do. We never find our true measure until we have been brought consciously into the presence of God. How many there are in whom there is a measure of the work of God, truly converted souls, in whom there is a measure of faith, yet who have never come directly into the presence of God! They may be able to say like Job, “I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear”, Job 42: 5. They have had to do with God at a distance. They have even received a measure of grace through believing the word, but they are not established in their relation with God; there are still unsettled questions with them; they lack liberty with God. There are deeper questions to be raised and settled; not now the question of their sins, but the character of the man that committed the sins, that is, the true knowledge of themselves. “O wretched man that I am”, Rom 7: 24. Sooner or later the truth has to be faced in the presence of God. True repentance involves not only the judgment of our sins, but the judgment of ourselves.

God said of Job that he was “an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil”, Job 1: 8. His conduct was unimpeachable. Yet he had to go through a long period of discipline to bring him to a real knowledge of himself, and with that a true knowledge of God, for the two things go together. In the end he makes his confession, “I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth thee, wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes”, Job 42: 5, 6. Then his captivity was ended, and God blessed him. This was the end of the Lord, James 5: 11.

So with David when he went into the sanctuary, he had to confess, “I was as a beast before thee” (Ps 73: 22), but then he could say, “Whom have I in heaven but thee? And there is none upon earth that I desire beside thee”, 25. God is known in a fuller way, and becomes the portion and joy of his heart. Thus we come to learn that God must be the only source and cause of all our blessing. Then we are on solid ground. God becomes our Rock.

Then again, in the case of Isaiah the prophet, before he is fit to be sent forth as God’s messenger, he must learn the same lessons. He sees the Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up, with the seraphim crying before Him and saying, “Holy, holy, holy is Jehovah of hosts”. Then he makes his confession and said, “Woe unto me! for I am undone; for I am a man of unclean lips”. That is, he discovers that morally he was a leper, unfit to stand before the Lord. “And one of the seraphim flew unto me, and he had in his hand a glowing coal, which he had taken with tongs from off the altar: and ... said, Behold, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin expiated”, Isa 6: 3, 5-7. The fire of the altar which had satisfied the claims of the throne, now cleansed the leper.

With Peter, when he found himself in the presence of One who could command the fishes of the sea, he fell down at His feet saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord”, Luke 5. It was not a question of his conduct, but what he was as a man, Peter had a further lesson to learn as to himself, not only the sinfulness of the flesh, but the weakness of the flesh. All this was preparation for his future service. No one is effective as a servant until he is brought to have no confidence in flesh, a lesson we are slow to learn.

In the case of Saul of Tarsus we have a man who had much to glory in as a natural man (Phil. 3: 4-6), full of religious zeal, and self-righteousness, attaining to a great reputation in the religious world. But when he found himself in the presence of the glory of the Lord, all his glory was withered up in a moment and all his righteousness became as filthy rags. He discovered that he was the chief of sinners. He had to say, “O wretched man that I am!”, “In me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing”, Rom 7: 24, 18.

Even the favoured disciple John, who had enjoyed much intimacy with the Lord, when he saw Him in His judicial character, as the Ancient of Days, he fell at His feet as dead; he could not stand before Him.

This self-knowledge brings us truly to appreciate the cross of Christ. We are thankful to know that our old man has been crucified with Him, and thus for ever removed from the sight of God. So that it is our privilege to turn away from ourselves, to delight in the perfections of the second Man, in whom we live before God. We bless God for the grace in which He has taken us up and blessed us in Christ. All that we are as saints we derive from Him. All that we possess, we possess in Him. And ultimately we shall in every way he conformed to Him, for the pleasure and glory of God.

It is in the sanctuary we must all find our true measure. We do not make a fair start in life until we begin from the bottom. Reduction precedes enlargement. “He that humbleth himself shall be exalted”, Luke 18: 14. And no one is efficient as a servant until he has found his true measure in the presence of God. Otherwise there will be more or less confidence in the flesh, and the adoption of human methods and means. Having started on this line we need to be maintained in it. The Lord will discipline us to this end. As the apostle said, “We had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raiseth the dead”, 2 Cor 1: 9. Again, we are “alway delivered unto death ... So death worketh in us, but life in you”, see 2 Cor 4: 11, 12.

We have to find all our resource in the Lord. “Rejoice in the Lord alway”, Phil 4: 4. ‘“Be strong in the Lord, and in the might of his strength”, Eph 6: 10.

From Goodly Words vol 10 (1932)