"ALL WHO ARE IN ASIA ... HAVE TURNED AWAY FROM ME"

“ALL WHO ARE IN ASIA ... HAVE TURNED AWAY FROM ME”

It is of the deepest interest to ascertain the cause of the defection from Paul of “all who are in Asia”, where he had laboured much; for surely in turning away from him they had turned away from the truth which was specially communicated by him and identified with him. To Paul was committed the mystery; and though it was revealed to God’s holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit, yet to the apostle Paul this great truth was specially committed, as we see from Ephesians 3: 7, 8. “Of which I am become minister according to the gift of the grace of God given to me, according to the working of his power. To me, less than the least of all saints, has this grace been given, to announce among the nations the glad tidings of the unsearchable riches of the Christ”. Accordingly we find Peter, in his second epistle, acknowledging the peculiar light given to Paul. “According as our beloved brother Paul also has written to you according to the wisdom given to him, as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; among which some things are hard to be understood, which the untaught and ill-established wrest, as also the other scriptures, to their own destruction”. The truth, then, that those in Asia had turned away from was the mystery. It has been alleged by some that you cannot be in a similar state to those in Asia unless you have previously received the truth of the mystery, and then, subsequently have turned away from it. Plainly it is more grievous when one turns away from the mystery after having received it, yet the one who would resolutely refuse to receive it would not be clear of the charge of turning away from it. No conscientious person would like to ^[p. 101] avow that he had turned away from a distinct truth; yet if he were opposed to it, he would turn away from the man who was identified with it in his ministry, because the teacher, according to his effectiveness, gives life and moral power to the doctrine which he inculcates. The mystery was the great truth with which Paul was identified. He himself calls it “my doctrine” in 2 Timothy 3: 10 and it was from this that they had turned away. Now every one who has been taught this truth, and has turned away from it, or has refused to receive it, is in the state of those in Asia. The mystery is that the church is the body of Christ, and that He is “the head, the Christ: from whom the whole body, fitted together, and connected by every joint of supply, according to the working in its measure of each one part, works for itself the increase of the body to its self-building up in love”, Ephesians 4: 15, 16. “The head, from whom all the body, ministered to and united together by the joints and bands, increases with the increase of God”, Colossians 2: 19. The nature of the relationship of all believers to Christ is “a great mystery”, but it is respecting Christ and the church (Ephesians. 5: 32). But without going into the profound blessedness of this relationship, the simple fact that the church is the body of Christ entails a dissociation from things on earth because of an association with Christ in heaven. If the church be Christ’s body, it is impossible that it could have a locality assigned to it different from the Lord’s own place. He is at God’s right hand in the heavenly places; hence, necessarily in keeping with the grace which has made the saints now the body of Christ, we are all raised up together, and made to sit down together in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus. The moment I accept the mystery, then I must admit that Christ’s body could not have a different place from Himself. It is true that His body is on the earth to maintain His name where He is not, but the earth is not its place. Its place and hopes are in heaven, and all its support is from heaven by the Holy Spirit sent down ^[p. 102] from heaven. Many a one receives the truth of the church verbally, and even sees that there is no true way for the Lord’s people now but meeting together as members of one body; but a truth is often honestly accepted when the responsibility and duties connected with it are not at all apprehended. Who enters into the grave nature of the bond which binds together the several members into one body? And if any one, in any measure, enters into it by faith, through the power of the Holy Spirit, he sees at one and the same moment, not only that he is under the greatest bond to all believers here, which he must most carefully respect as supreme to all others, but that heaven is his place too, though he is still on the earth. He feels displaced here, not because he was refused a place here, but by an assured sense of right to an entirely new and different place; and as this is seen, he honestly disconnects himself from a place no longer his, in order that he may extend his interest, and acquire the advantages which belong to his true place. I believe the one unmistakable mark of the believer who sees the mystery is that he sets his mind on things above, not on things on the earth, and that when any one is earthly, however great his knowledge of the church may be in theory, he has not by the Spirit of God grasped in his soul the church in its relationship to Christ. And as heavenly citizenship marks the genuine disciple, so does clinging to earth and advocating it (the earth, not so much the world), mark those who have not the light about the church which they at one time professed to have received. It will be found almost invariably that those who oppose the present heavenly position of the church are those who have got on in the world since they were called of God and enlightened as to their true church ground, or those who have never broken with their worldly associations; for there is no holding it in power, except by continual surrender. They, like those in Asia, accepted the truth of the church as to the mere order of assembling together and the like, but when it came to be ^[p. 103] insisted on, in a time of general declension and more open hostility of the enemy, that the heavenly places were the only true home of the church, that it had neither a title to earth nor a place on earth, then those who had their interests on earth would not surrender them, but lapsed into an earthly people, a state which characterised the Corinthians, as it does christendom in this day. Every christian retires in some degree from the grosser world, and some retire almost absolutely from the world as to its positions and pursuits, and yet they are quite earthly. One must be earthly if he is not heavenly. If he is heavenly, it is not that he despises the earth, but simply that he resigns it as not his place; and not with regrets, because he knows he has and enjoys an infinitely better place, even heaven. The man who holds the mystery in power is sensible of his great duty here in relation to the members of Christ’s body, and he cheerfully surrenders everything which would bind him to earth, because of his place in heaven, and also because the more free he is from the earth, and the more heavenly he is, the better he can help the church.

There is another great effect from the knowledge of the mystery. The apostle’s great desire for the Colossians was that they might comprehend the mystery. They were exemplary for their faith in Christ Jesus, and love to all the saints; but he saw that they would not be preserved from religiousness — the effort to have sanctity in the flesh, which has eventuated in the spurious sanctity of Romanism — unless they understood the mystery in divine power. It requires very little discernment to detect the buddings of this effort in those who, though settled in the blessed effects of the gospel, have not yet learned the ministry of the church. All perfectionism is traceable to this snare. Broadly, baptism, both by the ritualist and the avowed dissenter, is regarded as affecting the state of the recipient. That it is an ordinance of great importance I need not add, but its meaning is with relation to the place where it sets the recipient, and not as to its effect on ^[p. 104] him. I only adduce this as an example, because I bring to the same religious sentiment those who differ most widely as to the proper recipients of baptism. The ritualist would have every one in the parish, young and old, baptised. The dissenter would baptise only those who had made a true confession. One believes baptism is the outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace; the other, that you are to be buried and raised in figure because you already are so in fact. Their doctrine is one and the same, and their thought is to impart some sanctity to the mere man. I desire to point out that unless the mystery be known there is no safeguard from the snare of religiousness, and that one is taken in it in the most unexpected way, one in his singing, another in his praying, or joining in prayer, while another considers that addressing the natural feelings is right and proper.

Occupation with, or the formal observance of, religious appearance, sanctimonious manner, and so on, are all from one and the selfsame root. If the mystery be understood, Christ is everything. His Spirit may affect my body as He pleases. I speak, or I sing, or I weep, as He leads, but when I seek to make myself an expression of sanctity, it is will-worship, from which the knowledge of the mystery alone can save me. While a soul is learning the ministry of the gospel, it is not exposed to the snare of religiousness; that is, supposing that the simple gospel of God has been presented to it. It is after it has found rest in Christ’s finished work that it is exposed to the snare of religiousness, from which only the knowledge of the mystery can preserve it.

Surely we can see how great the inducement was to those in Asia to turn away from Paul. The very same prevails in this day. The man who seeks to acquire or enjoy on earth must find the mystery very unsuited to him. When he refuses to surrender — and the gain now is in proportion to the surrender — according as he has conscience, he relieves it by religiousness, the fervent activities of the natural feelings in one form or another;

^[p. 105] so that at times Christ Himself is addressed and approached in human affection, and not in the love of the Spirit, at once so deep, so absorbing, as to exceed and distance the warmest conceptions of the natural heart. If you will not surrender, and will be religious, you must turn away from Paul, like those in Asia. Alas for those who do so, and still more for those who lead them into — as the ten spies thought — an easier path! Alas, they had erred greatly, and swift destruction came upon them. “The men, which Moses sent to search the land, who returned, and made all the congregation to murmur against him, by bringing up a slander upon the land, even those men that did bring up the evil report upon the land, died by the plague before the Lord”, Numbers 14: 36, 37.