CHRISTIAN STATE
CHRISTIAN STATE
Christian state is the consequence of christian standing. My standing is a place, or position, given me by God; and my state is the result of this; while my practice is my manner of life, contingent on my state. The standing describes where I am placed, while the state, which results from and corresponds to it, discloses the real nature and value of the standing.
In Romans there is a twofold state — the state consequent on justification, and the state consequent on the knowledge of deliverance; they are properly concurrent. The full state in Romans belongs to the believer on earth, going on to glory. When the position is higher — that is, heavenly, as in Ephesians — the state is accordingly of another order; and both these together constitute christian state. The state in Romans would be incomplete without the state in Ephesians, and vice versa: one is the state of a justified man on earth, and the other is the state of a heavenly man, only that the latter could not be known without the former, though the former might be known without the latter.
Now the state consequent on being justified is detailed in Romans 5: 1 - 11. Placed in the righteousness of God, “being justified by faith, we have peace with God”. The first great effect of being justified, which is my standing, is, that I have “peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ”. Now peace is not simply forgiveness, though it is included in it; nor is it merely a relief from the fear of judgment. It is more; it is that every disturbing element has been removed from the eye of God. There is nothing offensive remaining; all has been judicially set aside in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ,
[p. 328] and through Him risen there is therefore peace for the believer; as the Lord announced to His disciples when He rose from the dead (John 20: 19), “Peace be unto you”. All the enemies are silenced; all that barred, and hindered, and was offensive, has been removed in the cross; and the believer is now, and for evermore, in divine righteousness, in the acceptance of the Lord Jesus Christ, in the presence of God. And there never can be any disturbance there. “Righteousness and peace have kissed each other”; they are, from henceforth, in profound and perfect amity.
If a believer has not peace, he has not accepted in faith the standing of a justified man, and occupation with his state will not help him to peace. His state is imperfect, because he has imperfectly apprehended his standing, and the state can be rectified only by reverting to the standing. If he has not accepted the ground on which God has set him — that of divine righteousness, his state cannot be according to God. I have dwelt long on this part of the state, because if the beginning be not known, the parts which succeed cannot be known. Peace is the greatest possession for a man on this earth: the blessed Lord’s legacy to His disciples. “Peace I leave with you”; and, in our own circumstances, “the peace of God, which passeth all understanding”. Now, without controversy, the peace of God cannot be known by any one not having peace with God.
Next, through our Lord Jesus Christ we have “access by faith into this grace [or favour] wherein we stand”. We are in the favour of God, as Noah was at the altar of burnt-offering, after he came out of the ark. Saved from judgment, now in favour. Christ’s death effected the one, and Christ risen places us in the other.
Next, we “rejoice in hope of the glory of God”. As children of Adam, we were “short of the glory of God”; now our Saviour, who went under our judgment, is in glory, and we can look up into glory, and we “rejoice in hope of the glory of God”. What a wonderful change!
Next, “not only so, but we glory in tribulations also”; suffering from the world, knowing that this suffering works endurance. The more we suffer, the better able are we to suffer, like the tree, the bark of which gets thickened on the windy side; endurance leads to “experience” — experience of God — learning Him; “and experience, hope; and hope does not make ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which has been given to us”.
The greatest thing, the nature of God — love, proclaimed in our hearts by the greatest power — the Spirit of God! This closes this part of the state of the justified man. It has two parts in these eleven verses: 1 - 5 is from God to him, and higher it could not go: “the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which has been given to us”; and from verses 6 - 11 it is from him (the believer) to God; how, when we were without strength, Christ died for the ungodly; how God has commended His love to us; how, when enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son; much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life; culminating in, “and not only that, but we are making our boast in God, through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom now we have received the reconciliation”. This is the state flowing from being justified, the consequence of what God has done for us. It is what I may call the ascending state.
Now we have to consider the state consequent on deliverance. I may remark that deliverance is an experience necessarily connected with being justified. In Romans we are instructed in the state of a righteous man on earth, hence he needs to have deliverance; that is, to be free from the body of sin and death. He requires liberty; he is still in the body of sin and death, but he is not to be under it, but free from the law of sin and death; and this is deliverance. The state consequent on deliverance is very marked, and is of a descending order; the effect of the deliverance is enjoyed in the details of [p. 330] life here on earth. The state in Romans 5: 1 - 11 is of the ascending order, while the state from Romans 8: 12 to the end of the chapter is of the descending order. Now, being made free from that in which we were held (as detailed in chapters 5 and 7), “for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death”, let us consider the state consequent thereon (chapter 8:12). As delivered, we begin with, “we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh”. This is a great beginning for one still in flesh and blood. “For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live”. Then comes the great truth: “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God”. If one is ever led (it does not say, always led), he is a son of God. Mark, it is not that God is his Father, but that he knows he is a son of God. Like a great prince in the bush, he is, though in this poor world where all is against him, a great personage — a son of God. It is a wonderful state, when one can say, “the Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: and if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together”. We are co-partners with Him in suffering, in order that we may be co-partners with Him in glory. We are in this suffering scene where Christ suffered, but we are the sons of God in all these uncongenial circumstances: our dignity is assured to us by the Spirit of God dwelling in us. He who assures us of our freedom from the old man of sin and death, assures us of our new dignity as sons of God; our circumstances are every way against us, but “the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the coming glory to be revealed to us”. Everything waits, or looks out for, “the manifestation of the sons of God”. “The creature itself also shall be set free from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God”. It is not only that creation groans, but we “ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body”. This will be the consummation: our present dignity established, personally and circumstantially, for we have been “saved in hope”. We do not get beyond hope in our state here.
Now, in verse 26, we come to another part, or item, of our state. Up to this, we have seen that the state of the delivered one is one of great dignity, but in suffering circumstances, yet buoyed up by the brightest prospects — “saved in hope”. Now we come to the way this great being, a son of God, is maintained in the most untoward circumstances. For he is not only in trying circumstances, but he is encompassed with infirmity, and opposed on every hand; in a word, like the widow with an adversary (Luke 18). The Holy Spirit who dwells in us, lends us His help in our infirmity: “We do not know what we should pray for as is fitting”, but the Spirit itself, so identifying Himself with us, “makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered”, so intense is His interest. In our great feebleness we have this great Manager, or Paraclete, so interested in all our affairs, and “he who searches the hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit”, who seeks the thing most suited for us, because He intercedes “according to God”.
In the first part of the state the greatness of our dignity was dwelt on; next, the suffering, in consequence of the nature of the scene we are in; next, our own infirmity, so blessedly provided for by the Spirit’s interest and help, touching all our need; next, “but we do know that all things work together for good to those who love God”. Every event and combination of circumstances — “all things work together for good to those who love God” — every occurrence, even the most adverse, apparently, is working to our advantage. We have only to be simple in our faith and leave results to God, as the parents of Moses had done. They did all they could to preserve their child’s life, and when they could not conceal him any longer, they placed him in an ark of bulrushes — the utmost they could do — and set his sister to watch him; and we know how all worked together for their good. The Lord give us to enter more into this: though very powerless as to our own resources, in the midst of contrary circumstances, yet restful, because assured that “all things work together for good to those who love God”.
“Whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified”. It is interesting to note how we have in this passage the highest thing in the present — being “justified”, as well as the greatest thing in the future — “glorified”. Blessed be His name! He has predestinated us to be conformed to the image of his Son.
“What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us? He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?” What divine restfulness it is to be assured in heart that the blessed God would give us everything with Christ; and truly we can say, we desire nothing apart from Him. Every opposer can now be challenged, because it is “God that justifieth”. This part of the state refers to the attempts of the enemy to accuse and condemn, even to one’s own conscience. Whoever accuses? It is God who justifies. “Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us”. All has been accomplished for us by the work of Christ, who is also at the right hand, in all power; who also intercedes for us. Hence, the next link in this great chain, is, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” Shall any of the sufferings which overpower man ordinarily? Shall “tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or [p. 333] sword? As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us”. Victory — yea, more than victory — is secured to us through Him who loved us; so that, in the fullest confidence in the love which has been “shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit”, we can say, that “neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord”. Thus the state of the one in deliverance coalesces with the state of the justified one. The state is twofold, but the two parts are concurrent — the two are one.
So far I have been endeavouring to describe the state of a justified man — a believer on the earth; now I desire to set forth, as I am able, the state of a heavenly man, though down here. It is evident that no believer could be the latter, if he were not the former; but it is possible to be the former, though not yet the latter as to experience. That is, it is possible to be in the state of the justified man, though not yet in the state of the heavenly man.
The vocation and portion of the believer, in Ephesians, is detailed in chapter 2. First, we are “raised ... up together, and made ... sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus”. Second, “created in Christ Jesus unto good works”. Third, “one new man”. Fourth, “one body”. Fifth, “access by one Spirit unto the Father”. Sixth, growing “unto an holy temple in the Lord”. Seventh, “an habitation of God through the Spirit”. This is the position of the believer united to Christ, having learned his corporate place, that he is a member of the body of Christ. We have seen the happy and exalted state he has here on the earth as justified by God. Now we have to apprehend his union with Christ — a member of His body. If he had not been fitted to be a companion of Christ, union would have been out of [p. 334] place; but, fitted by grace to be His companion, as to nature and life — one of His brethren, a son of God — he now finds that he is united to Him, and as he enters into this new position, he tastes of the state consequent thereon. It is very evident that, though I am, through grace, of the nature and life of Christ, able to say, “Abba, Father” in His Spirit; yet, as united to Him who is in heaven, I enter on a new state. I could not be so closely associated with Him, identified with Him in all that is His, without a state in keeping with this elevation resulting from it. Therefore the second prayer in Ephesians unfolds the state of the heavenly man. Having entered on the knowledge of “his power to us-ward who believe”, the prayer now is, that you may be “strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell [or domicile] in your hearts by faith”. This is the first great part of your state as a heavenly man, Christ dwelling in your heart through faith. It is not here that you are led up to God in consequence of your standing as a justified one; but that now Christ can have a dwelling-place in your heart through faith. What a blessed state! that not merely you can reach up to Him — the One dearest to your heart — where He is, which union has effected, but that He Himself can now dwell in your heart through faith.
Next, being rooted and grounded in love, you may be able to apprehend with all saints (no one left out here) the breadth and length and depth and height. The scope, or domain, of God’s purposes spread out before you; like Abram, looking “northward, and southward, and eastward, and westward”. First, the Person, who brought you to heaven; and then the view — the scene of glory.
Then, the love that is best known, and yet it “passeth knowledge”. How blessed that it is in heaven, where there is no need for the activity of love, that the heart can enter into it best, and delight fully in it, and know its effect, “filled even to all the fulness of God”. What a state!
Then, finally, worship. “But to him that is able to do far exceedingly above all which we ask or think, according to the power which works in us, to him be glory in the assembly in Christ Jesus unto all generations of the age of ages. Amen”. It is not in weakness now, but in the sense that God is able, in us, to do far exceedingly above all that we ask or think, according to the power which works in us. It is not simply that He acts by the power in Himself; that would be no wonder; but “according to the power which works in us”. To be in the sense of this great power is part of the state of the heavenly man; how else could he stand for the exalted Christ in the scene of His rejection? And it is in the consciousness of this power that he worships, as follows: “To him be glory in the assembly in Christ Jesus unto all generations of the age of ages. Amen”.
It is the worshipper (as we see in type in Deuteronomy 26) who can render unto the Lord the tithes; so it is only as the believer is the worshipper, in the sense of what God is able to do with him, according to the power that works in him, that he is qualified to act as a heavenly man for the Lord on the earth, according to the practice in the following chapters in Ephesians.
The Lord grant that we may so enjoy the blessedness of the state which is ours, through grace, that we may be here in practical life according to His pleasure.