(1) GRACE COMMENSURATE WITH GLORY
(1) GRACE COMMENSURATE WITH GLORY
Hebrews 2; 1 Peter 3: 18 - 22; 2 Peter 1: 17, 18
I should disclaim all idea of bringing forward anything new, for in one sense there is nothing new to be brought before saints. Things in Christianity are new only in the sense in which the Lord speaks of a scribe instructed unto the kingdom of heaven bringing out of his treasure things new and old. Certain things are characterised as new, for instance, a new song, a new covenant, and the like, and it is well to speak of these things. In fact they are the things of which we speak — but this is not inconsistent with giving place to the old things.
I am going now to speak about new things in that light, not at all in the idea of ministering to a craving after that which is novel. There is such a spirit much abroad among men and even among Christians, but I want to minister, not to that desire, but of the things of which Christianity speaks, new things.
Now in two of the passages I have read we have kindred expressions with regard to Christ. In Hebrews 2: 9 we read, “But we see Jesus ... crowned with glory and honour”. Evidently the reference of the Spirit of God there is to Christ in His place at the right hand of God. He is crowned there. Peter in his second epistle, speaking of what happened on the mount of Transfiguration, says, “For he received from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased”. The words employed here are the same as in Hebrews 2: 9. Peter says He received honour and glory, and in Hebrews it is said He is crowned with glory and honour, and that is at the right hand of God. He could not be crowned on the holy mount. Testimony to Him was given [p. 2] there, but He could not be crowned, for it was not high enough. When He goes to the right hand of God, then it is He is crowned with glory and honour.
Now what comes out in Peter is full testimony to the present place of Christ. Peter was an eye-witness of His majesty on the holy mount, and he was a witness, by the Spirit, of the glory He has at the right hand of God. He speaks of Christ as having suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, and afterwards says, “Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him”. That is equivalent to, “We see Jesus ... crowned with glory and honour”, He has tasted death for everything, and now He is crowned with glory and honour.
I am going to trace, with the Lord’s help, the steps which have led to the present place of Christ at the right hand of God, and then to bring before you the significance of this in regard to us. In regard to God it has its significance, but my point now is its significance in regard to us.
Two things meet in Jesus. The one, all that is for God, and the other, all that is for man; they meet in one and the same Person. You cannot understand God’s ways if you do not apprehend that. We see it in the first two chapters of Hebrews. You can examine the two chapters at your leisure; in the first you will find that everything is for God. It sets before us the throne, and shews thus the maintenance of what is due to God. The Son has inherited a more excellent name than angels and everything for God is secured in Him. He is the effulgence of God’s glory, and the exact expression of His substance, and God has appointed Him the Heir of all things. Everything for God is secured in Christ. God has established the throne upon the basis of the perfect discrimination of good and evil. Those are the lines. In chapter 2 you have everything for man. To me this order is very [p. 3] beautiful, and I would not have it otherwise. People do not get established if they do not see that everything is secured for God. That is the first truth in connection with Christ; and then everything has been secured for man. The expression, “We see Jesus ... crowned with glory and honour”, involves that grace is equivalent to glory. That principle comes out in Luke’s gospel; the greater the exaltation, the higher Christ goes as man, the greater the grace to man; for grace is commensurate with glory. If we knew more of the glory of the Lord we should know more of the power of grace. The throne of grace is spoken of later on, where we obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. The principle is that the grace is equal to the glory on account of the Person who is glorified.
I am going to note two or three points in the path of the Lord Jesus, which has led up to glory, and will then endeavour to show you the bearing of it in regard to us.
In God’s ways of grace in regard of man all began in the birth of Christ, and hence you get the remarkable celebration in connection with His birth. There was a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good pleasure in men”, Evidently that was the point of departure, in God’s ways, in regard of man.
The next step was the baptism of Christ; that indicated that the Lord saw fit to identify Himself with the repentant on earth. He said, “Thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness”. He went into the waters of Jordan to mark His separation from what was ungodly on earth; from the course of the world. He took that place, but, at the same time, it was to identify Himself with the godly of the earth. It is very much a fulfilment of Psalm 16, His delight was in the saints, the excellent of the earth. It was not, morally, a question of Himself at all, but of those with whom He saw fit to identify Himself. The answer to it was [p. 4] that the heavens were opened to Him. It indicates to me that you must not connect the Lord with the course of this world. Christ was here in the world as a man among men, but had no resources in it, and was in interest completely apart from man: He was ever true to the place He took in baptism.
The next step is the transfiguration, and that was figurative. Those who were on the mount with Him were permitted to see a vision of the kingdom, and hence what took place there was figurative of what was to take place on high. The principle of it was, that a man went up from the earth to receive from God the Father honour and glory in the recognition of who He was. By the fact of His birth and His baptism He identified Himself with man. He was the Son of man by being born of woman, and He identifies Himself thus with man, and in His baptism He identifies Himself with the godly of the earth; and now, on the mount of Transfiguration, He receives honour and glory and is saluted as God’s beloved Son. He was the Son of man, Son of David, and Son of Abraham, and in going up above He presents Himself on behalf of man to God — and there He received honour and glory when there came to Him such a voice from the excellent glory, “This is my beloved Son”. There was a vision of the kingdom.
That was the third step, but glory could only then be evanescent, redemption not having been accomplished what took place there could not be final. But the glory saluted Him. The real fulfilment of glory was when Christ ascended up to the right hand of God. When on the mount He had not suffered for man, but when He goes to the right hand of God it is as having suffered for man, redemption being accomplished. He had tasted death for everything, and He goes to the right hand of God on the behalf of man in the value of a work accomplished for man. It is not simply that He receives honour and glory, but [p. 5] He is crowned with it. He has suffered for sins, as a man on the behalf of men, “the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit”; and “is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him”. He is “declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by resurrection from the dead”.
Two things have come to pass in the Lord Jesus Christ at the right hand of God. One is that the kingdom in righteousness is secured for God; and the other, that everything is secured on the behalf of man. If you want to know the measure of grace, you learn it in Jesus crowned with glory and honour. The closer you come to God, the more conscious you must be of grace. There is nothing with God to repel, because Christ is crowned with glory and honour as a testimony to man. Man is invited. The whole course of the Lord — His birth, baptism, and the mount of Transfiguration, and His being crowned at the right hand of God — indicates to us that all that is for man is found there.
Everything for God and everything for man meet in the Lord Jesus Christ at the right hand of God. In one sense you can look at His work as accomplished for God, but even in that light it is spoken of as on account of us. “He hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him”. On the cross the Lord occupied our place: it was a work done for God’s glory on man’s behalf; He is raised, too, on our behalf, and gone to the right hand of God, and is crowned with glory and honour, as a witness to men of what subsists for man, namely, unlimited grace. The more we are apart from the course of things here, and the closer we are brought by the Spirit of God to the glory, the more conscious we become of the acceptance and favour in which we stand.
[p. 6] I believe, in regard of our pathway here, that there is no limit to the grace which is ministered to us. We cannot always count upon being delivered out of trying circumstances, but we can always count upon the plenitude of grace which will be with us in our circumstances down here. Christ went to the right hand of God to take up a place for man, and He makes intercession for us there.
Now I want to speak of the effect of this in regard to us, and I will read a few verses at the end of Hebrews 2: 14 - 18.
The first thing here spoken of is a work done: that comes out in verses 14, 15. “That through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil; and deliver them who, through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage”. Verse 15 describes a class which existed here. When the Lord came there were saints on earth who were subject to bondage through fear of death. This is hardly intended to describe a class which is here now. They were in bondage on account of the uncertainty to them of what was beyond death. They had glimpses of light, but they had no clear revelation of what lay beyond death, and hence they were distracted and terrified by the fear of death. You get that exercise, up to the time that Christ died, with godly people. Satan was active in it all, and we find him even coming against the Lord, but the Lord said, “The prince of this world cometh and hath nothing in me”.
By death Christ brought that to an end, for He came to destroy him, or rather the power of him, who had the power of death. God had seen fit to let the terrors of death be in the hand of Satan as against man who had listened to Satan, and hence it was that Satan affected man with the terrors of death and judgment; but the point upon which God is now bent is his salvation. I think that man wants salvation out of the [p. 7] power of the enemy, and God has wrought to effect this. You see this in the case of the Israelites. God was declared in the blood on the lintel and door-posts, and so with us, the blood of Christ is the witness that God’s righteousness has been vindicated and declared, and God presents Himself consequently in grace to man. The announcement of the gospel is the remission of sins, and this is proclaimed that man may be brought into salvation from the enemy. The salvation of Israel was from their enemies, and from the hand of them that hated them: from the power of the Egyptian. God was with them all through, but His purpose was that they might be delivered from the hand of their oppressor. He would bring them out of the land of Egypt that they might serve Him without fear.
God has wrought deliverance for us that we might not be in the fear of death. Our knowledge of God is of the God who raises the dead. The God we have to do with is the Saviour-God, who raises the dead and calls the things which be not as though they were. We know Him in that character, and, if we know Him in that way, it is entirely impossible that we can be in the fear of death. God has raised our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, “who was delivered for our offences and was raised again for our justification”. We have to say to God, we pray to Him, give thanks to Him, and hope in Him, but it is in the God who raises the dead. All our acquaintance with God and everything in which we have to say to Him is in that light, and hence saints cannot be in the fear of death. The only God I know is the One who raised Jesus for us. And if death has terrors for me, it only proves that I do not know God. Christ has ended the fear of death. By death He has destroyed him that had the power of death: that is, the devil, to deliver them who, through fear of death, were all their lifetime subject to bondage. Such a class could hardly exist [p. 8] at the present time. When that class existed God was not declared in the power of resurrection.
Abraham probably apprehended God in that way when he offered up Isaac. And all our hopes in connection with God are bound up with God, who acts in resurrection power. The Lord speaks of that in John 5, “For as the Father raiseth up the dead and quickeneth them: even so the Son quickeneth whom he will”. The effect of apprehending this is to deliver us from the world and all connected with it. Many Christians cherish expectations in this life, and make a good deal of a pious life here — which one would not at all seek to discourage — but, at the same time, it must be remembered that our relations with God are with the God who raises the dead and calls the things that be not as though they were. God never intended to communicate to us blessings on this side of death. He has communicated the Spirit in order that our souls may be occupied with Him on the other side of death.
The other point in the passage I last read comes out in the two last verses. “Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people: for in that he himself hath suffered, being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted”. You must take into account, in regard of this chapter, that it presents Christ as on the part of man; hence it is that in the passage read the qualification of Christ to be Priest is presented. He takes the place of offering priest before He enters on the high priesthood. It behoved Him to be made like unto His brethren that He might first become an offering priest. No one could make atonement under the law or deal with an offering except a priest; and Christ must needs assume the place of offering priest. Who was to offer Christ except Christ Himself? And hence,
[p. 9] preparatory to His taking the place of High Priest, He is the offering priest. He makes atonement for the sins of the people as offering priest, but it is at the right hand of God that He is in the place of High Priest.
In connection with God who raises the dead, we are delivered from the fear of death, and in connection with the offering of Christ we get the forgiveness of sins; but it is one thing to believe in forgiveness, and another to have the consciousness of forgiveness. According to the Apostles’ Creed, all believe in the forgiveness of sins, but that is not the consciousness of forgiveness, which lies in the appropriation of Christ. Many a Christian believes in the forgiveness of sins, but is not conscious of it, because he has not learned to appropriate the Priest. Such do not know that in Jesus there is not simply everything for God, but everything for man; hence in the appropriation of Christ as Priest you get the gain of all that is connected with the Priest, and it is as offering priest He made atonement for the sins of the people, that we might have the consciousness of forgiveness of sins in the power of the Holy Spirit. The office of the Spirit is to lead on the soul to the appropriation of Christ.
The same thing is seen in the fifth chapter of John’s first epistle. “This is he that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit that beareth witness, because the Spirit is truth”. When the apostle speaks of the witnesses in regard to us, he puts the Spirit first, because it is in the power of the Spirit of God, in appropriating the one witnessed of, we become conscious of the effect of the water and blood. Water and blood signify purifying and expiation, and the Spirit makes good in us the consciousness of these, and thus we can have fellowship one with another. In the light of God, and in Christian fellowship, we have a good conscience by the resurrection of Christ.
[p. 10] A good conscience is really in the Christian circle, into which baptism brings us, and is in the consciousness of forgiveness of sins, which lies, as I said before, in the appropriation of Christ on our side.
I could not do you a greater service than to impress upon you how completely Christ is on our side, and as such has gone to the right hand of God, where He is owned on God’s side as His beloved Son. Now we have the kingdom, and in connection with it the offering priest, who, having effected everything for us here, has gone into heaven to take up the place of High Priest on behalf of His people. His qualification is seen in verse 18, “For in that he himself hath suffered, being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted”.
I judge that succouring the tempted may be accomplished by Christ directly or indirectly. We see the Lord acting directly once and again in the case of Paul. The apostle got succour directly from Christ. There were circumstances in which he was placed and in which he might be distressed, but he experienced succour from Christ. He came into difficulties in his path, partly by the conduct of others, and partly by zeal on his own part, and then the Lord appears to him, He comes in to succour His servant. That was the interference of the Lord, directly communicating succour to His servant when he was tempted. Every one is in great danger when in a false position, like Peter in the high priest’s palace. We sometimes, by zeal, or it may be by carelessness, get into a false position and are exposed to temptation, and then the Lord can come in to succour. I sometimes feel myself using the language of the Lord’s prayer, “Lead us not into temptation”, for I desire to be kept out of circumstances for which I have not faith; I would be extremely likely to fail, but, at the same time, there is the succour of Christ. It is that I might be recovered, that my faith may not fail.
[p. 11] The end of priesthood is that we might hold fast our profession. It is that we may not fail, but if we have failed that we may be recovered.
But Christ can also succour through His people. If He is at the right hand of God, the hearts of all His people are at His command, and it is possible for Him to succour His people indirectly. Just as He can wash the feet of His people mediately so can He succour them. If we drink deeply into the Spirit of Christ, then we are qualified to sympathise with God’s people and to help them in circumstances of temptation to which they may be exposed in some way or other upon earth. We should be desirous of occupying the priestly place here in regard to one another. Christ has the hearts of His own under control, and sets them in motion one towards another, and if we were near enough to the heart of Christ we would be used of Him to help one another. He is the great High Priest.
It is very blessed to think that, in Christ crowned with glory and honour, everything is secured for God in the Man who is gone up to the right hand of God on the behalf of man. The Son of man is the Man taken from among men, gone up to heaven, having accomplished redemption on man’s behalf and the consequence of this is that He is the pledge of the complete overthrow of everything that is contrary to and opposes man. He is declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness, on the principle of the mount of Transfiguration where He received from God the Father honour and glory.
Now these things exist and are connected with the world to come. Do not get into the erroneous notion that the world to come is something future. It is not yet manifested, but that in no way proves that it does not exist. In Jesus crowned with glory and honour everything is secured for God and for man we know God who has acted in the power of resurrection, and have the consciousness of forgiveness of sins in the [p. 12] appropriation of the Priest, and succour in circumstances of temptation.
It is of all moment to see the purpose of the grace of God. The remission of sins is His glad tidings to man, God proclaims this in order that man may be delivered from the bondage of this world to serve God. That is God’s purpose in the gospel. This leads on to the truth of the church. If God sets His people free to serve Him they must serve Him according to the appointed order.
I trust that the thought may remain with us, that grace is commensurate with glory.