THE LOVE OF GOD IN THREE RELATIONS
[p. 461] THE LOVE OF GOD IN THREE RELATIONS
Titus 3: 4 - 7; John 3: 16; 1 John 3: 1
These scriptures speak of God’s love, which is the greatest of subjects as involving Himself. I wish to speak of it as in relation to man as it is presented in this first scripture, in relation to the world as in the second scripture, and in relation to christians as in the third scripture.
The first, although very remarkable, is less in our minds than it deserves to be — God’s love to man as a race. He had mankind in mind, so the Lord Jesus became a Man. Scripture says, “In him was life; and the life was the light of men”. That is, the range of the light was man, it was exclusive in that way. Angels had fallen and were in darkness, but light was not extended to them. And that light, being the effect of life, was a witness to God’s love to man. It was that kind of love. It is one word in the original: “philanthropy”, but much more than that word means as now used. Men are leaving God out and professing to rely upon themselves; modern philanthropic societies are professedly for the mutual assistance of man, and if we make full allowance for the result of these things, even if men could assist one another to the extent of retaining themselves here in life, the result would be entirely incomparable with what God proposes. If indeed from antediluvian times men had been allowed to live to this present time the conditions would be unspeakable; they are bad enough now. There would have been an ever-increasing power of sin, and its concurrent results in the way of what we have described here as “disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice, and envy, hateful, and hating one another”. So, beloved friends, if all these modern things are even successful, their results are not to be compared with the blessing of God in the gospel. It is a question not merely of relief that men [p. 462] might live in this world, but of complete deliverance from sin and its consequences. That is what God proposes. It is a question of the kindness and love of God for men, and that must be measured by what He is.
Now I appeal to all here as to the appearance of this kindness and love of God to man, and how it grapples with the root need of the race. You may say the results are very small, but we have to wait for full results, and when God is pleased to reveal them we shall see them to be adequate and according to His mind. The question for each to ask is, what is obtainable for me at this moment? For after all, what is the gain of occupation with dark Asia and Africa, unless each begins with himself? What is there obtainable for me? Is there any present relief? Is there anything that I can get tonight? These are the vital questions. The thing to be considered is, ‘What is God pleased to be doing now?’ In Genesis I see what He was pleased to do, that is, He worked six days to bring to pass the physical order of things around us, and on the seventh day He rested. Then He began to work again and the first thing He did was to make clothes for Adam and Eve — a very different kind of work from what He had been engaged in. The material was skin, but what was the cut? These skins represent the great idea of clothing, because God made everything perfect in its place. Everything is just as it should be in what God does. He does not make an egg, He makes a bird, He makes a man and a woman; He makes everything perfect. If He makes clothes they must be perfect, there could be no improvement. And from that day to this, God has worked as it has pleased Him to do. He might dispense with the misery and sin of this world, and roll up death and send Satan to the lake of fire at any time, but it has not pleased Him to do this yet. It has pleased Him to do something else — it has pleased Him to work in the souls of men; He has been pleased to work in my soul. It is His pleasure. Has He worked in your soul? You say ‘No’. I am sorry for you, and so is every christian here. You are to be pitied, and our souls go out to you. Why has God not been working with you? Have you been shutting the door on Him? The Lord Jesus said, “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me”, Revelation 3: 20. He is ready to do something for you. He has already done the greatest thing for you in giving Himself a ransom for you, now He is seeking to bring you into the blessed gain of this. If you are unaffected, get down upon your knees tonight and say to God, ‘Why have you not worked in me? Why have you not knocked at my door?’ It may be He will tell you that He has knocked but you have not opened, and He has had to turn away. We read of the Lord having to leave the country of the Gadarenes. They told Him to leave, but He left one man who had got the blessing, and He left that man behind so that others might get the blessing. I am speaking of God’s work now, based on the great work of atonement accomplished on Calvary nineteen hundred years ago.
Nicodemus says to the Lord, “We know that thou art a teacher come from God”. Do you ever think of Jesus in that way, “a teacher come from God?” It was a fine word from the teacher of Israel. University professors today do not generally speak thus, but if one of them becomes converted to God, he will say of Jesus, ‘He is a teacher come from God’. That is what Nicodemus said. You may say that was not very much. He took a long time to come to it, but there was a work of God there, and that will abide throughout eternity; and in the end he comes out and identifies himself with Jesus as dead; a sure evidence of the work of God! He had been hidden away like many of you may be, as was also Joseph of Arimathaea. He had been a secret disciple. There are many secret disciples, but they are disciples,
[p. 464] and heaven knows them — their names are there. Heaven knew Nicodemus’ name; when Jesus is to be buried he is present with his hundred pounds of spices. Where did he get them? If he had gone to some spicery merchant to procure these spices, what would he say if the man asked him what he wanted with such a large quantity of spices, for Nicodemus would be well known in Jerusalem, and on enquiry he would not tell a lie? You may be sure the work of God will assert itself and shine out according to God. Nicodemus would tell the merchant that he wanted these spices to anoint the Nazaraean, the Crucified. What would be in the mind of the merchant? He would say, ‘That is a poor deluded disciple of Jesus’. Thank God, the work of God has triumphed in this disciple, and will triumph.
I am especially calling attention to what God is doing. The question for everyone here is, ‘Has He done something in your soul, or has He left you alone, or have you hindered His work?’ Have you been hindering? Have you been indifferent to the divine appeals? The kindness and love of God has appeared for every man and woman and child in the world. If it is for mankind, then it is for you. God has come in in that relation. He has come in in love for the whole race of mankind. It is not a secret thing. It has appeared. God has moved. His kindness and love to man has appeared, and the next move is yours. Have you moved? In the gospel of John the thought is that man draws near to God, and in Luke it is the thought that God draws near to man. It is for you, young and old, to decide whether there has been any move in your soul towards Him.
The apostle goes on to say here, “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us”; that is, it is on His own principle. He is very jealous about His own principles, His own terms. They are the only right terms, they are the only effective terms, and the first one is mercy. Well, now,
[p. 465] it may be that you do not like that because it does not make enough of you. That is often the cause of people being stumbled; they want to have part in the thing, but God says, ‘I am not going to deviate from My own principles’; not only because they are His, but because they are the only effective ones, and hence the thing for you to do is to cast yourself on His mercy — accept salvation on that principle.
The next thing is the mode of operations. Here it is the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, “which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour”. God proposes to help you. If God is working with a man or a woman, conscience comes into action and there is a sense of unfitness for Him. Then one says, “God be merciful to me a sinner!” Not, for the moment, ‘God be merciful to dark Africa or Asia’, but ‘God be merciful to me’, as if there were not another person in the universe. You would say, ‘I cannot afford to let this pass by, the thing must be settled’. “God be merciful to me a sinner”. God is merciful, and merciful in such a way as to relieve you “by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Spirit”. The word “regeneration” is worth considering. You have the word “washing” attached to it. God would say, ‘I am going to make you live, but I am going to make you without spot or blemish or any such thing’. What a proposal on the part of God! It is not simply washing, but the washing of regeneration — that in making us to live, He washes us. It is a wonderful combination of the effect of the work of Christ on the cross and the effect of the power of the Spirit of God in a man’s soul. That is, as you sit on your seat, God relieves your conscience of everything that would disturb it, and at the same time makes you to live, so that there are pulsations towards God and the brethren. And he adds, “renewing of the Holy Spirit; which he shed on us”, or “has poured out”. Take [p. 466] notice of that word poured. At Pentecost there was poured out the Spirit of God, and the believer comes into this now. This all comes in through the Lord Jesus Christ. Is not that a witness to the kindness and love of God to man? What an expression the apostle was of it! I suppose no man trod this earth apart from the Lord Jesus who had such a heart for men. The apostle was a witness himself of what God can do and that is what every preacher should be. God has shed forth His Spirit abundantly on us, Paul says, through our Lord Jesus, so that being justified we might be heirs according to the hope of everlasting life. Where is there anything that could meet the condition of man like that — everlasting life! It would be an unspeakable disaster if man should live on as he is. Death is a mercy! Think of men like Caesar, Nero, Napoleon living on. That is not what God intended! He brought in death to limit all that. He proposes everlasting life on His own terms through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit. So there is to be a world presently in which men will live according to God. The proposal of the gospel is that we are to be like Jesus, to be raised and quickened and to be eternally with Him.
I want now to say a word about the love of God for the world. You may say the world is just the men that are in it. Does Scripture use words for nothing? Does the Spirit of God not know what He means if He uses special words in regard to the work of the six days in Genesis? Does He not mean something by it? God has something in His mind. The earth He formed was to be inhabited. He did not form it for a graveyard. It is a graveyard now, but the Lord knows where His people are in their graves. Sarah’s is the first grave mentioned in Scripture, and she was a believer, a saint; so that God is pleased to have His graveyard. He knows where His people are and Jesus will come, so to speak, to the mouth [p. 467] of every grave. He knows where the saints are, and we commit them to the grave with that knowledge. The graveyards are a solemn testimony, not to the creational wisdom and power of God, but a testimony to our guilt. Had not God ever in mind a world of life, of living persons, for He made the world to be inhabited? It is said in John that the Lord Jesus came into the world, and the world was made by Him. That does not mean the wicked men in it, it means the thing which is to subsist. He loves the thing itself. He is going to have what He loves. He is going to have a wonderful world. There is the world that now is, the world of the graveyards; but there is that which is to come, as the Lord Jesus said, “that world and the resurrection”. “The world to come whereof we speak”, or “the inhabitable world to come”. You see all that the greatest statesman can do is to ameliorate things and improve existing conditions, perhaps check evil; and we thank God for all the efforts that are made to check evil, but it is just for the time until God comes in, and He is coming in, and He is going to have a world the like of which men have not dreamed of. It says, “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life”. It does not say to be ‘heir of it’, but to have it. John does not put it off, it is for you tonight. Is it not worth thinking of? But then what is it for? God would have a people for His own world, and He is taking out a people now for His own world. “Whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life”. Where are we to spend that life? There is a world suitable to it, and God would bring every one of us into it. It will be a world teeming with life; but a life not such as we are accustomed to in this world, but a life according to God — eternal life, which is the gift of God. You cannot afford to be without it. It is the testimony of God’s love, and that is what I had in mind [p. 468] to speak of, His love for the world. He is taking out this one and that one who believes in the Lord Jesus. They have eternal life, and hence shall have their part in that world and the resurrection.
The final thought that I had to speak of is God’s love for His people, as in John’s epistle. God has a love for man as such. God has a love for the world, and He has a love for His people. John says, “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us”. It is the kind of love He has bestowed upon us. The manner of love that He has bestowed on men is set forth in Titus, the kind of love that He bestows on the world is seen in John 3: 16, and the kind of love He bestows on His people is in John’s epistle. Let our hearts open to it! “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the children of God” — the correct word is not “sons”, but “children”. How remarkable that we should be called the children of God! Have you cherished that name! What will not God in His love do for His children, the children of God the Father! The great thing that John would do is to bring God into this world, and His children are to express Him here. They are a testimony to Him. Now are we the children of God. Presently, as Christ appears, we shall be like Him.
The Holy Spirit witnesseth with our Spirit that we are the children of God, but the verse I read is that we should be called the children of God; that is the manner of His love. You can see how varied and extensive is the love of God. I would urge christians to value and to take up that name without fear. If we are that, then the world knows us not — it involves reproach. For this cause the world knows us not, because it knew Him not. Men do not want to know us. Nevertheless the apostle Paul says, “As unknown, and yet well known”. Which is the greater, think you — to be well known and loved in heaven, or unknown there and loved on earth?