THINGS WHICH PROMOTE SPIRITUAL GROWTH (AN ADDRESS AT BATH 20 NOVEMBER 1902)
[p. 275] THINGS WHICH PROMOTE SPIRITUAL GROWTH (AN ADDRESS AT BATH 20 NOVEMBER 1902)
I think there is something very interesting in the two epistles to the Thessalonians in the fact of their being addressed to young believers. Indeed, as far as we can judge, they had only been converted some few weeks when the apostle wrote this to them, and having just come out of heathendom, they needed to be addressed in the simplest form, and thus we need not feel that these epistles are over our heads. Though only “babes in Christ”, yet it is evident what great joy these believers gave to the heart of the apostle (1 Thessalonians 2: 19, 20), even though there might be much lacking in their faith (1 Thessalonians 3: 10). And how was this? Well, look at verse 7, “So that ye became models to all that believe in Macedonia and in Achaia”. That is, they were models, setting forth in themselves the effect of the grace of God in their hearts and lives. They might be very small in the eyes of men but they were very pleasing to the apostle and to the Lord. I desire to press this most earnestly, that these dear saints though small and feeble yet were true to what they had. It is no manner of use for us to be trying to acquire more light unless we are walking in that which we have. These dear saints were so walking in the power of the truth they had received that they are the only church addressed as “In God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ”.
The very style of the address should show us how far they had got on. It means that their souls were established in the knowledge of God the Father in the grace known in [p. 276] His beloved Son. It is the gospel which, if received in power, brings this knowledge of God in supreme grace. Beloved friends, have we got so far? Do we know God as the God of all grace, the One who is not demanding from us, but ready to supply us through His beloved Son so that we might stand firm in grace? What a bulwark this would be to our souls and so attractive, too, to our hearts! If it were so to these poor heathen, what should it not be to us? It turned them to God from idols. It is an immense thing to see God in this way. If I look at myself, I am only a poor sinner, blind, at enmity, dead, but God says, ‘I will take away all that hinders and bring in all that is in my heart, so that you may know Me as the God of all grace’. It is a wonderful thing that the Holy Spirit can address them as “in God the Father” so that, like the prodigal, they knew the heart of God and could bear witness, as they did, to His grace.
There is another thing — “and in the Lord Jesus Christ”. Paul was accused at Thessalonica of turning the world upside down and preaching another King. Jesus might be derided by men, but Paul knew Him as the King of glory. It is a wonderful thing to know what is behind the scenes. Men are altogether taken up with and greatly agitated about things here, but before God kingdoms and nations and all things down here are absolutely as nothing. God is behind the scenes and all for Him is contained in that blessed Man at His right hand. If you have received any blessing at all you have received it through that Man. God has set Him as administrator of all the grace and blessing He has for men, and that Man is announced as the One in whom not only are we blessed, but who is to give effect to all God’s pleasure with regard to this world. Then indeed He will turn the world upside down. The effect on the Thessalonians of seeing behind the scenes was that they were able to turn their backs on the world, its politics and [p. 277] its religion and to wait for God’s Son from heaven. They were able to stand in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Christianity is the knowledge of God in grace and of the Lord Jesus Christ as the Man through whom all God’s purposes will come in and be made good.
Then there is another thing, the moment you come to this there are certain effects produced — you have spiritual faculties. A child is born with all its faculties but they need developing by exercise, and so it is with the child of God. It was so with the Thessalonians; they had all their faculties developed by exercise and this epistle was written to put them in the right way to exercise their spiritual faculties. And now what are these spiritual faculties? Verse 3 tells us, “Remembering unceasingly your work of faith, and labour of love, and enduring constancy of hope, of our Lord Jesus Christ, before our God and Father”. Faith, love and hope are our spiritual faculties and the Thessalonians did not seek to exercise their natural senses in these things. It would be no good, for we receive spiritual faculties for spiritual things. The whole of the epistle shows how these faculties are to be exercised, so that they may grow and develop; if not we shall become spiritually dwarfed and not be for the pleasure of God. No matter how fond the parents of a new-born babe may be of their child, they expect it to grow and develop mentally and physically, and thus it is with the one who is born of God; God looks for the spiritual faculties to come into play and thus we grow and develop and are to His pleasure.
This epistle may be divided into three parts, namely:
- The work of faith, to chapter 3 verse 10
- The labour of love, to chapter 4 verse 10
- The constancy of hope, to chapter 5 verse 2
I desire to speak a little on each of these points and trust all will be interested because, if believers, we all have them in some degree. First, as to the work of faith, we find this [p. 278] brought before us very distinctly in chapter 2, verses 11 and 12: “As ye know how, as a father his own children, we used to exhort each one of you, and comfort and testify, that ye should walk worthy of God, who calls you to his own kingdom and glory”. Faith is the light of the knowledge of God in my soul. The effect is that everything takes a new character, it becomes the desire of the saint to walk worthy of God. Hebrews 11 gives us a wonderful account of the work of faith, “For in the power of this the elders have obtained testimony” (verse 2). Beloved friends, would you not like that? Well, these men did, each according to his measure, and with us today it should be our great exercise of faith to be in correspondence with that which we have received.
How does this work? Let us look at Genesis 17, verse 1 — “Jehovah appeared to Abram and said to him, I am the Almighty God: walk before my face, and be perfect”. This is the perfection of the pilgrim walk. If we have tasted grace we are in a position to walk before God and we see this come out in Abraham in chapter 24, verse 40, where he could say, “Jehovah, before whom I have walked”. That is the work of faith. What a contrast we find in Jacob as he neared his end, after his life of plotting and scheming, seeking in unbelief to bring about God’s promises by his own efforts! He could not speak thus of himself, though he could say, “The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, the God that shepherded me all my life long to this day”, Genesis 48: 15. Think of this for it is quite possible for us to miss this blessed path as he did. He was obliged to say, “Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life”, Genesis 47: 9. Why was this? It need not have been for at the outset God had revealed Himself to him in such a way that he might have walked before Him as did his fathers. The work of faith is that which keeps us in the presence of God and lets God come into [p. 279] everything connected with our path down here. Instead of this, how often we find that we walk before men or even before our brethren and that we prefer anything rather than to walk before God.
Now we come to another side of the work of faith (see Genesis 5: 22 - 24). “Enoch walked with God”, and again, “Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him”. This is not the pilgrim life as Abraham’s, but rather the life of privilege. The work of faith is to cultivate a life of divine privilege. Nothing could be more remarkable than that Enoch walked with God under the circumstances in which he lived. If we look at the line of Cain, the man of the world, we find the seventh from him was Lemech, in whose time the world began to be very attractive. The arts, amusements, manufactures and so on occupied man’s mind, but God says, as it were, ‘I will have a man superior to all that system of things, in whom I can find the work of faith’. So we find that (though death had come in by sin) only one man had as yet died, not an adequate witness to man’s condition. But Enoch lived in a sphere that death could not touch. It is a most wonderful thing to find a man who so walked with God that he had faith to be translated (Hebrews 11: 5). He was the first man who tasted eternal life down here, and was superior to the world system around and to death as the judgment of God.
God does the same with us; He renders us superior to the world by putting us in the light, and we are so brought into the secret things of God that we enter into and enjoy things which death cannot touch. But for this I must first be right as to the pilgrim life; then comes the life of privilege. I am brought out of the scene of death into the scene of eternal life in His Son. How wonderful to find Enoch so in the enjoyment of these things that his translation was morally appropriate. He leaves the world and goes on walking with God. The apostle in writing to the [p. 280] Thessalonians beseeches them to walk so as to please God and to be superior to the world, so as to be in moral preparedness for being “caught up” like Enoch, as we get it in 1 Thessalonians 4. Let us remember that the pilgrim life is before God, so that we may walk with God in the life of privilege until the Lord descends and we are translated and set down for ever in the presence of divine love. May we be exercised that we should be working out these things in faith.
Secondly we come to the “labour of love”. The work of faith puts us right in relation to God and the labour of love puts us right in regard of our brethren, for it leads in the direction of holiness and thus tends to unity. There is a moral order in christianity which we should be very careful to observe. As we have seen, the work of faith comes before the labour of love. The latter, as we see in chapter 3, verse 13, is “in order to the confirming of your hearts unblamable in holiness before our God and Father”, and mark, holiness is essential to unity. If I do not see this, I have not understood the great place that the unity of the saints has in the mind of God the Father and the Son. In John 17 we hear the voice of divine love and the burden of the chapter is that the saints may be kept from evil and sanctified through the truth in view of unity, “that they may be all one”. The labour of love is to be on this line; we should be labouring in order to promote holiness with a view to unity. The want of holiness is the reason why there is so little unity. We cannot be too sensitive as to this — just as a bit of grit in the eye hinders the normal action of the whole organ until it is removed, so we should be so walking in holiness and self-judgment that all should be set aside in us that hinders the flow of divine love. Why are not all christians walking in unity here in Bath? For want of holiness. We should be so in the energy of divine love that everything should go that is not of Christ or of God. If [p. 281] all were willing as to this there would very soon be the christian company walking in unity. It must be so, for nothing else would be left but a perfectly lovely company, the body of Christ.
Well, God puts us on that line and we should be labouring for it, as they were doing to all in Macedonia (chapter 4: 10), but was that enough? No! — they were “to abound still more”. Paul was insatiable as to this. May God enable us to set aside all that hinders. Paul, in writing to the Ephesians says, “I... exhort you” (chapter 4: 1). This chapter sets forth the labour of love, and it is not an altogether easy thing; you must give your mind to it “with all” (not some) “lowliness and meekness”. There must be no self-assertion, and thus far it is a question of yourself. Then comes the outward thing, “bearing with one another in love; using diligence” (that is labouring) “to keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace” (Ephesians 4: 2, 3) and that with every saint in this world, no less a circle. If others do not, you must. We find the blessed Lord is labouring to this end (Ephesians 5: 25), first in the love that gave Himself for the church, then working for the sanctification of it, and then comes the result, unity, one united company, no discord.
Beloved friends, are we working in this direction to promote the love of Christ in the company? If so, you will not tolerate anything that hinders in yourself and you will not tolerate it in others; you will seek to wash their feet. How? By a ministry of Christ, by being an expression of Christ. I would rather exhibit a little bit of Christ than say a lot about Him. If our labour of love is to be effective we must be more and more in the company of Christ so as to come out in His spirit and character and thus help the whole church. What! you say, can I do this? Yes; through the ministry and expression of Christ, and this is the labour of love.
[p. 282] Now we come to the third point, namely, the “constancy of hope”. If we are right with God through the work of faith and with our brethren through the labour of love we are morally prepared and free to look up in the “constancy of hope”, because we know what God has treasured up in Christ, the joy and blessing He has up there, ready to burst forth and illuminate the entire universe. We find often a great difference between many of the saints nowadays and these Thessalonian saints. The christian is now more often occupied with the thought ‘I am going there’ than with the thought of the glory that is coming from there. The constancy of hope would correct all this and keep one looking up in expectancy of all that is coming out and thus separate from the world, the whole system of things down here, which is all about to be done away.
All here is night and darkness; people may talk of the progress of science and the march of civilisation, but in the sight of God what is it all worth, and what is the effect of it morally on people down here? Are children more obedient to their parents? Is the love of God entering the heart? No! Look at what christendom is doing? With all the outward profession of christianity, men are unceasingly occupied in creating huge armies and navies, such as the world has never seen before, with the object of robbing, destroying and ruining one another. And is this done in the dark? By no means. People tell you that these are necessary things, that the world could not go on without them. Does this not show that it is the night according to God? But oh! the day is going to dawn. The Prince of peace is about to reign and bring the glory of God into this world. Are we rejoicing in the hope of it? We do not want to have anything whatever to do with the world, either its politics, pleasures or religion. Oh, what a wonderful place we are put in if by the work of faith we are walking before God and with God,
[p. 283] and by the labour of love seeking to walk in unity with our brethren and in the good of the constancy of hope, which would ever keep before us the One who is coming and all that is going to break forth in blessing through Him.
All this the Holy Spirit by the apostle puts before these young converts. It is these things, beloved friends, which lift us up from carnality and worldliness into God’s own thoughts and eternal realities.
May we all be helped in that direction.