THE POWER PECULIAR TO EACH STEP IN GRACE
THE POWER PECULIAR TO EACH STEP IN GRACE
We read that all things are ours, and we have to grow up into them. “Whereto we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing”, Philippians 3: 16. For each step in grace there is a special power given, so that there need be no mistake as to how far one has advanced.
Salvation is the first step, and it is marked with very distinct power; you are turned “from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me”, Acts 26: 18. There is often a long time between our being [merely] assured of safety, and our [thus] entering into the joy of acceptance. You enjoy acceptance when you believe that God has raised Christ from the dead; then you have peace with God, and the Holy Spirit is given you to shed abroad in your heart the love of God. It is a never-to-be-forgotten day when you know the power belonging to this step. However alienated and estranged you have been from God, you are now turned to Him who is the strength of your heart and your portion for ever. The peculiar grace in this step is, that God is the One who is paramount to you. Your own state does not occupy you at first; it is the greatness of His grace that fills your heart, so that like the thief on the cross, you are absorbed with the blessedness of being with Christ, and your old natural tastes are in abeyance.
[p. 417] The next step is deliverance. The believer who knows the gospel fully is, as I have said, at first so taken up with God’s goodness to him, that his own state does not come prominently before him. There is a moral greatness about one who is enjoying the gospel, and who has received the Holy Spirit; so that he necessarily shrinks from what is not of the Spirit of God; he avoids the company of those who are not led by the Spirit. Now when his own state troubles his conscience, he at first finds great relief in confessing his sins, because he knows that God is faithful and just to forgive him his sins, and to cleanse him from all unrighteousness (1 John 1: 9); and while he does not look at the law as the rule of life, yet he cultivates everything of which his conscience approves; so that his manners and bearing are often very attractive. Many earnest souls in their desire after holiness have recourse to prayer meetings and conventions in order to promote it, as the one thing to be desired. But this is not deliverance. Deliverance is when you are freed in your own conscience from the old man, “the body of this death”, as much as you are freed before God, and you know that you are in Christ, and that the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made you free from the law of sin and death, You have now quite another object of interest; it is not your behaviour, or answering to your conscience which is before you, but Christ. Isaac, according to the type (Galatians 4: 30), is in his rightful place, and Ishmael is cast out; and as you walk in the Spirit, it is not what you do that you are thinking of, but what Christ would do; you seek to maintain that you are dead to the law by the body of Christ, and He lives in you; you can say, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live yet not I, but Christ liveth in me”. (Galatians 2: 20) There is a spiritual power connected with this step which cannot be known otherwise, and which is so manifest that it is easy to recognise it. To the one who has deliverance [p. 418] and enjoys it, it is incomparable blessing; he knows that “where sin abounded, grace did much more abound: that as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord”, Romans 5: 20, 21. You not only delight in your wonderful acceptance with God, but Christ is in you; you enjoy nearness to Him, you know that you have joined Him on the other side of death, like Peter in Matthew 14. When you taste that, not only are you in His life above all the power of evil here, but by His priestly service He bears you above all the weakness of humanity; so that you do not look for any human power to aid you, for you are made conscious that Christ is Himself above all the winds and waves, above all the power of evil here.
Next is communion with Christ. “Part with me”. When you are in deliverance you enjoy the love of Christ, as we see in Romans 8, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” and when you do, nothing but company with Him can really satisfy you, like the disciples in Luke 5 who forsook all and followed Him. You feel His absence like Mary Magdalene - that He is not here, He is risen - and, like Ruth, your heart says, “Whither thou goest, I will go” (Ruth 1: 16); and you prove that His word remains true: “I love them that love me; and those that seek me early shall find me”. (Proverbs 8: 17) Your heart rejoices that it can behold Him in glory.
And as there is light there is the blessed step of coming to Him - the living Stone. You may be breaking bread for long without this being known. But when the believer knows it, and has come to the living Stone, he knows that he is part of the spiritual house, the holy priesthood, and the assembly is a great and blessed retreat for his heart. He not only knows Christ then as Son over God’s house, but he has boldness to enter the holiest of all, in heavenly association with Him; not only in Christ’s acceptance [p. 419] before God, but as empowered by Him to be here for Him, to show forth the praises of Him who hath called us out of darkness into His marvellous light. There is first deliverance from all that is on your side, you know Him individually as the joy of your heart, then you are free in heart to seek Him in company with His own in the assembly.
Now when you enter into the true meaning of the Lord’s supper, that it is not remembering His death for yourself, but remembering Him in His death, you are in blessed freedom from all that is of yourself, you then truly remember Him in His death here, and your heart finds that your only true state in the place where He died is to be in fellowship with His death until He comes. But the more truly you are so, the more you rejoice to know Him in glory, exalted at the right hand of God; and though this experience may come after your knowing Him as the living Stone, yet you will find that fellowship with His death gives everything its true character to you here. And then you can turn undistractedly to Him who is Son of God over His house, and to the place where He is, and not only know the blessedness of your own association with Him as one of the consecrated company, but that in divine seclusion with Himself, with feet washed, separated from all the defilement here, you know what He is to His own on earth, as He sets it forth in John 14.
Then you can come from Himself to serve Him in the place of His rejection, setting forth what He wrought when here, as is expressed in John 14: 26, and drawing from Him as the branch from the vine, His own in this world is the one great object of interest to you (the gifts of the Spirit come in here for this purpose). Finally, by the Holy Spirit sent from Himself in glory (John 15: 26), you are a witness for Him on the earth. Then the future is made known to you, “he will shew you things to come” (John 16: 13),
[p. 420] so that service embraces past, present, and future. I need not dwell on this in detail, as my point at present is only to show the power which is conferred with each definite advance in His grace.
Next, the more true you are to Him in this dark and evil scene, the more you feel the contrariety in it to His mind, and pleasure; and then the light of the blessed fact that Christ is Head of the church and that in the mystery are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, is made known to you, and it is an unspeakable relief to you to know that you are dead with Him from the rudiments of the world, that you are not only clear of everything here, but that the body of the flesh is cut off in Christ’s death. So that you are over Jordan, risen with Him, you are in the sphere of His life, and you know Him in His own place; you come forth as fitted by Himself, to make known His present mind and interests for His own circle. No one can describe the new and wonderful experience to be here in the scene where everything is contrary to the Lord, and to know that you are so with Him outside it all, that you return to everything in it (however beautiful it may seem naturally) as one in heart dissociated from it all. One must be in this experience to understand anything of the greatness of it, or to apprehend the superiority which you will enjoy when you come forth in the new man, replete with the divine sensibilities of Christ, and the knowledge of His word to His own here, so that you can say He is your life. When He shall appear we shall also appear with Him in glory.
Now you enjoy the Father’s love, for you do not love the world nor the things in the world; 1 John 2: 15. The great spiritual power that is given with this step, is that you have passed in with the Forerunner, not only in hope, but in present enjoyment to the spot where He is. You not only have an “anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast”, (Hebrews 6: 19) but you have [p. 421] passed in company with Himself in there; you have not only left earth for heaven, but you are clear of every influence here; the world is thoroughly a wilderness to you; you have nothing to seek nor to choose, and you return to it as dead to the things of earth to be here unhinderedly for Him.
The next step is one of inconceivable satisfaction, even surpassing the joy of salvation, when by the power which wrought in Christ and raised Him from the dead and set Him at His right hand in the heavenlies, you are conducted to Him in His own place, as Rebecca was conducted to Isaac; now you realise union with Him; the spiritual power with which you are endowed is fully detailed in Ephesians 3, “strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God”.
Lastly, you come forth from Him in heaven, to be His witness here on earth, as we learn in Ephesians 4, a new man, to be for Him in the assembly - in His circle; and in your own private circle. It is a moment of blessedness when you are Christ’s witness here, in such superiority to the world that you demonstrate what it is morally, and you can stand for the Lord against all the power of Satan; the prince of this world is judged. Then, learning of future things, glorifying Him, your heart rests in the things that eye hath not seen nor ear heard, but which God hath revealed unto us by His Spirit. Thus you are properly waiting for the appearing of Christ. The rapture relieves you from this scene of contrariety, that you may take your place in His kingdom.
To sum up, I will just recapitulate briefly the special power conferred in each definite advance in grace.
[p. 422] When you enjoy the salvation of God, you are morally like Noah after the flood. You are saved in the place where you were under judgment and the love of God is shed abroad in your hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given unto you.
Next, as you know you are accepted by God in Christ, and that the old man is removed in judgment on the cross, so now by the Spirit of God you know that you are in Christ for your own comfort; you belong to Him and you are in liberty, freedom from the flesh, delivered from the old man. It is not yourself that is before you then, not Ishmael, but Isaac. “Christ liveth in me”. When I am with Him above all the power of man He satisfies my love by drawing me to His side.
Next, I learn what it is to have part with Him, I behold Him in glory; as I am drawn to Him I find I am in association with Him in the holiest, and the place where He is has now that joy for my heart. There I learn how I belong to Him in the assembly; and in the breaking of bread I have fellowship with His death, and the more truly I enter into this here, the more I rejoice that I know Him and have part with Him, where He now is. From this I come forth to be occupied with His interests on earth.
Next, I learn to my unspeakable relief that I am dead with Him from the rudiments of the world, so that not only am I in the joy of company with Him, but I am in divine seclusion. As risen with Him I can seek the things above where He sits at the right hand of God, and be more efficiently in His service knowing Him as Head, abiding in Him.
Next, I realise union with Him in heaven; the immense portion I receive in consequence of this step is detailed in Ephesians 3. It is much more easily conceived than described.
[p. 423] Finally, I am in the inconceivable blessing of being here as His witness in divine power awaiting His appearing.