NOTES ON SCRIPTURE 1895 NO. 3
NOTES ON SCRIPTURE 1895 NO. 3
Consequent on knowing Christ in the holiest, and thus knowing access into the presence of God, you [p. 42] run on here, your eye steadfastly fixed upon Christ on the throne of God. It was a strange thing to a Jew to suffer from circumstances when he was faithful, as hitherto when he was faithful he had been blessed in the basket and in the store. Now the christian has to run on to Christ, and to surmount every difficulty in the way. He must lay aside every weight, that is more outside things, some habit or taste, such as the love of music or a newspaper - anything which is a hindrance to you, or detains you in the race. And inside, the sin that is in you, not merely a besetting sin, but sin in its principle, not fully done with until you are dead. You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin; you have not died as a martyr. Now the blessed God turns all your sufferings into discipline, all for your benefit. Do not ‘despise’ it, do not be indifferent, as man in his pride tries to be, when a blow falls on him; and do not ‘faint’ under it, do not be overwhelmed by it - endure the chastening as chastening and for your benefit. There are two kinds of chastening, one to correct you when you are inconsistent, the other to help you when you are faithful. Jacob suffered much at Shalem, he was very inconsistent. God told him to go to Bethel; and when he went there, and was in the path of faithfulness, Rebekah’s nurse died, and he called the place “Allon-bachuth”, the oak of weeping; he was not ready for the discipline until then.
When you are going on and come to any hindrance by persons or property, that is the stone before the wheel. God takes it away; He waits until the wheel, that is your inclination, is ready for the removal of the stone. We who live are always delivered unto death. A christian might think that he was all right because things were going on so smoothly with him; just as a horse, turned out to grass because he was of little use, might suppose that he was more favoured than the horse every day at hard work, simply because of [p. 43] its usefulness. The discipline here is more to help you. The great end in view is that you should be partaker of God’s holiness, apart from everything here as He is. “For their sakes I sanctify myself” (John 17: 19); this sanctification is immeasurable. It is only as you are near God that you can understand anything of His holiness, and surely, as you are exercised by the suffering, you are occupied with Him, not to find out the cause of the affliction, but that He is your resource in it. If God is before you, if you are in the Spirit, you make God paramount; He is first; if not, man is first. It is here where many christians fail; they are devoted, but man is more before them than God, and therefore neither in deed nor in word can they rise above man’s judgment and man’s feelings.