GOD'S WORD, THE PRINCIPLE OF LIFE IN THE SOUL
GOD’S WORD, THE PRINCIPLE OF LIFE IN THE SOUL
Hebrews 4: 12 - 16; John 1: 1 - 18
It may seem a strange thing to say, but my present feeling is that I would not spend time in being a mere expositor of scripture. I think what the servant of the Lord should seek to bring before others is that which is revealed in the scripture. I do not care to deal with anything but what ought profoundly to affect souls.
There are certain things not exactly discerned in the letter of scripture but which lie underneath the letter, that is, in the spirit of scripture, which are of such moment that one can hardly conceive of people having them brought before them without their being greatly affected. The study of scripture may be mental, but all that is mental will pass away. Whatever you are taught by the Spirit you never lose. In regard to lectures, I am content if a soul take in one point — a point which comes in to supply a missing link in the chain.
There are three things specially before my mind to bring before you, and they are subjects very simple and elementary, but at the same time very profound. The first is this — the revelation of God, in other words, the light of God; the second is, the love of Christ; and the third is, the power of the Spirit; and it is by each and all of these things that people are powerfully affected and by the knowledge of them they grow.
I take up now the revelation of God — the form and manner of God’s revelation of Himself in the gospel and the effect of that upon us, and with this thought I have read the passage in Hebrews. There you have three things spoken of, (1) the word of God in verse 12; (2) the great High Priest in verse 14; and (3) the throne of grace in verse 16. We have to take the points up in that order. People do not understand the great High [p. 176] Priest until they know the word of God, nor will they know much about the throne of grace apart from the Priest. When you find out that the word of God is living, you then understand that there is a great High Priest who feels with us, and makes us conscious that He does so, and consequent upon that you come boldly to the throne of grace.
It says, “the word of God is living”. Where is it living? I do not see that the word of God is living down here apart from the christian. It is living in me or in you. It is powerful in the way of bringing conviction, but it is the revelation of God, for “word” really means “expression”; God in the expression of Himself. We get the title “Word” applied to Christ — He is the Word of God. “The Word became flesh, and dwelt among us”. “No man has seen God at any time, the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him”. Christ came for the declaration of God, and the light of God is the living principle in the soul of the believer. Apart from this no man lives in regard to God. Some one might say, ‘Does not a person live by the Spirit?’ My answer is, that you cannot sever the Spirit from the revelation of God. The light which the revelation brings connects itself with the God it reveals.
The great need is for the word of God to be a really burning power in our souls, that we should be profoundly affected by it. If I hold up a Bible, I could hardly say that it is living, it is the letter. That is no doubt what the apostle meant in warning those that had the letter of the scriptures about “an evil heart of unbelief”. What is presented as object for faith in the gospel becomes, when received in the christian, the power of life; I live by that which I have believed, “the just shall live on the principle of faith”. My relations with God are formed by the light which God has been pleased to give of Himself. Scripture is not mere history, it is always intensely moral; the principle in it is [p. 177] life, where God works, but the principle of life is the revelation of God.
The first thing that a person properly knows of God (I am supposing the gospel to have been heard and believed), is the truth that Christ has died, and been buried, and raised again the third day, according to the scriptures. I think the faith of the gospel is founded on what is given at the close of Luke’s gospel. “Thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day”. This was preached first among the Jews and afterwards among the gentiles. It was what we might call dogmatic, that is, the announcement of facts. It is important to preach facts, but what is behind these facts is the revelation of God. When once the facts are accepted, it is no longer simply the facts, but the light of God which these facts reveal. It is the power of God’s revelation come into the soul.
It is in God’s purpose not only to save man by the gospel, but that He should by it be known in the heart of man. God has laid Himself out in divine goodness to secure the affections of man, and the work of the gospel is not done in any one of us until one can say, “I love God”.
The first light we get about God comes out in the death of Christ. His death is the revelation of the righteousness of God, and God means us to apprehend it in that way. Some one may say, ‘But was not the blood for the forgiveness of my sins?’ I admit that, but there was more than that in the death of Christ — of which the blood is the witness — God’s righteousness is declared in it, that it may be known in my heart, and this is the moral foundation which God lays in the heart and upon which He can build.
God’s thought is to deliver me from the power of sin; not only to cleanse me from its guilt, but to free me from its power. When once the truth of the righteousness of God has taken possession of the heart of man, the power of sin is broken. The righteousness of God is known in [p. 178] the blood of Jesus, and the purpose of God in making known that righteousness is that I may be delivered from the bondage in which I was by nature. What a wonderful expression of grace! It is inconceivable that any one who has apprehended the way which God has taken to declare His righteousness should go on in sin.
But the next point is the resurrection of Christ, “He rose again the third day according to the scriptures”. What does that fact convey? It is the display of the power of God, that is, the power of God in reference to man’s weakness. Man is very weak; the real expression of the weakness of man is in death. Death is very terrible; I may be the centre of a whole circle of affections, with wife, children, and friends around, and if I die all are affected. I pass powerlessly out of it all, and nothing can really fill the gap. Death is the expression of man’s utter weakness, but God has declared His mighty power in raising Christ from the dead. What is the moral purpose of that? That we may have that light of God in our hearts. I have hope in God that in my utter weakness His power is effectual to raise me up, not for judgment but for life, as in Christ. “For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God”. My point is that you may apprehend the wonderful light in which God has made Himself known; in His righteousness in the blood of Jesus, and in His power in the resurrection of Christ, and that is exactly what we want, and we have the light of that in our souls.
The result of man’s believing the facts of the gospel is that the Holy Spirit is communicated to the believer. Now, what does he gain? He begins to reason from the death of Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit, and sees that the death of Christ is not simply a witness of God’s righteousness, but the expression of His love. No one can apprehend this but by the Holy Spirit, as we read, “The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, which is given unto us”. The scripture goes on to say, “But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us”. The death of Christ is thus the blessed expression of God’s love to us, even when sinners.
The word of God by the gospel has become a living power in our souls. All the light that has come to us has come through the gospel; it is a great thing that our hearts should be in the full light of God’s blessed revelation.
Another thing you will find, and that is that when the word of God has become real in the soul, it is extremely analytical; you get everything dissected in the believer. I come to have a sense of everything that is in me. The word of God searches a man through and through, and finds out all the different elements that are at work in him. It is a painful experience, but very necessary to the christian. You may find spiritual dullness coming over you; and the light of God coming in, the will begins to be uncommonly active, for it rebels against the light of God. The principle of sin and unbelief is revealed. The word thus dissects. I can understand people being depressed by the discovery in them of these things. The fact is that you are finding out the terrible contrariety in yourself — what the strength of will is, and the working of it is discovered by the light of God in you. The object is that in being alive to it all you may be maintained in deliverance from its power. But we have to find out our own weakness, that in our flesh dwells no good thing, that is, that death is in us. There is death upon me, that is terrible, but death is in me, in the sense of inability for the good that is known. The only answer to it all is in the heart being sensible of the love of Christ. Thus are laid bare the flesh and its tendencies; but the Spirit of God emancipates the soul from the control of the flesh.
It is my privilege to live in the full light of God’s revelation of Himself in the gospel, and to be freed from the power of all that is contrary to it; to be free from sin [p. 180] and legality, and to learn absolutely to distrust the flesh. I have nothing to expect from the flesh, but everything from the Spirit that dwells in me. The gospel is not simply a question of grace, in which God has shone forth to us, but the light of the gospel in which the grace has been made known, becomes the living principle in the believer’s soul. “For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy [or undo] the works of the devil”; that is, that man might be released from the fearful bondage in which he was held, and know the God who has released him.