THE DISTANCE AND THE NEARNESS
[p. 310] THE DISTANCE AND THE NEARNESS
Genesis 6:5-8; Genesis 6:12-14; Genesis 7:11,12; Genesis 8:13,14; Genesis 8:20-22; John 10:11; John 10:14,15
Everyone, as a rule, knows that there is a distance between God and man. I have dwelt on this on a former occasion. The great defect in many is that they do not know the nature of the distance, one which they are unable to remove. I desire to bring before you this evening three parts in the gospel. First, the nature of God’s judgment upon man; secondly, how it has been removed; and, thirdly, the new position on the earth of the saved. They are so simple that the youngest can understand them. It is of the deepest importance that you should clearly know the nature of the pressure or weight on you; if you do not, you do not know what must be removed; if any of the weight remains, you will be still oppressed, and you cannot enjoy the unclouded blessing which belongs to the one who knows that, through the grace of God, all has been removed. The judgment on man is here simply told: “The end of all flesh is come before me”. I know it is not pleasant to the natural man to hear the Lord’s words, “The end of all flesh is come before me”. Man had been on the earth 1,500 years when the deluge came, and “the earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence”. Man was getting a day older, and a day worse, and therefore “it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth”, and He said, “I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth”.
It is not only that your sins must be atoned for, but there must be the ending of the flesh in judgment. This is God’s judgment on man; and you cannot apprehend the grace of God if you do not see the nature of the weight on you. I want you to understand the gravity of man’s position before God. In Genesis 2 we read, “In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die”. Death is the termination of man in the flesh; the judgment in the flood was the sample of it. “And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth”. That is the judgment resting on every man; you must first accept that the man in the flesh must go in judgment. It is not possible that another can bear the judgment on you, in order that you may retain man in the flesh. Many make this mistake, even true believers; they suppose that as the judgment has been borne by Christ, therefore they can retain the man under judgment. No; the Lord Jesus Christ bore the judgment of death on the cross, and He rose from the dead. “For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead”. The believer is clear of the man under judgment, and now he is of the Man who bore the judgment. “As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly” - “This mortal must put on immortality”. But the nature of the weight is plain enough, so that each of you must come to this - I am ruined; and in the spirit of the leper, you should put your hand on your mouth, your mouth in the dust, and cry, “Unclean, unclean!”
I want to make it clear to you that if the judgment on you be borne by another, you cannot retain the man which has gone in judgment on the cross. A great many are trying to improve the first man. How can you improve a being which must go in judgment? And though it goes in judgment in Another, yet you cannot retain it, because it would be morally incongruous to retain the man for whom Christ bore the judgment. We could not appear before Him. Hence the apostle could say of himself, “I am crucified with Christ”. I am trying to make plain to every one here the nature of the judgment on man. I know well how little people in general accept it. The weight on man is not seen, and few can believe that all that is so beautiful in man is of the “old things” that “have passed away”.
Now we have seen, I trust, the nature of the judgment, which is the first subject. We now come to the second - how you can be saved, how the judgment has been borne. God in His grace saves Noah and his house. Here His grace is displayed; He shows that He can save, and how He does it. The ark figuratively sets forth the death of Christ. There was a moment upon the earth when no flesh could be seen; it was either drowned in the water or covered by the ark. The covering, the atonement, is God’s way of saving the soul. It was a type; only a few, eight souls, were saved by water.
Now the import of this type is that they were exposed to the water, the judgment, and they were saved out of it. We read in Genesis 7: 11, “In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up”, and in chapter 8: 13, “And it came to pass in the six hundredth and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from off the earth: and Noah removed the covering of the ark, and looked, and, behold, the face of the ground was dry”. Of course, we are looking at the type at present, how those exposed to the judgment can be saved, for there is no other way in which they could be saved. The Lord possibly refers to it when He says, “I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me”. There was no way of being saved but by the ark, which typified the death of Christ. Noah and his house were a type of the saved company. This type (it is most [p. 313] important) shows that the first man is under the judgment of God, hence that man must go in judgment; and if that man is saved, he must be saved by another bearing his judgment; he does not retain the man under judgment. In the type the saved are covered in the ark, not seen. Hence we read, “The like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us”, that is, you are baptised unto the death of Christ; and if this be truly maintained, you cannot seek position nor recognition among men. It is by the death of Christ that you can be saved, but you must appropriate His death (John 6: 53). Noah and his house were a year and ten days in the ark; that is, they were every day in the year in every kind of circumstance which a whole year expresses, and at the end of that time they entered on a new history on the earth. They come out of the ark near the spot where they went into it. They went into the ark, because they were under the judgment of God. A word to every one in this room: Have you gone in? You are under the judgment of God. You cannot get out of it but by appropriating the death of Christ, “Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood”. If you appropriate Christ’s death, then you pass “out of death into life”; you enter upon a new position on the earth. Here they were in the ark a year and ten days, which figuratively sets forth man’s history in the flesh. (We read that the prophet was in the widow’s house a whole year.) Now they are out of the judgment; the judgment has been borne. They were covered in the ark, figuratively the atonement. The man that was under the judgment of God is no longer to claim recognition among men; you are saved from the judgment by Christ’s death, and baptised unto His death; you enter on a new history here; you shall never come into judgment.
Now we come to the third part. This we get in Genesis 8: 20, 21 - “And Noah builded an altar unto [p. 314] the LORD; and took of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. And the LORD smelled a sweet savour; and the LORD said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done”. I am keeping to the type still; it is important to understand the type, because it is a shadow of the reality. Noah and his house are out of the judgment, and because of the burnt-offering now offered up, they are in the favour of God.
Now I turn to John 10, to set forth the gospel in its fulness, as accomplished by the Lord Jesus Christ. I read two verses of John 10, one is, “I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep”. That is very definite; no one ever heard before of a shepherd dying for his sheep; a shepherd ordinarily cares for his sheep. If the shepherd has to die for the sheep, it is evident that nothing less would save them; it was not said that He did good works for them, or that His righteousness would be a set-off for their unrighteousness; no, “I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep”.
Now I must explain how the type has been fulfilled. I would draw your attention to the blind man in John 9. There is a blind man, he is a typical case. If there is any one in this room that has light, you were once blind. I will give you the history of grace. The Lord begins the work, it is the Lord who anoints his eyes, and it is the Lord who sends him to wash in the pool of Siloam. “He went his way therefore, and washed, and came seeing”; he has received his sight. I compare this to your eyes being opened to see things as God sees them. At conversion light has come from God. The difference between the two thieves was that one had light, saw the Saviour; and the other had only natural intellect. In the light I see things as [p. 315] God sees them; as the Lord said, “I am the light of the world”. Well, this man received light; his neighbours were the first arrested, they could not understand the source whence the light came; they did not doubt the fact that he had received his sight, but they did not see that it came from God. The neighbours brought him to the Pharisees, and they said, “This man is not of God, because he keepeth not the sabbath day”. Then they called his parents, and his parents said, “We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind: but by what means he now seeth, we know not; or who hath opened his eyes, we know not: he is of age; ask him”. They feared the Jews, who had agreed already that if any man did confess that He was Christ, he should be put out of the synagogue. Eventually, when reviled by the Jews, he said to them, “If this man were not of God, he could do nothing”. They retorted, “Thou wast altogether born in sins, and dost thou teach us? And they cast him out”. I would press on you that he is now outside of everything religiously good among men. First he was blind, and could not see any man; but when he sees, having received light from God, he is outside of man. This is where grace puts you. As a man you are under judgment; when the light of God works you will find yourself outside of every man - even the religiously reputable. You may think this too hard, but otherwise you do not understand what it is to be clear. There would be more happiness among christians if they saw the nature of the distance to be removed, and then saw that it was removed. The man once blind is outside of all that he revered religiously among men; but he is now in the solitude of light. O what a place - the solitude of light! I want you to estimate the moral greatness which the light of God’s grace conferred on this man. I wish you could really enter into what his position is now that he has light and he begins to see everything as [p. 316] God sees it. May you realise his singular blessed position. Now, at verse 35 we read, “Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and when he had found him, he said unto him, Dost thou believe on the Son of God?” He does not say ‘the Son of man’ some commentators would read, ‘the Son of man’; no, “the Son of God”. Do you comprehend? Because if you do, you will be much interested. And he answered and said, “Who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him?” It was not simply that the work had been wrought in his soul, but he had learnt that the light of God’s grace puts one outside everything of man. I press this because, until you understand it, you will never understand the unique position which belongs at the present moment to every one who has been relieved of the judgment of God. I am speaking to believers now, and I say, Do you know that all of the man under judgment, the best of him, has been so completely removed, that you are outside of all, and that outside of all you are bound in heart to Another, your Saviour, the Son of God? He said, Lord, who is He? I believe that is a blessed solitude. I have no doubt that it is because souls have never been in this solitude that they have not found the unexampled, the incomparable position in which a believer is placed at such a moment. “Dost thou believe on the Son of God? He answered and said, Who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him? And Jesus said unto him, Thou hast both seen him” - the last time he met Him he was blind; now he sees Him - “Thou hast both seen him, and it is he that talketh with thee”. Now, beloved friends, bear in mind where this man who was blind is; he is clear of the darkness, and knows a new and unparalleled place when “he said, Lord, I believe. And he worshipped him”; his heart absorbed in delight with an object, the Son of God - outside of every man, and in seclusion with Himself.
I have read part of John 10 in order to point out [p. 317] the two great traits of the good Shepherd. Many understand the one who do not understand the other. The one is, “I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep”. He died for them; Christ gave Himself a ransom for many. He gave up the life to which sin could be attached. You could not be saved by Him, and keep the life on account of which Christ died. Here there is confusion in souls. If there were true apprehension of the work of Christ, that He so bore the judgment on man that all the man who had offended against God has been removed to God’s infinite satisfaction, and that He who saved you from death is now your life, there would be a wonderful testimony to the grace of God. You could say, It is not merely that I shall be greatly blessed by and by, but I am unspeakably so now, in the place where once I was under the judgment of God.
The second trait of the good Shepherd we read in verses 14, 15: “I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine. As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep”. “I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep”. You are brought into the greatest intimacy with the Saviour; though you are cast out by the religious man, you receive infinitely more in acquaintance with Christ, the Son of God. The correct reading is, “As the Father knoweth me, and I know the Father”. It is almost too much to say, because it may seem so incomprehensible, that the same kind of acquaintance is to subsist between Christ and the believer as between the Father and the Son. I can understand an earnest soul saying, Well, if that is true, I should not mind being excluded from every man. We often sing:
‘I have found a Friend in Jesus;’ but this is incomparably more: you can say joyfully, “I sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste”.
[p. 318] I trust I have made it plain to you that, in the place where the judgment of God was upon you, you are set free from the judgment, and also that you are set up in the greatest blessing. You have seen this fulfilled in the man who was blind.
I desire much to press on you that, if any of the pressure from sin remains, your soul will be under a cloud. I have no doubt that this is the cause of the little happiness some believers have; they are not quite clear of the man under the judgment of God. The apostle can say for himself, “I am crucified with Christ”, not that he should retain the old man, but in order that, being free from the man under judgment, he should be here under the control of Christ, Christ being in him. Hence the apostle can say, “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world”.
I need not add more. I trust I have said enough to make it plain to you, and I will recapitulate concisely the three points I have spoken on. First, the weight or judgment on man, the nature of that judgment. It is senseless a man proposing to discharge a debt of which he knows neither the nature nor the amount. But, thank God, the Lord Jesus Christ knew exactly all that lay upon us; and He put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. He says, “I will discharge it;” “I come to do thy will, O God”. “Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me”. “By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all”. Secondly, how you are saved. You are saved by appropriating in faith Christ’s death, figuratively set forth in the ark. Noah and his house went into the ark and they were saved; they were a year and ten days in the ark, signifying that in the circumstances of every day here, they were under the cover of Christ’s death, excluded from man as he is, but shut in to [p. 319] Christ. You are saved out of the judgment, because Christ has borne it; and as you appropriate His death you are practically free from the man under judgment. Now, thirdly, you enter on a new history - you are in the favour of God. The man who was blind entered on a new history; he is not only clear of all the darkness, but he has now the most intimate acquaintance with the blessed Saviour. There could not be any greater favour or a happier position. Now this is yours; you are clear of all that was against you in the sight of God, and you are in incomparable nearness and intimacy with Jesus Christ, the Son of God.
I trust that you have not only listened attentively to the three parts of this great subject, but that you will study them before the Lord.
May the blessed God, in His infinite mercy, grant that each one of you may be able to say, I know the weight which was upon me, and I know that it has been completely removed, and that I am now in unclouded happiness with the blessed One who accomplished this great work, for His name’s sake.