GRACE AND TRUTH
I should like to refer to Mr Darby’s footnote to that word “subsists” in John 1:17—
Grace and truth came into being … they began to exist de facto down here. The verb is singular, and “grace and truth” go together in the Person of Christ. Nothing subsisted by the law, it was a rule given: but grace and truth actually commenced to be, not in God’s mind of course, but in revelation and actual existence down here. But its so taking place supposes its continuance.
That is what I should like to speak about, that last clause—‘its so taking place supposes its continuance’. We speak of a dispensation of grace. We use the term freely, more freely, dear brethren, than we understand it. I do not say that critically, but feeling it. It is remarkable the amount of exhortation there is in the epistles as to grace. There is one sober reference. It says, “watching lest there be any one who lacks the grace of God: lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and many be defiled by it”, Heb 12: 15. Watch, it says, lest any one should lack the grace of God. Why should we lack it? It reigns, dear brethren. It is on the throne. The throne is a throne of grace.
There are many more exhortations about it—to grow in it—“grow in grace”, 2 Pet 3: 18. The epistles are very full, if you just look it up, as to the need of grace affecting us in our relationships and in our circumstances. Paul prayed that something might be removed. It seemed a right thing to do. Many things that we have prayed about may be answered, but God says, “My grace suffices”. The thing was not removed in Paul. It may not be removed in you, but the Lord’s word was, “My grace suffices thee”, 2 Cor 12: 9. Grace is the power to effect things, and grace reigning in our hearts brings peace, even before there may seem a full outward settlement. Things were settled in the incoming of Jesus. The law did not settle anything. Years and years of law—and things got worse. Think of the passover night in Exodus 12, the affections that went out towards that lamb, and then think of the passover, as John puts it in his gospel, as a “feast of the Jews”, John 6: 4. That is the law in the hands of men, things became hardened, they became crystallised. The answer, beloved, to these deteriorations in man was Jesus coming in, “full of grace and truth”.
These things cannot be put the other way round. If I had written this I would have said ‘truth and grace’, but the divine word is accurate—it says, “full of grace and truth”. You cannot put truth first. It is the ultimate, dear brethren. The truth is what will prevail ultimately, but God came in in Jesus in grace. If He had come in in truth only, who would have stood? Think of Jesus in the temple, think of that woman taken, as it says, “in the very act”, John 8: 4. It says, “Jesus having stooped down wrote on the ground”, v 6. Had it only been truth, that woman would have been condemned. There would only have been one writing. But it says, “again stooping down he wrote on the ground”, v 8. Then he says, “Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more”, v 11. There was the grace and truth. Grace was there expressed, not in a scripture, not in tables of stone, but in a Person—oh, the expression of grace which was in Jesus! And who He was!—“the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us ... full of grace and truth”. These things are to affect us. As I have said, grace is on the throne. The truth is not weakened in any way by that—indeed it is adorned. The truth is adorned in the way that things are done. He came “full of grace and truth”.
It reminds us of the movements of David. Many opportunities arose, you may say, to enforce the truth. Had he not been told he would be king in place of Saul? And there Saul is at his mercy, and what does he do? He waits on God. That is what grace does. In the conscious sense of what has been accomplished in divine activities, there is much that can be left with God. David came to the throne. He was a king there in that cave as much as he was when he was on the throne, but he can move in the sense of divine grace in his soul. There were those among his followers who would have rejoiced in executing judgment, just as those disciples of the Lord to whom He says, “Ye know not of what spirit ye are”, Luke 9: 55. Surely it would have seemed right for these disciples to have called down fire on those who had rejected the Lord of glory, Jesus, in their midst, turning their back upon Him: but think of the Saviour’s words, “full of grace and truth”—He says, ‘‘Ye know not of what spirit ye are”. Beloved, we are of a dispensation of grace, but does it really lay hold of us?
Grace makes nothing of us, but it makes everything of the God who saw our condition. The end result will be that we will be “to the praise of the glory of his grace”, Eph 1: 6. What an end! ‘‘Vessels of mercy ... before prepared for glory, us ...”, Rom 9: 23. “Us”, it says: yes, we will be there at the end of that wilderness journey, seen to be “to the glory of his grace”. Oh, what a time it will be! One vessel after another! The results of having received “of his fulness ... and grace upon grace”.
Well, we read in the footnote, ‘its so taking place (its commencement) supposes its continuance’. It began in Jesus, began at the top, if you like. That is what Christianity is, dear brethren: it has begun at the top. Again, I do not want to be critical, but we often say, ‘Grace reigns, but it is through righteousness’. Of course it is! But it is not my righteousness. Grace reigns through the righteousness of Jesus, not through my righteousness. It does not reign on the principle of filthy rags. That scripture has been used to modify the operations of grace, maybe inadvertently, but grace reigns through the righteousness of Jesus Christ. Grace reigns because He reigns. Grace reigns because He has been raised from among the dead, the Object of the Father’s affections, enthroned in heaven. God has already found the settlement and the answer to sin and every question that it has raised, in Jesus, the Man at His right hand. That is the basis on which grace now reigns. Sin may still be having its day, sins may cause us sorrows, but grace reigns. The power of grace is dominant, it is greater than sin as we will see in Romans. It is greater than all that sin can bring in, because everything has been effectuated for God’s eternal pleasure in the cross of Jesus. The cross stands there as a witness, on the one hand to man’s indifference, but it stands there in God’s sight as the settlement of every issue that sin has brought in: and that blood, beloved, is the basis for God coming out towards us today in grace and truth.
Well, grace reigns. Does it reign in my heart? Does it reign in the local assembly as we have been speaking of it in these meetings? Well, beloved, there is no shortage of it. It says to “approach ... to the throne of grace”—for a rebuke? No! —“for seasonable help”, Heb 4: 16. Do not delay to draw near because of your own condition. The enemy would say, ‘Well, you do not deserve grace’. Of course I do not, but God comes out in grace, in Jesus. Grace reigns! As you draw near to that throne you can count on grace. Do not be frightened to tell God about how bad you are. He knows already, you know; indeed He knows more. God loved you before you were converted! “Christ has died for the ungodly”, Rom 5: 6. It can never be worse than that: He still loves you. There is nothing that can come into your history worse than that—you were held “dead in your offences and sins” (Eph 2: 1), and it was then that God made known His love in all its blessedness in the Person of Jesus. Do not delay to draw near because you think of how bad you are. Grace is on the throne.
The prodigal, you know, had deliberations about what he was going to say, but the father knew it all. What he found was, “Bring out the best robe and clothe him in it”, Luke 15: 22. There is grace—active grace—coming out. ‘Bring it out’, he says. He was not going to have him in the house as a bondman. He was going to have him in the house in the dignity and the joy and the blessedness of sonship. ‘Bring out!’—what a word that is! That is what you will hear as you come to the throne of grace. It is a wonderful experience to go into God. Perhaps you have many things to say about how bad you are, and you do not get the chance to go over it all. Who could say how bad they are with the robe there, the ring and the shoes? That is what you will find at the throne of grace. You will find a Saviour who has met all that condition that may be troubling you. You will find a Saviour who has already met those very offences and sins in His precious blood. Draw near, dear friend, to the throne of grace. That is what is there today, and it will continue as long as the dispensation goes on—grace reigning. You may say you think sin is reigning. No, grace is reigning unto eternal life.
“Grace and truth” came in in the Person of Jesus, but ‘its commencement supposes its continuance’. It is continuing in Jesus—there is no doubt about that. It is continuing up there, and it is continuing down here as flowing from Him, but it began in Jesus. That is a solid rock to get to in our souls, that what we have come to is not an improvement on anything that has gone before. It was no theory that man had devised, but it was something that was brought in in the Person of Jesus. “The Word became flesh, and dwelt among us ... full of grace and truth”. That is what they wondered at, you know. They “wondered at the words of grace which were coming out of his mouth”, Luke 4: 22. They wondered at it. A beloved servant, in contemplating the Lord in His lowly pathway here, said that His holiness set Him apart from all, but His grace made Him the servant of all (see J G Bellett, ‘The Moral Glory of the Lord Jesus Christ’ p12). There is a lot in that, beloved. Had it only been truth, had it only been holiness, could He have handled the leper? He was “holy, harmless, undefiled” (Heb 7: 26) but His grace, beloved, made Him the servant of all. He came “full of grace and truth”—how near He has come! Think of Him there in chapter 7 of Luke’s gospel, in Simon’s house, “full of grace and truth”. There was nothing to draw Him in. You go chapter after chapter in Luke’s gospel and you will see Him there in the days of His flesh, “full of grace and truth”. Well, that is how it began but, beloved, it is to continue. The flow we may say, was there in its fulness in the Person of Jesus, but today it is on the throne and the throne is active. May I encourage us all again to draw near and find seasonable help.
I wanted to speak of Abigail as displaying grace in the local assembly. We speak of David guardedly. We speak of David in that chapter as a type of ourselves. What he said was true, you know. There are a lot of true things said amongst us, but are they “full of grace and truth”? What David said in the first verse I read was truth, verily true: “Surely, in vain have I kept all that this man had”. He said, so to speak, ‘Surely what I have done is not going to be respected! I will put things right!’ How often these thoughts come into our minds, dear brethren—we know how things should be put right! Abigail says they will be put right on the basis of grace and truth. ‘You will be king all right, David’. We speak of many things that we can look back on in our histories—we could have done them better: grace could have been more in expression. The judgment arrived at, perhaps, was right, but I only say, was it “full of grace and truth”?
‘Its commencement supposes its continuance’, and that continuance would be in the local assembly. Abigail here, how she comes in! She says, “If a man is risen up to pursue thee.” You see, she was in the light of Christ, and if my soul is fresh in the light of Christ in glory, I can afford to let a lot of things go. “If a man is risen up to pursue thee”—how God will see to that, and He will! Let none of us seek self-justification. God, you know, can sort these things out better than you or I. It says in Zephaniah 3: 5, “Every morning doth he bringeth his judgment to light: it faileth not:” and, dear brethren, your morning will come. There are things to be put right, but God will bring to light His judgment, and your morning will come. David here is coming to the throne without any need to go back and say, ‘Well I should have done this better, I should have done that better’. As I say, the truth stands, the truth is to be attended to, but the truth is adorned in the way things are done, and they are done “full of grace and truth”. Abigail was in the light of Christ enthroned in glory. She says that David will come to the throne and she says it will be “no offence of heart ... that thou hast shed blood without cause, or that my lord has avenged himself”! May these things affect us in our judgments. May the character and glory of the dispensation be in evidence in the settlement of exercises. But it is not only in times of crisis—“full of grace and truth” continues because grace is on the throne.
I want to refer to Romans and our individual exercises, and it says that “the free gift in grace, which is by the one man Jesus Christ, abounded unto the many”. The richness of the passage commends itself to our attention—“the abundance of grace”. As I said, it is not running out—your exercises and mine are not going to exhaust the supply of grace. We sometimes think like that. We say, ‘Well we have given them a week, we have tried perhaps for months’, but grace never runs out—“the abundance of grace”. It reminds me of Isaac when he dug those wells, you know. He dug a well and it was his. Surely it was his well—he had dug it! The Philistines come along, and what does he do—fight for it? No, he moves on: there is another well. There is “the abundance of grace”. He moves on again—there is another well, and he says, “Jehovah has made room for us”, Gen 26: 22. It is the answer to the contention, beloved. There is much contention around—may it not affect us! But the answer to contention is “full of grace and truth”.
It says of the persons “who receive the abundance of grace, and of the free gift of righteousness,” that they “reign in life by the one Jesus Christ”. Well, may the power of grace be with us—it says it has abounded—“where sin abounded grace has overabounded”. There is no shortage of the supply. May our hearts be encouraged to be opened to allow it to have its perfect work. Paul closes, I think, every epistle with a reference to grace being with the brethren. In two of them he says, “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit”, Gal 6: 18; Phil 4: 23. May it be so with us, for His Name’s sake!
MALVERN
3rd June 1983
At three-day meetings with Mr A John E Welch