"HOLD FAST THE FORM OF SOUND WORDS"
“[p. 129] HOLD FAST THE FORM OF SOUND WORDS”
Anything made can only be distinguished from every other thing by its form and qualities. If you lose sight of any part, or confound the parts of one with parts of another, it is evident you have lost a true idea of the thing: it is imperfectly apprehended. Anyone’s knowledge is measured by the extent in which he sees and defines all things; as his acquaintance is thorough, he can nicely distinguish between two things in which there is the least difference. Knowledge of the commonest thing is determined by the clearness and accuracy of my perception of what constitutes it, and wherein it is different from every other. A definition is not a perfect one unless it sets forth the form and qualities which make it sui generis, and thus distinct from everything else.
Now if the preservation of distinctions in things is so essential to ordinary knowledge among men, how much more essential must it be in the things of God! In man’s things, or things within the grasp of the natural mind, any departure from the essential form or quality, vitiates the knowledge; and if you persist in your ignorance, you expose yourself to censure and often loss.
The more comprehensive and profound any piece of knowledge is among men, the more precise, and careful and painstaking must every student be, in order to prove and establish his knowledge. Now if this care, and caution, and elaborate study, be necessary in order to secure the right definition of anything within the range of human science, how much more in the things of God, which are entirely outside the natural mind! I may be able to see what God says; that is, I can understand the words of the statement made, but the extent and nature of the truth conveyed I can very partially grasp, and that only as I am spiritual. I see what is said; I can understand that Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father: the statement is plain enough, but the great issues involved in that statement are quite beyond my mind. Hence in God’s things, as I cannot comprehend them naturally (though I understand the propositions, so to speak, enunciated), my duty and wisdom is simply to adhere to the communication made, for surely the less I am able to understand its scope, the more incumbent it is on me persistently to maintain the full force of the words committed to me.
Paul warns Timothy to “hold fast the form of sound words which thou hast heard of me”, 2 Timothy 1: 13. There is a form or delineation belonging to, or contingent on, the words which the apostle had spoken.
Now, the failure of every divine commission to man has arisen from neglect or misapprehension of the form conveyed by the word.
Eve accepts a contradiction to the word, and the fall is perpetrated.
Cain will not bow to the form conveyed in God’s gracious remonstrance, “If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door”; but, on the contrary, he seizes an opportunity to slay his brother. In these two cases we have positive rejection of the word, and they serve to show how the mischief which followed would have been averted by adhering to the course which the word prescribed. It is a great thing to see that God provided man with an unerring guide and line of action, and that as he observed it, he would be preserved from every foe.
Noah, a man of God, called to inaugurate the new order of things on the cleansed earth, fails to maintain the form of the commission conferred upon him. Instead of ruling, he loses self-control; he is drunk in his tent. One would have thought that the man’s honour with which he was invested, would be the thing most carefully guarded and preserved by him. Alas, he basely surrenders it! He does not hold fast the form, and the issue is disgraceful failure. Doubtless he had no intention when he planted the vineyard, and began to drink of the fruit of it, that it would lead to such a catastrophe, but [p. 131] the very fact that one so honoured of God could be drawn into such a snare, shows us how fatal it is when we depart from the form of the truth committed to us. The greatest or main point is the one which is first compromised.
Thus with Abraham in the land. When he saw the famine (a good excuse we should say), he departed from the form of the instructions given to him, and he went down into Egypt. He probably did not intend to stay there, and he did not stay there eventually; but in surrendering the form, he forfeited the true place, and no doubt thereby entailed on his family their future bondage in the land of Egypt.
Then Jacob incurs much sorrow and shame because he fails to adhere strictly to the terms of the direction given to him to go to Bethel. It appears but a small thing that he should tarry at Shalem; and he had an altar there, which he called, “El-elohe-Israel”. He was, as we speak, a pious man, yet he did not keep the form; consequently trouble, and every kind of disgrace, fell upon him. It is very striking and momentous to see that a very insignificant divergence from the form entails the most grievous suffering; while in adhering to it there is perfect safety and success.
In like manner Israel falls under the power of the nations, simply because they failed to observe fully and accurately the terms on which they were put into possession of the land.
David also is a very remarkable instance of how a man with the best purpose, and occupied with the truest service, suffers loss and incurs judgment because he does not adhere to the order prescribed of God. When he essays to bring up the ark, he borrows the idea of a cart from the Philistines, and though all proceeded well at first, at length the defect entails judgment, and Uzzah is slain. What a warning to us all!
Israel forfeited the highest blessing - the sabbatical year - in the land, because they had not faith to act [p. 132] according to the distinct meaning of the word of God, and are carried away from the land into Babylon, because they sought help from the Assyrian, and in spirit and intent had departed from the form and meaning of their call and position given of God. When the captives return to the land, there is failure from the same oversight, in a very peculiar way. Through much suffering they had returned to the land, yet because they discontinued building the temple on account of the opposition from without, all the advantages of the land were forfeited. A departure from the form involved the sacrifice of what mostly connected them with God, and hence subjected them to the loss of their greatest blessings; so that one can attain to the knowledge of a true standing, and yet fail to enjoy the blessings connected with it, because they overlook that which chiefly connects them with the Lord. I mean, one might be quite assured, through grace, of acceptance and home with God, and yet have present blessings withheld because of not making the assembly paramountly one’s concern.
I must not multiply examples. But it is very important to be convicted of the danger and loss of departing from the form and intent of the truth. This was the reason for Paul’s public rebuke of Peter. He says, “When I saw that they walked not uprightly according to the truth of the gospel, I said unto Peter before them all, If thou, being a Jew, livest after the manner of Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, why compellest thou the Gentiles to live as do the Jews?” Galatians 2: 14. To circumcise Titus, or to overlook Peter’s preferring the society of Jews to that of gentiles, though apparently small things in themselves, the apostle will not yield to, because he knows how dangerous it is to depart from the form of the truth, and that whenever it is surrendered, in however small a degree, it is always a breach in the fortress, and is an opening to the adversary. It was from these small beginnings that all that were in Asia turned away from Paul, and all the varieties of doctrine and church government [p. 133] date from a departure from the form of the sound words committed by Paul. At first it was hardly noticeable, but it was the leaven with which the whole was eventually leavened. Hence the only remedy is to cancel all the growth of the mustard tree, and to revert to its first bud; to learn the word of the Lord, and carefully and accurately to adhere to it.
It is an immense blessing to have an assured sense of the sufficiency of Scripture, and to tremble at God’s word, and therefore to be always ready to be corrected by it; quite conscious that when there is any miscarriage or failure in the course we have adopted, it is to be discovered in the inaccurate way we have used the word of God, and not from any lack in it. It is able to make “the man of God .. . perfect, throughly furnished”. It is beyond the code of the wisest nation. Cases may and do arise among men, for which there is no legislation; no such thing can ever be supposed or averred of the Scriptures. When we err in judgment or counsel, it must arise simply from our imperfect apprehension of the word of God, or from a misuse of it; and constantly I find the way one quotes Scripture, indicates either his knowledge or ignorance, and the man who is most subject to the Word is the one invariably the most ready to subject everything to the word of God, and to be canvassed by it, for he knows that if he is right he will be corroborated, and if he be wrong, he is glad to be set right.
The Lord grant that we may be more jealous in holding fast the form of sound words; like one afraid to loosen one stave of the cask, or one spoke in the wheel, lest all should be broken up.