THE FIRST GREAT CONFLICT, OR, THE CHECK TO PROGRESS

^[p. 289] THE FIRST GREAT CONFLICT, OR, THE CHECK TO PROGRESS

There are in the christian infancy two distinct experiences. The first is when the soul, awaked to the impending judgment of God, sees that Christ is the propitiation through faith in His blood. This is an unspeakable relief to the sin-oppressed conscience in terror of judgment. The sense that safety is assured through the intervention of the One able to effect it, because He bore what was due to us, and that God can say, “when I see the blood, I will pass over you” (Exodus 12: 13), is the first and necessary experience of the guilty soul. This must be ever the first experience.

The ruined sinner must first be assured of the grace which meets his need in the sight of God. It is when there is no hope on our side that we appreciate the greatness of the grace which clears us before Him. There is “redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins”, Colossians 1: 14. We are set free from judgment, because the sins which had entailed judgment have been forgiven, and I am, as it were, cured.

But in addition to this, there is another experience; there is a sense of being brought nigh to God - that we are come to Jesus. That is, we have not only received grace from Him, even as the blood intercepted the judgment impending on Israel in Egypt, but we are come to God. We come near the One who is in the bosom of the Father, and hath declared Him. In the one case the grace is made known to faith - “when he beheld... he lived”; in the other there is a coming to the One from whom the grace has come. The experience of Israel when sheltered under the blood-sprinkled lintel answered to one, and when they sang the song on the other side of the Red Sea, to the other. The first is our escape from the destroying angel, which is known as soon as accepted; the second is only reached through an exercise that ^[p. 290] reduces man to nothing, that God may be everything. It is very plainly and continually taught in Scripture; and while knowledge of the first confers real blessing from God, and is unquestionably conversion, there is no real knowledge of God, in assured confidence in His grace, until the second is reached and apprehended. The reason for this is very simple. In apprehending the grace of God in saving me through the blood of Christ I am an immense gainer, even as a man; but when I come to God, I must as a matter of necessity drop all that which is simply of the flesh; the ground is holy. When I reach this nearness to Him I am established, I know in whom I have believed. I joy in God.

Now there can be a long interval between these two experiences, and while there is often much devotion and zeal when the first only is known, yet there is no stability, nor a distinct true testimony in real joy of heart until the other is known. Noah is safe in the ark, shut in by God; but he has not an altar until he is enjoying the sweet savour of the burnt offering, and then it is no longer escape from judgment, but the assured favour of God, where a few months before he was rescued from judgment, through His grace, in the ark. Abram believed God when He promised him that his seed should be as the stars of the sky, but he was not confirmed in the vastness and truth of this promise until he offered up his son; and then he could speak of God as Jehovah Jireh - “in the mount of the Lord it shall be seen”, Genesis 22: 14. We see in these examples a distinct interval between these two experiences, simply because the first great conflict is connected with the second experience and not with the first. In the case of Noah and Abram, they each in the first received distinct and manifest grace; but in the other, they had to do with God, a blessing which they reached only after deep exercise of soul; and this I call the first great conflict, without which there can be no progress or stability. The woman who touched the hem of Christ’s garment, in the clear and ^[p. 291] beautiful faith consequent on a divine revelation to her soul, expresses the first; but there was no confirmation of this great blessing, although it was possessed, until she submitted to the great conflict induced by coming into the presence of the Saviour. She had no reluctance nor hesitancy in appropriating the cure that grace provided and conferred on her by touching Him, but she shrank from the second. She was fearing and trembling, though knowing what was done in her, because of the conflict. In coming, she must lose sight of herself in the presence of the Lord. She “fell down before him, and told him all the truth”, Mark 5: 33. A soul may believe now in the virtue of Christ’s blood in the eye of God, and be sensibly converted and assured of eternal safety, and still may never yet have come into the presence of Christ, now in glory. He may never have learned the gospel of the glory of Christ; never in faith been led by the Spirit into the new and living way through the veil, that is, His flesh; never been sensibly outside the Adam condition, and in the simple liberty of the Spirit of God near the Saviour - as near as the woman, the sinner, in Luke 7. She was only so naturally, but we are so now spiritually.

Saul of Tarsus at his conversion entered into both these experiences; but even then there was an interval between them. He had seen the light, and had heard the voice, but he did not pass through the first great conflict until the three days during which he did neither eat nor drink. He learned the cross then - that everything which could cause a shade of difference between him and God was removed, and that there was no place for man in the flesh before God; and now, praying, he receives the Holy Spirit. The real objection to the gospel of the glory of Christ is the conflict which is entailed on the soul in apprehending it or entering into it. To receive grace to set me free from a troubled conscience and fear of future judgment makes no exaction on the natural man; it confers an immense gain on him. Even if religious duties or sacrifices be imposed on him, he can ^[p. 292] cheerfully accede to them as praiseworthy, and an evidence to his own heart of the great work which doubtless has been wrought in him. But he has never passed through the first great conflict; he has never found himself in spirit beside a Saviour in glory, and learnt that no flesh could glory in His presence. This accounts for the amount of zealous works which may be done by one still ignorant of the power of resurrection. Moses was converted when he refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, but he was not in divine power until, as an unshod worshipper, he listened to the voice of the Lord in a flame of fire in a bush, and the bush was not consumed.

Until the second experience was reached there must be a check to progress, because though the soul, through grace, has received the grace of God averting the judgment due to us, there is yet no conscious setting aside of man in the presence of God, and hence no opportunity of adopting the manner and condition of Christ. It is not only, “When he beheld... he lived”, but also, “If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink”, John 7: 37. The power and Spirit of Christ come with the second, but this is because of the displacement and refusal of the old man which must take place on one coming so near the Lord. There is often a prolonged interval between these two, and while it is so there can be no real progress, except on approaching the conflict which introduces into the divine line of things. The widow of Sarepta can enjoy for a whole year - that is, every variety of season here - an immunity from fear of death through the presence of the prophet, and all this time have no idea of his power over death. Nay, on the contrary, after a period that typifies one’s whole life on earth, she was reduced to despair, because her only son had died. She had never known the prophet on the other side of death. There are souls in the present hour, happy in Christ’s work in rescuing them from death, who are sheltered under His present care, as it was known to ^[p. 293] His disciples when He was on earth, and is now known to each believer, during His absence, through the “host” of Luke 10: 35. But they may never have accepted the end of man in order to reach His presence in glory; and until this second experience is known, they cannot say, like the widow, “Now by this I know that thou art a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in thy mouth is truth”, 1 Kings 17: 24. No one can ever know the Lord in His glory except concurrently with the surrender of confidence in the flesh. There is no entrance to Him in heaven but by the “new and living way”; the old way of carnal ordinances of every kind is not only abrogated, but superseded; they could not find a standing in the glory of God. As I have said, men may have much zeal and devotion in service when only the first experience is known; but until the first great conflict has put the old man aside, and placed one in the presence of Christ, there is not simple devotedness in following Him. Peter can devote his ship and his time to further the work of the Lord; he can even act in accordance with His word; but when he gets near Him as the Son of God, the screen - his flesh, which separated him from Christ, comes down; and now that he has known Him in the light, as able to remove every fear, he, with the rest, leaves all and follows Him. There is neither true light for our course, like Moses, nor assured confidence in the Lord, like the widow of Sarepta, nor out and out devotedness in following Him, until we have made His acquaintance in glory, and this cannot be without the withering up and renunciation of the flesh. The principle of this is taught when Elijah, in answer to Elisha’s true-hearted request, announced to him that the double portion of his spirit could only be acquired on one condition, namely, “if thou see me... taken”. Elisha saw him taken, and he exclaimed, “the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof”. And then in the rending of his own clothes, he indicated that all that covered him here was now set aside, and another manner of life was ^[p. 294] to be adopted by him here; consequently he assumed the mantle which fell from Elijah. It is evident that Elisha was devoted in heart and purpose to Elijah, when nothing could satisfy him, as remaining behind him, but a double portion of his spirit, and that on getting it he would require no more; but yet, nothing that he had hitherto done or enjoyed would entitle him to this great boon. To obtain it he must see him taken. In this day the servant of the Lord has no greater task than the endeavour to lead believers into this second experience, or, as the apostle calls it, the excellency of the knowledge of Christ; but this excellency was only acquired at the expense of man in his best estate. “What things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ”, Philippians 3: 7. The glory of Christ is the seal of the satisfaction of God in the accomplishment of the work which He gave His Son to do. “I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do. And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self”, John 17: 5. There can be no real progress, nor true joy of soul, until Christ in glory is known personally by the believer. For as it was through death, and the setting aside of the old man in the cross, that the glory was reached by our Lord, so no one now can reach Him there but through the same way; and this is the first great conflict known to the soul.

The servant now is often baffled and hindered by earnest and true men who, feeling their own ignorance of this great experience, and sensible of the cost it would involve, sometimes pronounce it unattainable or impossible; and again by others who say it is very high truth, instead of seeing that there cannot be progress unless the soul has consciously reached Christ in glory. Many good works can be done, and much of the scripture can be known, and yet it is plain that such an one does not date or derive from God. Man with his wants, it will be found, is the guide and measure of the walk and service of everyone who does not know Christ in glory.

^[p. 295] No one can get beyond his origin. If I can only date from man, whatever be the measure and extent of the blessings conferred on me, I cannot rise any higher. The more is conferred on me the more man is exalted. But when I enter the glory and approach the Lord, there in spirit, man in the flesh falls backward, and I am disencumbered. I am sensible that I am of an entirely new origin, even that I am of God, and can come into the scene in quite a new way in my feelings, tastes, and purposes. Isaiah was a greatly honoured prophet, favoured with visions, and a knowledge of the mind of God; but yet when he saw the King in glory, he felt undone. He cried, “I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar: and he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged. Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me”, Isaiah 6: 5 - 8. Now mark the change in this great prophet. When the Lord says, “Whom shall I send?” he says “Send me”. No one is able or ready to face all the ruin here, and testify against it, unless he has found that he belongs to God in the perfection and eternal joy of His own scene, and that he derives from Him. Then he can come down into this scene, counting all things but rubbish that Christ may be his gain, and leaving all things behind, that he might “press toward the mark” (Christ in glory) for the prize of the calling on high of God.

Unless Christ in glory be known, we can neither make the excellency of His knowledge our study, nor can we leave everything here behind, to “press toward the mark”; because unless we see and know Him there, we have no real or defined goal before our souls.

In fine, man’s works and man’s need, and what would ^[p. 296] in some way exalt man, belong to the first experience, and thus many are deceived; but only God’s mind and ways are known and acquired in the second. Hence, the more one is satisfied with the first, the more check there is to progress; the first great conflict has not been entered on. I do not say that there are not anxieties about the state of one’s soul, as to one’s acceptance, and as to the things that trouble one’s conscience, and many such like things. The experience may even go as high as that of the bride in Canticles; but then, one has never really got outside of oneself; one has never been beside oneself in the pure and absorbing light of Christ’s presence, or found oneself in personal nearness to Him - a nearness greater than that of the woman, the sinner, in Luke 7.

The Lord help His servants to understand and to meet the need of His people in this day.