UNKNOWN
UNKNOWN
... To have found by personal experience that the flesh cannot be improved, and that the more one tries to be for Christ the worse one seems to succeed, is a useful and instructive exercise so far as it goes. It humbles us and breaks down our self-sufficiency, but it does not give joy or power. Self-knowledge can only lead to self-disgust, and to hopeless despair of improvement. You have rightly concluded that something more positive than this is needed to bring delivering power into the soul.
All blessing and joy and power lie in the knowledge of God. This may seem a simple thing to say, but in it lies the true secret of deliverance and liberty. When we have the consciousness that God is for us we are in true liberty of soul. I will try to point out how this comes to pass.
In the first place we have to come to the knowledge of God as the Justifier. If we think of ourselves as children of Adam nothing attaches to us but sins — the sad evidence of our state and irretrievable ruin. But the Lord Jesus Christ gave Himself for our sins that we might be cleared of everything that attached to us as in the flesh. It was God’s will to have us thus cleared that we might be delivered from this present evil age. On our side we have become conscious of the necessity for this, and have taken God’s way to reach it. We have believed on Christ Jesus that we might be justified on the principle of the faith of Christ. We have sought justification where alone it can be found, that is, in Christ.
But God’s favour to us is not limited to justification. He has called us in the grace of Christ, Galatians 1: 6. He has brought [p. 373] into the vision of our souls the blessed and glorious “Person of the Christ, enfolding every grace”. This opens an entirely new world for our hearts, which we may explore in all its length and breadth in the happy consciousness that we are called into it by the blessed God. We see One raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, and crowned with glory and honour at God’s right hand. From thence there shines forth for us the radiancy of the glad tidings of the glory of the Christ who is the image of God. All that God is in infinite grace is set forth in that glorified Man, and in this grace God has called us.
It is easy to write these words, and easier still to read them, but that of which they speak is so vast and glorious, so pregnant with infinite blessedness, that it may well be the constant exercise and lifelong prayer of our hearts to enter into it.
It is in apprehension and appreciation of the grace in which we are called that we “live to God”. Our hearts are filled with the joy of it in the power of the Holy Ghost, so that living praise flows forth to God. We find true liberty of soul in the consideration of this blessed grace which has enriched us in Christ. We cherish in our hearts the knowledge that all that we are has gone in the death of Christ, and now Christ — the One by whom and in whom everything is established for God’s pleasure and our blessing — lives in our affections.
Then as to our practical life here in flesh we live in the light of the Son of God, and of all that subsists in Him. It is not a law that we have before us, but a Person in whom all the light of God shines and whose love holds our hearts.
The way to “go on rightly before God” is to be kept in the knowledge and joy of the grace in which He has called us, and in the light of all that subsists in His beloved Son. This — and this alone — delivers us from the dominion of sin, and from this present evil world. And if your heart turns to God in desire that all this should be made a divine reality to your heart, and the living blessedness of your soul, He will not fail to bring it to pass by His Spirit. It is His own will concerning you, and when your heart turns in that direction you find yourself in the line of His purpose, in the current of His Spirit, and in harmony with all His ways.
Many an exercise may be needed, many a painful discovery of unsuspected flesh; but if our hearts are set in the right [p. 374] direction we may leave the education of our souls with implicit confidence in the hands of God. He will teach us and bring us on just as fast as we are able to travel, and we shall not learn a lesson in His school that we do not need.
We cannot be men all at once; we must be content to begin as babes. Spiritual stature and strength do not come by effort but by growth; and growth is the result of being nourished by proper food. But if we do not grow by effort it is important to remember that we do not grow without exercise. God begins by giving our hearts a sense of the blessedness of the grace in which He has called us, and of all that subsists in His beloved Son, that we may be awakened to pursue the knowledge of all this with purpose of heart and prayerful exercise.
As we go along in this line we find that the grace of the Lord continually succours us in our weakness. We get divine support as we need it, whether for service — if we are called thereto — or for suffering reproach for Christ’s Name.
It is quite right to be exercised as to how we walk here, and to desire to be here solely for Christ, but if this is the prominent thing — that is if it takes the first place in our thoughts — it can only result in legal effort and failure. It is we who are trying to do something for God and for Christ. But if, on the other hand, we exercise ourselves rather to know God in all the blessedness of the grace in which He has called us — as we wait on Him to make Christ known in our hearts by the Spirit — we find power in the knowledge of God, and Christ does practically displace what is of ourselves. Christ is formed in us by the Spirit, and then Christ can come out of us.
There is no other way than this for you to reach what you desire. Let it be your great concern and prayer that God will establish you with His grace, and fill your soul with the blessedness and glory of Christ as the One in whom that grace shines forth — the One who as the glorified Man is the image of God.
As you travel on this line you will think less and less of yourself, either as a sinner, saint or servant; but you will find deepening delight in the knowledge of God, and you will be wholly cast upon His grace for your life and testimony here. Paul rejoiced that his conscience bore witness that his conversation was in simplicity and sincerity both in the world and towards the saints, and this not by fleshly wisdom but by [p. 375] the grace of God, 2 Corinthians 1: 12. It is a great thing to be content to be what the grace of God will make us. There is no effort in this, though there may be much exercise in prayer before God, and we may have to learn humbling lessons under His holy and gracious discipline.