HOLINESS
[p. 289] HOLINESS
Romans 1:4; Romans 5:5; Romans 12:1; Isaiah 6:1 - 3.
I have in mind to speak about holiness, a subject which one approaches with much diffidence, but it is so essential that one is encouraged to touch upon it for the Lord’s sake. It is but little known, notwithstanding that it is a subject as extensively dealt with in Scripture as any other, and it is particularly in evidence in the way the Spirit of God is designated in those portions which treat of grace. It will be found by comparison that the evangelist Luke, who presents grace in Christ, employs the designation “Holy Spirit” when referring to the Spirit of God more than others; not that John and the other gospel writers have not holiness in view, for John has the seraphim in mind, as I hope to show, but Luke speaks of the Holy Spirit much more frequently than John. John treats of the Spirit of God, but refers to Him as the Spirit, or as the Spirit of truth, presenting the truth, as He does from the side of divine sovereignty — from the side of life. He has ever in view to bring in life — living creatures. The life introduced thus is holy, essentially holy: “That which is born of the Spirit is spirit”, John 3:6, the Lord said to Nicodemus. The truth is presented in relation to the Holy One, as John says recording Peter’s confession, “We have believed and known that thou art the holy one of God”, John 6:69.
Christ comes in by way of life according to John, and in connection with life, for in Him was life and it was a holy life; whereas as presented by Luke He comes in on the line of grace, and the tendency is, in receiving grace, in approaching God as set forth in that gospel, to overlook the thought that He is [p. 290] holy. As God has been pleased to proclaim forgiveness everywhere to everyone, the tendency is and, alas! has been, as is seen abroad in the profession of Christianity, to overlook the holiness of God. The grace of God is thus turned into lasciviousness, and trifled with; it is a danger that exists in everyone of us as recipients of grace, and so Luke, as I said, almost constantly employs the designation Holy Spirit. The Spirit we have received in connection with the grace of God is the Holy Spirit.
It is noteworthy in this connection that Paul at the very outset in his presentation of the gospel emphasises the same feature — the grace that has come to us in One who had been marked by holiness. It has come to us by way of holiness. Of old the cherubim guarded the way of the tree of life. The cherubim represent the will and government of God, for He will not have persons alive before Him who are not holy. That Adam should have partaken of the tree of life as he was would have been a disaster, an unspeakable disaster, but Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied, “Behold, the Lord has come amidst his holy myriads”, Jude 14. How those holy myriads are produced it remained for Scripture to tell, but Enoch, who evidently was alone in walking with God on earth, is led to see that he is not to be alone for ever. The Lord is to have myriads.
God was not to be limited to one man: He valued an Enoch then as He values one today, for in the love of His heart He looked for company. Enoch walked with God, and, I repeat, God valued that; indeed He valued Enoch so much that He told him before He took him to heaven that he pleased Him. There is hardly a thought in the Old Testament more touching than that God should have graciously communicated to this man before He took him out of a world where only corruption prevailed, where men did evil every day, and grieved Him every day, that [p. 291] he pleased God. And so we read, “he was not, for God took him”. Genesis 5:24. But that one man was not to remain alone. He was the seventh from Adam, ending, in that sense, a spiritual period.
And so now we have the Lord as the holy One. Enoch and all other saints were holy, but Jesus was “the holy one of God”. John 6:69. As He came into this world we have the testimony by Luke, “That holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God”, Luke 1:35. How precious He was to God as born into the world, and God claimed Him thus. He was infinitely holy, I need hardly say, from the outset, absolutely free from all taint. The Spirit of God in Luke surrounds the scene, as it were, with a holy atmosphere, angels attending, and “that holy thing”, Luke 1:35, as the Spirit of God designates the Babe, claimed as the Son of God. So we have holiness in the mind of God associated with Christ from the very outset.
If one looks at the passage in the opening of Luke’s gospel, one is impressed by the recurrence of the word ‘holy’ especially as regards the Spirit. The divine ideal was coming into the world, One who could hold Himself absolutely free from the corruption that obtained there. So, too, the holy myriads will be in correspondence with Him. God is to surround Christ with myriads, but they are to be holy. As the Lord was bearing the judgment on the cross, meeting the wrath of God as regards sin and sins, He said, “Thou art holy”. Psalm 22:3. He maintained there in His holy soul and in His utterance what was due to God. He was not only meeting righteousness. God was righteous, but He was more than righteous, He was holy, and holy as inhabiting the praises of Israel. Wonderful thought! that God should inhabit, not heaven, but the praises of Israel, and in inhabiting these He was holy. So in that dark hour that stands alone, Christ is making known to us that if God is [p. 292] to be praised, if God is to be worshipped, if God is to be served, it must be in holiness.
Hence, as we were saying, the apostle Paul, in opening his great gospel epistle, refers to the Spirit of holiness, “declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead”. One has no difficulty in including His own resurrection in that passage, but it refers doubtless to the resurrection of others. It comes down to ourselves in a very touching way, for it involves that our resurrection shall be of that Spirit. We shall be raised absolutely free from taint of sin, and shall come out in glory in entire suitability, and in entire correspondence with Him who is to come with the holy myriads.
Then the question is as to the state of our souls now, there is no question as to what we shall be. This epistle, which is a fundamental epistle, introduces the element of holiness at the very outset, and Jesus testified to it as He died, “bearing our sins in his own body on the tree”, for the epistle tells us that God sent His own Son “in likeness of flesh of sin” Romans 8:3 — it is a remarkable expression — and yet He was infinitely holy, and could say as sin-bearer, “Thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel”. Psalm 22:3. So in that gospel which is to lay the foundation of Christianity in souls the apostle introduces the thought at once that the Lord Jesus was “marked out” — not made — “Son of God in power, according to the Spirit of holiness”. Thus we have the element of holiness, the germ of it, for the gospel received into the believer’s soul carries the germ of everything with it; every feature is there to be developed.
But the believer needs more than the light. So I read in Romans 5, which brings out another thing; “The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given unto us”. The gospel has in view the hearts of saints as the sphere of God’s [p. 293] operations. He is to dwell in the praises of our hearts, all is to emanate from hearts filled with the holy love of God. The Lord having gone on high is made Lord and Christ, that is, He is set up officially over everything, but for the moment He is occupied with the hearts and bodies of the saints. Presently He is to be occupied with other things, with the physical heavens and earth, for every item of the creation of God belongs to Christ. Indeed, the gospel is announced to all creation, but He is occupied now with our hearts, “Son, give me thine heart”, Proverbs 23:26 He says. That is the logical outcome of the reception of the light of the gospel. The Holy Spirit is given to all who obey Christ, and we obey, as the word says, “from the heart”. Christ is made Lord, and He is exercising His authority at the moment in taking charge of our hearts, and garrisoning them with the holy love of God. If He secure the heart, He secures everything. “Keep thy heart with all diligence”, the word says, “for out of it are the issues of life”. Proverbs 4:23. The whole body is affected by the heart, hence God lays hold of it.
Romans 5 is a kingdom chapter; it unfolds what accrues to us through our Lord Jesus Christ. The chapter shows what a believer comes into as coming under the dominion of Christ. The Holy Spirit is here in relation to the authority of the Lord so as to enforce it in our hearts, and He does it effectively by bringing in the love of God. No one is really subject who does not love. It is in love you are subject; it is in love you say, “Our Lord”. No one can say Lord Jesus save by the Spirit. In the sense of love the believer is effectively subject, and then he is for the divine pleasure. God has won you and He is not going to give you up. He is wonderfully patient. He may discipline you, and discipline is one of the assets of the kingdom; instead of tribulation being removed it is employed to work out patience. The [p. 294] Lord sees to that, for He will have your heart and bring the love of God into it. It is the service, I venture to say, that He has the greatest pleasure in at the present time.
We have “the Lord of glory” in 1 Corinthians 2:8, and “the glory of the Lord” in the second epistle 2 Corinthians 3:18, and glory is that He brings in the love of God. He makes the covenant of God effective in our hearts; and, as I said, I believe it is the service the Lord has most delight in at the present time. It is wonderful to think of the way God has designed to bring about subjection at the present time, by introducing into our hearts positively and authoritatively His love. So God is now producing a holy vessel on the earth. His train is to fill the temple, as we read in Isaiah 6, and we are to be in that train; but how, save on His own terms, that is, by having our hearts indwelt by His love.
So in Romans 12 we have the injunction to present our bodies a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable. Chapter 8 tells us the Spirit is life in us. “If Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness”. Romans 8:10. I apprehend that corresponds with the living creatures in Revelation 4. They are in the midst of the throne, and are marked by strength, firmness, intelligence, and rapidity-four features. Then what they say is; “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come”. Revelation 4:8. How completely creation is shown to be secured in life and in holiness to God! Then the elders join; they would represent priestly intelligence derived from experience in the ways of God; they fall down and worship God. They recognise He is entitled to all this, for they say, “Thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created”. Revelation 4:11.
Now I think Romans brings about in the people of God at the present time what corresponds to the living creatures. Paul says, “I beseech you therefore ... that ye present your bodies [for that is the part of us specially connected with creation] a living sacrifice”. That is our intelligent service, and answers to the living creature which had a face as a man — intelligence is the feature that is emphasised. It is our intelligent service to present our bodies. A Christian’s body is worth more than millions of money to God. If all the money in the world were called into service, you could not make a temple of God out of it, but the believer’s body is said to be the temple of the Holy Spirit. Hence you present it living and holy. The Spirit in us is life potentially. It is for me to prove it by the use I make of it. The poorest saint can present his body. We are not to trifle with our bodies. Each one is to hold his vessel, as it says in 1 Thessalonians 4, in sanctification and honour. What am I doing with my body? Present it to God, the apostle says. And how 1 As “a living sacrifice, holy”. God will not be trifled with. My body must be according to Himself if I present it. It is our intelligent service. This epistle is supposed to bring about an intelligent state of soul before God, hence the injunction in chapter 12.
Now I think all this leads up to Isaiah 6. John tells us in his gospel that Isaiah saw the glory of Christ. All will remember the passage in chapter 12 in which Isaiah 53 is cited, and then the evangelist quotes from chapter 6 of the same prophet and adds, “These things said Esaias, when he saw his glory, and spake of him”. John 12:41. Who among us who loves the Lord would not rejoice in what Isaiah records, that he saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and His train filling the temple? Seraphim are attending and they say, “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory”. What I apprehend the Lord is doing at the present moment is filling vessels with glory. The “whole earth” is not yet filled; for faith it is so, it is a prophetic scene, but what the Lord is doing now is filling vessels. And all vessels, as we read elsewhere, great and small, are to be hung on Christ, for He is the nail in a sure place. What I have in view is to show how vessels are filled, how vessels of mercy at the present moment are, as the word says, fitted for glory. The Lord is fitting us by bringing the holy love of God into our hearts, so that the whole body becomes luminous. Wonderful the vision that Isaiah had! And he gives the date, the year that king Uzziah died; that has its own voice to us, but time will not permit for us to dwell on it. “I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple”, he says. The tendency in the world for many years past has been to drag things down to earth, to the level of the miry clay. Things are on the line of moral degradation, government is dragged down in the same way, and there is no remedy. Politicians may scheme and legislate, and we pray for them, for we must have order, but the miry clay is inevitable; there is no remedy. The only remedy is in glory, in a Man lifted up on a throne. One would connect Isaiah 6 with the Lord’s present position on His Father’s throne. There is no throne like that for it involves the continuance of the grace of God. As long as He sits on that throne we have the year of grace. And then there is “his train”; I would like to call attention to that. Romans, I believe, brings in the train. As we come to recognise the place the Lord has, and associate ourselves with it, we become, I believe, part of His train. Nothing could be morally greater than to be identified with the throne on which the Lord sits. Even a slave may adorn the doctrine of God the Saviour; one in the lowest grade of society is thus contemplated as in the train [p. 297] of the Lord. We see thus what is available to the weakest and most obscure — to be part of that glorious train. One might dwell on illustrations of it in the New Testament, where His people are identified with Him in His present position, becoming in that sense part of the temple. In 1 Corinthians 3:16 they are said to be “temple of God”, being indwelt of the Spirit. The mind of God which gives light as to everything is found in the temple, so that Christians, as part of the temple, ought to be able to give some account of things.
Then there are the seraphim. They are symbolical, and one called to the other. Now I would say no family named of the Father will know mutuality more than we do. We are ennobled by being Christ’s brethren; and we have respect one for another. No one can love another if he does not respect him, respect must precede love. The light of the calling enables me to respect the brethren, and then I love them, and have mutual relations with them. So the seraphim call one to another. In that scene of glory there are mutual communications; and what do they call? They speak of glory, that is what they are occupied with. If we respect the saints at the present time, we come to speak one to another of holiness and glory, as having learned the love of God. The secret of it is, that we are vessels of glory; we are able therefore to speak of glory; it is not foreign to us. “The spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you”, 1 Peter 4:14 the apostle Peter says. Speaking thus, one has to admit how little of this is current, how little glory is the theme among us. Isaiah could refer to the Lord as exalted and he knew He was holy.
I believe the Lord would impress upon us this great feature, the “knowledge of the holy”. May I suggest that we have it before us, that our conversation should be more about Christ as the Holy One.
[p. 298] Let us familiarise ourselves with the great function that we are to fill. The heavenly city is to come down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God. Let us then, if I may venture to speak thus, familiarise ourselves by the Spirit with this glorious theme. The seraphim cry to one another. This feature of holy conversation marks the moment. It is said of Joseph that he kissed all his brethren; he conveyed to everyone of them that he loved them, and then it says his brethren talked with him; Genesis 45:15.