INCORRUPTIBILITY
INCORRUPTIBILITY
“Who has annulled death and brought to light life and incorruptibility by the glad tidings.”
I wish to call attention to the greatness of what is brought to light as incorruptible. Two great things, life and incorruptibility have come to light — they are not hidden, mysterious, unknown and unknowable, but they have been brought to light. I do not know anything that should fill our hearts with such joy as this, that what is incorruptible is within reach. It does not only mean that the thing has not been corrupted. Take a little babe, one of the most charming sights on earth, the very centre of its parents’ affections — it has not been consciously corrupted, but it is not incorruptible. However simple at the moment, we know very well that a little child is corruptible, and ere long it will become manifest. The incorruptible things are those which not only have not been, but cannot be corrupted.
There can be no question at all that we are in the last days of the world’s history as we know it — the last days, which are perilous times.
The last days of every dispensation are marked by awful corruption. Take the end of the world that God overthrew in the flood. As God looked down upon mankind, He said all flesh had corrupted its way before Him, and “the end of all flesh is come before me”, but He took Noah and his family out of the corruption. So with the end of Sodom and Gomorrah. Those cities of the plain were so corrupt that God turned them into ashes and delivered Lot, that righteous man who vexed his righteous soul with the abandoned conversation of the wicked. When God broke the power of Egypt the land was corrupt, the pools and ponds were corrupt, the land stank with dead frogs, and out of the soil came the lice. The whole scene was corrupt, and God broke its power in judgment and took His people out. So with the seven nations; when their end came, it was a scene of unspeakable wickedness and lawlessness, throwing their children to the fire, soothsaying and enchantments, and God came in in judgment.
So in the end of king Saul’s history; the lawlessness of the kingdom increased until he turned aside to spiritism — he sought for a woman who had the spirit of Python, and he died that day under the judgment of God. And so in every stage of the history of this world, especially the religious world. Babylon the great is fallen, and is become the hold of every unclean and foul bird, the mother of harlots and abominations, and God says to His people, “Come out of her, my people”, because He is going to pour the wine of the fury, and the wrath, of God Almighty upon that awful system. The last days are marked by men of corrupt minds turning away from the truth, and teaching that gain is godliness. Peter speaks of those who arise at the end of the days who promise liberty — hold out all kinds of inducements, and they themselves are the slaves of corruption. Their lives will not stand investigation. I mention this because of the danger to those of us who are young, lest these influences should have a place with us.
One felt the Lord might help us in looking a little at the thoughts of God as to what is incorruptible; because the only way of being preserved from evil is to have the positive enjoyment of good. Only as we are in touch with what is incorruptible shall we be preserved from the corruptions that abound. First of all I want to refer to the incorruptible God (Romans 1: 23.) God is incorruptible. We can never have to do with God except on that platform; He will never lower the standard. He dwells in the high and holy place, and He is holy, and before His throne the four living creatures full of eyes cease not to say day and night, “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come.” We can only have to do with God on the ground of our judging what is corrupt. “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God”, and “Without holiness no man shall see the Lord”. Grace does not lower that, nor set it aside; it is a continuous principle that abides.
There has also come into the light of revelation, a blessed Man who is incorruptible, the Lord Jesus Christ. It was said of Him, that it was not possible He should see corruption. Think of a blessed Man here on earth for God’s will whom it was impossible should be corrupted. That is what the shittim wood of the ark represents, Christ as Man. Shittim wood was the most durable wood known in those days. The Lord Jesus Christ came into this world as “that holy thing” — not innocent, but holy — and what was proved in His sojourn here was that He could not be corrupted. The temptations make it clear that no principle of evil, however subtle, could find any entrance whatever. The great corrupter, that being who had corrupted his wisdom at the outset by reason of his brightness, brought all his corrupting influences to bear upon Christ, but what came out was the shittim wood — a perfectly incorruptible Man. He attacked the Lord again and again — through Peter, through the weight of sorrow in Gethsemane, with all the dark forces of his power at the cross — “Your hour”, says the Lord, “and the power of darkness” — but He shines out incorruptible and goes down into death as incorruptible. So it says of Him, “thou wilt not suffer thine holy one to see corruption”. When His precious body was laid in the grave it was divinely impossible that that vessel should ever know the touch of corruption.
It is certain, we shall only know what incorruptibility is, and have contact with it, as we have to do with Christ. The source of incorruptibility is God, the expression of incorruptibility is Christ in manhood. That sweeps away practically the whole of the modern teaching of this world.
Now I want to call attention to the precious blood of Christ. I do not know anything that ought to touch our hearts like that. The apostle Peter speaks of that precious blood, implying that it was incorruptible — “not redeemed with corruptible things, such as silver and gold”. Silver and gold have a certain intrinsic value, and a certain value amongst men, but they are not incorruptible. On the one hand it cankers, it has an element in it that will eventually destroy itself. It may take many hundreds or thousands of years, but gold can waste away. Not only so, but its value might disappear. Silver, particularly, is of practically no value today, and you can understand a position might easily arise when gold would have no value. If supplies of food were cut off, gold would be of no value, for nobody would give up food for gold in such circumstances.
The apostle contrasts that with the precious blood of Christ. It is intrinsically incorruptible, and it has a value that never deteriorates. It is the price of redemption. The blood refers to the life of Christ here; He took a certain condition in which the life was in the blood. We have all forfeited that condition of life, and will lose it every one, either by dying or by the Lord changing us. But the Lord Jesus never forfeited His title to live. He had a perfect right to live in flesh and blood for ever, for His life as a Man in flesh was incorruptible, but He gives it up as the price of redemption. “The redemption of the soul is precious” — it is costly, and must be given up for ever. So when the Lord laid down that precious life He gave it up for ever, as the price of redemption. What an attraction for our hearts! That is what awakens the song of the redeemed “Worthy the Lamb that was slain”, “for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed to God by thy blood”. Gold and silver may deteriorate, but the value of that redemption remains to all eternity. It will never deteriorate.
There are other things that come to light as incorruptible. The Apostle speaks of an incorruptible crown. He speaks of those in a race or conflict striving for a corruptible crown. The man who creates a record in an aeroplane; the man in business who exceeds his competitors — they get a crown but it does not last. The moment it is obtained it begins to deteriorate. The Apostle was not concerned about that sort of crown, but about an incorruptible distinction and glory that will never deteriorate. Let us seek that. The Lord can give His own, and He will, distinctions, crowns that will never decay. I know what they will do with them. The elders had golden crowns which marked them off as men distinguished in their experience and wisdom for God here; but when they come into God’s presence they cast their crowns before the throne, saying “Thou art worthy”.
Young people, let me urge you to have your eye on an incorruptible crown. The apostle says (he could speak with certainty as to himself) “Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness ... and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing”. What is it to love His appearing? It is to love the day when one absolute Monarch will rule. Democracy will disappear and one will, will govern the whole earth. Do you love that day? Do you love the surrender of your own will, in the home, amongst your friends, in relation to the powers that be? Do you love the principle of subjection to the Lord? If you love the day when there will be only one will and one Master, there will be a crown for you in that day.
The apostle Peter brings forward again and again what is incorruptible, for he had a great sense of the corruption that is in the world through lust. He speaks about an incorruptible ornament which he desires should be upon us all, upon the women particularly, but the women are a figure of the place of the church, and it is really for us all. “Whose adorning ... let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit”. A meek, and quiet spirit is the spirit of Jesus. You remember what marked the meek man Moses, when Aaron and Miriam spoke against him. You know you may get that sometimes. Aaron was a great man, the saint of the Lord, and Miriam a prophetess and leader of the dances and praise to God. But there came a moment when they allowed jealousy in their hearts. No matter who we are, however well advanced, our hearts are susceptible to the principle of jealousy. So Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses, God’s servant, whom He manifestly supported. But Moses did not say one word to stand up for his own rights. It says, “the man Moses was very meek”. What an incorruptible ornament; how he adorns God’s system of things. Most of us have other kinds of ornaments.
Let our own dignity, the place we think we ought to have, be questioned, and what sort of ornaments come out? God would have us wear the incorruptible ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in His sight of great price. God had something to say to Aaron and Miriam, but Moses leaves his judgment, his matter with God, just like the Lord, “who, when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered he threatened not; but committed himself to him who judgeth righteously”.
Now half the difficulties that arise among the people of God are because these ornaments are lacking. We take offence because someone has said something against us, and our place and our dignity are in danger. That is an opportunity for the Lord’s gracious help by the Spirit, that we may show some of those ornaments that will glisten for all eternity, and come out at all times with this incorruptible ornament of a meek and quiet spirit.
The end of it for us will be — and it will soon be here — “this corruptible must needs put on incorruptibility”. This mortal body is corruptible, as we know by sad experience, but God’s work will be completed. And when He has secured an incorruptible inward man, an inward moral being that is incorruptible according to God and Christ, suitable to have a crown, with suitable ornaments and other features that the Apostle speaks of — when that work is completed by the Holy Spirit in our souls, God is going to clothe the inward man with an incorruptible body. “This corruptible must needs put on incorruptibility, and this mortal put on immortality”. It is not yet, though it may be in a moment. God will give His beloved people bodies of incorruptibility to enjoy that incorruptible scene where the incorruptible God dwells, where the blessed ark of the covenant is, the incorruptible Man.
These are the things that God would convey to our souls now. Incorruptibility has been brought to light through the gospel. The precious gospel brings us into living touch with what is incorruptible, and that is our salvation practically from a corrupted world.