LIFE SECURED AND MAINTAINED
[p. 424] LIFE SECURED AND MAINTAINED
John 5: 17 - 29; John 6: 35 - 45; John 7: 37 - 39
FER I think the idea was to touch on these three chapters 5, 6, and 7 together, they form the revelation of God in suitability to a scene of death and dearth here.
Chapter 5 is the Father, He is really revealed in His works. Chapter 6 is bread, or Christ. Chapter 7 is living water which flows out in life. When you take the three together you have the revelation of God not exactly in what they are but to what they have become with regard to men to a scene of death and dearth. Christ has become incarnate, the Father has revealed Himself in His works and the Holy Spirit is given. The Father’s work is raising man up from the power of death. He comes out in that way. The Son came here with the intent of making the work of the Father known, of making evident the work of the Father — the raising up of man in divine love from the time sin and death came in. That was the time it was really working from, there was no work that Christ really did except the cursing of the fig tree or that kind of thing. You get a picture at the beginning of the chapter which is typical of raising up Israel in the time to come. The point is death and moral dearth, everything is under the shadow of death and not only that but moral dearth. The wonderful thing is the way God has been pleased to adapt Himself to the state of things down here and all in view of the world to come. The coming of Christ brought into view what the Father had been going on with: “My Father worketh hitherto and I work”. It was all an enigma before that, no one understood. He brought the Father to light, that is the point of this chapter, the voice of the Son of God is distinctly in His death. It speaks of the love of God in contrast to law, but He says the hour is coming and now is, the utterance was there and abiding. All is on the [p. 425] ground of His death. You cannot interpret His ministry except by the light of His death, it is in His death you get the full light of divine love coming out and that explains every act of His life.
Ques “The voice of the Son of God”, would you limit that to the love of God?
FER Yes, when the light of it in the death of Christ comes home to a person he lives, because it is possible for a person to live in the light of the love of God. There is love in God that can overcome His judgment, you can see that in His death. I think the “Now is” is the present time.
Ques But did not that start with the first chapter?
FER Well, yes it did because this gospel started de novo from His death, ignoring all that had gone before. It has been said that you do not get the beginning of the gospel in John, what you get really is the revelation of what was in the heart of God. The beginning of the gospel takes into account the responsibility and forgiveness which you do not get in John. It is not the blood in Egypt and the Red Sea but the brazen serpent. John goes to the bottom and explains how the state of things was to be met.
Ques What about John 3: 16?
FER It is always true and you are entitled to preach it but you would not get a moral foundation by that because man must recognise where he is in regard of God. His responsibility must be raised and met but that does not interfere with verse 16 because that is the gospel, but not the beginning of it. You will not make man right unless he understands something about righteousness, there will not be a moral foundation, it is a necessity.
Ques Define righteousness?
FER Well I think it is relative, as the earth is with the sun and moon. They are not out of gear with each other and that is the point with man, he requires to be brought into gear with God and Christ in his own sense [p. 426] of things. Righteousness is the bone of the moral universe. In John the Lord takes account of man’s state. A man must be born again. The first element is the raising up of man from the power of death.
Ques That is sovereignty?
FER Yes, you get the expression “the Son raises whom He will”.
Ques How do you understand quickening?
FER Well it is emancipation from all that holds in bondage and it goes on to the body. Quickening is not resurrection it is really liberation from the power of death and applies to those living when the Lord comes. He will quicken your mortal bodies, He completes everything, death is swallowed up in victory. Scripture does not contemplate anything beyond the time of those addressed.
Ques What about chapter 6?
FER Well I think it is one of the most difficult chapters in Scripture to explain. It shows what is consequent on the incarnation, that all the good of heaven is really brought down to the service of man that man may eat it and live by it. We have to look at the world as the greater part idolatrous and corrupt when Christ came. Look what a profound effect the incarnation produces, a complete change of the texture of man. As you would change the food of a child, it would almost change the texture of the child. It is the world and that is what Christ will be when He comes, He will change the whole character of things in the world. ‘He will give His flesh for the life of the world’, it will mean a completely new condition of things morally starting from Himself.
Ques What about ourselves now?
FER Well what does a man know about holiness, love or mercy except by Christ? The philosopher knew nothing about them. He could spin out cobwebs about commonwealth, but could not tell you anything about these moral things. You have got to look at it in Him,
[p. 427] all was here in Him, His death is our side, the thought of His death brings in that, to get the good of what He was here incarnate, your mind must be in accord with the death. To be dead with Christ is that my mind is in accord with the death of Christ.
Ques. Is that Romans 6?
FER Yes, but one states it positionally and the other practically. In Romans, “reckon yourself dead” is more positional. If I say I am crucified with Christ, what does it mean? It means that my mind is in accord with the death of Christ; what He came to in fact, we come to in mind — that is essential. A man alive in this world, alive in sin, does not find his delight in the good of heaven. You get it all in the early part of the chapter, the hungry multitude were satisfied with the good of heaven. I wonder how you are going to put on the new man except by eating the living bread; you eat His flesh and drink His blood, that is first and you find delight from it and derive every right idea from what is come down from heaven. The bread of God is not simply to Israel, but He that comes down gives life to the world. All that is benefit to the church.
Ques Gives life to the world?
FER People are not going to stay in heaven. The church has to fulfil its function in the world to come and has to come out of heaven for that purpose. I try to contemplate the fearful moral dearth that affected this world when Christ came into it and to think of what He brought into it. No one knows the extent that the world has been affected by it. It is perfect rubbish a young fellow giving up the truth, it is really for a mess of pottage giving up his birthright.
In chapter 7 you get what meets the thirst; it is connected with Jesus glorified. Jesus is triumphant. He is the Head of all principality and power and if you once get a sense of that, there are living waters flowing out to others. You are so well fed and nourished by living bread that you benefit others, you nourish others. What [p. 428] an idiot a man must be to give up this; fancy a man getting the Spirit, I cannot conceive anything more wonderful than living bread and that living waters flow out, the effect of Christ going up into heaven to the right hand of God. And so you get here that the time will come when those that are in their graves will hear His voice and will come forth.
Ques. Why is it rivers?
FER Well they tend to fertilise down here; they run in different channels, the Spirit is the power, Jesus glorified is the source and the believer is the mouth. I do not know how far it is made good in us, I heard one the other day saying how often I have longed for someone to say something to me.
Dr. W. There are a great many bottle christians.
FER Well I think I am one of them.
RL If this were true there would be better times than the feast of tabernacles.
FER I think you get the thought in Ephesians 3 when the apostle prays “strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith”. It is very much equivalent to Christ dwelling in the heart by faith.
Ques Why did the Lord not want witness from man?
FER Well the sun shines, it does not require witness. The Lord did not want witness but He accepts it to bring conviction home to them.