THE TEACHING OF GRACE

N. McKay

Mark 10: 17–23; 1 Corinthians 2: 1–10; Titus 2: 11–14

I desire help to say a word as to divine teaching, in particular the teaching of grace. I think it is important to see that whatever we learn truly, that is whatever comes into our affections, into our souls and fills us in the knowledge of God, is given to us by divine Persons. When we are younger we tend to think that the older ones read the ministry and the Bible and therefore they know about things, but that is not exactly the case. The fact is that we understand things and are formed in the knowledge of God because divine Persons operate in our souls. I think it is very important to see that. If we know anything truly of God, it is because divine Persons have operated in grace in our moral and spiritual beings, and brought about a knowledge of Themselves. Not that there is not responsibility attached to that, there is, because divine Persons cannot teach you anything if you are absorbed in learning other things.

Speaking simply, just for the sake of the young ones, there may be a brother that reads the Scriptures and reads the ministry a lot, and does not seem to take in too much. He may admit that himself, and possibly he is not able to bring out the truth so much in reading meetings; I think we all know brothers like that, sisters like that too, but we value them, because in the time that is spent in reading the ministry and the Scriptures, in employing our minds in the things of God, the Holy Spirit is able to operate and bring teaching into our souls. Whether we can say much about it or not, God has been pleased to give us those who can teach; we have much teaching stored in the books of ministry on our bookshelves. As we sow to the Spirit, He would operate in our souls and bring in a teaching that is of God, and there is nothing that is going to go through except the knowledge of God.

In our circumstances too, and our discipline in the way God works with us; in our meetings together when persons speak over things; maybe persons can present things in a different light than we thought about them. And at the breaking of bread when God would give us light, especially there we would see things according to God; begin to see things more clearly because we view them from a different angle; not from the perspective of our lives and our work and the difficulties here, but view them from God’s purposes of love. We begin to see things differently and therefore we are changed, it says we are transformed, so the thought of divine teaching is that it changes us. It speaks of that in Ezekiel as to the house of God; when they came in by the north gate they were to go out by the south gate (Ezekiel 46: 9), that is that they were not to go out the same way as they came in. The light of God was to shine and they were to see things and they were to go out different. They had known the arduousness of their circumstances here, but they were to go out knowing the privilege and favour of God shining upon them. If they came in enjoying something of the privilege and the sunshine enjoyed in their hearts here, they were to go out by the north gate; they had to let the discipline of God operate in them, that it might become good in their souls. So, God changes us; there is a continual process of change and teaching because we are to be prepared for another world. The teaching of this world teaches us one line of principles, but the teaching of grace sets us up with completely different principles.

So we see in the gospels how the Lord taught. Divine Persons are all said to teach, the Father is said to teach; every one the Father teaches comes to Christ (John 6: 45)—Wonderful thing that the Father would teach persons and lead them to Christ. That is the place you are going to get help. If you want to know the Father, go to the Lord Jesus, you will see everything about the Father in Him. The Spirit is said to teach, “he shall teach you all things”, John 14: 26. How many times in John chapters 13 to 17 is the Spirit spoken of as the Spirit of truth; He would never bring in anything wrong; everything that the Spirit brings in is according to the truth and according to God.

And then the Lord teaches; it is blessed to think of the Lord taking us in hand and teaching us in our lives and in our souls. We see throughout the gospels how the Lord taught, He is spoken of several times as Teacher; we see how He teaches persons and it is no different now; because He is a Man in the glory does not mean He has stopped teaching us, He is continuing in teaching. The resurrection scene was a scene of intense teaching; these forty days when the Lord had risen from the dead, He came and taught them in an area where the doors were closed through fear of the Jews, a privileged atmosphere where the Lord in spirit was free.

Also He taught them all the things from the law and prophets and psalms the things concerning Himself. Just think of how the Lord would say, Isaiah 53 speaks of Me, how I “was led as a lamb to the slaughter” (Isaiah 53: 7); how He would speak of other things relating to Himself. So we can see the Lord’s teachings through the gospels; even at the age of twelve He was found in the temple asking questions and they were amazed at His understanding and answers. So I think that is a good guideline for us. At about twelve, man is considered to be coming into a responsibility which he did not have before; not that he has stopped growing, he is still growing but there is a responsibility as we begin to grow up. It says the Lord according to His perfect manhood took up that responsibility and it was evident at the age of twelve. So, we are to ask questions; either at twelve or when we begin to understand these things, we are responsible to do it.

And then at His first preaching in Luke chapter 4, at the commencement of His public service, they were astonished at the words of grace coming out of His mouth. They had the law and the prophets, but they never had this teaching before, it says elsewhere, “the crowds were astonished at his doctrine, for he taught them as having authority, not as their scribes”, Matthew 7: 28, 29. Think of that, the authority in the Lord’s teaching. I would just like to stress again, maybe not to the quite so young ones but to teenage ones and above, the teaching is a matter also of authority. I do not think we will progress until we recognise that.

The Lord said, “It is sufficient for the disciple that he should become as his teacher, and the bondman as his lord”, Matthew 10: 25. That is, as we are disciplined under divine teaching, the thought is that we become like Christ, but along with that, is the matter of the bondman, involving coming under authority. We are not going to get it unless we consider ourselves bondmen; we come under the authority of the master, and therefore what the Lord says goes. To speak simply, the Lord has spoken authoritatively.

So the epistles to the Corinthians and Timothy particularly give us the Lord’s commandment and we cannot disregard that. They give us the truth as regards our life here, in regard to things here, and are authoritative, and are to have full authority and sway with us, otherwise we will not progress in divine things. It is the truth; dear young persons, look through 1 Corinthians you find it is very strong. You do not pick and choose what scriptures you want to take and which scriptures you do not, because every scripture is divinely inspired (see 2 Timothy 3: 16). I do not mean to be hard but I mean to speak the truth as to these things because they are very important. Persons who progress have come under divine authority, they recognise what the Lord says is of utmost and paramount importance with them, and they are not going to be swayed by what the world thinks and teaches, and what goes on in the world. If something comes up, they are not going to say, Well, men think this and that, but they say, I will go to Scripture and find out what the Lord says about it, that is what is going to govern me. We are to be governed by the truth. The Lord says, “as the scripture has said”, John 7: 38. Think of the Lord quoting scripture to confirm what He said! So the scripture gives us His words and teaching.

In Matthew we get the thought of the kingdom involving moral teaching. In chapter 11 the Lord is rejected, and we find that He says these things are not given to the wise and prudent but to babes. So we come into these things by taking on the truth in a simple way; not questioning whether it is right or wrong, but enquiring, What is the truth? I am a child in the truth and I want to understand it, I am going to find out about it. Then He says, “Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me”, Matthew 11; 29. So whatever the Lord’s yoke was (I think primarily the Father’s will) we are going to say, Well, as I take on the Father’s will as the Lord took on the Father’s will, I am going to understand then how the Lord was able to carry out things here, I am going to learn from the Lord, He will teach me as I take up these things.

After the Lord’s rejection He begins to speak in parables to the crowd, and then He goes into the house. We can see that in the present day when the Lord has been rejected, that things are mysterious; men cannot understand them, without having the Spirit, the things of Scripture are foolishness to them as it says at the beginning of 1 Corinthians. So they interpret them on fleshly basis and they go awry. But inside the house the Lord interpreted the parables to the disciples, and dear young brother and sister, you need to get inside the house to see what the teaching of Christ really is. It is where the Lord can go in and out and teach us according to His own sovereign actions and operations as we avail ourselves of what the Lord will teach us. As we come together the Lord has opportunity in the circle of the brethren, to teach, to bring in the blessedness of the truth and make it bear on our souls. He has to upbraid the disciples several times, questioning why they did not understand. Elsewhere He teaches by example, saying, “as I have done to you, ye should do also”, John 13: 15.

In regard to the teaching of grace, it is clear we have to understand the reason why grace has come in and what goes against the teaching of grace, what is not the teaching of grace. There are two things that are not the teaching of grace; one is the law, and the other is man’s rejection of grace; man using grace to do what he wants. This young man in Mark 10 in one sense represents someone who has been taught by the law, and maybe we have been taught by the law. You may say we are not under law and we are not; but we may take up divine things in a legal sort of way, and learn them according to a set of regulations. We tend to do that when we are younger; we see that things are restrictive and tend to take them as a matter of rules and regulations, which they are not. Grace does not teach us that at all. The first thing the young man says is “Good Teacher, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?” I think to interpret that, the young man was speaking to the Lord as a man and saying, There is good in man, and there is good in me too, I have kept the law and I want to live here according to what is good in man—I will keep the law and keep the outward aspect of it, but I will go on in my riches and enjoyment of this life and I will be quite happy. He went away grieved because he had large possessions; the thing he was wanting to enjoy, the riches, actually ends up hindering and grieving him. I just say that if we are going on according to the law then these things end up grieving us.

The law was brought in as a regulation for man along with certain grace, the offerings which came in on account of sin; but they recognised man’s responsibility to God, and if man could have kept the law he would have been responsible to God under those tenets; but he could not. The Lord came in and set the whole system aside; He did not set the law aside for what it was as perfect before God, but He set the system aside and said “no one is good but one, that is God”. No man has been able to keep the law. He says, no matter how much you go on in outward things in keeping regulations, an orthodox system of things, you are only going to be taught by the law. What does the law teach you? What do taking up things in a rules and regulations way teach us? I do not say this in a spiritual way, I am speaking just for the help of the young people that we may realise that if we only go on in things because it is the right thing to do, and the right place to go, and our parents have done it, and we see it is good and right, then we will only go on with an outward shell of things. The law will only teach us to look and keep the outward thing going; it can never teach us inwardly, it can never bring the love of God into our souls, because it does not express the love of God, it expresses the righteousness of God, and God’s demand on man in responsibility, and, therefore if we go on with an outward show of things we will never come to know God.

The law taught man what God asked of man, what man was due to give Him, but it did not really teach man what God was; who God was and how God was operating in regard to man. It says, “grace and truth subsists through Jesus Christ” (John 1: 17), that is what came in with Christ; it was a new departure. So, whatever this young man wanted to live in, the Lord went right to the centre of that man’s affections and put His finger on the very thing that was the motive behind what that young man was saying. That is another way the Lord brings in help.

You might say, you come to the meetings and something just touches you. Well, maybe the Lord has just put His finger on the very thing that is hindering you; the very thing that is stopping you learning and coming to a true knowledge of God. Maybe He is doing that; maybe we are just going along with the outward thing, not learning God at all; not leaving ourselves open for divine Persons. It confused Peter and the others, they could not understand, but He says, “One thing lackest thou—go, sell whatever thou hast and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me, taking up the cross”. The man has to go, myself and my will have to go completely. These are basic foundational truths in Christianity; that we, as after the flesh, have to go. The man

after the flesh is irremediable, he cannot be taught, he cannot be changed and he is no use at all in the things of God. The Spirit cannot teach man after the flesh; the Spirit operates in the realm of the Spirit, so we have to learn to give up things that belong to down here and deny ourselves, to give up what we are after the flesh; what belongs to us after the flesh has to go as judged in the light of the death of Christ.

In 1 Corinthians we see how Paul taught. Corinth was a great city in Greece and Greeks were renowned for their learning, they were great men of wisdom and philosophy. Paul did not come there in that way, he came and made nothing of that—“For I did not judge it well to know anything among you save Jesus Christ, and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling; and my word and my preaching, not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power”. Paul was an exponent of the teaching of grace; he was not going on with what was outward; when he came to Corinth and saw all the difficulties there he would know the power of those that slighted him; not just the words, he would know the power of them. Think of the apostle Paul coming back there, testing men; they may have spoken ill of him, but what were they? What had they really learned? What was in their souls? Paul had not been there outwardly great or strong, but in “demonstration of the Spirit and of power; that your faith might not stand in men’s wisdom, but in God’s power”. Everything that is taught after man’s wisdom will come to naught, but what the Spirit says, the Spirit operating through persons, will actually work; the word of God is living and operative, discerning between the joints and marrow, and the thoughts and intents of the heart.

It says, “But we speak wisdom among the perfect; but wisdom not of this world, nor of the rulers of this world”. It says later, “which none of the princes of this age knew, (for had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory)”. That should bear on us, that there are two worlds in Scripture; God’s world and man’s world. Man’s world has a king over it and that is Satan, and man has anointed Satan king rather than God and he operates a world system, he has agencies and an administration of evil. Hades’ gates shall not prevail against the assembly, but Satan has a wealth of teaching in this world, a different world from God’s world. I say that soberly just so that the young people know; you might say persons are good people, not doing too badly. Young believer, they are going on in the system of man’s world which is set against God’s world, and it is doing so at the present time in a greater way than it has ever done before. We send our children to school and are afraid of what they will be taught there, because man’s teaching is becoming more and more prevalent and outward and strong. The teaching of man is against the teaching of God. I am not talking about mathematics, English and arithmetic, I am talking about the teaching of religious education; teaching of tolerance and philosophy; the tolerance of evil is what this world is going on with at the present time. Any sort of evil, any sort of depravity that man can think of is being tolerated; things that were against the law ten or twenty years ago are now publicly promoted. That is how bad man’s world is getting, it is getting worse, and we feel it. It says in regard to Egypt as a type of the world morally, that the darkness could be felt (see Exodus 10: 21). You can feel the darkness out there and you worry about your children going to school and the insidious influence they will be under. The influence of the media too is becoming one of the greatest influences on men, it is becoming the arbiter of what is right and wrong. We need to recognise that Satan’s world is becoming bolder and God’s world is being lost sight of in this world. We, as believers, are going on with God’s world, though we have to make our way through this world; but we have to realise there is help and strength that comes from somewhere else.

Paul says, “we speak God’s wisdom in a mystery”. Think of what the Lord said to Pilate, “I have been born for this, and for this I have come into the world, that I might bear witness to the truth. Every one that is of the truth hears my voice. Pilate says to him, What is truth?”, John 18: 37, 38. The world will not have the truth. “What is truth?”—what an expression of man and man’s world that was. They will not have what is in the Scriptures, but the Spirit teaches us God’s wisdom as revealed to us; the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. A spiritual teaching goes on in those who have the Spirit. It is a wonderful thing that divine things are taught spiritually, inwardly we are affected by God and the knowledge of God.

I have been impressed by this scripture in Titus. Titus was left in Crete by Paul, and was quite a strong man, a very sound man; I understand he was not so timid as Timothy was, he was able to exhort with authority and to rebuke. It seems he was a good brother to leave in Crete because he would establish the truth, and he would stand for the truth in a firm way. It says in chapter 1 that “Cretans are always liars, evil wild beasts, lazy gluttons. This testimony is true”, Titus 1: 12, 13. He was working among the Cretans in an atmosphere which is current now; one of immorality and deceitfulness. There is a time to come, not in this dispensation but in a coming one, when the Antichrist will work “to deceive, if possible, even the elect”, Mark 13: 22. You wonder at the feelings of God that His own elect, those He had taught and operated in, might even be deceived by the Antichrist. Think of the feelings of God with regard to that, His jealousy with regard to those He has operated in. He has worked in the soul of each believer, and He is going on in grace and teaching us, working in us. He is jealous as to us, He does not want us deceived by anything of that kind at all. It says the Cretans were like that naturally, immoral and deceitful sort of persons. Paul says to Titus, “rebuke them severely, that they may be sound in the faith, not turning their minds to Jewish fables and commandments of men turning away from the truth”, Titus 1: 13, 14. That sort of thing has not to be tolerated. “But do thou speak the things that become sound teaching”, Titus 2: 1. To the man of God as we get in Timothy, Paul says, “But thou”. Men are going on with certain things, “But thou”, go on with what is right. So, against that background the grace of God is operating; “the grace of God which carries with it salvation for all men has appeared”. I think that involves present salvation as well as eternal salvation; such grace has appeared, and it teaches us.

You might say the law has not taught us anything, apart from going on with what is outward; men’s teaching has taught us nothing; but God is teaching us by grace. We shall not need grace in a day to come when everything will be towards us, but we need grace now when things are so against God; and we need to stand true to what is of God in the present time. We need grace. We need to know the love of God in our present circumstances, and we need to know God, the God of love who has brought it to us. All things work together for good to those who love God. In all our circumstances God is operating towards us in grace. He has taken us out of this present evil world; He has redeemed us from lawlessness, He has bought us back, He has paid the price—we are not to go on in things that belong to this world. This world is going on to doom. So God has reached out to us in grace; that is His love is operating toward us where there is no cause for it. God had no reason, no cause, no justification, in one sense to reach out to us and to show us His love, because we were against God; we were going on in another line of things in this world, but God has reached out to us in grace, He has given His Son, who gave Himself for us, Jesus Christ gave Himself for us that we might know God in all his grace and love. There is nothing that will change us more than the knowledge of God. Whatever we need, whatever circumstance we are in, whatever trouble, however things are hard against us, what we need is the knowledge of God, and the knowledge that God is towards us in every way.

Be sure about that, dear young friend, no matter how difficult things are, God is towards you; God is giving you the resource and all that you need to carry on through this world. There is nothing you need you will find in yourself, you will find it all in God, and He is teaching you that. Every circumstance you go through He is saying, Stop relying on yourself, stop relying on the flesh, stop turning to men and men’s power and means, rely on Me. The world is going on against Me, but on the principle of grace you can go on and you can overcome the world in every aspect. You do not need the world. Grace is going to be evident in a day to come, the whole world will live on the principle of righteousness and the grace of God will be seen then; it will be seen to be superior to everything that man went on with here. Men do not operate on that principle at all. You can take that principle into work and men think you are weak. No, God says, You operate on the principle of grace, I have another world and it is operating on that principle, the principle of not asserting your rights, but relying on God to help you in every way.

Grace teaches us that “we should live soberly, and justly, and piously in the present course of things”. These are real inward effects, but they become evident as to the Lord says, “By their fruits ye shall know them”, Matthew 7: 16. So we can see persons who are going on with grace; they are going on soberly—they have a right estimation of everything that is going on in this world, a sober and true estimation of what this world is, a sober estimation of divine things, and a sober estimation of themselves. They are going on with that, they are not carried away with the world’s teaching or under the influence of it. They are going on justly, righteously in all their dealings, not worried about how things should turn out for them. At all cost, no matter what I do, I am going to be just and practically righteous. It is the one thing I value more than anything else, that I please God in what I do. If I lose money in doing this, I am going to accept that because I am just glad that I pleased God. I think it is as simple as that. I know what pleases God and I am going to do the things that please God. I think these things are real and inward. We know our motives in one sense, we know if we are doing things that are right or wrong.

The pious man is dependent and prayerful—that is what marks pious persons. It is not that they have an outward appearance of being godly, but they just depend on God for things and pray regarding things, “awaiting the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ; who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all lawlessness, and purify to himself a peculiar people, zealous for good works”. They are zealous, going on and doing what is right—a peculiar people, different from this world, not going on with this world—just different. These people are Mine, God would say, these people are different, they do not go on with the present course of things, and I am teaching them that that is the best way to be, awaiting the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ.

We may not be here too much longer, God is going to be vindicated, God is going to be seen to be right in everything that He did, every small detail of God’s operations. Men are going to have to say that God was right and they were wrong. That is a wonderful thing. These persons are waiting for that time, and every one will see that God’s world is true blessing, and that the grace and love of God proves superior to every adverse power; proves greater than all men’s wisdom combined. The simplicity of going on in grace is proved absolutely greater than anything in this world. God will be seen to be right. When the Lord comes out and appears in glory, the saints will be with Him, and as it says, “clothed in fine linen, bright and pure”, Revelation 19: 8. God will be justified in the saints, persons that are going on in lowliness now, unknown by the world, but then clothed in fine linen, bright and pure. They have lived soberly, they have been just and righteous. Fine linen speaks of that, how it has been woven into their lives and it is bright and pure. There is going to be a bright testimony to God whom they have come to know in love; God has taught them how to be here perfectly.

It refers to our responsible life. How blessed it is to live here knowing that God appreciates and loves us, knowing that no matter what happens, or how difficult things are here, in regard to our links with God there is nothing to hinder and everything is blessed. The teaching of grace would lead us to desire that; we want to leave ourselves open for God to operate in our souls and that nothing should come in to hinder communion between ourselves and divine Persons. We want that more than anything else, that God can operate in our souls. Let us not hinder it, let us appreciate it and go on and show the evidence and fruit in our lives of real inward operation. May we be encouraged in these things, for His name’s sake.

Address at Kirkcaldy
17 February 2007