Faith Gives Light

FAITH GIVES LIGHT

BUT

THE SPIRIT CONDUCTS ME INTO PRIVILEGE

It has been remarked that the privileges of saints today cannot be enjoyed “by faith” but only “by the Spirit”. I desire to emphasise the remark, because I believe that the difference should be seen, as indicating what was reached by saints in the Old Testament days, and what is God’s desire for us as saints now in the New.

First of all, I think that we must be clear that the Spirit is given now, and on “the principle of faith”, and not on that of law. Man, in the Old Testament, was distinctly on the ground of probation or trial, that is, on the ground of law, and on that ground the Spirit could not be given. I think that the coming of the Spirit is a further advance in God’s ways to conduct us into the privilege of sonship. “Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts”, Gal 4: 6. The time of ‘under-age’ is past, and what marks our day is liberty, the Spirit of the Son, that is, of full age. The reason for this is that “the Son of God is come” (1 John 5: 20), and the man that was under trial, and to whom the Spirit could not be given, is for ever set aside. “Cast out the bondwoman and her son”, Gal 4: 30. Christ has come, and Ishmael is not to share the privileges of the house, nor to be tolerated in it, now that Isaac is born.

The apostle asks the Galatians, “Have ye received the Spirit on the principle of works of law, or of the report of faith?”. We have heard the report, and on this principle we have received the Spirit. Faith as to the report has brought light from God into the soul. The receiving of the Spirit is, I think, the next step, that I may enter upon what the light shows me. The Spirit gives present enjoyment of privilege. By privilege I mean all that is true of me as a “new creation” in Christ. “If any one be in Christ there is a new creation; the old things have passed away;, behold all things have become new”, 2 Cor 5: 17 NT.

Faith gives light, but I think it will be admitted that it is quite possible to stop short of the enjoyment of what the light enables us to see. Hence it is that the Spirit conducts that soul wherein faith is found. Without faith there is of a surety nothing God-ward in man (Heb 11: 6), but I find that all the Old Testament saints had faith and light in their measure, but they could not have what is in God’s purpose for saints to have now. Hence the importance of the distinction that I have before referred to, and of giving to the Spirit His true place and work in us.

Many read Eph 2: 5-6, and kindred passages, which speak of our privileges as saints in this day, with (it seems to me) a good deal of complacency. What I mean is, that these passages which treat of the immense privileges of the believer as a “new creation”, and of the union of Christ and the church, are quietly dismissed with, ‘Yes, all this is true to faith’. Now such a remark (and many such kindred remarks) assume that the speaker, simply because he has faith, has, therefore, in his own soul, what he reads about, and if you question it, you are said to be robbing him! I think this is a grave mistake. It may be true of him, but enjoyment, that is, the possession of that which I see is mine, is what must be true in me. This, as I understand it, can only be by the Spirit.

It is worthy of note that the list of the “fruit of the Spirit”, which we find in Galatians 5: 22 as what we enjoy and display in the world, refers to what is true in us, and not to what is true of us. “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance”. But as to entrance upon heavenly privileges, this also is by the Spirit. “For who of men hath known the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Thus also the things of God knows no one except the Spirit of God”, 1 Cor 2: 11 NT. And the Spirit is distinctly and wholly heavenly.

What was seen in Old Testament saints, and its effect in them, comes before us in Hebrews 11, but is nothing more to be known today than they knew? The Spirit was not yet conducting into heavenly things, the things above, “where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God”, Col 3: 1. Abraham was conspicuous in Old Testament days as a saint for his faith in God. He got light as to the day of the “second man”, but he could not enter into what it was. “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day”, John 8: 56. He lived on the earth in the light which faith thus gave, but that was the highest point an Old Testament saint reached. He rejoiced at what he saw, but not in what he possessed of what he saw. He did get the enjoyment of what he saw, but he did not suppose that he possessed it as some do now “by faith”. “These all died in faith, not having received the promises”, Heb 11: 13. Surely faith and its actions in Abraham was greater in proportion to his light than is seen in many of us. Yet we may say, “he that is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he” (Luke 7: 28), because we live in the Spirit’s day, when He is conducting the soul into the present enjoyment of all these heavenly privileges and blessings. If I am in them in any sense as to present enjoyment, it is because I have answered the question, “Wilt thou go with this man?” Gen 24: 58.

I conclude with one remark, Is it not noteworthy that “grieve not the holy Spirit of God” (Eph 4: 30) is found in that epistle (Ephesians), which treats more of God’s purposes and grace as to a “new creation”, and more of our consequent union with Christ, than any other? And does not this alone show that our entrance in any measure into these wondrous blessings, must be “by the Spirit”?

From A Voice to the Faithful—vol 29, 1895