THE WORD OF GOD
[p. 75] THE WORD OF GOD
I want to say a little with regard to “the word of God”. It is important to understand, the idea which is intended to be conveyed by it. Reference was made to the way in which, in Luke 24, the Lord spoke to the two disciples. No doubt in that chapter the Lord, in a sense, took the place of the Spirit in expounding the Scriptures to His disciples. We must enter a little into the position they occupied, and indeed into that of all the Old Testament saints. What they had up to then, “the law and the testimony”, was everything to them, but in Luke 24 the point is, that while everything previously spoken was confirmed in Christ, it was He Himself who then spoke to them. He was the ‘Yea and Amen’ of all. And He was going to the Father to send to them the promise of the Father. Not merely was it that everything that God had purposed had its confirmation in Christ, but the power of all was to be down here in the Spirit.
That is the Spirit in which He blessed them, and “he was parted from them, and carried up into heaven”. He went up to heaven to send on them the promise of the Father, and we have now, in contrast to what saints in previous times had, Christ, and every thought of God, everything spoken in anticipation, now established in Christ; the reality has come in, and, at the same time, the power of it down here in the Spirit. In every way you will find a correspondence in the Spirit to whatever has come out in Christ. The Spirit is spoken of as the Spirit of Christ, but also as the Spirit of God and even the Spirit of the Father. Everything is now witnessed and maintained here in the Holy Spirit. Christ went back to the Father that He might send from the Father the promise of the Spirit. That is what we get in Luke 24. I call attention to the contrast between what had been,
[p. 76] what men rightly held to, and what marks this moment: Christ gone to the Father, every thought of God having its establishment and confirmation in Him, and He having sent down from the Father the promise of the Father, the Spirit.
To make things clear, I would notice a distinction between “the truth” and “the word of God”. God’s word is truth. Scripture says, “Thy word is truth”. But there is, I think, a distinction between “the truth” and “the word of God”. Scripture appears to make the distinction. “The truth” is the revelation of God. On the other hand, speaking in a general way, “the word of God” gives the idea of the revelation of God’s thought and mind in regard to men. It may indeed go wider than man; but in general it is the expression of His mind with regard to man; and His word is ever truth characteristically. But at the same time there is “the truth”, and that is a great thing to hold by. Christ is “the truth”, and the Spirit is “the truth”. These are statements made in Scripture, and entirely incontrovertible. It is remarkable that while the word of God is the expression of His thought and purpose with regard to man which comes out in a sovereign way, yet the revelation of God has come out in relation to man’s state and necessities. If you go through Scripture I think you will find such to be the case.
The name ‘Almighty’ came out in connection with the weakness of Abraham. God had made far-reaching promises to Abraham in connection with himself and his seed, and yet Abraham was under the common liability of death. All these promises depended, as far as Abraham was concerned, on resurrection, and it is in that connection that God made Himself known as the Almighty God who quickens the dead. You have only to read Romans 4 to see that “he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were”. That was in connection with the fact that Abraham was under the power of [p. 77] death.
The same principle is true with regard to Israel. In taking up Israel, God knew that He was taking up a people after the flesh, who, though they might be impressed by God’s dealings for the moment, would be entirely incapable of remaining in faithfulness to God.
Everything precious entrusted to them they would certainly lose. That is met by the revelation of the name of Jehovah, which indicates the eternal faithfulness of God to His own engagements. That comes out in contrast to the weakness of the people who were sure to surrender all that God had given to them. The people soon forgot the promises, these lost power with them, they had the law, but the living promises of God were lost sight of; but after all God had revealed His name as Jehovah, and that secured the eventual blessing of the people, and their getting the promises in the sovereignty of God’s mercy. You get that brought out in Romans 11. In chapter 4 you get the Almighty, in chapter 11 Jehovah. Both names come out in connection with the weakness of man.
If I go further and speak of the name of Father under which God has now revealed Himself; what has been the occasion of that? Why the sending of the Son to be the Saviour of the world. “God is love”, and “we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world”, 1 John 4: 14. We have the revelation of the love of God; but the immediate occasion of that revelation is the condition of man as down here under liabilities in regard to God from which be cannot free himself. The case could only be met by God coming out in self-sacrificing love. “He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all”, Romans 8: 32. The condition of man becomes the occasion of God coming out in the full revelation of Himself in the Son. “In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. Herein is love,
[p. 78] not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins”, 1 John 4: 9, 10. “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life,” John 3: 16.
In all that, as far as I understand it, you have the truth — Christ is the truth — and nothing comes up fully to the idea of the truth except the revelation of God. And I think you must distinguish between the revelation of God and the word of God, that is, the expression of His mind toward man, and yet the one depends on the other; the word of God takes its character from the revelation of God. You cannot understand the one apart from the other, though one may distinguish between them. All His thought and purpose in regard of man takes its character from the revelation of Himself. That is the point I want to make plain. Everything hangs together. His mind as to man hangs upon the revelation of Himself; on what He is, and the necessity of man has brought this to light. The more you look at it the more you see that the word of God wholly depends upon the revelation of God, but the revelation of God is the truth. It is a point of moment. Christ is the truth, and the Spirit is the truth. You could not say the Father is the truth, because He is not the expression. Christ is the truth as being the expression of God, and the Spirit subjectively in believers is the truth, perfectly answering to the revelation.
I come now to the word of God, and I look upon it as being the expression of God’s mind and purpose in regard of man, and Christ is that. All the fulness of the Godhead dwells in Him, and at the same time Christ is the Word, the expression of God’s mind in regard to man.
I venture to put it in this way: I should lay it down as a principle, that whatever has been expressed in Christ as Man is God’s mind for man. I ask you to judge this. It is clear enough to my mind, and I would like to make [p. 79] it clear to all. I am not now speaking of revelation. Of course everything which has been expressed in Christ as Man takes its character from that which Christ is. Nothing could be expressed in Christ which was contrary or unsuitable to Himself. Everything expressed in Him must take its character from that which He is.
I refer to three points: the first is righteousness — it was the first thing that it was necessary for God to establish; the next is sonship; the third is eternal life. I take up these three things as having been expressed in Christ, and I want to shew you that they are the mind of God in regard of man down here. These thoughts come out in the Old Testament. They are not new. We shall see this if we go back to Abraham for a moment. What came out in him was righteousness; promises were given him, but the great point in regard to him was righteousness by faith. Abraham was accounted righteous. He stood in the account of God in righteous relation to Himself. You get the great principle of righteousness established. He is the father thus of all that believe.
In Israel we get another expression of the mind of God. God’s word to Pharaoh was, “Israel is my son, my firstborn”. “Let my son go, that he may serve me”. Exodus 4: 22, 23. You get here the idea of sonship, I admit, in regard of the nation; but anyway there is the idea of sonship and service. Sonship implies that there should be a point where the love of God could rest, so that He might be served. God could not be served where His love could not rest. The great idea was a point where love could rest. If divine love could not rest in you and me and we be conscious of it, we could not serve God. It is an impossibility that He could be served otherwise. You are familiar with the passage in Zephaniah: “He will rest in his love; he will exult over thee with singing” (Zephaniah 3: 17) — and that here upon earth.
Why are we so defective in ability for the service of God? I think it is because we have so little apprehension of sonship and divine love resting there. We have so little [p. 80] apprehension of the calling.
I pass on to the third point — eternal life. It is curious that the thought of eternal life comes out in David. Righteousness in Abraham, sonship in Israel, and David is the first to speak of eternal life. He speaks of it in Psalm 21 and again in Psalm 133, which is “A song of degrees. Of David”. “There hath Jehovah commanded the blessing, life for evermore”. These things were all in anticipation, for the reality could not come out then either with regard to Abraham, or Israel after the flesh, or David. David never came into eternal life down here, but it is evident that these things were the mind and thought of God in regard of man.
Now all has come out. The Son of God has come forth. He says, “Lo, I come ... I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart”. Psalm 40: 7, 8. The Son of God takes a path. The moment He takes a path as Man He is necessarily the righteous One. He was the righteous Jehovah, the righteous God, but the moment He becomes Man, He takes a path He never did before. God prescribes a path; man takes a path, and Christ becomes Man and He takes a path to fulfil all righteousness. He undertakes the responsibilities under which man lay that we might stand in relation to Him as the Sun of righteousness, like the moon to the earth or the earth to the sun. That is the relation in which we stand to Christ. Sonship is evident and everything takes it character from what Christ is Himself. He is Son. And eternal life has been manifested in Him. In Christ down here upon earth there was an energy of life which rendered impotent the power of death and the forces of evil, and that is what eternal life means in its principle.
Every thought of God in regard to man has its full and perfect expression in Christ. He is the truth, the revelation of God, but He is also the Word, that is, the expression of God’s mind in regard to man, and the one hangs upon the other. There could be no thought in [p. 81] regard of man except what depended upon the truth, what is consistent with it and taking its character from it. When we come into the apprehension of God’s mind we find that we are in the full and blessed light of the revelation of God. All our blessing — every element of it, brings us into the full light of the love of God. He has brought us out of darkness into His marvellous light. We walk in the light as God is in the light. God has shone out and our blessing is in the presence of the glory of God.
We have righteousness, we have sonship, and God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.
One word more. We have come into the full light of God’s thought in regard of man, and Israel too will come into it. Even the nations will participate in righteousness and in a certain way in eternal life.
I hold it to be an incontrovertible principle that what has been set forth in Christ as Man is God’s mind for man. It is a great thing to get hold of a principle that can be carried through. We have now been brought into the light of God’s word and it is Christ, and we have the answer to Christ in us. Christ was bent upon gathering those to whom He could impart His Spirit. From the outset you see this. He gives living water springing up in the recipient to eternal life — that is in divine, quickening power in affection, so to fill us that the believer rises up to the full light of Christ, and in getting into the full light of Christ we come into the full light of God’s mind with regard to man. It is not God’s thought about any particular people, but about man; every man may have it, but through grace we have been brought into it, and we get it made efficient in us by the Spirit. We come into righteousness efficiently by the Spirit of God. I quite admit a man is justified by faith, but we come into righteous relation to God and to Christ by the Spirit. The Spirit is the seal of righteousness. The new man is created after God in righteousness and true holiness. You may apprehend that God can justify the ungodly,
[p. 82] but I do not think you can come efficiently into righteousness but by the Spirit. The Spirit is life, too, in regard of righteousness.
I need hardly say it is in the same way we come practically into sonship. The Spirit so makes us acquainted with the love of God in Christ that we come into the sense of it. The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Spirit. The Spirit in us cries, Abba, Father.
And so, as regards eternal life. It is a question of proximity to Christ. If you get close to Christ you come into eternal life. “God has given to us eternal life; and this life is in his Son”. It seems a simple question of being brought by the Spirit into proximity to the Son. We get under the influence of that which marks the Son. “He is the true God and eternal life”. 1 John 5: 11, 20. Thus Christ is the Word of God, the perfect expression of His mind in regard of man. All is in connection with the light of which we have heard this morning. The immediate occasion of the revelation of God has been the weakness of man through sin. If that be the case, do not you think that man might trust God? It is not my strength or my suitability which has brought out the revelation of God, but my helpless condition — and God in Christ has taken occasion to make known His thoughts in regard to man. His communications are livingly expressed to us in the Son of His love. It is not in terms but in a Person. Righteousness, sonship and eternal life we apprehend in a Person, and not only so, but that Person is represented in us by the Spirit. “The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death”.
I had a good deal of diffidence in attempting to speak at this time, but I feel it is important to make clear what the word of God is in its moral sense, and how it is substantiated in the people of God by the Spirit of God.