The All Sufficiency of Christ Part 8

a.s.suredly, from the New Testament. And what does it teach? Does it afford any warrant for the Christian to mix himself, in any shape or form, with the amus.e.m.e.nts and vain pursuits of this present evil world? Let us hearken to the weighty words of our blessed Lord in John xvii. Let us hear from His lips the truth as to our portion, our position, and our path in this world. He says, addressing the Father, "I have given them Thy Word; and the world hath hated them, because _they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world_. I pray not that Thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that Thou shouldest keep them from the evil. _They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world._ Sanctify them through Thy truth; Thy Word is truth. As Thou hast sent Me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world." (Ver. 14-18.)

Is it possible to conceive a closer measure of identification than that set before us in these words? Twice over, in this brief pa.s.sage, our Lord declares that we are not of the world, even as He is not.

What has our blessed Lord to do with the world? Nothing. The world has utterly rejected Him and cast Him out. It nailed Him to a shameful cross, between two malefactors. The world lies as fully and as freshly under the charge of all this as though the act of the crucifixion took place yesterday, at the very centre of its civilization, and with the unanimous consent of all. There is not so much as a single moral link between Christ and the world. Yea, the world is stained with His murder, and will have to answer to G.o.d for the crime.

How solemn is this! What a serious consideration for Christians! We are pa.s.sing through a world that crucified our Lord and Master, and He declares that we are not of that world, even as He is not of it. Hence it follows that in so far as we have any fellowship with the world, we are false to Christ. What should we think of a wife who could sit and laugh and joke with a set of men who had murdered her husband? and yet this is precisely what professing Christians do when they mix themselves up with this present evil world, and make themselves part and parcel of it.

It will perhaps be said, What are we to do? are we to go out of the world? By no means. Our Lord expressly says, "I pray not that Thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that Thou shouldest keep them from the evil." In it, but not of it, is the true principle for the Christian. To use a figure, the Christian in the world is like a diver. He is in the midst of an element which would destroy him, were he not protected from its action, and sustained by unbroken communication with the scene above.

And what is the Christian to do in the world? what is his mission?

Here it is: "As Thou hast sent Me into the world, even so have I sent them into the world." And again, in John xx. 21--"As My Father hath sent Me, even so send I you."

Such is the Christian's mission. He is not to shut himself within the walls of a monastery or convent. Christianity does not consist in joining a brotherhood or a sisterhood. Nothing of the kind. We are called to move up and down in the varied relations of life, and to act in our divinely appointed spheres, to the glory of G.o.d. It is not a question of what we are doing, but of how we do it. All depends upon the object which governs our hearts. If Christ be the commanding and absorbing object of the heart, all will be right; if He be not, nothing is right. Two persons may sit down at the same table to eat; the one eats to gratify his appet.i.te, the other eats to the glory of G.o.d--eats simply to keep his body in proper working order as G.o.d's vessel, the temple of the Holy Ghost, the instrument for Christ's service.

So in every thing. It is our sweet privilege to set the Lord always before us. He is our model. As He was sent into the world, so are we.

What did He come to do? To glorify G.o.d. How did He live? By the Father. "As the living Father hath sent Me, and I live by the Father, so he that eateth Me, even he shall live by Me." (John vi. 57.)

This makes it all so simple. Christ is the standard and touchstone for every thing. It is no longer a question of mere right and wrong according to human rules; it is simply a question of what is worthy of Christ. Would He do this or that? would He go here or there? "He left us an example, that we should follow _His_ steps;" and most a.s.suredly, we should not go where we cannot trace His blessed footsteps. If we go hither and thither to please ourselves, we are not treading in His steps, and we cannot expect to enjoy His blessed presence.

Christian reader, here lies the real secret of the whole matter. The grand question is just this: Is Christ my one object? what am I living for? Can I say, "The life that I live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of G.o.d, who loved me, and gave Himself for me"?

Nothing less than this is worthy of a Christian. It is a poor miserable thing to be content with being saved, and then to go on with the world, and live for self-pleasing and self-interest--to accept salvation as the fruit of Christ's toil and pa.s.sion, and then live at a distance from Himself. What should we think of a child who only cared about the good things provided by his father's hand, and never sought his father's company--yea, preferred the company of strangers?

We should justly despise him; but how much more despicable is the Christian who owes his present and his eternal all to the work of Christ and yet is content to live at a cold distance from His blessed Person, caring not for the furtherance of His cause--the promotion of His glory!

PART V

If the reader has been enabled, through grace, to make his own of what has pa.s.sed before our minds in this series of papers, he will have a perfect remedy for all uneasiness of conscience and all restlessness of heart. The work of Christ, if only it be laid hold of by an artless faith, must, of blessed necessity, meet the former; and the Person of Christ, if only He be contemplated with a single eye, must perfectly meet the latter. If, therefore, we are not in the enjoyment of peace of conscience, it can only be because we are not resting on the finished work of Christ; and if the heart is not at ease, it proves that we are not satisfied with Christ Himself.

And yet, alas! how few, even of the Lord's beloved people, know either the one or the other. How rare it is to find a person in the enjoyment of true peace of conscience and rest of heart! In general, Christians are not a whit in advance of the condition of Old-Testament saints.

They do not know the blessedness of an accomplished redemption; they are not in the enjoyment of a purged conscience; they cannot draw nigh with a true heart, in full a.s.surance of faith, having the heart sprinkled from an evil conscience, and the body washed with pure water; they do not apprehend the grand truth of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost, enabling them to cry, "Abba, Father;" they are, as to their experience, under law; they have never really entered into the deep blessedness of being under the reign of grace. They have life. It is impossible to doubt this. They love divine things; their tastes, their habits, their aspirations--yea, their very exercises, their conflicts, their anxieties, doubts, and fears all go to prove the existence of divine life. They are, in a way, separated from the world, but their separation is rather negative than positive. It is more because they see the utter vanity of the world, and its inability to satisfy their hearts, than because they have found an object in Christ. They have lost their taste for the things of the world, but they have not found their place and their portion in the Son of G.o.d where He now is at the right hand of G.o.d. The things of the world cannot satisfy them, and they are not in the enjoyment of their proper heavenly standing, object, and hope; hence they are in an anomalous condition altogether; they have no certainty, no rest, no fixedness of purpose; they are not happy; they do not know their true bearings; they are neither one thing nor the other.

Is it thus with the reader? We fondly hope not. We trust he is one of those who, through infinite grace, "know the things that are freely given them of G.o.d;" who know that they have pa.s.sed from death unto life--that they have eternal life; who enjoy the precious witness of the Spirit; who realize their a.s.sociation with a risen and glorified Head in the heavens, with whom they are linked by the Holy Ghost, who dwells in them; who have found their object in the Person of that blessed One whose finished work is the divine and eternal basis of their salvation and peace; and who are earnestly looking for the blessed moment when Jesus shall come to receive them to Himself, that where He is, they may be also, to go no more out forever.

This is Christianity. Nothing else deserves the name. It stands out in bold and striking contrast with the spurious religiousness of the day, which is neither pure Judaism on the one hand, nor pure Christianity on the other, but a wretched mixture, composed of some of the elements of each, which unconverted people can adopt and go on with, because it sanctions the l.u.s.ts of the flesh, and allows them to enjoy the pleasures and vanities of the world to their heart's content. The archenemy of Christ and of souls has succeeded in producing an awful system of religion, half Jewish, half Christian, combining, in the most artful manner, the world and the flesh, with a certain amount of Scripture, so used as to destroy its moral force and hinder its just application. In the meshes of this system souls are hopelessly entangled. Unconverted people are deceived into the notion that they are very good Christians indeed, and going on all right to heaven; and on the other hand, the Lord's dear people are robbed of their proper place and privileges, and dragged down by the dark and depressing influence of the religious atmosphere which surrounds and almost suffocates them.

It lies not, we believe, within the compa.s.s of human language to set forth the appalling consequences of this mingling of the people of G.o.d with the people of the world in one common system of religiousness and theological belief. Its effect upon the former is to blind their eyes to the true moral glories of Christianity as set forth in the pages of the New Testament; and this to such an extent, that if any one attempts to unfold these glories to their view, he is regarded as a visionary enthusiast, or a dangerous heretic: its effect upon the latter is to deceive them altogether as to their true condition, character, and destiny. Both cla.s.ses repeat the same formularies, subscribe the same creed, say the same prayers, are members of the same community, partake of the same sacrament, are, in short, ecclesiastically, theologically, religiously one.

It will perhaps be said in reply to all this, that our Lord, in His wonderful discourse in Matthew xiii, distinctly teaches that the wheat and the tares are to grow together. Yes; but where? in the _Church_?

Nay; but "in the field;" and He tells us that "_the field is the world_." To confound these things is to falsify the whole Christian position, and to do away with all G.o.dly discipline in the a.s.sembly. It is to place the teaching of our Lord in Matthew xiii. in opposition to the teaching of the Holy Ghost in 1 Corinthians v.

However, we shall not pursue this subject further just now. It is far too important and too extensive to be disposed of in a brief article like the present. We may perhaps discuss it more fully on some future occasion. That it demands the serious consideration of the Christian reader we are most thoroughly convinced; bearing, as it does, so manifestly on the glory of Christ, on the true interests of His people, on the progress of the gospel, on the integrity of Christian testimony and service, it would be quite impossible to overestimate its importance. But we must leave it for the present, and draw this paper to a close by a brief reference to the third and last branch of our subject, namely,

THE WORD OF CHRIST AS THE ALL-SUFFICIENT GUIDE FOR OUR PATH.

If Christ's work suffices for the conscience, if His blessed Person suffices for the heart, then, most a.s.suredly, His precious Word suffices for the path. We may a.s.sert, with all possible confidence, that we possess in the divine volume of holy Scripture all we can ever need, not only to meet all the exigencies of our individual path, but also the varied necessities of the Church of G.o.d, in the most minute details of her history in this world.

We are quite aware that in making this a.s.sertion we lay ourselves open to much scorn and opposition, in more quarters than one. We shall be met on the one hand by the advocates of tradition, and on the other by those who contend for the supremacy of man's reason and will; but this gives us very little concern indeed. We regard the traditions of men, whether fathers, brothers, or doctors, _if presented as an authority_, as the small dust of the balance; and as to human reason, it can only be compared to a bat in the sunshine, dazzled by the brightness, and blindly dashing itself against objects which it cannot see.

It is the deepest joy of the Christian's heart to retire from the conflicting traditions and doctrines of men into the calm light of holy Scripture; and when encountered by the impudent reasonings of the infidel, the rationalist, and the skeptic, to bow down his whole moral being to the authority and power of holy Scripture. He thankfully recognizes in the Word of G.o.d the only perfect standard for doctrine, for morals, for every thing. "All Scripture is given by inspiration of G.o.d, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness; that the man of G.o.d may be _perfect_ [a?t???], _throughly furnished unto all good works_."

What more can we need? Nothing. If Scripture can make a child "wise unto salvation," and if it can make a man "perfect," and furnish him "throughly to all good works," what do we want of human tradition or human reasonings? If G.o.d has written a volume for us, if He has graciously condescended to give us a revelation of His mind, as to all we ought to know and think and feel and believe and do, shall we turn to a poor fellow-mortal--be he ritualist or rationalist--to help us?

Far away be the thought! As well might we turn to our fellow-man to add something to the finished work of Christ, in order to render it sufficient for our conscience, or to supply some deficiency in the Person of Christ, in order to render Him a sufficient object for the heart, as to betake ourselves to human tradition or human reason to supply some deficiency in divine revelation.

All praise and thanks to our G.o.d, it is not so. He has given us in His own beloved Son all we want for the conscience, for the heart, for the path--for time, with all its changing scenes--for eternity, with its countless ages. We can say,--

"Thou, O Christ, art all we want; More than all in Thee we find."

There is, there could be, no lack in the Christ of G.o.d. His atonement and advocacy must satisfy all the cravings of the most deeply exercised conscience. The moral glories--the powerful attractions of His divine Person must satisfy the most intense aspirations and longings of the heart. And His peerless revelation--that priceless volume--contains within its covers all we can possibly need, from the starting-post to the goal of our Christian career.

Christian reader, are not these things so? Dost thou not, from the very centre of thy renewed moral being, own the truth of them? If so, art thou resting, in calm repose, on Christ's work? art thou delighting in His Person? art thou submitting, in all things, to the authority of His Word? G.o.d grant it may be so with thee, and with all who profess His name! May there be a fuller, clearer, and more decided testimony to "the all-sufficiency of Christ," till "that day."

_C. H. M._

Job and his Friends

The book of Job occupies a very peculiar place in the volume of G.o.d.

It possesses a character entirely its own, and teaches lessons which are not to be learnt in any other section of inspiration. It is not by any means our purpose to enter upon a line of argument to prove the genuineness, or establish the fact of the divine inspiration, of this precious book. We take these things for granted; being fully persuaded of them as established facts, we leave the proofs to abler hands. We receive the book of Job as part of the Holy Scriptures given of G.o.d for the profit and blessing of His people. We need no proofs of this for ourselves, nor do we attempt to offer any to our reader.

And we may further add that we have no thought of entering upon the field of inquiry as to the authorship of this book. This, howsoever interesting it may be in itself, is to us entirely secondary. We receive the book from G.o.d. This is enough for us. We heartily own it to be an inspired doc.u.ment, and we do not feel it to be our province to discuss the question as to where, when, or by whom it was penned.

In short, we purpose, with the Lord's help, to offer a few plain and practical remarks on a book which we consider needs to be more closely studied, that it may be more fully understood. May the Eternal Spirit, who indited the book, expound and apply it to our souls!

The opening page of this remarkable book furnishes us with a view of the patriarch Job, surrounded by every thing that could make the world agreeable to him, and make him of importance in the world. "There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared G.o.d and eschewed evil." Thus much as to _what he was_. Let us now see _what he had_.

"And there were born unto him seven sons and three daughters. His substance also was seven thousand sheep, and three thousand camels, and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she-a.s.ses, and a very great household; so that this man was the greatest of all the children of the east. And his sons went and feasted in their houses every one his day; and sent and called for their three sisters, to eat and to drink with them." Then, to complete the picture, we have the record of _what he did_.

"And it was so, when the days of their feasting were gone about, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt-offerings according to the number of them all; for Job said, 'It may be that my sons have sinned, and cursed G.o.d in their hearts.' Thus did Job continually."

Here, then, we have a very rare specimen of a man. He was perfect, upright, G.o.d-fearing, and eschewed evil. Moreover, the hand of G.o.d had hedged him round about on every side, and strewed his path with richest mercies. He had all that heart could wish,--children and wealth in abundance,--honor and distinction from all around. In short, we may almost say, his cup of earthly bliss was full.

But Job needed to be tested. There was a deep moral root in his heart which had to be laid bare. There was self-righteousness which had to be brought to the surface and judged. Indeed, we may discern this root in the very words which we have just quoted. He says, "It may be that my sons have sinned." He does not seem to contemplate the possibility of sinning himself. A soul really self-judged, thoroughly broken before G.o.d, truly sensible of its own state, tendencies, and capabilities, would think of his own sins, and his own need of a burnt-offering.

Now, let the reader distinctly understand that Job was a real saint of G.o.d,--a divinely quickened soul,--a possessor of divine and eternal life. We cannot too strongly insist upon this. He was just as truly a man of G.o.d in the first chapter as he was in the forty-second. If we do not see this, we shall miss one of the grand lessons of the book.

The eighth verse of chap. i. establishes this point beyond all question. "And the Lord said unto Satan, 'Hast thou considered _My servant_ Job, that there is none like him in the earth,--a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth G.o.d and escheweth evil?"

But, with all this, Job had never sounded the depths of his own heart.

He did not know himself. He had never really grasped the truth of his own utter ruin and total depravity. He had never learnt to say, "I know that in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing." This point must be seized, or the book of Job will not be understood. We shall not see the specific object of all those deep and painful exercises through which Job was called to pa.s.s unless we lay hold of the solemn fact that his conscience had never been really in the divine presence,--that he had never seen himself in the light,--never measured himself by a divine standard,--never weighed himself in the balances of the sanctuary.

If the reader will turn for a moment to chap. xxix., he will find a striking proof of what we a.s.sert. He will there see distinctly what a strong and deep root of self-complacency there was in the heart of this dear and valued servant of G.o.d, and how this root was nourished by the very tokens of divine favor with which he was surrounded. This chapter is a pathetic lament over the faded light of other days; and the very tone and character of the lament prove how necessary it was that Job should be stripped of every thing, in order that he might learn himself in the searching light of the divine presence.

Let us hearken to his words.