The One Great Reality Part 5

[Footnote: I John i. 7.] When we feel that sin is really a burden then the Holy Spirit points us to the little word "all." Then He applies the precious Blood to our guilty consciences, a.s.suring us by the Word that the Blood of Jesus Christ does cleanse from all sin so that not a single stain is left. It is a perfect cleanser, there is nothing it cannot do. Then the Holy Spirit shows us that G.o.d has provided a perfect covering for us in the Robe of Christ's Righteousness.

It is thus that the Comforter, who is the Spirit of Truth, leading into all truth, shows us the meaning of Christ's redeeming work and enables us to understand it and to appropriate it. When we do this it is indeed a blessed experience.

A young man whom I know described it as follows: "I heard the voice of G.o.d saying to me, 'Who told thee that thou wast naked?' [Footnote: Gen. iii.

11.] I am sure that it was the work of the Holy Spirit showing me my utter helplessness and leading me to seek the covering of Christ's Righteousness. I feel I am exactly suited to Jesus as He is exactly suited to me, for I am just the one who needs His fulness, and He is the only one that can supply my emptiness."

I praised G.o.d for this clear testimony, and I have seen again and again ever since I began to work for the Lord many years ago, that the Holy Spirit delights to reveal the Lord Jesus Christ as "a full Saviour for empty sinners."

The Gospel of St. John tells us very plainly that the Holy Ghost was sent, not only to make us see the meaning of Christ's finished work, but also to prepare our hearts to receive it in all its fulness.

How does the Holy Spirit prepare our hearts? First, He opens our hearts, awakens in us a sense of our need and sinfulness, then, when He has opened our hearts, He breathes into them a new life; He creates a longing for G.o.d. We feel within us a burning desire to know G.o.d. We catch eagerly at everything we hear about G.o.d, This is quite a new experience; we used to go on year after year not troubling about it in the very least. What is this new experience, this seeking after G.o.d? It is what the Bible calls "Repentance." The word means "Change of mind." Again and again the Apostle Paul urged upon both Jews and Greeks the necessity of "repentance towards G.o.d and faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ." [Footnote: Acts xx. 21.]

A few days ago I received a touching letter from a young friend telling me how G.o.d's Spirit had led her to repentance. She wrote, "When I was a little girl and began to seek the Lord, I was very much troubled because I could not feel sorry enough for my sins. I wanted a real repentance to come to the Lord with. I thought repentance meant crying over one's sins a great deal, and I could not feel sorry enough to cry as I wanted to. I used to keep praying, 'Give me a real repentance.' Many times I dreamed I had this deep repentance and could cry over my sins, and I have awakened with my face really bathed in tears, but oh, how disappointing it was to find it only a dream and I had not got what I wanted after all. I went on like this until I was twenty, when the Lord spoke these words with great power to my soul, 'The goodness of G.o.d leadeth thee to repentance.' The voice seemed audible and I turned to see if anybody had spoken to me. I was able to weep enough then, but they were tears of joy and grat.i.tude, and I well remember saying aloud, 'O Lord, why me, why one so sinful as I am?' I now see that repentance means 'a change of mind' and not a flood of tears. Had I known this when a child it would have saved me years of toiling and praying for repentance."

Dear friends, perhaps some of you are trying to get right with G.o.d. Look at the text which gave such peace to this seeking one. It begins with this question, "Despisest thou the riches of His goodness and forbearance and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of G.o.d leadeth thee to repentance?" [Footnote: Rom. ii. 4.]

We little know that all the time we are working and toiling we are really despising, turning away from the riches of His goodness. The word "riches"

shows how abundant His goodness is; therefore we are "without excuse."

G.o.d's forbearance in delaying punishment, and His longsuffering in patiently waiting, show that His purpose in thus dealing with us is to lead us to repentance, which is not merely grief for sin, but a thorough inward change.

So we now know what we did not know before, that it is "the goodness of G.o.d that leads us to repentance."

Yes, we find now that instead of working our way, back to G.o.d, He is there close to us, with open arms to receive us, stretching out His loving Hand to save us. We find that instead of trying to gain G.o.d's favour by our prayers and good works, G.o.d's Righteousness is there for us all ready and provided for us. We find that we are accepted in His dear Son not for any good thing we have done, but simply by faith in Jesus. All this is shown to us by the Holy Spirit, and without Him we could not have seen it.

We were speaking just now about repentance. Have you ever noticed that when our Lord began preaching the Gospel, the first word He said was "Repent." [Footnote: St. Matt. iv. 17.] Why did He call to the crowds so earnestly to repent? Again and again that word keeps ringing out. He wanted to make them see that He condemned the way they were living and their religious professions. It was a call to stop and think, as if He said to them, "You have lost your way, you are on the wrong road, stop and turn round."

First He points to the right road. He proclaims that the Kingdom of G.o.d is come. Then He says to them, But before you can enter in you must repent.

The people recognised the meaning of the call; they knew that if they obeyed the whole course of their lives would have to be changed, because having lost the true centre of life, they were simply _drifting_. The man who is living without G.o.d is like a ship drifting on the wide ocean without a pilot or chart or compa.s.s. For three years He pleaded with them tenderly and lovingly, and at last they gave their final answer to His message. They said, "We will not submit to the Divine government, we will not have this Man to reign over us," [Footnote: St. Luke xix. 14.] _and so they crucified Him_.

When we have been led by the Holy Spirit to repentance we see sin, and we see ourselves in a new light. As soon as we really know G.o.d we cannot help being sorry for our sin. We begin to long for a Saviour, a Mediator, and it is then that the Holy Spirit points us to Jesus. Repentance, or change of mind, is the first step, and then follows conversion--a change of heart and life. The word conversion means "turning round." Jesus says, "Except ye be converted and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven." [Footnote: St. Matt. xviii. 3.]

Think of G.o.d's two great gifts; first, the Gift of His only begotten Son, then the Gift of the Holy Spirit. Have you received them? Perhaps you ask, "How can I know?" If you have received the Holy Spirit there will be joy and peace in your heart, and the fruits of the Spirit will be seen in your daily life.

"Now the G.o.d of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost." [Footnote: Rom.

xv. 13.]

"And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Ghost."

[Footnote: Acts xiii. 52.] They were filled again and again, more and more filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.

You, too, may have a Spirit-filled life. G.o.d says to you now, and He is saying it every day and every hour, "_Be filled with the Spirit._"

[Footnote: Eph. v. 18.]

Remember there are different degrees in the Christian life. First, there is Everlasting Life for all who seek it. Only ask Me, Jesus said to the woman of Samaria, and I will give you _living_ water. Then he leads her on a step further. "It shall be in you a well of water." It will be an abundant life, a joyous, satisfying life. Afterwards He tells us that it will be a life "overflowing for others." [Footnote: St. John vii. 38, 39.]

This is to be the experience of all believers now through the Holy Spirit.

Lastly, the crowning of it all is still to come and we shall drink of "the pure river of the Water of Life." [Footnote: Rev. xxi. 1.]

That will be the fulness of life through all Eternity.

ADDRESS V

THE VOICE OF G.o.d

PORTION OF SCRIPTURE--Genesis xxviii. 10-22.

Jacob is leaving home for the first time, to take a long journey of 450 miles. He is quite alone and he feels very lonely when he lies down the first night in a barren place, with a stone for his pillow. Jacob was like some of us, he had heard about G.o.d ever since he was a child, but G.o.d was not real to him because he had never had any personal dealings with Him.

That night he had a wonderful dream, and it made a great difference to his whole life. The ladder which he saw in his dream was to show him that there was a gulf between him and G.o.d: and the gulf was caused by his sins.

It also showed the necessity for some means of communication to be provided for him. Right down to his deep need the ladder came, right up to G.o.d Himself the ladder reached. It was set up on earth and it reached to heaven to make him understand that the gulf had been bridged over, so that now, constant, free communication was possible between his soul and G.o.d.

The ladder which Jacob saw in his dream is mentioned again in St. John's Gospel. Jesus said to Nathaniel, "Because I said unto thee I saw thee under the fig tree, believest thou? Thou shalt see greater things than these. And He saith unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Hereafter ye shall see heaven open and the angels of G.o.d ascending and descending upon the Son of man." [Footnote: St. John i. 50, 51.]

The Lord Jesus had been revealing Himself to Nathaniel and this conversation took place near Bethel, so that the reference to Jacob's ladder was very forcible and the wonderful type was made clear.

When Jesus said that heaven would be opened, He meant not only opened just once, but _remaining open_; so that ever since Christ ascended into heaven we have lived and are still living under an "open heaven," which means free intercourse between G.o.d and man, because Christ Himself is the Ladder. It also means He is the one and only means of communication between the sinner and G.o.d. It is "through Him we have access by one Spirit unto the Father." [Footnote: Eph. ii. 18.] All that we know of G.o.d comes to us through Him, and all the grace we receive from G.o.d comes through Him. So Jacob's ladder is as real to us now as it was to him then, for it connects the seen with the unseen. It is possible for us now to have Christ's Presence with us always and everywhere, for He says Lo, I am with you alway. [Footnote: Matt. xxviii. 20.]

But there was something more wonderful for Jacob to see even than the ladder. "The LORD stood above the ladder." It was the first time in his life he had realised the Presence of G.o.d. He had lived over forty years without realising that G.o.d was close to him. When he awoke from his dream he said, "Surely the Lord is in this place and I knew it not." He never forgot it, just as we never forget the time and place where we are converted. One hundred years after that night, when he was a very old man, he mentioned it to his son. He said to Joseph, "G.o.d Almighty appeared unto me at Luz and blessed me." [Footnote: Gen. xlviii. 3.]

But what impressed him deeply was that _there_ in that lonely place, many miles away from any human being, he heard the Voice of G.o.d speaking to him. It was then that a new life began in his soul, for G.o.d told him that from that moment He would be with him _everywhere_, blessing him and protecting him from all danger, and it was then Jacob began to trust G.o.d as his _G.o.d_.

So we see how G.o.d's glory and G.o.d's grace were shining down from the top of the ladder into poor Jacob's heart. Jacob was face to face with G.o.d for the first time, and he began to tremble with fear. If only you could realise that G.o.d is now, at this very moment, straight in front of you, you would fall down on your face before Him, and you would cry to Him as Job did, "I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth Thee; wherefore I abhor myself and repent in dust and ashes."

[Footnote: Job xlii. 5, 6.]

It is at this moment that we realise for the first time our need of a subst.i.tute, just as Job did, for he said, "He is not a man as I am that I should answer Him, neither is there any daysman betwixt us that can lay His hand upon us both." [Footnote: Job ix. 33.] How Job would have rejoiced in the glorious revelation which Christ has brought to us. "There is one G.o.d, and one Mediator between G.o.d and men, the Man Christ Jesus, Who gave Himself a ransom for all." [Footnote: 1 Tim. ii. 5, 6.] He is not only the Mediator laying His hand upon us both, but He _gave Himself_, that is, He gave His life as a _ransom_. The ransom price was His own precious blood, for the life is in the blood. It is the Blood of G.o.d's own dear Son which makes an atonement for the soul.

The sentence pa.s.sed on you and me and on every sinner is the sentence of death, for death is the penalty for sin. We are all under the sentence of death, but the glorious message is sent G.o.d has found a Subst.i.tute.

"He bore on the tree the sentence for me, And now both the Surety and sinner are free."

You and I now have what Job longed for so earnestly. The Daysman is the Son of G.o.d Himself, "Whom G.o.d hath set forth to be a propitiation," that is an atoning sacrifice, "through faith in His Blood." [Footnote: Rom.

iii. 25.]

At first Jacob trembled with fear, but after he had heard the loving words which G.o.d spoke to him from the top of that wonderful ladder, then he began to realise that he was no longer alone in that lonely place. He said, "This is the house of G.o.d, this is the gate of heaven." Earth had faded from his sight and he was surrounded by heavenly realities. And so it is now, the veil is very thin which separates earth from heaven, the temporal from the Eternal.

It was _G.o.d's Voice_ which woke him up spiritually. G.o.d revealed Himself as the personal G.o.d to Jacob. We can recognise a friend by his voice even if we do not see him. So it is the Voice more than anything else which makes the presence of any one real to us. We have an ill.u.s.tration of this in the pictures of the gramophone in which we see a dog listening for the master's voice. The sheep knows the shepherd's voice; the child is quick in recognizing its mother's voice; why do we turn a deaf ear to G.o.d's Voice? How tenderly He pleads with us, saying, "But My people would not hearken to My Voice." [Footnote: Ps. lx.x.xxi. 11.]

G.o.d wants to be very real and very personal to each one of us, so He says, "Unto you, O men, I call, and My Voice is to the sons of man." [Footnote: Prov. viii. 4.]

G.o.d has been calling us from the very beginning. Far back in the 3rd chapter of Genesis, when Adam was hiding among the trees of the garden, it was G.o.d's Voice which called him out with the searching question, Where art thou? It was as if He said, "Adam, I want you." He is the seeking G.o.d still. It was G.o.d's Voice that reminded Adam of the holy, happy friendship now broken by sin. Before sin came into the world Adam never listened to any other voice, and now when G.o.d is yearning to bring us to Himself, He says, "Listen." That word Listen, or Hearken, comes again and again in the Bible. We find it very often in Isaiah and Jeremiah. When G.o.d is pleading with the sinner, that is the word He uses more than any other. In Psalm lx.x.xi., where G.o.d tells us how grieved He is by our waywardness, He says, "Oh that My people had listened or hearkened unto Me." And in Deuteronomy xxviii. 45, He tells them that their troubles have been sent because they would not hearken to the Voice of the Lord their G.o.d.

I think G.o.d has chosen this special way of calling us by His Voice, because it is what we can all understand--it is so simple and so homely.

When a boy is disobedient the father calls him, then he talks to him and pleads with him. The father's voice touches the boy's heart. How wonderful it is that G.o.d's Voice can reach us, however far off we may be. You have sometimes been to an Open-Air Service, and you have heard the speaker's voice a good way off, but now it has been discovered that any one's voice can travel through the air and be heard above 300 miles away by means of a new apparatus called the wireless telephone.

Some time ago a gentleman living in England put a special receiver to his ear and he actually heard a man speaking in France, more than 300 miles away.

A year or two ago when the _t.i.tanic_ went down among the icebergs, you remember how the wireless telegraph sent messages to other ships calling for help. This was done by special letters, flashed across the ocean, such as C.Q.D. (come quick, danger) or when the ship was sinking S.O.S. (save our souls).

But wonderful as this is, how much more wonderful it is to discover a way by which any one's voice can be heard miles and miles away. Very likely as time goes on and the wireless telephone is more used, you will be able to speak to your father or son far away in Australia or Canada, so that they will not only hear your voice distinctly, but they will answer back, and you will hear their voices just as if you were sitting together again at home. What a wonderful thing it will be to have this close link with them!