Dearest G Gausby, -- Legality does stick to us dreadfully, because it takes the form of conscientiousness, which is an excellent thing. But a full sense of infinite grace changes all. In Romans, Christians are always looked at as living men as you and I are on the earth, who have walked as men in their sins on the earth, living in them; but who having received Christ have received life, and are justified from all their sins, but have been introduced by baptism unto His death, and, in that He died unto sin once, and lives to God in that He liveth, reckon themselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ, not in Adam; hence are free in spirit to yield themselves to God as those that are alive from the dead -- the nearest approach to being arisen, but it is as such, the whole state being reckoned such by a living man. Hence, taking the old man as crucified with Christ, the Christian is to walk in newness of life. So we shall live with Him. The whole is a moral change in a man viewed as alive here de facto, but having Christ his life, instead of the old man and living in sins. If we be dead with Christ, we shall live (6: 8) is a moral conclusion. All this is the case because man is looked at as the responsible man in this world, and finding sin in the flesh as the power of evil, is taught how to have done with its power, namely, by reckoning himself dead and alive in Christ -- not in flesh. Chapter 8: 3-4 gives the great basis, adding the Holy Ghost and its effects in what follows.
The Ephesians views man in his state towards God, and no possibility of movement being awakened. Christ Himself is looked at only as raised from the dead when dead by God's power. So we are quickened together with Christ brought out of this state of death. Here Jew and Gentile have necessarily disappeared, children of wrath one as another, but are raised together and made to sit together; associated in a wholly new standing, not individually victorious in the old. In Romans the man reckons himself dead to sin; in Ephesians he was dead in sins, but is quickened with Christ who had died, and raised up and sitting no Jew nor Gentile in Christ. This takes me wholly out of the place I was in (not giving me a new life in it) as it took Christ out of the grave and set Him at the right hand of God, far above all principality and power, taking me out of death in sins and putting me into Him. It is not a living responsible man on earth counting himself dead that he may have power over sin -- not let it reign -- the old man being crucified; but a new creation, in which the dead in sins are taken out of their state and place by God's power and placed in Christ. There is no responsibility in Ephesians till after this. In Romans there is all through: in Romans nothing of counsels, save at the end of chapter 8 that is, of the Epistle doctrinally. God creates us in Christ according to His counsels before the world: He has met our responsibility both as to guilt and power. Both are all-important. One living in sins is dead toward God. I may take him up in grace, meeting his responsibility as a creature of God, or I may see him created in Christ, God's workmanship in his new estate, but then it is a wholly new thing, risen out of the state in which he was; and this involves the disappearance of the difference of Jew and Gentile. We get no to the Jew first, and also to the Greek, in Ephesians. And yet it must be a new life in Christ by which I have the power looked for in Romans. I do not think of flesh in Ephesians. It is not an actual state, but one of faith. Now, reckoning myself dead is thinking of the old man, that it may not reign by reckoning it dead. In Ephesians the truth in Christ is the having put it off and put on the new. Hence Ephesians is strikingly contrast all through. He gives himself up as a living sacrifice to God in Romans. [In Ephesians] he walks in love, and gives himself as Christ gave Himself, being free and coming out from God, an imitator of God. And all this difference is extremely instructive and beautiful. In Colossians you have both, only no sitting in heavenly places, but our hope there, and the actual life far more fully displayed and developed ... .
I trust I may have made myself clear, if not, write again; and, dear brother, the Lord give us both understanding in all things, for that is the real point.
F G Patterson, You ask, Are the two last verses of 1 Corinthians 5 practically applicable now to those gathered together separate from evil according to 2 Timothy 2: 19-22 And, Is it correct to refuse obedience until power come in To the first I reply that the word of the Lord abides for ever. Its authority never ceases, and obedience is always due to it. Power has nothing to do with this. Grace is needed to induce the heart to obey, but obedience is always due. The direction as to tongues has not lost its authority. Were there tongues it would apply. There are not, and there is nothing to apply it to. But its authority remains. This clears up at once the question as to 1 Corinthians 5 "Put away from among yourselves that wicked person" has its own simple authority that nothing can take away. It applies to an assembly, including all saints professing to own the Lord everywhere (see address of the Epistle), and wherever a wicked person is found in an assembly, the case it applies to is there, and it is a simple matter of obedience. There are acts of power, as "I have judged to deliver to Satan." He does not say, Do you do it. He does it in all the solemnity of the assembled saints, but there is no command, but a personal act of power, as Paul says elsewhere, "Whom I have delivered unto Satan."
The declaration or exercise of a personal act of power has nothing to do with the abiding authority of a command. The power may not subsist; the command does. That it requires the help and grace of the Lord to act upon it, is no more than is true of every command in scripture. To apply the ruin of the visible assembly to sanction disobedience is a principle wholly unallowable. I cannot appoint elders. It is not a question of obedience but authority, and I have not the authority. The assembly had it not when Paul was there, nor can they assume it now. They had not power as an assembly to deliver to Satan then, they have not now; but they were hound to obey the command then, they are so now. Wherever two or three are really gathered together in Christ's name Christ is, and there is the within and the without. It is a clearing of the conscience of the assembly: "Ye have proved yourselves clear in this matter." Otherwise, the assembly would be the positive sanction, and by Christ's presence, of the association of Christ and sin; and it would be far better there should be no assembly at all than that. 2 Timothy 2 gives us the general principle of every one who calls himself a Christian, separating from iniquity, purging himself from false teachers, and walking with those who call upon the name of the Lord out of a pure heart. It is individual duty when evil has come in.
As to the second question, it is practically answered already. In bestowing power God is sovereign. When the word has spoken I am bound to obey. To refuse obedience to it is to disobey, to assume on my own will authority not to act till God chooses to do that which rests on His will.
Affectionately yours, dear brother.
Georgetown, British Guiana, December 8th, 1868.
[C McAdam] MY DEAR BROTHER, -- We cannot have too clear a view of Paul's teaching union with an ascended Christ, putting us in a wholly new position. The more I go on, the more I see that the loss of this by the Church is the secret of their state; and it is mainly that which brethren have recovered, which God has brought out in these last days. But it is just that that makes it so important that the truth should not be discredited, by denying or in any way discrediting any other part of scripture. It is curious that this was just the ruin of the Paulicians. They had nothing else but Paul's epistles and the gospels, and their adversary took up this very point against them, a certain Peter,+ if I remember. But it is a mistake to think Paul only speaks of this new place; John does too. But that is not all: the other parts of scripture are the word of God, and if any have not attained to Paul's doctrine, we are to walk by the same rule. Besides, the other aspects of the truth are as important in their place as that. Where that truth is held alone, there is a hardness, a want of daily dependence which leaves the best christian affections dormant. Besides, the whole system is false. Those other parts of the New Testament were certainly available for Christians then, and if so, for Christians now. "Holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling," is clearly christian ground; and wilderness life is a part of christian life, as Canaan and conflict are.
Further, the person who makes light of John's writings, makes light of the manifestation of God and of the Father and makes his own acceptance before God the only thing of importance now. This is a very bad state of soul, and such are clearly on low ground. We have to maintain redemption against the Puseyite heresy of making incarnation the saving work. But if we hold redemption tenaciously fast, the Bread come down from heaven to give life must not be lost. And as to Peter, if I lose his writings I lose the government of God and the connection of this in christian times with Old Testament times. Now the glory of God is concerned in these things, and it is a poor boast of knowledge to leave that aside and think only of what exalts us. So of Jude, where it directly concerns the professing church. In no place is Christ's personal glory, as Christ, brought out more fully than in Hebrews. Is that nothing for the Christian, because the unity of the body is not brought out Even Paul's epistles give different aspects of truth. The Epistle to the Romans does not hint at our resurrection with Christ, nor allude to Christ's ascension, save once in chapter 8, to lay the ground for intercession, which is really dropped out of their scheme. Ephesians never goes on Romans ground at all: Colossians takes up in substance both. Their vaunted clearness is not, sound knowledge, but rejection of many important parts of truth, and uniformly produces self-sufficiency and hardness, not personal dependence on grace and on Christ.
Many have had difficulty in going with poor, whose teaching could not go down in London, and they did not break bread with him: he is personally a lovable man, but I confess I should have myself, though I know not to what extent he has given ground for any active dealing with it. I know his views (as they were some few years ago) well, and reject them as alike false and mischievous. It may be the case of warning brethren not to go there, when he occasion calls for it, and presenting a clear determined front of utter condemnation and rejection when any come across it as you have, and as I heard of it in the north, and dealing with it as intolerable, and watching any sign of its spreading. People may be easily misled by it, because there are important truths, often dropped, which their system brings forward. And some may err without being heretical. But I should resist at any rate, and take up immediately any teaching of the error. It is gross and mischievous ignorance, not light, to say nothing of disposing cavalierly of the word of God. To whom was the Epistle to the Hebrews addressed unbelieving, blaspheming Jews, or believing ones who had taken joyfully the spoiling of their goods? It is really wonderful how people can be so bamboozled; only, will is at work, and that must be kept in mind, and taken notice of++.
No great news from this. The brethren have been encouraged, and needed it, and souls have been added, and I trust several others blessed. They have taken the visit cordially. At Barbados there is more inquiry than here. Still the testimony has reached souls ... . The brethren are going on well, though they have had cases of discipline and needed rousing and setting on solid ground the most about 350 in the colony. Here, Georgetown, the work is comparatively recent. W. is arrived, and I (D.V.) leave for Barbados by next mail. All well through mercy. The heat is not so very bad, only always grapes ripening fast, etc.
+[Of Sicily]
++[See "Collected Writings," volume 15, page 308.]
[Sydney Smith] MY DEAR BROTHER, -- I am anxious about a rumour I heard of your becoming a doctor, and I am sure you will forgive my anxiety for the Lord's sake and yours ... . I look to the principle. Christ has ordained that they that preach the gospel should live of the gospel, and it is the clear duty of the church of God to aid those who are given up to the work. If a man can give himself wholly up to the work, and as an extra support himself by a trade he has already all well. I have known a brother, an evangelist much blessed, who so lived, when at a certain period of the year the people (from work) could not get on weekdays to meetings and he being a good watchmaker, mended all the watches in the country the rest of the year was helped by brethren. This is all well ... . But when I set about to learn a profession or trade, it is not merely the time, but Christ, and Christ's work, is put in a second place, and faith is set aside as to that, and the church encouraged in want of devotedness. All this seems to me evil. If you were not working for the Lord, your setting to do something would be perfectly right; but you are at the work, and it is saying, I fear not in your heart perhaps, but as testimony "I have put my hand to the plough," etc. I have never known but one case where a brother actually wanted: it was not known to brethren: a devoted pioneer, who pushed into unbroken ground in France. He fed on nettle tops, which they use much as spinach, not to give up an open door. The same man has been three times in prison. That was a bright testimony. I doubt you are quite there yet, and have been pinched, but so was Paul, and the Lord has very soon come in to help them. It may seem easy for me who want for nothing to press this on others, but I honestly began by giving up everything, though in point of fact my faith was never tried in that way, as an uncle left me something before I was run out, or very soon after.
But I dread settling the principle, when a man is a labourer, that the church is not to take care that those who labour shall be honoured by being temporally cared for: no salary. A man is a servant, but free under Christ in his ministry, and the privilege of the church, as those at Philippi, to be partakers in the grace by helping him who labours in it. It blocks up the path of simple, humble faith. A poor man has no difficulty: and it seems as if an educated person could take this blessed and honoured place of service to Christ: working when we can, and are not occupied in the work all well, as I said. But taking up a profession is really saying I have laid down that of working for the Lord, trusting to Him who knows that we have need of these things.
I have not seen the Lord leave those who have given themselves up to work, trusting Him: and I have seen distress of spirit and greatly hindered usefulness [in those] who, through their wives or own hearts, have turned to other things to help wife or family here. The most beloved and able witness was saved from great injury to his own spirit and usefulness, by its making him thoroughly miserable, and it did hinder him. There it was a wife's doing; but no matter what, the difficulties are what faith has to overcome. I am a very poor one for faith, but I am sure the Lord is sufficient, and that He will never fail us. He may try our faith, but He will meet it and rejoice our hearts.
Here, a small place, there has been really considerable blessing. No doubt many curious ones will drop off, but a goodly number of souls have come under the power of the Spirit and truth of God. We leave (D.V.) this week for Jamaica ... . The gracious Lord guide and teach you.
[Capt. Scott] BELOVED BROTHER, -- Most glad I was to get your letter, and doubly so from its contents. The Lord has been indeed blessing you, nor have we been without some droppings of the shower. Barbados was very interesting; numbers came, earnest, attentive, and many declared they had never heard the real gospel before; and considerable numbers found peace. Some were added every Lord's day we were there, and a good many have now to decide between taking up their cross and following Christ, or accommodating themselves to the world, and religious error and false doctrine, which they know to be wrong. The Lord give them grace to be faithful.
However, we had to come on to Jamaica, where there is scarce one to labour, and not much spiritual life, but some nice brethren, as far as we have seen, glad to profit by what we are enabled to afford them. How far the door may open is in the Lord's hands; at Barbados there was no mistake as to this. It helped, too, dear -- +, who had been labouring under reproach, a lowly man, distrustful of himself, but whom the Lord has blessed there much; treated as a bringer of strange doctrine and folly, but many say now, "they charged him with wrong doctrine, but now we see it was we who were wrong," and the rumour of it spread through the place. The brethren are in much union and harmony. Here, there are a good many scattered small gatherings in rather inaccessible places no roads or means of communication. I suppose I shall have, as people do, to buy a carriage and horses, and sell them again on leaving, riding when a road ceases, lodging where one can.
We want labourers. Oh! that the Lord would raise up single-eyed, devoted workmen, coming direct from Christ to those around, enduring hardness too betimes, as good soldiers of Jesus Christ. He has raised up some, His name be praised, but we need many more. We have to pray the Lord of the harvest and may He grant them. I suppose I shall have to go back to Europe from this; France and Germany claim a visit. I thought I had done with them: and I have some London work. But I am so used to the Atlantic and so well on it, if God preserves my strength, I may yet see the States, and so, the Lord willing, Canada. What effect has the new work in western Canada? But it is the Lord's work, and He only wakens and arouses.
W.++ has suffered a little, otherwise we are all well. No doubt it tends to destroy exertion, but people are needlessly frightened about the West Indies. This land is magnificent, full of misery and like all the West Indies, degraded in morals, but temporally has seen its worst.
The full mind of God has opened itself to me more largely than ever in these latter times, but I am not satisfied with myself as to my love to souls. I bow to filling up the little niche I may have been allotted, but still envy (not with an ill feeling) more active evangelists, and sometimes ask myself whether cowardice and want of zeal does not hinder one. Fully occupied and labouring, the question is whether a simpler love to souls would not put me in another place. I am content with -- thankful for -- any the Lord will allow me to have, unworthy as I am of any. I ask if the exposition of scripture is the task allotted me. I see the Church's need as to it, and am content with anything, but I have ever loved evangelisation. I have gone out on that work. The Church is at my heart perhaps more than souls: yet I trust I love them. But Christ's glory must connect itself with evangelising for me. Some much prized though I heartily rejoice in it, falls cold on my heart for this reason. But all is in His hands, only I would not avoid any responsibility. Well, enough of myself!
We are in a delicious spot by the harbour, a mile from town quiet itself, with woods and noble mountains before us, behind one of which there is a gathering. At present we are occupied with Kingston. Next week (D.V.) we, or I with a brother, go a hundred miles west, partly by roads, partly without.
Give my kindest love to the brethren: may they be kept very near the Lord, and truly waiting for His Son from heaven. My heart is with them in their blessing. May they know how, through grace, to keep it. Kind remembrances to Mrs. -- and your boys too: the Lord graciously keep them from the world, and by His own gracious power.
+Probably Benjamin T. Slim.
++George V. Wigram.
DEAR BRETHREN, -- I write for both, because I hardly know who is in -- , indeed for all, as to my heart's desire; and you will not be astonished at my being interested in the assembly there. I have heard from Mr. -- , and also through another, only one side of course of the circumstances, and consequently I say little of them; N., indeed, alluded to the question raised, but not to circumstances. I shall refer chiefly to principles, for you will feel that we are all, as of one body, interested in the position taken, and still more in the glory of Christ and our brethren's welfare.
The question is, as to reception of saints to partake of the table of the Lord with us, whether any can be admitted who are not formally and regularly amongst us. It is not whether we exclude persons unsound in faith or ungodly in practice; nor whether we, deliberately walking with those who are unsound and ungodly, are not in the same guilt -- not clear in the matter. The first is unquestioned; the last, brethren have insisted on, and I among them, at very painful cost to ourselves. This is, to me, all clear and plain from scripture. There may be subtle pleas to get evil allowed, but we have always been firm, and God, I believe, has fully owned it. The question is not there; but suppose a person known to be godly and sound in faith, who has not left some ecclesiastical system nay thinks scripture favours an ordained ministry, but is glad when the occasion occurs suppose we alone are in the place, or he is not in connection with any other body in the place, staying with a brother, or the like is he to be excluded because he is of some system as to which his conscience is not enlightened nay, which he may think more right? He is a godly member of the body, known such. Is he to be shut out? If so the degree of light is title to communion, and the unity of the body is denied by the assembly which refuses him. The principle of meeting as members of Christ walking in godliness is given up, agreement with us is made the rule, and the assembly becomes a sect with its members like any other. They meet on their principles, Baptist -- or other you on yours, and if they do not belong to you formally as such, you do not let them in. The principle of brethren's meetings is gone, and another sect is made, say with more light, and that is all. It may give more trouble, require more care to treat every case on its merits on the principle of the unity of all Christ's members, than say "you do not belong to us, you cannot come"; but the whole principle of meeting is gone. The path is not of God.
I have heard, and I partly believe it, for I have heard some rash and violent people say it elsewhere, that the various sectarian celebrations of the supper are tables of devils. But this proves only the unbrokenness and ignorance of him who says it. The heathen altars are called tables of devils because, and expressly because, what they offered they offered (according to Deuteronomy 32: 17) to devils, and not to God. But to call christian assemblies by profession, ignorant it may be of ecclesiastical truth, and hence meeting wrongly, tables of devils is monstrous nonsense, and shews the bad state of him who so talks. No sober man, no honest man, can deny that scripture means something totally different.
I have heard -- I do not know whether it be true -- that it has been said that the brethren in England act on this ground. If this has been said, it is simply and totally false. There have been new gatherings formed during my absence in America which I have never visited; but the older ones, long walking as brethren, I have known from the beginning have always received known Christians, and everywhere, I have no doubt, the newer ones too, and so in every country. I have known individuals take up the thought, one at any rate at Toronto, but the assembly always received true Christians: three broke bread in this way the last Lord's day I was in London. There cannot be too much care as to holiness and truth: the Spirit is the Holy Spirit, and the Spirit of truth. But ignorance of ecclesiastical truth is not a ground of excommunication, where the conscience and the walk is undefiled. If a person came and made it a condition to be allowed to go to both, he would not come in simplicity in the unity of the body; I know it to be evil, and cannot allow it, and he has no right to impose any conditions on the church of God. It must exercise discipline as cases arise according to the Word. Nor, indeed, do I think a person regularly going from one to another systematically can be honest in going to either; he is setting up to be superior to both, and condescending to each. That is not, in that act, "a pure heart."
May the Lord guide you. Remember, you are acting as representing the whole church of God, and if you depart from a right path as to the principle of meeting, separating yourselves from it is to be a local sect on your own principles. In all that concerns faithfulness, God is my witness, I seek no looseness; but Satan is busy to lead us one side or the other, to destroy the largeness of the unity of the body, or to make it mere looseness in practice and doctrine; we must not fall into one in avoiding the other. Reception of all true saints is what gives its force to the exclusion of those walking loosely. If I exclude all who walk godlily as well, who do not follow with us, it loses its force, for those who are godly are shut out too.
There is no membership of brethren. Membership of an assembly is unknown to scripture. It is members of Christ's body. If people must be all of you, it is practically membership of your body. The Lord keep us from it; that is simply dissenting ground.
Ever, beloved brother,
I should, if I came to -- , require clear evidence what ground you are meeting upon.
[C McAdam] MY DEAR BROTHER, -- I was very glad to get your account of the brethren: I need not say my interest is only increased by absence. As to -- , I am not aware I said anything that shewed I could break bread there. I do make a difference between the meeting and him; if the meeting was sound might go and get it to deal with him. Why is it to be judged for his doctrine unless it has intelligently accepted it? I attach great importance to the body. I might avoid the place, if there was no way of dealing with it, as Paul did at Corinth -- not going to the evil, but looking first to its correction. Have brethren informed themselves, and dealt with the conscience of the gathering? I do not know that I could go, but I should not judge the gathering till the gathering had been dealt with. Brethren may have done this, but has any one competent to meet him, "to convince gainsayers," dealt with the gathering itself? I gave six weeks to Plymouth, going to Guernsey before I left it, nor did till W. H. wrote to H. that I had tried to turn them into a dissenting meeting, and get the body itself to judge evil, and that they could not judge elders. Then I left, because avowedly as a body they refused to do it. We owe it to these poor saints to deliver all, or any possible, if we can. But it should not be merely rejection of -- 's notions, the extend of which I am ignorant of (though I hear he has gone forward in error), but care for the poor saints there and the gathering he is corrupting ... .
The brethren in London cannot judge the gathering as such, but they can seek to deliver the poor of the flock, and deal individually with him as with any saint anywhere. We have dealt with loose assemblies when the case arose, and quite right -- it was keeping clear ourselves -- cannot be too decided. What brethren have to do now is to seek the deliverance of these souls if the Lord may help them to it, and with -- to deal individually for his good, in discipline, if the question arises by his presence anywhere, so that it is called for. Individuals of course can deal with them according to what is given them. But -- should understand that discipline arises for an assembly when its purity is in question. Public teachers of error may always be dealt with individually as such; when I say always, I mean of course under God's guidance.
Barbados is really interesting. There was a great desire to hear, and many declared they had never heard the real gospel before; some were added every Lord's day. They are very united and happy together ... . I trust there was blessing at Demerara, but it was not manifested as at Barbados. Moravians, Wesleyans, Establishment came in considerable numbers, and there were some strange cases. Some have been brought to the point where they own the truth and it is a question of taking up the cross, losing a school, etc. There is some gift in the assembly when matured and developed. I believe dear -- will have a work of filling up, as we, at least I, could only give great outlines of truth, though seeking to bring it practically to the hearers. The attention is always great.
We are now at Jamaica, in a pleasant country house, outside the town at the sea (or harbour) side, with cocoa nuts, great cactus hedges, mocking birds, etc., and a magnificent country all around, mountain and wood, but a wretched population, but things looking up a little more confidence. I must close for the present, as I have many letters for this boat
The work in Canada is remarkable.
Ever, dear -- , affectionately yours.
Rolfe Leslie, At last, dear -- , I take up my pen to write a line to you in reply. to your letter. As to your Brahmapootras, I feel it must have been a great chagrin to you, but as you had to reproach yourself -- though this does not always soften our misfortunes -- it has left you nothing to say. I feel with you in it. But even in these little things we have to see the Lord's hand, for nothing is little to Him which affects the souls of is children. How did you feel when you found it out in the morning vexed, irritated, angry with those who did it or wishing vengeance against them? All this, you see, shews the state of your mind, and this is the real importance of the matter. I feared these Brahmapootras for you, not that there was anything wrong in keeping or taking care of them, but from the effect on your own spirit. The poor fowls were very innocent, and so is taking care of them. But I feared your heart had got engaged in them in a way that was doing you mischief, and now the Lord has taken them away. How good He is, to think even of the effect of fowl-keeping on your soul that lives for ever!
With regard to Lacrosse, healthy exercise for boys of your age is quite to be desired, but here too, I feared, and you have learned a lesson by this too. How many we have to learn in a way humbling to ourselves! And I am so thankful to see the Lord teaching you, and even in your letter I think I see the effect of it, and bless the Lord. I was very glad to get it. I could not have advised you to stay away, but I am not sorry you did; it is always well conscience should work, and the doubt you were brought into as to salvation will quicken your conscience and make you more watchful, and not only so, but make you feel your dependence on grace every moment, and help you to discern why such or such a thing is to be avoided; for you are now growing a great boy, and have to be exercised for yourself before God; and walking with a conscience exercised before Him, you will find yourself happy and strengthened too. I am glad you are in correspondence with -- . At your age you need companions, and our hearts get knit with some, and it is a great point it should be with those who help and do not hinder us.
At Barbados we had a good deal of blessing. Here, though the brethren are walking well enough as to walk, things are pretty dead around, they need more spirituality themselves. I have been a hundred miles through the island, which is a magnificent one, and beginning after much misery to revive a little. After all, the coloured people and houses are not nearly as wretched as in Demerara, which is very prosperous.
In many parts here inns are not to be had, but I got on very well, only it is very expensive. Commonly, if people go a tour, they buy a carriage and horses, and sell them when it is over; conveyances there are none, I only found one. Kindest love to all. I remember all the kindness I received, dear -- , with the same affection to you all as ever ... . The Lord be with you and keep you.
Ever affectionately yours in the Lord.
[From the French.] -- - I believe that the bread remains simply and absolute bread, and the wine, wine -- that, physically, there is no change whatever in the elements. To seek for material and physical things in such a precious institution of the Lord is, to my mind, a poor and miserable manner of regarding it. I have a charming portrait of my mother, which reminds me of her just as she was. If I am told of the canvas or the colouring I should feel that those who spoke thus knew nothing about it. That would not be my mother. That which is precious in it to me is my mother herself; and they turn my attention from her to the means employed to recall her to me; and the reason is, that they have no idea of what my mother is to me. The portrait has no value except as far as it is a good representation of her who is not there. I say, It is my mother. I could not throw it aside as a mere piece of canvas; I discern my mother in it. I cherish this portrait; I carry it with me; but if I stop at the perfection of the painting as a work of art, the link with my heart is lost.
There is more than this in the Supper of our Lord, because the Lord is really present with us in it spiritually according to the intention of the institution; and this is very precious. But it has pleased Him to give us a physical means by which we may be reminded of Him, so that I am authorised to speak of a portrait by way of comparison. I have still further authority to repel the idea of any physical change in the bred and wine, in that the Lord has said, in John 6, which you have quoted, "The Spirit quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing." The verses of this chapter, however, which speak of eating His flesh and drinking His blood, do not speak at all of the Lord's supper, but of Christ: I am, I do not say persuaded, but sure of this. The supper speaks of that of which the chapter speaks; but the chapter does not speak of the supper the symbol but of the thing symbolised. This is perfectly evident; one has only to read the chapter to see it. If the application that has been made of it to the supper be correct, then not one of those who have partaken of it would be lost, and he who had not partaken of it would be lost, whatever he might be; and those who participate of it would not only be blessed, but they would be eternally saved. (See vers. 53, 54.) Further, the Saviour says that it is of Himself, come down from heaven, that He speaks (not of the supper) of the same Person who will ascend up where He was before in heaven. (Vers. 35-41, 48, 51, 58-62.)
The Supper presents Christ in only one of these conditions, but in that which is, so to speak, central: it presents to us a dead Christ; but this foundation of all, this precious truth which could be a motive even for the Father Himself to love Christ this fact that it is a dead Christ which is presented to us, is the proof that we could not have a living Christ presented to us in the elements. This would be to deny the state of death, and to destroy the object and intention of the institution. This institution presents to us the death of Christ -- a dead Christ -- His body broken and His blood shed; but there exists no dead Christ. He desires that we should remember Him: "Do this in remembrance of me;" but I do not speak of the remembrance of Christ living in heaven. I live by Him; He is my life; I enjoy communion with Him; I dwell in Him; He dwells in me: there is no separation. If, through my folly, communion is interrupted, it is no question of remembering Him, but of being with Him anew with a Saviour who manifests Himself to us as He does not to the world.
And see where these poor Roman Catholics (and I love them much) have been brought by their material explanation of this precious institution. They wish it should be taken according to the letter ("the letter killeth"); so they take away, in the literal sense, the blood; they do not drink the cup: and this is very important, because the fact that the blood is out of the body is the sign of death of the efficacious work of Christ we are reconciled, justified by the blood. In order to compensate for this loss, they teach that the body, soul, blood, and divinity of Jesus Christ are in [each of] the two kinds. Now, if the blood is in the body, there is no redemption; without their knowing it, their sacrament is a sacrament of the non-accomplishment of redemption. This is the effect of materialising this institution There is no greater proof of the manner in which Satan makes sport of men, when they leave the Spirit for the flesh, than this fact, which is the centre of the Roman Catholic system. I affirm positively that their Eucharist is a sacrament, not of redemption, but of non-redemption. If you tell me that many among them think of the Saviour, of the efficacy of His death, I rejoice to believe it; but for this they must quit the materialism of their system for the thoughts of faith. They think, then, of the blood shed, and they drink it; they think of a Saviour dead and a body broken, and they really eat His flesh. Satan has not in this case -- blessed be God! -- been able to hide from their faith that which is denied in the form to which they attach so much value.
It is the same thing in John 6 as in chapter 3, where we are said to be born of water. If that is applied to baptism then we are born of God by the water. It is the same system everywhere -- a system which the enemy has introduced into the church to destroy the necessity and the power of a real work in the heart, and to reduce Christianity to the level of Judaism; that is to say, to a religion of forms, adding to these forms a pretension, which is not found even in Judaism, to confer on man that which Christianity alone gives him. Baptism [they say] procures for us that of which John 3 speaks, whereas it is said (John 15) we are cleansed by the word; "the washing of water by the word" (Ephesians 5: 26), which reveals the Word living, dead and raised again for us.
Now, do we by this diminish the importance or the sweetness of this institution? Quite the contrary; we hinder the materialising of it, and we insist that the spiritual realisation, or that which it represents, be in the heart, instead of that which is called an opus operatum, which is purely material. We are united to a Christ glorified; this is the point of departure: there is no longer a dead Christ; death has no more dominion over Him. I enjoy communion with a glorified Christ; I am one with Him; I shall be like Him. I rejoice; my heart is full of love at the thought of seeing Him, at the hope of the glory of waking up in His likeness. Shall I, therefore, forget His death and His sufferings? God forbid! It is precisely this which binds us to Christ by the most tender affections. There where He had to suffer and to do everything, He was alone; my heart at least will be with Him. He does not ask me to be one with Him there; I could not have been. There He was willing to be alone blessed be His name! and He has accomplished all. But the heart which would give itself for me there is the same which thinks of me now, and which loves me. In remembering His death, His love, His sufferings what shall I say? -- divine though human! I am united in heart with Him there, where He is, on high; it is not another person, another love. Whether in the supper, where we remember Him in such a peculiar and touching way, or whether at other moments, when I think of His death, when I eat Him as dying for me, I am in communion with Him living, and I realise the love of Him who lives that same love, that same heart of the Saviour; I dwell in Him, and He in me. It is not said exactly, "Do this in remembrance" of my death, but "of me." Still we remember Him on the earth, in His incarnation, in His life of humiliation, and finally and specially as dead on the cross. I remember Him! -- not Him in the heavens, but Him who lives in heaven as once humbled and dead for me: there is also a certain action of the heart we eat. In John v the Son of God quickens whom He will: here (chapter 6) we eat the bread come down from heaven; we eat His body, and we drink His blood.
It is most important to understand that it is a dead Christ, who in this state exists no longer, because we cannot have any relationship with a Christ living on the earth. If even as Jews we had had this relationship, we should have been obliged to say with Paul, "Though we have known Christ after the flesh yet now henceforth know we him no more." Death has put an end to all the relations of Christ with the world, according to the flesh, and He lives now as Head of a new race the second Man. Thus then, in John 6: 53, the Lord lays down, as a necessary condition of life, the eating of His flesh, and the drinking of His blood -- receiving Him in His death. Hence we remember Him before His resurrection; we are united to Him, as living, after His resurrection, as He has said, "Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." Thus our union is with a Christ glorified; we do not know Him otherwise: but the most powerful spring of affection for the heart is a Christ, man in the world, and a dead Christ. I am nourished by this; I eat it, and I live by this; but if we wish to bring back, so to speak, a Christ such as He has been in this world, as present, we overthrow entirely the intention of this institution, and even Christianity itself. Every time that we eat this bread and drink this cup, we shew the Lord's death till He come; but if we will introduce a living Christ to animate this dead one, so to speak we destroy Him. Why then is it said, "They discern not the Lord's body?" What body? His dead body. A perfect love, His accomplished work, an obedience which was arrested by no difficulty, present themselves to our eyes! Is there anything else there but a dead body? ... If so, I know not where I am, nor what the supper means. Do not animate it with the life that Christ had before death: His obedience was not yet finished, nor His work accomplished, nor His love perfectly demonstrated. Do not animate it with the life of a Christ now risen: you take Him from me as dead; death is no more there -- death which is the basis of salvation, the proof of obedience the glorification of God. Take not from me this death, this body broken, this blood for ever shed, which tells me that all is accomplished, and -- through the love of my Saviour -- that sin is put away for ever. If you can lead me to grasp yet more firmly what is precious in this dead Saviour, in the death of Him who is the eternal Son of God; if you can make me eat Him with more faith, more spiritually, with more divine intelligence, more heart -- ah! I shall be very grateful to you; but let it be my dead Saviour that is left to me! When one is in communion with Him living, there is nothing so precious as His Death; yes, precious even to God. "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again." For my spiritual intelligence it is the end of, or rather the proof and the consciousness that I have done with, the first Adam; that the first creation no longer exists blessed be God! for faith: for the heart it is the tender and perfect love of the Saviour. I am no more either Jew or Gentile, or a man living on the earth; I am a Christian. The death of Christ, Head of all, has put an end to the first creation. He has introduced us into a new creation as firstfruits united to Him.
I discern then the body of the Lord, but the body of the Lord broken -- His blood shed -- His death. It is not an ordinary repast, a simple remembrance, if you will, but an institution that Christ has given to His own; not that they may find in the elements anything else than the bread and the fruit of the vine, but that their faith may, in the sweetest way, by the power of the Holy Spirit, nourish itself by Jesus, by that which He has been for them when He died upon the cross a work of which the efficacy remains eternally, even to the Father's eye, but of which the love is all for us. If I treat this memorial with lightness, I am guilty of the body and blood of the Lord, for it is that body and blood which are presented to me in it.
I doubt if there is any one in the world who enjoys the Lord's supper more than I do (though I doubt not that there is with many more piety); but that which makes me enjoy it is that it presents to me the body and blood of my Saviour dead, and consequently a perfect love and a perfect work. But He cannot be in His dead body, which I discern there by faith. He is in me, that I may enjoy Him; if He is introduced living, that which I ought to discern no longer exists. All this is in connection with the fact of the entirely new position of the living Christ a doctrine which Paul presents to us with such divine energy, and which the enemy has always sought to hide, even under the form of piety, and for the preservation of which Paul so contended. What anguish he suffered from the efforts of the enemy to draw souls back to Judaism, as if they were still living in the world! "Ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God."
May God give us to discern yet more the body of Jesus -- to eat His flesh and to realise His death more! Yes: this death is precious. It meets us in our need just as we are, and it delivers us from it by introducing us there, where He is, in the power of a new life which by His death knows not the old.
I have written you at much length. I could willingly enlarge on this subject, for instead of thinking lightly of the supper of the Lord, it is of all institutions the most precious to me; only to be so it must be a dead Saviour that is presented to me in it. I am living with Him now in heaven.
There is another aspect -- the unity of the body -- which I have not touched on, though it be a precious side of the truth of this institution of the Lord: but it is outside your question. I hope you may, at least, apprehend the ground of my thought, though I write in great haste.
DEAR BRETHREN, -- All exclusive points are out of place at the Lord's table. It is clear Christ's death is before us; but eij" th;n ejmh;n ajnavmnhsin, or eij" th;n ajnavmnhsivn mou does not affect the question as to whether it is a remembrance of Himself or only of His death. One way or the other, ejmh;n is "of me;" and whether it be ejmh;n or mou, the only difference is that putting ejmh;n before makes it somewhat more emphatic and contrasted. It was not to be done in remembrance of deliverance from Egypt, as the passover was, but in remembrance of Him, "in my memory." But the simple answer to this link breaking out of the sentence is, that there is nothing about it in it. The Greek does not mean breaking every link with the creation, and says nothing about it: that is a simple fact. Should any one press it as a consequence, if led by the Spirit of God, all well and shew that Christ's death involved it; if it be so is another matter, but it is not in that sentence. I am not quite sure that I understand it, and though I am quite disposed to see a right intention in those who taught it, for it was breaking with the world, I doubt a little that they do any more. My impression is that their intention is right, and that they aim at an important truth; but I cannot go quite so fast as some.
When He comes again and takes this earth, and governs it and blesses it, it is as Himself risen: that is true; but you can hardly call this world then the new creation. 'The link of life in Him with this world was broken': but then I should be a little shy of speaking of His being linked with it at any time, though coming into it as a true man, born of a woman, for the suffering of death, and partaking ( paraplhsivw" ) of flesh and blood. But He says, "They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world." And again, "Ye are of this world, I am not of this world." "Ye are from beneath, I am from above." Yet, I repeat, I believe the object to be right; that is, that we are crucified to the world, and the world to us: at least, I am quite ready to suppose so. But I affirm positively it is not in eij" th;n ejmh;n ajnavmnhsin; though it be in death He is symbolised before us, it is Him we remember, and I doubt that the form in which it is put could be made good from scripture; and scripture is wiser than we are. But, as an effect, it does imply our having died to this world; for we shew forth the Lord's death till He come.
But I cannot admit with this absoluteness, that every Christian is, according to scripture, dead to the old creation, because his body is of the old creation. We are waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of the body. I see it held up as desirable that a man should live absolutely in the power of the Spirit and know nothing else. Still "he that marrieth does well." Of what creation is that? And he that forbids to marry does very ill. I see two things: God's part in the old creation as yet fully recognised; marriage as "at the beginning"; children; amiable nature (the Lord loved the young man, when He looked on him); but, a power brought in wholly above and out of it. If one lives according to this all well; it is to be desired; but to condemn the former is to condemn God. Sin has come in and spoiled it; and there is thus hindrance, care, sorrow in the flesh, that is true; but God ordered it in the beginning, and God owns what He ordered, till He brings in something new. Dead to sin, to the world to the law this I find in scripture; but not to the old creation. And this is the place of every Christian, and he is to hold himself so. But dead to the old creation, God does not say; for it is God's creation, and every creature of God is good. Live above it; in its present state, all well, and better, if it be given to us: but death to the first creation, and breaking every link with it, is not true, whilst we are in the body. Scripture does not say so, and scripture, I say again, is much wiser than we are. There is a new creation, and, as in Christ, we are of it -- I think we may say, the firstfruits of it "of his creatures," at any rate. Kainh; ktivsi": it is a very singular expression. (2 Corinthians 5: 17.) It is not "he is," as in English, but merely affirms its existence and character for one in Christ: but then when it goes on to say He died, it is not to the old creation; but "he who knew no sin was made sin"; and elsewhere, "In that he died, he died unto sin once."
It is wise and safe not to go beyond scripture. Fresh truths and mighty powers fill our sails, and it is well; but they may, if we trust them and the consequences we draw, carry our minds on to rocks hidden underneath the surface. The word of God checks, or keeps us rather, in the right and safe course. The first intentions may be right; but when not so kept, when one's mind is trusted, it may run into open ungodliness the common result of the human mind being trusted with mighty truths, or rather trusting itself with them; and in these days this has to be watched ... .
It is a very humbling thing to think how always at the first what God has set up was spoiled. We have only the power of good in the midst of evil, till the Lord comes, when power is not, rest is. But Philadelphia marks our state; and as we find truth spreading, decision in walk and waiting for Christ (not the doctrine merely of His coming) will be the test. Devotedness, heavenly-mindedness these are what we must look for. The foolish virgins were awake with the wise, but not ready. I have no doubt the doctrines we hold are penetrating widely. It is another thing to have the heart in heaven and to depart from evil on earth.
-- - Baptism and the Lord's supper (1 Corinthians 10) are for the wilderness. One introduces into the wilderness, but it is Christ's death, not mine only. I thereon reckon myself dead as a consequence, planted in baptism in the likeness of His. But we have not in Romans resurrection with Him; and, even where we have, as I think we must say in Colossians 2, no ascension, no Canaan.
As the one brings into, the other sustains in, the wilderness. So we shew forth Christ's death till He come. I am on the earth, but in the consciousness of being a member of the one body, which implies union with Christ; but it is on earth I celebrate it, not in heaven; that is, not as being there myself. I look at the humiliation as over with Him, but remember Him in it. Our service in it is simply owning the preciousness of His death, till He come. Our state is in resurrection; but we are occupied and celebrate His having been once down here and shew forth His death. The question is, Where are we when we celebrate it? In the wilderness.
[R T Grant] BELOVED BROTHER, -- As regards all the excitement, it will pass away. I said to brethren, Do not oppose, it will find its level, and we may try and deepen the work where superficial. Two of the most ardent in it are thoroughly cured. Evangelising is blessed work, and God bears with many errors and extravagancies in it, though they are to be regretted. One evil is that people so brought in, if real, require excitement and preaching always. But all finds its level. The excitement will die away, but God's work will remain. We have only to pursue an even way, and evangelise better if we can. I distrust myself a little as to it, I so dislike excitement. Still my judgment clearly disapproves. I must not forget that the action of the Spirit and drunkenness are twice compared in scripture. Yet I am sure the scriptural way of preaching was far different from all this.
I have spoken of admission to communion. Everywhere some are too large, some too narrow. In waiting on the Lord we shall be guided. 2 Timothy 2 greatly helps us, and recollecting that we do not "receive" properly, but own God's receiving and maintain godliness -- adequate testimony to this is what I want, judging all evil.
The doors are largely opened in these kingdoms. I only arrived in London yesterday, have twenty letters to read and answer. I still hope I may see Canada and America yet again. I am greatly attached to the first, and ought to be so from the kindness I received. I am in my sixty-ninth year, but better if anything than heretofore, and if still well and strong, next year may see me out again. But who can speak, save under God's will, of next year: if in heaven, how far better. I have through grace been getting more and more light on scripture, but my heart is more in work, than always teaching in such things as reading meetings: I am more nothing, and alone with God in the former.
May He graciously lead us in all things. The Lord be very near you, beloved brother.
W G Heney, The Lord will take care of Toronto as of everything else, and He does not mistake in discipline. It felt the contrecoup of what there was of excitement in the work that went on, and tested its particular state by that means. We can pray and look to the Head for it, and then are sure to find grace and help. You must look, dear brother, more directly to Christ. See Paul in the Galatians, whom he could not even salute nor say good of -- first he says, "I stand in doubt of you," then, "I have confidence in you through the Lord." The Lord has a present government which is often very humbling for us: but He has a long look out, and it is grace and faith looks out after it. "Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord." We must take courage: you have not even to say with Paul, "I have no man like-minded." The world had a great deal too much influence, as it was at -- .
But to return: just look at Israel in the plains of Moab. What murmurings and complainings, stiff-necked and rebellious since the day Moses knew them. On high "how goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel! ... as the trees of lign aloes which Jehovah hath planted, and as cedar trees beside the waters." "He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither ... perverseness in Israel." This does not excuse us; our judgment of ourselves is in the plain; but it encourages us in being with God for the people. We get the vision of the Almighty. I have been struck often, how individual souls grow in adverse circumstances, and that is the first point with God, though we ought as a whole to have the order and beauty of God upon us ... .
I do not wish you to rest on your oars; God forbid. But see after all what was there a few years back, to say nothing of the States. What I dread for all of us is the world, loss of earliest undividedness, not exactly in spirit, but in way and habit and testimony. I know no word more settling to the soul than "Be careful for nothing." How often have I found it so, when I have said, How possibly for Church sorrows? -- "For nothing." And it is not, if you can find His will, ask but present your requests to God, and His peace shall keep your hearts.
[G Biava] [From the French.] BELOVED BROTHER, -- I was glad of the news you give me from Italy. I greatly hope to be able to go there, but God only knows whether it may be, and when. I was much afraid that I might have to go back to America: I counted upon God however, and He has put His good hand where the enemy had sought to bring in, and, for a time, had brought in ruin I intend to go to France, but I have Germany also in view; where they are rather complaining of my prolonged absence. Just now I am busy about the new edition of my New Testament: they are waiting for me for this, and it will detain me for the present. Correcting for the press others can undertake but the verifying of all my fresh notes, and of the little corrections which I have been obliged to make, requires my own attention. Very possibly next year, if God keeps me strong, I shall go again to Canada and the United States. There has been some blessing in the West Indies, and they were encouraged by our visit ... .
There have been very humbling cases of discipline in Switzerland; but that is better than to have sin covered up; still it is sad, and ought to humble those who are not humble. Nevertheless, God is always good and faithful, and very patient with us -- when we think of His holiness, He must be indeed, since we are such a poor expression of the life of Jesus.
There are two principles of Christian life; Philippians and Ephesians; according to the point of view from which the Christian is looked at. He passes through the wilderness, looks towards the glory, and follows it; desires rather to win Christ. He is seated in heavenly places: he must manifest the character of God as he knows Him -- "Be ye imitators of God, as dear children." What a position! This requires that we should do as Paul did, that we should always bear about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus. Christ is the perfect expression of it, God manifest in flesh. The first gives motives which deliver us from the world and the flesh; the second, communion with the springs of those ways of God in which we are to walk communion with God Himself. Truly, when we see what we are, in comparison with our privileges, we are very small. But, while judging ourselves when needful, we must look at Jesus, not at self.
[J Dunlop] BELOVED BROTHER, -- I know well what you mean by what you wrote me of grace and legality in your letter, having passed through it, and so much the more painfully, as it was a dreadful cross to me to address myself to a stranger, and still more in public, so to speak. There was often legality; that is, conscience not grace drove me. But I found if I was near Christ in my soul, I found many opportunities and open doors, that I did not find when I was not. And this made my conscience work when I had difficulties. On the other hand, when conscious that I was with Christ and Christ with me, and at home in the service of His love, I felt more free to use opportunities (the true sense of redeeming the time in Ephesians 5), freer and happier, at liberty so to use them, and not forced by conscience to do it when it was only bringing out evil -- I do not quite say casting pearls before swine, but at any rate, approaching it, which we are directed not to do. But I am too great a coward to be satisfied with myself in the matter, and have, alas, often had to act from conscience, yet felt happier afterwards; at least, confessing Christ, if not seeking souls in love.
There may be cases where it would be amiss, and it would rather be "but rather rebuke them." But there is a taking opportunities -- but the hearty soul for Christ finds them. I do not say Satan drives, but conscience may, and we may then often do it in an ill way, because there is neither the wisdom nor the love. But I say all this, conscious that I am too great a coward in addressing myself to strangers in public to say a great deal. But I have found by the Lord's gracious mercy I get the ear of most who were willing to hear when a little time with them. When people see that you will speak of Christ, and use common kindness and courtesy, those who will not draw off, and those at all inclined give occasion to do it. We are according to our gift to preach the gospel to every creature, but there is a guidance; and if whole hearted in that I may leave Mysia and Bithynia and Asia, and go to Macedonia, without my conscience upbraiding me, whereas, if I am not, my conscience may upbraid me for Mysia and Bithynia, though I ought not really to have gone there. "If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light."
In these last days it seems as if God allowed much pressure on spirits to go to all, but regularly there is the thought of the claim of God, not merely the claim of souls, and then one is guided of Him who has the claim. When that is there, it is "Woe is me if I preach not the gospel"; but we do it guided of Him who has the claim over us. At any rate, our gracious God will accept a service poorly rendered by conscience, but we ought to serve Him well.
In public service another check is away. There was, and is in many places, the world against, and no civil rights, religious liberty, to plead. This is often a great snare, though not so great as cowardice through want of faith. Englishmen often do mischief through this; they force the world to leave the gospel free, and the work is hindered. The Lord uses this for testimony, and even to send the testimony elsewhere. Christianity has no rights but God's in the world, and that is in a rejected Saviour, who indeed has all power, but has left the cross behind Him in the earth. With the consciousness of this, and love for souls, we can go on with faith, but for Him. And where He has no place we have none. We must submit as He did. And He opens, and no man shuts, and shuts, and no man opens. Where little strength is, yet boldness with great mistakes, God has owned, and I am far enough from it to honour it greatly. They hinder themselves sometimes, but they do a great deal more of God's work. Some of it does not sometimes last so well. I do not doubt our hearts can be puffed up in doing feats. I have seen this. We are called to serve more than to do, and in serving to follow. I look for patience (it was the first mark of apostolic service) and guidance, but I see such a thing as great boldness in Christ Jesus. Of course, when the flesh comes in, Satan can use it, if grace preserve not. But the difficulty I have found is conscience driving when there was not peaceful love enough, enough of Christ to do it wisely. But there is a light boasting of preaching adventures in the world sometimes, which is painful.
As to Matthew 25, I cannot doubt a moment that it is the separation of the wicked and righteous -- in a word, goats and sheep. "Them" (verse 32) is merely those who compose them: indeed in Greek it does not agree with nations. We have the same form in other cases. As to the knowledge of Christ, it was very imperfect. Still He was looked for, but connected with judgment. The gospel preached was the everlasting gospel -- Revelation 14 -- answering to the judgment on the serpent in paradise: (Psalm 96 and Matthew 24) -- "this gospel of the kingdom." It was now too late to have the other gospel, so to call it. They had not to do with Antichrist, at least, only in a distant way. He was in Palestine, and subservient to the beast out of the bottomless pit, and these were judged by Christ coming from heaven, the rest by Christ sitting on His throne when come.
Everlasting life is always life in Christ for ever, but we get it in heaven. Two words are translated "world to come" in N.T. In Luke 18: 30 it is the age to come, Messiah's time, which may be in heaven. "The world to come, whereof we speak" (Hebrews 2), is the habitable world to come, which is of course down here. Life in Christ (He is eternal life -- 1 John 1, John 1) may be on earth, as Matthew 25, or in heaven, as "the end everlasting life," and elsewhere. It is only twice spoken of in O.T., Psalm 133 and Daniel 12, both referring to the millennium, namely, on earth ... .
I find the person of the Lord more and more everything in the word. It is unspeakably blessed to see Him, and God revealed in Him, in this world. How wondrous to have God revealed in a man amongst us. The whole Trinity was first fully revealed when He took His place in the first right step of His poor returning people in grace, and became the model of our standing here -- Son, owned of the Father, anointed and sealed of the Holy Ghost: all heaven open, only no object above for Him as for Stephen, but Himself the great object of heaven down here. Then in that place, He takes another part -- conflict with the enemy. What a testimony to the word too, that one verse is sufficient for the Lord, as authority as the obedient man, for Satan, to leave him not a word.
Peace be with you, dear brother, and mercy and grace. Kindest love to all the saints.
Ever yours affectionately in the Lord.
F G Patterson, In 2 Corinthians 4: 1 diakoniva is the apostle's ministry, but the ministry of, and characterised by, what he speaks of This is a common ambiguity in English. Hope is what passes in my mind -- faith, hope, etc. -- but my hope is laid up in heaven. 'Thought a good thought' is thought objectively; 'a man of much thought,' is the habit of thinking in the man, and so of others. In chapter 3 the subject matter, law or gospel, is the ministration, diakoniva (diakonia), that is, the thing ministered, but it was ministered by Paul, and therefore his ministry. A candle was lit up in a lantern: it was itself the light -- the candle's light -- but his light because he carried it. God had shone in his heart to give forth the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. His ministry was this knowledge, still he ministered it, and so it was his ministry.
The bringing the stones from Gilgal was merely a provision of material -- what was brought out of death: we are quickened together with Christ, but it was only the essential character of the stones provided; but the action with them was as much Joshua's as the other. (Joshua 4, 20) It was Christ's work in the power of the Spirit in both cases -- namely, the memorial was: only one, having been in death (only dry and an entrance into the new and heavenly thing for us), the other, turning back to know whence we were drawn. The second twelve are Ephesians; the first, Romans.
As to Philistines, I suppose it is from phalas to migrate. They came up from Caphtor in the direction of Egypt called Philistines because they were strangers. The Canaanites represent Satan's power over which the people of God are victorious, as God's army fighting for God -- taken as enemies, treated as such -- Satan simply in power. The Philistines are the thorns of Satan's power where he has not been overcome -- left and not treated as an enemy. They become an abiding source of distress and perplexity, having more power than Israel, though when God interferes they may be beaten as by Samuel, or put down when Christ comes as by David. They are the allowed evil of Satan's power, not the power of Satan banished or overcome by spiritual energy.
There are no specific scriptures that I know that state that the Holy Ghost will abide in us for ever. But its action in spiritual power is essential to our power in life. The Spirit is life, and it surely is not to be taken away as power of enjoyment in heaven. The law of the Spirit of life has made me free. The passage that made me see it was Acts 1: 2, where Christ gave commandments by the Holy Ghost after His resurrection; and we are to be fully conformed to Him. We do get it in the Ephesians: the truth as in Jesus is putting off the old man and putting on the new. Only it comes in more, by the bye, because we are looked at as in heaven, and circumcision is the application of that to our place on earth or tendency of flesh to it. In Ephesians we come out as manifesting God's character, the Holy Ghost dwelling in us. You have not the indwelling of the Holy Ghost in Colossians, but life. He is pressing their completeness there in Christ upon them, and so speaks of it; they had circumcision as viewed in Christ ... .
1 Timothy 3: 15. The Son of the living God is what the church was built upon. It is the power which has brought it above dying man, and withal is abiding. It is a term of power and dignity above idols, above death in man. We trust in the living God. We are converted to serve the living and true God. Well, this is His assembly on earth. See Acts 14: 15 or take a concordance and see living God.
As to John 1, 2, and 20, 21: the first is wholly earthly and with Israel, John's testimony and Christ's and the witnesses, and then His connection with Jews and temple on His return. John 20, 21 -- rather the contrary -- gathers His disciples after His resurrection, and is in their midst, and blessed are they that have not seen but have believed -- Thomas only representing the Jewish remnant, and fish already on shore when the Lord comes. It is not the Church formed -- that never in John -- but an intimation of resurrection work, not a simply earthly one. There are no days in John 20, 21, but three consecutive scenes pointing to a Christ known as having left them as walking here, though walking as yet with them in resurrection, not uniting by the Holy Ghost.
Daniel 7, "Most High." The words are different in Hebrew, that is, plural and singular; verse 18 plural -- heavenly, high, places. Verse 22 plural. Verse 25, first time singular, second plural, that is, with saints it is so. Verse 27 plural: the only difficulty, because it is elyonin not elyon -- that is, singular, His kingdom, not plural.
I was very glad to hear of the work in -- . Though accompanied by what craved excitement and was likely to sink down to its own real proportions, I did not doubt there was a real work in the Revival, but no Church to receive them. I trust in a measure that is the case in Canada. -- is gone out, whose gift and heart is to care for saints.
Affectionately yours in haste.
-- - I rejoice with all my heart in the grace shewn to you and to her, in the case of your dear child. I feel, too, deeply the anxiety attending the young being brought into a path in which they have to follow Christ, before they have tried and broken with this vain and empty world, which a young imagination, and a heart as yet unwearied by it, suppose may give some real joy. If Christ have taken a strong hold the path is simple, and the young may be saved many a pang. If Christ's, they will surely learn the world is nothing, and its friendship enmity with God; but it is better, and happier, to learn it in the blessed company of Christ than in regrets on a dying bed, or a heart repentant at loss and unfaithfulness. I do not expect young Christians to have learned everything, but the Lord expects them to be faithful to the light they have got. "And to him that hath shall more be given."
As to going through the world as a trial and exercise of faith, we have all to do it. It is like the ordinary, sinfulness of our hearts, and ministering to it, a process through which we have all to go, to have our senses exercised to discern good and evil, and Christ become everything to us, and we more like Him. Oh, how surely we shall feel it that day, that all that was not a heart given to Him was loss and wretchedness. I trust your child sees that in Christ our acceptance is perfect and full, as our sins are wholly put away, but with that we are His; and in feeding on Him, looking forward to His glory to give energy on our road, and feeding on Him as the patient and crucified One to abide in Him, we find in a lowly, gracious, and for that very reason, firm life, the bright hope of transforming glory.
As to judging of those around (worldly Christians), their state is judged in the scripture. But if we get near to the Lord, if we are in communion with God within in the holy place, we see all saints with His eyes, as dear to Him, washed in Christ's blood, and His in the power of the Holy Ghost, and they are clothed by faith and desire with what belongs to Him, objects of Christ's delight and the fruit of the travail of His soul; then intercession for them is easy, and faithfulness to them becomes easy and gracious too. But we cannot judge aright if we are not there: our judgment of certain things may be right, and our rejection of them in our ways, but we judge them without, as forbidden things, and that so far is all right; but within, while this judgment is only deeply strengthened, other thoughts and feelings come in with it which can be had only there. The evil and loss for the saints of the wretched path of worldliness -- the dishonour done to the Saviour, the ruin of their testimony -- is far more deeply felt, but because they are seen in Christ, not merely because they are wrong. We may fear for them, but the heart will carry them to God, to Christ, because they are His. Moses would not have the people cut off on the top of the mount; he called the faithful to cut them off when below, and both for the same reason. He connected the glory of God with the people -- an extreme case no doubt, but which shews us that divinely given love for God's people on high is the spring of severity even, if needed, below. God's glory was the plea for and against the people ... .
Tell -- how unfeignedly rejoiced I am that the gracious Lord has given her the immense privilege of belonging to Him. May He keep her close to Himself, and give her grace to keep herself in the love of God. My kindest love to all the saints. May the Lord consolidate them in the faith, and in one heart, and keep you all very near Himself till He come to receive us to Himself.
[F G Brown(e?)] BELOVED BROTHER, -- I have long purposed to write to you, but if you knew how I have been occupied, you would not be surprised at my having delayed in doing it, and now I can only say a word; but I was anxious to write to you, if it were only to keep up the communication of christian love, in which you have a large place in my heart, which flows out to those around you. Indeed, my heart is greatly knit to the States and God's people there. It is somewhat a charge on my spirit to be called to the continent of Europe just now, but we are servants, and like soldiers to go where we are bid. The door is opening happily in Italy for work I can take part in, though I am a bad hand at the language; and I owe to the love of brethren in Germany a short visit, which I shall soon (D.V.) pay them. My heart is greatly in America: my comfort is, One can bless according to His heart, and from whom no place can be far. What a comfort that is! His blessing makes rich, and adds no sorrow thereto. I was anxious too about dear -- . He got led away sadly, I fear, in every way, but my heart was not turned away from him but to him. I heard he made a full confession, for there was actual evil besides all the high pretensions of -- 's, which he joined in. I know not if he confessed as to both, but is his soul restored? that is what I am anxious to know.
I find a great difference, both as to the application of the word and as to prayer for ourselves and others, between being in the sanctuary or without. I can apply the word honestly to my ways and comfort as being here, and pray for my wants and the wants of others, as here, and it is all quite right; but I may be within. The word comes down from above, reveals God, and in grace; it does give me light down here in fact, but it can also take me up there, and form my heart, and desires, and spirit, and joys too, with what is there, and so my prayers. If in there, what a place and kind of place, they have in my heart; they are clothed with Christ love, with His character, as what they ought to be, as for His glory, and theirs too indeed; and my prayers flow from seeing them in that, that they may be brought into it: the spirit, and character, and love of the place I am in, will be in my prayers. Oh! it is a great privilege, a great blessing. I do not write as if I could do it much, for it is the very thing I have to judge myself in -- how little real power of intercession I find in myself, but I see the difference. It is anything but carelessness as to walk, called charity, but charity, about the walk. Though I admit the difference of dispensations, yet I see the identification of the people with God's glory alone, was the spring of Moses's prayer; and the same thing made him call the faithful to cut off his neighbour and brother down here. Ours is the one in grace and dependence; be it so, but there is a principle which shews it is not taking evil lightly. New York surely I prayed about in earnest, I was in the West Indies, and could not get there. One thing I can say, if I have worked in a place it is always on my heart. I am old, my brother, but if I am spared my strength yet longer, I should like to see you all at Boston again. The Lord be with you, that is what is good.
The work is proceeding; as to numbers and gatherings, they increase much. Our anxiety is more, a true and consistent testimony. Attacks rather more than ever, but that does not do much harm; they are left unanswered save by God. In Germany too the work has largely increased. You know of Canada better probably than I do. Thank God, the brethren are in general walking well, many young men, and a great and serious desire to hear; but with such a multitude as we have now, it needs great looking to God to keep the world out. The more things go on, the more I feel the need of the testimony of brethren -- the one body -- God in grace towards all -- but a peculiar people also belong to Christ and to a heavenly country; but the more I feel it must be an unworldly testimony, if it is anything at all -- a holy people to the Lord, a people who have Christ dwelling in their hearts by faith. But I must close.
Kindest remembrances to your circle, dear brother, and to all the saints cordial remembrance in Christ. May the Lord keep and bless them.
Yours affectionately in Him
[From the French.] -- - I doubt your having ever been stripped of self, in such a way as to rest with holy humility on a righteousness other than your own, the righteousness of God, but which is yours by faith.
This stripping of self is a deep work wrought by God, and by the revelation of what He is. The personal conviction of sin, and the discovery of our misery in the struggle against it are but the means of reaching it. When I have found that the result of my efforts to attain to holiness -- efforts that could not be wanting in a quickened soul -- is but the discovery that I do not attain to it, I am compelled (having come in my rags into the presence of God, who desires nothing in us, in His house, but perfect conformity to Christ) to submit that God should be on my neck, and I still in my rags, and that God should clothe me (because that is His good pleasure in His grace) with the "best robe," with Christ Himself, which did not belong to me either before my sin, or since -- no more the robe of Adam innocent than of Adam a sinner, but which was and which is in the treasures of God for those who are called by grace. Then I am called to walk as a son of the house, that is to say, as Christ walked. If we fail, we reproach ourselves for it a thousand times more than when we were outside, hoping to enter the house; but the question of knowing whether I belong to the house is not raised; it is because I do, that sin has so horrible a character in my eyes, so unsuitable to what I am, a child of God thus clothed -- so horrible, when I think of what Christ has suffered on account of that sin.
God speaks to you now by the circumstances through which He is making you pass. Be assured it is in love that He leads you thus, and because He loves you. Remember that Christ is your righteousness from God, but the righteousness of a soul convinced of two things, first that it has no righteousness, and then that it has need of righteousness, need of being at peace with God -- a need produced by the consciousness of its sin, without the hint of a desire that God should be less holy than He is.
This is why I said it is a deep work: it makes the soul simple, but it does not find it so. I do not look that you should be able to give an account of it intellectually, but that the thing itself should be done, and that you should find yourself stripped of self by the discovery of sin, leaning upon the righteousness of God which He has made ours, in giving us Christ, our precious Saviour. Peace be to you then in the name of [Him who shed] that precious blood which cleanses from all sin. Be watchful and look to God, opening all your heart to Him in through confidence. This is what puts truth into the soul, and He is worthy of it, through His perfect goodness to us.
[To the same.] [From the French.] -- - I need not tell you what real joy it has been to me to learn that you have received peace; so I will not send my answer to your letter. When God has stripped us of ourselves, He has (in His goodness) only to give us peace. It is what we see throughout in the word. Once the soul is in its true state before God, there is always "grace" for it, and nothing but grace.
But now that you are there, without doubting the love of God, there are some precautions to be taken, seeing the way in which you have been shaken. I am glad that you should tremble at the thought that you could lose your happiness. It is a serious thing, whatever be the goodness of God, to find peace with a God of holiness. Christ has made peace; but He would have us feel what it is to have need of it, in order that we may know it. Our hearts are so subtle and wicked, that following on peace comes negligence. We feared sin before, and now that we are freed from this heavy burden, we go forward not only more easily, but alas, often carelessly. Rejoice before God, and not without God, for the peace which He has given you; rejoice in trembling. It is the means of preserving peace, by grace. Moreover, pay great attention, never to say anything that goes beyond your experience; nothing is of more importance for our own souls.
Neither let the work lead you on to be occupied with other people, in such a way as to neglect yourself. It is before God that you have found peace; it is before God, also, that we keep peace, in the sense of the enjoyment of the true assurance of His favour. "Take heed," said the apostle, "unto thyself, and unto the doctrine; continue in them: for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear thee." (1 Timothy 4: 16) If you do so, it will be a lesson for the brethren, and a lesson more real than much preaching. Yes, dear brother, above all, keep your soul before God. Do not think that the work depends on you; see how it has been done without you. This does not mean that it would not be a great blessing to work in the Lord's work, but when we do so, we do so saying that we are servants, and feeling that it is God who does the entire work. Work then; edify others; but do not work beyond your communion. Nothing would be more calculated to make you lose peace. Seek to walk "in the fear of the Lord"; it is the beginning of wisdom: it is that which accompanies "the comfort of the Holy Spirit" in the Acts.
On the other hand, do not be surprised or discouraged if you do not always feel all the joy that you experienced at the beginning. There are deeper things in joy than this first satisfaction, because they belong more directly to communion with God Himself; but inasmuch as it is in us, it is of human nature, that the first impression becomes enfeebled. Do not be contented with that. Seek that it may be replaced by a deeper communion, and a fuller revelation of God, but do not be discouraged. Rest on what Christ is, and not on what you feel about it; it is there that you have found peace, it is there that it is kept ... .
[A Wells] BELOVED BROTHER, -- I was very glad to get your letter. The date of mine will explain that my being at Guelph in September is hardly likely, but my heart will be anxiously with you: but I do not know whether anxious is the right word, for one ought to trust the Lord, so faithful, so full of love, and patient goodness with us. But affections will in one sense be anxious, and how unfeigned my affection is for Canada I trust you know; and surely I never became more attached to any place, my heart more linked up with those in it.
It is a time of encouragement -- even here it is. For a time there had been a relaxation of energy, not an uncommon thing in individual or Christian communities after the first impulse of grace. But there is considerable re-animation, and our conference ("Guelph" meeting) is largely attended by brethren interested in the truth: many a new generation of saints springing up, and the coming of the blessed Lord has a more actual and practical place. I thought I had done with France, Switzerland, Germany, etc., when I went to America, but I believe the Lord has led me here, and there is a renewal of strength and christian affection. I am to be at a like meeting in France, September 15th, and you may all remember us. Then I have Italy, where the Lord is gathering and raising up more labourers, and Germany. There is a wish to have something like a satisfactory Old Testament in German, and in French. I hardly know how it will be effectually carried out, but it is one object of my visit to Germany. You see my absence from Canada is not idleness. I was very glad to have been in the West Indies. It is, oh! how great a measure of thankfulness to be led of the Lord. The power of evil is in astonishing progress. The boldest denial of all truth alarming Christians; and the world even, anxious and uneasy, and now often considering and inquiring of brethren why they are so quiet and peaceful. Not that we have not many things to deplore, but in sum we are at peace, feeling the evil more in a divine way, but having a kingdom that cannot be moved, a peace which nothing can take away. The brethren have come with cordiality and readiness from all sides to the meeting, which has cheered and encouraged. There are two Englishmen who have thrown themselves in some measure into the work here. Some are going to America.
It is possible I may, now I am growing old, become set apart to sedentary work (though still preaching and teaching), but I do not quite give up seeing you all again. For I am very well, and though I begin to feel the difference of age as to physical exertion, I am for work, thank God, able to go through more than most. This would not as yet hinder me. My difficulty is the rapid progress of the last days, which requires the faithful testimony of those who feel where we are, more perhaps in Europe than elsewhere. Men of the world as well as Christians feel all things shaking, an irresistible torrent rising, professing Christians at their wits' ends. The peaceful testimony from a position which God secures is of moment to souls, and however weak it may be individually as such, it tells on people's hearts. My comfort is, for Canada as for England, that the blessed Lord himself cares for His people: a poor, feeble folk, but their home is in the rock. God is raising up many active witnesses, and the Lord is more waited for. He Himself fills the heart sufficiently to enable us to forget ourselves; still the present link with Him, I feel, is not sufficiently felt, so as to bring Him out as fresh and full as He is given to us. That is what we have to seek here, and for that it is death working in us -- "always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body." That we are dead, and in Him, is a simple and blessed truth, but always to bear it about that only He may appear -- this is what we have to seek.
I write at intervals in the midst of our conference, so you must not be astonished at my letter bearing the impress of this interruption ... . I have been thinking of one of the joys of heaven, after Christ -- and it will be His joy, seeing of the fruit of the travail of His soul and being satisfied -- seeing all the saints perfect according to the heart and mind of God Himself, and His who has sought and saved them. What satisfaction and joy that will be! Truly it is what one's heart desires now. Then it will be perfectly satisfied, and Christ glorified in it and this, thank God, will surely be. I have been distinguishing latterly a good deal, the responsibility of man fully met by Christ for us on the cross, and the counsels of God before the foundations of the world (see Proverbs 8; Titus 1: 2; 2 Timothy 1: 9); the cross laying the foundation for their accomplishment -- in the incarnation, the ground laid for fulfilling Proverbs 8. What a thought -- His delight being in the sons of men, and how fulfilled in the incarnation, and then the cross giving us a part in it; man in glory, and the Father's house shewing us what it is! Along with perfectly glorifying God, it makes the cross a wonderful place, and grace a wonderful thing; and the old man put off, and the new man put on.
But I must close, as you see. Peace and much blessing, dear brother, be on you and yours: much love to them and to all the saints. May they, and all the Lord's dear workmen, be abundantly blessed.
Ever yours affectionately in Him.
Dear G V Wigram, -- I am over-fatigued, though not as two days ago, but take a moment to write. This quiet even is a rest. We had a very good meeting at Geneva. In Switzerland a fresh generation is rising up, and fresh blessing. I had large meetings in the Casino, as the Locale would not contain the numbers, and much attention. We had an improvised meeting at Valence on the way, of a good deal of interest, for two days, and largely attended from the neighbourhood. Those present have demanded to go over the same ground more fully here, so that it met wants. Nothing very new, but great lines of practical truth from Romans, Ephesians, Colossians, 2 Corinthians, etc. Here we began with the end of Isaiah, and now study Romans. An excellent spirit has reigned throughout. I have lectured and preached at many places, between fourteen and fifteen in Switzerland, and Lyons, St. Etienne, Annonay, Montpellier in France, but I was overworked. As to poor -- , some minds are apt to be occupied with evil from natural character. It is injurious, but a disposition, like another ... .
I am very glad that 'James'+ is coming out. I have had the R. C. controversy at heart; I think not without the Lord. May He use and bless it. There is a desire to hear everywhere. What my desire is, is that the Lord would raise up labourers; He has a claim on us for this after so much grace. Who goes to Jamaica? But He alone can give. I hope a little He is raising up some new ones here, a hope He has encouraged, but it is as yet only a hope. We are growing old. From Valence I am from hand to mouth, but He sustains me, but my brain is overwrought ... . Our meeting is, I trust, telling on souls as to the truth in a certain reviving power.
Au Vigan September 16th, 1869.
+["Familiar Conversations on Romanism."]
My Dear Rolfe Leslie, -- I have delayed answering your letter, partly because I have been excessively occupied, more even than usual, and partly because I was minded to visit my fresh sphere of labour before doing so. I rejoiced in getting your letter. I had heard of the blessing in different places through the gospel, but rejoiced to find that it had roused you up also. Most thankful indeed was I to hear of -- 's conversion too. I trust it is a permanent work; with her character and habit of mind, she must well know whether it is real. I have always hoped for her, though in many things so opposed.
But dear -- , the energy of the first impulsion always calms down, and the real value of Christ to the soul appears. It is not that the first impulses are insincere, but there is the impulse given by the first powerful impression, and that dies down. Then two things appear, which after all are really one, how far the soul has been fully reached and its state and affections filled with Christ, and how far diligence of heart in cleaving to Him has been produced. The apostle says not only "I have suffered the loss of all things," but "I COUNT them but dung." The excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus gave permanency to his estimate of what was in the world around him, and [what it] gave to him as a natural man. That third chapter of Philippians gives us the principle of walk which stamps Its energy and character on the christian course, a positive active energy with an object in view. Chapter 2 gives us the graciousness of the christian life; chapter 3 its principle of energy: the former Christ descending, the latter Christ in glory, whom the soul runs after as its sole object. This it is gives energy. "The double-minded man is unstable in all his ways"; even in natural things the man who has one object is energetic and full of force. It is this continuance in the judgment of the worthlessness of all things that marks the place Christ has in our hearts, gives true joy and liberty, and makes us a bright witness for Christ in the world. Only remember that he that seeks finds, that we need force every moment, and that the manna of today will not do for to-morrow. The world solicits always; we need the constant grace of Christ, the whole armour of God, having done all to stand. It is a blessed place, blessed now, but requires singleness of eye -- not merely avoiding actual evil, but the heart positively set upon an object pursued with lowly, cheerful, but constant energy. The last days are hastening on, and we have to be as men that wait for their Lord, when He shall return from the wedding, that when He cometh and knocketh they may open to Him immediately. Fix your mind calmly but steadily on His coming.
I have been half round England, and had a local meeting like Guelph, besides working very hard in London -- then visited fourteen places in Switzerland, and had a Swiss 'Guelph' meeting, and now the same in France, having visited some twelve meetings there. So that I have not been idle, and now leave for Germany to work a little there, and help in having a more correct Old Testament. I have more on my hands in this respect than I know how to do, but I labour on. If possible I shall go to Italy, but not just yet: there the door seems opening ... . May the Lord's blessing rest on you all.
le Vigan, September 25th, 1869.
[To the same later.] Rolfe Leslie, This is a world of passage, and you have been living like a plant in a greenhouse all your life, and know little of being shaken from vessel to vessel, as is said of Moab. I do not regret it is so, and in your petty troubles you ought to be very thankful. But your turn may come, in one sense must come, and in this there is the government of God. We may have -- the most patient and godly -- sore troubles for our good, like Job, but as a general rule and order, the quiet, gentle, submissive spirit, that walks in obedience and order (not in self-will in whatever shape its restlessness may shew itself) has a quiet and peaceful life. "Honour thy father and thy mother" has a general application in its consequences even now.
It is quite true that sin has brought disorder into everything, and that we are not under the manifested government of God as Israel was, and, as I have said, sorrow may come for spiritual good. Still, not a sparrow falls to the ground without our Father, and the government of God goes on. The epistles of Peter open out this -- the first in our favour, the second as against the wicked; and this is true of you, dear -- . If you walk quietly, submissively and obediently, with a will not seeking itself, no matter in what direction, not indulging itself or its thoughts, you will find happiness even here. Our own will and making ourselves the centre is the spring of all our wretchedness; for outward circumstances may be trying, as we know -- may give sorrow, but not wretchedness. Where this is it is the fruit of will, restless and discontented. Be it in little things or great, let patience, submission and self-government characterise you. You know, thank God, that there are better things than what will seeks here; and here there must be a diligence and earnestness to know their enjoyableness, and be free -- and at your age, the world and evil begin to solicit us and distract the heart -- communion too; and if there be not diligence (which indeed is always true) it gets a hold on the heart, and if not judged in the will, it shuts out the beauty and desirableness of Christ, so that there is no counter-power in our hearts, even though our conscience may condemn us. I am sure you know this to be true already. But in seeking earnestly the Lord and His grace, it is not only that we are not occupied with these things so as to get the mind engaged with them, but positive power comes in to deliver and free us and make us find in Christ delight which shuts out evil and the world. Seek this, and do not be lazy in divine things, for this can produce its fruit even in those who are sincere, as I do not doubt you are ... .
[To the same.] My Very Dear Rolfe Leslie, -- I was very glad indeed to get a letter from you. I should have surely answered it sooner, but its arrival was a good deal delayed. I have only just got it. It was a matter of joy to me that you have got on happily at -- 's. Tell him that I had the kindest letter from Mr. -- but that he has not long ago lost his wife, rather unexpectedly, humanly speaking, though she had been ill, and that though bowing to the Lord, he was dreadfully overwhelmed by it. We are in a world of sorrow, dear -- , though you are too young to have felt much of it. Only yesterday again I received an account of another tie broken, and one, a daughter, left alone desolate; but all this is good for us, it makes us feel our rest is not here, and young as you are you can learn this. Your very leaving home has begun the tale for you; it did once for me. I remember yet my desolation once on leaving it. 'Stranger' is a word sin has brought in. In Latin and in more learned languages it means an enemy; such is man. In heaven none can or will be a stranger there, nor any stranger to Him; and it is a blessed thought, for the love of God makes all one, and such ought the Church to be. But I do not at all blame your feeling as to home, however kind may be, and you happy amongst them, for in this world, for our human feelings, home is that which is the centre of all true feelings. I trust it will ever be so to you, only we have to learn that in this world all that breaks up, because sin and death have entered in, and we have gradually to learn to be pilgrims and strangers in it, and will find a home which will never break up. Blessed be God, that He gives us this rest, and has made His dwelling-place our home, as our Father, where we shall be with Christ our beloved One and our Saviour for ever.
I am very glad that you are thus searching and enjoying scripture. I can tell you, dear -- , that though, as you know, I have been searching it for years, I ever find through grace, what fresh treasures are in it, and that learning some truth and grace is but the means of being able to learn others, and these are not only truths, but the unsearchable riches of Christ: we know His riches in grace, in learning them. "For their sakes I sanctify myself, that they may be sanctified by the truth." What we learn in this is infinitely precious, because it is in Him, and the fruit of the Father's love. May the Lord keep your affections fresh in these things. Think little of yourself: the true effect of real joy in the things of God is to empty us of ourselves, and to make us think little of ourselves, because first our affections are drawn to another (Christ), and because we see all their divine excellences, not in ourselves, for we have to learn, but in another, and One who made Himself of no reputation, and humbled Himself for us, who "when he was rich for our sakes became poor, that we through his poverty might become rich." What a terrible thing it would be if by this we began to fancy ourselves rich, though in Him we really are. I trust you may profit much by these studies of scripture, and, as I have said, your heart and affections find its joy in them. Be diligent in all you have to do; duty is an excellent thing -- conscience -- and even in your play, hearty and free, though sober and yielding to others, and the Lord be with you and bless you abundantly ... . I shall be very glad to hear from you. I can often fill up my moments when I turn from heavier work, with a word to you or others. With my prayers that you may be kept and blessed,
[G Biava] [From the French] DEAREST BROTHER, -- I have just received your letter here, where I was to have come straight from England when I took Switzerland and France first for our meetings, but I was obliged to return to this place, when I had done that. I am only resuming my former work. It is six years since I have been here, and I have felt in turning my face and directing my steps here, that God was with me. Just now I am busy correcting the Old Testament, which has been already compared, and which I am now comparing with the Hebrew. You must not, on that account, think that I have given up Italy; I am waiting the moment God wills, and am busy with Italian. I am now reading a bad tract on regeneration, published in Florence, but written with uprightness, Wesleyan in its tone, besides other little works, which accustom me to their way of speaking. It will be even better, I think, that you should be a little settled, and should look round you a bit before I come. I could not be sure of the time, for this is a long task which I have undertaken, but a very needful work, and one most useful to me, for I am perfecting myself in Hebrew, and in knowledge of the Bible in detail. Meanwhile, write to me when I may come, and I hope our good and faithful God will shew me the time when I ought to come, if such is His will.
I am always in danger of attempting too much, and as they say, "He who grasps all loses all." I do what I do imperfectly -- alas, not even that -- but all the more I expect and hope for guidance from God, and do what I have to do today.
Your very affectionate brother.
Elberfeld, November 4th, 1869
Dear Mrs. Walter, -- I should never, and never have, as you know, pressed any to baptise their children, or introduced the subject. Indeed, while fully recognising it as a christian ordinance, I am disposed to think that it is in scripture, for our present condition, purposely left in the background. While eternal life and union with Christ are fixed and sure in Him, the ordering of all on earth till Christ comes, and even then, is provisional; not that we have not duties in the state of things we are in; duties belong to that: but the ordering of things passes. We have a kingdom that cannot be moved, eternal life, membership of Christ; but this in actual full possession is to come, and what we have now, even of divine ordinances, is passing. But I repeat, our duties are now. I shall only therefore present to you what scripture affords me on the subject, for if ever I hesitated, and, like others, I was exercised about it, I have NO doubt as to infant baptism of the children of a Christian. But I have a full feeling that Christ did not send me to baptise; I leave to others activities on either side. The twelve were sent to baptise, but as to ecclesiastical matters, we are under Paul.
This for such questions is an all-important remark, because the commission to the Gentiles (on which you and all Baptists rest) was given up by the leading apostles into his hands. But in general he, and he only, taught what the Church was, and it is on that ground we are. Further remark, the commission to the twelve was not from heaven, nor consequently immediately connecting with heaven, but from Galilee, and a commission to bring the nations into connection with an accepted remnant of Jews on earth -- not to bring Jew and Gentile into the body in an ascended Christ, which was Paul's commission especially, preaching withal reconciliation from heaven to every creature under it. His original commission is remarkable in this respect. A heavenly Christ was revealed to him -- "delivering [separating] thee from the people and from the Gentiles, to whom now I send thee." He belonged neither to Jew nor Gentile in his service, but to heaven. Hence he in baptism knows nothing but baptising to death to all man is, and at the utmost resurrection with Christ into a new state of things. With Peter it is: you have crucified Christ, God has raised and exalted Him. Hence they were to repent and be baptised for the remission of sins, and receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. Nor does he even go to our death with Christ, or our resurrection with Him. Nay, in Acts 3 he proposes to the Jews to repent, and Jesus would be sent back, and the people would be blessed by the times of refreshing of which the prophets had spoken.
You will say: This is a long story on what is simple; but it is on the mission of the twelve you found your doctrine. That was only to disciple Gentile nations and baptise them. Of the carrying out of this we have no account in scripture: the nearest to it is in Mark, the last verse. But we have an enlarged account of Paul's taking their place; and it is remarkable that Roman Catholics and Puseyites all rest on the commission to the twelve, not on that to Paul. But where in Mark baptism is spoken of it is upon wholly another ground: "he that believeth and is baptised, shall be saved." It was the gospel to a lost world, to every creature, and if a man believed and was baptised, he was saved. It concerns a heathen or a Jew confessing Christ, who before did not, and what is called joining Christians, and as "with the heart man believeth unto righteousness" so "with the mouth confession is made unto salvation." Here it had a saving force founded on faith, but that is not the question now. No one can in this sense say a man is saved by baptism, but that is the only use of it in Mark. The Campbellites have this view of it as an ordinance, but with grievous errors, and false in itself, as man's act and not as becoming a Christian. Further remark, that the hundred and twenty first formed into the Church by the coming of the Holy Ghost, or, at any rate, the twelve, were never baptised. I know it is said they had John's baptism, and no doubt rightly, some certainly, and all with little doubt; but that was the opposite of christian baptism. It was to receive Christ; christian baptism is to His death -- to a rejected Christ as such at God's right hand; and one baptised with John baptism had to be baptised again, as in Acts 19.
The command was to baptise, not to be baptised, and this makes all the difference. It is not an act of obedience, in this the scripture is quite clear. Acts 8. (verse 37 is not genuine+), he says, "what doth hinder me to be baptised?" it was a privilege to be obtained; but the words do not allow the idea of obedience, but exclude it. So Acts 10, 47, "can any man forbid water?" -- a privilege, no idea of obedience, but an admission into the christian estate consequent on the proof that God would have him: and indeed it would be cruel to make it a matter of obedience, as no man can fulfil it; another must do it for him. The admission to a privilege cannot be a matter of obedience, though obedience gives privileges as such. But the real point is, the passages prove that it was the act of the baptiser, not of the baptised. And this changes its whole nature. It is said, Where are children commanded to receive baptism? of course they are not, nor believers. Ordinances are never the subject of commands. They are ordained and rightly used, but never obedience in him who profits by them; it would deny the very nature of Christianity, and destroy the blessing for him who partakes of it.
Another important principle destroyed by the Baptist system is the existence of a divinely instituted place in which blessing is, independently of the question of personal conversion, and to which responsibility is attached according to the blessing: as the olive tree in Romans, whose branches are broken off and grafted in again or replaced by others who are broken off afterwards, branches where the root and fatness of the olive tree is, yet they come to nothing; so Hebrews 6, 10. So 1 Corinthians 10, where the sacraments, so-called, are shewn to be the ground of this in Christendom, and so the house in 1 Corinthians 3, where wood, hay and stubble are built in with false doctrines, but it is God's building. And in 1 Peter 4: 17 judgment was to begin at the house of God, alluding to Ezekiel. So we see it as a principle in Romans 3: "What advantage then hath the Jew? ... much every way." But he was condemned, not converted. So the wicked servant who ate and drank with the drunken: was "that servant" the same as the faithful one and Christ his Lord?
Another principle used by Baptists is that it is a formal testimony to what a person has already. This is quite unscriptural. We are baptised to death -- not because we have died -- rise therein, if I bring in resurrection: it saves us, says Peter -- is not used as a witness of being saved. "Arise and be baptised (says Ananias) and wash away thy sins," not in confession that thy sins are washed away. Thus the whole system of Baptists I find to be unscriptural. It is not obedience: that the Baptist brethren now admit: it is not testimony to what we have. The apostles were not baptised, but the twelve were sent to baptise the Gentiles, being themselves received by Christ. Paul was not sent to do it at all, though he was formally sent, from and by a heavenly Christ, to the Gentiles by a new commission, the leaders of the twelve giving theirs up and going to the circumcision.
What is it then? A formal admission into the place of privilege. Water cannot be refused to Cornelius: nothing hindered the treasurer of Candace from being baptised. 1 Corinthians 10 clearly shews that it is the admission into public outward association with God, as when Israel crossed the Red Sea, as the Lord's supper is a sign and expression of food and drink in the desert. It is not a sign even of life -- not of being baptised into Christ's body, nor of being made children. In Paul's teaching it is death; in Peter or Ananias, saving, washing away sins, as a sign, a passing from the state of sinful man into the place where God's privileges were, specially the presence of the Holy Ghost, who is among the saints in God's house as Satan is in the world. Paul in Titus 3 recognises the same truth.
The question then is, are children entitled to be received? are believers? Believers, clearly, if they have not yet been; if they have, they cannot be again. But supposing they have not, they are clearly received by baptism; and, in an ordinary way, at the beginning, those in received the Holy Ghost, as said in Acts 2, and may be seen in Acts 8. Can children, or are they to be left out where Satan rules? Scripture, I believe, gives a Christian parent a title to bring them to Christ, but this can only be now scripturally by death as baptism figures it, for "that which is born of the flesh is flesh." If baptism be the reception of children where the Holy Ghost is, and where they can be brought up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, and taught to obey, which till they are Christians as to position they cannot be, the question is, Is a christian parent obliged to leave his child outside with the devil, or allowed to bring him in where the Holy Ghost and the care of God's house is? Scripture tells one that children of a christian parent are holy, have a right to be admitted, are not as children of a Jew who had married a Gentile unclean, that is, unfit to be admitted among God's people, but holy. I know it is said the husband was so too. It is not true where the sense is looked to, The Jewish husband was profaned not profane, could not be profaned if he had been: it is what is holy that is profaned, nothing else can be. Now it is grace, and the unbeliever is "sanctified," not holy; the child is "holy". The Lord Himself has said, "Of such is the kingdom of heaven." It is said, Why not give them the Lord's supper? Because that is the sign of the unity of the body, and it is the baptism of the Holy Ghost that forms that. Baptists always reason instead of going to scripture. I have no difficulty with Baptists who think they have never been baptised; of course they ought to be. They have never been regularly admitted among Christians on earth; they may be of the body (as Cornelius) by the baptism of the Holy Ghost, but they have never been formally admitted to the house on earth, the place where the Holy Ghost dwells.
This answers another question you put -- the converted and unconverted being baptised together. If it is admission into the house they are all admitted together, cannot be on any different principle. If it be obedience, then indeed there is; but scripture is in the teeth of this: to separate them would be to deny the principle on which any are baptised at all.
I respect the conscience of a Baptist; I repeat, if he think he never has been baptised he ought to be, but it is as clear to me as the day that his principles are totally unscriptural.
Nothing can be clearer then, that in the New Testament it is never treated as obedience. If it were, we were saved by our own obedience, have our sins washed away by our own obedience; for this is what is said of baptism. I understand quite well that a heathen coming to baptism does administratively receive the remission of his sins: every one is baptised to it. I understand too that one who has been as a heathen and converted coming to the faith -- to such it is practically a first confession of Christ and that they are very happy -- but obedience of a believer to an ordinance is all wrong from beginning to end; as to the Lord's supper as well as baptism. If a man think it is -- I do not blame him for doing it, but it is wholly unintelligent. If a friend was to say, keep this in remembrance of me, and I said, I will do what you bid me, my friend would have no thanks to give me. The gift was not valued. You see it is a wide subject, but the great principle is that the children of a christian parent are holy; and so far from children being unfit subjects, "of such is the kingdom of heaven" -- not Christ's, note, on earth.
The truth Baptists have to learn is that there is a place, a system established by God, where the blessings are found -- the olive-tree fatness -- without the question of conversion being settled, in which heathen, Mohammedans, and now for a time Jews are not, but in which these last will hereafter again be, though not on our footing. I know it is said you are bringing us back to Judaism. I answer, in this respect the apostle does in 1 Corinthians 10 and Romans 11: and baptism does not refer to the body with which they had nothing to do, nor to giving life (which, if they had, was not brought to light, and they had it only in the state of servants), but the dwelling-place of God, which they were then, which Christendom is now, and according to which, or as which, it will be judged -- a very weighty consideration. All is so in confusion that this house is hard to own, but that does not alter the truth of scripture.
A word as to the place of parents; God has given them children; but "that which is born of the flesh is flesh." But the love of God is trusted, and the grace of Christ who receives such, and also the word believed that blessing is there where God has placed it. They cannot leave their children without in Satan's world; they bring them to be received as holy, as regards God's ways and dealings. The Church cannot receive them but through death, but receives them in Christ's name as if receiving Him, as He says, and the name of Jesus is called upon them through this image of His death too; and while received into God's congregation where the Holy Ghost is, and where all should be a pattern to them, they are given back to the parents in grace with Jesus' name on them to bring them up for Him, not for the world, "in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." I receive them then because they are holy relatively, because Christ received them, and "of such is the kingdom of heaven," and I can receive them in no other scriptural way -- with the sign of Christ's death and of His love.
I have no objection to any one reading this letter, but ... it is not the time to occupy the church with ordinances.
Ever sincerely yours in the Lord.
Elberfeld, November 4th, 1869.
+Griesbach rejects it, and it is cancelled or rejected by Grotius, Mill, Wetstein, Pearce, Tittman, Knapp, Lachmann, Tischendorf, and others; it is not found in the Vatican MS., nor in the ancient Syriac.
[R T Grant] BELOVED BROTHER, -- ... I quite feel what you say of the work, and when it is not mere evangelising it will ever be a certain isolation. I remember shocking an excellent sister some thirty years ago by saying, that as one went on one would always feel more alone, be more isolated. So it was with Paul, even as is easily seen: yea, so it was with the blessed Lord Himself, always alone, and more and more isolated as He went on. So He said at first, "Blessed are ye poor" (always true) -- at last, "Ye shall leave me alone." But one has to watch it. Faith is never alone; and as fruit Paul had his Timothy: yea, even the Lord -- John nearer to Him than others; though with Him the Father must be all. And when driven out from Judea by the jealousy of the people, it was just then to see the fields white for harvest. And what the word says when this isolation and perception of failure is strongest: "Be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God." "For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind." Not of ardent Peter, but of beloved John, it was said, "If I will that he tarry till I come," and we have to take the place God has put us in. I envy the evangelists sometimes, and feel they are better than I, but accept, perhaps as coming from my fault, the place I am in. But I feel, though evangelising heartily all I can, I live for the Church, whatever place God gives me -- none if He so wills. It is His, and that is right. I feel too I am growing old, but in itself that is a pleasure -- our salvation nearer than when we believed. In a day or two I am in my seventieth year.
I think you ought to rest, but if you must, it is also good in every way to change the scene we are in if God allow it. We see the work more as a whole with God, and even the details, and for ourselves the spirit is relieved from the pressure of responsibility as to details. Paul got this by prison: of that perhaps we are not worthy. I may be in London ere very long, though not just yet, but I could run over hence if you were there, and I will in England be your Timothy. I have Italy to go to if the Lord will, and desired work in Pau, but this left to the Lord, or I should be oppressed with too much on my hands. Whose hands? What poor creatures we are, and what can we do! I was myself really ill with fatigue, my pulse stopping dead for almost half a minute and then fluttering ever so fast; but it was only being used up, and God provided a day's rest, and I set off, travelled all night, and began our Vigan meeting at nine, and got better by resting an hour daily when possible all through the meeting. The Lord has made me work at these conferences; Geneva, Valence, Vigan, a day at Vergèze, Zurich, Stuttgart. They needed some teaching and getting into practically deeper water.
We were, all through, mainly on being dead with Christ, surely a most weighty point, on which all Paul's Christianity rests practically. It has connected itself in my mind with closing responsibility, with the death (for faith) first of the evil nature, and opening into the development of privilege, when God's righteousness is revealed, but given us and in God's purpose before the world, for His delight was in the sons of men -- wonderful thought! Then, His Son become man but in connection with responsibility rejected -- that, for the full glory of God, met in His death, and so the glory and privileges brought out. But there man is treated as dead "in" sins, not "to," as in Romans (in Colossians both, and man raised, not sitting in heavenly places), and it is a new creation and all God's work. The realisation is in 2 Corinthians 4, and indeed 5 as effect. All this marks wonderful perfection in the ways of God as to responsibility and purpose. Our responsibility, so brought to God, is in Ephesians 4: 5, "imitators of God, as dear children": in connection with Romans, the commandment of chapter 12.
You will find no epistle where courage is looked for in the Lord's workmen so much as in 2 Timothy, exactly where all was in ruin. The Lord's strength never fails, and we have to work on in that with the patience and grace that He alone can give, and looking to Him who alone can give result to our labour for good. Remember, beloved brother, if your heart fails at all in seeing yourself hindered in work, that the gracious hand of God is in it, and He makes all things work together for good to those that love Him. I rejoice to think you are in His gracious hands, and fully trust we shall see you better.
Ever affectionately yours in the Lord.
R T Grant, I have been through South France a little, and German Switzerland, since then Wurtemberg, now Elberfeld, and have had six 'Guelph' meetings, small and great, very much on being dead with Christ, though other aspects too.
[R T Grant] [To the same.] DEAREST BROTHER, -- I am still here hard at work at the German Old Testament. At any rate, I shall be a great deal more familiar with Hebrew in going thus through the whole Bible, of which I had only read parts in Hebrew. But it is very hard work, but I feel the Lord with me, so that when I teach and preach I have been helped. My German is pretty well come back to me, so that I have taught and preached to some four or five hundred in the meeting -- of course, with faults, but sufficient for the work, and their following all well. The scriptures are seen clearer and more precious, and the Lord Himself -- oh, how much more so. I feel nearer home, and home nearer me. It is a mercy to find it more familiar -- the heart more in it -- but it is mercy that I know well. The work has considerably opened here. In Italy I trust it is beginning, but there much patience is needed; the education of the people gives a character which greatly requires it.
Affectionately yours in the Lord.
Dear -- , -- You may put any letters you like to "James."+ I rather dislike dialogues as fictitious, but they serve to bring out truth in many cases better as a kind of parable, so to speak. Still I am hardly satisfied ... . The importance of judging church history, or the state it reveals, is daily more apparent to me. I am not at the bottom of it, but the change from scripture to prelacy, succession of bishops, so-called, has something mysterious in it, along with the fabrication of Ignatius, and perhaps Apostolic Constitutions, which are, I believe, heretical in their present state -- a prelacy which is the basis of all subsequent Christendom till the Reformation, and now of high church, and even all clerical systems. But one thing is clear, that all refer to Peter for the system, not one to Paul. The unity of the church as they view it is always based on him; Paul at best only comes in by the bye, swamped in Peter at Rome. And even as to detail, the rising up of scriptural conscience against image worship and evil was from Paul's writings, and the authors of it, called Paulicians. They had only his writings and the gospels -- but this by the bye. This system presses stronger on me than even infidelity, dreadful as it is individually.
As to the gospels and translation, I must leave it over to God: they want to get a French Old Testament and new edition of New; and I have here the Old on hand -- the historical part easy, the prophets often difficult, the Psalms done. I should be glad of a little quiet, but I have felt I must do the day's work, and leave the rest to God, for Italy is before me too. I am expected, but in no hurry. I have thought to run to England when finished here, or before if necessary ... .
As to the Psalms, I fear you have taken labour in vain. I translated them in America for study and practice in Hebrew, with only a Gibb's Gesenius, that dear J. Harris gave me some thirty years ago, which I use mostly for a travelling dictionary, very well done for its size, but an abridgment (now I believe out of print); but at your request I was doing all over again.
When I speak of church history, the word is quite enough for me, but the origin of an immense system calling itself the church, is of interest. It may be the Lord meant it to be concealed, that now we might judge by the word: in that I have no difficulty.
+["Familiar conversations on Romanism."]
[G V Wigram -- perhaps more likely G Biava][From the Italian.] DEAREST BROTHER, -- We have had a very blessed conference here at Elberfeld. We read the Gospel of John, and afterwards the Epistle to the Romans, but we spoke of many subjects while studying these books. We enjoyed much the presence of God, and I believe that the Spirit of God wrought powerfully in our midst, and that He taught the brethren much, and communicated these precious truths: we were very happy together. They came from various parts of Germany, and several came from Holland: we remained together the whole week. I ventured to preach in the German language to four or five hundred people. With the exception of this week, which has come to an end today, we were busy with the translation of the Old Testament. We have finished Isaiah and half of Jeremiah. On the Lord's day and twice in the week we have meetings; otherwise, I was rather dissatisfied to have no intercourse with souls, and to do nothing directly in the Lord's work; because from nine in the morning till eleven at night I work at the translation, so that I am unable to visit the brethren. So much, that you may understand that I am not neglecting the Italian language.
[G Biava][From the French.] I am very diligent, am I not? I read simple things with sufficient facility; speaking is a different matter, but I accustom myself to the language as well as I can where I do not hear it.
I write in order to say to you, do not be discouraged, and do not despise the day of small beginnings. Italy will need patience, but God knows how to act there as elsewhere. As to what concerns -- , act with patience: you will see, perhaps you have seen already, what his mind is with respect to these matters. Do not distrust him, if the groundwork is good: confidence produces confidence and openness ... . Write to me whenever you like; I shall always be glad to have news. Open your heart if things are going on badly, or if they are difficult; share your joys if you have any. I am accustomed, you know, to expect difficulties, and disappointments sometimes -- our own failure, but where we can always look to the Lord. Greet very heartily all the brethren. Remember the Lord is sufficient for everything. While firm in the truth, be patient with ignorance and mistakes, where the will is not active.
Dear -- , -- ... As regards S., I should be anxious that a careful distinction were made between false interpretation and false doctrine. This is for me in these days important. I might refuse to go to his meeting when I had done all I could to bring it right, but if there were no false doctrine as to anything that was the faith, I might not have to excommunicate him, though wholly rejecting him as a doctor or a teacher. If what was taught touched the faith it is another thing. If he taught what I thought mischievous I might refuse to go there, if the assembly did not stop it, but that is not excommunication I have not of course seen the publications, and cannot say how far they go. I know the system as a system and do not accept it at all. I think I know its bearing, and the difference of Peter and Paul teaching, and how far it goes, and where the Epistle to the Hebrews stands -- the heavenly calling as contrasted with church union to Christ. But that is in other parts of Paul's writings, in various degrees and very instructive distinctions, when the soul is arrived there; the hope only is in heaven in Colossians, and salvation is at the end in Philippians. We are not risen with Christ in the doctrinal part of Romans. But this instruct does not deprive the church of anything.
I am plunged in the Hebrew work, very useful to myself but doing it thoroughly is longer than I had hoped, and I am somewhat at a loss as to finishing it, and the English Testament. But the Lord will guide. They are very anxious I should go through with it, and as far as I can judge it is going on very well. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations finished, and seventeen chapters of Ezekiel, but how much more to do! The historical books are in general very easy, and the Psalms done.
I am anxious to get over to England soon, though not immediately, but the Lord will shew the moment.
[To the same.] G Biava, I forgot to add to my last letter that the Epistle to Philadelphia interested me more and more as to our position in these last days. Nothing can be more lovely than the picture in Luke 1, 2. I had not directly compared it with Philadelphia, but enter into the bearing of it. It is lovely to see such a picture of God's people in the midst of the awful state of the Jews. May we be indeed something like it ... . I work freely with my German -- was up the country yesterday with a large congregation -- and pray with comfort, always the last thing I do. Affectionately yours.
[G V Wigram -- perhaps more likely G Biava] [From Italian.] DEAREST BROTHER, -- ... I advise you not to ask for money from -- ; if God blesses the labours of brethren in Italy, perhaps they will be disposed to give some; but now I do not think that they enter sufficiently into the needs of Italy to have patience with the brethren who are labouring in that country, and to think rather of the work than of the workmen. If the latter love the Lord, and preach Him from the heart, having been called to labour by the Lord Himself, I am satisfied. The Lord has patience, and where He has patience we ought to have it too. I do not understand why, but among the Swiss, life does not develop much in outside labours -- I mean that when they are not engaged in the work, they have not the work in other countries much at heart ... . God has those who are labouring in France, and He has blessed them abundantly. I love these brethren much; I have myself worked much among them, as you know; but we must take all brethren as they are, the Thessalonians were not the Ephesians, nor were the Corinthians Philippians ... .
And now, dearest -- , do not think much about your health. I know that you are not strong; do not do what would harm you, but trust in God and in our good and faithful Lord and Saviour. God always gives the strength we need for the work He gives us to do, and His strength is made perfect in our weakness ... . May God Himself keep you and the beloved brethren in Italy. Remember that God is love, and that He is always thinking of us: "He withdraweth not his eyes from the righteous."
Your affectionate brother in Christ.
Elberfeld, December 24th, 1869.
Dearest G (C?) Wolston, -- Very glad indeed was I to get news from New York, and thank you much. The work in America I have much at heart, and N. Y. had much exercised me, but I fully trusted the Lord, I think I may say, and He has brought evident good out of evil. I always feel my work a very poor imperfect one: I sow great principles, truths of God's blessed word which I know to be truths and infinitely blessed; but am no wise master-builder. Indeed, in these last days I believe it is not the time for it, but for establishing the saints in those truths, and that separation from the world, and a worldly church, which places them in right testimony where Christ would have them. What a blessing that is! If it is where He would have them it is the right place. And after that we must labour, and labour with Him.
I do not think any one can have a deeper sense of the evil than I have, but we must not be occupied too much with it. It is very possible that it has made progress at N. Y. since I was there, for it does so, and rapidly everywhere. The clergy are at their wits' end in Europe through the boldness of infidels among themselves, yet cling together that there may not be a division in the church, so-called. When the world is separating into Romanism and infidelity, Christians must have their place, and keep their eye steadily fixed on that: "simple concerning evil," says the apostle, "wise concerning that which is good." I do not want saints to be unconscious of what is going on all around them; they are warned, but not to be occupied with it. The passage I have quoted is of every day walk, but there is a principle in it. Two things we need to have -- what Christ has in the world as perfect as possible, and to be looking to Him constantly for it. He can give: and He loves the church. Oh! that we might have more of the spirit of intercession, that He might be glorified. It is of every importance that those who do walk, should walk in unity and in power. God has been most gracious in N. Y., and I trust the work will yet go on. Only stick close to the Lord ... .
I not only have undertaken a corrected version from Hebrew of German Old Testament, but have finished the prophets within a day or two's work, I trust with satisfaction. I feel the Lord with me in it, but tied up by it, and sometimes say will not the Lord make it soon useless. But the church needs the word above all now. I find it wonderfully clear, and daily all clearer. This dead with Christ, well weighed, opens by practical truth, the truth as it is in Jesus far and wide -- God's ways putting responsibility and purpose in their place -- but goes deep into the conscience. I am very hard worked, the rather as I am anxious to finish and be at other labours ... . One thing I do feel, the word of God is everything under grace: the church here below a judged thing, the word light from God.
May the Lord keep and bless you, and keep you very near Himself.
[A Wells] BELOVED BROTHER, -- I have some little hope of getting to Guelph this year; I cannot tell. If fine weather, the voyage would be a rest to me: that is not a difficulty. But I am greatly shut up in work. I am at work at the correction of the whole Old Testament in German, from the Hebrew; not a correction from Luther, which is too bad. A German, and a Dutch brother, hold the Dutch and German translations of it, and I the Hebrew, with all other accessible helps to boot. We have, in another day, the prophets done, but still (though nearly all far easier) a great deal more to do; and then I have the English New Testament to complete a new edition of, in which I have examined for myself all the readings far more accurately. In the translation, save a few passages made clearer, there is no change.
The work goes on in England pretty widely, and with blessing. I cannot doubt that the Lord is preparing a people for His coming. All things are rapidly progressing and breaking up; but we have only to be perfectly peaceful and quiet, and earnestly seek from God that we and all the saints who seek His face, may be faithful and devoted. I feel this in the wide-spreading of the work, that we must take care that the testimony to unworldliness be maintained as to actual separation from all around us -- it is in a measure -- but in the spirit and temper of brethren. Here the work has spread considerably, but there is some want of learning Christ, though they are going on well. But we must remember that in prayer God is ours, power is put in motion, and that if through grace we can bring them up before Him, it is sure to be for blessing ... . I feel about -- , but the Lord is above it all; there are many dear souls, and by His grace they will be made to feel it is not good to dishonour Him. At New York Satan had put all in confusion, and it is better now than ever ... .
The Lord prepare His people for Himself. One thing we have to do -- to live for Christ, for what is not seen. It will be seen, and then how glorious. But I do not like to look at this as only wilderness, and that as rest and praise. We have the love of God, and the fulness of Christ to enjoy, if we walk with Him; and how free from hindrance then, I need not say. But it ought to be well known, though beyond all our thought. I almost fear sometimes that scripture gets too clear for me sometimes, as a plan or system of God if the parts are not filled up with the fulness of Christ. But it is wonderfully clear, daily more so; yet so as that we know in part. In that way we are little and narrow. However, all is true; and we shall find the fulness of it as a whole, and much more when with God
The history of the church is to me darker and darker in its character. I begin to have solemn thoughts as to what it all was; I mean, the power of Satan in it. God had His own loved people at all times, but history says little of them. But all this that is now coming up as good and primitive, though mere superstition in many, is in itself the power of evil. Our part is a quiet path in consistency; but it is no harm to be clear, as to what that is, with which we have to do. The word is ample, thank God, for our own walk; but it presses on me as a solemn thought what the working of the enemy was, in that which the Lord had set up so blessedly at first. Yet we are not to be occupied with evil, or be in any way terrified with the adversary, as if the Lord had not the upper hand. He has overcome, and is leading on to a full blessing, when the enemy will be bound. We must go on in the confidence that power belongs to Him, is in His hands. I do not mean that they are not perilous times; but in them, we have to look out of them, to Him who cannot fail us, who is full of blessing, and whose grace is sufficient for us, whose strength is made perfect in our weakness.
Canada is ever dear to me. I do not know how to account for my attachment to it, if it be not all the love I met with in it: that I ever feel. But I am now in my seventieth year; I have had some five 'Guelph' meetings since autumn began, and travelled -- save some time in London, close work -- constantly. Peace be with you, dear brother ... . How very gracious God has been in N. Y.; He ever is assuredly. I will write (D.V.) to dear H., but my letters get on slowly -- from 7 or 8 a.m. to 7 page m., and then have to search out all the hard passages in Hebrew. But every mercy and much faith be with you.
DEAREST BROTHER, -- My days pass on so much alike one another, and so confined to the house, that a letter from me cannot have, as to work, much to interest you, but I will not leave your kind letter, which I was very glad to receive, unanswered. I have preached out round on Sundays (as my German is pretty well grown up again after a six years' disuse) and here on a week day, but I am not yet content. I think they need some deepening, as to being dead with Christ, and here, save in the Conference, which was very happy, I have had little opportunity of much unfolding or pressing it. They have forgiveness, are familiar with being in the wilderness, and the hope of heaven, and the Lord's coming -- not enough I think with present association with Christ -- but who is? But they are going on happily, and the work is very considerably spread. Being saved, and God's love in it, they rest upon -- not so much being in Christ before God. Still they have these truths, but a good deal of contrast (which is quite true) not of present association. I speak of the general character of the work, for there is much to rejoice in, and I am thoroughly happy with them all. There is a good deal of kindness amongst Germans, and brotherly love, though in this manufacturing town they see little of one another -- I, at this moment, almost nothing -- save at the meetings.
I have gone through all the prophets into German; the Psalms were done, and we are in Job -- doing all the hardest first in case I should not finish. I am somewhat anxious about staying away so long from England, but trust the Lord may guide. I work by myself from soon after 7 a.m. to 9 -- breakfasting alone; then 9 to 12.30 page m. at translation with them; from 3 to 7.30 again, and then I work through reserved hard passages alone, and then often until midnight alone -- letters and what I have to do; so I am not idle. As to going out, I go to the post at dinner time, or for ten minutes elsewhere.
I have gone through Hebrews by reason of poor S.'s tracts, and analysed the epistle, making it all very clear to myself, at least, clearer than ever, and leaving no shade to my own mind in any part. It is being copied. I cannot conceive how any one that has closely examined it can doubt for a moment as to it. But it has put the scripture statements in a clearer shape and certainty in my own mind, for there is nothing really new in the doctrine. It is an examination and analysis of the epistle, shewing what it teaches and the ground it takes. I have kept this apart, save stating the ground and some allusions, and then answered statements of the tract in the end part. So that the first, with very little trouble, may be used apart for helping in reading the epistle. I have a paper too, on the Scriptures and the church for Present Testimony.+
I get on feeling I am old, and as to my body, worn out, but through mercy my mind is as fresh as ever, judging I trust all evil in me, past and present, more earnestly than ever, but finding unutterable goodness and mercy even there, and I hope living more with Christ and more in the Father's love. But I find intercession weak in me, though I know I love His people. For Himself He stands alone, and grace above us all. Still I should like to be more like Him, more with Him. Even my work absorbs me too much. The steam, so to speak, is spent in propelling the vessel along. Still He helps and sustains; and I find when it has not to be propelled, and a moment's rest is there -- oh! how sweet it is -- the steam is there, and rises up in unbounded thankfulness to unbounded grace, by grace revealed, and goodness that never fails. And so I am somewhat consoled but not content.
But I must close ... . I was at Duisburg for Christmas and Lord's day, and saw the brethren. A large room Christmas afternoon was filled to cramming. The Lord grant there may have been blessing. I have found at any rate great attention to the truth plainly put, and in several places there is considerable desire to hear. I have encouraging accounts from America. There are at least seven in the States now, who have given up everything and come out to work. New York getting on with Brooklyn, through grace and mercy, happily, better founded through His grace than ever. I always dread my work not being solid ... .
Elberfeld, January, 10th 1870.
+["Collected Writings," vol. 23. page 172.]
[H M Hooke] BELOVED BROTHER, -- I thank you for your letter, and thank you for the account of the work. Canada is dear to me for the work's sake, and for the affection of so very many from whom I have received every sort of kindness, beloved ones in the Lord. When I have laboured in a place I always feel it mine, not in possession, but in the service I have to render to the saints. I have a faint hope, but wait on the Lord as to it, of getting to the Guelph meeting. I should be glad to see them once more, but as I have told some of them, I am in my seventieth year, and though through mercy strong still, we know that threescore years and ten closes the title of man's active life, though our God can do what seems Him good. It depends a little on my getting through the work I am about here. I feel how great the privilege of evangelists is. I preach here or in the country around regularly, speaking, unless some special hindrance, two or three times a week, but every one has to do the work and fill up the little niche assigned him by God. My work is more in setting souls free, and now in these last days, when all is going so fast to evil, getting, as the Lord enables me, the word of God in its contents and in its purity among those who profess His name. They need being built up here; the work has greatly extended. And besides, I have undertaken nothing less than correcting the whole Old Testament, working it from the Hebrew with all the helps I can. It is a service underground, but I trust will be a help to the saints. They were really without an Old Testament -- either an excessively incorrect one, or by infidel translators. We have done (I have helpers for pure German) the prophets, Job, the most difficult of all, and are in good progress with other parts; the historical are very easy comparatively. I had done the Psalms a few years ago for them. I believe God is graciously helping us. I am very happy in the work, but a little anxious as to the time it will take. Then I have three gospels ready of the English New Testament, that and the French being now out of print, and the French are waiting for the English corrections. But if I get another gospel quite ready, I might perhaps get for a couple of months to America and return; if fine weather, it would be a rest for me, and that I somewhat want ... . I accept my present work while it is so important in these last days that brethren should have the word of God, and that they should have it as pure as possible -- and we must expect in these days to have the poor as always when the church got into its own place in the world, at least for the great mass. And I feel I am serving the Lord in using the little knowledge I have of Greek and Hebrew, etc., in furnishing brethren who have them not, with the word of God as nearly as possible as it is. Otherwise, the times call for building them up in the truth solidly as once given, so that I am jealous as to how much time I spend on what is means, however precious, for we cannot esteem the word too precious. It is that which God has given us when the church went wrong.
I rest on the Lord's goodness towards His people, though I be a poor intercessor for them. I feel the difference of counting on the Lord's love (that I feel through grace I can do), and using it in the activity of faith, to obtain the blessings it has in store for His people: there I feel weak. God will give surely according to Him own thoughts and purpose, but He allows us to have a part in carrying them out, first by prayer and then by service; and while I doubt not all is foreknown and surely ordained, and for those for whom it is prepared of the Father, yet herein comes our responsibility, the place of a single eye that does not confer with flesh and blood. One so wrought from the beginning, holding himself dead from that time, and always bearing about in his body the dying of the Lord Jesus. We, alas! have often to learn how to do it, or do so, at least, after much mixture of the living and the dead. Yet he had to be helped, and have a thorn in his flesh, and be delivered to death; but then it was from God and for Jesus' sake: the flesh was not different, but the man was. However, the Lord is all we need, and He is perfect.
I have not doubted a sifting time would come for the work in Canada, but the workmen must not be discouraged by it. I doubt not there may have been some excitement and craving after it, still with self-knowledge. I dread excitement, but I do not forget that when the Lord sowed, only one in four came to perfection. I do not mean this as a rule; we do not see it thus when the apostles preached: it is danger, and characteristic, but I use it to check a false judgment upon the work, where some disappointment may come. I am more anxious about what the world and the spirit of it forming a clergy may do, than about the reality of what has been done. I know -- too, but I know the gracious Lord is above all our weakness. It is a great point to know how to serve in what we find, not expect all as we would. Christianity works with what it brings, not with what it finds; and we are poor creatures ourselves after all. Give my kindest love to the dear brethren, and I am, dear brother,
Affectionately yours in our blessed Lord.
Dear G V Wigram, -- Whence did this Synopsis+ come? Did I give it to be published originally? I forget it (not its contents) entirely. The more I read it the more I feel the truth precious for those who can bear it, but there is such a sentence as, "receive ye ... but not to doubtful disputations." I doubt not many are able to bear it, and printing goes to all. What is the thought of bringing it out now? and how? I have corrected it, and there are passages I should like better as they were, but if stumbling blocks for the weakest, would take them out of the way. I will send it (D.V.) when I have looked it through; the first pages seem clearer than I should have expected. I not only believe it true, but believe it to be useful and used. But the raising of questions I dread.
It enhances for me, with far deepened feeling, the sorrows of the blessed Lord, and gives an apprehension of them otherwise not had, and makes His Person more divine to the mind. But His sorrows must ever be a depth into which we look over on the edge with solemn awe; we could not be there and still be; but it exalts His grace to the soul to look into that depth, and makes one feel that none but a divine Person (and one perfect in every way) could have been there. But it requires an exercised, and I believe a very humble soul, to look in: but I understand that to an unexercised mind -- I mean when human thoughts subsist, and the word is not simply received -- it may perplex them as to how He could be there. And though I think the saints needed it very really, and it was so far of God and called for, I think of those others, and should fear as to the sacredness of His Person, raising discussions and provings. The needed work is mainly done; for myself it is all deep gain of soul. I discuss nothing, but seek to learn ... .
I am just now getting on slowly with my German Bible. We are, or have been, in the hardest part, and now my chief German assistant is unwell. If it was too long delayed, I should get to England and finish it afterwards, but do not hastily move out of my present track. Unless Proverbs be difficult, we have now done all that is so. I shall be anxious to get on with 'James' when possible, and then the N. T. I have been reading a little at moments, the most careful rationalist view of the structure of Hebrew scriptures. I am struck with its poverty, though astonishing diligence of research; what has any weight I have been for years ready to recognise, and the rest, not only flimsy, but a total absence of all perception of divine intention and mind -- almost more than I could have thought. I think my sojourn here is useful for building up and teaching, and the Lord has graciously given me liberty. They are clear on grace and forgiveness, but need something of the new position, but are going on well. I think I mentioned that the work has spread considerably.
Affectionately yours
+[A compendium or abstract of Mr. D's Synopsis of the Psalms, by G.V.W.]
[From the French] [I come now to the subject of the sufferings of Christ. There are persons who oppose my doctrine, by saying, 'The Lord Jesus would thus voluntarily have endured non-atoning sufferings -- sufferings which do not shelter from the wrath of God those for love of whom He endured them -- useless sufferings, which in no measure satisfy the justice of God.' I reply: Certainly, Christ has willingly endured non-atoning sufferings, sufferings which will not shelter those for whom He has endured them from the anger of God. In denying this truth you reject what is most comforting, and, next to salvation itself, that which is most precious in the gospel. Christ has "suffered, being tempted." Now that was not expiation, neither does it preserve us from the same kind of suffering; on the contrary, it is our precious consolation, when we are tempted. He has endured the "contradiction of sinners against himself." From that I gain courage not to grow weary in the conflict; but there is no expiation there, no delivering man from wrath. "If so be that we suffer with him," it is said. Are those atoning sufferings? The Lord said to two of His disciples, "Ye shall indeed drink of the cup that I drink of; and with the baptism that I am baptised withal shall ye be baptised." (Mark x. 39.) Was that a question of expiation? Paul sought the fellowship of His sufferings, and filled up that which remained of the afflictions of Christ. Were these atoning sufferings? Some say to me, 'But these sufferings do not extend to death.' They are mistaken, for it is quite the opposite: "Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus ... for we which live are always delivered unto death for Jesus' sake." (2 Corinthians 4: 10, 11.) "The fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death." (Philippians 3: 10.) These are very clear passages. We have only to read chapters 2, 4 of the Epistle to the Hebrews to find the plain contradiction of the doctrine which some put forth in opposition to what I have taught. That doctrine denies almost all of Psalm 69 and a great part of Psalm 22, where explicit distinction is made between the sufferings on the part of man, and forsaking on the part of God. In Gethsemane, He was not yet drinking the cup, for He asks, if it were possible, not to drink it. Was He not suffering? How can any one say that the sufferings of Christ, which do not satisfy the justice of God, were useless? Is His sympathy of no avail? Is the fact useless that He takes part in all our difficulties, in all our sorrows, in all our temptation, to know how to apply His word to him who is overwhelmed with afflictions? "We have not an High Priest which cannot ( mh; dunavmenon ) be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin." (Hebrews 4: 15; compare Hebrews 2: 17, 18.) But I have said enough for every Christian, who thanks the Saviour for this special manifestation of His love. There are sufferings of Christ, sufferings of an infinite value for us, which are not atoning.
Some have raised a special difficulty with respect to His sufferings for the remnant of Israel. never will I seek to turn the Christian away from the atoning sufferings of Christ, and from those which form the basis of His sympathy with us in our conflicts, to draw his attention to that which relates to the remnant of Israel. I desire that the Christian should occupy himself, above all, with the atonement, then with the consolations which are bestowed upon us by the knowledge of the sympathy of Him who has suffered, being tempted. But when it is a question of explaining the Psalms, it is necessary to speak of the sympathies of Christ for the remnant, because that is the principal subject of the Psalms. It is easy to understand that many souls, as dear to God as a Christian more instructed in the scriptures, know nothing of that which the word teaches on this subject. We should not lead the weak to doubtful disputations. I do not think that what I have said would do this. Such souls would perhaps have said, 'I understand nothing at all about it,' and would have laid the book aside, for which I should not have blamed them. They might have been able to enjoy it afterwards, but they would not have been troubled, if their attention had not been drawn to this point. Without leading them into a discussion which would not be profitable to them, I shall seek to enlighten them as to what I mean.
Every Christian believes that which I teach, although all do not apply it to the remnant of Israel. The position of this remnant will, in the last days, be as follows: They will see before them the anger of God and will be in anguish, feeling how much they have deserved it; the power of Satan will be there in an entirely special manner; the mass of the people will be upraised against this remnant. Christ has passed through these troubles, although He did not deserve to do so, but He has felt how much His beloved people have merited these troubles. He has accomplished atonement for Israel in such a manner that, finally, the wrath of God will not burst forth against the remnant of this people; this remnant will enjoy blessing. But He has passed through the troubles above mentioned. The wrath of God was before His face, the power of Satan was there, it was the hour of the wicked and the power of darkness. It is said in the word, "In all their affliction he was afflicted" (Isaiah 63: 9), and I believe it is not there a question of expiation. In Gethsemane, He was not yet drinking the cup, but His "soul was exceeding sorrowful, even unto death." All this appears to me very simple and very certain, according to the word.
Difficulties have also been raised with regard to the idea that this took place particularly after the last supper. But the distinction of that hour is made in the word. "His hour," it is often said, "was not yet come." Afterwards the Saviour Himself denotes this special time. He said to His apostles, "When I sent you without purse, and scrip, and shoes, lacked ye any thing? And they said, Nothing. Then said he unto them, But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it ... . For I say unto you, that this that is written must yet be accomplished in me, And he was reckoned among the transgressors." (Luke 22: 35-37) He would not drink any more with His disciples of the wine of the passover. Then, this was the hour of His anguish. Does any one believe that He did not suffer from the forsaking of His disciples, the treason of Judas, the denial of Peter?
To the thought that this kind of suffering continued till death, special objections have been made. But Psalms 69: 22, are witnesses of it. Without doubt, the cup of the wrath of God has, so to speak, comparatively effaced all the rest; but it is no less true that these Psalms, of which we have the literal accomplishment in the Gospels, depict sufferings of Christ on the part of men even unto death, and shew that He has felt them. "Reproach hath broken my heart; and I am full of heaviness: and I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none. They gave me also gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink." (Psalm 69: 20, 21.) Read Psalm 22: 14-20, and remark the contrast between these sufferings and the forsaking of God.
We have already seen that Paul sought the fellowship of the sufferings of the Saviour in death. That Christ was then occupied with Israel, is brought out evidently by His words, "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do": an intercession which gave force to the call to repentance addressed to Israel by Peter: "I wot that through ignorance ye did it." The fact that the remnant of Israel go to the edge of the tomb in their anguish is constantly repeated in the word. Further, the application of the sympathy of Christ to Israel is only a particular application of a general truth of which I have already spoken. It is also clearly set forth in the word, that Satan came to try Jesus in a special manner. In the Gospel of Luke, it is said, that Satan "departed from him for a season." The Lord declares emphatically, in alluding to His last sufferings unto death, "The prince of this world cometh." Dreadful words! It was the hour of man, of the Jews, and the power of darkness. I say no more; I do not enter into controversy. It seems to me that what I have said will be received by every true Christian.
I seek not to go deeply into the question here, but to present the truth which is found in the word in such a manner that the weakest Christian may see that what I have said is scriptural. I do not think that the church of God ought to be deprived of the value of these precious facts. The more we see that atonement was made in drinking the cup of wrath, the better we shall comprehend what sin really is, and what deliverance is. The more also will be brought out the reality of those sufferings of Christ which are not expiatory, and Christ Himself will become more precious.
I have endeavoured to present my thoughts in such a manner as to wound nobody, and to avoid controversy. Whatever effects the opinions which are opposed to my teaching have produced in my own mind, I have taken care not to express them in the least. I seek, and that by request of others, to calm all anxiety which the suspicion of grave errors might have produced. "The fruit of righteousness is sown in peace." ... It seems to me that sincere souls might find edification in what I have written, and not objections only. I am not senseless enough to maintain that a pen, purely human and feeble, may not have expressed itself badly on such subjects; but I see nothing at all to retract from the statements themselves. I believe, on the contrary, that the Christian may learn in them better to lay hold on the whole extend of the sufferings of Christ, the reality of His humanity, and the infinite depth of His love.]
[G Biava] [From the Italian.] DEAR BROTHER, -- I delayed writing to you until I had read a little of the "Dispensatore," and I had very little time. I am well satisfied on the whole, and I believe, dear brother, that God has guided you. The articles are simple, and at the same time sufficiently advanced in the truth. I hope you will always keep before the eyes and the hearts of the Italians foundation truths; grace, salvation, redemption, the perfection of the work of Christ; that redemption was completed in His death; and that, in His resurrection, we have not only a new hope, but a new position before God. This gives perfect peace before God, and this is the measure of our walk in the world. What Christ is before God is what we are, because we are in Him; but if we are in Him, He is in us, and His life ought to be manifested in all our ways. I find much to interest me in these numbers, but I speak only of the articles which suggested some observations. Although it is useful to insist on the necessity of having an assembly pure, and of keeping it pure (and I believe this is necessary everywhere, and especially in Italy), I hope you will not go further in speaking of the questions which have risen up amongst brethren. Do not think that I am less strong in my conviction of the necessity for firmness; I am far from being so, but your "Dispensatore" is intended for edification, and for the growth of souls; and I believe that firmness is better manifested in practice where God is with us, when principles have been presented and proved, than in a multitude of words, which give rise to controversy. I must also point out a few little points, and say a word on the source from which you take the articles (I speak only of the defects) so that your paper may be as perfect as possible.
In No. 1 the principles of the article are very good, but I do not think that a person can believe that he has peace before feeling it, because peace is a state of the soul; it is something experienced. I can believe that Christ has made peace, but not that I have it.
In No. 2 page 2. Here also the article is very interesting, and the principles are true, but I do not think that "united to God" is according to the word. We are united to Christ. I do not believe that faith unites us to Christ: the Holy Ghost does. Many people say that faith unites, but the word does not. "By one Spirit are we baptised into one body." "He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit." I could not say (end of the second), 'not by preaching the law.' I acknowledge that the gospel, or Christ, is a better way, but for many hearts, or rather for many consciences, the law is a means of reaching them, and convincing them of sin: certainly it cannot give life or peace.
I cannot find it just now, but I think you have spoken as if the Old Testament saints could have been united to Christ. They had received life from the Son of God; but union depends upon the coming of the Holy Ghost.
One observation more. You ought to examine attentively (I ask God to guide you in this) the articles on repentance, and on sanctification. I do not speak about these, but I think you translate much of what dear -- has written; you do well, for his writings are most useful, and they attract the heart, and are much more easily understood than my own. But amongst our brethren, and in a whole school of Christians, on account of the war they have made against the error which requires so much repentance before believing, and coming to Jesus, and so much sanctification before knowing that we are in Christ, they have fallen a little into the other extreme; they will have no other repentance but faith itself, and no other sanctification but the fact of being in Christ, who is our sanctification. I do not say that your article on repentance is like this. But the one on sanctification does not seem to me quite clear. It is true that Christ has been given to us, made of God sanctification, and it is true that no human efforts can add to sanctification; but though on one side the life given by God is holy -- Christ is our life -- it is not the whole truth that we are accounted holy in Him. It is evident that the writer loves holiness, but the word speaks of following holiness (Hebrews 12: 14): it says, "The very God of peace sanctify you wholly." 'The sanctification that I have in Christ is as perfect as the wisdom and righteousness.' But the righteousness is always perfect as my righteousness; I possess it, and so I am the righteousness of God in Him. Could I say I am holiness, or I possess perfect holiness? God sees me in Christ perfectly righteous; He sees me, we can say, perfectly sanctified -- granted -- but, as to righteousness, there is no other righteousness before God but Christ. If I could have any other righteousness, I would not wish to have it; but I do desire holiness; I follow after holiness: could I follow after righteousness? God chastens us that we may be partakers of His holiness; this could not be said of His righteousness. There is, thus, a difference between sanctification and righteousness, although we have both in Christ. We are, as to our persons, sanctified in Christ, since we have the new life; but our state of soul may be bad or good, and we ought to follow holiness. If this be done before knowing the perfect righteousness of God, before being justified and knowing it, we are not really seeking sanctification, but justification, hoping that if we were more holy God would accept us. There is no true holiness until we have peace; after we get peace, holiness for its own sake is the desire of the soul. We must certainly first of all go to Christ, that is not the question, but what we are to do when we have gone to Him, and have found peace. That we have received an entirely new life, which ought to be developed, and the activities of the heart in prayer, in the use of the means given by God, are things often forgotten when sanctification is spoken of. In your article, the second part makes it evident that the writer desires the yoke of Christ, and brokenness of will, but the doctrine is not entirely clear. I say all this, dear brother, that your "Dispensatore" may be as useful as possible. The greater number of Christians will not observe these little mistakes in it; they will even be glad to find them, and will not consider them to be mistakes, the doctrine as to sanctification excepted ... .
Yours affectionately in Christ.
W Kelly, Immortality+ is incorruptibility, and applies to the body in life and immortality, nor is mortality applied to anything but the body. The evil is that people confound immortality and eternal life -- two things totally distinct. I am just as mortal when I have it as before. They must for their theory make Satan mortal as man. I am not very fond of the expression "immortality of the soul," as it gives a handle to them. Man is become mortal or under liability to die, but scripture is as plain as possible and as express, that death does not touch the soul. It is the separation of soul and body, or, as the second death, punishment. These things have vogue for a time with unconverted and unstable souls, and some other heresy springs up; but it is when God calls us to it to be earnestly contended against.
Mr. Minton evidently knows nothing of sin and atonement. That I have invariably found to be the case. Look at the article on the deserts of sin. Now Christ and atonement, or what the cross proves, is wholly passed over and ignored. Their system is merely natural religion, and that false. I find them writhe under the testimony of scripture. So in the article on immortality. I deny righteousness and holiness in Adam unfallen. The statement that death is the cessation of life (save as it is used for life in a body, as we use it now) is formally contradicted in scripture: "Fear not them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do." Life is used in various ways in scripture: "She that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth." And I die, or Paul dies, just as much as a sinner, who, according to their own theory, do not cease to exist at all. Christ died. Did He cease to exist? All this is stuff -- mere trash -- without reference to scripture.
When he says that scripture says that he shall die, it says also that they shall rise again, and "cast body and soul into hell." I do not talk of continuation but of punishment. Destroying does not mean annihilation. A concordance will prove the folly of it. Change the word and see: "O Israel, thou hast annihilated thyself but in me is thy help" -- "He came to seek and save that which was annihilated!"
+[See "Collected Writings," vol. 23. page 94.]
[To the same.] Dearest W Kelly, -- The great book on the subject is an American, which I have in a measure looked at when there, having to meet them; but found it best to trust the Lord and have scripture ready, through grace, and meet what I had to meet, and the Lord helped me. Some were delivered, and one, through mercy, kept safe. Birks is pretty much, as to the ground he takes, Origen's; that God had not revealed all the truth, but kept some back that useful terror might be there. But there is another question, What is the truth of what is revealed?
But I find gross ignorance of the gospel at the bottom of all this. Christians are put by Birks as having to answer for their works, and receive the things done in the body just if there was no complete salvation. Give an account of ourselves we shall; christian responsibility I fully acknowledge. But they leave out divine righteousness and a new position consequent on redemption. They leave us under our old Adam responsibility with a supplement of grace. They confound the wrath which judges temporally with the wrath of God revealed from heaven; our responsibility as men and our totally lost estate in nature. It is not only that we shall not come into judgment because Christ has borne our sins as to our own responsibility as men, but that we are passed from death unto life. This leaves the ordinary evangelical world, though they may be kept in simplicity by mercy, wholly incapable of meeting these questions.
The question besides the atonement is, Is the soul immortal according to scripture? and the distinct holding fast that death is not ceasing to exist, on which scripture is quite plain. Another point is that while God is love, He is perfectly righteous in His horror of sin. Generally these persons mean by righteous that He is under obligation to us, which is a very different [thing] from a holy nature expressed in power and authority against sin. But the atonement always goes when this doctrine is let in, and it must do so. As to details, they see nothing of the earthly judgments of the Old Testament; this clear, nine-tenths of their proofs are gone. All is hodge-podge in their minds (and in such as Birks') as to the difference of judgments of man here on earth, and wrath, as referred to man's being hatred against God, revealed from heaven. When death, destruction, and the like in the Old Testament are taken in their true sense, most of what they say falls away as without any force whatever; but here the evangelicals lay themselves wholly open to their attacks. Solemn intimations may be found which the spiritual mind may apprehend, but the dealings of God were on the ground of present judgment. So on the other side, though there were hints, life and incorruptibility were brought to light by the gospel.
I am drawing fast to a close with my own work here, and what we are now doing is very easy. I am only afraid of going too fast. I have no doubt I shall find defects, but the poor brethren will have an Old Testament they can use, which at present is not the case. English, Dutch and Italians are far better off, the last the best of all old translations -- Zurich not bad.
I have happy accounts of the desire to hear the word in Madrid. B.'s Italian journal is (up to this) very good in its matter, and not so far back in knowledge; a few slight mistakes not likely to be felt by those using it. We correspond in Italian now, mine bad enough, I am well aware, but he likes it better than French.
MY DEAR BROTHER, -- The denial of the immortality of the soul upsets the atonement entirely. If I have only an animal soul, where is responsibility? I put the case to them, Could God give eternal life to a dog They said, Yes. Then I said, It is a new creation, but be it so. But could the dog feel responsible for what he had done as a dog, as sin Would Christ have to die for his sins when he was such. If not, He has not to do it for mine when at best, if more intelligent, I had only an animal soul. I repent for the same reason of all my past life -- out of the question if I have no such spiritual responsible soul. And even if my sins only deserved a temporary punishment as particular acts, Christ's sorrows and sufferings must be proportionally small. If it be a spiritual nature which is at enmity against God, as the apostle states, then I understand the extent of the evil, and a misery which no mere quantum of infliction could reach. The atonement must be measured by the extend and nature of the guilt, taking in Him against whom we have sinned. If a person were merely puzzled by some clever person I might have patience in hope of restoration, but when a man is a heretic, that is, holds it so that it is the expression of sin in the flesh, he is to be rejected. I never met a person who held it deliberately who did not lose the atonement; as it indeed cannot be otherwise, for when there is not an immortal soul, a spiritual soul, how can you make an animal morally responsible?
As regards the Person of Christ, it is thus I have seen it work in America. They teach that death is ceasing to exist. If it be, either Christ has not died for us, or He ceased to exist. Thus His person was speedily lost; but all have not gone thus far. Some did distinctly state it to me. If it has practically taken the form of a heresy, we are told to reject them; and certainly what destroys the atonement is not the portion of a happy worshipper. They are not on Christian ground: the Lord's supper has not the same sense as it has for me ... .
Affectionately yours in the Lord.
F G Patterson, One great cause of error on this subject is, that the saints do not make the difference which scripture does between the government of God exercised over this earth and the necessary rejection of sin by God's nature -- His wrath from heaven. The evangelical world does not make the difference, and hence is liable to be misled, and unable to answer, though God may preserve souls by the instinctive sense of what is in scripture. Israel may be carried to Babylon, but Daniel finds it his sure path to heaven. All above twenty years old fall, save two, in the desert, but Moses and Aaron, and very likely many others, find their place in heaven too.
These dealings of God must be in connection with God's character, and immediately flow from it; but they are not the expression of it: they are His ways in and through men. Life and incorruptibility were brought to light by the gospel. Just judgment was expressed in these ways, but not the judgment of the secrets of men's hearts, but of men on the earth, for their conduct on the earth. This is so true that, though there are passages which lead the spiritual mind to see the loss and ruin of man ("He drove out the man:" that God was lost to man: that man had left God, the way back to the tree of life being barred), yet the express positive judgment as pronounced does not go beyond this world, even when it reaches death. Man was made out of the dust, and returns to the dust: but that is man, the object of our senses here; nor was more openly revealed. But the breath of God was not dust nor made out of the dust. Hence death, and destruction, and the like, in the Old Testament, though they may imply that displeasure which is the sign of what is connected with eternal misery, yet mean habitually, in the Old Testament, death and destruction by judgment in this world: a solemn and dreadful thing as God's displeasure, but which is not in itself eternal misery. The state of the soul afterwards may be learned from other truths, but what is expressed is present judgment without the smallest hint of what comes of the soul afterwards. It is judgment here.
The New Testament recognises this even to death, as judgment here too, but passes on to the revelation of what follows because life and incorruptibility are brought to light, and that the absolute incompatibility of God's nature and sin (not merely His governmental approbation of righteousness) is plainly revealed. But these, those who deny the immortality of the soul confound; and for the most part evangelicals too. The latter hold the truth in effect, but they accept the application of terms and passages to what is eternal, which puts a weapon in the hands of those who teach error, against which it is logically hard to defend themselves, though their faith may be right. Universalists are in the same error, but it does not so immediately affect the question on the surface of the matter; but it does as really, because the nature of sin and wrath is in question.
Another source of error for the Universalist, allied to this, is the not perceiving that an entirely new life is given in Christ. The evil of the flesh of the old man is unaltered. They confound and forget, in looking only at the practical effect on our state, the real gift of life, and suppose that a process after death can form the soul for God. Where eternal life is, punishment can break the will, give seriousness, restrain under the sense of God's hand, and so work effects; but no punishment can ever give life, nor does grace alter the old man. I only speak of general principles, which lead to these errors here, because in universalism either Satan and the evil angels, to be more precise, can be saved without propitiation (and so can we then too), or their plea of God all in all is false, and mere human selfishness; and the evil spirits remain unsaved, for Christ did not take up the cause of angels.
But I return to general principles. The Old Testament passages which furnish the vast majority of alleged proofs of the destruction of the wicked, speak of judgment and destruction in this world only. All beyond, save glimmers which traversed the gloom for faith, was dark and invisible. That system was the government of God, not salvation for God's presence and eternal life, though these were saved and quickened. Destructionism holds that eternal life is given in Christ alone, but confounds eternal life and the immortality of the soul, two entirely distinct things. As regards spiritual divine life, we have no life in us at all; we are dead. It is not merely that it is not immortal life; we have none. It denies that we are alive -- not that the soul is immortal but that we have life in us. They might as well, and more truly, use it to prove we are not alive at all -- for that is what is said -- than that the soul is not immortal. It does not apply to the question.
As regards destructionism, another false assumption, which formed the basis of thought in most minds affected by it, is that death is ceasing to exist. This is wholly groundless. Indeed it begs the whole question. It may or may not be, as far as man can say from what he sees; for beyond death he sees nothing. He may reason that the cessation of outward organisation does not and cannot affect that of which he has the consciousness, and have the strongest ground for rejecting the supposition when 'to be or not to be,' that is the question. He may speculate with Plato, or reason closely with Butler; but he knows nothing. As far as the intimations of the Old Testament go for faith, they furnish the thought which Pharisees had thus acquired of the subsistence of the soul after death. Thus Samuel is brought up: David says, "I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me." Enoch and Elijah gave yet brighter hopes in the darkness, though darkness still was there. So that the Lord could rebuke the Sadducees as not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God in rejecting the resurrection; and the resurrection involved the necessary truth expressed in Luke 20: 37, 38, that "all live unto him." Nor did scripture know in this respect any difference between saints and sinners: not only was He the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob ("not the God of the dead, but of the living"), but the ground of thus was not their piety, but that for God all lived, even when for man they died. Sadducees are no new race; but they "err, not knowing the scriptures." The Old and New Testaments alike forbid the thought that in man's case death is ceasing to exist: believers die, (Christ died just as much and as really as sinners. If death as such means ceasing to exist, then the saints and Christ ceased to exist. Nor can what has ceased to exist ever be raised again.
But there is another vital point in this question. The atonement is lost, and the responsibility in us to which it applies. If I have no more soul than a beast, though a more intelligent animal nature in degree, responsibility is gone. You cannot make a dog or an elephant responsible for sins. When I am converted, I repent, I judge my past sins; I feel I have failed in my responsibility; I learn that through infinite grace Christ has died for my sins. It is not merely that He becomes life -- new life to my soul. Thank God that is true; but He died and has made atonement for my guilt, my sins, when I had not yet that life. He died for our sins; and this that I might live. If eternal life were given to an animal, it could not repent of previous guilt; the Lord, with reverence be it spoken, could not make atonement for its previous sins: He has, blessed be His name, for mine.
Responsibility and atonement disappear with this doctrine, and in its value with universalism too; because, in the latter system, sin does not bring exclusion from God, but merely a measure of torment: the nature and character of sin is denied -- by some, indeed, expressly. And in the destructionist system, even the punishment of sin, temporary punishment after death has no ground. If I have only animal life, and can no more really sin than a dog or an elephant, what am I tortured for afterwards, and so destroyed?
It is well to remark, that not only do the two systems of destructionism and universalism denounce each other as utterly unscriptural, but there are two parties among Destructionists. One holds death to be death, and the end of man as of a beast. They are consistent, at any rate; for if we cease to exist, we cease to exist. But then, if scripture be owned at all, we read "after this the judgment"; and so the other party bring them up again, though saying death is ceasing to exist, and then destroy them gradually in the fire: though, as I have said what for, it is hard to tell if they have only animal life; or who is raised, is hard to tell if they have ceased to exist. But there is the judgment after death; that is, they have not ceased to exist at all. The soul is a distinct thing; it survives the body: "All live unto him."
I only seek here to review the bearing of the question, not to enter into detailed proofs.
Dearest W Kelly, -- We have three colours: blue, or rather purple, tlkT (tekeleth). This was on the table, on the candlestick, and on the golden altar. ynçt[lT scarlet; and ˆmNra reddish purple -- this last on the brazen altar: the scarlet on the loaves. I believe the first to be that which was heavenly, or the divine, in man. All relate to the person of Christ or the display of what He is. The table was divine righteousness in character, which is the base of human order and administration. This had the tekeleth; the candlestick the spiritual perfection. The altar was the same character, only within, in intercession. Hence all on the journey were so covered. What we know of them has this character, only within, in intercession. Hence all on the journey were so covered. What we know of them has this character in going through the wilderness.
The loaves were covered with scarlet, that is displayed royalty in perfect administration itself. So, over the ark; there was first the veil -- Christ's human nature; then guarded on the earth in spotlessness untainted, by the badger skins; and the result was the heavenly or divine in man manifested here.
The reddish purple I suppose to answer to the altar of sacrifice, and to the more heavenly royalty; the exalted man the consequence of self-sacrifice to God. It is lordship glory or reign, but not so much displayed from and displaying heaven, as brought into the same, as answering to suffering. It was more as conferred -- though the same one way -- than displayed in peace; though it will be displayed. The transfiguration displayed it, not the lowly Saviour. This is what has struck me, but we must distrust any imagination getting in. The things they are in, and their place and nature suggest them -- I hope under guidance.
Dearest R Evans, -- I am, under God's mercy, going again, which I did not think to do, as you know I am well on in my seventieth year. I do not think to stay; I suppose many will be at the Guelph meeting, and I shall see the principal gatherings, but I hope to be back by the end of August; staying, say two months the other side: a long journey for a short stay, but there was need, and I am the servant of the saints for Christ sake.
I am greatly attached to Canada, but the breaking up of all things here claims attention, both as to popery and infidelity, and I am expected in Italy, the Lord willing and helping, this autumn. I have been over-worked; I do not mean as to my body, for I am very well, thank God; but not a minute save a few on Sunday, to sit down and say, Thou art good; and my work scarce at all direct activity, searching out souls; and though willing to do anything, this, in a certain sense, was starving work. But I have been helped in ministry, and there is a great desire to hear. But my heart longs to be more and more with God, and study and feed on Christ -- what else have we? -- and that, in unutterable grace, we have. But I am dragged out -- in danger of not feeding enough; yet the word has unfolded itself to me a good deal these latter times, and I wonder at the graciousness of God in keeping His poor saints and leading them on, and gathering out, and keeping them steady; and on the whole the saints are in a healthful state; only I should like to have more intercourse with them ... . I rejoice to hear of the blessing; meetings are springing up everywhere, so to speak. What a responsibility it brings before us! But I comfort myself with the thought that there is One who cares for His own sheep -- and what a comfort it is! ...
Affectionately yours in the Lord.
[C Wolston] BELOVED BROTHER, -- I have no objection to call the Holy Ghost Lord as a general title in glory and Godhead, just as Jehovah our God is called Lord -- regularly so, in the New Testament. "The Lord said unto my Lord," Jehovah to Adonai, and thus I am quite free, and have no quarrel with those who do, because He who is God must in a certain sense be Lord; and I think that 2 Corinthians 3: 18 does connect Lord closely with the Spirit; but verse 6 gives it a peculiar force, when after a long parenthesis verse 17 takes it up again. The revelation of the Lord is in the present power of the Spirit of God; and that is the way in which we have even the new covenant. But he identifies this with the present power of the Spirit in saying, "Where the Spirit of the Lord is, here is liberty."
I do not think 2 Thessalonians 3: 5 amounts to a very distinct testimony. It is the general expression for the ordering guiding power of grace over His people, and without any definite distinction. It is Christ that comes, if we define, with the term Lord to the mind. In the regular use of the word kuvrio" is used in two ways in the New Testament. The LXX. have always translated Jehovah by kuvrio" and so it is used as a name without any article in the New Testament. I have given a list in my French New Testament in the preface. Then we have Christ set as man in the place of Lordship. "God has made this same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ." Every tongue shall confess "that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father." "To us there is one God, the Father ... and one Lord Jesus Christ." This truth is very distinctly taught. It is not a question of nature, but of a place He has taken. And in this character the church or Christians constantly address Him: "all that in every place call upon the name of the Lord Jesus, theirs and ours." It is a name of relationship -- "theirs." "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." "I besought the Lord thrice that it might depart from me."
The Holy Ghost is the accomplisher of all grace in us. In that sense He carries out the lordship work in us. It is not a question of the Holy Ghost's nature or being or personality. They that lie to the Holy Ghost, lie to God. He distributes to whom He will; and as thus acting He is practically Lord. Still though He exercises the authority in and over us, yet He refers our hearts to Christ. There are diversities of operations, but one Spirit. There are diversities of ministrations, but one Lord. So as to unity -- one Spirit, one body, one hope of our calling: one Lord, one faith, one baptism. Thus in the practical sense the Holy Spirit acts as Lord. We are led by Him. The Holy Ghost said "Separate me." But the title as appropriated is Christ's, or Jehovah, or the general divine authority and rule. The action by which Lordship is exercised in grace in us, is by the Spirit, as in 1 Corinthians 12 -- distributing: but the title Lord in administration is in Christ. If Christ directs my heart, the Holy Ghost would do it in me.
In Acts 4 it is another matter: it is despovth" not kuvrio", I mean in verse 24; as "the Lord that bought them," "the only Lord God" -- despot literally -- bought them, being the comparison of a master buying a slave. In verse 29, it is general, but if defined refers to Jehovah. "Child" (verse 30), is servant, Christ as man (exalted) is looked at as not dou'los, bondsman, but the servant of God.
But though Christ be made Lord and Christ as man, yet through His oneness with the Father and His being the true God, it runs up into a divine title; just as in the case with Son. He is in the place of Son as man, or we could not be with Him. "That holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God;" but it cannot be separated from divine and eternal Sonship. As man He becomes and enters into -- is in so far as He is a man in -- the relationship with the Father as divine and eternal Son. In all the works of God we find this co-operation of the Persons. The Son wrought; yet He could say, "The Father that dwelleth in me, He doeth the works:" and, "If I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God is come unto you." I know not that I can add more to make it clear. Definitions here are not man's part: he receives, thanks and worships ... .
My kindest love to the brethren. I rejoice in their blessing and joy in Christ, as my own -- in some sense more. The love of Christ directs the eye on them He loves. All is going on very fast here, but towards what? But the blessed Lord is as sure for this as for every other state of His saints, and the truth and the word of truth increasingly precious, Christ more all -- at any rate, more separately and contrastedly ... . Peace be with you.
Ever, dear brother,
P.S. -- In reply to the fly leaf I had not sufficiently noticed I add: It is not any question of Person or dignity as to the Holy Ghost that hinders His being the object addressed in prayer, but the place He holds in the divine economy. He does govern as we are led by Him, but our communion is with (objectively) the Father and His Son Jesus Christ. It is eternal life to know the Father and Jesus Christ whom He has sent. Yet without the Spirit, and a divine Spirit, we could have no communion and no knowledge. The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost given to us: our bodies are His temples. But it is as in us He works, leading us objectively to the Father and the Son. But God dwells in us: by the Spirit we know the Son is in the Father, a divine Person thereby; we know we are in Him, and He in us. And in Romans 8 we find Christ and the Spirit in this respect identified. The Holy Ghost is a divine person and in the unity of the Godhead adored and worshipped. He is the immediate agent of all that God does -- immediate to the effects. But His place in the divine ways is not in the same way objective -- as divine and as personal, but not in God's ways so objective.
[H M Hooke] BELOVED BROTHER, -- ... I have heard something of the work and rejoice in it; of the attacks I think little, if the brethren go on well. Toronto would give me ten times as much, but I was able to trust the Lord for it, and He comforted me: combat I know it will be to the end. Mere attacks I feel are never to be answered. If we have failed -- acknowledge it; if not -- leave it to the Lord. Occasionally, one may have to take up some great truth or error in controversy, but in general the way is to work on with the truth itself ... .
As regards my translating work, I look upon myself as a "hewer of wood and drawer of water"; only I say if the wood had not been hewn, there would have been no offering on the altar; and as it is the word of God, I am content to serve the saints: that word is so important in these days. However, in Germany I had three preachings or teachings weekly, and larger congregations than here, though the places are crammed, and there was a most attentive ear. Here I have it every day but Saturday. But I have the feeling of a kind of impossibility of getting through the day's work, though I know we have no more to do than what the Lord has for us to do, and time for that. But I sigh a little, to get out of the critical examination of the text, to the use of it. But the word, I think, has power here, at least a multitude of young men and labourers come and are very attentive -- considerably more men than women. But most of the day I am poring over Greek editions and MSS.; and I love not only to preach, but to be in direct communication with souls as to their relations with God -- saints, and sinners yet more. However, if I serve the saints I am content, and the word, and specially now-a-days, is of endless price ... . Hoping to see you, dear brother, ere long,
Ever affectionately yours,
In the love of the Lord, in haste.
Dearest G V Wigram, -- I write a line to say we are all here well, every way favoured in our voyage. But I have delayed my letter that I might give you some account of our conference. The evangelists had brought so many younger converts, that the beginning of the conference gave less communion than earlier ones, but met the need of the moment. Questions, though reading Ephesians, on how to preach the gospel, Christ dying for all, how to put bearing sins, and the import of the blood on the mercy-seat and the scape-goat, mixed with dying for our sins and our dying with Him, responsibility, and counsels, and such like, but all useful. After Sunday, when we broke bread, I suppose some four hundred, a very good time, many had to go away, and there was more study and following out the subject -- we had got to the armour -- and then a synopsis of Matthew, John, and Hebrews, for we stayed another week, and, indeed, a few of us are going to read 1 and 2 Timothy today. Many came from different parts of the States, and all our evangelists were there, some under tents. The happiest spirit reigned throughout. A few left for England before we had finished. On the whole, I think, through mercy, it has in some measure met the need of the case.
Some of the converts in the Ottawa valley are dispersed, but a very real work has been done. The evangelists had in some places shut the door against themselves somewhat, by preaching against the denominations and baptism, which alienated the minds of some, but I do not think the former made as much difference in result as might appear, because in the long run it was found out it did separate. But it made this difference, it gave a different tone to their testimony, and in -- , where they did not, the people were disposed in their favour, because the clergy attacked them and they attacked nobody. Both subjects came up at the end of the meeting, though I had abstained from it, but said what I thought when others brought it up. But there was no jar on any one's spirit; it was quietly inquired into. The Lord has been gracious to us, and I am thankful.
I now for a brief moment purpose running round one or two places: all is open. On souls just coming out, the speaking or praying (so to speak) against denominations does harm. I fear one interesting labourer was driven away by -- doing so at the beginning, but all is in the Lord's hands.
I still hope to return in August, though there is plenty to call for labour and interest here. Till the last two days it was very hot. We were in a large tent.
My Dear Mrs. J A Trench, -- page communicated to me the question in your letter. John 13. is advocacy: that is not access, which is the point in Hebrews, but cleansing, and restoration to communion, as in 1 John 2 -- the intercession of the blessed Lord when we are actually defiled, when, being washed (bathed), we have defiled our feet.
In Hebrews we are perfected for ever by the offering, and have boldness to enter into the holiest. Here it is a "part with me," and the present enjoyment of that is interrupted. The priesthood is for mercy and grace to help in time of need. We are feeble, have infirmities in the Hebrews, having to say to God: the word judges, the priesthood helps with grace in our position with God. In 1 John 1 we have fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
John 14-16 refers to other subjects: what Christ was on earth as to His Person so that His coming again should have its value, what the Spirit would be to them, what He was in relationship to them in contrast with Israel, what the Holy Ghost would be revealing the glory, and then His presence on earth. Chapter 17 is neither priestly nor advocacy, in the sense of Hebrews and 1 John ii. It is essentially putting the disciples in His own place with the Father, and doing and looking to the Father to do when He was gone, all that was necessary for their being, and being maintained, in this place. It is not priesthood with God for mercy and help for feeble man, perfect in conscience with God, but feeble as man here; not failure calling for advocacy and cleansing as 1 John 2 and John 13. It is the Son looking to the Father to keep in, and fit for, His place on earth, those whom He had put there (vers. 1-8) when He had gone on high glorified. Only the three last verses add a heavenly character to their joy: the rest is their place here, even in glory: this is the Father's house. But Jesus is Son here, not properly Priest or Advocate. Only the Son, while God, and one with the Father, never from chapter 1: 14 gets out of His place as Man in John, but receives all as such. I can only give the suggestions of the great leading principles. You must study the passages with that help which alone can make us understand the word, and but and is never refused to those who, not in searching merely in all things, seek His face. He gives to all men liberally upbraids not.
F G Patterson, Philippians 3: 3. I do not think the sense materially altered by qew' [Text. Rec.] or qeou'; because if it is pneuvmati it is qeou', and if laptevuonte", it is qew' whether the words be there or not. Only pneuvmati is more my state. I confess in spite of great authorities -- Alford says Text. Rec. may have preserved it. Of new authorities a has qeou', but Porphyrian ( a new good MS. published by Tischendorf) has qew' . So has D (Claromontanus) and has been corrected. Vulgate and Italic have both, Deo. So Augustine, save where he makes use of it for special objects. So Tertullian. Ambrose has Dei; but he, too, has a special object and appeals to Greek copies. But Aug. and Amb. have it wrong at any rate, spiritui Dei, namely, "serving God's spirit," their object being the doctrine of the Spirit. This is the diplomatic evidence -- the internal I judge to be for qew' . I see that Delveth, a very clear head, takes it up just as I have done. If you can get hold of Sabatier, you will find the Latin part of the subject pretty fully there.
The middle bavptisai and ajpovlousai (Acts 22: 16) has nothing particular. It was Paul's act to Arise and be baptised; self is the "arise" in his doing it. The ajpov governs self as in such cases: he could not actively baptise himself, yet it is an exhortation to him to get it done. Lassen sie taufen, "have yourself baptised." So in 1 Corinthians 10: 2 (where, however, a A C D etc. have passive -- not B and what I call P). It is the only accurate tense in either case, as Paul is called on to act in the case, but to receive reflexively. It is the receptive force (so Meyer and Alford) of the middle; as, 'I will hear,' namely, I receive a sound in myself. Actively he could not bavptize seautovn; passive was wholly out of place, because he was directed to be active. Acts 10: 47-48, it is passive because the orders are given about them. 1 Corinthians 10 is more significant: the following word is active; they took the profession on themselves.
As to Hebrews 11: 10 -- I take the "city" to be very general in contrast with tents (verse 9) -- a stranger in the land. But the only city is the heavenly Jerusalem -- itself a figure. It is not "a city," but "the city." In verse 16 it is a city, where the promise is more defined. They look for patrivda . But it is a permanent abode God has prepared for them. I do not see it said of them that they are the city, but they will enjoy it.
I am very thankful you were refreshed. I find my own quiet here a great blessing, for my work (besides study work) is with souls.
Affectionately yours in the Lord.
[L Pilson] DEAR BROTHER, -- Save giving the room they, the assembly, have nothing to do with testimony, though it be altogether happier to do it in fellowship. I say it only when the question is raised. Gifts are in the church, and one teaches at Ephesus or Corinth or wherever he may be by God's will. I feel it a totally different thing to speak when the saints are assembled as such, and when I stand alone speaking in my gift to people. I say this because the question has been raised here in England too. In one place, I believe, at this moment they are starving through this false notion. Whether an assembly asks any one to do it is a matter as to principle which depends on them. If they deny the individual exercise of the gift by an individual as such, they are denying the authority and title of the Holy Ghost who distributes as He wills, and Christ's too, whom such are servants of in this gift. All this is a mischievous delusion of Satan. It is a denial of the true liberty and title of the Holy Ghost. If the assembly prefer open meetings and have only one day in a hired room, I have not a word to say; I should fall in with the general desire. But if they reject the individual exercise of gift it is utterly false and pernicious. There could not be if this were true, Christ could not call, an apostle; nor the apostle, if He did, act out of the assembly. The gross absurdity of it in the case of an evangelist is evident, and the exercise of all gifts is alike under the authority of Christ, and ordered in the word.
As to an individual having the care of getting some one to do it, that is a matter of the desire and love to souls of the assembly, who may wish there should be evangelising or teaching. If the room is theirs, and they do not like it, of course no one has a title to do it. If they wish it, it is a matter of service according to their wish. Outside this love and care for sinners or saints on the part of the assembly, a person's coming, or seeking a person, is an individual matter. The assembly has no business to meddle save as in all things of common interest among the saints of God.
At present I am tied, getting the New Testament printed. When that is done, if in these countries, I may well see you all, and shall be glad to do so.
Your affectionate brother in Christ.
Dear F Cavenagh, -- It is far better that -- should give up the position he is in. Let the brethren pay for their room ... and use it as they like, beyond meeting in it. If they pay for the room they have a right to dispose of it: that has nothing to do with my ministry. Their getting some one to be active in getting a lecturer, is merely their confidence in the individual. If there was not liberty when the assembly meets as an assembly that is another matter. -- only proves by his tract that he knows nothing about what has passed at Plymouth. There was no such question there ever raised in any way. But as to the principles there I am decided. If Christ has thought proper to give me a gift, I am to trade with my talent as His servant, and the assembly has nothing to do with it: I am not their servant at all. If they wish me to teach them I will teach, but I do not go as into an assembly, but to teach those who are disposed to hear. I exercise my individual gift, the assembly has nothing to do with me. I refuse peremptorily to be its servant. If I do or say anything as an individual, calling for discipline, that is another matter; but in trading with my talent, I act neither in nor for an assembly, rejoiced to do it in fellowship with them. If -- 's doctrine was right, an evangelist could never exercise his gift at all, for he cannot really in an assembly as such. A teacher is just as much a servant of Christ as the evangelist, and bound to wait on his teaching. I believe it an effort of the enemy to deny ministry as service to the Lord.
In an assembly I may teach, but I do not go as a teacher: I may not open my mouth, or merely pray, I am merely one of the assembly. When I go to teach, I go individually to exercise my gift, and not into an assembly at all; and if this be denied, the authority of Christ and the liberty of the Spirit [are denied] to substitute for them the authority of the assembly. Difficulty was made here at one of the meetings, and I am going this day to lecture, the assembly having rejected the idea; and the brother who had the difficulty was silenced by their asking him did he not go and hold meetings in the country -- which he did. Why should you object, they said, here? The Lordship of Christ is denied by those who hold these ideas; they want to make the assembly or themselves lords. If I am Christ's servant, let me serve Him in the liberty of the Spirit. They want to make the servants of Christ the servants of the assembly, and deny individual service as responsible to Christ. I do not go into the assembly when I go to teach or to evangelise, nor am I aware that Lord of the assembly is a scriptural idea at all; if it be it can be shewn me, I do not recollect it; but my liberty in the Spirit and my responsibility to Christ I will not surrender to any one, or any assembly. But you have complicated it with the room. It is far better -- should give up the control of the room if the assembly pays for it. If the assembly as such wish for a teacher to lecture, -- has no right to hinder them; who is he to control the whole assembly in it? But let the assembly do it, if the assembly pay for the room.
There is full liberty. Paul takes Timothy; Apollos will not go where Paul wishes, and Barnabas gets Paul to come; and if they were teaching and preaching, why should not those gifted now? And if Paul and Barnabas were guided of the Spirit, why may not, in their measure, teachers be guided now? Who sent Titus to Crete, or left Timothy in Ephesus? They will say it was apostolic authority. Be it so; but do not let them pretend it is contrary to the liberty of the Spirit in those who serve. Paul went into the synagogue as his manner was; it was an arrangement. He separated the disciples, and discoursed daily in the school of one Tyrannus. This was arranged, and a lecture. Did this destroy the liberty of the Spirit? I am perfectly clear that all this is an attempt of the enemy to destroy the liberty of the Spirit, and the authority of Christ over His servants, and introduce another authority into the church of God. But do not mix this question up with a right over the room. If the assembly in fact pay for it, the room is in fact given up to them, let them dispose of it, and -- retire. If he lends the room to them on the old ground let him do so, and pay for it, or rent it to them, and they have nothing to say to it at any other time. But do not mix up the money title to a room with the title of Christ to dispose of His servants as He pleases ... . Leave the room to the assembly who pay for it, and let the assembly have lectures or not as they wish in their room. I am free to act without consulting them in my service to Christ: they are not the masters of the Lord's servants.
November, 1870
[G Biava] [From the French.] DEAR BROTHER, -- You ask for a few words upon the apostasy. I do not hold to the word apostasy. It expresses the open renunciation of Christianity rather than the abandonment of its principles by those who have made a profession of it. But the thing, as to the reality of it, is of all-importance for heart and conscience. So long as the word was applied only to the votaries of Romanism, one would have had no difficulty about using it; but when it is understood that if this falling away of Christendom has come, the effect of it has been universal, one is shocked by the use of the word.
The open apostasy, then, has not yet come; but the giving up of the authority and efficacy of the word, and of faith in the presence of the Holy Ghost, the substituting the authority of the clergy for the immediate rights of the Lord over the conscience, the denial of justification by faith, and the putting the efficacy of the sacraments in the place of the work of the Holy Spirit -- in a word, the full development of "the mystery of iniquity" -- shews us an abandonment of the first condition of the church, and of the principles upon which it was founded, which is a moral apostasy. As John says, "You have heard that antichrist shall come: even now there are many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time." Thus the apostasy, in the sense of a public giving up of Christianity, has not come; but the spirit of the apostasy manifests itself, not only in the development of the mystery of iniquity, but in the giving up of Christianity and of the authority of the word, and of Christ Himself, which characterises half the population of Western Europe -- rationalism, as it is called, and the spirit of rebellion which accompanies it. The thoughts of man have taken the place of the word of God; they will no longer have its authority: the will of man will no longer have the authority of Christ. If the antichrist is not there, antichrists have been there long since; if the apostasy is not there, the spirit of apostasy has long since taken hold upon the mind of men.
But I said it was a serious matter. If the assembly -- for the word "church" is very misleading, since we ask ourselves what the church is -- if the assembly of God has not kept its first estate, if it has said, "My Lord delayeth his coming," and has begun to beat the servants, and to eat and drink and be drunken -- and it has done this for a long time, for centuries -- it will be cut in sunder and will have its portion with the hypocrites. It is said that Christ built His assembly upon the rock, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. This I believe, thank God, with all my heart. But this has nothing to do with the question. That which Christ built, indeed, will not be overthrown by the enemy; surely not. It is a question of what man has built, in that case it is not so. "I," says Paul, "as a wise master-builder, have laid the foundation ... but let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon." There it is the responsibility of man, which in some sort -- in a certain sense altogether -- enters into the question of the building. It is indeed the building of God, the apostle says, but it is built under the responsibility of man: a present thing upon the earth. It is not a question here of the salvation of individuals, but of the condition of the system in which those individuals are. When the end of Judaism under the first covenant came, pious souls -- believers -- were transferred to the church. God made an end of the dispensation for ever. At the close of the christian dispensation the faithful will be taken to heaven, and judgment will put an end to the system in which they were previously. Nothing is more simple. The old world perished; Noah and his family were saved. The judgment of a system does not touch God's faithfulness, if it does not prove it by making apparent that He keeps His own even when all around them sink under the weight of His judgment. But what can be more solemn than the judgment of that which God established on the earth, that which had been dear to Him? If Jesus could weep over Jerusalem, how deeply ought His people to feel the thought of the coming judgment of that which had a value far more precious than even Jerusalem. It is thus that Jeremiah, the vessel of the lamentations of the Spirit of God under the old economy, in words of rare and touching beauty, shews his deep grief in view of the ruin of that which belonged to God: "The Lord has violently taken away his tabernacle, as if it were of a garden: he has destroyed his places of the assembly ... . The Lord has cast off his altar, he has abhorred his sanctuary." (Lamentations 2: 6, 7.) This is the spirit in which the faithful one ought to think of the ruin of that which names the name of Christ.
But you will say: Yes, certainly; when it was a question of Judaism, that is plain; but it could not happen to Christianity. In the first place, that is just what the unbelieving Jews in the days of Jeremiah said: "The law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet" -- a false confidence this, which brought destruction upon the people and upon the holy city. But there is more than this; it is precisely against this very false confidence that Paul (Romans 11) solemnly warns Christians from among the Gentiles, that is to say, as drawing a parallel between the Jews and Christendom. "Behold then the goodness and severity of God: upon them who have fallen, severity; upon thee, goodness, if thou continue in. his goodness, otherwise thou also shalt be cut off." That is to say, the Christian system among the Gentiles is subject to the same judgment as the Jewish system. If the Gentiles, who stand only by faith, do not continue in the goodness of God, they will suffer a like fate with the Jews. Is Romanism the "continuing in the goodness of God"? Are "perilous times" the result of "continuing in the goodness of God;" or is the "form of godliness, denying the power of it" from which the Christian must "turn away" (2 Timothy 3)? If the apostle could say, "All seek their own, not the things of Jesus Christ" -- is that "continuing in the goodness of God"? If the apostle foresaw that after his departure, evil would immediately intrude itself, the strong hand of the apostle being no longer there to keep the door shut against the adversary; if Jude was compelled to say that those who were the subjects of judgment had already crept into the church; if John had said they had left the Christians, had gone out from them -- a step beyond that of which Jude speaks -- that there were many antichrists, and that by this they might know that it was the last times; if Peter announces to us that "the time was come that judgment should begin at the house of God" -- does all this lead us to believe that the Gentiles have continued in the goodness of God, or that the Christian system established among the Gentiles would be terminated by judgment, the terrible judgment of God; that as to outward profession it is a question of drinking of the cup of His unmingled wrath, or of being spued out of His mouth as nauseous because of its lukewarmness? This is what is so solemn for our consciences. Shall we, as a system, come under God's judgment? The faithful will assuredly enjoy a far more excellent portion, a heavenly glory, but the christian system, as a system on the earth, will be cut off for ever.
With regard to the passages quoted from Mons. Bost, what he says is entirely false. The scriptures speak of the assembly as the habitation of God down here. The whole question lies here. In a house, the question is not of union but of dwelling. With regard to the body of Christ, it could not have dead members. We may deceive men, but in very truth he who is united to the Head is one Spirit. The body is formed by the baptism of the Holy Spirit. (1 Corinthians 12) Then, Christ builds a house which will not be complete till the last stone shall have been placed in it; it grows to be a holy temple in the Lord. But we have seen that down here the building being committed to men, it may be that the house is badly built, and will draw down the judgment of God upon what has been done. That the church has been placed as the pillar and ground of the truth, and that she is still responsible to keep that place, is quite another thing from saying that she has kept it.
Now the first Epistle to Timothy depicts for us the order of the house of God, and how man should behave himself in the house of God. Has he then behaved thus? -- this is the question. If he has done so, whence then the papacy? The second Epistle to Timothy directs the conduct of the faithful when confusion has come in. Already christian things were no longer in the condition in which they had been formerly. At the beginning, "the Lord added to the assembly daily such as should be saved." They were manifested, and were added in the sight of the world to a well-known body. Now when the apostle writes his second Epistle to Timothy, this was already changed. All he can say is, "the Lord knows them that are his:" they might indeed be hidden from man, as the seven thousand were from Elijah. But along with this, there is a rule for the faithful one, "Let every one that nameth the name of the Lord depart from iniquity." Then comes the thought of the great house. We must expect to find in a great house vessels to dishonour as well as vessels to honour, but again there is a rule for the faithful one. He must purify himself from the vessels to dishonour, and not only so, he must "follow righteousness, faith, love, peace, with those that call on the Lord out of a pure heart" In this state of disorder I cannot know, as at the beginning, all those who belong to God; but as to my own walk, I am to associate with those who have a pure heart. Further, in chapter iii., the apostle teaches us that in the last days perilous times shall come, when, under the form of godliness, its power shall be denied. This is not avowed apostasy, for there is a form of godliness; but it is real moral apostasy -- the power of it is denied. M. Bost says, I ought to remain in it and be content with it; the apostle bids me "from such turn away" -- whom shall I obey?
When he tells me that "it is impossible to distinguish those who are truly faithful from those who make an outward profession," and the apostle says, Let him who names the name of the Lord withdraw from iniquity, and tells me that I must purify myself from the vessels to dishonour and follow after christian graces with those that call on the Lord out of a pure heart how can I listen to one who tells me that it is not possible to distinguish? If he tells me that there may be many souls, known by the Lord, whom I do not recognise; I reply, undoubtedly: the Lord knows those that are His. But I have directions for my conduct in this state of things which contradict yours. I am to recognise and associate myself with those that call on the Lord out of a pure heart; consequently to distinguish them. I am to purify myself from the vessels to dishonour; consequently to distinguish them. I am to turn away from those who have the form of godliness, but deny the power of it; I must then clearly recognise those who are such.
Further, it is a frightful principle to say that we cannot distinguish between the children of God and the people of the world -- besides it is not true -- a frightful principle, for it is said, "By this shall all know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another": now, if I cannot discern them, I cannot love them, and the testimony which God would have is lost. In the next place, it is not true practically, for we enjoy brotherly fellowship, and every faithful Christian makes a difference between a child of God and one who is not. There are some that we do not discern and that God knows: this is not denied. But in this respect the passages which I have quoted from 2 Timothy guide us. What would become of family affection if a father were to say to his children, You cannot tell who are your brothers and who are not; you must associate with everybody, without any distinction whatever?
I do not look into dictionaries, as they tell us to do, but into the hearts and consciences of those who love the Lord, taking the word of God that I may see what was the state of the church at the beginning, and what it is now; and what that word says to inform us as to what the church would become in the last times. The word is as clear as can be as to the decline of the church, and the character of the last times, and as to the setting aside of the christian system. The word is clear enough as to the unity which should subsist as a testimony borne to the world, that it might believe. (John 17) If a letter were addressed by the apostle to the church of God which is at Turin, who would obtain the letter at the Post Office except those of the Roman system? The church, as it was at the beginning, no longer exists. Call it what you will provided that the heart feels that you have at heart the glory of the Lord trodden under foot by men. If the present state of the church is not the great beast which is spoken of the indifference of conscience which can say so, and cavil a to the use of the word, is the most obvious proof of that lukewarmness which in the end causes Christ to spue the church out of His mouth.
Besides, there is nothing in this failure of the assembly by what is in keeping with the history of man from the beginning. As soon as man was left to himself, he fell, and, unfaithful in his ways, has fallen from his first estate, to which he has never returned. God does not restore it, but He gives salvation by redemption and introduces man into an infinitely more glorious condition in the second Man Jesus Christ. When Noah was saved in the destruction of the whole world, the first thing that we read after his sacrifice is that he gets drunk. When the law was given, before Moses had come down from the mount, Israel had made the golden calf. The first day after the consecration of Aaron, his sons offered strange fire, and entrance into the holy of holies was forbidden to Aaron except on the day of atonement: he never wore his robes of glory and beauty there. David's chief son, Solomon, a type of the Lord fell into idolatry, and the kingdom immediately fell. God's patience was gloriously displayed in all these cases, but the system which God had established was set aside as a system connected with Him -- less obviously in the case of Noah because a formal relationship did not exist in the same way But the confusion of Babel put an end to the order of the world, and tyranny and wars came in. But with regard to man -- Israel, the priesthood, the kingdom -- whatever God's patience may have been, man fell at once, and the system was never restored on the old footing. It is not surprising if this is found again in the history of the church, in as far as it is placed under the responsibility of man. It has said, "My Lord delayeth his coming," and has begun to beat the menservants and the maidservants and to join itself to the world. It will be cut off.
The grand principle of Romanism, and of other systems which are more or less like it, and which makes them essentially false, is that they attribute to Christendom -- the assembly organised by means of ordinances -- the stability and the unfailing privileges which belong only to that which Christ has built, to that which is the work of the Holy Spirit. All kinds of false doctrines are the result of this error; one is born of God, a member of the body of Christ -- then one perishes: one is pardoned -- and lost. That is what the article in the Vedetta Cristiana comes to, what the passage quoted by M. Bost involves. He forgets one of the two principal characteristics of the church according to the word, precisely the one where the responsibility of man comes in; that is, of being the habitation of God on the earth. He shews us the title that Ephesians 1 gives us, and overlooks that of Ephesians ii.; then he shews us the condition in which the church now is, not surely composed of true members of Christ, without accounting for it, and without giving any information about the matter that might enable us to know whether it is good or bad -- whence it comes, where it will end, or how the word judges of this state of things. The expressions which he uses are equivalent to those of the unbelieving Jews in Jeremiah's time -- "We are delivered to do all these abominations." No one can say that the state of the church of Christendom is at all in any respect, such as we find it in the word. At the beginning there was no Romanism, no National Church, no Dissenters. There was the church of God, and nothing else; which, it will be said, became very quickly corrupted. Be it so. Has it taken place? But there was a church to corrupt, an assembly into which some men had slipped. Was this corruption a good thing, or does it not bring judgment? Has it not made frightful progress since? Has the church of God been re-established on earth? Ought I to mourn over it? Should I not search in the world to see what its end will be, and pay attention to this? We have quoted this word, let each one judge before God what it says. If we are in grievous times, has not the word given us principles by which we may trace the way in which we ought to walk? If any one has the conviction that we are in those sad times of which he reads in 2 Timothy 2, 3, and will be before God, who has given us those principles, in full confidence in Christ, the result as to his conviction will not be doubtful. May he know how to walk with God!
Let us remember that in every position in which the first Adam failed, man has been gloriously restored in the Second. But this is a subject, interesting as it is, upon which I cannot enter here.
Make any use you like of what I have written, dear brother. I have written hurriedly; from seven in the morning till twelve at night, always at work: meetings every day, then other work of all kinds in correcting new editions of the English and French New Testaments, often at the same time. The brethren are going on well. I did not know who had sent me La Vedetta till I received your letter. It comes a little late, but that does not much matter. The subject is always important. But ever set forth the gospel rather than controversy. I have been writing on Romans; you may find something there which has not yet come out.
Dearest A Ord, -- Your letter was received at the moment of my departure from Pau, and I have been in movement ever since, latterly afoot, which with reading meetings the morning, and preachings the evening, pretty much precludes writing.
Death entered by sin [Romans 5: 12]; sin is taken abstractedly the thing, sin, even personified, which is the highest figurative form of abstraction. The ejfj w| is a common Graecism for a condition, meaning for the existence of something, but which is not the cause, and for the principle on which it exists, though not the cause. Our breathing, or having air, is such a condition. So we are called ejn aJgiasmw'.+ It is the condition of our existence, not precedent but condition, as that without which the calling would not be what it is. Sin by Adam introduced death, but the sin of each is the state of things in which death works, as we say in French, moyennant. Pavnte" hmarton is not merely sin in the nature; there is culpability of which the conscience can take notice.
As regards crovnwn aijwnivwn (Titus 1: 2), it is not to be doubted that associated with other words aijwnivo" has the sense sometimes of what is not properly eternal; it is the whole period designated by the subject: but as a word it means eternal. I might reply to a child who asked did I lend or give him something for ever, that it was for ever, though the thing was perishable; this does not change the meaning of 'for ever'; it is an unrecalled gift. I apprehend that pro; crovnwn aijwnivwn refers to that eternal purpose which was in the secret of God's mind, or to which He was engaged, unknown to the creature, before any revealed age, including the eternity in which we are in relationship with Him, was brought out into existence by God to whom there is no time. This is not foreign to, that is, does not exclude, embraces, your 'eternity commencing with creation'; but gives another idea to the expression. The "in due times manifested his word by preaching" precludes, I apprehend, any application to a promise merely, before the execution in the age to come. Many promises have been given in time, to encourage God's people in their course; but this was a counsel and promise before any of the ages in which His government is displayed on earth. It was a promise, and then a word manifested above and without the government of God, though that government might be applied to the details of its accomplishment, as has been the case. Hence, I judge, he speaks of its being specially committed to him; whereas the gospel as revealing Christ in connection with the promises made to the fathers was rather committed to Peter.
As regards taking up Morris's doctrine, I am not fond of taking up certain heresies needlessly. It is not that I doubt that it is untrue, and miserably untrue, but there are certain metaphysical heresies which disappear before the fulness of Christ much more than before controversy; and often discussing them raises questions where they were not. I doubt much that the course pursued with Morris (it was at Ebrington Street after I left) was in any way guided by the Spirit. He is quite outside; and it would have to be met better, I judge, in individual cases ... .
I judge that the brethren have to begin their Nazariteship over again. I apprehend W.'s attack on Bethesda was a misapprehension of the whole state of the brethren, and of God's dealings with them; but God has used it for His own purposes. The result of the Plymouth affair ought to have given to see that the brethren's place was a quiet guarding of their own consistency with their own position, and a healing, very patient, restoration in their own gatherings, which a gracious hand introducing Christ might have done. Attacking that which had human force was like shooting with a crazy, broken weapon. It was not conscience of the state in which the brethren were; God could not accept it, though He might use it as a chastisement of their pride, as He has done; but it was to begin with it anew; and I believe on much better, stronger, and holier ground. But the result of what was done could not be any other, and God's hand is plainly manifested in it; but this is what gives me confidence. It is His hand; His quickening power never fails where He acts. If the ark is taken, David and Solomon are raised up: if Jesus Himself is rejected, it is that He may be raised. We cannot lay our poor body in the dust in the weakness of death, but that we may be raised up glorious and new, and yet it is we are raised up. I believe the real testimony, as God gave it to me at the beginning, and of which I never felt rightly the value, the brethren had failed to maintain, and they were not in the capacity of testimony, whatever the immediate occasion of the judgment, and that the test of revival will be greatly the capacity of that testimony. Of this I have no doubt. It is not a question of new truth to me, but of the place this truth takes in the creed of the church.
We treated the seven churches (Revelation 2, 3) at Annonay with much interest, and, I believe, help from above. The Church of England has nothing to do with the matter, for it never had any pretension to be a church at all in any scriptural sense of the word; it is a great unformed mass arranged by men, with many children of God doubtless in it. It is important, specially in these days, to see things as they are. The seven churches do not treat the subject of discipline by them, because they speak of Christ's judgment pronounced on them without any question of a subject (unsuited at such a time) of the means amply treated elsewhere -- or the means to be employed for avoiding the being subject to such a judgment. It is not the subject; and with the purpose of the Holy Ghost which I judge to be unfolded there, as do the mass of Christians -- that is, to apply it to the history of the church professing in all ages -- it would have been quite beside the object; but even for present instruction to the church it was not the matter treated. It is Christ's judgment of the churches, not the means they were to employ, already well known, of dealing with evil when in their regular state as a church; if they were out of it, and incapable of remedy, the candlestick would be removed. The body of Christ is in no way the subject of the seven churches. It is not the subject of judgment and removal. No communication of grace is ever found in the seven churches; responsibility is what is treated, threatenings, promises, all that acts upon responsibility, but nothing of communicated grace. The Holy Ghost directs the church according to the mind of Christ: Christ judges that which bears His name.
I have written to -- , but merely in a few words, judging the monstrous inconsistency and foolishness of his tract on the seven churches. I have only said that the whole matter rested on proving that Bethesda was such a church, which is assumed, and without which his argument was not worth a straw. Peace be with you; love to all the brethren.
Your affectionate brother in Christ.]
+[ ouj ga;r ejkavlesen hJma" oJ qeo;" ejpi; ajkaqarsiva, ajllj ejn aJgiasmw. 1 Thess 4: 7 ]
[From the Italian.] G Biava, You ask why I 'believe that the seven churches give us the history of the whole church.' I will not say I believe; I believe what God has said; my faith is in the word of God itself; what it says I believe. But we can have our understandings enlightened by the Holy Spirit in order to understand what has been written in this word, and set it before our brethren as a matter of knowledge, not of faith. I think, then, as many other Christians do, and, as far as I am concerned, I have no doubt that this series of churches applies as history to the moral successive state of the whole church; the first four to the history of the church from its first decline to its present condition in popery; and the last three, from Sardis to Laodicea, are the history of Protestantism. If you examine the structure of Revelation, you find it is divided into three parts. Read chapter 1: 19: "Write the things which thou hast seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall be hereafter," literally, "after these." Now "the things after these" (or "hereafter") begin in chapter 4. "The things which thou hast seen" precede evidently "the things which are" since the prophet has seen them; so "the things which are" are in chapters 2 and 3. In chapter 4 the throne of judgment is placed in heaven, not the throne of grace to which we draw near with boldness; from this throne proceeded lightnings, etc., the signs of judgment. Now the judgments which proceed from this throne fall on the earth. The church is not seen still in the world, but in heaven, seated upon thrones around the throne of God. It comes with Christ and all the saints in chapter 19. These things are not the things which are, but those that come after these. "The things which are" refer therefore to the church looked on as placed under the responsibility of man and judged by the Lord; and the Lord is seen, not as head of His body, not as a Priest to intercede for us, and to help our infirmities, but as a Judge: He is not serving, but He walks in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks to see what is the true condition of each, and to pronounce His sentence. however, the series is presented as a whole. It begins with the first decline of the church, and goes on to the Lord's coming, and to the judgment of the church; whether it is judged, and the kingdom and the morning star are substituted for it, or spued out of the Lord's mouth. That this series is looked on as a whole is confirmed by the force of the number seven in the word. It is a whole during the time of the apostle and the things that take place when God intervenes to judge the world, begin in chapter 6 after the throne is set in chapter 4, and the Lamb has taken the book in chapter 5. It is not, however, a whole at the same time, because the state of each church is different. Still, if we examine the church of Philadelphia, we find that a time of tribulation is spoken of which shall come upon all the world, and the Lord adds, "Behold, I come quickly": this cannot apply to the church of Philadelphia alone. I have already drawn attention to the church of Thyatira, where those who are faithful are to maintain their fidelity until the Lord comes. If we believe -- and for myself, I do not doubt it -- that chapters 6 relate the history of the judgments of God and of the Lamb after the throne of judgment has been set in chapters 4 and 5, then it is certain the seven churches, "the things which are," give the history of the church from the beginning till the end, until the Lord comes to take it away, and gather it round Himself, in order that the saints should come with the Lord to judge the world, and reign over it.
Now if we believe this, there are some points which may guide our intelligence, and confirm the justness of this way of thinking. The series begins with the decline of the church. It is necessary to observe, that these pictures of the church are not the history of the operations of God. God does not judge His own work, but when it has had its share in bringing about the result, then God judges this result; and that is what we find here. The Lord is not a servant in grace; He is not the Head of His body, and the source of grace and strength for His own as normally; but He wears a garment down to His feet, and He walks in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks to examine their condition. But man is not faithful, and the Lord finds that the church has left its first love. Through the faithfulness of God, persecutions follow; then corruption, and false and corrupt teaching. Then we find, not one teacher who teaches error and deceives the disciples, but that the woman Jezebel not only seduces, but is the mother of the corrupt; in the external church the children of corruption are born. Not only this, we find this solemn word, "And I gave her space to repent of her fornication, but she repented not." Then comes His judgment: there is still time for those who commit adultery with her, but for her children, nothing save judgment. The faithful are exhorted to maintain their fidelity until the coming of the Lord. Then the kingdom and the morning star are substituted for the external church. Thus the history of the church in its responsibility is related from the first decline until its end, brought about by the coming of the Lord, who judges corrupt Jezebel, and her children, and establishes the kingdom and the heavenly glory in their stead.
But in this case, what are the last three churches? I do not doubt that they represent Protestantism. The church of Sardis is not guilty of the horrible corruption of Jezebel, but she has a name to live, and yet she is dead; she is to be treated like the world -- solemn judgment. Compare 1 Thessalonians 5: 4; Revelation 3: 3. Philadelphia walks with little strength, but waits for the Lord's coming, and keeps the word of His patience; and she shall be kept from the day of temptation which shall come upon all the world. Then Laodicea is to be spued out of the mouth of the Lord. Thus we have the history of the external church upon the earth, and the sad result in the hands of men of the grace of God, but to be so much the more a witness of the patience and of the faithfulness of God towards His own.
I send only a few general principles. The understanding of the truth on this point depends on the explanation of all the ways of God towards the church and towards the world.
I send, dearest brother, a few lines on the seven churches -- not a finished explanation; but points that may be meditated on if the truth is sought: you can use it as you wish ...
[G Biava] [To the same.] [From the Italian.] 1. The word "everlasting"+ signifies that this order was not provisional and temporary, but established by God for all time, until there should no longer be a priest: ml[ (Olam) is thus used. If there were no longer a priest upon earth, the order would no longer have its application.
2. In the Old Testament the veil of the tabernacle was not yet rent, and God was not yet fully revealed. For this reason the standard was not so severe, so high; thus divorce was permitted if the wife did not please her husband: other things, likewise, were allowed which are not allowed in Christianity. But there is another difference. The opposition of the flesh to the Spirit was not known before the death of Christ as it has been known since. A man could say, 'This is forbidden,' and yet know that his heart desired it, but he could not say, 'This comes from the flesh, and not from the Spirit, it is wrong, I cannot do it.' Thus in this very case the Lord says, when He forbids swearing, "But let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay: for whatsoever is more than these cometh from the evil one," or "of evil." So it is swearing from the evil, the levity of the heart, not swearing before a magistrate who is ordained by the authority of God, which is forbidden. If I am in Christ the life of Christ is the only and perfect rule of my life.
3. The whole truth of the gospel depends upon the distinction which is pointed out in these words. [John 1: 17.] The law requires from man what man ought to be, in order to be righteous before God. The Lord Jesus Christ is and has done all that was needed to save a sinner. The law was not given, it did not come by Him. He owned all its authority; He fulfilled it morally in His life; as to its typical meaning, for example the sacrifices, the priestly office, and in many other points, it has been fulfilled in what He has done, or in what He is now doing, or even in what He will do in time to come. But the grace that saves and quickens, and the truth that gives light and makes all things seen as they are, came by Jesus Christ. The law can neither save nor quicken; it cannot take away sins; it can impute them and it brings a curse, but Christ has been made a curse for us, and grace flows freely according to the righteousness of God: we share in this righteousness; we are made the righteousness of God in Him. "Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth." We are "set free from the law, being dead to that in which we were held." The authority of the law is not weakened, but we have died in the death of Christ, and the law has dominion over a man as long as he is alive. But we are dead and the law cannot apply to a dead man: we have been crucified with Christ. The death of Christ confirms the law as nothing else does since it announces its curse, but we believers are set free from the law because we have died with Christ; we are dead to sin as to the law and alive to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Grace and truth have in no way come by the law, but by Jesus Christ the Son of God. The law was not annulled by His coming, but fulfilled: we are not under law but under grace. We do not sin because we have died with Christ; we have died to sin, to the law, by the body of Christ, This is true liberty, being made free from sin that we may live unto God in the new life which we have received from Christ, strengthened by the power of the Holy Ghost, Christ being the only object of our life.
4. The absolutely perfect and living rule is the life of the Lord Jesus Christ. In Him all written rules are united in one solitary living example; but the written rule which ought to govern our whole life is the New Testament. The Old Testament gives the most precious light, and illuminates the path of Christians by the light of divine faith working in hearts; still, before the rending of the veil, it could not be said, "The true light now shineth," save in the life of Jesus Christ: He was the light of the world. For this reason when the Holy Ghost gives as examples of walking in the path of faith, the faithful of the Old Testament, He adds, "Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of faith." The faithful have, each for himself, gone over a little bit of the path of faith: Jesus is the beginner and completer of this path. But whatever be the light that shines in the Old Testament, it is a precious light, and it can, through the faith which is in Christ Jesus, make us wise unto salvation. The precepts of the New Testament furnish a clear, perfect rule adapted to the Christian such as the Old could not do. Christ having suffered with a patience that was perfect, we have learned to walk in the same spirit; "If doing good and suffering, ye shall bear it, this is acceptable with God, for to this have ye been called." "Let the same mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus." He humbled Himself. We are called to walk worthy of the Lord so as to please Him in everything. We must know the Lord in order to walk thus -- "worthy of God who hath called you to his kingdom and glory." This absolutely clear and perfect light is found in the New Testament alone; but the Old, if we have learned to distinguish between the dispensation under which the saints lived in those times, furnishes very fine examples of faith, of obedience, of subjection to the will of God, of constancy in His paths. Happy is he who keeps by His side to learn how one ought to walk, and who understands the riches that are in Christ, the beauty of His ways, to enjoy communion with Him pleasing Him every day more and more.
I send my manuscripts without corrections, and without reading it over; I have not time. You can make use of it as you like, and as will be most useful and profitable.
Yours affectionately in Christ.
+See Exodus 40: 15; Number 25: 13.]
Dear A T Schofield, -- There is no difference between [breaking bread as] a Christian and fellowship, though some may not be always there; because the only fellowship or membership is of the body of Christ, and if a person breaks bread and is thus recognised as a member of the body of Christ, he is subject to all the discipline of the house. I may not enforce constant attendance with us only, because he may come with the desire to shew unity of spirit, and yet think that his ways are more orderly conscientiously. If his heart be pure (2 Timothy 2), I have no reason to exclude him; but if anything in his path require he should be excluded, he is liable to it like any one else. But I know no fellowship other than of membership of the body of Christ. Being met, the question is has he done anything which involves disciplinary exclusion.
Only I believe brethren alone walk in consistency with the fellowship of saints in the unity of the body; but I know no particular corporation as that body -- not even brethren -- nay, these least of all. This would deny themselves. Though they have this, that they meet on the principles of that unity, but for that reason, must own all its members, on the one hand, and maintain its discipline on the other.
Yours affectionately in the Lord.
[From the French.] -- - It is clear to me that a Christian, free to do as he will, could never be a soldier, unless he were at the very bottom of the scale, and ignorant of the christian position. It is another thing when one is forced to it. In such a case the question is this: is the conscience so strongly implicated on the negative side of the question, that one could not be a soldier without violating that which is the rule for conscience -- the word of God In that case we bear the consequences; we must be faithful.
What pains me is the manner in which the idea of one's country has taken possession of the hearts of some brethren. I quite understand that the sentiment of patriotism may be strong in the heart of a man. I do not think that the heart is capable of affection towards the whole world. At bottom, human affection must have a centre, which is 'I.' I can say, 'My country,' and it is not that of a stranger. I say, 'My children,' 'My friend,' and it is not a purely selfish 'I.' One would sacrifice one's life -- everything (not oneself, or one's honour) for one's country, one's friend. I cannot say, 'My world'; there is no appropriation. We appropriate something to ourselves that it may not be ourselves. But God delivers us from the 'I'; He makes of God, and of God in Christ, the centre of all; and the Christian, if consistent, declares plainly that he seeks a country -- a better, that is to say, a heavenly country. His affections, his ties, his citizenship, are above. He withdraws into the shade in this world, as outside the vortex which surges there, to engulph and carry everything away. The Lord is a sanctuary.
That a Christian should hesitate whether he ought to obey or not, I understand: I respect his conscience; but that he should allow himself to be carried away by what is called patriotism -- that is what is not of heaven. "My kingdom," said Jesus, "is not of this world; if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight." It is the spirit of the world under an honourable and attractive form, but wars come from "lusts that war in your members."
As a man I would have fought obstinately for my country, and would never have given way, God knows; but as a Christian I believe and feel myself to be outside all; these things move me no more. The hand of God is in them; I recognise it; He has ordered all beforehand. I bow my head before that will. If England were to be invaded to-morrow, I should trust in Him. It would be a chastisement upon this people who have never seen war, but I would bend before His will.
Many Christians are labouring in the scene of the war; large sums of money have been sent to them. All this does not attract me. God be praised that so many poor creatures have been relieved; but I would rather see the brethren penetrating the lanes of the city, and seeking the poor where they are found every day. There is far more self-abnegation, more hidden service, in such work. We are not of this world, but we are the representatives of Christ in the midst of the world. May God graciously keep His own.
[From the French] BELOVED BROTHER, -- I do not believe that restoration means the recovery of peace, unless it be peace in the consciousness of the favour of God, which is enjoyed anew in the soul -- the re-establishment of liberty of heart with God. One meets with cases where a Christian has fallen, yet in nowise doubts his salvation, or the efficacy of the blood of Christ; but the heart has got to a distance from God, has not the sense of what sin is, such as the presence of God always gives.
Now to be truly restored, the Christian must recognise the point of departure where his soul gave up communion with God, and sought its own will. It was thus with Peter. The Lord does not reproach him with his fault, but says to him, "Lovest thou me more than these?" That was the point where his soul had turned aside from the right way, where self had shewn itself, confidence in himself. The Lord probes Peter's heart, and makes known to him the undercurrent of pride and false confidence which was found there. Until that moment Peter was not restored, although on the way to be so. When a brother in fellowship has fallen, and has sincerely acknowledged his fault as an evil, even when he may have been reinstated, he is always in danger of falling again if he has not judged the root of it. It is there that he got to a distance from God. Communion with God is not thoroughly re-established, self and its will are not thoroughly broken, as long as the Christian has not found the point where his heart began to lose its spiritual sensibility; for the presence of God makes us feel that. I am not speaking of a matter of memory, but of the state of the soul ... . One meets with cases (where probably true deliverance had never been realised), like that of dear -- , where despair takes possession of one in failure. Then it is a question of finding peace through the blood of Jesus, or at least of power to raise the shield of faith, of confidence in God.
A soul is restored when it enjoys the favour of God, not simply as certainty of salvation, but when the Spirit, instead of accusing, causes it to rejoice in the goodness of God. Restoration is not complete until there is enjoyment of communion with our brethren. I remember having seen horror at having sinned against grace, and at the dishonour done to the name of Christ, as the first effect of the renewed power of the word in the heart: then came the sense that grace has triumphed over all -- blessed be God!
Dearest R Evans, -- I return -- 's letter. As to his statements, I know of no brother who holds that Christ had a life distinct from His communion with God, a life to which sin and death belonged: such a Christ would not be the true Christ at all. It is utterly false doctrine, and I know no one who holds it; and, unless abandoned, should think such a person ought to be excluded from communion. That sin attached to the life He had when on the cross, in the sense that He bore our sins and was made sin for us, is a fundamental doctrine of scripture, but it was He who knew no sin who was made sin, taking it on Himself, or rather having it laid on Him by God, and, as so, bearing it, He laid down His life, or died - this is also is fundamental. Further, that He took life again in a. different condition afterwards is stated in scripture -- "Being raised from the dead dieth no more, death hath no more dominion over him." It was not different as to sinlessness, sinless He always was; but He was "made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death:" now, as Man, He is exalted above all principality and power, and cannot die. Before, He could, for He did, and took manhood to do it -- for the suffering of death took flesh and blood, that through death He might destroy him that had the power of death -- but He was always in relationship with His Father, and in perfect communion, save as drinking the cup on the cross, when He said, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me" -- yet never more perfect than then. If brethren held what he states, I should not blame him for leaving them ... .
Christ making His own generation is dark enough: He was "made ( genovmeno" ) of a woman," but miraculously that there might be no sin; but "of the seed of David according to the flesh," and carefully traced up to Adam in Luke. But when he talks of a generation of light since Seth, and in consideration of their being flesh and blood, Christ took it, he is again away from scripture; for the saved were "sometimes darkness," and then "light in the Lord": there is no generation of light but by grace. Here, though obscurely stated, I am afraid there is something radically unsound. In Colossians "the beginning" is connected with resurrection. That Christ had eternally both life and quickening power I do not doubt, and so when here, and that it was a holy thing that was born of the virgin Mary. That Christ had no connection with the sin of human nature, but was as really a man come in flesh as we are, is fundamental as to the truth. That -- has allowed his mind to act on scripture, and got away from divine teaching, is quite plain, and is in danger of denying the real humanity of the Lord; and as to this 'generation of light' and the like, his mind is dangerously at work, instead of being subject to God. But gracious communicating might restore him: he studies scripture, but trusts his own mind, and that will not do in the things of God.
It may have been anxiety for Christ's personal glory but there is enough, to say the least, unclear, as to the Lord's true humanity, to make one inquire fully what he does hold.
[To the same.] R Evans, He must learn to learn. The passage is very simple and quite right, that though both the wilderness and Canaan make part of the Christian's life, they are very distinct parts; and that so it was in Christ. His joys above were distinct; He lived above in spirit and yet walked in the wilderness below: then, though one acts on the other, and in Him all was perfect, yet were they distinct. The Son of man was in heaven, and the Son of man walked on earth; one reproduced itself in the other, but they were distinct things. It is an evil thing to lean to one's own understanding. We have to learn, and when sound in the faith to suppose others right till we find them wrong.
Dear G V Wigram, -- Dr. W. brought us up word of dear T.'s departure. When I heard she was ill I felt for you. But I think when there is no special cause for distress, I have a happy feeling at those one loves going home. It is a natural kind of feeling of liberation with the Lord, and then an end of conflict and watching; and I suppose as one draws on oneself it seems more home and natural to be there, and you will feel this; but then you are left alone, being accustomed to be surrounded by the kindness of those near and dear to you. Well, you must have to take my path now of lonely service, till He comes to call us, and it is not an unhappy one to be more absolutely with only Him. I know what it is. I mean I know what it is to be alone, but I know, weak as I am, His unfailingness and sufficiency. It is only such and such a thing on the road, and He always the same. I was very fond of T., had known her, as you know, since she was born, and thought, and so did others, she had grown these latter times. I feel it is a great blow for you, but our hope and strength is elsewhere. Mortality is dropped, but otherwise there is no change. Christ remains the same, and service till He comes. Sympathy you will have abundantly, and all will feel it deeply, but even that, right and blessed as it is among His saints, is not our strength. The Lord will be graciously with you.
[R T Grant] BELOVED BROTHER, -- Rejoiced I was to get your letter -- always glad to hear from you, and now doubly, that your letter can tell how the Lord has blessed you. May He still abundantly bless your work, I heartily pray. I do not think if we peacefully pursue our way that opposition is much to be dreaded: of course it is a hindrance to unestablished souls, but if we quietly continue our path without retorting, it by no means follows that the door is closed. That depends on the Lord. In one place the apostle remained long because it was open, and there were many adversaries. What I feel anxious about is the godliness of the brethren, and a sober, lowly spirit with desire of Christ. For this we must pray; and there is One that hears and can bless and loves His church. We are not to be weary in well-doing in due time we shall reap "if we faint not." We lay up our rest and reward, if we may speak of such, to another time, and He keeps it. The principle of Matthew 20. is "whatever is right I will give you," so he went and worked and trusted: trusting Christ is a great matter. I should have very little to shew for my work: I feel it sometimes; think I have not courage enough to face the world, and read, "Herein is my Father glorified that ye bear much fruit, so shall ye be my disciples." But I pretend to nothing, and if I have only His approval, oh how content I should be, yet feel how little I have to deserve it in any sense. But I am sure it is all right, and He will be glorified, and in that I am wholly content.
-- is working under the reaction of an excited though a true work. We must learn to help in such cases. He has to learn in it, as well as care for others: officers have particularly. The signs of an apostle were wrought in much patience, but he is a beloved, dear man. I have a question how far one can look for out and out Christianity in all -- no doubt of what is right, but I fear a kind of despondency as to getting them all out and out with the Lord. A crowd are there never wholly devoted; the first impulse is not there. I am sure one ought not to be disheartened, but go on, and seek all one can, and look for unworldliness. I do not speak of anything pressing here, for in general, with small sorrows in which God's good hand comes in for good, the brethren are getting on happily; there is cordiality and a good deal of willing service, and they are apart from the world -- a great deal to be thankful for. Still there is an energy of initiation of good which is seldom found in a large number ... . I learn there are now some 150 brethren in the navy, in general very fresh and full of life, and they watch over one another in all out stations. The exercise as to their position would come in later ... .
I do not know when I have enjoyed scripture as I have in lecturing on St. Matthew. The Lord has been graciously with me on Colossians and Philippians, and perhaps there was as much for others, but this was Christ Himself for my soul, shewing He must be rejected and His Messiahship replaced by death and resurrection, and the kingdom in mystery, and the church, and glory; but then there is Himself running all through it -- Himself, Jehovah in grace, when there; abiding in grace when rejected; His place on earth, the pattern of ours through redemption; and the disciples,, children of the great King, with Him, but Jehovah, and in a Man, and in grace, always the same; presented to be received, or rejected, He abides the same, and this is very sweet. It gives a resting-place for the soul, a known Person -- may we not say a loved One, though we know "Herein is love, not that we loved him, but that he loved us", "we love him, because he first loved us"; but that word "first" lets the other come in at least. But the joy is in looking at Himself, and seeing what He is, "the chief among ten thousand, ... altogether lovely." Oh! it is blessed and joy to rest on what He is; to be at home with Him, and adoringly so, but confidence, and confidence in the interest He takes always in His people. His heart can say, "Whose own the sheep are not"; and what confidence it gives for service, too! May the Lord keep us faithful! but I speak particularly of having the secret of His love, a ground of confidence in our intercourse with Him, and so go on a little while through the world.
We have had the small-pox raging in London. A few of the saints and their children have had it: one child died, but otherwise the Lord has graciously restored all that were ill as yet, which I count to be a very great mercy. But dear Miss -- has departed with scarlet fever, but it is a comfort in this sorrow that there seems little doubt that it was taken through service to poorer saints in a family where it was. It is a great blow to dear W., yet relieves him from a natural anxiety in leaving her alone behind. He will have abundant sympathy from all. It was very brief indeed, and she soon unconscious. It did not come out at once. I think most felt she had grown in grace these later times. As W. said, the Lord does all things well.
Peace be with you, dear brother, and patience, and endurance in service. You say nothing of your health: I trust it is better. Our brethren in France have suffered less than we might have feared, and down near Montbéliard abound in thanksgiving for the way they have been kept and blessed by the Lord. I hear the Prussians treated them with more respect than did others finding what they were. The work is spreading in Germany, and in Switzerland there is some rousing up and blessing. May the Lord keep the dear saints in Canada near Himself, peaceful sober, and full of love both towards one another and towards all, that they may meet His face with joy.
Ever, beloved -- , affectionately yours.
[H H Snell] MY DEAR BROTHER, -- Though they have suffered they are full of thankfulness for the way God has preserved them. Indeed, round Montbéliard, when the Prussians found the Bible among brethren on their tables, they said "Good people," etc., and protected them. The Prussians were quartered there, of course, and their cattle were taken as provisions. In Paris, too, though they suffered from bad food and cold, they were peaceful and their meetings happy. I am as yet tied to London by my New Translation, though I shall be at Cheltenham (D.V.) at Easter; but I fear shall have hardly finished and must return for a short time.
Your affectionate brother in Christ.
Dear Lucius Pilson, -- Though the natural construction is "are" (Revelation 20. 10), as you might insert "were," or "had been cast," inasmuch as there is no verb, it would not be wise to insist on "are" by itself. It is not "were." If it is not "are" which I think it is, it is "were cast," carrying on the sense of ejblhvqh, but in either case basanisqhvsontai takes them all in.
You are quite right as to "destruction," but some of the annihilationists here do not admit the Lord's coming. If it be admitted, then 2 Thessalonians 1: 9 shews clearly that their use of it is false. But you have only to substitute "annihilated" for the word translated "destroyed," and the absurdity is evident. He came "to seek and to save those who were annihilated!" "O Israel, thou hast annihilated thyself, but I am thy help!" and the like. Secondly, I believe death and hades (Revelation 20: 13) are personified. and that there is no more death or state of separate spirits -- that is, in their separate subsisting condition of power. The power of death which Satan has is finally put an end to. But I have very little doubt that the contents of death and hell are included in them, in contrast with those in the book of life. But do not entangle yourself in volunteering explanations of difficult passages, when plain answers to error are there. The "second death" is explained in the word itself. It is the lake of fire: and in that torment is said to subsist, (not chapter 20: 14) 21: 8. It is -- not causes -- the second death; they have their part in it. If you ask me what I think of the second death, I believe it is the judicial separation of man from God, in the lake of fire, as death was the separation of soul and body. I had to meet one of these men lately, but I find that they quail before the word if it is known. It involves the immortality of the soul, and there can be no guilt or atonement for a mere beast's soul.
The non-subsequent existence of death and hades is merely a consequence drawn from general truth. They merge in the lake of fire. In the language they are personified and nothing is said of their destruction or non-existence there. I add this because they may use it as a plea that it means ceasing to exist. It does not. We find those who are looked at as living beings tormented there. It is therefore not ceasing to exist. When I interpret the passage, their power is absorbed in the lake of fire, as the kingdom in eternal glory in which it ceases to exist; and from that and other sources I see that they cease to exist, but not by the lake of fire as they pretend the wicked do. They could not say death and hades were tormented. I have no doubt at all of the meaning. But it is no proof at all that anything ceases to exist by the lake of fire as a punishment. Such a sense would not be applied to death and hell: nor in any case does torment mean ceasing to exist, for it ceases when the person tormented ceases to exist; that is, the second death is not ceasing to exist, for that is the lake of fire.
I fully hope to be in -- , but I am delayed by my translation being only yet printed to end of 1 Corinthians. The Lord be graciously with you all.
Your affectionate brother in Christ.
Dear F G Patterson, -- My feeling is to let it work itself out. Some who spoke to me were really true in heart. And any others I have known will not, as to discipline, recognise the unity of the body. I should hold fast to this ... . If unity as to discipline be not owned, we are independent churches. When H. B. asked me what was to be done, I said, Bethesda judged or honestly separated from, that is, no one should go there and the meeting openly disowned unless they repented -- guarantee for sound doctrine -- and the unity of the body owned. But their anxiety is for outward adhesion, and such that the worldly camp can be more or less owned. I have no desire for that -- all Christians individually surely owned who walk uprightly. A vast amount of the evangelisation has been by and in connection with brethren, and some of the most efficient are very strong upon the point.
There are those who act in this movement who are, I think, deliberately unfaithful -- I mean by that, who deliberately take an unfaithful path for convenience, some who spoke to me in [Dublin] preferred an evil course. I think in the leaders there is the pretension of a successful revival movement; they will find their level. This has no attraction for me, but there are those who are simple and perplexed by the wickedness of the Bethesdaites.
I feel my part is to remain perfectly quiet and let the Lord work. My conviction is that the movers have not a good conscience, and seek to cover their position under the plea of unity and charity. I am far from pretending brethren have not failed in many things: I do not doubt they have; and therefore it becomes them to go softly, but I have no wish to get into the camp.
Affectionately yours in the Lord.
[From the French] DEAR BROTHER, -- Very little is known of the history of what is called the church -- what is the church as to its responsibility -- and of the conduct of the clergy and indeed of everybody. It is happy to have only the word to follow, and to know that it is the word of God. What an immense mercy to have His word, the revelation of His grace towards us, of Jesus the perfect One, of the counsels of God, and what God has ordained for our glory. It is in His kindness towards us that, in the ages to come, He will shew forth the immense riches of His grace.
From the beginning, trusting the enemy rather than God, man was alienated from God, and the two questions: Where art thou? What hast thou done? shewed where man was as the consequence of it. Responsibility put fully to the test up to the rejection of Christ; then, God glorified in righteousness, His love, and the counsels of His grace from before the foundation of the world have been manifested -- that puts the gospel in a very special place, and then shews the connection of responsibility and sovereign grace with great distinctness. Moreover, there is no longer any veil over the glory of God. Thence, His wrath is revealed from heaven; but also, the glory of God is revealed in the face of Jesus Christ, witness that all the sins of those who behold it exist no longer before God; then, all that God is morally is fully revealed and established. We know Him according to that glory, and our relationship with God, our standing before God, are founded upon it. We are transformed from glory to glory according to that image, for we can look upon it: it is the proof of our redemption, and the proof that our sins no longer subsist before God. We are also renewed in knowledge after the image of Him who created us; we are created according to God in righteousness and true holiness; for, according to that glory, He hath shined in our hearts in order to shew out this glory of Christ in the world. We are like a lantern: the light is within, but it is to shine without; but dull glass (the flesh if it interferes) will prevent the light from shining as it should. Thus, that which is given us becomes inward exercise: the treasure is in an earthen vessel, and it is necessary that this latter be only a vessel; that we should be dead, in order that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh.
It is not only a communication of what is in Christ, as knowledge; but if it is real, we drink of that which makes the river. It is a communication that exercises the soul, makes it grow, and judges the flesh in everything, in order that we may not mar the testimony which is thus committed to us. In Christ Himself, the life was the light of men, and the light that we receive must become life in us, the formation of Christ in us, and the flesh must be subjected to death. "Death worketh in us," says Paul, "but life in you."
This is the history of ministry, of true ministry. What we communicate is our own; it enlightens us, but it works in us morally; the glory of Christ is realised in us, and all that does not suit Him is judged: now flesh never suits Him. The death of Christ put an end to all that was Paul; thus the life of Christ acted from him in others, and nothing but that. That is saying a great deal. Thus, in this respect there may be progress. For as to my position before God, I reckon that I am dead; for in order to live, death works in me. There is the vessel, but it must be only a vessel, and the life of Christ acting in it and by it. If the vessel acts, it spoils all. In reality, we live; but we must always bear about death, in order that the glory of Christ, the image of God, may shine for others. But all the glory of God is revealed; there is no longer any veil over it on God's side; if it be veiled, the veil is on the heart of man through unbelief -- truth of all-importance! Under the law, man could not go in; God did not come out. Now He has come out, but humbling Himself, to bring grace. Then, the work of redemption accomplished, He has gone in, and there is no veil over the glory.
[From the French.] DEAR SISTER, -- I have got the two books about which you spoke to me. They contain a mixture of old religious notions and new light obtained second-hand. I have no doubt at all as to Mrs. S.'s uprightness, nor of her desire to serve the Lord, and very likely her book may be useful to some souls. But it does not seem to me that the tone of the book is quite according to the Lord. It savours rather of the school to which she belongs: she hardly rises above the condition of her soul, and the circumstances in which she is. A. S., not the Lord Jesus, is the principal figure of the picture. Experience holds the place which redemption and the Redeemer ought to hold. Jesus becomes the servant of the soul, in place of the soul being at peace, serving the Lord. And so it ever is; I have never seen a soul living in its experiences and occupied with itself, with whom the "I" had not a place, without the person's being aware of it, and even without his having a suspicion that it was so. The Lord Jesus, in His infinite grace, uses us, but it is a bad thing to be occupied with ourselves and not with Him. We do not become acquainted with ourselves by thinking about ourselves; for, while we think of Him, the "I" disappears; one is in the light, where one is not when occupied with oneself.
You will think me cold and hard, but this book is just a study, and one does not write a book when one is occupied with one's own history without self appearing far too much. I do not quite admit that all these things take place in a Christian, but when we are occupied with Jesus, the littleness of all that one is, and of all that one has done, remains in the shade and Jesus Himself stands out in relief.
I do not question the sincerity nor the christian truth of this book, but rather its christian reality. The harm which I see in it is the importance which it attaches to what one has done oneself -- the making and publishing a book about oneself; though I do not deny that more than one detail may be useful to other Christians. Still, the system which induces them to work because others have worked, instead of confiding in the Lord, because He sends us, and His love and His Spirit constrain us, is, according to my experience, a bad system. One works with a degree of lightness.
Your attached brother in Christ.
[F Rowan] MY DEAR BROTHER, -- As long as a child is of the household, actually in relationship with its parents, the duty of obedience remains. If a man is married, he begins a new house, and is the head of it, leaves his father and mother. But as long as he or she is of the house, obedience is the duty, as the relationship remains. "In the Lord" is the limit and character of the obedience. If I had a Jewish or heathen parent who commanded me to deny Christ, I could not do it. It is not "in the Lord." If the parent be merely unjust in ways, and no duty be compromised, I believe the part of children to be patience and casting themselves on the Lord. I can suppose a child engaged in a positive duty, which the parents in such case would have no right to cause the child to break through. "In the Lord" has nothing to do with the character of the parents, but the conduct of the child; otherwise it would absolve from all obedience the child of heathen or Jewish parents. The obedience is "in the Lord."
Your affectionate brother in Christ.
[J Dunlop] DEAREST BROTHER, -- Thank you for your letter. I do not at present see that it is God's will I should be with you at your meeting at Ottawa, though I should greatly rejoice to see the beloved brethren again. My heart is in their blessing, and I pray God with all my heart to lead them on in what He gives, and keep them, and make them very humble, that they may be near Him. I feel deeply how only One can keep His church, even humanly speaking, for we all know (it is always true) it outreaches one's hand. But what a comfort to be able to apply to Him for its blessing, whose ear is ever open, who can, in grace, reach all, and whose interest in perfect love is far deeper than any interest of ours, only that He graciously allows us to have a part in it. May we know how to use the privilege!
I have felt my translation work a good deal as absorbing me from direct interest in the positive work, not as to my heart, but as to occupation of heart with Him. But it is nearly done, for which I am very thankful. Nature, of course, shrinks from suffering: still when it comes, if we are with God, strength and joy are there. I have found in the little difficulties I have had, much more trial in excepting trial than when it was there. When there I was calm and quiet, and no way uneasy -- whereas I was when expecting it. Out of it, if it threatens, you are thinking of it. In it, you are looking out of it to the Lord. Of course, there must be the power of the Holy Ghost. It is true I have a sadly fearful mind. But Paul (Philippians) was there in presence of the danger. He was in presence of his trial for his life, but he was surely wonderfully sustained. Still it was not a question of avoiding but going through, and then comparatively it is easy.
The difference of nature and the power of the Spirit you see in comparing Philippians 3 and Mark 10 -- in this, in the young man, you have legal righteousness -- all given up as worthless in Philippians 3: money clung to in Mark 10 -- all gain to self, dross and dung in Philippians 3: the disciples amazed and following trembling in Mark -- a privilege to have the fellowship of His sufferings in Philippians iii. But in Philippians you have the full power of the Spirit all through. Sin is never mentioned in the epistle, nor flesh as affecting the experience of the apostle. It is the experience of one living in the Spirit, in its power, and is exceedingly beautiful in this light, in every respect -- does not know which to choose, death or life -- one gain, the other labour for Christ; and so, self having gone, he decides his own trial, for it was good for them he should stay -- Christ had all power, so he was going to stay: the same mind as Christ in going down to the death of the cross, and so, perfect and delicate consideration for others admirably coming out in unconscious fruit: energy in following Christ before him as his object in glory -- to win Christ, and then with the resurrection from among the dead: a humbled Christ formed the character glorified one gives the energy of "this one thing I do:" then superiority through experimental acquaintance, with Christ's sufficiency, to all circumstances. It is the Epistle of proper Christian experience. I do not think he was asking for trial, though we may desire generally to have fellowship in Christ's sufferings: that one can earnestly do. "To you it is given not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his name's sake." But one does not desire suffering in itself. Only when there, they are a subject of all joy. Faith is given for them. He was in prison and just awaiting his trial. But he could say, in his ordinary life of service, "without were fightings, within were fears; nevertheless, God who comforteth those who are cast down," etc.
As to suffering for Christ, I am sure if the Lord lead one into trial for His name, He will give us strength to glorify Him. We can do nothing. But if living with Him in the secret of our souls, we shall not find it hard to die for Him. See how bright Stephen was, how quiet, kneeling down to pray for them. He was full of the Holy Ghost. We have to pray that we may be so filled, that what comes forth may be Christ, and Christ fittingly for what is before us. I find this a great test in practice of how far I am practically identified in spirit with Him. From Him came forth not merely what was right, but just the right thing in what He had to do or say ... .
I look for a more conscience-consecration to Christ. Oh! how earnestly I desire this. Those who first came out were all devoted -- came because they were, most of them giving up their place, perhaps everything in the world. Some have done so all along, and recently. But then many have come in converted, or because they saw it right, and remain pretty much where they were, and this affects the whole testimony. However, the world is utterly opposed as yet, which is a mercy, and I think that the Spirit of God is working ... . I trust our meeting at Cheltenham was blessed. The Person of the Lord was much before us, and I trust His coming is getting practical power. I think the Lord's presence was felt. I was glad it closed, for I feared that happiness turning into excitement, which had not been the case, and there was much liberty ... .
The Lord make us, dear brother, to find Christ everything that whatever comes with Him we may joy in, so be with Him that we have the consciousness of common interests, though He be Master, but who have His secret with us, His counsels, His objects -- stewards who have His interests at heart more than their own, and then go to see Him and be with Him. How sweet will that word sound, "Well done, good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord" -- poor and worthless creatures that we are! Well, we must go with Him now, take up our cross and follow Him: "If any man serve me, let him follow me." There is a great deal in that word. May He keep us near Himself. It is Himself that makes all clear and simple to the soul ... . The Lord be with you.
Your affectionate brother in Christ.
[H H Snell] MY DEAR BROTHER -- I am most thankful that the Lord has come in to deal with the case you mentioned. It is very sweet to find His hand and grace over us thus when difficulties arise -- that He is still near His people who wait upon Him, though what is impassable seems before them.
Affectionately yours in the Lord.
-- - A broken vessel, but dependent on the Lord's love, and in peace, you see that she has been a good deal smashed; but then broken vessels are often better than whole ones, to shew the sufficiency and grace of Christ -- indeed always, unless inwardly broken, which is the real thing. So you must be content to be a broken vessel, too.
I think Christians ought to be more heavenly; but two things are needed: first, that one should be broken, otherwise God has to act downwards, so to speak, in breaking. Indeed, this goes on in detail to the end. But there is a discovery of self, experimental discovery, which makes a total difference; otherwise, though, like Peter, we have been taught of God blessed truths, the flesh is not judged to the measure of them; what answers to them here is not received; and we may earn the name of Satan -- not savouring the things which be of God, but which be of men. But, secondly, we must be bearing about the dying, and Christ thus be the one spring of judgment, thought, and action. Then our state and mind is heavenly, for His life is so -- "Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me." That is, the Christ who is my life, is the object of that life, too, in the sense of His love; and this is the true christian state, Christ living in us. But it supposes occupation with Christ, or the Spirit is grieved. It is the old man put off, the new man put on, created after God, and the Holy Ghost dwelling in us. The body is dead because of sin, the Spirit life. This is the state, but it is realised as I have said, or rather the word says. Then heaven becomes -- is, the natural home of that life. Our conversation is in heaven. Now a Christian can live thus, and ought, and the flesh not intrude; only he must be much occupied with Christ, for Christ's own sake, otherwise, when there is no actual evil thought, his views, judgments, feelings, are natural ones, as to what he is passing through. They ought to be christian ones. Another thing is to be fully in the path of God's will. We cannot have power out of it, and so the enemy can ... . Here grace may shew itself in the broken vessel, and there are very few of us that are not more or less in associations, the effect of the acting of our will, and so cast on grace. But then, that is not only sufficient, but much more abounds, and we God is all, after all.
There are some remains -- a ground swell -- after the Rathmines storm; but I say, noisy rivers run all the same into the sea. It is not so much arranging, as bringing in Christ. Sweeping away snow is long work; if the sun is well up, it is gone. A night covers the earth a foot deep -- what millions of men could not do, a day takes it all away if God's warmth comes in.
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