London, May 1st.
My dear Brother,— … I know of no Christianity where Christ is not all—increasedly so, and naturally, in these my closing years. But there is a flighty notion of perfection which is merely self, and I think of a bad kind, through the religious pretension it has. There is no perfection but glory with the blessed One, and no other to be aimed at, and this always keeps us lowly, for what are we compared with that? Ah! when we study Christ’s life too down here, and what His heart and motives were, how shallow we are, how He must be everything, and how deep and far beyond our view the sufferings of His soul down here!
I would add that the meeting at——began in a very loose way, and had to be purged of this, and social circumstances added to the difficulty. But God pursues His own ends through circumstances, when we are often governed by them, or at any rate influenced and hindered. And how He bears with us! We have seen the Lord’s hand with us wonderfully here latterly. I certainly did look to the Lord, and He shewed Himself indeed in the most unthought of way, so that we have been astounded at His goodness. Here we are happy enough, but the County of Kent matters came up as we expected they must, being so near London, and [brethren] coming up, so that their reception involved the London gatherings. But though we know not how all will end, God has so dealt with the worst cases that His acting being manifest, encourages the heart. Brethren never went through such a crisis as they have in all this matter; but the Lord, while exercising and humbling them, has heard their cry, and I believe preserved their testimony: the testimony, I never doubted He would, but it did not follow—in their hands. But I felt in praying I could trust Him for that, and I believe He has. But I must close.
London, May 10th.
* * * * *
My dear Brother,—All depends on its being a private meeting or a public one. It is clear they must not teach, and in the assembly keep silence, and if they have a question ask at home. (1 Tim. 2:12; 1 Cor. 14:34.) I believe sisters have a very honourable place in scripture. They clung to the Lord when the disciples deserted Him; in death and resurrection they, not the apostles, are found, and in life ministering to Him; and the apostle in the end of Romans bears them the highest testimony. But the Lord never sends them out to teach or preach. And then the apostle is peremptory in forbidding them the same as to authority. Everything is beautiful in its place. If therefore it was quietly helping each other among themselves, I see nothing to hinder; or explaining scripture for the gospel to poor ignorant and unconverted women, even if several were together; but a teaching meeting even among themselves seem to me contrary to scripture. Its being in the room makes no difference really, but in circumstances it does: it is a teaching place, and you cannot separate the thought. Whatever puts them into the place of teaching, puts them into mischief, and is not of God. “The ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price,” is what honours them.
Your affectionate brother in Christ.
May 10th, 1881.
* * * * *
My dear Brother,—I confess I think the state of this sister unsatisfactory. There was no staying away from conscience at the time (naturally a woman would be ashamed of course), and continual deception for five shillings a week. Still she acknowledged it honestly: so far it was well. If I saw there had been thorough repentance of old, I would not bring it up again, but this hardly appears…
The great question for me would be the present state of the soul, her true repentance. If I was satisfied she was really humbled, and gave up the pay, I would not proclaim her sin. It might be said that the ancient sin unknown to the assembly had been discovered, but as the soul’s state had been restored before it was discovered, it was not mentioned. If there has not been genuine repentance, the lapse of time does not change the state: and I should say that the sin was of a very old date, but as no sign of adequate humiliation was seen exclusion was called for. All depends upon the state of her soul. There seems honesty: is there a real sense of the sin? As to Achan, I cannot doubt if he had put it all back they would have been spared, because then there was, though momentary failure, honest rejection of the sin. But that is just the question here: is there?
I would certainly not bring up sin, if it was judged. The question is, Is it judged? The assembly’s conscience was not denied, because it did not know it. If it had been more spiritual it might have felt there was something hindering blessing, but it was not defiled by permitted sin. Now you have to see if the guilty person has really judged the sin, or it may become so— at any rate in the conscience of those who do know it.
Your affectionate brother in Christ.
* * * * *
Dear Miss ——,—The Lord is graciously doing what was and is always needed, making you know yourself. We may often accept the gospel not insincerely, and yet not have the least learnt what we are, that is what sin is in the flesh. As regards confession (James 5:16)—the form this distress takes with you—I agree with ——, it is not a command imposed, but a means afforded for walking fully in the light, a relief if I cannot get rid of something that presses on my conscience; nay, even if I have done from time to time what keeps my spirit fretful, and out of communion, it is given as a means of relief, in order to my spirit’s being conscious of being in the truth, to find some one worthy of such confidence, and opening the matter to them. It is a relief to open the heart, only not to be done with levity, but in the true sense of the evil, and gives occasion to the other to pray for us. This is connected with the government of God, and has nothing to do with deliverance. Its true character is lost if we look on it as an imposed obligation; but we make what is called a clean breast of it, and all sense of guile and false appearance is taken away. Sometimes the desire to confess is a mere effort to get the mind at ease without a thorough dealing with God which goes to the root.
Romans 5:1 is simply forgiveness, faith that Christ has been delivered for our offences. If that be so, God must despise Christ’s work before He imputes sin to me: and not only is that impossible, but God has given proof to the contrary in raising Him from the dead, and setting Him as man in glory: and He has not got my sins there. The work God has wrought in Christ has blotted out my sins: the Lord imputes no sin. Then comes another source of distress, even if I am clear that believing in Jesus I am justified from all things. I find my old man, my flesh, produces the evil fruit still; and this perplexes the mind if it has learned forgiveness, and brings doubts and deep distress where it has not. It is always in its nature legal—that is, refers God’s estimate of us, to what we are: namely, His thoughts towards us are dependent on our state before Him; whereas our state depends on His thoughts. See the prodigal when he found his father. (Compare Num. 23:23.)
Now our peace as to our sins is simply that they are forgiven and put away: Christ has borne them. If I believe in Him, God has declared this; I am “justified from all things.” But for the discovery of our sinful state and getting deliverance, there is an experimental process in us. The doctrine is that we died with Christ: that is Komans6 But the resting on the truth found there as a doctrine, is connected with the experience found in chapter 7, the result then being in chapter 8. Now this experience is the painful learning that we have no strength to make good what we would in what is right. There is a point in this experience which often helps, but is not deliverance; that is, hating the evil which yet works in me, it is not I, for I hate the evil, and I am not what I hate. But after this I find what I hate too strong for me, and I am brought to the consciousness of my being without strength, the point to which God was leading me by it all: “When we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.”
Your anxiety about confession and distress of soul will all disappear, when you have the deliverance which follows this full breaking down. We are conscious then of being in Christ, as Romans 8:1; and then Christ is in us as the power of life (vers. 2, 3): Christ is substituted for self before God for us as righteousness., What am I before God? Christ. And He having died and risen again and received by faith, lives in us: and the flesh is treated as not me but sin that dwells in us, and we have by the Holy Ghost the sense of being children. In a word, Christ is substituted for self before God, and yet as livingly in us—“as he is so are we in this world.” This is God’s teaching; it belongs to every one who believes in Christ, but we do not get it experimentally, till the self for which Christ is substituted is thoroughly judged and broken down—no good in it, and no means of getting into a better state however much we desire it. And this is the process you are going through, with a pretty strong will to be broken by it. I add, it is of moment in this conflict to avoid all evil—not that this will give us peace; that comes from being dead with Christ; but if we are not watchful it gives a handle to the enemy.
Christ came to save the lost, and we must get to see we are lost as to our state in order to get deliverance: yet in the grace that came to save us when such, God knows when self is really judged, and then gives peace. In yourself in the flesh you are lost, but we get out of this standing through being dead with Christ. The sin in our flesh was judged on the cross. We hear nothing more of the prodigal son, once he found his father: all is what his father was to him.
* * * * *
To the same.]
* * * It is experimentally we learn what we are, and very humbling it is, but it casts us on the Lord so that we find He is our righteousness, not anything we are or our state, and then we get strength too; for “where sin abounded grace did much more abound.” You have a strong will, not accustomed to govern yourself, and hence the struggle is more painful; but the Lord is faithful to bring you through it. You must feel that deliverance is not for you till you get it: our will mixes itself up much more than we think with the flesh, but it is much better to suffer under it, than take it easy as you speak of. When you feel it pressing on your will, look away to Christ at once, and the new man being then in operation the heart gets elsewhere. It is not direct conflict with it, for this being under law, the motions of sin are by it. Then Satan uses it to bring sin on the conscience and discourage us. Resist him, and I do not say you will overcome, but “he will flee from you,” for Christ has overcome him for us. Then get healthful active occupations: there is plenty to do in this world, if we have the heart for it. Above all, believe ever—“My grace is sufficient for thee.” When the heart gets on Christ, all is easy; it is away from what is a snare to us. Once we let the devil inside, so that the mind is occupied with what the flesh tempts us with, it is far harder to get it out, than to keep it out. When you speak of gleams of light sometimes, it is what always happens when God is carrying through the process of self-knowledge. He gives us occasional deliverance so to speak, so that we know there is such a thing; like a man rising head above water and getting breath, or he would be drowned, yet goes under again when he has got enough, to shew there is such a thing as being out. Understand that God does this, because while He must make you know yourself because it is yourself, He is above, and can and will deliver. But you will find Christ faithful, and what He shews you thus that you may not despair, He will accomplish fully. Cry to Him—we ought always to do it, not to faint. Read your Bible as something addressed to yourself, praying Him to give it the efficacy of the Spirit to your soul: no indulgence of will, but ready service, in what the house or any other duty may call for, and you will find—not that the flesh is not there, but—that you are not in it.
The power that does it is the death of Christ, not for our sins, but to sin. (See Rom. viii.) God has condemned sin in the flesh on the cross, so that there is no condemnation for us. The sin we find working in us is worthy of condemnation, but has been condemned when He was (a sacrifice) for sin; and this we learn by faith, though God makes us learn what it is experimentally, which is just Romans 7. Chapter 6 is the doctrine, chapter 8 the result, when we have gone through chapter 7. The conflict remains, but the Spirit is there: it is no longer the conflict of natures under law. (Gal. 5:17, 18.)
Look to Christ always faithful and loving, and “sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under the law, but under grace”: that is, God is for you, not requiring, but giving and forgiving.
Sincerely yours in the Lord.
London, May 11th, 1881.
My dear Brother,—I was very glad to hear from you and that you were all safe arrived, and. thankful too that none had left to follow those that went out. Dear —— will want no spectacles now to see the King in His beauty, and even the vanity which may have hindered him on earth is gone for ever: there is none in the presence of the glory of God, nor with Christ our just and infinite delight… It is sweet to think that he is, dear fellow, with Christ, and nothing but the new man remains. That is a comfort for us all, though we ought to keep down the old man here, that we may be free fully to enjoy Christ. I am not a perfectionist, fundamentally not, but I believe there is power in Christ to keep the old man down so that the Spirit be not grieved, and thus communion perfect in our measure…
Christ is the same, dear brother, in Barbadoes, as in London, and He and He only is life and power, but He is intimate with us, can dwell in our hearts by faith, and so we can not only comprehend the wide extent of glory, and look down its infinite yet perfectly ordered parts as from a centre, but know, blessed be His name! a love which passes knowledge.
It is wonderful, the place God has given us, yet it is, while we were only sin, what Christ’s work was only worthy of, so that while pure and sovereign grace reigns, so that we know perfect love, that is God, yet it reigns through righteousness. It has often, for some time, been a joy to me that we shall all be a perfect testimony to the efficacy and worth of Christ’s work which brought us into it, as well as of the Father’s love, and that eternally. It is what we ought to be here, but we know how feeble it often is here, but there we shall for ever be adequate witnesses of Christ, by the very glory into which He will have brought us, and that is very blessed.
The Lord be with you, dear brother, in your work: we have only to serve Christ earnestly, and in communion with Him, and all is well; the rest passes and is gone. I have nothing much to tell you of things here… I do not, as you know, move in and out among brethren, from my bodily state. But God is working on to the result of His own ways. There is the occasional difficulty of letters of commendation, otherwise all around us is as quiet as possible… May the Lord be with ——in his work, and all the brethren. I am very thankful to them that they remember and think of me. They may be assured I do not forget them, and earnestly desire of God their blessing and peace in Christ, and that the whole assembly may be indeed as trees of the Lord’s planting. Oh that all His saints were! Christ all to them. Peace be with you.
Affectionately yours, dear brother, in the Lord.
1881
* * * * *
[From the French.
Dearest Brother,—I was very glad to receive your letter and news of Switzerland, for which I thank you. England is pretty much in the same state—more than one place where conversions are somewhat numerous, but nothing very striking. But the condition of brethren has evidently improved; there is more conscience, more life. All the labouring brethren who have gone about the country have returned happy, and with their souls refreshed; and God is acting in a striking way in the midst of the difficulties of London. Brethren can see it at a glance. Everything is not settled, but evil has manifested its powerlessness. We have had only to allow God to act, and who can do so but Himself? As to myself, it is the resolution I have taken from the beginning, and I bless His name for it. We do not sufficiently consider that it is He who works the good, and He alone who can do it, and He arranges everything.
I have been very ill, dear brother: I mean my strength has sunk under the effect of too much work, and of my age, then of a serious fall while travelling. I did not know whether it was not God’s will to take me out of this poor world… I had peace, I had not any doubt, but at first I felt the ruin of the vessel, when I was alone at night with the Lord. The thought of being with the Lord soon became uppermost, and I was happy in going to Him, if it was His will. What was in question was the activity of my affection for the Lord, and not at all the assurance of faith. That it would be better to be up there with Him, I did not doubt; His love is to my heart a treasure more precious than ever, of infinite value: it is the effect of this experience. I am better now, humanly speaking: the time of my departure has not yet come. I work as usual in my study; I have been present at the Sunday morning meeting, and have taken part in it; then I have been at two meetings for reading the word.
I asked myself whether God’s will was still to use me for the brethren: on one side that, on the other to be with Himself. I do not cling to life, but I should desire to finish my course; and brethren have not yet got out of all the difficulties of their position. But God is there; I do not by any means doubt that He will fully accomplish the work of His goodness, and the courage of brethren is revived by His grace. Those who seek good are more united than ever. I am working quietly—happy, profoundly happy in His love, with little strength, but sustained: bearing brethren on my heart, and reckoning on the Lord for them. It becomes me to remember that I have passed my eightieth year. Whether here or there, Christ is everything.
May God be with you in your labours. Greet the brethren cordially for me. May God give them grace to seek His presence constantly.
Your affectionate brother.
* * * * *
Croydon, June 28th, 1881.
Dear Brother,— … As to the difficulty in England, you were all wrong in supposing that brethren were not aware that baptism had to say to it. They were aware, but it was all on one side. Two years ago, one of them had said brethren must split on this point… For my own part, it was a complete demoralisation of brethren that moved me; and this has fully come out, and those in whom this want of principle really prevailed, form now a party, and seem likely to break off in one or two places where they prevailed. But in general consciences have been awakened, and the change for the better is strongly felt… There was a strong movement to leave brethren a year or more ago, on account of the demoralisation I have spoken of; which, having been deeply exercised about it, I resisted, and we have been spared that, and the Lord has wrought wonderfully. One after another has got clear, and the body of gatherings in London are united in their decision: in fact, there is more union than ever. The deep impression of how the Lord has wrought is effectual as the things He has done, His hand has been so manifest. And now, dear brother, if you were to become a Psedo-baptist, I should not be a bit more attached to you, and if you love Christ better, as I trust you may daily, I should. I never was satisfied with the manner of my baptism, though I felt it could not be repeated: I had been received into the ostensible body with bonâ fide intention of doing so, and could not be let in again. I think the principle more right than Baptist ones.
Since I wrote to you I have been at, what is called, death’s door—told that if I attempted to go upstairs I might die on them. The action of my heart failed, and often at night it felt as if it would cease entirely. The first feeling of the break up of the vessel was a solemn one. It was not doubt of the Lord’s love, or of the perfectness of His work, but the fact of the breaking up of the status of my existence; but it has left, through grace, the profoundest consciousness of association with Him, and of His love, and of the Father’s too, and as if I had left the world behind me: and this sense of His love is very sweet and of association with Himself. I am much better, though a really good night’s rest is unknown to me, but study work I can do as ever through mercy; but am, for my thoughts so to speak, a dead man, for the other world: we all ought to be so, and I had long so held the truth, but it is another thing to be there. All I have taught has come back to me as divine truth from God, and that is a great comfort. I have nothing to regret but my own poor walk, though I had no object but Christ. But of Jacob and Israel it shall be said, “according to this time”—the end of the wilderness—“What hath God wrought.” My mind is as fresh as ever: so there is your poor old friend, John Darby, looking for Christ in you and nothing else, and knowing He is there.
Kind love to all, and tell the Nelson brethren I have but one thought, their happiness in Christ.
Affectionately yours in Him.
The Lord will guide with His eye, if we look to Him—at any rate as poor horses or mules, in His faithful love, if we do not.
Croydon, July 10th.
* * * * *
* * * You have a more favourable opinion of the Bevision than I have. It is not that many passages have not been rightly corrected—many as I did myself, so that I cannot complain; and I think there are many well composed. But there is, it seems to me, no acquaintance with the mind of God, and great fundamental truth lost or marred. Look at Romans 1: “a righteousness of God by faith,” is not known to scripture. It is “revealed by [on the principle of] faith.” So (Col. 1:16) “in Christ all things were created.” They are wholly ignorant of the commonest force of ejn in Greek: so again: “Grieve not that holy Spirit of promise in which you are sealed.” (Eph. 4:30.) Now all this baffles a plain man, and on fundamental truths; and the word of God is for plain men. They are wholly ignorant of the force of English tenses; as the difference of ‘saw’ and ‘have seen.’ Both are past, but the shade of difference practically often of importance. They have not an idea of ‘have.’ The English auxiliaries vary the force without changing the time, or have two times, the participle and verb. ‘Has’ is present; ‘was’ present at another time, known from the phrase, not the word. I was comforted when it came out, finding several things good, and though the criticism of the Greek text vulgar, and the fashion, yet what was infidel or loose avoided. But when I read a chapter or two, I found it, with just corrections, for practical use a total failure. The Americans have generally the advantage of them…
The brethren were going on with top-gallant sails set, and that does not do for us; but God has been separating the precious from the vile, and He does well what He does—better than man. I have undiminished confidence in the result. The Lord is doing what He made my motto in starting, Jeremiah 15, “If thou take forth the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as my mouth.” He will, He must, accomplish His own purpose; may we be found only in the way of it.
I have been in sight of death, so to speak, and it was a useful experience as realising things; but I am a great deal better, though broken in physical strength, thank God not in mind. I find my service of God poor, as in me it all has been, and Christ indeed now everything.
July, 1881.
* * * * *
[From the German.
Beloved Brother,—I thank you from my heart for your affectionate letter. You must not think that, when I said those speaking French were my field of labour, I loved the French more than the German brethren. I do love the French brethren much, as God has much blessed my work there, and I have experienced all manner of love and kindness from them. I lived amongst them, and I bear them witness that nothing could exceed their friendliness; besides they are simple and generous. A peasant in France is nothing worth, and that is always profitable for all Christians. The blessing too has been great: at Pau, for instance, when I began to work there, it was said there were thirty Protestants and three Christians; now there are almost one hundred that break bread: besides a National church and an Independent congregation. In the south of France everything was pure unbelief, openly; now in most villages there is an assembly, often a numerous one. Yes, my heart says with joy, rich and poor they have all evinced continued love and kindness. One could hardly love brethren more than I the French; but in my spirit and natural temperament I have much more affinity with the Germans than with the French—more readily at home (French has not the word). What I wanted to say was, that I felt God, out of England, gave me the French speaking countries as a field of labour, perhaps America also, and in fact this did not fail. In His constant goodness He added part of Germany. I feel, indeed, how poor my labour has everywhere been, and that God alone is the worker of any good result. Who could be that? What source of good is there if not God? and there everything is good. I always thought that; and have learnt it too, and praise God that I am nothing and God everything.
Death has been realised in my experience, dear brother—no new principle, nothing new as regards truth, no doubt of His love, or that Christ is perfect righteousness before Him. But I found the breaking of every sort of link with life as it is here below a real thing. Now this experience has been very useful to me. I have a much deeper sense of the grace of God and of the value of Christ—no new truth, I believe—and my soul rests upon the truths that I have long learnt. All has been made good to my soul. But the consciousness of love is quite another thing. I feel that I belong to the other world. For long years it was my object, because I looked for the glory of Christ, and nothing else but the salvation of souls. But it is sweet to belong to the Father’s house and to feel that, and to realise in closer consciousness a deeper sense of the endless love and pure grace of the Father, and what Christ and His love is. I know that He is my righteousness, and I have not to think of myself, except of my footsteps here; and it is good to think of God as the Father, and of Christ His Son.
I am much better, and can work as usual in my study. My bodily strength is much reduced. But I have long felt that this has become my present lot for quiet home work. My mind is fresh as ever, and I have taken part in some meetings, but my outward activity is for the most part over. Partly, too much work has reduced me, and I fell to the ground which did me bodily injury. Then, I am eighty, soon eighty-one years old. My hearty greetings to the brethren. Assure them that I was never more at home than among them. The wish and prayer of my heart is that Christ may be ever more and more everything to them. Soon He will become everything, and all else will come to nought.
Hearty greetings to your family and all the brethren at Elberfeld.
Your attached brother in Christ.
London, 1881.
* * * * *
* * * I have had it on my mind to write to you ever since I heard you were sick. But I have been a great deal more sick myself—more over-worked and broken-down than ill, but so that for some time, though I felt all was in the Lord’s hands, I hardly thought I should recover my strength, but leave this passing scene. And this hindered my doing anything but what came necessarily to hand to do. I felt it a solemn thing: it was not doubt as to God’s or Christ’s love, or the efficacy of the blessed Lord’s work in justifying, but the breaking up of the life and its state in which I had lived hitherto, and its being gone. But it was a useful experience. It broke the link with present life a good deal, and made Christ’s and the Father’s love everything, and much more real to me, and this is a great blessing. I am a great deal better, still feel the effect of it; but, thank God, the effect in the realisation of Christ’s love in my spirit is not gone. I did not doubt it before, but I have a keener sense of belonging to another world, though for a little moment remaining in this—that is, Christ and the Father’s house is all. Now it has not come as near you: still your conscious decrease of strength, if it has not been such .as to give a conscious snapping of the thread of life, still tells of its passing away. I trust with care you may be better and refreshed in spirit. Still I believe it is good to look the truth of it in the face. I found sovereign grace more precious than ever. That I knew had met all my sins; of that there was no question: but the personal love of the Father and Christ was what the sense of was so greatly increased: thank God! It was a comfort to me that all I had taught and laboured in was of God and from God. It was not on this a question of the workman at all, but of the truth: I had long known, and gladly, that I was nothing.
Remember that all things work together for good to those that love God, called according to His purpose, and dwell on the perfect divine love of the Father in giving the Son, and His unknowable (in its extent) love in accomplishing all for us. And then He loves you now. I have not a doubt, though much better, that all this was from God’s hand; and so surely it is with you according to that love, only personally applied, which gave Christ for us—could not be greater. Not a sparrow falls to the ground without our Father, and He assures us we are of value to Him. He makes no mistakes, and there is nothing that escapes His eye and hand. “He withdraweth not his eyes from the righteous”—what a mercy! It is not death in itself which is present to you, that is another thing, but the course of life is broken with you for the moment, and even if you recovered strength, as I trust you may, and rejoice in God’s present goodness, still the experience will have been there, and give a tone to life, and that is a great gain. “As for man, his days are as grass: as a flower of the field so he flourisheth. For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more. But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear him.”
And now, dear——, be of good cheer: look to Him who is your life—a life that never fades—as He has “made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light.” God has to take care of you for a little while, instead of your taking care of the house, and He does it tenderly, graciously, with His poor weak children. Think of Christ and the Father’s love, and all will be well, and well for ever. That is what I have learnt…
Your affectionate brother and servant in Christ.
Croydon, July 12th.
* * * * *
* * * As to “justification of life” (Rom. 5:18) it is that justification we have as being alive in Christ; that is, it goes beyond mere forgiveness of sins as in the old man which are put away. It is the clearance of all imputation which we have as alive in Christ. But the passage gives us something more specific, it refers to verses 16 and 17. Verse 16 is “of many offences unto justification,” which of itself goes further than clearing the conscience of sins. Verse 17 further adds that they who have received “abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life.” This, while based on the clearing, brings us into the new place in life and reigning in it. Hence we have “justification of life”: “by one offence towards all men to condemnation … by one complete righteousness [dikaivwma] towards all men to justification” (ver. 18); but then “in life,” a new life in Christ—not merely, that is, the old sins cleared away negatively, but in the new place by a work of Christ which God had fully owned. He had finished the work which His Father had given Him to do, and was in virtue of it in a new place as Man in life. Life (in us) and justification went together.
I do not know if I have made myself plain. It does not go quite so far as the “in Christ,” but it does identify our justification and a new life in Him.
[1881.]
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Dearest ——,—The tract27 is merely the system of high experimental Baptists, Warburton and Gadsby and company. Indeed I had been the means of the conversion of its last leader when tutor to my nephews. There were godly people among them, but simple faith in the Lord’s work little and seldom known; they looked for Holy Ghost work in themselves—surely necessary, but not faith. But the tract is a moderate expression. The insisting on real exercise about sin for peace I believe to be useful in these days; there is great looseness and carelessness as to it. But there are two decided defects in the tract: the two first parables of Luke 15 are left out in it; and in his system. There, experience is excluded; it is brought in in the third, the only one he refers to; but that, till he meets the Father, is the history of the work in man, of the prodigal, not of the Father; the moment he comes to Him you hear no more of the prodigal. In the two first, all is on the divine side. “For God so loved” is forgotten. All his statement as to being born is drawn from a human illustration which scripture never uses, and not from scripture, and his statement is in the teeth of scripture. He says we are not children till we are sealed; whereas scripture says the Spirit is given to us because we are sons, and that it is when the gospel of salvation has been received by faith that we are sealed for the day of redemption; and we are declared to be sons of God by faith in Christ Jesus. Christ Himself (only He in His own title) was sealed and anointed by the Holy Ghost come down from heaven. The insisting on reality of repentance I believe to be timely in these days.
Affectionately yours in the Lord.
Croydon, July 21th, 1881.
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My dear ——,—I did not answer your letter, being laid so low myself as to stop my activities. I am better, and seek gradually to clear off old arrears. Indeed, I did not know for some time after your letter whether I was not going to be taken away from this world. I found it a solemn thing, for it was quite present with me, but a very useful, and, in result, blessed experience. It made me much more feel to belong to the other world, and the Father’s love and the Son’s love and work stand out with a clearness and real depth it never did before: no new truth, but a different realisation of what that truth brought. It has linked me wonderfully more with the sources of grace, but we are poor creatures after all.
As to Romans 6 of which you speak: it is not out of experience, as redemption—a work done for us, accomplished, and where accomplishment and value is owned of God—Christ has died for our sins and, as to imputation, we have no more conscience of sins. This (Rom. 6) is connected with our state, and yet in one sense it closes experience, that is, the efforts of the soul to get at rest by victory. Chapter 7 is the experience that we cannot succeed; even where to will is present, we have no strength. When fully, experimentally, convinced of this, we find through grace, that as to the flesh we died in Christ’s death; that what the law could not do, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin has condemned sin in the flesh—not forgiven, that cannot be; but that the sin
1 find working in me and distressing my soul, and which I condemn and hate, but is still there, God has condemned in the cross, so that that condemnation is accomplished for me; but that it was wrought in death, so that if I was there, or am now for faith in what Christ took, it is in death—Christ’s death, the condemnation over, the death come—I died with Him; so that the condemnation is passed, but I have died for faith. In Colossians 2, 3 it is God’s estimate of this my state, “Ye are dead:” in Romans 6 it is faith’s through grace; I reckon myself dead, because Christ who is my life died. In 2 Corinthians 4:10, you have the apostle carrying it out in practice.
Now, Christ’s work outside us, for us, is done entirely outside us and accepted of God; we believe in it and God’s acceptance of it. But in being dead with Christ, though it put an end to the experience of my own useless struggles, it is something I reckon as to myself; and while it is judicial (according to Col. 3), and hence is the way and only way of liberty, as I know God so accounts it about myself, yet I have by faith to reckon it according to what Christ has done once for all. I do reckon myself to have died with Him, and God so accounts me as having Him who did die as my life. Still, it goes on in my heart, and so far is experimental. I believe that the sin was condemned of God on the cross, and that God does so reckon it (Col. 3); but Romans 6 takes it up on the faith side, and I reckon myself—that is not judicial, though based on faith in what is, namely, Colossians 3, Romans 8:3— and I have to carry it out according to 2 Corinthians 4.
It is then experimental, as that which is the exercise of faith in us, and taking what has taken place in Christ as true of us; not a work done about us and available as accepted of God: it is so far judicial, that it is in seeing the work accomplished, and judicially in Christ, we obtain liberty with God in spite of flesh, and power in the law of the Spirit of life. Conflict remains, because the flesh and temptation are there, vigilance and diligence called for just because we are delivered, to maintain holiness and communion. The thought of imputation is gone or acceptance connected with it; till then, even if justification be known, it is a question of acceptance if not of righteousness. That question, as well as that of our sins, was settled on the cross, and we are free, free with God, but free to be holy, and that is real deliverance; we pass from the effort of a captive against his chains, to conflict, with the strength of Christ, against the enemy. Jordan and Colossians have come in, for Romans only insists on death with Christ, not on resurrection; life there is in Christ but not resurrection with Him. Ephesians is another thing, but that would be too large a subject now.
Your affectionate brother in Christ.
Croydon, July 28th, 1881.
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My dear Brother,—I have long had before me as a present purpose writing to you, though I had no special subject before me, but I was brought very low, and for a little while it was more a question of leaving this world altogether than of writing letters. I am better: God did not see good to remove me at present, though for a little while my heart was looking that way. It is a good thing to have it near one. It was the action of the heart giving way from overwork, and I had a bad fall on that, and being in my eighty-first year I am still feeble under it, but sensibly better.
As regards the question you put, it has exercised saints, and the case has been before us of old, but one would not accept a person who would not worship Christ. I took this same ground at Auburn, in Maine. There are certain vital truths connected with the Person of the Lord, which, when possessed, guard the soul from interpretations to which the soul who merely follows the words may be liable. Tell me I am not to worship Christ: you take away the only Christ I know. I have none other but one I do adore and worship with a thankful heart which owes all to Him. The object of John 16:27 is to give immediate confidence in the Father, in contrast with the spirit of Martha, chapter 11:22. Here the Lord says, “I say not unto you, that I will pray the Father for you: for the Father himself loveth you.” Further, the question is not of worship here at all, they should ask Him nothing (ejrwtw'), but were to beg (aijtevw) the Father in His name. But all the angels of God are to worship Him, every knee to bow to Him. But more; calling on the name of the Lord is, so to speak, the definition of a Christian. Paul thrice besought the Lord to take away the thorn, and the Lord heard his cry and answered. Stephen was “invoking and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” Christ is the Adonai of the Old Testament, as Isaiah 6 and John 12 and indeed Psalm 110 and other places. The Sitter on the throne and the Lamb are associated in Revelation 5:13; indeed, it is a question if chapter 4 be not the Son in His divine Person. You cannot separate the Ancient of Days and Christ in Daniel 7, though as the Son of man, He is brought before Him; for in verse 22 the Ancient of Days comes. And judgment is committed to the Son “because he is the Son of man”—yet “that all men should honour the Son even as they honour the Father.” I do not quote passages to prove His Deity—that He and the Father are one, the fulness of the Godhead dwelling in Him bodily; that He was God, and created all things—as it is not called in question.
As to the use of the Lord’s name in addressing the Father, if it be that in substance the prayer is not in His name, I reject it altogether. The use of the blessed Lord’s name did not belong to a lower state, for He says, “Hitherto ye have asked nothing in my name,” whereas on His going away He says, “Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name,” so that it belongs distinctly to this time. If it is merely the form of words, it is another thing; we may get into any routine of words and lose the force. But our prayers are only rightly directed to the Father in the name of Jesus; and in walking down here, it is not as being in Him we pray, nor is that praying in His name—true as it is that we are in Him. It is rightly addressed to the Father according to all the value of Christ to the Father, but as a separate Person, and separate from the Father too. It will not do to deny the mediatorship of Christ, the Man Christ Jesus, between God and man. He is both present with God, and Advocate with the Father. The loss of the mediatorial place of the blessed Lord would be the loss of Christianity. To “us there is but one God the Father;” “and one Mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ.” His divine nature is not the question in this, and I know of no right prayer that is not in His name; it is not in Him, but “through him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father.”
One who refused to worship Christ, or who did not own His mediatorship and that in every aspect, I could not walk with. But I think that worship of the Father and the worship of Christ as Mediator has a different character. In worshipping the Father I go to one who in infinite, uncaused love (the form and glory of Godhead never left) has revealed Himself to me, brought me into the place of son, not spared His own Son for me, reconciled me to Himself by Him, and given me His Spirit that I may have the consciousness of the place He has put me in, so that I cry, Abba, Father. It is all through Christ, but I know the Father and what He is through Him—alas, yet how imperfectly! yet so as to joy or glory in God. It is God, but God known as Father, John 4:23: John always makes the difference. So Christ tells us He was going to His Father and our Father, and His God and our God. It is what the Father is in Himself to whom we are brought, and as revealed in love in the Son, we being made sons, that is specially before us in worshipping Him, though all blessings flow from Him. Now in the worship of Christ become Mediator, I own His divine title though He laid aside His glory—now taken again —but it is One who has come down to me, has lived and died for me, loved me, washed me from my sins in His own blood. He was slain and has redeemed to God those far from Him; has made Himself of no reputation; and in unutterable grace to me, has been in all points tempted like as we are, sin apart, can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities. Now I quite admit a child owes worship to a loving Father—all right; but sorrows, exercises, thorns in the flesh, cases where I want sympathy, my wants, and then the administration of everything in the church, connect themselves with my looking to and worshipping Christ viewed as Mediator. It is not a person simply as made partaker of the divine nature, and through the Spirit knowing the Father through the revelation of the Son, who worships the Father as so knowing Him. I come more into the scene as knowing Christ a tempted Saviour, as a Friend tried in the circumstances in which we are. Were He not God this would lose all its value, but it is of inestimable value to every exercised soul. But it is evident that it connects itself more with my state down here. It is just what is precious.
This is true, that the work of Christ has been so divine and glorious, God Himself glorified in it, that it lifts us up to worship Him in respect of the excellency of what He has shewn Himself to be in that, and so we rise up to Godhead: for hereby know we love because He laid down His life for us. This it is important to lay fast hold of for His glory. We at once see the unity of thought, purpose, mind, nature, in the Son and in the Father. Still it is practically true that souls are apt to rest in looking at Christ, however justly, in the mediatorial aspect which concerns themselves, and their worship descends to this. It is not the blessed nature of God in which they joy and glory, and that known in a Father’s love as their Father, but in the grace and service and benefits of which they are the objects and recipients, found in Christ. Now this cannot be separated when true from the source of love in Him as a divine Person, but is connected with our wants, infirmities, and failures in a word—which, though divine grace, refer to self, and in which we ought to think of self, that the sense of it may be real, and we filled with divinely given thankfulness. Both are right, both are sweet, and what we have to cultivate by grace, but different. One lifts us up simply to God for our new man to dwell in and delight in, and surely worship Him. The other brings down that love in sympathetic goodness to our state, though felt and estimated by the new man—God revealed, but as entering into all we are, and all we want, and that even to our sins. Now that the adoring recognition of this is true worship I fully admit, and the exclusion of it wholly wrong and deadening to the affections of the soul; but it is a different thing from the soul, by the Holy Ghost, being with and adoring the Father, to whom Christ has brought us, loved as He is loved. I apprehend there was the tendency in——’s teaching, desirous of reaching to the former, to set aside the latter, and that was all wrong; but I fear brethren active in the matter had not learned to appreciate the difference between the two. The result was attack and then personal defences, and many things defended by others as right which were rash and ill-advised statements which might have been corrected.
Take hymns and see how many you have addressed to the Father, or which continue to have Him and not ourselves for their subject after the first verse? You may, perhaps, have hymns to the Father; but in revising the hymn book I found how grave a question the doing it had raised for me as to this: though our spiritual state affects everything we do, yet it requires a more spiritual state than hymns to Christ, though He be worthy of equal honour. But while I make this difference, you cannot separate them by a sharp mathematical line, so to speak. Affections do not flow in that way. And the love of the Father and the Son run into one another. If the Father did not spare His Son, the Son in the same divine love gave Himself. We have known the Father through His revelation of Him. “He that acknowledged the Son hath the Father also.” The incarnation, and service which follows it in grace, has given a special character to our heart relationship with Christ, but after all, all is of the same divine source. Worshipping the Father as being in Christ has been spoken of, as substituting it for worshipping Christ; but I find no such thought in scripture. In Christ is our place and privilege; worship is a separate thing which springs through grace from our hearts individually, or, yet rather, collectively; but worshipping in Him I find no trace of in scripture.
Affectionately yours in the Lord.
July, 1881.
Dear Mrs. ——,—I was very glad to hear of these different souls whom God is leading on. It is always so pleasant to see God working in blessing, and souls opening under the rays of His grace; for what He does, though it may be in a short moment, is eternal… It is not a good sign when people do not like a yoke being put upon them if the yoke be God’s word. “Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly of heart.” We like our own will. There may be a bondage which is not of Christ, if it is that of man on the new man, but subjection of will is the secret of all peaceful walk in this world. It is Christ’s work which gives peace to the conscience; but it is a subdued will, having none of our own, which in great and in little things makes us peaceful in heart in going through a world of exercise and trial. All in us, morally speaking, is sin, and having done with that, we live in what the Father is for us, and on what Christ is a wondrous exchange. Self is always alienation from God; that is, in its working.
As to Mr. ——’s teaching on Matthew 13:38-43; I do not know what it is: ——’s interpretation of verses 44, 45, I do, and never received—his interpretation made it not the kingdom of heaven at all—nor did I as to the bride: Ephesians 5 and Revelation 22:17 seem to me to contradict it expressly. But mistaken interpretations are not false doctrine.
Luke 11:5, etc., is a general statement, that if we ask we shall get. In Luke 18 there is more reference to importunity, but not to its being exactly God’s way, but that when the answer, for God’s own wise reasons, does not come at once (for the answer may imply many things which God cannot well do), then we should persevere. It is not sufficient to know what is the true ground; there must be adequate motive, Christ must be all to us or we shall soon be discouraged, and this true of everything. When Christ is not everything, and the Father’s love the air we breathe for life, we are not going right.
I sorrow over the way Mr.——’s case has been taken up. I have no doubt he spoke unguardedly and was wrong in certain views; but I doubt brethren understood what was in question. I admit his statements had done mischief to some, but the way it was taken up added to it. There might have been a gain of spiritual apprehension; I fear now there may have been loss, but the Lord will overrule it. “That all men should honour the Son as they honour the Father” with whom He is one, scripture is plain enough about, and that it lies at the basis of all truth is a first principle of Christianity. But I trust the Lord will give peace.
I am at a local conference out of London, the first experiment I have made of my strength. It is now some months since I preached, but have been four times to breaking of bread.
Yours sincerely in the Lord.
August, 1881.
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Dearest——,—Most thankful am I that your dear child has confessed Christ. At her age it is an anxious thing, as the world has not yet tried their faith; but I do not see that we have any title to keep them out when we have no doubt that they are Christ’s. I should put these things before her, tell her where my anxiety was as to her taking on her publicly the profession of His name—only guarding against producing any distrust of His love and perfect grace—before I brought her case before others with a view to her breaking bread; and make it a serious thing with her; but of course, if she be Christ’s, she has her title there, and there is the place where the care and nurture of Christ ought at least to be found. This of course will also fall much on you and Mrs. ——. May the Lord keep her in lowliness and close to Himself, that the flesh and the world it belongs to may not strengthen itself by growing years, but the contrary.
We had, I believe, a useful and happy meeting at Oxford, but, besides proofs to correct, it has left me with thirty-four letters to answer, several long unread, so I add nothing. Affectionately yours in the Lord.
August, 1881.
* * * I did not doubt a moment, when I saw the black edge, that your darling—— was gone. Be assured of my unfeigned sympathy. It is a world for death, but death is gain in Christ. The Lord, has left you other objects to occupy your affections, but I have always seen and felt that the first taken, and her the first-born too, tells more on us than any. Up to now life, so to speak, had been working, and the fruit of life growing up in these dear objects of affection. But now death comes and says Yes, but I am here in the world; and it is more or less written on all that are left. But it is a mercy that God has left all your recollections of dear little —— pleasant, and that you step from these into heaven to Christ with her. I do not think that there is more feeling in the sorrow than in sympathy with it—a different kind there is, of course: but the Lord’s sense of death at the tomb of Lazarus was deeper far, I believe, than Martha and Mary’s, tempered with divine sustainment of life, but feeling what death was more than they did—not exactly the loss of Lazarus, that was their sorrow, but all that death meant for the human heart, and as God saw it in love. So your little one is gone, but is gone to Christ, and He is the resurrection and the life. Wonderful that He, such in this world, Master of death, steps then into death Himself for us! But oh, how perfect in all things He was! I recommend you and Mrs.—— to Him. He makes up every loss, and in Him we lose nothing. He had a better right, and a blessed right, to—— than even you had, so He has taken her to Himself. We cannot say a word, save that that is what it is; and He has taken her before the fresh buds of divine goodness were soiled or sullied in her. May the gracious Lord turn it all to blessing to you. Since —— my affections were linked up with these little ones, but there is better than what passes away.
Affectionately yours in the Lord. 1881.
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[From the French.
* * * I have been very low—so low that I did not know whether I should get up again. I had no sense of death, for God—and, if we have not judged ourselves, Satan—is especially engaged at such a moment. But, quite uncertain whether I should get up again, J found myself within sight of my end, and I was surprised at the little difference which it made to me: Christ, the precious Saviour, with me for the journey; then, I through grace; with Him for ever—there was no change as to this…, Christ is all, beloved: everything else will pass out of sight; but He, blessed be His name, never. He who is not ashamed to call us brethren is, nevertheless, seated upon the Father’s throne. It is a wonderful redemption, and He who accomplished it is infinitely precious.
Let us keep close to the Lord, for He would have us there, and let us recognise our own nothingness. The true christian condition is this, that there should not be a thought nor a feeling in the heart of which He is not the source. This is the realisation of the word: “To live is Christ.” But what grace, what watchfulness, is needed, for us to come near it!
London, September 2nd.
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[From the French.
Beloved Brother,—I am much better through the goodness of God. There is a change in me at the end of this nearness of death, not in doctrine, not in my views. In all that nothing is changed, all is confirmed: it is a sweet thought that all that I have taught has been of God. But I have much more deeply the consciousness of belonging to another world. I had it indeed already by faith, but I have the feeling of being of it. I do not know when He will take me, and up to this moment I am doing, as always, what my strength allows. To watch and pray is necessary as in the past, but what the beloved Saviour has said is beyond it, “They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world”; and from whence was He? In this respect there is a sensible change—and I wait.
1881.
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* * * It has struck me, God continuing to bless through all the trouble. Exercise of faith it has been, and in a measure still is, but it is, after all, a happy thing to be cast on God; rest is elsewhere. Do not do feats as to bodily effort; the Lord’s servant has to endure hardness sometimes, and it is a good thing; but there is no good in doing it on purpose. Enduring is right; I would there were more of it; but a single eye takes out of seeking even this. What a blessing to have the heart purified, and all light by this, till we come to where there is no darkness at all—the blessed place where God is, where Christ is glorified. There all the saints will be for ever adequately to His glory, the fruit of the travail of His soul, for He shall see of the travail of His soul and be satisfied. Think of His being satisfied! His love is perfect now. We need polishing, but there are elements in us, because Christ is there, which will come out in perfect beauty, when the rough stuff, which makes its surface now, is wholly off for ever. Here it has to be worn off, detected by various exercises, that conscience may be exercised with it, and thus the internal, moral fruit wrought; but then it shall be perfect in itself.
I have finished John, and for myself, at least, I have learned a good deal in it; I hope profited. With Him it was only the coming out of the perfect thing; there was no inconsistent crust, not even individuality, to rub off. He was just what He should be to manifest God, and man in perfection to God, every moment. I feel the sense of divine love deeper and deeper, and of patience with such as me.
September, 1881.
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My dear Brethren,—I am not going to occupy you with —— or —— or——. It is to another they will answer, and I trust they will depend on His grace. I wish to inquire into the truth of your statement, ‘he is content to teach from the word of God, and we are equally content to hear it from that alone.’ You shall have the teaching you have learned to delight in and what scripture says side by side, and you or any one can then judge if this teaching is from the word of God, in the hope that some of you (may it be all!) may be delivered from what, to my mind, is a Satanic delusion, because on fundamental points it is in direct contradiction with that word.
‘The Gentile who is dead does not require forgiveness.’
Luke 24:47, “That repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among (eij", to) all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.”
Acts 10:43: “Through his name whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of sins.” Acts 26:17, 18. Romans 3:19, 25: “That every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.” “There is no difference … whom God hath set forth a propitiation [mercy-seat] through faith in his blood.” 1 John 2:2: “And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for (the sins of) the whole world.” Romans 4:7-10: “Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven … How was it then reckoned? … Not in circumcision, but in uncircumcision.” Acts 13:38, 39: “Be it known … and by him all that believe are justified from all things.” Colossians 2:13: “And you, being dead in your sins … having forgiven you all trespasses.” Now here we have Gentiles dead in sins and uncircumcision, forgiven all trespasses. Colossians is essentially to Gentiles. (See chap. 1:27, and as the whole passage here shews.) But they are forgiven. But if, in spite of evidence, it is insisted they are Jews, then the Jews were dead as well as Gentiles. At any rate the teaching is false that the dead do not need forgiveness, for here the dead are forgiven. And this leads me to Ephesians 2:1, 5: “And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; wherein in time past ye walked,” etc. These are dead Gentiles, “Among whom also we all had … even as others”—these are Jews. “But God … hath quickened us together with Christ.” Here are both together, but both dead and both quickened together, and sitting together in heavenly places in Christ.
This anti-christian statement that sinners of the Gentiles have no need of forgiveness is connected with, partly founded on, a false interpretation of 1 John 1:9, as if it applied only to believers, that they are cleansed from particular sins; but though this may be supported by souls not yet set free, it is not in the passage. It is not, if we fail the blood of Christ cleanses us, but “if we walk in the light, as God is in the light … the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin”—from all sin, not from any particular fault. It is the christian state, or standing in the light as God is, and cleansed so as to be fit to be there. After that John speaks of particular sins: “These things write I unto you, that ye sin not. If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father.” (1 John 2:1.) There is no re-shedding of blood, no re-sprinkling of blood in scripture. “The worshippers once purged have no more conscience of sins”: “By one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified.” It is not that we do not offend, but there is no imputing of the sin as guilt: “Blessed is the man to whom the Lord doth not impute sin.” And in Romans 4, where this is found, it is expressly declared it is not for the circumcision only. It is for all those who believe, “though they be not circumcised, that righteousness might he imputed to them also.” Your teaching has forgotten that there were those who were not Christians, who were not under law either, and accounted righteous by faith and forgiven their sins. See Romans 4, where this point is fully discussed to set aside what you hold. “There is one God, and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus; who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.” A ransom is that by which redemption comes, is wrought; to have the good of it Christ must be believed in: but as the righteousness is of God, it is as good for the Gentile as for the Jew, and is needed by the Gentile as the Jew. “There is no difference.”
I will now take up the question which your teacher connects with redemption, and where he is very confused. He declares he has only the earnest of the Spirit—he does not say of what, only goes on to the redemption of the body. That we are waiting for that is all true (Eph. 1): but in the previous part of the chapter, what is spoken of redemption is spoken of a something we have, “to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins.” According to the teaching you have now, this is Jewish, though there is not a word about law or Jews. You are not accepted in the Beloved, you have not redemption and forgiveness, and in your madness pretend you did not need it. The passage speaks of those who are chosen in Him before the foundation of the world: I suppose there were no Jews or Gentiles when “predestinated to the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will.” All this belongs, according to this passage, to those who have redemption through His blood.
You are taught that redemption is ‘only to the state in which Adam was, that is, Eden: as he was earthy, such are they who are earthy, and can, by redemption, only be brought to the state in which Adam was before he fell!’ Why so? Why is the sacrifice of God’s Son, made sin for us, to produce no other effect than creation? I read: “He hath made him to be sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him”; or, as we have just read, “We have the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace”; “He hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ.” (Eph. 1) Besides, redemption is identified with the forgiveness of sins. What has that to do with innocent Adam? If it be the intervention and work of God, it has the effect purposed of God, and according to the worth of that work; and that is, that we should be “heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ.” (Rom. 8:17) “So that in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.” (Eph. 2:7.) The whole train of thought in your doctrine denies the whole scheme and revelation of Christianity, which sets us redeemed and forgiven in the second Man, the last Adam, in all that belongs to Him as the glorified Man, as the Son of man. You get the same truth in Galatians 4:7, where it applies expressly to Gentiles. (See ver. 8.) “Christ was made under the law to redeem them that were under the law,” but He was also made of a woman, the Mediator between God and man.
We are told ‘he could not say all have sinned till he proved the Jew guilty; and now having quoted their own scriptures and prophets, he proves them guilty, now he writes “all.” ‘All right; but then the Gentile is guilty, has sinned, but being dead, ‘does not require forgiveness.’ ‘We have all sinned, are all guilty, but do not require forgiveness.’ It is a shame to have to reason about such stuff! And then he impudently says exactly the contrary of what the passage says, ‘He brings in the free justification from the law.’ Scripture (Rom. 3:21, 22) says, “But now without law [apart altogether from it] the righteousness of God is manifested”; and to whom?—those under the law to justify them from it? Not the least; but “the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference: for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, etc., etc., that he might be just and the Justifier of him that believeth.” Hence in chapter 4:11 he expressly tells us it comes on the uncircumcision, not to justify from the law, for they were not under it, but without law, having nothing to do with law (cwriV" novmou). Now you are taught that when Jews are proved to have sinned and be guilty, all are—Gentiles as well as Jews; and also that ‘the word no difference applies between Jews and Gentiles, not between Jews and God.’ All right: but then Gentiles have sinned, and Gentiles are guilty. All the world is guilty: all, Gentiles as well as Jews, have sinned. “Being justified freely by his [God’s] grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” Now this justification and this redemption is directly and unquestionably applied, and formally said of all those who had sinned, all Gentiles and Jews, for there is no difference. All this is largely confirmed and developed in Galatians 4 T do not dwell on Ephesians 1, 2, 3, where Jews and Gentiles are carefully identified in the same privileges, according to the eternal purposes of God, the middle wall of partition being broken down—Jews and Gentiles, they are all chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world—it would be to expound the whole epistle. To say those spoken of in the beginning of chapter 1 are privileges only of Jews, is to talk nonsense in defiance of what is said. It is all the saints and faithful at Ephesus, who were chiefly Gentiles (see Acts 29:9, 10); and Gentiles are carefully introduced, as his own mission is developed in chapter 3 where he calls himself prisoner for them—Gentiles.
I turn to another point: ‘God is not Creator of the unconverted! ‘It is denied’ that we, before we were saved, were created by God!’ I have been asked for a text. I quote Acts 17:25, 28: “He giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; and hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation.” He is addressing the heathen and says, “For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.” ‘Adam [before he fell] was God’s creature.’ Genesis 6:7: God says, “I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth.” But according to this teaching, He had not created at all what He was going to destroy. Malachi 2:10: “Hath not one God created us?” Even the poor women have a chance of thinking themselves God’s creatures. “For neither was the man created for the woman, but the woman for the man.” So in Ephesians 3:9: “God who created all things.” Ecclesiastes 12:1: “Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth.” Will it be said He is the Creator as well as the Redeemer of the Jews, not of the Gentiles? Then He is God of the Jews, and not of the Gentiles, not “of the spirits of all flesh” (Num. 16:22; 27:16); and Jews and Gentiles are distinct races of beings, have not a common Creator. John 8 refers to Jews. Further, if it be because we come in by ordinary generation, then nothing is created of God; for not a tree, not a bit of grass, but comes from another, as is written, whose seed is in itself. ‘God created nothing but the earth, and what was first upon it.’ Then “the things which are seen” (Heb. 11:3) has no sense. John 8:44 is referred to: there is not a word about creating. They had the spirit of Satan, murder and lying—he was the father of it. It was their moral character. So in 1 John 3:8: ‘Creature, or God’s only work in creating.’ This is because the word “made” is used, and that they are begotten of Adam. The poor women were never (not even Eve innocent was) created of God; nothing therefore at all that exists, is created of God! Genesis 1: heaven and earth were created. God created great whales, and all that moves in the sea. (Ver. 21.) The difference of “created” and “made” is imaginary. God said, “Let us make man.”… “So God created man.” (Vers. 26, 27.) And He rested “from all the work which he had made,” and in it “he rested from all his work which God created and made” (Chap. 2:2, 3—lit. “created to make”), and “these are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.” (Ver. 4.) In Hebrews 11: “By faith we understand,” etc. Now that is exactly creation. Colossians 1:16: “For by him [the Son] were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, Visible and invisible, whether they be thrones,” etc. But the coming in of sin, we are told, has made the difference—not as to his being God’s creature: “he that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning.” And “in this are manifest the children of God and the children of the devil. Whoever does not practise righteousness is not of God.” We are the children of Abraham, if we are in Christ; but of creation not a word, whereas sons of Belial is a common expression. They are morally his offspring by murder and falsehood; as the Lord called Peter, Satan, when hindering His obedience unto death, through the influence of the world’s Prince. As Christ says in this chapter, “Ye are from beneath; I am from above: ye are of this world; I am not of this world.” (John 8:23.) To be in the spirit of this world was to be from beneath. I might add as to present creatures Psalm 104, which celebrates creation as it is, and when we read verse 30, after speaking of creatures dying and returning to their dust, “Thou sendest forth thy spirit, they are created: and thou renewest the face of the earth.” The guilt of the heathen was that they “served the creature more than the Creator.” To Elihu who gives us the thought and mind of God in contrast with Job and his friends (Job 33:4, 6) “the spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life.” Yet he is speaking of natural life: “I also am formed out of the clay.” Again, chapter 34:14, 15: “If he set his heart upon man, if he gather unto himself his spirit and his breath, all flesh shall perish together, and man shall turn again to his dust.”
As far as I can gather what is taught (for the statement is obscure), the possession of eternal life is denied. That we have the earnest of the Spirit till the full development of it in glory is true. But at present I am told I only have the earnest of the Spirit. But it is said that life is mine by faith. The earnest of eternal life is not scriptural thought. Leaving the statement there, I give the positive statement of scripture. First, it is because we are sons that the Spirit of God’s Son is given to us: so that we must have life, be sons, to be sealed and cry, Abba, Father. More is needed, but this is clear; you must be a son, which is by faith in Christ Jesus (Gal. 3:26), or it is false to say, Abba, Father. This is by the Spirit given to us. (Gal. 4:6.) But I will cite direct statements. John 3:36: “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.” John 5:24: “He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.” 1 John 5:11, 12: “And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.”
Now this is the result of this short statement of the teaching you accept. You deny God is our Creator. You deny redemption, except of the body at the end. You deny that we have need of forgiveness of sins when converted to God; and unless an obscure sentence be cleared up, you deny we have eternal life—we have only the earnest of the Spirit. Now I do not touch on ecclesiastical questions, though you seem to me in this also to have cast the truth overboard; but you cannot expect to be owned to be Christians, denying all these fundamental truths. It is impossible. You may ask why I call you brethren? I do so, because I trust you may be delivered from these sad delusions of the enemy, in which the fundamental truths of Christianity, as to its application to us, are denied. I might have reasoned a great deal on the statements on which I comment, but I have preferred citing scripture as the adequate reply. May the Lord deliver you from the delusion of the enemy
Affectionately yours in Christ.
October 1st, 1881.
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My dear Brother,—I—indeed I might say we, for the brethren invited to meet the American labourers were here, and it naturally passed on to several—was greatly rejoiced to hear that God had graciously made your mind clear as to your true position and Christian path before Him. I have been more than fifty years in it, and have never had a shade of question on my mind. I have seen failure in myself and others, but it remained in scripture where God had put it. I am additionally thankful that it is from scripture, not from persuasion, that you have learned it. God can of course use others to lead us on, but we know better on what we rest when it is in scripture itself we have found it. Difficulties I have no doubt you will find; there are a certain class which are only in the path of faith, but the joy of the Lord is with us in them. In the last dayi, too, perilous times shall come we read, and that we must experience, but the light and strength of the Lord is there. What a bright picture we have in Luke 1, 2 of the poor and unknown remnant who walked with God in the midst of the unparalleled wickedness of Israel! As to your outward path God will shew it to you. We have only to find His will, and we shall find Him in it. —— will I dare say, have told you of our meetings here: there was much happy communion in it.
Croydon, October, 1881.
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My dear Brother,—I was very glad to get your letter and hear of the saints too. People newly come out always need pretty constant pastoral care, and especially in colonies where the tendency is to loosen all the habits. It is a comfort to know, that through all the Lord will keep His own; I do not mean that labourers and all saints should not be exercised as to it, but that when they see failure they have this to fall back upon. But we desire to see them as a watered garden. What a joy it is when we see them so! It is the power of the Spirit of God which makes them united and happy together, but then He must work in the individual heart, that it may be so, that they may be as “willows by the water-courses.” And there is grace enough in Christ to do it. The text has often been a comfort to me, “My grace is sufficient for thee”; but then we must learn, and experimentally—so Paul himself was obliged to do—the other part practically; and this is a very great thing to learn practically—I mean that we are nothing: we all know that it is true—but to walk in the sense of it. It makes the difference between one saint and another; only we must refer to Christ in grace, or we might get discouraged. But a man who is discouraged is not really there: he does not find strength; but where is he looking for it? When we are really nothing we look to Christ, and we know that He can do everything and, while contending in prayer for a blessing, we know that He does, and orders everything. I was saying to a young clergyman recently out, and fearing as to the future of brethren—the Christian has no future but glory. All he has to do is to do God’s will at the moment, and the rest is all in God’s hands; only we know that glory awaits us. But this does suppose a just sense of our own nothingness, and blessed confidence in God, so that knowing His love we can leave all to Him, knowing that He does all at any rate, and that He will make all issue in blessing.
I have not much to tell you of these countries. Dr. Wolston thought of asking the American labourers to England, and they came gladly to meet in a home conference those of us who had laboured there, and they enjoyed it amazingly, and we all got unusual blessing. They went round too to various gatherings as the Lord led, and I hear their ministry was very fresh and they enjoyed it much. I quite trust it may be a means of real blessing.
As to the difficulties among brethren, it is a moment in which there is a very great and organised effort to make a party against righteousness. It is of course sorrowful, but in effect I do not know that it is more than the needing sifting of God’s hand. My weak state makes it a little trying to me, but I trust the Lord and work on. There is much to be thankful for, but it is a sifting process at present, and we have to await the result of God’s dealing. The preservation of His testimony is what I look and pray for. Nor do I doubt of it, but I have left all in His hands, only answering letters written to me.
The Lord be abundantly with you, dear brother. He is all to us, and soon will be so without a cloud, and that will be a blessed time. I have happy accounts of God’s work both in France and Switzerland—in the former where they had, a good while, gone a good deal to sleep. May we be found watching and waiting for Him!
As to the revised version I think very badly of it indeed. Individual passages are more accurately translated, but they have not had the mind of God at all, and that on fundamental points. I have written a paper on it, to be printed, not published. I have had a slight paralytic stroke—very slight indeed, but it disables me a little in my activities.
October, 1881.
Dear——, It is time I should write to you. It was not for want of often thinking of you that I have not, but what little strength I have has been spent on the French Old Testament and the English New, both laborious work. But I felt you were a good deal isolated, and was longing to write a line… All around God is carrying on His clearing work. What I am anxious for is that brethren should see it is His hand which has indeed wonderfully interposed; but that calls for lowliness and thankfulness. The sense of His goodness always humbles. Exulting is never right; but what ground for it when we have allowed to come in and grow up amongst us what God in His mercy has to put out? Still we have great cause for thankfulness, and one thing I have noticed too, that God has never stopped His work by and amongst brethren. It is nothing very great, but it has constantly gone on, and is now too shewing itself… What I have specially had in my mind to pray for as to this is, that He would maintain His testimony, the testimony He raised up among brethren. Nothing is better than visiting work, without assuredly depreciating the gospel. What I feel is to be done, and as far as able always have done, is to seek to present Christ according to the state of the soul one has to say to. I never bother myself about brethren, if God gathers them it will be well; but my business is one—what does that soul want? It may be deeper conviction of sin: it may be, that Christ has made peace; but whatever it is, that is what I have to bring, and look to Him to seal the word and make it good; and then feed on Him for oneself, for He is there in grace for us, and unsearchable riches in Him.
I am better; in His goodness God has preserved my mind untouched. For study work I am as fresh as ever, and happy and thankful in His love, which is infinite. Eighty-one is not the age to expect very great restoration, but there is One above eighty…
Love to all the brethren. May they, with purpose of heart, cleave to the Lord.
Your affectionate brother in Christ.
Ventnor, October 2lst, 1881.
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Dear Brother,—I must be brief. I believe Christ bound the strong man in the wilderness after the Holy Ghost coming upon Him, and the Father owning Him as His Son. The relationship and position of accepted man being established there, He goes as such, led of the Spirit, to be tempted of the devil, who sought, if He were a Son, to get Him to put Himself out of the place of a servant and failed. The strong man was bound and He proceeded to spoil his goods, delivering all from his power; but that as his temptations were as to this world and the effects of sin, sin itself remained. He departed from Him for a season (Luke), and then the consequence of taking up the sinner, which was a second thing, came upon Him.
1 Corinthians 15:22 I believe is all in Christ. But the other sense is true, there will be a resurrection of the unjust, and it only speaks of the body here. But the resurrection of the wicked is not developed: see the verses which follow and verse 43.
I do not think 1 Thessalonians 1:10 refers to the tribulation, but to the carrying out of judgment by Christ, and first specially at His appearing.
The hymn book is out, and the brethren at Croydon thought it much improved, but I have found a good many printing errors—partly mine. The Croydon meeting was greatly enjoyed by brethren, much communion, and the Americans very happy. I trust they profited too.
October 21st, 1881.
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My dear ——,—I was glad to hear of you. It is quite intelligible your remaining to help——, the rather that he is not strong and would require some strength at this season, though the sea may temper it. I know what walking work is, but was perhaps stronger than either of you then, but non sum qualis eram; between my eighty-one years and paralytic stroke, however slight, my physical strength is sensibly impaired. Our real strength does not change and we ought always to know it better, and still more that we have none but that. Keep it in mind, dear——; we are all, though knowing it well, apt to forget it. But this stay implies that you have definitely taken your place as given up to the work. May the gracious Lord guide you in it! How does your wife bear the roughing? Real sorrows women often bear better than men, but, of course rough outward life, with little comfort, they will feel as weaker vessels. I have well known what roughing it is and long walks, but not only was happier in the work but, I think, never better. Still in the long run it wears; but to serve Christ is blessing wherever it may be—the best of blessings here below. When I look back (and I look more forward) I see much to judge, but serving Him and He was my object, casts a sweet light on it all, though tempered with the sense of my own poverty in it. But that turns the eye on Him, and that is all blessing. Be content to be tired and work hard, but do not do feats, which some of us are inclined to do—true labourers too. Do what Christ gives you to do with patience. You see I talk a little as an emeritus. I hardly shall do much more hard work since my attack of paralysis, slight as it is, but nothing separates from the love of Christ. Kind love to all the saints. My kind remembrance too, if she will kindly receive it, to Mrs. ——. I wish her a winter with Christ.
Ventnor, October 3lst.
27 [Referring to a tract by a high Calvinist on “Life before Faith.”]