Perfection
here means the state of a full-grown man. There is much, and, in a
certain sense, more, contrast than similarity in the allusions in
Hebrews to the Old Testament types. We are now in a different position;
those things which went before were only a shadow, instead of their
giving us a distinct perception of our position. While they were
figures, they did not disclose what we have at the present time. We
have boldness to enter into the holiest; with them, the vail was there
to separate them from it. In this passage it is important to see the
contrast. Christ is the high priest. “Every high priest taken from
among men (though He was taken from men, I need not say)…can have
compassion on the ignorant…for that he himself also is compassed with
infirmity.” Here is contrast, though the general image is taken up.
They had infirmity, and had to offer for themselves as well as for the
people. If we do not see this, we may make great blunders in drawing
these analogies. Absolute analogy in them would draw us away from the
truth. There are certain landmarks of truth that guard the soul, e.g.,
the atonement. The priesthood of Christ is in heaven. It has to be
exercised as a continual thing in the place where we worship. We
worship in spirit in heaven, and there
we
want our priest. Those sacrifices were the memorial of sin; we have no
more conscience of sins. The priest is there, once for all, in virtue
of the sacrifice made once and for ever. While, in point of fact, we
fail, our place is always in Christ in heaven. When communion is
interrupted, priesthood removes the hindrance.
Observe
the dignity of the person called to this office. “Thou art my Son.” The
glory of His person is owned in order to His priesthood. “This day have
I begotten thee.”
(Ver.
5).
He was as really a man as any of us, without the sinful part of it. He
was neither like Adam nor us exactly. Adam had no “knowledge of good
and evil.” Christ had—God has. But now men have the knowledge of good
and evil and, with it, sin. Christ was born of a woman, but in a
miraculous way. The spring was sinless, and yet He had the knowledge of
good and evil.
We
cannot fathom what He was. Our hearts should not go and scrutinize the
person of Christ, as though we could know it all. No human being can
understand the union of God and man in his person—“no man knoweth the
Son but the Father.” All that is revealed we may know; we may learn a
great deal about Him. The Father we know: “no man knoweth the Father
but the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son shall reveal him.” We know
Him to be holy; we know Him to be love, etc. But when I attempt to
fathom the union of God and man—no man can. We know He is God, and we
know He is man—perfect
man,
apart from sin; and if He is not God, what is He to me? What difference
between Him and another man? Christ came in flesh. Every feeling that I
have (save sin), He had. The quotation here from
Ps. 2,
“This day have I begotten thee,” does not refer to His eternal Sonship,
but to His being born into the world in humiliation. He is called to be
high priest. He has this calling as a man, not only being taken from
men. The glory of His person comes first. Looked at in the flesh, He
was born of God; with us, “that which is born of the flesh is flesh.”
But He in His very nature is associated with God, and associated with
man. He is the “daysman that can lay his hand upon us both.”
Job 9.
I may fancy myself clean when away from God, but when I come before
God, I know He will “plunge me in the ditch,” etc. “Let not his fear
terrify me.” God takes away the fear through Christ. Christ was perfect
holiness, and He was ready for everything. His lowliness was perfect;
fear is taken away by Him; He is even as a man, the holy one—on that
side He lays hold on God, and on the other He lays His hand on us; thus
on both He is the daysman to lay His hand upon us both.
The
priest in Israel had to take offerings to cleanse himself. Christ is
fitted in Himself, without that. Aaron alone was anointed without
blood; his sons after the sacrifice.
As to office, there is in Christ perfect competency. He is the Son, and therefore fit for God. He is man,
and so fitted for me. I am not speaking of His sacrifice, but of His person. “This day have I begotten thee;” there is
His person.
Then
comes the office, “called of God an high priest after the order of
Melchisedec,” without beginning of days, etc; not like man with descent
from one to another, “but after the power of an endless life,” without
genealogies. These great principles are thus laid down concerning His
person and office—the Son and a priest after the order of Melchisedec.
Before He takes the office, there is another qualification necessary.
Here would be a difficulty (not in the earthly priesthood, for it was
connected with an earthly tabernacle, and earthly worship, but) now it
is in a heavenly place, and the worship is in heaven. Then the
priesthood must be in heaven. He could not have experience of infirmity
there. What must He do? He goes through all first.
Priesthood
supposes a people reconciled to God. There was the day of atonement,
and daily priestly offices went on with the reconciliation for the
year. The day of atonement laid the foundation for the priesthood for
the year. Then on that day the high priest represented the whole
people—laid his hand on the scapegoat in order to their reconciliation;
(this was not the continued office;) that Christ did on the cross, as
the victim and the representative. He gave His own blood. He suffered
as well as represented the people, and then He went within the vail, in
virtue of the reconciliation He has made. One of
these
goats was the Lord’s lot, (the other was the people’s,) and the blood
was put on the mercy seat. There was no confession of sins in that.
Christ’s blood being on the mercy seat is the ground on which mercy is
proclaimed to all the world, even to the vilest sinner in the world.
But suppose a person comes and says, “I find sin is working in me; how
can I come to God?” I say, Christ has borne your sins; He has
represented you there; confessed your sins on His own head, and God has
condemned sin in the flesh in Christ. A person is often more troubled
at the present working of sin in him than at all the sins past; but I
say to that person, God has condemned your sin in Christ. God’s
character has been glorified, majesty, righteousness, love—all
vindicated on the cross. God’s truth is vindicated. He said, “In the
day thou eatest thou shalt surely die,” and Christ dies instead. Then
when I get my conscience exercised, it is not enough to see God has
been glorified in the death of Christ; I feel my own sin before God.
Then I see that He-has confessed my sins; and now, as Priest on high,
He maintains me in the power of the reconciliation made.
Before
He made the sacrifice, He has gone the path the sheep trod. It was
before He began to represent His people,—“who in the days of his
flesh”—a past thing, before He exercised His priesthood. When He
putteth forth His own sheep, He goeth before them in the paths of
temptation, sorrow, difficulty. Therefore it is said of Him, “the
author and finisher of faith,” not our faith there. We go through our
small
portion of exercise of faith. He went through everything. Moses refused
the treasures in Egypt; Christ refused the whole world. Abraham
“sojourned in the land of promise as in a strange country;” Christ was
a stranger in the whole world. In all His path we see him not screening
Himself by His divine power, but bearing everything that a human heart
could bear. There is not a trial but He felt it. If I speak of a
convicted conscience, this is another thing. He did bear that; but it
was in our stead, on the cross. In a still deeper way, He took it all
upon Himself. What entire dependence! “Prayers and supplications with
strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death,”
etc, Especially in Gethsemane did He realize the full power of what He
came to meet. In His walk we are to follow Him’, to “walk as he
walked.” But in Gethsemane it is another thing—He was alone there.
There
are three parts in Christ’s life. In the beginning He was tempted,
first to satisfy His own hunger, and then with all the vanities of this
world, but He would not have them, He did not come for that. The next
thing was more subtle; the answer He gave, “Thou shalt not tempt the
Lord thy God”—thou shalt not try the Lord. Tempting is not trusting.
When the people tempted the Lord, they went up to the mountain to see
if God would help them. Christ would not take these things from Satan’s
hands. He bound the strong man, and he departs for a season; then
Christ goes on spoiling his goods—healing the
sick,
raising the dead, etc. A power had come in grace, perfectly able to
deliver this world from the power of Satan, to deliver us as to the
consequences of sin—all the misery and wretchedness here. But there was
something deeper: man had hatred to God—they would not have Him. “The
carnal mind is enmity against God.” They entreated Him to depart out of
their coasts in one place. For His love He received enmity. This world
would have been a delivered place, if they would have had Him, but they
would not; and man profits by the occasion of God’s humbling Himself so
as to be within man’s reach, by seeking to get rid of Him! That brings
out another point. Having taken up the people, He must take
consequences. Satan says, if you do not give me my rights over them,
you must suffer. Satan comes and uses all the power he has over man to
deter Christ from going through. In the garden of Gethsemane, He calls
it “the power of darkness,” and says, “my soul is exceeding sorrowful
unto death; tarry ye and watch,” etc; but they could not watch with
Him, they went fast asleep. As Satan has power in death, He brings it
over Christ. Does Christ go back? No; but being in an agony, He prayed
the more earnestly; He does not defend Himself; He might have driven
away Satan, but He would not have delivered us if He had. No other cup
did He ever ask to be taken away; but He could not be under the wrath
of God, and not feel it. He was heard because of His fear. He went down
into the depth where Satan had full
power
over His soul. He was in an agony, in conflict, but there was perfect
obedience and dependence, “Not my will, but thine be done;” only He was
crying the more earnestly to God, and then let His soul go into the
depth under Satan’s power. If He had not given Himself up, they would
have gone away who came to take Him; they went backward and fell to the
ground. Again He presents Himself to them, “I am Jesus of Nazareth. If
ye seek me, let these go their way.” He puts Himself forward into the
gap. He goes to the cross; and there, before He gives up His soul to
His Father, He has drunk that cup; then His soul re-enters the presence
of His Father. Having gone through Satan’s power in death, (“this is
your hour and the power of darkness,”) He goes forward; God raises Him
from the dead, and gives Him a place in glory. He is the full-grown
man, as the second man—perfect. Stephen saw Him as “the Son of man,” on
the right hand of God.
Now
we might suppose that He had come to the end of His service, after
humbling Himself and becoming obedient unto death as the servant. What
more? See
John 13
He is going to be just as much the servant as ever!
Three
things we have seen connected with His priesthood, besides His person.
He has walked the same path we have to tread, only unfailingly, through
it all, and even unto death. That is one thing. He understands the
path. When there is sin, He dies. In His living, holiness is seen. The
second thing is
in making
propitiation for the sins of the people—blood is presented. Thirdly, He
is a perfect man in the presence of God. I have, then, the path
trodden, sin atoned for, and a living man in the presence of God—an
Advocate, Jesus Christ, the righteous. The foundation is not altered,
righteousness remains. He has made propitiation for our sins. He has
gone through all the trials of the way, and is proclaimed or saluted
(“declared”) of God an High Priest for ever after the order of
Melchizedec. The trial is gone through, and the work is wrought out
before He enters in, and He is perfect righteousness in the presence of
God. Aaron’s order was not Christ’s order at all. Christ’s is
Melchizedec’s order; but the analogy is according to Aaron. What was
Melchizedec’s order? Blessing. He blessed Abraham from God, and God
from Abraham. When the full time of blessing is come for heaven and
earth, He will have it as Melchizedec had it. It will be praise and
power. We have the taste of it now.
1 Peter 2:9
When we are with Christ in glory, we shall shew forth His praises.
While He is within the vail, not yet come out, He does not publicly
take this title; outward blessing is not come. Why? Is He indifferent?
slack concerning His promise? No; but if He put all this evil down by
judgment, men must perish; but He is long-suffering, not willing any
should perish, etc. While Christ is within the vail, the operation of
the Spirit is going on, gathering in poor sinners. He has the title
now, but not display. It is, therefore,
after
the analogy of Aaron. We enter with Him in spirit, there to offer up
spiritual sacrifices. The display of power is not come, but we are
within the vail, therefore the apostle presses them to go on unto
perfection, full stature growth. What is my measure of a perfect man?
In one sense, Adam was a very imperfect man, and what he had in
innocence he soon lost, at any rate; (imperfect, therefore, in the
sense of being able to lose it;) and certainly man is not perfect now
in the Adam state. Where, then, is perfection? In the man in heaven. I
have it in the knowledge of my position now in Christ, not in fact
there myself yet, but in Him; and we are to “bear the image of the
heavenly;” in that sense perfect. The Father has set Him at His right
hand. Then, suppose I have the knowledge of that, I am called to walk
as such. Then why perfect? Because I have fellowship with. Him,
association with Him where He is.
Does
any Christian say, ‘I am at the foot of the cross.’ Christ is not at
the foot of the cross. The cross puts a man in heaven. Christ is in
heaven. You have not come to Him yet. You are labouring about in the
thoughts of your own heart, and have not followed Him in faith to where
He is, if you are at the foot of the cross. How do I see the effect of
the cross now? By being in heaven. I have come in through this rent
vail. (The person is not to be despised who is there; but you have not
come in by the cross through the vail, if you are at the foot of the
cross.) If you were inside
the
vail you would know yourself worse—not one good thing in flesh. It is
precious to see a soul exercised even in that way, as the prodigal son
in the far country; but he had not come to his father then: he had not
found out where he was. There was a mixture of self, not knowing his
father, and talking about being a hired servant. He had not had the
Father on his neck, or he could not have thought of being a servant. It
is not humility, as people think, to be away from God, saying, Depart
from me, for I am a sinful man, as Peter. Is insensibility to God’s
goodness humility? The prodigal could not dictate and prescribe when
his Father was on his neck: he had no business to be in the house at
all as a hired servant. It is not humility. It is a mixture of self
with the knowledge of having got away from God. Where will you put
yourself? You must take Christ’s place or none. That is what is meant
by perfect here. There is one way of coming in; it is by Christ who is
in the glory. We have no title to any other place. How is Christ there?
Not in virtue of His High Priesthood, but He is there in virtue of the
offering for sin for us. “I have glorified thee on the earth.” “Father,
glorify thy Son.” That is the reason the apostle speaks of the gospel
of the glory. Christ is in heaven, the witness of the perfectness of
the work that He has done. (Ver.
13,
14)
Milk is fit for a babe and strong meat for a full-grown man; that is
all that is meant. Do not let us look for a place the godly Jew had,
but the place Christ has. Then he
goes on warning them, if they are only on this Jewish ground.
On
the cross, Christ was drinking the cup; in Gethsemane, anticipating it.
Death and judgment are gone; Christ cannot die again. The victory is
complete. Sins are put away and He is gone into heaven in consequence;
and that victory is ours.
Nothing
seemed to be a greater burden on the heart of Paul than to keep the
saints up to their privileges. They saw Christ had died for them, (and
this had not the power over them it ought to have had), but they were
risen with Him also; they were in Christ in heavenly places, within the
vail; and how were they realizing that?—“Are become such as have need
of milk.” There is a great deal of love in the heart when first
converted. And there is another thing. When first converted, all these
things are easier to understand than when more used to hearing them,
and the world conies in. When there is freshness in the heart, the
understanding goes with it. Great force is in that word “
become”
(chap.
5:12,) here. See the state they were in (Heb. 10)
when they took joyfully the spoiling of their goods, knowing that they
had “a better and an enduring substance.” Because they knew they had
substance in heaven, they were willing to sacrifice what was here. When
Christ had not that place in the heart, they were not willing to give
up those things, and the understanding of the heavenly things would be
dulled too. Freshness of affection and intelligence go together. When
it is
bright sunshine,
things at a distance are easily seen. If it is dark, there is more
difficulty. In the day one may walk through the streets without
thinking about the way—one knows it; but at night one has to look and
think which way. Just so with spiritual things; there is less spring,
less apprehension, less clearness when our hearts are not happy. My
judgment is clear when my affections are warm. Motives that acted
before, cease to be motives when my heart is right. I can count all
dross and dung, when force is given to my affections. “Where your
treasure is, there will your heart be also.”
“Strong
meat belongeth to them that are of full age;” not persons who have made
a great progress, but persons of full age. There were things hard to be
uttered, because they were dull of hearing. The freshness of affection
being lost was the secret of all this. It is serious to think that
freshness of affection and intelligence we may lose; but “to him that
hath shall more be given.” There are
good
and
evil
to be discerned; therefore I spoke of finding the way.
Take
this in connection with the beginning of the next chapter, “Therefore,
leaving the word of the beginning of Christ,” etc, instead of wasting
your time with what has passed away, go on to the full revelation of
Christ; be at home there, and understanding what the will of the Lord
is. We cannot separate the knowledge of good and evil from the
knowledge of Christ. When I come to separate between them of myself,
how can I? How can I
walk
as He walked, without Him? I cannot do it. “In Him.” What is that? “Ye
in me.” Where is Christ? In heaven; then I am there too. My affections
should be there too; my hope is to be thoroughly identified with Him.
The portion I have is what He has—life, glory; what He has; all my
associations are with Himself. There is the difference between the
principles of the beginning of Christ and the full perfection “being
made perfect,” (chap.
5:9,) glorified. He went through the experience down here, and then went
into heaven to be priest, because our blessings, associations, etc, are
all above, perfect up there, not down here. He had not received that
point of the counsels of God in glory when down here. Now He is there,
and He has associated me with Himself in that place. I can see Christ
has been through this world so as to sympathize with us in all our
sorrows and difficulties. He has borne my sins; and where is He now? In
heaven; and I am there too, in spirit, and lie will bring me there in
fact. Where He is, is His “being made perfect.” The work is done, and
now He is showing me the effect of that—showing me the walk belonging
to the righteousness He has wrought out. He has taken my heart, and
associated me with Himself; and He says that is the “perfection” for me
to go on to. Where did Paul see Christ? In glory. If he had known
Christ after the flesh before, he did not know Him so now; (that was
the beginning when on earth;) but now he knew Him in heaven; and
this
great truth was revealed to him, that all the saints on earth were as
Christ. Paul had been a hater of Christ, had sought to root out His
name from the earth; he had gone on in sin, been a breaker of the law,
a rejecter of Christ when on earth, and, more than that, he had
resisted the Holy Ghost, refused the testimony by the Holy Ghost given
in mercy to those people for whom Christ interceded on the cross. They
stoned Stephen who bore witness, and Saul was helping hi it. He was
“chief of sinners,” because wasting the Church of God. He discovered
the carnal mind to be enmity against God, not subject to God; he proved
it in his own experience, and now he found there were saints not in
that state—those quickened with Christ, and associated with Christ in
glory. “I am Jesus whom thou persecutest.” They were not associated
with the first Adam, but with the second man, in Christ; that was their
position. These people whom he had been persecuting were Christ. What
broke him down was seeing Christ in glory, and all these associated
with Him. Now he learns that he is dead to law, dead to flesh. The
Christ I want to win is a glorified Christ. To win Christ may cost me
my life. Never mind. That is my object. As to the first Adam, he was
“weighed in the balance, and found wanting.” He is out of it; not in
the flesh, but in Christ. The old thing entirely past; dead to the law,
the world, etc; dead and risen again, having another object. He is
alive from the dead, because Christ is; he is “accepted in the
beloved;” he has the consciousness
that
this work of Christ put him into a new place: (not glorified yet in the
body: ) this was the “perfection.” What was the state of his affections
then? “That I may win Christ,” was his desire. “As we have borne the
image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.”
This was his object. His mind was full of it.
The
Holy Ghost has come down to bring all these things to our remembrance.
Believers are united to Christ (it is never said Christ was united to
man) in glory. Then the apostle was living by the power of the Holy
Ghost. What a trial for him to see these people going back to their
“first principles,” “repentance from dead works, faith toward
God…eternal judgments”—all true! but if you stop there, you stop short
of a glorified Christ. “Who hath bewitched you?” he says to the
Galatians. He says of himself, “I know a man in Christ,” and his spirit
is broken to find the saints resting with things on earth about Christ.
The Holy Ghost was come out to make them partakers of a heavenly
calling; to associate them in heart and mind with Christ, and to show
them things to separate them from the world; not only to keep them from
evil, though that is true, too. They had a temple standing then, where
Christ Himself had been. Why should they have left it if Christ had not
judged the flesh? The middle wall had been put up: how should they dare
break it down, if God had not done it? If God had not said, “I will not
have to say to flesh any more,” how could they dare leave the
camp
and go outside? Christ glorified is the end of all the “first
principles,” and we have to go through the world strangers and pilgrims.
The
Only thing God ever owned in religion was Jewish. It had to do with the
flesh. That is gone by the cross; all is crucified: your life, your
home, your associations, are all in Christ. The doctrine of the
beginning of Christ was not that. What do I find when Christ is on
earth? He is speaking then of judgment to come, which they believe. The
Pharisees believed in a resurrection from death; baptisms, which mean
washings, etc. All these they had then they formed a worldly religion,
and were sanctioned by God until the cross. The Messiah coming on earth
was the beginning, but now I leave that. I do not deny these things;
they are all true; but I have other things. Saul might have been the
brightest saint going under the old things, but not knowing Christ. But
suppose persons got into the heavenly thing, being made partakers of
the Holy Ghost, having “tasted the good word of God,” and then gave it
up, what could they do then? Suppose they had received it all in their
minds, and then gave it up: what else was there for them? There might
have been a going on from faith in a humbled Christ to a glorified
Christ, but there is nothing beyond.
There
is nothing of life signified here, in their being partakers of the Holy
Ghost. It brings very strongly before us the actual presence of the
Holy Ghost, and power through Him; a very different thing from life;
and
what, notwithstanding, we are in want of knowing. We must have that
besides life. Being born of the Spirit, there is power for us through
the presence of a person, who may act in another without his having
life. There may be light in the soul without the smallest trace of
life. In the case of Balaam, we read the Spirit of God came upon him:
he had to see the blessedness of God’s people, and speak of it. He had
light, but there was sleep on his soul, and he has to say, “I shall see
him, but not now.” That was the opposite to having life. You see a man
close to life, seeing all the blessing of it, but not having it. Now,
if all the heavenly blessing is seen and rejected, what else could
there be?
“Tasted the good word of God”—Simon Magus is an example of this.
“Powers
of the world to come” or miracles, putting down Satan’s power. In the
future day this power will gain the victory over all Satan’s power.
Simon Magus wanted this power when he saw it.
“Impossible,
if they shall fall away… seeing they have crucified to themselves the
Son of God afresh,” etc. The nation had crucified Him—they did not know
what they were doing. Now these knew what they were doing. The Holy
Ghost had poured forth the light, and now they did it for themselves.
It was not ignorance, it was will. There are some who anon with joy
receive the word—the very thing that proves there is nothing in it.
They would have it in joy, and give it away in tribulation. The word of
God
does not always give
joy. When it comes in and reaches the conscience, and breaks up the
fallow ground, and judges the thoughts and intents of the heart, that
is not joy. It racks the heart when it is to profit, but it is for life
and health. Here is not merely the joy of hearing about it, but having
tasted of the good word about a glorified, heavenly Christ. It is not
quickening that is spoken of here. Moses was quickened, but he was not
baptized with the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost did not come till
Pentecost. He made the house shake where they were assembled, but that
was not for giving life. Power is a different thing from giving life.
Those already quickened were to be the habitation of God through the
Spirit. There were manifestations of God through these things, tongues,
etc, anticipative of the setting up of the kingdom. It is after
salvation is given, after the soul is born of God, the Holy Ghost comes
to the believer as a seal, an earnest, an unction. I might get a taste
of the power without being sealed; but as a believer I have the seal,
am broken down in myself, not only “with joy” receiving it. I am a
sinner—no good in me. It is a direct question between my soul and God;
not like Simon Magus, believing the miracles that He did. Before I was
converted, I believed there was Christ, as much as I do now. When
Christ was on earth, there were those who saw the miracles, and went
home again. But when the Spirit of God works in the heart, He shows
what we are and makes us submit to God’s righteousness. It ploughs up
the whole soul
and being of
a man—makes him submit to the righteousness of God—shows him his place
in the risen Christ—shows him that all is his. That is a different
thing to merely
seeing
it.
If you have rejected these glorious things, there is nothing else for
you. If you will not have Christ, there is nothing else. Here this
warning is in connexion with the Holy Spirit in the tenth chapter. It
is connected with the sacrifice. Then what follows shows no change
supposed in the man. “The earth which drinketh in the rain…receiveth
blessing from God; but that which beareth thorns and briers is
rejected,” etc. The ground is just the same—the rain comes upon it, but
it brings forth briers. So in men, there may be nothing in them to
produce fruit. The result of life is seen in fruit, not power. The dumb
ass might speak, but that was power, not spiritual life.
“But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany salvation.” (Ver.
9).
There is the work of love here; then there is life. Perhaps there is
only a little bit of fruit; but the tree is not dead if there is any
fruit—“things that accompany salvation,” not power merely—not joy
merely: that might be without a divine nature. But “though I give all
my goods to feed the poor, and though I could remove mountains, and
have not charity, I am nothing.” Judas could cast out devils as well as
the rest, but Christ says to His disciples, Rejoice not because the
devils are subject to you, but rather rejoice that “your names are
written in heaven.”
The
connexion of your heart with Christ, the consciousness of God having
written your name in heaven, is the blessed thing. Here was fruit; love
of the brethren was there—the divine nature was there, and the “full
assurance of hope to the end” is the thing desired. We may look for
that.
When
the seed fell into stony places, it sprang up rapidly; there was no
root. When the word does not reach the conscience, there is no root, no
life, and therefore no fruit. You might weep over Christ, and have no
life, like the women going out of Jerusalem. Flesh could go all that
length without divine life. There might be working of miracles, without
knowing or being known of Him. One atom of brokenness of spirit is
better than filling all London with miracles.
Ver.
6
The nominal church of God is just in this state. There is to be a
falling away, and they are to be broken off; prophesied of in
Rom 11, to be cut off, if they did not continue in His goodness. The apostacy will come, and no renewing them again unto repentance.
Now,
a little word for ourselves, what we have got in Christ. We have
heavenly things—we are associated with Christ in heaven; “because I
live ye shall live also.” I have all in Christ. He is my life, my
righteousness, before God. Then God rests with delight on me, because
in Christ. What place have I in Christ? In heaven, and He has given me
the Holy Spirit to know it and enjoy it, so that my soul rests on it as
the testimony of God. God cannot lie.
Abraham
got a promise, and he believed in it; an oath, and he believed it. I
have more than that. I believe He has performed it. I have a
righteousness now in the presence of God; and we have more in hope,
viz., the glory that belongs to His righteousness. I have life,
righteousness, the Holy Ghost as the seal, and more, the forerunner is
gone in, and the Holy Ghost gives me the consciousness of my union with
Him; not merely the fact that sin is put away. We have the Spirit in
virtue of the righteousness. The Holy Ghost has come to tell me I am in
that Christ. What is the practical consequence? If the glory He has is
mine, I am going after Him. Then all in the world is dross and dung.
“They
might have had opportunity to have returned:” that is, where faith is
exercised and put to the test. You who have known the Lord some time
have had opportunity to have returned, how has it been with you? A
stone left on the ground gradually sinks in. There is constantly a
tendency in present things to press down the affections—not open sin,
but duties, and nothing is a greater snare than duties. We have one
duty, that is, to serve Christ. On the side of God, it is all bright.