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The Joy of the Lord by Alexander MacLaren

Posted in Alexander MacLaren, Reforming Reflections on December 30, 2009|

The Joy of the Lord by Alexander MacLaren

‘The joy of the Lord is your strength.’ — Nehemiah 8:10

Judaism, in its formal and ceremonial aspect, was a religion of gladness.  The feast was the great act of worship.  It is not to be wondered at, that Christianity, the perfecting of that ancient system, has been less markedly felt to be a religion of joy; for it brings with it far deeper and more solemn views about man in his nature, condition, responsibilities, destinies, than ever prevailed before, under any system of worship.  And yet all deep religion ought to be joyful, and all strong religion assuredly will be so.

Here, in the incident before us, there has come a time in Nehemiah’s great enterprise, when the law, long forgotten, long broken by the captives, is now to be established again as the rule of the newly-founded commonwealth.  Naturally enough there comes a remembrance of many sins in the past history of the people; and tears not unnaturally mingle with the thankfulness that again they are a nation, having a divine worship and a divine law in their midst.  The leader of them, knowing for one thing that if the spirits of his people once began to flag, they could not face nor conquer the difficulties of their position, said to them, ‘This day is holy unto the Lord: this feast that we are keeping is a day of devout worship; therefore mourn not, nor weep: go your way; eat the fat, and drink the sweet, and send portions unto them for whom nothing is prepared; neither be ye sorry, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.’  You will make nothing of it by indulgence in lamentation and in mourning.  You will have no more power for obedience; you will not be fit for your work, if you fall into a desponding state.  Be thankful and glad; and remember that the purest worship is the worship of God-fixed joy, ‘the joy of the Lord is your strength.’  And that is as true, brethren, with regard to us, as it ever was in these old times; and we, I think, need the lesson contained in this saying of Nehemiah’s, because of some prevalent tendencies amongst us, no less than these Jews did.  Take some simple thoughts suggested by this text which are both important in themselves and needful to be made emphatic because so often forgotten in the ordinary type of Christian character.  They are these: Religious Joy is the natural result of faith; it is a Christian duty; and it is an important element in Christian strength.

I. Joy in the Lord is the natural result of Christian Faith.

There is a natural adaptation or provision in the Gospel, both by what it brings to us and by what it takes away from us, to make calm, and settled, and deep gladness, the prevalent temper of the Christian spirit.  In what it gives us, I say, and in what it takes away from us.  It gives us what we call well a sense of acceptance with God, it gives us God for the rest of our spirits, it gives us the communion with Him which in proportion as it is real, will be still, and in proportion as it is still, will be all bright and joyful.  It takes away from us the fear that lies before us, the strifes that lie within us, the desperate conflict that is waged between a man’s conscience and his inclinations, between his will and his passions, which tears the heart asunder, and always makes sorrow and tumult wherever it comes.  It takes away the sense of sin.  It gives us, instead of the torpid conscience, or the angrily-stinging conscience — a conscience all calm from its accusations, with all the sting drawn out of it: for quiet peace lies in the heart of the man that is trusting in the Lord.  The Gospel works joy, because the soul is at rest in God; joy, because every function of the spiritual nature has found now its haven and its object; joy, because health has come, and the healthy working of the body or of the spirit is itself a gladness; joy, because the dim future is painted (where it is painted at all) with shapes of light and beauty, and because the very vagueness of these is an element in the greatness of its revelation.  The joy that is in Christ is deep and abiding.  Faith in Him naturally works gladness.

I do not forget that, on the other side, it is equally true that the Christian faith has as marked and almost as strong an adaptation to produce a solemn sorrow — solemn, manly, noble, and strong.  ‘As sorrowful, yet always rejoicing’ is the rule of the Christian life.  If we think of what our faith does; of the light that it casts upon our condition, upon our nature, upon our responsibilities, upon our sins, and upon our destinies, we can easily see how, if gladness be one part of its operation, no less really and truly is sadness another.  Brethren, all great thoughts have a solemn quiet in them, which not infrequently merges into a still sorrow.  There is nothing more contemptible in itself, and there is no more sure mark of a trivial nature and a trivial round of occupations, than unshaded gladness, that rests on no deep foundations of quiet, patient grief; grief, because I know what I am and what I ought to be; grief, because I have learnt the ‘exceeding sinfulness of sin;’ grief, because, looking out upon the world, I see, as other men do not see, hell-fire burning at the back of the mirth and the laughter, and know what it is that men are hurrying to!  Do you remember who it was that stood by the side of the one poor dumb man,      whose tongue He was going to loose, and looking up to heaven, sighed before He could say, ‘Be opened?’  Do you remember that of Him it is said, ‘God hath anointed Thee with the oil of gladness above Thy fellows;’ and also, ‘a Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief’?  And do you not think that both these characteristics are to be repeated in the operations of His Gospel upon every heart that receives it?  And if, by the hopes it breathes into us, by the fears that it takes away from us, by the union with God that it accomplishes for us, by the fellowship that it implants in us, it indeed anoints us all ‘with the oil of gladness;’ yet, on the other hand, by the sense of mine own sin that it teaches me; by the conflict with weakness which it makes to be the law of my life; by the clear vision which it gives me of ‘the law of my members warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into subjection;’ by the intensity which it breathes into all my nature, and by the thoughts that it presents of what sin leads to, and what the world at present is, the Gospel, wheresoever it comes, will infuse a wise, valiant sadness as the very foundation of character.  Yes, joy, but sorrow too!  The joy of the Lord, but sorrow as we look on our own sin and the world’s woe! the head anointed with the oil of gladness, but also crowned with thorns!

These two are not contradictory.  These two states of mind, both of them the natural operations of any deep faith, may co-exist and blend into one another, so as that the gladness is sobered, and chastened, and made manly and noble; and that the sorrow is like some thundercloud, all streaked with bars of sunshine, that pierce into its deepest depths.  The joy lives in the midst of the sorrow; the sorrow springs from the same root as the gladness.  The two do not clash against each other, or reduce the emotion to a neutral indifference, but they blend into one another; just as, in the Arctic regions, deep down beneath the cold snow, with its white desolation and its barren death, you will find the budding of the early spring flowers and the fresh green grass; just as some kinds of fire burn below the water; just as, in the midst of the barren and undrinkable sea, there may be welling up some little fountain of fresh water that comes from a deeper depth than the great ocean around it, and pours its sweet streams along the surface of the salt waste.  Gladness, because I love, for love is gladness; gladness, because I trust, for trust is gladness; gladness, because I obey, for obedience is a meat that others know not of, and light comes when we do His will! But sorrow, because still I am wrestling with sin; sorrow, because still I have not perfect fellowship; sorrow, because mine eye, purified by my living with God, sees earth, and sin, and life, and death, and the generations of men, and the darkness beyond, in some measure as God sees them!  And yet, the sorrow is surface, and the joy is central; the sorrow springs from circumstance and the gladness from the essence of the thing; and therefore the sorrow is transitory, and the gladness is perennial.  For the Christian life is all like one of those sweet spring showers in early April, when the rain-drops weave for us a mist that hides the sunshine; and yet the hidden sun is in every sparkling drop, and they are all saturated and steeped in its light. ‘The joy of the Lord’ is the natural result and offspring of all Christian faith.

II. And now, secondly, the ‘joy of the Lord’ or rejoicing in God, is a matter of Christian duty.

It is a commandment here, and it is a command in the New Testament as well.  ‘Neither be ye sorry, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.’  I need not quote to you the frequent repetitions of the same injunction which the Apostle Paul gives us, ‘Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say, Rejoice;’ ‘Rejoice evermore,’ and the like.  The fact that this joy is enjoined us suggests to us a thought or two, worth looking at.  You may say with truth, ‘My emotions of joy and sorrow are not under my own control: I cannot help being glad and sad as circumstances dictate.’

But yet here it lies a commandment.  It is a duty, a thing that the Apostle enjoins; in which, of course, is implied, that somehow or other it is to a large extent within one’s own power, and that even the indulgence in this emotion, and the degree to which a Christian life shall be a cheerful life, is dependent in a large measure on our own volitions, and stands on the same footing as our obedience to God’s other commandments.

We can to a very great extent control even our own emotions; but then, besides, we can do more than that.  It may be quite true, that you cannot help feeling sorrowful in the presence of sorrowful thoughts, and glad in the presence of thoughts that naturally kindle gladness.  But I will tell you what you can do or refrain from doing — you can either go and stand in the light, or you can go and stand in the shadow.  You can either fix your attention upon, and make the predominant subject of your religious contemplations, a truth which shall make you glad and strong, or a half-truth, which shall make you sorrowful, and therefore weak.  Your meditations may either center mainly upon your own selves, your faults and failings, and the like; or they may centre mainly upon God and His love, Christ and His grace, the Holy Spirit and His communion.  You may either fill your soul with joyful thoughts, or though a true Christian, a real, devout, God-accepted believer, you may be so misapprehending the nature of the Gospel, and your relation to it, its promises and precepts, its duties and predictions, as that the prevalent tinge and cast of your religion shall be solemn and almost gloomy, and not lighted up and irradiated with the felt sense of God’s presence — with the strong, healthy consciousness that you are a forgiven and justified man, and that you are going to be a glorified one.

And thus far (and it is a long way) by the selection or the rejection of the appropriate and proper subjects which shall make the main portion of our religious contemplation, and shall be the food of our devout thoughts, we can determine the complexion of our religious life.  Just as you inject coloring matter into the fibers of some anatomical preparation; so a Christian may, as it were, inject into all the veins of his religious character and life, either the bright tints of gladness or the dark ones of self-despondency; and the result will be according to the thing that he has put into them.  If your thoughts are chiefly occupied with God, and what He has done and is for you, then you will have peaceful joy.  If, on the other hand, they are bent ever on yourself and your own unbelief, then you will always be sad.  You can make your choice.  Christian men, the joy of the Lord is a duty.  It is so because, as we have seen, it is the natural effect of faith, because we can do much to regulate our emotions directly, and much more to determine them by determining what set of thoughts shall engage us.  A wise and strong faith is our duty.  To keep our emotional nature well under control of reason and will is our duty.  To lose thoughts of ourselves in God’s truth about Himself is our duty.  If we do these things, we cannot fail to have Christ’s joy remaining in us and making ours full.  If we have not that blessed possession abiding with us, which He lived and died to give us, there is something wrong in us somewhere.

It seems to me that this is a truth which we have great need, my friends, to lay to heart.  It is of no great consequence that we should practically confute the impotent old sneer about religion as being a gloomy thing.  One does not need to mind much what some people say on that matter.  The world would call ‘the joy of the Lord’ gloom, just as much as it calls ‘godly sorrow’ gloom.  But we are losing for ourselves a power and an energy of which we have no conception, unless we feel that joy is a duty, and unless we believe that not to be joyful in the Lord is, therefore, more than a misfortune, it is a fault.

I do not forget that the comparative absence of this happy, peaceful sense of acceptance, harmony, oneness with God, springs sometimes from temperament, and depends on our natural disposition.  Of course the natural character determines to a large extent the perspective of our conceptions of Christian truth, and the coloring of our inner religious life.  I do not mean to say, for a moment, that there is one uniform type to which all must be conformed, or they sin.  There is indeed one type, the perfect manhood of Jesus, but it is all comprehensive, and each variety of our fragmentary manhood finds its own perfecting, and not its transmutation to another fashion of man, in being conformed to Him.  Some of us are naturally fainthearted, timid, skeptical of any success, grave, melancholy, or hard to stir to any emotion.  To such there will be an added difficulty in making quiet confident joy any very familiar guest in their home or in their place of prayer.  But even such should remember that the ‘powers of the world to come,’ the energies of the Gospel, are given to us for the very express purpose of overcoming, as well as of hallowing, natural dispositions.  If it be our duty to rejoice in the Lord, it is no sufficient excuse to urge for not responding to the reiterated call, ‘I myself am disposed to sadness.’

Whilst making all allowances for the diversities of character, which will always operate to diversify the cast of the inner life in each individual, we think that, in the great majority of instances, there are two things, both faults, which have a great deal more to do with the absence of joy from much Christian experience, than any unfortunate natural tendency to the dark side of things.  The one is, an actual deficiency in the depth and reality of our faith; and the other is, a misapprehension of the position which we have a right to take and are bound to take.  There is an actual deficiency in our faith.  Oh, brethren! it is not to be wondered at that Christians do not find that the Lord with them is the Lord their strength and joy, as well as the Lord ‘their righteousness;’ when the amount of their fellowship with Him is so small, and the depth of it so shallow, as we usually find it.  The first true vision that a sinful soul has of God, the imperfect beginnings of religion, usually are accompanied with intense self-abhorrence, and sorrowing tears of penitence.  A further closer vision of the love of God in Jesus Christ brings with it ‘joy and peace in believing.’  But the prolongation of these throughout life requires the steadfast continuousness of gaze towards Him.  It is only where there is much faith and consequent love that there is much joy.  Let us search our own hearts.  If there is but little heat around the bulb of the thermometer, no wonder that the mercury marks a low degree.  If there is but small faith, there will not be much gladness.  The road into Giant Despair’s castle is through doubt, which doubt comes from an absence, a sinful absence, in our own experience, of the felt presence of God, and the felt force of the verities of His Gospel.

But then, besides that, there is another fault: not a fault in the sense of crime or sin, but a fault (and a great one) in the sense of error and misapprehension.  We as Christians do not take the position which we have a right to take and that we are bound to take.  Men venture themselves upon God’s word as they do on doubtful ice, timidly putting a light foot out, to feel if it will bear them, and always having the tacit fear, ‘Now, it is going to crack!’  You must cast yourselves on God’s Gospel with all your weight, without any hanging back, without any doubt, without even the shadow of a suspicion that it will give — that the firm, pure floor will give, and let you through into the water!  A Christian shrink from saying what the Apostle said, ‘I know in whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed to Him until that day!’  A Christian fancy that salvation is a future thing, and forget that it is a present thing!  A Christian tremble to profess ‘assurance of hope,’ forgetting that there is no hope strong enough to bear the stress of a life’s sorrows, which is not a conviction certain as one’s own existence!  Brethren I understand that the Gospel is a Gospel which brings a present salvation; and try to feel that it is not presumption, but simply acting out the very fundamental principle of it, when you are not afraid to say, ‘I know that my Redeemer is yonder, and I know that He loves me!’  Try to feel, I say, that by faith you have a right to take that position, ‘Now, we know that we are the sons of God’; that you have a right to claim for yourselves, and that you are falling beneath the loftiness of the gift that is given to you unless you do claim for yourselves, the place of sons, accepted, loved, sure to be glorified at God’s right hand.  Am I teaching presumption?  Am I teaching carelessness, or a dispensing with self-examination?  No, but I am saying this: If a man have once felt, and feel, in however small and feeble a degree, and depressed by whatsoever sense of daily transgressions, if he feel, faint like the first movement of an imprisoned bird in its egg, the feeble pulse of an almost imperceptible and fluttering faith beat — then that man has a right to say, ‘God is mine!’

As one of our great teachers, little remembered now said, ‘Let me take my personal salvation for granted’ — and what? and ‘be idle?’  No; ‘and work from it.’  Ay, brethren! a Christian is not to be forever asking himself, ‘Am I a Christian?’  He is not to be for ever looking into himself for marks and signs that he is.  He is to look into himself to discover sins, that he may by God’s help cast them out, to discover sins that shall teach him to say with greater thankfulness, ‘What a redemption this is which I possess!’ but he is to base his convictions that he is God’s child upon something other than his own characteristics and the feebleness of his own strength.  He is to have ‘joy in the Lord’ whatever may be his sorrow from outward things.  And I believe that if Christian people would lay that thought to heart, they would understand better how the natural operation of the Gospel is to make them glad, and how rejoicing in the Lord is a Christian duty.

III. And now with regard to the other thought that still remains to be considered, namely, that rejoicing in the Lord is a source of strength, — I have already anticipated, fragmentarily, nearly all that I could have said here in a more systematic form.  All gladness has something to do with our efficiency; for it is the prerogative of man that his force comes from his mind, and not from his body.  That old song about a sad heart tiring in a mile, is as true in regard to the Gospel, and the works of Christian people, as in any other case.  If we have hearts full of light, and souls at rest in Christ, and the wealth and blessedness of a tranquil gladness lying there, and filling our being; work will be easy, endurance will be easy, sorrow will be bearable, trials will not be so very hard, and above all temptations we shall be lifted, and set upon a rock.  If the soul is full, and full of joy, what side of it will be exposed to the assault of any temptation?  If the appeal be to fear, the gladness that is there is an answer.  If the appeal be to passion, desire, wish for pleasure of any sort, there is no need for any more — the heart is full. And so the gladness which rests in Christ will be a gladness which will fit us for all service and for all endurance, which will be unbroken by any sorrow, and, like the magic shield of the old legends, invisible, impenetrable, in its crystalline purity will stand before the tempted heart and will repel all the ‘fiery darts of the wicked.’

‘The joy of the Lord is your strength,’ my brother!  Nothing else is.  No vehement resolutions, no sense of his own sinfulness, nor even contrite remembrance of past failures, ever yet made a man strong.  It made him weak that he might become strong, and when it had done that it had done its work.  For strength, there must be hope; for strength, there must be joy.  If the arm is to smite with vigor, it must smite at the bidding of a calm and light heart.  Christian work is of such a sort as that the most dangerous opponent to it is simple despondency and simple sorrow.  ‘The joy of the Lord is your strength.’

Well, then! there are two questions: How comes it that so much of the world’s joy is weakness? and how comes it that so much of the world’s notion of religion is gloom and sadness?  Answer them for yourselves, and remember: you are weak unless you are glad; you are not glad and strong unless your faith and hope are fixed in Christ, and unless you are working from and not towards the sense of pardon, from and not towards the conviction of acceptance with God!

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Working for Christ by C. H. Spurgeon

Posted in C. H. Spurgeon, Reforming Reflections on December 30, 2009|

Working for Christ by C. H. Spurgeon

“I must work the works of him who sent me …” John 9:3

So I introduce you tonight to the first topic of the present discourse, which is THE WORKER.  I give that as a well-earned title to the Lord Jesus Christ.  He is the worker, the chief worker, and the example to all workers.  He came into the world, he says, to do the will of him that sent him and to finish his work.  On this occasion, when he is pursued by his enemies, he is still a worker, a wonder-worker with the blind man.  There are many in this world who ignore sorrow, who pass by grief, who are deaf to lamentation, and blind to distress.  The easiest thing that I know of to do with this wicked, wretched City of London is not to know much about it.  They say that half the world knows not how the other half lives.  Sorely if it did know, it would not live as carelessly as it does, or be quite so cruel as it is.  There are sights in this metropolis that might melt a heart of steel and make a Nabal generous.  But it is an easy way of escaping from the exercise of benevolence to shut your eyes and see nothing of the abject misery, which is groveling at your feet.

“Where ignorance is bliss it is folly to be wise;” so said some easygoing ignoramus of old time.  If beggars are importunate, then passersby must be deaf.  If sinners are profane, it is a simple matter to stop your ears and hurry on.  If this blind man must needs sit and beg at the gate of the temple, then those who frequent the temple must just slip by as if they were as blind as he.  Crowds pass by and take no notice of him.  Is not that the way with the multitude today?  If you are in trouble, if you are suffering heartbreak, do they not ignore you and go their way to their farm and to their merchandise, though you lie down and starve?  Dives [the Rich Man in Luke 16] finds it convenient to remain ignorant of the sores of Lazarus.  It is not so with Jesus.  He has a quick eye to see the blind beggar if he sees nothing else.  If he is not enraptured with the massive stones and the beautiful architecture of the temple, yet he fixes his eyes upon a sightless mendicant at the temple gate.  He is all eye, all ear, all heart, all hand, where misery is present.  My Master is made of tenderness: he melts with love.  O true souls who love him, copy him in this and ever let your hearts be touched with a fellow feeling for the suffering and the sinning.

There are others who, though they see misery do not diminish it by warm sympathy, but increase it by their cold logical conclusions.  “Poverty,” they say, “yes: well: that of course is brought on by drunkenness and by laziness and by all sorts of vice.”  I do not say that it is not so in many cases; but I do say that the observation will not help a poor man to become either better or happier: such a hard remark will rather exasperate the hardened than assist the struggling.  “Sickness,” say some, “oh, no doubt, a great deal of sickness is caused by wicked habits, neglect of sanitary laws,” and so on.  This also may be sadly true, but it grates on a sufferer’s ear.  A very kind and pleasing doctrine to teach in the wards of our hospitals!  I would recommend you not to teach it till you are ill yourself, and then perhaps the doctrine may not seem quite so instructive.

Even Christ’s disciples, when they saw this blind man, thought that there must be something particularly wicked about his father and mother, or something especially vicious about the man himself, which God foresaw, and on account of which he punished him with blindness.  The disciples were of the same spirit as Job’s three comforters, who, when they saw the patriarch on a dung-hill, bereft of all his children, robbed of all his property, and scraping himself because he was covered with sores, said, “Of course he must be a hypocrite.  He must have done something very dreadful, or he would not be so grievously afflicted.”  The world will still stick to its unfounded belief that if the Tower of Siloam falls upon any men they must be sinners above all sinners upon the face of the earth.  A cruel doctrine, a vile doctrine, fit for savages, but not to be mentioned by Christians, who know that whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and even his best beloved have been taken away on a sudden.  Yet I do see a good deal of this cruel notion about, and if men are in trouble, I hear it muttered, “Well, of course they brought it on themselves.”  Is this your way of cheering them?  Cheap moral observations steeped in vinegar make a poor dish for an invalid.  Such censures are a sorry way of helping a lame dog over a stile; nay, it is putting up another stile for him so that he cannot get over it at all.

Now I mark this of my Lord: that it is written of him that he “giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not.”  When he fed those thousands in the wilderness, it would have been most just if he had said to them, “Why did you all come out into the wilderness, and not bring your provision with you?  What have you to do out here without something to eat?  You are unthrifty and deserve to hunger.”  No, no, he never said a word of the sort, but he fed them, fed them all and sent them home filled.  You and I are not sent into the world to thunder out commandments from the top of Sinai: we are come unto Mount Zion.  We are not to go on circuit as if we were judge and hangman rolled into one to meet all the sorrow and misery in the world with bitter words of censure and condemnation.  If we do so how different we are from that blessed Master of ours who says not a word by way of rebuke to those who seek him, but simply feeds the hungry and heals all those who have need of healing!  It is easy to criticize, it is easy to upbraid, but ours should be the higher and nobler task of blessing and saving.

I notice yet again that there are certain others who, if they are not indifferent to sorrow, and do not pitch upon some cruel theory of condemnation, nevertheless speculate a good deal where speculation can be of no practical service.  When we get together there are many questions which we like to raise and dispute upon which are of no practical value whatever.  There is the question of the origin of evil.  That is a fine subject for those who like to chop logic by the week, without making enough chips to light a fire for cold hands to warm at.  Such was the subject proposed to the Savior: foreseen guilt, or hereditary taint? – “Who did sin, this man, or his parents?”  How far is it right that the sin of parents should, as it often does fall upon the children?  I could propose to you a great many topics equally profound and curious, but what would be the use?  Yet there are many in the world who are fond of these topics, spinning cobwebs, blowing babbles, making theories, breaking them, and making more.  I wonder whether the world was ever blessed to the extent of a bad farthing by all the theorizing of all the learned men that have ever lived.  May they not all be put down under the head of vain janglings?  I would rather create an ounce of help than a ton of theory.

It is beautiful to me to see how the Master breaks up the fine speculation, which the disciples are setting forth.  He says somewhat shortly, “Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents,” and then he spits on the ground, and makes clay, and opens the blind man’s eyes.  This was work, the other was mere worry.  “Father,” said a boy, “the cows are in the corn.  How ever did they get in?”  “Boy,” said the father, “never mind how they got in, let us hurry up and get them out.”  There is common sense about that practical proceeding.  Here are these people sunken in vice, and steeped in poverty.  Postpone the inquiries: How did they get into this condition?  What is the origin of moral evil?  How is it transmitted from parent to child?  Answer those questions after the day of judgment, when you will have more light; but just now the great thing is to see how you and I can get evil out of the world, and how we can lift up the fallen and restore those who have gone astray. Never let us imitate the man in the fable who saw a boy drowning, and there and then lectured him upon the imprudence of bathing out of his depth.  No, no, let us land the boy on the bank, dry him and dress him, and then tell him not to go there again, lest a worse thing come unto him.

I say that the Master was no speculator; he was no spinner of theories; he was no mere doctrinalist; but he went to work and healed those that had need of healing.  Now, in this, he is the great example for us all in this year of grace.  Come, what have we ever done to bless our fellow men?  Many of us are followers of Christ, and, oh, how happy we ought to be that we are so!  What have we ever done worthy of our high calling?  “Sir, I heard a lecture the other night,” says one, “upon the evils of intemperance.”  Is that all you did?  Has any action come of that brilliant oration and of your careful attention to it?  Did you straightway try to remove this intemperance by your example?  “Well, I shall think of that, sir, one of these days.”  Meanwhile what is to become of these intemperate ones?  Will not their blood lie at your door?  “I heard the other day,” says one, “a very forcible and interesting lecture upon political economy, and I felt that it was a very weighty science and accounted for much of the poverty you mention.”  Perhaps so: but political economy in itself is about as hard as brass; it has no bowels, or heart, or conscience, neither can it make allowance for such things.  The political economist is a man of iron, who would be rusted by a tear, and therefore never tolerates the mood of compassion.  His science is a rock, which will wreck a navy, and remain unmoved by the cries of drowning men and women.  It is as the moon of the desert, which withers all it blows upon.  It seems to dry up men’s souls when they get to be masters of it or rather are mastered by it.  It is a science of stubborn facts, which would not be facts if we were not so brutish.  Political economy or no political economy, I come back to my point: What have, you done for others?  Do let us think of that, and if any of us have been dreaming day after day what we would do “if,” let us see what we can do now, and, like the Savior, get to work.

Yet that is not the point, which I am driving at.  It is this.  If Jesus be such a worker, and no theorizer, then what a hope there is tonight for some of us who need his care!  Have we fallen?  Are we poor?  Have we brought ourselves into sorrow and misery?  Do not let us look to men or to ourselves.  Men will let us starve, and then they will hold a coroner’s inquest over our body to find why we dared to die, and so necessitated the paying for a grave and a coffin.  They will be sure to make an inquiry after it is all over with us; but if we come to Jesus Christ, he will make no inquiry at all, but receive us and give rest unto our souls.  That is a blessed text, “He giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not.”  When the prodigal son came home to his father, according to all propriety, as people would do nowadays, the father should have said to his son, “Well, you have come home, and I am glad to see you, but what a state you are in!  How did you get into this condition?  Why, you have scarcely a clean rag on your back!  How is it you have become so poor?  And you are lean and hungry: how comes this about?  Where have you been?  What have you done?  What company have you kept?  Where were you a week ago?  What were you doing the day before yesterday at seven o’clock?”  His father never asked him a single question, but pressed him to his bosom and knew all about it by instinct.  He came as he was, and his father received him as he was.  The father seemed, with a kiss, to say, “My boy, bygones are bygones.  You were dead but you are alive again; you were lost but you are found, and I inquire no further.”

That is just how Jesus Christ is willing to receive penitent sinners tonight.  Is there a streetwalker here?  Come, poor woman, as you are, to your dear Lord and Master, who will cleanse you of your grievous sin.  “All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven.”  Is there one here who has transgressed against the rules of society and is pointed at as especially sinful?  Yet, come, and welcome, to the Lord Jesus of whom it is written, “This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them.”

The physician never thinks it scorn to go among the sick; and Christ never felt it shame that he looks after the guilty and the lost.  Nay, write this about his diadem: “The Savior of sinners, even of the very chief:” he counts this his glory.  He will work for you, not chide you.  He will not treat you with a dose of theories and with a host of bitter abjurations; but he will receive you just as you are into the wounds of his side and hide you there from the wrath of God.  Oh, blessed gospel that I have to preach to you!  May the Holy Spirit lead you to embrace it!

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The Blessed Man by A. W. Pink

Posted in A. W. Pink, Reforming Reflections on December 30, 2009|

The Blessed Man by A. W. Pink

“Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful” (Psalm 1:1).  We have been much impressed by the fact that the wondrous and precious Psalter opens with the word “Blessed,” and yet a little reflection shows it could scarcely begin with any other.  As most of our readers are doubtless aware, “Psalms” means “Praises,” and the key note is here struck at the very outset, for it is only the “Blessed man” who can truly praise God, as it is his praises which are alone acceptable to Him.

The word “Blessed” has here, as in so many places in Scripture (like Matt. 5:3-11), a double force.  First and primarily, it signifies that the Divine benediction—in contrast from God’s curse, rests upon this man.  Second and consequently, it denotes that he is a happy man. “Blessed is the man,” not “blessed are they:” the singular number emphasizes the fact that piety is strictly a personal and individual matter.  Now it is very striking to observe that God has opened this book of Psalms by describing to us the one whose “praises” are alone acceptable to Him  In all that follows to the end of verse 3, the Holy Spirit has given us a portrait (by which we may honestly compare ourselves) of the man on whom the Divine benediction rests, the only man who can worship the Father “in spirit and in truth.”  The outstanding features in this portrait of the “blessed” man may be briefly expressed in three words: his separation (v. 1), his occupation (v. 2), his fertilization (v. 3).

“Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly.” As most readers are doubtless aware, the best of the commentators (as Spurgeon’s “Treasury of David”) take as the leading thought of this verse, the downward course of the wicked: walking, then standing (a more fixed state), and ending by sitting—thoroughly confirmed in evil; tracing a similar gradation of deterioration in their “counsel,” “way” and “seat,” as also in the terms by which they are designated: “ungodly—sinners—scornful.”  But personally, we do not think this is the thought of the verse at all, for it is irrelevant to the passage as a whole, and would destroy its unity.  No, the Spirit is here describing the character and conduct of the “blessed man.”

How very significant it is to note—how searching for our hearts—the first characteristic of the “blessed man” to which the Spirit here called attention is his walk, a walk in separation from the wicked!  Ah, my reader, it is there, and nowhere else, that personal piety begins.  There can be no walking with God, no following of Christ, no treading of the way of peace, till we separate from the world, forsake the paths of sin, turn our backs upon the “far country.”  “Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly.”  But notice exactly how it is expressed: it is not “who walketh not in the open wickedness” or even “the manifest folly,” but “walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly.”  How searching that is!  How it narrows things down!

The ungodly are ever ready to “counsel” the believer, seeming to be very solicitous of his welfare.  They will warn him against being too strict and extreme, advising him to be broadminded and to “make the best of both worlds.”  But the policy of the “ungodly”— i.e., of those who leave God out of their lives, who have not His “fear” before their eyes—is regulated by self-will and self-pleasing, and is dominated by what they call “common sense.”  Alas, how many professing Christians regulate their lives by the advice and suggestions of ungodly friends and relatives: heeding such “counsel” in their business career, their social life, the furnishing and decorating of their homes, their dress and diet, the choice of school or avocation for their children.

But not so with the “blessed man.”  He “walketh not in the counsel godly.”  Rather is he afraid of it, no matter how plausible it sounds, apparently good the intention of those who proffer it.  He shuns it, and says “Get thee behind me, Satan.”  Why?  Because Divine grace has taught him that he has something infinitely better to direct his steps.  God has given him a Divine revelation, dictated by unerring wisdom, suited to his every need and circumstance, designed as a “lamp unto his feet and a light unto his path.”  His desire and his determination is to walk by the wholesome counsel of God, and not by the corrupt counsel of the ungodly.  Conversion is the soul’s surrender to and acceptance of God as Guide through this world of sin.

The “blessed” man’s separation from the world is given us in three details. First, he “walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly,” that is, according to the maxims of the world.  Eve is a solemn example of one who walked in the counsel of the ungodly, as is also the daughter of Herodius.  On the other hand, Joseph declining the wicked suggestion of Potiphar’s wife, David refusing to follow the counsel of Saul to meet Goliath in his armor, and Job’s refusal to heed his wife’s voice and “curse God,” are examples of those who did not do so.

Second, “nor standeth in the way of sinners.” Here we have the associations of the blessed man: he fellowships not with sinners.  No, rather does he seek communion with the righteous.  Precious examples of this are found in Abram’s leaving Ur of the Chaldees, Moses turning his back on the honors and treasures of Egypt, Ruth’s forsaking Moab to accompany Naomi.

Third, “nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.” The “scornful” may here be.  The Blessed Man regarded as the ones who despise and reject the true Rest-giver.  “The seat” here speaks of relaxation and delectation: to sit not in the scorner’s seat means that the blessed man takes not his ease nor seeks his joy in the recreations of the world.  No; he has something far better than “the pleasures of sin”: “in Thy presence is fullness of joy”—as Mary found at the Lord’s feet.  “But his delight is in the Law of the LORD” (Psalm 1:2).  The opening “But” points a sharp contrast from the last clause of the previous verse and serves to confirm our interpretation thereof.  The worldling seeks his “delight” in the entertainment furnished by those who scorn spiritual and eternal things.  Not so the “blessed” man: his “delight” is in something infinitely superior to what this perishing world can supply, namely, in the Divine Oracles.  “The Law of the LORD” seems to have been one of David’s favorite expressions for the Word: see Psalm 19 and 119.  “The Law of the LORD” throws the emphasis upon its Divine authority, upon God’s will.  This is a sure mark of those who have been born again.  The carnal mind is enmity against God, for it is not subject to the Law of God” (Romans 8:7).  To “delight in the law of the LORD” is a sure proof that we have received of the Spirit of Christ, for He declared “I delight to do Thy will, O My God” (Psalm 40:8).  God’s Word is the daily bread of the “blessed” man—is it so with you?  The unregenerate delight in pleasing self, but the joy of the Christian lies in pleasing God.  It is not simply that he is interested in “the Law of the LORD,” but he delights therein.  There are thousands of people, like Russellites, and Christadelphians, and, we may add, in the more orthodox sections of Christendom, who are keen students of Scripture, who delight in its prophecies, types, and mysteries, and who eagerly grasp at its promises; yet are they far from delighting in the authority of its Author and in being subject to His revealed will.  The “blessed” man delights in its precepts.  There is a “delight” —a peace, joy, and satisfaction of soul—pure and stable, to be found in subjection to God’s will, which is obtainable nowhere else.  As John tells us “His commandments are not grievous” (1 John 5:3), and as David declares “in keeping of them there is great reward” (Psalm 19:11).

“And in His Law doth he meditate day and night” (Psalm 1:2).  Thereby does he evidence his “delight” therein: where his treasure is, there is his heart also!  Here, then, is the occupation of the “blessed” man.  The voluptuary thinks only of satisfying his senses; the giddy youth is concerned only with sport and pleasure; the man of the world directs all his energies to the securing of wealth and honors; but the “blessed” man’s determination is to please God, and in order to obtain a better knowledge of His will, he medi1ates day and night in His holy Law.

Thereby is light obtained, its sweetness extracted, and the soul nourished.  His “meditation” herein is not occasional and spasmodic, but regular and persistent: not only in the “day” of prosperity, but also in the “night” of adversity; not only in the “day” of youth and strength, but in the “night” of old age and weakness.  “Thy Words were found, and I did eat them; and Thy Word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart” (Jeremiah 15:16).  What is meant by “did eat them?”  Appropriation, mastication, assimilation.  Meditation stands to reading as mastication does to eating.  It is as God’s Word is pondered by the mind, turned over and over in the thoughts, and mixed with faith, that we assimilate it.  That which most occupies the mind and most constantly engages our thoughts, is what we most “delight” in.

Here is a grand cure for loneliness (as the writer has many times proved): to meditate on God’s Law day and night.  But real “meditation” in God’s Law is an act of obedience: “Thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein” (Joshua 1:8).  The Psalmist could thus appeal to God—can you: “Give ear to my words, O LORD; consider my meditation” (Psalm 5:1).

“And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper” (Psalm 1:3).  Here we have the “blessed” man’s fertilization.  But notice very carefully, dear reader, what precedes this.  There must be a complete break from the world—separating from its counsel or policy, from fellowshipping its votaries, and from its pleasures; and there must be a genuine subjection to God’s authority and a daily feeding upon His Word, before there can be any real fruitfulness unto Him.

“He shall be like a tree.” This figure is found in numerous passages, for there are many resemblances between a tree and a saint.  He is not a “reed” moved about by every wind that blows, nor a creeper, trailing along the ground.  A tree is upright, and grows heavenward. This tree is “planted:” many are not, but grow wild.  A “planted” tree is under the care and cultivation of its owner.  Thus, this metaphor assures us that those who delight in God’s Law are owned by God, cared for and pruned by Him.

“Planted by the rivers of water.” This is the place of refreshment—rivers of grace, or communion, of renewing.  Probably the more specific allusion is unto “and a Man shall be as a hiding-place from the wind and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land” (Isaiah 32:2).  That refers to Christ, and tells us that just as a tree derives life and fruitfulness from the adjacent river, so the believer, by communion, draws from the fullness there is for him in Christ.

“That bringeth forth his fruit in his season.” This is an essential character of a gracious man, for there are no fruitless branches in the true Vine.  “In his season,” for all fruits do not appear in the same month, neither are all the graces of the Spirit produced in the Blessed Man simultaneously.  Trial calls for faith, suffering for the exercise of patience, disappointment for meekness, danger for courage, blessings for thanksgiving, prosperity for joy; and so on.  This word “in season” is a timely one: we must not expect the fruits of maturity in those who are but babes.

“His leaf also shall not wither.” This means that his Christian profession is a bright and living reality.  He is not one who has a name to live, yet is dead.  No, his works evidence his faith.  That is why “his fruit” is mentioned before “his leaf.”  Where there is no fruit to God’s glory our profession is a mockery.  Note how it is said of Christ that He was “mighty in deed and word” (Luke 24:19): the same order is seen again in “that Jesus began both to do and teach” (Acts 1:1).

“And whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.” This necessarily follows, though it is not always apparent to the eye of sense.  Not even a cup of water given in the name of Christ shall fail to receive its reward—if not here, certainly in the Hereafter.

How far, dear reader, do you and I resemble this “blessed” man?  Let us again press the order of these three verses.  Just so far as we fall into the sins of verse 1 will our delight in God’s Law be dulled, and just so far as we are not in subjection to His will shall we be fruitless.  But a complete separation from the world, and wholehearted occupation with the Lord will issue in fruit to His praise.

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How Sweet is Thy Word by C. H. Spurgeon

Posted in C. H. Spurgeon, Reforming Reflections on December 30, 2009|

How Sweet is Thy Word by C. H. Spurgeon

“How sweet are thy words unto my taste!  Yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth!” — Psalm 119:103

It is delightful to find how exactly the experience of David, under the Jewish dispensation, tallies with the experience of the saints of God in these gospel times.  David lived in an age of miracles and divers manifestations.  He could have recourse to the Urim and the Thummim and the priesthood; he could go up to Zion and listen to the holy songs of the great assembly; he could converse with the priesthood; but, still, the food of his soul was supplied to him from the written Word of God, just as it is with us now that we have no open Vision, and the Urim, and the Thummim and the priesthood are altogether departed, we still feed upon the Word.  As that is the food of our souls, so it was the food of David’s soul.

Martin Luther says, “I have covenanted with the Lord that I would neither ask him for visions, nor for angels, nor for miracles, but I would be satisfied with his own Word, and if I might but lay hold upon Scripture by faith, that shall be enough for me.”  Now it seems to be so with David here.  The honey that gratifies his taste is not found in angels’ visits or miraculous signs or officiating priesthoods or special revelations, but in the words of God’s mouth and in the testimonies of Holy Writ.

Let us, then dear brethren, prize this Book of God. Be not ambitious, as some are, of seeking new revelations, or enquire for the whispers of disembodied spirits, but be satisfied with this good household bread which God has prepared for his people; and while others may loathe and dislike it, let us be thankful for it and acknowledge with gratitude the bread which came down from heaven, testifying to us, as it does, of the Lord Jesus, the Word of life that liveth and abideth forever.

Notice that the Word of God is greatly appreciated! This exclamation of David is a clear proof that he set the highest possible value upon the Word of God.  The evidence is more valuable, because the Scripture that David had was but a slender book compared with this volume which is now before us.  I suppose he had little more than the five Books of Moses, and yet, as he opened that Pentateuch, which was to him complete in itself, he said, “How sweet are thy words unto my taste!”  If that first morsel so satisfied the psalmist, surely this fuller and richer feast of heavenly dainties ought to be yet more gratifying to us.  If, when God had but given him the first dish of the course, and that by no means the best, his soul was ravished with it, how should you and I rejoice with joy unspeakable, now that the King has brought on royal dainties, and given us the revelation of his dear Son!

Think a minute.  The Pentateuch is what we should call, nowadays, the historical part of Scripture; and haven’t you frequently heard persons say, “Oh, the sermon was historical, and the minister read a passage out of the historical parts of the Word.”  I have, with great pain, heard persons speak in a very depreciating manner of the histories of Holy Writ.  Now, understand this.  The part of the Word which David loved so much is mainly historical, and if the mere history of the Word was so sweet, what ought those holy Evangels and sacred Epistles to be which declare the mystery of that narrative — which are the honey whereof the Old Testament is but the comb — which are the treasures of which the Old Testament is but the casket?  Surely we are to be condemned indeed who do not prize the Word now that we have it all.

That Word of God, which David so much prized, was mainly typical, shadowy, symbolical.  I do not know that he understood it all.  I do know that he understood some of it, for some of his Psalms are so evangelical that he must have perceived the great sacrifice of God foreshadowed in the sacrifices described in the books of Numbers and Leviticus, or it would not have been possible that he should, in so marvelous a style, express his faith in the great offering of our Lord Jesus.  I put it to some professors here: do you often read the types at all?  If, now, your Bible was so circumscribed that all was taken from you but the Pentateuch, would you be able, to say, “Thy Word is sweet unto my taste?”  Are not many of us so little educated in God’s Word that, if we were confined to the reading of that part of it, we should be obliged to confess it was unprofitable to us?  We could not give a good answer to Philip’s question, “Understandest thou what thou readest?”  Oh, shame upon us that, with so many more Books, and with the Holy Spirit so plenteously given to guide us into all truth, we should seem to value at least half of the Word of God even less than David did!

A great portion of the Pentateuch is taken up with precepts, and I may say of some of them that they are grievous.  Those commandments which are binding upon us are not grievous.  Some of the commands of Leviticus and Deuteronomy are so complex, that they were a yoke of bondage, according to Peter, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear.  Yet, that wondrous 20th chapter of Exodus with its ten commandments and all the long list of the precepts of the ceremonial law, which you may perhaps account wearisome to read, David says were sweet to his taste, sweeter than honey to his mouth.  What!  Did he so love to hear his heavenly Father speak that it did not much matter to him what he said so long as he did but speak, for the music of his voice was gladdening in its every tone to him?  Now that you and I know that all the bondage of the ceremonial law is gone, that nothing remains of it but blessing to our souls, and now that we are not under the law, but under grace, and have become inheritors of rich and precious and unspeakably great promises, how is it that we fall so far short, and do not, I fear, love the Word of God to anything like the degree that David loved it?

David here speaks of all God’s words, without making any distinction concerning some one of them. So long as it was God’s Word, it was sweet to him, whatever form it might take.  Alas, this is not true of all professors.  With an unwise partiality, they pronounce some of God’s words as very sweet, but other portions of God’s truth are rather sour and unsavory to their palates.

There are persons of a certain class who delight in the doctrines of grace. Therein they are to be commended, for which of us do not delight in them if we know our interest in them?  The covenant and the great truths which grow out of the covenant, these are unspeakably precious things and are rightly enough the subjects of joy to all believers who understand them.  Yet certain of these persons will be as angry as though you had touched them with a hot iron if you should bring a precept anywhere near them; and if you insist upon anything being the duty of a believer, the very words seem to sting them like a whip; they cannot endure it.  If you speak of the “holiness without which no man shall see the Lord,” and speak of it as a holiness which is wrought in us by God the Holy Spirit and as a holiness of mind and thought and action — a personal holiness which is to be seen in the daily life — they are offended.  They can say, “How sweet are thy doctrinal words to my taste, but not thy precepts, Lord; those I do not love; those I call legal.  If thy servants minister them, I say they are gendering bondage and I go away from them and leave them as Arminians or duty-faith men or something of that kind; for I love half thy Word and only half of it.”  Alas, there are not a few of that class to be found every here and there.

And there are some who go on the other side. They love God’s Word in the precepts of it, or the promises, but not the doctrines.  If the doctrine be preached, they say it is dangerous — too high; it will elevate some of God’s servants to presumption it will tempt them to think lightly of moral distinctions; it will lead them to walk carelessly, because they know they are safe in Christ.  Thus they love one half of the truth and not the whole of it.  But, my dear brethren and sisters, I hope you are of the same mind as David.  If God shall give you a promise, you will taste it, like a wafer of honey, and feed on it; and if he shall give you a precept, you will not stop to look at it, and say, “Lord, I don’t like this as well as the promise;” but you will receive that and feed upon that also.  And when the Lord shall be pleased afterwards to give you some revelation with regard to your inward experience or to your fellowship with his dear Son, you welcome it with joy, because you love any truth and every truth so long as you know it to be the truth of God’s own Word.

It is a blessed sign of grace in the heart when God’s words are sweet to us as a whole — when we love the truth, not cast into a system or a shape,  but as we find it in God’s Word.  I believe that no man who has yet lived has ever proposed a system of theology which comprises all the truth of God’s Word.  If such a system had been possible, the discovery of it would have been made for us by God himself: certainly it would if it had been desirable and useful for our profit and holiness.  But it has not pleased God to give us a body of divinity; let us receive it as he has given it each truth in its own proportion — each doctrine in harmony with its fellow — each precept carefully carried out into practice and each promise to be believed and by-and-by received.  Let the truth and the whole truth, be sweet to our taste.  “How sweet are thy words!”

There seems to be an emphasis on the pronoun, “How sweet are thy words!”  O my God, if the words be thine, they are sweet to me. Had I perceived them to be merely the words of man, I might then have estimated them at their own weight, without reference to their authority; but when my Father speaks, when the Spirit lives and breathes in the truth to which I listen, when Jesus Christ himself draws near to me in the preaching of the gospel — then it is that the Word becomes sweet unto my taste.  Beloved, let us not be satisfied with the truth except we can also feel it to be God’s truth.  Let us ask the Lord to enable us, when we open this Book, to feel that we are not reading it as we read a common book — truths put there by some means, unimportant to us how; but let us recollect that we are reading truth put there by an inspired pen — that we have there God’s truth such as he would have us receive — such as he thought it worth his while to write and to preserve to all ages for our instruction.

The psalmist is not content to say, “God’s Word is sweet, and sweeter than honey,” but “How sweet are thy words unto my taste!  Yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth!”  After all, the blessedness of the Word is a matter to be ascertained by personal experience.  Let others choose this philosophy and that form of thought, let them gad abroad after the beauties of poetry, or dote upon the charms of oratory; my palate shall be satisfied with thy Word, O God, and my soul shall find an excess of sweetness in the things which come from thy mouth into my mouth!

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The Fight of Faith by A. W. Pink

Posted in A. W. Pink, Reforming Reflections on December 30, 2009|

The Fight of Faith by A. W. Pink

There are some who teach that those Christians who engage in spiritual fighting are living below their privileges. They insist that God is willing to do all our fighting for us.  Their pet slogan is, “Let go, and let God.”  They say that the Christian should turn the battle over to Christ.  There is a half truth in this, yet only a half truth, and carried to extremes it becomes error.  The half truth is that the child of God has no inherent strength of his own: says Christ to His disciples, “Without me, ye can do nothing” (John 15:5).  Yet this does not mean that we are to be merely passive, or that the ideal state in this life is simply to be galvanized automations.  There is also a positive, an active, aggressive side to the Christian life, which calls for the putting forth of our utmost endeavors, the use of every faculty, a personal and intelligent co-operation with Christ.

There is not a little of what is known as “the victorious life” teaching which is virtually a denial of the Christian’s responsibility.  It is lopsided.  While emphasizing one aspect of truth, it sadly ignores other aspects equally necessary and important to be kept before us.  God’s Word declares that “every man shall bear his own burden” (Galatians 6:5), which means, that he must discharge his personal obligation.  Saints are bidden to “Cleanse themselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit” (2 Cor. 7:1) and to “keep themselves unspotted from the world” (James 1:27).  We are exhorted to “overcome evil with good” (Rom. 12:21).  The apostle Paul declared, “I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection” (1 Cor. 9:27).  Thus, to deny that a Christian is called upon to engage in a ceaseless warfare with the flesh, the world, and the Devil, is to fly in the face of many plain Scriptures.

There is a very real twofoldness to the Christian life and every aspect of Divine truth is balanced by its counterpart.  Practical godliness is a mysterious paradox, which is incomprehensible to the natural man.  The Christian is strongest when he is weakest, wealthiest when he is poorest, happiest when most wretched.  Though unknown (1 John 3:1); yet he is well known (Gal. 4:9).  Though dying daily (1 Cor. 15:31), yea, dead; yet, behold, he lives (Col. 3:3-4).  Though having nothing, yet he possesses all things (2 Cor. 6:10).  Though persecuted, he is not forsaken; cast down, he is not destroyed.  He is called upon to “rejoice with trembling” (Psalm 2:11) and is assured: “Happy are ye that weep now” (Luke 6:21).  Though the Lord makes him to lie down in green pastures and leads him beside still waters, he is yet in the wilderness, and “in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is” (Psalm 63:1).  Though followers of the Prince of Peace, Christians are to endure “hardness as good soldiers of Jesus Christ” (2 Timothy 2:3); and though “more than conquerors,” they are often defeated.

“Fight the good fight of faith” (1 Tim. 6:12). We are called upon to engage in a ceaseless warfare.  The Christian life is to be lived out on the battlefield.  We may not like it, we may wish that it were otherwise, but so has God ordained.  And our worst foe, our most dangerous enemy, is self, that “old man” which ever wants his way, which rebels against the “yoke” of Christ, which hates the “cross”; that “old man” which opposes every desire of the “new man,” which dislikes God’s Word and ever wants to substitute man’s word.  But self has to be “denied” (Matt. 16:24), his “affections and lusts crucified” (Gal. 5:24).  Yet that is by no means an easy task.  O what a conflict is ever going on within the true Christian.  True there are times when the “old man” pretends to be asleep or dead, but soon he revives and is more vigorous than ever in opposing that “new man.”  Then it is that the real Christian seriously asks, “If it be so (that I truly am a child of God) why am I thus?”  Such was Rebekah’s puzzling problem when “the children struggled together within her” (Gen. 25:22).

What a parable in action is set before us in the above Scripture!  Do we need any interpreter?  Does not the Christian have the key which explains that parable in the conflicting experiences of his own soul?  Yes, and is not the sequel the same with you and me, as it was with poor Rebekah?  “She went and inquired of the Lord.”  Ah, her husband could not solve the mystery for her; no man could, nor did she lean unto her own understanding and try and reason it out.  No, the struggle inside her was so great and fierce, she must have Divine assurance.  Nor did God disappoint her and leave her in darkness.  “And the Lord said unto her, Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels; and the one people shall be stronger than the other people; and the elder shall serve the younger” (Gen. 25:23).  But the meaning of such a verse is hid from those who are, in their own conceits, “wise and prudent.”  But, blessed be God, it is revealed to those who, taught of the Spirit, are made to realize they are babes, that is, who feel they are ignorant, weak, helpless—for that is what “babes” are.  And who were the two nations that “struggled together” inside Rebekah?  Esau and Jacob, from whom two vastly different nations descended, namely, Edom and Israel.  Now observe closely what follows: “And the one people shall be stronger than the other.”  Yes, Esau was so strong that Jacob was afraid of him, and fled from him.  So it is spiritually, the “old man” is stronger than the “new man.”  How strange that it should be so!  Would we not naturally conclude that that which is “born of the Spirit” is stronger than that which is “born of the flesh” (John 3:6)?  Of course, we would naturally think so, for “the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God” (1 Cor. 2:14).  But consider the matter from the standpoint of spiritual discernment.  Suppose the “new man” were stronger than the “old man”—then what?  Why, the Christian would be self-sufficient, proud, haughty.  But God, in His infinite wisdom, allows the “new man” in His children to be weaker than the “old man.”  Why?  That they may depend upon Him.  But it is one thing to know the theory of this, and it is quite another to put it into practice.  It is the one thing to believe the “new man” (Jacob) is weaker then the “old man” (Esau, who was born first!), and it is quite another thing to daily seek and obtain from God the needed strength to “fight” against the “old man.”  That is why it is called the “good fight of faith,” for faith treats with God.

“Fight the good fight of faith” (1 Tim. 6:12). Our circumstances are the battleground.  The “flesh” is never long satisfied with the “circumstances” in which God places us, but always wants to change them, or get into another set than we are now in.  Thus it was with Israel of old.  The “circumstances” into which God had brought the children of Israel was the wilderness, and they murmured, and wished they were back in Egypt.  And that is written as a warning for us!  The tendency of circumstances is to bind our hearts to the earth: when prosperous, to make us satisfied with things: when adverse, to make us repine over or covet the things which we do not have.  Nothing but the exercise of real faith can lift our hearts above circumstances, for faith looks away from all things seen, so that the heart delights itself and finds its peace and joy in the Lord (Psalm 37:4).  This is never easy to any of us; it is always a fight, and only Divine grace (diligently sought) can give us the victory.  Oftentimes we fail; when we do, this must be confessed to God (1 John 1:9) and a fresh start made.

Nothing but faith can enable us to rise above “circumstances.” It did so in the case of the two apostles, who, with feet fast in the stocks, with backs bleeding and smarting, sang praises to God in Philippi’s dungeon; that was faith victorious over most unpleasant circumstances.  We can almost imagine each reader saying, “Alas, my faith is so weak.”  Ah, ponder again this word; “Fight the good fight of faith.”  Note the repetition!  It is not easy for faith to rise above circumstances; no, it is not.  It is difficult, at times, extremely difficult; so the writer has found it.  But remember, a “fight” is not finished in a moment, by one blow; oftentimes the victor receives many wounds and is sorely pounded before he finally knocks-out his enemy.  So we have found it, and still find it: the great enemy, the “flesh” (self) gives the “new man” many a painful blow, often floors him; but, by grace, we keep on fighting.  Sometimes the “new man” gets the victory, sometimes the “old man” does.  “For a just man falleth seven times and riseth up again” (Prov. 24:16).

Yes, dear reader, every real Christian has a “fight” on his hands: self is the chief enemy which has to be conquered; our circumstances the battle-ground where the combat has to be waged.  And each of us would very much like to change the battle-ground.  There are unpleasant things which, at times, sorely try each of us, until we are tempted to cry with the afflicted Psalmist, “O that I had wings like a dove, that I might fly away” (Psalm 55:6).  Yes, sad to say, the writer has been guilty of the same thing.  But, when he is in his right mind (spiritually), he is thankful for these very “circumstances.”  Why?  Because they afford an opportunity for faith to act and rise above them, and for us to find our peace, our joy, our satisfaction, not in pleasant surroundings, not in congenial friends, nor even in sweet fellowship with brethren and sisters in Christ; but—in God!  He can satisfy the soul.  He never fails those who truly trust Him.  But it is a fight to do so.  Yes, a real, long, hard fight.  Yet, if we cry to God for help, for strength, for determination, He does not fail us, but makes us “more than conquerors.”

There is that in each of us which wants to play the coward, run away from the battlefield, our “circumstances.”  This is what Abraham did (Genesis 12:10), but he gained nothing by it.  This is what Elijah did (1 Kings 19:3), and the Lord rebuked him for it.  And these instances are recorded “for our learning” (Romans 15:4), as warnings for us to take to heart.  They tell us that we must steadfastly resist this evil inclination, and call to mind that exhortation, “Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you (act) like men, be strong” (1 Cor. 16:13).

“Fight the good fight of faith.” Nor does the Lord call upon us to do something from which He was exempted.  O what a “fight” the Captain of our salvation endured!  See Him yonder in the wilderness: “forty days tempted of Satan, and was with the wild beast” (Mark 1:13), and all that time without food (Matthew 4:2).  How fiercely the Devil assaulted Him, renewing his attack again and yet again.  And the Savior met and conquered him on the ground of faith, using only the Word of God.  See Him again in Gethsemane; there the fight was yet fiercer, and so intense were His agonies that He sweat great drops of blood.  Nor was there any comfort from His disciples: they could not watch with Him one hour.  Yet He triumphed, and that, on the ground of faith: “when He had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto Him that was able to save Him from death, and was heard in that He feared” (Heb. 5:7).

Those two instances are recorded for our instruction, and, as ever, their order is beautifully significant.  They teach us how we are to “fight the good fight of faith.”  Christ Himself has “left us an example!”  And what do we learn from these solemn and sacred incidents?  This: the only weapon we are to use is the Sword of the Spirit; and, victory is only to be obtained on our knees—“with strong crying and tears.”  The Lord graciously enables us so to act.  O that each of us may more earnestly seek grace to fight the good fight of faith.

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