SKETCH
ABOVE: THE
EMPEROR NERO WITNESSING THE BURNING OF THE CHRISTIAN
MARTYRS AT
The God of our fathers raised up
Jesus, whom ye slew,
hanging him on a
tree. Him
did God exalt with his right hand to be a Prince and a
Saviour, for to give
repentance to
But this I confess unto thee,
that
after the Way
which they call a sect,
so serve I the God of our
fathers, believing all
things which are according to the law,
and which are written in the prophets:
having hope toward God, which these also themselves
look for, that THERE
SHALL BE A
RESURRECTION BOTH OF THE JUST
AND UNJUST.
Herein do I also
exercise myself to have a conscience void of offence
toward God and men always.
Touching
THE
RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD I am
called in question before you this day:(Acts 24: 14-16,
21b, R.V. )
-------
SCRIPTURE
The former treatise I made,
Theophilus, concerning
all that Jesus began both to do and to TEACH,
until the day in which he was received up, after
that he had given commandment through
the Holy Ghost unto his apostles whom he had chosen: to whom he showed himself ALIVE
after his passion by many proofs,
appearing unto them by the space of forty days, and speaking the things concerning the KINGDOM
OF GOD:
and, being assembled together with them,
he charged them
not
to depart from Jerusalem, but to WAIT for the promise of
the Father, which,
said he, ye heard from
me: for John indeed
baptized with water;
but YE
SHALL BE BAPTIZED WITH THE
HOLY GHOST not many days thence.
They therefore,
when they were
come together, asked
him, saying, Lord, dost thou at this time restore the kingdom to
-------
MINISTRIES OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
The
teaching
ministry of the Spirit was one of Christs last
promises before His crucifixion.
He said, I have many more
things to say to you,
but you cannot hear them now. But
when
He,
the Spirit of Truth,
comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative,
but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.
He
shall glorify Me; for He
shall take if mine,
and shall disclose it to you.
All
things that the Father has are Mine;
therefore I said, that He
takes
of Mine and will disclose it to you (John
16: 12-15).
This particular ministry of the Spirit was yet future when our Lord
spoke these words.
It began
on the Day of Pentecost and
continues throughout this age.
Peters
clear comprehension as revealed in
his Pentecostal sermon is evidence of the beginning of
this ministry.
In general the content of the Spirits ministry encompasses all the
truth (the definite
article appears in the text).
This, of course, means
revelation concerning Christ Himself, but on
the basis of the written Word (for
we have no other information about Him except through
the Bible).
Therefore, He teaches the believer the content of the Scripture which
leads him to an
understanding of prophecy (things
to
come). This particularizing
of
the general promise concerning teaching ought to
encourage every believer to study
prophecy. Notice
too that the Spirit does not originate
His message it comes from the Lord.
The result of the teaching ministry of the Spirit is that Christ
is glorified.
If He is not glorified, then the Spirit has
not been ministering.
Note also that it
is not the Spirit who is glorified or who is supposed to
be glorified in a
religious service, but Christ.
Further,
if Christ is known only through the written Word, then
He will be glorified
when the Word of
God is expounded in the
power of the Spirit.
How does the [Holy] Spirit teach the
believer? John
declares: The
anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you;
but as His anointing teaches you about all things,
and is true and is not a lie, and just as it
has taught you,
you abide
in Him
(1 John 2: 27).
This could not mean that human teachers are
unnecessary in explaining the Word of God.
If it could, then what would be the use of the
gift of teaching? (Rom. 12: 7.)
John wrote concerning the presence of
antichrists in the group.
Having stated
his own conviction concerning their heresies, he simply
declared that no man
really had to tell them to teach, for the Holy Spirit
would confirm it to
them. Human
teachers are a necessary
link in the procedure of instructing believers, though
the ultimate
authentication of the teaching comes from the [Holy]
Spirit.
For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are
the sons of
God (Rom. 8: 14). Leading is a
confirmation
of sonship, for sons are led.
This work
of guidance is particularly the work of the [Holy] Spirit.
Romans
8: 14 states it and the Book of Acts amply illustrates it (8:
29; 10: 19-20; 13: 2, 4; 16: 6-7; 20: 22-23).
This ministry of the Spirit is one of the
most assuring ones for the Christian.
The child of God never needs to walk in the dark;
he is always free to
ask and receive directions from the Spirit Himself.
The Spirit is also One who assures the
Christian that he is a child of God.
The
Spirit Himself bears witness with our
spirit, that we are children of God (Rom: 16).
The word for children is here tekna (in contrast to huioi,
sons) and emphasizes the fact that the believer shares
in the life of the
Father. Because
of this, he also shares
as an heir* [of eternal life] in the possessions
of the Father. Assurance
of all this is the work of the
Spirit to the heart of each Christian. Dr.
Charles
C. Ryrie.
[* Note. A
distinction needs to be made from what we presently have
inherited from God as
a free gift (Rom.
6: 23,
R.V) to His redeemed children, based upon Anothers
work; from what we hope
to
inherit in the age
yet to come, when
our Lord Jesus returns to establish His Kingdom rule;
and to Reward His
redeemed people for the quality and nature
of their
work. Behold,
I come quickly; and my
reward is with me, to render
to each man according as his work is, (Rev. 22: 12,
R.V.). Wherefore,
my beloved brethren, be
ye
steadfast, unmoveable, always
abounding in
the work of the Lord,
forasmuch as ye know that your labour
is not in vain in the Lord, (1
Cor. 15:
58, R.V.).
Whatsoever ye do, work heartily as unto the Lord,
and not unto men; knowing
that
from the Lord
ye shall receive the recompense of the inheritance; ye serve the Lord Christ. For
he that doeth wrong shall receive again for the wrong that he hath done: and there is no respect of persons,
(Col. 3:
23-25,
R.V.).
See 1 Cor.
6: 9,
10; Gal.
5: 21;
Eph. 5:
5.]
-------
1. Messiah was dead, but after three days and three nights in the
heart of the earth
(Matt.
12: 40),
He was
Resurrected out
from the
dead
(Acts 4: 2b,
Lit. Gk.), leaving the rest of the dead waiting in Hades
until the time of their
Resurrection! John
3: 13; 1 Thess.
4: 16
So
says
our Lord: Is it not for this cause that ye err, that ye
know not the scriptures nor
the power of God? For when
they shall
rise from
the dead, they neither
marry, nor are given in
marriage; but
are as the angels in heaven. But as
touching the dead, that
they are raised; have
ye
not read in the book of Moses,
in the place
concerning the Bush,
how God spake unto him,
saying, I am the God of
Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? He
is
not the God of the dead, but of the living: ye do
greatly err: (Mark
12: 24-27,
R.V.). Again:
And
it came to pass, that
the beggar died, and
that he was
carried away by the angels into Abrahams bosom: and the rich man died, and
was buried.
And in
HADES (not in Heaven)
he lifted up
his eyes, being
in torments,
and
seeth
Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. (Luke
16: 22, 23,
R.V.).
So
says
Stephen: The
God of glory appeared
unto our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia,
before he dwelt in
So
says the Writer
of
Hebrews:
These all died in faith, NOT HAVING RECEIVED THE PROMISES, but having seen
them
from afar
(Heb. 11: 13,
R.V.).
So
says
Peter: (Acts
2: 29-34).
Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who according to his great mercy begat us
again unto a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus
Christ from
the dead
unto a salvation
ready to be revealed in the last time.
receiving the
end of your faith,
even THE SALVATION OF
YOUR
SOULS. Concerning
which
salvation the prophets sought and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that
should come unto you: searching what
time
or what manner of time the Spirit
of
Christ which was in them did point unto,
when it [He] testified beforehand
the sufferings of
Christ,
and THE GLORIES THAT SHOULD FOLLOW THEM: (1
Pet. 1: 3,
5, 9-11,
R.V.).
So
says John: NO MAN HATH ASCENDED INTO HEAVEN,
but he that descended out of
heaven, even
the Son of man
(John 3: 13). Again: I saw underneath
the altar the
SOULS
of them that
had been slain for the
word of God, and for the testimony which they
held: and they
cried with a great voice,
saying, How long, O Master, the holy and true,
dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that
dwell on the earth? And there
was given
them to each one a white robe;
and it was said
unto them, that they
should rest for a little
time, until
their fellow-servants also
and their brethren, which should be killed even as
they were, should have
fulfilled their course (Rev.
6: 9-11, R.V. Margin).
So
says Paul:
But shun profane babblings:
for they will proceed further in
ungodliness, and their
word will eat as doth a gangrene: of
whom is Hymenaeus
and Philetus;
men who concerning the TRUTH have
erred, saying that the RESURRECTION is past already,
and
overthrow the faith of some: (2
Tim. 2: 16-18,
R.V.).
When
the filling of the
Spirit is mentioned in the Book of Acts, conversions
are recorded. Spirit-filling
on the Day of Pentecost (2: 4) resulted in the
conversion of 3,000 people (v. 41).
The filling of the
disciples in 4: 31
resulted in multitudes of men and women turning to the
Lord (5: 14).
One
of the qualifications for
the choosing of the first helpers was that they be
Spirit-filled (6: 3).
This was followed by the conversion of a
number of priests (v. 7).
Paul
was filled with the Spirit after
his
conversion, and the fruit of his life is well known. When Barnabas,
who was filled with the Spirit, went to
(1)
In
Old Testament times the 50th day (c. 7 weeks)
after the
harvest-consecrating, sheaf-waving ceremony of the 16th
of the month
Nisan. Pentecost
is also known as The Feast of
Weeks (Ex.
34: 22;
Deut. 16:
10), The
Feast of
Harvest (Ex.
23: 16), and The
Day of the First Fruits (Num.
28: 26). This one-day
festival usually fell on the 6th
day of the month Sivan (end of May or beginning of June)
and was the 2d and
least important of the three annual festivals which, by
ritual indicated in
sources J and E (Ex.
34: 18-26,
cf. 23: 10-17), were to
be celebrated at the sanctuary by every male.
It opened the fruit harvest, as the Feast of Unleavened
Bread opened grain
harvest.
Because
Pentecost
was observed about seven weeks after Passover, it was tied in
with the Sabbatical system of feasts;
usual labours were halted and
people met in a holy convocation (Deut.
28: 2-6).
(2)
In
the N.T. the first Christian Pentecost fell on the same
day as the old
Hebrew festival. The
events narrated in Acts
2 mark the beginning of the Christian Church.
Multitudes of devout Jews from what seemed every
nation under heaven
(v. 5) had been attracted to
[* At
the intercession of the descended Christ, as Peter
testifies, the Holy Spirit, as the angel (or sent
One) of the Lord, descends [at Pentecost]
in fire on the disciples of the rejected Christ.
Might they not then be the bush that was burning, yet unconsumed?
Moses wondered at the sight.
And did not men of Israel out of all nations
wonder, when the [Holy] Spirit
coming
down in wind and fire, gave to the 120 to speak with
new tongues, while
tongues of fire that consumed not, stood on their
heads? Out
of the fire of the bush came forth the
voice of Jehovah, testifying that He was the God of
the fathers. Might
not then the testimonies of the inspired apostles be
true; that this new
manifestation came from the God of Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob? Acts
3:
13,
25; 5:
30; 22: 14.]
Paul
in
1 Cor.
16: 8
spoke of delaying
his return to
(3)
In
some branches of the Christian Church Pentecost or
Whitsuntide is observed
as a solemn feast 50 days after Easter (reckoning
inclusively), to commemorate
the coming of the Holy Spirit.
In
Christian symbolism cloven tongues of fire signify the
Day of Pentecost, as
well as the Holy Spirit.
- (Blacks
Bible
Dictionary, pp536, 537.)
*
*
*
EXPOSITIONS
[PART ONE]
1
PETERS FIRST
THE DAY OF PENTECOST
By
ROBERT GOVETT
Let
us now pass to
the consideration of a passage of great moment, to be
produced from the New
Testament. It is found in the first sermon of St.
Peter, and runs thus -
Ye men of Israel, hear
these words: Jesus of
Nazareth, a man
approved of God among you by miracles, and
wonders, and signs, which God did by him in the midst
of you, as ye
yourselves also know:
Him, being delivered by
the determinate counsel
and foreknowledge of God,
ye have taken, and by
wicked hands have crucified and slain,
whom God hath raised up,
having loosed the pains of death, because
it was
not possible that he should be holden of it.
For
David speaketh
concerning him, I
foresaw the Lord always before my face;
for he is at my right hand that I should not be moved. Therefore did my heart rejoice, and my tongue was glad;
moreover, also,
my flesh shall rest in
hope; Because thou will not leave me in hell,* neither
wilt thou
suffer thine Holy One to see corruption. Thou hast
made known to me the ways of life;
thou shalt make me full of joy with thy countenance.
Men and brethren,
let me freely speak unto you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried,
and
his sepulchre is with us unto this day.
Therefore, being a
prophet, and knowing
that God had sworn with an oath to him,
that of the fruit of his loins,
according to the flesh,
he would raise up Christ to sit on his throne;
He, seeing this before, spake of the resurrection of the Christ, that his soul was not left in hell,* neither his flesh did see
corruption.
This
Jesus
hath God raised up whereof we all are witnesses.
Therefore,
being by the right hand of God exalted,
and
having received of the Father the promise of the Holy
Ghost, he
hath shed
forth this which ye now see and hear. For
David is not ascended
into the heavens:
but he saith
himself, The Lord said
unto my Lord, Sit thou
on my right hand until I make thine enemies thy
footstool.
Therefore, let all the
house of
*
NOTE. Hades is spoken of with
expressions of comparison utterly
inconsistent with the idea of the literal grave. Thus we read
of The lowest
Hades (Deut.
32:
22;
Psa. 86: 13) the
depths
of Hades (Prov. 9: 18); the
midst of Hades
(Ezek.
32:
21). It is in two instances clearly distinguished from the grave. In Gen.
37:
35,
where it first appears in the Bible, Jacob declares- I will go down into
Hades unto my son;
but from verse 33 we learn that the Patriarch was
under the impression that
Joseph had not, and could not have, a grave; he is
there represented as
exclaiming, An evil
beast hath devoured him. And in Isaiah 14:
15
it is declared that Lucifer
shall be brought down
to Hades, who, verse 19,
is represented as being cast
out
of his grave. It is used in antithesis with Heaven under circumstances which show
that the literal grave cannot be intended. It is as high
as Heaven, what
canst thou do? deeper than
Hades,
what canst thou know? (Job
11: 8).
If I ascend
up into Heaven, thou art there;
if I make my bed in Hades [Heb. Sheol], behold, thou art there (Psa. 139: 8). Though they dig into Hades, thence shall mine hand
take them: though they climb
up to Heaven,
thence
will I bring them down
(Amos 9: 2.).
The
New
Testament idea of Hades as distinct from the grave may
be most clearly perceived
in the declaration concerning Dives in Luke 16: 23; and in the didactic teaching [i.e. a
teaching meant to give instruction and understanding]
of the Apostle Peter (Acts
2: 27-31) concerning
the
soul of Jesus
between His death and His
resurrection. The Apostle,
manifestly, spoke of
both the body and the soul of
our
Lord (comp. verses
27 and
31, asserting that the former did not see corruption (although it was
placed in a sepulchre) and that the latter was
not
left in Hades - implying, of course, that it went to Hades.
Philip Schaff,
D.D.
Unless we adopt the
conclusion that the soul remains
in Hades for as long as the body remains in
decomposition - in the face of the
manifest implications of the Apostle and the whole
tenor of the Word of God - Hades
must be understood to be distinct from both tomb and
grave.]
-------
But the force of the argument is
lost from the words
having become familiar to our ear.
Let
it then be presented in other words.
The
descent of the Holy Ghost at Pentecost had caused all
the disciples then
present to speak with new tongues.
The
sound of so many voices speaking together in tongues
unknown to the listeners,
naturally drew a great concourse of persons, who
questioned amongst themselves what could be the cause
of so unusual
occurrence. One
cause was suggested by some scoffers, -
that it was only the effect of intoxication.
Thereupon Peter stood up to reply, and made
answer, that it was by no
means probable that so many could all be intoxicated
together at so early an
hour as nine in the morning.
But he
assured them that the cause of the event, which so
excited their astonishment,
was that
thing
which was spoken by the prophet Joel
- the outpouring of the Holy Ghost, - I will pour out my spirit upon all
flesh, and your sons
and your daughters shall prophesy.
St. Peters
answer, therefore, is in substance this,
- The event you have witnessed is due, not to the intoxication of wine,
but to the effusion of the Holy Spirit.
Hence, those have
misunderstood the scope of
the passage, who suppose
that St. Peter quotes the whole
of this prophecy as then fulfilled. But
it is not so. He
does
not say, Now is fulfilled;
but, This is an
event due to the same
cause, and is of precisely the same nature, as that
which, in the last day, shall receive its
literal accomplishment.
After
this
rebutment of the objection, the Apostle then proceeds to
the more immediate
object of his proof.
He lays first as
his basis - the undeniable miracles of the man generally
known by them under
the name of Jesus
the Nazarite* Now miracles
such as his, they all acknowledged, were a testimony on
the part of God to a
commission received from himself.
But
this Jesus was dead.
Did not that
destroy the evidence arising from his miracles?
No - it was by the determinate counsel and
foreknowledge of God. They might have anticipated that the
Christ or Messiah must die, if they had only attended
to their own prophetic
writings. In proof of which he cites
a
passage from the Psalms which evidently implied upon its very
face, the death
and resurrection of a
certain Holy One
specified therein. It implied
his
death - for his
body
should not see
corruption, nor his
soul be left in Hades.
*
It is a pity that
our translators have not rendered the
Nazarite, wherever it occurs.
If they had done so, its prophetic force
would have been seen.
But
in order to
evade the force of this, the Jews might reply Aye, we know that many of our nation
understand this of the Messiah, but now we see that we
were wrong -
it must be meant of David himself.
The Apostle then advances to drive them from
this stronghold. It cannot be David, he argues - for the Psalm
speaks of one whose flesh was not to see corruption. Now though
David, as they all knew, died, and
so far fulfilled the prophecy; yet his being buried
(which probably did not
take place till corruption was begun), and certainly his
close and fastened
sepulchre remaining among them up to their time, was a
clear proof that Davids
flesh, like all his fathers had yielded to natural
laws, and seen corruption:
If any doubted, they might open the tomb and judge for
themselves. It
could not, therefore, be David that was
intended in this Psalm. But
it was a natural and easy
deduction from the acknowledged principle that David was
a prophet, that this
Psalm should apply to the Messiah of whom all prophecy
was full, and in order
to prepare the minds of men for his reception, it was
given at the first.*
*
See also Pauls
words at Antioch of Pisidia:
We
bring you good tidings of the promise made unto the
fathers, how that God
hath fulfilled the same
unto our children, in
that he raised up Jesus; as also it is
written in the second psalm,
Thou art my Son, this
day have I begotten thee. And as concerning that he
raised
him up from
the dead, now no more to
return
to corruption, he
hath spoken in this wise,
I will give you
the
holy and sure blessings of David. Because he
saith also in another psalm,
Thou wilt not give thy Holy one to see corruption.
For David,
after he had in his own generation served the counsel
of God, fell on sleep, and [his
body] was laid unto his fathers, and saw corruption:
but he [Christ/Messiah]
whom God raised up saw no corruption
Acts 13: 32-37, R.V.
But
not only did it
apply to the Messiah, but it proved also that Jesus was the Messiah, because
it was
fulfilled in his death and
resurrection.
They needed
none to testify of the death of Jesus - all their nation
knew or had witnessed
that; and thus far the prophecy of the Psalm was
fulfilled. But
the Apostles could substantiate to them
the broad difference which marked the death of the Lord
Jesus from that of
David; and this Peter proceeds to do.
For Christ had risen again, had risen the third
day, and, therefore, so
short was the space of time intervening between death
and resurrection; that no
corruption passed upon his body.
Therefore they must also infer that his soul was not
left in Hades, for
it could not be that his body should be alive without the
reuniting
of the soul to it.
And the
resurrection of his body
was therefore the proof that his soul was delivered
from the bands of death, because he could
not be holden of it. But there was another
proof, arising from the miraculous fact they had
witnessed. Not
only had the Saviour arisen again, but he
had ascended to Gods right hand; as
the Psalm first quoted implied - God
is at my right
hand that I
shall
not be moved: and
again, - Thou
shalt make me
full of joy with thy
countenance. At thy right hand
there are pleasures for
evermore. Which
evidently implied that the speaker* was
enjoying the immediate vision of God in heaven.
And the
proof that he was there,
was the extraordinary miracle then presented.
He - the ascended Messiah, hath been the
cause of this - he
hath shed forth this which
ye now see and hear. He
promised us his disciples that he would do it when
he ascended on high.
The
accomplishment, therefore, of the sign
on earth is the token of the fulfilment of the
thing signified in
heaven. Lastly,
the apostle quotes
also the 110th Psalm, which all referred to the Messiah, and that spake of Davids Lord,
(not of Davids
self) as ascended to the
heavens. The
conclusion, therefore,
evidently was, that these
passages could
not be fulfilled in David, and therefore that he was
not the Christ; but that
they were fulfilled in Jesus of
[* Note.
The speaker
in this context, does not refer to King David, but
rather to the
indwelling
Holy Spirit, who recorded the prophecy
through David. A prophecy which, after
many years, would be literally fulfilled at the
Resurrection of Jesus
of Nazareth, Gods true Messiah,
His anointed King of
Israel and Ruler over all
creation.]
The
two things are
set side by side - non-corruption of the body, and the
restoration of the soul [of our Lord Jesus]
from
Hades - which were
fulfilled in Christ,
and could not be fulfilled in David; therefore it
follows, by implication
of a strong kind, that, on the other side, corruption
of
the body answers to the sojourn of the soul in Hades.
But
this may be
also cleared yet further, from the consideration that Christ is the
forerunner,
and that it
behoved him to
be in all things made like to his brethren. As, therefore,
he was like them in his death and the disposal of his body, so also in
the disposal of his soul.
He was to
be a man in every point of his history which was
compatible with his being
sinless; and as
his descending to the
place of the dead did not destroy that purity
of his nature, so it
follows that to
this also he
submitted.
*
*
*
2
JESUS REPLY
TO THE SADDUCEES
This true view of the dead will
materially affect our
comprehension of the Saviours reply to the
Sadducees. Jesus argues from
the expression used by Jehovah, I am the God of Abraham, of
Isaac, and Jacob, that the dead were to be
raised. In
what condition, then, did Jesus assume
these patriarchs to be?
Dead? or alive? Christians
ordinarily suppose that He assumes them to
be alive. So
says Wesley,
Therefore
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, are not dead, but
living. Therefore the soul does not die with
the body.
So
says Barnes.
God spake,
then, as being their God.
They must, therefore, be
still somewhere living.
He is the God only of those
who have an existence.
But
then there is
in that passage no proof of a resurrection; but only of the separate
existence of the soul,
after spirit returns to God and the body is laid aside. Now
resurrection never means the immortality of the soul, never means a future state.
Then, too, Jesus reply does not refute the
Sadducees. Their
alleged difficulty did
not relate to the intermediate state,
but to the
coming forth of the dead from
their tombs, and the restoration of their bodies. To whom the
woman was as wife to belong, was
a question applying only to the day when the
body was reunited to the soul.
Neither Pharisee
nor Sadducee believed in marriage among spirits.
This
answer, then,
makes Jesus evade the question, and prove the separate existence of the soul, instead
of the
resurrection of the body. It is,
in fact, a wrong way of stating the matter.
The
patriarchs were not alive,
but dead. The dead, as we have shown, are those human beings whose body, soul and
spirit are severed.
Then Jesus
admits to the Sadducees, that Abraham is dead, as much
as the woman and her
seven husbands. Abraham is dead, for his body is
still in the
It
is, indeed,
quite true that this passage proves the separate existence of the souls
of the
patriarchs. But that was not the
point. Jesus
does not cite it to
prove that, but Abrahams return to
his body.
The
separate existence of Abrahams body soul and spirit is
a proof of his being
then and now among the dead.
He will not
be alive till his body, soul and spirit are reunited.
In the same
state in which Abraham was when God spoke to Moses at
the bush, Abraham is
still. Barnes and others call him dead
then. He is, then, dead
now. Jesus
therefore is referring, not to time present, but to a
future day of
resurrection, of which the Sadducees were speaking.
Abraham
is
dead. Jehovah
is his God. But
Jehovah is not the God of the dead.
Therefore
God
is not now showing Himself the God of
Abraham, for the first
resurrection
- i.e.,
a resurrection to immortality
- is not yet come.
That the
resurrection was to be at
a future day, the Pharisees held; and on that,
allowed as a basis, the Sadducees plead. God,
then, by these words, engages
to restore
by His Almighty power Abraham to become Abraham again in
resurrection. Abraham when
the Lord promised him possession of
A
new and better age*
is coming, in which the resurrected neither die nor
marry, nor are given in marriage. As
long,
then, as marriage and death last among believers, so
long have we clear
proof that the better age and the resurrection out
from the dead are not come.
Luke 20: 35, 36.
But
if death be resurrection,
and the bodyless
state be the eternal one, Abraham had already risen ages
before, and was either
then enjoying the land of promise, or Gods pledged word
was broken. Then,
too, the Sadducees should not have
said, Whose
wife
in the the resurrection shall she be?
For
already in the bodyless state she was the wife of one or more of them.
If
they were wrong in their supposition about this,
Jesus would have corrected
their error. But while He affirms the reality of resurrection, which they falsely denied, He confirms them in
regard of the futurity of the resurrection.
But when they shall
rise
from
the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage:
Mark 12:
25.
They which shall
be
accounted worthy
to attain that age, and the resurrection [out] from among the dead, neither marry nor are given
in marriage: (Lit. Greek) Luke
20: 35.
-------
[*
The
following is from writings
by Nathaniel West.
The [Hebrew] word Olam, Ever, does not, of itself, and by fixed necessity, always denote the
annihilation of time, but as frequently, in Hebrew
usage, denotes simply unbroken
continuance up to a special epoch in history, or to a
certain natural
termination. It
has a relative as well
as an absolute sense, a finite as well as an infinite
length. It
means Here as well as Beyond, and applies to a kingdom that comes to an
End, as well as to one that has no End.
For this reason, a great World-Period, or
Age, are called Olam,
and in World-Periods,
or Ages, are called Olammim,
and in order to
express infinite time, the reduplication is used, Ages of Ages, Olammim Olammim. It is
therefore a false conclusion to say
that because the term Le Olam,
Forever, is applied to
the Messianic kingdom,
therefore the Hebrews contradicted themselves, when they
assigned to it limits
at the same time. Messiahs
kingdom is
Temporal and also Eternal, and in both senses, Olamic. The bondsmans
free covenant to serve his
master lasted forever, but that only
meant till
Jubilee. The
Levitical
economy was established to be forever, but that only
meant till the
time of reformation.
The Christian Church is forever, in its
present form, but that only means till He comes. True
to this view, the Jewish
Teachers ever held to a
*4th Ezra, VII. 48
**Baruch, XLVIII.
MILLENNIAL, NOT ETERNAL
That the Millennial
Age is not the Final
Age is made clear in both Testaments. The kingdom of
1,000 years stands in relation to an Age beyond its own
limits, the Endless
Age. It
is a false construction
if the word Until in the expression
Until the 1,000 years are finished, Rev. 20: 3, 5, 7 to say that
the end
of
these years is the end of the kingdom of Christ,
or of the
blessedness of Israel, or of the Risen Saints reign
with Christ, or of the
distinction between Israel and the Nations, or between
the Holy City and the
outside dwellers. Even
after the
Judgment of the Great
White
Throne,
and the surrender of
the Messianic Kingdom to the father, the priestly
co-regency of Christ and His
saints still exist.
There is still a
dominion of Christ and His Bride,
the
2. MODE OF LIFE AMONG THE
RISEN
As to the mode of intercourse between the glorified and
un-glorified, there are many vain speculations.
We only know
in part,
and time will bring the answer to our
various askings.
The whole discussion binds itself to our
conceptions of the
Resurrection-Body, - what it needs, and what its
functions, are. From
the very first, the Jewish teachers were
embarrassed here, and much divided in their views. The later Jews
are not more
clear. Saadias
and Maimonides
maintained that they who rise in the
resurrection, eat,
drink and marry, and their bodily members serve them, for these are not
in vain and they die again.* It
was an ancient
view, and founded on the cases of the resurrection of
the son of the Shunamite,
and the son of the widow of Zarepta,
both
whom,
says Saddis,
ate
and drank and doubtless took wives.
On the other hand, Bechai and Abarnanel maintained
that
they
who rise in the
resurrection neither eat, nor drink, nor marry, for there is no further need
of these, after the resurrection, nor do the risen
righteous ones return to
dust again.
They have their
bodies, in which the fleshly functions have ceased, as
in the case of Moses,
when in the Mount with God.
** Our
Lord corrects both these
views when, confuting to the Sadducees, He replies
that they
who
shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world (Olam Habba)
and the resurrection out from the dead,
- [Therefore, they
cannot
return again to the death state and remain in Hades
until the millennium has
ended.] - neither marry
nor are given in marriage,
NEITHER CAN THEY DIE ANY MORE; for
they are equal to the angels,
- [That is, able to ascend to heaven or descend
upon earth; and therefore able to rule in both
spheres during the Millennium.] - and are sons of God,
being sons of the RESURRECTION.
Luke
20: 35, 36.
Saadis and Ben Maimon said that the Risen
eat, drink, marry, die. Bechai, Abarbanel, Talmud and Cabbala,
aver they neither marry nor are given
in marriage, neither can they die any more, but says nothing
as the eating or drinking.
What he teaches is that the children of the
resurrection are as the
sexless angels. Beyond
the fact that
Lazarus ate after his resurrection, John 12: 1, 2, remains the fact
that our Lord
Himself, after His resurrection,
had a tangible and visible material body, already free
from the limitations of
His former humiliation, and possessed of
resurrection-life, and yet ate
food in Jerusalem and at the shore of Galilee, Luke 24:
30,
41,
42;
John 21:
12, and not only promised to the Twelve to drink
of the fruit of the vine, new
in the Kingdom of God,
Matt.
26:
29,
but appointed them a
Kingdom, in which,
said
He, ye may eat and
drink at my table in my
kingdom, and
sit on 12 thrones judging the 12 tribes of Israel. Luke 22: 29, 30.
We can grossly carnalize
this, on the one hand, and as ethereally
spiritualize it on the other.
The fact remains that the Resurrection
kingdom is ON THE EARTH,
and that the children
of the resurrection
have material bodies, adapted to spiritual uses, and
free from certain physical
functions. While
we must shun an Ebonite
Chiliasm on the one hand, we must equally avoid a
Gnostic Chiliasm on the
other, and not rob corporeity of its rights in the
resurrection, or dissolve,
under the idea of Glory, the resurrection body into a
gauzy texture ballooning in
the sky. Such
a
conception is foreign to the whole word of God. The
risen
ones shall have a human body, like their Lords, know
each other, and be known,
and live in relation to the saints UPON the
earth, and to the
Nations. Their
mode of immorality and
intercourse are not revealed.
It is
enough for us to know that not more difficult is the
faith of Christs
companionship with His disciples during the 40 days
next following His
resurrection. It
is enough to know that
Death is robbed of his empire, and that, as Professor
Milligan himself admits
in his able work on the resurrection, our Lords body
was a true spiritual,
glorified body, immediately upon His rising, and not
first after His ascension,
and that our bodies are to take the form and equality
of His. Equal
to the angels
we shall be, in one respect.
Like Him,
we shall be, in another.
As both,
in all.
Flesh and blood cannot inherit
Gods Kingdom, because corruption
cannot inherit
incorruption,
1 Cor. 15:
50.
And yet flesh
and
bones, pervaded by
the [Holy]
Spirit, and made incorruptible, is what our Lords body was in His
resurrection, Luke 24: 26,
a glorious body, and like
which - not equal to which - ours shall be
at His coming. Phil.
3:
21.
In such
bodies, the Risen Saints shall have
fellowship with the unrisen in the Millennial Age. For the
rest, our curiosity must be
restrained, and will be, if we listen to the Angels
voice to Daniel, Go
thy way, Daniel,
till the End shall be!
Inquire no more.
Be content with
what is already spoken.
Leave the
unrevealed future to God.
Sure we
are of one thing.
We
shall behold Gods face in righteousness, and be
satisfied when we awake with His likeness!
Ps.
17:
15.
Even so, Lord
Jesus!
* Eisenmenger. Eut. Jud.
II. 943.
** Ibid 495.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
... The Lords Advent is
not
to annihilate the existence of the Nations, as such,
but to overthrow their politics and rule, and scatter both like chaff,
and then transfer the sovereignty to
(1) The
Risen saints [That is, the resurrected faithful dead or the accounted
worthy
from both
Testaments, for,
apart from us they (the afore mentioned Old Testament saints) - should
not be made perfect,
Heb. 11: 40.
Ed.].
(2) New-Born
(3) The
Favoured Nations in
the flesh.
... Such is the clear representation of the whole word of
God. Earth
is beginning to realize the pattern
shown in the Mount,
and prepare for the full accomplishment
in the final new
Heaven and
Earth,
at the close of
the 1000 years.
The Nations are the Fore-Court of the Temple;
Israel and their Holy
Land, are the Holy Place; the Holy City and the Risen BRIDE are the Holiest of All; no veil existing.
To the perfect realization of this, all
things are tending.
The invisible is the
source of all Realities, and what has been
in history is the Beginning
and Type of
what will
be, only in greater perfection.
Davids
kingdom shall be restored, and among the sure mercies to
David is the gathering of Israel, and the resurrection
of the faithful
[dead] to enjoy that kingdom together; and therein all Christians -[whom our Lord will account worthy]- shall share, at
Messiahs Second coming.
... As to the alleged incongruity of the glorified among the un-glorified,
and how they will live, and what they
will do,
and what
their condition,
and daily occupation, questions revived by Kliefoth,
and repeated by others, though raised and answered ages
ago; and, further, will
there be flies, and bees, and
mosquitoes, in the Millennial Age, as still others have sportingly asked; and, yet others again,
as to the
habit of nature
they all belong to that same
unbelieving spirit, and cast of mind, that made a Socinus, some Schoolmen, and later profane wits, inquire whether
our Lord rose from the grave with
His digestive organs? Whether, as Cleopatra
wanted to know, the
Saints will rise with raiment? and
whence
came the raiment our Lord wore when He rose? and so, conclude, from
all, to a denial of the literal resurrection of the
body. Such
inquisition, it becomes us to repel,
with force, and rebuke into silence, holding, in spite
of a thousand questions
all men can ask and none can answer, in reference to
every doctrine of
Scripture, that it
is far more Christian
to believe what God has spoken, and
give him the glory, as Doer
of wonderous things, than it is to
idealize the prophecy, to
suit our vain thoughts, and land ourselves at last
into open rejection of the
Word of God.
The Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise that they are vain.
Painful to the last degree is the ever-recurring
style of objection we
meet with in certain writers, as It
is
unreasonable?
How remote from reasonable probability! It is Inconceivable, incredible, and far from probable, and everything the mere natural man can object to the
supernatural. We
dismiss it all with the
divine words, O man, who art thou
that repliest against God? Should
it be a marvellous thing in my eyes, saith the Lord?
The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will perform this.
The mouth of the Lord hath spoken it!
It is the utterance of Jehovah, Doer of these
things! It must be so,
as God has said. As
to the Risen Saints, we know what their
perfection is, and how near they are to Christ.
It is the
righteous man
raised [out]
from
the dead,
who is the
perfect man, ordained
to dominion, in
the Age to come.
*
*
*
3
STEPHENS ACCUSATION,
DEFENCE, AND MARTYRDOM
By
ROBERT GOVETT
Few readers,
or even students
of Scripture perceive much force in Stephens defence,
given at such length in
the seventh chapter of the Acts.
It
appears to them only a rambling citation of portions of
the patriarchal and
Israelite history, having little,
or no bearing on the
accusations brought against him.
They
think too, that probably it was broken off, before it
reached its intended
completion, by violence apprehended or already begun. Hence they are
unable to perceive, why his
enemies were so exasperated with the speech.
With the Lord the Spirits
help, I
think to be able to set the reader at such a point
of view, that he shall perceive the martyrs defence to
be full of force, strongly
bearing against the views of his accusers, and a real
and triumphant refutation
of their charges.
Stephen
was one of
the seven Greek-speaking Jews appointed by the church at
*
Meaning
Jews, who were once Roman slaves,
but had been made free by their masters.
In
the conflict he
proved victorious, by
the wisdom and grace of the Holy Spirit
given him.
This vexed the
beaten party, and they sought to slay him.
It is easier far to kill a man of God, than to
refute the arguments
he draws from Scripture.
They
accuse him,
then, of blasphemy against Moses and against God.
They set him before the religious council of
the nation, and bring against him false witnesses who
affirm:-
This man ceaseth not to speak blasphemous
words against this holy place [the
Stephens
reply
indirectly presents to us the arguments generally used
by Jewish
opponents of Messiah. We see in them
the men of the flesh and of
law, full of self-righteousness, confident that they
were better than their
fathers, and entitled to expect the fulfilment of the
blessings promised to
Israel by Moses and the prophets: Luke 18: 9; Matt.
23: 30.
We see them here expecting a reigning
Messiah, and refusing a suffering one. Among
the accusers of Stephen
too, were Sadducees, men
who believed
that the only rewards and punishments were received in
this life; the
immortality of man being to them only a Pharisaic dogma. Such men would
measure the criminality of
each by his history.
If trouble befell
him, it would be a proof of guilt, and of his being
refused by the Most High: Luke
13: 1-5.
The
arguments,
then, of the Jewish opponents of Stephen would take some
such form as this:-
1. How could he be the Messiah, who
never received from God the
throne and septre promised to the Son of David?
Psa. 72,
89.
Jesus
often spoke about the
2. Did
not Scripture promise,
that Messiahs foes should be cut off? Psa.
89: 23; 72:
9; 97: 3. How came it to pass, then,
if Jesus were Messiah,
that the disciples of Moses who resisted His claims,
and slew His people, were
not destroyed by miraculous judgments,
as the prophets foretold?
That
this argument
was considered very powerful and satisfactory, we see,
from the appeals made to
Jesus upon the cross.
Passengers,
scribes, elders, chief priests, the spectators, the
soldiers, the robbers, all,
Jew and Gentile alike, joined to challenge Him to come
down from the cross and
deliver Himself, if He were indeed the Christ, the King
of Israel, the Son of
God: Matt. 27:
39-44; Luke 23:
35-46.
It was supposed
therefore, that His death was the destruction of His
pretensions.
3. Another argument against
the claims of our Lord, was
founded on the judicial
decision of His own nation
against Him. The
wise, the learned, the powerful, had rejected His
claims, and given sentence of
death against Him.
The scribes and chief
priests in their council had condemned Him as a
blasphemer. Now
the law said,
that the decision of the priests and judges at
This
argument also
was considered of great weight, as we see by the
discourse of the two
disciples going to Emmaus.
Jesus,
they said, was a
prophet mighty
in word and deed before
God and all the people.
Yet the chief priests and
rulers gave Him up to the Romans
to be put to death and crucified Him. If His own
nation refused Him as an
impostor, how could He be the Messiah? The
Messiahs people were to be
His willing subjects, as the Psalmist declared:
Psa.
110;
Luke 24:
19-21.
4. How again could He be the Messiah,
if He threatened to
destroy the temple, and change the customs of Moses? Were not all
the godly kings of Davids line,
zealous for the maintenance of the whole law,
restoring it when it had fallen
into disuse?
5. Lastly,
how could
Christians be the
children of the kingdom
of Messiah, as they supposed, when they were despised,
imprisoned, and robbed?
Instead of being
exalted, they were losing even the privileges which
they had gained by the law
of Moses. If
Jesus
were indeed their Head, how was it, that He did not
defend them? Why
did He not avenge them on those who
ill-treated them? What had become of Him? If He were risen,
why did He not show Himself, that they might see and
confess Him as risen
indeed?
Now the speech of Stephen conveys, principally in the way of narrative, a
reply to these and like arguments. Viewed from
this point of view his
defence is a well-directed battery, every shot of which
told, and irresistibly
laid low his opponents.
The
martyr takes
the histories of ABRAHAM, JOSEPH, and MOSES,
and by these two or
three witnesses establishes every word.
1. Take first the case of ABRAHAM.
What did
If
now we are to
judge by circumstances, how would they prove their views
by the life of
Abraham?
The
Most High
began by stripping him of his country, his relations and
friends. He
was to leave them all for a foreign land, of which
he knew nothing.
He promised him that
the (1) LAND* should
be his, and
that a (2) POSTERITY numerous as the
sands of earth, and as the stars of the sky, should be
given him.
[*NOTE.
A-millennialists would have us believe the
contrary: It has nothing to do
with land.
The Kingdom is
within or among you.
There is no other
place to find the
Had
the Most High
then fulfilled to him these promises?
(1.)
Did He give him the
He
promised the
land to his SEED.
Did
(2.)
Did he see
the fulfilment of an innumerable SEED? For long years HE HAD NO CHILD.
What
did God say
about his seed? That they should be strangers in a foreign land, enslaved and ill-treated, for four
hundred years!
How
then must they
judge concerning Abraham, if they dealt out the same
measure to him, that they
did to Jesus Christ? They ought to say, That
it was clear,
that Abraham was deluded, or an impostor; for he
never yet had enjoyed the
promises, which as he imagined the Almighty had made
to him!
But
if the
treatment of Abrahams seed for four hundred years was
to be so severe as
foretold, then it was no proof that believers in Jesus as the Christ were
deluded, because they were troubled and persecuted in
their own land, and for
as long a time.
Then
too, it was no
proof against
Jesus being the Individual
Heir, and the chief
promised Seed
of Abraham, that
He was refused and rejected even unto death.
How
would they
reply? - We
admit
all that; but another
time
is coming, in which Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, shall be raised from the dead, and their seed shall then enjoy
the
land, and become innumerable; while other promises
will be fulfilled to them
that are included in the reign of Messiah, the great
Heir of Abraham.
Moreover God promised, at the very time that He
ratified the covenant to
Abraham, that He would judge the nation that
persecuted them, and bring them
out of their bondage to
serve him in
wealth and freedom.
To this plea the [martyrs]
reply
was
evident at a glance.
We
agree with you.
But if the future time of retribution,
and of the fulfilment of promises avails in the case
of Abraham, it avails for
us
too.
We also say, Judgment is coming on
those who
persecute Abrahams spiritual
seed, the children of his faith. And
Abrahams true sons shall have a greater deliverance, and better riches, than
those which rescued
Of the time of trouble which was to
precede the deliverance,
Jehovah gave an emblem, which ought to confirm our
faith. When
the covenant was ratified, a
furnace of smoke preceded the
torch of fire: v, 17. That is, the
brick-kilns and rigour of
Stephens
observation
too, that the God of glory showed Himself to Abraham in
Mesopotamia,
long before he dwelt in Canaan, is a commencing
refutation of their idea, that
the service of Jehovah could only take place in the holy
land and holy city.
The
martyr then
speaks of the covenant of circumcision, (Gen.
17,)
which followed on the first covenant, (Gen.
15,)
and then traces the line of the circumcised posterity of
Abraham up to Joseph.
2.
JOSEPH
What
think you, ye
Hebrews, of Joseph?
He
was great and
wise, the favoured of his father and of his God,
ruler of the world, and
deliverer of
But
what of his
earthly history, both
amidst his own
family, and the
Gentiles?
The patriarchs
moved with envy,
sold Joseph into
Mans rejected one was Gods accepted one.
The same conduct then on the part of Israel
against Christ, prompted by the
same
spirit of envy,
is no proof
that Jesus is not the Christ, the beloved Son of God: Matt.
27: 18; Mark 15:
19.
Joseph was sold for twenty pieces of silver: Jesus for
thirty. Joseph was
delivered up to Midianites; Jesus to Romans.
Did
affliction and
humiliation prove Joseph to be forsaken of the Most
High? If it did not,
neither does the same affliction avail as an argument
against Jesus. God
was not only with him, but delivered him
out of all his afflictions, and
gave Him favour and wisdom in the sight of Pharaoh
king
of
Perhaps,
then, it
might be true that Jesus despised,
sold,
falsely accused by his brethren, might
be not
only delivered out of all his trials by resurrection,
but promoted on high
before the King of kings, to be ruler of the world,
and Lord of [all]
Gods
household, whether angels or men!
Joseph,
rejected by his own family, and forgotten, found a home and glory in
The first half of Josephs life is heavily
laden with affliction. Till
the time
came that his cause was known,
the word of
the Lord tried him. The second half of it was glorious beyond all
former example, and without
a break. Might
it not be thus one day with the rejected
Nazarite also!
Do
you say, How
should He be the Messiah and Deliverer of Israel, who
could
not deliver Himself from the degrading death of
crucifixion? Try the same
reasoning on Joseph!
Could he
be the exalted of God, and the deliverer of his nation
and of the world, who could
not save himself from being put down into a pit, sold
for less than a slaves
price, and thrust as a malefactor into a dungeon under
false accusation?
Soon
there came
judgment on his persecutors. Famine assailed
them.
The
second time
of the patriarchs seeking Joseph, he is discovered
to them, and he
makes known his kindred
to Pharaoh.
So
Jesus, the
rejected at His first coming,
may at
His second coming make Himself known to
His brethren of Israel,
and forgive them; while He sets
them on high above the nations of the world; and
reassembles them to their own
land.
Jacob
and the
other patriarchs died in
* Our fathers died, and
were carried over into Sychem,
and laid in the
sepulchre, that
Abraham bought for the sum of
money of the sons of Emmor
(the father) of Sychem.
Has not
Stephens memory here tripped? Was not the
sepulchre that Abraham bought
purchased of Ephron the
Hittite? Gen.
23. And was not
the
3.
MOSES
We
come now to the
critical history of Moses.
What
would
Apply
now to
Moses the same principle whereby you condemn Christ.
What would you have thought of him, if judged
by the circumstances of his life?
That
he
was
rejected of God!
Though he led on
his nation with the hope
of the land flowing with milk and honey, he was
himself shut out of it by the
judical decision of God.
Does not that overthrow
your estimate of Moses? Neither let a like lot undo
your
view of Christ!
But
let us with Stephen
enter more particularly into this history.
1. Moses
was born as the time of promised deliverance drew near, yet he was in peril from his
birth. That Jesus then was born in like circumstances was no proof against him, but rather an
evidence that He was the predicted prophet
like unto
Moses, whom he began to resemble, even from the time
of His birth.
Moses
was fair to God. So the margin gives it,
and so it ought to have
been rendered. Much more, was
not
Jesus beautiful God-ward, as proved by the songs of
angels glorifying the Most
High at His birth? And what was Jehovahs
testimony at His
baptism? This is my beloved Son; in whom
I am well pleased.
Moses
was taught
in all
Moses,
had he
pleased, could have dwelt in a kings house, far above
the afflictions which
befell his people; and was a fair way to be next the
throne of Egypt, if not on
the throne itself.
But his heart of
compassion yearned over his oppressed brethren.
He left
therefore, voluntarily,
his glory, to take part with the afflicted people of
God, when he was forty
years of age, and fully competent to weigh the
consequences of such a choice.
Might
not Jesus then be the Prophet like Moses, if He
stooped from a loftier throne,
moved by compassion for
Was
not this His
becoming a
prophet like Moses,
while yet he was
superior to him?
Moses
bent on his
peoples welfare, on one occasion stepped forward, by
overt act, to testify how
fully he had taken
the side of
[* NOTE. That
statement
was true during the time of His earthly ministry while on
earth;
but it
does
not apply now, after His resurrection,
or in the future: I will kill her
children with death;
and all the
churches shall know that I am he which
searcheth the reigns and hearts:
and I
will give unto each one of you
according to your works (Rev.
2: 23,
R.V.).]
Moses
was
disappointed in his attempt to engage his peoples
afflictions. But he supposed, that his
brethren would understand,
that God by his hand
is giving them salvation;
BUT THEY UNDERSTOOD
NOT.
(Greek.)
Perhaps then
the cause of Jesus was
like this! God was giving
a higher salvation to
We
have next the
crisis of Moses effort depicted.
His own people were
divided among themselves; the
unrighteous part prevailing. Their discords he would
gladly have removed, as a
first step towards their rescue.
But the
doer of wrong to his neighbour,
refused him both by
word and deed. He
thrust him away, and
denied his mission of deliverance, reproaching with his
very act of favour
towards his countryman. Might it not
be then, that the kindness and
grace of Jesus toward Israel, had been in like manner
misunderstood by the
nation, and His purpose of redeeming them refused by
the proud and oppressing
sect of the Pharisees? Not that, in one
point, the reproach launched
against Moses could be dealt against the Jews.
When besought to divide an inheritance between
two brothers at variance
He refused, in words like this opposer of Moses.
Man,
who made me a judge or divider over you? Luke 12:
14. Moses in
justice smote the Egyptian to death.
Christ in grace delivered some from death, and
healed the stricken ear
of one of His persecutors.
Was Moses
reproached for his act of grace to
Which
of the two
parties then would they say
was right in word and deed
on the occasion of old? Moses? Or
Could
God love
Moses, and be with him in
spite of
Moses
thus refused
is in peril of life, and flees.
For
forty years he tarries in another land; and finds a
wife, and has a family
there. Jesus
rejected might have fled,
but would for others sake give up His life.
As
We
come next to
Moses second and successful visitation of
Of
Moses it might
be said, that his first
attempt to deliver
But
of the mission
of Jesus this could not be said.
God
appeared to Jesus at His baptism.
The
new name of God, as Father, Son, and Spirit, was there
displayed in act. Moses
is obliged to ask the name of God which
he is to bear to
But
if it be said,
The
appearance
to Moses took place after
his rejection
and flight, we
still find new
resemblances unfolding themselves, and new
superiorities. At
the
intercession of the descended Christ, as Peter
testifies, the Holy Spirit, as
the angel (or sent One) of the Lord, descends [on
the day of
Pentecost] in
fire on the disciples of the rejected Christ.
Might they
not then be the bush that was burning, yet
unconsumed? Moses
wondered at the
sight. And
did not men of Israel out of all nations wonder, when the [Holy]
Spirit coming down in wind and fire, gave to the
120 to speak with new tongues, while tongues of fire
that consumed not, stood
on their heads? Out
of the fire of the
bush came forth the voice of Jehovah, testifying that
He was the God of the
fathers. Might not then the testimonies of the
inspired apostles be true;
that this new manifestation came from the God of
Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob? Acts 3:
13, 25; 5:
30; 22: 14.
Where
was it that
this manifestation of God in Moses day took place? In
the holy land, and its
temple? Nay,
but before either
tabernacle or temple were built, in
the
While
Moses was refused,
Now come, I will send thee into
THIS MOSES
whom they
denied, saying, Who
made thee a ruler
and a judge?
THE SAME did God send to be a
ruler and deliverer with
the hand of the angel who
appeared to him in the bush.*
*
Moses
said: Take
my life: Jesus
gave His life.
The
nation denied
Moses, and drove him away.
Denied him in those very aspects, in which,
as
he saw, the God of
* Reference
to
the righteous
servant
of Isaiah. Paul
is the first to witness to Christ as the
Son: Acts 9.
**
Same
word as in Acts
7.
Moses
in the work
of deliverance, was not
alone. A
Divine Person attended with His divine
command to arrange all, and to put down all human power
with divine force.
And had not the same been in
part shown, when the
Divine Spirit, at Jesus baptism, descended on Him?
Then He
began publicly to act in the wisdom
of God, and the power of God. Was that not
something higher than Moses
commission in the desert?
And what had
come to pass since then?
Had not all
The same (Moses) brought them out and showed wonders
and signs in
Again and again does the
speaker thrust upon his
unwilling audience the identity of the chosen One of
God, with the denied One
of their fathers! They spoke of
Moses in that olden day with
contempt. This Moses!
So were men of Stephens day with like
contempt treating the Lord of glory. This Jesus the Nazarite!
In Stephens
day the whole nation stood up to avenge on the martyr a
supposed slight against
Moses, even though but an uttered word!
Perhaps,
then, one day the tables might so turn with regard to
Jesus, and the nation
might worship and rejoice in Him as their deliverer
whom their fathers
persecuted and slew!
Did
Moses, who at
the first appearing to
For
a period of forty
years miracles in
This is the Moses which
said unto
the children of
Moses,
the once
rejected of
To him shall
ye hearken.
O
then, this new
Prophet is also to be a law-giver, an issuer of divine
commands! Perhaps
those commands may be a repeal
of some, or of all of those of Moses!
Then it would be no blasphemy against Moses
to testify, that the
prophet he
foretold had come; and
that the new
prophet was to be listened
to, in preference to the old.
Did
not Moses change
the fathers
customs?
To be like Moses, then, Jesus should change
theirs!
Was
Moses meek?
Jesus was meeker still.
Moses once,
under strong provocation prayed against his opponents. Jesus allowed
them to proceed to scourging,
spitting, gibes, and crucifixion!
Here,
then, the
martyr turns on his accusers with immense force. You accuse me of blasphemy
against Moses. Do you
yourselves obey him? Are you not
in conspicuous opposition to
him? He
foretold a successor to himself,
who was to be guide to
This is he who was with the
congregation
[or Church
(A.V.) - the called out redeemed ones from
Moses
glory was
seen not only in the deliverance out of
But
Moses was not
alone in his work in the wilderness.
With him
went the angel of the Lord, the
angel of the covenant, the One who spoke to him in
Did
God of old
speak in the wilderness?
He was at that
moment speaking to
Were
Moses
oracles living?
The
oracles of Christ by the Holy Ghost
were life-giving.
They witness to One
who is Resurrection and Life.
To whom our fathers were
unwilling to become
obedient, but
thrust him away, and
turned back in the hearts unto
The
parallel and
its force still continues,
and deepens. Even
after
Moses,
because of
his absence, invisible on high, but appearing in the
presence of the Lord for
their sakes, was despised and thrust aside by the
tribes, and with him his
God. But
what said the men of Stephens
day tauntingly of Jesus? What
is become of
your Christ?
The same taunt
did their fathers launch at Moses.
The
same reply was to be given concerning Moses, as Jesus
disciples gave
concerning Christ.
He
is on high in the
presence of God for us.
But
Aarons mouth was stopped from bearing that witness; for
he with the other
elders had, in unbelief left the height which Moses had
assigned him: Ex.
24:
14.
The
contempt which
the Jews of that day were expressing for Jesus - This Jesus the Nazarite will destroy this
place -
their fathers had uttered
in the same manner against Moses, As for this Moses who
brought us up out of the
land of Egypt, we know not what is become of him.
This
was particularly stinging.
Some six or seven times does the martyr make
use of their word of contempt to glorify Moses, and to
discover to them the
opposition between Gods thoughts of Moses and the nations.
This Moses whom they refused, the same
did God send:
35.
This (Moses) brought them out:
36.
This is that Moses
that said: 37. This
is he that was in the
church in the
wilderness: 38.
41. And
they made a calf in
those days, and offered sacrifice to the idol,
and rejoiced in the works of their hands.
The
result of
This
is shown us
in Rev.
9: 20, 21. In Moses day
they worshipped a calf.
In the last days it will be the worship of
Satan and his Wild-Beast-King: Rev.
13. With the
refusal of the Lamb and his Father,
Satan and his blaspheming king and false prophet, step
in.
Then
God turned and
gave them up to worship the host of heaven,
as it is written in the book of the prophets, Did
ye offer me slain beasts and sacrifices for forty
years in the wilderness,
O house of
With
that act of
idolatry in Moses day God was displeased, that He
judicially gave them over to worship the starry host. And
answerably thereto arose
a system of
false worship, mocking the promises
and hopes given by Jehovah.
They carried in the wilderness a rival
tabernacle, dedicated to Moloch
(king), the
king of heaven. They carried
also the star of Remphan. Remphan
means Healer.
Then
in place of Jehovah
the
Healer, (Ex.
15:
26, Jehovah Ropha,)
and the star to come out of Jacob, with the sceptre
to rise out of
This
passage of
the speech, then, is directed against certain fallacious
pleas and ideas of
Not
so. God has
never forgiven
The
part of
Stephens speech which ensues, refers to the charge of
his blaspheming the
temple.
44. The
tabernacle of witness
was (intended)
for our fathers in the desert,
as He commanded
who spake to Moses,
that
he should make it after the pattern which he had seen.
They
boasted of
the temple and of Moses.
But Moses and
their fathers had only a moving temple.
That alone was suited to their frequent change of
place. It
was also the tabernacle of witness, or of testimony, not the temple of fulfilment. This edifice
bore testimony in several
directions.
(1) Against their
idolatry.
Was not Jehovahs
tabernacle
a testimony against that of Molochs?
As Jehovahs
tabernacle that bore His ark of the covenant, was a
witness of the better
things to come according to His promises; so the
tabernacle of Moloch could
but be a token of the dark days of Gods
judgment yet to be.
As the one
proclaimed, that the land should be entered, and the
enemies of the tribes
scattered; so the other betokened the triumph of
(2) But the
tabernacle of witness made
by Moses, was also a
testimony to a
system of things yet to come, far superior to itself. For Moses as
mediator of
Which
(tabernacle) also our
fathers with Jesus
(Joshua) having received,
brought in (to the
land) at the time of
taking possession of the nations,
whom God drove
out from before our fathers,
up to the days of
David; who found favour
before God, and asked
to find a tabernacle for the God of Jacob.
But Solomon built him
a house.
The
place of
worship under Moses, and even for four hundred years was
only a tent, removed
from place to place.
David desired to
build a house for the Lord, yet though he found great
favour with Jehovah, he
was not permitted.
It was very
significant, that Moses could not lead his people into
the land of
promise. He
must give way to Jesus. (Joshua,
in Hebrew).
Might
it not be then, that the Jesus whom they despised
might be the conqueror, who
should give them possession of their land in a day to come, and overthrow the Gentile enemies of
48. But
the Most High is not
dwelling in houses made with hands,
as the
prophet saith, The
heaven is my throne, and
the earth is my footstool,
what kind of a house will ye
build me?
Or what is the place
of my rest? Hath not my
hand made all these things?
While,
then, the Lord has promised one
day to dwell in
Thus
the martyr
has shown, that Jehovah was not tied to any
one place of manifestation.* He had
discovered Himself to Abraham in
[* See
Psa. 139.
**
This truth - (relative to the Holy Spirits indwelling a regenerate
believer) - runs throughout both Old Testament and New
Testament scriptures. ]
Ye
stiff-necked and
uncircumcised in heart and ears,
ye always
resist the Holy Ghost;
as your fathers did,
so do ye. Which
of the prophets
did not your fathers persecute? And they
slew those who beforehand spoke of
the coming of the Righteous One,
of whom ye have
now become betrayers and murderers:
Ye who
received the law at the command of angels, and
observed it not!
Their
circumcision
was the boast of Israelites.
This boast
the martyr takes away from them.
They
had circumcision in the flesh, but not in the spirit;
the sign, not the thing signified.
Their own Moses had reproached them, as the
stiff-necked, rebellious against God, and blind.
They refused to be turned from evil by any
testimony: Lev.
26: 41; Deut. 10: 16. Their hearts
refused Gods commands.
Nay, they
refused even to hear the Lords words, uttered by
Stephen the inspired, as they
presently afterwards show.
Were
the men
before him better than their fathers?
By
no means! They
refused the Son of
God. After
the [Holy] Spirits
descent to bear witness to the Son, they
refused the [Holy] Spirit too. They had rejected
the prophets, and persecuted
them. Even
those
into whose mouth God had put messages of hope,
concerning the Deliverer to
come, were maltreated and slain.
How
then could they imagine, that their national and
official condemnation of
Christ, really disproved His claims?
It
only condemned themselves. It only showed, that
the spirit of
There
was one
distinguished above the world of sinners as Jesus
Christ the righteous. How had they
served Him? They
had betrayed Him to the
Romans, and put Him to death.
But
were they not
strict observers of law?
No! Though
angels spoke it, they and their
fathers had all along disobeyed it, specially
in their
refusal of the prophet foretold by Moses, and the
crucifixion of the Righteous
One.
Such
was the Holy
Spirits testimony against
these self-righteous ones.
Such the
breaking up of all their arguments!
A
quiet statement of undeniable facts given of God,
scattered all their objections of confidence. The effect of the speech is strikingly given: more so in the original,
than in the translation.
54. Now
while they were hearing
these things they
were being sawn
through in their hearts,
and gnashed
their teeth at him.
They
refused to
accept the testimony.
Hence they were
troubled by the truth.
It could not be denied.
It was
stronger than their hearts.
They might
resist like wood; but the truth
was strong as
iron, sharp with many teeth like the saw.
Each statement was a new point to pierce them. It
was
delivered with power of the Holy Ghost. They would not
yield. But
they displayed their hatred of the truth,
by rage. They
were like the damned
themselves. Gnashing
of teeth is
one of the characteristics of the lost.* Here
the transgressors gnash their
teeth at the inspired of the Holy Ghost, the man who was
righteous through
faith. For so it was
written. The
wicked plotteth
against the righteous,
and gnasheth
upon him with his teeth. The Lord
shall laugh at him, for
he seeth that his
day
is coming: Psa. 37:
12, 13; 112:
10; 35: 16.
[*
NOTE. Not
always necessarily only
those who are eternally
lost: some
regenerate believers
within
the Church are also describe as wicked
(1 Cor.
5: 11, 12, R.V.
; Depart, I pray you,
from the tents of these wicked
men, and
touch nothing of theirs, lest
ye
be consumed in all their sins: Num.
16: 26,
R.V.).
These men were those the Lord redeemed
from
The
Lords
messenger was hated with a malice that could not
restrain even its visible
expression. This shows how
completely the whole speech
told against their feelings and their arguments.
They
lacked but
one more point.
But he being full
of
the Holy Spirit gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.
And he said, Behold, I
contemplate the heavens opened, and the Son of Man
standing
at the right hand of God.
He had proved the argument,
that God was not bound to
any place on earth. He had adduced
the testimony of Moses, that there was a
better sanctuary of God, than the one of mans
building on earth. He had cited
from the prophet a proof, that in this dispensation, God
is not dwelling in
temples made by hands upon earth.
But
now he is further to be made an eye-witness of the true
temple, and of the
glory of God in heaven.
There he beholds
the Jesus whom they rejected, stationed in the place of the
highest honour with God,
neither Moses nor Elijah being seen there.
The
speech had
showed, that despite their condemnation of Jesus,
He might have gone up into the heaven. But now
Stephen, his eyes opened
by the Spirit of God, can testify - He is in
heaven, I
see Him.
He
calls Jesus the Son of Man. This is His title in Dan. 7: 13, 14.
It
was of Him,
then, that Daniel spoke, as the Ruler of all the
earth.
That
is the title of the Governor of all things in heaven
and earth, (Psa. 8,) in the promised day of glory.
This was not to be endured. Like the
deaf adder, they stop their ears;
refusing to listen to the truth: Psa.
58:
4.
They
rush on him with feet swift to shed blood.
They cast stones, and in
this way
many could take part in his death.
They
cast him out of
the city, as they did our
Lord: for the disciple that is perfect shall be as his
Master.
He
prays to Jesus,
as the Saviour when departing prayed to His Father Lord
Jesus, receive my
spirit. The Redeemer,
then, is the
Lord of
Psalm
110. The Father
hath made the rejected Jesus both
Lord and Christ. Stephen, therefore, owns him as Adonai,
or Lord,
Lord Jesus.
Lord lay
not this sin
to their charge.
The old
High Priest is against him, but the new High Priest in
heaven is on his side; a
Divine Help. With
the blood of the new
covenant is come a new spirit also, far beyond that of
the old. When
the Spirit of God inspired the son of
Jehoiada to testify against the idolatry of
In
the present
martyrs case, earth
closed
against the man of faith, the inspired by the Spirit
of Christ. But
heaven opened to him, and
in the vision of
the glories there, he
can overlook the storm of earth.
Death to him is robbed of its sting.
He only falls
asleep. At the first
and
blessed
resurrection he shall reign with his Master.
From
the whole
argument, then, we see, that
a new dispensation must
arise in order to fulfil the
promises made to the
patriarchs, to
Now is the time of Gods patience, calling on an evil world to repent; calling
to
the men of faith to come out from the world, and to
work and suffer for, and
with, a rejected Christ.
The [millennial] kingdom of glory to come is set before us, as our comfort under trial for Christ, and as the reward and prize of our calling: Phil. 3. Soon the
days of vengeance
for the martyrs blood will fall on the earth; and
the watchful disciples will be caught out of the hour of temptation which is
coming upon all the inhabitable earth, to test its
dwellers, and to exhibit
their sinfulness: Matt. 23; 24;
Rev. 16. In
that day the glory of Jesus will fill heaven and earth,
and
Courage,
then,
Christians who suffer for Christ! The inferior seed of Abraham was left in
bondage
and trials four hundred years.
What
wonder, if the superior seed of Abrahams faith are
called to suffer too, and
for a longer period?
It is not our
calling to set the world right, and to find our
portion here below, in this
fleeting life.
But we are to wait
till the Redeemer comes, till the dead in Christ awake,
and the Saviour dispenses His rewards
to His faithful servants. May we meet in joy
IN
THAT DAY!
*
*
*
4
THE
RIGHTS
OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
IN
THE
HOUSE OF GOD
AN
APPEAL
FOR SCRIPTURAL
MINISTRY
OF
THE WORD OF GOD
By
G.
H. LANG
-------
Letter
One. November
1937.
Beloved
Brethren,
Mr.
N-------- has
informed me of your wishes regarding what I said at your
annual meeting upon
the unfaithful
servant
of our
Lords parables in Luke
19 and Matthew
25, that you desire such subjects to be omitted from ministry I may
give in future.
In various of my writings I have
emphasized the duty of local elders to restrain in
their midst what they regard
as unscriptural or unprofitable ministry,
and that this, not the resort to a controlled
platform, is the scriptural way
of dealing with such ministry. It follows
that I shall, of course, be ready
to have respect to your desires, should the Lord again
send me to gatherings
for the ordering of which you are responsible to Him,
even though personally I
may think that in this particular case you, with every desire to
do what is right, are acting partially and not to the true welfare of the people of God or in real interests of the
truth.
It
is the easier
to accept your suggestion because of the gracious and
brotherly way in which it
has been expressed.
I cannot but contrast this with the very different manner in which I
was treated many years ago by responsible brethren
then in your city, and I
rejoice and thank God that a happier and more godly
spirit now prevails, for
this will command His approval.
It
is not
necessary to say more, save to thank you heartily for
the kind things said as
to other elements of my ministry among you.
I am writing to Mr. N------ personally upon some
aspects of these
matters, and you will be welcome to read what I am
saying, if you wish.
Commending
you to
the grace of the Lord Jesus for your holy and
responsible service in His house,
Yours
affectionately
in Him,
G. H. LANG.
Letter
two
My
dear Brother,
Enclosed
with this
is a letter in answer to yours on behalf of the brethren
in oversight, for
which I thank them, as well as yourself for the
brotherly covering note.
In the latter I have expressed my sincere
appreciation of the gracious tone in which the brethren
have written, and the
same is true of your own kind note.
I
have remarked
upon the welcome difference in this to the action taken
in 1918 or 1919. The
dear brethren then leading the assemblies
in your parts specially and urgently (by telegram) asked
me to expound to a
gathering from the whole country certain features of my
prophetic views. At
the close of the evening meeting one of
the oldest brethren in your city, now with Christ,
assured me that, while some
had consented to the invitation with all sincerity of
heart, others had done so
because they hoped that in the issue my ministry would
be thereby prevented, or
at least prejudiced.
Subsequent events
justified his statement, as you may remember.
I
mention this now
because it emphasizes the solemn responsibility
incurred by rulers in the
house of God when they deal with matters concerning
the ministry of the Word in
their midst.
For those brethren virtually deprived the sheep of the Lord under their
care of any further help in the following thirteen
years which it might
conceivably have pleased Him to send through me. For
this
the Great Shepherd may hold them responsible.
Let
me now tell
you how I came five years ago to resume on my own
account attendance at your
conferences. Happening to be in the neighbourhood just
before the meetings an
esteemed brother and I were rejoicing that they still
followed the New
Testament plan of liberty of ministry.
He added, As you feel
so strongly to this
effect ought you not to support the brethren in their
course by attending the
meetings? After
some hesitation (in view
of the circumstances above mentioned), I decided to do
so, and was gratified
when I found that a friend had felt moved graciously to
prepare the way at your
end without knowing what I had in mind.
The present kind words by yourself and your
brethren as to my ministry
in general justify the hope that this step was of the
Lord.
In
my letter I have
expressed my readiness to do as the brethren wish as
regards not dealing with
such subjects as the unfaithful servant introduced by
our Lord in Luke
19, but I have added, should the Lord again send me among you.
Let me say plainly that this is not a veiled
intimation that I shall be unwilling to come again on
account of their present
action. My
heart will not be affected by
it. I shall
study to be as wholly at the
ordering of the Lord as to your city as much as any
other place. But
this I must say, that
on different occasions when
action
has been taken to restrict ministry, I have seen the
Lord Himself very
definitely cease to direct my path thither and open
doors elsewhere.
It
has to be
remembered that, in
the event of a
restriction not to His mind being imposed,
His
rights are invaded, and He
knows how
to act in His own interests and for the justification
of His servants. It has very
often been the case that opposition to a servant of
God in one land or district
has been followed by His Master depriving that place
of his service and sending
him to be a blessing in another:
they
will
not receive of thee testimony concerning Me ... Depart: for I will
send thee forth far thence
(Acts
22:
18-21).
When
the action taken
in your district years ago, and similar concurrent
treatment by a certain
magazine, made difficulties for me in some parts of this
country, suddenly,
without any thought of it on my part, doors were opened
to many other lands,
with needy and wonderful spheres.
On the
other hand, a few years ago, when
some
leading brethren in a distant country laid down a
condition without the warrant
of the Word, for four weeks I sat silent among them
before the Lord would give
me any opening of the mouth, though the assembly as a
whole was hungering for
food.
Such
things teach how
solemn a matter it is to deal with ministry, lest it
be forfeited,
and that those whose duty it is need to
have the clearest warrant from the Word of the Lord,
and not to act merely out
of regard to their own judgment, or preference, or the
feelings of others for
or against this or that teacher or line of teaching. It is
woefully easy to tolerate what the many
approve, or to restrain what influential men dislike,
and thereby to hinder the
[Holy]
Spirit
from giving what souls need. Medicine is
not always palatable.
If I mistake not, this is going on widely
to-day, is a factor in the decrease of spiritually
effective ministry, and is
attended with real injury to the moral condition of
Gods people. Except
(perhaps) in the very first generation
of Christians has there ever been a period when the
views of the majority have
been the truth?
I heard
Dr. A. T. Pierson
say: We
have a
saying, Great is the truth, and will prevail.
That
is never so in this age. Truth
is always with the minority; and
so convinced am I of this that if I find myself
agreeing
with the majority on any matter, I
make haste
and get over to the other side, for
I know I am
wrong.
Are
not all right
thinking brethren troubled by the undeniable increase of
serious and open moral
declension among Christians?
Ought we
not to be enquiring deeply, and before God, as to the
cause of this? Doubtless
they are many, but does it go
beyond the greater probability, almost certainty, that the great majority at least
of those over whom we
sorrow hold the popular prophetic views?
Do they not agree in rejecting the application
of the unfaithful servant
to
[regenerate] believers,
in opposing the thought of penalties following
the judgment seat of Christ, and in asserting the
certainty of a place in the
millennial kingdom for every Christian?
And ought not brethren to ask seriously whether
anything but moral
weakness can result when the searching words of the
Lord, certainly addressed
ostensibly to His own [blood-bought] servants,
are emasculated of all force and application to such
as being relegated to the unregenerate,
and His judgment seat is
robbed of its terrors for evil-doers among His [redeemed]
people?
There
are various
points of interpretation in which I do not agree with
the Newtonian school of
prophecy. They
are too pronouncedly
Calvinistic. They
also do not give due
weight to the solemn warnings of the Word to [regenerate]
believers. I
think them mistaken in
regarding the parousia as
one
continuous movement, and that Darby
was right in holding it to be a period, though he erred
in placing its
beginning before Antichrist, instead of at the close of
the Tribulation, as
This
was too
quickly and largely evidenced.
For Darby
himself soon showed that his views on these matters had no moral power
to make him afraid of the consequences of
bitterness, calumny, slander, and world-wide strife
among saints,
such as ruined the testimony to the unity of believers
committed to Brethren at the first. His chief
lieutenants fully imbibed and
displayed the opinions and spirit of their leader; and
in general, allowing
indeed for happy exceptions, those
since
who have most strenuously fought for his views on
these matters have
shown the like intolerance.
Years
ago there was a meeting of leading Open Brethren of
different opinions to
consider these disputed questions.
When
I asked one of that period why nothing of value came of
that gathering he
answered, Because so and so
(naming a strenuous
maintainer of popular views) was such a little fighting
cock! This
is the more observable since Darby and
so many others were otherwise such good and useful men.
Perhaps
many do
not recognize to what lengths this spirit has gone and
still goes. The
leading brother of an Open Meeting told
me unequivocally that he would not break bread with
anyone who held the view
that the church will go through the Tribulation.
I asked if he really meant that should Muller
have sought fellowship he would
have refused it. But
he stuck to his
assertion.
Doubtless
most
among us would not go to so plainly unscriptural a
length as to make fellowship
dependent upon agreement as to prophecy, but
it
is commonly made a test for accepting ministry. I read a
letter from a former convener of the
largest annual gatherings in the north which stated that
they had not felt
difficulty in receiving James
Wright of
Bristol to their platform because they privately
judged he would not
obtrude his view upon the point just mentioned, upon
which he agreed with his
father-in-law, George
Muller. So
that the acceptance of ministry from that
man of faith and most acceptable teacher was tacitly
contingent upon his
suppressing part of his convictions as to the truth of
God, and the
liberty in ministry of a spiritually
great man was restricted by the opinions of the
smaller men around him.
Let it be plainly asked was it the mind and
requirement of the Head of the church that James
Wrights grace and forbearance
should be presumed upon by men of less grace and more
opinionativeness than
he? If this
be affirmed, we shall
require Scripture to justify the attitude.
But
bigotry [amongst saints] can
go
much further than this. At your last
conference, concerning which you
have now written, a leading and esteemed brother
enquired whether it is the
case that I hold that souls
are
unconscious between death and resurrection, for
this had been asserted to
him most positively, as quite beyond doubt.
I thanked him for raising the question, and equally positively denied the assertion.
Again,
in a widely read
magazine I have been
charged with teaching that [regenerate]
believers
may be chastised in the lake of fire. Not one word of mine, spoken or written, can be added to support this;
it is completely false. Yet
it
was so stated in print, so as to be read by tens and
tens of thousands, and is
still believed by many without question.
In part, it was because I saw a rare
opportunity publicly to correct
this wrong notion that I explained among you recently
that I regard the
outer darkness as NOT the lake of fire,
for the charge
in question depends upon erroneously identifying these
two figures of speech.
Now
no possible
end can be served by thus spreading baseless charges except to discredit the
teacher and thus to
prejudice his teaching. To such unworthy
measures will holders of the
popular views resort. A private remonstrance to the
writer in the magazine,
with definite assurance that he was mistaken, was met
with a blank refusal to
believe that I was telling the truth by my denial;
and, with my
denial before it, the magazine proceeded further in
its attempt to fasten the
charge upon me.
Is
it not most
distressing to see Christians spreading falsehood to
support what they think truth? It reminds one
of the saying of the world, that a diplomat is a man who
tells lies for the
good of his country.
And is
it any wonder if those who know of such
actions ask whether the easy-going views that leave
the conscience so
undisturbed can be truth, or whether there must not be
some other line of
teaching in the Word calculated to prevent such
conduct, or at least to condemn
it and denounce penalties against it?
Not
so long ago at
an afternoon meeting I gave ministry to which no
exception was or could be
taken. The
leading local brother said he
thought it had been very good.
Yet at
the evening meeting an evangelist and a professional man
dragged in the
controversial topics I had not touched, as
the
basis of violent and bitter personal attacks, and one
of them went so far
as to extend his attack to an esteemed ministering
brother not present.
Concerning
the
teaching of a partial rapture, and so the view held by Newton, Muller, Tregelles
and other godly men, that the
church will be on earth during the Tribulation, the
editor of a magazine which
champions fiercely the popular teaching, wrote in
October, 1937, the words: Let the Devil use all these evasions
(my italics).
Similarly, a well-known evangelist, as I was
told, said that the
Devil knew well what he was doing when he got Mr.
Lang to adopt the opinions he holds! The latter has
already gone, and the editor
is on his way to that tribunal where, as the presiding
Judge has
solemnly announced, it is by their words
that men are justified or are condemned.
Thus
have
bitterness and intolerance too often characterized the
popular views throughout
the whole country of their existence, a long enough test
to show their moral
importance. What
but carelessness of
soul can possibly be the effect of such a statement as
the said professional
man made with emphasis: No matter how you live as a
Christian,
you are certain to be
part
of the bride of Christ and to reign with Him? or
of a similar mischievous
assertion I heard in 1935 from one who has taught these
views for sixty years,
Every
believer
will be raised when Christ comes,
no
matter how worldly you may be?
Many teachers of the general views would shrink
from putting the matter so baldly, but
it
is what they mean,
it
is inherent in their
doctrine.
On
the other hand,
the leading victims of Darbys attacks differed from him
upon these very
prophetic questions.
Tregelles said in
print at the time that every one knew that if only
Newton had agreed with Darby
on prophecy the latters voice would not have been
lifted against his old
friend when his serious, though temporary, doctrinal
error was discovered.
And when this later came to light the evil
consequences of not regarding the Gospels as for
Christians was at once seen;
for the one to whose notice the error was first brought
was an old colleague of
Newton, but he
did not follow the
principles for dealing with an offending brother as
laid down by the Lord in Matthew
18; he did not draw the private
attention of Newton to the error or make any attempt
to gain his brother and
win him back to the truth upon the matter in question;
but
instead, and without any notice, he wrote and allowed
to be issued a public
attack upon him as a heretic.
The
recantation that
In
addition to
The
influence
of beliefs on practice is powerful.
Several years
ago the editor of a magazine then running sent
to
me the draft of an article he proposed to insert
attacking me and my view of
a pre-tribulation removal of watchful believers. It was
saturated with vinegar and vitriol.
I declined to discuss the matter, saying that
if there was to be such mud-flinging I was ready to
endure it but not to join
in it. I
pointed out that the views he
held (Darbys) evidently had no moral force to prevent
him from bitter,
ungracious treatment of a brother, just as they had not
restrained Darby; but,
on the contrary, believing that, were I to be alive at
the time, bitterness and
strife might cause me to go through the Tribulation for
my perfecting, instead
of escaping it, I dare
not
treat him as he was proposing to treat me.
As far as I know the article was not
published. I
am happy now to be on
friendly terms with its writer.
Perhaps
he has profited by experience he himself has since had
of being attacked and
disapproved for another view which he holds.
The
moral
bearing of any teaching is a chief test of its nature.
While
writing this letter a veteran missionary of more
than forty years service, writes to me as follows: I am getting well into the typed
study of Selective
Resurrection, and I think thus far the exhortations
and warnings are very
important, and do
stimulate a more careful and
consistent walk with Christ.
Similarly
a
keen north countryman, to whom a friend explained this
view, felt its healthy
moral quality and said: Look ye, mon,
if its wrong its right, and if tothers
right its
wrong.
Many
years ago a
lady was working with others in the gospel in another
land. Earnest and able
she made herself a nuisance by striving to put everyone
else right in their
work. I
sent her a copy of D.
M. Pantons
Judgment
Seat of Christ.
Now this
contains sundry things I do not subscribe, but it presses the searching warnings Scripture gives in connection with
that solemn event.
The lady wrote that
when she learned
from its pages that the
Lord will deal with all wrong things she felt no
further necessity for her to
be judging and correcting everyone.
For twenty-five years she has been a valued
helper in that sphere.
Twenty-eight
years
since I met on a journey a gifted woman living to spread
the gospel. I
explained the passages which show that
sharing with Christ in the millennial kingdom may be
forfeited if a child of
God walks after the world or the flesh.
Meeting her in that land eighteen months later
it was to find her just
sailing to her own country to face things out with a
worldly-minded minister to
whom she was engaged.
She was resolved
to break with him if he was not ready to become
wholehearted as a disciple. He
was not willing, and she made the sacrifice
determined. By
her own avowal the awakening and
resolution was the direct result of what she had
learned through our
conversation. She
was not willing to risk
the best that God is offering of fellowship with Christ
but was determined to
obtain a full reward. For twenty years, until her death,
she pressed on.
In
1923 my path
took me to a remote place in
Such
results, deep
and lasting, I have seen; and I am yet waiting to
meet one believer to
testify that he walked godly until these views were
imbibed, and then as a
consequence, he was turned back from piety and purity. And these
instances are given to press the
question, which responsible brethren really ought to
face, as to the grounds
they can produce from Scripture for suppressing the
public exposition in the
assemblies of teaching which it cannot be denied is
morally healthy.
With schools of thought and
interpretation I have no concern:
I would not write or speak a sentence to support any
of them. The
truth of the return of the Lord is so
stated in the Word as
to command and
enforce practical holiness: every one that
hath this hope set on Him purifieth himself,
even
as He is pure: seeing
ye look for these
things, give diligence that ye may be found in
peace, without spot and
blameless in His sight (1
John 3: 3; 2 Pet.
3: 14).
Any
view which neither demands nor produces holiness
is not accordant with this; any teaching the evident
tendency of which is to
promote it ought at least
to be
heard.
Let
what is now
being urged be observed with
exactness. It
is not here asserted that the
popular prophetic views were or are
the cause of those who advocate them being so frequently
bitter in
controversy. The causes lie in the state of the heart.
But it is urged that these views
never have hindered this lamentable spirit nor provoked
love and patience, and
that in their very nature they are not calculated to do
so, because they empty
the New Testament if its
teaching of the severity
of God towards His own family, and thus make His goodness
a temptation to
laxity. This
one-sided, antinomian treatment of the truth hides the
warning that those who
call on God as Father are
ever to
remember that He is also a Judge, and a judge
Who deals with everyone, believer as much as unbeliever, according to his
works; and therefore we are to pass the time of our
sojourning on earth in fear,
striving to be holy because He is a holy Father and
Judge with whom we have to
reckon. It is to be
noted that this line of teaching
follows directly upon the call to set our hope upon the
revelation of Jesus
Christ, and concludes with a call to be unfeigned and
fervent love of the
brethren (1
Pet. 1: 13-22).
If Darby had professed such
a love for his brother
Let
one detail be
taken as a sample and test.
The popular
assertion is that the Lord may come at any moment. Many
blessed and godly men
hold this tenaciously; but if they can and will examine
the matter critically
they can perceive that this opinion is quite unnecessary
to holiness. Peter
did not hold it, for he knew from Christ that he had to
live till he should be
old and then die (John
21:
18), and
it was in
this expectation
that he
lived (2 Pet. 1: 13, 14). Paul
did
not hold it, certainly not between the time when the
Lord told him definitely
that he must bear witness at Rome and his having done
this (Acts
23: 11).
The
essential
matter that the Lord will come, and that each should be
ready to face His
judgment, is powerful
in
moral effect: the supposition that He may come
to-day
adds nothing to this effect, as is clearly shown by the
renowned saintliness of
men who flatly reject the idea.
When William
Hake told Robert Chapman that someone he had met held that the Lord might
come at any moment, that choice saint answered, Well, brother Hake, I am ready, but its not
in the Bible.
This
moral aspect
of the matter being really beyond challenge, the
question must be pressed, Why
shall a violent disturber of the peace
of Gods house like a Darby be encouraged to assert
boldly from every desk and
on every platform that the Lord may come to-night, but
a Chapman must not
declare his belief to the contrary under the penalty
of being blamed for
grieving his brethren and as a provoker of strife? Why shall
the one be in order in asserting
dogmatically that the church will not, simply cannot,
go through the
Tribulation, while a George Muller, James Wright,
David Baron, or A. T. Pierson
may not equally freely explain his judgment to the
contrary? Where
in this discrimination is the impartiality, the
fairness, the humility, the
love of truth for its own sake,
that ought to make all
children of God and more especially the rulers of
His house?
For
the complaint
mentioned has become the long-established habit of mind,
as the very message
you now send from your dear brethren instances. They say
that the putting forth
of diverse views creates an awkward
situation,
because other brethren teach differently and it is a
pity to cause
discussions. But
there would be no
awkward situation were it not for the intolerance of
the beloved brethren of
the popular views against any other view.
They virtually claim the right that their
opinions alone shall be heard
in the assemblies. This claim can in no wise be
conceded. It
is not warranted by Scripture, nor by the earlier and palmier
days of the assemblies we
love.
And
first
as to Scripture. We are all
firmly agreed that teachings depreciatory
of the Person, Offices, and Work of the Lord Jesus
Christ are not Christian at
all, and therefore must on no account be given any place
in a gathering of
Christians (2
John 10).
But as to
lesser questions, however important in their measure,
how were those dealt with
in apostolic days?
A striking and
critical instance is in Acts 15: 1.
We read that Certain men came down from
Judea (to
Now
this was
fundamental to the matter of [eternal] salvation,
and
therefore was of vastly greater importance than any
questions of prophetic
interpretation. Yet
there was not a hint
that the elder brethren at
It
would be
exactly thus were the diverse views as to baptism opened
up. I can
imagine nothing more calculated to
convince the many that household baptism is not
Scriptural than for one of its
best advocates to say all that can be said in its
favour. Possibly
a few might be persuaded, as a few
are now by private instruction; but the majority would
be dissuaded by seeing
how very little all is that can be urged.
By
a process
native to the human mind the suppression of a
teaching creates a suspicion
that there must be something in it, or its opponents
would not so dread it.
This provokes a certain
sympathy with its advocates and their suppressed view
and predisposes to it
being considered favourably.
Returning
to
Acts
15.
When the matter was debated at
If
it is urged
that this particular question had not hitherto been
settled and that discussion
was necessary for reaching a just conclusion, the answer
is that this is
exactly the position of prophetic enquiry; as yet we
know in part and prophecy
in part. The editor of
The Letters and Papers of Viscountess Powerscourt, in
whose house the united prophetic
studies of early Brethren commenced, explaining in 1838
why he included her
views on prophecy, wrote:
I
should certainly
not do what some persons, whom I esteem, have done -
publish the sentiments of
another, though at the same time considering them
erroneous on the fundamental
principles of the Gospel; but I would publish the
sentiments of another on the
future prospects of the Church, though in those
sentiments I thought the writer
was mistaken; because I consider the first subject
to be vital, and that error
on it is essentially dangerous; while I do not think
so of the other subject. I consider the whole
In
these first
days this liberty of discussion and exposition was
continued among Brethren,
and valuable progress in knowledge was made.
They became great pioneers and leaders in Bible
study. But
then came, alas, that period mentioned
when ceasing to be investigators they dwindled into
dogmatics, each contending
for his own scheme of interpretation: then process
ceased. It
is as sorrowful as true that for some
seventy years or more Brethren have added nothing
material to the understanding
of prophetic scripture.
One who has considered
carefully B. W.
Newtons Thoughts on
the Apocalypse (ed. 1, 1843; ed. 2, 1853) on the line of
the church passing
through the Tribulation, and William
Kellys Lectures on the Revelation (Bible Treasury
1853, 1859; ed. 1, 1861)
on the opposite side, will gain but little from anything
that has since
appeared on either side, as far as I know.
The
futuristic
school of prophecy has hitherto been practically divided
between these two
schemes, and the discussion has long since reached
stalemate. After
a hundred years of controversy no
approach has been made toward discovering what mistakes
in exposition caused
divergence. Harmonizing
of views would
encourage hope that Scripture was becoming understood,
but this is as far off
as at first. This
is regrettable, but it
will continue until intolerance on both sides yields to
a new humble search for
more light, with the readiness to surrender cherished
opinions when needful,
and to receive new ideas when proved by Scripture. These are
deeply searching words by a
singularly able teacher, Dr.
F. J. A. Hort:
To
have
become disabled for unlearning is to have become
disabled for learning;
and when we cease to learn, we let go
from us whatever of vivid and vivifying knowledge we
have hitherto possessed
... beliefs worth calling beliefs must be purchased
with the sweat of the
brow. The
easy conclusions which are
accepted on borrowed grounds in evasion of the
labour and responsibility of
thought may
or may not be coincident
with truth: in either case they have little or no
share in its power.
(The Way, the Truth, the Life, Intro.)
Does
not this last
sentence indicate what hitherto has been too largely the
case in relation to
prophecy, that ready made and long asserted notions have
been accepted easily
without patient individual examination of the nature,
and, what is really
vital, of their results, or their warrant in the Word of
God? Now
the most likely way to break this easy
and hurtful habit of mind would be to have free
interchanges of thought by
those who do seriously study these subjects; for the
presentation of fresh
ideas, even when these after due examination are not
accepted, always
stimulates general enquiry and conduces to activity of
mind in place of
stagnation.
And
this is
peculiarly important just now, for the spread of
education, with easy travel,
has introduced in the world a general exchange of ideas
and a spirit of enquiry
into things formerly accepted passively or remaining
quite unconsidered.
In the world of thought, as in other realms,
authority counts for less than formerly: almost
everybody questions almost
everything. Christian
teachers may not
shut their eyes to this factor.
Let them
not assume that the younger generation are accepting
mere assertions however
frequently or strongly made.
It is not
so. One
who is
sympathetic, instead of dogmatic, meets everywhere a
spirit of enquiry as to
prophetic and other subjects.
It is felt
that though a statement may have been made a hundred
thousand times through a
hundred years it is neither more nor less true than it
was the first time it
was made, and it is demanded that its truth be
demonstrated from
Scripture. Teachers
must produce this
proof, or be discredited (if silently) in the minds of
the thoughtful.
The
world upheaval
following the war has greatly accelerated this spirit of
enquiry as to the
future, and with its doubts as to the popular scheme. For believers
have found themselves plunged
into a wild whirl of world affairs, universal in extent,
and therefore neither
requiring real proof nor admitting of doubt, that the
church of God is so
peculiarly the object of grace that it would be utterly
inconsistent and
impossible for it to be subjected to the great
Tribulation; it simply must, and
as to every member of it, be removed to heaven before
that era. Yet
under our very eyes hundreds of thousands
of believers in
This
is how minds
are working, and beloved brethren really must take to
heart that mere
asserting and re-asserting of their opinions is not
convincing; and still
more should they ponder that tacitly to stifle enquiry
by a show of authority
or by denunciation will but stimulate enquiry, foster dis-satisfaction,
and may easily lead to the loss to the assemblies of
younger and able men, the
very class who, by reason of serious thoughtfulness and
independence of mind,
will be indispensable to the assemblies when we who are
older have laid down
our armour.
I
conceive this to
be a most serious consideration.
From
reading my own heart I know how easily the tie with our
assembly life may be
snapped. Under
the treatment I have
myself received it would have been very natural to have
turned away, had not
the divine principles for the house of God long before
gripped my heart and so
loyalty to the Head of the house kept me where those
principles are better
maintained than elsewhere.
But many
younger men do not yet perceive the duty of thus
adhearing to church
principles, or that these are really more important to
the cause of Christ than
enjoying what may seem easier and wider spheres of
ministry. It
is unwise, yea, wrong, to put upon their
adherence a severer strain than the Word of God demands,
by stifling enquiry
and suppressing utterance upon matters not vital to the
faith. Far
more
often than many conceive younger Christians, brethren
and also sisters,
fear to reveal their doubts and questionings on
matters prophetic and otherwise
from a not unfounded dread of being held
suspect as possible heretics.
When such
reach conclusions different to common opinion
either they conceal
their views to avoid trouble or readily go where more
tolerance obtains, and in
either case the assemblies suffer loss and themselves
also. Cases have been
known over such questions as women praying publicly and
whether supernatural gifts
are now possible. There
being no liberty among us, other
spheres have profited to our loss.
And
on the reverse
side, it is easy to believe that this lack of
liberty deters some from
coming among us who would be a real asset in the
ministry of the Word and in
church life.
I
am very well
aware, and very thankful, that by no means all who
uphold vigorously the common
prophetic views are bitter against other opinions and
those who hold them.
From many of these I receive much love, and it
is deeply appreciated, but this display of Christian
affection is in spite of
their prophetic beliefs, not a result of them.
It would continue were these to change, being
independent of them.
And
those
beloved brethren who are not bitter may
well
examine their hearts as to whether they are not intolerant, in that they will
not suffer other views to be taught, if they can
hinder it. Their
reasons may seem to them excellent and
imperative. They
honestly fear that the
ark of truth must totter if it would not be supported
by their zeal. In
this discussion I am aiming to undermine
both their reasons and fears, to show that the former
are baseless, the latter
needless, and that Scripture, reason, and a real
edification demand that very
freedom of exposition by serious and spiritual
teachers which they have refused
to tolerate.
Brethren
persuaded
of the post-tribulation rapture listen in quietness to
the popular
opinions. For
long years others of us
likewise have listened in silence to crude and dogmatic
assertions that we
think regrettable and believe we could easily show to be
contrary to the Word;
which thing we would attempt to do for general profit
but that we fear to
provoke fleshly hostility and the hitherto experienced
strife that would not
be
to general profit.
What is lacking in
the judgment and spirit of so many of our beloved
brethren of the common views
that they cannot find equal grace and shew like
forbearance? It
must be plainly affirmed that their school
of interpretation has maintained its dominant position
for nearly a century, not
by weight of argument and sound exposition, but mainly
by a subtle species of
terrorism, by taking advantage of the fears of the
weak, and also of the grace
of the strong who have differed from them but who have
been unwilling to
provoke the unholy dissension that could be expected. This is fact, even if done
unconsciously.
Another
harmful
result to this situation is now being recognized,
namely, that the so
important topic of the blessed hope is dropping out of the
ministry in the assemblies. This is
incalculable loss, but it is inevitable unless the whole
position be
changed. Dogmatists
are more or less
conscious that they cannot now reply upon the almost
obsequious acceptance once
rendered to mere assertion.
Moreover,
some teachers are not so
blissfully sure of certain
points as once they thought they were, and being
undecided in mind they wisely
say little. Those
who have definite
beliefs we judge worthy of statement refrain, either by request or from the fear mentioned of precipitating strife. There seems no
way open for restoring the
great theme to its just place save granting liberty
to every spiritually
accredited teacher to express what he believes he has
found in the Word, the
rest judging of what he says.
A
similar but yet
wider result is that large
portions of the Word are
neglected. The
more
part of the instructions by the Lord Himself; the
warnings of Paul
as to being disinherited, given to three churches (1
Cor.
6; Gal. 5;
Eph. 5); the five lengthy and weighty
warnings in
Hebrews; the solemn words to the seven
churches (Rev. 2.
& 3.), are
examples of these neglected
passages. Under
the popular scheme such
scriptures have no direct message to the child of God,
and their value is lost.
Those who
would so apply them ARE WARNED NOT TO DO SO: it will
compel uncomfortable
revision of cherished opinions: it will prick
conscience; it will provoke
strife! With
such as myself it is a solemn question how much longer
we shall be justified before God, in the interests of
a deceptive truce, to
keep back a large part of His counsel.
It seems to border on dealing deceitfully with His Word
to ignore wide tracts of it, for the teaching
prominent in the portions just
mentioned permeates the whole.
By what
right do teachers of any
one view put this strain upon the faithfulness of
teachers of some other view?
Under
the same
obstruction great themes on which God has been pleased
to give much, if
scattered, information cannot be opened up to the
saints, for these also would
compel some revision of accepted notions.
The vast and illuminating subject of the
temporal judgment of God,
including the present judical administration of heaven
and earth by angel
rulers, is the key to many perplexing passages; the
general service of angels;
THE STATE AND PLACE OF SOULS BETWEEN DEATH
AND RESURRECTION; the time and conditions of
the judgment seat of Christ
and its issues - are some themes of
fascinating interest and of deep
practical importance waiting fuller
investigation. The
prophecies of Daniel and Revelation need
more exact harmonizing and will yield yet more
instruction. Indeed,
because the Word of God is
inexhaustible, we ought not to treat it as if we had
exhausted it, but ought
eagerly to push enquiries forward regardless of what
revision of opinions may be
involved. But for most persons such research, or at least the exposition of its
results, is debarred in the assemblies by influences
before mentioned.
Only the kingdom of the Devil is advantaged
by large parts and themes of the Word being let
alone by Christians.
If elder brethren would
exercise their authority by
repressing bores, talkers of platitudes, and other
time wasters, would they not
be serving the truth and the saints more
effectually
than by restraining sober, searching ministry merely
because it is
not liked by some whose views it challenges or whose
consciences it troubles?
And ought they not as rulers to have equal regard to
the judgment of those also who would earnestly
welcome more light upon the
neglected portions of Scripture mostly in question, or
who are already
satisfied that the views opposed are profitable? The number of
these increases: is it
equitable or loving that their needs, desires, and judgment
be ignored and all the
preference be granted to one school of thought?
The convictions of the latter are no doubt strong
and sincere, but so
are ours. It
is really a question of
sufficient graciousness to let their yieldingness be
known. To
invite them to give up ought of the
essential faith of the gospel were unpardonable; to
suggest that they surrender
freely a position or privilege they never ought to have
occupied is but
reasonable. The
suppression of
minorities is neither kind, fair, nor wise.
In the world it ever produces ultimate
disaster; it is still more out of
place in the church.
What
is needed is
for responsible brethren in each assembly to weigh the
whole matter before the
Lord, and then to declare that in their local sphere
there shall be genuine
liberty for all sober exposition of Holy Scripture,
within the compass of vital
truth,
and with equal liberty for
other men of grace to express their dissent based on the
Word; and that
restraint be exercised impartially upon any man of any
school of thought who
ministers injuriously whether by matter or spirit.
The
right of elders
to restrain ministry is severely limited.
According to 1
Tim.
1: 3-5 they are to be dealt with who
do not dispense to the
saints that which increases faith, but who rather give
heed to myths and
endless genealogies, such topics as merely rise
insoluble and unprofitable
questions. But,
on the contrary, no
right is conferred to refuse what promotes love, a good
conscience, and faith,
for this is the precise end of ministry.
According to Titus
1:
10-16 the
mouths are to be stopped of such as will not bow to rule
and encourage it, but
are unruly; who overthrew whole houses; and who do this
for the sake of
financial gain. These are to be reproved sharply, yet
not simply to silence
them, but in the hope that, accepting reproof, they may
become sound in faith,
in which case they will be useful to the church.
It
will be
impossible to bring under such scriptures sober,
helpful, God-qualified
teachers simply because their views upon prophecy,
rewards, chastisements,
not to say lesser themes, do not coincide with this or
that school of
interpretation which happens to be popular. Therefore any such restraint is beyond the powers conferred by the Lord
upon the rulers of His house.
This
brings up the
serious issue that such
unauthorized restraint is
directed finally AGAINST
THE SPIRIT OF
GOD HIMSELF, acting for the Lord. If
this be
considered narrowly it will be seen that, over a
lengthy period, that every
liberty of the [Holy]
Spirit in the
supply and control of ministry which has been a chief
theme and feature of our
teaching, in
practice has been largely
curtailed and denied by unwarranted restrictions
being imposed upon His
servants.
Of
late this
curtailment has been vastly extended by the general
closing of platforms to all
but invited speakers.
In meetings left
open elders have failed in what is their duty, even to restrain vain
talkers, while ready to restrain
godly men with whom the Lord has not given them power
to deal. In
consequence
the latter are often silent, and the former are bold
to exhibit their
emptiness, both things tending to the poverty of
ministry and the
impoverishment of saints.
This
has led many
to the unscriptural plan of the world, the arranging of
ministry, involving the
thwarting of the very testimony that Christian
gatherings were designed to give
to the world, that God is among
you of a truth
actually ordering and empowering in His own house. From this restraining of the Spirit of God it follows inevitably that
churches become spiritually poorer, even though
oft-times congratulating
themselves that they are rich, merely because they
are pleased to be pleased
with the ministry they get, since it is of their own
choice. It
is
true that God withdraws from His temple reluctantly,
slowly, by stages (Ezek. 9:
3; 11: 22,
23),
and that so
long as He lingers a measure of His glory is seen, a
measure of blessing is
experienced; but if the glory is waning we may be sure
that there will
presently be night; if the [Holy] Spirit
is
persistently grieved He will at last be quenched; and
finally (Rev. 3: 20)
the Lord will be found OUTSIDE
a door closed against Him by
those who
nevertheless will cry, The people of the Lord are we.
We
rejoice rightly
in much still found in the assemblies that is of Himself
and reveals His
presence and grace; yet as a whole we are distinctly not
what once we were in
holiness and spiritual energy.
Factors
in this declension, germane to the topic discussed, are
here suggested. Will they be considered calmly and impartially? Will any be
convinced? And
will these then be found
faithful enough to Christ and His church TO ACT
UPON THEIR
CONVICTIONS? The
good Lord grant it, for
His name and glorys sake, for the matter is urgent.
And
what is the
urgency? Were
it a young man writing
this appeal for the New Testament liberty there would
not fail some to suggest
he was merely anxious to air his pet opinions or had an
eye to his
opportunities to preach and to his income.
But for myself every
year now diminishes the
importance of this liberty of ministry. With forty-five
years of public service
behind, the years ahead must be far fewer.
Already I cannot attempt what I did, and far more
doors are open than I
can enter. The
urgency arises from the
general condition and prospects of the people of God, on
grounds here
indicated.
Though
the end
days, as they are described in Scripture, are not yet
come, they are nearer
than they were. At
any rate, the present
time is perilous enough to spiritual and moral life to require a far more powerful stimulus to devotion and warning against
defection than has been provided by the view of the
future so long
dominant. In
the tranquil period some
can remember it was easy enough to talk smoothly about
perilous times and end days and great tribulation, and for
teachers to assure their
souls and their hearers that there was not the least
ground for personal
concern, because the church entire was certain to be
removed to heaven before
those dread days could set in.
But
this complacent outlook does not stir the
soul into flame, nor brace the nerves to
faithfulness and suffering in a period
of world upheaval.
With
nations full of foreboding, and of
consequent suspicion against each other, with military
service sternly
compulsory in most lands, with governments more and
more first regulating and
then suppressing pure Christianity, some more powerful
and deep-acting tonic is
required.
What
the Church
of God now needs imperatively is men able to show
fearlessly what the Word of
God teaches as to the future that will guide life
through difficulties and
dangers, perplexities and perils; also how to gain
strength to be faithful and
holy, and what will be the heavenly recompense; and
able to show also what will
be the sorrowful penalties the Christian must face if
unfaithful to Christ and
the word of His patience.
But this
demands close scrutiny of the Word of truth free from
the bias and fetters of
preconceived schemes of interpretation.
It
calls for zeal and courage, and the making known of the results demands liberty of utterance, if saints are to profit
by it, It is for this
God-granted liberty that appeal
is here made.
Readers
of church
history know that all too many God-wrought movements
have sooner or later been
paralyzed by one and the same means.
The
fresh light and truth gained from Scripture at the
first, the walking in which
brought liberty and quickening, is presently
systematized into a creed or a scheme
of teaching; zealous adherents of this scheme will allow
no deviation from it:
it becomes the test of orthodoxy in that sphere; liberty
is crushed, progress
ceases, movement stops, paralysis and death ensue. Is this to
find another exemplincation
in the assemblies of Open Brethren?
It
will, unless the change comes that is here urged, for
the process has long set
in. The
maintaining
of popular orthodoxy may prove the death of
spirituality.
Free movement is essential to health. Only
death is motionless.
That we may be
preserved from this state is my hearts earnest desire,
and therefore am I bold
to put the foregoing considerations before you and your
brethren, assured of
their sincere and sympathetic attention.
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be
with you
all.
Yours
in His love,
G.
H. LANG.
*
*
*
5
SPIRIT STUDY:2 (July/Aug
1990)*
[* The
following writing, by the late Jack
Hull
(Belfast), is here included for the benefit of those who
maintain the words: Lead thy
captivity captive, (Judges
5: 12,
R.V.) is proof that Hades is now emptied
of
all the disembodied souls of the regenerate.]
Hebrews
4:12: For
the
Word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than
any two edged sword, PIERCING
EVEN TO THE DIVIDING ASUNDER OF SOUL AND SPIRIT,
and of the joints and
marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents
of the heart.
In
truth, it must
be acknowledged that generally speaking, we do not know
our own selves, and
great is the controversy that rages among those who give
thought to express
themselves upon the subject.
This is
true both in the spiritual and the physical aspect of
man.
Those
who in their
wisdom place our beginnings in a slimy pond, some
millions, or trillions of
years ago (they cant really decide which) are so far
away from the truth of knowing
themselves, and are in fact, blinded by their
own wisdom (cf. 1 Cor. 1:19-21).
Those however, who in simple faith accept the
TRUTH of Genesis
chapters 1-3,
will find in the following pages of Holy
Scripture, a clear and concise description of man - not
only of his physical,
but also in his innermost (spiritual) concept.
Now,
while the
truth of this must be acknowledged, yet the vast
majority of those who accept
the Scriptures as the infallible Word of God, and read
it as such, do not fully
understand what that Good Book has to say on the
subject. This
results in misunderstanding which so easily loads to
misapplication and false
doctrine. The
reason for this being
that in many instances the English rendering of the
Hebrew and the Greek are
accepted at face value (and without query or
investigation of the original
word), and this rendering is then propagated as truth to
others, which often
finds widespread acceptance.
Thus, in
this simple way, we find the church today a mass of
differing doctrine and
confusion. viz. Millenialism,
Non-millenialism,
A- (Anti) Millenialism, Raptureists,
Non-raptureists,
Tribulationists,
Mid-tribulationists, Non-tribulationists, Arminianists,
Calvinists, etc. etc.
And even within
the ranks of those who hold to one or the other of the
above, there are
differences of opinions - and
we
speak only of those who know regeneration by the
Spirit of God in their
SPIRITS.
We
emphasise that
last word because we are concerned about the teaching
which is the accepted thing
today, namely, the salvation of the soul and the
tremendous confusion surrounding it.
It
is spoken of as if the regeneration has already taken
place IN THE SOUL.
THIS IS NOT SO,
and the Bible makes this quite
clear and plain in its teaching.
The anchor
verse on this matter is John
3: 6: That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the
Spirit is spirit. When speaking
of the soul, the Bible is clear that the salvation of the soul is AT THE LATTER END OF OUR FAITH. Consider the
following Scriptures:-
HEBREWS
10:
39:
But we are not of them who draw back
unto perdition: but of
them that HATH FAITH TO THE SAVING OF THE SOUL.
JAMES
1:
21:
Wherefore lay apart all filthiness
and superfluity of
naughtiness, and
receive with meekness the
engrafted word,
WHICH IS ABLE TO SAVE YOUR
SOULS.
1
PETER 1: 5
Kept by the power of God through
faith unto salvation READY
TO BE REVEALED IN THE LAST TIME.
And in verse 9:
Receiving the END
OF YOUR FAITH,
even the SALVATION OF YOUR
SOULS.
A
careful reading
of the context of these verses reveals that they speak
to the regenerated
man. If, as
many proclaim, that the
regeneration we now possess in Christ is that which has
taken place in the
soul, why do the above Scriptures speak DIRECTLY
of the soul being saved
AT THE END OF OUR FAITH?
Let
it be clear
that when regeneration takes place in the spirit of man.
he
is ... SEALED with that Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our
inheritance UNTIL the
redemption of the PURCHASED POSSESSION,
unto the praise of His glory.
(Eph. 1: 13,
14). The
sealing,
takes place in the spirit of man, and this is an earnest (Greek - ARRABON,
is a word
borrowed from the Phoenicians meaning to pledge
something
as part of the whole and paid beforehand in
regeneration, our
spirit is born again -
that which was dead to
God is given new life
through which we are
made alive unto God, and brought into communion with
Him. Galatians 5:
25 makes
it quite clear in which realm of our trichotomy we are
made alive. If we
live in the spirit, let
us also walk in the spirit. The A. V.
rendering gives the impression that
it is the (Holy) Spirit that is spoken of here, but not
so, we have here the
same thought as that of Romans
8:
1,
13, and various
other places. Look
also at Romans
8: 10.
And if Christ be in you, the
body is DEAD
because of sin, but the spirit is alive because
of righteousness,
(or, it has been made) righteous (through faith).
The
above verse is
quite emphatic that the body in which the believer
dwells is DEAD, BECAUSE
OF SIN. In
other words, it remains
in its natural state
even though the spirit
has been regenerated.
And it will remain
in its corruptness
until at resurrection it
puts on incorruption;
or, at the return of the
Lord it will be changed,
in a moment, in a
twinkling of an eye, and death will be swallowed up in
victory (1 Cor.
15: 50-58). If then, the
Scriptures confirm that one part
of our trichotomy, the spirit, is alive unto God; and
that a second part is yet
to be made alive at some future date, either while we
are in the death state,
or alive in the natural state.
The
Scriptures thus confirming the state of the spirit and
the body, what then of
the third part of our trichotomy, the soul?
We
noted in our
last study (Spirit Study:1),
that at death the spirit
returns to God (Eccl.
3:
1;
12:
7; Lk. 23: 46;
Acts 7: 59).
And, on the spirit vacating the body it [the
body] dies and goes into the grave
(James 2: 26; Lk.
23:
52, 53; Acts
8: 2). Also
in Luke 16: 22,
23, we were
enlightened further about the death state.
There it was revealed what happened to the third
part of our trichotomy,
the soul. Now
it does not mention the
word PSUCHE (soul) specifically in the context. But having
knowledge from [what]
the other
Scriptures mention above, concerning the, body and the
spirit, Luke 16:
22,
23 must then reveal the state of the soul at
death. It
says of Lazarus the beggar
that he died, ... and was
carried by the angels into Abrahams
bosom. And
of the rich man, that
he died, and was buried; ...
and in hell [Hades]
he lift up his eyes, being in torments,
and seeth
Abraham afar off,
and Lazarus in his bosom. (see also 12:
20). The
soul then, DOES
NOT RETURN TO GOD [in Heaven] AS THE SPIRIT DOES AT DEATH.
It goes to a
place, prepared for it (Job
30: 23)
- the
unregenerate to one part,
and the regenerate to
another (see Note 2).
There the soul will remain until either the first resurrection when it
will be united once again with its now glorified
(spiritual) body indwelt by
the already regenerated spirit which had returned to
God at the death:
or, in the case of the
unregenerate - [and also many of the regenerate not
worthy to attain to the
resurrection [out] from the dead (Luke
20: 35; Phil. 3: 11)]
- in the second
resurrection
(which is a thousand years later) and to stand before
the great white throne in
judgment (Rev 29:
4,
5, 11, 12). The
re-uniting
of body, soul, and spirit of the regenerate person
completes the redemption of
the PURCHASED
POSSESSION
Note 1
In
the Old
Testament we have NEPHESH - soul, and RUACH
and NESHAMAH -
spirit, and on the
surface there appears to be no difficulty with this. It is in the
English rendering of these words
that complications set in for these words are given a
variety of meanings i.e.;
Nephesh
rauch neshamah
soul
428
spirit 240 breath 11
life
119
wind 90 blast 3
person
30
breath 28 spirit 2
self
19
side 6 soul 1
mind
15
mind 6 breatheth 1
creature
9
Plus
14
other Plus 5 other Plus 5 other renderings.
In
the New
Testament we have only two words to contend with, but
the possibly even more
complicated situation.
They are the
Greek word PUSCHE = soul and PNEUMA
= spirit.
pauche pneuma
soul
58
Spirit (Holy) 141
life
40
Ghost (Holy) 89
mind
3
spirit 151
heart
1
life 1
ghost
2
wind
1
It
can at once be
seen that accepting at face-value the English rendering
of any of these Hebrew
or Greek words: without a thorough scrutiny of the
context, could well lead one
into a misapplication of the meaning of the original.
NOTE
2
Some
are of the
opinion that that house
spoken of In Job 30:
23, and which we undoubtedly see in Luke
16: 22-31,
has now been emptied of the souls of the
justified. It
is believed that when the
Lord descended into hell [Hades]
(Acts 2: 32; 1 Pet 3: 19)
which, place is located in the centre of the
earth (Eph. 4: 9,
10). On
His return He brought with Him the souls
of the justified saints, and led them into an abode
called paradise - this
theory is based on Eph 4: 8-10. The
phrase leading
captivity
captive
is assumed to
refer to the Lord leading those justified souls out of
the captivity, of
Hades. This
however could not be so if
we are to follow the law of
first mention.
Leading captivity
captive
is a phrase we meet with in the Old Testament, and in
the first instance in Judges
5: 12. After Baraks
victory over Sisera and his
army, Deborah sang a
triumphal song unto Barak (5:
1) for his
victory. In
verse
12 we come across the first mention of this
phrase ... arise,
Barak, and lead thy
captivity captive...
Now as the
type is, so must also be the antitype, but this would
not be so if we regarded Ephesians
4: 8
to be the antitype of Judges
5: 12 -
unless of course we change the meaning of
one to suit the other.
In the Judges
passage Barak is the conqueror OVER VANQUISHED ENEMIES, but in the Ephesian theory THIS IS NOT SO. The theory
built upon Ephesians 4: 8 makes the
captives FRIENDS of the conqueror
instead of ENEMIES - a
meaning which is entirely foreign to the first
mention. To
be true to the type the Lord would
have had to lead the unregenerate
souls out of Hades, for truly they were (and are) the
real captives there -
and we know that the Lord did no
such thing. It
is our considered opinion
that the true antitype of Judges
5: 12 (and
also Psalm 68: 18 where it is mentioned
in connection with The chariots
of God ...
verse 17), is to be
found in the words of Colossians
2: 15
where, after the victory of the Lord on the cross, it is
said. And having spoiled principalities
and
powers, He made a
show of them openly,
triumphing over them in
Himself. (margin). This then, was
Christs triumphant victory
parade, and the antitype of that seen in Judges
5: 12.
*
*
*
6
FAITH TO THE SAVING OF THE SOUL*
By PHILIP MAURO
[The
following
chapter (from Gods Pilgrims)
is included for the
benefit of Christians, desiring to know more of what
Peter has in mind by his
use of the following words:-
Who by the power of God are guarded
through faith unto
a salvation ready to be revealed in
the last time.
that the
proof of your
faith
might be found unto praise and
glory and honour at the
revelation of Jesus Christ: whom
not having
seen ye love; on whom,
though now ye see him not,
yet
believing, ye rejoice
greatly with joy
unspeakable and full of glory:
receiving the end of your
faith, even the salvation of
souls: (1
Pet. 1: 5-9,
R.V.).]
-------
We come now to the important words which bring the tenth
chapter
of Hebrews to a close, and introduce the great theme of
chapter 11: Now the just shall live by faith,
but if he draw back MY
SOUL shall have no pleasure in him.
But we are not of them that draw back unto
destruction, but (of
them that are) of FAITH
TO SAVING THE SOUL (10: 38, 39).
The foregoing is a literal rendering of the original text;
and we would at the outset call attention to several
corrections that need to
be made in the A.V.
1.
The words any
man are introduced by the translators as the
subject of the verb draw back;
but they are wholly without warrant in the
original. The antecedent subject is the just
man,
who is to live by faith. The expression is the
same that Paul used of
himself in Gal.
2: 20, the
life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith of the
Son of God.
Jesus Christ is not only the Author, but also the
Finisher of faith. As
already seen it is only the believer, the man who has
been justified by faith,
that can draw
back.
The unbeliever has not come to anything from which he
could draw back.
There is no question at all as to
the correctness of the reading, if
he draw back.
The drawing back to destruction is put indirect contrast
with the living by
faith, and going on to the saving
of the soul. It is
true that the believer cannot draw back from his
standing in Christ. He
cannot draw back from eternal
life. But he can draw back from the pilgrims
place, and return to the
world.
2.
We have already seen that the word perdition
should be destruction.
The
difference is important. The people of God will
surely suffer
destruction if they draw back into the world.
Because it is polluted, it
will destroy them with a sore destruction (Mic. 2: 10);
that
is, will
involve them
in great and irreparable damage or loss.
But they will never
come into perdition.
3.
The words of them that
believe, should read of
faith. The original has not a verb that believe, but a noun of
faith; and that word faith
is a most important
one because it leads into the theme of chap.
11.,
which is given to the people of God for the very purpose
of instructing them as
to the
character or
nature of that faith that
is effectual to, saving the soul. The next words
are Now faith, (that
is, the faith by which
the soul is saved), is the substance of things hoped
for, the evidence (or
conviction) of
things
not seen.
Then
follow examples of those who lived, to the end of their
days, according to
that faith which is the substance (that which stands
under and
thus supports) things
hoped for, and
the conviction
as to the reality of
things heard of, but not seen.
So far as the present writer is aware, the subject of the
salvation of the soul has
not been satisfactorily treated in any of the books of
teaching now in the
hands of the people of God. The manner in which
this expression is
commonly used, indicates that saving
the soul
is regarded as meaning the saving of the
individual man from condemnation,
that is to say as equivalent to the justification of the
sinner, and the
impartation of eternal life upon believing the Gospel of
God. In other
words, being born again,
and saving the soul,
are, generally taken to be
identical. But
according to the
Scripture, the
two are very different.
In
every case where the
salvation of the soul is mentioned it is distinctly
referred to as something future, and as
something conditional upon the behaviour of the individual himself. Eternal life is the gift of God, freely bestowed on every
believer in Christ. But the saving of the soul is distinctly set forth in many Scriptures, particularly in, the words of
the Lord Himself, not as a gift, but as a reward to be earned by diligence, stedfastness, and obedience to His commands.
The chief reason for the misconception that exists on this
point is the failure to distinguish between soul and
spirit, a distinction
which is carefully made in the Scriptures, as we shall
take pains to
show. The matter is of such surpassing
importance, and so great
consequences hinge upon it,
that we
strongly urge our readers to pay the closest attention
to the sayings of the
Lord Jesus, and to the other Scriptures cited, in this
chapter.
As an instance of the mention by our Lord of the saving and
losing of the soul, we quote Matt.
16: 25-27, calling
attention to the fact that the word rendered life
in verse 25, is the
same
word
rendered soul in verse 26: If any man will
(is willing, that is, has finally
resolved, to) come
after
Me, let him deny himself,
and
take up his cross and follow Me.
For
whosoever will (is
willing
to)
save his life (soul)
shall lose it;
and whosoever
will (is
willing
to)
lose his life (soul)
for My sake shall find it.
For what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole
world, and lose his
soul? Or, what shall a man give in exchange
for his soul? For
the Son of Man shall come in
the glory of His Father, with His angels; and then
He shall reward
every man according
to his works.
We see clearly from this Scripture that the saving or losing
of the soul is a matter of the will or choice of the man himself; and this is the teaching also of
every Scripture that deals with this subject. We
see furthermore also
that the time when those who choose to lose their souls
now for Christs sake
will gain their reward, that is, will find their souls again, is to be when the
Son of Man shall come in
the GLORY OF HIS FATHER, with His ANGELS.*
From
this Scripture alone it is clear that by the salvation
of the soul is not meant
salvation from eternal condemnation. The salvation
of the sinner from the
wages of sin, is not dependent upon denial of self,
taking up his cross and
following the Lord Jesus; but is the gift of Gods
grace, instantly and
eternally granted the moment the sinner believes in the
Crucified and Risen
Saviour. It is only a [regenerate] believer who can make the choice to deny himself, take up his cross, and
steadfastly follow his Lord in the way He went. To
them who thus follow
unto the end, a reward is promised. That
reward
is the finding, in the age to come, of the
soul they purposely lost
in this [evil] age. It
concerns us,
therefore, to ascertain, as may be done by diligent and
prayerful inquiry, what
the Lord meant by a mans losing and saving his own
soul. That is the [future] salvation of
which the Lord began to
speak, and which has been confirmed
to us by those who heard Him, that is, by
His apostles. Whatever may be embraced in the
meaning of the words saving the
soul, it is at least clear that they do not refer to the
justification of the sinner by Gods grace through
faith in Christ, but to
something in the nature of a reward set before those
who have been already
justified. The salvation
of the soul is
not something received at the beginning of the
Christian life on earth; but
something to be gained at the end thereof.
[* The time factor here, proves that this future salvation of souls
will happen at
the
time of the First
Resurrection,
when the gates of Hades
(Matt.
16: 18),
will not prevail against the (now waiting in
the Underworld of the Dead) disembodied souls accounted
worthy to rule and reign with
Christ in the age to
come, (Rev. 20:
4-6; Rev. 6:
9-11; Luke 20: 35.)]
That the saving of the
soul is not the salvation of the
sinner from eternal doom in
the
In the sayings of the Lord Jesus, to which we will refer, the
man is distinguished from his soul insomuch that the soul is spoken of as a possession of the
man, which he can keep or lose. Nevertheless, this
distinction is
practically obliterated, or at least ignored, in the
theology of to-day.
Indeed, there are those who expressly force the word soul
to mean the man himself, wherever that word occurs in
the Bible.
Another cause of the misconception referred to, is (as it
appears to us) the relatively little heed that is given
in many quarters to the
words spoken by the Lord Jesus Himself. There is
no room for dispute or
doubt as to the value of the words of the Lord according
to His own estimate
thereof. They are spirit
and life (John 6: 63).
They are the very words His Father commanded Him to
speak, and are what will
judge those who receive them not (John
12: 47-50).
His Sayings are HIMSELF
(John 8:
25).
The giving of His Fathers words was the fulfilment of
the purpose for which
His Father sent Him into the world (John
17: 8, 14).
His disciples recognised Him as the One Who had the
words
of eternal life (John
6: 68).
Keeping
His words
is the test of love for Himself, and has the promise
of a great reward. If a man love Me,
he will KEEP MY WORDS. Because
thou
hast KEPT MY
WORD. Because
thou hast KEPT
THE WORD OF MY PATIENCE (John
14: 23; Rev.
3: 8,
10). Whereas, being ashamed of His words will be visited
with disastrous consequences (Mark
8: 38).
Notwithstanding these weighty and unmistakably plain
utterances from the lips of the Lord Jesus Himself, it
must be admitted that,
in some of the teaching of to-day, the words of the
Lord, recorded for us
in the Gospels, are assigned to a place of
distinct inferiority.
In
order to maintain certain
dispensational views, it is necessary to relegate the
ministry of Christ in the
days of His Flesh to the Jewish remnant
and to treat His utterances as
having but a remote or indirect reference and
application to the
members of His own Body, the
Church. One consequence of this teaching has been to foster a neglect of His words,
and to render the hearts and consciences of many
saints insensitive to the
wholesome exhortations and warnings uttered by Him,
which they are taught to
regard as applicable only to an insignificant remnant
of
What, then, is the soul of a
man, concerning the salvation of which the Lord Himself
made a BEGINNING
of speaking? It is clear from the Scriptures that
the soul is quite
distinct from the spirit;
and by attention to the teaching of the Word
we may learn that the soul
signifies the natural
life of the
man. This embraces all
his own exclusive personal experiences, sensations, and
emotions; and these in
turn arise from his relations and associations with the
created
things about him,
especially from his relations with
his fellow human beings. It is distinctly the self-life,
that is to say, the sum of every experience which
pertains to the
man himself,
to his own separate personality, as distinguished from every other man. It embraces all his own
distinct and personal desires, ambitions,
gratifications, honours, and
pleasures. It takes in all the plans and
arrangements he devises to
secure his
own
satisfaction, entertainment, enjoyment, and so
forth. The instinctive longings of the soul are what
impel men to pursue riches so ardently. For it
is by means of money that
the desires of the soul may be gratified, so far as it
is possible to procure gratification for them in this
world. Wealth
commands distinction, attention, worldly pleasures,
and high social position,
and by means of it may be procured nearly everything
that, this world can supply for the satisfaction of the soul of man. Hence, the Lord
says, Beware
of covetousness, and His Apostle says, covetousness
is
idolatry.
Important instruction on this point is given by the Lord in Luke 12., in the parable
of the rich man. He
spoke this parable for the express purpose of enforcing
the warning:- Take heed,
and beware of covetousness,
for a mans
SOUL
consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he
possesseth (verse
15). Then He tells of the rich man, whose ground brought
forth plentifully, insomuch that he had not room enough
to store his fruits.
Therefore, the man laid his plans for his own advantage,
that
is for his SOUL.
He said,
I will pull down my barns and build greater; and there will I bestow all my fruits and all my goods.
And I will say to MY, SOUL, SOUL,
thou hast much goods, laid up
for many years; take THINE EASE, EAT, DRINK, and BE MERRY.
But GOD
said unto him, Thou
fool, this night thy SOUL
shall be required of thee*: then
whose shall those
things be, which thou hast provided?
[* NOTE. That is, in the
underworld of the dead, including those of all the
righteous dead from
Old Testament times, are presently waiting the
hope
of the promise made of God unto their
fathers, (Acts
26: 68. cf.
Phil. 3: 10-14; Acts
2: 34.) See
also Luke 16: 19-31; Rev.
6: 9-11; John 3: 13.
Which promise
our
twelve
tribes, says Paul, earnestly
serving
God night and day, hope
to attain.
And concerning this
hope I am accused by the Jews, O
king! Why is it
judgedincredible with you, if
God doth raise the
dead (Acts
26: 6-8).
It was Pauls belief in a select resurrection of reward
(Lk. 14:
14,
for disembodied souls
out of Hades) unto an inheritance
in the age to
come, which brought persecution and threats of
being killed by some
Jews, (Acts 23: 6,
12; 24: 21;
26: 6; 28: 20).]
This parable gives a clear idea of what the soul of man is;
and it teaches plainly that the loss of the soul is the
separation thereof from the
things capable of affording satisfaction to it.
In examining this important subject of the SALVATION
OF THE SOUL, we would begin
with the first reference to the soul in Hebrews,
which is in chap. 4:
12. We find there the important statement
that the Word of God sharply divides between the soul and the spirit; a distinction, however, which teachers and
commentators generally fail to observe. There are
some who professedly
make a specialty of rightly dividing the Word of Truth; which,
however, may be merely the
arranging of dispensational divisions according to their
own ideas. It is
questionable whether 2 Tim. 2: 15 means that we
are to divide up the Word of Truth. A better reading would seem to be, holding
a straight course in the
Word of Truth. But on the other
hand, it is certain, as has
been aptly said, that the Word of God divides us up, even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit. The Word of God speaks of the salvation of the spirit, of the salvation
of the soul and of the salvation of the body; and there is a great
difference between them.
In
1
Cor. 5:
5, Paul speaks of delivering one of the members of the assembly of
The distinction between the spirit of man and the soul of man
is recognized throughout Scripture. Thus in 1
Thess. 5:
23, the Apostle prays for the sanctification of the whole man, .and that
your whole spirit,
and soul, and body be
preserved blameless unto
(at) the Coming of our Lord
Jesus Christ.
Of the Lord Jesus it is written that just before His death He
commended His SPIRIT to His Father. And when Jesus had cried with a loud
voice, He said, Father, into Thy Hands I commend My
Spirit. And having
said thus He gave up the spirit
(Luke 23:
46).
Of His SOUL and BODY
it is written in Psa. 16., quoted in Acts 2:
31, that
His SOUL
was not left in Hades, neither did His FLESH
see corruption.
It thus appears that His body went
into the tomb, but saw no corruption there, while His soul
went to Hades, or
The word soul signifies, as we have said, the natural, or personal life of
the individual man, in the broadest sense, including all
the experiences,
sensations, and emotions pertaining thereto. In
fact, the Greek word psuche
is sometimes in our versions translated life,
sometimes
soul. When the
word life in our
versions stands for psuche
it
never
means eternal life,
possessed
by Christ, and imparted as the gift of God to those who
believe on
Him. For that life the Greek word is zoe. It is sometimes of much importance to know what the original word
is. Thus, in John 10, one of these words occurs in verse 10, the other in verse 11. When Christ said I am come that they might have LIFE, He used the
word zoe, eternal life. When, however, He added the
good
shepherd giveth his LIFE
for the
sheep,
He used
the word psuche, soul, or natural life; and the same word occurs in verses
15
and 17. In verse 17 we read, Therefore
doth My Father love Me, because I lay down My life
(soul) that
I might take
it again.
The
Lord Jesus has a true human soul, an individual,
personal life, like each
one of us, only without sin. He laid it down; but
He has taken it
again. Thus the Lord speaks of laying down His own
sinless Soul, and in
this we have further and conclusive proof that losing
ones soul does not mean
damnation. It means, as we have said, the cutting
off of the soul [at the time of
death] from the things created for its satisfaction and enjoyment. In verse
28,
however, and I give
unto them. eternal life, the word is zoe. That life can never be lost; for they who receive it shall never
perish.
Thus
the
life (soul)
which Christ gave for us is not the same as the life He gives
to us. The
difference is great.
Again, in John 12., both
words occur in verse 25:
He that
loveth his life (psuche) shall
lose it;
and he that hateth his life (psuche)
in this world,
shall keep IT (his soul, psuche) unto
life (zoe) eternal.
This is one of the instructive passages in which the Lord
began to speak of the salvation of the soul. The
statement is brief, but
comprehensive. The man who loves his soul (psuche),
shall lose it;
and he that hates his soul IN
THIS WORLD
shall keep it unto life eternal. The Lord here
declares clearly that the
salvation of the soul is a
thing future, and that it is dependent upon the
faith, obedience, and stedfast
endurance of the man himself. In verse
27 He speaks of His own soul (psuche) saying,
Now is My SOUL
troubled.
In the Garden of
From the above passage (John 12:
25) and from other
Scriptures, it clearly
appears, as we have already said, that the soul of man
is that part of his
being which is capable of experiencing sensations
arising from relations
with created things
- the world. The
actual functions of
seeing, hearing, tasting, etc. are performed by the
organs of the body; but the
experiences and emotions resulting therefrom are of the
soul. The seeing of
pictures, statues, buildings, processions, carnivals,
ornate religious
ceremonials, etc., etc.; the pleasures of music,
literature, especially
fiction, banquetting, dancing, sports, and the like; all
amusements,
entertainments, social functions, etc., form part of the
life (or soul) of a
man
in this world. It is by hating his soul, or self-life in this world, that a
man may KEEP IT for the age that is coming.
The passage last above quoted does not teach that the
pleasures of the natural or personal life are
necessarily evil quite the
contrary. Neither does the passage teach that it
is wrong for the people
of God to experience gratification when some pleasing
sight - as a beautiful
landscape or gorgeous sunset - meets their eyes, though
they should exercise
care as to the liberty they allow themselves in this
direction. It is
because these things are lawful and good in themselves,
and are appointed for
mans enjoyment, that the Lord would have His disciples
keep
their souls
unto eternal [age-lasting]* life, for
then the pleasures of the
created universe may be enjoyed to the full, without any
taint of sin, and
without any alloy of sorrow or pain. To that end
the disciple must hate
his self-life (soul) in this world. To love ones
life in this world is
much the same as to love the world and the things that
are in the world. BUT
CHRIST IS NOT IN THE WORLD.
He laid down His Personal Life (psuche) in the
world, and has now no
part or pleasure in it. Nor could He have pleasure
in the world as it is
now. His portion here was always sorrow.
Therefore, it behoves the disciple of Christ to set his affections on things above
where Christ is at the Right Hand of God (Col. 3: 1, 2). And the
consequence
of not doing so is that he may indeed enjoy his soul
here, but will lose it
hereafter. That judgment is just,
and is so plainly declared
in the Scripture that there is no excuse for ignorance
in regard to it.
Thus it is that the Word of God divides between the soul
and the spirit of man.
The above cited passage in Colossians states that YE DIED
and your life
(zoe)
is hid with Christ in God.
But when
Christ Who is our life (zoe)
shall
appear, then
shall
ye also appear with Him IN GLORY. Those who are to appear with Him in
glory are those who died with Him. It is
needful on the believers part to reckon this to be
true, and to act
accordingly, taking the place of one crucified to
the world, and therefore
having no portion in it. All that the
believer has in the world is a
path through it; the same path
that the Master trod.
The view we have presented as to the soul of man is confirmed
by the passage in Matthew 10: 37-39:
He that loveth father or mother
more than Me is not worthy
of Me; and he that
loveth son or daughter more
than Me is not worthy of Me.
And he that
taketh not his cross and followeth after Me is not
worthy of Me.
It is quite common for a person to refer to some trial or
burden
he is compelled to bear, as his cross;
but
that is not at all what the Lord means by this
saying. A disciples cross
is never something he must bear. In order to fulfil this saying of the
Lords the bearing must be voluntary. The disciple
must, as the act of
his own will, take
up
the
cross, and follow Christ; that
is, follow Him unto crucifixion to the world; for the
sole use made of the
cross is to crucify thereupon the one who bears
it. The saying,
therefore, is the strongest possible
expression for the act of deliberately choosing to be with
Christ in the place of death to the world, and to all
the world has to offer
those who seek their self-life there.
And the next words of the Lord are: He that
findeth his soul shall lose it, and
he that
loses his soul for My sake, shall find it. The
literal rendering, which
is preferable to the A.V. is: He that hath found his soul
shall lose it; and he that hath lost
his soul, for My
sake, shall find it.
This saying needs no explanation. It contains a clear
promise that the man who has lost his soul for Christs
sake shall find it; and
as clear a warning that he who has found his soul shall
lose it. The
words has found, has lost, point to the making of a settled and abiding choice.
One man has found his soul in this world as it now is,
and has settled down to
the spending of it. He will learn in the end that
he has indeed spent it. Another, for Christs sake, has parted with his soul, in this world. He shall surely find
it. Instead
of losing
it, he is really keeping it for the
coming age.
These
sayings of the Lord show that the losing of the soul in
this world is the
parting with all that ministers gratification to the
Soul. It consists in
taking such a position that the man is cut off from all
the things the soul
desires. If
such
be indeed the meaning of losing the soul in this
world, it will assist us to
understand what is meant by the loss of the soul in
the world to come.
Turning to Marks Gospel we find in chap.
8:
31-38, a passage in
which the Lord began
to teach His
disciples
certain
things; and
there we observe an important amplification of this
doctrine of the Lord.
We read: Whosoever WILL
(that
is, purposes or chooses to)
come after
Me, let him deny himself,
and take up his cross,
and follow Me (verse
34).
In this saying the action of
the mans own will is made conspicuous. Also the words are added, let him deny
himself,
signifying the putting of self, and all personal
inclinations aside, in order
that he may be free to act according to the will of
Another. This denying
of self is the giving up of all that constitutes the
self-life or soul in this
world.
In the next verse we find another addition.
In it the words and the
gospels
are
added to the words for My sake. The literal reading is, on account of Me and of the
good news.
We
take it that the good news in this connection is the good news of the so great
salvation
that awaits the sons whom God shall bring unto
glory.
The opening words of this
gospel of Mark are A beginning of the good news
of Jesus
Christ, SON OF GOD. The
Epistle to the Hebrews
calls special attention to the things spoken BY THE SON; and defines the so great salvation as that of
which A
BEGINNING was received to be spoken by the Lord. The
correspondence is
suggestive, at least, and may have more significance
than appears at first
glance.
Continuing to read in Mark, we come to the question: For
what
shall it profit a man,
if he shall gain the
whole world and lose his own soul? or
what shall
a man give in exchange for his soul? In this passage the word psuche
is correctly rendered soul
instead of life,
as in the preceding verses. It is the same word in
the original. Verses
35-37 read
as follows, giving the word psuche the same rendering throughout: For
whosoever will save his soul shall lose it; but
whosoever shall lose his soul for My sake and the
gospels, the same
shall SAVE
IT. For what shall it profit a man if he
shall gain the whole world,
and lose his own soul?
Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?
The Lord then adds this significant utterance: Whosoever
therefore shall be ashamed of Me and OF
MY
WORDS in this adulterous and sinful generation;
of him shall the Son of
Man be ashamed, when
He
cometh in THE
GLORY
OF HIS FATHER with the holy angels. This points very clearly
to the Coming of the Son of Man with the angels of His
power, as the time when the saving or losing of the soul, as to the next age, will
take place. It also admonishes us not to be
ashamed of His words. We should take heed therefore
lest we slight the words of the Lord Jesus, which He
spake concerning the age
to come wherein He will reign over the earth. We
greatly fear the consequences of the tendency
observable in certain quarters to
treat the millennial kingdom of the Son as a
thing of little interest to
the saints of God.
A passage almost identical with the one last quoted is found
in Matt.
16: 24-28, quoted in an
earlier part of this
volume. We call attention again to the fact that this teaching was introduced by the Lord in
connection with Peters confession of Him as the Christ, the SON OF THE
LIVING GOD, and in connection with His own
disclosure to His disciples of
His approaching sufferings and death. And the Lord stated that then, namely, at this moment
when those who have lost their souls for His sake
shall find them, would be
the time when He would reward every man according to his
works.
Luke 9: 20-26 also contains a passage so closely resembling the above that no further
comment thereon is required. This fact, however,
should be noted, namely,
that the teaching we are now considering is given in
each of the four Gospels,
which shows the great importance attached to it by the
Spirit of God. Yet
this surpassingly important doctrine has practically no
place at all in
the teaching received by many of the Lords people at
the present time.
We turn now to the great passage in Matt.
11.
The saying of the Lord
recorded there was spoken when He had been rejected by
that generation to whom
He had given the words the Father commanded Him to
speak, and before whose eyes
He had done the works of God. For their heart was
waxen gross, and their
ears were dull of hearing, and their eyes they had
closed. So He cries, He that hath
ears to hear, let Him
hear (verse 15). This is the Voice of Wisdom calling to all Her
children to hearken to excellent things. And the
Lord in this connection
declares that Wisdom is justified of her children
(verse 19). They are not like the children sitting in the market
place (verse 16-18).
Then He announces that ALL
THINGS
have been given Him of His Father; and speaks of KNOWING THE SON, saying, And no man knoweth the Son but the
Father (verse 27). This
knowledge of the Son is,
as we have seen, the knowledge that is appropriate for
those fully grown.
Then He says: Come unto Me, all ye that labour and
are heavy laden, and I
will give you rest. In the original, the words give rest
are a verb, which may be rendered will refresh
you.
This
refreshing He gives to all who come to Him. It is the washing of
regeneration, the renewing of the Holy Ghost, the making
of a new creature in
Christ. Then come the important words:
Take My Yoke upon you, and learn of Me, for I am
meek and lowly of heart, and ye Shall FIND
REST unto your SOULS.
For My Yoke is easy, and My burden is light.
There is, then, a [future] rest that is to be earned through submission to
the
yoke of Christ, and through learning from Him meekness
and lowliness of heart;
and this doubtless is the rest referred to in Heb. 3. and 4., that remaineth for
the people of God.
None
need fear to submit to His yoke, for it is easy,
nor to His burden, for it is light.
His commandments are not
burdensome (1 John
5: 3). But the
point of chief
importance for our present purposes is the doctrine that
the [coming
millennial] rest by which the disciple
of Christ is to be
rewarded for his obedience, is rest to his SOUL. Let
us labour therefore to enter into that rest (Heb.
4: 11).
In another passage of great interest and importance the Lord
speaks to His disciples of saving their souls. The
passage is found in Luke 21.
The Lord is there foretelling the
time of false christs, wars and commotions, earthquakes,
famines and
pestilences, and of persecutions, betrayal and death for
His followers (verses 8-16).
For their comfort He says: And ye shall be hated of all men for My Names
sake; but there shall
not an hair of your head
perish (17,
18).
Then
He adds the exhortation, as rendered in the A.V., In
patience
possess ye your SOULS. This
rendering, however, does not
at all give the sense of the original. The word
translated possess
means to gain,
as the reader can readily ascertain
for himself by consulting any critical version or Greek
concordance. In
Bagsters
Englishmans Greek New Testament the verse is
thus literally rendered; By
your patient endurance gain ye your souls. The
only question among the
competent authorities seems to be whether the form of
the verb be imperative -
gain ye - or future - ye shall gain.
For the purpose of our study it is immaterial what maybe
the tense of the
verb. In either view it signifies that the disciple of Christ may gain his own soul as a reward for the endurance of trials and persecutions. This is the word of Christs patience (2
Thess. 3: 5,
R.V.; Rev. 3: 10.).
It should be observed that, although Christ declares that
some of His disciples should be put to death, He
nevertheless immediately adds
that not a hair of their heads should perish. This
promise clearly proves
the full restoration of the entire man.
It is at the close of this passage that the Lord warns His
disciples against allowing their hearts to be
overcharged with surfeiting and
drunkenness, and cares of this life (bios),
lest that Day come upon them suddenly; and admonishes them to watch and
pray always, that they may be accounted worthy to escape all
these things, and to stand before the Son of Man.
It thus
appears that watchfulness and prayer are needed in order
to gain the promised
reward (compare 1 Thess. 5:
6, 17).
The foregoing are the recorded instances in which the Lord
made a beginning of speaking of the salvation of the
soul. Among those that heard Him, and that have confirmed the teaching to us, and
amplified it, was the Apostle
James.
This Apostle addresses believers as my beloved brethren, and
admonishes them to be swift to
hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath, and he exhorts them to receive with meekness the engrafted
Word which is able to SAVE
YOUR SOULS.
(1: 19-22).
In this important passage the Apostle clearly distinguishes
between the gift of the new birth and the reward of
saving the soul.
He first speaks of the
gift, saying, Every good and perfect GIFT
is from above, and
cometh down from the Father
of lights, with
Whom is no variableness,
neither shadow of turning (verse
17). The next verse
indicates a special gift from above, namely, the new birth, which is of the
Will of God, and therefore not subject to be
withdrawn, for in Him is no
variableness. Note the words, Of His own Will begat He us with the
Word of Truth, that we
should be a kind of first
fruits of His creatures (comp. John 1:
12, 13). Let it then be
carefully noted that those who
have been already begotten again with the Word of Truth
(having believed on
Christ, Who is the Truth), are exhorted to receive with submission the implanted Word,
which
is able to save
their souls. This clearly
distinguishes the new
birth from the saving of the soul. It shows that a
man may have been
begotten again, and yet not save his soul. The
reason is that the new
birth is a work done in a mans spirit. That which is BORN
of the Spirit is SPIRIT
(John 3: 6).
If we assume that the
exhortation of
James
1:
21
is addressed to those who have been already
born again, as we must do since they are addressed as brethren, it
necessarily follows that the
saving of the soul is something
distinct from the new birth.
The new birth, then, is a past event for every [regenerate] believer in Christ, and can never be undone.
But the saving
of
the soul
is
a thing
yet
to be accomplished. Receiving the
implanted Word is an
exhortation having practically the same force as giving earnest heed to things
we have heard,
or letting the Word of Christ abide in us.
This much neglected Epistle of James, which by many is
practically set aside as Jewish,
contains
much valuable instruction and comfort for Gods
pilgrims. The very first
words are strikingly appropriate:- My brethren,
count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations
(or trials). Why? Because the trial of your faith worketh PATIENCE; and this is
the very thing declared
by the Lord in Luke 21:
19, and by the Apostle in Heb. 10:
36 to be needed for attaining the promise, namely, the
salvation of the soul. The next words are very important: But let
patience have her perfect work, that
ye may be PERFECT
and entire wanting (i.e.
lacking) nothing.
The
words of the Lord recorded in Luke
21: 19
show that the perfect work of patience or endurance is gaining the soul.
This Epistle belongs to a portion of the New Testament
(including also Hebrews, and the Epistles of Peter,
John, and Jude) which
closely corresponds to the Book of Numbers, the Book of
the pilgrimage of Gods
people in the wilderness. This correspondence has
been often pointed out,
and much helpful instruction has been based
thereon. But the
correspondence teaches more than is generally supposed.
It is highly appropriate that just here we find Gods
gracious provision for sickness among His people (James 5:
14-16). That provision is
slighted by many; but it is highly valued by such of
Gods pilgrims as
have accepted His care for
their mortal bodies, not looking for help from the worlds systems of healing.
The Epistles of Peter are also full
of valuable
instruction for those children of God who would be true
Hebrews. Here
again the Word of God cuts
sharply and cleanly between the new birth and the
salvation of the soul. The
message of Peter is addressed to those who have been already
begotten again unto a living
hope by the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead
(1:
3).
These are now being kept by the
power of God THROUGH
FAITH unto
salvation
ready to be revealed
at
the last time (comp. 1 John 2: 18). This future salvation
is the
salvation of the soul,
spoken of in Heb.
10.;
and the faith
mentioned is the faith to the saving of the soul.
This is perfectly clear from verses
6-9.
Those born-again ones who are
in manifold temptations are called upon (as in James) to rejoice, and for the
reason that the outcome of the trial of faith, is
to
be rewarded
by praise,
and honour, and glory,
at
the Appearing
of Jesus Christ. Through believing on Him Whom they have not seen, they may
rejoice with joy unspeakable and glorified, receiving (as they shall if
they hold fast to the end the hope
to which they have been begotten) THE END of their faith, namely, THE
SALVATION
OF THEIR SOULS. We would call special attention to the fact here
stated that this salvation of the soul is the end
of our faith, not the
beginning. Then we are informed that this
salvation is that concerning
which the prophets inquired and searched diligently,
desiring to know what or
what manner of time the Spirit of Christ Who was in them
did signify, in
testifying beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the glory
that should follow. Unto those prophets it was revealed that, not to
themselves, but to us, they did minister the things which are now reported unto you (these being the things which we have heard) by those who
preached the gospel
unto you, with the
Holy
Ghost sent down from heaven. All this is manifestly in close correspondence with Heb. 2., where the so
great
salvation
is
mentioned. And, to make the correspondence still
closer, it is stated
that this is a matter in which the angels are directly
interested; for the
Apostle Peter adds: which things the angels desire to
look into (verses
10-12).
The next verse shows that the message is for pilgrims: Wherefore, that is to
say, in order to gain the
end proposed (the salvation of the soul), gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and
hope to the end, for
the grace that
is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus
Christ.
Grace provides this great
salvation, and faith attains it, through hoping to the end. As OBEDIENT CHILDREN, not fashioning yourselves
according to the former desires in your ignorance;
but as He which hath CALLED
YOU is holy, so
be ye holy in all manner of
behaviour. And if
ye call on Him as Father,
Who, without
respect of
persons judgeth according to every
mans work, pass
the time of your sojourning here
in
fear,(13-17).
Here we have express mention of obedience, of the children
who call upon God as Father, of the heavenly calling, of
the judgment of
believers works, the sojourning, and of fear as to the
consequences of
disobedience. These are the very topics to which prominence is given in Hebrews.
In chapter 2. we find the holy priesthood,
who are to offer spiritual
sacrifices (worshipping God in spirit) acceptable to God
through Jesus Christ (verse 5),
and the royal
priesthood who are to show forth the excellencies of Him Who called
them out of darkness into His marvellous light.
This, exercise of the
functions of the royal priesthood belongs,
we take it, to the age
to come, when the sons of the priestly
house will show
forth
(which they certainly cannot do now)
the excellencies of the Son, Who has called them into
His. marvellous light,
which will then be displayed.
Again, at verse 11 is a strong exhortation addressed expressly to Gods pilgrims: Dearly
beloved,
I BESEECH
you, AS
STRANGERS and PILGRIMS, abstain from fleshly lusts, (desires) which
war AGAINST
THE
SOUL.
Surely,
the meaning of this is unmistakable. The cravings
of the flesh,
whether coarse or refined, war against THE
SOUL, and if indulged will, as the Lord
declared, cause the loss of the soul in the age to
come.
It is the pilgrims
that are warned against enemies,
which make war against the soul.
All the exhortations and encouragements of this Epistle are
advantageous for Gods pilgrims; but we must leave our
readers to study them in
detail for themselves, asking them to observe that the
practical object of all
is that when His (CHRISTS) GLORY shall be revealed, ye may be
glad also, with
exceeding joy (4: 13). We call
special attention also to the
reference to Christ as the Shepherd and Overseer of YOUR SOULS (2: 25); and to the exhortation to those who suffer according to the
Will of God, that is, according to Gods appointment
instead of for
wrong-doings as in 4: 15, to commit the KEEPING
OF
THEIR SOULS unto Him in well doing, as unto a
faithful Creator.
Peters second Epistle is also full of pertinent instruction
but we would only call attention to the things which
they who have
obtained like precious faith are to add to their faith (1: 1, 5-8), in order that they
be not barren or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord
Jesus Christ (chap.
1: 5-8). Also to the words that follow: Wherefore the rather,
brethren give
diligence
to make your calling and election sure,
for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall (comp. Heb. 4:
11); for so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the EVERLASTING KINGDOM OF OUR LORD
AND SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST (10,
11).
This connects the passage directly with the [millennial]
Kingdom of the Son, which is
the theme of Hebrews. Therefore, the instructions
given are of the utmost
importance to those who would gain an entrance into that Kingdom, and especially to those who seek, as every saint
should seek, an abundant
entrance
thereinto.
Returning now to Hebrews, we would note that the hope
there set before us, and which enters into that within
the veil, is as an anchor OF
THE SOUL (6: 19).
The occurrence of the word soul
in this passage is very significant, but the
significance
thereof is rarely, if ever, noticed in the commentaries
on Hebrews. It
is not said or implied, here
or elsewhere, that a man may, by holding fast to a
promise of God, save himself
from perdition; but it is clearly implied in this
Scripture that the heir of
promise, by holding fast to the hope
set before him, may save his soul for the age when joy will be complete and unalloyed. The only security for the soul is that
afforded by the Anchor within the vail.
We fervently pray and trust that the foregoing comments may
be blessed of God, to the end that His saints may
through study of the
Scriptures cited, and by the teaching of the Holy
Spirit, receive an
understanding of that salvation so great, the salvation
of souls, whereof a
beginning was spoken by the Lord, and which has been
confirmed to us by them
that heard Him.
In the light of the Scriptures we have examined, the meaning
of the words faith to saving the soul (Heb.
10:
30),
is plain; and thereby also, the
lesson of chap.
11.
may be clearly perceived. We
refrain from commenting upon the details of that
chapter. It must suffice
for our purpose to point out that the saints of former
ages who are mentioned
there had not only repentance and faith towards God for
redemption from sin
and death, but also had faith to the end of their days,
waiting for
something whereof they had heard from God and
therefore hoped for,
but had not seen.
They all became strangers and pilgrims on earth
(verse 13), and declared plainly that they sought a country. They
were free to return to that country from whence they
came out;
but they set their hearts on a
better country, that is, an heavenly, and for that
reason, God is not
ashamed to be called their God (14-16). And such as these also are they of whom it is written
that Christ is not ashamed to call them brethren
(2:
11).
These Hebrews were tested in
various ways. No two were tried in exactly the
same way. On this
point see especially verses 31-38.
But, whatever may have been the test
appointed by God, it served to show that the man or
woman was at heart a true
Hebrew - that the HEART was right towards Him;
and that is the essential
thing.
*
*
*
[PART TWO]
FOREWORD
But
whosoever
will lose his life (soul)
for my sake shall find it.
Our
Lord does not insert the word wish in this
alternative. Many
have been martyrs for the truth, who
trembled at the thoughts of their own weakness, and
would gladly have been
spared. They
had no wish to lose their life.
But when the voice of God, expressed in the
circumstances in which they
were placed, demanded it, they made the surrender. Paul, indeed,
desired
the fellowship of Jesus sufferings, even to the being
conformed unto his death,
as the
pathway to the first
resurrection. But this is
not the high standing of many.
Jesus death and resurrection show how life lost is found in
resurrection. His
victory Hades is to be
theirs who so follow him.
The finding of
the soul is seen in
Rev. 20: 4.
I
saw the souls of those beheaded for the witness of Jesus,
and for
the word of God,
and they lived and
reigned with the Christ a
thousand years. But this resurrection is peculiar.
The rest of the dead
lived not till the thousand
years are finished.
Here we have the secret of the joyful suffering of the martyrs of
the earliest age of the church.
They
saw that a peculiar joy was connected
with such endurance. Some rushed
into death uncalled, that they
might attain it. It
is not in human
nature to desire suffering for its own sake.
But this motive overpowered dread.
If
all are to be alike
in the day of Christ, I should prefer to go through life
quietly, without
reproach, and without being called to give up any of the
comforts or enjoyments
of life. But if such is not the way to the kingdom, but the way to lose it,
faith will enable me to overcome nature.
So important is the sentiment of the verse before us, that it is
often repeated in the New Testament.
He that loveth his life (soul) shall
lose it, and he that hateth his life (soul) in
this world shall keep it
unto life eternal: John 12:
25.
The
context, in this case also, points us to Jesus
surrender of life.
- (R. Govett,
Entrance
Into
the Kingdom, pp.
246.)
THOSE WHO ALLEGE CAN PROVE
NOTICE
It
has
been shown above, that on the
day of Pentecost
(Acts 2:
1),
the Holy Spirit
came upon the apostles
whom he had chosen
(Acts 1:
4,
R.V.): Matthias,
being numbered with the eleven
apostles as
the one chosen by Him, to replace Judas,
(v. 26).
What
did
those present in the house where they were
sitting (2:
2) see?
They saw (1)
tongues parting asunder,
like
as of fire; and it sat
upon each one of them
(Acts 2:
3):
that is, upon each one of the Apostles which the Holy
Spirit had chosen! It was
the apostles,
could see tongues of fire as it
sat upon each one of them. (2)
What was it that they heard? They
heard a sound as of a rushing of a
mighty wind, and
it filled all the
house where they were sitting*: (2:
2).
*
It
would be hardly likely that the devout
men dwelling in
Every
man heard
them (the
Apostles), speaking
in his own language (verse
6).
Those
then present
were: Parthians and Medes and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, in Judea and Cappadocia, in
Pontus and Asia, in
Phrygia and Pamphylia,
in Egypt and in parts of Libya about Cyrene, and sojourners from Rome, both
Jews and Proselytes,
Cretans and Arabians
(as they
all heard the Apostles
speaking in our tongues
the
mighty works of God: (vv.
9-11).
That
Pentecost
brought with it a literal
fulfilment of what John
the
Baptiser had prophesied: He
shall
baptise you with the Holy
Ghost and with fire: (Matt.
3: 11; Luke 3:
16).
What
a
difference the divine anointing made in the lives of
the apostles, after
the Holy Spirit had given them His knowledge, powers
and miraculous
gifts!
Did
believes
who had these miraculous gifts
imparted to them, by the laying on of the Apostles
hands, continue to keep hold
of them? No! Why not?
Because of their disobedience and apostasy,
God withdrew them: and it is believed by many, that
after the death of the
apostles, they were withdrawn!
The
Church
at
The
Apostle
Paul had no interest in Judging
them that are without:
his
threatenings were all directed toward them
that were within! Any brother
who was a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler,
or a drunkard, or an extortioner,
was targeted
by him (5: 11)! Why?
Because a little leaven (evil practise) would
have had an affected all within
the Church; and therefore, the guilty one was to
be excommunicated.
The
threat
of losing their inheritance in
the kingdom
of God, (6:
9).
was directed toward the immoral and wicked
brother
on the inside: those unregenerate
on the outside, are in
no position to lose any inheritance,
in the coming
Kingdom - being
outside of Gods redeemed
family! The
danger which
threatened the regenerate was imminent; and immediate repentance toward God
was demanded from them, for Gods forgiveness and
restoration.
The
miraculous
gifts which Peter received at Pentecost,
enabled
him to see into the heart of Ananias
and Sapphira. He knew how
much they had kept back
from the sale of the land, and how they tempted and lied
to the Spirit of the Lord
(Acts
5: 3). Jesus had
given Peter the the keys of the kingdom of heaven
(Matt. 16:
19,
R.V.): and after exposing their sin, the divine judgment
descended upon them
immediately after his spoken word!
They
both died prematurely; and great fear came upon the
whole church (Acts 5: 11)!
Did they
lose eternal life?
No!
What then did they lose?
Their inheritance in the
coming kingdom
of Messiah Jesus, (1 Cor.
6: 10).
God
expects all who are indwelt by the Holy Spirit to
live responsibly before Him!
Failure
to do so will forfeit life in that coming
The
days
in which we are now living, are days of
disobedience and apostasy!
2 Tim. 3:
1-8;
2 Pet. 3: 3-9;
Jude 4, 8, 10-13, 16,
18, 19.
However, that should not prevent any of the
Lords obedient servants from
asking Him for miraculous gifts: He has commanded us to ask Him for
them! But
it does not automatically
follow that ever believer
will receive knowledge,
wisdom,
faith, gifts
of healings,
workings of miracles,
prophecy
discernings of spirits,
kinds of
tongues, the
interpretation
of tongues, (1
Cor.
12: 8-10, R.V.)!
The
closing
days of this evil age will be days of miracle: but it must be
remembered that not all miracles are performed by powers from God!
Satan
has power to deceive: and his servants too, have
received powers from him to
perform miraculous works.
The
Antichrist, who is yet to be revealed, will display his
satanic powers; and John
reminds us, that even
now there are many antichrists in the world!
1
John 2: 18.
Gods
anointed
servants will, at that time, also have miraculous powers - gifts from the Holy Spirit. Powers which He will distribute upon those chosen and anointed to do
His work.
I will give unto my two witnesses,
And if any man desireth to
hurt them, fire proceedeth out of
their mouth, and devoureth their enemies: and if any
man shall desire to hurt
them, in like
manner must he be killed.
These have the power over the waters to
turn them into blood, and to smite the earth with
every plague, as often as
they shall desire. (Rev.
11: 3,
5, 6,
R.V.).
*
*
*
EXPOSITIONS
7
NOTHING
LESS THAN THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST CAN
EXPLAIN PENTECOST.
Thus we now reach the highest level from which the fact of the
Resurrection can be viewed. Difficulty is solely proportional to the power of the person
meeting it:
a
difficulty insuperable to an infant, is, to a man,
no difficulty at all: so
to Sadduccan doubt of resurrection Jesus says, Ye do err,
not knowing the Scriptures
[foretelling resurrection], nor
the POWER OF GOD
(Matt. 22: 29). The
apostle chosen at Pentecost to expound the empty tomb,
devotes one
verse
to our Lords
life, one to his death, but twelve
to
His resurrection; for while the
efficacy is in the Cross, the demonstration is in the
Tomb; and throughout he
supremely reveals Gods mind in raising
His Son from the dead.
A man approved of God,
by
mighty works which
God did
(Acts
2: 22) - the only Man whom God never blamed and never
rebuked: delivered up by the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God - for from the worlds foundation the sacrifice of the Lamb had
dwelt in the heart of the Father (Rev.
13: 8): whom God raised up -
for the resurrection, as also the life and the death,
was full of God.
Now the sting of death is sin, and
the power of sin is the law (1
Cor. 15: 56);
that is, it is broken law which
inflicts death, and maintains corruption; but the body
of Jesus never corrupted
- the only body which never did - nor
was His spirit [i.e., His disembodied soul
(Acts 2: 27.
cf. v. 31)] left in Hades;
for
the law is powerless against
absolute holiness; and the body was without corruption, for it was without moral
taint. Having loosed the pangs of death: because it was not possible
that
He should be
holden of it
So Peter proves that the Resurrection had been on Gods
lips a
thousand years earlier.
Thou wilt not leave my soul
in Hades,
neither wilt thou suffer THY HOLY ONE to see corruption.
For,
had sin been in Christ, He could not have risen; and, had it not been on Christ, He
would not have died: but as
sinless, He was free to bear
the death-penalty for others; and as pronounced sinless
still by the
resurrection, the
sin
He bore had been expiated and consumed. Declared to be the Son of God
with power, according
to a spirit of
holiness
-
the force of Deity whereby He paralyzed death, and forsook Hades -
by the resurrection [out] of the
dead
(
But the Lord Jesus also participated in the
Resurrection. The Angels said, He is risen, not, He is raised: others
were raised,* He rose: it was a conjoint work of
the Godhead, in which His was an equal share. I lay down my life, that
I may take it again.
I have power to lay it down, and I have
power
to
take it again
(John
10: 17). Twelve times He is recorded as foretelling His
death in words free from all type or figure, and once only (Matt. 26:
2)
without naming His rising from the dead
in the same breath; and the figure He especially used -
the Temple rebuilt in
three days - formed not only the ground-work of capital
charges (Matt.
26: 61), but
was
correctly understood by His enemies as a specific
prophecy of resurrection
(Matt. 27:
63). What
sign
showest Thou unto us?
Destroy this temple, our Lord answered - for the Resurrection [of
Gods anointed Messiah] is the only sign to be
granted to this generation
(Matt.
12: 39) and in three days I
will raise it up.
But He spake of the temple of His body (John 2:
19, 21).
Both
temples, alike shrines of Godhead (Col. 2:
9), both
born in one spot (Psa.
132: 6), and both rent with death-pangs together (Matt. 27:
50),
perished for reconstruction, our Lord in three human
days, the
[* NOTE. That is, others were raised temporarily
from death and
from amongst the dead, who
are now present in Sheol/Hades.
God
allowed Samuel to come up to converse with king Saul;
and then return
again to the underworld of the dead in Sheol:
Tomorrow shalt thou
and thy sons be
with
me. (1 Sam.
28: 19, R.V.).]
** Moreover,
our Lord, alone of all the
prophets, foretold the exact measure of the little while (John
16: 16) between the
moment of expiring and
the unsealed tomb; a measure of time which makes it
impossible that the
resurrection was the mere release of the spirit from the
body. That was
instantaneous. On these three days and three
nights, see Note appended to
this pamphlet.]
So also the Spirit is Gods great Agent in resurrection, to
which also He is the supreme Witness; though I am not
aware that He is anywhere
stated to have raised the Lord. If the
Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead
dwelleth
in you, He that raised
up Christ Jesus from the
dead shall quicken
also your mortal
bodies through His Spirit that
dwelleth in you (Rom.
8:
11). Nothing less than the Resurrection [of Messiah Jesus]
can explain Pentecost. So it is the Holy Ghost who uncovers the
fatal consequences (1 Cor.
15: 12-19)
of a denial of the
Resurrection. For
if Christ now lies in
Palestine, (1) He
is
a dead man still; a false
prophet, therefore, of what never
was, and never can be, fulfilled; and, in His assertion
- I am
resurrection (John
11: 25) - a
blasphemer: (2) the
Gospel is a delusion
- our preaching is vain - for its
central dogma is a myth:
(3) the
Apostles
are liars
- we are found
false
[not,
mistaken] witnesses
of
God - utterers of
falsehood deliberately
put into His mouth*: (4) atonement is as dead as the Lamb
- your
faith is vain - for, as death is the physical proof of sin, so sins
obliteration can be physically proved only by
resurrection: (5) no
soul
has ever been regenerated - ye are yet in your sins
- so that all that is good and
lovely and god-like in character has been a mirage: (6)
the
godly are lost
they
also which are fallen
asleep in Christ have perished - for if a
lifeboat,
seeking a foundered ship, never returns, it can only be
because both have been
engulfed in a common destruction: and (7) we disciples are fools-
of all men most pitiable - for while
we have renounced earth,
we have also lost [the possibility of
ever ascending into] heaven, and
have led countless
myriads into the same folly. It is Deity alone
which emptied the tomb of
Christ [the
firstfruits of a better
Resurrection (Heb.
11:
35b).]: Christianity
answers for the
Resurrection with its life. But more perishes than the Christian faith, if Christ lies
beneath the Syrian blue. History is shattered
- for no other event was ever so closely or so amply
evidenced; testimony is
shattered - for no testimony can survive the
ruin of the testimony of
holy apostles and prophets; character is shattered -
for if our Lord was thus
exposed as a false prophet and blasphemer, no
character can be trusted again;
Heaven is shattered - for if the sinless Christ sank
under death, all escape
for the sinful is impossible; and faith is shattered
for if God has so dealt
with His Son, trust in Him can never be
restored. All this is a much less
credible creed than the Christian Faith. THE
RESURRECTION [OF
OUR LORD AND SAVIOUR JESUS CHRIST]
IS A FACT.
Millions of believing souls
had fallen asleep with their faces set forward to a
sinless Sacrifice; earths
only holy millions to-day have their faces turned upward
to a living Christ:
and the Church is too holy for a
foundation of rottenness, and
too real for a foundation of mist.
[* Moreover, our Lord, alone of all the prophets, foretold
the exact measure of the little while (John 16: 16) between the
moment of expiring and
the unsealed tomb; a
measure of time which
makes it impossible that the resurrection was the
mere release of the spirit
from the body.
That
was instantaneous.
On these three days and three
nights, see Note appended to this pamphlet.
It has been well expressed thus: If
false, you must suppose that twelve men of mean birth,
and of no education,
formed the noblest scheme that ever entered into the
mind of men, adopted the
most daring means of executing that scheme, and
conducted it with such address
as to conceal the imposture under the semblance of
simplicity and virtue.
You must suppose that men guilty of blasphemy and
falsehood united in an
attempt, which has in fact proved the most successful,
for making the world
virtuous; that they formed this singular enterprise
with the certain
expectation of scorn and persecution; that although
conscious of one anothers
villany, none of them ever thought of providing for
his own security by
disclosing the fraud, but, amidst sufferings the most
grievous, persevered in
their conspiracy to cheat the world into piety,
honesty and benevolence.
MAN AND HIS DESTINY
Thus the Resurrection, as we should expect from a miracle so
foretold, so evidenced, so unique, and so stupendous,
has changed the entire
destiny of mankind. For what exactly is man?
Scripture regards
both the body and the soul as man. The Lord God formed man of
the dust of the ground, and breathed into his
[still
lifeless] nostrils the breath
of life (Gen. 2:
7): they took the body
of Jesus, and bound it in linen cloths;-
there then they laid Jesus
(John 19:
40):
Dorcas fell sick and died;
and they
laid her in an upper chamber
(Acts 9:
37):
in each case the body is the man. So also, only more emphatically, is the
soul or
[animating]
spirit.
I
[as
a disembodied soul] will
go down to Hades to my
son mourning
(Gen. 37:
35): this day
[i.e., immediately after the time of death (Luke 16:
22)] shalt thou
be with Me in Paradise (Luke 23:
43): the garments
which
Dorcas made, while she was with them (Acts 9: 39):- in each case the spirit [not the animating spirit
(Luke 8:
55),
but a dead soul] is the man. Thus both body
and soul (in this
context I am using soul
and spirit as one) are
essential elements in man: humanity
is body,
soul,
and spirit (1
Thess. 5:
23).
Death, therefore, we had almost dehumanises: it is a
decomposition, a
disintegration, dissolution, of man:
it is a violent rending asunder of
constituent elements, consequent on sin: and, to speak
exactly, though body and
spirit are each man, neither is
man alone.
The
body rots; [when] the [animating]
spirit departs to [God (See Job.
34:
14; Eccl. 3:
21; Isa. 38: 16; Luke 23:
46. Cf.
James 2: 26,
etc.); and the soul - the person - descends into]
Hades:
the man is dead.
Thus, when God deals finally with man He deals, not with a
corpse, nor with a disembodied spirit, but with a man:
man,
for all eternity, can never cease to be man:
his eternal destiny, whatever it
be, must be the destiny of a man. Now our Lord, as
the typical Man, is
the One who, alone hitherto, has passed through all the
processes of man.
First, He was truly man:- they took the body
of
Jesus
(John
19: 40); my soul is
exceeding sorrowful
(Matt.
26: 38); into Thy hands I commend My spirit (Luke
13: 46). Violent dissolution took place on the Cross: Being
put to
death in the flesh, but quickened in the spirit; in which He went and preached unto the spirits* in
prison
(1 Pet.
3: 19). After
three days and three
nights, the angels said:- Why seek ye the living among the dead? He is not here - His corpse is not in the graveyard, His soul is
not left in Hades (Acts 2:
31) but is risen (Luke
24: 5); that is, the
recumbent body stands
again upon its feet, and the spirit is returned into it (Luke 8: 55).
Christ, born of a woman, was
born full man: He died as a man dies: and He rose with
body, soul, and spirit
re-knit in everlasting resurrection. I am the Living One; and I was dead, and
behold, I am alive
for evermore
(Rev.
1: 18).
[* NOTE. The spirits in prison, may refer
to the Nephilim that
is, the off spring from
a sexual relationship between the
sons of God
(angels) and the daughters of
men (Gen. 6:
2, 4).]
A passage now arises before us than which perhaps, the whole
Bible itself contains none more solemn. For since by [a] man came death - dissolution, decomposition, disintegration by
[a] man came also the resurrection
of
the dead (1 Cor.
15:
21)*
- the
re-knitting, in individual re-composition, of the
whole man; and this, for the
entire race. I AM RESURRECTION AND LIFE (John
11: 25): since Christ
was made man, and is
resurrection, resurrection has become an essential part
of human nature. For as in
Adam all die,
so in Christ shall all be
made alive - not regenerated, but made alive physically: for as
physical death poured
itself through Adam into all the race, so physical
resurrection becomes
integral to humanity from the second federal Head of
mankind. Because
Christ was a Man, and rose, all [sooner or later will] rise;
for
all partake of the same flesh with
Christ:
but believers are one spirit
with
the Lord
(1 Cor.
6: 17): so, while unbelief severs from all benefits of the Passion, no man can
escape the consequent resurrection.
The Incarnation empties
every grave: for Christ
is the
first-born
from the dead, the
first-born of all creation (Col.
1:
15, 18).
* By man, not by God: so that, while resurrection was from
the first a creative design of God (2
Cor. 5: 5),
it is actually a product of the
Incarnation. The spirit [and soul] of man was always immortal.
The eternal destiny of our race now stands revealed. The
last
enemy that shall be destroyed - for all
mankind
is death: man, after entering on resurrection, never suffers
dissolution again: it is appointed unto men once
to die
(Heb. 9: 27): full manhood follows for ever. Thus the redeemed are
wholly redeemed: redeemed in spirit, [soul] and also in body (Rom.
8: 23), the man, as man, is redeemed utterly and eternally. What then of
the lost? Be not afraid of them which kill the
body, but are not able to kill the
soul:
but rather fear Him which
is able to destroy both soul and body in Hell
[Gehenna] (Matt.
10:
28).
The wicked equally abide as
men
for ever: they twain were cast alive - that is, spirit, soul, and body - into the lake
of fire, which is second death (Rev. 19: 20;
21: 8). The Second Death is not decomposition, the splitting
up of the person - as was the First: much less is it
annihilation it is the
final and eternal abode of the undivided man. This is the second death, even
the lake of fire. And
if
any was not
found written in the book of life, he was cast into the lake of fire
(Rev.
20: 14). For this corruptible must put on
incorruption:
and when God says it must, it is certain
that it will.
Unbeliever, what a destiny! and what a Christ! I
am a
substance nobler than the stars: they must perish, but, for better or worse, we endure: none can escape the
momentous consequences of the
Incarnation. It twists its roots
under and about all that is
human, and lifts the entire race into resurrection from
death; and the new
relation which humanity bears towards Christ
is glorious, or fearful, according to what we do
with Him. And
what a Christ! Christ is so truly man that He
actually died as man dies:
He is so truly God that He not only raised Himself, but the
whole of humanity,
in His rising. The raising of one is the peculiar prerogative of the Godhead:
who but the Son of God, by
the mere fact of
association in the flesh, could raise all?
For who is it
that
lay on the slab of rock? The Lord has Himself
answered in one of the
most wonderful utterances that ever fell even from the
lips of the Son of
God. I
AM
RESURRECTION AND LIFE (John
11: 25). What is resurrection? It is life
in
battle with death, and conqueror: it is the tremendous creative energy of the Deity put forth over
a corpse. Jesus does not say, I produce
resurrection, or, I confer
resurrection, or, I intercede to obtain resurrection: He
says,- I am
resurrection. Resurrection, that is, is not some unknown law about
to operate suddenly: it is the personal intervention of Christ:
where He moves, graves
empty. Therefore our Lords resurrection is itself the
touchstone of all salvation. For to
acknowledge its absolute
truth, and therefore to cry with Thomas - My Lord
and my God!
is to confess the sinners need, to
embrace the sinless Sacrifice, and to submit to the
provided [imputed]
righteousness. Say not in
thy heart, Who shall
ascend into heaven?
- for the
Incarnation has occurred;
or,
Who shall descend
into
the abyss?
- for
the
Resurrection [of Christ Jesus] has
occurred:
and between these two points
Christs righteousness, the imputed obedience of the Son
of God, has
been
wrought out, and is ready for faith to grasp. Not
having a
righteousness of mine own,
even that which is of
the law, but that [righteousness] which
is
through faith in Christ,
the righteousness which
is from God
UPON [resting as a garment upon the shoulders of]
faith
(Phil.
3: 9;
Isa. 61: 10).
THEREFORE
if thou
shalt confess with thy mouth JESUS
AS LORD, and shalt
believe in thy heart that God raised Him
from the dead, THOU
SHALT BE SAVED
(
*
*
*
8
THE
POWER
OF THE KEYS
The ever-nearing approach of the
Church of Rome wakes
back into life the dormant controversies of centuries;
and it is of critical
importance that where Roman teaching seems
lodged on
Scripture, but is not, she should be openly and publicly
dislodged from what
appears to be a Bible foundation.
For if
and where she is lodged on Scripture, we agree; we fight
what is pagan in
The
Old Testament
Priests had no power of absolution: they sacrificed, but
they never
absolved. In
the primitive Church the
condemnation passed on an erring disciple, or a pardon
granted him on
confession, was a work of the whole assembled church,
expressed by the officer
presiding. Our
judgment, says Tertullian,
cometh with great weight, as
of men well assured that they
are under the eye of God; and it is a very grave
forestalling of the judgment to
come, if any shall have so offended as to be put out
of the solemn assembly.
But by the fourth century bishops began to
assume this power of excommunication and absolution; and
by the sixteenth
century the Council
of Trent had
lodged the whole, sole power in the Priest.*
The
earlier form, Donminus
absolvat
te - the Lord grants
thee absolution - gave way
to the priest acting judicially as possessor of the
Keys, Ego absolvo te - I grant it.
*
To
the Apostles, and to their
successors in the priesthood, the power was delivered
of remitting and
retaining sins. Decrees of Trent,
Session xxiii.
The
first of our
Lords three great utterances is addressed solely to
Peter, and, couched in the
future tense, is (as the Church has ever regarded it)
the fundamental passage
on church discipline.
Peter has the
moment before been the mouthpiece of the unborn Church,
in the first great
saving confession of Christ: immediately, the Lord
conjures up the Church to
be; then that Church as issuing from the grave; and
between the two He erects the Churchs present collective authority to include, or
exclude, from the
*
Belonging
to the Church
depends on forgiveness of sins, forgiveness being the
sign of entrance into the
Church. And
since an accepted member may
again become unworthy of membership, the power of the
keys has importance to
those already received, including remission of sin or
absolution on the one
side, or retention of sin as well as Church discipline
on the other (Dorner).
The
second
passage, in which our Lord makes the actual grant of
what he had promised,
extends it, explicitly, to the entire Church: word for
word, precisely that
which was granted to Peter - the keys - are placed in
the hands of the whole
body of disciples.
For the Lord had just
told them when to exclude a sinning brother: so now He
grants the Divine
warrant for doing it, and His own promised endorsement
of the exclusion. Verily
I say unto you - for this is one of the truths depending solely on the word of Christ
- what
things
soever YE - the Church, just named, and
which, for obstinacy in
sin, has just put a brother back among the Gentiles and
the publicans - shall bind on earth shall be
bound in heaven
the binding
coming first, as excommunication precedes restoration; and
what things soever
- what
rather than
whom: for it is not so much a person that is bound or
loosed, but a sin that
is bound or loosed upon
a person:
therefore it is not the admission or the
exclusion of the unsaved, whose
persons are
involved,
- ye
shall
loose on earth, shall
be loosed in heaven
(Matt.
18: 18).
Here all precedence or exclusiveness of
Peter, or even of all the Apostles combined, disappears;
and the power of
excluding from the Church on earth, with its
ratification by exclusion from the
future Kingdom,*
is vested in each,
and all, of the
Community of Believers.
So the dominant
Protestant interpretation - namely, that it is merely
the Gospel declaration of pardon and threatening of hell - is obviously
untenable: and our Lord puts binding
first,
for it is only those already in the Church over whom we
have (1
Cor.
5:
12) any
jurisdiction; we bind in discipline that we may
yet loose in love.
An irrevocable,
irredeemable ban is far from being spoken of
here: in its highest exercise of power the Church looses again precisely that which it has bound; it bound only that it may
be able again to loose when this may be possible (Olshausen).
These keys,
as Augustine
says, not one man, but the
entire Church, receives.
*
It is most
remarkable that it is from the
Kingdom of the Heavens - our Lords coming
Reign over
the earth - that the Church, if acting on Scripture
commands, locks out; they
are the keys of the Kingdom: so Paul, having given the
catalogue of sins
excluding from the Church (1
Cor.
5: 11), repeats the same
list (but with additions)
as a catalogue of the sins which
exclude
from the [Millennial] Kingdom (1 Cor.
6:
9,
10.).
The
third passage,
equally comprehensive, gives the deep underlying
safeguard that hedges power so
awful; and our Lord again lodges the power, not in a
Peter who dies, or in
Apostles who lapse, but in that Divine Society which
never dies, and which will
never lapse. In
the upper room, filled
with the gathered disciples, including the women (Luke
24: 9-11, 33),
Jesus breathed
on them, and saith
unto them,
Receive ye the Holy Ghost: whose soever sins ye retain - ye hold fast, so that they
may not pass away from
him to whom they attach - they are retained (John
20:
23). The use of
the perfect in these two words, forgiven and
retained,
expresses the
absolute efficacy of the
power; no interval separates
the act from the issue
(Westcott). He who has a
church sentence against him, and
knows in his heart that it is a sentence both Scriptural
and according to fact, can
already be assured exactly of what his sentence
will be at the Lords judgment bar.
So
also in the loosing: as Paul said to the Corinthian
Church - Whom
ye forgive anything, I
forgive also: I have
forgiven it in the Person of Christ (2 Cor.
2: 10).* But
this
final passage most guardedly confines the power to the
closest connexion with
the Holy Ghost: either
we
must have the miraculous discernment
of spirits
whereby Peter instantly excommunicated Ananias
and Sapphira;
or else, if devoid of
Apostolic and miraculous powers, we must confine both
our binding and our
loosing to explicit authorizations of the Spirit
recorded in the Scriptures.
The Church is not
to be a petty tribunal of judgment for everything
(W. Kelly);**
but the
Church
(that is, the really regenerate) exercise
the powers granted
by the Lord, not in any way which they themselves may
think proper, but
according to the intimations of the Spirit (Olshausen), intimations that can be found alone in the Book of
God. Beyond
six named immoralities (1 Cor.
5: 11), and
also personal injuries (Matt. 18:
15), and
perhaps sloth (2 Thess. 3:
10), no
offences - and none in any case doctrinal or ritual -
are named in Scripture as
authorizations of excommunication; and all, on
repentance, can be loosed,
by the use of the reverse key.
This cuts up sectarianism by the roots.
We cannot bind on earth what Christ looses in
heaven; nor loose on earth what He binds in heaven: unscriptural
excommunications, or remissions, can
only
recoil, in the hereafter, on those who made them.***
*
He
absolved him (1 Cor. 2: 10)
because the congregation absolved him; not as a
plenipotentiary supernaturally gifted to convey a
mysterious benefit, but as
himself an organ and representative of the Church. The power of
absolution, therefore, belonged
to the church, and to the Apostle through the Church. It was a
power belonging to all Christians;
to the Apostle, because he was a Christian, not
because he was an Apostle
(F. W. Robertson)
**
It is tragic that
the Christian group which, of all
groups, stresses most strongly that the Church is in ruins.
Is the group which most aptly exercises the
full powers, and far beyond, of a Church totally
unimpaired.
***
While
it is not said, - None are forgiven
but those whom you forgive
- so , on the other hand,
it is not merely the general
statement of forgiveness as applicable to certain
descriptions of persons; but
it has a particular application to particular
individuals. And
so great is the authority and efficacy
that is made over to disciples hereby that it is not
called power to forgive, but forgiveness (Govett).
The
power of the
Keys placed in our hands is a power from which we cannot
free ourselves, and
which we can refuse only through cowardice and sin. The sainted Robert Murray Mc Cheyne says:- When
I first entered upon the work of the ministry, I was
exceedingly ignorant of the vast importance of church
discipline. I
thought that my great, and almost only,
work was to pray and preach.
I saw souls
to be so precious, and time so short, that I devoted
all my time and care and
strength to labour in word and doctrine.
When cases of discipline were brought before me
and the elders, I
regarded them with something like abhorrence.
It was a duty I shrank from; and I may truly
say it nearly drove me from
the work of the ministry altogether.
But
it pleased God who teaches His servants in another way
than man teaches, to
bless some of the cases of discipline with manifest
and undeniable blessing;
and from that hour a new light broke in upon my mind,
and I saw that if
preaching be an ordinance of Christ, so is church
discipline. I
now feel very deeply persuaded that both
are of God: both are Christs gift, and neither is to
be resigned without sin.
*
*
*
9
THE PERSONAL INDWELLING OF
THE HOLY SPIRIT
By G. H. LANG
A
Practical Inquiry
In the article Inquire of the Former Age
in The Disciple
for May 1953, PP. 18, 19, it was said:
It
is asserted
that every believer of this age is a member of the body
of Christ, because
incorporation into that body
is effected by the indwelling of the Spirit of God. Just as the
many members of the human body
are one living entity because the one spirit of the man
pervades the whole
organism, so
are the
members of the body of Christ made such by the
indwelling of the one Spirit.
Now
many assert strongly, as if it were beyond dispute the
plain teaching of
Scripture, that every regenerate person, simply by, the
fact of his new birth
by the Spirit, is automatically sealed, anointed, and
indwelled by the Spirit
of God. I
have not been able to
discover the source of this opinion, but as regards
those early teachers, it is
fact that leaders among them repudiated this notion.
In
On
the Sealing
with the Holy Spirit,
p. 18. p.
18, Darby speaks expressly as follows: that a person may be born again, and not have received the Holy Ghost, is perfectly certain according to
the Scriptures. He refers to the fact
that the first disciples
were born of God while Jesus was with them, for they
believed on Him, yet they did not receive the Spirit till the day of Pentecost. He cites also
Acts 8, the
believers at
In
Vol.10 of Things
New and Old (1867), P. 198, C.
H.
Macintosh
wrote, We consider that Acts
19: 1-7 does
most clearly
show that persons may be disciples
and believers, and yet not be
sealed with the Holy Ghost.
Arguing
at length to the
same effect, in The New
Testament Doctrine of The
Holy Spirit (1867),
PP. 161, 162, and contrasting the reception of the Holy
Spirit with belief and
repentance, William Kelly wrote very strongly:
It is a subsequent operation; it is an additional
separate blessing; it is a privilege founded upon
faith already actively
working in the heart.
So far is it
from being true that a man receives the gift of the
Holy Ghost the moment that
he believes, that it may well be doubted whether there
ever was such a case
since the world began. I do not mean to deny
that the gift of the Holy
Ghost may be practically on the same occasion, but
never in the same moment
...
It
is to be noted
that thus three of the very earliest students of these
subjects in those years
say so clearly the teaching of Scripture on this matter.
The
subject is of
importance partly because of the subordinate references
and arguments of those
who affirm that the [Holy]
Spirit indwells
every believer. They urge, for
example, that every believer on Christ must of necessity
be a member of His body,
the church, because, as they hold, His Spirit
personally indwells each; and that therefore every believer must necessarily
be raised in the first resurrection and share
the
kingdom and glory of Christ.
If the fact is as they affirm their conclusions
may seem justified; if
it is not so, their scheme loses vital support.
With so much at stake some contend very
strongly for their opinion.
In
the study of
Biblical topics, as of all subjects, it is needful to
observe first the facts
of a subject, and also to weigh the relative importance
given to each fact by
the Holy Spirit. It is fact that the figure body
is not the first figure employed to teach concerning the
Paul
used it first
when writing to the Corinthians (10:
17; 12: 12-27), but
already in the epistle he had used the figure house or sanctuary
(3:
16, 17; 6:
19).
Writing
to the Ephesians he again employs both figures (1: 22, 23;
2:
19-22; 5: 22, 23).
The Writer of Hebrews gives
larger place to the figure house (3: 1-6; 8:
2; 9: 10;
13: 11).
Peter also employs it (1 Pet. 2: 5):
but neither uses the figure body.
This
is true of John also, but he uses the figure of a building in several connections,
earthly and heavenly
(Rev.
3: 12; 7: 15;
11: 1,
2, 19; 15:
5-8;
21: 3.
The tabernacle
in this last passage expanding into the larger
building, the city).
When
this picture
of the house is examined with attention it is very
noticeable how much truth is
connected with it. (1) The Lord is the builder:
(2) God dwells in the
house: (3) therefore it is to be kept holy for His use:
(4) to defile it brings
judgment: and other important truths. These are not simply attached to the figure by the New Testament
writers by way of explaining the type, but can all be
learned from the Old
Testament histories*
of the houses of God.
[*
For example, the
history of Saul (first king of
This
renders
invalid the notion that doctrine cannot be learned
from types, but can only be
illustrated by them. Some
insist
strongly upon this, apparently because types yield
lessons that will not fit
their theories. Doctrine is drawn
directly from types. That
redemption from the penalty of sin requires atoning
blood can be seen in the
history of the passover
night in
Doctrinal
explanation
of types, as given in the New Testament, is of course
the standard
as to how to use types; but if the Spirit-taught mind
can see the meaning of
types nowhere explained: how otherwise should such types
be useful? Andrew
Jukes (Types of Genesis) points out that
the histories of the seven
chief persons given in Genesis are so narrated as to
form together a complete
consecutive picture of the development of every full
Christian course. Thus:
Adam
is
man fallen through sin.
Abel
is
fallen man redeemed by sacrifice.
Noah
is
that redeemed man now regenerate, having passed through
death into a new
life and world.
Abraham
is
this new man walking with God by faith.
Isaac
shows
him enjoying the general quietness of faith.
Jacob
is
the same man but now shown in the conflicts, failures,
and discipline of the
life of faith, which both develops defects and removes
them.
Joseph
teaches
the essential feature that the
path of faith leads through
suffering to glory.
This
outline is
manifestly accurate and instructive, and it is drawn
direct from the typical
histories by spiritual understanding, for nowhere in the
New Testament is the
sequence thus explained.
That there has
been a vast amount of fanciful and futile dealing with
types, calls for
soberness in their application, and for being guided by
the New Testament use
of types, but it does not lessen the propriety and value
of such use of them as
is here indicated. In the New Testament the
tabernacle and the temple are
as types of the dwelling of God by His Spirit in (a) a
local community of
believers (1 Cor. 3:
16, 17, ye are twice), and (b) in the
body of the. individual
believer (1 Cor. 6: 19,
your body,
the physical body, vv.
13, 15, 18).
The histories throw clear light upon
our immediate subject of whether the indwelling of the [Holy]
Spirit is
simultaneous with justification and the new birth.
The
Israelites in
Before
this
dwelling among them could come to pass much preparatory
work was required, with
much free-will dedication to God of their labour and
valuable possessions,
leading to the completion of a house for Him to
inhabit. All this was in
conformity with His word: Let them make me
a sanctuary,
that I may dwell among them (Ex. 25: 8).
A
whole year from their redemption passed before that
sanctuary was ready and the glory of Jehovah filled
the tabernacle (Ex. 40:
17, 34, 35),
and
After
some three
centuries the carnality of Israel brought about the
captivity of the symbol of
God's presence, the ark; its centre, Shiloh, was
destroyed (Jer. 7: 12-15),
and with the destruction of that centre God ceased to
have a dwelling place in
Israel and they ceased to be a house to Him. Yet
they remained His
people, called by His name.
Later
David
brought the ark to
This
typical
history teaches (a)
that the
indwelling of God may
not begin until some time
later than redemption and regeneration; (b) that the
condition on man's side for the indwelling is a
wholehearted devotion and
dedication to the Lord; and (c)
that pronounced
and
persistent wickedness by the people of God may cause
Him to withdraw His holy
presence, whereupon a church or an individual may
cease to be to Him a house.
But (d) this fallen state is remediable, yet only
upon
due repentance and renewed dedication of all to
God.
The
spiritual mind
could read these lessons in the Old Testament, and could
profit by them, even
did the New Testament not confirm them, but this it does
quite plainly.
1.
The
apostles and others of the days of our Lord on earth
were born of God and
received eternal life as soon as they believed on Jesus
as the Son of God (John 3: 14-18, 36;
5: 24; 10:
27-30).
Moreover the [Holy] Spirit who had wrought in
them wrought with them so
that they preached and also, wrought great signs; but
He did not
come upon them and dwell in them until Pentecost,
after the ascension of Christ. The
new birth, progressive
sanctification,
much service, can be effected by the [Holy] Spirit, using truth
imparted ab extra not necessarily ab intra, that is, acting
from without the person
and not as a Person dwelling within him.
This had been the
rule prior to Pentecost, as the Old Testament
shows. On the occasion of
His first meeting with the apostles after His
resurrection the Lord did not say
to them receive ye the
Holy Spirit
(John
20: 22).
He used the same
expression as when a good while earlier He had said how
much more shall your heavenly Father give
spirit holy (pneuma hagion) to them that ask Him (Luke
11: 13).
Not
the Person of
the Spirit of God was in view, but rather the
spiritual nourishment (bread,
fish, egg) which He imparts, by virtue of which a
new, a holy, spiritual life
animates and energizes the believer. If this had meant the personal indwelling of
the blessed [Holy]
Spirit, then for those who had asked and received
there would have been no need
of Pentecost, and the Lord would not still have told
them to wait for the descent
of the Spirit after some days.
2. Perhaps
seven years after the Pentecostal outpouring Saul of
Tarsus was
brought to acknowledge
Jesus as Lord by seeing His glory on the road to
Damascus, but
it was three
days later before he received the [Holy] Spirit (Acts
9: 5, 9, 17).
That interval was enough to preclude Paul from
entertaining the notion that
the indwelling of the [Holy] Spirit is always
simultaneous with conversion.
3. About
the
same time after Pentecost Philip was
used by the [Holy] Spirit to
bring to faith in Christ the inhabitants of the city of
4.
Twenty-four years after
Pentecost (A.D. 54)
Paul reached the city of
Now
had Paul held the
doctrine that every believer receives the [Holy] Spirit at conversion and faith
he never could have
raised the question he did. No one who so thinks
would ask that question,
but would rather say, Ye know
that ye did receive the
Spirit when ye believed!
But, as
noted above, Pauls own experience forbade this idea.
These
instances
establish that during the first generation after Christ
the [Holy] Spirit did
not at conversion automatically take up in every
believer His residence as a
Person. He could and He did do much in and for and by each
believer, but it was sometimes as a Person external
and not indwelling.
Attempt to break the force of
these instances, and to
deprive Christians of their value, by the theory that
the period in question
was only interim or
semi-Jewish, and the true
Christian age did not set in until Pauls imprisonment
in
The
main present
point being thus established it is now to be
acknowledged that the anointing
with the [Holy]
Spirit may
be granted by God on the
same occasion as one first accepts the testimony of
the gospel as to the Son of
God. This is shown by the
occurrence in the house of Cornelius
(Acts
10:
44;
11: 15- 17; 15: 7-9). Yet
in these passages the kindling in the heart of faith
in Christ and the gift of
the [Holy] Spirit are presented as
distinct events, the one
following the other.
There
is no
warrant for inserting in Acts
11: 17 the word when
and so
making Peter say that they received the [Holy] Spirit
at
the same time that they had first believed on Christ (God
gave unto them the like
gift its He did also unto us when we believed
on the Lord Jesus Christ).
The aorist participle piteusasin
simply states that the apostles had at some time
put faith on Jesus, but it
does not say that it was at the same time that God
gave to them the [Holy]
Spirit,
and the history shows that the two events were widely
separated. This
was noted above. Peters later account of
the events at
Another
type
displays this distinction. The public cleansing of
a leper pictures the
restoration of a backslidden child of God (Lev. 14.). Part of the ceremony
was that the priest was to
take of blood of atonement and put it upon the ear,
hand, and foot of the
person. Following
this he was to pour
oil into the palm of his left hand, with his finger to
put oil upon the blood,
and to pour the rest of the oil in his palm upon the
head of the person being
cleansed. Though all this took place upon the one
occasion, the two
applications were plainly consecutive not
simultaneous. The laying aside
of the vessel with the blood, the taking up of that with
the oil, the pouring
oil into his palm, all
required some interval
between the use first of the blood, afterward of the
oil. Now the oil
pointed to the atoning of the cleansed believer with
the Holy Spirit.
Some
dependent
features in the cases mentioned should be noted.
1.
It was a definite
transaction at a definite time. Plainly this was
so at Pentecost,
Eph. 1:
13.
The
A.V. after that
ye believed ye
were sealed
would support the contention that the believing and the
sealing were not
concurrent: but the
translation is not accurate and
over-emphasizes the point. The R.V.
having
also
believed ye were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise is better,
for though it amounts to the same thing, it
does
not unduly press the point that the sealing was
subsequent to the
believing. But the history of Acts 19 shows that the fact was so, for
it was (a) when
they heard
Pauls announcement about Jesus that they were (b) baptized
into
the name of the Lord Jesus,
and (c) when
Paul had laid hands upon
them the Holy Spirit came upon them (vv.
5,
6).
The
point of
importance to be noted here is the use of the aorist esphargistheete,
were
sealed,
indicating a known
event at a definite
time.
1
Cor. 12:
13. Here the A.V.
is definitely wrong and
misleading. By the rendering in one Spirit are we
all baptized into one body
the reader is almost compelled to think that the
statement applies to all believers at all times; and by
the last clause, we have been all made to
drink into one Spirit,
that false
impression is deepened; and by the perfect tense have been
it is implied that that universal experience is
continuous in the Christian circle.
The
fact is that
both baptized and drink
are again aorists,
which the R.V.
renders by we were all
baptized ... we were all made to
drink.
The all here is
explained in the verse itself to
mean
that Jews and Gentiles partook equally in the
privilege mentioned; it does not
assert that all believers everywhere in all times know
the experience.
As with the Ephesian believers so
with those at
From
the action of
Peter and John at
That
the
Corinthians had
in fact received the
baptism in the [Holy]
Spirit is
clear, not only from this statement in
12:
13, but
also from Pauls opening statement about them
that they were enriched,
confirmed and came
behind in no gift (1: 5-7).
Chapter
14 amplifies
this by showing that they spake
in tongues and prophesied.
Thus
these two
main scriptures do not
lay down general
statements as to all believers at all times, but
refer back to distinct and
known experiences of the persons addressed. On the
other hand, concerning
the grant of eternal life there are unqualified
statements, such as John
3:
36, the one believing
on the Son hath
eternal life, or v. 24, the
one hearing My word,
and believing
Him that sent Me, hath
eternal life.
No
statement in this general unrestricted form is made
in regard to the
anointing and indwelling of the Spirit of God. The statements are
historical, referring to known experiences of the
persons in view.
Rom. 8: 9. Difficulty is felt as
to the words But if any one hath not the
Spirit of Christ he is none of His.
The strict rendering is, But if any one has not spirit of
Christ, this one is not of
Him.
There is no article
before spirit. In the Preface to his
translation of the New
Testament J. N.
Darby says:
The
use:
of a large or small s is of extreme difficulty in the case of the word Spirit; not giving it when the Holy Spirit is simply spoken of
personally. There it is simple enough.
But as
dwelling in us, our state
by it, and the Holy Spirit itself, are so blended as
to make it then very
difficult; because it is spoken of as our state, and
then as the Holy
Ghost. If it be put large, we lose the first; if
small, the Spirit
personally.
In
a footnote to
this clause of the verse before us he adds:
Another instance of the
difficulty of putting a large or small s.
It
is clearly the state and characteristic of the
believer; but it is so by the
presence of the Spirit. See too verse 15.
The
absence of the
article in verse
8 and
9 is to be noted: and those in flesh
existing (ones) are not able to
please God. But ye are not in the flesh but in
spirit, if at least spirit
of God dwells in you.
But if any one has
not spirit of Christ, this one (houtos) is not of Him.
(1) in flesh or in spirit are the two possible
states of experience.
The former being
plainly impersonal, so will the latter be, and the
person of the [Holy] Spirit is not
in view. Neither state is the person himself, but
each a state in which
the person may be. And that only a believer is in
question is certain
from the fact that an unbeliever cannot be in
spirit
but
only in
flesh.
A Christian may
be in either.
See I
Cor. 3:
1, 3, where carnal
is the adjective of the
same noun flesh and equals fleshly.
(2) if at
least spirit of
God dwells in you.
If this be taken to
refer to the Spirit of God, it indicates the possibility
that the Spirit of God
may not personally indwell a believer, this being the
force of eiper
if at least.
Thus Hermann
in Grimms Lexicon: It is used of a thing which is
assumed to be, but whether
rightly or wrongly is left in doubt.
Therefore upon this place Moule
(Cambridge
Bible for Schools) writes:
The
Greek
particle is more than merely if (which often equals since
or as),
and suggests just such doubt and enquiry as would
amount
to self-examination.
So Alford. Doubt and
enquiry upon this point can
only arise
as to the regenerate, for in the case of one
unregenerate it is quite
certain
that the Spirit of God does not
dwell
in him, and the eiper would not
apply.
It
seems
preferable, and is certainly allowable, to take spirit here in the sense in which a son may be said to have the same gracious
or courageous or humble spirit as his father. Nor
does it sound quite
reverent for a man to speak of having or holding or
possessing the Divine
Spirit as a Person, as if He were an article one may
take or hold. Rather
is it He who owns and holds the believer in Whom
He dwells.
But
there is no objection to the idea of a man possessing
and being animated by
the same spirit as was seen in Christ.
(3) he is not of Him. The rendering none of His
is certainly, too wide.* In
my Firstfruits
and Harvest,
22 and 83-89, this genitive of Him
is
examined at length, including this passage, and it is
seen that the force is
that of being a member of an intimate and privileged
circle attached to a
sovereign, his entourage, as
distinct from the larger body
of his loyal subjects.
[*See
footnote]
In
the light of
the other places considered this will mean that
one not ruled by the
same spirit that animated Christ is not of that company,
which He owns as His
circle, His household. He
is not His circle,
His household. He
is not His (belongs
not to Him in the higher and blessed sense of being
united to Him as a member
of Him.) Alford
in loco.
Italics mine.
Thus
the statement
in Rom. 8: 9
cannot be
rightly extended to mean that the person in question is
unregenerate and lost;
and whether it be taken to refer to the blessed Spirit
as a Person, or to the
generating by Him in the believer of the same spirit
that animates Christ, in
neither case does it teach that the anointing and
indwelling of the Spirit
necessarily coincides with conversion and the new birth.
2.
The
experience of the baptism or anointing was known
consciously by the subject of
it. Yet
not
always with equal dramatic force or supernatural
signs. Not
all the baptized spoke with a tongue or healed the sick
or prophesied.
This is settled by 1
Cor.
12:
28-30, where
each of the series of questions requires a negative
answer. But each knew
that the event itself had taken place.
How
could it be
otherwise under the circumstances described? Could
the leper be healed,
washed, sprinkled, and anointed and not know it?
Could the glory of God
descend and fill tabernacle or temple and it not be
known? Can the living
God, the King of moral glory, enter and inhabit a house
and His royal advent be
unrecognized? Can one be immersed, or made to
drink,
or be copiously anointed with fragrant oil, and be
unaware of it?
Indirectly
the
matter is established by the argument in
Gal.
3.
The
question is whether righteousness is reckoned by God to
one who works for
salvation or to him who sets faith in Christ.
Pauls argument comes to
this:-
Let the
point be determined by one single consideration: Did you
receive the Spirit as
Gods response to works of law or to faith in the
message concerning
Christ? Now if they had not known at what time or
upon what ground they
had received the Spirit the question would have been
pointless, for they could
not have answered it and the argument must have been
without force.
The
foregoing
establishes that there may be subsequent to conversion
a definite and known
reception of the [Holy]
Spirit to
indwell the believer.
The question now arises whether such definite
and known experience is indispensable to the indwelling,
or whether this may
become fact without such conscious reception at a given
hour. Are
the instances cited from Acts the
necessary and only type, without which the anointing has
not been known?
Or does Scripture admit other proof of the indwelling
without the more striking
accompaniments?
1.
The
principal purpose of the baptism and anointing as stated
by the Lord was power
to witness for Him (John 15:
26, 27; Acts 1:
8). Therefore
if that power is working through a believer, so that
by his witness men are
convicted of sin and brought to faith in Christ, this
would argue that the
Spirit is upon him, as also if his ministry edifies
and sanctifies believers.
2.
The
discussion concerning the Spirit found in 1
Cor. 12-14. is
governed by the
words of ver. 7, ch.
12, the manifestation
of the Spirit is given.
What makes manifest the presence of the
Spirit? In ver.
3 it is the
confession of Jesus as
Lord. Of course this did not mean a mere verbal
acknowledgement of the
fact. To confess Jesus to be the Lord meant at
that time a public
renunciation of idol worship, an open repudiation of the
gods as being demons,
a withdrawal from the State religion with the dangers
involved. For Lord
was a title of the gods my
lord Jupiter.
The
confession
meant also a refusal of the claim of the Emperor to
receive worship, which was
the keystone to the State religion. For Lord
was an official title of the Emperor, as an embodiment
of some god my lord Agustus.
Therefore
to
declare that Jesus was the only Lord meant, as the law
construed it, both
blasphemy and treason, and was
legal
ground for imposing on Christians the death penalty.
The one who
was faithful enough and brave enough thus to risk
torture and death must
have received such inward
energy from the Holy Spirit Who
had energized Christ
to be the Faithful Witness.
3. In vv. 8-11
of ch. 12
nine signal
manifestations of the [Holy] Spirit
are detailed. The presence of any one, or
more, of these will certify the indwelling of the
Spirit. It has been a vast and hurtful mistake to take one of these (speaking
with tongues) as the indispensable
evidence
of the anointing.
Any other one
of these nine gifts is
equal proof, for no one of them could be produced
but by the Holy Spirit.
4.
Then (ver.
31) the
apostle says: a still more excellent way [of manifesting the Spirit] shew I unto you, and
there follows
the necessity for and superiority of Divine love so
perfectly described in ch.
13. When such love
dominates a child of God it is the highest of all
proofs that a spirit other than the human spirit fills
the believer, for only
by the Spirit of God is the love of God shed abroad in
the heart of man (Rom.
5:
5).
Those
who have
experienced the anointing later than conversion listen
with pain and pity to
the dogmatic assertion that this is not possible because
everything possible
was received at conversion and only needs
developing. I am among those
who are amazed at
positive assertions
upon an experience the dogmatist admits he has not had.
When the
denial is made with heat of spirit it is also made
evident that the speaker
much needs the very experience he reprobates. I
know the place and time
when I accepted pardon and peace in Christ. It was
in my eighth
year. I know the time and place when I accepted
the promise of God
concerning the anointing with the Spirit. It was
in my thirtieth
year. Why should my testimony on the one point be
accepted, and on the
other point be denied?
It
is dangerous to
tell the professor that he is regenerate when his
conduct belies it: it is
injurious to tell the regenerate that he has received
the [Holy] Spirit when
carnality or feebleness deny
it. Each is
encouraged to go on as he is, instead of the former
seeking life and the latter
life abundant.
But
many have no
knowledge of when and where they first received pardon
through Christ, but they
know they are forgiven: they cannot say definitely when
they were born again,
but they know they are alive unto God. In the same
way, it would seem, a
believer may not know of a precise hour
when the blessed [Holy]
Spirit took
up His abode in him, yet
character,
life,
and service may show His presence and power.
Sometimes this
proof begins at the very
hour of conversion, sometimes at a later and known
crisis, sometimes it is by
quiet and gradual growth.
Yet
even as there
are certain definite advantages from knowing the time of
ones conversion, so
there are from a conscious reception of the [Holy] Spirit. If one is in
doubt of salvation, let
him take no risks, but definitely accept Christ: if a
believer is in doubt as
to the anointing, sealing, and baptizing in the Spirit,
let him take hold of the promises [and ask God]
as to this distinct and advance experience.
For
the method of
reception is the same as for all heavenly bestowments:
God promises, man
accepts, God fulfils. The fulfilment may be
immediate, with signs or with
ecstasy of joy: it may not be so accompanied yet be
equally real and
effective. Even as the [Holy] Spirit
is
sovereign in the new birth, like the wind not subject
to the dictation of man (John 3:
8),
so is He sovereign
in the anointing and indwelling: He
divideth to each
one severally even as He will (1
Cor.
12: 11).
There is lack of submission and reverence when one
insists that he must have
this gift and not that as proof of the indwelling.
The
assumption is
not warranted that, because on three occasions the
baptism was accompanied by
speaking with tongues (Acts 2; 10; 19.), therefore it was so
accompanied in every other case
in the apostolic age. The assumption is not
warranted that because, in
the instances cited above, the anointing was known and
conscious therefore it
must always be so. Faith is always to rest assured
of the fulfilment of
the promise of God, but the circumstances must always be
left to His ordering.
Neither
is it
warranted nor needful that, because the first disciples
were told to tarry in
Jerusalem until the Spirit descended, therefore
believers now must hold tarrying
meetings: for then the Spirit had not been
given and was not available, whereas now He is here and
available, and it is
for faith to appropriate and rest, leaving to the Lord
the manner and signs of
the enduement. The law of reception of all things
promised is, According to your faith
be it unto you,
not according
to your tarrying, weeping, groaning, striving,
and emotion. God does not require to be
press-ganged into bestowing His
proffered benefits. If fond earthly parents know
how to give good gifts
unto their children, how much rather the Father Who out
of heaven will give
most readily every holy spiritual gift to them that ask
Him in faith (Luke
11: 13).
A
fine Egyptian
student in
Now,
I
continued, the
same Book speaks of another Divine Person having
come to the earth, the Holy
Spirit of God. You will not see Him, but
neither have you seen the Son of
God, but the Book says He came, and that He came for
certain definite
purposes. He did not come to atone for sin,
for the Son of God had completed
that work; but the Spirit is here to dwell in our
body and fill the soul with strength
to be holy.
This matter I explained sufficiently and then said: If you will accept the promises of the Book
regarding the Spirit of God as you have accepted
those concerning the Son of
God, the former will be fulfilled in your experience
as definitely as the
latter have been. He thought
quietly for a time and then
said: Yes,
that
meets my case,
and he
went away to prove the
reality.
It
has been
remarked above that twice in the history of
Four
centuries
later this terrible double event was used by Jeremiah to warn the
then people that
their sins would
bring a like recompense of reward and wrath: Go ye
now to My place which was in Shiloh, where I caused My
name to dwell at the
first, and see
what
I did to it for the wickedness of My people Israel (Jer. 7:
12; 26: 6).
Though wicked they are still
acknowledged by God as His
people. Ezekiel saw the fulfilment
of this warning (Ezek. 10:
18,
19; 11: 23).
Reluctantly, by stages, the presence of God withdrew from the temple,
and the city, and destruction followed.
It
were impossible,
inconceivable, that Philistines could have
destroyed the tabernacle or Chaldeans the temple so long as the God of glory was in residence. It is
equally inconceivable that Satan could have destroyed
the body of the
incestuous brother at Corinth, or other carnal
Christians there, so long as the
Spirit of God was in residence in them (1
Cor. 5: 5; 11: 30). Types
and histories agree to
teach a withdrawal of the [Holy]
Spirit
followed by the destruction deserved. Twice it is affirmed in the Epistles that covetousness is idolatry (Eph. 5: 5: Col. 3: 5).
Covetousness is simply
the longing to have more, whether much or little more
being immaterial to the
nature of the sin. It implies dissatisfaction with
the present ordering
of God. Shall this idolatry be less offensive to
the holy and loving
Father than that other form of idolatry that provoked
His anger against
Nor can it be questioned that upon many a once Spirit-energized life there stands the dread notice Ichabod,
the glory is departed (1
Sam. 4: 21). As with
an individual
Christian so with a
church. To the
Laodiceans
the Lord
speaks as from outside the house knocking
for
admission (Rev. 3: 20).
The
Ephesians were warned of impending destruction as a
church: I
come unto thee
(so that He was not then dwelling among them), and will move thy
lampstand out of its
place, except thou repent
(Rev.
2:
5).
Except thou repent:-
therefore restoration was possible as it was to
All these features are facts,
undeniable facts of both
Scripture and experience. Woe is unto him who refuses facts to save a
theory, such as a dispensational scheme concerning
the body and the resurrection of the dead.
That
comes true in theology which Huxley said of
scientific notions, that many a beautiful theory
has been killed by an ugly fact.
A
note of caution
must be sounded. The
anointing and indwelling of
the blessed [Holy] Spirit does not guarantee sudden perfection of
knowledge, character, or walk. It will lift the
believer on to a far
higher level of holiness and service, but nothing
diminishes the need and duty
to watch and pray. Peter was anointed in
The
holy Dove may be
grieved, the heavenly lamp may be quenched (1
Thess.
5: 20).
The disciple may be filled today and need to be filled again tomorrow (Acts
4: 31).
For each task
and each battle he must drink of the Brook in the way,
so as to press on with
head erect (Ps.
110: 7). It is only he who drinketh,
drinks repeatedly, of the Water of life that shall never
thirst, but find his
own being to become the well in which the heavenly Water
springs up perpetually
(John
4: 14).
In that same word to the Galations (ch.
3) Paul
shows this very clearly. In verse 2 he reminds them of
the past: received
ye the Spirit? In verse 5 he brings them down to the
present: He
therefore that supplieth to
you the Spirit and worketh signs, etc.
The
chief present
work of the Spirit of God is to glorify Christ, even as
the Lord said, "He shall glorify
Me"*
(John 16:
14).
Man glorifies himself, the Spirit glorifies Christ. Whoever, therefore,
desires the fulness of the [Holy] Spirit let him devote himself
unreservedly to the work the [Holy] Spirit is here to do, for then the
effective co-operation of the [Holy] Spirit is assured; that is, let him
dedicate his body, mind, and spirit, his whole
personality, to the single
all-inclusive end of living to the glory of Christ.
This
will carry with it the watchful use of time, the
thoughtful use of words, the
unrestricted dedication of all possessions, the
ordering of business, of home,
of children, the concentration of life entire to the
honour of the Son of God.
[* This being His
object He does not attract
prayer and worship to Himself dwelling in the believer,
but directs it to the
Father and the Son in heaven.]
If
this dedication
is deliberate and complete, so that the believer can use
honestly Pauls words For to me to live
is Christ (Phil. 1:
21), then
will the anointing, sealing, indwelling,
empowering of the [Holy] Spirit be the Fathers
response for the honour of the
Son is the governing principle of the Father (John 5: 22, 23).
This
unreserved dedication
of all unto God brings to perfection the dedication by
-------
FOOTNOTE
The
translation they that are
Christs is not an exact
rendering. The
Greek reads: then those of the Christ
(hoi tou Christou) in His Parousia,
and it is not a question of what these words may mean to
an English reader
to-day with his mind obsessed by a certain theory, but
what did they convey to
a Greek ear of the day when they were written.
In
the ideal and
possibility all who are in
Christ are of Christ,
but that it is possible to be a believer
on Him unto [eternal] salvation from hell [i.e., the
lake of fire] and not to be of that
privileged personal circle
which He will acknowledge before God, angels, and men as
His companions, is
plainly taught in the Word.
If I wash thee not,
thou [Peter, my believing devoted
follower until now] hast no
part with Me
not (in Me, that
would have forfeited all,
including [eternal] salvation; but with Me, which means that
unwashed thou canst not continue
in My company, My circle (John
13: 8). Again,
Thou hast a
few
names in
*
*
*
10
THE ABODE OF THE HOLY DEAD
The
statement
will probably come as a great surprise to the vast
majority of modern
Christians, even including the bulk of prophetical
students, that for
the first five centuries
after Christ the mediaeval and modern doctrine that
dead saints are in heaven
was unknown. But
such is the fact.
The
most ancient of all the Fathers,
says Dr. Pearson in his classic
work on the Creed, were
so
far from believing that the end of Christs descent into
Hades was to translate
the saints of old into heaven, that they thought them not to be in heaven yet, nor ever to be removed
from that place until the general resurrection: very
few (if any) for above
five hundred years after Christ did believe that
Christ delivered the saints
out of Hades.
While
this
antagonism of the first five centuries to the modern
view is not by itself
a sufficient disproof of the doctrine, it frees us at
once from any obligation
to defend it as a sacred deposit reaching us from the
Apostles, and puts us
instantly on our guard lest, in accepting it, we are
accepting an error of the
later fathers. The denial of the modern belief of the
first five centuries
after Christ is
a fact of the first
magnitude.
Now
there
is no question, our Lord Himself being our Instructor,
that in His
lifetime, as throughout all preceding ages, the saved dead were in
Hades; for all - as Solomon had
said (Eccles. 3: 20)
- go unto one place.
It is obvious that the Hades to which his
angelic escort carry Lazarus is not
heaven, since within its confines is this place of
torment
(Luke 16: 28).*
The two compartments of the abode of the
dead our Lord unveils more clearly than has ever been
done before or since:
Sheol, and Abaddon (or
Death); two places,
so that our Lord says - I hold the keys [in the plural] of
Death and of Hades
(Rev. 1: 18); and, ultimately,
Death and Hades, as
outworn prisons, are cast into the Lake of Fire (Rev. 20: 14), which in its turn is named Death, the eternal abode
of the wicked. Thus
we are on sure ground in stating, on
Christs authority, that within His
lifetime all
the saved dead
were in Hades. No MAN, He
says, at least up to the moment He
spoke the words, HATH ASCENDED INTO
HEAVEN
(John 3: 13).
Next,
we
find that our Lord Himself descended
into
Hades in His compassing all human experience.
Paul says:- He also descended into the lower parts of the earth
(Eph. 4: 10): who shall descend into THE ABYSS
- that is, to bring Christ up
from the dead?
(Rom. 10: 7). So therefore Peter at
Pentecost says:- David saith concerning
him,
Thou wilt
not leave my soul IN
HADES: David
spake of the resurrection of the Christ, that neither was
he left in Hades, nor did his
flesh see corruption
(Acts 2:
27, 31). The
Representative Mans descent into Hades
to fulfil all human experience proves that up to that
moment the descent was all
human experience still.
But
this
establishes a point crucial to the revelation of the intermediate state. The
Saviour
said on the cross to the dying malefactor, - This day shalt thou be with me IN PARADISE
(Luke 23: 43): the Paradise
of which He speaks must
therefore be a
section of Hades, for into Hades He went immediately
on dying: and this is put
beyond all challenge or doubt by our Lord Himself
saying to Mary in the garden,
three days later, I have not
yet ascended unto the Father (John 20: 17); that is, for
three days and three nights
He had been
below, in the Paradise
which is in the heart of the earth
(Matt. 12: 40).
This Paradise therefore - Paradise without an epithet - cannot
be
the Paradise on
high, which is described as the
So
therefore
in our Lords lifetime, and in our Lords own experience,
the holy
dead are in Hades; and
next, as a later stage, on the other
side of the Ascension - and this is
critical - we have once again the
solid utterance of inspiration that the
saved dead are in Hades still. For speaking ten days after
the Ascension, and so ten days after the current view
supposes that our Lord
had taken all the saved dead to heaven with Him, the
Apostle says:- David
is not ascended
into the heavens
(Acts 2: 34). His tomb, Peter says - his unbroken tomb - is with us, a proof positive (argues the Apostle) of a spirit - [i.e., disembodied soul,] - un-ascended into
heaven, un-risen, left
in Hades. Therefore
the
conception
that since the Ascension [of Christ] redeemed
souls
in dying wing their way up to the Throne of God is quite untrue. Thus the comfort
Jesus
gives to John thirty to forty years after
the Ascension, when the Apostle falls at His feet
as one dead, is - I hold the keys of Death and of Hades (Rev. 1: 18), Hades thus
being no more emptied than Abaddon,
but both being
now in the direct, personal custody and control of
Christ. For
our Lord has led captivity captive (Eph.
4: 8)
- He has enslaved the underworld, dying that he might
become Lord of both the
dead and
the living
(
Now
therefore
we are prepared for a
word of Christ
which covers the whole Church throughout the centuries
until His return.
Upon this rock, He says, I will build my church; and the gates
of HADES shall not prevail against it (Matt. 16: 18) - shall not
overpower, shall not master, the
holy
dead. Thus
towards the close of
His ministry our Lord said:-
I will build my
church, which was then,
therefore, non-existent;
and shortly after Pentecost
we read - great fear came upon
the whole church (Acts
5: 11), thus
mentioned as existing for the first time: therefore
between these two dates -
doubtless (as almost universally believed) at
Pentecost,
the Church was born.
Now
this is decisive. For
if our Saviour had
emptied Paradise at His Ascension ten days before
Pentecost, it could not have
been the Church that was removed, for the Church was
then non-existent; and it
follows that either the Church has never been in Hades
at all - which would
exactly negative our Lords words - or else, if the
saints are in heaven, a
later emptying has taken place of which Scripture knows
nothing. The
truth is obvious - the whole Church (with
the slender exception of the living rapt at the close of
the Age) experiences
Hades down twenty centuries until, the moral fetters of
sin having been broken,
in due time the massive gates roll back to let forth the
rising saints.
A
crucial fact finally crowns the evidence. Ten
centuries after
the First Resurrection,
and in the moment of
the final muster of the dead for judgement, from both departments of the underworld - and not from one only -
stream up the dual dead.
Death and Hades give up the
dead which are in THEM (Rev.
20: 13). The dead
issuing from Hades as distinct from
Death, or Abaddon, cannot
have died later than the
First Resurrection, for no righteous
die
in the Kingdom (Isa. 65: 20), and the
unrighteous, dying, go to Abaddon. Exactly in
accord with our Lords words:-
All
that are
in the graves shall come forth:
they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life;
and they that have
done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation (John
5: 28). Thus
what the entire Church held for the first five centuries
after Christ is
the truth; namely, that HADES HOLDS ALL THE DEAD UNTIL RESURRECTION - THE FIRST,
and then the final - has done its work, when Death and
Hades themselves - the
old prison-houses now useless in a deathless eternity were
cast
- literal localities,
for ever ceremonially unclean -
into the lake of fire (Rev. 20: 14).
Scanty
but
precious light is cast on our intermediate home - when
we shall be at home with the Lord (2 Cor. 5: 8).
To
me to live is Christ,
and to die
is gain:
to depart and be with Christ; for it is far
better
(Phil. 1: 22): far, far better, even than a life which is
Christ (Bishop
Moule).
Dying is hard, once
said an old saint, but
death is
delightful.
The revelation comes with great
force, for Paul alone of mankind had
been
in
-------
TEN FOOTNOTES
1. In the A.V. translation the reader is prevented from the study
of death and resurrection because of its indiscriminate
use of the word hell, which today is believed by the vast majority of believers to
mean the eternal state of the lost.
Sheol (the Hebrew
word,
is equivalent in meaning to the Greek word Hades) and Hades in the A.V. are rendered grave, pit, and hell. However, in any Greek/English Interlinear, or the Revised
Version (1881), the distinction is made.
This
is one
example, and a very important one, where the R.V. translation is superior to that of the A.V.
2. Hades is taken for the whole abode of the dead in the underworld
of Hades: for the rich man in Hades is said to have looked
up (i.e., from a lower region of Hades) and
saw Abraham far away,
(Luke 16: 23); so also Korahs
company went
down alive
into
[not Abaddon, but] Sheol (Num. 16: 30).
Hades is sometimes confined to the holy compartment, (Rev. 1: 18; Luke 16: 26, etc.).
3. Many
of the ancient fathers understood of the
descent into Hades, as placed in the lowest parts of the
earth; and this
exposition must be expressed so probable, that there can
be no argument to
disprove it. That the soul of
Christ was in Hades,
says Augustine, no
Christian can deny
(J.
Pearson, D.D.).
St.
Basil, commenting on Psalm 49: 15, - But
God will redeem my soul from the hand of Hades, for he shall receive me, - writes thus -
He
clearly
prophesies the descent of the Lord into Hades, who
will redeem the
prophets soul also together with those of his saints
from that place, so that
they shall not remain there. This can only happen at the time of resurrection, when body body
soul are reunited.
4. In 2 Corinthians chapter
twelve, verses two and four,
there is no indication of
any particular direction.
The Greek
reads:.. I
know not, God knows,
caught such a one to the
third heaven (verse
2). That he was caught into the
paradise and heard unspeakable
words
(verse
4). The
English translators have inserted the word up,
apparently on the assumption that the third heaven and
5. Every Scriptural truth is a death-blow to all error. Paradise (according to Scripture) is (at present) the intermediate home
of Gods people of all
dispensations
(Ages) between the Paradise (in
6. King Davids unbroken tomb, is not a positive proof that
his decomposed body
has not been
resurrected, for it is evident that the resurrection
body can pass through solid matter. Proof of the
latter is stated in the case of
our Lord, as recorded in John
20:
19.
Furthermore, it is not the spirit that ascends from Hades, but
the soul. There are
spirits in Hades, but they are
angelic creatures.
The spirits
in prison now in
the underworld, may possibly refer to the Nephilim, (Gen.
6: 2,
4).
7. The expression led
captivity
captive,
is one
used frequently to endeavour to disprove
that the disembodied souls
of the godly dead are no longer in Hades.
It is asserted that the words refer to the godly
dead who were (supposedly)
transferred from Hades into heaven at the time of the
resurrection of
Christ. But
in Judges
5: 12,
where we have the first mention of the expression,
refers to enemies,
not friends! This
is another instance
where a false doctrine is asserted by means of one
reading into a portion of
Scripture what is not stated in that Scripture.
We must always interpret Scripture by
Scripture, not by our personal
beliefs, which may be biased. If all (or any of)
the godly dead were
transferred out of Hades at the time of Christs
resurrection, then what is the
meaning of the numerous passages which teach the
contrary? Resurrection
is the reuniting of the soul and spirit to an immortal
body; and
according to the Word of God, this has
not yet taken place.
See (John
3:
13;
Rev. 6:
9-11, R.V.).
8. The assumption
that the souls issuing from Death and Hades embrace only
such as incur the
punishment of the Lake of Fire is
based
upon the false hypothesis that all believers rose from
the dead at the
beginning of the Millennial Kingdom (Lange).
The first resurrection is one of reward (Luke 20: 35; Phil.
3: 11; Heb.
11: 35), for the righteous dead,
(Luke 14: 14),
for those whose personal righteousness
exceeds that
of the Scribes and Pharisees (Matt. 5:
20). If all
regenerate believers rise in the first resurrection,
why would it be necessary to open and examine the Book of Life,
a
thousand years later? (Rev.
20: 11-15; 20: 4-6).
9. Where can I go
from your presence? If I go up to the
heavens, you are there.
If I make my bed in the depths (Hebrew, Sheol), YOU ARE THERE,
(Psalm 139: 8) The fundamental fact, so
constantly ignored, is that, until
resurrection, the body is unredeemed (Rom.
8: 23), (Panton).
For disembodied souls to enter into the Divine presence in heaven without
a resurrected,
immortal body, is for uncleanness to enter the Holy
of Holies: for death, (with
the Curse clinging to it), to enter into the
presence of Life. In the
Lords
trenchant words: GOD IS NOT THE GOD OF THE DEAD (Matt. 22:
32). By resurrection
ONLY can He prove Himself
the God of a Patriarch now
(Luke 16: 23) in Hades, (Panton).
10. The falling
into oblivion the
truth of Hades not
only dislodged
the doctrine of the
millennium - for who would wish to
descend from the supernal Glory
even to a millennial earth, after (in some cases)
thousands of years in the
immediate presence of Deity? - but even
more disastrously dislodged
the truth of the
resurrection, which, for spirits [i.e., disembodied souls] already in the full glory of God,
becomes as fantastic as it is unnecessary. (Govett).
*
*
*
11
[PART 1]
THE FIRST RESURRECTION
By D. M. PANTON
As
we
draw rapidly nearer to the breaking tombs, we are met by
a pregnant and most
arresting fact. A
select resurrection from the dead has already occurred.* For we
read:- The
earth did quake
- a shock
such as shall end the world, and dissolve the
earth and
the
rocks -
natures hardest adamant,
and the very foundations of the Holy City - were
rent; AND
THE
TOMBS WERE OPENED (Matt.
27: 51); -
as a consequence of the rending
earthquake, and in the very moment of the crucifixion,
to show that the saints
rising was the fruit of Christs dying.
The voice of the dying Son of God was heard in
the tombs, and they that
heard, lived: the loud death-cry like the shout before
the sepulchre of
Lazarus, penetrated the halls of Hades with the
life-shock of creative power.*
If the Lord Jesus emptied tombs in the very moment of
His dying, at the apex of His weakness, how much more
shall He liberate the
dead when He comes on the clouds of heaven, in the apex
of His power? Earthquakes
are the travail-pangs with which that
with which earth labours - the holy dead - are born
afresh (Is. 26: 19)
out of death; and it is immediately
after the enormous earthquake in Rev. 6:
12 - that
which our Saviour calls the beginning of birth-pangs
(Matt. 24: 8)
- that we find the countless multitude in the heavens (Rev.
7: 9).**
I will ransom them from the power of the grave (Hos. 13: 14)
-
and the moment the ransom had been paid, the graves
power snapped: the shock
that will shatter the world will only liberate the
redeemed.
[* As
Death
is to lie down, Resurrection is to stand up.
Was this resurrection unto immortality?
No! It
was
a resurrection likened to that of Lazarus
and the prophet Samuel:
Bring me up
Samuel. And Samuel,
said to Saul, Why hast thou
disquieted me, to bring me up?
And Samuel
said, Wherefore then dost thou ask of me, seeing the Lord is departed from thee, and is become thine adversary?
Moreover the Lord will deliver
* The
type lies in perhaps the most extraordinary
miracle ever wrought; for no sooner did the bones of
Elisha - so steeped are
even the bones of Gods
anointed in the
Holy Ghost -
touch the dead Moabite
than he sprang to life (2
Kings 13: 21);
the death of Gods Holy One is the
life of the
dead.
** Everything
which
shall yet occur in the fullest extent in the Parousia
was thus indicated
partially in Christs First Advent (Olshausen).
A First Resurrection
And
now,
we see an actual historical example of what is foretold
in prophecy as
still to come to pass - a
select
resurrection from among the dead.
And
MANY - not all saints: not only was
it a
resurrection in which there were no
wicked, but a resurrection from which the vast majority of
the saints (so far as we can judge) were absent
- bodies of the SAINTS
- the only place in the Gospels where the disciples are
called saints, because blessed and holy
(saintly) is
he that hath part in the first resurrection (Rev. 20:
6); and only
on distinguished saints,
and saints distinguished for their saintliness,
could the honour of ascending
with the Son of God be conferred.* Our Lord alone
is the solitary Sheaf (Lev. 23:
10), the first-begotten from the dead
(Col.
1: 18): so
that while the earthquake burst the graves, our Lords
flinging open the gates
of Hades as He came up liberated the souls of the dead. The graves
were unlocked by the crucifixion:
the occupants were summoned up after the resurrection.**
So we learn,
by a vivid example before our eyes, that all
resurrection is graded: the only
Holy One of God rises first and alone; after His
resurrection, these; after these,
resurrections yet to come:
until at last arrives (with no honour in it) the
resurrection of the wicked.*
For whilst the
Incarnation ensures the tomb-emptying of the whole of
mankind (1 Cor. 15:
21, 22), priority
in
blessing involves priority in issuing from the grave. Observe
the extraordinary emphasis laid
by the Holy Spirit on resurrection being physical. Not saints
that had fallen asleep were raised, but the BODIES
of
saints that had fallen asleep were raised: no phantoms, no ghosts, no unsubstantial visitants from
the spirit-world - such as Spiritualists
have daily contact with,
and are pressing upon us as if they were resurrections -
but the bodies which
had been laid in the tombs; the bodies that had died,
rose - thousands of years
(if Old Testament martyrs like Abel were among them)
after death. Miraculous
power will restore even as it
cures: and
his
flesh came again
- for in leprosy
the flesh disappears,
together with
whole limbs like
unto the
flesh
of a little child (2 Kings 5:
14) - sweet, sound, pure.
*
There must have been
some ground of selection;
and it will hardly
be contended that the carnal
among the dead saints were chosen.
All
emptied graves were refilled in the Old Testament, yet a
better resurrection
was known and sought.
Women received their
dead by a resurrection -
a
temporary
resuscitation
of the body:
and others were tortured, not
accepting their
deliverance; that - as a golden goal they
might obtain
- for it depended on
fidelity even under torture a
BETTER
resurrection (Heb.
11: 35).
Thus the First Resurrection was a
constant prize before the
eyes of Old Testament saints, so precious that they
were willing to undergo
torture to attain it.
** The
words after His
resurrection belong
to the whole sentence, not merely coming forth
(Alford).
[* NOTE. Always keep in mind: the
word wicked is also
descriptive of some regenerate
believers!
What business is it of
mine, says the inspired
apostle, to judge those OUTSIDE the church? Are
you
not to judge those INSIDE?
Expel the WICKED
man from among you: (1
Cor. 5:
12, 13);
Matt. 18:
32-35. The
Lord said to
Moses and Aaron: How long will this WICKED
community grumble against me: (Num.
14: 14: 27,
NIV.)]
Unnamed Saints
So
resurrections
still to occur will simply be a continuation of an
already
historic event. For
coming forth out of the tombs,
they entered into the
holy city - an exquisite forecast
of the flight of the risen
into
*
Since Scripture
holds no hint of any spiritual
change in Hades, there
is no ground to
suppose that saints already found unworthy to ascend
with Christ will, at the
next breaking of the tombs, suddenly be found worthy:
nevertheless, as
saints by calling if not by practise, ascending from
Hades as distinct from
Death (Rev.
26:
13) after the First
Resurrection (that Age)
is over, their names are revealed (Rev.
20:
15) in the Book of Life.
Rapt Saints
Suddenly
the
veil drops no word is uttered of the next step in their
history: they are
simply gone. It
is not credible that
they died again. For
it would have been
no true proof of our Lords resurrection, nor a true
sample of the First
Resurrection -
incorruptibility - had they died afresh*:
nor, as a matter of fact, were their bodies ever found
on earth as corpses,
like that of Lazarus: nor is there any record of God having buried them, as He buried Moses.
Moreover, all cases of mere resuscitation,
the temporary suspension of death, lived out their
restored life on earth, and
amongst men; and it is hardly conceivable - and there is
no adequate purpose
visible - that these should have died again, thirty or
forty days after, when
our Lord ascended.
Moreover, it was as saints they rose,
in
honour and glory; not as Lazarus, merely to show forth
the power of Christ:
they were Enochs, who was not, for God TOOK him
(Gen.
5: 24).
So, from where Elijah came for the
Transfiguration, thither doubtless these saints were
rapt; and the very
discussion of what became of them is an exact
reproduction of the search that
was made for Elijah by the sons of the prophets.
The
mystery that enshrouds them is the
mystery that is coming again. Augustine,
followed by a host of expositors, supposes that they
died again; Origen
and Jerome,
followed by a still greater
host, assert that they ascended with Christ to glory.**
Efforts have
also been made by various expositors to ascertain their
identity. Who
are these that fly as the doves to their windows?
(Isa. 60: 8)
asks the Jewish prophet, in amazed and questioning
wonder. We
hunt as vainly for their names or their
corpses as the band of searchers scoured the mountains
for Elijah. They
sent therefore fifty men;
and they sought three days,
but found (Elijah)
not; and Elisha said unto them, Did
I not say unto you, Go not? (2
Kings 2:
17). No human searcher
will ever find the man
whom God has rapt.
Enoch
was NOT FOUND, because GOD
translated him: for
before his translation he
hath had witness borne to him that he had been well pleasing unto God
(Heb.
11: 5).
*
If it had been a mortal life, it
would not have been a proof
of a perfect resurrection (CALVIN). Of those in
the First Resurrection our Lord
says:- They
that are accounted
worthy to attain to
that age, and the resurrection from the
dead - for that age and the resurrection from the
dead are synonymous terms: it is not the mere
act of rising, but the
permanent state of resurrection -
neither marry, nor are
given in marriage: FOR
NEITHER CAN THEY DIE ANY MORE
(Luke 20:
35). It
is those
only who [attain
to that age] inherit
the [Millennial] Kingdom
(1 Cor. 15:
50) of
whom Paul says that they rise incorruptible:
temporary resuscitations
for presentation at the
Bema, found in the Book of Life (Rev. 20:
15), are
ultimately raised to eternal bliss.
**The survival of Davids sepulchre unbroken (Acts
2: 29) goes
far to prove it an
exclusively [future]
Christian resurrection,
composed, of companions
of our Lord deceased.
A Reaping in Groups
Thus
it
has been established by actual historic fact that the
first resurrection is
not a general rising, but a reaping in batches or
groups, one of which has
already actually occurred.* Nature has its
own lovely little
parable. The
snowdrop is the first flower
to herald the rebirth of nature in spring; it breaks up
through the hard,
frozen ground, and it always comes up alone; only one
species is known, a bulb
which, falling asleep, awakes first, breaking up through
the ground before
winter
has left the earth;
drooping in perfected humility, it is clothed with an
inner cloak of green -
the colour of mercy; and it appears in a garment of
snowy white, with just the
touch of yellow in its antlers to hint the crown of
gold. Thou
hast a
few names
in
*
The
First Resurrection
is not one summary event, but is made up of various
resurrections and
translations, receiving its last additions somewhere
about the final overthrow
of the Beast and his armies (J.
A.
Seiss, D.D.)
** White
heads of snowdrops have already shown themselves upon
a grass bank in
Walking With Christ
Now
the
Holy Ghost definitely uses this thought for the First
Resurrection. For - says the
Apostle, picking up the thread of the newly baptized
walking the clean-washed
life; and now revealing the consequences of such
holiness of walk if we have become
fellow-plants
- seeds sown
together, germinating together, and organically grown
into one: if we have
become one and the same plant (Godet),
interlocked
until we interlace in the likeness of His death - its visible emblem or
picture, which is baptism we shall be - in the future
(fellow-plants) of
His resurrection
(Rom.
6: 5) -
companions with Christ in the resurrection of glory.* The good seed, these are the sons of
the kingdom (Matt. 13: 38); and as
the burying of a seed is
its planting, so we
were buried with Him - seeds planted in the same
seedbed - through
baptism
- the baptismal trench cut in the ground is the
seedbed into
death: THAT - to the intent that like as Christ was raised from the dead, so we also
(Rom. 6: 4). No farmer ever
buried a seed in order to get
a crop more surely than God buries His child with a view to resurrection. So
Paul
elsewhere shows that our body is a seed deliberately
planted to
grow
again; for
of the
resurrection to glory he says, - Thou sowest
a bare grain; and God
giveth to each seed a body of its own (1 Cor.
15: 37);
and so in the ritual grave the eye of faith sees not
only the burying of the bulb, but the springing of the
bloom.
*
The reference to the
resurrection of the
body is altogether authorised by v.
9. if we regard the
new life as continuing to the bodily
resurrection - therefore an ethical and physical resurrection (Lange). So
Tertullian,
Chrysostom,
etc.
The [Greek] word
occurs more than
forty times in the New Testament, and always in one
uniform and exclusive sense
- the coming up of the fallen body from the grave
(Seiss). So also Govett:- We
are already partakers in baptism of the likeness of Christs
resurrection: what we hope
for is the reality.
For now we reach the grand
ethical secret of select resurrection:-
Knowing this,
that our old man was crucified with Him, that - as the
great purpose of our
salvation the
body of sin might be destroyed (crippled, disabled), that
so
we should no longer be in bondage to sin:
such only are ACCOUNTED
WORTHY to attain
to that age, and THE RESURRECTION FROM THE
DEAD (Luke
21: 36). The Christian
ought
to live now as if already risen, his old man
steadily dying in
crucifixion; and if he so lives, earlier emergence from his tomb
will prove his earlier sanctity.
Yet the
rite of baptism,
while it alone can force no plant up through the frozen
ground, is of
enormous consequence.
For he
cannot be regarded as with
the saintliness of select resurrection who gives a
steady and long refusal to
the initial act of faith: if a man contend in the games, is not crowned, except he
have contended LAWFULLY
(2 Tim. 2: 5).* For blessed - each of the
seven beatitudes of the
Apocalypse embraces
only a selection of
believers - and HOLY is he** - not
the
redeemed corporately, enjoying a collective privilege
founded on grace, but an
individual attaining through personal holiness - THAT HATH
PART IN THE
FIRST RESURRECTION (Rev. 20: 6).***
Thus taught almost
the earliest sub-apostolic
Christian known to us, an actual disciple of the Apostle
John:- If we please Him in this
present Age, we shall receive also the Age to come;
and if we walk worthy of Him, we shall also reign together with Him (Polycarp).****
*
So (in the type) the
Red Sea had to be
crossed; and while Israel as a whole failed to enter the
Land, no
one
did enter except through baptism in the sea (1 Cor. 10: 2). So our Saviour
says:-
Except a man be born of WATER and the Spirit, he
cannot enter into the
** Not only happy, but holy; he is in
the highest degree worthy
of the name of Saint (H.
B. Swete, D.D.)
*** Holiness,
conformity
to the mind and will of God, is the condition of
this resurrection
beatitude.
The rewards of Christ are not mere external
things, but inward and
spiritual possessions.
Therefore to say
that we shall be content with the lowest place in
heaven may sound like
humility and Christian meekness; but it means being
content with less of likeness
to Christ, less of His Spirit, less of His love. The share
in the first resurrection is
according to these things; and how can we be content
with but little of
them? It
is not humility,
it is a wrong to Christ Himself, to be indifferent
to this reward.
Oh, then, seek, strive, pray for his holiness of heart and life, that
you may be of those blessed ones who
have part in the first resurrection!
(Pulpit
Commentary.)
**** Since Polycarp three views have prevailed on the Kings associated with
Christ in the Millennial Kingdom:- some
holding that
they are all the saints;
others that they are only the martyrs; others still,
that they are the
specially faithful, including the martyrs (Lange). The inspired
forecast (Rev.
20: 4)
certainly lays enormous emphasis
on the martyrs, who compose three out of the four
divisions of Thrones, and to
all the martyred our Lord assures the First Resurrection
(Matt.
16: 25):
nevertheless other passages, while confining
it to overcomers within the Church (Rev.
3: 21), and
the early rapt (Rev. 12:
5),
embrace - happily for us - more than martyrs (Luke
20: 35). In
a preliminary
period of the Kingdom of glory upon earth there will
be thrones and cities (Luke
19: 17, 19),
and, for a time
yet, first and last: to
be first rather than last -
to attain to the first
resurrection -
after this we ought all to strive.
There will indeed remain, in eternity, also the
less exalted members of
the one Body (Stier). Dr.
Swete, though no
Millenarian, also so understands John:-
The limitation of the First
Resurrection is to the martyrs, and (as a
second class) to those who have suffered reproach, boycotting, and
imprisonment without winning the martyrs crown. Also Lange:- The truly perfected Christians, the approved ones, with all the martyrs.
Select Resurrection
Our
Lords
own up-springing is wonderfully portrayed.
Defined
to be the Son of God by the power (according to the
Spirit of holiness) of the SELECT
RESURRECTION from among the dead
(Rom.
1: 4): AS
FIRST of the select
resurrection
from among the
dead He is about to announce light to the people (of
* Govetts
translation, which
reads
as one word. It
seems a just (if
startling) inference from Dan. 12:
2, that a
select resurrection of wicked souls will also antedate
their general rising -
certainly including Nero
(Rev.
13: 18),
and probably Judas (Rev. 13:
11) - as
firstfruits of the damned, stamped, by prior
resurrection, as ripe in
wickedness as the risen saints are mature in grace.
The Cost
We
now
arrive at the supreme passage on the select resurrection
from the
dead. All
that Paul once valued, he
says, he cast overboard as so much dead cargo; I do count them but dung:
and why? if by
any means
- if possible (Meyer):
if anyhow (Eadie)
I may attain
- the word attain
means to
arrive at the end of a journey unto the select resurrection from
among the dead (Phil.
3: 11); - that
is,
not the resurrection of the dead, but a resurrection out from among the dead, leaving the rest sleeping
in their graves.
The
rest of the dead lived not until the thousand years should be finished: this is
the FIRST resurrection (Rev. 20:
5). In the words
of Bishop
Ellicott:-
As the context suggests, the first resurrection; any reference here to a merely ethical resurrection
is wholly out of the question.*
That Paul is speaking of bodily resurrection is clear
from the closing verse of
this very chapter: we wait
for a
Saviour who shall fashion anew the body of our
humiliation,
that it may be conformed the body of
his glory. As Professor
T.
Croskery, D.D., puts
it:-
It is not
a
part in the general resurrection (for it is an
out-resurrection from among
the dead); it is not
spiritual
resurrection, for that was already past (in the
experience of the Apostle);
it is [to have]
part in the resurrection of just, the resurrection of life.
* The context forbids us to adopt the
notion that the noun
refers to spiritual or ethical resurrection (Eadie).
The Standard of Attainment
Never
was
Paul so anxious to impress uncertainty on the Church
piles phrase on phrase
implying extreme difficulty of achievement.
Not
that
I have already obtained the
standard
qualifying for the prize;*
the word obtain means to win a prize (as in 1 Cor. 9:
24):
or
am already made
perfect
- with the
maturity required for the reaping sickle of the first
resurrection: but I press on - in hot pursuit if so be that I may
apprehend
that for which also I was apprehended by Christ Jesus.
Brethren, I count
not myself yet to have apprehended. It is a statement crammed with deliberate uncertainty: if by any means
is used when
in end is proposed, but failure is presumed to be
possible (Alford);
the Apostle states not a positive assurance,
but a modest hope (Lightfoot);
the
idea of an
attempt is conveyed, which may or may not be successful
(Ellicott). So high was
Pauls inspired conception of the
standard [of personal righteousness]
required by God, that more than any in the
* Jus
ad resurrectionem beatam
(Grocius).
A Prize
Now Paul reveals the profound
yet simple truth
explaining the uncertainty: namely, that the
out-resurrection is not a gift in
grace, but a prize to be won by devotion and sanctity. The First Resurrection is a
reward for obedience rendered
after the acceptance of salvation, and Paul knew
not the standard which God had fixed in His own
purpose (G. H.
Pember).
Tertullian
tells us that the Church of
his age prayed for a share in the First Resurrection. For a gift and
a prize are worlds
asunder. Here
is the solution of words
of Paul which have puzzled thousands.* For obtaining
simple salvation [by
grace through faith alone] Paul has just stated that all
works he had jettisoned
for ever overboard, for Gods [eternal] salvation is sheer gift, the [imputed]
righteousness of
Another given in grace; but so far
from this truth producing carelessness in Paul, or the conviction
that [the regenerate believers] works after faith are of no account, either for
time or for eternity, by a counter-truth Pauls
master-passion is now revealed
as the attainment of the Select Resurrection as [the
gateway (Matt. 16:
18) leading into the millennial inheritance and] the
prize. I press on to seize the prize, to attain which
Christ seized me:
the prize consequent on the
faithful carrying out of that
summons which I received from God in heaven (Alford): it is Christs
wish that all [regenerate]
believers
should win the prize:
it is our
heavenward calling (Lightfoot),
for
God is invoking us all so to run that
we
shall break up with the first through the shattered
tombs. For
no prize is won except at the goal: the
runner who, at any point of the track, calculates that
he has out-distanced all
competitors; or gets out of the running-tracks; or
lingers to look back in
satisfaction at the ground covered; or runs with
anything but intense
concentration - loses the race.** Seest
thou,
says Chrysostom,
that even here they crown the
most honoured of the athletes,
not on the race-course below, but the King calls them
up and crowns them there?
God give us to cry with the saintly Fletcher
of
Madeley:- Oh,
that the thought,
the hope of millennial blessedness may animate me to perfect holiness
in the fear of God, that I may be accounted worthy
to escape the judgments which
will make way for that happy state of things, and that I may have part in the
first resurrection!
*
With
the right motive of
safeguarding our eternal security, numberless
commentators, confounding the
resurrections and oblivious of a peculiar resurrection
of reward, wrest the
plain grammar so as to force the passage to assert a
certainty which it is
Pauls whole aim to repudiate.
But [the Greek word (1)
], means resurrection simply; and [the
Greek word (2)
],
means OUT-resurrection. If in one place
the Spirit uses [the
Greek word (2)
],
and in every other [the
Greek word (1)
],
there must be a divinely perfect reason;
and he who refuses to recognise it does so at his own
peril (E.
W.
Bullinger. D.D.) Let
us suppose,
says Prof.
Moses
Stuart, a first resurrection to be appointed
as a special reward of
high attainments in Christian virtue, and all (in the passage) is plain and easy.
**
Of carnal believers
Hudson Taylor, than whom none did a vaster work for Christ in the
nineteenth century, and few (I imagine) walked closer to
God, says:- They
have forgotten
the warning of our Lord in Luke 21: 34-36, and hence are not accounted
worthy to escape: they have
not counted all
things but loss,
and hence do not
attain
unto that resurrection,
which Paul
felt he might miss.
We wish to place on
record our solemn conviction that not all
who are Christians will attain
to that resurrection, or thus meet the Lord in the
air.
The Best
Paul finally presents us
with
a priceless cluster of truths that shine out like stars. First, our
resolve: Let
us therefore, as many as be perfect (full grown, mature, as
distinct from the neophyte,
the newly planted, the newly born) be THUS minded: that is, of Pauls mind; not
doubting or denying
that there is such a prize; not foolishly scorning the
doctrine of reward;
not despairing of ourselves, or
ruling ourselves out as competitors; not absorbed in
discussion as to who shall
win the prize, or wondering how near, or how far, we
ourselves are; not
reposing on past victories and resting on past laurels,
or crushed and hopeless
over past failures: but making it the supreme effort of our lives to attain.
There
is a
difference between the perfect and the perfected: the
perfect are ready for the
race; the perfected are close upon the prize (Bengel). Concentration is the secret of power.
Now follows a golden promise. And if in anything (or
in any detail of this truth) ye
are
otherwise
minded - if you think that the prize
is for all believers
without effort; or that there is no prize; or that the
first resurrection is
not the prize; or that it is not worth a lifes
devotion; or that you have, by
effort, already secured it: even this
- the Apostle makes the enormous assumption of a single
eye for truth in us all
shall
God
reveal unto you:
the verb indicates an
immediate disclosing to the human
spirit by the Spirit of God (Lange).
To differ from Paul is manifestly to confess
oneself in error;
nevertheless, Paul says, walk with me so far as you can
see your path; where
you fail to agree with me, or with one another, ask God.
Paul
teaches, but
God enlightens (Chrysostom). This meets the
inevitable challenge all down
ages:- Paul, your doctrine of
the Prize will plunge
the Church into chaos, and sharply sunder the adults (if
they follow your
counsel) from the babes (who for the most part will
refuse it). This
is the answer. Seek
the best you know, and God will give
you a still better best: be perfect in
devotion, as a passionate
runner, and God is pledged to show us what is the hope
of our calling (Eph.
1: 18), the most golden ideal that
ever hovered before human
vision. Only
- and here we reach the
divine closing word -
there must be
no mutual excommunications:
whereunto
we have
already attained by that same rule
let us walk. The unity of
the Church lies not so much in
the mind, as in the heart: all who have received the
Gift are for ever within
the Fold, whether running for the Prize, or scorning it:
YE ARE ALL ONE IN CHRIST JESUS
(Gal. 3:
28).
Follow
light,
and do the right, for man can half control his doom,
Till
you find
the deathless angel seated in the vacant tomb.
*
*
*
[PART 2]
THE
FIRST
RESURRECTION
By J. A. SEISS, D.D.
There
is a general
impression that the belief in the First Resurrection at
a different time from
that of the general resurrection rests solely on Revelation 20: 6. But this is a
great mistake. Omitting
the passages from the Old Testament Scriptures,
sustained by the promises of
which the ancient worthies suffered and served God in
hope of a
better resurrection
(Heb.
11: 35), our Lord makes a distinction between the resurrection which some shall
be accounted worthy to obtain, and some not (Luke 20:
35).
*
*
*
[PART 3]
THE
FIRST
RESURRECTION
By MOSES STUART, D.D.
The
second
resurrection will be general,
universal
comprising both the righteous and the wicked; while the
first will comprehend, as the writers language
seems to intimate, only
saints and martyrs who have
been specially faithful unto death.
This distinction the writer has made prominent. He expressly
assures us that the other
dead would not
be raised when
the thousand years should commence, but only at the end
of the world when all
will be
raised. The express
contrast here made between the partial and the general
resurrection, and the
manner in which this contrast is presented, shew that
the design is not to
compare a spiritual with a physical
resurrection,
but
to contrast the
partial extent of the latter at the beginning of the
Millennium, with its
general or universal extent at the end of the world.
It
is asked, Whether all
true Christians, and indeed all truly
pious men of every age, who lived
before the commencement of the
Millennium will be raised from the dead at that
period, or whether the
Apocalypse affirms this only of Christian
martyrs? To this I answer briefly, that those who
are beheaded for the
testimony of Jesus,
are clearly
placed in high relief by the writer of the Apocalypse; but possibly he does not limit the promises merely to these.
He may mean to include all who amid
sufferings have
been
faithful and true to the doctrines and duties of a
divine religion, in times of
pressure.
We cannot well
doubt that he has specially
in view the persecuted Christians of his day; but
still may he be regarded as designating two classes of persons? Can he mean
to be understood as
confining his views only to literal and actual
martyrs? And
if faithful Christians in general are
described by his language, then what forbids that all
of these before the
Millennium who have cherished the same spirit as the
actual martyrs, served the
same God, and possessed the same sympathies in respect
to the prosperity and
welfare of the church, should be included in the
promises which he here holds
out?
Is there not a distinction made by John between those who have periled
their lives and suffered for their steadfast adherence
to religion, and those
who have been distinguished neither by active piety nor
by suffering? Who
will venture to answer with confident
assurance, that there is not? The special
object, in view of which the
Apocalypse was written, seems
to point us to the class
of martyrs and faithful confessors, as being the
only ones intended to be
included by the writer.
In
times of distressing and bloody persecution was the book
written. Christians
were to be consoled and
fortified so as to meet the shock.
Was it not to hold out high and
peculiar
rewards to those who endured to the end?
It is difficult not to think this
probable. And
what is the peculiar
reward of unshaken constancy and fidelity?
A part in the first resurrection.
This
is the natural and obvious solution of the case.
And
does not Paul
himself seem to say, that although he might possibly be
a Christian, and attain
to final happiness, yet he should lose a part in the first
resurrection,
if he should become slothful and remiss?
He tells us that he had suffered the loss of
all things, and counted
them but dung, that he might know Christ and the power
of His resurrection;
if by any means he might attain to the resurrection
of the dead (Phil.
3: 8-11). Did
Paul,
then, consider it a matter of doubt whether he should
have a part in the final
resurrection? This
same apostle, who
has so expressly taught us the resurrection of all, both
of the righteous and of the wicked - did he
doubt whether
he could attain to this same
resurrection? Surely
not. Consequently
his
declaration, then and only then, seems to possess a full
and energetic meaning,
when we view him as declaring that a high and holy and
vigorous contest with
the powers of darkness must be carried on, in order to
obtain a part in the first
resurrection. So interpreted, the meaning of the passage stands
out in bold relief.
All
this seems
rather to guide us to the conclusion that a distinction
will be made among
the pious themselves, at the first resurrection. This is only
carrying out the principle that
those who possess five talents and improve them diligently,
will be made rulers over five cities: and those who have
two, over only two
cities. Si quomodo
occurram ad resurrectionem, quae
est
ex mortuis.
If
St. Paul had been looking only to the general
resurrection, he need not have given himself any
trouble, or made any sacrifice
to attain to
that; for to it, all, even
Judas and Nero, must come; but
to
attain to the First
Resurrection he
had need
to press forward for the prize of that calling.
-------
Finished at last, the Race
is run,
Hoping for a Crown
with Christ to have won;
Angels now, will have escorted me.
When earths last songs have all been sung,
All labour ended, and all trials done;
Well meet again, O happy band,
Together
with our Lord in a
new land.
*
*
*
12
EXTRACTS FROM EMINENT AUTHORS
DOUBLE JURY OF SCHOLARS ON REV. 20:
5,
THE
FIRST
RESURRECTION.
The spiritualizing, allegorizing, and
idealizing, expositors seek
to evade the
doctrine of the pre-millennial Advent of Christ, by
teaching that the First
Resurrection Rev. 20:
5,
is not a literal Resurrection of the Body, but means
something else. In like
manner, they seek also to evade the fact that the sublime scene of the Diademed
Warrior on the White Horse, Rev.
19:
11-16, is
not that of the Second
Advent
itself, but means something else. Thus, the
literal
Resurrection denied here, the literal Second Advent is
denied also.
But if the First
Resurrection is literal here, it must be coincident with the literal
Second Coming of Christ.
That the First Resurrection
here announced
is
literal, the following testimony is adduced to prove.
It might have been multiplied to a volume:
1. Volck.
The
view of Dr. Keil
concerning the First Resurrection is contrary to the
Scriptures. The
First Resurrection is literal and
occurs at the end of the
present world-period, at the visible personal Advent
of Christ.
It is the same as that described by Paul, 1
Cor. 15: 22,
etc,
and 1 Thess. 4: 14, etc. After this* are
the
1000 years. Volck, Der, Chiliasmus,
111, 113.
[*
NOTE.
That
is,
when our Lord returns, (1
Thess.
4: 16);
never
before
that time, (Acts. 2: 34;
John 3: 13; 2 Tim.
3: 18; Rev. 6: 9-11,
etc.]
2. Rinck. As
to the Resurrection, it is two-fold; the
general resurrection at the
final judgment, and, previously
to that,
the First
Resurrection
of
Priests and Kings unto God, which finds place at
the Advent of Christ followed
by the 1000 years kingdom. Rinck. Zustand,
etc., 223.
3. Fuller.
That a literal
resurrection is here represented
is evident from v. 5, which
informs us that the Rest of the dead lived not till the 1000 years were finished. This First Resurrection is nothing new. It is
only
what Paul had already taught in 1 Cor. 15: 23,
and 1 Thess. 4:
16. Fuller. Offenb. Johan.
351.
4.
De Wette.
Pauls
Basilica
is here called the 1000 years Kingdom, and is placed between the Parousia and the absolute Telos or End, named [Page 466] in 1 Cor. 15: 24. There is no
contradiction between Paul and John,
but perfect harmony.
The End
in 1 Cor. 15:
24 is not the End of this Age, but of the 1000 years.
Exegetisch. Handbuch
on Rev. 20: 1-11.
5. Lammert. This
is the First Resurrection in the true and
proper sense of the word, as the preceding verse shows. What Paul in 1 Cor.
15: 23, calls the Resurrection of those who are
Christs, is here called the
First Resurrection.
The
Rest of the dead are not raised until the close
of the earthly kingdom.
Lammert. Offenb.
Johan, Rev.
20: 1-4.
6.
Bengel. The 1000 years
come in between Cap. 19: 11-21, and Cap. 20: 11-15.
He
must deny the perspicuity of the Scriptures, altogether,
who persists in
denying this, or seeks to refute it.
The
First Resurrection is a corporeal one. The
dead
became alive in that part in which they were dead or mortal, consequently in their
body. Bengel. Gnomon V,
P. 365.
7. Kliefoth.
The word Resurrection must here not be explained by the word lived, but the
latter, by the former which
is added by way of exposition.
So Ewald
and DeWette. It certainly
means a return to life
by a bodily resurrection.
It
is the same word as in Rev. 2: 8. In the same way
Christ
Himself says He lived again.
This much is certain, that the 1000 years begin with the Visible Advent of Christ. Here all
agree, Bengel, Ewald, DeWette,
Dusterdieck, Hofmann, Ebrard, Luthardt, Auberlen, etc.
Kliefoth. Offenb.
Johan. 267.
8. Christlieb.
This
is
the First Resurrection. See 1 Cor. 15: 23; John 5: 25-29; Rev. 20: 1-6.
In the succeeding resurrection, Rev. 20: 11-13, which introduces the great mundane catastrophe,
and new heaven and earth, the grand process of the
worlds renewal
has its fitting consummation.
Mod. Doubt,
452.
9.
Lange
. The
Spirit of Glory is the Resurrection-Germ
in the believer, Rom. 8: 2; 1 Pet. 4: 14. This
Resurrection-Seed
will become a Harvest in the First Resurrection, 1 Cor. 15: 23, which belongs to the beginning of the cosmical consummation. The End,
1
Cor. 15:
24,
is
the conclusion of the One Day
which
is
with the Lord as 1000 years.
10. Steffann. The
words they lived, can mean
nothing else than what is expressed in the explanatory
clause, This is the First Resurrection; the possession again of their bodily life in that glorification which
the resurrection brings with it, to the saints. It is what
Paul says in 1
Cor.
15: 23, occurring at the Parousia of Christ. Either this First
Resurrection is a bodily one, or
that of the Rest of the dead, Rev. 20: 11-15, is not a
bodily resurrection, and the Apocalypse shows no
resurrection of the dead at
the close of our age, or of the worlds history!
Whatever
they lived means in the one case, it
means in the other.
Steffann. Das Ende, 312.
11. Rothe. The
Apocalypse distinguishes a First and
Second [Page 467] Resurrection. The First, which ensues at
the same time with the Advent, Rev. 19: 11-21, is expressly
described as the First in Rev. 20: 4-6. In it, the martyrs, and those who have remained pure from contamination
of the world-power, have a share.
Only
these reign with Christ 1000 years, while the Rest of the dead awake not to life.
After the expiration of these years, and victory
over Satan let loose,
then the Rest of the dead arise for judgment.
Rothe‑
Dogmatik, Part 11, p. 77.
12. Gebhardt. This
resurrection is called the First, in distinction from
the general
resurrection of the dead to judgment, described in 20: 12, 13.
That the Seer means by it what Luke 14: 14 calls the resurrection of the just, and what Paul
speaks of as the resurrection [out]
from the dead,
Phil. 3: 11; 1 Cor. 15: 23; 1 Thess. 4: 16, in which is included the change of the living, there can be no
doubt. The remaining
dead, remain dead, during the 1000 years reign,
until the general resurrection,
the sleeping saints, or Christians live, i.e., rise from the dead, and are glorified with Christ.
Gebhardt. Doct.
of, Apoc.
280, 281.
13. Gresswell. This resurrection is
called the First, and opposed to it
is another, the
second. A portion of
the dead rise in that First,
the remainder in that Second.
The
subjects of these different resurrections, at two
different times, are opposed
as a part, of a certain whole to the remainder of that
whole. That
whole is the aggregate or complex of the
dead. On
every principle of division,
the parts must be numerically distinct, and each exclude
the other. Unless a part of
the dead do actually rise on the former occasion,
they must all
rise
on
the second. But
if they who rise on
the second include those who rise on the first, then one part includes the
other, and the remainder is equal to the whole!
These are absurdities we cannot avoid, except by
allowing, in the plain sense of the book itself, that
part of the dead do
actually rise on one and a former occasion, and the rest
on another and later;
which reconciles everything, and makes
what is otherwise a flat contradiction and impossible,
perfectly consistent and
possible. Gresswell
on the Parables I, 327.
14. Eliott.
The Resurrection
spoken of corresponds in every
case, to the Death out of
which it was a revival. So constant and stringent is
this rule that, in any
doubtfully expressed case of Resurrection, there needs
but to ascertain the nature
of the Death
revived from, to
find all explanation of the Resurrection conformable
thereto. In the present case
the Death is
that of those who had been beheaded for the
witnessing of Christ; a form of
expression which identifies them with those John had
seen on the 5th Seals
opening - a literal bodily Death. The expression, the Rest of the dead, absolutely and
necessarily connects this remainder
of the dead, later raised to
life, with the
other dead, just before said to
have been earlier
raised to life; as having been originally (i.e., Prior
to the abstraction of
the dead first [Page 468] taken) part
and parcel of the same community, of the dead.
The
Resurrection in both cases, therefore,
is a literal one of the body, the death having been
literal, the righteous dead, at the opening of the millennium, having, then
adjudged them an abundant entrance into Christs
kingdom; the wicked dead being
excluded from it prior to their other and final
judgment. Eliott Horce IV.
140.
15. Stuart.
They lived means they revived,
came to life, returned to a life like the former one, viz., a union of soul
and body.
So does the word
mean in Rev. 1: 8, and in many other passages.
Any other exegesis here would seem to be
incongruous. They lived must mean, here, reviving
or rising from the dead.
Thus the Saviour spoke of Himself in Rev. 2: 8 as being He who was dead and alive again. after
the death of the body.
Thus too, it is said of the Beast, Rev. 13: 14,
that had the deadly wound of the sword,
that he did live. Thus,
in our context, also, it is said, the rest of the
dead lived not until, etc.
The
point of
antithesis, which decided the whole case, is the
distinction of order,
or
succession, not of kind.
The
exigencies of the passage absolutely demand the sense of
a
bodily resurrection.
Indeed, if this be not
a position in the interpretation of Scripture, which is
fully and fairly made
out by philology, I should be at a loss to designate one
which is. Stuart
Apc. II,
360, 475, etc.,
etc.
16.
Alford. If,
in
a passage where two resurrections are mentioned, - where
certain souls
lived, at first, and the Rest of the dead
lived only at the end of a specified period, after that first, -
the First Resurrection may be understood to mean a spiritual rising
with
Christ, while the second means a rising from the grave,
then there is an
end of all significance in language, and Scripture is
wiped out as a definite
testimony to anything.
If
the First
Resurrection is spiritual,
then
so is the second, - which I suppose none will be hardy
enough to maintain.
But, if the second is literal, then so is the first,
which, in common
with the whole
primitive church, and many of the best modern
expositors, I do maintain, and
receive as an article of faith and hope. * * I have ventured to speak strongly, because my conviction is
strong, founded on the rules of fair and consistent
interpretation. It
is a strange sight, in these days, to see
expositors who are among the
first, in reverence of
antiquity, complacently casting aside the most cogent
instance of unanimity
which primitive antiquity presents. *
* I have again and again raised my earnest protest against
evading the plain sense of the words, and in the
midst of plain declarations of
facts. That
the Lord will come in person to this our earth;
that His risen elect will reign with Him here, and judge;
that, during that blessed reign the power of evil will
be bound, and the glorious prophecies of peace and
truth on earth find their accomplishment; this is my firm
persuasion, and not
mine alone, but
that of multitudes of Christs waiting people, as it was [Page469] that of His primitive
apostolic Church, before controversy blinded the
eyes of the fathers to the
light of prophecy.
Alford. N. T. Vol. II,
Part II, 335, 336, 1088,
1089.
17.
Starke.
The First
Resurrection is a literal resurrection of the body; for,
although John saw only
souls yet this was for
the reason that the souls which hitherto had been in a certain
degree
of heavenly joy [in Hades],
are now united with their bodies and are, by such
union to be transplanted into
still greater joy and glory. Moreover, he
does not say that the souls lived and reigned,
but speaks of the whole
person. They, who were beheaded,
and they
who
had not received the mark of the Beast, became
alive by union of the soul with the body, and reigned with Christ 1000 years.
That the word lived means they came
to life, is clearly seen from Rev. 2: 8, 13: 14, John 5: 25, Rom. 8: 13.
Again, it is not said Blessed and Holy is the soul that has part in the First Resurrection,
but speaks of the whole person, (He) consisting
of soul and body, which has
part therein. For,
if the
First Resurrection and Reigning with Christ were to be
understood of the soul
alone,
then
John
must have said, verse 5, the rest of the souls lived not again - which he does not. As,
moreover, he
here speaks of the whole person, so in like manner,
the rest of the dead
lived not again until the 1000 years were finished. Therefore, we
must explain the living and
reigning with Christ, verse 4, of the whole
person.
Starke. Vol. II
182.
18. Birks.
We
are
told in the plainest terms that there are two
resurrections which include all
the dead; - that there is an interval of more than 1000
years between them;
that all who rise in the first are blessed and holy;
that the martyrs of
earlier and later times have this privilege; and that every one whose
name is not found in the book of life appears and is judged in the second resurrection.
When part of the dead are raised
it is self-evident that the Rest of the dead remain [in Hades]
un-raised.
After the mention of those who live and reign
with Christ in the First Resurrection, we are told
that the Rest of the dead live not again till the 1000 years are finished. After this
negative statement, we naturally
look for tidings of their later resurrection, under
their own proper title, - the dead. We
find
it in the exact place, where it might have been
expected, from the order
of the prophecy. Four
marks are given
that the Millennium is begun, - (1) the Binding of
Satan; (2) the Cessation of His
deceits; (3) the Reign of the saints; (4) the Delay in
the Resurrection of the Rest of the dead.
Four events are revealed in the very same order,
to mark its close; (1) the Loosing
of Satan; (2) the Deceiving of the nations; (3) the
Compassing of the camp of
the saints; (4) the Appearance of the dead, small and great, before the Throne for judgment.
It is perfectly clear that this judgment
corresponds, by strict parallelism, to the previous
mention of the Rest of the dead [Page 470]
whose resurrection was delayed till the
1000 years were finished.
It
is the judgment of the unfaithful dead, alone, and follows the
Millennium.
Birks.
Unfulfilled Prophecy.
114, 174.
19. Mede. The
second death is
that
of bodies not less than of
souls, and, this conceded,
it is sufficiently evident that the First Resurrection is a corporeal one. Since
the
second Resurrection is a corporeal one, similarly so is
the First
as is proved by the adversative participle
but.
John says, he saw the souls of those who were struck with the axe for the witness of
Jesus, and for the word of God, and they lived and
reigned with Christ 1000
years. BUT the rest of the dead lived not
until the 1000 years were
finished. Who does not gather
at once from this that
both
Resurrections are of the
same
kind?
The
use of the adversative requires
this. And,
as to the souls, it is so well known
as to need no proof
that, in
the Scriptures
this word is used to denote not only Persons, but dead
bodies; cadavera,
Psal. 16: 1. Acts 2: 21. Ezek. 44: 25.
Levit. 19: 28. Apoc.
6: 9, etc. All the
righteous
shall rise in the Millennial Kingdom, yet
in a certain order, as the
Apostle tells us, 1
Cor. 15:
23;
the Martyrs first, indeed, and at the
beginning, Rev. 20: 4-6;
after that, the remaining righteous who
have not borne the mark of the Beast; some sooner, some
later, as shall seem
good to Christ the judge.
And this is
called the First Resurrection; in Luke 14: 14,
the Resurrection of
the just.
Then, 1000 years having passed away, the wicked
also shall rise, and, at
the same time, the last and universal judgment be
accomplished. Mede. Works. 572, 573.
20. Hebart. The Aorist tense of
the verb lived, indicates
one definite Act, a coming to life
again, and finds its explanation in the added words, This is Resurrection the First,
so that by reason of the contrasted and corresponding Act, verses 5 and 12, it can only be a
literal resurrection of
the body that is meant, and no other. It can be
understood here only in a
literal sense, the sense they lived again. If, by the Rest
of
the dead we understand Believers, who died either a natural or martyr death, the idea that
they should,
first
of
all, come to a blessed life only after
the 1000 years are expired, is
contrary
to Scripture.
If we understand Unbelievers,
the idea that these should come to a blessed life, after
the 1000 years, is equally contrary to Scripture. The same is
the case if we take both at the same time, either way.
It
is, therefore, incorrect to hold that the words This is
Resurrection the First indicate any other
resurrection than a
proper and literal one.
Hebart. Zweite
Zukunft. pp. 188, 194.
21. Van
Oosterzee.
The Scripture,
in the dim distance, opens up the prospect of more than
one resurrection; first a partial [or select]
one,
and
then an absolutely universal one. Of the former, not
only
does the Apocalypse
speak, Rev. 20: 4-6, but also the Lord, Luke 14:
14, [See
also, Luke 20:
35]
and Paul, 1 Thess, 4: 16, and [Page
471] 1 Cor.
15: 23, as compared with verse 26, without, however, its connection with and difference
from, the other one being
more nearly
indicated. Thus
much is evident that the
Gospel teaches a
resurrection
not only of the just but of the unjust also.
Van Oosterzee. Dogmatik II 786.
22. Gill.
It does not mean that
they lived spiritually,
for
so they did before, and whilst they
bore their testimony to Christ and against Antichrist,
previous to their death;
nor in their successors,
for
it would not be just and reasonable
that they should be beheaded
for their witness of
Christ and His word, and others
live
and reign in their stead.
Nor
is this to be understood of
their living in their souls, for so they live in
their separate state; the soul
never dies. But the
sense is they lived
again, as in verse 5,
-
they lived corporeally,
their souls
lived again in
their
bodies, their
bodies
being raised and reunited to their souls.
Their whole persons
lived;
and
this is called
the First
Resurrection in the next verse.
Dr.
John Gill, in ioca.
23.
Seiss.
My conviction
is clear and positive that the resurrection here spoken
of is the resurrection
of the saints from their graves,
in
the sense of the Nicene Creed, where it
is confessed, I
look for the
Resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to
come. The
placing of it as the first in a category of
two resurrections, the second
of
which is specifically stated to be the literal
rising again of such as were not
raised
in the first, fixes the sense to be
a literal resurrection of the body.
It
is a resurrection of saints only.
It
is a resurrection from
among
the
dead ones, necessarily eclectic,
raising
some and leaving others, and so interposing a difference as to
time, which distinguishes the resurrection of the some in advance
of the resurrection of the rest. The
First Resurrection is one that takes place in different
stages. It is a resurrection which,
as
a
whole, is nowhere
pictorially described.
Dr. Seiss. Lect.
on Apoc. Vol. III,, p.
316, etc.
24. Lechler.
That this
First Resurrection must be understood in the literal
sense is clear from the
context, v. 5, where the Rest of the Dead live not until the
1000 years are
expired. We should do great
violence to the words if, with Hengstenberg, we
interpreted the First
Resurrection figuratively, and understood by it, the
first step of a
blessedness and rest in the invisible world.
Independently of all other considerations, it
would remain inexplicable
why this Resurrection, v. 5,
must first begin with the beginning of
the 1000, years.
The
word lived has the same
sense, here, as in 2: 8, i.e. came to life, or as Bengel
says, returned to life. The passage teaches,
as Lucke,
Hofmann, Delitzsch, and others unanimously agree,
a resurrection of saints and martyrs
from bodily death to the full enjoyment of dominion
with Christ, during the
1000 years;
a condition pictured, purely and grandly, without
any carnal traits whatever.
Lechler. Apost.
Zeilalter. 203,
204.
*
*
*
13
DELITZSCH,
ORELLI, AND LISTER,
ON
EXALTED
1
DELITZSCH ON
ISA.
2: 2.
And
it shall come to
pass in the last days, that the
mountain of
the Lords house shall be established in the top
of the mountains, and shall be
exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow into
it: Isa.
2: 2,
A.V.).
-------
The
expression
the Last Days, i.e.
the End of the Days, Acharith Hayyamim,
which
does not occur anywhere else in
Isaiah, is always used in an eschatological sense. It never
refers to the course of history
immediately following the time being, but invariably
indicates the farthest
point
in the history of this
life; - the point that lies on the outermost limit of
the speakers
horizon. This
horizon was a very
fluctuating one. The history of prophecy is just the
history of the gradual
extension of this horizon, and of the filling up of the
intermediate
spaces. In
Jacobs blessing (Gen. 49) the Conquest of
Canaan stood in the foreground of the Acharith Hayyamim and the
perspective was regulated
accordingly. But,
here, in Isaiah, the Acharith contained no such mixing together of events belonging to the more
immediate and most distant future.
It
was, therefore, the Last Time, in its
most literal and purest sense, commencing with the
beginning of the New
Testament Age, and terminating at its close.
Compare Heb. 1:
1,
1
Pet. 1: 20. The
prophet here predicted that
the Mountain
which bore the temple of Jehovah, and therefore, was
already in
dignity,
the most exalted of all
mountains, would, one day, tower in actual height above all the high places of the land. The
basaltic mountains of Bashan which rose up in bold peaks
and columns might now
indeed look down with scorn and contempt upon the small
limestone hill which Jehovah
had chosen (Ps.
68: 16, 17),
but this was an incongruity which the Last
Days would
remove, by making
the outward correspond to the inward, the appearance to
the reality and
intrinsic worth. That this is the prophets meaning is
confirmed by Ezekiel 11: 2, where the Temple-Mountain stands
gigantic to the prophet, and also by Zechariah 14: 10,
where all
* So
Orelli, Drechsler,
Cheyne, Van Oosterzee, Caspari,
Riehm, Hitzig, Nagelsbach,
etc., etc., at the
head. -
N.
West.
2
ORELLI ON
ISAIAH 2: 2.
The question whether
Isa. 2:
2
is to be understood physically and topographically, so
that the territory
itself and its relations shall undergo a mighty
transformation, in order that
Zion, now encircled by mountains higher than itself, may
tower above them all,
- or, whether it is meant only in a spiritual sense - is
an idle one. The Seer actually saw
*
Orelli
Die alttest. Weisag.
287.
3
LISTER
ON
ISAIAH 2: 2.
In
this passage, as in others,
- Zech. 14: 3-5,
10; Jer. 31: 38-40; Joel 3: 18-21; Ezek. 47: 1-12;
Ps. 97: 5; Isa. 64: 3; Judges 5: 5; Exod.
19: 18; Ps. 114: 7; Isa. 64: 1;
Hagg. 2: 6; Heb. 12: 26, etc.,
there is nothing whatever to favour an allegorical interpretation, but
everything to support a literal one. The prophet looks forward
to
the Last Days and points to great changes to be wrought in the
The
passage
in Isa. 2: 2, is a case of Elevation.
In Zech.
14: 10 it is a case of both Elevation
and Depression. In Zech.
14: 4,
5,
it is a
case of what is called. Disruption, Fissure,
or Fault.
Without pretending to indicate the exact mode
by which the
It
is
clear, from a comparison of the Scripture passages, that
the event predicted
in Isa. 2: 2,
and Mic. 4: 1,
viz.,
the Elevation of Mount Zion, the
Temple-Mountain, is the same event
as that predicted in Zech.
14:
10. viz.,
the Depressions of the hills of Judah, and the
Elevation of
Jerusalem; and which Ezekiel
sees accomplished, Ezek.
40: 2; and with
which the transformations in Jer.
31: 38-40; Joel. 3:
17, 18, Ezek.
47: 1-12, are associated, viz., the
Temple-Waters streaming
through the Acacia-Vale, and emptying into the
Mediterranean and
[Page 450]
Against
such
liberties, we hold to the text, as it reads.
What we are told is that
*
*
*
14
THE 1000 YEARS IN THE
APOCALYPSE
BY
PROFESSOR
HEINRICH VON EWALD,
*
From Ewalds Jahan. Schrift.
or Johannean Writings, II, 321, etc,
The last 7 Visions of the
Apocalypse disclose to the eye
of the Seer an altogether new Outlook into the farther,
and then farthest,
future, which, endless as it is, must embrace events so
much transcending all
hitherto witnessed, that, just because of their
remoteness, they can only be
seen the more clearly when presented in mere outline. In this wide
future, the glance of the Seer
lingers with supreme satisfaction on the blessedness of
Two Great Ends yet to be realized in history, the
one at the Appearing of
Christ in His glory, the other, more
distant still, at
the Ultimate Consummation of all things. For
the
Seer, these Ends were, from the very beginning, the
most certain and
blessed. For
the purpose of filling up
the wide and far spaces of the future, Old Testament
prophecy offered itself to
his hand. And
just as the WHOLE
Messianic
End
divides itself into Three
Great
Ends of destruction and overthrow,
each
succeeding
greater than the one [Page 481]
receding, so
does the Whole
Messianic
Activity,
for
re-establishment
and glorification, divide itself into Three
ever
higher Degrees
of
advancement,
of which the Last
Two are
certainly
before us. It
is of the very first
importance to recognize this.
Indisputable
is
that most correct idea, viz., that the End
of every great
earthly Dispensation or Established
Condition of things, - when, by its ever-increasing
perversities and sins, its
destruction becomes a divine necessity, - brings, only
first of all, sad
disaster and ruin, and enduringly so, were it not that
the divine power of
recovery, mightier still, has ever exerted itself to
counteract the existing
condition, and restrain, for the time, the ultimate
consummation, hid in the
will of God. Along
with this truth, this
other truth is coincident, viz., that, in the slow
development of human things,
this divine power of recovery, the more violently it is
hemmed in, and
resisted, by the wickedness brought to oppose it, rouses
itself at times, the
more powerfully, making a New
Condition of
things necessary out of the midst of the ruins of
the Old, and by definite steps, - so that brief moments
are obliged to still
the long sighing of centuries, - yet such as let it be
seen how, even for all
the widest and farthest conceivable spaces in future
times, a progress
corresponding in ever-widening extension, and larger
degree, has already been
pledged, and revealed itself, even in the smaller and
more unimportant
relations of the past.* And thus it is,
that the One
Great Complex Movement is found in
the divine word, to separate itself into Three
Individual
Movements at
Each Epoch in
the
Great Development:
*
The Student of Modem
History will not
fail to see the working of these two great truths and
laws, in the Times of the
Reformation, the French Revolution, the American
Revolution, the Slavery times
in the United States, and now, once more in the
Temperance movement in
Christendom. We
battle our Way to the
End! N.
West.
(1.)
The Approaching End, with the dissolution of the previous Bad condition of things, though
coming through many intermediate movements.
(2.) The
Last and
Mightiest Struggle of Evil
to maintain
itself against the Better incoming
condition.
(3.)
The Complete Victory of
the New and the
Better, on the
ruins of the Old and Worse condition.
As,
moreover,
it is the Christian view and presentiment, in general,
so is it
especially that of our Seer, that Christ only can
create a
new world (or age) upon the ruins of the old, that He
has done it already, that
He will do it again, and in ever-widening extent and
degree, until the last
Consummation comes. And if we only
observe how, on a large scale,
all this moved onward before the eyes of the Seer, in
definite outline, in
reference as well to the past as the future, we shall
also see the whole
developing itself into Three
Great
Stages, according
to
what has been said.
At the
Dissolution and End of the Jewish Age or Old Covenant,
Christ came (First
Advent) in [Page 482] the restricted form of an earthly life and work, yet at the same time
awaking the New order
of things in imperishable germ, and even then,
by virtue of His life and death, judging the world; -
Nothing less than Christ
as the Crucified
One introduced the victory,
whereby He now rules, at
least invisibly,
in His
own. If now
this
first
New order of
things
is crushed, by means of the Roman power, and only Romes
overthrow can
introduce the next great End, then only can Christ as
the Glorified
One,
reappearing from heaven (Second Advent), and overcoming
the Antichristian Trinity of our time (Dragon, Beast,
False Prophet), erect
anew, upon the ruins, His visible
kingdom, and secure
for His people a higher
salvation.
Finally if even
this
second New order of
things,
wide and glorious, is dissolved, at length, again, by
the irruption of the
farthest and outside nations of the earth (Gog
and
Magog), so introducing the third
time,
another great
End, then must also the
re-establishment and glorification become, on this
point, the very greatest
possible, so that nothing else can follow but the absolute
perfection of all things.
This is that which now becomes the widest and
ultimate outlook of our
Seer; and thus it is that not only Dissolution but
judgment also, and a Regenesis,
step forth continually before his eyes, in
ever-widening circles, until, at last, all is attained
that lay hid in the
divine purpose and will.
Of
these
great Ends in the development of Christianity, only the
last two are
future; yea, already their possibility is conceivable
only after
In the application to his own
circle of hearers of the
new anticipations, the 1000 years
become, for
our Seer, the beautiful intermediate period, when, on
the wide field of the
Roman Empire, and on its final ruins, an earthly Kingdom
of Christ shall rise
and rule, with the restored earthly Jerusalem as its
central-seat, and where
under the strong protection of the returned and
Glorified Messiah it shall
begin, in narrower circumference, as a prelude, to the
universal and eternal
glorification of all things.
Readily
enough, to the eyes of the Seer, came
the
illustrations of this, from the Old Testament, running
to meet him. Of
a glorified earthly
the
Old Testament,
the discourse is most frequent.
Pre-eminent, herein, is Ezekiels
vision of the Resurrection of Israel.
As there, Israel
rises anew,
so only first, through the Messianic judgment and
Glorification, shall all [Page 484]
true
Christians, the dead as well as the living, and only
such, first be glorified
and gathered together, to reign
with Christ, and so fulfil this part of the Old
Testament Hope. From this it
also results how closely the Appearing
of
Christ in His glory, which here stands as the beginning
of all wider
glorification, connects itself, backward, with all that
went before it. This
development is only the complete
overcoming of the deepest spiritual devastation of
former times, the conclusive
judgment upon the whole former age, and strong grounding
of a Better Order of
things, victorious on the ruins of the past; - the
necessary complement,
therefore, of the overthrow of Romes power.
It cannot, consequently be the last End, nor
ground of the Consummation
itself; for
Apoc.
19: 1-10
is the Vision of Heavens joy which the impending
event - the final fulfilment of all the longing of Gods
servants both earthly
and heavenly, - calls forth, just before the event
itself steps up into visible
history on earth; - a high joy of redoubling Hallelujahs,
the Marriage-Supper of the Lamb announced as at
hand. Apoc. 19: 11-16, is the Vision of the Visible
Appearing of Christ,
revealing the all-conquering King of Kings, Himself
descending with His armies,
from the Opened
Heaven. He is
represented, now, not as a Lamb
(which would be incongruous) but as a Warrior on His
horse, Apoc. 19:
17
to 20:
15. Here enter -
in the briefest manner, - the
events and decisive issues of the most distant and
longest period of the
remaining development of divine human things.
If, from a higher necessity it results that a
two-fold judgment lies
before us, these two [Page 485] judgments, because of their great significance, become the proper
objects of the Seers beholding, at the two sides of the
great intermediate
period of the
1000 years
between these
judgments, and before the final Consummation.
Therefore, this whole section, 19: 17 - 20:
15,
falls,
like the previous corresponding one, into three parts,
viz.: (1) the Vision of
the First judgment and First Resurrection, and the 1000 years, 19:
17 - 20:
5;
(2) the Vision of the End of the 1000 years Kingdom,
Gog and Magog; - 20: 7-10;
(3) the Vision of the Universal Resurrection and
judgment, 20: 11-15. The Two Grand
Visions of the Consummation are
(a) the Vision of the Glorification, 21: 1-8;
and (b) the Vision of the New Jerusalem 21:
9
to 22: 5.
As
to
the Vision of the First judgment, First Resurrection,
and the 1000 years
kingdom, Satan is now bound, by an Angel who has the key
of the Abyss, and is
cast into the Abyss, - not yet into the Lake of Fire, 20:
10
-and carefully secured, as if under bar and bolt, that
he should deceive the
nations no more, as he had deceived the Roman world into
hostility against
Christianity. By
this banishment to the
Under-world there has happened to the Prince of Demons
just what formerly
happened to the individual demons themselves.
After the 1000 years are expired, however, he
shall, according to verse
2, be loosed for a brief period.
Such a privilege has even Satan, before God, and
the forelight of this
is found in Isa.
24: 22.
The three Visions, viz.: 19:
17, 18, 19:
19-21, 20:
1-3, taken together, form the
ground of the last
one. These
three accomplished, then
follows, 20: 4-6,
which,
according to Luke
14:
14, is
called the Resurrection of the just, or what our Seer, verse 5, calls the First
Resurrection,
set over in contrast with the yet more significant
second one, in verse
13.
That it is a
real judgment of God, in which the judges take their
seats, solemnly, is
already depicted in Dan. 7: 9. Moreover, who
these judges are, is
foreshadowed in Matt.
19: 28, and
from Apoc. 4:
l. The power of
these judges goes only to this
extent, to summon true Christians to the new life, and,
therefore, first of
all, (1) those who have been beheaded with the axe, - a
symbol referring to the
well-known Roman mode of capital punishment, as Paul had
experienced it, then
(2) so many as had, in no one of the ways described,
sworn allegiance to the Beast. What number
there shall be, of genuine Christians, actually living
on the earth, at the
time of these mightiest of all changes, is, in the
glowing haste of these
visions, not narrated, but we can clearly enough
conclude it from what has been
earlier said of John, in Apoc. 14:
1-5;
19:
14, 19.
The risen
saints, - caught
up to meet the Lord in the air,
according to Paul, just after the First Resurrection, 2 Thess. 2: 1,
1 Thess.
4: 17, appear
here as fellow comrades with Christ, against the
Antichristian host.
The condition of the glorified in the
The
prophecy
of the 1000 years carries us swiftly over from the first
Messianic
judgment to the Final judgment, without a full
description of the Millennial
Age which, in the purpose of the Seer, could only be
impossible. Satan
must yet be free, once more, because
the old creation still exists.
And,
because he finds no opportunity to practice his
favourite art among genuine
Christians, he turns himself to seduce the nations in
the four corners of the
earth, Gog and Magog,
dwelling outside the boundaries
of the Kingdom of which Jerusalem, made better, is the
middle point, and so he
leads them against the Beloved City. Rev.
20: 7-9.
Here, as Ezekiels
vision, in Chapter
37, had swept before the Seer, in reference to the First Resurrection, so
now Chapter
38 sweeps before
him in reference to Gog
and Magog, while the special reason for Gogs
march,
as given in Ezekiel, here falls away.
The march of Gogs
conglomerate hordes is the
sign that the time for the Last and General judgment has
now come; this final
assault upon the blameless City being the last and
highest abomination of
wickedness; the sign that that
End, which
brings eternal Victory over ever-increasing
evil, and the full consummation of all the glorified,
must now follow. Thus,
Satan is foiled at every step.
As the Crucifixion was, in the first of the
Three Great Circles of ever-widening Glorifications, that out
of which came Christ the Glorifier; and as secondly, the
assault of Antichrist
and the antichristian Roman World-Power upon Jerusalem
made better, is that, out
of
which comes the Glorification of all Christians around
the Glorified One, in
the Kingdom of the 1000 years; so, now, in the third
stage of development, Gogs
assault, the last and highest abomination of
wickedness, and Satanic enmity, is that
out of which
comes the final victory, and the last and
highest consummation of glory for the Glorifier and the
Glorified, in a Kingdom
that has no end. In
the first instance,
the assault went only against The One Man that He might
be put out of the way, and lo! He is glorified!
In the second instance, it goes against All
those inwardly glorified, and All who, like Him, shall
be glorified outwardly
and lo! both He, and They
that are His, are openly glorified together, and on the
earth!
And, now, - in the third instance, it goes
against this sure and great beginning of the Kingdom of
the Resurrection, in
order to make all the previous steps of progress in the
glorification amount to
nothing. Then,
must either ALL THINGS
be annihilated and return to Chaos; absolute, [Page
487] or ALL THINGS
must be glorified, and the longing after the Final
Consummation be completely
satisfied. The
result is not
doubtful. The
End, the Final End, has
come which
brings with it the
Final New Creation, the Final New Heaven and Earth,
and Final New Jerusalem, a
Glorified World, in which the Glorifier and the
Glorified reign to all
eternities, and the last outlook of all things is
Glory Everlasting.
-------
Soli Deo
Gloria.
FINIS